"And then he left." Leo bowed before his Sensei. "He said he wouldn't report us … so that's a minor silver lining." Not a good one though.
It was a slow and painful trek back to the lair,and everyone dreaded retelling the story to Splinter. For once, Mikey managed to win the coin toss, so Leonardo was today's sacrificial lamb. Joy.
As he repeated the night's story, he couldn't help but re-hearing what the spider-guy granted to them at the end. About their failures and casualness … how he treated it like the fantasy he saw in space heroes.
He was actually grateful for Master Splinter's silence, allowing him to tell the story at his own pace. "And now we're here …" Leonardo finished.
"I see my warning about a red man swinging from webs was well founded, if off base."
"Yeah, the guy was amazing! Spectacular even!" Mikey cheered. "He was all like 'Thwip thwip' here and 'I'm sending your suits to the dry cleaners there'!"
"And he was really cocky." Raph rolled his eyes. "Just cause he's been at this a bit longer."
"Yeah,but that doesn't mean he didn't have a point." Donnie sighed. "We had no idea what we were heading into when we faced those guys, not to mention how someone threw their sai right into my shell." He glared at Raph.
"You were the one standing in the way."
"How was I supposed to know you were barely going to aim!?"
"Hey, at least it wasn't as horrible as Leo's!"
"Seriously!" Leo couldn't help but get pissed off at the blame game getting tossed around.
"Enough." Splinter cut them off. "I see now that while I allowed you to flourish your individual talents, your teamwork was never touched upon." Their master groaned. "You 're not ready to face the surface, and the fault rests on myself."
They all patiently waited for the verdict. Leo sensed no anger, but disappointment, which was ten times worse. "We shall begin training first thing in the morning. Prepare for bed."
"But what about the girl?" Donnie asked pleadingly.
"The man with a spider motif shall take the task of protecting her and her father." He spoke off-handedly. "It does no good to help if you can not focus on your own battles."
While the rest of the group groaned and complained, Leo took a moment to think deeply about his next response. The spider guy was more experienced, and given their lack of understanding of the upside world, they were likely to stumble and fail again. This wasn't a tv show where they could expect a status quo to reset things neatly. Real lives were at stake.
'By going out and using what you have, you're taking responsibility for protecting people, everything that happens, everything bad that happens, they happen because of you!'
"No." Leonardo stood up and looked his sensei in the eye.
"No?" Splinter asked with a raised eyebrow, obviously waiting for a reason to Leo's response before he answered with his staff hitting the back of his head and knee caps.
"You're right Sensei, we were unprepared, and we don't know how to be a team. If we did, then we wouldn't have failed to rescue that man and his daughter." Leo sighed. "But we jumped into that fight, we chose to use our skills to protect them. The moment we chose to help, that's when it became our responsibility. We took on that burden, and we need to see it through."
The man was very silent for a moment, staring at Leo, his brothers tense and preparing for the inevitable beatdown. "And what do you propose to solve your situation?" His Sensei asked.
"I …" He paused. "We'll pick a leader to make the decisions, until we can work as a team." That seemed like a half baked solution that could last until the girl was safe.
"And who among you should attain that position?" Splinter asked them.
"Well not to brag, but I am the most well versed in Ninjutsu.." Leo did his best to not sound vain.
"Why should you be the leader? I kicked your butt this morning." Raph butted in. "I'm the strongest, it should be me."
"I'm smarter than all of you combined, and this team could use more brains." Donnie interjected.
"And I have the coolest color, so I should be the leader." Everyone stared at Mikey with a raised eyebrow. "I could last a week."
"This is a difficult decision, one that I must meditate on for a long, long while." Their sensei headed into his room and shut the door…only to open it a second later. "It's Leonardo." And shut it again.
"WHAT!?" Raph shouted. Honestly he was inclined to agree.
After a few seconds he stood up. "Well as Leader-"
"Oh eat some worms."
"We should figure out what to do." Leo gave it some thought. "What do we know?"
"The kidnappers have suits, unnatural strength, laser technology, an unremarkable van, and a spider man webbed our shells and told us off." Donnie pointed out.
"Well obviously the first thing we need to do is make sure that spandex wearing freak doesn't get in the way again." Raph huffed.
"We can't fight him!" Mikey shouted. "He's a superhero!"
"Yeah, and he also spits out cheesier lines than Leo." Raph rolled his eyes in a groan. "I signed up to tolerate one dork in the group, not two."
"That's irrelevant, right now he's looking for a lead just as hard as we are." Come on, think of something, anything. Splinter wouldn't give you this position for no reason. "... I might have an idea."
"Might?" Donnie asked.
"The van might have been unmarked, but the building it came out of isn't." Leo was going off on a hunch, but he practiced situational awareness for a reason. "Standard hero 101 dictates that criminals always return to the scene of the crime. We stake out the building, and ambush the truck and force them to take us to the hostages.
"This isn't standard Leo." Raph deadpanned.
"Well I'm open to suggestions." Leo countered. "And no, running to every person on the street and threatening them is not an answer."
Raph grunted for a second before sending a punch into a nearby wall. "Fine, but I reserve the right to call bullshit for if and when this plan fails." That was more amicable than he was expecting in all honesty.
"What do we do about the Spider-guy?" Donnie asked.
"He wants the same thing we do, so nothing if we can help it." Leo responded.
"And if we can't?" Mikey questioned.
"Then we do it Raph's way." Hopefully it wouldn't come to that.
Donatello idly bounced the rubber ball back and forth against the wall as they waited. "So, did Space Heroes ever mention when they were gonna show up?" He asked the new apparent leader (did his tactics mean nothing?), who was vigilantly staring down at the building.
"No … but they'll show." Leonardo stated, minor hesitation in his voice. The plan admittedly had some merit, considering they didn't have any other clue as to WHERE the van had taken the girl, but that didn't make waiting around for over an hour any less tedious.
"Okay… I spy… something green.." Not helping was Michelangelo's repetitive choices for passing the time. "Green… like really, really green."
"Let me guess, Rapheal… again… for the hundredth time." Donnie boredly droned.
"Right again!" Mikey shouted. "It's like you can read my mind …"
"That implies that there's anything other than air inside that hollow case." Raph knocked their youngest brother on the head. "Admit it Leo, this plan was terrible. We're not going to get anywhere while waiting without thumbs up our noses."
"I don't think they'd fit." A voice came out from the side, making them all tilt their heads. "In fact, do you guys even have noses? Kind of hard to tell with all the green and it being night and all."
"Actually it's more a bump thing where-" Donnie was rudely cut off by a slap from Raph.
"I see the man in red showed up again." His brother growled, ready to take out his sai, only for Leo to hold his hand out in pause.
"And I see the turtles are up and about once more." The masked man calmly said as he sat on the side of a billboard like he was sitting on a chair. "Relax, Mr. Crude-and-Rude-Tude, I didn't come for a fight."
Leo looked back at the masked man, slight curiosity in his eyes. "Did the CVT cameras come up blank?"
"They were on loop for about an hour, meaning they either have digital access or an inside man." The masked man sighed.
"Then why are you here?" Raph asked accusedly.
"Figured the same thing you guys probably did." The masked guy said casually as he leaned against the billboard. "Bad guy returning to the scene of the crime, standard hero 101."
"See, I told you it was a thing!" Leo cheered in success.
"Congratulations, Leo. You have so much in common with the poindexter in bright red spandex." Raph laughed. "Whoopi-freaking do."
"I also brought solitaire." The spider guy held up a deck of cards. "You know, to pass the time?"
"Thank Shell, I was so close to pushing Mikey off the building if I had to play Eye-spy one more time." Donnie sighed in relief.
"Hey, hey, hey, since when did we start becoming buddy-buddy?" Raph asked indignantly.
"Since we both want the same thing." Leo stood up. "I know we got off on the wrong foot, but we want to make it right."
The spider guy looked contemplative for a minute. "Don't we all?" He flipped off the billboard and landed on the roof. "Call me Spider-Man."
"That's kind of a lame name." Mikey muttered. "What about, the web slinger, oh, no, Web-Head! Spider-Bite! No, what about…?"
"He eats a lot of sugar, doesn't he?" The apparently named Spider-man questioned.
