Haha, I know. I should have had this chapter out sooner but my life has been kind of hectic and I've been busy being silly on chat rooms with the fabulously wonderful, undeniably amazing Effar. She is teh great, after all. You all would do well to pay her for her greatness. No, but seriously, sorry – I've gotten caught up for the most part, though. I'm really excited about watching this Zombieland movie, too… It looks hysterical. It'll be even more hysterical if I can convince my friend, Dhwani, to go with me to see it. Her reactions are hilarious.
I can't thank the reviewers enough, you guys! You're really making this a great experience for me as a writer. It's not common to get so many worthwhile reviews and I adore it. Thanks!
TMNT, Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, Donatello, Splinter, and the Foot © Mirage Studios
story © Turtlefreak121
Paradigm
Chapter Four: Understatements
I listened to it a few more times. The chime of the rattling chains had held my attention for I would say about fifteen minutes at that point. It had been a long enough time that I had exhaustedly rested my shell against the wall and slid down to sit. I was tiring easier at that point, what with only being awake for a week and having to still get used to the crutches. It was so hard at first...
It hadn't been long enough for Don to realize that I had escaped yet, but I hadn't gotten close enough to the gym before I had to sit. Which meant, at least, that Raphael could only just barely see me if he really looked for me.
Fortunate for me, I think.
The way he had been acting ever since I had woke up and the way he was demolishing the hanging punching bag seemed to tell me that I was in a danger zone. Still, I sat there and watched with a gut wrenching acceptance that of all the people my brother could be imagining in the place of the punching bag, I could very well be one of them.
The thud of his fist echoed off the walls of our strangely quiet home once more. I flinched. It hurt and I had to bite my lip to keep stifling a cry, but still I flinched. Still not sure how I left the fight that battered, it wasn't exactly like I was sitting there allowing myself to be wailed on.
Raphael stopped and lowered his head. his shell was turned to me and he didn't turn around... but I knew that he was very much aware of my presence at that point. He just wouldn't look at me. I wanted him to so bad.
It was very silent for a moment.
I wondered if he was thinking about the sting of our words to Leo all that time ago. It's what I had been thinking about.
Everything was so different. After the fight. We were different.
He stood there for another moment or two and I waited for him to say something to me, anything. But he didn't. I kinda already knew that he wouldn't, but I didn't want the confirmation.
It was as if he was ignoring me - not just me but my whole existence.
With a low growl that became an explosive roar, Raphael punched the bag, slinging it through the air with the force before shaking in its long swing back and forth. He did not move out of its way, just knowing it wouldn't dare come near him again.
"DONNY!" he yelled before making his way toward the other end of the gym, the exit that would keep him far away from me.
"What?" Don could be heard yelling as he walked toward the gym. It wasn't long after that that he saw me and came over, a grocery list of complaints and concerns spewing from his mouth as he picked me up.
I didn't really pay attention. I was too busy staring at the swinging bag... at the fabric taped to its center...
The nibbles I give to the Snickers bar are enough to distract me from constant thinking during the drive, but the sacrifice is pretty great for it. It tastes like old chocolate and is almost too stringy at the center.
Really, all it's good for is breaking my concentration and not letting me count the minutes we have left on the drive.
But it can only do so much against the memories bubbling to the surface. And how they make me think about the finer details you can only really imagine in hindsight.
Like rules.
The additional rules to mine and Leo's punishment after my gossiping conundrum were fairly simple, if not strict beyond reason. Master Splinter made it very clear that we had done this wrong to begin with, as per his explanation for why the first day had ended in such complete and utter failure. Somehow it seemed unfair to surmise it that way, even to me, because really... what had Leo done wrong that day?
Leo made it pretty clear that night that he did not think Master Splinter's disciplinary actions were working their usual magic. His concern being that rather than becoming more united as brothers "by blood and by clan" like Sensei insisted, we were just going to get more pissy and further divided.
