Disclaimer: Unfortunately I do not own the Ninja Turtles or any of their wonderful comrades or enemies, though it's number 10 on my bucket list for when I graduate high school and become a -hopefully- successful person. *Coughs* The only things I can claim ownership to are the situations I'm subjecting our favorite turtles, and a handful of OC's. Yes, I'm sorry, this is heavily based on the boy's - and their allies - interactions with OC's and an original world, but bear with me. I've run them all through Mary Stu and Gary Stu tests I could get my hands on and I expect open-palmed slaps to the face if they get out of line.

I only recently rediscovered my love for these guys after several years of branching out into other fandoms, but I'm back and I'm ready to give writing for them another shot. The last time I wrote a full-fledged for these guys was - oh geez - four years ago? Point is, it's been a long time and I haven't done much writing besides scribbling down character ideas since. So I'll admit, this is kind of an experiment for me to see if I can get back into my groove, and to find my style once again. You're going to see the stumbling steps of a writer trying to get her bearings back but I hope you enjoy the journey, and at least partially approve of it. It's been a painful recovery process and I hesitated putting it up here Oh, and please forgive me for any particular brow-raising verb tense issues. It's always been my weak point, and with this dabbling in various perspectives I can use all the help I can get setting them straight.

I think that's it, so please, enjoy!

Omniscient 3rd Person

It was a warm summer night in Manhattan. The stars were out, eager to shine through the haze of light crowning the bustling city. The four of them were trekking in the shadows, as per usual on Friday Night training runs. They all raced with confidence between the rooftops; only faint flashes of color able to be picked out of the shadows. Moonlight found them paused atop an old warehouse, laughter sneaking between heavy pants. A prideful crow filled the silence, "So, as the winner of the D Street race, I get to choose the game!"

Michelangelo was grinning from ear to ear, even as his brothers exchanged begrudging looks. With raised eyebrows and composed breath, Leonardo found himself asking the obvious: "Ninja Tag, right?"

A loud groan rose from the resident hothead at the impossibly-wide affirming grin Mikey flashed in response. "Well duh. And? I get to choose the teams. Meaning the lucky turtle on my team is…" He took a breath, intending to pause for dramatic effect—

"Leo," interrupted Raph with a roll of his eyes. "Like usual." Grabbing Don roughly by the tails of his bandana, he started toward to the edge of the building. "Come on, Braniac."

"Ow, Raph, hey!"

Mikey's pout lasted roughly 2.5 seconds before turning to smile cheesily at his older brother. "You ready to dominate? Because with the Battle Nexus Champion on your side—"

"I can't lose. Yes, Mikey, I know. It's what you said the last ten times we teamed up." Smiling in amusement at his little brother's deflated expression, he called after his brothers. "Guys! Ten minutes! And no further than West Street and Eastman!"

"Yeah, yeah, Fearless, we got it!" Was the quick, but predictable retort from the next building over. Leo glanced down to address his younger brother, only to see him already setting the timer. He allowed himself a small smile.

Unknown P.O.V.

Screams of terror

Tua lye! (1)

Flashes of light across the sky

Wood splinters, bones cracking

Ed' Alestrial, please! (2)

Panicked mutters, wide eyes

Incantations

Rima ten'ta! (3)

Manke naa lye autien? (4)

Ed' Alestrial, mani naa lle umien? (5)

Searing, white hot pain

Alestrial, Alestrial—

Donatello's P.O.V.

A bright light illuminated the sky for a brief moment-if I had blinked I would have missed it. Now I could see a glowing blue circle, reminding me of the portals we've seen Master Splinter, Usagi, and the Daimyo use for inter-dimension travel, hovering above a roof two buildings down. I blinked a few moments before looking at Raph. If his 'Oh geez, wonder what it is this time' look combined with a slightly slack-jawed expression was anything to go by, then either we were both hallucinating or that had really just happened. My cell shell chimed, effectively dispelling the awkward silence. Ignoring a glare from Raph, I picked it up. "Hello?"

