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This story is rated PG-13 for violence and bad language.
Raph’s mind was starting to buzz. It usually did, about 10 pm or so, when most of the activity on the street outside had died and the day’s problems were dropping to the rear of his conscious thoughts. The creative part of his brain sprawled out in the newly created space, bringing up ideas and turning them over, examining and modifying them. It was when Raph’s mind started wandering this way that he knew it was time to get to work.
He brushed some crumbs off his desk and booted up the Frankensteinian computer that Don had built him after his typewriter cacked out. While he waited, he flipped through some sheets of notes he’d taken the other day and spent a few minutes examining a couple sketches he’d talked Mike into making.
He was on deadline for his second book (“Forty Suns and Other Half-Mad Tales”), and his publisher was already talking about putting out a third, maybe with a novella in it. They were all set to ink the contract when Raph saw the crap the creative director was planning to slap on the cover of Forty Suns. Now he was furiously negotiating for the right to pick his own cover illustration for the next collection. He thought with the sales of his first book and the buzz about the one in progress, he might be able to get away with it. Of course, Mike didn’t know that’s what the sketches were for...but Raph was sure if he could win the argument with the publisher, he could convince Mikey too.
Raph set down the pages and loaded up Word almost absentmindedly, then forced himself to focus as he read through the story he’d started the other day, pausing periodically to tweak the wording in this or that paragraph. Usually that warmed him up to the story so he could continue the narrative, but this time he found himself stuck. He rolled his neck and cracked his knuckles while he thought, then grunted and opened up an older story to proofread for a bit. Flipped back and pecked tentatively at the unfinished work. More proofreading. Back to writing. He would race ahead, writing a couple pages, then realize it was crap and delete almost all of it. Ugh.
Raph paused, lightly tapping his enter key without depressing it, while he fretted for a moment. He couldn’t seem to get himself in gear the past couple of days. He’d promised them 12 new stories by the end of next month, and he had 8; if you included this one, which just didn’t seem to be popping for whatever reason. Raph growled in irritation and glanced at the clock. After midnight now, and he’d accomplished fuck-all. Damn. He needed a drink.
Raph padded into the kitchen just as the phone starting to ring. He snagged it and tucked it between his neck and shoulder so he could open the fridge.
“’Lo...Hey, Mike.” He pawed Mark’s Coors out of the way (how he could drink that shit...) and grimaced as he snagged the last lonely bottle of Sam Adams that lay on its side in the back. “Naw, I was just takin a break.” Raph took his first slug and his stomach complainingly reminded him that he hadn’t eaten since he got up, around 2. He started to root for ham and mustard. “Yeah...no...uh huh, he called me too, said he wants to train with us on Tuesday instead of Monday...who the fuck knows, with Leo.”
Raph switched the phone to his other shoulder so he could shake the mustard with his right arm. Almost all gone....again Son of a bitch, why Mark could never remember to- Raph cut himself off with a mental sigh. Getting the apartment with Mark had seemed like a good idea at the time, since it both lowered his personal rent costs and gave him a human cover so far as dealings with landlords, groceries, and other human annoyances went. But he was just NOT cut out for sharing space...before Mark, he never realized how much leeway he allowed his brothers just because they were family. Or, honestly, how much they allowed him.
Raph idly considered moving out, but as usual rejected it as an unnecessary pain in the ass. Mark was like the ghost of a roommate, as the two were rarely in the apartment simultaneously for more than an hour at a time; that was probably the only reason why they hadn’t killed each other yet. Well, that and Mark wasn’t really a bad guy, just kind of annoying to live with. Raph scrawled “mustard” on the dry-erase board they kept on the fridge, and underlined it. Twice.
“Mm...April said something about driving up to the house next weekend...yeah?...No, haven’t heard from Don in a coupla weeks, the phone’s always busy when I call...Heh, no doubt. Should just get himself DSL or somethin...” Raph fished a knife out of a drawer to scrape the last of the mustard out of the bottle. “Mark’s fine...dunno, out shopping, I hope...uh huh...Yeah, okay. Catch ya later.” Raph thumbed the off button and tossed the phone on the table.
