I'm having Ravyne do a profile of Venus and Venn so that should be up on her DeviantArt account soon. The second I hear anything, I'll post a link to them on our profile so keep an eye out for that. Here's chapter 5.
Enjoy and let us know your feedback. All advice is welcome.
-Katt B.
**DISCLAIMER: WE DO NOT OWN TMNT**
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Strike of the Dragon
PART 2
5
3-3: "Buried Secrets"
Ryu slams her head into the steering wheel again as she pops the van into park the second they pull up next to the farm house. Her head is back to pounding yet again, driving a headache into her skull.
Venus looks up over the top of her magazine to glance at her, "Another headache?"
Ryu grunts in complaint.
"That's, what, the twentieth one you've had since we got here?" Venus rolls her eyes as she flips the page, "If I didn't know any better, I'd say they were getting worse."
Ryu sits up and drops her head onto the back of the seat to stare up at the roof of the van, "I'll be in in a minute, no need to wait up."
"Okay," Venus says all too eagerly as she hops out of the car and skips up to the house.
"Hateful hag," she mutters after the rude girl. When she sits up again, blinking against the pain, she spots Venn on the porch where Venus is chatting with him. His familiar, Haritos, sits perched on his hand lifting his beak and closing his eyes as Venus rubs him under his chin. Haritos had been Venn's familiar before he became a Dragon, but when he turned Fallen, Haritos came back to him; Venn's memories hadn't. He no longer remembered his time as a Dragon or anything before, no Fallen did. He only knows what the other Dragons have told him.
Haritos was so brave and respectful towards everyone. He's sweet and calm, but can be super playful if anyone ever brings out a bag of grasshoppers.
Ryu sinks farther into her seat until they're out of her sight, the scene striking her heart like a knife through paper. She reaches into her side pocket on her cargo pants for her phone and taps the screen. Instantly a picture of her and Gigi grinning like lunatics appears on the screen, pushing the knife deeper into her heart.
I'm sorry, Gigi. I'm so sorry.
A knock raps on her window and then her door is pulled open sharply. "Ryu?" April calls.
Ryu starts, fumbling to catch her phone as it flops between her hands and then quickly shoves it away into her pocket again to hide the picture, "Yeah, yeah! I'm coming." She smiles at April and Donnie who both raise an eyebrow suspiciously, and she hops out of the van to stand with them, "So what's up?"
"Time for cleaning," April smiles.
Ryu forces a smile and nods. Yep, time for cleaning.
Everyone takes a stance, readying to battle, their faces determined. "Everyone ready?" April calls to her friends.
"Casey Jones was born ready," Casey grins, still refusing to give up the third person act no matter how many times Venus bugs him about it.
"Let's do this!" Raph agrees.
"Y'all do know that this is just…a house…right?" Ryu asks from her place by the door while Venn and Venus lean against the wall next to her, gazing at the others as if they've gone crazy.
April, Casey, and the turtles all take off screaming their battle cries as if they're going off to war and Ryu just rubs her forehead in disbelief, her headache pounding worse in her skull. "I'm surrounded by weirdos," she mumbles to herself.
"Well, you have fun with those 'weirdos', we're going to go clean up the yard," Venus rolls her eyes as she pops her bubble gum and heads out the door with Venn. Ryu shakes her head and vanishes into the kitchen to start her side of the chores. She takes on the light fixture above the table first and then works her way from the top of the room to the bottom, stepping out to borrow Leo's mop for a second to do the wood floors last. As she's working her way backwards out of the kitchen to the doorway leading to the foot of the stairs, her headache suddenly pinches tightly at the back of her skull and something like a screaming siren echoes through her mind.
Geez, these headache are getting on my nerves, she grumbles to herself, even my power is getting frustrated.
Just beyond the headache, something whistles at her, but she can't make out what it is. She starts to focus in on it, trying to bring it forward to her through the thick pain in her head, but someone taps her arm. She looks up at Leo who points down at the mop in her hands.
"You done?"
"Oh, yeah, thanks," Ryu smiles.
They both look up as Raph stops beside them and then a shout comes barreling down the steps. "AGH!"
Leo, Ryu, and Raph all jerk their heads up and cry out in alarm as Mikey comes bouncing out of control down the stairway. They all fall to the floor, Leo ducking into the kitchen to avoid the collision, and Ryu feet are slung around across the floor in front of the door.
"Ow!" She sits up off of Mikey and glares down at him, "What just happened?"
"Mikey! I just vacuumed!" Leo protests, looking at the mess of his younger brother's spilled water bucket all across the floor.
"Oh yeah?" Raph growls as he shoves the younger turtle off of him, "Well, I'm about to mop the floor with him!"
As Mikey flies back, Ryu goes to move out of the way and her ankle twists, caught in something on the floor. "Ow, ow, ow, ow!" She tries to move her foot out of the rug, but when she looks down she finds out that it's not the rug tangled up in her feet, but an old metal hoop-like door handle attached to a trap door.
Her jaw drops slack as she slowly untangles her foot and pulls her legs out of the way to look at the door.