Mikey's uncertain voice came on the line, and I could almost imagine the wide blue eyes he'd be sporting. "So, uhm…. You guys saw that, right?" His barely-concealed-excitement was audible over the phone as well.

Clearing my throat, I continued to eye the portal as I spoke. "Correction: we're seeing it right now. That flash seemed to be the prelude to that portal that's appeared about two buildings down from us."

"Whoah, a portal? You mean like—hey, Leo, I'm making the call—"

I swallowed slightly, hearing squawks of indignation as a battle of wills rolled on for possession of the phone. Like usual, Leo won over, as evidenced when his voice came onto the line. "A portal, Don?"

"It's what it seems like. From a distance it seems pretty similar to the ones we've seen before. Do you want us to check it out?" I could practically hear him thinking on the other line. Raph was fidgeting next to me, obviously eager to go check out whatever it was that just appeared.

"How close are you to it?"

"About two roofs across."

"I see." He made the small 'hum'ing sound he usually does when he's taking in information. "Give me your coordinates and we'll come to you." I nodded to myself, easily rattling off the street and building we were currently on top of. "Alright," came Leo's voice once more. "Don't do anything until we get there. And keep us updated if it does anything else, or if anyone comes out, alright?"

"Sure thing, Leo."

Hanging up, I squatted beside Raph, who was still watching the glowing portal with his usual intensity. He bristled slightly, raising one eye brow, if we were to have any, at me. "We have ta wait for 'im, don't we?" I could only offer a sheepish smile in reply, as any rational explanation of why Leo's reasoning was sound would send him into a hissy fit.

His eyes narrowed, giving a low huff. If we had nostrils, his would probably be flaring. He and Leo were at odds again, surprise, surprise. Admittedly, though, this time around was much tamer than their other conflicts had been. Or at least it seemed that way. There had been far less outright fights and arguments, which meant that they were either both silently steaming at each other, biding their time for an explosion of unparalleled proportions or they both realized they had gotten worked up over something petty and didn't want to admit it to each other.

I gave a small huff of my own, deciding to save the mental rant about stubborn brothers for another time.

The corner of Raph's lips quirked, probably thinking my annoyance was also stemming from being held back my Leo's orders. I just gave a lopsided smile, and returned to watching the so-far-inactive portal. I half wondered if it was going to wink out before Mikey and Leo got here.

Michelangelo's P.O.V.

So maybe I was more than slightly excited. You really can't blame me: I mean, it's not like portals to other dimensions-slash-worlds opened up every day in the middle of a training run! Alright, so it has happened before… more than once, actually… but it's not like it's a 'common occurrence', as Don would put it. I tried to think of who could be using the portal this time. If it was the Daimyo or Usagi then we would've probably heard about it beforehand. They're all about the formality and politeness and that sort of thing so that kinda ruled them out. It wasn't the Ultimate Ninja, as he was just a kid right now. In fact, now that I thought about it, why would anyone that would want to make friendly contact with us appear in the middle of Manhattan without, you know, guarantee that we would be there?

I take a look at Leo's face while we ran toward our bro's location, and found that he was wearing his solemn ready-for-battle face. I swallowed, because that face meant he already had just gone through the same mental maze I had to reach the same conclusion. Except a lot faster, obviously.

We finally reached our brothers in about two minutes, because really, we are the master navigators of the Manhattan rooftops, and saw the portal Don was talking about. It was kind of hard to miss, actually.

Don and Raph both got to their feet as we approached, waiting, like me, for Leo to assess the situation and to give us our next move. "I think you might be right, Don. But we need to get a closer look." Quick as you please, we were moving to the next building over.

The portal suddenly flashed, and as one we all skidded to a halt. A shrill scream seemed to come from out of nowhere, and five undistinguishable forms came out of—were more ejected out of- the portal, flying across the flat rooftop and landing with horrific THUDS on the cement. The identical looks of shock on my brother's faces would've been hilarious if the situation had been different.

