The temperatures dropped low overnight. On the surface the heat wave that had been bearing down on New York for over a month had finally broken, and underground it was almost chilly.

Leonardo woke up earlier than he usually did. He stretched as he stepped out into the main room of the lair and glanced over at the couch. Raph and April were out cold, both wrapped up in an extra blanket each to keep off the chill. He stepped into the kitchen, only to see a pot of coffee was already brewed and a cups worth was missing. He poured himself a mug, and went in search of who ever was up already.

Leo stopped by his brainiac brothers room first. Donnie would sometimes pull all-nighters if he was working on something he was passionate about. But when he poked his head around the door, his little brother was sprawled out across his entire bed, snoring softly. Leo closed the door again and decided that he would check the training room as it was the only logical place that whoever was up could be. There was no way Michelangelo was up first.

Sure enough when he slid open the door, Holly was standing in the middle of the room. Her coffee cup was at the edge of the mat, along with her phone, and she was practicing by herself with one of the wooden swords.

"Practicing hard are we?" He commented, leaning against the door frame.

"Shh," Holly hissed, "Splinter is still asleep."

"Probably not." He said quietly, just in case he was wrong.

"Do you always lurk in doorways or do you ever actually enter a room?" She whispered back at him. She didn't stop her practice as she spoke to him.

"Ah, and I was wondering why Raph liked you." He replied sarcastically.

"If your tongue were any sharper, you wouldn't need your swords." She said with a hint of a smile on her lips.

Leo just rolled his eyes and watched her in silence for a moment, sipping his coffee. "You getting pretty good at that." He mentioned.

"I would hope so. I've been practicing everyday since we started doing this." She scoffed.

"Really?"

"Yes. This last week alone, I've practiced for about four hours every evening." She finished out her routine and turned to face him. "When your an only child, and your grounded, it's a good idea to do something to keep yourself from going crazy."

"I wouldn't know." he shrugged.

"No, I suppose not." She sighed. "Anyway, it's nice to have something to focus on." She padded barefoot over to her mug and took a quick sip. "Would you like to join me?" She asked before stepping back into the room.

"Seriously? You want to train?" Leo looked dubious.

"Yeah." She peered at him over the top of her glasses, "Unless your afraid."

"Wow, you really are just like Raph." He set him mug down and picked up one of the other wooden swords. "No one ever wants to train, you know."

"Well, I have to get my mother back." Holly stated honestly. "So I need as much practice as I can get." He just gave her a sad smile in reply.

Leo stared off going easy on her, but he soon realized that Holly hadn't been kidding about her training regime. She was easily blocking his attacks, and had even managed to throw a few swings his way that he hadn't been expecting. They must have been making quite a racket, as soon after they began, Splinter slid his bedroom door open to watch their sparing.

Leo stepped up his game, he charged her and swung under her arm, but Holly hopped backwards out or range. It wasn't as smooth or dignified as he would have been able to manage, but she was only a few months into her training, and it had gotten her out of the way. He stepped into her again, swinging at her shoulder, and then again for the other side of here body. She blocked both, keeping instep with him each time.

They swung back and fourth for a while, and soon Holly was getting frustrated. She was starting to swing with more ferocity and was watching him carefully as if he were actually her enemy. He swung again, this time for her head. She spun as she ducked, throwing out her leg to try and sweep his feet out. But he was faster and flung himself into a barrel roll over her. He hopped back away from her, with a smile plastered to his face. Holly, however, had strings of hair plastered to her sticky face.

Mikey, April and Donnie were peeking in on the session unnoticed. They watched Leo and Holly exchange blows until Holly was sweating with the effort she was putting in, and when she nearly got the better of him, they all broke out into excited snickers and whispers.

"What's going on?" Raph said from behind the three snoopers.

Three groans escaped from three dropped heads, and it was enough to make Holly realize that they were being watched. She blinked rapidly, realizing that she had been so focused on what she was doing, she hadn't been aware that there were snoopers. Her stance became uncertain, and Leo decided to teach her an important lesson. He dashed over to her and knocked the wooden sword out of her hand, swept her legs out from underneath her and stood over her with the tip of his weapon hanging just below her chin.

"Don't lose your focus. It will be your downfall." He said, she looked a little stunned and her glasses were askew on her face. "Also, try not to be self conscious, you were doing well until you realized they were there." He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder before lowering his weapon and pulling her back to her feet.

"That was awesome!" Mikey said enthusiastically, and toppled the three of them into the training room.

"Ow, Mikey get off me." Donnie's muffled voice came from the floor.

