BUCKINGHAM PALACE, LONDON
T om Truckle saw the Queen of England take the podium, that sinister grin glinting like a knife on her face.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” she said. “Pardon me, I mean mad ladies and gentlemen.” She snickered, and the crowd laughed. “I am about to offer you something that hasn’t been done in the history of mankind before. Something that will make us, Wonderlanders and fellow madmen and women, avenge what happened to us in the circus two centuries ago.”
Tom noticed the glaring silence of the crowd. Everyone seemed to be counting on the Queen now.
“What we’re going to do is going to shake this human world upside down,” she said. “It will make Wonderland look like such a sane place to what we’re going to do to the real world around us.”
Tom himself was as anxious as ever. Although an imposter, he felt like he’d like to be part of the Queen’s lunatic plan. Who worked in an asylum and didn’t feel like the sane world outside wasn’t the enemy? To Tom, it was the taxes he paid, the expenses of his divorce, and his medications. How much did he have to pay for those pills, just to stay sane in this mad world?
“But first, I want to show you a glimpse of the kind of madness you love to watch.” She pointed at the screen behind her. It showed people in England hunting all kinds of rabbits, opening them up to look for a bomb. Some people killed the rabbits, some ran when they saw one, even if it was on TV. The streets were a mess of accidents and panic. And oh, how insane the world looked right now. “This is just the beginning. In a few minutes, you will be watching something much more insane, so keep watching.”