"Uh…" she starts, turning her head up but keeping her eyes planted on the door, "April!"
"Yeah?" The redhead leans out over the top of the railing to look down on her. She spots the door and gasps, "What is that?"
"You've never seen this before?" Ryu asks slowly, pointing at it and raising her eyebrows.
"No, I didn't even know we had a basement."
The front door opens but no one turns to see who it is. "Hey, what was that loud bag?" Venn asks.
"And the annoying screaming," Venus adds in her usual negative tone.
They both glance at the others, following their gazes, and spot the trap door too, saying in union, "Oh."
"What do you suppose is down there?" Leo wonders aloud.
Mikey suddenly leaps up to hide behind Raph in fear, "Evil clown. EVIL CLOWN!"
"Stop that! I hate clowns!" Venus growls, slapping the younger turtle on the back of the head.
"Only one way to find out," Raph says, flipping his sai in his hands before slipping the tips of the blades under the edge of the door and flipping it open. It fights against him for a second, but eventually the door gives way and pops open obediently.
They all huddle close to peer down into the impossible darkness that swallows the rickety stairs that lead below. Ryu blinks in curiosity, "Sooooooo…who wants to go down the creepy, dark stairway to the murky basement first?"
"Well…since you asked," Venus starts.
"NOT IT!" everyone exclaims instantly, taking a step back from the door.
Ryu stands up straight after a delayed moment of reaction and blinks in alarm. She's the only one left near the door. "Ugh! Seriously?!" she groans loudly.
"Have fun," Venus pats her shoulder, gazing down the dark hatch warily.
"Hateful hag," Ryu grumbles through her teeth and she steps down on the first step gingerly. It takes her weight with a loud, slow groan and she sighs. With each step she takes, the darkness becomes thicker and thicker; she can almost feel it physically across her skin. Her hair starts to stand on end as she comes to the point where she can't even see a few inches in front of her face. There's no way it can be this dark down here, this fast. As she moves, Ryu looks back up the stairs over her shoulder, back at the faces of her friends who stare down after her cautiously, and she's suddenly hit with a feeling that this won't be the last time she'll have to leave them for the dark.
Well, duh, Ryu, she tells herself, you already know this. You know the risks of your actions. You chose this path. Now woman-up!
The next step falls out from under her and down she goes. "Crap!" her shoulders and back slam into the old wood as she tumbles down to the bottom and dust kicks up around her as she does. Ryu breaks out into a fit of coughs.
"Are you okay?" April calls down to her.
"Yeah, I'm good, it's not like I fell down a flight of stairs or anything."
"Oh, good," Mikey grins, "Then what did you hit?"
Raph smacks him, "She was being sarcastic, genius."
"Do you see anything?" Venus calls down.
Ryu rolls her eyes, "I don't know, Venus, can you see me?"
"Um…no."
"Then obviously I can't! Do you guys have a flashlight or something you can get me?" Ryu sits up and starts brushing dirt off of her arms and shirt. Upstairs, people are moving about, and then a few moments later something comes thumping down the steps with repeated clacks. It lands in the dirt a few inches from her and Ryu feels around for it. Her fingers find cool metal and instantly, her power sings out to it, glad to have a weapon in this unknown area around her with no way to see. "You couldn't just walk it down to me?" Ryu calls back up.
"I'm not going down there. There could be dusty, dead people," Venus makes a gagging noise in the back of her throat.
Ryu slowly climbs up to her feet, feeling the sore spots of her legs and back that she's sure are going to be bruised in a few hours. "I told you, vampires don't exist!" she growls back angrily, "I swear, I am surrounded by a bunch of scared little chil-."
Her voice stops in her throat as she clicks on the flashlight and the beam of light highlights a form she never thought she'd see this far out in the middle of the country.
"-dren," Ryu's jaw drops and her eyes become saucers. "April!"
"Yeah, what'd you find?"
Ryu's not sure how to answer, so she swallows, "…You wouldn't….believe me if I told you. So…you're gonna have to…come see for yourself."
"Just tell us what you see!" Venus barks impatiently.
Ryu moves the flashlight beam around to get the whole view of the object before answering as best as she can, "Uh…Hell?"
"What?" they all answer.
Within a few seconds, they all creep down the stairs nervously, their eyes darting around restlessly, and they stop behind Ryu. She lifts the flashlight beam again and points it at the object in question.
Everyone gasps.
"The Kraang," Raph glares.
After standing around for what seemed like forever, Donnie and Ryu were finally shoved forward to check it out and they find a thick layer of dust over it. It had been under the house for a very long time. Donnie had the door open in seconds so now they're all crowded inside taking a look around. Ryu instantly starts poking around under the computers curiously, not passing up the opportunity to study the Kraang computers without the fear of being shot with lasers every second.
"Okay, don't touch anything," Donnie orders as he kneels down in front of a glass pod-looking container. Ryu looks up to find out what they had found and she notices the container instantly; the outline of a person sits inside. She sits up immediately to watch in interest. Donnie turns his head to glare at Mikey over his shoulder, "I repeat: Do not. Touch. ANYTHING."
