Any references to TMNT or anything from popular media and culture is NOT MINE. I only own my OC's.
Chapter #10
*The next day/Saturday*
It had been a fun and peaceful morning as Mikey and Sam sat on the couch playing videogames. The two had been switching around and playing different games that they both loved. They currently were playing Drive Club and Sam was in the lead.
"Ahhh come on, come on, come on!" Mikey chanted nervously.
She laughed. "Chanting will get youuuuu NOWHERE!" She screamed as she won the race.
She stood up and threw her arms up in the air, followed by her jumping up and down on the couch.
Mikey lightly tossed his controller on the table in front of them as he shook his head and smiled.
"Jeez, is there any game where I can prevent you from kicking my ass?"
"Nope!" she said teasingly. "All my life I've had to learn every trick in the book in order to defeat my four brothers and get them to allow me to join them online, so now I'm UNSTOPPABLE" she said as she struck a pose with her hands on her hips.
Mikey chuckled until he saw the score board. "Uh oh…"
"What's wrong?" She looked up at the screen, a huge smile forming on her face. "Oh sweet! New high score!"
"SHHHHHHH!"
She looked at her friend. "Okay what's up? Why the shushing and not the cheering? What happened to only positive vibes?"
"This is Raph's game, as in one of his favorite games and also the only game where he knows he can dominate and always beat us no matter how hard we try to defeat him. The last time someone beat his high score, he spent the entire next day dedicated to beating that new score. And even when he finally beat that score, it wasn't good enough for him. He spent a couple of weeks making sure that his score was so high that no one could ever come close to beating it. He's going to flip when he sees this!"
Sam looked at him in confusion. "If it would be such a big deal to beat his high score, why are we even playing this game in the first place?"
"You said you wanted to play a racing game, and this is one of the best ones. Plus, I didn't think that within three rounds you would have gotten a higher score than the one Raph spent weeks working to achieve."
She shook her head jokingly. "Wow, I've never felt so insulted in my life."
Mikey chuckled as Sam picked up the controller. She saw that all the other scores had the name RAF printed next to them, so she typed the same name into the space next to her score.
Mikey gave her a puzzled look. "What are you doing?"
"If Raph sees his name next to the score, then he'll just assume that this is the score that he had worked so long to get, simple as that. Now let's go do something else before he gets suspicious."
As the two turned the gaming system off and walked away in the direction of Mikey's room, Raph then happened to enter the room. He saw the Drive Club game case on the table. Realizing that he hadn't played one of his most favorite video games in a few days, he decided to play for a while. Everything was fine…until Raph beat what was his old high score.
"Yeah!" he shouted as he threw his fist in the air. "I still got it!"
Just as he was about to add his latest high score to the top of the score board, his smile began to fade as he saw that his score wasn't in the top spot, but in the second spot. He looked at the spot at the top of the screen and his eyes went wide. He knew that he had never EVER reached a score as high as the one he was looking at. He then remembered that he had seen Sam and Mikey playing video games earlier that day and he had a hunch that Sam had been the reason his score was now only the second highest score on the board, making him furious. All his hard work and weeks filled with determination and dedication to get such a high score that only he could reach, only to be beaten by a stranger who had been playing for a few hours, and a stranger that he still saw as a threat to his family, the more he thought about it the more furious he got.
Raph stood up and stormed off towards Mikey's room, the last place he had seen the two wander off to. He shoved the door open and Saw the two sitting across from each other while reading comic books. They both looked at Raph with blank expressions. On the outside they seemed calm, but on the inside they were nervous as hell and were trying to remain calm. They were both worried about what Raph might do next.
Raph glared at them and spoke through his gritted teeth. "So, were you guys playing video games earlier?"
The two nodded their heads.
"Really? What did you play?"
Sam began naming games.
"Far Cry, The Last of Us, Call Of Duty, Wolfenstein, Assassin's Creed, Final Fantasy, Naruto, just to name a few."
"That's all."
Sam nodded, so far being able to maintain her blank expression. "Yeah, that's all."
"Ever heard of Drive Club?"
"Well yeah I've heard of it, but I haven't had a chance to play it yet."
Raph laughed sarcastically. "Well I don't believe that bs for a second."
Sam raised an eye brow. "I don't understand."
"There's a new high score on my game, and I would have remembered every detail of what was happening around me if I had gotten a score that high on my own. So, tell me the truth now and admit that you played a game that you shouldn't have" he then cracked his knuckles and gave her a wicked smile, "or I'll make you tell the truth the hard way."
Sam opened her mouth to speak, but before she could say anything, Mikey had stood up and blurted out "It was me."
