She'd run away from home at fifteen because of a drunk dad and a missing mom. One day she ducks into the sewers to avoid some police, trying to return her to her dad. There, she sees four baby turtles and a rat, and from there she becomes a mother of four. Her dad always did say she'd wind up as a teenage mom. When she woke up the next day to find the turtles twice their size, she doubted he'd meant anything quite like this.

A/N: Saw a fic like this and wanted to put my own spin on things. I think turtle tots are absolutely adorable!

Chapter 1: The Long Road to Nowhere At All.

Leola fast-walked down the street, taking a left turn into an alley to avoid a man in uniform. Apparently she had angered some higher diety though, because he'd spotted her retreat and made his way over to what he knew was a dead end alley.

Leola cursed in german and tried to find a place to hide. There weren't any fire escapes on this side of the building, but there was a manhole cover. As horrible as the idea of the sewers was, going back to her father would be a hundred times worse. So she lifted the metal cover, climbed down, and pulled it back over just as the policeman entered the mouth of the back alley.

It stank, and she tried to hold her breath as she walked down the corridors. She was infinitely grateful for the water proof boots she wore as she stepped through things she refused to identify. Other than her brown boots, she wore blue skinny jeans and an over-sized mountain dew T-shirt.

On her back was her school bag, which held three changes of clothes, ball shoes, a loaf of bread, peanut butter, jelly, fifty bucks, a half used photo album, and half a dozen feminine supplies and toiletries. Everything the teenaged runaway needed to survive on the streets, particularly if that same runaway was a high school drop out and on the run from the police.

The half-german teen sniffed, shuddering at the smell of rancid leavings as she sloshed her way down a long tunnel. There was light from the grates to see by, even if it cast eerie shadows from the pipes and the rats running across them reminded her of creatures from horror movies.

"Well, you've gotten yourself in a right old gerkin." She scolded herself weakly.

The sewers weren't half bad, once she learned to ignore the smells. Some pipes were large enough to sleep in, and she gladly took advantage of this fact. The next day, she made her self aa sandwhich and continued the march. What she was looking for, she didn't know. All she wanted was a place that she could stay for longer than a night with people who wanted her there.

Some nights she spent at the dump, just for a change of pace. Her blonde hair she kept short so it could be easily washed in a gas station bathroom. Her clothes got washed at any laundromat she happened to pass when they were dirty. Her fifty bucks just stretched until all she had was ten.

October first is a day she would come to view as the best in the year, tromping her birthday and christmas with no trouble at all. It was the day she became a single mother of four. It was a big step on this long road to nowhere at all.

The sewers were a refuge from the crisp day above. The closeness of the walls and the smell gave the impression that they were actually much warmer. Wearing a thick hoodie to hold in further warmth helped, and she swore that when she could afford one it'd be the first thing she bought.

POV Change.

It was getting into the afternoon, somewhere around two or three. I walked in relative silence, occasionally whistling or humming a tune. I didn't have any set destination in mind, I just didn't want to be sitting around all day. So instead I walked, slowly working out a map of the sewers in relation to streets.

Then I heard the sound of cracking glass somewhere to my right. Unfortunately gifted with a natural curiosity, I followed the sound and came across an amusing sight. One I sincerely wished I owned a camera to capture and put in my album, but I've pretty much burned the memory into my brain anyway.

There was a rat, trying to put four turtles covered in a green slime into an empty coffee can. The breaking glass I figured out was some kind of canister, with TCRI on the side.

Mister Rat saw me and froze, showing himself to be a credit to his race by not abandoning the little turtles. For a moment, all I could do was stare, and then I knelt down to make myself seem less giant.

"You're a very strange rat, aren't you?" I half expected an answer. Of course, if I had gotten one at that time I probably would have turned and started walking in the opposite direction at a very controlled but tense pace.

He decided that I wasn't going to try to take his dinner (At least I assumed at the time the turtles were dinner) and began trying to pull the can away. He wasn't making much progress though, and he couldn't tip it on it's side and roll it because then the turtles would fall out. So, since he'd already proven to be a very strange rat, I decided to offer my assistance.

"Do you want some help? I could carry it for you." Why was I asking a rat if it needed help taking home the groceries?

Yet, this time he did answer, albeit in his own way. He looked at me, then the turtles, turned his head to look down the very long tunnel, back at me. Finally, I spoke again.

"I don't know why I'm talking to you, offering to help. Maybe I'm so desperate for company I've been reduced to talking to animals." I sighed, slumping a bit. I was disappointed, no getting around that. For a moment I had honestly thought I'd be able to help someone, something, other than myself.

