Chapter 8 - "Did you or did you not take the movie?"
Far down in the sewers, a certain mutant turtle got dressed in his very own sub-car. He had just gotten out of the shower and put on his pads, and he was now tying his red bandanna around his head, his dark brown eyes peering out of the two holes. When finished, he left his room for a different carriage, where the tired voices of his brothers could be heard. The turtle stepped inside the sub-car and walked straight up the coffee machine, bringing the coffee-pot with him as he sat down next to his blue masked sibling.
"Good morning, my son," Splinter greeted as the final family member took his seat at the breakfast table. "I hope you do not mind we started without you."
"Can't say I do," Raphael answered, pouring steaming coffee into his cup. "Though it woulda' been nice of ya ta leave somethin'," he added, after scanning the not-so-full kitchen table. He glanced at Michelangelo from across the table when putting down the coffee-pot on a coaster.
"What?" Mike exclaimed innocently. "Don't look at me! I didn't eat it."
"Right..." Raph said sarcastically. "Juz like ye didn't use up all the hot water." He painfully remembered the freezing shower a few minutes ago.
"I knew that was you," Leo cried, while pointing at the turtle in orange.
"Yeah okay, so that was me," Mike surrendered. "But I swear I didn't eat your breakfast."
Raphael snorted at the comment, obviously not convinced.
"He's telling the truth," Leo stepped up and protected his little brother, even though they still weren't speaking to each other since the battle of the TV. But the eldest turtle felt responsible to stand up for justice. "None of us ate your breakfast," he continued, earning a puzzled look from Raph. "There wasn't much food when we got here in the first place," Leo finished, turning to look at this morning's chef. The rest of the family followed, staring at the purple masked turtle as he stirred his coffee in an attempt to ignore them.
"What?" Donatello finally squeaked, not being able to deal with the gawking. "There's plenty of food for you to eat. It's not like you'll starve."
Raphael held up a thin slice of bread, a critical look on his face. "Ya could've at least given us somethin' ta put on these crackers."
Don quickly scanned the table for something of that kind. "There's butter," he said, pointing at the package.
"Careful, Donnie," Mike said, rubbing his empty stomach. "Ya might spoil me."
Donatello frowned at the comment and returned to his coffee.
"Honestly, Don. What happened to all the food?" Leonardo asked, setting his cup of tea down in front of him. "I mean, I know we're running out of supplies, but it's not this bad."
"What?" Don said, a little ticked. "Just because I'm not serving you in bed - you complain?"
"Course he is," Mikey jumped in. "We miss the eggs and the bacon... and the cereal... oooh! And the oatmeal. And I remember that cheese I used to put on my sandwich. That was some sweet cheese..." he rambled, getting lost in the memories of past meals.
Leo rolled his eyes at his youngest brother and decided to ignore him. "Point is," he turned to Donatello. "I think you've gotten lazy."
"What?" Don said, as if he had never heard anything as ridiculous before. "I'm anything but lazy. Do you know how long it took me to write the supply list yesterday?" He was met with non impressed faces. "And do you have any idea how far it is to the dump?"
Splinter smiled carefully, as he recognized himself in his son, being as he too had took the trip to the city dump - and it was no picnic. "We appreciate everything you do, my son," he told him, before looking at the rest of his children. "What all of you do. I myself, if anyone, understand the hard work behind it."
The turtles suddenly felt very guilty for arguing about their chores, when Splinter usually did them all by himself. "I'm sorry, master," Leo apologized, lowering his head in respect.
"There is no need to apologize, Leonardo," Splinter turned to his oldest. "I only hope you understand the hard work behind your chores."
"We do," Mike guaranteed, hoping this was some sort of since-you've-seemed-to-learned-your-lesson-I'll-let-you-off-the-hook speech. All four turtles looked at their father with great anticipation, waiting for his answer.
"I am very pleased to hear that," the rat said, and then went back to eating his sandwich.
