"Remember to breathe."

"Right."

"Remember, it's not just your hands that are the weapon. Any part of your body can be used to fight."

"Yes, I know."

"Remember, the trick is to stay on your feet but try to use your mind to find a pattern. Most of our opponents will have repetitive ways of-"

"Leonardo." Monica's voice was stern, her muscles tense as she stood 10 feet from the blue-clad turtle.

Leo blinked, then smiled bashfully. "Sorry, I got carried away. Ready?"

"I am." Monica stated, placing her hands together. She and Leonardo bowed to one another, before Leo rushed at her. 

Monica only had a second to take in the fact that he was coming, and less than a second to realize that it was his left hand was that flying towards the side of her ribcage. She grabbed his wrist, using all her strength to stop Leo's knuckles from making contact, but quickly had to revert her attention elsewhere as Leo's right hand was coming down to chop her in the shoulder. She caught that as well, using less energy this time as she knew that she needed to challenge Leo offensively. Using the fact that she was holding both of Leo's arms, she gripped on tight and used his ridge muscles as a lever to hold on to as her bents her legs and kicked them both into Leo's plastron. 

The force sent both of them flying a few feet from each other, and though Monica landed more sloppily, Leo was slower to recover because of the pain. Monica took advantage and rushed him. Leo seemed to be preparing to face her head on, so Monica did the opposite, diving to the floor, shooting between Leo's legs so that the only part of her that was still underneath him were her legs. As he tried to turn to confront her, Monica kicked both her legs out to the side, hooking her feet around Leo's ankles, and then flipped herself onto to the stomach, which in turn flipped Leonardo onto the ground. 

The turtle landed hard, wheezing slightly and then gasping. Monica smiled victoriously as she stood up and leaned over Leo, who was fighting to catch his breath after having the wind knocked out of him. "Remember to breathe." She offered Leo her hand, and he took it as she helped hoist him up. He took the classic tripod position of leaning over with his hands placed on his knees. "You good?" To that, Leo gave a thumbs up.

"Wow, that was just pathetic." A raspy voice stated, and Leo and Monica both looked up to see Raphael leaning in the doorway, his arms crossed and his neon green eyes glaring. "Why would you go easy on her, Leo? It's not going to do her any favors."

"I mean, I wasn't going that easy on her." Leo muttered as he still worked to collect himself. "But she doesn't have anyone else to work with on Taijutsu except us, and going 100% will do nothing for her confidence."

"Oh, man, screw her confidence." Raph sneered. "We need someone who's trained in ninjutsu, not someone who was babied through ninjutsu." He stood up and made his way into the dojo. "Front and center, Monica. Get out of the way, Leo."

Monica gave Leo an exasperated look, to which he responded with a sympathetic shoulder shrug. While all the turtles had been helping Master Splinter train Monica in the second discipline of ninjutsu, Raphael was the one she dreaded the most. Monica agreed that she shouldn't be babied, but none of the turtles ever let her win, they just sparred at the same level as someone with the same level of experience as Monica had. Raphael did not see the point in sparring at the level of someone who had not yet passed all the disciplines of ninjutsu, since most of their enemies were far beyond. The logic made sense. But the sparring sessions were torture. 

Monica stood ten feet from Raph, placing her hands together and bowing. Raphael only cracked his neck and rolled his shoulders. 

Raph rushed her, as he always did. He jumped and flew towards her with an outstretched right foot, which she dodged and attempted to land a hit as he passed her, but his hand blocked her punch. Once he landed he spun to sweep her feet but Monica managed to jump. It was a temporary recovery, as Raph used the time she was airborne to recover and when her feet connected to the ground, he landed a hard punch to her stomach. She gasped, trying to contain her tears as she grabbed on to his wrist and twisted around so that his arm was looped under her's. She yanked forwards and bent over, sending Raph flying over her back and on to the mat in front of her. As soon as he landed, Raph pushed himself up with his hands and shot his legs out straight into Monica's thighs. 

The force was enough to take her legs out from under her as she landed on top of Raph, who swiftly rolled over so that he was on top. He pinned her arms down with his legs and straightened up, rearing back another fist. Monica turned her head and squeezed her eyes shut in preparation for the hit, but after a few seconds she realized it was not coming. 

She peered out of one caramel brown eye to see Raph glaring down at her, but his fist was no longer drawn back. "Don't feel too bad, Hawkeye. You may be a kunoichi one day, but you'll never be as good as us." With that, he got up and left the dojo.

"Mona-" Leo started as apology as he jogged forward to help Monica up, but Monica simply held up a hand to silence him.

"You don't have to apologize for your brother, Leo." Monica stated, fighting hard to keep her voice steady. In reality, she was embarrassed, winded, and in pain, but she was determined not to show it.

"I know." Leo said, offering his hand to her, which she took before brushing off her pants. "I was just going to suggest you not take it personally. He's still grieving. This is just... how he copes."

Monica stared at the floor for a minute, her brows furrowing slightly. What she really wanted to say in response was that was really no excuse to hurt the people around you. After all, she was grieving, too. She lost her entire family only a few weeks before Casey died. But then she remembered that she did initially try to kill the turtles when she first met them because of that, so she decided she was not the best example of healthy coping behavior. "I understand that." Was all she managed.

"I think we should call the session for now. But Master Splinter will probably want to have another session later. We could see if Mikey and Donnie want to join, then they can spar Raphael." 

"That would be a better arrangement." Monica agreed. "I can go discuss it with Donnie right now, actually. I promised him I'd drop in and check in on Tyler."

