Disclaimer: The Hey Arnold characters belong to Craig Bartlett, and to him alone. That his characters have inspired such hubris in me that would see me attempt a fan fiction based on them, speaks volumes of my reverence of the man.
ICYMI: The party reaches its destination, thanks largely to the unknown and unseen assistance of the Green Eyes. Which doesn't mean that Arnold likes the news they've provided him.
And here we are with my first update for 2021! Enjoy!
13. Rhyme or Reason (Part 1)
At around 11:15 one fine late-spring Friday morning, an announcement was broadcast via the speaker in the homeroom class of Robert Simmons.
"Your attention, please. Will Phoebe Heyerdahl please report to Principal Wartz's office? Phoebe Heyerdahl, please report to Principal Wartz's office."
For anyone other than Phoebe Heyerdahl, an announcement such as this would be met with hissing and other teasing gestures with the implication that someone had done goofed very badly. For Phoebe Heyerdahl, however, such an announcement was met with general indifference from her peers as it usually meant another award, commendation, or honor was to be bestowed on her. And since she wasn't known to be the most gracious in accepting such accolades, where was the fun teasing her for that?
She was promptly permitted to leave by Mister Simmons, who tried to rise above the general indifference by joking to her that her trophy cabinet must have been crying for mercy. His attempt at humor was received as well as expected: not at all.
As she walked down the passages, she allowed herself to wonder what it was she was bound to receive. What essay, experiment, string bass recital, or test from her miscellany of recent endeavors was the source of this latest accolade?
She arrived at the open door of the principal's office, where through which she looked to see the rotund old man waiting alongside an unfamiliar, younger, much lither man. Strangely enough, the school official wasn't seated at his desk but instead standing with the man beside it. On the desk, a laptop had been set up and was running, together with what Phoebe recognized as a portable LTE router. Curious. The stranger was impeccably dressed in a grey-and-white smart-casual ensemble with the different shades calibrated for optimum coordination.
"Ah, here she is!" announced Wartz as he spotted Phoebe. "Miss Heyerdahl, come in please."
"Miss Heyerdahl!" the man repeated in a friendlier, less authoritarian voice. "Such a pleasure to meet you. My name is Nizaam Adhikari and I am the legal representative of Mister Buckley Lloyd."
Rhonda's father? Phoebe's mind sprang into immediate action as she tried to determine the reason for the visit.
"Good morning," she greeted back. "Pleased to meet you, Mister Adhikari."
"Miss Heyerdahl, please!" responded the attorney. "No need for such formalities! 'Nizaam' will do just fine!"
"Very well, if you insist…Nizaam," Phoebe replied, sold on the attorney's friendliness. She watched as Wartz became huffy, seemingly at not having been granted similar first-name privileges. But that was not the most important matter in the room for her. Does this have anything to do with the San Lorenzo expedition, she wondered. While she was wondering, the attorney turned to the principal and said: "Thank you for bringing her here, Mister Wartz. Now if we may please have our privacy..?"
Once Wartz walked out of his office and closed the door behind him – while grumbling under his breath – Nizaam Adhikari addressed Phoebe in a quiet but much more urgent voice.
"Miss Heyerdahl," he began, "I've been informed of the status of my client's recent expedition to San Lorenzo. I've therefore no doubt that you have surmised that I am here regarding that matter. You are correct "
His demeanor put her further at ease. Whoever sent him appeared to have also informed him of her superior intelligence and her penchant for not suffering fools lightly. He in turn seemed to have taken those words to heart and was engaging her with all due respect with no trace of patronizing her.
"Oh goodness me!" she responded once the implications of his confirmation quickly set in. "I hope everyone is fine over there!"
"Rest assured, everyone in the party is unharmed and very much safe," Nizaam assured her. "But…they appear to have hit a snag in achieving their ultimate goal and—"
"You mean they've found Arnold's parents?" Phoebe briefly let her giddiness taint her natural curiosity. "They have, haven't they?"
