"You think this is the place that guy was talkin' about Donnie?" Raph looked to his younger brother. Donnie stared down at the entrance of the abandoned strip mall.
"Yeah bro, you think they took Leo in there?" Mikey asked. He was trying his best not to be overcome with emotion. He kept trying not to think about the worst case scenarios.
"This has got to be the place guys. I can't think of a single other location that he could have been talking about. I mean, this is the place where the convoy that Karai was leading loaded up. You gotta wonder where they were hauling all those crates from." Donnie said. He was swallowing hard. He didn't want to think about what may be happening to Leo. Donnie set his jaw then. Whatever they were doing to his brother and to Asha they would pay with their lives tonight. All of a sudden Donatello was very tired of Shredder and all this business with the Foot Clan. He made up his mind that one way or another he would end it once and for all if he could.
All three brothers crouched down on a nearby rooftop, watching for any movement in or around the strip mall. When they were satisfied that nothing was happening, they leaped down skirting around the back of the building to find an entrance. There was a line of loading docks, but only one of them stood partially opened. Quickly they filed in one by one, being careful to observe their surroundings. Being ambushed or surprised by anything or anyone simply wasn't an option. With his goggles pulled down, Donatello had taken the lead position, peering around corners and watching for anyone who might be on patrol. They made painstakingly slow progress through the one floor of the mall, but it couldn't be helped. Old security cameras that were active when the mall was open were everywhere. Even though they seemed inoperative, Donnie and his brothers still tossed shuriken at them. Better safe than sorry.
They had searched every corner but no sign of Leo, the Foot, or anyone for that matter. Donatello leaned against the wall and crossed his arms over his chest. They were now all standing in a small corridor leading to the restrooms and a storage area.
"I don't understand. This has to be the place. Where else in Brooklyn would the Foot clan be holed up?" Donnie asked himself aloud. Raph stood for a moment looking at the dirty floor between his feet. Or at least there should have been dirt between his feet. His brow furrowed. Even in the creepy darkness of an abandoned strip mall, he could see that the floor where they were standing wasn't as filthy as the rest of the floor had been. There were puddles of what he could only assume were water in places, leaves and dried twigs from who knew where, and just the general dirt and dust from lack of use and population.
"Donnie, you notice anything funny about this floor?" Raph asked still looking at the floor and patting his feet.
"What? You mean other than the layer of dirt on it that's about as tall as we are?" Donnie said, looking at the floor but not seeing where Raph was coming from with his question. Mikey had wandered towards the end of the hall where the door that lead to storage was. He was eyeing something on the floor and wasn't paying too much attention to his brothers.
"Yeah that's just the thing Don, there ain't a whole lot of dirt right here like it is everywhere else in here," Raph said starting to pick up on what Mikey was looking at too. "It ain't like somebody cleaned it, it's more like…"
"Somebody just walks on it more," Donnie finished for him, also seeing what his brothers were seeing. There were what looked like footprints but they were smeared in the dust. What caught their eyes were marks, as if something or someone had been dragged along the floor recently. Even more disturbing was the fact that blood was also smeared along the floor. Whoever had been brought here was hurt or worse. The trail lead straight to the door with the word 'STORAGE' stamped on it. The brothers traded nervous glances, their eyes saying what they refused to speak with their mouths.
Below them in a sub-basement, security monitors became snowy one by one. A guard who was busy eating sat up quickly, becoming alerted once the third camera went down. Someone was here. The guard pressed a single button setting off a silent alarm. Red lights flashed down all main corridors, as the soldiers took their positions. They knew what was expected of them in the event that this place was discovered. Now they all simply waited for explicit orders from Shredder.
Shredder was in Karai's old quarters. Her personal belongings had been packed away. He was sitting on the edge of the frame of her bed. Next to him on the floor was an open box. His Kuro Kabuto was sitting on the frame next to him. He was holding an old photo of Karai as a little girl in both his hands. It had been so long ago, that he hadn't remembered what it felt like to cry and tonight was no exception. He kept willing himself to do so, but couldn't produce a single tear. All that came in the place of sorrow was anger. He was angry at those damn turtles, Leonardo specifically. Only two soldiers made it back to tell their master what happened the night she was killed on a filthy New York street, like some common thug. He had sent for her body. He had even tried to save her by threatening Dr. Stockman into giving her a refined version of the mutagen but nothing helped. For his failure, Shredder had a collar fitted with small vials of mutagen made for the doctor, and placed it around his neck. Any attempt to remove it or escape would result in the bursting of those vials, and a mutation for the doctor.
