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akainagiTen Again More Trips Through Wonderland (Trips 41-45)
Author:AkaiNagi
Rating: PG
Pairing: Alice/Tarrant
Summary: Prompts 1-5/10 (Table 5) from![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
10_prompts.
Prompt: Hope
When Queen Mirana gave the Jabberwocky blood to Alice, Tarrant’s heart became lodged in his throat.
He watched in silence as she contemplated the purple liquid, knowing that her decision in the next few moments could either keep her in Underland, with him, or take her away from him forever.
She would not even remember me. The thought caused him an almost physical pain.
He loved her so, and she would not even remember his name.
That was the thought that made him speak. Part of him knew he had no right to try to influence her decision. The rest of him didn’t care.
“You could stay.”
Alice smiled at him. “What an idea,” she answered softly. “A crazy, mad, wonderful idea.”
Hope rose in Tarrant’s heart. What would it be like, he wondered, to be able to spend time with her without a revolution hanging over their heads. To be able to talk with her at leisure. To laugh with her, walk with her, dance with her, fall even deeper in love with her than he already was.
“But I can’t.”
Tarrant’s heart, which had been racing, buoyed by hope, stopped. Time itself seemed to stop in observance of the weight of this moment. He didn’t hear the rest of her explanation. He just watched in well-disguised horror as she brought the purple vial to her lips and prepared to drink. She paused.
He waited.
And when she abruptly took the purple liquid and poured it out on the ground, she was smiling serenely, at peace with her decision.
And for the Hatter, his heart and the hands of time started anew.
Prompt: Darkness
There is a deep well of darkness in her husband. Alice knows this.
She knew this when she met him. Knew it when she first kissed him, first lay with him, when she married him.
Yes, sometimes it takes her aback; the depth and breadth of that well. The darkness is made up of many things: rage, guilt, fear, madness. All are a part of him.
She knows he fears the darkness inside himself, fears giving it reign, fears it taking over. Fears showing it to her. Each time his darkness manages to overwhelm him, she brings him back, and he always says he’s fine. But Alice can see in his eyes the fear, the confusion and the guilt. And it hurts her heart each time he doesn’t confide in her.
She wishes there was some way to reassure him. She tries it with words and actions, but he never truly believes. He never truly believes that she accepts the dark and the light in him. Probably because he doesn’t accept it in himself. And the dichotomy between his light and dark self is the catalyst for his madness.
But when Alice chose to marry him, she knew what she was getting into. When she embraces him, she embraces both the light and the dark, when spoke her wedding vows she vowed to love not just his lightness, but also his dark side. When she makes love to him, she loves the whole of him, all that he is, joyfully and willingly.
She just wishes she could make him understand that.
Prompt: Celestial
As Alice plodded around the dance floor in boringly endless and endlessly boring quadrille,
she let her mind and her gaze wander.
What a beautiful day. Too beautiful to waste on formality and fake smiles and deadly dull dances with deadly dull partners. What she should like to do is tell Hamish to go sod himself and lose herself in the Ascots’ gardens. Maybe lay back in the grass. At the very least take off her tight and binding shoes and feel the soft green blades under her feet.
A pair of geese soared overhead, making their way across the perfect, cloudless blue sky. What would it be like to enjoy that kind of freedom, Alice wondered with a wistful smile. That freedom that was the very antithesis of corsets and stockings and quadrilles and stodgy Hamishes.
She was jerked out of her pleasant reverie when she collided with another couple.
Hamish had the expected response, apologizing to the other couple on her behalf and snapping rather harshly at her.
“I was wondering what it would be like to fly,” she offered Hamish by way of explanation.
The look on his face told one much about the young man’s personality. He answered her in a disdainful manner that fairly rankled. “Why would you waste your time thinking about such an impossible thing?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” Alice answered defiantly. Then she sighed. It was useless trying to explain such things to a man like Hamish. Their class seemed to have a universal lack of imagination and ability to step outside the strictest of social conventions in word or deed.
Alice wondered what it would be like to be held by a man who could appreciate such things as wanting to fly, or to contemplate impossible things, or even to feel cool spring grass against bare feet. She doubted such a man existed in the world in which she lived. All the men she knew were such stodgy creatures that she doubted they ever harbored an impossible thought in their lives.