"Well yes, they have located the missing Shortmans. But some serious complications are hindering and confusing them. They now turn to you to consult with them over the matter. You were highly recommended by Misses Lloyd and Bakkerud, and also Masters Shortman and Johanssen."
Phoebe had to suppress some pangs of still-raw emotion over Gerald and Nadine, but Arnold's situation was still the overriding factor. So she asked simply: "How may I be of assistance?"
Nizaam pointed to the laptop on the desk and bade her have a seat behind it. He then brought it out of its sleep mode to reveal a videoconferencing app running.
"I've set up a meeting with you and the party members in San Lorenzo," the attorney explained. "It'll just be a matter of re-establishing the satellite connection" – which he accomplished in good order – "and you're good to go!"
He then stepped back to indicate that the show was now hers. Phoebe watched as one by one, several windows revealed the many participants in the meeting that was to take place. Some participants had their windows to themselves, while Mister Lloyd shared his with Arnold's grandparents and the P.S. 118 contingent were all squashed in Rhonda's window. The rest of the participants were unknown to her, but she took comfort at the sight of the familiar faces.
And though she was aware that their situation could be dire, Phoebe couldn't help but be relieved that her school friends – and Nadine… – were safe. Her relief took the form of a greeting that made her sound drained even as the meeting began.
"Hi Guys!" she bellowed. "What a relief that you're all safe!"
The relief she projected was also the relief that she got back from the collective, the Hillwood locals in particular. "PHOEBE! Oh thank god we got through to you!"
She gathered too from their voices a sense of desperate hope, a hope that for reasons they were sure to explain now hinged on her. She noted as well how puffy Arnold's eyes and how streaked his cheeks were: something had made him cry severely. His grandparents exhibited similar bits of evidence. Not good, she summarised the situation, not good at all.
"Correct, Miss," one of the strangers – a middle-aged man with probably a Welsh accent – interrupted her train of thought, before all but confirming her hypothesis. "We're in a predicament that maybe you can shed a whole lot of light on."
Two hours before the fated conference call, the mood at a cave in a clearing somewhere in San Lorenzo had become sorrowful and somber. It began when Arnold read the scroll, which he correctly concluded was meant for his eyes. The more he read, the less he liked the story.
The scroll told its story with neither mercy nor tact. It cared naught for the feelings of its reader. The first few pictures portrayed the arrival of Miles, Stella, and Eduardo at an altar. Presumably, it was the very altar where Arnold now stood. So far, so ordinary.
Next, they appeared to have been led inside the cave for a consultation with the leaders. After some time they were shown leaving the meeting. No hints of treating any people in need. Maybe it was a different disease to the sleeping sickness that Mom's medicine wouldn't work against. Maybe she needed to make a new medicine.
So many maybes, so many possibilities. Until the next drawings brought about a chilling confirmation. The first of them showed the visiting trio being engulfed in what looked like…a purplish…was it a mist? An explosion?
No, his lingering doubt became a much more vivid thought.
The next one had worse news to convey as it showed the trio lying still on the ground.
"No."
A single word, spoken from a disbelieving mouth to a lifeless scroll being held in an ever-tightening grip by a boy feeling his muscles tensing from the distress. But no, there was more. The last picture showed his parents laid to rest on a plinth while still in the cave. At least he thought they were still in the cave as there was no depiction of them being carried anywhere else.
"NO!"
This one was more impassioned, more in denial. Loud enough to grab the attention of his onlooking colleagues.
"Kimba, what's on the scroll?" someone shouted, perhaps caught on to his distress.
"NO!"
"Short Man, what's it say?" Another voice. Equally worried. Equally meaningless.
"NO!"
"Arnold, are you OK?"
"Hey Arnold..!"
"HEY ARNOLD..!"
"HEY ARNOLD..!"
