It's about time I came clean. I am a ninja assassin. There, I've said it. I don't see what the big deal is. And to be honest, I'm not half-bad at it, so I think I have a fighting chance to survive when the Old Master sends his hotheads from Ninja Central Command after me. Bring 'em on,
Sensei.
The whole oath of secrecy really is kind of absurd, when you think about it.
Oooh, aren't we special, we're members of a secret society. Let's practice our stupid ritual handshake and light a bunch of candles . . . Here's a password for you,
Sensei: LAME! All these years of training, the abuses I endured to turn my body into a weapon, and my mind into a committed killer — and I'm not even allowed to talk about it at parties? I mean, what's in it for me? I get to sneak around Cambridge twirling numchucks at raccoons between assignments? Whoop-de-do.
Screw it. I can throw a stick of room-temperature butter through a watermelon and embed it in dry wall. I know a whole bunch of people who I think would like to see that trick, and I'm inviting them all over for a demonstration tonight over margaritas and Jello casserole. And who knows? If I
feel like it, I may well just open up my foot locker and show them my collection of knives, swords, and poison darts.
Here's a big middle-finger to you,
Sensei — you don't take a guy as far as you did and then hold him back. I'm telling the world:
I am one bad-ass Japanese stealth assassin, and I've got a Hollywood agent on the other line says he can get me a gig in a food-processor ad. Won't the folks at Cuisinart be surprised when I outchop, outdice, outmince the electric competition? The sky is the limit for a man with my talent and ambition. I'm gonna be famous,
Sensei. So kiss my butt.
