Chapter 1

Kayla was crouched on the edge of a roof, surveying the city. The sky was a dark navy blue with no stars, the peacefulness almost made it easy to forget that she was in the middle of New York.

'Almost' she repeated in her mind as a car horn made her look back at the busy streets. Even this late at night there was traffic. The only reason her brothers were allowing her out this late was it wasn't a school night, even though it was Thursday. Due to teacher meetings and stuff they didn't have school on Friday, giving them a three day weekend.

A light breeze blew by, making her hair and mask tails flap into her face. She patiently brushed them away. Her and her brothers were taking turns watching the streets. There'd been a huge crime wave lately and they wanted to make sure the streets were safe from crooks. Raph had been completely against Kayla participating in this, saying that it was too dangerous and all, but Leo had insisted that if she desperately needed back-up she had her shell cell to call if she needed.

As if on cue an alarm sounded, causing Kayla to instinctively reach for her bow, which was resting across her shoulder and back, as her eyes were drawn to the street. Her eyes widened when she saw a man dressed all in black running out of a store with a large bag in his hand. Kayla pulled her green, ninja mask down over her eyes. The sign on the store he broke into read, "2nd Time Around". Kayla gritted her teeth as she raced across rooftops, keeping the thief in her sights at all times.

"No one steals from April's shop and gets away with it." Kayla said to herself as she pulled ahead of the crook and leapt into the next alley. She rushed to the entrance to the alley and stood, back to the wall, as she listened. She could hear his footsteps approaching and tensed her muscles. Then, when he was nearly beside her, she threw her arm out of the alley, catching a grip on his shirt, and yanked him into the alley. Using all her strength she threw him against the wall. Within a second his shirt was pinned to the wall with an arrow, which she'd shot at him.

"Wait, p-please." the man stuttered as Kayla approached him, allowing the shadows to conceal her enough to make her look menacing. "I-I didn't mean it."

"Oh, so you just 'accidentally' broke into that shop and 'accidentally' stole this bag of antiques. Is that it?" she asked sarcastically as she held up the bag. The jingle of easily breakable antiques could be heard from inside it.

"C'mon kid." he panted nervously, "I- everyone's gotta earn a living, right?" he chuckled nervously.

Kayla pulled the arrow out of the wall and his shirt and placed it back in her quiver. Then she grabbed the collar of his shirt and lifted his face close to hers. "Don't call me 'kid'." and she threw him back to the ground. He tried to crawl away but she grabbed his leg and threw him into the wall, knocking him unconscious. Kayla brushed her hands off and picked up the bag. She planned on taking it back to April's and then she would come back for the creep.

As she was about to leave the alley a shadow crossed over her. Suddenly something shot by her, ripping the bag right out of her hand. Looking at the wall she saw the bag pinned to the wall by a sharp, red, boomerang-like device. Looking around all sides, Kayla got into a fighting stance, ready to take on whoever was in the ally with her.

Then six shadows stepped forward, surrounding her. She couldn't believe her eyes. From what she could see they were all kids like her! Kayla tried to back up but they were behind her, too.

Then a voice spoke, a boy's from the sound of it, "So, you think you're cool, stealing from other people, huh?"

"What?" Kayla couldn't believe what she was hearing.

"Don't try to play dumb, kid. It's not gonna work." said another, deeper voice from behind her.

"I didn't steal it! I stopped the guy who did!" Kayla protested.

"A likely story." said another boy's voice, this one sounding higher-pitched than the others, with a bit of a raspy noise to it.

Suddenly a fist shot out of the shadows toward Kayla's face, but she was ready. Catching the fist with her right hand she spun her attacker behind her and threw it toward the others. To her surprise a huge cushion of water appeared and her attacker, a girl, landed on it perfectly. Kayla took a step back.

"W-who are you?" she asked shakily.

"We could easily ask you the same thing." spoke another girl with a monotone voice who almost looked like a shadow herself. "Doesn't mean we'd get any answers out of you."

Kayla shook her head to clear it. "You have no right to be attacking me like this. This isn't even a fair fight!" she growled as she clenched her fists at her side.

"You think criminals fight fair?" spoke a boy, the first one, judging by his voice, "Clearly you're an unusual one." he crossed his arms, almost in a commanding way.

Kayla gritted her teeth angrily. "I'm not a criminal!" she shouted at him, "And I don't fight like one, either. I dare any one of you to take me on in a FAIR fight! Right now." she saw her attackers exchange glances. Then the boy who'd last spoken, the leader if Kayla had to guess, stepped forward.

