We're All Mad Here

Down the Wastebasket - Prologue/Short First Chapter

Froggeh12

A/N: Well, I'm sure you all know what this is by now… an Inuyasha fanfic with an Alice in Wonderland plot. Of course, in order to make it fit the Inuyasha story more, I'll be making changes. This is based off the book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll as well as a teensy bit of the Disney movie Alice in Wonderland... and maybe a bit of the Kingdom Hearts Alice in Wonderland ...land... but I'm not sure about that last part yet. I'm sure I'm not the only one who's ever thought of this, but hopefully it'll be interesting all the same.

Update: Revised the story today, August 24th. D

Disclaimer: I'm only going to say this once, so listen up. xP Before every chapter there will be a section with a passage from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. I am acknowledging right now that it is not my writing, and anyone who says I failed to do so is stupid. This section will be very noticeable, especially since it will be in all italics and in a completely different writing style from my own (and in between random words of my choice). Also, I do not own Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/Alice in Wonderland/Wonderland from Kingdom Hearts, nor do I own Inuyasha.

D o w n , d o w n . . .

So she was considering in her own mind (as well as she could, for the hot day made her feel very sleepy and stupid), whether the pleasure of making a daisy-chain would be worth the trouble of getting up and picking the daisies, when suddenly a White Rabbit with pink eyes ran close by her.

There was nothing so very remarkable in that; nor did Alice think it so very much out of the way to hear the Rabbit say to itself, 'Oh dear! Oh dear! I shall be late!' (when she thought it over afterwards, it occurred to her that she ought to have wondered at this, but at the time it all seemed quite natural); but when the Rabbit actually took a watch out of its waistcoat-pocket, and looked at the it, and then hurried on, Alice started to her feet, for it flashed across her mind that she had never before seen a rabbit with either a waistcoat-pocket, or a watch to take out of it, and burning with curiosity, she ran across the field after it, and fortunately was just in time to see it pop down a large rabbit-hole under the hedge.

In another moment down went Alice after it, never once considering how in the world she was to get out again.

. . . t h e r a b b i t h o l e . . .

Today was almost painfully dull. No, scratch that… it was very painfully dull. It was a hot and lazy summer day, and Kagome Higurashi had given up on trying to find anything vaguely interesting to do, so she did the next best thing - she worked on her God-forsaken summer homework.

Writing assignments came first, as they were the hardest and longest. The assignment was to write about her life in an alternate universe. This teacher thought she had some sort of imagination, apparently. No, she had no real creativity. She was quite convinced that she had been simply born with no talents to speak of.

She tapped her pen against her paper, clicking it rhythmically as she did so. She thought for a moment before jotting something down. "Kagome was born in a circus and has been an elephant trainer with her family ever since." Her paper seemed to come alive and mock her with the ridiculous idea, repeating the sentence over and over.

"Writing never was my best subject, was it?" she grumbled to herself, giving her notebook a stab with her pen.

As she prepared herself to hit slam her head against her desk until the circus idea seemed like a good one, her mother called from the bottom of the stairs. "Kagome, dear, come down for lunch!"

"Ok, coming!" Kagome called back, all but jumping for joy at the idea of avoiding a concussion. Maybe she could somehow get inspired during lunch. She rolled her eyes. Yeah, Grandpa probably had a couple dozen stories up his sleeve… though they would all probably be about what her life would've been like as a shoebox.

Summer hadn't always been this boring...usually she would be out at a friend's house or at the movies. Ever since that whole incident with Ayame and Kouga, however, there had been no such luck. Right after Kouga had kissed her, every single one of her friends had turned on her - and she had tried to stop him! It wasn't fair! Unfortunately, she reminded herself, life isn't fair.

"I wonder what's for lunch today…"

"Ohh…loneliness with a side of misery?" a disembodied kids' voice said suddenly, almost sarcastically.

Kagome started and gave a suspicious glance around the room, before shaking her head, deciding that she was probably going insane from boredom. "Ha ha, shut up, self." Kagome generally referred to her thoughts as "self".

It was hard to tell your thoughts to shut up, however. They never seemed to want to listen. She sighed and headed down the stairs and over to the dining room.

