Disclaimer: I do not own TMNT.

13

The turtles were all gathered around the table in Donatello's lab, watching him type away on his computer in an attempt to zero in on the location of another canister of mutagen. Raphael stood with his arms crossed, scowling. "Do you think it's possible?" he asked his brothers. "Could Hun be trying to send her a message?"

"I wouldn't rule it out," Leonardo said, rubbing his chin thoughtfully.

"Yeah but aren't there easier ways to send a message?" Michelangelo asked, sitting down on Donnie's metal work table. "Like I don't know, Email or maybe a postcard?"

"Easier usually means more obvious, too, though," Donatello reminded him. "Besides, if the cops know that the Purple Dragons are after Emmeline, don't you think they'd monitoring all of that - you know, for her protection? That is their job, after all."

Raphael shook his head, wanting to point out that that was also supposed to be their job as well. Instead, he said, "So there's no way to know for sure?"

Donnie froze in his seat, his spine suddenly going rigid. "Well, there is one way," he said.

Raph raised an eyebrow at him. "Which is what, pray tell?"

Donnie spun around in his seat to face all of them. "We would need to gain access to whatever the staff at the group home found in Emmeline's room, and a sample to compare it to. If the two have the same molecular make up - you know, are made from the same ingredients and everything - then we could, for sure, trace it back to the Dragons," he told them.

"And how, exactly, would we get those things, Donatello?" Leonardo asked, unsure if he actually wanted to know the answer.

Donatello turned his gaze to his fingertips. "Well, if Emmeline is gonna press charges against Hun, she's gonna need to go to the precinct eventually to give an official statement and since the drugs were found in her room, the cops are probably using it as evidence in her case file," he began, knowing even as he said what a terrible idea it was. "And I was thinking since the Dragons probably have dealers all over the city, she'll probably know someone and we could have Casey -"

Leo held up a hand to silence him. "Just stop," he said simply, shaking his head.

"Lemme get this straight," Raphael said, pushing past Leonardo and Michelangelo, so that he stood directly in front of Donnie. "You want a recovering drug addict to steal high-grade cocaine from the police and bring it back down here to us where we will have more cocaine waiting to be tested to see if we can trace it back to the people who got her addicted in the first place?"

Donnie turned back to his computer and resumed his typing. "I never said it was a great idea."

"Yeah, it's pretty terrible," Michelangelo chuckled in agreement.

"He is right about one thing, though," Leonardo interjected quickly.

"And what might that be?" Raphael asked him.

"The Dragons have dealers all over the city," Leo said, turning to him. "If they have a dealer located in Brooklyn, it wouldn't exactly be difficult for them to get inside the group home."

"Not if they said they were just visiting one of the other residents," Raphael finished, realization dawning on him.

"You can't trust any of those other girls, Em," Raphael's voice echoed through the T-phone later that night. It felt weird that they were friendly enough that he could call her by a nickname, but it was a good weird. "They might be working for the Dragons."

Emmeline paced up the length of the walk-in closet she shared with Vanessa. It was almost eight O'clock at night, and all of the other girls were downstairs watching a movie. Still, the only way she could feel safe was by locking herself in her closet. "Or the Dragons might have something on one of them," she sighed, sitting on the floor beneath one of the lower hanging shelves.

Raphael was silent for a moment before he finally said, "You've been thinking a lot about this, haven't you?"

"I've been thinking about a lot of things," Emmeline told him.

"Such as?" Raph asked her.

This time, it was Emmeline who was silent. Her thoughts drifted back to the last conversation she had had with Raphael and about how he had said about her friendship with Hun had been twisted. It was something she had always known, but never acknowledged, especially not when she had been getting high off of his product. Raphael was the first person who had ever voiced those thoughts out loud to her - the first one who didn't describe him as her hoodlum boyfriend or whatever. And he had said it without judging her. Now, she couldn't shake the feeling that Raphael could see some part of her that she had hidden away. Or maybe that she should let him see that part of her - the part that was innocent and trusting.

"Hey, earth to Em!" Raphael said, breaking her train of thought.

"Sorry," Emmeline said, pushing the thoughts hurriedly aside. "It's just you really get a change of perspective when someone asks you to pee in a cup with the door open." She laughed humorlessly.

"Yeah, a little too much info," Raphael told her, and for the first time, Emmeline could have sworn he was smiling while talking to her.

"They're sending us for blood tests tomorrow," she said, turning her attention to her cuticles.

"Well, those are harder to fake," Raph said as though it were obvious.

Emmeline rolled her eyes at how smug he was. "Yeah, don't remind me, please."

"Oh, is the big bad Snow White afraid of needles?" Raphael asked jokingly.

"Well, I don't love them," Emmeline couldn't help but laugh in response. "And, please, don't call me that. When it finally comes out that I'm Owen's mother, I don't want him to know that anyone ever used to call me that."

"Well, it's a little late for that, isn't it?" Raphael said, his tone turning serious. "How'd you get that name, anyway?"

Emmeline frowned. "It used to be just a nickname, you know, because I sort of look like her with the hair and eyes and everything," she said, wanting to spare him the details.

"Did he give it to you?" Raphael asked her.

Emmeline pulled away from the phone, surprised at the iciness in his voice. "Do you really wanna know?" she shot, unable to keep the hurt out of her voice.

"Not really," Raph admitted.

"Then why ask?" Emmeline demanded. "God, you're such a -"

"Yeah," Raphael said, cutting her off. "I know…" His voice trailed off before he added, "Look, I know that's not who you are. I just wanted to know, that's all. I was curious, that's all."

"Well, why do you care?" Emmeline asked him.

"Because I do," Raph snapped at her. "Is that so bad?"

