The Casey Chronicles
Page 6
They both heard a rumbling sound. A subway train was barreling toward them, flying like a silver bullet out of the darkness.
Casey started to freak. If they didn’t move, they’d be pancaked for sure!
With the train right at his back, Casey slowed down and dove, tackling Raph. They rolled away from the tracks and down the gravel banks. The wind of the passing train roared around them.
Raph opened his eyes … and saw Casey Jones standing over him. They were safe.
“You okay?” Casey asked.
Raph breathed a sigh of relief. The kid had saved his life. Maybe he wasn’t such a bad guy after all. “Yeah, thanks.”
Raph exhaled and then remembered: the Transmitter Footbot!
The shifty bot had scaled the moving subway cars and climbed on top of them, hitching a high-speed ride through the tunnels.
Raph put his issues with Casey aside and shook off whatever pent-up anger he had left. He gave Casey a friendly look, as if to say, Shall we?
Understanding that Raph would hop a moving train just to smash a robo-ninja—and was inviting him along for the ride—Casey knew he’d found a new, true friend.
It was time to catch a train.
On top of the speeding train, hot, stinky wind whipped against Casey’s and Raph’s faces. They spotted the Transmitter Footbot dragging itself from car to car with its four mechanical arms outstretched. The bot stopped and looked back at them.
Battling to stay balanced on the train, Casey and Raph lumbered forward and drew their weapons. They’d come this far. They were ready to shut this thing down for good.
But they weren’t ready for what happened next: the Transmitter Footbot released its grip from the train-top and let the wind get underneath it. The blast carried the bot straight at Raph and Casey.
They ducked, dodging its airborne chain saws.
The Transmitter Footbot grabbed hold of the top of the train once more, catching itself before it could fly off the back end. It extended its blades and clawed toward them for another attack.
Raph darted out of the way, barely holding on. Casey lurched forward, swinging his hockey stick, but the force of the train caused him to lose his footing.
Raph saw him disappear off the side and threw his grappling hook expertly. The rope caught Casey just in time! He dangled inches above the rushing tracks.
Raph hauled Casey up, grabbing his partner’s hand to help him back onto the train’s roof.
“Thanks, Raph,” Casey said.
“Now we’re even,” Raph replied.
Raph and Casey fought the wind, stomping toward their target with determination. The bot had made its way to the front of the train. A station overpass, an enclosed walkway with big windows, loomed ahead. This was the bot’s chance to escape to the surface.
As the nose of the train crossed under the walkway, the Transmitter Footbot vaulted itself upward, crashing through a window.
Casey wasn’t going to lose him. He launched himself, and the momentum of the train carried him into the overpass. Casey landed on his feet and immediately started swinging. The bot dodged this way and that to avoid Casey’s swinging baseball bat.
Raph stormed in, bumping into Casey because the hall was so narrow. Ticked that he didn’t have enough room to move around and hit the bot, he yelled at Casey: “Outta my way!”
The Footbot broke free, trying to make a run for it, when Casey lashed out with his last hockey stick. He was too wide again!
Raph rolled forward and kicked the Footbot hard in its metal midsection, its spindly body clanging down the stairs and into an abandoned subway station.
Not one to be outdone, Casey snuck around Raph, grinding down the stairwell rail on his skates. “I can take this robot down myself!”
Raph smirked. Seemed like all the friendly courtesies were out the window when it came to who would be first to wreck the robot. May the best man—or Turtle—win!
Casey chased the bot through the turnstiles, and Raph somersaulted in a few feet away. He threw his sai at it and—
THA-CLUNK!
The blade pierced the Footbot’s shoulder, pinning it to a pillar. It quickly pulled itself free, its circuits still sparking from the hit, and bolted toward the main exit stairwell.
“It’s going for the street!” Casey shouted.
“We can’t let it get away!” Raph insisted.
Raph and Casey pursued it up the stairs, but it was clear they weren’t going to reach it in time. Not in a foot race to see who could get there first. The robot had gotten too much of a lead.
If they were going to destroy this bot, they’d have to work together.
Raph grabbed Casey and threw him through the air as hard as he could. Before Casey knew what was happening, he was a human missile flying toward the Footbot. He quickly released his homemade electroshock weapon from underneath his pads.
BZZZZZT!
Casey Jones landed on the bot and fried its malfunctioning frame. After a series of hissing pops, the exoskeleton stumbled down the stairs to the platform. Raph added a finishing touch: a sai right through its metallic skull.
The Footbot sputtered and finally powered down, steam and smoke billowing from its junked frame. It was offline for good, and the Turtles’ location was safe.
An exhausted Casey Jones returned to
Raph’s side. “That … was … too close,” he
wheezed.
“You’re a pretty good fighter,” Raph admitted.“Sure, you’re raw, unfocused, dangerous, and crazy. But you’re not bad.”
“Thanks,” Casey replied, pulling up his mask. Coming from the angriest, meanest Turtle in the world, he knew that was a huge compliment.
They slapped hands.
With all the dismembered robot parts on the floor, the Turtles’ lair looked like a scrap yard.
Leo hacked two Footbots to pieces. “Is that all of them?”
Master Splinter lunged at the last remaining Footbot as it crept up behind Leo. He took it out with one swift swing of his sword. “Yes,” he said, calmly pulling his blade out of the bot’s sparking backside. “That is all.”
“What happened to Raph and Casey?” April wondered out loud.
As if on cue, April got her answer: they walked into the lair together like old pals as they relived their epic victory.
“Dude! The way we chased that thing down,” Raph reminisced.
“And what about when I shocked it with my stunner!” Casey grinned. “How cool was that?”
“Don’t forget the subway chase! That was the most awesome part!”
Everyone stopped cleaning up robot parts, their mouths hanging open as they gawked at the unlikely pair. What was going on here? Was this a happy Raph? Or—an even crazier thought— a friendly Raph?
“What’s up? No more robots left for Raph and me?” Casey asked the room, leaning on his new partner-in-crime-fighting.
Mikey was perplexed. “Whoa … what’s up with you two? You’re like best friends forever now or something?”
“I see you have found a new ally, Raphael,” Master Splinter observed.
“Yeah,” Raph admitted. “Casey’s cool.”
Master Splinter came forward to express his gratitude to Casey. “Thank you for helping my family.”
“No problem, rat-dude,” Casey answered, still a little leery of the giant rat standing before him. “But now,” he said, turning to Raph, “it’s time to clean the scum off the streets.”
“Let’s do this!” Raph growled.
“Yeaaaahhhh!” the dangerous duo yelled simultaneously, banging their heads together.
“Great. You know what this means?” Donnie said with a tremble in his voice. “Now we have two Raphaels!”
Raph and Casey hit the surface as a team, ready to deal a double dose of pain to evildoers everywhere!
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