Walking through New York City at night was, admittedly, not always the safest course of action in even the most ordinary circumstances. And tonight was about as far away from normal as it got.
April ran out of the abandoned warehouse, unshed tears burning her eyes. She wasn't sure what part of town her father had flown her to, but at that moment she wasn't thinking about getting home, or getting off the streets, or even about how she was going to get the cure for her father. All she could think about was getting away from those damn turtles.
She ran around a corner into an alley after running for what felt like miles, sliding down the wall, and hugged her knees. Slowly, she began to cry, her tears quickly turning into sobs. Soon she was a mess, sobbing freely. She cried harder than she had since her mother had died. She had lost her father again, and this time it might well be for good.
She had calmed down enough that her sobs had started to become sniffles when her phone started ringing. She pulled it out, not having to look at the screen to know who was calling. She rolled to her knees, raising the t-phone high above her head, poised to smash it, when she paused. She hadn't brought anything up to the rooftop when she and her father had set up the radar. She had no money, no card, not even change for the bus or a pay phone. She took a few breaths, and was about to hang up on whichever of THEM had called, when the phone went silent. It had barely stopped, however, before it began again. The familiar purple clad face popped up on her screen, grinning sillily up at her. April felt a new surge of anger, and almost destroyed the phone again, before gritting her teeth and simply pressed 'ignore call'. Before he could redial, April was already calling her aunt.
"Aunt Carol?" She asked as a sleepy voice answered. "I'm sorry, I know it's late, I just..." She paused, her voice breaking. "Could...could you come get me? Dad's...dad is..." She couldn't even finish her sentence before a new wave of tears came up, which, a small voice in her head rationalized, was probably for the best, because she had NO idea how to finish. Dad's a giant bat? He's gone batty? Got caught between a rock and a bat place? She nearly laughed, the night's events beginning to take a toll.
Luckily for her, her aunt had apparantly heard enough. She immediately began comforting her niece, and April could hear her rushing around in the background. She even heard a thump that sounded like her aunt falling over, a notion that was further supported by a quite 'damn it'. She peered around the corner and quietly gave the street signs to her aunt.
"Don't worry, April. I'll be there in two minutes. We'll figure this out, sweetie." April mumbled something that sounded vaguely affirmative, and then hung up, looking at her phone. A message popped up, alerting her of a missed call from Donnie.
Making a face, she brought the phone closer and said in a firm and clear voice, "T-phone self destruct." She didn't want any more contact with the turtles. Nothing more to connect her to the pain and chaos that surrounded them. She was done with them. For good.
