Augie stepped back from the terminal and stretched. The last of the injuries and treatments were recorded in the medical logs. No one had been seriously hurt on the mission, but a surprise Week 1 fight coupled with copious puking had done a number on all the recruits. The post mission check-up only featured bruises and some strains, and he had distributed more anti-nausea pills than ever before. Beyond the physical symptoms, however, most everyone seemed to be holding up okay. All but two were game for more.

Robyn was one of them. He didn't realize how close she'd been to the trunk when the mutant fell. She was shaken, but brave as always, cracking a joke and telling him not to worry. He did worry, but not about her life. They both understood that one day they might not come home from their job. Robyn was capable and normally pulled through anything. No, he worried about her anxiety. A priority shift towards safety was happening in his adrenaline-loving wife, and he wasn't sure if it was for the better or not. She seemed more hesitant, more uncertain of herself. He said nothing, but resolved to keep an eye on its development.

The other person who didn't seem okay was, surprisingly, Bishop. Augie had never seen their boss react so violently. He knew well and good that the man was a capable fighter, but he was also precise. Bishop rarely did things in excess and he certainly wasn't one to pump a twitchy vine full of a dozen darts with such rage. If he hadn't seen it himself Augie would have been tempted to dismiss it.

Bishop had been disturbed by something.

But unlike with Robyn, he had no simple way of checking in on the boss. Since he technically hadn't been in the fight, he technically didn't need a medical checkout. And, busy and secretive as ever, he had vanished for most of the day. Augie didn't want to pry, but he also hated seeing anyone hurting. Maybe a friendly conversation was all he needed.

Perhaps he could enlist the help of a new friend.

He sat back down at the computer terminal in the medical center and searched the internal network for Dr. Chaplin. The man had been with the BAI longer than he had, and certainly had higher clearance to a lot of things. He pinged him a call and hoped he would pick up.

"Chaplin here."

"Ah, Doctor," he smiled. The scientist had answered with a video chat from his watch. Augie didn't recognize whatever lab he was in; all he could see were some curving white walls. "I'm trying to track down our evanescent boss, have you seen him?"

"Yeah, he's here in Cocytus. Is there an emergency?"

Augie chewed his lips. Damn, he didn't have clearance to get into wherever Cocytus was. He'd heard the name on occasion and always assumed it was another office. Bumping into Bishop just became a little trickier.

"No, but he seemed a bit rattled by our mission today. Could you check on him for me? Just a quick call, or a mini conversation, and I think he'll be alright. I've never seen him so worked up."

Chaplin looked nervous on the screen. He glanced around his surroundings. "I'm not sure if now is a good time…"

"Then at least let me know if he's back to his dour self. I think he'd hate me more if I dragged him in for a check-up."

The scientist cringed. "Don't do that. It's… um… I'll talk to him. Chaplin out."

The screen winked off. Augie thought it was a little abrupt, but then again, he was coming to understand that Chaplin was a bit of a strange guy. He could handle a little social awkwardness, and it put his own mind to rest that the last 'check' was being made.

He stretched again and this time yawned. It had been a long night and was now well into the next day. Sleep was a good idea for everyone.

The Yokai was shivering, either from cold or from fear.

He hoped it was from fear. It was their turn, after all. He'd waited all morning.

He gazed impassively as Hun yanked it out of its cell, smirked as it whimpered when they clamped it to a metal table. He wheeled it himself down a bright corridor of Cocytus to the examination room.

The Yokai moaned when they entered.

Definitely fear. Pathetic.

"I would have thought that by now fear would have hardened you," he commented, locking the wheels of the table in place. "But I see that Yokai constitution is much weaker than that of humans."

The thing writhed, tossing its head weakly from side to side.

Hun passed him a laser-cutting tool from one of the shelves and stepped back. He turned it on, reveling as the Yokai's face went from purple to white.

"Of course, I mean mental constitution," he said casually, bringing the laser closer. "Not many others can actually survive dissection."

The Yokai flinched as he dragged the laser across the corner of the metal table, slicing it clean off. It clattered to the floor with a gonging echo.