Mikey backs up with a sheepish grin and knocks into the keyboard of a computer nearby. Ryu gasps and quickly rolls out from under the ones she's studying as it powers up above her.
"MIKEY!" Donnie yells as the containment pod starts to light up and open before all of them. Ryu steps up behind Raph and watches in interest as the container opens up all the way and a cloud of thick, cold, fog spills out around their legs.
"Oops," Mikey laughs weakly, "I promise not to touch anything starting…now?"
The door finishes opening and everyone stares at the grown woman inside. Her hair is pale blonde and her eyes are a light green, nothing out of the ordinary. Ryu narrows her eyes suspiciously, So then why would the Kraang keep her frozen in there?
"M-mom?"
Ryu jerks her eyes towards April whose voice shakes in surprise.
"Mom?!" Casey repeats, mirroring her surprise.
The woman inside starts to stir, fluttering her eyes and stumbling out of the container weakly, and nearly falls to the floor if not for Donnie and Raph being there to catch her.
"Take it easy, ma'am," Donnie gasps, taking her under the right arm while Raph goes under her left.
"Hold on," Raph adds. Ryu smiles privately at him. She was right; he really is a nice guy under all that tough exterior. The woman glances at them both back and forth, her eyes getting wider with each turn of her head, before she suddenly breaks out into a terrified scream and struggles to get away from them. They both take a hit in the stomach as she gets loose and rushes away screaming.
"Mutants!" the woman stumbles again, her legs obviously still trying to regain themselves, and she falls towards the floor again. Casey reaches out to grab her and Ryu steps up to help him get her to her feet again.
"Oh, uh, don't worry, Mrs. O'Neal, these are good mutants," Casey assures her. Mrs. O'Neal takes Ryu's offered arm, grabbing her steadily around the inside of her elbow, and stands up.
The touch burns into Ryu's arm and she jerks away in pain, hissing. Venus leans to the side to see her arm, "What the heck was that?"
Slowly the burn marks on her arm, searing red from the heat, begin to glow from the inside with that pink-purple glow and the burn is healed. Ryu rubs it gingerly, still feeling the heat coming off her skin.
Raph takes her arm gently to get a look at the area on her skin, but it's already fading. Ryu nods and they both turn to look at Mrs. O'Neal who speaks for the second time, "Where am I? And how do you know my-."
The woman turns towards April who stands like a statue across the room from her. She takes a shaky step towards the redhead, "A-April? But…but how? Just a few days ago, you were only…six years…old…"
Casey rushes forward once more to catch the woman as she passes out from shock. April reaches out towards the woman before she too passes out, Venn and Mikey catching her before she can hit the ground.
"Oh, snap," Mikey gaps.
Venn's hip bumps into a nearby computer that hasn't started up yet and it starts buzzing. "Whoops," Venn quickly pulls away from it, freezing in anticipation.
Everyone glances around warily, expecting some evil trap to go off and kill them all, but nothing happens. Ryu turns to the computer and eyes it curiously; usually a Kraang computer would be glowing with pink-purple lights, but this one doesn't.
She steps up to it, while everyone checks on April and her mother, and starts wiping the dust off the keypad, hitting a few buttons in the process. The computer stops buzzing and the screen blinks to life.
A message flashes on the screen: Denied.
What the heck does that mean, Ryu thinks. Suddenly, on the side panel beside the screen, a port opens and a strange, blue, rectangular disk slides out.
"That isn't Kraang tech," Venus states, standing up from her work on checking April's energy points. Everyone looks up at the computer.
"That looks like your tech," Venn agrees, grabbing Ryu's shoulder.
He's right, she takes note, this looks just like my tech.
Ryu starts to reach for the disk to pull it out, but Venn grabs her wrist to stop her, "Hold on, do you remember what happened the last time you tried to pull a random disk out of a computer?"
His words make her pause, fingertips going cold as they hover in the air around the surface of the chip. We could find out so much from this disk. It could give us information on the Kraang's plan, or information on their world, or details about the mutagen. Anything could be on this disk. I can't just leave it here, she thinks. But of course, her thoughts have to drift back off to the last time she pulled a random disk from a computer. It had set off a chain reaction through all the computers that destroyed all the hard drives before she could get anything off of them. And to top it all off, the disk had nothing on it, but a program to start that chain of destruction.
What could this disk have on it? She could pull it out and the whole ship explode or the disk could trigger a homing signal that could lead the Kraang here with a whole fleet of ships.
Ryu sighs. She isn't by herself here or otherwise she wouldn't really care. She has a whole family to think about here in this house, not just her. Taking a deep inhale, Ryu stretches out her index finger and pushes the disk back into the port where it disappears and the computer shuts down automatically.
Venus wraps her arms over both Ryu's and Venn's shoulder, "So, you try to type anything the computer spits out a random chip and doesn't allow you to do anything else. You push the chip back in and the computer shuts down and doesn't allow you to do anything else. The only option I can see in this situation is to pull that disk out…" She glances at Ryu, "Anyone else here seeing a trap?"