Shouts and questions swirling around him, driving him to confusion. Voices vying urgently for his attention, melding into one incomprehensible babel.
"NOOOOO!"
His next perceptions were of movement and of tear-blurred vision as he dropped the scroll and ran for the cave entrance. The feeling was phantasmagoric: he felt his deepest fears and strongest denials take possession of him and how all his actions would now be at their whims. Nothing he was doing felt of his own volition. Onward he ran to the cave, ignoring the frenzy of voices shouting at him. Perhaps warning him it might not be safe? Asking that he return, maybe? He wouldn't, he couldn't; his body and mind were no longer his. Into the cave he tore. Not too far inside…before he saw the plinth. Before he saw them.
They'd been laid on their backs on top of a padded surface held up by the plinth as depicted on the scroll. They appeared to be peacefully asleep, their arms folded across their chests with one hand over the other. They were still clad in clothing that he could remember them wearing all those years ago, and didn't seem to have aged at all since last he'd seen them. Thinking, believing, hoping that they truly were asleep, Arnold clambered up between them. There he began prodding them and tugging at them, begging them to wake up.
"Mom, Dad, wake up!" he begged them. They didn't respond.
"Please! It's me! It's Arnold. Wake up! Please wake up!" he kept imploring them to stir. Still nothing. He continued pleading with them as he felt his emotions well up inside him. And so…
"NOOOOOOOO!"
The cave walls amplified and threw the pained echoes of his scream back at him, causing him to drop to his knees and cry out ten years of betrayed hope. But he wouldn't be alone, for his grandparents followed shortly.
"Short Man!" his grandfather called as he came running in. "Are you OK? Are you OH GOD, MILES!"
"STELLA! STELLA!" it was his grandmother this time, also having taken in the sight.
The grandparents rushed to Arnold weeping in front of the plinth to comfort him. Their intentions were no match for the reality as they too succumbed to the roiling sorrow within them. They grabbed hold of him for a joint embrace, only to join him in his weeping.
"Oh no!" was the collective gasp from the rest of the team, unheard over the emotions of their mourning colleagues. The group had also disobeyed their combined common sense to stay put outside. They now wished they hadn't, and all they could do for now was keep their distance from the grieving Shortmans to let their mourning and their tears run their course.
xxXXXxx
Rhonda and Buckley were taking the situation particularly hard, given that this sad moment was the culmination of events set in motion by them. Rhonda looked at Arnold and his family, on the brink of tears herself. This is my fault, she scolded herself. This is all my fault. All because she felt the need for Arnold to find his parents or otherwise obtain closure over the matter. Well, here she was, witnessing that glorious thing called 'closure'. And it sucked, quite frankly! Damn you, Rhonda! What good is closure if this is what it does? A stream of angry emotion started flowing down each cheek as she slumped her head forward to mewl silently.
It was then that she felt her father's hand on her shoulder. "Now, Pumpkin," she heard him say in as soothing a voice as he could. "Don't blame yourself for this," he continued. "You couldn't have known this would happen. None of us could."
His words overwhelmed her, causing her to throw herself at her father to continue her mewling into his chest. "Daddy, I thought I was helping him! I thought I was helping them all! I kept saying they needed closure, I kept saying they needed to know what happened!"
"And you did help them, Rhonda," her father tried assuring her. "They've found their missing family. After ten years, they found them. They got their closure, they now know what happened."
Cold comfort for the dejected young beauty as she heard the continued sobs of the boy she loved. "I just wanted to help him!" she continued between fits of sobbing. "I saw how sad he became whenever I brought up his parents! Now I've just made things worse!"
Buckley Lloyd didn't have the words that would comfort her. He wanted to tell her how good her intentions were, how this expedition had brought her selflessness to the fore, and how proud he was that she was able to put someone else's needs in front of her own. But those words wouldn't have reached her right that moment, so all he had left was his comforting presence and his fatherly embrace as he let her mourn Arnold's loss.
