The Magic Pencil Read online

away.

  This was all very strange to say the least, and Noah didn’t care for it one bit. He was scared of the pencil his uncle had given him, but he was more scared of losing his dog who was also his best friend. Without really thinking about it Noah grabbed the pencil from his underwear and immediately began drawing another ship.

  This boat was bigger, with many more sails, so it could catch up to the pirates who had a head start. And he knew he would need an advantage over the other crew, so instead of just drawing pirates on this ship, he drew ninja-pirates! They dressed in all black from head to toe, but still had tri-corner hats, eye patches and peg legs. Noah also took care to draw each of them with smiles on their faces, to make sure they were nice people who would help him out. And when he was done he waited for them to come to life so they could set sail in search of Burt, who Noah knew must be very scared. Burt didn’t even like riding in the car on the way to the park, so being on a pirate ship was going to be no fun at all for him.

  But the ninja pirates did not move and the waves did not rise and fall. Noah shook the pencil to try to make it work. He’d seen his dad do this with the television remote control many times. But it did not work. The drawings stayed still. What had he done differently the last time?

  And then he had it!

  Noah quickly signed his name to the bottom corner of the page and the magic was back! The ninja pirates came to life and started flipping around in the air as ninjas do.

  “Hey!” Noah shouted at his drawings. “Hey! Up here!”

  The ninjas stopped jumping about and looked out at him. “Ahoy!” said the ninja-pirate captain. “Do you need help?”

  And Noah nodded. “Some pirates, not you but different pirates, stole my dog and sailed away. Will you help me get him back?”

  The captain smiled an even bigger smile than before. “Of course we will!” he said. “What are ninja-pirates for if not helping people recover their pets? Come aboard!”

  Noah smiled, too, forgetting how weird all of this was for a moment and just glad to be understood. The ninja-pirate captain held out his hand, and Noah took it and was magically pulled out of his bedroom and into his own art.

  “Which way did the go?” asked one of the ninja-pirate crew.

  Noah pointed toward the front of the ship and said, “That way!”

  “Well then,” said the captain, “There’s no time to lose.” The ninja-pirates leapt into action, pulling ropes and things until the wind caught the giant silk sails and away they went!

  The ocean breeze felt cool on Noah’s freckled face and the air smelled of salt and freshness. He smiled.

  Toward the back of the boat two of the ninja-pirates were arguing about something called a “Kraken.”

  “It’s twenty stories tall,” said the first one. “It has antlers and fangs and squid arms and it tips waiters poorly.”

  “I just can’t imagine it,” said the second.

  Then one of the ninja pirates approached Noah and asked to borrow his pencil. People ask to borrow pencils at school all the time and Noah was caught up in the sights and the smells of the open ocean so he didn’t really think about it. He just handed over his pencil. Also he’s only six years old. The ninja-pirate said, “Thank you” and moved back to his friend where he knelt down and started sketching something on the wooden floor of the ship.

  It was almost a full minute before Noah suddenly realized what might be about to happen. He dashed to the back of the boat where one of the ninjas had just finished drawing his kraken. It was huge and mean looking, all tentacles and teeth. Noah screamed, “NO!”

  But it was too late. With a flourish the ninja-pirate signed his name and Noah braced himself for a giant monster to come to life. But nothing happened. He looked around but all was calm. Noah sighed in relief.

  And then the kraken rose out of the ocean.

  It towered over the ship and growled a deep, horrible growl that almost sounded like it said, “Boo!”

  Ninjas, who aren’t supposed to be afraid of anything, screamed and ran around the boat with nowhere to go! It was just open air and water as far as the eye could see. “We need weapons!” one of them shouted.

  The kraken whipped its long, strong arms at the boat, the mast splintered like a worn out pencil. That’s when Noah remembered the pencil! He picked it up from off the deck and quickly sketched out the first weapons that came to mind. And as he signed his name a mountain of rotten tomatoes rose from the floorboards.

  “Tomatoes?” asked the ninja-pirate captain? “Really?”

  “I panicked,” Noah confessed.

  They would have to do. The ninja-pirates jumped and flipped and hurled the tomatoes at the massive beast, and the kraken didn’t seem to like it, but it didn’t stop him from hammering at the ship with huge, punishing blows.

