Hostage No More

She'd waited long enough.
Breathe in.
Breathe out.

Ikaruga relaxed in her bonds and expanded her awareness outward. Two in this room. One outside, passing. Maybe three more beyond that. Her senses were trained to be sharp, but not as super-human as her other abilities. This mission was personal for her. Her kidnappers had targeted her specifically, which meant the odds were that her family was at stake. They'd planned their abduction well, but they clearly just thought her an ordinary heiress. After three days of surveillance, a nondescript black car pulled up alongside her and burly men dropped a bag over her head, before pulling her inside. She'd warned her friends long in advance and they'd all acted their part of shocked and scared schoolgirls wonderfully, although if she didn't miss it, a little of Hibari's performance hadn't been entirely faked... Now, if she was any judge, they would be finished tracking the car down and ransacking the area for information on her erstwhile kidnappers. It was time to enter the final step.

She remembered Kiriya-sensei describing the means by which a kunoichi could remove her target. Attraction had been managed without any effort on her part; her attackers had known who she was (or at least, had known her public self) and taken her without needing the traditional steps of careful seduction a kunoichi typically relied upon. Infiltration too had been a snap, as they had taken her straight to the location of whoever was co-ordinating this. She had heard his voice congratulating his pawns and instructing them to keep her under guard. Confidence had actually required a minimum of effort, as by acting like the terrified and vulnerable schoolgirl she was supposed to be had easily fooled her captors. Position was a little more tricky. She was in the heart of the enemy's 'castle' but Hien had been taken from her. Her captors had assumed it was for an after-school club and had even laughed at the idea of a slender girl like her wielding the fearsome nodachi. She would need to recover it before she pursued her target, but that should be straightforward enough. That left only one step.
Elimination.

The two men in the room were nervous. She could hear one tapping his foot in a staccato rhythm against the concrete floor and both were smoking heavily. Both were worried about outside threats, such as a SWAT team kicking down the door to rescue the hostage. Neither were focused on the beautiful girl tied to the chair in the corner. Ikaruga tested her bonds, but they were well-done and tight enough to almost cut off her circulation in her fingers. She'd need to cut herself loose. Fortunately, although the chair was bolted to the ground, they hadn't secured her long and shapely legs to it. Ikaruga silently wormed her foot out of her shoe and pried open the secret compartment in the sole with her toes. Out of it, she carefully drew a small and wickedly sharp kunai. Despite being characterised as a dagger and throwing knife, the kunai was actually more often used by shinobi as a tool. All three aspects were about to come in useful however, as Ikaruga carefully weighed her advantage, holding it between her toes. With a flick of her leg, she sent the weapon upwards. This had to be done perfectly, or the blade would stick in the ceiling, or worse, come down on the crown of her head! The kunai rose, reached the zenith of its arc, tipped and plunged down, close enough that she could feel the breeze of its passing in her long, dark hair. She coughed to hide the sound of its landing, as it sliced through the cable ties holding her hands, using the moment to attract attention.
"Please," she gasped, still acting her role as she slipped her dainty foot back into her shoe, "W-whatever ransom you ask, I'm sure it will be paid, but... My sword... It is an heirloom of the Phoenix Conglomerate, please, it is safe, isn't it? If it's money you want, I'm sure my family will pay extra-" She cut herself off as the scrape of a chair told of one of her guards standing up. He walked leisurely over to her, his step telling of a man confident in his security. She could smell the nicotine on his breath as he got nearer.
"Don't you worry, Ikaruga-san," he said, a heavy hand resting on her head like a gross parody of fatherly affection and causing her eyes to narrow under the hood. "Your heirloom's safe and sound. It's right here and it'll be sent back with you. Now you just sit still and wait and we won't have any reason to return you any differently to how we got you, will we?"
"Thank you," Ikaruga nodded, her manners still holding, in spite of her situation. "That makes things much easier."

Her captor had just enough time to vocalise half a, "Huh?" before Ikaruga's strong and shapely legs whipped up, wrapping around his neck and head. His last sight was at least a pleasant one, as she twisted and with a sound like a green twig snapping, his spine broke. As he fell, Ikaruga snatched the knife from where it had stuck in the decayed concrete of the floor and hurled it across the room to where his partner was stumbling out of the chair. When flying lead didn't fill the air in the next two seconds, Ikaruga pulled the sack from her head and shook out her hair. Even blindfolded, she had struck the man cleanly through the throat and severed his spinal column with the finely-honed blade. He had died as instantly, if not as happily as the first. Hien lay on the table, surrounded by cigarette packets, ashtrays and the loose rounds that belonged to the guns now hanging from the lifeless grips of her would-be captors. Ikaruga warmly reclaimed her weapon and steeled herself. They of course hadn't found her scroll; no ninja worth the name would let that be found with anything less than an x-ray scan, so she was now fully armed and confident that her friends were somewhere nearby. Only Katsuragi had the mental training to take a life, but she was sure Asuka and Yagyuu could manage, if pushed to it. More likely, they would simply strip their enemies of the will to fight, as they always did, but the ringleader... He had to die.

