"So, what are we doing tonight?" Mike asked, as soon as Don got off the phone in the kitchen and joined the rest of the family in the living room.
Don looked down at him, mostly because he was sprawled on the floor, but also partly - Mike was sure - because he had asked a stupid question again. "You know my mom is going to be here very soon, right?" he said. "We're only a few miles from Manhattan."
Mike contemplated the ceiling. "Huh," he said, after thinking about the problem for a moment. "You're right."
"So much has happened in the last few days," Leo said, by way of explanation, and Mike felt better knowing that Leo had also been surprised to realize how close they were to home, "that it seems like we've traveled further."
"How's she getting here, though?" Raph asked.
"That's a good question," Don replied, and Mike couldn't help noticing that it was Raph, with his big IQ, who had asked a question Don thought was smart. "Aunt Terri answered the phone when I called. But she doesn't have a car either." He thought a moment. "Probably my mom will just call a cab. It will only take a few minutes for one to pick her up."
"And then what?" Mike asked, even though he had the feeling that this was not a smart question. "How will she know where to tell the cab to take her?"
Sure enough, Don just hooked a thumb over his shoulder. "Lynn left a pile of junk mail on the kitchen counter," he said. "It all has her address on it. Or," he added, a little smugly, "I should say, our address."
"Good work, Don," Leo said. Then he asked, "You didn't read her junk mail, did you?"
Don just shrugged. "I looked at it," he said. "It's junk mail. Nothing suspicious."
"Glad to know that's covered," Raph muttered.
"I'm going to go make the bed," Don said, ignoring Raphael's comment. "I left it a mess this morning."
"Right," Leo said. He looked around the tiny, rundown apartment. "This place is a disaster. We have at least a little time. Let's clean it up."
"While we're on the topic of making it look like we can take care of ourselves," Don said, before he disappeared into the bedroom, "nobody tell my mom what happened yesterday. That crash was totally not my fault. But I don't want her to think I can't handle being on my own."
"No problem, bro," Mike said. "We lie to Master Splinter about that kind of stuff all the time." He would have given examples, but then Leo put a trash bag in his hands and told him to pick up all the junk lying around the apartment.
For the next thirty minutes or so, he mostly managed to remain focused on the task of cleaning their new home. But every time he heard any noise from the street, he leapt to the window to see if it was Don's mom.
"Is that her?" Raph asked for the umpteenth time. He had caught on quickly to what Mike was doing.
"Nope," Mike said. "Just some people on a motorcycle."
Raph came to look anyway. "Nice bike," he commented, and then he returned to wiping down all the dusty surfaces.
They all just about jumped out of their skins when the ancient intercom buzzed.
Mike was the first to recover. "Pizza delivery," he said, jamming a thumb onto the TALK button. "Did someone order a meat lover's and a Hawaiian?"
He hit the LISTEN button, only to hear a loud laugh that sounded awfully familiar. "Is that you, Mikey?" asked a voice with a heavy New York accent. "You're burning out, bro. Your old material was better."
Mike blinked at the scuffed-up wall above the intercom. "Casey?"
"I knew it!" said another voice. "You are Casey Jones."
"Way to blow my cover, Mikey," Casey said. "You gonna let the lady in or what?"
"Aren't you coming in, too?" Mike asked.
"Aw, no," Casey said. "I gotta get back. But I'll catch you later. We'll go out for a beer when you're legal." An awkward pause. "And when you're twenty-one. And when Donnie's ma stops looking at me like that. I'll just… catch you later," he finished, and Mike hit the DOOR button and hoped Emma would forget the whole conversation.
By the time he turned around, Leo and Raph had hidden all the evidence that any unusual amount of cleaning had happened in the recent past, and Don was standing anxiously just beyond the apartment's tiny entryway. In a moment there came a sharp rap at the door, and Mike opened it, and then a heavy bag fell nearly on his foot and Emma was enveloping her son.
"Hi," Mike said, to the empty doorway. "Great to see you again. Thanks so much for coming on such short notice."
"You got my son arrested," Emma said, though her voice was muffled by Don's shoulder.
"No way," Mike said. "It was totally his idea to go to the protest."
"I know," Don agreed. "My first arrest for civil disobedience. Aren't you proud of me, Mom?"
"Maybe I will be when I'm done being furious at you," Emma said, and finally she pushed away from Don to hold him at arm's length and look him up and down. "Are you all right?"
"It all worked out for the best," Don said. "I really mean that."
Raph moved the dining room chair into the living room, Mike brought the bag Emma had dropped as soon as she crossed the threshold, and they all settled down to catch up on events.
"So what is going on with this lab?" Emma asked.
"For starters," Don said, "we all passed the IQ test with flying colors."
"They're… actually really nice to us," Mike ventured.
"And they gave you this apartment?" Emma asked. She looked around. "It's not much."
"It's what they had," Leo said. "It was a very generous thing for them to do."
Emma looked at Don. "Ron told me that the intern who leaked the notebooks -"
"Yes, we know," Don interrupted. "She's really not a bad person. She just… didn't quite realize what she had stumbled onto."
Emma sighed and reached for the bulging canvas bag. "Terri sent more clothes for you boys," she said, as she passed a tidy bundle to each of the Turtles. "I brought what was left in your closet," she added, to Don.
"Oh, great," Don said, reaching to take the stack of clothes his mom handed him. "I was getting really tired of only having one outfit."
"And Anna wanted you to have this," Emma added, holding out a thick envelope.
Don took the envelope curiously, slitting open the flap and studying the contents. "Dear… DaveyDon," he read, with furrowed brow. Clearly nobody had ever called him that before. "Get out of jail soon. Love, Anna." He checked the back of the card, then flipped to the front again. "Well, that was thoughtful."
"I don't get your girlfriend," Raph said. He'd already shoved his clothes onto the carpet next to his knee, so Mike didn't feel too bad about doing the same.
"It's a special relationship," Don replied. He seemed to understand the card, anyway, so Mike tried to just be happy for him - and to suppress the memory of that super-awkward card he had gotten from Anna's brother just a few weeks ago.
"We should all get to bed," Leo said, when it didn't seem that Emma had any more gifts to hand out. "We don't want to be late again tomorrow. Donnie, what time do we need to get up?"
"Not later than seven," Don replied.
Leo nodded. "I've set my alarm," he said.
Emma looked around. "What alarm?" she asked.
"My… alarm," Leo replied uncertainly, as if the question didn't make any sense to him.
"He just does it in his head," Don explained. "I guess it's something people learn to do when they don't have dogs waking them up every morning."
"It is quiet here," Emma agreed. "I had almost forgotten what it was like to not have a crowd of protesters outside my building."
"They haven't found us yet," Don said. He glanced towards the window. "I bet Lynn and Stockman have been trying to hide us. But…" He set his jaw, steeling his resolve. "We're not living in secret, here. Tomorrow we're going out to buy groceries. So… they're going to find us. And we probably won't be able to enjoy the peace much longer." He looked back to his mom, quickly, before anyone could say anything. "I'll sleep out here. You take the bed."
"Are you sure?" Emma asked.
"It's fine," Don said. "We'll try to be quiet in the morning. You should sleep in for once."
Emma eyed him, with almost the same look Splinter had when he suspected his sons were up to something. "How are your numbers?" she asked.
"I'm okay," Don replied.
Emma gave him a disapproving glare. "For a mathematical genius," she said, "it's incredible how often you forget that I'm okay is not a number."
