Ah, the plot thickens! We're not quite to clam-chowder thick yet, but we'll get there, I promise!
Still don't own the rights to 'em – just borrowing them for a bit of fun!
Enjoy!
"I wish you would reconsider," Nick said, feeling just a little desperation sneak into his tone. Leonardo looked back at him calmly.
"Thanks, but we can't wait anymore. You have the compounds you needed from Bishop, so Don's word of honor is satisfied. We've got the helicopter, and we're no help to you with curing Godzilla. We need to get Don back from Bishop. Now." The steel in Leo's eyes was sharper than his swords.
"But how will you find him?" Randy asked.
"We will find him," Splinter replied. "We must."
"But we have an idea. We've successfully tracked Godzilla before with something Mendel made. At least let us try configuring it to see if it can pick him up," Elsie argued.
"Godzilla's your priority right now," Raph argued, "and Donnie's ours. We can't wait for you this time. If you get that gizmo up and working, let us know. But until then, we're outta here."
"But…" Nick wasn't sure what more he could say.
The three turtles exchanged glances. They felt a little guilty about leaving HEAT on an island that was a front for Bishop's governmental goons, but after what Master Splinter had told them, there was no option. Their master had tried to reach Donatello's mind from meditation, only to encounter a shock of fear, and desperate pride, before the presence vanished. Splinter fiercely believed that his son was still alive, that he'd have felt the death clearly, but obviously something else, something strong enough to bury even Donatello's astral consciousness, had happened. And so their father had ordered an attack; his sons were well-ready to take the offensive.
"Let them go," Monique cut through the quiet. "I believe they are correct. They must extract Donatello before it is too late. We should not attempt to prevent them." Leonardo met her gaze and bowed very slightly in gratitude.
"We've got Don's Shell Cell," he gestured to where he had it stowed in his belt, "so call if you have anything that can help us. And try to get out of here as fast as you can. If you need us to come back after we've found Donnie, we will. But try to get going soon."
"No kidding," Dr Craven nodded. "We're pretty close to having enough of the antidote ready, so we shouldn't be too far behind you. And if there's something we can do to help, something not so much fighting, but more science, let us know."
Master Splinter stepped forward and his sons moved back, vanishing into the helicopter at an unspoken command. While they readied it for flight, the ninja master bowed to the five humans.
"I wish you well in your attempt to cure Godzilla," he said, "and I thank you for your willingness to protect and befriend my sons, especially Donatello. Without him, my family is somewhat at a loss, but if we have need of you, we will call. I apologize for our haste, but I believe you understand our urgency."
"Yeah, we do." Nick sighed. "I'm sorry we got him into this mess."
"I choose to believe our meeting was inevitable, even if the circumstances are not ideal at this time. When we have defeated Bishop and rescued Donatello, we will speak some more."
And with an odd and surprising grace, the mutant rat seemed to disappear from his position – he moved so quickly even Monique's eyes didn't follow. From the open door of the helicopter, Splinter raised one hand in salute, then vanished inward as the chopper gained altitude. Michelangelo waved wildly from a window, grinning.
"All right," Nick turned to his team. "Let's take care of Godzilla and get out of here. I have a feeling they're going to need our help, and soon."
-==OOO==-
Agent John Bishop calmly walked around the table, studying the prone form before him. He permitted himself a smile, though he relaxed not an inch in the presence of the mutant as much from wariness as habit. It had taken far more potent drugs than he'd expected to fully force Donatello into a state of deep unconsciousness. He needed the turtle's brain to be working at the barest minimum, enough to keep him breathing and no more; it was surprising how much resistance his brain had given, showing continued levels of activity even after twice the normal human dosage for medically inducing a coma. But finally the brain scans were showing only the most basic functions, everything else dormant.
"Given your significant intelligence, I'm sure you'd appreciate what I am about to attempt. Well, perhaps 'appreciate' is the wrong word. But intellectually, I am certain you would see the merit in my work."
