Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Father lied.

New York City is unbearably boring.

Not that he’d promised it’d be exciting, but during his latest monologue Karai distinctly remembers him saying the city would be the “site of their final victory” and “an end to the stain on the legacy of the”- she sort of stopped listening after that. Point being, it’s been almost three weeks of pigeon-filled patrol and staking out rival gang territory. She’s snoring at the very thought. 

She misses Tokyo. Not only did it have twice the attractiveness and four times the excitement as this rat-infested prison, but she had people there. 

(One person- Shinigami had been forbidden from accompanying her to America, courtesy of good old Dad, who insisted she not have any “distractions”.

When he met her coming off the plane he already had a speech ready:

“My daughter,” Hand on the shoulder, helmet still on- she hasn’t seen it off since he came to New York. “It’s good to have you with me again. I have a task for you.”

“Anything.”

“An old enemy of mine has resurfaced in New York. Hamato Yoshi.” He’d growled the name, two words she’d never heard uttered without hatred, ones she’d assumed she’d never put a face to. “Your mother’s killer.”

“...He’s alive?”

“Alive, and training ninja of his own. I want you to track them down. After all these years… we can have our revenge, Karai. Make right what he took from us.”

That first night she’d barely slept, imagining all the ways she might finally meet the man who tore her family apart. Father never told her much about him, but what she knows she hates. The ragged burns that trace the Shredder’s hands and arms, face and neck, were at his hand. 

The coward still hasn’t shown his face, nor have his supposed trainees, so for now her anger is simmering, overpowered by a boredom-induced blasé.

She out on patrol. Predictably, nothing's happened.

There’s a rustle of fabric next to her. One of her soldiers points down to the rooftop below.

A figure’s pacing there. He’s muttering to himself, kicking at various vent hoods and satellite dishes and fiddling with the straps of the two scabbards strapped across his… shell.

Obviously this is one of Hamato’s minions, if the swords and wrappings are any indication, but apparently he’s also a… well. He looks like a turtle. A turtle with a mask and weapons, walking on two legs. 

This might be interesting.

She waves the soldiers down, hanging back at her perch on the billboard. He’s good- he has his swords drawn before the Foot even land, all four on the ground in barely a minute. Unconscious on the ground, not a scratch on them. So he’s a goody-two-shoes to boot.

He grins amidst the crumpled forms of her soldiers, going to sheathe his swords. “Hm. I feel so much better.”

It’s time to make her entrance. She lands almost soundlessly on the rooftop and smirks under her mask as his eyes widen, katana and wakizashi drawn hastily back in front of him. 

“Not bad.”

“Uh… thanks?" He seems to recover from his confusion, raising an eyebrow (or whatever the turtle equivalent of an eyebrow is). "You should train those guys better."

“I guess so, if they get their asses kicked by the likes of you. You might actually be a challenge.” She could take him down now. Not bad doesn’t mean better than her. But why would she give up some potential leverage so soon?

So, she blinds him, slamming a knee into his plastron and then a foot into his chest. “Guess not. My name’s Karai.”

"You- huh?" He actually seems surprised at the offense, which is obnoxious, but it means he’s trusting.

Even better.

“I’ll see you around.”

**********

It becomes a sort of routine- she meets Leo on a random rooftop, at a random hour, and they both pretend it’s an accident. They fight, she beats him (or he gets the opportunity to beat her, but doesn’t take it), rinse, repeat.

She hasn’t told Father about their rendezvous’. 

Karai doesn’t like lying to him, per se, but it’s not the first time and it won’t be the last (she cares less now, now that there are missions she goes uninformed of and meetings she’s excluded from- there used to be a sort of understanding between the two of them, and if he’s going to break it than she can too). He’s too shortsighted to understand what she’s doing; this is her way to Hamato, his soft spot.

She just needs to build a little more trust in Leo, maybe worm some information out (besides the seemingly involuntary babble about his brothers and their latest escapades), and then they can take the whole clan down. But in the meantime, their unofficial spars have been kind of… fun?

You’re the first thing in this city that doesn’t bore me.  

It wasn’t a lie.

And besides. If Father’s going to send her across an ocean away from her only friend, she has a right to make some entertainment for herself.

She meets his family, and can finally put some faces to names. “Raph” first. He’s certainly not the picture of responsibility Leo is: more volatile, his fighting less restrained. Still, he’s far from ruthless. Her first encounter with the other two- Donnie, the smartest of the bunch (he fights like he’s enacting computer code- complicated, precise, but so predictable) and Mikey, who despite his capability in battle has all the maturity of a cartoon character marketed towards nine year olds- reveals the same.

Naiveté runs in the family.

Leo won’t give up on his theory that “there’s good in her!”, that “she doesn’t have to take this path!” (he talks like he’s in a corny seventies sci-fi, god), all based on the fact that she hasn’t finished him off after her countless victories.

He talks like Shredder’s evil.

It gives her pause. 

Her father’s never been the gentlest of people, and he’s downright ruthless to his enemies, but he does what he does for their clan. Their family. She doesn’t doubt that he would do anything to keep her safe by his side. Anything.

She doesn’t expect this… acquaintance to serve a real purpose until she properly discovers what those pink blobfish in robo-suits want. It looks like the turtles’ quarrel with them is less on moral grounds and more on “fate of Earth being endangered by planet-hopping aliens” grounds. 

A look at the bigger picture says that revenge can wait: these extraterrestrial parasites are a little more pressing.

But, of course, Father can’t see past the nose of the kabuto to acknowledge the threat they pose.

“I want to help you fight the Kraang.”

It all snowballs from there.

**********

Six months later

For the first time, Karai really, actually wants to hurt the turtles.

Before they were just… pawns, pieces in a game between Shredder and Hamato that she could move around if she liked. Collateral, in a way, and Leo was a- not a friend.

She’s smarter than that. He tried to kill her father. In front of her.

She finally got a glimpse of “Splinter”, the day the Kraang attempted their invasion of New York, and scaredy-rat wouldn’t even fight her himself. 

He looked at her like it hurt, like she’s a wound in his side that can’t heal right. She relished in it; he deserves to hurt after what he did.

Here on the rooftop, Splinter and the terrapin brats are tied up and waiting to be sent off to her father (He’ll be so proud. So incredibly proud, and she did it herself).

“Miwa-” She hesitates this time, at that name spoken in such a desperate voice. But-

“Karai.” Oh, great. Space Hero is yammering again. “Karai, don’t do this. Splinter- he’s your father. Your true father!”

No.

No, that’s too far.

To think that the murderer who splintered her family apart, who left her father bitter and angry with too much hurt to give out and not enough people to give it to- to think that she could ever be his.

“LIAR! You’d say anything to save him!”

Leo shakes his head frantically, eyes wide and pleading- she didn’t give him enough credit before. He’s a good liar. “No! No, I swear it. He’s your father- Hamato Yoshi!”

“If you won’t be silent-” She draws her sword on him, and for the first time he looks scared underneath its glare. “Then I’ll silence you.”

And she swings.

CLANG!

“Ugh- what-” Tiger Claw. If this fucking cat steps in her way one more time she’ll make him into a fur rug.

“Master Shredder desires them alive. He wants the pleasure of finishing the turtles himself.”

So she does the work, and he gets to make the kill. Funny how that works.

“...Fine. Let’s deal with the rat first.”

Raph starts to life at that, struggling violently in his bindings. “Leave him ALONE, Karai- argh- or you’re gonna answer to me!” 

Ooh, she’s really scared. Regardless of birthright, it seems the turtles really do think of Hamato as their father. At least enough to disregard their own safety, which is wearing down at the same rate as her patience.

The rat sways woozily as she stands over him, head bowed. He reaches into his robes with one clumsy hand, and- oh. 

“My sons- go, NOW!”

And she loses the turtles.

Now… she might be scared.

**********

“I will ask you once more. Why are the rat’s ninja not tied up with their master.”

“It wasn’t my fault! I had them, I swear, Splinter just- he-”

“He bested you. Even with Tiger Claw at your side, the greatest assassin on an entire continent, you’ve failed me.”

Her eyes burn at his tone. Indifferent. Disappointed. Not a word about how she took down his enemy of over a decade with that dart, delivered him faithfully when she could have ended them all then and there. “I got the rat.”

“Silence. Your sympathies for the turtles have gone excused this far, but no longer. You’re distracted. Unbalanced. And your place as my daughter does not excuse that carelessness.”

She bites her tongue until she tastes blood.

“Follow me.” He strides into the great hall without a glance back at her, eyes fixed on Splinter where he lies curled on the ground. He’s convulsing faintly, eyes half-lidded under the poison’s influence. “Bradford, Xever. Leave us.”

Then, his fists clenching: “Hamato Yoshi.”

Karai glares down at him with as much hate as she can hold.

“So you have come to this- a wretched rat man waiting to be put out of his misery.”

“At least I do not wear a mask… hh- hiding what little humanity I have left.”

“It is because of YOU that I wear this mask!” 

The rage in her veins surges. When she was younger she’d trace over the scars on her father’s face, tiny palms flattening over the marred skin, and vow that if she could, she’d bring that pain back tenfold on Hamato Yoshi. She finally has that chance.

Splinter huffs. “All these years, you continue to deceive yourself…” His eyes flick up to Karai, boring into her. “And everyone around you.”

In an instant Shredder’s blades are drawn. “You dare- now, it ENDS!”

This isn’t right.

This isn’t right-

“-No, Father!”

His head whips back to face her. “You would stop me?”

She falters under his gaze, the threat in it. “You’d kill your greatest enemy while he’s poisoned and chained? What about honor? Everything you taught me?!”

Tiger Claw nods next to her, and her fear eases. “The girl is right, Master Shredder.”

“Hmph.” Father draws his blade, hovering over the rat for a long moment before stepping away. “Very well. Gather the Foot; I will offer Hamato Yoshi one last fight.”

She holds her head high when she walks past Splinter, so he’s out of her line of vision.

“Why… did you help me?”

“I don’t know,” She spits. “Maybe because you look so pathetic.”

“You have your mother’s spirit. So fierce, and yet… so scared.”

“NEVER SPEAK OF MY MOTHER AGAIN!” He recoils at her volume. “You ruined my family. You ruined all of our lives.”

As she stalks out of the throne room, she can hear him whisper after her, voice strained and urgent.

“No. It was… Oroku Saki. O- Oroku… Saki…”

**********

These turtles are so damn slippery. She’s lost them for the second time in one day, the rat too, and as she runs she knows that she cannot let them go again.

“If they escape, Shredder will have all your hides.”

Tiger Claw squints at her from the next rooftop over. “And what about you, Karai?” The words are a warning, not a slight.

