Any references to TMNT or anything from popular media and culture is NOT MINE. I only own my OC's. Any references to "TMNT Out of the Shadows" DO NOT BELONG TO ME. Only my additions that I came up with myself belong to me. Anything from the films or other series ARE NOT MINE, only my OC's and my ideas that I have added onto the story FOR FUN.
Thank you.

Chapter #35

*Early morning Sunday June 7th, 2015. Just returning to the lair at 1a.m.*

As soon as it was confirmed that Sam was alright, everything went silent. Like, as incredibly super awkwardly dead silent as silent could get. And the worst part, everyone's body language displayed that there was A LOT that they all wanted to say, but no one wanted to start the verbal war that was brewing. So many thoughts and feelings were on everyone's mind: sadness, anger, fear, betrayal. Sam was just hoping that maybe this silence would allow things to calm down some before everyone started sharing how they felt, but sadly that wasn't the case. As soon as Splinter's voice was heard, the war begun. Hearing their father's terrified and shaken voice, the boys were officially set off.

Splinter turned around as soon as he sensed his sons enter the room.
"It is all over the police scanner. They're hunting you! What happened up there?"
Leo and Raph were now fuming as they stormed in side by side. Sam had been sulking in the back next to Michelangelo as the two slowly made their way into the lair behind a nervously storming Donatello.
"Tell him Raph. Tell him how you broke rent and got us all exposed!" Leo announced as he snatched the canister from Raph and held it up to their father as he passed by. "And for the most selfish of reasons."
Sam felt guilt as Raph was blamed for being the sole reason the events that had taken place that night went so sour.
Raph rolled his eyes and tried to defend his case.
"The Foot were gonna get their hands on it!" he shouted in a frustrated manner, his face revealing how much he was trying to justify all that had gone wrong.
"You didn't know that!"
"We had a plan where we wouldn't have gotten caught…" Sam thought to herself…at least she thought she thought it to herself.
Leo and Raph both stopped walking and slowly turned around to face Sam who had been walking slowly behind the rest of the group. Leo looked furious while Raph looked worried, not wanting Sam to deal with the same bs arguments that he knew he would receive from Leo. Donnie stared at her in shock while Mikey looked off into the distance, trapped in his own depressed thoughts.
"What?" Leo asked in a low but furious voice.
Sam paused as she realized that she had verbally shared her thoughts by accident. She sighed, realizing that there was no way of escaping this one.
"Raph didn't come up with this plan alone. I thought Shredder was planning on bringing his soldiers with him to the museum, so I thought tonight was a good time to retrieve the ooze from-"
"So you took advantage of Raph?" Leo interrupted.
Sam just stood there with a blank expression except for her raised brows.
"I did what now?"
Leo narrowed his eyes. "So you knew that Raph was upset about not getting to be human and so you used him for your own reasons to get the ooze."
Sam bit her lip to prevent herself from saying something nasty.
"The only thing I took advantage of was a good opportunity to take back something that should have already been in our hands."
Donnie now nervously stormed over and into the conversation as he mildly panicked with his hands behind his back.
"But your plan included stealing from police headquarters! When stealing from police headquarters there's no scenario where you wouldn't get caught!" he announced.
"Everything would have been fine if the soldiers had been where I thought they'd be" Sam said sternly as she fought not to glare at Donnie.
Raph on the other hand was already in Donnie's face as he shouted at him "well maybe none of this would have been an issue if you hadn't lied to your own flesh and blood!"
Now it was Donnie's eyes who were glued to the ground as a wave of guilt had washed over him. Raph was right, maybe if he had told the group as a whole then maybe the discussion of the ooze would have ended differently and the group being split up would never have happened. His actions could have played a role in changing what had happened tonight, and he felt terrible knowing that his excitement of his earlier discovery had distracted him from thinking through every scenario of how he should have handled sharing the news, and this crushed him.