"Quite impressive." Splinter said from the other side of the room. "You have been working hard, and it is showing."

Holly mumbled thanks and bowed awkwardly to their sensei before stuffing the equipment away and dashing off to take refuge in the shower room.

"I feel kind of guilty, I haven't been practicing much outside of our training session." April said as she disentangled herself from the others. She picked up one of the staffs from the rack and started absentmindedly twisting it through her hands.

"It's not required. Only Leo and Raph actually do extra work." Donnie shrugged. "Well, and apparently Holly too."

"What do you do with your extra time?" April asked.

"Build stuff." Donnie shrugged again. "What did you do while you were grounded?"

"Baked cookies and watched movies." She grinned up at him.

"And you didn't bring us any? Harsh." Mikey chirped in from the floor.

April just frowned at him, "Its not like I had the time to bring them over."

"He knows," Donnie said, also glowering at his baby brother, "He's just trying to guilt you into making more."

"Maybe later, when we have less important things to worry about." April said.

The remainder of the day was spent preparing for the evenings rescue attempt. They had decided that the most obvious place to check first would be the Fortune Cookie Factory. It was unlikely that the purple dragons would continue using the run down warehouse as their base, but it was the only place that the teens knew the gang usually were. Hopefully there would be a clue as to what was really going on with the increased gang activity.

At sun down, Leo lead the group out to the surface and across the rooftops to the warehouse district, and split them into two teams who positioned themselves atop buildings on opposite sides of the factory. He, Mikey and and Holly were facing north, over looking the delivery entrance. While Donnie, Raph and April were facing south.

"Something's not right." Leo said as he frowned into his binoculars.

"I agree." Donnie's voice crackled over the speaker of Leo's phone. "I haven't seen a single purple dragon member."

"Where else could they be?" Aprils voice came though.

"Hey you guys! There's a dog over there, doing dog stuff." Mikey yelled.

"Focus Mikey." Leo said.

"What are we going to do?" Holly asked. Silence, answered her.

"We go down there carefully, and see what's going on." Leo said calmly. "Move in, slowly."

The teens approached the building cautiously, even the surrounding streets were deserted. Leo,and his group entered the building from the loading docks, while Donnie and the others entered through the side street . The building was still damaged from their last visit, and there were still mouser parts strewn across the floor.

"They're not here." Holly whispered once they all were close.

"Doesn't seem like it." Leo replied. "Everyone fan out and look for clues."

"OK Freddie." April scoffed.

"Freddie?" Leo asked.

April sighed, "You know what, it doesn't matter."

They all broke off into pairs and started to comb the area. Leo and Mikey spread over the lower level, while Holly and Raph leaned against one of the conveyor belts and held a hushed conversation. Donnie and April climbed the stairs to what was Baxter Stockman's office, they rifled through the filing cabinets and turned over all the pages on the table top.

"Do you really expect to find anything?" April asked after a while of silent searching.

"I hope so." Donnie replied, "I doubt you want Holly to have to go through what you have been, do you?"

"Of course not. But If her mom's not here I don't know where she could be."

"None of us do, but we have to start somewhere." Donnie pulled open a draw in a filing cabinet. "What is this?" He pulled out an old looking laptop computer, and flipped the top open.

The screen was dark, but it sprang to life when it was opened. Stockman himself was waiting for them. "Well, you pests showed up sooner than we expected." He sneered at them through the web cam. "Luckily we were faster at relocating."

"What have you done with Mrs. Mcallister?" April demanded.

"Don't worry, she's safe with us." Stockman purred. "We promise to delivery her safe and sound, if the Turtles come and get her."

"That's a little difficult if we don't know where you are."April snapped.

"I will tell you, soon. But first I want to know, are you vermin warm or cold blooded?"

"Why?" Donnie narrowed his eyes suspiciously.

"No reason, I'm just curious as to how warm you like the ambient temperature." Stockman smiled nastily at the camera.

"Do you plan on telling us where you are, or not?" Donnie asked irritably.

"Certainly, we are waiting for you in the clock tower." April and Donnie turned to run out of the office when Stockman called out to them to stop. "We will be waiting, if you make it here alive." He pulled out a small remote control from his pocket.

"What's that?" April asked nervously.

"That's a detonator." Donnie replied panic-stricken. He grabbed Aprils wrist and dragged her out of the office.

"I would say it has been a pleasure knowing you." Baxter said happily, "But that would be a lie." He pressed the button.

Raphael had pulled Holly off to the side before they started searching the Factory, he had noticed that she couldn't stop fidgeting with her hands, and was on the verge of bursting into tears at any moment. "Hey, are you alright?"

