Prologue: Part Six
He'd been lost in the dark mess of his room for days now. The ever-present guilt and sadness was so often too hard to bear alone, so he made friends with the potent natured gods of liquor. It was better that way. At least he wasn't making an ass of himself or subjecting himself to the constant criticism of his older brother. It wasn't too likely anyone missed him, anyway. What worth did he have, to begin with?
The pounding music filling the dark air barely reached his mind, so lost was he in the memory of nearly getting Leo killed three winters previous. Eventually that faded as the knocking on his door caught his attention. For a little bit, he let it go on, figuring it was just Leo telling him to turn the metal down. It dawned on him, however, that there was no screaming accompanying the knocking. It was enough to draw him out enough to holler, "Whaddizit!?"
Barely heard, a now familiar female voice made its way through the wood of the door and the din from his stereo, "Raph? 'S me, Mo.."
With a wince and a groan, he slowly levered himself up off the mattress which served as a bed. God, he needed sleep. He lumbered over to the door, kicking various debris out of the way as he went. Eventually he cracked the door open, and peeked out with his dark eyes at the small woman standing there. "...Mo ..??"
Apparently the music hadn't been bad enough to do anything about just yet, but it was worse with the door open. After all, there was Leo's nagging voice yelling from the living room, "Raph! Shut that crap off! You're rotting your brain and ruining your ears!"
He growled and nearly shut the door, before remembering it was Mo there, clad in a figure hugging sweater and jeans, her two-tone hair cascading down her shoulders in soft waves, not Leo.
She wiggled her fingers at him in greeting, and rolled her eyes at the blue-masked turtle's yelling. "Heya..."
"....hey.." He rubbed his eyes with a rough hand. "...sup."
It took her a moment to identify the tang of alcohol in the air. When she finally did, she furrowed her brows, but said nothing of it. "Not much...just figured I'd see what you were up to...if ya don't feel like havin' company, tho..."
Raphael winced and glanced back to the mess of his room before looking at her again, "Uhm.. S'long as you dun'mind the mess.. "
She shook her head and smirked, remembering the time he rescued her from Mike's teasing several weeks prior, "'S no problem...handled it well enough last time."
Shamefully, he dropped his gaze to the floor. "..S'worse."
Feeling worry for her new friend starting to well up within her, she tilted her head. "...should be ok, so long as neither of us lose limbs along the way..."
At that, he sighed and stepped back to allow her admittance. It was indeed worse. When she cast her flickering gaze around, she saw more stuff strewn around, with altogether too many empty bottles and beer cases peppering the place. She's careful to let no reaction show just yet, though. "...what've you been up to...?"
At that moment, he hurried to futily try hiding the empty bottles from her sight, "Uhm.. sawry.." He tried desperately to find something to reply with. The alcohol slowed his mind so much, it seemed an impossibly hard task. He bowed his head. "Uhm..."
She rubbed at the back of her neck and frowned a little at this. There was a nagging twisting between her shoulder blades, which she tried to alleviate by rolling her shoulders. It's been bugging her for a while. But there were more important matters at hand, and she softly bit at her lower lip, "...when was the last time you been outside....?"
His gaze shot up to her, and he caught her expression. Lying was far out of the question. He knew it was wrong, and she was too valuable to him. Instead, he bowed his head again, sad, ashamed, and trying to hide it. "...s'not that b- ...a..a few days ago.."
Her soft hand reached out to touch his shoulder comfortingly, her voice soft, barely heard over the vocals of the music, "Mebbe we should get some air, then...might help ya out...."
Still too ashamed to raise his gaze to hers, he simply shook his head, "Naw..s'prolly better if I don't..."
At a loss, she shrugged, "Ok..."
Mo was trying to talk to him, and he could barely hear her over the screaming lyrics. He winced and sat on the edge of his mattress to change the music to something better. Nine Inch Nails, In a Warm Place. Perfect.
"Good song," she sank down by him, reaching across her body to try massaging the pain out of her shoulders. If she hurt herself somehow, shouldn't the pain be diminishing instead of getting worse? Her healing factor was supposed to take care of that.
Raph smiled a little, very sadly, the honey-brown of his masked eyes far away, "...s'one of my favorite songs.. No words.. no nothin' ..just.. just music."
Mo furrowed her brows at his sadness, and unconsciously pursed her lips at something else as she spoke, "It speaks to a different part of the soul...yeah..."
At the roughness her usually silken voice took, he lifted his head to look at her, "Y'all right?"
With a blink, she forced a smile for him, "Oh...yeah. Back's a lil' sore, is all.."
He found himself frowning, "...what happened??"
"Nothin'...that's the screwed up part..."
The gerbils in his head slowly began to come out of their drunken haze as they climbed back onto their wheels and he frowned in thought. "...Maybe you slept wrong... screwed it up.. Where's it hurt?"
