Hidden Alice
Title: Hidden Alice:
Fandom: Alice in Wonderland. Also inspired by the spin-off 'Are You Alice?'
Rating: Teens
Warnings: AU, character death.
Summary: The White Rabbit is tired of his world. He is tired of the way nothing ever seems to change. He is tired of the way people disappear and leave him to go back to the Dull World to bring their replacements. One day, he decides to change things by bringing in a boy and naming him Alice. Years later, another boy tries to kill himself and finds himself face to face with the last person he ever expected to see.
This is a work of fiction and I do not own the setting or the characters used in this story.
Link to Art: (Art)
Artist: evian_fork
Link to Part Two: (Part Two)
~~~
Part One
~~~
There was once a White Rabbit.
He was bored of life, simply bored. Nothing ever seemed to change, and life went on monotonously. He had his duties, and he performed them, at least he liked to think that he did, with utmost efficiency. But something was missing in his life. He was sure that was why he was bored. So one day, just to change things around a little, he killed a man.
And then, he changed. His duty had changed, so he changed along with it. He had to go back there, back to the Dull World, back to the world without the colors he loved. He had to go back to the world where he would seek a new Alice, one that would replace the person he loved the most.; that and another useless creature.
An idea hit him then. Why not bring in someone more to his liking? Who cared what the world thought? He had lost the most important person to him, all to the whims of a madman. He started counting then - there was the First Alice that had disappeared, the one he had never found no matter how hard he had searched. There was the Second Alice, who had died when she drowned in a lake because of one step taken in the wrong direction, he couldn’t prevent that either. There was the Third Alice who died when the Queen of Hearts cut off her head, there was the Fourth Alice who died when a boulder fell on her. And then, there was the Fifth Alice, his Alice. She was perfect in every way. He could find nothing wrong with her. She did her duty, or at least had tried to before she was abruptly removed. He hadn’t known when it had happened to the fourth, but this time he knew. He saw. He saw the Mad Hatter put poison in her tea. He watched as she reached out towards that cup, a bright smile on her face. She trusted everyone - that was her only fault. The White Rabbit had tried to warn her, but she had laughed him off.
“Don’t be silly!” She had said, as she brushed her hair behind her left ear. Why shouldn’t she trust her friends? She soon found out why. And the White Rabbit found his reason for living gone. He hadn’t understood at first- the pain he had felt. He wasn’t supposed to feel it, he was sure of that. He had never felt anything like that before, so why now? He had watched as the Mad Hatter laughed, not his usual eccentric laugh, but a scary sort of one. The White Rabbit had reached for the butter knife then. He didn’t know what he was doing.
Red.
That was what lay in front of him once the deed was done. Red, smeared over the dirt on the ground. It moved, as if it was creating a path. No, as if it was carving a path out for itself, reaching out towards someone, anyone. The red color that had smeared the grounds near the Hatter’s house that day. The White Rabbit didn’t know why he did it. But the sight of the Fifth struggling, clawing at her throat had made him act before he could think. Why had the Mad Hatter killed Alice? He didn’t know. He hadn’t waited to ask. Was it simply because he was mad? The White Rabbit paid no heed to that. More work needed to be done. He needed to find a new Alice. And so, as he brushed his tears aside and looked for a place to dispose of the bodies he wondered, ‘what was the point of it all?’
But that was a long time ago, and ever since then, he had started to number them. He numbered the Alices. He knew they would die. He knew he was bringing them to a slaughterhouse. A fun carnival ride that ended when the Ferris Wheel locked itself at the top, and then plunged down, down towards the earth. All that would be left was a body to clean up. It was someone else every time, someone else would kill Alice, someone else would be brought in to replace Alice. And each time he travelled to that Dull World to bring a replacement, he could see himself change.
He thought of new things now, the world of men had taught him to think differently. He had seen new things - a woman being stabbed for the money she had, a girl betrayed by her lover who had then killed herself, wars, plagues, death. He had seen death and he was now immune to it. It had another color though, where he came from, death had a very specific color. But that color was absent in the Dull World. He knew because he had tried. He had tried to emulate those around him; he had killed a man who had ferociously shot a rabbit right in front of him. It wasn’t out of anger, he had never felt rage overtake him since the time of the Fifth, but he had simply wanted to experiment. So he had killed, and he had liked it.
