A/N- Yes, I'm alive.

On Cassius' table lay a letter.

"Dear Cassius,

Hi. Erm. This is the person who is writing this writing. My computer wasn't working for some reason, and when it started, the internet wasn't, so I don't really know what is happening in this story I am writing and who is love with whom. And on top of that, I have loads of homework and studying to do, and life kinda sucks. Okay, that's an understatement; I have MILLIONS of projects and NO internet connection. And these marks are gonna be added, you know, to the marks in my finals, given by the stupid council. Whoever said that the BOARD year is very easy is very stupid. It makes ninth grade look like cake. And everyone keeps telling me that my freakin' career depends on this. How much does that suck? And I don't even get proper holidays.

Therefore, accept my apologies. I shall not base this chapter on you (don't know what is going on with this story, I have a bad memory, though I do remember someone called RoboDude), but on something else. Like Antony or something. Is shall finish this story in my lifetime, however.

-the author,

Arushi."

-----------------------------------------

Today was a very special day. Today was a local singing competition, and the triumvirate, because of their extreme importance and ability to damn people with the help of a pen and get them murdered effortlessly (that too in an unbelievingly cool way) were invited to judge. Antony's chest swelled up with pride every time he thought of the honour and the glory of being judge and watching people sing for free.

'It must have been because of my looks,' boasted Antony to Cleopatra and Julius who, in his living room, were sitting on a large, pink, comfy sofa, much too close to be up to any good. Antony, however, did not notice and continued, 'I know, I am too sexy to not have been a judge. I was bound to have been invited. I have my charms, and people fall for them, and this fact barely surprises me.' Saying this he tried to straighten his red curls. Nothing happened.

'It also looks as if I've finally beaten Ju at something,' Antony continued immodestly after a long pause. Cleopatra seemed to realize that Antony's words had a point, because she took her one arm off Caesar. The other arm remained curled around his shoulder in a seemingly friendly way.

'And now,' Antony said, after straightening his tie, 'I must go. Aren't you coming to watch me?'

'Oh no,' said Cleopatra quickly, 'I feel sick.'

'And I have a very high fever,' said Caesar, and to prove his point he took out a thermometer which he placed in a hot cup of tea just two minutes earlier.

'You're only jealous,' said Antony, looking very silly indeed with a toga and a tie wrapped carelessly around his body, a briefcase in one hand, and a feather (not a quill, a plain feather) that he used for writing in the other.

'I'm only not feeling well,' said Caesar.

Antony shrugged and left the house, a bad feeling following him. He wondered why Cleopatra was giggling very loudly inside. (Her voice wasn't exactly what you could define as quiet.)

On stepping out of the house, Antony immediately met Octavius, who was very quick to remind him that Lepidus was a tried and valiant soldier.

'So is my horse,' sighed Antony, wagging his finger, 'so is my horse.'

'I rather like your horse,' said Octavius, referring to Antony's pink stuffed unicorn called Martha. Antony kept Martha with himself at all times, for a reason he referred to as "gives me good luck". Martha was inside his big black briefcase at the present time.

'She is a valiant soldier,' said Antony, 'and I give her fodder.' By "fodder", Antony had obviously meant, "sugar cubes and sweetened apple and plum".

-----------------------------------------------

The competition had started. The park, which was hosting the competition, had been decorated with colourful and ridiculously expensive balloons, which all floated up and away into the endless sky in a matter of twenty seven and 452765/90000000 seconds.

Antony, Octavius and Lepidus were seated at a table at the far middle of the park in front of an extremely small, dirty, patched carpet on which the contestants were supposed to stand on one leg and sing.

'It tests their guts and will power,' Octavius, who had thought of thought of the rule which involved the standing on a single leg, explained to an unlistening crowd, 'apart from amusing an extremely hard to please, or choosy, audience, which is, of course our main aim.'

The two or three people in the crowd who had been, for some reason, listening to Octavius' words tried not to look overly happy at understanding their importance in the competition without even having to participate. Indeed, one girl was struggling so hard not to smile, she had been forced to stick her mouth together with the stickiest cello tape available in the universe; she did not want to look vain.

Octavius winked at the girl. She fainted. It is, after all, rather intimidating to have a super-duper first ever Roman emperor, who shaped our modern world, after whom the eighth month in the solar calendar has been named, winking at you. But seeing how that girl was not very well versed in history, she may have had probably fainted simply due to Octavius' good looks.

