A/N: Shoutout to Zevoros for reviewing! You're awesome, man! :)

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Zevoros ––– Very well could be! ;) And I think it is a sea creature, according to All The Wrong Questions, but I never finished the series, so I'm not 100% sure. :o I'm pretty far in the third book though. I should get to finishing it to be sure.

To be honest, I've always pictured The Great Unknown to be an enemy submarine, based on how Olaf and the Baudelaires react to it. So who do they both fear that they already know about? The man with a beard but no hair and the woman with hair but no beard, who I've always pictured being the captains of it. The Baudelaires don't know about the sea creature, but Olaf does, so that rules out the sea creature theory for my stories. My other story, Into the Fire, kind of expands on this. And this story is an AU to the ending of Into the Fire, which I'm still writing at the moment, so everything kind of goes back to that one story. Lol.

I plead the fifth on that one. Sorry to be a dick, but especially in this story's case, I love fucking with people's minds. Maybe you'll find out, maybe you won't. Stay tuned and you'll see which it is. ;)

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Disclaimer: Me no own ASOUE.

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Chapter 6
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"Sabotage?" Fiona breathed, astonished.

"Yeah," Klaus said, nodding. "Isadora and I found a phone wire cut in the control room."

Fiona looked at him suspiciously. "What were you two doing in the control room?"

"Isadora found the doorknob was missing and we decided to check it out," Klaus explained quickly with a blush, hoping his wife wouldn't get the wrong idea. "It looked like it was removed by force because the plate was still on the door and the trim was dented and scratched. So we walked in, looked around to see what happened, and I found a phone wire cut under a console."

"How'd you know it was a phone wire and not something else?" Fiona asked.

"I followed it," Klaus said simply. "It led to a phone on top of the console."

"Huh…" Fiona said, lost in thought at his findings. "It couldn't have been our enemies…could it? They don't know about Ebullient Isle's location."

"No," Klaus shook his head. "Worse. It was one of our own. A volunteer."

Fiona flinched. "Why would one of our own sabotage the phone lines? Makes no sense."

Klaus shrugged, equally as puzzled. "Hell if I know."

They sat there on the bed for what felt like forever. Night had fallen, and it was too dark to go outside and explore, even with a flashlight. Klaus didn't know why, but he felt a bit uneasy about his discovery. Of course, he'd tell Tadrey in the morning…but then again, all this thinking about a possible conspiracy against their own made him tense, paranoid even. Why was he feeling so bothered by it? There was no real evidence of betrayal here, other than the phone wire cut. And that wasn't enough to convince people of such a thing. He needed more.

"I need to go tell Tadrey," Klaus breathed, jumping up.

"Klaus, let it go. You're overthinking things," Fiona urged him tiredly.

Klaus looked around at her, appalled. "How can you just let it go?" he asked. He paused, thinking, his thoughts now rapid…dark. "Did you do it?" he blurted all of a sudden.

Fiona gave him the scariest glare he'd ever seen. No doubt she was offended. "Excuse me?!" she screamed, springing up from the bed and storming over to him.

Klaus gulped with a wince. …But, something deep inside was still rattling. Warning him. Something was very off about what was going on. And the one who was responsible was close, he could feel it…

"How dare you accuse me!" Fiona continued in an ear-piercing shriek. "Katey I can understand, but you?! I would've thought you'd known me better, Klaus Baudelaire!"

Klaus was quiet, apprehensive of attempting to put out this fire. "…But…something doesn't feel right," he protested in a squeak. "I just know it."

"Quit with the conspiracy theories, Klaus! You're just scaring yourself!" Fiona yelled, then turned around and walked back over to the bed to sit down. "I still can't believe you'd accuse me!"

Guiltily, Klaus looked off to the side. …Maybe it was nothing…but still, he had to tell Tadrey. That way, he could fix it…somehow. "I'm gonna go tell Tadrey about the wire," he decided after awhile, heading for the door.

