Numb
"Mikey? Mikey wake up!"
Sharra shook his shoulders and patted his cheek, but the turtle was well and truly passed out.
No... oh no.
Basic first-aid she could handle, even stitches. But a knife embedded in his flesh?
Should I pull the blade out? What if it punctured a vital organ?
She considered summoning an ambulance but dismissed the idea almost immediately. An emergency crew might not try to help someone as... unusual as Mikey. Also, there was no easy access to her loft. The nearest external entrance was a fire escape three buildings away.
I'll have to wing it.
Hastily, she explored a number of online forum posts about turtle injuries, seeking descriptions of treatment. Not many of those involved stab wounds to the gut or an eight-inch slice to the shoulder, but she was able to determine a general order of operations to follow: pain relief, wound care, and temporary stabilization of any loose shell fragments.
Unfortunately, Sharra couldn't offer much in terms of painkillers. She didn't own anything stronger than aspirin and without asking him, had no way to tell if the medicine would help or hinder the process.
She did try to make Michelangelo more comfortable. Gingerly, she removed his belt, pads, mask, and boots. The footwear was stubborn. One of his ankles had swollen so much she had to cut the dark leather away to remove it. She hoped he didn't mind too much.
I can't imagine shoes his size are easy to come by.
But there were more immediate things to worry about.
Like first-aid.
Medical supplies were expensive and Sharra didn't have many resources on hand, but Mikey's little magic trick earlier with the gauze convinced her he carried some. The trick was finding them.
With all the weapons on his harness, blindly rummaging through his possessions might be dangerous.
Deciding to proceed with caution, she picked one at random and peeked inside. An interesting assortment of electronic bits jingled in the bottom—intriguing, but something to ask about later.
Another enclosed a loose powder that made her eyes water until she sneezed. The third contained small capsules filled with liquid.
A fourth smelled of gunpowder. She abandoned that one instantly.
In the last, she found the medical provisions. There were more than she had hoped for; alcohol wipes, band-aids, larger bandages, gauze, sterile compresses, and stretchy elastic bands used to support strained muscles.
With a relieved sigh, she turned her attention to Michelangelo.
How am I going to do this?
There was no way to tell how much of his anatomy behaved like a man so she decided to treat each injury separately in regards to his dual heritage. If the wounded part resembled a human, an arm or leg, she'd address it like she would on herself. If the section appeared reptilian, like his 'plastron'— a new word she learned for his keratin laden gold chest armor—she'd use her research.
First, this knife has to go.
Steeling herself, she knelt at his side and grasped the handle. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, offering up a silent prayer to whomever might be listening that this was the right thing to do. With one smooth pull, she drew the wicked-looking dagger out of his abdomen as smoothly as possible.
Michelangelo screamed in raw anguish as a fountain of blood followed the blade out.
Oh my god, oh my god, oh my GOD!
The scream morphed into a horrible moan that would haunt her nightmares. There was precious little Sharra could do except frantically apply clean towels as a compress. When the groans fell silent, her panic doubled.
What have I done? Is he still breathing?
Tears poured down her cheeks, blocking her view, but she thought she saw his chest rise and fall. It was slight but regular, so she persisted in keeping consistent pressure on the gash, changing the towels when blood seeped all the way through.
Please, please, please let this stop...
If the knife had done more than tear muscle, it wouldn't. If the blade had nicked an artery or an organ, Michelangelo would die of internal bleeding, and there was absolutely nothing Sharra could do about it.
The third towel took twice as long to become saturated, and hope began to bloom in her chest. By the fourth, the flow ebbed enough for her to peek underneath and consider doing more than triage.
With great effort, Sharra pulled herself together. She wanted nothing more than to go pass out in the corner, but Michelangelo still needed her. With soap and water, she cleaned herself and the ragged margin of his pierced shell before drenching the outer edges with acetone. While the pungent-smelling chemical wasn't the best option, according to what she read, it would do in a pinch to keep out deadly bacteria.
Anxiously, Sharra positioned the pieces of his armor until they met. Then she applied a waterproof patch in the form of industrial fiberglass tape and epoxy resin.
Again, not the first choice of veterinarians, but the closest alternative I can supply.
With the edges touching, his boney plates should grow back together, given time.
That is if his plastron behaves like a regular turtle's.
Compared to the knife wound, stitching his shoulder was much less traumatic and took scarcely any time at all. A temporary sling made from some gauze supported his arm and she bound the area thoroughly.