Don sighed, exactly the same way that Mikey did when he wanted to convince Splinter that he was absolutely not doing anything that he could possibly get in trouble for. "Drawer closest to the refrigerator," he said.
"Come on, guys," Leo said, while Emma got up and went to the kitchen. "Let's put our clothes away, like Donnie told us this morning, and get ready for bed."
"Is your mom gonna freak if she comes back and we're all undressed?" Mike whispered to Don.
"Probably not," Don whispered back. He'd already put his own clothes on top of the television, claiming the prime not-on-the-grody-carpet spot. "It's not like she hasn't seen it before."
Sure enough, when Emma came back, the only thing she was interested in was getting a sample of Donnie's blood. She watched the glucose meter intently, then grudgingly admitted that he was fine.
"I'll see you tomorrow," she told him, and, after putting his insulin supplies back in the kitchen, she went into the bedroom and shut the door.
"Do you know your mom kind of ignores us?" Mike asked, in a low tone. He settled down between Leo and Don, while Raph stretched out on Donnie's other side. "Master Splinter doesn't ignore you."
"Master Splinter is used to having three kids," Don replied. "What's one more? But when you guys all show up… it's a little much." He shifted, trying to get comfortable on the thin carpet. "I sure thought so, the first time."
Mike kind of understood Don's point. But as he drifted off to sleep with all of his brothers around him, he thought that four was exactly the right number.
He awoke to Leo nudging his shoulder. He nudged Don, automatically, but then Don didn't realize he was supposed to nudge Raph, so Mike did that too. He was so on the ball already. Today was going to be great.
He boiled water for stove baths, while, by unspoken agreement, Don enjoyed the few gallons of hot water that the apartment's shower was able to cough up. They ate breakfast in silence and independently managed the process of locating and putting on clean clothes. They had almost succeeded in getting out the door - on time! - when Emma suddenly appeared from the bedroom.
"David," she said.
"Donatello," Don corrected, and Mike was super proud of his bro for standing up for his new name.
Emma only frowned at him. "Are you really going to use that ridiculous name in your academic career at NYU?"
"Are we really going to talk about this now?" Don shot back. "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. I have to go."
"The admissions office called yesterday," Emma said. "I forgot to mention it last night."
Don seemed to be frozen. Leo had stopped with his hand on the doorknob, watching the conversation. Raph seemed to be on edge, as though whatever Emma was about to say might somehow be a physical threat to his little brother. And Mike just had the feeling that he was witnessing another surprise twist in the bizarre story that was, apparently, his life.
"You got admitted," Emma said.
"Mom," Don said, with deliberate slowness. "Do not shit me. I cannot be late again today."
"They offered you a full ride," Emma added, almost as if Don hadn't said anything.
The word "Crap" appeared to form itself on Donatello's beak, but it didn't quite make a sound.
"They seem convinced that other schools will soon do the same," Emma continued.
For a moment, Don looked like he was going to have another seizure. Then he snapped back into his usual animated state.
"We are going to talk about this later," he said. "Right now, I need to be in that van." He made a gesture to his brothers. "Everybody out."
"No 'Bye, Mom'?" Emma asked, from behind them.
"Bye, Mom!" Don shouted, just before he slammed the heavy door.
"What just happened?" Leo demanded, as soon as they had all piled into the waiting van.
"I got accepted to NYU," Don said tersely. This wasn't really any more information than they already had, but Don didn't seem inclined to say more.
"You got accepted to NYU?" Hector echoed, from the front seat. "Way to go!"
"Would you mind your own business?" Raph snapped. He shot a glare towards their driver, who of course wasn't looking, then twisted around to face Donnie in the back seat. "What's it mean, Don?"
"It means they want me to be a student there," Don said, in a weirdly hollow tone. "They think I meet all their standards."
"Um," Mike said. "Isn't that a good thing? Why were you and your mom getting all mad about it?"
Don didn't answer. He was glazing over. It was seriously not a good time for that to happen.
"Okay." Leo pulled Don against his shoulder, rubbing Donnie's arm through his coat. "We're not going to talk about this now. It can wait until later. Everything is fine."
He trailed off into mumbling something in Donnie's ear. Mike couldn't catch what it was over the rumbling of the van's engine, but it seemed to be working as a distraction. By the time they got to the lab, Don was alert and focused again. Hector delivered them to the same area where they'd spent most of the previous day, and Lynn joined them just a few minutes later.
"Thanks for being on time today," Lynn said brusquely, if not quite sarcastically. "We have a lot to get done."
"Of course," Don said. "Tell us about the next part of your research plan."
"I mentioned the MRI machine to you yesterday," Lynn replied. "I said I wanted to put you in it." This statement did not get a very favorable reaction from the three Turtles who were not Donatello. But Mike liked it even less when Lynn turned her gaze to him. "But after going over the results we've obtained so far, what I really want to do is put Michelangelo in it."
"Why Michelangelo?" Don asked, while Leo tried the more general question, "What's an MRI machine?" and Raph went straight for "Like hell you will."
"An MRI machine lets you see what's happening in someone's brain while they're thinking about something," Lynn explained, choosing to deal with Leo's question first. "A lot of people don't like them because they involve going into a small, enclosed space and staying there for a while. But it isn't invasive at all. As for why Michelangelo," Lynn went on, and she looked at him again with a calculating gaze. "He had some answers on the IQ test that I'd like to explore further."
"Um," Mike squeaked. He felt small, suddenly. He could have knocked Lynn out and made a break for it. But that would have been a total abuse of the art. Being in situations where it would be super dishonorable to solve things with ninjutsu always made Mike feel weirdly powerless. He tried to use his words instead. "Can I say no to this?"
"Can we have a quick sidebar?" Don asked, before Lynn could do any more than look disappointed. She nodded at the request and stepped away, while Don pulled his brothers into a huddle.
"Mike, what's the problem?" he asked, in a low voice.
"She wants to explore my brain," Mike whispered back, with appropriately unsettling hand movements. "Why is this not a problem for you?"
"I've never done an MRI," Don said, which only made Mike more convinced that he didn't want to do one either. "But basically, it uses fancy technology to make a video of your brain. Then you can watch the video of what your brain looks like when you're thinking. Because, you know, your brain is still intact and inside your head. It's pretty amazing."
"No fucking way," Raph said.
Don ignored him. "I would do it," he said, giving Mike a reassuring look.
"Then you go first!" Mike said, in a high-pitched hiss.
"But Lynn wants you to do it," Don said. "She's bending over backwards to accommodate us. The least we can do is let her pick the order of the tests."
"Don is right," Leo said. "Michelangelo, for the clan."
Mike gulped. Ichizoku no tame ni was what Leo said when he really needed Mike to find the courage to do something he didn't want to do.
Raph still looked like he hated the idea too, but he wasn't coming to Mike's rescue with any kind of argument for why they shouldn't do this, so Mike pulled out of the huddle and nodded to Lynn. "Okay," he said. "I'll do it."
"Great," Lynn said, and she really seemed grateful that Mike had agreed to her request. "Donatello, Leonardo, Raphael, my colleagues will be down in a minute to help you find ways to occupy your time today. Michelangelo, let's take a walk to the MRI room."
"So, um," Mike said, as they walked. "Why me, exactly?"
"During the IQ test," Lynn said, "you were unusually preoccupied with the thoughts and feelings of the fictional characters. That shows a high degree of interpersonal awareness and emotional intelligence. Your cognitive intelligence - your ability to learn information and solve problems - is clearly relevant to whether people would be willing to consider you as equivalent to a human. But your social abilities have a lot of bearing on whether you would be able to successfully integrate into human society. That's what I want to learn more about today."
