Fluffiness and a bit of action in this chapter!
Also this is still an Apriltello fanfic, among other things. Just a friendly reminder^^
As soon as they were safely outside of Karai's area of effect, as well as her rather spicy topics of conversation, April finally felt relaxed enough to officially start her date with Casey.
"You're a little late," April groused and Casey made an arrogant heave of his chin.
"Casey Jones is never late. Only fashionably late."
The boy flashed a gap-toothed grin like he was naively trying out for a toothpaste commercial.
"You call 21 minutes fashionable?" she said, pointing at her watch, one eyebrow raised.
"A date with Casey Jones is worth all the wait."
She shot him an unimpressed look.
"Well at least you kept one of your promises. You're actually wearing a shirt," she observed, and how couldn't she? It looked like the shirt was the only thing different on his attire, which looked like the same he wore at dinner the previous night. It left her wondering if he'd actually slept with those clothes on.
"Sure am," Casey said, looking down at himself, his striped white and blue shirt a couple sizes too big. "How do I look?"
"Dashing," April laughed. "The combination of dress shirt, torn jeans and bandana is very… artistic."
"I would call it cosmopolitan casual. Besides, I couldn't just take my dad's pants. They'd be falling off me all afternoon."
"Are these your only pants?"
"They're my best pants," Casey replied smugly, then his eyes latched onto the side of her head. "Hey… Did you get purple highlights?"
"Oh. Yeah, just the one," April said, taking her hand to her right ear to graze it down along the braid. "Karai convinced me. And it's regalia, not purple."
"Looks purple to me. Hey, I like it. Looks good on ya."
"Thanks."
There was a short silence as they turned a corner into a busier street, simply walking shoulder to shoulder like they'd done plenty of times in the past, except this time it was a date. An actual date. Casey seemed pretty chill, but April was biting her lip hesitantly.
"So... you didn't tell anyone, right?" she asked at length.
"No…" Casey lied perhaps a little too quickly and his smile faded. "But I still don't get why we have to keep it a secret."
"It's not a secret, it's just… the omission of unnecessary information. Look, I just don't want the guys making jokes at our expense just yet."
"The guys making fun of us? Since when does that worry you? Are you sure that's all it is?"
"Why do you say that?" April said, knowing in an instant there was no way out of it. She had been compromised.
"Come on, Red. Why don't you just tell the poor guy?"
April scrunched her brow in annoyance, halting before the arcade entrance to face Casey. No point in denying it anymore, she supposed.
"I'll tell him. I just need to find the right moment." And with a loud sigh she added "do you really wanna talk about Donnie on our first date?"
Casey reeled, his eyes wide once he'd realized what the conversation had dangerously derived to. He mentally punched himself in the mouth for it.
"No."
"Then get your butt in there so I can kick it," she ordered, holding the door to the arcade open for him.
"Saw faster, man!"
"We have to be synchronized, Mikey! You can't just push buttons like a madman!"
"So catch up to me!"
"Will you just… okay hold on! Stop for a moment! I'll set the pace!"
"We can't stop now, just go faster! Go, go, go!"
"Ugh!" Raph let the controller fall in exasperation when the timer reached zero and the letters on screen announced the opposite team's victory. The chubby characters on the screen celebrated to the sound of a cheerful jingle while his little fat man with the crooked moustache and the purple overalls slumped in defeat.
"Aw, man, you suck at this, Raph!"
"What? I oughta break this thing on your hollow head, ya moron!"
The sound of the revolving turnstiles pulled them from their endeavors. Seeing Karai making her way down the steps, Mikey parkoured over the backrest to greet her.
"Big sister!" he shrieked, throwing himself against Karai to give her one of his patented rib-crushing hugs that lifted her off her feet and squeezed the air out of her lungs. Still, Karai smiled and returned the hug as best she could, having already getting used to her little brother's rather extreme shows of affection.
"Let her go, you doofus, she's starting to turn blue," came Raph's voice from the couch, not so much concerned as irritated. The red-clad turtle picked up one of his Modern Ninja magazines, having given up on the videogame.
"What's up, little brother?" she exhaled, catching her breath once Mikey released her.