Donnie slowly walked away and into his lab after his older brother had shouted at him.
Then it was Leo's turn to shout once again.
"Just like how you lied to April? And now she's taking the fall for your mess" Leo said in a harsh tone as he faced Raph.
Raph paused as his older brother's words sank in. He HATED to admit that Leo was right, and he would spend days defending his decision to retrieve the ooze the way they had if he needed to, but he knew this statement about April was true. He had gotten her involved in something she didn't know the full story about, and now she was suffering because of his decisions. Raph rolled his eyes and sighed as he walked away towards the direction of his room.

Sam sighed as she stood outside Donnie's lab. She wasn't sure which brother she should go talk to first since both had made it clear how hurt they were because of their decisions, but her decision was made up after she saw her best friend sit down and mutter "You should have seen the looks on their faces…"
Leo was watching over his youngest brother, though there was still a scowl on his face. Splinter however was listening with concern, just as Sam was.
"They weren't just scared. There was…actual hate" Mikey stated as he looked up at his father with his scared and saddened bright blue eyes.
Sam looked up and noticed Leo shake his head and walk out of the room as he headed towards the exit tunnel near the living room.
Splinter put his hand on Mikey's shoulder.
"It is alright my son. People fear what they do not understand" he said in a sympathetic tone.
Splinter then quickly walked away to chase after his oldest son before he could escape the lair.
Sam was still standing outside the closed off lab as she stared at her best friend. She couldn't stand to see him this way, and it crushed her to know that he had heard what that officer said. He called them monsters. What the hell did he know? In Sam's eyes, someone like Shredder was a monster, yet the officer had treated Mikey and the others as if they were the same as Shredder. It disgusted her. It enraged her. But she didn't want to cause another scene (whatever the hell that first one back at headquarters even was) and so she took a deep breath and calmed herself. She knew that if she wanted to cheer up her best friend, then she would have to be calm and cheery as well.

Sam walked over and crouched down in front of Mikey who was now slumped against the raised pipe in the middle of the room.
"Hey" she said softly.
The only reaction Mikey responded with was moving his eyes up so that he could acknowledge her presence and muttering again that "they called us monsters…", and then he returned to looking down at the ground.
"Man, this is worse than I thought. Come one Sam, think of something! Hell I'll probably start crying if I see him like this any longer. Prove he's better than what he thinks he is!"
That's when an idea popped into her head.
"Hey, so in my Psychology class we learned some cools things like reading peoples futures through their palms and things like that. Mind if I read your palm and see what it says about you?" she asked gently and with a small smile.
Mikey sighed. "Yeah. Go for it" he said as he still looked down at the ground.
Sam quickly took his right hand and removed the bandages wraps and orange wires he wore so that his hand was naked. She then placed her left hand under his to keep it steady and then used her fingers on her right hand to trace over his palm.
"You see, this one is your heart line. And there's your life line. That one's your fate line, and right there is your head line…Hmm, that's weird" Sam hummed.
"What's wrong?" Mikey said, now in a more slightly panicked state as he stared at her with wide eyes.
Sam looked at Mikey's palm questioningly as she moved his hand all around.
"I learned how to search for all different types of signs…but I don't see any monster lines" she said as she looked up at him with a smile.
Mikey's frantic expression then faded into a calmed one, and for the first time in what felt like hours, he began to smile. He felt so lucky to know that this girl was his best friend and that she always knew what to say to cheer him up.
"Thanks Sam" he said as he placed both her hands in his.
Sam nodded. "I know, I'm freaking awesome. You don't have to tell me" Sam teased.
This got Mikey laughing as he then pulled her forward for a hug.

"I don't know what to do Master Splinter! Donnie's nose is in his computer, Raph's brains are in his biceps, and Mikey's head's in the clouds! I can't get them all on the same page, to think with one mind!" Leo shouted to his father (not knowing he had an audience) from the other room.

