Author's Note: Sorry guys, I was kinda busy these past few weeks, and I couldn't find the time to write this stuff. And... I'm kind of losing interest in writing Hey Arnold fanfics now, since I have set my eyes on other shows like Avatar and KND. But, I'll try to finish this thing off. There's no turning back. :)
Legal junk: I don't own Hey Arnold, but Nickelodeon does and Mr. Craig Bartlett created it. But this fic belongs to me. Clear? Good.
Chapter 5: Sewers of Maria
The next day…
The gang grouped back at the headquarters, after a restful sleep back at their homes. But before they set forth on their journey, the party had to take a detour first to the hospital. Arnold and his grandfather requested to excuse themselves for a while so they could visit Grandma there, but everyone insisted on following them since they were afraid of the fifth grader's wrath. As they entered the hospital, many people thought that all of the kids were Grandpa's grandsons because there were some many children walking along with him. Grandpa shook his head and told them that his son was not that fertile and they were just friends of his only grandson. Grandpa's response drew some sympathized nods from them and they hoped and prayed that Grandpa's son would give him more grandchildren. If Miles was with Grandpa right now it'd be a totally embarrassing moment for him.
As the rest waited at the lobby, Grandpa and Arnold went up to see Grandma, lying on the bed, but she looked absolutely well. Arnold went closer to her and noticed something noticeably different about his grandma. He asked:
"Grandma… you look… younger than usual." He said, absolutely overwhelmed at grandma's metamorphosis. "What did you do to yourself?"
Grandma could just laugh heartily at her grandson, "That's why I don't want you to worry about me, Arnold. I went to the hospital just to get some Botox injections onto my face." She smiled at him. "C'mon, you can touch it." grandma added as she poked her cheeks several times. "See? The skin's still smooth!"
"Uh…" Arnold replied back, slightly disgusted, "Maybe later, Grandma."
"Boy, you sure look different Pookie!" Grandpa said happily, "You look 40 years younger!"
"That's what I intended, Phil." She smiled back at her husband as she purred at him. Grandpa purred back. Arnold was getting uncomfortable.
"Uh…" Arnold said, getting more and more uncomfortable looking at his grandparents.
"Hehe, sorry Arnold." Grandma replied. "The doc said he'll probably let me out of the hospital tonight, so can I have your spare key?"
Item lost: Spare Key
"Where's yours, Grandma?"
"I must've forgotten it. I may look young, but my mind is still as old as before."
Arnold nodded back, and he put his hand into his pocket and grabbed a handful of everything inside it. In between the keys, loose change and lint, Grandma saw the Ring on her grandson's palm.
"My goodness!" she exclaimed, "M-my old ring! Arnold… I'd… really like to hold it… before you go…" Noticing something was amiss, Arnold closed the Token Ring with his fingers and pull it away. Grandma then got angry, lashing out at Arnold. "RARR!" Her wrinkles on her face were visible once again. The startled Arnold backed away to his grandfather, terrified at his grandma. But Grandma soon slowly regained her composure, and began weeping. "I-I'm really sorry Arnold… I'm sorry that you have to carry this burden. I'm sorry for everything!" But Arnold, a good grandson he was, walked back to Grandma and gave her a warm hug.
---
The Fellowship then departed from the hospital. They traversed through roads, hills and traffic crawls on foot as public transportation were on strike and Grandpa's car broke down all of the sudden. Feeling tired, they then paused at a local pizza joint, where they could regain their strength. "At this rate, we should be at The Hive anytime soon." He explained to the kids while pointing on a location on the city's road map. "With any luck, the construction site on this road will be put on hold and we can travel through it to cut time. Then we turn right and head straight to their headquarters."
"Excuse me sir, but are these your grandkids?" a teenaged female employee said angrily to Grandpa while grabbing Iggy, Robert and Park by their shirt collar. She had a happy looking 'Hi! My name is Vicky!' nametag on her shirt. "I caught them playing swords with the mops."
"Well, they ain't my grandsons but they are with me." Grandpa replied back.
