A/N: This is based on the prompt "What's in the freakin' box?!" submitted by TheEquestrianidiot2.0. This drabble got waaaay out of hand and ended up being five pages...it just kind of transformed on me, so yeah, its a little long for a drabble. Also, this story is gory and morbid, so if you are squeamish or sensitive to horror, read at your own risk!
The Box
"Guys, he's over here!" I shout over my shoulder as I run to the darkened corner of the aged classroom. Our brother's been missing for a week. I was finally able to crack the demented riddles leading us to a forgotten and half-demolished high school on the outskirts of the city. Watchful of any unseen dangers, I approach my brother. He's sitting on a stool in the corner, arms gripping his waist. I sweep over his body with medical eyes—a lot of gashes and bruise, but nothing disinfectant and stitches won't fix. There is a mechanical contraption that fits over the lower half of his face that reaches behind his head like medieval orthodontic headgear. What I'm truly worried about is the daunting look in his eyes. There's no playful or spirited twinkle there, just an empty focused stare.
"Mikey," I whisper as I touch his shoulder, mindful of the dark purple bruises there. When his harrowing stare finally meets my concerned eyes I give a reassuring smile. "It's Donnie. Leo and Raph are here too." His eyes gloss over my shoulders to my two older brothers before look back at me. "We're going home, okay?" Recognition starts to wash over his features and I breathe a sigh of relief as he blinks with a sense of alertness. My mind immediately analyzes the strange mouth piece attached to his face. "Let's get this off of you first, then—"
"NO!" His unexpected outburst makes me jerk my hands away from his face. "Don't…"
I look at how the metal digs into his mouth and the skin of his face and know that the sooner I get this muzzle off him, the better. "Mikey, this thing has to come off."
"No!..Nuh-not now…box first…" Fear stutters past his lips in a pitiful whine as he clutches his middle protectively. I narrow my gaze, concerned for his petrified behavior.
"Okay, okay…" I try to placate him. He's too jumpy for me to try and remove it now. I'll have to wait until we get to the lair, then I can sedate him. Even with this wired device over his head, I can still see the agony etched across his face. He takes a slow breath as he rubs his stomach. "Where are you hurt?" His only response is a whimper as he doubles over in pain.
"Buh-box…the box…"
His ramblings about a box make no sense to me. All I know is my brother has an injury he's too terrified to show me. I keep my voice soft and calm as I rub his arm. "Let me see, Mikey." He fiercely shakes his head, holding his stomach even tighter. After a few more placid words, I'm finally able to loosen his trembling arms away from his plastron. It takes a moment for my brain to catch up with what my eyes are seeing.
His plastron is a mess of cracks and broken plates that have been glued back together in a crud fashion. Even with his mangled plastron, there's a large mass beneath it that's impossible to miss. The bloody and swollen skin of his stomach shows between the glops of hardened glue on his plastron. Within the crevices of his misshapen plates is a note that reads: Crack me.
The sick irony of the instructions infuriates me as I clench my fists at my sides. Mikey's distressing whines tear at my heart, but previous experience with the grisly riddles has taught me not following this psycho's directions can be just a deadly as following them.
"Leo, Raph, lower him to the ground…carefully" I direct my brothers. Mikey tenses with pain, holding his stomach between his hands as they position him on the ground. Raph places himself behind Mikey, supporting his head as he pats his chest. Conveniently, I find a hand shovel, no doubt that sociopath left for us. Pressing along his stomach, I can feel the heat of inflammation just beneath his skin. He cries out from the contact. "Sorry," I offer a quiet apology.
Whatever's been stuffed into my brother is sizeable and oddly-shaped making the outline of his stomach look like a canopied cube.
"Hurts…get it…out…please."
Hearing my brother's mewing pleas, I refuse to look him in the face. I need to brace myself. Pulling my lips into a thin line, I steady my mind. Taking a deep breath, I press the tip of the handheld shove against the highest point of his distended belly. I spare my older brothers a solemn glance. "Keep him still."
