A Moment's Contemplation
Oroku Saki, better known as the Shredder, stared at seven photographs on his tea table. Four were of similar faces, the only difference were the blue, orange, purple and red bands masking their eyes. The fifth was of a humanoid rat, the sixth of a woman with Red hair, and the seventh a man in a hockey mask. Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello, Raphael, Splinter, April O'Neil, and Casey Jones, respectively.
He sipped his tea in thought, the seven had caused him much trouble, and presented a most difficult problem. Divide and conquer never worked, because as much as they got mad, yelled, or argued, they hated him all the more and would work past it. If he took out Splinter, Leonardo could still hold the team. Take out the blue turtle, maybe Raphael or Donatello would step up. Try and take out either of those two and O'Neil and Jones would step up. Take out Michelangelo, not only would that make the turtles madder than a hornet's nest, but they could still cover the hole in the team.
But he knew their weak points, Raphael was hot headed and rash, Michelangelo was gullible, Donatello was physically a little weaker than his brothers, more brains than brawn, not all that noticeable unless they'd battled for a drawn out period, but still there. Splinter was old, he couldn't last much longer, April wasn't well trained as a fighter, an amateur, and Casey was also hot headed, as well as a little slow mentally. Probably from all the blows to the head.
Leonardo was the problem. Physically, mentally and spiritually, he was hard to break. But he did have one weakness . . . he loved his brothers, the rat and the humans. He'd do anything for them, and his worst fear, Saki theorized, would be to see them die before his eyes, unable to save them. But he couldn't capture or do anything without having the turtles and company come to the rescue.
It was an interesting knot. One that would take skill and patience to discover the one strand to tug to unravel it. As well as many trials and errors.
Saki smirked. At least he was finally up against a worthy opponent. He'd gone to long with out someone to fight. The last decent opponent was Hamato Yoshi, and he died after a few months. Longer than any of the other opponents before him. The turtles and their friends had lasted for a few years.
Silently he frowned. An idea from before coming up, but being re-visioned. If he couldn't have the turtles betray each other, then he would have to put a sleeper agent into play . . . one from him to infiltrate the ranks. If nothing else, that would give him more information on the turtles than before. He tapped a blank spot on the table. Yes, that might work. But it couldn't be someone from his own clan, or the purple dragons . . . There were a few other ninja clans stationed in New York, most he had already brought into the Foot's fold, others that he had killed. But there was a clan that had been put up into his radar recently. The Hoshi or 'Star' clan. A clan who was always able to find their way out of trouble, and help others . . . there were only a handful in New York, Five or Six, if he remembered rightly. One was a female, and there were rumors that she had a child. They were a tight knit group like the turtles, but he could easily capture them, use them and the child as leverage for the woman to help. It was a dangerous play, but there would be no way for the woman to back out of the deal, or even for her to help the turtles.
And while he was at it, he might as well restart the mutations program . . .
Story Idea, won't post it for a while, but I'm just setting up the story. If nothing else, The start of the one shot is a character study from the Shredder's point of view, so you can just review that.
Shakes head. You'd think I would learn.