The Mad Hatter shot to his feet and clapped his hands. The sharp clang of metal echoed through the empty room.
A hidden door slowly opened, and several pale-faced girls with vacant eyes walked out stiffly. Every one of them was a beautiful young woman in her teens or early twenties, and all had long, silky hair as golden as sunshine.
Their skin and hair were well cared for. Most clearly came from comfortable families and had received good educations. These girls had once been in the prime of their youth, full of vitality, with promising futures and endless possibilities.
Now, wearing ill-fitting Alice costumes of blue dresses and white aprons, they stood in a neat line inside this false "Wonderland." Their poses were identical, their movements graceful, and their smiles looked as though they had been measured with a ruler.
But there was no life in any of their eyes. They were like dolls whose souls had been stolen.
"Let me think..."
The Mad Hatter approached the row of "Alices," pacing before them like a king inspecting his subjects-no, more like a butcher examining lambs awaiting slaughter.
"No, this one's hair is too short... this one's too curly... this one's too straight... this isn't Alice's sunshine gold. It's more like platinum..."
The Mad Hatter's diminutive figure moved back and forth before the "Alice" girls. With eyes brimming with madness and malice, he pointed out their flaws as though he were selecting livestock.
"The Rabbit Soldiers are getting sloppier by the day. Are they all blind? Apparently so! Such short legs, such thick waists, such broad shoulders! Good heavens! Some even have those vulgar muscles! Unforgivable!-And these creatures think they can pass themselves off as my Alice?"
After finding a whole host of faults, the Mad Hatter grew angrier still.