They do escape.

The henchmen are punished, beaten and berated and promised that the next mistake will cost their lives.

And Karai?

Father doesn’t look at her with pride anymore. Not satisfaction at her prowess, or anger at her defiance, but nothing. His eyes flit over her like a stain on the carpet. This is a temporary punishment, and not an unfamiliar one. In recent years his attention has always been dependent on her successes.

He doesn’t notice when she sneaks out (or maybe he doesn’t care), but in either case she’s crouched just a billboard away from Hamato and the turtles.

“You did it, Sensei.”

“With the help of my brave sons, yes. We all did it.”

Oh, spare her. 

“But what about Karai?”

“I still can’t believe that evil witch is your daughter.” Ouch. O’Neil’s got bite. “...um- sorry to be so honest.”

“Perhaps one day, she will believe the truth. But that is her decision.”

So Leo wasn’t lying. At least, Leo doesn’t think he was lying.

She spends the rest of the day milling over the rat’s words. After all these years, you continue to deceive yourself… and everyone around you. How Shredder had seemed so eager to silence him, to stop his eyes from meeting hers again.

Father’s footsteps echo behind her.

“What is it that troubles you, Karai?”

Until she turns, his voice sounds just like it used to, gruff and warm and paternal. It’s like he’s asking her why she’s crying over homework.

But then she faces him, sees just a stripe of mottled skin beneath the kuro kabuto, and the illusion drops. 

It’s only them. He never used to wear the stupid thing when they were alone.

“I want to know the truth. The truth about my mother… and Splinter.”

She could swear the temperature of the room drops a few degrees. “You know the truth, my daughter. Hamato Yoshi took your mother away.”

Tiger Claw’s dramatic reappearance interrupts their conversation, and she wishes that his simple answer was enough to convince her, but-

This isn’t right. Something’s not right.

It hits her as she and the assassin are crossing the rooftops away from the lair, still brooding over his special promotion of being the one to end Leo and his posse. “You’ve faced the turtles in battle before and lost! What exactly is your grand plan for revenge here?”

“To destroy warriors such as these, you don’t strike at their limbs.” He stops and turns back towards her, claws glinting in the moonlight. “You go for their heart.”

“Tch- And what does an overgrown cat know of the heart?”

“No more than you, little one. Why do you think the Shredder sent you with me?”

Ah.

He's still shunning her- she's here because of what she knows.

“...Because I know them. I know the places they go, I know their weaknesses, their friends…” She straightens, gripping her wakizashi in its sheath. She’s getting her chance after all. “April O’Neil and Casey Jones.”

“The riders of the worm,” Tiger Claw growls. “They will all pay for what they did to me.”

Her heart’s pounding the entire way over to Murakami’s, jackrabbit-fast by the time the cat holds one talon to the older man’s throat and promises that any words other than the location of Casey and April will be his last.

She tells herself it’s excitement, pushes down the sick feeling just under her ribs at the way Murakami trembles in fear.

It doesn’t take her long to catch up to April. She’s gotten faster, though.

“O’Neil.” 

April draws her tessen immediately, face steely. “You want to do this, Karai? Fine. But I’m warning you, I’ve been training with Master Splinter big-time, and I’m ready to kick your butt.”

It takes superhuman effort not to roll her eyes, but she forces her expression into one of almost frantic innocence. 

“I didn’t come to fight. I came to talk.”

The redhead falters, raising an eyebrow. “Oh. Well… I’ve been trained in that too.”

The kunoichi makes sure to take her time starting her confession, lots of guilty stares at the ground and hand-wringing. “All my life, I was raised to believe that Shredder was my father. That Splinter was the enemy. So when Leo told me that Shredder had lied, I couldn’t accept it. But then-”

She swallows, glancing away in earnest. “I began to have doubts about his honor.”

“Doubts about the evil leader of the evil ninja clan? Really?”

Oh, save it. “Yes. Even now, he's sent Tiger Claw to destroy the turtles. He’s trying to use me to set a trap for them. But- I can’t… even if it means betraying the Shredder.”

April’s eyes widen. She stays stock still for a moment, never looking away from Karai. It’s like she’s analyzing something, feeling out this new information, and for a moment the older girl is actually a little nervous.“...I actually-”

“GET AWAY FROM HER!” 

Donatello and Leo clamber up onto the rooftop, the taller turtle immediately pushing towards Karai, but April stops him.

“Wait! You- I can’t believe I’m doing this- you have to listen to what she has to say.”

“I believe you, Leonardo,” Karai cuts in in a rush. “...I believe that Splinter is my true father.”

This feels easier than it should. Almost honest.

She’s always been a good liar.

April glances between the turtles. That feeling of being sized up is back, even though the girl’s back is turned. “I believe that she believes you.”

“I believe… April.” Donnie adds lamely.

Karai lets her gaze land on Leo, watches as he visibly fights with himself. He may have finally, actually learned. A strange part of her hopes he has.

“This…” 

He looks up, brightening. “This is great! I knew you’d come around.” He hurries over and takes her hand, practically radiating excitement. “We’ll take you to the lair to see Master Splinter.”

Idiot.

Before she knows it, she’s being tugged along behind him, April trailing with an amused smile and Donnie looking worried at the rear. They’re notably less apprehensive than she expected, but she can count on one hiccup in the plan-

Raphael doesn’t like her.

And he’s not going to like this.

**********

“I DON’T BELIEVE THIS!”

Mikey’s clattering around on the other side of the lair trying to spoon-feed an unconscious Casey some soup, but he peeks over at Raph’s yell.

“What have you guys done?!? What world do you live in that it’s okay to bring the princess of the Foot Clan to our secret lair?”

Leo frowns, distracted. “...What happened to Casey?”

“Tiger Claw threw him off a building. And YOU-” Raph wheels back around to jab a finger at the eldest’s plastron, “-just brought his partner in crime home for dinner!”

There’s no need for her to defend herself against his hate, but for some reason she feels the need to. He’s looking at her like she’s about to…

To destroy their home, family and friends? Where could he have gotten that idea-

“Shredder lied to me!” She falters, trying to compose herself. “I didn’t know.”

“Did you know that I’m about to stick this sai right up your-”

“Raph, cut it out!” Leo shoves him back, putting himself physically between the two of them. “She understands now.”

Karai pulls the communicator from her gauntlet.

“She gets it. She knows the truth, Raph.”

Tap. 

Tiger Claw will arrive in less than ten minutes. She’ll have her revenge in less than ten minutes.

Leo's voice is rising in frustration. “Will you just listen?”

…In less than ten minutes she’ll lose the only semblance of a friend she’s had here- stop it. Father will be happy. He won’t have to hurt over this anymore, and neither will she.

“I’ve heard enough from you and your girlfriend,” Raph snarls, brandishing both sai. “She’s probably leading the Shredder here right now!”

“Enough!”

Everyone straightens to attention at the voice, steeped in authority. The rat. Karai sees as his eyes land on her, widen and then narrow almost imperceptibly. “Miwa.”

“Splinter.” She bows for good measure, even as a voice in her head screams wrong! He doesn’t deserve that respect!

“...”

“...Come with me.”

The dojo she follows him into is sunny. There’s a tree, a real tree, rays of light filtering through its leaves to give the room a soft green glow; nothing like the training room at home, dark and metal and lit by candles.

It’s beautiful. She actually feels bad they’ll never see it again.

“I retain very little from my old life,” Standing at a set of shelves across the room, Splinter takes a small photo off and holds it out. “But this I will never let go… my daughter.”

There’s a man, presumably the rat- same eyes, same reserved sort of imposingness. And next to him…

.

.

.

Her vision tunnels.

That’s-

That’s her mother. She knows that face so well, knows exactly the way the corners of her mouth crease, how one eyebrow rests just slightly higher than the other, and here she is, smiling…

She knows this photo. One half of this photo, at least. And Shredder had always told her that in its un-ripped form, he was standing next to Shen. He loved her. She loved him. The picture had been destroyed by Hamato Yoshi so that all he had left was this fragment.

Father lied.

She chokes on her next words, searching desperately for some evidence of tampering, some clue or promise that everything she’s known is still real.

“I- I can’t believe it... you’re telling the truth!” 

The room tilts on its axis, sunlight filtering up through the floor now, walls twisting in her vision. It’s like her surroundings are some mutilated reflection of reality. Or, more accurately, vice versa.

“All these years, the Shredder has been lying to me.”

“Wait-” It’s the turtles. Leo’s voice has gone all high and confused, the way it does when his trust gets the best of him, because once again it has. “I thought you did believe it! If you didn’t believe it… why did you come down here?”

She swallows helplessly, voice barely a whisper: 

“...Father. What have I done?”

“You had to see with your own eyes. You had to learn the truth for yourself.”

“...You knew I was lying.” Of course- how stupid did she think he was? How could she expect to just show up on their figurative doorstep and become part of the family with no questions asked?

No- no, she hadn’t wanted that, she wanted to- she wanted to take them down, she had to-

“No doubt the Shredder’s forces are on their way.”

She can practically feel the air shift, the waves of betrayal and hatred (Raph, surely) and hurt (Leo) seeping in with the guilt and terror. “Tiger Claw is tracking me.”

“I TOLD you!”

“Karai-” The oldest turtle’s eyes are impossibly wide, hand outstretched to her.

“There’s no time to argue! I- I have to get out of here, I can- I- hah- I can lead Tigerclaw away!” Fuck. In one fell swoop she’s going to lose her family, true and otherwise. Why should they ever accept her now? How can she ever return to Fa- to him knowing what he did?

“Go. Take Karai and watch over her.”

…What?

“I will stay with April and attend to Casey.” 

Karai lurches toward the door, shame and horror rushing through every vein now, but Splinter catches her shoulder. She can’t look in his eyes. She doesn’t want to see what they might hold.

“You are who you choose to be,” He doesn’t sound like he hates her. She’s tearing up. She still can’t look at him. “Not what others make you.”

The words ring in her head as she sprints through the sewers with the turtles, following Michelangelo’s lead to an underground butcher’s storehouse. It’s far from the lair, about as far as they could get before Tiger Claw caught up, dark, and the heavy scent of deep freeze and raw meat limits his most deadly weapon- smell.

Maybe she underestimated Mikey. Given the circumstances, he couldn’t have given them much more of a tactical advantage.

She stays in the shadows when the cat shows up- as he pretty much pummels the turtles- at Leo’s request.

No sense in you fighting us when you don’t have to, right?

Only once Tiger Claw is looming over the leader, sword drawn, does she drop from the ceiling beams.

“Karai,” He growls, “Would you like the honor of finishing him?”