The turtles looked at each other. "Actually tonight was our first meal other than algae and worms." Donnie said. "The ongoing theory is that Splinter dropped him while on the run." Not that they'd ever accuse the man himself, but it would explain a lot.
"Gotcha." The vigilante nodded. "So do any of you fine green gentlemen have names, or am I going to just refer to you by mask colors…which If I'm being honest, kinda seems a bit redundant, considering the turtle shtick you have going covering….everything."
"Leonardo." The blue one raised his hand.
"Donnetello."
"Michelangelo."
They all turned to the only one they had his back turned. "What, I don't have to answer him if I don't want to."
"He's Rapheal." Leo answered in spite of Raph's yells of protest.
"... So the renaissance fair came early this year I see, last I checked they didn't have ninjas running around, but who's to say." Spider-man nodded. "Then again, it brings out the most in people." He pointed to the building they were watching, the people from the van going in and out."
"Finally, we get to fight!" Raph twirled his sais. "Now things will finally get interesting…" He was stopped as his hands and weapons were webbed to the ground
"Correction, I'm fighting them." The man in red said. "You all are staying here."
"You're not sidlinging us." Leo glared.
"No, I'm sidelining inexperienced guys with lethal weapons." They told the group. "Because in case you haven't noticed, we're not here to kill them, just get one of them staying around for answers."
"We know how to hold back…don't we Raph." Their leader stepped up, glaring at their angry brother.
"Get this disgusting stuff off of me!" Raph screamed as he tried to pry the web off of himself.
"Donnie and Mikey's are the least lethal, I can hold Raph back, and if you recall last time, those guys aren't exactly normal either." Leo continued to point out. "And they have lasers, you need all the leg up you can get."
He paused. "Fine, let's head down then." With a crack of the neck, the man jumped down. "Hey buddies, missed me!?" Spider-man shouted at the suit wearing guys.
"Cocky little wise ass…" Raph growled as he was trying to cut himself free.
"I don't know….anyone that can get under your shell that easily can't possibly be all that bad." Mikey laughed.
"He's got a point." Donnie smiled. "Let's see how this goes while Raph tries to free himself."
"What the-let me out of here!"
"Well as team leader, I say you need to be on the bench for this fight. Don't worry, we'll crack enough skulls in your place." Leo spun his katanas. "Alright, Turtles Ascend!"
"Turtles ascend, really?" Donnie looked at his brother quizzically.
"We'll workshop it later." Leo blushed as he jumped down.
Snake was supposed to have a wonderful night. Work with these suit guys, make a couple of quick bucks, and splurge on dinner. Now? Now he was being attacked by that masked vigilante guy. "Oh you guys really have a hard time sticking around, don't you?" The spider guy commented as the suits once more busted out of a web.
"The Kraang shall not be doing that which is known as the sticking around." One of his partners responded. "Krang shall instead be doing what is known to Kraang as lethal force on the interlopers that insist on interloping in the interests of plans only known to Kraang." The only down side to this gig was that he never was able to get a straight response from any of them.
"Oh yeah, well the interlopers will continue to interloop in the interests of the..things that we wish to know the…ah, this confusing comeback speech is harder than it looks." Coming down from the roof, what looked like a giant turtle in an orange mask said as he hit one of them behind the head.
"You'd think they'd take an English class." The spider man said as he continued blasting them with webs. Snake himself would have made a break for it, but he'd been webbed to the wall since the start of the fight. "Like seriously, if you live in New York, at least learn cohesive speech."
"Makes you wonder how smart they really are." Another turtle freak in a purple swung around a giant wooden stick and tripped a couple of them. "Advanced laser technology and they sound like five year olds repeating words in a dictionary for the first time."
"We can focus more on that the moment we actually catch one of them." A turtle freak in blue moved in to deliver a few punches to the face. "I know we're not killing, but these guys aren't easy to contain, you know."
"Get creative and knock them out harder." The spider-freak responded flippantly as he threw two of the suits into the air and webbed them to the wall. "See, just like tha-" The two suits broke out of the webs, falling to the ground, then getting right back up like it's no big deal. "Okay, maybe we knock them out even harder."
"Oh really? I thought the answer was going to be spraying more silly string at them!" Yet ANOTHER turtle freak, this one in red, jumped from a roof and slammed two hard fists into one of them. "Better hope these creeps are durable, web head! Once I'm done tearing them apart, I'm gunning for you!"