Leo held out his hand, keeping us back, and motioned for us to take cover. The portal vanished, but the figures remained easy enough to see despite the shadows. When you live in the sewers and spent the majority of your time sneaking around at night, your eyes start to adjust to the darkness, you know. Or something like that. From my position, I didn't even have to squint to see what was going on. The five figures had stood up – so they were bipedal, I guess, maybe they were friendly -, and four out of the five were dressed in dark clothing, almost resembling robes. The four in robes had rounded on the fifth – okay maybe not so friendly – and from the glint in their hands they were carrying weapons. It was like something from out of those really bad cult movies, especially seeing as how they were all surrounding a small blonde girl who looked like she was wearing one of those peasant dresses from the Renaissance Fair. She was also holding a sword, but was visibly favoring her right side with something of a limp. My heart leapt in my throat, seeing as she stepped into better lighting that her entire right side was covered in blood.

I glanced at Leo for our next move, and saw his eyes narrowed behind the mask. Don had a hand on his bo staff, and Raph's thumbs were stroking the handle of his sais. Leo gave us all the once-over, doing his contemplative frowning-thing. "Follow my lead." He then began to head over to the next roof, expecting us to follow. He hadn't drawn his katanas, which meant that he probably was going to try to talk to these guys first.

I swallowed, following his lead. I doubted that talking was going to work, and I suspected Leo did too, but he always did like looking at all the angles.

Leonardo's P.O.V.

When the girl had shifted into the light and revealed the blood on her dress I knew it was time to step in. She'd been holding the sword with the sort of confidence one only found when they'd been dealing with blades for several years, but the grip had been awkward. That, combined with the favoring of her side, meant that she was wielding the blade with her weak arm as she used the other to hold her side. One to four odds was not something I liked seeing, especially with a girl so small, but I liked it even less so when the girl was obviously injured and not at her peak.

After telling my brothers to follow my lead, I quickly made my way across the rooftop. I didn't draw my blades, not wanting to scare the girl we were intending to help, but also out of hope that maybe we could make some sort of sense out of this chaos.

When we got to the rooftop, all five of them, the girl and her attackers, stopped and stared at us. Each of them was visibly on their guard, but without a trace of fear. "Hey, don't you guys know that it's not nice to pick on girls?" Came Mikey's taunt, but the concern was audible in his tone as we stepped between the girl and the figures, our stances ready and threatening.

The four fairly tall cloaked figures glanced at each other, gripping their glistening daggers uncertainly, before one removed his hood – and it took all of my willpower to not let my mouth drop open. The man-humanoid-creature- was obviously reptilian, with slanted yellow eyes. Scales puckered around where his-its ears should have been had it been human, and covered it's completely bald head.

"Dude! It's like a snake-man! We could totally be relatives!"

Yellow eyes narrowed. A fork tongue flicked out as its eyes tracked all four of us, obviously sizing us up. "Mani naa lle? (6)"

I opened my mouth, then closed it, quickly looking at Don. "Uhm… Don?"

Don looked equally surprised, a lump appearing in his throat that was quickly swallowed down. "That wasn't English. Or any language I've ever heard of."

Raph gave a low groan. "You're not serious."

"Well we can't expect all aliens and other-worldly life-forms to know English…"

The girl and the snake-creatures all looked confused and dazed. Actually, the girl looked like she was about to—"Somebody catch her!" I cried, just now realizing that with the amount of blood on her dress and in her blonde hair, she should not be conscious.

Don quickly went to it, diving impressively to catch her, and cradled her small form in his arms. Her sword fell to the ground with a clang, catching the attention from the snake-men in front of us.

Immediately a loud hiss rose from the group, and the one in front – the leader I'm assuming – pointed a finger at the girl we were currently screening from his view, and back to himself and his allies. "Ona he a'lye, usquenerea! Ssssssssii'! (7)"

There was no need for a translator for that one, if the defiant expressions on my brother's faces were anything to go by. "Don, get her to the lair. We'll take care of them."

