Finally things heat up!

Chapter 8: TOO FAR GONE

Leonardo sat atop the streetlight, watching Michelangelo stride out of the store, his wide eyes peering around. He knew Michelangelo had seen him and his brothers on the roof just a moment ago, but what did Michelangelo think he saw? To him, had it been the eyes of Purple Dragons, coming to pull him back in? He looked fearful. Leonardo had to intervene before he returned to the Dragons tonight, and the best time to do it was now. Raphael and Donatello were nearby, ready to come in if things turned nasty, but they had agreed they couldn't overwhelm Michelangelo with seeing his three brothers all at once. Leonardo, who had been on the best terms with Mikey those nine years ago, would talk to him.

Michelangelo stopped, his breathing ragged. He could hear the light patter of running feet. It stopped just as soon as it had started. There was at least one person nearby who didn't want to be seen, and it felt as if a million invisible eyes were upon him. He chose to slip into the deepest of the shadows and disappear, but just the opposite of that happened.

"Hello, Mikey."

Hun was furious. He had woken up at midnight, unable to sleep with his stressed and thought-filled mind. Fists clenching the metal fencing of the second floor overlook in the factory, he saw that the Freak was nowhere to be seen. The rebel had snuck out!

"I knew I should have taken action before this happened!" Hun scolded himself in the nearly empty lair. "He knows too much!"

Fists clenching and loosening, anxious to deplete his anger, he stepped away.

Michelangelo's hands went immediately to the belt under his trenchcoat, pulling out his two nunchaku. "Who's there?" The weapons spun in a whir of red and yellow.

His third time turning around he finally saw the figure before him. Silvery blue eyes stared at him, their owner halfway between the shadow and the feeble illumination of the distant street light. As natural and at home in these shadows as if he was painted there. Yet in the darkness, Michelangelo saw the green of his skin. He drew back and the person stepped forward.

A blue mask, the bottom of it creased as the mutant's face broke into a grin. He eyes still glowed with caution, looking to the spinning nunchaku with an odd expression. "You still have them?"

Michelangelo knew who this was, but he could hardly believe it. It was his brother. After a moment, the name reached him - Leonardo. Yet he had no idea how to react - joy, pain, fear, excitement, nostalgia for days too far gone to matter? "Leo? Is that you?"

"Yes. Mikey, it's so good to see you again. We missed you so much." A hand shot out and instantaneously caught the end of a furiously spinning nunchaku, halting it mid-spin. Leonardo looked straight into Michelangelo's shadowed eyes. He shifted a little, as if about to hug him, but stopped when Michelangelo flinched. Drawing back, Leonardo said,"Mikey...I know this is hard. It may overwhelm you. But can you tell me what has happened in the last nine years to you? I want to know."

Michelangelo was suddenly filled with an anger he couldn't explain. He pulled the end of the nunchaku out of the turtle's hand and flung it into motion again. "Do you really care? Does anyone ever care?"

"What do you mean?"

"Nine years, Leonardo! I haven't seen you for nine years...Couldn't you find me?" Michelangelo didn't know why he was shouting. He didn't even know what he was saying. Something deep he couldn't quite explain was holding him back from leaping at his brother to pull him into a hug. "...Did you give up on me? Was I dead to you? In the Purple Dragons, I've never lived, so maybe I am dead!" The ends of his trenchcoat swirled around in the wind like black tendrils.

Leonardo stepped forward. "No. Mikey, we never stopped looking for you." He remembered the simple words Splinter had told him so soon after Michelangelo had disappeared. "New York City is a very big place."

"Where are the other two? Where is Splinter?"

"Do you want to see them?" Leonardo had to force himself to blink, his eyes unable to leave his brother. Nine long years.

Michelangelo paused, and he felt one of his feet slowly slip back, as if he might make to run any second now. He couldn't take the pain of this, the uncertain emotions. Was this his family anymore? They were just mutants. He couldn't go back. Yet, on the other hand, he felt a question he had been aching to hear answered for a long time rise up within him.

"How and why was I separated from you?"

The silvery eyes grew weary and sad, finally falling to the ground. "You ran away."

Emotion was slow to come. Then it hit him like a gun and he felt pain and confusion seize him. He was vaguely aware that his nunchaku had slowed to a stop. But the weapon he'd trusted his whole life would be useless to defend him against this kind of pain. "That can't be true! It can't, dude! I would never - You left me!"

"Do you remember anything, Michelangelo?"

