Hello! Mea culpa, I´m very sorry. Got a pretty big writers blockade and my English became a bit rusty, I fear. Hope you like it nevertheless.

Thanks to Cynlee for beta reading and corrections!

10. Hard Decision

After some time, she got calm enough to think clearly. Sitting here and crying wouldn´t help her. They knew which was her practice, so they would for sure know about her apartment, too. Maybe she cold go to one of her friends, but she didn´t want to cause them trouble. At the latest next morning the police would search for her, if they weren´t already. So there was only one address left.

"Damned", she muttered.

Luckily she had pocketed her purse. Carefully she left the practice and walked a few streets further, until she dared to call a cab.

The driver stopped a corner afar from the address Splinter had given her.

"Are you sure you want to get off here?" he asked doubtfully. "It´s not exactly a nice neighborhood."

"It´s all right. I´m going to meet someone."

The driver looked suspiciously, but didn´t asked further. After Tally paid him, he pulled out at once.

Without to hesitate, Tally walked to this special warehouse and again, she squeezed herself through a window. Then she hammered at the colorful baseplate which was the ceiling of their lift.

"Hey! I know that you´re there! Open!"

She didn´t had to wait long. Suddenly the baseplate moved, the lift appeared and Donatello stood in front of her.

"Tally? What are you doing here? How did you manage to leave the Lair?"

Tally pushed him aside and entered the lift.

"First get Mikey and Leonardo. I do not like to tell everything twice!"

When he had heard Tally´s story, Leonardo appeared to be calm, but Don knew that he was mad inside. This was sooooo typical Raph.

Leonardo just said two words: "Gotta go!"

He went to the elevator, followed by his two brothers- and by Tally. Leo grabbed her arm. "You stay here! This is much too dangerous!"

Angrily, Tally shook him off.

"This is about me, too!"

"He´s right, Tally", Don tried to calm her, "besides, someone has to look for-"

In this moment, the silhouette of his Master was visible before the ward.

"Splinter". Don sighed, then he went to his father.

Splinter stood trembling in the doorway and backed himself with one hand on the wall.

"What…had happened?" he croaked. "Where´s Raphael?"

Tally resigned. She walked over to Splinter and pushed him- more or less against his will- to bed again. Behind her she heard the sound of the closing elevator door. Just come back, she thought, an I´ll tell you something!

"He´s okay. Probably just out for a walk. The other ones will bring him home. Just rest. You shouldn´t stand up right now."

"He shouldn´t go topside", Splinter mumbled. Tally was nearly not able to understand him. "It´s much to dangerous. He will be seen. He might be in danger…"

He coughed hardly.

"Please, Splinter, be silent. You mustn´t speak!"

He opened his mouth again and Tally put without further ado a thermometer between his teeth. At least this would keep him from speaking. He lifted his hand to gesticulate, but Tally grabbed and held it. "Shhhh", she whispered. "Calm down". And finally he seemed to becalm. So she sat next to his bed, watching him dozing, and waited for the return of the Turtles.

Raphael sat at the edge of the rim of a shabby storehouse. There was not even the need to hide, for the night was pitch-black and there were no lights around him- except the one in the next warehouse´s window beneath him, where he observed a few man playing cards.

He whirled one of his sais in his right hand and listened absently to the faint sound of the harbor water.

Fate.

In some way, it started in the harbor- with the Foot; and it would end here. He grabbed his sai faster and prepared to leap forward. He was sooooo going to enjoy this.

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Ed Deans hand was disastrous, so he decided to leave this round and go to the rest room instead. Just as he stood up, a smashing sound resounded and something heavy hit him hardly in the back. He fell forward, his head hit the chair rim. Groaning he hit the ground. The impact must had been really hard, because he could have sworn that there was a giant Turtle standing in the middle in the room, grinning evilly and whirling around two strange kind of knives.

Raphael had knocked out two of the men immediately. The first one was still asleep, the second one laid on the ground and stared horrorstricken in his direction, but number three and four took out guns!

Damned! cursed Raphael inside, when he sprang behind the overthrown table. He should have thought of it! Two bullets hit his shelter, but didn´t penetrate the table. And this was not the way it should go! He should be the one forcing this bastards to search for shelter.

