The group climbed out of the sewers grates, scanning the area for any sign of suspicious activity. Leo, ever the protective turtle stood firmly in front of his family, katanas unsheathed and ready for a fight. Well, less of a fight, more of a search for any information. The rain certainly didn't help, since visual clues ought to have washed away.
"It's hard to believe it's been one whole night." Mikey said with a yawn. "It feels like we've been looking forever. Like an entire week!" Despite the humor in his voice, he still noticeably refused to look at Leo and instead opted to say this only to April and Raph.
"Stay alert. Keep an eye out for any clues." Leo ordered. "But stick to the shadows." He added, though that part was obvious.
April, Mikey and Raph nodded as they began their search. The ever wise cracking Raphael had no jokes or jeers planned out for his oldest brother like he usually did. They were all too stressed knowing Donnie and Casey were missing. Possibly hurt.
Leo was examining the sidewalk, when he felt a bump against his shoulder. He turned around sharply, facing the acid green eyes of his younger brother glaring at him.
"Have you found anything?"
Raph shook his head, silent.
"Keep looking then. We don't have time to waste." They continued to search, but every so often Raph would huff in annoyance. Leo frowned. "If you've got something to say: say it."
"What exactly did you see in Nova?"
"Raph, not now." He bit back a growl. "We don't have time." He repeated the same mantra so many times, it might as well be his catchphrase.
"Clearly you did, since you were off lyin' and sticking your tongue down a dangerous freak's throat. Now she's gone and nabbed our friend and our brother. How does that make you feel, knowing this was all your fault? It would have been prevented but you're too much of a moron to realize that not everyone wants to be redeemed just because they turn you on!"
"Stop it. You're not helping." He clenched his jaw, forcing a series of retorts back like it was bile. He wouldn't stoop to Raphael's taunts. He was older, wiser and more mature than him. But wiping that arrogant, haughty smirk from his brother's face would be so satisfying.
"You said I should say something, so I said it!" Raph spat. "Mikey's right, you know for once. I can't stay quiet when you lead him to her. She took our brother. He could be-"
"He isn't."
"How can you be so sure?" He asked, blood boiling as he watched Leonardo's expression stay stoic. Somehow the lack of emotion only made him angrier. "How can you be so confident he's even alive? How can you stand there, without a care in the world when our brother is missing?"
What he hadn't expected was the devastated expression on Leonardo's face and the haunting words that followed.
"I'm not."
"What?"
He sighed, calming thoughts entering his mind. "I'm not sure he's safe. But stressing over the what ifs isn't going to save them any faster. You can stay mad at me, but it won't do them any good."
"You- do you even care?"
"Of course I care!" He snapped harshly. "I'm not going to waste any more time arguing with you. We have to save them."
"Obviously. But you have a pattern with making an ass out of yourself over a pretty face. And we can't make any more sacrifices."
Leo's jaw tightened, ready to retort.
"We've talked about this before. Remember Karai? Need I remind you how that turned out? Besides the whole...her actually being related to us thing. Which was weird."
The leader in blue cringed.
"I just don't want the same thing to happen, brother. We need you. As much as I hate to admit it." He gritted his teeth. "And believe me, I really do."
"I won't make the same mistakes again." Leo vowed. "I promise."
"Hmph, you better." Raph's face twisted from a scowl to a worried grimace. "This was all on you. But...I'm just a little on edge, okay?" Barely audible, he mumbled a quick: "SorryforbeinganassIguess."
"Never thought I'd hear that from you." Leo quipped, earning a punch on the arm. "Yeah, okay I deserved that." He paused, sapphire eyes wandering to their other brother who looked more miserable by the second. "Do you think he'll forgive me?"
"Give him time." Raph assured him. "Mikey's never one to hold a grudge. No matter how much you deserve it. Which you do."
"You're right though. He was too. This /is/ all my fault."
"Yeah it was. So that's why you're gonna fix it. We all are. That's what we do. Fix our messes. Even the big ones."
