Thief in the Night Ch. 8
Three down…
Donnie and Mikey were ready for this attack. They already had their weapons out and were deflecting the attacks the Foot ninjas would give. Each of them would check over their shoulders briefly every few seconds to check on each other but would quickly turn back around to avoid getting hit.
This whole time, Mikey was very serious, which was odd considering it was Mikey. He wanted to make sure the Foot did not get his brother, because, after all, it scared him to death thinking he'd be alone. He wouldn't know what to do.
"There's so many, dude!" Mikey shouted, slicing a Foot ninja with the blade part of his nunchucks. The enemy fell down motionless by Mikey's feet, obviously dying or dead already. Mikey did not seem to notice, though. He was busy fighting off the swarm of soldiers coming towards him and his brother.
"Tell me about it!" Donnie yelled back, hitting a ninja on the head with his staff. "More and more keep coming!"
And Donnie was correct. When a Foot ninja fell, one was always lurking in the shadows, ready to replace him. There were still around thirty or so, and Donnie and Mikey both knew that they wouldn't be able to keep this up forever, unless they attempted an escape, which was unlikely, since the Foot were surrounding them on all sides.
"What are we going to do?" Mikey asked, growing desperate. He kept knocking out ninja after ninja, but he was already growing weary from fighting so quickly in order to avoid getting hit.
"We keep fighting!" Donnie answered, spinning his bō staff and hitting a few of the ninjas. "Just keep going!"
"But it's been forever!" Mikey whined. "How long can we keep this up?"
"It's only been five minutes, Mikey." Donnie replied with a sigh. "And-oof!" He let out a grunt as one of the ninjas managed to knee him in the gut, which forced him to step backward, causing Mikey to step forward almost into a Foot ninja, who was swinging a katana.
"Dude!" Mikey shouted over his shoulder, blocking the attack just in time.
"Don't blame it on me!" Donnie retorted, swinging at the ninja who had hit him. "It wasn't my-"
The Foot ninja who had hit him came at him with a stronger force this time, slamming his body into Donnie and causing Mikey to fall forward on his knees. Mikey rolled to the left, avoiding an attack on his side while Donnie laid on his shell, holding up his bō staff above his eyes, trying to block punches and katana swipes.
"A little help here, Mikey!" Donnie shouted, seeing his bō snap from the multiple katana hits. His eyes widened and he quickly jerked to the side, avoiding a ninja who brought a sword down.
"I wish I could, D!" Mikey yelled back, jumping to his feet and whacking a ninja in the gut. "I'm a bit busy!"
"So am I!" Donnie grunted, managing to push a ninja back and jumping quickly to his feet. "I'm getting a bit outnumbered here!"
Donnie was beginning to notice a few things. Slowly but surely, ninjas were leaving Mikey's area and gathering around Donnie. They noticed that the two were slowing down, and were taking advantage of it. And, since they wanted Donnie next, they were gaining up on him to capture him. There were two options that he could do; one, to fight them all off. But he would eventually grow tired and need to stop. Or two, try to escape, which he had crossed out from his mental list earlier. So that only left number one as an option.
Mikey looked around him, seeing that there were only about five ninjas fighting him. It was becoming very easy for Mikey to fend off the enemy, but increasingly harder for Donnie to do so. He noticed that slowly but surely, each ninja would break off and join the other ninjas and fighting against Donnie. Even though Mikey wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed, he knew exactly what was happening and exactly what their plan was and he had to make sure to not let that plan happen.
"D!" Mikey shouted, pushing a Foot ninja on the ground and looking over his shoulder at his lanky brother. "They're closing in on you, dude!"
"I think I've already realized that!" Donnie answered with a sigh as he did his best to fend everyone off. He was glad to see Mikey turn himself around so that he was beside him now instead of being directly behind him. The risk of rear attacks were higher, unfortunately, so Mikey would have to keep a look out for that, since Donnie was too busy fending off ninja after ninja.
They continued to fight for many more minutes, starting to grow weary of non stop battle. If things continued on the way they did, things would not end well for sure.
It wasn't until a few minutes later that one of the turtles got hit again, this time it being Mikey. Donnie looked over in surprise, seeing Mikey stumble back a bit. This gave the Foot a perfect chance to ambush Donnie without Mikey getting in the way. They all charged towards the purple masked mutant, leaving him with little options. He swung his broken bō staff about, hitting a few ninjas and making them fall on the ground, but there were just too many.
