Leonardo drove the ShellRaiser to April and picked her and her dad up from the random park they had ended up in. When the door opened, Holly stood there to try and help ease some of Kirbys' nerves about the guys.
"Hi Mr. O'Neil. Its nice to finally meet you!" She hopped down and held out her hand to him. He shook it tentatively.
"I'm sorry, but who are you?" He asked, his eyes drifted back into the vehicle before him and they noticeably widened as he caught sight of the Turtles. "What is going on?"
"This is Holly," April placed a hand gently on her dads elbow, "and she has been my friend since I moved into her school."
"What about them? I think I've seen them before?" Kirby said indicating at the turtles over Holly's shoulder.
"You have," April said happily, "Donnie here saved me when I got pushed out of that helicopter when you were taken. Do you remember?"
"And Leonardo saw you in the TCRI tower a few months ago." Holly reminded him.
"Oh, god. That's right." Kirby said, rubbing his head with a hand. "It's all been so traumatic, I can't remember what is real and what was a nightmare."
"It's alright dad, Lets just get you home." April said and she and Holly gently persuaded him into the ShellRaiser.
When they got to Carols apartment, Holly agreed to stay with April for a while to help get her dad settled.
"You guys head home. I'll catch up later." She said, "Here, be careful with this." She handed over her shirt that was still wrapped up like a bad to Donatello.
"Oh yeah, what is this?" He said and opened it up. Two canisters of glowing mutagen cast illuminated his already green face. "You took this?!" He exclaimed, "What if it had broken and gotten on you?"
Holly shrugged, "Oh I was very worried about that, but you're going to need it if you're going to get your serum working properly."
"Are you crazy?" Raph yelled at her. "If I would have known you had that..."
"Hey, I saw an opportunity, and I took it. If I never have to touch that stuff again, it will be too soon." She argued back, "But right now is not the time, you can be mad at me later." She nodded in April and Kirby's direction.
"She's right." Leo pipped up from the drivers seat, "Call Raph when you're on your way, he can meet up with you and you can argue before you get back to the lair."
"Deal." Holly said, and waved them off before running after April and Kirby. Kirby had one arm around his daughters shoulders as he climbed the stairs to Carols apartment, so Holly ran ahead and opened all the doors for them.
"Carol!" Holly shouted as she opened the door to the apartment. She flicked on the lights and took Kirby's other arm and they shuffled through the hallway.
"What do you think you're doing?" Carols voice came from her room irritably, "Do you know what time it is?" She opened her bedroom door in her bath robe clearly having been fast asleep. She saw her brother however, and all anger melted away from her round face to be replaced with pure shock. "Kirby? Oh my god." She rushed over and hugged her brother. "Where have you been? How did you get here?"
"We, uh, broke him out." April said not really sure how to tell Carol the truth.
"You two?" Carol asked skeptically. "Let me guess, were your other 'friends' involved again?"
"You know about them?" Kirby asked hoping he had imagined all the strange creatures he had seen in the TCRI tower.
"She knows of them." Holly quickly amended before too many questions could be asked.
"I don't think I can stay in this city much longer, something is going on. You know the news was trying to claim that the giant ship that destroyed a bunch of stuff was just a weather balloon?"
"They launched their ship?" Kirby asked, stunned.
"Yeah," April said gently, "They tried to abduct all the people in the city."
"I knew something was going on. They had taken about half the other people away for testing,we never saw them again. Then they moved most of their people out of the tower, there were just a few left to keep us alive." Kirby said, he had begun to shake slightly as he talked.
"Oh my, come sit down." Carol said, and guided Kirby to the couch, she dug out a blanket and wrapped it around his shoulders.
"I'll go give you guys a minute and make tea." Holly said and left them all to sit together as a family.
"Dad, you don't have to talk about it right now. Just try to relax." April held her dads hand until he calmed down a little.
"Here I am talking about myself. How have you been?" Kirby asked his daughter.
"Dad, I am fine! I've had Aunt Carol, and Holly." She said.
"Hmm," Carol eyeballed her niece, noticing the lie by omission. "We should call the police, let them know you're here."
"NO!" April and Kirby both shouted at the same time.
"Uuh, no. They're going to ask questions that I wont be able to answer." Kirby said, knowing full well that no one was going to believe his story, and if they did, they would probably have him shipped off to a military facility to be examined and questioned for the next ten years.
"It's not like you can just walk back into your old job though. People are going to ask where you were this last year." Carol said.
