Ninja Girl

Nick set down his coffee and rubbed his temples and then his eyes. He yawned sleepily and shook his head in an attempt to clear the cloudiness in it away.

“I think I’m gonna need more coffee,” he said groggily.

“That’s your third cup already,” Anya said, a growl of annoyance slicing through her tone like a samurai sword.

“Hey, I know in Japan this is probably prime ninja-ing time, but here in America I’ve normally been asleep for a few hours by now.”

Though it was true what he had told her, that he had no clue as to where, or if, there were any Ryerson buildings in the area, what he did know was a twenty-four hour coffee shop with free Wi-Fi. So they had made their way to it, and Nick had purchased a cup of coffee for himself and one for Anya – which he had ended up drinking since she refused to touch it – and then he had set up his laptop and gotten to work. The next several hours had been spent wading waist deep through one search engine result after another. He had not expected to have much difficulty finding anything out about such a well-known company, but once he got going he was flat out shocked by how little information was actually available.

So what Nick had expected to only take a few minutes had instead lasted for hours. They had been in the coffee shop for so long that Nick’s limbs were growing stiff and sore and outside the windows the dark blue of the night was beginning to break into a lighter one. For probably the hundredth time in as many minutes Nick shifted in his seat and stretched his aching limbs. He couldn’t help but wonder how Anya remained so motionless. Immediately following the moment that Nick had placed their order, Anya had crossed to a back corner of the room – a position from which she could look out over the entire room and also out the enormous windows comprising one wall of the establishment – and climbed up onto her chair, not really sitting but more “perching.” There she had remained, hardly moving a muscle except to help sweep her gaze around the area or to offer a singular, monosyllabic response to things Nick was saying.

“When you said you knew how to find what we are looking for, I assumed you meant it would be quick.”

Nick stifled a yawn. “Yeah, well, me too, but things don’t always work out like you’d like. Look, think of it this way: if what you’re saying about Ryerson is true…”

“It IS true,” Anya interrupted, her voice as cold and hard as the daggers she was staring into Nick.

Nick closed his eyes and used the finger and thumb of one hand to rub his eyelids. He could not be sure if it was the weariness, the coffee, or the conversation, but something was giving him a rather intense headache. “No, I… that’s not what...” He sighed. “Look, forget Ryerson for a second. I’m not really talking about them. I just mean, hypothetically, say there’s some company out there. We’ll call it… Evilcorp. Now, Evilcorp’s goal is to dominate the world by creating chemical weapons. To do this it requires them to perform horrible experiments on people. This means violating all kinds of UN sanctions, Geneva conventions, and… God knows what else. Now, say you’re the owner of this company. Would you not want to control what, and how much, information about your company gets out?

“Really, with Ryerson, they likely have the public face of their company, Ryerson Cable, but that’s only a subsidiary of Ryerson Technologies, Ltd, and that’s the company I’m having trouble finding any information out about. That’s the one they’re keepin’ all ‘hush hush’ and ‘on the D.L.’ and ‘Q.T.’ and what have you.”

Anya blinked. “You know, I still don’t know if it was what Ryerson did to me or something else, but despite whatever it is that translates everything you say for me, there’s still times when you seem to be speaking absolute nonsense.”

Nick sighed. “Sorry, I’m tired. Look, what I’m saying, basically, is that I figured I could start by going to their website. Well, Ryerson Cable’s website, since that’s the one I’m familiar with. That led me to the Ryerson Tech site, and that had some useful information. They apparently have national corporate headquarters in several places across the globe. Like…” Nick clicked through the various tabs he had left open in his web browser until he found the one he wanted. “Ah, here, yeah. One in Canada, one in the U.S., one in Mexico, one in Brazil, France, England, Germany, Italy, Spain, Egypt, Australia, and Japan. God, that sounds like an amazing vacation. Well, except Canada. Who wants to go to Canada? Have you ever been to Canada?”

“Can you focus?”