Sam spun around to face him, and both she and Raph furrowed their brows.
She mouthed 'what are you doing?' to Mikey, but he ignored it as he stayed focused on Raph.
"I was playing the game earlier today before she got here since she said she hadn't had a chance to buy and play it for herself yet. I'm the one who beat your score."
Raph glared at his brother. Sadly he had nothing to prove that it had been either of them that had beaten his score, he didn't even have anything to prove that they had even played the game anytime that day, or ever for that matter. But he knew that she had done it. Mainly because he had just seen the two playing video games earlier, but also the fact that he had played this game with his siblings so many hundreds of times and they had never come anywhere close to reaching the scores that he had. The day Donnie had beat his score which sent him into his weeks' worth of gameplay trying to beat said score, that had been nothing but pure luck, Donnie even admitted that himself. So the fact that this ridiculously high score just happened to suddenly appear was very suspicious, but for now he decided to let it slide. He could tell by the girls face that she felt bad about the entire situation, and for now that would be enough to satisfy his hot temper.
"You're in my house now, so stay away from my stuff, or else we're going to have some serious problems" he said as his hands balled up into fists at his sides and as he cracked his neck. "Got it?"
"It's his house to" she said as she nodded her head backwards towards Mikey.
"He should know how things work around here, but if I have to beat the rules back into his head then so be it."
For the first time since she had known him, Sam glared at Raph.
"That's pretty harsh to say about your own brother."
"Oh he should thank me, maybe a good beating will clear his head of everything you've done to brainwash him."
"YUP THANKS RAPH! You're the best!" Mikey cut in, hoping to settle things.
Raph looked back at each of them one last time. "Like I said, keep away from my stuff, and watch your back" he growled as he slammed the door behind him.
Raph instantly put his ear up to the door to hear what the two were talking about after he had just left the room. He heard Mikey's voice first.
"Dude, what were you thinking? You can't talk to him like that, not unless you have a death wish!"
"He has no right to talk to you like that, I mean you're his brother. He's made it obvious he cares about you in his own hot headed way, so I'm shocked he would talk to you like that."
"That's just how he is, he's the older brother who wants his space and doesn't want people near his stuff. I know he cares about each of us, but that's usually just how he is. But egging on the fight just makes things ten times worse."
There was a pause.
"*sigh* Alright, I'll be more careful when talking to him then."
And after that the two then began talking about the comic books they had been reading.
Raph felt a mix of emotions. First, he was upset and pissed that his brother had lied straight to his face. Mikey had always been honest and would admit what he had done wrong, followed by him joking around and trying to make it seem like whatever he had done wrong wasn't that big of a deal, but this time he had just lied with a straight face. Raph then began to grow furious as he thought about the way his brother had been changing now that he was hanging out with this new girl, and he hated this new change. Then, he slowly began to feel excited, but for the worst reason. He began to think of the facial expression the girl had given him. Every time one of the brothers had ridiculed either Sam or Mikey, she always timidly looked at the ground because she felt guilty for what either she had done or for what Mikey had done because of her, but this time was different. Raph had really gotten under her skin this time, and in a wickedly evil way, he enjoyed that. He still viewed this girl as a threat and therefore as his enemy, and he saw it as a win on his part that he was able to make her produce such an evil expression when she glared at him.
He nastily chuckled as he walked away from the door and back out into the main living area.
"Heh, I better go work out and cool off before I do something I regret."
Donnie was tinkering around with some devices at the desk in his lab when he paused as he felt a presence enter the room.
"Uh, hey bro!"
'Ah, its Mikey this time' Donnie thought.
He turned around to face his brother. "Alright, what do you need?"
"Those goggles you wear so that nothing can damage your eyes."
"Safety goggles?"
"Yeah those!"
Donnie chuckled. "They're in the case in the back corner. What do you need them for?"
"I'm messing with the gaming system in my room, trying to use some hacks that Sam taught me. I just wanted a pair in case there's any sparks that fly or anything."
His brother nodded in approval since it sounded like something Mikey would do. He wasn't a technical genius, but when it came to videogames, Mikey was pretty dang smart. When it came to cheat codes and hacking into games to get secret weapons or power ups or things of that sort, Mikey could usually figure out what to do. It might take him a long while to accomplish his task depending on how complicated it was, but Mikey had surprised all of his brothers many times with his technical skills involving videogames.
Donnie was silent, until he saw which pair of goggles his brother took.
"Mikey, why are you taking the smallest pair?"
He froze as his eyes went wide. "Say what?"
"Why are you holding a small pair of goggles?"
"…I don't understand."