'Peevish schoolboy,' Caius hissed into Portia's ear.

Octavius winked at Cassius, who too fainted. ('He has a month named after him!' Caius explained hastily the next day, 'and he's really famous.')

Grinning stupidly, Octavius went and seated himself comfortably between Antony and Lepidus on a large purple sofa with a very shiny table placed in front of it. On the table, saw Octavius, lay a sheet of paper on which Lepidus was (with his eyebrows knitted together in concentration) drawing a cartoon-picture of a very handsome face on top of a lean muscular body. The words "Lepidus" were written on top of sheet, and hence, Octavius was forced to assume that Lepidus was trying to draw a picture of himself.

Octavius opened his mouth in order to tell Lepidus that the picture was neither realistic nor accurate, that not even in the smallest way did the drawing's features match Lepidus', but stopped himself in fear of hurting the other man's feelings; he was, after all, putting enormous effort into that absurd drawing.

The first contestant came. Who he/she was, Octavius did not see, for he was busy checking whether the legs were out of place, deciding how many marks he should cut for each time the legs wobbled. Then, he wondered how much he would have to exercise to get his own legs that skinny. Maybe you could puke after you eat something fattening, he told himself, or get a plastic surgery. He thought of the pros and cons of plastic surgery for the next five minutes or so.

And the contestant stopped singing. The audience stared pointedly at the triumvirate for fifteen minutes or so, and it was then that it hit Octavius that he and the other two were supposed to judge the singing. He looked to the right of himself, where Antony was fast asleep, his head lying on the table, drool tricking out of the corner of his mouth on to the sheet where he was supposed to write marks next to the contestant's name. Then he looked to the left of himself, where Lepidus was still immersed in his cartoon, which, unsurprisingly enough, was being drawn on the mark-sheet. And then, to his immense horror, he realized something else. Realizing what he had just realized, he removed a pair of pink fluffy earmuffs wrapped very snugly (and more importantly, tightly) around his ears.

Oops.

He nudged Antony very hard on the rib. This didn't prove to be very useful, and, in contrary to what Octavius had expected, did more harm that good, because Antony murmered, 'No mommy, I don't wanna go to school. The other kids beat me…'

'Ah, erm,' began Octavius staring at the empty sheet before him, pretending to read, 'yes, that was very impressive…uh…though I must say I expected more, much more…' it was now that he wished he watched shows like American-idol, more often, for he knew not of word of what should have been said. Why had he forgotten to take those earmuffs after waking up from his nap anyway? He wished he had, at the very least, known what song had been sung.

'When I first saw you,' Octavius invented, 'I thought you were very promising, but, ah, unfortunately…um…your legs are very nice though.'

'Excuse me?' said the contestant, who, Octavius noticed, for the first time, was a girl. She looked angry.

'Ah, um,' Octavius tried to think, 'you misunderstand me, what I meant was-,'

'Legs? Legs? Here I sing in this oh so beautiful voice, which has reduced the audience to tears-,' what the girl had said was true, for the audience were sobbing the words, 'her voice…her pretty voice' into their handkerchiefs, -'and all you notice are my legs?'

'All you men are the same!' shrieked a very large lady in the audience and threw a very red, juicy tomato at Octavius' head. It was so red and juicy that in other circumstances Octavius would have eaten it, and this was saying something as Octavius was a very hard man to please, especially with something as disgusting as food. Octavius hated eating, which was, in his opinion, a disgraceful and ill-mannered thing to do. He hadn't eaten in years. How he survived, no one knew, though many popular theories stated that he ate within the safety of his very well hidden bathtub.

'Hmph!' said the girl, 'you idio-,'

She didn't finish the sentence, for Lepidus had, at that very moment, put up his head and begun to talk.

'Your voice,' he said, 'was one of the most moving, touching, beautiful pieces of music I have heard. That such a voice exists, I knew not. Your song was heart-rending and poignant, so tragic; it reminded me of the losses that we all suffer and will always suffer. Thank you, young girl, thank you.' and then he wiped a big fat and extremely fake teardrop from the corner of his eye.

'Yes,' said Octavius quickly, 'and for this we award you, um, eight points.'