For a split second, Leo’s gaze flicks up to her.

She closes her eyes, touching the hilt of the wakizashi at her hip. It was her thirteenth birthday present. Under the wrappings it reads, Oroku Karai.

“I have no honor.”

There’s a barely audible intake of breath in front of the two of them. A faint shifting of feet.

Her eyes snap open. “But that’s about to change.”

She leaves the sword sheathed. He’ll expect a slash of it, not a kick. Her foot swings wide of Tiger Claw’s ear. He folds backwards, the meat cutter’s saw skimming the fur on the back of his neck. Swinging down from the rafters again, she braces her sword, aims it right at his chest-

He catches the blade. Slams her down onto the metal table, saw buzzing deafeningly beside her ear.

She springs back up, dodging his claws, and pulls a spinning kick at his head. Blow after blow land, but nothing’s strong enough-

The turtles are stirring again. Out of the corner of her eye she sees Leo stand, settling back into a fighting stance and ready to jump back in. Thank god. Maybe she’ll make it out of this ali-

“AGhh-” A paw punches hard against her chest, hurling her backwards against the storeroom’s metal wall. Ow. 

“Ddd-don’t go aft-”

The buzzing of the meat cutter fades.

Chapter Text

Karai knows exactly where she is when she wakes up.

She’s been dumped unceremoniously onto the floor of Shredder’s throne room. He’s at the end of the great hall, back to her.

“She has betrayed you, Master Shredder. She fought alongside the turtles.”

She betrayed? Her whole life has been a betrayal. “TELL ME THE TRUTH! Splinter is my father, isn’t he?!”

“Father” doesn’t yell back. He straightens, walks toward her with measured steps. He’s- there’s hurt in his eyes, now, too.

“...Yes. Hamato Yoshi is your true father.”

The vertigo returns at the words coming from his mouth.

“Tiger Claw.” Leave us, he’ll say. 

She’ll have to fight him. She thinks she'll lose.

“Take her away.”  

There’s no point in fighting it as Karai’s shoved into the cell, as Shredder turns his back on her, like she was never worth his gaze to begin with. At first she’s just too stunned to struggle. She only screams after him when she realizes what she is.

Bait.

**********

It’s been three days. He’s visited just once, to bring her food.

(Her favorites, yakitori and curry rice. She kicked the plate back at him and didn’t say a word.)

“...Karai.”

She can hear that the helmet’s off, and it takes impossible effort not to turn and see his face exposed. Maybe she’s scared because it’ll hold hatred, but she thinks, more likely, it’s because it’ll hold love. Or something love-adjacent, something to drag her back into the blissful ignorance of her old life, and the fact that she doesn’t immediately hate the idea is enough for her to banish it from her mind.

“You must know that I never wanted this to happen.”

“...”

“Splinter is your father, yes. But it would’ve been wrong to allow you to be brought up by scum like him.”

Scum that protected her after she brought him nothing but harm. Took her in knowing she’d betray him. Trusted her after it all.

“I did what I had to do, what I knew was right. I… I hope that one day you will understand that.”

God, he sounds upset. Actually upset. Karai tongues silently at the coin hidden in her mouth.

“Fine,” He growls. “Don’t talk. But this streak of disobedience will not last, I can promise you that.”

He slams the door to the dungeon on his way out, its metallic resonance rattling the bar she’s sawed through. Just a couple more passes with the coin and it pops free.

Just get out. She can come back later to finish this business, she just needs out-

“UGh-” An annoyingly familiar paw clenches around her skull, pitching her back to the dungeon floor. Her makeshift pry bar clatters down in front of her.

“Where do you think you’re going, little one?”

The ensuing fight is about as evenly matched as the last time she faced off with the big cat. Her style’s always been to use speed and agility over force, ducking and weaving until she can strike precisely and her opponent’s tired themselves out. Tiger Claw’s larger than most of the people she fights, but worse he’s impossible to throw off balance and equally calculating in his attacks. It’s like hitting a brick wall.

When she comes to, the cell’s the same. All except for the heavy shackles now chaining her to the ground.

Shredder's watching her from the other side of the door. He hasn't brought her food. “Karai. I wish you could understand. Everything I have done is for our clan’s honor. Why do you insist on hurting me?”

Unbelievable. 

“Have you nothing to say to me, daughter?”

She straightens as far as the chains will allow, wheeling on him. 

“I am not. Your. DAUGHTER!”

“Did I not raise you? Protect you when so many others wanted to do you harm? Teach you everything you know?”

“You did everything but tell me the truth. That you- that you stole me.”

“I took you in. He was not fit to-”

“He was my FATHER! He is my father. And you,” Karai tugs on the chains, forcing him to notice again the cuffs around her wrists. His eye catches on them until she speaks again. “Are dead to me.”

That finally shuts him up. She watches as his face tightens, contorting with rage and a vengeance whose object is a mystery to her, then smooths into a cold distaste. He jams the mask plate back onto the kabuto and stalks towards the stairs.

There’s no last warning before he leaves, no pleading question of why, why, how, and somehow it fills her with dread more than his threats.

Father’s silent when he’s planning.

**********

Against every self-preservation instinct they don’t seem to have, the turtles do get her out. 

Karai stares at the two oldest brothers through the cell bars, raising an eyebrow even though her tone is drenched in relief. “Took you long enough.”

“Well, we got tired of waiting for you to break out on your own,” Leo chuckles, leaning on the cell door. Oh, that’s right. He’s a fifteen year-old boy.

“Quit it with the hero act, Fearless. She’s gonna find it just as lame as we do.”

Leo flushes, scuffing at the ground with his toe. “Just- keep an eye out for Foot. And the Shredder, okay?”

Famous last words. The turtles neglected to take out a fair few henchmen on their way in. Somehow, though, she makes it out of Shredder’s headquarters, springing out of the sewer on Raph and Leo’s heels to see Mikey trudging towards them, clutching his arm.

“MIKEY!” Raph’s on him in a second, trying to pry his hand away from the injury. The youngest turtle just waves him off, but with a conspicuously trembling upper lip.

“I’m good! It’s not my water balloon throwing arm… but- ow.”

They make another unlikely escape from Tiger Claw and the horde of Footbots he sends after them, with Leo having to physically drag her away from the fight and into the Shellraiser. 

"It's not worth it, Karai. We'll be back."

He’s watching. He doesn’t chase them, doesn’t even stir from his post on the rooftop. It’s a bad sign.

Once she’s back safely in the van, and can finally catch her breath, she starts: “Guys… Leo-”

“-I know,” He cuts in easily. Smiles at her from the rearview. “You’re not good at saying thank you.”

Once safely back in the lair, everyone starts to disperse and settle down after the battle. It seems the attention will finally be off of her, which she appreciates-

“Michelangelo! What happened?”

Oh. She hadn’t really thought about seeing Splinter again. Seeing her father.

“”S just a scratch, Sensei. You should see the other guy.”

“What have you boys done? I thought I told you-” 

Mikey sidles over from in front of her. The rat man gasps, taking her in as she shrinks under the scrutiny. “Miwa.”

They’re both frozen for a moment, until she’s pulled forward by some subconscious calling, and suddenly her legs are moving and her arms are opening and- she’s clinging to him, face buried into his robes that are so much more worn and soft than what she’s used to, not daring to breathe until he hugs her back just as tight and doesn’t say a word.

She wonders if this is just what hugging your father is supposed to feel like, simple and safe and all-encompassing, and decides just as quickly that she doesn’t care. She’s going to save this feeling as long as she can.

The ninja master doesn’t mention the damp stain on his robes when she finally pulls away, just like she doesn’t mention the tear he wipes from his cheek.

**********

It’s decided that Karai will sleep in the dojo. The permanence of this setup is unclear, but she’s not about to question having a roof over her head while the leader of the most dangerous ninja clan on the continent is after her.

She leaves her armour in a neat pile by the bedroll- the same way she’d normally lay it out on her dresser- and sits to meditate- the same way she always does- until a hesitant knock sounds on the dojo’s door.

“Karai? It’s Leo, I got you some blankets.”

She slides back the folding panels to reveal the oldest turtle peeking out from behind a stack of bedding. 

“...Settling in?”

“As well as I can be, I guess. But I don’t want to be- you know, I’m-”

“I know. It’s okay.” He places down his gifts. “Mikey says that if you ‘want a nightlight’, there’s candles in the cabinet over there. But there’s no power in here ‘cause Donnie still hasn’t done the wiring.”

She nods. There’s a long, excruciatingly awkward silence. That’s new.

“I’m-” He shifts from foot to foot, picking at the skin of his thumb. “I’m glad we got you back. I was worried.”

Karai’s seen that shaken look on his face before, but it’s never been directed at her. It’s the same face he makes when Mikey gets hit a little too hard in a battle, or when Raph throws himself into the fight a little too hastily.

“...I’m fine, Leo. He didn’t do anything to me.”

He nods quickly. Still, though, he fidgets, and after what looks like a brief debate he rushes forward, sweeping her into a hug.

Two in one day- that’s got to be a record for her, at least in the past decade. Shredder was only affectionate like this when she was very little, and even as a child a ruffle of hair or a hand on her shoulder were more standard gestures. 

She and Shini had embraced exactly three times- the night the witch’s father passed, on Karai’s thirteenth birthday, and the morning she left for America.

“He could have,” Leo mumbles. He relaxes noticeably when she wraps an arm around his shell. It still feels unnatural, but it’s for his sake, not hers. “He’s not the type of guy to just… accept betrayal.”

“He’s got fucked-up priorities, who knows what he was planning. But- I’m okay. I promise.”

“...Okay.” The turtle takes a long breath before he lets her go, shaking his hands a couple times as they settle at his sides. “You should get some rest, I’ll go.” He stops halfway to the door, waffling for something to say, and then just… waves. “Uh- goodnight.”

“Good… night?”

This is going to take some getting used to.

**********

“Come on, Mikey. Focus.”

Leo swings at the orange-masked turtle with his swords pressed end to end, groaning in frustration as Mikey dodges each attack with his hands behind his back. “Gonna have to try harder than that, bro. I’m in the zone.”

Karai’s only watched training this morning, and so far it seems the turtles’ spars are closer to play-fighting than anything. She catches Mikey actually slap Leo after breezing past his katana, sending a shit-eating grin to his opponent and springing backwards.

When the oldest finally lands a kick to his plastron, knocking him to the floor, he turns on the waterworks. She at least recognizes that as a classic little brother move. “Ow, dude!”

“I- Sorry, I didn’t-” Leo’s cut off by a water balloon to the face.

“Aw yeah, son! Never underestimate the water balloon arm.”