She briefly entertained the fantasy of travelling to another world, one freed from stifling social conventions, one where she might meet the kind of man with whom she could talk about flying and women wearing trousers and how funny it would be if everyone had to wear a codfish on their head.
She sighed again, making Hamish glance at her in annoyance.
Talk about an impossible dream
Prompt: Beautiful
“Well what did she ask you? Try to remember exactly.”
Tarrant furrowed his brow in concentration. “She asked me if I would mind terribly – no that’s not right - she asked me if I would still love her if she was the size of a house.”
Bayard nodded solemnly. “I remember that one. And what did you tell her.”
“Well,” Tarrant began rather sheepishly, “I told her that I quite preferred her the way she was.”
Bayard shook his head. “You didn’t?” he asked disbelievingly.
The frustrated hatter wrung his hands. “Well what in Underland should I have said?”
“My friend,” Bayard answered in his gruff voice, “there are only two answers you ever give a pregnant female: ‘I love you’ and ‘you’re beautiful.’ And if neither of those works offer her something to eat.”
The Hatter took in Bayard’s advice with all the enthusiasm of a disciple learning from a Great Sage.
“Pregnant females,” Bayard continued, “are temperamental and high-maintenance creatures. They need constant reassurance and their moods change quicker than the weather. When Bielle was pregnant with the pups I learned to stay on my toes and always have a compliment handy.”
“Is that so?” a decidedly female voice interjected.
Bielle, flanked by her pups, padded her way over to the two of them and sat herself in front of the Hatter.
“Mind the pups, will you dear, while I have a word with Mister Hatter here.”
“Yes, dear,” Bayard replied dutifully, knowing full well that after his wife had her talk with the Hatter she would be having a talk with him.
“Now Mister Hatter. What my husband told you is all well and good, but the most important thing you must do is simply be there for your wife. Listen to her fears.”
“She’s afraid? What on earth for?” The Hatter asked in puzzlement.
“Why everything, of course. When I was pregnant with my pups everything overwhelmed me. In just a few months my life was going to change forever. Would I be a good mother? Would Bayard still love me when I was huge and heavy with pups? Would the pups be born healthy? Was I doing everything I could to make sure they were born healthy? Would the labour go easy or hard? All these questions are racing through your wife’s mind all the time.”
Tarrant felt a pang of guilt. “I had no idea,” he told Bielle.
“Haven’t you thought of what it will be like to be a father?” Bielle asked.
“Of course,” Tarrant replied.
“And does the thought ever frighten you?” Bielle questioned knowingly.
The Hatter was silent for a long moment. “Yes,” he admitted. "I wonder if a madman like me even has the right to be a father. I wonder if I can be there for Alice when she needs me to be.”
Bielle smiled. “Then share that with her. And let her share her fears with you. Go, now. Find her and do what needs doing.”
Tarrant thanked her for the advice and turned to leave. He paused.
“Um, Bielle?”
“Yes Mister Hatter?”
“Might I borrow your nose,” he asked sheepishly. “You see, my wife ran off, and at present I have no idea where she is."
Bielle chuckled. “My pleasure, Mister Hatter.”
Prompt: Awe
The Hatter never ceased to be amazed by his Alice.
She worked her charms on nearly everyone she met. Mallymkun had gone from being the human girl’s rival to her only slightly begrudging friend. The tweedles fought amongst themselves over who enjoyed more of her favor. The queen, having given her the official title of champion and court advisor, placed great store by her advice. And of course she had managed to capture Tarrant’s own heart so completely that the entire court could see how besotted he was.
One thing that amazed the Hatter more than most, however, was how she and no other claimed the slavish devotion and friendship of the bandersnatch who formerly terrorized the countryside at the bidding of Stayne and the Red Queen. The bandersnatch would snarl and snap at all others, except Queen Mirana, of course. It was impossible for any animal to be a true enemy to the White Queen. The Queen by her the purity of her nature was respected by all animal and plant life in Underland.
But the bandersnatch’s heart really belonged solely to one person. The two jaunted around the countryside together as Alice explored her new home of Underland. This slip of a girl riding around on several tons of gnashing teeth and claws. She had even given the fearsome beast a name – one the bandersnatch seemed to have thoroughly taken to, and one that brought a secret smile to Alice’s face every time she used it:
Lady Ascot.
