Disclaimer: All The Magician characters - and related material - are copyrighted by Gaumont Multimedia. The kitten is my own character, and a feisty little character, too.

A week had passed since Zina had found her new friend. Ace and Cosmo had done a little brainstorming about how the kitten had gotten inside the Magic Express, and come to the conclusion that Cosmo had brought it in, inadvertently.

Cosmo had been over at Ulene's, showing her a new gadget he'd bought earlier that day. He called her to check and see if there was a litter of cats in her area. She confirmed it, and how long they'd been there, but said that no one knew who owned the mother. She was probably a stray.

"Why do you ask, Cos?" asked Ulene.

"It seems one of the kittens got caught up in my stuff - probably my jacket. I brought it home by accident, and now Zina thinks it's one of her cubs. She won't let us near it."

Ulene laughed. "That I'd like to see. But you should be grateful that she's mothering something other than you for a change."

Cosmo brightened. "Hey, you're right. I didn't think of that. Well, gotta go. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Okay, Cos. Bye."

Cosmo hung up and turned to Ace. "The kitten is from a litter of a stray. Ulene said the kittens were born about seven or eight weeks ago."

"Well, at least it's been weaned." He turned to watch Zina, as she kept watch over the kitten, who was trying its darndest to go exploring. He chuckled as she got up for the tenth time, lifting it off of the side of the sofa that it was trying to climb, and bringing it back to her patch of sunlight. "She looks a bit frustrated, and more than a little tired. But I wish she'd let us get close enough to it to see if it's a girl or a boy."

"Hey, bro, she's your panther. You get her to let you look at it up close."

"I may have to resort to a little magic to check it out."

Zina seemed to understand what he said. Picking the kitten up by the scruff of the neck, she walked over to stand in front of Ace, the kitten dangling from her mouth. Ace squatted in front of her.

"Well, well. Congratulations, Zina. It's a boy. And he looks very healthy, too." Ace stood up and Zina walked back to her spot. She lay down, then put the kitten down between her front paws. Immediately he started climbing over her leg. Zina looked resigned to the situation, and let him go. She seemed to realize that he wasn't going to be taken away from her. She rolled onto her side and fell asleep.

"Well I guess we're keeping the kitten, right bro?"

"It would seem that way. But, what are we going to call him?"

"I don't know. I've never named an ani... OW!" He reached down to his thigh, where the kitten had decided to go climbing. He pulled the kitten off and held him up. "Look, little dude, if you're gonna live here, you're gonna have to get one thing straight. People aren't for climbing up."

The kitten looked straight at him. "Got that, little dude?"

The kitten meowed back at him, and swiped one paw out at him.

"What did you call the kitten, Cosmo?"

"Little du... Hey! That's what we can call him. Dude!" The kitten meowed. "You like that name, Dude?"

The kitten meowed. It sounded like he was agreeing with Cosmo.

"Okay, then. From now on, I'll call you Dude."