But when the blood of that man touched him, he had changed in more ways than one. This red was not trying to carve itself out - trying to make a pathway for itself, knowing that it would be replaced. This red was as dull as the world it was a part of. It simply formed a pool around the man. The White Rabbit had touched it, and when he did, he saw that he had hands; human hands. He panicked. He ran to the pond nearby, to take a look at himself. He was looking human; like a small boy. That was what he had become- except for one thing, his ears. He still had his old ears and a small amount of white fur that covered his whole body.
An anomaly. He had decided that he was an anomaly. And that gave him the right to do whatever he wanted. But he still had a sense of duty, so he went to collect the Thirty-Third Alice. He was slightly sad; the element of wonder might be gone now. But he was wrong. The Thirty Third was more delighted by his features than the previous thirty two had been. He supposed being half-human had its perks.
But the Thirty-Third, much like her predecessors had been a disappointment.
“I’m sorry.” She had cried with tears streaming down her face.
The White Rabbit had just stared at her, unsure of what to do. He was sure that the old him would have tried to reassure her, tell her that she was worthy of the task she had been given. But the anomaly he had become couldn’t do that. So he simply stared. Alice didn’t want to live because the Hatter didn’t love her? That sounded funny to him, so he couldn’t help but smile. If that was what she wanted, he would give her that. And so, he killed his first Alice. He strangled her. He could feel her struggling beneath him, but wasn’t this what she wanted? The new Hatter he had brought was not capable of loving anyone; he had made sure of that. And if this Alice was not going to fulfill her duty, then he needed to find another one that could. And in order to do that, he would need to dispose of this Alice first.
It was fun. More fun than killing that old man had been. He wondered if he could do it again. Kill Alice. He wasn’t supposed to do that, he had thought to himself. But who cared? He would just bring in a new one to replace her, and all would be well.
He had noticed something else right then as well, how no one noticed these changes. Did no one realize that Thirty-three Alices had come and gone? They didn’t seem to at any rate. He wondered if he could toy with them, he wondered if they were toying with him. Who had killed all those Alices? And who would kill the next one?
Their world seemed to now revolve around that. The disappearance of the First Alice had made everyone around him panic, cry, scream in distress. But over time, they had become used to it. This is what was supposed to happen.
There was one thing that the White Rabbit was scared of. He thought he was becoming more human with each trip to that Dull World. And he found himself unusually attached to another Alice, the Fifty-Seventh. He liked her. She was a bit dark, gloomy even. But she was practical, and he liked that. He liked how she could solve any problem, how she concentrated on any task given to her. She was one of the few Alices whom even the Queen of Hearts had come to like. He had thought that this would be the last Alice, the real Alice. But he was wrong.
She met her demise at the hands of the March Hare. The White Rabbit killed again, he killed that hare. How could he? The White Rabbit had felt betrayed. But that was not all.
He had to go back there again, and he didn’t want to. He didn’t want to fulfill his duties. He didn’t want to bring in another person who would die. Death was intriguing to him, but he didn’t like how every time he liked a new Alice, they would be snatched from him. He felt like a boy who had lost his favorite toy. But that attachment was superficial, and he understood that better than anyone else. This time, this time - he thought, he would bring in a new Alice, someone who would live.
The new Alice died, but the replacement for the March Hare did not. In fact, the White Rabbit quite liked him. They became good friends. The March Hare became someone whom the White Rabbit could speak to; he was even a partner who gladly traveled to the Dull World with him. And the White Rabbit liked that. And just like the White Rabbit, the March Hare soon became more and more human. He had human features, but he retained his ears and that slight furriness - just that bit, but not visible unless you were looking at him carefully. The March Hare had new ideas too. And quite a few of them were mischievous. The Cheshire Cat was the usual victim of these pranks, and this delighted the Hatter to no ends. Things were looking up, and the new Alice was still alive. The Eighty-First Alice - would she be the last one?
The Cheshire Cat killed her. “It was an accident”, he had smiled, but the White Rabbit knew otherwise. So he went on with his duty - to find the next Alice. And the Marsh Hare went along with him - he always tagged along with his best friend.
