Two more chapters left. Any suggestions for part 3 are now being taken. I'd love to hear about what you would like to see in the next segment. Enjoy.

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

-Katt B.

**DISCLAIMER: WE DO NOT OWN TMNT**

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Strike of the Dragon

PART 2

16

3-8.2: "Ryu"

Venus drops the basket on the floor in front of the washing machine, standing back up to pinch her nose in disgust, "Why are men so filthy?"

"That's not filth, that's our own manly musk," Casey grins smugly.

"Walk away. Now."

He picks up on the 'get lost or you're dead' tone in the older girl's voice and he ducks away quickly. Venn watches him go, leaning against the doorframe to chuckle, "You know, that's probably why you don't have any friends."

"I have plenty of friends, thank you…wait. Excuse me?"

He grins at her, "Chill, kid, I'm just trying to give you some advice."

"It's not needed."

Venn rolls his eyes at her childish snap of defiance.

"Are they back yet?"

"No, they're not," Venn throws her a look as she stalks out of the wash room.

"Ugh, I hate picking up all this slack!"

"Don't you mean…'actually doing chores'?"

"I will kick your skinny-!"

He slaps a hand over her mouth in a flash, "Kid's story! How many times do I have to tell you this?!"

Venus opens her mouth wide and bites down, effectively getting him to let go and move out of her way so that she can move back to the kitchen. April is busy washing the dishes from lunch, clearing the table so that she can wipe off any remainder crumbs. Venus takes out the broom and starts sweeping up the floor as the red head wipes down the kitchen counter.

Venus glances out of the corner of her eye at the younger girl running around the room, "Can I…ask you a question…?"

April jerks to a stop, caught off guard by the fact that Venus willingly wants to talk to her directly; considering the fact that Venus never showed a desire to talk to her. "Um," she trails off, "Sure?"

"How do you feel about Ryu?"

Again, she's caught off guard by the question, but April thinks it over, wondering if this is a trick, "Well…I feel like…she's been a bit…distant lately, maybe a little short tempered with Casey and I, but nothing more than that. Why?"

Venus stares off out of the window at a bird bouncing across the grass after a worm or bug. She lets out a sigh, "No reason, just curious. Why do you think she's been like that?"

"Hmm…I don't know. Stress?"

Venus fights back the urge to slap the red head, hands quickly busying themselves with dusting the windows. As the silence stretches on April drops her rag and turns to her, "What's the deal?"

"What deal?"

"No one asks something like that without an ulterior motive," the red head lowers her tone.

"True, but I'm not 'no one'. I may have an ulterior motive, but I'm not going to just go around blurting it out, now am I? Wouldn't be much of a spy if I did that all the time."

April narrows her gaze, "Spy…? For who?"

Venus drops her rag and turns to meet her eyes easily, trying not to smirk at the kid's juvenile try at a threatening glare. She'll need a lot of years of hard core practice to get where I am, she thinks.

Letting a smooth smile pull up one corner of her mouth, she crosses her arms and leans back against the window frame, "That's not part of the game…now is it?"

Venn walks in right then and nearly chokes on the tension, "Cough-W-what the heck is…Cough! How are you two doing today?" He glances between both girls warily, feeling the cat-fight ready to break out in front of him.

Venus finally moves after a long moment, keeping her grin in place as she walks past him, "I'm fine…for now. I'll be outside surveying if you need me."

Venn swallows as she passes him and closes the front door behind her. The wind welcomes her, bringing smells of flowers and fresh cut grass to her senses, and she tucks her hair behind her ear. The golden bar in her ear gleams in the sunlight along with the three other studs in her lobe. She finds a nice place in the yard among the soft grass and sits down cross-legged, placing her hands on her knees with her palms facing up and open towards the sky. Closing her eyes, Venus focuses her breathing….in and out, in and out….

The wind stops as she drifts off into her connection to the spirit, a living connection that floats through all things that possess a living being: plants, animals, people. It's all connected in a much deeper way than people realize. Venus has been trained to locate and see these connections and even travel them sometimes if she needs too.

Be ready…

Venus tears her eyes open and blinks repeatedly at the voice brushing against the back of her mind. She nods to the unseen voice and stands to her feet just as April, Casey, and Venn walk out the front door into the yard.

"So what are we practicing today?" April asks.

"Let's strengthen that leg of yours and get you breaking wood before the others come home," Venn answers as he leads them over to the stack of firewood near the outdoor swing.

