It was tradition in Mavis Harland’s first period to play pranks on the sub whenever we had one. Sometimes, they were meaningless, nothing of pranks that even five year olds would yawn at. Other times, they were so bad that they sent the teacher out crying.

    That morning had been one of those mornings. Actually, that morning started out much like most of her mornings did. She got up, got ready, picked up Jaquelin, and then went to school. It was the afternoon that turned weird.

    The first odd part had already been planned. She would be leaving school fifteen minutes early so that she could go to the Veteran’s Hospital with Alex-had even written a reminder to leave at 2:50 on her hand in black sharpie. They were going with their German group to hand out Christmas goodies to the veterans. They’d done it the year before and apparently the veterans had enjoyed it so much that they were asked to come back.

    It was the other series of events that was unplanned.

    They were in Alex’s car, driving to the V.A when it happened.

    “Dammit,” Alex hissed, hitting her steering wheel and revving the engine.

    They had had to stop for a stop sign, and ended up getting stuck in the snow. Any other car would’ve been able to gun through it, but Alex’s car was just barely bigger than a smart car, which meant that the chances of them actually being able to get out of this while staying the car was next to none.

    Mavis sighed, and rested her head on the back of the seat, waiting for her to realize this. Alex hated the cold though, which meant she would probably end up using half her fuel before admitting that it was time to get going.

    “Mavis!” Alex whined, and turned to her, “Can you go kick the snow?”

    Mavis snorted, and turned away from her, “Yeah right. It’s your car.”

    “But I don’t wanna get out!”

    “Well, I’m only getting out if you do as well.” Mavis sighed, and grabbed out to yank slightly on Alex’s long brown hair, “Let’s just get this over. The faster we get out, the faster we can get going again.”

    Alex stuck her tongue out at her as Mavis opened up her door and did the awkward half roll, half step thing she had to do while getting out of her absurdly tiny car. The air outside was so cold that her shoulder length blonde hair, wet from having forgotten to hold it back while getting a drink from the water fountain almost instantly began to freeze. They would have to get this done quick or she may end up having a new haircut tomorrow.

    “Ugh, there’s so much snow!” Alex whined when they got to the front of the car.

    It was true. The pile came up almost halfway to her bumper. They would be freezing by the time that they got the vehicle free. Mavis pouted, before poking the pile forlornly. The rubber was colder to the touch than she had imagined. She pursed her lips worridly. They had been driving for some time, you’d think the constant movement would’ve kept it from getting so cold.

    She stepped back and examined the car from afar. What was going on? This was just starting to get to be too weird. There was no way the vehicle should be so cold when it had just been running up until not even a minute ago.

    As she did so, her foot sunk unexpectedly in the snow. She shrieked, as she lost her balance and fell backwards onto the cold, hard ground. As she did so, she sunk more into the snow, way too far. There shouldn’t have been more than an inch or two of snow covering the ground, but somehow she had sunk so that it came almost up to her knees.

    “Jeez, Mavis,” Alex laughed as she made her way over to the blonde, “Are you capable of walking two feet without killing yourself?”

    Mavis pursed her lips, already shivering from the cold. Dammit. She knew she should’ve worn something warmer than a bulky vest and fall jacket. At least gloves or a hat or something.

    “Get m-my hat out of my bag,” she stuttered as she spoke, “I’m f-freezing.”

    Alex cocked her head to the side, before fighting her way back to the tiny car. As she did so, Mavis struggled to pick herself up. Sitting down, she was eye level with the bottom of the tires, which proved her point that she had fallen way deeper than she was supposed to. And it didn’t make her happy that she was right in the instance.

    She had gotten to my knees by the time Alex was back, her black, girly baseballish-styled hat in her hand.

    “This isn’t going to do anything in keeping you warm,” she stated the obvious but handing the cap over to Mavis, nonetheless.

    Mavis nodded and tugged the cap over her hair, wet again from the snow that had gotten in it and melted from her body heat. Great. “Yes, but it’s better than nothing.”

    Alex placed her hands on her hips and pursed her lips, “You’re awfully low in the snow.”

    Mavis nodded, “Thanks for stating the obvious, Sherlock.”

    Alex rolled her eyes, “I’m just saying. It’s weird.”

    “Once again-”

    “Shut up. Just because you’re the one who’s wet and cold now doesn’t mean you have an excuse to get all bitchy at me.”

    Mavis shut her lips, but let them jut out in a pout for a second, before pulling herself fully to her feet. Clearly, there was more snow that they would have to dig, so they should probably get going any second now.

    As she was doing so, Alex held out a hand to help and Mavis complied, grabbing a hold of it. But, before she could get all the way to her feet, the ground opened up beneath her and the two of them found themselves tumbling forward, into a deep hole.

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    “My queen!” a man with white hair and rabbit ears cried, running into the royal chamber.

