Hello, everyone! Here's the next chapter. It's a shorter one, but it sets up what will be coming next.
DISCLAIMER: "Alice: Otherlands" is directed by American McGee and produced by Spicy Horse. All credit to things belonging to them and the "American McGee's Alice" video game series belong to their original creators. All other material in this story belongs to the story's author.
Onward!
The mist-wall does not feel any more comforting when I use it to leave the remaining Vale of Tears. I emerge into a midday atmosphere, close to a small pond; a strong wind is blowing up leaves and sticks along the pond's surface. The pond itself has some green stuff on its surface, so I do not approach it. Instead, I walk around it and check what lies beyond the pond. Glancing at a clear part of the pond's water shows I have my "Vale of Tears" clothes on again.
Beyond the pond is a dirt path wide enough for several people to walk along side-by-side. I take this path, kicking up some dust as I stride along. A bird with a cow's head notices me approach from several feet away and quickly flaps in a different direction.
The big city feels like the best place for me to get allies quickly. Plus, if people talk about this, it will help show the Knave of Hearts is a dangerous person. I think that them knowing that things are not safe is better than them dying without being aware of what's going on.
Have I already made my choice? Is "Londerland" where I want to go? Do I need to keep asking myself these questions?
Yes, yes, and no.
I smirk at my own answers and walk down the path. There are many small things to note, and I enjoy taking them in at my own pace. The path turns left, right, left again, and finally ends with a straight section. The path then opens into a larger space and walkway, marked by a wooden bridge going over the running waters of a larger stream.
A harsh scent hits my nose just as I step onto the bridge. As I wrinkle my nose in disgust, the sky turns dark. Loud noises come from inside the city, followed by plumes of smoke.
I freeze on the bridge. This is not a thunderstorm; it is something far worse, inside the city.
I start running towards the noises as a loud rumbling comes from the same place. The air grows colder. As I cross over the bridge, I see demolished wreckage where homes once were. My footsteps echo against the crackling ambience of unchecked fires and spraying water lines.
Oh, no…
I stop after running without pause for several long seconds. My gaze rests on a grisly sight. A few human hands, along with some insect limbs, poke out of the rubble from what used to be part of the market district. Blood pools along the bottommost stones. Dried blood, still smelling of iron and death.
When I turn away from the blood, my heart and spirit do not break down in sorrow. I have sprayed lots of blood myself in previous battles. I fought, and killed, many beings with my own hands. But this is more like a massacre; like the dead Origami Ants and Deluded Depths fish-men. Dead with no chance to save themselves.
So many dead!
Louder rumbling comes from a few blocks away. Closer to me, tongues of fire burst from a collapsed roof as something beneath it ignites. I look over to the fire, steel my nerves, and summon the "Winter Wand" weapon to my grasp. The wand immediately begins to chill my hands and fingers, but I focus on turning its cold blasts on the flames. The wand's magic proves superior, snuffing out the fire and coating the roof's remnants in a thin layer of frost.
I do not linger by the blood and rubble, running to the end of the block and looking down every connecting street. Shadows dance on the walls, reflecting more fires. I hear no people, however, which makes everything else seem quieter. "Londerland" should have noise and crowds; this is not that city.
I dash through an alleyway, passing by a severed insect-person's body. At the other side, I almost run smack into the slowly advancing form of a robotic walker. Its four thick legs, each colored black that fades at the edges, smashes into the street with no care for damage. A large, metal tank hangs on its back, strapped tightly to the body. Two nozzles point forwards as the walker stomps past, not pausing for a moment or appearing to notice I am here.
The Knave's robots! If they are here, then that means…!
I barely hold myself from rushing out into the open and attacking the machine. The Knave of Hearts must be here, in Londerland! He caused all of this, killed all these innocents! What's worse, Alice isn't here to stop him, only me and whoever is brave or insane enough to be hiding here. As the Knave's fire-belching walker travels along its own path, I silently curse my misfortunes and cast a prayer for Alice to return swiftly.