One slammed his body into Donnie, just like earlier, causing him to fall on his side. His two part bō staff skidded away a few feet from him, which made him have to reach to try to get it. As soon as he tried reaching though, a Foot ninja walked over and stomped on his hand, and kicked his staff away, just to make sure he wouldn't be able to reach for it again.
Donnie let out a pained yelp and immediately pulled his hand away, only to be kicked in the side by another ninja and hauled to his feet by another.
Mikey stood to his feet, his eyes widening as he saw three different ninjas holding Donnie back, making sure he wouldn't and couldn't escape. Donnie kicked and struggled against their grip, but it was no use. Their grip only became tighter.
"Donnie!" Mikey shouted. He realized what was going to happen. They would take Donnie away, because no matter how hard he and Donnie could try, the Foot ninjas would find ways to make sure that Donnie would not be going home. "Don't let them capture you! Please! I can't be alone!"
Donnie gave him a look of sympathy seeing the dread in Mikey's eyes. He continued to struggle, even though he knew his thrashing about was hopeless. "I'm sorry Mikey…" he muttered. He looked down and back up within a few seconds, accepting his fate. He knew he was going to be captured. Without his weapon and being way outnumbered, he couldn't do much else. Mikey could help him, but the Foot ninjas would probably hurt him, and Donnie didn't want that.
"Go!" Donnie urgently shouted. "Go back to the Lair!"
"But Donnie!" Mikey cried. "But-"
"Just go!" Donnie shouted. "Please! I can't let you get hurt! Leo and Raph have probably been hurt already."
"But I don't want you hurt either, dude!" Mikey protested. "It's bad enough having two of my bros missing! I can't have all of them gone!"
A Foot ninjas took out one of his katanas.
"Go Mikey! PLEASE!"
Mikey nodded, letting out a shaky exhale and turning around and running towards his home. He looked over his shoulder as he ran and he wished he hadn't. The Foot ninja raised his katana and slammed the butt of it on Donnie's head, rendering him unconscious. His limp body drooped forward and one of the ninjas picked him up and swung him over his shoulder like a garbage bag. They then ran away, and disappeared.
Mikey turned his head back around as he continued to run and sniffed. The third brother was gone...and that meant that he was next.
For a good amount of time, Leo and Raph just sat in silence. Conversation topics could not come to mind and they felt it was best to not waste their energy to talk anyway. And so they sat and breathed, Leo's breathing being more calm, of course, since he was in deep meditation.
Meditation had always been a way for Leo to calm down, and he most certainly needed the calm now. He kept his breathing steady, breathing in through his nostrils and out gently through his agape mouth, feeling calmer and calmer. In fact, part of him forgot that they were even in danger. Part of him thought he was at home, recovering from a horrific nightmare. It wasn't until he opened his eyes that reality punched him in the face. No, he wasn't home and no, he wasn't safe. He and Raph were still in a living nightmare, with them being the victims.
"Welcome back to Earth, big brother." Raph grumbled quietly, letting out a sigh and drumming the fingers of his good arm on the floor.
Leo let out a scoff, not impressed with Raph's attitude, instantly wishing he could go back to meditation. Or that Raph would.
"Has anything happened?" Leo asked after a moment of silence, his heart feeling heavy. He was afraid of his brother's answer. If his answer was a yes, he knew the answer would be bad.
"No, surprisingly." Raph answered, lifting his head up from against the wall. "It has been awfully quiet." He fell silent, and Leo could practically see the thoughts running through his younger brother's head. "Do you...do you think they're not doing anything because they're getting Donnie?"
"Don't say that." Leo snapped, cringing at his tone. "They won't get him."
"You don't know that, Leo." Raph muttered. "None of us do. No one is a true psychic, especially not us. We don't know what will happen."
"Let's just say they won't." Leo replied, shooting his brother a look. "I would rather have gals hopes than none at all."
Raph sighed again, remaining silent. He knew Leo was right. He too thought that at least giving himself false hopes would be better than having none. Thinking that Donnie had gotten captured would only make them upset, and that was the last thing they needed at the moment, especially since they were already upset enough.
"I remember Splinter telling me about false hopes once." Leo then said, breaking the silence that had filled the room. "He told me a story of when he first met Tang Shen."
"And this has to do with capture and torture how?"
"He was convinced Tang Shen liked him...but he was afraid to ask." Leo continued. "He was afraid his hopes would get smashed before him in the form of rejection. But then, one day, he asked her, and he found out the truth."
Leo sighed, and Raph sighed too, though his was more of an irritated sigh where Leo's was calm.