After that, training devolves into a wrestling match involving all four brothers with impressive speed. She ducks away from three ninja stars, half of Donnie’s bo, and a wildly swung punch from Raph before Splinter calls, “Yame!”

“My sons- and daughter,” He smiles a little, but just as fast his expression is stern again. “That is enough for today.”

The turtles stand and bow, Karai with them.

Leo glances back at her as they file out. “Karai, you coming?”

“...In a minute.”

Splinter waits until his sons have gone and the door is shut before addressing her. “Not what you expected?”

“I admit it’s a little weird being with… people I was told were my enemies.” She stares at his family photo on the shelf, a picture of peace and happiness. “What really happened between you and Shredder, and my mother?”

“I’m afraid it goes much deeper than our rivalry over your mother.” The rat man scooches a low table and two mats into the center of the dojo. He motions for her to sit. 

“The bitter feud between the Hamato and Foot clans has lasted centuries. Oroku Saki was the son of the enemy, but he was just a child, so my father gave him shelter. We were raised as brothers, and rivals in all things-” He chuckles a little at that, gesturing to dishevelled aftermath of the turtles’ fight. “As brothers are. But that rivalry soon turned bitter when we met Tang Shen, your mother.”

She swallows a lump in her throat at the name, and sees his eyes have gone glassy as he prepares the tea.

“Jealousy became hatred when Saki learned of his true heritage. He swore vengeance and rebuilt the Foot Clan. One night... he struck. The blow that was meant for me- ahem-  took your mother instead. Shredder blamed me, and in his rage he burned our home to the ground, leaving me to my fate.”

Splinter studies the pot as the leaves steep, brows furrowing. “I thought you were lost in the fire. He took you away from me.”

It takes a long moment before she trusts herself to speak.

Karai’s seething. The depths of Shredder’s betrayal, the lengths he went to, hadn’t even been clear to her until now. “After all this time, haven’t you wanted revenge?”

“After all this time, I have learned revenge only leads to more pain.”

“But- I’ve seen you fight, Father! You could take him out!” How can he be content to let that monster live? After what he took from them? This rage is so familiar, she doesn’t understand how it can’t be shared.

“We are safe here, and we are finally together again, my daughter. That is all that matters.” He pours a cup of tea, extending it to her with a pointed look. His voice takes on that same stern tone. “Not revenge.”

It’s easier for him to let all his hurt go unpunished. It’s been well over a decade for him. But… just weeks ago Shredder still had her living his fantasy. She’s known more lies than truth.

There’s no point in arguing now, though, not when her father’s eyes are closed and he’s sipping his tea with the clear hope that she does the same, so she finishes her cup with him in silence. 

It’s not difficult to look at ease the rest of the day, drifting through the various rooms of the lair and exchanging brief (and considerably awkward) words with whoever she runs into. Mikey challenges her to a few games of air hockey, a game she’s frustratingly bad at. Donnie offers her a bowl of ramen when he emerges from his lab around noon. They eat in silence. Karai notes where the kunai and shuriken are kept.

She’ll need a proper arsenal to do what she needs to. 

Leo’s the only potential threat to this plan, due either to his inexplicable worry for her or the “no-killing” rule he shares with the rest of his idealistic family, and so she avoids him. Splinter didn’t seem to suspect her after their tea time, which she ended with an impressively genuine statement that she after everything, all she wants is peace. 

She didn’t clarify how she’d get it.

It’s nearly dawn when she sneaks out, finding Leo peacefully asleep and Splinter’s room closed off and silent. The other turtles’ living spaces are similarly hushed. 

Things are looking goo-

“This is a bad idea, princess.”

Of all people.

Why is Raph the one getting in her way?

“Don’t try to stop me,” She warns as he drops down from the ceiling beams. “I’ll fight you if I have to, and you know I’ll win.”

The hothead glares at her. He’s wearing all his gear, plus a pouch strapped to his back. Its contents sound metal. “You know, the part of me that holds grudges has absolutely no problem letting you run off on a suicide mission to destroy Shredder. And the part of me that really fuckin’ hates the guy doesn’t care either.”

“Perfect. Go back to sleep, and no one needs to know.”

Raph groans, crossing his arms. “I wasn’t done. No matter how annoying and pretentious I find you, you’re my sister. I’m not letting you do this on your own.”

“I’m going to kill him.”

“I know. Or you’re going to die trying. So let’s weigh your options here.”

“You’re…fine with that?”

“Only the first part.” When she raises an eyebrow, he huffs and pulls one of his sai out of its holster, spinning it between his fingers. “Shredder is never going to stop hunting us. I’m not letting him hurt my family again, and three swords are better than one. You’re taking me with you.”

They face off silently. Unstoppable force against immovable object.

Or so Raph thinks.

“...You’ve got weapons?”

“Loads.”

“Noone else knows you followed me?”

“I’ve trained to be a ninja for fifteen years- I know how to sneak out.”

Karai nods once, gesturing to the open tunnel in front of them. “Seems like I don’t have a choice, then. After you.”

His half-scowl turns to an expression of determination, and he shoves his sai back in his belt as she reaches into hers. 

He’s just about to leap off the subway platform when the dart hits him, in the bare patch of neck above the edge of his carapace.

“Ow, what the-” His eyes widen as he sways, gaze darting to her. “Shit. Karai, I’m ss-serious. Don’- don’t-” He crumples to the ground gradually, then all at once, eyes fluttering in an attempt to remain open.

“I’m sorry,” She murmurs as she steps past him, sticking her blowdart gun back in her belt. “It isn’t personal- it’s just not your fight.”

She’s got less than half an hour until the tranquilizer wears off.

Time to make her peace.

**********

Getting through the guards is child’s play.

(Literally- Father used to train her on them, doubling the soldiers she’d fight until she couldn’t knock them all down. Her record was thirty-two.)

The Shredder is waiting for her on his throne when she drops into the great hall. She lost a handful of her throwing weapons on her way in to the building, but the kunai tucked in the sash at her hip can do more than enough damage on its own.

A thought drifts through her subconscious, fleeting, as if her mind’s wandering of its own accord. His helmet hasn’t been polished.

“Daughter.” A nod. As if this is a casual rendezvous. A reunion.

“Liar,” She shoots back easily. She lets him stand and approach, close enough that she could jam her sword clean through his neck. He looms closer. He used to lean down like this and kiss her forehead- when she still threw fits over having to go to bed. The memory jams itself behind her eyes, lining up messily with the masked, razor-sharp silhouette before her.

“...You won’t kill me, Karai.”

“I'd do worse.” 

Kunai flipping in her hand, she swings her arm down, aimed below his jaw.

He pulls back lightning-fast, but it's only his fist that arcs over her head. The tekko-kagi stay in his gauntlets.

"FIGHT ME LIKE YOU MEAN IT!" It's a phrase she'd use in training, when she was young enough that he went easy on her. The childish indignation the words used to hold are nothing like how she screams it now.

"Very well," His face darkens suddenly. He slams his knee into her gut, stepping forwards again as she gasps and dragging her up by her turtleneck. She scrabbles and kicks for a minute, before her foot flies up to meet his nose and she can flip back out of his hold. It's broken, if the stream of blood and crumpled look of the feature are anything to go by.

She lands another hit, on his abdomen, and rolls to the ground. His balance is off to the right. She pulls a roundhouse to the back of his neck. He catches her foot and drags her towards him, his punch breezing past her ribcage as she twists out of his grasp.

Stab. Chop. Slam. 

He really did teach her everything she knows. Everything he knew.

Karai dodges three swings before he cuts her cheek. It’s deep. Not quite to the bone.

He’s not her father by a single drop of blood. But she’s his daughter in all the blood she’s spilt.

She thrusts at his shoulder joint now. Artery.

He pulls an axe kick and she darts out of its path, jabbing at his side and leaping onto his back with the sash from her waist looping around his neck.

“I won’t allow you to make this mistake. To throw away your home, your birthright, for the likes of them. And some day,” He practically swats her off, tossing the sash to the side hurling her down at in front of his throne. “You will be grateful to me.”

“Never,” Karai hisses, kicking hard at the back of his knee. It buckles. She dives past the backwards swing of his tekko-kagi, grasping one prong of the kabuto and wrenching it off his head.

She’s going to look him in the eye.

“There’s one thing I should thank you for.” Her wakizashi’s at his jugular in an instant, now exposed. He rests on one bent knee, blades frozen pointed at her heart. “You taught me how to kill. And you taught me well.” 

Father meets her eye and raises his chin.“You’re everything I hoped you’d be, Karai." He looks proud in a way she hasn't seen in years. "You’re perfect.”

Her vision’s blurry. A tear slices down her cheek, burning first at the insides of her eyes and then at the cut along her cheekbone.

“Goodbye.”

.

.

.

Her sword only gets the chance to twitch against his neck.

A paw wrenches her backward. A gun presses to her forehead. Father stands and wipes the blood from his face.

Karai stays conscious, and screams until her throat is a shredded mess.

The turtles and Splinter arrive, fight, win, lose. She had known she was bait for them, was sure the Shredder would be ready for their rescue, and though he wan't the first time he is now.

She didn’t think the fish and the fisherman could lose their catch.

It’s a long time before she hears her human voice again.

Chapter Text

September 6, 2015- One year later

The process of getting a brain worm out, Karai discovers, is just as unpleasant as the process of getting it in.

Extremely.

She gags at the sight of the slimy thing squirming on the ground in front of her, toothy mouth grasping for its host, and looks away as she stabs it with her kunai. Her head is shrieking in pain, nose bleeding and throat scratched raw from the rather extensive battle with her little parasite, but her thoughts feel her own for the first time in… 

She can’t remember how long it’s been.

Hm.

She’s shivering violently, now- a byproduct of her cold-bloodedness, being sopping wet from her trip down the sewer drain, and having lost most of her body fat in a year of scavenging and endless fighting- and Karai realizes that she doesn’t know where to go.

The lair, her brain supplies. To Splinter and her brothers. It’s really the only choice that makes sense.

(She misses them intensely, all of a sudden. In a year of being hunted, mind controlled, and technically homeless, her memory of the lair was the only thing that brought her any comfort. The idea that someday, she could go back.)

Today isn’t that day.

Which leaves her with the issue of having no friends in New York, no allies separate from Shredder, and no money or means of communication.

All she has is… April O’Neil’s address.

**********

It’s a ten minute trip from the section of the sewer she’d crawled out of to April’s apartment (not counting the half-hour she spent debating whether to go at all). She stays underground as much as she can, only popping up to the rooftops once she’s on the girl’s street.

Karai makes sure her drop onto the fire escape isn’t silent. Best not to give April a heart attack on top of everything else. Her rap on the window is tentative.

