The Mighty Kuma Kaze

Commisioned for Srg Spiffyasaurus By VelvetAndNyquil

"Ugh" Itou grimaced as he woke from his bed. The radiant sun that peeked out from his crumpled bed curtain was blinding his eyes, and even worse, washing out the light from his Mac. Typically Itou would wake up in a dark stupor in his dimly lit cave of a room, yet today the summer months had taken a great toll on his odious vision. As he shook his head to remove those peskie sleepies his ex-wife always nagged him about from his eyes, one of the many socks covering his face-feelers fell to the ground. Itou spat on it. It was already grungy from the night before, and he certainly was not going to clean it. With dark-ringed eyes, Itou looked out the window and into the sunrise.

Summer was like a cheerful and vibrant cat; One that Itou wished would cough up a lung and die.

Itou gently stomped to his computer screen, shaking off from his feet a few pairs of slacks that were covering the floor and the odd crusty sock that had stuck itself to his toe. He smiled a cold, damp smile at what to himself was a wholesome wallpaper, a pack of baby penguins getting a one-two welcome punch from Tyke Myson. A smile crept on his face, something similar in consistency to curdled milk. God was he happy. As he looked through stock price after stock price he was encouraged by last nights growth and went about checking his computer for other cheerful wallpapers. He found one of a baby girl being informed her family's home would be sold soon, but before he could reach for the download button his doorbell rang.

"Who would dare disturb a man of old age at this hour?" Said Itou, a man of 35 years now stumbling to his door, groggily awake in the middle of the day.

It was a small girl, apparently, that dare roused the migty Itou. She seemed nice. Too nice, Itou thought.

"What brings you here, little girl." Itou said with a callous half smile. Hopefully if he was kind enough to the girl she would scram like every other cookie peddling squatter. The little girl looked up at Itou all to happily, and before Itou could shut the door on her face, she perked up and spoke.

"What's a subpeona?" The girl asked, holding up a handful of letters marked "FOR ITOU, URGENT BUISNESS. OPEN ME NOW!"

"Uhhh..." Itou looked around, as if a squadron of police cars were about to descend upon him like locust. Subpeona's made Itou very, VERY uneasy. He did not like courts, or lawsuits, or the thought of giving someone else his precious money. In fact he very much disliked laudromats even, preferring to keep all his change in an ACME inpenetrable Piggy-Broker. He noticed one letter among the many subpoenas, one that looked like it belonged to a small child, possibly a birthday card for a grandson.

"Oh, that must be mine!" Itou said reaching to steal the card from the blonde little girl.

"Umm..." The blonde child said as the note was ripped from her hand.

"What?" Itou chided the small child. The child did not respond, not even as Itou greedily ripped open the note, hoping to find some small amount of birthday money inside. Itou, much to his dismay, found the following message inside:

"Dearest Itou,

I knew this would be the best way to get you to take credit for your son. YES, THATS RIGHT YOU NEWT, YOUR SON! You would rather take money from him than feed him, wouldn't you? Well now he's your problem.

Signed,

Your Ex-Wife!"

Itou wondered how seriously this note could be taken. Yes, his ex-wife was certainly vindictive enough to do such a thing, but she had forgotten one crucial element.

"Ha," Itou laughed out loud,"She really thought she had the better of me, didn't she?"

"Mom, said you would say that, and that I should tell you to shut up when you did." The little girl replied meekly. Itou froze. He had chills up his spine, in very much the way a salamander feels when its final light is to be extinguished.

"Your, *gulp*, mother?" Itou paused. "What is your name, dear?" Itou asked the girl.

"Kuma, Kuma Kaze, and I really wish you would stop referring to me as a girl." Kuma said angrily as she turned around and looked back at the narrator.

(Sheesh kid, sorry already)

"No worries." The boy replied.

"WHO ARE YOU EVEN TALKING TO!" Itou shouted to himself as both the boy and the narrator helped themselves into his house.

"STOP THAT, STOP-" The narrator quickly duct taped Itou's mouth, feeling he needed a few minutes to adjust to this startling discovery. After Kuma had time to unpack his things in a seldom unused room in Itou's house, he parted ways with the narrator, and went to go undo the duct tape placed firmly around his father's mouth.

"Oh...thanks." Itou said to his son, a bit worse from the wear after being gagged for so long, but happy to see a joyful face helping him in his time of need.

"No problem...dad..."Kuma said, his eyes unwaivering from the ground. Itou could tell the child...his son (that was still wierd for him to say, his hair was such a lovely shade of gold after all) was feeling a bit odd around him. This isn't how he wanted his son to feel, not if he was going to be staying in his house.

