Title: Treasure
Rating: T
Summary: Nick Midnight is a high school girl who's a victim of fierce bullying regarding her appearance and name. On one rainy day she falls into Wonderland and hopes to start a new life. Will she ever find anyone who will accept her for who she is, or will the vicious cycle begin again? Mary Gowland x Original Character
A/N's: For this fic I've been basing Blood's personality off the one in the HNKNA manga by Soumei Hoshino because that was the first Alice manga I read (I got 1-5 when TokyoPop was still around, and the sixth book in French in Canada) and I haven't liked Blood that much since. He seemed to be just a jerk, and I know that portrayal didn't show his sarcastic or funny side so I don't mind him so much anymore. Please don't hate on the Blood hate strewn throughout this fic. Also, Blood and Gowland don't get along so it's better to make Blood one of the quote-on-quote antiheroes.
Also, for plot convenience and the avoidance of extra-jealous Ace, the Clock Tower has multiple bedrooms.
Chapter Two: Julius, the Clockmaker & Nightmare, the Nightmare
As Ace whines on about shortcuts that don't exist and Alice rambles about how our trio is almost at the Clock Tower, I take the time to look around and observe the scenery of the Country of Hearts. There are two other territories of this bizarre country that I have yet to come across - technically three as I have of yet to reach the residence of the Clockmaker - one being the Castle of Hearts from which Ace hails from and the other a colorful, eccentric Amusement Park. Even without travelling to these other territories, there seems to be a plethora of fresh and green landscape, which is a nice change from the overly industrialized home country of mine.
A soft, sweet breeze blows through the air and the scent of pine and other coniferous trees fills my nostrils. I look up at the sky, sun blazing high above the clouds; the air is a… lukewarm temperature, not too hot or cold, but just right. It feels like spring, a true spring - not like the pre-summer simmer we have in Florida.
Eventually, Alice, Ace, and I come across a fork in the road.
"Midnight, just for future reference, if you take the road to the left it leads to the Clock Tower and if you take the road to the right it leads to the surrounding town. Technically you could go either way to reach your destination, but there hasn't been a time period change in a while and I think we should take the quicker route before it gets dark." Alice informs me.
However, Ace has other ideas. "Hahahahaha!~ Alice, Midnight, if you go to the right it's a shortcut!"
Alice slaps her palm of her hand to her forehead and sighs. "Ace, don't bother. You have no clue where you're going! Midnight, don't listen to him."
"But I always get there eventually, ahahahaha!~ Hey, let's go camping." Well, that's Ace for you. Poor, misguided, silly Ace.
Alice begins to lose her temper and yell at the idiot for his suggestion and I laugh at their interaction, finding the whole exchange a bit funny. However, I am soon alerted that the air has gotten cool and the sky has turned a navy blue. What just… happened?
Like a light switch, the sunlight of day was gone and replaced with the glow of a crescent moon.
"Ahahahaha!~ I'll get out my tent: it's not safe for young ladies to be wandering around at night!~" laughed Ace.
"No! Ace, it's not safe to be with you at night. Besides, we're almost at the Clock Tower."
I looked around, trying to deciper, trying to understand why the time of day suddenly and quite randomly changed. It was almost as if someone had snapped their fingers and got a time they ordered.
"Uh, Alice?" I spoke.
Turning to me and noting my confusion, Alice decided to speak on the matter at hand - the change of time period.
"Oh, Midnight, this is what I was talking about a few minutes ago - a time change. In Wonderland, time has no particular order. They time of day can switch from day to night, dusk to dawn, at the drop of a hat and with no warning whatsoever."
Well, assuredly that doesn't make much sense, but then again this is a land of wonder, and its namesake reflects. If a time period could change so easily, what else differs from my normal?
"It must take some getting used to," I laugh, " Am I right?"
Alice nods in agreement, pulling the attempting-to-wander-off Ace by his coat sleeve in right, or in this case left, direction.
"Also, Midnight," Alice fumbles around in one of her dress pockets with her free hand, "Outsiders can find these around Wonderland." From her hand appears a small, golden hourglass. The beach-tan sand inside sparkles in the night with a glimmering sheen.
"If you flip the hourglass, you can change the time period to whatever time of day you choose. However," she pauses in her explanation of the workings of the object, "They are incredibly rare and hard to find, so don't waste them."
"Since you know so much about them, I assume you've used one before, Alice?" I inquire.
She nods once more, and the three of us begin to walk down the left path to the Clock Tower.
"Yes, I use them to change the period to night if I want to sleep, or if Blood wants to have one of those Midnight Tea Parties of his..."
Blood. I got silent at the mention of his name. That man... he's just like them. Cruel. Spiteful.
Sadistic.
