Samantha Allan Park

by TheNerdyTomboyNewb96

Sam is a tomboy nerd whose life has been destroyed by the Foot. She has nothing but her older brother who's barely ever around. Somehow, fate leads her to discovering the turtles. Will they accept this stranger they just met, or push her away? Will this make her life better, worse? Involves canon material from movies, shows, and comics along with original content and characters.

18. Samantha Allan Park Ch18

Any references to TMNT or anything from popular media and culture is NOT MINE. I only own my OC's.

Chapter #18

*Friday July 4th, Dance Hall, Stage Area*
*Themes:
Mike Perry ft. Shy Martin-The Ocean
Cash Cash ft. Sofia Reyes-How To Love
Jonas Blue ft. RAYE-By Your Side*

The turtles were hiding in the walkway area above the rows and rows of seats that filled the auditorium of the dance hall. They watched as Sam was finishing up her final performance. Tonight was a big night for everyone who was part of the huge and competitive program since multiple scouts for various reasons were here. Some were here to recruit college students and offer scholarships so that they would perform with teams at their university, some were here to look for back up performers for upcoming musicals, music videos, commercials, etc. and some were even here to look for possible trainees for upcoming boy and/or girl singing and dancing groups. The turtles expected to see Sam in at least a few different performances, since there were tons of people that worked in different areas of the program and there were so many different genres of music that were used when the groups performed, but so far Sam had been in every performance that night. She went from performing the most elegant and poised dances in more slow passionate songs to then performing the most energetic dance moves in much more upbeat songs. She had solos, performed in duets, and even in various larger sized groups. She danced to all types of music with all types of people, and she never missed a beat once. Family and friends were allowed to attend the performances to cheer on their loved ones, and whenever the turtles heard it get silent during Sam's moments in the spotlight, the silence ended quickly as they cheered as loud as they could for their friend, which would instantly put a smile on Sam's face while she was on stage.

Once all the performances were officially over, the turtles quickly and quietly traveled to the spot in the building where Sam had instructed them to meet her. It took a while, but eventually Sam met up with them in the designated spot.
"Geez, what took so long?" Raph annoyingly asked.
"Sorry, I had hella scouts talking to me about various upcoming opportunities, including some for the university I hope to attend, so of course I wasn't passing up the opportunity to talk to them" Sam said with a huge smile on her face.
"You're fine Sam," Leo said as he nudged his brother's arm, resulting in Raph scowling at him, "so, where are we heading tonight?"
"Yeah, now that it's 10 o'clock" Raph said before he was shoved by Mikey, who he then chased after as well.
"Well, a lot of people are heading to specific spots of town for fireworks, so that means a lot of family owned shops are closed down, and that means we can go have fun" she said merrily.
Leo and Donnie smiled at her. "Well, lead the way" Leo said as he crouched down and cupped his hands in front of him so that he could give her a boost and help her exit through the vent-ways that he and his brothers had entered the building through above them. Donnie then followed behind Sam and Leo, and once the remaining two brothers realized they were alone, they also quickly exited the room as well.

As the group traveled along the roof top, Mikey thought that the direction they were heading in seemed familiar. Finally, he remembered why it seemed so familiar.
"Oh! Are we heading to the place you took me the first time we hung out?!" he called out.
Sam turned towards him and gave him a big smile as she nodded at him.
"Oh, so now we get to see where Sam and Mikey shared their rebellious phases together" Donnie teased.
"I don't know what you're talking about. We're good kids" Sam said with a comical expression.
"Totally, we look both ways before we cross the street" Mikey added with the same expression.
"And we eat all our vegetables"
"And we help old ladies with their groceries"
"And we complete all our homework." The two continued this back and forth conversation, playfully nudging each other as they talked.
"And we floss and brush twice a day"
"And we wash behind our ears"
"And you stole from us, hid from us, lied to us, and then snuck around behind our backs!" Raph said as he pushed his way past the two and then threw his arms around the duo.
Sam gave him an annoyed look. "Why you gotta bring up the past like that?"
"Ahhh because those were the good times where I got to kick your ass" he said with a smirk.
"Pshh, she kept up with you each time, you didn't kick anything" Mikey teased.
"Well, I can kick something right now" Raph said as he put Mikey in a headlock and the two, once again, went back to fighting.
Sam stared at the two and then shrugged. As she turned to catch up with the other two brothers she then smiled and took off running. "We're here!" she exclaimed. "Ohhh I've always wanted to do this with a group" she said excitedly.
"You do realize Mikey cares about skateboarding a million times more than the rest of us, right?" Donnie asked.
"Who said we were here for skateboarding?" she said with a grin. She and Donnie had already disabled and altered any and all security systems on the way, so now they could open the vents and climb on through.

The boys all followed Sam for a few minutes until finally she stopped, kicked out the vent cover below her, and then hopped down. The boys followed behind her and instantly huge smiles grew on all of their faces.
"This makes a lot more sense" Leo said as he looked at the laser tag equipment in front of him.
"Ahem! We have to watch the safety video first" Sam said as she pointed towards a small room off towards the side.
"Are you serious?" Raph asked.
"I want the full laser tag experience, and that includes learning about laser tag safety. It takes like five minutes, be a man and deal with it" she said sternly.
Raph rolled his eyes as his brothers all chuckled at Sam's comment. They all walked in and sat in the chairs in the small room. Leo sat in a chair on the far side of the room, and then Donnie sat, then Raph, and then Mikey left an open space for his friend and then he took a seat. Sam got the t.v. set up in the front of the room and then ran back to her seat. The video went on to explain the basics: the rules of the game, how the equipment was to be worn and used, how the course was set up, reasons why people shouldn't play, etc. The video then mentioned that those who think they might be pregnant shouldn't play. Raph smirked and leaned over towards Sam and whispered in her ear "any chance that you're pregnant?" Sam knew that Raph was purposefully trying to mess with her, which was something he did well, so she gave him a taste of his own medicine when she smiled and whispered back "nu-uh, how about you?" Both Mikey and Donnie heard this and they both slapped a hand to their mouths so that they wouldn't laugh out loud. Raph then slapped Sam and his brothers on the back of the head (secretly slapping Sam gentler than the other two), and Leo, who had missed whatever it was that was so funny, just rolled his eyes and decided he didn't even want to know. He then stood up once the video was over.

"Alright, so how do we decide on teams?"
"Me, Mikey, and Donnie vs. you and Raph" Sam said without hesitation.
"I like this grouping" Donnie chimed in.
"Wait, why do you get to pick the teams? Who made you the leader?" Raph asked.
"What, you two aren't man enough to defend yourselves on your own?" Sam asked with an evil grin.
Leo and Raph paused and then turned to face each other, both squinting their eyes in frustration.
"You know, I'm really starting to hate how she does that" Leo stated.
"Heh, welcome to the club" Raph replied.
"Great! So teams have been decided, let's suit up!"
The equipment consisted of shoulder pads that connected to a chest and back pad (each was a target) that had to be pulled over top the person's head, and then a buckle had to be secured at both the left and right sides. At the bottom of the front pad was a chord that connected to the gun that was then used to shoot at other targets.
Sam and Donnie were able to wear the regular sized gear since they were the thinnest out of their group, and they quickly put their green colored gear on. As they turned to meet back up with the others, they laughed as they saw the others struggling to get their gear on, since their larger muscle sized bodies were a bit too big to wear the regular sized equipment.
"Guys, they have suits that are meant for people on the larger side, you just have to look at the end of the rack" Sam said as she nodded her head towards the end of the row, where there were tons of suits that were meant for more fluffy or more muscular sized people.
The three paused and then fake laughed as they walked over towards the larger sized equipment, feeling silly for struggling from putting on the wrong sized equipment.

Once everyone was finally ready to go, the two teams walked over towards their sides of the room. Leo and Raph walked over towards the far side of the room with their orange colored gear, and Donnie, Mikey, and Sam stood near the entrance on their green side of the room. Suddenly, a voice come across the speaker which was part of the game, and it counted them down to get started. "3…2…1…BEEP" and the members from each group scattered.