That was when the rat darted to me, darted to the can with a significant look, and then walked part way down the tunnel. He turned around and looked at me when I didn't immediatly follow. Well, like I said, I was desperate for company. So I gently picked up the can and started following the rat.

What does it say about me, that I now officially get along better with rats than humans?

He had a pretty nice burrow filled with straw. It was large enough for a fully grown man to sleep inside, and I took a seat and helped the turtles out of the can. They still had some goo on them, so I started wiping it off. I got a fair amount on my hands but at the time didn't think anything of it. How was I to know it was actually a dangerous chemical? As far as I could tell it was the same stuff you put in glo-sticks!

Anyway, I cleaned them off and they slept like tiny rocks in the straw. The rat curled up nearby and there was plenty of room, and I did feel strangely tired. So I laid down with my bag for a pillow and slept.

I could've been imagining it, but I could've sworn I felt four little lumps wriggle closer to me. I could've been imagining it, but I like to think not. October first, it's a day that's made me smile everytime I revisit.

The next morning I gave birth to a litter of kittens right there in the straw. All boys.

"Holy cow!" I whispered. They were about the size of toddlers, but with green skin and shells. Also, the rat.

"Holy cow!" I whispered even quieter. It was big enough to eat me!...Okay I'm exaggerating. He was about four feet long, not counting the tail. I guess I wasn't as quiet as I thought I'd been, because he woke up and uncurled. Almost seeming not to notice his increased stature.

"...I didn't think rats grew this big." I mumbled, suddenly wishing he was wearing something. Anything really, even my old mountain dew shirt. I'd be happy to loan it to him so long as he promised not to shed all over it.

Well, it turns out he understood me, because he looked down at himself and gasped in a very human way. His whiskered maw hung open as he realized that now he was big enough to eat the new giant turtles without opening his mouth too wide. Good thing he never really intended them for a snack.

He then compared the turtles and I realized that they were awake too. In fact, the smallest one looked up at me with big watery eyes and made this sad little peeping sound. The others soon picked up the tune and I slowly picked two of them up, trying to get them to stop crying.

"Um, shh...It's okay little guys! Don't cry!" I don't think I was doing a very good job of it, but the rat was studying us and I hoped he could figure out what was wrong. Maybe they just wanted their mommy?

"We must find food for them." And that, ladies and gentlemen, should have been the point where I calmly set down the babies and walk in a controlled but tense manner in the opposite direction. This is when I should've poked my head out of a grate to check for flying pigs. This is when I should've checked my family tree for any relation to Dr. Dolittle.

Instead I said, "I have enough for a medium pizza."

Well, I bought a pepperoni and brought it down. The babies happily set upon it with the rat and myself taking only a single slice each. The biggest one was eating calmly, slowly, watching his brothers. The second biggest was aggresive, shoving the dry-green one to get to the food. The sea-green one, also the smallest, was running around the box, alternating between brushing against his brothers and eating.

This had totally wiped out my piggy bank though. After this there was nothing left in the United banks of Leola. And already I couldn't bare to leave these guys to fend for themselves. Dare I even think it, but maybe I'd found a place that needed me, if just for a little while.

"So, I don't suppose you have a name? I'm Leola." I felt a bit silly introducing myself to a rat. Even a giant talking one. Was I taking this too well? Shouldn't I be curled in the fetal position right now? Maybe I was just weird.

"I am called Splinter, Leola." Good, now I can stop calling him The Rat. It was really very annoying.

"Nice to formally meet you." I quipped, already more preoccupied with trying to coo over all the boys at once. It didn't help that they really soaked it up, smiling up at me with too big eyes that made my icy heart melt. My stone heart was crimbling, leaving behind a nugat center. And I don't even know what nugat is!

"My humble burrow will not be enough for them." Splinter sighed, looking sadly at his pipe. Had to agree there. With everyone the sizes they were it was getting a big cramped. Here I tried not to appear to eager when I voiced another offer of aid. He accepted and we started herding the baby turtles to another part of the sewers, looking for a place to call home.

It took a week to find the perfect place. A week of dumpster diving and scrimping for a bottle of water. I really felt homeless for the first time since I ranaway. I mean stereotypical homeless, not nowhere-to-sleep-tonight homeless. The kind of homeless where you're struggling to feed yourself and you can't seem to get enough.

I'm glad we found a home when we did, and that it had electricity. Three light bulbs hung in one of those little maintanence rooms off to the side, it had a solid door that faded into the stonework in a way that we almost didn't see it. Inside it was pretty obvious that no one had come to call for a while. The dust was so thick, I almost mistook it for a carpet.