“Right, sorry. What I’m trying to say is, that seemed all well and good and everything. National headquarter in the U.S., perfect. Except, that one’s in New York, not here. And that’s it. No other information. Not even an address for the one in New York. But here’s the thing, if they feel the need to have a national headquarters than it seems only logical that this means they have branch offices somewhere else. This is a big city, making it a likely prospect for a branch office, but nothing. There’s nothing on the website for branch offices, no website for the branch offices, no website for a Ryerson anything in this city… I mean, there’s nothing.” As he spoke, Nick clicked randomly through the other tabs on his browser. “I tried checking the Ryerson cable site for what they have, but the only buildings that they list the locations of are tiny little payment centers. I don’t think that’s gonna help us at all. There isn’t even…”

Nick’s voice trailed off as he stared at his screen. His eyes narrowed in concentration and he leaned toward the screen.

“What is it?” Anya asked.

“It’s… okay… wait.” Nick rubbed his face with both hands and then turned his attention back to the screen. “Huh,” he said simply.

“What?” Anya demanded, her patience wearing thin. “What did you find? A Ryerson location?”

“Not… exactly,” Nick replied.

“Then what is so interesting?”

Nick hesitated a moment longer. “Well… it’s not exactly… It’s not exactly about Ryerson. I just… I just kinda stumbled upon an article here from a local business magazine. Teller Communications were just bought out. By Ryerson.”

“And?”

Nick looked up at Anya and smiled. “I may not know where Ryerson is here, but I DO know where Teller’s head office is.”

Anya stood up. “Good. Let’s go.” She turned and headed for the exit.

Nick frowned. “I thought you’d be a little bit excited,” he mumbled. Sighing, he closed his laptop, stuffed it back into his bag, and headed after her. He had to jog to catch up to her. She walked very briskly, and was already almost down to the next block by the time he even made it outside.

“Wait up,” he called to her. “It’s a bit of a distance. We’ll probably want to take the car.”

“I don’t think we should take your car up to the building. They might be on the lookout for it.”

“Right,” Nick responded, doing his best to keep from groaning. “Well, how about a cab then? Or, oh! How about Alto?”

“What?” Anya asked rather sharply, stopping abruptly and giving Nick a funny look.

“A…Alto…” Nick replied, suddenly very nervous. “It’s a cab company. Sort of. It’s like… the social media of cab companies. If that makes any sense.”

“It doesn’t.”

“Right. Well, it’s a cab company. They have apps. I’ve got one on my phone. I’ll just…”

Nick stopped there, his hand in his pocket. He didn’t have his phone. He had forgotten once again that the battery had died and he had left it on the floor of his room. Now it was probably a useless charred brick buried under a mound of ash and debris.

“Well, crap.”

“Looks like we’re walking.” With that, Anya turned forward and started off again.

“Wait!” Nick called, hurrying after her. “You don’t even know where it is!”

For some reason, this fact did not seem to convince Anya to wait. They hurried through the dim pre-dawn light down city streets and past dark alleyways that on any other day would have made Nick nervous to be passing. Today, though, with Anya there, they did not seem to bother him at all. He could not be sure if it was because her obvious strength and skill made him feel safer than normal or if she just left him with the feeling that he needed to buck up and be brave.

As Anya marched ever onwards Nick did his best to direct her. While he had a pretty good idea of where the building was located, he had never attempted to walk the path before, and overall the part of town they were in was not one he was particularly familiar with. A couple times he steered them in the wrong direction and attempted to correct their paths casually, but Anya clearly caught on to what he was doing and became increasingly frustrated with him as they travelled.

Finally they rounded a corner and the building came into view. “There, you see?” Nick said, pointing to the building. “That one up there. That’s the Teller building. That’s the one you’re looking for.”

“Good,” Anya said, and picked up her pace.

“Seriously?” Nick groaned, but she wasn’t listening to him. With a sigh of defeat he quickened his pace. He got so caught up in attempting to hurry after her that for a moment he lost sight of her. When he looked up, she was just suddenly gone. “What the hell?” Nick asked.

Suddenly an iron grip wrapped around his arm and yanked him into an alleyway. Nick opened his mouth to scream but he was slammed up against the wall hard enough to knock the wind out of him. A second hand clamped over his mouth. When his head finally stopped spinning, he realized that his assailant was Anya. She was once again holding him in place against a wall and leaning in close to him.

“Are you an idiot?” She whispered. “We can’t just walk up to the front door.”