What am I doing what am I doing why would she let me-

The window slides open, and April’s head pops through- her hair’s down. She’s in pajamas. And she doesn’t look half as startled as she should.

"..."

“...You’re alive?”

“I’m myself again! It’s not- I’m not here to kidnap you or anything, I’m-” The kunoichi stumbles over her hasty reassurances, shuddering from the chill of evening. This was a horrible idea. “I need a place to stay. I… don’t know anyone else.”

April just shakes the faint bewilderment off her face and nods.

Nods, pulls the window all the way open for her, and flits out of the room to return with a towel in hand.

Karai stares hard at her as she wraps the towel around herself. She's rustling around in a linen closet now.

“You’re not going to ask me what happened? Why I tried to kill you guys? Twice?”

“More like why you tried to kill us again,” April corrects absently, tucking a pillow under her arm. At the hunch of the older girl’s shoulders, her face turns sympathetic. “I know you were mind controlled. We never suspected anything else. I’m more surprised you didn’t drown after being flushed through however many feet of sewer drain.:

“Yeah, well. I’m a good swimmer,” She murmurs, but she can’t help but fixate on April’s statement. They trusted her. They trusted her.

It probably shouldn’t be such a revolutionary thought, considering they are her family, but then again, Karai doesn’t have a great track record with families and honesty.

“My dad’s away right now, so we don’t have to worry about him coming home to find, uh- you. You can take the couch.”

As April leads her into the living room and starts tugging a sheet across the couch, she can’t help but blurt another incredulous demand. 

“How do you know I’m not still being… influenced?” When April just looks unimpressed, she elaborates. “I’m not. But you didn’t question it when I showed up.”

“I could sense you. Or, I could sense your mind? When you still had the brain worm it was all just static. Turbulence, sort of.”

And Karai gapes, because it turns out O’Neil is actually psychic and can probably actually read her mind.

At the thought, the girl smiles teasingly (it feels a little strange between the two of them). “I’ll keep out of your head, don’t worry. I don’t go poking around people’s minds unless they’re okay with it.”

“...I appreciate it.” 

With her second question out of the way, her conscience provides a third. It’s been eating at her since… well, since she had the capacity to feel guilt for her actions.

“Are the turtles okay?”

April winces. Shit. Shit shit shit what did she do-

“They’re… freaked out. Those traps were, like, really messed up.”

She wishes her memories of the night were hazy, or gone all together, but they’re not. She remembers exactly how Mikey cried when it seemed he was going to be doused in mutagen, exactly how long it took Raphael to crumple once the heaters in his cell were cranked up. “Okay. I’m s- okay. But physically, they’ll be all right?”

“Raph’s got a nasty case of heat stroke, and Donnie was sort of catatonic when I left, but give it some time and they’ll be back to their usual annoying selves. You didn’t do anything that can’t be fixed.”

That last sentence has a double meaning that Karai really doesn’t believe.

Neither of them speak much after that, and April makes two mugs of hot cocoa as Karai sits bundled up on the couch like a half-drowned toddler, blinking at the faded stripes of wallpaper across from her. It’s surreal, after the year she’s had, to be drinking Swiss Miss at O’Neil’s apartment in borrowed flannel pajamas.

The redhead gets herself ready for bed, drifting between her room and the bathroom through Karai’s temporary living space, then lingers in the doorframe, silent.

After a long moment: “The others don’t know you’re here. Or that you’re- uh, breathing.” 

“...No.” 

April nods slowly, that barely-familiar sense that she’s assessing something filling the room. It makes Karai’s arms break out in goosebumps. “Should they?”

The kunoichi just stares again. Are you ready to see them, is what the redhead means, and the fact that she’s even asking is enough to make her twice as grateful as she was already.

“No.”

“Okay, then.” Her host’s brow wrinkles as she seems to wrestle with her next words, like she’s trying not to disagree with Karai’s decision- after all, she is choosing to let her family continue assuming she’s dead, for a non-infinite but indefinite amount of time.

Finally: “There’s cereal in the top kitchen cupboards when you wake up.”

The light flicks off. April pads off to her room. In the distance a police siren shrieks, muted over blocks of brick and parked cars.

Weirdly enough, Karai’s sure she’ll fall asleep as soon as she closes her eyes. There’s a detached calm that’s settled over her- if beneath it is horror and pain and rage, as she suspects, then that’s bound to well up sooner or later, but for now she’s content to be unnaturally at peace.

Her eyelids fall shut. The siren fades into silence.

**********

Karai stays three days at the O’Neils’ apartment. April stays home from school the first day and visits the lair, reporting back that everyone is pretty much fine, as promised (a concerning turn of phrase, but she lets it slide). After that, though, the redhead needs to report back to her state-sanctioned learning, and so Karai is left to stare distantly out the window and read her awful romance novels.

Every few hours the thought that she should be doing something pops into her head, something of substance, but the urge always fizzles under… nothing. Everything. For the first time in a year she has true agency, and in the face of infinite opportunities she’s using it to consume 300 pages a day of truly horrible writing. In various pairs of checkered pajama pants.

What has happened to her life?

She catches sight of herself for the first time in the O’Neils’ bathroom mirror. It’s… unsettling.

She can remember most of the injuries she’s sustained over the past year (and there were many- snares cutting through her scales, a fair amount of head trauma, skinned knees), but they haven’t left any scars, courtesy of her new ability to shed. Her face has thinned out significantly, shadows now sitting under her cheekbones and bags tattooed under her eyes. 

Strangely, the worst part is her hair- it’s too long, and the bleached section is unevenly shaved now, just starting to go dark at the roots. It looks awful, with the shoddily trimmed bangs that brush her eyebrows, but also because her “father” used to cut her hair. Whoever was hacking away at her head while she was out wasn’t him, clearly.

That thought results in a frantic jolt back from the mirror, eyes burning, and a return to “Bare My Soul”. Or whatever her latest read is called.

On the fourth morning of “lying low”, April’s home until later than usual (study hall), and Karai announces confidently that she’s leaving.

“Oh!” The younger girl braces one knee up on the counter to reach the top shelf, shoving her box of Cheerios back to its rightful place. “Okay, where to?”

Karai sets down her coffee and announces less confidently that she doesn’t know.

“...Do you have somewhere to go?”

“Technically.”

April sighs exasperatedly. “But you’re still not going there.”

“I can’t just sit around your home anymore, O’Neil. I think my soul is starting to melt into your couch. I need to- I don’t know. Shredder is still out there, and for once he has no clue where I am or what I’m doing. I need to plan-”

“You need to rest!” April cuts in, eyebrows creeping up beyond her bangs. “You do get that you were, like, hunted and tortured for a year, right? That most people would take this time as an opportunity to sleep for a week and maybe cry?”

Karai stiffens a little at that summary of her recent experiences. “Don’t sugarcoat it.”

“Sorry, I’m sorry. I just- we’ve been really worried about you. And for good reason, even though I know the guys can be overbearing, but-” She bites her lip before continuing. “You’ve gotten yourself into trouble before from rushing into things. Don’t try it again.”

“...Okay.”

“So you’re not leaving to run off another revenge mission?”

“No,” She insists (a tad too defensively). “I need to make a phone call. And get a phone. And I don’t mean to shit on your hospitality, but I need something to eat besides Eggo waffles and peanut butter.”

After a long moment of contemplation, April seems to accept this reasoning. “Just… call me if you need anything, all right? ”

And so Karai packs her belongings (the clothes she wore to April’s house, and nothing more), tosses her couch sheets in the laundry, and dons a rather hodgepodge disguise of one of Mr. O’Neil’s jackets, a pair of ripped jeans, and an actual “I <3 NYC” t-shirt before giving April a farewell at the door.

“Thanks for the outfit. And for… you know. Everything else.”

“Any time,” The kunoichi-in-training smiles, waffling briefly between a hug and a handshake before patting her awkwardly on the shoulder. “We’ve had stranger visitors.”

**********

She can’t remember Shinigami’s number.

Of all the things Karai could have forgotten. Hundreds of experiences and people she would have been happy for the brain worm to gnaw away, and she can’t remember how to call her best friend.

The next time she sees Stinkman, she’s going to pummel him.

Leaning against the grimy brick of an alley with a fresh burner phone, she stares hard at the little grid of numbers before her. It should be muscle memory dialing Shini- it is, it just doesn’t feel like it- so she opts to jab out the most instinctive combination and see who picks up.

The dial tone vibrates through her eardrum, almost taunting- one, two, three, seven rings- until finally a raspy voice sounds on the other end.

“You’ve reached Morita Shinigami’s number, who is this?”

Whoever’s on the other end of the line, it’s not Shini. “...Her cousin. I need to speak with her on a family matter, where is she?”

“Away on business. She’s not available.”

“Away on business” without her phone means some probably-illegal, definitely-confidential mission, one that warrants leaving any form of identification with whoever this is. “Well, when will she be back? It’s serious.”

“Can’t say for sure.” Read: none of your business.

“All right- all right, fine. I need you to give her a message from me, then, as soon as she’s back. Tell her… Harmony’s back from her trip- that’s me- and wants to see her to discuss the funeral. She can call me at this number.”

“...I’ll pass it along.”

“Thank you.”

A faint *click* is the only farewell she receives.

There’s nothing left to do now but wait. And hope that Shini’s trip will be over within the week, rather than within the year.

In the meantime, she needs money, and subsequently food, and somewhere to sleep that isn’t an alley behind a 24-hour convenience store. Lucky for her, she knows where Shredder’s various partners keep their heaps of cash.

One heist later (it was almost laughably easy to snatch a stack of bills, and she preens a little to think that security would never be so lacking under her supervision) and with a sub and Ramune in hand, Karai’s scouting out hotels with ideal price-to-cockroach ratios. 

She settles on a minimally shitty place a block over from the closest sewer entrance to the lair. Maybe the proximity will give her the courage to see the turtles when her own will can’t. Maybe she’ll just run into them on the way to some mission, casually. Maybe they’ll just get some sort of mystical sense that she’s near and alive and show up at her hotel room.

Get a grip.

They wouldn’t even know her room number. Maybe she should tell the front desk.

**********

She doesn’t risk breaking into Foot headquarters the next day, or the day after that. She just sort of… watches it, perched on an adjacent rooftop where she can stare slightly into her bedroom window. It’s strange, considering somewhere that used to be so familiar, so safe, while analysing how many Footbots she’d have to cut down to get in.

Three days after her change in accommodations, Karai runs into someone.

One of the someones she really wasn’t ready to run into.

