Chapter Text
With his hat down, and his collar up, Saki looked like any other New Yorker out for the evening. And with the dimness of evening, and the shadows the street lights created, no passing individual would see his scars.
He might revel in having hundreds of drones and soldiers at his whim, but even Saki sometimes needed a break from his imbecilic employees. A walk on the streets of New York, as an anonymous person, did wonders for his stress levels; especially with the recent loss of his… of his daughter, Karai.
Under his breath, Saki sighed; the incident with the mutagen, that had never been his intention. And the mind worms, they’d been meant to bring her home to him again, bring their small family back to unity. But the turtles, those blasted turtles…
And Yoshi. It was always Yoshi, taking from Saki the things and people he wanted. Where ever Karai had run to, it wasn’t in New York, and there was no trail to follow; perhaps Saki had trained her too well in the art of hiding from one’s enemies.
A remaining spot of softness for his adopted daughter stung to think that, that he was considered her enemy now.
Saki had given Karai everything she ever could have wanted; training, position, power, a home and a loving father. But she’d thrown it all back in his face, and for what, a mutant freak of a man and his animal sons?
His ungrateful daughter, should Saki ever find her, would receive grievous punishment; of course, if she apologized for her lapse in loyalty, Saki would forgive her. But until Karai returned and did so, the Foot clan would not allow her true mercy; her life only, nothing else.
Karai should count herself lucky, that her father still loved her despite her betrayals.
An ordinary citizen bumped into Saki’s shoulder, the bulkier man turning to no doubt call Saki out on not paying attention to where he was going. A quick flash of his scars and a furious sneer fixed that, sending the paling man away at a much faster pace than before.
Saki scoffed; pathetic, New York was filled with cowards it seemed. He could have used a quick fight; his own men were too terrified to give their all against him. As they should be, but robotic opponents only gave so much thrill during a spar; sometimes, the sensation of crushing a living, breathing person was the only thing for Saki’s foul moods.
And speaking of…
On the edge of Saki’s hearing, the sound of fighting had started to reach him. It was coming from the roof tops, a few stories above the street level. All the windows of the derelict building were dark though, and either broken or boarded up. Rationally speaking, there should be no one in or on top of the condemned building.
This was however, not far from the church Saki had chosen to make his base of operations. All too likely, on top of the building he’d stopped in front of, were some of the ham-handed recruits from the newest Foot clan branches in the western hemisphere. He’d been meaning to break them in, but he’d been too busy with Karai and the war lately.
Saki clenched his fists, hearing the shouting get louder above him; perhaps he’d get that fight after all.
Darting a quick glance both ways on the only semi-busy street, Saki ducked into the shadows of the thin alleyway between the condemned building, and the struggling pawn shop beside it. He walked with light steps towards the rusted fire escape up the side of the building; and with an expert leap, Saki began his silent climb up the structure.
As he neared the top, the voices got louder and more heated; if the sources did turn out to be some of his men, he’d thrash them beyond their imaginations for being so sloppy. Shameful, being loud enough to be heard by any random passerby; he’d personally see to their punishments.
Saki’s coat flapped in the cool wind, the deep brown fabric catching the draft between the buildings. As he reached the top level, Saki pressed his hat further down, peering just over the edge of the roof’s lip. A quick scan of the area, and he found the source of the fighting. But…
The four figures creating the noise weren’t his soldiers. They weren’t even human.
It was the turtles.
Immediately, Saki’s anger turned to something darker than just frustration with incompetent subordinates; these four mutants had blocked his every attempt to enact his revenge, right from the very start. He wanted each and every one of their heads on a pike, along with their so called father’s.
But, as much as he would have liked to eviscerate all four of them right that moment; Saki had left majority of his weapons in storage, only bringing a standard amount of concealed knives and shurikan along for his walk.
Tactical retreat then, because even though Saki was in civilian dress, the turtles would undoubtedly recognize not just his voice but his scars as well. He would have to save the bloody rage coiled inside him for a later date, when he could properly kill each one of the mutant brothers.
