We survived the hurricane! Well, I did. I haven't heard from Katt B. yet, but I'm sure the dragon will rear her ugly head soon. Hahaha!

Please review! All advice, suggestions, and critiques are welcome!

-Ravyne

**DISCLAIMER: WE DO NOT OWN TMNT**

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Strike of the Dragon

PART 2

11

3-6: "Race With The Demon"

"That qualifies as breaking news out here?"

"What does?"

Raph glances back over his shoulder as Venus and Ryu both lean against the back of the couch to watch the TV over Mikey and Leo's heads. The news report is being conveyed by a woman, relaying a warning for all watchers to remain at home and off the streets. Ryu's eyes narrow at the image of a "mad driver" running other drivers off the roads as if possessed.

What is wrong with people? It's like everyone in the world has gone insane lately, Ryu thinks to herself.

Venus nudges her arm, "Whatcha think?"

Ryu pops out of her thoughts, "What?"

The taller girl glares at her, narrowing her eyes, "The crazy driver. On the news report. On the TV."

"O-oh…right…TV. Yeah, bad."

Venus blinks. "Seriously," She replies, "That's it? Just…bad?"

Ryu turns towards the brunette in confusion and shrugs, "What?"

Venus groans and drops her head onto her arms before spinning away and strolling out of the room.

"What?!" Ryu calls after her.

"There's a crazy maniac running people off the road," Raph answers, "And all you can say is 'bad'."

"This is more than bad, Ryu," Leo adds.

She drops her eyes to her hands, watching her thumbs spin around each other absentmindedly as her thoughts spiral just as fast. Lately her thoughts have been too preoccupied to think of anything else or even come up with well thought out verbal responses to anything anyone has said to her.

Ever since returning from the dream realm and witnessing the hazy figure behind the blurry doorway, she's been having strange nightmares of the same experience. Over and over and over again. It doesn't seem to show any signs of stopping any time soon.

The front door opens and slams shut and everyone in the room jumps.

"Guys, come here quick!" April exclaims.

This doesn't sound good, Ryu thinks.

"It was him!" Donnie gasps the second they had relayed the news report to everyone in the kitchen. "That's the maniac that tried to trash us!"

"You ran into that nut?" Leo asks.

"More like he ran into us," Casey growls angrily. "Over and over! We got to get back out there and teach that guy a lesson!"

April rolls her eyes as she goes to drop her paper bag full of groceries on the dining room table. "Casey, it's not worth it. Just be glad we're all okay," she tells the hot head.

Venn comes in from upstairs and pauses behind Venus and Ryu who block the doorway. They both throw him looks as he steps up behind them and he nods. "You two heard anything?" he asks quietly.

"I've tried finding out some more about the daredevil online but I've got nothing more than what the new reporters have released," Ryu shakes her head.

"I'm gonna drive up to the local store and see if there's any gossip going around about him," Venus adds.

Venn and Ryu spin towards her in alarm.

She catches their shared looks, "Ugh! Okay, chill. I won't drive. Buncha paranoid babies."

"Your neck okay, Donnie?"

Ryu pulls out of their private conversation in time to see April step up behind Donnie and start rubbing his neck. Donnie throws a victorious look at Casey who grinds his teeth furiously. April watches the exchange but does nothing to quell it. She just rolls her eyes and keeps rubbing Donnie's neck as if nothing is happening.

Ryu clenches her jaw shut, fury rising in her blood again. What the heck-!

"Ryu, come on," Venn grabs the girl by the arm and leads her stiff form out the front door. "We need to come up with some kind of plan. We can't have some crazy guy putting innocent lives at risk."

"That's obvious. I would've thought you'd have decided on that a while ago," Venus gripes, walking up to join the conversation.

"You've always got to add a negative comment into the mix, don't you?" he growls.

"It's a part of my charm," she grins sarcastically.

"Ryu…"

Both stop arguing to look over at the quiet girl. Her face is flushed, eyes down cast, fists clenched at her sides.

"Ryu?" Venn repeats. "What's up?"

"Yeah, you look like you're about to hurl a rock," Venus crosses her arms and starts picking at her nails in boredom.