She’s just finished a solid hour of pacing around the old church’s neighboring buildings, thinking up a million easy ways to enter it (it’s nighttime, and the headquarters seem particularly understaffed) and acting upon none of them, when she gives up and drops down into the alley.

A quick check of her burner phone shows no messages and no missed calls. 

If Shini’s mission doesn’t wrap up soon-

There’s a *thump* on the roof above and to her right. And then three more thumps. They’re quiet in a trained way.

In that moment, Karai strongly considers leaping through the nearest window of the church and taking her chances with the night guards. It’ll beat whatever confrontation she’s about to have.

An all-too familiar voice filters through the drone of the city, tone stern: “-ight, guys, remember the plan. Just reconnaissance- we need a way into Stackman’s lab and a way out. Once you have that, pull back.”

Why isn’t she moving. The end of the alley is right there-

“I say we split up. This isn’t too risky of a mission, and the more area we cover at once, the faster we get out, right?”

“Good call, Don. You take the east side of the building. Raph, take the west, and I’ll check out the roof. Mikey, you’re in back.”

“Oookey dokey.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll see you guys in a bit.”

“I wasn’t done- Raph!” One set of footsteps patter away. “All right, fine. Spread out.”

The other three gaits thump over concrete above her head, and still her feet stay rooted in place. 

Wanting to move and being unable to is a sickeningly familiar sensation now- Karai had been almost sure she was done with it.

The fire escape over her clatters, and directly in front of her lands Michelangelo.

His back is to her at first. If she really stayed quiet, he’d walk out of the alley none the wiser, but her breath stutters, because apparently she didn’t want to avoid them as much as she thought, and he whirls around.

Mikey doesn’t get the chance to blurt her name, because as her muscles decide to unlock she sees herself tackling him and slapping a hand over his mouth, as if she’s a bystander watching the interaction. 

Another feeling she knows too well.

“Kuwhagh?!?” His eyes are bugging comically at the sight of her, and he seems to be trying to decide whether to hug her or kick her off.

“Don’t yell,” She hisses, scrubbing her free hand down her face. “Of all the- what are you guys doing here?”

He just blinks, and she gets the sudden sense that he’s going to lick her hand if she doesn’t let him answer, so she pulls back with a hopefully-threatening stare.

“We’re scouting out a way into Stockman’s lab. Donnie needs some samples of his brain worm stuff to synthesize… something. I stopped listening, but it’s super sciency and super important, sooo-” Mikey crosses his arms, squinting at her petulantly. “What are you doing here? We thought you were, like, not alive.”

“Shredder thinks so, too. I’m trying to take advantage of that.”

“Why…” The orange-masked turtle drops his interrogation face, features screwing up in a faintly hurt expression. “Why didn’t you come see us? It’s kind of a bummer thinking your sister’s dead for a week.”

“...I couldn’t.” She makes an impressive maneuver of avoiding eye contact, surveying the pavement behind his left leg. “I’m sorry. But- why do you, agh- why do you want me back? After everything?”

“Karai,” Now Mikey really looks concerned. It’s a weird look for him, so serious and distressed.

“No, no, don’t- don’t try to say that it’s all okay, or that I didn’t really hurt you guys, or- I did. I could have killed all four of you. I would have. And Splinter, too, I w-” She stops short, swallowing. 

The brain worm didn’t just control her actions. It controlled her thoughts. 

Now, she shudders at the image of Leo swaying under her venom’s effects, eyes rolling back like glassy white marbles, pulse slowing to a snail’s pace. She didn’t then.

“I wanted to,” She breathes. “It- it made me want to. I couldn’t fight it anymore, I just-”

Mikey takes a step forward. Karai takes three back.

She didn’t sleep much those months without free will, but she’d get dreams, sometimes- awful, gory things of enemies at her feet, blood pooling around her, shattered shells and crimson-matted fur, and Shredder standing before her, smiling appraisingly without his helmet, hand heavy on her shoulder. She’d yearn for those dreams in her waking hours, no matter how they made her head pound and her heart race.

“He did something to me,” She gasps. “It’s not safe, I’m not- I can’t go back-”

She had one of those dreams just a couple nights ago. She woke up screaming.

“Karai,” Mikey’s pressing forward, and the kunoichi reels back until she hits brick.

“Don’t-” There’s a stabbing pain behind her eye. Something’s still there she knows it she knows she’s not the same-

Green hands inch up on either side of her face. Karai’s watching from a few feet behind Mikey’s shoulder now. They settle against her head, holding it gently, and slowly she finds them both sinking to the ground.

“It’s okay,” He whispers. Nothing more, no elaboration as to which of the thousand meanings those two little words carry now.

It’s not okay, because all the family she’s ever had as either hurt her or been hurt by her, and her skull hasn’t really stopped throbbing since she got the brain worm out, and there’s scars and freckles she swears she remembers now absent from her skin. It’s fucked-up.

When she goes to shake her head, Mikey just steadies it again, nodding forcefully. “Yeah. No one’s controlling you anymore.” He thinks for a minute, rocking back on his heels. “Stick out your tongue.”

“Gh- what?”

“And roll it up. Like thith,” The turtle demonstrates, and for some reason she mimics him, so that her still-wheezing breaths whistle through her tongue. 

“Now, uh- cross all your fingers.”

“You’re so weird,” She mutters shakily. Again, though, she does (with some effort). “That’s easier for you to do anyway.”

“Nice. Why would Shredder make you do any of that stuff? That’s my pure little brother influence, brah. So he’s not in your head anymore.”

It’s not very sound logic, but Karai can’t bring herself to care. For some reason she’s calmer now, with Mikey’s big blue eyes less than a foot from her face (doesn’t he need to blink?). 

He smiles encouragingly, fingers drumming lightly against her temple, until she nods and leans back against the brick behind her, letting out a long sigh. 

She’s so tired.

“...You can’t tell the others I’m here.”

“Man- why?! We just wanna help, do you really want to be alone that badly?”

“No, I just-” She pinches the bridge of her nose, thunking her head against the wall. “I’m not ready. I have matters I need to attend to, and I’m not getting you guys involved again. Not for a while.”

“So why can’t we just be your brothers? We don’t have to get dragged into your… your revenge missions- evenifwereallywanttohelpyouandyoushouldn’t- uh, do this alone-” He trails off at her stare. 

They both know the turtles will end up in whatever business she has if they can help it. The only way to stop that, at least for now, is for her to stay well away from them.

“I’m happy to see you, Mikey. But I need you to keep this a secret. Forget about me for now, all right?”

After a long and conflicted pause, the youngest turtle nods, eye ridges pinched.

“...Are you going to be okay?”

“I reached out to a friend. Hopefully, I’ll be meeting her this week. And I have a place to stay.”

“Are you okay now?”

Karai doesn’t bother answering that. She just stands, brushing off her clothes, and hugs him for a good long while. “I’ll see you sometime. I promise.”

Mikey pulls back, gives her an awfully sad and confused look, and nods. Shit, this is hard.

“...See you soon.”

Karai actually hopes she will. It’s a pretty stupid wish.

**********

Bored.

Nothing’s happening at Shredder’s compound, and nothing’s happening on the news, and the DVDs she finds underneath the beat-up TV in her room are all terrible (she knows because she’s seen all of them now).

The radiator’s making this infuriating whistling noise.

Her head still hurts (possibly courtesy of the radiator)

Her phone’s ringing.

Her phone’s ringing-!

Karai vaults off of her bed and snatches it out of her new messenger bag, fumbling to flip it open as it trills away. Shini’s number flashes on the screen, and of its own accord her finger stabs at the “accept call” button.

….

“Karai?”

“...” It’s all she can do not to choke at the sound of her friend’s voice. It’s been so long since she heard her name spoken in that particular lilt- not as high as when they were younger, when Shini’s laugh was sharp and striking and unconducive to stealth missions. “You- hi.”

There’s a giggle on the other end of the line- smoother than she remembers, but only a bit- and Karai can hear the smile in the hum that follows: “Hi, Kiki. I assume there isn’t any funeral?”

It’s no use. She’s tearing up, even as she’s grinning like an idiot. “Hi. God, I’ve missed you.”

“Watashi mo, don’t worry. It’s not the same back here without you. But how’s America?”

“...It sort of sucks,” Karai sniffles. “I thought it was boring, but it’s just weird, and- I’ve got so much to tell you-”

“No kidding, you haven’t called! What am I supposed to do over here, when you don’t even write to me? I’m like a war widow.”

“I know, I’m sorry. So much has happened, it’s- things are different. That’s why I haven’t been in touch.”

“Hm, mysterious. Can I come to New York? Or is your dad going to be annoying about it?”

She lets out a watery laugh at the immediate inquiry, gasping a little. “Shit, Shini, of course. Please come here, I need a friend.”

“I can be there in the next few days- loose ends to tie up, you know, but what’s wrong? Why are you all weepy?” The witch’s voice is sharp with concern now.

“”S a long story,” Karai murmurs, pressing her forehead to her knees. “I’ve had a messed-up year. Just- promise me you’ll be here? I can’t tell you everything over the phone.”

“I promise. Don’t lose your mind, all right? Just a few days.”

“Just a few days,” Karai repeats. A brisk rap on the door reminds her that she ordered room service, and that she needs to get it, and that she can’t stop crying while talking to her lifelong best friend. “I need to go, Shini, but- I’ll see you soon. Daisuki.”

“Daisuki, Kiki. Mwah.” She hears an air kiss blown into the phone, and then the little blip that signifies Shinigami has hung up.

She allows herself one short, relieved sob, then pats her face and blinks her eyes dry to go receive the food. The employee at the door looks first miffed at having to wait on her and then startled at her tear-streaked appearance, but she just takes the offered dish with a jerky thanks, closing the door before he can comment.

Karai hops onto the bed with her mediocre-looking grilled cheese (she’d normally cringe at the thought of eating in bed, but it’s not her bed, and she doesn’t even really have a bed anymore when she thinks about it, and she’s earned the right to be a little careless) and considers the past week of her life.

She got her mind and agency back by puking up a worm, which is insane in itself, April O’Neil unexpectedly came to her rescue, and she just talked to her favorite person for the first time in nearly two years. 

Her chest is going a little tight at this recap, and it’s all she can do to chew her bite of sandwich with great intensity and think about mundane things, like how the painting above her bed doesn’t have a signature.

Shini will be here in a few days.

One of her (April's) socks is starting to fray at the toe.

There are only three people on earth who know she’s alive.

It was unusually cold today, for September. She walked past a bundle of cosplayers leaving a convention on her way back to the hotel and noted that their costumes were neither accurate nor weather-appropriate.

Leo would’ve had something to say about them.

Chapter Text

“You need a haircut.”