"I love talking about my feelings," Mike said quickly. "But what does the MRI thingy have to do with it?"
"Strictly speaking, very little," Lynn replied. "But we know that human brains use certain regions for processing emotions. If it turns out that mutant brains also have dedicated areas for thinking about and reacting to social situations, that would be evidence that something fundamental about how we experience feelings is really the same between mutants and humans." She looked at Mike out of the corner of her eye. "Maybe that's a technicality that's really only of interest to scientists. But I think it matters."
"I… I don't think my feelings are in my brain," Mike said, in a small voice.
"Which is why I'll also be measuring your blood, your sweat, and the electricity in your skin," Lynn said.
"What?!" Mike yelped.
"By the way," Lynn went on, "do you have any metal on you? I mean this question very seriously. The MRI runs on very powerful magnets. If you bring metal into the chamber - even a tiny piece - you're likely to be severely injured."
Mike thought hard about his gear. He wasn't carrying anything today - no nunchaku, no shuriken, no kunai, no shuko spikes, not even a set of lockpicks. There was a zipper in his pants, but he was certain it was plastic.
"Given your history," Lynn said, "I think the answer must be no, but do you have any implants? Any dental fillings?"
Mike smiled broadly. "I have naturally perfect teeth," he replied.
"You do," Lynn sighed. "I'm a little jealous."
For once Mike was at a loss as to how to handle a compliment. But just then they reached the end of a hallway, and Lynn hauled open the heavy door. "This is the MRI room," she said. "I'm going to walk you through the procedure. If you're not comfortable with anything, you can say so."
For the next twenty minutes, she told him things that made his head spin. She told him that he was going to look at pictures and answer questions about them while lying in a tube that was barely bigger than an abandoned water main he'd been forced to hide in just a few years ago, and then had almost died in because his shell got stuck and it was literally two whole days before Leo found him and cut him out. He was sure his carapace had gotten bigger since then. But Lynn swore up and down that he was going to fit.
Then she explained to him that, believe it or not, everybody had electricity in their skin, and scientists could read it to find out how someone was feeling. Mike thought it was better to find out how someone was feeling by talking to them, or by watching how they acted. But Lynn was certain that the electricity method was more accurate.
Then Lynn told him that the MRI machine was very loud, and she showed him the special headset he was going to wear so he could hear her questions over the noise. They spent a little while figuring out how it was going to fit on his head. And then Lynn asked him if he consented to the procedure.
"What?" Mike asked.
"Do you want to do this?" Lynn said, watching him closely.
Mike looked at the machine. He'd always been told that he had a gift for perceiving other people's feelings, and now he had a sudden urge to know whether it was really true. He supposed this was how Donnie felt when he had an opportunity to measure his intelligence against an objective test. Proving his smarts was important to Don. Now, Mike felt, it was important to him to prove his intuition.
He nodded.
Lynn helped him put on the headset. Then she helped him get settled on the little bed that would go into the MRI machine. The way she had him lie down was way too similar to the way Mike had been taught he should arrange a body, if the responsibility should ever fall on him to do honor to the dead. But he kept his mouth shut and did what he was told.
When the narrow platform whirred into the chamber, the sensitive receptors in his shell told him that he was brushing the smooth walls. But he held still, and focused on the task at hand.
"Michelangelo, can you hear me?" asked a voice in his ear.
"Hi," he said. His voice quavered a little.
"Are you doing all right in there?" Lynn asked.
"No problem," Mike said, as bravely as he could.
There was a brief pause. "Can you see that picture?" Lynn asked.
Mike would have been hard-pressed to miss it. It was right in his face. "Sure," he said.
"Can you tell me who that is?" Lynn asked.
Mike could. He'd identified the grinning individual immediately. "It's Raph," he said. "… Is this his mug shot?"
"It is," Lynn confirmed. "Stockman got most of your records when he was given custody."
It wasn't the question of how Lynn had obtained this photo that Mike was trying to get at. "… Can I have it?" he asked. "I don't think I have any pictures of Raph smiling."
"Um," Lynn said. She apparently hadn't been expecting that request. "I'll see what I can do. Now, can you describe this photo?"
For the next several hours - or maybe it was quite a bit less; time was difficult to measure in a featureless chamber barely larger than his own body - Lynn showed Mike photos of humans of all different ages and ethnicities, and asked him to identify what emotions they were showing through their facial expressions. She didn't tell him if his answers were correct or not, and she didn't tell him anything about what she could see in his brain, but the task felt very easy, and Mike was confident he was getting a good score.
Then Lynn began to show him photos of people with more neutral expressions, and this time she asked him simply to remember the faces. After he'd seen several dozen images, she began to show him the photos more slowly, and asked him to say for each one whether he had seen that person before.
"I'm not so good with remembering faces," Mike told her, when he realized where this was going. "Humans all look alike."
"I don't need to know that," Lynn replied. "Just tell me - have you seen this person before?" And she flashed another image in front of his eyes.
Mike's head was swimming by the time Lynn told him the test was over. That idiom - my head is swimming - had always given him odd mental images of a lost and confused head, without its body, steaming along across the surface of a lake. He was super curious what the sensation looked like on the MRI video. But Lynn didn't say anything about that as she made the little bed go back out of the machine.
"How would you feel about some lunch?" Lynn asked, after Mike handed back the fancy headphones. "Sorry I forgot about that yesterday. I know you guys need to eat."
"Sounds great," Mike said. He bounced off the narrow bench, and controlled the urge to go leaping around the room. The prolonged confinement had made him antsy. After lunch - or maybe before - he needed to burn off some energy. "I'm starving."
"What are your calorie requirements, anyway?" Lynn asked. "There are competing mathematical models going on upstairs. Once again, the senior researchers have forgotten that they should just ask."
"Well," said Mike, who had only understood about half of that, "I'm on a seafood diet. I see food -"
"Yes, I've heard that one before," Lynn interrupted. "You know, Michelangelo, there are some people who are of the opinion that dogs are smarter, because they listen to instructions. And then there are people who believe cats are smarter, because they choose to not follow orders. What do you think?"
"I like cats," Mike said agreeably. "I have a cat. His name is Klunk."
"You - have a cat?" Lynn said.
"His name is Klunk," Mike repeated. It was such a great name, he felt that it should be repeated as often as possible. Then he looked at the floor. "I miss him."
"Where is he?" Lynn asked.
"Where is lunch?" Mike replied, by way of changing the subject. He knew better than to start talking about where his family really lived.
Lynn obviously was not fooled, but she decided not to push the issue. "How would you feel about eating in the cafeteria?" she asked.
Mike tilted his head. "What's a cafeteria?"
"It's kind of like a big kitchen," Lynn explained. "It's where we all go when we want to eat."
"Do I get to cook?" Mike asked.
Lynn responded with a strange expression he couldn't identify. "Health code says no."
Mike didn't know what that meant, but as long as there was food, he was game. "Works for me," he said.
Lynn closed up the MRI room and led him to another part of the building. Before long, they were walking into a huge room that echoed with the sounds of people talking and eating and doing other normal human stuff. Or, at least, Lynn was walking in. Mike had frozen in the hallway.
"So, um," he said. "When you said it's where we all go…"
"No way," said a voice behind him. "Abort. Retreat."
Mike would have cheered, if he wasn't being terrified into silence by the crowd of happily socializing humans. Talk about awesome timing for Leo to show up.
"For once, I think you're totally right," said another familiar voice. Mike turned to see that Raph had also just arrived. "Let's get out of here before Don sees this."
