Waltraud unties me, her lips pursed. "Go get dressed now. But remember, when you come back, your brain is mine. I'll mush it into mushed potatoes with ketchup made of your blood!"
I still don't get why an ambulance. Maybe to camouflage me being transported for inspection in another hospital.
The guards snicker as they push me into the empty back of the vehicle. I glimpse the words written on the back doors before they close on me:
hairies
I feel like a spy on a new mission, watching the latest report.
The YouTube video's purpose is for me to catch on. I learn all about the Stamford Bridge crime. The head stuffed into a football. No doubts this is the Cheshire's doing. The phrase "Off with heir heads" seems like one of his messages. Then I watch recorded local news about a man named Roman Yeskelitch who found another head in a watermelon he just bought.
I realize why I am out now. There is a new Wonderland crime happening out there, and I am needed. I can't deny my excitement. I am not going to lie.
Rolling down the window, I stretch out my hands like a child and sniff the day's cold air.
A few minutes later, the Chauffeur stops in front of a "Richmond Elementary School." At least the school bears a coherent name. I have no idea how no one comments on the name of the vehicle we're in, let alone why we're arriving in an ambulance.
"Why are we stopping here?" I ask.
The chauffeur points over my shoulder. When I look back, an old woman in thick glasses appears out of the school's main gate.
"You must be Alice." She approaches with welcoming sparks in her eyes. Her attitude screams "teacher," one of those kind-hearted and very talkative few in every middle-grade school.
I step down reluctantly. The woman pulls me in her arms, kisses me on the cheek, hugs me, and tells me how Professor Pillar never stops mentioning me.
She ushers me into the school, telling me Professor Pillar is so kind to agree to lecturing her kids. A lecture about the virtues of going after one's dreams. It turns out he told them I am the optimum example of achieving my dreams.
All I do is nod. The woman will eventually send me to the Pillar, wherever he is.
I want to tell her she has a dangerous serial killer in her school. I want to ask if she'd never heard about Pillar the Killer. But she doesn't stop talking, so I have no room to even comment.
Finally, she departs, leaving me at a corridor leading to a few classes. She tells me the school management preferred to give the Pillar all the privacy he needed in the classroom.
The word "classroom" bothers me. I ask how many children he has with him in there. The teacher nods with the happiest smile ever, and claps my hand between hers before she says her prayers and blessings, still enamored by the presence of one of the country's most renowned professors. All of this without telling me how many children. She tells me how kind it is that a man of the Pillar's caliber visits the children, and how happy they are about meeting with such an idol.
"Do you happen to know he's been convicted..." I can't help it.
"Of murder?" She laughs and waves a hand in the air. "Professor Pillar was so kind to explain the misunderstanding. Of course, there is the
I can't argue with her, actually. I myself am not supposed to be out of the asylum. I think the brilliance of my cover is that I am not expected to be walking the sane world. "And why would a madman visit a school and lecture kids if he'd escaped the asylum?" I am thinking out loud, trapped inside the logic he fed to the poor woman. It's scary how the change of a word or two can twist any truth into a lie.
I pat the woman and thank her, turning to walk the corridor. A few empty classes away, I find an occupied one. When I peek in through the glass in the door, I don't see children flying paper planes or practicing all kinds of chaos in the absence of real teachers. Instead, I see them all building things. Some kind of Lego structure, except they are putting together pieces of a few hookahs.
"Boys and girls." He points his hookah and lets a spiral of smoke swirl around him. "Welcome your new friend." He points at me.
The attention of the young folks tenses me momentarily, but once they start calling my name, I have no choice but to open the door and take them in my arms.
"Alice!" a girl runs into me and hugs me. "The Pillar said you would come visit us."
"I wouldn't miss it," I say, and then gaze at the Pillar for explanation. He is not looking at me, occupied with chalking something on the blackboard. He draws a blind woman holding two scales, a hookah in each, and writes underneath: ...
"Are you going to catch the Watermelon Killer?" a girl asks. I feel dreadful that they know about the crimes, and shoot the Pillar a blaming look.
"That's TV's doing, not me," he says, and drags from his hookah.
"He is not called the Watermelon Killer," a boy objects. "He is the Football Killer."
"Why don't you all give me some privacy with the Pillar for a few minutes"—I pat a few children—"so I can catch that killer?"
"Kick his arse!" A tall and chubby boy fists a hand as if he were Superman.
I guess that is TV's doing as well.
"Go back to your hookahs, kids," the Pillar says. "They're not smoking hookahs, just putting a few together," he tells me before I object. "It's basically like Lego."
I leave the kids and walk to him. The Pillar shows me out to a balcony. Once we get out, his funny face disappears. "The Cheshire is killing again," he says, not wasting any more time.
"How do you know it's the Cheshire?" I ask.
"At least he is behind the killings. But this time it's different: grander, gorier, and bloodier. Whatever he has on his mind, we're way behind to stop him." He reaches for his phone to show me something.
