The Envelope: Snippet Post

So, it's the 15th of the month, which means it's Snippet Post Day for the scifibigbang !!


Here is an excerpt from The Envelope, Part Two --

*~*~*~*
WARNING: Rated M for sensuality, non-explicit sexual situations, and references to past torture.
Pairing: Alice x Hatter

Sensing that sleep will not answer her call tonight – perhaps she and it no longer speak the same language, or perhaps she requires the Hatter’s assistance with a translation – Alice slides out of bed, puts on the robe and slippers provided for her, and silently exits her room.

It is nearly pitch black in the hall, but she knows the layout well. And she knows precisely how many steps it is to the Hatter’s door. What she does not count on, upon reaching it, is the startling swiftness with which it opens before she can even knock. She gasps reflexively and warm hands fumble for her shoulders in the dark. And then she hears him giggle softly.

Relieved, she moves toward him and quietly shuts the door behind her.

“Hatter,” she whispers as she smooths her cheek against his slightly stubbled one.

“Yes, Alice?”

“May I stay the night?”

His arms pull her closer. His teeth worry at her earlobe. “I’ve a bed nauw,” he murmurs. “Hauw wou’ye like teh use it?”

“Thoroughly.”

This time, when they come together, there are no clothes or other fabrications between them. Alice gasps softly against his bare shoulder, counts the irregularities along the skin of his chest with her fingertips. Several slash-like lines of raised skin here just below his heart, a pucker of once-burnt flesh there near his collarbone… to name a few. Now she understands why, on the drive of Marmoreal, clearly thrilled to have escaped Crims with his life, the Hatter had not embraced her although, at the time, she had expected he would. She does not ask why he had merely clasped her hands briefly then. She does not ask what these marks are, nor why they are on his chest rather than on his back; she already knows.

“Do you forgive me?” she murmurs. “I was late. So very late. I did such a poor job of saving you…”

“Hush, my Alice. Hush.”

She does.

*~*~*~*

The Envelope is at 42,500 words and I just have bit more to write!  Yay!!

I'm currently debating whether or not to add that song - "I Think We're Alone Now" (80s flashback much?) - to my fanmix for this fic.  (^__~)  The Click Five actually has a pretty awesome cover of I Think We're Alone Now on YouTube.

Cliché Prompt 2: A Beautiful Nightmare

Title: A Beautiful Nightmare
Rating: K
File size: 646 words
Summary/Notes: An extension on the Balcony Scene from Tim Burton's film Alice in Wonderland. Title taken from Beyonce's song "Sweet Dreams". And here's a fanvid made from it, if you're interested: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuSQAl5fR5s
Comments: Just a quick response to the cliché. Don't get your hopes up for Epicness, people, because it's so not Here.

*~*~*~*

 

The night is young and the moon is full of possibilities.  The white stone of the balcony glows with hope and that hope shores him up against the young, future-Champion’s self-doubt and stubborn resistance to belief.  He respects that resistance; he himself has resisted much in his life.  He knows the effort it requires.  Knows the price it exacts.

“You’re just a figment of my imagination,” she had said.

But even figments can be real, can they not?  Even figments have a fate?  Yes, yes!  Perhaps, that is the Oraculum’s meaning!  Perhaps it will not be the Alice herself who defeats the Jabberwock, but a figment of her imagination!  If she can imagine him defeating the Jabberwock then it will be so!   It must be so!  If, in fact, this is all a dream – her dream!  Yes, this is what they’ve all been waiting for!  For the Alice to dream them up… and end their nightmare!

 “Thank you, Alice,” Tarrant Hightopp whispers.

The young woman beside him, irreverently leaning on her elbows on the balcony rail, glances at him with an expressive frown.   “For what, Hatter?” she replies, her voice as soft as the moonlight.

Oh, silly child!  If only she would think, then she would know why he thanks her!  “Row, row, rowing the boat, of course!”

Her confusion is palpable.  He taps his thimble-capped fingers on the stone in thought, wondering how a creature as capable as her could fail to understand such a fundamental truth: all life is but a dream!

“Being a figment of your imagination does not make me any less real,” he elaborates, proud of the succinctness of his explanation.  “To you,” he adds.

“To me?”

“Yes!  And that’s really the most important thing, isn’t it?”  Her response, such as it is, is rather dissatisfying.  Must he lead her by the hand up the treacle well?  “Don’t you see?” he patiently continues, “You make all of this possible.  Tomorrow, the Jabberwock will be defeated.  You believe that, don’t you?”

“I…  But they say I’m supposed to be a champion and…”

Tarrant blinks at her, startled.  “But, Alice, you already are a champion.”

“How can you say that?” she rasps, standing upright and bracing her hands against the stone.  Glaring out at the moonlit orchard, Alice says with heat, “Figment or not, I shouldn’t have left you at Crims like I did!  What sort of champion is that, I ask you!  And, in the end, it wasn’t even I who saved your hat.  It was Bayard and Chessur and…!  I have done nothing to—!”

“You,” Tarrant firmly interrupts, “are my champion, Absolutely Alice Kingsleigh, because you enabled me to save myself.”

Sighing, she turns toward him and confesses, “I… don’t understand.”

No, of course she wouldn’t, doesn’t, can’t.  This woman-child is too young to understand such things.  He glances down at her hand.  Were she but a bit older and wiser, he might have dared to hold it.  But she isn’t, so he won’t.

He lisps, “Always teatime, never breakfast or supper or even a moment to spare for cleaning up.  Have you any idea how long I have been snubbed by Time?  Trapped at 4 o’clock?  How many cups of rancid tea I have choked on?  You arrived,” he reminds her on a happy sigh, “and freed me from that wretched table.”

She stares at him.  He doesn’t mind.  For when Alices are not speaking, they might be thinking.  And he dearly hopes this one is doing just that.

“You saved me, Alice,” he informs her on a whisper, “and that is why you are a champion, whether you face the Jabberwock on the morrow or not.”

With a bow, Tarrant Hightopp departs the balcony.  Tomorrow, a champion will be chosen.  Tomorrow, if Alice believes it is possible, this nightmare will end… and the dream will, at last, begin.