Sam and Mikey sighed simultaneously.
"Doesn't sound like he's calmed down yet" Donnie said as he reappeared from his lab and then sat down at his computer station.
Sam turned around to face Donnie, although he couldn't see her since he was facing his screens.
"Hey D. You okay?"
Donnie sighed. "I'll be fine. I've had worse arguments with my brothers before. This is minor compared to those." He then paused and spun his chair around. "Look, Mikey-"
"It's fine dude" Mikey interrupted as he shook his head. "Leo gave you an order and you followed it. You were in a tough spot between doing what he told you to do and hiding from me and Raph. It would have been a tough choice for me too."
Donnie was finally able to form a smile as well.
"Thanks Mikey. Means a lot."
Sam could sense that these two were already starting to cheer up some and return to normal. Splinter was calming Leo, so that just left Raph.
"Hey, I'm gonna go see how dauntless is doing" Sam said as she stood up and placed her hand on Mikey's shoulder.
Mikey nodded as he continued to sit, deciding that it was best if he and Donnie stayed where they were now that they were helping each other cool off.

Sam walked down the hall and saw that Raph's door was cracked. She knocked, but got no response, so she slowly pushed the door open and looked away at first (providing privacy if it was needed) and when she heard nothing, she looked up at saw Raph just lying on his back on his bed.
Sam walked in and shut the door behind her.
"What's on your mind?" Sam asked as she lay down at the end of his bed since there was enough space for her to do so.
"I fucked up big time" Raph grumbled as he squeezed a hand grip weight in his right hand.
"No, WE fucked up big time. You weren't the only one who came up with that plan" Sam stated as she basically curled up in the fetal position as her knees came up to her chest. Somehow this had always been her most comfortable sleeping position.
"…you didn't have to do that you know…" Raph grumbled.
"Do what?"
"Stick up for me back there. I was the one that was pushing Leo over his limits, you could have just let the blame fall on me. I'm the one that started the whole argument once I figured out what the purple ooze could do."
Sam nodded while she continued to lay down.
"You had every right to be upset, though I think Leo would have handled things better if you hadn't come charging at him the way you did…well technically yesterday night since its Sunday morning now. But I had my motives for joining you in creating a plan in secret rather than talking you out of it. I'm to blame just as much as you are."
Raph grunted as he sat up.
"But you don't deserve to have Leo yelling at you the way he does to us. He's been strict with you but he never talks to you like that" Raph stated in a serious and angered tone.
Sam gave a small smile with a chuckle.
"He's my brother too now Raph, it's going to happen. You know that when he goes off like that it's just because he cares. He tried to make decisions to protect everyone else, he just doesn't realize that sometimes those decisions do more harm than good."
Raph closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
"I know. Sadly that's something he and I have in common. I know I'm more sensitive like Mikey, but Leo's always been like me and been rough in showing the ways he cares. Heh, knowing him he probably hates how he ended our argument earlier-"
"Yesterday, its tomorrow now."
Raph rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Point is, he's probably killing himself that those were his ending words. But, it'll pass. Things will be fine. We've all had worse fights before. Right now I'm more worried about April than anything. I can't believe we got her locked up. She's not like me and my brothers. She has a life outside of these sewers and we could have potentially just stolen that life from her…" he said as his voice got lower as he remembered seeing April and Casey put their hands behind their heads and kneel onto the ground, both put in a situation where the brothers could do nothing but run away even though their human friends were in a time of need.
