TMNT 2003 S1: Four Turtles More

by Fanficteller

Fifteen years have passed since the accident. Now, eight turtles, six brothers and two sisters, born as mutants in the sewers and trained as ninjas by a rat, are forced to leave their destroyed underground home and take the first step into a surface world where they face many adventures and meet new friends and foes, until they meet their toughest opponent ever, The Shredder.

58. The Girl and the Turtle, Part 2, Part 4

Animegamefanatic: Well, both Louie and Angel are gonna be in so much trouble after what they're put through in the next chapter after this.

3bodyjaa: Thank you.

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Author's note: There are a lot of references to three movies in this chapter, which are All Dogs go to Heaven, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and even The Shinning. And the next chapter is gonna be a lot more action based.

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= TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES 2003 =
= THE GIRL AND THE TURTLE PART 2 P4. =

A little later...

In another part of the city, there was an old, abandoned and remarkably dilapidated six-floored hotel building from early 1900s that had the fenced area around of it. The building's doors and broken windows - the ground floor's windows had the shredded cotes over them and the windows of the next four floors had a small balconies in them - were boarded-up from the bottom floor to the fifth floor, save for the dormer windows of the sixth floor, i.e. the roof level, where was glowing a dim light as if there was someone in there. The hotel was standing in between of two tall buildings, which towered high over the dwarvish building. The fenced area was overgrown with weeds and couple of trees and there were old swings, a merry-go-round, a slide and a playhouse.

At night, an abandoned and fenced-off hotel with boarded-up windows and only one visible light in one of the windows on the hotel's roof created a rather eerie atmosphere for anyone who dared to pass by the place at this time or even dared to go inside of it.

Especially tonight.

Outside of the boarded-up doorway of the hotel, two a very ominious-looking shadows were casted against it by the moonlight, which approached towards the hotel.

The shadows, as the moonlight casted then down to the floor, then somehow entered into the dark lobby of the hotel, where the moonlight entered weakly through of the narrow gaps between the boards of the windows

In the lobby had been piled up some crates and there was the couple of scaffolding set up against the walls for some undergoing but apparently neglected repairs. From the ceiling of the lobby hung a large chandelier and there were the doorways in the right and left of the lobby led to the other parts of the ground floor - they happened to be boarded up though and in front of which was standing a single or couple barrier signs per each. And at the other end of the lobby were the main stairs that led both to the upstairs and the east- and westwing of the hotel.

The shadows, casted against the walls, then climbed up a quite loudly creaking old stairs in the west wing of the hotel - while watching the apparently very fragile steps that could give in under the weight - striving higher and higher to the upper floor of the building. And on each floor shadows passed a doorway that opened into a dark corridor with hotel rooms for the visitors.

But as the shadows made their way to the rooms in the end of the stairs and at the roof level, there was heard an rather evil-sounding and chills-giving raspy laughter from the upstairs... along with rather haunting background sound.

"Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha haa! Who does his evil deeds in the shadowed dark of night? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha haa! The phantom does." the spooky male voice-over said in the upstairs, in the room where the light came out.

The ominous shadows, casted against the wall again, were now climbing up the last of the stairs leading to the attic room of the hotel... until the figures behind the shadows turned out to be Louie and Angel, with both of them carrying ten pizza-boxes in their hands, with Louie carrying extra few on top of his head, along with one big box.

"Louie? Can you finally tell me what we're doing here? Stopping at Kevin's Pizza to pick up a pizza for us would be one thing if you were planning for us to have a pizza date at some building's rooftop staring at the night sky... but coming here, in this empty and dark dump, with this many pizza boxes?" Angel said, before she glanced behind over her shoulder with restless look on her face.

"I don't really like this place, Louie. It's quite spooky for my taste. And I also don't like that sound coming from the upstairs." the purple-haired teenager admitted.

However, like Angel, Louie was not at all worried about coming to this hotel.

"(Panting) Not to worry, Angel-cake. (Panting) I wouldn't have (panting) brought you here at all if I (panting) hadn't any reasons." Louie said as he turned to Angel, panting slightly after having climbed up the stairs all the way up here.

"Then why are we here at all?" Angel asked again.

"Because up here lives some of the poorest people I know. Trust me, Angel-cake, these guys are poorer than... than the church rats. And the awful truth is that they're pretty much treated as such. You'll see what I mean." Louie said before he kept climbing up the stairs.

At the top of the stairs, the two peered over the railed edge of the stairwell - or what was left of its rail anyway - into the attic room, and a wide delighted grin spread in Louie's lips when he and Angel saw what was in there.

In the attic room was a huge amount of toys lying around the group, such as plastic animals and dinosaurs (including godzilla), stuffed toys, dolls and doll houses, medieval castle toy with knights, horses, and siege equipment, manual or remote-controlled cars and planes, various action figures, musical instruments, balls, pins, kites and skateboards, A, B, C blocks and building blocks, tricycles, dominoes, toy trains, toy ships, spinning tops, little toy soldiers, rocking horses, jack-in-the-boxes, teapot and teacups, wooden or plastic swords, slingshots, toy guns and bows and arrows, slingshots and many other (probably bought from some local toy shop or maybe even shoplifted).

There was also a huge open trunk, where appeared to be a various hats, clothes, masks, wigs and fake-beards for the small masquerade party.

In the other end of the room was a group of dozen small children, whose ages varied between 7 and 10, and one young woman with shoulder-length auburn hair and next to her was resting a female collie. All of them had a rather old, torn and patched-up clothes.

First one of the kids was chubby-cheeked boy with the large and over-weight appearance and the short from the middle parting brown hair. He wore a checkered blue shirt and blue pants with suspenders and next to him was an empty cookie jar.

Second kid was a black-haired boy with the bluish-black T-shirt with the skull in it and blue pants. He wore a black pirate-like eye patch above of his right eye and what looked like a pirate bicorn hat on top of his head. He also had a wooden sword beside him and a toy pirate flintlock pistol loaded with sticky darts.

Third kid was a curcly and black-haired African-American boy with the black-hair, glasses and blue-white shirt, and who had a red skateboard resting beside of him.

Fourth kid was a young and irresistibly cute little girl dressed in pink clothes and she wore a white skirt. Her short hair was dyed pink and she was wearing a red hair bow tie on top of her head.

Fifth kid was a second girl with the amber-colored shirt and light-brown pants and she wore a daisy behind of her left ear. She had a long golden-brown hair tied into two long and thick pigtails.

Sixth kid was an African-American girl with the long braided black hair, and she wore a brown leather aviator hat and goggles on her head and the aviator scarf around her neck.

Seventh kid was a buck-toothed boy with the dirty-blond hair, who wore a brown medieval-like cap with black feather from the crow's tail on top of his head and a a green leather tunic. He also had a wooden sword strapped in the belt and a toy bow with the quiver filled with the sticky arrows resting next to him.

Eighth kid was a girl with the black and curly hair tied into two big and messy space buns behind her head, and he had a purple streak falling over her forehead. The girl had a gray and white hooded shirt , bluish-gray shorts and white and purple cap on top of her head.

Ninth kid was a boy with shoulder-length brown hair, who wore a torn white shirt with brown vest and brown. He had a quite big golden-brown boots in his feet and he wore a saucepan on top of his head as a headwear. This one was tallest and possibly oldest of all of them.

And the last two kids young boys, apparently twins due to them having a similar facial features and clothing with each other, with the orange-dyed flaming haircuts and both of them wearing a grayish-green bandana around their foreheads. They also had a wooden rifle-like slingshots strapped in their backs and toy tomahawks resting next to them.

Under the single light from the ceiling, The children had gathered around the old-fashioned radio standing on the small chest of drawers, from which they listened to the horror story playing on it tensely and clinging to each othe, hence the spooky voice and the haunting background sound.

There was a loud creaking sound from the radio as if a very creaking door had just been opened... and right then when the creaking stopped.

"AAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

A sudden sound of a high-pitched and terrified woman shriek came from the radio, which frightened the little kids and caused them to stampede everywhere for cover.

At this moment, Louie knew that it was time to reveal his presence.

"HEY! ANY LITTLE NINJA HERE IN THE MOOD FOR SOME PIZZA?!" Louie let out, jumping out of the stairwell with couple of pizza boxes in his hands, making the lids of the boxes, as well as the lid of the top box of the stack above his head, opened, revealing the fresh pizzas inside.

Angel gaped at Louie wide-eyed, unable to believe that he had just reveal himself even though he wasn't supposed to be seen by the humans due to being a mutant turtle!

Angel nearly expected these small children and the woman to scream in terror the moment they saw Louie... until something happened that she never could've expect from them.

"Hey kids!" the woman called out with the surprised smile on her lips when she saw Louie coming out of the stairwell. "Look who's here!"

The kids turned away from the radio, and the moment they saw Louie standing there...

"HEY, IT'S UNCLE LOUIE!" all of them shouted with one voice with delight and excitment. "AND HE'S GOT PIZZA!"

In the moment, the kids stampeded towards Louie, laughing, giggling and squealing, until the entire group was upon the turtle in black.

"Wow, wow! Wow, wow! Hold it! Hold it! Hey! Hold it! Ah, hee hee hee hee hee hee ha ha ha ha haa! Hey!" Louie laughed as the first of the children jumped on him, some hanging from his arms, some wrapping their arms around his waist giving him hugs, some clinging to his legs and one even climbing onto his shoulder, before they tackled the turtle in black over to the floor with sheer numbers.