The young turtle seemed to notice her new hair then and his eyes scanned her with a look of fascination.
"Whoa! Rad new look!"
"Thanks, Mikey!"
At that very moment Leo was passing by carrying a mug and, at Mikey's words, his head swiveled around like a spinning top. Karai smiled mischievously at his gaping expression, running her hand through her bangs and shaking her head to make them dance.
"What do you think, Leo?"
"Wow that… looks amazing!"
The mug was full with what appeared to be -and smelled like- coffee, which was obviously not for him because he never drank the stuff. But in his stupor he was slowly tipping the cup over, and the liquid within started going over the rim and dripping to the floor. Karai tilted her chin towards the forming puddle at his feet and Leonardo finally sprung back to reality.
"Aw, man," he said, holding up his foot with the coffee stained bandaging before heading for the kitchen.
"Guess what, sis," Mikey went on after Leo had left. "I think you'll be happy to know that I've solved your name problem."
"My name problem," she repeated, fairly intrigued.
"Yeah, you know, how your name is Karai, but it's really Miwa, but you're still mostly Karai?"
"Ah…" Karai said, finally understanding, and then braced for Mikey's so called solution, partly dreading the sound of her new "better" name.
"I think you could use both names at the same time!" Mikey announced, his arms outstretched in a theatrical pose.
Karai smirked under her confused frown.
"I don't know, Mikey. Karai Miwa is a little long, don't you think?."
"Nooo, nothing so pediatrician!"
The girl giggled to herself at the adorable misuse of words.
"I think you mean pedestrian?"
Mikey stared for a few seconds, his expression blank. Then he continued like she hadn't just said anything.
"I thought of something more awesome-sounding, like you, big sis!"
She couldn't help but smile at the look of admiration that her little brother was giving her, an ample grin on his freckled face, his blue eyes shimmering with excitement.
"So what is it?" she probed, playing along with his anticipation.
Mikey inhaled deeply, getting ready for the reveal.
"Miwarai," he exclaimed finally, his hand making a dramatic arch in front of him like he could see the word written in the air with fireworks. "It's Miwa and -rai, from 'Karai', get it?"
"Aw, Mikey," she said, trying hard to suppress her laughter. "That's great, but… well, it's not a real name."
"Okay, not to worry. I got another one. Karaiwa!"
"Hm... You know, actually that is a real name, sort of. It's an area of Japan, in the prefecture of Kōchi," she said, amused by the coincidence.
"Hah! See? I'm a genius! That is totally a sign! From now on, I shall call you Karaiwa!"
She cringed at the sound of it, grasping for a way to let Mikey down gently.
"I'll… think about it," she said through her forced smile and Mikey seemed to catch on quickly for once, judging by his puppy dog eyes.
"Y-you don't like it?"
"It's not that I don't like it, it's just…I'm used to the way people call me, that's all," she explained in her best motherly voice while also caressing the smooth dome of his head. "Tell you what: you can call me Karaiwa if you want, okay?"
"Really?" he said, his eyes sparkling with renewed hope.
"Yeah! It's cute! Karaiwa."
"Sounds like a brand for instant noodles," Raph contributed, a look of derision in his narrowed eyes, before getting back to his magazine.
She did her best to ignore Raph, hoping the mockery would end there. She'd have to warn him to sleep with one eye open if it didn't.
At that moment Leonardo showed up with a cloth to wipe the coffee-scented mess he had caused before while trying not to call too much attention to the consequences of his lapse. Of course it was a moot effort because one of Karai's favorite pastimes was keeping an eye on him and everything he did whenever he was around, with the sole intention of finding anything she could use to further embarrass him for her own amusement. Sneaking up to the the turtle boy, she whispered in his ear:
"So was there enough left inside the cup for you to drink at all?"
Leonardo jumped at the kunoichi's sudden proximity.
"It wasn't for me, it was for Donnie. He was busy with something and I offered to take him his coffee. He said he didn't get much sleep last night," he said, kneading the damp cloth into a ball.
"Well it looks like your kind offering was all for naught," she cooed, patting him on the shell, and Leonardo adopted one of his renowned looks of deepest offense.
