Chapter Text
--KLAUS POV--
I desperately reach out for something solid. Anything. Anything that isn't more of the seemingly endless expanse of sea and salt. I find that something. It slips through my fingers, almost like sand. Sand? BEACH! I hoist myself onto the beach, limbs aching, fully aware of the water that's now dripping from my every orifice. I don't care. All I know is that I can breath again, even if I am shipwrecked. Shipwrecked. The Beatrice. Violet, Sunny, and Beatrice!
I scramble to my feet, "VIOLET!! SUNNY!! BEA!!"
I try to look around for any sign of the girls, before I realize that my glasses have been stolen by the waves. I'm blind as a bat. Nonetheless, I search like my life depends on it. Theirs just might.
"VIOLET!! SUNNY!!"
"Klaus!!"
I follow the shouting. I trip over something as I do, faceplanting onto the sand. I hear sniggering and then something akin to a baby gurgling. Beatrice. I breathe a mental sigh of relief as I sit up and turn towards the noise, rubbing sand from my still-useless eyes. I can only see a blob, but I hear Violets voice.
"Klaus! Thank god! When that storm capsized us I managed to grab Bea, but I couldn't find you or Sunny. I well...I was worried," she pauses for a moment, the darker connotation behind her 'worry' quite obvious, " luckily Sunny washed up right by me when-"
I cut her off by crushing her and Sunny in an embrace. "-Vi its okay. We're okay." I let her go. "Just what we do now is the question.."
"Where go?" Sunny asks in her half-developed speech. Her meaning is clear enough.
Violet pauses to think for a moment, brushing her hand through Beatrice's hair.
"Home."
"Yes, but where is that now?" I ask in quick succession.
"No, I mean home. Literally." I quirk my eyebrow up at her response, still confused.
"You mean the ruins?" She nods. "The ruins are connected to those tunnels. Those tunnels lead to the rest of VFD," She pulls Sunny closer to her, "to people who can help us." My expression is pinched. "And if those people are on the other side of the schism?" "That's just a chance we'll have to take." She looks between me and Sunny. "Besides, we've survived worse." There's a pause. I nod. She's right. We both stand and I grab Sunny's hand, helping the toddler walk.
"Should we try to scavenge the wreck?"
Violet shakes her head, at least I think she does, I can't really tell without my glasses.
"I've already looked around. I found the Incomplete History, but other than that no signs of anything but water-logged wood and torn up fabric. No sign of your glasses either." I had been hopeful that more had survived the crash, but the most important thing is that we're all here and relatively safe.
The sun sets as we traverse the oh-too-familiar coast of Briny Beach. We realize the trolley isn't an option, but even if we could take it we probably wouldn't have, as we would be too scared of being recognized as "the crazed orphans" from the Daily Punctilio. Honestly, how Mr. Poe's wife is able to get away with writing that nonsense is beyond me. We travel through the familiar streets of our childhood, a melancholy deja vu washing over us.
"Do you miss it?" Violet asks as we walk. The question takes me by surprise, it feels quite random.
"What do you mean?"
"This. All of this. When we were young and didn't have vile villains chasing us everywhere we went. When we were free to research, cook, and invent without worrying about schisms and VFD. "
"Of course I miss it! I miss it more than anything else in the world, how could you not?"
"Would you rather you didn't know about VFD then? Any of it? Would you rather be left in the dark?"
The question feels important, calculated. I'm not sure what the correct answer is. It takes me much longer to answer then it normally would.
"I-I don't know." It's truthful. An uncertainty that hangs over my head like the million others currently in my life.
We arrive at the ruins. They're the same as the last two times we were here. Ashy, destroyed. Burnt. We don't linger. We take a moment to search for the secret passage that led to 667 Dark Avenue. That place, of course, is not our destination; but I remember seeing tunnels that led elsewhere, hopefully to somewhere safe. Violet goes down the ladder first, carrying Beatrice. Then Sunny goes. Then me. Before I close the hatch I take a moment to look at the place I used to call home; knowing I will likely never see it again. I shut the hatch with a definitive slam, jumping down to join my sisters. The passages are dingy and dark, lit only by flickering bulbs on decrepit wires.
"Which way do we go?" I ask. I can tell there are signs on the walls, but without my glasses I can't read them.
Violet pauses for a moment, biting her lip and thinking. "Follow me." I do as told, grabbing Sunny to lead her along as well. I'm not sure how long we've been walking but we eventually stop in front of what seems like a ladder. Violet begins to climb.
"Vi where are we?"
"Montgomery Montgomery's home. Based on where the signs pointed it seems like the only safe place."
"The Last Safe Place..." I respond, almost ironically, as I think about what happened at Hotel Denoument. Sunny and I follow Violet and reach Uncle Monty's home. The secret passage lets out in the corner of his reptile room, behind the now-empty-cage of the Incredibly Deadly Viper. the room looks the same as when I last left it, albeit without the reptiles nor the body of my guardian.
"So you want to live here?"
"At least for the time being. We're close enough to town to get whatever we need, and since its abandoned no one will bother us," Violet seems to reconsider," and if they do, they'll likely be on our side of the schism. It's our best option for now."
That satisfies me. I respond, "Alright." I pause, "First thing we can do is deal with food. I'm starving. Sunny, any ideas?" Sunny smiles and makes her way towards the kitchen, effectively lightening the mood.
Over the next few months, we manage to make the house a suitable home for two teenagers, a toddler, and a baby. We take shifts going into town in disguise (something that Sunny says makes us like Olaf, a comment that unnerves both me and Violet) and use money we find stashed in drawers to buy food, clothes, diapers for Beatrice, and anything else we need. Soon enough we're living contently, finally finding a semblance of peace. We even find a spare pair of glasses I left behind when we were living there. The whole situation is quite lucky. Fortunate even.
One day I'm making my way through the countless books in Monty's library when I hear the sound of a hinge, I assume it's the door.
"Coming Vi!"
There's no response.
"Vi? Violet?" I'm getting worried. I look up from my book. The sight of Violet Baudelaire does not greet me. Instead, there is a large man with jet black hair and a suit standing next to the entrance to the secret passage. I realize he looks just like Jacques Snicket. He is staring at me with a mixture of shock and absolute horror.