Raph, expectedly, used a very fast paced approach and instantly starting running towards the opposing team and started shooting at them. Of course he and Mikey started rough housing and the two were on each other's backs, and right now Raph was winning, until he realized that his back pad kept lighting up. That's when he realized that someone had been shooting at him from afar. Raph turned and Mikey went to follow, but just then he ran out of ammo.
"*gasp* oh no! I'll be back!" he said as he ran off towards the charging station.
Meanwhile, Raph walked over towards where the shots had been coming from. He then found a dorky Sam slowly and awkwardly crawling on the ground.
"What kind of crawl is that? You look like a slug" he said as he gave her an odd look.
"Well, it was working up until now" Sam said with her eyes closed and a wide teeth bearing smile as she tried to quickly turn over onto her back, but Raph was already shooting at her. Unfortunately, he had used up the majority of his shots on Mikey, and by the time he realized he was out of ammo, Sam had already stood up. Raph retreated and was followed by Sam who continued to keep shooting at him. Just then, Sam's shoulder pads started lighting up. She looked up and saw Leo shooting at her from on top of the obstacles in the room.
"Hey that's cheating! You're not allowed to shoot from up there!" Sam called out with a smile.
Leo hopped down. "Then why was it okay for Donnie to do it?" he asked.
"Simple. Donnie's on my team" Sam said as she closed her eyes and gave him a large smile.
"Awww that's messed up" Leo said as he smiled and shook his head as he walked towards her, "and you're going to pay for that," he said as he pulled up the laser tag gun and began shooting at her.
Sam laughed as she took off running and Leo chased her, but then Michelangelo was now standing behind Leo and was shooting at him while Leo kept shooting at Sam.
Out of nowhere, Raph then did the most awkward roll any of them had ever seen. Mikey was laughing so hard that he was distracted and couldn't focus his aim, but luckily Donnie had joined back up with him and was helping to defend Sam.
"Dude, what the heck was that?" Leo asked with a laugh.
"I don't know! It's impossible for me to be a ninja with this gear" he laughed. Right after he said this, he noticed Sam sneaking away using her awkward snail crawl again. Raph smirked and then ducked back. He ran off and Leo ran behind him for a bit before splitting up and running off in a different direction. Now that Raph momentarily had no one behind him, he carefully creeped back over to where he saw Sam crawling off to. He then got down on his stomach and army crawled over to where Sam was hiding. When Sam saw the lights from her shoulder pads go off, she quickly turned around to see Raph crawling behind her.
"These are the benefits of real army crawls!" he shouted.
Just then, Donnie jumped on top of Raph and pinned him to the ground. "And this is what happens when the snail lures in the prey!" he said as he continued to shoot at Raph's chest pad.
Once his bullets ran out, Donnie, wide-eyed, ran off back towards his base, but just then the alarm went off to signal who had won that round.
"Winner…orange team."
"Ha! Who's the prey now?" Raph exclaimed as Donnie helped pull him off the ground.
"At least we didn't body slam into the ground each time we rolled" Donnie teased.
"Dude I seriously don't know how to function in this equipment" Raph said with a laugh.
"New round!" Sam exclaimed as she ran by the two, pulling on Donnie's arm in the process. "Come on! We need to strategize! Where's Mikey?!"
"Right hereeee!" he said as he practically skipped over towards his best friend. "Bruh, thanks for having my back at that last part. Sorry for not warning you about Raph, he snuck away from us."
"It's all good, we just need to come up with a counterattack in case he sneaks off again" Sam replied.
"Oh! I have a plan!" Donnie said and the three stood in a huddle.
Raph smiled as he walked back towards his side of the room. "Did we strategize at all last round?" Raph asked Leo when they met back up at the orange start point.
"Nope. We winged that whole thing, just went with the flow. But don't tell them that or else they'll lose their motivation to huddle up and work together, and they're having fun in their little group over there. This is like a videogame to Mikey, so he can actually keep up with what Donnie is saying, and Donnie is enjoying that he can actually strategize and plan with his teammates."
"Heh, well let's see how well their strategies work this round" Raph said as he held his hand up for a fist bump to which Leo completed.

"3…2…1…BEEP" and round two began. Leo and Raph both ran in opposite directions and hid behind the tall colorful posts along the wall, waiting for a good moment for them to strike. Just then, Leo saw Mikey run right past him, and Raph saw Donnie run right past him as well. Both older brothers jumped out and started shooting at their younger brothers, wide smiles growing on their faces while their scores grew higher and higher. The two were so distracted by their siblings that they completely forgot to look out for Sam until they saw the large orange post lighting up behind them back at their base. The two brothers then began quickly trailing back to their side of the room while still trying to defend themselves against their youngest brothers who now had large smiles forming on their own faces as they witnessed their plan quickly change which team had the higher score. Donnie chased after Raph, but Mikey stayed further back. Soon both Sam and Donnie ran out of ammo, but since they were all standing by the orange teams base, Raph and Leo quickly got a full round loaded and they began shooting at their opponents as the two ran away back towards their base. Now that the tables were turned, the two oldest were now chasing rather than defending, that was until Mikey leaped out of nowhere and began defending his teammates. He ran out of ammo quickly and also had to retreat back to his base, but by then Sam and Donnie had reloaded and were now chasing Leo and Raph again. Using this tactic, the green team eventually won the round and cheered after doing so.
"Yeahhhhhh! That's what I'm talking about!" Mikey shouted as he high fived his teammates.
"I'm surprised this worked as well as it did" Donnie said with a smile on his face. "Of course, we have to come up with something different this time or else they'll catch on and create a new tactic to stop us."
"Hmmmm, let's try something similar to what we just did and see if it works. How about one person run towards one of their opponents while the other two hang back. Then after a few seconds, a second person run out, but instead of running towards the other opponent, just stay on the same side as the first runner" Sam said.
"Ohhhh, so dupe them into thinking that we're doing the same thing as last time, but the first two draw them both to one side of the room, and then the third person runs down the opposite side once it's completely clear" Mikey replied.
"Bingo!" Sam said.
"Sounds good to me, I say Mikey should be the first runner and that he should run at Leo. No offense to Raph, but I feel like we can dupe him due to him wanting to jump in and be the hero. If he sees that Leo needs help and that a second runner runs towards him, I feel that Raph is more likely to quickly jump in and add brawn to the fight before standing back and thinking about the strategy behind the situation. Plus you and I will be much quicker at running up and past the others" Donnie added.
"Agreed. How about you?" Sam asked as she faced Mikey.
"Ditto" he replied with a smile.

"3…2…1…BEEP" and just like that, their plan was set into action. Leo and Raph both assumed the same positions as last time, and Mikey ran towards Leo on the left side of the room. He was instantly spotted and the two began firing shots at each other. Just as they expected, Raph stayed put and waited for someone to run towards him again, but like they planned, Sam ran along the left side towards Leo, and once he realized that his brother was about to be outnumbered, he started heading towards the middle of the room to help aide his brother. What the green team wasn't expecting was for Raph to plant himself in the middle of the room. He shot at Sam from much further than she had anticipated, and because of this, it was harder for Donnie to run past his older brother without getting shot at. Leo quickly picked up on this and also started heading towards the middle of the room, making it more difficult for any of the three members on the opposing team to run past them without taking a lot of damage along the way. Because of this, the orange team won this round, and the green team huddled up to come up with another new strategy.
"Alright, approaches where we try to charge one or two at a time aren't working" Mikey said with his hands on his hips.
"We need bait," Sam stated, "something that will separate those two from each other. It's hard getting past them when they're practically side by side, but if they're split up, then it's easier to score points against them."
"I have an idea" Donnie said. "We're going to do the same thing we just did, but I'm going to be the second runner. Sam, you'll know when to go out and help Mikey."
"Heh, this will be interesting" Sam said with a grin.

"3…2…1…BEEP" and that fast Mikey took off running towards Leo. He even saw Leo roll his eyes at the same tactic being used once again. Raph had already started walking towards the center of the room, and he thought he knew what to do when he saw Donnie charging towards him, but he was caught off guard when he saw Donnie randomly cut towards the right side. Raph turned on his heel, but Donnie was hiding very well. Raph carefully walked forward, but then Donnie leaped up and trailed back some, and then cut to the left. Raph quickly chased after Donnie, assuming he was heading back over towards Leo, but instead Donnie had was leading Raph all over the arena. By the time Raph had realized what his younger brother's strategy was, it was too late. "Winner, green team" the electronic speaker announced. Raph groaned as he heard the green team members cheering at the top of their lungs.
"Hey, what happened to you out there?" Leo asked as he met back up with Raph on their side of the room.
"Ahhh, I got so wrapped up in trailing Donnie that I didn't realize he was just leading me in circles" Raph replied groggily.
"They got us good that time. We were so used to them trying to sneak past us, we didn't expect them to them to bring us along with them as they snuck by. While you were distracted they went back to attacking me one at a time while another aimed for our base. This time we're both going to hang back more" Leo stated.
Raph nodded his head in response and soon the next round started.

