fandomhigh | Creature Languages, 1/12, Period 3

A fishbowl-sized terrarium has been placed on Dream's desk, and students who look closely may notice a small brown arachnid within it, crouched between two rocks.

"Hello.

I have decided to start the term with a discussion with a creature who many of you might be wary of, a Brown Recluse Spider. Like all spiders, brown recluses are arachnids, not insects. This means they have only two body segments instead of three; a fused head and thorax (called a cephalothorax or prosoma) and an abdomen (called the opisthosoma), supported by an exoskeleton composed mainly of chitin.

Spiders also have eight legs (insects have six), no antennae, and their eyes are single lenses rather than compound eyes. Additionally spiders have pedipalps (or just palps), at the base of which are coxae or maxillae next to their mouth that aid in masticating food; the ends of the palp are modified in adult males into elaborate and often species specific structures used for mating.

In short? Do not refer to our guest, who you may call Aunt Nancy, as a "bug."

And do not fear her. Brown recluses bite only when disturbed, and she is bold for her breed. No harm will come to you from her."

As he speaks, Dream reaches into the terrarium and draws out the small brown spider. She crouches on his palm, then waves a foreleg.

//Hey there, children.//

"She is greeting you. I will interpret for the duration of class, but I believe you will pick up on her cues soon enough."

"As always, I am in my office after class."

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Roll call.

Say something to Aunt Nancy.

Pass notes, chat, listen to the lecture, etc.

Dream and Aunt Nancy are in his office after class.

Blair signs in.

Blair finds a seat and sits, sniffling slightly and pulls out a notebook to write down his notes from the lecture.

Jake signs in.

Jake waved hello back to Aunt Nancy. "Do spiders like coffee?" he asked, curious.

Blair grins nervously and waves. "Hey there...Aunt Nancy...fine...um...tank you've got there."

Blair shook his head and tried again. "What do you wish you could tell people, like if you could talk to them all the time?"

Aunt Nancy shuffles on Dream's palm.

//Dearie me, boy, I hardly ever get enough to say! But I did have a cousin who lived in the rafters at a coffee shop once. He lived off the spilled stuff and was always busy, all over the place like a bee or a gnat. Built the biggest web of anyone in our clan, too, we were all so proud.//

Aunt Nancy bounces at the boy's nervousness.

//Shucks, don't be afraid of me! Morpheus here told me I needed to be nice to you guys, and I will.

And tell your friends that, too -- don't be afraid of us brown recluses. We'll only bite if somebody scares us -- well, wouldn't you, you're so much larger than we are and there ain't much else we can do. So be careful and respect our space, and we'll respect yours.//

Paige signs looking tired and sad.

Xander signed in and looked curiously at the spider, not especially unnerved by her. ~~Because he's from California and doesn't get the annual health and safety freakout announcements that come out every summer in the midwest about Brown Recluses.~~

Blair grins and bounces back. "I am sort of afraid of spiders but I think it's because I listened to too many stories as a kid and possibly because I watched this movie with 50 ft spiders in it once but maybe I could be more respectful and not as scary!" Blair bounced and smiled. "What are things you like doing? Do spiders have hobbies?"

Paige looks at Aunt Nancy for a moment before deciding on her question, "Are you one of the breeds of spiders that eats their mate?" she asks, not meaning to offend her, right now she thinks it's a pretty good system.

Xander shuddered, given his own experiences with mate-eating insects. Spiders might not make hm nervous, but that certainly gave him the flaming heebie-jeebies.

Xander tilted his head and considered the creature politely. "Any particular story behind 'Aunt Nancy'?" he asked ~~while his mun groaned because she just got it~~. "Do you have a lot of little nephew and niece spiders running...er, crawling around?"

Aunt Nancy shoots out a little jet of web at this question.

//Do I do what? No, honey. Truth to tell, we don't see much of the boys -- they come around at mating time and then run back off to their own webs. No need to eat 'em, they're gone before we get hungry.//

//It's just what people 'round here call me, sugar. We spiders lay lots of eggs, so it's true enough. I don't have that large a family by our standards, though, only a couple dozen kids who made it through the winter and a few hundred nieces and nephews.//

Paige frowns slightly, "I'm sorry I didn't mean any offence, it's just that's what black widows do right?"

//Hobbies? Mostly I like to hang out in my web, watch the world go by ... when I was younger I used to spend all my time tryin' to make the prettiest web I could, but turns out a simple one's easier and draws just as much for me to eat.

I spent some time in a bowling alley. Liked watching the games, there. And I love fussing over my family.//

//No offense taken, it's just not anything I'd want to do. There's too much else to eat without starting on the men.// If Paige understood Spider, she would be able to tell Aunt Nancy's answer was good-natured.

Dream interjects at this point. "Some breeds do eat their mates much of the time, Miss Matthews, yes. Brown recluses don't. Animal cultures are as particular as human ones."

"Sweet," Jake replied, nodding. "If you're going to stick around, I could bring you some coffee later. I have lots." Knowing he could heal from darn near everything, made Jake pretty fearless when it came to animals and creepy crawlies.

"That'd make for a whole lot of Christmas presents to buy if you were a human family!" Xander answered.

She smiles slightly at Aunt Nancy, "yeah good point," she says to her.

She nods to Dream then, "of course, thank you sir."

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Creature Languages, 1/12, Period 3

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