Author:AkaiNagi
Rating: PG
Pairing: Alice/Tarrant
Summary: Prompts 1-5/10 (Table 5) from
10_prompts.Prompt: Hope
When Queen Mirana gave the Jabberwocky blood to Alice, Tarrant’s heart became lodged in his throat.
He watched in silence as she contemplated the purple liquid, knowing that her decision in the next few moments could either keep her in Underland, with him, or take her away from him forever.
She would not even remember me. The thought caused him an almost physical pain.
He loved her so, and she would not even remember his name.
That was the thought that made him speak. Part of him knew he had no right to try to influence her decision. The rest of him didn’t care.
“You could stay.”
Alice smiled at him. “What an idea,” she answered softly. “A crazy, mad, wonderful idea.”
Hope rose in Tarrant’s heart. What would it be like, he wondered, to be able to spend time with her without a revolution hanging over their heads. To be able to talk with her at leisure. To laugh with her, walk with her, dance with her, fall even deeper in love with her than he already was.
“But I can’t.”
Tarrant’s heart, which had been racing, buoyed by hope, stopped. Time itself seemed to stop in observance of the weight of this moment. He didn’t hear the rest of her explanation. He just watched in well-disguised horror as she brought the purple vial to her lips and prepared to drink. She paused.
He waited.
And when she abruptly took the purple liquid and poured it out on the ground, she was smiling serenely, at peace with her decision.
And for the Hatter, his heart and the hands of time started anew.
Prompt: Darkness
There is a deep well of darkness in her husband. Alice knows this.
She knew this when she met him. Knew it when she first kissed him, first lay with him, when she married him.
Yes, sometimes it takes her aback; the depth and breadth of that well. The darkness is made up of many things: rage, guilt, fear, madness. All are a part of him.
She knows he fears the darkness inside himself, fears giving it reign, fears it taking over. Fears showing it to her. Each time his darkness manages to overwhelm him, she brings him back, and he always says he’s fine. But Alice can see in his eyes the fear, the confusion and the guilt. And it hurts her heart each time he doesn’t confide in her.
She wishes there was some way to reassure him. She tries it with words and actions, but he never truly believes. He never truly believes that she accepts the dark and the light in him. Probably because he doesn’t accept it in himself. And the dichotomy between his light and dark self is the catalyst for his madness.
But when Alice chose to marry him, she knew what she was getting into. When she embraces him, she embraces both the light and the dark, when spoke her wedding vows she vowed to love not just his lightness, but also his dark side. When she makes love to him, she loves the whole of him, all that he is, joyfully and willingly.
She just wishes she could make him understand that.
Prompt: Celestial
As Alice plodded around the dance floor in boringly endless and endlessly boring quadrille,
she let her mind and her gaze wander.
What a beautiful day. Too beautiful to waste on formality and fake smiles and deadly dull dances with deadly dull partners. What she should like to do is tell Hamish to go sod himself and lose herself in the Ascots’ gardens. Maybe lay back in the grass. At the very least take off her tight and binding shoes and feel the soft green blades under her feet.
A pair of geese soared overhead, making their way across the perfect, cloudless blue sky. What would it be like to enjoy that kind of freedom, Alice wondered with a wistful smile. That freedom that was the very antithesis of corsets and stockings and quadrilles and stodgy Hamishes.
She was jerked out of her pleasant reverie when she collided with another couple.
Hamish had the expected response, apologizing to the other couple on her behalf and snapping rather harshly at her.
“I was wondering what it would be like to fly,” she offered Hamish by way of explanation.
The look on his face told one much about the young man’s personality. He answered her in a disdainful manner that fairly rankled. “Why would you waste your time thinking about such an impossible thing?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” Alice answered defiantly. Then she sighed. It was useless trying to explain such things to a man like Hamish. Their class seemed to have a universal lack of imagination and ability to step outside the strictest of social conventions in word or deed.
Alice wondered what it would be like to be held by a man who could appreciate such things as wanting to fly, or to contemplate impossible things, or even to feel cool spring grass against bare feet. She doubted such a man existed in the world in which she lived. All the men she knew were such stodgy creatures that she doubted they ever harbored an impossible thought in their lives.