"Too late," Venus calls as they pass her.

They all stop and follow her gaze towards the tree line as figures begin to move out of the shadows. Leo, Raph, Donnie, Mikey, they all step out dressed in new armor of white; completely opposite of the ninja's traditional black. They carry flags, each with a symbol in black painted on the white fabric. As they approach, April takes a step towards them.

"W-what…happened out there?"

Leo lifts his head so that his eyes are revealed from under the hood, "It's time for us to go back. Back to New York."

Venus and Venn share a look and she can't help but think, Finally going to get out of this dump and do some real work. That's when she realizes that Ryu is nowhere around them.

Venn must've caught on to the same thing, "Where's Ryu?"

The turtle's expression turns to bewilderment. "She's not here?" Raph asks.

They all shake their heads 'no'.

"Venus, can you find her?"

She rolls her eyes at Venn's request, kneels down to place her open palm against the ground and shuts her eyes. Her breathing instantly begins to slow, pacing itself as she concentrates on slipping into her focus almost lifting out of her body. Her spirit reaches out for the connection between her own living soul and that of the grass.

The spark is almost instant, tugging on her as she feels a piece of herself become a part of the network of live wires all around her, pulling her consciousness forward. She's suddenly flying through the ground, across the grass, through the trees, and with the wind. The connections carry her consciousness a deeper into the woods until she approaches a clear, flowing stream and a short waterfall, slowing down as she reaches the edge of the shore.

Standing in the water with her back to Venus is Ryu, and further away is a form she's never seen before. The being is a fox with startling cool, blue eyes; those eyes turn to look directly at Venus as if it can sense her. She gasps, the connection sparking around her and breaking her concentration, throwing her back into herself and out of her focus.

Venn grabs her shoulder when she starts to fall back from the hit; she stands up a moment later to face him, "She's not too far. I can find her."

"Then let's go," he nods.

"There she is," Venus points out from their hiding space behind the bushes. All of them poke their heads out over the top of the thorny branches poking into them.

"Couldn't pick a better hiding spot?" Venn growls under his breath.

"Well, excuse me for not wanting to be under…that stare."

Venn follows her gaze and searches out across the river to the opposite shore, spotting the small form of an animal sitting calmly by the shore under the shade of a fallen tree further up the bank. The animal slowly moves, its cool, blue eyes turning smoothly towards him until they meet Venn's gaze. The connection sends a jolt through him and he instantly drops his eyes to the ground, noticing that all the others on the opposite side of him all staring off at the scene.

"Lower your eyes!" Venus hisses. They all drop their eyes sharply at the order.

Across the river, the animal turns to look back at Ryu, the fox shifting its tail to wrap it around its feet as it watches her. The white-haired girl is balancing on her right foot, her left placed against her right knee and her hands lifted high above her head where they're clasped together. The leaves tumble through the wind and onto the rivers surface around her and flow away with the currant as the water tumbles and twists around the rocks.

The water breaks, rearing back like a snake and striking at her. Ryu moves, spinning fluidly to side step the attack. Raph follows her movements, noticing then the white bandana round her eyes to blind her. He furrows his brow in bewilderment; what could the lesson be in that? She's already half blind.

Ryu continues her dance across the surface of the stones peeking out over the water's surface; spiraling with a grace that even rivaled that over the rivers. Even though her eyes are blinded by the fabric, Ryu seems to know when and where the water is going to strike and counters.

Raph understands; it's faith. The perfect counter for fear. By placing faith in your senses, trusting your body to know what to do, the fear of what will come and how you will face it all but vanishes. Like water, one has to keep flowing, drift, and adapt to the changing landscape before it.

Raph releases the breath he had been holding as he observes her changing right before his eyes. He hadn't noticed it until now, but something about her is different. Just as Venus had said once before:

"Something dark was there, attached to her almost…I mean attached like a parasite."

His chest tightens at the thought that swirl crazily in his head. Just what is 'attached' to her that they can't see?

Ryu hears the almost inaudible swish of the attack and flips back to avoid it, landing on her right palm for a pause before flipping again onto the shoreline on the wet soil. Her toes dig into the soft dirt with a deep sigh of relief.

You have done well…

Ryu nods and turns towards the voice, bowing deeply. She can feel the pride flowing off her Spirit Guide, making her smile warmly before she catches on to the approaching sound of footsteps. Lots of them.

"Ryu! That was awesome!" Mikey exclaims.

