Curiouser and Curiouser

CC-2: Forgetful Things

You've wandered into the woods where you simply cannot remember anything! Find a most creative way to interact with whatever creature (or person) you find there and escape together. (<500 words)

Alice and John hurried from the courtroom and onto a path. From the left, Alice could hear the sounds of the Queen's croquet match, so she turned right, but John stopped her with a hand on her wrist.

“What's going on? Where are we?”

“Hush,” Alice peered behind them but no one was there. Good. “I'll explain in a moment.”

He stood firm. “Where's Fia?”

“If I knew, we'd be with her.” Alice snapped back. “Move. It isn't safe.”

Finally, he started moving, pulling her along. Almost immediately, they came to a wood. Alice was fairly certain that she had never been there before. She looked around. Peaceful. The path was gone and she was surrounded by trees with the blue sky overhead and the song of birds around her. On a branch ahead of her, she could see a grin appearing from nowhere. That was familiar.

“This must be a dream,” she murmured.

Beside her, a man tugged at her wrist. She looked around at him. Who was he? She tugged and he let her go, absently. “I wonder where we are,” he said. Then he looked at her. “Who are you?”

“I'm not certain,” she said. “But I think that cat is familiar.” And there was something tugging at her memory. She'd forgotten something important.

“What cat?”

She pointed at a grin hovering above a branch across the clearing. She took his hand and they wandered toward it with no particular urgency.

As they approached, the grin grew a cat around it, who asked them, “Why are you here? Don't you have somewhere to be?”

“I'm not sure. Do you know where we're going?” She frowned. “I have forgotten something important. I'm sure of it.”

The cat rolled his eyes. The rest of his head faded so he could do it, leaving only the grin and a set of rolling eyes. She blinked, and shook her head because the rapid eye motion gave her a bit of a headache.

“Well, it's no use talking to you.” The cat faded leaving just a grin which bobbed through a gap between two trees.

She tugged at the man, and they both followed the grin to find themselves on the path again. The cat was perched on a signpost. Alice gasped.

“Oh my,” she said. “Which way should we go, Cat?”

“That depends. Where do you want to go.”

“To find our daughter.”

The Cat's grin widened. “Ah, good. It's better to have a goal in mind. If you don't know where you're going, it doesn't matter which way you go.”

“Her name is Fia.”

“Ah, yes. Fia. Quite a clever little kitten she is.”

“You've met her, then?”

“Yes, in the company of the Hatter and Reia.”

Alice peered up at the signpost. The sign reading “Mad Hatter” pointed to the right.

Tugging at John's hand, they headed towards Fia.

word count: 495