Saki turned to leave the squabbling mutants behind, when a phrase one of them used caught his attention.
“You’re always acting so self-righteous; take it down a notch already! Karai isn’t just your sister you know, she’s ours too!” Raphael shouted at Leonardo, glaring at his team leader. “Just because you’re Sensei’s favorite doesn’t mean you have to kiss up to him every damn second-”
(“Just because you are our Sensei’s favorite son, does not mean you have to kiss up to him every second -”)
“-of the day, Leo!”
(“-of the day, Yoshi!”)
Saki blinked, the echoes of his youth ringing in his ears. He settled back into his hiding spot, and listened to the evolving fight.
“We need to keep looking for Karai, and I don’t care if you think it’s not worth it, I’m not stopping until we find her!” Leonardo spat at Raphael, tilting his head in a way that reminded Saki all too much of his former brother.
“Uh, in case you fucking forgot, she’s crazy and working for the Shredder!” Raphael shot back, stepping into Leonardo’s space. “And even if Sensei’s mystical-hand-whatevers actually worked, which I really fucking doubt, who’s to say she’s actually gonna want to stick around with us? All she’s ever done is stick us in the back; she’s a lost cause Leo, just admit it already!”
“I am the leader of this team, and if I say we keep looking for her-” Leonardo shoved a pointed finger against Raphael’s chest, punctuating his words. “-then we keep looking for her. Or are you going to blow up like you always do, and skip out on us? Because that would be just like you, always losing your temper-”
(“-just like you, always losing your temper and causing unnescessary drama-”)
“-for everyone else around you. Suck it up, and be mature enough to get outside of your own selfishness for once in your life, Raph,” Leonardo said, condescension evident in his words.
“Oh, like you’re so fucking perfect, mister holier-than-thou,” Raphael growled at his brother. “Acting like you’re so much better than us, just because-”
(“-you think yourself so, when you are nothing-”)
“-but a damn poser. And the only reasons you think you’re better than me is because Sensei made you leader -”
(“-because our father chose you as his heir-”)
“-and because you’ve got in your head you’re some kind of white knight, shit-head hero for trying to save a girl who doesn’t want to be saved!” Raphael yelled, slapping Leonardo’s hand away.
“We aren’t stopping until we find her, there’s no room for negotiations,” Leonardo said in a low tone, glaring poisonously at Raphael.
“Well count me out, we’ve been at this all night, all week, and we’ve gotten JACK out of it!” Raphael exclaimed angrily, turning and storming away from the collection of mutants. “She’s gone, and I fucking hope she’s not coming back.”
Leonardo looked furious at his brother’s insubordination, and his tone confirmed that. “I’m the leader; you have to listen to my orders-”
“Oh fuck off; I don’t have to do anything for you. I’m going and you can’t stop me, so shove it oh fearless leader,” Raphael shot over his shoulder, just as he jumped off the building’s roof and onto the next; disappearing into the maze of streets below.
Saki watched the red banded mutant go, remembering old fights with Yoshi that had gone similarly. He turned his gaze back to the remaining turtles, offhandedly interested in how they’d react now that their heaviest hitter had left.
“Wow,” Donatello commented boredly, watching Leonardo as he kicked the ground in frustration. “You two made it a whole evening with only three of those fights. I’m surprised Raph didn’t lose it before the fourth hour of this.”
Michelangelo nodded along, humming agreement. “I was sure that one scuffle like, two hours ago would’a set him off. Since you know, Leo said that one thing he really hates, about the whole duty to our father thing…”
“I’m not the one who causes this to happen, it’s Raph who does!” Leonardo insisted to his two brothers. “He’s always blowing things out of proportion and storming off because he doesn’t get what he wants; he can’t be a team player even when he tries, and he doesn’t try.”
