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Chapter Twenty Nine: The Enemy From the Opposite Side of the Mirror Part One:

Harry stood in the living room of the Potter Residence, before he climbed to his feet, making his way towards the door.

“Wait, Harry!” called Ginny as she rushed up behind him, looking rather alarmed. “You can’t seriously think you’re going to fight all of those ninjas by yourself, are you?”

“No choice, this is a battle that I have to fight alone,” said Harry firmly, as he looked at Ginny, not wanting to drag her or anyone else into this situation. “Look, I know you want to help and believe me, I am confident of your abilities, not to mention I appreciate your help. However, you can’t help me, not this time.”

“Why?” demanded Ginny, as she looked at Harry, sensing that he was keeping something from all of them, and the others looked up towards Harry.

“Yeah Harry, you’re attacking strange, even for you,” said Hailey. “Something’s bothering you, who are these people and why are you so intent of fighting them on your own without any help?”

Harry sighed, if only he could tell them, but he could not. Not this time. It was essential he faced him alone.

“Is this about your interdimensional trip?” asked Lily quietly, looking at her son. “What happened there, you never told anyone?”

“And there’s no time to do so right now,” said Harry quickly and Ginny opened her mouth, but the second she blinked, Harry was gone. He went off and was going to fight whoever was threatening the world on his own.

“His silence indicates that was exactly what was the matter, the question is finding out exactly what from that trip is bothering Harry,” said Luna perceptively. “He had to have seen something that really caused him grave concern and it must have been bad, as Harry rarely does get like this.”

“No who doesn’t, he’s always managed to keep his head in some situations where even a normal person would break down,” added Sirius. “Still, whatever happened, it’s freaked him out, spooked him.”

“Well, what are we waiting for, let’s go after him,” suggested Hailey. “Maybe we’ll find out exactly what’s been bothering Harry if we following him.

“No, Hailey, that might do more harm than good,” said Lily firmly. “As much as I want to find out, Harry will tell us when he wants to know and not a moment sooner than that.”

“I agree,” remarked Hermione. “If I know anything about Harry, it’s the more you push, the more he resists, he can be really stubborn.”

“He gets it from his mother,” muttered Sirius underneath his breath, but if Lily had heard her old friend, she chose not to respond.

Harry ducked behind a light post, shielding himself as he watched the entire army of ninja wizards moving forward. There appeared to be at least fifty on the street Harry was on and no doubt many more spread throughout the city.

“What’s your game?” muttered Harry, as he stepped around to the side, as he saw a group of the assassins step into an apartment building. Several screams echoed, before the ninjas were dragging the people inside. Men, women, and children were being rounded up by them and Harry clenched his fist, he could not stand by, letting innocent people being harmed. In an instant, Harry darted in front of his targets, distracting them.

“Someone’s there,” said one of the ninjas as he moved forward, wand in one hand and a katana in the other hand. “Stay here, I’ll round him up.”

The ninja looked around, seeing no one there. Then all of the sudden, Harry’s feet swung out from high above. Both of them impacted the ninja right into the face, dropping him to the ground, before Harry grabbed the ninja and dragged him from behind a dumpster. Harry swerved around, as another one of the ninjas moved into the alley, to check on his companion. Quickly, Harry blasted the ninja from behind with an uppercut. The ninja dropped to his knees to the ground and Harry pulled him out.

“Two down, about several hundred to go,” muttered Harry under his breath, before he heard the footsteps of several more ninjas entering the alleyway. Harry quickly dodged into a doorway to the side, standing in the shadows, awaiting for them to move towards him. Putting his back to the wall, Harry swung his feet forwards, kicking one of the ninjas into a second one. A third ninja had blasted a stunning spell towards Harry, but Harry blocked it with a shield and seconds later, he was behind the ninja, before he grabbed the warrior around the arm. A loud crack dropped his opponent to the ground, as Harry dodged several shuriken, before he sprung up. The two ninjas that tossed them at him, looked up, only in time to have the bottom of Harry’s feet cracking them. They dropped down.

When he was certain that he had knocked all of the ninjas out, Harry ducked out of the alleyway, but unfortunately, the rest of the ninjas had taken the civilians. Despite his best efforts, Harry could not save them. Taking a deep breath, Harry took a couple of steps forward, he needed to find his counterpart and find him soon. Only then could Harry figure out what his counterpart up to and stop him.

