Sabrina's POV:
I fell and fell and fell, down, down, down. I didn't even feel the walls of the tunnel. All I could see was the darkness before me as I tumbled down, and all I could hear was the wind whistling in my ears.
I could hear shouts of fear and confusion a little distance away, and a loud bark.
At least they're okay, I thought, guessing it was Daphne, Red, and Elvis.
I looked forward into the darkness. Well, I looked down. It was an odd feeling, since I was falling straight down, but it seemed like I was sliding forward.
Where am I? This definitely isn't anywhere in Ferryport Landing...
Is it another one of those time portals?! This thought brought panic into my mind, and I tried to reach out to touch the tunnel walls, to try to stop myself.
But I couldn't find them. They had disappeared, even though they had been there a very short while ago.
And suddenly the darkness around me turned to light and I tumbled onto a dirt path, rolling until I came to a stop and dust flew up around me.
I heard the sound of three more people—or two people and a dog—fall to the ground.
I slowly opened my eyes and stood up, seeing Daphne, Red, and Elvis a small distance away. They were also standing, Daphne and Red staring around in amazement like I was, and Elvis sniffing around, probably looking for sausage.
"Where...where are we?" I whispered.
Daphne was still glancing around in wonder, but she turned to me and slowly said, "I think... I think we're in Wonderland."
"N–no way..." I said, after a moment's pause. "No way."
She nodded, now sure of herself. "Sabrina, we're in Wonderland. And it doesn't look like ANYTHING from when we went here in the Book of Everafter."
"What do you..." I started to ask, but stopped when I realized she was right.
This place looked nothing at all like the place we were in in the Book of Everafter. The whole landscape was completely different; not just because the colors were more natural and vibrant unlike the blue-tinged lands and characters in the Book.
"Who's this?" a voice rang out from somewhere in the trees around us.
I spun around as a mad giggle sounded right behind me, but nothing was there.
"Who are you?" I asked, still trying to find the mysterious creature.
"I might ask the same of you!" the voice exclaimed.
"Answer me first."
"Oh, but that's not fair!" Another fit of giggles.
"Whatever," I huffed. "If this is Wonderland, then you're mad and I have no reason to talk to you."
"Everyone's mad in Wonderland," the voice agreed. "It's just a matter of sensibility."
"Yes, yes!" a new voice said. "Just a matter of sensibility!" A head popped out of the leaves of the tree in front of me. It was a boy of about nineteen. Another identical face popped out next to him.
They both grinned at me and swung down from the tree, their green eyes glittering.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"Who are you?" they echoed, then started laughing.
"This doesn't make any sense!" I exclaimed, scowling.
"Of course!" the first one answered. "Nothing is sensible about this place!"
I groaned. There was that word, sensible. "We somehow fell down a huge...rabbit hole, I guess, and then we ended up here; can you help us?"
"Obviously, you can't go that way," the second one said. "Going down wouldn't make any sense, would it, Dum?" he questioned his twin.
"No, Dee, there's nothing sensible about any of it!" his brother replied. "There can't be any question; they'd have to have gone through."
Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum? I wondered. But...they don't look ANYTHING like how the ones in Ferryport Landing look... There's something off about all of this.
The strange voice from the trees sounded once again, laughing.
"Do you know the way back?" I asked the creature, whatever it was.
"Back?" it replied. "Why would you go back? It's silly, isn't it? Going backwards? Forwards, sideways, left, right, up, or down, those are the best ways to move, but never back."
"But we have to get back," I said, frustrated.
"Never back, never back!" a wide, wide smile shimmered into existence in front of me, a shadow seeming to form around it. "People don't like going back, even if they must. I don't like going back! And I'm not people! But I look back, sometimes, every so often, just to make sure I'm not leaving anything important behind. Like my tail! I can never be sure when I leave my tail behind me by mistake."
"But we did leave important things, important people behind!" I said, ignoring the creature's nonsensical ramble.
The shadow finally fully filled itself in around the creature, revealing a cat floating in mid air in front of me, it's tail curled around the front of its paws.
"The Cheshire Cat!" Daphne exclaimed, biting her palm. "You look way more cool than the you in the Book!"
The Cheshire Cat's grin got wider. "I like this one; she doesn't make a lick of sense."
He giggled at his pun, rolling around in the air, his fur shimmering and changing colors.
I rolled my eyes and turned to the Tweedle twins. "I'm Sabrina, that's my sister Daphne, that's our friend Red, and that's Elvis, our dog."
The Tweedles both stuck out their hands. "Nice to meet you!"
I didn't know what to do, their identical faces looking at me and their hands both stuck out to shake. So I shook both their hands at the same time, using both of my hands.
They grinned at each other. "So maybe this one isn't as sensible as we thought!"
A strange mixture of the scent of roses and paint neared us, and the Cat's smile vanished as he disappeared in a hurry.
The Tweedles looked around in alarm. "We have to go!" Dee whisper-shouted, panic lighting in his eyes.
And that's when I blacked out, memories that weren't mine overtaking me.
Roses, roses, painting white roses strawberry red.
And tarts! Who took the tarts? Did Snowlanders take the Duchess's tarts?
The Queen of Hearts...
My eyes popped open. I was shivering, a cold compress pressed against my forehead, and I was in a different place.
"Wha...what happened?" I whispered.
Daphne threw her arms around me. "Your heart stopped beating. We thought...we thought..."
"But it's only been a few seconds," I protested, struggling to sit up. My head hurt.
Daphne just shook her head.
A beautiful woman—she looked about the same age as the Tweedles, but she was probably older—with ringlets of silver-white hair and piercing violet eyes smiled at me grimly. "We have much to talk about, Sabrina."
I frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Like that." Daphne pointed to my forehead, it more specifically the spot between my eyebrows.
"What?"
"Look," she said, handing me a mirror. I realized it was the mirror from Beauty and the Beast.
"I had time to pack," my sister explained, holding up a backpack. Funny, I hadn't noticed that.
I was about to question her, but the words died in my mouth when I saw myself in the mirror.
A silver, eight-pointed star, seemingly a tattoo, was resting right between my eyebrows.
"What is that?" I cried, dropping the mirror in shock. Daphne dived to catch it.
The violet-eyed lady looked me in the eyes. "You can now read people's emotions."
"What?!"
"And some of people's memories, the strongest ones." A pained look passed over her face. "A certain person currently, I suspect."
"Who?" I asked, rubbing the star between my brow. It felt like it wasn't even there, excluding the slight tingling in my fingertips.
The woman's eyes had dropped to her pale hands, which were clasped tightly in her lap, but they met mine.
"Alice."
A/N:
So! Who liked the chapter? I have many many many many plans! I'm so excited because I just got a huge burst of ideas and guys get ready for lots of things to happen.
I'll try to update soon!
~Shadow