Guest1: It does? Not familiar with this Blue Eye Samurai but I'm pretty surprised if my story does.
animegamefanatic: Well, you can't blame Splinter for going out of his way to protect his sons and daughters by constantly reminding them to stay out of society's eyes for fear of losing them to the dangers of the world, just like he lost Master Yoshi to Shredder's attack, the trauma that will haunt him for the rest of his life. But yes, there will be a grudges between two members of the mutant family in this saga for partially similiar reasons, but Splinter won't be the other party.
= TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES 2003 =
= THE GIRL AND THE TURTLE PART 2 P6. =
The morning began to dawn over New York City and the day began its usual route quite peacefully... with majority of the city being unaware of the last nights events.
However, the morning wasn't quite peaceful for one person, who was walking down the street earlier at dawn with the clear purpose in the said person's mind.
And the said person happens to be none other than Ellie Bridge.
All last night, Ellie has been racked with worry after discovering that Angel hadn't returned home from a date night with Louie... and despite several attempts to call her granddaughter to ask where she was or if she was already on her way home, her calls were never answered. And since Louie had given her his secret phone number, she had tried to call to the turtle in black as well to ask him if Angel was alright, but neither Louie had answered to her calls.
Even if it was against her better judgement and a desperately urging temptation to call to the police to report them about Angel's disappearance... again, Ellie had decided to do otherwise and go to look for both Angel and Louie by herself.
But knowing that she really had no idea where to start looking and where to find them, since New York was a big city and they could be anywhere, Ellie decided to start from some particular lead.
The place where Louie and Angel had met each other for the first time, the abandoned warehouse at the corner of Eastman and Laird.
With the luck being on her side, Louie had given her the coordinates of the warehouse's whereabouts, and following those coordinates, Ellie made her way to the warehouse, and arrived there when the sun had almost risen over the rooftops of the building.
Standing there and looking at the long abandoned and dilapidated warehouse, its appearance left her with an uneasy feeling, as Ellie didn't really know what to expect from there and who she would run into there.
But because knowing what Louie's family mostly looked like, and knowing that they must be living in there - and hoping that she could ask from them where Louie and Angel were - she dared to slowly venture towards it until she was standing right at one of the boarded windows.
Ellie peeked inside through the gap between the boards... and all she was a lots of piles of garbage and abandoned vehicles shrouded in darkness.
"Lorenzo-dear really lives in such of poor conditions." Ellie said to herself in sympathy for the turtle in black, thinking that this old warehouse was Louie and his family's home, which really had nothing to praise of.
"LORENZO?!" Ellie called through the gap, hoping Louie to be there. "Lorenzo?! Are you there?!"
However, after waiting for a moment for the answer, there was none. So Ellie tried again.
"Lorenzo?!" Ellie called again, desperately. "Lorenzo?! I know you're in there! Answer me!"
Once again, there was no answer after the moment of waiting.
"Lorenzo! You didn't bring Angel home last night like you should have! Where is she?! Is she okay?!"
Nothing.
Ellie slowly turned away from the boarded up window with a look of utter desperation and confusion on her face, mostly as to why Louie wasn't answering her calls even though she was standing right on his doorstep.
For a moment the thought crossed her mind that maybe Louie had deliberately misled her about the coordinates and that this wasn't where he lived, though she recalled both Louie and Angel having said that morning at hers that they had met each other for the first time right here, and there was no other Eastman and Lard in a town but one, and this is it!
Then another thought crossed her mind... that Louie might not even be home yet, and judging by the desolate emptiness of the warehouse, neither was his family.
Such of devastating setback: because if there was no one in the home right now when she needed the help most, then what she was supposed to do now.
"What am I supposed to do now?! Where I should start looking for them?!" Ellie asked from herself in growing desperation and in panic.
Ellie turned back to the boarded up window for a moment before turning away from it… until she suddenly gasped in startlement as she realized that in the corner of her right eye she caught a climpse of some dark figure inside of the window, peering through the boards and looking right at her!
But when Ellie, breathing rapidly from the startle, turned back to the window... there was no one there.
Now aware of the presence of someone inside of the warehouse, though it made her more alarmed than hopeful, Ellie warily peeked back inside through the window and tried to see who was in there, even if all she saw was darkness.
"L-L-Lorenzo?" Ellie called again with low, soft and shaking voice.
Again, there was still no answer and Ellie stared deeper and deeper into the darkness until... she quickly found herself staring right into the blank white eyes that stared back at her through the gap.
"Who is huffing and puffing my house to the ground?! This ain't Green Hood's grandma's house, you know?!" the figure behind the window said, though sounding more of joking than irritated about the intruder in his property.(1)
"AGH!" Ellie cried, startled by the figure's sudden appearance right in front of her, and hastily stepped away from the window as the figure at the window kept staring at her.
"Mikey!" called the second more femine- and angry-sounding voice from Ellie's right.
Ellie turned to look to her right, and gasped again after seeing that standing there was a giant turtle, who had appeared there out of nowhere, unexpectedly and without her notice. This one had almost the same facial features as Louie, but with a much slimmer pastel green body with feminine features. And instead of black mask, she was wearing the pink mask.
The turtle in pink, Arcee, was also looking past her and towards the boarded up window of the warehouse with a reproachful expression on her face.
"You are mixing two different fairy tales together, and right at a bad time." Arcee chided, as she turned to gesture her hand towards Ellie who, despite having seen one giant talking turtle, stepped away from her.
However, she suddenly felt herself bumping into something sturdy behind her and turned around to look, only to gasp again with startle when she found herself staring wide-eyed at the emerald green tough-looking turtle with the red mask, and arms folded before him, who had also appeared in the spot as if out of nowhere.
The turtle in red, Raph, too was looking towards the window as Arcee was.
"I'll be huffing and puffing your sorry rear end if you don't stop scaring this old lady right now!" Raph said gruffily." Raph said gruffly to Mikey.
Ellie then turned to look at the warehouse when she heard its doors being lifted open, revealing from behind it three more turtles, one with blue mask, Leo, one with purple mask, Donnie, and another female turtle with a turquoise mask, Mary, before they were joined by the fourth turtle with orange mask, Mikey, who looked outside at Arcee, Raph and Ellie.
"Come on, guys! Get her inside! Hurry!" Leo said to Raph and Arcee urgently, hurriedly beckoning them to come inside of the warehouse.
Ellie heard Leo telling the other turtles to bring her inside the warehouse, but she couldn't figure out why he wanted it done so urgently... beside of what Louie had told her earlier, that because of what and who they really were, and that the other people cannot understant them, they couldn't be seen on the surface, especially in daylight.
Arcee then cautiously glanced at the street before the warehouse before she quickly rushed to Ellie and took a gentle hold of her from her back and right arm, with Raph grabbing on her by her shoulders, while warily looking to the left and right.
"This way, ma'am! Quickly!" Arcee ushered as she and Raph escorted Ellie towards the open warehouse doors.
"Get inside, lady! Don't ask why! Just get in there!" Raph told her as he shoved the old lady towards the warehouse as gently as he could yet urgently.
"Okay, okay!" Ellie told them, figuring it might be wiser to do as they said and then ask questions later.
"Yes! Hurry!" Mikey said half urgently, half dramatically, taking one last peek outside. "There are hungry wolves outside who are fond of the taste of grandmothers!"(1)
However,he earned qith that a slap on top of his head from Leo, who was not in the mood for Mikey's foolishness right now.
"OW!" Mikey yelped, touching his head after the hit.
"Served you right, wiseguy!" Arcee hissed at her little brother as she, Raph and Ellie hurried through the doors and inside of the warehouse.
With Ellie having being brought inside, Mary, Donnie and Leo took each one last peeks outside to make sure that the coast is clear, before they lowered the warehouse's door down and locked it.
With everybody inside, the turtles gathered around of Ellie, who was put under the light from the ceiling as if in the interrogation room. Standing there, and looking uncomfortably at the turtles standing in the edge of the light which left them half covered in shadow.
