Stacey drove Splinter and the Turtles back into the city. Since it was the middle of the day though, they hung the sheets up in the windows, and parked the van completely blocking the sidewalk to let them out. April opened the side door and Splinter and the Turtles dipped into the sewers before they were seen.
"Hey! Move it lady, this is the sidewalk!" Some jerk shouted at them and smacked the side of the van.
"We'll move when were done here!" Holly shouted back leaning out of the window to block whatever of the guys might be exposed.
The jerk flipped her his middle finger, but carried on his way. Holly checked over her shoulder, but the manhole cover was back in place.
"Alright, I'll drop you off at home April, then I need to get home." Stacey said and put the van into gear.
"What about the rental?" Holly asked.
"I'll pay the late fee and drop it off tomorrow." Stacey said and pulled away from the curb.
April hauled her backpack out of the van and waved goodbye to her friend, before running upstairs to her aunt.
"Hey! How was your trip?" Carol asked when April came through the door.
"Awesome! It was so beautiful." April answered and dropped her bag and gave her aunt a hug. "How has the city been?"
"I mean, its still being rebuilt and the crime has been crazy. I'm glad you got to get away for a couple days to be honest."
"Has there been any information about the space ship?" April asked. She grabbed an apple out of the fruit bowl on the kitchen counted and took a bite out of it.
"Well, yeah actually. They sent a dive team down to look for it and they can't find it." Carol frowned, April almost choked on her apple.
"What do you mean, 'they can't find it'? Its a massive ball." April said.
"I don't know. Unless it moved or has some sort of invisibility power?" Carol said with a shrug.
"That's not good." April made a mental note to call everyone as soon as possible. "Anything else, any news about dad?"
"Not really. The press has been trying to dig into where the aliens came from, but they have no real ideas." Carol said.
April grabbed her bag of stuff and threw all the clothes into the wash before going upstairs. She opened up her laptop and pulled up all the news sites she could. They were indeed all reporting that the Technodrome had disappeared. Most of the repairs to the city were well underway, the roads that had been destroyed were being repaved, and the majority of the debris from the fallen craft had been collected, no doubt by the military. One of the more obscure news sources was reporting that the recycling plant had been destroyed and rebuilt already. Most of the other sources, along with a lot of scathing comments from social media, were accusing this media group of being completely out of their minds. April called Donnie and Holly on conference to see if they too were already looking at what was going on.
They both answered their phones, Donnie a little more enthusiastically than was really necessary. "Hey, are you guys checking out the news by chance?"
"Not yet," Holly answered, "Why, is something going on?"
"Sort of, the Technodrome is missing, and the recycling plant has miraculously been rebuilt in a week." April summarized for them
"Whoa, whoa," Donnie interrupted, "What do you mean 'missing'?"
"The military sent a dive team into the Hudson and nothing was there." April clarified.
"Hmm," they could practically hear Donnie scratching his chin through the phone, "We'll it either really did move, or its cloaked."
"Is there a way we can know for sure?" Holly asked.
"Without going down there personally? No."
"Why can't we go down there personally?" Holly asked after a pause.
"I bet we could, actually." Donnie agreed. "We have the underwater entrance. I just need to make sure it goes out into the river somewhere, and I'm sure we could."
"What about the recycling center? Why would the Krang rebuild that?" April asked them.
"That one I am not so sure on." Donnie admitted. "There could be more going on there than we initially thought."
"You guys never really did get a chance to investigate." April said a little guiltily. It wasn't her fault that she got kidnapped, but the timing was unfortunate.
"We'll have to go back there." Donnie said.
"Go back where?" They could just hear Leonardo ask in the background.
"Hold on." Donnie said into the phone.
The girls waited for a moment, they could hear a discussion going on between the turtles, but Donnie was not a part of it.
"OK, you're on speaker." Donnie said, "I was saying to April and Holly that we should go back to the recycling plant to see why it was rebuilt so fast."
"Who rebuilt it?" Raph asked.
"Presumably the Krang." Donnie answered.
"Why would they do that?" Leo asked.
"That's exactly the question." April said.
"It was completely demolished when the Technodrome launched, or at least we are assuming that, right?" Holly asked. Technically they had not seen it get destroyed.
"There's no way it wasn't." Raph said.
"Yeah, that building wasn't that big, and the Technodrome was huge." Mikey added.
There was another pause in the conversation.
"What if we've been focusing on the wrong building?" Holly asked.
"What do you mean?" April asked.
"That's certainly a possibility," Donnie agreed
"Someone please explain." Leo said slightly irritated.
"Chances are that the recycling plant was just an entrance to the Technodrome, What every they want to hide is probably next door." Holly said. "When they launched the ship, I bet it left some kind of access point vulnerable."
"That is where the bulk of their security was." Donnie remembered.
