Updated Author's Note (as of May 19 2016):

Alright, let me begin by saying that Alice's Adventures in Wonderland as smitten me. My writing life practically revolves around this beautiful literature novel. So naturally, it bled into my fanfiction for the Uta no Prince-sama fandom, and, well. Two years ago, this fanfic existed.

I've written many chapters ahead, but never posted it. Why? Well, in all honesty, I kind of hated them. I was baffled at the time at why I was obsessed with "Alice in Wonderland" things. I even had my room painted with checkered walls and red accents. A Cheshire Cat plushy was on my bed, and a Mad Hatter's hat was on the table. Yeah. I know. So I tried to breathe and thought I deleted them.

But I never deleted the chapters written.

Recently, I edited them a lot and found Wonderland's appeal once more. I'm not quite as obsessed with it now (I think), but I do enjoy the madness. Don't you?

(NOTE: For those who have read the first posted draft, you don't need to read Chapter One unless you'd like a refresher.)

Disclaimer: Any references the reader finds and the characters used in this story do not belong to me. This fanfic is a non-profit, unofficial story that's written for the sake of improvement and for the reader's enjoyment. :)

Prologue

I Can't Go Back to Yesterday

"I don't understand! Mikaze-san! What – what's happening to me?"

The Conscious would've seemed emotionless, if it weren't for the sinister grin on the white mask he wore. "I'm sorry, Alice Liddell. Or should I say… Haruka?"

"You! – You knew my name?"

"We all did. But Wonderland isn't a place to frolic around and toy without a care. It is a game. It was your game. And you lost."

"B-But – Mikaze-san! Please, don't do this!" pleaded Haruka. "I – I don't know what to do!"

"Your journey ends now, Haruka," whispered Mikaze in the girl's ear, causing her to jump. The rusted chains bound to her body reacted and sent jolts of pain and imprisonment, like a snake coiling around its prey tighter. "You've lost already. Those who lose don't live long in Wonderland, you know."

The other figures of Wonderland shone before Haruka, scowling and turning away from her. But with the masks, they all seemed to mock at her with their smiles. "Please help me!" she frantically cried, not caring if she looked pathetic in the slightest.

"Why should we?" they all questioned in unison, as if they despised her. Though the masks gave off a different, unsettling look.

"I – Please! I really need someone—!"

"You won't have to anymore, Haruka… never. Good night." The Conscious smirked, and then, with his Outsider dagger in hand, he raised it above his head, plunging it down to—

Nanami Haruka bolted upright. She screamed, her hair disheveled and her hands covering her ghostly-pale face. Tsukimiya Ringo, her half-brother, practically kicked the door down and rushed to her side.

"Alice!" he shouted, grabbing ahold of her unusually pasty cheeks. "Are you all right?"

Haruka, panting, tried to calm her heart, breathing deeply. It was all a dream as usual, she repeated in her mind, as the smell of sweat filled her nose. It always feels real, but surely I can tell by now that they're never real—

She coughed and grasped Ringo's shirt, leaning her face to his chest and inhaling his scent in attempts to reassure herself. "It was just a dream. I'm okay, Ringo-nii-san," she whispered, causing Ringo to widen his eyes for a moment before bunching his lips up and bristling.

"… Okay, first of all." He lifted a manicured finger up, crinkling his brow, hoping Haruka would get amused quickly. "Don't call me 'Ringo-nii-san.' It's sister, all right? And second of all, Alice, we're in America now. You must use English names, meaning I'm Lorena."

Haruka frowned. "Ringo-nii-san, you're a boy. And boys don't wear girl clothes—"

"What did I say about commenting about those things?" Ringo sternly questioned with a glare that made Haruka shut her mouth.

She was actually trying not to laugh. It felt almost inappropriate.

"It's for work, okay? Boss said that I looked good as a girl and that I could attract customers more like this—"

"But you look handsome as a boy as well…"

"—and here we are, pretty much a bit richer than middle-class people," he finished, huffing.

"In Japan," Haruka quietly added.

