When Tarrant and Mallymkun made their landing on solid ground, the mad hatter was able to glimpse at Salazen Grum from their high vantage. What was supposed to be a gigantic chasm from Cheshire’s explosion was still the figure of a castle in the middle of a gorge—crumbling but still standing.

It had the mad hatter thinking as they landed the ship.

“Mally,” Tarrant said, “Tell me if I’m going mad after I say this but Cheshire might be alive and well…no not well but alive, well he could be well and alive but alive and well at the same—”

“Hatter!” Mallymkun snapped Tarrant when the hatter’s pace in speaking increased as the sense of it decreased.

Tarrant stopped, “Fez…” and then he shook his head. “How much time does the queen need again?”

Mallymkun shrugged, “She didn’t exactly say anything about it but I bet it’s not enough for you to go on exploring outside.”

Tarrant’s brows centered and relaxed simultaneously. “Crims palace is still standing…”

“Impossible,” Mallymkun gasped. “So does that mean someone was able to disable the bomb?”

“Apparently.” Tarrant punched the red button that opened the exit.

“Hatter, where are you going?” Mallymkun asked.

Tarrant walked outside. “Don’t wait for me, Mally.” He said nothing more than his farewell as he made his way outside.

***

It was quiet all around. Other than the occasional sound of bubbling water from the cylindrical containers, it was their breaths that added to the noise. Rocket walked back and forth before the metal door of the genetics section. He hesitated in opening the exit for fear that the Bandersnatch might intercept them the soonest. There were no growls or light bellows that could indicate the beast’s presence outside yet the raccoon was taking too much caution.

Cheshire leaned against one of the cylinders with his shoulder and his foot, crossed on the other as he observed Rocket. “Don’t you think it’s about time we move out?” the Cheshire cat asked and followed another statement. “We’ve been here for hours… the beast isn’t likely to be there anymore.”

Rocket stopped pacing. “We can’t… we’re not sure,” he said shortly and then began walking back and forth again.

“Then what do you plan on doing?”

“I don’t know,” Rocket said the moment Cheshire finished. “I can’t risk you getting mauled by that beast. I’m thinking of a more convenient way we could go through this.”

Cheshire sighed, “I’ll be fine. Just open the door and we’ll cautiously make our way—”

“No you won’t,” Rocket interjected. He didn’t even look at Cheshire. Instead, he had his hand under his chin and the other folded on his chest, deep into formulating a strategy he couldn’t think of hours from now.

“Is this just because of me?” Cheshire stood up straight. “Am I the reason why you’re so hesitant?”

Rocket paid him no mind.

“I can take care of myself, I’ll have you know.” Cheshire walked over to Rocket.

Rocket stopped when the cat was in his mid. “I’m not risking your safety so stop being an idiot and let me think.”

Cheshire gave out a wry chuckle. “Do you think I can’t fend for myself? Do you see me as some weakling?”

“Without your assets you are a weakling.” There was no trace of reluctance in Rocket’s voice with the way he let go of those words. He was blunt and didn’t have the intention of euphemizing whatever he said.

Cheshire intercepted Rocket in his back and forth pace. “Just because I use my assets all the time, doesn’t mean I’m weak. I wasn’t born being able to fly and disappear.”

Rocket inhaled. He planted his hands on his hips and looked at Cheshire straight in the eyes. “Oh yeah, tough guy?” he challenged, “Then tell me, how are you going to protect yourself from that ban-that-snitch without any weapons?”

Cheshire folded his hands on his chest. “First of all, it’s Ban-der-snatch,” he segmented the word and then lifted one hand between him and Rocket. “Second, I have this.” He pushed out three shiny claws from between the gaps of his fingers. It glimmered, from the fluorescent lamps above them, emphasizing its serrated tips however the raccoon was all but convinced.

“You’re planning on combatting that enormous thing?” he flailed his hands in the air to scale the Bandersnatch’s size. “I’m not letting you get near that thing.”

“I’m a fricking cat!” Cheshire bursts, “I have natural assets I could use!”

Rocket retorted. “So what if you’re a fricking cat? I don’t even know what that is except that it’s apparently you after your claim.”

Cheshire groaned. “Just trust me okay? I can look after myself. You don’t have to baby me around.”