"You're right."
"Wha-?" Venus's eyes bulge out of her head, dropping her arms.
Ryu just shrugs, "Yeah, I said it. You're right. I can't take any risks here. That disk will just have to stay in the computer."
"Well, until we can figure out anything from this ship, let's get these two upstairs," Leo orders. Venn and Ryu help out to carry the two females up the basement stairs and into the living room. When April finally wakes up, Donnie goes to help her make tea in the kitchen for her mom who is conscious when they return.
"Here you go, mom. Just relax," April smiles, handing her mother a cup of the tea. Ryu glares at the turtles, mouthing at them to back off when they all lean around the chair to stare at the woman a bit too close and she shudders uncomfortably.
Mrs. O'Neal takes the cup from her daughter and Ryu leans against the wall nearby, "Thank you, April. I'm still a little shaky."
Ryu's eyes narrow in an instant. Something in that short sentence sets her off; the tone in the mother's voice doesn't sound quite convincing. Why would she say it like that? Is she just that uncomfortable with the turtles? They're not that bad.
As April's mom sips her tea, Ryu studies the woman's profile carefully, finding a few of April's features in her face. After a few moments of silence, Mrs. O'Neal starts explaining how she came to be in the ice box they had found her in, about how they had experimented on April's great grandfather who was the one to discover the ship under the house and accidentally woke up the Kraang from their slumber.
When Mrs. O'Neal stands up to hug her daughter, she pulls away a second later to look around the room, "Where is Kirby anyway?"
"Kirby?" Casey stops drinking his tea to answer her with a smile, "Oh, he got turned into a wicked Kraang headed mutant-!"
Raph and Ryu reach over to smack him, spilling his drink out of his glass. "You just had to pull a 'Mikey', didn't you?" Raph growls at him under his breath.
Venn taps Ryu on the arm and motions over towards the doorway where Venus has turned away to stare blankly out the window. Something about her blank stare has Ryu worried, but then Mikey starts mumbling to his brothers under his breath in a voice too mature for his age, "Is it me, or does April's mom seem a little bit…off?"
Raph laughs, "Ha! Like you're one to talk."
"I'm serious, dude, I got those ninja vibes, yo. I don't trust her," Mikey glances suspiciously over to where April and her mother are hugging again and Ryu follows his gaze.
So he feels something too. Guess I'm not the only one who thinks something's up.
As Venn and Ryu head out of the room, Venus has moved to the window by the front door, a drinking glass cradled between her two hands. Venn touches her shoulder and comes around to stand beside her, "You okay?"
The girl looks up, her shoulder length hair swaying to the movement as her dull eyes gaze up at the sky, "A storm's coming. I can feel it."
Ryu swallows and looks out the window to the yard. She knows that Venus doesn't mean a literal storm, but all the same she can't help looking around for some evil slithering across the yard towards them. Venus's ruling element has always been wind, so Ryu's gotten used to these kinds of random switches in her mood.
Those ruled by the wind element could always sense when something drastic was about to happen to someone's emotional state; they're sensitive like that—paranoid.
But always right.
Later that night, when Ryu and Venus are playing cards at the table, the front door slams open and April's mom comes rushing in and vanishing up the stairs in a fit of tears. After a few loud, angry screams outside, April follows her in.
The two girls share a worried look before heading to the base of the stairs to find out what's going on. Raph, Donnie, and Leo meet them at the door just as Mikey comes in from outside, stumbling to a stop when he spots the glare his brothers are giving him.
All the turtles come barreling towards him, followed by Casey, and drag him back outside and across the yard towards the barn. Venus and Ryu go after them to find out what's up since no one is exactly talking. The barn is dark until Donnie switches on a bright spot light and angles it down on the younger turtle.
Ryu throws Venus a look; she'd already told her about the strange feeling she and Mikey had gotten towards April's mother. Venus nods before they both turn back to observe from a distance.
"Michelangelo," Donnie starts.
Ooo…full name, Ryu winces, never a good sign.
"You…attacked…April's….MOTHER!" Donnie screams at Mikey as loud as his anger would let him and Ryu flinches. She's never really seen Donnie get this mad before.
"Mikey, have you completely cracked your shell?" Raph growls.
"I don't trust her!" Mikey shoots back defensively, "She's all kinds of wrong. You guys gotta believe me!"
Leo raises his hand to cut him off, "Oh, just like the time tiny elves stole your nun chucks and replaced them with mozzarella sticks?"
Mikey thinks about it for a second and then jabs a finger at his older brother, "Yes!"
"Or the time you and Ice Cream Kitty entered a break dancing contest?" Raph snaps.
Again Mikey thinks for a second, "Exactly!"
Venus's jaw drops as she whispers over to Ryu, "You attract the weirdest people."
"Stop it, Mikey!" Casey jumps in, "Do you have any idea how much this means to April? If you ruin this for her-."
"Enough!"
Everyone turns to face Ryu's outburst; even Venus eyes her curiously. Ryu brushes her hair back over her shoulder from its loose ponytail at the back of her head and walks over to stand by Mikey and face Casey with a glare.