"You little kids are even worse than a pack of agitated guard dogs, I'll give you that! Ha ha haa!" Louie laughed as the happily squealing piled on him, playfully wrestling with him.

"Alright, alright, alright! Calm down! Please!" Louie pleaded while still laughing. "This turtle isn't enough for all of you, but there's plenty of pizza for everybody!"

With that, the kids immediately went for the pizza boxes, taking them from Louie one per each and opened them up. The sweet aroma of fresh pizza made the children to go into such of frenzy state that they immediately began to gobble up their pizzas, munching their bites pretty loudly and getting their faces messed up with the cheese.

Angel, who had put the pizza boxes she was carrying on the edge of the stairwell for the children to find, entered the attic room herself, watching how the squealing children gleefully either piled on top of Louie or ate the pizza they brought. The sight that the children or the woman following this from aside didn't seem to be afraid of Louie at all brought the smile even forcibly on her lips.

When the last of the kids had finally let Louie to get up from the floor before starting to wolf down their own pizzas, Louie walked up to Angel.

"Ahem! Excuse me! I'd like to- I want you- Hey!" Louie called out, but the kids didn't hear him out from under all that loud munching.

SLAP! SLAP! SLAP! Louie then clapped his hands together loudly enough to make the kids to pause their eating and look up at Louie.

"Well, now that I've got your attention, little ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to introduce you tonight a very, very special guest. Meet, Angel Bridge." Louie said, gesturing towards Angel.

Angel gave the turtle in black a small glare for calling her a "special guest" as it dawned on her that Louie had brought her here to throw these little kids a pizza party. However, she quickly shrugged her shoulder with the scoff before she turned to the little kids.

"Hello there." she greeted, waving her hand at the kids.

"HELLO, ANGEL!" the kids greeted with one voice.

Louie then turned to Angel. "Angel? I want you to meet each of these little ninjas in person." the turtle in black said.

Louie then knelt down to pick up a map stick lying on the floor nearby before he pointed with it at the chubby kid at first.

"Angel? Meet first Jake. A little fella might have gained some weight but even under all of that (fat) there is a heart of gold." Louie said, introducing the first kid. who has a such of appetite

Jake didn't say anything as his mouth was still full of pizza, and his chubby cheeks were stained with the cheese, slice of salami and olives. Jake only nodded his head in greeting to Angel, who nodded back in kind.

Louie then moved the map stick to the next kid, the one with the pirate hat.

"This one is Edward, or "Eddie" for short." Louie introduced. "He's..."

"Let me guess..." Angel said, cutting Louie short and stared at him with her arms folded. "This one, Eddie, is fascinated with the pirates, isn't he?"

Eddie immediately pointed his wooden sword up at Angel 's chest while aiming his toy gun at her head. "ARH! That's captain Eddie to you, landlubber! Remember that correctly next time, unless ye want to be put to walk the plank to the sharks!" he said with the tough pirate-like talk, making Angel to step back, slightly taken aback.

"Easy, easy, easy there, captain! She's with me!" Louie said, crossing the map stick with Eddie's sword.

Louie then skillfully moved the stick around of the wooden sword and then yanked it off Eddie's hand, making the sword to fly neatly into the wooden box full of wooden swords, before Louie gently put the stick over Eddie's pistol and gently lowering it down.

Louie then moved the map stick to the next kid, a black-haired African-American boy.

"This is Conrad. And as you can see it yourself, he has a passion to the skateboarding, just like Mikey." Louie said.

"I'd show you what I can do on a skateboard, if only there was enough room here... and if it wasn't so dark both downstairs and outside." Conrad said with a bit restless voice as he glanced nervously at the window.

Angel glanced at Louie, wordlessly asking from him if this is what it looked like, that Conrad has an issue with the nyctophobia, which Louie confirmed with the nod.

"It's okay, Conrad." Louie said soothingly, gently rubbing the top of his head with his hand. "It can wait for a later."

This made Conrad smile at him, reassured again, to which both Louie and Angel returned in kind.

Louie then moved his stick to the pink-haired cute girl with the bow tie.

"This little irresistibly cute sugarplum here is Minnie." Louie introduced.

"Hi!" Minnie greeted with the sweet smile and cute little high-pitched voice.

"Hi." Angel greeted back, while looking at the little girl up and down for a moment. "Nice bow tie."

"Aww, thank you." Minnie thanked, flattered.

Louie then moved the stick to the girl with the thick pigtails.

"This is Laura! Our sunny shiny girl!" Louie introduced, making Laura to giggle a bit and hold her hands together in slight shyness.

Louie then knelt to the eye-level with Laura and touched her shoulders. "Say hello to our guest, Laura."

"One moment!" Laura said before she dashed off to somewhere. Laura then quickly came back, holding a big and beautiful yellow daisy in her hand and held it out towards Angel.

"May I?" she asked politely.

After taking a moment to realize what Laura was about to, Angel nodded her head with the smile before she knelt down and allowed Laura to put the daisy behind her right ear. And after she was done, Angel looked up at her.

"I like to keep a potted flowers, especially daisies, as a welcome gift to the visitors, even though we don't have them often. So I wanted to give one to you. You like it?"" Laura asked kindly.

Angel nodded her head in affirmation that she did like her gift very much, making Laura squeal with happiness and hug her in gratitude, to which Angel returned in kind after a small surprise but without any hesitation.

Louie then moved his map stick towards the next kid, the girl with the aviator hat, goggles and the scarf.

"Angel? This is Jessica... the aviator girl in the gang who has such of passion to the remote controlled planes and flying, that she believed among of these little rascals to be reincarnation of Adrienne Bolland herself." Louie explained.

"Because I am!" Jessica exclaimed aloud.

"I see." Angel said, nodding her head.

Louie then moved the stick towards the buck-toothed blondie kid.

"This is Buck! Never leave a home without a brave and noble knight like him." Louie introduced.

"On your knees, bandits!" Buck said with the brave, confident and challenging voice... with a lisp, while drawing out his wooden sword and held it high. "Or you can taste my sword!"

Buck then began to swing his sword wildly around, making "HYA!", "HAI!" "YAA!" cries, while making the others to back away to avoid getting hit by it.

"Easy there, Zorro." Louie said as he gently took a hold of Buck's shoulder to calm him down.

"Sir Buck to you, Mr. turtle." Buck corrected him with the look, and pointing his sword at him.

"Alright, alright, Sir Buck." Louie said, hands help up in the surrender while rolling his eyes. "But if you want the dragons to fight with, how about I next time bring you a real wooden one, okay?"

Louie then moved to point his stick towards the girl with the space buns and white and purple cap.

"This is Angela or "Angie"." Louie introduced as Maggie took her cap off and gave a light bow in greeting to Angel. "Angie here actually is one of my favorites here."

"How's that?" Angel asked curiously.

Not long after Angel had said that, she and Louie heard a tiny squeaking in the ground, making them to turn their heads to where it came from. To Angel's surprise, she saw a pretty big rat running across the children's feet until it came to Angie's feet and climbed up to her left shoulder, while Angie seemed not to mind to have a rodent sitting there. Instead, she lifted up her right hand and gently and affectionally petted it with the tip of her finger before feeding to it the piece of pizza she had saved for it.

"She has a rat for a pet?" Angel asked, turning to Louie.

"Yeah, she does. Angie actually saved that rat's life from the stray cats that had followed it here some years ago and gave it one of her cookies to eat. The little one, however, stayed in the house instead of leaving back to the streets and showed a noticeable affection for its rescuer. It first started with slow habituation and building trust between the two - mostly from the rat's part - until the rat eventually ventured out of the hiding and approached Angie, as she was the only one the rat appeared to trust most, even allowing her to touch and pet it. Angie also became so attached to the little animal that decided to take care of it." Louie explained.

"His name is Mike." Angie said, introducing her rat. "And I like rats. They're poor unwanted and misunderstood creatures that just try to survive, and are largerly mistreated by the other people. With me, Mike doesn't need to be afraid of people."

"That is exactly the reason why I like her the most..." Louie said to Angel in whisper. "... due to the irony that she has a rat as a pet and she likes the rats with the passion, and that I have a rat as a father and master."

"Oh, I see. You like her only because she has a rat as a pet." Angel questioned, before a teasing grin crept on her lips. "But does she like you in return, Lover-boy?"

Louie raised an eyebrow, not getting what Angel was after.

"Feeling little envious that the rat gets all the attention from her and you don't? Then maybe you should act more like a rat to get it. Hee hee hee!" Angel joked, starting to snicker at her own joke.

"Oh, knock it off, Angel! I can't do that 'cause I'm not the rat!" Louie said back.

"Then why don't you put on the rat suit, then you definitely become one!" Angel joked again, laughing out loud this time, with one hand over her face, one arm around her stomach and one leg up.

Angel's joke made the children laugh with amusement at Louie's expense, to which Louie responded with the roll of his eyes.

"Oh, har, har, har! very funny, Angel-cake." Louie said sarcastically, while he momentarily spun the stick around in his hand before the turtle in black went back to the introduction.

