Written for the TMNT Mini Bang 2014. I had this idea rattling around in my head since I saw "Vengeance is Mine;" I just kept wondering, what if things had gone according to Shredder's plan? What if the turtles were mutated, rather than Karai? The mini bang was the perfect opportunity to work out the idea, even though it kept growing and growing. Thanks to theherocomplex for all the encouragement and organization!
Afterward, Karai sits in her room—not a cell this time. She's been restored to her own bedroom, with a door that she can open by herself, and all her things exactly as she left them. It's eerie, as if she had only stepped out for a moment.
There's one big difference, though, and it sits in front of her: a tank, or terrarium, glass-walled, with sand in the bottom, and the four serpents twining among themselves.
Karai doesn't know much about reptiles, but she suspects it's too cold for them. The living quarters are kept on the cool side, because Shredder believes it promotes health and vigor. The tank is only a glass cage, hastily arranged to house its four occupants. There is water, but no heater. Already, she thinks, the snakes grow sluggish. They do not move around as much, but gather together. Do they remember what they were? Who they were? Do they remember each other, or her?
One of the snakes fixes her with a cold, glassy eye, not brown or blue or green, but greenish-yellow. Karai does not know which one it was. They all look much like, mottled yellow-green scales, wedge-shaped heads, pointed fangs. She can't tell if they recognize her, if any of their former wits and skills remain. She can't tell whether they are afraid, or angry. Stockman had said they were only snakes, no more than animals, cold-blooded, slow, not—
Karai wishes she could be as cold. It would be simpler if she could see them all as her enemies, worthy of any ruthless retribution. She'd been taught to be cold.
Right now, it would be pleasant to be ice. Anything would be better than the mess of emotions churning through her chest. She doesn't know if she can sort out the tangle and name them all right now, but she knows that first among them is anger. No, rage. Her father—or, at least, the man who raised her, and who called her daughter not an hour ago, before he sent her to her room with her new pets—used her as bait. Dangled her over a vat of mutagen that could have turned her into a thing, as if she were disposable, all in service of his vendetta. He was prepared to risk her for that, and if his plan hadn't worked, it would be she with the scales and the torpid eyes, coiled in a glass tank. The betrayal in that shakes her to the core and gives her a slight sense of nausea. It would have been so easy for something to go wrong, and their clan's fights against the turtles and their master have been anything but predictable.
She wraps her arms tighter around her knees against the sense of hot shame that that brings up. All her life, she was taught to despise Hamato Yoshi. He was treacherous, she was told again and again, and weak, unworthy. But Splinter had taken her into his home, placed no pressure on her to make a choice and declare her loyalty. He and his sons had come for her when they didn't have to, had risked their own lives for her.
If that was weakness, Karai doesn't think she understands strength.
Leonardo had never truly seen her as an enemy, either, for the entire duration of their acquaintance. She had thought that foolishness more than once, an unforgivable weakness, in spite of his skills. Now, the certainty he had always expressed about her true nature leaves her heartsick and confused. And his brothers—they had never trusted her the same way, and she can't blame them for it. But they had come for her, too, and they had tried to welcome her into their home as best they could, and the result had been... this.
The snakes lie quietly in their tank, now. She should see about a heater, or... something. Even the fact that the tank is here, in her quarters, is a message. It is a lesson, or a test, or a reminder. The Shredder intends her to learn something from this, or he intends to test her loyalties, now that she has nowhere else to go.
Karai tightens her jaw, frowning at the tank. There is no one she can talk to about this. It isn't even safe to speak her thoughts out loud here, in the privacy of her room. There could be listening ears, or listening devices, anywhere. She dares not even breathe an apology to the creatures behind the glass.
But she cannot let this stand. Her father turned on her, used her as an instrument for his revenge. Has she ever, her whole life, been anything more than a prop for his schemes? She can't be sure any more.
He thinks he's won. He thinks his vengeance is complete with the turtles' transformation, with Splinter's death. He's so very wrong. But Karai will need to play this carefully. She has been locked away too long; she needs to understand how matters stand within the clan, and she needs to keep her own counsel until she's sure.
There's just one person she can think of who might be able to help her, who might be interested in some revenge of her own. Even getting out of the Foot compound unobserved will be a challenge, but having even a single ally could be worth it.
#
Donnie isn't answering his phone.
Donnie always answers his phone when April calls, usually on the second ring, sometimes even if he's in the middle of a fight.
After the third try, April tried calling Leo, and then the others. Radio silence all around. She almost called the cheese phone, too, but her fingers hesitated on the button. The cheesephone is for emergencies, and she doesn't know if this qualifies as an emergency.
Sometimes the guys were out on a mission, or a training exercise, or something where they couldn't answer their phones, but they'd usually send her a message first. This unplanned, unannounced silence pulls at April's senses. It feels wrong.
Actually, the whole day has felt wrong. She woke up from muddled dreams she couldn't quite remember, but that left her unsettled and drooping. She picked at her breakfast and tried to brush off her dad's concern.
At school, everything feels too loud and too bright. April manages to track down Casey between classes. "Have you heard from the guys at all?" she asks, not caring how it looks that they're having a whispered conversation in the hall, with everyone chattering and bustling around their lockers.
He shakes his head. "Nah, not since yesterday. Why?"
April bites her lip. "I don't know... I just... I keep calling and... I don't have a good feeling about this."
His eyes light up. "We should go check it out."
"After school?" April suggests.
The bell rings. They're both going to be late to class. Casey raises an eyebrow, his usual sly grin spreading over his face. "You wanna wait that long?"
