WonderLand

"It isn't manners for us to begin, you know," A massive rose, with thorns the size of my fist, suddenly said, turning it's crimson bloom down to face me. "And I was really wondering when you'd speak! I said to myself, 'Her face has got some sense in it, though it's not a clever one!' Still, you're the right color, and that goes a long way."

"I don't care about the color," Another flower, a tiger lily, remarked abruptly in a prim tone, "If only her petals curled up a little more, she'd be all right."

"Oh dear," was about all I could manage. I was feeling a little blindsided by this new development, though honestly, after everything else that had happened so far, I probably should have been a lot less surprised, since talking flowers were hardly the strangest thing that had happened to me so far.

"Oh dear? Well, that's hardly an introduction now, is it! Honestly, I have never met such a rude flower before in all my days!" The Tiger Lily snapped, ruffling up her petals indignantly.

"I don't even think she is a flower; she looks more like a weed to me!" A Lilac whispered to the Tiger Lily, just loudly enough for me to hear.

"I'm not a flower or a weed!" I snapped, my nose in the air. "I'm a person, and I'm not in any mood to be insulted by a bunch of plants right now. Now I would very much appreciate it if you could please tell me how to get to the Chess Board."

The flowers seemed more than a little offended at my tone, but the Rose gave a civil enough reply, if a little sulkily. "I am afraid we most certainly haven't the least bit of an idea. We're rooted, you know. We can't go wandering around the countryside like a wild thing, like you. We just stay in our bed, where it is safe."

I sighed, my hopes dashed once again. I was never going to get out of here.

"Who planted you here?" I asked, in a much nicer tone, trying to get the flowers into a better temper. Even if they couldn't direct me to the Chess Board, maybe they could help me with something, so I figured I should start trying to be nice, even if they weren't.

"The Red and White Queens." The Rose replied proudly. "We were their personal garden. They used to come take lovely long walks through us all the time, and we would sing the most delightful songs to them!" The other flowers gave happy murmurs in agreement, and a bed of pansies gave a longing sigh in unison. "But is has been such a very long time since those days."

I could guess where this was going, and I decided to change the subject. "How is it that you all can talk? I've never met any talking flowers before."

"Put your hand down, and feel the ground," said the Tiger Lily. "Then you'll know why."

I bent down and laid my palm against the cold dirt. I didn't notice anything particularly unusual, except that the earth was packed down tightly.

"The ground is very hard," I said, "but I don't see what that has to do with it."

"In most gardens," the Tiger Lily replied smugly, "they make the beds too soft--so that the flowers are always asleep."

"I never thought of that before!" I remarked politely, even though it made about as much sense as the reason anything else happened in WonderLand so far--that is to say, none. But unfortunately, but good natured attempt at politeness backfired.

"It's my opinion that you never think at all," the Rose said, in a rather severe tone.

"I never saw anybody that looked stupider," the Violet added suddenly. A couple of daffodils gave inelegant snorts of laughter.

"Hold your tongue!" cried the Tiger Lily sharply. "As if you ever saw anybody! You keep your head under the leaves, and snore away there, till you know no more what's going on in the world, than if you were a bud!"

"Alright," I quickly cut in, trying to diffuse the situation. "It's no matter. Just... can any of you tell me anything? I'm afraid I'm lost, and I'm being chased by some very bad men, and it is extremely important I find my way to the Chess Board. So if you know anybody I can talk to, or somewhere I can go...?"

"Well," The Rose said, sounding a little mollified, "There is someone who still visits us from time to time."

"To care for us, you know," The Tiger Lily added.

"Because while I could fend off a jaguar or a bandersnatch with my thorns if they came close enough, if they were out of my reach we would all be left helpless." The Rose remarked.

"So he still comes every once in a while to make sure we are getting along nicely, and pull up any weeds who try to invade," the Lilac chirruped.

"Oh good," I said in relief. So with a little luck, I wasn't totally stranded out here. I just hoped whoever this person was, he was a good guy. "Who is he? And where can I find him?"

"I am afraid we don't know." The Rose said apologetically. "He comes to us, you see. We haven't the foggiest where he goes when he leaves. But tell us your name, and the next time he visits, we will tell him you came."

"Well, my name is Alex, but it might be easier if I just waited for--"

I didn't get to finish my sentence. The moment I let my name slip, the entire garden was suddenly in an uproar, with every flower shouting at once and waving their leaves frantically to and fro.

"Hey, what-?" I began, but it was impossible to make myself heard over the cacophonous garden. The Rose lowered it's huge head and butted me away, causing me to stumble backwards and fall to the ground.

"We don't want any Alices here in our garden!" She shouted, lashing out at me again. I scooted out of reach and pushed myself back up to my feet, only to be shoved from behind by a Morning Glory, and into the bed of pansies which immediatly fell upon me. I was buffeted from flower to flower, each one attacking me as best they could with their silky petals, though a few of the thorned ones managed to dig their spikes deep into my arms and legs.

"Get out of our garden, Alice!"

"You'll lead the Queen of Hearts right to us, Alice!"

"I bet you were planning on picking all of us!"

"Go ruin someone elses' garden!"

"WonderLand doesn't welcome you, Alice!"

"You're worse than a weed!"

I covered my face with my arms, trying to shield myself from the vengeful flowers. They continued to tear at my hair and dress, and used their creeping vines to grab my ankles and pull my down to the ground. There was nowhere I could run to; the garden was so tightly packed that no matter where I stood one of the plants could reach me. I fought back, kicking and tearing at leaves, and tried to push my way past them and out of the flower bed, but their sheer size made it nearly impossible for me to fight my way through. I fell back into the midst of them, and was forced to my knees. This is it, I thought to myself. After everything else I've been through, after nearly falling to my death, nearly getting kidnapped by the Cat, getting tackled by the Carpenter, meeting pig babies and cursed cookies and everything else, I'm going to be done in by a bunch of pansies.