“You aren’t exactly helping that, pulling the leader card every time you fight,” Donatello countered, crossing his arms. “You, me, we all know Raph isn’t going to respond well to that. You’re just winding him up when you do.”
“He’s supposed to listen, Sensei’s made it very clear that I’m the one who calls the shots on this team,” Leonardo replied icily, and again, his posture and tone reminded Saki very much of Yoshi at the turtle’s age. “It doesn’t matter if he thinks what we’re doing is pointless, he’s supposed to listen regardless.”
“Yeah, that’s not quite what Sensei says…” Donatello started on another half-hearted reprimand of his leader, but Saki was no longer listening.
He left the fire escape as silently as he’d come, and started across the roof tops of the adjacent buildings. After hearing and then witnessing the eerily familiar fight between the mutant brothers, Saki was oddly curious about Raphael’s post-fight reactions.
Leonardo had always reminded him deeply of a younger Yoshi, but until now, Saki hadn’t seen the resemblance Raphael bore to his own teenage self.
It was an… interesting thought.
Saki found the scornful second son again not long after he started looking; Raphael sitting on another roof top, surrounded by a flock of pigeons.
Saki crept around the edges of the building, remaining hidden from sight as he attempted to listen to the quiet conversation Raphael was having with the assembled birds.
“-always Karai this, or leader that, never takes a fucking break these days,” Raphael was grumbling to the pigeon in his hands, gently stroking the bird’s head. “An’ Sensei’s always backing him up, or encouraging him to be a complete ass to us. And they’re both freaking obsessed with that snake-bitch lately, and I don’t get it. Why the hell would our father want her around, when she’s tried to kill him like, at least ten times already, probably more? I mean, he’s already got us… why’s he need her anyways…”
Raphael lifted his arm, and allowed two more birds to perch on his bicep. “They’re both… they’re both always putting me down for tellin’ the truth, just because they don’t like it. Never fuckin’ listen no matter what. It’s always the same thing too; “Raph, control your temper, restrain your emotional outbursts.” or “Raph, listen to me because I’m the fuckin’ leader.” or “Raph, don’t fight with your brothers.” or “Raph, do as your brother says because I made him the leader since he’s so perfect and mature and totally my favorite fucking SON-!””
The pigeons scattered at Raphael’s sudden shouting, their loud grey wings cutting off the mutant’s ranting. The turtle watched them dispassionately, the anger draining from his posture as the flock flew away.
Saki shifted in his position on the sill of the window he stood on; watching in case the mutant turtle noticed his presence and he needed to leave before he was identified.
However, Raphael didn’t; simply sighing, getting up from his cross legged position on the roof’s shingles, and heading the opposite direction from Saki. Saki heard the turtle mutter under his breath, “I miss Spike.” as he left the roof top, and that was the end of that; the mutant disappearing down onto a different roof, and leaving Saki alone.
Saki climbed up onto the abandoned roof top, going to the side Raphael had vanished from, and watched the green form disappear into the darkness of the evening; brief flashes of the mutant getting fewer and fewer as he went further from Saki’s position.
Saki turned over in his head the fight and the words Raphael had said; the mutant ninja sounded very, very much like his younger self. Furious and restrained, mounting frustration at constantly coming second to his brother; the favorite son, the chosen son, the brother whom everyone chose over Saki.
Reaching back into his memories, Saki found other interactions he’d witnessed between Leonardo and Raphael that resembled ones he and Yoshi had had.
It seemed Saki had misjudged the worth of Raphael, perhaps letting the red banded ninja go to waste after the mind-worm attempt had been a mistake. Perhaps, there was still a use for the mutant.
Saki returned to his lair that evening, thinking and considering an idea taking form inside his mind. He ignored the scattering guards around his entrance to his living space, shutting the door on their silent-yet-loud clamor without a glance backwards.
Removing his coat and hat, Saki sat down in the arm chair before the fireplace; tapping his fingers along the arms as he thought deeper on his ideas, on the eerie resemblance he’d begun to see between Yoshi and himself, and the sons the mutant man had adopted.
