Alice woke up to a brightly lit forest. She couldn't see the sun but she assumed it was high in the sky from how bright the fortress was. She slowly sat up in bed and noticed the space next to her was empty. She gently touched the place next to her where Hatter had been and the blankets were cold. Her worries that were quick to strain at her heart and tighten the back of her throat were immediately washed away when she heard the sound of Hatter's voice a little ways off.

"I got that water! It's right there by the wash bin, like you asked me to do!" Hatter was shouting at Charlie over the cold fire pit. She smiled to herself at looked at her two boys and slowly got out of bed and approached them.

"I asked you to get two buckets of water, Harbinger. One for drinking water and one for washing up." Charlie replied in his usual superior manner than angered Hatter.

"All you said was go get water from the stream and pointed the way."

"I told you to get two buckets, and all I see here is one."

"How am I supposed to get two buckets of water when you only have one bucket!"

Just then Charlie noticed her standing there watching them and straightened himself up and bowed. Hatter stood there for a moment in confusion before turning around. "Good morning sunshine." Hatter said smiling brightly at her, all of his anger gone in an instant.

"Morning." She replied with a wide smile and a slight laugh at seeing how excited he was to see her.

"Although it's not really morning anymore. Its nearly mid day."

"I really slept all morning?"

"Yeah, I didn't want to wake you. I thought you needed your sleep."

"Yeah… I guess I didn't realize how tired I was."

"Well, you had been up for about two days, and gotten captured, twice."

"Hey, don't make fun of me." She said nudging I'm playfully as she passed him on the way to the bucket of water him and Charlie had been arguing about.

"I didn't say anything," he said defending himself as she bent down to the bucket and put her hands in the cool water and splashed some on her face. The water felt so good against her skin and helped to wake her up.

"So what was for breakfast?" She asked wondering what she missed for this was the first morning she was in the camp yet she had still managed to miss breakfast.

"Eggs and potatoes. We saved you some, if you're hungry."

"Yeah, that sounds really good actually."

"Great."

"I'll get the fire started," Charlie interjected.

"I'll help." Hatter said.

It was hard for her not to laugh while the boys made her breakfast for while they were trying to help each other they always managed to hinder more than they actually helped. Hatter tried his best to help start the fire but he didn't exactly know how to work Charlie's inventions. Hatter took over cooking the food but just as Hatter tried to help him with starting the fire Charlie tried to help with preparing the food even though there was only one frying pan and obviously too many cooks in the kitchen.

When she finally got her breakfast she ate one egg that was meant to be sunny side up and a few thin slices of potatoes that were baked with the eggs so they were like really thick chips now, but she supposed they were in place of toast because Charlie apparently didn't know how to make bread.

"So," Hatter said trying to make idle conversation while she ate. "What all happened at the Hospital of Dreams yesterday. You never told me what all happened."

Alice then proceeded to tell them the whole story while she ate, from Caterpillar to what they did for their patients, then all about her dad up until they were ambushed. She decided to leave out all the parts about Jack using her because Hatter already knew all about that and she didn't think Charlie wanted to hear all about her relationship problems.

"And he just disappeared?" asked Hatter looking very confused.

"Yeah…" She said setting her plate down now that she was done eating, "he ate this weird mushroom looking thing and then, poof. Up in a cloud of smoke." Hatter furrowed his brows as if he didn't quite believe it but he believed her so he was at a fork in the road and didn't know which way to go. "Where do you think he went?"

"I have no idea. I've heard stories about him before, mostly rumors, about him being, rather odd, but nothing about him being able to disappear."

"What about you Charlie?" She asked since he had been keeping quite for so long. "Know of any mushrooms that make people disappeared?"

"Certainly not." Of course. "But I do know there used to be a type of mushroom a long time ago that used to make people grow as tall as the tree tops and others as small as mice."

"Sure there was," Hatter said sarcastically getting up and picking up her dish to clear it away.

"Really that sounds amazing." She told Charlie.

"I never saw it happen myself of course but there were all these stories when I was a lad, but they kept all those mushrooms locked up, for they were very dangerous you know. Didn't want your dog ending up bigger than you were." Hatter stood behind Charlie and mimed crazy gestures and pointed at Charlie. She ignored him.

"Yes, that would be really frightening. Are there any other magic stories from back then?" Hatter sighed and shook his head and sat down on the log behind himself.

"Nearly everything had magic in it in the old days. This forest itself was once magical." Hatter snorted.

"What happened?"

"When our queen left it seemed she took all the magic with her, for magic can't exist where people don't believe in it, and The Queen of Hearts didn't want people to believe." Hatter laughed slightly and Charlie turned to him. "It's people like you, Harbinger, that killed this forest."

