JMJ

Chapter Sixteen

Dressed in Green

Matthias was first to lift his head, though he hated leaving the quivering Esther still huddled on the ground as he pulled himself to his feet.

They were in a wood more than a park, though it was gentle woodland more restful than a pile of trees in the center of a city. The breeze sang in the lush green trees and a late afternoon sun of sparkling komorebi danced more serenely and perhaps even more lovingly in its loneliness than in any waltz. There was freeness and candor to this small grove like the freshness of an open mountain pass but with a homier feel. There was nothing tight or intoxicating like the park of Heartland. Contrariwise! It was so real that it was more surreal than anything surreal he had ever imagined— at least super-natural to the natural. It was as though he himself was the literary figure standing in a place far more real than he was, or at least more genuine, which was not quite the same thing. He had even to wonder if he was the dreamer or merely a part of someone's dream or if he was both at once and that it really did not matter either way.

He cocked his head like a squirrel might in contemplation more than a man feeling regret or resentfulness about what most would find troubling notions, and just like a squirrel he quickly forgot such depths of the psyche and went back to his usual more limerick mode of spirit. Though in his spiritual jig, he did not lose at all the liberating feeling of this woodland as though having a sort of tea party with his surroundings for banter more amorous than any pining dirge— or at least purer.

Though, as an afterthought, he had to add that he may have pined for woods such as these without knowing it for years as he drank in a great sip of pine perfume before turning round to the woman on the ground. He smiled then like a baby and shook his head for a little laugh as though looking down upon one sleeping like… a baby.

"Wake up, Alice!" he said cheerily leaning down and tapping the woman's shoulder gently. "We're quite safe now. I only wish I had a hat. Then I would call all this a day quite successfully finished!"

"Mmm…" Esther moaned.

And his song at last had words:

"The wispy spring of teas was what drew me nigh.

The grunt that was to follow was from gloom striking my eye.

The phanty in the corner thought 'twas the call for ease.

He wasn't wrong, though not the tease

For knocking heads to cry.

The washing was to clean my sheets

In tea from head to feet

—Eight feet, in fact

I'll not subtract—

For this audience quite discrete.

The sweeping was to clean my ears

In tea from all my fears

—Nine years in all

It's no short fall—

Of landing through clock gears.

But now I'm here with pallet rinsed

By trees and I'm convinced

—ten tints of green

They're all serene—

I would dare no word be minced.

The wisp of spring in trees was what drew me up.

The song that was to follow was from the scent more than some sup.

The angel in the corner thought 'twas the call to sighs.

She wasn't wrong, I'll sympathize

Yet not to gloom but Wonder's pious cup."

He straightened his elf-green jacket despite how wet it still was and felt satisfied that it quite rhymed with the Irish-green of the emerald tints all around them.

"How do you do that?" asked a very simple childlike voice.

It was Esther, and she was now squatting rather childlike too on a particularly large oaken root.

Matthias looked away to hide his sneer and the shake of his head, "Do what?"

"Just… make up songs off the top of your head."

"I don't make them up off the top of my head," laughed Matthias.

"You know what I mean." She was not annoyed but sneering just as playfully back.

"And I mean what I say," said Matthias plainly as he spun back round to her and leaned back against her tree. "They're always added upon from other things. Don't you remember the other similar thing I was working on… although…" He paused. "No, I don't think I ever told you it. Well, either way they aren't that good anyway. Heh."

And here the conversation dropped, though the pause was not awkward. It was more as though the woods itself was taking its turn in speaking. It was not the birds or the wind in the trees (even if they agreed). It was something far more subtle than that. Just as though she was responding to it, Esther turned suddenly to the teacup on the ground, and her brow wrinkled, though did not quite tighten as she considered the thing.

This was the first time Matthias had noticed it himself, or at least took note in what it could mean, for he had kept himself from stepping on it during his solo.

"You don't think they're in the ground now, do you?" asked Esther.

"Who? The teafarers?"

"I… yes. Them."