"Aside from TCRI." Leo reminded them.
"The tower is a whole other mystery." April said.
"We need to figure out what is going on in there." Donnie agreed.
"Why don't we just go back there?" Mikey asked them all.
"To the Tower?" April asked.
"Yeah," Mikey said, "We got in before, why can't we do it again?"
Another lapse in the conversation as everyone considered it.
"Let's do it." Leo said. "We'll go as soon as its dark."
"I'm coming this time." April said.
"No way!" Donnie yelled.
"If my dad is there, I am going to find him." April said. "I'm going."
"I'm not getting left behind this time either." Holly agreed.
This time both Raph and Donnie began protesting at the same time.
"Absolutely not."
"Are you out of your mind?"
"We can't risk you guys getting hurt, or caught."
"There is no way we're going to let you come."
"Let us come?" Holly said catching that particular phrase.
"I don't think you understand," April said, sounding a little dangerous, "We're going, with or without you."
"Guys, they've shown they're capable enough to help." Leo said, knowing there was no point arguing.
This time, Raph and Donnie directed their arguments at their brother.
"They've barely had a year of training."
"We can't guarantee their safety."
"If they're determined to go regardless, would you rather them go in with us, or on their own?" Leo shouted over them.
Raph and Donnie both stopped arguing, Raph glared at his big brother, while Donnie had the decency to look slightly ashamed of his behavior.
"Come one guys. Remember, they did beat us during training the other day." Mikey said trying to ease their worry.
"We were going easy on them." Raph snapped.
"If that's true, then you need to stop doing that." Holly said over the speaker, "How are we ever going to get good enough to actually help you if you won't even give us the chance?"
"She's not wrong, my sons." Splinter said, he had come out into the living room to see what all the shouting was about. "We are going to need allies to take on all our enemies, and you owe it to them to help them be the best they can."
"Thank you." Holly said exasperatedly.
"I think you all may need a moment to calm your minds before someone says something they do not mean." Splinter said, hearing how worked up everyone was getting.
"Whatever." Raph said and stormed off angrily.
"I'll be over later." Holly said, and hung up without saying good bye
"I do need to finish up some stuff here, but I'll come over as soon as I can." April said a little more diplomatically. "See you soon."
Leonardo let out a breath they didn't realize he had holding. "That could have gone better."
"If Raph and Donnie weren't so overly protective." Mikey shot at Donatello, since he was the only one there.
"They shouldn't have to fight our battles for us." Donnie shot back.
"But it is not just our battle," Splinter said correcting his son, "April is involved, the Krang have used her and her family to assist them in their plot."
"What about Holly, she has no skin in this fight." Donnie tried to argue.
"She has chosen to get involved because of her love for her friends." Splinter said, "which is as noble as any other reason." He turned and left his son to reflect on this information.
Donatello did understand, but he didn't have to like it.
April and Holly did turn up at the lair a couple of hours later. April had cooled off after the heated argument, but Holly was still pissed. April was conversing at least nicely with Leo and Mickey, although she was giving Donnie a bit of a cold shoulder. Holly on the other hand only spoke if it was completely necessary. She had arrived and basically dropped her bag on the floor and busied herself prepping for that evening. Both the girls had brought a change of clothes, darker form fitting outfits that provided the greatest range of motion while, hopefully allowing them to use the shadows if need be.
Holly had ditched her glasses for the night, and was presently wrapping her hands and wrists in tape to help stabilize her joints. Raph came out of the training room and they locked eyes for a moment. The others looked between the two of them, the tension unbearable, but Holly just went back to taping up her hands without saying a word.
"OK." Leonardo said to no one in particular.
"Are we going to talk strategy, or is everyone just going to ignore each other until we actually go?" Mikey asked the group as a whole.
"We're going to go in on one of the upper levels again." Leo said, "That's where we saw Kirby last time, and its where that weird control room was."
"What then?" April asked.
"Then we're going to figure out what exactly they're doing in there?" Leo continued. "We'll do whatever we can to cause as much damage as possible, without hurting any civilians."
"That's not much of a plan." Raph said moodily.
"Then it has more chance of succeeding with more of us there." Holy shot back at him.
Raph narrowed his eyes without turning around to look at her.
"Also," Leo continued tentatively, "Donnie, do you have something that can disable them as much as possible."
"I sure do!" Donnie said and hurried off into his lab.
"Great. April, Holly, can you guys do your best to stay close by to at least one of us?" Leo said.
"You worry about the Krang, we will make sure we're close by." April reassured him.
"It would be better, if you weren't there." Raph muttered just loud enough for them to hear.
"Maybe it be better if you stayed back this time?" Holly said, immediately furious.
"You guys wouldn't last ten minutes without us in there." Raph wheeled on her.
