Malice in Wonderland #1: Alice the Assassin (3 page)

They all turn to leave, all except the guard, who must stay to inform her of her duties for the day.

Alice suddenly remembers a custom that may help her get access to the Mad Hatter’s hat, though.

She shouts, “No, wait! My birthday wish! I’d like to ask it of you, Hatter.”

They all turn back around again. The Hatter looks quite put out—he is still holding the two pies in his hands—they look rather precariously balanced and heavy after being held for so long.

Alice says, “But I want to let you win at a game!”

She’s hoping the Hatter won’t start asking too many questions.

Thankfully, his eyebrow twerks up. “Oh? I enjoy winning games. What kind of game?”

“Toss the Card in the Hat. As I said, I’ll let you win and the winner, well, the winner gets to smash those pies in the loser’s face. Please play wif me?” She gives her best big doe-eyed pathetic expression.

A predatory grin comes across his face. “Yes, that expression! Wear exactly that expression when I smash the pies in your face, won’t you?”

She nods with a cute pout.

But some of the others are grumbling.

Tweedledum says, “Hey, how about us?”

Tweedledee says, “Don’t we get to play?”

The Hatter shouts, “Silence! She’s the birthday girl, and it is her wish to play with just me, because I’m special, right?”

Alice says, “Yes. Just the Hatter.”

There is more groaning.

The Hatter says, “So what are the rules?” He sets the pies down. “Oh, my arms! I held those things this whole time!”

“Well, the rules are that the winner is the person who doesn’t toss the card in the hat after the other player does. Do you think you can win at such a game?”

The Hatter stands thinking for several long moments, his eyes rolled toward the ceiling. He seems to be mouthing many of the words of the rules she’d stated. “Ah, I believe I have devised a brilliant strategy to win this game! Let us begin.”

“Okay. I have a special card to play with. It has holes in it so it can fly through the air.”

The Dormouse shouts, “Aerodynamic!” then promptly goes back to sleep.

“That’s right,” Alice says. “Who goes first?”

“Ladies first, because I am a gentleman,” says the Hatter. He removes his top hat.

So Alice tries her best to toss the card into the hat. It barely misses.

The Hatter gives the card a meager fling then laughs. “I am the most clever hatter in Wonderland!” he proclaims. He is also the maddest. They say he’s gone mad from all the mercury and chemicals he uses to make his hats—all the noxious substances make beautiful hats, but are quite toxic.

It takes several tries, but finally Alice manages to toss the card in the hat. “Well, guess I lose!” she says, before lifting the card from the hat.

The Hatter puts his own hat on, with a tap on the top.

Alice looks down discreetly to see that the card is glowing.
Should I take my heart out now? But how?

“I’ve a surprise!” she shouts. “Everyone close your eyes! Keep them closed!”

While everyone closes their eyes, she presses her hand into her chest, which is a strange thing to do, and pulls out her heart. It looks like a cartoonish heart, colored bright red. There is no blood or pain, but that seems perfectly normal in Wonderland. “Wait, wait! I’ve almost got it ready. Don’t open your eyes!” She quickly runs and puts the heart inside a wooden jewelry box. While she is doing so, she feels like Humpty Dumpty is peeking at her, but when she glances at him, his eyes are closed.

She goes back to stand by the table. In a panic she lifts the two pies and holds them toward the Mad Hatter. “Okay! Open your eyes! Ta da!”

The reactions are mixed. Some cheer and applaud, some boo and express disapproval. She admits, it’s not much of a surprise, but it’s the best she could think of.

What a bunch of decrepit characters,
she thinks.

“Shall I pie you now?” says the Hatter.

Alice nods. Even though she doesn’t want to, she thinks it would be best not to arouse suspicion, so she puts on her doe-eyed pathetic expression and she stands still and willing as the Hatter smashes not one, but two pies in her face.

Everyone laughs but her.

I wonder how the bastard would like a pie smashed in his face?

As she’s wiping the custard from her face, the Hatter informs her that he has more pies waiting to use on her when next she visits him at the tea table.

They all begin leaving, except for the card guard. Alice waves. She doesn’t say goodbye, because many of them expect her to visit them sometime during the day. The Tweedle twins wish her an “Unhappy birthday,” which makes her want to strangle them, but she just grins and bears it.

Finally it is just her and the guard card in the room. It’s the same card guard card as usual. He stays after each party to provide her list of scheduled duties, and he is a total idiot. She thinks it’s maybe because he’s only the number three, or maybe it’s because he’s so flat, and not much brain matter can be fit in such a flat surface. He has been the source of much of her sorrow, and she wants to get revenge.

The cake is still there, flickering with its candles, forgotten.

“Guard card,” she says, cooingly. “It’s my birthday, so I’d like you to do the customary thing and blow my candles out.” She feels a thrill go through her. Never before has she been able to engage in the level of deception she intends in the next few moments.

“What? Why would I blow the candles out? It’s
your
unhappy unbirthday!”

“Idiot! It’s my
birthday.
Haven’t you been paying attention? The rules are the opposite today.
I
don’t blow the candles out,
you
do.”

“I do? The Queen didn’t mention anything about that. Besides, the candles are blowproof—they can’t be blown out.”

“Wow, how dumb are you? Must the Queen tell you everything? Everything is the opposite today. The candles are the opposite of unblowable, because it’s my birthday, not my unbirthday. Wow, just how dumb are you?” Alice had never been so deceptive before. It’s a good skill to have, she thinks.

