Author's Note: I'm sorry no chapters didn't get posted yesterday. I awoke yesterday morning with a terrible cold, and felt just absolutely miserable yesterday! Spent most of the day in bed, and attended a monthly event in my area with my folks called Third Thursday, and ate dinner with my nephew, but otherwise, I felt miserable and more or less, spent the day in bed. Other than having no appetite this morning, I feel somewhat better, or at least up to writing anyway, so, let's have the next chapter!
Chapter 4, The Search for the Skeleton's Missing Hand
August 8, 2014…
The next morning, everybody was headed off to the Museum of Natural History. As for the Rugrats and their families, everyone was up early, ate breakfast, and was waiting outside just in time for the lemozine to pick everyone up and take them to the Museum of Natural History. Once they got there, they checked in at the ticket desk. Peter, who was paying for this trip, along with Taffy and her band, went up to the front of the line of their group and saw to their tickets.
"May I help you?" Said a woman behind the counter with dark hair and red rimmed glasses.
"Yes, I'm King Peter Albany of the Confederacy, and to my right is Taffy, the lead singer of Taffy and the Salt Waters." Said Peter.
"Oh yes, Taffy, the band that's beginning their tour here this weekend. We've been expecting you." Said the woman, as she turned towards Taffy.
"Good morning." Taffy replied, as she shook the woman's hand, and she came out from around the corner, to see who else had all shown up.
"I see you all have several young children here with you this morning. You guys are not by chance, here for this morning's special program and scavender hunt that's taking place in our forensics lab are you?" The woman asked.
"Actually, we are." Didi replied from farther back in the line.
"Once I hand out everybody's tickets, please head upstairs to room 2A, it's across from the elevators on your left, you can't miss it, as it's quite full of noisy chatter, as we're expecting a ton of kids attending today." Said the woman, as she went around and put buttons on to everybody's shirts, to show that they had checked in as touring members of the museum.
"Have a wonderful time!" Said the lady, as she then motioned to Taffy.
"Taffy, I believe you'll be wanting to meet with some of the museum staff, to hand out flyers or something?" The woman asked.
"Oh, yes mam." Taffy replied.
"Please, right this way." Said the dark haired woman, as she jestured to Taffy to follow her, and they went off to another part of the museum.
The Rugrats and their families, along with Bobby and his family had gone off at this point and found the elevator, where they headed up to the second floor, and Celeste was feeling around for any Braille signs that would lead them to room 2A. Then, she found it!
"Here we are everybody, the forensics lab, room 2A." Said Celeste, as she opened the door.
A tall woman with bright red hair wearing a green tour guide's uniform approached her.
"May I help you?" The woman asked.
"Oh, yes, my name is Celeste Wehrenberg, and this is my nephew Zack, and our other friends. We're here for the forensics lab program and scavender hunt." Said Celeste.
"Oh yes, we've been expecting you. My name is Cyndi, please, come on in and take a seat at the long tables around the room." Said Cyndi, as she opened the door wider and all of the families, strollers with the toddlers, and everyone came into the room, where they gathered at several tables, covered in various bones from the human body, along with other families and their kids, gathered there for this special event.
Once everybody had taken their seats and was quiet, Cyndi clapped her hands, cleared her throat, and began.
"Good morning boys and girls, my name is Cyndi and welcome to the forensics lab at the Museum of Natural History. This morning, we have a very special treat for you." Said Cyndi.
She then went on to talk about the different bones, and asked for a volunteer to help her come demonstrate and teach the lesson. Bobby raised his hand.
"And what's your name?" Cyndi asked.
"Bobby Generic." Bobby replied, as he got out of his seat and went up and joined Cyndi where she was standing, along with several bones in front of her.
"Well Bobby, it's great to have you joining us this morning. Now Bobby, can you tell the difference between which skull is a boy's skull and which one is a girl?" Asked Cyndi, as she placed 2 skeleton skulls in front of Bobby.
Bobby looked them over for a minute before responding.
"No." Bobby replied.
"Ah, now I'd like you to feel the back of each skull. Notice how one of them has a small bump near the base of the back of the skull and the other one doesn't?" Cyndi asked.