Owens and his team were keeping a professional distance, remaining stoic and detached from the sadness. Among them stood Gerald and Nadine. Gerald had an arm around Nadine, mostly for his own sake as he was depending on Nadine for stability. Likewise, Nadine appreciated Gerald's gesture for the source of comfort that it was for her. Against very difficult odds, they were trying their best to remain stoic as well should their best friends require their support.
"Well here's exactly the situation I was hoping we could avoid!" MacArthur whispered to Owens. "If we kept them at home then we'd be breaking this news over Skype, far away from scenes like this!"
"Will you pipe down!" Norton shushed her. "We brought them with us and now they're in mourning and there's nothing we can do but let them grieve!"
"Well just look at you!" MacArthur shot back. "You let that old geezer get to you, you did! You let this mission get personal, and look at where it's gotten us! We'd be better off if we never found them!"
"That's enough!" ordered Owens. "Now's not the time for airing grievances!"
But it wasn't enough for MacArthur. "Oh, like you were any better! Allowing that Shortman boy to get his hopes up! Bringing in young children and exposing them to this sight! You pretty much just robbed them of their innocence! They'll be having nightmares for years to come! You ask me, that's beyond cruel!"
"He'd have found out anyway no matter how we went about this operation," Owens attempted his explanation. "Besides, that lad is much stronger than you give him credit for. He's reacting the way anyone would if they find out both their parents are dead. Trust me, he'll recover soon enough and move on with his life. You read the journal. You know it'll be the same for him as it's been for the past ten years."
MacArthur then resigned herself to the reality that for all the sadness surrounding the team, it was very much a case of mission accomplished. Nothing in the contract about finding them alive. "I suppose I should radio for the chopper to come pick us up then?"
"Wait!"
Nadine's voice cut through the team's chatter, and all eyes were suddenly on her. "Before we leave," she continued, "do you think that maybe I can have a closer look at the parents?"
"Whatever for, Miss?" Owens asked back, unable to fathom why a girl her age would be interested in a pair of corpses.
"Because she suspects the same thing that I suspect," Norton answered on Nadine's behalf and his.
"And pray tell, what would that be?" MacArthur fired back on the team's behalf.
"That they're not dead!"
xxXXXxx
The mourning lasted for twenty minutes before the Shortmans regained enough lucidity to announce that it was time for Miles and Stella to go back home with them.
"Um, Arnold?" Nadine nervously chimed in. "Before we do that, can…can I please take a closer look at your parents?"
Before anyone from Hillwood had the chance to be shocked and confused by her request, Norton also had his. "And if you don't mind, I'd like a look at them too."
Arnold was first to reply, equally as nervous as Nadine was when she made her request: "Any reason why, Nadine?"
"Just a feeling I've got," replied the budding entomologist. "Could be nothing, could be…I don't know…something just doesn't feel right for me!"
Feeling that there was no point in not allowing Nadine's request, Arnold and his family granted the requested permission. What they witnessed was the source of much surprise, bordering on shock and prompting many – asked and unasked – questions beginning with 'What the hell'. It was quite the bizarre spectacle as Nadine went about inspecting Miles and Stella, sniffing them from top to toe, stopping occasionally to express confusion while ignoring several questions about her intentions.
"OK Nadine, what gives?" asked Gerald once she was done with…whatever it was she'd just done. "Did you find what you were looking for?"
"No I didn't," she replied analytically, "and that's what doesn't feel right."
"Well go on then!" urged Owens. "Don't go keeping us in suspense now!"
"If they're dead, then where's the insect activity?" Nadine began her explanation. "No blowfly larvae. No maggots. Not even evidence of bacterial activity and gas build-up!"
Nadine's feedback was briefly sidetracked by questions from Wales focussing on just how such a young one could have such a morbid fascination with post-mortem matters. Rhonda then took it upon herself to disclose her best friend's fixation with insects and also relate some of the more gruesome aspects of her hobby.
