I think it might at last be becoming clear why I titled this story "Resonance;" I promise it wasn't just a whim. Sorry this one is short, but it's a fun place to leave things.
If I owned any of these guys, you can believe this story would have been animated!
Enjoy!
They screamed.
Outside and underwater and within his lair, Godzilla slammed back and forth in the shallow water as if he could drive the pain out with more pain. He was thrashing in the cavern, heedless of what his clawed feet struck or the waves he created far above. But he was well away from the shipping lanes or the land, and thus his tearing and rending of the water was mostly harmless.
Inside, Nick had dropped like a stone, his knees simply buckling under him as he fell. Curling into fetal position, the scientist wrapped his arms around his head as if he was warding off blows. He shook as he rolled back and forth, his throat rough and ragged as his agony forced its way through his lungs in a verbal display.
Donatello jerked on the table, his body rocking as if in a seizure. He made a gargling noise, as if he were screaming through water, and blood trickled from his nose and eyes like red, broken tears.
"What's happening?" Mendel shouted, running to Nick.
"My sons have killed a clone of Godzilla," Splinter replied, moving not towards the human but to the turtle.
"How do you know that?" Randy wanted to know as he skidded to a stop beside the fallen doctor.
"It is of no consequence. But apparently their joined minds bring shared pain as well," the sensei called back, again finding a pressure point on Donatello's neck and arresting his movements with its use. "If they continue to fight, Dr Tatopoulos will likely continue to suffer."
"Nick!" Elsie called. She'd scarcely ever moved as fast as from the moment he'd fallen; she cradled his head on her knees and gripped his shoulders fiercely, as though she could pull him out of the pain that claimed him. "What do we do?"
"F…fight," the fallen scientist gasped around his pain. "Stop them…no matter…what."
"There is your answer," Splinter said. "And now I must ask you to trust me."
"What?" Mendel looked at the rat in confusion.
"You must hide yourselves." Splinter moved to where the three crouched around Nick. "If my senses do not lie, we are soon to be swamped with enemies, and my family and I may not be able to defend this lab for long. You must be ready to flee if the battle goes against us."
"What about you?" Randy asked, eyes wide.
"We are ninja. We shall vanish. With Donatello in his current state, we cannot take you all with us in safety. He is enough to carry in silence and secret."
"The HEAT-Seeker," Elsie said brusquely. "If we can get to it without Bishop noticing us, we could always take off in that. And once we're on the water, if Godzilla is okay…"
"There'd be no way Bishop could get us," Craven finished.
"Then go. Take the doctor there without drawing attention if it can be managed. If Bishop assumes you are within the lab, he will concentrate his attack here and an opportunity to escape may present itself. Here." The rat reached forward and grasped the back of Nick's neck firmly. A moment later, the spasms stopped.
"What did you do?" Elsie wanted to know.
"I have temporarily relieved him of consciousness. He will awaken in moments, but this should provide you the opportunity to move him without drawing as much attention to yourselves." Splinter helped them get Nick's weight distributed between the three of them, Elsie and Randy each supporting his shoulders and waist, Mendel carrying his feet.
"When you have him on-board your boat, hide for as long as is plausible. If the battle turns in our favor, I trust you will know what to do. If it does not, you must escape." Splinter took a breath. "Donatello needs your assistance if he is to return to us. My sons will buy your escape by whatever means necessary to ensure your safety."
Elsie and Mendel began to shuffle towards the door away from the fight, but were stopped by Randy who was not yet moving. The hacker stared at the wizened rat, who had turned from them and was instead taking up a position across from Donatello, who was again beginning to stir. The diamond-hard look in the sensei's face had shaken him.
"But, Master Splinter, what's gonna happen to you and Don and the others?"
"If all goes well, we shall not require you to escape at all," he replied, meeting the young man's eyes evenly. "If not, our best chance for survival will be to find you again under better circumstances. Donatello believed in you all, believed that you more than myself or my family could save him from this. I must do the same."
"Randy, come on!" Elsie grunted. If they ever got out of this, she was definitely telling Nick to go on a diet. He seemed as heavy as Godzilla. But fear was giving her adrenaline, and with it, the strength she needed. Randy turned back to her and as one the trio began the long trip to the HEAT-Seeker.