She briefly entertained the fantasy of travelling to another world, one freed from stifling social conventions, one where she might meet the kind of man with whom she could talk about flying and women wearing trousers and how funny it would be if everyone had to wear a codfish on their head.
She sighed again, making Hamish glance at her in annoyance.
Talk about an impossible dream
Prompt: Beautiful
“Well what did she ask you? Try to remember exactly.”
Tarrant furrowed his brow in concentration. “She asked me if I would mind terribly – no that’s not right - she asked me if I would still love her if she was the size of a house.”
Bayard nodded solemnly. “I remember that one. And what did you tell her.”
“Well,” Tarrant began rather sheepishly, “I told her that I quite preferred her the way she was.”
Bayard shook his head. “You didn’t?” he asked disbelievingly.
The frustrated hatter wrung his hands. “Well what in Underland should I have said?”
“My friend,” Bayard answered in his gruff voice, “there are only two answers you ever give a pregnant female: ‘I love you’ and ‘you’re beautiful.’ And if neither of those works offer her something to eat.”
The Hatter took in Bayard’s advice with all the enthusiasm of a disciple learning from a Great Sage.
“Pregnant females,” Bayard continued, “are temperamental and high-maintenance creatures. They need constant reassurance and their moods change quicker than the weather. When Bielle was pregnant with the pups I learned to stay on my toes and always have a compliment handy.”
“Is that so?” a decidedly female voice interjected.
Bielle, flanked by her pups, padded her way over to the two of them and sat herself in front of the Hatter.
“Mind the pups, will you dear, while I have a word with Mister Hatter here.”
“Yes, dear,” Bayard replied dutifully, knowing full well that after his wife had her talk with the Hatter she would be having a talk with him.
“Now Mister Hatter. What my husband told you is all well and good, but the most important thing you must do is simply be there for your wife. Listen to her fears.”
“She’s afraid? What on earth for?” The Hatter asked in puzzlement.
“Why everything, of course. When I was pregnant with my pups everything overwhelmed me. In just a few months my life was going to change forever. Would I be a good mother? Would Bayard still love me when I was huge and heavy with pups? Would the pups be born healthy? Was I doing everything I could to make sure they were born healthy? Would the labour go easy or hard? All these questions are racing through your wife’s mind all the time.”
Tarrant felt a pang of guilt. “I had no idea,” he told Bielle.
“Haven’t you thought of what it will be like to be a father?” Bielle asked.
“Of course,” Tarrant replied.
“And does the thought ever frighten you?” Bielle questioned knowingly.
The Hatter was silent for a long moment. “Yes,” he admitted. "I wonder if a madman like me even has the right to be a father. I wonder if I can be there for Alice when she needs me to be.”
Bielle smiled. “Then share that with her. And let her share her fears with you. Go, now. Find her and do what needs doing.”
Tarrant thanked her for the advice and turned to leave. He paused.
“Um, Bielle?”
“Yes Mister Hatter?”
“Might I borrow your nose,” he asked sheepishly. “You see, my wife ran off, and at present I have no idea where she is."
Bielle chuckled. “My pleasure, Mister Hatter.”
Prompt: Awe
The Hatter never ceased to be amazed by his Alice.
She worked her charms on nearly everyone she met. Mallymkun had gone from being the human girl’s rival to her only slightly begrudging friend. The tweedles fought amongst themselves over who enjoyed more of her favor. The queen, having given her the official title of champion and court advisor, placed great store by her advice. And of course she had managed to capture Tarrant’s own heart so completely that the entire court could see how besotted he was.
One thing that amazed the Hatter more than most, however, was how she and no other claimed the slavish devotion and friendship of the bandersnatch who formerly terrorized the countryside at the bidding of Stayne and the Red Queen. The bandersnatch would snarl and snap at all others, except Queen Mirana, of course. It was impossible for any animal to be a true enemy to the White Queen. The Queen by her the purity of her nature was respected by all animal and plant life in Underland.
But the bandersnatch’s heart really belonged solely to one person. The two jaunted around the countryside together as Alice explored her new home of Underland. This slip of a girl riding around on several tons of gnashing teeth and claws. She had even given the fearsome beast a name – one the bandersnatch seemed to have thoroughly taken to, and one that brought a secret smile to Alice’s face every time she used it:
Lady Ascot.
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Date: 2010-03-29 06:12 pm (UTC)