"Well apparently, you wont take the time to make sure we could last ten minutes." Holly retorted hotly.
"We have 16 years of training to our names." Raph said. "You can't possibly expect to gain that much experience in less than a year."
"I'm not saying we could, but we might be further along if you hadn't tried to coddle us." Holly shouted and pointed accusingly at him.
"You're being unreasonable." Raph shouted back. The other were staring wide eyed at their argument.
"I'm being unreasonable?" Holly's eye was practically twitching now. "Are you kidding me? I have intentionally sat out of every one of your missions, unless I was dragged into it, literally, kicking and screaming."
"Oh, give me a break." Raph scoffed.
"The only time I have actively been involved is when I was grabbed off the street and was beaten up by that thug, Song."
"Exactly, you got beat. What else matters?" Raph said.
"Uh oh." Mikey said watching Holly's face drain of color.
"I'm going to ignore that comment." Holly said, her tone shifting to something much more frosty. "I have spent every waking hour either training, doing mind numbing surveillance, or translating massive amounts of Krang data for you. Everything I do, is for you." Raphs' face had changed from anger and a mixture of shame and fear. The others could barely breath watching the exchange, even April was amazed and she sheer force Holly was exuding. "How dare you stand there and tell me that everything I have done 'doesn't matter'. Luckily for you, I know you think you're trying to protect me, but if you haven't figured out that I want to be able to protect you too, you're completely delusional." Holly stood breathing heavily, apparently having said everything she wanted to. Before he could say anything, she shook her head and walked off in the direction of the training room. She didn't slam open the doors, like Raph would if he stormed off, she just slid open the door, stepped through and gently closed it again.
"Dude," Mikey said into the silence.
"She's not wrong." April said. "The whole point of us training is to be able to protect ourselves from the people who are after you."
"Well, and to keep you safe from the Krang." Donnie added nervously.
"Yeah, I got it." Raph said morosely. He followed Holly to the training room, not even caring how his brothers were going to make fun of him later.
"I'm sorry." Donatello said to April as they watched Raph go. "I understand why you were mad when we said you couldn't come"
"Thank you." April said, and took his hand. "I know you're worried about me too."
"Do you think she's going to kill him?" Mikey asked as Raph went into the training room.
"No... At least I really hope not." Leo said.
"You want to listen at the door?" Mikey asked cheekily.
"No. Well, yes, but were not going to." He scolded Mikey who was already trying to sneak over to listen in.
Holly slid the door shut behind her and took a deep breath to try and calm down. She walked into the middle of the room and lay on her back, knees up and covered her eyes with one arm and tried to get her blood pressure down. She took another slow, deep breath and felt a little of the tension in her shoulders loosen.
"Holly." Raph came into the room after her. She didn't reply, she just took another deep breath trying to keep her cool. "I aah, I'm sorry, OK?" Again he got no response. "I know you have been working hard to get better in a fight, I was there for most of it."
"Yeah, you were." She said, but did not move.
"You did manage to catch Leo off guard too." He admitted.
"Yup." She agreed. "What I don't get though," She uncovered her eyes but looked at the ceiling, "Is why you decide to pick a fight after such a nice weekend?"
"Yeah, that wasn't my best move." He admitted. He walked over to her and lay down the opposite way to her so their heads were right next to each other.
"Especially after everything I said to April." Holly reminded him.
"I'm not the smartest. Definitely the most handsome, but not the smartest." He tried some humor to test the waters. She did murmur some sort of acknowledgment, but he wasn't sure if it was positive or not. "Listen, I'm not great at all this, but I just need you to know that I'm just... I can't..." He struggled for the words. "I don't know what I would do if you got hurt because of us."
"Technically, I already have." Holly said.
"Yeah, and I don't want it to happen again."
"You can't stop that from happening." Holly said and turned her head to look at him. "The Krang, and the Foot, have already proved that they're willing to do just about anything to get at you guys. They have come to April and mines' houses."
"I know." Raph said miserably.
"All I can do now, is keep trying to get better, and you have to trust me that I am going to do what I can to avoid those situations where I could get hurt. Who knows, maybe I'll save your shell one of these days?"
"I wouldn't be surprised." Raph said honestly.
She smiled at him this time, then went back to looking at the ceiling. "I meant what I said to April. Everything I told her is how I feel about you."
"Am I off the hook then?" Raph asked hopefully.
"I'm still pretty annoyed, but I'll get over it." Holly said at the ceiling.
"I probably deserve worse than that." Raph said.
"Yeah, you were being a real jerk." Holly said, but turned her head and kissed him on the cheek. "You want to just stay here for a while?"
"Yeah, they're going to roast me for this one." Raph said
"Yup, I love being an only child sometimes." She smiled to herself and he let out a low chuckle.