“Yes, what is it, Ginny?” asked Harry, as he was stopped in his tracks, when Ginny had called him on his two way mirror, seeing her completely befuddled face on the other side of the mirror.

“Thought you should know this Harry, it’s all over the news, everyone inside City Hall has been rounded up,” informed Ginny. “Eyewitness accounts have said they were taken to the edge of the city where they just disappeared without a trace. In fact, people all over the city are disappearing, no one seems to know what’s going on.”

“Thanks for the information Ginny,” said Harry with a frown, he now had a pretty good idea what was going on and he did not like it all. “It’s important that you all stay inside, do not leave the house under any circumstances. You should be safe and away from…the person who’s behind this.”

Ginny looked like she was about to ask Harry what was going on, but she stopped herself cold. Harry sensed the look of discomfort on her face, so he took a deep breath before he regarded carefully.

“Ginny, I really do trust you completely, but at the same time, you have to trust me that this is something that I have to deal with at my own,” said Harry in a tired voice and Ginny looked conflicted, but nodded all of the same. “I promise to tell you everything when I’m ready to but not a moment sooner.”

“I know you will Harry,” stated Ginny with an encouraging smile. “Good luck Harry.”

“Thanks,” said Harry, as the mirror went dead and he reached into the pocket of his robes, before he removed a pair of heat vision goggles. Placing them around his eyes, Harry fiddled around with the settings, attempting to detect any unique energy signatures. After a couple of moments of intense searching, Harry stepped forward, he now knew where his counterpart was.

The four Turtles moved their way towards the city. With all the ninjas throughout the city, they could not sit back and do nothing, despite Harry’s wishes. Leo motioned towards them, as they leaned forward, watching as about twenty people were pushed forward, by the ninjas. The ninjas backed off and a blast of light came from the window. The light engulfed the group of people, as they were pulled forward, particle by particle, before they completely vanished without a trace. The Turtles collectively gasped, as they watched the ninjas moving off. Quickly, Don bent down, examining the ground closely, before he frowned.

“Very odd,” said Don, before he looked over the ground. “The ground’s warm, but it’s rapidly cooling, other than that, there is no indication that anyone has been here or ever was here.”

“Just a hunch, but I bet we find our answers inside that building,” suggested Raph, as he pointed towards the place where the light blasted from. The others nodded by his side, before Leo motioned for them to forward. The entire group snuck through, just barely missing a group of about twelve ninjas that were patrolling around the outside of the area. One by one, the four Turtles slipped into the entrance. They walked around the warehouse, before they saw a figure quickly move off into the distance.

“C’mon,” muttered Leo, as he moved his way forward, before he rushed forward, and the group forward, but the figure turned around, to reveal the face of Harry, causing them to relax their expressions.

“Harry, did you see anyone here?” asked Raph.

“Yes in fact someone’s going right by this way,” stated Nega-Harry and the Turtles turned around, which allowed the Dark Emperor to kick Leo from behind, causing him to smash into several crates. This caught the group off guard and Mikey was grabbed around the arm, before the malevolent version of the Boy-Who-Live twisted Mikey around the arm, before he drilled the elbow down across the arm, before he swung Mikey around. Mikey flew right into Don, causing both of the Turtles to smash down to the ground.

“Harry, what are you doing?” asked Raph but the Dark Emperor just moved forward, before he smashed Raph in the chest with his knee, before he grabbed Raph by the headband and slammed him to the ground, before he hoisted a crate over his head, levitating it, before he smashed it down across the chest of Raph, sending pieces of wood shattering in every direction, before the Dark Emperor rolled forward and flung a shuriken out of his sleeve, triggering the sprinkler system. Water splashed down, with a time delay charm froze the water forming a wall of ice between Nega-Harry and the Turtles, before he pulled out the Teleport Cannon. In time, he would transport them into the void, but the time was not now, he wished to have his misguided counterpart present when his entire family was transported off the planet.

The ice melted, as the Turtles dropped down, Leo holding the weapon in his hand, as it powered down, before they pulled themselves to a standing position, looking rather shaken.

“First Master Splinter, now Harry, what is going on here?” demanded Raph, as he slammed his hand against the wall in frustration.

“I don’t know, but something is up,” agreed Leo, but Mikey just frowned, shaking his head, something about this entire situation that was very wrong.