The group played multiple rounds of laser tag, and each time a team lost, they figured out how to win the next round. The winning streak went back and forth so many times that both teams decided to end the night in a truce, each complimenting the other on the abilities they had demonstrated throughout the fun battle. It was a few minutes to midnight when they all decided to head back home.
"Man, laser tag is super fun!" Sam exclaimed as she jumped down from the vent opening on the top of the building.
"You and Donnie sure are a scary combination though," Raph teased. "Every time we thought we had you guys figured out, you always found a new way to sneak by us."
"Heyyyy, I helped strategize to!" Mikey moped. "I told you videogames and activities like this were my strong suit" he said as he crossed his arms and stood tall and proud.
"Surprisingly, Mikey did come up with a lot of creative ideas." Donnie reassured.
"You'd never know this was the same guy who didn't know the difference between there, their, and they're" Raph teased with a mocking smile.
"I kept thinking they all meant the same thing!"
"Or that pterodactyl started with the P sound" Leo said with a smirk.
"How was I supposed to know it was silent?!"
"Or that 1+3 equals B" Donnie said with a chuckle.
"I thought you were asking me a trick question!"
"Heh, funny hearing all this come from the guy who thought duct tape was spelled like the animal, the guy who has trouble saying 'prescription,' and the guy who accidentally blurted out that 10 times 2 equals 100" Sam said with a devilish sarcastic grin.
"HA!" Mikey shouted, mimicking his friends expression as he pointed at each of his older brothers.
"Ugh! Why does Sensei keep telling you things about us?" Raph said as he rubbed the side of his head.
"It's really tough to pronounce…" Leo mumbled, looking down and to the side.
"I was under pressure, and I was just thinking the wrong thing since I heard times two and so I thought of ten times ten, I knew the correct answer but I got ahead of myself because Sensei was testing me-" Donnie rambled on.
"I accidentally wrote it wrong on my paper, literally like one time! I didn't realize what I was doing until after Sensei collected our homework" Raph mumbled.
"Hehe, this is great" Mikey said as he looked over at his friend with a smile.
"You're welcome" she replied with a chuckle.
Just then some type of explosion went off in the air behind where the two were standing. It startled Sam so much that she literally jumped and would have stumbled backwards if Mikey hadn't grabbed her arm and helped her keep her balance.

*Theme
Begin-BTS/Jungkook
Lost My Way-BTS
Interlude:WINGS-BTS

The two turned around to see what it was that had made such a noise and the two were amused to see that there were some late night fireworks going off for the 4th of July.
"WHOA! They're so pretty!" Sam shouted. She walked over to the rail at the side of the roof and held on and she stood as close as the rail allowed for her to view the fireworks.
"You act like you're never seen fireworks before. The four of us haven't always had the best view, but even we have seen them" Mikey said as he walked over and stood next to his friend.
"I've seen them before, but it's been awhile since I've actually been outside and watched them go off. I loved watching them go off when I was a kid, but usually I just listen to them from my room and maybe later that night I would watch them on t.v." she stated as she continued to look up to the sky in awe.
The remaining brothers walked over and stood along the rail and also looked up in awe at the fireworks display. Like Mikey had stated, they knew what fireworks were and had watched them before, but it was always from a storm drain in the middle of a crowded street. This was their first times watching the fireworks go off without anything blocking their view, and the fact that they were so high up made the view look even more spectacular.
As the brothers watched the fireworks, they each thought the same thing to themselves. It had been a little over two months that Sam had been allowed to openly visit the lair whenever she wanted to, and that fast each of the brothers had shared incredibly fun and memorable moments with the girl that none of them ever thought they would based on how they met her.
Leo thought back to how he couldn't stand her sneaking around and how that could put Mikey and the rest of their family in danger, and how now they were using her crafty skills to help them when patrolling the city. Raph reflected on how much he just wanted to fight her whenever she mad a sly remark or did something that frustrated him and his brothers, whether it was really something frustrating or just something simple and stupid that ticked them off because it was her who did it, and how now he loved sparring with her and working out with her by his side. Donnie remembered all the times where Sam seemed to be a bad influence on Mikey, like when she was the reason his brother had lied to his face about what he was taking from his lab and why he had done so, and how now Sam's influence actually seemed to help Mikey think more logically in certain battle situations (not always, but there was some noticeable difference, but nothing major. Mikey would always be Mikey and nothing was ever going to change that) and how Sam was now allowed to walk right on into his lab and take whatever she wanted because of how comfortable the two had become. Mikey had always been kind to Sam, but he reminisced more so on how his brothers reacted when they saw Sam enter the lair now compared to the past. Whenever she entered the lair back in mid May, the room was silent and everyone seemed to disappear because no one but Mikey and Splinter wanted anything to do with Sam. Now however, when Sam entered the room each brother had to patiently wait their turn to complete whatever activity or hobby it was they completed with her.

And then there was Sam, who also was secretly thinking about all that had changed since she had been allowed to freely enter the lair. She was so grateful to each of the four turtles that was standing around her. Each one of them brought back a piece of her life that she had lost a few years ago. It was such a short time ago when her life had changed for the worst, yet it felt like it had been so much longer ago because of how much she had suffered alone. But that was the number one thing that had changed, she wasn't alone anymore. She had come to find out that each of the brothers were easy to talk to casually about literally anything, and she was always either training or watching sports or playing videogames or doing something with the brothers as a whole, and there were now tons of activities that she completed with either the brothers individually (meditating, exercising, coding, or skateboarding just to name a few) or in groups, like when she taught Leo and Raph to cook, or worked on the van with Donnie and Raph, or would organize different parts of the lair with Leo and Donnie (who both loved organization as much as life itself). Because of all of this, she was never truly alone anymore. She never worried about when Jay would finally get to come home so that she would have some company, she never cared about what all the other kids at school were doing while she was sitting around at home every night, and overall she was never upset anymore. Her saddened thoughts from lonely weekends had now turned into cheerful moments with her new friends on what had now become a daily basis.

Sam's presence affected the brothers as much as their influence had affected her. Each was shining light on something that the others life was missing. Sam had reunited with aspects of her life back that she had lost years ago, and the brothers now had bonds with someone who had similarities and interests with them that their other brothers didn't always understand. Everyone was happy with how their lives were going, and none of them wanted anything to change. But, as much as they loved how life was now, none of them knew that things would change much quicker than any of them had anticipated.

*Friday July 18th, (2 weeks later)*
*Theme:
BTS-Save Me*

Mikey was in the dojo with Sam. The other brothers had gone out earlier before the two had returned back from the lair, and until they were told they were needed, the two decided to continue with why they had left in the first place. It was now mid-July, and ever since mid-June Sam had been working on a project that might help her gain some 'strength' that would help her keep up with the turtles in ways that she physically could not on her own. She had been working on a battery powered glove with a vacuum powerful enough to move objects or even deflect them.

She had tested multiple different designs and she had finally found one that seemed to work. The glove extended all the way from her finger tips to a mid-point along her arm. From her wrist to her mid-arm on top was a blue plastic covering, which was connected to a black thick but leathery material underneath. Built into the plastic covering on top was an old phone she was able to buy cheap at a pawn shop. She had re-wired it and had basically created her own personal app on the phone that connected to and was used as a control panel for the lithium iron battery that powered the vacuum piece, since this battery would help keep the device working without the battery dying out to early on. This control panel could be used for things such as setting how much air she wanted to be either pulled in or pushed away from her. There was a blue plastic covering around her wrist, which also had some black leathered material webbed in the creases so that she could still move her wrist, that was a little thicker with wires inside that ran inside the thicker material and connected to a square piece at the bottom of her wrist that plugged into a rectangular piece that was attached to the black leathery material covering her palm. There were two buttons along the side of the rectangular piece. The top one was what made the air suck in, and the bottom one was what made air fly out. On this rectangular piece were two holes. Along with their corresponding buttons, the top hole was used for sucking in air, and the bottom hole was for pushing air away from her.

