Roxas Strife. He wasn't exactly your typical seventeen year old boy, nor was he the typical quiet child. He was a dreamer, something he had picked up from his father at a very young age. He had always adored his father. Most people made Roxas feel like he was bizarre and that he didn't belong. But whenever Roxas had been around his father he didn't feel so weird. He felt like he finally belonged somewhere. And then came that one terrible day. The day when he felt like his life had ended.

The day his father died.

It had been a rainy day, as most were in England. But the rain had been coming down especially hard that day. It was dark out as his father was riding home in a cab, working a bit later at the museum than he normally would have. With the combination of the rain and the dark of the night, it had been quite hard for the cab driver to see. So when the driver saw a pair of headlights headed straight for him he quickly tried to swerve out of the way. The sudden movement caused the cab to slide on the slick, wet road and soon enough, the cab driver no longer had control over the vehicle. The car flipped when it hit a bump then slid into a building. His father had been wearing his seat belt, unlike the cabbie, but even so he didn't keep his life. His skull had been bashed against the window several times until it finally shattered against the strength of the blows. There was a lot of blood pouring from his head and pieces of glass stuck in the flesh. He didn't stay alive for very long after the ambulance had brought him to the hospital. Only long enough for his wife and son to come and say goodbye. The doctors had told them that even if he had survived he would have suffered from severe brain damage. But that had been the thing that killed him in the end. Roxas had been eight that day.

After his father's death, it had only taken two weeks before his mother decided she couldn't cope with her husband's death and taking care of her child by herself. So to suppress her pain she'd started doing drugs. At first it had just been a bit of weed twice a week then it became every day. Soon enough she started coming home with new drugs like cocaine and crystal meth. She'd even started to invite other people over the house to do drugs with.

Roxas had become very quiet after that day, and for a while he took to staying in his room, reading books and day dreaming about the impossible things that his father had always spoke with him of. On most nights, when Roxas would wake up, he'd go running to his father to speak with him of his dream, then his father would comfort him and sit on his bed with him till he'd fallen asleep. He no longer had that option, especially since his mother would just tell him it was a dream and to go back to bed. It had taken a year and a half for him to get used to not having his father there to calm him at night.

When Roxas was thirteen his mother completely stopped picking him up after school, saying he was old enough to walk home alone and that she had other things to do. Roxas knew that she just wanted to stay home and do drugs all day. So Roxas started going to his father's grave everyday after school. He'd stay there till sun down, telling his father about his day at school or his dreams he woke up from every night. His mother never noticed his long absence through out the days, simply believing he'd been at school the entire time.

Since he hung out in the cemetery so often, most kids started to assume he was a goth and would avoid him. However, even some of the goths avoided him, writing him off as weird because he'd sit and day dream through out school then go and talk to his father's grave. It didn't matter how weird anyone else was, no one thought that normal. So Roxas was left with out friends. He didn't mind though. He preferred to be left alone. Other people just liked to interrupt his day dreams and question them. After all, he was rather honest and straight forward (another one of his traits that made people dislike him) whenever someone would ask what he was thinking about.

Over the years all his habits just got worse and he seemed rude to most because he was so blunt, he just became the odd man out in school. He spent more and more time at his father's grave, by fifteen he was even spending his entire weekends there. His mother was so far gone in her drug addiction that she never even noticed he was gone, and honestly, he wondered how she even kept her job, it's not like it was anything special though. She just made pizza's. That was his dinner every day unless he decided to cook something. By now, Roxas hated pizza.

Roxas had always wanted to run away though. To just leave his mother behind and have a little adventure in his life.

Was that too much to ask for?

He didn't think so. But for some reason he felt like he couldn't leave. There was this nagging feeling in the back of his head that told him to stay. He didn't know what it was. But for some reason, unbeknownst to him, he listened to the nagging.

Until, finally, one day the adventure found him.

Roxas sat at his father's grave, his back resting against the large stone as he read a book in peace. It was quite cloudy that day, leaving the day rather dark and Roxas with the suspicion that it was going to rain rather hard that day. He didn't mind the rain so much, he just hated when it interrupted his visits with his father.

But as stated before, he was reading peacefully until he spotted something in the corner of his eye. He saw long, white, fluffy ears sticking up behind a small gathering of dead leaves then quickly disappear. Roxas raised a brow curiously and tilted his head slightly to the side.

Was that a rabbit?

He put his book down by the grave stone and got up to go find the small creature. He took slow steps and looked around curiously with every step, trying to find the rabbit. Suddenly he saw a flash of white two grave stones away. It hopped behind the stones and scurried down the row of graves. Roxas was quick to follow the rabbit, running past the graves and straight into the forest beside the grave yard.

It was harder to follow the rabbit in the forest, but some how he managed. He could've sworn the thing stopped and waited for him at one point though. But he knew he probably imagined it.

He finally caught up to the rabbit though, but it jumped down a rather large hole in front of a tree. Roxas came to a sudden stop in front of the hole, losing his balance for a moment but quickly regaining it. He got on his knees, peering down into the hole in hopes of seeing the rabbit. As the wind suddenly picked up Roxas lost his balance once more. Though he couldn't recover this time as he suddenly fell forward and tumbled down the large hole with a startled scream.

It barely registered in his mind as he quickly passed a floating book case, a large grandfather clock and a piano among many other random objects. He suddenly hit a large bed, but was quickly thrown off by the force that he hit it with bouncing back. He continued to fall down the strangely large hole until, finally, he hit the hard ground with a sharp gasp.