"Please, don't hurt me." Ellie pleaded them. "I may have tresspassed to your property, but I swear you this: I'm not looking for the trouble."
"Don't worry, ma'am. We're not going to hurt you." Arcee told her reassuringly. "We're not like those cowardly street punks that prey on the weak and defenseless."
"Unless somebodtoof those street dudes wants to hurt you, miss..." Mikey said, once appearing out of nowhere right next to Ellie, who upon noticing the turtle in orange presence gasped with the startle and stepped back. "That dude will be the one who gets hurt!"
BONG!
Ellie winced with another startle when Raph's fist landed hard onto Mikey's head, knocking the turtle in orange down and making her to turn to the turtle in red, who proudly waved his fist up.
"Like that!" Raph said with the cuckle.
"OW!" Mikey moaned as he got back up, rubbing his head with his hand while scowling annoyedly at Raph for what he had just done to him. "Not cool, dude!"
"Guys! Knock it off!" Leo told them strictly.
Leo then turned to Ellie. "Don't be afraid of us, miss. Like Arcee just said, we will not hurt you." the turtle in blue said reassuringly, before he put his hand over his chest as if introducing himself. "I'm Leonardo."
"Michelangelo!" Mike said, waving his hand.
"Raphael." Raph said, folding his arms over his chest.
"Artemisia." Arcee said before politely adding. "Hopefully we weren't too rough with you, ma'am."
"Marietta." Mary said, punching her palm and bowing to Ellie.
"And Donatello." Donnie said lastly.
Ellie glanced at each turtle one at the time as they introduced themselves to her, recalling each one's names that Louie and Angel had told her. Ellie also noticed that one of the turtles along with Louie was missing, the one they called by the name Domenico, but that mattered quite very little for her right now.
"My name is..." Ellie was about to say to introduce herself to them, until she was cut off when Mary spoke over her words.
"Ellie Bridge, Angel's grandmother." the turtle in turquoise said. "Yes, ma'am. We know who you are."
Ellie turned to Mary with the frown, surprised and confused that the turtles already knew who she was, unless Louie had alreafdy told them about her.
"How do you know me? I don't remember we having met before." Ellie said to them.
"True. We're not. At least not face to face, Mrs. Bridge." Donnie told her. "But we've heard a lot about you from both Casey and Angel. And we've seen you once when we were watching from the shadows of the alley across the street when Casey brought Angel back to you."
"And we also noticed you coming to the door of the warehouse, but we didn't immediately reveal ourselves because... you know... people's reactions always when we see us." Arcee pointed out.
"It was at least until you brought up Louie's name many times over that we decided to take our chances and reveal ourselves to you... although it didn't go exactly as planned." Raph said, scowling at Mikey's direction, earning an innocent shrug from the turtle in orange.
"And it was a imperative urgency for us to get you in here for our own sake, for we do not generally walk upon the surface in the daylight, or else we would be seen." Mary told her.
"So..." Leo said as he stepped forward. "How do you know our brother, or us at all, Mrs. Bridge? And how did you know where to find us?"
"Well..." Ellie stammered a little at first before continued. "I know your brother Lorenzo because he came to save me and Angel when we were about to get mugged and kidnapped by some people on the alley over two weeks ago... and we invited him in our place as a token of our gratitude, where he also told me a quite lot about the rest of you turtles. He and Angel also told me of having met each other for the first time along with the rest of you right here... at the corner of the Eastman and Lard." she told them honestly.
The rest of the turtles were taken aback by what Ellie had just told them.
"Louie did what?! He revealed himself to the bunch of people?!" Mary gasped, perplexed.
"And not just that! That shell-for-brains gave away the secret of our location?!" Raph growled angrily.
"Oh no, no, no, no! Don't be so hard on him. He didn't tell me anything until he had made me to make the same promise you all had made Angel and Arnold to make to you: that I will never tell anything to anyone, not even to my own family, that I've seen you and know about your secret. And so far for more than two weeks, your secret has been safe with me only in my own knowledge." Ellie told them quickly.
The turtles had a moment of silence as they took all of this in. While it was a good thing that Louie had made Ellie to promise that she won't tell anyone about them, they didn't appreciate it that Louie had been acting so rashly behind their shells, like going against Master Splinter's instructions by revealing himself to more people even if they happened to be the close loved ones of their friends so far... not to mention of Louie having given out the secret location of their Lair, which too was forbidden by their master.
"Well, that was a good thing at least. But still..." Leo said with disappointment in his voice, before the turtle in blue turned to Donnie and Mary. "Donnie? Mary? Go to the Lair and tell Master Splinter what has happened. He should know what Lorenzo has gone to do."
The turtles in purple and turquoise nodded, but before they could turn to leave to tell their master...
"No need for that, Leonardo. I already know everything." the voice behind them said.
Everyone, all six surprised turtles and Ellie, turned towards the voice and saw Master Splinter standing there in the dark, holding a candle in his hand, which small flame partially illuminated his face, and revealing himself to Ellie at the same time.
"Master Splinter!" the turtles gasped, as Splinter began to make his way towards his children and their new guest.
"How long you have been standing there, master?" Raph questioned, because they hadn't even heard him come with the elevator, which hadn't even come from the Lair to the warehouse, and only a moment ago the place where the old rat master just stood was completely empty and covered in darkness.
"Long enough, Raphael." Splinter said, blowing the candle off as he stepped to the edge of the light between Leo and Donnie.
"And I'm sure you heard everything that was said up until now, huh, Sensei?" Mikey said.
"It doesn't matter what I heard now, Michelangelo." Splinter said dismissively. "I've been aware of what Louie has done for a some time."
The rest of the turtles were taken aback by this revelation.
"You knew, Sensei?" Arcee questioned, earning a nod from Splinter.
"How long? Since when?" Leo questioned.
"More than two weeks ago, Leonardo. Lorenzo told me himself." Splinter told to his eldest son. "Although I was surprised, though not very pleased, that Lorenzo had indirectly revealed the value to our guest where to find us."
Splinter then turned to face Ellie, who was still staring at him in the wide-eyed shock and astonishment.
She remembered Louie having told her that his sensei and father was a rat, and while that didn't mean she didn't believe him - because seeing a giant talking turtle was such of surprise that it was enough to convince her of that - she was still surprised to see him herself. If Louie hadn't told her about it before this meeting, Ellie would probably have been so shocked to see a giant talking rat standing right there before her that she would have passed out (like April did a long time ago upon their first meeting) and tumbled to the ground.
"So Lorenzo was right. You are a rat." Ellie said in aloud whisper.
"Indeed, I am. My name is Splinter." Master Splinter said before the old rat master bowed his head down in greeting.
Splinter then lifted his head up and looked at the old woman before him with stern look but gentle and reassuring smile. "Don't be afraid of us. You are among friends."
"Thank you." Ellie said nervously, trying to composure herself after taking a quite lot for one morning.
"Now, Mrs. Bridge, if you don't mind me asking." Master Splinter started. "Since you know about us and where to find us, what brought you here to us?"
Quickly remembering the reason why she had come here in the first place, Ellie forced herself to fully calm down and push aside at least most of her uneasiness from meeting Louie's family face to face for the first time, so that it would be easier to tell Splinter and the turtles why she had come to their place.
"Well, you see, Master Splinter..." Ellie started, as her desperation for help and her pressing concern for Angel returned to her. "I came here to see your son, Lorenzo. Is he here?"
"Louie ain't here." Raph quickly informed her.
"He's not?!" Ellie said, nearly gasping from shock as she turned to Raph with wide eyes.
"Sorry, miss. You just missed him" Mikey told her.(3)
"Mikey!" Raph snapped and slapped him in the back of his head.
"OW!" Mikey yelped in pain.
