Chapter 10, Confrontations, Confrontations

Disclaimer: In keeping with the foreign language theme from several long months back—Siamo proprietari di nulla. il resto, devo scusarmi per la mia negligenza profusamente malvagi.

A/N: Awkward, I know. It's been, what, almost half a year, right? There was so much occuring in my damnable personal life that got in the way of things. But, I would like to say that wen are back with chapter ten—and soon enough, much more.

First of all, we'd like to thank Gypsy Rosalie for reviewing us as always {it is lovely to have a fan as dedicated as you!}, and also thanks to the Nerdy Mirror Maze Queen for reviewing Book 4! Welcome to the ASoQE world! And, now for the news. After completing this particular installment of Queer Events, us Plot Murderers will indeed continue with this series, and as an added bonus will be starting an entirely new project! Now, I won't wax poetic about it now, suffice it to say that I believe it will be the finest thing my palpatating creative mind has ever produced.

But I'll let you guys be the judge of that—when it happens. And now, without further ado, on with the story!

Isadora didn't know where to look first. Duncan lay merely three feet before her. He was bleeding from a wound in the chest—it was still smoking.

Her eyes next went to her brother's assailant—it was a serpent. Thick and black, with eyes green as jade. His pipe-like body was curled around an—also smoking—shotgun.

"What—" Isadora stammered, "I don't—"

Suddenly she was seized from behind. The hook-handed man had taken hold of her, digging his hooks none-to-gently into her waist, "Careful now, pretty." he snarled, "We don't want you having any accidents."

Flo crossed before her, also holding a gun. A revolver, in this case. She trained the firearm on Isadora, and hissed, "Not a word, honey, or we'll blast you off the face of the earth."

Isadora clamped her mouth shut tightly, though she feared more than ever what would happen when Chubs reached them. And her mother.

Who was this snake? Wasn't he the one that Duncan had mentioned as having left to fix the floodgates? And here he was, shooting down the person to whom he had been his only friend in this dismal place.

The footsteps clattered on up the steps, and Chubs arrived, round little Xibaldo under his arm. Alice was right on his heels, humming to herself in a daze, "Isadora!" Chubs started, panting. And then he noticed, "Why—cor' blimey!" Chubs never said such things as 'blimey!' except when he was petrified in utter shock. This was clearly one of those times.

"I'M WALKING ON SUNSHINE!" Alice was singing, "WOO-OO!" Did she realize at all that her son was lying on the floor, dead—or dying, at least?

"Hello." the snake nodded, "You must be the friends of Mr. Crap."

"Howard!" Xibaldo gasped, "What is the meaning of this?" he blustered even further, "You are our leader—"

"I'll get to my monologue later." Howard sighed, "At present, Xibaldo, I'd prefer to continue being ominous and dramatic." he looked to Alice and chuckled, "My new helpers tell me that old Babbity's your mum." his glimmering, hypnotic stare fixed itself on Isadora, "That's quite impressive. Very funny, too. And our lovely Overlord is your father. Well, he's dead now."

"Dead?" Isadora asked incredulously.

"Yes, and you're one of the first to know. I killed him, of course."

Isadora tried to step back, but Hooky was having none of it. He twisted her arm behind her back with the crook of his—well, his hook. Isadora hissed in pain, and Chubs made to go to her, though he too was seized by Flo, dropping Xibaldo to the floor, where he rolled dangerously near the edge of the cone.

Neither Howard, nor the others, seemed to mind Alice still being free. The woman just sat there on the worn stones, playing with her hands as though she had never before noticed them. What about the others? The thought suddenly ran through Isadora's mind. There were still a few other inmates who were on their way.

As though he had read her mind, Howard spoke, "Don't mind the others, dear girl. They won't make it."

"What do you mean?" asked Chubs, "They're nearly up here, as it is!"

"You might want to have a rain-check on that. My other new-found helpers will be here presently, and they are dealing with my old Demon Roommates." he laughed lightly at his own pun.

Isadora looked at her brother, "Why?" she asked the slimy serpent, "Why did you shoot him?"

"To give us some bartering material." Howard executed a kind of head-bobbing, which might have been interpreted as a shrug, "He's not dead, you know. He will bleed to death within two hours, though. I can save him, if you act compliantly."

