So here's the next chapter. I hope this makes up for missing this past Sunday's upload. If not, I hope a promise that I will be posting up this Sunday even though I did a double upload tonight will be a good enough bribe.
Again, all advice and critiques are welcome!
-Katt B.
**DISCLAIMER: WE DO NOT OWN TMNT**
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Strike of the Dragon
PART 2
7
3-4: "The Croaking"
"Focus or I'm going to smack your hands clean off," Ryu warns.
Raph scoffs as he blocks her attack again, the two branches smacking together with a loud clack, "Whatever-! OW!"
Ryu bites back a smile as she backs up two steps after tapping his knuckles when he left them clear open for attack. A snicker escapes the back of her throat against her will and he jerks his eyes up to glare at her. Ryu grins sheepishly, "Sorry?"
"Yeah, right!" Raph swings his branch and she dodges, smiling as the training continues for another ten minutes before April steps out the front door.
"Hey, guys, we're going to the store to get out of the house for a little while. Want to come?"
"Yes, please, stop. You're getting on my nerves," Venus gripes from behind her as she walks past the door to go into the kitchen.
Raph and Ryu pause mid step and turn towards her, "Sure."
Ryu hurries upstairs to quickly take a brief shower and changing into some comfortable jeans and a green cotton t-shirt that forms to her body. She takes the time to brush her hair and teeth out before wrapping her silver-white hair up into a loose pony-tail on her shoulder as she heads down the stairs.
"This is the third time you've messed the place up in a week!" Leo yells.
Ryu pauses on the top of the bottom section of the stairs to glance over at the living room. Everyone besides Venn and Venus are standing in the entrance way glaring at little Mikey beyond; just barely Ryu can see areas that have been trashed.
"Clean up NOW!" Raph shouts as he shoves a mop into the younger turtle's hands. "And as for you," he continues, jabbing a finger down at Ice Cream Kitty who hisses up at him from Mikey's feet, throwing drops of melted ice cream into his face, he picks her up and storms off into the kitchen, "And stay there!"
Ryu can hear him slam the freezer door sharply and she winces, feeling sorry for the poor tiny mutant. Everyone steps out into the main room by the stairs as she comes down to join them and Mikey hugs the mop guiltily to his chest.
"It better be spotless by the time we get back!" Raph demands before stomping out the front door. Everybody follows him out, Ryu and April the last in the group. "Some ninja, you're just a big screw up!"
Ryu winces again at Raph's harsh words before glaring out after him. April turns back to smile sheepishly at Mikey before closing the door to the house, "You're not going to say anything?"
April looks up at Ryu who crosses her arms angrily, "Huh?"
"To Raph! This is your house, you know? You do have say as to how Raph can act while he's here," Ryu snaps as she jerks open the sliding back door to Venn's van and sits down in the seat next to the guys in question. Venus glances back at her from the driver's seat as April and Casey slide into the front seat.
"What's wrong with you?" Raph asks Ryu as she slides down in her seat to glare out the window.
"Don't talk to me," she spits out through clenched teeth across Venn, glaring out at the tree line so that she doesn't have to face him.
"What'd I do?!"
"You-!"
"Shut up!" Venus cuts them off, "I am not going to drive with five year olds bickering in the back seat! Zip it!"
Ryu sinks farther down into her seat, glaring out her window as they pull out of the drive. Between them, Venn glances warily at both of them and regrets not taking up Donnie's offer to sit in the back with them. As they pull out onto the road, Venus turns on the radio and country music swings out of the speakers and she growls.
"No good music out here in the middle of butt-ugly nowhere," Venus gripes.
"Could be worse," Venn tells her.
Venus scoffs but doesn't respond. A little while later, Venn heads into the small store with April and Casey while everyone else waits out in the car; the silence becoming thicker and thicker with awkwardness.
When the air becomes so dense that it starts to physically weigh on Ryu's tongue sourly, she sighs in annoyance. Venus glances back at her through the rear-view mirror, raising a curious eyebrow, "What's up with all your noise?"
Ryu shuts her eyes and chews on the side of her mouth to keep from bursting at the seams. What she'd give to punch a tree right now.
"Wow," Venus chuckles as she resituates the magazine in her hands, "Drama."
"Shut up," Ryu growls, "Drama's your thing, ain't it?"
"First off, 'ain't'…ain't a word, and secondly, I don't like child drama. That's just annoying and predictable; something that usually starts at the beginning of a relationship."
Ryu starts, "Excuse me?!"
Venus scoffs, throwing the girl a look via the mirror again, but doesn't answer. When she does, a few, long moments later, she holds up a deck of cards, "Want to continue where we left off?"
