April tore through the building, leaving a bloody mess in her wake. It was almost if she had a specific person she was trying to find, a goal in mind.
"Where's she going?" Mikey huffed as they followed behind, taking care of any loose foot soldiers who might be remaining. April had already disappeared from their sight as they stopped to take care of a number of soldiers that had come out of a barracks room.
"She's going after people who hurt her. In her state of mind right now, that would be anyone that wears the foot uniform and those who are in charge." Donatello stated, as he used his Bo to knock an attacker unconscious.
"So that means she's lookin' for Karai and the Shredder." Raph growled, kicking another foot square in the chest, knocking her across the room.
"So she's going to head to the top floor then." Leo concluded, slamming the butt of a katana into the temple of his opponent.
Clearing out the rest of the foot, they found the nearest elevator and piled into it. They were silent as the ascended up the shaft, all focused on what could be waiting for them at the top.
The door of the elevator opened to reveal what looked like a front office, the secretary's desk empty. Next to it, two huge double doors were closed, and an attempt by Leo to open them revealed them to be locked. Donnie studied the door for a bit and then nodded his head.
"They'll open if they're hit hard enough." He stated, and turned to the turtle in red who radiated a nervous energy. "Would you like to do the honors?"
Raph nodded, and took a few steps back to get the momentum he needed. His brothers stepped away and he ran up, slamming all of his weight against the door and it burst open, with the others following him into the room. April stood at the other end, her body tense and ready to attack the man standing before her.
"Sachs." Leo growled, his hands tightening around the hilt of his weapons.
"Looks like the nanites finally backfired on them." Eric said darkly, his eyes glowing with hate. "I warned them that would happen, but they didn't listen."
"Where is the Shredder and Karai?" She snarled, her blue eyes gleaming murderously. Eric moved back pinned to the wall.
"They left for Japan." He told her. "Too bad they didn't get to see their little pet finally lose it." April moved up closer to him.
"You killed my father. You took away the only member of my family that cared for me." April moved up to the now-trembling man, pressing her weapon to the soft flesh of his throat. "Now I'm going to kill you."
"No!" Raph yelled, his voice filled with panic. She turned to him.
"No? Why shouldn't I? He took my father from me!" April yelled, tightening her grip on her weapon. Raph slipped his weapons into their sheaths.
"Because you're better than that April." He said gently. "Come on, just leave him for the cops, it'll be okay I promise." She looked from Raph to Sachs and back to Raph.
"Why do you say I wouldn't do this?" She asked him, blue eyes flashing.
"Because you believe that no matter how obviously guilty a person is, he deserves a trial, just like everyone else, that just killing him will make you no better than him." He answered her. "Come on, you have to remember." The woman in front of him turned to face him fully.
"I don't remember, I-" She gasped, dropping her weapon, and clutched her head. When she looked up, her eyes met his and she smiled. "Raph!" She cried, and moved to him, but Sachs pulled something from inside his jacket and a gunshot filled the air.
April's eyes went wide, and she looked down at the wet spot staining her uniform. Looking back up at him, she reached out as she collapsed to the ground.
"Raph…"
He got to her before she hit the ground, and eased her down.
"You sonofabitch!" Raph looked up to see that same dark look in Michelangelo's eyes that had been there the night they broke up that sex slave ring.
With the lightning reflexes, the youngest had the man up by his collar against the wall. He looked over his shoulder to Donatello, who was now kneeling next to Raphael, checking on April.
"Is she going to be okay?" He asked, as Eric tried to squirm out of the turtle's grasp. The purple-clad turtle looked up and sadly shook his head. Michelangelo turned his head to Leonardo, who stepped up to address the human.
"You have harmed a member of our clan who had just shown mercy to you. Because of this, you are now will face our judgement. Taking in that this is not the first time you have attempted to harm or have harmed our clan, we can no longer allow you to fall into the hands of the human authorities." The leader looked Eric straight in the eye as he delivered his sentence. "Your life is now forfeit to us." He moved to draw his kantana from its sheath, but Michelangelo was quicker, and there was a sickening crunch as he cracked the entrepreneur's head open with his nunchaku.
Letting the dead man drop to the ground, Michelangelo, walked with Leonardo back over to April, as Donatello made an attempt to stop the bleeding.
"I did something bad, didn't I?" she asked weakly. "I can feel I've done bad things, but I can't remember what."