"We haven't seen Louie since yesterday evening. He took his Shell Cycle too, but hasn't returned yet." Arcee said as she nodded her head over her left shoulder.
Ellie looked on where Arcee had nodded her head to and spotted there the turtles' Battle Shell and Sewer Slider, between of which stood a red bike, Raph's bike. And between of two vehicles seemed to be enough of room for the second bike to stand side-by-side with Raph's, possibly Louie's bike as Arcee told her, but that spot was empty.
"Then where is he?!" Ellie asked nearly in panic.
"We actually don't know, miss. He never told us anything about where he was going." Mary told her.
"And we've been trying to call him through the shell cells too, but he hasn't answered all morning. That's why we were just about to go find him in the city and bring him back until we ran into you." Leo told Ellie.
"If this helps anything, I happened to see Dom leaving the Lair almost as soon as Louie had left last night. And because we already know that Dom has a habit to watch after Louie wherever he goes to make sure he doesn't end up into the trouble, do you guys think that he might have...?" Mikey told them.
However, he immediately cut himself sort when he noticed everybody staring at him with wide-eyed stares.
"What?" Mikey asked, not getting it why they were staring at him.
""That he might have gone after him", right?" Leo said, sternly questioning Mikey if that was what he was about to say.
"Are you telling us that Dom went after Louie last evening, Mikey?" Mary sternly questioned.
"And it never crossed your stegosaurus level mind to tell us about this EARLIER THIS MORNING?!" Raph exploded with roaring.
"NO!" Mikey denied, waving his hands in front of him.
"No?" Arcee questioned, folding her arms and giving Mikey a long and silent look that told to the turtle in orange that he wasn't telling them everything.
"Okay... maybe a little more than an hour earlier." the turtle in orange added sheepishly, and an embarrassed chuckle.
For his honesty, Mikey earned a whack on top of his head from scowling Donnie's Bo-staff.
WHACK!
"OW! Ow-ow-ow!" Mikey moaned as he held his head. "Sometimes it hurts to be honest."
"Shell-for-brains. Could've done this a lot of earlier instead of right now." Leo hissed in irritation, before he took out his shell cell and began to dial Dom's number to call him.
As Leo retreated from the others to his privacy to wait for the call from the turtle in white, Donnie turned back to Ellie, for one thing in this whole case had crossed his mind
"Why are you even asking to see Louie? Why are you so interested to meet him right away?" the turtle in purple questioned.
"Because of Angel." Ellie told them.
"And what about young Mrs. Bridge?" Master Splinter asked, frowning suspiciously.
"Louie and Angel have been doing their late night dates for a past week now, but yesterday evening after Louie took Angel to the bike ride to somewhere, he didn't bring her back home all night like he was supposed to." Ellie told them. "I have tried to call them both, even Lorenzo, to ask where he and Angel were and if they were about to come home yet, and if Angel was okay, but neither has answered to my calls. After waiting all night, I was about to call the police to report Angel having gone missing again, until I thought of going to look for Lorenzo and Angel from here first. And all apparently for nothing, as I now learned that Lorenzo and most likely Angel are not here either!"
Master Splinter hardened his frown upon hearing this, and the other turtles looked at each other, taken aback by all of this.
At this point, even if no one was paying an attention, Leo finally managed to make a contact with Dom who answered to his call.
"Louie has been dating with Angel all this time?" Mikey questioned perplexed.
"And he never told us anything about that?" Donnie questioned as well.
"That explains a lot: Louie's rather exhausted attitude during daily exercises, the lack of sleep and disappearing in the evenings." Arcee listed.
"And knowing that swashbuckling daredevil..." Raph told his siblings.
"Say no more, Raphael." Splinter cut him off.
Splinter could just barely hide his disappointment in his missing son, because he knew that Louie had an almost constant tendency to recklessly get into dangerous situations, even life-threatening ones, just for the sake of sport, and now he's probably dragged Angel along on such wild excursions on the surface, thus putting an innocent life in needless dangers.
"That young man is in a very big trouble when I get my hands on him." Splinter growled, tapping his staff against his palm as a demonstration of the punishment he has for Louie.
"I beg your pardon, Dom! Louie and Angel have done what exactly?!" they all heard Leo almost yelling in his shell cell with the shocked voice.
Everybody turned to Leo as the turtle in blue listened to the story of Louie's and Angel's misadventures Dom was telling him from the other end of the line, with the wide-eyed frown upon Leo's face hardening into the stone-hard scowl with every nod he was giving to every detail Dom told him.
"Alright. We'll be there in a minute. And don't let that shell-for-brains to flee the scene until we get there." Leo instructed before he hung up.
Ellie immediately stepped forward and looked at Leo both hopefully and hesitatingly.
"Was that the last one of you? Domenico if I recall the name right? Did he find them? Did he find Lorenzo and Angel?" Ellie questioned impatiently.
"He did." Leo told her. "From the front door of your place, Mrs. Bridge."
"From my place?" Ellie said, sounding more confused by these news rather than relieved. "But I never saw them coming there before I left."
"They most likely got there some time after you were gone." Leo concluded, before he became more serious. "But guess what Dom just told me about what those two have been up to."
Everybody were on their ears to listen what Leo had to say... and in the end, none of them were pleased of it!
###
Few hours earlier...
"Louie...? Louie...? Louie...?"
Louie stirred at the echo of the familiar femine voice that was calling his name in the darkness.
"Louie...? Louie...? Louie...? Can you hear me...?"
Slowly and with difficulty, Louie, who felt like he was lying on his left side on the floor, lifted his head up a little and grimaced, because he felt quite groggy and awful from his head, and had to shake it to get himself clear.
"Louie...? Louie...? Louie...? Wake up...!"
The turtle in black then slowly opened his quite heavy eye lids, though all he met was more darkness. Louie tried to peer around him to get an idea that where he was, but his vision was mostly blurry, so he had to blink them many times over to get his vision clear.
"Louie...? Louie...? Louie...?"
This time, Louie turned towards the voice calling his name, and even though his vision was still unclear, he saw a blurry image of the face staring right at him. A purple-haired figure who was lying on the right side right next to him.
"Angel?" Louie moaned.
Angel let out the sigh of relief when Louie finally woke up and spoke to her.
"Oh, Louie! I was getting worried you might not wake up!" the purple-haired girl told him.
"Wake up? How long I was out?" confused Louie asked.
"I don't know." Angel told him honestly. "An hour, couple maybe. But to me it felt like hours when I couldn't get you to wake up. I don't know do you even remember anything before you passed out, but those dishonest scoundrels poisoned you..."
"No! No poison!" Louie quicky cut her off. "Tranquilizers. "I'd never have ever woken up if it had been poison they injected me with. But whatever they used on me, that must have been a small dose to just knock me out."
"But why? Why would they want to capture you? Or us altogether?" Angel asked, looking confusedly around of her.
"Can't worry about that now, Angel." Louie said, before he looked around. "First we have to figure out where we are."
Angel gave Louie a deadpanned look, as if wordlessly saying "Really? You haven't already figured that out" to the turtle in black.
"Does this answer to your question, Louie? We are in the trunk of the truck." Angel said.
With that, Louie looked around of them a little bit closely until he realized that, with them both lying quite close together in a rather tight space, they were indeed locked in the trunk of one of Mr. Nosy's goons' cars.
Angel then groaned from the effort as she began to struggle a bit to pull her hands behind her back, but she couldn't after frew attempts. "And our hands are tied behind of our backs!"
Taken aback by this information, Louie tried to peer over his shoulder behind his shell-back and tried to pull one of or both of his hands from behind his back but he quickly noticed that he couldn't, because they too were tightly tied up with ropes. The turtle in black cursed at himself for not seeing that beforehand.
"Okay... then let's skip that part." Louie said. "Let's then try to figure out where they are taking us."
"Well..." Angel started. "Moments ago before you woke up, Louie, I heard someone talking outside...as if greeting the driver and passengers of the car before I heard the gate's creaking, as if we had arrived at the gate of some fenced or private area. But... that is just a theory."
