A band of appropriately dressed-up chibis ran yelling through the kitchen, waving guns and bows with suction cup arrows as they disappeared out the back door, their many feathers a colorful blur as they went by. Melody was very relieved that the cowboys and Indians had decided to continue their war outside; she was tempted to lock the door. The whole afternoon had been a nightmare of noise and Indian whoops and Relena insisting at the top of her lungs that she was an Indian princess and wasn’t just 'any ol' Ind'in maiden.'

And didn’t the telephone just have to ring right at that moment. Melody sighed and picked up the receiver.

“Hello. This is Mrs. Meyer,” the strained voice on the phone said to the harried webmommie, who had spoken with the chibis’ teacher often enough to recognize the sound of her voice without the need of an introduction. “Mrs., uh, what do I call you? All of your children have different last names.”

“Just call me Melody,” Melody answered, glad to get that problem out of the way at the beginning of the conversation. She hated being called by titles. She also wondered why Mrs. Meyer asked her that same question every time they spoke. She must have the attention span of a gnat! Not to mention her lack of recalling skills. “What did Duo do this time?” she asked resignedly.

“This is not about Duo,” the teacher responded, which surprised Melody somewhat. Just about every time she spoke with the teacher it was about something or other that Duo had cooked up.

“Which one is it? Is Heero staring at you again? I’ve talked to him about that.” Melody guessed. “Or is Wufei still insulting the girls?”

“Mrs...uh, Melody, well, I know you think your little Quatre is nearly an angel and he usually is but he’s been telling tall tales and I think you need to nip that right in the bud.”

Melody nearly died of shock.

“Tall tales, Quatre,” she parroted the teacher’s words, trying to put them into the same thought, and then attempted to gather her wits about her so she could converse intelligibly. “What has he been saying? I’ve never known Quatre to lie.”

“He says that the Moganocks—“

“It’s pronounced “Mog-wah-nocks.”

“The Mognowah—well, anyway that band of dangerous men that follow Quatre around,” the teacher said impatiently; she hated to be corrected and hated it more that she couldn’t pronounce the word after having been corrected. It hurt her vanity. "They are every which way we turn! They're always patrolling the school grounds and at least three of them are looking through the classroom window all day long, which is quite unnerving! And there must be fifty of them!"

“They are not dangerous,” Melody said decidedly, objecting to the unfair label that the teacher was giving to the dedicated Maguanac Corps. "And there are only forty."

“'Only forty'!" exclaimed Mrs. Meyer. "Well, no matter how many there are they sure look dangerous to me.”

“But they’re not. As I’ve told you before, they’re loyal and helpful and protect—“

“Anyway,” the teacher rudely interrupted; she’d never believed a word that Melody had had to say about those strange men, preferring to judge them with her own ignorant eyes, “the problem is about what Quatre says about them.”

Melody waited, clenching her teeth and hoping that she wouldn’t be provoked into losing her temper. How this woman had ever been hired by the school board was beyond her!

“He says that the—Mag—those men are living in an underground base in your back yard!” Mrs. Meyer exclaimed incredulously. “Did you ever hear such a tall tale? And it gets worse!—“

It was Melody’s turn to do the interrupting. “They DO.”

“What?!"

"I said, 'They DO'," Melody repeated.

"Do you really expect me to believe—I’m not stupid, Mrs.—ah, Melody. I know you think Quatre is beyond telling tales but he’s not an angel and he can--“

Melody’s irritation was growing by leaps and bounds. “They DO live in an underground base in our back yard. Where else could they store their mobile suits? Would you like a tour? I’m sure they’d be happy to show you—“

“No, that’s quite alright,” Mrs. Meyer said quickly, still not believing that the underground base existed. “But he also says that the Mogno—those men--had given him a baby circus effelant—I mean, an elephant--for Christmas and that it lives in the underground base in the back yard. Surely that is a lie!”

“Quatre does have an elephant and she does live---“ Melody said; the great aggravation rising within her was clearly conveyed by her tone of voice. Why did this woman have to call and make her stressful day even worse?!!!

“Do you really expect me to believe-- Why are you protecting him from getting in trouble for telling such a preposterous story?!” said the mind-boggled teacher. “People can’t keep elephants for pets!”

“Well, we do,” Melody told her defensively. “The city gave us an elephant permit.”

”An elephant permit! Whoever heard of such a thing!”

“Well, it was specially granted to the Maguanac Corps and drawn up for them—“

“He also says that his elephant is an artist and has painted the garage door and the tool shed’s door to match! You can’t possibly defend him on that point, even if he really does have an elephant for a pet, which I don’t believe for a minute!”

This woman was becoming unbearable.

“Would you like to come and see her artistry? Queenie—Quatre's elephant—painted a quite unusual design on the garage and tool shed doors,” Melody said with a coolness in her voice that was rapidly becoming icy. “The Maguanacs would be happy to show you everything so that you will believe that our sweet little Quatre is not a liar!”

“I don’t care to interact with them any more than I already have to,” Mrs. Meyer countered with nearly-equal iciness; she had said “them” with venom-dripping scorn. She was beginning to wonder if Quatre got his “tale telling” from his deranged webmommie; at any rate she shouldn’t attempt to cover up his lies by insisting they were true. It was obvious to her that Melody’s marbles weren’t all in the same bag--how could they be with having to be mother to that wild bunch of kids?! "It’s a wonder that you even let those cut-throats be around your children!”

“That’s it! I’ve had enough for one day Mrs. Meyer.” Melody had reached the limit of her patience. If Mrs. Meyer weren’t the only Kindergarten teacher at that school she wouldn’t have her anywhere near her precious chibis! “I think it’s a good thing that the Maguanac Corps are guarding the school at all times and also that they are keeping tabs on you!”

At that moment the door opened and the cowboys and Indians invaded the tense situation which was going on in the kitchen. The war whoops and shouting came through loud and clear to the unbelieving teacher as they carried their war into the family room. “I AM a princess!” the teacher heard Relena insist. “I am Poculontas!”

“You’re all crazy,” Mrs. Meyer decided, remembering the first day of school when Relena had told her that because she was a princess she was to be addressed as either 'Princess Relena' or 'Your Highness'. “A princess, indeed!”

Melody looked fondly at the chibis, some of whom were jumping off the furniture, some hiding behind cushions while firing their guns and all causing general chaos. She loved each and every one of them as fiercely as a mother bear protecting her cubs, no matter how much noise they made. The irritation of their boisterous play earlier in the day paled in comparison with the irritation she felt toward their Kindergarten teacher. “If our life is crazy, I would much rather have my darling chibis than to live a life of what you, with your obvious lack of imagination, declare to be sanity. Good day, Mrs. Meyer!”

Click.

The war in the family room wasn’t the only battle that was being fought! A quotation by a famous thinker of our time randomly popped into Melody’s mind: