Thankies for the kind reviews of this fic to date peeps! Always pleased to know where I'm going right or wrong. I know the chapters for this fic are much shorter than those I normally write, no excise really excpet that this seems the way the fic wants to be written in so I went with it. This chapter is a little longer than the others. We're over half way through now and I've been having fun writing it, which is what it's all about isn't it? I'm pleased that you're all enjoying the ride too!
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In spite of the labs they had spent much of their childhoods in and continued to attend occasionally for tests, the three turtles shared one of the blocks designed to be used by scientists or soldiers should their presence on the base for long periods be required. There was a shared main room, kitchen and bathroom, along with four mid-sized bedrooms. Each turtle had a room of their own, the spare used for storing junk. Don had wanted to turn the room into a computer work area, Raph had wanted it as a workout room but the space wasn't big enough to use it for both. Mike had eventually pointed out that there was both computer facilities and a gym in the base for their use and that they may as well store the things they didn't use often in there instead. Raph occasionally suspected that Mikey had been displaying some cunning there – most of the junk in there belonged to him, along with the books that Don refused to part with but rarely read. Only Raph didn't accumulate much in the way of possessions, nor was he sentimental about his belongings.
The evening of the disastrous test that Bishop had overseen, which none of the turtles had any idea had even happened, Raph wandered back to their quarters at about ten, having stopped off for a workout. He had fixed up his room so that he had a hammock rather than a bed, which could be taken down in the morning to make room for the swinging punch bag. Just because there was a gym there didn't mean he didn't sometimes want to just punch the thing without the hassle of dragging himself to the gym and doing a whole workout.
The main room was dark save for a dimmed lamp, the glow from the mute television and the meagre light from the computer monitor in the corner, that showed Mikey's profile as he browsed the Internet. Upon hearing Raph enter, he turned to the door and put a finger to his lips, indicating for quiet, then pointing to the prone figure on the couch.
Raph shook his head ruefully as he realised Donnie had fallen asleep in front of the television. "How long has he been out?"
"Couple hours," replied Mikey in a low voice. "He's been down at the lab since about eight. Something about the greys."
"Those stupid aliens?" Raph closed the door and wandered over to Mikey, leaning over to see what his brother was looking at. "How important can it be? They've waited this long."
"You know Donnie. He gets a project, little things like food and sleep go by the wayside. Check this out!"
"Those stupid joke websites? You got too much time on your hands bomb-boy. What's to eat?"
"I made tuna pasta, should be some left over if you wanna nuke it. Unless Don ate it all."
"Damn, I wish he'd stop eating outta the pan!"
"You do it all the time."
"Yeah, but only when I'm gonna finish the whole thing." Raph left Mikey to his jokes and dumped what was left of the pasta onto a plate, shoving it in to the microwave and setting it before going back into the living room and shaking Donnie's shoulder.
"Whuh? Leeme 'lone."
"Move your shell Don. Go to bed and sleep there."
"Uh?" Don blinked once or twice, focusing blearily on Raph. "Oh. I fall asleep on the couch?"
"Yup. Again."
Sitting up, Don yawned widely and rubbed his eyes. "Yeah, I guess I'm gonna go catch a few more hours. Night!"
"Night Don," said Raph absently, waiting for the turtle to close his door before throwing a cushion at Mikey. "You shouldn't let him sleep on the couch."
The cushion caught Mike on the shell and he turned to glare. "Hey, the dude needs his sleep."
"Yeah, in his own bed. You know what he's like when he gets like this. Nothing stops him. We should at least try to make sure he doesn't burn out."
"That's why I left him to sleep," said Mike reasonably.
Raph turned the sound back up on the TV and flipped channels for a fe minutes. "So how's the newbie coming along?"
"Who, Layla?" Mikey's voice was full of casual nonchalance and Raph rolled his eyes. Great. Mikey had a crush. "Um, she's doing OK. Better than the last guy."
"Yeah, the last guy didn't have an ass like that."
"I, uh, hadn't noticed."
"Michelangelo, you are a terrible liar."
"I hadn't!"
Raph sniggered and hopped channels again, finding an 80s action film on and turning his attention to it, waiting for the pasta to ping. Just another typical evening with the guys. Their life in the base wasn't the best, the most certain or what he would have chosen given the chance – but sometimes he could forget all the other bullshit and feel like part of a normal family. In the unlikely event of him leaving the base permanently, that would be the best part of the memories from there. Maybe the only good one.
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Dr Lee paced, feeling nauseous. No one had touched him, not even to help him get to what would appear to be his home for the next few weeks at least. Bishop had basically forced him to walk here and enter the cell. At gunpoint.
