Everyone rushed to the window, their hearts pounding. Was Shredder...gone?

As they looked over the broken glass, there was a whooshing noise. Shredder's fall suddenly reversed and he began rising, a loud clang sounding as he made contact with something. The sky beneath him shimmered, revealing a Kraang ship that was speeding away towards TCRI.

There was another thing to think about, however. Kenzie, Kayla, and Sarah were ordered to kill their friends, but instead, Shredder was the one who almost died. Apart from Abby, who was still delusional from Fishface's venom, everyone was perfectly fine.

Which could mean only one thing.

Everyone's eyes snapped to the three mind-controlled girls, who were all scowling out the window. However, their expressions turned to confusion as they faced their friends.

"How did we get inside? I thought we were on the roof," Kayla asked, Kenzie and Sarah nodding in agreement. Everyone was silent as they stared at their friends. Sam was the first to speak.

"Kayla!" she exclaimed, rushing forward and wrapping her sister in a tight hug. Kayla returned the gesture, but arched an eyebrow.

"You guys are back to normal again!" Mikey cheered. "That thing worked! Go Mikey, go Mikey, go Mikey!"

Leo smiled, genuinely proud of his younger brother. "Good work, Mikey."

The orange-clad turtle glowed with happiness. It wasn't often that his ideas actually succeeded, and it felt good knowing his brothers appreciated his achievement.

"Wait, did Shredder..." Kenzie trailed off, her hand flitting to her shoulder. She pressed down and felt the dull ache that came with getting a medical shot. Her eyes widened when she realized what happened. "How long have we been under his control?!"

Sarah and Kayla both gasped at that, but suddenly everyone's reactions made sense.

"A week," Leo responded. He opened his mouth to say something else, but Donnie cut him off.

"What happened to Abby?!" the purple-clad turtle questioned, turning everyone's attention to the poisoned turtle.

Mentally scolding herself for forgetting about Abby, Dalilah quickly explained, "Xever bit her!"

Raph's face paled at her comment. "That is not a pleasant experience."

"She needs help, fast," Donnie informed, his hands already working to pick her up. In seconds they were all rushing to escape their enemy's lair.

"Piggyback ride!" Abby exclaimed sleepily, her voice distant. Dalilah frowned, feeling as though she should've done more to prevent Abby from getting hurt.

"I'm gonna rip the robot legs off that fish," she scowled.

"Believe me, that won't stop him. I've already tried it," Raph countered snappily. Dalilah nearly made a sarcastic comment about how Raph didn't have to shoot down all her suggestions, but held it back to avoid the wrath of the red-clad turtle.

Soon enough, they were out the doors, though Dalilah fell slightly behind. She had run up all the floors to reach Shredder's throne room, and now she had to go back down only a little while later. Mikey let her ride on his shell until they were far enough away from the building to not worry about being chased, either by Footbots or Fishface and Rhazaar, who no doubt were close to awaking.

Their giant group proceeded to sneak into the sewers as discreetly as possible. Luckily, it wasn't morning yet, so the shadows helped to hide them from prying eyes.

Leo led the way to the lair, everyone rushing to get back so Abby could be healed. She kept muttering things about random animals, and tried to stroke everyone's head as if they were pets. When they made it to the lair, it didn't take long for Donnie to recreate the antidote he'd made for Raph all that time ago. Within minutes of returning, Abby was cured of the mutant fish's venom.

She grunted as she stood up, her head spinning. Blinking a few times, it took Abby a few extra seconds to comprehend her three previously mind-controlled friends.

"What the shell?" she coughed. When she realized Kenzie, Kayla, and Sarah were there in the lab, her face lit up with joy. "Well obviously, I missed something."

"Fishface poisoned you," Dalilah explained, and Abby grimaced, glancing down at the bandages on her arm. The gauze hid the bite marks and well as countless scratches, a gracious gift from Rhaazar. Dalilah couldn't meet Abby's eyes. "You knocked him out in ninja-mode but he still got you. I tried to help, but–"

"Hey, it's fine. I'm already better, right?" Abby waved it off. Her attention was drawn back to her best friends as a grin spread across her face. "How are you guys yourselves again?"

"Whatever the memory machine did must have worked," Leo explained. "And then we just had to get them to remember us."

"And they remembered just in time to not kill us!" Mikey said cheerily. Abby's eyes widened.