"This forest isn't dead. If I'm not mistaken I see trees everywhere."

"You didn't see the forest in its prime. It used to be filled with wondrous creatures you had to see to believe and the Queen kept the dark creatures like the Jabberwock and the Boraova at bay but when she went away the smaller more marvelous creatures didn't have a chance and they were gobbled up by the Whangdoodles."

"Poppycock, and there is no such thing as a Whangdoodle. No one has ever even seen one. It's made up."

"Just because their invisible doesn't mean they don't exist." Charlie said matter o factly and Hatter threw his hands up in defeat realizing there was no use arguing with a crazy stubborn old man. Charlie didn't say anything else and began whittling a piece of wood and Hatter stood up.

"Alice, can I talk to you, you know, in private." Hatter said motioning with his head away from camp.

"Yeah, sure." She said getting up and following him out of camp. She wondered what he needed to talk to her about that he couldn't in front of Charlie, which kind of worried her. She had fallen for yet another guy but she didn't think she could stand if the floor fell out from underneath of her yet again. She didn't want to be alone anymore, and Hatter meant more to her than all the others. She didn't want to think about what she would do without him.

He walked until he thought they were far enough out of camp before he turned to her and immediately pulled her into a kiss. He kissed her sweetly and deeply while holding her in his arms. The kiss didn't last long before he pulled away and smiled at her. "I've been wanting to do that all morning. I've been thinking about you." So that's what this was all about. Thank God. She didn't know why she was so quick to doubt him all the time from this morning when the bed next her was empty to just now. He had promised he wasn't going to leave her, and she believed him, she just wished she didn't have these moments of doubt. Every other guy she'd ever been with had always proved untrustworthy eventually, even Jack whom she thought she loved more than the rest of them turned out to be the biggest heartbreak so far. She wanted to give her heart to Hatter. He seemed to promise a better greater love than she ever thought she could feel but that also frightened her because the more she loved someone the more she seemed to get hurt by them.

So she decided not to think about it, at least for the moment, and just see how things went. Besides they hadn't actually talked about any of those big important words like relationship, commitment, or especially love. She knew all those words were brooding between them but they hadn't acknowledged them yet so she was fine pretending they didn't exist. They also had more important things to worry about that their relationship at the moment.

"What are we going to do Hatter?" She asked and he frowned at her because this defiantly wasn't the response he was looking for. "Now that I lost the ring, what's the plan?"

He sighed and his brow furrowed as he thought. "I really don't know, Alice. Nearly all of our options have been exhausted. The resistance is useless to us now that you've lost the ring, and Dodo still wants to kill me and who knows what happened to Caterpillar. The Queen has the ring now and I'm sure her security has been doubled since we got away and that psychopathic killer is probably still on our tail." His words stung her, because up until now he always had a plan, no matter how far fetched or dangerous or impossible, he always thought of something. Now it seemed like absolutely everything was against them and all they had in the world was each other and a 200 year old Knight. He saw that he was distressing her so he continued, "We'll find something. Let's start simple. What do you want, because I know it's changed since yesterday. You used to want to save Jack, and then your dad and go home. Now what do you want. What's most important now?"

"I just want to go home. Your world is just too complicated and nothing is ever what it seems and Jack doesn't need rescuing and it probably isn't worth trying to get my dad out of the Casino. He doesn't remember me and he doesn't even want to leave." She said feeling tears brimming behind her eyes but she refused to cry again.

"Home it is then. If that's what you want I'll get it for you."

"How?"

"You had to ask didn't you? That's the tricky part." He said and she could see his brain was working hard to get her an answer. "Ah ha. Now this is a very long shot, but the Queen will have the ring now and she's going to want to restart the mirror as soon as possible and that means moving the ring into the city. If we can ambush the Suits moving the ring then there is a possibility of getting the ring back, considering if there are only a few of them and they are unarmed, which is unlikely, but it's the only hope we've got."

"What if it doesn't work? What if they've already moved the ring or what if there are too many of them?"

"Then we'll think of a new plan. Don't give up Alice. I will get you home."

"What if you can't Hatter?"

"We'll just figure out things as they happen, okay?" He stared at her intently until she nodded and he held open his arms to her and she gratefully accepted his hug. They hug was just a short one but they parted slowly and looked deeply into each others eyes.

As much as she was afraid of her feelings for him she was drawn to him like a fly to honey. She began to lean in to kiss him but he turned away and said, "we should probably get back to camp. Tell Charlie what the plan is. We could probably make it to the Casino before sunset if we hurry." He stepped away from her and smiled very lightly at her before turning and walking off to camp leaving her there feeling alone and rejected.