Chapter 21

Head Busting Buds

Casey Jones scanned the school halls for a certain redhead.

Finally, he spotted her walking hand in hand with Donnie Hamato, and helping him carry his books since his arm was in a sling. Apparently the Hamato siblings had been mugged by Purple Dragons the week before, so all of the ones still attending school still had visible signs of their injuries.

Upon seeing the girl, Casey hurried towards her with a yell of, "April!"

Glancing up, April's face fell at the sight of him, and she began walking faster, tugging Donnie along as she went.

"Wait!" Casey called as he tried to catch up. But April kept going, and Donnie sent him a dirty look before the two were lost in the crowd.

Sighing in defeat, Casey banged his head against a nearby locker. All he wanted to do was apologize, but it looked like April was subscribing to the same approach Nick had. Complete and utter avoidance of him.

"She'll come around," said a voice next to him.

Casey jumped and let out an unmanly sounding shriek, banging his head against the locker a second time.

Next to him stood Mikey (his face and neck showing bruises which had come from the mugging by the Purple Dragons as well), who smiled at Casey's clumsiness, but to his credit he didn't laugh.

"What?" Casey asked when his head stopped hurting.

"April," the youngest Hamato elaborated, "she's mad right now, but I think she'll come around eventually. She kinda understands where you're coming from about it, but you gotta understand that the heart is a soft and squishy muscle, dude. And what you did when you tried to get information you really squashed hers."

Casey stared incredulously at the younger boy. He would have thought for sure Mikey was joking if not for the look of utter seriousness as he spoke. "Okaaay…" he finally said, not sure if he should take Mikey seriously, but hoping his screwball logic was somehow right.

The hockey nut thought that might be the end of it, but what Mikey said next took him completely by surprise.

"Raph misses you," the younger boy said.

Casey's eyes grew the size of dinner plates as he stared at the other. This was the first time he'd heard anything solid about Raph in weeks. "What?"

"Raph," said Mikey, not seeing how he could be clearer. "He misses you. It's been a rough couple days for him."

Casey raised an eyebrow at him. "Because he's sick?" he said, making sure to put all his disbelief about that obvious lie into the last word. "You know I know that story is a load of crock, right."

Mikey fidgeted nervously. "Yeah, he's not really sick, but, um, saying that he is is easier to than why he really can't come to school.

Casey frowned in concern. "What happened?" he asked.

Mikey avoided his eyes. "Lots of stuff, dude. And just last week, well, you remember his turtle, Spike?"

Casey nodded. Of course he knew Spike, Raph loved that little box turtle. He told the scaly critter everything.

"Well, Spike is…" Mikey trailed off to find the right word, "he's gone."

"Aw man," said Casey in sympathy, knowing Raph had to be heartbroken without his pet. "He doing okay?"

Mikey shrugged. "He's been better. And, uh, Raphie's been getting kinda stir crazy with just us as company."

Casey blinked when he heard this. Did that mean what he hoped it meant? "Are you gonna let me go see him?" Casey asked eagerly.

Mikey looked conflicted. "I wanna let you see him, and Raph wants you to come see him, but everyone else says no dice."

Casey's face fell. "Aw, come on," he groaned.

Mikey shrugged. "Sorry dude, but your stunt with April didn't really impress them all that much. Mom and Dad think you might be trouble, Donnie's mad at you because April is, Miwa feels for you, but she doesn't want to screw up her new friendship with April, and Leo won't okay it till our parents do. Sorry."

Casey groaned, and banged his head against the locker again. "But Raph's okay, right?" he asked. "I thought he'd gone missing or something. Why didn't he answer my texts?"

Mikey looked sheepish. "Oh that. No, Raph's not missing, and he didn't answer cause he broke his phone awhile back, and his new one doesn't have your number."

Casey looked incredulous. "That's it?" he burst out. He'd had all these conspiracy theories for weeks, but from the sound of it Raph was fine, if in some strange situation keeping him from coming to school.

"Yup," said Mikey.