"Don't listen to him, Isadora!" Chubs told her, "He's deceiving you! I am certain, he is!"

Isadora ignored him, saying to Howard, "What am I to do?"

"For now, you stay still and wait."

"Wait for what?"

"A boat. It will be along soon enough, and then I will organize some story time, if you will."

Isadora wasn't happy about the arrangements, but she stopped struggling against the hooks.

If it would save her brother from death, than she would do anything.

I opened my eyes wearily. What had happened? The last I remembered was screaming in terror as the wild currents swept us out. There had been a boat. A boat underground, yes, but it was still a boat.

Looking around, I saw that we were on that boat. PM1 was lying next to me, still out cold. Violet was up and aware, and she bolted over to me the moment she saw that I had woken up, "Finally, someone to talk to!" she said, voice running a mile a minute, "We've got to get off this thing!"

I stared at her, not comprehending, "Violet, what are you talking about?"

"Olaf is steering the boat!" she whispered, her voice grating like nails on a chalkboard. She looked surreptitiously at the captain's nest at the far end of the deck, and I saw she was right. Olaf, still wearing his disheveled 'Alfonso' disguise, was sitting at the helm, guiding our little craft closer and closer to the pyramid-like thing, which was already half-submerged under the floodwater.

"Enya and Tocuna are below deck!" Violet went on, "They have some kind of police-woman down there. They tied her to a post and everything!"

I cast my eyes over the edge of the boat. There were bodies in the water. Bodies of many people: deformed, mutated people. There was even a giant, green canary drifting about a little way off from us.

"Violet, where are we going to go, if we manage to get off this boat?" I asked her, "The current's too strong out there! We'd never last."

"Don't say that!" Violet snapped, tying her hair back with an old, silk ribbon. She looked different with her hair in a ponytail. Older, more alert, "I'll think of something." she smiled at me, a weak smile, but a smile nevertheless, "I always have. And I always will."

I looked at her sitting there, thinking so hard behind her furrowed brow. I swept her into a hug, holding her close to me, "I'm sure you'll manage." I said to her, "You're Violet Baudelaire."

Violet nodded to me, and said, "I need you to distract Olaf. I'm going below deck to free the police woman."

"Sure."

I crept my way over to the captain's nest and whispered in Olaf's ear: "There's no earthly way of knowing, which direction we are going. There's no knowing where we're rowing—" I let out a moaning sound, which caused Olaf to jump into the air, "Is the grisly Reaper mowing, for we're still going, going, going! Showing no signs that we are slowing, for the rowers keep on rowing! HA, HA, HA, HA, HA!" I laughed shrilly. Olaf spun around to glare at me, "What are you doing, you loon? Do you want us to capsize?"

"Yes!" I replied.

A strange sort of scuffle ensued, in which Olaf and I showed off our—nonexistent—fighting skills. In this tussle, my brother, as well as the fat man: Poe, woke.

"What's all of this hullabaloo?" Poe wondered, rubbing his eyes, "I haven't slept so soundly in days!"

PM1 was quicker on the uptake than he, "They're having some kind of fight!" he whispered to Poe, loud enough that I could hear, "He took boxing lessons in grade-school. An epic fail if there ever was one!"

How the hell did he remember that? I thought to myself. Well, I suppose some plots can have holes in the name of comedy.

"Idiot!" I called to him, "Take the wheel! Steer us to the big rock!" I gestured to the pyramid with my elbow.

"You're not getting away that easily!" Olaf roared, biting my hand.

"Blast and botheration!" I swore—if that can be considered a swear—at the top of my lungs. My brother wasn't an utter fool, though. He ran over to the captain's seat and took the helm, steering us on our way.

Meanwhile, Poe was setting to waking up the other two members of our party: Carmelita and Violet's baby sister. I hoped that neither of them were too badly shaken, as I continued barely holding my own against Olaf.

Violet crept down the narrow steps to the boat's cabin. The ceiling was rather low, and she had to stoop down to move. Enya and Tocuna were huddled at the far end of the cabin, looking over the police-woman, who was still bound and gagged in a corner.

This official looked far worse for wear. Her jet-black hair had been pulled into a bun, which was now wild as forest nettles. Her LSPD uniform was soaked beyond recognition, and was rumpled as a washing rag to boot. But worst of all, was the expression on the woman's face. She wore a mixture of terror, indignation, and incredulity that made her resemble a wily pug dog.

