DICLAIMER: I delcare that Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are not mine…I'm just borrowing them for a spell, making no money from it, blah blah woof woof…
As far as I can tell, there hasn't been alot of fic done on the Keno character from the second installmnent of the TMNT trilogy...so after watching it one night, I plucked up the shiny new idea, (which I have notoriuos habits of starting but not really finishing), and said... Well, what the heck!
So tell me what you think...
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Splinter's visions were never very accurate; a flash of a name, a face, a millisecond of an image that froze itself in his minds eye after a deep meditation. A whispering at the edges of 'The Sight', fading into black as his mind shifted, and he became aware of his physical presence once again.
His first master had spent long, deep hours in the wakeful slumber, legs crossed, shadowed into the far corners of the room. His hand never strayed from above the wickedly curved dagger hidden within the folds of his gi. His master has never, until the moment of his death, been more than a second off guard.
Splinter had tried, over the years, to instil such wariness in his own children, but like all young men, only half listened to his more strident teachings with one ear. Splinter observed dryly, that the other ear had been much too busy filtering his words out with the noise from the television.
For years, through many of their battles, he had always relied on the importance such forewarnings gave them, when on the rare occasions, silence filled the subway, and he could meditate easier. His four sons were a welcome blessing he would trade for nothing, but they could make enough racket to wake the dead from slumber! Not surprisingly, lately he'd been unable to immerse deep enough in the craft to serve as anything more than a light nap.
Tonight, however, as his sons had, at last, retired for the evening, he sank into the familiar pose, cross legged, laying his staff down on the straw mat within easy reach, and closed his eyes. His breathing steadied, and he searched into the darkness behind his lids, until the silent whispering that always filled the air, but few could hear, grew in strength, clear and echoing in the room around him.
Thinking back, hours after the session, Splinter noticed several reasons for the images that lasted into his consciousness, in that split second as he opened his mind. None of them, however, truly covered the extent of the vision itself, as it pounded image upon image into his skull, until he though he would be quite ill. Then, just as it reached a fever pitch of sound and feeling, it faded.
He awoke; gasping, drained, and sprawled on his straw mat, his staff several metres away. The air was silent, and still. There was no movement coming from outside the room. Only the candles still burning on the desk betrayed any loss of time. For a space of time that felt instantaneous, the tiny flames had burned down low, flickering on the wet remains of the wick.
It had represented the first major meditation session in weeks. It had come easily, with a clear and strong feeling and sense behind the images. And precisely why this one worried him as deeply as it had. The vision made no attempt to ease itself from his conscious, but squatted in the back of his mind for days after, obscurely maddening.
He was so distracted; his sons had started asking questions. It had never been his intent to tell them of his meditation sessions, for they faded into haziness, minutes after he roused back to the real world, fate itself saying something- no doubt. It had been simply, a spiritual journey which he had always intended to undertake alone, as is the nature of such things. He made nothing more out of it.
This time, however…was radically different to the misty, indistinct dreams of the past. He felt himself pulled into another place, the surroundings of the vision merged as surely into the background as the walls to his room. He shivered as he felt the coldness of the tiled floor beneath his feet.
It had been so very real. But completely disconcerting; he had nothing to make of it. But one thing he did realise; something was coming.
Someone new.
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The figure flew through the air, arcing widely to land hard on a crowded table surface. With a tumble, it toppled to the ground, and was still.
The silence shock waved into the crowd. No one spoke, their eyes drawn to the stage above…tranced. Harsh, stucco rasps filled the room, expanding and contracting with the hunched, shadowed man towering above them.
It rang on for several seconds, until the figure straightened, and the crowd murmured.
"Now," the words were drawn out, deceptively soft. He paused, evidently soaking up the group's attentive stares. His eyes burned out from beneath the darkened cowl of the metal headgear. Staring straight out into the masses, he growled, furious.
"The next person to question my logic will find themselves at the end of my blade. Is that clear?" No one spoke; and he screamed, the thin strand of control broken.
"IS THAT CLEAR!" He raked again at a lion's roar, striding up to the edge of the platform, hands claws by his sides.
The crowds jumped, and responded as one. "YES, SIR."
The figure turned, satisfied, to the Oriental man leaning against the side of the stage drapes, a curving smirk pulling one side of his scarred face upwards, like a living puppet. The arms remained crossed in front of his robes, hidden in the sleeves of his plain, flowing gi. He spoke up, apologetic.
