I can only apologize so much for the time it took for me to upload this chapter. I’ve been quite busy and unusually social as of late, as you can see on my profile page. But, on the other hand, I’m sure a whole lot of you were busy with the Halloween festivities as well. In any case, I at last finished up this chapter and am kind of saddened that we have only this and chapter ten left…

Thank you all so much for the support, you guys! I’m so excited that anyone out there besides myself is enjoying this story. I really, truly appreciate it ;) Thanks!

TMNT, Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, Donatello, Splinter, and the Foot © Mirage Studios
story © Turtlefreak121

Paradigm
Chapter Nine: Trapped

I remember sitting beside Don in the absolute silence of the room. He didn’t want to say anything because he already knew what was on my mind. No one else had come out of their rooms yet besides the two of us and it was almost noon.

After the six months of hell I guess one could argue that Master and Raph were simply sleeping in. The problem with that conclusion, though, is that Master wouldn’t have been able to sleep in through that day even if he had wanted to.

As for Raph… I just knew that he was awake. I knew this mostly because I knew he had yet to actually go to sleep.

That day had made six months, only Donny and I were in the lair’s cold, barren corridors.

I was getting around well. My leg, by some otherworldly or mutated miracle had healed and all that was left of that night were the scars riddling my body like interconnected trenches. In other words I looked like Frankenstein’s monster.

Don knew that I was healed. He also knew that this meant that I no longer needed a doctor.

I think he was questioning whether or not I needed him now, though it was most likely a thought shoved into the far corners of his mind if it was there at all. He was much more concerned, I believe, with what he knew was coming.

“Are you hungry?” he asked me dryly, breaking the icy quiet between the two of us. “I can make you something to eat.”

“No,” I responded truthfully. I began to wring my hands awkwardly and watched as Don turned from me. He didn’t want the conversation to even start.

But I had to know.

“How did Leo…” I began only to bite my lip. How does one start a conversation like this? “After the fight…”

He wouldn’t look at me and I suddenly felt crushed. Had I possibly broken the last true-brotherly connection I had left in this family? Had I pressed Donny simply too far this time? Why couldn’t I have waited for another day?

“I always… thought after that much blood loss…” Don spoke up slowly, his voice fading into pauses as he concentrated on each censored word, “… I always thought we’d look… pale… like white.”

I didn’t understand.

Don bit his lip. “Leo and you… were sallow…”

It was lovely visuals, but it was not what I wanted. No, I wanted something much deeper than what he was going to tell me at that point.

Sucking it up some and overcoming my anxiety, I sighed and looked at my brother very seriously, something I had been getting much better at over the months. He stared downward, though I caught a very aware flicker in his eye.

“Did Leo say anything before he left?” I demanded.

Don released a quick sigh. It wasn’t really aggravation but it wasn’t relief either. “Yes,” he replied shortly at last.

I stared at him, hardening myself to his ridiculous answers. I wasn’t in a mood to be played with any more than he was. I crossed my arms. “Well?”I questioned.

“Well what?” he looked at me with a blink.

“What was it?”I asked, becoming irritated myself at that point.

“That he said?” Don asked. I replied with a low, growl-like noise which, for whatever reason, he seemed to acknowledge and even understand before leaning back in his chair. “I don’t know what he said to be honest,” Don shrugged.

“What!?” I growled. “How do you not know?”

Don frowned. “He didn’t tell me,” he said lowly. “He told Raph…”

I moaned and rubbed my face. It would have just been easier if Don had said that Leo had not said anything at all. Anything would have been more welcomed information than one currently thrown at me. And this had been important, too.

“Great,” I huffed.

“Just go ask him,” Don whispered lowly.

I stared at him before shaking my head. “Raph would eat me alive then spit me back up before backing up over my ashes!”

“He would not,” Don retorted, now beginning to be a slight more irritated with me. “What makes you say that?”

The reply came out before I could stop it. “Because he hates me.”

Don narrowed his eyes. “No he doesn’t,” he said firmly, a strange tone coming from the Don I knew. “What makes you think that?” he demanded.

I felt my insides churn. “I-I don’t know,” I responded. I was worried because I didn’t want to get another one of my brothers in trouble. “Just recently he seems… angry.”

“At you?”

“At me.”

Don stood up and stormed out. “We’ll see about that!” he declared as he took off toward Raph’s room. I was too dumbfounded to react and I suddenly had the urge to hide in my shell and just never come out except for food, water, and comic books ever again.

I lowered in my seat miserably. My mind was racing with everything that had happened and I felt dizzy and increasingly depressed. I wanted so bad for all of this to end and never have my family hurt and broken the way it was and is.

At that moment I felt a warm, familiar hand grace my shoulder with its presence and I gratefully leaned back into my father. He affectionately held to both of my shoulders and sighed a long, hurt sigh of his own.

