Closed: An Ersatz Guardian

[biteybaby]

Like most people Sunny's age, she tends to wake up bright and early. Unlike most people Sunny's age, Magnu Chase is normally at her house when she wakes up these days. She honestly just expects it at this point. Today Sunny wakes up and her first stop is, of course, the potty. She's very proud of herself for making it all the way through the night without peeing in her diaper! Potty lessons have been going well. She even found some fancy diapers that she can pull up and get on all by herself, so she barely needs any help at all these days. She's a very independent woman, after all.

Far and Apu are still sleeping, so Sunny is very quiet as she picks out an outfit to wear, and she's very quiet as she gets Magnu to help her put on the outfit, and she's very quiet as she spills Lucky Charms all over the place while pouring them into a little baggy to carry with her on the adventures she and Magnu are going to have today.

Eventually Sunny is all ready to go, she even has a sippy cup of watered down apple juice (Magnu took care of that one, after the Lucky Charms mishap), and they are out the door ready to go.

"Plans?" Sunny asks, by which she means, "What are we going to do today?"

Comments

[summerdude]

"Sharp rocks," Magnus agrees. "And... there are some critters, but Galahad hasn't looked them up yet so I don't know if they're, like, poisonous or anything."

[biteybaby]

"Oh." She doesn't think the sharp rocks would be a problem, she did climb up a 66 story tall concrete wall several times a few months ago using her teeth, but poison is dangerous. "Won't. Only eat cereal."

[summerdude]

"If there's anything that looks particularly biteable, maybe we can put it in my backpack and take it back to look up first."

[biteybaby]

Sunny walks around a little, exploring, until she finds a nice flat rock jutting out from the wall. She points at it. "Sit here?" She needs help getting up on it though.

[summerdude]

"Totally. Do you want a boost or a lift?" Magnus asks -- they've been working on Magnus using his body as an extra ledge she can use to clamber up things if she doesn't feel like getting picked up.

[biteybaby]

"Yeah, climb!" she says, and then begins climbing up Magnu so she can sit on the rock.

[summerdude]

Magnus winces as her knee goes right into his side, but he holds steady so that she can make her way to the ledge on her own steam.

[biteybaby]

She clambers on to the rock and turns back around to sit very comfortably, completely unaware that she kneed Magnu in the side at all. "Pickick time!"

[summerdude]

"Picnic time!" Magnus agrees. He opens his backpack to unload cereal and juice. He also has some granola bars from camp, in case that suits her fancy, and adds them to the array of stuff on the ledge next to her.

[biteybaby]

Sunny likes cereal best when it is like this. Not floating around in milk that makes it mushy. She grabs a handful out of the baggie and shoves it in her mouth. "Agnu," she says, trying to say 'Magnu' with a mouth full of cereal, then changes course when she realizes it's harder to speak like that. Sunny need talk, she signs.

[summerdude]

Magnus chews his enormous bite of granola bar and swallows it. "What's up?" he asks.

[biteybaby]

"Polly... bad?" she asks, meaning, "Is Uncle Polly a bad person?"

[summerdude]

Magnus... chokes on his granola bar!

He has to hack out half a lung, essentially, before he can catch his breath and clear his throat. "Um," he say. "Why do you ask?"

[biteybaby]

Sunny doesn't know how to make someone stop choking, so she's glad when Magnu seems to sort it out on his own. "Cause," she explains, "Argued Apu."

[summerdude]

"He got in a fight with Pops?????" Sagramore fights with people?????

[biteybaby]

Sunny nods. "Apu ask baby," she says, which here means, "Apu was asking him to talk about his children. Did you know he has children?"

[summerdude]

"Yeah," Magnus admits. "I've met a bunch of them when I was visiting my cousin and her boyfriend. They both have parents who are... related... to Apollo. My cousin Annabeth's mom is Athena, who is Apollo's half-sister, I think? And her boyfriend Percy's dad is Poseidon. Apollo's uncle. So I'd say they've introduced me to at least three or four of his current kids."

[biteybaby]

"Ask kids. Can't amember," Sunny explains. By this, she means, "That's where most of the disagreement started, I think. Apu asked about Polly's kids, and he couldn't remember how many he has."

[summerdude]

Magnus frowns. "I guess it must be hard to keep track of, like, thousands of them," he says, as neutrally as he can manage. This is, in truth, not very neutral at all.

[biteybaby]

"Start omilia better, kidquess, bad, bad quess, Magnu," she looks at Magnu very seriously for this next part and says, "Lost kids."


What she means is, naturally, "He started talking about how he's trying to be better, but that he still has to send his kids on quests? And they're bad! Bad quests, not just going to the store to get ingredients for dinner, they sounded like they were really dangerous, Magnu, because he said he's even lost some of them. And I don't know if he misplaced them or if they're dead, and to tell you the truth I'd be surprised if he knew himself, since he can't even count them all."

[summerdude]

Magnus pulls himself up onto the little ledge Sunny's sitting on so he can be right next to he. "Sunny," he warns. "I'm very biased on this subject. I have... strong opinions. My dad is a god, too. So is Alex's mom. From a different religion than your Apollo and Uncle D, but... I'll tell you what I think, but you should know that up front."

[biteybaby]

Sunny nods, then asks, "Jerome?" Sunny has undoubtedly told Magnu all about Jerome Squalor by now. She has told him about how Jerome had a big nice home, where all three of the Baudelaire orphans had their own bedrooms, and how, even though they may have been oversized and ugly, he got clothes for them, and how they had plenty to eat, even if it was sometimes gross food, and how they didn't have to do all of the horrible chores and other tasks that they had to do with certain guardians who shall remain nameless. But she has also told him how, even though Jerome had all of these nice qualities, he abandoned them, right when they actually needed his help. How the Quagmires are, at least as far as Sunny knows, still kidnapped, because Jerome refused to do anything. How he was scared, and in being scared he failed to do the most basic task a guardian is meant to do, which is to help keep them safe. How he walked away from them, seemingly not even caring.

So when Sunny asks, "Jerome?", Magnu will know that what she means is, "Do you think he's like Jerome Squalor?"

[summerdude]

Magnus is quiet for a long moment. "I don't know," he says. "I, um, kind of avoid him because we don't get along. I think maybe my dad is like Jerome. My bio dad, not, like, Hanguang-jun or Pops. He... he also sends me on quests. He told me it was my job to save the world. So I guess Apollo could be like Jerome, too." Magnus, however, is of the opinion that he's worse!

[biteybaby]

"I'msorry," she says, in regards to his bio dad being like Jerome. She pats Magnu's leg. "Why don't like Polly?"

[summerdude]

"Kind of for the reasons you outlined," Magnus says, ruffling Sunny's ponytail. It's a little askew, because he's still learning how to do it right. "And he was wearing Percy's clothes when he got here. And I've, um. Heard stories from Annabeth about how he's acted on her and Percy's quests. And I don't like that most gods in my world neglect their kids."