Of course, in no time at all I had shoed the boys out and started the painstaking task of sweeping. It took two hours before I deemed it fit for human habitation. I was only half way done, but the boys were tired and we were hungry. So we settled all together on the cold ground, curling together to try to share heat. Splinter's fur is awesome. I wish I had fur.

Well, I got fur. Goes to show that you should always be careful what you wish for.

Remember that glowing green ooze I got all over my hands? Well, at my size it wasn't enough for an instant transformation like the boys, I didn't get enough. Well, apparently it worked slower on me and when I woke up, I had a tail. Also, soft rat-ears the same shade of blonde as my hair.

"I have a tail!?" I couldn't keep quiet about that. I woke up, pushed away the appendage thinking it belonged to Splinter, and was startled out of my mind when I felt it. So I got up, and sure enough, a long sinewy tail

"Miss Leola?" Splinter looked as surprised as me. Neither of us expected me to grow a tail, or silky ears. They really are pretty soft. Like velvet, or what I imagine velvet feels like. I've never touched velvet before.

Of course, when he talked I heard all sorts of echoes. There were sounds all over the place that I couldn't identify. Imagine walking into a rock concert, everyone's screaming and the ramp's on ten. You're sitting between two ramps, and their facing you. Through it all are also these little annoying sounds, the ones people make when they walk and talk and eat. Sounds that when you're trying to listen to music, or trying to sleep, become incredibely annoying. Now imagine that, and then imagine that everything was just fine. You couldn't name all the sounds, but you were immune to headaches!

Now if you can picture all that, you know what it's like to have rat ears. It is not a pleasant experience to wake up too. Even though I was now immune to headaches caused by loud sounds.

And of course, my tail kept swinging in every direction which kept making me stagger like a drunkard. I felt like my father.

"I have a tail, and rat ears! And claws?" The last ones I hadn't noticed until then. My nails had lengthened into bag lady standards and were much stronger than before. After they went past the fingertips they started to curl, and later when I felt a bit better about my circumstances, I tested their sharpness. That wash rag won't bother anyone ever again.

The mutagen had changed me slower than Splinter or the boys, but change me it had. And apparently I had spent too much time around Splinter, or maybe I just wasn't compatible with turtle genes. Whatever the case, tail, ears, and claws.

Tails actually don't affect your center of gravity that much. And humans do still have a tailbone. Something we lost the use of, so it serves as this bump just above the buttcrack. Well, I was using mine. The tail had grown out of it and popped out of the skin there. It was about the same width as three fingers at the base and it went down to a single digit at the tip. It measured to about five feet, so seven inches shorter than my total height.

My normal ears were no more, gone forever. They had lengthened out and gained the ability to flap about, rotating back and forth to catch all these new sounds I was hearing. I checked in a mirror later and when I forcefully held them down, it was hard to tell they were there at all. So long as the pink inside wasn't showing and I kept my hair in place, I looked normal. They'd migrated upwards about an inch or so each and were about the same length as my pinky finger.

Well, I wasn't going to let my new appendage hold me back, so I started the day. The boys sure had a hard time wrapping the tail around their toddler heads, it was fun to see them so confused. Splinter went to forage for food and I resumed cleaning and keeping an eye on the tots. While doing so I explored the changes that came, listing them on a mental T-graph. Points for and points against.

Points against: I keep stepping on my tail when I step backwards, although I suspect eventually I'll stop doing that, it hurts. Every sound from the boys sounded like a thunderclap, so I kept jumping and looking at them expecting to see some giant noisy disaster. I'll have to wear my hoodie every time I go topside now, curling my tail around my stomach to hide it.

Points for: I now have super-hearing, if I learn what all those new sounds are. My tail is a lot more flexible than Splinter's, meaning I can use it to hold things, so it's like a third arm. The claws will be useful to attack anyone trying to mug me.

So it's pretty even, so I'm trying to remain nuetral while learning how to drive this new body. The first step to that, I think, is finding out what all those noises are. The ones I don't think I've ever heard before, along with pinpointing where the further away ones are, and how large is the range.

I went to the dump that day, keeping my ears down and wearing my hoodie. Luckily the weather was getting cold so I wasn't too out of place. Walking through the grounds I claimed six blankets, all nearly threadbare. I found two pillows, which I figured me and Splinter could use since the kids basically used us for pillows. No mattresses though, which would've been awesome.