He sent a message out later, having reached a point of near-conclusion.
Saki told his soldiers that they were to target the mutant known as Raphael specifically; but not to kill. Oh no.
Saki wanted them to observe the turtle; learn his fighting style more closely, his reactions to confrontations, his relationships with his brothers… and with his father.
Saki had a plan forming in his mind, but he had to be sure. Before, his plans for the red masked turtle had been heavy handed and done with brute force; this one however would be executed with careful precision, and steady planning.
Mind worms had failed Saki, both times he’d used them, but… there were other ways to mold a loyal soldier.
And, there were other ways to create a possible heir.
“Observe him, find his weaknesses, spot his tipping points; do not let anything go undocumented,” Saki told his top tiered soldiers. Not the mutant ones, those fools were his muscles; instead, he was addressing the few human ninja in his commanding forces skilled enough to compete with the robots and mutants. “Report back to me each time you engage him, give me every detail you uncover. Alert the Purple Dragons that each time Raphael shows his face, they are to summon my forces to their location. Am I understood?”
“Yes, master Shredder,” The ten assembled ninja replied, perfect sync; which was why Saki had chosen to keep them among his inner ring in the first place.
Saki dismissed them, settling back into his throne, and began tapping his fingers again.
Soon, he would know if his plan would be worthwhile. All he had to do was be patient, and learn each nuance about the mutant ninja. Then, if his tentative planning proved a possible success, Saki would lure the turtle into a trap.
Saki sat in the cool darkness of his throne hall, and waited patiently; like a spider awaiting its prey to enter its web, or a snake coiling to strike.
“Hey Dee?” Mikey asked casually.
“What?” Donnie replied in a deeply annoyed tone. “If this is about the possibility of shooting a bee’s nest from space again, I swear to god-”
“It’s wasps, Donnie, keep it straight. But seriously though-” Mikey threw his kusarigama’s weighted end, wrapping it around a Foot bot’s neck and tugging the thing off its feet; right into Donnie’s extended naginata blade. “-I got a question about something important. Not that shooting wasps from space isn’t important, because that’s seriously sick just imagine it Donnie-”
“Get to the point already!” Donnie snapped, wrenching his staff’s blade free and turning its edge to the oncoming robots. “We’re sort of busy at the moment, in case you haven’t noticed.”
Mikey rolled his eyes, ducking around a four sword attack from the closest Foot bot. ‘Busy’, yeah right; dealing with swarms of Foot clan robots was basically normal for them, chatting between blows was totally acceptable at this point.
Though that was what he’d been trying to ask Donnie about, because-
“Don’t you think the drones are targeting Raph a lil more than usual?” Mikey asked, switching his chains back into nunchaku mode again. Two deflected blows, three Foot bots now missing their heads. Nice. “Seriously, look at ‘em, they’re all over him right now.”
They really were; while the rest of their family and friends dealt with maybe five or six per pair up, Raph was off on his own against at least a dozen. Not that he seemed upset about it.
Raph had that manic glee of his, the one he always got when the battle high really hit him; Casey had it too, but his wasn’t quite what Mikey’s brother’s amounted to. Raph’s always seemed a lot more focused than Casey’s; less general chaos, more of a tunnel vision for violence.
Donnie was finally looking at the situation Mikey had pointed out, and he hummed thoughtfully. “I suppose you’re right about that. I haven’t really noticed anything different though, since-” They both watched as Raph bodily threw himself into the biggest cluster of robots, metal arms and heads flying off as he did. “-he does that anyways. Raph always literally throws himself at the biggest group of opponents; it’d be hard to tell if they’re targeting him on purpose or not because of that.”
“Still, this is like, our fifth throw down with the Foot clan for no reason in one week,” Mikey exclaimed, punctuating his words with a quick grab and snap of a robot’s head. “And every time we do this, more an’ more of the bots go for Raph over the rest of us! C’mon, that’s gotta be weird to you too.”