The card says, “But I just saw you try to blow them out a while ago. They went out and came back again.”

“Moron! That was a few moments ago! And that was me, not you. The candles can only be blown out by you, not me, because this is my birthday, and not my unbirthday! How dumb are you?” She hopes she is being sufficiently confusing. She fights the urge to chuckle.

She watches the card ponder what she said, or at least
try
to. He nods. “Okay.” He leans down and blows the candles out. He grins at her.

The candles spring back into flame.

Alice shouts, “Idiot! You have to lean closer!”

“Closer? But—”

“Closer! Moron! Imbecile! Buffoon! Do it!”

The card leans closer than before, blows the candles out. He grins at her.

The candles burst back into flame.

“Closer closer closer! Do you not know the meaning of the word? Don’t make me tell you again!”

This time the card leans very close indeed, but before he even has the chance to blow, he catches fire, and begins flailing about while screaming, but the flails only make the flames grow higher.

Alice merely watches while laughing and pointing at him.

The card now lies as an ashy burnt smoking remnant of the card, now quite dead.

She digs the keys to her chains from the ashes then slips the chains and keys in her pocket.

When she goes to the jewelry box, she finds that her heart is missing.

Someone has stolen it!

Her thoughts turn dark, filled with ideas of revenge.

No one steals something from me, unpunished! I’ll find out who did it, and I will make their life, or death, pure hell!

And first on her list of suspects is Humpty Dumpty. Her mind fills with the delicious fantasy of chaining Humpty Dumpty and torturing him to punish him for stealing her heart.

CHAPTER THREE

The Cheshire Cat

Tra la la la la la la.

She hops and skips wickedly.

Things are definitely different with me.

Why, just yesterday, my black dress symbolized my brooding melancholy and now it shows my malevolence and duplicity.

She’s smugly satisfied with the words she had chosen—they were quite impressive in their number of syllables.

They show how much smarter I am than the average girl.

She stops when she hears the familiar purr in her right ear.

The Cheshire Cat.

“Kill yourself,” he whispers, as usual. He swoops out to face her, floating in front of her.

He’s a floating, grinning cat head with no body.

Alice tries her best not to glare him down evilly. She puts on the meek face she usually greets him with.

The Cheshire Cat says, “You’ve thought of my offer, I can tell.”

Yes, his offer. His offer is this: he will provide her with a pistol, if only she agrees to shoot herself in the head with it.

She never accepted though and the cat knows if she ever
did
accept she would follow through, for all the creatures of Wonderland know she is incapable of lying.

That is, I was until today.

The pistol pops into view, floating, glowing in the air next to the cat’s head. It is a single shot, flintlock pistol, with an ivory handle and a single lead ball bullet inside—a dueling pistol. “Why not take it?” he says.

She ignores his offer, offers instead, “I’m searching for something that was just stolen from me. Have you heard anything about it?”

“No, I’ve heard nothing. What was stolen?”

It’s best for others to still think she’s sweet and caring she thinks, so she says, “I don’t want to say exactly what. I just want to know if you know anything about it? Do you know who might have it?”

He just grins that stupid grin. “You’re teasing me. But I forgive you because you’re so pretty.”

Her shoulders slump. “Thank you.”

“Awww. If I help you get this thing back, will you kill yourself as my reward?”

“Yes.” She nods and nods eagerly. She’d never really lied before today. It feels somehow thrilling. Had she been missing this feeling all her life?

“Such a pretty girl, so pretty on the inside too. I would love to see your brains.”

“Thank you.” She decides to lie even more. “I tell you what, if you let me have the pistol, I promise I’ll shoot myself very soon if I can’t find the object I’m looking for. But if I
do
get the object back, I’ll be so happy that I’ll kill myself so I can die happy. So can I have the gun, pleeeeaaase?”

The cat looks at her suspiciously. “Well…why do you need it? I’ll just give it to you when the time comes.”

“Awwww Mister Puss Puss. Don’t you trust me?”

Everyone trusts Alice, or the old one with her heart intact.

“Well, everyone knows you can’t lie. It’s a weakness of yours. As long as you promise me…”

She looks at him innocently and protrudes her bottom lip. “I pwomise, cross my heart and hope to die, I’ll kill myself very soon, if you just give me the pistol.”

He relaxes and his grin edges up again. “Okay, but promise not to do it without letting me watch okay?”

She gives him thumbs up. “Promise!”

The cat giggles. “I’m so glad you finally decided to give in. Here’s the pistol. It’s a single shot dueling pistol, so aim carefully so you don’t miss.” He laughs. “That’s a little joke. I’m implying you have a tiny brain.”

Alice smiles to keep from scowling. “Very funny.”

“Yes, it was. Well, here you go.”

He mouths her the pistol. “Now, I must be off, because I’m bored with talking to you. Oh, I get bored so easily.”

He vanishes.

She slips the pistol into her dress. It could come in very handy for her mission.

CHAPTER FOUR

Tweedledum and Tweedledee

Alice is headed for Humpty’s place, but the Tweedles’ place is along the way. Even from quite a distance, she hears them bickering. She rolls her eyes

Hmmm, only one bullet in the gun. Perhaps if I lined them up properly…

She grins at the wicked thought. Before, whenever she thought of killing them, she would mentally scold herself. But now she enjoys the thought.

It might be easy to line them up, since they are so often mirroring each other’s movements.

She’ll take a slight detour, she decides, to visit the twins.

They’re standing in a clearing beneath the shade of an oak tree.