Synopsis: Leonardo vowed to protect his family, but how is one supposed to protect their family from something that no one can see - or worse yet is the protector?

Turtlefreak121: Alrighty, I've been plotting this one for quite some time, so if you would please, this is The Dark Half and I'm not sure how good this story will eventually end up, but I know I have quite the tendency to use cliffhangers (evil snicker)

The Dark Half

Chapter One

By Turtlefreak121

Disclaimer: The turtles belong to Mirage. The title belongs to Stephen King. And I am currently under residence of my parents. Heh heh...

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Murder in the Big City

Dusk. To Leonardo it always had a dry, unappealing sound to it. To him it never really seemed to pull off the calm, beautiful sound as its synonyms of twilight, nightfall, or sundown and could really never pull off that calming feeling of pleasure in his body that this time of day seemed to bring to him. Dusk - time of descending sunlight; moment of the sun's apparent dwindling in the evening - according to Webster, it was a moment of the day that the Sun could play the trick of falling that made the Egyptians create the Sun god Re and had early sailors believing the world was flat when truly the Sun wasn't moving at all. To Leonardo and his three brothers, however, it meant something more. To them, this meant that it was close to night, and night was a ninja's favorite time of the day - they would not abuse the few hours of nighttime freedom they had on the surface.

Leonardo was one of four. He was the oldest, the fastest, and the most graceful. He was a learning ninja with much potential and great aspects of learning from their adoptive father and master. He led his brothers during nighttime patrols of vigilante-like crime fighting with his twin katana. He wore a mask of deep blue to structure his cool, collective personality. After all, he had to be cool to put up with his three brothers - all of them were fifteen and his brothers acted each feature of it.

There was also another burden that Leonardo carried besides the already instinctive urge to protect his brethren. His family could never interact with the human world; they would always have to be outcaste from the society because they were different. True, they were like any other family - a guiding parent figure, the four unruly teenagers including a genius, a hot-head, a wise-guy, and of course Leo as the strict, protective oldest - but they were also more different than your average Johnsons moving into the house across the road.

For one, they lived in the sewers - no where else for them. Though that may be somewhat average in the Big Apple, it was not average for the four teenagers to be in fact mutated turtles living under the strict care of their mentor and father, a mutant rat named Splinter. And though they did have some friends including such kind people as April O'Neil, Casey Jones, and Angel - a girl close friends with Casey - they all knew they would never be able to strive with humanity as they all dreamed to someday do. And Leonardo's youngest brother, Michelangelo, had made friends with super heroes like the Silver Sentry and the legendary Justice Force. Donatello, the mechanic of the family, was also close friends with a fellow mutant - a croc named LeatherHead who lived not far from the turtles' secret underground lair.

Tonight - or what would be tonight - Leonardo could feel would be a full night of suspense. The Foot - a rivaling ninja clan of evil intentions - had been increasing in bizarre activities for the past couple of weeks along with the infamous street gang, the Purple Dragons, and Leo knew that this night would not be any different than the nights before.

Looking over the peak of rundown building on this Queens avenue gave Leo a perfect view of the last seconds of the Sun's decent into the deep, blue water of the harbor. The farthest clouds in view slowly turned a rosy color into a shade of deep orange before mellowing out into a deep violet and finally a dark grayish blue color. Soon the first stars of the night would begin to shine - but Leonardo had the good sense to be more alert to all around him instead of concentrating on such.

He heard the soft patter of his three younger brothers landing not far behind him and then slowly walking over next to the eldest. Raphael was the first to step up next to the gazing leader.

"What's da call, fearless one?" he joked as he looked into the distance with him.

"Let's have a few more practice runs and see if there's anything happening around here," Leo ordered before looking back and gazing to his other younger brothers and receive their accepting nods before they continued to the next roof.

The moon had risen and the stars come out by the time the turtles decided to stop for a breath. During this time, they overheard an argument coming from what had seemed earlier to be a broken down warehouse.

"C'mon, let's check it out," Raph said as he took out his Sais and spun them around.

"If it's just a quarrel, then we don't need to be placing ourselves anywhere near it," Leo stated with an unsettling feeling in his stomach - something around that building just didn't sit well with his stomach.

Just as Mike and Don were about to concur, there was a sound of a gun being set off. The four turtles prepared their weapons.

"Remind me to stay on these guys' good sides!" Mikey exclaimed before a second loud BANG! sounded off.

"Someone's hurt," Don stated.

"Let's go," Leo finally agreed as they took off.

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Earlier...

Big Tony was the head honcho of the underground mafia - the big cheese, the boss-man, the head of the outfit - and he was not afraid to show it off. He would flash his many stolen rings and medallions to anyone who cared - or in some cases didn't - to see them in all their dazzling glory. He regularly wore his dark purple pin-strip suit and had so much moose in his hair that it was worse than the actors in Grease - but of course no one dared to mention it, in fact people who came in his presence didn't usually speak at all.

Now, Big Tony was heading to a meeting in his office with his closest follower, a skinny, shade-wearing rat of a man known as Weasel. Weasel was as crude as he was thin, and his wardrobe depicted his uncanny behavior - especially his purple and banana-yellow spotted tie.

This meeting wasn't anything big, but the thought that this puny, impudent man had the nerve to schedule a meeting with Tony after Big Tony and his men had walked into his house and all over the man thousands of times before got Big Tony mad. And when Big Tony was mad, the underground of New York might as well as stop in its tracks because when Big Tony was angry everybody was angry.

Tony flung the oak door open and nearly shattered the glass of the window as he stomped forward into his office.

"EARWINS!" Big Tony bellowed. "Don't ya dare tell me that ya have the nerve to call me ta a meetin' and then NOT COME!"

"Oh...I came, Tony...you can be sure of that..." a cold voice sneered from the darkness of the seemingly empty room.