"There's my girl!" Kagome's grandfather beamed as she entered. "I never get to see her anymore, after all…working so hard on her studies." He helped himself to a large portion of whatever was on the first plate he saw. It was long and stringy, orange-blue in color, and smelled a bit like caramel. It looked like something she had done for her third grade science project. Today is Souta's turn to cook, Kagome concluded to herself. She grabbed a dinner roll, something relatively safe.

"Oh, Kagome, those are my strawberry-tofu rolls! Tell me what you think of them!" Souta announced proudly. Kagome almost saw hopeful stars in his eyes.

She suppressed a cringe. "Um…actually, I'm not feeling very hungry…" It was the truth, actually, and she had only just realized it. She hadn't eaten in nearly five hours and yet she felt almost full.

"Kagome!" her mother said sharply from across the table.

Oh no, she thinks it's just because of Souta's cooking! Kagome thought to herself. She turned to her mother with the best grin she could muster. "What is it, Mom?"

Mrs. Higurashi sighed. "Kagome, you're not on a diet are you?"

Kagome groaned. So that's what she had been worried about! With these teen fads and all of those anorexia and bulimia cases, it was no wonder her mother was concerned. "Of course I'm not on a diet!"

"You're not all that fat, you know," Souta said innocently, munching happily on his strawberry tofu roll.

Kagome was about to wring her little brother's neck when Grandpa interrupted with a helpful, "She has gained five pounds, however."

"WHAT?" Kagome hissed. No one knew about that!

"You shouldn't leave your diary out in such obvious places, dear," Grandpa said in response, giving a mild shrug.

"You've been so depressed for a couple of weeks now, Kagome. I wish you'd just tell me what was wrong," Mrs. Higurashi interrupted sadly. It wasn't an order.

"What are you talking about? I'm not depressed! I mean, come on, I'm the happiest person you know! Aren't you guys always telling me how happy-go-lucky I am? They've just given us a lot of summer homework this time."

Mrs. Higurashi continued as though there had been no interruption. "You never talk to your friends, anymore, Kagome. It's not just Ayame, it's Eri, Yuka, and Ayumi. What's happened to them?"

They were all against her for "kissing" Kouga. "Like I said, I've been busy with school work." She refused to let her mother find out about this. What mother wants to know that their daughter is a loser?

Mrs. Higurashi raised an eyebrow. "Oh? What kind of work are they giving you that is making you work this hard?"

"They're giving me a writing assignment; a nice, long, ten page writing assignment! Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got some work to do." She sent a meaningful glance Souta's way. "I don't want any interruptions."

The younger Higurashi snorted. "Yeah, right, like I want to spy on you doing some stupid writing assignment."

Kagome rolled her eyes and stood up. She pushed in her chair and began to clear of her part of the table.

"Kagome, what is this writing assignment on?" Kagome's grandpa asked, intrigued.

"What my life would be like if it were an alternate universe. Yes, well, I'll be getting back to my room now…" She arranged the chopsticks and napkin on the almost unused plate and started to head over to the kitchen.

"Did I ever tell you the theory of alternate universes?" Grandpa interrupted, causing her to stop in her tracks again. "They say that for every action, there's an alternate universe where something else could've happened in that situation. And sometimes, because of a different action, two universes get intertwined!"

"Yes, yes, grandpa, that's nice, but I really need to be going! See ya later, everyone!" Kagome exclaimed before anyone else could add on to her stupid project. Leaving her plate behind, she bolted upstairs in a fit of teenage angst.

"Geez…can't get anyone to leave me alone for just a minute?" she sighed, plopping down on her bed. She sighed again. "If only there was an alternate universe where I still had my best friends."

"Excuse me, miss. Do you need some help?" The same kids' voice as before was in the room again. "You've been working on that writing thing for an awfully long time and you keep sulking and procrastinating."

She clenched her teeth at the sound of a little boy's voice. Souta sounded a bit strange, and it was weird that he could suddenly walk through walls, but who else would it be? "Souta, get out, I already told you I'm working on my homework. Don't you have some game store to - …um…? Souta?"