"That case holds a handful of goggles that are big enough for all of us to use, so why are you holding one of the smaller pairs from when we were kids?"
"That sir, is an excellent question…can I take a rain check on providing the answer?"
Donnie's brow furrowed. "They're not for you to wear, are they?"
"Wellllll."
"You lied to me just so that you could bring a pair to her."
Mikey gave his brother a serious look. "'Her' has a name you know."
"Yeah, and 'her' just persuaded you to lie to me so she could get what she wants" he said in a sour tone.
Mikey threw the sour tone right back at his older brother.
"First of all, no, she didn't persuade me to do anything."
"Do you know what persuade means?" Donnie asked with as he raised his eyebrow.
"I do, it means she made me believe or do something by reasoning with me. ANYWAY, any and all materials she thought she would need to add rockets to her own skateboard she got from her house, but she didn't have goggles. She was going to work on her board without them because she didn't want to bother you by asking for them, that and she knew you would say no before she could even say one word. So, I offered to go get her a pair. She never made me do anything, I offered to help her."
Donnie looked down towards the floor, trying to hide his frustration.
"You lied to Raph earlier in order to protect her as well. Is this becoming part of a normal routine for you?"
Now Mikey was looking at the floor. "You know about that?"
"Leo and I happened to be in the living room when Raph was yelling at you guys, we got the gist of what happened."
"*sigh* honestly I'm to blame for that one, I never thought that within a few rounds she would top his high score."
"So now this is the second time you acted without thinking because of her."
Mikey rolled his eyes. "Okay, I acted without thinking way before we ever knew she existed."
"Fair enough" Donnie said as he nodded his head, "but that still doesn't explain why you keep lying to everyone."
"In order to get you guys to be nice to her. I get in the beginning that you guys were all worried, but she would have done something already if she was planning something, right? I mean if she really wanted to kidnap me or come back to the lair or something crazy like that then she would have done it already, right? She's literally been down here playing videogames all morning, how dangerous can that be? If you guys gave her a chance then maybe you would see that she's not the terrible person that you think she is."
Donnie paused, thinking of how he should respond to this. Not knowing what to do, he continued to stand still and silent.
Mikey sighed. "I'll put these back-"
"Take them."
Mikey looked at his older brother, his face expressing his shock.
Donnie continued to look down. "I'll let it slide this time, but I don't want her using my stuff after this."
"Yeah, gotcha" Mikey mumbled as he turned and exited the room.
Once his brother had left the room and was out of sight, Donnie shut the lab door. He went back to the table and sat down. He put his elbows on the table and held his head in his hands. He wasn't sure how to handle this entire situation. He still didn't really trust or really even like this girl yet, but his brother was correct in saying that he also hadn't given her a chance. That was mainly because he didn't even know where to begin with her. It was so different when he and his brothers had first met April, she was so innocent and just happened to take their picture. The situation wasn't that serious and overall it was handled quickly and peacefully. Sam had also claimed that she just happened to find their lair, but this required her to use GPS devices and even camera detectors in order to find them, and then she tried to block them out once they had found her. She just seemed so suspicious and it made it extremely difficult for him to just casually walk over to her and start a conversation. He made a small smile as he thought of his brother's respectable confidence. Mikey could probably become friends with anyone because of how calm, collected, trusting, and friendly he was. While everyone was afraid of April telling people about what she had discovered on the night they had all met, Mikey was more worried about getting a chance to talk to her. Donnie's smile then turned into a frown as he thought of the facial expressions and body language his baby brother had just displayed moments ago. He made it visibly obvious how upset he was with how everyone was treating Sam, and that was also something to be concerned about. Donnie didn't want to lose his brother, and he knew that everyone being rude towards Sam was going to push Mikey away.
Donnie sighed and went back to tinkering around with the devices on his work table. He knew that something had to be done to help lighten the tensions within this situation, but he decided that he would worry about that another day, and for now he would just stay calm and worry about his inventions.
"You didn't tell me that they were Donnie's!"
"It's fine, your eyes will be covered now, that's what matters."
Mikey and Sam were sitting at the kitchen table while Sam worked on adding the rockets to her skateboard.
"No, what matters is that it's only the first day that I've been allowed down here and two of your brothers now hate me even more than they did before."
"No they don't, they're mad at me, not you" he said with a huge smile, which slowly faded as he saw the depressed expression displayed on his friends face.
"That doesn't make things better…" she replied.
Mikey tried to think of how to lighten the mood.
"Pshh, well you don't have to worry about Raph, he just hates everything the planet has to offer."
Sam smiled lightly in return. "I guess pizza isn't something this planet has to offer then."