Matthias shook his head and took his ease as he sat comfortably on a nearby root across from Esther's. He crossed his outstretched legs at the ankles. "I wouldn't worry about them."

"But isn't it the cup we were in?" asked Esther.

"Maybe, maybe not, but I'd be more surprised if we didn't meet quadruplets again than if we did."

"And they'll try to scoop us up like field mice and bop us on our heads, I guess," Esther sighed wistfully.

"At least we can safely say that elephants are afraid of mice for our side of things," said Matthias very amused.

Esther wrinkled her nose like a kitten. "Are they really?"

"In Wonderland," said Matthias.

He paused once more as the woodland gave its own say; though it seemed to just be laughing at him now. It was only a tease and nothing malicious, but it still made Matthias' face a little red. It was not teasing his words so much as something far deeper than that, and Matthias had already made up his mind not to be go any more introspective just now than the free moment itself. He popped up quite like a jack-in-the-box to move the moment along in its natural course.

"So!" he chirped. "Let's see where we can go from here."

"Something to eat?" suggested Esther.

"Well, this is a fairly welcoming wood. I'm sure we don't have to go far. It isn't tame at any rate," said Matthias. "So at least we won't be expected fare."

"Perhaps it will even come to us," said Esther.

"That's the spirit," said Matthias. "And then I suppose, it's up to us."

"What's up to us?" asked Esther.

"Well, your mission is as much my mission now. To save the victims of that tragedy we left behind."

Esther smiled and nodded; though even as she did-so it became sluggish with doubt. And Matthias knew it was because they had not the faintest idea how to begin such a mission. They were really in no predicament yet to plan it all out properly.

Slowly Esther stood up, and he waited patiently until she was beside him. Her skirt look less pencil-like now and its jean pleats were already dry enough to spin like jean petals above her pale stems for ankles and her root-like sandals. She had no socks, he just now noticed. It reminded him of how soggy his socks were. Then he led her along the hill, for they on some pinnacle of land, to a ledge over which they could survey their surroundings.

The air was cool but not cold. The breeze was enough to dry their clothes and yet strangely, if not simply conveniently, was not to the skin. It was Wonder for certain, and to boot, there was even a forest bootleg of steam or fog in the deeper parts of the forest below— just enough to give some atmosphere, while the air above was refreshing with therapeutic movement. There were flowers that looked like they may prefer Hawaii to this spot, though they were thriving. There were conifers that looked like Finnish taiga. There were birches to lay claim to Cherokee fables and oaks of English epics. Distant towers and spires that looked like no particular culture seemed more part of the landscape than cliffs. Cow bells and deep lows could be heard somewhere over the horizon so distant but familiarly close as though to make one as a human feel more welcome with the natural world. While near at hand insects sang to put any diva to shame. Somewhere water was bubbling in a brisk but friendly stream as it played alongside whistling birds who in turn did not sound off key alongside the crisp whisperings of trees clearer than any loud speech.

It was all more a dream now than a wonder, Matthias had to admit, but he was more awake than he could remember as though he was just born now.

Both Matthias and Esther looked down to admire the beauty of Eden and might have been a new Adam and Eve, but there was something post-modern enough to be post-apocalyptic in the most grungy post-popular novel in the quite tarnished presence hovering over all that would otherwise be pristine. Matthias could almost say he had never seen or felt such a discord of vision as that great ugly monstrosity, that horrid satellite, that cancerous tumor that festered so gross as to make him throw up. It was the planetoid of Heartland hovering in the sky, and he glared upon it with a loathing that almost frightened him.

And was that a ticking? Or was that all part of his mind? Had time stopped or just a clock commanding it? The ticking and the tocking. The—

He shook his head and it dissipated quickly enough; though the vision unhappily remained. The air suddenly felt colder then. The freshness turned a bit daunting though perhaps Esther felt the same and it was not all in his mind, after all. It was only the wind picking up strength and only a coincidence if there were such things as coincidences here. He knew it must be so, but this was not one of those occasions. Either way, Esther leaned in close after a shiver either for protection or warmth as she followed his vision to that bomb floating in space and time like a frozen frame in freefall that forever would hold the suspense of exploding into the ground.

