-1Chapter 12

Recovering, Part 2

AZ

Heya people, sorry for the wait. I did say that I would definitely put up the next chapter over Christmas and I didn't. I do have a rather good excuse- I was in hospital for most of the holidays with glandular fever and tonsillitis (which, quite frankly, sucked)

There is another edition of 'Notes for the Terminally Confused' at the end of this chapter- a summary of everything since about Chapter Nine, but I think this should sort out most of it…

Er…you may want to reread Chapter 10- The Awakening again, if you're feeling a bit lost. What happened then is gonna be important for this one.

"Listen to me…I cannot stay long…Can you hear me? Sense me? Concentrate. LISTEN!"

Leo snapped out his meditative trance so abruptly that he nearly toppled with a gasp.

"My son? Are you well?" The aged rat who also meditated in the quiet dojo asked the question with concern in his eyes. The loss of his youngest had made him almost suffocating in his desire to protect what was left of his family. A week on and he was uncomfortable with allowing any of his sons out of his sight, or awareness, when the former was not possible. Now he kept a mental 'eye' on Raph, following the spark of his spirit as the angry son roamed the increasingly dangerous streets. His concern could be almost claustrophobic to his sons who were now used to freedom but Leo was glad of his Sensei's presence.

"I…don't know…" he trailed off. "I couldn't…it was like a presence, trying to make contact with my mind…but…I could almost make out words…" He shook his head. "It was just on the cusp of hearing, not quite distinct enough. But….there was definitely something."

The rat's eyes narrowed in thought. "Did it feel threatening?"

"Nooo…" replied his eldest son, forehead wrinkling. "It felt like something was trying to communicate." He shook his head again. "I will meditate again. Maybe whatever it was will try again."

Splinter nodded slowly. "Be cautious, my son. The mind is a good place to lay traps for the unwary. You are skilled at entering the higher levels and are wary but you have never been seriously challenged. I will anchor you in case of difficulty."

"Hai, Sensei," replied Leo, seeing the sense in his master's words. He let himself fall back into the trance, his breathing slowing and becoming regular as he sought for the place he had been when the voice had spoken.

His father watched for danger to another of his children.

Nothing was to come of this watch though and Leo was to leave the dojo less relaxed and tranquil then would be usual for him after meditation.

He entered the kitchen and felt suddenly exhausted as he looked at the messy room. Usually it would be almost spotless, especially when…when Mikey was here. Not because the happy-go-lucky turtle was particularly neat -he was not!- but he loved cooking and…and refused to work in a messy kitchen. He sank down at the kitchen table, a table that had seen all too few family dinners in the last week, or month. Five weeks. Was that all it had been? Five weeks ago, he had been part of a family. A family of outcasts who still managed to make a difference. They'd been like a pyramid, four brothers and Sensei, the centre, holding them together, directing them. But they'd been linked so closely that now one corner was gone, everything was crumbling. The family was spiralling out of control as the pyramid shattered. And it was his fault.

His fault.

He was the leader.

The eldest brother.

"Fearless" Raph had called him when he wanted to annoy him.

But he wasn't fearless.

Every time he had led his brothers into battle he had been terrified. Terrified that under his leadership, using his plan, he would get one of his brothers killed. Every time he led his brothers into battle he prayed that if anyone was to pay the price for something overlooked, it would be him. Knowing that in all probability, it wouldn't be. Donnie, perhaps- a fearless and clever fighter when necessary, but a pacifist at heart who would always hesitate that nanosecond before striking, hoping for another answer. Raph, maybe. A fighter who relied on strength rather then canniness and whose hot temper so often got the better of him. He would always be in the centre of the fighting, taking out that bottomless pit of fury on some enemy heads. Yes, Raph was always a worry.

Or Mikey. Mikey, for whom he'd never be able to look out for in battle again. Although all four turtles were used to fighting with each others' weapons, Mikey had never been quite at home with the blades of his elder brothers. He was quite good with a staff, but it wasn't his weapon. The nunchucks were perhaps the hardest instruments to get a feel for, and definitely the hardest to fight with at a rudimentary level, so the youngest brother was used to losing battles against his older brothers when they was little. Then he had gotten a feel for them and, in a burst of industry that had shocked everybody, he had really worked, spending hours a day doing the complicated patterns of weapons and footwork. He had taken them all by surprise really. But Mikey could never quite take it all seriously enough and his ways had nearly gotten him killed more then once.