Suddenly, they felt the car jerk to a stop before the engine was turned off, signaling to both of them that wherever they had been taken to, they had arrived their destination. Soon they heard the doors at each side of the car being flung open, which were followed by the steps of the guys walking to the back of the car as if to pick them up from the trunk.
"We shall see if your theory hits its mark, Angel-Cake." Louie told her.
"Louie. What are we going to do?" Angel questioned worriedly, not very keen to wait for what these goons have stored for them.
"I'm thinking of an escape plan all the time, Angel, I just need to analyze both our situation and our surroundings before I can hatch one." Louie told her. "Until then, just follow my lead, and be ready for anything."
"Louie?" Anger said, not sounding really convinced.
She would have been convinced if this was just about the Purple Dragons, as they were easily predictable. But this was now about an organized criminal organization, a small private army of cabinet-sized goons, heavy armament, bloodthirsty hounds, their own turf, and who knows what kind of horrible ways to get rid of snoopers and prisoners. Nothing like those street thugs who are nothing but muscle and thirst for brawl.
"Hey! Hey! Angel! Look at me! You look at me!" Louie said to her.
Angel turned to look at the turtle in black in the eyes, and Louie smiled at her reassuringly.
"We will get out of here... alive... and together. I promise." Louie assured her.
Then suddenly after Louie had said this, the trunk of the car was opened, letting the light of the early dawn to get in. Louie and Angel turned to look up, and they instantly saw the towering form of Mr. Nosy looking down at them along with Johannes, Marcus, Helga and Gabe.
"Ahh! You're awake! Good morning, Mr. Sunshine." Mr. Nosy wished gleefully, earning a laughters from his guys around of him. "Now get out of here!"
Mr. Nosy then leaned down and grabbed on Louie, before he personally dragged the turtle in black out of the trunk, while two of his bodyguards dragged Angel out of the trunk.
After they have been taken out of the trunk, Louie and Angel took a moment to look around of them to see where they have been taken to.
Louie and Angel found themselves standing in front of some fine-looking remote mansion. The turquoise-colored building was at least three stories high and it had domed crimson roofs. At least two spiral staircases led up to the doors on either side of the fountain that depicted a giant dandelion, and above the doors was two vast balconies supported by pillars in the manner of some ancient greek style, and the door on the third balcony probably led to the private quarters of the owner of this mansion. On the first two floors, there was a row of quite large arched windows, which were possibly the windows of the halls or large hallways.
The mansion was surrounded by a high wall and the gardens with pools, more fountains and the vast fields of yellow dandelions. There were bushes that were trimmed into the shapes of life-like hounds like into guarding the dandelions from the tresspassing vandals, and there were tree-lines along the road that led from the gate in front of the mansion.
There were also a lot of not-so-friendly-looking people here and there: At the gate, on the wall, on both sides of the road, on the steps of the staircases, on the porch, on the main doors, on the balconies, and even on the roof, there were armed men on guard, and on the roads between the dandelion fields was more armed men with guard dogs.
There are way more of then than a couple hundred, or something like that.
"Welcome to our humble home, Mrs. Bridge and Mr. Lorenzo." Johannes wished as he gestured his hand towards the building before them. "Fancy, isn't it?"
"But such of luxury isn't meant for such of hideous freaks like yourself." Marcus added.
Helga then took a sniff and grimaced with disgust, and waved her hand over her face. "Not to mention about one that reeks strongly like the sewer."
"QUIET YOU!" Mr. Nosy ordered harshly, silencing all three of them instantly.
"Now get moving! Both of you! Our boss is waiting!" Mr. Nosy ordered and shoved Louie forward, while the goons dragged Angel in their wake.
They took Louie and Angel up of one of the staircases and towards the front doors.
And as they went, the guards they passed by stared at Louie with astonished and perplexed looks... never having seen something so strange than the prisoner with the likeness of the giant humanoid turtle.
Louie, Angel, Mr. Nosy and the goons soon entered through the doors into the lobby and turned to the left hallway, to the east wing.
The hallway of the east wing - which was also filled with even more guards, who either stood guard or patrolled the hallways as they walked past - was quite magnificent: well kept and well cleaned by the maids taking care of the furniture, green carpets with yellowish edges on the floor and curtains on the windows, antique tables with dandelion-pattered vases, candelabras, pendulum clocks, and busts depicting several persons individually, old medieval swords and blunderbuss pistols on pedestals, antique cabinets filled with china, the set of old armors with dandelion insignia on breastplates and paintings depicting barrel-chested and smugly posing individuals in gangster-like costumes from the early 20th century.
However, the people on the boards, they all bore the few common things that they shared with each other. One was that they had the dandelions attached to their striped yellow and green suits and the facial likenesses of...
"Dandelion." Louie whispered, recognizing the face of a man released from prison a few weeks ago from every face of a person on each board.
So this is William Dandelion's place. They have been brought to Dandelion's hideout.
"Move it!" Mr. Nosy ordered and shoved Louie onward.
Mr. Nosy and his goons then directed Louie and Angel up the stairs to the second floor, which appearance did not differ at all from the hallway in downstairs.
And in the end of this hallway, there was a dandelion-patterned door, big enough that it would only mean that the doors led into some great room behind of it.
And right in front of the door was standing a couple of nasty-looking guards in blood-red suits, one of them had a black hair and a scar across the right side of his upper lip, and another guard had a bald top, small mustache and the stitched eye-patch.
The guards, upon seeing Louie, Angel and Mr. Nosy's party approached them, instantly reached for their guns that rested in their chest holsters.
Like the guards outside the mansion, these two were also surprised to see that one of Mr. Nosy's prisoners wasn't a human but a giant turtle.
Staring at Louie wide-eyed, both guards pulled out their guns and aimed them at the turtle in black.
"Mr. Nosy! What is this?!" one of the guards, the black-haired one, asked. "Who or what is this costumed freak you bring before us?!"
"It looks hideous and reeks awful!" the eye-patched guard said, disgusted, and covered his nose with his arm to keep Louie's smell away.
"First of, it's not the costume, it's flesh and blood. And secondly, you're ugly human garbage that belongs into that trash can." Louie shot back, offended by their remarks.
Both guards reeled back in shock upon witnessing Louie speaking.
"THAT FREAKISH THING SPEAKS?!" the eye-patched guard gasped.
"Oh, I can do a little more than just speak, One-eye." Louie told him. "You throw one more insult at me and I'll show you what I can do even with my hands bound behind my shell!"
Such of threat made with such of huge amount of confidence, with zero amount of fear and even with his hands bound, left the one-eyed guard taken aback, though the black-haired guard merely scoffed at this, not indimitated like his partner.
"Big talk, coming from some freakish salamander that is brought before the boss both bound and unarmed." the scar-lipped guard spat.
"Salamander?!" Louie said, puzzled. "You blind or stupid or both?!
"He's a turtle, idiot." Angel told to the guard.
"That's right! Turtle! TUR-TLE! T-U-R-T-L-E!." Louie said. "And you're second on my list after Mr. One-eye here." Louie shot back.
Provoked, the guard then raised his gun at Louie's face, threatening to shoot him if he tried something. "Go ahead! Make my day!"
Mr. Nosy then stepped forward and, reaching over, grabbed to the guard's gun and lowered it down.
"Enough with this exchange of nonsense! The boss is expecting this turtle and his friend as a special guests at his birthday party! Let us through!" Mr. Nosy told them.
"See?" Louie told to the guard smugly. "This overgrown gorilla at least has some human-like intelligence to see the difference between the turtle and salamder whren he sees one."
Mr. Nosy frowned at Louie's remark and him calling him an gorilla.
"The boss has given exact instructions that his birthday party will not be disturbed." the black-haired guard told Mr. Nosy, ignoring Louie's remark.
