Something was chasing her. Laughing and chasing after her, its footfalls sounding like thunderbolts. Running, running, running. She can't fall now, not that she's come this far. Not….not now…

"Alice! Alice, awake! You are having a nightmare."

Alice jolted up from her cot in a cold sweat, breathing heavily. She checked her side and felt the reassuring presence of the Vorpal Blade strapped safely to her side in its sheath. A boy, a Faunus boy, stood next to her, looking a bit concerned.

"Thank you Chessur," Alice said, out of breath. She had a cutting English accent, and her long black hair was in a tangle around her face. Brushing it out of the way, she took a huge breath. "Are we nearly there?"

Chessur nodded. He was dressed in a disheveled gray suit that was missing a tie. He had a hole in the seat of his pants that let out a long bushy tail that reached down and curled around one of his ankles. His ears were slightly larger than that of a normal cat Faunus, and were quite furry. His eyes were a strange purple colour, and looked very much like cat eyes instead of normal human eyes.

"We should be arriving in a few hours to meet up with Headmaster Ozpin and our new partners, Team RWBY." Chessur said, frowning. His voice had a slight rumble to it, and was quite deep. Narrowing his eyes, he looked at Alice. "Are you alright, Alice? You look more disturbed than usual."

"I'm quite alright. Wake Absolem and Nevins, we should make ourselves presentable if we are to arrive in a few hours. Off with you then." Alice said, motioning Chessur away. The Faunus grinned and slowly faded away in a trail of purple smoke till only his grin and eyes were left.

"As you wish, madam." He said, and then the grin and eyes disappeared along with the rest of him. As the smoke dissipated, Alice coughed and swung her legs off the side of the bed. Taking another deep breath she stood up, trying to ignore the slight swaying of the airship.

She dressed herself in a blue and white blouse, with black slippers. Tossing her shoulder-length black hair behind her head, she walked up to the bridge of the airship.

"Captain Tarrant, are we nearly there?" she asked curtly, her hands clasped behind her back.

"Quite. I estimate about two hours before our arrival. Where are the rest of you?" The captain asked, adjusting his rather obnoxious bright red top hat.

"Rrright here." The voice of Chessur emerged from Alice's right as he materialized beside her in a whirl of smoke. The captain noted that Chessur rolled his r's more often than not, and wondered if he was doing it on purpose or not.

Two others emerged from behind Alice and took places at her left. A girl a little taller than Alice, with baby blue hair and pale skin. Her eyes were blood red and she had a bow and a quiver of arrows strapped to her back. Her armor was a full suit of brown leather, covering her entire body except for her head.

Next to her was a small boy nearly half their size with snow white hair and a nervous tick. He constantly blinked and wrung his hands, and had no visible weapon on him. But his outfit was a small suit not unlike Chessur's, except his was a darker gray and much more well-kept.

Chessur himself wore a pair of sinister looking gauntlets made of a dark gray metal, with overlapping plates causing a rippling effect across the length of the glove. The fingers looked more like claws, and on the palm of each glove was a small glass circle, behind which lied a white swirling mess of what looked like sand. The gloves fit so perfectly it almost seemed like they were part of the suit, or Chessur himself.

"I take it we've almost arrived?" Absolem spoke up, adjusting her bow. Blowing a stray strand of hair out of her face, she sat down against the wall and waited.

"Almost."Alice said, not looking at her teammate. She and Absolem didn't exactly get along, as Absolem was a few years her elder and believed that Alice was unfit for leadership. But she had settled down somewhat in the past six months they had been training together and accepted, however grudgingly, Alice's leadership.

Chessur made a rumbling noise in his throat that wasn't quite a purr nor a growl, but something in between. Nevins looked around nervously.

"Who are we meeting here again?" Nevins said, a small titter to his voice.

"Tourettes acting up again, Nev?" Chessur rumbled, grinning a little.

