-40-
My life was reaching a level of absurdity that Lewis Carroll himself would be proud of.
"You've got to be kidding," I said to the guys.
No response.
"That's it." I turned toward the trap door. "We're going. Now."
"But the visions..." Aurick began.
I turned back to him. "You listen to me. All of you." I glared at each one of them, one by one. "We're going in there, no matter how many other visions any of you have on the way in there. Because I can't take this anymore. I would rather go in there and actually die then spend another minute out here with you all, doing nothing but worrying about what else could possibly go wrong once we get in there. There's no way to find out besides going in. All the philosophizing and analyzing in the world isn't going to beat the Queen. I have to. We have to. So let's go."
I'm not sure if it was my words that moved them, or if they just gave in to defeat, but either way, they followed me down underground and into the castle.
Which barely looked like a castle at all. It looked more like...
"Oh, my god," I whispered.
It was a cave. The cave. The one from my visions.
"What is this place?" I asked.
"Secret entrance to the castle," Nam began. "With all the concrete, and the lack of scenery out there, the castle would've been in some real danger... being the only visible landmark isn't exactly safe. So they... moved it."
"The castle?"
He nodded.
"Underground?"
"That's magic for you," he replied, looking around. "They picked a great place, too."
Zione made a noise of discontent. "Yeah. This place is like a freaking deathtrap. Bats and cats and..."
I laughed, despite myself.
"What?" Zione asked. "There really are bats and cats in here." He looked around, lowering his voice a bit, as if they might overhear and come looking for us. "Somewhere."
"Have any of you been in here before?" I asked.
Nam stopped. I waited for him to speak, but he said nothing.
"What is it?"
He looked around, as Zione had just done. "Where's Zale?"
I looked around as well. Sure enough, Zale was gone. Aurick too.
"What the..." I began, looking to Zione and Nam. "Where...?"
I took a couple of steps forward, and found myself looking over a giant cliff onto a deep, wide lake below. I had barely begun to enjoy the scenery when I noticed the absolute silence behind me.
Zione and Nam were gone as well.
Each and every one of the Villikins had left me. Had they chickened out? Was there something else they weren't telling me? Or...
Were they already goners?
"Zale? Zione? Nam?" I sighed in exasperation. "Losers."
I had no idea what to do next, or where to go. Then I remembered the map. Yes, it was a map of WoNDeRLaND, but maybe it had something, some kind of information I could use in my current predictament.
The map made a loud rustling noise as I unfolded it. Or so I thought, up until the noise continued after I had stopped messing with the map. Something was coming toward me.
I walked back a bit, away from the cliff, and paused, remembering something. I consulted the map. It wasn't there. And if it wasn't in WoNDeRLaND, that meant it must be in the Looking-Glass World. I had never been there myself, but I had heard the stories. And if my luck was going the way I knew it was, then there was only one place that the Queen could have chosen as her castle's lair.
"Here, kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty," I called out into the darkness. Call me crazy, but I just had to test my theory.
"Here, kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty."
I looked up to find Zale standing before me, his red hair a bit tousled.
"Zale."
"What are you doing?" he asked. He barely seemed awake.
I walked past him. "Here, kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty."
"ALiCE," he began, but the rest of his sentence was drowned out by the rumbling below us.
"You hear that?" I asked excitedly.
"Yes. Do you hear that? Do you know that is?"
"Here, kitty, kitty, kitty, kitty."
"Stop saying that!" Zale yelled frantically. "That thing is not a cat!"
"I know," I whispered as the rumbling grew louder. "But if it thinks I have one, it'll come."