There was a shift and suddenly Michelangelo was nine years in the past, seeing the blurs of a worn-out memory. Flashes of a red mask, angry green eyes, a mouth opening wide in incoherent shouts...one of the few things he remembered from before he'd been separated from his one-time family. His red-masked brother, whose name he had forgotten some time ago, had been insanely angry. For the longest time he had thought it been a memory of some of his last days with his family, wondering what he had done that had made his brother so furiously shout at him. In his mind, at the end, they had hated him. He'd long thought he might have been abandoned.

But now the confusion cleared. He realized, partly from Leonardo's insistence that he had run away, that this memory had been blown out of proportion by his six-year-old mind. It had merely been a moment's fleeting anger mistaken for hatred. As he looked back into Leonardo's eyes, he saw in his mind a memory of looking at these same eyes so long ago through the holes in a manhole cover. As he'd stomped over them and ran away into the city.

Michelangelo's hands flew to his head. It was everything he could do to not drop to his knees. He had lied to himself for nine years, his mind constructing a different story to avoid the guilt of running away. The pain he'd caused to himself and his family. He wanted to scream.

Suddenly, there was a hand on his shoulder. "It's in the past, Mikey. You never stopped being my brother."

Michelangelo took a deep, wheezing breath and drew away. In his pocket, his phone began to buzz but he ignored it. "It's only a memory. That does not mean anything."

"Mikey, come home, please. You can have your life back!"

There was a wall between them, nine years thick. Vague memories couldn't retie severed connections. "I have a life! I belong to the Purple Dragons! I am the Freak."

"What are you saying?"

This was too much. Michelangelo repeated to himself that he could never go back. He couldn't let himself feel the emotions, the memories. The pain and the distance. Being a Purple Dragon was nearly all he remembered. And soon enough Hun would hunt him down and bring him back to the hideout and he didn't want his brothers hurt.

"I'm saying...you're not my brother."

He turned in the blindness of watering eyes to see two forms land in front of him, practically falling in from out of nowhere.

The new form, a short turtle with a red mask, blocked his path. "Don't go! Give this a chance. The Michelangelo I know would never say any of this!

The tall turtle in purple - Donatello - stepped forward. "This can't be you, Michelangelo. The Purple Dragons, they've - they've brainwashed you!" He nervously reached out to his brother.

Michelangelo batted the hand away. "Maybe they haven't. Who I am as a six-year-old does not make me who I am for the rest of my life."

Silence.

Leonardo stepped forward. "No, Michelangelo, it is your surroundings that do. Look at what the Purple Dragons have made you into."

"Made me into?" Michelangelo's world turned red and he ran at his brother. "I'm no more of a monster than you!"

His fists flew in a blur, one after another, any mercy he'd once had pounded out of him in his years in the gang. But Leonardo dodged them all swiftly, not making a single move to strike at his brother.

Suddenly, Michelangelo was restrained, pulled back. He fought against his two brothers holding him around the shoulders.

"Don't make us hurt you," said the one in red. With the tone of his voice and how easily Leonardo had dodged his strikes, Michelangelo realized these three surpassed him in skill. They'd had fifteen years of training with an expert ninja.

In his struggle to break free, the hood slid off of Michelangelo's head. Leonardo standing before him saw in full detail the freckles and baby blue eyes he remembered belonging to an entirely different person. There was a couple faded scars on his face, one stretching out from beneath his thick red scarf. But there were new ones as one, dried blood running down next to his right eye, a large bruise on top of the head.

Leonardo didn't dare touch his brother, as if in fear that he would break. His brother glared at him as he gaped. "Michelangelo, you didn't have these injuries last time you left the hideout...What have they been doing to you?" He looked broken to see his brother hurt.

Michelangelo made to launch at Leonardo again, but the other two kept him in place. Breathing hard, he resorted to talking. "Hun started doing this to me a few days ago during training - going harder than I can take. He's trying to injure me enough to keep me confined in the hideout but I haven't let him do it yet. I had a hunch he was trying to keep me away from something. I even had a feeling it could be you three."

He felt the turtle in red let up on his hold, but Donatello remained tight and firm. Michelangelo continued.

"I d-don't know what I want. I can't go back to the life I had before and I only know the Dragons. Nine years I waited for you guys to find me, to save me. But as time went on, you know, I became less of Mikey and more of the Freak. I guess I finally gave up on you guys."

The turtle in red completely dropped the arm he was restraining. Michelangelo looked up to him. "Thanks." The turtle in red gave him an uneasy smile. Michelangelo wished he could remember his name, but was scared of him at the same time. In his memory, the turtle in the red mask had yelled at him. A memory that he'd mistaken for hatred and abandonment, keeping him up at night for the last few years as his real memories had faded, with a feeling that he'd never really belonged anywhere.