"Before Don sees what?" asked Don, as he arrived escorted by another scientist. He craned his neck, using his height to look over his brothers. "A roomful of people eating lunch? Oh, no."
"For real?" Raph said. "You're not going to have a seizure over this?"
"If you're afraid of a workplace lunchroom," Don said calmly, "then you can go eat a sandwich in Lynn's office. I'm going to eat in here."
"Did he really just go in there?" Mike asked a moment later.
"If he's going in, I'm going in," Raph said, and he wasted no more time before doing exactly that.
"I'm… going to follow them," Leo said, and then he did.
"Guuuuyyyys!" Mike whined after them. "Don't leave me!" But none of them came back, so Mike had no choice but to go in after them.
It was super weird to be amongst a crowd of humans without attacking anyone. Mike couldn't help visualizing the most efficient way to clear a path to the exit - with a detour to the serving counter along the way. His brothers were already approaching the steaming trays of food. And, amazingly, the humans were clearing a path for them, getting out of their way as they simply made it clear which direction they wanted to go.
Mike hurried to catch up. Before he knew it, he was standing in front of a dozen gleaming pans of all kinds of different food, all cooked and keeping hot and ready for him to devour. He was reaching for the serving utensils almost before he realized what he was doing.
"Wait," Leo said, slapping his hand. "Do we have to pay for this? We left all the money back at the apartment."
"It's taken care of," said Lynn, who apparently had followed close behind them. "Eat whatever you want."
Mike didn't need to be told twice. He was acutely aware that Lynn - and everybody else - was watching to see what a mutant Turtle would eat when given access to a free buffet. But it was hardly the first time his dietary choices had been scrutinized, and it didn't affect what he put on his plate.
Soon, he and his brothers were moving away from the counter in a huddle, looking for a place to sit. As one, they zeroed in on an empty table, and shortly thereafter they were occupying that strategic position. Unfortunately, nobody seemed to realize that the table was now their territory, and they had hardly climbed onto the attached benches before half a dozen scientists settled around them, like fearless pigeons looking for breadcrumbs.
"Um," said Leonardo.
"Personal space," Raph said pointedly, to the researcher who had boldly sat right next to him.
"Really?" asked the middle-aged man. He moved over barely an inch. "How about now?"
Raph scowled at him, but the man only looked as if he were in the middle of making a fascinating discovery. Suddenly, Mike wondered whether they had been too successful at persuading people that they were friendly and harmless.
"Well, it looks like you've made some new friends," said Lynn, who had not been lucky enough to claim a spot on the benches. "I'll catch up with you guys later."
"But -" said Leonardo.
"Our first time in a cafeteria and we are already sitting at the popular table," Don said loudly. "I sure can't think of a single reason why we would complain about this situation."
Leo sighed. "Okay," he said, pulling his lunch tray closer to himself and glancing around at the scientists. "What do you all want to know?"
"Can you see your own snouts?" asked a younger researcher, almost before Leo had finished his question.
Raph leveled a scathing look at the man. "Seriously?" he said. "That's what you wanna know?"
Mike could not detect a single iota of shame on the young scientist for having asked such a weird question. "It just seems like it would be in the way when you try to look down," the man said.
Mike crossed his eyes as he contemplated the inquiry. "I don't know," he said. "I guess so? But usually I don't notice it."
"What happens when you sneeze?" asked a woman.
"It's gross," Don replied. "Next question."
"Do you like music?" asked a more senior woman.
"I like music," Mike said.
"The stuff you listen to is not music," Leo told him.
"The stuff you listen to makes the dead beg to be put out of their misery," Raph put in.
"If that's so," Leo replied, "why have people been listening to it for hundreds of years?"
"Why did doctors use leeches on their patients for hundreds of years?" Raph asked. "Sometimes dumb ideas just won't go away."
"Does Jeff owe me five dollars?" asked another scientist. "He bet me that you were hive-mind."
"Jeff should be fired for having such a ridiculous hypothesis," Don snapped. "And you should be fired for only betting five dollars against it."
"Do you hibernate?" someone asked.
"No," Raph snarled.
"Can you withdraw into your shells?" asked someone else.
"No," said Leo, who sure looked like he would be doing it right now if he could.
"Do you use toilets?" asked the youngest guy.
Mike almost choked on a spoonful of curry.
"Okay, we're done here," Leo said loudly. He pushed his tray back; he had quietly eaten everything on it while the scientists peppered them with questions. "We'd like to cooperate with you all, but this is disrespectful. Guys, let's go."
"I concur," Don said. He tossed back the last of his milk and stood up.
"Creeps," Raph muttered. He palmed a couple of chicken legs and left the rest of the tray.
"Sorry, dudes," Mike said, as he jumped up to follow his brothers. "The food was great. I'd love to stay and chat, but -"
"MICHELANGELO."
"See you later!" he said in a rush, and then he zipped out of the cafeteria.
"Don't undermine my authority," Leo said in a low voice, as they marched down the hallway.
"It's not their fault," Mike said, though he didn't even quite know why he was defending the scientists. "I mean, haven't you ever wondered how humans go to the bathroom? Okay, never mind," he said, when Leo only glared at him. "I forgot that you don't desecrate your astral essence by acknowledging the existence of bodily functions."
Raph snorted. "And on the topic of being disrespectful…" Don said mildly.
"What are we doing this afternoon?" Leo asked the group at large.
"I got plans," Raph said, though he didn't share what exactly they were.
"I was having fun this morning," Mike ventured. "More or less. I think Lynn's not done yet."
Leo looked at the fourth brother. "Don?"
"I… have something in mind," Don said, though he wasn't forthcoming with the details either.
"All right," Leo said. "Where is Lynn?"
They found her in the cubicle room, sorting through papers. "Back already?" she asked, when they appeared in the doorway.
"I think lunchtime Q&A sessions are not the best way for you and your colleagues to conduct your research," Leo said carefully.
"I take back everything I said about that Fenwick guy and his nosy questions," Raph added, as he tossed a pair of chicken bones, stripped bare, onto the nearest desk. "He was classy, compared to your friends back there."
"So noted," Lynn said, and Mike had the strong sense that she was going to investigate the situation and make sure that it didn't happen again. "Were you still interested in these materials, Leonardo?"
"Yes," Leo replied. "Did you have something else for Michelangelo?"
"If he's willing," Lynn said, and pretty soon they had all dispersed to their respective activities. Mike found himself back in the room where he had taken the IQ test, but this time it was a computer, rather than a stack of papers, that Lynn put on the little table.
"Do you mind if I stand?" Mike asked. The lunchtime interrogation hadn't exactly helped him to relax, and he was even more wound up than he had been before. "I'm not really used to being on my butt so much."
"As long as you take the test seriously," Lynn replied, "it doesn't really matter to me."
"What's this test?" Mike asked, as he watched Lynn opening things on the laptop.
"I'm going to ask you to watch some short videos," Lynn said, "and then I'm hoping you'll answer some questions about them. With serious answers. I'm going to keep repeating that until I think you've understood."
Mike hopped around a little. The room was small, and he didn't want to break anything. "Are you saying you think I'm stupid?"
"I don't think you're stupid," Lynn said. "I think you're easily distracted, you have an odd sense of humor, and you deflect like crazy."
"Thanks," Mike said, with a bright and disarming smile.
"See?" Lynn sat back from the laptop, turning it towards him. "You're pretending you don't understand me because you don't want to deal with my slightly critical analysis of your personality."