Vicky then violently shoved them to Grandpa and shouted, "Listen Gramps! I've gotten a lot of crap babysitting twerps like these and I certainly don't want things like this to happen here! YOU GOT THAT OLD TIMER?"
Grandpa could just stare blankly at the teenager, "You know, you should respect your elders." He replied coolly, pointing at her.
"Arrgh!" Vicky yelled in frustration, and stomped away. "Today's gonna be ten times worse for Timmy!"
"Man, that girl got some issues." Gerald replied, looking at her with one of his eyebrow lowered. Just then, a group of kindergarteners was seen running outside the pizza joint. They could see the kindergarteners through the glass window.
"Spies of the Fifth Graders!" Sid said grimly. "The 'hood here is being watched. We gonna have to take the East Side neighborhood."
---
Reluctantly, they had to turn around and headed for the East Side neighborhood, arguably one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in the city. Within a few blocks from their destination, Arnold accidentally looses his footing and fell down, and the Ring flew out from his pocket. He quickly got up and tried to find it, but he couldn't locate it. But Iggy found it at a crack on the sidewalk, picking it up. Sid saw what he did there.
"Iggy… give it back…" Sid warned.
Gazing at the Ring, Iggy replied, "It's kinda weird isn't it? We hafta suffer so much over this one small… thing."
"Iggy!" Sid snapped, "Give it back to Arnold, man!"
Iggy chuckled weakly, and gave it to Arnold, "Here. Like I care." He then walked away, as Arnold looked on suspiciously. Eventually they arrived at the East Side neighborhood, and to their surprise, there were thousands of cops setting up barricades to the entrance of the neighborhood. Grandpa approached one of the busy cops and asked:
"What's going on Officer?"
"We've got a tip there's going to be a riot to protest the lack of public transportation. And I hear there's going to be hundreds of riots across the city too." The policeman replied, "So we can't let anyone inside. Sorry, gramps." The policeman left and proceeded to a van where some other policemen were wearing their riot gears. "Go back home where it's safe." Grandpa then walked back to the kids.
"Now what?" he asked the kids. They then turned to look at each other for ideas. Suddenly, Harold had an idea.
"I know! How about if we go beneath the city? There we can avoid all the stuff happening on the streets and we'd most probably go twice as fast!"
"Harold, I know you're crazy before, but that idea of yours is crazy beyond all recognition man!" Sid yelled at him. "What are we supposed to do? Follow along the subway tracks? Forget it! Even with the strike I'm not crazy enough to risk my life to go down there!"
"No Sid," Harold said back, "Not the subway, but the Sewers of Maria!"
"Maria…" Grandpa said gravely, "The sewers were named so by the architect because his wife was a total pain in the fanny. Sinister, cold and icky. You know who lives there now? Crazy mole people and their king!" Grandpa then looked at Arnold, and everyone followed suit, "Let the Ring holder decide." He said grimly.
The weigh of his friend's safety was suddenly put on Arnold's shoulder. Should he go across the city when rumors of violent riots are spreading, or go down to the quiet, yet still perilous dark Sewers of Maria? He looked at everyone. Everyone was counting on him to decide on the right decision.
"We'll go through the sewers." Arnold answered, quite unsurely with his decision.
"The sewers it is."
Quest Updated: Head to the Sewers of Maria
---
After much walking cross-city, they arrived at the embankment to the entrance of the Sewers of Maria. The door to the entrance was sort of huge, and made out of aluminum. To open the door, a valve must be turned in order to get in. But there was no valve in sight.
"Where could've the valve gone to?" Gerald yelled frustratingly and threw some rocks into a small pond nearby. Robert and Park then decided to play by throwing rock in it too. Sid was aware that the action might invite trouble, so he stopped them.
"Don't disturb the water." He warned them. Sid then left his two friends to search for the missing crank. After Sid was far enough for them, Robert and Park resumed chucking rocks into the pond.
"Use your Earthbending!"
"Found it." Arnold said, while holding a rusty old valve high in the air, showing it to them. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief. And as Arnold brought the valve to the entrance, some of the guys could hear some ruffling sound in the tall grass nearby them. They began to worry.
"Hey, Stinky…" Harold said fearfully, "could you hurry up? I have a bad feeling about this…"
"Patience is a virtue, Harold." Stinky replied back. "Just give me a second and—" suddenly he heard many vicious barking noises coming from the tall grass. Other began to group in front of the entrance, scanning the area nervously. Then, a rabid stray dog leaped out from the grass, followed by many others. All of them looked like they hadn't had any food in weeks.
Press X repeatedly to turn the valve quick!
"CRANK IT UP! CRANK IT UP! CRANK IT UP!" Iggy yelled in a panicky tone at Stinky, and he rotated the valve as fast as he humanly could. They fended the dogs off as they attacked, but the dogs were getting more and more vicious as time pass by.
"It's opened, let's go y'all!" Stinky yelled at them, and they quickly went it. And after everyone was in, Gerald pulled the valve out from its socket and the entrance door came falling to the ground. Nobody could get in and out now. It was totally dark now, but Arnold came prepared. He brought his flashlight with him, and passed it to his grandpa.
"We now have only one choice, kids." Grandpa said. "We must face the long dark of Maria. Be on your guard. There are older and disgusting things than the fifth graders in the deep places of this place." The Fellowship carefully picked its way over the floor and up the broad steps. "Don't make a sound." Grandpa added. "It's a four hour journey to the other side. Let's hope they don't notice us passing by."
The Fellowship then entered a great sewer intersection with a walkway suspending through the air in the middle. After climbing up a flight of stairs, they then resumed onwards, looking with awe at the old abandoned fuse box and tangled telephone and electricity cables. Suddenly, Park lost his footing and slipped into Robert.
"Dude!" Robert said, putting him back to his feet. Then, on the fourth hour of their journey, the Fellowship climbed another flight of stairs to a crossroads in the sewer, and saw three tunnels loom before them.
"Now… there's something very familiar about this place…" Grandpa said, stroking his chin. "Oh, well." He shrugged his shoulders, closed his eyes with on of his hand and pointed to a tunnel with his fingers. "Eenie Meeny Miny Moe—"
"Uh, Grandpa…" Arnold stopped him, "I think it'd be safer if we wait for you to remember which way the exit is."
"Well, whatever floats your boat, Shortman." And so, the Fellowship took a much needed break for a moment. As Arnold sat, he looked down the path they walked on earlier and saw a small figure leaping from stone to stone. Alarmed and startled, he quickly walked over to where Grandpa was sitting.
"Grandpa, I think there's something down there."
Grandpa took a look, squinting his eyes, "Why, it's your friend Curly."
"Curly?" Arnold asked back incredulously.
""He's been following us for hours."
"He managed to run free from the fifth-graders!" he exclaimed quietly.
"Run, or they set him loose?" Grandpa said back. From the distance below, Curly looked up, and his large glasses pierced the darkness as he observed the company with his hateful eyes. "He has sort of a love-hate relationship with the Ring, you know. It's because of that ring it made him become what he is now - obsessed with a compulsive need for a cold, cruel, and soulless character, like the Ring."
"Oh, I thought you were describing my friend Rhonda, Grandpa." Arnold replied back. "It's kinda sad that Grandma didn't smack him when she had the chance."
"Sad? That Curly character is already sad, Arnold." Grandpa replied back. "That's why your grandma didn't smack him because she felt sorry for him. So that's why, I don't like it when you pass out judgment so easily like that, Shortman. Besides, I have a feeling that Curly fella is going to prove useful later, good or bad, before this whole dang thing is over." Curly then went back into the shadows, and Arnold sat next to his grandfather.
"I wish the Ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened." Arnold said, sighing frustratingly.
"Well, it did, so live with it." Grandpa replied back nonchalantly, nearly callous sounding. And ever so suddenly, he got up and pointed the flashlight to the cave at the left. "It's this way!"
"How'd you know, gramps?" Gerald asked.