“Maybe I wouldn’t baby you around if you quit acting like one.”

“So I’m babying around?” Cheshire chortled wryly. “So that makes you my father all of the sudden?”

“Look at it in whatever way you want but I am not risking you,” Rocket raised his voice a pitch higher to overcome the cat’s. Then his voice became low. “I’m just tired of worrying,” his gaze averted to the floor. “I’m just fed up of that feeling when I think that I’ll end up alone again.”

Cheshire swallowed. He wanted to reply but found that he couldn’t.

“You understand, right?” Rocket said under his breath a little too low for anybody to hear. Perhaps he meant it for himself and just unconsciously said it. Regardless of the reason, Cheshire was still able to hear it and no… he didn’t understand. He didn’t know what it was like to lose someone.

“So we stay here?” Cheshire’s first words were raspy. He fell back on the metal floor with a thud and noticed something odd about the vibration his landing had made. He thought it was just his imagination but if he wasn’t mistaken, he heard a very faint echo underneath.

He lay flat on the floor with his ears against the metal. He knocked a few times but the force he made against the floor wasn’t enough to get a feedback. He wasn’t able to confirm a speculation but he was risking it.

Standing up, he extended his claws out from his flesh—six pieces of sharp, indestructible metal displayed.

Rocket observed the feline that was focused staring on the floor. Before he could ask what Cheshire was about to do, the cat began scratching manically against the floor. There were clangs on the first swipes as the cat scarred triple exes on the specific area. The screech of the metal gradually sounded less of screeches and became more of clangs and the sound of livewires spitting.

After much endeavor, Cheshire was able to create a small hole where he could peek on what’s underneath. He knelt on the floor and slipped his head inside the hole. There was light below. It was far and his claws could only dig so deep. It was still unreachable plus the entrance he created couldn’t even fit him.

“There’s a passage underneath us,” Cheshire said. “Could you widen the hole?”

Rocket snorted. He smiled quite largely, displaying his sharp canines to the feline without saying anything.

“What’s funny?” Cheshire asked without a clue.

The raccoon simply unstrapped his bazooka and charged the weapon for an ion blast. “What’s funny is that…” Rocket paused just to look at Cheshire with wild malice in his eyes. He continued, “…this isn’t the first time I’m using my big gun against a hole.”

Cheshire flustered and found that his voice had temporarily left him. Heat rushes invaded his neck up to behind his ears.

Rocket blasted the hole and the noise his bazooka created had an instant feedback of the Bandersnatch bellowing outside.

“Woops,” Rocket strapped his bazooka on his back, “Better move quickly.” He jumped down the hole and landed on all fours.

Cheshire followed without having to wait for Rocket to catch him. He landed roughly on the raccoon’s back, coiling him against the floor. “Oh sorry… you said move quickly,” Cheshire remarked sarcastically.

Rocket groaned as he got up, stretching his back. “I don’t know if I deserved that or not.”

They were now inside a tunnel where forward and backward were identical—both were an endless path lighted by the stream of fluorescent lamps on either side of the walls. The flooring had the rails of a train as if some machine used to travel to wherever.

“Where do we go now?” Rocket asked.

Cheshire shrugged, turning back and forth as he tried to choose the path. Rocket kept quiet. As the silence grew longer, Rocket noticed a faint ticking coming from south of where he faced. He closed his eyes and focused on the sound. It wasn’t his imagination.

“I think we should go there,” Rocket pointed behind Cheshire.

The cat looked to where Rocket pointed and he just had to ask the raccoon why.

“We don’t know where we’re going anyway,” Rocket said, “Besides… I have a strong feeling that we should follow that ticking sound.”

Cheshire reacted immediately. “Ticking sound?” he asked and then focused himself. “I can’t hear anything.”

“It’s there,” Rocket convinced. “Let’s just walk the path. Maybe you’ll hear it once we’re closer.”

Having not so sure where to go either way, Cheshire agreed and they made their way to south.

The hall was bright and curvy. It spared no space to be dark with its lamps within the walls in rows and columns. Above them was a complex entanglement of wires and pipes supporting the metallic floor at the first level of whatever section.

