The talent show was going well, but the announcer lady, June Adams, was getting a little tired. Thank goodness there are only three more acts, she thought to herself. She turned to face her audience.

"Thank you, Mr. Mueller," she said to the last contestant. "And now, our next contestant is… hmm, that's weird. It's Dot. No last name, just Dot." She paused for a moment, then yelled backstage. "Is there anyone back there named Dot?" she asked.

"Yeah, I'm coming!" came the reply.

When Dot walked on stage, there came a loud "Aaaaaawwww" from the audience when they saw just how cute she was. The only thing June noticed was how young she was… and the fact that she wasn't even human.

"Welcome, Dot," she said. "And how old are you?"

"Today's my fifth birthday," said Dot proudly.

June glanced at the sheet. "Do you have a last name?"

"No," said Dot. "Maybe I did once, but me and my brothers can't remember. We don't have any parents."

"Aaaaawwwww," the audience said again, although this time it was out of pity.

June sighed. Hopefully the judges would go easy on this girl. Only five years old, too! "So what are you going to play, sweetheart?"

"I'm playing Music Box Dancer," said Dot.

June had never heard of the song, but if she had, she would have said something like, "Yeah right". Music Box Dancer, a repetitive yet complicated song with very complex chord structures, would be considered a little above the piano playing level of a five-year-old.

"Go ahead," said June.

Dot sat down at the piano, and to the judges' amazement, played MBD at a fairly fast pace, with very few errors, and with dynamics and style. Once she was done the audience burst into applause. Some people even threw roses on the stage.

"Don't throw all of your roses!" cried Dot as she was bowing. "Save some for my brothers; they're better than me."

"Um… thank you, Dot," said June with astonishment as Dot gathered her roses and walked offstage. "Our next contestant is Yakko—"

"Thank you, thank you very much!" said Yakko. He was already on stage.

"So Yakko," said June, still a little amazed and freaked out, "are you Dot's brother?"

"One of them, anyway," said Yakko. "Now let's quit the small talk. I wanna get to playing!"

Before anyone could object, Yakko sat down at the piano and started to play Pachelbel's Cannon. This song is a very pretty one, which is one of those "built on a theme" songs. Its starts simply, but builds on the simple melody until at the end it turns out to be a very complex song. Yakko, like Dot, played it with very few errors at a moderate, steady pace.

Once he was done, he too was having flowers thrown at him. "Well, at least you aren't throwing tomatoes! Although those would keep me fed for a week or so…"

June pulled Yakko aside and spoke to him quietly. "How old are you, Yakko?"

"I'm nine."

"Yakko… this might sound rude, but what are you?"

"Why, I'm one of the contestants, of course!" Yakko and Dot always liked to answer this question (which was asked a lot) in a different way each time. (Unlike Wakko, who would simply answer "I don't know" if asked.)

"Seriously," June said.

"Seriously, I have no clue," said Yakko with a grin.

"Well, you did a very good job. Just like your sister."

"You ain't seen nothing yet!" said Yakko as he walked offstage. "Wait till you hear my brother!"

"I'm guessing that would be our last contestant—Wakko. Could you come on stage please, Wakko?"

Wakko ran on stage eagerly, his tongue was sticking out hanging out. Although Wakko as very smart, as his siblings very well knew, others would see him like this and thing him a bit mentally handicapped. June even was thinking, He doesn't look like he'll be as good as his siblings.

Wakko could sense what she was thinking and found himself glowering a bit in anger. Why did everyone think he was stupid?

"So Wakko," June asked him as though she were talking to a mentally handicapped eight-year-old, "how old are you?"

"Seven," said Wakko simply, quietly controlling his anger. He sat down at the piano and without further ado started to play Maple Leaf Rag.

Out of the three songs that the siblings played, MLR was probably the hardest of them. Ragtime is hard to learn, and MLR is a hard ragtime piece. This song requires your fingers to fly all over the keys, and is also very fast. But we're talking about Wakko here, the best piano player of the three of them. He played the song flawlessly. When he was done, he got the loudest applause out of the three of them.