"I smelled Nemo's Pizza coming from this way." Grandpa replied back. "Me and Nemo gone wayyyyyyy back…" The party then headed down the left-hand passage, and soon enough they arrived to a more open space. "Let me increased the light a bit…" Grandpa said, rotating the flashlight's handle. As the light source being magnified, it illuminated a grandiose hall of slimy pillars and arched dirty ceiling that awe and yet, grossed them out.
"Eeeewwwwww…" the kids said in chorus in disgust.
"You kids are lucky." Grandpa said, scoffing. "When I was your age, I had to live in places like this during the Great Depression. It was called a shantytown. Back in the old days, we don't have any fancy-schmancy 'game videos' or branded shoes that you kids have right now." Grandpa began to tell some lame stories about his childhood to the obviously modern kids in front of him. "We all played a game of stickball barefoot for crying out loud! I can remember really clear right now…"
"Arnold," Harold whispered to him, "Tell your Grandpa to shut up."
Gerald was still in awe of the hall and said, "Now that's an eye-opener and ain't no mistake about it." The party walked through the hall, and suddenly, Harold saw a room with a dim light shining inside it. He wanted to investigate it.
"Harold, where're you going?" Sid said as he watched Harold walking to the room. Harold didn't respond back, much to the party's disbelief. They then followed Harold from behind and entered the room with him.
As the party explored the room, Robert stumbled upon an old book. It was large and battered. "Look at this, you guys." Robert said, after flipping a few pages over. Grandpa walked up to him and grabbed the book. After clearing the pages from dust and dirt, Grandpa began to read it.
"It's the maintenance logbook." Grandpa said. "They have taken the maintenance bridge and the second hall. We have barred the gates, but they still coming through. These people are crazy. We have to run and report to the Boss."
As Grandpa continued reading, Park noticed an opened toolbox near a large hole. With a curious mind, he then headed slowly to the toolbox and tried to pick up some random tool inside it. And just as soon as he touched the toolbox, it fell down inside the hole, causing a very loud noise that echoes from wall to wall. Park winced at every sound it made, and then, to his relief, there was finally silence. But everyone else was angry and glared at him.
"What didja think you're doing?" Grandpa said angrily as he slammed the book shut. "Wake up the dead?" But just then, they could hear a loud horrible moaning.
"ZOMBIES!" Harold yelled frighteningly. "Quick, let's get out before we're infected with the T-Virus!"
"No Harold… they're the mole people!" Arnold said back. Iggy went to the door to take a look, but the only thing that greeted him was the sound of rocks pounding the door.
"Stay back!" Sid yelled at his friends as he drew his rubber sword out. He quickly ran to the door with steel pipes in his hands to barricade the door. Others gave him a helping hand. Because they were unarmed, Arnold, Gerald, Park and Robert quickly brandished themselves with some stuff they found on the floor - like chains and small steel pipes. Harold was determined to fight them all.
"C'mon baby!" Harold yelled like King from KoF, brandishing his hockey stick, determinedly wanting to kick butt and chew some bubblegum.
The mole people began breaking the door down, moaning "food… money… spare some… for the homeless…" Finally they broke through and the battle began as the Fellowship engaged the mole people.
Defend yourselves for 2 minutes!
The battle raged on, as they did whatever they could to defend themselves from the mole people that constantly went through their pockets and backpacks for money and food.
"I said I have no money on me!" Grandpa yelled as he shoved a guy away from him.
"I don't have any food on me, man! I swear it!" Sid said nervously, as he backed away slowly from the unhygienic guy, slowly creeping his hand out to him.
"Use you Earthbending!" Robert yelled at Park.
"Are you crazy? This is not that show, man!" Park yelled back.
"Just throw some rocks at them, fool!" and the both of them threw some rocks at the poor, poor mole people. Two minutes passed, and finally they reached a cutscene where there was an opening from they were standing on to all the way through the door, without any mole people to stop them.
"Everyone, run!" Grandpa shouted at them all, and off they flee away to the door.
"Grandpa, where are we going?" Arnold said, while running away from their enemies.
