A/N- this chapter should not have taken as long as it did but I am so bad at writing fight scenes. I'm so sorry for the long wait, I hope you enjoy and please leave a comment I love reading comments!
Leo was wrong... He was wrong!
Ming punched the training dummy repeatedly, the words screaming in her head.
He's wrong! Wrong, wrong, WRONG!
She was able to take care of herself, she was good enough to go on missions with them, she was a ninja!
Ming panted, before punching the dummy hard again. He's just... WRONG!
The subway rumbled overhead. Her fist connected again with the training dummy.
Then prove it.
She stopped. Prove it?
Prove it. Tonight.
Ming glanced through the doorway of the dojo, at Leo, who was reading a book on the couch while Mikey skated around the lair. It was the morning after their argument. They had all successfully snuck back in to the lair without Splinter catching them.
Sneak out tonight. By yourself. Prove you can handle criminals on your own.
She smiled to herself, returning to her training dummy. That would show Leo. She wasn't just a little kid, she was a ninja, too, and just as good as her brothers.
That night, Ming grabbed a few ninja stars and a couple kunai, pulled on a black hoodie over her dark grey clothes, and snuck out of her room. She could hear the evening news coming from the TV where Mikey probably was, and noticed light coming from Donnie's room.
She cursed her impatience. Of course none of her brothers were actually asleep yet... but that made it all the sweeter when she did successfully sneak to the entrance of the lair and made it out into the sewer tunnels without being noticed or stopped.
It boosted Ming's confidence as she climbed up to the manhole cover and onto the streets. She had gotten past four ninjas, and not one of them noticed her.
In your face, Lame-o-nardo. Ming smirked to herself, when she suddenly heard screaming.
Turning the corner, she saw a large group of people running out of a nearby subway station. That was worth investigating.
She ran past them, pushing her way through the crowd and getting downstairs. She heard somebody behind her, asking people where they were going and why they were running, but Ming payed her no mind... until the dark red-haired woman grabbed her shoulder. Ming shoved the woman back behind the wall she was hiding behind, as she watched two armed men wearing black head down the stairs past the turnstiles to the subway station. They looked like the same men from the night before at the docks.
For a moment, Ming wondered if she was biting off more than she could chew, if this really was such a good idea to try this mission herself, but Leo's words from last night's argument came back to her mind, as biting as ever, and she clenched her fists. I can do this. I don't need them.
The two were alone in the empty subway station now. Ming put her finger to her lips to signal the inquisitive woman to be quiet. They could hear a gunshot ring out through the empty halls, and the echoes of men yelling and people screaming and sobbing.
Ming ducked behind a red pillar, made sure nobody was there, and jumped over the turnstiles. The woman followed her, but suddenly yelped.
Ming turned to see a gun pointed in her face. Two of the armed men had found them. One was holding the dark red-haired woman tightly and pushing her towards the stairs heading towards the platform. The other man was holding a gun in Ming's face. Before she could react he had her arm held tightly behind her own back and was following the others down the stairs. Ming gasped at the sheer number of hostages and soldiers on the platform. Some of the armed men were placing bombs on the wall where some hostages were crouched. Others were laying on the ground with their hands over their heads. Ming recognized the leader, a woman with pink streaks in her black hair.
She had been there.
At the docks.
The red-haired woman and Ming were both shoved onto the ground.
Ming felt in her pocket for the handle of one of the kunai. If ever there was a time to prove herself, it was now. These people needed her.
With one swift motion, she threw the kunai at the leader's head...
... And missed.
"Who threw that?!" The woman turned angrily, gun drawn. Ming grabbed another kunai, but before she could throw it or do anything, two of the armed soldiers, both much larger and stronger than the 11-year-old girl, grabbed her arms and slammed her face into the floor of the subway station platform.
"Stupid little girl." The woman placed a foot on the back of Ming's neck, pointing her gun at the girl's face. "We know you're out there!" She suddenly called out, to nobody in particular. "If you don't surrender, we start executing hostages!" She looked back down at Ming, grinning sadistically. "Starting with you."
