CH:24 Divide and Conquer .:Part.3:.

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Meanwhile: Down in the lair, in Donny's lab

Donatello POV

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Just as I'm about to pass out on my keyboard again April hollers at me, waking me up with a startle.

"Donny! Look at this!" Then shoves her yellow laptop in front of me and hit play on a video of a news report.

I see a male news reporter with a huge strong jawline and tall blonde hair sitting in front of a desk, "Renowned neurochemist Dr. Tyler Rockwell has been reported missing. I spoke with Rockwell's colleague, Dr. Victor Falco and this is what he had to say." Then the screen cut to a middle-aged scientist in a white lab coat with a narrow face and salt and pepper short hair. Falco says, "I haven't heard from him in days so I stopped by his lab. The place was a mess and he was gone. I fear the worst." He closes his eyes and tilts his head down in morning. The screen then Cuts back to the news reporter as he continues, "The police say they have.."

But April closes her laptop before he can finish and looks at me with those beautiful green eyes. 'Focus Don', I remind myself before I say, "Do you think this scientist was abducted like your dad? I mean they might not be connected at all." I point out as I hold my chin in deep thought.

With determination in her eyes she says, "There's only one way to find out. We should go to that lab and look around."

Without any hesitation I stand up from my desk, "You're right, we should go check it out." Making her smile. I give her a warm smile back as I think, 'I really can't help myself around her.'

I grab my bo staff and my To-Go-Bag of gadgets before we head up to the surface through the elevator. April's retro VW van was parked in the abandoned warehouse that Mikey unfortunately keeps calling the Turtle Cave. We hop in her van and she puts the address she got online into the GPS that I hooked her up with. A little while later we are at the building his lab is in. Amazed at how quickly we got across town I couldn't help but think, 'Way more efficient then jumping across rooftops. We should use the Battle Shell more often.'

I look around before I get out of the van. "This neighbourhood seems to be abandoned, kind of a weird place for a lab", I ponder out loud.

April says as she walks past me towards the building, "Depends on what you're doing in the lab. Come on, it's up on the 23rd floor." And together we quickly run into the building and up the stairs until we came across the right door.

She stops in her tracks and looks at the numbers on the door, "23-47! This is it." She goes to open the door just to find out that it's locked tight.

'This is my chance to impress her!' I couldn't help but get a little excited at the thought as I step forward and ask, "Let me give it a try." She steps back from the door. I take her place and crouch at the keypad with April now following my movements crouching right next to me, making my heart beat a little faster. I pull out my digital lock pick and stick it into the keypad. It makes a few little beeping sounds before the door starts jiggling and opens, right when the red light on the keypad turns green. "There isn't a lock out there that my digital lock pick can't crack." I say with the bit of a smirk on my face.

She looks at me actually impressed and says "Smooth!" making me chuckle kind of uncontrollably and I feel my cheeks get hot.

April pulls out a flashlight from her pocket and we walk into the room to look around. There's a counter along one side of a wall with broken beakers and test tubes and other busted up chemistry equipment. There are loose papers scattered around, literally everywhere. Not to mention the broken glass and busted ceiling tiles and vents. There is even giant scratch marks all over the walls and floor. "Wow! This place is a wreck." I couldn't help but bursting out as I look around with wide eyes.

On the other side of the room from the counter there was a giant cage in the wall with a big broken gate. When April saw this she scoffed in disgust, "They must have been experimenting on animals."

She moved the flashlight over a few feet and illuminated a freaky armchair that has latches on the armrests and headrest. I suggest out loud, "Either someone was up to some secret research or they were renting the space to one freaky dentist."

"Or a scary tattoo artist..", April points out as she walks towards the back of the room with me right next to her.

The far wall has a window with broken shutters. Just in front of the window is a desk that has an office phone and some scattered papers about it with some other junk. As April shines the flashlight where I'm looking, I pick up one of the papers and quickly skim over it. Quickly realizing it's basically just some chemical formulas I put it down and started looking through the drawers.

The top drawer just had some pill bottles in it with different kinds of medicine, and the bottom drawer was empty at first glance. Although since we are in a dark room, I could see some green glowing light coming from a small notch in the bottom of the drawer. I put my thumb in it to lift up the false bottom and April reaches in to pull out a canister of Mutagen.

Our eyes both go wide as we look at the glowing canister in her hands right before she gasps and takes a step back yelling, "Donny, look out!"

I look over my shoulder to see a man in a lab coat swinging a 9-iron golf club at my head. I had just enough time to pull out my bo staff to block his swing. Then hooking my staff with the end of the golf club, I use his momentum to swing him around my body, tripping him with an outstretched leg in the process. Making him land on his back before I pinned him down with my staff across his chest. A muffled grunt was the only thing that came out of his mouth before April was able to finally find the light switch and turn it on. "Dr. Falco?" She asks as she sees the middle-aged doctor pinned under me.