"Quickly, to the Crossing of Hazard Doom!" The Crossing of Hazard Doom was actually a zebra crossing near the exit of the Sewers of Maria where accidents occurred frequently between a pedestrian and an automobile. The party ran out the rear door of the room as they being closely pursued by the band of mole people. It looks like they're really desperate for food. Other mole people sprung out from the floor or bolted through the door and went down a pillar like firemen sliding down on a pole. There were hundreds of them as opposed to the party that only numbered in nine. The Fellowship was being surrounded by the mole people.
"C'mon, man…" one of the mole people pleaded to them, "I'm on my way become a millionaire, so if you'd just give me some couple of hundred bucks it'd be more than enough to help me."
Arnold then took his wallet out and took some cash out, but his actions were quickly stopped by his grandfather, by asking to put it back into his pocket. Grandpa shook his head in disbelief, looking back at the guys with a disgusted face. "The only way for you to get some cash is to get a job, ya freeloader!"
The mole person looked back at Grandpa angrily, "Fine then! Someday you'll learn the joy of helping others in need! But right now…" He whistled a quick note, and all of the mole people surrounding them began to prepare themselves for a fight. The party drew their weapons outward. Just then a beam of light appeared at the end of the hall followed by a terrifying howl. The mole people, dismayed, and fled in panic to all directions.
"What the heck?" Harold said in confusion, scratching his head.
"It's the Sewer King…" Grandpa said grimly. "If he catches ya, you're gonna be his Royal Rat Groomer for sure!"
"Grandpa's right!" Arnold said, "We do not want him to catch us!"
"That fella is beyond crazy! Let's go! Don't look back, run!" The party then entered a passageway, then up a slight of stairs. But, they encountered a gap on the stairs. Stinky made the first leap, and safely arrived on the other side. But it was not safe enough, as the mole people began to throw rocks from some openings at the stairs. Stinky, being skillful with his slingshot and all, attempted some shots at them, and achieved hits with each and every rock he used. Only two people left: Arnold and Sid, and the Sewer King was heard approaching ever closer. Suddenly, a big rock fell down and smashed the steps in front of Sid and Arnold, widening the gap further. With no other alternatives, they resulted to a leap of faith, and succeeded.
"To the exit! Run!" Grandpa shouted, pointing to a walkway suspending through the air in the middle that leads to the Crossings of Hazard Doom. The kids crossed the walkway, and saw the light at the end of the Sewer. Grandpa on the other hand, turned to confront the Sewer King.
"So you're the guy who keeps dropping those antique watches into my kingdom!" he said accusingly. "Well you ain't gonna get them back!"
"Keep it!" Grandpa screamed back. Just leave us alone ya dirty smelly guy!" Offended by the insult, The Sewer King tried to run up to him. "YOU CANNOT PASS!" he smacked The Sewer King with the flashlight. "I have a flashlight, and I'm not afraid to use it against the likes of you! I'm the wielder of the alkaline battery! The darkness will not defeat me, smelly guy!"
The Sewer King then caught Grandpa on both of his wrists and they pushed one another, struggling greatly.
"Go back into your hole!" Grandpa screamed at the top of his lungs. The others could only watch them helplessly. Grandpa managed to push him away and screamed, "YOU… SHALL NOT… PASS!" he then threw the flashlight at him, and hit directly on his head. The Sewer King was bewildered, stumbling around like a drunken person. Grandpa let a sigh of relief out, and turned around to the kids. But suddenly, The Sewer King grabbed one of his hand and both he and Grandpa fell down. "RUN YOU FOOLS!" was Grandpa's last words before he fell into the chasm below.
"NOOOOOOOO!" Arnold screamed distressfully. "GRANDPAAAAAAAAA!"
It's kinda fun to imagine Grandpa saying those immortal words, which is, by the way, inspired me to write this story up in the first place. Well, I think the next chapter would be the last of the first part of the Lord of the Decoder Rings story, but don't fret, it will then continue to 'The Two Towers' part of the saga. Well, that's about it. Thanks for reading and please leave a review!