Okay, okay, It's here! 'Shattered" is finally up. Also, I lied about the date of it being up, I went on a writing spree late last night and found this story, and I finally FINISHED IT NOW! We'll start with a simple prolouge:

It's been five years since the end of ASOUE, and the Baudelaires have separated. Violet is 20 and lives with the also 20 Quigley. Both are quite succesful with their jobs (Violet as an inventor and Quigley as a map-maker who maps all the important places VFDers have explored). Sunny is 6, and is watched over by 18-year-old Klaus, who works as a professor's aide at a very prestigious university in town. Sunny, on the other hand, is readily expanding her cooking skills and sometimes even cooks dinner for Klaus and herself. Both sides of the Baudelaire line live in beautiful homes, bought with portions of the Baudelaire fortune Violet has inherited. The rest she split between the two familes, evn though it is rightfully hers. All four work as VFDers, and helped the organization spring back to its former glory, although now more tightly guarded.

And Olaf? He's doing hard time at the Ima Fealon Maximum-security prison on the outskits of town. He's doing life with no chance of being set free, in solitary confinement.

Sounds like a pretty happy ending, right?

Well, not quite. For as the four unlucky orphans of the past grew up, Olaf began planning his revenge, and now, five years later, Olaf's planning to escape and put his evil plan into action.

Disclaimer: I don't own ASOUE, and I don't own any product referances in this story.

Enjoy Chapter one!

Violet sat at the kitchen table of her new home, tinkering with a small robotic spider that she had come up with a few days ago. Having only honeymooned and wed two weeks ago, she felt rather relaxed and able to focus on her current project. She was just tightening one of the last screws when her husband entered.

"Good morning, dear," Quigley said, leaning over to Kiss Violet on the cheek.

"Good morning," Violet replied, smiling. She flicked a switch on the underside of the robot and watched it skitter across the table on its spindly legs, as if it had a mind of its own. The robot peered up at its creator with bugged eyes, blinked, and then skittered over to Quigley. Violet smiled thinly as Quigley picked up her invention.

"Well," she said, "Say something."

"Something," Quigley said wryly.

The robot looked at Quigley and appeared to process this word before slowly repeating it back in a hihg, but unmistakibly robotic voice.

"S... S-ome... thing... Something!"

Quigley jumped, then was spooked again by the robot suddenly leaping out of his palm, landing on the table, and skittering around, repeating the word it had just learned from Quigley over and over.

"My God, Violet!" Quigley said in amazement, "I've seen you make some pretty amazing things, but never anything that could speak!"

Violet grinned. "It's small enough to fit in places the typical person could not ordinarily reach," she explained, taking the small machine off the table and flicking the switch off. "And it's smart enough to evaluate any problem it could come across. It's programmed to learn from its mistakes."

"So, it could be used to scope out a scene before a volunteer went in."

"Exactly."

Quigley grinned. "We should invite your siblings over to celebrate."

"An excellent idea," Violet said, "But first, we must show this to L."

Sunny stood in the kitchen, her brother keeping a close and solicitous watch over her.

"What are you going to make, Sunny?" Klaus asked, watching the six-year-old rummage through various ingrediants in the pantry and refridgerator.

"I'm going to make Breakfast Burrito Crepes," she said. "I'm going to roll up fruit in crepes, which are thin pancakes, and make orange julises to go with them. I'm also going to garnish with whipped cream." Sunny continued her search, taking out several types of fruits, eggs, flour, vanilla extract, oranges, ice, whipped cream, ice cream, the blender, several pots and pans, a whisk, and a spatula.

"That sounds delicious, Sunny. Be careful that you don't burn yourself. And be VERY careful with the knives."

"I will. Geez, Klaus, I'm not three years old, you know."

"I know," Klaus said, smiling. "But You're my little sister, and I care about you. I just don't want you to get hurt, that's all."

Sunny rolled her eyes and began to mix the ingrediants for the crepe batter together.

Klaus shook his head and returned to his private library.

Lemony examined the spidery robot in his palm with a critical eye. The robot peered up at the VFD leader and blinked once, then said "You big!"

Lemony smiled, something that he rarely ever did. Violet and Quigley watched eagerly as the robot and Lemony interacted with each other, then watched it leap onto Lemony's typewriter and look at it curiously.

"What this?" the robot asked, blinking at its creator.

"Typewriter," Violet explained. She demonstrated by typing out the word 'hello' on the paper, then set it back to the edge of the margin, causing the writing tool to make a satisfying ding! The Robot looked at the keys, then the words, and typed 'hello' onto the paper just as it had seen Violet do.

"So, L," Quigley asked, "Do you think that this will work as a tool?"

Lemony watched the robot finish typing 'hello' a fourth time and said "Yes, I beleive so, if it truely can evaluate situations in a rational manner as you say."

The robot soon became bored with writing 'hello' over and over, and glanced at the keys, evaluating how it should step to type out other words.

"What shall we call it, then?" Violet asked. "It should be VFD-oriented in some way, shouldn't it?"

The robot overheard this conversation about its name, thought it over quickly, then typed something else on the paper. A few moments later, the three adults had their conversation interrupted by the ding! of the typewriter reaching the paper's margin. Th group looked down at the robotic spider, then Violet read aloud what it had typed.

"Virtually Finding Data," she read. "VFD!"

"Vee... Eff... Dee!" Virtually Finding Data chirped. It begain to skitter around Lemony's typewriter, chanting the three initials over and over, making the group collectively laugh.

The phone rang. (A/N: No, there ISN'T any Sebald Code in this last bit of text.)

"Hello?" Klaus answered. "Oh, hi, Violet! How has your job been going? Another invention accepted by VFD? That's great!"

Sunny entered carrying two cupcakes she had just made.

"Who's on the phone?" She asked, setting down the desserts.

"It's Violet."

"Can I talk with her?"

"Sure," Klaus said, handing Sunny the phone. He looked at the cupcakes, then took one and peeled off the paper wrapping. It was chocolate with vanilla frosting and cream filling. He took a bite and listened to Sunny's conversation.

"Hi! How are you? Oh, I'm fine; I just got braces put on. The ties are red and yellow. The orthodontist said that he's impressed that all of my baby teeth grew out as quickly as they did, and he told me that I have a strong mouth and very healthy teeth, but my adult ones came in a bit crooked, that's why I got braces. He even gave me this nifty little brush to go under the brackets!"

Klaus rolled his eyes. He knew all too well that if Sunny ever got on the phone, she'd talk for hours and hours on end.

"What?" Sunny asked, continuing the conversation. "You're inviting us over for dinner tonight? That's a great idea! I'll make my extra-special dessert for the occasion. No, I'm not going to tell you, no matter how much you say 'please.' It's a surprise!"

"Okay, Sunny," Klaus said, stopping Sunny before she could get too carried away. "You've already racked up a high phone bill twice this year. I think it's time you get off before that happens a third time."

Sunny rolled her eyes and said "Bye" before handing the phone back to Klaus and eating her cupcake.

"So, you're inviting us over for dinner? What are you going to make? It's a surprise? Okay, I suppose I'll just prepare for the worst, then."

This last comment made both siblings laugh.

"Okay, I love you, too. See you at 6:00 to night. Bye."

I know, I know, lame, boring chapter, but I had to give you an idea of how they're living currently. The next chapter is going to be from Olaf's P.O.V., so it's going to be pretty freaky... O.o