Disclaimer: TMNT and all related characters are not mine, naturally.

Grammar Nazi: I'm so sorry, your email did not come over on your review, so I couldn't respond! But yes, if you're up for, have at it at these chapters. I'll be the first to admit, I'm not always on par when it comes to grammar. And I always appreciate the help! Thank you! :D

A/N: Hey, guys! Hope you're enjoying your summer! As promised, here we have Harvester on the move. Little break from the turtles (which I didn't notice until I was editing, sorry!) but we'll catch up with some of the guys again next chapter.

Warnings...eh...a pair of OC's, Harvester's POV, violence, blood, and peril on the streets. If you're a fan of that sort of thing, I hope you enjoy! Thanks for reading!

Chapter 10: Gone Astray

I'd like to think that my return to the real world could have been spectacular. I could have risen out of the depths of my own subconscious, hungry for the world that my Lady had just unleashed me upon. I can envision an effortless stirring of my host's limbs, harkening to my command as if they were my own. Up we would have risen and I would have set both his gaze and my ambition towards the darkness above us where the untold mass of humanity teemed.

It would have been glorious.

Unfortunately, that's not exactly how stepping from one plane of existence to the next works.

I've found.

I can't say that I truly understand how the whole thing works. It's not my business to understand, I guess, but, I can say that when my Lady had first drawn me into the core of Her mind for my confrontation with Leonardo, I had gone with Her easily. It had been like being tugged along by some gentle, yet steady, current. All that had been required of me was to let go and She had done the rest. It had been quiet, pleasant; a moment when all that existed was She and I. And oh, how I relished every second of that grey and silent journey into the mists of Her mind. I had emerged, giddy and excited, into the cavern where I would truly meet my stubborn and rebellious host and watch Her bring him to his knees.

In hindsight, I think She might have shielded me from the sheer brunt force of the transportation during that first round. She must have known the...effort it takes to jump from mind to mind. Or is it reality to reality?

Either way, coming back wasn't quite so pleasant.

Had she not been so distracted by trying to still Leonardo's incessant squalling, I have no doubt that the return journey would've gone just as smoothly as the departure. But Her guest was adamant in his thin belief that he was somehow capable of defying Her, and required Her attention more than I did.

Witless sap, I would've laughed at his naiveté , if it hadn't cost me so much.

The moment She released the mental cords binding me to Her side, there was no gentle drifting back to the world. Instead, it was more like I had been suspended at the far end of an extended rubber band that had just been set loose.

I catapulted through darkness and gray space, flung at such a velocity that I was dashed into the far wall of the cramped enclosure inside my own head.

I writhed at the impact, curling myself against Leonardo's skin in a desperate attempt at self preservation. My return to flesh and blood reality reignited the few nerves I possessed out of their catatonic reverie and brought everything sizzling awake. The shock of it reverberated down my proboscis and jabbed Leonardo's nervous system like a cattle prod.

That went over well.

His lungs pulled in a painful gulp of air, humid with the heat of my Lady's presence. His eyes sprang open on their own accord, and I was bombarded by a smear of darkness highlighted by colors that I couldn't begin to decipher in the avalanche of data pummeling my brain. I felt his insides aching with hunger pains and his throat itching with thirst. White noise blazed from his motor cortex, hissing that the seated position I had left him in had stemmed the blood flow to his lower extremities. Everything below the waist was tingling and numb and pleading with his absent higher functions to shift his posture.

I didn't care. This sudden swirl of information had left me dizzy and nauseous. That nausea poured into Leonardo's much larger stomach and I felt the sting of bile rising up his throat.

And then we were sliding, his shell scraping against my Lady's flank as we went keeling over to the right.

Oh, for the love of – –

I bit down, tightening my jaw around our point of contact and cracking the seals of clotted blood that had formed around them. My will and the remains of the turtle's instinct collided and together we managed to keep from falling face-first into the dirt. I hauled us upright, grunting with the effort and focusing on the taste of his blood while his senses danced around me. They wailed of cramped muscles and sore limbs and the weariness that still clung to him from the trauma of having half his mind drained out of him.