"Actually there was plenty in the machine," he retorted petulantly, picking up the mug full of coffee from the floor where he'd left it and showing it to Karai, who only gave it a sideways glance.
"Anyway, and speaking of our resident genius, I'll be in Donnie's lab," she said.
"What are you two up to in there lately?"
"Are you guys planning world domination?" Mikey asked. "Cuz if you manage to convince Donnie, he could totally pull that off for ya with his mad science skillz."
"If we were, we wouldn't be telling you, right? But I'm not interested in that today, I'd just like to look up a couple things in his nerd library," she lied. "I'll take the coffee."
Karai plucked the mug from Leo's hand and wandered off towards the big metal doors, leaving the other two alone.
"Donnie's library? I doubt she'd find anything of her liking there among all that Carl Sagan and Stephen Hawking," Leonardo said rather skeptically, but his thoughts were interrupted by Mikey's hushed words.
"No, but seriously, bro… Can you imagine Donnie going evil? He'd be like this cyborg turtle genius super-villain with murder gadgets and doomsday devices, he'd be like 'Storkman', but a lot worse…" Mikey shuddered, his voice going grave.
"Stop that, you're going to give yourself nightmares and then I'll have to deal with you."
The heavy lab door slid open with its unmistakable deep metallic rumbling, momentarily tearing Donnie's concentration away from his computer. He watched Karai slither herself inside through the narrow opening before closing it again behind her.
"Hey," she said with a tip of her head.
"Hey, Karai!"
"Leo made you coffee," she said, holding the mug up for him to see.
"Oh, right! Thanks!"
"Whatcha working on?" she asked Donatello as she crossed the lab towards the workbench, setting the mug down next to Donnie's keyboard on her way there.
"Nothing right now. Just chatting it up with Dr. Rockwell," he replied distractedly.
"MonkeyBrains?" she said, looking over Donnie's shoulder at the username on the chat.
"It was his idea," Donnie shrugged, bemused.
"It's no weirder than any of our usernames. So you two getting along?"
"Most of the time," he snickered. "You gonna work on your big surprise?"
"Almost done," she sang, taking out the lump of leather that had been lying secretly in one of the drawers and preparing the necessary equipment to continue working on it. "Good thing you let me occupy your lab and borrow your precious gadgets. I don't know how I would've kept this a surprise without your help."
"No problem. I can understand a need for quiet." Donnie smiled, knowing Karai's difficulty at openly showing gratitude. Then he waited a few seconds to casually ask "So how's everything?"
She rolled her eyes in mild exasperation, knowing damn well what he was referring to.
It was no secret that she'd been having a difficult few months. It wasn't just the time spent as a mutant, and the way Shredder had used her to hunt the turtles. Everything she once knew for sure had been proven wrong as well. Too many things had changed, too many walls in her life had been torn down and the landscape of her beliefs had been leveled down to a bed of rubble. She wasn't the same. After curing her mutation, the people she'd once considered the enemy had taken her in. And everybody in the lair of the Hamatos was aware of how she'd been struggling with her new life. Even Raph had been relatively kind, but their general strategy was usually staying away from the topic of her past and avoiding unnecessary questions.
Donatello, on the other hand…
Sometimes she'd swear he was trying to be the grandmother she never had.
"You don't have to ask everyday, Don," she said, throwing him a sideways glance and setting the hole punch on the table with a hollow thunk.
"Just making polite small talk," the turtle said nonchalantly. "And I don't ask every day! I could, though…" he threatened.
"No, thanks, I'm good!" Karai pleaded, palms out as if begging him to spare her life, and he chuckled merrily.
"Glad to hear."
"Yeah, yeah," she said with a dismissive wave of her hand.
After a few more adjustments Karai's work was finally nearing completion, and all that was left were the finishing touches.
"Hey, Don. You wouldn't happen to have a rivet gun?"
Donnie answered without taking his eyes off the screen or his fingers from the keyboard.
"In the closet, top shelf. It's in there somewhere. Rivets are in the bottom drawer."
Karai opened the closet and started digging around the various tools and gizmos that crammed its entrails. She stood on her tiptoes and really buried her hand in there, feeling for the thing she was looking for while trying not to knock down anything else. But there was some kind of wooden box that was in the way and she decided to take it out.