The four siblings looked in between each other and their father, as if checking to see if they were all seeing the same thing. Since it seemed they were, it became very obvious that the conversation was over, and that in spite of their hard work and sympathy for their master, the chores still applied to them.
Therefor, they too returned to their breakfast and continued to eat in silence, each turtle a little less happier than before they entered the kitchen.
Sometime after breakfast, Donatello headed towards the kitchen to pour himself a glass of water, since that was pretty much all they had right now. But he saw something that made him stop in the doorway and carefully peeked inside to observe his brother.
Michelangelo was busy emptying the litter box in the trash bin, and with his back turned to the doorway he failed to notice Don's shocked expression. When Mike was done he threw some tissues over the sand to cover his tracks and closed the cabinet. Only when turning around did he realize that he had been busted.
"What do you think you're doing?" Donnie asked, his arms crossed over his chest.
"Um... I uh... well, it depends on how long you've been standing there," Mikey answered with a cheesy smile.
"Long enough to know why I have to clean out the trash every other day," Don said, not moving so mush as a muscle.
"Well, okay..." Mike mumbled, while trying to come up with a logical explanation. "Then you should know that this was a one time thing - and that I've never ever done it before." He looked at his brother with a creepy smile, one that of course was fake.
"Mikey.." Don sighed, while walking up to the cabinet. "It's not like walking back and forth to the dump is my favorite part of the day, because if that's what you think, then I can tell you it's not."
"C'mon, Donnie," Mike happily encouraged. "Knowing you, you probably find tons of gadgets to tinker with." He playfully nudged his brother with his elbow.
"That's the junk yard - not the city dump," Don strictly pointed out.
"Oh," Mikey realized, his smile shrinking fast.
"You know what," Donatello said and pushed his brother aside and opened the cabinet. "Just get out of my way." He grabbed the bag and brought it out of the trash bin, while the younger turtle shamefully watched from behind him.
"Look, man, I'm sorry," Mike truthfully apologized. "I won't do it again."
"Sure.." Donnie mumbled while closing the cupboard, clearly not convinced of his little brother's promise.
"No, really," Mike spoke up. "I'll do my own cleaning from now on."
Donatello turned around to look at his brother, not showing any signs of believing in him.
"Really," Mikey assured him, a small smile pulling at the corner of his mouth.
Donatello had a hard time to be angry with his little brother and fought with his conscience to stay mad, until he finally couldn't take it any more. A deep sigh escaped his throat. "You swear?"
"Till death do us part," Mike said, drawing an invisible cross on his plastron.
"Look, I don't wanna marry you, I just want you to tell the truth," Don said, his voice holding a little less anger than before.
"I do-- I mean, I am," Mikey quickly corrected himself, after accidentally giving wedding vows. "..telling the truth, that is."
Donnie stared at his little brother for a moment, doing a quick lie detector test, but it seemed like he came out clean. He nodded at his brother in approval before walking past him to get rid of the trash.
Mike felt relieved that he seemed to get along with at least one brother and soon left the kitchen. He walked out into the living room, which for once was empty. He glanced inside the bathroom sub-car, where Leo was filling up a bucket with water to start wiping the floors. To Mikey this meant that he got to watch something else besides 'Band of brothers.' He sat down on the couch with the remote ready in his hand, channel surfing for a couple of minutes before he decided to watch an old episode of 'Fresh Prince.'
Half way into the episode Leonardo walked past him to wipe inside the kitchen, which unfortunately meant the there wouldn't be much longer till he was done with his chores. So to secure his spot in front of the TV Mike walked up to the book shelf and grabbed the infamous 'Band of brothers' box. He quickly looked around himself to make sure no witnesses were around, before he took off with the movie towards Raphael's room.
