Gang activity is on the rise.
City crime rate skyrockets.
Xanus Pharmaceuticals making headway on animal trials.
Xanus seeking new patents.
Donatello had a bunch of newspaper headlines pulled up on one of the screens of the computers in his lab. He shook his head as his brother's crowded around. "Xanus is obviously making a name for themselves already." He flipped through a page. "But If we look over here, you can see that the Purple Dragons are clearly on a rampage again. Why they are out and causing such a fuss I can't piece together. Their crimes don't seem to make sense." Donnie ran a hand over his face. "I have all the major news networks, websites and media sites flagged for the key words to do with xanus and the Dragons so I'll keep an eye on it but that is about all I can do from here."
"What we need to do is train and get back into shape so we are prepared when shit goes down." Raphael snorted.
"Shit isn't going to 'go down' unless we make it." Leo rolled his eyes. "First we have to figure out what exactly Xanus is doing messing around with the mutagen. And we have to figure out a way to stop him."
"Doing that requires getting past the Purple dragons and all the foot." Ant's voice piped up from behind them all. They weren't used to having him in the big family debates. "And for that we do need training."
"He has a point." Mikey looked at his older brothers.
So that's what the boys did for the next few weeks. They trained. Donatello took extra time to help Ant with his hand, they even managed to make a mold of his arm and cast a guard made of Kevlar. Without his grip in that right hand, the kusarigama wasn't working that well, but he still had a good control and amazing power behind his swings and blows with the weapon. Raphael talked things over with Donnie and they settled on the Ono, a battle axe.
The boys spent hours every day training. Then they would go out at night and see if they could test out their newly learned skills and messing up the Purple Dragon's plans never hurt anything either.
While the boys busied themselves with that, Jack had her own agenda. She hated being in bed and not being able to help them so it started off small. First she just focused on being able to stand and walk without hurting. She'd make the boy's breakfast and lunch, make sure they took time to eat throughout the day. But then once her ribs started to feel better she started to get back into her own training regimen on her own. It started off small as well. Pushups and sit-ups and stretches mostly. But slowly she moved into the more advanced stretches her gymnastics was used to and her exercises became more intense. Of course it was all on her own, she'd never tell Raph or let him see for fear of him freaking out.
Raphael and Antonello were up on the street. It was a little after two in the morning, the city was dark, most were sleeping, most of the good people anyway. The only light came from a few dim street lights that flickered in the alley they were near. Raph was sitting crouched on a fire escape ladder looking down at the group of Purple Dragon's below them. He glanced across the alley to where Ant was hunched in a dark window peering down at the same scene.
They didn't seem to be doing anything at the moment. Just standing there and talking. Raph signaled to Ant and then swung down to a lower perch on the fire escape with expert precision silence. Ant shimmied down to a lower perch as well to get a better view. What they heard next was not what they had been expecting.
"…hasn't been seen in more than a month. We need to find her." The oldest, a man with a shaved head and a tight leather vest over his muscled chest was telling the other teenagers. He had a huge tattoo snaking around his arm that reminded Raph of one of the anime characters Mikey always watched. But this tattoo was of course, a purple dragon. The big man ran a hand over his head, it glinted in the flickering street light and he sighed. "She will ruin all the plans if she gets into the corporation. If you guys ever hope of climbing up the ranks, becoming real Foot… you have to go out and find all you can on her. We know she is here in the city."
The younger kids whispered excitedly.
"Jacquelyn Marie Garver. She is our target. We must locate and capture her. The original plan to eliminate her has failed so things have changed. You are to acquire all intel you can on her and report directly to me. Got it?"
"Yes sir!" They sang out in unison.
Then the smallest one in the group raised his hand.
The bald man grunted. "What is it Runt?"
"What did this chick do? I mean… why exactly are we all going after her? Sending the whole gang…. Isn't it a bit over kill?"
"This woman can single handedly bring down our entire existence. Do you want that?" The boy shook his head. "Do you want to lose a place to call home?" He shook his head again. "Your family?" The bald man gestured to the others standing around him. "Then help us find her so we can get rid of her."
"Yes sir."
The kids dispersed, heading out in a few pairs and small groups leaving the big man standing there alone.
Antonello looked over at the turtle he thought of as a brother. He swallowed hard as he watched Raph's grip tighten on his sai. This wasn't going to be pretty. Ant dropped down to the alley floor, still in the shadow of the brick wall, waiting for Raph's temper to lead him to do something stupid. 3…2…1…Raph launched himself at the big bald man.
They collided and smacked into the dumpster with a loud clang of metal against the brick wall.
"Fuck." Ant mumbled as he darted across the lit section of the alley.
Raph was already beating his fists into the man, in the darkness behind the dumpster. "Why are you after her?!" He roared. "Tell me!"