Seeing the strobe of a red light in the ceiling, Shredder placed his Kuro Kabuto back upon his head, a wry smile forming on his lips. Turtles. Honor-bound and foolish, they had come for their disgusting mutant brother. Good. He would kill them now once and for all. The only two things missing were the mutant lioness and the rat. They had moved their lair, so finding the rat would prove difficult, but the lioness he thought was not too far behind. They had the girl who had killed singlehandedly so many of his soldiers. Shredder would destroy the turtles and all that they loved utterly, but first he would make them suffer. He would make them watch as the city they so pitifully loved, but could never be part of fell before the might of the Foot Clan. He rose to his feet and entered the hall, closing and locking Karai's old private quarters. Just then three soldiers ran up to him.
"Master Shredder, we've been breached," one of them panted waiting on orders. Shredder stared into each of their eyes making them very uncomfortable. He had become volatile and unpredictable since Karai's death, so he could have ordered them to commit hara-kiri for all they knew. He raised a hand as if to show them the way out.
"Please, by all means welcome our friends. I believe they wish to have a family reunion. Bring them to me alive." Shredder said as the soldiers left immediately to carry out their orders.
He made his way to the room that held Leonardo and his lady friend. As before they were caged in a glass-like cell. Both Leo and Asha were chained to the walls by both arms and legs. There was very little slack in the chains, and the manacles were digging into their wrists and ankles. Leonardo's face was swollen and bruised, one eye bloodshot. The cut on his side would have been healing had it not been for the constant reopening of it from cutting it over and over. Leonardo was beginning to curse his ability to heal quickly. It made for a longer torture session. Asha was in no better shape. Multiple times in the short hours of their capture, she had been taken into a different room. Through the walls Leo could hear her scream. He wondered why she hadn't transformed yet. It wasn't like her to accept defeat without fighting. There had to be a reason she was holding back.
Leo opened the eye that wasn't swollen to watch his enemy approach his cell. He tensed and felt all the pain in all his muscles and joints protest at the involuntary motion. Shredder stood for a moment looking at him. Even though his mouth was covered, Leo saw clearly that Shredder was smiling.
"I have something for you Leonardo. Your family is here," he said. Leo rolled his eyes and turned his head as if he didn't believe him. Shredder grabbed a small remote from a soldier standing nearby and pointed it towards a monitor mounted on the wall. The screen came to life and his brothers appeared before him. Leonardo strained against his chains, growling.
"You had better not hurt them Shredder! You hear me?!" Leo screamed at his captor who only turned to him smiling evilly again.
"You are hardly in a position to offer me threats turtle. They will most certainly be hurt, but not to worry. You will be able to say your goodbyes to them in due time. I'm going to bring them to you, that way you can suffer alongside your pathetic brothers, as you observe your beloved city fall and your family be killed before you." Shredder said, and when he saw the defeat in Leo's eyes he was satisfied. He would break them as they had broken him. He would take from them sevenfold what they had ripped from him. Shredder looked over his shoulder to Asha. The doctor told him that he had found some interesting facts about the young female that he urgently needed to know. He would get to that later, after all she wasn't going anywhere. Shredder left the holding cells and went to the large landing bay to wait. There was a platform there that was getting prepared to be raised. When it came back it would be bearing three turtles. He narrowed his eyes in anticipation.
Mikey was the closest to the door. He didn't try to open it just yet, afraid of what he might find. Instead, he turned his head and pressed against the door, listening. At first he couldn't hear anything, but then there was a sound. At first very faint but growing louder. It was a whirring sound almost kind of quiet in a sense. Mikey couldn't place the sound right away, but he eventually recognized it as the sound of an approaching elevator. That couldn't be possible though. The door was clearly marked storage and didn't even look like an elevator door at all. He looked to his brothers.
"What is it Mikey, what'd ya hear?" Raph asked anxiously. Mikey shrugged.
"Dude I dunno. Sounds sorta like a, elevator I guess." He stepped aside to let Donnie listen. Donatello placed his ear to the door. His frown deepened as he listened. It did indeed sound like an elevator but that was preposterous. Where was the door to this supposed elevator? Just then they all heard and felt a deep rumble come from overhead. At the place where the ceiling and wall met, dust and paint chips began to fall. They could hear the sounds of gears turning or joints creaking. The ceiling and wall began to separate. The turtles stepped back getting their weapons at the ready. Whatever was happening, it wouldn't be good.
The wall with the storage door on it began to lower into the floor like a reverse garage door. It opened to reveal a very large elevator shaft. They could feel the rush of warm air greet them as the door opened completely. Raph placed himself between his brothers and whatever was going to come from this doorway. Donnie was a little behind him on his right, Mikey on his left.
"Get ready." Raph said simply, twirling his twin sai and spitting the toothpick from his mouth. They were ready for a fight, to the death if need be, but they wouldn't get the chance. As soon as they saw the first man, they launched for an attack but were stopped by something restraining their movements. The Foot soldiers filed in guns pointed, but they were net guns. The turtles struggled but it was useless. The nets were made of a flexible metal and they felt the hot current of electricity pulse through them.
