Author's Note: What sort of Asian am I... I'm perfectly aware that yin-yang is Chinese and not Japanese, but let's just pretend Karai studies Chinese philosophy every now and then. Anyway! Mbak Sanca here. Since FFnet got banned in Indonesia, I asked Princess Kanako to post this in the Unwritten Fellowship. Hope you enjoyed! I know the story's a bit rushed, and it's not quite as good as I hoped, but please enjoy!
Title: Storm, Tempest, Cyclone
Author: The Unwritten Fellowship (Mbak Sanca)
Pairing(s): N/A
Date Submitted: 28/8/14
Disclaimer: I don't own TMNT
Claimer: I own the idea of this story
Genre: Angst
Summary: Karai's life was neatly arranged, until those turtles come in. Then it becomes a storm, but it's not long before it becomes a tempest - and finally, a cyclone. Takes place from City at War to Exodus.
In her life, Oroku Karai has trusted two people (beings, really. Karai has never trusted an actual human).
The first is her father, Oroku Saki. The man-alien-Utrom-Shredder-psychopath-it's-a-long-story being. She owes him her life. She owes him her honor, her dignity, her name, her entire being. Oroku Saki, who took her in, a little orphan girl, lonely and abandoned.
He gave her a new life. Karai shudders to think what would have happened to her if her father had not adopted her. Would a be a prostitute? A deranged beggar? Or worst, a slave in a distant place far from any chance of rescue, where she is honorless, with no will of her own?
She doesn't want to think about it. Without Oroku Saki, she would have nothing. Honor crushed like brittle autumn leaves, dignity no more than tiny shards of glass, life not worth living.
Karai is not an idiot. In fact, she prides herself on being an intelligent young woman. She knows that the Shredder does bad things. She knows that her father is Oroku Saki, and Oroku Saki is the Shredder. Therefor, by default, she knows her father is the Shredder, and that since the Shredder is evil, and the Shredder one and the same as her father, her father is supposed to be evil.
But she cannot think of her father that way. To her, her father, Oroku Saki, is a completely different entity from the Shredder. She likes to think of Oroku Saki as the yin to the Shredder's yang. Karai likes to think that Oroku Saki is a good man. Karai likes to think that she serves Oroku Saki and not the Shredder, that she serves Oroku Saki's good rather than the Shredder's bad.
Karai is still young. She is barely nineteen (though her leadership duties, her daughter-of-Oroku-Saki rank, her place in the Foot, gives her the grace and spirit of one much older). She is barely an adult, still quite the child. Children are innocent. Children view the world in black-and-white. Karai likes to view the world in black-and-white. She likes to think she is set firmly in white, that she is good yin.
Her world is neatly placed, neatly arranged, and, most importantly, with a moral compass set in stone. Karai is the daughter of Oroku Saki. She serves Oroku Saki. Oroku Saki is good. Karai is good. She is honorable. She has nothing to do with the Shredder.
Of course, the turtle has to come in and turn her neat world with its calm autumn breezes into a full-out storm.
He is the second of the two beings she trusts. The turtle, Leonardo. Karai knows that he is Oroku Saki's enemy, and therefor he must be bad. But from the instant Karai sets eyes on him, she immediately knows someone that honorable and brave cannot be evil.
She watches him with his brothers, fighting and living and loving together. Karai sometimes feels a pang of jealousy when she sees him. His world is so uncomplicated, simple. Leonardo's life consists of his his brothers, his master and fighting evil. Karai, on the other hand, is caught in a storm of morals and balance, of honor and loyalty. Leonardo is very lucky to have his honor and loyalty coexisting peacefully. Karai's honor and loyalty enjoy butting heads as often as possible.
After their first meeting (which did not go as smoothly as she hoped), she manages to bring him and his brothers on board with her Plan To Sort New York Into Neat Order And End This Ridiculous Gang War Chaos.
Karai tries not to think of her role masquerading the Shredder during that memorable event. She views it as a necessary evil, a necessary disguise, to sort New York back into order. After her first meeting with Leonardo, the Karai-the-head-of-Foot-Clan owes Leonardo-the-eldest-ninja-turtle much.