Sam clutched her hands around her knees tighter.
"Yeah, I feel horrible about that too. But I know we'll make it right somehow. The good thing is that she's not alone. At least she has Casey with her, and I'm sure he'll do everything he can to help her out."
Raph formed a small smile on his face.
"I gotta admit, the guys not as bad as I thought. He had the guts to work with us and risk his job, and then he risked that and his life when he came in to help defend us. He's alright."
As Raph thought about April and Casey defending his family from the cops, he then thought of Mikey's sorrow filled words when the cop called them all monsters, and this then lead him to thinking about when he had yelled at Donnie once they returned home. Raph felt worse about yelling at Donnie. Donatello was interesting when it came to loud aggressive verbal arguments. He had no trouble breaking up others arguing, and depending on the situation he would even loudly share his own thoughts on the topic, but as soon as someone came blaring at him, he would snap. He would either sulk and hide away like a young child, or he would become enraged and would switch over from good cop to bad cop and would go all out to the point he was like a whole new person. Strong verbal arguments always sent him far left or far right, never onto a middle ground, and Raph knew that this time Donnie had felt the more depressed side of the spectrum.
"How are Donnie and Mikey doing?" Raph asked timidly.
Sam then began to smile again. She found it interesting how Raph would show his emotions in such an aggressive manner, but then would switch over to this more soft and concerned character who was afraid he had been too tough on his brothers.
"Don't worry. I talked to Mikey and he's feeling better, and once Donnie was able to go off on his own for a bit, he calmed himself down as well. Don and Mikey were talking about how they were put in some tough spots of what was and wasn't considered betrayal."
Raph nodded.
"I know it's not Donnie's fault, Leo put him in a tough spot. I shouldn't have yelled at him like that."
Sam gently kicked Raph's leg from where she was lying down.
"Stop being so harsh on yourself. I've seen you act way more over the top towards him, and the fact that he calmed himself so quickly means that it didn't bother him that much. He's as tough as the rest of you, both the youngest are. They also don't dread about things as much as you and Leo, but I also think that's because their minds already wander back to other important things before they can continue to think dreadful thoughts. Maybe it's an older brother vs younger brother thing. But point being, they're both okay."
Raph smiled.
"Thanks Sam, for helping Mikey…and for me I guess" Raph grumbled towards the end, pretending to put on his 'I don't care' act to make himself look tougher.
Sam pursed her lips as she looked up at him.
"Great apology. Always been one of your best qualities" she stated sarcastically.
Raph just playfully waved her away as he now got a good look as how she was lying down.
"How the heck is that comfortable for you?" he said, nudging her with his foot.
"There's something about this position that is incredibly soothing" Sam said as she held herself tight like she was cuddling herself.
Raph then shifted out of the bed and began to walk over towards the door.
"Guess I should still apologize for yelling at Don and for putting Mikey in the situation that I did."
"Guys! I got something!" Donnie's voice echoed as Raph had just opened up his bedroom door.
"Or I guess I can tell them later."
"Good call" Sam said as she kicked her legs up and literally rolled backwards out of the bed and then rushed behind Raph as the two made their way back into the central part of the lair.