Man, it was really starting to hurt in a bad way. What was wrong with her? With a frown, she stretched her back, hoping it was just a knot or something, "Could be...right between the shoulder blades..."
His hand began to make its way towards her back before he paused, remembering manners, "...uh.. can.. can I see?"
She nodded her affirmative, "Um...sure..." A small smile made its way over her face before it was replaced with a slight wince. "Have a ball..."
He carefully laid his hand at her shoulder blades and felt along them for knots like the ones he's gotten out of Casey's back, and his brothers limbs. Humans had much more exposed flesh to them than turtles. There was a certain morbid fascination about what lay under the skin, even if he didn't like thinking about it much. He felt her begin to relax a little under his touch, and even caught the small smile, before she winced.
His thumbs encountered two knots on either side of her spine. It was funny, though. They felt more like bone than muscle, and they almost seemed to move. "What'd you do to yerself.. .....you really fucked yer back up, babe.." Wait, what did he call her? "Er...." Crap. "You..uh..oughta get a new bed..er..somethin'." Crapcrapcrap!
She blinked, then winced more, "I...guess...damn..."
Biting his lip, he forced his hazy eyes to focus, unknowingly going a little cross eyed, His wide thumbs slid along her back, exploring and massaging. It really didn't feel like what happened when Casey needed work. Human bodies were just so strange and confusing. Suddenly, the two knots surged against his thumbs. There was a gasp before he jerked his hands back, suddenly afraid he'd hurt her. "Shit! ..Sorry! ...is that supposed to move?"
Her body instinctively curled a little around itself, and she couldn't conceal her shudders. "Doubt it...goddamn..." She grit her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut. This was completely unlike anything she'd ever felt before, so intensely painful, she really didn't want to deal with it.
Suddenly intensely focused, he sat back a moment to watch her, his beak wrinkled with confusion. What the hell was wrong with her? Finally his brain kicked back into gear and he very carefully reached out to wrap an arm around her shoulders, though put no weight on her, afraid to hurt her more. "M..mebbee you should lay down? ...uhm.." Carefully, he watched her. Splinter might be needed for this.
For barely a moment, she leant into her friend, before tearing away from him. Her back arched, and a mask of agony fell over her face as the sweater plastered itself to her chest, just before the back ripped to shreds like the flesh beneath. Acidic blood splattered the room, her rigid body, and a stunned Raphael as a set of massive, leathery wings violently thrust from her back. Somehow her eerie silence was worse than any scream. For an eternal moment, she arched rigidly there, before suddenly falling limply to her side, and shuddering in her unconsciousness.
He was frozen. He barely breathed. All he could do was stare open-mouthed. He couldn't feel anything in his shock, not the hard concrete beneath his feet, not the sting of her blood slowly eating into his skin.
Eventually, though, there was a sharp intake of breath before he reached a shaking hand out, and went to his knees beside her. He gathered her limp body into his arms and held her close, whispering desperately to her as he wiped at the blood on her face, "..Mo...Oh god... oh jesus.. Mo.. wake up..." An old sweatshirt was grabbed to try wiping the blood from her face better, as she only responded with a very weak groan, and turning of her head.
Silently, he told himself not to panic. It would do neither of them any good. It didn't work worth a damn. "LEO!!!!"
Leo burst in barely a second later, ready to draw his katanas at the fear in his brother's voice. Instead he only saw the horrible blood-splatter covering the mess of Raph's room, the two huge wings now extending from Mo's back, and his brother holding the shivering girl's upper body, absolutely terrified.
For a fraction of a second he just stared before he shook the disbelief off. He yelled for Don to bring water and washcloths, and Mike to start a warm shower to put her under to wash the blood off. He then knelt by the two to straighten out her legs and check her over for other injury himself. "That's it Raph, support her upper body. We have no idea what condition those..wings are in.. ...just get as much blood as you can off her.. I'll call Di.. Don't move. When Donnie gets here- ...Don'll know what to do. Just support her."
Raph was too frozen to do anything else. So he just held her, and leaned down to nuzzle her softly. He found himself cursing the alcohol in his bloodstream, slowing his mind even more. She was so light to him, nothing to hold. His mind remembered something Don had said about birds having hollow bones so they could fly. Maybe that was the case. He hoped it was.
Leo's voice was nothing but painful warbling to Mo's ears; she couldn't understand a thing he said but the nuzzling helped soothe her shocked body a little. With a soft groan, she leaned a very little into Raph, reaching a badly shaking hand up to rest against her eyes. There was little else but weakness and pain in her world. She could feel him close to her ear, his rumbling voice soothing, but his words garbled. Still, she relaxed a little more into him, though still shaking in reaction to the huge change.