"What?" Emmeline said, surprised at the heat that rose to her cheeks. "No, I didn't say that. It's just -"

"Yo, Em!"

She fell silent as the sound of her roommate's voice filtering through the closed door of the closet. "I gotta go," she said apologetically. "I'll text you."

"Just remember," Raphael told her in a hurried whisper. "You can't trust her."

"I know!" Emmeline told him.

She turned off the T-phone and shoved it in her pocket as she got to her feet. "Hey," she said to Vanessa, pushing open the closet door.

Vanessa looked at her like she was insane. "Why were you in the closet?" she asked her.

Emmeline shrugged and went to go lay down on her bed. "Oh, you know," she said, rolling over onto her side. "Just wanted to be alone."

"Whatever," Vanessa said somewhat hesitantly. "Who were you talking to in there?"

"Eavesdropping, huh?" Emmeline asked, her voice taking on a playful tone as she tried to push all thoughts of the conversation out of her head. She wasn't sure what she had been thinking, telling Raphael all of that, and had he actually said that he cared about her?

Maybe she was insane.

"Girl, please, you just a big mouth," Vanessa laughed, sitting down on her own bed.

"Yeah, okay," Emmeline grinned at her.

"It was him, wasn't it?" Vanessa asked her. "That Raphael guy?"

Emmeline's smile vanished. "Yeah, so?"

"So," Vanessa said, laughing. "What were you guys talking about?"

"Just about all the drama that went down today," Emmeline told her, trying her best to downplay the conversation. "He just wants me to be careful and stuff, that's all."

"And stuff," Vanessa echoed, nodding. She laid down on her side, facing Emmeline and added, "See, I knew he cared about you."

Emmeline scoffed. "Yeah, okay. I doubt it."

"If he's worried about you, then he cares about you," Vanessa told her.

Emmeline shook her head. "Anyone can say that they're worried and they care about you. It doesn't mean they mean it."

"Yeah, but you said he listens to you, right?" Vanessa reminded her. "Why would he listen to you if he didn't care?"

"Look, I really don't wanna talk about this," Emmeline said, rolling over to face the wall. "I have bigger things to worry about."

She grabbed one of her pillows and pulled it towards her, hugging it to her chest as she tried to block out the sounds of the rest of the girls coming upstairs for bed. She didn't know why she was so freaked out by this conversation. She had been with guys - tons of guys before. Guys like Alex Matthews. But that had been different, she admitted to herself. Half the time she had been high when she was with them - okay, most of the time. And, besides, she had never cared about any of them just like they had never cared about her. They had been nothing. Meaningless.

Was Raphael meaningless?

Raphael sat silently on the heavily carpeted floor of the training platform, staring down at his T-phone. He closed his fist tightly around the phone and heaved a sigh. Why had he said those things to her? The last thing he wanted was to start an argument. He was tired of fighting of Emmeline, so why…?

"You seem troubled, my son."

Raph looked up to see Splinter standing over him. "Master," he said. "Why is it I can only seem to say terrible things to her?"

Splinter knelt down on the floor beside Raphael and set his staff down on the floor. He stared out at the pit where the other turtles were sitting with April and Casey. "Your brothers have told me about your friend Emmeline's past," he told Raphael simply.

Raphael looked up at him. "So you know about…?" His voice trailed off, unable to finish the thought.

"The child," Splinter concluded, nodding. "Hai. She has suffered a terrible injustice."

Raphael looked back down at the T-phone in his hand. "I know," he said. "I know it wasn't her fault, but I can't help be feel angry about it."

"Hai," Splinter said, looking down at his son. "But who are you angry at?"

Raph sighed, shaking his head and pushed himself to his feet. "Why wasn't she more careful?" he said, thinking aloud. "Why did she let him get so close - if she hadn't, then none of us would be in this position. She wouldn't be locked up in a group home, and I wouldn't have to spend my nights babysitting a murdering thug's kid."

Splinter was silent for a moment before he said, "Do you regret meeting Emmeline Harris, Raphael?"

Raphael spun around to face him. "What?" he said, shaking his head. "No, I just - I wish we could have met under different circumstances."

"Then you should put your anger where it belongs," Splinter said, using his staff to push himself to his feet. "Behind you - like the past. Holding onto anger is like swallowing poison, Raphael: Painful and the only one you're hurting is yourself."

"Hey, you guys are gonna wanna see this!"

Raphael looked up to see Donatello rolling a dry erase board with a map of the city taped to it into the pit. "What's going on?" he asked, looking at the map, which was dotted with round circular stickers.

"You remember earlier when I was trying to triangulate the location of that mutagen canister?" Donatello said, righting the board so that it now faced all of them.

"What about it?" Leonardo asked him.

"Well," Donnie said. "While I was at it, I picked up the signature for three more canisters all in the same area."

"Four canisters in one area of the city?" Leo echoed, crossing his arms. "That hardly feels random."

"It isn't," Donatello told him. He pointed to the stickers on the map. "Each of the stickers indicates the location of a mutagen canister. These are the four I picked up on tonight."

Raphael studied the board for a moment before realization dawned on him. The stickers that Donnie pointed to formed a perfect square on the map. "These are all in Manhattan."

"That's right," Donatello said, nodding. "In Battery Park City, to be precise, and look what they're all centered around." He pointed to a building in the very center of the square.

Raphael recognized the address immediately. "That's the building where Emmeline's parents live."

Maybe Emmeline was right, he thought as he took in the sight of the map in front of him. Maybe Hun was trying to send a message.

A/N: I'm sorry if it doesn't seem like a lot has happened in this chapter. I promise there will be more action in the next one.

Thank you to everyone who read and reviewed the last chapter. Please, continue to share your thoughts with me and look forward to the next chapter. It will be up soon.