Leonardo dipped the mop in the bucket before returning to swabbing the kitchen floor, which was always the filthiest in the mutant household. Especially around Michelangelo's chair for some reason. Although today there wasn't much, only a few crumbs, due to the poor breakfast Donnie cooked for them earlier. But then as he moved on to Raphael's chair, there was old coffee stuck to the floor. Leo traced the puddle up along the leg of the kitchen table, stopping by the edge of the surface.
Looks like Donnie cheated, Leo thought to himself, referring to his brother's cleaning up after breakfast.
He sighed swiftly before walking up to the chair to wipe the floor clean. But as the spot wouldn't vanish Leo stated scrubbing harder, his arms tensing in frustration. But it didn't matter how hard he scrubbed, because the coffee stain was still there, so Leo used the other end of the mop to try and scrape the stain away with the plastic edge of the swab, nonetheless it persistently remained stuck to the floor.
Leonardo dropped the mop in irritation and walked up to one of the kitchen drawers. It practically flew open with the immense force of his pull and the silverware inside it clattered and mixed up together, forks landing among the spoons and so on. He quickly grabbed a fork and went back to the immortal stain by Raphael's chair, not knowing who he was most angry with; Raph for spilling it or Don for not cleaning it up.
He bent down on his hands and knees and stared carving it off with the fork, pleased to see that it was actually working. Unfortunately as the coffee came off, so did some of the floor, or at least the paint it was painted with. Which was actually ironic, because the kitchen was the only sub-car with intact floor, or at least it had been up until now.
During his panic he began gathering up the yellow pieces of paint with his hands and collected them in his left palm. He swiftly looked around the kitchen for a place to dump them without anyone being able to trace the clues back to him. He rushed up to the sink and washed them down the drain with hot water. He turned around and looked at the palm sized hole in their floor, his breathing beginning to hyperventilate.
Michelangelo hastily knocked on the sub-car wall before stepping through the open doors.
"What do ya want?" Raph asked with an irritated tone of voice as the youngest turtle appeared in his room.
"Nothing," Mike said. "Juz hang out with my favorite brother." He walked up to Raph where he sat on his mattress and sorted out his CD's, putting them back in their cases, or at least the ones that still had them left. Because like most of the stuff in the temperamental ninja's room - they were broken.
Raph snorted at the comment, still not looking up from the disc in his hands. "I'd appreciate it if ye took yer head outta my ass and cut to the chase."
"What?" Mike asked innocently. "I don't need a reason to spend time with my brother, do I?"
"Any other guy - sure. But you..." Raph trailed off, not needing to say anything else.
"What, I juz came in here to see what you're doing," Mike insisted, while glancing around the room for a place to hide the 'Band of brothers' box.
"Fine," Raph said and looked up at Mike, who instantly turned to look at him while trying to appear casual. "I'm cleaning - get out."
"What?" Mikey smiled and walked up to stand in front of his older sibling. "You don't need any help with the CD's? Cuz I'm the best there is in the 'sorting out piles of unlabeled CD's' market."
"How can ya, when most of the ones in yer room are mine?" Raph countered, a cynical look on his face.
"You're free to take 'em any day," Mikey offered with a big smile, while hiding the movie box behind his shell.
"Alright," Raphael said and rose to his feet. "An' juz so ye know, I'll kill ya if ye touch anythin'."
"Pinky swear," Mikey promised and held up a curved finger.
Raph only grunted and walked past him to reclaim what Mike had unofficially stolen.
The second the red masked turtle was out of view Mike bent down and started rummaging through the pile of already sorted out CD's. He quickly picked out five cases of home-made music and opened them on the bed in front of him. He then folded up the DVD box he'd carried with him and removed the 'Band of brothers' discs to place each of them in Raph's CD cases, underneath the resident CD's of course. He then quickly shut them closed and put them back in the pile Raph had heaped up on the floor by his bed.
Just as he had returned to his position on the floor, with the now empty DVD box behind his back, Raphael returned with a bunch of CD's in his hands. He stopped in the doorway to quickly inspect his room for any changes and finally settled with his eyes on Mikey.
