After a quick skim through Karai's medical folder, April slipped out of the ward again. She hastily typed a message to her father that she was going to be late for dinner, then called Donnie.

He answered on the second ring, as usual. "Hey April, what's up?"

She laughed dryly. "You won't believe me when I tell you. Pick me up on Harbour Avenue?"

"On the other side of town? Where are you now?"

"At the hospital-"

"At the hospital? Is everything okay?" Some crashing and a frantic yell to his brothers. "Hang on April, we're getting in the Shellraiser now. We can be there in-"

"Donnie, I'm not in hospital!" She protested as loudly as she dared in public. "I only want you to pick me up because I'm so far from the lair!"

"O-oh. R-right. Uh... one sec." Another call to his brothers, this one more sheepish. "So, uhm, why are you there?"

"I was with Casey. Didn't he tell you guys about his leg?"

"Oh, about him beating up some local thugs and breaking it? Yeah, he told us."

Concluding that she could ruin Casey's pride another time, April continued. "Yeah, well, I was up here with him and- Look, this is gonna take a lot of explaining, can I tell you later?"

"Sure. We're heading out now. See you soon."

"See you..." April hung up and sighed. At least she'd bought herself some time to work out how the heck she was meant to explain this.

"Okay, so what's the big-"

"Karai's in hospital for cholera."

Four sets of wide eyes blinked back at her in shock. Granted, it hadn't been the most tactful way to break it to them, but after forty minutes of thinking it was the best April had come up with.

Eventually, it was Leo who managed to speak. "Karai? As in, our Karai? Master Splinter's daughter Karai?"

"How many do you think there are?" The joke fell flat.

"But... But that doesn't make any sense. W-we searched everywhere, she was gone!"

April shrugged helplessly. "Then I guess she's back? Workers found her in the sewers and took her to a homeless shelter, then the shelter staff brought her here."

"It's gotta be someone else, April," Raph huffed. "No-one's seen her in months; she left New York."

"Then she must've come back looking for you guys."

"There's no way you can prove that," the hot-headed turtle denied. "I mean, it's not like you spoke to her."

An awkward pause fell over the group. Raph just blinked. "You didn't."

April offered a half-smile. "I may have kinda sorta maybe... sneaked-onto-the-ward-to-talk-to-her."

"Wait, you sneaked onto a hospital ward? April, what if you caught something?" Donnie pestered.

She rolled her eyes. "Don, you know cholera's only passed by ingesting the bacterium."

"Well yeah, but it's not safe to-"

"Donnie I was just trying to help-"

"Guys, please, let's hear April out-"

"Leo, this is ridiculous! Karai is gone and-"

The chatter quickly turned to shouting. Soon the Shellraiser was filled with the angry voices of three turtles and one human-

"GUYS!"

- until a fourth turtle shattered the noise.

Everyone turned to Mikey. The youngest turtle was still sat at his station, fiddling with a shuriken. He seemed nervous about yelling over his brothers, but he had a small smile on his face. "What if she's really home this time? I mean, she's in a hospital. Shredder's goons can't get her there."

There was a moment of silence as the others contemplated what he had said. Leo's eyes widened hopefully. "And she can't run from a hospital either, because the nurses will be watching her."

"It's definitely safer," Donnie agreed, "and if she's getting treatment, then they'll be making sure she has enough nutrients in her system."

Leo nodded emphatically. "And she should be calmer, which means we'll get a chance to actually talk to her."

"Okay, are you hearing yourselves? This is insane!" Raph interrupted.

"Is it, Raph?" Leo asked. "What if she finally comes home this time?"

He sighed. "How do you know she even wants to 'come home'?"

"Why else would she be back in the city?"

"I don't know Fearless, maybe wherever she ran off to was worse than here so she decided to take her chances."

"She told me she was sorry," said April quietly. All eyes turned to her. Suddenly, she felt awkward. "Well, she didn't say it to me specifically, but I heard her say it in her sleep."

Three turtles turned to Raph expectantly. He folded his arms stubbornly. "She could be apologising for anything."

"Raph, come on!"

"Logically, it makes sense for her to be apologising for our situation."

"Don't you want her to come back?"

The red-banded turtle turned to his younger brother, a dangerous glint in his eyes. Mikey met his gaze evenly. "Don't you want our sister back?"

"This is pointless!" He snapped furiously. "We do this every time! We try so hard to get her back and every time we fail! And then, the one time we succeed, she can't handle her anger and leaves anyway! And the cycle starts again! I'm sick of it!"

Breathing heavily, Raph sank down onto his chair, deflating visibly as the fire left his body. Clearly he had been suppressing these thoughts for a long time. Nobody spoke for what seemed like an eternity, before the red-banded turtle murmured to the floor, "Yes, I want her back."

Hesitantly, April approached the volatile turtle. "I think she wants to come back, Raphael. At the very least I think she'll talk to you guys."

"Awesome!" cheered Mikey, leaping to his feet. "Then what are we waiting for? Let's get in there!"

Leo caught the excited turtle by the shell as he tried to run out of the vehicle. "Mikey, we can't just walk through a hospital full of humans." He sighed in resignation. "We'll just have to wait."

"I'll figure out a way for you to get in," April promised. "I'll be going in to see her anyway. Oh, and I'll let you know when she's, uh... ready to see you."

Raph glared at her accusingly. "I thought you said she'd talk to us?"

"I think she'd be willing," she assured, "it's just that she was, well... having a little bit of delirium."

"Delirium? Cholera doesn't usually cause that," Donnie interjected. April was about to speak, but he cut her off as he drifted into his thoughts. "Oh, unless the residual traces of mutagenic components in her DNA are reacting to the cholera bacterium, therefore causing her perception to be warped and-"

"Donnie," Leo cut in, "do you think you could figure that out in your head?"

"And then dumb it down for us?" Mikey added. "Also, what's delirium?"

The youngest went ignored as April returned her attention to Donnie. "You should have a couple of days; she was seriously dehydrated and had just been put on antibiotics."

"Okay. Do you think you can keep gathering information for me?" He requested. "If the mutagenic components are affecting the cholera, then the hospital might not be able to fully treat it."

"Yeah, of course, no problem."

"And April?" At Leo's voice, she turned to him. "Thanks for looking out for her."

She smiled. "It was nothing. She's actually pretty nice company when she's not beating me up."

"I know, right?"

Boo, short chapter :( Sorry guys, but I wanted to write the Turtles finding out, and I couldn't add any of the visit in without making this way too long. So anyway, as you can see, I chose to continue this. Hopefully the next/last chapter (the actual visit) should be up sometime in the next few days.

Also, Donnie's theorising about the mutagen affecting the bacterium was basically just my cop-out for forgetting that cholera doesn't usually cause severe delirium. Since I'm a pretty bad hypochondriac, I'm not great with disease research, so I just used cholera since I already knew a little about it from History. Sorry if there are any medical inaccuracies.

Finally, sorry for the long A/N, and thank you for reading this chapter :)