"My sons," Splinter says as I stand next to him, and the four turtles stand in a square facing each other. "You are truly becoming impressive warriors. But to fight as a team, you must know each other's strengths and weaknesses."
They take out their weapons confidently, all except Mikey, who burps. I hold in a laugh (which is so mature). Yeah, the youngest turtle can be utterly gross sometimes.
Splinter instructed me to sit this one out, that the turtles would have this themselves, which I obey without hesitation.
"This is a free for all," Splinter says. "Last turtle standing wins. Hajime!"
Donnie is still dazed out at Mikey's gross burp, so Raphael gets him first. Leonardo is going against Mikey, who is laughing at Donnie. My eyes meet with Leonardo's and he smiles confidently yet cozily for a split second, and blocks Raphael.
"What are you doing?" Raphael says. "I was going after Mikey!"
"What part of last turtle standing don't you understand?" Leonardo kicks Raphael back and leg-swipes Mikey making him fall flat on his shell.
"Beware your distraction, Michelangelo," Splinter says. "Misdirection and distraction are the ninja's most powerful tools."
While Splinter isn't looking, Mikey mimmicks him. When Sensei notices, though, he grins innocently and sits down next to me.
Raph and Leonardo face each other.
"Looks like you made it to the boss fight," Raphael teases.
"I'm gonna wipe that smirk off your face," Leonardo says. "Permanently."
The two run towards each other, but Leonardo is able to force Raphael to let go of both of his Sai by throwing them away. Raph runs toward the tree where one of them landed and Leonardo chases him the other way around. Then, he surprises Raph by kneeing him in the head sending him flying a couple meters back, and now Raph ends up on the ground.
"Looks like Leo won this one!" Donnie says.
Leonardo kneels in front of Splinter in respect, and glances over at me. I smile at him, and he looks away smiling too.
A growl calls my attention. It's Raphael, losing his temper.
"Uh-oh!" Mikey says. "You've awakened the beast!"
Next thing you know, Raphael gets up and charges at Leonardo kicking him hard, and sending him back (well, front, in Leonardo's perspective). He lies on the ground without moving.
"Leonardo?!" I yell when I don't see him moving and crouch down next to him. I help him sit up and support his back by placing one hand on his shell and the other on his shoulder. Donnie takes his left arm and Mikey takes the right one.
"Raphael!" Splinter scolds the brawler. "We have talked about this time and again. Anger is a dangerous ally and you must not let it control you!"
"I wasn't angry!" Raphael denies. "I was just- determined to win!"
"You hurt one of your brothers, Raphael," Splinter says.
"But I told you I wasn't angry!" Raphael insists, and his eyes land on my hand on Leonardo's shoulder. He scoffs and throws his Sai on the ground, and leaves the Dojo angrily.
****
I sit on the wooden stairs right next to the living room, the ones that lead to the surface, checking out maps of Kraang facilities that I downloaded into my T-Phone from Donnie's computer. It's been a long while since we've so much as spotted a Kraang, and I've had no sign of my dad, not even when we rescued Mr. O'Neil.
I go from map to map, but don't find anything new.
"Sara?" It's Leonardo. "Mind if I join you?"
"Go ahead," I look back at my T-Phone.
He sits down, his knees bent over the edge of the stairs allowing his feet to dangle. I get in the same position as he does.
"What are you up to?" He asks me.
"Just checking out maps of Kraang facilities," I turn off the T-Phone and face him. "It's just weird... we ravaged every Kraang facility Donnie found, checked each one to the last corner, we even blew up TCRI and went to a Kraang detention center, but we didn't find my dad anywhere."
Leonardo looks down. "I'm sorry we haven't been able to find him."
"Don't worry, it's just..." I trail off. "It worries me. Where on earth could he be? Because... the Kraang use interstellar portals, right? What if he's not even in Earth? What if he's somewhere around the galaxy? Or the universe?"
Leonardo places his right hand gently on my left shoulder. "I'm sure he's not that far out of reach. We're going to find him, I promise."
I look into his deep blue eyes and smile. "Thanks, fearless leader. So how are you doing?"
"Well, I feel like a punching bag but it could be worse."
I chuckle. "What are we gonna do? Hey, I'm getting hungry, you want something to eat?"
"Yeah, let's go in the kitchen," He helps me up. "Mikey's making popcorn, unless you want to get pizza. We did agree we'd get one, right?"
"I need a break from pizza," I say. "Don't tell Mikey I said that. But we can eat that later."
Leonardo chuckles and we start going down the stairs.
"By the way, Sara," Leonardo says. "I was wondering if you'd like to train with me, just us two. Maybe to perfection our teamwork technique." He opens the door of the kitchen for me.
I go in; Mikey's already inside making the popcorn.
"That wouldn't be a bad idea," I say. "Maybe that way no one will get angry."
He chuckles. "So how about tomorrow, before our evening patrol? That way if we run into trouble, we could actually use a strategy."
"Awesome," I say. "Remember that flip we made in King of the Mountain?"
"For example," he replies. "We gotta learn to do more stuff like that."
I spot Mikey looking at me with suspicious eyes and a little smirk when he gets back to his popcorn. "Can I join?"
"Sorry, Mikey," Leonardo says. "It's kind of a compatibility thing."
"Hmmm..." Mikey says rubbing his chin. "Whatever, I'm too cool for that anyway."
"Okay," Leonardo chuckles in response. "I'm going with Donnie to watch Super Mecha Robot Force."
"Again?" I say. "You guys aren't tired of that yet? Seriously, Space Heroes was better, and it was also really lame."
"Oh, yeah right!" Leonardo says. "You adored Space Heroes."
"Only because it was fun to watch your reactions," I say.
He chuckles again and grabs a small bowl of popcorn. "Alright, meet you back at the living room."
Once Leonardo's gone, I take a bowl and turn around to find Mikey staring at me wide eyed.
"He's totally flirting with you," he points out.
"What?!" I say. "NO!"
"Yeah he is!" Mikey insists. "Private training sessions, laughing, smiling, trying to impress you in the free for all, comforting you about your dad?! What is that to you, woman?!"
"Okay," I say. "Splinter says we're compatible during combat and we've demonstrated that we are. Laughing, smiling, comforting, that's who he is. And he beat Raph because he's just that good, not to impress me."
"That's what you think!" Mikey yells. "I may be stupid, but I'm smart! Wait, that came out wrong. I mean, I-"
"Mikey!" I stop him. "He's not flirting."
"Is he?"
"No."
"You like him?" He grins and pokes me.
"No!"
"Really?" He holds out his finger wiggling it and crouches down a bit with a stupid smile.
"No, dammit!" I say. "Seriously, I've seen him flirt before and this is not how he does it. He usually smiles cozily and overreacts during battle to shine excessively by taking out the toughest..."
I trail off and look at Mikey, whose eyes are wide and has a huge grin. I look back at Leonardo's smiles, his performance at the free for all, the way he protected me from Karai, how he didn't get angry at me when he did get angry at his brothers, how he's been trying to make me feel better...
"No," I say. "And I recently broke up with Raph, do you think it would be okay to start looking at Leonardo?"
"So you do like him?!"
"No!" I yell. "Forget it, Mikey."
Mikey hands me my popcorn and grabs his own, and exits the kitchen. "We'll settle this later, Blackburn. I have some Super Mecha Robot Force to attend."
I sigh. Is Leonardo really trying to get my attention?
When I get back to the living room and sit next to Mikey, Raphael is apologizing (that's unexpected for him) to Leonardo.
"I thought I had my anger under control," Raph says. "But I didn't. But now, I do."
"He means for now," Mikey says. "I give him ten more seconds. Nine, eight, seven..."
Raph looks at Mikey.
"Six, five, four, three, two-"
"SHUT UP!" Raph loses it again.
"DING DING DING!" Mikey yells. "WE HAVE A WINNER!"
Leonardo tries to calm Raph down, but the brawler shakes himself off his brother's grasp and starts to leave.
"Raph, come on!" Leonardo says. "We were just busting your shell!"
"Ah, let the green baby go," Donnie says.
Raphael throws a shuriken at the popcorn making them spill. I get up and follow Raph to see if I can help him come to his senses, but when I reach the surface I can't find him anywhere.
Raph? I try to communicate with him.
No answer. No feeling, nothing. It's probably best if I go back inside."
****
The day after that, Leonardo and I choose to train by ourselves. He helps my get better at wielding my katana and then we fight each other. Obviously, neither one beats the other. We go at that for almost an hour, until we decide to have some fun and practice the same flip we tried for King of the Mountain.
Then, we get out chatting about how fun that was, and spot Raphael entering the lair looking bummed.
"You guys watch so much TV your brains are gonna rot," Raph says.
"Yeah, maybe," Donnie says.
"Cool off yet, man?" Leonardo asks.
