The CEO, The Ninja, and The Pirate, or, Finally... A Slightly Epic Battle Rages

When I finally woke up from my concussion, aka "nap" induced by Mr. Congeniality/Andrew... I was so far beyond pissed off that pissed off was only a distant happy memory.

After all this... Was a pirate actually taking the side of a ninja? I mean, sure... Congeniality did kidnap me, and give me an enormous pain in the ass... But on the other hand, I did enjoy torturing him... and he hadn't ever actually done anything to me...

What. Tha. Fuck.

Was I actually defending that smiley faced bastard?

For the Love of Carlos... I think I've finally lost my mind entirely.

I gave myself a mental head slap and then got busy checking out the layout of my newest prison.

I was tied to a pillar in the middle of the biggest office I had ever seen. There were simply acres and acres of gray marble floors, and the windows gave a 360 degree view of the entire city. Near the eastern edge of this domain was a desk made of some warm and buttery looking wood, and Shiruken, the CEO of the College Board, and Congeniality were standing gathered around a white board on an easel next to this massive work of artistry. Shiruken looked on the board with little interest, smoking some sort of pipe. Wisps of smoke gathered about his head like stroking hands, and he leaned back against the desk.

As I stood slumped against the pillar, all three men were discussing the movement of Princeton Review troops into the suburbs of every small town, minor city, and metropolis in the United States. Their plan was to force every single high school student in our land to take the PSAT, not just once, but TWICE...freshman, sophomore, AND junior year!

Oh the humanity!

My stomach roiled around in an unpleasant dance with my intestines and my colon. For a moment I actually started to believe that I might commit that unpardonable sin (at least in my own eyes) of completely ensuring that I would forever bear the name "Virginia Poopy Pants."

The CEO was a darkly tanned man with brown hair which receeded from his forehead as though it were actively attempting to get as far away from his face as possible. This was understandable, since between his cold gray eyes, hard sneer, and the lines on his mug, I can imagine that any hair follicle worth its weight would run screaming from him... as would anyone else who got in his way. His face was shaved so closely that I wondered if he just stared at his chin in the morning and ordered his follicles to stop producing. It seemed likely. I heard him say,

"Are you sure that the senator has recieved his "contribution"?

Shiruken stared at the CEO in a way that managed to communicate his complete disregard of the man without being insulting enough to give offense before saying,

"Naturally. Andrew paid him last night after escaping from that tub, the Unvanquished. Relax; your plan is a success."

At this, I really did lose it. Though the moan that escaped me was barely a breath of wind, it drew the attention of all three men.

I can't prove it... but I think I actually did stop breathing for a time.

The CEO froze into complete stillness as his eyes met mine across the vast and echo-y chamber.This was much more disturbing than you might think. Although he was somewhat rotund, he seemed to convey a nearly palpable sense of danger, and there was a suspicious bulge under his left arm that suggested to me that he might be carrying more than simple bulk under his suit jacket. His suit was as dark and foreboding as the rest of him, and his Italian leather shoes squeaked for mercy when he turned in my direction.

He didn't look like the CEO of an "educational" corporation. He looked like a hit man for the mob. His whole bearing suggested a clenched fist, ready to be planted squarely in the jaw of anything that might get in his way, and that was exactly how he was looking at me.

I actually felt ice crystals forming in my guts.

'Well that's just great.' I thought. 'First, I'm going to soil myself... and secondly... I'm going to shit icicles. This is going to suck.'

Naturally... This did the trick of making me even more furious.

Was I going to allow this?

Hells to the NO, as the Lizz would say.

Slowly, I conducted a silent scan of my entire body, and everything seemed to be intact... But where were my compadres?

It was at this moment that Shiruken looked away from the whiteboard. When his eyes met mine, the cold look dissolved like ice cubes melting in a glass of warm water; they crinkled and sparkled with humor. He turned slowly, and began to stalk forward. Though it was impossible (for me at least) to determine his actual age, he must have been at least twice as old as me. Still, he moved like smoke across a still room... Nearly flickering from my vision a few times.

It was disturbing in the extreme.

When he was close enough to reach out and slap me, he stopped and said,

"Awake already?" After a slight pause during which I made absolutely no reply, he continued.

"I must say, your highness... My friend Andrew didn't lie when he said that you have the hardest and most unbreakable skull he's ever encountered. At first I thought he was merely pulling his punches, due to his nearly maniacal obsession with certain... female attributes... But perhaps not."

I snorted, and then hawked something out of my throat that looked like a cross between a hairball and a green and yellow gummy bear, hitting him somewhere in the middle of the chest. The goop slid down the front of his shirt like a snail, leaving a track of my DNA in its wake.

