CH:3 First Impressions

After we shared our names I could tell that their curiosity is bubbling up so figured that I should give them an explanation. After all, they released me from the stasis pod, I kinda owed them at the very least an explanation.

I cleared my throat and said "You guys are probably curious as to who I am"

Raphael scoffed and said "We don't even know WHAT you are!" Pointing an oversized metal toothpick at me.

Donatello then asks me, "Are you a mutant?" Which kinda confuses me but I just shook my head.

As I lean against the concole, I look down and hold my chin in deep thought, 'How am I going to explain this? From what I could gather, according to the database, there is nothing on this planet that slightly resembles my kind.' With skin so pale I almost look white, waist long wavey snow white hair fading to light purple at the tips. I'm just a tad shorter then the turtles. I have a thin but muscular curvy body and a thick long stronge tail. Large gem-like black horns on the top of my head that stretched backwards over my head with a twist, long fangs, and my big, bright amethyst purple eyes. It seems all evidence of my kind has been removed by time alone. "I guess my best answer is that I'm not originally from this planet."

Raph scoffs again and growles out "I'm pretty sure we figured that much out."

Leo put his hand on Raphs shoulder saying, "Easy Raph." Just to get his hand knocked of by Raphael as he stormed away a few steps over to a wall to lean on with his arms crossed.

Leo then turned to me and asks in a serious tone, "If your not from Earth then why are you here? And why are you studying our planet?"

'I guess only the truth will get me out of this' And with a deep breath I began to explain, "When my kind first found this planet it was inhabited by reptiles larger then any living beings we have ever come across. Fascinated we begun to study from afar, unnoticed. Then an asteroid hit wiping out all life, turning this planet into a ball of magma. We then decided as a whole to do what we could to bring life to this planet again, and fixated on this goal. We built this underground city to live in as we worked so we wouldn't effect the project with our presence. We weren't able to recreate what was lost but we were able to start the building blocks for new life using our own DNA, tweeking it as needed until we could create sentient life. After a few thousand years, my kind started getting old and dieing off before our life-long project was even half way completed we began trying to figure out how to preserve our kind to witness the completion. Since there weren't many of my people left, five of us volunteered to live the rest of our lives in stasis just to see the completion of the project and appling tweeks if necessary. Each one being revived 10 million years apart since we didn't know how long it would take. I am the last to awake but it appears my pod has been tampered with." I say the end as I glance over at my pod noticing that all the wires are exposed.

Mikey excitedly says, "Dudes, that explains all those creepy skeletons!"

To witch the other three said in unison "Shut up, Mikey!"

I couldn't help but wonder with horror about the skeletons Michelangelo mentioned. I guess my facial expression gave my thoughts away since the four all exchanged looks.

Leo is the first one to speak up "Well Ying, you should probably know. While we were exploring this underground city, we found a room that looked like a shelter. The door was blocked by rubble. When we removed it all the door finally opened revealing bundles of skeletons with horns and tails like yourself. At first we thought they were just mutated humans until we stumbled upon your pod. They were all clusterd together, it looked like they all died hugging there families." With the last sentence a single tear rolled down his cheek.

I felt my heart snap at his words. 'Maybe he is not telling the truth? My people were supposed to leave the planet, to find a new home and repopulate after the five volunteers went into the stasis pods... How could this have happened?' I tried to delude myself but I could feel the truth and sincerity in his words and actions. I fall to the ground landing on my ass. I hold my legs to my chest as my tail wraps around me. The last of my strength fading out of me and being replaced with a deep sense of loss and loneliness. I whisper to myself in a raspy voice, "Then I'm all alone."

To witch Mikey came up to me putting a hand on my shoulder cheerfully saying, "Your not alone anymore!"

I looked up at their faces and what I saw shocked me to my core for I have never experienced this before. Leo is looking at me as something precious to protect. Donny is looking at me with utter fascination. Mikey is looking at me like a long lost friend. And then there is Raph who is just glaring at the floor. 'Three out of four isn't bad I guess' as I inwardly smirked to myself, honestly being moved by them. My people rarely showed emotion, just one more reason why I never fit in.

But just as I am starting to feel thankful for their presence I have a realization. 'How did they find this place? We are so deep under ground that there is even a lava lake surrounding the city.' As I thought about it I figured that there is no choice but to ask. Just to be safe, I tried to play it off as a nonchalant conversation. "Just out of curiosity, how did you guys stumble upon this city?"

They all looked at Donny. 'He must be their brains' I thought to myself as I focus on him. Donny cleared his throat, visibly nervous. As he starts to explain he is scratching the back of his head. "Well you see, I picked up some strange energy readings after a small earthquake that lead me to these crystals." As he says this he digs in a brown duffle bag at his hip and pulled out one of our blue power crystals, like the ones in the walls lighting the room. 'Try to reserve judgment, Ying.' I warned myself trying to not make a face at the crystal.

Donny continued, "I brought it back to our lair to study and discovered that if exposed to certain sound frequencies it turns into liquid and produces even more power." This bit of info shocked the crap out of me. As my eyes widen to dinner plates Donny puts the crystal back into his bag and continues, "I was able to combine that liquid with another substance that we call mutagen to create an anti mutagen and heal our friends that were forcefully mutated. But I ran out before I could help them all. So we came back down here to see if I could find more but aside for the three in my bag I couldn't find any that wernt dead. Atleast until we found your stasis pod. There was one in the bottom of the pod and when I removed it, the whole thing shut down, reviving you in the process."

I thought for a bit while holding my chin. Deciding to trust the turtles, at least for now, I finally answered, "Well if most of the crystals are dead then the city would fall back into the lava lake. So I think most of them are just dormant like the ones in this room before I was awoken." Now it's the turtles turn to have dinner plates for eyes. "If you don't mind me joining you, as we leave the rest of the crystals should activate as they detect me. We should take as many as we can so my kind's technology doesn't fall into the wrong hands." I said thoughtfully.

Without hesitation, Leo says "You're more then welcome to join us, but are you sure you want to sink this city? It's your last connection to your people."

I look at him with serious eyes, "This is just stuff, my connection to my people is within myself... Somewhere in there, anyways."

"That's deep, yo" says Mikey with visible awe.

And with no more words we start pulling the glowing crystals from the walls hoping that we can get out before the city sinks into the lava lake below.