Who are you: volume 2

The real reason Usagi stayed behind

The tanks back door opened, allowing Leo to walked ahead of everyone to make sure they hadn't been spotted. He then looked to Donnie and silently signaled that it was safe. Donnie took a gulp before his battle-shell activated its lights and shone the path in front of Donnie. Everyone followed with their weapons in hand and made sure to stay silent and avoid touching the junk in case it acted like a hivemind. "Feeling a lack of rush in this rush hour, right?" Leo joked, not expecting a laugh or anything but he thought he'd make sure the silence wasn't uncomfortable. "I don't know, Leo. Something feels-" Donnie stopped himself and turned to an area he swore he heard move. Everyone had paused their movements and looked to where Donnie did for a moment before looking ahead. 

"Uncle Don's right, something is off, I heard it." Ezra whispered to Casey. Venus remained behind everyone in case something attacked from the back while Leo led the group. Then Mikey smiled as he walked up to Donnie and jumped onto his back, scaring the softshell a bit that caused him flinch massively. "Don't worry, I won't let us die. I'm a mystic warrior!" Mikey said as he shifted around Donnie's back and waved his hand towards the air, Venus chuckling a bit at her younger brothers' antics. "I feel better already, he said without a hint of sarcasm." Donnie said bluntly as Mikey slipped off Donnie and hurried after the others. Venus rolled her eyes again with a smirk before going back to following the others. "Look, the stairs." Leo said as he hopped out of the tracks and onto the sidewalks, pointing his katana to the Metro Tower exit. 

 "Sneaking in from below was totally the right move. Thos slimeballs will never see us coming." Leo said as his back was turned to the exit. But what he didn't see was the vines had eyes that began to wake, almost like they were woken by Leo's smugness. Everyone gasped quietly as they saw the eyes, Donnie even made his lights move up slowly to see just what they had woken exactly. Leo noticed the shift in everyone's behavior and slowly turned around, seeing the light stop at a mouth and it's several eyes looked at Leo as he gasped softly. It roared quietly before tentacles sprouted out of its mouth and aimed for each person.

Back at the lair...

Splinter and April looked down at a white board of options to try and break the device, all of them were marked off with a red marker. "We tried to jackhammer it, flamethrower it, pour acid on it..." April said as she paused and marked their most recent attempt which was labeled as "ILLEGAL LASER", their last option was "Lots of kicks" and I think we can assume that won't do much. "I thought laser cut everything! How did that not work?!" April said, a worried expression on her and Splinter's face as they turned to the device, which remained on a table. "There's not even a scratch!" April yelled as the device sat next to an empty pizza box, almost like it was taunting April and Splinter in some way. "Maybe, it was your aim!" Splinter huffed as he pointed at April with his tail.

She narrowed her eyes at the rat and bent forward a bit to meet his level. "Maybe, your big rat head got in the way!" April spat, pointing at the rat before grabbing his cheek. April did let it go and both glared at each other, growling in annoyance as they glared. Splinter then frowned and turned away. "Mmm, I'll show you fat rat head." Splinter huffed sadly as he rubbed his cheeks. April frowned as she realized she might've taken it too far and stood back up. "Okay, deep breaths." April said as Splinter folded his arms across his chest and rose a brow at April. "You said some things, I said some things. Maybe we should just get back to saving the world." April said with a nervous grin, putting her hands together.

Splinter hummed for a moment before scoffing at her light. "What's next?" April asked, Splinter sighed and looked at the board. "Not many, but how is Usagi doing?" Splinter asked as he turned back to April. The teen sighed and both looked in Usagi's direction. A bag of the silver lotus flower mixture remained by his side as he sat on the couch, his sharpening stone covered in the mixture as Usagi used the stone for its intended purpose. He set the stone down and looked at the katana, waiting for it to flicker somehow before aiming it at a plant, closing his eyes and focusing. The blade flickered its normal green glow but then zapped Usagi as if punishment for forcing the weapon to do something it could do.