"Do you think she'll dump him?" Mikey asked the others as they sat waiting for something to happen.
"She was really mad at him." Leo said, "Remind me not to get on her bad side."
"You know what they say, 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned'." Donnie said.
"Who says that?" Mikey asked.
"Its a very famous quote, so everyone." Donnie said mystified at Mikeys' obliviousness.
"She won't do that." April said, knowing that Holly wouldn't let one fight ruin anything.
"What if she did though?" Mikey continued. "Do you think he would cry?"
"Have you ever seen him cry? He'd probably just break everything." Leo said annoyed that he was probably correct.
"I'd start with the TV." Raph said from behind them all. Holly was with him, and they looked like they had at least calmed down.
"Don't break the TV!" Mikey yelled and hugged the widescreen tightly as if Raph were about to jump on it any moment.
"Is everything OK?" Leo asked suddenly concerned.
"It will be," Holly reassured him. "Why don't we go over some potential scenarios and make sure we're all on the same page?"
When the sun set, The turtles, April, and Holly loaded into the Shellraiser and headed towards the TCRI tower. They tucked the converted subway car into a nice quiet alley way and climbed their way up to the closest rooftop to the building. Like the last time, they used Donnies' grappling hooks to zip-line to the other building. This time however, Raph and Leo crossed over first and the girls were going to cross after them.
April and Holly stood on the edge of the building, wrists through a strap that was their only safety nets from the seven story drop they were about to swing over.
"Are you guys ready?" Donnie asked after making sure everything was secure.
"Yeah," Holly swallowed down a sarcastic comment as the wind blew her hair around her face.
"Lets do this!" April said and pushed off the roof.
"She seems excited." Holly said. She blew out a breath before following April across the street.
Raph caught her before she slammed into the side of the TCRI tower. "Thanks."
"No problem." Raph said and helped her to get unhooked from the zip line.
Mikey and Donnie followed them over before they all made their way into the building.
"OK, guys." Leo said, "Lets try to stay out of conflict until we're ready."
Leo led the way through the building. There was not a whole lot of Krang left in the building, and the ones they did encounter were easy enough to avoid.
"Where did you last see my dad?" April whispered to Leo after they had been through a few of the hallways.
"I can't really remember." Leo admitted, "Last time we were here we were all over the place."
"Is there a computer terminal nearby?" Holly asked.
"Yeah, they have them all over the place." Donnie said and started checking rooms.
They found a terminal room that had a couple of Krang droids at the controls, but they were facing away from the door, so they decided to take them out. Leo and Raph charged in and took down the droids before they even knew what had hit them, and Donnie and Holly immediately started to check through the system for any clues as to where Kirby could be.
"OK," Donnie said and started typing. "lets see what we can find."
Holly stood beside him at the other terminal and started selecting options from the Krang library.
"You guys can really read that?" April asked.
"Do you understand how many terabytes of data we sorted trough?" Holly asked, she shook her head and looked at Donnie, "We're so underappreciated."
"I know!" Donnie agreed, "Ah! I have the actual Krang schematics of the building." He started reading down the list of floors. "Control room, genetic testing floors, droid production floor, specimen floor?" He looked at Holly who pulled a face that said she didn't want to know what they kept in there. "Mutagen floor. That one we need to destroy." Donnie said.
"How much mutagen are we talking about?" Leo asked.
Holly's fingers flew over her terminal and she found some security feeds that showed some of the floors, "Oh my god. That's a lot of mutagen." The image showed an entire floor dedicate to storing mutagen. There were enormous storage tanks lining one wall that all looked full of the bright green slime. Along with a dispensing machine that filled the smaller canisters that were shelved floor to ceiling as far as the image showed.
"That's probably not all of it either." Donnie said.
"How can you be so sure?" Leo asked.
"There is no way they would store it all in one place." Holly agreed.
"Where else would it be?" Raph asked.
"The military base, right next to the Technodrome." Donnie said and shook his head.
"How are they moving it then?" April asked. "It would take a lot of trips if they just drove it to and from."
"No idea." Holly admitted. "What else is listed on the directory?"
Donnie went back to his diagram, "Well, there's weapons storage in a few places," He pointed out some locations, "I think this says, doorways?"
Holly checked the location and tried to find some security footage to corroborate his theory. "That doesn't make sense." The image showed a hallway that had weird triangular light fixtures on the walls, but there were no doors that anyone could see.
"What else? Anything that looks like holding cells?" Leo asked and both Holly and Donnie continued reading through the rest of the labels.
Mikey, who was already bored watching the others reading, so he was the only one paying attention to the images that Holly had pulled up. "Guys." He said as Krang started appearing on the screen. One of the lighting fixtures opened up and created a triangular purple opening in the wall. Mikey watched as the Krang walked through the opening. "Guys!" He shouted to get their attention.
