It was a late summer afternoon, and all of Wonderland's bright, warm foliage was astir. "Twister!", its inhabitants had all heard. The Tweedles closed all their windows. Alice, luckily, had never come at all. Even Caterpillar went home. And Hatter… he was hiding inside one of his cupboards.

This left one to wonder why Hare was running out his front door at such a time. The grey sky even seemed to be descending upon him, opening its mouth to flush its breath as harshly in his face as it could.

But he had to get to his poor babies!

He had left some of his new plants from the nursery out in their pots near the garden, and he knew that they would never survive a twister! So, one by one, he plucked them up and carried them inside.

Such a good mummy, he was! So selfless! So emboldened by love! Stronger than he may usually be, thanks to pure adrena- CLUNK!

Only several hours later, Rabbit was making his rounds on behalf of the Queen, to inquire as to everyone's safety. The pathways - all littered with fallen tree branches, tumbled woeberries, and wind-whipped trash - were quite hazardous for one on rollerblades, so he was eager to say he had finished the deed and head back to the palace before he broke his hip or something.

As he rounded the corner at 1602 Teapot Terrace, he found Hatter by himself, sitting in his host's chair with one foot up on the tea table and a cup already in his hands.

"I say, Hatter~... are you alright after that dastardly twister came through?" He queried as he rolled towards the gate and gave him a good look. He was as dapper, then, as he would have been had he not been hiding in a cupboard for several hours. The only difference was his suit was severely wrinkled, and he had a serious kink in his neck, which he squeezed with his free hand. He looked over to the bunny at his gate and said, quite dryly:

"I survived." Then he snapped out of it. "Wait a minute, IS HER MAJESTY OKAY?!" He tossed the cup over his shoulder and scuttled over to Rabbit, bearing his teeth in angst.

"A bit tipsy, but yessss," Rabbit answered. Hatter cocked his brow. "Well, we were down in the wine cellar~ for most of it, and she passed the time by having a sip… or three. Or ten."

"Sounds nice," Hatter mused, more to himself.

"It took the edge off, I can admit…"

"Yeah, I'm trying to get my edges off right now, too. Hey... you want a cuppa?" He danced back over to the table and rattled the teapot, which tempted Rabbit, but he was too much on a mission.

"No, I cahn't… the palace is a mess, and I've got to have it sorted before the Queen notices."

Hatter looked all around at the chaos surrounding them. "Understandable," he admitted. He got comfy in his chair again, just as Rabbit was about to head off. Very swiftly, however, the old bunny turned around.

"Oh! The Hare~... is he alright, too?"

Hatter opened his mouth nice and wide like he was ready to assure him how safe Hare was… until he realized: "Well, I dunno, I mean, I-, he probably is. I haven't seen him since yesterday. I'm fairly certain he would be! He knows how serious Wonderland twisters can be! He's no adrenaline junky! There's nothing he'd throw caution to the wind for! No pun-!"

"Right, right, yyyesss," Rabbit started talking over him. "Well can you check on him, just to be sure~~?"

"Oh yeah yeah, definitely, I'll get right on it. Of course, I would," Hatter insisted, now that he was second-guessing himself. Rabbit tilted his head, then nodded, then waved, then rolled out of sight in an uncoordinated, disoriented manner… leaving Hatter to dart his eyes around. Then he gulped down the rest of his tea and dashed off.

The Tweedles found the aftermath of a twister to be the most exhilarating time to play catch, apparently, because they were already out and about, chucking, ducking, and hollering, despite that Wonderland had turned sideways. It made the game challenging. "HATTER!" They spotted him, just as he was running out of steam.

"Oh, hey guysss!"

"Hey," Dee said all cooly, with the ball in between his hip and his elbow. Dum came running up next to him and gave Hatter an up and down. He seemed okay.

"You and Hare wanna play some Odd Ball?" He wondered. "Better yet, let's have a whole, reckless, post-twister Odd Ball club meeting. Huh? Huhhh?"

Dum's eyebrows did all his talkin' for him.

"Well, you'd have to ask him," Hatter admitted.

"Oh, you two weren't together this entire time?" Dee seemed mystified.

"Were we supposed to be?"

The Tweedles both shrugged.

"I gotta go," Hatter told them, suddenly all flushed.

Again, he dashed, all the way to the clearing where he would find Hare's peaceful little dwelling. His carrot patch and his flowers. All kinds of doodads, wind chimes, and watering cans strewn about, too.

This place really was a mess, just as one might expect. But what he was not expecting was for Hare himself to be huddled on the porch, with fluffy locks twice as wild, and eyes buggy. When he spotted Hatter, he stood up and almost knocked over the little table he was sitting at, just gawking at him.

"Hare?! What the fffffuck are you doing out here?" Hatter wondered out loud. Hare didn't appear to have an answer at first, as his partner approached him. Then his mouth slowly fell ajar, so he may say, cautiously:

"Betty Botter b-bought some... butter…"

"Huh?"

"But she said the butter's bitter! If I put it in my batter, it will make my batter bitter-"

"Hare."

"But a bit of better butter will make my batter better!"

"Where are your glasses?"

"So it was better Betty Botter bought a bit of better butter…" Hatter couldn't help himself from grabbing Hare by the shoulders and looking him deep in the eyes, though he was met with a timid, increasingly terrified gaze.

"What happened?!"

Hare's chest went up and down, up and down, as his frenzied heart beat within it, before he told Hatter breathily, "I saw Susie sitting in a shoeshine shop."