#shadowflame611

Weeks later, I presented my sons with their masks, having decided to begin their training. They each were allowed to pick their own color. Michelangelo and Raphael were the first to rush forward.

"Orange!" My youngest claimed. He turned to me. "Like that sunlight!"

"No, red!" The other crossed his arms over his chest. "The sun turned everything red! And you didn't even go up to it, so you wouldn't know, you big baby!"

Underground, day and night creep by unbidden, indifferent to those unfortunate enough to have handicap to their presence. Molded together to a confused lump of time, one must learn to rely on instinct in order to determine the position of the sun and moon.

A son of no man, I have little trouble referring to my more animalistic side. The pull of the moon holds precedent over the sun; it puts strength in my bones, makes my heart beat an increment faster. My muscles twitch to run, to float in the cool, darkened air, to absorb the relative calm the stars bring.

I resist.

I have found anchorage in the lives of four young turtles, mutated in the same fateful accident which created me, empowered me with the gift of man-language and, perhaps most importantly, the capacity to love. These boys, my boys, are much more than the love I could have had for any man as his pet, though memories of my past brought in to this more intellectual mind do carry the same emotion.

My master, Yoshi, fallen to the hands of men who were only similar in terms of their flesh... Not the same in soul, never soul. My beloved caretaker… if he could only see me now. What would he think if I could converse with him, could tell him the love I have now extends beyond the gratitude associated with food?

It is best not to dwell. It only clouds the mind with sorrow, only serves to drag my attention away from what is most important.

"Most important:" feed these children, my sons, keep them safe and well until our life paths solidify.

Unfortunately over the years it became more difficult to contain the children. First, they learned to walk. Then, to my dismay, they learned to run. Their energy is barely restrained, and must be burned lest they explode.

Therefore, it is most productive to include my sons in the search for useful items for the home. In the beginning of each trip, they express enthusiasm at the notion of finding new things, exciting items to look at and play with. Eventually, however, they become bored, and begin to wander. It was a blessing when they became old enough to understand the concept of danger, for me to explain the hazards which lurk on the surface.

Over time the sleeping schedule adjusted itself to the relative hours of day and night, with my sons awake during the daylight. Due to the possibility of more men being awake, I tended to lurk in the deepest part of the sewers at those times. However, I couldn't escape the fact that the best of the items were freshly exhausted from the outside world, which led us incrementally closer to the surface with each additional trip.

Raphael and Michelangelo accompanied me for my first trip to the near-surface where the underground boarders the outside world. Their brothers were content to sit and play with their toys, bored with the notion of digging around again. Due to the fact that we had gotten a decent-sized bag of "loot" just two days before, I allowed them to remain behind with the promise that they stay in the relative safety of our home.

My "second-oldest" son has always been the most apprehensive of the four; he grew tired of the surroundings of our home very easily. It was completely without argument that I was able to commandeer him on this trip; for his part, Michelangelo was eager to follow his more temperamental brother around, his side of the conversation never-ending as he went back and forth between addressing his brother and myself.

"I wonder if we'll find anything good today? You said we were going further up, Master Splinter, to somewhere we don't look all the time? Actually, we don't look there ever, right? Hey Raphie, let's race! I bet I can beat you! Remember the time I raced you and Donnie? You guys say I'm stupid, but at least I can run faster. If a monster comes or something, I think it might be smart to run away fast, not stupid. Right Master Splinter? Lookit that rock! It looks like a apple! If you eat it, it'll probably hurt more than-"

Yes, it was certainly a good idea to include Michelangelo, whose supply of energy near dwarfs that of his brothers. I watched him skip from tile to tile, playing games with the patterns he found there. Today he seemed determined to only tread on the dark gray ones. Raphael, for his part, was searching his hardest, dutifully snapping his head back and forth between the running water and the path we walked.

Eventually, Michelangelo found a large stick, busying himself by running up the path and floating it down the water until he all but bowled in to me in his haste to retrieve it. I called warnings to him, and he merely laughed.