Mike just shrugged, neither confirming nor denying Lynn's vague accusation. "So what's this video?" he asked, as he leaned over the computer.
"Watch," Lynn said, and then the image on the screen began to move.
"Hi, Jason," said the woman in the video. Mike was pretty sure she was one of the scientists he'd been talking to in the cafeteria just a few minutes ago. Then again, maybe not. He wasn't good with human faces. "I baked cookies," the woman went on. "They're in the kitchen. Let's eat them together later, okay?"
"Wow, Beth," Jason said, in equally stilted tones. "That sounds great. I can't wait to eat cookies with you."
Beth and Jason sort of waved to each other awkwardly, and then the scene abruptly ended. In the very next shot, Jason was walking into a kitchen. Two cookies were arranged on a small plate on the counter. Jason glanced around the kitchen - which, Mike observed, didn't seem to have an oven - and then ate both cookies.
Suddenly, Jason was gone and Beth was standing in the kitchen, looking at the empty plate. There wasn't any place to sit, so she just leaned against the counter and started crying. She was obviously not a professional actress, but she tried really hard to fake some tears. Then the image stopped moving.
"How does Beth feel at the end of the video?" Lynn asked.
"She's pretty bummed," Mike replied.
"Why?" Lynn asked.
"Uh, because Jason ate the cookies without waiting for her," Mike said. Then he furrowed his brow. "But, I mean, he only ate two cookies. Didn't Beth bake more than two cookies? Nobody bakes just two cookies. That would be stupid."
"Say that there were only two cookies," Lynn prompted.
"Well," Mike went on, "actually I don't know how Beth baked any cookies at all, because she doesn't have an oven. But anyway, why is Beth being so selfish about her cookies? If I baked cookies and somebody else ate them all, I'd be happy that they liked my cookies."
"But suppose -" Lynn started.
"Plus," Mike continued, without waiting to hear Lynn's comment, "if Beth didn't want Jason to eat the cookies yet, why did she leave them sitting out? She even told him where they were. If the cookies were for later, she should have hidden them." He narrowed his eyes at the woman who was still sitting frozen on the computer screen. "I think Jason got played."
"What do you mean?" Lynn asked, with a carefully neutral expression.
"Beth wanted Jason to eat those cookies," Mike explained. "Now she's acting all sad about it so Jason will feel bad about what he did. Next, Beth will ask for something Jason would usually say no to, and Jason will say yes. Beth plotted this whole thing."
"Why do you think that?" Lynn asked.
"Because I do it all the time," Mike replied. He had no shame over this. It was a totally valid strategy. "My bros will do anything for me if I just make them feel bad first. It never fails."
"Mm-hmm," Lynn said. "When you watch this next one, could you try to overlook the bad acting?"
It was a tall order - and, lousy production values aside, Mike really did think that his "Beth is manipulating Jason" story made more sense than the "grown woman is crying because she didn't get a cookie" narrative that Lynn's colleagues had apparently been aiming for. But he did his best to focus on the other videos. At least, when he wasn't wondering why Stockman hadn't forked over the dough to hire some real actors and buy some decent microphones. Maybe he wasn't really interested in studying the social intelligence of mutant Turtles. Maybe he just wanted to distract Mike and his bros with hastily-produced home movies, while he worked on something evil. Maybe Stockman didn't really have that much money. If he did, he should have been sharing more of it with Lynn. Lynn was nice.
"How is Franco feeling now?" Lynn asked.
"Uh, sorry," Mike said. "Can I watch that one again? Not sure I was following all the subplots."
Lynn raised a brow, but she made the computer show the video a second time.
He must have watched half a dozen or so of the little movies, while Lynn made cryptic notes in her folder. Then she told him the test was over.
"How did I do?" Mike asked.
"I'm going to go over some things with my colleagues and tell you tomorrow," Lynn replied.
"What about that test yesterday?" Mike asked. "Who got the high score? It was Donnie, wasn't it?"
"I'll tell you that tomorrow also," Lynn said.
Mike frowned. "Why not now?"
"Because science is a slow and methodical business," Lynn said. She closed the folder and put it back in the filing cabinet, then began to pack up the computer. "I get the feeling you're not a slow and methodical person, Michelangelo."
"Not really," Mike agreed. Then, true to form, he let go of the question of what they were doing the next day, and refocused on the immediate future. "What are we doing now?"
"I thought I would let you go home early," Lynn said.
Mike raised a brow. He was totally in favor of this, but at the same time it was surprising to the point of being suspicious. "Why?" he asked.
"Well," said Lynn, "while I'm living here now and so I might as well work late into the evening, my colleagues still get to go home at the end of the day, and so they requested that the meeting to review your test responses be held during normal business hours."
"Got it," said Mike, who thought he had mostly understood that. "Where are the guys, though?"
"I'm not entirely sure," Lynn replied. "Let's go find out."
With the help of Hector - who in his quietly observant way seemed to always know everything that was going on in the building - they soon rounded up the other three Turtles. "As I was just explaining to Michelangelo," Lynn told them, when they had all gathered, "I'll be able to share your test results with you tomorrow. At the end of the day, probably, so you're not distracted while working on other tasks. But right now, you're all welcome to go home."
No one seemed to want to argue with that, and soon they had all loaded themselves into another van. "It's still daylight," Leo said in surprise, as they pulled out of the garage.
Mike pressed his snout against the window - he hadn't really seen the area yet, since they'd mostly been out of the lab after dark - then hastily pulled back when he realized how cold it was. "What are we going to do with all the extra time?" he asked.
"We - should probably get to the grocery store today," said Don, though he didn't look thrilled at the idea. "We still have a few days' worth of food left. But I'd rather our first shopping expedition not be when we urgently need something."
"Agreed," said Leo, even though Mike didn't need to be a social genius to see that he didn't relish that mission either.
"And I don't know about you guys," Don went on, "but I am really missing my heat lamp. We should get a new one."
"Tell me about it," Mike said, as he gingerly rubbed his frozen snout with one mittened hand.
"The last thing we need right now is shellrot," Raph said in a low voice, with a sideways glance at their sometimes-too-nosy chauffeur.
Don leaned forward from the back seat. "What is shellrot?" he whispered.
"It's when your shell gets all gross and fungus-y," Mike whispered back.
Don's eyes went wide. "That can happen?"
"What, it never happened to you?" Leo asked, and Don only shook his head, his expression one of vague horror. "Why did I let you guys talk me out of amputating this thing?" Don hissed.
"Uh, cuz it's fused to your spine and you would die," Raph reminded him. "Anyone want to talk about what we were doing all day?"
"I made brain videos," Mike said cheerfully. "And then I watched some really bad movies. I don't understand it, but somehow it was proving that my emotional IQ is about a million."
"That's not a real score," Don told him. "This morning I made them give me a tour of the lab. I didn't see everything, but they showed me a lot. And then I spent the afternoon in the medical wing."
"What?" Leo snapped. "Donatello, what happened?"
"Nothing happened," Don said. He looked put out by Leo's concern for his wellbeing, which was totally justified and totally uncalled for at the same time. "What happened at lunch just got me thinking - they haven't seen us yet."
"What do you mean, they haven't seen us?" Raph growled. "Everybody in the whole damn cafeteria saw us."
Don shook his head. "Guys, believe me. I've been through all this before. Seeing a mutant Turtle with his clothes on is not the same as having the full mutant Turtle experience. People don't get it until they see the whole thing."
"The… full mutant Turtle experience?" Mike echoed.