“Well, you might have a point with the meaningless fighting parts- ack!” Donnie barely ducked a swing that would have removed his head; as he came back up from his crouch, he shot a glare at Mikey. “Can we please discuss this later, when we aren’t fighting for our lives?”
Mikey stuck out his tongue at his brother, because by now Donnie should’ve been used to multitasking like this; using the fight as excuse to not talk about the to-tal-ly weird thing with the Foot bots? That was just weak by their standards. “Ugh, fine, but don’t forget this time! You always hide in your lab and forget I even exist because you’re so focused on your experiments an’ stuff.”
“I won’t forget, just make sure to remind me, and no not in an annoying way, I know for a fact that you’ve got my megaphone still.”
“You take the fun out of everything.”
“I like my ear drums intact, being able to hear is plenty fun.”
Mikey was about to respond with another completely witty comment, but the sound of shattering glass from the sun-lights above distracted him. More Foot clan soldiers descended from the broken windows, rappelling down onto their skirmish in the wide storage facility; their multitude of arms already extended and weapons primed for the fight. As the twenty some reinforcements landed, the group disbanding to join in with the already in-progress fights, Mikey saw at least half of them head directly for Raph.
“SEE?! WEIRD!!” Mikey yelled over the sound of the increasingly frenzied fighting. “I’M NOT BEING CRAZY ITS ACTUALLY HAPPENING!”
“FINE I SEE YOUR POINT BUT STOP YELLING!”
“YOU’RE YELLING TOO THOUGH!”
“ONLY BECAUSE YOU ARE!”
“I’M DOING THIS SO YOU CAN HEAR ME!”
“I CAN HEAR JUST FINE SO CUT IT OUT!”
“Donnie! Mikey! Focus!” Leo barked at them from across the warehouse. “Honestly you two, can’t you take this seriously for once?”
“WE ARE!” Mikey snapped at the same time as Donnie did.
Donnie did forget to talk with Mikey after that particular battle, but a near identical one happening only a few days later brought the subject back to him.
A split patrol, Donnie with Raph and Mikey with Leo; an exercise about mixing up their individual attributes. It was essentially uneventful up until the end, what with the Kraang gone, and the Purple Dragons still nursing their wounded pride from a particularly harsh beating; Casey and Raph had dished it out two weeks back, putting half that branches’ members in the hospital for sure.
The relatively peaceful outing had gotten a lot more chaotic, when an unprovoked swarm of Foot droids attacked them. The mechanical ninjas appeared at a random interval of street hopping; suddenly appearing in a pack of thirty, despite that Donnie and Raph were far outside the Shredder’s claimed territory.
Donnie went into the fight expecting the experience to be long and difficult, and likely accumulate a lot of injuries during it, but…
Majority of the robots headed straight for Raph, leaving Donnie with only three opponents. As Donnie quickly dispatched his pitiful amount of enemies, he remembered the conversation he and Mikey had forgotten to have.
The clear targeting the droids had for Raph was completely obvious to Donnie now, seeing it up close and personal. And despite the fact that Donnie started at the mob around Raph, the drones kept complete focus on Donnie’s older brother. It made it easier to catch them off guard of course, but it was disconcerting how eerily intent they were on Raph.
Raph seemed the complete opposite of disconcerted once they’d finish demolishing the robots; grinning and posturing like nothing weird had happened. And he brushed Donnie’s queries off, instead claiming they should just call it a night and head home.
“Well, if you’re sure… call Leo, tell him we’re heading back right away here,” Donnie said to Raph, crouching down as he spoke to examine the felled machines. While Raph pulled out his t-phone to call their brothers, Donnie pulled out a kunai and a couple of his favored tools from his belt. Creating a tear in the facial plating of the closest robot head, Donnie used a small pair of forceps to pry it open.
