Note: Tyroth Darkstorms fanfics 'Ancient Legacy' 'Mutants Misplaced' and 'A Sister's Plight' are mentioned in this chapter.
Chapter Thirteen
Spirit Searching
Tyroth, Sharky, the Geckolings and the Hamato Clan hurried to Devina's location.
They had taken the tunnels leading to one of the islands on Lake Michigan.
As they did, they all had memories, or rather sad ones of when they were chasing Diablo after he betrayed them and following Vulstrun.
Tyroth lead the way until they made it to the Island and looked around at the open lake that stretched for miles and the towering city of Chicago in the distance.
"Where's Devina?" Sharky asked.
Tyroth checked his shell cell and saw the Vampiress's location.
"She's over there!" he said pointing then turned to the others.
He got on his knees and beckoned with his head.
"Raph! Get on my back! Mona! I'll carry you!" he said to which Raphael climbed onto the Dragon's back and Monalisa walked over for Tyroth to carry her in his arms.
"Freya! Loki" Tyroth said as he scooped Monalisa up bridal style "You carry Donnie, Mike, and Splinter! Sharky, you follow me in the water!"
"On it dad!" Loki said and hovered in the air with Freya then Donatello and Michelangelo took the hands of the Geckolings and Splinter held onto the ankles of his two sons.
Tyroth then took off into the air with Freya and Loki following behind and Sharky swimming underneath.
They soon made it to the island where Devina was waiting and Tyroth gently let Monalisa down on to the island, as well as let Raphael slide off his back.
Sharky swam up to the side and leaned on the side of the rock to see what Devina might have discovered.
Freya and Loki at the same time lowered Splinter, Michelangelo, and Donatello down.
"What have you found Devina?" Tyroth asked as he remained hovering in the air, as did Freya and Loki as there wasn't enough room for all of them on the small rock.
Devina held up the strands of hair.
"I found these on the rock." She said, "It's hair!"
"Hair!?" everyone cried in unison.
Devina nodded.
"I sniffed it, and I can't deny it's smell!"
She held it up to Tyroth and the Dragon lowered himself so he could smell it as well as his eyes widened.
"By Odin." he murmured as he went pale.
"What?" Monalisa asked.
"What is it dad?" Loki asked desperately.
Tyroth lowered himself onto the rock and sniffed the hair more to make sure, but it was inevitable, he couldn't deny that scent.
"It's Pandora's hair!" he said, "She must have washed up here after the warehouse exploded!"
"What are you saying Tyroth?" Splinter asked and Michelangelo looked at Donatello in fear whilst Donatello looked at Raphael and Monalisa who stared silently at the dragon.
"Pandora washed up here!" Tyroth said "And there's no sign of her, so either she's still around in the water..." he looked at Sharky who nodded silently and he dived under the water to search the area around the rock.
Splinter watched Sharky go down then looked at Tyroth.
"No! My granddaughter!"
"Pandora!" Donatello murmured as he looked at Michelangelo who leaned on him and started crying into his chest.
"No, she's not...she's not!" Michelangelo wept.
Raphael meanwhile covered his eyes with his paws and fell on his knees.
Tyroth instantly knelt next to him to comfort him, but he could see how broken the red masked turtle was, sobbing silently into his hands.
Tyroth could feel his heart tearing into a thousand pieces as he began to think that Pandora really wasn't going to be found alive.
Hot tears fell from his eyes as he placed his paws on Raphael's shell, and he looked over at his children who were still hovering in the air but looked devastated.
"If only we had tried to stop her!" Freya wept "If only!"
Tyroth lowered his head as he felt a sense of failure within him, almost like a devastated knock to his spirit.
He remembered feeling helpless when he thought he had lost Sephie all those years back, and after Jennifer and his family were captured by the Foot, yet by some miracle, they had been saved.
This time he had failed to save Pandora, and the signs leading to the fact that she had perished were getting clearer.
He hoped Sharky was able to find her body around this area, and if he did, they would return her to Mutopia and give her a funeral.
"I promised I'd bring her home." He thought mournfully to himself "I promised I would, but with the devastating news she didn't survive the explosion..."
Devina meanwhile sighed sadly as she looked at the hairs then at the rock wondering how long Pandora had been there for before she disappeared whether she was dead when she ended up on the rock or still barely alive.
She looked at the devastated turtles then looked around the rock again, as she did, she noticed Monalisa was standing away from everyone and was analysing the rock then she sat down.
"Mona?" she asked "Are...Are you alright?"
Monalisa didn't speak, yet the vampiress could see how stricken she looked, given the news that her daughter may be dead and lost in Lake Michigan after finding evidence that Pandora had been washed up on the rock.
"Mona?" Devina asked concerned.
Her voice made Donatello, Splinter and Michelangelo look up from mourning and they saw Monalisa sitting on the rock in the lotus position.
"What's she doing?" Devina asked as she looked.
Splinter analysed his daughter's moves and stepped closer to her.
"Monalisa?" he asked placing a hand on the lizard's shoulder to which she looked back at him, tears in her eyes.
"I'm not giving up yet sensei." She said, "I won't."
At the sound of her voice, Tyroth and Raphael also looked over.
"I refuse to believe anything until I see it!" Monalisa snapped.
"How are you going to do that sis?" Michelangelo sobbed.
Monalisa looked up at everyone.
"When I became Leonardo's second in command, he's been trying to teach me the way of meditation that he used to find you when Karai attacked those years ago, and when he helped me find my attackers." Monalisa confessed "And I feel, that if I try, I might find out what happened to Pandora..."
