Chapter Eight
In that afternoon, after Juno Boreas had given the Baudelaires the Fire Flower - which Violet later put between the pages of a book given to her by Juno herself - the Baudelaires enjoyed tea with the Boreas sisters, Lars and Charles completely obvious to the intruders that had invaded the perimeter. They were in Juno's garden, in an outdoor platform circled by lovely white fences with vines covering them. It was really an idyllic place to be in, and the Baudelaires were glad to be with those great volunteers. While Lars and Charles bonded over their previous experiences, the Baudelaires enjoyed coffee with Juno Boreas. Jessica was still chasing insects up and down the garden, unaware of the two lurking intruders in it.
'Jessica, stop trying to catch that beetle. Come sit and have coffee!' Juno shouted, trying to get Jessica's attention. The girl was determined to catch it, however. 'Sorry Juno, but I really want this one!' Jessica said as she ran by, swinging her bug net, in a futile attempt to catch the beetle in mid-air. 'Butterflies are easier!' She said, her red hair flowing in the wind.
'Oh nevermind her. She's trying to impress you, you know.' Juno said, looking at Klaus. 'Me? Why?' Said Klaus with a smile. 'Well, she likes you, Klaus. You're the first male teenager Jessica has seen in ages, and you're
Klaus Baudelaire.' Juno said. 'You're very likeable.'
Klaus said nothing, merely putting down his cup, his face red with embarrassment. Klaus had never have a girl like him besides Cindry and Fiona, and with them, Klaus liked them both back in the same way, but Jessica was more a friend and he was unsure how to tell her that.
'Look!' Violet said, pointing towards a further area of the garden where Charles and Lars talked, on a bench. Lars was giving his first smile, he was actually
laughing. It was good to see him recover, even if slowly, from Felix's betrayal. 'Oh yes. I knew those two would get along.' Juno Boreas said, taking another sip of coffee.
The conversation was then interrupted by an earthquake. The ground started shaking, all the dishes on the table making noise, some even falling from the table. 'Everybody calm down!' Juno shouted, trying to make herself heard over the disturbing sound of the shaking earth. Beatrice and Sunny started to cry, with Violet and Klaus immediately picking them up and holding them. The far away glass ceiling of the Verdant Forest Dome cringed and cracked, with the menace of a rain of sharp glass shards. Lars and Charles both came to the Baudelaires' and Juno's side.
'Wait, where is Jessica?' Juno asked. She then heard a scream from somewhere in the garden. Jessica.
'Wait, Juno!' Lars shouted, when Juno stormed off in the direction where she heard Jessica scream from. Then, they all followed her. Nothing could have prepared the Baudelaires from what was next.
'Jessica!' Juno shouted, looking all over for her sister, who was nowhere to be found, in the middle of a grass patch in the garden, surrounded by a maze-like hedge structure. Jessica's shriek was the heard again and she appeared, from a passage in the hedge. She had a frightened expression, and there was something strange around her neck. Something metallic. Something sharp.
'Is that...' Violet began to speak, but Klaus finished. '...a hook?'
'Hehehe.' A low toned laughter sounded from behind Jessica. A male's laughter. The male in question suddenly became visible. Violet, Klaus and Sunny Baudelaire let out a sudden outburst of surprise. The metallic object around Jessica's neck
was a hook, and the hook was attached to the arm of a man the Baudelaires surely assumed dead.
'Hi there Baudebrats. Missed me?' Fernald said. He didn't look much different than the last time the Baudelaires had seen him, inside
The Carmelita, the octopus-shaped submarine Count Olaf used to pursue them in the ocean. But Fernald was very pale, as if he hadn't seen the light of day in months.
'Let her go, Fernald!' Klaus shouted angrily, snapping out of the shock of seeing Fernald. 'She's done nothing to you!'
'You have something we want. If you give it to us, we'll let this lass live.' Fernald said, caressing Jessica's neck with his left hook, the cold metal against her skin giving the girl shivers. 'What is it that you want?' Klaus asked. 'And
we? Who's with you?' Klaus asked nervously. He already knew the answer to his question, but was too afraid to say it out loud in case it might come true.