Bobby felt the skulls and took note of this bump. Then he nodded, as he held up the skull with the bump on the back, which he held up in his left hand.
"The skull you have in your left hand, belonged to a male, while the one that's still on the table in front of your right hand, is a female." Said Cyndi.
Everybody in the room felt the back of their own heads, to see if they could find the bump.
"Yeah I feel the bump on the back of my head too! Fascinating!" Howard D replied.
"Yep, no bump here." Said Betty.
Then, Bobby went on to pick up some other bones, which were human leg bones.
"Why does this one have a bump on it?" Bobby asked, as he held up a leg bone.
"Ah, good question Bobby. This person broke their leg while they were alive, and the bump you feel here, is a calcium deposit." Explained Cyndi.
"My friend Tommy broke his leg, and was alive when it healed. Do you think he might have bumps like that?" Bobby asked.
"Yes, he probably does." Cyndi replied.
Then, Bobby picked up another leg bone, only this one looked to have a slight bend and limp.
"What's wrong with this one?" Bobby asked.
"Well, did your friend wear a cast when his leg was broken?" Cyndi asked.
"Yes, twice because he tried to speed up the process, only making the break worse." Bobby replied.
"Well, this is what would have happened if your friend's leg hadn't been set properly back in its place, and healed the wrong way. See how there's a bend? That's because the bone healed out of place." Cyndi explained.
Over at the table, the other toddlers had long since lost interest in what Bobby was doing, as they all turned to one another.
"So when can we sneak off and go looking for Tommy?" Chuckie whispered into Dil's ear.
"I don't know." Dil whispered back.
Back at the front of the room, Bobby picked up two leg bones that appeared to be split in half, but they were hollow on the inside.
"What's wrong with this one?" Bobby asked.
"Good question Bobby. This person's bone broke after they died. See how it's hollow on the inside? That's because unlike the leg that broke while the person was alive, this one broke after the person died, causing it to be hollow on the inside because the body is no longer producing calcium or nutrients, to help the bone heal." Explained Cyndi.
Meanwhile, back at the lobby of the museum, Bob, Mike and Tommy had arrived before anyone else did, but they were hiding behind a curtin with a display of ancient Native American symbols on it. Once the dark haired receptionist had left to go with Taffy around the museum to hand out flyers and promote her tour, Mike nudged Bob in the ribs.
"Now's our chance! Go in there!" Whispered Mike into Bob's ear.
"No Mike, you go in, and hurry! You want us to get caught?" Bob asked.
By this point, nobody was paying attention to Tommy anymore, and he was starting to get bored. He quietly snuck out from behind the curtins, and went off to explore the museum. Unnoticed that Tommy was gone, Bob and Mike snuck out from behind the curtins, made their way behind the desk where the dark haired receptionist had disappeared from, and started looking around for a safe. Then, Mike spotted it in a deserted room in the back, where he quietly snuck in, used a fake key he had in his pocket, as he and Bob had been collecting several keys from several lock smiths over the last six months, proclaiming they were lock smiths from around the country, and tried several keys until he found one that fit the lock. Using it, he opened the safe, grabbed a huge pile of cash, and stuffed the money into his pockets. Once he was satisfied, he turned around to find Bob behind him, but Tommy, completely out of sight.
"Where's the kid Bob?" Mike asked.
"I don't know I thought you were watching him." Bob replied.
"No, I thought you were watching him." Mike replied.
"Well we'd better find him, before we get caught. Come on." Bob yelled, as he turned to run out of the office, only to see the lady with dark hair back at her desk.
Mike quickly closed the safe and turned to find that lady was in her office. Nervous, the two criminals quietly snuck out of her office. Hearing a noise, the lady looked up from her desk to see what she had heard, but by the time she looked up, Bob and Mike were gone.
In another part of the museum, Tommy had explored several rooms, one with several indian exhibits, and now, he was exploring a room that had pictures and artifacts that were dug up from different wars that took place in the United States, when Bob and Mike finally caught up to him.
"There he is, grab him!" Bob called out to Mike.
"Nuh uh, you grab him Bob." Mike argued.
"No you! Before he gets away!" Bob hissed, but Tommy was running out of the room before either of them could catch him.
