The Silver Balloon

Where The Moon-Bird Rests From Flight

ミステリー! 秘密主義の援助!

)*(

Hi, everyone! To those of you who live in America-or don't, that's just fine, too ^^-I hope you all had a Happy Fourth of July!

Heavens, I missed this story...and I need to get a move on if I want to finish half the amount of updates that I want done by Summer's end! *Rolls up sleeves, looks determined.*

I hope you enjoy this next part...as some rather peculiar things are at work...


Quote:

"Let us leave this place where the smoke blows black
And the dark street winds and bends.
Past the pits where the asphalt flowers grow
We shall walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And watch where the chalk-white arrows go
To the place where the sidewalk ends."

~*~


Carefully tucking the small envelope inside of his pillow case, the little orange-clad turtle plunked his head against his pillows with a small sigh, his eyes fixed on the dark, wooden ceiling overhead.

He pouted slightly as he heard rumbling sounds from the living room. Turning his shell to the door, Mikey absentmindedly began to play with the small lamp Splinter had salvaged from the sewer tunnels, sending the room from darkness, to light, to greater light, before tweaking it to darkness once again.

Uncomfortable with the dark, Mikey tweaked it to moderately light, and decided to leave it that way before curiously glancing at the door.

Right now, Splinter was mediating in the dojo, and his brothers had gotten permission to tug out a movie for the evening, while he had been sent directly to bed, much to Raph's sneering derision.

Normally, Mikey would have been quite upset by this turn of events, but in all honesty, he had to remind himself that he'd already seen 'The Blob' forty-six times, last he checked, and, that, well...he needed a moment to think.

The small turtle turned slightly on his bed, still frowning slightly.

What was he going to do, now? Hurry to send Rosa's letter sometime tomorrow, sneaking up the ladder to visit the mailbox, as he always did? He wasn't too sure of that, anymore. After all, if he'd been as frightened as he had been today when faced with the prospect of his own father finding out...

...what if he came face to face with a human? Mikey swallowed, suddenly cold, and the turtle scurried to hide himself under his comforters, trembling lightly.

He was a ninja. He was powerful. He could handle anything!...except maybe a dog, if Mikey ran into one that wasn't very friendly, or got caught by someone who didn't assume he was placing in the victory circle at a costume convention...

Mikey wriggled down into his sheets.

He'd never come face to face with an actual human before, but Splinter's constant insistence of keeping their existence a secret from those who lived on the surface was enough to make Mikey frightened. The rat was all about invincible in Mikey's eyes, because that was just how Splinter was. There had never been anything that the rat couldn't handle, couldn't fix in some way or another. And the small turtle had seen how his Sensei could fight while exhibiting moves in their training exercises. Surely he could handle any human danger-and set people running if they tried to confront him, right?

...right?

"Right," Mikey murmured lightly to himself as he turned again, making Rosa's letter and picture crinkle from underneath him.

Splinter was a good guy. Mikey KNEW he was. And if the world was anything like how it was on TV, the good guys always won out in the end. People weren't afraid of the good guys!

...unless it was Godzilla. People were kinda ascared of him. And Batman. And The Hulk. But they generally did good things, even if they looked scary! As for his family, they never hurt anyone in how they lived-they only took stuff that had been thrown away! And Master Splinter, while he was a great many things, including an extremely talented martial artist...

...he wasn't a violent person. Not by nature. The thought of Splinter actually hurting someone was incomprehensible to the young turtle. But what if the rat had no choice?

Mikey shivered again, unconsciously reaching for his small teddy bear as he did so.

It didn't take a genius to know that Splinter was kinda protective. But how far would he go if Mikey messed up while talking to Rosa? It wasn't face-to-face, but...

Michelangelo sat up, stretched, and got up from his bed, reaching for a nearby book that Don had kept on the small, extremely cramped for space shelf between the small beds the turtles shared. But even though he quite enjoyed The Tale of Desperaux, he took no delight in Roscuro's plotting or in Desperaux's continuous fainting fits tonight. Instead, his mind deadlocked back to Rosa.

The old woman was kind in her letters-very much so. But she assumed he was just some boy-a human boy. What might she say if he told her that he was a turtle?

Well, at the very least, she probably wouldn't believe him. Reassured, Mikey flicked to the chapter about Miggery and the clouts.

But what if she did believe him? What if she told someone? What if that got in the wrong ears? What would happen, then?

The small turtle halted in midst of turning a page, blue eyes suddenly flickering to a more fearful avenue.

Splinter said that people would come, when the turtle had once asked such a question when he was three or four. He had said little more, but judging by the way his face had clouded over with the thought, Mikey knew that meant to stay put. After all, as he grew, he had learned that 'people coming' meant that people in suits with lots and lots of equipment would come down to the sewers, to, as Mikey had once heard a cowboy say on the TV, 'flush them out like the little rats they are.'

That was scary. Almost petrifying. But Rosa didn't seem like those types of humans. Her letters were fun to get-and even more so to read! Mikey had saved Rosa's letters in his treasure box. As long as they only spoke via mail, and Mikey didn't say anything incriminating, why, then, what was the problem?

Mikey's shoulders sagged, and the turtle shoved the book away from him, no longer in the mood to read. The surface was a problem. Writing these letters was no chore at all-but getting these letters to Rosa? Much more difficult. The turtle's face scrunched up ever so slightly as he attempted to remember the 'data,' as Donny called it, that he had collected.

By now, he had learned that the mailman came around Noon, sometimes early evening on Thursdays and Fridays. And, for some reason or another, the post never came at all on Sunday, though he was not yet sure why.

So how was he going to do this? How was he going to send Rosa his picture and letter without taking too much of a risk?

Suddenly, Mikey's eyes lit up, as an idea burst into his mind. Hopeful, the turtle rushed out of the room, mentally congratulating himself on his brilliance.

"DONNY! Donny, I need you!"


Lol. Dear Mikey. We still have some chapters to go...^^