Just then the warning bell rang, and the two hurried to their next class. "I'll try to talk Mother and Father into letting you see him," Mikey called over his shoulder as he went. "I'll let you know, dude."

"Thanks, man!" Casey called back as he hurried off.

Well at least that was something of a relief. Casey knew Mikey wasn't much of a liar, so if he said it then it was most likely true. At least he knew his best friend was safe.

But that still didn't answer Casey's questions about the other missing kids, and the killer mutants and robot ninjas that had been plaguing the streets.

Looks like another mystery for Casey Jones to solve. And this time he was gonna do it the right way. No pumping innocent girls for information, he was taking this fight into his own hands.

Besides, being a vigilante would e good practice for being a bounty hunter.

Casey spent the next few days preparing to put his new plan into action. He worked hard at converting his old sports gear into weapons and armor, and made sure to add in a few un-sports related surprises as well. The final touch came when Casey took one of his old hockey masks, and spray-painted it to look like a skull.

Wearing the completed outfit in front of the mirror, Casey couldn't resist flexing his muscles and saying, "I'm Batman."

At that exact moment his little sister then burst in through his door, and told him to stop playing dress up and come to dinner, the little brat.

Unfortunately, the day Casey was about to make his debut, Mikey approached him at school with some bad news.

"Sorry, dude, " he said looking sympathetic. "Father and Mother both said no about you coming to visit. Me 'n Raph'll keep trying though."

Casey was disappointed, but he managed to hide the accompanying anger long enough to thank Mikey for his efforts, and go their separate ways.

But come that nightfall, Casey was determined to take his frustrations out on the scum of New York. And they'd learn not to mess with his city or steal kids, not while Casey Jones was around.

Things at the Hamato household weren't sunshine and roses either.

With the loss of companionship that Spike had provided for Raph, his moods were going downhill faster than ever. It was getting to the point he couldn't go a day without yelling at three people, and getting into a fistfight with at least one. The fact that most of his siblings were still sporting bruises from Slash's attack made the latter of those more difficult to do. Raph had recovered from the injuries he'd gotten much faster than they had despite being beaten much harder, a fact Donnie contributed to his mutant DNA.

Even so, he was trying his best to keep it contained, and his siblings were trying harder not to push his buttons. But you can't undo years of annoying quirks and habits in just a few days.

Plus, whenever Raph tried basking, or other things that usually made him happy, it would inevitably remind him of Spike, or the fact he could no longer show his face to the outside world. Even with being able to go out at night, Raph felt like he was climbing the walls of the dojo, and if something didn't change soon he was going to snap.

So when Mikey had come forward with the suggestion they let his friend Casey in on their secrets, Raph had jumped on the idea. After Spike, Casey had been his best friend, and he was confident the hockey nut wouldn't reject him if they just explained things (or at least he hoped not).

But no one else in their family would get on board with the idea, making it another disappointment in a now long list of disappointments, and Raph was getting really sick of it.

Because of this, Raph's temper was worse than ever, and after a particularly disastrous training session, he ran all but ran out of the dojo to get some air and hopefully cool his head.

Though, taking his frustrations out on the fixtures of the rooftop he'd decided to go to didn't seem to be helping any.

With a huff, Raph sat down on the roof, and not for the first time wished he had Spike back.

He remained sitting there, until the sound of someone getting mugged in the alley below caught his attention.

Maybe beating up crooks would be a better use of his misplaced aggression.

Meanwhile, Casey was spending his first night as a vigilante finding out that it's not as easy as Superheroes made it look. He didn't have the first clue how to find clues bout the ninjas, mutants, or missing kids. In fact, he was having a hard time finding crime all together, leading it to start off as a very boring night.

Lucky for him, it didn't stay that way for long.

As he patrolled, he caught sight of the Purple Dragons trying to mug an old man in a dead end alley. The sight made him grin and pull his mask down in front of his face.

"Time for this vigilante to make his debut," Casey muttered to himself as he stepped over to get the perfect shot.

