Azumanga Die Hard
An Azumanga Daioh fanfic
by hkmiller
4 January 2005 - FFML draft
The characters of Azumanga Daioh were created by Kiyohiko Azuma
and are copyrighted ADV Manga in the United States.
No disrespect intended by my unlicensed usage.
- - - - - - - - - -
"These guys aren't very competent terrorists," Tomo remarked
in a casual aside to Yomi and Chiyo-chan. "I could do a much
better job."
Yomi made very indignant-sounding noises through her gag.
Somehow, the fact Tomo had been left ungagged due to a shortage
of cloth seemed not the least of the injustices heaped upon her
this day. If it hadn't been for Tomo, they wouldn't even be in
this mess!
Tomo had assembled six school friends as character witnesses for
her job application to Interpol, ignoring the fact that Interpol
didn't hire second-year high school students. The seven girls had
been bullied into trooping downtown to Shinjuku, only to find that
Tomo had the wrong address. They'd still been staring at the sign
saying "INTER-POLL (International Polls and Marketing Consultants,
Inc)", on the thirtieth floor of a Shinjuku skyscraper, when the
terrorists had captured them. Now they sat together in a back
room, their arms and legs bound with thick ropes, all except Tomo
and Osaka firmly gagged.
"Oh, you think so, do you? You think terrorism is easy, do you?
Well, let's just see how you handle things!" The sole ski-
masked terrorist set to guard them strode over ominously.
Bending down, he untied the ropes on Tomo, helped her to stand,
and handed her a spare ski-mask, which he then helped her to
don.
The other girls (except Osaka, who wasn't really paying attention)
held their breath. Surely this guy couldn't really be that
dumb...
Finally the terrorist guard handed his automatic rifle over to
Tomo. "Now, why don't you just SHOW us how we should be going
about this, hmmm?"
"Sure! Just watch this!" Tomo turned and pointed the automatic
rifle at her friends and classmates, then fired a burst just above
their heads into the wall. Drywall flagments flew everywhere,
pelting the shocked girls.
"You see? Instant terror!" Tomo continued importantly,
"Terrorism isn't just about blowing up this building, you know.
To do a thorough job, ya gotta keep your hostages terrorized too,
even if they're all going to die when the building goes." Tomo
safetied the rifle, then handed it back, ignoring the muffled
protests of disbelief and fury coming from beneath the gags of
her friends.
"Hmmm. Yes, I see," the terrorist nodded his understanding of
Tomo's point.
Tomo took off her ski mask and handed that back as well, then
retrieved the ropes from the floor. "Now, just retie me, and
we'll be back to normal, except that you are now a much more
effective terrorist."
"Yes, that's true, I am. Thank you very much!" The terrorist
guard gave Tomo a deep bow, then tied her arms and legs back up.
Ten minutes later, he fired another rifle burst into the wall
above the girls' heads. The other girls ducked, their gags
muffling screams; Tomo merely nodded. "That's it, you've got
it now!"
- - - - - - - - - -
"Oh, my!" The exclamation escaped Nyamo's lips at the sight of
the label "Hostage Crisis in Shinjuku" on the television news.
Bored, Yukari made to click on past to the next channel, but Nyamo
stopped her.
"The terrorists have yet to indicate their demands, but we have
confirmed that they have a number of hostages in the building,"
the young female newscaster announced into the camera. "These
hostages are known to include seven high school girls..."
Scratching herself, Yukari got up from the sofa to go scrounge
something to eat from Nyamo's kitchen, ignoring Nyamo's gasp of
dismay as the name of the high school where they both taught
emerged from the reporter's mouth.
Eyes glued to the set, Nyamo was oblivious to Yukari's return with
a beer and some roasted soybeans. Yawning, Yukari re-seated
herself, ignoring the list of names scrolling up the television
screen.
"Yukari! The girls! Your students are hostages!" Nyamo turned
her head to Yukari, only to see the latter purse her lips in mild
concern.
"Huh. If they get killed, I'll have to learn new seating
arrangements. That's bad. On the other hand, I do get rid
of Tomo." Yukari considered, then grunted. "It'd be worth it."
