Every single thing in the galaxy stabbed the blades of their frozen eyes into them, only them, from the recesses of the mundane recesses of their skulls.
Eyes.
All were staring, stalking, unblinking and almost inhumane eyes.
Vomiting out emotions of dumbfounded shock if there were any emotion in them at all.
The atmosphere of the strangling pocket of sinister silence hooked both sides of the cinnamon-eyed gadgeteer's brain... melting into the undeniable, whirling questions of inquisitivity- why? How? What the hell would you or anyone do in this ridiculous situation where hundreds of people in a foreign country, four hundred years ago, suddenly all froze at the exact same time and stared right at you without saying a single word for a million centuries?
Avid memories of knowledge suddenly flew into the pieces of Donatello's memory after being infected with the apocalypse of stunned silence- psychology-wise, a website he'd visited a few months ago informed that staring was often a way of communication, sending signals that suggested the other person appeared different to them, 'not in a way they like' . Well, duh. But the other unanswered problem was-
"Okay, guys, I know I'm supposed to be your guide and all, but why the heck is nobody speaking?" The panicked rake of Renet's whisper didn't even scratch through the monstrous, utter block of quiet.
In spite of standing right in the centre of countless inhumanly stretched eyes, the blondie flicked his anime-like hair to the side, crudely dramatic. "Don't worry, Renet," he soothed- if the definition of soothe was to stroke her shoulder like an old creep. "I think they're just blown away by how awesome we look."
Brambles of irritation dipped with anxiety pricked through Donnie's hollow stomach. "It's not that," he murmur. Managing through the invisible yet vicious curtains of dead, frozen sets of eyes, the ninja flicked his gaze around. It was such an outrage due to the fact that all the endless, endless rows of markets, buyers, and merchants- all bustling around, throwing reckless bargains and screaming for their products' attention had all been eaten by the universe where there was nothing but deafening mute and the eyes. Staring through your soul and into everything you never want them or anyone to know. "It's clear that they don't like us."
Even the retort from his spunky brother behind him failed to push through the caved walls of mute. "And once again, our ethnicities explain that," Raphael scoffed. Silly little blue-eyed Mikey must've shot him a clueless glance again, since Raph spat under his breath with simmering impatience. "You know, our skin colours? No? Our nationalities? So they're Asian, and we're... uh... New-York-ian-"
"European," Donatello corrected. "We originated from Europe, then sailed to America between eighteen-twenty-one and eighteen-ninety-"
Another witness of the freckled blondie making a fool out of himself in the spotlight of hundreds of people lurched the brunettes already-nauseous heart. "Oh," the short boy exaggerated with an overdramatic British accent. "Then, am I suh-posed to tork loike this?"
Leonardo's fists tensed, reeking of apprehension at the corner of Donnie's vision. "Mikey, you're embarrassing us!"
But Donnie forgot to agree.
Because right then, right there, right in that moment, the sharp breath of the dark stranger who they first didn't trust sucked in a breath to explain.
Explain to the whole universe made up of millions of unauthorised eyes and heads and eerie attention and four hundred year old stranger's that they were nothing special- just mere friends. Explain how badly Donnie, Leo, Mikey, and Raph needed the horses, yearning to get to their destination on time. Explain how their final destination is the Hamato Clan where like his terribly fabulous brother and leader, Leo, said, that their only mission was to save their mentor and father-
Sound.
Sound that was not Hanzo's.
It rocketed out and overlapped, ascended and roared, broadcasting the salvaged innocence of blue to flood back into the sky once made out of bland white eyes.
It was the people.
They were speaking again. But Hanzo didn't even say a single word to explain. How? Hanzo didn't even explain their questioning presence and yet the people turned their own heads, chose to look away and speak again as if nothing ever this cyclical had happened in the first place. It...it...
