Timbers & Rivers (Leorai)

Chapter Two

                  Two Years Later...

Two shadowy figures leaped across a rooftop above a darkened alleyway in New York, both of them laughing. One was a girl, about nineteen years old, and another was a boy just a year younger.

"Feels good to finally be back." Said the girl, she had a slight Japanese accent mixed with American. She had waist-length black hair with blonde highlights and she wore heavy dark makeup: heavy eyeliner with red paint above it and dark red lipstick. She had dark brown hiking boots on along with a black leather jacket, denim jeans and a white tank top.

"Yes. Yes it is." Grinned the other, he was fully American and was a little shorter than the girl. He was a humanoid turtle with an azure, worn scarf with white dojo wraps on his knuckles, ankles and fore arms and wooden elbow and knee pads. He had a belt and strap on his plastron and two ninja-to blades on his shell.

"But, something's wrong. The streets are deserted and windows are boarded up. It looks like a zombie apocalypse Leo." The woman stated and looked across the city,no electricity, no people, nothing.

"Yup." Said the turtle. "We should probably keep our voices down Karai." Earning a nod from the said girl.

As if on cue, a dirtied blonde woman stumbled out of a store entrance, screaming as if her life depended on it. Two hunched figures slowly dragged themselves out behind her, they were bloodied and dirty, and their eyes were sunken in. Leo and Karai could smell them from their perch in the roof.

The slowly inched closer towards the frozen woman and pounced, each one tearing and biting at the flesh of the poor soul. She screamed louder than before for what seemed like hours before the sound died down and the only noise was flesh being ripped apart.

Leo covered his mouth with his hands and vomited off to the side and Karai was in shock. They had just seen a woman get eaten alive by two men.

"Skin's all rotten and they smell like shit! What the hell is this?" Karai said to Leo once he stood back up. "We need to stay quiet, i-it seems that er s-screaming was what attracted those... T-things."

Leo nodded shakily and grabbed Karai's hand, leading her away from the site. A couple more screams were occasionally heard, and more things wondered down the streets.

"Hopefully the guys are alive." Leo said and the two teens continued to jump rooftops in the shadows - only to be stopped by two more men jumping and pinning them to the ground.

Both of them struggled with all their might while shouting crude insults at then, until a familiar voice stopped them.

"Leo?"

"Raph?" Leo asked and was helped to his feet along with Karai. Leo's face immediately broke into a sad smile and he hugged his long lost brother.

"I-I'm so sorry!" 'Raph' cried and hugged his missing sibling. Raph now had a pump-shotgun strapped to his shell and a machete hanging from his hip. Donnie wore two 9mm pistols on his side and bore a hunting knife strapped to his thigh.

Karai had held back, a cute grin on her pale face. She did her best not to laugh as it was rare, if not impossible, to see the all mighty Raphael and Donatello cry in front of them.

The reunion, however, was ruined when a loud corse of moaning filled the streets. It was those things.

"W-what's been going on?" Karai asked but got no answer. The two new turtles ushered them both in a direction.

(TIME SKIP CUZ I CANN!!)

"So, this has been going on for a year!?" Leo exclaimed, with an all-too-happy Michelangelo clinging to him. Raphael and Donatello had led them both to an apartment building to escape the horde.

Mikey had a 22 gun strapped to his shell and a large satchel on his side.

"Yeah. It's everywhere, how did you not know?" Donnie exclaimed in surprise and worry at the same time. Had thy both been in a coma? Was they kidnapped?

"No! We've been living in a forest! We had seen bloodied guys but we paid no attention to it!" Karai gasped. She wrapped an arm around Leo's shoulders protectively. Nobody was going to hurt her little brother.

"Oh. Well April, Casey and Splinter'll be back from scavenging in a while. Man, will this be a surprise. I kept telling them that the city is picked clean, but Splinter won't allow us to move to Salt Lake." Raph explained and continued sharpening his sai's.

"We went to Salt lake a couple months after we left. I think we should go there." Leo stated and looked out of the window, staring at the dead people walking.

"April said that there's only three-hundred people still alive." Donnie said. "Nothing has been the same without you..."

A new stab of guilt made it's way into Leo's heart. The irrational side of him told him that it was their fault they ran away but the rational side told him that they were just stressed and it wasn't their fault. He didn't know what to feel.

"S-so what do you call those... Things?" Leo asked shakily, he was still in shock from seeing that poor girl.

"Walkers, Lurkers, whatever... All we know is that they eat and whatever is left comes back as one of them and does the same. If you get bit, you have a fever for about twenty-four hours before you turn as well." Donnie explained. "Geez, this is like you teaching us ninjitzu..."

"Oh, we've lost that." Karai said, waving a hand as if it was nothing.

"So, what did you do in the forest?"

"Fun stuff. Steal. Vandalise, as in spray paint! Steal cars. Jump rooftops. Camp." Leo dragged on, Donnie, Mikey and Raph were shocked. But, it didn't matter now because there was no room for 'fun'.

"How did you get that?" Mikey asked while pointing at a nasty scar of Leo's right cheek.

"Hahaha! Oh that's a good one! Karai?" Leo said and Karai continued.

"Hehe.. Well, we had an argument, Leo started calling me Helmet-Head and Naruto-Fangirl and I ended up pulling a knife. Then, heheehe, h-he s-startehehed n-making weird, hahaha, squealing p-pig noises, hahahahahahaha, p-pretending to be me HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" Leo and Karai were laughing like crazy, as if the story was funnier than it was told, and even the brothers let out a couple grins. Raph, however, did not find Karai hurting his brother funny. One. Bit.

"Guys! We're back!" A female voice whispered and three figures jumped in.

"Leo?"