The humor in his face vanished quicker than under age college students when the cops show up at a house party. He cocked back his fist for a punch that would probably have landed me in Mass General, but before it could fall, Congeniality was standing at his side and nudging him out of the way. He said,

"Oh Master, please... Allow me. I owe the queen many times over for the insults she has ventured upon my person, and after all, as part of my reward in this matter you did mention that I could... play with her for a while... Yes?"

I could feel my face blanch so white that I probably turned nearly translucent for a minute, and I almost choked on my own tongue.

Now this was the absolute, rock-bottom, slime-covered, purple-backpack-carrying, LIMIT. A sudden hot flash raised my temperature so high I thought I would just start to smoke from every pore. If anyone had touched me at that moment without an oven mitt, they would have taken a third-degree burn to the hand, I swear before Carlos and his holy mother.

"Play?" I spat out.

Before I could continue what would no doubt have been a rip-roaring, ear-searing, side-splitting diatribe, Congeniality/Andrew hit me square on the left cheekbone with no less than 4 knuckles... Though it felt like ten.

But only for the barest whisper of an instant.

Purely in defense, my head snapped to the side, and I took a hard knockl of column to the right side of my face.

When I got my bearings and turned back, Shiruken was drifting back over to the CEO, who was once again staring at the White Board of Doom, and Congeniality first raised his eyebrow at me, and then gave me a look that could charitably be called a smirk.

And he winked.

In a voice so low that it felt like he was speaking directly into my cerebral cortex, he asked, "How was that?"

I whispered back, "Just shut up and untie me smartass... I'm sick of pretending to be scared of you."

He restrained himself... But I could see his eyes, and he was definitely laughing on the inside.

With one swift and silent cut, the knot of the ropes holding me to the marble column gave way like a sandcastle hit by a tsunami. Before Shiruken, the CEO or any nearby henchmen could react, I reached into a hidden location on my person, and pulled out a very small detonator.

And that was the moment that the tide began to really turn in our favor.

The explosion that resulted from my finger on the detonator switch was a small one, but significant.

The desk that Shiruken was once again leaning on exploded in sparks, as the CEO's laptop and his Blackberry both erupted like tiny tiny grenades. Apparently, my emails of the evening before really had been successful.

Sweeeet.

In the next instant, windows were imploding from every side as furious, riled-up, and just plain crazy-ass pirates rappelled in to the room from above. They were howling, swearing, and generally striking fear into the hearts of all and sundry as they landed on the marble floors and skidded towards their foes.

God it was beautiful.

As they landed, ninjas raced in silently from the floor below, and the two groups met in ferocious battle. Smoke bombs flew, pistols kicked out shot after shot, and katana and cutlass clashed with the music of swordplay.

I saw the Quartermaster shooting with one pistol while he dueled a ninja with the other. The boatswain took out three ninjas with a resounding crash when he came barreling into the office from the floor above.

In the center of the maelstrom stood the CEO, staring alternately between Shiruken's fallen form, and my own upright one. His eyes had darkened to the color of dirty and soot-stained pebbles, and his glare could have killed a Pekingese at twenty paces.

But it was lost on me.

With absolutely no thought, consideration, or hesitation, I threw myself across the intervening distance and launched myself at that suit-wearing, holier-than-thou, cappucino-drinking, bastard. I bounced down hard, but my shoulder met his knees with a solid ka-thunk... and I heard something pop in a way that sounded... mighty unpleasant. The CEO let out a roar that could almost be heard above the clash of battling scurvy knaves and silent shadow fighters.

I could feel his hand going for his weapon, but I would not be stopped now. I had been abused, kidnapped, insulted, and thwarted too many times. I was more than willing to "take one for the team" by sacrificing myself, if it would only save all those innocents from the forces of standardized testing.

He reached into his jacket, but I got there first... And my manual dexterity is a hell of a lot better.

The gun went off with a pop that barely registered in my thundering head.

It wasn't so bad...

He won't need that thumb anyway... Not where he's going.

He was still howling at me and glaring furiously into my eyes, as a boot came from the side and struck him right in the ear... At which point he dropped into a sweet and peaceful dream state.

And a hand was offered...

I took it.



As I got to my feet, the battle continued to rage... But it was almost over.



Can you believe it?



*Personal Note to the Reader:

On a side note, I would just like to say... When you are a sneaky, badass pirate queen like myself, there are a few advantages to being built like... well... A Fucking TANK, and they are the following:

1. Distraction (If you can't win them over with your looks, you can at least shock them into stunned silence with your... fashion choices).

2. Hidden cargo space that never seems to get searched (personally, I think it's because I've just got too much acreage in the ... pectoral area... The entirety just never seems to get completely "patted down" if you know what I mean).



Just sayin'.