"It is absolutely no use at all unless one knows the identity of the dreamer," Everless agrees.

"The only purpose it serves is to push the question of origin one step further away, while the first does away with it entirely."

She continues, "Another in the same vein proposes that time is circular, and that eventually it will loop back around to the beginning; our lack of history is because we cannot be allowed to remember previous iterations. This is not only unlikely but impractical considering the existence of a surface world with, presumably, many more than three hundred years of history since you mentioned this as strange."

"Well, it can't really be circular unless I don't count as part of your history. But yes that's strange—my species is thousands of years old, my planet millions, my universe billions."

"I did warn you, did I not, that these were only stories?" Everless reminds him.

"If I am honest, I do not expect any of them to be correct."

"It's just—three hundred years, and a population of two thousand—how often do you reproduce?"

"Personally? Never. In fact, I do not believe anyone in this house has done so," Everless says stiffly.

"Also, I am not certain that the three-hundred-year mark is intended to be the beginning of the cycle, or that we are supposed to have started with a population of any particular magnitude. Shall we move on to a marginally less ludicrous theory?"

"Do let's, although do understand that from the perspective of a magicless world neither of these theories is meaningfully more ludicrous than the other."

"This next one is, actually, vaguely coherent, although it does still assume the existence of beings outside of Wonderland," Everless says.

"There is a belief - falling out of fashion, these days - that the world was created by two gods, the Black and the White, each of whom created exactly half of Wonderland. Because of this, Wonderland is more perfect than other places, which may have been created by one god rather than the other, and did not benefit from their collaboration."

The air-quotes around 'perfect' are practically audible. 

"I think assuming the existence of beings outside of Wonderland seems reasonable, given. Me."

"That is true, but bear in mind that for the majority of Wonderland's history there was no evidence of any such outside world," Everless reminds him.

"Even once discovered, it was only known to the elite, and not to those who came up with such stories. Also, given that you are not accustomed to magic, I would be surprised to find that your world contains anything with the kind of power attributed to the gods of the stories."

"Well, given the state of historical records it's also not unthinkable that you might have had more evidence of outside worlds that's been lost to time except in the form of stories, and two is an unprincipled number for the quantity of worlds."

She blinks.

"That is a good point. I never thought of it in those terms before, but I suppose if one starts with the premise that there are multiple worlds, there is no particular reason that there should be exactly two."

Hatter, who has been busily clearing up breakfast around Sadde and Everless, hums thoughtfully.

"I wonder if there might be some way of contacting these other worlds. Perhaps they could help us defeat Marcella."

"What sorts of ways to Earth are there, who knows of them, and what are they used for?"

"Well, there is the way you came in," Everless begins.

"It is known as the Rabbit's Hole, since it is primarily used by the White Rabbit. She uses it to gather rare materials and resources on Marcella's behalf."

She continues, "Passage in and out is not consistently controlled, but the only way up is by flying or floating, and its location is even less consistent than most of Wonderland. Only a few know how to find it, and most of them work for Marcella."

"And were they discovered only very recently, then? And how does the Rabbit float up there?"

"...Oh, I suppose you wouldn't have bubble cakes," Everless realises. 

"And yes, the Rabbit Hole in particular was only discovered last year," she continues. "The one in use before that was a little easier to find, but only just big enough for a rabbit."

"How are they discovered? Do people just end up—floating up to them?"

"Something falls through, usually," Hatter contributes in between washing dishes. 

"For this one, I think it was a badger?" 

Everless nods. 

"And this started happening only recently?"

"Actually, the first one was discovered back in the days of the Red King," Everless corrects. 

"But they close up, after a while. That one was closed within a month of Marcella's coronation, and hasn't returned since. It was one of the few at ground level, as well. I don't believe there are any of that type open at present." 

"Is there a pattern to when they appear, and to whom?"

"No," Everless says instantly.

"I attempted to determine the existence of such a pattern around seven years ago, and concluded that the discovery of a path between the worlds is impossible to predict before its first appearance. Once it has been discovered, its movements can be tracked and turned into an algorithm for predicting its future location, but there is no such consistency between different paths."

"Not even a pattern of the plotty type? Like, someone needed rescue, or someone was wandering the woods and it'd be interesting, or it would make the grand arc of Wonderland become more evocatively beautiful or something?"

"...Hmm. I had not thought to look for that sort of pattern, no," she admits. 

"Those would be more difficult to determine, anyway, since they are so subjective."

"Yeah, kinda," she agrees. "But—were any relevant to interesting things that happened? Like, if one was used to bring my—mum—upside then that's plot relevant, did that one appear shortly before that? Or do any appear right after or before anything historically important happens, or suspiciously conveniently..."