Ryu glances up at the cards and smiles, "Yeah, sure."
"I don't even remember where we stopped last time."
"I believe it was nine to three."
"Oh, BS!" Venus snaps.
Ryu breaks out into hysteria, dropping her forehead onto the back of the seat in front of her.
"You know, for you two to supposedly 'hate' each other, you really do get along," Leo chuckles from the back seat.
Venus and Ryu's expression become blank as they turn to eye him. "You're kidding me, right?" Ryu responds.
"'Getting along' and simply 'knowing someone' are two different things," Venus adds as she fans her cards out between her hands. "Alright, my turn."
"Hold up," Ryu gasps, "Winner always goes first."
Venus glares at her, "Yeah, we get along so well." Her sarcastic remark has everyone chuckling, even Raph, and effectively relieving the built up tension. A few moments later, the front door to the shop opens and the others return to the van, Vann climbing over Ryu's knees to return to his spot between her and Raph.
It's not until that second that she suddenly feels the distance between them. Before, the tension, her anger, had blocked that from her mind. Now, it feels like a physical wound in her side. She chews on her bottom lip as she leans her head against the cool glass of the window, gazing out at the country land as they drive past it. Even in the moving vehicle, she can faintly hear the earth's song whispering out to her, a welcome distraction to the thorn piercing into her rib cage like an annoying rash that won't go away. Ryu closes her eyes, lets her power reach out to that song, lets the melody become louder and louder as it threads into her blood and beats in time with her heart. Slowly, she sinks into the lullaby; it hums to her and the world around her vanishes.
"Ryu!"
She jolts straight up in her seat, shocked out of the silent state she has slipped into, and looks around. Venn is poking her in the shoulder, one hand resting on the open door beside her. They've returned back to the house. "We're back already?"
"Yeah," Venn eyes her worriedly, "I've never seen you dug in that deep. We went over some serious bumps in the road, no thanks to Venus's reckless driving,"
"HEY!"
"But you didn't even budge an inch," he finishes. "Were you asleep or something?"
Ryu sits up straighter, turning her legs so that they hang out of the door, and rubs her eyes. "Yeah," she smiles, "Sleeping."
Venn nods, "Okay, well, help the others bring the groceries inside."
As he walks away, Ryu drops her hands into her lap and stares down at her palms. What had happened? She goes into a lot of meditations, but this one had been different. It's like the earth's song had been trying to drag her away; trying to take her somewhere out of her body.
That's in no way normal, she thinks, Going to have to keep an eye on that and write it down in the report to the guardians.
"Hey."
Again, Ryu starts, nearly falling out of her seat, "Geez, make a noise or something before you sneak up on a girl like that! I'm fragile here."
He scoffs as he hangs the grocery bag off over his left shoulder, "You? Fragile?"
Ryu glares at him and crosses her arms, "Yeah."
Raph shakes his head with a cocky grin, "No way do I believe that. All the evidence says otherwise. You constantly go looking for trouble, you're way too stubborn for a girl, and you like to pick fights."
"Don't forget: I also put up with you," Ryu adds with a smile. They both chuckle at that, but it quickly turns strained and trail off. Their eyes drop to the ground.
"Look, I-."
"Would you-?"
They both stop abruptly, staring at each other.
"Sorry," Ryu scratches her head, "You first."
"N-no, you go ahead."
"No, really!"
"Ladies first."
Ryu blinks in surprise. Since when does he have a lick of chivalry in him? This is odd for him, "O-okay, um….I wanted to…apologize for…being rude…"
"Uh…well, yeah," Raph replies, shuffling his feet, "I didn't understand why you were so mad at me all of a sudden."
Ryu sighs, digging her nails into the sides of the cushioned car seat. "I was…mad at how you yelled at your brother."
"Who, Mikey? He deserved it."
Her fingers dig deeper, her anger stirring, "No, Raph, he didn't. So what if he messes up. So what if he's not as serious as the rest of you. So what if he's a little goofy. Does it matter? Does it really give you the right to talk down to him and make him feel bad about himself? You can't do that. I can understand disciplining him about the mess and all, but that last comment about him sucking as a ninja took it too far. And then to leave the way you did? That could've been the last thing you said to him; something could happen to either one of you in an instant and that would be the last thing said between you two."
"Mikey knows I didn't mean it," Raph argues, crossing his arms.
"Did he?!" Ryu snaps, hating the sight of his ego rising again. His expression is defiant, prideful.