"Fine. I will." he answered. Kayla nodded and the other teens stepped away from them, moving to the side of the alley. Kayla faced the boy, he had dark, spiky hair and a cape, she couldn't quite make out any colors in the darkness.

She bowed her head to him, just because they seemed to fight unfairly didn't mean she should act dishonorable. He attacked first. She side-stepped and avoided him. Then she got out her bow and managed to block a strike from a steel staff he'd pulled out. He swung it at her a few times, skillfully aiming his blows. Kayla ducked one of his attacks and swept her leg under him, knocking him down for a moment. She struck a punch toward him, but he rolled to the side, causing her to punch the concrete. She flinched as the pain shot up her arm but just turned her pain into anger as she dodged a kick he aimed at her side. She leaped into the air, flipping backward and landing on her feet just behind him. There she threw another punch at him, nailing him in the side of his face because he'd tried to turn around. The punch sent him spinning but he turned it into an advantage as his leg swung and knocked her bow out of her hand. When her head turned back to face him his fist flew toward her and she was sent flying back and landed hard on the ground.

Before she knew it he landed with his knee planted firmly on her ribs and his hands pinning her arms to the ground so that she couldn't move. She looked up at his face and just realized that he was also wearing a mask, but his was white with black around the edges. Realizing she'd lost she glared up at him; he smirked down at her, making her even angrier.

Suddenly a shadow crossed above them, making Kayla look past him. Then a flash of green passed in front of her and her attacker was kicked by a green, two-toed foot. Seeing flashes of red, blue, orange, and purple made her smile. Before she knew it a familiar, three-fingered hand was offered to her and she took it, quickly being pulled to her feet. She came face-to-face with a blue-masked turtle, though he was a few inches taller than her. He handed her bow back to her, "Missing something?" he smiled as he handed it to her.

"Thanks bro." Kayla smiled at Leo before she turned to see her other brothers fighting the teens who attacked her.

"We could use a little back-up, thanks." Raph shouted sarcastically, fighting a larger boy. Leo and Kayla nodded to one another before they split up; Leo raced to help Mikey, who was fighting the leader who'd fought Kayla, a girl with long, red hair, and what looked like a tiger. Meanwhile, Kayla hurried to help Don who was fighting a girl in a dark blue cloak and a girl in a red and black shirt.

Leaping into the fight she came face to face with the girl in the red and black shirt. They immediately jumped into a fist fight, throwing and dodging punches. Kayla managed to catch the other girl's chin with her fist, but she saw the girl make a fist with her own hand and a fist-shaped chunk of ice appeared right by it! She swung her fist toward Kayla and the ice followed as if it were actually attached to her. Kayla was thrown into the wall as the ice slammed into her stomach. Kayla ducked quickly as the girl tried to punch her again. When she pulled her arm back Kayla leapt into the air and spun her leg around, kicking the girl in the face. The girl was thrown into the ground.

Kayla walked toward the girl, who was still on the ground.

The girl looked up at her, panting with blood dripping out of her mouth. She wiped it away with her knuckle. "Don't fight like a criminal, huh? Well, you have a funny way of proving that." she shakily pushed herself into a sitting position.

"How's that?" Kayla asked.

The girl nodded to where her friends were fighting the turtles. "You said a one-on-one fight, but you have a whole army of lizards jump in the moment you lose. Not exactly fair, is it?"

"Turtles." Kayla corrected instantly, "And I didn't ask them to jump in and help. My guess is they saw me 'in trouble' and decided to help me. And even with their help you guys still outnumber us." Kayla looked at the girl thoughtfully. "Ya know, you don't seem too surprised to see four giant turtles."

The girl shrugged and rubbed her knees. "I guess I've seen enough strange things in my life that very few things faze me anymore." the girl looked up at Kayla. "What about you? You didn't seem too surprised when I punched you with ice."

Kayla shrugged back. "Same thing. I've seen enough to not be too surprised anymore."

The girl looked up curiously at her. "Who are you?" she asked suddenly.

"I could ask you the same thing." Kayla replied shortly.

"You could." the girl agreed, "but I'm surprised you haven't figured it out yet."

Kayla offered her hand to the girl, deciding she was either really good at tricking people or they were pretty much done fighting. "How do you figure?" she asked.

The girl cautiously took her hand as she said, "Well, not to brag or anything, but we are kind of famous and all."

"Famous? You?" Kayla tried to keep a scoff out of her voice. "How?"

The girl rolled her eyes and pulled a yellow and black, walky-talky type thing with a white 'T' on it out of her pocket and showed it to Kayla. "We're the Teen Titans."