As the two friends joked around, they didn't realize that Leo's bedroom door was open. Being the oldest and having seniority, he was able to locate his room away from the others, so while they all had bedrooms on the right side of the lair, Leo's bedroom was on the left. There was a small five step staircase towards the back of the eatery that lead to a decent size room that he was able to call his own. At the moment, he was sitting on his bed as he cleaned and polished his katanas. He did this as silently as he could in order to listen to as much of Sam and Mikey's conversation as he could. Right now, he could hear Sam's voice.
"So, I guess Raph is the type where he never shows emotions and to an outsider he has a cold heart of stone, but deep down he actually cares about you guys more than anything?"
"I'd say that's pretty accurate. Like he can be really fun and actually cracks the most jokes with me out of all my brothers, but he also gets ticked off quickly. Like, one moment my jokes might make him laugh, but then five minutes later he could get angry based on another joke I make. He's someone where if you've been around him long enough you just kind of figure out what to do and say and when as well."
"Sounds complicated."
"Tell me about it, like you have to be really careful when comforting him so that he doesn't get more upset, and you have to be careful when ridiculing him and trying to teach him what he's doing wrong and how he can improve or else-"
"He goes over the top crazy?"
"Bingo!"
Sam looked up at Mikey, and for the first time she noticed that Leo's bedroom door was open, with absolutely no sound coming from the room.
"He sounds like a hot head, no offense."
Mikey turned around to face what Sam was looking at. He saw the open door, and out of curiosity, he continued the conversation as he wondered what his friend was up to.
"Oh he is, I love the guy but yeah he's insane."
"Ironically, for someone who can be as violent at the Hulk, he throws a weak punch."
"I guess that means you weren't affected by his punch then?"
"Well, would you feel any pain if you were hit by the Slimer monster from Ghostbusters?" she said as she winked with a serious expression at the turtle sitting across from her.
He nodded. "But you went unconscious, how do you explain that?"
"It's not because of his strength, it's because of where he hit me. A punch to places like the jaw or the temple can easily make someone pass out. Leo hit me way more gently than Raph did and yet I was knocked out both times. Raph might put on a show so that it seems like he's strong, but in reality his muscles seem like they're made of a green stretchy rubber material."
"So, you're saying that Raph doesn't have any strength to him?"
"Of course not, what would you expect from someone who fights with gardening tools?"
They both heard Leo's katanas slide into their holsters and the next thing they knew, he was walking up to them. His face was calm, but the aura in the air made it known how pissed off he was.
"You" he pointed to Sam, "let's go." He then walked off towards the dojo.
Sam stood up and flashed Mikey the O.K. symbol before he could say anything.
Once Sam made her way into the dojo, she stood next to Leonardo. His arms were crossed over his chest as he watched Raph train. Leo continued to face forward as he spoke.
"Say something that you know will piss Raph off."
Sam responded with a beaming smile as she spoke loud enough to get the hot headed turtles attention. "Hey dauntless, are you the biggest of your brothers because you have the most muscle, or because you're just that fat?"
Leo's eyes went wide, he wasn't exactly expecting that, but he knew it would definitely do the trick. Mikey reacted the same way once he had caught up.
"Dude, just, why?!"
With a joyful smile, Sam pointed at Leo. "He told me to!"
Mikey looked at his older brother with wide eyes. "What?!"
Leo kept calm as he faced his brother. "She wants to play games, then let's see how she likes this one."
Right on cue, Raph was now standing in front of them. "Looks like the twig has a death wish."
She shook her head. "Oh no, having a death wish means that I would have to lose. I plan on ending with a win" she said as she gave him a wicked smile.
Raph glared at her.
"Pick a weapon, you have five minutes before I start kicking your butt."
"*gasp* oh my god, I was about to tell you the same thing!"
"Sam!" Mikey said as he pulled her back. "What are you doing?"
"Going to go get my tonfa since I only have 5 minutes."
"SAM."
"Dude, I got this, just trust me. All will be explained later."
He paused for a moment before giving her a light nod. She then ran over to the eatery where her bag was, pulled out her tonfa, and then hurried back over to the dojo.
"Alright, let's do this" she said as she walked out towards the center of the room.
Leo and Mikey continued to watch from the side of the room. Donnie then walked over and stood next to his brothers.
"Why are we all standing here watching Raph?"
"Because she" as Leo nodded towards Sam, "is up to something, and Raph is going to teach her a lesson about respect."
"And how did this happen?"
"She was insulting him behind his back, and Mikey allowed" Leo said as he then turned and stared at his youngest brother.