“Seriously? I haven’t seen you in two years and the first thing you do is fuss over my hair?”

Shinigami rolls her eyes, dropping her bags, and pulls Karai into a one-armed hug. “I suppose I had better catch up with you, but tonight we’re fixing this… scruffiness.” 

Her perfume’s different now: heavier, more like plum or rose than the lilac stuff she used to douse herself in. Underneath it, though, she still carries the scent of silk and metal, from the numerous weapons no doubt hidden in her dark purple jacket. Karai squeezes the witch back, firm but not lingering, then straightens to take a piece of luggage. “You’re lucky. I’m out of that awful hotel now.”

“What?!”

“ Oh . I haven’t- okay, I can explain.”

Shini had been dragged back out on an unexpected mission a day or two after she called, delaying her for a miserable two weeks while Karai witnessed the near-destruction of Earth, again. It’s really getting old. 

Long story short, though, the Shredder hasn’t been seen in New York since the black hole. At the moment, Karai’s hoping he got sucked in (though she doubts it), but it’s left Foot headquarters largely abandoned save for some straggler recruits, and she’s taken up residence there once again.

(It’s not much more pleasant than the hotel, really. Empty of people and full of uncomfortable memories.)

It takes the entire taxi ride to the church and a fair amount of unpacking for the kunoichi to finish her recounting of her life in New York City. When she finishes, Shini mumbles a curse and stares at her for a long moment.

“I knew you had a bad year, but that’s… jeez.”

“Yeah.” 

The witch makes a troubled hmm sound, and decides to wrap an arm around her. It’s stiff at first, unpracticed. They’ve never been very touchy with each other. Eventually, though, Karai lists to the side and presses her face into Shini’s shoulder. She likes this perfume better, she’s decided.

“Will you just let me bottle it up for a bit? Please?”

“I’ll give you a few days,” Her friend allows. She rubs at the nape of Karai’s neck for a minute, working out a knot right at the base of her skull. 

“Oh, let’s get something to eat! I’m starved.”

They decide on Indian, somewhere Karai’s never been before because Shini drags her into the first restaurant they walk by, and they eat and talk for hours, and it’s the best she’s felt in forever.

She can’t escape the haircut her friend promised. Not that she wants to. She does trust the witch with her hair (as she trusts her with everything), and it feels good to finally look like herself again, her undercut trimmed and re-bleached and bangs out of her eyes thanks to some careful trimming.

“ Doumo, ” She sighs as she runs her hand through the shaved section. “ God, that’s better.”

“No problem,” Shini hums. She pulls her own hair out of its elaborate updo, rifling through her bags for a brush. “I don’t think I’ll be awake much longer, this jetlag is killer.” 

The witch slips off to the bathroom to get ready eventually, emerging in a loose t-shirt and shorts, hair braided down to her shoulder blades, and once Karai’s taken her turn in the bathroom she flicks the lights off and finds Shini dead asleep on her bed, on top of the covers. 

Unsurprisingly, the process of Karai dragging the blankets from under her and shoving a pillow beneath her head fails to wake her- she’s always slept like the dead.

“See how you’d fare if someone breaks in,” She mutters fondly. Tossing herself under the covers on the free side of the bed, she stares for a moment at her best friend, at the changes two years have had on the face she knows so well.

Shinigami’s hair is shorter now than when she left; it used to hang down to her hips, with purple streaks. Her face has lost what lingering baby fat it had when she was fifteen, showing the outline of her cheekbones, Still, with her makeup off she looks younger. Softer.

She’s a good three inches taller, and has a solid inch on Karai (in heels she practically towers over her). The kunoichi is going to have to get used to looking up at her, after so many years of meeting perfectly eye to eye.

She’s beautiful. 

That’s not a totally new development- Karai’s always found her pretty, and known that most others would agree, but with these added years she seems to have grown out of any teenage awkwardness and even now, bare-faced with a few loose strands of hair drifting across her face, there’s a confidence to her.

Karai wonders briefly what she looks like to Shini now (because sometimes there’s something in her own face she doesn’t recognize), but casts the thought away for the moment. It’s easy to pretend they’re still fourteen and fifteen right now, having secret sleepovers after whispering for hours into the night.

She lets herself believe it until she drifts off to sleep, and doesn’t wake up until morning.

**********

“I’ve decided what I’m going to do.”

“I really hope you’re going to say ‘the dishes’, because your kitchen is in a terrible state right now.”

“I’m letting them soak,” Karai dismisses quickly, though a quick thought back to her kitchenette reminds her of the mess she’s been doing her best to ignore, and it’s… significant. It’s been trying getting any menial tasks done recently. They just feel so… in significant. In the grand scheme of things. “But I was going to say that I want to rebuild the Foot. And I want you to be here with me. In New York.”

Shini’s eyes widen, then pinch in concern, then squint in a contemplative way, until she finally decides, “All ri-”

“I know you’d be far away from your sisters, and if you’d like they’re welcome to join us here, but you’d be free to take leave and visit whenever you want.”

“Karai-”

“And I know there’s… history with all of this now, and that I’m not really the heir to the Foot, but I’m the closest thing there is to it and I don’t really know what else I’m meant to do if it’s not that, and everything just feels so- so meaningless sometimes now that I think I need to work on something bigger. Something that I’m really a part of, because everything I was a part of was a lie and-”

“ Karai!” Shini sighs through her nose when she finally stops her ramble, standing from her seat on the park bench. “ Tomete kudasai. I’d be honored. And I’ll stick with you no matter what you want to do.”

“...Thank you.” 

“But are you sure this is what you need? I mean… have you even worked through everything? Your dad, and the mind control, and-”

“He is not my father.”

“ Yes, Karai. That’s my point . That’s a lot on its own, but on top of that…” The witch bites her lip, debating over her next words. “Don’t be offended; you look exhausted. And you’re skinny.”

Shini’s right, because she usually is. She’s messed up and tired and scarred all over in ways she doesn’t understand and the only thing she can think to do about it is throw herself into the next big thing. The mission.

Karai rests a hand on her best friend’s shoulder, trying to find someway to not lie and not admit just how accurate the witch’s worries are. “...I’ll deal with it. I swear to you. But I can’t yet, and I need someone here with me to get myself and the clan back on its feet.” She softens a bit, pleading. “I need you.”

Shinigami takes her hand firmly and pulls it up so that their arms are crossed in front of each other, giving a steady nod. “Then you have me for whatever you need. On the condition, ” She quirks one dark eyebrow. “That you start eating enough and take breaks. I won’t watch you work yourself to death.”

“For you, I’ll do my best.”

“Good enough for me, Senpai. Let’s get to work.”

**********

The following week is a whirlwind, to say the least. They assemble what Foot soldiers are still hanging around New York, contact any reserves available in Japan, and wrangle deserters for a meeting at the clan’s old headquarters. They clean the throne room, clearing away the dust and mouse droppings Karai’s been willfully ignoring for the past month. Shinigami buys a new hat (her previous one got crushed by a careless baggage handler on her flight over, much to the witch’s dismay).

As Karai stands at the end of the church’s great hall, she notes that her audience looks reluctant at best and murderous at worst (she’s not exactly on proper terms with the Foot, for those who know of her betrayal).

Shini is standing off of her right side, hat tilted over her eyes and back straight. Her cloak is off, showing the silver crescent of the kusarigama at her hip.

“I’m sure you’ve all heard of the Shredder’s unfortunate disappearance.” She pauses, taking in a general lack of surprise but also a lack of melancholy. “It’s unknown whether he lives or not. As his heir , I don’t intend to let this clan disintegrate.” Karai emphasizes her title, though it’s not really hers and it leaves a bad taste in her mouth, all too aware of the precarious position of leadership she holds.

A long pause brings no shouts of disagreement, so she presses on. “Anyone who wishes to follow me in re-strengthening the Foot’s presence is welcome. Anyone who doesn’t will not be forced. But I will not tolerate insurrection.”

This prompts some murmurings.

“I want to take our clan in a new direction, free of the vendettas and history that tied us-”

“What makes you think you have the right?”

Beside her, Shini’s head snaps up. Karai searches the crowd for the source of the voice, until a tall-ish man with a buzzcut shoves his way to the front.

“She betrayed the Shredder. But worse, I’ve heard she tried to kill him in cold blood!” A wave of mutters sweeps through the room, and the man glares up at Karai. 

She recognizes him now: one of his highest in command, but still outside of his inner circle, tasked with managing their money laundering operations. 

He used to laugh when she sat in on meetings. Like she was a novelty in rooms of older men with scars and sunglasses hiding their faces, young and face bare until she adopted her signature eyeliner. “You’re no more his heir than any of us now . Threw away your birthright, and for what? I bet you’re the reason he’s gone, you entitled little bi-”

In a split second, Shinigami’s darted off the podium and has him grabbed by his collar, forcing him to bend at the waist as she presses a kunai to his throat. Her hat is still covering most of her face, but Karai can see just a sliver of her left eye, narrowed and dangerous. 

“My friend was speaking, nezuki. It’s rude to interrupt.”

The man- Kobayashi Takibi, she remembers- fumes for a second, but Shini’s grip at the back of his neck is unyielding. She straightens and nods to Karai. Continue.

“You have a point, Kobayashi,” She allows, lip quirking up when he blinks at her, dumbfounded. “You shouldn’t all have to take me at my word that I can lead the Foot. We need proof, hmm?”

He scoffs nervously. “...Well. I only meant that-”

“No, no. Why do I think I have the right? It’s only fair someone else gets their chance at wearing the kabuto, if all I have is my birthright.” She nods to Shini and the witch shoves Kobayashi forward, turning back to the gathered crowd.

“You can fight me for it.”

The man’s eyes widen, though he’s clearly trying to hide his surprise. His fear.

“Go on. What right do I have to that helmet?” She gestures sharply to the kabuto where it sits on the throne, polished to a mirror-like finish. “Take it.”

The older man straightens his shirt, still rumpled from Shini’s fist, and nods. He can’t back down now, and they both know it. Just like they know that she’s better than he is.

She’s way better.

He takes the steps up to the throne far too fast, balance tilting forwards with every step so that when he reaches her it’s child’s play to hook his leg and flip him onto his back. He rolls away from her downwards kick just in time and stumbles back onto his feet, eyes wild. It takes only a second for her to land another hit, a punch right to his diaphragm, and while he’s hunched over gasping she circles once before kicking at the back of his knee and forcing him to a kneel. Her arm cinches around his neck, just tight enough that he can’t catch his breath.

They’re facing the kabuto . Kobayashi’s gasping breaths are fogging up the metal a bit, his reflection distorted and wild-eyed in the chrome finish.

