Down the Rabbit Hole

Chapter 2 : The Interruption and the Temptation

Now, the entrance of the Hatter was not something too surprising. Nor was it unwanted, especially if you asked the Rabbit. But being the Hatter, all tall and imposing and quite terribly lanky in his own, graceful way with his lovely hat hiding the top of his face, one would have been quite mad to find his company unwanted in anyway. His figure always brought silence in its wake, only for the silence to be broken by a pocket watch exclaiming in its muffled, digital sound: a bunch of little twats, or something on a similar level in its inappropriate quality. And for once, as the pocket watch made it quite clear that he disapproved of the new members Rabbit couldn’t have agreed more. The reason, of course, wasn’t that Hatter was suddenly quite a bit more interested in those idiots than in him.

“I believe I heard someone teasing this dear friend of mine,” the smooth, voice rang out, immediately launching the slightly buzzing crowd into dead silence for the second time. “I must say that to do so isn’t too wise, do you not know that he can get your asses eternally booted out of this system?”

The silence that followed was obviously awkward, every human in the vicinity of the Somnian seemingly quite disturbed because of something that they weren’t quite familiar with. Of course, one’s first moments in close proximity of a mind-reading Somnian were bound to be quite embarrassing and more than humiliating. Usually their mind reading abilities were accompanied by wit and sarcasm bound to cause the faintest of heart to faint or at the least, break down into tears. As it was, the Hatter did not disappoint, because one of the newbies quickly dissolved into tears, whilst another one seemed to reach a state of near hyperventilation.

All of this did nothing but awe the obnoxious crowd, and once again, Rabbit was more than aware of how the Hatter was immediately the one who was respected. Not that he minded, he was used to such annoying little tidbits, especially when it came to Hatter and being in his company. Really, he had yet to meet someone that caused so many women and men to fall at one’s feet as Hatter. And it did nothing but make him sickly jealous. Of course, he did not admit that, nor did he admit that it was quite a frequent state of mind.

Letting himself slip to the back, he idly listened to the Hatter speak, watching his movements carefully, just like he always did. He found them fascinating, and as it was, the man had a rather… oddly flexible spine. The thought of just what he could use that for seriously disturbing, but to Rabbit it only was something more to fantasize about. Not that he would ever admit to fantasizing about anything. That would have just been wholly unprofessional of him, and he truly loved his job, even with all its downs. Rubbing his temple as he absently chewed on the carrot, he seemed rather distracted from everything that was happening. Soon, the newbies were filing out, but Rabbit did not seem to notice. Instead, he was much too happy chewing on his carrot, humming softly to himself.

The slowest recruits weren’t entirely sure which one of their instructors was the saner one.

“Now, now, you’re not supposed to space out, dear colleague of mine. It is truly unprofessional,” came the purring voice of the hatter who had managed to make the Rabbit’s chewing halt for a moment as he looked up, seemingly confused as to why there was someone there still. Resuming the chewing, it took him a while to grasp the whole sentence, and the fact that he’d been called unprofessional, which made him scoff and glare. Of course, the effect would have been much greater had his reaction taken place 20 seconds earlier.

“You handled the situation perfectly and thus I saw it fit for you to keep control until the very end. Besides, it isn’t like they listened to me at all,” he grumbled, taking a rather vicious bite out of the carrot.

“They were laughing at you, dear Rabbit,” the Hatter purred, leaning in so that his breath tickled the Rabbit’s ear, causing him to shift in his discomfort. It seemed that one of the most pleasant things that the Hatter could think of doing was cause the smaller man quite a bit of trouble, especially when it came to self-control, which was already waning. And whenever Rabbit’s self-control started waning, he turned into a rather pissed off bunny. Of course, the reason he became so terribly bothered and pissed was only because he really wanted to hump the Hatter’s leg. It just happened to be so that some characteristics of a rabbit might have slowly rubbed off on the Moderator.

“They can laugh all they want, I’ll skin them a bit later,” the pale boy huffed, glaring at the man for just a while before he shifted away from those horribly teasing hot puffs of air against his most sensitive skin. His nose twitched with his annoyance, and he mildly scared at the Somnian. “And why were you late?” There was not a hint of the annoyance that should have been in his voice, the only thing dripping annoyance was that damned clock that Hatter had, yelling around obscenities and saying that it truly wasn’t his fault. Everyone knew that that watch did anything but keep the Hatter on time.

“Oh shush there, Frederic-“ the Hatter had named his clock. It was most disturbing. “As you know, my dear Rabbit, I am a most busy man, and important at that, too, and so I had things to do! Important things, you know li-“

“You met with the Cat again, didn’t you?” Came the most annoyed voice of the Rabbit, killing the explanation that the Hatter was happily providing, rendering the tall man most tongue-tied for a while. Fumbling for words, he shifted, pouted, then finally sighed deeply, knowing when he had lost. There was no point in rubbing it in his face, he admitted his defeat.

“Yes, I did. But he had this really psychedelic white powder with him! And little pieces of paper!”
“You’re telling me you bought drugs off of him again.”
“Why, yes.”

Rabbit blinked, sighed, and shook his head. He had almost given up hope when it came to the Hatter, but just as he was going to launch himself into a verbose rant of how it wasn’t wise and how the Cheshire Cat was rather famous for pulling one’s leg, Hatter gave that seductive smile and the smaller boy could almost feel all of his brain cells melting and reforming to become most accepting. He hated himself.

Rubbing his forehead, the white haired male just watched the Hatter as he walked over to the desk, promptly sitting down on the comfortable chair and settled down, before pulling out a vial from his pocket, showing it to the younger of them. As the Rabbit watched, Hatter emptied the contents of the vial onto the table, innocent looking white powder dusting onto the teak. A pale brow rose as the slighter of them only watched and wondered if the man was serious, but it seemed like he was, because soon enough he had separated a streak for himself and snorted it. Rabbit scrunched his nose in distaste, and as time passed, Hatter snorted a few more streaks before straightening his back and looking most happy.

Rabbit blanched, especially when he pulled out a new carrot. When had his last one finished? The sight of the juiciest carrot on earth made the boy salivate, and he would have done anything to get it, alright, almost anything. And oh, the Hatter was just so well aware of that fact, even with the high he was receiving from the drug.

“Oh, little bunny, would you like a carrot?” The perverse grin made the Rabbit blanch, but red eyes stayed locked on the treat. He knew good things never came for free.

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A/N: Oh my goodness. It’s been a while, hasn’t it? As usual, this chapter hasn’t been read through by anyone but me and Word’s spell check, so do point out mistakes. I don’t really like this chapter but ah well.