"Should we flay her, again?" Enya addressed its partner.

Tocuna bit her lip, "Let's not. The poor thing's only got a few more hours to live. Why ruin them?"

The officer said some things, though they were muffled by the old rag that they had gagged her with.

"Poor dear." Tocuna sighed, "Well, there's nothing we can do for her, now. Why do you think she was down here in the first place?"

"Probably chasing those kids. We did pick up some of them who weren't in the house when we arrived."

Tocuna leaned against the wall, and let out a shaky breath. Her dull eyes flicked around the cabin. And she saw Violet.

Tocuna let out a wild cry, that made Enya jump, "What's the meaning of all that?" it asked furiously.

Tocuna pointed at Violet and uttered a strange series of whistles, moans, and chirps. This annoyed Enya even further, "Stop singing!" it told her, "STOP IT, I SAY!"

Only then, did it follow Tocuna's gaze, seeing the ingenious girl with her hair in a ribbon, lurking behind the stairs.

Enya roared and charged, though at that precise moment, PM1 began steering the boat. The whole craft executed a three-hundred-sixty degree turn on the water, and proceeded to tilt itself halfway into the air. The boxes and crates that had been stored in the cabin slid all about, some of them bursting open and raining a shower of old clothes and cleaning detergents down on them all.

The police-woman screamed, loud and clear now that her gag had slipped down from her face. She was still pinned to that pillar, and was forced to endure every nauseating twist and turn the boat took.

Violet, being resourceful as she was, picked up a box labeled: Old Shoes, and tossed it at the two of Olaf's henchfolk. The box split open on making contact with Enya's broad body. Penny loafers, slippers, even jagged stilettos spilled out every which way, the majority of them pummeling Enya and Tocuna to the ground.

While the two were distracted, Violet took one of the stilettos, and began to hack through the ropes that bound the officer. This was a complicated process, made even more difficult by the moving of the boat.

Once she was free, the officer stood on wobbling legs and grasped Violet's hand, "Thank you, thank you, so much!"

Violet nodded and said, "Quickly, get up on deck!"

The two women made for the stairs. Once on deck, Violet closed the door behind her, drawing the bolt and sealing Enya and Tocuna away inside.

"Ah! Here they come, now." said Howard approvingly. He was right: a motor boat was just now pulling up alongside the pyramid—most of which was underwater by now. The other inmates who had been mounting the steps to the top had been swept away.

Hooky—or, 'Fernald' as Flo referred to him—was still holding tight to Isadora, and Flo was doing the same to Chubs, "Why?" Isadora mustered the courage to ask the snake, "Why has Olaf agreed to help you?"

"Oh, you'll find out presently." Howard was off-hand.

The boat had moored by now, and the passengers were running up the steps. But that wasn't Olaf—

"Violet?" Isadora gasped, "Sunny?"

Indeed, the two Baudelaire sisters made their way toward them, followed by PM2 and another boy who looked very much like him, Arthur Poe, Carmelita Spats and an LSPD officer who looked quite bedraggled.

"You've rounded up the whole cavalry haven't you, sister?" Chubs' eyes had gone wide as saucers on seeing the retinue that had come upon them.

Violet looked about to reply, when she noticed Duncan on the floor, "Duncan!" she cried, rushing over to be at his side. Just before she could bend over him, though, Howard lashed his serpentine tail out at her, knocking her down, "Sit still, you little wench!" he scowled, "Where's Count Olaf?"

"None of your damn business." frowned PM2, who had gone over to help Violet to her feet.

Carmelita was also looking at the prostrate Duncan, staying at a safe distance away from Howard, "What have you done to him?" she asked, her voice breaking.

"Something not nearly as bad as what I'll do to you if you don't shut your mouth." replied Howard coolly, "I ask again: Where is Olaf?"

"Right here!"

They all turned back to where the boat had been moored, and found Count Olaf trotting up the remaining stairs, followed by the faithful Tocuna and Enya.

When Flo saw her sister, she bolted over to her side, dropping Chubs on the floor, where he landed quite close to the helpless Xibaldo, "Tocuna!" she embraced her counterpart, "Tocuna, thank God you're alright!"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Tocuna sounded insulted, "It's all on my account that we've brought all of these captives here!"

