A/N: What up my turtle loving people? It's a good day today, in fact it's a pretty darn good week. You wanna know why? Because it's reading week daug! That's right, a whole week of no classes, staying at home, sitting on my butt and writing fan fiction when I should be studying for classes like they want me to. My goal for this semesters reading week is to have this story finished by the time classes start again! Now let's see if I can achieve this goal. And because of this awesome week, here's a special treat for all you people reading; that's right, 2 that's right two chapters in one day. You're welcome.
Chapter 2
The boy walked down the crowded street, on his way home after a full day of school. While weaving between people and dodging around street vendors, he felt what he knew would one day come. It was time.
The Shard has surfaced and is active once again, and it's his duty to find and protect it with his life. But it was the finding part that was going to cause a bit of trouble.
He wasn't sure exactly how long he had been in this reality; how long he's been away from the war that is still raging far away. After entering the Hyper Vacuum with the Shard, he felt himself falling for a long time. Then all of a sudden, he woke up in bed in an apartment with a family and a normal life. It was as if he'd always been a part of this family. He had memories of playing in the park with friends, eating out at restaurants with his parents, being annoyed by a younger sibling . . . but he also had memories his life before he fell.
His body was so much more fragile than before. Traveling through the Hyper Vacuum had changed him; his once well toned muscles were no where to be found, replaced with the flimsy limbs that are trademarks of all children who spend too much time indoors. At least he can still use his abilities. He can still feel the Shard, still channel its power, can still fight against the Dark. At least as far as he knows. He hasn't been able to test the limits of his abilities in this new human body.
Despite his new life, he still knows who and what he is. He is the Shard's Guardian. He has a job to protect it from those who would covet its power until the Light returned to claim what was hers. It was only a matter of what would happen first; the arrival of the Light, or the chaos that would follow the Shard's revival. Because both were sure to happen, one way or another.
Oo-oO
"April? April!" Donatello shook his friend, who lay unconscious on the ground, Leo and Casey watched with worried expressions.
"Dude, what happened?!" Casey demanded.
"I don't know," Donnie snapped back, "give me a second." He handed April off to Leo, who brought her out into the main room, placing her on the couch in the pit with Casey close behind. She was looking a little pale, even her hair seemed a shade lighter. Wait . . . was that possible?
"What happened?" Raphael exclaimed upon seeing them and Michelangelo emerged from the kitchen to see what the noise was about. They all crowded around April as she lay still on the couch.
"My sons," Splinter appeared from the dojo and took in the scene, "What has happened?"
Leo took a deep breath before recounting the events of the past few minutes. Meanwhile, Donnie was examining what remained of the mystery rock.
"What . . . ?" Donnie studied the printouts of the readings from the rock in the lab. He glanced from the readings to the rock, then back to the readings. Shaking his head, he turned off the machine that was monitoring the rock.
"What is it, Donnie?" Leo asked as Don joined them in the pit carrying the latest readings.
"It's just . . . look here," he pointed to an area of the readouts. It was a line graph with a lot of zigzags that meant nothing to the older brother. "This part here, the readings are relatively consistent. But here," he pointed to where the lines spiked drastically, "the readings went crazy when April touched the thing, and after that," he traced his finger over the flat line that followed, "nothing. No radiation, no readings . . . it's as if whatever made this thing work, just disappeared."
"Like it broke or something?" Leo asked.
"Maybe?" Donnie asked, unsure. "It's hard to make any guesses when I don't even know what the heck the thing was in the first place!"
"So what happened to April?" Casey demanded angrily. Everyone turned to the genius, silently awaiting answers.
"From the looks of it, maybe some sort of short out?" Donnie suggested. "I mean, if it really was emitting some sort of psychic waves, maybe they reacted negatively with April's powers, overwhelmed her and caused her to pass out?"
"Could that make her hair to change colour?" Mikey spoke up.
"What?" Donnie asked. Sure enough, there was a single streak of white mixed in with the fiery red hair. "How is that possible?"
"Add that to the list of mysteries," Leo said. "I'm starting to think that rock is more trouble that its worth."
"Ugh." The boys all looked down at April as she groaned. Her eyes fluttered open, "What happened?"
"April, are you alright?" Donnie asked, pushing the others out of the way to examine her.
"My head hurts a little," April said, pressing her hand to her forehead, "what was that?"
"It looked like you had a negative reaction to the rock," Donnie explained helping her sit up.
"Negative reaction?" April asked sitting up, her loose hair falling around her face.
"If my reasoning is correct, the rock was emitting some sort of psychic waves. They must have reacted with your powers and it overwhelmed you," Donnie repeated his theory.
"Weird," April said.
"Well whatever it was," Casey said, pushing Donnie aside, "it's gone now. Let's not worry about it."
"Casey's right," Leo said. "We've got more pressing concerns right now."
