Just a Note: I have not yet shut down the contest. Until I finish the entire story, that contest from chapter 2 is still available to anybody who wishes to enter. Good hunting!
Chapter 7
"So this is the underwater catalog," Klaus said, smiling in delight and surprise.
"Correct," said the masked woman. "We knew that in order to protect the underwater catalog, we had to design an intricate and complex way to prevent our enemies from entering."
Duncan ruffled his brow in confusion. He had expected there to be some rational expression for the simplicity of the directions, but this wasn't quite what he expected. "I'm afraid I don't understand. How come that was so intricate? It wasn't at all difficult."
The masked man explained, "Yes, to you at least. You children were able to interpret the note I left, and…"
Violet interrupted, "So you're the volunteer who wrote that message about time." She had a look of comprehension on her face that made her realize how it all fit. "You met Sunny onboard the ship to confirm we were going where you wanted us to go."
"Correct," he replied.
"But," the woman continued, "we still had the problem of the self-sustaining hot air mobile home. I had calculated the point of arrival of the flying device to the Infinitesimal Island, but we still didn't know if you would think to try and escape from Olaf's clutches or if he prevented you from doing so. Clearly, our preliminary assumptions were correct."
"Yes," the man added. "The trick was that the passageways passed by several former V.F.D. headquarters, and we knew these would distract villains who were trying to find and destroy this top-secret catalog. Clearly, following the headquarters would be much smarter, and therefore the actual location of the underwater catalog would be safe."
The children nodded as they began to understand the logic of these volunteers. But before they could ask any more questions, the man and woman immediately hopped to it, a phrase which here means "immediately got to work." They walked around the giant stone catalog, peering inside every one of the large shelves, looking for something.
"Excuse me," Klaus called when the masked volunteers were at the other end. "What are you looking for?"
The volunteers looked up in surprise, as if they were expecting Klaus to understand immediately. The woman walked over to the children and said, "Have you already forgotten what is hidden somewhere down here?"
The Baudelaires paused and realized exactly what the woman was talking about. Ever since they had been up in the Mortmain Mountains, uncovering secrets of the V.F.D. headquarters, the Baudelaires had known about a mysterious item of sweetened proportions that was supposedly supposed to keep a dangerous secret within.
"The sugar bowl," all three of them said in unison.
"Wait," Duncan interrupted. "What makes you think the sugar bowl is here? Hector said it was going to be delivered by crow to the hot air mobile home."
"That's right," Isadora said. "He said we would need to deliver it to someone in Paltryville."
"No, I'm afraid they're right," Quigley sighed sadly. "As far as I could tell from the notes I looked at, Hector overlooked the fact that one of our enemies might burn down the headquarters."
"Burn down…" Duncan said, but paused in the middle of his sentence.
"Burn down?" the woman asked, puzzled. "I'm afraid I didn't get that last bit. It would be wise to finish what you had to say."
Duncan stared at the woman as if she were telling an unfunny joke. "I was just expressing surprise, but I couldn't finish."
"Well," the woman said carefully, "it's best to finish everything you say. Have you ever heard the phrase 'What you say is just as important as what you don't say'?"
The children nodded, for they remember hearing their parents obscurely mentioning that phrase when they were talking with them. It is important to understand this principle because if you start out by saying, "He's the brother of a man who—" and then you stop before finishing off with the words "you were supposed to meet at the Lucky Smells Lumbermill" because a mob of angry citizens cuts you off, the people you are talking to may never know the secrets hidden in the sentence you did not finish. I used to know a woman who knew certain secrets that I never found out until it was too late for the both of us, especially her. If I had known earlier in my life that sausages were very handy for storing tiny objects that are not meant to be eaten, I never would have nearly choked when I dined at the Anxious Clown after delivering people to their various destinations. Had Beatrice ended the phrase "When you go to the Anxious Clown," with "check the insides of the sausages and check for a tiny piece of parchment," then the calamity could have been avoided and I may not have swallowed a crucial piece of evidence.
"Anyway," the man said. "We had better get to looking for the sugar bowl. If Dewey was right, and his plan worked, the sugar bowl should be in one of these shelves. The only question is, which shelf is it in?"
Everyone started to wonder, but then they heard a noise. It wasn't a large noise, but it was a noise nonetheless. The Baudelaires, Quagmires, and the masked volunteers turned in the direction of the noise, and then out came a person who looked as confused as the orphans were. They had no idea where they were, and they looked as if they had fallen from a great height. The orphans believed that it was Hector, who had survived the fall after all, and ran over to see him close up. Strangely enough, the figure, who was concealed in the shadows, didn't want the orphans to see them, and so they ran.
The masked man shouted, "Whoever you are, stop running! There is no way you can escape, so it would be best to cooperate!"
The figure, however, didn't seem to want to cooperate, and starting running to escape the grasp of the orphans. The children, however, were in good physical condition, and so they were able to catch up to the person in no time. Klaus grabbed the person by the shoulder, and turned them around so he and the others could see them, but when he saw who it was, his heart nearly filled with all sorts of different emotions.