"Shut up, you pasty-faced woman!" Olaf snapped. Everyone stared at him, "What?" receiving no answer, Olaf addressed Howard, "Sorry we're so late, but there was a mutiny on the boat you so generously provided me with."

The other man—likely PM2's brother—looked puzzled, "Wait, wait, wait! You're working for a talking snake? Why?"

"Very simple." Olaf sniffed contemptuously, "I lent the use of my associates," he gestured to Flo and Fernald, "To Howard, here, as part of our deal."

"Which was—" Isadora prompted him.

"Our deal was that I help him kill every soul in the Demon Room. In return, Howard would help my party and I escape to the sunlit lands."

"Sunlit lands?" PM2 raised an eyebrow.

"Shut up! Of course, I would also be allowed to keep the Baudelaires and Quagmires, in order to murder the majority of them and thus inherit their fortunes."

"Is that why you've let him shoot Duncan?" Isadora stepped on Fernald's foot—something she could have done before, though she hadn't wanted to endanger her brother's life.

"Yes." Olaf picked at his nails, nonchalantly, "Now, my dear, you are the only remaining member of the Quagmire family!"

"Wrong!" Alice stood up, striking a ridiculous pose, "Mother dearest!" she pointed to herself.

Olaf stared at her, "Who's this clown?"

"My mom."

"Your—" everyone among the new arrivals seemed particularly shocked. At last, Olaf managed, "That is Alice Quagmire?"

"Yes." Isadora went on, "You don't have to worry about my father, though, he's dead as a doornail. He was Dr. Montgomery. Presumably, he changed his name after sending me and Duncan away to school and locking my mom down here."

Olaf was noticeably flabbergasted, "WHAT?" he moaned.

"Oh, and I apparently also have a long-lost brother." Isadora crossed her arms, enjoying playing around with this wicked mastermind.

There were more shocked ejaculations. Not those ejaculations! Get your minds out of the gutter.

Violet gaped, "You have a brother? How do you suddenly know all this—"

"I'll tell you later." Isadora assured her friend, "Right now, I'd like this guy," she pointed at Howard, "To give an explanation."

Howard rolled his eyes, "Yes, I am a little overdo, aren't I? I shall began:"

HOWARD'S MONOLOGUE

"I have lived a tragic and tumultuous life. I was born in the wilderness—the first of a rare, hybrid species. My parents proceeded to eat each other, and my young life was ruined further by a man from the Board of Life Science in Dirty Bastard. He captured me, as a new species and brought me to the city. Note that this all happened on the same day. I was than auctioned off to a janitor for the Snicket, who had recently been appointed as an inventing professor for a school in the Dandruff Mountains. My species was christened: The Incredibly Deadly Viper, and it was decreed that no other vipers could be born. I was alone—young, naïve, and rather stupid.

"I was presented in class on a day in late winter, some eighteen years ago. The professor was incompetent from what I can remember, though a plucky student and her friend—actually the professor's own associate—rescued me from my captivity and carried me into a pine forest outside the school.

"I was grateful, so very, very grateful. I had not yet learned human speech, so I could not thank my rescuers properly. The odd thing was, the moment we came into the wood, the girl set me down on the banks of a stream, and she and the boy made love right before me. I was traumatized! I wondered if I would ever recover from the terror of the human reproductive system, witnessed in full force when I was still but a child!

"And even worse: while these two were in coitus, the girl's leg struck out, and I was knocked into the stream. Mind you, I was still in the cage that the professor had sealed me in. And I was trapped, whisked down from the slopes on the wild currents. At one point, I feared that I would be swept into the great sea. But no! I was carried along a tributary to a lake, a lake by a small town, the name of which I had never bothered to find out. On the shore of this lake, I was finally released from my cage by a girl of about seven. Her name was Belle, and she cared for me as though I were her very own.

"Only a child could look at a snake and think it innocent. Belle treated me with the utmost respect. She fed me, gave me a place to sleep, she even introduced me to her mother, who lived in an old house on a high cliff. Belle's mother, I did not like. She worked a position in Dirty Bastard, with the Snicket himself, and so she wasn't often around. Belle's father had died long before this. And so, it was just me in that house with Belle and a fidgety old housekeeper: Mrs. Rees-Toome.