I hate people like him, the ones who point the fingers and direct their anger outwards towards other people. People like him, who mock and harm, spew lies and trash their fellow comrades. All humans are humans - we are all the same, and yet we are all different; some unfortunate souls are more different than others. I find myself to be one of the outliers, one of a different kind, but why do people, people like him, have to mention all my flaws and imperfections all the time?
I would like to feel different about myself, I would like to have the ability to like myself. But, there's nothing to like about me: everyone says so. I don't understand why they feel like reminding me about that fact so often. The people who don't, the people who aren't like Blood, the people who are like Alice, take pity on the poor little lonely girl who is bullied by the meanies of society. As I've said before, those kinds of people are just too nice to say otherwise, to say the truth.
I'm such a pathetic creature. It was unwise of me to believe I could make myself become anything but worthless.
As we continue to travel the darkened path, Alice asks if I want her to use her hourglass, but I decline.
"We're almost there, didn't you say? It would be a waste."
"I suppose that's true."
"Ahahahaha!~"
In the cover of night - or whatever the hell the real time is here - we move to visit the Clockmaker.
_~|TREASURE|~_
"You're late, you imbeciles."
Was the warm welcome our trio received upon entry from the blue, long-haired man that was currently seated at an engineering table covered in broken clocks. He didn't even look up at us as he continued his motherly scolding of danger and responsibility - neither Alice nor Ace looked even slightly fazed by his ramblings, and I figure it must be a routine activity for the duo.
The man in front of me dressed in a long coat and accessorized with a single clock earring, soft-and-silky looking, straight as an arrow hair pulled back into a tie, diligently working was the owner of this neutral territory and the Clockmaker, Julius Monrey. As an important role-holder - ones with a special task -, it was his duty to collect and repair all the clocks of Wonderland. Currently, however, Julius and Ace have established a relationship in which Ace would be the ones to collect the clocks and bring the ever-increasing pile to him to fix while Julius is given a chance to breathe.
"Well, I still came, Julie!" laughed Ace.
Julius twitched and turned around in his chair to face Ace and Alice. "You stupid Knight! That is not my name, we are not friends - only acquaintances - so you have no permission to shorten my name more than it already is!"
As per usual, Ace laughs off the retort, and Julius finally notices my presence. Feeling awkward and not knowing what to do myself, Alice steps in and starts to explain my situation.
"Julius, this is Midnight. She's a new Outsider, like me."
The Clockmaker studies me, and I look down at and study myself as well. Covered in grass stains and dirt from being found out in the woods, my appearance is pretty shabby but my backpack is still in one piece, so I suppose everything's alright.
He begins, slowly, "I see." Julius stands from his chair and walks towards us all. Dragging Ace off to the side for some business and leaving Alice and I alone, we have obtained the perfect opportunity for the two of us to chat about various things. There are a few things on my mind that I would like to get off my chest.
"Alice, do you like him?"
She looks shocked as I pose this question. "W-who?"
"Do you like Blood, Alice?"
Alice is quiet, as I suspected. I'm not as thick, as dull as the people at school would claim me to be. I notice interactions, patterns, and emotions - regarding things that have nothing to do with me, of course. When it comes to my relationships, I'm completely hopeless and don't have a damn idea of what I should be or not be doing. I'm also give good advice to those who need it, except for myself.
"He's a friend, but…" she trails off, "Blood's not always like that. I don't know what got into him today, Midnight. Don't take any of what he said to heart, alright? Those things he said are not true."
I shake my head at her. "Alice, he got the twins to start to call me big brother. I haven't even known them for more than five minutes and they already have the wrong idea."
"Midnight, they're smart children and understand better than that. Maybe they were trying to play a game?"
"Well, whatever that was, it wasn't funny." I say bitterly.
Passively, I look past Alice's head to see Ace and Julius bickering about something in the background. It looks as if they're talking about… I squint; it seems as if they're talking about… Outsiders? Ace's hands rest upon Julius's shoulders, shaking him and pulling him closer. Julius pushes the other man off of him, and turns to walk back towards us. I turn my attention back to Alice as to not get caught staring that the two men's conversation.
"Come with me, there is something you should be shown." Julius grabs me by the hand and leads me to the high-rising stairs that are past his work desk. As I pass Ace, he has an expression of hatred and jealousy. If there's something special about Outsiders, then I think I know what this is about.
_~|TREASURE|~_
As I approach the top of the stairs and the roof of the Clock Tower, the night time period has ended and a sunset has taken its place.
"You still have your pack, that's good." Julius notes to me as he approaches the outer edge of the roof's circular platform. "As an Outsider, staying in Wonderland means becoming a part of the Game, and until the Game is complete, you cannot leave it."