"That can all wait though," Holly reappeared with a tray of tea and some sandwiches. "Right now, you're free, you need to eat something and get some rest."
"That's probably a good idea. Carol, you don't mind us both staying for a few nights, until I can get something more permanent sorted out?" Kirby asked.
"Of course not. You can stay as long as you need. You can have my room for a little while. I'll sleep on the pull out sofa in the office." Carol stood up and left to find her spare set of sheets.
"Is there anything else I can do to help right now?" Holly asked as April poured Kirby a cup of tea.
"No I don't think so." April stood and hugged her friend, "Thank you."
"Don't mention it," Holly beamed at her friend. "I'll let the guys know you'll probably be MIA for a couple of days."
"Yeah, I need to make sure my dad's OK." April said.
Holly looked at Kirby who was thoroughly shell shocked. "He's probably going to need some therapy."
April sighed, "Probably."
"I'll give my mom a call too, maybe he just needs to talk to another adult about all this too. Mom might not have been through exactly the same experience, but she might be able to help." Holly said realizing that her mom might also need someone to talk to.
"That's a great idea! We'll give it a few days though." April said, and they hugged again.
"OK, I'll leave you guys in peace. Goodbye Mr. O'Neil, try to get some sleep." Holly said and placed a hand over her friends father. He looked distant, and fearful, she tried to give him an encouraging smile before she stood and left the O'Neil family in peace.
April and Carol sat with Kirby while he slowly ate half of one of the sandwiches and drank one cup of the tea. They then guided him into the bedroom and helped him take off his shoes and tucked him into bed.
"Whatever has happened to him, has changed him." Carol said sadly. "Its going to take a lot of time for him to recover from this." April nodded, and a little gasp of emotion bubbled out of her. "Oh honey," Carol put her arms around her niece and let her cry out all the fear and loneliness she had been holding back for so many months.
Holly called Raph as she left Aprils apartment. He answered almost immediately and she smiled to herself. "What? Were you staring at your phone waiting for me to call?" She asked him.
"No!" Raph protested.
"Yes," Came three bored sounding conformations.
"Where are you?" He asked irritably, clearly his brothers had been winding him up again.
"I'm just leaving Aprils, are you going to come have another shouting match with me?" Holly asked him and began walking in the direction on the lair.
"No, but I gotta get away from these idiots." He said. In the background Holly could hear Leo, Mikey, and Donnie all protesting their innocence and his bullheadedness over one another.
She laughed at them, "You're all as bad as each other." This time, all four of them began protesting at the suggestion that Raphael was not the antagonist withing their family. She laughed even harder at them, "Sorry I even suggested it. Just come find me."
Once the call had been disconnected, Holly searched for the closest building she could actually climb up to the roof on her own. There was a dumpster in a nearby alley way that she could push under a fire escape. She climbed up to the roof, and began to make her way in the direction of the Lair.
It didn't take Raphael long to find her. She had gotten to a gap that was too wide for her to cross alone and she was sat on the edge of the roof top swinging her legs out over the side.
"What? You can't make this jump?" He yelled at her from the other side of the gap.
"No. Unlike you, I don't have super powers." She shouted back.
"You think I have super powers?" He asked after he launched himself across to her.
"Well, you absolutely have more strength than any humans I know." She said standing up, "Granted, I haven't exactly done any research to see if you guys scale compared to a normal Turtle."
"You could always test Spike?" He said as he picked her up. He leapt back across the gap between the buildings with little more exertion than when he just had to get himself across.
"I'm not going to use him for any experiments, he's family." She scolded him, "But how much more difficult was that? While you were carrying me?"
"Not much. You don't weight that much." He shrugged.
"I'm one hundred and thirty-five pounds. That's not an insignificant amount." She protested. He shrugged again not having an answer for her.
They slowly made their way back to the lair, Raph glad to be away from his brothers teasing for a stretch. Holly was starving after all the excitement of the night so they decided to stop in to see Mr. Murakami to make sure he was doing alright after all the commotion. The Sushi shop had sustained some damage during the Krang Invasion, but nothing that had put him out of business. They chatted and waited for their food, and Holly was sure to leave him an extra large tip since they had bothered him so late in the night.
When they returned to the Lair, Mikey was the first one to greet them.
"You brought food?!" He asked excitedly.
"I was hungry, I figured you all would be too." Holly said and happily unloaded some of the bags into Mikeys' arms.