"Look, I've been at this job for a few months. I'm not ready to have my own stalker yet. Flattered, but just not moving that fast." Surprisingly, the comment did not appease the red guy.
"The interlopers that keep interloping in the business of Kraang must not keep interloping in the business of Kraang." One of them announced.
"Kraang agrees with Kraang. Kraang suggests what is known to Kraang as a tactical retreat." Another announcement.
"Kraang agrees with Kraangs assessment." The suits began running off, throwing off the-
"Oh not this time!" The web head lived up to his name, shooting lines of web at the two running away and yanking them back, only for the webs to snap. "Damn it! I really need to improve the formula on these things."
"Don't worry, they forgot one." The orange turtle freak pointed to Snake, still webbed to the wall. "Seeing how he doesn't have a suit, guess he's not a full time member of their freaky little club."
"Yes, thank you for saving me." He lied. "Could you help get me down now?"
"Yeah, we weren't hatched yesterday. We saw you driving that van, that same van used to kidnap that man and the girl." The purple turtle freak glared at him, pointing to his ride.
"Plus this isn't the first time I've come in to bust Snake." The Spider Man swung down. "Remember that drug deal a week back buddy? With good old Flinty and O'hern?"
"Oh choke on your own web." He growled. "It's thanks to you I had to spread my services around to weirdos like those guys."
"Yeah, and exactly what services are you providing?" The Blue one asked with a stern look. "You can tell us now, or we can let our brother let out a little more steam on a weaker punching bag." He pointed to the red one, pounding his fists.
"Please resist, I skipped today's daily workout." The red one smirked menacingly.
"I don't know anything, I just drive the freaks around." Snake grumbled.
"Raph…" The blue one gestured as the red one got closer.
"Okay, Okay! I just know they're called the Kraang and they've been kidnapping Scientists all over the city!"
"Scientists?" The purple one turned around to the web head. "Did that man look familiar in any way, shape or form?"
"Not particularly, I recall he studied animal behavior or something." The vigilante rubbed his head. "What would they want with him?"
"Maybe … to mess with this stuff …" They turned to the orange one, looking inside of the van with a hint of worry in his voice. He slowly reached inside, pulling out one of those canisters with a strange substance inside of it. "I think I found mom."
"Is that…" The red one asked with wide eyes.
"Mutagen…" The Purple one said in shock. "The same kind that created us."
"Wait, so you guys aren't everyday random average-joes that got bitten by radioactive turtles?" The Spider-freak asked while scratching his head.
The turtle freaks turned to each other. "Donnie." The red one says. "I know I haven't ever asked you for this … but is that science?"
"By all accounts, no, it's not." The purple one replied. "No, we were turtles that got hit with this stuff …" The freaks turned to him. "And you've been carrying this stuff around."
"I don't ask questions, I just make money." He slowly reached into his pocket and took out a shiv, slowly cutting through the web. "Whatever they do in their free time is none of my business."
"Well now your business is going to be telling us where this 'Kraang' gang is keeping their hostages." Spider-man glared.
"And what's in it for me?" Snake countered.
"Well we have to keep you alive." The red turtle twirled his blades. "We just never said how untouched." He gestured to the canister of ooze. "And right now you're tied up while we have a concoction of unknown origin that could either make you as handsome as me, or as deformed as Mikey over there."
"HEY!" The orange one shouted in protest.
"So.." He opened up the can, and let some of it get close to his face. "Are you feeling lucky, punk?"
"Hey!" The spider-guy shouted. "We're not just going to pour mutagen on him!"
"You won't, but me…I'm a different story." It got closer, and closer, and…
"ALRIGHT!" Snake cried out. "They have a facility just on the outskirts of the city! They plan on transporting to a new location at midnight!"
"There, see, was that so hard?" The red one said cheekily as he thankfully put the lid on that gunk.
"... Was he actually going to do it?" The spider freak asked.
"I'm not sure you'd like the answer to that." The purple one sighed. "Now what do we do with it?"
"Isn't it obvious?" The orange one said with a goofy smile. "We drink it!"