"If it makes any of you feel any better, I got the same feeling from her. I can't say that Mikey handled this the right way, but he's not wrong."
Casey throws his hands up into the air in frustration and then puts his face close to hers, "You're just trying to protect him!"
"So what if I am?" Ryu growls through her teeth, jamming her nose against his to meet his challenge, "What are you going to do about it, child?"
"Okay!" Venus quickly and calmly steps in between the two of them and brushes them apart. She then takes Mikey's hand in hers and closes her eyes to focus. Ryu crosses her arms stiffly over her chest, glaring past Venus's head at Casey who glares back, and waits for Venus to be done. She'd informed her of her suspicions about Mikey having an extra sense when they'd first arrived at the farmhouse, but until now they'd never been given a reason to check him.
Until now.
One quiet moment later, Venus opens her eyes and gazes off into the distance, still holding Mikey's hand, "Well, you were right about him being different from the rest of them."
Ryu grins cockily at Casey, reveling in her moment of triumph over the kid, and then turns to look at Venus.
The dark haired girl holds up her free hand and draws a circle in the air with her finger, "All his energy points are…rotating in reverse. It's really quite fascinating."
"Does that help anything here?" Ryu asks the whole group.
When Venus drops Mikey's hand, he stands up out of his chair in a rush, "I don't care what they think. If they don't believe me, then I'll prove it."
They all watch him leave the barn and then silence returns, no one sure of what to say. Venus finally shrugs with a carefree sigh and heads for the exit, "You know, Ryu, I don't know why on earth you'd call these people a team. They certainly don't act like one."
Ryu drops her head into her hand and rubs her temples, "Yeah." She lifts her gaze to throw a sideways look at Casey, "I know."
Ryu sits down at the table where Mikey is sulking. Ice Cream Kitty pops up from inside a bowl and hisses at her. She hisses back and the mutant lowers defiantly below the rim of the bowl. Mikey hands her a can of whipped cream with a sigh, "Thanks, Ryu."
"No need, I believe there is something wrong with April's mom but I think you handled it the wrong way. You need to have some sort of proof before you go all ninja on someone," Ryu accepts the can and sprays a few rings over the mutant cat's head who gazes up at her appreciatively, before spraying some in her own mouth for herself.
"Yeah," Mikey rubs the cat's chin and she meows, "At least you two believe me, though."
He picks a cherry from the bag next to him and drops it on the top of the whipped cream mountain on the cat's head and smiles at the mutant. Ryu watches them both interact and grins as she props her head onto her hand, "You know, seeing you two together, I wouldn't be surprised if she was your familiar, Mikey."
"Ice Cream Kitty?" Mikey lifts his head in curiosity and Ice Cream Kitty meows excitedly.
"Yeah, she found you right?"
"Well," Mikey scratches his head, "April actually brought her to the lair, remember?"
"Yeah, but that just means that fate brought her to you. And if you think about it, has any cat really taken to you this well?"
Mikey stares down at the mutant who is rubbing against his hand that sits on the side of the bowl, purring. "Not that I can remember," he answers.
Out of nowhere, Ice Cream Kitty pulls back and starts hissing at the window nearby. Ryu and Mikey glance at each other warily before going to the window to look out into the night. Even through the darkness, they can just make out April's mother sneaking out across the yard.
"What do you think, Kitty? Go after her?" Mikey calls back to his mutant friend. He and Ryu look back at the cat and she hisses louder, swiping at the air in response.
"I think that's a yes," Ryu grins.
"Let's do this!" Mikey and Ryu bump fists before slipping out the side door of the kitchen and into the darkness after her. They keep hidden behind trees and bushes as they follow behind the woman, moving quietly, and finally spot her coming to a stop farther out beside a small stream.
The moonlight leaves the skies for a second, darkening the woods around them, and as April's mom turns towards them to keep walking, they both gasp and duck down behind the rocks they've stopped beside.
"Sweet mother of mutagen!" Mikey gasps quietly.
"I take it you saw that too?" Ryu whines.
"You mean the monster face?"
"Yeah."
"I thought that was just a nightmare."
"You're awake," Ryu points out.
"Am I?"
Ryu sighs and takes him by the hand to pull him along behind her after Mrs. O'Neal. They come to stop when Mrs. O'Neal kneels down beside the stream and stretches out her arms. Ryu's eyes widen in alarm when she sees the glowing green mutagen container in the woman's hands. She covers Mikey's mouth when he starts to raise his voice to scream.
But they don't have time to sit there. The woman is starting to tip the container over, letting the goo run out thickly like molasses towards the water's surface. Ryu and Mikey share and look and tear to their feet to stop her. Mikey throws his chain forward so that it twists around the mutagen container and then jerks it away from the water before it can contaminate it. They take a stance, ready to fight.
"You foolish welp!" the woman turns on them.
"Don't try flattering me!" Mikey growls.
"That was an insult," Ryu states.
"Oh."
"You shouldn't have done that, Michelangelo," Mrs. O'Neal warns, stepping towards them as she pulls a pair of scissors out from behind her back, "Now you've made mother very angry!"
