A Series of Unfortunate Events Box: The Complete Wreck by Lemony Snicket
“Tell them, Triangle Eyes,” Count Olaf said with a wicked smile. “Tell the Baudelaires that you’ve joined up with me.”
“It’s true,” Fiona said, but behind her triangular glasses her eyes were downcast, a word which here means “looking sadly at the floor.” “Count Olaf said that if I helped him destroy the last safe place, he’d help me find my stepfather.”
“But Count Olaf and your stepfather are enemies!” Violet cried. “They’re on opposite sides of the schism.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Esmé Squalor said, her suction cups dragging along the floor as she stepped through the broken porthole. “After all, Captain Widdershins abandoned you. Maybe he’s decided volunteers are out—and we’re in.”
“My brother, my stepfather, and I could be together again,” Fiona said quietly. “Don’t you understand, Baudelaires?”
“Of course they don’t understand!” Count Olaf cried. “Ha ha half-wits! Those brats spend their lives reading books instead of chasing after fortunes! Now, let’s remove all the valuables from the Queequeg and we’ll lock the orphans up in the brig!”
“You won’t get away from us this time!” the hook-handed man said, taking the tagliatelle grande from behind his back and whirling the noodle in the air.
“We didn’t get away from you last time,” Klaus said. “You helped us sneak over here, to save Sunny. You said you wanted to come with us when we escaped in the Queequeg and joined V.F.D. at the last safe place.”
“V.F.D.,” the hook-handed man sneered. With one scornful flick of his hook he popped one of the balloons Phil had used to decorate the Main Hall for Violet’s birthday. “All those silly volunteers with their precious libraries and complicated codes—they’re fools, every last one of them. I don’t want to sit around reading idiotic books! He who hesitates is lost!”
“Or she,” Fiona said. “Aye!”
“Yes,” Count Olaf said, “let’s not hesitate a moment longer, Hooky. Let’s tour this submarine and steal anything we want!”
“I want to come, too!” Esmé said. “I need a new fashionable outfit!”
“Of course, boss,” the hook-handed man said, walking toward the door of the Main Hall. “Follow me.”
“No, you follow me!” Count Olaf said, pushing ahead of him. “I’m in charge!”
“But Countie,” Carmelita whined, jumping off the wooden table and twirling around awkwardly. “I want to go first because I’m a tap-dancing ballerina fairy princess veterinarian!”
“Of course you get to go first, precious,” Esmé said. “You get whatever your adorable little heart desires, right Olaf?”
“I guess so,” Olaf muttered.
“And tell Triangle Eyes to stay here and guard the orphans,” Carmelita said. “I don’t want her to take all the good stuff for herself.”
“Guard the orphans, Triangle Eyes,” Count Olaf said. “Although I don’t think you orphans really need to be guarded. After all, there’s nowhere for you to go! Tee hee traction!”
“Giggle giggle gaudy!” Carmelita cried, leading the way out of the Main Hall.
“Ha ha hair trigger!” Esmé screamed, following her.
“Tee hee tonsillectomy!” Count Olaf shrieked, walking behind his girlfriend.
“I also find this amusing!” the hook-handed man yelled, and slammed the door behind him, leaving the Baudelaires alone with Fiona.
“Traitor,” Sunny said.
“Sunny’s right,” Violet said. “Don’t do this, Fiona. There’s still time to change your mind, and stay on the noble side of the schism.”
“We received a Volunteer Factual Dispatch,” Klaus said, holding up the telegram. “V.F.D. is in desperate need of our services for a most urgent matter. We’re meeting the volunteers at Briny Beach. You could come with us, Fiona.”
“Greenhut!” Sunny cried. She meant something like, “You could be of enormous help,” but Fiona didn’t even wait for a translation.
“You wouldn’t abandon your sister,” the mycologist said. “Aye! You risked your lives to save Sunny. How can you ask me to abandon my brother?”
“Your brother is a wicked person,” Violet said.
“People aren’t either wicked or noble,” Fiona said. “They’re like chef’s salads.”
Klaus picked up the photograph from the table and handed it to Fiona. “This doesn’t look like a chef’s salad to me,” he said. “It looks like a family. Is this what your family would have you do, Fiona? Send three children to the brig, while you help a villain in his treacherous schemes?”
Fiona looked at the picture, and blinked back tears behind her triangular glasses. “My family is lost,” she said. “Aye! My mother is dead. Aye! My father moved away. Aye! My stepfather has abandoned me. Aye! My brother may not be as wonderful as you Baudelaires, but he is the only family I have. Aye! I’m staying with him. Aye!”
“Stay with him if you must,” Violet said, “but let us go.”
“Rendezvous,” Sunny said.
“Take us to Briny Beach,” Klaus translated. “We might be on opposite sides of the schism, Fiona, but that doesn’t mean we can’t help one another.”
Fiona sighed, and looked first at the Baudelaires and then at the photograph of her family. “I could turn my back,” she said, “instead of guarding you.”
“And we could take the Queequeg,” Violet said, “and escape.”
Fiona frowned, and put the photograph back down on the table. “If I let you go to Briny Beach,” she said, “what will you do for me?”