As soon as a light comes on he just screams in my face and asks, "What are you?!"

I tried to ease him a little by saying, "Relax, I don't want to hurt you." As I get off of him.

He looks at me with a bit of fear in his eyes as he raises his voice to say, "You already hurt me!"

I look at him with a small smile, "I mean anymore, besides you attacked me first." I couldn't help pointing out.

April walks over and chips in, "We're here to help." And I offer him a hand to get up.

Once the good doctor calms down, April precedes to explain why we are here and that we're looking for leads to help her find her father.

"I'm sorry I wish I knew something to help you but unfortunately I don't", Dr. Falco says while looking down thoughtfully.

With my curiosity getting the better of me I finally asked the question that's been burning inside. I hold out the canister of Mutagen as a gesture and ask, "So, what can you tell us about this?"

Falco looks at the canister and says, "Some shady corporate goon paid Rockwell a lot of money to experiment with it."

April holds up a picture on her phone and asks, "That's him?"

Falco takes one look at the image of the businessman with a blank expression, "That's him."

"The Kraang!" I bursted out in surprise with wide eyes.

Falco looks away from the canister with a bit of anger as he says, "Well, I wanted no part of that stuff. Who knows what kind of monstrosities could result?" Then looks at me to say, "No offense."

"Some taken", was the only response I could say to that.

April looks over at the far wall, "Is that what was in that cage over there? One of his monstrosities?" She finishes looking back at Falco.

Getting slightly annoyed I had to ask, "Can we ease up on the m-word, please?"

Ignoring me and answering April's question, Falco says, "That's where he kept the monkey he was experimenting on."

In shock a "Whoa" slipped out of my mouth, "It sure didn't like being locked up in there." I pointed out noticing that the cage door was pried open from the inside.

Falco looks down saying, "Rockwell didn't treat it very well."

I couldn't help but feel that Falco's reactions were a little off. But just as I'm starting to feel suspicious, April burst out saying, "Maybe the Kraang didn't take Rockwell. Maybe the monkey went berserk, busted out of the cage and dragged him off! Or worse."

I look down and hold my chin, "We should probably go see if we can find a way to track the monkey down." And with that we left the doctor in the destroyed room as we made our way out of the building.

As we're walking back to April's van she asks, "So, how do you suppose we're going to find Rockwell without any leads?"

With a smirk I say, "Well, maybe we'll know more once we have a look at his flash drive."

She looks at me confused, "What flash drive?"

With a chuckle I pull out a flash drive and say, "The one I swiped off his desk."

A hopeful smile sprawls across her face as she says, "Nice!"

I put my hands behind my head trying to play it off cool as I say, "Yeah, well, keeping cool under pressure is the hallmark of.."

But before I could finish boasting, a giant ape landed on the ground in an alley that we were walking past.

Without any hesitation I quickly took a battle stance between the monkey and April. Pulling out my bo staff so fast that when I land in position the end of it vibrates a little.

The monkey has huge fangs, bulging eyes and a metal collar around its neck. It doesn't have a tail and a lot of its features are very human-like. It growls and rawrs at me when it sees me get into position.

April hollers out with concern clearly in her voice, "Careful Donny! That's a dangerous mutant!"

I glance back at her and say, "That makes two of us!" Then I spin my bo staff around my body as I prepare to attack. Only to have the ape slam one of its hind legs into my chest, knocking me back as my bo staff flies out of my hands. The ape picks up my staff, sniffs it and throws it away.

April asks, "Donny, are you okay?" With even more concern in her voice.

I rub my chest as I reply, "I'm good", and run back at the ape. It dodges every single one of my attacks and when I start getting frustrated I threw three throwing stars that the ape still dodged perfectly. Then it starts lashing out and starts hitting me back. Without even letting me have an opening the ape mercilessly lands multiple hits. Then grabs my head with its hands and slams its back feet into my chest knocking me a couple metres back onto my shell. Before I can even get my shell off the ground, the ape climbs up a fire escape and jumps down. Landing on my torso with its clenched fists aimed towards my head. I tried my best to keep my arms and fists up to block his rapid punches but they were so fast and hit so hard I could barely do a thing. He didn't stop until I was in the verge of passing out.

Then the ape turned toward April. All I could do was stretch my arm out towards her and barely manage to say, "...run." But her feet were rooted to the spot.

The monkey was snarling and growling as it walked closer to her and put his hands on her shoulders. The moment the ape touched her something changed and he completely calmed down. April put her hands on his and said, "It's okay, everything will be alright." After a moment looking at each other the ape actually let go of April. Then turn and ran away, climbing up the building and out of sight within seconds.

April ran to my side saying, "We have to get to back." With all her strength she got me up and into her van, then rushed back to the lair.