Next, Louie pointed the stick at the boy with the saucepan as a headwear.

"Meet Oliver... The Baddie Leg's Bane!" Louie introduced with the dramatic voice.

"Baddie Leg's Bane?" Angel said with the chuckle, finding the name amusing. "And how come he came up with the name of that?"

Oliver then took the saucepan off his head and held in up with two hands like he was ready to hit with it somebody.

"You want a demonstration about that?" Oliver asked from Angel, before he pointed his saucepan at her legs. "Which leg?"

"Ah, ah, ah, ah, ahh!" Louie said with the chiding voice, snatching the saucepan off Oliver's hands before gently putting it back on his head. "Save it for the bad guys' legs, Oliver."

Oliver groaned in disappointment, before Louie leaned closer to Angel to explain, covering his mouth with the back his right hand to tell it to her in whisper.

"The reason why he's called that is that he likes to use the saucepan he wears on his head pretty much as a weapon, with which he likes to flatten your toes as pancakes."

Angel nodded in understantment.

Lastly, Louie moved to point his stick at group of two young boys, apparently twins due to them having a similar facial features and clothing, with the red-dyed spiky hairs and all three of them wore a grayish-green bandana around their foreheads. They also had a wooden rifle-like slingshots strapped in their backs.

"And here comes the Twins, Tito and Dino, though it might be a difficult to tell that which one is which, but the two of them have such of big attitudes that replaces their small sizes for sure." Louie introduced.

"That's right. Tinies rules, biggers drools!" Twin One one said.
"That's right. Tinies rules, biggers drools!" Twin Two repeated, with almost the same voice as Twin One, although a few seconds after his brother had started.

Once Louie was done with introducing the kids to Angel, they immediately resumed gobbling the pizza and even fighting for the best parts.

Allowing the little kids to eat whatever was left of the pizza, both Louie and Angel then turned around as the woman with the collie by her side casually approached them both, while chuckling at the children's antics before the woman turned away from them to meet Louie and Angel in person.

"Hello, Lorenzo." the woman greeted the turtle in black in motherly way.

"Hello, Wendy." Louie greeted back the woman named Wendy. Louie then knelt down to the eye-level with the collie and began to affectionally scratch her from behind of her ear and from under of her jaw. "Hello there, Flow. Nice to see you again."

The collie, named Flow, returned to Louie's scratching by affectionally licking her face. After getting enough of dog-kisses all across of his face, Louie stood up again to meet Wendy.

"It was nice of you to come by, Lorenzo. You should visit more often. We don't see much of you anymore." Wendy said.

"Well, you know how it is, Wendy, I mean, you know... Got a business to run. being a ninja turtle ain't easy when you got your hands full of the underworld's crooks and the bad guys to deal with." Louie explained shortly. "But hey, I at least promised to come by at the best chance I get."

"Yes, I know how it is." Wendy said, before she took notice of Angel standing behind the turtle in black, staring at her and Louie rather curiously. "And I can see that you brought along a new friend."

"Oh, yes, I did!" Louie said as he turned back to Angel.

Clearing his throat, Louie then gestured his right hand towards Wendy. "Angel? I want you to meet the good friend of mine and the single caretaker of these little ninjas in person. Meet Wendy, and her pet collie here, Flow." Louie then turned to Wendy and gestured with his left hand towards Angel. "Wendy? I want you to meet my newest friend I met a few weeks ago, Angel Bridge."

Wendy smiled kindly at Angel before she extended out her hand towards her in greeting. "Hello, Angel my dear. Welcome to our humble home."

"Thank you, ma'am." Angel said as she accepted Wendy's hand and shook it with her. "I feel very appreciated to meet you in person, though I'm still kinda surprised, shocked, perplexed, what you wanna call it? Whatever, that Louie actually has way more human friends, even if he is..."

"... supposed to stay out of the sight because of us humans will never understand of him being a teenage ninja turtle? Yes, I know." Wendy finished, gently cutting in. "Louie has already told me a lot about himself."

"So I take it that he does trust in you to keep his secret, right?" Angel asked.

Wendy nodded in confirmation. "After all, we're just a trash of the society, we orphans, that nobody wants."

Angel blinked in surprise after hearing that one certain word.

"Wait! Orphans?! You're all orphans?" she questioned.

"Indeed." Louie cut in, making the two to turn to the turtle in black.

Without them noticing, which they quickly afterwards did, the kids had already finished with their pizza at this point before they had gathered around Wendy, Angel and Louie to listen to them as if it was a story time, with some of them remaining up while others sat down cross-legged.

"When Wendy and all these kids were younger, she used to live in an orphanage that happened to be in the serious lack of funds and the owner had unfortunately ran afoul with some shady dealers who she had lend money from to keep the orphanage running, but was unable to pay back her debts after the shady dealers had in their greed inflated the money she owed to them to double, maybe even triple the amount she had originally lended, which would practically leave her with nothing to keep the orphanage running. Desperate, the owner tried to plead for more time to get the money and even tried to appeal to their conscience, telling them to think about the children in her care and their future, which was now threatened by their increased rates. The shady dealers were unsympathetic, however, and as a result of the owner's unpaid debts, they set the building on fire, with everyone locked inside to burn along with the orphanage, which they even justified by saying that the world doesn't need a few more mouths to feed." Louie narrated, wearing a sympathetic look over his face. "Only Wendy and these eleven children, including Flow, were the only ones to escape the building before it was burned to the ground, and they have been taking a shelter here, in this abandoned hotel ever since."

After Louie had finished telling the story, Angel was left horrified to hear what Wendy and these innocent little children had gone through in the past.

"I'm so sorry for what you and these little kids have gone through, Wendy." Angel said, turning to the older woman with the sympathetic look over her face.

"Thank you, dear." Wendy said gratefully. "They were rather rough times before and after the fire... living homeless and unwanted on the streets, begging for money from the bypassers or even lowering ourselves to steal from the markets and small shops in order to survive... and it would've been even more rougher, if golden-hearted Lorenzo here hadn't shown up into our lives."

Angel's face lightened up upon hearing that. "And how come you even came to know Louie?" she asked curiously.

"Well, one night, a few years back..." Wendy said as she began to narrate her and the children's first meet with Louie some time ago.

Beginning of the flashback.

A few years ago, it was raining heavily outside that night and lightning flashed brightly through the gaps of the boarded windows of the hotel, briefly illuminating the dark lobby. It was all quiet for the moment, until the ringing of a burglar alarm could be heard from somewhere nearby.

Wendy: "It was raining heavily outside, but otherwise everything seemed calm and peaceful, until there was the ringing of a burglar alarm nearby."

After the burglar alarm was set off, into the hotel's lobby intruded a four soaking wet figures, wearing a wet hooded trench coats and black masks that covered their faces, and carrying over their shoulders the duffel bags.

The figures stopped in middle of the lobby and put down the bags, with one kneeling over one of them and opened it, revealing various gemstone jewelry inside, such as rings, necklaces, earrings, bracelets, tiaras and so on, along with the wads of cash.

Wendy: "Then four strangers entered the lobby. They were wearing masks over their faces and carried the duffel bags, which were filled with the jewelry and cash. Judging from the burglar alarm. They were probably some thieves that had recently robbed the local jewelry store and were taking the shelter in the hotel until the things would quiet down."

To kill some time until the police outside would drive pass the abandoned hotel the thieves had chosen as their temporary hideout, the crooks began to inspect their loot under the flashlights to see how much they had managed to steal, until suddenly...

"AAAA-ACHOO!"

The echo of the unexpected sneeze alerted the crooks of the presence of the occupants, and all three of them turned their flashlights - while drawing the handguns from under of their coats - towards the the staircase in the other end of the lobby.

But even though the crooks saw no one, they were still aware that there was someone with them.

One of the crooks, the apparent leader, then hand signed to one of the crooks to stay put with the loot, while he signed the other two to follow him as he began to search through the lobby for the "intruders" with the flashlights.

Little did they know - but soon they will - that the Twins were hiding in various places of the lobby. Tito and Dino were hiding behind of the reception desk, dangerously close of the crooks, and cautiously peeked from behind their hiding spots and followed the crooks's going.

Wendy: "Unfortunately, the children were playing hide-and-seek game in the downstairs, and them playing down there alerted the crooks."

Splitting up, one of the crooks stayed in the ground floor while the other two checked up the upstairs, leaving no room, no corner and no door unchecked and peeking under every bed and table, looking into every closet, wardrobe and cupboard and behind of every furniture.

And after searching for a while, the crooks eventually found the hiding children, one by one, from various places of the hotel.

Younger Jake was found first, hinding under the table of the hotel's common room, where one of the crooks caught him stuffing into his mouth the jar of cookies, before he was roughly dragged out of there by his arm.

Younger Eddie was also found in the crommon room soon after Jake, hiding in the common room's clock case.

Younger Minnie too was found from there, hiding inside the empty wooden trunk next to the fireplace, as the trunk was formerly used to store the firewood.

Younger Jessica was found from the hotel's kitchen, hiding inside of the stove (most of the electricity had been long time ago cut from the building, so there was no danger to hide yourself even in the stove).

Wendy: "They searched through the whole place and rounded up the kids in the lobby, one by one."