Leo smiled weakly, amused by his brother's always need to be blunt. To say things how they were and never sugarcoat. "Thanks."
"No problem, Fearless. Now stop standin' around and help me look for clues."
A beat.
Raph looked at him, voice still gruff, but he seemed uncharacteristically uneasy. "I didn't mean what I said. I know you care about Donnie. I was just..."
"Scared?" Leo raised his eyebrows, clearly amused by Raph's denial of having a soft heart deep inside his hard exterior.
'Like a geode.' Donnie probably would have said at that moment. If he had been there.
He scoffed. "No way. Donnie's tough. But I may be just a teeny bit concerned."
~•~
April found herself checking and rechecking every spot just to make sure that it was thorough. So far, nothing. Each second she wasted pacing through the dimly lit streets made her grow more unnerved and frustrated with herself.
This wasn't right at all. She had seen Donnie just this morning. He had passed her apricot jam during breakfast for her toast, rambling on about some latest project he was working on. In his endearing, Donatello way. She had been half asleep at the time, but she remembered staring into his doe eyes with rapt attention. Seeing him get so excited made her heart swell with joy.
Was that the last time she was going to hear his voice? See him smile?
Sure, some of his efforts to woo her with his obvious crush had been annoying. Sometimes vaguely creepy. But he had learned every time she had told him to calm down. And he had. He had listened to her. She had appreciated that he had made an effort to.
And Casey...she hadn't seen him all day. But he had called her the night before, complaining about some calculus test that he hadn't studied for.
"Why would I need to study when I've got the best tutor around, Red?" He had said.
"Flattery won't help you pass this class, Jones." She remembered rolling her eyes fondly.
Her boys. Her sweet, sometimes insane boys who made her heart flutter inside like a trail of butterflies in an exhibit. Now that they were starting to get along, she had found herself falling for them even more as each day passed. Of course, silently rooting that they would become friends for their own sake.
And her sanity.
"I'm so screwed." She mumbled to herself, silently scolding that she couldn't deal with her feelings now. They weren't important at the moment and she wasn't quite what she was even feeling. A mixture of emotions.
April looked up at the navy blue sky. The stars were shimmering brightly, even through the foggy pollution scattering the clouds. "It'll be okay, guys. I promise, we'll find you. I'll find you, at least." She vowed.
She could see their eyes, the outlines of their broken bodies. They were alive. But barely.
She wondered if they were looking at the same set of stars too.
"April? You okay?"
She flinched, startled by the unexpected noise.
"Sorry," The orange masked turtle said meekly. "I didn't mean to scare you. You just looked super deep in thought. Kinda like a zombie. Wait...I guess zombies don't really look deep in thought. Since they don't think." He giggled, then rested a hand on her shoulder, looking surprisingly wise. "It's okay to not be okay, you know?"
"I know. And, yeah, I'm not doing so good."
"Me neither."
"I keep telling myself that it'll be okay. But I can't help being scared."
"It's okay to be scared too. We'll save them. We just have to keep looking!" He chirped, optimism evident in his bright voice. It comforted her, even a little bit.
"I sure hope so." Her insides felt as though they were tied in knots. But she couldn't give in. No matter how much she wanted to scream, cry, vomit, or do all three at once. She couldn't. She had to be strong.
Thankfully her jumbled thoughts were interrupted by both Leo and Raph marching towards them.
"We found something." The latter said darkly. He held up one half of a bō, Leo held the other.
"That's Donnie's staff! Someone broke it again!" said Mikey. "He's gonna be so bummed."
"That means he tried to defend himself." Leo's voice sounded hoarse.
"Look a little closer." Raph shoved the snapped bō into Mikey's arms.
"Are those...teeth marks?" April murmured, grazing the wood with her fingertips.
"Ew, did Donnie bite his own staff?" Mikey asked. "That's just nasty."