"Mikey's always hungry." Leo said from the couch. "But thank you for bring us something anyway."
"'Ish is aweshome." Mikey said around a mouthful of dumpling.
"Go get Donnie before you eat everything." Raph said and smacked Mikeys hand away from the rest of the dumplings.
They ate their meal as a group, and Holly was happy to chatter away with Splinter about how they managed to free all the people and Aprils dad. She was so ecstatic to have been included, even after the others had finished eating and cleaned away their bowls she had barely eaten anything.
"I thought you were starving?" Leo asked once Holly finally took a breath.
"I was, I am." She replied but looking around saw that she was the only one still eating. "Oh, I guess I am just still riding the high of being involved."
"Don't apologize, you were awesome, and you should be proud of yourself." Donnie said.
Holly blushed at the praise, she dug into her food which had gone cold at this point, but she was hungry enough still that it didn't matter.
"How was Kirby when you left?" Leo asked.
Holly covered her mouth with her hand, "Not great, but you can hardly blame him."
"I suspect the mental tole his imprisonment took is going to be greater than the physical." Splinter hypothesized.
"He probably has PTSD and will need therapy." Holly said worried for her friend. "Chances are that he is going to be very clingy to his family for a while."
"What makes you say that?" Donnie said a curious tone entering his voice.
Holly paused, a forkful of food half way to her mouth. The others were all looking at her curiously. "Oh, um, personal experience," She answered vaguely. "It's not the happiest story, so I tend to save it for more melancholy times."
They all dropped it, and let her eat. Leo and Mikey filled splinter in on any details that she had missed about their adventure that evening. By the time the had cleared everything away and relaxed as a group for a while, it was very late.
"How can you possibly be tired?" Holly asked as the turtles started yawning and drifting off to their respective rooms.
"Its nearly four o'clock," Leonardo said checking the clock. "and we all worked hard to free Kirby."
"Yeah, a real warrior knows when to rest." Mikey said.
Holly frowned at him. "I thought you were the party animal?"
"There's a time for partying, and a time for sleep; and now is sleepy time." Mikey said and poked his tongue out at her.
She returned the gesture, but smiled and bade him goodnight.
"You can come and hang out with me." Raph said, "I need to make sure Spike is OK, so I'll be up for a while yet."
"OooOOOooo," Leo, Mikey, and Donnie all teased their brother.
"Yeah, Yeah. You're all just jealous." Raph said with a hint of a smile. He allowed Holly to go ahead of him and shut the door behind himself.
"I wish he weren't quite so accurate." Donnie said thinking of April.
"Don't worry Donnie, he'll mess it all up soon enough." Leo said jokingly.
"I dunno'," Mikey chimed in, "he's like, being a nicer person. I think he really likes her?"
"You know we can hear you, right?" Raphs' angry voice came through his door, followed by a bark of Holly's laughter.
The others laughed and all turned in themselves.
Holly sat on the end of his bed and crossed her legs. Spike was in his glass terrarium, but was trying to climb the walls to get to Raph.
"Alright buddy, I missed you too." Raph said and picked up his pet.
"Didn't you see him earlier?" Holly asked. There had been a few hours between them getting back from the cabin and she and April showing up.
"Yeah, but I only got to change his water and throw a couple of fresh snacks in for him." Raph said and sat on his bed opposite her. He plopped Spike down between them and Spike started walking around stretching his legs. Holly scratched him on the head, and he started making his was over to her.
"He likes you." Raph said, and Spike began to climb over her leg.
"I like him too, he's got quite the personality." She said as Spike toppled into her lap, she picked him up gently and set him back on his feet to continue his exploration.
They said for a while, feeding Spike lettuce scraps that Raph brought in from the kitchen. When Holly finally did start to show signs of getting tired, Raph picked Spike up and put him back in his glass container.
"I'll go sleep on the couch, you've earned a good nights sleep." Raph said and started towards his door.
"I don't want to take your bed," Holly said, and he turned around to see she was pink in the cheeks, "I'd much rather share it."
Raph blinked at her, "You want to what?"
"Its been an emotional day, I was hoping I could stay with you tonight." Holly said, "But, if you're not comfortable with that, I can understand."
"No! No, its fine." Raph protested a little more enthusiastically than he meant to. "There's not going to be a ton of space though."
"I'm sure we'll manage." Holly said with a grin. She took off her outer shirt and set it off to the side of the room, her tank top rode up a little.