Bishop regarded the absolutely still turtle with interest, and an odd sort of respect. The accidental creation of the outbreak virus had had more than one unintended benefit, not least of which was the sheer amount of data he now possessed on the mutant turtles, and Donatello in particular. Scans taken after the cure had been administered had showed him that, among other things, this turtle was more than a rival for Baxter Stockman's brilliance. Actually, Bishop was somewhat astounded at the possibilities presented by the sheer brainpower evident in Donatello. But much of that innate intelligence was not quite yet fully developed, as the turtle remained still a juvenile in many ways.
"Not that you would ever serve me as Stockman has, even if you were no more than a few organs in a jar," he told the turtle. "I'll give you this much – you freaks are consistent about your honor."
But besides knowing how smart Donatello was, he also had an intimate knowledge of the turtle's physiology, mutation, and basic anatomy. He expected he knew Donatello better than even his so-called father did, at least biologically. And from that knowledge came great power. For what he had told the turtle was true – of all the mutants the world offered, Donatello was by far the best candidate for his research. No other mutant was so easily controlled due to sheer size and lack of nuclear side-effects than the turtles, but only this one also possessed such advanced and malleable DNA.
"You profess to desire to protect this world, and while I seriously doubt that, you will be given the chance, my friend," Bishop commented, stopping at the table and lifting a very delicate, and very sharp, scalpel. "You're going to save me months of work, and your assistance will render my probability of success more than 60% greater."
At the push of a button, hydraulic arms abruptly hoisted up and flipped over the limp body so that Donatello was face-down on the table. Bishop flicked on a bright light and settled it over the back of the turtle's head, neatly slicing through the bandana as he broke the skin. Purple tails fluttered as they fell away, their edges red with blood; Bishop wondered if anyone could appreciate the symbolism, the imagery of his act as he, with one gesture, violated the two things Donatello held most dear – his mind, and his clan.
"And all I need from you is your brain."
-==OOO==-
"How is he?"
Nick turned at the voice and waved Monique to join him. The French agent stepped beside him, seemingly unaware that they were within yards of Godzilla's head. She appraised the enormous creature coolly, then looked to the scientist for the answer to her question.
"It looks like the compound is working. His symptoms are starting to subside, and it's calmer somehow," he said, gesturing to his forehead. "Elsie and Mendel really did it this time."
"Actually, a lot of the real work was Don's," Elsie corrected, joining them. Mendel and Randy were on her heels. "It was more than just his blood that gave us the cure. It was his brain that pieced together what to do with it."
"We so owe him big time, jefe," Randy said, and there was clear guilt in his voice.
"Yeah." Mendel wiped a handkerchief across his forehead and squinted in the sun. "So, any chance we can get off this island-secret-base-thing any time soon?"
"As soon as Godzilla wakes up," Nick replied, turning back to his charge. "I don't like the idea of leaving him here with those government people everywhere."
"Agreed," and Monique's voice was sharp. "But once he is able to defend himself, we must return to the city."
"You really want to go find Donnie, don't you, French fry?" Elsie asked, eyebrow quirked.
"He is an ally. That is sufficient reason to assist."
"Oh, come on! Admit it! You like that green geek as much as we do," Randy laughed.
"Don's not a geek," Mendel protested.
"No, you're the geek," Randy countered.
"Guys, knock it off. Anyway, Monique's right. We do need to help the turtles find Don if we can. Not just because we owe him, but because he'd do the same for us. And I think we need all the friends we can get right about now." Nick's face resolved into stronger lines as his voice switched to the tone he used when he was in command. "Elsie, you said you might be able to modify the tracker Craven developed for Godzilla to track Don? How long will that take?"
"Not long, since we already have enough genetic material from Don to use as a base," she answered.
"The real problem is that Donnie doesn't have a nuclear signature the way Godzilla does, so it won't pick him up at the same distance. If it works at all, we'll have to know approximately where to look before it can tell us exactly where to look," Mendel said, rubbing his nose.
"Something's better than nothing. Do it," Nick ordered. "Randy, is the HEAT-Seeker sea-worthy?"