"I guess this ties into what we are experiencing because...we never really will know if our hopes are false or not until we see Donnie come through that door. If he doesn't...then we can continue to have hope that is real. But we will never know until our eyes see it, like Splinter didn't know until his ears heard it."
"Way to be insightful." Raph scoffed. "But, I guess it does make sense."
"Easier to think of a story than…" Leo then fell quiet, not wanting to bring up anything else horrific. He wanted to say more positive things, since he and Raph both needed it very much right now.
And so, they told random stories.
"Remember that time when Sensei gave us our first weapons? You totally almost sliced your hand off, Leo."
"Oh yeah? Well what about that time you tore a hole in your mask and had to make another?"
"And that time you stayed up till two in the morning watching Space Heros and got grounded for a week? You were sure upset."
"Or that time Mikey dyed your mask pink? Fun times."
They both chuckled, feeling their feelings of dread slowly melt away. But then they heard loud footsteps outside their door and they froze, anticipating what would happen.
A few voices could be heard muttering on the other side, their tones sounding annoyed and irritated. Neither of the brothers could make out what the people on the other side were saying, but they assumed they were arguing. But over what is what they wondered.
It then fell silent and a soft click could be heard as a key was inserted into a key hole and twisted. The door was quickly swung open, and a turtle tossed inside like a doll, uncared for and unwanted. He fell on his back and let out a grunt as his body hit the hard floor, making the Foot ninja that threw him in chuckle softly to himself as a Foot ninja ran in to chain his foot to the wall like his brothers.
"We will be back soon to give you your food." he said, obviously amused by Leo and Raph's shocked and angered expressions. "We'll give you some time to chat with your brother here."
He smirked, his eyes smiling at his accomplishment of capturing the third brother. And with that, he closed the door, not caring how loud it slammed.
Donnie sat up, letting out a groan due to his head spinning and hurting thanks to the whack the ninjas gave him on the head earlier. He saw colorful stars dance in his vision for only a few seconds before they faded away and his head wasn't spinning as much.
"Donnie!" Leo cried out. Luckily he was next to Donnie so he could reach him even with his chain. Raph, however, could not. His chain was a few inches too short, so he couldn't go up to his brother. All he could do was see and talk to him, which frustrated him beyond belief.
Donnie looked up, somewhat startled by Leo's sudden outburst.
"Leo? Raph? Oh thank goodness you're alright!" Donnie breathed, putting on a sad smile. "Are you hur-"
He paused, seeing in the dim light that his brothers did indeed have some injuries. His logical brain instantly started thinking of reasons how they could've gotten these injuries, and also how they could treat them. Though, his logical brain also told him that he had no access to any kind of supplies, especially not medical ones.
"Never mind." Donnie muttered, changing the position he was sitting in. "I see you've all been in a mess already."
"Yeah, I guess you could call it a mess." Raph grumbled. "This whole thing is a mess! There's only one turtle left, and that's Mikey! What the heck will happen if he gets captured too?!"
"Easy, easy, I told him to run away." Donnie assured him. "Mikey ran back to the Lair and none of the Foot followed him. They were all...uh, too focused on me."
"So that's it?" Raph asked, becoming rather frantic.
"Yes, Raph, that is all." Donnie replied. "We did find out you guys were here, though. We were about to go back to the Lair and inform Master Splinter so we could rescue you guys before sunrise. But, we ended up getting ambushed. They tricked us. They left evidence sitting out because they assumed we'd look for clues, which we did."
"Did you two find anything?" Leo wondered.
"We did, actually." Donnie answered. "We found one of your sais, Raph, for one thing. And, we also found an old prepaid phone that one of the Foot ninjas used to send messages to Stockman."
"Please tell me that you don't have it." Raph muttered, honestly hoping for the worst.
"Well...no, I don't. Mikey made sure to keep it with him." Donnie replied. "So, yes, he has it. And the texts told us you were here. So, hopefully Mikey is at the Lair by now telling Master Splinter the news so that they can create a plan."
"I hope so…" Leo sighed, leaning his head towards the ceiling. He prayed that nothing happened to him. Mikey was the last turtle left, the last turtle to tell Splinter where they were. If he got captured too, then it was all up to Splinter.
Leo couldn't bear thinking that the Shredder would get Splinter too. He couldn't let that happen. But, there was nothing he could do. He was stuck.
Hey all! I am so sorry that I haven't updated in so long! I haven't had much motivation to write, and I finally got it last week and was able to finish this chapter, which I started back a few months ago. I hope that chapter 9 will not have as much of a delay, but we will have to see. But uh oh, 3 turtles are down!
~Trip