That was when they met the boy. He didn’t look much older than the White Rabbit, and he had the mental capacity of the March Hare. He was childish, but mature in the way he dealt with his younger brother. The boy had spotted their unusual features - he could see their fur, even though it should barely have been visible from the other side of the park.
Why the White Rabbit had entertained the March Hare’s desire to play in the park was beyond him, one should think that he was too old for such things. And that was when they saw the boy playing with his younger brother.
It was late at night, and the park was mostly deserted. He wondered what they were doing out there, all alone out so late at night. He wondered who that boy was. And then, when the boy said, “Talking animals!” He was actually surprised. He was laughing, not in a mean way, but in good humor. The White Rabbit was really intrigued. And that was when he had the idea. What if this boy was to become the new Alice?
They couldn’t find a replacement, even though they had searched all day, and he was running out of time. So why not take this boy with him? He was unusual. He could see them for what they really were, not a common feature among most humans. They just saw what they wanted to see. But this boy could see beyond his transformations, he could see beyond all his adaptations - he could see the White Rabbit for what he really was.
He probably would never have agreed to the idea, but the March Hare liked it. “It should be interesting.” He had said.
And that decided it. If he was by himself, the White Rabbit would never have done it, but now that he had someone who agreed with him there was no turning back. So he invited the boy. The boy came eagerly; he wanted to talk to the talking rabbit. His brother waited on the other side of the park; he was too scared, too shy to follow.
Two days later, when the police asked him what had happened to his brother, he told them the same thing he had told so many people before, “He followed the talking rabbit.”
~~~
The White Rabbit was amazed. But the March Hare was not.
“What did you expect?” He asked. This was going to happen. The White Rabbit had known that this would happen. No one said anything. Even though the Eighty-Second was a boy, no one said anything at all. They all treated him like he was Alice, and soon he would become Alice. The Hatter liked him, the Cheshire Cat liked him, the Queen of Hearts loved him - but that was proof enough that he wasn’t Alice. Was the White Rabbit contradicting himself? He wasn’t sure.
He loved Alice. He loved Alice more than he had loved any of the previous Alices. He loved him like a brother. But there was something missing. Alice had no duties. Alice had no responsibilities. No one ever asked Alice to do anything. Alice was symbolic. He was just a little boy playing all day. And that made the White Rabbit wonder.
Not everybody loved Alice though, the March Hare hated him. He hated how the White Rabbit paid more attention to the boy, “You don’t play with me anymore!” The March Hare had complained to him one day.
“Don’t be silly, you’re not a kid.” It was his usual reply. His usual reply to anything childish the Hare said. The White Rabbit was the adult. So what if they both looked like children? At heart, the White Rabbit was far older than anyone he knew.
It would be a lie if he said that he hadn’t noticed. It would be a lie if he said that he didn’t want the March Hare to kill Alice. It had been so long since he had gone to the Dull World. He felt a yearning to return, nostalgia enveloped him. Also, he was looking more and more like his old self with every passing day. His human features were disappearing. The same features that had so awed the Queen of Hearts that she gave him personal attendance at the court. He was proud of how he looked, and now it was disappearing. He couldn’t go back to the Dull World, not without a purpose, not unless he had to. He didn’t know why, that’s just how things were. That’s how his world operated. So someone would have to kill Alice, but he couldn’t do it himself. No, he loved Alice too much. But he knew how it could be done. So he played with Alice all day and watched as the March Hare grew angrier with each passing day. At first, he would just stare menacingly towards Alice, but as time went on he kept becoming more and more aggressive.
The White Rabbit could have sworn that he had seen the March Hare eyeing his knife one day when he had called his friend over to dinner. It pleased the White Rabbit. Things were going well. But there was a problem. He had picked the replacement for that old dead hare very specifically. He had wanted someone who would not kill Alice. So how could he make this Hare kill Alice? Just getting him jealous wouldn’t be enough. It couldn’t be just the White Rabbit; everyone would have to marvel at Alice. Everyone would have to ignore the March Hare.
Doing that was easy enough. First, the White Rabbit started to ignore him - he started focusing more on Alice, more and more with each passing day. The March Hare was never really close to anyone else, and it proved to be not very difficult for him to be side-lined. They had a new Alice!
And then one day, just as the White Rabbit had expected, Alice disappeared.
