It was dusk in New York City. The clouds were indigo layers that contrasted the yellow street lights perfectly. The sounds of birds returning to their nest and people returning to their homes were quiet throughout the concrete jungle. Unfortunately, below in the city's sewer system, it was quite the opposite.
Two mutant turtles kneeled silently as they watched the other two spar. A mutant rat was watching from a safe distance.
There was a thump and a certain red banded turtle fell to the floor. His blue banded opponent smirked with pride and turned to his master. Suddenly, a loud cry was heard and Raphael launched himself in Leonardo's direction. After barrel rolling, Raphael pinned his brother to the floor.
"That's the last time I lose to you Leo!" Raph held his fist in the air as Leo twitched in fright. Before he could bring it down, a furry paw grabbed his wrist softly.
"That is enough Raphael. As a ninja you must do no harm, especially to your brothers." Splinter let go of his son's wrist and Raph just huffed and left the dojo.
"Well that was interesting." Leo stated as Splinter helped him up. "Thanks Sensei." Leo smiled.
Splinter returned it and turned on his heel. "I will leave you to sort this out, my sons." He spoke over his shoulder. "Yet do not add more fuel to the fire as it is strong enough already."
The two kneeling brothers stood up and all three bowed in unison to their master.
"You okay, Leo?" The purple banded one asked.
"I'm used to it." Leo let out a small smile.
"Dude, I've never seen him do that before. I mean he's gone to hit you but he's never been that much of a sore loser and on top of that-" The youngest orange banded turtle gave his brother a confusing look when he cut him off.
"I get it, Mikey." Leo did a mental face palm. "Come on, I'm gonna watch space heroes, wanna join?"
At this Donatello and Michelangelo cringed; they hated space heroes.
"Ah, um, I'm need to finish my lab project." And with that Donnie scuttled away.
Leo let out a sigh, "Mikey?" He turned to face his brother but there was no sight of him. He turned fast enough to see his little brother rush out the dojo.
"LeoImSorryButSpaceHeroesSuck!" He let out in one breath.
Leonardo sighed again. At least I'll have some sort of peace and quiet for now. He thought.
Raphael had finally finished 200 punches on his punching bag and was debating which brother he could chat with.
Leo? No way! He is what got him in this mess in the first place.
Donnie? His scientific intellect and choice of words would probably anger him more.
Mikey? Yeah why not? Play some video games... But he might hate him for how he spoke to Leo.
Suddenly Raph got a tiny twinge of pain. He looked down at his hands and saw his busted, bleeding knuckles. Donnie it is then. He thought and made is way to the lab.
"Just add a drop of hydrochloric acid and..." Donnie was concentrating his hardest when his lab door banged open. "Ah!" Donatello jumped and accidentally let out a lot of acid. The mixture he was working on fizzed and turned to black foam.
"Ugh Mikey! How many times-" Donnie was surprised at who entered his lab. "Raph? What the shell dude? You ruined my experiment! You're as bad as Mikey." He muttered the last part and lowered his gaze and he sighed. "Punching bag?"
Raph sheepishly nodded and Donnie threw him some bandages and cream.
"I would do them but they don't look that bad and you ruined this, so it's seems fair." Donnie smirked. "Besides I'm sure you wouldn't want your younger brother patching you up, big tough Raphie can do it himself." He saw Raph's eyes twitch at that last point.
"You know I hate that name." His voice was filled with so much venom.
"You know I love my experiments so yeah whatev- Ah!" The sound of the lab door shut with such a loud bang Donnie practically fell out his chair.
"Brothers." He muttered and went back trying to fix his experiment.
Raphael stormed out of the lab on the verge of blind rage. First Leo now Donnie? All of a sudden his youngest brother appeared from behind him with a bright smile
"Hey Raphie-boy!" His smile faded when Mikey saw his brother's expression. "What's up?"
That sent him over the edge. That little question made him think of everything that's happened this evening. Raph clenched his fists and let out a mighty roar. What happened next was a blur. Flashes of red appeared in his eyes as he swung his fists around wildly. He came into contact with something and a short but loud yelp followed. As soon as he focused again, his brother was beneath him holding his plastron. Deep, quick breaths came from Mikey as his eyes welled with tears. Raph didn't know what to do.
"Mikey, bro, I'm sorry!" He crouched and put a hand on his shoulder still shocked and in fear for his little brother's safety.
He cant believe he hurt his baby brother. He had just asked what was wrong and boom he was on the floor in seconds.
"Ugh," Mikey's voice came out raspy. "It's...fine dude. Ughhhh, lemme...catch my breath." He winced as he breathed in. A couple of tears left his eyes.
"I-uh-um- I'll get Donnie." Raph suggested in a panicky tone. Normally Mikey would say 'no, it's not that bad' and just get up. But this time, he agreed. He must be really hurt bad.
Raph didn't want to leave Mikey struggling on the floor but he had to get Donnie. He stood up and took a few steps from Mikey towards the lab.
"Donnie!" Raph practically screamed. "Get your shell in here!"
Donnie's head popped around the lab door and glanced around. As soon as he saw Mikey on the floor, he was constantly asking questions.
"What happened?!"
"What did you do?!"
"Mikey, what's wrong?!"
"Raph!" Donnie turned to Raph with anger in his eyes. "What. Did. You. Do." His voice filled with venom.
"I-uh-I..." Raph started.
"Ugh save it, Raph." Donnie turned away and crouched down to Mikey. "Go do something that doesn't bother us."
Raph started to leave but he took a small glance back.
Donnie had his tongue out in concentration whilst his eyes were still filled with anger.
