Chapter 5: Finding Solutions
Kaitlyn stared at her reflection in the bathroom mirror. As long as she was in this condition she wasn't allowed in public. She sighed.
"Kaitlyn, open up! You've been in there long enough!" Raph called from the other side of the door.
"Geese, you don't have to be such a grump." Kaitlyn said as she exited the bathroom. Just then, Raph's shell cell went off. Kaitlyn answered it. "What ya got?"
"Nothing." Don sighed, "I was up all night, but none of Doom's notes make sense to me. It's all in code."
"Reed may be able to help."
"With the current situation, that's easier said than done."
"Why are you such a downer? April and I will think of something and get back to you." Kaitlyn and Don said their goodbyes and hung up.
...
April was just about ready to open up shop.
"April." Kaitlyn called.
"Morning Raph, er, I mean Kaitlyn." April said.
"I think I have a clue to how I can reverse this body swap." Kaitlyn told her.
"That's great." April said with a smile.
"But I need Reed to decode Doom's notes."
"Oh, that may prove difficult."
"I know. I'd e-mail it to him, but than he'd question how I got it."
"We could anonymously e-mail it to him."
"And maybe get H.E.R.B.I.E. to help us."
"That sounds like it would take too long." Raph chimed in, "I say we just go back to Doom's Castle and do what we did before."
"That's too dangerous." Kaitlyn told him.
"It wasn't when we went before." Raph said.
"You don't know how to control my powers. You can be unpredictable and that makes it dangerous."
"Ever since this body swap happened, your powers haven't been working."
"In my experience, they always activate at the worst time."
"Kaitlyn, someone's coming. You have to hide." April said, rushing Kaitlyn upstairs.
Kaitlyn obeyed. She grabbed April's laptop and sat down on the couch. She began to type an e-mail to H.E.R.B.I.E., asking for his help, but found herself thinking about Raph's plan to return to the castle. She could always help him control her powers and it would be a fast solution. It was a risk, she knew, but she felt really uncomfortable with the whole body swap.
"Hey Kaitlyn." She heard someone from downstairs. It sounded like ...
"Oh, hi J.J." April said, loud enough for Kaitlyn to hear.
'Oh no,' Kaitlyn thought, 'Raph!'
"Hey, April." J.J. said. Kaitlyn moved up to the staircase so she could hear more clearly.
"So Kaitlyn, the guys and I are heading down to the skate park and ..." J.J. began.
"Sorry J.J., Kaitlyn has to, um, help me clean." April told him.
"Ya," Raph said, trying to sound like Kaitlyn, "The place is a mess."
"Oh, okay. Another time then." J.J. waved as he left the shop. April and Raph waved back. As soon as J.J. was out of earshot, Kaitlyn yelled down to Raph.
"Raph, get up here!"
"Geese, what's her problem?" He asked April as he ascended the stairs, "What?"
"If it wasn't for April, you would've made a complete fool out of me." Kaitlyn told him, "I can't wait for H.E.R.B.I.E. or Reed. We're going back to the castle tonight."
...
The moon was full and illuminated the area nicely. Raph and Kaitlyn stood on a rooftop nearby Castle Doom.
"We used my powers to get in last time." Kaitlyn said.
"So we'll do that again." Raph was becoming impatient.
"Do you know how to phase through solid objects?" Kaitlyn asked him.
"No."
"Then we need another plan."
"Just show me how and we'll make this easy."
"Fine. Try it with this wall. Imagine that it's not there and put your hand through it."
Raph stared at the wall. Concentrating, he slowly moved his hands towards it. His hand made contact with the wall. He tried again with the same result.
"Not as easy as it looks, is it?" Kaitlyn asked him.
"Shut up." He said, without removing his hand. Suddenly, the wall seemed to vanish and Raph fell through. "Whoa!" He yelled, and realized he had phased through the wall. Looking back, he saw that his stomach was in the middle of the ledge. "Hey, I did it." He congratulated himself. He tried to sit up. "Ummm ..." He began, "I'm stuck."
"Of course you are." Kaitlyn said as she grabbed Raph's shirt, "Think of something that makes you mad."
"Why?" He asked.
"Just. Do it." Kaitlyn growled, sounding more menacing with Raph's voice.
Raph decided to listen and thought of a prank Mikey had pulled on him a few days ago, before all this craziness happened. Suddenly Kaitlyn pulled on his shirt and he phased back through the wall.
"How did ..." Raph began.
"I control my powers just by thinking about them. But you seem to use emotion." Kaitlyn explained.
"So every time I get angry I'm gonna phase through something?" Raph asked, worried about his temper.
"Just be glad you didn't phase through the floor." Kaitlyn said standing up, "Come on. We can enter the same way we did last time, now." She attached a rope to the edge of the building with a grappling hook and they climbed down to ground level. Making their way to the entrance point, they made sure not to be seen.
"Here we are." Kaitlyn whispered to Raph, placing her hands on his shoulders, "Just do what you did before. I'll follow behind."
Raph nodded and placed his hands on the wall. Once again he thought of Mikey's prank and walked through the wall.
"Nice job. Let's keep moving." Kaitlyn told Raph and began in the direction of the lab. They found it easy and entered with caution. "Do you remember what you did last time?" Kaitlyn asked.
"I remember leaning against that computer." Raph replied.
"There has to be a hundred buttons," Kaitlyn sighed, walking up to the console, "Which one did you push?"
"Like I remember. I didn't even see." Raph argued.
There might be something in Doom's data files." Kaitlyn began searching for something related to body swapping, "There it is. He used it to try and take Reed's place once."
"That's weird."
Kaitlyn pushed the button to activate the mini bots. After a few seconds, they both felt a pain in the back of their neck.
"This feels familiar ..." Raph said, before passing out.