[A/N: Hey guys! Thanks so much for your reviews :) I'm hoping to get this story done before the end of the year, if possible. The next few weeks will be insane with school but the end is in sight and we're almost to the end of the story! There are still several twists and turns ahead so I hope you enjoy reading! And as always, please review! ^_^
D/C: I don't own Hey Arnold]
"She hung up on me," Helga muttered in a frustrated tone later that afternoon after yet another unsuccessful conversation with Brooke Wellington. They'd gone back to the cottage to continue their investigation. "I swear, that woman's locked up tighter than a chastity belt," Helga grumbled as she plopped down on the couch as Arnold sat at the table on his laptop.
Arnold stifled a laugh at Helga's inappropriate joke and continued with his business. He was currently working on his laptop trying to adjust the focus of the picture they found of the man across the street but with little luck. As much as he attempted to sharpen the image, they still couldn't identify any defining features other than the fact that the guy had dark brown hair and was probably average height for a man.
"I mean, criminy," Helga continued, looking through her phone. "Why avoid the conversation so much unless there's something to hide?" She turned and leaned against the back of the couch cushions so she was facing Arnold. "If she's anything like her daughter, I don't trust her,"
Arnold sighed without responding to Helga's comment, "This is the best my software can do," He turned the laptop toward Helga and she tossed her phone on the couch. "Which isn't much, unfortunately,"
"Let me see," Helga said as she walked over and squinted at the still blurry image. "Criminy. The one great lead we find and we don't even know what the hell we're lookin' at,"
At that moment, Helga was startled by the sound of her phone ringer going off. She left Arnold's side and he watched as she walked back over to the couch and answered the call, leaning against the arm of the sofa as she did so.
"Hey William, what's up?" She said casually but her brow furrowed with concern only a moment later. Arnold looked on with earnest, mouthing, 'What is it?' to which Helga only put up her index finger for him to wait.
"They're sure?" Helga's tone was grave and Arnold's concern was deepening. What could be going on now? It seemed as though there was always something going wrong lately.
Helga nervously tapped her fingers along the couch's armrest. "Okay," She said brusquely and sighed, her eyes softening but her jaw still clenched and set. "Okay, thanks, Will…Keep me updated… Bye,"
"What is it?" Arnold repeated his question out loud.
Helga half-sat on the arm of the couch and stared at her phone for a second before responding. "William just called with Rich's autopsy report,"
Arnold paused, waiting patiently for her to continue.
"It wasn't his heart, Arnold," Helga breathed slowly, obviously trying to keep herself calm. "They found a bunch of tranquilizers or something in his system,"
"What?" Arnold said in surprise as he stood up from the table and moved closer to her. "You can't be serious,"
"It's what the report said, apparently," Helga shrugged and despite her guarded appearance with her arms folded over and her brow set and furrowed, Arnold could see the sadness and fear billowing in her eyes. "I knew something was fucked up when I saw that mark on Rich's neck," She said, half to Arnold, half to no one in particular. "William said the cops are investigating but they're keeping it quiet for now,"
Arnold ran a hand through his hair. "Okay, so now what do we do?" He asked as he processed this new information. "This is getting dangerous, Helga,"
"Like I don't know that, Football-head?" Helga snapped at him, then immediately bit her lip and tilted her gaze away. "Sorry,"
"Look, I'll help you no matter what but I wouldn't be being honest if I said I didn't think this whole situation was getting out of hand," Arnold confessed. "I mean, you got shot and I know everyone, yourself included, has been brushing that off as a possible accident and not taking it as seriously as maybe they should but Helga… Someone… If someone put that stuff…" Arnold struggled to vocalize the thought even though it danced around in his head, taunting and terrifying him. "Someone murdered Rich," Arnold said quietly and Helga winced at the words.
"Don't you see, though?" Helga pushed. "That means we're getting close,"
"Don't you see that this means you are putting yourself in danger?" Arnold countered. "You could get hurt! Or worse!"
Helga let out an exasperated sigh. "Why do you even care, Arnold?"
