Special thanks to my great beta-readers, Colonel Pop, GoodGirlSmiles and Pita Fish. Thanks guys!

I don't own TMNT or any characters found therein. I DO however own Ken. Mmmmm…

Chapter Three

I spent Sunday afternoon preparing for the date that evening, primping and mentally practicing small talk. For the date I put on a pair of adorable black heels, a yellow sleeveless summer dress and a little black cardigan sweater. I decided to let my hair stay down but pulled my bangs back with a hairclip that looked like a cheerful sunflower. I was thankful that it was in the early fall, so I could get away with wearing a little sweater.

At 5:30 I was waiting down in the hall, trying my best to look cute, but not too cute, and mature, but not too mature. I was busy trying to practice my flirty-but-not-too-flirty lines in my mind when I heard a wolf whistle behind me. I turned to see Ken standing there in a pair of jeans, a collared shirt, a jacket over it, and that impish grin of his. I gave a playful wink back to him and we walked outside arm in arm to his car, which was not at all what I was expecting.

"THIS is your car?" I said, gaping in shock at the sleek black Porsche in front of us.

"Careful, I think you dropped your jaw," Ken said jokingly.

I gestured towards the Porsche again. "That… is your car."

He raised an eyebrow at me as he walked to his side of the car. "You can even ride in it if you want. Or we can walk, but that's about four miles, so-"

I hurried to the passenger side of the car and opened the door, breathing in the scent of leather as I slid in slowly, luxuriating in the knowledge that I was getting to ride in a Porsche. "I think your car is worth more than I am. I'm afraid I'm going to ruin something in here." He shook his head and grinned as I continued to bask in the glory around me. "It's soooo neeeew and expensive!"

"I've had a trust fund set up for just this one baby for years." He patted the dashboard with fondness. "Since Freshman year at High School. Finally earned enough this summer. My one big birthday present to myself for the next twenty years." He glanced over at me as we got onto the road. "So, you like cars?"

"My ex used to have the cutest Volvo convertible. I used to love driving that thing around, but when we split, he got to keep the car. I still keep an eye out though."

He gave a playful derisive snort. "Volvos."

"Don't make me smack your arm with my purse here."

"What, that thing? It's tiny! You couldn't stun a toy poodle with it."

We bantered back and forth all the way to the restaurant, where we joked and flirted lightly through dinner. At a quarter to seven we decided to head out to the parking lot to his car so we could get to the movie on time. As he went for his wallet to pay for the meal though, he gave a frown and patted his pockets. "Damn it."

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Nothing big, I just forgot my wallet in my car." He grumbled and shook his head. "What an amateur move."

I smiled reassuringly at him. "Don't worry about it. I can pay."

He held up a hand in protest. "No way! First date and all that. I mean, I guess you could pay me back later if you want." He got a goofy grin on his face and said "Wink, wink, nudge, nudge."

I did a mock face palm, but I didn't bother trying to hide my chuckles. Ken got up from the table with an assurance that he'd only be gone a minute at the most, so I sat back and enjoyed the rest of my drink and picked at the leftovers on my plate. I hummed along with the music that they were playing in the restaurant, but after I got through three songs I started worrying. I checked my watch and decided to wait another five minutes before I got out my debit card and paid for the meal myself.

I slid down in my seat a little and on a whim, looked out the window and saw a lovely view of the left side parking lot. Ken's car was on the other side, but I couldn't help the small spike of fear I felt when I saw three guys wearing black and very unhappy faces walking through the lot to the side where I knew the car was parked. They had jackets with big pockets and had their hands in them. This does not bode well, I thought to myself, and without another thought I quickly paid for the meal and hurried outside as quickly as I could, cell phone in hand to call the police if I had to.

There were muffled voices from where I was standing, and I decided that discretion was the better part of valor in this case. Making sure that I was safely hidden behind the side of the restaurant, I poked my around the corner to see-

Five men standing next to Ken and talking in… Well, I couldn't understand the language, but if I was hearing the tones and voices right, then they weren't happy campers. I reached for my cell phone in my purse, ready to dial 911 like there was no tomorrow. Then suddenly, they all seemed to come to some conclusion because the other men all suddenly turned to walk away. Ken stayed by the car looking growly, and so I stayed hidden for another minute until I saw him start to walk towards the restaurant. I decided to make things easier- I walked out from behind the building, trying to make my face look causal but concerned as I walked up to him.

"Hey, you okay?"

"Yeah, sure, I'm fine," he said, trying to pull a smile on. "What're you doing out here?"

"Well, it's just that you were gone almost twenty minutes and I got worried, so I paid and…"

"Aw, you didn't have to do that. But thanks anyway." He put an arm around my shoulder and we walked to his car. "I'm definitely paying for the movie and snacks though."

I nodded my consent and tried to put out the sight of him with those other guys from my mind. It wasn't my business, after all. I had no place asking him what he was doing with them. But at the same time… it was a little worrying. "I was afraid you were getting mugged or something," I said, trying to keep my voice light.

"Nope, just dropped my wallet where I couldn't find it. But I got it now, so it's fine."

"Alright," I said, and dropped the issue.

The rest of the night was great. We went to see a comedy which left us both cracking up (the ninja movie was full of obnoxious teenagers who kept texting through the whole thing), and when he dropped me off at my apartment, he escorted me to the front door where we stood for a moment.

"Tonight was really fun," he began.

"Yeah, I had a great time. Thanks so much for asking me," I replied.