"Yes, captain," the hacker saluted sharply. "It's rigged like a Christmas tree, but it should hold. Got a little help from the guys before they left."
"Good. Make sure she's ready to go as soon as Godzilla is. Monique? I was wondering if…"
"I have already called." She didn't mention Roache's name aloud, but Nick was on the same page with her. "If anything is known, I will have the data shortly."
"All right. Let's get to work, people." Nick moved to put a hand on Godzilla's snout while Elsie, Randy, and Mendel moved off to their tasks. Nick could hear the ringtone of Randy's phone as they retreated, but it didn't really touch his consciousness. All his effort was bent on Godzilla.
"Come on, big guy," he breathed. "The sooner you wake up, the sooner we can get out of here." Then, aware that Monique hadn't left, he turned back to her. "What is it?"
"You were right." The words were short, slightly bitter, but rounded with something approaching resignation, almost amusement. "The turtle has a heart."
"And so do you," Nick thought, but didn't say. Instead, he replied, "Glad you're on board, then. Randy's right, too, though. You really want to help him."
"Yes."
"Why?" he asked, gently enough that she wouldn't see it as a fight, but rather, a scientist's curiosity.
"Because he, like Godzilla, is unique. They are all unique. And unlike Godzilla, I do not believe he poses a threat. Instead, he may be the very best weapon of all to prevent harm from creatures like Godzilla. His family is honorable, his brothers are loyal, and his has proven himself to be altruistic. That is a rare combination, more rare than Godzilla. I can do no less than protect such a one."
Nick felt himself smiling and quickly averted his face to prevent her seeing his expression. Monique's own visage hadn't shifted much from its usual stoicism, except for a very slight challenge in the eyes for him to mock her. The words had been spoken from the heart, and Nick would rather brush Godzilla's teeth with his favorite shirt than embarrass her.
"And do not tell anyone what I have said." Now her voice was as cold as a frozen mountain lake. Nick grinned even wider.
"Not a word," he promised.
-==OOO==-
"So, what's the plan," Raphael asked, leaning over the copilot's chair and gripping its arms tensely. "How're we gonna find Donnie and spring him?"
"I…don't really know," Leo admitted tightly. "Bishop took him away in a sub. Assuming they're still on-board, they could be anywhere. And if they're not on the sub, Bishop's bases aren't exactly easy to find."
"This is the part we really need Don for," Michelangelo complained. "He could find that sub in like a minute!"
"Well, we don't have Don, so we're just going to have to figure it out for ourselves," the blue-clad turtle snapped. Then he sighed. "Sorry. I just…I really don't know how to find him this time."
"Perhaps," Splinter said from his seat somewhat behind the turtles, "this is precisely the sort of assistance we should ask Dr Tatopoulos for."
"Or, better yet, a crazy hacker!" Mikey cheered. He jumped to Leonardo's side and pulled Donatello's Shell Cell from his brother's belt. He quickly pulled up the contacts Don had entered and found Randy among the very short list. The call was easily accomplished, although Raph took the phone away from his younger brother eventually to clarify Michelangelo's ramblings to someone who didn't speak fluent turtle.
"Well, he's gonna see what he can find," Raphael closed the phone and handed it back to Leo. "Said it wouldn't even take that long."
"In the meantime, which direction should we be heading? Towards New York?" Even as he asked the question, Leonardo wasn't sure that home was the right answer. Bishop had operated out of New York for a while, but he would also be expecting a rescue attempt. It didn't make sense for the government agent to head right back to their stomping grounds. And yet he'd been local recently, so maybe he wasn't too far away after all.
"Well, if you had a sub, and you were an evil, creepy, twisted secret agent guy, where would you go?" Michelangelo asked.
"Someplace nobody could find me," Raph answered. "Someplace nobody could get to."
"Or nobody would think to," Leo added thoughtfully. "Bishop's not just hiding from us, but from everybody, even the rest of the government. Everything he does has to be secret. But he also needs room to work, room he can't get on a submarine."
"What are you thinkin', Leo?" Raphael asked sharply.