"Not….again…aaahh!" Donnie yelled. The last time they had been tazed, he took the worst of it because of the equipment on his back, and that was the case this time as well. The brothers struggled on the floor before they felt themselves being dragged into the open door onto a large flat platform. Slowly they began to lower as the soldiers stood by, guns still trained on them in case they found a way to break the restraint. Raph couldn't even threaten them verbally. Every time he made any sudden move he felt the currents rip through him anew.
The platform landed with a soft thud. They were then dragged into a room that looked eerily similar to the one they were trapped in for their blood. It was smaller, and they were each loaded into glass-like cells that all faced one another in a circular pattern. Each brother was thrown inside and the cells locked automatically. Donatello was detained a little longer than his brothers as his equipment was stripped from him. Shackles shot out from the walls and floor before the turtles could recuperate, restraining their hands and feet.
Shredder strolled into the room with a smug look touching his eyes. Behind him came Tiger Claw and Xever. Tiger Claw looked at Leonardo and smiled, once again showing his gleaming white teeth. Xever walked over to Asha's cell holding what appeared to be papers of some sort. One by one he showed her the papers. They were x-rays. One showed her mouth. Her normal teeth were there but underneath and buried within the gums were her fangs. Her muscular system was shown to be crowded with dense muscles all over her body, and her skeletal system showed double boning in many places. After the little show, Xever ripped each paper grinning at her with his hideous fish face. Asha vowed to kill him just for trying to taunt her. She was going to kill all of them, and now that she had seen what Shredder looked like he would not escape her unless she died before she could get to him.
"I asked you where the lion freak was and you said nothing. I had to find out through other means," Shredder said as he approached the cell. "It was very unwise of you not to answer my questions when I asked."
He pressed a button that Asha didn't see. Immediately she felt the heat of electric currents running through her body. She gritted her teeth trying not to cry out. The currents eventually stopped and Asha drooled all over herself.
"You are not the same kind of mutant that I am accustomed to seeing. How do you go from a young woman to a monster?" Asha did not even look up. Then came the shock. This time she cried out, and when it was over she went limp against her constraints.
Shredder's eyes narrowed. He strolled over to Leonardo's cell and pressed the same button. Leo cried out for a long time, his body convulsing and his eyes rolling to the back of his head.
"Noooo…" his brothers chorused together angrily. It pained them to no end to see Leo in such poor condition. Asha was looking up with horror in her eyes. She would do whatever she could to stop them from torturing Leo.
"Alright, I will….change," Asha said barely audible.
"What?!" Shredder yelled as he turned up the volume on Leo's voltage. Leo screamed again and then went limp.
"I…will…change! Just stop hurting him, please!" Asha screamed as loud as she could. Shredder turned off the current.
"Whatever you need to do I wish to see every inch of it. Slowly now."
Asha took a deep breath. Slowly she began to change. Every muscle and every bone shifted. It was painful. She had been tortured, beaten, and almost raped by some soldiers before Tiger Claw stopped it because he thought it a senseless and dishonorable act. Shredder stood in what might have been awe had he been a person easily awed. He had never seen a shifter although he had heard about it due to the abduction of the children. It was strange and weird and powerful. Suddenly he understood how such a creature could have killed his longtime associate Ivan Steranko, and was glad that she was weakened and chained. He looked from the corner of his eyes to find Tiger Claw looking like he wanted to be impressed. He didn't think the mutant had met another big cat such as himself. He spotted the nub of the tiger's tail wagging excitedly, although his face tried to remain unaffected.
The room was silent except the buzz of electric current from its unknown source. Suddenly her arms and legs were released, and she instantly became active, beating herself against the unbreakable glass structure. A gas filled her chamber and Asha stopped as suddenly as she began. When the gas cleared, Asha was groggy on the floor of her cell, apparently sedated. Leo's eyes went wide. He wanted to struggle but his injuries and being repeatedly electrocuted had drained him beyond the point of exhaustion. They opened the door and dragged her out of it and took her to another room. Shredder turned to Leonardo before walking out of the room.
"I think you will enjoy the show. I have something I want to test, and she'll be the subject. Let's see how she reacts to a little….stimulation shall we?" With that he marched out of the room. A few moments passed and the monitor overhead came to life. What Leo witnessed there filled him with dread and horror. He didn't want to see what they were doing to her but couldn't look away. He had to see it. He had to internalize the reasons behind his decision to kill the Shredder once and for all.
A/N: Thanks so much to the readers who reviewed. I appreciate it so much you have no idea. Also, please forgive me for taking so long with an update. I usually do this a little faster. I had a distraction, but I'm good now and will continue to regularly update this story.
