That Which Prowls In The Dark of Night
Disclaimer: The TMNT belong to Mirage and other people. Not me.
Authors Note: Okay Okay! I get the message! Leo couldn't have fit under Casey's couch. Mea Culpa! I do read what you guys write but I want to post everything before I start making corrections.
And now...
Chapter 5 The enemy appears
Leonardo and the others tensed as they hid in the shadows. They could hear all around them the sound of an unsettled city. "Man, this is almost worse than before," Donatello said. "Why is everyone in New York acting crazy tonight?"
"You guys noticed too?" Raphael asked. "Casey said it's been like this for a couple of days."
Leonardo frowned as he glanced at Michelangelo, who was being unusually quiet. "There has to be some connection," he muttered to himself. "Something out there is causing this."
"Causing what?" Raphael asked.
"Everything," Leonardo said. Three pairs of eyes stared at him. Leonardo didn't blame them. Each one of his brothers had a piece of this puzzle, but he was the only one who understood that they were all connected.
Suddenly a scream and a sound make all four turtles start and lay a hand on their weapons. "Gunshots," Donatello said.
"We'd better check it out," Leonardo said. He didn't want to be distracted, but he couldn't stand by while innocent people were hurt. He led the way over the rooftops to where two groups were in the middle of a melee.
"What in the world?" Donatello asked.
Leonardo sighed heavily. "It looks like the City is back at war."
"I don't think that's it, Leo," Raphael said sounding slightly confused. "What's that down there?"
"What's what?" Donatello asked.
"That orange blob thingy next to that guy with the mohawk," Raphael said pointing.
"I don't see anything," Leonardo answered.
At that same time Michelangelo shot back excited. "You mean you can see it too?"
"Wait," Donatello said. "You mean there really is something down there?"
"What does it look like?" Leonardo asked.
Michelangelo looked down into the alley way. "Like Raph said, it's like some kind of jello thing. It's all orange and green, and real icky looking." Suddenly Michelangelo backed up a pace, and started shaking. "And . . . and I remember! That's the thing that was gonna eat Raph!"
All three reacted to that.
"Eat Raph?" Donatello asked.
"That thing?" Raphael said simultaneously.
"Oh, shell," Leonardo muttered under his breath. He then moved over to Michelangelo and shook him gently to get him to focus on them. "Mikey, are you saying that the thing you and Raph can see is what you dreamed about the other night?"
Michelangelo was nodding vigorously. "I remember! It ate him from the inside out then it turned into him, and he was gonna kill me!" Michelangelo was shaking so hard now that Raphael knelt down, and held him close.
"Easy Mikey. It didn't happen. I'm okay. I listened to you. I didn't go to Casey's until morning, and I made him come get me."
Michelangelo looked very confused at that. "It didn't happen? But I saw . . . "
"You stopped it," Leonardo insisted. "Sometimes when we listen to what you tell us what you predict doesn't come true. You can stop some of these things from happening."
Michelangelo was calming down. "I can?"
"You have!" Leonardo reminded him. "There were lots of times when we were kids when we avoided what you predicted, and if we knew better you would have probably stopped more disasters."
"Well you'd better hurry if you want to stop a disaster now," Donatello said as he watched at the roof's edge. "The guys down there are creaming each other."
Leonardo and the others joined Donatello back on the edge of the roof.
"No, we can't go down there." Michelangelo insisted. "What if what I predicted wasn't supposed to happen last night! What if it's gonna happen tonight?"
Leonardo and Donatello looked at each other, and Leonardo bit his lower lip. What if Mikey was right? What if letting Raphael go down there was going to make Michelangelo's prediction come true?
Leonardo glanced at Raphael who had his customary scowl on. "Don't even think it, Leo," he said. Before the others could stop him, he leaped over the edge of the roof, and entered the fray.
"No! Raph!" The three called out, but it did no good. Raphael was already in the melee. Leonardo let out an exasperated groan and muttered under his breath. "I swear sometimes I think he has a death wish!" To the others he ordered "Lets go!"
The three jumped down into the fray as well. Leonardo dodged someone with a hunting knife and used the flat of his katana to separate two other combatants. He glanced to his left and saw Donatello trying to keep a Purple Dragon from beating up another guy wearing Purple Dragon colors.
What the shell?
"Leo!" Donatello called out as he ducked under a blow, "Both groups are Purple Dragons. They're fighting their own!"
They're fighting their own? That doesn't make any sense. "Don, get over to either Mikey or Raph. Remember there's something down here that we can't see." I wonder if that thing is the reason the Purple Dragons are fighting each other.
