HOO-BOY guys! These last few chapters are taking FOREVER! Hope you haven't forgotten us!

But here it is, the dramatic action-packed climax with shippy sprinkles on top, part ONE. This is what the Future Turtles came back in time for. It's the longest friggin' chapter to date, and definitely the hardest to write, having to choreograph all those fight scenes, and coordinate all those POVs. But we damn proud we wrote it.

And as usual, huge thanks to theHerocomplex and Queequegg for their amazing beta work.

WARNINGS: Secondary character death, violence and blood.

Enjoy...


Previously...

The Lotus Clan is on a suicide quest for revenge, and no matter how hard the turtles tried, Karai still ran off with them.

The Shredder's cooking himself an army. The ingredients include a bunch of kidnapped neighborhood kids and a lot of mutagen.

The feelers around Chinatown have just rung the alarm. Now it's time for the turtles and their future counterparts to go intercept the Lotus, and help them defeat the Shredder-and hopefully not die.


"Alright, I think I got something again. Roach 5's spotted movement near Murakami's. The infrared footage confirms sixteen individuals," the older version of Donatello announced over the hustle and bustle of the common room. He squinted in concentration at the three-dimensional projections on his curious wrist device. Eight turtles and three humans assembled in a flurry, while Splinter watched from the side, hands clasped behind his back.

It could hardly be considered supervising. Though he still couldn't quite say he entirely approved of this plan, these boys still had everything under control. And they certainly didn't need him. His little chuckle of proud satisfaction went entirely unnoticed in the commotion.

"Omigosh-omigosh…" young Michelangelo chanted under his breath on his seventh time past, before turning around to nervously hop about some more.

"Is it definitely them?" the older Leonardo asked, eyes blazing with focus.

Future Donatello gazed at the footage for another second, then said with certainty, "It's them. They're on the move. Heading northeast, towards the Foot lair. The speed at which they're going, the Shellraiser can get us there well before they arrive, but we gotta hurry."

"We're here! We're here!" came younger Donatello's voice from the entrance. He and April jumped over the turnstiles and approached the group, sweaty and short of breath.

"Finally. Another minute more and we'd have left without you," older Leonardo groused, while the younger one gave them a judging glower.

Donatello and April both winced in unison. "Sorry."

"Woaaaah, you got a new armor!" young Michelangelo exclaimed. Then he gasped. "Something happened, didn't it!" He pointed between April and Donatello, and the pair exchanged sheepish glances, color rising to their cheeks.

There was a short pause in which everybody stopped to regard them. Splinter did too, stroking his beard. Michelangelo was right: they did have a kind of light to them, standing close to one another, the air between them rippling with confidentiality. Catching Splinter's gaze, the pair shifted awkwardly, surely wondering what his opinion was on the matter.

He squinted. What had they been doing? They're still so young. Might have to give them the talk. Splinter let his whiskers quirk in a glimpse of a smile, but decided not to comment for now, and averted his eyes. My boys are growing up.

"No time for that, Mikey. Alright, everybody, let's move!" Future Leo ordered quickly, herding the group around the distraction, something for which the pair seemed very thankful.

From his idle, unobtrusive vantage point, Splinter could see every reaction to this new development, even in the new surge of activity—from young Michelangelo's delighted little grin and Casey's curious side glance, to older Donatello's lingering gaze, the expression on his face quite the exposé. It journeyed from hope through uncertainty, then despair at the change of subject. Lastly, begrudgingly, he visibly forced himself back to the matter at hand.

"Triple-check your gear! Smoke bombs, shuriken, T-phones, toothbrushes!" older Leonardo listed aloud, going around as they all frisked themselves and their travel bags, while younger Donatello dashed into his laboratory. "Retro dart guns?"

"Check one," younger Leonardo chimed.

"Check two," young Raphael raised his gun next.

April followed, right after younger Donatello reappeared at the lab doors to hand her hers, along with a pack of darts. "Check three."

"And checkity-check four," younger Donatello finished, then patted the duffle bag at his side. "Also got our new mapping marbles, my tracker, few packs of Future Donatello's medi-gel and extra darts… I think we're set."

And so here they were. With everything and everyone ready to go, hearts racing and bodies quivering, all movement ceased, bustle coming to a stammering standstill.

Every pair of eyes turned, one by one, to Splinter. His sons from another time seemed to hesitate, as if none of them really wanted to acknowledge the moment.

Older Leonardo was the first to lay his rucksack at his feet, and the rest did the same. Splinter's heart ached at the weight of their steps, as they slowly approached him. Even he was left without words once the four of them were standing before him, looking up at him like he was a shrine.

"Well," Leonardo uttered after no one else seemed to know where to begin. "This is it."

Splinter nodded solemnly, but smiled a bittersweet smile, painfully aware of what this goodbye meant to them.

"You know something, Sensei?" Michelangelo said, sounding ten again. "I don't really feel like going back right now."

The others' pressed lips and furrowed brows were an echo of Michelangelo's ever honest words.

Splinter laid a loving paw on the smooth dome of his son's head and Michelangelo blinked slowly at the touch, eyes glossy. "I understand, my sons. It was such a brave thing to do, to face your past. But you cannot live in it. Your own present needs you now and you must face that present, and look towards your future. You have much to do there."

"I think we all just wished we coulda spent more time with you…" Donatello said through a half smile, in a matter-of-fact way that was still brimming with emotion.

Splinter gripped his shoulder, and shook it gently. "I know what you have been through," he stressed, and gazed sadly at the others. "I wish I could have been there. But I was lucky enough to witness what you have grown into, and you have grown plenty. I would like you to remember that no matter what has happened these past few years of your lives, I was here today. And I was able to look upon you, after all your hardships, and see how strong you have become. I am certain you will come out of this, not only victorious, but wiser as well. We all owe you a great deal." And as he looked at their wet smiles and glistening eyes, something caught in his throat. He swallowed it down to say, slow and definitive, "I am proud of you, my sons."

"Thank you, sensei."

"Thanks, sensei."

Splinter opened his arms, and unlike the first time they met, not three days ago, they dove in without hesitation, bunching around him, enveloping him. He grasped Raphael's strong arm, nuzzled Donatello's cheek. He got a few sobs in return, drowned in his robe, and his own throat constricted, eyes burning with the threat of tears.

His voice came out gruff as he gently pushed himself away. "Go, my sons. You cannot waste any more time."

"Come on, guys," Leonardo said as they all arduously unlatched themselves from Splinter's body, sniffing and wiping their eyes before picking up their equipment off the floor. All the others who had been quietly watching the scene cleared their throats, rubbed their faces, and got moving as well.

Before anyone could go very far, however, Michelangelo spoke up over the rustling.

"Hai, Sensei II. But first… let us take a selfie!" he proclaimed before physically gathering a few of them up by the arms and bunching them together in front of Splinter.

"There's no time for self—!" Future Donatello's complaint was cut short when Future Casey yanked his belt strap, so that he all but fell sideways into Casey's armpit.

Michelangelo positioned himself in the front of the group, stretching out his arm as far as it would go and maneuvering the T-phone so everyone would be in frame.

"Scooch in closer, feel the love! Okay! Say gyoza!"

"Gyoza!"

After that, all that was left for Splinter to do was to watch as the whole party stuffed themselves and their luggage in the Shellraiser like sardines in a can. His sons from another time looked back until the Shellraiser doors closed and the engine revved up.


"Team Nerf here. No sign of 'em yet. Anything on any of your ends, guys?" Donnie murmured into the comm and was immediately answered by Future Leo's voice in his ear, faint and mechanical.

"Team Roof: nothing."

Present Leo's voice came in next. "Team Bones: zippo."

Donnie currently sat in darkness next to Raph and Casey, in some of the deepest, dankest, man-made tunnels in New York City, eyes on the lonely escape hatch. They'd been there a while now, and he could hear Casey already sighing and shifting and tapping the brick wall rhythmically with mounting impatience, which was never a safe state for Casey to be in.

"Team Casey Jones." The older Casey yawned through some static. "They're sure taking their sweet time." He was the only one waiting in the Shellraiser, hidden inside a subway tunnel, ready for when they got out. With his shoulder still out of service, and his gear sitting at the bottom of the East River, there really wasn't much else for him to do.

All these bored Caseys were making Donnie nervous. Was the one at his side humming… Cinderella? That bit totally sounded like "A dream is a wish your heart makes", though he didn't have time to hear it properly before Raph administered a silencing smack.