"No, shell for brains, someone bit it in half." Raph snarled. "And we all know who must have done that, huh?" He gave a pointed look at his older brother.
"She must have taken him." Leo said, not missing the slightly resentful look from both of his remaining brothers.
"That's not all.. " Raph said, showing a snapped hockey stick in his other hand. "Casey too."
'Now what?" Mikey whimpered.
"I thought...I thought that I could trust her." He swallowed. "I'm such an idiot."
"I mean I could have told you that. Oh wait, I already did."
"You've got to pull yourself together, Leo. And Raph, chill out." snapped April. "We'll need backup. These teeth are sharp. I can't tell what animal she is, but she's definitely big."
Leo blushed. "She is."
"Even with all of our skills combined, it'll be rough. We'll need all the help we can get to fight her. Let's-"
She didn't have a chance to finish her sentence. None of them had even a second to hide in the shadows before they were ambushed by an unexpected intruder. Sprinting at full speed with the energy of a highly caffeinated jack rabbit.
Directly at Leonardo.
"Gah!" He yelped, stumbling backwards clumsily. Each took a closer look and realized it was only a child. A child with spiky black hair wielding a baseball bat.
"Donatello!" The tiny stranger exclaimed, hugging him tightly by the waist. "Boy, am I glad to see you. This night has been insane!"
"Uh..." Leo blinked in confusion. "What?"
"Wait a sec, you're not Donatello." She frowned.
"No kidding!" He hollered, while his brothers couldn't hold back their laughs at the mix up.
"Riley?" April stepped forward towards the younger girl curiously.
An awkward silence dawned on them as they all tried to figure out what was going on. She was smaller than average and wore what looked like a grey shirt, black vest and ripped jeans. Her face was covered by a matching black mask but there were teeth drawn crudely on it to resemble a mouth.
"April, you know these guys?" Riley looked positively starstruck, pulling down her mask.
"They're my friends."
"No way! What a coinkydink."
"Biggest population in America my shell..." Raph mumbled under his breath. "What are the odds?"
"Anyway," Leo interrupted. "Did you call me Donatello?"
"How do you know Donnie?" Mikey pondered.
"And who even are you?" Raph demanded.
"This is Casey's sister Riley." April explained.
"Half sister." Riley corrected.
"Seriously, what are the odds?" Raph snarked. "Wait...you're /the/ Riley? The one Casey always talks about? And the one Donnie saved from the Purple Dipshits?"
"Ah, so you've heard of me. Don't blame you, I'm pretty well known. Riley Elizabeth Zhao-Jones," She spat into her hand, holding it out expectantly. Only Mikey shook it, the remaining two turtles looked positively disgusted. "Sorry, I didn't mean to confuse you for him. I didn't realize there were more of you. That's so cool! You're like a bunch of turtle ninjas!" She lightly poked Leo's shell with her fingertip. "Woah...is that a sword?" She reached her hand out to touch the sharp blade, but April pulled her back.
"These are Donatello's brothers. Leonardo, Raphael and Michaelangelo. But I thought you were at home with Sara and your dad, Ri. It's too late to be out."
"Well I had Kung Fu practice." Riley replied. "But Casey never picked me up. So I figured I could get some answers." She swung her bat around, nearly whacking Raph in the face, who ducked due to his quick reflexes.
"That's great kid, but we've got to save our brother." Raph said, ruffling her hair in a way that seemed too condescending for the girl to handle.
"So do I." She shot back defiantly. Soon she was nose to nose with Raphael, not an inch of fear in her glaring hazel eyes despite his size and muscle advantage. "I overheard you guys. Some ...mutant took them? We should work together to save our brothers!"
"I'm down!" Mikey bounced excitedly.
"Uh, yeah I'm not. She's a kid." Leo said, stern as always. "We don't have the liability for putting a child in danger. She shouldn't even know we exist."