"Not really." She answered honestly.

"Don't worry so much, we'll get you mom back." He said earnestly.

"Yeah, but then what?" She said glancing around at the others. "The best case scenario I can see coming out of this is that we get her back, unharmed, but she now knows about you guys, and those stupid goons aren't just going to let this go. They will keep harassing April and I until they get what they want." She sucked in and let out an anxious breath.

"Well, there's nothing we can do about any of that right now." He shrugged. "The number one priority right now is getting your mother back, and everything else, we can deal with later." She didn't say anything in response, she just let out another sigh and nodded to show she understood.

Leo and Mikey had been searching the loading docks when April and Donnie's hurried footsteps made everyone turned to see what was going on. "We've got to go." Donnie yelled.

"Why?" Raph asked indignantly. That was when the office exploded above them. Raph and Holly were thrown bodily through the air and crashed through some left over crates piled up on the floor, as soon as Raph hit the floor he rolled over to Holly and shielded her with his shell to protect her from any additional damage.

April felt Donnie pull her close to him just before he launched them both over a nearby table. As they crashed down he grabbed the ledge and pulled it over on its side to provide them with what little cover he could. While Leonardo and Mikey dropped to the floor where they stood.

"Lets move." Leo bellowed before anyone could even move.

"Are you alright?" Raph asked Holly, he grabbed her under the elbow and lifted her to her feet. She blinked at him with glassy eyes and nodded absently at him. A trickle of blood oozed from her hairline, so he grabbed her wrist and dragged her after him.

More and more charges blew behind them, sending swirling shrapnel spinning past their heads. Fires erupted all around as the stacked boxes and pallets caught dancing flecks of ash. Leo lead the way through smoke and fire, dodging falling plaster and vaulting over upturned conveyor belts. Raph and Holly came next, with Mikey just behind them.

Donnie and April were lagging a few yards behind them when another explosion on the right caught them off guard. April threw her arms up to protect her face but the chunks of brick that rained down on them caused her to miss place a step and she felt her ankle roll out from underneath her. Something popped. "Donnie!" She yelled.

He turned to see her clutching her ankle looking distraught. "Can you walk?"

"I don't think so." April said.

Donnie scanned around for the others, but they had disappeared into the smoke and the boxes of cookies were burning away to cinders. "Well have to find another way out".

April nodded and let Donnie lift her into his arms. He set off running back the way they had come, hoping there was an exit still accessible to them.

Leo and the rest of the gang burst through the exit, and on into an empty alley way, coughing and spluttering. Holly was bent over double retching up the smoke that was in her lungs, while Raph checked over a nasty looking cut on her head.

"That was not our most gracious exit." Mikey said to no one in particular. Everyone silently agreed.

Leo quickly assessed the damage. Mikey looked alright, he just had a few cuts and scrapes, but nothing that would be considered serious. Raph too, looked fine. "Where's Donnie and April?"

"What?" Holly spun around, and immediately turned to run back towards the burning factory.

"No!" Raph grabbed her around the waist and held onto the squirming girl. "Don't be stupid."

"They were right behind me!" Mikey yelled.

"Don't worry, I'm sure they're OK." Leo said, hoping he sounded more confident than he felt. "We'll check the other exits before we start panicking."

The teens started to make their was around the outside of the building. Black smoke was curling it's way into the night, and Leo knew it wouldn't be long before the fire department was on its way.

"We have to go back in." Holly yelled suddenly.

"Absolutely not." Leo said firmly. "Donnie is resourceful, he'll find a way out.

"Yeah, but what if they don't?" Mickey asked softly.

"They will." Ralph responded for his big brother. Leo locked eyes with Ralph for a moment, and they nodded to each other, reassuring themselves.

They turned around the corner that lead to the alley that divided the back of this warehouse and it's neighbors and one of the windows shattered, and Donnie and April fell to the ground in a shower of glass. Donatello straightened up and set April gingerly on her good foot. Holly let out a little laugh of disbelief and ran over to April. While Leo and the others gathered around Donnie.

"What happened in there?" Leo asked.

"We just got separated, and the path was blocked by burning debris when we tried to catch up." Donnie offered, not wanting to blame April.

"Are you alright?" Mikey asked April, sounding worried.

"I don't know, I think I sprained my ankle." April said, she lowered her foot to the floor and put a little weight on it before gasping in pain and resuming her one legged stance.

The teens all looked around at each other, trying to read each others faces.

Leo was the first one to say what was on their minds. "You can't come with us if you can't walk."

"Well, obviously." April snapped.