- - - - - - - - - -
"I bet your dad's worried about you, Chiyo-chan," Osaka murmured,
oblivious to the suddent burst of gunfire tearing splinters
out of the wall right above her head and Chiyo's accompanying
muffled scream of terror.
Osaka's words did raise a question in Sakaki's mind, however.
Where WAS Chiyo-chan's father? Shouldn't he be flying to their
rescue, ignoring the hails of bullets from the terrorists' guns?
Sakaki's brief fantasy was interrupted by a "meow" from the door.
A pair of grey cats sidled into the room where the girls were
held, ignored by their guard after a brief puzzled glance.
The cats made their slow way through the group of girls, examining
each, before setting down behind Sakaki. Sakaki barely winced
when she felt the bite of their teeth on her bound hands, this
being the most familiar part of the entire situation.
After a few chomps, Sakaki was surprised to find that her bonds
felt loose. Carefully choosing a moment when their guard was
looking in another direction, she flexed her formidable muscles
and felt the ropes part. Now, what to do with her free hands?
She could get to her feet quickly enough, but not walk or run,
until she had a chance to untie her feet.
A few minutes later, their guard again fired a burst into the
shattered-looking wall above the girls' heads. This time the
burst cut off a little more quickly than usual.
"Huh. Outta ammo. How 'bout that?" mused the guard, studying
his gun.
Sakaki leapt to her feet and dived for the guard's legs, tackling
him. With both down, the two began wrestling, and Sakaki found,
to her surprise and dismay, that she was clearly the stronger of
the two. Easily wrenching the gun from the guard's grasp, she
reversed it and swung the gun's butt against the side of the
guard's head. He slumped.
Hastily Sakaki untied herself and then began untying the other
girls, beginning with Kagura and Yomi so they could help. She
found herself shying away from untying Kaorin; something about
the look in Kaorin's eyes, fixed as they were on Sakaki, unnerved
her. It was already depressing enough to find herself stronger
than a grown male terrorist.
Kagura began fumblingly trying to reload the guard's gun. Chiyo-
chan came over. "Oh, the Romanian-made MK-11. These rifles are
copies of the Russian AK-47," Chiyo-chan explained. "Here, let
me show you how to reload; it's a bit tricky if you've never held
a gun before."
"And how did you happen to know THAT?" Yomi asked her as she tied
up their unconscious guard.
Chiyo-chan shrugged. "I got to try one once when my folks took
me to Romania. Oh, Yomi, wait! That's the wrong knot to use
there. Let me show you." Chiyo squatted down next to Yomi and
retied the last knot on their former captor's bonds.
Untied last, Kaorin stood up gingerly, rubbing her numb arms, her
eyes fixed on Sakaki with adoration. "Isn't Sakaki-san
wonderful?" she said to Osaka, who shrugged.
"Ah, Chiyo-chan's Dad woulda done the same if he'd been here."
Once all the girls were loose, Yomi asked the question most of
them were thinking. "Now what?"
"We have to stop the terrorists' bomb from going off!" Chiyo-chan
insisted. "If the terrorists blow up this whole building,
hundreds of people will die!"
"Shouldn't we just escape and leave that to the police?" asked
Yomi practically.
"I AM the police!" Tomo insisted. "Or, at least, Interpol won't
turn down my application after I've single-handedly saved this
building and rescued all the hostages!"
"WHO single-handedly did WHAT?" asked Kagura rhetorically. Tomo
ignored her.
It turned out that Tomo and Chiyo-chan both felt strongly that
the girls should go for the bomb, and Kagura agreed with them to
some extent. Neither Sakaki nor Osaka voiced any feelings on the
matter, and Kaorin would go wherever Sakaki did. Yomi found
herself outvoted. Grumbling, she went along with the majority
rather than try to escape by herself. "I suppose there is SOME
wisdom in sticking together," she muttered to herself.
"So, where IS the bomb, anyway?" Tomo asked.
