Tofu and Tuna

Tofu and Tuna

Tofu and Tuna is an adult animation series about elite crime fighters who combat elite criminals.

Tofu and Tuna, when they aren’t killing people, are searching for Tofu’s long lost mother.   Being deaf, dumb, and blind, Tofu must feel his way through the myriad of women drawn to his child-like simplicity.  Tuna wants to console the distraught women whom Tofu discards once he decides they are not his mother.

Tofu and Tuna, brothers-in-spirit, would never bite the hand that feeds them.  Unless, of course, the hand gets a little too close to Tofu.  Let’s be reasonable.

The Tofu and Tuna Saga

1

A starving, young woman wrapped her infant in a blanket and pulled a discarded, flowered swim cap over his little head to keep him warm.  She kissed him gently and deposited him on the steps of the Shalin Temple.  Her eyes filled with tears, she kissed him again and knocked loudly on the door before she ran off into the night.

The bleary-eyed night guard opened the door and checked the empty streets.  He cursed gruffly before he noticed the babe at his feet.  He sighed and closed his weary eyes.

As he picked up the child, the blanket fell away to reveal the swim cap.   The startled monk almost dropped the baby.  He ran with the infant into the compound forgetting his duties at the door.  He cried out for the abbot.  As monks gather in the courtyard girding themselves against whatever had invaded their night, the abbot made his way through the throng and to the guard and the baby.

“Another child!”  the abbot whispered and said a brief prayer to the heavens for guidance.  The guard put a hand on the abbot and was about to lose it for his insolence when the abbot saw the flowered swim cap on the baby’s head.

The holy man dropped to his knees.  The other monks followed suit.  The one they had expected for age upon age had arrived!  The child with flowers on his head!  The age of reckoning was upon the world.  The age of reformation.  The age of Tofu.

2

In a cozy little 24,000 square foot house in Bel Air, Edward Tuna celebrates the birth of his son, Charles, by reciting Homer’s Illiad in the original Greek in American Sign Language.  That’s not nearly as easy as it sounds or doesn’t sound as the case may be.  His arms and hands were so tired afterward, he spent the next three days in bed signing only, “Love you, Chuck!”

When he was informed that his wife had no interest in the baby, he roused himself from his stupor.  When asked why, she said, “I have to get my nails done.  Look at them.  Just look at them!”  He had to admit that they weren’t perfect.  So, off she went and thus began the absentee-mother upbringing of Chuck Tuna.

3

 It was a dark and stormy night.  Wolfgang Tristan Bassett wasn’t so much born as screamed into existence by his mother.  His father was asleep after an exhausting night of wenching and his mother had to deal with the thrill of childbirth all on her  own.  She had sung Brunnhilde, Isolde, and Kundry so many times that her normal speaking voice, some called “the screech”, carried for miles.

His father took one look at Bassett and accused his wife of infidelity.  It was true that the baby was swarthy with tufts of black hair which sprouted from one cowlick after another and that his father was fair skinned and blond.   The mother smiled sympathetically and suggested the father do something physically impossible with his head.  The first family portrait showed the smiling babe staring unfocused at the camera, the father leering at someone off to his left and the mother flirting with someone off to her right.

4

Ten year old Tofu, the flowers on his swim cap faded but still visible, stands like a statue in the midst of his fellow, young monks in training.  They taunt him and throw pebbles at him.  Everything bounces off him without effect.  He sees nothing, he hears nothing, he never says a word.

One of the boys comes near and, before anyone can react, Tofu spins and thrusts forward with his staff.  The boy flies backward ten feet into some of his classmates.   Tofu points in the young monk’s direction and silently laughs.  His laugh silently grows and grows until he is doubled over with mirth.  The boys come out of their shock induced stupor and, as one, pounce on Tofu and beat him into the dirt.

5

Ten year old Chuck Tuna pretends to fence while his tennis instructor patiently points out the correct way to hold a racket and approach a shot.  The teacher starts the ball machine which launches ball after ball at Chuck.  Chuck winds up and bats them out of the tennis court, raising his hands in victory and making crowd noises for each home run.  A bell rings.  Chuck looks up at the main house to see his father sign “I love you.”  Chuck smiles and signs back, “Back at you, Dad.”

Behind his father, movers cart furniture out of the house.  A few of them come down to the tennis court, take the machine, the balls, Chuck’s racket and, one particularly strong one, picks up the instructor and lugs him away.  While passing Chuck, the instructor squeaks out, “Power comes from the waist.”  The mover grunts, “Tough luck, kid.”

The bell rings again.  Chuck looks up at his father who smiles sheepishly and shrugs.  The movers yank the bell from his father.  One carefully unclasps the watch from his father’s wrist and takes it, checking it off on his list.

