Chapter Two:
Flytrap

"deceit"

Disclaimer: I do not own the series Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Like, at all. It and all its respectable characters are © to Kevin Eastman, Peter Laird, and ViacomCBS and Nickelodeon. However, all writing contents and semi-plots here are © to me, unless it is stated otherwise. All shows/ books/ video games/ songs that are mentioned in this chapter are all © to their respective owners, I do not own them.

Summary: Life had been simple. Shay had moved out of LA to Montana's deep northwestern woods with her kids. She had a ranch and house. It wasn't perfect, but it was better than LA. Shay, however, hadn't planned on hosting a bunch of mutant turtles that stemmed from old comics, movies, or shows. Just how far will she and her kids go to protect them from their tight knit community?

Notes: Today is a special day! It's my birthday! I have officially turned 31 and yet...somehow, I feel so much older. It's a strange sensation. And what do I ask of you, my lovely readers? Please review. Consider it a birthday gift to me. I love hearing my readers! And I feel its necessary to also thank guest reviewer, The Butterflies. Reading your words was an absolute delight, and I'm so very glad you are liking the story so far!

I hope to continue to deliver in a manner that's satisfactory for all my potential readers!

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"There's a reason that everybody lies: it works. It's what allows society to function. It's what separates man from beast."
—Doctor Gregory House, "House M.D."

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Shay awoke, sluggish and groggy and mildly surprised that she had even managed to sleep at all. The first thoughts to roll through her skull were the events that happened last night. Or maybe they hadn't happened at all. It was all fuzzy, dancing at the fringes of her thoughts. She couldn't bring it forth to examine directly, like some object on the edge of her periphery. Perhaps she had imagined it. That seemed more likely. All just a dream. A very odd one, but a dream all the same.

A headache, made up of a potent mix of tension and alcohol-related, pounded and throbbed along the back of her head. Shay rolled over beneath her blankets, curling up on her side.

Time to get up, she told herself. The mantra continued until her alarm went off. She fumbled with her phone, squinting at the screen. Even with the haze of sleep still dusting her consciousness, she managed to turn the alarm off rather than hitting the snooze button and pushed herself upright with a stretch and a yawn. She swung her legs over the edge of the bed and she sat there for a long, hard minute.

Gotta get the kids ready…gotta get out and take care of the horses and the goats…take the dogs out to go to the bathroom. Feed the chickens, check out the garden. Plan dinner for tonight. Nah, screw that, it's leftovers tonight. We still have lasagna. Crap, I still need to go grocery shopping, and get more feed for the animals…

Suffice to say, her thoughts were already whirring and geared up towards the pressure of Getting Shit Done.

Mom's picking them up today, so I can get all this shit done…

Her cycle of thoughts was promptly disrupted by a heavy head plopping into her lap. Evergreen whined, tail thumping against the side of the bed as she gazed up at Shay with affection in her eyes. A sliver of a smile curled her lips up as Shay rewarded the wolfhound with a vigorous round of petting and kisses.

"Good girl, who's my good puppers? Huh? You are, that's right, baby."

Shay went about her morning routine in getting ready to face the day, with Evergreen practically glued to her side the entire time. Once she was properly groomed and dressed in sensible pair of jeans and a graphic tee, Shay was ready for the next step in her wake-up routine: coffee.

Her intentions, however, were scattered and completely forgotten for a second time in a row when her daughter came busting in. She was in near-hysterics, babbling nonsensically and was atwitter with palpable exhilaration. It took Shay a few minutes to coax Korra down off her high of excitement. When she finally did, Korra's eyes were still glazed over with delight.

"Okay, kiddo—what is all the hubbub about? I need something coherent to work with."

"Mom—Mommy, you won't believe who's downstairs!"

The gears clicked inside of Shay's head and at first, she was at a complete loss.

It slowly hit her like a brick wall as the events from last night came flooding back to her with sharper clarity than when she first woke up. The blood drained from her face and she was suddenly hit with a very lightheaded and dizzy spell.

"Who, baby-girl?" Shay asked quietly, even when she already knew—or at least suspected—the answer.

Korra was brimming with too much excitement to take notice of her mother's slightly catatonic state. She began tugging her mother's hand, trying to coax the woman to follow her.

"The ninja turtles! They're downstairs! They said you're letting them stay here! Are you really letting them stay, Mom?!"

The final nail in the coffin was struck into place. Shay barely heard herself when an answer came forth, but the voice coming out of her sounded so foreign to her ear. She was almost sure someone else had taken over to answer in her stead. All plans Shay had been brainstorming about getting things done today went out the window. Poof.

The only thing that was running around her head on a loop was a simple phrase: I am so fucked and not in the way I want to be.

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Shay was completely unsure how she made it through the next hour or so. It was as though her entire being was running on autopilot and she was watching herself go through the morning routine. At the same time, she could feel the searing gazes of her house guests burning into her backside as she got the kids ready for school. They knew. She knew they knew. They knew that she knew what they knew.