So I did the only thing that comes natural to someone like me.

Releasing my hold on him, I shifted higher and sank my proboscis into a fresh patch of skin along the curve of his neck. Hot drops seeped over my mouth. Salty, strong, and touched by that potent tang that had not been present in Casey's blood. I drew down on it, leaving the maelstrom to swirl inside him while I fed off his strength, pulling from his ample stores and squeezing venom back into his bloodstream at every pause.

His enormous heart began to slow, bringing down his body's frantic reaction to my intrusion. The alerts and warnings blaring through his head retreated into a more manageable flow until they had all but ground to a halt. I ignored them, busying myself with my own needs until I had been sated.

When I finally turned my attention back to the state of my host, it was to find peace and quiet waiting for me. He had fallen to the allure of my venom again, and now an emptiness spread beneath me where life, vitality, and his unending personality had once thrived.

I loved the silence.

The basic functions of his brain were still firing, keeping the blood pumping and the lungs drawing and expelling air, but now there was no resistance as I moved my will forward. I sank the probing fingers of control back into vacant gray matter and felt the first stirrings of response when I quirked my proboscis into the new length of nerves that ran beneath me.

Reconnecting us, fusing us, and bringing everything that Leonardo possessed to my disclosure.

Now, he was truly mine.

I shifted his weight, my weight, to allow blood back towards the toes. Lifting my head, I pulled my eyes into focus, finding shapes littered throughout the night, dimly illuminated by the ethereal glow of those strange blue veins that spread up the walls of Her den. I drew a breath, filling my nose with Her strong scent.

Something was straining against my plastron.

I lifted my hands, fumbling with the weight of them, to tug at the strap that ran from my shoulder to hip. Even as I struggled with it, I recalled its presence from before. Leonardo had been accustomed to the weight, another part of him, and so I had not put much thought into it. But the rediscovery of that leather band across my chest left me feeling trapped and claustrophobic. I wrestled with the binding pressure for a moment before the buckle popped free. I shrugged those large shoulders and writhed my way out of the leather contraption before flinging it aside.

It clattered to the ground and something slipped from the sheath. I blinked at the bright, silvery glint of steel standing against the dimness. I tipped my head, retrieving the last visual memories I had from Casey's mind and a smirk crossed my mouth.

Of course, Leonardo's weapons.

Swords. No, something else…a katana...his katanas, I should say. That was it. They were important to him and he used them skillfully. Very skillfully.

Like to cut me in half, for example.

A surge of heat rose up my chest and into my cheeks. I kicked at the mess of straps and buckles, snorting when clods of dark soil sprinkled over the bright steel. I turned away, scrubbing my palms over my free plastron and grinned to myself at the sudden prospect that I had taken one more piece of Leonardo's precious identity from him.

I sat there, enjoying my moment of petulant satisfaction, when I realized I was not so cut off from my Lady as I had first thought. I could still feel Her. There, shifting against the back of my mind, Her focus still divulged elsewhere, but everything in my host's body sagged with my relief. Her presence drew my attention from the buzzing swarm of gnats consuming my legs as the circulation made its way back to my calves and feet.

I cut off the connection to most of the pain receptors between us then. I didn't have time for his numb legs and hunger pains. Not while She was so close. I had a charge to complete, and I meant to see it through. With the turtle's legs or without them.

My Lady needed bodies.

I planted a foot beneath me, followed by the other, and I pushed myself up and up, feeling the distant sting of stretching muscles and tender nerves. I swayed for a moment, making minute corrections until those thick feet beneath me held firm and steady.

You know, for all the superiority that vertebrates regard themselves, they sure are finicky things.

So many parts just willing to break down.

They're just so vulnerable.