In the upstairs, younger Laura was hiding in the bed in one of the hotel rooms, having crawled under of the blanket, though it left a small visible mound in the middle. When one of the crooks entered the room and found her hiding in the bed, Laura, thinking that it was just one of her friends selected to be It, giggled as she planned to jump out to surprise It the moment she was about to be discovered.

However, little did Laura knew that it wasn't one of her friends but the crook that was sneaking up upon her...

"COTCHA!" the crook exclaimed as he quickly wrapped the blanket around of surprised Laura before closing its edges together like the mouth of the sack with two hands. With Laura squirming inside of the blanket-turned-sack, the crook took her away to the downstairs.

Younger Buck, who was wandering in the corridors as he had been selected as It, was alerted by the noise the crooks were making while hunting down his friends and sought refuge by locking himself in the bathroom of another hotel, hoping that he wouldn't be found from there.

However, the second crook eventually discovered him after finding the door of the bathroom being locked (as so far none of the doors he had already checked had been locked until this one). The crook tried to get the door open first by twisting the handle violently and repeatedly before banging and kicking the door to force it off its hinges.

And when this didn't work, the crook went to fetch from the wall of the corridor the fireaxe, with which he began to hack the door into pieces, while Buck, scared out of his wits, cowered in the corner, watching in horror as the blade of the axe cut through of the door, leaving a hole in it, through of which the crook peeked in.(1)

"Heeeeeeeeeere's Johnny!" the crook said with creepy sing-song voice, before he resumed to break down the door.(1)

Younger Oliver and Conrad were found hiding in the wardrobe of another hotel room, hiding behind of some old clothes, although it wasn't enough as their legs were peeking out from under the hems of the hanging clothes.

Angie was found from the third hotel room, hiding behind of the curtains near the boared window.

She was actually the only one who almost avoided being found and captured until Mike the Rat accidentally exposed by dashing into the room between the crook's legs as he looked in and climbing onto Angie's shoulder, squeaking quite loudly and thus causing Angie to hush at the rat a bit too loudly, causing the thug to heard her just as he was about to move into the next room, prompting the crook to look behind the curtains where he heard the noise coming from.

"AH, HA!" the crook shouted when he found the screaming Angie hiding there and reached out to seize her by the arm, only for Mike to lunge from Angie's shoulder at the crook's masked face with its claws in Angie's defense, distracting the crook long enough to give Angie a chance to dash out of the room and escape.

However, the crook pulled Mike off his face and threw the rodent away, though not before Mike had torn his mask into shreds and left the crook's face slightly scratched by his claws, before the crook sprinted out of the room and into the corridor after Angie. The crook quickly caught up with her and wrapping the other arm around of struggling Angie's waist while clamping his hand overthe girl's mouth to shut her up, the crook took her away to the downstairs.

Wendy: "Including me myself as I was spending our time up here in the attic room with Flow."

Moving up floor after floor, the crooks eventually made it up to the attic rooms, where they found Wendy brushing Flow's fur.

Afterwards, the crooks went back downstairs, one of them holding Wendy at gunpoint, demanding her to keep moving while another crook roughly pulling Flow along by the leash.

"Careful with her! That's not the way to handle my poor dog!" Wendy cautioned the crook with the leash.

"Shut up!" the crook retorted rudely.

After rounding up the kids and Wendy to the lobby, the crooks then tied them up together, back to back, and gagged them as well, while Flow was tied up by the leash to something and somewhere aside, while the collie kept barking angrily at the crooks.

Then the crooks just stood there around of Wendy and the kids, guarding them with their flashlights and guns aimed at them.

However, unbeknownst to anyone, a new strange figure appeared to the hole in the wall, looking cautiously around to make sure that the coast was clear before stealthily moving inside the lobby.

The figure was apparently a small kid but drastically lacking any traits of the human kid, as the figure was bulkier by the shape and had a thick legs with two toes and three fingers in each hand. Only the figure's eyes glowed white in the darkness.

This new stranger slowly walked deeper into the lobby, but immediately stopped in its tracks upon seeing the crooks standing over the tied up Wendy and the kids in middle of the lobby. At the sight of the people, the figure immediately dived for cover behind of the reception desk, from where the figure then carefully peeked out to follow the situation.

Wendy: "While we didn't know that we're being watched by this new stranger, the crooks began to discuss among themselves what to do with us."

"I say that we just leave them here tied up and we get out of here before the cops cover the whole area!" one of the crooks said.

"We can't just do that! They've seen us! Which means that they know about us already!" another one argued.

"Then what are you suggesting? Do we just take them with us as a hostages?" the first one retorted.

"And how exactly we're gonna do that? We got no escape van!" the third thug pointed out. "And trying to take them with us on foot will only slow us down... and not the mention about the risks of one of them managing to escape to alert the cops on our trail, and that mutt alerting the whole neighborhood with its barking."

"Then that marks them as nothing more but a dead weight." the apparent leader deduced, causing the children to gulp down with dread upon hearing that.

"Then what are you suggesting we should do with them, boss?" the third crook asked.

"Simple as that." the leader said, turning to the hostages and aiming his gun at them. "We'll put them all down!"

Seeing the leader aiming his gun at them randomly and without caring which one he was aiming at, the children and Wendy began to panic and squirm frantically in a desperate attempt to free themselves from their bonds - which was quite futile - while letting out muffled cries and screams of terror through of their gags. Flow began to bark harder at the crooks while trying desperately to get free of the leash to help her owner and the others.

From his hiding spot, the small figure's eyes went wide upon hearing the leader's intention to murder all of the kids in cold-blood... until he narrowed his eyes and looked around to see what he could do about it, before disappearing behind of the desk.

Even the first crook was taken aback by this.

"What? Are you just going to kill them in cold blood?" the crook asked uneasily, as if he found murdering the children to be very disturbing thing to his conscience, despite being a petty criminal, before he at least tried to reason with him. "Come on, boss! They're just the little children."

"I know... and I hate children." the leader said coldly. "We'll start from the oldest bitch! Remove the gag from her mouth and blindfold her eyes."

Reluctantly, the first crook knelt down behind Wendy and removed the gag from her mouth before he began to blindfold her eyes.

Wendy: "I saw it as my only chance to try to reason with them."

"You do not need to do this! Please! Please, spare them! I beg you! They're just a little kids with no home and family of their own aside of each other and me!" Wendy pleaded frantically as her eyes were blindfolded.

"Sorry, miss." the leader said with the mock apology, as he walked up to her and put the gun's barrel against Wendy's forehead as the first crook backed away. "But the world doesn't need for a few mouths to feed... let alone to squeal about us to the cops!"

"Please, don't do this!" Wendy pleaded desperately as she felt the gun'äs barrel pressed against her forehead. "I promise we won't tell anyone! WE WON'T TELL ANYONE!"

"And you won't." the leader added as he began to pull the tricker.

Wendy: "But when it looked like we we're already goners..."

Before the leader could pull the tricker and shoot Wendy to death, he was unexpectedly hit in the headby the mug that flew out of nowhere, shattering into pieces upon impact.

Surprised by this unexpected turn of events, the leader turned to look around, frantically pointing his flashlight and his gun here and there to see where the mug had came from... before he angrily turned to his underlings.

"HEY!" he barked, getting his underlings' attention as they turned to him.

"Who was it?! Which one of you that mug at me?!" the leader barked, shaking his gun-wielding hand in the urging tempation to draw his gun on someone of them for supposedly throwing the mug at him.

"What are you talking about?" the second crook questioned with the confused frown.

"None of us threw at you anything, boss!" the first crook said, holding his hands up in defense.

"Then who was it?!" the leader demanded to know.

Suddenly, the leader saw something soaring in the air, flying over the heads of the crooks before him and then coming down straight towards him. He only had time to see it was another mug before it hit him straight in the middle of the forehead, knocking him back.

The rest of the crooks were surprised to see their boss getting hit by the mug in the head. Realizing that there was someone else with them, they turned around and began to frantically point their flashlights to everywhere to see where that mug had came from... and who had thrown that mug at their leader.

Suddenly, the crooks came under the fire as they were thrown at with various small objects from where the flashlights weren't pointing at: the crooks got multiple hits in their heads from various vases, glass bottles and canned food cans. The leader even got a hit from a wall clock and candelabra, while the second crook got hit from the bucket full of cleaning water, the third crook got hit from the plant pot and the fourth crook got a large painting thrown at him, which knocked him off his feet over to the ground.

"We're under the fire!" the second crook let out.

While shielding himself with the thrown objects, the leader came with another conclusion what was going on here and turned his ire to his underlings because of it.

"You idiots! You missed the one kid!" the leader berated harshly.

"But we already checked up the whole place twice, boss! There was only these fourteen here! Nobody else!" the first crook protested.

"Whatever! Don't just thand there like an idiots! Do something!" the leader demanded.

"Like what?" the second crook asked, spreading his arms.

"Well, get that kid!" the leader barked, before he chuckled in mockery at their attacker's strategy. "After all, we have both numerical and technical advantage, since there's only one brat on the loose and there's four of us. We have a guns and the brat has, HA, small objects as weapons!"

Suddenly, the leader felt someone landing on his shoulders, catching him by surprise. The figure standing on the leader's shoulders said then grabbed from the hood of his coat and pulled it over his eyes, blinding him, and making him to drop his gun and flashlight.