As I re-crack the plates of his plastron, my brother's tortured cries echo in the abandoned school like the lost souls of the undead. I pocket the loose plates in my belt pouch, unsure if I will be able to reattach them later. Removing some of his plastron reveals the tender stretched skin of his stomach. His skin is butchered and brutally stitched together with thick threading, keeping the bulge beneath in place. Mikey's stomach spasms as he struggles to breathe through the excruciating pain. The flesh was pulled too tight and now there are angry red puckers along the stitches. Dried puss is crusted over another label that reads: Untie Me.
I clip the end of the knotted thread with my clippers. A single tug is all it takes for the stitches to unravel. I gasp at object bulging from his insides. "A box…"
Lo and behold, there is indeed a box pressed into his stomach cavity. Twin doors adorn the front of the box with a small label tied to one of the bloody knobs that reads: Open Me.
"Ahh…hahhh…buh-box…Argh!..." Raph and Leo double their efforts as Mikey squirms beneath him.
"Shell, Don!...What's inside the freakin' box?!"
I frown in annoyance when Raph's gruff voice breaks into my thoughts as he continues to hug Mikey by the chest to keep him still. "I'm a scientist, not a mind-reader!" Turning my attention back to my little brother, I stable my hands as I slowly open the small doors of the box.
My eyes burn as I try to make sense of what I'm seeing. Inside the box is a disarray of colored wires grossly entangled with the length of my brother's intestines. The back of the box was cut out in order to snake his intestines between the wires….that means his large and small intestines have been sliced and reattached just to create this…this…sick death trap. I look up at my brother's pale sweat-slicked face. I'm astonished Mikey lived through that surgical manipulation.
How could someone be so demented, so mentally disturbed to do such a repulsive thing? I've see lab rats treated more humanely. A small click and the sound of static make us all snap our attention to Mikey's head.
If you are hearing this message, you have found your dearest little brother.
The voice plays from a small recorder embedded in the side of the mechanism on Mikey's head.
If you haven't figured it out by now, your brother's insides are intricately entwined in a tripwire. I hope deactivating it is somewhat of a challenge….it was quite difficult to set those wires amongst his intestines; innards' juices are just so slippery!
I had a devil of a time getting the little nitwit to shut up as we waited for you, but if you pull the wrong wire, you should be able to take care of his incessant babbling permanently. You see, the orthodontic retainer attached to your brother's head is not to correct misaligned teeth. If you disable the wrong wire in that box, it will trigger a signal to my levered head garment. It will wrench those chubby little cheeks of his back into one last smile before slicing precisely three-fourths of his head off like a summer melon.
You have six minutes to deactivate the bomb without decapitating your brother. In three minutes, my robotic hellhounds will be there to destroy you all, that is, if you haven't already blown yourselves to oblivion. Remember one slippery move and off with his head; take too long and my hellhounds will come for you right before you explode into a glorious blaze of bone shards and splatter guts. You should probably get started now, time's a-wastin'.
The sadistic recording ends only to be replaced by the tell-tale ticking of a timer. Red numbers countdown on a digital counter on the bottom plate of the face muzzle. I look back down at the tangled mess of wormy intestines and wires. I glance at the timer again. I'm down to five minutes. There are no physical wires attaching the head-slicing device to the bomb…good. Pulling out my T-cell, I work as quickly as I can with blood-slicked hands. Manipulating the motherboard, I'm able to use my phone to disrupt the wireless interconnection. The head trap releases a loud hum before dying out completely. My brain is on autopilot as my hands go to work dismantling the headpiece with tools from my bag. Within seconds, pieces of the contraption start falling to the ground as I pull apart and unscrew its various parts. I breathe a sigh of relief when the paper thin blade falls away eliminating the immediate danger of my brother being decapitated. I can't hide the smug smirk that travels up the corners of my mouth. This 'Jigsaw' wanna-be has no idea who he's dealing with.