"I knew there was something wrong about you," Mikey shouts, "You're with the Kraang!"
"Yes, I will capture April O'Neal and take her to my masters!" Mrs. O'Neal smiles darkly. She pulls her arm back and swings the blades down at Mikey's head.
"And that's all I need to hear," Ryu pushes her power out and grabs hold of the scissors, ripping them out of the woman's hand and they fly off into a tree.
"Well, Mom," Mikey spits out sarcastically, "Things are about to get a lot worse!"
He rushes at her, baring the blade in the end of his nun chucks, but Mrs. O'Neal dodges him way too easily. Ryu pulls up the earth around her feet, but Mrs. O'Neal jumps and flips away from it in a flash. Mikey goes at her again. She grabs the back of his shell, spins him around and throws him against a tree a few yards away.
Ryu gasps and rushes to his side, "Come on, get up!"
Mikey groans, rubbing his head, "Ugh, mom's a lot tougher than I thought."
As she helps him to his feet, they turn around a second later to find April's Mom standing directly behind them, making them jump back in surprise. The root of the tree trips them both and they stumble back onto the ground again.
"What are you really?" Mikey demands.
April's mother grins sinisterly and her hands start bending and crackling in a way that isn't human. Ryu backs up against the tree, her stomach churning sickeningly. Right before their eyes, the woman's human form starts peeling away, shifting, transforming into something else entirely, each change making Mikey and Ryu that much more sick to their stomachs.
"Mikey," she whines.
"Y-yeah?"
"I know I said I would stop running away, but at a time like this…" Ryu trails off.
"Agreed," Mikey whimpers.
"RUN!" they both cry.
They barely get a few yards through the trees before something screeches and snakes through the air after them. It snags Mikey around the legs, forcing him to face plant in the dirt. Ryu stops to grab his arms quickly, pulling him back as he starts getting dragged back the way they had come from.
The monster behind them, hidden in the darkness so that only those pink-purple glowing eyes can be seen, roars at them and pulls Mikey's legs harder and harder until Ryu is sure he's going to slip out of her fingers.
"Ryu, I don't know much about science, but I'm pretty sure I can't get any taller than this!" Mikey cries.
"I know! And that's Anatomy not science!" Ryu grunts. She twists her ankles back and forth, digging her heels into the ground that responds to her call by solidifying into stone to aid her. The monster pulls harder and the stone around her ankles cracks and splinters. "You've got to be kidding me!" Ryu gasps, looking down at the stone breaking away around her feet.
Ryu loses her balance and falls over onto her stomach, her grip slips on Mikey and he's carried away into the darkness. Oh, my gosh! Mikey!
A dark voice echoes through the trees around her with a laugh, "Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide."
Ryu jumps to her feet and races back towards the house. She's going to need backup against this thing!
Again the voice calls after her, "Keep running, keep running. You will eventually meet your doom, Mina."
What?! A shiver runs down Ryu's spine.
She skids to a stop just inside the tree line and ducks behind a thick hedge of bushes. April's mom, back in her normal form, is strolling across the yard towards the house as Venn and Venus are coming out. They wave to her politely, but the woman ignores them as she pauses on the porch to stare out at the trees. They both shrug and continue on their walk to the van.
Ryu's breath is sharp, hot against the inside of her mouth, as she watches her friends climb into the van, I can't move! If I try to go to them, that beast will pick us all up before I can warn them. Dang it!
As soon as the van leaves, April's mom disappears into the house beyond, closing the door behind her. For a long moment, Ryu just stands there in the darkness, afraid to move, but she finally deems it safe to move towards the house and slink along the side of the building to the side door. She ducks down outside it and peeks in through the window inside. The kitchen is dark, void of life; the sight drops a cold stone into her stomach.
She turns the knob slowly, keeping her noise to a minimum, and opens the door with a quiet creek sound that scares off a tiny mouse back under the refrigerator. Ryu closes the door carefully, moves along the edge of the dark room in silence, and stops at the side of the doorframe to calm her breathing. The lights above the front door are on, casting a small glow into the dark kitchen, but not enough to reveal her to anyone who might come in. She moves a bit to glance around the doorframe; the trap door to the downstairs is open.
Footsteps are stomping up the steps, forcing Ryu to duck back inside the kitchen as a shadow moves across the small space of light stretching into the room.
"Hey, red, you okay?" Casey asks, his shadow joining the other.
April sighs, "Yeah I just…I'm going out for some air."
"I'll go too."
"Cool, we can see if we can find my mom."
"Still haven't found her?" Casey asks as they move out the door. Leo's shadow comes into the light a second later along with Raph's.
"They can't find her?" Raph asks.
"Yeah, and I don't know why," Leo grumbles.
"What makes you say that?"
"I could've sworn I saw her go down stairs."
Raph shrugs and heads back out of the light, "Well, I haven't seen her. Maybe April missed her on her way down."
"I'll go check with Donnie."