And it did. From behind Fernald came another person the Baudelaires had given up for dead, or lost. This person was a female, a young female that had stolen Klaus' heart during the Baudelaires' ventures underwater only to betray him later, breaking his heart. This female in question still wore the same triangular glasses, but she had changed. Now she was different, her hair was longer and she had become more womanly.
'Fiona!?' Klaus uttered, dazed and confused. 'What are you doing here?'
'Long time no see, Klaus.' Fiona said. 'We have urgent business to discuss, and I sugest you do what we tell you.' Fiona then reached and stuck her hand in the pocket of her brother, Fernald, removing a gun.
'Now. Give us the sugarbowl.' Fiona said, lifting the gun, and holding Klaus in gunpoint - a word which here means Fiona was aiming at Klaus.
The sugarbowl was in Violet's back pack, back at the tea table where they were just sitting at. 'Now, Klaus. We want it, NOW.' Fiona then pointed the gun at Jessica, who was crying. 'Go and get it for us, we have it on good authority you have it. Now, be a dear and go get it for me.'
'No.' Klaus said. Fiona's expression was of shock, then of malice. 'You act as though you actually have a choice. See this?' Fiona then removed something out of her pocket. It was a small transparent capsule containing what could only be described as a deadly, poisonous, horrendous variety of mushroom known as the medusoid mycelium. 'Fernald and I are immune to it. We ate a large meal of sushi with large quantities of wasabi for breakfast. In this closed dome...I wonder what will happen if I break this!'
'Break that capsule and that's the last thing you'll ever do, you heartless little...' Juno said. She was ready to jump at Fiona and do something very violent to her. 'Oh yes. Juno Boreas. I heard about you and your plants. We know about the Fire Flower. We'll be needing one of those too.' Fiona said, a wicked smile on her face. She was nothing like the Fiona the Baudelaires once knew. Paying attention to her, Violet noticed something curious. The symbol of a question mark was embroidered on her jacket, which Fiona wore over a full-body black suit, a suit similar to Fernald's.
'How could you possibly know about the Fire Flower?! I have never heard of it!' Juno shouted angrily, but Fiona laughed.
'Please Miss Boreas, don't waste your time trying to fool us. One of your very own former co-workers told us about your research. He works for the same people we do now.' Fiona said. Juno was shocked. Apparently, she realized who the former worker - and traitor - was. 'How can we survive in our fight...If we keep being betrayed like this...'
'Spare me of your silly displays of emotion. Now. Give us the surgarbowl...and a Fire Flower. We have a deadline we're supposed to meet.' Fiona said.
'I'll go and get the sugarbowl and the flower.' Charles said to Juno. He vanished from everyone's sight, returning moments later with the surgarbowl and a newly plucked Fire Flower.
'Great.' Fiona said. 'Now if you excuse us...' Fiona grabbed the sugarbowl and the fire flower, putting them inside her jacket and then she did then something strange. She pressed a button on the gun, which began to blink. The Baudelaires were expecting someone to be shot, but instead, not a full moment later, the ground started shaking again.
'Release her!' Juno shouted at Fernald. He gave an arrogants smile, disappearing with Fiona and Jessica behind a hedge. There was nothing they could do, specially when a rift formed between them and the escapees; the ground still shaking and a familiar, terrifying red glow inside it. Realizing they had very little time, the Baudelaires, Lars, Charles and Juno ran away from it, avoiding the lava that started to come out. 'Not my garden!' Juno shouted repeatedly, crying, as she looked back to see the lava spreading from the rift, and with it, a fire.
'Where do we go next?' Violet asked. 'We can use the secret path to exit the dome. We can't be here right now! Mt. Gulug must be erupting fiercely!' Charles shouted.
'There is a secret path?' Klaus asked. 'Of course! You didn't think the Aqua Lagoon was the only entrance to this dome, did you?'
And then, the Baudelaires, along with Juno Boreas, Lars Gabriel and Charles made their way to the inside of Juno's house. All the volunteers had already evacuated the house, and grabbing onto sufficient jungle survival kits, they headed to the outside, hoping that there was some way they could steal back the sugarbowl, the Fire Flower, and Jessica Boreas from Fernald and Fiona's clutches.