"WHAT!?" The rest of the freaks shouted as they turned their backs, perfect timing for Snake to free himself.
"Duh, dudes, it's simple science. You poor mutagen on a mutant, and you get a SUPER mutant!"
"Or we become horrible blob monsters mutated into eternal agonizing hell." The purple one chastised.
"... So what you're saying is there's a chance."
"Horrible blob monster or not, it'll probably be an improvement over the original." The red one snickered. "So help yourself."
"Why don't you be the first, I'm sure the glow will fix your complexion." The spider-freak pointed to the red one. "You are looking pretty green."
"Alright, forget the truth, I'm clobberin this knucklehead!" And with that, Snake was finally able to cut himself free moving into a run as he tried to get away from this freakshow.
"GUYS, stop messing around!" He heard the blue one shout as he made his distance
"I've got it." The web head messed with his wrist, but nothing happened. "Damn it, out of fluid."
"Wait, those don't come from your hands?"
Mikey watched as the Spider-man (still wished he had a cooler name) turned to him. "What, no, why would you think it came out of my hands?"
"Because you said you have … 'radioactive spider powers'." Donnie air quoted. "Which I'm still not buying."
"Oh I'm sorry, mr. teenage mutant ninja turtle, I'm sorry that I said something so impossible. I'll be sure to tell the business suits with lasers that I'm just too unbelievable." Fair point, the comics always said anything radioactive leads to super-powers.
"And insufferable." Raph rolled his eyes. "So we know where they are, let's rush in and grab them."
"Not if Snake gets away and warns them first." Leo pointed his swords forwards. "Spread out guys, we can't let him out of our sight."
"Didn't we already do that…twice already?" Mikey pointed out, making his brother's stare at him. "Right, not helpful, got it."
"Just go search the area, see if they left anything important behind." Leo told him, as they all began jumping away.
Sighing, Mikey began wandering the alley. "Man, it's not fair. I pull my own weight too, you know. I've even got the second coolest weapon." Right behind their leader's swords. "And it's really hard to use them too! You don't just swing them around and that's it." He hit his head probably a thousand times before he got it perfectly down.
"Better than me at least." He looked up to the Spider-Guy sitting on the wall, reaching for something around his waist. "I mean, what's a Spider without his webs?"
"You have your own utility belt?!" He squealed in excitement."How do you get cooler every second?!"
"You think I'm cool?" The eyes of the mask widened in surprise.
"Well, yeah, you have the costume, you know how to kick butt, you even have funny jokes that get on Raph's nerves." Mikey listed off. "Honestly you're what I wanted to be. That guy saved the day, beating up supervillains, getting daytime friends."
"It's not all sunshine and rainbows kid. Responsibility is a big factor in having powers." The hero sighed, pulling down his sleeves to reveal some kind of weird wristband. "I mean, I make sure to have a certain percentage of quipage in every battle, but that's to usually to help me cope."
"But it's superhero stuff, that's not stressful." He paused. "Unless you're dealing with aliens out to eat your brains."
"Or an alligator in the sewer, to which I've seen there are a lot of." Spider-man kept messing with his wrists. "So you guys are giant turtles, no human parts at all."
"Nope, one hundred percent genuine turtle, born and proud." He smiled proudly. "Donnie would explain some long science babble about how it's because human CNA touched us or something when the mutagen did its thing."
"DNA."
"That too." Mikey nodded. "So how do you deal with-"
"LOOK OUT!" Spider-Man thwip him out of the way when one of those suited guys came in, trying to strike him from behind. "Looks like we have a straggler!"
"Don't worry, I totally got this!" Relying on instinct, he swung his nunchaku …. a little bit harder then he was expecting to in all honesty..
Crack
The man was sent flying, skidding across the ground as the two of them stood in silence, the head of the guy in the suit sparking. "Oh no, I broke his brain!" Mikey shouted. He always knew it was electricity running the nerves.
"Hold up, I don't think we should rule on the manslaughter charges just yet." Spidey jumped from the wall, and got closer to the sparking and glitchy sounding body. "Blood isn't usually this electric…or purple for that matter."
"It's not?" Mikey blinked, getting closer. "… So he's not a normal dude?"
"I think he's a robot." Spidey observed, tapping the skull with a metallic ding.