Raph turned away, and began removing his pads and wraps. Holly climbed into his bed first, and squeezed over as far as she could so that he could climb in too. After a little shuffling, Raph put his arm around her shoulders and she rested her head on his plastron. She let out a little giggle, as she realized her legs were about a foot further down the bed than his were.
"What?" He asked.
"I think I may be too long for your bed." She wiggled her toes at him.
"That sounds like a you problem." he said, but kicked the covers a little further down the bed for her. He turned off his light and they lay quietly in the dark for a time. Holly could feel his heart beating against her cheek and Raph felt her shoulders relaxing under his touch.
"Next time we'll have to sleep in my bed." She said absently
"Next time?" He asked and looked at her, but her eyes were closed and her breathing was getting deeper.
"Mm-hm," She confirmed for him.
Some time later, Holly was rudely woken up by her phone ringing. She didn't open her eyes, but fumbled around behind herself until she found it on the side table.
"Hello?" She answered softly.
"Hi honey, did I wake you up?" Stacey was on the other end of the line.
"Yeah, last night was a late one." She confirmed.
"I won't keep you then, I just wanted to let you know I will be flying out later today and I love you."
"Who is it?" Raph asked groggily.
"Mom." Holly answered him,
"Oh, Raph is there?" Stacey said a little grin in her voice. "Tell him I say 'Hi'."
"I will, have a safe flight and I love you too."
"I'll be back in a few days, but I'll text you all this in case you forget." Stacey shook her head to herself.
"I won't forget." Holly protested weakly, but she was already falling asleep again,
"Yeah, OK. Take care of my girl Raphael, or you'll have to answer to me."
"Mmm 'kay" Raph said blearily.
Stacey ended the call, and Holly dropped her phone back on to the side table.
"You can stay here with me until she gets back." Raph said and pulled Holly closer.
"Sounds good to me." Holly said, she threw one of her legs over his and snuggled back into his shoulder.
They slept late together. Leonardo had snuck a peek into Raphs room to find out where they were, but closed the door again when he saw them both still sleeping. Neither Mikey or Donnie seemed to notice that one of them wasn't out on the couches, so he didn't bring it up. Splinter however flicked his eyes around the room, noticed the missing teen, and raised an eyebrow at his oldest son. They shared a knowing smile, before Splinter went back to his own room.
"I wonder what April is doing?" Donnie asked absently as he drew up some more design plans.
"Probably looking after her dad." Leo replied. "He was pretty shaken yesterday."
"Wouldn't you be? If you had been a captive of the Krang for a year?" Mikey asked them both.
"They wouldn't be able to keep us captive." Leo scoffed smugly.
"No, but Kirby is only human." Mikey pointed out. "He's not smart like Donnie, or super slick, like yours truly." He gestured at himself.
"That's actually a good point, except you're not 'slick'" Donnie said and smiled to himself.
"Slicker than you." Mikey replied wittily.
Donnie frowned, affronted.
"You started it." Leo shrugged at Donnie.
"What are we going to do today?" Mikey asked dancing around the room.
"Well, once Raph wakes up, we should do some training." Leo said.
"Where is he?" Donnie asked looking around, "Wait, where is Holly?"
"Ahh," Leo said wide eyed, realizing too late that he should have kept his mouth shut.
"Where are they?" Mikey asked, a sadistic smile crossing his face.
Leo didn't say anything, he just looked between his brothers wide eyed as they both began grinning deviously at each other.
"Oh, this is gold." Mikey said and scrambled as fast as he could over to Raphs door. Donnie was right behind him and had to shush Mikey who was giggling uncontrollably as they pressed the sides of their heads to the door.
"Do you hear anything?" Donnie whispered.
"Guys, get out of there." Leo hissed at them.
"No, maybe they're still sleeping." Mikey whispered back, ignoring Leo.
"How could he possibly sleep? His girlfriend is in his bed with him." Donnie hissed incredulously.
"I dunno," Mikey shrugged.
"I barely slept when I was in the same room as April." Donnie complained miserably.
"Wait, wait! I think I hear something" Mikey hissed, and both he and Donnie leaned into the door to try to hear anything.
"I hear movement, but not much else." Donnie agreed.
"No, I heard someone speak." Mikey said.
"And you couldn't tell who it was?" Donnie asked scathingly.
"No they were whispering." Mikey said as if it were obvious.