When someone you know and love abandons you, and then you don't hear anything about them, you tend to often wonder where they were. Amazingly enough, this young woman that Klaus had only met days ago was now right before his very eyes, which looked sympathetic, but angry, at the same time.
"What are you doing here?" Klaus asked ambiguously.
"I'm as mystified as you all are," said Fiona Widdershins. "I remember helping Fernald with the eagles, but…"
"You," Quigley said, looking at her with a feeling of pure loathing. Isadora and Duncan immediately recognized her, and reacted as if she were something putrid and horrible. "You."
"Wait a minute," Fiona gasped. "You're the Quagmires! What…"
The Quagmires started going for Fiona, but the Baudelaires held them back as if they were wild animals that had escaped from their cages. The triplets' eyes were filled with tears, just like when they found out that Olaf had burned their house and their parents. Somehow, they were under the impression that Fiona had done something, and it wasn't before long that they found out what.
"You killed Hector!" Duncan cried, his voice echoing throughout the chasm. "You and your brother killed an innocent man! How could you?"
Fiona reacted with her face half sorry and half self-satisfied. "What was done is done," she said solemnly, "and we can't change that."
"You didn't have to do it!" Isadora cried, her voice echoing throughout the chasm. "The Baudelaires were apparently under the impression that you were just a misunderstood noble person, but you're a murderer!"
Violet whispered into Isadora's ear, "Calm down, it's not worth it!"
Quigley then spat out, "You're just as bad as Count Olaf!"
Fiona looked shocked, and replied, "That is absurd! I'm not nearly as wicked as…"
"I'm afraid they're right, Miss," replied the male volunteer. The Baudelaires and Quagmires slightly jumped, only just remembering that he and the female volunteer were still there, looking for the sugar bowl. "No act of killing is unalike."
Fiona then replied, with a hint of superiority in her voice, "But Fernald fell over too! He dragged my brother down with him!"
The man looked very stern, but did not lose his temper. "Miss Poe…"
Fiona almost fell over. She started screaming as loud as she could, and wouldn't stop. The man put his hands over Fiona's mouth so no one anywhere above could hear them. Finally, the young woman stopped struggling, and they let go.
"Don't you ever," Fiona said furiously, "EVER call me that name again! I don't even want to think about that incompetent idiot! Do you know how hard it was for me and my brother to grow up living with those imbeciles? We were almost glad when we had gotten lost in the…"
"But you respected Captain Widdershins more," the man interjected, clearly overlooking his comrade's principle of letting people finish what they had to say. "Why?"
"Why?" Fiona asked, her eyes still watering. "He didn't spend all of his time tending to the littler ones and not paying any attention to us! He didn't have an annoying cough that made it impossible for us to have a nice conversation for once! He actually loved me like a real father! And he didn't dare make a deal with Count Olaf!"
The orphans looked momentarily shocked, but Violet then said, "They didn't make a deal, Fiona. Your father was blackmailed."
Fiona looked at Violet in a sort of way that reminded the Baudelaires very much of the way Count Olaf looked at them. "I take it your friends told you? Well, that's it for the telling, I guess."
"What are you talking about?" Duncan asked.
Fiona finally laughed. She laughed long and hard and loud, and the orphans got more frightened by the second. "Didn't you tell them, Baudelaires? Didn't you tell them everything?"
The Quagmires looked confused, but the Baudelaires' hearts raced as they knew what Fiona was talking about. Even though they had decided to tell the Quagmires everything, they had left out the fact that they helped Count Olaf burn down the Caligari Carnival, helped cause Madame Lulu's death, and murdered Dewey Denouement. They had told the Quagmires that Count Olaf had done all those things, for fear that their friends might not respect them if they found out that the Baudelaires were killers.
Fiona continued to laugh, and then said, "Why don't you tell the Quagmires exactly how it is that noble people can do horrible things, hmm?"
"Baudelaires, what's she talking about?" Isadora asked, looking fearfully at her friends.
Klaus, by the way, had been silent this whole time. He had no idea how to express his emotion. On one hand, he was relieved to see Fiona, because in his heart he cared very much about her and she had kissed him before they had separated. On the other hand, he was disgusted that she would dare show her face after abandoning them, joining Count Olaf, and murdering a volunteer. He couldn't figure it out, but at the female Quagmire's question, Klaus could keep quiet no longer.
"We were…"
And then he stopped.The masked man, who was standing right behind Fiona, shook his head, indicating that Klaus not tell the Quagmires what had really happened, at least, not yet. But if he was going to get the triplets to trust them, he would have to think of another instance in which noble volunteers did something horrible, and think of it he did. But before he could voice his thoughts, the woman let out a cry.
"Oh, my! Come here! Come here!" she yelled, laughing and whooping at the same time.
The masked man and the Quagmires ran over to see what the woman was up to, but the Baudelaires remained with Fiona. There was a bit of an awkward moment between them, while they looked each other in the eye.
"What are you even doing here?" Sunny asked, staring Fiona straight in her eyes.
Fiona looked at Sunny like Count Olaf had done when they had been living at the count's house and she had said that they had no roast beef. The count had ended up lifting up Sunny, and Fiona looked like she would have, but she had better intuition than the count, and controlled herself.