And then one day, when Belle had recently turned ten, her mother returned, flushed red and excited. She was in high spirits, over finding love at last. Belle did not ask any further questions, but I had a feeling it was a workplace romance. This woman—what was her name? I can't remember now—looked upon me, how much bigger I had gotten over a course of three years.

"She announced that I was growing too quickly to have a place under her roof. Belle protested, sobbed my name into the night; it had been her, who had given me the name of Howard. That wretched old hag dumped me into the lake that I had come from, while her daughter watched.

"And I was floating adrift again. Though this time, there was no cage to hold me, and I was able to bear myself onto a rocky shore. I traveled the land for many years, stopping nowhere and making no friends. And then the news came to me: The Wicked B*tch of the West had terrorized Snicket Land for the last time. The Snicket's chief advisers assembled a group of men to go out into the world and kill her. I had put the pieces together now, going by the descriptions that were given of the B*tch, that she was the same terrible creature who had kicked me into the stream as a child, damning me to my wretched existence. Even better: Belle's mother organized the hunt! She never did recognize me as the pet her daughter had kept as a girl. I figured, that if I captured the B*tch and killed her, than Belle's mother would take me back into her household, where Belle herself might still be waiting for me.

In the end I, out of hundreds, was selected to find and kill the B*tch. Myself, as well as a masked man who called himself 'The Bald Avenger'. I didn't like him much, but we did not speak to each other often on our quest. Figuring that the Wicked B*tch of the West would live in the west, that was the direction in which we headed. As we were crossing the Dark Forest, I was separated from the Avenger, for I had seen someone whom I had thought I would never see again: Belle.

"At first, she did not recognize me, but when I twinkled at her with my green eyes,she noticed. How happy she was! All thoughts of the Bald Avenger and my trip west were interrupted as Belle took me home. To her new home. She now lived in a villa, the very one that lies above all of our heads. She had become the lab assistant of Dr. Montgomery Montgomery, the rejected biologist.

"Belle did not mention her mother, so I did not. We chatted, as we had always done: with me moving my head, tail and tongue, so Belle could understand me. We talked and talked for hours upon hours of all the lost days and weeks and years. When night began to fall, Montgomery asked Belle what the devil did she think she was doing spending so much time with his 'new specimen'. A look of terrible shock spread over Belle's face. She tried to protest, but it was as futile as it had been when we were first separated. Montgomery struck her. Struck her so hard that tracks of blood appeared on her cheek.

"Montgomery took me down to his lab—that little room beneath his study. There, he performed tests and experiments, the first of many. To think back to those disgusting procedures would cause my mettle to shake down around me, so I shall not go into detail on them. Montgomery then locked me away, like all of the men, women, children and animals that he tested on, in the Demon Room. It was then, on one night, that my tongue was no longer heavy with hisses and snarls. The serums that Montgomery had slipped me had given me the power of speech.

"The other inmates—all dead now, of course—saw this and, on noticing my sharp intellect, elected me as their new leader. The old monarch: a purple octopus, had killed himself a few weeks prior to my imprisonment. And so it was for these past months. I presided over each one of the manic meetings that were held in that great receiving room which, if my plans have succeeded, is completely underwater by now.

"And now, to my plan. I committed these murders for one reason: revenge. Revenge on Montgomery, for locking me up here. Revenge on Belle, for never trying to rescue me. Revenge on every single one of those fools I had shared my prison with, for being too dim to make any decisions of their own! I did have an ultimate goal, though: escape. Escape from these dark lands—to head off to the outside world! And this is how I did it: I knew, from the moment that I had been cast away in the Demon Room, that my body was particularly suited to the task of creeping through dark crevices. The drainage pipes that connected the room to the surface were too secure. But the cracks in the crumbling walls were perfectly suited to the task of my escape. But, the cracks would not lead to the sunlight—just Montgomery's offices, a little higher up than the Demon Room.

"It took a bit of a while to explore every crevice and crack in the place, but at last, I found one. I slipped through it, and found myself just outside of Montgomery's control room. This was shortly after Belle had been brought to you, and had given you your weapons. Montgomery was just in the process of shutting down his house's power and sealing all the exits, when I bit his ankle. He fell to the floor, badly wounded. While Montgomery was incapacitated, I did some maneuvering with his control panels. It was I who split your party up, to different torture chambers, or parts of the villa.