Suddenly another Purple dragon came up behind him and tried to knock him into the sidewalk. He got to his feet feeling his blood heat up with anger. How dare this guy try to nail him while his back was turned. How completely without honor. Well he was going to fix that. Suddenly furious at his opponent for no reason, Leonardo advanced on the thug ready to teach him a lesson he would never forget.
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Raphael loved being in the center of a fight. To him this was no different from any other melee he had participated in. Even so he knew that something was strange about this one. He gave a nervous glance over to the orange blob thing that seemed to be generating a sickly green luminescent fog that was seeping into the skin of the fighters. This wasn't right. That weird blob was doing something, and Raphael couldn't figure out what was going on.
"I have to put protections on him," she said "If I don't the dekabor will keep coming after him."
The dekabor? Where did that thought come from? Raphael wasn't sure. He felt as if he should know more about what was going on, but he couldn't put his finger on what was bugging him. The one thing he knew for sure was that he wasn't in danger of being eaten now. He could accept that last night was a possibility but somehow he knew that tonight he was safe. Okay Raph get a grip on yourself. How could you know that so certainly? Raphael didn't know how he knew but he was sure of it. Something about this was wrong and he couldn't figure it out.
Still as he dodged and punched the thugs around he kept one eye on the strange orange entity. He didn't like it at all, and he couldn't shake the feeling that it was the reason that Michelangelo was freaking out lately and seeing things. As he split up a pair of combatants, he realized something strange. He knew these two guys. They were not only both Purple Dragons, but they were best friends. What the shell is going on here?
He picked up one of the pair who was still semi conscious. "What's going on?" Raphael demanded. "This is your best bud. Why are you pounding on him?"
"Wouldn't you like to know, freak!" The punk retorted, but his voice sounded wrong. Raphael had seen these two around a lot, and this guy's voice simply didn't sound like that.
"That's not an answer, punk," Raphael insisted hiding the chill that just ran down his shell. "You aint actin' normal tonight, and I want to know why!"
The punk in his hand chuckled slowly. "He freed me you know! I can do anything, and not care! It's soooo delicious. He can free you to you know."
This guy has to be either high or drunk, Raphael thought as he held him against the wall. Yet there was something about the thug's expression that made Raphael ask, "what do you mean?"
"He can feel you," the punk said. "He can sense your anger, taste your aggression. He can free your mind, man." The punk's head lolled to one side as his eyes rolled up into his head in ecstasy.
"You're crazy," Raphael said, but even as he said it he could feel that thing come up behind him. He dropped the half-conscious human, and came face to face with something without a face at all.
He is right, the thing said as it oozed around the floor coming closer and closer to Raphael. The thick green mist thickened around him and the creature
I can free your mind, give you all the power you have ever dreamed of. I can shake you of this bond with the others of your kind and make you lord over them all. You need only give yourself over to my power.
Raphael shivered internally from a chill he never knew. Its voice was like an icy breeze penetrating his shell and thick reptilian skin. This was what Michelangelo had predicted the other night. This thing wanted something from him, and Raphael wasn't about to give anything to it, if he could help it.
"There is no way in shell I'm giving anything to you jello boy," Raphael answered it.
The creature growled angrily at Raphael No, I will have you! It said. It tried to advance on Raphael, and touch him but suddenly it backed away as if some force had repelled it.
At that exact moment Michelangelo dove through the air, to come between Raphael and the orange blob. "No! Leave him alone!" Michelangelo shouted as he curled into a tumblesault and came back up on the balls of his feet. His nunchucks were out and spinning wildly. He tried to attack the creature, but it turned transparent and the nunchucks hit only empty air.
Arrrgh! The thing growled and backed away from Michelangelo. It tried to advance on Raphael again. Raphael swung at it with his left sai, but like the nunchucks nothing happened, until it touched him. Raphael tried to wince away, but the moment the orange blob came in contact with his arm, a blue light came between them and an electric crackle was heard in the air. Raphael found himself pushed away as if hurled by some magnetic force, but the orange being was flung a good four feet passing through a few people on the way down. It roared out in pain and agony.
Curse you! Curse you turtle, and curse that child witch who holds your soul. How dare any of the white order come between me and my prey! She cannot keep you from me forever! The white ones always feel sorry for their servants! She will free you soon enough, and then your soul will be mine!
Raphael didn't have a clue about what that thing was talking about, and all the better. That made his retort make even more sense. "You know I was wrong about you. You're not jello. You're a bag of hot air!"
