The Complete Alice Wonder Series - Insanity - Books 1 - 9

by Cameron Jace

  She sighs, “I don’t what, but there is something wrong with both Tom and the March. I just can’t put a finger on it.”

  Warehouse, an hour earlier

  When the Inklings were fighting the Reds in the warehouse, Tom Truckle had to bet on his best shelter. Not being a man of war, he needed protection. Constance had been his better choice, but the little girl hated his guts. Jack didn’t care much for Tom so he didn’t know whether he’d protect him or not. Tom had let Lewis down in the past, so he didn’t think crouching and ducking behind him was a safe bet. The best bet had been, like always, Alice.

  He hid behind her as Fabiola was giving her the sword. Tolerating all the madness about her cutting herself to gain powers had been much easier than taking Constance’s curveballs in his face all the time.

  Then when Fabiola fainted, and Alice gained her power and left to fight, he was alone again. He sneaked around like a cat, trying his best to dodge a bullet or a sword’s cut here and there.

  And then, in the middle of all of this, he found what he had been looking for. A cellphone.

  It didn’t matter whether a Red had dropped the phone or if it had belonged to someone in the warehouse earlier that day. After all, everyone had been in a panic since last night. Leaving a cellphone behind wasn’t a surprise.

  The real question was: did it work?

  Tom picked it up and wiped the blood off of its screen and pushed the button. Hurray and hallelujah! It worked.

  Now the question was: did it have credit?

  Two hurrays, three hallelujah, and fries on the side! It did.

  Tom ambled out of the warehouse, leaving the fight behind. He had been dying for this phone call all day. But the line wouldn’t connect.

  A few minutes later he returned. The Inklings were gathered around the March. He told them about the mushrooms and the garden and Six Keys. Tom now had to make that call now.

  He stepped back a little, out of the warehouse. In the shade next to the main door, he found a signal.

  Typing the number, he breathed heavily. The man on the line scared him, but the phone call had to be done.

  “Hello?” the gruff voice said.

  “It’s Tom.”

  “Tom who?”

  “Tom Truckle.”

  Silence. A drag from a cigarette. Then, “Ah, the Mock Turtle. You have something for me?”

  “Of course,” Tom whispered. “I heard the March tell them where the Six Keys are,” Tom told the man what happened.

  “Great job.”

  “Will you send someone to pick me up now? I spend so much time with those monkeys, and I need my pills — and my financial reward.”

  “You get your pills and your money when you finish your mission,” the voice said.

  “As you wish, Master,” Tom said disappointedly. “As you wish, Mr. Jay.”

  Ice-cream Truck

  “Check this out,” Constance points the phone she had confiscated from Tom Truckle. “The Kew Garden where the mushrooms are has its own guards.”

  “Really?” I snatch the phone from her.

  “Do you have internet?” Jack wonders. “I thought phone coverage would be dead by now.”

  “It’s a Wonderland War, not a Walking Dead Episode, Jack,” Constance says. “Though it soon will be, unless we save the world and find that most precious thing.”

  “Why would they have their own guards?” I ask, reading the Wikipedia article. “It says they’ve had their police since 1897.”

  Constance looked back over her shoulder to check on Fabiola and Lewis in the back to ask them, but they seemed engaged in a conversation of their own. She gave it up and talked back to Alice, “I think this is evidence that the March is right.”

  “Why?” Jack asks.

  I answer on Constance’s behalf, “A private police guarding the garden suggests there is some secret there. Maybe they’ve been waiting for the March’s arrival for two centuries.”

  “I agree on that,” Constance says. “The plot thickens, though I’m still confused why the March forgot after being told the secret.”

  I nod. It’s been puzzling me as well.

  “Maybe the secret was too hard to hold on to,” Jack says. “So he went to the Pillar as well,” Jack squints at his conclusion. “But it doesn’t add up since the Pillar doesn’t know where the Six Keys are.”

  Constance sighs, hands on her waist. “Why six keys?”

  “Six impossible things. It’s one of Lewis’ most memorable saying in the book,” I told her, pointing at Lewis and Fabiola. “What do you think they are talking about?”