"What Mikey?" Raph answered and they all turned to see what was going on.
"Where are they going?"
"Portals." Donnie said suddenly. "Its not doorway, its portals."
"Portals to where?" April asked.
"Lets see if we can't find out." Holly said and started selecting options off the view screen. She flicked through security feed after security feed, but nothing seemed to be the other side of the portal. As she clicked by, she passes an image with people milling around a room.
"Wait, go back!" April said. Holly clicked back a couple of feeds, and there on the screen was a small group of adults, some in lab coats, some sitting with their heads in their hands. One tall, balding, red-headed man was pacing along one wall. "Dad!"
"Where is that?" Leo asked, and Holly and Donnie cross referenced the image with the schematics.
"Looks like they're about twelve floors below us." Donnie said.
"Lets go." April said and bolted for the door.
"Slowdown Rambo." Raph said, and grabbed her around the waist. "You're not just going to charge down there without us."
"Says the guy who usually goes in all fists a-blazing." April scoffed irritably.
"OK, left out of this room, second right to the stairs." Donnie started reading out the directions to himself so he could remember them better.
"Whats the easiest way to get them out of here?" Leo asked, and Holly started looking for an exit.
She sighed and shook her head, "It's not going to be easy. The ground floor is heavily guarded and I don't think we can get them all out the way we got in."
"Probably not." Leo agreed
"What about the portals?" Mikey asked.
"We don't know where they go." Holly protested. "They could go anywhere, another state, another galaxy."
"We go there first, If there's no way out, then we head to street level." Leo said.
"We still need to do something about the mutagen." Holly reminded them. "Even if we can't get all of it, that is just that much less they can use."
"We have to split up." Leo said, with a sigh.
"Split up?" Raph protested. "Absolutely not."
"We don't have much of a choice." Leo said, "Regardless of what we do, we're going to draw attention from the Krang. We need to do as much damage as possible, as fast as possible."
"We also need someone who can read this stuff on each team." Donnie said, "I will go with April and Mikey to get her Dad, its up to you guys to take care of the computer system and mutagen."
"How exactly do you propose we do that?" Holly asked.
"Whit this." Donnie said and produced a little vial of silvery liquid.
"What is it?" Holly asked taking the three inch long glass tube between her thumb and finger.
"This is a little substance I made that can neutralize the genetic altering capabilities of the mutagen at the cellular level." Donnie said smugly.
"How?" Holly asked absolutely stunned.
"It analyzes the chemical makeup of the mutagen and rearranges the molecules to make it into harmless goo." Donnie crowed.
Holly's eyes went wide, "Donnie you are a genius."
"Thank you." He said and gave a little bow. "I don't have a whole lot though, and it is only in beta." He produced a few more vials from a pouch on his belt. "So if it does work, its probably only enough to deal with the larger vats. You'll have to dump one tube into each container, and it should be just enough to neutralize that much mutagen."
"I could literally kiss you right now." Holly said, and carefully placed the vials in her pocket.
"Are you done gushing over that stuff, or what?" Raph asked impatiently. "Lets go."
They left the room and agreed to maintain contact if things started going badly. Holly slipped a Bluetooth head set over one ear, "One of the benefits of having external ears." She shrugged, while April placed one on her ear also. April was eager to get to her dad. It had been almost a year since he had originally been taken, and she was anxious to get him out of this place. She, Donnie, and Mikey made their way to the southern stairwell. They needed to go down a dozen floors to get to the holding cells, and then there was the problem of getting everyone out.
"Hold up." Mikey said as they reached the door that lead to the holding floor. He opened it a crack and peeked out to check if the coast was clear.
There were a number of Krang milling around in an antechamber with a few guards stationed between the hi-tech cells. There were small windows that allowed people to see who was in the cells, but from their location on a landing behind a door, it was impossible to tell where Kirby was.
"OK, we're going to do the heavy lifting here." Donnie said softly to April as they peered out of the door. "You try to find a way to get those cells open and start leading everyone to the portal room."
"Got it," April responded. "Up four floors, right?"
"You got it!" Donnie said encouragingly.
"Alright, lets do this." April said, and let Mikey and Donnie burst into the room a few seconds before she did to pull the Krang away from the cells.
Leo, Raph, and Holly were climbing the north west stairs trying to get up to the mutagen room. They were assuming that they could stay undetected for longer if they delayed going to the main control room. Leo lead the way, followed at Raph's insistence, by Holly. The mutagen room was only a couple of floors above where they had all been, but there was no guarantee that it was empty.
"Just to point out a possibility, they could have their tanks wired up with sensors." Holly whispered nervously as they climbed the stairs. "So we could very quickly be engaged."
"It'll be fine." Leo said.