Carefully she pulled on the corners with her fingertips until she could see it over the edge of the shelf and she grabbed it. She was going to put it aside on a nearby table when she saw the golden heart engraved on its lid. She turned the container around in her hands, wondering how in the world had this ended up here, and opened it.
A snort of hilarity forced its way out of her throat at the sight of Donnie's smiling face on a photo greeting her from the inside, a tender melody playing on the revolving mechanism.
"What the heck is th-" she started before a green hand shot up from the side and shut the box with a thud, the music dying instantly.
"It's nothing, just… a thing I brought from the farmhouse," Donatello said evasively, taking the music box from her in haste and stretching to leave it on top of the closet where she couldn't reach it. He looked absolutely mortified, which did nothing but incite her mocking instincts.
"Did you make that for April?" she asked, a provocative grin on her face, and burst in loud giggles. "I doubt she'd like it. Don't let her cute clothes fool you. From what I've learned she's allergic to this type of cheese, especially in such copious amounts."
Donnie scoffed humorlessly.
"Yeah, I noticed," he said, and added with a hint of sadness, "I don't try stuff like that anymore."
"Oh. So you showed her already."
He didn't reply to that, and for a few seconds Karai only watched him fiddle with a marker that he'd picked up from a desk for no apparent purpose before he'd even realized what he was doing. Then he tossed the marker aside, sitting back at his computer.
He was rather adorable, in a hopeless kind of way, and below her devious exterior she felt genuine pity. That he'd been head over heels for April for the longest time was the world's worst kept secret.
A memory crossed her mind, one of Donatello coming to April's aid the night Karai had set out to kill her. She'd been the recipient of his wrath then, the fierceness with which he'd fought her off, almost a year ago now. She put the thought aside, the silt of shame once again stirred to the surface by the reminder.
"Maybe the photo was a bit much. You could've at least chosen one where your eyes don't pierce through the soul," she half-jested, breaking the silence in a feeble attempt to soft-pedal. She carefully approached him and leaned on his desk as he averted her eyes, his lips pressed tight. "So if it's in your lab, on the top shelf and out of sight, I'm gonna guess she didn't accept it, right? Did she make you take it back? That seems a bit cruel."
"Aren't you supposed to be working on your armor?"
Karai chuckled, but gave Donnie's shoulder a friendly nudge.
"Don't be like that, Don. It's not that bad, the gesture was actually kinda cute. Clumsy, but cute."
"Yay."
Karai regarded the turtle thoughtfully. It had just occurred to her that the poor guy was most probably unaware of how at this very moment April was on a date with Casey. It didn't matter what April had told her in words, Karai didn't need to be psychic to see through the ruse. And if she were to go by the fact that April had decided to hide that bit of information from her, it was likely she'd meant for it to be a secret. She decided not to press the matter further. For now, at least...
She ambled her way back to the closet and rummaged some more until she finally found the rivet gun, then brought it back to her bench, all the while maintaining respectful silence. Secretly she couldn't help wondering what she'd do if Leo ever made her a music box with his picture on it and her heart gave an unexpected flutter.
Then she tossed the thought aside, a smirk spreading on her face, because she knew it was like wondering what she'd do if it ever happened to rain upwards. Pointless. That would never happen. Even if it occurred to him to do something for her, it simply wasn't Leo's style.
"Noodles are ready!" came Mikey's voice from outside reverberating on the metal doors.
"Coming! Ok, this is the last rivet, I promise," Karai told herself, punching one more spike into the leather. Then she stood back and gave her work a critical once over, gun in hand. "There."
"You're done?" Donnie said from his corner of the lab, getting up from his chair.
"Yes. For real now."
And she quickly put the tool down, sliding it across the table and out of reach to make absolutely sure she attained to that.
"Can I see?" The turtle approached the piece of armor laid atop the workbench, a multitude of metallic rivets and spikes glinting in the light of the lamps. "Whoa! That is metal!"
"Is it a little much? I may have gone overboard with the rivets," she said in a slightly smaller voice that was very unlike her.