"Well" Mikey began, "she's definitely up to something. She gave me this look when we were talking that signaled to just go along with whatever she was doing, so that's what I did. She said she would explain herself afterwards."
The three then turned towards the center of the room where Sam was facing an angry yet excited Raphael.
Raph was swinging his sai around his finger as the two prepared to fight.
"Heh, they say that whoever gets the first punch will win the fight." He then clenched his free hand tightly, showing the veins that ran all the way up his arm.
"Well, I'll just have to make sure I land the first punch then" Sam said with a wicked smile.
"Alright" Leo butt in, "are both parties ready?"
Raph pulled both his sai out of their holsters while Sam tightly gripped both her tonfa handles, pressing the button on the sides of the handles and swiftly extending the length of each.
"Three, two, go!"
That fast, Raph was charging at Sam with his sai's held sideways in his hands so that he could still throw punches.
Sam kept her feet planted as she swiftly dodged the first punch. She dodged to the right, but she didn't attack. She then saw where the open space for the next punch was coming and ducked down. With each punch that was thrown, she was always able to detect where the next punch was coming from. No matter how quick Raph threw his punches, she somehow always found out where to go in order to dodge the attack. Finally, Raph almost got a solid hit, but Sam saw that he was slowly trying to move closer and she also saw that he was beginning to raise his leg like he was going to try and land a solid kick to her stomach. Like she suspected, he turned sideways, brought his leg up, and landed a hard and solid kick, but Sam was able to pull both tonfa in front of her in time to block the kick, though it did push her back a decent distance away from where she was standing.
"What? You can talk big but don't know how to fight?" he called over to her.
She just smiled back at him. "You said whoever lands the first punch will win right? Guess that means I still have a chance to win."
Raph gave her an evil grin. He thought the fight would have been over by now. He knew that she was quick based on what he had witnessed when she fought against that Foot soldier the night before, but he didn't expect her to be this swift.
As Sam slowly began walking backwards, Raph charged towards her again.
By the time Raph caught up and began throwing punches again, Sam had moved so far back that each time a punch missed her, it slammed into the wall. It was obvious that Raph was growing more and more furious as the fight went on.
"Why isn't she attacking? How does she expect to land a punch if she just stands and dodges my attacks? She's not even trying to block, she's specifically just dodging and …oh!"
Raph quickly backed away. Sam gave him a confused look.
"He finally figured it out" Donnie claimed as Leo nodded. Mikey just stood there, confused as to what everyone else knew that he didn't.
Sam sighed. "I guess you discovered my motive?"
Raph nodded. "You're not going to get me that easily, dodging my attacks until I tire out."
"Oh, I was actually waiting for one of your fists to get stuck in the wall" she said as pointed to the holes he had begun to make. Raph hadn't realized how deep the indents in the wall were until she had pointed it out. "Once you slipped up for a second I was going to attack, but you saw through my plan."
Raph chuckled. "Did you really think it would be that easy?"
"Guess not" she replied as she rushed towards him.
For the first time since the fight began, Sam actually started to attack. She wanted to hold back from actually fighting as much as possible since Raph's strength would make blocking and landing attacks much more difficult. It would be easier to attack an opponent who was the same size and weight as her, but hitting an opponent that was much bigger and stronger than herself would hurt her more than it would the enemy. Sam wasn't sure exactly where to try and land a hit on Raph where it wouldn't hurt her to much as well, and it had to be a hit from her tonfa or else the attack would really backfire and end up hurting her.
After a few punches, she noticed that he kept attacking up high, leaving the bottom half of his body wide open. Raph threw a left hook, aiming to use his sai to knock one of her tonfa out of her hands. He expected her to lean back again and just dodge, but this time she ducked down. It was risky, because ducking down to attack meant that she wouldn't be able to see where his next attack was coming from, but if she was quick enough, she would be able to land a hit near his feet, and that's exactly what she did. As soon as she ducked down, she jabbed the head of the tonfa into Raph's left foot, but at the same time while Sam was blinded from any incoming attacks, Raph was able to use the handle of his sai and jab it into Sam's left shoulder.
They both quickly leaped to their rights, creating a small gap between them. While Raph only felt some pain in his foot, he could still walk it off and fight. Sam on the other hand was really struggling to gain control over her left arm. The jab hurt more than it normally would due to Raphs incredible strength. Raph noticed her wincing at her sore arm and instantly took advantage of this. He quickly walked towards her and continuously aimed for her left side knowing that it would be much more difficult for her to block if she continued to try and block that one side. Sam knew she had to think quickly or else she would tire out soon. While Sam had incredible speed and strength for someone her age and size, she hadn't fought like this in a long time, and with her daily physical activities she at least got some breaks. Knowing she would tire out soon, she took a chance and ducked again, this time aiming for the back of Raph's right knee. If she hadn't been hurt than she would have been quicker, but just as she swung her right tonfa around to connect with the back of Raph's right knee, he brought that same leg up and then quickly slammed his foot down to knock the tonfa out of her hand. As Raph brought his leg down and tried to get back in ready position, Sam had already stood up right in front of him. She knew that she couldn't throw a punch at him unless she wanted to shatter her hand, so she went with her gut. Before Raph could event react, Sam slapped him right across the face.
