Ninja Star

Train To Your Heart's Content

Star hung on a street light, patiently awaiting the arrival of her new student. When she spotted Hikaru under the lamppost she swung down to the ground to meet him. She snuck up behind him and poked him in the ribs, making him spin around. She cocked her head to the side and grinned, "Hello, new student."

"'Morning new teacher," Hikaru smiled his best "teacher's pet" smile, "I did everything you asked; new shoes, dark clothes, come alone to the ghetto at one in the morning."

"Do not question the teacher!" Star commanded. "Your first lesson, now that you have your new shoes, is to climb this wall right here," Star leaned her weight on the nearest brick wall, "once you're on the roof we can start training for real."

Hikaru stared at her. "Are you not going to teach me how to climb it? I'm just expected to know how to do this?"

"Yup."

Hikaru sighed. He watched Star climb the wall and pull herself up to the flat roof. He tried to take notice of every little detail in her technique. He sized up the wall, got a running start and grabbed for a handhold between two bricks. Star giggled as she watched him slide down to the ground again.

"Don't run next time, it makes it harder. Especially if you don't know what you're doing." Star climbed back down the wall to teach Hikaru, even though she had told him she wasn't going to. "Try this, use every little outcrop and ridge in the wall to your advantage. Don't rely on just your toes to climb either. Try to keep your feet as flat against the wall as you can. You have nails in your shoes for a reason: traction. And try to move as quickly as possible. On a flat surface momentum is key."

Hikaru nodded his head and tried again. He grabbed between the bricks and kept his feet parallel to the wall. Very soon he managed to pull himself onto the roof, panting like a dog. He lay down on his back and breathed heavily. Star pulled a bottle of water out of the messenger bag over her shoulder and tossed it to Hikaru who quickly drank half of it.

"First order of business," Star said, looking down at her student, "starting tomorrow, you'll be going to the gym everyday. I don't care when or where but you're going. You need to build up endurance, especially if climbing a wall makes you winded. You'll also need to build up muscle, so don't forget to weight train. And make sure you have someone spot you." Star made checklists in her head as she paced back and forth in front of Hikaru.

"You won't come with me?" Hikaru asked and stared up at her with puppy dog eyes.

"Absolutely not! I have work at night, which means I sleep all day, which means I won't be there to hold your hand. Pick a friend or someone you trust who knows what they're doing and take them with you. You have friends, don't you?"

"Yeah of course I do, I just thought... We were going to do this together." Hikaru pushed himself from the ground and brushed himself off, keeping his eyes averted from Star.

Does this kid have feelings for me? Star thought to herself. She felt her face getting red and pushed the thought to the back of her mind.

"Do it again." Star said, pulling her sweatshirt off. She threw the purple hoodie with the word "Strength" written on it in black, to the ground and shivered as the brisk wind cooled the sweat to her skin. "Push me against that wall as hard as you can."

"But I don't want to hu–"

Star cut Hikaru off in the middle of his sentence. "I promise, you can't hurt me. Push me against the wall."

Hikaru did as he was told and shoved Star as hard as he could against a brick wall. "Again." She commanded. Hikaru sighed and shoved her again. This time, for a brief moment, she winced when she hit the wall. A grin broke out on her face and she clapped Hikaru on the back. "I told you working out at the gym while you're not practicing with me really pays off."

"Sure, but it makes me twice as sore in the mornings." Hikaru had been going to the gym at his school with his twin brother Kaoru, and his two third-year friends: Mori-senpai and Honey-senpai who were martial arts masters. And it's been making everyone a bit suspicious.

Star retrieved her sweatshirt and they scaled down a nearby wall in the black night and snuck into an alleyway. Star rolled a beat up dumpster that hadn't been used in years out of the way to reveal a large hole in the brick wall behind it. "Where are we going?" Hikaru asked her.

"To my apartment. I have something I need to do before we end training," Star replied. They slid through the gap and took a right turn arriving at a door. Through the door, up six flights of stairs, and three doors down the hallway was Star's apartment. She opened the door to let them both in.

She lit a cluster of old candles and set them on the only table in the one-room apartment. "Welcome home. The kitchen is that corner, the bedroom is that corner, and the bathroom in through that door, although you'll probably have to jiggle the faucet handle a few times to get the water to run." Star explained as she lit some more candles and set these on the kitchen counter. She noticed a little spider in the corner making its web against the fridge so Star let it crawl onto her finger. She took it to the open window and flicked it off into the outside world. I need to dust more.

"Why don't you just turn the lights on?" Hikaru asked. He flipped the light switch by the door making the bare bulb hanging from the ceiling glow, and making Star hiss.

"No! We don't use the lights! You have no idea how bright they look from the outside." Star explained. "Technically," Star dragged out the word, "I'm not supposed to be living here. The landlord doesn't know I'm here because I don't pay rent. Didn't you wonder why I made you crawl behind a dumpster instead of taking you through the front doors?"