"There was once" – for example – "this time we came across a dead wallaby when we vacationed in Australia. It was ripe too, with maggots and flies all over the place! Guess which one of us didn't throw up when we saw it. Guess which one actually approached the decomposing mess. Guess which one kept poking it with a stick to see what bugs would come out of it."
And that was enough for the Welsh contingent, who made it known that Nadine's seriousness was beyond any reasonable doubt, even if they did now think the girl to be a bit disturbed upstairs. Rhonda, for her part, was relieved that she didn't have to provide any more anecdotes as the wallaby story was the tamest example.
But as impressed with Nadine's reasoning as everyone was, there were still some who weren't fully convinced. Lewis, for instance: "Maybe underground's not the best place for the blowflies to thrive. I mean, I've retrieved victims in caves before that had straight-up mummified." – he turned to face the Shortmans specifically for his follow-up – "No disrespect at all, folks, but maybe your loved ones were on their way to that state."
"That's where we disagree!" Norton cut in. He then took a place between Miles and Stella. From there, he went about lifting up one of Miles's arms. "Have a look at this," he said as he squeezed, poked, and prodded the man's bicep, tricep, and forearm muscles. "Musculature is still intact, no sign of dehydration, no lividity to speak of. In fact, mate, no lividity at all. Then there's this."
He next focussed on Miles's hand where he wiggled each finger almost playfully. His apparent flippancy almost earned him the ire of the rest of the party but for the point he made as a result of his actions. "See that? No rigor. If they were dead, then what I just did with the fingers would have been impossible. I'd sooner have snapped off the digits."
"So what does it mean?" asked everyone through Owens.
"Honestly?" replied Norton. "I'm buggered if I know!"
He observed the disappointed sighs around him before continuing: "But on this evidence, I won't say they're dead. I don't know why – and I know it sounds crazy and I might be talking out of my arse – but I think these two have been on pause for the past ten years."
The next voice heard was Arnold, a suddenly emphatic: "Well then, why don't we look into it?"
Any attention on Norton was instantly redirected toward the footballhead, all of it reflecting thoughts of him still being in denial. His grandparents were first to vocalize their thoughts. "Hate to break this to you, Short Man," said an emotionally inert Phil, "but it's over."
"Sorry Kimba," added an equally depleted Gertie, "but we did our best and must now be content with the results."
Arnold then turned to Buckley and asked: "Mister Lloyd, how long do we still have the services of Mister Owens and his team?"
And Buckley responded: "They'd still have to transport your parents to a medical facility. Dead or alive," – he sounded aware of Arnold's thoughts – "they'll stay there while we get the paperwork sorted out to transport them back to Hillwood."
Arnold then turned to Owens, who he asked: "Mister Owens, any chance we can postpone transporting my parents to investigate more thoroughly. I mean, the scroll I read said that they're dead, now two people don't think so and I don't know if they're right or wrong. Wouldn't it be good if we knew for sure?"
Owens mulled over Arnold's words for a while before responding: "How much time you reckon you need?"
Arnold surveyed the party to find that – judging from most of the expressions around him – he had the majority support. "One hour, maybe two?" he estimated.
"Tell you what, Lad. Have three! With our full support!" Owens then turned to Buckley, who smiled and nodded back in approval. "OK, Arnold," Owens continued, "any idea where we should start?"
Arnold didn't miss a beat. "I'd like another look at that scroll. I know it said my parents died, but what if I read it wrong? What if there's something that was lost in translation?"
"One scroll, coming up!" announced Gerald before setting off with Nadine in tow.
"And what about Eduardo?" Arnold's vigor was slowly regenerating. "If he's not here with my parents, then where is he? The scroll said he was with my parents when this happened to them, so is he still in this cave somewhere else?"
"I'm on it, Son!" Lewis responded enthusiastically, before leaving to explore the cave a bit further. He didn't wait for the go-ahead from his team leader. Owens only smiled at Lewis's gesture; he'd have given him permission anyway.