Fandom: Alice in Wonderland. Also inspired by the spin-off 'Are You Alice?'
Rating: Teens
Warnings: AU, character death.
Summary: The White Rabbit is tired of his world. He is tired of the way nothing ever seems to change. He is tired of the way people disappear and leave him to go back to the Dull World to bring their replacements. One day, he decides to change things by bringing in a boy and naming him Alice. Years later, another boy tries to kill himself and finds himself face to face with the last person he ever expected to see.
This is a work of fiction and I do not own the setting or the characters used in this story.
Link to Art: (Art)
Artist: evian_fork
Link to Part Two: (Part Two)
~~~
Part One
~~~
There was once a White Rabbit.
He was bored of life, simply bored. Nothing ever seemed to change, and life went on monotonously. He had his duties, and he performed them, at least he liked to think that he did, with utmost efficiency. But something was missing in his life. He was sure that was why he was bored. So one day, just to change things around a little, he killed a man.
And then, he changed. His duty had changed, so he changed along with it. He had to go back there, back to the Dull World, back to the world without the colors he loved. He had to go back to the world where he would seek a new Alice, one that would replace the person he loved the most.; that and another useless creature.
An idea hit him then. Why not bring in someone more to his liking? Who cared what the world thought? He had lost the most important person to him, all to the whims of a madman. He started counting then - there was the First Alice that had disappeared, the one he had never found no matter how hard he had searched. There was the Second Alice, who had died when she drowned in a lake because of one step taken in the wrong direction, he couldn’t prevent that either. There was the Third Alice who died when the Queen of Hearts cut off her head, there was the Fourth Alice who died when a boulder fell on her. And then, there was the Fifth Alice, his Alice. She was perfect in every way. He could find nothing wrong with her. She did her duty, or at least had tried to before she was abruptly removed. He hadn’t known when it had happened to the fourth, but this time he knew. He saw. He saw the Mad Hatter put poison in her tea. He watched as she reached out towards that cup, a bright smile on her face. She trusted everyone - that was her only fault. The White Rabbit had tried to warn her, but she had laughed him off.
“Don’t be silly!” She had said, as she brushed her hair behind her left ear. Why shouldn’t she trust her friends? She soon found out why. And the White Rabbit found his reason for living gone. He hadn’t understood at first- the pain he had felt. He wasn’t supposed to feel it, he was sure of that. He had never felt anything like that before, so why now? He had watched as the Mad Hatter laughed, not his usual eccentric laugh, but a scary sort of one. The White Rabbit had reached for the butter knife then. He didn’t know what he was doing.
Red.
That was what lay in front of him once the deed was done. Red, smeared over the dirt on the ground. It moved, as if it was creating a path. No, as if it was carving a path out for itself, reaching out towards someone, anyone. The red color that had smeared the grounds near the Hatter’s house that day. The White Rabbit didn’t know why he did it. But the sight of the Fifth struggling, clawing at her throat had made him act before he could think. Why had the Mad Hatter killed Alice? He didn’t know. He hadn’t waited to ask. Was it simply because he was mad? The White Rabbit paid no heed to that. More work needed to be done. He needed to find a new Alice. And so, as he brushed his tears aside and looked for a place to dispose of the bodies he wondered, ‘what was the point of it all?’
But that was a long time ago, and ever since then, he had started to number them. He numbered the Alices. He knew they would die. He knew he was bringing them to a slaughterhouse. A fun carnival ride that ended when the Ferris Wheel locked itself at the top, and then plunged down, down towards the earth. All that would be left was a body to clean up. It was someone else every time, someone else would kill Alice, someone else would be brought in to replace Alice. And each time he travelled to that Dull World to bring a replacement, he could see himself change.
He thought of new things now, the world of men had taught him to think differently. He had seen new things - a woman being stabbed for the money she had, a girl betrayed by her lover who had then killed herself, wars, plagues, death. He had seen death and he was now immune to it. It had another color though, where he came from, death had a very specific color. But that color was absent in the Dull World. He knew because he had tried. He had tried to emulate those around him; he had killed a man who had ferociously shot a rabbit right in front of him. It wasn’t out of anger, he had never felt rage overtake him since the time of the Fifth, but he had simply wanted to experiment. So he had killed, and he had liked it.