Donatello kept his hold on Michelangelo. Leonardo said,"Donnie, you can let go. Michelangelo won't hurt us again. It was just the shock and confusion."

Donatello let go, almost robotically. He looked down at Michelangelo, and the orange-masked turtle saw a different type of emotion in his eyes than the others had. Non-recognition and guilt…the emotions Michelangelo felt about the turtle in red, the brother he had the least remembrance of.

Michelangelo didn't stand, remaining on his knees in a defeated slump on the ground, his trench coat radiating from him in a pool of black, like a dark ocean that he couldn't reach across to find his old self. The silence was shattered by the loud vibration of his cell phone in his pocket. He didn't answer.

"I have to go back, soon," Michelangelo said. "Hun will be angry that I left."

Leonardo dropped down to a crouch and looked his younger brother in his eyes, and Michelangelo had a flash of a memory of this very brother pleading with him nine years ago, begging him not to go. Michelangelo's memories of his own past were becoming clearer, the emotional block of abandonment fading away. He realized that his young mind had made up that he'd been abandoned years ago, once he'd accepted that he'd likely never be able to go back to his former family. It was better to forget them to wallow in the pain.

"Do you want to go back to them?" Leonardo said. "Tell us the truth."

Michelangelo hesitated, mouth hanging open in thought.

Donatello spoke up, shushing whatever his brother was about to say. "I hear footsteps."

The rest of the turtles tuned in. The sound was distant but growing fast, the sound of running. There was muffled voices switching between Chinese and English. The three other turtles were lost in the language they didn't know, but Michelangelo spoke enough Chinese from his years in Chinatown's slums that he understood the gist of the conversation.

Hun had tracked his cell phone. They were about to find him. Just as this thought occurred to Michelangelo, his cell phone began to buzz once more. They were letting him know they were coming and that he would be dragged back to the hideout if necessary, on Hun's orders. The thing the Purple Dragon leader had feared most had happened. Michelangelo couldn't run, they'd see him now for sure.

"They are going to find me," Michelangelo said, bursting to his feet. "You have to go. Find me again some other time."

Leonardo nodded, quickly shaking his brother's hand. Donatello leapt onto the fire escape in the alley with barely a sound and together they scrambled onto the roof. The turtle in red, though, remained on the ground, standing right in front of his brother.

"Raphael!" hissed Leonardo. Michelangelo caught the name, mulling it over in his head. It had a very vague familiarity.

Raphael spoke to Michelangelo. "You can come with us. We can hide you from them."

"Not now," Michelangelo said, nerves on edge. The Dragons could come in any second now.

"I'm sorry that I was mean to you, Mikey. I never meant for you to run away. I can't believe it's my fault you've stayed away from us - "

Michelangelo smiled reassuringly. "There are many reasons that I couldn't and can't go home, but the fact that you hurt my feelings nine years ago is not one of them."

Raphael looked like he wanted to say more, or maybe grab Michelangelo and pull him back to his old home as forcefully as how the Purple Dragons were going to drag him back to the hideout. But before he could, Leonardo climbed back down and tugged Raphael away. "We've got to go!"

Raphael angrily broke free of Leonardo's grasp and leapt onto the fire escape, scrambling up to the roof. Leonardo gave his orange-masked brother one last somber look and leapt upwards, following Raphael.

Michelangelo watched them go with sad, watering eyes. As they disappeared over the roof, he thought they'd escaped unseen by anyone but himself, but then he turned to see Fong from the Purple Dragons on the edge of the alleyway, mouth agape as his loping run stumbled, in shock, to a stop. He'd seen Leonardo climb onto the roof in the shadowy night, a glimpse of the unmistakable green skin and shell of the gang's enemies, the blowing of the long ends of his blue mask in the light wind. It had to have been a quick glimpse, but it was enough.

Three other Purple Dragons caught up to Fong. Michelangelo was tense in fear as Fong glared at him. Fong didn't even need to explain what had happened to the others. The tension that rose like a scream in the claustrophobic alleyway was enough to condemn Michelangelo. "Master Hun will not be happy with you." They started towards him.

Michelangelo backed up. He was the best fighter in the gang besides Hun, but it was easy to tell that Hun had sent some of the other top members to catch him. All of these four were amongst the other best fighters and they had all taught Michelangelo what he know. They knew what to expect from him, they knew his style. He couldn't defeat them all, especially with his aching muscles from Hun's abuse lately.

The night seemed to get darker as Fong leapt towards him. Michelangelo tried to fight him off and didn't even see another gangster's fist coming for his face. The impact was enough to send him staggering blindly, and Fong - pulling the turtle's arms behind his back - slammed him against the wall, holding him there.