"It's almost like they expected us to be here." The brown-eyed teenager's muse seeped aloud in the other new layers of sound, the eyebrows of Mikey and April loosening raising as he revolved toward them. It made sense, didn't it? In normal Japanese clans, they would scream, point, and brutally attack uninvited guests. There wouldn't be just silence- well, actually, nothing made sense. If the Tori clan expected the team to arrive, there would be thrown hands everywhere and pats to the back in familiarity with a tender sensation of warm welcomes. And like the static oppression distorted on Leonardo's face, Donatello found it obvious in the crawling atmosphere that they were definitely not welcome.
Incredulous roots of sentiments rejected to abandon the curved lines of the blue ninja's features, staying as he stated, "expecting us or not, that was just weird." Unlike how he usually converged with Donnie, the cobalt gaze of Leo continued to glide about the busy isles in piercing concentration. "But remember, guys, the only thing we have to worry about for now is-"
"HUSKED RICE!" Before anything in the world happened the sharpest clang bulleted through the perpetual atmosphere and rattled Donatello's pitiful eardrums. After catching his teammate's symphonies winces, the gadgeteer angled his head purely on the snap of instinct.
CLANG CLANG CLANG- the taunting of the metal plates were so deafening that you could hear it from the other side of the world. "Husked rice for everybody! Husked rice-" the oddly wild gaze he happened to catch was surrounded by a round, plump face of a seemingly immortal entity- a thousand lines of old age weaving and charging across the dim tone of her skin. And then she called, "You!"
Me?
"You!" Her gaze shot directly into... his? Something, somewhere sparking in the back of Donatello's mind whispered to his heart that through the never-ending crowds and the team, the only person she meant was him. "You," she repeated in Japanese. "You and the girl!"
"April." The 'girl', that, of course, was the girl of his dreams, stepped forward with the wonderful vibrance of pink on her lips which curved up at both edges. "He's Donnie," she implied with a sheen of confidence, "and I'm April."
Rapidly, the world's heartbeat accelerated at each impulse which his tan boots edged toward the ginger girl- oh, no. What if they'd blown their precious cover? Well, shell-brain, they've already seen our race. "Umm," that was all he could muster because of his stupid awkwardness. "April, they don't understand... English."
Blue blades of her two globes glanced sideways, sheepishly. Yet at the same time she still sheened of beauty more than ever with her charm-peppered aura. "I'll let you take it away now." And while she whispered she leaned up close in his ear. Her pink lips were a straight line.
In a split second a force fingered Donatello's shoulder- Raphael, the curve of that repetitive smirk bent across his lips. "Enjoy. I bet the two of you'll definitely have fun."
"Hang on, Donnie." The white boots of his black-haired brother advanced forward, steadily holding their gaze before fretfully connecting it with the other members of the muddled team. "You're the only one who knows a single thing about how Ancient Japan worked. We can't just go off without you."
Of course Mikey had to perk up with unwanted babbling. "I know a lot about Ancient Japan too, Leo! Rice cakes, pepperoni sushi-"
"I'm sure you'll be fine," Donatello instinctively assured. The most basic of the basic rules of courtesy set in Japan gently solidified into Donnie's mind like the lyrics of a song. "Just bow at pretty much everyone you meet," very important, "take off your boots when stepping into someone's place of living," especially important, "say hello to people who stare at you for usually more than an average of three seconds," significantly important, "don't stick your chopsticks in the middle of your rice bowl," deadly important-
All of a sudden, talons of impatience grazed through the ripped chords of a woman's demands that actually, genuinely sent a shiver charging to Donnie's heart. "You!" Him, him more than ever. "And the girl!" Her, anything he ever wanted instead dripping with a thousand more tonnes of maliciousness than there should be. "Come here and taste my husked rice!"
Well, sheesh. Could she ever invite two strangers over for lunch any more polite? His brown gaze linking with the teams and the teams linking his, the ominous cloak that lay over the atmosphere still didn't budge over Donnie's faithful grin. An impetuous gesture that just felt right, really. Just right before the two lost souls ventured into the turbulent dark mouth of...
Who knows, anyway?
"It's such a great delight that you came to try the," the unknown woman breathed in the dim, monotone and basically scentless scents of the twin identical bowls, sitting on the still wooden desk. "... great husked rice I made, even with your little... friend here..."