    A young woman who couldn’t be much more than fifteen or sixteen years of age with dark brown curls, dressed all in red turned toward the strange man who had entered her room. She did not seem surprised by his unusual appearance, however.

    “What is it, Romeo?” the queen hissed, setting down her quill, “Can’t you see I’m very busy right now?”

    “But your majesty!” the man was practically jumping in his excitement, “I found her! She’s back!”

    “What?” the queen gasped and turned to face him fully, “Are you serious!”

    “Of course!”

    “Go, Romeo!” the queen shooed him with a wave of her hand, “We haven’t a moment to waste! I want you to be there when she arrives and bring her straight to me! That girl will pay for what she has done!”

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    Mavis couldn’t make any coherent words as they continued to fall. All she could do was scream and hope that whatever was at the bottom of this hill was comfy and yielding. My god! How long had they been falling? They were going to die without a doubt!

    She wasn’t sure why she was clutching onto her hat so dearly. It wasn’t like it mattered if she lost it or not. All she knew was that it was something to hold onto and that was what she needed. One hand clutched the black fabric to her chest, while the other one absentmindedly searched for Alex. She knew the brunette was with her, for she could hear her own shrieks as well.

    Were they going to fall straight to the center of the earth? Was the world falling apart and things like this were happening all over the place? A million different reasons were flashing through Mavis’s head. Her hand finally found Alex’s elbow and she tugged the girl just a bit closer. They were going to die.

    And right as she thought that, they suddenly slowed down. They didn’t stop, but there was definitely a great amount of lag that had suddenly been put against them as if they’d all of  a sudden opened up a parachute. Mavis turned to see Alex staring at her with wide brown eyes and she knew that her own face probably mirrored it.

    And then… they found the ground.

    Mavis landed with a grunt as her butt suddenly came in contact with hard ground. She groaned, sitting up and rubbing her backside. Well, that had been weird.

    “Are we alive?” Alex asked, after they had caught their breath.

    Mavis sat up and looked around at their surroundings. They were in a large room with big purple tapestries hung up on the walls and a tiny door barely bigger than her foot on the other.

    “I hope so,” she breathed, “Because this is not how I pictured heaven to be.”

    She brought herself up to her feet, and walked the perimeter of the room, “How do you think we get out of here?”

    “I don’t know,” Alex bent down in front of the door, and poked at it, “This is definitely too tiny for either one of us to fit through.”

    “Hey, that tickles!” a voice suddenly broke through the room. Mavis froze, her hand lingering on one of the curtains, before turning toward the door where it had come from,

    “Did that door just… talk?” she asked, her blue eyes wide.

    Alex was staring at the door as well, where a face had suddenly appeared, “Of course! And I’m your only way out!”

    “But.. doors don’t talk,” Alex gasped, ignoring his second statement, “Their inanimate objects.”

    “Well, I don’t know what doors you’ve been talking to, but I can most certainly talk. And sing. And laugh. And whistle, and-” the door laughed again, “Well, hell, I can do just about anything you can do.”

    “Oay then, Mr. Door,” Mavis raised an eyebrow, not quite sure if she was buying all of this, “You say you’re our only way out, right?”

    “Yes, ma’am.”

    She got down on her knees so she was right next to Alex and as close to face to face with the door as she could get, “Then how do we get through you? I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but you’re quite a bit smaller than us.”

    The door laughed again, “Simple. See that table over there?” Mavis turned to see a wooden table appear out of thin air in the far corner. On it lay a bottle with some liquid in it and a note that said ‘Drink Me’ and a key. “Drink that and then use the key to unlock me.”

    Mavis moved to grab the drink, but was stopped when Alex put a hand on her elbow, “Wait, Mavis. We don’t know what’s in that.”

    Mavis raised an eyebrow, “So what? It’s not like we’ve got anything else to lose-clearly we’re already crazy. And I don’t want to spend the rest of my life in this weird place.”

    Alex’s lips straightened into a thin line before she hesitantly pulled her hand away and nodded. Mavis made certain to put the key in her pocket-something in her told her she’d regret it if she didn’t-before taking a big drink of the potion and quickly handing it over to Alex who did the same.

    All of a sudden, she felt a tingling all over her body, as if she were holding onto one of those fake packs of gum that shocked you when you tried to pull a stick out. She watched as everything in the room started to get bigger and the feeling intensified. Yupp, it was official. She was going insane. People didn’t shrink, they grew.

    She fell over as she suddenly stopped, before crawling over to the door, now the perfect size to fit through. Alex came up behind her as she dug the key out of her pocket. The door laughed as he caught sight of it.

    “You’ve gotten smarter, Alice,” he told her.

    Mavis entertained the thought of asking why he’d called her Alice but decided that compared to everything else that had just happened, it wasn’t that weird. However, there was one thing she had to know before she could open the door.

    “Just one more thing,” she said, pausing with the key hovering just a few inches from the lock, “Where are we?”

    The door smirked, “Well, don’t you remember Alice? You’re in Wonderland.”