"Well, no. I figured it was one of the least weird things you could have done. But isn't it illegal to live here without paying?"

"Sure, but the guy who owns the place is like a thousand years old. He doesn't come up to the top floors anymore. He'll never catch on. He just pays for my electricity, water, and plumbing." Star grinned.

Hikaru looked at Star like she was crazy. There was still so much he didn't understand about her and her lifestyle. Then again, it had only been two weeks.

Star left Hikaru to snoop around while she retrieved the item she had come for. She knelt on her bed and put her hands on a rectangular portion of the wall where the bricks were different shades of red and brown than the others. She gripped it with her nails and pulled it toward her. The scraping noise it made distracted Hikaru from looking through Star's things. He watched Star swing the portion of bricks toward her like a cabinet door. Inside the cavity in the wall were an assortment of knick-knacks and treasures.

Old letters, a navy blue jewelry box, a knife sheathed in a mother-of-pearl casing, and a newspaper clipping.

"How did you do that?" Hikaru asked with intrigue. "Do all of the apartments here do that?"

"No; they were here when I moved in. I obviously wasn't the first person to live here that had things to keep safe. There are a couple of them hidden all over the room, but I won't tell you where they are just yet." Star smirked. She closed the bricks off again. You could never tell they had moved.

Star had in her hands a little elephant figurine. "I've been saving up for it. A friend of mine's daughter's favorite animal is an elephant. It was her birthday today so I'm going to bring this to her." She made for the door, Hikaru on her heels.

"Will they still be awake? It's like three in the morning!"

"They'll be awake. They run on the same sleep schedule that I do. Their father and I have the same… Job."

"Happy birthday, Yuna!" Star whispered happily to a girl that had just turned eleven. She handed her the figurine and took a step back to watch the girl admire it. Yuna was the daughter of one of Star's allies: Masaru Tatsuko and his wife, Aki. They were a family of brown hair and brown eyes for whom Star had become accustomed to watching their three daughters while they were out working. Star said goodnight to the birthday girl, her younger sister, Masako, and the baby of the family (who had been sleeping all along), Ishigo and kissed them all goodnight. Star quietly exited the apartment that was only two floors above her own and met Hikaru in the hall where he had been waiting.

"How did it go?" He asked

Star broke out in a grin. "Wonderfully." She grabbed his hand and started dragging him along with her down the stairs to the ground floor. They went out the back way and carefully replaced the dumpster when Star explained to Hikaru, "I have something I want to show you."

"Isn't it magical?" Star asked him. She threw her arms open wide and flung her head back, letting her hair blow behind her in the crisp autumn wind. Below her was a view of not just the rough parts of downtown she was used to, but a view of the upscale city as well. This was the city she had dreamed of living in since she was young. The gargantuan buildings, the way the city glittered with lights even in the dead of night. She couldn't wrap her head around it. She couldn't believe Hikaru could ever get tired of something like that.

"Where are we?" Hikaru asked, shoving his hands into his pockets to keep them warm in the wind that was picking up. He stood next to Star and observed the view below them.

"We are on the roof a the tallest, and nicest, building in town. The Suou Downtown Hotel. The closest to high-class I've ever been. This has always been my favorite place to go."

"Suou Hotel?" Hikaru smirked while memories of his dear friend Tamaki Suou flashed through his head, "I think I know the owners of this franchise."

"Why am I not surprised?" Star jokingly punched him in the shoulder. "It's this view that has made me contemplate every aspect of my life. It gives me something to hope for. I'll never understand why you'd want to leave something like that," she gestured to the shining buildings in the distance, "I would kill to be there."

Hikaru sighed before responding with, "Where do you go to school?

Star gave him a funny look. "I don't understand what that has to do with anything."

"It doesn't. It was just a question, sheesh. You don't have to answer it." Hikaru shuffled his feet. There was a momentary silence.

"I don't go to school, not that it should come as a surprise to you. I learned everything I need to know on the streets." Star finally replied. She thought about the countless hours she spent learning with Ivy.

"Come to school with me then." Hikaru broke his gaze away from the city and looked up at Star. "I could pay for you. My parents will never know if a few million yen go missing," he chuckled, "I owe you one anyway. It really does mean a lot that you're doing this for me.

"Go to rich kid school with you? Wouldn't it be taboo to have a street kid in a pristine high school?"

"They don't have to know that you live on the streets. From now on, you're my distant cousin!" Hikaru beamed with excitement at his 'well thought-out' plan.

Star looked over the city once more. She took a deep breath and held it in for a few seconds before loudly releasing it. "Alright. When will I start?"

Hikaru slung his arm around Star. "As soon as possible!"