6

Fifteen years later:

The Wealthy Man and Mister Lee enter the courtyard of the monastery.  Monks–some on crutches or with casts, slings, or bandages–steer a wide arc around Tofu who stands motionless in the middle of the courtyard.   Only the faintest hint of flowers remain on the swim cap and the temples of his sunglasses are taped onto the cap where his ears should be.   His clothes are simple and simply filthy.

“This is the man,” Wealthy Man says as he points at Tofu.

“I thought you said he was a monk?” Mr. Lee asked.

“He is.”

“Then why don’t the other monks associate with him?”

“They fear him,” Wealthy Man says.  “Watch!”  He jangles a purse filled with gold coins.  All except Tofu take notice.  They move toward Wealthy Man and Mr. Lee.  One of them steps within striking distance of Tofu who smashes the unfortunate monk with a blindingly fast staff strike.  The monk flies backward into some of his fellows knocking a group of them down.

“Oh, my!” Mr. Lee says.

Wealthy Man holds out one coin.  Tofu sniffs the air and heads toward the coin.  The monks clear out of his way.  Tofu takes the coin and puts it in his mouth.  He smiles.  Wealthy Man steps forward then holds still in front of Tofu who sniffs him.  He places another coin in Tofu’s hand.  Tofu smiles again.

Emboldened, Mr. Lee steps forward.  “He likes you!”

“He likes gold,” Wealthy Man says.  He taps signs into Tofu’s outstretched hand.  “This person wants to hire you.”

Tofu hands Wealthy Man his staff and turns quickly to Mr. Lee.

“Stand still!” admonishes Wealthy Man.  Mr. Lee stands frozen as Tofu glides his hands over Mr. Lee’s face, chest–a look of disappointment crosses Tofu’s face–and finally down to Lee’s groin.

“Oh, MY!”  Mr. Lee says with a smile.  Tofu grimaces and backs off.   Mr. Lee steps forward.  Tofu grabs his staff and faces him.  “I have a job for you.  There is a problem…,” Lee starts to say.

“He can’t hear you or see you for that matter.”

“Then you tell him.”  Mr. Lee points at Tofu’s hands.

“Would you tell a bullet why you fire it?”

7

Meanwhile back in Bassettville… Wolfie Bassett had gone through several stages growing up.  He even tried Neo-Nazism for a day but it reminded him way too much of his father.  That and the idea of having a needle put ink into his skin!  He was nauseous for a week.

During his goth phase, he was at a bar being ignored by all the cool kids who were busy ignoring or insulting everyone around them.  He was about to leave when he noticed a stunning woman across the bar being ignored by the same people who were ignoring him.  He made his way to her.

“Come here often?”  he asked in his best casual American weighed down, as it was, by a thick German accent.

She lifted her blackened eyelids, looked past her studded nose, and smiled with her pierced lips at him like he was a gift from heaven.  “Did you speak to me?”  she answered in her own thick, German accent.

It was love at first umlaut.

“Vat’s your name?”

She said Polly something but he discarded the last name from his memory for soon it would be Bassett.

In the ensuing years, it was never clear if marriage was in the offing or not.  As Wolfie got more comfortable around her, he slipped into his Wagnerian opera phase, the phase that would last him the rest of his life.  It included a tunic, tights, Viking-like sandals, and a Viking’s winged helmet.  He also sported a riding crop and removable moustache which were left over from another phase he would rather not talk about.  Spontaneously, he would burst into arias from various Wagner operas in the middle of movies, or shopping or, worst of all, sex.  Fortunately, Polly was in love and tone deaf and didn’t mind nearly as much as passersby and neighbors.

But this left Polly searching for a new character.  As much as he pushed her toward Isolde, she ended up looking like a little Swiss miss with a thing for Goth who had spent too much time on the street.  She got rid of more than half of her piercings which still left enough to set off metal detectors for miles around and she let the dye fade around her eyes.

Together they faced the world huddled in the huge estate left to Bassett by his parents.  Alone except for the army of killers Wolfie had been assembling and training since his inheritance came through.

The world was going to pay.  For what, he wasn’t sure.  But it was going to pay.

8

The reason became very clear.  His precious Margaret Ann, his little sauerbraten, his beloved  basset hound had gained a few pounds.  As he told an increasingly jealous Polly, “Zey look good on her, you understant, but I feel I should do somezine.”

He went to MaxiMart and shopped for the most expensive, diet dog food.  He didn’t bother to read the label or he would have seen, down past the other illegible other stuff, that it was made in China.  After a couple of cans, his sauerbraten had drooled her last long, glorious strand of drool.  He had her bronzed and made one of the Bassetteers, on pain of death, responsible for making sure that Margaret Ann was always on hand.

Polly tried to lose the statue a few times with the result that there were a few less Bassetteers.

Bassett declared war, not only on MaxiMart, but on all exporters of cheap and dangerous goods.   Mister Li just so happened to run a company called, Cheap and Dangerous Goods.   Amazingly, this was not something lost in translation.