Cell? Ha, that was too grand a word for it. A cell brought forth images of a door with a bullet-proof window, giving some semblance of privacy, even a transparent unit with sectioned off areas for him to sleep and shit in peace.
What he had been placed in was a cage. Concrete floor, raised cot, toilet off in a far corner in full view of anyone passing, bars comprising three of the four walls. Where they kept the experimental subjects. He had been put in with the mutants.
Why?
That question was simple enough. As a punishment. Bishop didn't really expect that the serum would have any effect on him but couldn't take risks. The cage left him unable to leave, negating the risk. But an isolation room wouldn't have showed him or the other scientists the price of fucking up.
The cells were side by side, separated by only the bars, but the cell between each of the mutants was always left empty as a security precaution. Lee was in the end one, beside him an empty cage, and beside that specimen 00582. Lee had been at the base only four years, but this specimen had been one of the several that pre-dated his arrival. It hadn't reacted to him in any way, merely sat in the far corner, staring at nothing. It was creepy.
Lee dropped heavily onto the cot and sighed, wincing slightly at the pain in his stomach. He was also sweating excessively and he blotted his hands on his lab coat. It had to be the situation he was in. It couldn't be a reaction to the serum, it couldn't be...
Could it?
I have to get out of here!
If the serum really could be transmitted through skin contact as well as ingestion and injection, then surely he would be better off working on some kind of a cure for the serum, something to stop him changing the way the gecko had – or the mouse. The mouse hadn't changed immediately after drinking the serum, it had taken several hours. If he really was infected, then skin contact should take even longer. He could do something, he could work on a cure, help them to...
Wait.
A thought occurred to him. No one had taken a sample of his blood. Surely if they were working on the cure, they would need his blood to run tests on. They needed to see how it was responding to his DNA and if they did have a cure, test it on the blood to check there was no adverse reaction. Even if it was a race against time, that was a must.
They're not working on a cure. If you live, you live. If you mutate – well, so much the better. Bishop's first human test.
Lee wrapped his arms around his stomach and leant forward. This couldn't be happening to him. He had to get out of here!
Not changing position, he touched his fingers to the lump in his lab coat pocket, so small it was practically unnoticeable. As Bishop snarled at his co-workers, Lee had used the distraction to snatch a small vial of the serum and slip it into his pocket, not sure what was going to happen but having some dim thought of insurance at the back of his mind.
Much use it would do him. He may be able to get out of the cell using it – but he would have to ingest it himself, turn into a mindless mutant. There was a chance he would do so anyway, but there was an equally good chance that he wouldn't, that it was just the stress that was making him feel so awful. That and the fact he really needed to take a dump and there was no way he was doing that in front of the cameras that covered the room. What if one of his colleagues walked in, or Bishop? The embarrassment, the shame of being watched like some animal in a zoo, knowing they were laughing at him...
He clenched his fists. He would get out of here somehow. And get his revenge on them all.
Animal...
He turned his head slowly to the right. In the cage beyond the one beside him was the mutant 00582. His interactions with the specimen may have been sparodic but he knew the thing was capable of some stilted speech and of following instructions.
It was also stubborn, occasionally wilful, capable of lashing out violently should it be pushed too far. Still, Lee didn't plan to push it. His hastily thought up scheme was risky, but he knew he couldn't remain in this cell for much longer. He hated the feeling of being stared at, treated like some kind of freak just because he had been knocked into some experimental serum. All he needed was a distraction. Maybe then he could reach through the bars as scientists and agents filled the room, steal some keys and free himself in the bedlam. A plan born of desperation, but better than waiting, wondering and being afraid.
He snagged the vial with as little movement as he could manage, remaining doubled over from the waist to further disguise the movement, then leant down as if to scratch his foot, putting the vial on the floor behind his heel. Had those monitoring the cameras noticed anything? He spent ten minutes waiting to see if anyone would enter and ask him what he had in the cell with him, but no one entered.
Now for the tricky part.
He checked his watch. Close to ten at night. With any luck, those watching the camera images would be bored, unobservant, whatever marginal interest his presence had engendered gone when he failed to flip out. They would have half an eye on him, the rest of their attention on their notes or a paperback or a magazine. And that was if there were any scientists in the room. He doubted that the special agents that typically watched would even have that much interest in his predicament.
There was a gap beneath the horizontal bar at the bottom of the cage. The danger was if it hit one of the vertical bars and rebounded, or if he didn't send it far enough and it ended up in the middle of the cage between him and the freak. Of course, if those watching picked up anything suspicious in what he did next, he would be well and truly fucked anyway.