"Alright, what do you need me to do?" Mikey asked his friend, excited to finally test out the cool new gadget that Sam had made.
"For now just get something really small, something that's thin and light. That will be used for our first of many tests" she said as she started getting her glove set up.
Mikey found some empty water bottles in the recycling bin in the other room and brought them over. He placed one in the middle of the dojo and Sam stood so that she was about 20 yards away from it. She set the glove so that the most amount of air pressure would come out when she pressed the bottom button. Mikey made sure to stand off to the side, just to be safe, and he watched as his friend pulled her arm back, and pushed down on the button in her palm as she threw her arm forward. A tremendous amount of air was pushed forward and the empty bottle was thrown forward as it slammed into the wall.
Mikey's jaw dropped, and as he turned towards Sam, he saw that she had the exact same expression on her face.
"Whoa! That was awesome!" he exclaimed with a smile as he walked over towards her.
"I know. I hoped that it would work, but I never expected it to be so powerful on the first try, especially with the type of battery I'm using."
"You need to explain what that means" he said casually as he nodded his head.
Sam chuckled at his comment. "Most people use lithium ion batteries to power devices where they want huge amount of power, like the power my glove just displayed, but those batteries also die out very quickly. Knowing this, I decided to use a lithium iron battery, which in many ways is similar, but it can hold a charge for much longer and can sometimes be a bit weaker in how much power can be produced. The battery I'm using is typically used in most of today's smart phones, so I never expected it to exert such power as it just did…do you know what this means?" she asked as she turned towards her friend.
His curious face turned into one of excitement as the wheels in his head turned. "We get to keep flinging stuff around to test it out?"
"BINGO!" Sam shouted.
The two high fived and then searched throughout the lair for various objects of different sizes and weights that Sam could test her glove on.
They started with softer objects like blankets and pillows, and then slowly moved up to harder and larger objects. She moved pots and pans used for cooking, small desk lamps, and even chairs. The two then went out and found some construction materials they had set up at the various locations throughout the sewer that they had been fixing up. They brought back piles and piles of wooden boards and concrete bricks and then started to set them up for her to try out. They piled the boards and bricks, and every time they made the pile higher, she was still able to knock it over. They then started testing how far away Sam could stand from the objects and still be able to push them away. The dojo was about 50 yards in both width and length (the lair in total was quite a huge space for being buried underneath the city) and Sam was able to determine that she could move small and light objects from at least 50 yards away, and heavier objects from about 30 yards away (though she had to be much closer to the heavier objects if she wanted them to move greater distances). Eventually, Sam then tested her device in bringing objects towards her. She discovered that the distances for pushing objects away from her was the same as when pulling them towards her, and that light objects flew towards her extremely fast, but heavier objects traveled at a ridiculously slow pace, but they still moved towards her. The heavier objects moved a bit quicker when within that 30 yard radius though.
"Hey, can you help me set up some pillows and cushions along the opposite wall real quick?" Sam asked.
"Yeah sure, but why?" Mikey asked.
"I'm going to try some tests and see if I can push myself on my skateboard by solely using the power from the vacuum pack on my glove. But if something goes wrong, it would be nice to have something blocking me from ramming straight into the wall, hehe" she said as she nervously rubbed the back of her head.
"Tsk tsk, and you think that some pillows will be good enough to protect you?" Mikey asked teasingly, "we need a better barrier."
"And what would you suggest Mr. Cowabunga?" she asked, tilting her head and smiling.
"Helmet, knee and elbow pads, and shin and wrist guards, and thank you for asking Ms. Booyakasha" he said in a sarcastic tone.
"Ummm, do you have any of those items in my size?"
"I do actually. We don't really get rid of anything but rather just move things around. Sensei likes to keep things as keepsakes since we're kind of his only family, heh. So, we actually have a space where all our old clothes are, so stay here and I'll grab you some of our old gear."

He returned back within five minutes, and in another fifteen they had Sam all suited up. She stood on her skateboard and adjusted her device so that it was on a much lower setting. Sam was about 110 lbs, and on the lowest setting, the device had her moving forward at a walking speed. For the next half hour, she tested how fast she traveled as she slowly increased the speed of the air pushing out of the device each time she tested it out. She was actually able to take her tests to a pretty high setting before thinking that it would be too dangerous to continue testing the device in a confined area like this.

"Looks like all that time you spent creating the perfect design and thinking over every complication really worked" Mikey said with a smile.
"It did, and now this opens up even more opportunities for me to adjust this device" she replied with a beaming smile.
"How so?"
"For one, one day when we're not in a confined area like this, I can test how fast I can really travel with this device, and that can affect my movement on missions with you guys. I can also test to see if I can provide a gust of wind strong enough to deflect punches or even to cut into other objects. This is incredible! Man I wish my siblings could try this out, they would love something like this. They would joke around about how it would make them feel like they were in an action movie. Especially Jay, he still dreams of being an actor, so when I finally introduce this to him he'll act like he was stopping a criminal on a dangerous chase or something, haha" she said as she walked away and went to put her glove away, thinking that they had gone through enough tests for one night.

While Sam was walking away, Mikey couldn't stop thinking about the way Sam had just worded her sentence. "They would love…they would joke…they were in…"is how she spoke when talking about her siblings, but then she said "he still dreams…he'll act…" when talking about Jay. He and his brothers had talked about this before, and none of them knew why she spoke like this. He wondered if his friend even realized that she had been talking this way. He knew that it was wrong to question and invade someone's personal space, but it was killing him to know that his friend was hurting and that there was nothing he could do about it. He remembered how broken she was when she thought she saw Brian, and how she had cried the night she had a dream about him nights later. He wanted to ask her about her family, but he was terrified to do so. He didn't want to pry and make her think that she couldn't trust him and turn away from him instead. He took a deep breath and decided that he would carefully try to talk to her, but he would instantly back off if she made it clear that she didn't want to talk.

"Hey Sam, there's something I've been wanting to ask you, but I totally understand and respect if you don't want to talk to me about it." Mikey said to his friend nervously.
Sam had just put her glove away in her bag at the entry way into the dojo. She paused as she was zipping her bag up and then calmly responded to her friend. "Yeah sure, what's up?" she asked, afraid that she had done something to upset him.
"Why…why do you talk about Jay in the present tense…but refer to the rest of your family in the past tense?" he asked as he stared at her without looking away anywhere else, wanting to show that he truly cared and wasn't asking to be childish and just get the dirt on her past.
Sam stood up and paused. She thought back to what she had just said about her siblings and how they would react to testing out her device, and her eyebrows rose up in shock as she realized that Mikey was correct in what he had just asked her.
"Huh, I honestly didn't realize I was doing that. Do I do that a lot?"
"To be completely honest, you do that every time you ever talk about your siblings" Mikey said with a serious yet concerned expression.
She then gave him a small smile as she turned towards him. "You've been worried about that for a while now haven't you?"
"…not to be weird or anything, but yeah. I just want to know what happened so that I can support you, you know? Like if anything triggers bad memories, I know to help prevent those memories from coming back, stuff like that. I just want to help you, but I don't want you to tell me anything unless you feel 110% completely comfortable in doing so. I want you to feel like you can trust me with your life before you decide to-"
"Okay" Sam cut in.
"…what does that mean?" Mikey asked.
She gave him a soft smile. "It means that I trust you with my life and will tell you about my past. But if you tease me for being emotional-"
"I'd never do that, I swear. If anything ever makes you upset I promise I'll comfort you and never EVER tease you about it" he said with seriousness in his tone.
Sam really appreciated that her usually goofy friend could be so calm and reassuring. She loved that he could act mature and not just crack jokes all the time.
"*sigh* alright, I'll briefly start from the beginning. Because of past generations, my father and Jay's birth father grew up as best friends, and their wives were coincidentally friends before they met our fathers as well, so when they got married we all were like one big happy family. His parents were like and uncle and aunt to me, and mine to him, and all us kids saw each other as cousins because of how close our families were. Sadly, in 2006, his parents were involved in a car crash. There were some foot clan members who were speeding away from a robbery, and his parent's car was in the wrong place at the wrong time. They were hit head on and soon after, they lost their lives. I was 8 at that time, and because of his parents will, Brian, Jay, Amber, and Jamie were to be sent to live with us, and because of how much my parents cared for them and didn't want to lose them, they adopted all four of them, making them our newest families members by law. We protected them from what they had experienced, until two years later when my parents experienced the same fate. My parents were having a date night and as they were walking to their car, they were attacked and killed. Then it was the oldest siblings turn to protect and comfort the younger ones. It was very difficult for all of us, and to make it worse, there was a huge chance we were all going to be split up in foster homes because none of us had legal guardians anymore. Luckily, Jamie and Amber were legal adults aged 21 and 19, and though Jay was only 17 at the time, he was a freshman in college and could at least start finding work, and even Brian and Nick who were 15 and 14 were able to get some small part time jobs throughout the year, so as long as we were all financially stable, we were all able to live together in our house."
Sam paused and took a long deep breath.
"It was really difficult at first, but we were lucky enough to have eight of us to look after each other. We all had our special bonds with each and every one of our siblings, so no matter who was around at the time, we all knew how to take care of each other. Because of this, life slowly began to fall into a daily routine and we all started to grow more and more cheerful and full of life just like how we all used to be. Eventually everything was great between all of us…and then another two years passed, and everything fell apart. I've been telling you guys that my family is all scattered throughout the world because of various reasons and that I'm always alone because they're all gone. I've been lying and telling the truth at the same time. They're all gone, but not for the reasons I've been making you think of."