"No, I like it! It's very you. All those rivets are bound to give your armor a +2 bonus as well," he joked, although genuinely impressed with the end result.
"I just wanted an armor that doesn't have 'Shredder's daughter' written all over it."
Donnie turned towards her, appraising the change in her expression. His mouth stretched in a sincere smile as he lay a reassuring hand on Karai's shoulder.
"It doesn't. But even if it did, it wouldn't matter."
Karai offered him a thank-you nod.
"You gonna show them?" he asked, motioning towards the exit.
"I'm gonna wait until tomorrow before training. That way I can surprise them and test it in combat."
"Excellent. Might I suggest AC-DC for the catwalk?"
Karai's mouth and brow contorted into a 'not bad' kind of face at the idea and she started cleaning up all the tools and discarded thread and studs.
"And what will you play when you show April her armor?" she then asked casually, watching for Donatello's reaction out of the corner of her eye. His look of surprise did not disappoint, and neither did the dark blush on his cheeks.
"What? How- how did you…?"
"I peeked," she shrugged, feigning innocence. "So what made you embark on such a risky voyage?"
At first Donatello had meant to appear displeased, but the scowl was quickly discarded, too distraught by the sudden butterflies in his stomach.
"When you started making yours I thought it would be a good thing for April to have her own kunoichi gear as well. It's long due. I wanted to surprise her."
"Even after…?" Karai tilted her head towards the closet. "Man, Don, I gotta admire your tenacity."
This time Donatello wasn't so forgiving. Apparently she'd gone too far, judging by that fire in his eyes evaporating all trace of timidness.
"I didn't do it to get something in return! I was just hoping to do something nice, that could be useful and… I'm not expecting anything from her, okay?"
Karai was not at all fazed, but raised her hands apologetically.
"Okay, okay…"
"I mean, can't I do something nice for a friend?"
"Sure!"
"Good. I just… wanted to make that clear."
"Roger that."
The room went quiet but for the light tapping of Donatello's fingers on the desk, his eyes darting back and forth indecisively, and Karai waited patiently for him to make the question that was clearly at the tip of his tongue.
"Well- can you at least tell me if she… if you think she'll like it?" he stammered finally. His blush was back and Karai smiled to herself. He was so easy to read. Maybe that's why he was such easy company for her.
However she didn't have time to try and assuage his fears before they heard the heavy lab doors being heaved open.
"What are you guys doing in here? Your noodles are soaking up all the soup!"
Thankfully the armor was out of sight by the time Raph could finish poking his head in through the opening, buried under a couple of thick tomes on Advanced Magnetism and Applied Microbiology, which Donatello was now pretending to guide her through.
"Yeah, hold on, let us just finish this paragraph," he said casually.
"Dude, if you wanna bond with Karai, homework is not the way to do it. I thought you'd be doing something cooler and more in Karai's field of expertise, you know, like taking over New York," Raph jested, one eyebrow ridge raised.
"Thank you, Raph." Usually when Karai spoke those words, in that order, it wasn't out of gratitude, and Raphael clearly knew this based on the crooked grin of self-enjoyment he was dedicating her.
"You're welcome, sis," he retorted in mock-sweetness before turning away.
Karai hurriedly put the armor away in the drawer before anyone else could see and turning to Donatello she pressed a finger to her lips in a secretive gesture. Donnie acknowledged by pretending to zip his mouth shut and they were off.
"Man, I can't wait to give this thing to Raph," Casey snickered, holding up what appeared to be a strawberry pink stuffed crustacean creature, the size of a German Shepherd with a white bow on its head. The multiple little arthropod legs on its belly dangled around with its carrier's every step and Casey couldn't look more thrilled about it. "He is going to flip."
April laughed deviously. Knowing Raphael's phobia of cockroaches, there was a slight chance Casey would end up hanging on the wall from a pair of sais, but they'd both deemed it absolutely worth the risk.
"I would so get the whole thing on youtube if it wasn't for our vote of confidentiality," she said, already on pins and needles picturing each of the turtles' reactions.
They had acquired this thing with their combined tickets won at the arcades. They saw it hanging there like a grotesque angel and they had both agreed it was the most adorably disgusting thing they'd ever seen. Its beady eyes were practically begging them to adopt it.