Spotting Tommy running out of the corner of his eye, the two criminals started running through the museum chasing after the purple haired two-year-old. They chased him into the elevator, and up to the next floor, where they managed to stop him upon approaching door 2A to the forensics lab. Mike grabbed Tommy by his shirt collar, and the two-year-old tried to squirm away, but Mike stopped him.
"Oh no kid, you're done playing, it's time for us to go." Said Mike.
But Tommy didn't want to leave. He was curious to see what was behind that door.
"Wanna go in there little guy? Huh?" Bob asked teasingly.
"We don't have time for this game Bob, we need to go!" Mike hissed.
"Awe come on Mikey, look at how curious the kid is. You'd think he was Curious George or something. Come on Mikey, please?" Bob begged.
"Oh all right, we'll go see what's going on in this room, but if there's nothing interesting in here, we're leaving." Said Mike, as Bob opened the door, and they walked in during the forensics lab program where all of the Rugrats, Bobby, and their families were, along with several other families and their children.
By this time, Bobby had taken his seat, and Susie was at the front of the room, studying bones and asking questions. When Bob, Mike and Tommy arrived, they spotted Susie pointing to a complete skeleton of the human body in the corner of the room, only the skeleton was missing something, it's left hand.
"What's that?" Susie asked, pointing to the skeleton.
"That is a skeleton of the human body. We've been trying to sell it to another museum for years now, but nobody is interested in it because it's missing its left hand." Said Cyndi.
"Well what happened to it?" Susie asked.
"It's gone. Whoever finds it though, could win a prize though, or if one of the museum staff finds it, we could sell that skeleton and earn ourselves enough money to buy a new one, as that skeleton is worth over two-hundred-million dollars." Said Cyndi.
"Wow!" Susie exclaimed.
"That is a lot of money, isn't it Susie?" Cyndi asked.
Susie nodded.
Of course, overhearing this, Mike and Bob exchanged looks, eager to participate in what might be coming. A scavender hunt that the kids were most likely about to take to find that missing skeleton hand.
"And now kids, it's your turn to help us. That's right, it's time, for the big scavender hunt. Are you up for the challenge?" Cyndi asked.
All of the Rugrats and Bobby turned to one another.
"Uh Bobby, do you by chance think that if we find that missing skeleton hand, we might find Tommy too?" Chuckie whispered into Bobby's ear.
"Maybe, there's only one way to find out. Everyone, split off with your buddy, and search for the skeleton hand." Bobby said in a low tone to everybody who was still at the table.
"You all have one hour, that's two episodes of the Dummi Bears, to search this room for the skeleton hand. Good luck." Said Cyndi, as everybody got up from their seats and started searching around the room. The Rugrats each got with their partners they had the previous day at the zoo, as even Hazel and her parents had shown up for this event, and she found Phil at this point, and she and Phil, Jesse and Lil, Chuckie and Dil, Kimi and Zack, and Bobby and Susie started looking around the room for the skeleton hand.
As for Bob, Mike and Tommy, who had left the room, overwhelmed by the bulk of kids at this event, Tommy started to whimper slightly.
"Awe, I think he wants to find that skeleton hand." Said Bob.
"Not a chance. Wait, Baby Thump, you wanna find that hand for us? Make daddy a rich man? If we find that hand, we can sell that skeleton and get us some big money! Come on kid, wanna help us?" Mike asked in a teasing voice, as Tommy pointed and smiled.
"If I find that hand, maybe I can find my friends and go home!" Tommy thought to himself, as he nodded and agreed to go along with this plan, of course, for different reasons entirely than what Bob and Mike had in mind.
Once it appeared that the search was underway, as there was a small window in the door to the forensics lab, they sent Tommy back into the lab, who started crawling around under stuff, as were all of the other kids, as the adults were all sitting together at the end of one table, talking to one another and watching their kids having fun on the scavender hunt.
Bob and Mike found a curtin with some ancient Chinese writing on it that they hid behind, that was next to a flower vace covered in hyrogliffics. From behind here, they kept their eye on Tommy, which wasn't easy to do, since he kept disappearing behind different items, and emerging from each one, empty handed.