Donnie clicked his tongue and checked his tracker for the time. Twenty minutes since they'd lost track of the Lotus again. Hachisu and her clan were probably lurking in some sewer nearby, together with Karai, waiting for the right moment to strike. Once they showed up, the Hamatos would offer to join forces.

That was the plan, at least.

The objective was simple: locate Karai, keep her safe, take out the Shredder. The challenge was getting to them. They had all the known exits covered, hoping to intercept them before they could enter. While Donnie's group watched the hatch to the maintenance hallways leading into Baxter's lab, Present Leo's group had the catacombs. All four of their older selves would be waiting on the rooftop a couple streets down, keeping a constant eye on the glass-roofed throne room.

Shredder's lair didn't just have soldiers protecting its bounds—most of Donnie's sensors were being blocked by noise and interference, probably caused by electronic disrupters.

"Team Nerf: my sensors are dead. I'm blind and deaf, just FYI," he warned, and tossed the tracker inside his duffle bag. Even now, half a dozen spy roaches still kept watch all around the block, but the app was pretty much useless down here.

Future Donnie's answer gave some relief. "Team Roof: I still have roach vision. Storm's picking up, though. Visibility kinda sucks from up here too. Keep an eye and an ear out."

Donnie looked at the time again—one hour until the wormhole momentarily grazed the Earth before flying off into space—and released an anxious breath out into the blackness of the tunnel.

Karai, where are you?


The old secret escape passage lead directly to the catacombs underneath the church. They sat in a single file halfway down a narrow stone staircase which was just wide enough for human shoulders, and barely wide enough for Leo's shell.

"They should be here by now," Leo breathed through the dusty darkness, shaking his head to his troubled thoughts.

"Yeah, we're cutting it kinda close," April said, glancing at her T-phone's clock. "That wormhole's not gonna wait."

"Okay, I don't like this. And not just 'cause we're in a creepy tomb," Mikey said, a little too loud for Leo's tastes, but the place seemed absolutely, well, dead. "I got a bad feel in my tum-tum, guys. Like when I ate that month-old slice of pizza."

"Shouldn't your prophetic tum-tum have warned you against eating month-old pizza, though?" April said wryly.

"Ah yes, but food is tum-tum's only weakness," Mikey retorted, patting himself on the stomach.

Leo was not one to disregard Mikey's hunches himself—not regarding food at least—as his brother's faithful gut had gotten them out of tight spots more than once. But now both April and Mikey were looking at him, waiting for his orders. Finally, he said into the com, "Alright. This is Team Bones: we're gonna have a closer look."

"Team Roof: be careful. They might be expecting us."

Leo got down low, and signalled the others to cover his shell. They advanced silently down the claustrophobic staircase, weapons at the ready, the rims of his shell scraping against the stone walls, until they found the dungeon's iron gates. No one in sight, no guards, nothing.

Suspicious.

"Deploying mapping marble." He took the small glass ball with the tiny camera, gently rolled it under the bars, and opened the app. "How did this work again? Oh yeah." On his phone screen came the Marble Vision interface, and the same interference the Donnies had complained about, although proximity seemed to help.

He put his thumb on the up-arrow. The tiny marble rolled into the dark corridor and then it was gone from sight. Huddled together cheek to cheek, Mikey, April, and Leo followed the marble's trek on his T-Phone.

There was a light further down the tunnel. They turned a corner to even more stone floors and walls, and niches housing whole skeletons, a series of torches illuminating their crackled skulls. They kept going, the minuscule camera bouncing on the uneven ground, turned the second corner into a junction and—

They jumped. Leo got a reflex slap in the ear, and dropped the phone.

"Who's that?" Mikey squeaked, and they slowly leaned in to look at the face on the screen, which looked back right into the camera with blind eyes, the torch fire glinting off them as the only sign of life. The owner of the face had his neck twisted at an odd angle.

Heart racing, Leo picked up the phone, and maneuvered the marble around the body. There were more bodies. Several of them, littering the floor.

"The Lotus is inside!" he whispered as loud as he could manage into the com.

"What?" came the sharp reply. Leo wasn't sure whose.

"Party's started without us! Karai must have led the Lotus through some other secret entrance of hers!" he went on, rushing to pick open the gate.

"What? How did you not know she'd do that!" This time Leo recognized one of the Raphs' voices.

"It didn't happen this way in our universe!" That was Future Donnie. Everyone was forgetting to state their team names. "They went in through the front door! We were watching the other exits purely as a precaution!"

The lock clicked, and Leo heaved the gate open and dashed through the dark corridor, April and Mikey at his heel.

Future Donnie was still talking, "I'm guessing, since the Karai from our timeline joined them at the last minute, she didn't have the time to show them—"

There was an ear-splitting boom and next thing Leo knew he was on his back. His chest hurt, ears rang. He shielded himself as the last wave of dust and debris hit his face. He opened and closed his mouth to make his ears pop, and now he could hear the other Leo's voice on the com.

"—come in! What was that!"

"Leo! What's going on?" one of the Donnies demanded as well.

"Dammit!" He rasped, from nose to windpipe feeling as though he'd been singing in a sandstorm. He coughed, and gaped at the pile of rubble before him. "Foot's blown up the dungeon entrance!"

"Are you guys alright?" Donnie's voice said, sounding anxious.

Leo looked around to see, relieved, both April and Mikey dusting off a few pebbles.

"Yes, but we're blocked out and the Lotus are trapped in! You need to get in here!"

"No!" His own older voice retorted on the other end. "We have to stay on the roof and wait for a visual on Karai! Get in there! Help the Lotus and keep an eye out!"

"Team Nerf: we're also on our way!" younger Donnie acknowledged.

"You heard them, guys," Leo said. "Start digging."

As they slowly removed stone after stone from the blockade, he could barely hear Future Leo's fervent words over the sound of his own pulse in his ear. "Remember: we avoid as many casualties as we can, but the primary goal is to get Karai out of there alive!"


You could hear a pin drop on the concrete floor of the old, cylindrical, cistern-turned-laboratory of horrors. It looked empty from where they stood, just above the nook housing Baxter's console.

Donnie glanced at Raph and Casey, and they answered with frowns of suspicion. Casey mouthed "trap" and Donnie pressed his lips in agreement. It could be that everyone was upstairs, countering the Lotus' attack… or it could be an ambush. Either way they had to make it to the catacombs quick.

Donnie and Raph jumped down noiselessly by the console—Casey did his best. A bunch of fish ogled lazily at them from inside the built-in water tank at the back of the recess. The vending machine had, as always, a full stock of Choco-logs.

Overhead, glowing an otherworldly green, Baxter's mutagen sphere hung like a gigantic lava lamp, filled to the brim. Oh, all the things he could do with that amount of mutagen. Dozens of tubes and cables slung out of it like a bad hair day, connecting to the shadowy terrariums. Donnie thought he heard a faint gargle coming from behind the thick monster-proof glass, but that could've been the pipes.

They had to hurry; the Lotus, and Karai, were face to face with the Foot at this very moment. Deeming the coast clear, they made a run for the exit, across the bottom level under the mutagen tank. But before they could reach it, the door slid closed on their noses and Donnie whined out loud.

"Called it," Casey said, as they all unsheathed their respective weapons.

"Ah, turtlezzz!" a familiar voice buzzed over their heads. "I wazz expecting you zzz!" The Baxter Fly hovered up to them, something like a remote control in his grotesque, slimy claw. With an unpleasant chuckle, the fly pressed the big black button, and a series of bangs echoed throughout the space. Dark shapes shifted behind the terrariums' glass walls.

"Here we go," Raph growled.

Taking a moment for his routine assessment of the playground before the bell, Donnie noticed a set of vials plugged into a machine.

"Uh-oh. I know that lovely purple glow," he sang. "It's Reagent X, one of the main ingredients for the mind control serum."

"Yezzz, you'll find my boyzzz're not very pretty, but they're very loyal..."

Something very heavy landed to their right with a sloppy thump. Before Donnie could take a good look at it, another thump made him twirl to the left. Another one behind him, then another one, and another one. In a matter of seconds, they were surrounded by monsters. Misshapen. Bulky. And that smell.

"Eugh they reek!" Casey coughed. "Which reminds me: is there a Billy here?"

There was no answer but for Baxter's gurgly laugh. "Kill them!"

"Remember, these are human kids!" Donnie said, speaking quickly as the monsters stalked nearer—twelve of them, three in the front, one to the right, two to the left, three behind, three still perched on the above ledges, and one man-fly in pink floating overhead. "Use the dart guns!"