"Listen up Mr. Blue, I've got some mad skills. And I'm no kid. I'm almost a teenager." She puffed out her chest. "Sides, I can totally be trusted. I've seen a /lot/ weirder."
"Yeah, she's definitely related to Casey." Raph smirked. "But you're still not coming with us."
"Damnit!"
"So, what do we do with her?" Leo said. "We can't just leave her alone."
"I'll take her home." Raph offered. "I know Casey's place."
"And we'll visit the Mutanimals. Ask if they're willing to help us." Leo said to April and Mikey respectively.
"I'll send a mass text message to the group chat!" Mikey squealed. "To let them know we're coming!"
"Do I get a say in any of this?" Riley whined.
"No!" All four teens chorused.
"We better go then." Raph said to Riley, who he only now realized was an entire foot shorter than him. "Tell Mona I say hi." He added.
"I'll send you the coordinates of where we are once you're done." Leo confirmed. "I have a theory that might be where Nova is."
"You're sure you can handle taking her home, Raph?" April asked.
He snorted, waving her off. "I've taken down alien robots, mutants twice the size of me, a giant cheese grater and a shit ton of other monsters. Walkin' some kid home? Piece of cake." He snapped his fingers. "Catch you all later. Give me a call if anything changes in the plan."
"We will."
~•~
But what Hamato Raphael had underestimated that evening, was how annoying one middle schooler could possibly be. At first he thought it was going to be a cakewalk. A pint sized girl with a temper was hardly anything to be worried about. And at first, she didn't seem too bad.
The girl skipped along while Raph forced himself to hide in the shadows, keeping an eye on the kid who seemed to want to stop for everything.
"So can I touch your sais?" She asked with her annoyingly high pitched voice that reminded him of Mikey.
"For the hundredth time: No!" He growled back, growing increasingly agitated by the second. "We're almost there. Keep up."
"Why do you wear a mask anyhow? It's not like you need to protect your identity or anything. Seems kinda silly to me."
"God, help me now." Raph groaned to no one in particular. "Why me? What did I do to deserve this torture?"
"Can we stop for food?"
"No." It was like if Casey copy pasted into a significantly more annoying child.
"You know, if I could be a mutant I think I'd be a goat. Goats are cool. Ooh or maybe a raccoon! Like Sparky!"
"Who's Sparky?"
Just as he asked that, a tiny furry head popped out of her backpack. Raph let out a surprised unmanly shriek.
The raccoon- Sparky apparently raised a claw to playfully swipe at the giant turtle.
"That's a raccoon." He said, baffled. "That's a raccoon. In your bag. Why the hell is there a raccoon in your bag? That's not supposed to happen! Something is very wrong here!"
She simply giggled. "This is Sparky!"
"That thing is evil and I regret everything." He deadpanned. Even as an avid animal lover, Raphael knew better than those adorable big eyes.
~•~
"Stay stealthy ninjas..." Leo said, checking his surroundings for the umpteenth time. He knocked thrice on the rusty door, waiting for a response.
"Is this the right place?" April tilted her head. It didn't really look like a secret base. Just an average, run down building.
"Yeperdoodle!" Mikey chimed happily. "Trust us."
The door slammed open with a bang after the third knock, causing April to shriek in surprise and Leo to draw his katanas.
The turquoise sole female member of the Mighty Mutanimals stood tall in front of them, ignoring the broken door as if it was a common occurrence.
"Mona!" Mikey chirped. "It's so good to see you! Have you gotten taller?"
Mona Lisa frowned, noticing there were only two turtles present. "Where is Raphael?"
"He's fine. He'll be meeting us later." Leo supplied.
"Why are you here?"
"We need your help. Our brother Donatello is missing, and so is Casey Jones."
The alien's eyes looked grim. "You better come inside then."
The trio entered the warehouse after Mona, all looking at different levels of worry. The lair of the Mutanimals looked different than the last time they had visited. It seemed cosier, fitting to each of the respective mutants' needs.
Including a massive skateboarding ramp.