"Sure you wouldn't rather keep it yourself?"
April gave a dismissive wave of her hand.
"No way. It'll be a lot more fun to have around the lair. Let it be a testament to my superior gaming skills. I own like 78% of that doll," she said, taking pride in Casey's offended pout at those words. He was a bit of a sore loser, but being on a date she had the upper hand today.
Looking up at the already darkening sky, another thought occurred. "What time is it?"
"We got time. Movie doesn't start in another fifteen minutes."
"We better hurry up though, we've already paid for these," April said, taking the tickets out of her duffle bag to check the start time.
"Let's take the park! It's a shortcut. And also very romantic," he suggested in a deep voice, wiggling his black eyebrows. April shoved him away with a crooked grin, but agreed to take the shortcut just in case.
They should've known better than to meander through a park at sundown. They'd only barely made it a few yards in along the dusty trail when there was a holler to one side of the path that caught their attention.
"Check it out! Casey Jones dressing all fancy for his girlfriend!"
They turned around to look for the source of the laughter that followed and saw four kids, probably her age or younger, gathering in a group before a vandalized "if your dog poops you scoop" sign post with paint cans in their hands. They were pointing at the pair and cackling derisively.
"Hey, Casey! Are you on a date or on your way to church?"
"Yeah, nice shirt! Did ya borrow it from your dad?"
April turned to look up at Casey with her lips puckered in lofty apathy.
"Old friends, I presume?"
"It's just those kids from my block," Casey said with an air of disgust and his hands balled into tight fists. "They only get together to mess stuff up. Or to mess with people… I caught them smashing a car window to steal a stupid toaster. They have no idea that was me in the hockey mask kicking their sorry asses, or they wouldn't be making fun of me right now."
"Honey, you can do so much better! Wanna try with a real man?"
April let out a groan of revulsion and slid her hand inside her duffle, rummaging for the reassuring feel of her tessen. "You don't even shave, you brat," she muttered under her breath, pretty intent on avoiding any kind of trouble.
"What the hell is that thing you're carrying, Jones?"
They knew they were referring to the horrifying yet somehow sickly sweet bug plushie in Casey's arms.
"Duh, it's Casey's little sister! Don't you recognise the bow?"
April felt Casey tense beside her, hatred rolling from him in waves.
"Just ignore them, Case. Don't fall for it," April said in an attempt to dissuade him from engaging in a fight that he was destined to lose, but Casey's entire attention seemed focused on the morons smacking their thighs and clutching their stomachs in forced laughter. And she knew him well enough to know where this was going.
Oh boy...
"You'd think at her age she would've sprouted wings already!"
Casey snarled, his lip curled upwards.
"Casey..." April warned in a dangerous voice that said 'don't you dare'. The boy only turned around to hand her the plushie and he faced the bullies.
"Hang on, Red! These goons need to be taught a lesson!"
"You think you can postpone the class for another day? We're gonna be late!" She struggled to keep the doll in her arms while tapping her own watch to emphasize her point. "Also, you're gonna get clobbered!"
"Don't worry, April, this will only take a moment!"
"Not even if you weren't outnumbered four to one! The movie, Case!"
But at this point the movie was really just an excuse to keep him from getting into another street brawl, and April pulled on his shirt sleeve begging him to move. At long last, Casey reluctantly obliged, his temple throbbing with contained rage.
"You can come back some other day, and you can bring Raph with you and have some fun with them. But now we better hurry or we won't make it to the theater."
She dragged Casey through the park as fast as he'd go. It didn't help that the group of bullies started tagging along. April could hear the sound of Casey's molars grinding against each other.
"They're lucky I don't have my gear with me, or I'd teach them to mess with Casey Jo-"
His words were cut off by a projectile cup hitting him square in the back of the head, the liquid getting splashed all over his hair and shirt.
For a few seconds Casey remained frozen, his feet nailed to the ground, the sticky syrup dripping down his face as the kids behind them threw guffaws of unpleasant laughter into the night air like coyotes.
"Oh, crap," April squeaked.
Casey started to vibrate like an over-heated boiler. Finally he exploded, and swirled around to pounced at the perpetrator. Growling, he tackled the guy to the ground, a cloud of dust wafting up with the impact.