Mikey gasped. "New York has robots!?" The surface was the best.
"It would seem that way, my large green friend." The hero picked at the face, peeling off the skin to reveal a completely metal head behind it…hah, Metal Head, he'd have to save that name for later use. "Way too advanced for just off the street stuff …could Oscorp be involved?" Spider man began pondering. "Whatever the case, it's not safe to just leave something like this laying in the streets, so we should take it back…"
The stomach began to make noise, bulging just a tad. "… Spidey?"
"Yes.." The hero responded nervously.
"Can robots get indigestion?"
"They're not supposed to…" Spider-man carefully reached out his hand. "Please don't let it be aliens bursting out of the chest, please don't let it be an alien bursting out of the chest…
They opened up the suit, revealing … "I thought the brain was in the head?" Mikey asked, looking at the strange pink mass of-
"SCREEEEEE!" Shouted the brain that grew eyes, teeth, and tentacles.
From that moment forward, Mikey and Spidey sent a look towards each other, mentally agreeing they would both swear to never tell anyone how fearful and girly their screams of terrors were.
"AHHHHHHHHHHH!" Both of them cried out as the brain thing jumped out and landed on Spidey's face. "AHH! GET IT OFF, GET IT OFF, GET IT OFF!"
"I'm on it!" Mikey began punching the man in the face repeatedly. "Gross, it's all slimy!" He knew deep down brains weren't as impressive as Donnie always claimed it to be
"YANK IT OFF, YANK IT OFF!" His super hero friend screamed. "HURRY BEFORE IT LAYS EGGS IN ME!"
"RIGHT!" Mikey grabbed both sides of the brain thing, feeling the gunk from its icky tentacle cover his hands. "So slippery, why does it have to be so slippery!?"
"Grgrgrgrgrgrgrgrg!" The brain thing grumbled.
"GET…OFF OF ME!" Spidey roared as Mikey gave it one more good yank, flinging the brain thing over their heads and across the alley.
"Graaaa!" It hissed at them, crawling away as the two of them just stared in horrified silence.
"Please tell me my brain won't do that." The young turtle pleaded.
"Normal brains don't do that…then again you're a mutant so that factors into things.."
"HOW IS THAT COMFORTING!?"
"I told you I joke to cope!" Spidey freaked out.
"Well I was expecting Mikey to be standing around like an idiot, didn't know why I expected spandex boy to be any different." They turned to see the rest of the gang coming up.
"Guys!" Mikey shouted. "We ran into another one of those suit guys! And he had a brain!"
"Everyone has a brain, Mikey." Leo rolled his eyes, obviously not taking him seriously like usual.
"Not everyone." Donnie snarked.
"Brains in their chest!?" Mikey brought up.
"I knew I should've slapped him awake when I gave that lecture on biology." Donnie sighed disappointedly.
"Dudes, he's being serious!" Ahaha, that's right! Mikey had a witness to that freakshow! "Those guys in suits aren't human, they're robots being controlled by these weird little brain creatures."
"Are you serious?" Raph asked with a raised eye. "Did Mikey infect you with idiocy or something?"
"Well you could always ask the ROBOT ON THE GROUND!" Spidey pointed to said suit. "But that's just me."
"Oh yeah, that's still here!" Mikey cheered as they showed it off. "Thanks, I almost forgot about that." It was paying off more and more to have a superhero for a friend.
"Of course you did." Leo groaned before everyone surrounded the thing. "What are we looking at, Donnie?"
"Fascinating." Donnie muttered, opening the stomach to a bunch of silver and purple lights. "How does it function?" He pressed a button on the inside, after which a hand went straight up and punched the turtle in the face. "Ow!"
"There's only one or two tech companies I can think of that can come close to making something as advanced as this." Spidey observed. "And if the Kraang are kidnapping scientists, it's not a stretch they'd be stealing tech too." He looked at his brother. "So what's the sitch with Snake?"
"Me and Raph followed him into an alleyway and pretended we lost him." Leo explained. "Made a big show about how we'd use his van to sneak past the Kraang, so when they think they're expecting us, we'll be five steps ahead of them."
