The woods where pitch black and so foggy that it was impossible to see much farther than a few feet in any direction. But from this fog there appeared a man; tall, looking very glum, and stranger than any other man in any world. His shoulders where slumped and his face was covered in ashes. As he dragged his feet forward, his hands, drooped at his side, swung gently and just as slowly as his dragging feet."Why the long face?" a voice murmured near the man's left man did not bother to turn to the speaker but sighed a long, melancholy sigh. "Absolem, go away, I do not wish to speak with you.""Such a boring response," Absolem murmured, inhaling deeply from his pipe, and then exhaling a fume of colors. "I would expect something… a bit more eccentric from you. You are after all known for your madness.""I am now" the man said, "but I wasn't always.""Well pray then, why don't you tell me about what is troubling you, surely it can't be that trait which gave you your name?" Absolem put the pipe in his mouth again and puffed little clouds into the air, clouds of all the colors of the rainbow, which swirled upward and paused briefly above the Hatter's head before drifting away into the Hatter hesitated a second before taking a seat atop a bright orange mushroom. "I wasn't always mad, and I wasn't always a hatter either. Once upon a time I was a toy maker in a world far, far, away from here. A world where wonderland was impossible, and where I was not mad at all."