"I didn't touch a thing," Mike said, feeling slightly uncomfortable with the stare his older brother gave him. However he handled it quite well and didn't give himself away. "You wanna check the room for fingerprints?" he asked as Raph wouldn't stop glaring at him.
Raph decided to believe his little brother and walked over to his mattress where he sat back down to sort out the rest of the CD's, ignoring Mike while doing so.
"You sure you don't need any help?" Mikey asked after a moment of silence.
Raphael looked up at the orange clad turtle, his eyes telling him to back off.
"Okay.." Mike mumbled and backed out of the room, making sure Raph couldn't see the DVD box he hid behind him.
When back in the living room, Mike set off the Donatello's room to hide the rest of the loot.
Donatello was a couple of minutes away from the lair, ankle deep insewage water. He certainly didn't feel like walking the long strode to the dump and as he spotted an old sandwich floating by, he was hit with an idea. Maybe it wasn't one of his best, but it definitely made his trash chore a little less depressing.
He turned left at the nearest tunnel and put down the garbage bag on the dry cement surafece adjoined to the water. He then quickly turned to leave as a part of him forced him to turn around and look at the trash he'd left behind. He heard Splinter's voice in his head, telling him that the hard way was always the right way. But another, much lazier part of himself, pushed the thought into the far corner of his mind and pulled him away from the crime scene. Instead he headed off to his favorite place: the junk yard.
As Mikey was finished with hiding the DVD box and returned to the living room to watch some dearly missed TV, he found the object already occupied by someone else.
"Master Splinter?" he questioned in surprise at the sight of the old rat in his chair with the remote gripped in his right hand.
"Yes.." Splinter mumbled while staring intensely at the television screen.
"What're you watchin'?" Michelangelo walked up to the couch to get a better view at the TV.
" 'Days of our lives', " the rat answered, never taking his eyes off the TV.
Mikey sighed deeply as he sank down onto the couch, cursing at himself for forgetting about the soap opera his father watched on a daily basis.
Leonardo came out of the bathroom after having finished cleaning the lair. He quickly noticed the show Splinter was watching and walked up to have a seat next to Mikey. "How long've you been watching, master?" he asked, while making himself comfortable on the couch.
"A couple of minutes," Splinter answered. "Stefano is just about to admit to his adopted sister that he impregnated her with their dead stepfather's semen."
"But I thought it turned out he wasn't dead?" Leo wondered, looking from the TV to his sensei.
"No, that was his evil twin brother," Splinter explained, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
"Oh," Leo nodded in understanding, completely lost in the dysfunctional world of daytime television. Then they both returned their attention to the TV.
Mike only rolled his eyes and got up from the couch to do something a little less depressing.
Donatello sat by the desk in his room, working on a small TV set he found in the junkyard. It was pretty much intact, apart from some wires inside of it that needed replacement. His concentration was however broken as the frustrated voice of Leonardo ripped through their home.
Don rose from his chair and left to check out what was going down in the living room, where Leo stumbled around searching for something. "I know you took it, Mikey," he accused his younger brother who was standing by the couch and watching. "So tell me where you hid it!"
"C'mon, Leo.." Mike said, moving out of the way as Leo lifted the couch cushions to look underneath them. "Don't ya think you're being a bit paranoid?"
The blue masked turtle looked up from the couch, irritation playing on his features. "You turned my room into a war zone for Pete's sake!"
Mikey chuckled at Leo's attempt to transform his anger into words. "Pete's sake?" he repeated with a grin. "Dude, honestly.."
"Not now, Mikey," Leo threatened with gritted teeth. "Where issit?"
"What's going on?" Donnie asked as he walked up to his two brothers.
"Mike hid 'Band of brothers'," Leo answered and rose to his feet.
Don looked from Leo's stern features to Mikey, who did his best to hold back a smile. "Did you?" Donatello asked, trying to read Mike's body language.