I made my way to the den's entrance with only the slightest limp impeding my progress. From there I worked my way upward, following the luminescent track of blue stretching along the length of the tunnel. By the time I was stepping out into the dry, cemented tunnel of men, the heat in Leonardo's legs had all but gone. Once again, the stirrings of excitement coiled through my stomach.

I turned left to follow the tunnel back the way I had come. Now I took notice to the echoing roar of water running through the sewers all around me. I walked until the noise grew louder and the cement beneath my feet began to incline. Following walkways and crossing over thick pipes with all the grace of my host's ingrained instincts as water surged below.

I might have failed to procure Raphael for my Lady's collection (a thing that seared my pride). And although Leonardo had served as an acceptable substitute, it never strayed far from my thoughts that I had not truly delivered on what She had asked of me.

But this was my second chance. My redemption.

I could not fail Her again.

I was close now, so close to the world. I swear I could feel the heartbeat of its roaming masses toiling above my head. I could feel them, all of them. That blind mass of humanity which relied so heavily in the false security of their homes and their routines, never veering to the left or right. They were a distracted race; oblivious and ignorant to the very notion that something like me could ever exist. Let alone be coming for them.

Just as She preferred.

She would bring this city of men to its knees before they even knew they were in danger. One would go missing, then another, followed by four more, then ten, twenty, and that's when they would begin to worry. That's when they would begin to wonder what was happening. Why it was happening. And most importantly, who would it happen to next?

My Lady would be the invisible, nameless horror that would infect their multitude. She would leave them wailing in the night after long after She had feasted and gone. And I would be the one to initiate it all of it. I would be -

Bee dee! Bee dee! Bee dee!

My knees buckled at the shrill noise that suddenly erupted around me. It bounced off the stone walls, adding to the cacophony already created by the filthy river flowing by. I swiveled my head up and around, searching for the source. Then I felt a buzzing against the plates of my midsection. I discovered a small, round device quivering inside a pouch on the belt. I pulled it out, turning it over as it continued to beep and buzz. A bright red light was blinking rapidly near the top of it.

I gave it a shake. Flipped it upside down. Then side to side.

Then I turned and threw it into the wall.

The device burst with satisfying crack and the pieces came dancing back towards my feet. Tipping my head, I snuck out a toe to help one of the larger pieces further along its path and into the water. It plopped into the greasy current and disappeared.

"Hope that wasn't anything dear to you, Leo," I said, brushing my hands of the thing's demise.

Then I froze, my palms still pressed together. I looked over the scattered pieces.

It must have been dear to him.

Precious enough that he carried it on his person.

I peered down at the cracked cover, painted tan and green to mimic the design of a turtle shell. The flickering red light that had accompanied the beeping had died along with the device, but I had a sudden dread pooling in my stomach as I stared down at its remains.

Shell...

Shell cell.

The words brought me back to the human's apartment. Before Leonardo. Before our fight. When the battle had consisted only of me and Casey. Those words had been popping through his mind like fireworks, bursting across it over and over while I fought to seize control of his nervous system.

Shell cell. Shell cell. Get the guys...

The guys who had turned out to be Leonardo and -

No.

I lifted my gaze to the shadows stretching out in darkness behind me.

Somewhere in all that inky blackness, Raphael was coming for his brother.

For me.

I swiveled my torso around and bolted along the walkway. I had to put as much distance between me and that little device as possible. Much as I yearned for the chance at a rematch with the fiery-eyed turtle, I didn't have time for him now. Not with my second chance at stake. Not on the brink of Her assault against the city.

I had to get away and then go up. Up into the convoluted streets where I would not be so easily tracked.

Even as I ran, however, my heart burned with fresh wrath against my adversary. Raphael dared try to hunt me down? Me? The servant of Messis and the new commander of his brother's flesh? Ha! Let him try.

Let him keep trying. The next time, I'd gladly reunite him with his brother.

I ran.


