TMNT are not mine.

Major warning here, the TMNT are going to be skirting some disturbing moral issues, which I'm not going to mention because that'll ruin the fic. This is an attempt to give a realistic side to one of the most commonly used plot items in TMNT fandom. As always, my turtles are a blend of New Toon, movies and Mirage, so their lives are a lot darker than NT.

The second part of this fic is completely open, the turtles that are speaking are entirely up to you.

My thanks to Disney Delinquent for betaing this fic and preventing me from committing comma abuse. Constructive feedback always appreciated.

The Wrong Choice

The scientist slammed into the wall hard. He remained a crumpled, groaning heap for a few moments until he was forced up against the wall by a pair of strong hands.

"What are they?" the voice was deceptively calm, but beneath it there was a definite promise of pain and death.

A lot of pain before death.

The man coughed and moaned, eyes weakly fluttering open.

"Wrong answer," the voice actually managed to sound nice, before he was dealt a stinging blow that snapped his neck to the side.

"Michelangelo, why don't you pass me one of Raphael's sais?"

They were named after Renaissance artists; the absurdity forced the scientist's eyes open and he blinked dumbly at the scene behind his interrogator. The red turtle stood frozen, the blue turtle holding a blade to his throat as the orange one took its weapons away.

"Raphael," his brother's voice sounded so distant as his world narrowed into a hazy tangle of red. Rage and anger coursed through his body and it took every filament of control to keep from exploding. His muscles shook as he trembled with the need to go ballistic and destroy everything in his path.

The threat of cold steel on his throat brought him back and he glared into Leonardo's turbulent eyes. His brother was just as enraged as he was and promised him that vengeance would be attained together.

He smiled darkly and Leonardo nodded silently, removing his blade, trusting him not to explode.

Yet.

"Now then," the purple turtle said in a tone that could almost be cheery as he received the strange weapons from the orange one. "I would like some answers. Please bear in mind that I have extensive knowledge on the human anatomy and could make your last moments on earth extremely painful."

The man whimpered as the sharp blade traced a line straight down his face. "Some of them are clones," he moaned, "We took samples the first time Bishop brought you in."

"What did he want them for?"

"Experiments. Couldn't get his hands on you so he built his own. Others were to be soldiers. Please, this is just my job-"

The weapon pressed hard on his cheek and sliced through the thin skin. "Please don't ask for mercy. It's not part of the answer. Are all the samples here?"

"N-n-no! Bishop had several backup labs," he coughed and spat out blood, "I don't know where they are but the information should be on the system somewhere. All the work on the project is."

"Now then, you said some are clones. What are the others?"

"We took sperm samples as well. Technically, they could be called your-"

A nun chuck smashed his skull open and Donatello dropped the corpse to the ground. Michelangelo's face was deathly blank and he stepped back without the slightest trace of regret.

The four turtles gazed quietly at the end of the lab. Rows upon rows of tanks spread across the room, their occupants in various stages of growth; some were hatchlings, others young children.

There were too many of them.

There were so many opportunities.

"We burn them."

He took a deep lungful of the smoggy city air and choked on it. He was strangely grateful for the pollutants. As he hacked up his lungs and fought to clear them, the thoughts that had been swirling down on his brain were briefly ignored. For a long time, he sat quietly, watching the city lights.

"Do…you ever think-" his tongue stalled, unable to form the words he desperately wanted to air, and yet was terrified to speak.

His brother roused himself from his stupor beside him. "Do I ever..." the turtle's voice was equally low and throaty, hoarse from disuse.

They didn't speak a lot. Ever since that night in Bishop's lab, they'd all fallen into a strange brooding silence, one that had left Master Splinter, April and Casey bewildered.

"I…held one," he spoke, hardly believing the words coming from his mouth. "I held one. It could have been…mine. Or yours. Or one of the others."

"Don't think about it," his brother advised flatly.

"It could have been mi-"

"Don't think about it!" the other turtle ordered, voice sharply echoing across the rooftop.

His fingers clenched uselessly into fists as he struggled to sort out the words that were flooding to his mouth. "It's not that," he said, "It's not that at all. It's just, I held one. And there was nothing there."

His brother didn't speak, merely waited for him to speak his mind. "There should have been something right?" he pressed, dreading the answer. "I was holding it and it was so small and yet nothing in me didn't care that I was going to-"

"Turtles," his brother broke in, "Don't raise their young. They lay their eggs and then they swim away."

"I know!" he said, voice rising. He paused, then went on in a lower tone, "I was holding it, and not a single inch of me cared what it was, what it represented. So I started wondering about all the things that we could do if we took it back with us and I realised-"

His voice broke and he fought desperately to silence his traitorous tongue, these weren't the sort of thoughts people had about children. "I wouldn't have wanted it like that," he said, his stomach turning as the words escaped from his mouth, eyes watching the city blankly. "Living in the shadows, always watching over our shoulders, it's hard enough for us alone. I wouldn't want to bring them up to be the next generation in our feud with the Foot. I wouldn't wish our lives onto anyone. What we did...what we did… I wouldn't have wanted it any other way."

They fell into silence, listening to the sirens, the roars and murmurs of the city, breathing the polluted air. "Do you ever wonder…" his brother asked hesitantly, "That we did the right thing?"