“We must speak, Michelangelo,” he insisted.

And we did…

I always think it’s strange how when you’re very anxious about arriving somewhere, the last few miles seem the longest and most unnerving. One instant the trip is taking too long, the next moment the destination is arriving way too fast.

I really wish I could put my life on pause right now and reconsider everything I’m doing.

Even if I did have that magical ability, though, it would be much too late. I’ve interrupted the lives of our family’s closest friends so that I could come this far to see my brother who was only in Northampton because of me to begin with.

Or was he?

I need to stop thinking about all this for just a minute, which is why I’m sitting in the back seat while Casey and April are in the little folk store – our last stop before we get to Casey’s grandmother’s farmhouse. It’s like a tradition for Casey or something.

I don’t care either way. I needed the pause and I’m really enjoying the pop rocks that April bought for me. They are just what I needed to wake myself up!

It is completely engulfing my attention as I place the round candies on my tongue only to take them from there and smack them around in my jaw as they explode in my mouth. It’s hilarious! It’s making my jaw hurt, but it’s hilarious!

I can feel a grin on my face, a big one. It almost feels strange. It’s been a long time since I could wear one so freely. It’s almost like you have a favorite hat that you’ve worn in just right and then lose it. That’s it – I’ve found my hat again.

It fits back in its old spot, same as always. But it’s different, too. I know that while it’s been gone I’ve missed a lot of opportunities to be wearing it.

Casey opens the door my feet were propped up on to my surprise and grins goofily in his classic, Space-Case sort of way. I smile politely as he gives his “sorry” and shoves in the floral wreath he and April had bought.

The pastel colors seem to really clash with the dark green – and very fake – foliage in my opinion. It reminds me of when I was on laundry duty and put in bleach with our masks. It just doesn’t look right to me.

I hear the front doors open and the awkward shuffle of bodies sliding over cold leather and then the sound of the same doors slamming shut.

“Sorry it took so long, Mike,” April apologizes. “Casey didn’t know which one would look best for his Grandma’s grave.”

“Hey, this is important to me!” Casey mutters.

I find that my smile has gone missing again and do my best to retrieve it. Once again, though, it’s a foreign smirk on my face that I’ve never felt the likes of before. I miss my old hat. “It’s cool, guys, seriously,” I reply. “I understand completely.”

They both get real quiet as they reconsider their own words and then question whether mine had any underlying meanings themselves.

April looks back, though it feels forced in my opinion. “Do you think we should have gotten something for Leo on the way?” she asks timidly.

It’s so strange to hear that carefulness in her voice. The April I know is strong and forceful even in her most compassionate state.

“No, it’s okay,” I assure her, regretting my earlier input.

“No it’s not,” Casey determines as he unbuckles himself. “I’ll run in and grab something for Leo, Mike—“

“Seriously, don’t,” I say, a bit sharper this time. I watch as Casey slides back into his seat and nods reluctantly. I feel unusually satisfied. “Leo’s not that showy, guys. First off, he hates presents and second of…” I pause and think. Did I have a second off before I started to ramble? “Well, I hope he can settle with seeing me.”

“Of course he can,” April says gingerly before nodding to Casey for him to start the car. “I bet it’s the only thing he’ll care about…”

I wasn’t so sure.

Another thing I always wonder about is how it is that in the most intense, condemning circumstances that my mind will have the tendency to bring up the most random peculiarities. In the midst of the night’s battle I was not overly concerned with the immediate threat of the Foot.

I was much more concerned with the cursing battle I was having with my brother.

“Shit!” Leo hissed as his knife-wielding opponent managed to cut his cheek one. Fearless angrily administered the hilt of his sword to the grunt’s neck in return. He was not one happy ninja at the moment due to a combination of suppressing the urge to say “I told you so” to me and the fact that he had been outmaneuvered.

It was one thing to get Leo in trouble. It was another to be a step ahead of him.

Honestly, it scared me too. Leo was, after all, a tactical genius. If he was outmaneuvered I really didn’t see much help for the rest of us. So this particular band of the Foot not only got to us on a physical level, but really was affecting Leo on that strange “mental superiority” battle of his.

Leo’s job was to keep us out of trouble. He was failing because of me so my job in the family was kicking in: keeping the light atmosphere.

“Screw!” I exclaimed before pelting an approaching troop with shuriken. These were obviously the loser new guys because half of them didn’t even attempt to dodge. Poor, unfortunate ninja.

Leo threw me a wicked grin which he worked his hardest to mask in a disapproving scowl but could not. He was enjoying it; I don’t care what he said. At that instant I had that strange, over confident feeling that we were both going to come out of this just fine. It was no longer a concern of mine whether or not we knew what we were doing because good guys always come out on top!

