For those of you who don't know, a "riff" is a story that plays off, or with, somebody else's story. It is the principal sort of story we do in TCATGR. By way of giving a taste, and keeping my promise to open communication, I've dusted off my first TCATGR riff for your perusal.

By way of introduction, at this point, there are several dead Tygra and RD Rivero clones lying about, and a question has been posed that I took it upon myself to answer...

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Fianna strode out of the forest. Spying Panthro at work on the Thundertank in the Cat's Lair's yard, the green caninoid called to him and waved.

"Hooo!"

Panthro looked up and grinned. The burly panther wasn't into fanfic authors in general - in his opinion, they were probably just shirking something else they ought to be doing - but Fianna at least had the redeeming feature of letting him kick some ass in his stories.

"Well, if it isn't the jolly green giant," Panthro laughed as Fianna drew near. "Lose your chew toy or something?"

"No, no, she's at home sleeping on the sofa," Fianna laughed. "And be nice, or I'll pee on your tires."

They drifted into the garage, bantering amiably, taking care not to step in the snarf droppings littering the yard, and in Fianna's case failing. "You know, you really ought to get the kids out here to scoop this mess," he chastised as he scraped his boot in the grass.

Panthro went to the cooler by the workbench and opened it, surveying the contents. "No Guinness," he said, returning with two bottles. "I'm a Bud man myself."

Fianna set a small box on the bench, took the bottle and eyeballed it. "Looks like water to me."

"Quit bitching. Just because you don't have to chew it first doesn't mean it isn't good," They drank for a moment, then Panthro asked, "What are you doing here anyway? And what's in the box?"

"Well, now those are interesting questions..."

"Oy vey," Panthro muttered. "Here we go."

"You've been following the posts at the new club, I trust?" When the panther snorted derisively, he said, "Ah, silly me, of course not. Anyhow, there's been alot of talk about, er, relative anatomical dimensions. So given the recent carnage, I..."

Panthro stared at him, aghast. "Whose dimensions?"

"Um, RD Rivero's versus Tygra's."

The panther snorted beer out his nose, doubling over in uncontrolled hysterics. When he got some degree of self-control back, he wiped the tears from his eyes and said, "Oh Christ, you have GOT to be kidding me. Neither of those rocket scientists could find their dingers with both hands and a samoflange."

Fianna allowed himself a small grin. "That's a matter of opinion, methinks, and some conjecture among the club members. Anyhow, during the last few weeks there seems to have been a run on both of them at Snarfer's Happy Character Copier, and the bodies are lying around everywhere. So..."

He reached into his pocket and fished around for a moment, finally producing a miniscule set of scissors and some tweezers. "I took it upon myself to settle the issue. I collected a couple of samples, and the winner..."

"Don't you mean 'loser'?" Panthro grinned.

"Whatever. In any event, the smaller, uh, 'set' if you like, is in this box."

Panthro picked up the box and took the lid off. He examined the contents for a moment, then said, "I can't tell. I thought the stripes would be a dead giveaway, but it's so small I can't make out any details."

"No problem," Fianna chuckled. "DNA testing will prove my claim. It's a good thing I got here when I did, though. These copied characters degenerate fairly quickly when nobody is paying attention to them. I expect their gone altogether by now."

"Aren't you worried your sample will evaporate too?"

Fianna shook his head. "Naa. As long as somebody is thinking about, it stays in the 'refresh' cycle."

At that moment, Wilykit burst into the room. "Panthro, Snarf just sent me to tell you the samoflange is running around loose in the kitchen again."

"Goddammit, that's the fourth time in two weeks!" the panther roared, throwing a wrench across the garage. It bounced off the wall and hit the floor with a deafening clang.

"Oh, calm down," Fianna said. He went to retreive the wrench. "Come on, I'll help you catch it."

Panthro shrugged and went to the cabinet by the cooler, taking out his samoflange stunner. "Fine. You're welcome to stay for lunch once we snag the damned thing."

"Snarf said lunch won't be ready for an hour after he gets his kitchen back," Wilykit said. "Thanks for the raisins, Panthro, I'll tell Snarf to pick up another bag when we go shopping at the village. Oh, and hi Fianna!"

Fianna watched her go, then looked at Panthro. Panthro looked back. They both sprang back to the desk to find Fianna's box empty.

"My DNA!" Fianna whimpered.

"There goes your proof," Panthro chuckled. "For what it's worth though, I'll take your word for it. Whose were they?"

Fianna drew himself up to his full height. "I'm sorry, Panthro, but that is an accusation I could never make without hard evidence to back it up. I'm afraid it must remain a secret forever."

"Well, I hope it was Rivero," Panthro said as they left the garage. "I got nothing against the guy - hell, giving Tygra a hard time is a public service. But I think he'd appreciate the irony best."

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CONSERVATIVE, n. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.

--Ambrose Bierce---

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