"Wow, nice improv work." Spidey nodded. "All that's left now is to bust into a highly isolated area filled to the brim with brain monsters piloting highly sophisticated and durable robots while getting past all the highly advanced laser technology." There was a pause. "Things were so much simpler when it was just purse snatchers."
"Yeah, when it comes to us, we don't do simple." Raph smirked. "What now, 'fearless leader'?"
"Now we head back to the lair and plan before Midnight strikes." Leo nodded and waved for them to follow them.
"Wait, hold on." Raph stopped Leo in his tracks. "We're not just going to let some masked weirdo enter our secret lair just like that?"
"The man could've exposed us when he didn't, and he's been helping us this far.." Leo went on.
"Yeah, so helpful."
"I say we can give this team-up a chance." Leo finished.
"Shell yeah, we're finally having friends over!" This day really was the gift that kept on giving. "Oh Spidey, you're going to love it!" Mikey cheered. "Maybe we can order more of that pizza stuff!"
"Sure thing, glad to help you learn the cuisine of the human variety." The man chuckled, patting his back. "So what abandoned warehouse slash apartment building are you guys hiding out in?"
All the turtles looked at each other. "Why do you think we've been calling New York the surface?" Leo asked.
The hero looked confused for a second, before his eyes widened in realization. "I'm going to be spending a lot of time in the sewers by hanging around you guys, aren't I?"
"Oh, the big shot hero can't handle the stench of the sewers?" Raph laughed. "And here I thought you couldn't get any lamer."
"How do you stand being related to sunshine over there?" Spidey asked as they made their way to the nearest manhole cover.
"I'm still trying to figure out the answer to that question." Donnie replied. "Oh, is someone going to drag that body over? I'd love to study some of the finer parts."
"… Did you hear how cryptic that sounded out of context?" Spidey asked.
"Don't worry, if he comes close to making the robot apocalypse, Mikey will probably end up breaking something important before it happens." Leo explained. "That's kind of his thing."
"Can't argue with that." Mikey smiled. He was happy to be of service.
April once more tried punching the very little piece of glass that was in the mostly metallic cell they had been placed in. "Come on, what is this, bullet proof!?" She complained in anger.
"They're robots with lasers, honey, I think the walls are a lot more than bullet-proof." Her dad sighed as he sat down. "You might want to give it a rest, April."
"Come on dad, don't start talking like that now!" She said exasperated. "We could try hacking the lock again."
"That set the room on fire, before they put it out." He responded. "Then you tried to tackle them, which ended with you being thrown back without even trying."
"Yeah … but if at first you don't succeed, try, try again, right?" She countered. "That's how the saying goes?"
"April, your determination is great, and I'm not trying to be a downer, but we have to look at this practically and realistically." She hated when her dad used his smart talk to bring down the mood. "And realistically, I don't know any way we can break ourselves out of here."
"Well, that doesn't mean people won't be looking for us, right?" April was stretching, but she needed to cling to something.
"That's all we can hope for … which means we need to save our energy." Dad patted the seat next to him. "So sit down, and let's wait it out."
"I…I can't…I can't just wait, I don't want to feel helpless!" She groaned.
"I'm the one who feels helpless." He sighed. "My baby girl's in danger and I can't do anything to keep her safe."
She paused. April almost forgot she wasn't the only one having a hard time here. "...Well, we're in this together…that makes me feel just a little better." She finally relented and sat herself next to her dad. If she wasn't going to focus on escaping, she might as well think about the other weird part of her week. "So what do you think was the deal with those giant green men?"
"Wait, I thought that was just a concussion talking. There were actually four turtle men?"
"Yeah, the ones that knew kung fu apperently." April almost scoffed at the ridiculousness. "How is it that the guy jumping around in red spandex is somehow the most normal aspect of this whole ordeal?"
"Because the one thing the world will never run out of is brave people trying to do the right thing." Dad explained, rubbing her head. "I guess the rumors about a spider themed vigilante weren't exactly rumors."
"Since when did New York become the centerstone of the weird and wild?" April asked.
"The city is a melting pot. Apparently that includes vigilantes and alien robots." Good thing April wasn't particularly religious, or she would've been spouting bullshit. The thought that the bug guy and turtle guy were out there, possibly looking for them gave her mild comfort…but not that much.