Family Comes First- ASOUE

Chapter 42: Putting an End to the Sham

*Violet's POV*

The sun was beginning to rise as the Fickle Ferry pulled up at Damocles Dock. We saw Emerson leave the boat wearing a hat that covered most of their head and face, with Captain Sham trailing after. Duncan, Izzie, and I, with Sunny in my arms, started walking towards the stairs but quickly noticed Klaus wasn't following. He was staring out into the distance, towards the big forest nearby and a pair of smokestacks not far away.

"Klaus?" Isadora said to get his attention.

"Look..." He said, holding up the picture with our parents in it, Aunt Josephine's note behind it.

"Lucky Smells Lumbermill!"

"Aunt Josephine said it wasn't far."

"But before we can go there," Isadora sighed, "We have to prove Sham's a fake."

Klaus began to stuff the two documents back into his pockets, but the suicide note slipped from his hands. "Wait, no!" He exclaimed, trying to reach over the railing to reach for the note. It was out of his reach though, and we watched in despair as it fluttered down into the lake. "That was gonna be our evidence..." He said sadly.

"Come on, guys..." Duncan mumbled. "We should go down. I see Sham giving us the death glare anyways..."

Mr. Poe was coughing as we walked up to him. "What am I supposed to do with you?" He asked, "You said you were going home to rest, but instead you steal a boat and push Josephine's house down a hill? I missed the prehurricane discount tickets and had to spend the night in a nearby bed and breakfast! I wouldn't be surprised if Captain Sham was no longer interested in serving as your guardian, even though I filled out these forms in triplicate while he boated around Lake Lachrymose looking for you!"

"Well," Captain Sham began, "I'll admit the children's behavior did make me have second thoughts. But then I also had third thoughts, which are how empty my wallet and my heart are. I truly think that the Baudelaires and the Quagmires can be an enormous, enormous fortune in my life. I'm so happy that I managed to rescue them before the boat sank!"

"Mr. Poe, you don't understand!!! This man is Count Olaf in disguise." Klaus tried to reason. "He murdered Aunt Josephine in cold blood."

"Klaus, we've been through this! There's absolutely nothing at this point that will convince me that this man is actually Count Olaf. And you have no evidence to support these wild accusations, and I cannot, on behalf of Mulctuary Money Management, take the word of a single child!"

"You don't have to take the word of a single child," Isadora spat, "You can take the word of all five of us!"

"You'll have to take our word that Aunt Josephine may still be alive!" Duncan added. "But we have to go try to rescue her immediately!"

"Please, Mr. Poe!" I said. "Trust us!"

"Why won't you believe us!?" Klaus added desperately.

Captain Sham, Mr. Poe, the Quagmires, Klaus and I continued to argue, and stopping myself from slapping Poe into next week was extremely difficult. Any more arguing and I would have been shouting at the top of my lungs. So, clearly, I was very distracted. During the argument, Sunny seemed to have enough and dropped down out of my arms and took a big bite from the peg leg, making it split right in half with a loud cracking noise.

Obviously, the peg leg was fake, and it split open to reveal Captain Sham's real leg. There on the pale and sweaty skin of Captain Sham's ankle was the solution to our problem. By biting the peg leg, Sunny had cut the Gordian Knot, which is a fancy term for a simple but rude solution, and as the wooden pieces of fake peg leg fell to the floor of Damocles Dock, everyone could see a tattoo of an eye.

Sunny smiled triumphantly as Olaf realized he had been caught. Despite this, he jumped into a lie without hesitation.

"My leg!!!" Olaf exclaimed. "My leg has grown back!! It's amazing! It's incredible! It's a medical miracle!"

"Oh, come now, that won't work," Mr. Poe said as I picked Sunny up off the floor of the dock. "Even a child could see that peg leg was false!"

"A child did see that the peg leg was false!" I corrected him. "Five, in fact."

"But you didn't listen to us!" Klaus said.

"You never listen." Izzie added.

"Well..." Olaf said, still trying to weasel his way out of being caught, "Perhaps the peg leg was false, but I have never seen this tattoo in my life!"

"That won't work either! You tried to hide the tattoo with the peg leg!"

The adults continued to argue, but the Quagmires, my siblings and I were more interested in the slam we heard behind us. We turned around and saw a man in dirty coveralls loading up a truck. Both the coveralls and the truck had a logo of a circular saw blade with "Lucky Smells" on it.

"Let's go." Klaus whispered to us. I looked at the Quagmires to see if they were uncomfortable with the idea of running away, but they were already sneaking off after Klaus. The adults were distracted enough to not even notice us leave.

Duncan helped Isadora into the truck and I handed Sunny to him when he got in. Klaus and I got in last and we all sat against the boxes, lying low, so the driver wouldn't see us.

"Cozy..." Sunny whispered sarcastically, meaning 'Better get comfy...' I chuckled a little. We rounded a corner and Mr. Poe and Count Olaf disappeared behind it. I imagined Poe would realize we were missing and give Olaf a perfect chance to escape.

"I'm glad Mr. Poe means well," Isadora said, staring down at her teddy bear in her lap, "But he's too ignorant to be of any help. We might as well be all alone when he's around."

"We'll never be alone," Klaus said. "As cheesy as it sounds, we have eachother, right?"

Isadora giggled softly. "Yeah, that's true."

We sat quietly for a while and I thought a little. "What's that thing Haruki Murakami said?" I asked.

"'When you come out of the storm, you won't be the same person who walked in.'" Klaus answered quietly.

"Before that part."

"You won't even be sure, in fact, whether the storm is really over.'"

Duncan sighed. "Do you think we made the right choice?"

"Doesn't matter if we made the right choice." I replied. "What matters is what happens. And all we know that will happen is we'll be together."