Randy didn't look back at Splinter, but he could not get the words out of his mind. How much must the turtles and their father trust HEAT that they would put themselves at great risk to ensure the team could escape? And at what cost to themselves? Randy was barely aware of the trip to the Seeker, of ducking behind things to avoid detection, of climbing to the upper platform to access the deck directly rather than climbing the side-ladder, of dropping Nick gently to the floor of the pilot-house and groaning with the soreness in his shoulders. Somehow, none of it mattered.
"I think he's coming around," Craven said quietly, seeing Nick begin to twitch in earnest. He and Elsie grabbed a life-jacket and pushed it under Nick's head, watching him worriedly. But Randy turned away.
"Take care of him," he said. "I'm gonna go help Monique."
"Randy, what?" Elsie hissed at him.
"She needs to know where we are, and so do the turtles. And she probably needs help out there. You guys stay with Nick. If you have to run, run." Randy stepped out of the door and closed it behind him before he could change his mind. He crawled down the side of the HEAT-Seeker's ladder and crept across the inner dock as quietly as he could. Along the way, he picked up a baseball-bat-sized piece of pipe. Instead of giving away their location by simply rounding the dock, though, he went back inside the lab.
Donnie was definitely awake now, as evidenced by the convulsions shaking the turtle. He jerked wildly, grunting and flinching as though he were under physical attack. Across from him, Splinter sat, his face completely calm, lost to the world around him. Randy stared at them both for a minute before again gathering his courage and stepping out the same door Monique had used.
The scene below was chaos. Three turtles stood amidst a crowd of Godzilla clones, dozens of them, all of which were quick to attack and quicker to recover after a blow. Monique stood off to one side, guarding against any intrusion into the lab with all her strength. Nearby, bathed in flickering light, Bishop watched.
Randy bounded to Monique's side, sweeping away a clone as he went, surprised by the shock of hitting the creature, its solid bones causing his own arms to reverberate in response to the strike. He met her eyes briefly, then glanced in the direction of the dock where the HEAT-Seeker waited, and nodded. She apparently got the message, for while nothing in her stance changed, her focus shifted slightly. She kept up guarding the lab directly from intrusion, but if any clones started moving towards that part of the building, she would be aware.
Mission one accomplished, Randy charged into the fray fully, making a break for the three turtles who were fighting more grimly than he'd witnessed on the island. As he drew near to Leonardo, he came up with a stupid, crazy plan.
"Bishop!" he shouted, brandishing the pipe. With a wild yell, he charged the agent. He wasn't even within striking-range when Bishop was suddenly there in front of him. Then there was the sensation of a boot on his chin and he was flying backwards, his head screaming at the kick he'd received. He hit the ground and rolled slightly before coming to a limp stop.
"Randy!" Leo yelled, cutting down a clone and jumping to his defense. Randy got to his knees before the turtle hauled him to his feet. As the hacker allowed his head to clear, he whispered as softly as he could manage.
"We're in the HEAT-Seeker. Don and your dad are still in the lab. We're gonna run if we have to."
The words had an immediate effect on Leonardo. Randy could practically see the wheels turning inside the ninja's mind, and after a heartbeat he nodded. With only the barest glance of gratitude, Leo gave Randy a shove in the direction of Monique, telling him to "stick to rear-guard," and instead repositioning himself in the battle. Randy marveled at how the turtles seemed to read each other. When Leo took up a new position, Michelangelo and Raphael did as well, and this new configuration, Randy noticed, was a little more spread. Still they could guard the whole building, but now one turtle was in-reach of the dock that led to the Seeker. Like Monique, they had read the plan from his mind and reacted to it.
Satisfied that his work was done, Randy returned to Monique's side, still clutching his pipe. He took up a defensive position next to her and waited for the next clone to attack.
"That was foolish," she told him wryly.
"I know. But I've always wanted to be a tragic hero," he joked back. Then he thought about everyone else, the situation they were in, and what was on the line, and his smile faded to a grim line of determination. "Besides, if this is the only thing I can do to help these guys save all our lives, then I'm gonna do it, no matter what."
Randy never caught Monique's startled, and approving, expression; he was too busy swinging angrily at the next clone that came into view.
"Very well," she nodded, her usual cool demeanor restored.
As one, they defended their position, and waited for the next blow to come.