A Game? This seems interesting enough; I don't think I'll want to leave though, unless the rest of the people here are like Blood, like them. Alice and Julius seem nice enough so far. Ace, though, I don't know what he really thinks. His laughter conceals the face he revealed earlier like a mask.
"As a token, prize piece if you will, of the Game, you are to drink the serum and become the main player. Have you done so yet?" He stops staring at the surrounding scenery and faces me, a questioning look projected on his face. "It comes in a thin bottle with a heart, for this country, on the top."
I shake my head 'No', and connecting the dots, I take my backpack off of my shoulder and dig through it for the described object. My hand reaches something cold, long, and octagonal and I remove it knowingly that it was not in my possession before I arrived in Wonderland.
Similar to the sand in Alice's hourglass, the bottle of the Game's potion had its own sparkling shine. Made of rainbow glass and topped with a glass red heart, the serum shone in the light like a carnival attraction. Etched into one of the eight sides was a music note - precisely, an eighth note. I hand the bottle to Julius, unsure of what I was to do with it.
He studies the bottle, running his finger over the patch with the imprint, and blinks rapidly in succession.
"Your bottle is different from the bottle Alice holds. Her mark is a heart, and yet yours is a note…" He hands the bottle back to me. "Drink this and you will begin your journey to find your true reason for being in this world."
I follow his instructions, and he begins to speak to be about the Country of Hearts.
"You're in the Country of Hearts. It has four domains." Julius points to a large structure northeast of the Clock Tower. "That building is the Castle of Hearts, ruled by the Queen of Hearts." Gesturing to the southeast of the Clock Tower, "That elaborate compound is the Hatter Mansion, run by a mafia family, and controlled by a noted sociopath 'The Hatter'."
"Ace took us there on accident earlier. It was a most unfortunate… interaction." I mentioned softly while he continued his explanation of the layout of Hearts Country.
"We are here, at the Clock Tower Plaza, and adjacent to us is the Amusement Park."
I look out at all the places far away, the ones that look small because of this distance's depth perception. The Amusement Park catches my eye, and I take a few steps in its direction. Even from here I can spot a Ferris Wheel revolving and a rollercoaster cart moving along a high track. I smile to myself, remembering the first experience, and last experience, that I had at my trip to the amusement park back home.
"Thank you, Julius, for your explanation."
He grunts in response, adding, "If you have any other questions, I suppose the Dream Demon will be there to answer them when you go to sleep." Turning on his heel, he begins to head down the winding stairs, leaving me to stare off at and admire the new world I find myself now living in.
_~|TREASURE|~_
As I hurry down the stairs, backpack in hand, I almost trip and fall on my face. When I reach the floor that the rest of the people in the Clock Tower should be on, only Alice is there, standing around all by her lonesome.
"Julius went to see Ace out of the Clock Tower. It's so surprising how he can get lost on a straightforward staircase, but he's managed to do it before!" she laughs.
She must not have seen what I saw… and she's been here longer than me. I guess you could say she's not the type who's very observant. Maybe she just pretends not to notice; that could be another reason of her ignorance, or perhaps feigned ignorance.
I begin to ask Alice if she had any clothes that I could borrow - earlier she told me that she stays here with Julius, so she must have some in her room - when Julius returns, hair slightly disheveled, and a glassy look in his eyes. Being the workaholic that he is, he promptly sits at his work table once more and resumes repairing the clocks.
"Alice, make me a coffee please?"
She perks up and responds with a smile. "I will in a few minutes, Julius, just as soon as I find Midnight a change of clothes."
"Thank you so much, Alice, I'm really grateful. You too, Julius - thanks for letting me stay here for the time being."
The slightly cranky clockmaker grunts again while trying to smooth out his crinkled locks, and Alice whisks me away to an upstairs room. Once there, she hands me a nightgown and a bathrobe, pointing me in the direction of an empty bedroom and the bathing room.
"I'm going to retire for the night as well, after I make Julius his coffee. The poor man, he hardly ever sleeps. I wish he'd take better care of himself..."
"Alright, Alice. I can't thank you enough. If you and Ace hadn't found me on your travels, I don't know what I would have done." I truly am grateful for everything she's done. Aside from the visit to the Hatter's Mansion, everything went well today. Maybe this is a place I'll be able to fit in, maybe there isn't any place I'll be able to fit in. Only time will tell, and a girl can hope, can't she?
_~|TREASURE|~_
After the warm, relaxing shower, I lied on the guest bed, closed my eyes, and fell asleep instantly. What I expected was to have a dream-filled sleep and wake up in the morning nice and refreshed. What I did not expect was to open my eyes moments later to a dark void with a floating, grey-haired man in it.
Startled, and remembering Julius's comments about a Dream Demon visiting me in my sleep tonight to answer all of my remaining questions, I began, "Are you the one Julius mentioned to me?"