Kagome blinked and looked around. Her brother was no where to be found. She frowned and walked over to the bed. "Ha ha, very funny," she said sarcastically, yanking up the sheets and ducking down quickly. There was no one there. The raven-haired girl sighed headed over to her closet, yanking open the door and giving a swift glance around.

"Maybe that stupid alternate universe thing is getting to my head…" she muttered. She gave a small sigh and sat down at her desk.

"You know, it's awfully rude to ignore someone." A small boy with a fluffy tail and blue bow in his red hair appeared on her desk, leaning on her paper and looking bored.

Kagome let out a shriek. Who was this kid and where had he come from? "Oh my god, what are you?" But hey, if he claimed he would help her with homework, then by all means.

"Use manners much?" the fluffy kid snapped, scowling. "I just want to help."

His anger only sent her into a fit of squeals. "Oh, look how cute you are!" Kagome shrieked, picking him up and pulling him into a tight squeeze, ignoring his protests.

"I know, I know, but cute things have to breathe too!" the fluffy kid gasped.

"Oh…sorry," Kagome said, putting him down reluctantly. "Umm…so what are you, now?" Goodbye, Mr. Tact, it was nice knowing you!

"I'm the Red Fox, Shippo!" the little kid announced proudly. He took out a gold-rimmed pocket watch and glanced at the time. "I have a little bit of time…now, what was it again? Oh, yes, the writing assignment…an alternate universe." He changed his tone to have a bit of a mystical air for that last sentence.

Kagome nodded dimly. She still had no idea why a talking red fox humanoid seemed so keen on doing her homework. Did he even know how to write yet? "Well, I guess if you're not doing anything else…"

"Not to worry!" he scribbled down a few words. "And…voila! I'm done, see?"

"No you're not!" Kagome insisted, turning the paper around in her hands. The few words were suddenly filled with incredible detail. When she was done with the first page, she looked and there was a second page, fluttering innocently with the breeze of the ceiling fan, like it had been there all along. She gaped at the page, becoming engaged in this fascinating story. The same thing happened with the next page…. and the next… and the next, until there were 10 perfect pages. But… "Shippo, I can't turn this in! It's…it's cheating."

"No, it's not. You are Kagome Higurashi, aren't you? Aren't you fifteen today, June 28th?"

She frowned. How did he know that? "Yes…how does that make it any less of cheating?"

The Red Fox scowled and took the story, which had been reduced to one page with a couple of words on it, like it had originally been. "Fine, don't "cheat" then." He crumbled it up and threw it into the wastebasket. He pulled out the pocket watch again and let out a loud yelp. "Oh my god, I'm late! I'm late! It'll be off with my head, she'll say 'off with your head', I'm LATE!" he moaned. "Ohh man, the queen is going to be pissed!"

"Wait!" she exclaimed. "Wait, tell me who you are!" He couldn't be leaving already! She had so many questions!

"I can't, damn you, I'm late!" the red fox shrieked. He made beeline to the wastebasket and jumped into it.

"Shippo…what on EARTH…?" Kagome stared at him blankly as he stood there nearly chin-high in crumbled up papers.

"I'm LATE!" he shrieked, and with that he disappeared completely.

Kagome jumped up and walked over to the trash can. "Maybe I really am going insane…" There was no recently crumpled up paper in there anymore… then again, there wasn't anything else in there, either. She had been working on theories for an alternate universe for a while now, and she was quite sure that those crumpled-up papers hadn't gotten up and walked away.

"Umm…Shippo…Red Fox, sir?" Kagome muttered stupidly, poking at the trash can with her pen…and to her great surprise, that pen was sucked into the wastebasket. "Gah!" she screeched, jumping back.

"Nyah nyah! C'mon Kagome, aren't you gonna come?" the stupid trash can taunted her.

"Of course I'm coming!" Kagome snapped irritably. She didn't like being mocked, whether it was something that collected dirty tissues and old papers or not.

So without a second thought, she got up and stood inside the wastebasket. She waited a few seconds and… nothing happened. She tried a different approach and announced loudly, "Uh…I'm late…?"

"Now that's the spirit!" the wastebasket exclaimed.

In a flash, Kagome Higurashi was transported from one universe to another, not giving it a second thought.