"Don't be immature," Don said, giving Mike a look that just barely bordered on disdainful. "What I'm saying is, we are very human in our minds. But we're more than minds. We have bodies, too. And nobody is really going to understand who we are and how we see the world if they don't know how our bodies work."
"So…" Raph said. His eyes narrowed. He thought he knew what was going on. He was just waiting to have his suspicions confirmed.
"So I let them look at whatever they wanted," Don said. "And I told them what it all feels like."
Leo and Raph were appalled in stereo. "Don -!"
"It doesn't bother me," Don said evenly. "Really. It was just something I had to do." He looked at the two older brothers as though he'd just related a story about a quite uneventful day. "What did you do?"
Leo let out a breath. The topic of how Donatello had spent his afternoon wasn't closed, only set aside for the time being. "I took that test from yesterday. Then I asked for some study materials. Then I took the test again."
"Interesting," Don said. "Raph?"
"They wanted me to do kata enbu again," Raph said. "But they wanted me to wear -" He made a gesture, indecipherable through the thick gloves. "These sticker things."
Leo's brow furrowed. "Sticker things?"
"They said a special camera was recording the sticker things," Raph explained. "And later they'd be able to, I don't know, make a video that had the stickers but didn't have me."
"Ah," Don said. "Motion capture. They're studying how we move."
Raph just shrugged. "Then in the afternoon they cleared out the company gym and gave me the run of it. I ain't had a real workout in days."
"Well," Don said, "then it sounds like we all did what we wanted to do today."
Leo didn't answer. He was too busy brooding. Raph looked like he had some things to say, but didn't want to make those kinds of comments in Hector's earshot. So it was Mike who spoke up.
"I'm a little worried," he said, in a small voice. "Everything's been too easy so far. Everyone's been too nice. I think Lynn really wants to help us, but it's still Stockman's lab. The nasty kind of tests have to start soon, right?"
"Let's talk about it inside," Don said quietly, and sure enough, the van had just pulled up in front of their building. "Thanks, Hector," Don said more loudly. "Same time tomorrow?"
"I'll be here," Hector said, as if he didn't expect to have anything better to do, which didn't put Mike any more at ease.
He followed his brothers out of the van and up the stairs to the apartment. This time, the place was not as they had left it. Emma clearly had discovered the trash bags from the night before, and had spent the day putting more things in them. She'd moved Lynn's belongings off the shelving unit in the living room, and had labeled each now-empty shelf with a Turtle's name - color-coded, even. Then she'd pushed the TV sideways, making a sizable empty corner in which she'd laid out some spare bedsheets.
"Wow, okaasan," Mike said, after he'd taken in the redecorating. "It looks great."
"I like to have a nice home," Emma said. "Are you going to take your coats off? I made room in the closet."
"Let's hang them over the radiator," Don suggested, gesturing to the ancient heating device with one elbow as he struggled out of his ill-fitting outerwear. "We want to go get some groceries," he added, for Emma's benefit, "and it would be nice if we had something to keep us warm on the way."
"Are you all going?" Emma asked.
"For once," Raph said. "I'd rather stay home."
Mike looked at him in astonishment. "Seriously?"
Raph nodded, shrugging out of his coat and dropping it on the floor. "You're going to be geeking out over all the food. I don't need to be around that. You can tell me about it when you're done with all the screaming."
Leo looked relieved that he didn't have to be the first to say he didn't want to go. "I think I'll sit this one out too," he said. He folded up his coat and stuffed it into his shelf, second from the bottom, proving that he understood the new organizational system. "I'm just… not up for it today."
Mike turned to his last brother with wide eyes. "Donnie?"
"Of course I'm going," Don said. "This is what I wanted. I can't back out now."
"How are we going to pay for these groceries?" Emma asked. "I can't afford to feed all of you."
"We have money," Don replied. His eyes lit up as he remembered he hadn't told his mom about this yet. "It's under the mattress."
"Where did this come from?" Emma asked a moment later, when she had retrieved the envelope and counted the bills in it.
"It's a stipend from the lab," Don explained.
"Oh?" Emma said, with raised eyebrow. "And when are they giving you more?"
"We'll ask tomorrow," Leo said. "Is it enough for tonight?"
"We'll make it stretch," Emma said. She went into the bedroom again to retrieve her purse, which she carefully tucked the money into. "I'm experienced at that. Are you two ready?"
Mike grabbed his coat off the radiator. It was delightfully warm, but not too hot to put on. He wrapped it around himself and hoped the heat would hold for a while.
The next thing he knew, Emma was throwing a trash bag into his arms. It was weirdly soft and squishy. "What's this?" he asked.
"Your dirty clothes," Emma said. "We'll take them to the laundromat."
"How'd you know there's a laundromat?" Raph asked.
"I already walked to the shopping center today," Emma replied. "What, do you think cleaning this place up was the only thing I did while you were out? Let's go," she added, to the two Turtles who weren't too cowardly to go on a little errands run.
"So what else did you do today?" Don asked when they reached the sidewalk - possibly because he was genuinely curious about his mother's life, possibly just to distract himself from the icy air that slapped them in the face as soon as they stepped outside.
"Well," Emma said, as she set a brisk pace towards the strip mall, "I spent a lot of time on the phone. The protestors are not the only ones who can put two and two together. Quite a few of my old friends have been realizing why we've barely seen each other in fifteen years."
"That is not my fault," Don said, though Emma hadn't exactly claimed that it was. "I never asked to be a secret. I was a charming and adorable kid and I'm sure all your friends would have loved me."
"All true," Emma replied. "But maybe you're not aware of just how many friends I had. Pretty soon, I would have been sharing my charming and adorable kid with the whole world. And I know you are aware that I'm just not that generous."
Mike supposed that this was what passed for a compliment in Donnie's weird family.
"Are we going to talk about NYU?" Don asked.
"Over dinner," Emma said.
"Ah, dinner," Mike said, seeing an opportunity to jump into the conversation. "Donnie, do you like lasagna?"
"Who doesn't like lasagna?" Don replied. "It's like a stacked-up pizza."
"I have plenty of time to make it tonight," Mike said, "if we can find the ingredients."
"Well, we found the grocery store," Don said. Indeed, the strip mall Lynn had told them about was not even a five-minute walk from the apartment. "We are doing great so far."
Nobody had even tried to stop them yet. This was in part because there were few people out and about on such a cold afternoon, and in part because Don and Mike were so bundled up, nobody realized that they were mutants. Donnie wasn't wrong when he said that people reacted differently to seeing the whole Turtle.
When they got into the store, Mike and Don exchanged glances, then pulled off their hats and scarves. Still no one looked at them. It was New York, after all. People knew how to mind their own business.
"So this is a grocery store," Don said, as he looked around in wonderment. Mike looked too. He could see open baskets of produce, and cabinets full of baked goods, and rows of shelves with signs hanging over them. The signs said PASTA and JUICE and CANNED VEGETABLES and other things that he couldn't read from where he was standing. There were beeping noises that he couldn't identify the source or purpose of. There was some really dated music playing. There were shoppers pushing carts just like the ones homeless people had. It was amazing.
"What do we need?" Emma asked.
It was super hard to focus right now, but Mike pulled up his mental inventory of what they didn't have in the kitchen. "Lasagna noodles," he said. "And pasta sauce. Mushrooms, peppers, onions. Cheeeeeeese." He looked around again, his eyes going even wider. "Can we get cheese? Let's get cheese right now."
"Let's get the veggies first," Emma suggested, and without waiting for any debate she steered her young charges towards the produce baskets.