I dart, wait, dart, and wait. I dare not use my teleportation powers or the "Winter Wand's" magic, in the hopes that I can avoid detection a bit easier. Given that so much here has become dark, and lifeless, bursts of white mist or blue-green frost may seem noticeable. I don't want to be noticed here.
After passing three more blocks and dismissing the "Winter Wand", I come across a ruined clearing. What used to be a small roundabout is now a messy circle of rubble. In the middle of the circle is the Knave of Hearts, still in his suit of spiked armor. Flanked by two of those bladed robots, he stands at about half their size. They all appear small before the large, swirling white hole floating behind them.
I stay in the corner of the alleyway I currently am in, trying to look closer at the hole. I have never seen this kind of thing before. Its white light brightens the darkness around it, but it seems… wrong. Almost like this hole is not supposed to be here. Wonderland and "Londerland" does have different methods of travel between realms—Alice and I have used some of them—but this is nothing like those.
The Knave turns back to the swirling white hole, his robots moving to look around the area. I slip back behind cover, breathing slowly with a hand on my "Vale of Tears" suit collar. This is worse for me than before: I have no backup and no immediate way to get help. If I attack now, as I so very much want to, I may not survive the return assault. Using my mist powers will only get me so far, and certainly not far enough to win.
What should I do?
A blaring noise comes from the Knave's position. I risk looking back there, seeing the bladed robots hunched down to the ground with their blades dug into the broken street. They look ready to fight, not that I want to charge at them. I am trying to not be a barbarian anymore, but it is hard to block my instincts.
A flash of light comes from the white hole. The Knave raises his hand towards it, gauntleted fingers splayed out wide. The hole flashes again, a bolt of white light lashing out to strike the Knave's hand. He jerks back, shouting a muffled curse. With the flash of a "Clubs" suit symbol, that hammer appears in his hands again.
I see an opening to strike. The bladed robots are not facing me, and they don't appear to be moving. Maybe, if I can get the right angle, I can deal a huge blow before they notice me. I summon the "Automaton Hammer" and angle it into the "Ranged" mode. Kneeling in the alleyway, I close one eye and peer at my target with my other eye. I press the firing switch as the oh-so-familiar throb of power flows through my hands.
The ball of molten metal I launch at the Knave and his robot guards smashes into the ground in between all of them. The subsequent explosion it generates knocks the Knave prone and tears holes into the robot's sides. The machines make several more blaring sounds as they collapse and struggle to move; I take this chance to switch my weapon back to its "Melee" mode, step out into view, and get some answers.
"What is this, Knave?" I shout once the machines take up guarding stances between the Knave and me. "Why are you destroying the city? There is no Ruin here!"
"Incorrect!" The Knave springs to his feet, moving faster than a man in plate armor should be able to. "The Ruin is buried in the minds of its people. They remember this "Doll-Maker", and in doing so they keep that monster alive."
"You are destroying Wonderland!" I accuse as the Knave readies his own hammer again.
"I am cleansing it!" The Knave grips his hammer in one hand and points its heavier front end at me. "Wonderland must be fixed at its core, all its impurities burned away."
"That does not give you the right to destroy what is here." I point to several blasted holes, dead corpses, and the smoke from fires still burning in nearby blocks. "I want the Ruin gone as well," I insist, "but not like this!"
"You would wait until the cancerous remnants of the Dollmaker grow old and stodgy, then? Until Alice Liddel becomes aged and decrepit!?"
The Knave's voice grows louder, his helmet amplifying it to a booming level. My composure falters under the Knave's words; they carry enough reasoning behind them to be worth thinking about. But I can't think about them now, I have a danger right in front of me!
"There must be order," the Knave tells me, his voice going back to its prior tone and volume. He takes two steps forward, both hands now squeezing his hammer's handle. "Only order will withstand the chaos of Alice's reality. You are a fool to not see it this way."