But when the blood of that man touched him, he had changed in more ways than one. This red was not trying to carve itself out - trying to make a pathway for itself, knowing that it would be replaced. This red was as dull as the world it was a part of. It simply formed a pool around the man. The White Rabbit had touched it, and when he did, he saw that he had hands; human hands. He panicked. He ran to the pond nearby, to take a look at himself. He was looking human; like a small boy. That was what he had become- except for one thing, his ears. He still had his old ears and a small amount of white fur that covered his whole body.
An anomaly. He had decided that he was an anomaly. And that gave him the right to do whatever he wanted. But he still had a sense of duty, so he went to collect the Thirty-Third Alice. He was slightly sad; the element of wonder might be gone now. But he was wrong. The Thirty Third was more delighted by his features than the previous thirty two had been. He supposed being half-human had its perks.
But the Thirty-Third, much like her predecessors had been a disappointment.
“I’m sorry.” She had cried with tears streaming down her face.
The White Rabbit had just stared at her, unsure of what to do. He was sure that the old him would have tried to reassure her, tell her that she was worthy of the task she had been given. But the anomaly he had become couldn’t do that. So he simply stared. Alice didn’t want to live because the Hatter didn’t love her? That sounded funny to him, so he couldn’t help but smile. If that was what she wanted, he would give her that. And so, he killed his first Alice. He strangled her. He could feel her struggling beneath him, but wasn’t this what she wanted? The new Hatter he had brought was not capable of loving anyone; he had made sure of that. And if this Alice was not going to fulfill her duty, then he needed to find another one that could. And in order to do that, he would need to dispose of this Alice first.
It was fun. More fun than killing that old man had been. He wondered if he could do it again. Kill Alice. He wasn’t supposed to do that, he had thought to himself. But who cared? He would just bring in a new one to replace her, and all would be well.
He had noticed something else right then as well, how no one noticed these changes. Did no one realize that Thirty-three Alices had come and gone? They didn’t seem to at any rate. He wondered if he could toy with them, he wondered if they were toying with him. Who had killed all those Alices? And who would kill the next one?
Their world seemed to now revolve around that. The disappearance of the First Alice had made everyone around him panic, cry, scream in distress. But over time, they had become used to it. This is what was supposed to happen.
There was one thing that the White Rabbit was scared of. He thought he was becoming more human with each trip to that Dull World. And he found himself unusually attached to another Alice, the Fifty-Seventh. He liked her. She was a bit dark, gloomy even. But she was practical, and he liked that. He liked how she could solve any problem, how she concentrated on any task given to her. She was one of the few Alices whom even the Queen of Hearts had come to like. He had thought that this would be the last Alice, the real Alice. But he was wrong.
She met her demise at the hands of the March Hare. The White Rabbit killed again, he killed that hare. How could he? The White Rabbit had felt betrayed. But that was not all.
He had to go back there again, and he didn’t want to. He didn’t want to fulfill his duties. He didn’t want to bring in another person who would die. Death was intriguing to him, but he didn’t like how every time he liked a new Alice, they would be snatched from him. He felt like a boy who had lost his favorite toy. But that attachment was superficial, and he understood that better than anyone else. This time, this time - he thought, he would bring in a new Alice, someone who would live.
The new Alice died, but the replacement for the March Hare did not. In fact, the White Rabbit quite liked him. They became good friends. The March Hare became someone whom the White Rabbit could speak to; he was even a partner who gladly traveled to the Dull World with him. And the White Rabbit liked that. And just like the White Rabbit, the March Hare soon became more and more human. He had human features, but he retained his ears and that slight furriness - just that bit, but not visible unless you were looking at him carefully. The March Hare had new ideas too. And quite a few of them were mischievous. The Cheshire Cat was the usual victim of these pranks, and this delighted the Hatter to no ends. Things were looking up, and the new Alice was still alive. The Eighty-First Alice - would she be the last one?
The Cheshire Cat killed her. “It was an accident”, he had smiled, but the White Rabbit knew otherwise. So he went on with his duty - to find the next Alice. And the Marsh Hare went along with him - he always tagged along with his best friend.
