Li'l Miggle and the Scavenger Hunt

One day Li'l Miggle and Li'l Tiggle were playing in the back yard. Momma Cat poked her head out and asked, "Li'l Miggle, Li'l Tiggle, can you run some errands for me?"

"In a minute, Momma!" they answered, and went back to playing.

A few minutes later, Momma Cat asked again, "Li'l Miggle, Li'l Tiggle, can you run some errands for me?"

Again, the kittens replied, "In a minute, Momma!" and went back to playing.

A few minutes later, Momma Cat asked yet again, "Li'l Miggle, Li'l Tiggle, can you run some errands for me?"

And once again, the kittens called back, "In a minute, Momma!" and went back to playing.

Finally Momma Cat gave up and went out to run errands herself. When she came back, she popped out into the yard and called, "Li'l Miggle, Li'l Tiggle, I found a treasure map, but I don't have time to figure it out. Maybe you can help."

"A treasure map?" The kittens scampered over excitedly. Momma Cat handed them a scrap of paper with a map on it, and disappeared back into the house.

"Let's see..." Li'l Miggle rotated the map around and around, trying to figure out what it was showing.

"Wait a minute," Li'l Tiggle cried. "Is that our pine tree?" He pointed excitedly to the fuzzy triangle, then the big pine standing in their back yard.

"Li'l Tiggle, that's brilliant! This is a map of our back yard!" Li'l Miggle bounced excitedly. "So that means..."

"...we have to go..." Li'l Tiggle traced the dotted lines to the X.

"Isn't that the fish seller?" Li'l Miggle stared at the map dubiously.

"Let's go!" Li'l Tiggle scampered off, with Li'l Miggle following close behind.

The kittens arrived at Harry's Hake Shop and began scraping around in all the hidden corners.

"What are you kids up to there?" Harry asked.

"We're on a treasure hunt!" the kittens chorused.

Harry chuckled. "Well all right, but as long as you're here, take these sardines back to your momma."

The kittens accepted the sardines, and continued to search the shop. Finally, Li'l Miggle cried, "AHA!" She tugged out a crumpled piece of paper from under a jar of pickled fish, and held it triumphantly.

Li'l Tiggle rushed over and together they smoothed out the map. "Where do we go next?" he asked excitedly.

The kittens squinted at the map, rotating it this way and that, until Li'l Miggle lifted her head and looked out the window. "Wait a minute..." She took the map, held it up to the window, and yelled, "It's the fountain!"

"That means...." Li'l Tiggle took the map back, tilting his head this way and that. "The green grocer!"

The kittens rushed out of the shop, yelling "Thanks Harry!" as they went. Around the fountain, down the street, there was the green grocer!

The old curmudgeon who ran the green grocer looked at the excited kittens scampering around his shop, shook his head, and sighed. "As long as you kids are here, you might as well take this home to your momma," he hollered and set out a basket of cat grass.

Li'l Miggle and Li'l Tiggle grabbed the basket, and then squealed in delight as they found the next clue, tucked under the oranges! They quickly scampered out of the green grocer, sitting down again in the sun to investigate the next map.

"This looks like...." They peered at the strange lines. "Is this..." They looked at each other. "The giant chicken statue!" Yelling triumphantly, they followed the map past the giant chicken statue and on to Mr. Mewser's Dairy Farm.

The kittens raced around the dairy farm, upsetting all the goats, until Mr. Mewser came out to see what was the matter. When he saw the kittens, he called out, "Hoy, Li'l Miggle, Li'l Tiggle! Slow down, or you'll get a kick from the goats!"

"Sorry, Mr. Mewser!" The kittens slowed down, creeping around so as to not upset the poor goats.

"By the way, since you're here, take this milk back to your momma!" Mr. Mewser put out a bucket and went back into the barn.

Li'l Miggle and Li'l Tiggle finally found the next clue, wedged between two slats of siding on the barn. "Let's see, let's see," they crowded around eagerly.

"Hey, it's the fuzzy triangle again," Li'l Tiggle said.

"Back to our yard!" cried Li'l Miggle.

They gathered up the sardines, the cat grass, and the milk, and raced back home.

"Hi Momma Cat!" Li'l Miggle yelled as they ran through the house.

"Here's the groceries," panted Li'l Tiggle as he set them down on the table, before running out into the yard."

The next clue was hidden in a hole in the side of the big pine tree. There was no map this time, only a bunch of nonsense letters. They puzzled over it for a long, long time. Finally, after almost an hour, they solved it: C-O-M-E-I-N-S-I-D-E.

"Co mein side?" Li'l Tiggle scratched his head.

"No, it says to come inside!" Li'l Miggle jumped to her feet. "Come on!"

They raced back into the house, where Momma Cat had just finished cooking. "Perfect! You found the treasure!"

"Where is it, Momma Cat?" they asked, wide eyed.

"Go wash up, treasure's on the table." She smiled fondly at them.

It was the yummiest supper Li'l Miggle and Li'l Tiggle had ever had.

