Family Comes First- ASOUE

Chapter 66: The Orphan Shack

*Duncan's POV*

We were a full set of triplets again... Nothing this stupid school could throw at me would bring be down, I believed. We met up where we said we would. There was a small courtyard in the building with a little tin building in the center.

"Welcome to my humble home..." Quigley said with a small, embarrassed smile. "The kids call it 'The Orphan Shack' because the ones with no guardians have to live here."

"It's small..." Izzie commented. "Even for a shack."

"Oh, you don't know the half of it."

Quigley opened the door and fetched his book from his bag, walking inside. Klaus started to follow but jumped back. "Crabs!!!" He exclaimed. "Your shack has crabs!"

My brother slammed his book against the tin wall, scaring us and the crabs. The small creatures retreated under the wooden floors. "Sorry for the loud noise. It scares the crabs, and the only alternative I could think of was taping metal to the bottom of my shoes and tap-dancing."

"Your shack has stalactites of fungus!!!" I exclaimed, looking at the gross, tan substance on the ceiling.

"They were dripping stalactites of fungus!!!" Quigley replied. "I sent a friend from the organization a sample of it and they said that it isn't toxic, and it'll dry up if I throw salt at it!" He smiled, proud of how he managed to adapt to Prufrock.

"Valtack!!" Sunny shrieked, pointing to the walls on the inside. They were painted lime green with little pink hearts.

"It does look like a tacky valentines day card in here," Violet agreed.

"I had taken a knife from the cafeteria," Quigley explained as he went around collecting his things, "and I tried to scratch it off, but it was too tedious of a process, so I gave up."

Izzie and I took a couple of his things from his arms to lighten his load. "I'll bet you're thankful for the change in scenery." I said with a chuckle.

"Immensely." He smiled. "I'm so glad to get out of there."

We finished switching rooms and moving Quigley in with us, but Klaus had a question.

"Quigley, are you sure you don't know anything else about the organization?" He asked.

"Not much else," Quigley answered. "Jacques thinks I'm better off if I know less."

"Well I want answers!" Violet said. "At Aunt Josephine's, we found a book that looked like it contained a lot of answers."

"We lost it in a hurricane," I added. "It was called An Incomplete History of Secret Organizations."

"That's the right book, yeah!" He smiled. "It has a ton of information, but I couldn't get my hands on one long enough to learn anything useful."

"Could we look for a copy in the library?"

"It's been closed for forty minutes," Quigley said, "but Olivia stays in there all day and she sometimes lets me in during the off hours. We can ask her, but there's no guarantee."

We all agreed to it, so off to the library we went!