Anne Brunner had no idea when she left her apartment that dreary morning that she was about to become a missing person's case. She never saw her attacker coming, simply because she had had no reason to look for one in the eight months she had been working at the bakery. Besides, in her mind, she had no reason to be abducted by the night. After all, she was the epitome of a nameless face in the endless crowds of New York.

Nineteen years old, on the cusp of twenty, she was making it on her own for the first time, and in the big city no less. Nine months ago, she had left the endless fields of North Dakota to study accounting at NYU. Not an actress, or an aspiring model, she dressed to keep herself covered, used just enough makeup to be presentable (and therefore, stretch out her supply a few weeks longer). Obviously too broke to warrant the attention of any would-be thieves and she felt she was plain enough to dissuade any further, or fouler, attention. Aside from a thin scar that slid just above her right eyebrow (the fallout of a rock fight she and her brother had engaged in as kids), she didn't think she any real distinguishable features that would warrant a second glance from would-be perverts.

Unfortunately, she was still green enough to still think those were the only two dangers in this world.

On that rainy, miserable morning, she would learn differently.

A Dash of Sugar, the bakery where she worked, was only a few blocks from her little apartment. It was a quaint, narrow shop frequented by locals swinging in for breakfast pastries before trudging off to work. It was a bright place, full of the smell of dough and sugar, both powered and confection, and Anne enjoyed doing the prep work for them in the mornings.

Her boss, Sophie, was a bustling, bubbly socialite who knew the personal details of almost every customer that came through her door. She was also a fierce businesswoman; steely eyed and protective of her business, and Anne had been terrified of the woman for the first three months of her employment.

Slowly, though, the girl had found herself at home in the kitchen, making friends with the gals who ran the front, the maintenance guy, and even the high school duo who made up the weekend crew. It was a good fit for her and kept a little spending money in the bank while she was going to school. If she had a complaint, it would be the that back alley she had to cut into in order to use the employee's entrance had always left her skin crawling.

In the end, she had good reason for that.

The rain had started up again during the night and now it came drizzling down in silver sheets, pattering quietly off the hood of Anne's coat. It was still dark at four twenty-two in the morning, and her regular route was illuminated by the yellow glow of street lamps shining over the parked cars on her left, while the black windows of the stores lined her right, still hours away from opening. Anne walked, feeling peaceful and sleepy as her work tennies slapping off the soaked sidewalk and she hummed along with her iPod. Ever set to shuffle, it had turned up one of her Broadway selections. "On My Own," from Les Miserables. She grinned to herself.

A song about a single girl singing in the rain. Appropriate in a way, although Anne herself currently had no man to pine over. Still, she allowed herself to get lost in the melody as she passed by the derelict gold and coin shop that stood as the bakery's neighbor.

The shop's hidden camera peered out into the morning, ever steadfast in its watch. It snapped three photos of her as she passed by. A young woman, her frozen hands buried in the pockets of her coat and her head turned aside to look out over the street. Three photos that would soon be poured over by the detectives in the following weeks as they tried to explain how Anne failed to report to work in the building which lay not twenty feet further along the sidewalk.

For that, they would never have an answer.

Reaching the edge of the building, Anne turned a sharp right and cut through the narrow gap that separated the two businesses. As she emerged into the rear alley, she paused, thinking how the air always seemed so much closer and darker than it did out front. Especially on rainy mornings.

Though the small lamp that hung above their door did its best, it's 75 watts just barely seemed to hold the night at bay.

It was childish and ridiculous, but the cramped space spooked her. Beyond the gloom, it was hard to tell what lay in the shadows stretching out on either side of her. Though her past eight months had proven her fears were unfounded, Anne had never been able to fully shake the creepiness of the alley.

She knew it was silly. She was a grown up. She could handle a little dark. Everyone else seemed to manage okay, not that she had ever discussed her misgivings with her coworkers. Still, no ghoul had ever been there waiting for her. No hands had grabbed at her from the night. No psycho had ever popped out to kill her, knock on wood.

