Disclaimer: A Series of Unfortunate Events belongs to Daniel Handler.

Author’s Note: In response to Radioactive Nerd: don’t worry, I’ve been planning a parody of The Reptile Room ever since I started writing this story. I’m going to do parodies of all thirteen books.

Chapter 9: Your Ten Seconds Are Up

Violet gaped and looked across the keyboard at me, giving me the Dagger Stare of Doom. “You apologize to Olaf when you do stuff to him, but you don’t apologize to me?” she griped incredulously.

Hey, all Olaf has done this entire story is walk around in a drunken, stupid state. He deserves ten seconds of evil glory.

“That’s right!” Olaf said, sticking his tongue out at Violet.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten! Okay, Olaf, your ten seconds are up.

“But—”

Look, when I say ten seconds, I mean ten seconds. Your moment of evil glory is officially over. That’s just how it goes…oh, CRAP!

“What now?” Violet asked.

I have the strangest feeling that I just made a continuity error. In the sixth chapter, Olaf said that The Marvelous Marriage was originally called Count Olaf’s Big Dastardly Plot To Steal The Baudelaire Fortune, but last chapter, Olaf didn’t get the idea for his big, dastardly plot until Klaus said something. How do I get myself out of THAT pickle?

“Um…say that Olaf was generating ideas, but he didn’t have a really good one until I confronted him,” Klaus suggested.

That works. Where were we? Ah, I remember. Olaf’s ten-second moment of evil glory was over. Olaf was particularly miffed about that, but his true moment of evil glory was just around the corner! He continued to smile evilly at the two remaining Baudelaires. “So your sister has disappeared,” he said. He suddenly frowned, and pulled out a copy of Villain-Speak For Dummies, which had helped him along throughout the story. “Er…hang on for a sec, I can’t find the section on what to say when a small, helpless baby is in your clutches…oh, here it is. ‘When trying to threaten the older siblings of the baby, say “I’m very sorry to hear that” in an insincere, but not blatantly villainous tone.’” He shoved the book back into his pocket and looked back at Violet and Klaus.

“I’m very sorry to hear that,” he said in an insincere, but not blatantly villainous tone.

Violet and Klaus just gawked at him.

Olaf began to feel self-conscious. “Do I need to work on my performance?” he asked.

“I think you just reached a brand-new level of pathetic,” Klaus said.

“Are you sure he wasn’t at that level already?” Violet said.

Olaf shot them a glare, then peeked at his book again. “Want to see something very strange and scary?” he asked in the creepy tone of voice that he’d perfected over time.

Violet and Klaus looked at him.

The count rolled his eyes. “Not me!” he said. “I’m flattered that you think of me as strange and scary—”

“But mostly strange,” Klaus cut in.

“Shut up!” hissed Olaf. He sighed. “Let’s just go out to the backyard.”

Under normal circumstances, Violet and Klaus wouldn’t have followed that strange freaky man anywhere. However, since they wanted to get to the bottom of the mystery of Sunny’s sudden disappearance, they followed Olaf downstairs and out of the house. They tripped over scraggly weeds and ran into a Venus flytrap that snapped at them. When they got into the backyard, Violet and Klaus saw that Olaf had rearranged the pile of logs so that they would spell out his name. The logs had also been painted for some reason.

“Uh, Count Olaf, why are the logs green?” Klaus asked.

“I like the color green,” Olaf said. “It’s the color of money!” The mere thought of money made Olaf giddy, and he started doing a little victory dance around the backyard. His dance was cut short when he started spinning out of control and smacked into the tower. He rubbed his sore head and glared up at the tower, but he saw something that made him grin again. “Come over here, Baudelaires!”

Violet and Klaus stepped cautiously over to where Olaf was, carefully avoiding some gopher holes in the ground. They looked straight up.

“Hey, look! There’s a full moon tonight!” Klaus said.

“I see a helicopter!” Violet said. The aforementioned helicopter flew by, and the two Baudelaires waved at it.

“You’re looking in the wrong place!” Olaf said. “Look a little more to the right.”

They looked to the right.

“What kind of birds are those?” Violet asked, squinting.

“I might be able to tell you,” Klaus said. “Can you tell what they look like?”

“Well, they’re kind of—”

“You’re still looking in the wrong place!” Olaf interrupted testily. “Look a little more to the center.”

They turned their heads a bit and kept their gaze centered.

Violet noticed the strange and scary something first. “OH MY GOSH!” she screamed. “IT’S A BIRDCAGE!”

Klaus noticed it, too. “OH MY GOSH!” he screamed. “SUNNY’S IN THAT BIRDCAGE!”

“Finally!” Olaf said.

Hanging from the tower window was a birdcage with Sunny Baudelaire in it. Violet and Klaus looked closer and saw that there was a piece of red tape around her mouth and ropes around her body. They saw her mouth move, and suddenly, the red tape fell off.

“Neeka!” she shrieked, which meant, “I can talk through tape! Take that!”

Hey, you know what that reminds me of? One time when my dad was in third grade, he talked a lot, and so his teacher put a piece of tape over his mouth, and my dad talked through the tape and the tape fell off…

While I ranted about my dad’s educational experiences, Violet and Klaus turned around and gave Olaf the Dagger Stare of Doom.

“You let her go, or I swear I’ll pour all your wine down the toilet!” Violet yelled.

“Yeah, and then we’ll hit you in the head with the empty bottles!” Klaus yelled.

I suddenly stopped my rant.