Just like mine had surely been, she thinks. Ryu sighs, releasing her anger. When she speaks again, her voice has steadied, calmed, "Raph, the last thing I said to either of my parents was that I basically hated my sister and that I hated that she took them away from me. I have to live with that for the rest of my life. I have to carry that. I have to relive the fact that I never got to tell them that I loved them."
She lifts her eyes from the ground, feeling the tears building up behind them, but somehow finds the energy to pull out a weak smile, "Don't make my same mistake, Raph. Please. I don't want to see you have to carry something like this. It hurts more than you know."
Raph opens his mouth to say something, seeing the tears building up behind her heterochromia eyes, but Leo's voice stops them, "Guys, come quick! Mikey's gone!"
"I can't believe this!"
Ryu flinches at Raph angry shout again; even from the kitchen she can feel his rage from where everyone is gathered in the living room. She sighs heavily, wishing more than anything that Raph would get his anger under control. It can be very destructive not only to himself but to those around him as well.
She pops open the fridge and Ice Cream Kitty hisses at her, threateningly. Ryu holds up her hands in defeat, "Whoa, kitty! I'm on your side. I need to know where Mikey is. Can you give me a hint?"
The small mutant just hisses and turns away from her.
"Ugh!" Ryu slams the door shut, the cold air shutting off from her face, "Useless."
"What are you grumbling about now?"
Ryu turns to find Venn and April stepping into the room with question marks on their face and she jabs a finger at the freezer door, "That stupid cat is being more stubborn than Raph. I'm trying to help her here and she just keeps hissing at me. She's never liked me, I swear!"
"Ryu!"
"What?!"
Venn grabs her shoulders and shakes her gently, "Relax! Geez, I can definitely see why you and the red one get along so well."
April muffles a scoff behind her hand. Ryu throws a glare at the girl; lately she's been getting on her nerves and she can't really pin point why. "Look," Ryu sighs, "All I'm saying is that as Mikey's familiar, Kitty should be trying to help us find him."
"Familiar?" Venn raises an eyebrow and Ryu just nods. "Huh, never thought about that before. Makes a whole lot of sense. I'll try talking to her. You go calm down your boyfriend."
"He's not my boyfriend!" Ryu exclaims.
The whole house goes eerily quiet all of a sudden and she turns to look over her shoulder slowly. Everyone is standing piled in the door way, gazing at her with either looks of amusement, barely contained fits of laughter, or, in Raph's case, gazes of blank shock.
"Wow, Raph, barely into the relationship and already she's turning you down," Casey nudges Raph's shoulder with a tease.
"Shut up!" Raph raises a sai at the taller guy but Leo quickly steps in between the two before a fight can break out.
Ryu claps her hands down over both her ears and shakes her head, "Weirdos. I'm surrounded by weirdos. I'm going to look for Mikey elsewhere; maybe he went to walk in the woods or do some chores outside somewhere."
"Okay, but-," Venn's sentence is cut short as Ryu slams the side door to the house shut on his words, "And never mind."
Out in the woods, Ryu kicks a small stone out of her path angrily, listening to the earth's song ring out from the small element. It reaches out to her, brushing against her power curiously, but she pushes it away. Right now all she wants is quiet away from everything. She'd been worried that the argument that morning would lead to something like this, but she never actually imagined that Mikey would run away.
He couldn't have, Ryu thinks. On her waist, her radio starts spitting out a static noise and she snaps it off the clip on her belt, "What?"
"What part of the woods are you searching?" Venus's negative, monotone, bored voice comes blaring out the speaker in response.
"To the east of the house," Ryu rolls her eyes.
"Good."
Ryu blinks in surprise, void of words, "Excuse me?"
There's more static and then Venn's peace-maker voice comes through apologetically, "Ignore her, we're going to take the west."
"Fine," she releases the side button and pops the radio back onto her belt clip with a sigh. Around her a gentle breeze picks up and rustles a few loose strands of her hair and caressing her face. The leaves above in the trees dance around and whisper like little paper chimes in the canopy and Ryu turns her head up to look at them. These trees are tall, but they're nothing like the trees back home. Though few they are, at the foot of the mountains they are like enormous, wise towers that guard the outskirts of her home. These have the same feel to them, but she can tell by their thin trunks that they aren't as old as the ones she's come to know and love.
A small smile touches her lips. Lately, though, she's become accustomed to buildings and noisy streets too. Closing her eyes, she breathes in the night air as she looks back over her memories with her new family.
Leo, Donnie, Mikey. Raph.