Raph did, and then Donnie. Two darts met their targets and the mutants gurgled in surprise, then roared, before dropping to the ground, writhing.

"What?" Baxter exclaimed in anger, seeing his creations deflating and shedding skins like snakes. The other mutants watched their fallen mates nervously with what little consciousness they had left.

"I think it's working!" Donnie cheered. "Get in line, uglies! Casey, cover us!"

While the monsters were busy warily eyeing the dart guns in Donnie's and Raph's hands, Donnie took the opportunity to reload, then picked the next one in line—the one dragging the big bulbous forearm, giving him flashbacks to the April Derp. He aimed.

There was a buzz by his ear, loud as a single-seater. "I'll take that!"

"No!" Donnie cried, but Baxter had already yoinked the gun right off his hands and he was left reaching into the air.

Casey swung with his bat, but Baxter simply climbed higher out of their reach.

"You brats alwayzz messing up my projectzzz!" Baxter sputtered, then addressed his guard dogs. "What are you waiting for, cowardzzz? Get them! Kill them!"

Ten monsters lunged at them like a landslide, and Donnie leapt into a ducking roll.

As he moved, he distinctly heard the third dart slicing the air, and a third mutant collapsed to the ground. Raph had managed to hit another one. Now if he could get his own dart gun back...

In the opening confusion, Donnie scrambled to the exit door to take a quick look—magnetic lock, no console, probably controlled from Baxter's computer, or his remote—before having to spin away again to avoid a charging monstrosity, which slammed into the door instead. It looked around stupidly for a second before spotting Donnie, then it roared, and took off after him again.

Donnie ran through the next open door, into the maintenance stairwell leading to the top of the cistern.

"Team Nerf! Where are you!" said Future Leo's voice on the com.

"We're uh… held up! Be right there! Just gotta take care of—" He yelped when the fire door exploded inwards beneath the force of the same brute. Donnie bolted up the stairwell, round and round in bounds, the gigantic chunk of putrid meat sloshing and stomping after him.

Eight stories later he reached the top of the cistern, and shot out onto the catwalk that hang directly over the mutagen tank. As he looked over the railing, he spotted Baxter a couple levels down, plucking the dart out of Donnie's gun and inspecting it. The remote control protruded out of his back pocket.

Donnie poised himself and jumped—just in time to avoid the fleshy tank that had burst out onto the catwalk.

Baxter squawked when Donnie landed on his shoulders and latched on to his grotesque head like a baby monkey. Two pairs of wings buzzed frantically in an effort to keep them airborne, smacking him left and right. Kicking and yelling, they crashed into a terrarium glass wall. Donnie landed on the ledge, and the remote bounced at his feet. He caught it before it fell off, and quickly pressed it.

There was a sound of mechanical clicks in the terrarium behind him, but the exit door didn't even shudder.

"Sewer apples!" he grumbled out, and flung the useless remote at a fast-approaching Baxter. It struck true, and the fly covered his face, crying in complaint. Donnie took the opportunity to pounce on him again, snatching the dart gun back, and got the hell away.


"50 points!" Raph cried, having nailed his fifth shot, and leapt out of the way of the rampaging monsters.

Casey skated by like he had rockets on his feet, smacking a few on the way, which prompted them to conveniently change targets. It bought Raph some time to reload. He reached in his belt pouch, but before his fingers even found the dart, he heard huge insect wings droning overhead and his whole body ducked in a reflex, an involuntary shudder crawling up his arms to his neck. Before he'd realized what happened, Baxter had snatched his gun.

"Don't you fucking dare!" Raph sprung as high as he could, and managed to get a grip on Baxter's arm. He tried not to focus on the feel of giant insect hairs poking his palms as he held on—or the mucus, or the smell of acid. His toes touched ground, and he made sure they wouldn't leave it again.

"Give me!" Baxter buzzed from his end of their tug of war.

"Get the hell away from me, you gross bug!" Raph nearly squeaked, quivering, fighting nausea and an impulse to let go.

As a response, Baxter made a disgusting noise in whatever he had that passed for a throat, and a bright yellow juice spewed out of his mouth and onto the gun—and Raph's hands.

"Gyeaggh!" He yelped, jumping backwards. The stuff wasn't just disgusting, it burned like hell. He desperately shook the puke off, tried to rub it off the cement walls, wanting to puke himself, and meanwhile Baxter was off with his dart gun.

Satisfyingly, the flying dork's stupid chuckle was cut short by a puck smaching him straight in his puke-hole.

"You like that?" Casey taunted, still being chased by six clumsy, very angry blobs.

On his way past, he pucked Baxter again, this time knocking the gun off. It fell to the ground at the other side of the room, and Raph lunged for it, jumping over the incoming mob following Casey like the tail of a comet. The brutes were apparently too stupid or too clumsy to grab, or even notice, something treading on their own heads, and Raph hopped from one bald, blackened, skull to another like stepping stones, trying to get a good view of the floor. He located the dart gun at the foot of Baxter's computer, and made a dive.

But as soon as he put his hand on it, he immediately dropped it again. "Aw, ew! It's all melted and disgusting!" he yelled.

"We still have one!" Donnie cried from above, perched on the second story ledge, and as if to demonstrate, shot at a couple of mutants, before hopping across the cistern dodging another.

"Then let's not lose it!" Raph cried.


"Whoops!" Casey skipped over the shaky lump of just-demutated teenager shifting on the ground, narrowly avoiding jamming his rollerblade in their mouth. There was a bunch of them now, still wrapped in gross, oily peels of dead skin from their old monster hides. Some whimpered, looking around with where-the-fuck-am-I faces, desperately trying to crawl away, out of reach of the remaining mutants. Casey swerved, leading the monsters away from them.

He peeked over his shoulder as he skated. "Only four to go, guys! Hey, pass it over!" he said to Donnie, who threw him the dart gun and a pack of darts.

"Three!" he cheered after getting another one, and then he skidded to a stop.

He squinted at one of the remaining monsters, at the strands of shredded gray fabric hanging from its forearms, and around its waist. The face was all Quasimodo'd, much like the rest of him, but something about it was familiar.

"Billy? That you?" No answer, besides a growl and a charge. Just like Billy. "Don't worry, pal, I'll save you!" He whacked Billy on the chin while spinning out of his way. "You better show up for hockey training after this! Team needs you!"

And not even bothering to reload, he stabbed a dart straight into the nearest bit of flesh—in this case, Billy's left butt cheek. Billy roared and writhed, grabbing his ass, until eventually he dropped to the floor like all the others, where he started deflating as he squirmed.

"Ten down! Two to go!" Casey hollered, shooting his arms up in the air. Then something tugged his foot and his world turned—it took his brain a moment to realize he was the one that was upside down, 'falling' towards the ceiling, with one Baxter fly attached to his leg.

"My work! Little brats!"

Casey cried out, blood flooding to his head, as the ground got farther and farther away. He shot past a tangle of tubes and the wobbling mutagen goo in that big sphere tank, and now Casey knew where Baxter was taking him.

He yelled and thrashed as hard as he could, managing to get a kick in. Baxter retaliated by puking on him. The acid seared through his clothes and the skin of his leg started to sizzle. Casey screamed, trying to rub off the smoking fabric. Meanwhile he was hanging upside down over the opening to the mutagen sphere.

"Shi-i-i-it!"

"Casey!" came Donnie's shout, and a second later a puff of red smoke exploded in Baxter's face. Casey could smell the sting juice. It made his eyes water, but Baxter coughed and spurted frantically. With Baxter's flight knocked off kilter, Casey barely had time to gasp as they both plummeted downwards, straight into the—

"Gotcha!"

Casey felt himself get hauled away, and once he could tell what was up and what was down, he found himself in Raph's arms.

"You okay?" Raph said.

"Yeah-yeah… I'm awesome," Casey mumbled wetly with itchy eyes and a runny nose, and as his vision slowly cleared, he noticed they were hanging from one of the cables leading down from the top of the mutagen tank, which was also a first class front row seat to Baxter's single synchronized swimming number. The fly's silhouette thrashed and gargled desperately inside the mutagen tank.

"Damn!" Raph exclaimed as... stuff... started to come off of Baxter's form, and some other stuff sprouted, only to come off again. Baxter was bubbling and dissolving piece by piece like an alka-seltzer. It was hypnotic in the same way a fatal train-wreck is, but even he had to admit it was a little too horrifying.

