Nao Hime
Six
Winter gradually shifted into spring, as Nao's life carried on largely like before. She and Mikoto snuck off campus to bail and clobber pedophiles, occasionally getting help from Shizuru too. They also did some side jobs for the formidable Natsuki Kuga, who needed someone to tail people from her father's various companies. She was determined to prove 'that bastard' as she usually called him, was up to no good.
At the same time Nao continued to be chased by Haruka Suzushiro, along with her loyal minions in the Executive Committee. The tough blonde seemed unwilling to admit that she couldn't catch Nao at something, and most days had someone out looking for her at night. Thankfully Fuka was such a big area that she couldn't cover every way back to the academy.
"Ugh, I hate this rain," Nao muttered as she hurried down the path. She was mostly 'safe' at this point, having made it onto the academy grounds, but she didn't want to get caught carrying her bad of pedo-baiting gear. The disposable cellphone was fine, but the one size too small uniform would raise eyebrows. Not to mention the brass knuckles...
Nao hurried along the path, stopping behind a strand of trees as she checked a heavily used crossroads. One of Suzushiro's executive was there, a young man with glasses on, looking around him with a bored expression on his face. It took a minute to register, then Nao realized it was Tate Yuichi.
'What, Haruka's sicking the kendo team after me now?' Nao noted, even as she edged around the clearly tired guy. 'Wonder how long the poor bastard's been out here?'
She was just about out of sight when a muffled scream rang out. Tate jerked, then hurried down the path towards the cry. Nao hesitated, then with a muffled curse stashed her bag under a bush and hurried towards where the sound came from.
'Damn it, why did I have to grow a conscience?' Nao thought irritably as she followed the running boy, 'My life was so much easier when I was just a amoral thief!'
They emerged into a clearing, where Nao saw several figures surrounding two women. Nao instantly pegged the guys as gang types, probably lured to Fuka in the hope of finding easy victims. They had two women surrounded, and by their stance they intended to do them some damage.
"Get away from them!" Tate yelled, racing down the slope at the apparently armed men.
'Oh hell,' Nao thought. There wasn't much chance one guy could turn this around, not against six armed men. They were already moving to keep their captives while others peeled off to face Tate. She hesitated, wanting to just walk away, to use this chance to go back to her dorm and forget about all this.
"Eee!" one girl screamed as one of the goons punched her even as Tate tried to reach them.
"Fuck!" Nao growled, slipping into the shadows.
The headlong, and in Nao's opinion fucking stupid headlong attack by Tate served as a good distraction, letting Nao make her way around the group. Even better the two guys guarding the women were focused on the fight, not a young woman approaching with a fallen tree branch.
Nao got the first guy before he could even react, clubbing him across the back of his head. That, however, drew the attention of the other guard who went right for her. "You little...!" he growled, the tall if not heavily muscled guy grabbing for her. She dodged the first attempt, but tripped over something in the twilight as he grabbed for her again.
However, before he could get a grip on her he was kicked powerfully in the leg, going down with a yelp of surprise and pain. The busty blond stepped forward and kicked him again, this time in the head, silencing a attempt to yell for help.
"Suzushiro?" Nao yelped.
Haruka Suzushiro was banged up but otherwise intact, her uniform smudged and a livid bruise on her face. Beside her Yukino looked somewhat better, though the brown haired girl was nearly as dirty. "Well, well, the proverbial daughter returns," Haruka noted cryptically.
"Prodigal," Yukino corrected her. She looked at Nao, "Are you all right?"
"Fine," Nao said as they heard a grunt of pain nearby, "but that idiot Tate is in trouble. We'd better help him."
Haruka gave Nao a odd look, but nodded briskly. "Let's go!" she declared, leading Nao and a slightly slower moving Yukino.
Thankfully the remaining four guys were all concentrating on beating the crap out of the now restrained Tate. Three were pounding on him, one was keeping his arms pinned. She was tempted to just watch for a minute, but Haruka charged in. The guy pinning Tate's arms had a chance to yell a warning just as Haruka casually clocked one of the guys with a single blow.
'These guys must have caught Haruka by surprise,' Nao thought as she clobbered another man with her trusty branch. It staggered him, enough that Nao managed to whack him over the head with it again and knock him out.
Tate seized the chance to bust loose, and the suddenly outnumbered two guys looked very, very nervous. "What are you villains doing at our academy!" Haruka growled dangerously.
"We heard there might be good money here," the guy who had been restraining Tate said weakly. "I never planned doing anything like this, honest!"
Yukino sounded very, very angry as she said, "You planned to hold us all for ransom, I heard you arguing about it!"
The other guy edged sideways, trying to get away before Tate put himself in the way. "Where do you think you're going?" Tate challenged, just as the man charged him.