For the rest of his cuts, she washed him with the lukewarm soapy water to remove the debris from the fight. Once clean, she swabbed them with alcohol wipes. The worst ones got bandaged for good measure.
Hours passed while Sharra studiously wiped, sewed, and cleaned. Until poor Mikey resembled a mummy from all the dressings and wrappings. Finally, the only thing left to do was warm him up.
He is already numb from the cold, hypothermia is a real threat.
Sharra flitted around the room gathering all the cloth she owned. Everything from her spare clothes to her worn-through sheets, blankets, and pillows. She dumped them on the floor in the most open space to form a colossal nest.
She eyed the mountain of prone turtle thoughtfully. There was a good ten feet of space between his current location and the bedding.
I could hardly move him when he was upright. Now what?
Friction. Friction was the enemy here. Off in the corner, she had some old plastic drop cloths. If she rolled him on the sheeting and dragged that, she wouldn't injure his body further by tugging.
And he'll be easier to slide.
Adrenaline would also help.
If I have any left after this harrowing night.
She needn't have worried. Before she got Mikey into position on her makeshift sledge her bracelet vibrated another perimeter alarm.
Shit! The Foot are back.
Heart pounding she watched through the cameras as they combed her rooftop again; seeking the disappearing turtle. Their luck held and the Foot overlooked her hatchway entrance a second time. But when they left, she was tense enough to move Mikey several times the distance needed.
As soon as she had him in the blankets, she tucked him up turning him to one side with several cushions supporting his wounded extremities. She placed the heater as close to him as possible without setting the fabric pile on fire.
Her back popped as she stretched. And the rest of her body ached something fierce, urging her to find a bed herself.
But there is still blood on the floor.
Scrubbing it clean would take another few hours but she had so little space immediate clean-up was crucial. As she worked her scrub brush over the rough wood, Michelangelo jerked and hissed under the blankets in front of her. Though he wasn't actually awake, the stiff set of his shoulders spoke volumes. He was in severe pain and it was keeping him from the one thing he needed most. Rest.
He's not the only one who needs sleep...
Sharra snorted at the thought and rubbed her eyes. Dawn had come and gone, and the morning long passed, but she had to complete one last thing before she collapsed.
Delete all traces of Mikey's frantic flight to my door.
Dragging herself to the desk, she used more than a dozen different programs to erase Michelangelo's digital tracks. At first, she only concealed the events of the prior evening. But ultimately decided to assign an ongoing algorithm to seek out and destroy ANY images, videos, or other indications of him.
The purge would take a little time, especially considering the redundancies of most cloud structured servers, but she was confident enough in her skills to believe he would be safe electronically soon.
Mikey shifted and moaned again, shivering. Sharra frowned and left the computer to lay a delicate hand on his forehead.
He's still freezing!
Her old faulty space heater barely held back the chill of the room and the quilts weren't doing much on their own. Sharra sighed. There was nothing else for it, she would have to use her own body heat to raise his core temperature.
Cautiously, she made her way between him and the wall to kick off her shoes. She stripped off her leg warmers and swapped her heavy sweater for a lighter tank top. Reluctantly, she burrowed into the covers behind him.
Sharra moved closer gradually. First touching his freezing toes with hers before scooting up against his shell. When Mikey sighed in relief, she willed more warmth into her palm and hesitantly stroked down the smooth carapace covering his back—mumbling soothing nonsense under her breath.
I wonder if he can feel the path of my fingers.
The idol thought was fleeting. What she really hoped was he was not offended by her proximity, for she grappled with her own paranoia to stay by his side. Allowing someone close to her physically—trusting he was safe—was something she hadn't done in years.
But I fought too hard to save him to lose him to shock because of my foibles.
Michelangelo slowly relaxed under her hand. A few strokes later, his breathing resembled the more normal patterns of sleep, discounting the occasional hitch for pain.
Sharra closed her eyes, just meaning to rest them for a second, and fell sound asleep.
"Damn it!"
The uncharacteristic curse flew from Donatello's mouth as his fist hit the table. He still hadn't found anything. At least, not anything good.
There were hints. Multiple cameras captured shadows moving in a familiar way. Shapes that might be Michelangelo. He also located footage of several groups of Foot soldiers slinking along the snowy rooftops, but nothing more definitive.
He leaned back in his chair and rubbed a palm over his face. Leonardo, sitting beside him, shot him a sympathetic glance.
"At least you haven't found any proof he's... gone."