What really started out as the base to their shaky friendship-slash-alliance, though, is the fact that Karai, as a person, owes Leo nothing. She trusts Leonardo, and yet she owes him nothing. It confuses her. Before, she had always considered owing someone something the basis of trust. Then again, the first of the two people she trusts is her father, whom she owes everything to. The second is Leonardo, to whom as a person she owes absolutely nothing.
And it thrills her.
It makes Karai want to grin like an idiot.
Most excitingly of all, though, calm, collected Leonardo has entered Karai's life in a storm, with his honor and bushido and courage. He's like a bright light, a new chance in her dark and lonely world with its simple ways.
Of course, though, simply turning her world composed of her simple black-and-white isn't enough for Leonardo. Oh, no. He decides he has to return and turn it into a tempest.
To Karai, her simple world of clear-cut moralities is over (thanks to that stupid Leonardo). Now, her world is divided in two. She can no longer deny that her father is the Shredder, that he what he does is wrong. Instead, her world has been split into two very simple concepts: honor to what is right (courtesy of Leonardo) and loyalty to her father and his bad deeds (courtesy of the Shredder).
Her father wants to kill Leonardo. Leonardo wants to kill her father. Karai decides it's a very good thing Oroku Saki has no idea of her feelings for Leonardo. He has enough (twisted) motivation to kill Leonardo in the first place. No need to fuel the fire.
Karai feels so very guilty, this terrible guilt overcoming her. She has promised Leonardo peace. She holds honor in as high of a regard as loyalty. And she has betrayed that honor. The guilt consumes her.
And quite unexpectedly, Karai finds her world being torn by love, of all possible things. Love for her father and all he's done for her. Love for Leonardo and all he can offer her. She finds herself rooted right in the middle, unsure what to so. There's a tempest swirling around her, and the chaos is too much for Karai's once-neat world.
In the end, Karai isn't sure what forces her to choose her father, her dark and dangerous past with its dark and dangerous obligations thanks to her unwavering loyalty instead of choosing Leonardo, who can offer her a bright new world full of honor where she can be loyal only to honor and she isn't caught in the middle of wars, torn by tempests, thrown around and treated like a worn doll.
Karai hates herself, and she hates the torture this path of loyalty is bringing upon her, but she must be loyal. She owes Oroku Saki too much. She loves her father too much. Many people call Karai a great warrior, but she disagrees. A warrior is brave. Karai is not. She does not have the courage to do the right thing, and that tears her apart.
Her greatest flaw is her blind, too-dedicated and unswayed loyalty. She knows loyalty is a great thing, but Karai wonders if it's still a great thing if it brings this much suffering. Her unwavering loyalty has lead her down a dangerous path with her father. There is no turning back.
Every time Leonardo and his brothers pop up, he always offers her a way out. But Karai's loyalty is too great, and her honor cannot win over it. She wants so desperately that way out, a way to reclaim her lost honor. It tears at her. Karai wants more than anything else that honor. She cannot, though. She must be loyal. Be loyal to her father. To Oroku Saki. To the Shredder. She owes him too much, and Karai will do anything to repay that debt, even if it means becoming a servant of evil.
At least Karai still has a shred of honor enough to offer the turtles an escape route out of whatever mess they've gotten tangled in with the Shredder, even if it means lying to her father. She feels guilty, oh so guilty, whenever she works against her father, sneaks behind his back, lies to him. Those are not honorable things to do. Karai knows, though, that those are necessary evils in the name of honor. It breaks her heart, but it must be done. If not for her honor, then for the life of Leonardo and his brothers.
This tempest tearing her apart, swirling and mixing her morals until she wants to break down and cry like a little girl (but oh, no, she is a kuinochi, and she may be young, she is little, but a kuinochi must shed no tears). Sometimes, Karai wonders why she even bothers suffering this terrible tempest, with its two tearing winds of honor and loyalty. She wonders what's to stop her from running away forever, becoming just a woman.
But the moment that thought comes, she banishes it immediately. Karai is hardly a woman anymore. She may appear feminine, but inside, her spirit has become a warrior's, undefined by race or gender or height or age or weight. Her warrior spirit is all she has. Karai is nothing but a warrior, and while it is a hard life...