The words dribbled out into inaudibility without notice- holy cow! Upon the glittering sheen of a sudden mirror, the shard of glass weaved its light together to create brown hair waving forwards to the round and oh-so-intelligent eyes, down to a handsome mouth which was slightly peeled-open in awe. And the fragments of his face all pieced together to make... him? Donnie? The person who she didn't love back?
"Admiring yourself in the mirror, young man?" All of a sudden without warning, not even an inch apart from his ear was the woman, foul breath battering against his cheek. But that didn't matter, because what she said had made sense, loud enough to hear for April, who was all smiley and polite on the other side of the desk. "Is it for the girl?" A random jolt blasted toward his heart on ambush. "You sure do fancy the girl, don't you?"
Rigid lumps of the bitter rice which were wheeling aimlessly in his mouth struck an attempt to careen right out. "No!" How did she know? "I'm sure it's nothing like that. Also, this rice tastes fantastic," he lied abundantly.
Something... off vomited out from her pair of dark ice chips. "There's an obvious line in where the girl likes the boy." The stranger's rugged, raking fingers cast an abrupt chill through his shoulders as they invited themselves to graze up, and down, up... and down... A line? It still didn't make any sense- how could she know? How could a random old lady possibly rip her head into the bottoms of his genius soul then tear out all the roots of his deepest, darkest feelings right out of their sockets? "Also, are you certain the rice tastes fantastic?"
"Sure it does." What he replied with was automatic for as he took the twenty-third glimpse at the glowing face of the freckled beauty, he knew, he knew that something... was more than off. Once a grinning, bright and thankful girl, now rigid, with furrowed brows. Shadowed blue eyes. Tight face. Hunched-over shoulders. What had happened? "Are you alright?" It hurdled out of him- the whisper, not claiming a chance to think.
Silence. Brittle, fretful silence hung in the air like gathering storms of thunder waiting for the right time to shower down. What on earth was the matter? Second by second, the poison of discomfort spread in the bottom of Donnie's stomach as well. Too quickly. Too uncomfortably... Too... unnaturally? Was his stomach always this dreadfully churned? Or was it just his daily nerves due to a two metre range from his lovely April?
Strangely, it remained unhealed as the hissed reply to his asking slithered out in an odd mixture of doubt and pain- something was definitely wrong. "My.. psychic.. senses..." Why was she pausing after every word? "They're... telling me that something's..." Through the distorted, almost harmonic layers of noise curving and twisting through the drowsy... slow air, something... something glinted in the very centre of April's two shimmering pools admits all of it- nebulous dust clouds- "Wrong..."
A headfirst slump on the solid wooden table and she stopped.
Sunlight streamed in molten beams, yet why did the atmosphere that stabbed in like an individual horde of knives into Donnie's chilled skin... feel so... cold? Bitter? Uninvited- April had stopped talking- stopped talking, the curl of her lips- curl of her lips- curl of her lips- the slump of her head- solid wooden table- asteroid storms- Tori Clan- Kane- atomic bombs- they'd visited the... Tori Clan? Horses? Periodic Elements- April and him- him and April- Primera swamps- CLANG CLANG CLANG- Husked rice! Husked rice! Husked-
Husked rice.
And then he finally heaved his ten million pound head up and before anything in the entire multiverse fused together in the frontier of everything there she was- she was- the woman- a thousand wrinkly lines- CLANG CLANG CLANG- her fire- her two- four?- eight eyes altogether were on fire- fire or ice? That made her a straight-up psychopath- and they're burning- burning- burning, like large stars burning hydrogen fuel- burning directly into his own eyes, and her mouth twisted into a horrible smile which was wider than it could really go and she just stared... just stared...
Husked rice- husked rice- she- a thousand wrinkly- she put something in it- April was right- she always is- this was all a trap- all a trap- the Tori had expected the team to... come... Hanzo.. lying... Raph was right too... stay... awake- stay.. "What'd.." stay.. "you do..." awake... "that... for?"
Before the unescapable blackness burned only the sight of her wide-eyed, distorted frozen smile.221Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjQbQUGwivY
