A grey light washed over him. With it, a grinding headache. The pain in his head was intense enough that a sick feeling settled abruptly in the pit of his stomach. The last thing he wanted to do was move.
He shied from the light and unconsciousness claimed him once more.
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Oh, the grey light again, but this time he felt stronger.
He assessed his situation. The headache was gone. A faint memory of it lingered, but the pain was gone. He seemed to be lying on his back, with his head and shoulders supported on something. It felt as though someone were stroking through his hair. A powerful memory tore at him.
"Such lovely hair you have, Adrian," his memory made a soft voice play in his mind. "Very like your father's."
His mother had said that to him. It was when he was very young and the unique color of his hair had earned him teasing from the children in the village. He'd run all the way home to his mother's arms where he knew that no matter what, he would be accepted. She had smiled gently as she settled his head and shoulders across her lap and stroked through his hair, listening to his grief, until he'd fallen asleep.
It was with gentle regret that he sealed the cherished memory away again.
The touch stroking through his hair went on, as it was not part of his memory. His mother was dead, who could it be? Bat? Fairy? Val? He struggled to recall how he could have wound up in a situation like this. He had found a good inn, wrangled with the innkeeper over the room he wanted, gone to sleep -- and wakened in Wonderland. Oh, yeah. Wonderland. Where he'd met the White Rabbit, the Cheshire Cat, the Tweedle brothers, the Mad Hatter, the Dormouse, the Duchess, the Queen and Death.
"OFF WITH HIS HEAD!" Val's command set to ringing ominously through his mind once more.
Well, his head seemed to be firmly attached now, though he seemed to recall there was a moment there when it hadn't been. Nearly everyone was there for that, so it could be anyone holding him now. Still, he didn't think that he was resting across Bat, Fairy or Val's lap, as each of them in her own way was rather slight and this person's lap seemed more substantial than that. D. D was there. No way -- D wouldn't, couldn't, be the one who was being so gentle -- could he? His eyes snapped open.
It was his father's eyes that met his. Dracula's eyes held a gentleness Alucard had never seen, and a spark of mischief that was regrettably familiar.
"You really should be more careful, m'boy. You scared everyone when you banged your head and knocked yourself silly!" Dracula remonstrated with mirth bubbling just under the surface of his voice.
Dracula stood, his sheer power being more than sufficient to lift Alucard as if Alucard were just the child he'd recalled being in his memory. Dracula tilted his head, assessing Alucard's appearance. His hands nearly fluttered as he twitched Alucard's Twilight Cloak straight to fall in the proper folds from his shoulders and set a lock of Alucard's hair into what he judged to be the proper place, just skimming along his cheek.
Alucard realized that they were no longer in the Queen's Courtyard. They weren't even in the clearing where his Wonderland adventure started. No, they were on the rocky hillside where he usually watched Castlevania sink into the ground for the next century after defeating his father as Castlevania's final boss. His apprehensive glance reassured him that Castlevania was still dormant.
Granted, everyone from "Wonderland" was here; Left Hand was attached to his brother's arm in his customary way; Demon and Sword floated nearby; Bat and Fairy stood next to D while they watched him and even Val was here, though she stood a little way off from everyone -- but no one was in a Wonderland costume. Everyone seemed rather grim as a matter of fact.
"I..."
Did it really happen? Did Alucard visit a twisted version of Wonderland or not? Had his head been lopped off by Death or not? What really happened? He wasn't typically given to flights of fantasy. Staring at the ground from which his father's evil castle would rise again, he tried to make sense of it all.
"Psst!"
"Psst!"
"Huh?" Left Hand replied, finally noticing that Sword was trying to get his attention.
"Rabbit ear!" Sword said urgently, before floating back, hoping that Alucard hadn't noticed. Alucard seemed lost in thought and oblivious to external things. Dracula glared at the parasite and nodded sharply once, before turning his head slightly, fixing his gaze to the right of Left Hand, and glaring again.
"Huh?" Left Hand repeated before realizing that one of his rabbit ears had poked out from under D's cloak. He pushed it back under hiding quickly, hoping that the Lord of All Vampires wasn't too angry at him.
Alucard's memory jumbled together as he tried to sort it out. His cloak was black and red, no, it was blue and white. He'd checked into an inn and fallen asleep in a bed, but wakened on the grass. Left Hand was a time-obsessed rabbit; Sword and Demon were circus-tent-clad twins; D and Ghost were roommates in a teapot; Bat was a magical unicorn; Fairy and Val were nobility and royalty respectively, but not-so-cordially hated each other's guts; his father was the monstrous lord of Castlevania, but he was also a sarcastic, smiling, vanishing cat...
One thought floated helpfully to the surface, a distinct memory from the book itself.
"Father, I had a most curious dream," Alucard stated, looking directly into Dracula's eyes. The statement, reminiscent of something Alice herself says in the Wonderland story, was a gauntlet of words he tossed down as a challenge to his father.
Dracula smiled at him sweetly. Alucard could read in Dracula's eyes that he was relieved, and touched, and very pleased with him. Alucard wondered that the realization that his father was pleased with him made him happy, given their never-ending cycle of conflict with each other whenever Castlevania rose.
Dracula's smile deepened, baring his fangs.
"Really?" he asked, fading away like the Cheshire Cat. The eerie fangy smile of Dracula hung in the air for a moment before it disappeared.
Stunned, Alucard turned toward D.
"Did he...?! What...?!" Alucard looked around at everyone wildly. "Help?"
"Father has a strange sense of humor," D noted.
Alucard's mind and memory swirled together unhelpfully again and he staggered. D's arms closed around him sturdily, steadying him and offering support.
"Father was rather put out that the eeD situation made it so you couldn't 'play' with him in Castlevania this time around," D began in a dry voice.
"'Play'?!" Alucard latched onto the word as he straightened. Seeing that Alucard didn't need the support any longer, D stepped back.
"That's what father said. And even though Death said that Dracula had recently had a chance to do something interesting with you..." D's voice trailed off, in case Alucard wanted to clarify.
He was amused to see the slightest blush creep across his brother's face.
"Uhm -- well, that is --" Alucard stammered.
"Death made a mini dungeon where he killed me so Alucard had to rescue me," Bat supplied helpfully. "And after that, Alucard and I discovered something fun we could do when I'm in this form."
"B-Bat!" Alucard protested. She grinned at him impishly and danced away to chat with Fairy again.
D smiled. "I wondered how it is she has a dhampir nature now. It's a good thing I'm not one to get jealous of all the attention Father is paying to you lately, Alucard," he teased.
"Oh, yes, such fun to have my head severed from my body!" Alucard retorted.
"Death wasn't allowed to take you," D sobered. "While you were recovering, Father told me he thought that would be the most likely way this adventure would end, so Death was not permitted to actually kill you."
"Could have fooled me," Alucard replied sourly. "How in the world did Father manage to set this up and get everyone's cooperation? Why on earth are you here doing this, D?"
"Father can be most -- persuasive when he wants to be. He invited, guilted or browbeat all of us into participating. He said that he wanted some 'quality time' with you since you had to miss Castlevania this rising."
Alucard stared at D while digesting that. He would never understand his father! Heck, he wondered if he'd ever understand D, and they shared the synergy.
"So -- " Alucard began in a teasing voice, "a tea party? Whose idea was it to make you the 'Mad Hatter'?" Alucard reached out and flicked the wide brim of D's concealing hat.
D looked him full in the face quite sourly for a very long minute before replying.
"Bite me." He turned to walk away with outraged dignity, but Alucard spied the smile playing about his brother's lips.
"Master Bat!" Alucard was glommed about his neck by his wife. "Oh, that was so much fun! Tell me, are there other children's stories we can use to play with your father? He's such an interesting person!"
Alucard nearly choked, not from his wife's slightly tight and completely ardent hold, but from the implications of her question. No! He barely survived Wonderland! Given his father's tastes, he'd hate to see what Dracula's favorite children's stories were!
"Dear heavens I hope not!" Fairy exclaimed as she flitted up. "Are you okay, Master Alucard?"
"I'm fine, Fairy. Did you have fun?"
"It was fun, guiding you to the Courtyard," Fairy admitted.
"What's going on between you and Val, Fairy?" Alucard asked, sensing an opening.
Fairy just looked at him. "Nothing you need to concern yourself with, Master Alucard. It won't hinder my performance as your familiar in the least," she promised. Alucard sensed that Fairy wanted the matter dropped. For the moment, he decided to comply.
The rest of Alucard's familiars drifted over, to make certain he was okay and check to make sure he wasn't mad at them for their participation. He grinned as he reassured them on both counts.
"Ghost! I'm not mad at you. Why are you being so loud all of a sudden?" Alucard demanded, as Ghost was clacking away at a furious rate.
"Oh, I should have told you," D realized. He walked over to face Alucard again.
"He's talking. I spent the time waiting for you to find the tea party teaching him Morse Code."
Alucard blinked at D. "Morse Code?"
D nodded. "An ancient form of non-verbal communication from my world. Each letter has a pattern of dashes and dots. Since Ghost can make two distinctive sounds, we designed a way for him to use Morse Code to 'speak'."
"Ghost can...?" Alucard blinked at his familiar as if seeing him for the first time. "He's -- intelligent? Oh, and he's a 'he'? Are you sure? I have learned to ask, you know." He touched Bat's arm by way of explanation.
D nodded again. "He's quite intelligent, and he's definitely male. His name, when he was alive, was Basil. Basil..." D paused. Alucard, if he didn't know his brother better, would have said it was a dramatic pause. "...Belmont."
"WHAT?!" Alucard exclaimed. At that he did look at his familiar with wondering, confused eyes. "What?!" he repeated again, a bit more softly. "But, that means.... Tell me, D. Tell me what you know!"
D laughed at him. "Not my story to tell. Allow me to teach you the patterns of letters for Morse Code and Ghost can tell you himself."
Alucard nodded. "Thank you, D. If you hadn't done this, I never would have known..." Alucard blinked up at him again. D shifted uncomfortably.
"Morse code has three states. A short sound, commonly called a dot, a longer sound, referred to as a dash, and no sound which is used between letters. 'A' is dot-dash, 'B' is dash-dot-dot-dot, 'C' is..."
Alucard grinned, letting D use teaching him the patterns as a way for his brother to gloss over an uncomfortable moment. He could see that his familiars were paying close attention too, though he knew they had some way to talk with Ghost in the familiar's dimension.
Ghost just floated there with his naturally impassive skull face and listened quietly. Alucard wondered what Ghost was thinking, and realized how grateful he was to his brother for discovering a way for him to talk to his familiar. The synergy had long since snapped into place between them, so he knew that he would remember the patterns, as D was not only saying them aloud, but also almost inputting them into his mind directly. He reached out and squeezed D's hand briefly, thanking him again for this gift. D smiled slightly, accepting the thanks this time, even as he went on to the next letter.
Val started to approach tentatively after the lesson was finished.
Bat jumped in her way, placed her arms on her hips and shouted at her.
"NO! You are not allowed near Master Alucard!" The rest of Alucard's familiars darted over to place themselves between Val and Alucard, unifying their intent with Bat's.
A tear slid down Val's cheek. "I never intended... I never meant..."
Alucard was in a very difficult spot. He knew that Val didn't mean him any harm, and that it was whatever feelings existed between her and Fairy that had created the frightening end to his Wonderland adventure. Yet, he couldn't dishonor his familiars, especially Fairy, to say so aloud.
Knowing that his familiars were facing Val and not able to see him, he smiled deliberately at her. Knowing also that she had gifts for perceiving subtle things, he tried to let her see that he understood, and that he bore her no ill-will at all for what had happened. Indeed, he was wondering what he could do to make things better between Val and Fairy.
Val's eyes still seemed a bit miserable to him, but he could see that she got his message. He nodded, and said aloud for the benefit of his familiars, "Perhaps it is time for us to go."
With that he realized that D had no way of traveling dimensions, as he did, to return home.
"How are you and Val going to get home?"
"I'm certain Father has something dramatic in mind, once you've left," D noted wearily.
Alucard nodded.
"Well, then, I have to leave first, huh?"
D nodded.
"Farewell, D. Thank you for..." Alucard stopped. Quite honestly, though he hated to admit it, it had been fun. He was a bit distressed by the bad feelings between Fairy and Val, but otherwise -- seeing D eating sweets he admitted he didn't like, watching Bat play at being the Unicorn, seeing Left Hand and Ghost play "dress-up" with silly animal ears, watching his father tease Demon and Sword, even the strange visits from the "Cheshire Cat"... Most of it had been fun. And the odd feeling, almost a glow, still within him that his father was pleased with him. It was disconcerting, given that he knew he would have to fight his father, as the lord of Castlevania, again, but for now, it was a nice feeling.
"It was weird and ended rather violently, but since my head is still attached and no one got hurt, the whole Wonderland event was -- fun. Father sure has one twisted way of showing affection, though."
"Indeed," D agreed.
"Farewell, D."
"Farewell, Alucard."
D watched as Alucard settled Bat in his arms and touched the amulet he used as a cloak pin to open the pathways between dimensions. Alucard faded in a way not entirely unlike how the "Cheshire Cat" faded. Once he'd faded completely away, Ghost, Demon, Sword and Fairy drifted upward, disappearing themselves, as they followed him.
"Farewell, Master D!" Fairy called out just as she disappeared.
D looked down from watching them leave to meet his father's eyes.
"Are you quite finished abusing children's classics, Father?"
Dracula waved a hand airily, almost arrogantly, whisking Val, D and Himself back to D's world.
"What do you think, m'boy?" he asked before grinning, disappearing and leaving his fanged smile hanging in the air for a moment before it too faded away.
"D," Left Hand shivered, "I'm frightened!"
"You should be," D replied. "We all should be."
- end -
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Author's Notes -
I have to admit I'm worried. I hope I didn't upset anyone with the many liberties I took with the characters from VHD, Castlevania and the character of Dracula Himself, or the fact that I rammed such an unlikely group into Lewis Carroll's beloved masterpiece, Alice in Wonderland.
Reviews, comments and constructive criticisms are always welcome! Please feel free to email me also if you see something awkward that needs to be clarified or fixed. I need all the help I can get!
stargarde (at) stargarde (dot) com