Fan Fiction ❯ Black Orchid ❯ In the Tulgey Wood ( Chapter 13 )

Quote: "It's not that I want to kill you. It's just that I have this feeling, that if I don't, someone else will. So I'm saving them the trouble. Call it my good deed for the day." -Hiroshige Hayashi.

Yeah: anyways, I'm the only one you'll ever hear that quote form, cuz I made it up. Anyway, here's the last acid, er, wonderland chapter. Well, that is until we come back *mwahahahaha*. Finally, find out what a Bandersnatch looks like. Or at least what a frumious one looks like. Next chapter: a frustrated Sora, an upgrade, and an enemy convention. And guess at my ramblings at the end of this chapter. And now, the fight chapter!!! And who is the mysterious voice!?

READ AND REVIEW, FOR THE REVIEWS ARE WHAT KEEP ME WRITING INSTEAD OF PLAYING DIABLO II AND FFTA!!!

Facet 1: *sniff* you're ruining my life! I can't play my games!

Facet 2: *kafwacks Facet 1* shaht up!

(personality facets)

PS: eat cliffie! And many thanks to Hislight + Aliasfan, and Tako Hanako (roughly: Octopus Flower Girl) for your support. Hnn…all my reviewers are girls…I think…*drools**gets slapped* ow! "Why oh why did she come from Planet V? Well I don't know-oh-oh-oh…"

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She took her vorpal sword in hand:

Long time the manxome foe they sought -

So rested she by the Tumtum tree,

And stood awhile in thought.

"Y'know, he never did tell us what we're fighting," complained Arc as they stood underneath the strange tree.

"It's probably one of those 'you'll know it when you see it' sort of things," said Orchid, lazily swinging the Vorpal Blade.

And as in uffish thought they stood, the Bandersnatch, with coiling ends, came whiffling through the tulgey wood, shenaiging towards the friends!

"What's that?" asked Orchid, now alert and ready to fight.

"That would be the Bandersnatch," said the Cheshire Cat, lounging on a low limb of the Tumtum tree. "And it sounds quite frumious."

The cat disappeared before they could ask anything further, and they were further cut off when something came crashing through the underbrush.

"We have to fight that?" shouted Orchid, staring at it.

"Looks like it, kupo," said Montblanc, his voice touched with fear.

Arc just gritted his teeth and pushed up his shades.

The Bandersnatch was a fearsome thing. Covered in blue and green scales, it was roughly twenty feet long from blunt snout to the end of either of its two lashing tails. It was much like some large lizard, its head being a blunted triangle shovel shape, about three feet at the widest, that swung from side to side as it fixed them with its right pair of eyes, then its left, and its body being long and round, splitting into the dangerous looking tails that swung about menacingly. It was propelled low to the ground by four pairs of legs, each the size of a bent Orchid and each had three nasty looking claws on their feet. Finally deciding that the people in front of it could be eaten, it opened its mouth to them in a hissing roar, revealing row upon row of two-inch long, needle-like teeth.

"Get out of the way!" yelled Arc to a stunned Orchid, knocking her away as he did so. Montblanc jumped to the opposite side as the Bandersnatch charged forwards, just missing them. They scrambled out of the way as its scrabbling claws went rushing past until it crashed into the Tumtum tree, causing it to shake and loose a small rain of golden leaves. Seeing their opportunity, Arc and Orchid lunged at the monster, only to be batted back by one of its swinging tails.

"Cure," muttered Orchid, healing herself an Arc. She made a mental note to watch for the tails. Then she got up, and charged back at the Bandersnatch, which had turned to face them once again.

"Aero!" shouted Montblanc, who was now behind the creature. A blast of air shot from his rod to crash into the monster's back, causing it to roar in pain.

Sensing her chance, Orchid ran up and struck its head while the pain distracted it. Her blade hit true, but the Bandersnatch lunged forwards in retaliation, knocking her off her feet.

"THAT'S IT!" yelled Arc. He came crashing down on top of one of its legs, his stone fist meeting it with a sickening crack. This was met by another furious roar, followed by Arc getting his side scratched by one of the vicious sets of claws.

"Fire!" A blazing salvo rained from above: Montblanc had gone airborne to avoid the lashing tails. The Bandersnatch was wearing down.

Orchid ran forwards and began to execute a series of slashes that Eriks had taught her. The order came naturally to her from years of training, though it didn't matter since the enemy had no sword. As she finished them, the Bandersnatch shook itself violently, knocking Arc off as he broke another of its legs, and slamming Montblanc out of the air with its tails. Orchid had been knocked onto her butt by it, and when she looked up, she found herself staring into its two right eyes as it glared at her maliciously; it's body coiling with pent-up strength. It suddenly stood up on its four back legs, and blocked out the sun behind it, its mouth open and hissing like a cobra, ready to strike. That's when she saw it: the emblem of the Heartless, marked in large across its chest.

