Chapter Eleven

Can't Stop

The girl leaned against the brick wall at the corner of the block. The remaining ten minute she was forced to wait was going by impossibly slow. This was what she got for walking around until the dinner rush.

Ignoring the adults giving her disapproving looks about her blue hair she looked up at the darkening sky. It was going to rain. Thunder rolled, though it was barely audible over the sound of honking horns in the New York traffic. A single rain drop hit her between the eyes.

With a sigh she dropped her braid down the back of her newly bought sweatshirt and pulled the hood over her head and stuffed her hands back into the two-sided pocket before anyone noticed her bandaged hand. The wraps had turned red again; they needed to be changed when she got back. The cut was deeper than she thought.

Staring at the ground she felt the rain slowly started to fall, turning the cement a darker color spot by spot, she tried to nonchalantly rub her back against the building's rough wall to scratch her wings that were protesting about being concealed after having a whole night out in the open with no worries.

The time passed so slowly that road kill could travel faster.

Then he passed. Alex was just watching people's shoes coming and going from her vision when a person seemed to stand out, followed by the sound of clanking metal. Under the pants that were too soaked to be just from the rain were no shoes, though the pant legs covered the foot when she watched him continue on his way she saw his heel as he stepped. It was bare and silvery-grey. With astonishment she looked up at him. Underneath a dark green bandana that covered his head she could see the ends of hair the color of river mud. No way. Could it be?

Trying to be discreet about it, not wanting to cause too much attention if she was wrong, she quickly followed the guy. He was roughly her height, maybe a little taller. She could feel the happy apologies start to form in her throat as she watched him turn the block corner. But when she turned the corner after him he was gone. She tried to look passed the adults on their dinner dates and all the other people quickly trying to duck into buildings to escape the rain, but saw no sign of him. Maybe she just imagined it.

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The adults watched on the screen as the hooded girl turned back to the restaurant unaware of the cameras watching from the streets.

The biggest one crossed his arms with a scowl, shoe shaped bruise on his cheek twitching. "Yeah that's the one. I know its allies, though haven't found the hideout… yet."

The scientist folded his hands on the large keyboard in front of the wall of monitors. "Your enemies' friend is our enemy; I can make out a deal. Get me a DNA sample of your enemy and my new pets will be able to track them down. Do this for us and we'll have a win-win situation. We get what we want back, and will take your enemy out of your way, if you'd allow."

The scarred one gave a sharp nod. "But be warned that we have been deceived and failed before, and the consequences are never delightful on your part."

"Us scientists are men of our words," the scientist assured. "And besides your enemy is in the sewer, a place riddled with disgusting rivers, and we just happen to have a little shark already on the surface."

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Alex balanced the four pizza boxes in her arms as she made her way down the sidewalk and sneakily slipped into an alley. It was raining steadily and getting her soaked, not to mention the cardboard boxes. How she had become the turtles' errand girl she had no idea. Could they even eat four pizzas? They had better have a can of soda for her as payment for going through this… she thought as she stood in front of the manhole cover trying to figure out how she was going to get the food to the sewers without dropping the boxes. Speaking of soda, she still had to get back at Raph for her first few days with them! Oh, he was going down sooner or later.

Finally thinking of an okay plan, Alex set the boxes on the driest part of a nearby dumpster and pulled the heavy sewer cover out of the ground. Going as fast as she could to save the pizza from sogginess she carried a box down one at a time making four trips up and down the ladder with a box balanced on one hand, setting the pizza down on the least gross part of the ground in the sewer to go retrieve the remaining pizzas. With all four in the sewer tunnel she climbed back up the ladder and put the manhole cover back in place. Jumping down she picked the pizzas up and started down the tunnel.

As she walked that guy she knew she saw was starting to bug her. She didn't just imagine it, right? No. It was just her past haunting her after she had laid it all out the day before. Her mind was just creating ghost images with grey skin, mud brown hair, green bandana… bare feet in the rain… walking right by like he was mad at her…

Alex shook her head. It wasn't him. He was still under the Statue of Liberty, still with Them. Her mind was just playing the guilt card on her. But she was going back for him and Physic too, one of these days…

When she finally reached the lair she was in an almost depressed state and didn't realize that the lights were off until she was already well away from the entrance.

"Uh… guys?" she called through the darkness. The place was unsettling dark. There wasn't even the soft glow from Don's computers anywhere, not even the pinpricks of light coming from the VCR and DVD players. Something was up. "Hello?" she called into the foreboding darkness, her tail slowly uncurling behind her in unease as she made her way to the kitchen purely by memory. "I've got pizza," she said, setting the boxes down on the table. She turned around to search for the lever that worked the lights when there was a soft whoosh of something moving through the air at a high speed behind her. She turned around trying to see through the darkness. She felt along the table. The pizza was gone.

