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Stupid Cupid!
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Chapter 3: Irresponsible Cupid
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"Sooo, is Cupid like… your real name? Or some kind of nickname?" April seemed annoyed, and a little bit confused… but mostly annoyed.
The smile on Charlotte's face disappeared as soon as she realized the idiotic thing she had just said. She got too carried away in the moment and ended up revealing too much information.
"Cupid it's not a name, it's what I do…" she hurried to add.
April crossed her arms crankily "and what is exactly what you do?"
"Ehmm… It's really hard to explain…" and embarrassing too. Feeling ashamed, Charlotte lowered her sight and started fidgeting with her bow.
"Listen, you have been attacking me with your silly, glittery arrows for an entire week. So, you either tell me what you did that, or I will make you" This more-aggressive-than-usual April, was the result of a sleep deprived week and a lot of piled up school work.
"Hey! I painted and glittered each of those arrows with my own hands, so they could match with this!" she lifted her golden and super sparkly magical bow that could even be seen from three blocks away "don't call them silly! They take a lot of work to make" now, the little miss was offended "plus, if you just had left yourself being hit in the first place, things wouldn't have escalated this much" and she was caving her own grave.
The redhead laughed incredulously "wait a minute… Are you saying it's now my fault because I didn't let myself get shot by some lunatic girl?"
The young miss gasped after hearing such words "I- I-am not a… I- am not a… YOU ARE MEAN!"
Both girls narrowed their eyes at each other.
A little bit overwhelmed by the catfight developing in front of him, Donnie cleared his throat in order to break the sudden tension "Alright…" he awkwardly darted his eyes between both girls "that aside, you still need to tell us why… HEY! WHERE ARE YOU GOING?"
"Keep the arrows if you want! I'm going home" Charlotte announced as she walked away from the alley. The little miss wasn't used to deal with confrontations. They made her become agitated, and she hated feeling agitated. Jose was the one in charge to handle these kinds of situations for her, and with handle I mean he used a teaser against anyone who dared to talk back to his mistress.
April took in a deep breath and went after her "Not so fast! You will not walk out of here without giving us some clear answers" the exasperation on her voice was palpable.
Charlotte turned around with her eyes a little bit glossy "I don't want to! Leave me alon-SMACK-eeeww!" her little tantrum was abruptly interrupted when she suddenly collapsed over the ground with a loud TUMPH.
After knocking Charlotte down with the back of his Sai, Raphael twirled it on his hand and tucked it on his belt again.
"Raph!" both Donnie and April shouted at the same time.
"Sup…" he greeted nonchalantly as if he hadn't just knocked out a person "Please, don't tell me this person is the one we have been searching for all this time" he glowered at the unconscious girl sprawled on the ground.
Donnie and April just nodded with astonished expressions.
"Casey!" April gasped when she noticed Casey's pass out form hanging onto Raph's shell "what happened to him?" she rapidly ran to aid his friend.
Raph rolled his eyes "He got hit by an arrow"
She let out another gasp as soon as she took Casey's cracked mask off. The black paint on his face was all washed out because of the blows he had received, his left eye was really swollen up and his upper lip had a really nasty cut over it "there's no way an arrow could have caused all this" she said, pointing out all of the bruises and cuts "don't tell me that old man caused this…" she quirked a brow.
"No, it wasn't the old man" Raph answered while unceremoniously dropping Casey's body against one of the alley's wall.
"Then what happened?" April insisted, kneeling in front Casey.
"Well… ehmmm" Raphael scratched the back of his head, thinking about the most tactful way to tell them what had happened "after the arrow hit him, he started acting…weird, so knocked him down to normalize him" he crossed his arms defensibly over his plastron.
"What do you mean by weird?" As far as Donatello was concerned, Casey always acted weirdly.
"And beating him up like this was really necessary?" April clearly wasn't happy.
"April, calm down. He's just unconscious" Donnie said as he kneeled beside her " Mmmhp…he only has some minor bruises. I'll patch him up as soon as we get to the lair and he will be fine" he showed her a reassuring smile.
Despite Donnie's comforting words, the redhead didn't tore away her worried eyes from Casey's beat up body.
Raph sighed and gave a sympathetic pat to his brother's shoulder "Hey Donnie, help me tie up the psycho before she wakes up" he jerked his thumb over his shoulder towards the other passed out person on the floor.