"You guys almost died?" she exclaimed. "I'm so sorry, I should've been there to help!"

"It isn't your fault that Fishface bit you," Kenzie pointed out.

"But it's okay, because we knocked Shredder through the window!" Kayla exclaimed.

If possible, the female turtle's eyes got even bigger. "Is he..."

"No, the Kraang saved him," Sarah snapped frustratedly.

"What is this 'memory machine?'" Kenzie asked Donnie, figuring he knew the most about whatever the device was.

"It was actually that old mechanism you used on Sarah when you were kids," the intelligent terrapin answered. "All I had to do was alter it to restore lost memories, and then we used it on you guys."

Kenzie furrowed her brow, and Abby answered her question before she even asked it.

"It wasn't hidden very well," she reported with a laugh.

"Abby and Dalilah found it in two seconds," Raph elaborated with a snicker.

"Oh yeah, Dalilah. Who are you?" Kenzie questioned curiously.

"Well, I was a Kraang prisoner for most of life, I worked for Shredder for three days–you actually trained with me–and then the turtles kidnapped me. They convinced me to help them and I was their spy."

"They kidnapped you?" Sarah questioned.

"We rescued her," Leo tried to defend, but the response was enough to make Sarah snicker.

"She's also my long-lost adopted cousin," Abby added. Her friends exchanged glances, but they didn't say anything. "My uncle had just adopted her when he got in a car crash, so we never knew about her, but the Kraang did. Apparently."

"Speaking of the Kraang," Donnie piped up. "We can't forget that they're making a general MGE."

"What?" Kayla, Kenzie, and Sarah chorused. They exchanged worried glances.

"The Kraang are creating an MGE for each human blood type so they can control everyone in the world," Abby explained. She pushed herself of the lab table she was sitting on, wincing a little at the pain in her arm. "We need to destroy that stuff, as soon as we can." A chorus of agreements told Abby she was right.

"Would it work on us?" Leo asked, directing the question at Donnie and Abby.

"We may be turtles, but we still have partially human DNA," Donnie replied. "It's what gives us our human-like features; walking, talking, and so on. It's highly likely that the MGE will work on us even though we're only semi-human."

"Shred-head is probably guarding it, or helping the Kraang make it," Raph voiced his thoughts. "If they already finished it, they're probably using Shredder to give it to everyone."

"How will they inject every single person?" Sam pondered.

"That won't matter if we destroy it before they can use it," Kenzie determined.

"Then let's go kick some Kraang booties!" Mikey proposed. For a moment, all anyone could do was stare at him for a second over his peculiar choice of words, but they soon began formulating a plan.

"We should go the second it gets dark again," Leo suggested. "That will give us a whole day to rest up and get ready. Then, we can attack the Kraang at full force."

Nodding their heads in agreement, everyone dispersed from the lab and made their way to their bedrooms, wanted to be as alert as possible for the battle to come.

~•~

The next evening, after much preparation, the turtles and their allies were ready to go. Even Splinter was coming; he insisted that he accompany them when he learned Shredder would be at TCRI. While Splinter didn't doubt the abilities of his sons, he knew better than to let them fend for themselves against both of their greatest enemies.

The turtles brought their weapons and countless other small items, including ninja stars and smoke bombs. Donnie brought along a small backpack containing the memory machine, just in case one of them was injected with MGE. Splinter had his staff-sword, and the girls all had their mini-katanas. When they were ready, the giant group set off to take out the Kraang.

The second they lifted the manhole cover, however, it was obvious that something wasn't right. Their suspicions were confirmed when screams suddenly flooded their ears, coming from everything direction. What was even more unnerving was the fact that one by one, the panicked shouts cut off abruptly, only to have another take their places.

Splinter, being the first one up from the sewers, immediately realized what was going on. Before he could tell his sons and their friends to remain below ground, they were already climbing out. Splinter ushered them under the protection of a fire escape, narrowing avoiding getting hit with the rain that was pouring.

Except it wasn't rain; it was a gooey, glowing gray sludge that was being sprinkled all over the city by a floating Kraang ship.

"They don't need to inject to MGE," Abby whispered. "If they made it like true mutagen..."

"All it needs to do is rain on someone's skin and their mind belongs to the Kraang," Kenzie finished, fear alighting her face. "We can't make it to TCRI without getting rained on!"