With a sharp slap, Casey used one of his hockey sticks to send a puck flying, hitting the biggest Purple Dragon hard enough to knock him off his feet.

The man being mugged took that opportunity to flee, and the Purple Dragons all turned to look in the direction the puck had come from.

Casey stood in the shadows, allowing his skull mask the have top creepy effect. "You slimeballs picked the wrong night," he said.

But the scrawny Purple Dragon scoffed. "Nice outfit. Who's this clown?" he asked the others, who shrugged and looked amused.

"I'm the last guy you see before you wake up in the hospital," Casey replied. Then he rushed forward and used his hockey stick to knock the skinny guy flat.

Not happy about that, the other two came after him, but were no match for Casey's crazy moves. Soon the three gangsters were lying sprawled across the alley floor, but Casey wasn't about to stop there. These guys needed to be taught a lesson, and Casey still had plenty of aggression to work through.

Unbeknownst to him was that Raph was above, observing his assault on the crooks.

As much as the turtle didn't like the Purple Dragons, all the concepts of honor his family had drilled into him said you don't attack your opponents when they're already down like the boy below him was doing. And if he didn't stop soon, someone could get badly hurt, and the kid would have to have that on his conscience.

"That guy is out of control," he muttered to himself as he stood and pulled out his sais. "Time for a little intervention." With that he dropped into the alley, and hid in the shadows.

The Purple Dragons were now trying their best to escape from the crazy kid in the hockey mask, telling him that they gave up, and doing their best to run away.

But Casey was blocking the entrance to the dead end alley, and the only way out was past him. He wasn't finished with these guys yet.

At least he hadn't been until someone snuck up behind him, stole his hockey stick, and then used his back as a springboard to vanish back into the shadows all in a matter of seconds.

Casey quickly grabbed a baseball bat from his golf bag, and began searching the alley for his attacker. "Wh-who's back there?" he called, trying not to sound nervous about whoever had gotten the drop on him. "Uh, show yourself?"

His eyes were then drawn to a particularly dark shadow by a dumpster, where he could see a pair of blank white eyes staring back at him from the darkness. Then a large, green, three-fingered hand reached out of the shadows to rest on the dumpster, before the rest of the creature stepped out into the light.

Casey could only stare at the giant turtle with ninja gear and a red mask standing before him. "Another mutant?" he asked in surprise.

The turtle scowled. "Got a problem with that?" he snapped.

As Casey's brain started to process what he was really seeing, he said, "Wait, what are you? Some kind of turtle ninja?" he had to laugh at the ludicrousness of that statement.

But his laughter only seemed to tick the turtle off, and it gave the Purple Dragons a chance to escape.

Casey immediately stopped laughing, and glared after the gang members, and started to go after them. The turtle tried to extend an offer to handle the Purple Dragons himself, but Casey just shoved him away and started to go after them again.

Raph scowled at being shoved, but tried one last time to get through to the kid. "You know, anger is a dangerous ally," he said, knowing that fact very well. He then shoved the kid back and added angrily, "Why don't you cool off for awhile."

But for Casey that was the final straw. He'd lost one friend, was being bared from seeing another, had no clue how to solve the mystery he'd been chasing, and now he was being blocked from taking out his aggression on those who deserved it by some mutant freak, enough was enough.

"That's it, lizard," he said, arming himself with the bat in one hand, and a spare hockey stick in the other. "I'm done with you."

With a yell of "GOONGALA!" Casey launched himself at the turtle.

What followed was nothing short of a brawl. Raph's ninja training gave him an edge, but Casey's improvised and unpredictable style of fighting allowed him to give as many hits as he got.

Eventually, Casey managed to get behind the turtle, and club him with both weapons, making Raph fall forward onto his face.

Casey grinned to himself cockily at being able to make his opponent fall flat. "Heh, ain't turtles supposed to be endangered?" he taunted.

Raph glared at him, and twisted around. "Only the ones who can't do this!" he yelled as he kicked his feet up and clocked the kid under the jaw.