"Hey, lovebirds, you coming?" Before he could decide whether he wanted to see what came out of the horror show or not, the holler directed his gaze down to see Donnie standing by the exit door, which was now open. The last monsters had seemingly been taken care of while Casey was flying, and the de-mutated teenagers whimpered and sobbed on the ground.

That's when Casey registered Raph's big hand on the nook of his knees, holding him bridal-style, and his own hands tight around Raph's neck, and Raph's face very close to his own, and turning a very, very dark purpley green. His eyes were downright fluorescent under the light of the mutagen tank, his features chiseled by the strong shadows. Casey suddenly wished he'd brought his sketchbook. He felt his own ears grow hot as Raph quickly slid them down the cable.

Let's not, right now...

Before heading out the exit to the catacombs, Casey had an idea to smash open the vending machine, and tossed a bunch of Choco-logs at the kids. Donnie shot him a gaze of approval, and kneeled before a group of them.

"We'll be back for you," he promised, and then they were off.


"I'm almost through!" Mikey cried excitedly, finally seeing the dark corridor at the other side of the blockage, when out of the corner of his eye he saw April, seemingly being swallowed by the pile of rocks.

He paused, uncertain, and realized her thinner, shell-less body was already squeezing through where they couldn't.

"April, wait!" Leo said as her butt disappeared.

"No time!" they could hear her say, and soon her feet, too, were gone.

Terrified of April being alone inside a freakin' ninja fortress, Mikey dug faster. It took a few seconds more until they had an opening big enough to clamber through.

April had obviously gone ahead, and they broke into a sprint through the torch lit tunnel looking for her, not daring to call out her name. They dashed through the real actual passage of terror, watched by the skeletons on the walls, having to skirt around and jump over the odd body. So far, all Foot. But at every turn Mikey expected a fight, or somebody he knew that they weren't able to reach in time.

After a couple of odd turns, Mikey heard the unmistakable sounds of battle. He and Leo exchanged looks, and unsheathed their weapons, just as they reached the weird worship chamber with the freaky god statues. As they went through the archway, a Foot soldier shot from the side, and Mikey jolted, but the guy just flew past, followed by April.

He would've helped, but apparently she had this. Looking like a proper ninja with her new armor, she swung her tessen across the guy's forearms, and immediately, his hands dropped the sword. To finish up, April flying-kicked him square in the solar plexus. Mikey felt a twinge of pride for his big sister as the soldier stumbled backwards, his head bouncing on the ground, grunted and then was still.

Just like that, the chamber went quiet, but for their panting. April was checking herself out, paying close attention to her side, and Mikey's guts clenched. She picked at a long gash in the leather of her armor then released an exuberant "phew," which Mikey totally felt. Other than that there was a cut on her arm, but no big deal.

Relieved, he soft-punched her on her side, and she smiled back, before stooping to pick up the ninjatou that the soldier had dropped. "I think I might use this."

Mikey gave her a thumbs up.

"Let's tie them up. You guys okay?" Leo asked the other two bloody-faced Lotuses which Mikey only now noticed.

As Leo and April started tying the surviving Foot, Mikey's attention went to the foot of one of the statues, where another figure lay.

"Where are the others?" Leo asked behind him in Japanese.

"They went on. The Foot were expecting us. We were separated," one of the Lotus responded in the same language, breathing heavily. She was one of the eldest. Mikey never learned her name.

But Mikey did know who that was sitting up at the feet of the statue, his back against the stone legs, motionless. He reached out and pulled the mask back. "Oh no, dudes… It's Wakai."

He took a step back as the two remaining Lotuses approached the boy, and could only look on as they reached out to hold his face. Man, he'd been playing Mario Kart with him just a few days ago. It wasn't often that Mikey got to actually meet people beyond aaa-monster-run, and he and Wakai had really hit it off. He was way too young.

Way too young. Mikey wondered what the heck he was doing here.

Someone touched his shoulder and he flinched. Leo and April offered their looks of sympathy.

"We have to move on." Leo told him softly before turning to the other Lotuses. "Will you join us? We'll come back for him."

They nodded right away, and carefully stood, their gazes lingering on Wakai's body.

"Just one thing," Leo said seriously to the two. "No more killing. Not if you can avoid it."

They seemed hesitant—even Mikey knew that was a weird thing to ask a ninja—but then they nodded again, and Leo led the way into the next tunnel.

Mikey threw one last glance at Wakai's body, his heart twisting achingly, then he followed the others out.

They soon came to another gate, which had already been forced opened, and climbed up the stone stairs, following the sounds of battle. They'd been through here before—Mikey knew where they were going. At the end of one of these tunnels was the Foot's living quarters. They had a fridge and everything, Mikey remembered.

As they ran, he realized suddenly how they hadn't encountered any foot bots yet. He wondered if, after the fight at the harbor the other day, the Foot had definitely run all out of robots. And with the Kraang out, they'd probably had to go back to the traditional soldiers made of the regular ol' flesh and bones. Actually, even these garden-variety Foot soldiers seemed scarce. Probably turned to goo with Baxter's experiments—

Mikey yelped as a bunch of figures popped up from a side tunne, and swung his chuck. It smacked against something metal, and it took Mikey a second to recognize the glint of Raph's sai in the torchlight.

"Whoa, it's us, you dingus!"

"Oh shit, Raph, I almost killed you!"

"As if."

Donnie and Casey were beside him, and they were all dirty with yucky dark spatters. Casey's pants were… melted.

"Everybody okay? Any sign of Karai?" Donnie asked right away, his eyes stopping at the cut on April's leather armor.

"We're good, and not yet," Leo answered simply, and with no time for any further ado, signaled a move on.

The noise got louder as they made their way down the corridor, the two Lotuses at the rear. Mikey's heart raced as they picked up the pace and the great hall came slowly into view beyond the archway ahead. Karai could be in there. She could be in trouble. Already they were encountering some more bodies on the ground. At least one of them was Lotus.

Please, please let her be okay.

"Mikey, get ready!" Leo said, as they dashed through the threshold and into the total chaos that was the great hall; screaming and smashing of metal, and bodies colliding, and a bunch of other bodies lying motionless on the stone brick floor.

"Gotcha, captain!" he hollered, two smoke bombs in each hand, as he scanned the battlefield for any recognizable faces, taking notes and memorizing all the bad guys' positions. With his best war cry, he let the bombs fly in four directions, and the battle field was engulfed in thick smoke.

There was one second in which the clinking of weapons staggered to a pause. In the confusion, Mikey and his siblings cut through the smoke like arrows for a multiple ninja hit-and-run. Mikey swung and kicked and wacked every guy he'd memorised. By the time the smoke had dispersed, a dozen foot soldiers were on the ground, and another two Lotuses gaped in awe, weapons still awkwardly aloft.

"Konichiwa!" he proclaimed triumphantly, and handed them the extra weapons. "Watch these guys. We got this." And he bounced back into the action.

On top of one of the huge wooden tables that sat tucked in the side aisle, Atsuko fought fiercely, her hood pulled back, long hair flying loose. By her side was a tired-looking Jiro. Behind them, someone was on the floor. Actually, there were several of them. Mikey raced over, heart in his mouth. Oh no

He went for the guy attacking Jiro first, his kusarigama latching onto his arm, making him drop his weapon. Mikey shoved him into his mate. They were chained up together before they hit the ground.

As he turned he saw Atsuko crank up her sword to strike another one. Quickly, Mikey ripped one of the tapestries from the wall, and before she could deal the deadly blow, slipped between them. "Whoa! Sorry, I got it!" He proceeded to roll up a Foot burrito, which slowly fell to the ground like timber.

That taken care of, Mikey moved right past the befuddled Atsuko and Jiro towards the fallen bodies, kneeling beside a petite female figure. She was huddled over, mussed-up black hair draped over her face. He couldn't see clearly in the stupid torchlight. Why just torches? They had a fridge down here, they clearly had power!

"Karaiwa?" he barely dared say as he reached out.

But as the figure lifted her head, slowly, he made out Hasu's features. Despite himself, he released a breath of relief.

The Lotus leader seemed badly hurt, but alive. For now at least. Her hand was pressed against her side, over a shimmering dark stain. The guy next to her wasn't moving. His mask was on, but Mikey could still recognize him: Brick Face. Mikey silently apologized for never learning his real name.