Raph bantered loudly with Leo in the background, but Donnie wasn’t listening; using his own intent focus to puzzle out the mystery the Foot drones were presenting.
“Oh… that’s not good,” Donnie mumbled under his breath.
He’d dissected the robot before; they hadn’t had this sort of technology in them back then. Now, underneath the eye sockets of the face, there were high quality camera lenses. Another layer pried back, and Donnie found something that made him frown deeper.
From the looks of it, the space that had originally been occupied by long distance tracking equipment had been greatly diminished. The removal of circuitry seemed to be specifically for the large new processor; multiple wires connecting it to the small, but powerful cameras in the robot’s eyes.
The processor was still blinking, as well as the tracker next to it.
Whoever was on the other end of the video no doubt being recorded, they could still see Donnie and his brother, and probably hear every word Donnie and Raph said.
Donnie cut out the processor, disconnecting it from its cameras and the tracking device. He needed to examine this, and as soon as possible. The strange phenomena Mikey had pointed out; it seemed to go a lot deeper than they’d thought.
“So what was it you wanted to show us, Donnie? You said it was important,” Leo asked as they assembled around Donnie’s computer screen. It had to be important, since Donnie had called master Splinter into his lab as well.
Donnie nodded his head, already typing away on his keyboard to pull up a file. “Alright, so a couple days back, Mikey pointed out something weird going on with the Foot drones, but-”
“SHOOT! I totally forgot about that!” Mikey exclaimed loudly, smacking his forehead.
“-we both forgot. Sorry, it slipped my mind because I got busy with the engine mods I’m doing for the shell-raiser,” Donnie clicked on a file, and he pushed his chair back as the program started loading. “Anyways, I thought you guys would want to see this; especially you, Raph.”
Leo heard Raph shuffle behind him, their brother coming closer to the gathering. “And why exactly would I care about this?”
“You will, don’t worry. Or I guess, you should worry, since it’s not a good thing,” Donnie replied grimly.
Leo moved to the side so master Splinter could lean closer as well, minding to not step on his father’s robes as he did. Donnie turned up the speakers of his computer, and leaned away from the desk as multiple video feeds started playing.
As each one loaded, Leo’s curiosity turned to disconcertion.
They were videos of Raph. Every single one of them.
Moments during a fight, random clips of Raph on patrol, close up shots of Raph when they all were hanging out on a roof top. Raph fighting with human gangsters. Raph sitting alone on buildings with his pigeons. Raph with Casey on their weekly outings. Raph fighting with other Foot bots. Raph with any combination of their brothers.
It was nothing but videos of Leo’s brother, interspaced over the last few weeks. Leo had been there for half of those recordings, but he’d never seen the robots following them; or even noticed one getting away after a battle.
“…okay that’s really freaky,” Raph said, watching as the short videos began to loop again. “What the hell am I looking at, Donnie?”
“As far as I can tell… the Foot clan has been watching you. Like specifically you, and writing the rest of us off as a, poor pun I know, but as a foot note,” Donnie said, adding a humorless chuckle to the end. He paused the videos with a tap of his mouse, freezing the multiple images into blurs. “There’s only about ten minutes of clips on here, since the main storage would be on whatever hard drive this was connected to. I could only get so much out of it, a ton of the code was encrypted to heck and back, but I managed to salvage this footage before the fail-safes locked me out.”
“Donatello, what do you think this could mean?” Splinter asked, speaking for the first time since he’d entered the lab. Leo turned his eyes from the screen to his father, who looked grim and wary. “This looks as though… the Foot clan is studying Raphael.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure they are,” Donnie replied, rubbing at his eyes tiredly. “I was up all day reviewing the dates of the videos in comparison with some of my research logs, and most of them take place in the last month. There’s no pattern though, other than it being specifically Raph they’re targeting.”
“Why though, why would they be targeting me?” Raph asked, sounding as disturbed as Leo felt. “It’s not like I’ve been doing anything different towards the Foot lately, just normal skull bashing. Why’d they single me out like that?”