That was when they met the boy. He didn’t look much older than the White Rabbit, and he had the mental capacity of the March Hare. He was childish, but mature in the way he dealt with his younger brother. The boy had spotted their unusual features - he could see their fur, even though it should barely have been visible from the other side of the park.
Why the White Rabbit had entertained the March Hare’s desire to play in the park was beyond him, one should think that he was too old for such things. And that was when they saw the boy playing with his younger brother.
It was late at night, and the park was mostly deserted. He wondered what they were doing out there, all alone out so late at night. He wondered who that boy was. And then, when the boy said, “Talking animals!” He was actually surprised. He was laughing, not in a mean way, but in good humor. The White Rabbit was really intrigued. And that was when he had the idea. What if this boy was to become the new Alice?
They couldn’t find a replacement, even though they had searched all day, and he was running out of time. So why not take this boy with him? He was unusual. He could see them for what they really were, not a common feature among most humans. They just saw what they wanted to see. But this boy could see beyond his transformations, he could see beyond all his adaptations - he could see the White Rabbit for what he really was.
He probably would never have agreed to the idea, but the March Hare liked it. “It should be interesting.” He had said.
And that decided it. If he was by himself, the White Rabbit would never have done it, but now that he had someone who agreed with him there was no turning back. So he invited the boy. The boy came eagerly; he wanted to talk to the talking rabbit. His brother waited on the other side of the park; he was too scared, too shy to follow.
Two days later, when the police asked him what had happened to his brother, he told them the same thing he had told so many people before, “He followed the talking rabbit.”
~~~
The White Rabbit was amazed. But the March Hare was not.
“What did you expect?” He asked. This was going to happen. The White Rabbit had known that this would happen. No one said anything. Even though the Eighty-Second was a boy, no one said anything at all. They all treated him like he was Alice, and soon he would become Alice. The Hatter liked him, the Cheshire Cat liked him, the Queen of Hearts loved him - but that was proof enough that he wasn’t Alice. Was the White Rabbit contradicting himself? He wasn’t sure.
He loved Alice. He loved Alice more than he had loved any of the previous Alices. He loved him like a brother. But there was something missing. Alice had no duties. Alice had no responsibilities. No one ever asked Alice to do anything. Alice was symbolic. He was just a little boy playing all day. And that made the White Rabbit wonder.
Not everybody loved Alice though, the March Hare hated him. He hated how the White Rabbit paid more attention to the boy, “You don’t play with me anymore!” The March Hare had complained to him one day.
“Don’t be silly, you’re not a kid.” It was his usual reply. His usual reply to anything childish the Hare said. The White Rabbit was the adult. So what if they both looked like children? At heart, the White Rabbit was far older than anyone he knew.
It would be a lie if he said that he hadn’t noticed. It would be a lie if he said that he didn’t want the March Hare to kill Alice. It had been so long since he had gone to the Dull World. He felt a yearning to return, nostalgia enveloped him. Also, he was looking more and more like his old self with every passing day. His human features were disappearing. The same features that had so awed the Queen of Hearts that she gave him personal attendance at the court. He was proud of how he looked, and now it was disappearing. He couldn’t go back to the Dull World, not without a purpose, not unless he had to. He didn’t know why, that’s just how things were. That’s how his world operated. So someone would have to kill Alice, but he couldn’t do it himself. No, he loved Alice too much. But he knew how it could be done. So he played with Alice all day and watched as the March Hare grew angrier with each passing day. At first, he would just stare menacingly towards Alice, but as time went on he kept becoming more and more aggressive.
The White Rabbit could have sworn that he had seen the March Hare eyeing his knife one day when he had called his friend over to dinner. It pleased the White Rabbit. Things were going well. But there was a problem. He had picked the replacement for that old dead hare very specifically. He had wanted someone who would not kill Alice. So how could he make this Hare kill Alice? Just getting him jealous wouldn’t be enough. It couldn’t be just the White Rabbit; everyone would have to marvel at Alice. Everyone would have to ignore the March Hare.
Doing that was easy enough. First, the White Rabbit started to ignore him - he started focusing more on Alice, more and more with each passing day. The March Hare was never really close to anyone else, and it proved to be not very difficult for him to be side-lined. They had a new Alice!
And then one day, just as the White Rabbit had expected, Alice disappeared.