But, as these things so often ended up, we were left to trust our father's judgment regardless.
I never bothered arguing, I knew better before arguments ever started.
Still, the whole moving the starting of the punishment from "sunrise" to "waking time" meant that I had to completely rearrange the order of my day.
Why?
Because Leonardo was always one of those heinous and most despicable of people known as as an Early Bird. His idea of normal was waking up at, believe it or not, five in the morning. Five.
There was no real excuse for this surreal self-torture. Other than his claim that doing otherwise made him feel "slothful". And that was just irritating for someone whose record wake-up time was around eleven.
Suffice it to say, I wasn't in a good mood when I woke up at five fifteen for "weapons maintenance." To be honest, I'm not entirely sure if before that moment I knew there was a five fifteen in the morning. I thought it was something made up like yard gnomes.
But maybe it was also the difference in weapons. I guess "weapons maintenance" makes a lot more sense when your weapons are swords as opposed to nunchucks. Cleaning nunchucks - particularly nunchucks that were relatively new and unscarred - was not really something I concerned my day with. In fact, I barely thought about it at all, other than when Splinter alerted Don, Raph, and I that it was time to clean our weapons.
"Stop groaning, Michelangelo," Leo muttered as he polished his blade.
"You can't do this at eight o'clock, Leo?" I moaned as I halfheartedly ran a rag through the links of the chain. "Or at least seven? Six?"
He gave me a warning glare before turning his blade over to check its level. He was silent for a moment as he balanced the blade in his hands, testing the weight, then he turned toward me and sheathed his blades. "Can't."
"Bullhockey," I snapped grouchily.
"My morning practice run is at six," he said shortly. "And if you don't hurry up then we'll be late and won't be back in time for breakfast."
I stared at him angrily. I did not want to go on his hellbent morning runs. Not this far into winter. Leo could be Mr. Perfect with training sessions and obsessive pre-training rituals, but I enjoyed relaxation. Like sleep.
"Why can't we go after breakfast?" I asked. "We could take Don and Raph with us."
"No," Leo said defiantly before getting up and throwing away the dirtied rags he had used, carefully folding them before dropping them in the bag.
I rolled my eyes. Seriously. Who folds stuff before they throw it away?
With yet another disgruntled moan, I gathered myself enough to rise to my feet and halter my weapons. Leo turned and raise an eye ridge expectantly. I glared back for just a moment before rubbing my face. "What?"
He looked down, I followed. Then moaned again.
Picking up the rags I had used, I wadded them up and shot them into the trash bag. Air ball.
"Goof," he muttered before picking them up for me.
I was too tired to continue this so I merely yawned and waited for him to lead me out the door. I looked forward to breakfast. It might've been the first breakfast I was on time for in years.
And, per our agreement, it would also mark the trading point from Leo Time to Mikey Time in our mandatory activities.
I could only hope Leo was dreading it nearly as much as I was looking forward to it.
We headed out and met Master Splinter at the Lair's exit. He smiled at us, bowing to us both. We replied in kind, myself incapable of suppressing a bellowing yawn on the way back up.
"Good morning, my sons," he said. "Have a nice run."
"Domo arigato, Sensei," Leo said with a nod.
"Save me some pancakes, Master Splinter, please!" I begged only to cause Leo to roll his eyes again and grunt at my supposed disrespect.
Splinter didn't seem to mind, even chuckling some at me.
I wasn't entirely sure why Leo still did the morning runs to begin with. A few Christmases before he had been on one and it... ended badly.
We almost lost him then because he had been alone, cold, and outnumbered. He got the shell beat out of him by the Foot. And then they came after us all, sending Leo first as a message.
The images of Leo after that night can still make my stomach lurch.
When I had to go out with him that morning I had known for some time that he was still going on the runs, but I didn't think much about the why. As we neared the surface, though... well, it struck me just how odd it all was for him to do that. I had to wonder if he ever worried about a repeat scenario.
