Soundtrack: Your Betrayal - Bullet for My Valentine

"She was crazy, Sensei!" Mikey blabbers to Master Splinter, while making furious hand and body motions - most likely meant to be ninjitsu moves . "She was all like, hiyah! And we were all, you ain't catching us! But then she was like..."

Raph rolls his eyes. Mikey was a horrible storyteller. Could the weird fidgeting and motions be any more confusing?

While Mikey was busy 'reenacting' the fight with Pirate Girl for Sensei, Raph was lounging about reading comics. Or rather, trying to read comics, but it was impossible to make use of a word with Mikey's chattering and Leo's pounding on the punching bag and that damn Pirate Girl's pretty green eyes-

Raph fell off the couch in shock. Mikey pauses his story and doubles over as he burst out laughing. Leo smirks as he glances at Raph. Even Master Splinter chuckles lightly, but Raph can't bring himself to be mad at them, mostly because he's too busy reprimanding himself for thinking of the enemy like that, who the shell do you think you are, ya can't be thinking about the girl who freaking attacked you and your brothers, shell for brains...he tries to remind himself. He shakes his head.

Stupid bright, innocent green eyes. Look what ya did.

•

He had green eyes, just like hers.

Not completely similar. His were a darker shade of green, filled with anger, hatred, and distrust, all directed at her - which, for some unfathomable reason, Akumu didn't like. Red's eyes were intriguing, she decided, but not anything she should lose her guard over.

After all, her proposal was strictly business.

Now, she sits in her hotel room in sweats and a camisole, munching on the delicious complementary chocolate that the hotel provided. Akumu's laptop is propped in front of her on her bed, a strange page open in front of her. One that moved and filmed live action, programmed to hack into any devices and steal all kinds of juicy information. One that was small, in plain sight, but never suspected of suspicious actions. She chuckles. Kano, I don't know how you programmed your spy flies, but I'm forever grateful for that. Planting it on Orange's phone was easy.

The fly zooms in on Orange talking to a humanoid rat - thank god it saved footage, or she wouldn't be able to go back to it - and Blue going hard at a punching bag. Red is on a couch, reading a comic - manga,her Japanese wired brain corrected. Purple is nowhere to be seen, until...

•

"Hey, guys! Check this out!" Donnie calls from his lab, and Raph doesn't particularly want to get up, but he's bored, and he'll do anything to stop thinking of her...

As the others assemble into Donnie's haven - lab- Raph sees one of Donnie's computers on a strange site, with a familiar symbol as a picture. He can't place it, though.

"I took a picture of that girl's shuriken before we left," Donnie says, "and I did a bit of Internet research. Apparently, the symbol on it, the black rose? It's the symbol of an Japanese urban legend, called the Chi-Bara."

"She-Banana?" Mikey echoes, and Raph rolls his eyes and hits him over the head."

"It's actually pronounced She-Baana,Mikey. It means-"

"Bloody Rose," Leo interjects. Raph and Mikey turn to stare at him. Leo flushes. "I cannot have been the only one paying attention to Master Splinter's Japanese lessons." Raph only shakes his head in exasperation, and motions Donnie to continue. Donnie clears his throat.

"Right. Like Leo said, Chi-Bara means Bloody Rose.In most criminal undergrounds, including Japan's, people hire assassins to kill people for them. This Chi-Bara was the one of the most requested. They - most likely a she - were skilled and deadly. People would hire this assassin to take people out for them. And they'd pay millions of yen just for them to do it. Whenever the Chi-Bara killed someone, they'd draw a rose on the victim's forehead in the victim's own blood."

"Which is why they call the assassin Bloody Rose," Raph said, and Donnie nodded his confirmation.

"That's right. No one knows if the Chi-Bara actually exists, or if they're even a single person. Some even think that they're an otherworldly spirit," Donnie glances at his computer, "'...here to cleanse the world from the evils of humanity.'"

"Do ya think tha' Pirate Girl is the assassin, Don?" Raph asks.

"Most likely. She must have been hired by Shredder to take us all down."

"Then we get to her first," Leo says, eyes narrowing. "Can't risk her killing us all."

Normally, Raph would agree with Leo wholeheartedly, but there was something nagging at him. "I dunno, Leo. Wouldn' she 'ave killed us since she had the chance? Why hold back if she's gotta kill us for Shredder?"

"He's got a point, Leo," Mikey shrugs, and Raph shoots him a grateful look.

Leo rolls his eyes. "Never thought I'd see the day. First Raph's trying to back down from a fight, and now Mikey's agreeing?" Raph glares at him, and Leo only gives him a puzzled stare before he turns to Donnie again. "Anyway to track her, Donnie?"

"Not at the moment. But I'll think of something."

•

Akumu couldn't help but chuckle at the fact that people speculated her existence - online,no less.

So the turtles had names. Mikey, the orange; Leo, the blue; Donnie, the purple; Raph, the red; all most likely some sort of nicknames. "Raph," she experiments the feeling of Red's name on her tongue, and decided she liked it.

No I don't,her brain says indignantly.

Shut up, of course you do,she heard her subconscious smugly reply.

She refocuses herself at the task at hand - locating the lair of the turtles, which wouldn't be a hard task, not with Kano's tech at her side.

Akumu glances back at the picture frame on her bedside table. A little girl, about four years old, in dark brown pigtails and bangs and bright green eyes, stands with a man, woman and small new born. The girl is the spitting of the man - who is obviously her father - but has the exact same freckles and bright green eyes as woman, her mother. Akumu smiles bitterly. "Don't worry, Mom and Dad," she murmured, almost insane like.

"I'll set things right. Then we can be a family like we were supposed to be, before everything went to hell. I'll make sure of it. After all, a promise is a promise."

•

Well that was dark.

That last sentence idea was actually conceived on the spot while I was writing which i think of as an achievement. SO YAY

Hope you enjoyed, criticism welcomed, flames not, love y'all, CIAO!

~Carla