"Yet this little insolent turtle dared to insult our beloved boss so... so dastardly in Alcatraz's rap concert, so he needs to answer for every word to him!" Mr. Nosy told them.
"And I'm proud of my every word." Louie told him.
"SILENCE!" Mr. Nosy shouted, before turning back to the guards. "Let us through! I am not going to ask thrice."
"I'm sorry, Mr. Nosy, but boss has said..." the black-haired guard tried again, but Mr. Nosy was having none of it.
"AND I AM THE SECOND-IN-COMMAND OF THIS ORGANIZATION AND THE BOSS' RIGHT-HAND-MAN!" Mr. Nosy roared threateningly. "WHATEVER I DO I WILL ANSWER ONLY TO THE BOSS ALONE, AND YOU TWO WILL LOSE A LITTLE MORE THAN YOUR JOBS AS HIS GUARDS IF YOU DON'T LET US IN IN THIS INSTANT! NOW OUT OF MY WAY, BOTH OF YOU!"
Mr. Nosy then stepped forward and grabbed with his big hands from their shoulders and roughly tossed them aside, before he turned to his party and beckoned them and Louie and Angel to follow him, before he turned to the doors and opened them, entering inside.
The guards stood up and walked slowly to the door, scowling angrily at Mr. Nosy for forcing his way past them and the door to disturb the boss' birthday party against his orders.
"You guys are lucky Mr. Nosy was easy on you." Louie told them as he and Angel were shoved through the doors. "But you won't be so lucky when I handle you myself. That's the promise!"
The guard turned their scowls at Louie and the turtle in black and Angel were taken into the room.
The doors were then closed after the party, leaving the sulking guards outside.
Once inside, Louie and Angel got a better look of the room.
Comparing to the hallways of the mansion, this room - or more likely a some sort of private banquet hall - was a pretty large and way more spacious with almost not any furniture in there, save for the very large table in middle of it, and it was right under of the pretty huge chandelier, which was tied with the ropes to the hooks in both sides of the room and the table. There was a green tablecloth with a dandelion patterns on the table and around of it was a dandelion decorations like the decorations of holly around of it. The table was laden with quite delicacies, such as a pot of steaming tea, wine or champagne, bowls of biscuits, plates full of delicious-looking cream puffs, and to crown the dish, a huge three-story cake with pink and white frosty along with cherries.
However, around the table sat quite a group of not-so-friendly-looking but, reluctantly granted, impressively elegantly dressed gangsters. All of them were undoubtedly Dandelion's men - and presumably some of his top guys, like Mr. Nosy here, as they stood out from the simple traditional henchmen either with their striking physical appearances and traits or more flashier individual clothing - due to them having the dandelions in their suits. They were apparently celebrating Dandelion's birthday, because all of them had the piece of cake on their plates, a steaming tea in their cups or champagne in their glasses, which they were all holding up in the air, just about to cheer somebody, while looking all at the same direction.
And in the back of the table, while everybody else were sitting in their seats, only one of them was standing up while holding his own glass up. And once looking upon of him, from head to toes, both Louie and Angel recognized the person from his barrel-chested physical appearance, thick eyebrows, small mustache, double chin, tidy haircut, olive green suit and pants with the golden stripes and that dandelion attached to the left side of the suit, a red black-spotted cravat and a grayish-brown fedora hat, with some dandelion flowers attached to it, lying on the table next to him.
"William Dandelion." both Louie and Angel mumbled.
Indeed, and Dandelion wasn't sitting alone in the same table. In the next of his seat was sitting a rather familiar black-suited and balding elderly crooked man with long hooked nose, long white hair, light pale greenish skin and circular eyebags under his eyes: Dimitri Dandelion.
And behind of him were standing the rather familiar looking bodyguards, such as that same Japanese-African man with shaven face and in the blue suit with dark purplish-blue stripes and brown fedora hat that was escorting him out of the police station with Dimitri, and those same two henchmen: the short and slender guy with small thin mustache, blue pants, black suit and wide-brimmed black fedora hat, and the tall, muscular and broad-shouldered guy with the bald top, black pants, reddish-brown suit and small dark-brown defora hat, who waited for him outside of the station and at the door of his limousine.
Dandelion looked to be in the middle of some speech to his gathered people, but cut himself short the moment when Mr. Nosy busted through the doors into the hall along with Louie, Angel, Victor brothers, Helga and Gabe and turned towards the unwanted interruptors of his party... along with all of his guys.
As Mr. Nosy escorted Louie and Angel towards the table, there were more the collective gasps and murmurs amongst the crooks when they stared in wide-eyed puzzlement at the turtle in black.
"Whatta hell?!", "Are you seeing this?", "What is that thing?", "What is that despicable creature?" "Some kind of freak in the turtle costume!", "It's a monster! It's a monster!", "It looks hideous!", "What a disgusting creature!", "Abamanation!", "Where does that thing come from?", "Why it isn't in the leash?", "Ugh! It smells awful like a sewer!", "What is it doing here anyway?"
Angel was angered for them talking about Louie in that way, but the turtle in black himself, however, didn't care about their degorate words. All he did was to stare back at them with the wide-eyed in mock-surprise as if they were some kind of freaks to him.
"Oh, look there, Angel. On two legs walking hairless, tailess troop of stupid monkeys." Louie mocked.
Though amused by Louie's joke, Angel could just barely hold back her laughter even if she was unable tocover her mouth with her hands. The gangsters though did not take it kindly for the turtle in black mocking them and Angel laughing at them because of it.
Mr. Nosy, Louie, Angel and the others then stopped by the corner of the table on Dandelion's right, with Dandelion himself glaring at his cabinet-sized minion with mild-annoyance... apparently having not taken a notice of Louie's a rather surprising and attention-grabbing presence yet or he simply chose to ignore him for the time being.
"Boss." Mr. Nosy said before the oversized henchman took his hat off and bowed his head in respect to Dandelion.
"Mr. Nosy." Dandelion said with the cold calm voice. "Good Mr. Nosy. Not only you come late from my birthday party, but now you've chosen a really bad time to burst in to the party and interrupt by speech to my fellow Dandelion family members, despite my exact instructions that I shall not to be disturbed."
"Hundreds times of my apologies for being late from your party, and thousands times more of my apologies for bursting in your party like this, boss." Mr. Nosy said humbly. "But I have brought you a "guests" that you've requested me to bring to you." He added, before stepping aside to present his prisoners to his boss.
Louie stood there calmly, while paying a swift glances everywhere in the room, trying to find and licate every available and potentially useable thing as he secretly plotted their escape from here in between of staring down at the mafia boss with the defiant frown, while Angel stood just a little behind of his shell-back, in the turtle in black's right side, and put on a fearless, defiant and maybe more than a little angry look on her face, possibly from the night Dandelion had sent Johannes, Marcus, Helga and the rest of their little gang to kidnap her and her grandma in that alley.
By now, like everyone else in the same room, Dandelion fixed his eyes on the turtle in black. But instead of instinctive reaction of shock and wariness upon seeing something so extraordinary, the look of Dandelion's face was instead more of the mix of expected surprise but unexpected - yet oblivious to the man himself - interest over this.
"So, this is the supposed turtle-creature who dared to talk ill about me behind my back in the concert?" Dandelion said casually, addressing Louie as if he was just a regular person.
"The name's Louie, but yes." Louie told him.
However, Louie immediately earned for that the barrel of the shotgun being put against his left temple, and held by none other than Marcus himself. This surprising act caused Angel to gasp lightly out of fear for Louie, but the turtle in black casually rolled his eyes before frowning at the trigger-happy lunatic in annoyance.
"Oh! And before I forget by the way, also the guy who kicked harder in Marcus and his colleaques' ego than their sorry butts about three weeks ago for harassing my friend." Louie added, nodding his head towards Marcus and pointing his right hand's thump at Johannes and Helga behind them.
"You haven't been given the permission to speak, freak! So shut your trap before I'll blow your brains out!" Marcus threatened.