That only made the thing scream louder causing both him and Michelangelo to wince. "Get away from him!" Michelangelo shouted trying to attack again.
The orange blob floated up out of Michelangelo's reach. So be it. Let the white witch keep you. Savor your victory turtle, for If I cannot have you, I will take that which you cherish. With that the orange glob disappeared into the ground with most of the sickly green smoke.
Raphael looked around confused for a second. The green smoke was still around at ankle depth, but there was no sign of orange. "Where'd it go?" Raphael asked.
"Away from you I guess," Michelangelo said rubbing a bruise on his shoulder. "Raph, how'd you do that? Make it back off like that?"
"I didn't do anything," Raphael said as he checked out his own injuries. "My sai had just about as much effect on it as your chucks did."
Michelangelo shook his head emphatically. "No I saw it. It touched you and all of a sudden you were like glowing blue and that blue light hurt it somehow! And what's with those things on your wrists?" Michelangelo pointed down to Raphael's wrists, but there was nothing there.
"Ahh you're seeing things again, Mikey." Raphael grumbled, but then a thought came to him. "Hey did you hear that thing talk in words?"
"Kinda," Michelangelo agreed. "Who's the white witch?"
"I don't know," Raphael answered, but as the last words the creature said came to his thoughts he felt there was something he was missing. "He said that if he couldn't have me, he'd . . . " Suddenly the same horrifying thought came to both him and Michelangelo. "We'd better go find the others!"
They didn't have to look very far. Ten yards away Leonardo and Donatello were battling twenty more of those street thugs. The sour green smoke that had practically faded from their area was thick around the fighters, and the two turtles. Raphael drew his sai and would have joined in the battle, but Michelangelo pulled him back. "No wait, Raph, look."
Raphael watched amazed as the green smoke was being absorbed by the bodies of the fighters and their two brothers. He watched as both Leonardo and Donatello soon got that half mad look in their eyes, and their moves became more and more vicious.
"Aww shell! That stuff is makin' them crazy!" Raphael said. "Mikey we gotta get them out of that!"
"It's worse than that, Raph," Michelangelo said pointing behind Leonardo. "It's back!"
Sure enough the orange creature was starting to rematerialize hovering over Leonardo. Tiny orange pseudopods began to form on the surface of the creature heading right for Leonardo.
"Leo!" Raphael cried out and let instinct and training take over. Before he had a chance to take a breath in both his sais were out and he was slashing at the thing severing the tendrils before they could touch Leonardo. When he landed on the ground, he was shocked to see a strange green substance on his right sai.
The thing roared in anger and pain. Raphael turned back over his shoulder to see that he had actually hurt the thing. It had changed back into a floating blob. Curse you and curse she who holds you! It hovered above Raphael for a second and then vanished into thin air.
Raphael had never known real fear until that moment. He didn't know what that thing was, but he knew what he had seen. It could control people, and it almost had Leonardo and Donatello.
What the shell are we going to do? Raphael looked over at Donatello who was being supported by Michelangelo.
"Don, you okay bro?" Michelangelo asked earnestly.
"What? What happened?" Donatello asked sounding distant and confused. "I was so angry."
Raphael moved over to Leonardo's side. Leonardo was staring at his katana shaking his head. "I...I could have killed that guy. I wanted to!"
"It wasn't you, Leo," Raphael said evenly. "It was that over sized jello mold with the attitude that was playing with your head."
"But still . . . " Leonardo said, and shuddered visibly.
"Raph, lets get below now!" Michelangelo said distressed.
Raphael and Leonardo looked at each other and nodded. Master Splinter would know what to do. As soon as Leonard and Donatello had fully recovered, they made their way into the sewers and towards home.
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Coming Soon
Chapter 6 Questions
Leonardo watched Michelangelo as he went up the stairs. Once he was certain his brother couldn't hear them he turned back to Splinter and Donatello. "Which problem is more important right now? Mikey or Raph?"
Donatello shrugged and looked upstairs as well. "Wanna flip a coin?"
Splinter sighed. "Michelangelo's abilities are distressing, but we may need them. They may have returned because of this strange being that is causing trouble."
Leonardo didn't like that idea. "But that would mean that this thing is far more dangerous than we think." Splinter nodded gravely.
"Why?" Donatello asked.
"Because Don, since Mikey's ability's come back he's only predicted one or two things, but they've always been major. Now He's had a nightmare while he's wide awake. I can't shake the feeling that whatever we've stumbled into this time it's way over our heads." Leonardo looked sadly over to their sensei. "So what do we do?"