Her mood darkens as the last name crosses her mind, Splinter…
She would find a way to make it up to him; her plan has already been put into play. She's crossed the line now, so there's no turning back and abandoning this mission. Ryu turns her gaze back up to the canopy, I will finish this, no matter what.
RUN!
Ryu jolts, jumping back a few paces to duck behind a tree. Her breath all but stops in her chest, her body tuning to near silence naturally to listen for any danger around her. The wind still twists around playfully, stirring the leaves, the grass, and her hair. But nothing more.
Everything is quiet once again. She leans out cautiously, shifting her narrowed gaze through the darkening forest around her for any signs of movement.
Nothing.
I could've sworn…, Ryu thinks to herself, That voice sounded so close. As if it was right next to me. That's when she notices it again: a tugging. The earth is calling to her, trying to urge her soul away from her body. She slams her back against the tree and wraps her arms around herself in alarm. What the heck is going on?! Since when has the earth ever attacked me like this? Something is so wrong!
The shadows around her lengthen and she glances up. The sky is already dark. How long has she been out here? It's felt like only a few minutes.
Her radio starts making noise again, "Ryu? Ryu, you there?"
"Y-yeah? What's up?"
"Well…uh…Hey!" Venn's voice is cut off for a few second before Venus's comes snarling through, "Get you ugly mug back to the house. We've got issues.
"Tell me something I don't know," Ryu responds, eyeing the forest around her warily and secretly glad to be called out of this suddenly menacing place. She hangs the radio on her clip and starts jogging back the way she came, desperately wanting nothing more than to escape the eerie feeling that something is wrong with her powers and that maybe her body is starting to reject the Trial.
"No way," April shakes her head, "Mikey wouldn't do something like this."
"Not even on his worse day," Raph adds.
"And why would he write 'Humans Beware'?" the red head continues.
Venus steps into something, the ground feeling oddly shaped under her shoes, and glances down. She instantly picks up her foot and grabs onto Venn's arm, recoiling away from the sight, "Ew, what the heck?"
Venn squats down to get a better look, "Hey, check out these footprints."
"There're over here too," Casey calls from a few yards away.
"And more over here," Donnie points out from a different direction, "Pretty far apart…like they…jumped?"
Raph calls out that he spots more footprints a little ways off, but April suddenly grabs her head and starts wincing in pain, "Agh! Ow. Guys, I got a bad feeling about this!"
Out of nowhere, something rustles behind them in the trees above and then dozens of forms drop to the ground in a long line. The whole group forms together and backs away towards the house. The form in the front stands up and raises the spear in his webbed hand, "Now is the time my brothers. Frogs, ATTACK!"
"Oh, great. More mutant freaks," Venus snaps.
"Liberate the turtles!" the main frog mutant orders to the lower soldiers and they all start hopping forward to attack.
"Back off!" Ryu locks her hands tightly together as if she's going to pray and then slams her fists into the ground, splitting it open so that a high wall of earth can rip up and snake its way across the ground from her. It cuts off the approaching army and curls into a half moon shape around the front side of the house.
"Why didn't you do that sooner?" Venus gripes.
"Why are you still standing here? Get in the house!" Ryu growls back at all of them as she rushes past them towards the front door. They all follow after her and she and Venn slam it shut behind them, locking it and placing their back against it. "You know, you're right. I knew I should've put up a wall around this place the second I got here," Ryu rolls her eyes breathlessly.
"Guys, what is going on?" April exclaims.
"Mutant frogs," Venus answers, "What else?"
Ryu and Venn jerk back away from each other with a gasp as spikes tear through the door between them.
"Repulsive humans! Hear me!"
"Is he talking to us?" April questions.
"I don't see any other humans around, do you?"
"Shut it, Venus," Venn snaps at the girl.
Ryu reaches into her pocket for anything she can use and finds the metal sphere she'd been playing around with that morning. Pulling it out she pushes her power into it and fuses it around her fingers like brass knuckles before slamming her fist into the spikes and pushing them back out the way they had come.
The heavy voice outside continues despite the display, "Free our brothers! The human reign of terror in these woods ends tonight!"
"Uh…these humans didn't kidnap us," Leo calls out as he helps Raph place a wooden bench in front of the door to barricade it. Ryu plops down to rest on it after her long run and leans her head back to find Raph raising an eyebrow at her. She just smiles sheepishly.
"What?!" the booming voice fumbles. "Are they forcing you to say that?"
"Um, no. We're actually pretty good friends with these humans," Donnie calls out.
There's an obvious noise of alarm outside before the booming voice answers, "Friends? With humans?! Then you are traitors! Frogs, show the humans and turtles no mercy!"
