And then there was one...

Down in the sewers deep under the city, there is an old abandoned basement under the old warehouses that nobody owns and nobody cares about this part of the city anyway. This was the part where the poor gathered and the new immigrants banded together tocreate mini-Greeces and mini-Lebanons. Each group carving out their own little corner in the vast world that was New York.

A shadow creeps in the now miltdly lit sewer-ways, tracing a path silently through the underground network, his movements guided by the many years he had previously spent here. He continues to make his way amid mixed emotions. A return to your childhood home was always bound to cause emotions, adding to this the difference in age and number. He didn't know whether he should dread this moment or be impatient for it.

He stops at the familiar entrance. Upon entering, he heaves a sigh of relief. Everything was just as they had been left but were now older and in appearance and dust had collected on them. Memories that had been untouched by the sands of time, began playing before his eyes. "Master Splinter would havesat here." He said to himself as he passes Splinter's corner. The memories kept coming like videos for which there was no remote control. He could see the present room and the room of his memories simultaneously but he knew that these memories would have to remain as just memories in the purest sense of the word.

He was often laughed at by his brothers for being the sentimental one and was often jokingly refered to as the most emotionally unstable of the four. However on this particular occasion, he was surprised to find that he did not feel the urge to cry. Where once this was a place of warmth and security, it was now just a cold reminder of a time longago. A time that could never return. A time that had elapsed through a series of misfortunate events:

A calling by fate for their master to seek revenge, which eventually killed him;

Their untimely aquaintence with the national news crewduring one of their adventures;

The following national hysteria and interest in them and the many projectsthat followed from there;

Their seperation fora numberyears before a reunion told them that their eldest had passed on;

The rumble with the authorities that had claimed the life of Raphael and the eventual support that they got from some of the more sympathetic members of the public;

The landmark courtcase in which Donatello managed to secure humanitarian rights for the;

Don's eventual illness and death at the hospital;

His reunion with April and Casey whom had both married (not to each other);

And finally his return to their childhood home;

In the space of less than a decade, the public grew from curiosity and immense interest in the turtles, to loathing and hating them, to a re-awakening from which sympathy could flow, to a sort of acceptance of them, and finally, all of the hysteria having passed away, to forgetting about the whole thing. In another twenty years, no one need ever know that once upon a time, a small group of mutants had once lived in this forgottenpart of the city.

He moves forward toward the kitchen, laughing as he passes the stove, remembering his first attempt at cooking (which produced a burnt meal). The kitchen was his special place. Now he could do what he had come for. He sets down Donatello, the only turtle for whom he had managed to gather the ashes. Then he places alongside his beloved brother, three photos, each in the memory of another family member. Within minutes, he had effectively turned the kitchen into a shrine.


Note: Just thought I'd make an attempt at Tragedy.