"Okay, let's assume he has to take Don off the sub, that he doesn't have a lab on-board," the eldest said slowly. "There was an outpost right under our noses on those islands and we didn't know about it. I don't think he would have circled back there – it would be too dangerous."
"But sneaky!" Michelangelo put in. "Hiding Don right under Godzilla is seriously crazy. And Bishop's crazy, but not that crazy."
"Agreed," Splinter put in. "He would not remain once his position was compromised. It is not in his nature to hold that which is lost."
"Right. But he does need resources. He has to be on the grid someplace." Leonardo narrowed his eyes. "You know, it would be a lot easier to make a base out of something that was already there instead of making one from scratch."
"Reduce, reuse, recycle," Mikey recited automatically. Then he stopped. "No, wait, that's it! It's perfect!"
"What's it?" Leo asked.
"The underwater base that crazy Garbageman had. The one Don and I found when we were testing out the Shell Sub. I mean, we did a number on it, but it's still there. And nobody knows about it, but it's already rigged for everything, like electricity and stuff. If Bishop found it when they were cleaning all that alien tech out of the river, he might think we don't know about it."
"I hate to say it," Raph sighed, "but he's got a point. Maybe sometimes you can use your brain after all."
"It's still a gamble, though," Leo pointed out. "We'll lose a lot of time if we're going in the wrong direction, time we don't have to lose."
"My son, in this I feel we must trust our instincts," Splinter put a hand on Leo's shoulder. "Until we hear from Mr Hernandez as to whether his pursuits have been fruitful, we can only act based on what we know. Michelangelo's theory is sound. And there is a certain arrogance in Bishop that lends credibility as well. It would be illogical for him to return to New York unless he were so convinced of his own superiority. If Bishop believes he is unassailable, he might well make his place just below our eyes."
"All right. We head towards New York. And here's hoping we're right!"
-==OOO==-
Donatello was dreaming. He knew he was dreaming. He had to be dreaming.
He sure hoped he was dreaming, anyway.
It was a room very like one he had seen in one of Bishop's previous labs. High ceilings, dank smell, and rows and rows of liquid-filled containers stretched into shadows beyond, each lit from below by an eerie blue light. The turtle moved slowly between the racks of giant test-tubes, his footsteps oddly loud in the pervasive silence. The space was cold and he could feel his own movements a little sluggish from the chill. But there was no sense at all of danger, no feeling that he needed to escape or that Bishop was anywhere present in what was obviously his domain. He circled the perimeter twice, but didn't see much in the way of an exit. Perhaps there wasn't one.
"Definitely dreaming," he said aloud, his voice echoing awkwardly. "This only makes sense if it isn't real." Still, he was here, so he figured there was at least some point to indulging his subconscious.
Almost hesitantly, Don finally approached one of the clear containers. There was a form in it, and until this moment he hadn't wanted to look, but now there was an urgency in his mind, as if he were drawn in. The ninja laid his hand on the cold glass, suppressing a shiver at its chill. The shape within blurred, then suddenly became clear. He stepped back, a gasp escaping him.
It was Godzilla.
Sort of.
The giant mutant lizard was now shrunk; standing he would barely top Donatello himself. The lizard's limbs were out of proportion, too, the legs a little too short, the arms a bit too long, the head oddly small on a very thick neck. Don suppressed a shiver – it was very wrong, Godzilla like this. The grace and power of his real shape had been twisted into something still menacing, but awkward, almost clumsy. With sudden sympathy, the turtle leaned his forehead against the icy test-tube.
"Bishop," the turtle murmured aloud. "He's cloning Godzilla, like he tried to clone Master Splinter."
"You are not my parent."
Donatello almost fell backwards he was so surprised to hear a voice, clear as anything, in the stillness. Although "hear" might not have been the right word – the contact came in images, feelings, smells, even sensations that all added up to the statement. Godzilla's eyes were open, wrongly yellow and burning, and staring at him. The voice had sounded rough, alien, full of fire and passion, treacherous as the sea.
"Godzilla?" Donnie asked hesitantly, not quite sure how to reply in a language comprised of not-words.