Taken aback, Arnold looked at her quizzically. "What do you mean? Why –"
"I just don't get it," Helga said softly, shaking her head and standing up. "I mean, the last time I saw you, you were all over Lila Sawyer and now all of a sudden, you're here but you've actually been helping me all this time… I just… I don't get it," She shrugged and sat back down on the armrest and Arnold let out a slow breath. To be honest, he didn't quite understand what he was doing or why either. It just felt right.
Arnold tentatively moved over to her and leaned against the armrest with her, severely overestimating how much space there was for him to sit and Helga's pulse quickened at how close he was all of a sudden.
Arnold sat next to her, his head tilted down and his hands in his lap as he formulated words. He wanted to explain things but really, how could he explain something to her that he didn't completely understand himself? He'd never fully understood her or the relationship they had with one another. Despite everything she'd ever done that should've made him hate her, he never could. She was a mystery to him and somehow, despite every mean thing she said or did, despite every time she rejected his attempts at friendship, he couldn't give up on her. She was like a plain wooden box, unpolished and unsanded, that left him with splinters whenever he tried to get too close. But there had been a few incredible, though brief, moments in which he'd caught a glimpse into the inside of that box and when he did, it took his breath away. The marvels within that box only left him craving more answers and so he returned to it again and again, wondering. What other amazing things dwelled in that plain, splintering box that he hadn't yet seen? That was Helga. And it drew him to her every time.
"I care about you," Arnold said quietly, shrugging. "I can't tell you why I care, I just… do," Helga glanced at his hands as he wrung them together in his lap. He tilted his head so he could see her face the slightest bit and when she met his gaze, the two of them quickly realized how close they were, their faces only inches apart. Arnold quickly got up.
"Um," He said, looking everywhere but at her and trying to power through the sudden rush of embarrassment that he was sure was flooding to his cheeks. "Look, I, I want to help and –"
"You can," Helga said and Arnold turned to her, suddenly astounded by how open her face was. It almost took his breath away how, for a brief moment, there seemed to be no wall separating him from her and it was a strange, bewildering sight to see her so genuine.
Helga sighed, "I can use all the help I can get," She shrugged and put on a half-hearted smirk. "I just can't give up on this. Helga G. Pataki is no quitter," She flashed him a sarcastic smile and he reflexively smiled back.
"Yeah, I know," He said absent-mindedly. "Um, okay… so if we're going through with this we need to be careful,"
"Yeah, you're right," Helga said and Arnold could pick up on her sarcasm before she'd even finished her sentence. "I should probably stop walking around with explosives in my mouth and a target on my back,"
Arnold rolled his eyes. "Okay, so what do we do from here?"
"Let's take another look at Marguerite's journal,"
. . . . . . . .
It'd been a week since Lila's first attempt at leaving Stinky's house. Her first attempt at sneaking out had been unsuccessful. Try as she had to convince him that she would be fine and that she would come back, he hadn't been as gullible as she'd once thought. Sure, he believed that she was in trouble and needed help but since then, he hadn't let her out of his sight. He was convinced that she had some kind of "battered woman syndrome" and that she would just try and go back to Arnold and put herself in the same situation she'd been in before. He wanted to protect her and he had good intentions but Lila was losing her patience. Stinky had no idea why she really wanted to leave. She needed revenge against the man who hurt her, who shattered her into so many pieces when she was only a girl. And she needed to know about her mother's past. She needed to know the truth.
So since then, she'd been biding her time, playing up her façade as the wounded and abused housewife in need of love and care and protection. She needed time to come up with a plan – something that wouldn't blow her cover with Stinky but would allow her the freedom to do what she needed to do.
Lila was stirred from her thoughts by a gentle knock on the wooden door of her temporary bedroom.
"Hey Lila," Stinky's voice, despite its drawl, was warm and genuine. "I'm makin' pork chops for dinner, if you want some," He smiled at her and she propped her head up with one hand as she lay atop the homemade quilt on her bed.
"I'll be down in a little while, Stinky," She said sweetly. "Thanks for thinking of me,"
Stinky grinned ear to ear, completely oblivious to her deceit. "No trouble at all," He nodded respectfully to her and ducked out of her room, still smiling the hapless smile of a man in love.
. . . . . . . .