"Okay guys," she said, slowly backing up from the table, tail swinging from side to side, hating the fact that her wings were concealed underneath an uncut hoody. "Game's over, you can turn the lights on now." Nothing moved. "I'm not playing this, guys," she said moving to where she last remembered her backpack and pulled out the flashlight. She turned it on just in time to see a glint of metal and dove out of the way. Quickly rolling to her feet she got ready. It was a real disadvantage the flashlight could only catch bits and pieces of her surroundings at a time.

Suddenly the silence broke with a burp and Alex threw the flashlight in the direction of the sound. There was a loud thunk followed by a small shriek of surprise and pain.

"Mike you really need to work on your stealth," Alex said, hands in fists, noticing how bad it was of an idea to throw her only light.

"Too bad he's the only one," a low voice said right behind her.

Alex's tail swung on impulse and one of the blades got caught with a clang of metal against metal. Suddenly her tail was yanked back, taking her with, and she fell rolling across the floor. She stood up trying to figure out which way she was facing when there was the soft sound of something landing behind her. But before she could react a long pole was pressed against her throat, pulling her up and back into a solid. She grabbed the pole, standing on her toes trying to pull it away as she choked and felt a sharp point lightly touch her in front of the heart.

Then the lights turned on and Leo stood in front of her with sword extended.

"And she's dead," Raph said, putting his sias in his belt.

Don pulled his bo staff away "That was a little too easy," he said as Alex rubbed her throat.

"Not exactly what we expected by someone with military training," Leo commented as he sheathed his katanas.

"I told you guys I was never actually taught combat," Alex defended as she pulled the hoody off and let her wings have their space. "And that was a completely unfair ambush."

"Life's unfair, kid," Raph said.

"You're talking to me about unfair?" Alex said flexing her wings. "And if I could see in the dark I could have defended myself…" she added in a mumble.

"Oh yeah?" Raph challenged.

"Yeah," Alex said straightening to her full height like that would help anything. It was obvious a fight was going to break out between the two if something wasn't said. Luckily something was said – in the form of a loud belch. When they looked for the source of the impressive, yet gross, sound they found Mikey sitting in front of one of the pizza boxes at the table, three fourths of the pizza already gone and two soda cans sitting beside the box.

"Mike that's for all of us," Leo said going to the table. Alex, Don, and Raph followed before all the food was gone.

Alex was about to sit down when her chair suddenly disappeared out from under her and she hit the floor. Jumping to her feet she glared at Mikey next to her, who had a wide smile while he chomped down on his pizza slice. With an inaudible grumbling she reached for the soda sitting in front of her and put a hand on top of the can when she hesitated. Looking at Raph with narrowed eyes and put the can back on the table and instead grabbed the one sitting in front of him. Opening the one the can became a fountain on her.

Raph and Mikey laughed; at least Don was trying to hide his laughter while Leo rolled his eyes, none of them aware of the tail secretly moving across the floor under the table, a blade hooked around a chair leg and yanked back. One minute Raph's laughing, next minute the guy's on the floor, Mikey's laughing harder and Alex is smirking with the small feeling of payback, though the real vengeance wasn't yet won.

Suddenly Alex's chair jerked and she tipped over, she grabbed Mikey's chair to try and save herself, and Mikey grabbed the table as his chair started going and they took the whole table down though Leo and Don were able to save a pizza box each.

Raph stood up behind the tipped over table. "Wow, you two made such a mess," he said.

Alex pulled a pizza slice off her head with a huff, leaving red sauce stuck in the blue hair. Mikey took the pizza box off his head and just pushed a slice in his mouth, apparently not caring where he was just as long as he has his pizza.

Splinter came to investigate the sound. The adult of the lair stood there surveying the pizza splattered everywhere with a calm that just made you feel like you were in trouble.

From their spots on the floor Mikey and Alex gave guilty smiles for a moment before both of them pointed at Raph and Raph pointed at Alex while Leo and Don looked like they couldn't believe they knew the three.

"What happened here?" Splinter asked.

"Mikey tipped the table," Raph said.

"Alex tipped me!" Mikey said quickly.

"Raph tipped me," Alex quickly passed the blame.

"Alex tipped me first," Raph pointed out.

"You blasted me with soda!" Alex exclaimed.

"You have no proof," Raph crossed his arms.

"Who else would?" Alex asked, pushing the box that was sitting on her lap off.

"Mikey."

"Bro how could you say such a thing?" Mikey asked theatrically putting a hand to his chest.

"Technically, sensei," Don said, putting the pizza box in his hands on a counter. "Mikey is innocent throughout this."

Mikey smiled in his innocence.

"Raph started it," Alex muttered.

Raph opened his mouth to argue when Splinter smacked the end of his walking stick on the ground to command silence.

"Raphael, Alexandra," he said sharply his voice having that weird power adults have to show authority that almost glues other people's mouths shut. "It is not a matter of who started it or how it was started, what matters is who willingly took participation in it."

