A Tale of Wretched Occurrences: The Beginning

𝓒𝓱𝓪𝓹𝓽𝓮𝓻 𝓣𝓱𝓲𝓻𝓽𝔂-𝓕𝓸𝓾𝓻

“I’ll be right back! Nobody leave!” Foreman Flacutono announces.

You wait until he’s out the door and has turned the corner. Violet grabs Sunny, and the three of you sneak out of the factory, heading for Sir’s building. The door to his office is wide open, but thankfully, he’s not there.

“We better hurry,” you say tensely. “We should get back before Foreman Flacutono does. And definitely before Sir does.”

Violet sets Sunny down on a reading chair in the corner of the room, and the two of you get to work scanning the shelves. That’s when you notice something odd about the library.

“The History of Lucky Smells Lumbermill… The History of Lucky Smells Lumbermill… The History of Lucky Smells Lumbermill… they’re all the same book!”

“Who would want so many copies of the same book?” Violet asks, sliding one off a shelf.

She carries it over to the only reading table in the room, and you join her. On the back cover is an “About the Author” section, along with a photo of the author. A photo of Sir.

“Of course,” you sigh.

But you don’t stop to read his little blurb. Violet flips the book open.

“How are we going to find what we’re looking for? This is a long book, and we don’t have much time.”

“Use the table of contents,” you suggest. “That’s what Klaus does whenever he reads a long, difficult book.”

Violet opens the book to the table of contents, running her finger down the list of chapters. “‘Chapter 12. The Paltryville Fire.’”

She turns the pages to find chapter 12, only to make an unfortunate discovery.

“‘The Baudelaires were unequivocally responsible…’ the rest is crossed out!”

You run to the shelves, pull another book off, flip to the right page, and are also greeted with paragraphs of crossed out information.

“This one is crossed out too.”

You and Violet grab book after book, but every time make the same wretched discovery. A mountain of books grows on the table that’s almost as big as the table itself. But finally, finally, all that time spent searching pays off.

“This one’s not crossed out!” Violet exclaims delightedly.

You peer over her shoulder. Just as you’re about to read the chapter, you hear footsteps coming down the hall.

“Klaus was right. Every time,” you mutter.

Violet picks Sunny up off the chair, and the three of you duck behind it. You can’t see who’s walking by, but based off the smell wafting into your nostrils, it’s Sir. There’s the sound of something ripping. Violet tries to catch a glimpse of what he’s doing, but you pull her back.

“Sir! Your goat cheese and beef jerky omelette is ready!” Charles’s voice calls from somewhere down the hall.

The sound of Sir’s footsteps recede away, but you wait a few seconds to get out from behind the chair.

“Eh luboo,” Sunny babbles, which means, “I found something.”

She points to a large dictionary sitting next to her. The Verified Functional Dictionary — First Edition, according to the cover. Violet opens it to the first page, on which a quote has been scrawled.