Both of them walked until Charlotte's immobile body and sat her against a wall. Raphael took out a rope from his gear and started tying up her wrist together. Donatello did the same but with her ankles.
After making sure April wasn't paying any attention to them, Raph whispered "So Donnie, is Casey really okay?" He directed his gleaming green orbs at his genius brother.
Donatello gave a quick glance to April's direction before answering "Raph, what happened out there? Casey is really beat up" he half whispered/grunted to his brother. He really hated lying to April, but in that moment, he did it in order to avoid another confrontation.
"I really don't want to talk about it…" The red banded brother lowered his eyes again to concentrate on the knot he was making around Charlotte's wrist.
"You will have to tell us sooner or later you know that, right?" Donnie said as he applied pressure to a sailor knot he made to hold her ankles together.
Because of the sudden discomfort, the young miss started stirring her body "Mhmm, don't touch me perverts, I'm not into bondage" she mumbled, still unconscious.
Raphael arched a brow "I think she must have some mental issues…"
"She's a strange one indeed" Donnie picked up the sparkly bow from the pavement and began inspecting it. It just seemed like a regular overly decorated bow to him "Maybe she's just another eccentric teen with too much spare time… like Timothy" he gave half a shrug. If that resulted to be true then it would mean they could resolve all this mess much faster. However, there were many things they needed to address first.
"Hey guys! It's everybody okay?"
"Leo!" they all shouted as soon as they spotted their leader in blue, carrying an unconscious Michelangelo over his shell.
"What happened to Mikey? " Raph asked.
Leo contorted his face as he remembered what had happened "Well… when I found him he was behaving… weirdly. So knocked him down to…"
"Ugghh… my head is killing me…" Leonardo's anecdote was interrupted by a little miss, who was starting to wake up "Jose, bring me some pain killers…" she slowly began opening her eyes "Jose, why does my room smells like garbage?" after finally adjusting her sight, she blinked at the odd audience in front of her "Oh… shit. Why I'm tied?"
"This is the person who was after you April? She certainly doesn't look… dangerous" Leo looked really unconvinced
"Is because you haven't had the pleasure of talking to her" April huffed.
"What did you guys find out?" Leo asked, placing his little brother gently beside Casey.
"Nothing much, Raph knocked her out before she could tell us anything" April said while throwing daggers at Raph with her eyes. She obviously wasn't over the Casey's beat down issue.
"Raph!" Leo turned around to scold his overly temperamental brother.
Raphael sent April a threatening glare, but she just stuck out her tongue at him "why are you looking at me like that, Leo? She was running away! Someone needed to stop her!" he lifted his arms defensibly.
"We'll talk about this later" Leo sent one last scolding glance at his hotheaded brother, and walked over to Charlotte "Hello Miss, my name is Leonardo" he bended over to face her.
The pink haired girl recoiled against the wall behind her with eyes as wide as plates "Hi…" she answered sheepishly. For some reason Leo intimidated her much more than Raph, even when the last one had mercilessly knocked her down to the hard cold floor.
On the other hand, not provoking screams of terror and hyperventilation was already a victory for Leo, so he felt satisfied "Can you explain to us, why you are after April? " he asked calmly.
"April…? Who's that?" she seemed genuinely confused.
"That one over here" Raphael jerked his head dismissively towards April.
"That...?" April frowned.
"No, she's not…" Charlotte said matter-of-factly "She's the redhead girl and that one over there is the toothless boy" she pointed at Casey with her tied hands.
"How hard did you hit her Raph? " Leo was a little bit concerned.
"Believe me… not that hard"
"Miss, I'm afraid you will need to tells us why you wanted to shoot April" Leo's words were polite, but his tone was severe.
"Who?" she tilted her head a little.
Leo took a deep breath "the redhead girl…" This was getting nowhere.
"Well… It's kind of hard to explain…" Charlotte was a little bit distracted by the overly polite boy dressed as a turtle in front of her… for some reason, he really reminded her of someone.
"Then make it simple!" Raph threatened.
"Ahm…" she lowered her sight; she was really trying to come up with a good explanation, until she remembered something very important "Where's Jose?"
"Who's Jose?" Leo asked.