Just as I was about to resign myself to the most pathetic death imaginable, something suddenly grabbed me by my arm and hauled me up and back, away from the attacking flora.

"She's the Alice, Gardener!" The Rose screamed, waving her thorns threateningly at me while I was being dragged backwards, out of her reach.

"Pick all her petals off!" The Lilac screeched. The Daffodils honked angrily, and the Morning Glories refused to unwrap their prickly vines from around my ankles until whoever was dragging me away wrenched me from their grasps.

I was pulled from the garden and back into the comparative safety of the forest, covered in bloody scratches, dirt, and bits of shredded petals. My savior had simply seized me by my arm and dragged me, still kneeling in the dirt, from the garden, so I hadn't gotten a look at him. But the flowers had called him the "Gardener", so I could only assume he was the one they had mentioned that took care of them since the Red and White Queen's deaths.
We stopped in the cool shade of the massive trees, and I knelt on my knees, panting heavily and trying to cough up the wads of dirt that had been lodged in my throat.

"I'm--cough cough--so sorry--cough cough--I didn't mean to upset them..." I tried to apologize, and I looked up at the man who had rescued me.

And began choking all over again, this time on my own sharp intake of breath.

"Cat?!" I gasped, while I struggled to breathe. Without replying he knelt to the ground beside me and pounded me on my back, until my coughing fit subsided. "Who the... when did you... what are..." I stammered, at a complete loss for words. The Cat gave me a weak smile, and I suddenly noticed how haggard he looked.

"You gave me quite a scare there, Alex," He said quietly, his voice strained. He reached out to brush debris out of my hair, but I flung myself backwards out of his reach before he could touch me.

"Uh, no!" I was incredulous. "What the hell do you think your doing here?!"

"I came to rescue you," He replied, a tad lamely.

"I don't need your help!" I snapped, struggling to rise to my feet. He came forwards, his hands outstretched to steady me, but I stumbled backwards, away from him again, and he stopped abruptly, his expression suddenly darkening.

"Oh really? Because it looked like you sure needed it to me in the Garden!" He snapped, his green eyes flashing.

"Well, if you're so eager to help all of a sudden, where, pray tell, were you when that fat guy and his Carpenter friend were threatening me with weapons and breaking my ribs?" I countered furiously. At my words, he blanched, suddenly looking as if he was about to be sick.

"She sent the Walrus and the Carpenter after you?" He asked, his voice a few octaves higher than usual.

"What? You didn't know?" I replied, with officious sweetness. "I would have figured you were in on it, being that woman's faithful little traitor!"

The Cat's complexion colored again, and I vaguely wondered what this was doing to his blood pressure. "Alex, stop it! I told you before, you don't understand-"

"What isn't there to understand?" I gave a little laugh, that may have sounded just slightly crazy. "You lied to me, you betrayed me, you tried to hand me over to woman who wants me dead, or at the very least incapacitated, twice! What am I missing here?"

The Cat bared his teeth in frustration. "Well, of course it sounds bad when you say it like that..."

"If you think I'm going with you to the Queen, you're wrong." I spat, trying to brush the worst of the dirt off my dress. "I've had to sleep in the forest, put up with Gryphon's lip, watch my only friends get beat up by you, get attacked and kidnapped by a couple of hammer wielding lunatics, and get attacked by a bunch of talking flowers in order to get to that stupid Chess board so I can go home and I'll be damned if I let you stop me now." I pushed my hair out of my face and rolled up my metaphorical sleeves, determined that I wasn't going to be taken without a fight. "If I could take the Walrus and his blockhead friend, I can take you too, so I suggest you either get out of my way, or point me in the direction of the Chess Board right now."

An odd collection of emotions flitted across the Cat's face, and for a long moment it was impossible to tell whether he was about to laugh or cry. "You... you 'took' the Walrus and the Carpenter?" He asked after a moment, in disbelief.

"I wouldn't be standing here right now if I didn't." I replied coldly. The Cat shook his head, his green eyes shining.

"I don't know whether you are incredibly brave, or just incredibly lucky. Either was, you most certainly are incredibly stupid. I don't know how you escaped from them, but believe me when I say it was a one time fluke. They are not the kind of men people cross more than once and live to tell about it. And you can bet your life that now that her best hit men have failed, the Queen won't be holding back any more. She wants your head, Alex, and she is willing to do anything to get it."

"And that's why you're here, I suppose?" I replied coldly.

And expression of pain briefly flashed across the Cat's features.

"No," he said firmly. "I'm on your side now, Alex. I'm not taking you to the Queen. We're going to the Chess Board."

"I..." I faltered. The Cat, a... triple agent? This was getting ridiculous, and impossible to follow. "Wait, what?"

"Alex, things have gotten wildly out of control. I fear I have made a great mistake. I know how you feel about me right now, but time is running short. I need you to trust me, Alex, and I need you to do it now." The Cat said, speaking quickly now, his green eyes widening imploringly.

"I... how am I supposed to trust you?" I gaped in disbelief.

"I know, Alex, and I'm sorry, I really am. But I haven't lied to you yet, you can't deny that, so believe me when I say unless you trust me for now, the Queen will have you by sundown. I am the only person who can keep you safe now. Do you trust me, Alex?" He looked at me, his hand outstretched, silently waiting for my answer. I fought with myself, a hundred different emotions and a million different voices of logic and reason raging internally in me. I chewed on my bottom lip, my heart pounding in my ears, searching the Cat's wide eyes until I finally came to a choice.

"I don't suppose I have any choice," I relented, taking his hand. "You did call me Alex, after all."