“You still want it?” Karai hisses the words so that only he can hear. “You still think I don’t deserve it? That you do?”

“No- ngh- no, I don’t- I”

“Don’t you ever disrespect me like that again. I earned my place here in blood and sweat before I turned twelve.” She squeezes at his neck, just once, so that he makes a strangled gasping sound. “And I’d have beaten you then, too.”

“Yes, I- ghhk- hh- I’m sorry-”

She releases him all at once, leaving the room in dead silence until he’s dragged himself up and scurried back down the stairs, hand clutching at his throat. She’ll have left a bruise.

“Anyone else?”

“...”

“Good. Leave your names if you’re joining me. If you’re not, just leave.”

“Is it true?”

Karai can’t tell who asks the question this time. It comes, disembodied, from the crowd, echoing around the vaulted ceilings of the church like it’s ringing inside her own head. Maybe it is.

“Is it true that you tried to kill the Shredder?”

“...No.”

Shinigami’s hat tilts up. Her eyes meet Karai’s, and Karai looks away, out at the sea of masked and bare faces in front of her.

“No. Just a rumor.”

**********

As promised, Shini doesn’t prod about her feelings or experiences from the past year. She gives looks of pointed concern when Karai flinches too hard around needles or hisses when startled, but they’re silent.

Some nights she jolts awake with a scream caught in her throat, drenched in a cold sweat, and sits in the doorframe of the guest room, staring at the rhythmic rising and falling of her friend’s shoulders until the room stabilizes.

The witch doesn’t wake up. Karai doesn’t disturb her. She knows that if she did, Shini would bundle her up in a blanket and make her tea without a second thought, but she also knows it would break the precarious vow of silence the older girl had taken in regards to her mental state. 

For now it’s better to let this simmer, unspoken.

There’s a slew of long days and even longer nights organizing the Foot that have decided to follow her: she revamps the uniforms to scarlet red, restocks their weaponry, and organizes training and recruitment. Shini stays at her side with sharp words and even sharper weapons, when necessary.

She hasn’t seen the turtles around for a while. 

It’s weird, because normally Karai can’t avoid them even when she’s trying, and she thinks she may be approaching being ready to speak to them. 

It’s a little childish, and cowardly, but she sends Shini out to find them. She gives the witch the task of bringing back one of their weapons, because firstly she knows her friend is capable of it, but also chances are someone will come looking to get the weapon back.

“These are the brothers I told you about. The turtles? Don’t hurt them, but don’t hold back. They can handle themselves. April O’Neil will probably be with them- she’s a redhead, human, and she doesn’t have all of their training. So… you know. Don’t behead her on accident?”

“No promises,” Shini coos, though her tone conveys the joke. “ Jaa mata ne , Kiki.” She snatches her hat from its spot on the throne’s arm, sauntering down the steps in the church’s great hall. She stops just before the door, though, squinting back at Karai. “Are you sure you’re- you’re sure you want me to do it like this?”

“Yes.” This is the only way Karai knows how to do it. Violence is an easy language for her, blows and stolen weapons. Words are far more dangerous, and far more complicated. She’ll avoid those until she can’t anymore.

“All right, then. Four turtles and a redhead, coming up.”

Shini is gone in a swoosh of black silk.

Karai swallows.

**********

In just a few hours, Shinigami comes scampering back through the door of the church, arriving in front of Karai with a dragon tanto- she hasn’t seen this one before. 

“So,” She murmurs, balancing the blade on one hand. It’s… nice. Well-weighted, fine steel. “Splinter finally got around to making April a kunoichi? Took long enou-”

“HAH!” With a conspicuous thump, the redhead in question lands in the center of the church, clad in a new black and yellow-striped jumpsuit. 

Beats the neon yellow t-shirt and Uggs.

“This kunoichi would like her tanto back, Karai.” April takes in the kabuto on her head, her seat on the throne, and Shini’s perch on the armrest. “...What are you doing, anyway? I thought you-”

“ We’d like to know what’s going on here too!” 

Ah.

As promised.

The turtles burst through the entrance, weapons drawn, and in an almost amusingly coordinated movement their fighting stances falter when they see Karai.

She can see the slurry of confusion, relief, hurt, and apprehension that flit across all their faces, seeping into the air of the room until she feels she may choke on it. Noone speaks for a long moment.

“...Is that really you?” It’s Donnie that’s spoken first. Beside him, Mikey’s chewing at his lip fit to make it bleed. “No, uh- no mind control? Brain worms?”

Karai nods.

Raph crosses his arms, sais still clenched in his fists. “Well, ignoring your little stunt of, you know, being dead, why’d your crazy friend attack us?!”

“It was only a test! To see her skills.” Shini closes the distance between them and leans an elbow on Karai’s shoulder, surveying the group below them. She bumps her hip against Karai’s. “Shinigami’s an old friend from Japan, she was never going to hurt you.”

The witch makes a little mh sound, picking an invisible thread off her friend’s shoulder. “At least, not permanently.”

“She’s telling the truth,” April offers, though noone responds. She raises a hand to the crystal around her neck, then, and Karai gets that familiar prickle down her spine. “They’re not after us. They’re after… Shredder?” Karai gives her a little nod, then turns her attention to Leo.

The oldest turtle’s remained deadly silent; his eyes are fixed on the kabuto, with a sort of distant, pinched look across his face. He hasn’t lowered his swords.

Raph glances over at his brother, seeming to notice the tension too, and wheels back on Karai. “So what’s with the headgear, princess? Daddy issues? ”

Yes. She’d barely been able to put the helmet on the first time. It still smells like him, for god’s sake. “The kabuto’s under new ownership now, as is the Foot. I’m going to destroy Oroku Saki. And his empire.” She looks back to Leo, desperate for some sort of response. “...Nothing to say?”

The leader in blue sheaths his swords and says nothing. His face is unreadable, if smoothed a bit now that she’s removed her helmet.

They face off for what feels like an eternity. Wordless, but not without things to say.

The other turtles are silent, too, waiting to see which of the eldests will break the silence. Donnie’s wide-eyed, leaning forward on his staff. Raph’s stiff, but clearly invested. Mikey’s eyes are darting lightning-fast between his siblings, hands wringing in front of his plastron. 

After a few more days of silence, it seems the youngest can’t contain himself any longer: “AGHHH! Okay, I can’t DO this anymore! IknewshewasaliveandIwantedtotellyouguysbutSHE-” He gestures wildly to Karai-“Mademepromisenottosayanythingbecauseshewasguiltlyn’scared whichisFINEbutIdon’tthinkfamilyshouldavoideachotherjustbecausetheyfeelbadbecausewe’ve done thatandit sucks and-”

The youngest turtle is cut off by Raph slapping him firmly on the shell. “Take a breath , man. You’re gonna pass out.”

As Mikey blinks, gasping suddenly, Leo finally speaks: “You could’ve come to find us.”

“This is dangerous, Leo. I didn’t want to get you into more trouble for m-”

“So you had to let us think you were dead?! Why do you think we’d rather mourn you than have to deal with a few extra battles?!” He hisses angrily, blinking at the floor for a moment, and opens his mouth as if to continue.

Donnie glances at her quickly and puts his hand on Leo’s shoulder before he can. “I’m sure it’s not that simple. Let her explain.”

“It’s not!” She hurries, “I didn’t want to avoid you guys, but I didn’t- I didn’t know how to come back. Nothing in my life made sense anymore, so I just thought that- I don’t know…”

“That maybe you should stay dead?” Raph blurts suddenly. He winces after the words, just a bit.

“...Yes.”

“That’s stupid,” Leo mutters. He sounds so childish for a moment, glaring petulantly up at her, that she can’t help but giggle. “Don’t laugh! It’s not funny! I’m so sick of you shutting us out for stupid reasons!”

“ They’re not-” She pauses, trying to find the words that will get Leo out of his gripe with her. He doesn’t quite understand why he’s angrier about this than he was about her selling his family out to the Shredder, but that’s probably her issue more than his. “...I’m sorry that I hid from you guys. I wanted to find you, honestly, but I- I was scared.”

At that, Leo looks up, 

She thinks again, now that she’s caught his attention. “You know I don’t have a good track record with family reunions . I mean, Shredder nearly made me kill you all. And I couldn’t stand to see you again if it just meant that the only family I had left would get hurt. So… I kept to myself.”

“Did you have… anyone? After everything that happened?” The oldest turtle’s anger has melted into a sort of frustrated worry now, which she counts as a win.

“Shini. She’s been with me in New York for over a month. And-” Karai glances at April, who gives her a shrug. Go ahead. “O’Neil helped me get back on my feet. Right after I broke free from Shredder.”

“You knew too?!” Mikey wails, wheeling on April. “And you let me suffer in silence? I thought my head was gonna explode!”

“Well…” Leo shifts in place, crossing his arms again. “I guess I can forgive you going undercover. You had good intentions, and you’ve certainly been keeping busy-” He eyes the freshly-hung Foot emblems surrounding the great hall. “But promise me you won’t pull something like this again.”

“...”

“ Karai.” Surprisingly, it’s Raph who addresses her now- quietly. He gives her a pointed look, one that tells of things she doesn’t know and hasn’t seen, but the message is clear: Not again.

“All right.”

Leo nods, satisfied. Shini tilts back off of her shoulder, hopping back up on the arm of the throne and twirling April’s tanto between her fingers. The redhead flushes at the motion, eyes darting warningly between the witch and Karai.

Before anything can boil over, Mikey rejoins the conversation: “Why don’t you come back to the lair, sis? Master Splinter would love to see you!” He looks awfully hopeful.

“Maybe, Mikey. Soon,” She allows. “But I need to find my own path for myself. Not one he makes for me.”

Mikey gives a dejected thumbs-up. Raph shrugs, Donnie nods against his staff, and Leo stares off into the corner before meeting her eyes again: “Then I’ll see you soon, aneki. I’m… glad you’re okay.” He gives a little smile, and the turtles turn to leave.

She doesn’t pay much attention as April demands her tanto back, halting their exit, watching halfheartedly as Shini (frankly) mops the floor with her. She does call the fight off once the human is well and truly down, but only then. It takes unexpectedly long.

April’s stronger than she gave her credit for.

She’ll have to keep that in mind: O’Neil is a worthy ally. And an interesting acquaintance, to say the least.

April leaves with her weapon, and the turtles leave with an efficient good-bye. Shinigami leans back over her shoulder as the church’s door swings shut, drumming her fingers across Karai’s scapula.

“Quite the family, senpai .”

“Yeah,” Karai murmurs, drifting back to the throne and flicking at the kabuto where it sits, discarded. “Hereditary charm, I guess.”