"My friend"
"The old Mexican guy?" Raph said.
"Hey! He's not that old" She sent him a dirty look.
"I don't know where he is, I lost him after YOU shot my friend with one of your stupid arrows"
"They aren't stupid" Charlotte's eyes became glossy again, and she started wondering what problem did these people had with her arrows "and you were the ones beating him up two against one. That was absolutely not a fair fight"
"She has a point, Raph" Leo expression was somehow pleased, and to make it worse April and Donnie also nodded.
Raphael felt a little bit cornered by all the accusatory stares "Arghh, whatever… she's the one you should be judging here not me!" he walked to the opposite wall and leaned on it with his arms crossed and a grumpy expression on his face.
Leo smirked and returned with the interrogation "Miss, why were you after our friend?"
"Because is my job… at least temporally"
"Your job…" Leo turned pensive for a minute…perhaps someone had sent her to go after April, maybe the kraang or the Foot. That would mean they could be starting another conspiracy to take over the world "are you working for somebody? Did somebody send you?" Leo felt like he was starting to make some progress.
"Yes… a winged toddler" Or maybe not.
"Excuse me? Did you just say a winged toddler?" Now was Donnie's time to intervene, he had remained silent until now, but after hearing such ridiculous thing, he needed to say something.
"Yes, he lent me his magical bow while he's recovering from his injury" she said almost robotically.
"Injury…?"
"Yes, I pierced his arm with an arrow… it was all an accident of course" She cleared out.
"So, you are saying that… you were after April, because you are doing the winged toddler's job until he recovers from the injury that you accidentally caused him?" Donnie resumed. That's why he was the smart one, because nobody else had been able to keep up with such a conversation.
The little miss nodded.
Leonardo's sapphire eyes narrowed and he stood up again "Ok, time to huddle guys"
All the conscious and not tied up people in the alley, gathered together in a circle and interlaced their arms together.
"Okay, this is creeping me out guys" April was the first to talk.
"Are you guys sure she is just not a patient that escaped from a mental institute or something?" Raphael suggested.
"That sounds logical" Donnie nodded, remembering the story about the winged toddler.
Leo shook his head "Have any of you searched for an ID or something?"
"Of course not, but it's not like she could hide much… did you see what she's wearing?" Raphael pointed out a really important fact.
"Why me?"
"Because you are both girls "
"I don't want to go anywhere near that crazy girl"
Leo sighed, "Well someone needs to search her… April?"
Leo rolled his eyes "Sigh…Okay, Donnie search her"
"W- W-Why me?"
"Just scan her with your phone and you won't have to touch her, brainiac" Despite Raphael's harsh tone, he was a little bit glad he wasn't the one chosen to do it.
"Oh right… I knew that" a small blush creep up to his cheeks.
April leaned closer to the center on the circle "Guys, there's something that doesn't smell good here… and I'm not talking about Raph breath"
"Hey!"
"All I'm saying is that even if she's crazy, her arrows really did something strange to Casey and Mikey"
"Yeah, Casey was like possessed by something" Raphael agreed.
"Mikey too" Leo nodded.
Donnie eyes became round with curiousness "Leo, Raph, what do you mean by that? What did they do?" He asked like for third time tonight, darting his eyes between his two older brothers.
"Well…"
"Sorry for interrupting…" Charlotte wasn't known for being very patient, plus she could hear them perfectly from where she was sitting, "but, I really need to get going and…"
April rapidly broke the huddle and turned to face her attacker with her hands on her hips "you will not go anywhere until you tell us exactly who you are"
"I already told you… I'm a cupid, I thought the costume really gave it away you know" Charlotte was getting tired of so many questions.
Everybody just stared at her confusedly.
"Afff… I go around the city shooting people to make them fall in love. That's my job okay!" The little miss's face became vivid red. At that moment, she felt like dying from embarrassment, and the weird look everyone was giving her only made it worse.
"Ehmm…" Leo was a little bit perplexed by that statement, but he managed to recover his cool fast "Miss, could you explain yourself mo-"
Raph pushed his leader out of the way "Yeah, yeah, invite her to take the tea later Leo" he crouched in front of Charlotte and roughly pinned her shoulder against the brick wall behind her "you have to be kidding me missy!" He practically grunted while taking out his Sai and pointing it at her neck "you think we are all fools or something? Who would believe something like that?"