Donatello pushed into the room at that moment. Outside of looking a little pale, he was perfectly calm, as he rushed over and dipped the cloth into the water. When he began to properly wash the crimson streaks from her face, he recoiled with a gasp. "Jesus...this stuff's acidic! ... Raph you're covered in it.. Here.. I'll carry her, you wash yourself off."
Reluctantly, he handed his suddenly fragile friend over to his brother. Don hissed as he was burned, but easily lifted her and rushed for the showers.
Raph was left behind to hastily grab the cloth and drop it into the warm, soothing water. His brother was right, it did sting, and he hissed softly through his teeth himself as he ran the cloth over his arms and face. The blood left raw spots in his scarred, rough skin from sitting there for so long.
Don looked down at the girl in his arms at her wince and sudden, shuddering breath. "Shh...S'gonna be alright. Di's on her way." ..he hoped. "We just gotta get this blood off you.. I need to see your back.. I'm gonna put you under the shower, ok? It's not gonna be too warm." He wasn't too sure she understood him, but took the light furrowing of her brows and muffled moan as a good sign.
A moment later, warm water cascaded over the two of them. Don was slicing the remnants of her sweater from her torso with a throwing knife. When the mangled fabric was free of her, he tossed it aside and slid the blade under her bra to free her from its constraints. Once that was taken care of, he slid a towel over her chest to spare her dignity, and held it there as he cleaned her.
He noticed neither the bared breasts under the inch of fabric he held up, nor the water raining down upon him as well, so intent upon his task he was. He examined her back for further injury, as he cleaned with the hand not supporting her. As far as he could tell there was nothing else, save the blood sluggishly oozing from the wounds around the new wings.
Mo was entirely too exhausted to do more than jerk slightly at the sudden water drenching her and Donnie slicing her clothing off. Otherwise, she simply lay there against him as he worked, her pitch hair falling into her face in wet tangles.
At that moment, Diana appeared at the bathroom doorway, accompanied by Leo. She just stared briefly, before she shook the shock of the new limbs off and knelt by Don and Mo, paying no mind to the water drenching the dark clothing and leather trench she wore, fresh from work. She took her friend's vitals with a practiced hand, "...how long ago did this happen...?"
Jet eyes narrowed as Don examined the demon-esque wings protruding from his friend's pale back. "About 15 minutes ago.. ..She doesn't seem to be injured from it other than a bit of blood loss.. maybe a pint or so.."
Di nodded and reached up to smooth her friend's dripping crimson streaked black hair back, "It must be her mutation...she told me it was unstable, but..." She bit her lip and shook her head, "You guys did pretty much all anyone could...she needs rest...and I believe should be watched..." A soft breath left her chest, "...was anyone else hurt...?"
Don slowly nodded, "..ok ...do you think we should try transporting her back to your apartment? Or should we make her up a bed down here.. ...hurt?" He paused with confusion, before he shook his head. "No..I don't believe so. ..Well.. Raph was a little burned. Her blood appears to be..acidic in nature."
Leo crossed his arms from where he watched the trio knelt below the water. He knew he had no real authority over Mo, but... "I don't think she should be taken anywhere, Donnie. ...Not like that. I can put some fresh sheets on my bed and she can sleep there until she's well enough to travel."
Di nodded in agreement with Leo, "Hai..." She glanced up at Raph with an apologetic smile, before returning her gaze to Don, "If you don't mind...I don't think she'd do so well in the cold."
Raph couldn't acknowledge her smile. He could only stand and watch his friend as he held Mikey's hand to his chest and kneaded it like a worry-ball. Mike stood at his distraught brother's side, and watched helplessly with a mix of worry and awe.
"I will get a spare set of her clothing..." She paused. "Modified, apparently."
"Good idea." Leo was calm, all business, "Donnie, you dry her off and when you're ready, we'll move her to my room. I should be able to get fresh linens on the bed by then, and we can go to work bandaging those shoulders."
The dripping turtle nodded and reached up to turn the water off, his skin dewy with it, his bandana sodden. He then reached for a nearby towel, "Ok. I can get some medicine made.."
With a slight nod, she squeezed Don's shoulder gently before she stood. The water deepened the red of her braided back hair, slid in droplets off the leather of her jacket, soaked the fabric of her pants and made her face shimmer in the dim light. "I'll return shortly..." She paused briefly by Raph and Mike, gently squeezing their free hands and reassured in a soft voice, "She'll be ok...don't worry..." Quickly, she vanished into the night.
Leo nodded to her, then spoke as soon as she was gone, "Mike, go to the kitchen and get the herbs ready for a poultice. ..Don-" His eyes fell upon his brother drying Mo's skin, before they slid to Raph, "...You've been drinking. .......make yourself useful and go drop the rice in the rice cooker. She's going to need to eat when she comes to."
Don simply shook his head to himself as he worked. Mike was already gone, and Raph stumbled after, unable to answer any of Leo's questions just yet. He was still stunned into silence.