Mike quickly recognized tomatoes and oranges and grapes and broccoli. He saw produce in bags. He saw produce in bunches. He saw produce that was lumpy and weird and produce that looked like it had just been placed there by the angels. He saw the most beautiful, shiny bell peppers he had ever seen in his life. The next thing he knew, he was stuffing his gloves in his pocket and reaching for the peppers. And touching them. And trying to decide which was the most perfect.
"Are you really touching those with your slimy hands?" someone said, and abruptly Michelangelo realized that he had not died and been immediately inducted into vegetable heaven for his countless culinary good deeds, but was standing in a small neighborhood grocery in Westchester, being stared at disapprovingly by some middle-aged lady.
"Um," he said, and put the peppers down as carefully as if they were bombs. "I - uh - no."
"No, he definitely wasn't," said Donatello, coming to Mike's rescue with fancy sentences and a level of bravado he didn't often show. "Because his hands are not slimy. In fact, we don't even have sweat glands in our palms. So, unlike you, we don't perspire on the merchandise."
The lady was not impressed by this lecture on mutant Turtle anatomy. "Do I need to call a manager?" she asked.
"I don't see why," Don replied. "We're just shopping." He glanced at his brother. "Take the peppers."
Boldly, Mike did. He wasn't sure whether the ones he had grabbed were the best, and he was sorry to miss the experience of finding out. But there was still something very satisfying about taking food that wasn't in a dumpster and putting it in the cart that Emma had acquired while he'd been gazing in awe at this wondrous phenomenon called a supermarket. Apparently Mike had already subconsciously noticed that she'd done that, since at some point he had put the bag of laundry in it.
"What else did you want?" Don asked, ignoring the lady, who was still glaring at them.
"Mushrooms," Mike reminded him.
Don looked quickly around, then led Mike towards a basket of mushrooms. They were pre-sliced, and Mike didn't know quite what to do with them.
"Here," Emma said. She handed him the thinnest, flimsiest plastic bag he had ever encountered. "Take as many as you want."
Mike did. He shoveled until the bag was bulging and threatening to tear. Then he looked around for another.
"Let me rephrase that," Emma said. "Take as many as you need for tonight."
As soon as she said it, Mike rebelled inside. How could he put the mushrooms back? They were clean and fresh and not at all fungus-y, except for the fact that they were fungus. He wanted to take all that he could carry. He'd find a use for them later.
"They'll be here next time," Don said, and then he glanced at his mom. "That's the whole idea, right? You can go to the grocery store any time, and they always have the same things."
"Pretty much," Emma agreed.
Don nudged Mike's arm. "Put them back."
Mike could hardly stand it, but he poured the mushrooms back into the basket, until he just had two handfuls left in the bag. Then he put his much-reduced score in the cart. "Onions?" he said.
They were intercepted on the way to the onions by a store manager, who began with "Excuse me," and ended with "Oh."
"Is there a problem?" Emma asked.
"You really are the mutants," the manager said in surprise. It seemed he hadn't quite believed whoever had alerted him to their presence in his grocery establishment.
"Yes, we are," Don said. "I'm Donatello. This is Michelangelo. It is our first time engaging in the normal human activity of food shopping."
"Dude," Mike whispered. "You sound like a robot."
Neither Don nor the manager paid much attention to this. "I'm not really clear on whether I can legally ask you to leave," the manager said. "And I'm not sure what impact it would have on my business if I did or didn't. What I do know is that we pride ourselves on customer service here, and seeing that it's your first time in a supermarket, I think all our customers would be best served if I assisted you personally. What are you looking for today?"
Don and Mike exchanged another glance. "Right now, we're looking for an onion," Don said.
The manager helped them find one. Then, in short order, he led them to shelves stacked high with lasagna noodles, an aisle containing a dizzying array of pasta sauces, and a refrigerated display of cheeses. He waited patiently while Michelangelo fondled the cheeses and changed his mind repeatedly and finally decided on which ones he wanted. Then he took them to an unopened check-out lane, which he opened himself. Mike watched in fascination as the manager ran their selections over a glass pane in the counter - so that was the source of the mysterious beeping noise - and then named a large amount of money.
"See?" Don said quietly, as Emma fished in her purse. "I told you it wouldn't last long."
"We can always go back to dumpster diving," Mike whispered.
"We are never going back to dumpster diving," Don told him.
In a moment they were out in the cold again, Mike loaded down with three plastic grocery bags and the sack of laundry. "Well, that wasn't so bad," he said.
"Are you going to sit with me in the laundromat?" Emma asked. "It will take a couple of hours."
"Oh, wow," Mike said, as he envisioned being in a small space with a bunch of humans, just sitting and waiting while the machines spun. "That sounds great, but -"
"It's probably better if we just go back to the apartment," Don said quickly. "One errand is enough for today."
"Suit yourself," Emma said, lifting the bag of clothes from Mike's arms. "I'll be back in time for dinner."
"Why don't you keep a few dollars for the laundry and give us the rest?" Don suggested. "It will be good to put it back under the mattress as soon as possible."
"Are you sure?" Emma asked. "If something happened to you while you were walking home alone, I would hate to lose the money also."
"First," Don said, "thanks for being so concerned about my safety. But second, Mike is a ninja and nobody is going to touch us or our money. What if something happened while you were walking home alone?"
"Fair point," Emma said, and after stripping off a couple of bills, she handed Don the remaining money.
"That totally made sense," Mike said, after Emma and the Turtles had parted ways in the strip mall parking lot, "but I know it's never that simple with you. Why did you want to take the money and bail?"
"Because we're going there," Don said, and as soon as he was done wrestling the zipper of his pocket closed with his gloved hands, he pointed towards a store at the far end of the parking lot. Feathers, Fins, and Further, said the sign. Supplies for pets of all kinds.
"Missing Snowflake, huh?" Mike said sympathetically. "Do you want to get one new cat to share, or should we each get our own?"
"I'm not getting a new cat," Don snapped, and Mike ducked reflexively, even though Donnie never slapped him in the head the way Leo and Raph did. "We're getting a heat lamp. For ourselves."
"Ohhhhh," Mike said, and then he hurried to follow his long-legged brother. It was really damn cold out.
The little bell over the door rang as they entered, and the owner of this much smaller shop looked up right away. "Good afternoon," he said. "Is there anything I can help you find?"
Don approached the counter - sometimes he was amazingly fearless - stripping off his hat and scarf as he went. "Hello," he said. "We need some UV bulbs and a heat lamp."
"They're in the back corner," said the owner, almost without doing a double-take, "next to the reptile food."
"Thank you," Don said, and he marched Mike down one of the two aisles in the tiny shop until they found what they were looking for.
"How many should we get?" Mike asked.
Don was studying the labels on the boxes, and comparing them to some colored tags on the shelf. "I'd like two of each," he said. "They're expensive, though." He put the packaged bulbs back where he had found them, pulled his gloves off, and counted their remaining money again. "We have enough," he reported. "But then we'll really need to get more tomorrow."
"What if Lynn won't give us more?" Mike asked.
Don bit his lip. "We'll run out of food in a week or so whether we save this money for groceries or not. If we don't buy the bulbs, I hear some nasty stuff can happen to us. Which maybe Lynn would find quite intriguing. But personally, I'd rather not learn more. Call it a conflict of interest."
"I don't care what you call it," Mike replied. "Shellrot sucks."
"Let's get the bulbs," Don said. "We'll just remind Lynn that she can't do any meaningful research on us if we're starving. It worked really well the first time."
Mike nodded. "Sounds good to me."