Bishop grinned. "It looks like my hand slipped."

The Yokai looked like it was going to cry. Hun kicked the fallen piece out of the way. Bishop smiled at him, then pushed away the laser cutter.

"But enough of that. Today we're going to try something new."

He pulled out a syringe.

"Something that may finally break down the secret to your immortality… or just break you down."

The Yokai's lips were moving. He had to bend down to catch what it was saying. A short, breathy, whisper wheezed out of its soul. "Mercy."

"Mercy?"

He looked at Hun. His scarred friend's eyes flashed, steeled emotions flickering violently behind them. His own heart thudded like a stone against stone as he turned back to the monster on the table. He lowered his voice, barely able to contain his ice-cold rage.

"Your kind knows nothing of mercy."

He tightened the clamps, thinking he should have used rope so it would know how it feels, and prepared to inject the compound into its neck when his watch buzzed. Annoyed, Bishop glanced at it to see who he needed to chew out for calling him at a time like this but stopped when he saw that it was Chaplin. Pursing his lips, he stepped away from the table and tapped his earpiece.

"This had better be good, Doctor."

"Oh! Uh, well sir, just an update on, uh, Jericho! Uh, everything's… we've been able to open the spent AMD and so we're pretty sure we have the right transmission frequency, but, signal strength is still a problem, and, uh, power output-"

"If you have no breakthroughs to report, then do not waste my time." His hand clenched around the syringe. "Bishop out."

He tapped the earpiece harder than he needed to, making his eardrum protest. Chaplin was touchingly absent-minded, but it was a problem at times. Times like now. He lifted his watch to block all calls for the duration of the next experiment.

There was an email from Bootyyyshaker9000.

He couldn't say what compelled him to open it then instead of saving it for later, but he did. His breath was sucked out of him. The world seemed to fall away for a moment as he reread it.

The hacker, Othello von Ryan, was already studying mystic energy.

The fact that he called it 'mystic energy' alone meant he was telling the truth. Bishop had carefully made sure to avoid the term on all pages and correspondences so as not to attract the attention of dangerous Yokai living in the city. There was no sense in playing their own hand too soon. This Von Ryan had to have learned it through his own means.

And he wanted to exchange notes.

Hun was giving him a puzzled look, curious as to the delay. He signed him a quick reassurance and strode back over to the Yokai, who tensed. Bishop towered over it for a moment, letting it squirm.

"It seems this is your lucky day," he said. "Some developments have come up that I must see to. Perhaps," he lifted the syringe, "this will be improved before our next meeting." He pocketed it.

The Yokai collapsed in relief, visibly shaking.

"Take it back to its cell," he turned to Hun. "And fetch Chaplin." He scrolled through the email again as his friend complied, making sure he wasn't misreading anything.

A scientist, eh? He knew how to talk to scientists to get what he wanted. One simply had to feed their curiosity and need for recognition; some needed more of one than the other, and some needed a balance of both. He had considered that this Othello might be the same age as Miss Gunabi and O'Neil, but perhaps he was a professor at their school. In either case, he learned a little more. At the very least he now had a second alias to feed to the Cherubim.

This little side project had brought him nothing but fortune so far. He grinned. With a bit more luck, his projects were about to make some large advances.

He was in the round room.

He was alone. There were doors everywhere with shadows behind them. How could he tell there were shadows when the doors were all closed? He was scared, and alone. He missed the dark sewers, he wanted his daddy and brothers. Or, wait, were they the shadows behind the doors? His heartrate quickened. Were they alone somewhere? Why couldn't he find them? Why was he in this horrible room? He squeezed his eyes shut.

There was a crash and a roar and when he opened them he saw a dinosaur fighting a necktie. Its eyes glowed and it looked right at him. He couldn't move away as it charged towards him-

"Ah!" Raph awoke with a start.

There was a shuffling sound and the bed dipped next to him. Someone looped an arm around his shoulders. He whirled and saw Leo sitting there, offering him a gentle smile. "You know where you are, buddy?"

