Short chapter this week, guys. I hope you enjoy!

Chapter 15: Alone in the Future?

How Zuko had found him, Mikey didn't know. But Zuko must have somehow gained possession of the orb. If that was the case, then Zixx must have exchanged the orb.

The next thing Mikey knew was that he was back in the future laying on the floor in some office. Zuko was on the ground a few feet away from him.

"Where are we? Back in the Future?" Mikey questioned as he looked around.

Zuko stood up and pointed a gun at Mikey with a smirk. "You finally figured that out?"

"Where's Donnie? What did you do to my brother?" the Turtle glared. Zuko laughed, which confused Mikey.

"You thought all that was real? You're even more stupid than I thought!"

Mikey grid his teeth. He didn't like being called stupid, he was just a little less smart than most. Zuko crouched down to meet Mikey eye to eye.

"That 'reality' was something you created by a selfish desire. It was fake. Still, there was one thing you managed to do by using the orb's power."

"Oh, yeah? What's that?"

"You made your brothers disappear. They're dead."

Mikey was shocked and shook his head. "No, you're lying!"

"Am I? Zixx told me himself. Said that they didn't have much longer and that you actually believed him when he told you it could change your destiny. You changed it alright."

Mikey's eyes filled with tears and he shook his head, trying not to listen. "No, You are lying! I know it!"

"You're alone," Zuko whispered harshly into the Turtle's ear. "It's your fault."

"Shut up!" Mikey yelled.

He pinned Zuko to the ground, the nunchucks jabbed at his throat. Zuko growled and grabbed Mikey by the arm and threw him off. Mikey landed upright and began spinning his chucks about, preparing for Zuko's next strike.

"That's the best you've got? I'm not afraid of you!"

"Oh, you will be by the time I'm finished with you!" Zuko declared. He dug into his desk and Mikey grew tense as the Triceraton took out an electric whip. "If you surrender, then I'll make sure to make it a lot less...painful!"

He pulled the whip tightly as he spoke those last words to emphasize his point. Mikey wasn't going to let this Triceraton think that he would have the upper hand by trying to scare him into submission.

"Bring it on!"

"So be it!"

Mikey ducked as Zuko swung the whip at him and backed away a few steps. He was waiting for an opening, but didn't look like Zuko wasn't going to give him a chance to fight back. Mikey ducked and steped back again, only to find himself pressed against the door. When Zuko cracked the whip towards Mikey again, the Turtle held up his chucks for defense. The whip tongue tightened around the nunchuck chain.

"You're not putting up much of a fight."

"Yeah? Well, you're not letting me strike a fair blow!" Mikey shot back. Mikey held on to his chucks, while Zuko tried pulling them out of the Turtle's hands. Zuko gripped the whip in one hand while he reached for his gun again with the other. Mikey shrieked and ducked as Zuko fired a bullet.

"I thought you wanted me alive?!"

"I do!" Zuko said as he fired another bullet. "These are stun bullets, fool!"

The door busted open from all the bullets and Mikey backed out of the office, the gun pointed at his head. He looked around for his chucks, but they had slipped out of his hands while trying do dodge the bullets and out of his reach. Zuko chuckled again as he noticed Mikey was no longer armed.

"Night night, Turtle!"

When Mikey came to, he was laying on the floor beside three aliens. They were tied up and Mikey soon realized he was too. He looked around and noticed a group of Triceratons were loading up a ship with cargo. They must be preparing to leave soon for their homeworld. Mikey didn't want to stay around and find out. He tried pulling his arms free from the rope wrapped around his wrists, but it wasn't like any rope he had seen before.

"You, don't move!" a gruff voice threatened. Mikey looked up and noticed a Triceraton had his gun pointed at his head. No way of knowing if it was a stun gun like the one Zuko used on him earlier.

"What are you going to do to me?" Mikey asked.

"And no talking!"

Geez, Mikey thought, I'm just curious.

He sat quietly and began thinking about his brothers. He remembered what Zuko said and began to think that maybe the Triceraton had been right. When Leo had come for him a while ago and asked Mikey to come back to the future with him, maybe he should have done it. At the time, he had thought that Leo was making it up, but now that he had been forced to come back to the future and realizing that his brothers were disappearing because of him, he started to feel guilty.

"I should have listened to Leo," he mumbled. "Now it's too late. My brothers, my real brothers, they're dead. And it's because of me!" His eyes began filling with tears again. How could he have been so stupid as to listen to Zixx, to believe that his desire to change his life wasn't going to have consequences?