They walked for quite some time now and yet the cat still couldn’t hear the ticking sound which made Rocket doubt if the sound was really there. It bothered him, as they walked, that the sound gets louder and Cheshire still couldn’t detect it. Between them, Cheshire had the keener hearing.

Deeper into the path they walked, Cheshire finally reacted.

“I hear it,” he said, halting with his ears moving to the sounds. “It’s familiar… like I’ve heard it my entire life.”

“You think you could guess what that is?” Rocket asked, “And why did you just hear it now? It was clear even back there.”

Cheshire just shrugged and closed his eyes, recalling where he’s heard the sound. “I think… it’s near the border of Wonderland—by the end of the Tulgey Wood where your ship landed. I think,” he emphasized to show Rocket he wasn’t sure, “It’s the enormous clock that changes the Tulgey Wood every now and then.”

A dangerous idea struck Rocket. He wasn’t sure of it since he didn’t know the geography of Wonderland but currently, they were underneath an underground laboratory. They were in the changing clock’s level. He went to the walls and ran his hands against the structure. It wasn’t compact. It was built for changing.

The Cheshire cat became curious to Rocket’s sudden enthusiasm and with the raccoon’s expression, it didn’t seem too good.

“What are you doing?” Cheshire asked.

“We’re in danger…” Rocket mumbled. “I’m not sure but tell me if I’m wrong. Above us is the Tully wood, right?”

Cheshire corrected Rocket inside his mind but just nodded. He folded his hands, “Why?”

“Look at the structure of these walls and then look at this railing.” Rocket pointed.

Cheshire gazed at the structure and saw that the rail had small branches connected to the walls. He ran his hand on the metal structure and noticed that the walls weren’t fully attached to each other. It could easily be detached and removed. Perhaps the rail wasn’t used for an actual transportation machine. Perhaps it was what moved the walls to change.

“Curse that looney,” Cheshire spat. “I thought it was a genius idea to build an underground section underneath an underground section but this is just pure idiocy. Why would she build something like this?”

“So that none of her labs could be invaded again,” echoed a voice from a turning corner.

Rocket acted by reflex, instantly taking out his bazooka. He aimed it at the corner, charging a projectile.

Cheshire thought that the voice was familiar but he had his guard up nevertheless, extending his metallic claws.

A jolly laughter echoed from the corner and then from there, peeked out a hatted head.

Rocket shot immediately and the mad hatter’s head withdrew the instant. The electronic blast exploded against the wall, leaving an ashen splat marked on its body.

Cheshire pushed aside Rocket’s weapon with his hand and looked at the raccoon sourly.

“I got overexcited,” Rocket alibied and strapped his weapon on his back.

“Come out, Tarrant, it is fine now,” Cheshire called.

Out peeked the hatted head once more and then he giggled frivolously. “I never thought I’d see you again, Chess…” he came out and marched elegantly towards the duo.

Cheshire approached and when they were face to face, he pounced on the mad cyborg, embracing him. “How were you able to find us?”

“Well, I had a speculation that you might still be alive,” Tarrant said, “Having seen the Crims palace still standing… well, not standing but standing still, one piece, crumbling, almost standing—”

“Hatter!” Cheshire interjected.

“Fez…” He gasped and shook his head. “I took that chance in finding you.”

Rocket hated being out of the conversation. And he hated it more when he was being left out of place. He walked closer to Cheshire and pulled the cat beside him. “I hate to break your reunion—actually, I don’t but may I remind both of you that anytime, we could get sliced by these walls.”

Cheshire shook Rocket’s hands off him and approached the mad hatter once again. “I suppose you know the way, out?”

Rocket interjected, “Of course he does. How else would he have been able to come here otherwise?”

“Still cranky as always,” Tarrant remarked as he looked at Rocket with a pouting mouth and though as Rocket wasn’t there, he whispered loudly to Cheshire. “I still don’t understand how you came to love this fellow.”

Rocket snarled. “I could hear your failed whisper, idiot!”

Tarrant chuckled and pointed at Rocket. “I said it quite loudly.”

“Is that how yo—”

“Rocket that’s enough,” Cheshire interjected.

“What about him?” Rocket gestured to the mad hatter. “He’s the one being rude here.”

