I do not own Alice in Wonderland

(Alice)

I awoke up the next morning to find Quinn shaking me into consciousness. "Wakey, Wakey, doll. Vincent says we gotta get a move on."

I sent him a glare that I hoped could convey all the utter burning hatred I felt for being called 'doll'.

All I got was a giant 'I-don't-care-because-I'm-

Quinn-mother-fucking-DeMuse' grin right in my face.

So much for a good morning.

On second thought, how good could a morning in this situation be? I had hardly gotten any time to think over the events of the previous night. I knew I couldn't refuse. It was my responsibility. I had single-handedly caused the destruction of the Tulgey Wood with just my presence.

I had to do something. I had to fix things.

I looked around, rubbing the sleep from my bleary eyes. Charles sat under one of the shriveled, dead trees, writing away in his notebook as always. He looked up, glasses slipping down the bridge of his nose, and gave me a polite wave. "good morning!" he called.

Quinn's grin twitched a bit more upwards at the left corner, making it more of a smirk. He grabbed my hand and pulled me to my feet. Vincent and Theodore came into view then, talking animatedly a ways away.

Theodore seemed to be angrily arguing and imploring with Vincent. Why, I couldn't tell, but Vincent's eyebrow was twitching and his hair was tinting red again. Needless to say, neither of them were happy with the other but they seemed to come to an agreement. Vincent came storming back to us, Theodore in tow.

"Come along." Theodore called to us calmly.

Vincent, on the other hand, sounded absolutely mad with barely suppressed anger. In fact his voice came out more as a growl than anything else. "We're going to see Sven." He told Quinn, who made a face of distaste.

I looked between them confusedly. "Who?"

Vincent rolled his eyes, seeming annoyed that he had to explain something to me yet again. "Sven Hatter. He has a history of being..."

He glanced at Quinn and Theo. "An asshole. But we need his help if we're going to get into the castle. He knows all there is to know about secret passages and hidden secrets. Considering many of the most important and complex buildings in Wonderland were built by Hatter."

"And now, if we're done here, let's move. We're wasting time that we don't have." Vincent finished coldly, turning on his heel, and walking away. Theodore followed him, looking oddly panicked at the mention of lost time.

Quinn stuck around for a moment or two with Charles and me. He made an almost gentlemanly gesture for Charles to go ahead of us. "I'd like to talk to the little lady for a bit if you don't mind, Charlie."

I could tell Charles didn't like being called that from the way his shoulders tensed and he stalked away without another word.

I was about to follow after him when Quinn grabbed my arm forcefully and yanked me back. "don't step on the mome raths."

Charles looked back in interest, whipping out his notebook. "mome raths?"

Quinn gestured to the ground in front of me where thousands of tiny white things that looked like fuzzy mushrooms. He looked down at the white 'mushrooms' and started scribbling furiously in his notebook. I stared at them intently and realized suddenly that they weren't mushrooms at all.

They were tiny little creatures running in circles and making a soft grinding noise like some gruesome machine. I could make out many rows of razor sharp teeth on all of them. They were swarming like sharks in a feeding frenzy, but Quinn led me through them carefully with the kind of catlike grace that I'd expect from him. Charles followed suit, still scribbling feverishly.

I looked down at the mome raths and they just looked back up at me hungrily with black beady little eyes.

I shuddered as a cold chill ran down my spine.

-.-.-.-

We had been walking for about half an hour when we reached a table in the middle a vast flower garden. It was a lovely sight if not a bit macabre. Every petal of every flower was pitch black and the leaves were a dead, ashen gray.

There were two young children sitting back to back on the table, both so still that they looked like statues. They were twins, both male and around 10 years old. Their hair was black and a dark contrast to their skin which was almost sickly pale. Each had a stitched scar on their cheek, one had it on his left cheek and the other his right. They wore the same clothes exactly, right down to the missing button on their shirt collars. Their clothes consisted of black, ragged, pinstripe suits with sleeves that were a bit too long for their arms. They wore black, scoffed up combat boots that reminded me of the pair I had back at my grandfather's house, and matching black fedoras. The only difference between the two boys was how they wore their hair. The one on the left wore his long hair in a ponytail, tied with a blue ribbon and the one on the right had his hair messy and free, letting it fall to the small of his back with a red ribbon woven into a tiny braid that hung near his face.