Charlotte turned pale; she was starting to understand why Jose always warned her about the gang thugs "It's true! That's the reason why my arrows don't hurt people; didn't you think it was weird that there was no arrow stuck in your friend after I hit him?" The little miss was really having a hard time ignoring the giant and pointy salad fork pressed against her neck.
"Raph back off… maybe she's telling us the true"
"Leo you cannot be serious, that doesn't make any sense" Donnie said with a shocked expression.
"It does… a little bit. I mean, that would explain why Mikey was acting that way…"
"Leo what happened with Mikey? What did he do?" this time April was the one who asked.
"Said it Leo!" Donnie snapped.
Leonardo took a deep breath and closed his eyes before almost shouting "he was kissing a civilian! In the lips!" he almost felt sick after saying that.
Charlotte rolled her eyes… aff, this guy is obviously a total virgin "Please… how old are you guys? He was almost eating her face! It was hilarious" Charlotte began giggling until Raphael pinched her with the point of his Sai to shut her up "Ouch"
"Wait! Do you mean… a human girl?" Donnie was still trying to process what his leader had just told them. He could have imagined Mikey doing anything with a human girl, but that… he was the baby on the bunch for God's sake! He was still going through puberty.
Charlotte raised a brow "A human girl? Why you guys talk so strangely… Ouch!" Raphael pinched her again.
Despise Leo pained expression he continued "After I arrived to the rooftop Mikey was supposed to be in, I heard someone screaming and I realized he had broken into one of the next building's apartments, then when I jumped closer I saw him… well, all over a human girl" he covered his eyes with his hands in order to shake off the memory.
Donatello began rubbing his temples "Let me see if I get this… she shot Mikey and that made him broke into a random girl's apartment to kiss her… and what happened with Casey? What did he do then…?"
All of them turned to look at Raph, who was still crouching in front of Charlotte and pointing his Sai at her neck, hence giving his shell to everybody else. That made Charlotte the only one able to see his face at that moment, which had turned as red as the mask he was wearing "Ohh… the plot thickens" she mused in her mind.
Leo cleared his throat "Mmmh… Raph? What's-"
"After I shot the toothless boy, he jumped over a random girl on the street" Charlotte suddenly spoke "I saw him kissing her before I went running after the redhead" She didn't know why she was covering this really rude guy up, but after seeing his flustered face she just couldn't help it "and for the looks of it, I think she was a street walker…" okay, that last part she just said it to get even for all the pinching.
Raphael's eyes widened a little "Y- yeah… just as she said" he removed his weapon from her neck and stood up to go meet the others, but not before giving a last unreadable look to Charlotte "but she wasn't a street walker" he growled.
"Are you sure? She looked pretty cheap to me" okay, now the situation was getting a little bit out of control.
"You little…" Raph muttered and was about to grab her again until Leonardo stopped him.
"Alright guys, it's enough" he ordered.
Raphael growled one last time and leaned against a wall without saying another word.
"This is crazy, how can she do that?" Donnie still couldn't truly believe it.
"So… Casey made up with a whore" April had a look of pure disgust on her face.
After seeing the perturbed expression on everyone's faces, Leonardo couldn't help but blame himself for how the things had ended up developing. He was supposed to lead them and yet… everything had resulted disastrous, plus, they had encountered themselves with another predicament.
This strange girl, who called herself a Cupid…
"Sigh… maybe she's telling us the truth, maybe her intention wasn't hurting April or anybody else"
"Leo you can't be..." Donnie started protesting, but went quiet when Leo raised a hand to indicate silence.
Leo demeanor changed drastically to a more serious and menacing one "However, the way she shot Mikey and Casey without any kind of scrutiny or rational bases, made me realize that her type of ability, even if it sounds harmless, could be very damaging…even dangerous if it's on the wrong hands"
Charlotte's mouth fell agape "dan- dangerous?"
Leo nodded "you just made Mikey and Casey kiss innocent girls against their will; and even if it was only kissing that stills count as an assault… and I don't want to imagine how many other people you had shot so irresponsibly"
Those last words pierced Charlotte's soul like a dagger. She had never thought of her new powers in that kind of way…the boy dressed as a turtle was right, she used her powers in a really stupid way, and she let her feelings overcome her good judgment. Reason why, now she was tied up in alley, surrounded by strange people, and Jose…well, she didn't have any frigging idea about what had happened to Jose, but surely he was pretty beat up.