The door was bolted but not locked. Ikaruga opened it just a crack, careful of the creak of aging metal hinges and glanced about. A basement corridor greeted her, the harsh glare of bare-bulb electric lights leaving no-where to hide. Thankfully, there was no need to, as the man she had heard had just turned the corner to noisily ascend metal stairs. Moving on tip-toe, Ikaruga followed, emerging into the loading area of an industrial park that had been abandoned when the Japanese economy started to decline. One man watched the window with an automatic rifle cradled in his arms, while the one she had followed joined two more at a set of plastic chairs and cracked open a lukewarm beer that was passed to him. With their guns lowered but near at hand, it would still be easy for her to kill them all... But that was not the way of the shinobi. Her immediate guards had been necessary, but these men, she could avoid with little issue. She silently swung herself up a mess of rusted scaffolding and out a window that had long-since lost its glass. As soon as she was outside, Ikaruga immediately detected the presence of a shinobi barrier that Katsuragi was doubtless having the time of her life in, beating hapless guards until they cried for mommy. There was no danger of them being detected, behind the mystical walls of the barrier and her own furtive step was as near as impossible to be detected as it could be. The gentle chirp of cicadas in the late evening sun was the only sound in the abandoned buildings, save for the occasional tread of booted feet on cracked paving and the knock of idly-slung firearms.

A few swift leaps took Ikaruga to high ground, where her sharp blue eyes swept the buildings. Apparently this was quite the centre of unpleasant activity, albeit none of it quite as brazen as kidnapping the daughter of the head of a conglomerate. Katsuragi and the others were beating their way through what looked like extortionists in an old packing plant; there were ultra-nationalists in a neglected office building to one side (avoided by even their fellow lowlifes); blacked-out windows pointed to the location of drug manufacturers... "Quite a disgusting gathering," Ikaruga sighed to herself. "Aha... There you are." Most groups here wore some kind of gang identification, if nothing that could be called a uniform, but those that had held her had nothing of the sort. They were street-level toughs for hire; a disparate group with no allegiance to one another, beyond what they were paid for and a duo matching that description were emerging from what looked like the manager's office of a small factory. Whoever was in charge had to be someone highly-placed to get a position like that among the gangs that ran this place... Possibly someone with Yakuza connections, or just a lot of money. Regardless of who he was however, he wouldn't be for much longer.

"Shinobi tenshin," she whispered, grasping her scroll and pronouncing each syllable clearly and quietly. Ninja are traditionally associated with the shadows, but light could hide their figures just as well, the same way it hid Ikaruga as chi coursed through her body, stripping her of her clothes and re-forming into the pantyhose, skirt, gloves and crisp, white jacket of her shozoku. With the battle attire fitting snugly around her generous curves and athletic body, she cleared the distance to the far rooftop in a single, arcing bound and landed with less noise than a cat. The rooftop door opened without a sound, letting her walk serenely through the empty corridors of fallen ceiling tiles and cracked, dirty linoleum. There was only one person in the office, tapping his foot and gazing at the screen of a laptop with furious intensity. He didn't even notice Ikaruga until she spoke.
"You took a big risk for money alone," she lightly suggested, "Too big for something so simple."
The man started and went to rise, but Hien's needle-sharp point touching his throat forced him back into his chair.
"I don't think it was for money at all," she continued, taking in his appearance. Dusty business suit, no tattoos, no weapon... He wasn't Yakuza, that was for sure. "So what was it? Did you think you could gain some sort of advantage over the Phoenix Conglomerate by holding me hostage?"
"Nothing like that," he gulped, eyeing the subtle curve of steel that hung over his life like the sword of Damocles, "I just wanted something from him."
"What could my father possibly have that you want so badly?" Ikaruga asked, frowning a little.
"Not your father."
An icy fist gripped her heart and stilled Ikaruga's blood. Not her father? But the only other man in her life whom her kidnapping could move was- "Anon..."
The man's eyes widened, as he saw cold fury burn up from her heart and into her eyes. Hien rose, flashing in the setting sun, before it fell like a thunderbolt, passing through ribs and flesh alike, as if they were air. He didn't even have time to scream.

Chiburi.
Breathe in.
Breathe out.

Katsuragi raised her hand to greet her best friend and grinned broadly, as Ikaruga joined them just down the road from the park. With the heads of the various gangs beaten and bruised, there was no-one to protect it now. The police would be there shortly to clean up the rest.
"Yo, Ika-chan! Get what you needed done?"
Ikaruga nodded, "Mmh. There were no problems. You?"
"We manged fine, sempai," Asuka beamed, "They won't be a problem for anyone anymore!"
"Sooo, I think that means it's time to celebrate!" announced Kat. "I want ramen!"
"Oh! Hibari would like candy!" chimed in the pink-haired class darling.
"I'd prefer squid," sighed Yagyuu, idly twirling her umbrella and seemingly bored, "But I'll be happy with whatever Hibari wants."
"Oh, but I think grandpa's is still open!" Asuka interjected, "I could really go for a maki roll right now!"
Ikaruga smiled and sighed, beaming at her classmates. "Alright... Leave it to me! I'll make sure we can all enjoy something."
"Uh- Sweet squid ramen rolls again?" asked Asuka, laughing nervously. They tasted fine, but the appearance...
"Ohh, maybe we can invite Anon to taste it too!" teased Katsuragi, draping her arm over her best friend's shoulders, "Hehehe... Or maybe Ika wants to try HIS maki roll instea-"
"KATSURAGI-!" the heiress exclaimed, her face bright red and scandalised. Kat's laugh was soon joined by Asuka's and then Hibari's and even Yagyuu's restrained chuckle, as they walked towards the shopping district and the peal of police sirens passed them by.