"Like the mess it made in my lab," Donnie muttered, recalling the blades of electricity and the damage they caused.
"More like where it came from, and are there more of them out there," Leo clarified.
"You think there's more of these things?" Casey asked seriously.
"I hope not," April muttered, still holding her head, "I've got a massive headache."
"Now that I know what it was emitting," Donnie mused, "I could probably make a specialized scanner to pick up these sorts of frequencies."
"Alright," Leo said formulating the plan, "tonight we'll do a sweep of the city and make sure there are no more of these rocks—"
"Oo, oo! Call them Shock Rocks!" Mikey cut in.
"—make sure there are no more . . . Shock Rocks," Leo just went along with it, "anywhere else where someone can get hurt."
"What are we supposed to do with them when we find them?" Raphael asked.
"Donnie?" Leo turned to his brother who was deep in thought.
"Well, we'll need to find a safe way to store them until we can figure out how to dispose of them safely. We'd need to find someplace that's not easily accessible. Somewhere where people rarely go," Donnie explained. "Should probably out them in something that would block their radiation, you know, just in case."
"Great," Raph huffed, "and where are we going to find this 'perfect hiding place'?"
"Oh, oh. Dudes, I know just the place!" Mikey's voice rose with excitement.
Oo-oO
"Mu-mu-mu . . . ta-ta-ta. . . gen-gen-gen."
The jar was cracked. The ghostly greeny, blue ooze leaked out.
A psychic pulse woke it up. Electricity gave it energy to move, to change, to crave.
"Mu-mu-mu . . . ta-ta-ta . . . gen-gen-gen."
None.
There was none in this room. There used to be some, but it's gone. Gone. Gone. No more left. Wait, there. Through the door. Mutagen blood pumping through the bodies of the ones that created it, the ones that trapped it, the ones that made it sleep.
One thought ran through it's simple mind.
Mutagen. Need mutagen.
Oo-oO
"You sure you're feeling alright?" Leo asked April as she stood up and stretched her arms.
"I told you," April insisted, "I feel totally fine, other than a headache that's already going away. Now, I think I'm gonna head home and sleep until next Tuesday."
Leonardo watched April push through the turnstiles with Casey in tow. Casey would make sure she got home safely. But for now, there's bigger things to worry about.
"It's this way dudes," Mikey later called as his brothers followed him through the sewers.
"Mikey, where are we going?" Leo asked. They had been traveling for a good twenty minutes and were currently moving through a section of tunnels that the city's sewer workers didn't even maintain anymore.
"I totally found this awesome place the other week," Mikey explained over his shoulder without breaking his pace. "I was totally out skating around the tunnels when I found the biggest sewer rat, like ever! I tried to catch it, but the little bugger was fast. Then before I knew it, found this place," with a wave of his hand, Mikey stepped aside to let his brothers inspect his awesome hiding place.
Leo was the first in the small storage room built into one of the tunnels for the city workers to use. The room was fitted with a few rusty shelves and a cupboard for cleaning supplies. There wasn't anything particularly special about the cramped room, except for maybe that green puddle in the corner, but nothing that would ensure the security needed in this situation.
"Please tell me you didn't drag us half way through the sewers to show us a cramped storage room," Raph said crossing his arms, eyeing the space critically, clearly not seeing the awesomeness that encompassed the room.
"Allow me," Mikey said, sliding around his skeptical brothers and over to the cupboard clearing his throat. "Ahem, prepare to be amazed at the awesomeness that is Michelangelo."
At his brothers' eye rolls and groaning he flung open the cupboard dramatically and spread his arms out, gesturing to the hole inside the cupboard that lead off into the dark, the false back lying off to one side. Their eye rolls and skepticism was quickly replaced with confusion and curiosity.
Donatello was the first to approach the new door way and shine a small flashlight through the darkness. "It goes in pretty far."
"Why is there a secret passage in the sewers?" Raph wondered aloud.
"Not a clue," Mikey said dismissively, "but it's a great place to hide stuff right?"
"Well let's not just stand here," Raph said, pushing Donnie out of the way, eager to be the first in this newly discovered tunnel. "Let's get a move on!"
Oo-oO
"I wonder what was up with that crazy rock," Cassy said as he walked April back to her apartment. "I mean, it was crazy, it was all 'Zap, zap' and then you were all like glowing and your hair was floating everywhere. It was wicked!"
"Can we please not talk about this," April cringed moodily as her headache flared up again. It'd been like this pretty much since they left the Lair; Cassy going on and on about that stupid rock. The entire thing was starting to get old, and all April wanted to do was go home and sleep off this headache. Hopefully it would be gone in the morning, just in time for another school day. Joy of joys.
"You sure you're alright," Cassy asked, "I mean it was pretty crazy, what with the lightning and the whirlwind, and—"
"I get it!" April exclaimed and stopped walking. "Can we drop it now?"