Don scooped up four of the bulbs, balancing them in the crook of one arm while he held tightly onto their money in the other hand. They went back up the other aisle, and then Don laid everything on the counter.
"I couldn't help overhearing," the owner said, as he tallied up their purchases. "I'm sorry to pry, but - these are for you?"
"Yes," Don said, and his attempt to be friendly coupled with his instinct to be wary made it come out in a very weird tone.
"There have been reports that you're cold-blooded," the owner said carefully, as he packed the bulbs into another plastic bag with equal exactness.
"Not everything you hear about us is an insulting lie," Don replied.
"What is it like?" the owner asked. "I mean, how do you track your own temperature and know when you need a heat source?"
"It's easy," Mike said. "We just -"
He broke off there as Don clamped a hand over his beak. "Are you hiring?" Don asked the pet supply store proprietor. "I understand that your question isn't from idle curiosity. I have fifteen years' experience as a mutant Turtle, twelve of those also as a veterinary technician. I don't give away my knowledge for free."
"I would hire you," the owner said, as he picked up the bills Don had put on the counter and made change from the register, "but you're either not a human or protected by child labor laws."
"Too bad," Don said, and he pocketed the coins the owner handed back to him. "It's no different from being hungry or thirsty," he added, as he tugged his scarf up over his beak. "You just know. Have a nice day."
"Why'd you help him?" Mike asked, as they hurried back up the sidewalk towards the apartment.
"I've inherited a lot of things from my mom," Don replied. "Her love of having a well-decorated home, her passion for animals, her sarcastic attitude. But I'm trying to learn to be a little more generous than she is."
They didn't talk any more on the way home. They also didn't run into any trouble, which was a little disappointing, because Mike had liked being reminded that he was still a ninja and could kick the ass of anybody who tried to hassle him or his non-ninja bro. It wasn't dishonorable to rough someone up a little if they tried to mug you.
In the apartment, it was warm. Mike dropped the four bags on the tiny dining room table, and almost threw his coat on the floor, but then he saw Don putting his coat on the shelf, and remembered that he should do that too.
"How come I got the bottom shelf?" Mike asked, as he straightened up.
"Because you're short," said Don, who had been awarded the highest shelf.
"I am not," Mike said, even though anyone looking at that moment could see that he was almost a whole head shorter than Donatello.
Nobody was looking, though, until Don called "We got heat lamps!" which brought Raph and Leo out of the kitchen.
"And food!" Mike added. "We're making lasagna for dinner!"
"Er," Leo said, and Mike couldn't imagine why Leo was not excited about lasagna. "We started dinner already. We figured it was the least we could do."
"What are you making?" Mike asked.
"… Rice and beans," Leo said, in obvious embarrassment.
"Bro, you're killing me," Mike replied.
"It's fine," Don said. "We'll have the lasagna another night. Unless you don't put the cheese in the refrigerator."
"I got it," Raph said, and by quickly skimming his hand over the bags he identified which contained the cold foods, and snatched them up to put away.
"What are these?" Leo asked, as he peered into another bag.
"They're green peppers," Mike said.
Leo's eyes widened. "That's what peppers are supposed to look like?"
"You should have seen what else they had," Mike told him. "You and Raph really missed out."
"Some lady tried to give us a hard time," Don said. He was already dragging Lynn's gooseneck floor lamps over to the sleeping corner, pulling out the regular bulbs and screwing in the new ones. "But the manager was very friendly."
"We basically got VIP service," Mike agreed. "It was sweet. I hope it keeps happening."
"From nobody to celebrity in less than a month," Don said. He folded up the empty lightbulb packages and found a trash bag to tuck them into. "Let's… try not to get crazy about this."
"How full of ourselves can we get?" Mike asked. "We're having rice and beans for dinner."
Leo cracked a smile, though Mike could tell his heart wasn't in it. "See? I'm doing my part to keep us humble."
Emma returned after dark, reporting that she'd likewise had no trouble on the way home, and after they had all stacked their clean clothes neatly on the shelves, she allowed them to sit down to dinner.
"So," she said, as soon as everyone had been served. "NYU."
"Is this for real?" Don asked. "They offered me a scholarship?"
"They're even willing to delay enrollment," Emma replied. "Whenever you're ready." She hesitated. "Whenever the world is ready, I guess."
"What's the catch?" Don asked.
"The formal offer is in the mail," Emma said, "though exactly when or how we're going to get it, I don't know. But the person I talked to on the phone didn't say there was any catch. He just said they were desperate to have you."
"'Desperate'?" Leo echoed. "That sounds like a catch to me."
"He thought every other school was going to want you also," Emma explained, "because you're such a unique candidate."
Don's eyes turned dark, and he suddenly seemed more interested in his bland dinner than in his academic future.
"They didn't try to lie, David," Emma said. "Yes, they've noticed you're a mutant. But they've also noticed your brains. They don't see a lot of fifteen-year-olds who can do what you do."
Don drank some water. He didn't respond, but it was clear he was listening.
"I haven't talked to you much about college before," Emma said. "You need to think about what they're offering you - academics, research experience, campus life, a prestigious diploma. But you also need to understand that they're thinking about what you offer them. When NYU says they're desperate to have you, they mean that they think you can offer something to other students that no one else can. They think you will bring something special to class discussion, something that will make an NYU education better for everyone who is lucky enough to share it with you."
"So the catch is that it's contingent on me being a freak," Don said, without looking up from his plate, as if he were making a routine comment about his plans for the evening.
"You are not a freak," Emma said.
"My nose is upside-down and I'm dependent on external heat sources and my hands don't sweat," Don said, a choice of Turtle-specific features that caused Raph to say "What?" "Plus I have an IQ that basically doesn't exist. Every part of me is freakish."
"You knew all of that before you applied to NYU," Emma pointed out. "Why are you now acting like you didn't want them to accept you?"
Don slumped. "I don't know," he said. He put his fork down, his dinner still half-uneaten. "I guess I wanted them to accept me blind. Without knowing who I was."
"The price of being exceptional," Emma told him, "is that everyone is going to know who you are."
"I guess I just don't see the difference between exceptional and freak," Don said.
"Well," Emma said, "the good news is that NYU is willing to overlook your lack of facility with words, and waive the essay requirement."
Don looked up. "Really?"
"But they do want to see your standardized test scores," Emma told him.
"I guess tomorrow I'll find out how much studying I should plan to do," Don said, and then, with his brothers' help, he told his mom about the tests Lynn had been running them through. About some of the tests, anyway. "And we're not really sure what we're doing tomorrow," he concluded.
"It's getting late," Emma said, and it was true, relative to their new human-type daily schedule. They had lingered a long time over dinner. "I'll clean up the kitchen. You four should start thinking about bed."
"That sounds good to me," Leo said. "It's been a long day."
They helped clear the dishes, and then they settled down on Lynn's striped sheets. Don switched the lamps on, and, despite all that had happened, Mike was instantly back in heaven.
Raph was not distracted by the warmth, though. "What's up with you?" he murmured, to Leo. "All you did today was study and take tests. You love that stuff. Why are you so tired?"
"Just a little run down," Leo said, as he and Raph stretched out on opposite sides of their little brothers. "It's been too many days since we've had these lamps."
It had been a while, and these things always seemed to affect Leo first and hardest. But somehow, Mike didn't buy Leo's explanation.
He let it go, though. He'd had an exhausting day of getting his brain scanned and interpreting shoddily-written video scripts and walking around in public. Pretty soon, he was drifting off to sleep.