Sakis Queen (Shredder/April 1987)

Part 2

Chapter 2
Raphael sat in the firelight wrapping a nasty gash in his upper arm, glaring across the fire and through his companions to where Shredder sat bound tightly to a tree in the darkness. It had been an interesting afternoon.

The night before they had not gotten very far in the thick darkness that had descended rapidly in the jungle and made camp early. Shredder had been fairly passive, refusing to eat what little foliage the turtles determined was edible and being generally belligerent, but submitting to being tied to a tree where he promptly fell asleep. Raphael was convinced it was a ploy and refused to sleep, keeping watch with a sai ready. But even he fell asleep after a while. Only April stayed awake late into the night while all the combatants slept heavily. She lay on her side close to the dying fire, examining the face of her sleeping companions. The turtles' faces were smooth and green and infinitely innocent in their sleep. She felt secure, even in this strange world, surrounded by her friends. What was making her nervous was not the strange unearthly calls of unseen creatures echoing through the trees, but the man tied to a tree just outside the circle of light. He appeared to be asleep too. She could just see the outline of chest rising and falling rhythmically, and see his profile slumped forward. She had to admit she was with Raphael on this one. She didn't trust Saki for a minute, and lay tensely expecting him to leap up at any moment and slaughter them all. But eventually she, too, fell asleep.

The next morning they set off in the baking heat of a jungle sun. They had reached the foot of the mountain and started off across a flat, steamy jungle plain. With the flatness, the mountains in the distance that marked their destination, and the strange white city fell away from view. All they could see was the rubbery greenness of oily tropical leaves and ropey vines flowing over impossibly tall, thick-trunked trees. They had eaten some berries in the morning, Shredder again refusing to eat, but had yet to find some water. They trudged along blearily in the heat, sweat glistening on the turtle's domed heads.

"You doing ok, April?" Don asked, coming up beside her.

She brushed wet strand of hair out of her face, "I'm pretty thirsty."

"Ditto," said Mike.

"There's got to be some sort of river in this valley," Don insisted. "These hills have to drain somewhere, and its too damp in this jungle not to have any water."

"Maybe they don't have water here," Raphael suggested.

At this remark, Shredder snorted. Everyone turned to look at him as they walked. His face was as flushed as April's and slick with sweat. He sneered down at Raphael, but continued to walk forward. Raphael stopped. "You think that's funny dumb ass?"

"Raphael..." Leonardo warned, urging Raphael to continue walking.

But Shredder stopped too, chest heaving, straining his bound hands, and glared down at Raphael. "I do, turtle. I found your remark quite entertaining."

"Really?" Raphael said. "Enlighten me. There could be no water here. You don't know anything about this world...or do you?"

Shredder pursed his lips. "You simply revealed your profound ignorance of dimensional travel. The vegetation here has obviously progressed along the same evolutionary track as earth's and is, as far as I can tell, carbon based. Chemistry doesn't change dimension to dimension. There is water here. But I couldn't expect your primeval little acorn of a brain to have deduced that."

Raphael's body literally swelled with rage and he started toward Saki when the world seemed to settle the debate for them. The breeze that had been almost inaudibly whooshing through the trees all morning died down a bit, and beneath that stratum of sound, was the gurgle of water somewhere near.