Casey went flying back down the alley from the hit, and his mask was knocked clean off and clattered to the ground next to him.

His head shot up and he glared at the turtle angrily, only for his expression to quickly change to confusion when he saw the turtle start backing away from him looking almost scared.

Raph, meanwhile, was freaking out. Once the mask was off, he finally recognized just who he'd been fighting. Even with the Halloween makeup caked on his face, there was no mistaking it.

Backing away, the white left Raph's eyes for the first time since the fight started, and he stared at the prone form in the alley. "Casey?" he asked incredulously.

Casey pulled himself to his feet, and glared at him. "Yeah, how do you-?!" Casey broke off when he caught sight of the mutant's eyes. He only knew one person with eyes that shade of green, and now that he thought about it, that voice was familiar too. Combine all that with the color red…

Before Casey's brain could finish processing this, Raph threw down a smoke bomb and vanished.

Coughing on the smoke, Casey ran towards where the turtle had last been, yelling, "Wait!"

But the smoke cleared and mutant turtle was nowhere in sight.

After a few minutes of fruitless searching, Casey found himself more lost than ever. But one question stood out above the rest.

Had that really been Raph?

The next day, Casey confronted Mikey at his locker.

"Hey, Casey," said Mikey cheerfully when he saw the other boy, despite the new bruises on the hockey nut's face. He pulled his skateboard from his locker, and added, "Sorry, nothing new on the home front."

"Why the hell is Raph a giant turtle?" Casey asked bluntly, making the youngest of the Hamato siblings jump in shock, and practically throw his skateboard into the air.

The board flew over Casey's head and smacked a passing girl in the face, making her yelp and clutch at her nose, which started bleeding heavily.

While Mikey felt bad for that happening, he immediately seized his opportunity to escape and rushed over to the girl, apologizing profusely for hitting her.

The goth girl he'd hit gave him a glare, but the pleading look of apology on Mikey's face must have worked, because she shrugged it off. "'M fibe," she said, still clutching her bleeding nose. "Ib lookd ike a aksidnt to be."

"Still, you should see the nurse, uh-" Mikey floundered to remember if he knew the girl's name.

"Irba," the girl provided.

"Right, Irma," said Mikey taking her hand. "Let's get you over to the nurse, Irma."

The youngest Hamato shot Casey an apologetic look, but led the girl away so it would be impossible for them to continue the conversation, and vowing to avoid all things Casey Jones for the rest of the day (and warning his siblings to do the same).

Casey only glared after him in response, before sulking off to his next class.

Mikey knew one thing for sure. This could only mean trouble.

Raph was in a lot of trouble once Mikey came home from school and reported what had happened.

The turtle sat kneeling in the dojo, as Yoshi stood over him was a disapproving scowl on his face.

"So," Yoshi said stroking his beard. "I expressly forbade you meeting your friend while you are in this form, did I not?"

Raph winced. "Hai, Sensei."

"Only for you to go out and find this friend, after I specifically told you not to?" Yoshi continued.

"Iie, Sensei," Raph denied.

Yoshi raised an eyebrow at this response. "No?" he asked skeptically, allowing Raph to elaborate.

"It was an accident, I swear!" Raph insisted. "I was just out trying to blow off some steam, and I saw this kid in a mask kicking the snot out of some Purple Dragons. And I'd have no problem with that normally, but he was still beating on them once they were already down and surrendering. That's not the honorable way that you taught us, Sensei."

He paused to look at his father imploringly.

Yoshi nodded to show he understood, and Raph continued, "So I went down to try and stop him before someone ended up in the hospital. Only the guy wasn't too happy when I tried to give him the 'anger is dangerous' speech, and yeah, he started pushing my buttons too. So we fought."

Raph lowered his head as he said the next part. "And while we were fighting, I managed to kick the guy's stupid mask off, and that's when I saw that it was Casey. I swear I booked it the second I recognized him. I-I didn't think he'd recognized me back…"

Yoshi sighed, and placed a hand on his son's shoulder. "Clearly he did," said Yoshi, somehow sounding stern and sympathetic at the same time. "And we will have to deal with the consequences." He then turned and walked away. "I will meditate on this."

