GO: THE RETURN

"Man, I don’t know how Casey put up with this thing all those years. Itches like a bitch!"

Michaelangelo shook his head as he watched Raphael yank his hockey mask off and scratch feverishly at the unsightly scarred green tissue that made up the left side of his face. The other two Turtles remained silent, their expressions unreadable from under their diguises.

"Ease up, bro," Michaelangelo coaxed, "Casey didn’t go and get half his face blown off."

Raphael winced with his good eye. "Don’t remind me!"

"Why don’t you just go back to wearing Shredder’s armor?" Mike asked, clapping him on the shell. "I’m sure that was much more comfortable for you, wasn’t it?"

Raph shot his brother a fierce glance. It had only been three months since he'd given up the mantle, relinquishing it to the Foot Clan—the Foot Clan he’d recreated in New York—and the mysterious Lady Shredder. "You’re pushing it, Mikey."

"Say, Leo," Mike began, tilting his hat to look at his brother, "anything wrong? You look kinda spooked."

Leonardo didn’t speak a word as he continued to uneasily lead the others down the dark sidewalk. Abruptly, he stopped dead in his tracks. His head tilted toward the rooftops high above.

"Leo! What’s up?"

Leonardo’s eyes widened with horror, his hands quivering at his sides. He forced them to be poised; ready to draw his twin katana swords from their sheaths at a moment’s notice. Squinting, he tried to make out the figure he had been certain he had seen only a few seconds ago. He could still see it, looming over the side, peering down and seeing through their disguises with ease.

It had seen them. They could hide nothing from it.

"Dammit, Leo, what do you see?" Raphael shouted. "We bein’ followed or something?"

Leonardo ignored the question, instead turning to Donatello. He had converted his massive arm cannon back to the metallic limb approximate to his old flesh and blood arm for the occasion. Regardless, his cyborg bulk still bulged out enough to make him look conspicuous to the average New York pedestrian. "Don, scan those rooftops!" Leo frantically instructed, jabbing a finger upward.

"Um, sure." Donatello craned his head upward, servos and gears whining lightly in his neck. The eyepiece implant that obscured his left eye came to life, focusing on the apartment complexes above. Even with nightvision engaged, he could see nothing. He then tried switching spectrums, going to infrared and thermographic. "Don’t see anything. What am I looking for?"

Leonardo rubbed at his eyes and forehead, turning away from the building. "I thought I saw him. I…I thought I…"

Raphael grabbed Leonardo by the shoulders and shook him. "Saw who? Just who the hell did you think you saw up there? More of Puzorelli’s thugs? Those Komodo bitches?—Kunoichi? C’mon, man, who?!"

"No…none of them." Leonardo met Raphael’s gaze. A grim understanding settled between them. "Him."

Within the walls of an abandoned steel mill in downtown Manhattan, there congregated a meeting of the New York Foot.

"I saw him! I swear it!" a Soldier protested below.

The slender, armored figure of the Lady Shredder appeared on the catwalk above. She glanced at the assembly of Foot Soldiers, eying her disciples. "The Shredder is gone," she spoke. Her tone expressed calm confidence. "Your former master is gone. Oroku Saki is no longer with us. It is something you must all learn to accept. His leadership and mantle has fallen to me. Our Japanese branch wills it."

"But I saw him as well, Lady Shredder!" another Foot called. "Saki lives!"

"They are not lying!" declared a third.

The Lady Shredder sighed. "There are those who may wish to assume the identity of all that the Shredder was, in tribute to his accomplishments as leader. If Oroku Saki has truly returned from the dead once more, why would he not reassume his post here? It has been almost two years."

Silence spread through the room.

"The Shredder’s only living descendant is the bastard daughter he most likely never knew he had. His legacy ended with his headquarters. You and I all know this. Saki is the past. We…we…are the future of the New York Foot!"

"The past returns."

The deep voice echoed through the room.

It was the voice of Oroku Saki.

Shocked gasps and commotion spread throughout the crowd like wildfire as the armored figure strode forward. The Foot stepped aside and started clearing a path for him.

"Ah, the impostor reveals himself." Lady Shredder laughed from above. "Are we truly expected to believe that you are the Shredder reborn?" she asked, more than a hint of sarcasm in her voice. "Show us your face."

"As you wish." His voice contained no hesitation, no doubt.

The Shredder removed his face plate.

"It is him!" one of the Foot bellowed, only seconds later.