*Flashback: Summer of July 28th, 2010 around 6:30p.m. There's still some light from the sun set, but slowly it's getting darker and darker as night approaches.
Sam and her siblings are at a local park. Jamie is 23, Amber is 21, Jay is 19, Brian is 17, Nick is 16, Haley is 14, Sam is 12 and Chuck is 10.*

"I'm the highest!" Sam shouted.
"No way, I'm swinging the highest!" Chuck shouted back.
The two were competing to see who could swing the highest on the swings, their favorite thing to do when playing on the playground.
"Well I know I can jump further than you!" Sam shouted.
"Do that and see what happens!" Jay shouted as he pointed and glared at the two of them from the teeter totter he was on. "All I need is for you two to break your arms like your idiot brother did" he said as he shook his head at Brian.
"Oh come on! I was younger than them at the time. I just wanted to look cool like the older kids!" he exclaimed with a playful smile.
"You keep forgetting you're not cool though" Jamie teased as she fell down from the monkey bars, AGAIN.
"And you keep forgetting you have no muscle" Brian teased.
"Oh like you have any room to talk" Haley teased as she helped her older sister up. She and Jamie were weaker than the others. They were dancers and had great stamina and had some muscle, but nowhere near as much as the others. Even Sam and Chuck were able to win against them in select physical challenges.
"Brian you can't say a damn thing until you're over here with us" Amber said as she and Nick were once again competing to see who could complete the most pull-ups. The two loved to exercise and went to the gym often, so whenever they hung out like this they were always playfully competing against each other.
"Yeah….what she said…" Nick said, starting to reach his limit.
Sam laughed as Nick flopped down and fell to his knees, exaggerating how tired he truly was. She brought her swing to a stop and then ran over to where Brian and Jay were. The teeter totter had two seats on each side, and Sam climbed onto the seat in front of Brian.
"Who said you could drive?" He asked.
"It's okay I have a permit" she joked.
"Oh well then be my guest and drive" he said as he stood up and began to walk off, letting all of Jay's weight on the opposite side pull his side down and Sam up high in the air.
"Okay, okay! Please help me drive!" she exclaimed.
"Well if you insist on needing my help" he said as he shrugged his shoulders and climbed back onto the back seat.
"Hey, where's my assistant?" Jay called out as he turned his head towards Chuck, who had a huge smile on his face when he heard this and ran over and climbed onto the front seat in front of Jay. Jay held onto Chuck tightly, as did Brian to Sam, and both sides tried their best to get the other to go higher up into air, hence why the older siblings were holding onto the younger ones. This went on for a bit until the others called them over for other activities.
"Brian, come help me" Haley called over.
"I'm busy!"
"But I need help!" she called.
"Ugh, but then I need to get up" he groaned, causing laughs from his other teeter tottering siblings.
"Right because women love men who are scrawny and lazy" she teased as she rolled her eyes.
"Yeah, if they know how to cook! And hey! I have a decent amount of muscle" he said as he held up his arms and tightened his muscles.
"Then get over here and prove it by helping me!"
"*sigh* excuse me young lady," Brian said as he carefully stood up and helped Sam off her seat.
"Don't abandon your woman, bring her over to!" Haley called out with a smile.
"Gosh so bossy!" Brian joked as he then bent down so he could give Sam a piggy back ride over to the zip line seats. There were a few different types of zip lines at the park. The few that they were using had round seats that connected to a rope that traveled down, across, and slightly increased before doing the same in reverse. There were a few of these types of lines next to each other.
Sam and everyone else knew that Haley and Brian had a thing for each other, so she didn't want to interfere with their moment together. Everyone in the family knew about this and they had for a long time. Way back when both their parents were still around, the two were always very close, and their parents always teased that one day they would grow up and marry each other. It was awkward and difficult when they then became siblings, but everyone always knew that when the time came, they would deal with the situation and find a way to allow the two to be together. Brian and Haley would never do anything romantic in front of their siblings because they knew the situation was strange, but they had been on dates alone before, but everything was kept private about them, and everyone had respect towards one another about the situation. Still, the others would try to give the two some space if it didn't seem to odd, and right now seemed like one of those moments, so instead of having Brian push the two of them, Sam called someone else over.
"Hey Nickkkkkkkkk!"
"Yeah, yeah I'm heading over" the curly brown haired boy said.
The girls got on their seats, and the boys pulled them all the way back to the highest point the wires would go, and the two nodded towards each other before taking off. The two boys ran forward, but when it was time for them to push and let go, they both jumped onto the seats with the girl in front of them.
Nick and Sam both stood on their seat as Nick shouted "onward!" resulting in a huge smile coming from his younger sister. He swung an arm around his sister in a protective manner, since he wanted to keep her safe. Haley had been sitting on her seat, and Brian had jumped up and swung his legs around her so that they both were sitting on the seat as they swung down and forward, his arms tightly wrapped around her in a more romantic motion.
"Ohhhh I wanna try! Chuck come protect me!" Jamie called out.
Chuck ran over and stood behind his eldest sister who was sitting down. Jay followed behind and pushed the two forward as they swung forward on the zip line. Chuck held tightly onto Jamie's shoulders as the two zoomed across the zip line.
They all did this a few times as Jay and eventually Amber provided help to those who needed it, until they also wanted a turn.
"I need someone strong to push me" Amber said jokingly.
Haley and Jamie used all their might to help push Amber down and across the zip line, both cheering for themselves each time they completed this task.
"Oh Nick, please protect me on this perilous journey!" Brian said as he ran over and jumped onto the seat in front of Nick.
"Only if you protect me as well!" Nick exclaimed with a smile.
"Never let me go Jack!"
"I'll never let go!" and with that the two went down and swung on the zip line, laughing the entire way.
Jay also laughed as he was helping Sam and Chuck get set up on their seat. Sam sat down and Chuck stood up as Jay gave them a forceful push and the two took off.
"Wow, look at how brave these two are Amber. I think they should aide us on our travels" Jay said with a smile.
"I agree!" Amber said as she got off her seat and walked over to where the two youngest were.
Jay carefully helped Chuck off the seat as they walked down to the furthest zip line, and Sam sat down so that Amber could sit behind her. Jay then sat behind Chuck on their zip line and soon everyone else came over to help push the two groups, the girls pushing the girls and the boys pushing the boys.
Everyone was laughing and having such a good time, that nobody had noticed the shadowy figures that were slowly approaching, getting closer and closer to where the family was playing.