"Ooohhh" Donnie said with his chin resting on his knuckle. Leo winced with him after witnessing and hearing the *slap* sound after the girl had landed the attack.
"HA*slap*" as Mikey slapped his hand to his mouth so that no one heard him laugh at what he just saw. He never thought he would ever see Raph get bitch slapped, but damn was it hilarious.
Raph stood there, frozen like a statue.
Sam had jumped back some after she landed the attack and stood there waiting for a reaction…and she continued to stand there. She waited for her opponent to move, but he just continued to stand there as he processed what had just happened to him.
Sam then ran over to Mikey and basically started patting him down as soon as she got over to him.
"Whoa dude, what are you-"
"Looking for a weakness."
Leo and Donnie gave her a weird face, a bit weirded out by what she was doing, but also very intrigued at the same time. They would never admit it, but they both were extremely impressed with what they had witnessed so far. They never imagined the fight would last this long, or that there would even be a fight period. Leo expected Raph to get a good solid punch or two in, for Sam to beg for mercy, and then they would ridicule her about how this would happen every time she was caught being disrespectful towards their family. But Sam had held up a pretty decent fight, so he decided to just sit back and watch the show.
Sam continued to pat Mikey across different parts of his body until she found a somewhat softer spot on his plastron near his waist. It was still solid of course, but it was a bit softer than the rest of his chest.
"Um, find what you're looking for?"
She gave a small smile and nodded.
When Sam turned back around, she saw that Raph was still frozen, but now his hand was gently cupping the area where he had been slapped, as if he was still trying to process what had happened to him.
Sam smiled as she rolled her eyes and called out to the red bearing turtle.
"Hey dauntless, I'm the one who beat your high score in Drive Club within an hour of playing the game!" she shouted.
Raph then turned around to look at her. He glared at her, and this glare was nastier than any other glare he had ever given her since the two had met. He was a mixed of embarrassed and pissed that she was able to keep up with him, and once he processed that he had just been bitch slapped, he couldn't control his anger. Because of this, his fighting style became very sloppy, and Sam used this to her advantage. Both Sam's left shoulder and right hand were very sore. Nothing was broken or seriously damaged, but very sore, so gripping her tonfa would be very difficult. She decided to momentarily go back to dodging Raph's attacks, but she could also feel herself getting slower. Right now they were both showing their weaknesses, and they both were trying to take advantage of this as best as they could.
As Sam dodged a punch that came in towards her right, her reaction time was slow and the next thing she knew she was being pulled forward and was hit in the stomach with Raph's elbow. As he then let her go, he expected her to feel winded and to stay put as he spun on his right heel and brought his left leg around with him to land a blow to her stomach, but instead she left her right foot planted and pivoted backwards only with her left leg. Just as Raph was bringing his leg down after missing his target, Sam was now doing the opposite of what Raph had just done. While he was bringing his leg back down, Sam swung her left leg backwards while turning on her planted right foot and used her left foot to land a blow right to where the somewhat softer spot on his plastron should have been. She had no idea if the softer spot near the waist line of Mikey's plastron would be on the same location of Raph's plastron or if there was a softer spot at all, but at the moment it was all she had in order to try and win this fight.
Luckily, it had been in the same spot, and this blow actually did a decent job at knocking the wind out of Raph. He took a few seconds to hold his waist as he tried to catch his breath. Since Sam was much weaker than him, it didn't take him to long to recuperate and get ready to fight once again, but wow that had been scary. He couldn't think of a time where he had been hit in that exact location on his plastron, and he couldn't remember the last time someone hit him in a way that left him so winded. He hated to admit it, but this was starting to become more of an enjoyable fight than it was infuriating. Sadly, Sam was at her limit. When she saw that Raph was about to come over and start attacking again, she threw her hands up in defeat.
"OKAY, okay you win! I surrender to the almighty dauntless!" she said as she bowed down in front of him on the ground. She did so mockingly, but Raph could tell that she was being serious in wanting to stop the fight.
"Had enough?" he said in a mocking tone.