"Wait, this has to have a rational explanation… she can't just magically made people fall in love just like that, that's just absurd" The genius turtle was still trying to find a logical explanation for all this mess.
"Then, what you suggest we do Donnie? We can't exactly handle her to the police, but we can't exactly let her free either" Leo asked.
Charlotte was startled out of her guilt trip after hearing that "Wait a minute? Did you just say you can't let me go? How long are you planning of keeping me here? I need to finish my job!"
"Sorry miss, but we can't let you continue your 'job' until we make sure you are not a threat against other people"
" I know my rights you know!" in the middle of her anger outburst Charlotte's little wings started flapping around and tossing feathers everywhere.
Donnie's eyes widened "Wait a minute… are those wings real? All this time I thought they were part of the costume"
"So, she isn't human?" To April that would explain a lot of things… a lot!
Donatello approached the winged girl and scanned her with his T-phone "apparently not…" after the scan finished, the screen blinked with the words 'Undetermined species' several times before showing the scandalous numbers of trackers she had on herself.
"I'M A HUMAN! How can you say such a thing? This is just a costume, like the turtle disguise you are all wearing"
Everyone just exchange an awkward and nervous look before setting their eyes on anything else but her.
"What?" She asked nervously after observing everyone's awkward reaction.
"Pfff, this is not a disguise dudette. We are real turtles… mutated turtles…but turtles" someone laughed.
"Mikey! When did you wake up?
"A couple of minutes ago dude" for some reason he seemed okay.
"And how are you feeling?" Donnie started to check his brother's vitals but Mikey decided to jump in that moment to scream.
"AWESOME!"
"Uhgggg…" Charlotte was starting to hyperventilate. Fuck they were real turtles…real giant turtles.
Leo knelt in front of her "Miss, are you okay?"
"I thought it was weird she hadn't freaked out by now" Raph smirked.
"Awww, I think she's really cute guys, she can't be evil, she looks like a little angel" Mikey cooed while pocking Charlotte's cheek with his finger "and look at her hair! It's awesome! It's like cotton candy"
"EEK! Stop chewing my hair"
"Mikey stop! You don't know where that has been" Leo scolded
"Why don't we take her home with us? Bros!" Mikey big blue eyes sparkled with hope.
"We can't bring her home with us Mikey, she is an enemy… although, I could examine her better in my lab" Donnie said as he finished disabling all of Charlotte trackers "Why do you have so many trackers on you?" that definitely raised a new question for him.
"What? You want to examine me already? At least invite me dinner first" Even in the middle of a terror fit, Charlotte couldn't let any dirty innuendos pass.
Leo clapped his hands "Well… The sun will rise soon and we need to go home. If we keep her tied up she shouldn't be a problem. What do you think Raph?…Raph?"
Raphael seemed to be on his own little world at that moment "Uh? Eh…I don't know just do what you guys want"
"Great!" Mikey yelled and made a back flip before picking Charlotte up princess style. "You, ice cream kitty and I will be the best friends ever!"
"Mikey, she's not going for pleasure" Donnie said, throwing all Charlotte's trackers inside a trash can.
"Oh so you aren't even going to give me that" again, she just couldn't let pass any opportunity to make a dirty joke.
Donnie just grunted… he was starting to regret this decision.
"There, there, it's alright there's no need to be scared, you will love the lair! I will show you my comic book collection and my action figure collection" Mikey started bouncing around "Then, we can watch a lot of scary movies together, eat pizza… Oh! And I can teach you my awesome moves in my skater board! It will be sooo much fun!"
"Let me go! I prefer being handed to the police" she started squirming like a worn trying to free herself.
"There's no need to worry miss. We'll let you go after we make sure you are not danger to others" Leo made a signal at Mikey indicating that it was time to blindfold her… and also to cover her mouth with something.
"No! Please someone help me! Jose! Jo…jsjfmmmdj"
"Alright guys, let's go home" Now the principal worry on the young leader's mind was his father's reaction to this entire situation.
To be continued...