Raph stood, and made his way out of the dojo, glaring at his clearly eavesdropping siblings on the way out.

Leo looked at him disapprovingly. "You go out, and just happen to run into your best friend fighting the Purple Dragons?" he asked skeptically. "I don't buy it."

Donnie nodded in agreement. "The odds are astronomical that such a thing would happen," he added.

Raph glared at them. "Well it did happen!" he snapped. "So you can take your odds and shove it!"

Miwa just shrugged, and went to find something more interesting now that Raph wasn't getting chewed out anymore.

Mikey, however, looked timidly at Raph, since he was the one who gave the news that got Raph in trouble in the first place. "Sorry, Raph," he said.

Raph gave him an annoyed look, before grunting and turning to leave. He was a little mad at Mikey from ratting him out, but mostly he was angry with himself for letting this happen.

He needed to find Casey and set this right.

But after a few hours of searching that night, Raph was getting very frustrated that he couldn't find Casey anywhere.

He'd checked the hockey rink, only to find it had started closing earlier after the fight Miwa, April, and Donnie had with Chrome Dome in there.

He didn't seem to be home either, as when Raph looked through the windows, he only saw his father and sister milling around the apartment.

Raph checked all of Casey's usual haunts, only to not catch sight of his friend anywhere. Finally he took a break on a random rooftop, feeling irritated this was taking so long.

Little did he know, Casey wasn't at his usual haunts because he had had the same idea as Raph, and was out looking for him as well.

He was getting just as frustrated as Raph about his lack of progress, when he managed to spot the turtle on the roof, punching at the air, and looking irate. He started towards the roof, when what he saw next made him pause in alarm.

Unbeknownst to Raph, there were several dark figures moving in the shadows behind him. Squinting Casey recognized them as the same robo-ninja guys that had attacked Miwa in the park the other day.

As he watched, he saw them creep closer and closer to Raph, raising their weapons to attack him, and Casey knew he wouldn't get there in time to stop them.

"WATCH OUT!" Casey shouted, making Raph jump, and turn around just in time to dodge a blow from a Foot-Bot.

When Raph saw he was surrounded by Foot-Bots, he immediately dodged an incoming blow from the closest one, pulled his sais from his belt, and stabbed said robot in the head.

"Shredder must have downloaded the abridged book of ninja fighting into you," Raph taunted as he began doing the same to any robot that came within reach. "I mean come on, how do you lame buckets of bolts expect to beat me?"

Just as he said that, several more Foot-Bots came out of the woodwork, far more than he could fight alone.

"Good answer," Raph admitted grudgingly.

He prepared himself to continue fighting, when a shout of "GOONGALA!" drew his and the Foot-Bot's attention.

They looked just in time to see Casey launch himself over the side of the roof, and simultaneously smack two Foot-Bots over the edge with his hockey stick.

The Foot-Bots wasted no more time, and attacked them both at once. But despite having to constantly fight, Casey managed to move to stand by Raph. "Need some help?" he asked jokingly.

Raph spared at him wide-eyed glance. "What Are You Doing?!" he shouted, kicking a Foot-Bot off the building as he did so.

"Watching your back," Casey grunted, as he knocked the head off a Foot-Bot, and then used the head as a puck to bowl over another. "That's what best friend's do, right?"

Raph paused from fighting to stare at him for a minute, before throwing down a smoke bomb, grabbing Casey, and hightailing it to a shed sitting on top of a roof a building away.

Raph threw Casey into the shed, shut the door, and locked it behind him. He knew it was only a matter of time before the Foot-Bots found them again, but he hoped he had enough time to talk some sense into Casey before then.

"This isn't your fight," the turtle snapped at the vigilante. "Those robots'll be on us again any minute. When they do, I'll distract them. You should try to get away while you can."