“No, it’s you who’s being rude.”

Rocket grunted and folded his arms. “Just get us out of here,” he spat.

Tarrant took off his hat and used to it present the way. “If you would follow?”

Rocket scurried ahead though he didn’t know where to go. There was only one path and it couldn’t be more obvious where they were supposed to go.

***

The mad hatter and the Cheshire cat conversed the whole time they walked. Rocket was ahead of them, arms folded on his chest. He mumbled as he walked, spitting every once in a while to the unwanted vibe the duo behind him created. They were going in the right direction, Rocket thought and they didn’t need the mad hatter at all. It’s not like the path was complicated. There was only one way to follow. He hated hearing the joyful laughter of the couple behind him. It sounded annoying.

“Could you two hurry up?” Rocket didn’t even look behind him. “This tunnel is making me claustrophobic and you guys merrily skidding there isn’t helping at all.”

The duo paid him no mind and Rocket bit his lip having been ignored. He stopped on his tracks and turned behind him. Impatience was written on his face, contempt by the tight clasp of his teeth. A light growl bellowed in his lungs as the duo paused to ask what made him stop.

“How did you even find us in the first place, you hatted weirdo?” Rocket snarled.

“Don’t talk like—”

“Shut up, Smiley!” Rocket growled at Cheshire and then turned to the mad hatter. “I was surprised that smug-face over there didn’t know about this tunnel. How did you even get here?”

Tarrant was silent and serious for a moment before chortling his way out of Rocket’s cornering question. “How I got here was through an entrance, obviously.”

“Don’t screw around with me!” Rocket’s voice echoed throughout the tunnel. “Where is that entrance? How did you know about it?”

Cheshire walked over to Rocket and tried to calm the raging raccoon but he was easily pushed aside.

Tarrant kept his face straight and only his eyes glowered down to the short raccoon. He wet his lips a few times. “What do you have there on that sling-bag?” he asked, “It’s been bothering me for quite some time now.”

“Don’t change the subject!” Rocket yelled.

The mad hatter walked over to Rocket and bent down.

The raccoon growled.

Tarrant reached in for the sling bag with his metallic hand. Rocket responded aggressively, biting the hand that approached but found that his teeth clasped against metal. The sling bag he wore was immediately in to the mad hatter’s possession.

Tarrant got up and opened the sling bag. “Oh my…” he looked at Rocket. “What ever are you planning to do with… these?” he took out three circular metals with complicated wires attached to them.

“Give them back!” Rocket jumped to retrieve the radiators but he couldn’t with the mad hatter’s size. He only noticed a petrified feline whose eyes were shockingly fixated on the metallic devices.

Cheshire’s breathing was readable to his heavy inhales and exhales, to his diaphragm moving constantly. Rocket felt a surge of guilt course through him as he witnessed the face of fear written on Cheshire’s face.

The cat’s legs trembled and his fur bristled. A terrified meow cried inside his lungs as Tarrant held the radiators in the air.

“You should close your bag well,” Tarrant placed the radiators back inside the sling-bag, “I was only able to glimpse at its edge yet I already knew what it was. Where did you even find these?”

Rocket wasn’t interested in the bag anymore or the mad hatter. He walked over to Cheshire and grabbed the feline on both shoulders.

Cheshire jutted upward with Rocket’s sudden contact. His eyes were wide open, pupils constricted and fixated to the air where the radiators couldn’t even be seen anymore.

“Chess… look at me,” Rocket whispered.

Cheshire tried but his eyes couldn’t settle elsewhere. He quivered for moments but he was able to look at Rocket nonetheless. “W-why do you have those?”

Rocket opened his mouth to speak but no voice came out. He swore that he knew what he was going to tell Cheshire once it was time but his rehearsals inside his mind were all but it was—just inside his head. Rocket breathed.

He let go of Cheshire and walked back.

“Alright…” his face became neutral. He walked ahead and faced the twosome. “I retrieved those so what you have on your back could be replaced. I retrieved those so that you wouldn’t have to be unstable anymore. I retrieved those because I thought you wouldn’t be complete if you weren’t… you.”

Tarrant coughed and looked at Cheshire.