"Stop!" I demand.
He looks confused.
"Seriously?" I sneer at him, tilting my head.
He blinks twice, wondering about my annoyance.
"You don't contact me for a week, leave me behind with so many unanswered questions, and then when we meet, you act as if I'm working for you or something?"
"Oh?" he says. "I suppose I should've written you a letter of fluffy words on pinkish watermarked paper that smells of summer roses."
"Of course not. It's just that unanswered questions keep piling up."
"I suppose I could answer a couple of questions." He checks his pocket watch. "If the Cheshire doesn't go chopping a few other heads and stuff them in watermelons while we do."
"Don't do this to me." I raise a finger. He is triggering my desire for justice and saving people.
"After Yeskelitch's watermelon, eleven more heads were found in watermelons across the country. In a span of two days."
"So fast?" I am perplexed.
"Also, the news hostess lied and kept vital information from the public," he says. "The head Yeskelitch found was one of his
kid's
"Thirteen heads so far, all kids between age seven and fourteen," the Pillar says. "It's a Jub Jub mess." He turns on the news on his mobile phone.
"This is insane..." My jaw is left hanging open, my eyes begging me to drop down my eyelids so I won't have nightmares from what I am looking at. Families are crying their hearts out, mothers vomiting upon seeing their children's chopped-off heads, and fathers cry hysterically and swear they'd chop the killer into a million pieces when they catch him. "This is insane," I repeat to myself, because I don't know what else to say.
"Well, no more watermelons sold in Britain," the Pillar muses. Now he has my attention, he starts playing sarcastic and cruel again. "People should stick to cantaloupe. Ah, not big enough to stuff a head inside."
"So, why is the Cheshire killing again?" I have to ignore his weird sarcasm. It's only meant to provoke me.
"I have no idea."
"You don't?" I frown. "I thought you knew how the Cheshire thinks."
"Usually I do, but this"—he points at the screen—"is some messy massacre. I don't understand its purpose."
"But the message on the kid's foreheads speaks for itself," I offer. "'Off with their heads.'"
"So does the idea of chopping off heads." The Pillar stares absently at the screen. I can tell he is genuinely confused. "It's definitely a Wonderland crime, committed by a Wonderland Monster like the Cheshire. I just don't understand why."
"The Cheshire said there will be a Wonderland War—whatever that is. Could that be a part of it? Just some carnage, messy massacre to ensure terror on humans?"
"Nah." The Pillar tongues his cheek from inside. "Despite his unquenchable grudge against humanity, the Cheshire's main concern is to locate and free the Wonderland Monsters to help him in the Wonderland War." He eyes me briefly, letting me know I am not supposed to ask what the war is about, not now. "So, inducing chaotic madness upon the world isn't his thing. These murders are about something else. This is tailored work, a careful design of crimes. Whoever killed thirteen children all over Britain in two days had committed the crimes much earlier. We were only meant to know about them now. There is a message we're supposed to get."
"We?"
The Pillar nods. "Humans, although he detests them, are of no interest to him. They are merely puppets he uses. If he represents the black tiles on the chessboard of life, we represent the white ones. Well, at least you. I'm only helping you for now." He takes a moment to consider. "Last time, the Cheshire wanted his grin back, so he could retain his unstoppable power that would assist him in finding the Wonderland Monsters."
I am not following, not really. All I care about is stopping the crimes, so I am thinking. "Why don't we start with learning more about the victims' heads? It's clear that this is what the killer wants us to look at."
The Pillar shoots me an admiring look, as if I am his clever apprentice. "Good thinking." He points at the news showing the victims being transferred to the morgue for autopsy.
I take a moment to comprehend what he is trying to imply. "Wait." I take a step back. "You don't mean I am..."
"Going to the morgue?" His smile broadens.
"I thought I'd leave the asylum to see the world outside, go see Oxford University, the Vatican, and Belgium like last time."
"If you want to know about the dead mean's fate, the morgue is always a good start."
"Which morgue?" I sigh.
"The Westminster Public Mortuary, formally known as the Rue Morgue to the likes of Edgar Allan Poe."
"Poe?" I know he was a prolific writer who wrote a short story called "Murders in Rue Morgue," which took place in London centuries ago. Was he actually writing about
"And that would be?"
"The Westminster Public Morgue has a most secretive section inside. They call the
living
Too late, too late, for an important date
"What is that?" I stare suspiciously at the mushroom.
"A sedative. It will make you look dead for an hour or so." He pulls my hand and gently places this spongy thing on my palm.
"Why would I want to look dead?"
"Oh, Alice. How do you think you will get into a maximum-security mortuary? Just take a small bite." He nudges my hand toward my mouth.
I open the balcony and say goodbye to the children in class. They wave back enthusiastically, welcoming me with their Lego hookahs. I gaze back at the Pillar, wondering if I should trust him. It's hard to tell from the way he looks at me. It's hard to tell who he really is, or what he wants with me.