It took much longer to get the kids ready than she would have liked. They kept wandering away to pester the brothers. Shay had to keep steering them back on task, much to her kids' chagrin and disappointment. Shay couldn't bring herself to meet her kids' gazes directly for longer than a split second or two.

It was a tangible relief when she got them out of the house and onto the school bus for the day.

That relief soured almost instantly as the yellow gleam of the bus vanished behind a bend in the road when she remembered she had to go back home. Had to go inside and face the proverbial music. Every step closer echoed like gunshots in her head. The weight of having to lift her foot to propel her forward was as though she was walking through a field of tar—dense and leaden, unyielding to her force of will. She was on death row, walking straight to her execution.

Shay made several attempts in her head to figure out a way to explain things to the turtle brothers. Each and every time, she failed to make it past the first or second sentence because how in the holy hell do you tell someone that they're not real? Not here, anyway; that they had started out as a figment of someone's imagination and had then spawned out into a major entertainment franchise? How did one go about relaying all of this information and more to a series of individuals that had once been nothing but ink on paper and pixels on a screen?

There was no guidebook or series of rules on the matter. There were films, games, stories in general that ventured into this kind of territory—but there was a difference between projecting the possibilities and actually living through it. None of that served as a solid guide on how to proceed forward if that kind of situation ever happened to somone.

And I was one of those people who wrote those kinds of speculative stories, Shay thought with bitter irony that tasted like ashes in her mouth. Okay, so how do I go about this?

She was fast approaching the house now. Evergreen sat faithfully on the porch, watching as Shay draw closer. Chief was bounding across the open slopes with nary a care in the world. He even changed course to zoom in on Shay. He went full pelt towards her and then zipped on by at the last second.

Did I even want them to know about this? About what they were to us here in this reality?

A part of her wanted to protest and say yes. Deep down, however, she knew if she had a restart button, she'd hit it in a heartbeat, no hesitation whatsoever. It made her stomach slither lower down in her abdomen, leaving behind a nauseous hole in her gut in its place.

God, that makes me sound like such a big prick. This is way above my fucking paygrade. But I'm the best person they've got right now, and I just…I have to bite the bullet.

Twenty seconds of courage. That's all she needed. Twenty seconds of massively insane courage to make it through all this existential crisis crap.

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A latticework of tension permeated the air, much like gossamer spiderwebs. Delicate yet sticky, clinging to whatever caught onto it. A hurricane of turmoil and forced calm raged within Shay as she sat on the one couch, the brothers on the other. On the coffee table between them were a few pieces of merchandise. Proof to what her kids had inadvertently revealed to the brothers.

DVDs, fan-made schwag, official comics, the works. Whatever she'd had on hand in the house, she brought out.

Shay made it a personal goal to avoid direct eye contact for as long as possible. The only visible sign she showed regarding her nervous state was her jiggling leg. They sifted through the materials and every second seemed to stretch out into hours. She was perpetually braced for the worst and didn't expect anything less than that.

She tried several times to speak, but her tongue was a swollen, bloated mess stuck to the roof of her mouth. She couldn't wedge her teeth apart to even slur out a halfway intelligible series of words if her life depended on it.

Don't expect them to stay here anymore. They'll probably figure it's better to sit it out in the woods than spend another hour in here when they're done.

Her stomach, at this point, had ceased to exist altogether and all she felt was sick and queasy. She was braced for the worst and didn't even deign to entertain the notion that things would turn out well.

The entire room was stifling and hot and all-too-claustrophobic, like the muggy heat of a Louisiana swamp at the height of summertime. At this point, she practically had to chew on the air to gulp it down into her lungs. The only slice of respite Shay had was by watching her more rambunctious dog dancing on light paws around the four brothers, tail wagging furiously, whining profusely for attention. He eventually realized that he was gaining no love and came back around to Shay. Chief hopped up on the couch beside Shay and promptly flopped on his side with a groan. Evergreen lay by her feet on the floor, snoozing lightly.

Shay was hyper alert to the softest of sounds; every crinkle, rustle, creak, clearing of a throat.

She jerked upright when slowly, it seemed she had garnered the attentions of all four at once. Shay drummed her fingers along her thighs, while her right leg jiggled up and down.

"You knew who we were the moment you saw us."

It was a statement, clear-cut and right to the point. Shay nodded to Leonardo.

"Yeah. Although, to be fair, I had a bit to drink most of the night after the kids went to bed. And I thought I was just…drunk. One of those days, you know?"

That small sliver of courage she had been trying to hype herself up to was leaking out of her, one drop at a time. Liquid proverbial gold, going to waste. She pinched the bridge of her nose and crinkled it at the same time.

"I don't know how or when I could have told you about all of…this," Shay continued, motioning in the vague direction of all her TMNT products. "But having my kids ambush you like they did? Probably not the route I would have chosen."

"Would you even have told us if they hadn't?" Donatello inquired. There was no malice in his tone of voice. Genuine curiousity, perhaps…but no malevolence or spite. It was encouraging, to say the least, and Shay was slow in lapping it up.