"I'm sure." Holly said, "I'm just trying to think of any possibilities so we can have the upper hand."
"Holly, you need to breath." Leo turned to her and forced her to take two deep breaths with him.
"I'm sorry. I'm nervous." She admitted.
"That's fine, but we really need to be quiet." Leo continued up the stairs.
Holly mentally scolded herself. She had been the one to insist that she could help, and they hadn't even seen anyone yet and she was screwing up. She bit her tongue to stop herself from babbling again and continued after Leo.
When they got to the floor the mutagen was on, Leo peered out into the hallway and signaled that they should keep moving. The crept along the hall until they came to a large double door that opened out to the storage room. The room was a lot bigger than it had looked on the monitor. The larger tanks were easily fifteen feet tall, and the shelves that the rest of the mutagen was on filled the twenty foot high room to the ceiling.
"Well, that's not ideal." Holly said once Raph and Leo had checked that the room was clear. She strode over to the closest tank to take a look at the mechanics. The tanks had piping coming out of the bottom that ran along to a dispensing unit where some empty canisters were waiting to be filled. She walked between two of the tanks and peered behind them, then she tried to climb up as high as she could to see the tops.
"Whats the problem?" Raph asked, "Dump the silver stuff in there and lets go."
"I can't." Holly said, "There is no external access to these tanks."
"How are they filled then?" Leo asked looking around as if the answer would appear magically.
"I don't know, but give me a few minutes." She hopped down and jogged over to the dispensing machine. It had a control panel on it that she started manipulating deftly. Leo and Raph looked around awkwardly, not really sure what was going on.
"Hmm, where ever this stuff comes from, it travels through the whole building to get here. There are pipes coming from deep under the tower all the way up here." Holly said.
"Fantastic, now what?" Raph asked irritably.
"We might not be able to neutralize the mutagen, but we can still do some damage to the system. This machine is the only one here that can get the mutagen out of the tanks and into the canisters. If they can't get it out, they can't use it." Holly shrugged.
"So I get to smash stuff," Raph said with a grin.
"The Krang will one hundred percent be alerted to us though." She said.
"We knew that was going to happen though," Leo replied, and turning to his brother, "We make sure this thing needs replacing, not just fixing."
"I'll get out of the way." Holly said and backed away from the console.
Raphael wound up ready to drive his sai into the machine when a blaring alarm wailed out through out the building.
Donatello and Michelangelo burst through the doorway and immediately started to take down the Krang droids. Catching them unaware had given them the upper hand, but the Krang were fast to react and were firing off purple laser blasts at the two turtles who led them away from the door as bait. April gave them a moment before sneaking through the door after them and rushing over to the closest cell. She peered through the little window on tip toes, but the first one was empty. She ran to the next one, but it too was empty. As she started for the third one, a paid of Krang rounded the corner at the end of one hallway and stopped dead in their tracks. April unfolded her tessen and threw it a moment too late, just before the fan blade cut off the head of one of the Krang droids, it had already pressed an alarm button on the wall next to it.
"Dang it." April fumed, but she rushed the other Krang droid, sliding past it on her knees until she could get her tessen back. She used it to block the laser bursts and slice through the droids arms. The Krang stumbled backwards slightly, and looked at the nubs that were its arms. April raised an eyebrow smugly at it before it turned and tried to get away, but April decapitated the robot with one last strike from her fan.
"April?" A muffled voice said from one of the windows.
"Dad!" April shouted, and rushed over to the door.
"What are you doing here?" Kirby asked his daughter.
"I'm here to get you, and everyone else, out of here." She looked around to see if she could see any door controls. The panel to her left obviously opened the door, but there were no symbols that she could see to indicate what the buttons did. "Shoot, hold on everyone. I'm going to get some help."
April ran in the direction Donnie and Mikey had gone, they were only a couple of hallways away, but they were being louder than was really necessary to draw any Krang they could away from April. "I've found them, but I can't get the doors."
"On it!" Donnie shouted and knocked the Krang he was facing down, before driving the hidden blade in his bo staff into the face of the droid. He rushed back to the cell, April and Mikey in toe fighting off any remaining Krang that were left in the area. He skidded over to the control panel and ripped the face plate off the wall.
"April, get away from that thing!" Kirby shouted through the door.
"Dad, He's a friend." April said, much to Donnie's dismay. Although now probably wasn't the best time to bring up the fact that they had been making out just yesterday.
"Nice to meet you Mr. O'Neil. I'll have you out of there in no time."
"Sooner, rather than later, would be preferable." Kirby said through the window.
Another group of Krang droids appeared from around the far end of the hallway. Mikey and April held them back so that Donnie could continue working on getting the door open.