By the time Jay had noticed the movement and nudged Amber, it was too late. Just as they were helping the two youngest climb down from the seats, someone somewhere was shooting at them.
"Go! Split up into groups to confuse them!" Jay shouted as they all started running away.
As the siblings all began to scatter in groups, Sam had ended up close by to Jamie, and Nick and Chuck weren't too far away from where they were running as well. Jamie and Nick made sure to run behind and block their younger siblings from the bullets behind them, but in the midst of their retreat from the playground the two had been hit and collapsed.
"KEEP GOING!" they both yelled to the younger ones of their group. Sam and Chuck were too scared to think, and so they followed the instructions they were given as they heard footsteps getting closer to where they were standing. Sam turned around to see Nick and Jamie crawl under a car together to try and hide from the shooters while they were too injured to move.

Sam and Chuck continued to run, and after a few minutes and multiple turns from street to street, they were reunited with the others.
"What do we do?" Haley asked in a panic.
"It's easier for them to attack us if we're in one big group because we're just one giant shooting target. Let's move in two groups of three. Hide if you need to and stay with your group. Try to find help if that's possible" Jay instructed.
Everyone nodded and they split up, the girls staying together and the boys staying together.
As Sam ran with her sisters, she was in such a panic and was so scared that she didn't realize she wasn't picking up such simple details that stated that someone was nearby. As the girls turned down another corner and began to run forward, Amber called out to stop, but Sam had already taken to many steps forward. Haley pulled on Sam's arm and pulled Sam backwards, but in doing so, exposed herself to the kunai knife that was thrown at her. The knife dove deep into Haley's side as she cried out in pain. Sam reacted instantly and pulled out her tonfa from the bag she had forgotten was on her back until now. The adrenaline kicked in quickly and she swiftly knocked the other knives out of the man's hand and then kicked him in a sensitive spot, making him collapse to his knees as Sam punched him right in the nose, both giving him a bloody nose and knocking him out.
"We need to hide her, Sam help me" Amber called out.
Sam quickly ran back and the two girls put Haley's arms around them as they helped move her to an alley way where they helped keep her hidden behind a few dumpsters.
"Sam, you and Chuck went through all that martial arts training, so you need to stay here with Haley, got it?"
Sam slowly nodded her head as tears began to form in her eyes.
Amber cupped her sisters face in her hand, and then did the same to Haley with her other hand. "It's going to be okay," she said with a gentle smile, "we're going to get help and we're all going to be okay. I'm sure the boys will be back any minute now. Stay alert and don't come out unless you absolutely need to."
Just then, they heard footsteps getting closer.
Sam grabbed Amber's leg as she stood up.
"Where are you going?" Sam asked desperately with teary eyes.
"I'm going to lead them away from you two. Like I said, stay here and wait for help. I love you guys." And with that, Amber ran off, and seconds later, a handful of shadowy figures were chasing after her.

Sam was terrified. Yes she and Chuck had gone through multiple martial arts courses and trained with multiple weapons, but actually experiencing an attack like this was so very different from their training. You didn't see your siblings get hurt in training, you didn't see blood in training, and there weren't gun shots during training. She wanted to be at home in her bed with her siblings all sleeping in their designated rooms, she wanted to know where everyone was and that they were safe.
These thoughts ran through Sam's head for about ten minutes, and then suddenly, more gun shots were heard from off in the distance. She wondered why no one had called the police yet after hearing all these gun shots. She would have done so already if her phone hadn't died, and all her siblings either had the same dilemma or they had just left their phones at home to charge since they all were hanging out together that night.
"It's okay Haley, we're going to be okay," Sam whispered to her sister whom she was holding in her arms. "Why do you think the police aren't here yet...Haley?" Sam looked down at her sister and noticed how pale and blue her skin looked. Sam looked at her sisters wound and noticed that the knife was still in her side, and even though it hadn't been pulled out, her sister had still lost a lot of blood.
Sam wouldn't believe it, she would not believe that her sister had been lying here dead in her arms the entire time. She didn't check her sisters pulse because she knew that everything had to be okay, everything had to go back to the way it was before tonight, it had to. Things had to go back to normal because Sam couldn't handle another tragic loss, not again, not after everything had finally started to settle down and when everyone was beginning to live life full of happiness and cheer each day rather than filled with sorrow and anger from all that had happened to them.
"Haley, I'm going to go get help, but I'll be back okay? Please stay safe, you can't leave me…none of you can…" and Sam got her tonfa out and slowly began to exit the alley way. She walked along the wall of the shops that faced the street. She was constantly turning around and looking all over the place, making sure to watch out for anyone who was trying to pull a fast one on her. She felt like she was wondering around forever until finally she saw someone up ahead. As she got closer, she saw that someone was lying in the middle of the street. She looked over and hoped to see the body of one of their attackers, but Sam fell to her knees and wasn't able to control herself from sobbing out loud at what she saw. In front of her was Amber, lying in a puddle of blood that had come from three streams coming from her stomach, her eyes still wide open and filled with fear.
Sam held onto Ambers hand as all reasonable thoughts fled from her mind and as she cried aloud at the sight in front of her. Amber was so much more than just a sister, she was her role model, someone who made her feel comfortable and safe, like her own personal body guard. Amber had taught her how to stand up to others who belittled her tomboy ways, and Amber was a light that brought nothing but happiness and confident energy to anyone around her, and now she lie in front of her, covered in blood and the most scared expression on her face that Sam had ever seen.

"Hey you!" cried a voice. Sam turned back to see some men dressed in black with guns in their hands exiting another alley way that had been behind where she was now kneeling.
Adrenaline kicked in and Sam took off in the other direction. She sprinted down the road way in zig zag patterns and in between objects so that it would be harder for the men to hit her. She ran past someone standing in a tight space within the walls and stopped when she realized it was Chuck that she had just run past. As she was turning around, Chuck had already run out and had thrown shuriken stars at the three gun men. All three hit vital points on all the men and quickly they all collapsed.
Sam was so shaken up, both from fear and also in awe at what her brother had just done, that she couldn't comprehend how to say anything.
Chuck turned around and grabbed her hand. "Come on, we have to meet back up with the others." He lead the way as the two ran off for a couple of minutes and then turned left into a dimly lit alley way. The two kept walking until Chuck shoved them off to the side behind a dumpster. Sam gasped for air but her younger brother covered her mouth. She was so out of it that she hadn't realized that four more men dressed in black had been following them. She heard footsteps get closer to where the two were standing until suddenly she heard a crack and then a thud. She peered around the corner and saw Jay standing in front of the remaining three men. He had a long piece of wood that he must have found in a different alley way and had just used it to knock out the fourth man in black. Right after, Brian came running from the darker side of the path with his own wooden strip and also began swinging at the men in black. It was made obvious very quickly that the three men had had martial arts training behind them based on how they dodged each swing of the blocks with ease, and once they gained the momentum, they started attacking more than dodging. Sam bit her lip as she tried not to cry out loud as she saw her older brothers get punched and kicked. She could hear Chuck beginning to sob as well. Sam turned towards her younger brother and then held up one of her tonfa. Chuck gave a light nod and then held up three fingers…then two…then one…and the two ran out to avenge their brothers.

Sam and Chuck ran out and tossed some weapons to their brothers and then quickly pulled out more for them to use. Brian grabbed a hold of the sais and Jay snatched the bo staff that had been tossed to him and the two were able to start attacking along with blocking attacks much better than they were before. Sam quickly started attacking the man closest to her with her tonfa while Chuck quickly pulled out his nunchuks. Chuck was very skilled in using his sais, but his true calling was within his nunchuks. He was able to move as quickly as the men in black when using them, and Sam aiding him with her tonfa made them a tough pair to beat even for their young ages. The fight continued on with each person working hard to look for an opening. The fight was more difficult for Jay and Brian, but luckily they were the ones that helped the younger ones train the most, so they had learned a lot when fighting with the weapons they were given. Brian knew how to hold the sais so that they wouldn't cut him when he went to attack the enemy, and Jay knew how to use the bo to help maintain his balance while also looking for openings on when to attack, and he was lucky enough to find one. He quickly swung the bo staff and landed a solid hit to the man's head, but after all that Jay had been through that night, he was much weaker than he was when helping his siblings train, so the hit wasn't anywhere near as strong as it usually was. This left Jay wide open and as soon as he realized this, he was already out cold on the floor. Sam's face turned red from anger and she ran up and started attacking the man who had just hurt her brother with full force. The man kept stumbling backwards, obviously not expecting such stamina and strength from such a young child. Sam was filled with so much energy that she was able to swing her leg down and knock the man backwards, knocking him out as his head made a solid connection with the wall behind him.