Casey pushed his mask off his face, and gave Raph a deadpan glare. "Drop the act, Raph, I know it's you."

Raph froze for a minute and sighed. "How did you know it was me?" he had to ask, having been wondering about that since Mikey had announced it earlier.

Casey shrugged, and said redundantly, "Just how many short angry dudes in red can there be in New York?" Then he asked, "How did this even happen, anyway?" He knocked a fist against the back Raph's shell to emphasize his question.

The look Raph gave him was anything but amused, and he shoved Casey's hand away. "Long story," he said bluntly. "I'll tell you later, but first you need to go."

"No way, man," snapped Casey, poking Raph in the chest this time. "Do you have any idea how long I've been looking for you? After all that I'm not about to let some stupid robo-ninjas slice you up."

As if to agree with Casey's statement, the door to the shed began rattling, signaling the Foot-Bot had found them again.

"This isn't your fight, Casey," Raph repeated, trying to get it through his thick skull, while keeping an eye on the door. "Those guys are just after me, you can still get out of here."

Casey gave him a deadpan glare. "Raph, when have I ever run from a fight?"

The answer was never, and Raph knew that better than most.

Raph pinched his forehead and sighed. "Fine," he said reluctantly. "But if you die out there, I will freakin' kill you."

"Good to know," said Casey in a cocky tone.

The door behind them began to splinter, as the Foot-Bots continued to try and break through.

As the two teens got ready to fight again, Raph added, "One last thing. Stop calling me by my real name. In the field, the name is Iyasa, got it?"

"Got it," agreed Casey as he pulled his mask back over his face. Then he paused thoughtfully. "Maybe I should come up with a cool code name."

Raph just grunted in agreement, and the door burst open.

Knowing if they stayed in the shed, they'd be dead for sure. The two barreled through the Foot-Bots the second the door was open. The Foot-Bots toppled over like bowling pins, but quickly got back to their feet, and started fighting again.

"So what are these things anyway?" Casey asked as he repeatedly bashed the robots' heads in.

"They're called Foot-Bots," Raph replied with a grunt, while stabbing a Foot-Bot in the throat. "And they're basically exactly what you see. Evil, robot, ninja pains-in-the-ass."

"Okay," said Casey, sending a puck ricocheting off some of the robots' heads. "But why Foot?"

"That's part of the long story," said Raph distractedly.

Just then two Foot-Bots managed to pin the turtle, but Casey tazed one with his homemade Taser, and Raph used his sai to stab the other in the shoulder, breaking its arm off. He then used the arm to bat the rest of the Foot-Bot into three more.

The fight continued like this for several minutes, each of the teens using every weapon in their arsenal, and every fighting move at their disposal.

Finally, the rooftop was strewn with battered Foot-Bot parts, and the two boys stood panting in the center of them.

"That… the last… one?" Casey asked as he tried to catch his breath. He shoved his mask to the top of his head to get air easier.

"Yeah… think so," replied Raph, equally out of breath. "Come on… We should go… somewhere else… More might come…"

The two took off across the rooftops, until they finally came to rest at a water tower a few blocks away. The two practically collapsed under it, and just focused on being able to breath again before they started talking.

"So," said Casey to start it off. "You gonna tell me why you're a giant turtle now? And how the heck are you a ninja? When did any of this stuff happen?"

Raph sighed. "Like I said, it's a long story."

Casey glanced at him, waiting for him to start telling it. When he didn't, Casey said, "Come on, dude, don't leave me hanging."

Raph let out an aggravated sigh, and rubbed his head. "I don't know if I should," he admitted. "You gotta understand, Casey. This is kind of connected to a huge secret for my whole family. Bad things happen to people who know."

"Like what?" Casey asked.

Raph thought a moment before replying. "You were there when Mutagen Man went after April, right?"

"Mutagen Man?" Casey asked incredulously.

"The walking jar of guts with the hots for April."

"Oh, that thing."