"One of the articles on skyscraper architecture after 9/11, in
America, described the weak points of buildings like this,"
Chiyo-chan replied. "Assuming they read the article, the
terrorists will be planning to destroy the central support column
four stories below the roof. That's the best level to create a
cascade effect where each succeeding floor pancakes down on the
one below it. If that happens, the whole building will collapse."
"So the bomb is six floors above us," Kagura added after a
moment's thought. "But these guys are bound to have guards on the
stairs. And they'll notice if the elevators move."
The seven girls considered this.
"Hmmm... if only there was a way we could get on top of an
elevator," Kagura mused.
"Did you know that if you assign musical notes to the 'Up' and
'Down' buttons on an elevator bank, and play the first three
stanzas of Beethoven's Sixth Symphony on those buttons, a
skyscraper elevator will arrive at your floor with its roof level
with your floor?" asked Osaka.
The other six girls stared at her.
Chiyo-chan snapped one finger. "Ah! And Mitsutomo high-speed
elevators all have a roof control panel from which you can control
their movements, and open and close their doors! If Osaka is
right, we can do this!"
The girls trooped over to the elevator bank. Yomi gestured for
Osaka to summon the elevator, which she did, head tilted, tongue
between teeth, as she pressed buttons in time with humming a
melody to herself.
The elevator doors opened. The elevator roof was indeed level
with the floor the girls stood on.
"Let's go," Chiyo-chan said, leading the way onto the roof of
the elevator car and stooping to open a recessed access panel.
At Chiyo-chan's direction, the elevator doors closed and the car
rose. Chiyo-chan took the car to its normal position with
respect to the floor they wanted, so that the girls were above
the door, which she then opened. A hail of gunfire perforated
the elevator car.
"Damn! A diversion! Get to the stairs! Prepare for a rush!
Ready on the detonator!" A commanding voice could be heard as the
gunfire ceased. Several responding murmurs could be heard.
Chiyo-chan waited a few seconds, then slowly lowered the elevator
car a few feet. The backside of one guard gradually became
visible. Like a great cat in motion, Sakaki vaulted through the
narrow gap and landed on the guard, twisting his head and breaking
his neck with what looked like a single motion.
Kaorin sighed, holding her hands together by her chin, her eyes
shining.
Luckily, the now-dead guard had another gun, with ammunition, plus
a number of well-balanced throwing knives. Sakaki picked up a few
of the latter, flipping one in her hand thoughtfully, as she kept
her eyes focused on the far end of the corridor leading to the
elevator. Kagura, next out into the hallway, picked up their new
gun and handed it to Yomi, carefully keeping it out of Tomo's
reach.
Tomo picked up another knife, and tried to flip it, but ended up
dropping it, point down, on Yomi's foot, where it penetrated her
shoe and stuck up firmly between two of her toes. Yomi narrowly
managed to stifle a betraying scream of fury.
"Harder than it looks," Tomo commented conversationally.
"Shh!" The other six girls replied, fingers to lips.
Sakaki, with a knive poised to throw, and Kagura, clutching the
group's first gun, made to advance, but Tomo waved a stop. "Hold
on, guys! Let me get ready first."
Tomo stripped off her blouse, then ripped a strip of cloth off of
the bottom and tied it around her head in a headband.
Unfortunately, she tied it so that it kept some of her hair in her
eyes rather than keeping all of it out of her eyes. Next she
reached over to Sakaki's hands, still slightly bloody from the
cats' teeth, and rubbed some of the blood onto her fingers.
The other six girls glanced at each other in puzzlement.
Continuing, Tomo began to draw bloody streaks on her cheeks and
spirals on her bare chest.
Osaka finally spoke up. "Ah! You're trying to summon Neo-Ranga
to help us, aren't you? Good idea; he could destroy the whole
building!"
"That's anime, not real life!" Yomi muttered. "Get a grip!"
"That's not what I'm doing! I'm just doing exactly what Rambo
does every time he has to take out some North Whatever
terrorists!" Tomo replied loudly.