She nearly falls over when a pair of arms circles her torso abruptly and lifts her into the air. Ryu laughs and pats him on the head, "Thanks, Mikey, but can you put me down please? I've been beat up really bad today."

He sets her down carefully and they all bombard her with questions about the fox, about her spirit plane quest, about what she learned.

"Guys, guys, hold on! One at a time," Ryu chuckles.

"Okay, I got one."

Everyone turns at Venus's voice, finding the girl standing by the water with her arms crossed. There's a puzzled look on her face, her eyebrows are furrowed.

"Why are you still wearing the blindfold?"

She starts, reaching up to finger the cloth over her face, "Wow, I totally forgot about it. It was part of the lesson, to learn how to trust me and not my eyes, and how to adapt and evade like the water does."

Raph watches Ryu's hands move to untie the blindfold only to struggle with the knot, so he turns her around with a gently pull of her shoulder and begins to tug at the knot, "Can't even tie a knot right."

"Shut up," Ryu snickers, secretly enjoying the feeling of his hands working through the knot and dropping the cloth away from her face.

At first her sight doesn't adjust to the light, but she blinks through it until she can see the faces of her friends clearly…and it's like seeing them for the first time. She almost forgot that she's half blind, or maybe it's the light, or maybe it's just her. Standing here with the sunlight streaming down through the trees, Ryu has never seen things more clearly.

Her eyes shift over all of them, ending on the turtles: Leo, Donnie, Mikey, and then finally Raph. She stops there and stares him straight in the eyes, ignoring the internal urge to look away. Ryu swallows hard and faces him fully, "Let's go home."

Raph nods with a small smile pulling one corner of his mouth. His brothers follow suit.

She smiles, "We have a city to save."

Ryu finishes up packing her things and zips her bag closed before standing up and looking around the kitchen. She's come to kind of like this kitchen; it reminds her of the one she used to have when she was a child. Taking a deep breath, filling her nose with the smells of wood and waffles and fresh apples, Ryu sits down at the table with a sigh. A familiar heavy pounding comes in a second later and she smiles.

"Hey, Metalhead, haven't seen you in a hot minute," she pats the robot on the head.

Metalhead's head lifts to stare her in the face before its jaw opens and a voice exits, "Well, I've been uploading some old programs I used to have on him. By the way, thanks for letting me have that scanner."

"No prob, Donnie, it's the least I can do after all you've done for me. Wait, where are you at?"

"I'm out at the barn, Leo and Raph are packing up the car, and Mikey is…well…"

"Yeah…" Ryu trails off with him. "So once everything is packed, we're heading home."

"Yep."

"Have y'all come up with a plan yet?"

"No, Leo's been sorta quite about the whole situation."

Ryu nods into the empty room, "Gotcha."

"What about you three?"

Her eyes pop open wide. Three? He said that as if they weren't all on the same team. How could they all not be on the same team now? "Um-."

"We'll be heading to the city with you."

Venus takes the seat at the table by the window and grabs an apple from the bowl without a second thought.

Ryu glares at the girl's rude outburst, "Those are wax."

Venus coughs up the apple violently. Venn storms into the room and pats her on the back to clear her choking, "I really wish you two would stop being so…"

"Us?" both girls finish together.

He rolls his eyes, "Just get into the living room."

"Why?" Venus coughs around the remaining apple pieces, wiping her mouth.

Venn stops at the door frame and motions with his head for them to follow, "There's something you might want to see."

Both of them leave the room, Metalhead stomping behind them, and head into the living room. Venn has the TV on, the news lady giving her report loudly as she stands in front of a small building that could pass as a house if not for the business signs. Ryu's eyes widen in alarm.

That's Roy's shop…, she thinks.

"Just this morning, this innocent shop was attacked by an unknown assailant who has yet to be found. The owner, Roy Cooper, was not found at the scene, leaving police wondering if this brutal scene was the result of a kidnapping or something much worse."

"Geez, can they make it anymore dreary?" Venn shakes his head.

"It's the news. Of course they can," Venus answers around her apple, a bored expression on her face as she listens in on the report.

"Can you be anymore dreary?"

"It's me. Of course I can," she grins.

Venn turns to throw her a look but stops, smile dropping off his face, "Where's Ryu?"

"Slow much. She left a while ago."

"What?!"

The sound of squealing tires and gravel flying against the house makes them both jump in surprise.

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 reviews, suggestions, and critiques are welcome.

-Katt B.