He took the first bite of his sandwich as he headed back to the desk, and was just sitting down when he heard the rap on the window. He yanked the cord to raise the blinds out of the way and saw a skinny kid in ripped jeans and a hoodie, frantically signaling Raph to open the window. “The hell...” Raph muttered as he flipped the lock and yanked the sill up. One of Mark’s damn friends? Mark had dropped out of gang life before Raph met him, but he still had an awful lot of street scum hanging around him. Raph was gonna have to get after him again for giving out their address to these people.
“Raph, yo, something’s up.” Raph recognized the voice, and examining the face again, realized he knew the kid after all. It was Jet, one of Mark’s less objectionable tagalongs, a street kid he’d helped set up a squat. Probably here to ask some favor. The kid had run some errands for Raph before, and he liked him okay. He just had other stuff on his mind tonight than bailing some drug-addled shmuck out of whatever trouble he’d gotten into without Mark around to babysit. If Mark wanted to play junior social worker, that was his business, but Raph had his own life.
“What’s up?” he said. “I’m busy, here.”
Jet seemed not to notice Raph’s brusque tone. “Hey, there’s some shit happening out by my place...Looks like maybe a gang war starting.”
“Yeah, so?” Raph dismissed it. “This is New York, kid, there’s about a thousand pissant little gangs and they’re always fighting over something.” In Raph’s opinion “gang war” was a much over-used term, and certainly didn’t apply to a couple mobs of street toughs wailing away on each other.
“Naw, this is big,” Jet said authoritatively. “Some kind of meeting going on, I saw at least three sets of colors.”
That did give Raph pause; gangs actually taking the time to parlay usually meant a more advanced sort of trouble than normal. Could get interesting. But there was this deadline... “Eh. I’m busy.”
“Awww, come ON,” Jet urged, his voice edging on a whine. “I thought you were down with this stuff, man. A year ago, when I first met you, you’da been all over this before I even knew about it. You get a job and you’re a fucking pussy now?”
Raph bristled. “Pussy?! You little-“ Jet smirked. Well...maybe the kid had a point. He wasn’t getting much done here. And wasn’t Leo always saying he didn’t practice enough on his own time? He grinned to himself. “Awright, asshole, you win. Let me get my sais.”
Raph lightly leaped down to a lower roof, breaking the landing’s impact by neatly tumbling into a somersault. He was on his feet in less than a second, and had to wait while Jet worked his way over by a more cautious route. “Come on, slowpoke,” he taunted in a low voice. “Can’t keep up?”
“Hey...fuck...you...” Jet panted. Raph had kept up a steady, loping pace, but for the unconditioned Jet it was rough going. He had still dogged Raph’s heels the whole way; you had to admire the kid’s guts, at least. “I dunno how you do that shit, if I jumped from there I’d have broken my legs.” Jet’s hand, swiping sweat from his brow, pushed back his cap.
“Yep, probably,” Raph cheerfully agreed. Looking at Jet’s head, he suddenly realized why it had taken him a second to recognize the kid earlier. “Hey, you cut your hair.” The formerly thick mass of dirty blonde curls had been turned into a buzz cut.
“Yeah, Mark made me.” Jet pulled his cap off and crammed it into his pocket, rubbing his stubbled head with his free hand. “He said I looked like an unwashed poodle.”
Raph snickered. “You did.”
“Yeah, yeah, shaddup.” Jet peered over the edge of the rooftop at the intersection a few stories below. “Um. 34th and Arraby I think.”
“It is.”
“’Bout 10 more blocks then,” Jet sighed. “Man, why we always gotta go this way anyhow?”
Raph flashed him a vicious grin. “Now who’s a pussy?” Jet rolled his eyes. “C’mon, that’s enough rest.”