Turning his head, he checked the still bustling hall for someone that could be Karaiwa. The smoke from the bombs had already cleared, the big church-like cavern coming into view with its stone arches and blood-red banners. His brothers were finishing up with what was left of the Foot soldiers. Leo and Raph had copied his tapestry idea and Donnie, April and Casey were on their way to Mikey. But Karaiwa was definitely neither fallen nor fighting.

"Hachisu-no-Hana-san, where is she? Where's our sister?" he asked, slightly jostling Hachisu, just as the others arrived beside them. Donnie went straight for her wrist, then gently pulled open her eyelid.

Hachisu was kinda out of it, and didn't look as if she knew what they were talking about. She blinked up at Mikey, and there was finally a sign of recognition in her eyes. "I don't know... Iwao!" she exclaimed suddenly, and reached for her brother in arms.

Brick Face—Iwao—didn't react. Leo checked for his pulse, and his face was all the confirmation they needed. Hachisu stared at him for a bit, clutching the fabric of his shoulder, and they waited.

Finally, she let go. As she laid back, hand returning to her side, she said weakly, but confidently: "Your sister disappeared. Suddenly she was not there."

"She's gonna try to get to the Shredder alone," Leo said. "We have to move."

"I must go… to Shredder." Hachisu tried to move, but she barely managed to tilt to one side before her body snapped, and she cried out. With the support of Donnie's hand, she settled back down.

"Sorry, Hachisu-no-Hana-san, but you're not going anywhere," Donnie said. After a glance at Leo, who nodded and signalled them all to leave them room, he adjusted his position beside her, and pulled some kind of kajigger out of his bag: it was that medi-gel thing. Mikey watched with curiosity as Donnie ripped open the stained clothes and examined her for a bit. Hachisu let him.

Knowing what came next, Mikey offered his chuck. "Here, bite down on this." She glanced between him and Donnie before taking the suggestion.

"Don't move now," Doctor Don said, all professional.

Mikey grabbed both her hands, and cringed as Donnie stuck the pointy end of the thing into Hachisu's wound. She grimaced at that, but then with a whooshing sound, something blueish and foamy spurted out from the tip of the thing, and Hachisu's nails dug into Mikey's hands, face contorted in a silent scream for a couple of seconds. Then, just like that, she relaxed, letting out a sigh.

"That's it," Donnie said soothingly, putting the kajigger aside.

"Damn. I'll have a bit of what she's having," Casey said, grinning at the look of relaxation on Hachisu's face.

Mikey giggled momentarily, before remembering what they were doing there.

"Stay with her, gather up the wounded," Leo told Atsuko and Jiro. "Is there a chance you can take your people out the same way you came in?"

"No. The passage is too narrow, and there is a part that is under water," Atsuko replied, sounding very tired. "It is not good for carrying bodies."

"Same goes for the way out from Baxter's lab, and the tunnel out of the catacombs is blocked," Leo said. "Gather up the wounded, wait here for now, and tie up any remaining Foot. We're gonna move on."

"There's about a dozen kids down in Baxter's lab as well," Donnie chimed in.

Leo nodded. "Have someone go find them and bring them up here. We'll let you know if the coast is clear and you can take everyone out the front door."

Both Lotuses took the order, and they all started moving. Then Leo lead the way towards the giant wooden doors with the giant dumb portrait of Shredder hanging above, speaking into the com as he did.

"Teams Nerf and Bones: we found the Lotus, but Karai's not with them. Heading upstairs now to—"

A very obvious bad-guy laugh stopped them in their tracks.

"Hey, turtles."


"Bradford!" Leo shouted, wondering if they should just charge right through the piece of wolf jerky or if said wolf jerky looked so smug for a reason. He decided to err on the side of caution. "Where is Karai?"

"Karai?" Bradford chuckled, a sound as crusty and gritty as the rest of him, and squinted. "Interesting. I have no idea. But I do have someone else we wanted you to meet..."

For a moment it seemed as though pieces of the darkness beyond the doorway had detached and become alive. The three shadows emerged from behind Bradford, a green glint at the back of their eyes. Big, and hulky, and fibrous, their skin looked charred, a texture like burnt wood. They stood on either sides of Bradford in their basic Foot uniforms, wearing eager grins.

So this is where all that elusive mutagen had gone. Baxter had perfected the serum. Their new super army was already in production.

"These guys are not like the half-baked blobs downstairs," Raph observed aloud, a tinge of nervousness in his gruff voice.

"That's because these are not 'half-baked'," Donnie replied through a shaky grimace. "They're, um, 'well done'. Al dente, if you will."

Casey made a skeptical sound. "They look more like they've been roasting on the grill for a couple hours too long to me."

"Rude," the biggest monster went and growled then.

"Oh, it talks!" April chuckled, and it was not as mocking as it was jittery, pretty much voicing Leo's new concern: they were smart.

Great.

Judging by the horrifying sneers on the monsters' faces, pale teeth standing out against the ashy black of their skin, they were rather enjoying the meet-and-greet.

Leo muttered into his comm, "Teams Nerf and Bones here. Uh, it's definitely those super soldiers you were talking about..."

"Lock, Shock and Barrel!" Mikey cried out suddenly, earning a few puzzled glares, including Leo's.

Casey whipped a finger at Mikey's proposal. "Sold!"

Leo ignored them. "We'll get in touch once we're done," he told their older selves waiting outside.

There was the sound of rain on Leo's earpiece, then a simple, "Be careful."

"You know what to do," Leo said, whipping out his dart gun, and this team responded by taking out the other two and aiming them at the trio of mutants. Without a second's wait, they fired.

Three darts flew and three darts ricocheted off the mutants' hides like a granite wall.

They barely even flinched.

Leo gaped at the dart that had landed at his feet, ruined, its needle bent like a corkscrew. He turned to the others, and they all looked at each other in a silent "oh, fuck?"

Bradford laughed again. "Told you they'd like you." Then his skeletal sneer turned vicious as he commanded, "Kill them. We'll make this a field test for you and your new recruits."

"Yes, sensei Bradford," said the largest of the three. Barrel? Yeah, definitely a Barrel. And as Barrel took a step around his sensei into the hall, he smiled, hungrily eyeing them all down as if they were a spread of food trays in a buffet and he was trying to decide which one to taste first. Leo felt his brothers shift nervously.

Behind the monsters, Bradford cackled to himself as he grabbed both sides of the heavy wooden double doors and started to close them with dramatic slowness. "Play safe, children!"

The door slammed shut, the foreboding boom reverberating in the tall stone walls, followed by the loud roll of a very big lock.

"Oh man, where's the quicksave?" Mikey whimpered as Barrel made a signal, and the other two beasts started lumbering towards them, puffing like locomotives. Leo and the others walked backwards on instinct. As the monsters picked up speed, Leo could feel their stomps reverberating through his own chest.

"Move!" he yelled. The group broke up, and Leo just nearly dodged one big fleshy ram of a fist.

He jumped and climbed up a column as high up as he could, out of reach, and latched onto the molding. Some of the others followed him up. To his right, Donnie grabbed onto the top of an arch, April's hand in his helping her hang on. Mikey had taken the other column. He couldn't see Raph or Casey from here. Probably hiding.

The two lower soldiers paced beneath their feet, looking voraciously up at them. Leo stared back, studying them. There was the female with the mohawk—Shock, he mused. She looked capable of bringing down a building with her bare fists. The smallest one—Lock by elimination—had long hair and spindly legs which wiggled and twitched impatiently even when standing still.

Meanwhile, at the forefront of the nave, the injured Lotus crawled to cover behind the row of columns, disappearing beyond the tables. The four Lotuses that were still standing had taken on Barrel while their mates escaped. The brute made quick work of them. With one sweeping crack, he flung all four ninjas at the wall, and then he ambled back to his position by the door.

"We gotta get upstairs! Karai's bound to be there!" Leo said between his teeth.

"But Barrel over there!" Mikey cried, pointing at the large, smug, chunk of oil spill guarding the exit, seemingly in no rush whatsoever as he stood between them and Shredder. Between them and Karai.

"Donnie! Why aren't these working!" Leo waved his dart gun, exasperated.

"Their skin's too tough! The needle can't reach subcutaneous level."

Boom! The whole stone structure trembled under Leo's desperate grip. Shock had pounded on Leo's column, really earning her nick-name.

Donnie continued on, more quickly. "We'll have to inject it in softer spots."

Boom! The stones began to shift, dust falling off the cracks. She'd bring the whole thing down. Beside her, Lock bounced impatiently on his feet like a dog waiting for the ball throw.