Maybe that's why she ignored the warning that tickled the back of her neck that morning.

She didn't notice the glittering black eyes that followed her steps up the low porch while he was still catching his breath. She never heard his shifting weight as he checked the alley behind him, searching for any sign that he was being followed. She didn't see the white of his teeth appear in a wicked grin.

Anne pulled her keys from her pocket, the silver tinkling filling the silence around her. Shaking out the little brass one to the bakery, she continued to hum along with the song, working to fit it into the old lock. She tipped the knob upward and wriggled the key back and forth before it slid home.

In her peripheral vision, a shadow shifted against the all the rest.

A hair lifted along her neck, followed by a few more.

Anne turned, pulling her ear bud free. The music was replaced by the quiet tapping of rain on the soaked pavement. Frowning, she lowered her chin and looked down the length of the alley, but there was nothing to discern anything from the surrounding darkness.

Weird, she thought.

It must've been a stray cat or something.

Something simple. Something real.

She looked down to the knob again, twisting the key aside.

Her forehead slammed off the ancient metal door.

A rush of air blew from her lungs, leaving in such a rush that nothing so organized as a scream managed to accompany it out. The hollow sound of the hit filled her head, knocking her senses askew, and then she was tumbling sideways off the short steps.

Her shoulder struck first, catching the brunt of her weight before the rest of her came down. Pain shot up her elbow as the pavement claimed a decent patch of skin through her coat's sleeve. Her mind raced to sort out what had just happened as she rolled to her back. She blinked, blearily, against the fine droplets misting down on her face. The light continue to buzz overhead, a million miles away.

A black silhouette moved over her, blotting out half the light.

She blinked again, thinking her vision must've been knocked off kilter too. The shape of the shadow did not hold true to the head and shoulders of a human's outline. Anne marveled at it, her muddled thoughts flicking through every potential alternative that had the ability to do this.

She came up empty.

Then, words were coming from the darkness, fueled by a kind of breathless excitement that left twisted her insides with dread.

"Well, isn't this a convenient little turn?" it chortled in a light voice. Lighter than she imagined something born of darkness could produce. "Oh, just look at you, love."

A hand came out of the night to sneak beneath her neck, cupping her gently as the shadow made to lift her. Thick fingers were pressed against the curve of her spine and with a sinking jolt, she realized that it was not four digits that were spread along her spine.

But two.

Anne bucked as everything within her suddenly protested against that alien touch. She kicked at the empty air behind the creature in vain and her arm came up to shove off its chest. Her palm struck something solid and hard instead of giving flesh. Slick from the rain, her hand slipped and slid across whatever protective shield it was and she slammed her shoulder into his raised knee.

She bounced off ground again and scrambled for an escape.

The shadow made a grab for her, missed, and let out an annoyed growl.

Anne twisted to her stomach, soaking her knees on the wet pavement and tried to scuttle her way back toward the gap between the two buildings. Those terrible, heavy fingers raked up through her hair and swiveled into a painful fist. Anne finally let out a yelp of pain, her hand rising to clutch at the strong wrist above her head. She felt herself being drawn off the pavement a few inches and then the shadow smashed her head back down.

Fire bit across her nose and mouth as blood burst from both.

Her vision blacked out for an instant and when it came back around, she found she had been rolled over yet again. She choked and coughed on the warmth flowing freely down her face. Lifting a stunned hand, she whimpered to find her nose had buckled beneath the force of the hit. She pushed her tongue forward, feeling the ugly sensation of her teeth dislodging from inside of her lower lip. Tears stung at her eyes and joined the blood that already slipped over her cheeks, heading for the ground.

A hard hand hauled her upright and she went compliantly, still spluttering and weeping as the creature set her shoulders against the brick wall. Her gut churned with fear and a swell of shame that she had never imagined she might feel in a situation like this.

Two hits. That's all it had taken to incapacitate her.

