Disclaimer: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles © Nickelodeon/IDW Comics, where appropriate. Character Designs © Mirage Comics, under license from Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, except where appropriate. I do not claim ownership of any character.
Author's Note: Author's Note: This is based on an alternate timeline for the Nickelodeon series, which begins with a change, in that the meeting that kicks off Karai's Vendetta occurs when she first arrives in New York, instead of several weeks later in-universe, while April still has issues with the Turtles over the mistakes they made in those early battles.
Due to plot changes brought about by this, Casey's role will be eliminated completely, since the reason April and Casey met, the Turtles screwing up royally, will not see them meeting. About what those changes might be, A little bit of advice… The name in the title is the name of one of Karai's loyal retainers for a large portion of this story. The other, Shinigami, wasn't seen much in series, but will be in this case.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Uzuki
Chapter 1: Ripples In Fate
Karai had been brought up by her father to know the value of good intelligence, supported by a good support base and intelligent, loyal followers. From what she read as she headed towards New York, if she was put in command of it, she'd suggest a few 'random' bouts of yubitsume, or meetings where the head of department is told not to bleed on the floor, within the parts of his staff where the most ineptitude was occuring.
If they had expertise he couldn't lose, Well, She found that assistants suddenly became a valuable commodity for failing departments within parts of the Clan that were becoming a problem. Something about the fact that they didn't like finding out that their assistant no longer had fingers… or their weekly review included a tanto and a man brought in to help their head off their shoulders.
A good start would be whatever cut-rate mercenaries he used for his dealings with the kame ninja. When you had a high-profile, grossly over-paid in her opinion, mercenary group suddenly see their leader in a pool of his own blood after reporting their failure, generally they stopped reporting failures. Admittedly, nine times out of ten in those cases, After you discreetly put to death their replacement, usually they got the message and stopped lying. It was only after that, they also got a lot more competent and sometimes even started taking the initiative.
A good example was with the Yakuza back home. They'd made an attempt to form an alliance against the Foot, using a relatively weakly defended part of their territory. The leader of said alliance was found dead, his empire simply given away to her as a birthday present. Oddly, there was no more talk of alliances. The daughter of that man was currently handling her affairs in Japan, while his son was an unfortunate accident. His sister had accidentally used the katana she'd given her as a gift to behead him when he sat down with the other Yakuza heads. She was the only one still standing afterwards.
Due to this, she'd not gone straight for the 'kame ninja' who covered the reports, instead heading to New York in secret, supported only by Shinigami. Within moments, Shinigami, as a cat, had observed a day's activities of the kame ninja, coming back with an interesting approach vector… One April O'Neil, daughter of Kirby O'Neil, a scientist whose location was stubbornly and annoyingly 'unknown'. They were her chance to deal with the kame ninja her father so hated, without ending up impaled on the end of a katana.
It was only a couple of hours since she'd finished setting up her forward base for her new operation, well away from the massive skyscraper that was her father's headquarters. The plan had been simple. She'd already noticed that things seemed to revolve, rather than what her father thought, to instead of the kame ninja, around April, just from Shinigami's observations, the reason her father pursued the easy target being that they clearly used a known variant of Foot ninjitsu, drawing his interest immediately.
This is what had brought her to be sitting at the favourite eating spot of the Turtles and their human ally, the fact they served a form of pizza flavoured dumpling confirming the fact, her 'cat' in her lap, having "accidentally" struck out at the girl she was observing, the cloth she used to stop the bleeding placed in a plastic bag for later use. The fact that the cloth was sealed in a sterile pouch beforehand, and the bag it was put back in was a sample bag, was testament to the level of accident it was.
This is not what brought her however to have stayed for well beyond the time she needed to, having the blood sample, or explained why she'd made the choice of getting Shinigami a plate of sushi fish, and herself a plate of the 'pizza gyoza', while preparing to make small talk with Ms. O'Neil. Even Shinigami was making curious looks, from over the bowl of fish scraps, about why they weren't making their way to the apartment, instead making the risky choice to make contact with her.
"So, What is your name?" April had asked. She'd thought about it, coming up with a name that had popped into her head, not sure where she'd heard it from.
"It's Miwa, My cat's name is Shinigami..." She'd offered, scoffing mentally at the name. 'Harmony'… Like she could bring harmony to anything.
"Murakami, Wait a moment, Just had a thought. I want to change my order..." April had stated, noticing him slide one serving onto the plate beside him, "Just regular gyoza please. And a second plate of sushi, Shin seems to have finished the one she was given."
Karai frowned when she heard her use the, literal, pet name for Shinigami. Only she called her Shin. She was surprised however at the fact she'd noticed the cat-witch had been hungrier than she'd expected. However, what intrigued her was why she'd changed her order from pizza gyoza.
"Why did you change your order?" Karai asked, "Notice I ordered them?"
"If it wasn't for the fact it's still an interesting twist on the recipe, I'd be telling Murakami to take them off the menu..." She had declared in a low tone, while Karai's eyebrows rose. This wasn't what she was expecting, not at all. Shinigami even looked up from the new plate of fish she had been given. This was news, and potentially good news for her father. She'd got something that would interest him, but wasn't sure what.