“Call me crazy, but I don’t think that was Harry,” stated Mikey.

“It looked like Harry, talked liked Harry, it fought like Harry,” argued Raph before he shook his head. “Still, you might actually be onto something for once, Mikey, it could be someone trying to mess with our heads.”

“If someone could put forth an imitation of Harry that is that authentic, then we could be in for a struggle, so everyone remain on your toes, be ready for anything and everything,” said Leo, before the entire group moved off quickly, there was little doubt that now they knew where this place was, those who were behind it would never come back here.

In another warehouse, quite a distance from where the Turtles had their confrontation with Nega-Harry, Harry slid through a window. According to what he saw, the energy signature was in this building. Harry carefully dodged behind crates, giving him cover, he was dealing with a dangerous adversary, so there was no room for error. A humming sound echoed from behind the door, so Harry theorized that his foe would be behind there. Still, he pushed open the door cautiously and sure enough, Nega-Harry was standing with his back turned to him. Harry prepared to spring forward for the attack, but his twisted counterpart had turned slowly, regarding him with a smirk.

“Welcome hero, it was quite predictable that you would come to this first place that you would see the slightest energy signature, not like I would leave you any clues,” stated Nega-Harry and the image of the Dark Emperor flickered. Harry pulled out a dagger and threw it towards his counterpart. It offered no resistance and sure enough, the dagger completely passed through Nega-Harry, before it stuck in the wall on the other end.

“Hologram,” hissed Harry, but at that moment, the door behind Harry had slid shut and the image of Nega-Harry vanished, revealing a large laser cannon that aimed towards Harry. The room became bathed in a platinum colored light and a large blast of red hot laser fire sliced its way through the air towards Harry. Harry instinctively tried to put up a shield charm but much to his absolutely frustration, he was unable to even master the simplest defense. The laser impacted his arm, causing him to go down to the ground. Harry cradled his arm, it felt like it was on fire, as he crawled around, but the laser just spun around, stalking Harry, keeping it armed right on him. Harry could not get out of range enough to get a clear shot at disabling the laser as it followed him. Injured arm and all, Harry pulled himself to his feet, the room was making him week and now he knew why, his counterpart had put a magical destabilization spell around the room. It was a rare spell that took a lot of power that prevented the target to be unable to even perform the simplest of spells for a short amount of time. Overexposure had caused the target’s magic to turn inside them, ripping their internal organs to shreds. It was a rather nasty way to go to say the least.

The laser followed Harry, as he looked to the ceiling. It was a slightly reflective surface, if he could somehow get up there and force the laser to fire at him, it would bounce off, thus destroying it. Taking a deep breath, Harry just barely managed to avoid a laser fire. Bending his knees, Harry sprung up, as the laser aimed upwards. Harry stood still, hoping that this would work. Sure enough, the laser blasted upwards. Harry dropped down at the last possible second. The laser fire hit the ceiling, before it bounced down, striking the laser. Harry dove behind a metal cabinet, he could not put up a shield charm, so this was the best he could do. The laser blew into millions of pieces, also blowing the door off of its hinges. Quickly, Harry stepped outside before he collapsed, still feeling the effects of the destabilization spell. Harry struggled to his feet, sweat rolling down his face, before he managed to walk towards the building. Slowly, his ability to perform magic was returning to him, but it would take a bit, he just hoped that it would return before he had to battle Nega-Harry.

On the other side of town, Nega-Harry had returned to the empty City Hall, with his teleporting cannon tucked under his arm. By now, he supposed his counterpart would have detected and defused his trap. Despite their differences in philosophy, Nega-Harry did admire his resourcefulness, but he was still too dangerous to live. He would only be allowed to live until the time where he would understand that the Dark Emperor’s methods were the only way to go. Then, Harry Potter would be executed for allowing this world to fall apart at such a rate, when he had the power to do something.

“Now to do something about those infernal Turtles,” muttered Nega-Harry, as they were an annoyance that he did not have the time or patience to deal with. Still, the obvious solution can to mind and the Dark Emperor gave a calculating smirk, before he activated a wristband, causing a burst of silver light to appear, before the four alternate counterparts of the Turtles dropped down.

“Free, at last we’re free, I thought we would never get out of that place!” yelled Nega-Mikey happily, but they all looked up, seeing the unamused face of Nega-Harry staring back.