"You didn't babe, the other person did. That person that the Shedder made from you. It wasn't you at all." He shut his eyes, trying to steady himself. He clenched his teeth, remembering how April had screamed as the Shredder had tortured her. It wasn't her fault she was like this. She had been forced into it.
"I'm sorry." He choked, tears in his eyes. "I'm so sorry, I should have protected you better." He pulled her closer against his chest, as he fought back tears. He felt her small hands wrap around his head, and she leaned up to press her forehead against his. He heard her whimper in pain when he held on to her tighter.
"It's okay." She said, her voice soft. "I understand." Tipping her head up to his, she kissed him softly. He leaned into it, trying to show her that he didn't blame her, that he loved her more than anything else he could ever care for. She pulled away, looking him in the eyes. Giving him a sad smile, she stroked his cheek with a shaking hand. He took it in his own, and gave it a gentle squeeze.
"I love you so much, Raphael. You gave me so much happiness, I can't even begin to tell you." She gave him one of her bright, loving smiles, but her eyes were sad. "I need you to do something for me." Confusion came to Raph's face.
"What's that babe?" he asked, trying, and failing, to smile back. She pressed her other hand to his face, and pressed her face back against his.
"I need you to find hope. Please find hope for me." She whispered softly, her breathing becoming more ragged. Raphael looked up to Donnie to see if the more intelligent turtle knew what she meant. His brother could only shrug at the woman's cryptic message. Raph turned back to April, and squeezed her hand.
"I'll do it April, don't worry." He assured her, a wavy smile coming to his face. She returned it, and looked up to his brothers hovering around him and began to speak again.
"Thank you so very much." She took another shaky breath. "You guys are the closest thing I have had to a family since Dad died." She managed a small smile. "I always wanted little brothers. I was so lonely as an only child."
There was a small laugh as she looked from Leonardo's face, who was trying to hide his panic and fear from his younger brothers, to Donatello's quiet, accepting one, and finally to Michelangelo's face of despair, tears in his bright blue eyes.
"You guys aren't exactly 'little', but that's okay." She tensed in pain, gasping for air. "Take care of each other, family is so very important. Nothing hurts like losing your family." She shut her eyes briefly, trying to cling to life as long as she could. Opening them again, her eyes met Raphael's for one last time. "I love you so much. I can't ever thank you enough for loving me."
Raph fought back tears and gently stroked her cheek, wiping away her tears.
"I love you too, April, more than anything else." He closed his eyes and pressed his forehead to hers. "I will never stop loving you." April fought for one last breath, her hand going to cup his face.
"Goodbye." She pressed her lips against his one last time, and she went limp, hand sliding from his face. A sob ripped from Raphael's throat as he buried his face into her chest. A gentle hand pressed against his shoulder. He looked up at Leo, not caring if his older brother saw his tears.
Leo kneeled next to the grieving turtle, looking him straight in the eye.
"Raph, we need to get moving, okay?" Raph nodded stiffly and gently laid his lover's body to the floor and moved away, but stopped when he noticed a silver chain coming out of her top.
Kneeing back down next to her, Raphael gently pulled the chain from out of her shirt. Amazement came into his gold eyes, and he slid his hands around the back of her neck to take the chain off.
"Let's go." He said, clinging to the necklace in his hand. The others nodded and followed Donnie as he led the way to the roof of the building. Outside, winter clung to its hold on the weather, and a light snow was falling around them.
They didn't stop running until they were several blocks away, and in another abandoned building they used to hide out when they needed it.
A quick check revealed that they were all okay for the most part, but the turtles knew they would have to move again after resting for a bit. The chaos that had happened that night would hopefully keep the rest of the Foot busy enough for them to get their things and leave, but they would have to be quick.
Then there would be time to mourn the one they lost.
Leonardo looked around at his brothers from his perch on an old shipping box.
"I'm sorry." He said softly to them. This caught the attention of the other three, and they all turned to him. "I-I let my desires to get ahold of me. I should have been in more control." Raphael shook his head.
"Erin- that other woman- She's to blame Leo, not you. She's the one that contacted the foot to where we were. I should have tried harder to get her to remember me, maybe then-" Then Donatello interrupted.
"If I had found a counter to the nanites earlier, I could have cured her, it's my fault." The purple turtle said, and behind him, Michelangelo's face twisted into a frown. Standing suddenly, his older brothers faced him as he began to speak.