"I'm always cool," Raph replies. "Move over."
Not even a minute goes by when we hear a fork dropping to the floor from the entrance of the lair. We all look in that direction to see somebody in a mask hiding.
"An intruder!" Mikey yells out.
"You again?!" Raph yells.
All of us get up and so does the intruder, revealing he has hockey sticks as weapons. Hockey... that reminds me...
Donnie and Mikey grab the intruder by the arms.
"You know him, Raph?" Mikey questions.
Leonardo steps up and removes the guy's mask revealing a skull-like painted face.
"It's just a kid!" Leonardo says.
It's not just any kid. It's Casey Jones, April's new friend. He recognizes me.
"Hey!" He says. "You're Red's friend!"
"Who's Red?" Leonardo asks.
"Casey?!" April yells out suddenly. "What are you doing here?"
"You know this guy?" The turtles ask.
"You know these guys?" Casey asks.
"Stop, Casey's my friend!" April says. "Casey, these are the... friends I told you about."
"So they're not the bad guys?" Casey inquires.
"No!" April replies. "Casey, I want you to meet Leonardo, Donatello, Michelangelo-"
"Wut uuuuuupp-" Mikey's interrupted when Raph smacks him.
"-And the one and only Raphael," April finishes. "And well, you met Sara back at the skating rink."
"Yeah..." Casey says. "The turtles are Italian?"
"No," Splinter says, freaking Casey out. "I just named them after my favorite authors."
"You're a talking rat?!" Casey yells.
"It's okay, Casey," April explains. "This is Master Splinter. He's cool."
"You do not have to be afraid, my friend," Splinter says. "Rest assured, I do not bite."
Raph laughs. "Big vigilante's afraid of rats!"
Mikey holds out a roach at Raph causing him to yell and hide in his shell. I can't help but laughing at his stupid phobia.
April and I gasp.
"You felt that?" She asks me.
"Yeah," I reply.
"Felt what, girls?" Splinter says.
"Sensei," I say. "We're not alone." I point to the roof, where there are Foot bots spying on us, and then they jump down.
"You led them here?!" Raph yells at Casey.
"I led them here?" Casey counters.
"BOOYAKASHAAAAA!" Mikey takes out his nunchuks and starts attacking the Foot bots, with us following.
Casey and Raphael keep arguing as they fight the Foot. April and Splinter are helping us out too. Master Splinter takes out his badass side by taking on many of the Foot on his own.
"Whooooooa," we all say.
"Stay alert," Splinter says. "More are coming."
One of the Foot bots starts scanning the lair.
"Hey!" Donnie yells. "It'll give away our location!"
"Do not let that robot escape!" Splinter orders.
Eventually, Raphael and Casey go after that bot together, while the rest of us fight the Foot that chose to stay in the lair.
Leonardo and I are back to back.
"Ready?" He asks me.
"Ready," I reply.
Leonardo starts making random animal noises to call the Foot bots' attention to us. They charge at us and when they're at the right speed and distance from us, we jump high up in the air so that they crash and land again with our Katanas pointing down so that we take out those two. Then, we perform our combos, the ones we were training earlier. Jab, cross, kicks, to several of the Foot bots. We do this completely synchronized, almost like a mirror, and are able to take down at least ten Foot bots.
"Aw, yeah," Leonardo says when we're done. "Let's help the rest!"
After fighting effectively, we fight off all the Foot bots until there are none left.
"Dude!" We hear Raph coming. "The way you chased that thing down!"
"And remember the subway?" Casey replies.
"That was awesome, you nailed it!"
"Wut," I say when they come in. "First you're at each other's throats, now you're best buds?"
"That's what teamwork can do," Raphael says.
"Yeah," Casey replies. "But now it's time to clean the scum off the streets."
Casey and Raph bang their heads together. "YEEEAAAAAHHHHHH!"
April, Leonardo and I exchange looks.
"You know what this means, right?" Donnie says. "Now we have two Raphaels!"
I can't help but chuckle at how happy Raphael looks with Casey. It's a good thing that they became friends. Now, they rush out of the lair together causing the rest of us inside to laugh at them.
"So..." Leonardo says. "Super Robot Mecha Force?"
"Whatever," I say. "But first let's get these bots out of here."
"Pass," Mikey says. "You and Leo can do it."
I glare at Mikey, and he winks back.
"We all help, Michelangelo," Splinter says, and we get right to it before we sit down and watch that lame show of theirs.