"Oh yeah" she replied as she sat up, holding her knee. "I'd love to try and keep going, but sadly any attack I land on you will continue to hurt me more, at least while I'm this twiggy" she said in a sour tone, "and I don't want to cause to much damage to my body. I mean hey I have a game tomorrow, I don't want to lose my future career because of one fight where I never had a shot of winning from the start."
"Okay wait." Donnie then jumped down and began walking over to where the two opponents were standing, with Leo and Mikey following right behind him.
"If you knew there was no way you could win this fight, why would you even think of trash talking Raph? You had to know it would lead to this."
"Well," Sam began, "I wasn't sure what exactly would happen, but I was ready for whatever punishment was in store for my behavior. That and I was mainly just trying to get a rise out the one listening."
"Wait, you were insulting Raph in order to annoy Leo?" Mikey asked.
She turned towards Leo. "I'm not stupid, I saw that your door was open, and there was no sound coming from the room, so there was a very high chance that you were listening in on what we were talking about."
Leo turned his head, pretending to look at something that had caught his eye in the pipes above them.
"So if you weren't trying to mess with me, why were you so serious when you got over here?" Raph asked.
Sam chuckled. "To get you pumped to fight me. If Leo just said to fight me then you would instantly say no, so I had to be a bitch" she said with a beaming smile.
"So what was your overall goal in doing all this?" Donnie asked. "I'm sure there's more to it than just annoying Leo and getting to fight Raph."
Sam gave them a playful and triumphant smile. "I got all of you to talk to me."
All of them but Mikey gave her a confused look.
"Ahhhh" Mikey began, "you knew that Leo was listening in on our conversation, and as a test to see how he would react, you said things that you knew would annoy him which would then lead him to come out and confront you. You weren't exactly expecting to fight Raph, but since that was the result, you did what you had to in order to make sure the fight would happen, aka interacting with Raph. And Donnie walking over and joining the group and questioning you was probably just a bonus."
The remaining brothers stood their speechless. They weren't used to hearing Mikey sound so intelligent.
Sam nodded with a shocked expression. "Couldn't have said it better myself."
She reached her knuckle out and the two fist bumped.
Leo nodded, but he had one final thought that hadn't been answered.
"Okay, one last question." Sam turned her head towards him. "If you wanted to get a rise out of me in the beginning, why did you insult Raph and not me?"
"Easy, if I insulted you then it would be too obvious that I knew you were listening in on our conversation. Plus I had a strong feeling that insulting Raph would lead to a situation like this, whereas throwing insults at Donnie would lead more to just a formal apology and the whole thing would have ended at that. This scenario ended with all three of you actually starting a conversation with me."
"My best friend is smarter than yours!" Mikey shouted as he triumphantly threw his hands up in the air.
Leo and Raph both nodded towards Sam with blank expressions as they began to exit the room. Neither of the two brothers was sure how to feel. They both felt defeated and they definitely didn't like that, but at the same time they both couldn't stop thinking about everything they had both seen and heard from the girl. Not only had she done a great job of fighting an opponent where she was at a huge disadvantage, but she had planned out the entire situation before and ended up getting what she wanted. She may have lost that individual fight, but overall she had won the full battle. Raph was determined to make sure she wouldn't win the overall war, whereas Leo wondered if the tension really needed to continue.
The two were so caught up in their thoughts that neither of them had seen what Donnie had. The nerdy brother was the only one who saw the glimmer in Sam's eye, and how hard she was fighting to conceal her smile when she heard Mikey call her his best friend. Donnie thought back to his earlier thoughts about whether their friendship was a good thing or not. He knew that Mikey truly cherished it, but he never knew how Sam felt. Based on what he had just seen, he had a feeling that she was also very grateful to have the orange bearing turtle in her life. He overheard the two talking as he walked out of the dojo and headed towards his lab.
"Come on Sam, let's get back to working on your skateboard!"
"Hmm?" she said a bit dazed, "Skateboard, right! Let's go!"
And with that, everyone went back to pick up on where their day had left off.
*Later that day, closer to nighttime*
Donnie was happy with what he had accomplished that day. He had been tinkering around with some of the equipment that he hoped to one day use in what was supposed to become the med wing, but it was getting late, so he wanted to start closing up shop before he fell asleep and would then wake up to a huge mess in the middle of the night. He began putting tools back into drawers and putting equipment back up on shelves.
He walked over to a shelf to put some small machines back in their places. As he was organizing what went where, he heard a rustling noise behind him. He quickly turned around, but no one was there. He slowly turned around and then swiftly turned back to face the center of the room. In doing so, he caught a frightened Sam standing towards the wall on the opposite side of the room holding a pair of goggles in one hand and a strap in the other.