As they approached their destination, Raphael began to move more slowly and deliberately, keeping to the shadows and away from the edges of the roofs. The kid followed his example surprisingly well. Jet was probably the only person Raph had toyed with the idea of training- well besides April, but all four of them plus Splinter had worked with her so that didn’t count.
This boy reminded him of one of his brothers trailing along behind Splinter on those first awkward training runs aboveground, stubbing toes and breathing hard...No doubt sounding like a herd of elephants to Splinter, just like every noise the kid made now was a shout to Raph’s trained ear. Still, he wasn’t all that bad, considering. Light on his feet, and knew how to follow Raph’s lead, or Raph wouldn’t have come on this outing in the first place.
Maybe he could talk Casey into giving the kid some street-fighting lessons first, and see how that panned out. Shadow was a few years younger but Casey had already been teaching her some stuff, they could learn on each other. But naw, that might be a little much for an adolescent boy’s ego, getting his butt whipped by a 9-year-old girl.
While his mind wandered, he operated on automatic: noticing they’d reached their destination and selecting the best vantage point to watch the alley below. He leaned over the roof’s edge only just enough to see, which minimized his visibility to anyone who happened to glance up. Jet, on the other hand, was leaning so far over he may as well have painted a neon orange target on his head. Raph put out a hand to shove him back.
“Ow, I can’t see,” Jet whispered resentfully. Raph glared back at him and laid a finger on his lips, a silent warning. “We’re three stories up, if we can’t hear them, they can’t hear us,” Jet protested. Raph left his finger where it was, and tapped it a few times, heightening the glare’s intensity. Jet got the message.
Despite himself, Raph thought the kid might be right; he strained and still couldn’t hear what the low, murmuring voices were saying, so he scanned the alley and counted heads instead. Six guys in a huddle, talking. Six more, hanging back at a respectful distance and saying nothing. Two at the mouth of the alley, to watch the street; a pretty pointless exercise, in Raph’s judgment, since it was deserted and most of the streetlights were out. Doubly pointless, since it never occurred to the cretins to look for interlopers on the roofs or fire escapes, and nobody was going to just stroll into the alley off the street.
Raph’s eyes went back to the talkers. He could see their hands, and nobody was holding drugs, money, or anything else suspicious. Too many people for this to be a simple drug deal anyway. These fuckers were dumb, but they weren’t totally incompetent, especially when it came to their “business.” Raph had to squint to make out much, it was awfully dark...but he thought Jet was right about it being multiple gangs. Looked like...
Holy shit! The 12th Street Gang and the Pigkillers? Smalltime hustlers for the most part, but both violent as hell- the latter name wasn’t a reference to pork farming- and more importantly, bitter enemies with each other. Jet was right, something serious was going on. Two of the guys in the huddle were from a faction Raph didn’t recognize. They were wearing by far the most sensible outfits of the group, mostly black with a bit of dark red and purple, and none of that baggy shit. He didn’t see any visible tattoos. Damn he wished he could hear. But nobody was looking up...maybe he could chance it...
He mouthed stay here at Jet, and without waiting for a response, began to carefully crawl over the edge and lower himself onto the fire escape. The metal grating was cold and hard under his bare feet, and he walked softly to the railing. A five-second freeze while he made certain no one had heard or seen him move. Then he swung his legs over the rail (careful not to let his shell strike the bars, that would make a noise they’d be sure to hear), turned to face the building and Jet’s scared face peeking over the roof, and lowered himself slowly until his arms were burning and his feet touched the 2nd-story railing. He found his balance, let go of his grip on the metal above, and crouched easily on the rail.
Better. The murmur had started to resolve itself into words. “Yo, ain’t...stuff?” he heard from one 12th Streeter. He was still missing a lot of the quiet conversation, but maybe he could at least figure out what was up from the audible snippets.
One of the guys in black spoke next. “...most satisfactory thus far...” Thus far? This was no street hood. The voice was older, more cultured than those of the punks talking with him. Maybe someone from uptown, wearing semi-street clothes to blend in. But why would someone of that ilk be doing business with a pack of sleazy gangs? And what kind of business WAS it?