"You are not Nick. But I know you." The Godzilla in the container did not move, but his eyes did not leave the turtle's face.
"You…you can talk? Well, I guess you're not talking exactly, but…"
"I know you," the usually much larger mutant interrupted. "Why are you here?"
"Um, I don't know," Donatello replied. "Why are you here?"
"Because I am here."
Don didn't have a good response to that, so he let it slide. "I was in your mind before and you didn't speak then."
"Yes. I was hurt, and I was angry. I could not hear Nick. Everything was wrong." With the words came a sense of loss in a vastness too violent and deep to be penetrated, as if a lifeline had snapped and there was nothing left to do but drown.
"But you're not hurt now?" Don asked.
"No."
"I don't suppose there's any chance you want to come find me and get me out of here," the ninja said, feeling even as he spoke that the request was too complicated for Godzilla. Certainly the giant mutant was pretty intelligent, but its cognitive processes were entirely different from his own kind of sentience – he could hardly expect Godzilla to understand at the same level.
"I am here," was the surprising reply.
Suddenly Donatello became aware that all the test-tubes, dozens or hundreds or thousands – he couldn't have said exactly – were filled with identical mini-Godzillas, all misshapen, and all awake. All looking at him. And a bizarre idea came to him.
"Bishop is cloning you. You remember me being in your mind, which the clones couldn't know, but you are also here with the clones. Does that mean that Bishop's clones are creating a shared intelligence, that you're becoming a hive mind? Is that even possible?"
The rows and rows of burning yellow eyes looked at him but did not respond. Don began to pace.
"He's making an army, the same way he did before, but he wants it to be like you, complete with all your abilities. He used my DNA to bridge the nuclear issues in blending your cells with whatever he's using as a base, but I'll bet he didn't consider your brain at all. Even if he knows you're smart, he'd have no way of knowing about your ability to forge a psychic link. But you're not like us, you're not really like me at all. Bishop has me to compare to you, but we're so fundamentally different, he'll never notice this. He's accidentally splitting your mind a thousand ways."
A feeling of something cold and hard knotted in his stomach as a new idea flashed across his mind.
"The clones must be in the very beginning stages of creation, since hopefully I haven't been under that long, which is why you can think so clearly – you're the only one aware enough and mature enough to think. And he'll probably keep the clones dormant in their test-tubes for a while, like all those guys in the lab when he grabbed Master Splinter. But when he wakes them up, if they're programmed in a certain way, does that mean you'll have to follow their programming?" He considered quickly the strength of Godzilla's mind against the imprinting Bishop could instill in a thousand versions of the same thoughts, and swallowed. The odds were not good.
"If Bishop's not careful, he's going to wind up with an army of half-turtle, half-Godzilla creatures that operate with a hive mind, one he might or might not be able to control. One you might or might not be able to control. I'm not actually sure which is worse, but we've got to do something about it before even one of them matures enough to wake."
Donatello paused, remembering that he was, well, if not dreaming, at least still unconscious. He sighed. "Not like there's a whole lot I can do about it at the moment, though."
Then, the scene around him began to dissolve rapidly, melting before his very eyes into swirls of darkness. Donatello felt himself dropping away, as if he were falling asleep from within the dream. He had no way of knowing if that meant he was waking up or being drugged even farther, but he knew he only had a few more seconds before he lost his hold on his mind and went wherever he was being drawn.
"Godzilla, can you talk to Nick?"
"Yes."
"Can you tell him something from me?"
"I will try."
"Okay." He thought quickly, knowing he had to give Godzilla a that was message short and easy enough to be relayed in images and feelings to such a different mind, but that would give his friend the knowledge he needed. "Tell Nick that your eggs are hatching."
"I do not have eggs."
"I know," and Donatello would have been frustrated if he had even a spare amount of effort left over after trying to keep the mental connection against whatever was pulling him away. "Tell Nick your eggs are hatching. Just tell him, please Godzilla."
There was a crack in Don's mind, and everything winked out.
He wondered if he was dead.