Johannes was about to interfere to the scene, but was beat by Dandelion who seized Marcus' shotgun and forcibly made him to lower the gun down.
"I haven't given such of order, Mr. Marcus." Dandelion said sternly, before he ripped the gun out of his hands a d handed it over to one of his bodyguards standing behind his chair.
"And who gave you a permission to step out of your position?" Mr. Nosy said, before the huge minion grabbed the thug by his jacket and lifted him up like a rag doll.
"H-Hey! Put me... put me down! Ow, ow, ow, ow!" Marcus groaned and flailed his limbs in the air as Mr. Nosy carried him away and unceremoniously dropped him onto his butt next to Johannes and Helga, with the former facepalming himself and the latter shaking her head, both annoyed to the point of embarrasement of their comrade.
With that interruption dealt with, Dandelion turned back to Louie. "Yes, so I have heard from Mr. Johannes through of Mr. Nosy, about a vigilantic creature, capable to pull its head into its body like the turtle, who interfered our simple invitation of young Mrs. Bridge to the meeting with me." he said as he glanced over Louie's shoulder at Angel while gesturing his hands towards her in "polite" manner.
"Invitation?" Angel questioned, finding the claim rather outrageous due to remembering the events of that night in that alley to be anything but an invitation. "It seemed more likely a kidnapping to me. Your guys attempted to take me away against my will after I rejected your invitation." she retorted.
"Definitely a kidnapping." Louie agreed, giving Dandelion a rather dirty scowl.
Dandelion, however, shrugged his broad shoulders, unfazed by such of accusations. "What can I say. I prefer myself as an not-taking-"no"-as-an-answer kind of the guy. But I assure you, my honored guests, that I always begin my business first with a polite and kindly-asking gesture and go to the extreme measures as a very last resort, and I always expect the same thing from my men as well."
"Uh-huh, sure. And which is exactly what unleashed me upon your guys and they came back to your feet beaten and all black and blue." Louie shot back.
Dandelion put his hands on his hips and raised his eyebrow, daring to question Louie's claim. "And yet I sent Mr. Nosy here along with the several other of my guys after you, and yet he came back nearly completely intact, with you and young miss Bridge, in binds." he pointed out.
"Yes, boss!" Mr. Nosy said out loud, feeling very proud of himself. "I alone managed to do where Johannes, Marcus and Helga incompetently failed. I defeated and captured single-handledly this creature in one-on-one combat underneath of the Manhattan Bridge and brought it before you as my trophy just like you requested." he declared, pompously taking the credit all for himself while disregarding his own minions' heavy casualties and all the hard work they went through to capture Louie, which of course earned him a dirty scowls from Johannes, Marcus and Helga.
"Yeah, you did. But not fair and square." Angel retorted as she turned to Mr. Nosy.
"Yeah. I almost had your sorry ass kicked and handed over to you, and yet you, a cabinet-sized apeman, had to rely on the dirty game by having a secret sniper on the bridge to shoot me in the neck with the tranquilizers." the turtle in black accused.
"That ain't true!" Mr. Nosy hastily said in denial.
If Mr. Nosy was nervous about that matter, regarding to his claim of his so-called victory over Louie being fair and square and the lie that he didn't rely on the dirty game like he did for real, he hid it very well under the facade on his face... though Louie indeed could sense the slightest fear of a blow to his huge ego and the following humiliation if the news spread amongst the whole Dandelion mafia that their boss's most loyal, strongest and the most feared henchman cheated by relying on the outside backup to win the fight he was gonna either win or lose.
"It ain't my fault that you happen to be too slow, too weak, and a huge of disappointment to me while I was expecting a true challenge." Mr. Nosy accused, either enforcing or, from Louie's view, even buying his own lie or .
Louie narrowed his eyes into a teeth-gritting glare at that overgrown apeman for this, until he smiled slyly and switched his frown into a challenging stare.
"Oh, you better watch your tongue, big guy, for I will show you who the two of us really is too slow, too weak and a huge disappointment... and unlike you, I won't be needing anyone or anything to cheat my way into proving that. This is my promise." Louie said, swearing to take care of Mr. Nosy whenever he gets the chance.
Mr. Nosy growled at Louie and shook his fists at the turtle in black threateningly, but quickly backed off when Dandelion calmly gestured him to calm down and back down.
Out of curiosity, Angel then turned to Dandelion, wanting to ask some questions relating to that night in the alley.
"You sent your guys..." Angel started, as she pointed her thump at Johannes, Marcus and Helga behind them. "... to deliver me that card of yours, because...?
"Because..." Dandelion started. "As you might already know, I work as CEO of DLC, a.k.a. Dandelions' Laundries Company, founded, build, owned and ran by the Dandelion family ever since the beginning of the 1900s, which I then inherited from my dear late father, Sullivan Dandelion, to carry on his legacy, like his father did, and his father before him as well, by washing the good and honest New Yorkers' clothes for them and earning our family's great fortune from helping others with the hard and honest work."
"Honest and hard work?" Angel questioned suspiciously. "I remember that when Johannes approached me with his little gang, he addressed me as the member of the Purple Dragons."
"And those losers have earned nothing with hard and honest work, I tell you that, Willy." Louie reminded. "Trust me. I myself have more than enough of experiences about those lousy street thugs."
"I'm well aware of that, Lorenzo." Dandelion said in matter of factly. "But my loudry company is open to anyone who wishes to have his laundry done, even the people from underworld of this city. Besides, is it really a crime to wash even the laundry of such poor people as even the Purple Dragons?"
"Kidnapping is." Louie said. "Angel rejected her membership with the Dragons and so, she rejected your card as well, and yet your guys attempted to take her and her grandma away against their will. Why?"
Dandelion was about to answer to that question, until Louie held up his finger, rudely interrupting the mafia boss.
"Oh, wait! Let me guess." Louie said,
The turtle in black walked up to Dandelion and deliberately invaded the mafia boss' personal space by leaning his head forward and uncomfortably close to Dandelion's bodyguards, Mr. Nosy, Gabe and Marcus instantly reached for their guns to defend their boss, but Dandelion signed them to hold back.
"Angel was a former member of the Purple Dragons, so she knows a lot about their inner circle and is therefore branded as the main witness to their activities, and anything she has either seen or heard could lead to both the Dragons and everyone associated with them going to jail for a while, so you felt the need to get rid of her as soon as possible because she might know about your association with the Dragons and other underworld criminal organizations in New York." Louie said, remembering Master Splinter telling him three weeks ago that as a witness of the Dragons' activities and the criminal underworld people accosiating with them, Angel and anyone accosiated with HER could pretty much be the targets of the immediate elimination to get rid of the witnesses and secure their shady activities from the law and the authorities.
"So, mind to tell me, Dandelion, what kind of shady dealings you and your guys have that you absolutely needed to have Angel and her grandma to be taken out of the picture, hmph?" Louie inquired with the knowing smirk on his lips.
"And is it somehow related to counterfeiting money, for which you were previously arrested and taken into police's custody?" Angel said rather boldly and accusingly.
Dandelion turned to glare lightly at Angel for such of accusations, but otherwise didn't say anything, until...
"It's none of you two's business!" Marcus snapped abruptly, ignoring both Johannes' and Helga's orders for him to be quiet, and even Mr. Nosy's much harsher orders to shut his trap. "And why should the boss even tell you anything to you about his plans to overthrown the Leg Clan as the dominating organization of the New York City's underworld?"
However, Marcus' mention of "Leg-Clan" caused Louie's eyes go wide and the turtle in black gasped from surprise, before he turned away from Dandelion to stare at Marcus.
"Wow! Wait! Wait! What did you just say?! Did you say the... "Leg-Clan"?" Louie asked, suddenly both shocked and surprised as he quickly picked up what Marcus really meant by that "Leg-Clan". "As if... the Foot-Clan?"