"Sounds good." Leo smiled, and with that, Monica left the dojo, her steps quick and purposeful as she made her way over to the lab. The empty living room made her mood go for bad to worse as she moved through it. She looked at the couch and could perfectly see the turtles, Shelby, April, Casey, and herself sitting there around four months ago, debating whether or not Jurassic Park could really happen or not (in a world with mutants and secret ninja clans armed with alien technology, the answer was yes). Now, the living room sat dim and empty. 

Of course, when Donnie wasn't helping to train her, he stayed cooped up in the lab, and Mikey split his time between Shelby's room, the dojo, and the kitchen. The only time Monica saw Raphael was in the dojo and the occasional drop in to her room where he would either borrow Riley, her pet iguana, for company or return him. Otherwise, Raphael patrolled by himself and spent the rest of his time in his bedroom. And then there was Shelby, who hadn't left her bedroom in three months. April had dropped off the face of the earth since Casey's funeral, and Casey... well, he was skating around in whatever afterlife he found himself in. Monica knew that Master Splinter was likely mediating in his room, which she respected, but she wished that he would come out and watch something on the TV every once and awhile, just to make the lair feel more... homey. 

Monica eyes flinted across the empty lair as she laid her hand on the door handle of the lab, frowning. When she had left Philadelphia with the turtles, she had hoped this was somehow a fresh start, but it was starting to feel like she had lost her family all over again.

She opened the door and peered inside. "Donnie?"

"Oh, Mona! Hi, how was training?" Donnie asked with a smile. Monica returned the smile. She loved that nickname. It made her feel like the turtles truly valued her as a team member. Well, Donnie, Leo, and Mikey, that is.

"It was fine until your brother showed up." Mona mumbled.

She did not have to specify which one for Donnie to give an understanding nod. "Yeah... training hard is how he copes."

"I know, I know." Monica grumbled, her wavy brown hair bouncing in her ponytail as she approached Tyler, laying unresponsive on the medical cot. "Has he been moved yet today?"

"No, I couldn't remember if we were supposed to flip him on his right side or his left." Donnie said, approaching the cot.

Monica gasped mockingly. "Donatello... you forgot something? How could you NOT remember that he was on his right side last evening?"

He laughed and shook his head. "Oh, give me a break, I have a lot of stuff on my plate." They both worked to flip Tyler onto his left side, an effort that took no communication because they've done it so many times in order to keep bed sores at bay. Monica changed the shape of Tyler's pillow to make sure it wasn't covering his nose or mouth. She caressed his face for a moment as she took in his features. Paling skin, freckled cheeks and nose bridge, a greasy mess of knotted, sandy blonde hair. A face she'd become so familiar with, but she had only ever heard his voice two times while in battle. He was so young- what, like, 14?- and had already been through so much. She hoped that Donnie would be able to successfully bring him back so she could meet him properly.

"How's the antidote doing?" Monica asked as she began running her fingers through his hair, getting the knots out. 

"So far? It's going well. I've been giving the serum in small doses as to not overwhelm his neurological system. The original "mind erase" serum actually only affected a couple areas in the brain, namely the hippocampus and amygdala, which are associated with episodic memories and memory recognition, while leaving other parts of the brain associated with semantic and procedural memories alone. Brielle's notes on this are actually quite fascinating. If she wasn't apart of the Foot Clan, I'd love to sit down and talk about how-"

Monica cleared his throat, looking up at Donnie. "Stay on target."

"Oh, right. Well, the original serum didn't actually destroy any neurons and cause permanent damage. Instead, it reversed the oligodendrocytes of those regions of the brain from mature cells that produce myelin to pre-myelinating oligodendrocytes without actually getting rid of the oligodendrocytes themselves."

Fortunately for the biology classes she had taken in nursing school, Monica was keeping up with Donnie's explanation perfectly. "So the antidote basically ages the oligodendrocytes back to the myelin producing stage, which re-establishes the connection between neurons in the hippocampus and amygdala, which... restores the memories that make him Tyler Bradford."

"Precisely." Donnie flashed a gapped-tooth smile, grabbing his laptop and showing Monica a program that had been downloading Tyler's brain activity. "See the lack of activity by the midbrain? Those are the hippocampus and amygdala. These were from two days ago." He flipped to the next picture. There was a small increase in activity, but it was certainly there. "This was today!"

"Wow, so he's really coming back." Monica beamed, looking back down at Tyler. "When do you think we'll be able to wake him up?"

"I'd say less than a week." Donnie stated.

Monica's heart fluttered with excitement. A lot of hope for Monica's future laid on Tyler's shoulders, and he didn't even know it. But Monica had hope that a revived Tyler would finally be enough to lure Shelby out of her room, and that felt like the first step to getting back to normal. She looked up at Donatello to tell him that this was great news, but the words became lodged in her throat as her eyes fell on a young boy with dark tawny skin and scruffy, dark brown hair that fell slightly in front of his hazel eyes as he looked at her. He smiled at Monica, dipples forming in his cheeks. Monica could only stare, her mouth agape, all words alluding her as tears welled in her eyes.

The boy's brows furrowed his confusion. "Are you okay?" He asked.

"Andrés?" She asked, reaching towards his face.

He grabbed her hand, holding it in gentle redirection. "Who's Andrés?" Monica blinked, clearing the moisture from her eyes as her brother disappeared, Donatello sitting in his place with a concerned expression. "Mona?"

She cleared her throat, pulling her hand away and rapidly wiping her cheeks before standing. Donnie stood as well. "I think I should do some meditating."

"Are you sure? Do you need to talk about something?" Donnie asked.

"No, no, I just need to relax." Monica insisted, brushing past him. But before she could reach the door, it opened, revealing Leonardo on the other side.

"Guys," he started, looking rather distraught, "living room, now."