Meanwhile, Angelica was not interested in participating, so she, Drew and Charlotte, along with Derek, Kelly, Peter, and Taffy's band mates went off to the eatery downstairs to get a bite to eat, as they were all growing hungry. They let the other adults know where they were going, and they agreed to meet up with them after the scavender hunt was over. Back on the scavender hunt, the bulk of the toddlers, Bobby and Susie were not having much luck finding the missing skeleton hand. However, Zack and Kimi found several colorful rocks, and Jesse found a green and purple pinwheel.
"I founded this pinwheel! Look! See how pretty it is?" Jesse said excitedly, holding up his prize in front of Lil.
"That's nice, but it's not no skeleton hand. Now get that thing out of my face!" Lil snapped.
No sooner had Lil snapped this, when Tommy crawled behind the vace with the hyrogliffics on it, and found the missing skeleton hand. Excited for finding it, Tommy started giggling, as he held the skeleton hand up.
"Hey! Quiet kid." Bob hissed, startling Tommy, who threw the skeleton hand in Chuckie's direction. Seeing it, Chuckie caught it.
"Guys! I got it! I got it! And, I found Tommy! He's behind that plant thing." Said Chuckie, as he pointed to the vase.
"Wow! Are you sure?" Phil asked.
"I'd know Tommy's laugh anywhere Phil." Said Chuckie.
"Yeah, but I've never seen a hand fly before." Said Phil with amazement.
"Me neither!" Said Hazel with a smile in agreement.
Of course, worried they would get caught, Bob grabbed up Tommy quickly from behind the vase, and the two criminals and their kidnapped child, rushed out of the forensics lab, on to the elevator, and out of the museum to head back to their bomb shelter, before any of their plans could be spoiled. Once they were far away from the museum, Mike spoke up.
"So, did the kid get our special hand?" Mike asked.
"No, he threw it and some freckle faced carrottop caught it. What an idiot!" Bob hissed.
"I thought you were the one who said to be nice to the kid." Said Mike.
"Yeah well, our kid ruined our chance at two-hundred-million dollars!" Bob replied angrily, as they made it back to their bomb shelter.
Mike leaned in and whispered into Bob's ear.
"No worries, I got us covered. When the kid is sleeping, I'll fill you in." Whispered Mike into Bob's ear.
Later, when Tommy had fallen asleep on his uncomfortable pile of newspapers, mainly because he was growing exhausted, as a result of a lack of good sleep, and seems as if he was getting the most tired in the afternoons as of late, Mike reached into his pants pocket and pulled out the wad of cash he had stolen from the Museum of Natural History, and added it to the stash that was in the shoebox beneath his cot.
"So, where to tomorrow?" Bob asked, once he saw that Mike had accomplished another mission of getting them more money, and so far, managed to keep it hidden from their kidnapped child, which, they only hoped they could keep it hidden from long enough until their mission was complete, once they hit the Whitehouse come the beginning of the next week.
Mike, who now have charge of that itinerary, pulled it out from beneath Bob's cot and looked it over.
"We'll be hitting two places tomorrow. In the morning, it's to the Jefferson Memorial, in the afternoon, we're hitting the Library of Congress." Said Mike, as he put the itinerary back, slumped down on his cot, and closed his eyes.
"Looks like a long day ahead of us." Said Bob, as he too slumped down on his cot and closed his eyes for an afternoon nap.
"Yeah Bob, but it will be worth it." Said Mike dreamily, as he yawned and fell asleep.
Back at the museum, upon hearing that Chuckie thought he heard Tommy from behind that flower vase, Phil went and peaked back behind there, but found nobody, as it was after Bob and Mike had snatched Tommy out from behind there, and made a mad run for it before getting caught.
"Uh Chuckie, I don't know who you saw, but Tommy isn't back here." Said Phil, as he came out from behind the vase.
"Oh." Said Chuckie disappointingly, as Cyndi approached him, noticing the skeleton hand in his hands.
"You found it! Congratulations…" Cyndi started to say, before she cut herself off, unsure of the child's name. By this time, Chaz and Kira had walked up to Chuckie, who looked a bit disappointed as he knew he heard Tommy, but he was nowhere to be found, plus, he was feeling a bit shy with this lady staring down right at him.
"Chuckie." Chaz said to Cyndi, giving her his son's name.