He quietly stood up and took a few bows. Then he held up his hands to signal the audience to shut up, calmly picked up his roses, and walked off the stage.

"Thank you, Wakko," said June shakily. What siblings! What talent! she thought.

Meanwhile the judges were talking amongst themselves.

"We have never given three siblings the top three prizes, and we certainly aren't doing it now," said one of the judges.

"But you heard the girl say that they didn't have any parents," said another judge. "And the oldest was only nine. A nine-year-old, taking care of two kids? They probably need the extra money badly."

"And they deserve it, too," said a third. "They're only kids, but did you hear them playing?"

"Besides," pointed out the second, "it's not like we've ever had three siblings play here anyway."

They handed June the envelope, and she opened it quickly. "Well, looks like we were all impressed with those kids. Because all three of them won the top three prizes!"

Yakko, Wakko, and Dot ran on stage again, laughing and hugging each other. The audience stood up started cheering.

June had to holler above the applause, "YAKKO WON THIRD PLACE, DOT WON SECOND PLACE, AND WAKKO WON FIRST PLACE!"

Wakko and Yakko looked at each other. Guess I was worrying for nothing, Wakko thought.

Yakko gave Wakko a slight nod and a smirk. Meanwhile, Dot was saying to June, "You can just give all the money to Yakko. He can keep better track of it than Wakko and I can."

"Yeah, since I'm the oldest I'm the official money tender," said Yakko smugly. "Thanks again, good, fine people!"

"Chow!" said Dot.

"Change your underwear!" cried Wakko.

A wave of applause drowned out anything else that the siblings said.

…………

"Well what a stroke of good luck!" cried Yakko as the left the competition.

"Too bad you only got five dollars," commented Wakko.

"I don't care. It was a group effort anyway. Thirty-five whole dollars!" said Yakko happily.

Everybody was leaving the auditorium at this time. A man who looked to be about twenty-five or so walked up to the siblings.

"Hi kids," he said.

"Hello sir," said Yakko, Wakko, and Dot courteously.

"My name is Tony Hall, and I would like to personally congratulate you. I've been playing the piano for fifteen years, and I'm not even as good as you three are!"

"Thanks for the compliment, Tony," said Yakko, once again very courteously.

"So where do you kids live?" asked Tony.

"We stay wherever we want to," said Yakko. He started to sing "That's cause I'm the type of guy who never settled down, where pretty girls are well you know that I'm around—"

"You can sing too! But you really don't have a home?"

"Nope," said Dot. "We're just poor, delinquent kids."

"We're not delinquent," stated Wakko.

"Poor kids. Would you like to stay with me for the night?" asked Tony.

Wakko and Dot's faces lit up, then fell. They knew Yakko too well—Yakko hated to be in debt to anyone, and seemed to be unable to accept charity. And sure enough—

"Oh no sir," Yakko was saying, "we couldn't possibly trouble you like that."

"It would be no trouble at all," said Tony.

Dot looked up at her oldest brother. He eyes grew and her voice, already high-pitched, was high and innocent. "Pleeeease Yakko. Please let us go with him."

Yakko winced, obviously giving in. He managed to give Dot a half-firm look. "No, we don't want to inconvenience him." Dot knew she had to try a different approach.

"I think the lack of nutrients has made me weak, Yakko," she said, with the sweetest yet most helpless voice she could put on. "He could fix us a real meal. You don't want me to… DIE, do you?"

"Fine," said Yakko. "We're going." Dot grinned—Yakko's love for her and Wakko was his greatest weakness.

Tony laughed and led them to his car. He got Yakko in the passenger seat and Wakko and Dot in the back. "So today's your birthday, Dot?" he asked as he drove off to his house.

"Yep," said Dot happily.

"Well then, since it's your birthday, and since you are 'lacking nutrients', I'll let you pick what you three will have for supper."

Dot thought for a moment, remembering a time when she was about three. She was looking in the window at someone eating some long, stringy stuff. "This is wonderful spaghetti!" she heard one of the people say as they ate it.

"Could you make spaghetti?" asked Dot.