The figure then hopped off the blinded leader's shoulders towards the first crook and mischieviously pulled his pants down, humorously revealing the heart underpants from under, much to the crook's embarassement.

The figure then dived towards the second crook and swiftly kicked his legs out from under, causing the crook to yell in surprise as he fell on his face to the floor.

The figure then flipped over the first crook - as he sheepishly bowed down to get his pants back on - landing behind of him, before the figure proceeded to kick the crook in the butt, knocking him down.

The children, save for blindfolded Wendy, were left astonishment upon seeing the shadowy figure handling with the four creeks at the same time with unexpectedly ease, despite its small size and being numerically disadvantaged.

Wendy: "And while our mysterious rescuer kept our captors busy, we used that as our chance to free ourselves, thanks to Angie's pet rat."

At the same time as the figure kept the crooks occupied, Mike the Rat dashed out of its hiding spot within the darkness and towards Angie. The small rodent, seeing its friend being tied up, began to gnaw the ropes that kept Angie and her friends tied up.

Meanwhile, the third crook that was knocked down by the large painting earlier managed to get back to his feet and, seeing the figure taking out his comrades, was about to draw a gun on him, until the figure jumped up to him and punched him swiftly in the groins.

"UGH! MY GROINS!" the crook wheezed in pain as he bent over, only to get uppercutted under his chin by the figure, knocking his head back, before the figure jumped up and kicked the crook away with his left foot.

The leader, who had already pulled the hood off his eyes, took frustratedly the aim at the figure with his gun and fired.

BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!

Wendy and the children, who at this point had almost freed themselves from their bonds, screamed in fright at the loud gunshots, with Wendy covering the children with her body as best as she could.

However, there was no guarantee that the leader would hit his target as he could not see anything in the darkness, and couldn't use a flashlight to locate his target as he had accidentally broken it after dropping it. Only a flash of lightning outside helped him locate the figure, but only for a moment.

So, he had fired the shots blindly to where he anticipated the figure was standing - unaware that the figure had already sneaked out of the shot's way after the flash of the lightning ended, before he leaped at the leader under the cover of darkness and kicked him in the face, knocking him back.

However, the fired shot happened to hit out of the sheer luck to where Flow's leash had been tied, freeing the collie.

Once Flow was freed, and eager to help the figure whoever it was, the collie charged into the battle and towards the first crook, who clumsily tried to get up from the floor with his pants pulled down earlier, and clamped her teeth into the crook's butt!

"AAAAHHHHHHHH!" the crook howled in pain.

The second crook then stood up and aimed both his flashlight and the gun at the figure in order to get the clear shot at him, but before he could, the figure took out the couple of chains and swung them towards the crook, wrapping them around of the crook's wrists, much to the crook's surprise.

The figure then began to spin around and swing the crook around of him by the chained arms, first slow, then fast, then even faster, that the crook had difficulty to keep up, until the figure let go of the chains, causing the crook to stumble backwards until he tripped to the first crook - who was crawling towards the entry of the hotel to get out of here while Flow was still biting his butt - and fell onto his back to the floor.

With three down and one to go, the figure started to search for the leader, who after getting kicked in the face and with the figure having turned his focus momentarily to the secondly last crook standing, had disappeared from the sight.

Then, the leader had appeared behind of the figure without him noticing, because the villain had noticed the figure using the darkness as his advantage to evade them and had thus decided to use the figure's own technique against him.

"SURPRISE!" the leader snarled as he grabbed from the figure by the shoulders, lifted him up and then roughly tossed the figure to the ground.

With the figure down, the leader walked upon him, picking up the pipe from the floor and whacking the figure hard in the head with it, twice, before he brutally kicked the figure in the face with his foot, earning a pained grunts from the figure each time he assaulted him.

With the figure finally down, the leader then picked up one of his underlings' flashlight, along with the gun, and aimed them both at the downed figure.

"No more "Cat-and-Mouse" game, little brat." the leader sneered as he stood over the figure. "Now let's see your face. I want to remember the last look of fear in your eyes before I put the bullet into your skull."

However, when the leader put the flashlight on to see the figure's face clearly, he immediately stepped back with the loud gasp of surprise after what he saw.

Even Wendy and the children gaped in astonishment as they stared wide-eyed at their mysterious rescuer once his identity had been exposed.

The figure under the light of the flashlight was revealed to be a young turtle tot, no older than nine or ten years. His skin was avocado green and he wore around his head a black mask with the amber eyes. The turtle tot had a nasty bruise in the left cheek - left by either the leader's kick or strike with the pipe - and he had a slight bleeding in the left corner of his mouth. And instead of the look of fear, there was a defiance in the turtle tot's eyes as he stared back at him - while shielding his eyes from the light with his hand.

Wendy: "That indeed was the strangest moment in my life, and I never forget that shocked and surprised feeling I felt inside of me that night."

The leader kept staring down at the turtle tot in black in wide-eyed disbelief.

"What... What are you?!" the leader asked, breathing rapidly in and out.

The turtle tot in black didn't reply but kept staring at the leader defiantly.

After the moment of silent staring war between the leader and the turtle tot in black, the leader then looked down at the gun in his hand for a moment, and then back to the turtle tot in black, before the villain gritted his teeth and raised his gun up and aimed it at Louie with the intention of shooting the turtle tot to death nonetheless.

Wendy: "But before he could've fire a shot, we decided to intervene, despite the shocking surprise that our mysterious savior was revealed to be a giant turtle tot."

As the leader was about to pull the trigger, he got hit in the back of his head by the bottle. Both the leader and the turtle in black turned back to Wendy and the kids, all of them free from their bonds and having picked up from the floor one or two of the objects the turtle in black had earlier thrown at the crooks, all glaring at the leader angrily.

"Get away from that thing!" Wendy said before she threw a round vase at the leader.

"And get out of here! This is our turf!" young Eddie screamed as he threw candelabra.

"Yeah! Leave!" young Jessica added as she threw the glass bottle.

"And don't come back!" young Buck added as he threw the bucket.

The leader once again found himself under the fire of the objects thrown at him. Some of them hit him in the head while others hit him in the arm he had shielded himself with.

"And this is for my cookies!" young Jake said as he threw his empty cookie jar at the leader, hitting him in the head and causing the jar to shatter into pieces upon impact.

Angered, the leader tried to raise his gun at Wendy and the kids to shoot at them, but the turtle in black intervened by kicking in the back of the leader's leg, knocking it out from under and making the villain to fall onto his knee... right at the same time as Flow lunged at him and knocked him over to the ground.

Seeing the villain down, Wendy and the kids, encouraged by the turtle in black's courage, picked up the melee weapons from the floor - mostly the long pieces of wood - before they charged at the leader while he was distracted by Flow pinning him to the floor. And as Flow jumped off of him, the kids surrounded the leader and started to whack him with their weapons from all sides without mercy, with Wendy kicking the gun out of the leader's reach.

"Agh! Ugh! Sto... Ow! Stop it...! Ah! Ouch! Ohh! Enough...! Ugh! Ohh! Get... Get away...! Agh! All of you! Ohh!" the leader whined as his head, shoulders, back, butt, fingers, bag of the hand, arms and legs took the hit, as he struggled to get up.

"Eat saucepan, meanie!" Oliver said as he whacked his saucepan headwear hard onto the leader's each foot's toes.

KLANG! KLANG!

"AHH! OHH!" the leader whined as he began to hop around, lifting up one leg at the time after it got hit from Oliver's saucepan, making him to look like he was dancing.

Young Conrad gave salt to the injury by swinging his own weapon up from below and whacking between the leader's legs behind his back.

The leader's face morphed into grimace as his groins took the hit, eyes as wide as saucers and nearly bulging out of their sockets, while bared teeth gritted tightly together.

"OOHHHHHHHH!" the leader whined as he bent over and fall over his knees in pain, while holding his groins with his hands.

The kids then pulled back from the downed leader, but only to make the way for the young Twins who prepared to further add insult to injury by lifting up their loaded rifle-like slingshots and took the aim each at the leader's exposed butt, before they mischieviously chuckling released their shots.

"AAHHHHHHHH!" the leader screamed in pain when the Twins' shots hit him hard in the butt.

"HOORAY!" the young Twins cheered happily with one voice.

"RIGHT IN THE BUTT!" the Twin One started.
"RIGHT IN THE BUTT!" the Twin Two repeated shortly after.

Moaning in pain he felt everywhere, especially in his groins and his rear end, and breathing laboriously, the defeated leader looked around of him and saw Wendy and the children still glaring daggers at him while holding up their weapons... and slowly but threateningly approached him from everywhere like they were intending to give him another round of pain right away.

"That does it! I'm out of here!" the leader wheezed before he rather hastily and clumsily stumbled up to his feet and took off into the night.

"Boss! Wait!" the first crook called as he and his defeated comrades, who had at this point climbed back up on their feet, ran after their boss and out of the building.

Flow chased after them, barking at them and snapping her jaws and teeth at their rear ends to make them to leave with such of hurry that they left all of their loot behind.

With the leader and the crooks gone, the children raised their weapons up and let out the one big "HOORAY" cry in triumph over their captors, which echoed aloud in the lobby and the whole building, while hopping and dancing with each other, happy that they were all still alive and alright. Even Flow joined in by letting out the victorious barks in the air.