While this fight was occurring, Brian was still fighting his opponent. Again, he wanted to attack with the energy he had, but because of the beating he just took he knew that he wouldn't be able to land a solid hit hard enough to defeat his opponent. Just then, the man knocked one of the sais out of his hand and it went flying into the dumpster. Just as the man ducked to cover himself from an attack, Brian saw Sam run back to aide Chuck. Sam jumped on the man from behind and used her tonfa to help suffocate him while Chuck punched him in the gut. His face turned blue and he collapsed. As Brian's opponent stood back up, he heard footsteps rush behind him. "I'll use the last of my energy for this" Brian thought as he quickly swiped his leg by the man's knees, making him fall backwards as Chuck quickly ran up, twisted his hips and brought his left leg up to connect his foot with the man's face.

Finally, all the men were now unconscious. They all let out a sigh of relief. Sam ran right over to Jay and saw how bloody and bruised his face was. "We…we have to move him" she choked out as she held onto her brothers hand while he lie unconscious on the ground. She prayed that this wasn't the same case as what happened to Haley, but more tears formed in her eyes as she noticed the similarities in how Jay looked now to how Haley looked when she was injured earlier.
"We'll hide him quickly, but then we need to keep movi-"
Just then, and it happened so quickly that no one heard or saw anything except the red dot that formed on Brian's forehead, he had been shot. Chuck instantly pulled out a shuriken star and threw it in the direction of where the shot was taken, and soon after a man fell down in front of them. Sam gasped as she stared at the man who had just fallen and then at Brian's body.
"NO!" Screamed Chuck.
Sam turned and saw that two more men in black had grabbed Chuck and knocked his weapons out of his hand. That fast, the tides had turned and they were all screwed.
"How? How are there so many of them? Why do more keep appearing?" These were Sam's thoughts as she stood up to run over to the men, but as she took her first step, she saw one bring out a shuriken star of his own. The second man held Chuck's arms out as the first man ripped the star down Chuck's forearms. Chuck clenched his fists, not wanting to cry out and give the satisfaction to the cruel men that they wanted, to hear their victim cry out in pain. Chuck looked up and saw Sam standing next to Jay's body. He could tell how broken she was and he knew that she would be next.
"I love you Sam" he choked out. And then his eyes slowly began to droop, and his face slowly lost its color, and his body soon went limp, and the men dropped him on the ground once they realized he was gone.
Sam just stood there. What should she do? There were yet again more men in front of her, and no matter where she ran she knew that more would appear.
These were her last thoughts as felt something slam against the back of her head, and then everything was silent as everything went dark.

Theme:
Ellie Goulding-Dead In The Water

When Sam woke up, she was in a white room. As her eyes adjusted to the brightness, she realized she was lying in a bed. She heard some beeping and slowly turned her head to see many different monitors around where she was laying down. She then went back to her original position when she felt a sharp twinge in the back of her head. She assumed she must have been in the hospital and she wondered where everyone else was. That's when she heard some footsteps coming into the room. She closed her eyes, thinking that maybe she could learn what happened after hearing the doctor's talk.
"…Alright, she seems to be okay. She should be waking up sometime soon based on these results" said a female voice.
"That's good news at least. It's still unbelievable and it makes me sick. How could someone harm such a loving family?" asked a male voice.
"Sadly this happens more than you would think. I hate to be gruesome rookie, but sadly this is something you have to get used to in this field."
"I know, I know. I just can't believe that she's the only one that survived out of all the ones they checked. Some of them might have had a slight chance if help had been sent. The bleeding could have been properly treated for the girl, and the bullets might have been able to be removed from the other two, but the rest they looked at were long gone and didn't stand a chance. I just…can't believe this actually happened. And that one kid was only 10!"
"It's insane. I can't imagine what was going through her head that night. Well, as horrible as it is, there's others like her and we need to help them in every way we can. Let's go check on the patient next door, she should be waking up soon as well…"

Sam opened her eyes after she heard the door close shut. She couldn't believe it. Everyone they checked at the crime scene was dead, she was the only survivor. What was she supposed to do? Whenever tragedy struck she always had her siblings, they were the reason she was able to live life now. Anytime anything made her upset, whether it be a serious matter or just something stupid, her siblings were the reason that she was able to get through it and see the light at the end of the tunnel. Now she was alone with no one to protect her and no one for her to protect. She felt lost, not knowing where she would go or what she would do without them. They were literally her entire life, everything she did was for them, everything she did was with them, and now they were all gone. She thought of what might happen to her now and tears filled her eyes as she thought of being sent to therapy where she would have to re-live everything she saw that night, and then being sent to a group home where she would always be alone after re-living the pain. That was another thing, how was she supposed to stop seeing them? Those images: Jamie and Nick under the cars covered in holes, Haley bleeding by the dumpster, Amber lying there stone cold in the street, Jay on the ground with so many blue and purple bruises and blood that you couldn't even tell what his skin color was, Brian's blank expression as the red dot formed on his head, and Chuck slowly fading away right in front of her eyes. She was wrong. She would never be alone, because she would never be able to get these images out of her head. Sam cried out as she realized that she wouldn't be living anymore, she would be existing. Existing with nothing but fear and terror consuming her thoughts every moment of every day.
"I don't want to live this way…I can't live this way…I don't want this, I want to be with them. I can't do this on my own" she thought to herself as she brought her knees up and wrapped her arms around them, hiding her face in this cocoon as she wailed out loud. She then noticed something out of the corner of her eye. On a nearby tray table was a small bottle. Her vision was so blurry from tears that she couldn't read the bottle, but she didn't care. She quickly popped open the top, poured a handful of pills, and then stared at them in her hand.
"I can't live without them, I can't live alone. Maybe if life was different…but now EVERYONE is gone. I'm only existing without them here, I want to join them and live again" Sam thought as she brought her hand to her mouth, and she tried to swallow the pills as she threw her head back.

"NO!" screamed a familiar voice. Sam felt two fingers shove their way deep into her mouth and then another hand tilt her head to the side as she threw up everything that just went into her body.
"WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!" the voice shouted at her.
Sam looked forward to see Jay standing in front of her with glassy and pissed off eyes.
"They said you were dead…" she mumbled as tears streamed down her cheeks, her hands shaking like crazy.
"WHO?!"
"The doctors just did. They said I was the only survivor of those they checked" she mumbled, barely being able to choke out the words.
"YEAH, BECAUSE THEY DIDN'T CHECK ME! I was awake when they got there so I told them to focus on you guys and that I would let them check me later! Jesus, so your first thought was to take my pain medication and fucking kill yourself?!"
Sam was so startled by everything that she kept choking from her sobs as she attempted to talk.
"I…I thought I was alone…I can't live alone. Not with the images…all the images of everyone…I couldn't live with that on my own…"
Jay pulled a chair up next to her. He took some deep breaths and made sure he was a bit calmer before talking to her. He held her hand and went slow as he talked.
"Don't EVER do something like that ever again. I felt the same way…but I stayed strong until I knew 110% what condition everyone was in. When the paramedics said you still had a chance to live, I cried and kept praying that you would make it. I need you Sam, I need you more now than ever, more than I've ever needed you before. This…this is worse than any situation we've ever been thrown into…"
"What happened?" Sam asked as she clenched her fists. "Why us? Why were there so many of them? Why didn't it ever end?"

"No…don't tell me" she said as she started shaking her head.
Jay really began to cry now, tears pouring from his black and purple bruised eyes.
"It was them again, the Foot Clan and the Purple Dragons. That's why it never stopped, they always have so many men nearby when they attack" Jay said as he began crying aloud with his sister.
Sam slammed her other fist down on the bed. "WHY?! WHY IS IT ALWAYS US? FIRST YOUR PARENTS, THEN MINE, AND NOW LITERALLY EVERYONE ELSE! WHY US JAY, WHY?!" she screamed as she cried.
He stood up and hugged his sister, for both of them. They clenched their fists as they hugged the other.
"I wish I knew…I wish I knew. But look at me" he said as he backed off and grabbed her face in his hands, "you can't leave me okay? You can't pull a stunt like that EVER AGAIN! I need you!" he said, choking on his sobs, "I need you so much Sam. We ALL have always needed ALL of our siblings in order to get through tough times, so now I need you even more than before. It's just us, so you can't leave me…you can't leave me…"
Sam gently tugged on her bothers arm and he crawled into the bed with her.
The two lay together, Jay on the left with his chin resting on the top of his sisters head. They looked like a father comforting his daughter the way they were holding each other. They needed each other to survive, and they both vowed that they would never let anything ever happen to the other one. They lay this way for the rest of the day except for when the doctors needed to check on them, not letting go of the other, both afraid that letting the other go might be the last time they saw each other, terrified of losing the other and being left all alone in this world.