  SPECIAL_IMAGE-images/svgimg0001.svg-REPLACE_ME

  Fabiola and Lewis sat guarding the March Hare. Tom sat a bit on the end of the seat, looking out a small window. The March was breathing. He looked like he was dreaming, in deep sleep, solemn and serene, without troubles now that he’d passed on that part of the secret.

  “Shouldn’t we try to wake him up?” Fabiola wondered.

  “I’ve tried,” Lewis said. “He has to wake up on his own. Sleeping long enough should help him remember.”

  “And you don’t remember Lewis?” she leaned forward to the seat opposite to him. “Are you hiding something from me?”

  Lewis looked back into her eyes, “I never lie to you.”

  “I know, but I had to ask,” she said. “I mean, without you, I would have still been married to the Pillar.”

  “We all wanted to help you out,” Lewis said, then his face drooped. “Though what happened to you after your awakening was worse.”

  She leaned back again, not wanting to remember. It was worse.

  “Sometimes I think maybe I should have let you be married to the Pillar, brainwashed by his mushrooms,” he said. “But then again, someone had to tell you the truth so you could make up your mind.”

  “It was my destiny,” she pointed at her scars, which everyone mistakes for tattoos.

  “Is that why didn’t kill him? Because you still loved him?”

  “Why do you keep asking me this?”

  “Because you keep saying you didn’t kill him, or attempt it, because of Alice. I don’t buy it.”

  Fabiola looked away, then nodded in Tom’s direction. She didn’t want him to hear. Then she turned to look at the March sleeping again. “Do you at least know what the Six Keys are? I mean, you and I have an idea of what they do, but what are they?”

  “What do you mean ‘are’?” Lewis questioned. “They are keys.”

  Fabiola sighed, eyes fixed on the March. “I am starting to doubt that they even exist.”

  King’s Cross Station in London

  Margaret worried that the Tiger Lily was lost. Thieves had blown off the lockers to steal what was inside. With cemented feet, she felt like she was going to have a heart attack, staring at them stealing what’s inside.

  “What the hell,” she said.

  She gathered her courage and began looking as fast as she could, jumping from pile to pile, and avoiding strange-looking men that stole everything. She saw two guys fight over a safe box that had been kept in one of the lockers. She peeked to see if the Lily was nearby, then left to another pile.

  She saw a child hanging onto a pot of roses.

  That’s it!

  She ran to her and snatched the pot away, howling at her. The girl cried right away and ran off. Margaret held on to the pot like kids hold on to their books from school on their way home.

  Finally.

  She lowered her head, and to her surprise, this wasn’t a tiger lily. Just some flowers. She read the card on it:

  To my lovely wife, till death do us apart.

  “Death already did you apart,” she said and dropped the pot.

  Panic surged through her every pore as she jumped again and again. A civilian buried under the pile reached out to her so she could help him. She took off her hoodie and snarled at him. The man changed his mind and buried himself back inside.

  She was in such hurry that sh
e stumbled and fell over and over again.

  “Goddamit!” she cried out, kicking whatever she’d stumbled upon.

  Then her feet froze.

  Here it was. The Tiger Lily.

  Crawling on all fours, she went back and picked it up. What kind of plant survived so intact? The pot had no scratches on it.

  With one grip she pulled the poor lilies out with their muddy roots and threw them behind her. With her other hand, she had already dug into the mud to find an envelope.

  An easy task.

  A yellow note.

  She pulled out it, wiped off the mud and flattened it.

  Her heart pounded faster, so much that her eyes could not comprehend what she was reading. It was as if she had dyslexia all of a sudden. Why was it hard to read one word?

  The Pillar’s Wonder.

  But when she read the note, her facial features crumbled. On her knees, she flipped her head back and screamed upward. “Damn you, Pillar!”

  Ice-cream Truck

  “It’s like the Writing Desk puzzle,” Constance says. “No one ever knew what it was. Lewis is crazy sometimes, but I adore him.”

  “So we’re never going to know why they are six keys, not seven or five?” Jack asks.