"Anything else?"
This time it was MacArthur weighing in, much to Owens's surprise.
Arnold paused for some thought before replying: "If it's not too much, I'd like to call in a consultant to assist us."
The answer wasn't specific for MacArthur, who sought more clarity. "Oh? What kind of consultant?"
"Supergenius!" blurted Rhonda. "Mile-high IQ. Knows just about everything!"
"Yep," concurred Arnold. "Phoebe Heyerdahl."
"Phoebe Heyerdahl? Your classmate?" queried Buckley.
"Classmate!" repeated an incredulous MacArthur. "As in…the same age as you kids?"
"Trust me," assured Arnold. "She's our best option for helping us out right now." He then turned to the Lloyd patriarch: "Mister Lloyd, any chance you can set up a video conference with her? I know it's short notice and you've done so much for us and I really hate to abuse your—"
"Don't worry, Arnold," Buckley cut him off. "I'll make it happen. Let me call my attorney to set it up."
Then he too left the cave to make his call.
That left Rhonda, who shot Arnold a look of affection to convey how impressed she was with how he'd stepped up to the plate. With nary a word spoken between them, they moved over to Phil and Gertie to offer a comforting presence if nothing else.
They were watched from a distance by the remaining team members: Owens, MacArthur, and Farah.
"Strewth! He really is his parents' son!" MacArthur whispered to her comrades, impressed by the young boy's maturity and wisdom.
"Aye, that he is," concurred Owens. "It's what he's had to be for the past ten years."
"But I somehow suspect you knew that already when you invited him to tag along. Didn't you, Nige?" queried Farah, just a little bit suspicious.
"Honestly, I have no idea what you're talking about," answered Owens.
That'll do for this chapter, dearest readers! My apologies for the delay, but I kinda got distracted with another story I was working on, 'A Language We Both Understand', but I'm back to get this story on track. Thank you for reading, thank you for waiting, and most of all, thank you for (hopefully) enjoying this chapter. So...things appear to be looking up for Arnold: could this be a turning point?
Anyway, to the reviews we go:
Kryten: The truth and nothing but the truth. But still...And I hope you found the full joke amusing.
The J.A.M. a.k.a. Numbuh i: I'm not sure what his idea was, but...OK.
Anonymous Latino: You're correct that this is not yet the end.
The hotdog man: The Green Eyes' POV was a last-minute addition to that chapter. I decided it would provide a better idea of their viewpoints and capabilities, as well as their knowledge of Arnold's past and its current influence on them.
Onward now to my notes:
I found the biggest challenge here to be setting up the situation for Arnold to regain his resolve. It's not something he'd be able to do on his own, as he'd be in a really bad place and all the adults would consider the case of Miles and Stella closed. It would also have to be a gradual process so as not to rob his mourning of any of its impact. For that, you may thank Nadine and her bug expertise. Nadine was never just going to be a sidekick or an emotional crutch for Rhonda. In fact, I had her scene with Miles and Stella in mind since the final chapter of Rhonda IV and since then had been painstakingly setting it up. It did mean having to imbue her with some of the eccentricities of Sherlock Holmes as portrayed by Jonny Lee Miller in Elementary, but even that didn't feel like too much of a stretch. What say you?
Fair warning. I'm playing by the rules of the Hey Arnold universe as established in the TV series and the movies. As such, my aim is not to debunk any implausibilities - two people lying for ten years in a coma with no ill effects, for example. Instead, I'll be offering my version of an in-universe explanation and resolution for them. My aim is to give you a hopefully entertaining story, not the last word in real-world realism.
So now we've reached the Deezer list for this chapter:
Stamina – Beatenberg
Screen – Brad
I Won't Back Down – Hybrid
The Touch (Power Mix) – Stan Bush
And we're done with this chapter. See you next time!