“May we help you, Harry?” asked Nega-Raph in an irritated voice, but Nega-Harry just waved his wand, causing an electrical impulse to blast through the mutated ninja’s body, causing him to scream out in agony.

“You have no right to call me that name, you miserable failures, you may only call me the Dark Emperor,” said Nega-Harry as he narrowed his emerald green eyes, looking at the four mutants, who fearfully backed off. “If you had destroyed my counterpart when he had entered that dimension the first time, we would not be in the current situation, the portal would have been completed and we would have stormed the world. This world’s Voldemort would not have run rough shot over everything like he has and that accursed Tengu would not be in the process of being resurrected.”

“H...Dark Emperor, that’s this world, everything’s fine in our world,” stated Nega-Don.

“I have given you my word on this matter, I do not wish to discuss this again, but you four have one last chance to redeem yourselves,” said Nega-Harry coldly, causing the four Nega Turtles to gulp in fear at his chilling expression. “Lure your counterparts here, and do it soon, I have a feeling that he will be showing up. I want all of his friends and family here at one place, at one time, so I can see his face when they disappear.”

The Nega Turtles nodded, before they moved off quickly, not wanting to trigger the Dark Emperor’s wrath. The second they left, Nega-Harry pulled out a crystal. It got brighter with each passing step, signaling the arrival of his counterpart. Admiring the stroke of brilliance in using the laser to place a tracking charm on Harry, with a powerful stinging charm masking what was really going on. Pressing his ear against he crystal, Nega-Harry was able to listen to every movement of his counterpart and any communications that were made. Nodding his head, the Dark Emperor placed his crystal down on the table before he removed his wand from his pocket.

Back in the Potter Residence, Ginny sat on the edge of the couch with the others. Master Splinter had just woken up from his rest and was sitting in the corner, deep in meditation. The room was very silent, everyone sat in silence, just waiting, given the charms on the house, they would be safe, but it was hard to sit by, while everyone else in the city is disappearing.

“This is mad!” piped up Ron suddenly. “He won’t tell us anything that is going on.”

“Harry never has anything but a good reason to do anything,” said Luna in a reassuring voice. “Something’s going on, something that he intends to face off against alone.”

“I agree, if we worried about every little thing Harry did and the reasons why he did it, we’d have no time to ourselves,” said Neville. “Not that it’s all that pleasant standing back and just watching everything go on around us, but still if anyone can stop what’s going on its him.”

“Yeah, but can he do it alone?” asked Hailey skeptically. “You saw all those ninjas flying into the city. Way too many for one person to go against alone.”

“We have to trust Harry,” stated Ginny in an absent minded tone of voice, but she had her hand on the mirror, in case Harry did need help, she would be there in the blink of an eye. “Certain things he really can’t let us in on, they are too dangerous, maybe so even for him.”

Lily entered the room, obviously just having made a Floo call.

“I talked to Alexandra, her Aurors are doing everything they can to find who’s making all of these people disappear, but the problem is, some of them are vanishing too,” said Lily tired. “I’m going to call Harry, hopefully I can manage to pry some insight out of him on what’s going on.”

Before Lily could call, Ginny’s mirror began to come to life. Quickly, she could pulled it out and saw the battered, bruised face of Harry on the other end.

“HARRY!” yelled Ginny in an absolutely horrified voice, as Harry looked to be in pain, barely able to hold up his head, as he peered into the camera, blood dripping down from his cheek as he struggled to talk, it seemed like it pained him to breath. It absolutely tore up Ginny inside to see him in such an injured state “What is it, what went wrong with you?”

“Attack…help…they tried to take me out…said they will come back to finish me….when they were out of the way,” breathed Harry, as he clutched his chest. “City Hall…they’re coming back…need help…before they finish...off.”

“Hang on Harry, we’ll be there as quickly we can,” said Ginny as the mirror went dead, before she turned to the others. “Harry’s been attacked, they said he was going to finish him off when they got everyone out of the way, we need to go save him right now.”

“Wait a minute Ginny, something’s not right here,” stated Lily with a frown. “I can’t quite place it, but something’s going on here that doesn’t quite match up with everything else, including what Harry told us. I know my son and he isn’t one to call for help, even when he should.”