“Oh,” Nick breathed, the word little more than a muffled note under her hand. Trusting that he had calmed, she pulled away from him. Now recovered from the shock of the attack, he realized he was still out of breath from hurrying so quickly after her. “Phew!” He added, kneeling down and putting his hands on his knees. “That’s…” he started, but was forced to keep up his breathing. After a moment he was able to speak again. “You’re too fast,” he said.

“You are in very poor physical condition,” she admonished. “Must be all the fast food.”

“I’m fine,” he said, waving one hand dismissively. “I mean, I’m in okay shape. You’re just in crazy good shape. Comparing me to you is just really unfair. No matter how good of shape I’m in, you’re at Super Ninja level.”

“There is no such thing as ‘super ninja.’ I am a regular ninja.”

“What?” Nick asked, confused.

“What?” Anya echoed back, innocently.

Finally feeling as though he had caught his breath, Nick shook his head and straightened up. “Whatever it is that’s doing the translation thing between me and you… I think it might be super literal. And by that I mean very. Very literal.”

Anya blinked. “I… I forgot that you weren’t just speaking Japanese.”

“Yeah, nope, everything’s in English to me.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“Tell me about it.”

“I just did.”

“Yes, I… forget it. Just… what do you want to do about this building?”

Anya pressed her back up against the wall and slid along it until she could peek around the corner at the Teller building. “I need to get inside,” she said. “I need access to a computer.”

“Why?”

“I need information. Just look at this place. Office building, certainly. It’s probably not even really a part of their company. It’s probably just a shell company. A legitimate face hiding the vile stench of their evil.”

“Wow, you really hate these Ryerson people,” Nick observed.

Anya frowned at him in annoyance. “Are you disagreeing that they’re evil?”

“Well, they did burn down my apartment, so they’re certainly not in my good graces at the moment.”

“Good,” Anya said simply. She turned and looked up and down the street. Despite the early hour, it was still late enough now that the street was beginning to fill with people going to work. “With all these people, it’s going to be difficult to get to a computer without anyone noticing. But I need access to their records.”

She turned away from the street and tapped a finger to her lips thoughtfully. After a moment, she seemed to notice Nick again. Her eyes focused on his face, and then lowered.

“Uh, what are you looking at?”

Anya pointed at his laptop. “Can you get the information?”

Nick stared at the bag hanging off his shoulder as if noticing it for the first time. “Get it? What do you mean? You mean, like, hack in?” Nick was shaking his head as he spoke. “Okay, look. Real life…it’s not like TV shows and movies. Just because someone knows how to do a web search and use a word processor doesn’t mean they magically know how to ‘hack in’ to just about anything. Hacking is way more complicated than that. It takes a lot of specific knowledge and skill and, I dunno, probably some specific programs to aid the process. Not to mention a good network connection and a more powerful computer. I don’t have any of that.”

“A simple ‘no’ would have sufficed.”

“Right, well, ‘no’ then.”

“I guess I’ll just have to do this the hard way then,” Anya said. She turned back towards the street and started around the corner.

“Woah, hold up,” Nick demanded, grabbing her by the arm and pulling her back into the alleyway. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? What, you’re just gonna waltz in there and start killing people?”

“I wasn’t planning on doing any dancing,” Anya said, looking a little confused. “I was more going to attempt to sneak in and find an open terminal and access it.”

“An open terminal,” Nick echoed, nodding his head as if it all made sense. “That has got to be the worst plan I’ve ever heard!” he snapped.

“Well do you have a better idea?”

“How about just committing seppuku right here and now and saving Ryerson the effort?”

Anya jerked back, looking for all the world like she had just been slapped.

Nick stepped back and held up his hands apologetically. “Look, I’m sorry. That came out wrong. I’m just saying, that plan is just going to get you killed. Have you ever used a computer? These days there aren’t really just ‘open terminals’ or whatever. Typically everything’s locked into accounts with usernames and passwords and then those accounts have different clearance levels. Without high enough clearance, you won’t be able to get anything out of their system. And I’m sure if there is potentially harmful information about Ryerson in there it is going to be locked behind the highest level of security.”

“I’m not hearing any suggestions.”

“Right. Well, let me think.” Nick rubbed his temples with his forefingers as though trying to manually turn the gears inside his head. His brain needed all the help it could get, running on just the small amount of sleep and coffee he’d had in the past 48 hours. “Okay, so… if what we need is a high level access password…” He snapped his fingers and looked up at Anya with excitement. “That’s it. Duh.”

