Alan returned to the central chamber where the Hatter was being held and approached his refracted ego slowly and deliberately. He took out both keys and removed the large padlocks from the man's wrists and ankles finally freeing him, the heavy shackles clattering to the ground in a thunderous echo.
"So...You've finally done it, eh? Heh." The doppelgänger's lips curled up in a maddening grin as the mechanical steam works brought down two artificial arms that crowned the man with his signature hat.
"Indeed...And it better be worth the trouble."Alan retorted brashly.
"Trouble? You think resolving your neglect of two aspects of your subconscious is inconvenient? Pity, I expected it to the torturous."The hatter replied happily, walking cheerfully past Alan and back into an adjacent chamber that was cluttered with scrap metal poking and jagging out of the walls and floors.
"I'm not here to play games!" Alan snapped, following after his other self incessantly.
"For someone who isn't here to play games, you've done an awful lot of faffing about the place. Did you really need to see the Duchess to know that you longed to see (Y/n)? That was a good million pounds wasted." Hatter replied, hopping over and climbing the rubble with ease but occasionally waiting for Alan to catch up.
"Nevertheless, you know what happened. If...Something happened. At least, if it really happened...Regardless! Tell me what you know!"
Hatter paused and looked at Alan with shock and disdain, "You really can't tell by the state of things? Feh."
He jumped away out of sight of Alan and his voice echoed through the facility, "I can't help those who refuse to help themselves after all."
Alan's growl turned to a roar of frustration, "HATTER I'M SUFFERING!!" Alan screamed, huffing as the stress of not knowing weighed down heavier and heavier on his chest, "I did something, or I'm doing something, or something happened and I just want to know..."he trailed off, choking at the thought.
"Knowing is only half the battle, but what use is knowing the pain if the one who caused it will never see Justice? Uphill nothing, it's a useless exercise. And that's coming from the one between us that lives to exercise!" Hatter replied, returning to Alan's side.
Alan looked to his twin with surprise, "The one who caused it, how did he escape Justice!?"
"Oh, how does anyone escape Justice these days, by being king~" Hatter sang bitterly, "Or Being rodents-!"
Before the alter ego could complete his hiss of disdain the facility erupted into violent tremors as the old, rusted scrap metal began to groan and snap apart.
"I AM NOT A RODENT!!" The March Hare screeched above the shrill squeals of metal scraping against metal.
A mechanical monstrosity arose from the chaotic clamor, a marvel at least 500 meters tall and 300 meters wide to boot. In one eye was a window to the Hare's control room and the other the Mouse.
"Birds of a feather nevertheless." Alan growled in reply.
"And nevertheless is never the wiser. I might have been subdued but not sub planted. Neither of you would have survived the fire if it weren't for us. You're lucky to be intact and functional but your luck has run out." In a rare appearance of lucidity, the Hatter looked upon his friends with a wistful sentimentality and a serene smile upon his lips.
At first the Dormouse and Hare were enraged by the words, gripping their mechanical controls in fury. Yet the smile on the hatter's face rendered the two unable to move forward in terror...
Such a face...It was an all too familiar sight of absolute control that should not be possible...After all this time...
Suddenly the mecha creaked and moaned, the claws and arms of the machine dropping into the molten metal below.
"Wha-!? A-Alan-!"
"Hatter, what is this!?"
The two pleaded and yelped as their machine began to fall apart at the seams.
Alan was thoroughly confused as to how such a feat was possible and looked to the Hatter, his twin's gaze fixated towards the base of the contraption.
There they were, the trolls which had been slaving away under Dormouse and Hare were climbing up the mechanism and taking the whole thing apart, bolt by bolt.
"This is what happens when you have no control, you can't act."
The machine tumbled in descent to the platform and the large plates that made the encasement for the pair of pilots loosened and fell, the heavy thick metal crushing and mangling the two in the process.
Alan had to brace for the impact of the piece and nearly was swept off his feet by the air pressure of the event alone. As the entire facility rumbled and groaned from the crash, steel beams began to buckle and break apart, scattering about the domain in disarray. In the chaos he tried to look to Hatter once more only to find he was no longer by his side, he looked to the left and right until he saw the distinct tell tale hat through the dust and steam.
"HATTER!" He beckoned before attempting to maneuver around the falling debris to his lookalike.
"Hatter! Tell me what you know! Who caused all this!? Who knows what happened to (Y/n)!? ANSWER ME!!"
His mirror image stood over the mangled bodies of the dormouse and hare with a dissociated blank stare, unable to move.
"Would you like more tea, Dormouse? I see the jam has worked well for your nerves. And Hare, mind your manners. You never know when (Y/n) will be back...She went to meet the king you know. Such a lovely set of tea cups, it was a shame I couldn't enjoy them. I just had to do something. That pervert, his eyes would make such a wonderful gift for the king. I only take tea with those who can behave themselves."
"That was you? You made me...That can't be..."
"Drink Alan! A toast to her memory! A cup for her health!"
Just as Alan was beginning to have a grasp of the situation, a brown pool began to rise up to his thighs and reeked of Darjeeling.
"Hatter wait-! Where did she go!? Where is her looking glass line? What has happened to my memories of (Y/n)!?"
"The Mock Turtle knows the Looking glass, what good is a hat for reflecting things? The ocean is better suited for that!"
And an ocean is quickly what Alan was beginning to surround himself in as the tea crept up to his chest and then to his neck.
"Have all the tea you'd like. I need to find out what happened to (Y/n)."
He tried to swim to higher ground but the water just kept getting higher and higher until his head dove under water.
'How do I always leave in a worse mess than when I enter that place?'
YOU ARE READING
The Huntsman In London {Sequel to Mad and In Love}
Fanfiction"Madness is not a state of mind, Alan..." "It's a place." Sequel to "Mad and In Love" A Male!Alice x Reader love Story May be characterized as Yandere. Mentions, Murder, Rape, and Other Violent Acts. You have been warned.