"Hey!" Another terrorist poked his head around the far corner of
the hall and saw the girls. Fortunately, Sakaki saw him as well,
and threw her knife the length of the corridor and into his throat
before he could bring his gun around and fire. He gurgled and
fell forward, into the hallway, dropping his gun as he fell.
Before anyone else could react, Tomo gave a great war whoop and
dashed forward, grabbing the dead man's gun off the floor and
continuing on around the left corner, in the direction the dead
man had come from. Bursts of gunfire came echoing back to the
girls.
Eyes wide, Sakaki and Kagura quickly advanced to the end of the
corridor. Cautiously peering around it to the left, in the
direction Tomo had run, Sakaki simply said "Clear".
Kagura, looking in the other direction, echoed her.
"If this floor is laid out like the one we were on," Chiyo-chan
announced, "then we want to go right. The bombs should be just
behind the elevator shaft, but the access door is around another
corner that way." Chiyo-chan pointed.
"Guess we leave the idiot to her own devices, then," Kagura
replied. The other girls muttered agreement.
"Actually, Tomo's using an old trick that's supposed to work
pretty well," Chiyo-chan said, leading the way to the right.
"It's called 'The Nailer', and involves a woman operative entering
a room topless. For some reason, this freezes male enemies for a
few seconds."
"Tomo hasn't got enough upstairs to freeze anybody, though,"
Osaka pointed out.
"In either sense of the word 'upstairs'," Yomi added.
"I just hope she doesn't circle around in front of us, still
shooting," Kagura muttered.
Keeping together, Kagura watching behind while Sakaki kept watch
ahead, the girls proceeded down the hall and around another
corner. The girls continued to hear the occasional burst of
gunfire echoing through the corridors from other parts of the
floor, evidence that Tomo was still alive.
The door which gave access to the central support pillars was
slightly ajar when they reached it. Carefully, the remaining six
girls crept close, then listened at the door.
From inside, they heard a stern, slightly staticky voice lecture
someone. "You have failed me, Number Two! You know my standing
orders for anyone related to Doctor Mihama! You should have
gone to Plan B the moment you knew you had the girl in your
possession!"
Chiyo-chan sucked in a breath as she recognized the voice, then
nodded to Sakaki, who slammed the door open.
A single terrorist, who'd been saluting a two-way video
communicator, whirled and raised his gun, but Sakaki's knife took
him in the gun hand, and he dropped the weapon. Yomi kept him
covered while Sakaki searched and disarmed him.
Chiyo-chan ignored all this to stare boldly at the face on the
communicator, a bald man of indeterminate age and yellowish
countenance. "So, Doctor Zin, you were behind this! My father
will be very interested to know that. He had hoped you were dead
after our last encounter."
"That is as I wished. Even though this plan has failed, I am now
better prepared for our next encounter. Next time, Doctor Mihama
and his allies shall fall before me!" As he spoke, Doctor Zin
reached forward and pressed a button on the console before him and
the communications device went dark.
By now, the other girls had the terrorist leader tied up. Kagura
and Yomi kept watch on the door, while Sakaki crept around the
perimeter of the area they'd entered, making sure that there was
no other way in.
Chiyo-chan, Osaka, and Kaorin located and examined the bombs.
"Don't these things always have a red wire and a blue wire?"
Osaka scratched her head. "And you have to pick which one to
cut?"
"That's just on television," Chiyo-chan replied. "These guys
didn't have much reason to be booby-trapping their bomb; they were
in control of the whole building. Hmmm... PE, as I expected," she
continued, opening the case of the nearest. "So all we need to do
is remove the detonators."
Chiyo-chan proceeded to show Kaorin and Osaka how to do this, and
the three girls started disarmimg all of the bombs strapped to the
pillars. When she'd finished her bombs, Chiyo-chan inspected the
one Kaorin was just finishing, complimenting her on her technique.
Kaorin, beaming, skipped off in search of Sakaki while Chiyo-chan
continued on to Osaka, who was still on her first bomb.
Osaka, it turned out, was just finishing using two different
colors of nail polish to paint red and blue "wires" on the plastic
explosive. She turned to Chiyo-chan as the latter came up to her.