"WATCH OUT BELOW!!!" Hollered a voice above them. Leo and April braced themselves.
"Woah!" Mikey ducked, watching in awe as Mondo Gecko slid down the ramp, flame practically trailing behind him. Pigeon Pete flew above him, squealing.
"Cowabunga!" Mondo did a clumsy pose on his board once he finished.
"Wow!" Pigeon Pete squawked. "That was way better than the last five times!"
"Five times." April repeated, using her levitation abilities to knock the teenaged lizard to the ground.
"Dude, not cool." He grumbled.
"There is no time to fool around." Mona scolded the more playful mutants. "I will bring Slash and Leatherhead. This is an emergency."
"What about the others? Rockwell and Muckman?"
"They went to get food! Chinese, technically speaking. I'm starving!" Mondo Gecko explained, placing his skateboard down once he saw their exasperated expressions. "What happened?"
"That's something I'd like to know too." The gravelly voice belonging to Slash snarled. The enormous mutant entered the room, tiny eyes glaring at them. April shrunk back. Redeemed or not, Slash was freaky.
"Slash," Leo said curtly.
"Leatherhead!" Mikey exclaimed, hugging the alligator mutant behind Slash.
"Michaelangelo, my dear friend." The older mutant said after the embrace. "What has happened?"
"They didn't cancel our order, did they?" Mondo piped up.
"No, you ignoramus. Let them talk." Slash said, turning to Leonardo sharply. "So, don't leave us hanging. You wouldn't come to our place after 11pm unless something happened."
Leo took a deep breath, finally revealing the truth. The aching regret inside him made his anxiety go haywire, especially with all eyes drawn to him. But he refused to show any emotion. "A new mutant has emerged. A new dangerous mutant." He swallowed slowly, regretting each vulnerable moment he revealed to them. He was supposed to be the perfect leader, the leader his team counted on. But now, he felt small. Scared even.
"But I thought we knocked out all the baddies?" Pete asked, fluttering over their heads.
"We thought so too. But apparently not. And worse, Donnie went topside and I'm so certain Nova- I mean erm- the mutant has taken him and Casey." He raised the broken staff to show while Mikey held the hockey stick. "We don't know what she wants."
"You're sure it's her? Or that she even took them? Hang on a sec, how do we even know she's a she?" Mondo said, tapping their eyeball comically. "It's not good to make assumptions!"
"Ah, shut up, peabrain." Slash shoved the small gecko aside.
"Well excuse me for being politically correct!" He harrumphed.
"Oh, it's her alright." Mikey scowled. "Leo and I fought her before. And she was tough!"
"Besides, who else could it be?" April added. "All the other mutants we've met have either become our friends or...well, disappeared."
"You've got a point there." Pete shrugged, landing to the ground.
As Mikey and April chatted with the Mutanimals about a plan, Leo stood in the back, frustrated with himself.
"It's all my fault..." He whispered.
"Did you say something, Captain?" Mondo asked Leo. "You were kinda mumbling."
He shook his head meekly. "No I didn't. Will you help us?"
"Are you kidding? Of course!" Pete exclaimed.
"I'm in." Slash smirked, twirling his mace. "I could use an excuse to kick some ass."
"I am as well." Mona said.
"And I." Leatherhead nudged Mikey. "We owe you our gratitude. And we will help save our friends."
"Me too!" Mondo leaped into the air. "Operation Rescue Mission!" He glanced at Michaelangelo for approval, who gave them a thumbs up.
"We'll meet Raph at the location then." April said.
"And I shall notify Rockwell and Muckman of what has happened." Mona said. "You will not go into this battle alone."
"Good plan. No way this Nova character will be able to handle our supreme awesomeness!" Mondo cackled.
"Have no fear, the cavalry's comin'!" Mikey shouted directly in April's ear.
Each member of the Mutanimals let out a mighty battle cry.
They were ready. But the feeling of dread and uncertainty remained as the night drew out.