Boo Cat and the Hole in the Ground

Once upon a time, Boo Cat was wandering through the forest when she came upon a log. She investigated it with her snoot. She snooted the top. She snooted the bottom. She snooted all along the front. She snooted the far side of the log, where she discovered a hole in the ground. She snooted the hole, as far as she could, when suddenly, a ferret popped out and booped her on the snoot!

"Ack!" Boo Cat was startled. She snooted the burrow again, where the ferret had gone.

The ferret popped out and booped her snoot again.

"Ack!" Boo Cat sat back, nonplussed. "This hole in the ground is dangerous."

"It sure is!" The ferret popped back out. "Wanna snuggle?"

Boo Cat considered this. "Okay."

So Boo Cat and the ferret snuggled next to the dangerous hole in the ground.

Boo Cat

Once upon a time, there was a little boo cat who lived in a big jungle. The boo cat was called a boo cat because it liked to jump out at things and yell "Boo!" at them. The jungle was full of huge trees and thick bushes. This boo cat was very particular, and it liked to keep a very clean house. Every morning, the boo cat would roam all over the jungle picking up bits of fuzz. The boo cat was very fluffy, and shed a lot. One day, the boo cat was picking up fuzz when it heard a rustle nearby. It crept up quietly, and leaped on it! You'll never guess what the boo cat found!

A bunny?

It was a bunny. The boo cat pounced upon the bunny, and had dinner that night.

The Introvert

I wish I didn't have such awful dreams.

A new girl moved in down the street. She was terribly introverted, and openly despised all out-going personalities she had to interact with. No one was sure what she did for work, save that it made her horribly upset every day.

The girl hated other introverts even more than the extroverts, but above all else, she hated herself for hating other introverts. She should be supportive, she supposed, and so loathed herself for her failing.

One day, she ordered an enormous corner bathtub to be installed in her house. I suppose she thought to calm herself down with a nice bath after a stressful day. As far as I know, it never got used for that purpose.

The installers came, and their mostly quiet efficiency let them install the tub without terribly freaking out the girl. As she started running the bath, a knock at the window startled her. One of her neighbors peered in at her through the slats of the blinds, waving cheerfully. Every visible inch of his grinning face set her teeth on edge.

Doesn't he know how disruptive he's being? she thought furiously to herself as she stomped around the house, trying to find the door that this neighbor was trying to enter through. Stupid broken doorbell. Stupid neighbor, moving around and being hard to find. Stupid people trying to talk to me.

As soon as she opened the door, the annoying, clueless, extrovert neighbor let himself right into her house. She glared and sputtered, eventually squeezing out that she is drawing a bath right now. He perked up and asked to see the new tub, because he'd seen the installers, and he was interested, and so on and so forth.

One thing led to another, and between the stress of her job, the installers, and the incredibly pushy and yappy neighbor, the first use of the tub turned out to be washing away all the blood the neighbor drained into the churning water. Nobody was quite sure how it happened, only that the last thing anyone saw of him was a light red swirl as it was sucked down the tub drain.

Maybe, she thought, staring at the draining water, if I killed the other extroverts, that would be like supporting my fellow introverts.

A few days later, she invited the lesbians down the street to her house. When they knocked -- the doorbell was still busted -- she answered the door naked. The lesbians were variously shocked, suspicious, and intrigued. She jutted out her jaw and spat, "You were hitting on me when I first got here. If you still want me, come take a bath."

Bemused, the lesbians let themselves be led to the tub. They climbed in, she uncharacteristically chatty, though not particularly skilled, and they rather more quiet. The stuttering conversation still grated on her nerves, and by the end of the bath, the water had again turned red.

Later still, I, and another person I didn't really know, were invited to visit the introvert's bedroom. We had gotten to the point of being naked and entangled when suddenly, the bedroom doors burst open, and a camera crew spilled in. A microphone was thrust at me, and a cheerful announcer said something along the lines of "Surprise!" -- we were -- and "You're on such-and-such show!" -- apparently, we were.

The introvert began to tremble violently. I held her hand, and spoke into the microphone. "What are you doing here?" I asked. Someone we knew told the crew that we would be here! I shook my head and asked the only other person in the room -- besides the TV crew and the trembling introvert -- who disavowed any knowledge of this. "You're upsetting our host," I told them.

We went back and forth a bit, until the introvert took the microphone from me, and confessed that she had been planning to sleep with us, then kill us as she had done to a few others before us. It got really awkward after that. The crew, my fellow guest, and I all managed to disentangle ourselves and leave without too much unseemly haste. The introvert was still naked on her bed as we crept out.

I don't think I really believed her at that point. A small part of me was shocked and relieved to have been rescued from death -- by a surprise TV crew, of all things. But the rest of me was pretty convinced that it wasn't really ever a danger.

The introvert eventually got a boyfriend. He was some kind of therapist and CIA agent. They got along well, and he was helping her be less upset all the time. For a while, the killings stopped, and we all thought things were going to be okay. The introvert had even thrown a real party, with no killings, at her house. Then he got called in for a job while the two of them were out together.

