Michelangelo was exhausted in every sense of the word. His body threatened to collapse under its own weight with every labored step he took. He winced every now and then, any time his mangled arm moved too much. He'd managed to find a scrap of cloth with which to bind his wound, but such slap-shod first aid had only served to stop him from bleeding to death for the time being. He still couldn't feel or move anything below his left elbow.

Worse than his weary, battered body, his mind had taken a great toll. Thoughts struggled to surface themselves through the sludge of shock and despair, and when they finally did they were so painful that he immediately buried them once more. Leatherhead, beheaded. Leonardo, drowned in what had amounted to acid. Raphael, crushed to death by gnashing, heavy gears. How much more of this hell could he endure?

Then, as if testing to see just how much farther his poor mind could go before shattering completely, he remembered what he was supposed to do, what Donatello had told him he must do to destroy the Machine. There was still one death more yet to face. Michelangelo shook his head, as if the action would physically wrench the idea out of his brain. He couldn't do it. He just couldn't bring himself to kill, not on purpose. He blamed himself for the others' deaths, that much was true, but they were all accidents. To actually have an active, purposeful hand in murder? He didn't care what the reason was, he just couldn't do something like that. He didn't have it in him.

Mercy…

The single word bit at his memory. No… No, not even for that reason. He didn't subscribe to this world's twisted concept of 'mercy.' He refused to.

Still, despite his vehement refusal to do the only thing left to be done that had any hope of saving the world, his legs still carried him on, trudging endlessly, mindlessly through the deepest bowels of the Machine. He had no way to know exactly where he was going, but he somehow knew he would end up standing before… Him.

He found himself wading through a river of blood, treading the foul, thick substance up to his knees. He didn't seem to notice, or if he did, he didn't care anymore. He couldn't tell which was more disturbing. Of course, what proof did he have that any of this was real at all? It could all be an illusion, a sick fever dream. For all he knew, he was still safe and sound in his bed back home in New York. He would toss and turn until he finally woke up and, after about five minutes or so, he'll have forgotten most of what he saw here. He'll be fine. His brothers would be fine. Everything would be fine.

But not even he could convince himself of such a wild fantasy. What he had seen here surpassed any nightmare his formerly-innocent mind could possibly conceive of. What he had seen here was simply too gruesome, too horrible, too unspeakable to have been a mere nightmare. There was no waking up from this.

The river of blood had turned into a lake. A vast cavern spread out before him, the light of his lantern unable to pierce far enough through the darkness to see just how big it really was. The only thing he could see from his current position was a platform out in what he supposed to be the middle of the lake, a single cage-like lift resting on the surface, beckoning him forth.

The blood came up to his chest now. Michelangelo still had the presence of mind to hold his arms above the surface, not wanting to risk severe infection to his wound or risk shorting out his lantern. That he would surely die down here was bad enough. He didn't need the added misery of being in excruciating pain or in complete darkness as he waited for the end.

He could see objects floating on the surface of the lake, bloated and stained a rusty red. They were bodies, but he couldn't tell if they had been human or Manpig. Did it really matter which at this point? No, he decided it didn't. The Hamatos of this world hadn't seemed to make a distinction between the two, at least. Both were filthy wretches, ripe for the bleeding.

He reached the lift, absently pulling the lever once he was inside. He didn't cling to the bars this time as it descended. What did he care if it fell now? It would just bring a quick end to it all. He would almost welcome that at the moment. He stared blankly forward as the sheet metal surrounding the lift cage slowly slipped by, not bothering to wonder how much farther he would have to descend. He didn't care anymore. Damn it all, he didn't care about anything anymore. He just wanted it all to end. It didn't matter how.

Sheet metal gave way to an open chamber once more. This cavern seemed so large that, had he not known better, he'd have thought he was outside in the chilly midnight air again. Out there, rising through the mists, towering above everything as he came to a rest at the lift's final destination, was a massive stone pyramid of Aztec design. Michelangelo's blood ran cold as he stared up at it. This was it. He was up there. He just knew he was. Terror gripped coldly at his heart. He wanted to run. He wanted nothing more than to run away as fast as he could, any way he could. He simply had to get out of there, no matter the cost.

His body didn't seem to agree. Even as everything in his heart, mind, and soul were screaming at him to get away from this cursed place, his legs carried him steadily forward. It was as though he no longer had control of his body. Or, perhaps he was just so far gone into insanity that he reveled in his own fear. Was either option any more ridiculous than the other? Then, Mikey remembered what Donatello had told him when he wondered how he'd know where to go, how he simply needed to follow the chill in his heart, the fear in his soul, and that he would be led in the proper direction. Was this what he'd meant?