"Where are ya, Earwins?" Big Tony demanded.

"Ya-ya better come out or Big Tony'll show you!" Weasel managed to squeal out. Weasel despised Big Tony being angry - it was one of the few things in this world that could unnerve the little psycho.

Slowly, Big Tony's office chair turned around. Leaning back into the chair was non-other than the pudgy Maxwell Earwins. His regular attire was on - a simple dark blue suit with a tie and the suit's matching hat. Earwins was a stout, tiny man and did not look right in the six foot seven mafia man's chair. He looked shorter than usual. His eyes were unusually cold and his hands were touching finger tips over his chest.

"Get out of my chair, Earwins," Tony roared.

"I don't think I will, Tony," Max said behind a smile as he leaned forward and placed his hands on the desk. "You see, Tony - I've got an interesting proposition for you and you might be highly pleased with."

Tony cooled himself off just enough to take a nice laugh about the matter. "You're a smart guy, Earwins - how about you get back into your senses and stop this before I really get ticked."

Maxwell made a tisking sound and placed his finger tips against each other once more. "I want my money back, Tony - and I want it now," Max stated simply.

Weasel began laughing. "As if, Porky! This is real life - not the school grounds at lunch!" Weasel laughed and nudged Tony with his elbow. "Funny eh, boss?"

"Shuddup, Weasel," Tony growled. "Yar not getting yar money back, Max," Tony said. He then smirked. "What're ya going to do?"

Earwins sighed. "I suppose I'll have to do this," he stated simply before reaching into the inside pocket of his coat and pulling out a .45 revolver.

Weasel backed up with a striking look of fear in his eyes. Tony started laughing. "You don't have the--"

There was a blast of smoke and Weasel let out a scream as Big Tony hit the floor and earned the new nickname of Cold Tony.

"No, don't--"

Earwins pointed his gun towards the skinny side-man and then pulled the trigger.

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The turtles crashed in through the warehouse window and stood in surprise at the empty room. Before them laid two dead bodies - each shot from what seemed to be point-blank, cold heartedly and ruthless the murder was - and by the looks of it, set up. But somehow - just seconds after the second shot - the murderer had escaped.

Raphael walked over to the dead bodies and set down on his haunches a few feet away. "I know these boobs!" he exclaimed. "They're Big Tony 'n Weasel - the mob guys!"

"What do you think happened here?" Don asked as he put his hand to his chin.

Mikey looked over to the grizzly scene. "Uh...shot each other?"

"Impossible," Don complied. "These are point-blank shots, Mikey. The first man shot would've died instantly - let alone pick up a gun and pop the other one."

"Besides," Leo stated as he stood over the two. "There isn't a gun around here." He then headed over to the desk as his brothers continued to gawk at the dead men. His eye had been caught by a piece of paper that just seemed out of place. He quickly snatched it and read it - a chill ran through his body at its very specific words.

Just then, there were the sounds of feet barreling their way outside the door before it flung open. At least twelve of the mob members looked down in horror at the dead forms of their boss and second in command.

The turtles backed up as one bent down and checked for pulses.

The greasy haired mob man looked up with pure ferociousness in his eyes like the rabid pooch in Cujo. "THEY KILLED THE BOSS-MAN!" he roared. "GET 'EM!"

All of them pulled out guns and took aim - leaving the four turtles with only seconds to jump out the window and onto the smaller building below. The now half-crazed mobster headed to the windows and fired through the already shattered glass.

"We're like sittin' ducks!" Raphael yelled before he jumped into the first level of the fire escape and the climbed the rest of the way down.

Donatello and Michelangelo followed - Leonardo went last, but not before he caught sight of the daring mafia hitmen jumping onto the building after them.

"RUN!" Leo yelled to his brothers before descending as well. The rest happened like a blur for them as they ran into the alley, through a manhole, and the through the sewer until they were for sure that they were not being followed.

They all leaned against the sewer wall and nearly slid all the way down in their out-of-breath states.

"Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time," Mikey wheezed breathlessly.

"That was set up," Leo stated harshly.

"We noticed," Raph snapped as he put his hands on his knees.

"Not for them...for us," Leo clarified.

"What?" Don asked from his sitting position. He looked up at his brother in confusion.

"Yar off yar rocker, Leo," Raph stated.

"Yeah, bro - no one could have known that we would go over there, we didn't even begin to at first," Mikey concluded.

"But someone did - I just know it," Leo stated before shuffling around. "Either way, we need to get home so that Master Splinter doesn't get worried."

"Right," the three said slowly before getting up and heading towards the lair.

Leo started to follow, but he stopped and pulled the piece of paper from his belt. 'Look what you've done, Leonardo' - it read. The same chill ran down his spine before he flipped it over. It continued. 'The Dark is rising, Leonardo - DO NOT RESIST!' Something about its words - and the familiar handwriting - caused Leonardo's senses to scream out at him to look behind him. He began to turn...

"Leo!" Mikey yelled as his head stuck out from around the corner. He looked at his brother whose shell was turned to him.

"Yeah, Mike?" Leo asked in a shaky voice.

"Coming or not?" Michelangelo asked. He arched an eye ridge. "All right, Leo?"

"Fine...fine..." Leo stated before slowly turning and catching up with his brothers.

Mikey shrugged and ran back to the waiting Don and Raph.

Before Leo turned the corner, he cocked his head to glance over his shoulder and he glowered at the dark shadows behind him. He glanced down at the note before crumpling it up and throwing it into the flowing water and continuing.

It meant nothing...I'm fine - if anything it meant another Leonardo...right?

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Turtlefreak121: Hmm...started off with the cliffhangers - good sign...good sign... sigh I desperately need to get a hobby...or a boyfriend. JK - this is my hobby! -