Raph sighed. "That thing used to be a friend of Donnie's. Donnie told him only part of the story, and the kid went and tried to do the same thing that happened to me to himself, and, well, you saw the result. Then he went nuts, and Donnie had to turn him into a popsicle to stop him, and now he's in the brainiac's lab making him feel guilty for the whole thing whenever he looks at him."

Casey winced at the thought of that.

"And April," Raph continued. "She knows the whole thing, and I can't tell you how many times our enemies have tried to hurt or kidnap her for it. She had to hide out at our place for a while 'til they stopped looking for her, and even now she can't go out for long without a bodyguard, and she can't come to our dojo without going through a secret passage as a precaution. She's been learning how to fight from my father, but that only does so much when the bad guys can send a whole army after you."

"Like the one we just fought?" Casey asked, glancing back towards the roof they had been fighting on.

"Yeah," Raph said with a nod. "This stuff is dangerous to know, Casey. Enough people have been hurt by it. I don't want anything bad to happen to you too."

Casey gave Raph a friendly shove. "Like I said before. When have I ever run from a fight? And for the record, if you don't tell me, I'll just keep looking for answers on my own. And imagine how much trouble I'll get into that way."

Raph shot him a glare. "Yeah, because that's been working out great so far," he said sarcastically.

That took some of the wind out of the vigilante's sails. "I'm really sorry about April," said Casey, looking guilty. "I just wanted to know what happened to you, and it was looking like your family was more open with her than they were with me. I've been trying to apologize to her ever since the thing with Miwa happened, but she's been taking the Nick approach to the whole thing."

Raph nodded, not looking surprised. "Yeah, April is looking like she could compete with Mi on who can hold a grudge longer. You really could have handled that better."

He then heaved a sigh, and (after making sure the coast was clear) told Casey everything. Raph knew without a doubt that after all this, Casey wouldn't stop until he got his answers, or he'd gotten himself killed searching for them. It would be better for all of them for him to just come out and tell the truth.

When he was done, Casey was staring at him as he tried to process the impossible sounding story.

"Your life is a lot more interesting than I gave you credit for," he said finally.

Raph threw back his head and laughed at the sheer amount of understatement that was in that sentence, before breaking off and looking worried as he realized something. "Oh man, Mother and Father are going to kill me for this."

"That, I don't doubt," said a voice behind them.

They turned to see the rest of Raph's siblings in their ninja gear standing behind them, looking disapproving.

Raph and Casey exchanged glances, and groaned. They were definitely in trouble now.

But before they could ask how the others had found them, Mikey launched himself across the roof, and grabbed Raph in a tight hug.

Raph was so surprised by this, he could only pat his brother's back awkwardly, while sending his other siblings a 'What the hell?' expression.

"When we saw all those scrapped Foot-Bots back there, we got worried. Mikey especially, since he thought you'd gone out because you were mad at him," Miwa explained.

"Yeah, but why were you looking for him?" Casey asked, as Raph was now busy trying to pry his baby brother off of him ("Dammit, Mikey, it wasn't you I was mad at!") to ask. But it was no use. Mikey could cling like an octopus when he wanted too.

The other three exchanged glances, and Donnie said, "I'll show you when we get home. Come on."

Soon the five Hamato teens, and Casey were all in Donnie's lab as the genius typed at his computer.

"A while after you left, Raph, Donnie intercepted a transmission the Foot had sent to the Kraang through the communication orb," Leo explained.

Donnie brought it up onto the screen, showing a picture of the five Hamatos fighting against Foot-Bots, as well as several lines of Japanese text.

Raph leaned over to read it, before drawing back with wide eyes. "What'd we do to piss them off this time?" he asked.

"What?" asked Casey, looking at them all in confusion. "Some of us don't read that stuff, what's it say?"

"Basically," said Miwa, "it's a bounty on all of us. The Foot are telling the Kraang that they would pay through the nose to get at least one of us brought to the Shredder alive for questioning."

"Considering the fact that they usually just want all of us dead," said Leo. "That means they have something big planned for whoever they manage to catch."

"And whatever that is," added Mikey, "you can bet it's all kinds of not good."