"Leo, get the rest of this scrap metal off his head while I deactivate the bomb." Mikey's head lolls against Raph's chest as Leo removes the final piece from his head. I can still see the shuddered movement of his chest as he breathes. He passed out somewhere between me unscrewing the mouth piece and removing the blade. Still precautions must be taken. "No matter what. Hold. Him. Still." With a nod, Raph tightens his bear-grip around Mikey's chest. As soon as my fingers pinch a wire twisted around his lower intestine, his eyes snap open with pinpoint pupils before he lets out a bloodcurdling scream. I ignore him. Every emotion and protective sentiment for my little brother gets shoved to a quarantined part of my mind. I can't focus on how Raph struggles to hold down his bucking body, or the way Leo's voice deepens with watery emotions as he whispers loving words and strokes Mikey's brow affectionately. No, I can't let those things weaken my resolve or make me apprehensive of the task at hand. I have to concentrate on the blood-soaked wires….shell, he's bleeding too much.
"Raph!...Hold him down!"
Michelangelo is depending on me…they're all depending on me. I'm down to three minutes…three minutes?...oh shell…
"Donnie, I'll hold off the robots as long as I can." Leo's already on top things. His face is hard with determination as he unsheathes his katanas and runs for the door. Mikey's movements are becoming more sluggish.
"Go with him, Raph."
"What about Mike?"
"I got it from here, he's about to pass out again, anyway." Raph gives me a scrutinizing glare before staring down at our youngest brother in his arms. "I can't focus on Mikey, if I have to worry about Leo getting mauled to death because he doesn't have back-up."
With a low growl, he eases Mikey's body against the wall. "Fine, but we'll be back once we trash those tin can canines." I watch my hot-headed brother's retreating form until he disappears from the room. I shouldn't have lied to him, but in all honestly telling him the truth wouldn't have made matter any better. Mikey's not on the verge of passing out…he's going into shock. I've disconnected all the wiring accept one. Unlike the other wires that were simply wrapped around his intestines, this wire is impaling his abdominal aorta. I'm not equipped to remove it without killing him. I've already played out every possible scenario and they all end in at least one of us dying today.
He's won. That heartless monster won. The thought of that murderer sitting in some two-dollar motel getting off on watching us die from some hidden camera makes hopelessness fester deep within my soul.
I failed my little brother. Mikey's a goner no matter what I do, but if I plan this just right Leo and Raph will have a chance. It's inevitable at least two of us won't make it because I won't leave my little brother to die alone.
"Duh-Donnie?..." I blink back tears as I look at my brother, his face a shade of deathly grey.
"Yeah, Mikey."
"Don't…leave."
"I'm right here, Mikey. I'm not going anywhere." I ease the flaps of his stomach closed. I don't bother to tighten the stitches, afraid of putting him through any more unnecessary pain. Pulling a gauze from my bag, I gently wrap the unstitched wound watching as red stains blossom against the white material. I lean against the wall and pull him as close to me as I can before he gasps in pain.
"Is..is the box…out?" His words are breathless and his voice sounds so small.
"You're going to be okay, little brother." I avoid his question and squeeze his shoulder drawing him even closer as the chill of his body molds into the warmth of my side.
"Where Lee and Raphh?…" His words start to slur and I know I'm losing him. I glance at the counter on the floor. A little less than two minutes left. I hope he passes on his own before the blast has a chance to take him out.
"They'll be here soon." My throat constricts as the lie passes my lips.
"…Okay…." He cranes his neck to look up at me. His weary eyes widen, too bright and too innocent for the cruelty of this world. "D, sing our…..suh-song." His face scrunches together in pain and effort at his request. I swallow down the fear, the anger, the unfairness of this fate, because right now my baby brother is all that matters. I plant a lingering kiss on the top of his head before I find my voice again.
"Sometimes in our lives we all have pain, we all have sorrow; but if we are wise, we know that there's always tomorrow."
"…Lean…on me…" He surprises me when he weakly joins me on the chorus. I can hear Leo and Raph outside the room still fighting off mechanical beasts. The blast of the explosion will probably knock them off their feet, but they'll survive. Mikey's voice tapers off and his eyes are unfocused….unseeing. They say a person's hearing is the last thing to go before death, so with a heavy heart and forced bravery I sing past the tears and heartache that threatening to steal our song of brotherhood from my vocal chords.
"….For it won't be long 'til I gonna need somebody to lean on."
FIN
A/N: Hope you guys enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it! Be sure to leave a review, prompts are always welcome :)
Poetique