"Shit," Nao cursed as Tate was elbowed aside, the man breaking away from them. Grabbing her tree branch she ran after him, then in a moment of brilliance thrust it between his running feet. With a yelp he went down, but came up swinging.
"I got it," Tate hurried up, catching the man's punch in his hand then proceeding to break his nose with a single punch.
Nao helped drag him back to the others, even as Haruka was using her cellphone to call for help. "Why didn't you use that earlier?" she asked dryly.
"One of the kidnappers had it," Yukino noted before Haruka could say something snappish.
A few minutes later members of the executive began to arrive, exclaiming in alarm over their injured chief and restraining the goons. With a sigh Nao decided it was time to get out of there and quietly turned to go.
"Hey Nao!" Haruka called as a minion was bandaging her fist.
"Yeah?" Nao turned, wondering what her personal nemesis wanted now.
"I want to see you at the student council rooms tomorrow after school," Haruka said, "we need to talk about what exactly you were doing out here tonight."
Nao felt her jaw tighten, a flash of anger welling up inside her. "Saving your ungrateful ass," she growled before striding off into the twilight.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
The next day was hell as Nao coped with classes on less than a few hours sleep. She had also scraped up her hands in the fight last night, and had needed to get them bandaged up at the nurse's office. Thankfully nurse Yohko didn't press on how she got hurt, but it still wasn't fun.
Surprisingly a lot of people had heard about last night, and a lot of the stories said she was the hero. Nao found it kind of amusing how badly the truth got distorted, with people claiming that she was a shadowy avenger of justice to others who thought she was in league with the kidnappers then turned on them in the last minute.
Nao left her last class, then stood in the hallway taking a nervous breath. "Nao-senpai?" a quiet voice nearly made her jump.
Wheeling around Nao saw Erstin Ho, and beside her her friend Nina, whom Nao had helped rescue from a jackass. "Erstin," she nodded politely.
"I heard about last night," Erstin smiled, "you were so brave!"
Nina nodded eagerly, the black haired girl's eyes shining, "You beat four men to save Yukino!"
"No, no," Nao shook her head, "trust me, I wasn't terribly heroic. I jumped the bastards from behind, and I certainly didn't stop four of them."
"I heard you rescued Tate, the best kendoist on the team," Erstin protested.
"Trust me, I cheated," Nao half smiled. Deciding she needed to get the student council stuff over with soon she excused herself, "Sorry, got to go."
It wasn't far to the class room the student council used, but it felt like miles. And every step she reminded herself that she had been a complete idiot getting involved and helping Haruka Suzushiro. She should have just left, or at most phoned someone on the executive. But no, she HAD to get involved and help her out! And now... who knew what would happen.
Walking up the hall Nao blinked as she saw Natsuki Kuga slip out og the Student Council room, the black haired young woman looking amused. She saw Nao nearing her and nodded, "Nao, you're right on time."
"Oh?" Nao asked, raising a eyebrow.
"They just starting talking about last night and you when I left," Natsuki nodded to the closed door. Quietly she added, "Good luck."
"Thanks," Nao sighed. She put her hand on the door handle, then took a steadying breath. She pulled it open and stepped forward, "Nao Yuuki, here as requested."
"Ah, Nao," Shizuru smiled warmly at her, "thank you for coming."
Nao swept the room with her eyes, taking in who was there. Student President Shizuru was there, of course, as was her VP Reito Kanzaki. Haruka and Yukino were both there, Haruka looking annoyed while Yukino looked rather sheepish. Finally there was Tate and several members of the Executive leaning up against the one wall.
"You asked for me, so I'm here," Nao said, scowling at Haruka. "Get on with it."
"Why you...," Haruka growled, half getting up from her seat before being yanked back down by Yukino grabbing her arm.
"Haruka!" Reito barked, frowning at her.
"I see you both have some issues," Shizuru sighed. She looked at Nao calmly, "While the accounts differ from person to person, it seems quite clear to me that you risked yourself saving two members of our council."
Nao shifted uncomfortably under her gaze, "Well, I..."
"I want to thank you, on behalf of the Student Council," Shizuru said gracefully.
Reito nodded, "As do I."
Haruka looked down at the table, then reluctantly up at Nao too. "I also need to thank you," she admitted with clear reluctance, "if they had grabbed me and escaped, my father would pay any price to get me back."
Nao was faintly surprised to actually be thanked by Haruka. "You're welcome," she said, nodding to them all.
"Thanks from me too," Tate noted with a sigh, "you pretty much did my job for me." He brightened, "You ever think of joining the Executive?"
Haruka was sipping some tea when he asked that, then sprayed it across the table as she began to cough and choke. "Haruka," Yukino yelped, patting her on the back.
Tate blinked innocently as he asked, "What'd I say?"
To be continued...