"It looks like that's where they're headed," Sam added, nervously pointing to a large group of people whose faces were blank. They were walking methodically in the direction of the Kraang's lair, no doubt to aid the alien robots in their conquest of the world.

"We have to stop the Kraang," Leo insisted. "If we don't, the world stands no chance."

"Leonardo is correct," Splinter agreed. "We have the cure. It would be selfish to go into hiding to save ourselves when we have the ability to save millions."

"The rain isn't constant," Donnie noted. "If we time it right, we can run to another covered area without getting hit."

Upon further observation, they could see that Donnie was right. Every other minute, there would be a 30-second long pause in rain as the Kraang ships refilled. It would be close, but they could manage. The main problem would be maneuvering around the groups of mind-controlled people wandering about. However, it wouldn't be too difficult, seeing as five of the eleven were trained ninja, or six if you counted Abby. In addition, Kayla, Kenzie, Sarah, and Dalilah had at least a tiny bit of training, and Sam had extremely quick reflexes that could help her avoid the zombie-like people.

When Donnie shouted at them to move, they all sprinted across the street into another alleyway, hiding beneath another fire escape. Scoping out the area, Donnie spotted a canopy above a shop they could run to next. After watching the skies intently, he told everyone to run again, and they all made it safely. No one bothered to stick to the shadows, as anyone who saw them would likely be mind-controlled, or if not would think they were hallucinating out of fear.

After another minute, Donnie waved everyone to the next fire escape. Just as it started to "rain" again, one of the Kraang ships exploded, spiraling towards the ground. MGE spilled out of a hole in it's side. It slammed into the fire escape and ripped it out of the wall, allowing the MGE to spill on every single one of them. It took only a few seconds for them to fall to the ground. Moments later, they were back on their feet, eyes devoid of emotion.

As the mind-control mutagen landed on Kayla, Kenzie, and Sarah, they realized the MGE had no effect. They were still in control of their own minds, as if the MGE couldn't work on them anymore since they had already broken out of its control. Their friends, however, just started walking towards TCRI like every other mind-controlled being.

Panic filling her veins, Kenzie lunged for the memory machine in Donnie's backpack. Almost as if the Kraang had suddenly realized who they were controlling, Donnie whipped around and pulled out his bo staff, everyone else bringing out their weapons as well.

"We're never going to get that machine," Sarah groaned. "Kenzie, we need to get out of here before they try to kill us!"

The second she finished speaking, Leo shot forward with his swords raised like he understood what Sarah said. Kayla pulled Kenzie out of the way just as Leo's swords hit the ground where she was previously standing. Taking that as their cue to leave, the three girls turned around and sprinted as fast as they could. No one followed them, but they didn't stop until they were sure they were safe.

"What are we gonna do?" Kayla cried. "It's us against the whole city."

"We need to get to TCRI and destroy whatever or whoever is giving them orders," Kenzie plotted. "If we can do that, no one will be able to stop us from taking the memory machine, and we'll be able to save them. We can go from there..."

Sarah sighed. "We barely have any ninja training, how are we supposed to get in to TCRI, and then destroy the thing in charge? We aren't exactly skilled enough to run across the roofs."

"What we know is enough," Kayla assured. "It has to be."

"The turtles broke in to TCRI from the main lobby once," Kenzie reminded them. "They just snuck into the elevator and–"

"They were knocked out by the Dimension X air when they got to the Kraang floors," Sarah pointed out.

"What if we disguise ourselves as Kraang?" Kayla suggested.

"I am not putting a robot suit on," Sarah vetoed.

"Alright, how about this? We know there's stairs that the Kraang barely use, why don't we use those stairs and get to the top floor? Then we can sneak in, destroy the control center, and break the Kraang's control," Kenzie planned. The two other girls nodded in agreement, readying themselves for their biggest mission yet; saving the city, alone.

~•~

A/N: Hey guys! Sorry for the month-long wait, the end of school gave me pretty much no time to write. Now that it's been over for a week I finished this chapter! It was super long, and I was gonna add even more but decided to make that a separate chapter because it flowed better.

Hope you liked it! If you did feel free to vote and comment :P

There's only a few chapters left! I'm planning to finish this book in August, if not before then. WOOHOO!

~DY