“No, but if Harry is in trouble in any way, it would be a good idea to help him out,” suggested Remus. “Be ready for anything, but still if there was any chance that Harry would bite his tongue and contact us for help…”

“I know,” said Lily. “Believe I know, but someone’s going to have to stay here, just in case something happens and we need help from the outside.

“Ron, you and Luna can stay here,” said Ginny quickly, without really thinking about it, before she rose to her feet with the others following her, as they quickly moved out the door, all the magical figures with their wands raised, with Master Splinter leaning on his walking stick When they left, Ron and Luna were alone in the room but Ron’s eyes widened.

“Wait a minute, what are we supposed to do if something happens?” asked Ron in a confused voice.

“Wait and see, many things can go wrong, it’s not a good idea to have just one plan,” said Luna. “So, it’s a good idea to think things through, so we can consider all sides of a situation.”

Ron just nodded in agreement with Luna. It was best not to think too hard about what she said most of the time, but still in her own strange way, she always seemed to make perfect sense in the end.

The Turtles moved forward, it seemed that the city was rather empty and barren. No one was around so it was easy to an extent to sneak around but also difficult as it was also difficult to a certain extent, as they could no longer be a face in the crowd. They moved towards city hall, Don had held up the magical detector that Harry had built, after retrieving it from the lair, but it only blipped occasionally.

“Odd readings here, it’s not the Shredder who is behind this, not quite powerful enough, but only a couple of levels behind it,” said Don. “If I didn’t know any better, it was technology that was enhanced only slightly by magic, but that’s impossible to pull off as the two elements will cancel each other out.”

“Someone’s coming,” stated Leo and out of the shadows, four shell backed figures walked. The Turtles stepped back, as they gasped, seeing exact duplicates of themselves standing on the other side of them. It was almost looking into a twisted reflection of themselves.

“Someone’s here,” taunted Nega-Leo. “On my signal, we trounce them, but remember the Dark Emperor wants these four alive.”

In an instant, Nega-Leo attacked his counterpart. Quickly, the regular Leo ducked, before he sprung into the air and blasted his sword, sending blue flames crashing down, but that attack was avoided. Mikey rushed his opposite, at the speed of light, but Nega-Mikey calmly stuck out of his foot, causing the fun loving terrapin to spiral down to the ground, crashing face first. In an instant, Mikey tried to get up, but his counterpart aimed a foot right into his face. Elsewhere, Raph and Don both engaged their counterparts in battle. Don dodged the attack, before he lifted his weapon. He spun around in a cyclone, causing a heavy wind storm to kick up, but Nega-Don carefully flicked a small silver orb into the cyclone. It caused the cyclone to spin in reverse. Don spun around and around, until the cyclone spat him out, causing him to crash right into the side of the building, looking dazed and confused.

Raph rushed forward, but his foe leapt out of the way. Taunting Raph, his opposite had raised his ire, causing him to raise his weapon and blast forward, trying knock his opponent out with a blunt shot, but Nega-Raph crouched down. As a result of this maneuver, Raph struck the side of the building. The sonic vibration erupted through the wall, causing the brick wall to slide, burying Raph under a pile of bricks. Raph attempted to force himself free, as Nega-Leo and Leo remained fighting. Leo attempted to blast his opponent but his opposite rolled underneath the attack.

“Let’s go!” yelled Nega-Leo, as the other three Nega Turtles moved their way towards the building, following him, as Don and Leo moved over, as they helped dig Raph out of the bricks, who burst out with an irritated look etched on his face, as Mikey moved over to join them. Once Raph was dug out of their containment, they wasted little time going after their alternate counterparts. They gave chase into the building.

“Okay, now where are they?” demanded Raph, as he looked around the empty building, before they saw their counterparts on the other side of the corridor, motioning for them to come over, taunting them. The Turtles raised their weapons, magical energy spiraling within them, as they rushed forward and sprung up, attempting to blast their counterparts with an enemy at once, as Nega-Don reached over, pulling a switch, causing a force field to come between both of the groups of Turtles. The magical energy from the weapons struck the force field, sending the energy from the weapons back into them. The Turtles flew backwards, crashing down onto the ground, groaning in pain.

“Excellent work, perhaps you are not as dismal of failures as I had thought,” stated the Dark Emperor from the shadows. “Take there weapons and bind them.”