Nevins nodded and continued wringing his hands. "It gets really crazy whenever I get stressed or nervous. And I'm pretty nervous."

Alice sighed. "We are meeting the headmaster of Beacon Academy, Professor Ozpin. We are also to meet our…partners. They will train with us, guide us around the school, and otherwise assist us. They are called Team 'RWBY' and are apparently even stronger than us."

"Doubt it." Absolem muttered as she flicked a bug off the wall. "I hate to say it, but no one can come close to Alice in terms of sheer power. I mean with your-"

"That's enough of that." Chessur growled in a sinister tone. Absolem immediately shut up, showing a level of respect and a bit of fear at the strange Faunus boy. "We will not speak of that here, are we understood? Ozpin is already aware, and no one else need know unless Alice herself deems it necessary. Am I not correct?"

Alice nodded. "We are here for the tournament only. Then we shall see if Ozpin wishes to extend an official invitation to become proper students. But until then, that little detail stays secret. Am I understood, Absol?"

Absolem didn't respond, choosing to huff her annoyance instead. Alice rounded on her and approached very slowly.

In an icy tone, Alice repeated herself. "Is my order," she said, putting a lot of emphasis on 'order' "understood, Absolem?"

Absolem gritted her teeth and muttered "Yes. I understand."

Alice smiled. "There. That wasn't so hard, was it?" she said, her voice considerably warmer. Absolem chose to ignore her and went back to annoying the spider that was dead set on climbing the wall of the airship.

"Almost there. See the towers? That's Beacon." The captain said, smiling. "We arrive in about ten minutes."

"Are we prepared, Team Anarchy?" Alice asked curtly. A chorus of grunted agreement was heard, and the group headed towards the hanger bay where they would disembark.

…

As they left the launch pad and the airship took off once more, they walked down a seemingly deserted walkway. Luckily there were no clouds, and Alice could clearly see five figures waiting for them not too far ahead.

As they approached, the oldest among them, a tall man with gray hair and spectacles, held out his hand.

"Team Anarchy, I presume?" He asked, shaking Alice's hand.

"You would be correct. I am Alice. This is Nevins, Absolem, and Chessur, my second in command." Alice said, indicating her teammates with a sweep of her arm.

"I am Professor Ozpin, headmaster of Beacon and your host for the next three months. And may I introduce you to your partners, guides, and hopefully friends, Team RWBY?" he said, stepping back.

A short, redheaded girl in a red cape and black blouse jumped up excitedly and marched forward with quite a bit of bravado for such a tiny body. She stuck her hand out and smiled.

"I'm Ruby Rose, leader of Team RWBY! How do you do?" she announced, shaking Alice's hand vigorously.

Alice frowned. This Ruby was already rubbing her the wrong way and it had barely been five minutes. "Hello…Ruby." She said tightly, releasing her hand as soon as she could.

"This is Weiss," Ruby said, indicating a white-haired girl in a matching dress, "I guess she's my second in command." She said, smiling. Weiss smiled at this proclamation, and tossed her ponytail behind her shoulder. Alice noticed she had it on the side of her head, which she found quite interesting.

"My older sister Yang," this time pointing at a tall blonde wearing a leather jacket and rather short black shorts. She grinned and put her hands on her hips.

"And that's Blake!" Ruby finished, pointing at the last member of her team. She looked up with a bland expression on her face and nodded. Chessur took special interest in her, examining the purple bow on the top of her head with narrowed eyes and a small smile on his face.

Alice nodded slowly and walked up to the other three girls, shaking their hands gently. "I hope," she said with a serious expression, "that we can all get along."

Ruby grinned and Alice sighed. This was going to be a bit difficult, but nothing she couldn't handle.

…

"You guys are sleeping in the room across from us. It's empty, and you can let us know if you need anything. We have classes, which you are welcome to sit in on, or you can go use the training fields if you want I suppose." Ruby said as they arrived at the dorms. "Any questions so far?"