  “I hope the kraken hates to eat his vegetables!” said one of the ninja-pirates as he hurled another tomato at the sea monster. It exploded on the beast’s face.

  “Tomatoes are a fruit!” said another as he ducked out of the way of the kraken’s tentacle.

  “Well that’s even worse!” said the first ninja. “Maybe next you could draw some noodles! We could make the kraken a nice pasta dish!”

  And then Noah had a brilliant idea. “You know who makes the best spaghetti in the world?” he said already sketching out his answer. “Dragons!” Noah quickly drew three of them, with their large, bat-like wings, scaly dinosaur tails and long streams of fire shooting from their mouths. He gave them kind eyes and smiles, too, to make sure these were the nice dragons his uncle had told him about. And no sooner had he signed his name to his work than three massive dragons flew down from the sky! They screeched and cried out and the kraken was not pleased.

  The hulking sea monsters said, “Boo!” one more time and retreated to the depths of the ocean.

  The ninja pirates jumped for joy and high-fived each other, who said they were more than happy to help before eating what was left of the tomatoes. But it wasn’t time to celebrate just yet. The boat had taken a lot of damage and was quickly sinking. Noah drew buckets to dump the water overboard, and huge adhesive bandages to try to fix the leaks but it was no good. Water flooded in more quickly than they could dump it back out, and that bandages wouldn’t stick to the soaking wet ship. They were going down.

  Noah was scared. He was a good swimmer, but he wasn’t sure he was good enough to swim the whole ocean. And the deck was too wet to draw on, now. It wouldn’t take the pencil marks.

  Then one of the dragons spoke up. “You know,” he said, “flying is the safest way to travel.” Then he and his two dragon friends crouched low and Noah and the ninja-pirates all climbed on their backs.

  They rose high in the air and soared through the sky as the ship below them was swallowed by the sea.

  Noah explained the situation with his dog to the dragons and away they went, their hair blowing in the breeze! The dragons were fast, propelled through the air by their huge, powerful wings and in no time they saw the pirate ship on the horizon.

  The ninja-pirates discussed a battle strategy. They would attack from the air, of course, land aboard the ship all at once, fight the pirates in hand-to-hand combat, give their foes wedgies and rescue Burt. But as they came closer and closer to the ship Noah saw something surprising. Burt wasn’t tied up or in a cage like a prisoner; he was on the deck of the ship, running back and forth. And, yes, Noah was sure of it now, he was playing fetch with the pirates!

  Noah thought about how terribly lonely he had been before Burt came to live with him, and how these pirates were probably lonesome, too. They had gone about this all wrong, of course, it’s really not nice at all to steal someone’s dog, but Noah understood in that moment that everyone needs someone to love and care for, even pirates. And it’s not as though Noah had drawn any pet stores on the ocean.

  “I don’t want to fight them,” Noah said to his ninja-pirate friends. “Fighting doesn’t solve anything. Let me talk to them.”
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  The ninja-pirates agreed and shortly Noah landed onboard the ship. As soon as he touched down Burt sprinted over to Noah, leapt in the air and licked his face. Burt had missed his person just as much as Noah had missed his dog.

  The pirates were terrified of the dragons so Noah reassured them. “These are my friends,” he said. “We’ve come to help.”

  “Aarrr?” asked the pirate captain.

  “I know what it’s like to need a friend,” Noah said. “And I think I can help.” Noah sat cross-legged on the deck and, with his magic pencil, carefully drew four parrots, one for each of the pirates. And, as always, when he signed his name the birds came to life, and flew directly onto the shoulders of the pirates. The pirates smiled and laughed and were clearly very happy with their new pets.

  Noah then drew a dozen boxes of crackers. Because if there was anything he knew about parrots is that they always wanted a cracker.

  Then they made even more friends as the ninja-pirates joined the first pirate’s crew, since their own ship was somewhere on the ocean floor at this point. And then the dragons made everyone spaghetti, and it actually was the very best any of them had ever tasted.

  Noah was happy for everyone and very glad to have Burt in his arms, but now he was starting to wonder how he was going to back to his room. He missed his mom and dad and while