xXVXx

Chapter Four

The Ground

They stripped him of all the space gear, leaving only his belt, pads, mask, and wraps. Those weren't worth anything to them. Basically, he was left with only what he truly owned. "Worthless junk," they called it.

Raph wouldn't mind it, really, but they took the translation device he had on him and now he couldn't understand a single word the aliens pronounced.

He was lying on his side in the far back of the vehicle with his hands bound together behind his back. He would have broken free of the restraint and fought everyone on board any day, but at that moment his main priority was staying alive rather than wreaking havoc.

His breaths were deep and hard but at the same time rapid. His wheezing was loud. He would have never thought he would get tired from simply breathing. Every time he relaxed and slowed the tempo just a bit his oxygen was cut short. And every time he tried to move, or his exhausting new breathing cycle got disturbed in any other way, he'd start coughing and that only led to more suffocating. So he tried to stay as calm and still as he could – as much as it went against his hot tempered nature.

He really wanted to yell and fight and escape, but was forced to lie and gasp for air until his throat hurt.

Feeling like forgotten luggage, he watched the aliens sitting in a circle on the vehicle floor, chatting and laughing with each other as if this was a regular Friday evening in their lives.

After all the adrenaline from before left Raph's body, he couldn't help but feel confused and scared. He still had no idea what was happening or why it was happening in the first place.

In time, the aliens' figures started becoming more and more illuminated by the occasionally flickering orange ceiling light as the light outside the dirty windows dimmed.

How long have we been driving? Where are they taking me? Are Casey and Mikey okay? Were they taken, too? The unanswered questions started settling like dust.

The sounds the aliens made as they talked with each other were strange and unpleasant to his ears. The way they spoke, words snapped in odd places, reaching strange deep tones and then becoming a fast-paced mess of sounds he couldn't find the right letters for.

The language they spoke was so much different, so unlike anything he'd ever heard, that it made him terribly homesick just listening. On one hand, he was still partly glad they chatted out loud so his terrible breathing wasn't the only noise in the small room, but on the other, it made him feel like he was kept in the dark about what was going on.

Why couldn't they have left the stupid translator?

Every now and then a head would turn his way and then back to the loud group and Raph knew they were all talking about him right in front of his face. He hated the obvious glances. They weren't even trying to hide it. It irritated him more than the sting in his eyes from the dirty air.

He felt humiliated over his fear, too.

The ship suddenly shook and its engine screeched before giving up as the whole vehicle landed with a light thump. It shook Raph out of his circle of thoughts and brought him back to his situation.

The giant thugs all got up, reminding the turtle just how small he was in comparison. One grabbed him by the edge of his plastron, near his lightning bolt crack, and yanked him up to his feet.

"Aagh!" Raph stumbled over but caught his balance. His lungs didn't appreciate the movement or his cry as they burned with pain. While the aliens waited for his new coughing fit to stop, they placed the breathing masks, that were strapped to their belts, on their faces. Raph wished to have the luxury of wearing one but no one showed a sign of even considering giving one to him.

The vehicle door opened and a cloud of brown smoke illuminated by the orange light in the van burst into the tight space. Raph's eyes widened and he tried to back away from the spreading cloud but the alien that pulled him up held him firmly by the edge of his carapace.

Raph's automatic response to the smoke would be to hold his breath but he forced himself to keep his breaths even like before instead. The air that hit him was as lacking in oxygen as the air inside the ship but it was so dusty it tickled and scraped his throat and lungs. He could taste the dirt on his tongue and it stung his already reddened eyes. It hurt so much more to breathe and see in it.

He was pushed out and forced to walk into the dim outside. There was dirt and trash lying around and hanging from the tangles of wires and heap of collapsed platforms in the thick smog above them. Raph recognized they were at the bottom of the "bottomless pit", at the foot of the enormous skyscrapers. It was in an even worse state than he had imagined. Everything was rusted to the point it hardly held together. Even the supporting metal pillars and beams that must have been added at one point were decaying. There were no fancy bright neon lights decorating the dirty walls and beams. Only a few flickering, makeshift street lights lit the path of trash they were walking on.

Little creatures scrambled through the trash and scattered between everyone's legs as they walked by them. Raph's blood ran cold when one decided to run over his toes. He immediately kicked his leg up trying to shake away the disgusting feeling which earned him laughs from the aliens around and a merciless punch to the stomach for stopping his pace by the one who was leading him forward.

The hit, which Raph would dismiss in a fight back home, sent him stumbling over from impact. His hands were still tied behind his shell and he landed flat on his stomach, lifting a thick cloud of dust from the ground with his fall. Air was knocked out of his lungs and black spots swayed in the corner of his blurred vision. More laughs burst out around him as he gasped. He couldn't get enough air no matter how much he inhaled. The dust forced him to cough after every try and it hurt so much. His body started convulsing and shaking uncontrollably as blackness started wrapping itself around his mind.

The group of alien thugs ended their amused chuckles when the small green alien beneath them started to spasm.

The horn-headed leader, who had been further ahead, came back to see what made her gang stop. She pushed her way through the circle to see her loot's life slipping away before her.

"Idiots!" she growled at them as she crouched down before the suffocating alien. "Do you want him to die!?"

Taking off her breathing mask, she pressed it against Raph's snout. Raph's panicked eyes shot open from the sudden contact and looked straight up at her. They were bloodshot and wide as those of a cornered animal.

"Breathe…" she encouraged him, even though she knew he couldn't understand her. She didn't want the alien to die. He was worth a lot of money alive. If he died choking on dirt, she was positive no one would even consider eating his meat, let alone buying it.

Raph's breaths evened after a minute of greedily sucking in oxygen and his head relaxed back down to the ground. He felt woozy and detached, his consciousness still not fully returned. The alien strapped the mask on his limp head seeing he would need it for at least a while. She herself didn't have the need for it apart from the smog annoying her.

"Nartraal, take the gear to Sippa. Tell him to sell it at the market at a good price. The rest of you just leave before you screw everything up!" the leader ordered after lifting Raphael from the ground and throwing him over her shoulder.

Raph tried to kick at her but found no strength to cause any damage. All he could let out was a silent choked whimper under the breathing mask.

The leader stopped one of the leaving members. "Kralya, you're staying with me. You're better at negotiating than I am."

The blue four-armed alien stepped to her side as the rest of the gang started returning to the vehicle. He looked over at Raph's pale face and unfocused eyes.

"He should be better in a couple of valyutes."

"Good."

xXvXx

What will happen to Raph? :O Please leave a review until next time. :)