"I heard you," Ringo muttered with a small, breathy chuckle, leaning back, before suddenly jerking forward between Haruka's eyes. "But honestly, do I look better as a boy? Huh? Do I?"

Haruka nodded. "You really do, Ringo-nii-san."

"That – that's not the point Alice," sighed Ringo, retracting his body again and running a hand through his short, peachy hair. He really was attractive in either gender.

Haruka mentally swatted away those thoughts and mumbled, "It's Haruka though."

"No," he insisted, clearly hearing her small voice, "it's Alice now."

"But—"

"No buts about it," interrupted the cross-dresser, his feminine hand halting in front of Haruka's face. When he saw the look in her eyes, his expression softened, as he gently took her soft hands in his. They're cold, he thought, as he turned them over silently.

"Nii-san?"

"Ah, right," Ringo thought aloud, shaking his head. "Alice, for God's sake, are you okay? Did you have a nightmare again?"

Haruka did not wish to speak of it, since the dreams had been continuous. Whenever she slept, she'd just pick up right when the dream stopped. For this reason, she secretly disliked sleeping and tried to read or distract herself to stay awake. They were futile attempts however, as they softly lulled her to inevitable sleep.

"Alice?" No response. He sighed again. "Haruka."

"Ringo-nii-san," she spoke up suddenly, surprising Ringo, "I don't remember what happened in my nightmare, so I don't think I can properly explain it to you." Haruka lied in her sentence (something more often done recently), the dreams scorched in her memory.

Ringo sighed once more because of two things: he couldn't help her more than just telling her sweet nothings, and that she called him by "Ringo-nii-san."

"Alice," he slowly started, "you know you can't say my name in public. We need to be more secretive and get used to our lives now. Be grateful I didn't make you cross-dress either, and that only Boss knows about how we lived in Japan."

Haruka faltered, rubbing her pale arm. "I – I know," she whispered, her eyesight blurring out. No tears fell past her cheek, but it felt like an abrupt conflict forming in her eyes.

"Now, I'm aware of your disliking to adapting to all of this, but we don't have a better option than this. We're abundantly blessed here, with a house and more than enough needs compared to before. We don't ever truly starve, or wonder where we must go anymore…"

His voice tuned out in Haruka's mind, as the memories came back in blinding flashes like cameras, except in an extremely exposing way. Each word tingled her skin uncomfortably, and each phrase triggered an image. She shivered and shook her head rapidly, signifying him to stop.

Ringo's voice seemed to hiccup, as he searched in her eyes for the reminder of torment. This wasn't to scare her, nor was it for her to be aware of what they had now. It was for her to more forward once more.

"Alice… I'll remind you once more." He leaned forward and moved his sister's bangs with his thumb, his other fingers on her head, as he kissed her forehead chastely. He pulled back with a small smile. "We must try to move forward. If it helps, try to forget. Pretend you were 'Alice Liddell' all along, like me."

"… But what if I can't?" she barely whispered, her eyes lifting up to meet the blueness of Ringo's stare. His forehead could practically bump with hers, but he was playing with her short, sunset-orange rose hair, stroking it between his slender fingers.

"You must find a way that'll help you, then," he supplied. "Did you think it was easy for me? Well, sweetie, it wasn't. But you know? For one thing, I have to be the dependable one for now as you finish school. Therefore, I must be the person you can look up to. Second, our parents wouldn't want us to be tied down and unhappy with the circumstances just because of what has happened to us in the past. So do it for them. Try to dream of them, happy that you and I are safe."

Haruka, in tears at this point, wept and sniffed, rubbing her nose with her clothed arm. "O-Okay."

He smiled, then yawned. "Okay. Are you alright now? I'm – ah – quite tired, you know."

Before, he would turn and Haruka would grab onto his sleeve. However, he stayed and waited patiently.

She gave him his answer.

It wasn't like Haruka and Ringo had a bad relationship. In fact, it wasn't like that at all. The two were closer than any normal relationship, if not clearly seen due to their differences. They adjusted and formed this bond through the circumstances thrown at them at a young age, and Ringo felt responsible for looking out for the both of them.