Right?

“Your turn,” I said with a flash of my tongue.

He raised an eye ridge at my antics before stiffening in alarm at how the ninja were suddenly backing off. That was never a good sign. It was like parting the waters only instead of Moses and the Hebrew crossing they were making way for the pharaoh and a little friend of his I like to call Satan.

I turned around to where Leo was facing and we saw him.

It was the Elite guard that Raph and Don had been telling us about. He looked like big guards on medieval video games that were all rippling muscles and scariness – Berserkers. He even carried an axe. A badass axe.

But that wasn’t even the most of it! Not only did he look bad, but he had that whole omen about him like the Crypt Keeper or even Death himself! I think I could even smell rotting flesh on him – well, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but there was something in the atmosphere that told me I did not want to stay in his company for long.

Leo summed it up the best with a little, four-letter word that rhymes with “muck.”

I chortled some. “I’m telling Splinter.”

“Mikey,” he uttered in that warning voice as we backed up.

“I know,” I grunted before a gulp as the Elite approached. “Quit acting like a child.”

Leo shook his head some. “Actually…” he muttered, “I was going to say ‘Tattle Tell.’”

He stopped before us and Leo and I made scowls. What did this guy want?

Suddenly, he looked at me and waved one hand for me to approach… by myself. I wasn’t all that inclined to take the invitation so I grinned my best and shook my head at the offer. I wasn’t about to get myself killed for sadistic pleasure.

“Don’t do it,” Leo hissed at me, never taking his eyes off of me.

“Dude,” I replied, “like it was ever even in my thoughts to do something so stupid.”

“You did get us here,” he snorted.

At that point the Elite was no longer asking nicely and lunged forward so fast that the sheer shock just about kept me from my footing. Leo met his axe’s swipe with a crossing fence and the two locked their weapons in a battle of shear force.

I could see in Leo’s eyes, though, that even he knew that a contest of force would be next to useless against this Elite. He had far surpassed any of the muscle mass we all had acquired in our young, teenage lives and since he was an Elite it was fair to assume he had the sturdiness to back it up.

“Mike! Get out of here now!” he snapped at me as the weight and pressure caused his legs to quiver. He was leaning backward to levy the force of the axe elsewhere but his shell was restricting how much he could do so.

I stared at him. He could not have been serious with me, like I would leave my brother!

So I rushed forward and whirled my chucks at the Elite who just broke Leo’s block and left a gash over my brother’s worn carapace. It wasn’t much but it was a hit, and with all the cuts and bruises we already had I knew that he would tough it out.

Problem was, by rushing I had inadvertently given the silent okay to the accompanying ninja to join in the attack. They came forward to assist their leader and Leo and I found ourselves in separate rings of fighting, furious grunts.

Curses leapt from my lips like the sound of a fine tuned instrument as I received blow after blow and delivered block after block accompanied with strike after strike. I was beginning to lose my cool somewhat because being in a losing battle was not all that fun!

Worse yet I was beginning to tire. I had no natural concept of time due to my own obliviousness so what had felt like ages of combat I could only take to be ages of combat in real time.

“LEO!” I yelled out as I could hear the clang of metal over my own blocking and attacking. He must not have heard me because the precise, unyielding noises continued. “Leo! Listen! LEO!”

At about that moment I happened to see a bulky grunt appear before me out of nowhere, catching me off guard, before hammering his knee into my stomach. I didn’t even have a chance to gasp as every breath expelled from my lungs.

I went down like freshly sliced cold cuts and lay in a heap on the ground. For a moment I thought that maybe if I played dead they would leave me alone. Not a perfect or even reasonable plan but at the moment when I couldn’t move, it sounded GREAT.

It was then that I felt a kick to my lower abdomen turn me over and prevent my chance for air intake. So I laid and looked up as the same guy cracked his knuckles. I grabbed my chucks and was ready to pull him down when his foot came down without warning on my shin. There was a sickening crack that entered my ears and honestly hurt me more than the leg itself.

I yelled out pulled my leg up from under his foot in response before biting down on my lip. I muttered another curse, still going for the record, before swiftly wrapping my chuck around the ankle of his supporting foot and yanking, literally taking his feet out from under him.

It is true what they say about the bigger they are.

At that moment I should have probably been wondering where the other ninja were or even where our buddy Mr. Elite had gone off to, but I didn’t.

I laid my head back and groaned over my leg.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, as I shook from the pain of my poor, innocent leg, I recognized the sound of metal slicing through the air behind me. I blocked it out, though, because in the most stressful situation of my life I didn’t really want to think about impending doom.

I heard Leo screaming and all went black.

…

A/N: It’s not what you think… or is it?

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