"Then what do we do?" Donnie asked

"We need to get out of here, someone will notice the factory on fire." Leo said.

"Then we should get the girls back underground. We can try this again tomorrow." Raph chimed in.

"No." Holly shook her head. "I will take her back underground, you guys will do better against these jerks with out us anyway."

"You can't be serious?" Raph scoffed. "After all those times you guys argued with us?"

"Listen, they will either suspect we're dead, or have turned home with out tails between our legs. If you go, now, we will have a better shot at catching them off guard." Holly spoke clearly, even though the tears tracking down her face betrayed her dismay.

"Are you sure?" Leo asked.

"Yeah." April admitted for Holly.

The boys remained silent, they knew how badly the girls wanted to help them, but they also knew that they could move much faster with out them.

"You guys should go, the cops could be here any minute." April said.

"I'll give you a piggy back ride until we're far enough away from here." Holly crouched down and let Donnie help April onto her back. She stood shakily bearing the weight of her best friend easily enough for now. But she knew it was going to be a long walk back to the lair.

"We'll see you soon." Leo said.

"Take care you two." Mikey gave them a quick squeeze.

"Don't push yourself too far. Rest if you need to." Donnie glanced for one girl to the other with worry plastered across his brow.

"Just bring my mom home." Holly said.

Raph just nodded at her in silent promise that they would do what they could. The girls watched their Turtles race off into the night, until they heard sirens off in the distance. Holly bumped her friend up higher on her back, before turning away from the burning building into the darkened alleys of New York.

Holly carried April for just shy of an hour before she had to stop. By then they had made it to the entrance to the sewers, but there was still the long soggy leg of the journey to go yet.

"How's your ankle doing?" She said after setting April down.

April tested it again by trying to take a few steps. "Better, although it's still killing me."

"Well, we can go slower now we're not in the open." Holly slid the cover back over the entrance and turned to her friend. "But if it gets bad, I'll carry you again."

They walked slowly. April threw her arm over her friends shoulder, while Holly gripped April around the waist. When they finally made it to the lair both of them were out of breath, and April had pretty much given up using her bad ankle and was hopping along using Holly as a crutch.

Splinter was in the main room watching television, he had the news on and was watching the live report of the suspected arson in the warehouse district. He turned around before either of the girls could say anything, and for a brief moment, they could have sworn that they saw disapproval in his dark eyes. But if there was anything there it evaporated into concern when he saw the state the girls were in.

"What has happened?" He asked and sprang over to them. "Where are my sons?"

"They're fine." Holly said hastily. "They went on without us."

He didn't know who to tend to first. April looked like she was in pain, but there was blood soaking into Holly's collar that had come from her temple. "Lets set her down on the couch and then let's get you checked over." Splinter helped Holly get April settled before rushing off to get a first aid kit and some warm water in a bowl for them to clean up with.

He crouched down in front of Holly and beckoned her to lean forwards, and to April he said, "Tell me what happened while I fix you up." He brushed back the hair that clung in bloody clumps to Holly's face, and gently washed the grime away as he listened to the girls talk. The cuts on Holly weren't as bad as he had feared, they were shallow but there were plenty of them that they had bled quite a lot. He had her hold a cool towel to them and turned to April.

"It was all planned." April finished off, and she sounded angry about it.

"It sounds like it, but you girls did the right thing letting them go without you." Splinter said softly. "Now, what hurts?"

"My ankle. I think it's sprained."

"I'm going to take off your shoe to take a look. But it's probably going to hurt." Splinter told her honestly. April just nodded and looked pale. He tried to be as gentle as possible, but he had to rotate her ankle around to see if anything was broken. "Can you wiggle your toes?" He asked. She did, which was good. "You are correct, it is sprained. We'll ice it for a while and then wrap it later and you should be fine in a couple of days."

April nodded grimly, she had gone from pale to a sallow shade. Which only made her ash covered skin look even dirtier.

"I suggest that you two clean yourselves up and change while we wait for the turtles to return." He stood and headed off to his room, and returned with Holly's unwrapped Yukata folded neatly into a square, and a wrapped package for April.

"Thank you." Holly said.

April unwrapped her parcel, and a soft yellow robe unfolded its self into her hands. It had little embroidered bright orange birds on it, and was the same shape as the green one Holly held.

"This is beautiful, and my favorite color." She beamed at her sensei. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. Now, go get tidied up while I make some tea. I have a feeling we'll be waiting for a while." Splinter said, he helped Holly get April to he feet, but left them to get clean and changed in private. The old rat kept himself busy in the kitchen making some sandwiches and tea for the girls to eat while they awaited the return of his sons.