“I honestly have no idea,” Donnie admitted, slumping in his desk chair. “There’re possibilities, hypotheses, but I don’t have anything concrete to go on other than this footage at the moment. Sorry.”
Leo grimaced at the still images of their brother on the computer screen; he didn’t like the sound of that, of Donnie not knowing why something was happening, and Leo himself drawing a blank as well. “Sensei, what do we do then? If the Foot are targeting Raph, that could mean his life is being threatened. Shredder’s been getting increasingly dangerous, and it’s been a while since Karai disappeared. If he’s going to attack, it’ll likely be soon.”
It’d been weeks since they’d seen Karai, since they’d had any meaningful fights with the Foot clan. None of the heavy hitters, or even sentient soldiers, had been showing up for the skirmishes. Only the drones, coming at random moments during patrol; either going down too quickly to really note, or leaving right away afterwards. Leo had thought it was just Shredder blowing off some steam at them; petty minute long revenge tactics, or maybe just an exercise of their strength after the four way trap Karai had lured them into.
“Hrm, whatever the Shredder is planning, we will have to proceed with caution,” Splinter said, stroking his beard thoughtfully. “Raphael, we will have to discuss a new set of rules for you until this problem has been solved.”
“Aw what? What kind of rules, Sensei?” Raph asked in a put upon tone.
“For starters, I do not want you to go above to the surface alone any longer. If the Foot clan is trying to single you out from your brothers, it would be a mistake to be caught alone. If you wish to continue your expeditions above ground, you will require an escort,” Splinter’s words weren’t a suggestion, they were a statement, and they left no room for negotiation.
Leo heard Raph grumble under his breath, but Raph ducked his head in a bow regardless.
“Hai, Sensei. I’ll… bring an escort from now on,” Raph said the word ‘escort’ like it tasted bad.
“That is a good start, but we will have to discuss this further. Come, there is a box of camomile tea that we may boil while we talk,” Splinter placed a hand on Raph’s shell, pushing him towards the door. “Leonardo, come along as well. I need to discuss something with you in private.”
“Ah, Hai Sensei,” Leo replied, leaving behind Donnie and his ominous screen of spy videos.
Raph was sent to the kitchen to get the tea and cups to go with, while Leo remained with their father in the empty space of their living room.
“Leonardo, I will be asking much of you in the coming days,” Splinter said quietly, so that Raph wouldn’t hear them. “I unfortunately cannot entrust his supervision to Donatello and Michelangelo, their minds are too… distractible to depend upon fully. Because of this, it will likely be you who watches your brother the most.”
Leo suppressed a grimace; spending night after night until this was solved, watching his surly and rebellious brother? Not his idea of a good evening.
Leo didn’t say that though, instead bowing his head. “I won’t let you down Sensei; I’ll make sure he doesn’t do anything too reckless until we figure this out.”
“I knew I could count on you, thank you, Leonardo,” Splinter said warmly, placing a hand on Leo’s shoulder. Leo smiled to himself, his sense of pride growing. His father trusted him to keep an eye on Raph, and to solve the suspicious focus laid on him. That was worth the trouble it would no doubt be, almost completely.
Raph listened as his father laid more praise on Leo, and his grip tightened around the kettle’s handle.
He was being targeted by a wack job, and his father was putting more restraints around him, all the while praising Leo for doing the or-so-terrible job of keeping an eye on Raph.
Raph didn’t need anyone to watch him. He was more than capable of taking care of himself. He didn’t need Leo or any of his brothers making sure he didn’t get hurt.
Whatever Shredder was plotting for him, he could bring it on. Raph wouldn’t shy away from a fight; in fact he was itching for it. Things had been way too stale in the lair lately, Leo and their father persisting with the search for Karai. Raph was pretty much sick of every patrol being a search party; Karai might be their sister, but she was also way, way too dangerous to trust. Every time she’d gotten even close to them, someone got hurt. Estranged sibling or not, Raph didn’t want her in his home. She impaired Leo’s judgement, as well as their father’s.