"Be quiet!" I shout, bristling at being called a fool. It's almost as bad as being called a barbarian.
"Naïve boy. You are not listening."
"I'm seeing enough to call you a monster!" I shout as I raise the "Automaton Hammer" to match the way he holds it. The robots still guard their master, inert and damaged as they are. I can't get past them.
"I am no more a monster than the people in the real world."
"The "real" world?" My eyes widen, thinking back to the worlds I've visited on my own and with Alice. "You mean London, England? That world?"
The Knave straightens up, saying nothing. His silence tells me I picked the right place; if I had not, he probably would be insulting my intelligence again. Behind the Knave, the white hole continues to shine and flash, looking no smaller than before.
"Alice Liddel is in London now," the Knave proclaims in a quieter voice. "London is a world of industry, innovation, and immoral indulgences. Wonderland is her escape, her fantasy. Her reality was, and is, far worse. She came here before to escape the rules of her life. Then her family died in the fire, and there was no escape left but madness."
I remember all this very well. "We stopped the madness," I tell the Knave. "Wonderland is safe. Alice is happy with the way things are."
"It will not be this way for long." The Knave's eyes glow inside his helmet while he looks at me. "Alice is a product of London's darkest habits. A girl who lost everything and got nothing in return. Now, free to pursue her interests and not bound by the laws of a child, she is beginning to discard her childish ways; she is becoming a proper woman."
"And that is a bad thing to you?" I clarify.
"Do not rush to judgement," the Knave snaps before regaining his composure. "Coming of age is a natural and welcomed rite of passage. But we, creatures of Alice's mind, are not supposed to change along with her. Unless Wonderland changes with us, we will become a fantasy of her past. The fire changed Wonderland, but Alice's current path will have us lost forever."
I flinch, understanding this truth but not truly accepting it. Her Majesty, the Red Queen, said something similar: "We will not be doomed. We will be forgotten. I may survive here, but you two are finished!"
Doctor Angus Bumby had also said, "Memory is a curse more often than a blessing." It pains me to admit his truths are still relevant after his death.
"The Dollmaker thought that way, too," I say while taking a few steps to my left. The bladed robots attempt to shuffle around to match my position but move slower than me. "He used hypnosis to make Alice into her toy, like other children in London."
"I have seen the aftermath of this corruptor's effects." The Knave turns to face me, never exposing his side to me. He knows what he is doing, and he keeps talking while he does so. "His work exists in different shapes and sizes inside other Londoner's minds. Minds that Alice is now sensing, interacting, and changing, no matter the consequences."
I stop walking. Those last words… Are they true? Is Alice really changing other people simply by being with them? Could Alice's previous time in Wonderland be a cause of the problems she faced back then?
"Ah, you understand me now." The Knave appears to smile, but I don't so much see it as hear it in his voice. "Alice Liddel is changing the minds of others, while abandoning Wonderland to die on its own."
My brain lurches, denial intermingling with disbelief. To say Alice, our creator, left us behind, to fade away all alone seems very wrong. She would not discard what she has made: Wonderland has endured in her absence, even if it took different forms! The Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat, even the Red Queen are still here, fighting instead of dying.
Maybe that's not true anymore, though. Maybe Wonderland is dying, and I just haven't noticed it. If you leave something alone for long enough, it will eventually rot away…
"No. No, she will come back here." My fear slips into my voice, but my grip on the "Automaton Hammer" stays firm. "It'll be like she did before. She'll come back to save us."
The Knave scoffs. "She is no longer miserable with her station. Are you so much of a puppet to her will that you are content to be put in a dark cupboard, never to see the Sun again?"
I bite back an insult; how dare this armored exile question my loyalty towards Alice?! "Alice created me," I shout back at him. "I owe her everything!"