*Present day, back in the dojo*

Sam took a deep breath in, and then out. This was the first time in a long while that she had relived that entire night, and she was a bit shocked at herself that she hadn't even shed one tear. At one time she couldn't speak a single word before tears came pouring from her eyes, but she had just told the entire tragic story without even the slightest sob sneaking out. She had come a long way since that night, and this was one example of how. She looked back up at Mikey and was startled by the expression on his face.
"How…how were you able to hide that for so long? How do you just carry that around with you? Like…holy shit…" he said. Sam had never heard him talk in such a serious tone, or with such a serious expression. His eyes were wide, but they were filled with sorrow. His body was stiff yet there was still a slight tremble when he spoke.
"It's been four years, you learn to grow with the changes, and you learn how to deal with them. It wasn't easy and it never will be, but there are things that help make it better, things that help you survive and find the will to move on" Sam replied.
"Just…wow. Everything makes sense now though. The past and present tense in your speech now makes sense, and even things like why you won't even try to fight with nunchuks makes sense."
"Yeah," she said with a small smile as she remembered her brother, "his sais were his original weapon of choice, but he was even more incredible when he had his nunchuks in his hands. I was never able to look at them the same after he passed away, so I haven't fought with them in a long time, and I never plan to. That was his number one weapon and at times it seemed they were meant for him to fight with, I could never try to top that and I don't ever want to. That's a memory of him I never want to change."
Mikey nodded his head. "I would have loved to have met him, and if he's like you then I would have loved to spar with him" he said with a small comforting smile. "The reasons for all your training makes sense now as well. I'm assuming you took even more classes after that night?"
Sam nodded. "After we all learned that both the Allan's and Park's had been killed by the Foot, Chuck and I wanted to learn how to defend ourselves if a time came where we needed to do so. Obviously our training helped some, but it wasn't enough mentally or physically. I made it clear to Jay that more and various types of training were needed if I wanted to truly start to move past that night. I couldn't fall asleep for the longest time because I was terrified that soldiers would sneak in my room late in the middle of the night and attack us again."
"There's only one thing I don't understand, do you mind me asking?" he asked gently.
"Of course not, ask away."
"You've said multiple times that you don't really have any friends and that those who talk to you only do so when you're part of that activity or if they need something, was that night one of the reasons you've been so isolated?"
"Yeah. Everyone looked at me differently after that night. No one tried to comfort me, no one even said hi to me. It was made very clear early on that besides for Jay's support, I would have to deal with my daily struggles all by myself. I basically spent each day all alone, and it was worse when Jay had to start working more so that he could financially support the two of us."
Sam noticed that Mikey's eyes had become glassy and that he kept staring at the floor rather than at her face. He finally looked back at her as he began to speak.
"I'm so sorry that you had to go through all of that. I'm sorry I didn't know you then, because I never would have let you go through any of that by yourself ever. No one should ever experience what you went through that night, and the fact that only one person for a limited time was there for you at your weakest moment is just…" he cupped his mouth and looked off to the side for a few seconds, taking the time to collect himself, "it's just so difficult for me to wrap my head around the fact that someone as kind and energetic as you was left alone in so many ways like that."
Sam smiled at him. "What you don't realize is that I haven't acted that way in a long, long time. I've smiled and laughed more in the past few months since I met you guys than I have in the past four years of my life. Most of the time when I did smile it was forced, and most of my social interaction came from online chat rooms since I spent every night at home. I became so distant from people that I cared for no one but myself, and Jay of course, and after becoming much stronger in multiple different ways I began looking for dangerous and usually illegal activities to make me feel alive again."
"Like jumping from rooftop to rooftop and finding places you could sneak into after hours and how to hack their security systems in order to do so?" Mikey asked as he raised his eyebrows and realized that this now made sense as well.
"Exactly those things, and a lot more just like them. But it's a good thing that I ended up that way."
"Really?"
"Yup!" she said with a smile as their conversation became a bit more relaxed and casual again, yet still serious and emotional.
"Please explain" Mikey replied, a smile on his face for the exact same reason.
"Because my sneaky and adrenaline filled curiosity lead me to this place, and then I met all of you, and you all are the reason I've changed so much. I've rediscovered parts of me that I haven't seen in a long time, and you've all allowed me to have interactions that I haven't had in years. I've been able to look back on memories of my family with happiness rather than with sorrow, and I laugh when I think back to my past rather than cry. I mean I still cry sometimes, but nowhere near as much as I used to. My life has changed for the better in ways I never thought it ever would, so THANKS GUYS FOR ALLOWING ME TO KEEP VISITING THE LAIR!" Sam shouted as she turned her head towards the giant circular entry ways into the dojo.
There was a pause…and then Leo, Raph, and Donnie slowly poked their heads around the sides of the walls and slowly walked in. Each of them was silent and felt guilty for listening in on the conversation.
"Sorry" they all said simultaneously before giving each other odd looks for their oddly synced speech.
Sam smiled at the boys. "It's okay, I wouldn't have kept telling the story if I didn't want to. It felt like the right time to tell the entire truth. You guys never pressured me into saying anything, even though at times it was obvious you wanted to know."
This made the boys react in embarrassed manners: rubbing the back of their heads, looking off to the side, rocking on their feet, etc.
"It was a bit of a rocky start, but you guys let me get to know you, and you all did the same thing in return. I haven't felt this comfortable with other people in a long while, and telling me about the past and present tense thing made me realize that I had already been giving you guys personal hints about my past that I hadn't even realized. So thanks, for knowing me better than myself" she said with a small smile.
"Heh, thanks for sneaking into our home" Mikey teased.
"And thank you for eventually letting that go and not seeing me as the thief anymore" Sam said with an awkward smile.
"That's what family does, forgive each other and move on" Raph said with a small smile.
"I mean hey, you're practically our sister" Leo said before turning to walk away.
"…hey, you knew you said that that one night, didn't you?!" Sam said as she ran over to him, remembering the night he accidentally called her his sister as they were leaving the parking garage after they had all snuck into the latest Foot headquarters building and quarreled with the Mutanimals.
"I don't know what you're talking about" Leo said playfully as he shrugged.
"Yeah, yeah. Oh Dorkatello! Did you see my latest invention before you guys began your eavesdropping?" she teased.
Donnie was still rubbing his one hand down his face while holding his glasses in the other hand, trying not to let anyone know he had teared up a small bit when listening to Sam's story (none of the three would ever admit it, but they had all teared up some). "All I saw was you putting something into your bag and then right after that you started talking to Mikey."
"Oh then I need to show you now!" Sam said as she ran over to her bag.

And that fast things were back to normal in the lair. Sam never in a million years thought she would be able to relive that night in the way she just had. She was able to casually reflect on her past and in a comfortable setting rather than a forced therapeutic one. Once again her new family members helped change her in a way she never thought possible, and she loved all of them, but Mikey was the number one reason she had changed as much as she had. He always knew what she needed in order to feel better and he knew how to help her open up on her own terms. He was gentle and kind with her and on multiple occasions showed that he truly cared about her and wanted to know about her and her life so that the two could continue to grow closer to each other. He also helped his brothers see her the way he did and because of this she was able to open up to so many more people and experience things she hadn't in so long, and this is what lead her to not having to but WANTING to tell them about her past. She never thought she would want more people to know about her past after the way everyone else had abandoned her after learning about the tragedy that occurred, yet here she was answering questions and reflecting on her past with a new and more loving and positive mindset, remembering the love and happiness her siblings brought her rather than thinking of their last gruesome moments. Her new family was the key reason that she was living again, they were the main reason she WANTED to live, and she prayed that nothing would ever come between her and her newest family members. For four years she had been existing, but for these past few months, she had felt finally felt what it was like to live again.