Disclaimer: I do not have any claim to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles compared to Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird as well as those they entrusted to adapt it from comic books to cartoon shows and anything in-between.
[NMA]
Nothing Matters Anymore
[NMA]
Upon hearing the O'Neil girl's angry prompting to help save the Earth from the present alien invasion for Karai, if nothing else, Oroku Saki, resurrector of the Foot Clan, wearer of the Kuro Kabuto, and the one who earned the name "Shredder" for his ruthless acts and Ninja prowess, contemplated the girl and Hamato Yoshi's offer as he retracted his weapon from the latter.
"Saki." Yoshi, or Splinter as many in New York City now knew him, began to say, but the Shredder held his hand up for silence from the Human-born rat mutant as he continued contemplating.
On one hand, he was honestly more insulted than amused that Splinter, of all people on Earth, had the gall to ask him for help in something that would normally be not his fight. But on the other, he could not discount the "Triceratons" as they called themselves, having seen such one of their asteroid vessels destroy the Technodrome of the Kraang. Shredder was, in some ways, not of afraid of death, but that did not mean he had given up on Karai just yet.
'But even if I save the Earth for her, would Karai even care?' The broken-hearted man inside the Shredder could not help but ask himself in his mind, considering that as soon as Karai learned of her true heritage, she promptly abandoned him, as if none of their happiness together ever existed. It was as if she fell under the belief that blood was thicker than water without him even knowing.
'No, no.' The Human born as Oroku Saki quickly said to himself. As lonely as he was, there was no sense in leaving Karai to her death, even if it was one that they would share together. Turning back to his attending followers and unwanted guests, Shredder finally sighed as he nodded. "What would you have us do, Yoshi?"
[NMA]
Upon being told of the black hole generator in Washington Square, Shredder allowed Splinter and the O'Neil girl to lead him, Ivan Steranko the rhinoceros, Anton Zeck the warthog, Xever Montes the fish with robotic legs, Chris Bradford, who had been horribly disfigured by his own mutations from a dog to a skeletal werewolf, and lastly, Shredder's second in command, who appropriately referred to himself as Tiger Claw, to where they would find battle with the Triceratons. Dealing with minor patrols barring their way as well as a minor reprimand of Splinter's to "remain stealthy", the Foot and their momentary allies had arrived unnoticed by the aliens who were busy repairing their doomsday weapon, keeping watch over their prisoners, and receiving further reinforcements via teleportation just when Tiger Claw was advising the Shredder that they must not waste any time.
'It's as if my own second in command trusts a Hamato's word over mine as well.' Shredder thought bitterly, but kept his temper at bay until Splinter gestured for them all to commence their attack on the Triceratons, which was when Shredder took out all his rage and uncertainty on their common enemies.
As they fought the aliens' advanced firearms with their own strengths, Shredder slowly came to see the irony that he and Splinter, who he ultimately became foes with each other in adulthood after growing up as brotherly friends in their childhood together, were fighting alongside one another as if they were indeed fighting for the same thing.
'And we are.' He corrected before snidely thinking. 'Even though only he will get the love that I've been denied.'
Trying to push away such a thought from his mind, Shredder kept on using his Ninjutsu skills to fell one Triceraton after the other. As he fought, however, Shredder began to have doubts over a different reason. 'Even if we disable the generator, what's to stop the aliens from destroying us all by bombarding the planet from orbit? It worked with the Technodrome.'
By the time that the O'Neil girl was able to rescue the foolish Jones boy from his energy bubble imprisonment, the four mutated turtles that Splinter called his sons had appeared at last to fight alongside them, but even as he killed one alien at a time, Shredder's mind was still elsewhere. He could not stop thinking about how Earth was going to be destroyed no matter what they did and how Karai would never love him as a father ever again either.
'Stop it, Shredder.' He ordered himself not to give in to such negative circumstances. 'Would surrendering be what Tang Shen would've wanted?'
As soon as he asked himself that question, however, he attacked the Triceratons with more ferocity as he remembered how the only woman he ever loved chose Yoshi over him, even giving up her own life to save Yoshi from an attack that haunted Shredder ever since.
'And what am I supposed to do to win any happiness back?' He asked himself just as angry. 'Turn myself in the law and what then decide my fate? Commit seppuku and hope Tang Shen will forgive me upon arrival in the next world? There's no hope for me or anyone!'
It was during a fight with several Triceratons alongside Splinter that the two lifelong rivals then heard the generator's timer reach its end.
"Hurry, Saki, we have no time!" Splinter all but ordered the Shredder as he headed straight for the generator.
Hearing such a demand, Shredder narrowed his eyes at the rat, but promptly ran as well after him thinking. 'I've had enough.'