The man laughed between choked breaths that came with each blow. He threw Raph off of him and made it to his feet just as Ant circled him. "So you know the bitch?" He didn't seem surprised at all to see two giant turtles standing before him. "Maybe I'll just have my crew follow you two."
"Good luck with that!" Ant shouted as he charged the man from behind. Knocking him down Raph grabbed one of his bulky fists before it could be thrown at his littlest brother.
Gritting his teeth, Raph pressed the tip of his sai to the man's throat. "Tell me why you are after the woman." He said again.
The bald man just grinned. "I'm not telling you turtle. You'd be better off killing me."
"You should probably be taking it easy. Raph is going to be pissed if you hurt yourself."
Jack frowned over at Mikey, as she paused in her routine. "What he doesn't know, won't hurt him. I've been training myself for weeks now. I am sick and tired of just lying in bed. I don't want to be useless when something happens and you guys actually need me. Or I need to defend myself."
Mikey ran a hand over his face. "At least let Donnie look at you before you do anything too hard? I mean… I am not going to spar with you until he says it's okay."
The woman rolled her eyes and steadied the swaying heavy bag with her hand before she walked to the door of the training room. She smiled and patted Mikey on the arm. "You guys take such good care of me." She moved past him and headed to his brothers room to get the OK to train, even though she'd do it without it anyway.
"Only because you take such good care of us!" Mikey called after her.
She simply waved over her shoulder before she stopped at Donnie's door. Her knuckle's tapped on his door before she heard a muffled 'come in.' Stepping inside she wondered over to his desk and leaned back on it as he held up a finger, finishing a conversation on his headset with one of the customers from his IT job. Jack picked at a loose thread of her yoga pants while she waited for him to finish.
"Ahem…" Her red face looked up to meet his. "I can see you have been training… Against better judgment most likely."
Jack looked down at her sports bra and pants. It had become her standard training outfit but sometimes she forgot to put a shirt on afterwards and it still caught her off guard when they called her on it. "Uh… Yeah. I just got sick and tired of doing nothing. I don't want to get too far behind you guys." She wrapped her arms around her exposed mid-section. "Mikey wont train with me though until you say I'm okay."
"That's because he knows Raph will kill him if you get hurt on his account." Donnie got to his feet and gestured to the table on the other side of his room. After Jack sat down he grabbed the med kit and did a rundown of her injuries, checking how far along they were in healing. Then her joints, to make sure none of them were still sprained or damaged. Last he checked her breathing and ribs, as well as the motion of her torso. The ribs were what worried him most. He wasn't sure how truthful his restless patient was being when she said it was okay. "Well, things seem to be fine as far as I can tell… so ease back into training. No brutal hits, work up to those." He let a smile show.
Jack nodded and hopped off the table to head to the door. "Thanks." She paused. "Oh… I have another favor to ask."
Donatello quirked a brow. "What's that?"
"Um, well… I was kinda in the process of getting a job when all this stuff with Leo went down. Do you think you could fudge me up some fake doctor's papers? Say I was in a car wreck or something? Let me take them to the place and apologize at least. I don't expect them to give me the job. Probably filled it already, but I figured I might want to let them know…. Which reminds me, the whole point of that job was to get Raph a present for his birthday, which is in like a week." She frowned. "Did you ever get a hold of that Usagi guy?"
He rolled his eyes. "So many demands. Yes, back when you first asked, and yes… I'll get you some fake papers tonight between my calls."
"Thanks!" She stood on her toes and kissed his cheek before rushing out of the room. The young woman headed to her rom but stopped when she heard noises coming from the training room. Poking her head in she sighed when she saw Leo. He had joined in the groups training, started to help with instructing Ant when Raph would let him and as a group they worked well together. But… he could hardly look at Jack. "Knock knock?" She said softly as she rapped on the door.
Leo let his hands fall to his sides before he turned around. He didn't say anything just looked at her for a moment before turning back around and striking out at the heavy bag.
"Come on Leo… please don't ignore me." She stepped inside the room and leaned against the wall. "You know I'm not angry at you. I don't blame you for anything."
He let out a snarl that sounded oddly like Raphael and then turned to face her. "I know that." He said, vastly calmer, he seemed anyway. "But I do. I have never felt such a lack of control or understanding." He ran his hands over his face. "I hurt you, and Ant. Friends… No, more like family." He let out something that was almost a laugh. "I have betrayed one of the people I care about the most and I can probably never salvage that relationship."
Jack saw the glimmer of a tear fall off his face in the dim light. "Nothing is destroyed, and no one is perfect. Don't take all this blame on yourself. You talk as though your relationship with Raph will never mend. He is your brother and although he is angry, he will forgive you. It may just take time."
He took a shaky breath as he wiped at his face and looked at her. "You sound like Master Splinter." There was that awkward smile again.
"That's not the first time I've heard that."