Leo had grown up a lot since then, sure. We were older and Leo was way more alert about the Foot's working and how they positioned themselves and picked out territories. He knew where to go in order to not be in the red zones for ambushes.
Still, I figured that he did the runs out of pride, not wanting to let the Foot have the satisfaction of changing his habits for him. If he was going to change himself, he would do it for himself.
But... maybe it had been something even more.
"You're too slow and loud, Mikey," he hissed at me as we crossed the rooftops. He looked back at me with some annoyance. "You have to remind yourself that this is a morning run, we don't have all the ambiguity of the night on our side. It's a completely different battlefield when the sun is rising rather than setting -"
"Okay, Leo, seriously! Chill out!" I moaned. "We're fine, I get it. We're in the clear anyway, aren't we? I mean, there's not anyone around." He glared at me. "Stop taking this so seriously. It's practice."
"Stop," he snapped. "You're being way too loud, Michelangelo. You're going to break our cover."
Tired and annoyed, I actually growled at him. I couldn't believe he thought I was so dumb and clueless, that being the youngest legitimately made me a child by comparison. "I paid attention to the last time you warned us about the streets, Leo!" I bit back before leering at him. "We're not close to any of the streets the Foot have been active at. Heck, we're not even in Purple Dragon territory at this point!"
And I'd be damned if there wasn't that tingling sensation the moment the words came from my mouth. You know the one I'm talking about, that one that ninja have been using invisibility to surround you until ti's too late for you to get out of it? That you're outnumbered by an enemy who is only then making themselves apparent to you?
That irony tasting feeling. Like when you put your foot in your mouth.
Leo and I immediately got back to back and drew our weapons for the ready. Maybe it had been a good thing they were freshly cleaned and battle ready after all. I honestly hadn't expected that detail to be relevant to our run.
"The Foot," Leo snapped, "has expanded two streets in all directions since that meeting,Mikey." he looked back enough to give me the ol' angry eye. "Or hadn't you been paying attention yesterday when I was marking these areas down?"
I didn't get to respond. The literal reason would be that the ten ninja had lunged at that moment but the secondary reason would be that I couldn't really think of anything to say to that other than "oops".
The real practice for that morning should have been 'how to keep your big beak shut.'
Fortunately for the two of us, the ninja were not really anything special. In fact, by Foot standards they were rather pathetic. If they weren't complete newbs they were less than a year old in Clan years and hadn't been too skillfully taught. Like grunts.
"Mike, you better pull behind me, you're not as practiced," Leo warned as he took on two of the swordsmen.
I was touched... but mostly offended. Sure, I'd been skimping on the personal training, but I had more important things to be concerned with. Like leveling on Soulcalibur. A turtle must maintain priorities.
"Oh, yeah?" I asked with a laugh. "Well, while I was playing Soulcalibur, I saw some pretty kickass moves that I thought would be just perfect for a situation like this one!" I responded cheekily as I flipped one knife wielding ninja over my shell. "This move was first perfected by the nunchaku master himself, Maxi!"
"From that videogame - MIKE!" he looked behind himself to tell me to stop. His face was horror stricken.
But that was when I performed the flip from my battle with Lizardman the day before. And it was flippin' sweet, if you ask me. Though no one was more surprised at my pulling it off than my two ninja targets.
It wasn't long after that when Leo took out what ninja were left.
We stood there for a moment, taking in the damage and the fact that the sun was piercing the clouds like a spear.
I was thinking about how our avoidance of the sun made us like less sucky vampires when I noticed Leo had been staring at me the whole time.
"I don't understand you, Mikey," Leo sighed.
I looked at him, my cocky grin refusing to leave my face. After all, I was feeling pretty full of myself. I had performed just as good if not better than Mister Practice Makes Perfect himself.
But Leo... Leo was completely serious. He looked at me really sobered up or something, making me quirk a brow.
"I really don', Mike," he said again before shaking his head. "I'm sorry."
I blinked and let him explain what paradigms were.