But Mikey, he was looking at Raph, with pain in his eyes but a smile upon his face. He mouthed "I'll be fine." Which made Raph relax a little. His little brother had no failure making him happy.
Raph turned back and went to his room; the place he knew he could stay in control, and waited for evening patrol
It was only an hour after the incident with Mikey and Raph was already losing it. He wanted to go see if his brother was okay but he didn't want to cause any more trouble. Raphael lay on his bed looking up at the ceiling.
If only I had I still had Spike. He thought to himself as closed his eyes. Raph didn't want to sleep but he found himself drifting off.
Dream
"Ugh" Raph rubbed his head. "Where the heck am I?" He said as he looked around.
Raph stood up and looked out a window. There was a vast black sky filled with stars that almost looked...cartoonish?
"Commander Grundch!" A loud voice bellowed. Raph turned and felt himself fill with horror. He was going to kill Leo after this.
Standing before him was Captain Ryan from space heroes. Crankshaw and Dr. Mindstrong were behind him.
Suddenly a stop slap came to his face.
"Commander Grundch, are you with us?" Raph looked down and saw he was in a space heroes outfit. He really hated Leo now.
"Uh, um, yeah?" Raph replied to Captain Ryan.
"Because of you, Crankshaw is injured! You mustn't return to the ship until you can control your anger!" He shouted.
"I haven't got anger issues!" Raph shouted back. "Ugh forget it." He muttered as he took the solo ship out for a spin.
After what felt ages, Raph decided to get back to that ship, maybe it could get him back to reality. But when he got back to where he thought the ship was, it wasn't there. Instead dozens of Zaxatrons were in its place. Raph soon found himself surrounded.
A message suddenly came through the speakers, startling him.
"Give in pathetic commander!" It's voice bellowed and it sounded very familiar. "For you are surrounded and soon we will capture the rest of your crew!"
Raph went to put in a retort but he soon realised who the voice belonged to.
The Shredder.
His brothers began to replace the space heroes crew as he saw them crying out in pain.
"Commander Grundch!" Captain Ryan's voice had became Leo's as well as the face. "I just want to say...ugh...don't blame yourself." His voice faded as he disappeared.
"I know we rarely talk, Commander," Dr Mindstrong was now Donnie. "But you were the greatest Commander I have ever known." He too, like Leo, disappeared.
The last one left was Crankshaw. He looked like he was going to burst into tears any minute.
But even though he resembled Raph's youngest brother in so many ways, he stayed silent, bowed his head and also disappeared.
Raph felt lost. He had no idea what to do. Or what the shell this dream was trying to tell him.
Raph suddenly got a chill down his spine. Not just a cold chill but a chill of fright. He turned around to a sight he couldn't imagine if he wanted.
There, in front of him, was shred-head himself holding three masks: blue, purple and orange decorated with flecks of Crimson.
Raph wanted to scream yet he couldn't. His throat was dry as if he hadn't drank for days.
The shredder laughed. A mad man laugh. A sick mad man laugh.
"At least the blood will blend into your mask, turtle." His deep voice was not muffled at all even though a mask covered half his face.
Raph's eyes went as wise as saucers as Shredder raised his hand and brought it down for the kill.
Reality
Raph jolted awake with beads of sweat dipping from his head. He looked at his bed and it was all messy. He was obviously thrashing around.
Raph rubbed his head. I wonder what that was all about he thought.
He got up and walked out of his room to see all three of his brothers with the tv on but they were staring at him.
"Why are you not ready?" Leo said sternly.
"What?" Was Raph's reply.
"I just knocked on your door and told you we're going on patrol in five minutes." Leo's voice had softened but had a lot of concern.
"You don't look too good, dude" Mikey pointed out. "You look like what I look like after a nightmare... Did you have a nightmare?" Baby blue eyes were filled with concern. Raph lowered his gaze away from Mikey's eyes and saw a small bandage on his torso.
At that point Raph's shoulders started to shake. He felt awful for what he did and his dream really didn't help.
"Raph?" Donnie started. "Hey, don't get upset-" Raph cut him off
"I'm not getting upset!" Raph snapped causing his brothers to jump. He saw the worries faces around him and softened his tone."I had a dream. Not just a nightmare but sort of like a warning."
"What do you mean?" Leo pressed on.
He didn't really want to say. He was never good at sharing feelings.
"I-I just don't think we should patrol tonight." Raph looked down.
Then, as if on cue, the tv show stopped to report breaking news.
"Carlos Chiang O'Brien Gambe here. What seems to be robots/ninjas are terrorising the city! They're raiding shops, homes and even the sewer system! So stay indoors, hide your children and DON'T go outside. More news on this later."
The turtles eyes were incredibly wide. The footbots were in the sewers?"
"Okay ninjas!" Leo's usual confident voice was laced with fear. "We need a plan that makes us look like we don't live in the sewer."
"But we do live in the sewer- Ow!" Raph smacked Mikey on the back of his head. Mikey looked up and pouted.
Leo rolled his eyes and continued. "We need to split up into twos and one team takes the sewers and the others take topside. Then it looks like we knew the footbots were down here and we just sent two to go get them. Raph you can go topside with Mikey, Donnie you're with me and we'll stay down here. Okay? Let's go!"
Raph and Mikey turned right out the lair whilst Donnie and Leo turned left.
Whilst he was running, Raph still couldn't shake his uneasy feeling.
Hi there! I'm new to Fanfic, but this isn't my first story! I would really appreciate reviews even constructive criticism! (I don't really know how to use it yet so bear with me!)
-Duckie