Raph panted but looked around. He was in his room. There was Laceface, there was Ghostbear. There was a sleeping bag on the floor – that's right, Leo stayed over. His brother was right here next to him. He took a steadier breath. He was not alone.

"Yeah," he replied. "Thanks."

"You want to talk about it?" Leo reached behind them and pulled Commissioner Graciepuffs off the shelf.

"Not much you don't already know," Raph said, accepting the teddy bear.

"Was it the round room again?"

"Yeah…" he looked down. Leo kept rubbing his arm as if he didn't have anything else he needed to do. While that was probably true, Raph still appreciated the gesture. He hugged the commissioner closer.

"It's just… parts of it have been getting a little more distinct, you know?"

"Which parts?" Leo handed him Dr. Huggenstein.

"Like the unfamiliar thing. Normally it's just kind of like a shadow, all dark and spooky. But lately it's been dressed up. Suit and tie. Mostly tie."

Leo swung his feet, thumping them against the bed. "Suit and tie sounds less 'unfamiliar' than spooky shadows. Are there any other features?"

"Not really. There's no face or skin color or anything." He automatically took another teddy bear Leo held out to him and shivered. "It's pretty creepy."

"I'll say. You're dreaming of Slenderman fighting a dinosaur!" He passed Raph Mayor Cuddlecakes. He was holding four teddy bears, now. "That's actually a movie I would pay to go see."

"Yeah?" Raph smiled. "I guess that does sound pretty cool."

"Right?" Five teddy bears. "Of course, they'd have to do it right, otherwise we get another Alien vs Predator fiasco."

"I didn't think it was that bad."

"It was so dark you could barely see them fighting!" Leo rolled his eyes. "The color grading was abysmal." Six teddy bears.

"Have you been watching critics on YouTube again?"

"My judgement is my own, thank you."

Raph laughed. "That's an understatement." He stretched his back and heard it pop, relaxing as a little bit of the tension from his nightmare ebbed away. "Thanks, brother."

"No problem," Leo replied, stashing what would have been teddy bear #7 behind his back. "You want to get a late breakfast or skip straight to lunch?"

"Is it that late?"

"You slept in, my bro." Leo hopped off the bed and also stretched. "I'm pretty sure even Dad's up."

"Well, then," he set down his bundle of teddies and tapped his fingers together. "I guess I'll get some lunch."

The normal drips and clangs of the sewers echoed around the lair as they walked down to the kitchen. Raph jumped when he heard a rumble, then realized it was just some distant thunder from above. The drips increased in frequency – it must be raining outside.

Donnie's 'music' drifted out of his lab, really blaring for this time of day. Noises from the arcade room indicated Mikey was up. Splinter's usual commercials sang jauntily from the living room. Leo tapped on his phone next to him, texting someone. With all the familiar sounds of his family surrounding him Raph was able to relax a little more. He couldn't shake the feeling that there was something missing, though…

"Where's April?"

Leo sent his text and yawned, crossing to the fridge. He tapped a note tacked on it. "Went home earlier this morning."

"Alone?"

"Pretty sure Donnie drove her, I heard the garage door open." He pulled out some leftover pizza and rummaged through the cabinets for his teabags.

"Hmm…" Raph accepted some pizza and downed some milk to chase off the uncomfortable flutter in his stomach. He set the glass down with a clank. "If everyone's up, then, we can start finding out who those humans were last night."

"With no identifying markers or leads?" Leo raised an eyebrow.

Raph turned in the direction of the faint dubstep spilling into the lair. "Maybe some traffic cams picked up where the cars came from. Or went, if they managed to take down Stinkbomb." He swallowed a pizza slice whole and dusted off his hands. "You get Mikey and I'll ask if Donnie found anything."

The ear-splitting noise his purple brother called music guided him up to the lab, and he was grateful to hear it, for once. It was something familiar, comforting, and promised a type of security Raph himself could not provide: answers.

Donnie knew everything, and if he didn't he could certainly figure it out. He couldn't count the number of times Donnie's contingencies, or tech, or random knowledge got them out of tight scrapes. Nothing was totally 'unfamiliar' to the brainiac, which certainly reassured him now more than ever. They'd learn who these humans were in no time, and then he could relax. He picked up the pace and stepped around the curtain.