And this is where the punishment comes in… Alex thought. It always did in the movies…

Ten minutes later Alex and Raph were on their hands and knees grumbling sounds that might have been words at some point in time as they angrily pushed and pulled the scrub brushes across the floor trying to get the pizza grease off the floor after righting the tipped over table and chairs, only to move onto cleaning the rest of the lair from top to bottom. This was completely unfair…

Raph punched his brush into the bucket of soapy water and looked at it thoughtfully as the water sloshed out onto the floor. He looked behind him at Alex who was looking from the two brushes in her hands, to her shoe strings, to her feet, and back to the brushes equally as thoughtful though their ideas were completely different. With a smile that flat out and said 'I'm looking for a fight, what are you gonna do about it?' he grabbed the bucket took some kind of aim and let the contents fly. It was the girl's fault anyway.

Alex sat perfectly still, watching the droplets of soapy water collect at the ends of her hair and fall into the huge puddle around her, grip slowly tightening on the brush in her hand, it wasn't going to be there long. With a quick flick of the arm a bump was growing on the back of Raph's head. He deserved it.

Splinter walked out of his room to check how the cleaning was going to find Raph and Alex in a full out war, complete with clashing weapons. The adult interrupted the fighting just as Alex had jumped on Raph's back and jammed a still full cleaning bucket on his head, water splashing everywhere. Both of them were soaked with soapy water.

With one look at Splinter Alex knew they were in trouble, again.

Five minutes later Alex and Raph were equipped with towels and told to wipe up all the access water until the floors were bone dry.

As Alex picked up her towel to move to another puddle she held it by the corners. A smile slowly crept on her lips as she twirled it and slowly moved towards Raph like she was holding a loaded weapon. After a quick crack of the towel-whip Alex was running through the lair with Raph right on her tail, literally.

They were checked on just as Raph grabbed Alex's tail and sent her skidding along the wall and crashing head first into the back of the couch. She was on her feet in seconds and jumped into the air, wings zooming her way forward to tackle Raph - no one pulls her tail! - when she was caught by the shirt, almost choking her as her collar suddenly push into her throat, and forced to stay still.

"Aw man…" Alex muttered, having a good idea what was going to come from the rat. Though she wasn't exactly expecting what the punishment was.

"I feel like I'm back at the lab," the girl complained sourly to the floor as she did unlimited pushups along side Raph. "How is exercise a punishment anyway, damn it-" thwack "-ow!"

"I have warned you to not swear in my presence," Splinter said as a throbbing appeared at the top of Alex's head; a headache was bound to appear out of that hit.

"Sorry…" Alex mumbled.

"And you are doing this exercise since neither of you seem to know when it is time to stop. Hopefully your bodies will be able to tell you at some point. Until then both of you will continue this for as long as it takes."

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Then next day Alex sat in Central Park on a park bench. The sky overhead was overcast and everything seemed damp and gloomy. She was resting in the corner of the back of the bench and the armrest with a leg propped up on the seat almost like she was claiming the bench as hers while her arms hurt to move; three consecutive hours of push ups could start to take their toll on a person.

As she breathed in the moisture filled air her mind wouldn't stray from what she thought she saw the day before. She knew she had seen him, and yet there was still doubt. Even if he was mad at her he would still acknowledge her if they happened to pass. He was a person with a temper fast to heat up he wouldn't just ignore her. Created with shark genes; could you blame him?

The girl gave a sigh. Now she realized just how long ago she had left the labs. She had been aware of the vow to go back always sitting at the back of her mind and really ment to go back for them - for everyone - but she couldn't go. She couldn't really fight and if she was completely honest about it, getting out of the labs was almost a fluke- a once in a life chance. How was she going to pull it off again? And with escapees?

She shook her head. She needed to stop thinking about it before she gets utterly depressed about the matter. Deep down she knew that not knowing how to fight was only half the problem, the other half was an actual fear of going back. Would she come back out if she did?

"Stop it," she hissed at herself and stood up. Splinter was right, she didn't know when to quit, she admitted as she walked through the park to the streets, then to an alley. But that also meant she wasn't going to quit on that promise she made to everyone back at the labs. She was going to go back and was going to ask to be trained by Master Splinter even if it was going to be a somewhat awkward moment. The sooner she was trained how to fight the sooner she could fulfill her promise and everything would be over.

Jumping down into the sewer she started heading for the lair before she lost her determination and courage to actually ask for the training. About half way there she started to notice something on the floor; small red specks. Not sure what to make of it, she continued forward. The farther forward she got the more frequent and bigger the specks became until they were drops that she noticed formed into a messy line. Bending down she stuck a finger in some of it and brought it close to her eyes, sniffed it; blood. It didn't feel very old judging by the wetness of it.

Straightening up she forgot about going to the lair and followed the trail as fast as her wings could take her though there wasn't much space for the twelve and a half foot wingspan. Whatever was bleeding seemed to have bled faster the farther they went and she just had a feeling whoever was at the end of the trail was someone she knew.

Hey, sorry this chapter is kind of short and doesn't really help anything plot wise except that she's finally going to ask to be trained, but the next chapter will be good. I'm not going to say much else in fear of saying too much, so enjoy this one until the next one is done!