-==OOO==-
The paths of the mind were often complex and labyrinthine, but Splinter was an old hand at walking them even in times of great turmoil. His own inner unbalance he kept firmly locked down, bound against interfering with his task. There could only be steadiness, security, serenity. Anything else brought to light in this place and his own fears would materialize around him, and he could not waste time defeating them here. He had already tried several times that night to accomplish this same end, but now he had a burning motivation beyond what had been before. Now it was more than just Donatello's mind at risk; it was the lives of all of his sons. This gave him clarity and mental strength he had rarely tapped before. He tapped it in its entirety now.
To his inner eye, the space that was the astral plane looked as it always did, foggy and yet solid, taking on the shapes of places he had seen or imagined and merging them with the unimaginable until the landscape was eerily familiar and yet alien. Beneath his feet, a grey path stretched to the horizon, and he knew if he followed it backwards it would lead him to his body.
With a silent command, Splinter used his new-found force of will to adjust the land around him. Now, running near to his own lifeline were four others, each the color of his corresponding son, each woven together even as they were separate. The blue path was arrow-straight alongside his own, steady and strong, with only a few aberrations before ultimately returning to an independent but similar echo of the grey that had come first. The orange path was vibrant but a little erratic, curving and weaving with jagged irregularity, though it still moved ultimately forward alongside the others. The red ran close to the blue and orange, but veering in its own direction, drawn back time and again, but always arcing widely to its own space where it seemed to burn the very ground intensely beneath it.
But it was to the purple path Splinter turned his attention. This one also ran alongside those belonging to its brothers, and not directly correlating to his own, and as he focused upon it, its purple color began to fragment into many shades and hues. The color was almost jewel-like in its multifaceted complexity. It was also brilliant in the dimness of the astral plane, like its three companions, as present as Splinter's own grey road that was more solid than the ground upon which it rested. But as he gazed deeply beneath the surface, he could see that the purple indicated a consciousness that was unusual in its capacity and scope and potential, potential that seemed to shimmer with the ghost of blue and orange and red and grey and a few other hidden colors, influenced and driven to such heights not only by an inner light, but by a demanding loyalty to others.
Splinter set off along his own path, keeping the purple firmly within his sights. It was not long before he found what he was looking for. A dark stripe appeared seemingly out of nowhere and intersected all five of the paths, then moved off ominously, but after that moment of contact, the purple path bore a stripe of sickly yellow. To Splinter's horror, the yellow stretching forward was growing, and in the foggy distance, seemed to encompass the purple entirely. Here, then, was where he must act. He had reached this point many times in the past few hours, but not until this moment had he been certain his strength would succeed in what he had no choice but to attempt.
Splinter centered himself, creating with his will a tangible rope from the path on which he stood to wrap around his waist tightly. He had never yet gotten lost within the astral plane, even those times he and his sons had ventured far afield from themselves. But he was not willing to risk disorientation that might delay his return to himself if his task was unsuccessful, for if he failed, his sons would need him at once.
"I am coming, my son," the rat said to the purple path. Then, he stepped from his own onto the purple, exactly at the point where the sickly yellow stripe had appeared within the mind of his son, and willed himself entrance.
At once, images and feelings washed over him and he fell into their depths. The paths, the astral plane itself, all vanished in a cyclone of confusing images and sensations. The ache of extreme pain swirled around him, an outside control ghosted across him, and the desperate fear of his son struck him like lightning. Splinter reached out his hands, touching the whirling chaos and grasping at the ethereal wind that was at once sand, scales, water, blood, and thought.
"Donatello!" he called into the abyss. He was not afraid, for fear would only complicate and confuse his focus, but he was concerned. He could not act here alone – his son's presence and mind were too strong for him to manipulate unaided.
"Father?" came a whimper from everywhere.
"My son, I am here. You must hear me and be calm," he soothed. The maelstrom shifted, slowed slightly. Sickly yellow tendrils took advantage of the slowing momentum to expand themselves, and a cry of pain sounded from every direction.
"Sensei, I can't!"
"You can, Donatello. Your mind is still your own. Follow me, my son, and join me here." If he had been on the mortal plane, he would have held his breath. If he was to be successful at all, it was dependent upon the skill of his son and not himself in this moment.
An eternity later, a pale version of the purple that was Donatello's path seemed to leak out of the tornado in which Splinter floated. Slowly, hesitantly, the purple coalesced until it was the form of a turtle, curled in on himself even as it hung in the space across from the rat's own presence.
"My son, do not fear," Splinter reached out a grey paw to touch the domed, shaking forehead.