He stole a look toward the mutants cage and then stared at the floor. Gathering all of his courage, he put the side of his shoe to the vial and pushed rather than kicked, refraining from staring after it and drawing attention to himself. Instead he rocked himself slightly, trying to watch without moving his head too much. The vial skittered through the bars without touching the bars...
And came to a stop just outside the mutants cage.
Biting on his lower lip in frustration, Lee waited another five minutes, telling himself not to panic. In the meantime, the pain in his guts intensified. His skin felt like it was trying to crawl from his bones and he tried to hide how he felt. Right now, he didn't want anyone to see that he was in any kind of discomfort. If they hadn't already.
A cramp passed through him and he got to his feet, knowing he would be being watched now but hoping he could get away with it if he didn't behave suspiciously. He went to the bars separating him from the next cell and the mutant beyond, hoping to get its attention, leaning on the bars as if he were merely observing the creature.
For a moment, the thing didn't move, didn't even seem to see him. Then it raised its head and met the doctors stare with one of its own.
Lee kept its gaze for a moment and then deliberately looked to the vial. The mutant glanced to what he was staring at and then looked back at the doctor.
"Take it, you ugly fucker," muttered Lee through clenched teeth, trying to smile at the mutant and managing only a grimace. "Pick it up, pick it up!"
The creature reached its foot between the bars, barely needing to stretch, grabbing the vial between its toes. Lee winced, expecting the fragile container to break, but the thing was surprisingly dexterous, retrieving the vial without breaking it. It picked up the vial with its hand as soon as it was in the cell, eying it curiously.
"Don't be so obvious, you freak!" Suddenly Lee was ice cold, shivering, his teeth chattering. "Just drink it, don't fucking stare at it..."
And then the effort of keeping himself upright was too much and he dropped to his knees, crawling towards the toilet, a part of him cringing in embarrassment, most of him in too much pain and misery to care. He dry-heaved into the bowl, pulling himself up and dropping his pants immediately after. Nothing. Yet the pain in his gut intensified further and he doubled over, tears making his vision shimmer.
I don't deserve this, I'm gonna get you Bishop you fucking cocksucker, I didn't do anything to deserve this...
When he finally raised his head, he barely cared that the mutant had uncapped the vial and was sniffing the contents. All he wanted to do was go back to his cot and sleep for a couple of years.
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"Hey, check out the doc!"
The agents in the observation room glanced at the monitor and sniggered as the man dropped his pants and sat on the toilet, bowing his head and clenching his teeth.
"Only ten fifteen," said the second agent, temporarily putting down his cards. "You owe me twenty bucks."
"Ah crap," muttered the first, fishing a crumpled note from his pocket and shoving it at his colleague. "I thought he'd hold out 'til at least midnight."
"Not so fucking snooty now, huh big-shot?" The second agent smirked at the monitor, gloating, before turning back to the game. "How much more money am I gonna take off ya tonight?"
Neither of them paid the mutants in the cells a second thought.
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It had been a long time. He didn't know how long. There was no way of guessing how much time had passed and he hadn't the vocabulary to logically think through the concept, but he was aware that he had changed. He had grown taller, his body was different than it had been. He was different. But things around him never changed.
Not until tonight. The man who sometimes looked at him, wrote notes and took his blood was in a cell much like his own. He didn't know why and didn't dwell on it as strange – but it hadn't happened before and he was slightly confused.
And then the man dropped something on the floor in front of him and whispered at him to pick it up. Again unusual, but he did it anyway. Some things just weren't worth fighting over. The man was able to come and go as he pleased (or so he thought) and when he didn't do as they wanted him to, there was PUNISHMENT. PUNISHMENT was bad and it hurt. And PUNISHMENT came when he didn't do what they wanted.
But then the man looked sick and went to use the toilet. 00582 didn't know what he was supposed to do with the glass container he had picked up, but he had seen things like this before. Usually the men would put the contents into a syringe and put the syringe in his arm. Usually it made him sleepy. Right now, he wouldn't mind being asleep. There wasn't much to do once the men all left and the one that was still there seemed pretty ill. Maybe he was going to die, like 10225 had. 10225 had started to be sick just like the man, but the sick had been red and then he had fallen over.
00582 took the top off the vial and sniffed the contents. It didn't smell like anything, but neither did most of the drinks they gave him. And he was bored and wide awake. Maybe it would help him to sleep.
So he drank it.
Discarding the vial in a corner, he went over to his cot and lay down, fully expecting to be asleep within a few minutes. But sleep didn't come. After a while he opened his eyes and stared into the next cell. He could see the man, finished on the toilet and lying down on his own cot. He looked sick.