The sound of heavy, numerous footsteps comes barreling towards the house and Raph grabs Ryu's arm to pull her up off the chair before spinning her behind him, "Great, I was tired of that conversation anyway." He spins his sai and readies for the approaching battle.
"You know," Ryu glances at him, "Your love of fighting kinda worries me sometimes."
Raph just grins evilly and Ryu rolls her eyes. A large tree trunk knocks down the door like a battering ram and everyone scatters as mutant frogs invade the house. Ryu backs up a towards the living room as two come hopping right at her and she flips back as one of them swings its spear at her, "Wow, for amphibians they sure do move pretty fast."
The bay window in the living room shatters and the wall collapses under the weight of even more frogs as they pour into the house. "Look out! They're everywhere!" April shouts as she defends herself a few paces away from Ryu.
Donnie rushes to help her, leaving the bay window open for more frogs to come in. Ryu presses herself against the doorframe into the living room and then walks up the opposite side of the frame to escape another attack, spinning over and landing on the floor behind them.
"Ryu, can you do something about the house?" Venus calls from her battle on the stairway.
"Like what exactly? Make it disappear?" Ryu responds sarcastically.
"Like maybe lift it up off the ground!"
"Sure, why not! You got three vials to spare?!" Ryu throws her hands up to her sides. "'Cause that's how much it's gonna take to do that!"
Raph comes flipping over the banister to land beside Ryu and kicks an approaching frog away from behind her, "Would you pay attention!"
"Don't even start snapping at me," Ryu glares at him, "I was handling this just fine."
"Not from where I was standing," he snaps, stepping up to put his face up to hers.
Ryu ignores the fact that he really has gotten a few centimeters taller than her and stands up taller to meet his challenge, "Then maybe you should recheck your footing!" Ryu slams her fist into an attacking frog's face without looking away from him.
"Would you two finish your lover's spat some other time, please? Like when we're not being invaded by mutant freak shows?!" Venus gripes as she shoves them apart to hurry into the living room.
"Shut it!" they both growl at her at the same time, following after her. Inside the living room, the frogs have increased in number and Ryu is split up from Raph as a mass of them press in on her and Venus, forcing them into the far corner of the room; spears pointed at their throats.
"Got any bright ideas?" Ryu mumbles to her.
"Well, I could scream them out, but from this angle, I'd probably take out half the house and all your friends along with it," the older girl answers. "You?"
"Well, if I had about five vials I could just lift them all up individually and hurl them all the way to jersey, but there's a lot of 'em to pick up."
A frog throws a spear and they pull away from each other to avoid it and the rock tip splinters into the wall.
"AGH!"
Ryu turns towards the noise only to be hit on the back of the head way too hard for her liking and knocked to the floor.
The frogs suddenly stop as that familiar booming voice cuts out above the noise of battle, "Enough my brothers!" Horns blow a few times, signaling a private message, and the frogs all rush out of the house.
Something grabs Ryu by the wrists and she instantly starts to struggle, but then she's hit yet again and her grip on consciousness slips out of her grasp.
Ryu's not really sure how she got here. All she can remember through her blurry memories is her head continuously getting dragged along a bumpy surface and then feeling lighter than air as if she's being swung back and forth. And then, faintly, in the back of her mind, she feels the call of the earth getting weaker and weaker as if it's moving away from her.
When she finally starts to come back to her senses, she's faced with a splitting headache and a really foul mood in the pit of her stomach, "I am so getting sick of being knocked out. I never had this kind of trouble before I came here."
"You're awake!"
"Ack!" Ryu gasps as April hugs her around her neck tightly when she starts to sit up. "Okay, I get it. Nice to see you too," her annoyance stirs again and Ryu glances over at her as she rubs the back of her head. April smiles at her, obvious relief on her face, and Ryu rolls her eyes; she's not sure what it is that's getting on her last nerves but she's sure she'll figure it out soon.
"So what's happened?" Ryu asks.
"We got taken captive by a bunch of frogs. That's what happened," Casey grips from a nearby cage. Near him, Ryu spots Mikey and instantly climbs to her feet.
"Mikey, are you okay?"
The younger turtle looks up and sighs heavily, "Sorry, guys, I didn't know they were going to do this to you. I swear, I thought they were nice there for a while."
"It's not your fault, Mikey," April tells him.
"Yeah, we'll get out of here," Ryu adds as she wraps her arms around the twisting bars of the cage curiously. Then her eyes shift down and she squeaks. Her stomach starts to churn at the sight below her, "Heights. Why did it have to be heights?"
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.