"Pretty sure I could tell if it was Raph or Holly, even if they were whispering." Donnie replied tartly.
The door swung open fast on them, and they both fell face first through the gap and landed in a heap on the floor.
"Are you pervs quite done spying?" Holly said from above them. Raph stood behind her, arms crossed and smiling nastily at his brothers. "Or are we going to have a problem here?"
Mikey and Donnie both smiled guiltily up at her. "We weren't spying." Mikey said.
"Technically, we were just... eavesdropping." Donnie admitted.
"Regardless of what you were doing," Holly said, eyebrow raised at Donnie who should know better. "How would you like it if we listened in on you and April?"
"Yep, that's totally fair." Donnie immediately apologized.
"I would spy on them too." Mikey admitted unapologetically.
"You know, I believe that, so I'm not going to hold it against you." Holly smiled down at Mikey, "But I don't think he's going to be as forgiving." She indicated at Raph behind her with a thumb, and stepped over the two so she could get out of the way.
"Oh no." Mikey said and backpedaled out of Raphs room as fast as he could.
"This is going to hurt." Donnie said, and he tried to pull Mikey back so that there was someone between himself and Raph.
"Oh, yeah!" Raph concurred, and launched himself at his brother. They all tumbled and wrestled around the room, limbs flailing in a desperate attempt to escape.
"Ow!" Mikeys voice came through.
"Not the face!" Donnie shrieked as the pile of Turtles rolled past Holly and Leo in the kitchen.
"So, how'd you sleep?" Leo asked.
"Fine, thank you." Holly answered, setting the coffee on to brew. "Although, mom called earlier and she's probably already on a plain to Europe. So that kind of sucks."
"Why is she always jetting off like that?" Leo asked.
"She's a fashion designer," Holly said unenthusiastically, "there's always some disaster or other going on with either the clothes, or the models, or god knows what. Personally, I don't get it, I have never really been into clothes and makeup and all that stuff. It's too much work."
"Don't you have a closet full of dresses and stuff?" Leo asked, remembering Holly's room.
"Yeah," Holly replied a little sheepishly. "My mom used to make me model for her in local shows when she was first starting out. Most of them don't fit anymore, but she won't let me get rid of any of it so it hangs in my closet."
"So what are you going to do until your mom gets back? You are welcome to stay here if you like, although I can't imagine sharing Raph's bed is all that comfortable." Leo remarked. The ball of limbs rolled by them again.
"Well, I was actually going to go see April in a bit. To make sure Kirby is OK and see if they need anything." Holly said. "After that I may go home for some peace." They both looked at the wrestling match that was going on. Raph had Donnie pinned to the floor while he wrestled with a struggling Mikey. "That's probably enough for them, don't you think?" She asked Raph.
"Almost." He replied and two simultaneous 'Owwws' came from the floor, and he let his brothers go.
"How do you do that?" Leo asked Holly and shook his head.
She scoffed, and poured herself and Raph coffee, "Please, if you can't figure that one out, you really are sheltered." She handed a mug to Raph before turning to see Mikey and Donnie still laying on the floor slightly dazed, "So, what did we learn?"
"No to eavesdrop." Donnie moaned,
"Good, and you?" She directed at Mikey.
"To be sneakier." He groaned.
"Close enough." Holly said, and she and Raph clinked their mugs together satisfied.
April had barely slept after they had dropped her and her father off the previous night. She had been convinced that the Krang were going to bust into the place and take him away again at any second. The only way she had gotten any rest was to sleep on the couch so she could listen to him mumbling to himself in his sleep. Apparently he too, was worried about the Krang coming back for him. When Holly called and asked if April wanted some company, she was all too happy to have someone else to take her mind off things for a while.
Carol was still pushing for Kirby to go to the police. Although she could only argue that point to April as Kirby was still sleeping fitfully by the afternoon.
Holly arrived with a bag full of groceries for April and her family. She had picked up a pre-cooked chicken, some mashed potatoes and baked veggies, along with a few snacks and drinks to make sure that they had a quick, hot dinner so that no one had to cook. April immediately began eating eating the potatoes right from the container as Carol carved the chicken.
"Would you at least put it on a plate?" Carol asked as April pulled a huge spoonful of potatoes out of the Styrofoam cup.
"Sorry," April said through a mouthful, and grabbed a plate.
"Did you guys get any sleep last night?" Holly asked them, they both seemed irritable.
"A little." Replied Carol.
