What if it was Different?

Chapter 4: Dilemma

Holly attempts to call the Hotel Denouement several more times but receives no answers, only silence. She knew that either her Uncle Frank or Uncle Ernest had picked up but some voice in the background had prevented him from speaking to her further. So why couldn't she call back? This was important, their triplet brother was alive and the Baudelaires were not guilty of any crime except for injuring Dewey, but that could be cleared up easily. She puts the phone back on the receiver and wonders if she should attempt to take the cab and go to the hotel herself...

But who would believe her if she had no proof? No one would believe her because she was still seen as a child. Dewey would have to physically walk through the doors to prove this and that would not happen for some time. The Denouement triplet still had a lot of recovering to do, but the doctors were optimistic that he would be back to full health and be able to resume his duties at the hotel, should he choose to do so.

However, Holly knew that Dewey was done with VFD and the hotel. He and Aunt Kit had a baby on the way, her cousin, and they were going to go off and raise her someplace safe. The young Snicket girl desperately wants to go with them, leave all this behind and resume a normal and quiet life. Her mother had always told her that being a part of the organization was her choice and her choice alone. She was never recruited and never told that she had to stay. She could leave if she wanted to. The only reasons she had stayed was due to her wanting to rescue her friends the Quagmires, help her friends the Baudelaires, find her father and discover the secrets behind everything including her family and her mother's murder. Well, the Quagmires were safe as far as she knew up in the Self-Sustaining Hot Air Mobile Home, she had found her father and saw him one more time before he died and she had tried to help the Baudelaire siblings quite a lot, only for her efforts to be in vain or too slow for the situation. Why she had not revealed herself to them at the Hotel and talked to them was something she could not explain. Now, the only remaining reason was for her to discover the secrets about the organization and what surrounded her life. She wanted to learn more about her family and her parents. She knew that her mother had been murdered by two truly sinister villains and what VFD stood for, but the more she attempted to find answers, the more questions she had. Perhaps it's impossible to know all the answers and it was pointless to try any longer. Maybe she can ask Dewey and Kit if she can come live with them because they were her only family left.

All these thoughts rushed through Holly's mind as she went back to see her uncle.

...

The Baudelaires' minds raced and rush like a raging river as they thought about what to do.

"What shall we do?" Violet whispers as quietly as possible.

"Peek," Sunny whispers back.

"If we peek," Klaus whispers, "we'll be guilty of contempt of court."

"Justice Strauss cannot reply right now. She's concentrating very deeply on this case," the sinister deep voice assures the crowd.

The same noise of someone in distress is heard.

"Justice Strauss is fine. She made that noise because she's enjoying a delicious piece of saltwater taffy," a wheezing voice continues.

Violet looks at her siblings, at least who she thinks are her siblings and says, "Maybe this court deserves contempt."

Knowing that this was no longer a just court, they remove their blindfolds.

"The Baudelaires have taken off their blindfolds!" the man with a beard and no hair shouts from above.

"They're guilty of contempt of court!" the woman with hair and no beard continues.

"We certainly are! This court is worthless and dishonourable!" Violet says.