Here's the second chapter! This one is longer than the first.

Disclaimer: I do not own any turtles, let alone ninja turtles

Enjoy!

The Mark

Chapter 2: The first artefact

"What the shell is that?" Mikey asked as he pocked Leo's arm. "OW" cried Leo. "Don't do that, it burns enough without you touching it!" His brothers looked at each other.

With that comment, Juto finally walked over. He took one look at Leo's arm and gasped, so silently that no-one heard him they noticed. Before he could say a word, the remaining members of the Ninja Tribunal entered.

Upon seeing the acolytes crowding around Leo and having caught Juto's worried expression, the tribunal looked at each other and mentally discussed their next move. Upon coming up with the verdict, they nodded to each other and turned to the acolytes, who were staring at them, confused.

"The first artefact has been found', said Jikara. "You must go and retrieve it!" "Leo will you be fine?" asked Donnie in his 'I'm worried about you' voice. "If not, you could stay." "I'm fine" Leo answered looking at his new dragon mark. "It stopped burning anyway". With that Leo stood up. "Come on we must go!" he said walking towards the tribunal. After a quick briefing, the 8 acolytes boarded the mystical flying ship and went to retrieve the first artefact.

After arriving at the destination, Mikey tried to sneak past the tengu (For those who don't know tengu is Japanese for demon) using what he called 'stealth mode'. Everything was fine until he was caught and the others where driven to save him from the tengu.

Each one of the acolytes used their new mystical weapons, except for Leo, who just used his normal swords. But they were fighting a losing battle. Since the tengu can travel through the water in the river, their strength was slowly fading.

"The river!" shouted Leo as he ran towards the others with the 1st artefact. "Use the dragon kings flame!" "To stop a river, it's impossible!" said Ferarge. "Nothing's impossible!" answered Leo, grabbing Ferarge's sword. Leo's chi marks appeared, bright against the dragon mark. Using all his strength, Leo jumped up and sent flames hurling towards the river, drying it up. All the tengu disappeared and the steam clouded everything else from site.

When the steam cleared, all the acolytes were lying down dazed. All but Leo stood up, for he was unconscious. "Leo!" shouted Raph as he ran towards his fallen brother. Leo didn't respond. Raph carefully lifted Leo so he was in a sitting position and with some help from Don and Mikey carried him towards the ship, with the other acolytes following closely behind, Adam with the 1st artefact.

When they arrived back to the Ninja Tribunal, they were shocked with the Tribunal's lack of concern for Leo's well being, claiming they should have left him there for the sake of the artefact. The further shock was announced when they found out the great evil they were being trained to fight against is none other than the original shredder, a powerful tengu.

Leo didn't stir even when his brother's placed him on his bed and then retreating to theirs, Splinter and the Ancient One to their meditating spot. Nobody spoke. They were all to wound up in their own thoughts, about the Shredder and their survival. They were all to distracted that none of them noticed the mark on Leo's arm was brighter than it has been…

TBC...

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