"Well Chuckie, here is your prize for finding this special skeleton hand." Said Cyndi, as she pulled a piece of paper out of her pocket and handed it to Chuckie.
"It's a coupon for any flavor of one scoop of ice cream from our eatery downstairs. You know Chuckie, ice cream is not only tasty, but it's also very healthy for your bones. You see Chuckie, ice cream is made with milk, and milk has calcium, which will help those bones of yours grow! So go get yourself a scoop of your favorite flavor of ice cream, you deserve it." Said Cyndi, as she handed Chuckie the coupon, and took the skeleton hand from him, and put it in her pocket for safe keeping.
"Uh, thank you." Said Chaz, as he took Chuckie's hand that wasn't holding the coupon, and he and Kira went and gathered up the other kids and adults, and everybody headed down to the eatery, where they met up with Peter, Taffy, and everybody else who had gone down there during the scavender hunt, and everybody who participated in the scavender hunt, went and got themselves some lunch, as it was growing near lunchtime by this point in the day.
Once everybody had left the forensics lab, Cyndi applied some glue to the skeleton hand, and glued it to the skeleton's body, making it complete once again, giving it both, its left, and right hand.
Back down at the eatery, Bobby, Susie and the toddlers had all finished lunch, and were all enjoying some ice cream for dessert while gathered together at a table, Chuckie, got a scoop of vanilla ice cream with his coupon.
"Congratulations on your ice cream prize Chuckie." Said Kimi.
"Thanks, but I'd be a lot happier if we had Tommy back." Said Chuckie, as he took his last bite of ice cream and stared back at his sister, who was sitting across from him at the table, a huge frown on his face.
Bobby, who was sitting next to Chuckie, turned to him.
"Don't worry Chuckie, we're not giving up yet. We just need to keep looking harder at all of the places we visit. I'm sure we'll find Tommy before we leave to go home." Said Bobby.
Chuckie tried to let out a small smile, but turned away from Bobby, as the frown came back to his face, as he really wasn't so sure if Tommy would ever be found at this point, and he was quite worried about him, concerned if he was ok, wherever he was at this very moment.
At another table, the adults and teens were talking.
"Well everyone, that's all that was scheduled for today. I called the lemozine, they'll be here in half an hour to pick us up to take us back to the hotel so the kids can have their afternoon nap and Taffy and her band can have another rehearsal down in the lobby." Said Peter, as he took another sip of his soda.
"Thank you Peter, I appreciate it that you've scheduled in time for my band to rehearse, especially since it doesn't look like we'll get much of an opportunity to do so tomorrow." Said Taffy.
"Oh? And why not?" Peter asked.
Taffy pulled out the itinerary from her purse and looked it over.
"Tomorrow morning, is our trip to the Jefferson Memorial, along with other sights, based on what people want to see, if I recall when Didi scheduled the tour with Jen Epstein, she could schedule in the whole morning with us, remaining with us right up until lunchtime." Said Taffy.
"Yes that's correct." Said Didi.
"Then tomorrow afternoon, is our tour of the Library of Congress, and when making the reservations for this one, recall the tours last approximately ninety minutes, this is of course, provided the minis don't escape." Said Taffy.
"No worries, uh, like, Peter and I can watch them." Said Kelly.
"By the way, speaking of the minis, any word about Tommy's whereabouts?" Peter asked.
"No, but I've made sure to say something at every place we've been. So far, the security people at the Spy Museum, National Zoo, and Museum of Natural History are keeping an eye out for him, as everybody has been provided with photos of him, recent ones I had on my phone. I'll also be sure to report him to the people at Jefferson Memorial and the Library of Congress tomorrow." Said Taffy.
"Thank you Taffy, we really appreciate your help in all of this." Said Didi.
"No problem." Said Taffy, as she took another sip of her smoothie.
"That reminds me Deed, Randy and I will have to skip the tour of the Library of Congress tomorrow afternoon." Said Stu.
"Why?" Didi asked.
"Yeah I thought you two were looking forward to this tour." Said Lucy.
"We were, but turns out the guy at the Air and Space Museum wants to meet with us at that time, for Stu to demonstrate his Dummi Bears hot air balloon, and seeing that I'm the head writer for the Dummi Bears, I agreed to accompany Stu to this meeting tomorrow." Said Randy.