"Casey, no!" she yelled in vain, holding the ugly plush tightly in her arms as the two rolled around in the dirt like roosters in a cock fight, grunting and puffing while the rest of the goons cheered.
So far Casey seemed at an advantage. He was older and a more experienced brawler, and he'd learned a thing or two from having Raphael as a friend. The bully thrashed and kicked desperately trying to get his adversary off, but Casey had him pinned now, and he was landing punch after furious punch on the guy's guts.
"I bought lemonade from you when we were kids, Joey! You! Ungrateful! Asshole!" he yelled in between blows until the others watching decided their mate had had enough and it was time to intervene. One of them snagged the collar of Casey's shirt and yanked backwards, pulling him off of Joey and throwing him to the ground.
Between the blink of an eye and the next, the tables had turned and now there were too many angry teenagers tossing Casey around like a volleyball. April had been contemplating the prospect of calling for help, but that would take a while and then -of course being Casey- he would most surely get into even more trouble with the cops. Forget the movie; he would end up either in the hospital or in jail if she didn't do something soon, and yelling threats wasn't working. After dancing nervously on her two feet for a bit, she finally came to a decision. With a tired sigh of surrender, she leaned to sit the fuzzy bug creature down on the park bench, promptly reaching inside her bag.
Casey was on the ground now, curled into a ball as the kicks flew from all directions, his cries of pain muffled on his sleeves.
And then suddenly an object flew by spinning and hit one of the teens in the face. It bounced off to hit another one in the back of the head, with that knocking both of them on their rears. Everybody halted and looked around in confusion, spotting the young red-haired girl who was striking a karate pose with a fan in her hand. The fan glistened with a dangerous metallic glow.
Before they had time to process, she swung again. The fan hovered off towards the group of slack-jawed teens at lightning speed, catching a couple of cheeks with its razor-sharp edges before returning to its owner's hand.
The girl held the thing aloft menacingly.
"Get away from him or so help me!" she growled.
A few of the kids were already backing off from Casey's trembling form, gripping their faces where the tessen had left bleeding gashes.
"What the fuck, man! That fan's alive or something!"
"Yeah, unlike you, if you don't get the hell off of him!" she threatened.
They appeared hesitant to be intimidated by a pretty girl waving a fan, so April helped them come to grips with the notion. She made a warning brandish, flashing her fan in front of her. The kids flinched and that made her smile.
Swelling with confidence, she feigned a new attack and they jumped, scurrying away like the weasels they were as she made her way to Casey.
The boy disentangled himself from the pitiful ball he had rolled himself into and started laughing as he accepted April's hand, the idiot, scrambling to his feet with a clipped cry of pain.
"Those assholes!" he chortled, wiping the dirt and blood from his upper lip. "Did you see that? They totally cheated!"
He swayed and April caught his arm, putting it around her shoulders to help him stay on his feet.
"You thought that was funny?" April snapped, infuriated and annoyed by Casey's continued laughter when he was covered in cuts and bruises and could barely stand upright. "Let's get you to my place," she growled.
"Wait!" he groaned and for a second April thought his leg was broken or something. But all he did was reach for the plush sitting on the bench, grabbing one whisker. "Okay," he confirmed and leaned on April with his other arm. The pink crustacean doll dragged on the dirt ground like a deflated balloon as they slowly made their way out of the park.
April scoffed, narrow eyed.
"You douchebag. We already had tickets to that show."
"I can still go, no big deal! You think this will stop me from going to a movie theater? Like literally the only thing you do there is sit for two hours," Casey slurred before he tripped over himself, almost making the two of them fall.
"Are you nuts?" she exclaimed. "Come on. We gotta get you cleaned up."
Wooooo I loved writing this chapter!
There's probably going to be a new illustration to go with it, so keep an eye on the profile for the links.
I never knew the Donarai bromance would be so much fun. What did you guys think?
Oh and another thing: don't be too discouraged about April apparently rejecting the music box. Just wanted to say that.
A big thank you, as usual, to our beta reader Queequegg.
Remember, reviews are fuel for the writing furnace!
