“I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m really sorry. But if I don’t let you go, you will not have a good afterlife. You don’t have to stay in this world and be my guardian.”

“Why, Alice?” His moist eyes look into mine. “Why did you do it?”

“You mean the killing?”

He nods.

“I don’t remember.” I can’t stop the tears anymore.

“You said I had to die. I seem to remember glimpses of it now,” Jack says. “You said all of us on the bus had to die! Why?”

No words escape my throat. I am both crying and ashamed. I’m Alice’s frustration, mutinied by misery, repeated over and over again.

And the irony is that I don’t even know why. “It doesn’t matter, Jack. You need to let go.”

“I loved you, Alice,” he says. “I would have died for you.”

I can’t comment on this. He already died for me—in a way. Who gives away a love like that? I mean, the boy died and died again for me. He loves me unconditionally, if not borderline silly. He almost thinks about nothing but me.

“Let me stay,” he begs. “I don’t want to go. I still want to make sure you’re going to be okay.”

“That’s not fair, Jack. You can’t stay because of me.”

“I think I also want to stay to protect you from something.” He looks more confused than ever. “I can’t remember what it is, though.”

“You’re dead, Jack. I killed you once, and I have to kill you twice,” I say with all the bluntness I can muster. It hurts so deep inside I feel like I’m going to tear apart, blood will spatter out of my veins, and my brains will explode like a watermelon on crack.

“Don’t do it, Alice.” He reaches for my hand. I pull away. I hate my hand, and I hate myself. “This Pillar... he isn’t what you...”

I close my eyes, wishing he’d disappear when I open them again. Goodbye, Jack. I hardly remember you, but I know deep inside, somewhere between the layers of my heart and soul, somewhere in the middle of my brain, that I love you more than anything in the world.

But I have to let you go, because you’re probably not there in the first place.

Chapter 41

The Garden of Cosmic Speculation, Dumfries, Scotland

Time remaining: 12 hours, 07 minutes

My eyes flip open to a terrible ache in my body. My back is strangely arching upward. I feel like I have landed on a bed with a thick mattress.

I look up, but there is nothing to see. I wonder if the hole has been closed or if it’s so far away I can’t even glimpse it.

It’s all pitch black around me, as if I am buried in a grave.

Where am I?

Well, I know I am underground, but where?

One sentence comes to my mind: Alice’s Adventures Underground.

When I try to move, my body aches harder, but it’s not that bad. I don't think I broke any bones.

The place smells of dirt, and the rabbit I was chasing is absent. I should at least hear its voice if it is still here. Could something have happened to it? I remember holding it in my arms before I fell. If I am not hurt then the rabbit should be safe, too.

I cough a couple of times before I reach for my phone. I get it and use its screen as a flashlight.

I point it upward, but I still can’t see the opening of the hole. Down here, there is only dirt on both sides. I’m in what looks like a round room made of brick, maybe at the bottom of a tower. And it doesn’t look like there is a way out, unless the light from my phone isn’t reaching far enough.

I stand up and point the light at where I fell. It is a bed, like I thought, with one hell of a thick mattress.

I yell for help a couple of times but I get no reply.

Then it occurs to me to check the time on my phone. It’s almost midnight. Have I been unconscious for more than two hours? Why haven’t the police picked me up yet? It shouldn’t have been hard to find the hole. It’s one big hole.

My phone rings.

It throws me off for a second. Then I realize it’s the Pillar. I realize I have twenty-three missed calls from him. I pick it up.

“Where are you, Alice?” He sounds concerned.

“I’m underground.”

“What does that mean? We’re looking for you all over the garden.”

“I found the rabbit, but then followed it and fell into a hole.”

“A hole?” The Pillar sounds skeptical. “You mean a rabbit hole?”

“You could call it that,” I say. “I am surprised you didn’t come across it.”

“This can’t be,” he says. “We’ve been looking for you so long. The police scanned every inch of the garden. They didn’t find you. No holes, either.”

I point the phone’s light upward again, still unable to see the opening of the rabbit hole.

“I have no idea what’s going on,” I say. “Wait. Let me use the GPS.”

“Good idea.”

I fiddle with my phone and I turn the GPS on, and try to locate my place. At first, I think there is something wrong with it. Everything showing on the map is like nothing I have seen before. There are no streets. No names. Nothing that makes sense.

“What’s taking you so long?” the Pillar urges me.

“You will not believe this,” I say, still looking at the GPS on my phone. “My GPS doesn’t show street addresses and coordinates.”

“I don’t understand. What does it show?”

“A map.” I want to scratch my head.

“A map? Of course it shows a map. Now send me your coordinates or just activate your location, because I am not getting any useful info from your phone.”

“Pillar,” I say firmly, “you don’t understand. It’s a map of Wonderland.”

Chapter 42

Time remaining: 12 hours, 05 minutes

“Alice, that can’t be.”

“That’s what it says.” I try to zoom out, but it’s impossible. I can’t even log in to other applications on the internet, just look at this GPS and talk to the Pillar. “It says my location is the rabbit hole.”

The Pillar stays silent on the phone. He is as shocked as I am.

In truth, I’m not as shocked as I am fascinated by the idea: I have a GPS map of Wonderland?

“So the March Hare was right.” I try to make sense of it. “The Garden of Cosmic Speculation is a magical doorway to Wonderland.”

“I don’t know what to say to that,” the Pillar says. “Why can’t we find you, then?”

“Maybe the rabbit hole is a hole into another dimension,” I suggest. “More of a black hole, maybe.”

“So the so-called Hatter planned all this to get you to find a secret doorway to Wonderland?”

I think it over. It could be.

“Maybe all he needed was to get to that door,” the Pillar says. “He fabricated all those clues to lead you to the March Hare, who would eventually send you to Wonderland. If you hadn’t met the March Hare, we wouldn’t have been granted entry by Interpol themselves.”

“Are you saying he couldn’t have entered the garden by himself?”

“It’s under surveillance and maximum security,” the Pillar says.

“Then how did he get the rabbit in?”

“Maybe he got it inside after we opened the gates,” the Pillar says. “Maybe he is among us now.”

The idea makes me frantically circle the hole. Could the so-called Hatter be in here with me? But what are the dress, fan, and gloves for? Why would he send me in here, anyway?

“Who else will discover the rabbit hole but you, Alice?” the Pillar says. “I don’t know how this works, but it seems right to me.”

“It doesn’t click for me, Pillar.” I touch the walls, looking for a door out. If this is a replication of the rabbit hole in the books, then I should find a door out.

“Hang in there, Alice. I will talk to Inspector Dormouse. We have to find you.”

“Please do.” I squint at the walls, listening to the Pillar hang up.

It occurs to me that the door is maybe too small or too big, like in the books, so I kneel down and feel the walls.