Splinter looked to the sky for a second as a small beacon of hope rose within him, as well as a sense of pride to his eldest son for teaching Monalisa what he knew after his teachings with the Ancient One so many years ago.
"I hope it works..." he prayed softly.
Monalisa sat in the lotus position, closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths, trying to remember everything Leonardo had been teaching her when she first became second in command.
"It was one of the most advanced spiritual meditations the Ancient One taught me." Leonardo had told her "And it helped me search for answers buried deep for questions I had, as well as find those lost..."
Monalisa hoped against all hope that this worked, even if she had not perfected the technique, she wasn't going to let that stop her.
She breathed deep and focused hard on Pandora, which was easy as she remembered every feature of her child, when she was first born and held her in her arms, to helping her take her first steps, to hearing her first words and of course teaching her along with her mate, sensei, and brothers in law the ways of Ninjutsu and Kung Fu.
The Lizard Lady saw nothing but inky blackness behind her closed eyelids, but before long, she started to see images, almost like a television with static, but some images that were starting to get clear.
She could hear the loud explosion of the warehouse blowing up, then the rushing of the water in the river, then a shape of what looked like a person being thrown into the water, as she did, she felt a tightness in her throat like she wanted to cough, but she fought it, not wanting to be shocked out of her meditation so quick.
Another image soon came, and she saw herself surrounded by seagulls, and they were squawking and screaming around her as if attacking her and she felt the urge to wave her arms to flap them away.
It was then she found herself switching to another image, of the rock she was sitting on and the waves crashing against it, then she saw a figure getting washed up onto it, then the same seagulls surrounding it
Still fighting the urge to cough as well as keep still from the attacking seagulls she kept trying to hold onto the images before her, even though they were static and kept jumping about, she tried to focus on the figure laying on the rock and being pecked at by the seagulls.
It was then she saw the face of the figure and despite the many burns and wounds that adorned it, she could see it was Pandora!
"My Baby!"
The words erupted from her throat like a volcano exploding magma and she then started coughing hard, the images beginning to fade!
Yet before she was wrenched away, she saw the seagulls get scared away by something, as well as a loud flapping of wings...
"Mona!"
Devina's voice was heard and Monalisa opened her eyes as she coughed hard like she was choking, and she could feel several hands on her.
"Mona?"
"Sis?"
"My daughter!"
Monalisa blinked and coughed hard before her throat cleared and she leaned forward.
"Donnie?" she heard Michelangelo's scared voice "What's happened? What's wrong with her?"
"She's choking!" Donatello said and Monalisa soon felt the purple masked turtle kneel next to her and stroke her back.
"It's okay sis." He said "Let it all out, it's okay...breathe... breathe."
Monalisa soon caught her breath and started to inhale and exhale gently as her throat cleared.
"I...I...I..." she spluttered "I'm alright."
The feeling of spluttering out water was nothing new to her, for many years ago, when she and her family, Tyroth and Sephie had been accidently sent to Skyrim, she remembered being revived through CPR thanks to Donatello after she almost drowned in an underground river when a mine, they were hiding in collapsed.
Splinter knelt to the lizard lady and stroked her hair comfortingly.
"What did you see?" he asked, "What happened?"
Everyone else leaned in to listen eager to know.
Monalisa looked up at everyone as reality sunk in again and tears fell and at once everyone feared the worst.
"I saw only static images..." Monalisa forced out "I heard the bang of the explosion, I saw her, she was thrown in the river!"
"WHAT!?" everyone cried.
Monalisa nodded.
"I saw her hit the water; I can taste it! I was choking on it!" she explained "Then I saw this rock... seagulls..."
She looked up to see several birds above them, many were circling the rock as if to observe the mutants below them and Loki and Freya almost felt a sudden urge to chase them away but they continued to hover in the air and listen.
"Pandora did end up here!" Monalisa started to sob, and Raphael made a choking sound as he listened.
"I saw her, even if it was blurry!" Monalisa wept "She was terribly burnt and being pecked at by seagulls!"
A cry was heard from Michelangelo as he fell on his knees in grief.
"My geisha! My little Geisha!" he wailed to which Donatello quickly wrapped his arms around him and held him close.
"No way!" the twins cried in sadness.
Tyroth just shook his head and Raphael again buried his head in his hands and wept heartbroken.
Devina sighed and shook her head then looked to the lake wondered where Sharky was and if he had found Pandora's body.
Her answer was soon given when the Sharky popped his head out of the water and swam over to the rock.
"Guys!" he called out "Guys!"
At once everyone looked over to see the Mutant Sharky swimming over.
"Have you found her?" Devina shouted as she went to the edge to which the Sharky shook his head.
"No!" he said, "I've searched around this rock and where the tide would have gone, but still nothing!"
He looked over to Monalisa and Raphael who looked up and saw the Sharky was empty handed.
'Nothing?' Raphael signed despite his tears.
Sharky shook his head.
Monalisa blinked away her tears as she looked at the shark then she remembered the seagulls in the images she saw being scared away.
"Wait..." she said to which everyone looked at her.
"What?" Tyroth asked as his tearful red eyes widened "What else did you see?"
Tyroth, the Geckolings, the Hamato Clan and Sharky made it to the rock where Devina was, and Monalisa has tried to use Leonardo's advanced meditation to find out what happened, and despite the blurred and static images, she seems to have discovered something...