Leo had just rushed over and was now standing to the right of Donnie, and Mikey had stood up and was now standing to Donnie's left. Raph walked over so that he was standing next to Leo's left, and then Sam stood between Raph and Mikey.
"Talk to me Donnie" Leo started.
"The computer has pinpointed the isotopic signature from the purple ooze. I can track Bebop and Rocksteady's exact coordinates."
He continued to type away on his keyboard and turn dials as he talked.
"Got it! They're at 36,000 feet traveling at 490 knots!" Donnie announced.
"Whoaaaa, they've achieved the power of flight!" Mikey stated as he then crossed his arms and nodded his head. "Good for them you know."
Raph and Sam looked at each other with pursed lips as they nodded their heads, impressed that Mikey was actually able to put that information together and understand that this meant that Bebop and Rocksteady were in the air. Leo and Donnie were both trying to contain laughs and maintain their small grins as they also shared a look with each other.
"They're on a plane Mikey."
"…Oh" Mikey said in defeat, though receiving a pat on the back from Sam, which then brought his smile back.
"It looks like our mutant buddies are heading to Brazil."
"How do we get there?" Leo asked.
"We sneak onto the next cargo plane from JFK" Donnie replied.

Leo sensed eyes on him as he turned and confirmed this sense as he saw Sam and Mikey staring at him, as if they were waiting for an answer to something. That's when he realized they were asking for permission to let Sam join them.
"No way" he stated bluntly.
"But!-"
"We need her" Donnie stated, also bluntly.
All heads turned towards Donnie in shock of him going against Leo's orders, especially after all they had witnessed after one brother had disobeyed their orders.
Leo shook his head rapidly.
"Donnie no, it's too-"
"If things go sour in the air then we'll need her powers Leo. Sam can help keep us safe in the air if we need it."
Leo paused as he thought over Donnie's words. He thought about the small chance that the plane crashed and something like their parachutes malfunctioning happened, Sam could literally be the factor that determines their life or death. As slight as these chances may have been, they were chances that might need Sam to use her powers to help glide them downwards from that high up.
Leo sighed.
"Alright Sam. Go with Donnie to gear up and-"
"YESSSSS! Awwww this is gonna be awesome!" Sam said as she was mid-way in giving an excited Mikey a high-five.
"ONLY if you contact Jay first" Leo and Raph said simultaneously.
"Ughhh alright, alright" Sam groaned as she walked towards the dojo to gain some privacy for her call.
Donnie then searched in his lab for all the materials the group would need in case of any emergencies that might occur while they were on the plane.
Meanwhile, Mikey was watching as Leo and Raph were looking downwards in worry.
"Aww relax bro's! Sam will be fine!" Mikey reassured, though he didn't get the reaction back that he was expecting.
"She's your best friend, I thought you'd care more about making sure she makes cautious and careful choices" Leo said sternly.
Mikey pursed his lips.
"I'm always cautious dude. But I can't watch over her if she's not by my side. She's safer with us than running off by herself."
"Usually I'd agree, but this is different" Raph stated gruffly.
"That's why we have all this" Donnie said as he now walked out of the lab and laid a bunch of different materials down on the table in front of where all his computers were. "Before we leave we need to make sure all of us know how to use these materials. These will be used for safety precautions."
Donnie had all types of parachutes and cables and all sorts of materials laid on the table.
"Then let's start the demonstrations now!" Sam announced as she jogged back into the room.
"What did Jay say?" Donnie asked.
"You're all his clones" Sam scowled.
"Better believe it. Now what did he say?" Donnie pushed.
"He said to be careful and to contact him if anything happens okay?" Sam said rather quickly. "Now let's get things moving! We have bad guys to catch and…I don't really know anything else except that. I also just realized I have no idea why they're in Brazil…why are we going to Brazil?" Sam asked in a childish tone.
"Oh, right. Sorry, I just realized that only Leo and I know about this. At the museum we discovered this huge boulder like object that had been tampered with. The material of the rock contained neutronium which can be used to rupture the space time continuum and, if Shredder wanted to, he could open a portal to another dimension."
Sam's eyes went wide.
"I'm assuming there's something in Brazil that aides in this portal being opened?"
"We don't know for sure, but regardless, they went to Brazil to retrieve something, and we need to intercept their pick-up."
"Then let's get going already" Raph urged.

Donnie then showed the rest of the group how to attach different pieces of equipment to themselves and how to work other materials. After everyone was done testing and using the materials, they all packed up and attached any and all important pieces of equipment to themselves and loaded into the turtle truck as Donnie quickly drove them down to the airport.
It was only 2:30a.m. when they arrived, but they needed to travel while it was still dark out, or else they would easily be spotted if they tried to load into a plane once it was bright out. They parked the truck in a brush filled area about 20 minutes away from the airport and then carefully moved on foot to a cargo plane that had been scheduled to leave around 5a.m later that morning. Once everyone made it on board and was settled, it was time to play the waiting game. At this point they all decided to find a comfy spot to rest and relax, knowing that once the plane was off the ground and moving, they would need to be alert and ready for when their next battle would begin.

SURPRISE! Somehow I was able to type up and upload a chapter. Right now I'm sort of at a decent homework spot where if I get enough homework done within each day then I can spend short time periods every dew nights working on my story, if I'm lucky enough to get those moments.

Hopefully this short chapter was still a nice continuation to what happened last chapter, and I hope you all are still enjoying the story overall!

Oh, and quick shout out to "another-tmnt-writer" on Tumblr. They're the one that came up with that palm reading bit when Mikey is upset about being called a monster, and I loved when I read that small one-shot online and asked if I could include it in this story. Reading it online I just felt like it matched Mikey and Sam's friendship spot on. So if you ever see this, thank you very much "another-tmnt-writer"! :D