TMNT Halloween: 2005: Noises in the Dark

By Kali Gargoyle

**

The TMNT are owned by Mirage Studios. Kali is owned by myself.

**

This year… this year was going to be different. He wasn’t going to walk into anything. He was going to be alert and cautious. He was going to have a perfectly peaceful evening…

"Happy Halloween!"

Raph jumped and pulled his sai before being blinded by a flash of light.

"Oh, that was a good one," Mikey chuckled, quickly stepping out of range of Raphael’s blindly grabbing hands.

"When I get my hands on you…" Raph growled, rubbing his eyes. "No pranks tonight, Mikey!"

Mike continued to dodge his irate brother. "Please, give me some credit. If I was really going to prank you, I could do so much better than a candid camera."

"Well, you’d better not!" Raph blinks several times and Mikey comes into focus. "None of that is going down this year."

"Pfft," Mike smirked. "Never thought I’d see the day when you’d be afraid of little ol’ Halloween."

"Afraid my ass, I just don’t wanna deal with that psycho this year."

"Hey guys!"

Raph and Mike both look startled at Kali’s sudden appearance. Mike hid his smirk behind his hand. "Speak of the devil."

Raph just glared. "We are not getting sucked into a Halloween mind freak."

Kali looked positively shocked. "I had no plans to do anything of the sort."

"Yeah, right."

Mike can feel the tension and decides the best course of action would be to remove himself from the area as soon as possible. "Well, I’ll be enjoying a scary movie marathon if either of you needs me."

"Have fun," Kali said, waving after him. Then she once against turned her attention upon Raphael. "So what are your plans?"

"Avoiding you," Raph replied.

Kali grinned. "You should know better than to say something like that to me."

Raph continued to glare. "If you so much as breathe wrong…"

"Fine." Kali raised her hands in defeat. "I’ll simply find new prey…"

**

15 minutes of relative silence later…

"Help! She’s gonna eat me!"

Raphael was in the television room before the sentence ended, weapons at the ready. Michaelangelo zoomed past him only to double back to hide behind his brother’s shell. "Save me!"

"Hand over the M&M’s!"

Raphael found himself once again glaring at the she-demon. Kali stood with one hand on her hip, the other held out waiting for the candy to be surrendered, her face a mask of intense determination.

This time, Leonardo and Donatello were also pulled from their tasks to find out what the commotion was about.

"Just give her the chocolate, Mike," Don advised.

"It’s mine!" Mike replied. Leo rubbed his temples to try and ward of the headache.

Raphael pointed at Kali. "Just get out. Go make weird things happen to someone else."

Kali pouted. "You should be nicer to pretty young women, you know."

"Out!"

Kali stuck her tongue out as she disappeared into a nearby shadow. Mike let out his breath. "Thanks Raph. Me and my candy are – Hey!"

Raph turned to see Mike’s candy bowl disappear into another shadow. Don chuckled. "Should have kept a better grip on it."

It was Mike’s turn to pout, but it only lasted long enough for him to decide that popcorn went better with movies anyway and went off to make himself a batch. Don said goodnight to his brothers and returned to what he was doing as well.

Leo glanced at Raph. "Better watch it. You know what they say, ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned’." He finished his warning with a wink before leaving.

"Whatever."

**

Raphael set down his wrench and stood up. He looked around for the source of the noise. There was nothing else in the room besides him and his bike. He listened carefully to see if he could identify the sound.

Damn, what was that? Raph left the room, on his quest for the mystery sound. "Mike, turn that movie down!"

Mike looked over his should, very confused. "Splinter already told me that an hour ago."

Raphael wasn’t about to admit the even in the doorway of the television room, he could barely hear the movie. "Did you hear a noise before?"

"Nothing that didn’t come from the surround sound." Mike moved his gaze to behind Raphael. "Did it come from that thing behind you?"

Raph spun around only to face empty space. Mike laughed out loud. "Chill, bro. What’s up, you usually aren’t this easy to scare."

Raph clenched his fists and shot his brother an angry look before storming away. Stupid immature little…

Raphael stopped. He wasn’t hearing things. He would find the source of that sound.

