He’d always been so fascinated by unusual things that he couldn’t hurt them, even if he knew they were dangerous. It was a bad habit of his. But before Blood could reply, Elliot cut across him.
“Ugh. Are you still here?” The March Hare still hadn’t bothered to wipe the blood off his cheeks. He casually lifted his gun.
A shiver ran down Alice’s spine. With no apparent hesitation, Elliot put his finger on the trigger.
“Just die, will ya? Pain in the—”
“Wh—NO!”
Alice squeezed her eyes shut as the gunshot cracked. A heavy thud sounded at the same moment.
“Nngh…hggh!”
Miraculously, the groans didn’t roll up from her own throat. They came from Elliot.
Alice opened her eyes and gave a short yelp. Elliot was down on his knees, Blood’s foot grinding into the small of his back.
“Who told you to shoot her, Elliot?” Blood murmured, glaring down at his minion in contempt.
“B-but Blood…!”
“We were having a conversation. Never interrupt your boss.”
“But when she said ‘Blood,’ she—urg!”
Maybe Blood just wanted to stop the argument; he dug his heel into Elliot’s side. He kicked the obviously hurt man again, then whacked Elliot on the head with his cane. Blood flashed a sneer.
“I’m the one who decides what happens to the girl. Raise your gun to her again and I’ll shoot you.”
“S-sorry, Boss…”
“Clearly I need to pound that into your body or it doesn’t stick.”
“I won’t get in your way anymore, I promise!”
“You’d better not.”
Alice watched the beating, dumbfounded, but the rest of the Hatter Faceless all averted their faded eyes. None of them complained about their boss’s high-handed savagery. Elliot didn’t even resist.
“……”
Alice felt a sense of déjà vu. She remembered a time not long after the White Rabbit had dragged her to Wonderland—when this kind of cruelty was common within the walls of Hatter Mansion. As time had gone on, she’d witnessed fewer and fewer of those scenes, but they’d probably never stopped completely. Maybe the Hatters had just hidden them from her to be polite.
Now, clearly, they didn’t feel the need.
The twins suddenly stepped up from behind Blood, absently twisting their hands over their axe handles. “Hey,” Dee interrupted. “If the bunny’s punished now, Boss, what are we gonna do with her? Ya want us to kill her?”
“Eh, I want bonus money if I’ve gotta do somethin’ extra. I hate doin’ freebies. We can throw her in the body pile an’ add her kill to our bonus cash.”
Blood shrugged. “I know the girl looks like trouble, but we can kill her later, if I feel like it. For now, just throw her into one of the cells. At least until we decide how to deal with her.”
The maid Alice had saved nodded her head. She lowered her gun and re-gripped Alice’s arm.
“As you wish, Boss~. Miss, if you’ll come with us~.”
Alice recoiled slightly. “If I…have to?”
The maid led her into the compound, and down to the inner depths of the mansion.
Alice had walked the same route countless times in the Country of Hearts and the Country of Clover. The mansion had some different decorations this time around, but it was essentially the same structure as ever.
What country was she in? And who was in it? Alice wished she knew who the Hatters had been fighting outside. She had a million questions to ask…
But she knew the Hatters wouldn’t answer. Not if they suddenly didn’t know her—or couldn’t remember her. Whatever the heck was going on.
The maid eventually brought Alice to a basement hallway Alice had never entered before. Alice’s anxiety flared up at the dim light and chilly drafts. They walked past a long line of doors until the maid opened one on the end.
“In here, if you’d be so kind~.”
“Uh…thanks for the hospitality,” Alice muttered awkwardly as she stepped inside.
Her eyes trailed over the stone floors, a bed that could only charitably be called a cot, and a tiny window with iron bars that choked the outdoor light. Like a typical prison, as far as she knew.
As she stared at the cell in a daze, she heard the clang and chak of the door closing and locking behind her.
They didn’t have to lock it, she thought. They know I’m not gonna run.
Every employee of the mansion was in the Mob—nobody could escape a place filled with gangsters on guard. Even though Alice knew the mansion pretty well, there was no way she could escape without someone noticing her.
With nothing else to do, she sat on the cot attached to the wall. The rock-hard mattress was a good match for the damp air. As she considered sleeping on that thing, her lips unthinkingly curled into a sardonic smile.
“This is actually pretty good treatment for a stranger who just happened to appear in a Mafia headquarters.” She rolled her eyes up to the ceiling. “At least I’m not being tortured.”
Only a few time periods before, the Hatters had insisted she stay as a guest in one of their lavish rooms. And it was more than just her guest room—she’d been invited into the twins’ room. Into Blood’s room.
Each and every room was a top secret within the Mob. But they’d also housed good friends, and so she could easily remember the interiors of all those rooms.
What happened to those friends…?
As she lay down on the cold cot, questions spun through Alice’s head. Had there just been another “move”? Did this count as “moving”? But she hadn’t just gone to a different place—the flow of time seemed to have gone upside down on her.
Alice reached toward the ceiling in the dim light and clenched her hand.
She knew that no matter how much she reached into empty space, nothing would come into her grasp. But she still reached out and closed her hand, over and over.
A queen who constantly lost her temper and ordered beheadings. A strange knight who was always lost. A stalker rabbit who never listened to what anybody said. Now she longed for them, but she didn’t even know if they existed in this country…
Her vision started to swim. She felt a sudden, heavy drowsiness suck away her strength.
“Huh…?”
Her eyelids fell, as if an unseen hand pressed down on them. Sure, it was nighttime, but she couldn’t remember ever feeling such an insistent stupor. She couldn’t stay awake. Maybe it was physical and mental fatigue after everything she’d gone through.
“……”
She wished that when she awoke, she’d be back in the red castle.
But even as she wished it, some part of her knew it wouldn’t come true.