"Not really." said April. "Evert time I closed my eyes I would dream the Krang was coming to get us."
"I can imagine." Holly agreed, "But, you know that if you really needed some peace of mind, they guys would come and keep an eye on you?"
"I know, but I'm not going to ask them to do that." April said, "We should be fine for a while."
"What do you mean, 'should be'?" Carol asked, concerned suddenly.
"Well, their ship is trashed, and now so is their other base, so hopefully they'll be too worried about rebuilding to come after us." April said.
"What do you mean by that?!" Carol asked, more concerned.
April and Holly shared a grimace that they has spoken a little too freely around Carol. She still wasn't completely convinced of all the stories April was telling her, especially since she had been lying about a lot of things over the last few months.
"I am sure that you're all going to be just fine." Holly tried to reassure them both.
Carol made a noise that suggested she didn't believe a word either of them was saying, but dropped it for now. There was still things she didn't fully understand, and pushing the issue would only push the girls to tell her less.
"What about you and the guys, did you have a nice evening after you dropped us off?" April asked.
"Yes." Holly said, trying to sound indifferent. Her pinkening cheeks gave her away though.
"Ooh! Go on, what happened?" April asked, glad of the distraction.
"Nothing really. We ate some food, filled splinter in on everything. You know, the usual." Holly's pitch began increasing uncontrollably.
April laughed at Holly, "You know if you don't tell me, D will?"
"Fine, Raph and I slept together." Holly sped through the sentence.
"You what?" April almost choked on her mashed potatoes.
"Not like that!" Holly's eyes went wide as she realized what she had said. "We shared a bed. We shared his bed."
The teens giggled as April tried to get as many details out of Holly as she could. It felt like a month since they been up at the cabin, even though it had only been a few hours in reality. April was glad her dad was back, but he was not the same man she had lost a year ago. Carol just shook her head, she remembered what it was like being a teenager. Holly helped Carol to plate up some food for Kirby before putting away the leftovers.
April knocked on Kirby's door, "Dad?" There was no answer, so she opened the door a crack. "Dad, are you awake?"
"Just about." Kirby's voice came back to her.
"Are you hungry? Holly brought over some food for us all."
"Sure, I could eat." He said sounding better. April entered the room and sat on the end of the bed. Kirby was sat up in one of his old t-shirts that Carol had boxed up in her office. His eyes were softer than they had been last night, and some of the tension seemed to be out of his shoulders. He took the plate from her and took a small bite of the chicken.
"Are you alright?" April asked hopefully.
"I am a little better today. Yesterday was incredibly stressful, and I am still trying to process everything that happened." He took another small bite and chewed it slowly.
"Understandable." April said.
"I don't think we can stay here much longer though." Kirby said looking sadly at his daughter.
"Of course not. Aunt Carol should get her home to herself again." April agreed happily.
"No, I mean in New York." Kirby corrected her quickly. Aprils face dropped. "This city is overrun with the Krang and they're not going to stop coming after us."
"We can't leave!" April protested loudly. "That's just letting them win."
"It's not letting them win. Not getting caught again, stops them from winning." Kirby said.
"All it would do is slow them down." April stood angrily from the bed. "Fighting back is how we stop them from winning."
"April, you and your friends can't stop them on your own. The military is the one's who need to take care of this." Kirby tried to reason with his daughter.
"The military didn't stop the Technodrome, the military didn't break you out of TCRI Tower. Me and my friends did that." April was shouting now. "We've been the only ones doing anything about all of this."
"I'm not saying you haven't done amazing things. But I cannot risk your safety, or my own, over this any longer." Kirby replied wearily.
"I'm not going anywhere. The only people who can help us are here, and no one is going to understand what we have been through better than them." April pleaded.
"Nothing has to happen right now," Kirby said gently, "But this is something you should start planning for."
April bit her tongue and she turned and ran out of the room. She burst back out into the main room of the apartment and walked straight past Holly and Carol who were in the kitchen doing the dishes together.
"April?" Carol asked. But she didn't slow down.
"April, wait!" Holly called after her. She hastily dried her hands and went after her friend, "I'll keep an eye on her!" She shouted back at Carol as she raced to catch up to April who had bolted from the apartment.
"Be careful." Carol said into the empty apartment, more for her own peace of mind.
April stormed into the street breathing heavily. She wasn't going anywhere. Just because her dad was scared didn't mean she was. She stood in the cold evening air, her breath misting out in front of her.