Casey and Raph exchanged glances. "Well that explains all the Foot after me tonight," said Raph ruefully. "You picked a hell of a time to want to be involved, Case."

"No sweat," said Casey cockily. "I bet I can handle anything they dish out."

A hand came to rest on Casey's shoulder, and in front of him, Raph froze with a deer-in-the-headlights expression. "Is that so?" said the hand's owner.

Casey turned to see Master Yoshi standing there, with a disapproving expression on his face.

"Then you will not protest my questions to ensure you keep my family's secrets," said Master Yoshi in a dark tone.

Casey shifted nervously. "Uh, I won't tell, cross my heart," he said, drawing an X over his chest as he did so.

Yoshi raised an eyebrow, and didn't look impressed.

Casey could feel himself sweating under the ninja master's gaze. "Um, Raph, help me out here," he said, turning to his turtle friend, only to see him being pulled out of the lab by his angry looking mother, who was pinching him on the cheek as she dragged him out and scolding him as she went.

"Looks like Raph's getting his own lecture and punishment right now," said Miwa looking amused. "Would you like me to take a message?"

Casey gulped, and looked back at Yoshi's scowling face. And he'd thought the army of ninja-bots was the worst he'd have to worry about tonight.

The Shredder was not at all pleased, and the sources of his ire were kneeling before him.

"What is this I hear of you sending out a bounty on Hamato's students without my permission?" he asked menacingly.

Before him, his three hench-mutants shifted nervously.

"You see. Master Shredder," said Fishface. "Ever since you discovered Tang Shen was alive, you have been, um…" the fish mutant paused as he tried to think of a way to say 'A terrifying rage menace' without resulting in him becoming sushi.

"And with Stickman not being able to hack his way into the DMV or anywhere else to find out where she is-" Rahzar started to say.

"Hey!" snapped Stockman, who had been hiding in the corner as he watched the proceedings. "It's Stockman! And it's not my fault someone's put all sorts of firewalls and viruses on that sort of information. You can't even type the name Hamato into Google without your computer crashing."

(Over in the Renaissance Dojo, Donatello sneezed and got the sense someone was talking about him.)

"-So we thought if we brought you one of his students to interrogate, you would be able to find her faster," finished Rahzar, shooting a glare at Stockman as he did so.

The Shredder glared down at them. "Revoke it," he demanded.

The three mutants looked up at him in surprise. "Master Shredder?" asked Tiger Claw in surprise.

"Revoke the bounty," the ninja master demanded again. "And do no such thing without my permission again." He extended the blades of his gauntlets and added, "Or else."

Rahzar and Fishface gave a quick bow, and beat a hasty retreat along with Stockman to do just that.

Tiger Claw, however, stayed in his kneeling position. "Master Shredder, if I may be so bold. Why have you ordered the bounty's revocation?"

The Shredder studied his second-in-command for a minute before answering, "In the recording that told me Tang Shen was alive, the O'Neil girl mentioned that Karai had brothers. It is likely that at least some, if not all of the other four students are those very brothers, making them Tang Shen's sons."

Tiger Claw nodded thoughtfully. "And you do not want to upset their mother by harming her cubs," he said in understanding.

"Indeed," Shredder said, gazing out the window over the city. "I cannot make my next move until all the pieces for my victory are in place. Make no mistake, when that happens Hamato Yoshi will fall by my hand. And once he does, I shall reclaim what was rightfully mine."

A/N I put some of references to the Original and 2007 movies in this. Some of the lines Raph says when he's being ambushed by the Foot are adapted from the original movie, and Casey's confronting Raph about knowing who he is is reminiscent of Casey telling Raph he knows he's the Nightwatcher from TMNT, as well as hiding in the shed from one of the stone generals. Also, as you can see, April is still mad at him for trying to use her, but it looks like she'll have to deal with it since Casey's now part of the team. Also there were some hints to coming things here, can anyone spot them.

Don't forget to check out the new chapter of Turtle Loops.

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