Helga and Arnold worked late into the evening, revisiting old newspapers and photos again and again until they couldn't see straight. They were trying to find some sort of connection between Marguerite's life and the names and numbers in her journal. Helga had called the officer who'd dealt with Marguerite's case when she first went missing but that wasn't much help, either. Apparently they'd exhausted every simple option they could think of – phone numbers, mostly but they couldn't find a lead. Helga thought the names and numbers could be somehow linked to Marguerite's religious life so she tried focusing on that area but it'd been a long, grueling process so far.
The days were beginning to get longer but night still fell quickly. Clouds had rolled in earlier that evening and now a thunderstorm shook the trees outside with vigor. Arnold and Helga had spent much of the night on their laptops at the table, taking turns refreshing their supply of coffee and running ideas by one another as they thought of them. By ten o' clock, Helga had begun to think they should give up for the night until Arnold stirred.
She eyed him curiously when he began typing furiously, his eyes emblazoned with a newfound excitement. "What did you find?" She asked.
Arnold furrowed his brow in thought but when his screen loaded, he exclaimed, "Yes! That makes sense,"
"C'mon, Football-head," Helga said, standing up and moving to his side of the table so that she could see his screen. "What did you figure out?"
"I found the connection between the numbers," Arnold said, only slightly masking his pride. "I went with your idea that these are somehow related to religion and look –" He pointed to the screen and read from it. "'The Book of Leviticus is the third book of the Hebrew Bible,'"
"Okay, and?" Helga asked, unimpressed.
"Look at the numbers, Helga," Arnold said, grabbing the journal from where it sat on the table between them and pointing. "Each number starts with a '3' and then look," He returned to his keyboard and pulled up another webpage. "This one is 'Magda 30112', right? Well, what if all of these numbers are Bible verses? So Magda would be Leviticus and then chapter one, verse twelve," He explained, an almost child-like excitement escaping in his tone. "And this one, 'Sara 32016' would be Leviticus, chapter twenty, verse sixteen,"
"That makes sense!" Helga said incredulously. "Pull up the verses, let's read them,"
"I've got this one up already," Arnold said, clicking to an open tab on his browser.
"' And he shall cut it into its pieces, with its head and its fat: and the priest shall lay them in order on the wood that is on the fire which is upon the altar,'" Helga read. "Okay, that's freaky," She said bluntly. "So, what about the others? What's the connection?"
"I'm not sure, let me look," Arnold said and Helga stood watching over his shoulder as he pulled up each of the bible verses. Outside the wind was howling as thunder cracked and lightning lit up the sky. Inside the cottage, the lighting was dim – the ceiling light in the kitchen area was on as well as a floor lamp over by the TV but when the lightning flashed, the light from outside came through the window blind, further illuminating the room. "Other than being bible verses from the same book, I'm not sure what else pulls them all together," Arnold said once he'd copied and pasted all of the verses into a document.
"Email that doc to me, would ya?" Helga said as she moved to return to her seat but at that moment, a clap of thunder was heard and barely a second later, the power in the cottage went out. "Or not, great,"
"It's okay, Helga," Arnold said as he went into his email inbox to compose a new message. "I'm running on battery now so I'll save everything real quick and send you the verses,"
The room was even darker than before with only the dim light from their laptops to guide them. Helga walked over to the counter in the kitchen area and began digging through drawers in search of a candle or flashlight. While they had some light at the table, over by the couch and TV, the room seemed to be pitch black and they couldn't expect their laptop batteries to run all night.
Once Arnold finished saving all of their work, he began to help Helga look for alternative sources of light. Helga managed to find a flashlight in one of the kitchen drawers and Arnold found a used candle in the hall closet.
"Here," Helga said, tossing Arnold a pack of matches she'd dug out of the kitchen drawer and he quickly lit the candle.