"Well ok then." Said Lucy.
"And once the tours are done for the day, I received a text on my phone while we were here at the Museum of Natural History from Sandy. She, Rosie and Mary's train is due to arrive at the train station tomorrow afternoon at four, and I agreed to go pick them up and escort them to the hotel." Said Taffy.
"That's, very nice of you to offer to do that." Said Kira.
"I thought so. Our hotel isn't easy to find in the mess of buildings, and I didn't need Sandy and her two young companions getting lost. They're already going to be exhausted, as they will have traveled here all the way from Boston, being on the train for nearly twelve hours or more, with three transfers. One in Springfield, Mass, another in Albany, NY, and one last one at Pen Station in New York City, before arriving here in Washington D.C." Said Taffy.
"Wow, that's a long trip." Said Chaz.
"Yeah, but Sandy told me she wasn't going to miss the start of my tour, and she promised to bring her minis to visit my minis, which I know they're all really excited about." Said Taffy.
By this time, Betty looked over to see that all of the kids had finished their lunch and dessert, so she started helping to clean everybody up, as it was getting close for the limo to be arriving to take everybody back to their hotel.
Once everybody was cleaned up and their trash was thrown away, they went outside of the museum, to where the limo was waiting for them, piled in, and headed back to the hotel.
And this, ends chapter 4.
Author's Note: Well people, we're halfway through the story at this point, only four more chapters to go, and I see the next few chapters, being long, just like these first four have been. I should also point out a few things, since this story is based off of a real trip I took nearly three years ago now, as it was back in July of 2012 when I visited these places the Rugrats and Bobby are visiting in Washington D.C. However, because this is a ficticious story, some things have been embellished for dramanization, like the forbidden area with a trap door from the airduct sample at the Spy Museum. There is an actual replica of an airduct for people to crawl through at the spy museum, and those gadgets the Rugrats explored before crawling through it do indeed, exist, but I had to find a clever way for Tommy to escape and be kidnapped without the others finding out, and that was the best thing I could come up with. Also, there are actual orangatans at the National Zoo, and if I recall, they're one of the most popular exhibits there for people to look at. Plus, I always thought it was interesting how on, "The Wild Thornberry's," Donny was raised by orangatans before Nigel and Maryanne found him, and I remembered how in, "The Rugrats Movie," when Dil was taken off by the monkeys in the forrest, so I thought it would be kind of funny for Tommy to have some experience with one of our primates, and since I remembered there being orangatans at this zoo, I thought, how perfect! I also have no idea if there really is some abandoned bomb shelter on the outskirts of our nation's capital, but again, that's something I came up with, to give the criminals a place to hide out, and an uncomfortable one at that, as it's going to serve an even bigger purpose in the story in a later chapter, when something happens to Tommy. And what happens to him? Well that's for me to know, and you all, to find out! And as for the program at the forensics lab at the Museum of Natural History, which is what this chapter was all about, I did attend a similar program, where I got to study different bones of the human body, but there were some differences. There is a whole skeleton there with a missing left hand that broke at one time, but when I went there for real, there was no scavender hunt for us to go and find it. I added that in, to make this program a bit more appealing to young kids and toddlers, and, the facts that Bobby and Susie learned from studying the bones, were facts that I learned when I went to this program at that museum, and sadly, the only ones I remember to this day, as I learned a lot more than that when I went, but it's been nearly three years since I attended this, so some events of this particular trip I took have grown fuzzy, while others, stick out in my mind as clear as day now. Also, there is a real eatery at the Museum of Natural History, as well as the restaurant Spy Café at the Spy Museum for people to eat at, and, really, if there was a prize to give out to a child for finding a missing part of a skeleton, a coupon to get ice cream, which has calcium in it, does sound like an appropriate prize, don't you think so? I'll be sure to make more comparrisons between the Rugrats trip and mine in future chapters, let me know if you guys like learning about that, and I'll continue these in future author's notes in chapters to come. Not sure if anymore chapters will get posted today, time will tell, but I'm going to do my best, to have this story finished by June 29, 2015, if not sooner, so I hope you continue to enjoy this story, and, be looking for more chapters, coming soon!