Now, Anne was far from anyone's definition of a fighter. Until this moment, in fact, she had never actually been in a real fight. Still, she had always assumed if she had ever wound up in a situation like this, it would have taken more of struggle to bring her down.

And it stung, terribly, to learn that wasn't true.

She didn't know what to do.

When his hand returned to her face, she flinched as a blunt fingernail peeled a few stray strands of hair from where they lay plastered against her temple. Her skin crawled as the ends were pulled through smeared blood, painting fine lines of red higher along her cheekbone. She winced at the soft, malicious chuckle that still seemed distorted by the quietness of the creature's voice. Then, she looked up.

The angle of light had shifted when it had moved her, granting her full view of its features.

It wasn't made of shadow, but flesh and blood.

It was not human. Definitely not.

Beyond that fact, her battered mind registered little else.

Maybe, given time, Anne might have come to grips with what she was seeing. She might have recognized the protective plating running down its front or the curve of the shell rising above green shoulders. She could have recognized that the smirk it bore seemed so unnatural because it was formed from a turtle's beak rather than human lips.

Maybe, just maybe, she might have also seen the mottled brown slug clinging to the creature's neck and understood that it was not by its will that she had been brought to this end.

Instead, she could only tremble in astonishment as those horrible, empty eyes bore into hers. Malevolence hung between them and seemed to radiate out from him with every breath. Her bloodied lip quivered, painfully, as he suddenly leaned into her, sweeping break up along the curve of her jaw. He inhaled deep, held it in for a beat, and then let his breath go, sending fine coils of heat over her goose bumps. She shivered, even after it pulled back to send her a cruel smile.

"Easy, love, there's no need to fret."

It reached out to swipe a thumb along her upper lip. Anne flinched back, knocking her head against the bricks, but it only followed after her, jamming unbearable pressure against her ruined nose. A thick groan had slipped from her before it finally let up and tipped its head, curiously, to study the glob of cooling blood it had gathered on the broad pad of its thumb.

Anne coughed again, choking on the mucous and blood still draining from the back of her sinus.

"I'm gonna need you to pull yourself together a bit, okay?" it said with a grin. "See, we're putting together a little party, you might say. And you're a guest of honor."

It closed its mouth over its bloody thumb, scraping it against the back of its teeth. Dark eyes rolled skyward, thoughtfully, like a connoisseur sampling a new wine. Anne's throat convulsed at the thought.

"Oh, yeah," it said at length. "She's gonna find a lot of use for you."

Anne blinked.

She?

His fist cut across her cheek in a vicious arc, bouncing her skull off the wall with enough force to bring down a man twice her size. The girl let out a wet and garbled grunt and all the feeble resistance she had maintained so far went out of her. The turtle-thing caught her beneath the arms as she slumped forward, lifting her as if she were nothing more than a child and bringing her up and over his shoulder.

Anne's chin slammed into the back of its shell and it rose, bringing the toes of her shoes off the cement. The girl groaned a little when the rim of the carapace dug into her gut, but all of that annoying whimpering had come to an end.

Or so he thought.

He laughed to himself, setting off again into the darkness, and reveling in the good fortune of his find. He cast a wary glance behind, should anything unpleasant be following his steps, and grinned to find there was nothing in alley but the pair of them. He passed by the bakery's back door and vanished into shadow with his new captive in tow.

Anne's keys continued to sway against the falling rain, still jammed into place in the back door. There they would remain until Sophie reported to work herself.

The owner of the bakery would be seen screaming out into the front street with a young woman's abandoned purse clutched in her hands. She would be wailing about blood and keys, and someone named Annie all why those gathered around her fumbled for their phones to call the authorities. They didn't have a clue what to make of the hysterical woman or what discovery had brought her to this state.

As far as they could tell, however, something had happened to this Annie girl.

Something bad.


A/N: Well, there we go, the Lady's first human victim.

Next chapter, we catch up with Casey, April, Donnie, and Splinter. See how they are all faring, eh?