"After this was done, I made use of one of Montgomery's maneuverable pieces of furniture. I controlled a reading lamp, setting it to bludgeoning Belle to death. That was my first task done. I then curled myself around Montgomery and tossed him into the surveillance panel. He was fried like the dirty criminal he was.

"What follows is a little complicated. I let your group split up, in hopes that Montgomery's traps would finish all of you off. And, as I am sure you are wondering, the voice that two of you heard in that bathroom was a recording set up by Montgomery. There were no keys transplanted in your stomachs. Montgomery did away with many, using that ruse. I knew now, that I needed an ally. I found one in the form of Count Olaf. It was I who showed him the secret exit from the lagoon of Molars the Great White. In return, I asked for him to lend me his services—his own brand of genius, as well as his associates. I found the hook-handed one first, and roped him into helping me stand guard on this pyramid. Next to join us was Flo, who did not yet know of her employer's plans. Luckily, she listened to Fernald's explanation, and assisted me.

"And now, my work is almost done. Montgomery and Belle are dead. So are the majority of those whom I shared the Demon Room with these past few months. You might have wondered what this pyramid and this brass mechanism were used for. This was originally an entrance. Montgomery had kept these catacombs from years before he had bought the villa. His wife didn't know, of course. The tunnels extending from the house are newer, and were added after the villa became Montgomery's residence.

"The brass device is an elevator, and a rather large one at that. It operates using a series of sturdy chains that extend through that funnel like passage running into the ceiling above us. Count Olaf, his assistants, and I will be leaving through there, with certainty. Unfortunately, there is no room for any of you lot, especially with a wounded boy on your hands. The water won't rise any higher, I can tell you, so you should all be safe for a few months, if you decide to eat each other. And it is now that I make my exit."

END OF MONOLOGUE

Isadora couldn't believe this. Howard had lied to her—he wasn't planning on helping her at all. She would die in this pit. She would die, along with her friends, her brother, and the rest of them.

The police-woman stepped forward, "This is really astonishing, sure enough. But one of my deputies was killed! Who did that, eh?"

Howard did that little shrugging thing again, saying, "I don't know. I suppose you'll never find out, what?"

He tossed his shotgun to Olaf, who beamed, "I'm terribly sorry to leave you all like this." he mocked them. Directing his gaze on Isadora, he went on, "And I suppose that I'll never have a chance at the Quagmire fortune. But as for that of the Baudelaires—" he lunged, pushing Violet to the ground and snatching Sunny from her arms, "I still have a chance. You'll all starve to death down here, and I can use dear Sunny to get the money!" he cackled with malicious glee.

Sunny struggled, bit, kicked, did everything she could, but Olaf sneered at her, "I'll get my revenge on you yet, you little louse!"

Sunny was appalled, "Krimanka?" she screeched, meaning: "Revenge? You're the one who abandoned me! Many times!"

"Little details like that are insignificant!" Olaf snapped, "Now, let us hurry. I'd like to see my dearest Kit again."

"And I'd like to smell fresh air." Tocuna beamed.

"And I would like to hear birdsong." added Enya.

"I'd like to feel the sun on my hooks." Fernald eyed his grim appendages with satisfaction.

"And I'd like to see The Book of Mormon on Snicket-way!" Flo gave a longing sigh.

"Yes, yes, we'll do all of that, just hurry!" Olaf yelled at them. Howard had already slunk into the elevator.

Violet was still sprawled on the floor. She seemed to have twisted an ankle in her fall. She looked at her brother, "Chubs! Get Sunny!"

Chubs snapped out of some sort of distracted trance, and Isadora hurried with him to Olaf, though by the time they crossed the top of the pyramid, the group of villains—plus their captive—had entered the elevator. Howard wound himself around a winch that was inside it, and the whole device clattered and clanged up the chute.

They were alone now. And they had lost Sunny.

A/N: That was something, wasn't it? Howard's monologue was fun to do. I always love the exposition part of mysteries. But there is one little question that remains: Who killed Deputy Sandbag? Well, you'll find out for yourselves later. How much later? A mystery—

Also, Sunny's going away with Olaf again! Though this time, it isn't of her own free will!

Find out what happens to our trapped heroes next chapter, and thanks for sticking with us after all this time! You don't know how good it is to hear from you guys!

Update Coming Next Friday!:)