Excerpts From Nonexistent Books

William “Black Bill” Cubbins IV, our regular pirate affairs commentator, sent us this rebuttal to Ms. Matsumura-Tamarabuchi’s column published yesterday. Cubbins serves as pirate-in-residence at the University of Plunder Bay, and executive director of UPB’s William Kidd Center for the Study of Pirate Culture. A practicing pirate, he most recently took a Spanish Man o’ Tacos freighter off Cadiz laden with baked golden treasure from Mexico.

I was disgusted by Felisa Matsumura-Tamaribuchi’s column yesterday demanding the release of murderer and reprobate Death’s Hand–or to use his appellation in Piratese, Lorryblawwer or “Burner of Buses.” But it is not surprising; if there is one thing you can count on from the disorderly, untrustworthy, illegal, racist, fascist, and unattractive hordes of ninjakind, it is to milk every perceived slight in the overwhelmingly pro-ninja media.

The so-called Grand Sensei–a meaningless and made-up position used to buttress pro-ninja sentiments and to disguise the fact that ninjas as a nation and a people were unrecognized prior to 1868–is in fact a murdering, pyromaniac bilge rat. His open attack on a bus of peaceful pirate settlers en route to our most sacred ritual, Plundercon, was but the latest in a litany of ninja aggression and terrorism. Fifteen peg legs, seventeen hooks, twenty-eight eyepatches, and one wooden aorta were given out as a result of that attack, a toll in blood and treasure not seen since the dark days of the Anti-Pirate Campaigns of the 1710s.

Ninja claims that Death’s Hand was acting in self-defense, that he is a man of peace, ring hollow in the face of naked ninja barbarism and aggression. The ninja way is the way of violence, of rejecting civilized parley in favor of daggers between the ribs. Politicians and media commentators repeat the lie of the peaceful ninja out of pro-ninja bias or out of fear that a stray remark will enrage “peaceful” ninjas worldwide and lead to still more slaughter, violence, and assassination. One needs only look at the titles of Death’s Hand’s mind-poisoning “children’s” books and the list of simpering pro-ninja public figures lined up to protest his just imprisonment for evidence of that.

It is perhaps most telling that Ms. Matsumura-Tamaribuchi must trot out that most well-worn Big Lie to support her case, the so-called Protocols of the Pirate Elders. Serious scholars have long since dismissed that text as a forgery concocted by the British crown during anti-pirate pogroms in the 1700s, and for such a fringe theory to crop up in a supposedly reasonable column further reinforces the fact that ninjas are an unkempt, proudly ignorant, and backwards race.

Reject the call for in the “ninja liberation struggle.” Use your brain. Plunder freely, plunder well, and ignore the lies of the pro-ninja media. Let not their lies and slander diminish the strength and ferocity of every throaty “arr” we raise to the heavens with our mugs of grog.

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Felisa Lloyd Matsumura-Tamaribuchi is a frequent editorial contributor to EFNB and the current Tokugawa Chair of Shinobi Studies at Kaizoku University. Widow of Sensei Takeharu Matsumura-Tamaribuchi of the Black Shadow Clan, who died in 1997 at the age of 108, Ms. Matsumura-Tamaribuchi was born in Omaha, Nebraska in 1977 and is perhaps the most visible and vocal pro-ninja activist in the nation today.

I write to you today to decry the illegal, racist, fascist, and high blood sugar promoting imprisonment of a great and shining light among the Shinobi–or, to use the popular but less enlightened term, ninjas. I speak of course of Grand Sensei Shi No Te, Death’s Hand, also known as Adder’s Venom, Chill-of-First-Snow, and The Tickler. He is a political prisoner, a symbol of the shameful treatment of ninjas by world governments and the world media.

His crime? Merely blowing up a bus full of pirates on their way to Plundercon 2002. I, and the greater ninja community, hold that this act was a political testament, an expression of free and therefore protected speech, and a great favor to all cities and gas stations at which the bus might have stopped. For, as detailed in the absolutely true and oft-repressed text Protocols of the Elder Pirates, pirates are and have always been secretly planning to take over the world and plunder it like a giant galleon from the shadows. Grand Sensei Death’s Hand was merely striking in self-defense, as part of the inevitable move to drive the vile pirate invaders back into the sea.

His incendiary actions and unpopular slaughter aside, Grand Sensei Death’s Hand is a man of peace, as are all ninjas. The ninja way is the way of peace, only slipping a muffled dagger between the ribs of a victim when they really, really deserve it. Grand Sensei Death’s Hand has dedicated himself to education and peace during his imprisonment as well, penning gentle children’s books like Kill All Pirates, Pirates are the Assassins of Our Future, and Dear Children Reject Pirate Lies. Entertainers, politicians, and Nobel laureates have all called for his release, drawing on their vast experience in those honest and directly ninja-related fields.

I urge you, dear readers, to write to your government–secretly controlled and financed by pirates as it may be–to demand the release of Grand Sensei Death’s Hand. I urge you to take direct action as well, through protest and possibly making things explode. Blow up your own buses full of pirates. Join us in the great Shinobi liberation struggle by donating your time and talents. We ninjas are waiting for your help, silently, in the shadows, wearing black, with concealed daggers, and also perhaps some smoke bombs.

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“Fire!”

The road pirates’ vehicle had pulled alongside the fleeing Sani-Cola drink truck, let fly with another burst of fire, this time ripping apart one of the rig’s rear wheels. Stricken, it jackknifed a bit before one of Captain Higgs’ men cried out and pointed at the cab: the trucker had removed his off-white wifebeater and was waving it as a white flag.

True to the Jolly Roger they drove under, Higgs’ men let the driver go, giving him naught but a boot to the ass for the trouble he had caused in trying to run away. He then set a crew to work replacing the Sani-Cola truck’s tire so his men could drive it to a safe chop shop while their armed and armored Toyota Hilux did the same with a skeleton crew.

“A fine bounty boys, an excellent haul!” Even selling for pennies on the dollar, the Sani-Cola, Diet Sani-Cola, and Sani-Cola Xtreme filling the truck would net each of Higgs’ men a fine prize share. As was his right, the captain took the contents of the cab for himself, including two fine beaded seat covers, an ashtray full of change for toll roads, and highly addictive Trucker’s Choice brand pep pills worth a few bucks on the side.

The crew of road pirates had just about finished making their catch ready to drive when Captain Higgs’ first mate, who had been scanning the horizon, pointed and cried out. A Mitsubishi with neon lights was approaching at high speed, and through his spyglass Higgs could see several figures in black on its running boards.

“Damn! Road ninjas!” he hollered. “Battle stations, all of you!”

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