Leo and Raph made quick work of mangling the machine, within a few seconds it was reduced to wires, tubes, and bolts. As soon as they were done, they ran from the room expecting company at any moment. Before they did leave through, Holly doubled back quickly and grabbed 2 canisters of the mutagen for Donnie. She took off her outer shirt and quickly fashioned a bag for them. She threw it over her head before running to catch up to the others. As she rounded a corner, the Turtles were already engaged with a squad of the Krang.
"Where did you go?" Raph yelled at her.
"Is now really the time?" Holly ducked and rolled to avoid the laser blasts that were whizzing past her. She drew out a collapsible baton from her pocket and extended it as she ran, Holly slid and swiped at the legs of one of the Droids. It went down with a clang, and Raph finished the job by stabbing it through the face.
"Lets go. Holly, try to find out where the others are before we trash this place." Leo said, and Holly gave a short nod of understanding before they entered the control room.
Leo and Raph charged into the central room drawing most of the attention away from Holly. There was still a couple of Krang at the console. They were distracted by the Turtles though, so Holly was able to dispatch of them with a blow to the head with her steel baton. Once they were taken care of, she immediately started tapping the control screen to pull up some useful information. She found the security footage again, and saw that Donnie was kneeling by one of the cell doors trying to get it open. She flicked through the screens to see if she could find anything that might help when she found a destination list. She flicked the video feed over to the portal room and selected a few of the destinations on the list. A few of the Portals opened up, bright purple triangles materializing in the wall. Another matching portal opened in the wall to the right of her console and she smiled to herself knowing she had translated it correctly.
"Guys! I have an exit for you." Holly said touching the headset in her ear.
April was startled to hear Holly's voice in her head, until she remembered they had an open line going.
"You scared me." April said, "What did you say about an exit?"
"The portal room has an exit to the outside." Holly said excitedly. "There's also one that'll bring you up here so Donnie and Mikey can come help us while you get your dad out."
"Nice work!" April said beaming. "Holly has found our way out."
"Fantastic, and if I'm not mistaken..." Donnie trailed off, the door that held April's dad whooshed open.
"Is anyone else being held here?" Donnie asked, wanting to make sure they saved everyone.
"No its just us." Kirby said, indicating the half-dozen terrified looking people behind him.
"We're going to get you all out of here." Donnie reassured them as best he could. "Just maybe, don't tell anyone about it."
"A little help here guys!" Mikey shouted, he was still fighting off a hand full of Krang.
"I'll get them out." April said, "Meet me in the portal room as soon as you can."
Holly watched as April started back out into the stairwell.
"We're going up?" Asked one of the other scientists anxiously as April started climbing the stairs.
"Trust me, I can get you out of here." April said.
Holly was already skimming through some of the other systems when one of the Krang came up behind her and jammed a cattle prod into the small of her back. The pain was so intense she could hardly breath, and when the Krang removed the prongs she crumpled forward onto the console. Hitting numerous buttons as she tried to stand up again.
"Holy fuck." She said breathlessly. Glancing over her shoulder, She saw the Krang pull back, ready to shock her again. She spun to the side, narrowly avoiding another jolt.
"Holly? Are you OK?" April asked over her headset.
"One moment please." Holly responded. She snatched up her baton and used it to swat away the cattle prod as it was thrust at her for the third time. She used the heavy handled end to jab at the exposed pink brain in the droids abdomen. It shrieked at her. "Yeah, not so nice being hit in the tender spot is it?" She whacked it again, and the Krang back peddled flailing madly. Holly wretched the cattle prod free from the droids grip, and shocked the Krang back. The droid collapsed, and the actual Krang scuttled away. Holly directed a kick in its direction, but it scurried out of her reach too quickly. "Yeah, you better run."
"Holly, we're at the portals, which one gets them out of here?" April's voice cut through Holly's adrenaline rush.
"Right," she quickly looked over the portals that were open and luckily remembered which ones would take them outside as more Krang were coming into the room. "The one that takes them outside is the third portal on the left. The one that brings you up here is the last one on the right."
Holly soon found herself being forced back from the desk by a barrage of laser fire. Holly used the baton and the cattle prod to deflect the bursts, but she needed to find cover as they were approaching quickly.
April turned to her dad, "This one will get you guys out. I have to stay and help my friends." All the other scientists immediate ran through the portal. But Kirby was reluctant to leave his daughter in the Krang lair.
"I'm not going without you. These Krang are monsters."
"I know they are, but my friends and I are trying to make sure they can't hurt anyone else." April said, desperate for her dad to understand. "I promise, we'll be right behind you."
Mikey and Donnie appeared in the portal room a little out of breath, "We should go, there are more Krang on the way up here." Mikey said.
"Last portal on the right." April said and nodded as they rushed past her to try and aid their brother.
"April, go with your dad." Holly said through her head set.
"What about you guys?" April asked.