"Nothing," Ryu mumbles. She spins on her toe and heads for the barn where she's set up her own little 'lab' in the far corner away from Donnie's and Casey's shop. The lone computer that she pulled from the Kraang ship under the house still sits there silently, mocking her; the screen is black and empty.

She sits down in her creaky chair and leans back with a heavy sigh, staring at the strange machine thoughtfully. At one point, Donnie and Casey come in and start working on the old car they found sitting forgotten in the barn when they first got out here, but she ignores their constant arguing. After a few hours, they take the car out for a spin with Raph and Mikey to see if their speed adjustments are set right on the vehicle. Raph asks if she wants to come, but she declines, trying her best not to meet his eyes. There's been a wall of awkwardness between them since their trip to the dream realm.

As the silence settles back in, Ryu drops her head on the top of her work table. It hits the surface with a dull thud.

Forget about it, Ryu, she thinks, It's not your place. Donnie can handle it himself. She slides back from the table and goes over to the Kraang machine. She presses a key and the same thing happens as always.

The screen blinks, the machine whirls, the weird drive slides out of the port beside the screen. Again, Ryu just stares at it in wonder. Every time. She's faced with the same dilemma. It plagues her…

The barn door slams open, making her jump. "Can't believe those guys!" Casey growls.

Ryu follows the fuming teen with her eyes as he crosses the room and snatches up a tool from the nearby tool table. A few seconds later, the turtles are pushing the trashed vehicle back in; the poor old car looks like it's been through hades and back again.

"What the heck did you-?" she stops to a halt when Casey hurls a glare at her from across the room, shutting her off. Biting her tongue, Ryu sits back down in her chair and turns on her computer to bury herself in her work again.

"You guys call us when the car is fixed. We've got to get back out there, but this time we're going to have a plan. Raph, you're with me," Leo calls to his brother. Raph glances over at Ryu who has dropped her head into her hands, brushing her fingers through her hair; an obvious sign of stress.

A while later, Casey hits something under the car and he curses under his breath.

"So, find the problem with that clutch?" Donnie spits out.

"I found part of the problem," Casey snaps. Ryu glances back over her shoulder and watches the kid slide out from under the car with a white chicken in his hands. He growls as the bird flaps frantically and leaps away, "Hey, Mikey, keep your chickens out of the barn, man!"

Ryu sighs and shuts her computer down, exhausted already from their bickering. Outside, the wind stirs her hair as she pulls it out of the bun at the back of her head. It cascades down her shoulders and to her waist in straight locks. As she brushes it out with her fingers, her eyes shift over to the tree line. The sun peeks through to the forest floor and brightens the colors to near neon.

The peaceful scene calls to her; beckons her to leave her stressful world and to get lost in the serenity that is nature.

Ryu sighs again, How I wish…

"Hey."

She nearly bounds right out of her skin, "Yikes!"

Raph jumps a bit at her exclaim, but carries on towards her all the same, "What's with you?"

"You scared me," Ryu groans, sitting down on the log lying on the ground outside the barn, "Did you need something?"

He takes a seat next to her and turns his eyes away. Ryu too finds herself unable to meet his eyes, staring down at her fiddling thumbs. "Just…uh…Back when we, uh…" he stammers.

Ryu risks a glance up at him through the wall her hair has made between them. His sharp green eyes are closed tightly as if in a panic and his hands are clasped just as tight.

"Back when we were stuck in that other dimension…you know, with those beavers? I just um…wanted to…uh…"

"A…A-apologize-?"

"Yes!" he shouts quickly, making her jumps in surprise again. "Yeah, sorry. That's…yeah, that's…that's it."

He shoots straight up off the log and hurries stiffly across the yard and back into the house. Ryu watches him go in astonishment, baffled that they have both come to a point like this. Her chest tightens as she drops her eyes to the ground.

How would they ever get past something like this?

"I can't believe this," Ryu mutters under her breath.

"Oh, chill, maybe he's just out to lunch or something," Venus rolls her eyes at the girl's grumbling.

Ryu throws her a glare, "At four in the afternoon?"

"He could've just closed down early. Maybe he's sick or something."