Leaving her at the entrance, the therapist agent went into the depths of the factory basement. There was shouting, and a gunfight, and a poisonous gas leak caused by a stray bullet. Once the shooting subsided, the therapist agent stumbled his way back up to the introvert. Alas, he had inhaled too much toxic gas, and collapsed a few feet from her, hand outstretched in a plea for help.

The introvert tentatively stepped forward. I thought for sure she had gotten better, enough to maybe go to his aid. Instead, she looked around to make sure they were unobserved, and stabbed him in the chest. Then, she wandered away into the night without a backward glance.

Little Tiggle and the Snuggle Fruit

Once upon a time, Little Tiggle came upon a tree that looked funny. It had bright leaves, and wasn't like anything he had seen before. So Little Tiggle decided that he was going to see what sort of fruit the tree grew.

Each day, he climbed up the tree to see what was in its branches. For a while, he scared off all of the little birds in the tree, because he was a cat. But soon they realized he was a snuggle cat, and couldn't catch a bird if he tried. So they just went about their business and occasionally stole his whiskers to build their nests.

One day, little white flowers started appearing all over the tree. Little Tiggle watched as they turned into little green globes, and got bigger and bigger each day. Then they started getting soft and turning orange.

And Tiggle thought, 'I could snuggle that.' So he did. And it was great, until the day the fruit ripened and together they fell from the tree, and he and the fruit rolled all the way down the hill to the feet of a surprised Miggle.

"Whatcha doing," she said.

And Tig said, "I'm snuggling a snuggle fruit. You should help me get more."

So Miggle and Tiggle collected a pile of fruit and snuggled them all day.

The end!

Tiggle Goes to the Dentist

Once upon a time Momma Cat brought Little Tiggle to the the dentist, 'cos Little Tiggle needed his toofs to be cleaned. Little Tiggle was very apprehensive. Dentist cats are scary. So he mewled and moaned, but Momma Cat got him into the dentists chair.

Then this cute Siamese came in and said "You must be Little Tiggle. I'm the dentist's assistant.  I'm going to clean your toofs." And she told him to open wide, and began scrubbing away at his toofs with mouse flavored toofpaste.

Little Tiggle got kinda sleepy and fell asleep with his mouff open while she worked. And he woke up to find this big skeery tom cat peering into his mouff with a big sharp poker! So he chomped his mouff shut upon the big skeery tom cat's hand.

With his off hand, the dentist grabbed a bottle of catnip drops and dripped a few into Tiggle's cheeks. And it was a bit of a blur from there. 

Later that evening, Momma Cat said, "Little Tiggle, the dentist wants you to go to the orfodontist. He says your fangs are tooooo long."

The Beauty Pageant

Once upon a time, Li'l Miggle wanted to enter into the local beauty pageant. Momma Cat said, "Mm, okay," so Li'l Miggle signed up. Of course, that meant that Pirate Bun had to join too. And Li'l Tiggle didn't want to be left out, so he signed up too.

The first competition was a formal-wear contest. Li'l Miggle dressed up in a tasteful black evening gown. The judges murmured, "Hmm," and scribbled down their notes. Pirate Bun wore a revealing cocktail dress, and the judges all whispered, "Escandalo!" and scratched in their notes. Li'l Tiggle walked down the stage in a full tux, complete with tails, and the judges all remarked, "What a dashing young cat!" and took copious notes.

The second competition was a question-answer session. The judges asked Li'l Miggle, "If you could give everyone one thing to promote world peace, what would it be?" Li'l Miggle thought long and hard, and answered, "Tuna for everyone!" The judges said, "Hmm," and wrote down their notes. Then they asked Pirate Bun, "If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go?" Pirate Bun answered boldly, "Yarr, I would be a pirate and sail upon the seas!" The judges exclaimed, "Oh my," and wrote down their notes. Then they asked Li'l Tiggle, "If you could do anything in the world, what would you do?" Li'l Tiggle scratched his head and thought, then replied, "I would win this beauty pageant!" And the judges all said, "Aww," and wrote down their notes.

The final competition was a swim-suit contest. Li'l Miggle strolled onto the stage in a sleek one-piece, and the judges nodded and took notes. Pirate Bun sauntered out in a sexy two-piece, and the judges gasped and took notes. Li'l Tiggle missed the memo and misunderstood the contest, so he came out dripping wet in a tiny speedo, so that you could see all his curves and musculature, and the judges exclaimed, "What a well-formed cat!" and took notes.

In the end, the judges announced, "Due to the irregularity of this year's competition, we have decided to make a new category! The runner-up for the Queen's Category is Pirate Bun! And the title of Queen of the Year goes to Li'l Miggle! And finally, for our newest category, the title of King of the Year goes to Li'l Tiggle! Congratulations!"

And they all lived happily ever after, once Li'l Tiggle finally got dry again.