Carrying everything was a hastle, and it went slow because I kept stopping to try and guess what every sound was. In the middle of the dump was the tiny and quick pitter-patter that I guessed were my distant cousins, or maybe Splinter's brothers. The cloth in my arms rustling sounded like, well, try rubbing you arms slowly and then pour on the volume till it sounded like a tire wheel rubbing concrete.

In the sewers was all the rushing, dripping, glorping of water. And other non-drinkable liquids. It was dizzying and for a full five minutes I got so turned around by the echoes that I couldn't find my way back to our new burrow. I don't think I hear much farther than a human, it's just there's more sounds in the immediate vicinity so it looks like it.

Now I described a few sounds we hear already, but with rat ears there are sounds so high pitched that humans can't hear them at all. I found those out later with Splinter, after I got back with the blankets and stuff.

"Describe these sounds you hear and I will attempt to help you identify them." He said as soon as the kids were asleep. We were sitting facing eachother with a few lit candles, the kids were in an alcove on the left side, when we hung a curtain it's be like a bedroom. On the right was another alcove, and two more on either side further down. One for him, one for me, and one for a kitchenette.

"Well, anytime something moves there's this scratchy sound. Is that just cloth rustling?" I demonstrated by rubbing my thumb and forefinger together to produce the sound.

"Yes, the sound of Movement. If you rub cloth together the sound is softer, yet more pronounced." I tried it out, comparing the slight differences. It was like the skin-on-skin one was hearing two pieces of sand paper rubbing together and cloth-on-cloth was the sound of cats sharpening their claws on a door post. That's the closest comparison.

Normal sounds were a normal level, but the quieter ones I normally dismissed or couldn't hear at all were suddenly there too, and wading through that level of sensory input was hard to get used to. We stayed up for a good hour, me asking about different sounds that I had heard and us both trying to figure out what it was. Sometimes my descriptions weren't very good and we struggled for up to ten minutes once until we figured out that the echoe-y static-y sound was from the same generator that gave us power.

Then there were times when I gave a very brief description, like this pulsing thrum, and he would smile and calmly tell me it was hearbeats. Six of them, four slightly distant ones that even now I strained to hear over the sound of breathing, and two more pronounced ones. Heartbeats.

After a while I slept, but somehow wound up with the tots instead of my own little nest. Splinter did as well. I guess neither of us were ready yet to let them sleep alone, or maybe it was us that needed that closeness. Heaven knows I'd never gotten enough of it in my life.

Two more days passed before Splinter brought back a book on Renassaince artists and we chose names. Leonardo was the largest, seeming oldest. Raphael was the most agressive, because I thought it sounded tough. Donatello sounded nice and thoughtful, with was exactly what that dry-green tot was. Finally the smallest turtle was named Michelangelo, because the others sounded stupid and I didn't want him getting picked on by his brothers. Well, I didn't tell Splinter why I chose that one, I think I told him I just wanted to call him Mikey.

So now they had names, and we made sure they knew them. Pretty soon though I had reverted to using nicknames, you know, Leo, Raphie, Donnie, and Mikey. It made me wish we'd chosen something that could make an ie sound for Leo, since it didn't quite fit with the others'.

I could make a whole new range of noises. And apparently, so could the tots. Sometimes, if Raphie was being too rough, Mikey or Donnie would make this high pitched peeping noise, like a baby bird. The first time I heard that was a day after we'd picked names. Something in me made me rush over from where I'd been setting up a box of refilled water bottles to the 'living room'.

"What's wrong baby? Tell mama!" I crooned until the victim stopped crying and then I would round on Raph, or rarely Leo, and scold them for making their brother cry. Five minutes in the corner, unless they tried moving, then I added five minutes. There wasn't a worse punishment for children anywhere.

The noise would call me from wherever I happened to be in the burrow, and when I tried describing it to Splinter he explained. Apparently rat infants make that same high pitched noise, and the 'mother' always reacted by retrieving the infants to the 'nest'.

That night, when I curled up with the boys and Splinter I lay awake. I listened to their steady breathing, listened to the tiny heartbeats. Mikey was curled into my stomach, one pudgy arm flung over me like I was his favorite teddy. Donnie was cradled by Leo, who looked just adorable hugging his brother. Raphie was covered in blankets but he was close enough to Splinter that his tail had wrapped around the bundle.

My daddy always said I'd wind up one of those down trodden teenage mothers. I don't think this is what he had in mind.

This is my story. This is me on this Long Road to Nowhere at all. I'm making it up as I go, and doing pretty good so far. Someday, maybe my boys will find this journal. They'll figure out the trials and tribulations of being a single mother of four.