The mocking smile Lady Shredder bore beneath her faceplate dissolved as the crowd’s astonishment reached her. "What…what is this?!" In one graceful movement she grappled the catwalk and leapt to the floor. She stomped toward the Shredder, freezing at the sight of his face. "No! This cannot…"

The Shredder reattached his face plate. "My Elite Soldiers have been slain. I am told you are responsible... Karai."

The Lady Shredder flinched, then removed her helmet. This was too much. "Your daughter...she had more—"

"Those were my daughter’s. What of mine?"

"We believed you dead. Chaos spread through New York after your death…the Foot Clan became divided, each division a warring faction. It did not take long before the entire New York branch of the Foot was openly slaughtering each other. We in the Japan Foot, unfortunately, did not find out about the situation until it was nearly too late. I had to act. So I came here." She glared at the Shredder. "Your bloodthirsty Elite were among the worst of the butchers. In their bloodlust they slew my only daughter…" Karai trailed off into silence.

"Nevertheless," Shredder spoke, "you are responsible. Those men were hand-picked soldiers from an army of hundreds. I spent years teaching and guiding each of them…they were my finest warriors." He then added, icily, "Now they are dead."

"I was not alone in my actions," Karai said. She had not forgotten about her pact with the four Turtles.

"So I am told." Shredder took a step towards her. "I am willing to overlook these infractions on the condition that you will relinquish your leadership of the Foot and return to Japan. Immediately. Your duty here is done with; your honor has been upheld. Oroku Saki has returned."

Karai remained undaunted by the Shredder’s words. She knew very well that he could never honor the truce she had sworn to the Turtles. Aside from that, she had spent nearly two years unifying the New York Foot Clan, cleaning up the mess he had left behind. Even when things seemed back in order, Antoine Puzorelli’s hitmen had gunned down the entire ruling council, once again requiring her full attention after the incident with the Raphael Turtle and Saki’s daughter. Her dedication to the New York Foot even cost Karai her place as leader of the Japan Foot, and her place in the now-Council of Five. Yes, through pain and hardship, she had earned her people’s respect. "I cannot do that."

A malicious gleam came to the Shredder’s eye. "What did you say?"

"You can find another city in America. It took you less than a year to assemble this Foot, surely you can do it again somewhere else." Karai’s eyes narrowed to slits as she stood her ground. "The New York Foot belongs to me."

"Then it would seem we are at odds, Karai." Shredder raised his bladed fists. "A pity."

"I agree."

As the Foot Soldiers crowded around them cleared aside, Karai took a fighting stance. Shredder moved quickly, leaping at her with a leg extended, shin-blades first. Karai dodged his flying kick, though his bladed leg snagged on her right shoulder on his way by. Putting the pain aside, Karai swept her foot behind and around her, catching Shredder off-guard. He vaulted himself back onto his feet even as he began to fall to the floor, swinging a clenched fist forward and feeling his blades rake across Karai’s forearm. She sprang back, barely avoiding another swing.

"You shall not defeat me!" Karai nearly screamed.

"You are already defeated."

Karai roundhoused Shredder across his steel helmet, producing a loud cymbal-like noise. Shredder rolled with the kick, going low and planting a straight kick to her abdomen. Karai stumbled backwards, nearly falling. Shredder pressed the advantage, backhanding her across the face, his blades finding unguarded flesh once again. He followed his swipe up with a sharp jab beneath her chin that jolted her off her feet.

Karai dropped.

Shredder loomed over her. He reached down and lifted her up by the hair. "Do you yield?" he asked.

Karai struggled under his grasp. Meeting his gaze with pure defiance, she spit blood at Shredder’s feet. "Never."

"I did not think so." Shredder brought a hand back and swept it over her neck, the blades rending her throat from one end to the other. He let the arterial blood-spurting body fall to the floor, stepping away.

"Master Shredder…" one of the Foot Soldiers spoke, bowing. In unison, the entire room followed suit.

"There is much to be done," Shredder coolly spoke, his commanding voice filling the room. The gazes of the assembly of Foot met him with newfound reverence and loyalty. This pleased him. "I will need to rebuild my Elite Guard and seek out my daughter, Pimiko. I hear she has fell in with that cursed Komodo organization, then tried to claim my place as a new Shredder. With her at my side and my new Elite at my command, we will reinstate our shadow reign over New York." He paused for effect. "Then we shall find the Turtles. Then they shall at last feel the curtain of death for what they did to me." The malicious gleam came back to his eye. "The truce is over."

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