"He lives in the back of the building! His car is still here!"

Venus groans and props her hands on her hips, "Well, excuse me. I'm not buddy-buddy with this loser. How the heck would I know the inner workings of his life?"

"First off," Ryu snaps, "Roy is not a loser. He-."

"He left the Order. Who in their right mind would leave the Order?" Venus cuts her off.

"He didn't leave! He retired to be with the woman he fell in love with. How is that wrong?" Ryu turns from the locked door of Roy's auto shop and storms back towards the van with Venus hot on her heels.

"I didn't say there was anything wrong with that, but when his wife died he had a choice to come back and he didn't. Something about him is messed up," Venus argues.

Ryu slams her door shut and grips the steering wheel tightly, "Secondly, I don't know the inner workings of anyone's life. Roy has just always been a good friend and when I heard that he had opened his own shop, I wanted to come check it out. His wife was the one who was nice enough to show me around. She was so happy to have a place of her own. They had even started fixing up a room for their child…" Ryu trails off, remembering the foggy memory of the joyous smile that had taken over the soon-to-be mother's face when she had showed off the brightly painted pink room. They had been getting ready to welcome their baby girl into the world…when the doctor's diagnostic had crushed their dreams and their lives. Roy's young wife had left this world before the child could be safely brought into it.

"Wait…"

Ryu comes out of her thoughts and glances over at the passenger.

Venus's face has fallen, her usually bored expression softening into something else. Ryu blinks in surprise; the girl looks almost sad.

"I thought…he just lost his wife. No one told me about his unborn."

"That's because…Roy never told anyone."

The dark skinned girl looks up again, "Then how did you know?"

She drops her eyes to her knuckles, her fingers loosening from the steering wheel, and then moves to crank the van. It backfires in response as she pops it into gear, "I figured it out."

Static from the radio sitting in the cup holders between them interrupts their conversation and Venus picks it up hesitantly, pressing the call button, "What's up?"

"We're in some hot water over here, I might need both of you," Venn's voice answers.

"Where are you at?"

Ryu glances at her as her hand hovers over the gear shift.

"On the back road leading to Roy's shop."

Before Venus can answer, Ryu is shifting the gears and tearing out of the driveway. She knows exactly where they are; the back road to Roy's shop is winding and dangerous. There's only one reason they would be up there.

Casey has run off again after that speed demon, she thinks.

"Uh…what's going on?" Venus asks as she slams the door shut of the van. "I thought you guys were in trouble. We sped over here, quite recklessly I might add, and instead of finding you people in turmoil, you're jumping around like a bunch of baboons."

Ryu pauses mid-step towards the group, eyeing Venus worriedly at her rant.

Venn spins around from his place between the others and grins sheepishly, "Well, you should've sped a bit more recklessly. We finished without you."

"Gee, thanks for leaving some fun for me," Venus gripes, smacking him on the back of the head, "I could use some destructive fun right about now."

Ryu lowers her eyes guiltily, Maybe I shouldn't have said anything.

"So, whatever, fill me in on what happened," Venus hangs over Venn's shoulder, showing some interest in Donnie and Casey who are chatting excitedly about their recent victory.

Leaning against the front of the van Ryu smiles over at Donnie and Casey, glad to see that they're not fighting for once. Thinking this, she's reminded of the reason that they are constantly fighting and her eyes instantly find the red head in question.

What she finds send a bolt of fury though her. April leans against Raph, her arm wrapped around the back of his shoulders.

How many does she have to-?!, the thought doesn't finish in her mind before her powers flare in response to her unbound emotions. Her foot kicks forward, heel digging sharply into the dirt, and the ground shifts, ripping frontward at a lightning speed.

The attack trips April's feet and sends her sprawling backward onto her backside.

Venn and Venus both react first, Venus shouting out her outrage, "Ryu, what was that?!"

But the girl is gone, racing off the side of the road and leaping over the guard rail. Her feet hit the nearly ninety degree angle incline and the earth welcomes her, breaking off to catch her and slide her down the hill. She vanishes into the dark woods below.

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.

All reviews and advice are welcome!

-Ravyne