While Wendy, who was holding one of the crook's flashlights, didn't join the kids' victorious cheering, aside of checking out each kid to see if anyone had got injured, she did gave them tight hugs and congratulatingly rubbed the tops of their heads.

Wendy: "But in that moment of "our victory", I suddenly remembered that who was to really thank for us being still alive after such of terrifying experience in the first place. I looked around for that little turtle but I didn't saw him around of the other kids... let alone any trace of him."

"Hey! Where is that thing that just saved us?" Wendy asked from the kids as she lightened the lobby with the flashlight to see if the turtle in black was still here, but there was no any sign of him.

Most of the children could not answer this question, because none of them had seen where the turtle in black had disappeared during the fight. Young Laura and Oliver helped Wendy to look around for the turtle tot by using the crooks' flashlights - save for the leader's as it was lying on the floor broken - to enlighten the lobby to see better, but still there was no sign of him.

After the moment, young Angie was surprised when Mike all of the sudden jumped off her shoulder and ran off - with young Angie going after the rodent, confused that where he was going and calling him to come back, until Mike stopped next to another large painting leaning against the wall in the corner.

Sniffing the air with its tiny little nose, Mike peeked under the big painting for a moment before turning back to Angie and began to squeak aloud to get her and the others' attention.

Even Flow, who had lowered her muzzle closer to the floor sniffing it, came to the same spot were Mike was standing. As the rodent stepped aside, Collie took her time to sniff the bottom right edge and corner of the painting and the floor around it before she peeked under the painting as well to see what was in there.

After the moment, Flow came out from under of the painting and turned back to Wendy and the kids, before the collie let out couple-three loud barks to get their attention.

"I think that both Mike and Flow are trying to tell us that it is in there!" young Angie informed, pointing at the large painting.

Wendy and the rest of the kids all turned to look over young Angie at the painting in the corner.

Wendy: "We gathered around the painting in the corner of the lobby, from which there was no other way to escape. And being the oldest of us, I went first to check... and there I found the one who had saved us."

As the other children stood around of the painting, all eyes on the painting, Wendy knelt down next to the painting and carefully peeked beneath it with her flashlight.

And from there she found him... the turtle tot in black... crouched on all fours, though shielding his eyes from the flashlight's light with his hand, while looking up at Wendy cautiously.

Even though Wendy had already seen a turtle tot once, she couldn't help but be amazed at the very existence of such a creature.

However, her amazement soon faded away when he noticed that the turtle tot did not seem very trusting of them despite his heroic deed. After all, the creature before her was still quite young, still a child, and yet even among the strangers.

Wendy: "Although he was like a cornered animal, he showed no signs of fear or hostility, only an unmistakably understandable wariness of us. And so, because this strange creature had bothered to save our lives that night despite not knowing us, I thought that I needed to somehow convince him that we meant him no harm."

Taking the matters into her hands as the oldest of the group, Wendy decided to at least try to talk to the turtle creature to show to him that she and the kids were friends.

"Hey? It's okay, dearie." Wendy said in a soft and calm voice, almost like a mother soothing a child. "You do not need to be afraid, nobody here is going to hurt you."

The turtle tot in black, remained quiet and didn't speak a word. Whether he was convinced by Wendy's words or was still cautious of her, he didn't show it. He only kept staring at Wendy with the unreadable look over his face.

"That what you just did. That was very brave from you. You just saved our lives. Thank you." Wendy thanked.

The turtle tot in black still didn't reply and the look on his face didn't change... but he went into a sitting position nonetheless, never breaking the eye-contact with Wendy.

"Where do you come from?" Wendy asked gently.

The turtle tot still didn't reply.

The children outside huddled behind Wendy and peered in over her shoulder to see the turtle tot for themselves.

"Ohhh!" they all gasped quietly.

"Look at it!" young Conrad said, pointing his finger at the turtle in black.

"What is it?" young Jessica questioned curiously.

"Is it a monster?" young Minnie asked, a bit afraid.

"No. It's the turtle." young Laura replied assuredly.

"That is the biggest turtle I've ever seen!" young Buck said, his eyes as wide as saucers.

"Look at the eyes! So much like human!" young Angie said.

"What's the deal with the black bandana over its head?" young Eddie questioned, noticing the black bandana over the turtle's head.

"Did you see what it did those guys? Kicked their butts like they were nothing." young Oliver recalled.

"Where he did learn to fight like that?" young Twin One asked.
"Where he did learn to fight like that?" young Twin Two said, repeating the question.

"Wondering what it might eat." young Jake wondered, standing in front of the whole crowd while munching a one big cookie he had taken out of the pocket of his suspended pants.

Wendy then turned back to the children, young Jake in particular, and noticed the half-eaten cookie in his hand.

"Jake? Will you give me that cookie? Please, sweetie." Wendy requested.

As young Jake was about to take another bite of the cookie, he instantly stopped when he heard Wendy requesting for his cookie, and stared up at her with the raised eyebrow.

"But I managed to take this one with me to spare it for a later after I was found by those bad guys that forced me to leave rest of my cookies under the table." young Jake protested.

"Just give me the cookie, sweetie." Wendy asked a little firmly this time.

Reluctantly, young Jake held out the cookie to Wendy, who took the cookie into her hand before turning back to the turtle tot in black.

"Here." Wendy said as she held the cookie out towards the turtle tot. "Cookie. You like cookies? Take it? Consider it a token of friendship."

Although the turtle tot in black still didn't reply, the turtle tot stared at the cookie in Wendy's hand with interest. He was about to reach for it until he quickly pulled his hand back and looked up at Wendy a little suspiciously.

Wendy, however, only nodded her head reassuringly at the turtle tot in black before beckoning him to take the cookie.

The turtle tot in black, after the moment of consideration, decided to trust his guts - but not before his stomach began to ironically growl from slight hunger - before he slowly reached out for the cookie and gently took it from Wendy's hand. Wendy then pulled her hand back as the turtle tot started to take bites out of it, much to young Jake's dismay.

With the turtle tot in black eating the cookie, Wendy continued talking to him. The next question came out of her mouth out of curiosity after taking notice of the turtle tot's eyes, which shone with a glint of human-like intelligence and consciousness.

"Can you speak?"

The turtle tot stopped eating the cookie for a moment and looked up at Wendy again, unsure if he had heard her right.

"You seem to understand what I'm telling you, don't you?" Wendie asked again, before she repeated her question. "Can you speak?"

There was a moment of silence between the still slightly wary turtle tot in black, the patient Wendy and the children who eagerly waited for an answer, or more likely the anticipated speech to come out of the turtle tot's mouth. The turtle tot was at first quiet for a good amount of time but Wendy gave him all the time he needed, not wanting to push him.

And about ten or fifteen minutes later, the turtle tot in black finally opened his mouth, making Wendy's and the children's eyes go wide as they held their breath...

"Yes." the turtle tot in black said in soft Scottish accent.

"OOOOHHHHHHH!" the children, even Wendy, collectively gasped in amazement of what they just saw.

"It can talk!" young Eddie gasped.

""He"! He can talk!" young Laura corrected.

"A talking giant turtle? Amazing!" Conrad gasped, taking off his glasses.

Surprised even by herself that her assumptions about the turtle tot in black capability to the speech turned out to be correct, Wendy kept going.

"Well then, What is your name, little one?" she asked, earning another wary look from the turtle tot. "Surely you have a name, don't you? What do we call you?" she added.

This was followed by another moment of silence between Wendy and the turtle tot in black until the kids broke it when they started thinking about that.

"What if he does have no name? Maybe nobody wants to take him in and hasn't given him a name of his own." young Jessica said with sympathy.

"Then... I guess... we should take him in and give him a name ourselves." young Buck suggested.

"Good idea! So, what shall we call him?" young Oliver asked.

"I don't know. Should we call him simply Greenie, because he kinda is green?" young Jake suggested.

"Nah! Too obvious. I say we call him Lil' T." young Angie suggested, earning the looks from her friends. "What? He's a little and he's a turtle, and turtle starts with "T"." she pointed out.

"That's a super lame name, Angie! I suggest we call him Lil' Butt-Kicker! That sounds much cooler name, after you guys saw how that turtle kicked those bad guys' butts!" young Eddie said, kicking the air couple times to make his point.

"I like it!" young Twin One exclaimed.
"I like it!" young Twin Two repeated.

"Why does everything you suggest have to be a violent?" young Angie asked, lightly chiding Eddie for the choice of the name.

"Can we call him Mr. Shelly?" young Minnie innocently suggested.

"Or Lou? What about Lou? I'd like the name Lou." young Laura suggested.

"Guys, guys, guys! Give the poor little guy some break! We can't just go into that "can we keep this thing as a pet" thing with him! He is not like some stray dog that you can name whatever you want, but a poor lost child in need of help and should be treated as such!" Wendy chided the children lightly as she turned towards them.

However, little did she knew that young Laura calling him Lou had actually caught the turtle tot in black's attention.

"But he's not even a human but a turtle." young Eddie pointed out.

"Eddie's got the point here, Wendy." young Conrad added.

"And he didn't really look like he needed help recently when dealing with those goons." young Oliver said.

"That doesn't matter!" Wendy said. "What really matters here is that we should at least try to help him like we're always helping each other, whoever he is and wherever did he come from and..."

"Lorenzo."

The turtle tot in black's voice cut Wendy short and made her and everyone else around to turn back to the turtle tot, surprised of what he had just said.

"What? What did you just say?" Wendy asked again.

The turtle tot locked his eyes with Wendy's, pefore he opened his mouth to speak again.

"My name... is Lorenzo... or Louie for short. And I... come from... the sewers." the turtle tot in black, named Lorenzo or Louie, told them slowly, taking the brief moments of silence between his words as if momentarily considering how much he should reveal about himself to them.

Wendy and the children then locked eyes with each other... both surprised and confused by the turtle tot revealing his name to them and that where he had came from in the first place

The End of the Flashback

"Lorenzo stayed with us for at least a week, getting to know both me and the kids and became friends with us pretty quickly, so we almost considered him part of our family." Wendy told to Angel.

"Yeah!" the children said, voicing their agreement in one voice while nodding their heads.

"And that was the happiest week we ever had." Wendy explained, before she gestured her hand towards some pictures on the wall, beckoning Angel to check them out.

In one picture, young Louie was sitting in the floor next to young Jake, both stuffing the pizza into their mouths with passion while getting themselves messy with the cheese.

In the second picture, young Louie, wearing a feathered green paper hat on his head and the black cape, was duelling with both the pirate-dressed Eddie and the knight-dressed Buck with the pair of wooden swords.

In the third picture, young Louie was skating with young Conrad in the lobby on the hotel, with the turtle tot in black sliding down along the railimng of the staircase.

In the fourth picture, young Minnie was riding on young Louie's shoulders, both of them laughing happily.

In the fifth picture, young Laura was giving young Louie a tulip yellow springgreen as a welcoming gift, which the turtle tot in black accepted humbly.

In the sixth picture, young Louie - wearing a disguise - and young Jessica were together flying the remote controlled plane across the air in the yard of the hotel.

In the seventh picture. young Angie was sitting next to young Louie while introducing him her pet rat Mike, with both Louie and Mike taking a liking of each other pretty quickly.

In the eighth picture, young Louie was playing gunfighting with the pop-guns with young Oliver (who was on Louie's side) and the Twins (who were on the opposite side).

In the tenth picture, all the children, including young Louie, were huddled around of Wendy, who was reading a bedtime story to the kids.

And in the eleventh and final picture, young Louie was playing with Flow in the yard of the hotel, with the collie playfully pinning the turtle tot in black to the ground and licking his face.

"Wow. That was quite a story." Angel said in wonder, though she couldn't help but catch one plot hole in the story, which made her to turn to Louie. "But how come you were above the ground that night? I remember you telling me that your dad almost never allowed you to travel outside of the sewers to the surface when you were younger."

"And he didn't, Angel-cake." Louie said, nodding his head in agreement. "But it was actually one of Master Splinter's instructions as to why I ended up here that night. You see, me, my siblings, and Master Splinter were scavenging for more supplies in the sewers below this block at the time until the floodgates malfunctioned, causing the tunnels to flood. I was separated from my family by the flood current, but in case of such of incidents, Master Splinter had instructed us to find any sheltered place from that block and to stay put and stay hidden until he comes to look for us. Then, on the seventh day, Master Splinter suddenly appeared in the hotel lobby while we were all playing together upstairs, still looking for me and calling me by my name. I knew him showing up here meant it was time for me to go back to the sewers with him, back to my real family. And oh boy! You really should've seen the look on the kids' faces, Angel Cake, such of puppy-dog eyes when I was forced to confess to all of them that with my father here, I couldn't stay here any longer... and it was possible that we might never see each other again. They asked, no, they pleaded me with tears in their eyes to stay with them, but I just couldn't do that even if I wanted to. And so, with tears in my eyes, I bid them a touching farewell with my gratitude for them taking me under their wings for a week. They then followed me down to the lobby, but stayed hiding at the top of the stairs while watching me reuniting happily with Master Splinter."

"That's true." Wendy confirmed. "We even took secretly a picture of it as you can see."

Wendy then gestured her hand towards the picture, which showed young Louie reuniting with Master Splinter. The turtle tot in black was happily hugging the relieved rat master, who happily embraced Louie back, in the middle of the hotel lobby, unaware that Louie's new friends were watching them from upstairs the whole time.

"Although I was happy to see Lorenzo reunited with his rather extraordinary father, it was really sad to see him leaving us almost for good. The kids weren't very in the playful mood for a couple of weeks after Lorenzo's leave, even Flow seemed glum about that, and it took us a pretty while to get used to his rather sad absence again." Wendy said softly.

"Except that it wasn't the last time we saw each other, now wasn't it?" Louie questioned knowingly.

Wendy chuckled. "No... it wasn't, Lorenzo dear. After a while, Lorenzo started making occasional visits to check on us and was so generous enough that he brought us food, blankets, clothes and other supplies, including almost all these toys you see around here, and everything else necessary to make our lives here much easier and more comfortable... as a way of expressing his gratitude towards us and hoping that we canmanage a little longer until our lives take a positive turn."

"True." Louie confirmed. "Because Wendy and the kids are pretty much just the trash of society just like me, and that I technically owe them for showing me kindness, taking me in and taking care of me for a while, I feel a pretty strong drive to make their lives easier in return... and, if I'm being honest here, I also want to see my old friends and playmates whenever I get the chance."

"Yes, and these little guys have never stopped wishing to see you again after each of your visits, because they just love you so much, Lorenzo dear." Wendy told to the turtle in black with the smile.

Suddenly, Wendy, Louie and Angel heard aloud grunting and munching noise coming from the level of their feet.

Looking down, the three of them saw that Jake had grabbed onto the turtle in black's left leg without them noticing... and had begun somewhat childishly to chew on Louie's leg like a hungry wolf.

"OH! OH! WOW! WOW! HEY! EASY! EASY! EASY, JAKE! My foot is not a pacifier!" Louie chided, along with the gentle chuckle, as the turtle in black hopped onto his right foot and lightly shook his left to make Jake to let go.

Neither Wendy or Angel couldn't help with themselves but to chuckle at this in amusement.

"Maybe they love him a little too much that they actually want to eat him." Angel joked while laughing.

"Har, har, har, Angel-cake." Louie said sarcastically, before the turtle in black turned back to Jake, trying to get the boy to let go without using too much force in it. "Okay, okay, okay, Jake! Little teeth off me! Off! Off! Off! Let go of me!"

Jake then let go of Louie's foot and fell with the gentle thud onto his butt to the floor.

"Sorry Uncle Louie, but I just wanted to ask if I can have any leftovers?" Jake asked innocently.

The turtle in black chuckled and shook his head at the little chubby kid, whose mind was always in something to eat, much like Mikey's. Shortly after, Louie caught the sight of a lone pizza box lying on the floor next to him, Wendy and Angel.

"Whatever you want, Jake. Whatever y- Here. Eat this box. Fetch!" Louie said, before the turtle in black gently kicked the box away and towards Jake.

The pizza box ended up sliding to the other side of the attic room and Jake, wanting to see if there was anything left to eat, chased after it until the pizza box hit the railing of the stairwell, with its lift popping open.

Jake was delighted to find out that there was still one whole pizza left.

The chubby kid, mouth drooling with hunger, was about to have the whole pizza for himself... however, the other kids too had caught the sight of the pizza and, wanting to have some more for themselves too, stampeded towards Jake all together., with Jessica, Conrad and Minnie tackling Jake down.

"Hey!" Jake complained when Jessica, Conrad and Minnie tackled him down, with Minnie taking the pizza box out of Jake's hands and backing away with her prize.

"Give it back!" Jake whined, while being pinned down by Jessica and Conrad.

"Hey, that's mine!" Conrad whined.

"I saw it first!" Minnie said, shielding the pizza box from her friends.

"I'll take that!" Eddie said as he unexpectedly came from out of nowhere, taking the pizza box out of Minnie's hands while rudely showing her off her feet to the floor.

"HEY!" Minnie whined, her feelings hurt for what Eddie just did, with Laura coming to her side to check her out.

"Give it to me!" It has my name of it!" Buck said as he charged forward and grabbed to the pizza box with both hands.

"Nah-ah! It does not!" Oliver protested as he came in and grabbed from the other side of the box with both hands.

"Let go of it!" Eddie demanded.

He, Buck and Oliver started the three point tug-of-war over the pizza box, pulling it back and forth, each one of the three of them determined to get the pizza for themselves.

"Knock it off, guys!" Angie said as she grabbed to the box too, joining in the tug-of-war with the boys in order to pull it out of their hands.

Eddie then decided to play dirty, as he pushed Buck back with the pizza box, knocking him back and off his feet, before he whacked both Oliver and Angie away with the box, making all three of them to let go of the box.

But before Eddie could enjoy his "victory" by eating the pizza himself, he was surrounded on all sides by all the kids, including the Twins, each of them glaring daggers at him for his selfishness and rudeness and eyeing for the pizza box in his hands.

And then, every and each one of them charged at Eddie all at once, each one of them grabbing a hold to the pizza box and began to pull it back and forth, while crying, squealing, shouting and dictating insults, disapprovals and selfish demands to each other.

The commotion caught Wendy's, Louie's and Angel's attentions... and the turtle in black was quick to go to interfere.

"Now just a minute, you little rascals! Don't you know how to share? Huh?!" Louie said aloud.

All the other kids let go of the pizza box - save for Eddie, who backed away from the other kids while holding the box tightly like it was the last thing to ever hold on in the whole Earth - and all turned to look at Louie.

The turtle in black locked his eyes with Eddie's as he slowly and calmly walked towards the boy, while the other kids stood by the turtle in black's side, cornering Eddie against the stairwell's railing and cutting his escape, while glaring daggers at him again.

(The background music starts to play)

"Get away from it! All of you! This pizza is mine! Mine alone!" Eddie demanded.

"All right. It's only a pizza, Eddie. Huh? Come one! Surely you don't mind sharing it." the turtle in black said.

"Absolutely I mind!" Eddie declared.

Eddie then tried to make the mad dash past Louie on his right side, knocking down Laura, Buck, Angie, Oliver and one of the Twins as the kids tried to charge at him for the pizza box. However, reacting faster than any one of the kids did, Louie, who still had his map stick in his possession, hooked Eddie by his shirt with the stick's handle and pulled him back.

Now, now now! No fighting!" the turtle in black chided as he put Eddie back down and took the pizza box out of his hands and held it up high, out of anyone's reach.

"You see, kids." Louie started as the children gathered around of the turtle in black. "My master once wisely said: your relationship to each other is more important than your relationship to things. You must learn to share and never let the possessions to possess you, for that leads to obsession and the obsession leads to bad blood. You got the clue?"(2)

The children exchanged a confused glances with each other when they took Louie's words of wisdom in, though they soon responded by shaking their heads or shrugging their shoulders cluelessly.

"No?" Louie asked, sounding not surprised, before the turtle in black put the box on top his head. "Then let the older guy to tell you something about sharing in the language you know the best."

(The background music plays even louder as Louie starts to sing along with it.)

LOUIE
"What belongs to me, belongs to you"
"What belongs to you, belongs to me."

Standing aside, Wendy and Angel watched Louie giving the lesson to the children with the smile, gently swinging their heads from side to side along with the rhythm.

One by one, the children hang their heads down in shame over their fight for the one pizza box. Louie kneels down in front of bitterly frowning Eddie and puts his finger under his chin and gently lifts his head up, giving the boy a reassuring smile.

LOUIE
"And when you share, you will"
"Find the happiness that you seek."

However, Jake tried to take advantage of Louie's momentary distraction in order to snatch the pizza box, that was now within his reach, off the black turtle's head. But when he was close to even touch it, Louie quickly gets up, taking the box out of Jake's reach.

LOUIE
"COME ON! EVERY LITTLE NINJA WITH ME!"

Louie then begins to walk casually around, failing to notice that the Twins had sneakily climbed on top of the high dresser and were waiting for the perfect moment to strike as the turtle in black kept getting closer with the pizza box.

LOUIE
"So what belongs to me, belongs to you"
"What belongs to..."

Louie was suddenly cut off when the Twins caught him by surprise by jumping off the dresser and landed onto his shoulders/shell and snatching the pizza box off his head before jumping off with their prize, making the turtle in black to glare after the Twins... though the hint of the proud smile of their sneak attack on him briefly visited on his lips.

LOUIE
"HEY! You little rascals! Will you put that box...!"

The mischievious Twins ran off from the turtle in black with the pizza box... right in middle of the circle of other children. Seeing the box in the Twins' hands, the children narrowed their eyes and got ready to pounce on the Twins, about to start another fight over the pizza, but Louie jumps quickly in between to stop them, pushing the children away from each other and taking the box back to his hands.

LOUIE
"NO! NO! NO! STOP IT! This isn't right! You shouldn't be fighting! Uncle Louie has another way to explain it to you."

Louie then threw the pizza box in the air and sent the pizza flying out of it. Putting the box away for a moment, Louie pulled out his Butterfly Sword and jumped up at the pizza before swinging his short swords up at the pizza for the six times, slicing it into twelve clean pieces, while the children look on in amazement.(3)

SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!

CHILDREN
"Oooohhhhhhhh."

Landing back on his feet, Louie put his swords away and grabbed to the empty pizza box, lifting it up and catching each falling pizza slice back into the box one by one, till they were all there back in the neat order. Louie then took one of the slices out of the box and gave it first to Jake.

LOUIE
"If you have heart, to give your friend"
"Then your friend, will give you too."

Jake grabs the slize of pizza eagerly and is just about to eat it, but is stopped when he sees Eddie staring at him, asking him to give him some of it with the puppy-dog-eyes act. Conflicted, Jake looks up to Louie for guidance, and the turtle in black encourages him to share it with the nod.

LOUIE
"Nothing to lose, but so much to gain"
"Hallelujah, that's all you need to do, eh?"

Joining in the song, the children began to pass the slices of pizza to each other as Louie handed the rest of the slices to them one by one: Jake to Eddie (while sneakily eating one slice), Eddie to Conrad, Conrad to Minnie, Minnie to Laura, Laura to Jessica, Jessica to Buck, Buck to Angie, Angie to Oliver, Oliver to Twin One and Twin one to Twin Two.

CHILDREN
"If you got a lot of everything"
"Then why don't you share it a bit?"

LOUIE
"That's it! Hey, I'm proud of you, kids!"

CHILDREN
"Everything you got is everyone's"
"And not just a one's."

When each child had their own slice of pizza, each of them turned to each other and handed them their own and took the one offered to them by the other: Jake and Eddie shared theirs, Conrad and Minnie shared theirs, Laura and Jessica shared theirs, Buck and Angie shared theirs, Oliver and Twin One shared theirs and Twin Two - with no one else to share his slice with - split his slice in two and gave it to Jake, who happily accepted it. And then, each one of them stuffed the slice they had into their mouths.

CHILDREN
"So what's... yours... is mine as well."

Louie began to walk along the circle of the children as they all kept singing together and clapped their hands together along the rhythm

LOUIE "What belongs to me, belongs to you" CHILDREN "If you got a lot of everything"
LOUIE "What belongs to you, belongs to me." CHILDREN "Then why don't you share it a bit?"
LOUIE "And when you share, you will" CHILDREN "Everything you got is everyone's"
LOUIE "Find the happiness that you seek." CHILDREN "And not just a one's."

CHILDREN
"So what's... yours... is mine as well."

The children then took each others hands and closed in around of Louie.

LOUIE "If you have heart, to give your friend" CHILDREN "Because each other's more important"

Then, viewed from above, from the circle, every second child (Eddie, Minnie, Jessica, Angie, and Twin One) pulled back before every first child (Jake, Conrad, Laura, Buck, Oliver, and Twin Two) did the same, forming a five-pointed star twice, until they stood in the wide circle.

LOUIE "Then your friend, will give you too." CHILDREN "Than our love for things that you got."

The circle of children then ran around of the turtle in black, twice, before they closed in around of him again.

LOUIE "Nothing to lose, but so much to gain" CHILDREN "Never let the possessions to possess you"

Then Jake then let go of Twin Two's hand and grabbed Louie by the shell, as the circle switched into the dancing conga-like, led by Louie, then Jake, then Eddie, then Conrad, then Minnie, then Laura, then Jessica, then Buck, then Angie, then Oliver and lastly the Twins, as they kept singing.

LOUIE "Hallelujah, that's all you need to do, eh?" CHILDREN "And you'll be free from obsession"

CHILDREN
"Just share whatcha got"
"that's all you need to do."

As Louie and the children do a conga dance, the turtle in black grabs a different box and holds it over his head, as they continue singing

LOUIE & CHILDREN
"Hallelujah, that's all you need to do!"
"Hallelujah, that's all you need to do!"
"Hallelujah, that's all you need to do!"

At the end of the song, Louie then drops the box on the floor, before he draws out his Butterfly swords again and sliced the box open.

SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!

"The class's dismissed, little ninjas! Well done! And finally, here's..." the turtle in black declared as he put his short swords away.

The box falls apart, revealing to the surprised children, as well as Wendy and Angel, a delicious-looking cake with raspberry frosting and a shiny red cherry on the top.

"... your dessert. Dig in!" Louie declared with the hearty chuckle.

The children were so delighted to see such a delicious treat presented in front of them that, squealing with excitement, all of them stampeded to gobble and fight over the cake, disregarding everything about sharing and not fighting over the shared things.

Louie gaped at the children's messy eating and fighting over the best parts, before the turtle in black frowned that all he had tried to tell the children a moment ago had fallen to the deaf ears.

Once again, Both Wendy and Angel couldn't help but giggle at Louie's embarrassment, with Wendy shaking her head and Angel trying to supress her own laughter. Even Flow howled in laughter.

Seeing the two and the collie laughing at him from the corner of his eye, Louie turned his scowling gaze at them for a moment... until the smile crept slowly but forcibly to the turtle in black's lips.

"Hee, hee, hee! Kids these days." the turtle in black laughed with the shrug.

TO BE CONTINUED

---

TRIVIA

1) - The reference to the "Here's Johnny" scene from The Shinning.

2) - The reference to Master Splinter's line/words of wisdom from the Back to the Sewers episode "Incredible shrinking Serling".

3) - The reference to Leonardo using his Katanas to slice the pizza for his family in 1990 and 2014 live-action films.