As always, this is resoundingly wIcKeD and consensually I mean completely, AL-TER-NA-TI-VE !!!

All responses or comments can be referred to: draven_logos@hotmail.com

My name is, what... My name is, who...Sl-im, Sl-im, Slim Shady!

--Eminem

Xena and Gabrielle are crouching around the campfire after dusk, picking quietly at the remnants of a delightful platter of leeches and squid.

Gabrielle looks up, pensively removing a tentacle from her lips. "Xena, I've been wondering about something for awhile..."

"I'm sure I can explain," quoth Xena, nearly regurgitating her impassive leeches. Could she actually be thinking what I'm thinking?! Cartman really is a fat-ass?!

"Actually, it wasn't that-although, I do side with Stan and Kenny's astute assessment of his obesity. No, I was online the other day and stumbled across some wonderfully engrossing fan fiction. Do you know that we have sex at least ten times a day, with eels, in dungeons, and for a little excitement drink each other's blood?"

"Gabrielle, that's disgusting...the eel, dungeon, blood thing...but the rest...I-" Gabrielle suddenly turns to Xena, in a moment of perfect clarity and understanding. In a blur reminscent of Johnny Cage's more illustrious feats of teleportation, Xena is suddenly on her back in more ways than one. In the background is heard the strains of House of Pain's smash hit, "Jump Around". " I'm the cream of the crop...I rise to the top...I came to get down, I came to get down, so jump off your seat and jump around!" A loud screech rings out in the clearing amidst the crashes of thunder and the wailing of the Four winds. Two sets of legs are up, indistinguishable from one another, " Jump up, jump up and get down!"

As the Irish band makes their way out, shaking their heads at the prodigious stamina of our two heroines...the clouds part. An androgynous-looking hand, radiant with translucence snakes out of the heavens and murmurs, " Damn...and I thought the folks with the Golden Calf could party!" Xena and Gabrielle, both entirely sated, slowly look up in quiet amazement..."But, Xena, that can't be...the uber-author's said that that religion was wrong." Xena, shaking her head at Gabrielle's endearing ignorance, "No, no, don't you remember that we met His...Her...or is it It in capitals? Anyway, didn't we see Its Son passing through the other day? The hippie Jew with the long-hair?" Gabrielle nods in comprehension, " Oh, yeah, Him...right, I remember. He was cute." Xena rolls her eyes and decides not to make an issue of Gabrielle's obvious bisexuality...or her own for that matter.

"Well, Gab, was that all you saw, in the Internet, I mean. Ares told me that he'd scoped some really hot leather babes on the sex pages."

" No, actually, I saw something far more mundane. I was intending to ask you about it. Is it possible to copyright something you don't really own?"

"What you mean?" spake Xena scratching the ugly hickie on her arse.

" Well, you have all these folks copyrighting Xena fan fic, stuff that mentions our names explicitly and is clearly founded upon the Xenaverse."

" Hmm...you wondering whether that's legit or not? Well, let us peruse this scroll here..." Xena rolls over and reaches inside her saddlebag, snatching a pair of horn-rimmed reading specs and a dusty scroll. "Here we go..." slowly stretching its massive length and peering closely through her lenses. "Well, Gab, we belong to Renaissance Pictures...a copyright would only protect the author's right to the story line or their own characters per see...however, it's a pretty worthless construct. Can't make a dinar with it, can't sue anyone in court for it, not without Renaissance taking a big chunk out of their asses, of course."

" How come they can't sue? Didn't you just say that their story-lines and characters would be protected under copyright?" Gabrielle returned, picking the pubic hair off the bedrolls.

" Well, it doesn't really mean anything. Say for example, someone used a character you created in Xena fic in another story and you, yourself, disapproved. What authority are you supposed to cry to? Right off, all Renaissance material isn't yours and is only allowed to be used by you on account of their good-natured mercy (aside from the massive costs of regulating such a thing, of course). That, in and of itself, complicates your case to such a degree that you couldn't do it. Hades, how are you supposed to prove who had what when on the Internet? And, better still, who the hell is going to care given the precarious legal footing of your creative efforts in the first place?"

" Well, Xe, looks like you've got a point there. Anyway, I've got to go watch a Lenny Kravitz concert on Mount Olympus...I hear that Aaliyah and Timbaland will also be performing. Wanna come?"

" Those folks who sing, "Are You That Somebody"? Okay. So long as I don't have to deal with too much Lenny."

" Xe, we could always bring Hendrix back for you...I know how much it hurt you when he went to Elysia."

"Whatever, Gabrielle, let's go." The two part in a flash of light, courtesy of Aphrodite and made possible through the sponsorship of the Royal Family.

Later...

Half-boozed over and plastered...both Xe and Gab giggle senselessly on the carpeted floor of an Olympian bathroom.

" Xena, I was wondering about something else within the larger issue we discussed."

" What..."

" The copyright thing, sweetie..."

" Oh. Right. What about it?"

" Can you copyright under a name that doesn't exist?"

" What? Like if my handle were Draven but my real name something else?"

" Yeah. Like that. Say I put copyrighted by Draven, 1999. Wouldn't that be like...bogus?"

" Nope. That would be plain stupid."

" Next question."

" I don't have any."

" Well. I guess we'd better go now. Don't we have a final paper due on Hildegard of Bingen?"

" That. Oh, I already started." "Xena."

" What Gabrielle?"

" I think I puked on your boots."

End of Story?

By: Draven, no copyright, thank you.