Raphael also moved ahead. As always, I kept the two in my periphery as I began to fill my makeshift sac. After a while, however, the bulk of my attention focused itself on the task at hand.

"Master Splinter!" The voice carried no alarm, and so I moved my way to them calmly. That is, until I saw that the two of them were standing in the sun-shadow of a large, very open drainage junction. The light emitting from the setting star was bringing out rich colors in the stone and water which under darkness do not exist, and the two boys seemed so enthralled by the sight that they didn't notice my presence in the shadows behind them. I looked through the gate to make sure nobody would catch sight of them, heart racing, yet sensing no immediate danger.

I remember the air blew a quality fresher than the sewage scent, tinged with salt from the harbor. Gulls could be heard faintly in the distance, scavenging for their own survival. Somewhere out and below, the bloop of water could be heard lapping at the cement outside. The light shone brilliantly against the reflective surface of the wavelets, magnifying the effect of the light to a near blinding level.

Michelangelo peeked fearfully over Raphael's shoulder as my son put his hand to the light, marveling at the way the orange hue lit up tones in his skin not visible under the dullness of the sewer artificials. He turned his arm, staring at his palm, then his knuckles, and moved the hand so that the shadows of the gate played over the uneven surface there.

It seemed to be too much stimulation, too many alien sensations for my youngest. Michelangelo lost heart and turned, coming to me when he saw my shadow beckon him. Raphael continued to examine himself, then abruptly stepped forth, immersing himself in the shining beacons. He turned to grin at us. Look at what I can do.

Bending at the knees, he brought his palms down to the sewer floor, slap- slap. "It's warm!"

"Sunlight, my son," I supplied, albeit dumbly. Uncertainty kept my neck hairs raised.

He smiled at me again, blinked, and made as if to rush to the gate. "What else is-"

"Raphael!" Beside me I felt my youngest cringe at the tone, and softened my voice accordingly. "Come away from there." My more excitable son paused, looking unsure.

"But…" Face scrunched in the beginnings of defiance he half-turned, pointing a finger outside. "But I want…"

And suddenly, unexpectedly, the sight caused my heart to plummet as my mind supplied the finishing words for that sentence:

But I want to go outside.

But I want to play with the other kids.

I want to go to school. I want to go to college.

I want to make friends.

I want to be an astronaut, a cowboy, a police man.

I want a woman to love me.

I want to leave here, to start a family of my own. That's how it's supposed to happen.

That's how it is for them.

…I want to feel the sun.

Something in my face caused the young turtle to move completely from his spot in the light and approach me, his head lowered as though expecting to be chastised. He pulled me from my thoughts, the high-pitch of his voice ringing clear though the fog.

"I didn't go! I didn't go over there!"

"No," I allotted, attempting to comfort with my tone as I slipped back in to the present. "You didn't. I apologize my son; I was nervous. Remember our discussions of the dangers outside?"

He was looking up at me, traces of curiosity mingling with the confusion there, all underneath a shaky foundation of understanding. He didn't know the dangers of the world, translated to his own terms. He seemed to be the only one of the four willing to challenge my word. The knowledge sent a cold spike of fear through my chest, and I had to fight not to grab him to me lest he suddenly run off.

Slowly, he crept forward and buried his face in my neck. "Don't get nervous." I could hear the tears in his voice, the upset caused at the notion of my fear. "I won't go out there if that's what you want."

...if that's what you want.

…what you want.

Arriving home that day, my heart stayed heavy in my chest. It had it's first crack through it, a hairline which would eventually grow a chasm of fear and sorrow.

I can only provide for them so much. Is it cruel to continue on this way?

Perhaps it is. But I was, and I am, too selfish to end it, to put them out of a life of rejection.

I have been gifted sentience. I have found love, and it supplies me well beyond what I need, what is limited in instinct… But I am my own jailer. I cannot change the world I am forcing them to live in, but I can drag them through it with me, kicking and screaming. I am unfair, I am selfish, and I must be the one to reject the world they crave before it has a chance to do the same to them.