"It's ready! You start counting down from five, and I'll have to
decide which wire to cut. Okay?"
Perplexed, Chiyo played along. "Okay. Five. Four. Three..."
Osaka's eyes widened. She turned back to the bomb, now visibly
nervous. She raised both trembling hands to the 'wires'.
"Two. One..."
"I gotta cut one of them; but which?" Osaka muttered to herself.
"One... One... Zero. Boom."
"I'll just cut them both!" Osaka declared triumphantly, using a
fingernail on each hand to 'cut' the 'wires'. "I did it! I
saved us all!"
Chiyo-chan noticed something odd about Osaka's bomb and peered
closer. After a moment, she abruptly blanched. "AAAAAHHH! This
bomb WAS booby-trapped!" Quickly she traced the leads. "Oh,
good," she relaxed. "It's disabled now. But this was very
tricky, Osaka. You had to cut this brown wire half-hidden behind
the others first, and then the green one. You did it perfectly.
How did you know what to do?"
"Hmmm? Oh, bombs never have brown wires, everybody knows that.
So that one had to go first. Now, sometimes they have green
wires, and I figured, green is blue and red combined, right?
Since you always cut either red or blue, it was easy to see that
you'd always want to cut green."
Chiyo-chan gazed at Osaka nervously. "And that's why you did it
in the order you did?"
Osaka nodded happily.
"Right. Well," Chiyo-chan turned back to the other girls, "I can
use this communicator to contact the police and tell them the bomb
is disarmed. So all we need to do is stay here until they arrive.
Oh, and I guess we need to find Tomo, as well."
Yomi grunted in disgust and stepped to the door. "Tomo! Stop
playing around and get your ass over here!" She yelled.
Two minutes later Tomo came charging around the corner at the
far end of the corridor, bullets whizzing past her. "I'm outta
ammunition! You guys got any more?" she panted as she plunged in
past the door, then bent over, her lungs heaving.
One burst from Kagura down the corridor, timed just as Tomo
cleared her line of fire, caught one of the terrorists just as
he came around the corner. He collapsed. The sound of footsteps
coming to an abrupt halt came echoing around the corner.
"There's at least one left up there, and he knows we're here,"
Kagura warned.
"He must be the only one left, then," Tomo got out, her lungs
still heaving. "I'm sure I killed dozens!"
"There are at least two out there," Sakaki said quietly. "Could
someone hand me a few of those detonators?"
Chiyo-chan handed her two. "Be careful with these; they explode
without much provocation."
"Just like Yukari-sensei," Osaka observed sagely, nodding.
Holding the thin cylinder aloft like a knife, Sakaki judged her
distances, then threw. The detonator flew the length of the
hallway, bounced off the end window, and rebounded past the corner
into the adjoining hallway.
A quick "Shi-" was cut off by a muffled boom.
A couple of second passed, then a lone terrorist rounded the other
corner, hands up and weaponless. "Don't shoot! I'm unarmed, and
the last one alive on this floor."
"Haw! Told you!" Tomo said proudly.
"How many of you were on this floor to start with?" asked Chiyo-
chan.
"Four plus the boss," their new prisoner replied.
"Which means Tomo managed to hit exactly nobody," Yomi commented.
After he'd been searched and bound, their new prisoner shook his
head in disbelief. "Who ARE you guys, anyway?"
Next to him, his leader just shook his head sadly.
Neither ever got an answer which satisfied them.
- - - - - - - - - -
The next day, Miss Yukari finished taking attendence. "So you're
all here safely, even Tomo. Humph. So much for my hopes," she
muttered to herself. In a louder voice, she continued,
"Chiyo-chan, Sakaki-san, Yomi, Kagura-san, Osaka, and Kaorin-chan:
the Principal has asked me to inform you six that you will be
receiving official commendations for your level-headed actions
yesterday."
The other girls' murmurs of appreciation were drowned out by
Tomo's loud cry of "Hey! What about me?"
"Tomo, those markings on your face are in violation of the school
dress code. You'll have to stay after class for detention."
Tomo screamed.
- - - - - - - - - -
The End.
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