Helga walked over to the window and pushed aside the blinds to look outside. She could barely see anything with the downpour going on outside. "Looks like you're crashing here tonight, Football-head,"
"Is it that bad?" Arnold said, walking toward the window. "I don't want to impose,"
"Good grief, Arnold," Helga rolled her eyes and turned to him. "It's bad enough that the power went out. You're not imposing," She said gruffly as she disappeared from the room. In the dim light, it looked like she'd gone down the hallway and a few moments later, she returned with a dark red crocheted blanket. "Here," She thrust the blanket into Arnold's hands and he carefully avoided it coming into contact with the candle he was still holding as he carefully placed the candle on the coffee table. "Do you need a pillow?" She asked and Arnold was mildly surprised by how hostess-like she sounded. He also noted that she hadn't offered Rich's former room to him. Then again, even if she had, he would've refused.
"No, the couch pillows will be fine," Arnold said good-naturedly as he draped the blanket over the back of the couch. "How long do you think the power will be out?"
Helga deadpanned. "Just a sec, let me consult my crystal ball over here… criminy, Arnold, I don't know!" She exclaimed sarcastically and Arnold simply sighed. Even if she had changed over the years, her sarcasm could become exhausting at times.
"Alright, well," Arnold sighed, shrugging. "What do you wanna do, then? We probably should limit how much we use our laptops just in case we're out of power for a while,"
"Yeah," Helga agreed as she plopped down on the couch and Arnold followed. "At least we found some kind of lead. I just wish we could do more with it,"
"We will," Arnold affirmed, pausing in thought for a second. "Do you think the names could be connected to the verses somehow? I didn't see anyone with those names mentioned specifically in the verses but –"
Helga suddenly cut him off. "What if it's not about the verses?" She turned excitedly to him. "What if it's not about religion at all? What if it's a code?"
The gears in Arnold's head began to turn, quickly picking up speed. "That would make sense… like if the names refer to real people she knew and the verses are saying something about them,"
"Holy shit, Arnold," Helga's eyes widened with a sudden realization. "Those verses are brutal; what if they're describing someone's murder and Marguerite was keeping some kind of log about it?"
"Like she saw a pattern!" Arnold exclaimed. "Or maybe… maybe she knew who did it?"
Helga groaned. "Ughhhh, I wish I could use my laptop,"
"Go ahead and look it up really quick, Helga," Arnold nodded toward the table where their laptops sat. "A few minutes shouldn't hurt,"
"I wasn't plugged in," Helga grumbled. "My battery's probably on its last legs anyway,"
"Use mine then,"
Helga got up from the couch and retrieved Arnold's laptop from the table, then returned to the couch where he sat waiting. She opened it and a box popped up asking for a password.
"Here," Arnold said, leaning over to type in his password and all of a sudden Helga was very aware of how close he was. His hair was in her face, she could smell the faintest hint of his fading cologne, and she could feel the slight brush of his body leaning across hers and a sort of electricity jolted her. She didn't move a muscle and Arnold seemed none the wiser when he leaned away from her as his desktop loaded. "There you go," He said and Helga quickly started searching for news articles.
Arnold sat waiting patiently, quietly wondering why Helga had become so quiet and stiff all of a sudden but brushing it off as his imagination.
"Ohhh shit, Arnold," Helga breathed as she turned the laptop toward him. "Look at this,"
She'd pulled up an article about a homicide case from a few decades ago.
"'Sara Witt was found murdered in her family's barn outside Concordia in 1975,'" Helga read from the dim screen and Arnold scooted closer to her.
"Sara?" Arnold parroted curiously.
"Yeah, listen," Helga said, continuing to read. "'Authorities believe the attack happened between the hours of two and three in the morning. The woman's body was found disfigured, possibly as a result of a religious ritual. Police have declined comment on any further details.'"
"Did they find out who did it?" Arnold inquired and Helga skimmed through the rest of the article.
"No," She said in a sober tone. "The case was never solved," She looked up at Arnold whose face had contorted in thought.
"What's the verse for 'Sara' say?" Arnold asked and Helga quickly typed into the search bar in a new tab.
"'If a woman approaches an animal to have sexual relations with it, kill both the woman and the animal,'" Helga read. "'They are to be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads," They both let the meaning of the verse soak in for a few minutes.
"It's a long shot but we should check it out," Arnold said, re-reading the article on the screen. "We can go in the morning,"
"Works for me," Helga said quietly as she closed the laptop and leaned her head back against the couch cushion.