Their normal routine on the weekdays would be that Haruka was at school, while Ringo was at work. Haruka would go home, do her homework, and cook dinner for two, and Ringo would come home late and find his sister either practicing her English or reading. On weekends, Haruka would attend her part-time job while Ringo would normally shop for clothes and food.

Ringo was a man in his twenties, eight years older than Haruka. His hair was a straight dark sunset orange, his eyes a sky-like blue. His work was at a restaurant, the theme surrounding butlers and maids. Ringo naturally could pose a sassy attitude and feminine looks. Thus, he worked as a maid and was paid much due to his high-spirited personality and his devotion to work adamantly and consistently. He was a very likable and liable man, but was only seen as a woman to everyone except for Haruka and his boss.

Haruka was a sixteen-year-old youth, with silky shoulder-length locks of a bright sunset pinkish-orange, her eyes a honey golden and her pale skin smooth and unblemished. Bangs draped over her forehead, her cheeks a naturally rosy hue and her small pink lips curved upward constantly. Like Ringo, she tried to be optimistic about her life, and was always thanking God for every meal, for the clothes she'd wear, and for the money in her hands when paying for when being paid. Unlike Ringo, Haruka would be polite yet blunt at times, and was a curious sort who liked riddles and puzzles. She would tend to not think twice but she was a very obedient young woman.

Together, the two lived in America, due to escaping Japan after an incident. They could not show their faces again, could not mention their names, and had to lay low. Ringo's boss helped immensely when it came to concealing their identities, since the boss was a mysterious man himself. He claimed to know of their family and gave them the key to his old house, where the siblings currently dwelled.

In Haruka's gentle heart, innocence and purity dwelled within. Yet there was also brood and longing.

The next day, being Saturday, Haruka had a break day from work. Ringo had gone shopping as usual, leaving Haruka alone in their house.

"Ringo-nii-san needs a wife," she hummed, taking the time to vacuum the living room. "I just hope that she'd like me and give me company."

After vacuuming, Haruka could practically hear a pin drop in the silent house. "Ah, but everyone thinks that nii-san is a girl," she mused, eyeing the dust on the bookshelves in the study room, "and nii-san doesn't like boys or anything… ah. I wonder if one day a girl would accept nii-san as a man. If only he could be a man."

The girl started to walk over into her bookshelf filled with books she liked (though there wasn't enough room so she kept her favorites in her room). Whenever Haruka went out shopping with Ringo, she'd wander off to the bookstore, reading as many titles and flipping to the back of as many books as possible. When she had plenty of time, Haruka would even read the first chapter of each book. After a good number of books catch her eye, she would buy them. They mostly were fantasy novels, historical fiction, romance series, and especially classic literature.

Walking around the house, she came across the glossy, white piano – bought entirely from saved up gift money. Ringo insisted for the family picture to be on top of the piano, showing himself and Haruka as children with their parents. Haruka smiled wistfully, inhaling the faint scent of lemon (she had wiped it from its dust earlier with a fragrant spray), while sitting down on the piano chair. Lifting the cover up, her fingers grazed the keys. She sat down.

Her fingers moved on its own – and gracefully so.

Music had spoken volumes into her life, and had influenced her form. If it weren't for learning to play the piano, Haruka would be much shyer, slouching on her unconfident posture, and less motivated. She loved to sing as well, though only when alone, and dance in a way that felt elegant. She sometimes imagined a partner.

But dancing was different. Haruka could not hum while dancing, or else it triggered a bad memory she wished to suppress. It gave her an unsettling feeling, because she'd hum the same thing. Even playing the piano, while beautiful, cursed her with that tune her fingers would often play. Ringo hated the song as well, and they both held back feelings of anguish like a wall of monochrome silence.

Haruka, her eyes dull, replenished her color through books, escaping to her room and reading until she heard the calls to nap. She tried resisting it, but sleep was inevitable for Alice Liddell.

Her eyes fluttered shut.

And her dreams came alive.

Nanami Haruka ~ Alice Liddell

Tsukimiya Ringo ~ Lorena Liddell