There was some inaudible muttering back and forth, one of the men in black moved out of the huddle, and the other swiftly shook hands with each of the remaining four. Raph caught a glint of color- passing vials?- but the man moved fast and that glimpse was all he got. He mentally writhed in frustration. More wordless noises...Raph’s feet were starting to hurt from balancing on the narrow rail, but he didn’t dare shift them. He was only a few feet above the thugs and the noise could easily give him away.
One of the Pigkillers spoke up a bit, then. “...what you came for.” He turned and called to the group standing at a distance. “Show ‘em.” The thugs shuffled aside and Raph saw what he’d somehow missed before: a kid (boy?), maybe 7 or 8 years old by the look, crouching on his heels with knees tucked up and arms wrapped around them. Both his clothes and his pale skin were smudged with dirt, and the skinny arms sticking out of his t-shirt were ringed with bruises. A cut across his forehead was black with dried blood. But what really struck Raph as horrifying about the pathetic figure was the empty, hopeless expression on the kid’s face.
Raph choked back the growl rising in his throat as the Pigkiller who’d spoken grabbed the kid by the arm and casually dragged him over the trash and asphalt to the man in black. The man toed the boy in the side and spoke, low. There was a round of soft laughter from the punks...
And Raph snapped.
His sais were already out as he tipped forward and kicked off the rail. The pommel of the one punched into the back of the Pigkiller who’d grabbed the kid, sending him sprawling on his face. Raph followed him down, his weapons neatly plunging through his back and between his ribs to puncture his lungs, then pushed off the body, yanking the sais out as he rose. He still had time for a thrusting kick to the face of the nearest guy before the others were on him.
The punks seemed oddly unshaken by the sudden, violent appearance of a giant turtle. In a second of fighting, Raph realized why: these were skilled street fighters, too experienced to stay surprised for long. Most of them were armed with knives or brass knuckles, and a couple with clubs. They tried mobbing him first, hoping to pin him down under the weight of their bodies, but Raph’s slashing, stabbing sai work soon drove them off. One punk was on the ground with a gaping belly wound, and another was dancing back with a shallow slash on his cheek. He was one of the knife-wielders, and clearly knew his way around a fight; Raph had been aiming for his eyes.
The remaining punks- he had no time to do a head count, but his mental arithmetic told him 11 were left- circled cautiously like a pack of wild dogs, feinting, darting in two or three at a time to strike, fading back without waiting to see if they hit. Raph was good, but he couldn’t be three places at once, and these guys were fast. It would’ve been fine if he could take down at least one of them on every feint, but sometimes he went for the wrong one and let them all get away.
Raph had jumped in anticipating a rage-fed, commando-style raid: kick some ass, grab the little kid, pull out with most of the gang on the ground and the others wondering what the hell was going on. But the skill of these street fighters had carried the fight past the point where Raph’s brutal, all-out style would work to his advantage. The longer they spun the encounter out, the further the situation slipped out of Raph’s control.
He was slowly cutting back their numbers, but they were scoring points too. One of them landed a lucky punch in his side, and he was soon trailing blood from half a dozen shallow cuts as well. They weren’t enough to stop him but they were damned distracting. He tried several times to rush out on them, but when he did they regrouped instantly and went for his back and sides, and he was forced to fall back with his shell to the wall. Half his strength in this situation was the ability to smash through opponents quickly and largely one at a time, but these pack tactics were taking that away from him.
By the time Raph had narrowed the field to 9 punks, he had stopped thinking about how to win, and started thinking about how to get out. A commotion deeper in the alley drew his glance; Jet had finally managed to climb down the fire escape in the more conventional manner, and was coming to Raph’s aid with a club dropped by the second goon Raph had hammered. Jet’s first blow glanced off the top of his target’s head, eliciting only a startled yelp; but as the punk turned toward him, Jet gave him a good belt in the face that sent him down.