"There's no ocean beneath it," Esther whispered. "…Unless it's beyond the hills and towers and it's bigger than before."

Matthias' stare hardened, but he did not look at her. It was as though the big black metal thing was watching him like a great eye without iris or pupil of some massive and powerful demon that reminded him with a calm derisive sardonicism that it had once possessed him and it could easily do so again. In defiance, he looked away. Taking Esther's hand he led her down a different path away from the sight of the thing. Esther did not protest and soon was following without his hold, and she kept very close.

The verdant afternoon was quickly turning into a golden gleam. It was still captivating but it now carried a poignant vibe that was more of a vibration than a sight as though it would disappear around them like a vision just before waking. The stream rose to meet them as they descended into undergrowth that was as feathery as a winking eyelash. But as they wound the glittering trees the aura slowly thickened again into a citrine juice that was a breakfast for his poise. It solidified back into red velvet. It was still as soft as a velveteen weft, but there was no waking from that which was already framed in full consciousness despite the sudden warp in vision suddenly out of the corner of his eye.

Matthias saw a flicker in this newfound fabric of vision, and he turned sharply and with defensive action for a fight suddenly so feral in the bull-like reddening, but he stopped short as he saw the last thing he expected in the dimming wine to mahogany shadows hinting now of dark cherry finish. It was the brush of a tail in a silver glaze, the tail of a cat, and a cat with a grin. He knew it was no illustration, and he knew he had seen that face before and felt his grin.

It was no ordinary Cheshire Cat, it was the very same personage who had sat with him on the train station bench in what now felt like a lifetime ago. Certainly, Matthias had been a different person then, but the cat had not changed. The Cat in turn grinned wider, more pleased to see Matthias' recognition than from his own recognition of the ex-Hatter.

#

Sterile blackness and emptiness suddenly shifted somewhat to the sound of buzzing air and a synthesized hum. A loading screen appeared. Then there was the map alongside options for screens of specific areas and beacons marking the patients. Even as everyone sighed with the relief about that, there was suddenly a much vaguer and yet more profound gasp to see that the light through the open doorway became brighter too. Mars went to check the corridor, and it was quite true that the world outside the corridor window looked bright again clear into a defined horizon as was custom.

"There, you see?" said Uranus in his strange high-pitched voice. "The programming is just all mixed up. That's what happens when a person messes with programs and machines that are only half tested. The holographic nature of everything we're working with is volatile to say the least, but here we are!"

Venus pulled out a cell phone and scrolled. She frowned, throwing her hair behind her in a bronze wave with a toss of her head and then she laughed humorlessly.

"So now what?" she demanded.

Pluto rolled his eyes. His impatience was due to not looking for Mercury even if minor staff members were still on the hunt. He said nothing at the moment as he looked at the screen for himself over Uranus's broad bony shoulder.

"Are all the patients accounted for?" asked Neptune dark enough for Pluto anyway, though it was dark for the wrong reason.

"The Little Isolated Synthetic Essence is missing," said Uranus; in his gravity he sounded like a wimpy ghost in an old animation short.

"She must have gotten lost in the system," sighed Venus. "If we had Mercury here—"

"Oh, Mercury ran off!" snapped Mars.

Pluto snorted silently.

"I doubt that," said Venus quite dry enough for him, so he still had no need to speak; though again it was not dryness for the right idea.

"I think the Hatter is missing too," said Uranus scratching his skeletal chin.

"Is he really or did his beacon break?" asked Neptune.

"We should have checked the bay first!" said Mars. "I bet that that LISE has been hacked."

Instead of answering the question or commenting on the guesswork, Uranus slowly scratched his chin the more like a dried branch rubbing against a brittle window and said, "The Cheshire Cat is also missing."

Here Pluto smiled. It was no Cheshire grin, but it was perhaps a fishier sneer, a sardonic weary looking curve in that thin wire of a lip in that puffy pale face of his. There was no satisfaction in it, but there was a certain sagacity of misery.