"We sure will." Raph's face had contorted into a leer – and while I was confident in our abilities, I didn't think he should be so cocky considering we had no idea what these guys' skill level was. However, seeing as how he'd been itching for a good fight as of late, I wouldn't begrudge him. Especially since these four clearly deserved it.

The reptilian creatures were watching us expectantly, and their smiles had turned maliciously gleeful when I had gestured to Don. I would think that they were used to being complied to, or that they were just terrible at interpreting intentions.

They understood however, when Don got to his feet with the girl in tow and took off. Snarling in rage, the snake-men leapt into action, trying to get past us and to Don – but if they thought it was going to be that easy they had another thing coming.

Donatello's P.O.V.

I'd kept an eye on the girl as soon as we had reached the roof; with that much blood lost, she was not going to stay conscious much longer. I'd been proven correct, and I was diving toward her before Leo had even called for someone to catch her. When I got her in my arms, I noted that while she was rather small, probably not even reaching five feet, she looked like she could easily be in her teens. I swallowed slightly, moving the blood-stained hair out of her face. I saw that the tips of her ears had points, like an elf's; she couldn't possibly be human.

I was about to tell my brothers so, when I heard the snake-people's harsh, demanding tone, and saw him gesture toward the girl in my arms. My blood boiled slightly, and I narrowed my eyes. When Leo gave me the order to get her out of here, I couldn't have been more relieved. I kept my smile small as I adjusted her gently in my arms. I rose to my feet, mentally tracking the quickest route back to the lair, and took off.

I could hear the creatures shout-hiss?-screech at my retreating back, and had no doubt that my brothers could take them on, even a turtle down. I continued running, my breaths and the girl's rapid, overcompensating heartbeat overwhelming even the sound of Manhattan traffic as I raced. What class of hemorrhaging was this? I didn't have the time to stop and look; none of my medical equipment was here. Off -hand it could possibly be Class II or Class III, but it was dramatically different in regards to whether she would need a blood-transfusion or not. She was so damn tiny.

I was still a few blocks down from where our lair was, but she was getting colder and colder in my arms. Her blood had spilled from her dress and was starting to slick my hands. I didn't have enough time. I needed to stop the bleeding NOW. I halted almost immediately, and gently set her down on the cement floor. It was cold, but holding her to me wouldn't have kept her any warmer. It wasn't the first time I regretted being a cold-blooded creature. Muttering apologies I tore her dress to find the wound, and praised whatever god that listened to mutated freaks like me that she was wearing some sort of shorts underneath.

I inhaled quietly, finding a deep puncture wound in her right side where she seemed to be losing most of her blood. There was also a cut across her forearm, a non-deadly bloody gash on her head, and whatever injuries she had been sustained from being ejected out of that portal. Those could be attended to later. I slipped off my elbow pad and, muttering more profuse apologies, I ripped off the usable parts of her dress, tearing them into strips. I placed the elbow pad to the wound, trying not to panic as the brief contact with her skin told me how much colder she'd gotten, and tied it in place with the strips. I tested the make-shift bandage, and, satisfied with my work, I began to wish I had something to keep her warm.

Gently pulling her into my arms once more, I continued on my way to the lair, hoping that would be enough to keep her alive.

A/N: So, uhm, that's the end of that. There's more written, but I wanted to portion it out to see what people thought and to see if there was any interest. Comments, questions, criticisms? Constructive criticism makes me want to bury my head in the sand in shame, but is always welcome. This is a story is a tool to improve myself and to explore the character of the boys, so any and all advice is welcome, so please leave a review! Reviews are the equivalent of puppies and sunshine! Thanks for reading! ^^;

(1): Help us! (2): By Alestrial, please!(3): Run for it! (4): Where are we going?(5): By Alestrial, what are you doing? (6): What are you? (7): Give her to us, ugly ones! Now!

Elen sila lumenn omentilmo means "A star shall shine on the hour of our meeting."