"We'll manage. Like you said, we'll be right behind you." Holly reassured her.
April bit her lip unsure what to do, "OK, but be careful." April took her dads hand, "Lets get out of here." They walked through the portal and out into one of the many small parks dotted around Manhattan.
Donnie and Mikey emerged in the control room to see Leo and Raph separated from Holly. They had been pinned back against the far wall, while Holly was closer to the wall they had just come through.
"Thanks for joining us." Holly commented as they immediately leapt between her and the approaching Krang.
"Looks like we arrived just in time!" Mikey said happily and immediately sprang into action to help his brothers.
"Did you destroy the mutagen?" Donnie asked Holly as they fought side by side to get back to the console.
"No, but we did some damage to limit how much they can actually use." Holly admitted. "Although if we can blow this place sky high, it might take the mutagen with it."
"I didn't bring any explosives with me." Donnie said a little concerned that Holly had.
"You shouldn't need it. The portals in this place have to be powered by something, and if they can be overloaded they should take it our one floor at a time."
"If we do that, we won't have much time to get out ourselves." Donnie said.
"Hey, I'm just making suggestions." Holly said and casually electrocuted another Krang.
"I'm going to tell Raph to never get on your bad side again." Donnie said.
"What's the status Donnie? Are Kirby and the other out?" Leo asked as he and the others finally battled their way back over to the console.
"Yes, and April went with them." Holly answered for him.
"She did?" Donnie asked.
"Yes, She hasn't seen her dad in a year, he wasn't going to let her stay without him, and he would just slow us all down." Holly said.
"You're probably right." Donnie admitted, but he was a little disappointed that she hadn't even told him she was going.
"You can be sad about it later." Holly said, uncharacteristically candid. "But I am pretty wired after getting zapped with this thing, so lets blow this place to high hell, and get out of here."
"You got shocked by that?" Raph asked.
"Yeah, it hurt like a bitch and I'm still not happy with you, so forgive me if I am lacking in sympathy right now." Holly said, clearly high strung.
"We can blow this place up though?" Leo caught on to her previous sentence.
"Theoretically." Donnie said, "But it wouldn't give us a whole lot of time to get out."
Leo thought for a brief moment. "Do it. Whatever it takes to stop the Krang from invading."
Donnie shrugged and headed over to the console. He began typing furiously on the control pad, closing down the Portals that Holly had opened so that he could control where the explosions were. As he powered on certain portals, he increased the energy flow to them disengaging the automatic shutdown. He selected a few of the portals on the lower levels of the building, making sure that none of them opened up anywhere civilians might be nearby.
"OK, all we need to do is lock the controls and get out of here." He said.
"Allow me," Holly said, and slammed the cattle prod down hard into the control module. It lodged deep in the mechanics of the terminal and immediately began sparking and smoking. "That should do it."
"Time to go!" Leo said, and he and Mikey led the charge back out of the building.
Donatello grabbed Holly's hand and dragged her after him as she was busy shouting obscenities at anything that was still moving. "This it your fault you know." He yelled at Raph as the crashed into the stairwell, explosions already ringing out from lower levels.
"Yeah, OK, I get it. Don't piss off Holly again." He yelled back and launched a Krang over the railing and down the empty space in the middle of the stair well.
"I'm more annoyed at getting electrocuted." Holly said defensively. But the anger had worn off now that they were running out of an exploding building. "Lets just get out of here."
Leonardo bust back out onto the floor where they had come into the building, their zip lines were still securely fastened to the lettering of the TCRI Tower. This time however, they didn't have time to climb carefully back out of the windows. The explosions were shaking the glass and they needed to get out right now. Raph threw he sai at the window and they pierced the glass like a hot knife through butter. One well placed kick and the glass shattered completely.
"Jump!" Leo shouted and they all launched themselves out of the broken window onto the ropes. Raph had scooped up Holly and was holding her tight to him around the waist when Leo cut the lines and they all dropped until the rope went taught and they swung across the street.
"Wait, wait!" Holly yelled and quickly took her make shift bag off her back, just in case the canisters broke inside of it. The all slammed into the other building feet first. Holly had wrapped one arm tightly around Raphs shoulders, but the other she let swing slightly to try and absorb some of the impact.
"What is that?" Raph asked when Holly let out a sigh of relief after giving the bag a little shake to make sure it wasn't leaking.
"A present for Donnie." She said, and they all gave her a very strange look. The confusion didn't last long however, as one last explosion rocked the TCRI Tower. They all turned to see the top couple of floors of the tower collapse in on its self. Holly immediately burst into laughter and hugged Raph tightly.
"You're terrifying, you know that?" Raph said, but he had a smile on his face that was just for her.
"Lets get out of here, before the fire department show up." Leo said. They climbed up to the rooftops and got in contact with April again before heading back to the lair.