"Yeah, I got one." Absolem said, raising her hand slightly. "When's the tournament being held?"

Ruby blinked. "Is that what you're here for? You're three months early."

"Ozpin wants to observe us living here," Alice started icily, glaring at Absolem. "So he can see if we fit in. If we do, and we enjoy it here, he will extend an official invitation to become students of Beacon."

"Ohh, I see." Ruby said, grinning. "Well, I hope you guys are tough. Beacon's full of really strong people!"

"So I've heard." Alice said, smiling tightly. "Anyway, is there a place we can eat? I'm rather hungry."

"There's a mess hall not too far from here. C'mon, it's getting to be around lunchtime anyway. Coming guys?" Ruby said, turning to the rest of her team, who all heartily agreed.

Ruby led the group down the halls, and Alice noticed Weiss falling back to walk next to her. "Yes?" she asked, trying to be nice.

"Are you guys really just here for the tournament?" Weiss asked, curious.

"Yes. After that ends, we will be leaving provided Ozpin does not make us an offer."

"And if he does?"

Alice remained silent for a moment. "Then we will consider it." She finally said, smiling.

Weiss nodded. "Well, I've never actually heard of you guys. Team Anarchy, right? How strong would you say you guys are, as a team or individually?"

Alice frowned in concentration. "As a team? Quite strong. They listen to me when I give orders, even Absolem. Individually…well, that's debatable."

"What do you mean?"

"Our semblances. None of them are particularly spectacular in combat, except maybe Nevins'." Alice said. "Mine can be used in combat, but it's more of an evasion or gap-closing move than a damager."

Weiss nodded. "I think that's what makes our team really strong, both as a team and individually. All of our semblances are primed for combat, even Ruby's."

"What does hers do?" Alice asked, curious despite herself.

"Ask her yourself." Weiss said, shrugging. "She can explain it best."

Alice nodded, making a note of it. "What about you?"

"I create different glyphs that do various things, mostly providing a midair platform, a speed increase, or to hold something in place." Weiss said, smiling.

"How does that help you fight?" Alice asked, confused.

Weiss grinned. "You'll just have to find out. What about yours?"

As Weiss asked this she noticed that Chessur was suddenly at Alice's opposite side in a swirl of purple smoke. He said nothing, instead just walking forward, but Weiss was jarred nonetheless by his sudden appearance.

"You just saw Chessur's. He can transfer his body to a place anywhere approximately…what is it, two hundred? Two hundred feet away from him. It takes a few seconds though, and requires a lot of concentration. Not exactly a combat-ready Semblance." Alice said, and Chessur rumbled in agreement.

"Interesting. But what's yours?" Weiss said, pressing the question again.

"Mine is similar to his, but shorter range. But it only drains the smallest fraction of my aura, and I can repeat it as many times as needed. I can only move about five feet, and then I rematerialize for a second before I can immediately do it again."

Weiss nodded. It was certainly a spectacular gap-closer or dodge, but not quite useful for anything else.

…

They eventually arrived in the mess hall and began eating the various foods the cooks had prepared there for lunch. Chessur dived into a plate of tuna salad, with Absolem tearing at a steak. Alice simply had a bowl of salad and some fruit, and Nevins had a sandwich.

Alice situated herself next to Ruby and as she expected, the redhead began chattering.

"So what kind of weapon do you use?" Ruby asked in between bites of her lunch.

"A hunting knife." Alice answered, unstrapping the Vorpal Blades sheath and laying it on the table.

"May I?" Ruby asked, holding her hand out over the sheath. Alice shook her head.

"That is the Vorpal Blade. It is one of the sharpest blades to have been forged. It's been in my family for generations. It cuts through solid steel like a normal knife slides through butter." Alice said, a hint of pride in her voice. Ruby gasped and looked reverently at the blade.

"That's the Vorpal Blade?" she whispered, running her finger gently over the sheath. Alice nodded.