"Like which?" April squawked, hanging on with tooth and nail.

"Eye sockets, maybe armpits!" Donnie replied.

"What about the tenders?" Mikey suggested from the next arch over with a fiendish grin.

"Well, if you can reach…"

BOOM! The stone gave way underneath Leo and he felt himself fall. Over the rumbling he heard the others scream as that whole section of the arcade collapsed onto the nave.

"Split up!" He yelled mid fall, and they all hopped off in different directions, hiding in the rising cloud of dust and pebbles, hoping the entire ceiling wouldn't come down on them.

Leo ducked into a roll out of the way of the toppling heap of stone bricks, debris raining on his head again.

He could barely breathe, let alone see. Making an effort to stop coughing, he heard fighting, and Raph and Casey's usual battle banter, somewhere to his left. But that was all. It was the worst, not being able to tell what his team was doing—not being in control.

Blinking rapidly in the clearing dust, he spotted Donnie and April recovering from the fall and kicking off some debris. Good, it was something.

"Donnie! You and April help the Lotus get the injured to safety," he commanded, and the pair nodded. "And give one of your dart guns to Raph." They did just that, gun and pack of darts flying to meet Raph's hand, before they took off.

But in yelling Leo had attracted someone else's attention.

Past the mound of stone debris, Lock whirled around, locking eyes with him. Leo gawked about, suddenly finding himself very much on his own.

The monster lunged after Leo, kicking and punching stones into the air. Guy was fast, his spidery arms waving and thrashing, grazing Leo's plastron as he tumbled in his retreat, tripping on himself and on the fallen bits of column and ceiling. A swing of Lock's long arm caught the leather strap on his front, and it snapped. The sheath at his back slid off and onto the floor, still partly hanging from his belt and catching on his foot. Scrambling, he managed to grab it, slipping the sword out and brandishing it before him. It merely clanged against Lock's iron-like hide. All he could do was block the harsh blows while he quickly yanked off the remainder of the leather strip and flinging the empty sheath at Lock's face. It barely slowed him down.

His tactic quickly became zig-zagging in between columns as fast as he could. The monster growled and spat in frustration, swapping left and right but not being able to catch him. Ditching his sword, Leo aimed the dart gun, trying to recall the soft spots Donnie had mentioned. But he soon realised Lock was too quick, and he couldn't risk wasting the retromutagen.

In his hesitation, one smack landed, throwing Leo on the floor and knocking the dart gun out of his hand. He crawled away, trying to stand on the shifting rubble before Lock threw the next bludgeon.

Then something smashed against the side of Lock's head, bursting in a glimmering rain of silver and copper pieces, and effectively confounding him to a halt. Leo's face got hit with some of the shrapnel, and he peered in confusion at the objects scattered around his feet. Coins? Did he somehow step inside a video game?

"I gotcha, Leo!"

Leo followed Mikey's voice to the kitchen tucked in beneath the row of columns, and a little sign with the words "Coffee Fund" over the now empty space on the counter. Mikey stood there next to the open fridge, holding a series of flasks. He threw one, and it connected with Lock's contorted face, breaking and splashing pickles and vinegar all over his front. The mutant roared in humiliation, the distraction giving Leo just enough time to roll out of the way before he noticed. When he did, Lock reached out for his leg, but a third glass object met its target, and this time it spilled what looked like mayo and chunks of stuff all over his hair and neck.

It couldn't have hurt, but it pissed him off well enough. Mikey giggled and scurried away between jeers as Lock forgot all about Leo and rammed into the kitchen, yanking the fridge right out of its niche and throwing it at Mikey.

As his brother lead Lock away, Leo gladly took the opportunity to gather himself and his gear, and to do a lightning scan of the room.

Beyond the still clearing dust, near the forefront of the nave, Raph and Casey had their hands full with mohawk girl—Shock, Mikey's voice corrected him in his head. Donnie and April had thankfully already gotten the survivors out of their way, and were nowhere to be seen. Good. Barrel was still supervising his two recruits from his spot at the door, dutifully blocking the exit. He and Leo locked gazes for a moment as the monster sneered, and Leo's forefinger twitched on the trigger of his dart gun.

With three seconds wasted in total, he concluded Mikey needed him and his dart gun most at the moment, and kicked off towards the back of the nave, where his brother was hopping back and forth between columns, across tables, dodging Lock's furious swipes and projectile benches.

"Mikey! I need a clear shot!"

At his shout, Lock stalled and turned to look at him. Leo could tell, from the way his eyes caught the dart gun in Leo's hand, that he'd gotten the message too. Mikey stopped running as Lock sauntered his way to Leo without an ounce of concern on his face. Lifting the gun, Leo went over the soft spots in his head, none of which were easy targets. And Lock just kept getting closer, that ugly grin on his face and that jittery twitch in his limbs.

But Leo didn't run. He waited, because he'd given Mikey instructions. Mikey would do his part… Soon… Any moment now...

Lock was getting way too close again and Leo was about to make another retreat when the end of a chain shot up over Lock's head, looped itself around the fibrous neck like a snake, and lifted. Leo's eyes followed the tight line of the chain, up to the arcs, over a beam, down to Mikey's fists as he hung half-way up a column, feet flat against it and trembling with the effort.

Lock fumbled with the chain around his neck—not quite choking, just annoyed, though the monstrous hands shielded what could've been a good target. Then, as Leo caught sight of the exposed pits, he recognized his moment.

He raised the gun, aimed and pulled the trigger. The dart hit its mark just as the chain around Lock's neck gave, and the mutant stumbled forward. Monster hand slapped monster armpit as though killing a mosquito, and Lock gawked at the dart in his fingers for one confused second before collapsing on the ground between violent shudders.

"Better luck next time, Brad!" Mikey laughed and boasted at the fallen monster. When Leo looked at him in confusion, he repeated, as though it should be obvious, "Brad!" He lifted his arm over his head and pointed at its underside. "Pitt!"

Leo pinched his eyes shut as if that could shield him from the pain of Mikey's pun. He purposefully did not reply, and turned his attention to Barrel. He was very satisfied to see the bewildered expression on the monster's face, who jerked as if he wanted to run at Leo, but appeared tethered to the door like a guard dog, and all he could do at the moment was bear his teeth.

Now it was Leo's turn to sneer, flaunting his heroic dart gun and pointedly reloading it so Barrel could see.

"Come on, Mikey! We got this!" They took off, following the bangs of Casey's explosive pucks.


Fifth time Casey was thrown against a pillar, panting and aching and slippery from sweat, he nearly threw his stick. "Fuck thiiiiis."

Usually Casey would be thrilled to fight big ugly monsters for hours, but this tank lady was just annoying. Dudette was untouchable, like the game was glitched, like nothing he did to her even mussed up her awesome mohawk, let alone make a dent on her health bar. And on top of all the bruises, Baxter must've done something to his ankle, 'cause it kept not doing what he wanted it to. Didn't help that his skates were a little less than useful in the bumpy stone floor.

How many of those darts you got left?" he asked Raph, eyeing the dart stuck on the super soldier's mohawk.

"Last one," Raph replied with a grimace, landing a harmless kick at the small of Shock's back before having to scurry away from her giant bear hands. "Pretty sure Donnie has a few spares. Hopefully."

Just then Mikey arrived, toot-tooting the cavalry charge call, followed closely by Leo, both armed with thick ropes and chains. What, did they defeat their boss already? No fair, Casey's was harder!

Leo and Mikey got right on it, throwing their chains and ropes around each of Shock's wrists, looping them around two columns on opposite sides of the nave, and pulling. Shock's arms flew open, and she gargled in surprise.

Barrel boomed from the door, "Careful, you idiot! Get the dart gun! Destroy it!"

Casey saw Shock's beady eyes land on the gun in Raph's hand.

"Come on!" Leo roared, and Raph lifted his gun. Yeah-yeah-yeah! Git it!

But as the gun fired, Shock pulled on the ties, yanking Leo and Mikey face first into their columns. Then she went straight for the gun's current holder.

Raph yelped. "A dart, a dart, gimme a dart! Guh!" He threw it at Mikey, who immediately threw it at Casey like a hot potato. Shock, obviously, lunged for him next, and Casey kicked off to a race.

"Casey!" Leo called as Casey circled around Shock, holding one dart aloft.

Casey skated by, snatching it from his hand, and continued to skate around in circles avoiding Shock while the others did their best to slow her down. As he struggled to get the stupid dart in the stupid gun, his skate caught on a fallen brick, and his ankle gave. He stumbled over through a door straight into a freaking pantry, and only the pile of veggie crates stopped his fall.