"What's that?" asked Yakko.

"If it's edible, I'll eat it," said Wakko.

"I like your attitude, Wakko. It's noodles with tomato sauce dipped over them, Yakko. Yes, I can fix you spaghetti, Dot," said Tony, grinning.

"Okay!" said the three siblings simultaneously.

…………

"So you three don't even have a last name?" asked Tony. The four of them were sitting at Tony's table, eating the spaghetti that Dot had requested.

"No," said Yakko, "but I've always thought we should have one. It's kinda embarrassing, you know. I only have one name! Most people have a first, middle, and last name, but I only have a first! It would be awkward if someone ever married me—she'd loose a last name!"

"You know, Yakko," said Tony thoughtfully, "there's something about you that reminds me of Bugs Bunny."

Yakko looked confused. "Who's Bugs Bunny?"

Tony looked astonished. "If you've never seen a Looney Tune, then tonight that's what we'll do. We'll watch Looney Tunes."

"What are Looney Tunes?" asked Dot, her mouth full of spaghetti.

"Cartoons made in the 30's through the 60's. I think you guys would like them."

"Well then," said Wakko, who had long since finished his supper, "what are we waiting for?"

"Me to finish," muttered Dot. She slurped up the rest of her noodles. "Okay, I'm ready now!"

Tony lead the siblings to his TV and popped in a Looney Tunes tape. And another. And another. For hours the siblings sat enthralled, watching those glorious old cartoons.

Finally Tony had to say, "That's it, I'm out of tapes."

"Ah man!" cried Dot.

Yakko grabbed one of the tape cases and looked at the WB shield on the front. "So who are these Warner Brothers?" he asked. "They were geniuses!"

"They were Harry, Albert, Sam, and Jack. The real geniuses are the writers and directors, though," said Tony. "I've got lots of books on the Warner Brothers cartoons, if you want to look at them."

Yakko and Dot smiled at the idea. When the looked to see Wakko's reaction, however, he was simply standing in front of the TV with a thoughtful look on his face.

Warner. I like the sound of that. Warner.

"Me too," said Yakko thoughtfully.

Tony scratched his head in confusion. "Who's he talking to?"

"He's talking to Wakko. What did he say?" cried Dot.

"I said that I like the sound of Warner," said Wakko.

"There!" said Tony suddenly. "There's your last name! Warner!"

"How common is it?" asked Yakko skeptically.

"It's no Joe Average name like Smith or anything, but people won't ask you to repeat yourselves when you say it or mispronounce it or anything."

"I like it too," said Dot, grinning.

"Yeah!" said Yakko. "We can be the Warner brothers!"

"And the Warner sister," pointed out Dot.

"Well, Warner brothers and Warner sister, you must be pretty tired. Do you want to go to bed?" asked Tony.

"Sure!" said the Warners.

…………

Tony's guest room had a king-size bed, and the Warners could all easily fit in it. Although it was a very comfortable mattress, and Wakko and Dot feel asleep almost instantly, Yakko tossed and turned unhappily late into the night. He should have slept easily, being in this house, with a real bed, and a last name, but something was bothering him.

"Yakko… this might sound rude, but what are you?" he remembered June asking him.

What am I? thought Yakko helplessly. Where did I come from?

He turned around and saw that Wakko was also awake, watching him with thoughtful eyes.

Can't sleep?

"No," said Yakko quietly, so not to wake up Dot.

What's keeping you awake?

"You would know."

Wakko smiled, almost sadly. You're wondering what we are.

"Yeah. Wakko… if we did have parents, and we stayed with them till Dot was born, that means that till I was four…"

Someone raised you, Wakko thought, finishing Yakko's statement for him. You didn't have to take care of yourself. Someone else took care of you.

"Yeah. And did our parents die, or abandon us, or what? What do we do with our lives?"

Maybe Warner Brothers would hire us as actors.

"Not a bad idea," said Yakko slowly.

Well, I'm tired, so I'm going to try to sleep. Wakko flipped over and fluffed his pillow.

"Okay. Good night, Wakko."

Good night, Yakko.