Marcus' own eyes instantly show wide open when the thug realized that he had said too much and quickly covered his mouth with his hand to prevent himself from revealing anything more... though he did cowered under the harsh and reprimanting glares of Johannes, Helga and Mr. Nosy.
However, the damage was already done, as Louie turned back to Dandelion.
"You guys have been associating with the Foot? And the... the Shredder?!"
The mention of the very name of the evil Foot leader and, according to Marcus' blabbing, the apparent lord of the New York City's underworld, caused the series of fearful gasps and the dread-filled atmosphere amongst the people of the celebration. Even Dandelion's own polite and friendly facade turned into a lethally serious frown when the Foot leader was brought up into the subject.
The mafia boss casted a brief but icy-cold glare at cowering Marcus, before he turned back to Louie.
"Yes…" he admitted, both grimly and seriously. "Albeit reluctant associates."
"Reluctant?" Louie repeated with the raised eyebrow.
"Yes. Like the Dragons and other New York underworld criminal organizations, the Dandelions too have been forcibly subdued under the control of the Shredder and the Foot Clan, and we've been sent his ninjas' ninja garbs to be washed in our laundry company." Dandelion said with open resentment. "Our company's century long honest business has been defiled by his ninja clans corruption and the seek of dominance over New York, and their own need of money to fund their own shady dealings has been nearly driven my company into the bankrupt!." he added with the lament.
However, neither did Louie and Angel felt any pity towards Dandelion for losing the control of his' family's so-called "honest" company to the Foot Clan and the Shredder, due to him previously having been trying to kidnap them.
"But my father once taught me the motto of the Dandelion family, which goes like this: "a true-blooded Dandelion always wins"! And I'm going to follow his teachings at all costs." Dandelion snarled angrily, squeezing his hand into the fist and shaking it determinedly.
Dandelion then turned to Louie and Angel. "And as for your questions, yes. Because of the Shredder and the Foot-Clan's rule over the Dandelion business, MY BUSINESS, I've been forced to turn into the shady dealings to fight fire with fire. And indeed, Young Miss Bridge, the counterfeiting has been a pretty much of part of those shady dealings."
Neither Angel or Louie were surprised by this confession.
"So that witness guy who turned you in to the police for the possession of the dirty money was right all along." Angel spat in disgust. "The police made a severe mistake to let you out in the first place."
"That snoopy guy who had somehow managed to spot the counterfeit wad of money peeking out of my coat's pocket was right indeed. He had quite a sharp eye and the ability to tell real money from fake, even though we had managed to make our money look exactly like the ones printed by the government, I'll give him that." Dandelion said in annoyance.
"But without the evidence to prove my guilty to counterfeit, which seizure, careful preservation and concealment I entrusted to the hands of Mr. Nosy, my most trusted right-hand man, I was free to walk away with it, and thanks for that belongs to the help of my lawyer and dear cousin Dimitri Dandelion at the trial." the mafia boss added as he gestured his hand towards his cousin, who nodded his head in affirmation.
"But ever since I was released, that same little snoopy had been on my tail trying to find a way to get me in jail for the same crime he caught me in the first place. He proved to be a threat to my plans and so he had to be taken care of first. I tried to bribe him into silence, first with a big with a sum of money, and then with the same offer of laundry I made for you, Miss Bridge, but he rejected my first bribe because he thought my money was counterfeit - even though it was in fact real money - and he rejected my offer of laundry, vowing that he would not rest until he had both me and my business flushed down of a toilet. And so, there was only one way left to get rid of that little snitch." Dandelion said.
"What did you do with him?" Angel asked, already anticipating the outcome but curious nonetheless.
Dandelion, however, didn't respond to that, but instead he gestured towards Mr. Nosy to explain that part for him, making Angel and Louie to turn towards him.
"The boss tasked me and couple of my guys to ensure that the kid stays silent and off of our tails, so we snatched that guy from his home one night and took him under the Manhattan Bridge, to the same spot where we brought you two. We tied him up, gagged him, put his legs into the pan and filled it with the wet concrete. And once it was hardened enough, we threw him into the bottom of the river, with the compliments from our boss for his hard but vain work to bring us down." Mr. Nosy explained.
Both Louie and Angel glared at Mr. Nosy with horror and disgust at what they had done to that poor witness guy.
However, even if the truth of Dandelion having committed the crime of counterfeiting was out, Louie especially wanted to know why.
"You said that you were gonna "fight fire with fire". And that you're about to follow your motto "Dandelions always win". Does that mean that you're actually going to challenge the Shredder and the Foot Clan for the dominance of the New York City's underworld?" the turtle in black questioned.
"Yes. Yes I am." Dandelion confirmed. "The Shredder will one day regret the day when he came to me to enlist my company and family as part of his criminal empire."
"Then how does counterfeiting money relate to your plans?" Louie asked again.
However, as Louie asked this, he carefully dug a hidden Shuriken from under of his wrist band and began secretly saw with its sharp blade the ropes that kept his hands bound behind his back. Upon noticing this, and realizing that Louie had some sort of escape plan in mind, though not knowing what kind of yet, Angel moved closer of the turtle in black that she could hid what he was doing from the goons behind them.
"Well, you see, Mr. Lorenzo..." Dandelion started, unsuspicious of what Louie was secretly doing and confident that his secret will never leave outside of his house's walls.
"Because the Shredder and the Foot have forcibly drained most of my savings for their own purposes, leaving me with just enough income to barely keep my business afloat, I'm almost incapable of saving much of my own money for the necessities I desperately need in order to challenge the Foot Clan for the city's criminal empire. So I hired Mr. Lassie, the country's most notorious counterfeiter, with a gift for producing cash so identical to government-printed money that no one - or almost no one - can tell it apart from the real ones with the naked eye. I'd love to introduce him to you, but he's too busy these days to supplement my empty savings with his homemade cash that he couldn't make it to my birthday party."
"So you're going to attack against the Shredder through of his funding with the dirty money, eh?" Louie deduced.
"No." Dandelion said, shaking his head. "Even if it was an effective way to undermine his own criminal organization through his fundings, there is no doubt that sooner or later he would find the ruse out somehow, as well as from whom the fake money came from. And if and when he does, he will come to my doors with full force to make my family pay dearly for our insubordination."
Dandelion then chuckled sinisterly. "No. I'm going to use my fake money savings to buy from the shady arms dealers the whole arsenals of best weapons they can offer, and enough of weapons to arm a small army to the teeth. And in addition to guns, I plan to use my fake money savings to hire an army of mercenaries from the darkest places in New York to enforce my goal. And once I have enough of man- and firepower to challenge the Shredder and the Foot, I will take them by surprise by striking with the full force to the very heart of the Shredder's empire, and then I will take what is mine. The domination of the New York City's criminal underworld."
Angel grew pretty uneasy and very worried of this plan, because this could pretty much lead to open and widespread gang warfare between of two criminal organizations: in this case, the Foot and the Dandelions and anyone who sides with them, which could tear the whole city apart from within.
Louie, however, wasn't worried too much to hear Dandelion's plans.
"Rather impressive plan, Dandelion. Rather impressive indeed." the turtle in black said, before he gave the mafia boss a rather mocking smirk. "But unfortunately, there happens to be one small problem with your plan."
Dandelion raised his eyebrow in confusion as he stared at Louie. "What do you mean?" he asked.
"The Shredder... is DEAD!" Louie announced.
This was followed by a moment of stunned silence, with everyone present holding their breath in astonishment and stared wide-eyed at the turtle in black as his announcement sunk in. Even Dandelion, Mr. Nosy, Gabe, Helga, Marcus and Johannes couldn't believe what they were hearing as they too stared at Louie in disbelief.
Then, the silence was broken by a series of shocked gasp and murmurs amongst themselves.