Um, guys, I noticed another continuity error-type thing…

The two Baudelaires rolled their eyes. They were struck by lightning thanks to my author powers, and after that, they were ready to listen.

Well, you know how Olaf didn’t get the idea for his big dastardly plot until last chapter? It doesn’t make sense how he knew to lock Sunny up when he didn’t even have a plan!

“Like you said earlier, I was generating ideas,” said Olaf. “Tormenting Sunny was the first part of my plan. Well, actually, it was Not-Ted’s idea. You know, my bald lackey? So he snuck in and stole Sunny while Violet and Klaus were sleeping.”

Okay. Thanks for the clarification.

“Not-Ted locked Sunny up?” Klaus asked.

“He must have been the one making all that racket last night!” Violet said.

We will now momentarily pause this story for…THE FLASHBACK THAT NOBODY ASKED FOR! I’m so excited!

Flashback.

Violet was sleeping in the lumpy bed, Klaus and I were arguing about him reading Nuptial Law, and Sunny was sleeping peacefully in her little pile of curtains. All was well, more or less.

Suddenly, the door opened and Not-Ted walked in. By that time, Klaus had decided to shut his trap and read the book, which he promptly became engrossed in. Violet was too busy trying to get comfortable to notice. Sunny was lost in a deep sleep. Not-Ted smiled to himself. This was going to be so easy! Boy, was he wrong.

The first sign that things were going wrong was when he stepped on a creaky part of the floor. Violet stirred and turned over. Not-Ted froze in place for a moment, then made his way carefully across the room. The floor continued to creak and squeak.

Now, that bedroom was very dark. Don’t ask me how Klaus could see his book in the dark, because I don’t know. Anyway, the room was dark, and Not-Ted had no clue which direction he was going. He tripped over the toilet-bucket and fell to the floor. The toilet-bucket wiggled back and forth a bit, and some water spilled out (ew, just typing that sounds so gross…), but it didn’t tip over. Not-Ted tried to get up and banged his head against the wall on accident. Ignoring the headache that was forming at the base of his skull, he tried to stand up again. This time, he was successful.

Not-Ted turned in what he assumed was the right direction, then walked that way and smashed into a wall. He turned the other way and promptly hit the cardboard box that was in the middle of the room. He swerved to avoid it and headed toward a corner, then tripped over the pile of rocks and fell flat on his face.

“Olaf needs to put lanterns in here or something!” he said to nobody in particular. He got on his knees and crawled along the ground. His hands searched around until they felt fabric. He eventually picked Sunny up and exited the room, glad that the whole ordeal was over.

End flashback.

“I could barely sleep because of that guy!” Violet groused.

“I didn’t hear anything,” Klaus said.

“That’s because you were reading,” Violet said.

Olaf yawned. “Now that we’ve established the fact that Not-Ted kidnapped Sunny and makes too much noise…”

Violet punched him in the gut.

“OW!” the count cried out in pain. “You hit hard!”

“There’s a lot more where that came from!” Violet snarled. “When we’re finished with Daniels—er, I mean, when we’re finished with you”—here she glared at me for putting words in her mouth again—“we’ll hunt down Not-Ted and give him the beating of his life! Unless, of course, you promise to let Sunny go. Let her go, or we’ll make good on our promise!”

“Yeah, what she said!” Klaus agreed.

“Why, certainly,” Olaf said with a grin. He fished around in his junk-filled pockets, pulled out a walkie-talkie, and pressed a button. “Let her go!”

The birdcage started dropping rapidly to the ground.

“Harivi!” Sunny screamed, which meant, “Bad choice of words, Violet!”

“NOOOOOOOO!” Violet and Klaus wailed dramatically.

“Oh, fine,” Olaf said. He spoke into the walkie-talkie again. “Stop that cage!”

The birdcage paused.

Sunny let out a sigh of relief.

“You guys always ruin my fun, you know that?” Olaf grouched.

Violet ignored him and nudged Klaus. “Look at how close the birdcage is to the ground,” she said, pointing at it. “If we just walk over there while Olaf and his lackeys aren’t around, we could rescue Sunny!”

Someone pulled the birdcage up high again, so it was out of reach.

“There goes your great idea,” Klaus muttered.

“Speaking of great ideas,” said Olaf, who had heard Klaus, “I have one.” He knelt down in front of Violet, pulled a box out of his pocket, and opened it. He held it out to her. “Violet Baudelaire, will you marry me in the play?”

“That’s a mood ring,” Violet said, peering into the box.

“It was the only ring I could find,” Olaf said sheepishly. “So, will you marry me, mood rings and all?”

“NO!” Violet objected.

Olaf pulled out the walkie-talkie. “Hey, Fernald, feel free to loosen your hold on that rope…”

“NO!” Violet shouted again.

Olaf shoved the walkie-talkie back into his pocket and crossed his arms. “There you have it,” he said. “Marry me, or your sister bites the dust. Take your pick.”

“Wait!” Klaus said. “What if…what if I took Violet’s place?” He cringed as he said it.

Violet looked at him with a grateful smile.

Olaf looked at him like he was insane. “Are you kidding? Who would want to marry you?” he asked. Without waiting for a reply, he turned back to Violet. “Well?”

Violet gulped. “Well…I guess…I’ll do it,” she said. She hung her head in shame.

Olaf smirked and went back into the house.

Tears welled up in Klaus’s eyes and his lower lip quivered. He summed up the situation with four words.

“We are so screwed!”

Author’s Note: The story about my dad and the tape is also true. He told me about it one day.