"You are her fantasy," the Knave growls, his anger rising again. "When she has tired of you, you will be worth nothing to her." The Knave turns back towards the white hole, readying his hammer as his robots shift positions to block my attacking him. "I do not wish for my home to be forgotten like that," he declares.
"Then I will find her." I risk stepping towards the robots, not willing to run away this time. "I'll get her to come back here and stop you!"
"You will die." The Knave raises his hammer, looking ready to strike at the white hole. "The other worlds, other minds, are realms beyond comprehension. Alice is already lost to them. And Wonderland will follow if I do not stop it."
"Liar!" My vision flashes red, images of Alice lying somewhere and bleeding out, all alone, rush through my brain. "I will find Alice, and help her save our world!"
The Knave says nothing back to me before swinging his hammer at the white hole. The weapon actually strikes the surface as if it is a solid wall; unfortunately, for him at least, the hole proves far stronger than his weapon. The Knave slides back a few feet, his hammer flying out of his hands and skidding to a stop on top of some broken cobblestone blocks.
The white hole flashes again, and this time I feel something pass through my body. Some new power suddenly emerges, filling the clearing with a pressing weight. The power intensifies as a giant, winged creature bursts through the hole, screaming through a fanged mouth as it unfurls wings made of ripped skin and black blood. A second later, a swarm of flying machines knocks down the creature while passing overhead, filling the sky with buzzing engines.
"No! I am too late!" The Knave's voice barely comes through the growing cacophony of noises coming from the white hole. "The Outside has already begun invading!"
He is right. I see him grab his hammer and rush at the fanged creature as it grabs onto one of the Knave's robots. The beast sees him coming and pumps its wings. The robot is too heavy to lift, but the creature uses its taller body as a takeoff point so it can fly into the air. I look back at the white hole, seeing more flying machines emerge like giant metal bugs and making just as much noise.
Suddenly, the white hole starts smoking. No, wait, those are large shadows; I see them shift into grinning, muscular monsters with glowing armor colored red and black and gray. These monsters howl as they charge out of the hole and into the empty "Londerland" streets, some of them riding horses that shriek like ghastly specters.
It is a horrifying scene. My vision blurs at all the new sights before me. The white hole is the only constant, the source of all these new terrors. No wonder the Knave was trying to attack it. If this is the "Outside", I do not want to be near it.
Alice is out there, though. Somewhere in the "Outside", she is living her own life. I remember what the Insane Children and I had to do to find Alice before. Now, things may already be too late.
But I won't just stand here and watch the world burn. Not when I can get help and save it.
Caterpillar's words come back to me: "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."
The Knave shouts at me while attacking the multitude of invading things around him. I do not hear his words as I run into the portal and leap at its surface. My body phases through what feels like a thick layer of gelatinous goop, the substance not slowing me down in the least. I shut my eyes to block out any dangerous sights or harmful objects harming my sight.
After several seconds of tumbling through the goop, I burst from it and land on a hard surface. Coughing, I crack my eyes open for a few seconds. A pair of narrow walls made of brick and stone constrict me into a small, narrow pathway. Mold and dampness cover the walls, the stench of something old and wet slowly invading my nostrils.
The corpse of a mangy white cat lies by one of the walls, its body clearly long begun to decay. I force my eyes open fully, recognizing this place from my regained memories. The end of the alleyway is close enough for me to see, and easy enough for me to approach without issue. Even the sight of the dead cat does not faze me.
Looking outwards, I see dim lamps arranged along the corners of different city blocks. The streets are made of brick and stone, laid down straight. No one is walking about, but the buildings I see have closed and boarded windows for multiple levels above the ground.
I swallow hard. This is London, the real "London". And that means, outside the alleyway, Alice Liddle is here. But if what the Knave says is true…
Will Alice want to come back?
Alright, that's all for now.
A short chapter, but I am working out a larger plan for this story. As usual, reviews and feedback is appreciated.
Draconos is taking off.