I stared at them interestedly, figuring they were made of wax. "Who are they...?"

"They're the Tweedles. Dee and Dum."

I jumped and looked over at the head of the table. There sat a man who definitely hadn't been there before. He had golden blond hair that curled at the nape of his neck where it ended. He wore an eye patch over his left eye and the other was sharp, cold and bright green. He was smirking at me devilishly like he was analyzing me or something equally as creepy. He dressed very sophisticated in a white suit, black tie, and a large black top hat with a card stuck in the brim, reading '10/6'. A small teapot was balanced on the top of his hat.

"I am Sven. Sven Hatter. Welcome to my tea party, Alice."

"Um...thanks...?" I frowned cautiously.

Sven stood up and took long theatrical strides over to me, grabbing me by the chin and looking over my face. "Ah yes, you certainly do look like her...The hair, your eyes...even this funny little sprinkle of freckles over your nose."

"Ooooooh~!" A childish voice echoed from one of the twins. The one in red.

"Looks like Hattie found himself a little crush, hm?" The blue one said right after.

'Funny...' I thought. 'I didn't see either of them move...'

Sven's eyebrow twitched a little in anger. "I am merely observing." His hand went to his side where there was a long fancy sabre of a sword at his hip.

"Oi!" An angry shout chorused from the other end of the table. I looked over and was once again surprised to find someone sitting at the table who had not been there before.

The speaker, a woman of maybe 18, was one of the most beautiful people I had ever seen. Her hair was long, curly, and a dark chestnut brown. Her eyes, clear and blue, were currently half lidded making her look rather unimpressed with everything. There were two, long, black rabbit ears poking out of her head. She wore a pretty black and purple dress that came to her knees and ended in shredded ruffles. A collection of bright purple flowers bloomed on her shoulders and their vines wrapped their way around her arms. Her skin was tan and a little mole sat under her right eye. Her voice was strong and clear with a hint of what sounded almost like a French accent, yet there was something...off about it. Like it was mixed in with something else that was entirely untraceable.

"You two." She said to the twins, surprisingly calm after her previous outburst. "Off my table."

They exchanged glances with one another and slid off the table, saluting her with the utmost respect.

"Hatter. Don't threaten children." She frowned at Sven who was still looming over me. He backed off and removed his hand from the swords hilt.

He turned a sly smile at the woman. "Etta. How good of you to join us."

I glanced at my companions curiously.

Quinn chuckled and strutted over to stand behind the woman. "Alice, may I introduce Miss Henrietta March. The most simply devastatingly beautiful creature in all of Wonderland." He trailed a finger lightly down the side of her face and she smacked him away.

"Hands off, Cat." Her eyes hardened into an icy glare that could most likely have set a lesser man on fire. "Or I'll castrate you in your sleep. Got it?"

"Dually noted." Quinn pulled back as if she had turned into a venomous snake.

The twins giggled loudly, thoroughly enjoying Henrietta's violent nature.

"Well. Now that we've all gotten acquainted shall we move this little meet and greet inside?" Sven asked Vincent with a cold smirk of disdain.

"You'd like that, wouldn't you, Hatter? Another chance to show off."

"Oh, you're accusations are brutal, Oracle, just as always."

Vincent muttered something that sounded suspiciously like "feed you to mome raths" and we all headed inside. Vincent was as quiet as the grave I'm sure he'd like to send Sven to and yet, said Hatter chattered on as if nothing had happened. I sighed, feeling that this would somehow end in an attempted murder.

AN:

CHAPTER 7 AFTER MUCH ADO ABOUT NOT A LOT!

Chances are, were I faced with Sven, I would feed him to mome raths.

Much Love,

Evan