With a loud moan he slowly sat up and rubbed the back of his head.

"Damn that hurt." Roxas mumbled to himself. He slowly cracked open his eye to look around him. He was in a large circular room with doors all around, dimly lit by two large candles standing on either side of each door. He blinked in confusion as he looked around the room. Where the hell was he?

Slowly clambering off the ground, he walked in a small circle around the room. Each door varied in size, some rather large and others oddly small. Though the door that caught his eye was the smallest door in the room. It appeared to be just big enough for a small dog.

"Drink the potion." A deep voice echoed through the room. Roxas quickly spun around in a circle and looked around the room. There was no one there, so where had the voice come from?

"Drink. The. Potion." It repeated, this time a bit more sternly. Roxas furrowed his brows in confusion and looked up at the ceiling.

"What potion?" He asked, slightly irritated that he couldn't see the person.

"The one on the table." The voice said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"What tab-" Roxas turned and found a small table now sitting in the middle of the room. "-le?" He finished.

His eyes widened and he cautiously made his way over to the table and atop the smooth wooden surface sat a small bottle filled with clear green liquid. Tied around the rim of the bottle was a small tag with the words "drink me" written in nice calligraphy. He picked up the bottle and looked over it for a moment before he removed the lid and took a cautious sip of the green liquid. He scrunched up his nose at the taste of the bazar liquid then his body started to tingle as he watched the room grow in size around him. Wait... Was he shrinking?

He looked around the room curiously for a moment before he realized that he had indeed shrunk, though his clothes had not. He was also now the perfect size for that really small door.

He quickly made his way over to the door, forgetting his lack of clothes for a moment, and tried to turn the doorknob, but he quickly found it was locked. He huffed and stomped his foot on the floor in irritation.

"Tsk tsk tsk. You forgot the key my dear boy." The voice said.

"There wasn't a key!" Roxas yelled in irritation. A light chuckle resounded through out the room.

"Ah temper temper love. There is a key, beside the bottle. You just didn't look for it." Roxas growled and glared at nothing in particular. He couldn't believe this was happening to him.

He stomped his way back over to the table. He jumped up, trying to grab the edge but failing horribly. He kicked at the ground to work out some of his frustration but ended up kicking a small box and causing it to skid and flip on it's side. He looked over to the small box curiously. The lid was open and sprawled out on the lid and floor were large cookies in the shapes of hearts, diamonds, clubs and spades. He picked up one of the cookies and looked it over. It had yellow frosting on the top and in green frosting was written "eat me".

Roxas slowly took a small bite from the cookie and his body started to tingle again, though this time the room started to shrink around him as he grew.

"Shit!" He hissed, cringing as his head hit the ceiling and he had to crouch down to fit in the room. He looked down at the small wooden table and spotted a small metal key. He picked up the key in one hand and the green potion in the other. He took another sip of the odd tasting liquid, it wasn't as bad when you knew what to expect, but it was still pretty gross.

He slowly shrank back down, the key growing in his hand while the bottle grew too large for him to hold and he dropped it on the floor, the liquid spilling out as the bottle fell on it's side. He paid no mind to it though as he rushed over to the small, or rather normal, sized door. He pushed the key into the lock and heard a resounding click as it unlocked. Another light chuckle floated about the room.

"Well done. You may now enter." The mysterious voice said and the door swung open. Roxas's jaw dropped as he looked through the door. Before him was a large expanse of dried up dirt and way off in the distance he could see the green and browns of a large forest.

"What is this place?" He quietly asked himself.

"We call it the country of Hearts." The voice from before said right behind him. Roxas jumped and spun around, coming face to face with a grinning blonde. The man wore a nice, kind of long, dark blue suit jacket with a golden vest and white button up shirt with black dress pants and leather shoes. He had white fluffy rabbit ears atop his head and bright blue eyes. He started to pull off the blue jacket then handed it over to Roxas.

"Ello love." He said happily. Roxas gave the man an odd questioning look as he took the offered jacket and wrapped it around his bare body.

"Where the hell did you come from?"

"I was right behind the door there love. I was told to help you get through the door." He said, pointing at the door as he pulled out a pocket watch to look at the time. "Now, if you will excuse me, I really must be on my way. I am rather late for a meeting."

With that, he strolled right past Roxas.

"W-wait! Just a minute please." Roxas said quickly, turning around to face the man again. He stopped mid stride and turned on his heel, crossing his arms across his chest.

"Make it fast love."

"Who are you? And what is this place?" Roxas gestured to the desert surrounding them.

"I am Luxord, the white rabbit and this exact area here," He paused to gesture around them. "is the sea of dried up tears. Now I really must be on my way, if you wish to know more you must find the hatter."

And with that said, the blond bounded across the desert and into the forest, leaving a very confused Roxas to stand there and watch him slowly disappear. Roxas was beyond confused actually. He was absolutely flabbergasted by the events that just took place.

The sea of dried up tears? The country of Hearts? What the hell was that? And who the hell was this hatter he was supposed to find? How was he supposed to help him?

With a sigh, Roxas ran a hand through his hair then began his long trek across the desert. It's not like he was gonna get anywhere just standing there right?

And so ends chapter one. I do hope you have enjoyed this update. Much love and thanks to all who review favorite and or follow. I really appreciate it guys! I'll see you all next chapter! Goodnight, good morning, good afternoon and good evening!