Fiona rolled her eyes. "Fine," she sighed moodily. There was just no getting through to him. His mind was made up, and that was that. "But I want you to stop it when you get back. Understand?"

Klaus opened his mouth to answer, but no words came out. "Yes…" he uttered finally, defeated. With that, he turned and headed out into the hallway.

/

With a stressed, tired moan, Fiona opened her eyes and blinked up at the ceiling. How long had she been asleep? She glanced at the clock. A couple hours? Wow. It felt like a couple minutes. She supposed that was to be expected from an adrenaline crash. She shook her head, replaying the argument from earlier. She couldn't believe it. Her own husband accusing her of a conspiracy that wasn't even real. Now he'd really done it. Late night love was definitely off the table tonight. Distressed, she looked down at her stomach for answers. "Why does your father have to be an idiot?" she asked softly, rubbing it soothingly.

The bun in the oven remained silent. Either it too was in such stunned silence, or it was too early for a response. She growled in frustration, glaring back up at the ceiling. She couldn't wait a few more months for an answer. She needed to know what the hell was going on with him, what had him so on edge about a damn phone wire. Tadrey said they were old, maybe it frayed and broke off finally. Even with all the careful maintenance in the world, things were always bound to break eventually. She didn't know, and Klaus making a borderline schizophrenic assumption about it only made her stress worse. Katey was already doing good on that front, she didn't need him adding to the pile.

Why was he being so erratic? She thought hard. Tadrey said the phones weren't working and he found a phone wire broken…okay. Everyone was antsy to get off the island after what happened with the plane. He'd lost his sister in a horrific way, sure. That's part of it. But there was more. The only way he could get this nervous about something was if he did something wrong. Suddenly, her eyes widened. What if he did it, unable to cope with his sister's death, and he wanted everybody to suffer, at least in a nonviolent way, how he was suffering? He wouldn't do that…would he? And even by some crazy imagination if he did want them to suffer in a horrific, violent way, he wouldn't do that…

…Would he?!

Had he really gone off the deep end here? Had this traumatized him beyond repair? Especially after all he'd been through in his life… Was this finally the breaking point? The point of no return? Had she lost her husband to psychosis? He was going to be a father, for God's sake. She couldn't lose him now. Even though she wasn't afraid of single parenting, she preferred Klaus by her side helping, like any real father would do.

God, Fiona, get ahold of yourself! she chastised inwardly, shaking her head back into reality. The conspiracy's not real! He's just traumatized over his sister! A little too traumatized, but still… How could you entertain such a notion? Wonderful. Klaus had her thinking about something that wasn't even real. Oh, the effect he had on her…

Why else could he be so on edge? Other than his sister? After some more thought, Fiona stiffened.

Isadora.

She was in the control room with him, a place most people wouldn't dream of checking out for fun. Maybe something did happen between them, and he was using the phone wire as a scapegoat to hide his guilt. It would be convincing enough, seeing as how Tadrey had brought up a problem with them earlier. And what if him "going to tell Tadrey about the phone wire" meant something else? Perhaps code for "going to hang with Isadora for awhile"? And by "hang", he really meant "screw"? Her eyes narrowed. She wouldn't dare! Not when he was going to be a father! She wouldn't dare play that dirty…

…Would she?

Fiona sprung up from the bed, her worst fears gnawing away at her heart. She had to find him. He was right about one thing: something didn't feel right. And she was going to get to the bottom of it. But right as she was about to rip open the door, the room went dark and she let out a frightened gasp. What the–––?! What happened to the lights? There wasn't a storm outside harsh enough to knock the power out. Did Klaus need another excuse to run off again, seeing as how she'd caught on to him for the phone wire? He was going to get it now…

"Klaus?" Fiona called curtly, stomping out into the hall. It was unbelievably darker than their room, but that was mostly because it lacked a fireplace and a roaring fire within it. She shivered. The hall was also uncomfortably quiet for some reason. Sure, it was always quiet in their hallway, but this time was different, and not because the lights were out either. What was going on? Another excuse not to just run off, but stay longer with her, too? I couldn't find my way back, it was too dark, she could picture him whining. Her face flushed a bright red in anger. She couldn't take it anymore. Dark or not, he was coming back with her. "Klaus!" she shouted again furiously, storming down the hall.