“I’ll teach you how to repair submarines,” Violet said, gesturing to the telegram device. “You could restore the Queequeg to its former glory.”
“I don’t need the Queequeg anymore,” Fiona said. “Aye! I’m part of the crew of the Carmelita.”
“I’ll give you my commonplace book,” Klaus said, holding out his dark blue notebook. “It’s full of important secrets.”
“Count Olaf knows more secrets than you’ll ever learn,” Fiona replied.
“Mmph!” The children looked down and saw Sunny, who had slipped away while the others were talking, and was now walking unsteadily back through the door marked
KITCHEN, dragging her diving helmet.
“Don’t touch that, Sunny!” Violet cried. “There’s a very dangerous fungus in there, and we don’t have any more antidote!”
“Mycolo,” Sunny said, and lay the helmet at Fiona’s feet.
“Sunny’s right,” Klaus said, looking at the helmet and shuddering. “Inside that helmet is the bugaboo of the mycological pantheon—the Medusoid Mycelium.”
“I thought you destroyed it,” Fiona said.
“No,” Violet said. “The Medusoid Mycelium grows best in an enclosed space. You said that the poison of a deadly fungus can be the source of some wonderful medicines. This is a very valuable specimen for a mycologist like yourself.”
“That’s true,” Fiona admitted quietly, and looked down at the helmet. The Baudelaires looked down, too, remembering their terrible journey through the grotto. They remembered how cold and dark it was when they left the Queequeg and drifted through the cavern, and the horrifying sight of the Medusoid Mycelium trapping them in the eerie cave until the stalks and caps waned away. They remembered their chilly journey back to the submarine, and the dreadful discoveries of the missing crew and the mushrooms sprouting inside Sunny’s helmet, and the image of the octopus submarine on the sonar screen, and the villain who was waiting for them when they tumbled inside.
“We’re back!” Count Olaf announced, bursting back into the Main Hall with his comrades behind him. Esmé and Carmelita were peeking into a small, shiny box, and the hook-handed man was staggering under the weight of the uniforms and diving helmets he was carrying. “There wasn’t much to steal, I’m afraid—this submarine is not quite up to its former glory. Still, I found a small jewelry box hidden in the barracks, with a few valuable items.”
“I think the ruby ring is very in
“That was my mother’s,” Fiona said quietly.
“She would have wanted me to have it,” Esmé said quickly. “We were close friends at school.”
“I want the necklace!” Carmelita demanded. “It goes perfectly with my veterinarian stethoscope! Give it to me, Countie!”
“I wish we had those carnival freaks with us,” the hook-handed man said. “They could help carry some of these uniforms.”
“We’ll see them at the Hotel Denouement,” Count Olaf, “along with the rest of my comrades. Well, let’s get out of here! We have lots to do before we arrive! Triangle Eyes, take the orphans to the brig! Ha ha hula dance!”
Humming a ridiculous tune, the villain performed a few dance steps of triumph, only to stumble over the diving helmet on the floor. Carmelita giggled nastily as Olaf reached down and rubbed his tattooed ankle.
“Ha, ha Countie!” cried Carmelita. “My dance recital was better than yours!”
“Get this hat out of here, Triangle Eyes,” Count Olaf snarled. He bent down, picked up the helmet, and started to hand it to Fiona, but the hook-handed man stopped him.
“I think you’ll want that helmet for yourself, boss,” the henchman said.
“I prefer a smaller, lighter hat,” Count Olaf said, “but I appreciate the gesture.”
“What my brother means,” Fiona explained, “is that inside this helmet is the Medusoid Mycelium.”
The Baudelaires gasped and looked at one another in horror, as Count Olaf peered through the helmet’s tiny window, his eyes wide beneath his eybrow. “The Medusoid Mycelium,” he murmured, and ran his tongue thoughtfully along his teeth. “Could it be?”
“Impossible,” Esmé Squalor said. “That fungus was destroyed long ago.”
“They brought it with them,” the hook-handed man said. “That’s why the baby was so sick.”
“This is marvelous,” Olaf said, his voice as raspy and wheezy as if he were poisoned himself. “As soon as you Baudelaires are in the brig, I’m going to open this helmet and toss it inside! You’ll suffer as I’ve always wanted you to suffer.”
“That’s not what we should do!” Fiona cried. “That’s a very valuable specimen!”
Esmé stepped forward and draped two of her tentacles around Olaf’s neck. “Triangle Eyes is right,” she said. “You don’t want to waste the fungus on the orphans. Besides, you need one of them alive to get the fortune.”
“That’s true,” Olaf agreed, “but the idea of those orphans not being able to breathe is awfully attractive.”
“But think of the fortunes we can steal!” Esmé said. “Think of the people we can boss around! With the Medusoid Mycelium in our grasp, who can stop us now?”