No, all of them had their faults in battle that made Leo fear for them. He supposed he did too. He knew he did. Overconfidence was one, although he knew about that and tried hard to eliminate it. But that was why he trained so hard. He trained so that he might pick up the slack, if needed. He trained so that if one of his brothers got into trouble he might just have that extra edge needed. And it had worked on numerous occasions.

But it hadn't worked this time! He hadn't been there and his worst fear had come true. He hadn't been there and it was his fault. He stared at a pan with burned sauce in the bottom- one of his own experiments as he tried to make up a dish that his youngest brother had always been able to whip up with ease. His eyes stayed dry this time. He thought that perhaps he couldn't cry any more, after what had happened with Donnie in Mikey's room, when he'd found the purple turtle methodically packing away Mikey's stuff.

Donnie hadn't come out of his lab in the last few days, feverishly working on something. Leo, or occasionally Raph would go in every so often and make him eat something. Raph would be back soon.

After another minute he put on an apron mechanically and started to wash up. It as his turn to cook tonight. They would all be in this time and now…he gripped an innocent cup tightly…tonight they would go through Mikey's stuff properly- those letters for one. Tonight they would start being ninja again. Tonight would mark the start of true blood-feud. Mikey could not be brought back, but he would be avenged!

"Oracle. Are they here? Are they still asleep?" The voice came over the com and the seer known as Oracle wanted to scowl. Her face twisted in the dark with anguish. God forgive her for what she was doing. But…it was the only way. In all the thousands of possible futures she had Seen first and then desperately Searched, this was the only way in which full World War could be avoided. She whispered an affirmative to the comm, tears streaming down her face in the gloom of her room in the innocent country house which sheltered five recently- deceased, newly reborn mutants and the people that had betrayed and then saved them.

Chrysta! Oh, Chrysta. Her fate was much worse then Oracle's own. But had she lived, the cruel disease that was eating her lungs would have killed her. Chrysta never found out that she was in the final stages of lung-cancer and Oracle, who had seen both fates, had not told her.

She heard the door crash and shouts from below. She was on the upper floor. The others had left on a supply trip. The mutants were in a medically induced sleep downstairs, as they had been for almost a week, unprotected as their bodies recovered from the stress of death and the return to life.

Why had she started on this road? Why had she joined this small party of idealists? Chrysta and her husband Robert. And Robert's sister, the strong willed mistress of illusions, Mirage. Mirage had been the first one to join that shadowy group of mutants who used humans for their own ends. Oracle knew that she would be the one to betray the ideals of Chrysta and Robert. Poor Robert. He'd lost his wife. He'd lose his sister and friend. Within days, he'd learn that Mirage had known all along that these people controlled humans and had set out to kill the mutant Team X. The young couple had thought that they were helping the trainees- reporting on them, using Robert's powerful mind-Gift to See them- and those who hurt or helped them.

The noises downstairs had faded. The mutant…mutant children would be gone, she knew, if she ventured downstairs. She closed her eyes but still the tears leaked through as she continued her mind-narrative of why she had betrayed the people she saw as family.

Then the mutants' deaths- as she had foreseen but not told. And Chrysta's reaction when she realised that it had been their information that had lead to those deaths. But she had not needed to See that- she knew it would happen just from her knowledge of poor innocent Chrysta and her powerful and unique Gift.

Robert's accusation. Yes, she had known. And she would bear that guilt for the rest of her life.

And now a small rogue group of NID operatives had been allowed to snatch these children. And their time in the NID's hands would not be pleasant although mercifully short.

So why had she done this?

Quite simply because it was the only way.

She had Seen over a thousand terrible terrible futures in which the world was rent apart by war. The civil war had started in America when what had started as minor clashes between humans and mutants had gotten out of hand.

An assassination attempt on the mutant Team X had failed- a minor headline on June twelfth.

A mutant stronghold had been blown up by anti-mutant protesters two days later. The Army had been called in to help patrol the streets, interrupting the training of Team X, who had been killed on duty by a sniper, not a week after the first attempt had failed. Just another couple of deaths.