The ground shook, louder and louder, and Shock rammed her shoulders straight into the door frame. The entire wall trembled and shifted. And Casey was trapped with the carrots.

He fumbled to get the dart into the gun as Shock kept pounding away at the wall. The door jamb was starting to splinter. Just as the dart finally clicked in place, one last ram sent the stone wall crumbling inwards, with Shock shooting through it towards Casey.

"N-ahh!" At the sight, he pulled the trigger on a reflex, arms coming up to cover his face, expecting to die right then and there surrounded by produce.

But instead of that, he heard the mutant shriek, and he cautiously opened his eyes to see her throwing her head back, the dart sticking out of her left nostril. Covering her nose, the giant tumbled backwards through the hole in the wall, into another column, sniffing and gulping. Finally, she plummeted on a pile of rubble, where she writhed, lifting up stones like a kid in a ball pit.

The others gathered around, catching their breaths. Casey sauntered over to join them, and pointed at the dart still jutting out, dangling from the movement. "Hey, Raph! How many points does that get me?"

"Score board's frickin' glitched out!" Raph laughed, and they high-three'd their victory.

Wh-bam!

Casey flinched backwards at the chunk of stone pillar that had just exploded against the wall, showering them with little chips and pebbles.

"Holy shit!" he shouted as he turned to the thrower.

"What did you do to my soldiers!" Barrel boomed, a voice that sounded like it was coming from a dusty subwoofer. "D'you know what you did? You just ruined my chance, you ugly freaks!" He started moving, pounding one fist in the other. The floor trembled beneath his stomping feet. "That was my big break! Now I'll break you!"

Casey honked. "Dude, lame."

But Casey wasn't able to remain so confident—Mikey had totally nailed the names, as per usual, Casey mused as he saw Barrel barreling towards him, like a big literal barrel rolling downhill—

He was forced to interrupt his own thoughts in order to throw himself out of the way. The mass zoomed past like a sixteen wheeler, and Casey heard the others swear and shout. He got on his feet as Barrel screeched around for another pass, and noticed the dart gun still in his grip.

Oh, right— No, wait!

Ammo!

"Leo, dart!" he called as he kicked off, ready to repeat the previous tactic, minus the tripping and falling.

Leo was on the ground, holding half a dart gun. He tossed it aside, and threw the dart pack to Casey. "Last one!" he warned.

Barrel was on Raph and Mikey now, and Casey got close enough that he could almost kick Barrel in his monster ass if he wanted to. He considered aiming for the pucker, just to mess with the guy, but sadly it was covered in clothing. So he settled for the good ol' pit, aimed, waited for the right moment, and took the shot…

But the dart met the palm of Barrel's hand instead, bouncing off it and dropping to the ground like a dead bird. Before he could retreat, Barrel grabbed Casey's dart gun, with Casey's hand still on it.

He cried out, trying to wiggle it out, pulling to wrench the fist open with his other hand. He might as well try to open a safe with a toothpick.

Barrel smiled viciously down at him. Casey had a great view of the faint greenish glow in the vessels of his forearm. "Anyone ever tell you you have beautiful veins?" he squeaked.

Barrel responded by squeezing. Casey howled, the bones in his hand screaming as the pressure built, tighter and tighter. He felt something pop and crack and hoped with everything he had, it was the dart gun.

"Ow, ow, ow—uncle, uncle!" he nearly choked, pounding at the closed fist with his other hand, as Barrel only laughed.

"Dude, he said uncle!" Mikey's voice shouted, and a second later he appeared on Barrel's hump, and wrapped a tapestry on his head. Without letting go, Barrel swatted at him like a buzzard before ripping the tapestry off. It was enough that Barrel lightened his grip slightly and Casey managed to jiggle out, falling on his ass. He scrambled backwards away from the brute, nursing his arm to his chest.

As the others went on, he tested his aching hand, opening and closing it. It was still aching, but nothing seemed broken. It was good enough for Casey, and he got up for more.

Barrel cackled. "What, ran out of ammo? Boy, I'd hate to be you!"

"Orders, Cap'n?" Mikey yells.

"Just stay out of his—" Leo's order was cut short by a mammoth left-hook.

Raph cried, "Where the hell's Donnie?"


The Foot's sleeping quarters, unlike the grandiose nave, was bare and gray—basically a bunch of bunk beds inside a hole, out of sight. At the moment it served the purpose of an improvised emergency room. April and a couple of still-standing Lotuses were helping with the wounded, carrying them inside out of the fray and tending to them with the Foot's med kit. Meanwhile Donnie performed first aid on a profusely bleeding shoulder, a Lotus teen named Sôichirô who was starting to look very pale, when Leo's loud whisper broke through his ear piece, sounding so close he might've been chewing on the microphone.

"Donnie, we need more darts! Get out here!"

At the order, Donnie stood, leaving April pressing on Sôichirô's wound, and went to peek outside. He scanned the area, and spotted Leo kneeling on the mound of rubble.

Lock and Shock were squirming a little bit like tickly toddlers as they shrunk in their own hides. They were down to the last super soldier. And...

"Door's clear!" Donnie cried in April's direction, and she peered up at his words. "Ugh, but there's no way we'd be able to get past that behemoth," he thought aloud, taking in the wreckage of the hall, and really hoping all those columns were mainly for decoration.

He took out his gun and counted the remaining darts. Just three. He set his jaw.

"Stay here, finish up," he called over his shoulder, ready to rush out.

April nodded as another Lotus stepped up to help her. "Be careful, D."

Inspired by a new-found cockiness, he winked at her. She grinned back, and Donnie felt a kind of elated courage surging through him as he exited the room.

All he needed was a clear shot. Barrel was distracted, and hadn't noticed Donnie for now. But he was still moving too quickly—especially for a beast his size. At all times, every potential weak spot was either shielded behind a massive limb or a blur.

From behind his column, Donnie winced in sympathy at every blow, while he racked his brain. The guys were already trying with every means to contain Barrel—ropes, banners, chains, a carpet—but there was no containing him. Barrel was extremely confident, which was extremely justified. Donnie would be too if he was the size of an excavator, with the body strength of roughly seventeen adult Raphaels.

The more confident they are, the harder they fail, Donnie said decisively to himself, and after another quick scan of the nave, his eyes landed on a possible solution.

"Just keep him distracted, and get him to the middle of the room!" Donnie said into the comm, making sure to grab a poker from a stove before unstrapping his grappling hook and shooting it upwards at one of the three big iron chandeliers that hung from the arched ceiling. He let the winch propel him upwards and he latched on to the thick wrought iron frame, careful not to knock over any candles. The chain from which it hang could've anchored a cruiser in a hurricane, but the stone ceiling where it was nailed had been badly damaged by one of the several structural collapses. The whole titanic chandelier was pretty much dangling from a thread.

Wedging the poker in the crack, Donnie waited until Barrel was right on the target. All it took was a little bit of cranking and the peg snapped right off. The iron structure on which Donnie stood started to free fall like a drop tower. His stomach rose, and just before impact he hopped off.

He heard massive the weight crash on stone floor as he landed on a roll and quickly turned to appraise the results, dart gun at the ready.

Bullseye! Barrel groaned and shifted achingly, pinned beneath the massive weight of the chandelier. Acting quickly before he recovered—and he would recover—Donnie aimed at the back of Barrel's head and waited. Once Barrel turned, Donnie's dart gun was staring straight into his beady, glowing right eye. The fire in the monster's gaze sizzled down as Barrel froze, and brimming with satisfaction, Donnie pulled the trigger.

The dart gun clicked...

Much like when he was free falling, Donnie's stomach flip-flopped, and the room went deathly quiet as his brothers looked on in horror. He pulled the trigger again, smacked the gun against his thigh, and a heartbeat later, Barrel's fist had rammed him in the chest, propelling him backwards into the air.

Donnie heard voices, crying his name, and the next thing he felt was the bone shattering impact, the back of his head bouncing on the hard surface, before slipping down to the floor. His vision blank, he attempted to gather his senses, his whole body aching, and blinked away the stars in time to see Barrel shaking off the chandelier, ugly teeth bared against the charcoal black of his face, eyes blazing.

"Give me that," he growled, stalking towards Donnie.

The others tried to stop him. They used the chains again, looping them around his throat. But he shook them off like a spiderweb. They threw stones at his head, but his attention swerved only long enough to grab the remains of the chandelier and swing it at them, knocking them back beyond the mountain of rubble. Then Barrel resumed his path towards Donnie.