Usually Sam would try to play off what had happened with a joke, but she could read Donnie's body language and facial expressions all too well, and it was obvious that he was furious.
"Why?"
She paused. "Um, what exactly doe-"
"As in why are you sneaking into my lab?"
"Uh, well-"
"See no, there's no correct answer because you shouldn't be in here." Donnie had tried to stay calm each time the girl had done something that irked him and his brothers, but this had been the last straw for him.
"Raph verbally fought you earlier because you had touched something that was his, so what makes you think it's okay to sneak in to my lab? I mean this is the only place besides my room that is like my sanctuary, my utopia even, which means that if I don't give you permission to come in here then you need to stay out! I mean, is this like your hobby? Do you enjoy poking into other people's personal lives and taking their belongings? Please, tell me what your reason is for purposefully sneaking into my lab and doing something else that you know you shouldn't be doing, especially after I strictly told Mikey not to let something like this happen again."
After Donnie had stopped laying into the girl he then noticed that she wasn't smiling, she wasn't responding with any sarcastic comments in a mocking tone, and she wasn't trying to run and hide. She just stood there. Her eyes were glued to the floor and her hands seemed a bit shaky. Finally, she gained the courage to talk to the turtle.
"I just…I didn't want you to get mad at him again. I didn't know he was going to do what he did earlier in lying to get the goggles for me to use, and I know you were probably upset with him doing that. I don't want you guys to keep getting upset at him, he's just trying to be a nice guy. So, even though you hate my guts, I took the risk in sneaking in to get another strap to fix the goggles. I went adjust them and the strap snapped and I didn't want you to get mad at him again. I'm sorry."
She laid the goggles and the strap down on the table and turned to walk out of the room.
"Wait."
Sam paused, but continued to face the door. She was too afraid to continue facing Donnie.
Donnie took a deep breath as he thought about what he had just done. More than anything he was hurt when she said that he hated her. He knew that yelling at her like that was wrong. He basically had just let out all the thoughts he had been storing away about this whole situation, but he knew that wasn't right. After a few seconds, he carefully chose his words and began to talk again.
"So, that's one of the very rare occasions where I turn into Raph, and I apologize for that. I get that Mikey is a good hearted guy and that he just wanted to help you out, but I also don't like strangers invading my space and using my stuff. Then again, this whole situation is due to me still treating you like a stranger. So, in order to somewhat try and fix that, if you ever need anything from my lab, you're free to come in and use whatever you need.
Sam turned around in annoyance.
"Seriously? Dude don't get my hopes up like that just to be like 'hey gotcha' and it all be fake" she scowled.
He tilted his head in confusion. "I'm not joking, as long as you tell me what you're taking, then I'm honestly saying you're allowed in here."
Sam's eyes went wide. "But…you have super awesome stuff…you'll let me use your super awesome stuff?"
"Yes."
"You swear?"
"I swear."
"…110% positive?"
"If you keep asking then I'm going to change my mind."
Sam smiled a huge smile that reached from one side of her face to the other.
In return, Donnie also gave her a small smile. "Oh, I don't hate you by the way."
"Oh, okay. Not sure where that came from, but that's cool."
"Well you're the one that just said that I hated you."
Sam pointed towards herself. "I said that you hated me?"
"Yup."
"I did?"
"Let's not do this again please!"
"Oh…well thanks again!" Sam's face was turning redder and redder as she quickly walked out the room, embarrassed that she had accidentally spoken something that she had been keeping in her thoughts.
Once Sam had left the room, Donnie went back to organizing his lab. He wanted to be strict about the rules of his lab like he always had, but seeing that expression on her face broke him. Even though it wasn't the smiley expression she had on her face when Mikey had called her his best friend, this depressed look showed how much she truly cared about Mikey just as much and the happier expression had. Donnie could truly tell that she cared about Mikey's relationship with the rest of his family and that she had been hurting from the way Leo, Raph, and himself had been arguing with him about being friends with Sam. That's why he broke and decided to let her come into the lab. If Mikey had bonded with her by letting her in and talking with her, then maybe giving her a chance would also allow him to understand this bond that the two had and why they both cared so much for the other.
He smiled and chuckled to himself.
"Heh, things are going to get very interesting with her around."
Thank you to those who are still reading my story! If any of you get a chance, are there spots where I'm doing well, doing not so well? Are the fight scenes decent at least? I'm new to all of this, so if you have any comments or complaints then please tell me, if you'd like to that is.
Thank you again for continuing to read my story even though I'm taking forever to update. Hopefully this chapter makes up for lost time and meets expectations .