Both of the shadows move from the light and Ryu looks out. The space is clear. Move, Ryu! Move! She slips out of the kitchen and moves past the trap door carefully towards the living room.
"Raph!"
Raph turns on the couch as she comes sliding around the corner of the couch and ducks down by his knees, "What's up with you?"
She grabs his arm and pulls him down to the floor with her. "You have to listen to me! She got Mikey! She's not real-!"
"Ryu!" Raph grabs her shoulders and stops her panicked rant, "Calm down. What are you talking about?"
Ryu closes her eyes and focuses her breathing, feeling her pulse and heart rate react almost instantly. When she opens her eyes again, she finds his hand pressed to her forehead. Grabbing it sternly, she meets his fiery green eyes, "April's mom isn't her mom. She's some sort of monster! She's not real. Mikey and I followed her out into the woods and saw her dropping mutagen and we tried to stop her but she attacked us. She got Mikey!"
Raph's eyes widen in disbelief.
"Please believe me!" she pleads, closing her eyes and drawing his hand to her chest above her heart.
He opens his mouth to answer her, but a scream tears through the house from downstairs. They both jump to their feet, both recognizing that voice.
"Leo," they breathe in union. Taking off they head to the front door and stop at the top of the stairs leading down the trap door. Below, barely seen through the darkness, Leo is struggling to crawl up the stairs, his crutch nowhere to be found to help him.
They take the steps two at a time down to him and pull him to his feet so that they can move him to an old chair nearby. "Bro, you okay?" Raph asks.
"I…I think so," Leo breathes heavily as Ryu takes a defensive stance in front of him to gaze around the room.
"What happened?"
"Mikey was right," Leo answers, "April's mom really is a creature."
"What?!" Raph takes a stance beside Ryu, spinning his sai in his hands.
"Where is it?" Ryu demands.
"Here."
Ryu and Raph turn stone cold at the dark change in Leo's voice. Ryu's breath hitches in her throat, heart beat returning to the race it had been running in the woods, but she turns towards Leo anyway. They both rush at Leo, ignoring the fact that his arms have turned to long, pink tentacles, joining four others that spear out of the back of his shell, but Leo stops both other their attacks. One tentacle wraps around Ryu's fist while another entangles Raph's sai. They're both lifted easily into the air and tossed back across the room where they tumble over the top of the Kraang ship and then fall to the dirt behind it.
Ryu sits up, coughing out gravel, and Raph grabs her shoulder, "You okay?"
Ryu grinds her teeth, the beating on her body raising her anger and stirring her power. She grabs her forehead, her fingers lifting her bangs from her face over her blind eye and leaving her other eye exposed.
"Ryu?"
"No," she growls under her breath, "I'm not."
Raph blinks as her eyes comes open and he finds the edges glowing, that illumination clawing towards the center of her pupils. This close, he's discovers a small, pin point white glow deep in the center of her pupil; something he hadn't seen the last time she'd transformed in front of him.
From above, Ryu can sense the next attack coming and she quickly pulls up a dome of earth over them as it hits. The dome trembles from the impact, barely having any time to truly strengthen itself before the attack hits, but Ryu holds it up with a grunt.
Raph stands up and pulls out a smoke bomb, "Let it down Ryu or you'll lose control again. I got this."
"A smoke bomb?" she asks through her teeth, wincing as another attack from the Leo double slams into the top of the earth dome. A crack splinters it.
Raph growls under his breath, but keeps his comment to himself as he wraps his arm around Ryu's waist, drawing her close to him, and the earth dome falls from the lack of her power supplying it.
The Leo-double lands in front of them, blocking their escape route and screaming that devil scream, but Raph just tighten his hold around her and snaps the smoke bomb on the ground at his feet. The cloud swallows them up and they vanish.
Outside where Casey and April sit together on the swing, the yard is quiet and calm as the crickets start coming alive around them. It's not until the front door bursts open that everything is thrown into chaos.
Raph comes barreling across the yard with Ryu on his back.
"Raph?" April jumps up, "What happened?"
He sets Ryu down on her feet and the silver-haired girl collapses on the nearby stump to rest and get her breathing back under her control. She can faintly feel April touch her shoulders, place her hand on Ryu's forehead, even shake her arms a bit to get her attention, but Ryu's head is pounding too hard for her to focus on anything.
"April," Raph says from his place kneeled down by Ryu's side, "It was you mom."
"What?" April jerks up straight, "What are you talking about?"
"Your mom…she's…" Raph trails off, not sure how to explain, "Your mom isn't human, April. She attacked the others. She's some kind of monster."
"Not you too, Raph!" Casey argues.
"I don't believe you!" April snaps.
"April!"
They all look up as the woman in question steps out the front door and onto the porch with a stern look on her face. "I told you to pack your bags. We're leaving," Mrs. O'Neal orders as she comes towards them.
Raph takes a stance in front of them all and flips his sai out threateningly, "Stay back…mom…thing!"
"Raph, stop it!" April pushes him to the side as she goes to her mother, "Mom please tell me what's going on-."
Her mother grabs her arm sharply, "Enough of this, go pack your bags now!"