"You can't keep your eyes to the ground son. A Kaze is proud. Proud as the day is long!" Itou told his son, a strong wind blowing in his heart.

"Proud?" Kuma said, just barely looking up at his dad.

"Proud!" Itou said, daring to look the narrator straight in the face. The narrator soon blushed, and became weak in the knees looking at the mighty Itou Kaze.

(It's O.K. Babe, You're safe now.)

(Oh, Itou Kaze...)

(Woah...go dad!)

"See son," Itou told his son. "You need to learn to live like a man. Don't worry though, I'll teach you everything you need to know!"

"Gee, that's great dad!" Kuma replied. "One thing though. Mom said you needed to call the second you took me in."

Itou's eyes quickly shrunk and his entire body began to convulse. "YOU CAN'T MAKE ME DO IT, I REFUSE TO TALK TO THAT DEVIL WOMAN, I WON'T-"

(Thanks for the help.)

(No problem kid, should I go grab her now?)

(MMF, MMMMMMF!)

(That's a yes!)

Ms. Kaze knocked a few times on Itou's door. Itou gave a very mean look at the narrator, who only had his best interest at heart. Unbeknownest to Itou, a clan a zombie-samurai-pirates were only seconds away from crashing through the ceiling and-

"ALL RIGHT, ALL RIGHT! I'LL ANSWER THE GODDAMN DOOR!" Itou answered.

(Thank you hon.)

(Go suck a lemon.)

( o.o)

Ms. Kaze looked up at her ex of seven years with something a bit less than a joyful grin. Itou didn't bother speaking, he knew the first thing his ex would want to do is slap him in the face on sight. After all, he had spent the better part of seven years hiding from both her and his magnificent son.

"Well?" Ms. Kaze said.

"Well what?" Mr. Kaze replied, hiding his face between his fingers. His son walked up from behind him and hugged his mother, almost knocking down Itou in the process.

"He's not so bad..." Kuma informed his mother. "Though his room could use a cleaning."

Itou turned a deep red, one that his ex could see in his eyes. His ex returned the small glance with a wry smile.

"You still leave those socks lying around everywhere, don't you?" she asked.

"I'm afraid old habits die hard." Mr. Kaze replied.

"Well," Ms. Kaze answered as she let go of her son, "Your going to be getting some help with that. Kuma needs a place to stay, and-"

"And he won't have to look far. Son, I'll always have a place for you." Itou said as he smiled down warmly at his son.

Kuma looked up at his mother for a second. He wasn't sure about this, if it was alright to be happy about his distant father finally accepting him. His mother smiled back warmly, though, and in that instant Kuma jumped into his father's arms.

"Take good care of him, Itou." Ms. Kaze said warmly as she left the two in peace. For now :P

Itou was warmly awoken by the sun slamming against his face the next morning. His son, Kuma, had torn the blinds down in one quick grab, and was now taking great lengths to awake his father from his stupor.

"You said you'd take me under your wing today! No slacking off!" Kuma yelled at the top of his lungs. His father slowly got to his feet, his room now clean of socks and pants from a rigorous amount of cleaning the day before. Both he and Kuma had turned the house upside down, and in the process had even deleted a great deal of depressing photos from Itou's computer. Itou was in some small way sad to see his collection of seal clubbing photos dissappear, but having his son in his life felt like such a greater joy that he did not spend much time thinking about how they would be missed. As he removed each clean sock slowly from his feelers and placed them in his clothes hamper, he noticed Kuma was already intently watching the stock ticker on his computer.

"Do you know how those work?" Itou asked his son. His son shook his head, though suprisingly to Itou he did not seem disinterested. "You really want to learn the stock market, don't you?" Itou asked.

"Its what you do...so it's what I should do, right?" Kuma replied to his dad. Itou gave a small chuckle. "Son," Itou replied,"You're good natured to say that, but that's a chumps way through life. You have to do what makes you happy. Accept no substitutes."

"No substitutes?" Kuma asked.

"None." His father said fiercely. Kuma thought on this for a few moments. His eyes looked down at the carpet. Itou decided to look through the stock listings as his son thought to himself. He had been in those shoes, he knew it would take at least a few more minutes. The DOW looked good, which mean't nothing really, Itou knew he would need to check all of his finances individually. He looked through J.C. Penny, Calvin Klien, First National Bank. Actually, Exxon Mobil seemed to be doing really well, he wondered if...

"Dad?" Kuma said as he looked up at his father. Itou looked back down at him.

"Can I be a model?" Kuma asked

"I'm sure you could, son." Itou replied.