**

Donatello paused his game when he heard knocking on his door. "Yeah?"

Raph peeked his head in. "Are you working on anything in here?"

"Just a new high score, why?"

Raph scratched the back of his head. "I keep hearing this annoying sound."

Don sat straight up. "You think it’s something dangerous? What kind of noise?"

"I don’t think it’s dangerous. It sounds like a normal sewer sound, but I can’t recognize it."

Don leaned back and smiled. "Kali?"

Raph narrowed his eyes.

**

Raphael walked back to his room, trying to ignore the sound. "I’m on to you, Kali. You hear me? You aren’t going to get me this time!"

Raph felt the skin on the back of his neck crawl. Something was here, he could feel it.

That she-demon could be hiding anywhere. Anywhere light couldn’t penetrate.

"Whatever you’re planning, you can just forget it!"

Was that a movement? Raphael stood perfectly still. Yes, there it was again, something was definitely there. "Show yourself!" he yell as he leapt forward.

Something small scurried over his feet and Raph watched the rat run off down the hall in search of another hiding place. Sewer rats were common invaders to their home, though over the years the family had managed to find ways to keep all but the most determined and intelligent out. Raph berated himself. Scared of a sewer rat? What am I, five? "Get a hold of yourself, Raphael. There’s nothing there. Everything’s fine."

Raphael stood in the silence, slowing convincing his instincts that there was nothing wrong.

"ARG!"

"Raphael."

Raphael turned. "Sensei?"

Splinter put his hand on his son’s arm. "You are most distressed. Come with me."

Raphael followed along after the old rat to the meditation study. Dozens of candles were lit all around the room. The flickering pattern of light, and of course, shadow, made Raphael extremely nervous.

"My son, I sense much unrest within you tonight."

"Stupid demons and their plinks…"

"Umm… yes." Splinter sat his son down on the mat in the center of the room.

"You heard it though, right?" Raphael asked, grabbing onto his father’s sleeve.

"It is perfectly alright, Raphael," Splinter replied, placing his hand on Raphael’s head, much the way he did when they were children, scared of the things all children are scared of.

Raphael relaxed at these words. He knew that when Splinter said things like that, it was true, or soon would be.

When Splinter left to make some tea, Raphael got busy. He placed many of the candles as close to the walls as was safe. Soon, there wasn’t a surface in the room that didn’t have some contact with light. "Let’s see her get through that…"

**

Kali stepped back into the Turtles’ television room. Mike jumped up, ready to defend his new snack. Kali simply held out his candy bowl. "I return to you your non-chocolates."

Mike pouted as he took the bowl and rummaged around inside. "You ate all the chocolate?"

"You!"

Both of them turned to the doorway where Leonardo was standing, pointing an accusing finger at Kali. "What?" the she-demon replied. "I just got here!"

"You drove Raph insane!"

"I didn’t do anything! I’ve been mocking demon-costumed humans. You wouldn’t believe what they think we look like… wait, what’s wrong with Raphael?"

Leo still wasn’t convinced that Kali hadn’t done anything to Raphael, but escorted by him and Mike, she was taken to the meditation chamber.

Raphael was still sitting in the center of the chamber, but now he had a blanket placed over him. Splinter sat to one side, sipping tea with a concerned expression on his face.

Raphael pulled the blanket tighter around him. "Can’t sleep… plinks will get me… Can’t sleep… plinks will get me…"

Kali tilted her head. "What’s a ‘plink’?"

Raphael suddenly looked at Kali and without a single word leapt at her. She yelped and took off down the hall. "I didn’t do it!"

They sprinted down the hall, nearly taking out Donatello as he stepped out of his bedroom. "Whoa!" Don exclaimed as he narrowly avoided being trampled. He walked over to the others, carefully looking over his shoulder in case Raph and Kali changed direction. "There’s a leak in the pipes above the lair, I’m gonna go fix it."

Leo, Mike, and Don all plastered themselves to the wall as Kali and Raphael came barreling past again.

"Stay still you little…"

"It wasn’t me! Stop and I’ll give you a lollipop!"

"Stop and I’ll give you a pounding!"

**

TMNT Fan Fiction