Groaning, Donnie heaved himself up on his knees, reaching back for a dart, but touched something wet instead. The darts must've broken on impact, and it was a good thing this retro-mutagen only worked intravenously. Barrel was getting closer. His bo was also gone from its sheath. He found one half at his side and grabbed it—not really knowing what good it would do him—and flicked the naginata blade out. Already there, Barrel responded by grabbing the weapon first and squeezing it to shreds in his fist before slamming his hand onto Donnie's front, hooking his fingers around his plastron, pinning him down.

"Thought you almost had me there, did ya?"

Donnie kicked in vain as the big hand around his torso lifted him in the air before slamming him shell-first against the floor. His head hit stone and the stars were back. He tried to move but he couldn't see past the rain of sparks crowding his vision. Barrel was putting all his weight on him.

"You ever seen that video, 'watermelon versus hydraulic press'?"

His last coherent thought was how this guy definitely seemed like the type of guy that would spend hours watching videos like that, before something back there cracked, and he screamed at the bolt of hot, sharp pain.


April screamed. The sight of Donnie under Barrel's fist sent a jolt through her nervous system down to the tips of her fingers—a sudden blinding urge to move! Just go! Do something!—and she was running before she knew what she intended to do.

Donnie was barely moving as Barrel lifted both arms, about to deliver a finishing blow.

"Stop!" In a rush of panic, she threw her hands forward, and something happened.

Something... electrical surged through her, some kind of energy. It sprung from her core, out through her fingertips. She felt a resistance, a pull. Something told her to hold onto it, and so she did. Then she realised Barrel's arms had stopped mid-air.

Barrel snarled, looking around in confusion, and April tried at all costs to keep whatever was happening, happening.

Raph got there first, dragging Donnie's sagging form from under Barrel's hovering fist.

"Woah! How are you doing that?" Mikey said, passing her.

"I don't know…" she grunted between gritted teeth. She was doing this. Holy shit, she was

Barrel turned his ugly head, ashen features contorted in rage, and looked right at her. On top of everything else going on with her body, she felt a chill. "...but hurry up!"

Mikey and Leo had rushed in to immobilize the mutant. Mikey climbed on top, and tied a tapestry tight around his arms. Leo struck with his sword, at the wrists, the ankles. Nothing was cutting the skin.

"None of this is gonna work!" Casey cried, a big chain dangling uselessly from his hands.

"Dart him! Someone dart him, now!" Leo yelled.

"Not an option!" Raph replied next to a limp Donnie, lifting a broken, dripping dart for them to see, before rushing back to help, climbing on top of Barrel.

"We can't just kill him," April barely heard Leo say under his breath.

The moment stretched as they all just grunted from the effort of keeping their grips. That's when she felt something warm trickling from her nose down to her lips, and she tasted blood.

"I can't hold him… much longer!" April growled, forehead throbbing, and she winced, straining to keep her eyes on the monster as her vision blurred.

The pain soon became unbearable, and a roar ripped from her throat. The hovering arm moved, shifting slowly out of her failing hold, and she felt herself begin to buckle.


Raph's muscles trembled from the strain of trying to keep his lock on one monstrous arm. He could barely even wrap his own arms around it.

"Leo?" he called. From atop Barrel, he could see Leo struggle with himself, still trying to find an alternative. But they'd already run fresh out of those.

While Leo was still on that, Barrel roared, and his body jerked into motion. With a single twitch of his arm, Raph was flung off. He recovered to see April falling to her knees over by the fallen chandelier, her hold broken.

Liberated, Barrel started again, this time going straight for April, an expression both angry and curious.

"Leo!" Raph called, again, and this time Leo answered.

"Do it!"

The instant he said that, Raph heaped onto Barrel's back, and before he could get a reaction, he'd climbed up to his head, pulled out his sai, and stabbed it deep in his eye.

Raph jumped off as Barrel barely even screamed before collapsing in a heap.

Immediately after, April collapsed too.


Karai's breath was damp on her own face inside her narrow hiding spot. It was a dangerous place to crawl through, the vent for one of Shredder's boobytraps. But it meant nobody expected her there.

The henchmen underneath her kept watch outside the throne room door, as always letting the expendables face the attack first. There were footsteps climbing closer up the stairway, and soon Bradford appeared and joined the others.

"How's it going down there?" asked Xever—Fishface, as Mikey liked to call him, she remembered fondly. She'd never see him again. Any of them.

She pushed the turtles out of her mind, unable to bear the pounding ache in her chest.

"The new recruits have been released. They won't reach ground level," Bradford replied, voice dripping with evil satisfaction. She never liked him. Neither did Tiger Claw, she knew; the cat wasn't making much of an effort to hide his discomfort.

Zeck snorted, leaning into his pal Starenko, "I hope so. I seen those things, they give me the jeebies, man."

"Da, they are pretty scary…" the rhyno muttered nervously, looking over his shoulder.

Not seeing the point in waiting, she punched open the grate, and grinned when every one of those tough mutants jolted. Zeck's squeal lasted the longest, only stopping once Karai had landed right in the middle of their circle. Then they all froze.

"Look who it is," Bradford chuckled finally through his teeth.

"The prodigal daughter is back," Xever cooed.

She strolled past them, pointedly ignoring them all, and entered the throne room. She didn't stop, not even when Shredder caught sight of her and stood.

"Karai…"

She only snarled, coming to a stop in the middle of the room. Shredder's eyes roved over her Hamato attire.

"So… you wear his colors now."

"You like it? I made it myself," she said venomously, stressing the detail about it being her choice.

A second's pause. "Hm. And why have you come back?" he asked as if it were a mere formality.

He already knew.

She said it aloud anyway. "I'm here to kill you."

There was no reaction from Shredder—none that she could see. She'd spent so much of her youth talking to the Kuro Kabuto, even now she still often forgot there was an actual human face underneath it.

"Should we restrain her, Master Shredder?" Bradford said, he and the others taking a few cautious steps into the room.

Shredder made a negative sign, then calmly shrugged off his cape, letting it fall to his feet.

"Hamato Yoshi is more of a coward than I thought, sending you to do his dirty bidding."

"Actually, father did not want me to come. I do my own bidding."

This time his fists betrayed him, leather cracking beneath his grip. His biceps bulged and twitched.

"What future awaits you with those freaks? Are you going to live in the sewers? You don't belong there. You are Foot, and you always will be. I offer you an empire, the Kuro Kabuto."

She let him talk. She wanted to make sure he knew, no matter what he said, she had no interest.

"The serum is perfected. In just a few days we'll have an army. The Foot Clan is on the cusp of a new golden age. It could all be yours."

Waiting a beat once he was done, she said, "What you offer me is empty. What I've had during my time away from you, you will never understand. I was only ever a means to your end. You only taught me hate. You were never really my father."

"I'm disappointed." Shredder only ever spoke of his own feelings when it served a purpose. She would know. She'd learned that bit from him. "The filthy rat has succeeded in brainwashing you."

"Hilarious. You have the balls to mention brainwashing to my face." She shot him a wolfish sneer. "That rat has more honor in his little toe than all the history of the Kabuto combined. The Foot can get fucked for all I care."

And as soon as she'd said that, she realized…

She'd just made a choice. It didn't matter anymore, how often the memories of her life of privilege as the heir to the Foot Clan had tempted her—if only she'd come back. Though she'd always known, deep down, her saying it out loud had somehow sealed it: Foot could get fucked. She wanted to shout it to the four winds in joyous fury!

It took her walking willingly into a dead end—what she'd thought was her destiny—to see it. There was nothing for her here.

Mixed in with her fury she felt a sense of revelation, of wonder, as she said, slow and definite, "You're not even worth my sweat."

Standing as tall as she physically could, she turned her back to Shredder—even when she knew it was a bit too late for that.

Tiger Claw and Xever stepped up, cutting her escape, and she turned back again to face Shredder as he stepped down from the throne, his shoulders set, metal groaning and muscles trembling. She could hear the growl in his voice. "If you are not my daughter, then you are my enemy."

Welp, she thought bitterly, getting down on a battle stance.

She was here now. There was no turning back.


DUN DUN DUUUUUUNNNNNNNN!

Yep, it's a cliffhanger! We're sorry! Or not!

MEIN GOTT TELLS US WHAT YOU THOUGHT, THE STORY'S ALMOST OVER!