No one else seemed to think so, or at least they didn’t voice their opinions. Donnie just ducked his head when the topic came up, and went along with whatever order Leo called; while Mikey… Mikey just did what he always did, going with the flow of things. Sort of. He didn’t make a fuss over looking for Karai at least, just offhandedly complaining that his feet hurt and that was it.
Raph didn’t want to keep looking for her. She was gone, and hopefully, she wouldn’t be coming back.
Not that Karai mattered much at the moment. Raph had something a lot more important to focus on; like the fact that their resident Big Brother had just decided to make him a creepy film obsession.
As Raph set the kettle on the stove, turning on the heat, he considered what could’ve triggered that obsession.
The only thing that came to mind, outside of all the usual battles with the Foot, was the mind worm incident.
Raph shivered, because sometimes he could still feel the cold and painful sensation of the worm sliding into his mouth; its hundred sharp little teeth burrowing into the back of his throat, to get at his spinal cord and brain stem. That’s what Donnie had said it was doing, attaching itself to an unprotected part of his nervous system; no skull bone to block it. Brain worm was less of a literal term, more of a nickname.
He couldn’t look at leeches or worms or anything slimy and legless for a week afterwards. Still didn’t like to. It’d put him off the rare algae and worms dishes Mikey still made sometimes, choosing instead to go hungry until he could find something less wriggly.
Raph grimaced, recalling how much it’d hurt to throw up the worm once Leo had sent him into that rage fit. His tonsils and throat had been raw and inflamed, and he’d spat up some congealed blood later on. Disgusting.
That was the only serious interaction he’d had with the Shredder, one on one at least. Not the most comforting thing, since it’d involved capturing him, and putting a mind-altering insect in his brain.
That didn’t spell anything good for what the videos could mean.
Raph got out three cups from the cupboard, knowing that it’d be Leo as well as Sensei he’d be talking with. Much as he loathed that fact, he wouldn’t choose this particular moment to be petty about Leo’s position as leader. He’d save that for when they weren’t discussing something so serious.
Raph leaned back against the dining table, watching the steam start to rise from the old tea kettle. He tried to focus on the sound of the water starting to boil, and not the conversation happening just outside the kitchen doors; listening to his father praise Leo again, and basically re-enforce the favoritism there, wasn’t something he needed to hear.
Splinter had all the time in the world for his psycho long-lost daughter and favorite son, but basically none for Raph. Or Donnie and Mikey, they got even less attention than he did. If you could call it ‘attention’, since it felt like everything his father had to say to him was either a reminder to ‘control himself’, or a scolding for losing his temper again.
Raph scrubbed a hand over his face, dislodging his mask enough to rub at his eye sockets. He didn’t want to think on that stuff, it just made him more frustrated, and more likely to lose it in the wrong moment.
He tried, he really did, to keep his emotions under control; but sometimes he just couldn’t, and he paid the price for that every time. Raph would probably lose it a lot less if a certain older brother would stop being so smug and condescending all the time, or a certain youngest brother would stop poking all his buttons and being incessantly annoying even when Raph told him to bug off, or a certain genius who was always…
Actually, Donnie didn’t really do much of anything. Maybe he shot a sarcastic comment occasionally and teased Raph when their brothers were already doing so, but other than that, Raph’s fellow middle brother kept things to himself. Well, at least one of his siblings didn’t drive him insane constantly.
The kettle started whistling, and Raph got out the tea bags he’d been instructed to.
He put a lock on his frustrated thoughts, saving them for later when he had his punching bag, and brought the cups out on a platter. He also pretended he didn’t notice his father cutting off whatever he’d been saying to Leo, and only sort of shoved Leo’s cup into his hands.
A ways away in the city of New York, Saki gave the order to begin the second step of his plan.