"But he's always been like that," remarked Venus; she was losing her nerve a little, Pluto could plainly see that. "Besides, we all know that since the patient of Cheshire died from an unexpected heart attack that Pluto has been the one sneaking in as him, especially when Hakuto isn't around."

Now the face fell into a dark pit. Pluto closed his eyes with irritation as the others turned to him with cold suspicion.

"What?" demanded Mars; he was one tick away from snatching the little man by the collar and throttling him.

"He's Mercury, isn't he?" said Neptune.

"Ah, yes, she has learned the art of bilocation," Pluto said with a very gloomy chuckle.

"I bet it's Donner. This whole thing. That rabbit. The missing Petra." Mars growled and now looked quite like he was going to strangle somebody invisible.

"But why aren't we more worried about the Hatter disappearing?" Venus almost whined.

"I doubt he disappeared, Venus," said Pluto almost kindly, but in that "almost" it was also almost cruel, and Venus shuddered behind her obstinate scowl. "He's just not where you'd expect him to be. Stilbon's favorite was the Hatter."

"I can't understand the preteen fixation with the Mad Hatter," said Venus looking away. "Much less hers."

"Nevertheless," Pluto said slowly, almost sleepily. "Matthias Haddler was hers. Even Jupiter granted him to her. And as for preteens… well, I think it's not their fault so much as the fault of certain pastiches."

"Pastiches or not," Venus shrugged. "That cat I get. Not a leprechaun with a giant head, and even less a white-faced hobo clown with red eye shadow and more retarded than a lamppost."

"The psyche of a girl like Stilbon is a deep and harrowing peak," Pluto breathed. "Besides, that one was never her favorite."

Venus raised a brow. For a moment it was only her and Pluto as she studied the little man with care.

"You're starting to sound a little like Mercury, you know."

Pluto cocked his head like a languid cat. "Well, you know. I'm sure to outsiders we'd all be considered mad here."

"That's it!" snapped Mars grabbing Pluto now by the scruff. "If anyone says one more reference to that bullshit—!"

"Mars!" snapped Venus.

Mars huffed and released Pluto.

"Really," sniffed Neptune distastefully of the ruffian.

Pluto merely straightened himself, hiding his mental prickles now that he knew he was safe from a beating.

"I'm going to check on Dr. Donner," Pluto said.

"You really think?" asked Uranus cloudily; here it seemed more befitting of his voice. "I—I mean that Dr. Donner is the Cheshire Cat?"

"Actually…" said Pluto all mirth, false or otherwise, gone from him. "I think we should not bother Donner."

"What are you thinking, Pluto?" asked Venus with care.

"That we should all have a look at the patients' bay before he comes back…" Pluto looked around shiftily. "If he ever does."

"You don't think he left like Mercury, do you?" Venus pressed.

Pluto shrugged. "I don't think anybody left, Venus, and neither do you, do you?"

Uranus and Neptune looked unhappily at each other. Mars ground his teeth.

"Well!" snapped Mars. "What are we waiting for?"

#

"Cheshire…" Esther breathed; then turned away with embarrassment.

Matthias' defensive posture relaxed and he did nothing but give a small pout as he looked back at the Cat.

"Oh, both work for me," said the Cat. "A pair of boots would look good if I had the motivation to stand in them."

"What are you doing here?" asked Matthias point-blank; though his face was no longer blank but quite creased along a heavy brow.

It was the same voice, the same face, the same grin, but it was not the same coat entirely. Or perhaps it was better to say that like everything here, it was more visible. Starker. He was easier to see in this comfortable shade than it ever had been to see him in Heartland.

"You mean, 'What was I doing there,'?" shrugged the Cat for a very feline-like stretch of his forepaws along his broad bowed oak branch.

"No," said Matthias. "I want to know what are you doing here and now. I always knew there was something about you."

"And I always knew there was something about you," said the Cat unperturbed as he recovered from a yawn. "Though, not as much as I knew there was something about Alice."