"After Fernald fell, I flew away so the Quagmires wouldn't see me. I knew they might have seen me before, when I was behind him, and apparently they did. But I waited near some rocks until the coast was clear. Then I flew the eagle to dry land, where I got off and then walked a way. I eventually ended up at some hotel where everything was done backwards."
"The Hotel Denouement," Violet said, not bothering to say that they were there at the time.
Fiona continued, "It was in complete chaos. People were running everywhere, trying to escape the inferno. I saw a woman on the roof who was just standing there. She didn't even move. It's like she was welcoming the flames."
"Justice Srauss," the Baudelaires said aloud. Immediately Klaus asked, "Who else did you see?"
Fiona started to talk, but then stopped and glared at Violet. "Why are you so interested in what I have to say?"
Violet tripped over her own words as she tried to answer the mycologist, but it was like trying to explain the meaning of logic to Count Olaf. There would clearly be no point to it, because she knew the other person in both situations wouldn't understand.
The older girl then turned to Klaus and whispered, "And what about you, Klaus? Did you miss me?" Her voice sounded like that of a mother talking to her infant child, but Klaus kept his mouth shut. He refused to let Fiona take away what little respect he still had for her, but he knew that she was baiting him on purpose.
"Fine," she said, her eyes penetrating the Baudelaires like x-rays. "Clearly I'm wasting my time here. I'll see you."
And then, without warning, Fiona ran off into the same area she had entered from. Clearly there were secret passageways everywhere, and the Baudelaires were surprised that they were not that upset to see her go. Then they suddenly remembered where the others were, and ran over to see what had happened.
The man and the woman, as it turned out, were talking to someone else. It couldn't have been any of the Quagmires; the person was too tall. He was very tall and skinny, and his arms and legs stuck out at odd angles, as if he were made of drinking straws instead of flesh and bone. When he turned around, the Baudelaires' hearts raced, as the man also happened to have a nametag on his uniform, which read "Hotel Denoument MANAGER: Dewey."
"Oh, Baudelaires!" Dewey cried, and the orphans ran into his arms. Clearly, they had forgotten all about the fact that they had seen Dewey die before their very eyes, but it didn't matter to them. They hadn't even thought about the possibility of one of his brothers posing as him, but it didn't matter.
"Dewey!" Sunny cried, still embracing Dewey and not letting go.
"You don't know how happy I am to see you again, children!" Dewey said, clearly enthusiastic. "I know it must have been terrible for you today, but I promise we'll be able to help you get your answers."
Violet, Klaus, and Sunny turned to the Quagmires, who were grinning at them and standing right next to the masked volunteers. Suddenly, the two of them lifted their masks off their heads, and the Baudelaires nearly fainted in shock.
The phrase "to come back from the dead" isn't one that is used very commonly, and is mostly used in horror films where people see other people coming back from the dead. This being said, the only time you would be very likely to hear that phrase is during a showing of Frankenstien or The Mummy. However, this phrase is sometimes used by people who are facing people who they assumed dead for a long time. The Baudelaires had said variations of this phrase to Quigley Quagmire, the first time they had met him. They knew it was impossible to actually come up from the dead, but the orphans were so surprised as to who were behind the masks, they almost believed it was true.
The man and woman were people the Baudelaires knew very well, for they had been the Baudelaires' guardians for an amount of time. The best guardians, as one of my associates tells me, are members of your family, and the Baudelaires knew that this was true. The man and woman came over and joined the Baudelaires in their embrace, and the Quagmires came in too. It seemed as if at that very moment, all of the turmoil and chaos, a phrase which here means "all of the bad things that were happening in the world," had stopped. You tend to channel out negative thoughts when you are in a group hug with people you know and love very, very much.
I am sorry to say that although this story may seem to have a happy ending, let me remind you that this is only the seventh chapter. There are still quite a few to go, and I can sadly tell you that this moment of happiness is soon disrupted, a time I know only too well. As many of you have by now guessed, Count Olaf will indeed return again, and will be the cause of this calamitous catastrophe, while deciding to kidnap a volunteer along the way.
Wishes, sadly, don't always come true. We can wish for ice cream cake, but we may not get it. We may wish for one more piece of paper, but we may not get it. We could also wish for world peace, happiness, no villainy, and/or all of the above, but we may end up not getting that wish either. But even though wishes rarely come true, it is good for people to make wishes, as they help to improve a person's self-esteem. This is why, at this moment that I am writing on this sticky note that I will be later transferring onto a sheet of paper, I am making one simple wish that in the future, no one will have to suffer any misfortunes like the Baudelaires did. Even though the orphans had their share of good times, the bad ones always overpowered them.
And so, as the Baudelaires, the Quagmires, Dewey Denouement, and these two people who had been watching over the children ever since they left embraced, nothing in the world seemed to matter to them anymore. All that was important was that they had each other. And then they all decided it was time to get down to work. So Dewey climbed back up the ladder, the Baudelaires followed suit, the Quagmires followed them, and taking up the rear were Dr. Montgomery Montgomery and Josephine Anwhistle.