His smile faded as he slid to a seat against the wall.
"What is it?" Jack stepped closer, kneeling in front of him.
"I am worried about Mona…" He sighed. "She was always the one area of my life where I didn't have to be so strict, I didn't have to follow every single rule." This time a sincere smile as he stared of into the distance. "She always let me loosen up, like Mike says, I'm wound way too tight sometimes."
Jack nodded. "Okay… So what worries you about her?"
"She is obsessed with becoming human again. And I come home to find out she has been harassing Raph for the entirety of my trip? I only proposed to her recently, I mean… What if she hasn't really gotten over him?"
That made Jack pull back a bit. "Get over him? I don't understand." Despite Raphael's full and explicit confession to the woman, she wasn't conscious to hear it. Leo's revelation, surprised her.
"When we first met Mona Lisa, she was a student, kind of like you, caught up in the wrong situation. Mutated by the mutagen with a lizard's DNA. That's how we got the Mona that you know, the Mona I love. But after we initially dispatched the people for that incident and she started hanging around, she had a thing with Raph. They were just friends to him I think, no matter how much she wanted to be more. When he said no, Mona disappeared for a while. She came back and we started dating, that while he was with Ninjara, but that didn't last for him either. That's the short version anyway…"
"Oh, I see…"
Leo shook his head. "I'm sorry I shouldn't be burdening you with this. I should go meditate for a while. Then I'll feel better." He got to his feet and grabbed his swords.
"Leo?"
He stopped at the door and looked back at her.
"Any woman would be privileged to have you."
He didn't say anything, just walked out.
Jacquelyn sighed and got to her feet as well. Walking out she headed to the bathroom to shower and clean up after her workout. She didn't feel so excited and chipper after that conversation with Leo. Of course he has had other girlfriends. She thought as she rinsed the shampoo out of her hair. But why do I feel like that information makes me sick… the thought of him with someone else makes me want to puke. Jack shook her head. "Stop it. He doesn't feel anything for you." She was quick to finish up her shower and scurry to her room since she was only wrapped in her towel.
When she shut the door and turned around she smiled. On her bed were a few papers typed up, filled in and signed by some 'doctor'. Poking her head out the door she called out across the house. "Thanks Donnie!" Setting the papers on her dresser and out of the way, she dried herself off and pulled on some shorts and a tee shirt to sleep in. It was really late, or early depending on your view, in the morning she'd go to the café and see about that job.
Jack was about to walk over to Raphael's room to crawl into his hammock and wait for him but she hesitated, chewing on her lip. "Maybe I shouldn't… What if…"She shook her head and went back to her own bed. Crawling under her blanket she curled up on her side and closed her eyes. I wonder what's taking him and Ant so long anyway… She sighed and tried to sleep.
Raphael stopped at the entrance of his home and looked at Antonello. Both were tired, panting. There was blood dripping from the ends of their weapons as well as their knuckles and hands. There were scrapes and cuts scattered across their bodies, but nothing major. Ant's mask was stained.
"You tell no one what we did. Ya got it?"
Ant nodded. "I won't."
Raph sighed. "I'm sorry I had ta drag ya in to that but I am not about to let 'm get anywhere-"
"I know Raph." Ant looked up at him. "Jackie is like a sister to me. I don't want anything to happen to her either."
The one eyed turtle opened the door and let them inside. It was dark, silent. The only light was coming from under Donnie's door. Raph looked at Ant. "Go wash up." He whispered. AS the younger turtled went down to the bathroom and started up the shower, Raph went to the kitchen sink and started to wash up. He found abrasions and cuts across his hands and knuckles, and despite the stinging of the soap, he just stared down at the reddish water, expressionless as it swirled down the drain. Grabbing a dish towel he got it wet and started to wipe the blood off of his face and chest and any other place he could find. He threw the towel angrily into the corner of the counter after wiping off his weapons.
Raph walked to his room and opened the door. The room was empty. He didn't bother going in, he needed to see her, needed to know she was okay, that she was still there. That she was tangible and living. That they hadn't killed her.
Opening up her bedroom door he felt the muscles in his neck loosen a bit. Jack was sleeping in her bed, just like he had hoped. Yet the turtle couldn't bring himself to move, to go back to his own room. Running a hand over his face he stood in her door way, watching her calm face as she slept. I can't do this… He squeezed his eye shut. I killed someone because they were going to come for you. He dropped his sai to the floor and kicked the door shut behind him. The thought of losing you, of someone hurting you again is unbearable… He knelt down on the side of her bed and laid down behind the woman curled up on her side. I really do love you don't I… Raph wasn't sure how to rationalize the omission to himself as he wrapped his arm around her and pulled her to his chest. "…please… don't think I'm a monster." He buried his face in her hair and took a deep breath of the familiar scent he was so fond of, trying to urge sleep to come.