“No one!” Count Olaf cackled in triumph. “Ha Hunan chicken! Ha ha hamantaschen! Ha ha hors d’oeuvres! Ha ha h—”
But the Baudelaire children never learned what ridiculous word Olaf was going to utter, as he interrupted himself to point across the Main Hall at a screen on the wall. The screen looked like a piece of graph paper, lit up in green light, and at the center were both a glowing letter Q, representing the Queequeg, and a glowing eye, representing the terrible octopus submarine that had devoured them. But at the top of the screen was another shape—one they had almost forgotten about. It was a long curved tube, with a small circle at the end of it, slithering slowly down the screen like a snake, or an enormous question mark, or some terrible evil the children could not even imagine.
“What’s that cakesniffing shape?” asked Carmelita Spats. “It looks like a big comma.”
“Shh!” Count Olaf hissed, putting his filthy hand over Carmelita’s mouth. “Silence, everyone!”
“We have to get out of here,” Esmé murmured. “This octopus is no match for that thing.”
“You’re right,” Olaf muttered. “Esmé, go whip our rowers so they’ll go faster! Hooky, store those uniforms! Triangle Eyes, take the orphans to the brig!”
“What about me?” Carmelita asked. “I’m the cutest, so I should get to do something.”
“I guess you’d better come with me,” the count said wearily. “But no tap-dancing! We don’t want to show up on their sonar!”
“Ta ta, cakesniffers!” Carmelita said, waving her pink wand at the three siblings.
“You’re so stylish, darling,” Esmé said. “It’s like I always say: You can’t be too rich or too in!”
The two wicked females jumped through the broken porthole and out of the Queequeg, followed by the hook-handed man, who gave the Baudelaires an awkward wave. But before Count Olaf exited, he paused, standing on the wooden table, and drew his long, sharp sword to point at the children. “Your luck is over at last,” he said, in a terrible voice. “For far too long, you keep defeating my plans and escaping from my clutches—a happy cycle for you orphans and an unprofitable one for me. But now the tables have turned, Baudelaires. You’ve finally run out of places to run. And as soon as we get away from that ”—he pointed at the sonar screen with a flick of his sword, and raised his eyebrow menacingly—“you’ll see that this cycle has finally been broken. You should have given up a long time ago, orphans. I triumphed the moment you lost your family.”
“We didn’t lose our family,” Violet said. “Only our parents.”
“You’ll lose everything, orphans,” Count Olaf replied. “Wait and see.”
Without another word, he leaped out of the porthole and disappeared into his ghastly mechanical octopus, leaving the Baudelaires alone with Fiona.
“Are you going to take us to the brig?” Klaus asked.
“No,” Fiona said. “Aye! I’ll let you escape—if you can. You’d better hurry.”
“I can set a course,” Violet said, “and Klaus can read the tidal charts.”
“Serve cake,” Sunny said.
Fiona smiled, and looked around the Main Hall sadly. “Take good care of the Queequeg,” she said. “I’ll miss it. Aye!”
“I’ll miss you,” Klaus said. “Won’t you come with us, Fiona? Now that Olaf has the Medusoid Mycelium, we’ll need all the help we can get. Don’t you want to finish the submarine’s mission? We never found the sugar bowl. We never found your stepfather. We never even finished that code we were going to invent.”
Fiona nodded sadly, and walked to the wooden table. She picked up Mushroom Minutiae, and then acted contrary to her personal philosophy, a phrase which here means “hesitated for a moment, and faced the middle Baudelaire.” “When you think of me,” she said quietly, “think of a food you love very much.” She leaned forward, kissed Klaus gently on the mouth, and disappeared through the porthole without so much as an “Aye!” The three Baudelaires listened to the mycologist’s footsteps as she joined Count Olaf and his comrades, and left them behind.
“She’s gone,” Klaus said, as if he could hardly believe it himself. He lifted one trembling hand to his face, as if Fiona had given him a slap instead of a kiss. “How could she leave?” he asked. “She betrayed me. She betrayed all of us. How could someone so wonderful do something so terrible?”
“I guess her brother was right,” Violet said, putting her arm around her brother. “People aren’t either wicked or noble.”
“Correctiona,” Sunny said, which meant “Fiona was right, too—we’d better hurry if we want to escape from the Carmelita before Olaf notices we’re not in the brig.”
“I’ll set a course for Briny Beach,” Violet said.
Klaus took one last look at the porthole where Fiona had disappeared, and nodded. “I’ll look at the tidal charts,” he said.
“Amnesi!” Sunny cried. She meant something along the lines of, “You’re forgetting something!” and pointed one small finger at the circle of glass on the floor.
“Sunny’s right,” Klaus said. “We can’t launch the submarine without repairing that porthole, or we’ll drown.”
But Violet was already halfway up the rope ladder tha
“Cook,” Sunny replied. “Cook and teeth.”
“We don’t have time to argue,” Klaus said grimly, pointing at the sonar screen. The question mark was inching closer and closer to the glowing Q.
“Aye,” Sunny said, and hurried to the glass circle on the floor. It was still intact, but the youngest Baudelaire could think of nothing that could reattach the circle to the wall of the submarine.
“I think I’ve found the location device,” Violet called down from the Queequeg’s controls. Quickly she flipped a switch, and waited impatiently as a screen came to life. “It looks like we’re fourteen nautical miles southeast of the Gorgonian Grotto. Does that help?”