Usagi yelped in pain and dropped the sword, looking at the plant and narrowing his eyes as he saw the plant hadn't even moved. In a fit of rage, Usagi grabbed the stone and threw it somewhere that crashed in the distance. Usagi huffed and let his back flop against the couch. "Guess the Silver Lotus's only fixes the weapon, not restoring their mystic abilities." April said sadly, Splinter's frown also deepened at the pikathrope's actions and then looked at the board. "While I think of some more options, you talk to him?" Splinter said as he took the marker from April's hand. She bit her lip and looked at the board. While they were in a rush to break this thing, it's not like the Krang knew where the lair was located. She exhaled quietly and gave Splinter a thumbs up, then headed over to Usagi and picked up his weapon and sat next to him. 

"Hey, it was a good try." April said, pointing the hilt towards Usagi so he'd take it. He looked at it and sighed, taking the sword from her. "Not good enough apparently." Usagi said and put the katana back into its scabbard which remained at his other side. He then slouched forward and used his elbows to prop him up against his thighs. April stayed silent and looked at the plant Usagi attempted to shirt, seeing it wither from the lack of sunlight and water it received. "You wanna tell me what's wrong?" April asked, wondering if there's more to Usagi's actions than what's shown. Usagi looked up at the plant huffed silently as he leaned back. "I've never seen Leo that angry before, it... worries me." Usagi said, April looked over at Usagi with a frown. It did scare April when Leo came out of that pod, yelling and blaming Casey and Ezra if they knowing Raph would get kidnapped.

"While I understand that rage and what the real reason was behind it was, I'm just worried that his anger will cause him to do something he'll regret later in the future." Usagi explained and rubbed his neck. "So, I just thought that if I could get my katana working again, some of the pressure would get lifted off his shoulders and then I could take it." Usagi said as he put a hand to his chest and looked ahead with a worried expression. April smiled at Usagi and put a hand on his shoulder, causing him to look at her. "That's really nice of you Usagi, and I'm sure Leo would very much appreciate that... but some people have to learn the hard way. Leo was gonna have to get a reality check someday, especially if he didn't listen to Raph." April said, Usagi looked at the ground and balled his hands.

"I get that, and I know you don't mean anything rude by Raph getting kidnapped, I just... I just don't want to watch Leo do it alone. To make him think he has to do it alone, like I did when Ophelia left." Usagi said and looked at the ground, April smiled again and hugged Usagi. "Aww, look at you! Wanting to make sure Leo is alright and being open with your feelings. You sure have grown in these two past years." April said with a closed eye grin. Usagi was shocked by the sudden movement but slowly smiled and patted April's arm that had wrapped around his neck. "Well, I might've had more than a few more Dr. feelings seminars than I like to admit." Usagi said with a smile, it caused April to laugh a bit.

Back at the board, Splinter smiled at the two. It made Splinter happy to know that if his sons and daughter couldn't come talk to him about something, they could easily run to April and Cassandra. Sunita was a bit more difficult, but she still offered an ear if any of the other teens. Now that Splinter thought about it, what was Cassandra doing? Last he knew, she was still turning the "Mama CJ's girl scout cookies" operation into a secretive way for girls with anger issues to talk to others. "Yo Splints!" April called out, pulling the rat from his thoughts as he looked over and saw April getting a piggy-back ride from Usagi. "You made any progress?" April asked, Splinter chuckled as he opened his mouth to answer. 

But alarms blared in the air as the flash red lights appeared to alert the three of something. April hopped off Usagi's back, allowing him to grab the device and his weapon before everyone ran to Donnie's monitor. Everyone looked at the monitor and saw Huntress ripping off a blocked entrance to the lair, the Foot Clan was behind her but looked like they got infected to become Krang, mindless drones. "This cannot be good." Splinter said as the three looked at each other.