"April, whats going on?" Holly asked catching up.
"My dad wants to move us out of the city. He seems to think that we'll be safer somewhere else." April said angrily.
"OK?" Holly replied, her brain trying to process this information. "Did he say what exactly his plan is?"
"No," admitted April, "Just that I should start preparing for it."
"Well, he is probably pretty scared right now." Holly tried to calm her friend down, "He has been held captive for a year, and you broke in with a group of mutant turtles to rescue him. He is going to need some time to come to terms with it, and its not like he can do anything right now. He'll have to get a job, and line up somewhere to live. All that takes time, and chances are you can convince him that you would be just as safe, and much happier, here."
April shook her head, "I don't know, Its just so unfair. I have been taking care of myself for the last year and he suddenly decides that I can't do that anymore."
Holly frowned at her friend, "I seriously doubt that's where his motivation is coming from."
"He still thinks I'm a little kid." April shouted indignantly.
"Well, maybe if you stopped acting like one, he'd stop treating you like one." Holly snapped back loosing her cool.
"Excuse me?" April asked furiously.
"Look. Your dad, literally just got home from being gone for a year, and you're throwing a tantrum at the mere suggestion that he wants to leave." Holly stood her ground, "My mom talked about moving for a month after she was kidnapped, but we're still here. How can you not give your dad the benefit of the doubt that he will take your wants into consideration?"
"I don't have to take this, you're supposed to be my friend!" April said.
"Friends don't just agree with each other blindly. Real friends tell each other when they're acting like a brat." Holly said, April turned on her heel and stormed off. "I could tell you what you're really being?" Holly muttered to herself and headed home.
April hadn't grabbed a coat before leaving her aunts house, and the temperature was dropping with as the sun sank behind the buildings of the New York city skyline. She shivered and headed for the closest man hole cover. Being underground would at least protect her from the wind, and Donnie would certainly hear her grievances without calling her names. April pulled up Donnies' number on her phone.
"Hello?" He answered almost immediately.
"You won't believe what Holly just said to me." April launched into her story.
At the lair, Donnie was in his lab when April called. He was lying on his bed in his room for once relaxing after their training exercises. He had been browsing the web when Aprils call came through. He had been ecstatic to see her name and custom image come up on his phone, but once she started talking, his pleasure had all but evaporated. April and Holly had just had an argument, and she was looking for some validation for her fury.
"What happened? Start from the beginning." Donnie said, and ran over to his door, he ripped it open and frantically searched for Raph. Donnie muted himself, so April wouldn't hear him. "Raph!"
Raphael was playing the pinball machine on the other side of the room, he turned at the sound of his name and saw Donnie frantically waving at him to come over. "What?" He shouted
"Just, get over here." Donnie hissed, and Raph rolled his eyes and walked lazily over to his brother.
"What?" He repeated.
"April and Holly had a fight." Donnie said.
"So?" Raph replied, hearing Aprils voice coming from the phone in Donnies' hand.
"So? What do Ido?" Donnie asked frantically.
"I don't really care." Raph said annoyance on his face. "What ever happened, happened between them. Let them figure it out."
"April wants me to agree with her, should I?" Donnie hissed.
"Why are you asking me? I don't want to be involved." Raph said callously.
"What if Holly calls you?" Donnie asked.
"I'll tell her the same thing I just told you." Raph said and he turned and walked away, irritated that he had been pulled this far into the drama.
"Are you listening to me?" Aprils voice cut through Donatello's thoughts.
He quickly unmuted himself, "Yes, of course. It's all just a lot to take in." He lied, and went back into his own room.
Raph went back to the pinball machine, after he played a couple more rounds, and he was sure Donnie wasn't lurking around anywhere. He shot Holly a quick text. 'Heard about the fight. You OK?'
Three little dancing balls appeared in his chat window. 'Yeah, It'll be fine.' was Holly's response. The tree balls reappeared. 'I had a feeling she would drag Donnie into this.'
'He is her little puppy dog.' Raph sent back with a chuckle.
'She's just mad at the situation. Don't worry about it.' Holly replied.
'I am here if you need me' Raph sent.
"Ooh, are you texting with Holly? I see those doe-eyes you're making at your phone." Mikey said sliding up to the side of the pinball machine.
"I'll show you my fists if you don't quit it." Raph threatened, but he let Mikey get away with a few jibes at his expense as he played another round of Pinball.