#he was always meant to use them so having a heavy odachi instead would of course be a bit of a learning curve for him

[remmushound]

Curse of the Clan part 55! @selfindulgenz

Content warning!! Violence, fighting, injury, Blood

Raphael’s team led the charge with no thought of the danger they could be putting themselves in. Cassandra was at his side, giving a confident shout as she held her naginata high in a declaration of war against the one currently destroying her city. Sunita, Draxum, April, and Raphael all soon joined her in the battle cry, their voices joining together in a powerful roar of will.

Krang only laughed, stopping his charge in favor of arming the weapons that lined his body suit and aiming them at the group. “Run run, as fast as you can! Can’t wait to rip you apart again!”

“Ignore him.” Raphael growled to his team. “We’re stronger than him as long as we stick together!”

Krang fired his weapons, purposely missing the group while getting just close enough to make them duck and cover. His laugh was one that could not be easily forgotten, like the monster under the bed crawling out to say hello to the child it had been tormenting.

“Don’t want to do it too soon though. You’re so much fun to play with!”

“Draxum, make us a way up the mouth.” Raphael ordered and Draxum obeyed.

Draxum’s vines shot up from the earth, extending out with a powerful reach to snare around Krang’s mouth and arms. The oni wasn’t amused by this display, giving a frustrated growl as his weapons shifted and rearmed to aim instead at the bridging vines. They didn't have very long to cross the vine bridge before the weapons were online and tore through the mystic plants just as fast as Draxum could replace them, leading to a stalemate of will. The faun had to stay on the ground to achieve such a feat, making way for the rest of the team to try and cross. Each slice and strike and gash to the vines shot back to Draxum, and he felt it as if the bullets and blades were ripping through his own body. There was no damage to his physical form, but the pain was still there, overwhelming. His hooves dug deeper into the stone, nostrils flaring under the pressuring strain, muscles tense and defined. He had to hold it together, he had to replace the vines. There were four lives depending on it, half of them very dear to him. He had to hang on with everything he had.

Raphael’s mind was split thin. Not only was he focused on not getting hit, but making sure the girls didn't get hit either. Sunita had no experience in things like this, and though April and Cassandra could easily hold their own, Raphael still couldn’t help but worry about them more so then himself. He was so focused on ensuring a safe path for them that he didn't notice his own path had ended until he was walking on air, like something out of an old cartoon, and promptly plummeted.

“Raphie!”

Cassandra wanted to jump after him but Sunita was faster. The polymorph moved like pure, conscious fluid, gripping Raphael and surrounding him like a protective geliaton mould. When they hit the ground, they bounced, and Sunita took the opportunity of the new height to stretch out and snare her arms around a traffic light while the rest of her still supported Raphael’s weight. To the snapper, it was like being on a bungee cord that slowly lost its momentum until he was dangling above the intersection like a fly in a spider web. But he was alive, and in one piece.

April knew the charge attempt wouldn’t follow through, and looking ahead showed nothing but promised destruction. The better senses in her told her to fall back, and the vines seemed to sense her apprehension as they slowly wrapped around her middle to lift and guide her to safety back beside Baron Draxum.