8 left. Two of the punks turned off to deal with Jet (6 left) but it still wasn’t enough, and now there was Jet to worry about. Raph was becoming seriously alarmed. This was a job for two fighters, or even three, not one fighter and one untrained (though energetic) kid. He turned his head to check on Jet; he wasn’t going to last five minutes against two of these fuckers. It was time to get the kids and get out. Time to end this fight.
The ring around Raph suddenly fell back and he had a fraction of a moment to see a dusty station wagon that had appeared at the mouth of the alley, and the two men in black standing in front of it. One of them was taking aim- FUCK! Raph dodged and the shot pinged off the bricks a couple feet away. Not a very good shot, luckily for him. But now the other guy from the mystery gang was drawing a gun, and two of the punks were reaching into their pants...
When the guns came out, it was time to go. Raph took advantage of the momentary confusion to leapfrog over one of the punks on the weaker side of the ring surrounding him. The two punks fired then, ignoring the yells of their compatriots who were trying to move out of the way, and one shot clipped the edge of his shell. Raph pelted toward Jet, realizing belatedly that while he’d been fighting, someone had vanished the little kid that was the whole reason he’d started this in the first place. Damn it.
“Run!” Raph yelled, reaching Jet and giving him a shove toward the back of the alley. He shoved one of Jet’s opponents in the other direction, throwing him off balance and into the line of fire. The shots stopped for a precious two seconds, which was all Raph needed to grab the kid and throw him up at the 7-foot wall that marked the back of the alley. The top of the wall caught Jet in his midsection, knocking the air out of him, but even as he gasped he had the presence of mind to tip himself over fully.
Raph ran toward the wall, and jumped just as the punks realized what was happening and started to fire again. He caught the top with his hands and scrambled for a foothold. Another lucky shot blew through his outstretched arm and he slipped back, almost losing his grip, but by strength and sheer will managed to haul himself over the wall. “Shit,” he muttered to himself, probing at the wound to make sure the bullet hadn’t lodged there after all. Good. No bullet, but bleeding like a mother- must’ve nicked an artery...
“Raph!” gasped Jet, pointing, and Raph turned to see a gun-wielding hand braced on top of the wall. Another hand quickly followed, and a head began to appear. Holy damn, they were following!
“Run, kid,” Raph said, and instantly followed his own advice. Jet fell in behind as they careened out of the alley and across the blessedly empty street. Roofs were a no-go; they only had a couple seconds of breathing space and Jet climbed so slow that all the attempt would do is make them a couple of sitting ducks. Damn, damn, damn! Why hadn’t he guessed they had guns? Should have thought harder before he jumped in, but too late for that now. He had to get the two of them out of here.
As Raph led Jet up the deserted, half-dark street at a dead run, he spotted a manhole. Sweet salvation! He skidded to a halt and put out his hand to stop Jet, even as he crouched to heave the manhole cover off with well-practiced skill. Raph resisted the urge to look over his shoulder. If the punks saw him, he’d deal with it, but continuing along the surface was not an option, and this was their best chance for escape.
Raph looked to Jet, who wore an expression of mixed shock, disgust, and terror. “No way, you have got to be kidding me.”
“No time, go,” Raph snapped, and all but crammed Jet down the hole. He didn’t wait to hear the splash of Jet’s fall before he dropped down onto the ladder, dragging the cover with him. He let go of the ladder and landed in the puddle below, making a splash of his own.
Jet was standing up, trying to wring out the soaked sleeves of his hoodie. “Man, nasty.”
“Come on, if they saw me go down, they’ll follow us,” Raph said, and took off up the tunnel that roughly followed the street above. If he followed Retin up to 20th street, he could double back via Broad and get home that way... He couldn’t hear anyone following, but he plotted a duplicitous route anyway.
You could never be too careful about trouble following you home; he’d learned that lesson too often and too thoroughly to forget it now.
The TMNT and associated characters belong to Mirage. Shippai and all its original characters are mine. Please do not steal from me, or I will be forced to feed you to the lawyer I keep chained up in my basement.