“Duh?” Asked Anya, unfamiliar with the word. However, Nick did not seem to notice.

“I know that at my work place, the people who have access to absolutely everything is I.T.”

“I… T?” Anya asked, clearly growing more confused by the second as Nick talked.

“Yeah, I.T. The tech guys. Look, every company has a tech department that basically keeps all the computers and networks and everything up and running. They have access to everything. And I mean everything. Even the CEO has less power than them in a sense, since they’re the ones who created his account.”

“Really? So how do we get their account?”

“Well…” Nick said thoughtfully, tapping on his teeth with his fingernail as he mulled it over, “probably we couldn’t get their account. But we might be able to get something just as good. When I was hired for my current job, I got to see some of the account creation process. The program they were using was pretty straightforward. If I could get access to one of the computers in I.T., I could probably make us a dummy account with full access.”

Anya crossed her arms, her skepticism clearly readable across her face. “So we would still need access to a computer. How is this any better than my plan?”

“Because with your plan you’re just hoping to randomly come across a computer with full access to everything and be able to use it as long as you might possibly need. With my plan, I would only need a few seconds access to one specific computer and then we could come back when the building was empty and use a computer for as long as we might possibly need.”

Anya considered that for a moment. It was clear that his argument made sense to her. “Very well, when you put it that way I guess it does sound better to do it your way. So then tell me this, how are we going to get access to the I.T. computer?”

“Yeah, that is the difficult part. We’ll need a reason to be going into their office. Which means we would need to be having computer trouble. So, I guess, we’ll have to get our hands on a laptop. And then, somehow, infect it with viruses. And then bring it to them and see if we can get them to take a look at it.”

“Well, the first step is done,” said Anya.

Nick turned to her, confused, and then followed her gaze to realize what she was suggesting. “Woah! No way! Not my laptop!”

“Why not?”

“Because,” he whimpered pathetically, “it’s mine…” Anya crossed her arms, clearly not impressed by that line of reasoning. “It’s… it’s all I have left.” A thought popped into Nick’s head and he perked up. “Oh, because,” he said more confidently, “most I.T. departments won’t work on personal devices. We’ll need to get our hands on a laptop from within the building. That will be our best bet.”

Anya frowned. “No.”

“What?”

“No. This plan is just getting too complicated. If we had access to one of their laptops, couldn’t we just keep it and try to get the information off of it?”

Nick grimaced. He hadn’t thought of that.

“I understand you don’t want to infect your computer. But can’t you just, I don’t know, make it look like it was infected?”

Nick opened his mouth to immediately rebuke her, but the idea began to slowly sink into his brain. “Actually, that isn’t bad. I might be able to do that.”

“Good. Then we can use that, and maybe I can attempt to convince them to get me another laptop. That way, I might actually be able to pull them away from the computer. Isn’t that the goal here?”

“Yeah, I suppose it is,” admitted Nick. “So, fine. I guess I can sacrifice my laptop to the cause. But you’re gonna have to do something, too.”

Anya looked quizzically at him. “What?”

“Well, I’m the one who needs access to the open computer, right? Which means you’re the one that’s gonna have to do the distracting.”

“I thought that was obvious.”

“Which means,” Nick continued, unperturbed, “you’re gonna have to dress the part.”

“What’s wrong with how I’m dressed?” Anya asked, her eyes narrowing dangerously and her voice filling with venom.

“Nothing. Obviously. You look great… for a badass ninja warrior. You’d look right at home in a medieval Japanese pagoda. But we’re talking about you infiltrating a modern, 21st century telecommunications building. You’re gonna need something less… assassin-y to wear.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t exactly bring a change of clothes with me when I was unexpectedly and unwittingly abducted from home. This is what I have.”

“Right, I get that. Which just means we’ll have to get you something.”

“What do you want me to do, kill some woman and steal her clothing?”

Nick’s eyes went wide. “Uh, no. I was more thinking I’d buy you something.”

Anya took a step back, as if afraid the young man before her might suddenly turn into a snake and strike. Nick was unsure if it said something that his suggestion was more appalling to her than the one involving murder.

“You have got to be kidding me,” she said.