April wavers. Unlike Casey, she tries not to cut class, but... no, she doesn't want to wait.
The lair is empty.
"Hello, anyone home?" she calls as they step through the turnstiles. "Donnie?"
"Yo, Raph!" Casey shouts, right behind her.
But their voices echo against the concrete and pipes, and April looks around, bewildered. Empty. It looks pretty much the same as always—the power's on, there are comic books scattered around the living room, and somebody's skateboard is propped against the ledge. "Hello?" she tries again, but the room seems to swallow her voice. "Check the bedrooms," she tells Casey, and goes to the dojo herself. Everything there appears as orderly as usual. She ventures toward the screen—where she's never been before—and has to force her voice above a whisper. "Master Splinter?"
There's no answer, and when she finally summons her courage and pushes the sliding screen back, there's no one there. The bedding looks rumpled, but everything else is tidy. No blood.
She turns away and leaves the dojo, her heart hammering.
"Nothin' in the bedrooms," Casey reports, coming back with a frown on his face.
"They must have left," April says, half to herself. They left without warning, though, and they'd left behind... everything. All the weapons and equipment are still in place, so they left in a hurry... and she can't imagine why, or where they could have gone without a word to her. She walks into the kitchen and opens a cupboard, at random. No, they didn't take food, either, just about everything seems to be in place. She opens the freezer, and Ice Cream Kitty mews and offers her a fudgesicle.
They went somewhere in a hurry and they haven't come back, and they're not answering their phones. April frowns. Her heartbeat feels loud in her ears.
"What do you think happened?" Casey asks.
"I don't know," April replies slowly.
There's nothing more to do here, so she walks back to the turnstiles, her footsteps dragging as she tries to puzzle it out. Kraang? Foot? Something else? What could have happened?
Out in the tunnel, a strip of black separates itself from the shadows and says, "Thought I might find you looking around here."
April yelps and her tessen is in her hand at once. She braces herself, but Karai faces her with open hands, hip cocked to one side, not attacking.
"Whoa," Casey says. "Is this that ninja chick you were talking about?"
April ignores him. "What did you do with them?" she hisses.
Karai's lip curls, her nose crinkling. "I didn't do anything. It was Shredder."
"I don't believe you!" April snarls.
Karai's eyes flick away for a moment. She lips part as if she's going to speak. Then her mouth draws tight and her shoulders hunch. "You're right," she says. "I made a mistake."
"Where are they?" April demands. "What happened?" She's proud that her hand stays steady, and half aware of Casey tensing at her back. He'll back her up. She's got that, at least. She doesn't know if the two of them could take down Karai, but at least they're two and she's one. That's something.
Slowly, Karai extends her arm. April tenses, but there's no weapon.
Clenched in Karai's fist is a bunch of fabric.
No.
Four strips of fabric.
Just as slowly, April puts out her free hand and takes them. Her fingers feel numb as she closes them around the four familiar strips. Red. Blue. Orange. Purple.
She can't stop the tears from springing to her eyes, then.
Casey says, "What the fuck are you— that's messed up."
April clenches her fist around the four masks. "Are you telling me they're dead?" she says, unable to stop her voice from shaking.
Karai's mouth twists. "My f- Splinter is. I saw Shredder kill him myself. The turtles, no, but they're—"
"Where are they?" April demands, her body quivering with rage. She doesn't know why Karai's here, but she will storm Foot Headquarters by herself if she has to—
"—mutated," Karai finishes.
"Dude. They were already mutants," Casey says.
Karai sneers at him. "They mutated again, all right? They're snakes now." Her eyes flick away for a fraction of a second. "I don't—Stockman says they're not intelligent. It wasn't regular mutagen, it was something he cooked up. I don't know. I have them in a tank in my room."
Mutated. All the breath seems to go out of April's lungs, because this... this they can deal with, right? There has to be a way. They found a way before, or... Donnie did.
Behind her, Casey bursts out in a sharp bark of laughter. "You have them in a tank in your room? What the hell? That's weird."
"Oh, and what do you think I should do with them?" Karai snaps back.
April says, "If they're... if they mutated, then maybe... the retro-mutagen..."
Karai's eyes cut quickly from Casey to April, widening. "Retro... you mean there's a way to undo it?"
"Maybe it would be different for mutating mutants," April says doubtfully. "But Donnie invented a retro-mutagen." Her grip on the masks tightens.
"Where is it?" Karai demands, leaning forward. April holds up her fan defensively, taking a step back, and Casey steps forward, putting them almost shoulder to shoulder.
"There isn't any more just lying around," April says. "It was hard to make—it needed a lot of mutagen, and..."
"But you can make more, right?" Karai says.
April's heart clenches with dread. She knows her DNA is part of it, but... Donnie's the only one who knows how to make the retro-mutagen.
Donnie. He worked so hard to make the retro-mutagen and help April's dad, to do the impossible, and now he's the one who needs help. She looks down at the masks dangling limply from her hand, red and orange and blue and purple. "I'll figure it out," she says. Her voice only wavers a little. "I'll go over his notes. He must have written it down. But, um... I'll need some mutagen to test it with. It would help to have a sample of... the kind that got used on them."
Karai nods, her eyes bright. "I can do that. Give me a little time, and I'll get some from Stockman's lab."
"Wait a minute," says Casey, coming up to stand next to April. "Why do you care? Aren't you, like, the enemy?"
April opens her mouth to say it's more complicated than that, and closes it, deciding that's not her place. Karai scowls at him. "You don't know anything about me, punk." After a moment, she adds, more quietly, "But I owe them."