As Splinter moved closer to the generator in a vain attempt to save Earth, Shredder surprised many of the fighters at Washington Square from the Turtles, his own Foot Clan, and even the Triceratons by stabbing the rat mutant with his signature weapon.
As Splinter collapsed to the ground, dying before the Shredder's own eyes, the latter heard the Turtles scream in anger and worry as he turned to the generator, momentarily wondering if there was still time to prevent the planet's demise and if he wanted to do so. However, a scream from the O'Neil girl, who somehow emanated a psychic wave that pushed Shredder away from the generator as well as pulled his helmet from his disfigured head, ended that line of thought just as Splinter breathed his last and the timer ended.
In a matter of moments, the generator moved upward and expanded as a black hole formed in its center. Oroku Saki was not a scientist, but from what he understood before and saw right then, the black hole's gravitational attraction would swallow anything and everything no matter what. The Triceratons, those that were still alive, also knew that fact as well which prompted them to teleport off world.
"We're all doomed!" Shredder heard Zeck scream in terror that brought the thieving swine into Steranko's arms, who, out of pity or shared fear, reciprocated the hold before they were both pulled in the black hole.
Elsewhere, Bradford and Xever tried to hold on to anything that would keep them from being sucked away, but it was fruitless as they respectively joined Zeck and Steranko to their graves.
Looking down at the ground in a mix of fulfillment and despair, Shredder heard Tiger Claw angrily cry out to him. "Shredder, what have you done?!"
For a moment, Oroku Saki, who never knew his birth family, killed his adopted one, and now had destroyed Humanity and the Earth completely through abetting the Triceratons, did not know how to respond to Tiger Claw's desperate question. Saki had spent sixteen years and more vilifying the Hamato Clan, Yoshi especially, for wrongs that he had as much part in as they did, so he figured Tiger Claw would not care for Saki's justifications of hopelessness on multiple angles, and he had no interest in preaching them anymore regardless.
'Nothing matters anymore.' He said in his mind but instead voiced. "Hamato Yoshi is finished." Turning to the Bengal tiger mutant, he added. "The Earth can be destroyed for all I care. I have finally won!"
While the Turtles and their Human friends gathered over Splinter's corpse, Shredder noticed the black hole expanding even more and growing far stronger in terms of its gravity. Multiple people throughout the City, including the Mighty Mutanimals, Tiger Claw, and even Shredder himself, were being pulled into the singularity, and as Saki knew, it would soon swallow the entire Earth itself from Tang Shen's gravesite to wherever Karai was at.
Thinking back on his adopted daughter, Saki felt sick to his very being, but closed his eyes as he embraced the end that they would all share, knowing that they would all be together in death soon enough.
'I'm sorry, Karai, but nothing matters anymore.'
[NMA]
I hope that this did well in showing how the Shredder from the 2012 animated series went from attempting to stop the Triceratons from destroying Earth to then abetting them when he decided to slay Splinter out of his hatred for him in the third season finale without really whitewashing him. To be honest, while I do not dislike the 2012 show, it does not have the same "wittiness" and pop culture references among other things that I remember the 2003 show had in its run, at least to me, and with respect to TMNT fans who like pitting Karai against Shredder for honor, revenge, or perhaps present loyalty as shown in Turtles Forever's Uncut Version (which I wish was on video), I just think that the 2012 show had them butting heads too easily and too soon for my taste.
I know that 2012 Shredder is a strict controller, an irresponsible liar, and an apathetic killer whose surprisingly lacking in ambition compared to most other Shredders we see in TMNT media, but his romantic love for Tang Shen and fatherly love for Karai were both genuine for a time before the former became obsessive and she lost her life protecting Hamato Yoshi and the latter warped and ultimately cast aside when he fully became the Super Shredder, who, even then, was not comfortable in the season four finale when Leonardo called out on him, and it was implied in the season five episode, End Times, that he allowed himself to go to the Netherworld as a Zombie out of regret for the wrongs he did in life. I guess the topic of whether he is truly redeemable is another story, but I suppose he was more redeemable at one point than the 2012 Rat King, Doctor Victor Falco, was.
Back on the Karai part, it is just a matter of nature versus nurture, in my opinion, so you know. I am not against her ultimately siding against her adopted father out of concern for the people he hurts, but I know some TMNT fans on the SpaceBattle Threads feel as I do that she probably should have just left the conflict as a whole at first in a kind of neutrality thing because while Hamato Yoshi/Splinter may be her good-hearted birth father, Oroku Saki/Shredder is still the one who raised her from infancy, and she should have recognized that he still loved her.