April pulls at the woman's arm, suddenly seeing her mother as some stranger, "Mom, that hurts. Stop, please! Why are you doing this?"
"Because I'm your MOTHER!" she turns on April, her face deformed as it had been out in the woods and she screams out in an alien voice.
April shrieks in alarm, trying desperately to pull away from the creature. Raph and Casey run to her aid but before they can attack, the earth splits open and a spike half the height of the house rips up and cuts off the creature's tentacle that holds April hostage. April stumbles back and the boys catch her before they all turn to look back over their shoulders.
Ryu must've lost control.
The creature starts shaking and crackling as the whole body shifts and changes, growing into a huge spider-like monster with a long neck half that's half the size of the house. It lowers its head and screeches at Ryu's transformed image.
Ryu's eyes fly open, fully glowing that pink-purple radiance, and she screams that unearthly howl that shatters the air around them. Raph, Casey, and April grab their ears against the noise as they duck behind the swing out of sight; Leo had warned them that she reacts to movement in this form.
The beast sends a tentacle flying at her but Ryu vanishes and comes to a blurred stop behind it. She raises her arm and, to everyone's surprise, it starts to shift too. Her fingers mold together in a glowing mass of light and then her arm extends about double its former length to materialize into a long, lethal looking blade.
Raph releases a breath in confusion. Had she been able to shift like this before? How much more is she not able to control?
The creature moves again and so does Ryu. She becomes a blur again and strikes hard at the creature's right, slicing off two of its legs in a flash and they fall to the ground. The beast cries out in pain and Ryu shrieks back in that eerie voice of hers.
Behind the swing, April lowers to the ground and pulls out her phone, punching in her speed dial. The voice that answers is flat and annoyed, "Yeah."
"We need you back here now!"
Venus pauses on the other end of the line, "I forgot my wallet so we were already heading back anyway. What's up?"
"Ryu is what's up! My mother isn't my mother, she some sort of Kraang mutation!"
Venus hangs up quickly but not before April hears one last sentence from her before the call ends, "Hit the gas!"
Something hits the swing and sends all three of them flying back into the grass. Raph jumps up and tries to locate Ryu again, but she's become a blur again as she strikes at the beast over and over. The beast cries out again and again as pieces of it are sliced off like pieces of bread.
Nearby at the side of the house, there is the sound of squealing tires and doors slamming shut across the yard and then suddenly things take a strange turn. Something lands in front of Raph, Casey, and April, forcing them to their bellies on the ground as the figure yells at them.
"Cover your ears!"
They don't have the chance to ask questions before a loud siren-like shriek fills the air, louder than anything any of them have ever heard. Their ears ring in complaint from the noise attacking them, the ground rumbles as if an earthquake tears through it, and all other noises are drowned out under it.
The sound slowly fades to a deafening ringing after a few long, agonizing minutes, and Raph opens his eyes; even his vision is knocked off balance. That's when he realizes that the ringing noise is coming from his own ears and he starts fearing that he's gone deaf for good.
The arm holding him to the ground lifts off and he sits up slowly, his head spinning like a top.
"You all okay?" a voice asks.
Raph looks up, glad to know he can still hear, no matter how faint it is, and spots Venn reaching down to help them all up.
"Don't worry, the ringing will go away," Venn explains to April who is still holding her ears. He abruptly turns away from them as if he's called and he runs around the swing set, leaving them there to themselves.
Raph moves to follow him, a bit slower on his unstable legs, and Casey and April follow behind him. They all find the beast gone, evaporated to goo on the ground, and Leo, Donnie, and Mikey all sitting up in the center of the slime slowly.
Raph is glad to see his brothers okay, but his eyes are too busy zeroing in on Venn and Venus to focus too heavily on them. Venn has a gun draw, aimed at Ryu's head. Venus has a long dagger drawn from somewhere off her person to bare it at Ryu's throat.
Raph goes to their sides warily, staring down at Ryu who is covered in the same slime and starting to stir herself. She sits up and pauses the second she spots the tip of Venus's blade at her head.
"Show me your eyes," Venus orders.
Ryu looks up. Her eyes are back to normal, letting them all relax, but Raph can see the exhaustion behind them, making the blue and amber even duller than normal. She coughs and pulls a slap of goo off of the side of her face with a wince as she turns over to sit on her butt.
"Who did I hurt?" Ryu asks.
Author's Note:
Here's a layout of the text affects again:
Italics-any words in this affect are personal Thoughts or Sounds.
Bold-any words in this affect are Computer Messages/Text Messages.
"Bold"-any words in this affect inside quotation marks are Computer Voices.
"Italics"-any words in this affect inside quotation marks are Past words/Emphasizing.
"Bold/Italics"-any words in this dual affect inside quotation marks are Past Computer Messages/Past Text Messages.
Bold/Italics-any words in this dual affect are Voice of the Earth.
Italics/Underlined-any words in this dual affect are Voice of the Spirit Guides.
Bold Underlined-any words in this dual affect are an Unknown Voice.
Again, all advice and comments are welcome.
-Katt B.