But in this very moment, he had no chance. The room was too bright and to small. He counted the shoots, and in a break, he leaped out of the window, hoping the man would follow him- and they did!

By the time they climbed clumsily out of the window, Raphael had already reentered the roof and watched them. It would be so easy to kill them with his sais from above- to easy. He wanted them to really regret. He would had never admitted it, but when he had seen his sensei, his father in such a shape, he just wanted to break every bone of the one responsible- very very slowly. Unfortunately the Foot soldier was already dead, but this scum was still alive- up to now.

Now all four again stood before the window, arguing. Raphael grinned and sprang noiselessy from the roof in the alley between the warehouses. He took a small stone and threw it at the back of the men closest to him. The men cried out and stumbled, but didn´t fell, right as Raphael planned. Immediately the four turned around and came up to the alley. Raphael ducked a little bit deeper in the shadows, sneering. "Yes, scum, come here to play!"

Meanwhile his brothers drove the Turtles Van at high speed to the harbor. Leo peered at one of Donatello's monitoring displays, where a green spot was blinking.

"Don, you´re sure he´s still there? After all, he deactivated his Shell cell!"

"That doesn´t matter", shrugged Don, "as long as he still keeps it with him."

They left the Van at the beginning of the port facility and went over the rooftops. They didn´t even need Don´s tracking device any more- a loud scream hat shown them the proper direction. When they entered the fighting place, they saw how Raphael pulled one of the guys into a garbage can- head first.

As he lifted one more from the ground, Leo sprang in the alley and caught his brothers fist before Raphael could hit the men´s face again.

"What are you guys doing here?" Raphael smashed the men to the ground again and stared angrily at his brothers. Before Leo could start, Don tried to arbitrate.

"Raph, that´s not the right way. Besides", he added, "Master Splinter won´t heal any faster if he has to worry about you."

"That… is… not… fair!" Raphael was close to attack his brother, too. "They deserved it! Heck, you have seen it what a state Sensei was! You want them to get away with it?"

Leo paused for a moment. He was angry, too. But…

He sighed.

The men already left the alley, except the one who was pinned into the garbage can.

"Let´s call the police and then go home."

"And what do you think the police will do?" Raphael was not willingly to let them run free.

Leo shrugged. "You mean, when they say that they were attacked by a giant turtle while they were after a giant rat?"

Donatello already did the phone call.

"Besides, very good job in Tally´s office. What were you thinking?"

Raphael didn´t answer. He just turned around and walked to his bike.

"We put the corpse into the sewers. At least nobody will find it", Don shouted after him.

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It was nearly in the morning when the Turtles came home. Donatello entered the infirmary and sat down next to Tally.

"How is he?"

Tally shrugged. "As the case may be… fine, at least for the moment. Breathing and heart beat are steady. But he really shouldn´t overexcite!"

Donatello sighed. "Well, that´s Raphael. I hope he calmed down right now. Besides, we cared for your surgery."

Tally nodded. "But they will still be after me, won´t they?"

Don shrugged. "Depends on how much Raphael terrified them. Better wait for two weeks or so."

"And what to tell the police then?"

Donatello lowered his head. "I´m sorry".

Tally looked to the Turtle beside her, then to the sleeping rat, huddled up under the blanket.

Two weeks or so, she thought. In two weeks… or so, Splinter should be better, and she would be able to return to her old live. She stood up.

"Well then. If I have to stay here for some more time, just let us make one thing clear: Your home is in a mess! Havn´t you cleaned up just one single time since Splinter was missing? You´ll start tomorrow to tidy this pigpen!"

Donatello was too taken by surprise to argue properly. "Yeah? Or what?"

Tally smiled evilly. "Or I´ll tell him when he´ll awaken tomorrow!"

Don looked at his sleeping father. "Hey! That´s extortion!"

Tally grinned. If she thought about it, this two weeks or a little bit longer would for sure become interesting.

N/A: Well, Tally is introduced… the long way. Now I can start with the interesting part… hopefully faster than this chapter.