Puffing on the smoking pipe that he held in his hand, he speaks. "The 'Dream Demon'? That's a name I prefer not to be called by, but yes. I am Nightmare Gottschalk, the Nightmare and an incubus."
I feel one side of my face begin to twitch in annoyance with the last description about his existence. I mean, really, who would go around flaunting and volunteering information that they're an incubus? Apparently, Nightmare, the Nightmare and man who loves to pleasure many women in their slee-
"I am an incubus in name only, I swear!" Nightmare shouts, with a flushed face from embarrassment. "I have never, and will never, do something like that in my entire li-" he struggles to finish his words as he begins to cough up a stream of blood.
I stare at the bizarre sight less than five feet away from me with a perfect poker face. A fretting, middle-aged, sickly Nightmare who panicked over a thought I made in my mind was currently puking blood from his stomach, which most definitely couldn't be healthy. I'm worried, suspicious, and don't know what to think; is that man alright, how did he know what I was thinking, and where am I and what is going on? To have that response to what I self-dialogued, he must have read my mind… If he can read my mind, then he can-
"Hear your thoughts? Sorry for interrupting, but yes - I can." Nightmare dabs the corner of his mouth with a handkerchief, wiping away the speckled remnants of his miniature coughing fit. "I think it makes conversations so much easier, don't you think?"
I start to crack up - what a card! While some people may find it offensive and an invasion of privacy, being able to overhear one other's thoughts can help communication become more productive. Ha, he is right - having an ability like that would make conversations so much easier.
"Well, hello Nightmare, nice to meet you. My name's… Nick Midnight." If he can hear my thoughts, then he also must know I hate my name. Even hearing myself say 'Nick'…
Blood, that bastard.
"It's nice to meet you too, Midnight. I see you've had a run in with the Hatter already?" he questions.
"Yeah, if that's what you want to call it. I'm trying to push it out of my mind…" Just like everything that happened back home. This is Wonderland, why am I wasting my time dwelling on the past?
Why am I wasting everyone else's time by being here?
"Don't think those thoughts," he orders, "One, they're not true - you're a beautiful person who's been victimized by selfish and jealous individuals, two, I think you'll find Wonderland quite peculiar and… different from your homeland."
My brow furrows, and I take a seat on the ground of this void. "What do you mean?"
"You want to know about Outsiders, correct?"
"Yes."
"You already know about the Game, don't you?"
"Yes, Julius explained it to me."
He stares at me, most likely going through my memories to find out what it was exactly that Julius told me about the Game, and I stare back.
"You are to refill the vial, the object that you drank the serum from, to be able to exit Wonderland. This is done by interacting with the role-holders of Wonderland and forming relationships with them - platonic or romantic."
"So Wonderland is a non-optional social convention?"
He laughs and agrees. "Yes, I suppose so. You are an Outsider - and everyone loves an Outsider."
Everyone loves in outsider… platonic or romantic… I ponder the fresh information before I figure out why Ace was giving me such hate-filled dirty looks earlier. Is he worried that I'm going to try and pine after Julius? He's afraid that I'll take the effeminate, cranky clockmaker from him? I laugh, and Nightmare laughs with me since he knows exactly what I'm thinking.
"Now that's a development that I had no knowledge of. It seems my fountain of information," He's talking about Alice here, "Seemed to have missed it."
I laughed softly. "She missed their entire exchange earlier, their argument I mean. She also missed his ravaged appearance when he came back from 'walking Ace out'."
Nightmare snorts.
"So everyone likes an Outsider, huh…" I say.
"Outsiders who come to this world all have a quality about them we seem to love."
I doubt that's true about me. Me, having a special quality that makes people like me? What ridiculousness.
"What did I say about that kind of talk?" Nightmare scolds.
"Sorry, mother."
Laughing together, Nightmare and I talk for a bit longer, discussing my day and the special workings of Wonderland before casually coming to the issue of my wardrobe.
"Midnight, I regret to inform you, but the female citizens of Wonderland don't really wear your type of clothes. It's going to be hard to find a replacement for the clothes that were ruined by your fall into this place."
My face twisted up like I had taken a bite out of something bitter; there would be no way I would wear frilly dresses like Alice does.
"But," Nightmare interrupts my thoughts, "I think something can be arranged. There should be a present waiting for you on your nightstand when you wake up." He sing-songs.
My sour mood vanishes and is replaced with a true smile of real happiness.
"Oh, thank you so much, Nightmare!" I give him a quick hug, but release and hold him by the shoulders as he begins to cough again.
"You really are an unhealthy man, aren't you?"
"Hey, I'm not that bad! Besides, I hate needles..."
I step away, smile, laugh, and wave as he fades into the darkness of the now dissolving and disappearing black void. I see, it must be now time for me to awaken to my second day in Wonderland.