Yes! Your favorite author is BACK! And this time, she has prepared . . . *drumroll begins* A FUN ONE! That's right, I'm poking fun at all our favorite characters! But no worries — I still love 'em.

I think this story is somewhat amusing, and hopefully you will too, so just read it already!

Hoohoo, hoohoo, WHOOPS! We're reading Antigone in English (it's an old Greek play) and today we had debates about it. My debate was on the character CREON in the play. So I had just made a killer opening statement, and this is what I said next: "So who is the most egotistical, sexist, self-serving character in the play? Cleon — obviously."

It took me a while to figure out what went wrong. Sadly, two of my friends were in that class, and they know about my somewhat obsessive obsession with all things Tammy. They teased me the rest of the day. Well, one did — the other didn't notice. How sad is that?

Chapter One

In Which Kitten Is Very Bad

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The day began like any other.

The sparrows woke everyone in the second year knight's wing at dawn with their incessant chattering. Kel rolled over and rubbed her eyes, blinking blearily and feeling three soft balls of fluff perching on her chest. She smiled, and another one landed on her forehead and poked her in the eye. "Ow!" she cried, eye watering. She closed the wounded feature. Clumsily, looking at the world from a two dimensional perspective, she went to fetch their seeds.

Neal opened one eye, saw the birds flitting above his blanket, and took a swipe at them, but his sleep-clouded brain wouldn't function, and he missed. Nevertheless, it is a fair guess that he would not have been able to hit them anyway.

The rest of the second year knights – Kel and Neal's yearmates –pulled the blankets over their heads with groans and tried to fall back asleep.

Daine was awakened when Jump, true to his one-syllable name, leaped onto the bed and landed on her blanketed form. The air was forced out of her body with a whoof. Jump barked, happy that she was trying to speak his language, and began to frantically wash Daine's face. Beside her, Numair raised his head. "Midear," he said, burying his face in the pillow. "How did that blasted dog get in? I thought we locked the door!"

Kitten, listening at the door, gave a self-satisfied chuckle and waited for Daine to come out and feed her. She would teach those mortals to make her wait!

Alanna, visiting the Palace from her home of Pirate's Swoop, bounded out of bed, fully dressed, and started doing pushups.

All over the Palace, people began their morning rituals, mainly washing their faces and trying to sneak out of whoever's room they were in last night without being caught.

However, Daine did not have that problem. She was in the kitchen, trying to make breakfast and not succeeding. She swore eloquently, sat down, and thought.

Numair was in his workroom when he heard her call for the first time. He ignored her and kept dictating to his magicked quill, which recorded whatever he said.

" . . . therefore, after taking into account the hypostatical degree to which the experimental material was insulated and the inference that was propagated by the conglomerational proportions, I have just three more experiments to go before I conclude that, indeed, hugs are better than drugs."

Daine called again from the kitchen. "Numair! Help me make toast!"

"I'm rather busy, Daine!" he called back, exasperated. The quill diligently wrote that out. Numair swore at the bug in his spell, and the quill recorded that, too.

"Please? Help?"

"I can't! I don't have the –" he broke off.

Daine had whispered the password to the door, which then let her through – Kitten had to be kept out of the dangerous magical environment, which was why the door was protected in the first place. Daine sauntered into the room and sidled up to him. She stuck her face in the nape of his neck and started whispering all manner of things, which shall be left unsaid, the key factor being that he help her make toast before she proceeded to do any of them.

After several seconds, Numair gave in – although it was more of the fact that her nose was tickling him than he wanted her to do the several interesting things she promised she would. He followed her out of the door of his workroom.

In the split second after both humans had cleared the doorway and before the door's spell was reapplied, Kitten snuck into the room.

She paused, lifting herself onto her forepaws and peering around happily. Kitten immediately spotted the magicked quill, standing at attention on the desk. She trotted over to it, her silver talons making slight scratching noises on the hard stone floor.

Kitten pulled herself onto the table. She narrowed her slitted eyes and croaked at the quill. It scratched across the paper for a few seconds, leaving a trail of wet ink, then halted again. Kit's eyes widened. She trilled. The quill scratched. Kitten paused. Then she carefully picked up the quill in her razor sharp teeth and concealed herself by the door, ready to jump out the door when someone re-entered the workroom.

Just scant minutes later, Numair stalked into the room, muttering the password and then continuing on with, "I can't believe she wouldn't do it." Kitten hustled through the opening and trotted proudly under the bed, where Daine sat, triumphantly eating toast.

***

Kel, finishing up a pattern dance, whirled her glaive in the move "The Courageous Rabbit" and finished by hacking a chip from the doorjamb. She surveyed her work grimly. "One enemy down, cleaved through the neck," she said approvingly, running her fingers over the row of gashes in the wood.

"My dearest Lady Knight!" cried a male voice from the hall. "I see that you're back to your destructive habits. Tsk, tsk."

Kel's eyes widened. She thrust the weapon onto its stand above the fireplace, jamming her finger between the wall and the staff of the glaive. She swore and shook her hand.

Someone threw muscular arms around her and gave her a backwards hug. Released, she turned and looked slightly up, staring into the bright blue eyes of the man standing behind her. "Nice to see you, too," she said seriously.

Dom laughed. "Admit it. You're more than happy to see me."

Kel was about to open her mouth and agree, but she caught herself. Dom, like Neal, would never know of the monster crush she had on him. Instead, she asked, "What are you doing here? Isn't Third Company on the road?"

Dom shook his head. "We got called back — winter's closed off all the roads north, so we're stuck here until the thaw." Kel swallowed, heart beating wildly. "Now," he continued, slinging an arm around her shoulder, "We have orders to go find Lord Raoul. He wanted to talk to you, and I think that I'll just come along for the ride."

They strolled through the door.

***

Daine walked back into her rooms, exhausted after a morning with some stubborn stallions that the Palace had recently acquired. Perhaps a short nap . . . she thought longingly, and moved towards the bed in surrender.

She ground to a halt. On the rumpled blankets lied a single sheet of paper.

Who could leave her a message? Only she and Numair had keys to the rooms.

Cautiously — the paper could be magicked to explode at the slightest touch — she stuck her face close to it. It smelled like paper. She closed one eye and examined it closely. It looked like paper. Even more cautiously, she bent down and picked it up. She gasped as she read it.

Narftlot; seteper TNEMMOT rehhal Qicp, TEALPA atilsdoOOOO. kreEEkast kand GONE aipxhel seroetem. Seroetem.

Daine grabbed the sheet and ran out of the room.

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hehe . . . well, that was fun! Maybe this will help prod Search for the Six out of its coma. Let's hope so. In any case, I was meaning for the characters to be a little out of character — it's hard to make a spoof otherwise. Please, please, hit that periwinkle button and tell me what you think. PLEASE.