Michelangelo panted, sweating under his heavy black cloak. His head was pounding louder than his heart, and he could already feel the beginnings of a black eye on his left.

"Consorting with the enemy, are you?" shouted Wan, the largest of the group, leaning in near his face. Michelangelo struggled to break free from Fong's grip. He got one hand free and grabbed Wan's throat, gritting his teeth in grim pleasure as this man who'd always hated him gasped for breath. Finally, Wan snapped away from his grip.

Fong struck Michelangelo's legs and sent him falling to his knees. "Whose side are you on, Freak?" Wan kicked him and punched him. Blood ran into his eyes from a strike on his head.

"Hun is going to have something to say to you. Sneaking out and talking to the turtles! You never were too smart!" Wan and Fong each grabbed one of his wrists, pulling him out of the alley, tearing his trenchcoat as it scraped across the ground. The two other Purple Dragons there cackled with glee.

Michelangelo chuckled. "At least I'm smarter than you four! Don't you wonder if there's a connection between three other mutant turtles and me? Or is that just a wild coincidence?"

Fong's grip on his wrist grew stronger, letting Michelangelo lose the feeling in his hand. "Don't act like you know anything! Freak, we know more about you than you do!"

They continued dragging Michelangelo down the midnight streets, with him struggling against them all the while. The Chinatown residents knew to ignore the shouts and cries that rose in the darkness, used to hearing the violence of the Purple Dragons. The group even passed two cops on the other side of the street, but the cops ignored them with the conviction and blindness that the Purple Dragons paid them for.

Finally, they reached the hideout. They forced Michelangelo through the door and shoved him up the stairs, letting him fall before Hun. He looked furious and Michelangelo remained on his knees, in humble subservience. His whole body ached, from injuries a few days old to brand new ones.

Hun rose from his chair, as silent as death.

Raphael glared at the Purple Dragon's' hideout from across the street, so filled with anger that he was shaking. Donatello sat next to him in somber, sad silence.

Leonardo wasn't with them, but instead was sitting on the sill of a boarded-up window on the hideout, listening to the Purple Dragons shove Michelangelo before Hun.

Across the street, Raphael folded his arms. "Why couldn't we save Michelangelo?" After leaving him in the alley, the turtles had followed him and the Dragons back to the hideout, shocked at the cruelty with which they treated their brother.

Donatello shook his head, his eyes glazed over in despair. "Did you see those gangsters, Raph? Those four were all the toughest in the Dragons that we've fought. No way we could have taken them."

Leaning against the windowsill, Leonardo pulled out his phone and called Donatello's. He whispered,"The PD need better security," and held the phone near the window so that his brothers could hear the talking inside.

So far, nothing important was being spoken. It was merely the four gangsters explaining what Michelangelo had done to Hun. Raphael growled. "I say we could have stopped them from dragging Mikey back here! We're weak for letting them hurt our brother right in front of our eyes!"

Leonardo heard Raphael through the phone and whispered his reply. "They could have done worse, Raph. We can't fight all four of those guys and they had Mikey. If we barged in, they could have hurt him more or threatened to kill him. I doubt the Purple Dragons will find much value in him anymore since he betrayed them."

Raphael sighed in submission. Donatello listened closely to the Purple Dragons' muffled voices through the phone.

Hun stepped in front of Michelangelo. He didn't kick him or even shout, but Michelangelo shuddered knowing that if and when Hun sought to punish him, it would be his own death if he fought back. By sneaking out and speaking with his brothers - the gang's enemies - there was no way they could trust him anymore, even if Michelangelo wanted to stay with them. And he wasn't sure if he did.

Hun sighed. "I suppose it was inevitable that you would happen upon the turtles someday. It almost happened a few days ago and so I've kept you in here since then."

Michelangelo balled his fists. The past few days Hun had trained him to his breaking point, going harder than he could take and injuring him. Hun was trying to hurt him enough to keep him confined to the hideout until he healed, a temporary way to keep him away from the turtles.

Hun told the other Dragons to leave. Then, alone with Michelangelo, he said,"There is so much you don't remember, and so much you never knew. Well, ever since your early days in our family and since the other turtles revealed themselves six months ago, I've wondered about you. I knew there must be a fascinating story behind how you came to be, a story that connected you to the other mutants, the ones that my gang members fear running into."

"They're my brothers," Michelangelo said, speaking for the first time.

"I know. I have some friends that have told me much about you and your mutant brothers. And you must be dying to know what I do, and I'd kill to hear about what the turtles told you tonight. So I say, it's time we get a few things straight."

Hun may not be shouting, but Michelangelo had known him long enough to know that Hun was never predictable and always to be feared.