It's enough for her.
At some point or another, Karai grows almost used to the tempest swirling within her, trying to tear her to shreds. She is almost used to nights spent sleeplessly in bed, staring at the ceiling, wondering why she bothers. She is used to split-second decisions behind Oroku Saki's back to save the turtles. Karai has almost grown used to the tempest within her.
And then, of course, the tempest turns into a full-out cyclone.
Really, it's not her fault. It's not her fault Oroku Saki felt a need to escape to a faraway planet. It's not her fault those damn turtles decided to hitchhike a ride. It's not her fault, and there's not a single damn thing she can do about it and she hatesithatesithatesit.
Karai has never felt more torn. She had never been thrown into a position like this, where she has no choice. Defend her father, or defend the right thing? It's depressing. And in a split-second decision, Karai wants to choose The Right Thing so bad (i.e. Leonardo, Purple, Hothead, Smart-Aleck and Splinter).
But she cannot.
She is Oroku Karai. As dishonorable as fighting with the Shredder is, abandoning Oroku Saki (Ch'rell, technically, but to her, he will always be Oroku Saki) is just as bad. Blood runs thicker than water (she knows it's actually blood of the covenant runs thicker than the water of the womb and she so dearly wants the turtles as her covenant but she just owes Oroku Saki too much).
And against her will, against the little voice screaming don'tdon'tdon't in her, Karai chooses to be Oroku Karai.
She fights by the Shredder's side.
She owes him too much.
A huge debt. Her life. Her honor. Her dignity. Her spirit. All of it. She must repay that debt. She must serve her master, the Shredder.
Regretably, fate is not the only master she must serve. Fate is only one of three, along with the Shredder and honor.
So though it pains her, Karai chooses to stand by the Shredder's side. It is not beyond her, however, to plead Leonardo to stop fighting and just let it go, the Shredder's leaving, he'll be gone, they don't have to fight, they can end it here and now, Karai can coerce Chaplin into sending them back, but Leonardo is far too honorable for that.
It's not possible.
Unlike Karai, Leonardo serves only one master - honor.
It grieves her. She does not want to fight him. Actually, at this point, the only person Karai wants to fight is the Shredder. That stupid Shredder. Without him, she could just be Oroku Karai, daughter of Oroku Saki, friend of the turtles.
She almost wishes Leonardo let her fall. She almost wishes Leonardo let her die.
For one simple reason: had she died, she never would have gone through the torture following.
Karai never wanted to stab Leonardo. Karai never wanted to hurt her ally, her friend. She never wanted to betray him. She never wanted to subject him to that sort of torture.
More than anything else, she wishes she had pointed her sword down. Had she down so, Leonardo would have never been impaled on her sword. She would never have stabbed him. Before, Karai would have said owing the Shredder was her biggest regret. Now, it is not dropping her sword. It is not pointing it down.
Because if she had, Leonardo would never have been impaled.
She is too shocked to fend off Raphael when he attacks her. She is too shocked, much too shocked. She cares for Leonardo. She wants to tell the hothead she never meant to hurt his brother. But her warrior instincts kick in, and Karai finds herself fighting back, even if only with half her usual vigor.
When the Shredder prevents Raphael from killing her, Karai wants to scream. Now not only does she owe the Shredder even more, but she would have welcomed death. She cannot forgive herself for stabbing the only being who ever cared for her as a person.
She wishes the Shredder had let Raphael kill her. She had, after all, stabbed Leonardo. Death would have been a fitting punishment
The moment the Shredder readies himself to kill the unconcious ninjas, however, Karai is immediately grateful he saved her life. She can, at least, now use her life to piece together tiny bits of shattered honor and protect the defeated ones.
Karai isn't so sure what happened next, though. She's certain the Shredder was about to shred her into tiny pieces (no pun intended). She's certain that they were somehow blown out of the power core room. She's certain the Shredder yelled at Chaplin to open the door.
Everything that happens afterwards is... a lot blurrier. She remembers a loud sound, a bright flash. Then everything grows dark, and she welcomes the sudden darknes.
After all, it's an end to this cyclone, no matter how temporary.
Fin