"It doesn't matter whose fault it is! She's gone, really gone, and there's nothing we can do to bring her back!" He yelled, glaring at his brothers. His face then softened as he continued. "She wouldn't want us doing this. She'd want us to move on, to continue to live. That's why she never told them where they could find us." He paused and swallowed hard. "Can't we do that, for her?"
The others looked at their brother, as they let his words sink in. Finally it was Raphael who spoke.
"He's right." He said, his voice gruff as tears threatened to fall. "She sacrificed herself for us, and we need to honor what she did for us." He felt Mikey wrap an arm around his shoulders, and for the first time in many years, the larger turtle accepted his younger brother's embrace.
Later, Raph was perched on the rooftop of the building they had settled into for the night. The necklace that he had taken from April gleamed in little light that made it up there. It was a simple silver chain that had three small charms hanging form it. A small turtle, the Japanese kanji for family and a microphone, all were meant to mean something to his beloved reporter, and she had never taken the necklace off after he had given it to her for her birthday.
Tipping his head to the sky, he felt the soft flakes hit his skin as he mulled over her parting plea. Standing up, he took a deep breath in, and let it out.
"I'll find hope April, whatever you meant by that, I'll find it." He whispered to the sky as he went down into the building to join his brothers.
Epilogue
Things slowly moved back to something that the turtles could call 'normal' after that. With the huge amount of abandoned subway stations under the streets of New York, it wasn't hard to find a new home to settle into, and with the rest of the foot busy elsewhere, they moved with relative ease into a new place.
The building they had been in 'mysteriously' exploded not long after they had escaped it, but the rescue workers found April's body among the wreckage. Vern had tracked them down to give them the information for her funeral, and on a warm day in early May, her ashes were scattered at the farmhouse she had lived in as a teenager. The brothers attended, hiding in the new green of the trees. Afterwards, the cameraman gave them a small portion of the ashes for their own shrine set up next to Splinter's.
Two months after April's funeral, Donatello called Raphael into his lab. The younger turtle seemed excited and nervous at the same time, his hands shaking as he motioned the larger turtle to sit.
"I found out what she meant." He said to his older brother, pushing his glasses up his face. "What April meant about finding hope? I found out what she meant." Raphael frowned at the turtle sitting across from him.
"What do ya mean?" He asked, gold eyes searching his brother's green ones.
"April wasn't talking about hope as in the emotion, she was talking about a person." Donatello explained, turning to his computer and bringing up something that looked like a medical report. "Look at the date on this birth document I found in the files of what was left of Sach's corporation." Raph moved his chair near Don, and looked over at the monitor. "Look at the name. She was born seven months after April disappeared." Raph looked at the form, and skimming it over. The mother had died during childbirth and was taken in by one of the nurses that had taken care of her.
"Hope Jones. Adopted by Casey and Gabrielle Jones" He said out loud, looking at the name. He turned back to Donnie. "What does this have to do with me and April?" Don switched to an internet browser, pulling up what looked like a Facebook page.
"Because Hope Jones looks like THIS." He said, pointing to a photo on the screen. Raph studied the picture, and he froze in shock. The little girl, no more than five or six looked at the camera, dark red hair framing a familiar face. The girl's nose looked slightly flat, and then there was her eyes. Filled with life and laughter, brilliant GOLD eyes looked at the camera. The red turtle clung to the arms on the chair as he realized who the little girl looked like. Beside him, Donatello cleared his throat.
"Congratulations, Raphael. It looks like you have a daughter."
So there you go. I'll be working on a one-chapter sequel to this in-work title 'Raising Hope'. It'll be out sometime in the next week or so. I hope you liked my first attempt at a longer story.
I'm working on Pet on and off, and my next big project is a historical fiction with the working title of Gaijin. The basic synopsis is that in a world where animal-hybrids like the turtles live and work along humans, April is the daughter of an owner of a large ranch who died, and the owners of the ranch next door have her Shanghaied to take her land. After escaping from the ship on Okinawa, she ends as a side attraction for a Japanese circus as a red-hair Yuki-onna. One day a runaway horse nearly runs over a rat who is out with his four turtle sons, but April saves him at the last minute. That's about what I have planned out so far.
Thank you for reading this story, and I hope you check out "Raising Hope" and "Gaijin." Please review to tell me what you thought!