"No," the youngest insisted. "What? Juz cuz his stupid movie's gone missing you immediately think it's me?" He pointed to himself with his right hand.
"Well, you did dump Klunk's number two's on his bed," Don reasoned, earning an enthusiastic nod from Leo.
"Only cuz you got me drunk," Mikey reminded his two siblings.
"Maybe we wouldn't've, had you treated us a little better for morning practice," Leo argued, angrily stepping closer to Michelangelo.
Don got in between the two and broke them up, pushing them aside with a hand on teach turtle. "Okay-okay. Both very good points," he said, trying to cool them off. "But let's not get ourselves carried away here."
"He started it," Mikey muttered, pointing to the oldest turtle, who's eye ridges shot up in response.
"Mike," Donnie turned to the shorter turtle, his eyes telling him to shut up. "Did you or did you not take the movie?"
"I totally didn't," Michelangelo answered, ignoring the outrageous look Leonardo sent him.
"You lying little prick," Leo grabbed after Mikey, Don stopping him with both arms.
"Leo, he said he didn't do it," the purple masked turtle told his oldest brother.
"Right. Just like he didn't break my airplane model," Leo added, glaring at the guilty.
"I was six!" Mikey defended himself, getting tired of his brother bringing that up every time he did something wrong.
"You still did it on purpose!" Leonardo angrily pointed out.
"I give up," Donnie sighed and collapsed onto the couch, rubbing his temples to rid himself of the headache that just arrived. Of course, Leo and Mike didn't notice that their brother withdrew himself from the argument as they focused on bickering with each other.
Splinter, who had retreated to the kitchen with a cup of tea, had heard the entire argument and he had hoped Donatello's brave attempt to silent them would have worked. But his sons' voices were louder than ever so Splinter did the only thing left to do and left the kitchen for his room. As he strode behind his children in the living room, Michelangelo took a break in his bickering and turned to him.
"Where you going, sensei?" he asked, a look of worry on his face.
The other two turtles turned to look at their father as they realized he was in the same room. Donatello had a tired look on his face, as if hoping the old rat would be able to help, while Leo seemed to be ashamed that his master had heard him lose his temper and yell at his brother.
"I thought I would meditate for a while," Splinter answered while looking at his sons. "Let me know when dinner is ready." He then grabbed a stronger hold of his wooden cane and fled into the safety of his sub-car, where neither of his sons could ask him to choose sides.
When Splinter was gone, it seemed the argument was too. Both Leonardo and Mikey stood staring at Splinter's closed door, while Donnie simply enjoyed the silence he'd been blessed with.
"He's been doin' that a lot lately," Mike realized and turned to Leo. "Hasn't he?"
Splinter sat down on the rug he'd positioned in the centre of room. He placed his cup of tea next to him and crossed his legs to begin another session of 'closing his noisy sons outside.' But just as he was about to close his eyes he noticed something in the corner of his right eye.
The Ficus in the far corner looked rather... dead, or at least on the verge of it. Then as Splinter checked the rest of the plants in his room he noticed they too were suffering from the same syndrome. The 'Michelangelo gave me too much water' syndrome, and now they were simply suffering the consequence of it.
The old rat realized he had to bring out heavier stuff for this meditation session, if he was going to be able to relax. So he got up from the floor and walked up to his closet, where he kept most of his belongings. There, a lonely candle resided on one of the shelves. Not too long ago the shelves had been stuffed with candles, given to him on various father's days and Christmas presents. But it seemed like his children cleaning their home equalled in himself using up his candle supply.
There are downsides to everything, Splinter calmly reminded himself. Although it seemed this particular situation had more than just one side-effect.
BTW: I know nothing about 'Days of our lives.' I do know there is a guy called Stefano, but that's pretty much all I know. I made up everything else, so if you're big fans of the show, please don't yell at me for getting it completely wrong. Adios!