There is a place.

It is a beautiful place.

Imagine it, please. Take your time.

Imagine a world where you are loved by all. Where nobody desires to hurt you.

Imagine a world where you are strong and beautiful. You are wise and respected.

Imagine a world where you are rich. All the money and wealth you could ever desire is yours.

Imagine a world of eternal peace. No one fights. No one betrays your trust.

That's my world.

That, is Wonderland.

But, all things come at a cost reader.

I've payed my dues.

Shall you pay yours?

I awaken with a headache, my grey, torn jacket clinging to me like a warm hug. I get up, realizing almost instantly that I'm not home.

"It's OK," I remind myself, "remember what mother said. There is no child. There are only dreams. Nightmares."

Like I do each time I have this dream, I begin to walk down a long, dim hallway, the only light sparsely spread out gas lanterns. The air is chilled, freezing my very soul as I begin down the hallway. My short, brown hair doing little to keep my head warm, forcing me to pull the hood of my jacket over my face. My jacket seems to decay with each step I take, the seams slowly coming undone.

From the darkness, I see a child, ten at most, emerge, wearing a black jacket. He shakes, and appears thin, not malnourished, but not healthy either. He seems to grow older as I follow him. Slowly aging up before my eyes, until around the time he looks to be twelve we enter a dining hall.

I hear the child's stomach growling, but he seems to have little interest in eating at the banquet filled with the appetizing food. I can't figure out why. As he walks, I can hear him mumble, "thirsty."

I notice a bottle of wine. The only beverage in the banquet. The child seems to glance at it, grabs it, and throws it at a wall, enraged.

"Poison," he mutters, "have to protect the others."

The child takes out a notebook, "must not return to Wonderland."

The child begins writing as he walks, refusing to acknowledge me in any way shape or form as an eerie humming begins. It almost sounds like a mother humming a soothing tone to help a child slumber. A lullaby. Only, it feels wrong. Like the mother is twisted in her voice, and her words lies as sour as the most soured lemon.

The child is now fifteen. He appears to shake. He is afraid. There is fear in his stance. Two shadows follow him. Mayhaps they were always with him. I can't be sure. I never can tell what these shadows are. Every time I have this dream, they step in at different points. Maybe they're not real at all?

None of this is. What am a saying? This is a God damn dream!

We enter another corridor. He goes from fifteen to sixteen.

"They're hurting them," he mumbles.

I see another child crying, average weight, brown hair, and a kind appearance. They have a welcoming aura around them. Crying. Two masked figures loom, knives spewing from their mouths, like their words can kill. They disappear into the darkness.

"Have to stop them," he hisses.

I see a younger child with a paintbrush, and a man looming over her, preparing his fists. As he lifts his arm, darkness consumes them.

"Stop hurting them," he grows angry, the shadows behind him seem agitated, scratching at his eyes and ears.

"No," he demands, "we must learn."

They back away, hissing as their forms distort into monstrous shapes with claws and teeth, jaws.

"Stop hurting them!" He grows louder and older. A wine bottle appears from the darkness, empty. Wrath is in his eyes now. He lets our a hellish screech of fear and rage. In his eyes, is more than wrath, it is madness.

"STOP HURTING THEM!" His cries fall on deaf ears as I hear laughter from the darkness.

We enter a new room. A gallows, with children of all ages hanging from hooks, masked men and women, some with bloody knuckles, or teeth replaced with knives looking with horror at the children. The poor children. Each time the ones with knives in their mouths speak, the knives stab any living child in the vicinity.

However, the dead ones are the lucky ones. There are some who still breath, and squirm. Their faces are stained with tears, and they cry out, desperate, frantic, begging for help into the cold uncaring abyss.

"That's not all of them," the child in the black jacket is hit with countless knives as he begins to limp, blood dripping from his wounds, "that's not all of them!"

The shadows block the knives, as the child becomes a shadow himself, clinging to a teal teddy bear.

He is now seventeen.

"All of them," he demands as we approach a being in a mask on a throne in the darkness.

"I have all of them," the man chuckles, "poisoned, beaten, hurt with words, they are all mine."

"The poisoned," the shadows speak, the original maintains a somewhat human form, "where?"

Bottles of alcohol roll out from the darkness. "As the masked wish," the being chuckles, "they're everywhere, and they're spreading. I am your God now."

"How many more must you take?" The child demands.

"How much longer will you fight back?" the being on the throne, their deep, unnerving voice all I know of their form, as they are shrouded by the night, demands the child's answer.

"Until you are weak," the child growls, "even if I can never kill you foul-"

"Or you let me be strong," the dark being chuckles, "come on kid. It's not hard. It's not hard at all. Just pay your dues. Just take my hand."

I hear only a heartbeat. The child seems injured and weak, he staggers forward, almost falling over, but getting back up.

"Not..." he growls, "not yet."

His voice is empty. There is nothing in it but resolve. Resolve with nothing behind it. No power or money or even hope. His cause is full, but his means empty. Whoever or whatever he is fighting, he has lost.

"Come now," the being speaks with a chuckle, "they are beaten, poisoned, and killed with words, but why you? Why bother? We win kid. Just make a deal..."

I see a hand from the darkness.

"Fine," the shadowy child takes the being's hand, "I'll let you take the world..."

The child take the being's hand, and I hear a women humming, like the lullaby from before. Everything goes black, and I wake up, tears streaming down my face as the humming fades out in my head.

There's a knock on my door. "Are you OK Leo?" I hear my mother ask.

I look around my room, my bed in the center. On the left a bookcase lined with novels and tales, some of my own creation. On the right, a gaming center with several consoles and a computer. Next to my door, a dresser which contains my outfits.

"Everything," I smile, blocking out the nightmare, "is just peachy..."