The cat seemed to have grabbed ahold of his self now. He looked at Rocket, forcing himself not to cry. “You know Alice made me be this way and you’re pushing for what she wants?”

“Yes,” Rocket answered blatantly. “I know what you’ve been through. I saw all of it. I could try to understand but that’s as far as I could go. I was experimented on too…not as much as you but did you ever think…” Rocket paused to make sure Cheshire listened. “Did you ever think how stupid it is to stop at something that endangers you all the time?”

Cheshire bit his lip.

“Why stop at something that could kill you? You know what Alice put in you were prototypes. Why stop there?”

Cheshire nodded his head. “Because I’ve had enough of it,” he said under his breath. “In every experiment, I kept on wishing that I die. I told myself if I could escape, I would and when she put these on me,” he referred to the tech bulging out of his back, “Escaping became possible… so I did.”

Rocket sighed. “There is no good reason in why I retrieved those for you,” he chuckled wryly and pressed his palm against his forehead. “I only got those so you wouldn’t leave me behind,” Rocket gritted his teeth and though he wasn’t aware of it, a tear had already escaped his eye. “Because getting left behind sucks! It’s pathetic being left with memories to haunt you every day, making you think you could have done something to keep that person yet why didn’t you?”

Cheshire looked down.

Rocket continued, “This is me doing something to keep you. I don’t want to be separated from you like I was with Lylla. Do you know how much that fricking bothers me?” Rocket yelled. He was laughing and crying at the same time. “And if you really want to go, then Alice isn’t the one you should be running away from.”

A loud chime echoed through the entire hall. The trio had to cover their ears just to block the massive ring. The floor beneath them grumbled and the walls began to shake. Seconds after, the rail was glowing. Both walls on either side of them detached like puzzle pieces. All in synchrony, the walls tilted at a hundred-eighty degree angle and moved to the main rail.

Rocket had to jump and evade the moving walls that were moving like crazy. More paths were unveiled which was hidden behind the walls as everything around them shifted. Tarrant and Cheshire were nowhere in sight as it was every man for himself in trying to survive the moving walls.

Rocket grabbed hold on top of one of the walls that moved to the main rail and he rode it to wherever it was supposed to go. The shifting was finished in a minute. The last wall that moved on the rail, which Rocket rode, positioned at the end of a hall where a slanting platform stretched outside.

Fog loomed from the exit and Rocket followed it to a place so familiar—the landscape which underneath rests a giant clock—the Tulgey wood. He was alone and he didn’t know if he should get back inside the secret passage to search for Cheshire.

His decision was cut short when in the heaven projected a gigantic holographic image of a pink-skinned woman with curls of blonde hair.

“I see my dear pets have raised the flag of war,” the sound echoed throughout the entire forest—the entire country perhaps.

Rocket guessed that the woman was Alice. It could be nobody else.

She continued, “If freedom is what you so desperately seek, then come fight for it. I shall spare no one in the spilling of blood…. Jabberwocky.”

The projection stopped and the Earth beneath Rocket grumbled. The ticking of the clock underneath hastened and the whole forest began to move again. Rocket thought of getting back inside the secret passage but found the entrance had already closed up.

The ground parted in half and as fast as a lightning spit, a gigantic figure dropped towards the sky. It moved too fast for Rocket to comprehend what it was but its silhouette gave Rocket all the time he needed in trying to guess what the creature was.

It must be the Jabberwocky, Rocket thought as he looked at the winged beast concealed by the grayish clouds above him. It bellowed—a terrifying screech not even a thousand Bandersnatch could rival. Purples hues of lightning spat out from the Jabberwocky’s mouth, turning the canopy of grey clouds into a storm of miasmic gases.

It rained fire above as the beast made its way into the clockwork town, wreaking havoc.

Although the sound of destruction dominated, Rocket could still hear the voices of despair, people perishing.

Not long after the Jabberwocky’s appearance, the earth beneath him grumbled once more but it was just subtle as if the source was somewhere far away. Moments after the tremor, glowing red eyes were lined in the distance and the vibration of heavy, synchronized marches stomped.

It’s an army of cards—too many to battle.

Rocket went down on all fours, running the opposite direction where the cards were headed. The Frabjous day, which the caterpillar spoke of… perhaps this, was it.