Down in the lair, the brothers were huddled around Donnie's monitors, each one showing view from a different security camera. Donnie had called them all to his lab after Splinter had left for the night and Ming had probably fallen asleep, based on her locked bedroom door.
"Surveillance uplinks are showing heavy, heavy Foot Clan activity in the Broad Street platform." Donnie explained, pointing at the monitors.
"They're taking hostages, dude." Raphael pointed out, directing his observation at Leo, who stuttered.
"Wha- You know we're not supposed to go above ground!"
"We've done this before. We started something, and we gotta finish it."
"This is insane..." Mikey piped up, catching both Leo and Raph's attention from their small argument. "That cat is playing chopsticks with chopsticks!"
"Don't be an idiot." Leo growled, pressing a button on the keyboard to switch the monitor Mikey had been watching back to the surveillance cameras.
As Mikey sighed in disappointment, Donnie noticed something on the monitor that had just been switched back to the cameras. The monitor showed the turnstiles just above the platform, which, between the hostages being held on the platform and the other people scrambling to get out and to safety, was once empty. Now, however, two figures appeared on the camera, slinking behind pillars and leaping over the turnstiles. "Isn't that-"
"Ming..." Leo groaned in frustration. "She's gonna get herself killed! What is she doing?!"
"No choice now." Raph commented as a couple armed soldiers appeared on the monitor and grabbed both Ming and the other woman that had been sneaking around the subway station with her.
"Okay, let's rock and roll, boys." Leo agreed, bumping his fist against Raph's.
Ming closed her eyes, tensing for the gunshot, but it didn't come. The rumbling of a fast-approaching subway train echoed through the tunnel, and with it came a familiar voice yelling out. "All aboard!"
The leader shouted something in Japanese, and suddenly the lights cut out, and all that lit the subway platform was the faint glow of the red emergency lights and the lights in the passing subway train, as the four large mutants leapt from the train.
Ming ducked out of her captors grasp as one of her brothers smashed into the leader, throwing her into a wall and knocking her out. Gunshots mixed with the rumbling subway train, and the triumphant cries of the turtles as they threw around armed soldiers like they were rag dolls. Ming swore she noticed Leo throw one of the men into the moving subway train, which definitely would have killed him.
Ming scrambled for her kunai, and got to her feet to try and help her brothers, but the flashing light from the subway train and the quick movement of bodies made it impossible to aim or throw a weapon, without knowing for certain she would hit a soldier and not a hostage or one of her brothers. As she was trying to decide her next move, she felt a soldier grab her arm, only for Donnie to elbow him in the face and slam him to the ground. He grabbed his little sister and pulled her towards their exit plan.
Ming followed her brothers silently to the roof, disappointed in herself. How could she let the Foot get the jump on her?! How could she be so stupid?!
She was feeling more worthless than ever.
Maybe Leo was right...
Mikey, Raph and Donnie were breathless and ecstatic about their most recent victory. Leo wanted to scold and lecture Ming, but one look told him she was already beating herself up enough about tonight.
"Are you hurt?"
She shook her head, although Leo noticed tears forming in her eyes. He didn't press the issue, but turned to his brothers instead. "Great elbow Donnie!"
"Whoo! Yeah that's what I'm talking about!" Raph laughed as Mikey whooped. "This is our city! These are our streets!"
"You mess with us you step into the Wu! Wu Tang!" Mikey laughed, lightly hitting Ming's shoulder playfully.
Ming chuckled, unable to help getting into the celebratory mood her brothers were in. Sure, her plans for the night had been ruined, but they had just had the second official ever victory over the Foot Clan.
"Yeah, that was pretty awesome guys."
"Did you see that guy's jaw connect with the concrete?" Raph grinned excitedly.
Donnie laughed. "He'll be drinking out of a sippy cup for months!"
"That's what I'm talking about, brothers, like shadows in the night, completely unseen-" Raph, Mikey and Donnie moved in for a high five, and at that moment, a camera flashed.
Oh, shell...