"We can still share..." Karai replied, taking a gamble as she added, "Give it a send-off between friends?"
"Friends, I'd like that… Sure, That sounds good, Miwa..." April stated, Karai finding she was coming to like 'Miwa' as a name, "Anyway, I got saved by the guys who made them, seemed like they were my friends… Not like you. I don't see you and Shin destroying my life for some stupid vendetta…"
This was what brought her to the present, Karai having laughed lightly, while feeling a mental gut punch. She knew that likely it would be exactly what she'd be doing if she gave her father openly the information she gleaned from April. So, Shinigami had looked up at her as she excused herself to go use the nearby toilet area. Once she was out of sight, Shinigami changed into her human form, as Karai splashed water over her face, trying to calm herself.
"This is bad, This is really bad..." Karai sighed, "Did she have to say that? Did she have to bring up that damn vendetta, how she's estranging herself from the kame ninja because of it… I can't do it, Shin. I can't..."
"She trusts you, that's the problem..." Shinigami mused, "Now, we still do the blood work. Otherwise, it'll drive you crazy working out why she's so damn important..."
"What about my father? If he..." Karai asked, as Shinigami took out her set of keys for the apartment, removing the cat's paw fob.
"He doesn't have any interest in O'Neil-san..." Shinigami offered, "Also, why are you worried about your father..."
"I felt sick to the stomach when she mentioned the vendetta..." Karai stated, "She's not from either of the clans, she's neutral… She'd end up kidnapped, or worse, if my father catches wind of her..."
"I have a feeling she's not as neutral as you think… But we're not the enemy, We're a new friend and her cat. And if we keep being that, the kame ninja, your father… Neither of them will realise she is our ally, not their's… and, if the vendetta becomes an… issue, she will be our closest ally," Shinigami stated, changing back.
"You're right… Right now, My father doesn't even know I'm here… If I keep using Miwa, it shouldn't raise any suspicions with my father..." Karai mused, before walking out with the keys, accepting her plate of gyoza.
"Look, I have an apartment nearby. If it gets any worse between you and your friends, and you need a place to crash..." She'd offered, tossing April the keys. She didn't use the front door, even though she did have a key for it. She'd specifically bought the place since the skylight had a way to open it from the outside...
A short time later, she was sat with Shinigami, looking at her, trying to figure out what her angle would be going forward. She'd just made an alliance that was forcing her to pick sides against her father, and that would not go down well.
"You made a valuable ally, Karai-sama..." Shinigami stated, "If she moves in… Then the situation with the kame ninja has become untenable, and we… deal with them. She'll be as invaluable as Sakuya is in Japan..."
"And if my father asks why I'm going ronin? Sakuya was me dealing with anti-Foot sentiment. This is not like that," Karai asked, "He'll notice my operation if I start making strikes he didn't authorize against them..."
"He's not going to think you went ronin. More likely he'll congratulate you on your forward thinking, think your strikes against the kame ninja are for his benefit," Shinigami offered, "Look, for now, I'll hang around Murakami's and keep an eye on the pizza gyoza situation… See if she does take it off on them,"
"Are you sure you're not looking out for any sushi off-cuts?" Karai ribbed, Shinigami having the honesty to nod sheepishly, "Seriously, Let me know if she does go through with that..."
"And you get Baxter to look over that blood sample, make any excuse to make sure he doesn't ask whose it is..." Shinigami stated, transforming before disappearing off to do her own intelligence on the strange situation they were in… as well as get some more free sushi.
A few days passed, Karai having slipped the request into Baxter's in-tray, with several confidentiality tags on it, citing that operational security is tantamount, 'tantamount' being nicknamed 'tanto-mount' when Karai or Shredder stated it, since you obeyed what she wanted unless you wanted to be the mount for a tanto.
However, the more important thing was that earlier that same day, Shinigami had reported that pizza gyoza was 'off the menu', adding, as an aside, that Murakami considered her his best non-paying customer. When she went to the apartment that evening, she wasn't surprised to see April there with a couple of soup bowls, and a carton of take out. She clearly had taken Karai up on that offer, which indicated that something hadn't gone smoothly, but she wasn't sure how bad.
"Remind me to put a sign on the front door… For mail, visitors and cold callers only. Friends, The skylight isn't locked..." April offered dryly, before adding,"Wait, the… kame ninja would also use the skylight. Anyway, What do you think of turtle soup, my treat?"
Karai felt a mild thundering sound in her ears, calming down and schooling her features. Clearly things had gone wrong if the kame ninja's closest ally had ordered, completely straight faced, some turtle soup from what was clearly Murakami's. The gyoza that were part of the side order were most likely not pizza ones, if Shinigami's information had been correct, a quick try of one showing she was right. A quick check of the Foot Clan database, claiming a message on her phone, showed April's file had been closed, since she was no longer associating with them.