It was ten times louder inside, but Raph could still locate Donnie's mad scientist laugh over the noise. He followed it to where his brother was dancing around a whirring battle shell that hovered over a table. "I've done it! I've done it! Another science point awarded to-"

"Donnie!" Raph shouted over everything. "We have work to do!"

Donnie tapped an icon on his wristband and the heavy techno-beats mercifully subsided. He flipped up his goggles revealing wild, bloodshot eyes. "Work? I have done the work!" He spread his hands towards the battle shell. "It flies!"

"That's awesome, brother, but we need to address what happened last night. I was wondering if there was a way we could hack into some security cameras in the area or anything that would give us a clue as to who those humans were?"

"Oh, I already know, they're with the BAI."

"The – what?" Raph blinked. That was quick.

"The Bureau of Anomalistic Investigations." Donnie flounced to his computer and pulled up the website. "Tiny thing, but it looks like the government is finally looking into a cure for all those affected by the oozesquitoes. That little team we saw last night must have been part of their newly launched Project Eurydice." A dreamy look came over his face. "Fitting, really. As Orpheus braved the depths of the Underworld to reclaim Eurydice from her fate, so too is the BAI reclaiming the humanity of-"

"I get it," Raph cut him off. He frowned. It was… all good news, but something still wasn't sitting right with him. "Are they… how are they finding this cure? Are they asking for volunteers?"

"Any good trial requires a large sample size," Donnie said. "But they've only just begun so I'm certain they're still merely gathering data."

"It's just," he furrowed his brow. "Repo was really upset about his cat."

"Agh, we've been over this." Donnie tossed his arms. "A gigantic, out-of-control, manty-cat is going to attract attention, and apparently did. Same with a gigantic, out-of-control, corpse-flower. They've got it handled! And it gives us a bit of a break."

"Maybe." Why couldn't he shake this bad feeling? Was it just leftovers from his nightmare? He shivered. "Are there any mutants you keep tabs on that we can check? Just to make sure they're, you know, still there?"

Donnie crossed his arms and swiveled his chair towards him, narrowing his eyes. "Do I have the appearance of a stalker, to you, Raphael? Do I spend my days recording the steps of every ally and enemy who does not fall within the normal parameters for homo sapiens? For shame how my own brother could think so little of me!"

"Donnie," Raph warned.

His brother rolled his eyes. "It is called 'social media', brethren. I believe you are familiar with it." He tapped on his wristband, and for a moment his eyes widened. His computer pinged at the same time and he quickly doused a notification before Raph could comment. "Okay! Todd's Facebook page is still active, Bullhop is in Canada, DIGG is hosting a concert tomorrow night, and no, none of them have mentioned anything about the government coming to cart them away. World's fine and yawn I need to get some sleep, how about we continue this later?" Donnie got up and pushed against him, but his feet only slipped over the floor as Raph didn't budge.

"I can figure that much out, but what about Meatsweats? Or Hypno? What's ah, what's Ghostbear up to?" He tapped his fingers.

His brother gave up trying to push him and just leveled him a glare. "If I knew what our off-the-grid mutant villains were up to all the time, I would not act so surprised every time we ran into them. Now, if you please," he gestured the door with a humble bow. "A turtle needs his beauty sleep."

There was no arguing with Donnie when he was hyped up on sleep-deprived sass. Looking from the hovering battle shell to the BAI website it seemed he had been up all night. And, he did get the answers he came for. Donnie had certainly delivered on the direct scoop this time. It wasn't his fault that these answers just weren't sitting right in his gut.

"Okay," he relented, allowing himself to be pushed out of the lab. "Try to be up by dinner, though."

"Yes, yes, of course, my appetite and I will both be there, now good day!" The curtain parted and Raph found himself out in the hall, arms full of Mikey and Leo who had just been on their way in.

"Bad time?"

Unbeknownst to Raphael, Donnie didn't go right to sleep. He tapped the notification that had popped up during their conversation and grinned.

It was a reply.