"You've heard of it then?"

"I'm a huge weapon nut. I love weapons. Mine is a HCSS, a High Caliber Sniper Scythe. I call it Crescent Rose." Ruby said, beaming.

Nevins, who was sitting on Ruby's other side, perked up. "You like weapons?" he asked, smiling. His eyes were twitching and he was blinking a lot, but he looked happy.

"I love them!" Ruby said. "Why, what's yours?"

Nevins looked extremely happy as he opened his suit and removed what looked like a short katana from the jackets inside. Unsheathing it, he pressed a button and it extended from six inches to around three and a half feet long. A light hum came off it as electricity crackled along the edges.

"Whoooooa." Ruby said, her mouth dropping open. "It's electric? What else does it do?"

Nevins pressed another button on the handle, and the blade spun back upon itself, turning into a very, very deadly Frisbee, with the hilt as the only safe place to hold it. "See the watch on my wrist? The silvery one? It's bound to the hilt of this sword. Whenever I throw it in this form, it homes back onto me and does it in a way so I always catch it by the hilt."

"That is so cool!" Ruby said, clapping her hands. "Did you design that yourself?"

Nevins nodded proudly, smiling. "It's my pride and joy. I've always been good with tinkering, so I modified a higher-end katana to do this stuff. It runs on pure electricity, no Dust required. Although it does need to charge overnight once a month if I don't charge it normally, which I do."

Ruby giggled. She liked Nevins.

Alice sighed as the two got into more and more complex discussions about weapons. When she couldn't take it anymore, she interrupted with the question she sat down to ask.

"Ruby. What is your semblance?" she asked, putting on a smile.

Ruby blinked and turned to her. "I can go really, really fast. I don't really teleport, but it seems like it."

Alice frowned. "Weiss said all your semblances are useful in combat. How does that work? Don't you need to concentrate?"

"I do, but what I'm able to do is get a large amount of distance between myself and the opponent. Then I charge them with a blast of super speed and slam them with Crescent Rose! Or I can use short bursts of it to give myself momentum, which is what my combat style thrives on."

Alice nodded and returned to her meal.

"What's your semblance Nevins?" Ruby asked, turning back to her new friend.

"I can screw with someone's perception. Time, depth, whatever. I can change how they see and perceive the world around them." He said, smiling. "It takes a lot out of me though, but it doesn't require a lot of concentration. Just a lot of Aura. So I can't use it too much, but when I can use it to get that finishing hit in with Slicing Maelstrom, it's worth it."

"Your weapon is called Slicing Maelstrom?" Ruby asked, confused. "Why?"

"It doesn't just do electricity. I said it doesn't need Dust, but I kinda lied. It can utilize Dust to empower the blade with different elements, but Dust is hard to come by. But I can empower it with fire, frost, corrosion, you name it. I prefer to just use the natural non-Dust using electricity though. It's usually just as potent, but there are some situations and certain Grimm that require a different touch. So it's a mess of different elements and it's a super-sharp katana Frisbee. So, Slicing Maelstrom."

Ruby thought that was just the coolest thing, and her level of admiration for Nevins and his super-duper-awesome weapon went up a notch. "What about your weapon?" she asked, turning to Absolem.

Swallowing, Absolem grinned. "This is Heartseeker." She said, pulling the bow off her shoulder. "It doesn't really have any special abilities. But it's really durable and had a very strong string. It's the arrows that do stuff. They're all Dust-imbued and do different things."

Ruby smiled. "Neat! But what about close range fighting? I assume a bow and arrow doesn't do very well in that scenario."

"That's what I have these for." Absolem said, pulling out a pair of steel tanto. "These are my tanto, Mekkei-Mai and Mekkei-Maru."

Ruby's jaw dropped. "Wait, run those names by me again?"

Absolem repeated the names of her weapons and Ruby gasped.

"Please tell me those are the original Mekkei-Mai and Mekkei-Maru." Ruby said, clasping her hands together. Absolem grinned.