"In case you're wondering, There's not going to be any more pizza gyoza..." April stated, "Murakami was… nice enough to tell them that their money was no longer good at his shop. He then used one of his cooking knives to symbolically cut a handful of the pizza-marked tiles into little pieces, after I helped him remove them from the machine… They use a particular pizza place now on phone orders. Only place that can fulfil their orders..."
"OK, What exactly did your friends do to you that you basically told Old Man Murakami to blacklist them in such a final way?" Karai asked, slightly puzzled as to why they only used one place. Probably allergies.
"They get me into so much trouble, then, when I try to solve it myself, they treat me like some weak, defenceless bystander… Because I followed them around, My life is a mess, I was spending more time hiding out in the sewer than having a life… So, I gave them the brush-off, and moved in," April offered, "Miwa, honestly, tell me… Have you ever been patronizing towards me or lied?"
Karai hid the wince well, over the fact she had lied by omission to her, helped by the fact she'd got a phone call on her private phone, from Baxter of all people. "Excuse me for a moment..."
She vaulted up through the skylight to get a quiet place to take the call. The fact April didn't even react was noticeable. She guessed that ninja in New York was becoming normal for her. Admittedly, considering her quip when she arrived, she probably expected that an oriental woman in New York likely was a ninja.
"What crap is your father up to now?!" Baxter snapped as she answered the phone, "Half the DNA sequences in that sample are not in my database!"
"Baxter, What are you talking about?" Karai asked, her heart clenching. This was going to strain her burgeoning friendship with April if Baxter was finding issues with the DNA sample.
"From what I can tell, half the DNA sequences are pretty much boilerplate human. The others are non-terran… What has your fa-… That's odd. Computer, check X chromosomes again… This sample is female?! I thought all the mutates were male..." Baxter started, and she then heard typing, realising that Baxter was going to start doing cross-referencing to find out why a female sample had abnormal genetics. And there was a very small reference pool, and she knew it.
"Baxter, This is an order from me. It might as well be from my father. You don't need to check the source, Consider that it was internal," Karai stated, the typing stopping abruptly, "It's something I'm checking up on for my father… I'll be over to pick up the results. You dare show them to my father, or if I find you've made a copy, and you might well end up with your career terminated with prejudice… Please remember, Security is tantamount, and you could have ruined everything being nosy..."
Dropping back down, she noticed April hold out the bag from the takeout, half of the contents sat on the table, served out.
"Let me guess… Family crisis?" April offered, "You look like something bad has happened..."
"Medical emergency..." Karai stated, "Friend of mine was having some blood work done up, and it's not come out how they expected..."
"Story of my life. Dad has me on a list who can't have blood work done, due to some medical issues my mother had..." April stated, "Also means I can't donate blood..."
"Anyway, Gotta go see what the problem is..." Karai continued, realising that her father knew all about April's odd genetic make-up, and had tried to avoid a genetic make-up being done until now. This was very much more than just the vendetta. This was bigger than she thought, by far.
Baxter had said 'non-terran', which meant she had genetics which were artificial or worse. Which meant she was the key to everything, and right now, she had her safe. She now knew what made the kame ninja guard April, and what would make her invaluable to her father. But, oddly, she didn't care, except that her father would not know. She had to find a way to hide her in plain sight.
"Look, They'll be fine…" April offered, "Anyway, Enjoy your soup. Someone like you won't spill a drop..."
"Is this about the skylight?" Karai asked, April nodding, "So how long have you been crashing here?"
"It didn't take more than a week," came the bitter reply, "Look, Miwa, there's only one person, ninja or kunoichi, who gets in that skylight. Anyone else… I'm getting a panic alarm. I'll let you have a way to shut it off by remote,"
An hour, all the gyoza and half the soup, later, Karai noticed one of the kame ninja, on a nearby rooftop, quickly identifying it as the one she wanted, the one referred to as 'Donatello'.
"You! Kame Ninja!" She snapped, 'Donatello' freezing as she approached, "I've been looking for you for the past hour!"
"Who are you, and what do you want?" He asked, looking her over to check for hidden weapons. Very very few people were out here at this time of the night. Especially Japanese.
"My name is Miwa, and I need your help with something…" She stated, "It's sensitive and I need it looking into urgently."
"I don't know how I could help…" He offered, "Would love to know how come you actually called me a Ninja Turtle from a glance..."
"You're a turtle, and your… attire filled in the rest," She stated, before pausing, and eye-rolling deliberately as she stated, "One of your brothers… Michelangelo… is also a nightmare for your operational security..."
"OK, We'll look into this. I assume you'll be waiting here over the next few days?" He asked, Karai nodding.
"I will trust you over one thing, on the understanding that you keep the information confidential..." Karai stated, "The name of the person whose blood work this is… Uzuki."
She then handed him the paperwork, deliberately drinking from her cup of soup as he slipped it into his pouch, hiding the smirk as Donatello winced upon recognising the branding on the cup in question, then she was gone. Even the kame ninja would come to understand Foot Clan operational security soon enough. She couldn't use the usual methods.
Well, how would she get a tanto past their shells, and they already had a shortage of fingers... So, instead, she reminded them of what they'd recently lost.