"M-Master Splinter?" Donatello's voice gained strength and his form resolved in a flash to his usual green appearance, complete with his bo. "What happened?"
"You have become overwhelmed by the invader in your mind," his father said. "Your brothers are under attack, and your friend the doctor is incapacitated. You are needed."
"Father, how are we even here?" the ever-curious turtle asked.
"We can discuss this later," Splinter smiled fondly at his son. "For now, you must return to yourself and help them."
"But if I've been overwhelmed, how can I…?"
"I will assist you from here. I cannot remove it physically from your body, but I may be able to block its psychic impact. If I remain here to restrain it, you may be able to regain consciousness."
"Father," the turtle's face collapsed in worry, "what will that do to you?"
"Nothing compared to what Bishop will do to us all if he succeeds," Splinter replied. In the quiet of his own mind, he felt warmth spread through him – the concern and love of his sons was precious indeed. "My son, take what little relief I can offer you and assist them as only you can. This is not a battle that can be won by skill and stealth alone. It will require science, and in that, I know I may rely upon you entirely."
"Yes, sensei," Donatello executed a perfect bow. Splinter realized all at once that his son had done something it had taken him half of a lifetime to perfect, this physical manifestation on the astral in spite of severe impediments from within. He quietly marveled at his son's intellectual and spiritual flexibility.
"Go quickly. I will remain here as long as I can."
"I won't fail you, father," the turtle promised. At Splinter's nod, Donatello closed his eyes and bowed his head. The astral body began to melt seamlessly into the purple-faceted color once more, this time its vibrancy fully restored. Like a zephyr of light, it circled Splinter once, then shot upwards out of the maelstrom, leaving Splinter within the collapsing eye of a yellow storm.
"Be safe, my son, and may you be victorious. I will not fail you, either, Donatello." Then Splinter turned his attention to the presence that remained, and stretched out his hands, his soul afire with the strength of a father's love. "You who have harmed my son shall not escape here to continue your evil for as long as I draw breath!"
And the battle for his gentlest son's mind began in earnest.
-==OOO==-
Donatello opened his eyes with only a trace of surprise that he was, in fact, awake. But as with other times in the astral plane, he remembered everything perfectly. Including what Master Splinter had warned him of when they had met within his mind – his brothers were in trouble! The sounds of combat outside the lab confirmed that analysis, and from what he could hear, he was already late to the party. Don moved slowly into a sitting position, ignoring the dizziness that struck. He had bigger concerns. Looking up, he could see his sensei sitting perfectly still in lotus-position on a nearby chair.
"Thank you, father," he said, bowing low from his seated position. Even though the rat was deep in meditation and unable to see the gesture, his son knew it would be felt nonetheless. Master Splinter was buying him an opportunity, and he was going to use it. The time for pain was over. Donatello pushed himself off the table, gathering his bo in a smooth movement, and felt his legs wobble, then strengthen under him.
"Enough is enough," he muttered to himself. "I've been infected, captured, operated on, mind-controlled, and banged up all to shell by Bishop. Time for a little payback."
The immense ache in his head remained, but the ninja chose to ignore it, implementing as many mental pain-blocks as his training could allow until it was reduced to a dull thudding. His brothers were out there, fighting for him, and he wasn't going to let them fight without him. But he also knew better than to just rush into the fray as he was – there was no telling if he would lose control again. However, for the first time in what felt like days, his mind was truly cool and clear, and he could act freely. His father had freed him, trusting him to find a solution, and he wasn't about to let his sensei and his family down.
"I need some kind of plan, some means to attack the control Bishop has, without actually hurting us." Don paced slightly, his thoughts beginning to spin with urgency as he considered. "We've never really beaten Bishop before, and we probably won't now, not the way we want to. We can fight him to a draw and force a retreat. But we need more than that. As long as his mutations are viable, he'll use them, and as long as he uses them, Nick and Godzilla and I are liabilities. But if I could expose the weaknesses in the mutations he has, he'll give up on them and go back to his hole to come up with a new plan."
Donatello flew through various situations that had incapacitated Godzilla, from tranquilizer mixes to tachyon mind-control, but nothing quite fit. Drugging the clones wouldn't help the situation, nor would gaining an even firmer control over them all – that would only prove Bishop's point too well. No, he needed something more targeted, something that would incapacitate without destroying, that would weaken without causing harm.
And then an idea began to form, a plan hatched, and Don smiled.