Maybe whatever was wrong with the man was catching, because within two hours 00582 was feeling pretty sick himself. He was too hot, shivering, His stomach rolled uneasily and his head felt heavy, even moving it a little hurt. The dim lights hurt his eyes. As soon as he threw off his itchy blanket, he became cold. As soon as he covered himself, he became too hot.
He groaned quietly. He didn't know what was happening to him, but he wanted it to go away. There was no way of getting any attention unless he got up and started shouting, and he didn't feel well enough to do so. The men didn't want him disturbing them just because he was hungry or bored.
The men were mean.
Dimly, he could recall some of the tests they did. The one where his food had shocked him was the worst. He'd reach for his bowl and BAM! A shock that raced up his arm and hurt him bad. Soon he had been afraid of touching the food. But it was either learn how to get it without the shock or starve. He had figured out a way – but it had taken nearly a week. There were other tests too, none as painful or tortuous as that one but bad enough.
"See how smart it really is," one of the men had said during the shock tests. Agent Bishop. He had been part of the tests for as long as 00582 could remember and he was the worst of them all. Sometimes he would smile during the tests, gloating, as if he knew something that the mutant did not.
And then there were the insults. Ugly fucker was one of the mild ones. Some of them were really nasty and he could tell they meant every word.
Agent Bishop sometimes talked to him, when there was no one else listening. Not that he said a great deal and when he did, the words were full of malice. One of the things he had told 00582 was that without him, none of the other mutants would even exist. They would be someone's pets. That made him really unhappy – knowing that without him, they might still be normal and not stuck in this place with those men.
The more he thought, the angrier he got and the angrier he got, the worse he felt. It wasn't like him to get so angry – it did no good. All it did was lead to PUNISHMENT. But maybe whatever was wrong with him was making him feel this way. It didn't matter how mad he was anyway. There was little he could do about it.
He managed to fall into an uncomfortable doze, only to be awoken what seemed like only minutes later by a shriek. He raised his head, wincing at the pain, and looked into the cell beside his. In the other cells, the mutants that had been woken were making enough noise of their own, most of it in fear.
The man had changed.
When 00582 last looked at him, he had been laid on a cot and whimpering quietly. Now he was on his feet, staggering toward the bars, seeming at least a foot taller. His lab coat tore as his muscles grew and his face seemed almost to be – melting?
But the worst part was the way he screamed.
The noise was deafening. The other mutants joined in the cacophony, save for 00582, who felt too damn sick. The noise hurt his head and he couldn't comprehend what he was seeing.
Two agents ran into the room and skidded to a halt, gaping at the scene. One of them took out a radio and started shouting into it, his voice barely audible over the noise of the mutants and the man. They didn't seem afraid though, just stunned. Maybe they thought the bars would hold him.
The former man grabbed two of the bars and wrenched, snapping them and throwing them aside. Then he was out, making his way to the agents.
"Cocksuckerrrrrrrrs..."
The agent with the radio just stared, the other made for his gun but handled it too slowly and clumsily. The creature that had once been Lee reached out with amazing speed and grabbed them both by the heads, slamming them together with lethal force. There was a crunching sound audible even over all the noise and the heads seemed to just – cave in. Lee tossed the bodies aside, where they lay bleeding.
00582 couldn't believe it.
The other mutants were going insane, throwing themselves against the bars of their own cells, some cowering and screaming. 00582 merely watched. He felt strange. Nauseous, cold, like something was happening inside him...
More agents arrived, trying to stop the man. Lee shrieked again as a bullet tore open his arm, stamping toward the agents and scattering them like bowling pins. The whole room was a mad, loud, chaotic scene, none of the agents bothering even a little about the mutants that screamed and yelled from their cells. Certainly not about the mutant that had remained silent throughout the whole thing.
Anger overtook 00582 once again as he saw a stray bullet miss the former man and hit 20019 in the leg. She went down, howling in pain. Others buried themselves in to walls and the wise mutants took cover, hiding where they could. The man reached out to one of the agents and grabbed the arm, pulling it right out of the socket – but he was being forced into retreat by the greater number of heavily armed agents. All that stopped them really was the limited space, meaning that not all of them could enter the room.
00582 glanced down at his arm and stiffened. It had formerly been just – well, his arm. Green, thin, tri-fingered, marked from years of blood samples and injections. But now it was different. The scrawny muscles were beginning to bulk up, colour darkening, seemingly lengthening. Even as he looked, he could see it changing.
Something was happening to him. And he was pissed about it. Pissed about what was happening out there. Pissed about his whole shitty life to date.
But at least he didn't feel ill any more. Just mad.
Slowly, he got to his feet, knowing as he did so that something was different. His tread was heavier, he felt like he was taking up more space. And it was getting hard to think. All he knew was that he was angry and some one had to pay.
He reached out for the bars.