  “Trust me, Jack,” I tell him. “It doesn’t matter. We just want to find them.”

  “Yeah,” Constance says, turning pages on the phone in her hand. “Sometimes I don’t know what we are doing at all. Wouldn’t it be easier if Fabiola and Lewis tell us what the precious thing is?”

  “I am a dead man,” Jack chuckled. “Don’t ask me.”

  “Wait,” Constance stopped, staring at the phone.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask.

  “The logs on this phone are a bit strange.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “All calls received or dialed were last done this morning, but the last call was made twenty minutes ago.” she raises her eyes toward me.

  “What does that imply?” Jack asks.

  I know what it implies. “Tom,” Constance and I say in one breath.

  “But he said he would call his children,” Jack says. “What’s wrong with that?”

  “His children are in Scotland, remember?” I say after having snatched the phone from Constance again. “This is a number in London.”

  Jack shrugged, hands gripping the wheel.

  “I never trusted him,” Constance says, glancing back at him, sitting next to Fabiola and Lewis, staring out the window.

  “You think he works for…” I begin to say, but then stop. Jack is cussing out loud.

  “Oh, no!” Constance says, staring ahead.

  I look and see the police have blocked the road ahead. “Can we go back?” I ask Jack. “Scoot over; I’ll drive.”

  “No point,” Jack says, looking in the rear mirror. “They’re behind us as well.”

  “And we’re in a narrow alley,” Constance says. It’s the first time I can sense fear on her tongue.

  “We’ve been ambushed,” I let the words spill out of my mouth.

  In the back, Tom sticks his head out of the window and waves, “Hey, it’s me, Tom. Just kill them.”

  Past: Wonderland

  Fabiola’s journey from darkness to light was a messy one. Day after day, she came to wake up and understand. Every day she woke up and looked at the pictures Lewis had given her. The face of the girl called Constance still talked back to her, though it faded away slowly. It’s seemed like the magic Lewis used didn’t last so long. Why would it? Fabiola had seen the light and needed to act.

  Each day, she would stare at the Pillar and see the real him. Behind the facade of happiness and fun existed an evil soul. How did she miss that?

  Of course, she hadn’t been that alert all of the time. The mushrooms effect on her made her love him occasionally. The whole situation felt like trying to stop taking a certain drug. One that had run deep into her vein and hurt every organ. She was an addict, wanting to stop, but couldn’t.

  There was also the matter of not showing the Pillar what she had learned, or who knew what he’d do to her. She began talking to people behind the bushes of the forest. She began communicating. Hearing stories. Horrible stories about the Pillar. The real Pillar. One day she met a young boy who’d been addicted to the Pillar’s mushrooms, and now that he’d spent all his family’s money, he had no way to pay him. The Pillar was cruel enough never to give him his fix. Instead, he would ask him to do terrible things for him as payment.

  Then the White Queen figured out a way to leave the forest. She made up stories about wanting to buy dresses she liked from merchants in the heart of Wonderland. She’d earlier made up a story about visiting her sister, but she’d dearly suspected her sister had a hand in this conspiracy. She knew how the poor Queen of Hearts hated her.

  Reluctantly, the Pillar allowed her to leave, for a few hours max. Not much time to ask for help. Not enough time to reach out to Lewis.

  Another idea had crossed her mind: to reach out to the Hatter, but she was worried the Pillar and the Queen would hurt him if they knew about their meeting. She had no accurate recollections of her love for the Hatter in the past, but there was this tinge she could feel in her heart whenever she thought about him now.

  Fabiola’s only solution was the words. In the scant time she had to herself away from the Pillar, she reached out to the Duchess. That ugly looking woman, living alone in the woods that were nearest to the forest. She had only met her once or twice before. In Fabiola’s mind, she thought the Duchess would sympathize with her, especially since she’d been a neglected individual in Wonderland.

  “How can I help?” asked the Duchess, pouring some tea for her. Fabiola had entered a few minutes ago, and the lonely woman had welcomed her.