Just then, there was an agonized scream from around the corner, making her jump out of her skin.

"Klaus?" Fiona hollered, sounding quite panicked this time. She darted to the end of the hallway and looked to find someone bolting toward her at top speed. "Klaus?" she said again, hoping it was him.

"Fiona, run!" Klaus wailed, and though she couldn't see him, he sounded like he was in tears.

Shutting Pandora's Box for the time being, she hurried with him back to their room. Once inside, Klaus slammed the door closed and locked it, panting heavily.

"Where the hell were you?!" Fiona asked, her adrenaline skyrocketing. "What's going on?!"

Klaus kept panting. "D…Duncan…!" he breathed finally.

"What about Duncan?" Fiona asked.

"He's still out there!"

"Well, let him in," Fiona told him, reaching for the knob.

"No!" Klaus cried, seizing her wrist. "Don't! There's something out there!"

Fiona just looked at him. "Klaus, there's a hundred people in this mansion, of course something's out there!"

"No, you don't understand! There's a killer out there!"

"A killer…" Fiona repeated skeptically, fighting not to laugh. He was going all out on this coverup, wasn't he?

"Yes, look!" Klaus pointed at his chest.

Fiona looked to find an extremely thick, dark line spreading across his white ribbed tanktop. Puzzled, she pulled him over to the crackling fire and examined it closer. Sure enough, it was red. Her eyebrows rose, astonished.

"Oh my God you are bleeding," she uttered faintly, mortified.

Klaus nodded, looking down at it, unable to believe it himself. "I barely got outta there alive," he breathed.

"Why, because you were getting a little too handsy with Isadora?" Fiona inquired hotly all of a sudden, glaring at him. "You didn't know what "no" meant?"

Klaus flinched. By the eerie glow of the fire, she could see he was offended. "What?"

"Is that why you had to "go tell Tadrey"?" Fiona seethed. "Is because she was getting lonely after your little encounter in the control room?"

"I am not cheating on you!" Klaus fumed. "Where did that come from?"

"That's what it feels like to be accused of a conspiracy that doesn't even exist!"

"Oh, you're really gonna go there, aren't you!?"

"Yeah, I am! You're gonna be a father here in a few months, and I'd like to make sure my husband is psychologically capable of handling it!"

"I am capable of handling it!"

"Not with your schizophrenic paranoia you're not!"

"I'm not paranoid!"

"Then what's with freaking out over the phone wire? If you weren't paranoid, you'd just tell him in the morning! Why now? It's a little fishy! See where I'm coming from?"

"Yeah! The asylum! Why else would you be accusing me of such a thing?!"

"I don't fucking know! I don't know what the hell is going through your head since Violet died! You've been a basket case ever since, and that's not like you! Now what are you hiding?! What did you do that was so terrible?!"

Klaus was silent, mostly to catch his breath from screaming. "I'm not hiding anything," he said much more calmly after a moment. "There's a killer out there, Fiona. You can think I'm a liar all you want, but if you don't believe me, go ahead. Go out there. See for yourself."

Fiona kept glaring at him. Fine…she'd humor him. Play his little game for once. She let go of his collar, stood up, and walked over to the door. "Can't believe I'm doing this," she muttered, rolling her eyes. She unlocked the door and opened it. The hall was still dark and still quiet. But right at her feet were the brutally mutilated, bloody remains of a volunteer about their age. Fiona let out a scream, slamming it shut and locking it again. Never had she seen a puddle of blood so big. Never had she seen so many body parts in one place. Never had she seen such an abhorrent sight. She looked around at the wound on Klaus's chest, her heart pounding, fear now in her eyes.

"Believe me now?" Klaus asked quietly.