Then the President had been assassinated and mutants blamed. All of North America had been smouldering for months and this act was more a hand grenade then a match. North America went up in flames. First those who were obviously mutants were taken, killed and often horribly. Then- the horrors of mutant registration. Some clever sods had hacked the entire list and put it up on the internet for all too see.

In almost one thousand realities, July 5th would become known as the 'Night of Guns'. Witch-hunting vigilantes murdered their neighbours and hounded down the almost five thousand listed mutants, killing nearly four hundred. Then the Middle East- which didn't often need much to set it off, exploded into open warfare while America and the UN were distracted. Various parts of Africa took advantage as people in small unstable countries staged coups and counter-coups. And, as always, it was the ordinary people that suffered. Finally, in November, the EU collapsed as each country was undone by everything from riots to civil war. Countries turned on themselves and ate themselves from within.

One thousand realities and a World War which wouldn't end for three bloody years until people were too hungry to fight themselves. Terrorists on both sides had targeted places like Sellafield in Britain and about half the nuclear stations in France and Germany. Most were mercifully contained but even the blowing up of Sellafield alone devastated Britain and eastern Ireland, destroying farmland and fishing. Finally, famine and disease plunged more then half the world back into the Dark Ages.

One thousand realities.

And then this one.

If they killed the mutants now and then brought them back without anyone knowing about it. She had Seen the one single future in which the President had not been killed- the plot had been foiled by five young people who by all accounts were dead. World War had been averted. It would cost lives…but not as many as otherwise.

There were so many thing which could go wrong. Chrysta might not have had the strength to pull all five back. The NID group might accidentally kill the mutants while doing their 'tests'. The riots that even now plagued the streets of all the major cities of North America might spark up before the mutants could complete their all-important task. But Oracle had Seen it. She had pushed it this far an she hoped it had been enough. It was too late now to worry…

The door whispered open. Oracle stood, there in the dark. She had seen this too.

"I'm sorry, Oracle. But you know too much."

"I know," she replied quietly. This was the other price.

The silencer didn't quite cover the sound of the shot, but out here in the countryside, even in broad daylight, who was there to hear?

Hey people,

Okay, I know some were confused at the end of chapter 10 (where Mikey came back), so I'll just give a quick recap on the story so far.

As explained in this chapter through Oracle's eyes, she was part of a minor group helping a bigger group. Chrysta and Robert were innocent, if rather naïve; they thought that by passing information, using Robert's strong telepathic Gift, they were helping Team X, when in fact the information helped lead to their deaths at the hands of a group of mutants who are controlling humans. Robert's sister, Mirage (the "mistress of illusions", present when Chrysta revived the team, knew exactly what was going on and was helping the group use the innocent couple for their own purposes.

Mirage and Robert stole the bodies during the funeral-but they messed up slightly on Donnie who realised he had a gap in his memory.

Chrysta revived our Five but was punished for her audacity in going into death five times. She was turned into one of the Sidhe- a faerie that cannot pass through the Gates of Death, just like she said (without knowing the consequences)

Yes, Oracle knew all along and pushed events along this route. Why? Because her Gift was strong 'Second Sight'. She Sees all possible futures- and in every future in which the mutants did NOT die, the world was plunged into war. So their deaths- and subsequent betrayal (by Oracle) to this second group- these rogue NID people is necessary to prevent this war. Otherwise they'd have died in the streets anyway ("The Army had been called in to help patrol the streets, interrupting the training of Team X, later killed on duty by a sniper") The other death that was necessary was her own.

Phew…

Oh, and Becca T- you were right in saying that Glacier (Ganymede) made a huge sacrifice, although not perhaps the one you think. She is not Chrysta (although you gave me some very interesting ideas). She did have to return to a world where she is an outcast, from the place where she was at peace. But she did it because she was needed.

And finally, something seems to be trying to contact Leo.

So, I hope that clears up any confusing points! I'll be back soon!

AZ

NEXT CHAPTER- Recovering, Part 3

Reading the unedited letters and Leo manages to talk to whatever it is that's trying to contact him. Donnie has some startling news. Raph almost certainly loses his temper.