Open: Well young lady, have you been good to your mother?

[biteybaby]

Sunny Baudelaire has been having quite an exciting time lately. For once, "exciting" means "filled with fun" and not "filled with terror, pain, panic, and an inordinate amount of running and hiding". Without the threat of Count Olaf and his associates finding her in an attempt to steal the Baudelaire fortune, Sunny has had more time for her studies. "Her studies" is a phrase which here means, "catching up on learning how to do things most people take for granted".

She has finally learned how to walk. She thinks the amount of words she is now able to say has increased. Magnu has even taught her a few things in sign language, which she finds is a little easier than speaking. The biggest news is that she now has five very sharp teeth, as opposed to the four she started with when she arrived.

Shortly before she arrived, Mr Poe had told the Baudelaires about an aphorism: It takes a village to raise a child. She wonders if that is why she has had so much time to grow. Her days are spent rotating around between several different guardians, babysitters, and friends, and it has been lovely. She hopes her siblings are having just as good of a time in the village of V.F.D.

Unfortunately I must report that her siblings are not having just as good of a time in the village of V.F.D., nor are they even still in the village of V.F.D. Sunny does not know this. It would probably be for the best if nobody tells her.

Comments

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad tries to imagine anything but maggots coming from fly eggs -- the idea of tiny dwarves hatching out instead strikes him as something Susan would hate. "No eggs," he tells Sunny firmly. "That's why Magnus can't grow you."

[biteybaby]

Sunny pouts. Have any of the flowers ever gotten eggs from Magnu? Probably not. This sounds like baseless conjecture to her, but she won't keep arguing it. For now, anyway.

[summerdude]

"Sorry, Sunny," Magnus says, ruffling her little ponytail and dislodging more dragonflies in the process. "But you know what? Big people have a harder time making friends with all these bugs. Because of the, um, size difference." Go along with this, he mouths to Galahad over her head, and then adds, "So since you're still little, you can help us see the one we might miss otherwise. Because we're big."

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad's best friend should remember that he's constitutionally incapable of lying! However, he says gamely, "You're closer to the ground."

[biteybaby]

She nods. That's what she's been saying all along! The ground is where a lot of bugs live, and since her eyes are closer to it she will be able to see them better. She wasn't anticipating so many flying bugs, but she should be able to see the ground ones pretty easily. She starts crawling around, on the hunt.

[summerdude]

Obviously Magnus knows that Galahad can't lie, but he's doing a great job of bending the truth today for Sunny's benefit. Overcome with fondness, Magnus grins at his best friend, ruffles his hair, and then flops on his belly to watch Sunny crawl.

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad pulls his sketchbook out of his messenger bag and begins preserving the moment.

[biteybaby]

Sunny sees a bug, but it hops away before she can grab it. “Fast,” she says.

[summerdude]

"If you move really slow and hold out your hand, sometimes they'll land on you," Magnus tells her.

[onthewillowsthere]

"They do," Galahad says, because that is truthful.

[biteybaby]

She tries this method. Nothing happens for a long time, but eventually she spots a brightly colored worm nearby, so she scoots over to it. After a very, incredibly, super, unfathomably long amount of time -- a phrase which here means, "approximately 30 seconds" -- the worm crawls onto her fingers.

"Aaaaaaah," she says, not out of fear but out of a sense of not really knowing what to do at this point.

[summerdude]

"Now you can look at it really close-up," Magnus tells her. "Or you can poke it very gently."

[onthewillowsthere]

"If you hold it up for me I'll draw it."

[biteybaby]

She very carefully holds her hand up for Galahad to see. "Hair," she says, pointing first to the tendrils sticking up off the caterpillar's back, then to her own hair sticking straight up off her head.

[summerdude]

"Yeah," Magnus laughs. "It's like you in caterpillar form."

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad isn't quick, but as he begins sketching he quickly, for him, gives the caterpillar Sunny's face.

[biteybaby]

It starts to crawl out of her hand and up her arm, and she doesn't know what to do about that!

[summerdude]

"If you move your other hand onto your arm, it'll crawl onto that one," Magnus tells her, and flops closer so that he can demonstrate, letting the caterpillar climb onto his finger.

[biteybaby]

As soon as the caterpillar is on Magnu, Sunny puts her arm down. "Magnu keep," she says, because she didn't really like how it felt crawling around on her arm. She is still looking at it very closely though.

[summerdude]

"You got it, boss." Magnus lifts his finger away from Sunny's arm, but keeps his hand close, so she can inspect it at her leisure.

[onthewillowsthere]

He turns his sketchbook around so they can see the Sunny version of the caterpillar.

[biteybaby]

Sunny looks, then bursts into giggles. "Sunny!"

[summerdude]

"Do you want us to build you a cocoon, Sunny?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"A pupa."

[biteybaby]

"Huh?" She doesn't know what those things are.