Nip the weed in the bud; aim for the heart!

The voice from eternity again.

"Heeyah!" she yelled, leaping up and plunging the Vorpal Blade into the middle of the crest.

One, two! One, two! And through and through

The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

The monster threw back its head and screamed in agony, stumbling back away from her, taking the keyblade with it. She shielded her eyes as blinding light shot from the wound, then from all over the creature. It burst into inky particles, which shot out rapidly, then were siphoned back in an implosion, the speeding darkness imbedding itself in the keyblade. The Vorpal Blade hovered in the empty air for a moment, then shot back to Orchid, spinning in a circle as she called it back, and caught it deftly with her hand.

The Bandersnatch was no more.

Brushing off her blue sweatshirt, she looked around as Montblanc and Arc walked up, Arc rubbing his right arm, and Montblanc casting Cure. They all looked up into the branches of the Tumtum tree when they heard a familiar voice.

"O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!" he chortled in his joy. The Cheshire Cat seemed genuinely pleased, despite the constant stone-grinding sound coming from Arc. "I thank you most graciously for the services you've rendered. Ask away."

"Kupo?" asked Montblanc.

"I'm sure you have 'many a natterly question', as Lewis put it," said the Cat. And they did.

"I've been wondering," started Orchid, "where's Alice? We seem to be done here, but we haven't even seen her. Sora met her here, so I expected we would too."

"You expect things not to change? Foolish girl," purred the cat, much to Orchid's dismay. "But it is a valid question. We've been wonder the same thing lately."

"Do you think she was taken?" asked Arc.

"Or she stopped visiting us," said the Cat. "It's not as if she lives here."

"Well, then," continued Orchid. "Could you lead us to the Bizarre Room? Preferably the floor? We need to seal the keyhole, but I think we'd get lost."

"Why do you want to go over there?" asked the Cheshire Cat, an amused look on his face. "That one's still locked. You should see what's in front of you, not what's ahead of you."

"Isn't that the same…" she started, then stopped as she looked at the Tumtum tree's trunk. In the middle of it, right in front of her was a large keyhole. Before she knew it, the keyblade had lifted itself up to point at the hole. "Huh?"

A beam of glowing light shot out from the tip of the Vorpal Sword to plunge into the keyhole. This began to glow, then faded with a click like the sound of a lock. After that, the trunk looked like a normal tree again.

"Well, off you go!" said the Cat.

"Shouldn't we talk to Mr. Carroll?" asked Orchid as Arc and Montblanc walked off towards a clearing.

"Don't worry," said the cat as their gummi ship landed, and Orchid hurried off not to be left behind. "The author always knows what happens in his story."

*

"What a weird place," mumbled Arc, punching in a course for Traverse Town.

"Yeah," said Orchid, once more staring out into space. "It kinda reminded me of…him…"

"Who, kupo?" asked Montblanc, turning in his chair to face her.

"No one," she said vaguely.

"Just tell us," said Arc, still staring ahead, steering the ship.

"It doesn't matter."

The ship stopped as Arc cut the power. He turned his chair around, and looked at her over his yellow shades, absently brushing back the one lock of hair that constantly fell next to his face. Then he reached out and poked her with his left in the stomach, and was rewarded with an uncharacteristically girly squeak.

"Tell us."

"Nuh-uh."

Another poke, followed by another squeak.

"Come on."

"Never."

"Just tell him, kupo."

She shook her head, and was only met with more poking, which created more squeaking.

"Fine! Fine! Just quit touching!" she surrendered, waving one arm at Arc to ward him off, and using the other to try and cover her exposed stomach. "It's just that, the craziness there…it reminded me of home."

They stared at her.

"Not that my home was crazy like that," she said quickly. "But there was this magician… He used to come to town sometimes and put on shows. He always had this little tent, that when you went in, you had to turn immediately, then you were in a hallway, and after wandering through almost a whole maze, you came out in this huge circus ring. He'd put on these great shows, and at the end, all the actors would all bow, then they'd disappear. And he'd be only the only one left. I think his name was… Morpheus. Called himself the King of Dreams. He stopped coming about three years ago. I wonder where he went."

They looked at her, not saying anything as she stared out into space.

"Aw, but that doesn't matter," she said, looking back at them and smiling. "Come on Arc, tell us about you."

He just stared and raised an eyebrow.

"I mean, you can't be mister mysterious forever. Where did you live before you came to Traverse Town?"

Silence.

"She's right, kupo," supported Montblanc.

"I lived in Hollow Bastion with Yuffie, Rikku, Cloud, and those guys," he said eventually. "I moved there two years ago."

"And before that?" Orchid pried.

"Let's go," said Arc suddenly, turning his back and starting the ship up again. The rest of the journey was spent in silence.

What was he hiding?