Donatello snorted. "I haven't found any that he's not."
He glanced at Raphael where his brother lay sleeping in the cot at the back of the lab and lowered his voice. They were all spent, but no one wanted to be isolated in their own rooms. Instead, they took turns napping in the cot to be ready to leave the second he confirmed a location. Any location.
"I don't know how much more I can do," Don complained. "So far there's no video of his passage."
"We're all careful around cameras," Leo reminded him.
"Yeah, but I found images of Raph from months ago on this deep dive. I even glimpsed you on the warehouse run near the boat basin. Mikey is excellent at spotting cams but not good enough to disappear so completely. Someone must have scrubbed his trail."
"The Foot?"
"They never cared before. And quite frankly, they're not clever enough to accomplish what I'm seeing. Or rather, not seeing," Don added with a bitter twist to his lips.
"Maybe it's time to take a break. You skipped your last two turns at rest. You might notice something more if you come back to the problem with fresh eyes."
"I can't. Not until I find something."
"Don't make me order you, Donnie. You won't be any use to Mike if you're exhaust—"
"Any news?" Raph interrupted. He hadn't even sat up all the way in the cot before cutting Leo off with the urgent question.
Donatello sighed, missing the dagger-like glare the leader directed at Raphael. "No. He had to have crossed through here, but I've been over this footage repeatedly and..."
"And what?"
"And nothing. I've found nothing. I'll just have to keep digging."
Don turned back to the keyboard but a firm hand gripped his elbow and lifted him to his feet, rolling the office chair out from under him.
"No, now you need to rest," Leonardo said. "And when was the last time you ate?"
"I ate..."—Don trailed off. He couldn't recall his last meal—"something."
Leo shook his head. "Raph, go grab him a protein bar and one of those pre-mixed vitamin shakes."
As Raphael headed for the kitchen, Leo turned Donnie toward the cot. "Sit," he ordered, releasing Don with a gentle push. Donatello sank down on the bed, stifling an impressive yawn.
"I'll eat, but I ought to get back to work," he protested.
"You can't keep pushing yourself like this. Let Raph and I take a turn staring at the monitors."
Donnie attempted to rise, but Leo pushed him back as Raphael reappeared with the food.
"I promise I'll wake you if we see anything suspicious."
Reluctantly, the genius gave in. He accepted the proffered snacks and suddenly found he was starving. The power bar vanished in record time and the shake followed as his brothers settled themselves in front of his spread of eight screens.
Leo was right. I am tired.
In fact, Donatello didn't remember lying down, but somehow he was gazing numbly at the ceiling of his lab. As the hunger faded, so did his consciousness. In moments everything disappeared into the blackness of sleep.
Darkness.
All Splinter saw when focusing on Michelangelo was darkness.
No matter where they were, with enough concentration, Splinter could sense the auras of his children. The others were luminous with colors born of their emotions.
Red anger and frustration radiated from Raphael. The yellow-green of despair, muted by exhaustion emanated from Donatello. And an ocean of pale yellow grief and guilt drowned Leonardo.
All three glowed with life mere feet away from his quarters. Safe, despite their negative sentiments. But from his youngest, most exuberant, and light-filled child he sensed only darkness.
Ancestors protect him.
Splinter repeated the silent prayer by the minute, as regular as a clock.
Michelangelo wasn't dead.
Not yet.
The anguish and fear of his initial wound had torn Splinter's heart in two, but a pulse of relief and even joy had come through since.
But how long will he remain alive?
The injury Splinter sensed was a lethal one. Without help, Michelangelo would perish. Still, there was nothing physical for him to do. No assistance to provide outside of a vague sense of direction for his lost son.
Ancestors protect him.
Splinter shared the emotions of his children. Anger and frustration raged through him. Desperate and guilt-ridden he examined the events leading up to Michelangelo's disappearance. Yet he found no fault.
Their lives were perilous. The possibility always existed that one or more of them would not come back from any given confrontation. Splinter braced for such an impact every time they went out to safeguard the city.
But this instance had been unexpected. The family blindsided by a cascading turn of events no one could have predicted. The loss of his son's bright light filled him with sorrow.
Ancestors protect him.
All Splinter could do was pray. And keep meditating. Hunting for the beacon of Michelangelo's aura. Right now his child was numb. Trapped by darkness. But that would change. He would wake and channel some sort of emotion.
Until then, there was nothing to do but wait.
Ancestors protect him.