"So…" he rocked back on his heels a little. "Would you… I mean, if you aren't too busy…"

"I'd love to have another night out with you." I wasn't sure if he had planned on being the one to initiate the kiss, but I decided that I might as well, and I stood on my toes to manage to place a brief kiss on his lips. From the look on his face when I stood back, it wasn't half bad, despite its brevity. "So, I guess just stop by the library and we can talk about what we wanna do."

He had a goofy grin on his face as he watched me. "Uh-huh…"

I gave him a little wave and walked inside, not bothering to hide my own grin.

There was a message waiting on my answering machine for me when I got out of my shower. I was wearing the flannel pajamas from the night before and I had my hair up in a towel so I didn't get them wet. I put my glasses on and pressed the Play button on the machine so I could listen to the message as I did some dishes.

"Hey Irma, its April. I was just calling to get some gossip on how your date went, and to also ask you if you could find me any books on this guy named Kaizo Shizumi. Apparently he worked on something that could be what I'm looking for. Thanks a lot. So, yeah, just give me a call back whenever and I'll talk to you lat- MIKEY! Don't touch tha-" There was a loud crash and someone swore before the message cut off.

I gave my phone a quizzical look. "The heck was that about?" But I shrugged and went back to washing, making a mental note of looking up anything specifically on Kaizo Shushi. I had a weird feeling on the back of my neck- where I always got my weird feelings- but I pushed it aside in favor of basking in the awesome date I had.

Maybe I'll do some reading on this artist myself, I thought. After all, wouldn't hurt me to become more cultured. Also I could surprise Ken with the fact that I knew something artsy. Pleased with my own cleverness, I decided to start right away and pulled out my laptop to find out more about this guy.

Initial searches didn't pull up much- just basic info. He was a guy who lived a long time ago, was never really popular, and supposedly died young. None of his works were big enough to be found just by doing a google search. No wonder they need me, I thought to myself. A university information base really would be the only source of info on this thing.

I shrugged and went to bed after a couple hours of surfing the web, feeling excited for a new day.

The library was quiet that day, so I spent most of it doing intense searches for the Sushi guy April asked me to look for. I was hoping a certain handsome professor would show up too- I had picked my outfit out with him in mind. A green flared skirt, green button down vest, white blouse with long loose sleeves, green strappy heels, white headband, and gold earrings and necklace. All in all, I thought I looked pretty damn good that morning. I even wore my hair down. But he never did show up. I was pretty disappointed, but I realized that he probably had professor-y things that he needed to do. So I just kept myself occupied with looking up the info.

I came across something interesting in one of the academic journal articles that I was glancing over while I was eating some soup at my desk (we librarians had a code about this- don't slurp, don't tell) when I noticed that it mentioned that although he wasn't too well known for his paintings, he was actually one of the first inventors of the classic Puzzle Box- the kind that you had to slide panels around to get it open. Now that was neat. I loved puzzles myself. I decided to follow that lead a bit more and eventually found some stuff specifically on Shizumi and his puzzle boxes. It was actually really cool. He had made several for famous Japanese figures at the time, including a couple generals whose names I didn't recognize. Apparently he made his boxes so tricky that he put a prize on the inside for when you actually managed to open them. A fun birthday gift, I mused to myself.

On a whim, I decided to see whether they still made any of these boxes. I was lucky enough to come across a whole website dedicated to following Shizumi's box puzzle tradition, complete with prizes on the inside. With a grin, I put down an order for one. As I said before, I love puzzles. And once I managed to open it I could just use it as a fun jewelry box. See if any thieves can get to my diamond earrings through that, I grinned to myself.

I kept browsing through the site to see if there was anything else cool when I noticed a tab that said "About the original artist". I eagerly clicked it.

Kaizo Shizumi was a Japanese artist and inventor who is thought to have lived in the early Sixth Century BC. Although he never became popular for his artwork, his puzzle boxes were well known throughout the nobility at the time. Wealthier members of society would commission boxes from him for what would sometimes be exorbitant prices with the hopes of impressing their peers with the intricacy of his designs.

Not only would they be very detailed in design and decoration, they would also often have gifts of valuable natures inside of them, usually jewelry or fans for women or daggers and other small weapons for men.

They fell out of popularity about twenty years after they surfaced when a daimyo (a noble lord) gave a very complicated box to a very impatient Emperor who took it as an insult to his intelligence when he could not figure out how to open the box himself. Shizumi and the daimyo were subsequently imprisoned and are believed to have been executed shortly afterwards, although due to lack of information available at that time, this cannot be verified.

However, there is a popular legend regarding Shizumi's supposed escape. It is said that the goddess Seiobo, the Queen Mother of the West in Japanese mythology, rescued him and offered to give him one of her fabled peaches of immortality if he would construct his greatest puzzle for her, so that she could store her peaches safely and not worry about them being stolen from her. He agreed, and constructed a box so clever and complex that he had to show the goddess five times how to operate it successfully. Convinced that her peaches would be safe, she gave Shizumi one of them and allowed him to return to earth, where he traveled the world admiring the art of all people.

I read the information excitedly, enraptured by it. This sounded very close to what April might be looking for. I stopped suddenly and then started laughing. THIS was what April was looking for? "Yeah, right," I snorted to myself. "You might as well look for the Holy Grail or something." But I forwarded the link to her anyway. Who knew, maybe it actually would help her. "Or maybe it'll help her realize her client is a crackpot."

Either way, I didn't really care that much. I had my puzzle box and I was looking forward to seeing what was inside.

*Author's Note- Puzzle Boxes didn't come into prominence until the 19th century in Japan, but for the purposes of this story, I decided to use Author's License for plot.

Next chapter should be fun. STUFF starts happening then. Hmmmm…