'Thank you judges,' said the girl, and then stopped to think over something and continued with her sentence, 'I mean, judge.' And she gave Octavius a very threatening glare. Octavius didn't seem to notice this because he whispered to Lepidus, 'she had very nice legs, didn't she?' loudly, and well within earshot of the girl, who had not quite left yet.

'Stupid man, that Octavius,' she said loudly, though deep down inside, Octavius knew she was blushing. Or hoped so, at the very least.

The next contestant was –

'My name,' said the contestant, 'is Robodude. I have cherished a long desire to be a singer. I have always cherished this dream, and am grateful that this may now be true. I shall now sing

I'm too sexy for my shirt,

Too sexy for my laser gun,

Too sexy for the button at the back of my neck,

To sexy to have fun,

Too sexy…'

Octavius put his earmuffs back on; the robot's voice was sharp and metallic and reminded him of torture, those prisons they used to burn Jews in, homework, math, pointy swords, knives, tanks, machine guns, sushi, and other similar things that made Octavius want to vomit (You have to eat to be able to vomit, Octavius told himself, and this thought comforted him for the next half-an-hour or so). Lepidus went back to his cartoon and Antony, in his sleep, started talking crap, 'Mommy? How come Caesar prettier than me? All the boys make fun of me.'

At the end of this song, Robodude started firing bullets everywhere for what he later explained as 'a nice dramatic ending'. The trouble was that everybody else ran away, ('I'm not normally scared,' explained Cassius, 'but those bullets didn't look very friendly.') and only Caesar was left.

'You all,' Caesar addressed a nonexistent crowd, 'must be wondering how I was at home and am now here.'

Due to lack of reply, Caesar gave the answer himself, 'well, I realized how much you all must miss me. I also wanted a go at singing.'

And he started, 'Oh baby, baby, how was I supposed to know?

That something wasn't right?'

He sang Hit me baby one more time in the most disgusting and horrible way it has ever been sung in the history of the universe. As Octavius shrieked in agony, even the sleepy Antony woke up and cried his heart out, yelling the words, 'Oh ye gods! Save us!' at regular intervals. Lepidus quickly stole Octavius' earmuffs while the latter wasn't looking and giggled in a very evil way inside his head.

'Hit me baby one more time!' Caesar concluded after what seemed like a hundred-thousand years, although that wasn't really possible because Octavius' watch said that only five minutes had passed since Caesar had started singing. This fact seemed to surprise Octavius to a great extent.

'Five?' he asked Antony, 'only?'

'It may have been a hundred thousand years-and-five minutes,' said Antony wisely (the way he said it was wise, though the fact he has stated was the most stupid thing a person could think of), 'that would explain what your watch is saying.'

'What?'

'Or maybe there's a mistake with your watch.' Antony wasn't very fond of watches that gave the wrong time; they always made him late for something or the other (resulting in him having to suffer Cleopatra's wrath). And hence, he, taking out a very hammer, which he always kept with himself for protection, and smashed Octavius overly expensive gold watch into millions of teeny weeny pieces.

Octavius immediately started to sob uncontrollably.

'No use crying over spilt milk,' said Antony saintly.

'WHY YOU-; but Octavius was stopped in the middle of his sentence.

'We must give the marks,' said Lepidus gravely.

'Ar, um, ten points,' suggested Antony.

Octavius and Lepidus gave him a disbelieving and shocked look, 'what?'

'He's my friend, you know,' said Antony.

'I was thinking one mark,' said Lepidus.

'My friend,' Antony repeated.

'He's my uncle and Lepidus' friend too,' said Octavius, 'it's not fair.'

'You didn't even hear the other guys, that gives Julius first prize, right?'

'But it's cheating,' Lepidus pointed out.

'FRIEND!' Antony shrieked.

'The girl sang nicely,' said Octavius, 'I think she should win.'

'You had your earmuffs on!' said Antony accusingly.

'How would you know, you were sleeping!'

'Friend…'

'CHEATER!!!'

This continued for about five minutes or so. Finally, it was decided that the winner would be declared after an arm-fight between Antony and Octavius. If Antony would win, Caesar would, if Octavius, the girl would.

Octavius won, but when he went over the girl's house to give her the prize, he got it thrown back at him along with a tight slap across the face.

'MY LEGS I ASK YOU!' she shrieked, slamming the door on his face.

Octavius sat down and cried.

------------------------------------------------------------------

A/N- Okay, next chapter will be out…um….ahhh…review for now. I'll finish this story within this lifetime.