  “I am embarrassed to ask,” Fabiola said. “It’s about the Pillar.”

  The Duchess twitched. Apparently, she didn’t want to have anything to do with the Pillar. Fabiola could see how people feared him now.

  “And the mushrooms,” Fabiola said.

  For an hour, she told her what happened. The story from beginning to end. Fabiola was surprised by the Duchess’ lack of surprise.

  “We’ve all known,” the Duchess said. “Though we weren’t sure about the mushroom that made you fall in love with him.”

  “It’s hard to imagine that love can be induced by a drug,” Fabiola said.

  “Love is a drug, darling,” the Duchess replied in her gruff voice. Fabiola noticed that she smoked all the time. The woman smoked her lonely life away. “But I can help you.”

  “How so?”

  “Magic.”

  “What?”

  “Dark magic, to be precise,” the Duchess said. “Let's face it. The Pillar owns you as a slave now. Even if you confront him, he will find a certain mushroom that will serve his purpose and stuff it in your guts.”

  Fabiola shrugged with despair. “So what about the dark magic?”

  “Fight fire with fire,” the Duchess said. “To counter the Pillar’s mushrooms, you will need to use a terrible magic.”

  “How terrible?”

  “It’s a spell. One that will hurt a lot.”

  Fabiola leaned forward. “But will it help me?”

  “It will.”

  “Will I be free of the Pillar’s mushrooms?” Fabiola asked. “Will I be myself again?”

  “Yes. And then you could maybe help out all the other poor Wonderlanders under his spell.”

  “You mean the kids he sells drugs to?”

  “I mean people like Lewis,” the Duchess said. “Can’t you see he hasn’t been himself lately?”

  “I can,” Fabiola considered. “I saw him. The Pillar messed with him and gave him an evil mushroom.”

  “You make me laugh, child,” the Duchess said. “There is no such thing as an evil mushroom. Only we are the evil ones.”

  The Duchess struck Fabiola as a wise woman. She felt for her. Then she heard baby cries in the back of the ho
use.

  “You have a child?” Fabiola asked.

  “A baby,” the Duchess said. “Just don’t tell anyone.”

  “Why?”

  “He is a bastard son,” she said. “I had him with stranger traveling through Wonderland. A man I only saw once. I fear people would know I have a baby and ask about his father. Let’s face it, and no man would love me with my looks.”

  Fabiola patted her. “Don’t worry; I will not tell anyone.”

  “Now, are you ready for the dark magic?”

  Fabiola hesitated. “How painful is it?”

  The Duchess stood up and pulled out a glinting knife. A small one with a sharp, thin blade. “This painful,” she said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Here is the situation,” the Duchess said. “The Pillar has you under his spell. To unchain yourself you will have to cut yourself.”

  “Cut myself?” Fabiola began sweating.

  “There is no way around it,” the Duchess said. “Small cuts every day, all over your body. Make them look like tattoos and paint over the cuts, so the Pillar won't suspect you’re using dark magic.”

  Fabiola hugged herself gently. She could taste the pain of the blade on her arms already. “But--”

  “There is no other way,” the Duchess said. “Fight fire with fire.”

  Fabiola took the blade and slowly cut herself in front of the Duchess. The first cut wasn’t the deepest though. It would take her months of pain, cutting through herself to rid herself of the Pillar’s spell. And the cuts would live with her like another layer of skin forever.

  Present: Fly Emirates Airplane

  The Cheshire loved flying first class. He’d booked his ticket and booked two seats left and right so he could take all the space he wanted. In the public’s eye he was Angelo Cardone, so he could do whatever he wanted. What he wanted more was to know why Mr. Jay had asked him to fly over to England.

  He was reluctant at first. Who wants to fly an airplane with all that was going in the world? The last he’d heard was that most airports were closed, and very few airlines still functioned. But Mr. Jay advised him not to believe all that’s been said in the news. Mr. Jay had bought Virgin airlines a few days back. Virgin had known about the prophecy of the Wonderland Wars twenty years ago. Special hangers, planes, and even crews had been on standby for many years. And you know what? The time has come.