"They are new," his voice was thick with heavy, broken English. "Young baka, foolish- eager." He spat out the last word clearer, obviously having used it most often. "Weak."
"Eager is good," the man grew thoughtful. "And as for weak…We will soon show them the path to strength." This brought a cruel grin to the foreign man's face, becoming uglier than ever.
"Just do what must be done- And no allowances will be made, this time, if you fail me again!" He drew his cloak around him, and stalked back into the curtain's shadows, disappearing further into the darkened building.
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"Are you sure these readings are accurate?" The man straightened his glasses and stared back at the computer screen. His companion stood behind him, also entranced by the blinking formula at the bottom of the page.
He nodded, clearing his throat. "That's the tenth time I've run those numbers, and each time, the computer gave me this!"
"What about diagnostics?"
"I've had three different tech's in here, and each one gave the system a clean bill of health."
"Spectro-analyzations could be compensating for the radioactive seals…"
He shook his head again. He could feel the excitement rise, unbidden in his chest. "Nope," the man craned his neck to stare at his smiling face. "Even if the readings spiked to above normal levels, which I'm not seeing here, there's a completely different power grid and access panel designed to check and monitor the intensity inside the chamber. This station has no link up to it what-so-ever."
"Some security guy's way up gave the go-ahead at the beginning of the year to install separate access points with individual monitoring systems, just in case one station was compromised or damaged. This means that this here," his fingers touched the screen briefly, "is 99.9 percent accurate."
"99.9 per cent?" The man queried.
He rolled his eyes. "The system is not, as is all technology, 100 per cent precise in it's findings, but based on what it sees here, everything is normal. In that chamber," he couldn't contain the laugh that burst forth, "the weather is perfect."
The man sat back, clearly shaken. After a moment, he turned to the other, who was leaning against the console, eyes on the plexiglass mirror that enshrined one wall, the white walls of the chamber gleaming beyond.
His eyes were wide behind the glasses. "But that means that…"
"Yep." He nodded, sending the man a significant look.
"Oh," he sat back again, only to rocket up a second later, another realisation hitting him. "Oh man, and that means…"
"Yeah." He sat, elbows digging into his knees as he cradled his head in his hands, his hair in disarray from the amount of times he'd run his fingers though it.
"This is going to be big…Like Microsoft big…No, like Internet big…"
"We're so screwed, aren't we?"
"No," the first man shook his head. "This isn't finished yet, you know. There is still our initial report to the Board of Directors on this…" he struggled to find the right words. "…Breakthrough…But, I know they'll give it the go ahead. And then, there'll be the first year of testing, although where they'll find the subje-"
The second man jumped up, waving his hands about. "WHOA! Slow down! Did you hear what I just said?"
He frowned, leaning back further into the chair. "Yeah, I heard you. But it's the same old breakthrough jitters we all get. You'll get over it in a couple of hours, and then we can focus on the project." He stretched around, yawning. "Come on, I'll shout you down at McGann's. This," he threw a glance at the white room beyond the plexiglass, "isn't going anywhere, and we both could use the break."
The other man stared for a second, before sighing, running a hand through his hair. "Yeah, alright!"
He grinned at the man opposite. "Last one out buys the first, second and third rounds…"
A groan was stifled across the room. "Should've known better than to make that suggestion with Scrooge the penny pincher! How about first one done, rechecks the security logs?"
The pair turned back to the terminal, oblivious to the silent opening and closing of the door behind them.
"Nah! Just because you always end up closing up last doesn't mean you get pity points!" He toggled the switch for the motherboard, and it powered down with a soft purr.
The shadow moved closer. At its belt, a sword gleamed wickedly in the fading light, unsheathed.
His friend sniped back, dimming the overhead fluro lights, bathing them both in a red glow from the next room. "As opposed to the poor little Momma's boy how graduated Harvard with 2nd highest Honours? Urgh. Please! Kill me now!"
A whistling sound was all the warning he got. The silver gleam sailed through the air, catching him completely unaware. He looked down, registering the blood on his shirt with a 'huh' of surprise, before crumpling to the floor.
His companion turned, alarmed by the thud. With wide eyes, he ran over to his friend, heart pounding. Looking down at the blood welling up from the large hole in his chest, the man gagged on the metallic smell. A creak sounded out from behind him, and he whizzed around, absolutely terrified.
"Who-o-ose there?"
A laugh, low and rumbling, whispered right into his ear. He stopped breathing.
The black figure spoke only one word. "Boo." The silver gleam appeared out of nowhere, and the laughter grew louder.
He screamed.