"Yep! Been in my family for generations. I never knew what the big deal about them was though."

"Those tanto were the first attempt to recreate the Vorpal Blade in a very long time. They failed, but the weapons they ended up with had extreme amounts of durability and sharpness not often found in normal tanto. Mekkei-Mai and Mekkei-Maru should have sharpness on par or above that of Crescent Rose, which is saying something."

Absolem raised her eyebrows and examined her weapons with newfound interest. "That's neat. Nevins, did you know that?"

Nevins shook his head. "No, I never thought about it. But I do remember reading something about it now that Ruby brings it up."

As the threesome began talking more about weaponry, Chessur appeared next to Blake, who jumped a little.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to startle you." Chessur said, the ever-present half purr in his voice.

"It's fine." Blake said shortly, going back to her food.

"I like that bow of yours." Chessur commented, smiling.

Narrowing her eyes, Blake subconsciously reached up and touched the bow. "Thanks."

"But you know something?" The tone of Chessur's voice changed slightly, going from a deeper tone to a lighter, more teasing voice.

"What…?" Blake asked, suspicion gleaming in her eyes.

"You…smell different." Chessur took a deep inhale through his nose. "I wonder what you could be hiding underneath that bow, hmmm…?"

"I think I'm done talking." Blake said curtly, turning back to her food. Chessur grinned and disappeared, reappearing next to Alice and whispering something in her ear.

Alice nodded and stood up. "I think we'll take our leave for now, I'm sure we're all tired and keeping you from other things. But I think tomorrow we will have to set something up, no? After hearing so much about how you all fight, I think I'd like to see it in action. Is there a place we can train?"

Ruby looked at Alice and smiled. "Yeah, of course. What time tomorrow?"

"Morning, after breakfast."

"Sounds good, we'll take you there after we eat. That alright guys?" she asked, and her team nodded quickly.

"I'm curious to see this 'Vorpal Blade' in action." Yang said, grinning. "Looks pretty sinister."

Alice didn't smile. "You have no idea."

…

As Alice lay back on the bed she had chosen, she went over the day's events. Team RWBY was welcoming enough, although she found their leader too bubbly and childish for her liking. But she was interested to see her fight. She had only seen one HCSS user in her whole life, and he had been the only man to ever defeat her in single combat.

So she was rather looking forward to fighting against the reckless, all-out combat style of a scythe user. At least, that's what she was expecting. She knew there were two ways to fight with a scythe, reckless and all-out, or patient and counterattacking. And Ruby didn't seem the patient type.

She hoped she had finally found someone to match her fire that hopefully wouldn't beat her into the ground. She whispered the name she had come to think of so much, the name of the one man that had ever put her down.

"Qrow."

Author's Note

Hoooh boy. And so we begin another story, this time technically set in the canon universe of RWBY! And it's an Alice in Wonderland crossover no less.

But I do wish to clarify a few things. First of all, this Alice is the Alice from the video game Alice: Madness Returns, not the Disney version.

Secondly, Alice and Chessur are the only two characters from AiW that stay true to their counterparts in terms of flavor. For the names of other characters, I borrowed ones from Tim Burtons Alice in Wonderland movie. Absolem is the Caterpillar, and Nevins is the White Rabbit. And I made Absolem a girl because fuck it, I didn't want a team with three guys and Alice. That would be boring IMO.

Anyway.

Despite this not being in the Romance genre, I'm still going to include it. Pairings are not yet decided, but with what I've written so far of this, I'm liking Chessur/Blake and Ruby/Alice. Again, these aren't set in stone, and I'm willing to take suggestions. But I'm rather partial to those two, since especially with Ruby/Alice I can use it for THE PLOTZ.

But I'm rambling now.

As always, reviews are appreciated! I love them.

Enjoy the very first chapter of RWBY: The Strife of Sanity, and have a wonderful day!

Spike