"What did he said?", "He said the Shredder is dead.", "The Shredder? Dead?", "He's dead?", "Dead?", "Impossible!", "It can't be!", "Where? When?", "Is the Foot Clan leaderless now?", "Does this mean that the Dandelions are no longer controlled by him?", "I cannot believe that!", "Me neither!", "That freak must be lying!", "But what if it is true?"
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Lorenzo." Dandelion said, stunned and confused, as he stepped forward. "But what did you just say?"
"I said... that the Shredder is gone, defeated, vanguished, killed, dead like a rock!" Louie repeated himself, letting his announcement to sink in to everyone in the present for the second time.
"Could it be... possible? The Shredder is no more?" Johannes gasped in astonishment.
"Don't let that thing fool you! He is only trying to mislead us!" Marcus spat, for he was one of the few who genuinely refused to believe Louie's claim that the Shredder was no more, to the point of accusing him of lying.
"Yet he sounds absolutely positive about that." Helga pointed out.
"But it's not possible!" Mr. Nosy bellowed. "There is a rumor amongst the people of the underworld that no one cannot defeat the Shredder!"
"Not easily at least." Louie countered. "I have the physical and mental scars to prove it, for that metallic scarecrow broke my arm the last time I encountered him."
"He is a liar! A filthy liar!" Marcus yelled out, still refusing to believe it.
However, Johannes then stepped forward, making Louie and Angel to turn to him. "Are you absolutely sure what you just said is true?" he asked.
"Is he really dead?" Dandelion asked, making Louie and Angel to turn to him. "The Shredder? Is he really dead?"
Louie responded with the affirming nod. "The Shredder is dead. And I don't mean it metaphorically, or rhetorically, or poetically, or theoretically, or any of that kind of way. What I've just said is true. Straight up true. I fought him with my family and defeated him, and I saw with my very own eyes how he got washed off the rooftop to the street level before we dropped the huge water tower onto him, crushing him. That was the last time we've ever seen him... alive."(2)
Lorenzo and Dandelion then locked their gazes, and for a moment each party stared deep into each other's eyes. Neither of them blinked, instead continuing to stare hard and unwilling to give up, as if the latter was trying to find signs in Louie's eyes that the turtle in black might be lying about his claim, while the former resisted Dandelion's efforts to expose him as a liar and stayed firm with his claim.
Dandelion then blinked, not because he had apparently lost the staring match against Louie, but rather from a sudden realization when he couldn't find any sign of lying in Louie's eyes about his claim that Shredder was no more, and he stared at Louie with stunned look.
"You're were not lying. It is true! The Shredder indeed is gone!" Dandelion declared out loud to everyone in the room.
Louie was momentarily stunned to see that Dandelion somehow possessed the similiar skill the tell whether the people were lying or telling the truth like Master Splinter once did with April some time ago, but he quickly shook that thought out of his head and returned back to the situation at hand.
"Indeed. So there's no need to wage the war on the leaderless organization that is most likely fallen apart without the Shred-dude around." Louie said with the shrug.
However, Dandelion immediately responded to this with another sinister chuckle, confusing both Louie and Angel.
"What's so funny?" Louie asked.
"So what if Shredder is gone?!" Dandelion suddenly declared as if triumphantly. "It just means that the entire criminal underworld of New York City is without a dominating figure to rule over it. And with both the Shredder and the Foot out of our tails and out of the way, Dandelion family can freely take it over and destroy any other criminal organization that dares to challenge us and we will rule it as the dominating criminal organization!"
"HEAR! HEAR! HEAR!" the whole Dandelion crime family cheered and shook their fists in the air in unision, showing their undying support and loyalty to Dandelion's cause. Even Johannes, Marcus, Helga, Gabe and Mr. Nosy joined in cheering, while Dandelion held his chin out pridefully.
This made both Louie and Angel to exchange the worried but also determined glances with each other, knowing that they needed to stop Dandelion.
"You gotta be kidding me!" Louie said, defiantly shaking his head at Dandelion's plans to take over the New York City's underworld by force. "Your lust for power has really gotten into your head, hasn't it?!"
"Well, it's all thanks to you, Mr. Lorenzo." Dandelion said tauntingly. "For you taking the Shredder down and hitting the devastating blow into the Food-Clan for us, you have just opened us the gates into ruling this city unopposed and unstopped. So, for your favor you've done for us, I could almost kiss you on the cheeks as my personal token of my gratitude."
"BLAH! Forget it, creep!" Louie gagged, sticking out his tongue in disgust. "And what shall be my reward for so unintentionally helping you to the top of the underworld's food chain?" the turtle in black questioned.
"Oh! Right about that!" Dandelion said, mockingly sounding as if that was the subject he had almost forgotten, though it was obvious that he hadn't. "Since you and young Miss Bridge now already know a little too much about my business methods, which I would not like to have come to the attention of the authorities, especially since I was almost brought to court once for them, I would like to offer the two of you a quick, painless and kind of peace-to-your-souls and rest-in-peace way to get out of here as your reward."
Both Louie and Angel gasped and stared at Dandelion with wide-eyed looks when it hit them that what the mafia boss was actually meaning.
"You're saying that you're going to...?!" Angel gasped worriedly.
"Don't tell me that you're planning to..." Louie said with the annoyred frown.
Dandelion smirked at the two wickedly, before he raised his hands up and clapped them together for the three times.
This was responded by the doors of the room being flung open, again, and inside of the room marched in the row a small group of twenty-one Dandelion family's mobsters dressed up in all black suits and wearing the black fedora hats and shades, and they also had the rifles in their hands, and each one of them appeared to have the tattoon in their foreheads: two dandelion flowers, as SKULL in middle of them. The one in the lead, who also had the same dandelion flowers and skull tattoo on his forehead, was carrying a two large bags in his hands.
"Ohhhh! Goodie! Goodie! Goodie!" Marcus cheered and clapped his hands, disturbingly excited upon seeing these guys coming into the room. "This should be fun!"
Louie and Angel looked at these people as they marched and then stopped to the table's left side - the side on which they all were - before they made a quite weird-looking salute by removing their own dandelions from their suits and raising them high into the air towards Dandelion.
"Hail, Dandelion! We who are about to put an end to the snitches salute you!" these guys said in unision.
Dandelion returned to the salute with his own, before he and these men put their dandelions back into their suits.
"Mr. Lorenzo? Miss Bridge? May I introduce you your "reward" which I have arranged just for you." Dandelion said.
Louie groaned and shook his head, before he turned back to Dandelion. "So this is our reward for us? The death squad? You're gonna put us through the public executions, and even at your own birthday party?"
"What can I say, Mr. Lorenzo... dead men tell no tales." Dandelion smirked wickedly.
Louie glared up at Dandelion for his plans to have him and Angel executed for knowing too much of his plans, and began to hurry up to cut his ties loose with his hidden shuriken while Angel still kept his actions hidden from the rest of the goons.
Marcus couldn't take it anymore, so he walked out of his spot towards Louie and Angel, who turned to face the trigger-happy lunatic. Smilling evilly at the two, Marcus took out both of his shotguns and lazily waved them towards the two of them, but kept their barrels half-pointed at the turtle in black's and the purple-haired girl's heads and looked like he could just "absentmindedly" and "accidentally" pull the trigger and blow their heads off right here and now.
"Too bad that I am not part of the Dandelion death squad... because otherwise I would've taken a great pleasure to blow you two's brains out!" Marcus remarked sadistically.
Marcus remark earned him the hard glares from both Louie and Angel.
TO BE CONTINUED...
TRIVIA
Author's note: This chapter, especially the meeting with Dandelion, kinda foreshadows the events of the City in War episodes.
1) = Reference to the Red Hood and the Wolf story.
2) = Louie's quote "And I don't mean it metaphorically, or rhetorically, or poetically, or theoretically, or any of that kind of way." is a lightly eddited version of the Puss in Boots: The Last Wish film's character the Death's quote "And I don't mean it metaphorically or rhetorically or poetically or theoretically or any other fancy way."