Madmen and Cabbages 3
Title: Madmen and Cabbages
Verse: Alice in Wonderland (2010)
Characters: Alice Kingsleigh, Tarrant Hightopp, and all the inhabitants of Underland
Pairings: Alice/Hatter
Rating: PG13, some adult themes that may be too intense for kids
Plot: Same as all the rest out there lol, Alice comes back and finds a devastated Hatter. Can she save him?
Growling, the Hatter headed over to the large sewing table in the middle of the room. He tugged at a bit of fabric on the bottom of a tall stack and it teetered threateningly. He laid the bolt out over the top of all the other items lining the table and began to cut swathes in seemingly random patterns.
Alice pulled herself up and wove her way over to the table until she was standing directly in front of the Hatter. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I'm sorry,” she offered quietly. “I'm not going to leave you. Not ever again.”
Hatter paused in his motion and shook his head woefully. “Would that the real Alice had been as dedicated as my demons are.”
That declaration cut into her heart as effectively as any knife. Alice frowned, “Real Alice? Do you think me an illusion? Hatter, I'm real and I'm here. Please look at me.”
The Hatter raised his head slowly.
“I promise you, I'm real. As real as you.”
Hatter smiled unpleasantly, “Since I am a figment of my own imagination that’s not a very convincing argument. We’ve had this discussion before hatesome ghost. We will not have it again, I promise you.”
Alice shook her head, he didn’t even believe that she existed. How could she convince him of anything if she couldn’t even convince him she was real? “I remember the first time we met. You were in the glade having tea and you were singing the merry unbirthday song. You have a good voice by the way.” She smiled, “Do you remember? Mally was very drunk. The grape jelly for the scones had fermented, poor dear. I didn’t know what to make of any of it really. It was wonderful and it was frightening. You made me laugh. I think I was quite taken with you even then.”
The Hatter’s eyes flashed yellow and Alice stepped back. “You will not speak to me of Alice. No more!” Hatter grasped a pair of shears sticking in the table and brandished them. “I am nothing to her. A mad thing in a mad world and it’s true enough, I know.” He raised the over-sized blades and circled around the table. “Why do you feel the need to cut me so? Have you not enough of my blood!?” he thundered. Bringing his arm up, he drew the blade across his shirt sleeve slicing through to his skin.
“Hatter!” Alice exclaimed and threw herself towards him tangling her feet in more strewn fabric, she landed in a heap at his feet. He looked down at her, his eyes the color of rubies glittering in mad pain. “I will not falter this time. I will not spare such a hatesome ghost on account of love.” He brought the deadly scissors up over his head.
And suddenly the Cheshire was there, hovering between the enraged Hatter and the cowering Alice. “Hello there, Tarrant. I’m not interrupting anything am I?” The cat floated, his demeanor casual but his twitching tail belied his real agitation.
The Hatter gritted his teeth, “Obviously, you are, you mettlesome, molty, mongrel. Kindly move aside so I may dispatch this heinous, hatesome, hideous, reminder of my lonely, listless, loathsome nature.”
“So it’s your intention to kill your one and only true love then is it?” Chess questioned.
“Don’t be daft you dizzy, dreadful, delinquent excuse for a feline.” The Hatter shook his head vigorously. “Stop.. Cease.. Halt.. No more.. no more.. no more..”
“Hatter..” the cat offered. “Concentrate on the matter at hand. Being which.. you intend to eviscerate your beloved.”
“No, only ghosts live here. I pay in blood so they will leave me be.”
“I assure you, old friend, the enchanting lady currently in a disheveled lump at your feet is no ghost or specter. She is THE Alice, quite real.” Chess’s tail had finally stopped it’s restless flicking. “Returned to Underland to claim her true love lost. Any ideas where she might find him?”
Alice came shakily to her feet. The Hatter had lowered the shears but still held them tightly clenched in a slightly trembling hand. “What are you saying damnable puss?”
“I'm real Hatter, I came back to Underland. I should have returned sooner.” She took a hesitant step forward. “I came back to find you. To tell you how I feel.” Alice took another step forward and Hatter took a step back, his head shaking negative. “I’m real, Dear Hatter. It’s me.”
The Hatter stared at her, his eyes now large as saucers, their color the oddest shade of pink. “Oh, Hatter,” she reached out and cupped his face in her hands as she had once before when his madness overcame his reason and left him reeling. “Please forgive me.”
At the contact of warm hands to his face the Hatter inhaled with a gasp and let loose a blood-curdling yell. The shears fell from his numbed fingers and his expression twisted in horrified agony. He bolted across the room to the small dirty cot where he pressed himself into a ball in the corner, his arms over his head and his face buried against his legs.