Seeing Redd

WUUUMP!!!

It didn’t matter who or what they were-queen, tutor, guardsman, general, evil ex-princess, conniving former king, chessman, soldier, mercenary, or civilian. To WILMA, all were equal, all equally vulnerable to the upside-down mushroom cloud of energy she’d birthed, and for a time, the length of which would be forever unknown in the annals of Wonderland, it was as if life in the capital city had been wiped out.

S HE WASbeautiful. She was powerful. WILMA was everything a despot could want in a weapon. If, in terms of destruction and body count, the annihilation she caused was not as massive as it might have

been, the loss could still prove inconceivable…

Redd was among the first to revive. She found her scepter, which had been knocked loose from her grip, and stared groggily about. Her three-wheeler was nowhere to be seen. Her army-her niece’s too-lay scattered before her in various attitudes of unconsciousness.

A quarter of a block away, Arch and The Cat were gradually waking. Arch recognized the effects of WILMA but did not understand what had happened. The effects were not as drastic as they would have been if Hatter had activated WILMA per his instructions. Still, the weapon could not have failed to operate upon the imaginatively gifted. Wasn’t Redd’s three-wheeler gone? Every one of her conjurings would have vanished. But precisely to what extent Redd had been affected, and for how long she would remain so, Arch didn’t know. He would have to bide his time, to watch and learn. He hadn’t become Boarderland’s king by being reckless. He would not ruin his chances to be king again by acting too hastily.

Approaching Redd, he said, “Alyss must have harnessed more power from the crystal.”

Redd snorted, dismissive. But a power that could flatten entire armies in one go? She sought Alyss in her imagination’s eye, but it was as if she’d been blinded and she saw only darkness. She had been feeling somewhat less tingly since she’d awakened…

She tried to conjure a transport, unable to summon so much as a wheel into existence. She tried for something smaller, simpler: a rose vine. No vine formed. She tried to conjure what even a talented child would have considered child’s play: a tarty tart. Again, she met with failure.

She was powerless. She had no imagination.

How could she face her niece without imagination? She would kill Alyss for doing this to her. A slow death. A torturous death. But not now. No, she first had to regain her former strength, again suffuse herself with power, and then…

Arch was watching her. She grimaced to hide her panic. “Bring the doggerels!”

From her caravan of attendants, the dazed doggerel-keeper shuffled up with three packs of the dazed creatures.

“Heads ache, not quite awake,” the animals chanted, “let us alone and give us bones.”

“Shut up!” Redd said. “You are to sniff out Vollrath, Sacrenoir, Alistaire, Siren, and whoever is still alive among the tribal leaders. Tell them we’re returning to Boarderland. They are to consider today a practice run for the genuine attack we’ll soon make on this, my queendom. Now get.”

Their collars clicked open and the sixty doggerels trotted lazily off in various directions. Redd stomped over to a spirit-dane struggling to its feet. Not yet recovered from WILMA’s impact, the beast nearly buckled when Redd climbed onto its back.

The Cat transformed himself into a kitten and jumped up to sit in his mistress’ lap.

“Arch!” Redd aimed her scepter at him as if to strike a blow with her imagination.

Amused, Arch said, “Coming, Your Imperial Viciousness,” and hopped into the saddle behind her. Spurred on, the spirit-dane loped toward Boarderland, carrying Redd and Arch into a future that could

never accommodate both of them.

T HE REPORTS were identical to the ones received after the Crystal Continuum had been rendered useless. Conjurers were unable to conjure, writers unable to write, inventors unable to invent, musicians unable to play their instruments or compose. The sole difference between WILMA and Arch’s prototype lay in degree, scope. WILMA had left imaginationists throughout Wonderland without their abilities.

“If I myself hadn’t seen the Heart Crystal as dim as a volcanic rock,” Bibwit said, “I wouldn’t have thought it possible. Whatever else has happened, the universal imagination has been scrambled, and I pray this is merely a temporary problem, as it was in the continuum crisis. But I do grow paler than usual when I consider what might have occurred if Hatter had done Arch’s bidding and sewn the caterpillar thread over the city’s center.”

They were in Heart Palace’s war room-Bibwit, Alyss, General Doppelganger, and Dodge. Waking from WILMA’s shock in the gobbygrape arbor, Dodge had found no evidence of The Cat. With Redd’s forces retreating, and with coaxing from Alyss, he had reluctantly come back to the palace.

“We’re lucky Redd thinks you still have imagination,” Bibwit said. “Does she?” Alyss asked, watching Dodge.

“There’s no other reason for her to retreat.”

The general cleared his throat. “How long are Hatter Madigan and Homburg Molly to remain at Talon’s

Point?”

“Long enough to grieve,” said Bibwit.

The force of WILMA had knocked Hatter off the mountain’s peak, but he had slowed his fall to the mouth of the cave by raking his crowbars down the rock. Inside the cave, he’d found Molly woozy but uninjured. He had climbed back to the summit and cut as many of the caterpillar threads as he could reach. The loose ends flapped and furled and the entire web had crackled into dust and been carried every which way by the wind. Weaver would be given a proper funeral. Hatter would mourn her death a second time, but at least now he would do it with his daughter.

In the war room, General Doppelganger said, “Hatter has always exemplified devoted service, but Queen Alyss, he did disobey you. I can’t help wondering if he should not be subjected to the same tribunal that a Two Card would be.”

“Hatter expects punishment,” Alyss said. “He welcomes it. But the fact is, General, that if he hadn’t gone to Boarderland when I told him not to, Redd might at this moment be wearing Wonderland’s crown.”

The general bowed his head, satisfied, and consulted his crystal communicator. “Redd’s army isn’t retreating quietly,” he announced. “We’re still receiving reports of intermittent skirmishes. The good news is that we’ve captured enough Boarderland tribespeople to fill a smail-transport.”

Alyss nodded. She wanted to be alone with Dodge, to whisper in his ear, How strangely free I feel

without my imagination. She’d been left with the chance to explore who she might be, unburdened by such a great gift. I want you to feel what I feel, Dodge. The Freedom.

Perhaps later they would discuss it. Yes, she’d confide in him as she would for the rest of her days. But right now, as if she still had the power of remote viewing, she looked off in the direction of Boarderland, to where she knew Redd was already plotting another attack, and she longed for a single, unified imagination, neither Black nor White.