"Sorry Red," Cassy said defensively. "Just making sure you're alright."
"I'm fine," April snapped, rubbing her temple. "I just wanna go home and get some sleep."
"Alright," Cassy gave in and started walking again, leading the way. There was no more conversation for the rest of the walk.
Oo-oO
The turtles followed the tunnel in the storage cupboard around a turn and found themselves in another room that was larger than the storage space. This one had several shelves stalked with old glass jars filled with various pickled vegetables and some other questionable products. There was a wooden bed with various moth eaten blankets that had slumped to the floor from rot and there wasn't much left of the mattress. A small metal desk was pushed up against one wall with a half used candle knocked over on its side and an almost illegible bound book with an old school pen and ink well sitting beside it.
All in all, it had been awhile since anyone had been here.
"What the heck?" Raph breathed.
"Was someone staying here?" Leo wondered.
"Some sort of bunker?" Donnie hypothesized.
"Cool right," Mikey smiled proudly. Only a ninja of his skill could have found a secret hide out like this. Alright, so maybe that rat had knocked over the false backing in the cupboard, but the guys didn't need to know that.
"What is this place?" Leo asked as he went over to inspect the bed, or what was left of it.
"No one's been here for a while, that's for sure," Raph said eyeing the amount of dust and rotting wood in the place.
"Hey guys," Donnie called from the desk. He had the leather bound notebook carefully opened and was skimming over the contents.
"What do you have Donnie," Leo came up behind him, peering at the ancient curved writing that was smeared and faded from water damage.
"Not much of this is legible," Donnie squinted in the poor lighting, "but from what I can gather, this room has been here since the mid 1800s. Guys, I think this hideout was part of the Underground Railroad."
"The Under-who what?" Raph asked.
"The Underground Railroad," Donnie sighed. "It was a system that existed a long time ago that helped people escape the practiced slavery in America by fleeing into Canada where they could be free."
"Slavery . . ." The word tasted bitter on Leo's tongue.
"Over a hundred years ago," Donnie continued, "coloured people were sold as slaves and forced to work in horrible conditions. But not everyone was okay with the way things were, some people believed that slaves should be free. The Underground Railroad helped slaves escape from their masters and gave them a safe place to hide from the authorities while they traveled north. This room must be one of those safe-houses, or at least what's left of it."
"Slavery sucks man," Mikey pouted. He held a new respect for the room he was standing in. People helping complete strangers because it's the right thing to do; he liked the sound of that.
"Well, now this room is going to be hiding something different," Leo announced. "Donnie, can you set it up here?"
"Yeah," Donatello pulled out a small, light weight, metal box from his satchel that contained what was left of the Shock Rock. Although it didn't seem to be active, it was best to keep it hidden away where it couldn't hurt anyone else. He got to work, building a secret compartment in the secret Underground Railroad safe house that no one had found in over a hundred years.
Yeah, this is a good hiding place.
The room fell silent as Donatello worked to set up security, occasionally asking one of his brothers to help in digging out a new hole in the wall, or angling the flashlight in a certain way. In all, it was boring, and Michelangelo would have none of that.
"Hey guys," he said breaking the silence, "you think any of this food is still edible?" The rows of old glass jars offered little nutritional value, and would probably stink something horrid if they were to be opened or broken.
"I don't think so Mikey," Leo replied, focused on digging out a section of the wall that would act as a safe for their dangerous treasures.
"I don't know bro," Mikey said, passing his flashlight over some of the jars. "Some of it still looks good. Let's see, we've got . . . umm, peas, onions, carrots, there's some pink stuff, and . . . Holy Challupa! Guys! It's the Creep!"
"What!"
"Where?"
"How?"
The reaction was instantaneous and hilarious. His brothers dropped what they were doing and had their weapons out, ready for a fight.
"Haa, ha ha," Mikey laughed holding up a particularly nasty jar of something green that clearly had some sort of fungus growing in it. The thing practically glowed.
"Mikey!" Raph scolded.
"You gotta admit," Mikey said waving the jar around, "it does look like the Creep's jar."
"Mikey put that back before you break it open," Donnie said. "I'm almost done here."
"It does look like the Creep," Leo admitted, inspecting the ancient jar more closely.
"Right! I told you guys this place was awesome," Mikey exclaimed.
Oo-oO
Gone. The mutagen blood was gone. Where is it? Where did it go? Need. Neeeeeed mutagen. Must find it, need mutagen.
"Mu-mu-mu . . . ta-ta-ta . . . gen-gen-gen. . ."
Weak. Too weak to move. Body not fully formed. Wait. Need to wait. Gather strength, gather energy, must prepare.
Need it. It. Mutagen. Blood. Must find it.
Must get . . . tur—tles.