The Nega Turtles nodded, before they removed the weapons from the hands of the Turtles. They removed shackles, snapping the hands and feet of their opposites in half, before they began dragging them off into the distance, into the other room, before the sounds of several people arriving outside were outside.

“Everyone disappear and await my signal,” hissed The Dark Emperor from nearby and the Nega Turtles dragged the Turtles off into the next room, just as Ginny, Sirius, Remus, Lily, Hermione, Neville, Master Splinter, and Hailey entered City Hall. There wands drawn, Master Splinter holding his walking stick firmly for an attack, it was empty and rather quiet.

“Harry!” called Ginny, as she looked from side to side, with her wand drawn as she stepped forward, before she heard a muffled sound from the other end of a nearby door. Quickly, she held her wand towards the door, before she tapped it towards the lock, with the others following, as she rushed forward, to see the outline of Harry and she stepped forward, but now that she was near, something felt very off. She could normally feel Harry as she got close because of the bond, but she felt nothing and it was obvious why. “You’re not Harry!”

“Well, I’m not the one you know,” stated Nega-Harry as he stepped from the shadows, but he had several wands on him. He just raised his eyebrow in amusement, before he motioned for his army of ninjas who pointed their wands and weapons at them, before they rushed into the attack, but as a short magical battle entered, but the Dark Emperor landed firmly on his feet, before he grabbed Hailey by the hair and quickly put a dagger right to her throat. “Okay, enough with the games, drop the wands, or I’ll slice her throat.”

The dagger was inches away from Hailey’s throat, as she struggled, but the Dark Emperor held her firmly, as Lily and Ginny quickly dropped their wands, followed by the others, as the ninjas moved in, grabbing onto them, as Nega-Harry pushed Hailey over towards his ninjas, as he summoned up the wands and Master Splinter’s walking stick, before he stood in front of the ground, a calculating expression, as his followers bound them up.

“We’re missing two of them Dark Emperor,” reported one of the ninjas.

“Such is the best laid plans,” commented Nega-Harry, as he watched the group attempt to break free. “It is useless to struggle, you have fallen into my trap, acting exactly how you thought I would.”

“Just who are you!” demanded Ginny, but the Dark Emperor just waved his hand and the Turtles were carried out, in chains from their exact duplicates, before pushing them over to the ground, as Nega-Harry pulled the teleportation cannon from behind his back.

“A reflection of something that your beloved should have been, had he had the nerve to use his power,” replied Nega-Harry casually, almost in a bored tone of voice. “The blood of the entire world is on his hands, but I can fix it, as we speak, some more of my associates are gathering up the equipment I need to create a satellite link up for my teleportation cannon. Once done, the signal will be amplified and all organic life on this planet would be transported into the void in one fell swoop.”

“You’re the reason why Harry took his defeat at the hands of Voldemort so badly!” yelled Ginny as she surveyed Nega-Harry with anger blazing in her eyes, but the Dark Emperor was rather unfazed.

“You two are too much alike, I’ll stick you out of the way until I take care of my ineffective counterpart and then you will be sent to a one way trip to the Realm of Darkness, I trust the nastiness in there will find ways to amuse themselves with you, my dear,” remarked Nega-Harry as Ginny attempted to pull herself loose, before Nega-Harry. “Now, thanks to subtle hints I’ve placed across the city, we should be getting a guest, right above…now.”

Sure enough from high above, Harry dropped down, right in front of the Dark Emperor who raised his hands before he began clapping slowly and loudly.

“Bravo, hero, right on time,” said Nega-Harry, before he stepped to the side, as he motioned to the others causing Harry’s eyes to widen, before he dove towards the Dark Emperor. In an instant, the Dark Emperor removed a remote control device and pressed a red button. Grey tentacle like cables burst from the floor, wrapping around Harry’s arms and legs, sending an electrical shock through him. After a few seconds, with Harry dropping to his knees, Nega-Harry cancelled the attack. “Enough, I want you awake for this and let you know that if you had accepted my help or had taken control yourself, this wouldn’t have happened.”

Nega-Harry pointed the teleportation cannon towards Neville, Hailey, Ginny, Hermione, Master Splinter, Lily, Sirius, Remus, Leo, Don, Raph, and Mikey. With a pull, the entire group was engulfed in light. Harry watched as they seemed to be sucked into the light particle by particle, unable to move as a numb helplessness coursed through his body.

A second later, they were all gone, without a trace.