As Ginger grew older, so strengthened the bond she had with her parents. However, it was an oddity to the couple that she would rather assist them with chores around the nest, such as ridding it of the vermin that so often spawned within the twigs, than play around the nest and let them do all the work themselves, as they'd expected of her. Nonetheless, they weren't about to discourage it; an owlet with a good work ethic was a blessing in disguise, and seeing that there were no other owlets around for her to busy herself with, Ethan and Nutmeg were the only ones she could really be influenced by.

That, however, was about to change.

It was a year after Ginger first tasted meat with the fur and bones still attached. The afternoon sun was dimmed by cloud cover, and out of the three Barn Owls in the nest, only two of them were actually asleep.

Nutmeg, unbeknownst to her family, was in the middle of something grand.

It'd all started with what she thought was the STRANGEST of dreams. She'd become a chicken, for some reason, and was laying perhaps one egg every two seconds, and they'd accumulated so much that they filled the entire coop. Of course, being a dream, it didn't seem odd that the human who'd come to visit her was able to fit all of the dozens and dozens of eggs in his basket at once before ordering that she keep it up.

And that was when she'd woken up, and found out just how much of a COINCIDENCE it was that she have a dream like THAT.

It seemed like she'd unknowingly done most of the work while she was dreaming, and that her actions there had reached into the real world, so it only took one more minute for her to finally finish what she'd started.

When she was done, Nutmeg stood up and looked in the nest beneath her. Oh, boy...After what she and Ethan had been up to during the day just a few nights ago, they should have been expecting this to happen. The good news was that they'd been discussing the matter, anyway, lately...Still, he had to know about this.

Now.

She nudged her mate, hoping not to disturb the owlet curled up against him. Nothing. So, she tried again, a bit harder and along the facial disc. This time, he shifted, and seeing the empty space beside him, acknowledged that Nutmeg was awake.

"Hm?" he mumbled, opening his eyes to the unpleasantly bright sunlight. "What is it...?"

"I need you to look at this," she whispered.

"What? What do I need to-"

He turned his head to the side to see what Nutmeg was pointing down at, and his tired eyes popped right open at the sight of it.

"...Is that a-"

She nodded. Ethan's eyes grew wider, but a smile slowly stretched across his beak. The couple looked each other in the eyes, then down at the egg, and then down at...

Ethan whistled. How was Ginger going to react when she knew about this?

"...Think she'll be jealous?" he asked her.

"No idea. We won't know until..."

"Hm...? What?"

The downy owl shifted in the nest, and her eyes slowly opened. She found herself looking up at her parents, who were, strangely, wide awake, and staring right back down at her. In the middle of the day? Her little owlet brain immediately figured that something was going on.

"What's going on?" she asked them, sitting up in the nest.

Her parents exchanged glances once again, then Nutmeg let out a small huff of a sigh. It'd be better that she know sooner than later.

"We have news," she told her. "BIG news."

"What big news?"

Ethan pointed down into the nest.

"Look."

She tipped her head down to see what her father was motioning towards.

There in the nest sat a milky white orb. An egg. Her future sibling. Ginger's eyes grew wider and wider every passing second.

"So...Your input on this?" Nutmeg asked her.

Her beak, which had been opened into a giant 'O' of surprise, immediately turned up into a goofy grin.

Well. THAT was a good sign.

"This is amazing..." she whispered, her stubby wings squished against her face in awe."

"You're gonna be a big sister," her father told her. "What do you think of that?"

The owlet emitted a somewhat muted, high-pitched squeal of excitement.

"Hey...Speaking of big, would you look at that?"

Ginger cocked her head, not sure what her father meant by 'that'.

"Your wings," he pointed out.

The owlet took a look at her wings, and saw an unfamiliar sight through the down coating them; there were little black...somethings scattered across each wing, just beneath her thin skin. Some of them looked about ready to poke right through to the outside.

Having no idea what this meant, she was fairly alarmed by this.

"Wh-what's this? What's happening?" she begged her father, hoping she wasn't in an danger.

"Pin feathers," he explained. "Once they come through the skin, they'll start to grow, and eventually, they'll look like this."

The Barn Owl spread his own wing, displaying the large, ruddy brown flight feathers the covered it.

"And when they get like this, that's when we'll teach you how to fly like me and your mother."

"TWO things to celebrate, now!" Nutmeg chimed in. "Isn't that something?"

"Wow..."

Ginger marveled at the little black pin feathers dotted across her wings.

"...How long will it be until they're like yours?"

"I'd say another...mmm..." Ethan surmised, doing the math in his head. "Six years? Maybe less?"

"Until then, you, your father and I will be plenty busy with whoever comes out of that egg. Looking forward to it?"

The owlet nodded, still staring at the white orb in the nest, awestruck. Questions flooded her mind. What would it be? A buff? Another leia, like herself? What would he or she look like? Dad? Mom? Both? Neither? Would it look anything like her? Would it ACT anything like her? She would get the answers to these questions eventually, but until then, they were all going to have to pitch in and make sure the egg came along alright.

One thing was for sure: the following month was destined to be a very busy one.