His feet led themselves to the massive stone steps leading up the side of the black temple. This was it. There was no way he could turn back now. As if to confirm the chilling thought, an all too familiar voice rang out from inside his own head as he made the slow climb to the summit, a voice devoid of form yet imposing itself over every other thought in his mind. The voice of the Machine. The voice of Hamato Yoshi.

'I have stood knee deep in mud and bone and filled my lungs with mustard gas. I have seen four brothers fall. I have lain with holy wars and copulated with the autumnal fallout. I have dug trenches for the refugees; I have murdered dissidents where the ground never thaws and starved the masses into faith. A child's shadow burnt into the brickwork. A house of skulls in the jungle.'

'The innocent… the innocent, Michelangelo, trod and bled and gassed and starved and beaten and murdered and enslaved! This is our coming century! They will eat them, my son… They will make pigs of you all! And they will bury their snouts into your ribs and they will eat your hearts!'

Michelangelo now stood atop the temple, frozen, his eyes wide at what he saw there waiting for him. It was hard to see much of anything in the near darkness, but a dim blue glow imposed itself on him, making it impossible to look at anything else. Sitting there on a throne of stone and steel, wires and pipes spreading outward from his withered body in all directions, lifeless black eyes staring blankly forward, was the one man most responsible for setting in motion the horrible events Michelangelo had experienced in this single night of terror. It was the core, Hamato Yoshi himself.

More accurately, it was what remained of Hamato Yoshi. The man was little more than a corpse. His skin had shriveled and turned gray, tightening over what almost seemed to be bare bone. His hair, what little hadn't fallen out, had turned a ghostly white. His chest seemed to have caved in and, right in the middle of the ghastly depression, sat a glowing blue stone carved to be the exact size and shape of a human heart. It almost seemed to be pulsing, beating as a real heart would. It must have been the Orb.

Mikey's eyes couldn't help but fix themselves on what lay across the man's lap. It was a tiny form, the skeleton of a young child. A young girl. She was still dressed in a fine yellow dress, her silky black hair clinging to her tiny shattered skull. Yoshi's gaunt hand was cradled under her head, as though he'd still been in the process of stroking her hair when rigor mortis had finally taken hold of him.

Miwa.

'My son… Have you come here to kill me?'

Michelangelo flinched slightly as the Machine spoke to his mind once more. He swallowed hard, trying to clear the lump that had gathered in his throat. Why did it have to use that voice?

'You don't understand. No one does. All of this, all I have done, all of the so-called atrocities you have seen here… I did it all for you, my son. For you, and for your brothers. For your sister. For my Miwa.'

Mikey tried to look away, feeling the tears start to well up at the corners of his eyes. It wasn't Splinter. It wasn't his Sensei. He couldn't let himself be tricked into thinking that this creature, this corpse, this faint wisp of a man was in any way his beloved master. Yet… He couldn't ignore the sincerity in that all too familiar voice, especially when it spoke of Miwa.

His eyes were pulled back to the man seemingly against his will, his gaze drifting down to the girl's skeleton in his arms. Could it be that Hamato Yoshi had slipped so far out of his right mind that he still believed that his beloved daughter was still alive and well, even as he cradled her long-dead remains close to his chest? A pang of pity struck Mikey suddenly, his heart clenching in his chest as he couldn't help but think 'Poor Sensei…'

No. No, he couldn't let himself slip into thinking that way, even by accident. This wasn't his Sensei. This was a machine. He forced himself to stare at the Orb in the man's sunken-in chest, watching as it pulsed, beating out a deceptive rhythm. That was it. That was the only thing that was truly in control here. That's what was talking to him now, what had stolen Hamato Yoshi's voice, his mind, his life, and had turned his grief into these twisted machinations. So long as that cursed Orb existed, Yoshi's very soul would be forever trapped in that withered corpse, still under the delusion that what he had set into motion had truly been for the benefit of his children.

"Mercy…" Michelangelo heard himself breathe out in a barely audible whisper. It was the first time since he'd arrived in this hellish world that he'd been able to hear the word without cringing. He was starting to understand what Donatello had meant earlier.

'No… No, wait… What are you doing?' the Machine asked, a note of concern, possibly even desperation entering its pseudo-voice. The lantern had fallen out of Michelangelo's hand and clattered to the ground, its light flickering out. Slowly, he began stalking towards Yoshi's body, guided only by the pale blue glow of the Orb. He bent down, grabbing a loose length of heavy brass pipe that had been carelessly left lying around. He kept his eyes forward, staring at the Orb, an icy chill invading them for the first time in his life.

'No, please, I am begging you… I made you. I am your Creator, your father! You cannot destroy me!'

Even as the Machine gave this final plea, Michelangelo raised the pipe over his head.

"You're not my father."