Twisted Wonderland: Yulia

Prologue: How to fix a Broken Chandelier

"Fgnaahhh! There's no one here!!" Grim whined as he darted back and forth from classroom to classroom.

"Figures, I guess we waited too long. School was let out," Yulia opened another classroom door. "I think I saw a teacher somewhere. Maybe we could wait for them and ask where Ace is?" She suggested.

"But I'm tired of waiting!" The fur on Grim's back stood up a bit and his flaming ears glowed in agitation. He hopped on top of one of the desks and looked around the room, his eyes gleaming. His tail drooped off the side of the surface of the desk, depressedly. He must really want to attend Night Raven.

"What sour moods you both have," some voice said. Yulia whipped her head around towards the door, but no one was there. The voice sounded old and like it was coming from an odd direction. It sounded like it came from the very walls of the classroom. "Look this way, I have a beautiful golden frame!"

"Golden... frame?" Yulia asked as her eyes fell upon a painting. The old man adorned in a top hat, glasses, and an exaggerated shirt collar blinked at her. Yulia reeled back and Grim fell off the desk in shock. The painting had talked!

"Hm, quite the reaction. Never seen a painting before?"

"Not one that speaks!" Yulia clutched the collar of her janitor uniform as if that could stall her beating heart.

"I have a mouth do I not, so why shouldn't I speak? The old man asked, rather offended.

"Ah—." Yulia couldn't argue against that especially considering this world's magic. She stared at the painting in silence as it watched her judgingly. She realized that she wasn't going to get anywhere if everything about this place surprised her. With a deep breath, she accepted that paintings could apparently talk along with floating books and flaming monster cats and zany crow masked headmasters.

Grim got over his initial shock as well and strutted up to the painting. "Oi, painting! Did ya happen to see a lousy guy with spiky red hair pass by? He's got a heart mark on his face and dumb grin!"

"His name is Ace Trappola," Yulia added.

"Ahh, I think I remember seeing someone of that description... He was a freshman, yes?" Yulia and Grim nodded at the painting. "He's probably headed back towards his dormitory now."

"That jerk is trying to get out of window washing! Which way did he go?" Grim eyes flashed in anger.

"The East Building is where you can find the entrance to the dormitories." Grim had already dashed out the door before the painting had finished his sentence. Yulia scrambled after him.

"T-Thank you Sir Portrait!" She waved awkwardly at the old man before chasing after Grim. She felt a little bad because he wasn't painted with hands so he couldn't wave back. She shook the thought away and followed Grim into an enormous room filled with large and detailed mirrors.

There Ace was, standing with his hands in his pockets in the center of the room staring about absentmindedly. He had absolutely no intention of helping out with the windows.

"Hold it right there!" Grim shouted. Ace looked like someone had suddenly poured ice water down his back. He didn't turn to look at Grim, instead, he hurried towards one of the mirrors.

"No way am I cleaning windows on the first day of school, I'm outta here!" Ace made a break for it, running awkwardly for fear of Grim's fire magic. He came upon another student standing before the mirror he was headed towards. "Gah! Out of the way!"

Taken by surprise, the other boy stood there frozen, confusion plastered on his face.

"Please, stop him!" Yulia pleaded.