April lies asleep on the couch. She does that a lot these days, sleeping. Not that there is much else to do. Not since …. Since almost everyone we love died.
Mikey sits on the floor, leaning up against wall. It has been ages since I have heard him laugh, or seen him smile. It hurts seeing him like that. The old Mikey, the one who couldn´t stop pulling pranks and making jokes, is gone. But it´s not just that. It´s his innocence as well, his faith good things, his ability to see the positive side of everything and his love for life. It´s all just gone. He isn´t full with joy or energy or enthusiasm anymore. He is just…empty. No, not empty. He has a lot of anger and pain. Guess that´s something.
It has been thirteen days since we buried Raphael. Thirteen long days. Leo was the first one to die. It was the Shredder himself that finished him off. Splinter was the next one to go. Then Donnie. After that it was Raph´s turn.
Mikey looks at me. "I am hungry. Wanna get some launch?" he asks.
"Sure," I answer. Not because I am hungry, but because I usually try to do as many things with him as possible. Partially because I desperately need some company these days and partially because I am worried about him. All three of his brothers and his father died in less than a year. Now he has only got me and April left. Well, and Leatherhead. Good, old Leatherhead. Thank God we have him.
Mikey stands up and starts making something from the things we have got. I go and help him.
"Let´s make some for April," I say.
This is how it has been ever since Donnie died. The few of us remaining simply just trying to get by from hour to hour. Before we at least still fought. But after his death it was as if everything seemed too hopeless. There were too few of us and frankly, we just didn't have it in us anymore. The deaths of three loved ones over the course of few months were too much for us to handle. Raph was the only one who still wanted to fight, and even he didn´t have the guts to go up against the Shredder and his Foot ninjas alone, and the rest of us stopped him from going top-side to beat up lowlifes. So he had to let his anger go out on his punching-bag and his room. Not one thing in it is unbroken, apart from his bed. It hasn´t been slept in for weeks now.
Mikey´s eyes start to become misty and a tear runs down his cheek. He begins crying. I do the only thing I can think of and wrap my arm around his shoulders. He leans his head on my chest. After awhile I start crying too. There we stand until the water we were heating starts to boil. Still sobbing we continue cooking and when we are finished I go over and wake up April.
"Hey, baby. Mikey and I made some dinner. Come and get something," I say. I try to be as calm and light-hearted as I can, like my best friend didn´t just get killed few days ago.
"No thanks. I am not hungry," she replies.
"Come on, baby. You got to eat. Please just humor me, okay," I say.
"Okay," April says and sits up. Like a good little girl she walks over to Mikey who is already eating, and the three of us sit down and share meal together.
We sit on some old pillows that were found in the junkyard. After Leo´s death sitting at the table became painful with his seat being empty and all, and when Donnie died it was just too much, so we started eating on the floor instead.
I notice April watching the pillow beside Mikey. Nobody is sitting on it. I don´t say anything. Mikey sees what we are both looking at and I can tell we are all thinking the same. It used to be Raph´s.
First the dinner table, now the floor.
Thirteen days. It has been thirteen days since we buried Raph´s body at my grandmother´s farm. Since Mikey buried his last remaining brother. Since I buried my best friend.
Sometimes (well, most of the times) it gets too much. All of it. Not fighting, having lost four family members, watching Mikey and April suffer. I really can´t stand it. Then again, I guess nobody could.
"I think I should go top-side," April says.
"Why," I ask, terrified. I can´t lose April too, and after all that has happen I have become quite paranoid. Bet Leo would have loved seeing how cautious I am nowadays. That´s what happens when some three of your best friends, and their father, are murdered with cold blood - no puns intended.
Mikey looks just as frightened of the idea as me.
"Just to get some of my stuff. I still haven´t got everything I own," April explains. "I would of course only go together with you," she says.
A while after Splinter´s death April and me decided to move in with the guys. We felt like we had to be there for them since they were orphans now. I sold my place and started sleeping on the couch in the Lair. April slept on a mattress beside the couch, but she still kept her place. We used to spend some time at it for a while, but lately none of us has bothered leaving the Lair unless to get some food or go out for an occasional training run. Leo would probably lecture us to no end if he knew how few of those we have had since his death.
I just lost my second job since Leo died. Well, I don´t know that for sure, but since it has been over two weeks since I showed up last time, I guess it is safe to assume that I have. So I am unemployed in the moment, but I am just too depressed to look for another one in the moment. April´s shop has been closed a lot lately. It was last open the day Raph vanished. After that we spent all of our time looking for him. Eight days later we ran into Hun, who happily told us that there was no need to keep on searching.
"Sure," I say. "Wanna go after dinner?" Like I was agreeing to go out with her to see a movie, not risk both of ours, and a mutated turtle´s, lives by leaving the sewers of New York. Now when it is just the three of us left we are being extra careful, since there are too many Foot ninjas out there, even if we got Leatherhead´s help. Not to mention Purple Dragons and people who are hunting down green, turtle like creatures that roam the city. Yes, the turtles have been spotted too often and now there are people trying to capture them.
Once we have finished cleaning up after dinner we go topside and go over to April´s place. While Mikey and she go inside to get her stuff, I guard the building outside. I look over the roof top I am standing on and I feel the absence of my best friend. How I wish Raph were there by my side. I remember guarding April´s place once before, in what felt like another lifetime. I remember when Raph came over to ask me help him and his brothers look out for April, and later dragging me inside together with April after I got injured in the battle with that nano –robot-thingy. When his brothers left he teased me about staying behind to be taken care of by April. What was it he said? Something like: "You wouldn't be milking this boo-boo thing, wouldja Case?"
Thinking about Raph makes me miss the others too. How could it not since they were a family? Hard to think of one of them without not being reminded of the rest.
I hear something in the alley behind the building. I walk across the roof top to check what it is. It is just some homeless guy going through the garbage.
Guess losing four friends in less than a year can make you pretty paranoid. At least if they were all murdered.
April and Mikey come with April´s stuff and we head back to the lair together. We might have lost a lot this year, but at least we still got each other.