Cassandra didn't stop. She wouldn’t stop for anything. Her body wouldn’t let her. All around her were sounds like engines backfiring, time and time and time again in repeat, deafening her senses and leaving nothing behind except what was automatic. What came natural, and what came natural was fighting. Fighting, charging. Her naginata was flaming gold in her hand like a tiny sun that swallowed her in an embrace that encouraged the bravery deep inside of her. She hardly noticed that her feet were treading nothing but air, and she hardly noticed the flash of silver finding hold deep in her side, whisking through her belly and chest. She hardly noticed the pain, the blood, the shredded flesh. She hardly noticed how she was flying and how Krang was getting smaller. She hardly noticed anything until she hit the ground.

~~~

Krang was distracted and that bought Leonardo’s team enough time to strategize, and enough time for Donatello to map out the blind spots of the alien mech. It’s okay, Donatello kept telling himself. He would be okay as long as he didn't see that monster that still tormented his every waking thought.

“Step where I step.” Donatello told the group behind him.

The blind spot was small, but it would be enough for them to get onto the mech undetected. When Donatello moved, the chain behind him moved, and when he stopped, they stopped. Like an army of marching ants, they made their way across the parapet of the building toward the mech. That’s all Donatello could think of it as; the Mech. If he thought of it as the one who was controlling it, he was afraid of what might happen. The mech wasn’t Krang and Krang wasn’t the mech and Donatello didn't dare think of them as one unit. A breath to sooth the burning inside of him, and Donatello jumped.

Clearing the space between building and mech was easy. His brothers and fathers soon followed suit until they were all on the shoulder of the mech.

“Are you sure we’re out of sight?” Leonardo whispered to his twin.

Donatello gave a weak nod that steadily grew stronger and more confident. Leonardo trusted fully in his brother, giving a motion to the younger one to start their plan. Michelangelo gave a smirk as he wrapped his chain around a sheet of peeling metal, securing it tightly and giving it a sharp tug to ensure it was steady. He gave a thumbs up and smiled as confirmation for his older brother.

Donatello took Michelangelo’s hand, and Splinter took Donatello’s, and Leonardo took Splinter’s. They formed a chain that cascaded down the mech’s shoulder and chest, just low enough for Leonardo to be level with the belly latch that Sunita had reported to them. In Leonardo’s chest grew a familiar, tight ball that seemed to reach up with its yarn to strangle the life out of him. Doubt stung his eyes and made them water, each breath like it was taken through a heavy cloth. He had one job; make a rift and get them inside. That was all he had to do. Why, then, was the odachi failing to do that simple job?! Leonardo was slashing and waving it around like he always did to make a rift before, but no rift took form.

No. No— no no no, it had to work! He had gotten past the anxiety, the panic, the worry that had caused him so much trouble to begin with! This should have been easy, as simple to him as cooking was to Michelangelo and fighting was to Raphael and tech-geek stuff was to Donatello. This was mystic stuff, stuff that Leonardo was supposed to be good at! So why wasn’t it—

Something happened. Leonardo felt the familiar pull of a rift but he knew he hadn’t created one. There was no tear in time, blue or otherwise. No distortion, no wavering, no disruption. The air was still solid and in one piece! But still there was something pulling at him with such mystic pressure that, if he were to resist, he was almost certain it could rip him apart. The thought of that fate in his mind was all it took for Leonardo to close his eyes and let the magnetic effects swallow him into a tunnel of warping, space and time bending all around him like looking at an image through a glass. Once he had relented and let the force take him, all he could do was hold onto his father for dear life and hope.

The next thing Leonardo knew was that the group above him was now on top of him, a crushing weight of bodies against his shell.

“Oww…”

“WOW!” Michelangelo was on top of the stack, beaming as he looked around. This was definitely where they had meant to go, and the inside of the mech was even more impressive than the outside. Light seemed to be coming from nowhere, a gentle green glow filling the entirety of the mech. Up and up and up Michelangelo looked, but he couldn’t see the top of the mech at all! “I didn't even see you make the rift! Good job Leo.”

“Can’t breath.” Leonardo felt like a flattened pancake.

“I didn't either.” Donatello hurmed, his eyes darting around in an anxious search. There was no sight of that horrible creature, and the voice hadn’t invaded his mind. That was good right? That meant Krang didn't know they were there, right? “That’s so weird.”

“You’re crushing my old bones…” Splinter groaned.

“Oh! Sorry.” Michrlangelo hopped off the stack, then Donatello, so Splinter and Leonardo were free to breath once more.

“Agh…” Splinter pressed his hands into the small of his back to stretch. “My body don’t bend that way anymore.”

Splinter’s nose twitched. He reached a hand to touch the back of his nape, where he found his hairs sticking up on end. His tail lashed, and something in the pit of his stomach warned of danger; the warning was enough to heighten every sense he had to focus on something jarring, just out of sight. Powerful muscles sliding across metal with a shhhk shhhk shhhk. The crack of jaws resetting themselves. The steady, whistling hiss of a predator to all of rat kind. A snake.

#Cassandra??? #a predator emerges #who could’ve made that rift? #and two plans #tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #rottmnt #tmnt au