It was also an incredibly fair question. Shay desperately wanted to say yes and be done with it. She just couldn't get her tongue and teeth to cooperate.

"I…I don't know. Maybe. I would have definitely wanted to be more tactful going about it, for sure. It's not like there's a guidebook for this sort of thing. This is some pretty heavy shit, man."

"She's got a point." Michelangelo remarked as he bobbed his head in agreement.

"The hell she does," Raphael burst out as he leveled Shay with a look so venomous that she was lucky it didn't adhere to the old 'if looks could kill' adage. "She's full of nothin' but shit. I say we take our chances with gettin' back to New York an' go from there."

"Dude, we can't. We wouldn't be in our New York if we tried that," Michelangelo pointed out, earning a scowl from the red-banded turtle.

"And who's to say our way back home isn't there? Donnie doesn't know for sure, he even admitted it—"

"—I'm actually fairly sure and I can't believe I'm saying this, but Mikey's actually right. I was going over the energy readings earlier this morning and we definitely need to stay here, stay in the area—"

"—the hell with stayin'! Fer all we know we could have a one-way ticket back home on the East Coast an' we wouldn't know it because you want us t' stick around this Podunk backwoods dump in the middle of god's nowhere—"

"—we're not moving, Raphael, we need to get every scrap of intel we can get and that's final—!"

"—dudes, can we just not with all of this right now? All you do is go in circles and it's always the same thing, over and over—"

Shay watched and listened to the bickering in bewilderment and with a touch of awe. The starstruck feeling faded fast after nearly a minute of them having a go at one another, however. She quickly shifted into the territory of annoyance and exasperation the further the squabbling went.

Shay pinched the bridge of her nose, massaging at the area between her eyes until she felt the final twine of patience she had snapped in half. With a soft huff, she pushed up onto her feet and circled around the couch, intent on heading toward the kitchen.

"Hey, where the hell d'ya think yer goin', huh?"

She came to a grinding halt and pivoted on her heel, leveling a cool gaze on the speaker.

"I'm going to make myself a drink, in my kitchen, in my house. Is that all right with you?"

"We're not done wit' ya," Raphael growled, advancing two steps before Leonardo flew to his feet and planted himself between her and his brother.

"That's enough, Raph. Regardless of everything that's happened, we're still her guests."

"Christ al-fucking-mighty, y'all are acting worse than my kids."

Heads turned in her direction, eyes a bit wider than usual. Shay clung to the scrap of courage she had left in her tank and planted a fist on her hip. When no one protested, not even a peep, she continued on.

"You guys wanna have a go at each other, then have at it, hoss. Just take it outside where you ain't fucking up my house. Sound good?" Shay allowed a pause to pass between them all before she motioned toward the kitchen with a jab of her thumb over the shoulder. She couldn't, however, hide the sheer, bald annoyance painting her voice. "Y'all want anything to drink?"

Seconds passed and no one moved or spoke. Shay began counting backwards from ten in her head and got to six before Donatello raised a hand in the air.

"Coffee, if you don't mind?"

Throwing a thumbs up his way, she headed back on her path. Once she was out of sight, the strength immediately sapped out from her legs and she sagged heavily against the counter. Jitters crawled up and down the length of her body, making her body shake all over as she gathered her wits.

"Fuck."

It could have gone better. It could have been worse. She didn't have a good read on the situation. It was all too surreal and weird, and she was completely in over her head. She squeezed her eyes shut so tightly her temples began to throb.

Stop that shit. Fucking stop it. You're tougher than all this shit, don't go and fucking back out now, you're in this too deep to give up. You can handle this. You can.

Shay kept to the mantra, trying to rev herself up. She breathed in deeply, held it, then let it out even slower. She could hear the rush of pounding blood beating away in her eardrums gradually growing softer, quieter. The tightness in her chest, like she had a vise clamped across her ribcage, lessened considerably as Shay calmed.

She opened her eyes, gazing up at the ceiling and connecting strange patterns in the miniscule bumps along the otherwise smooth surface above her. Get to work.

She moved on autopilot, moving with purpose as she ducked in and out of cabinets, the fridge, and around the countertops. In the background around the corner, she could hear the arguing had begun anew.

Amusing in a movie, not so much in person. Why didn't I see that coming, Shay thought absently as she filled the water tank for her Keurig. Clicking the button on the back, she returned the water tank and a deep blue light illuminated the liquid within while the inner cogs began heating up.

Several minutes later, she had two full mugs of coffee sitting on the counter, and off to the side, sugar and creamer. When she turned on her heel to call that coffee was ready, she startled and backed into the counter. Donatello smiled sheepishly at her from the entrance of her kitchen.

"Sorry about that," he said before Shay could form words. "Old habits and all. Oh, the coffee's ready, right?"

Shay nodded, rendered mute for only a little while longer before she scootched over and offered one of the mugs to him. She picked her own mug up and took a sip of hers, relishing in the taste, even when the liquid remained scalding.

She watched Donatello as he moved in, claiming the mug she had left for him. She took note that he only seemed to take two sparse teaspoons of sugar and nothing else. Words failed to surface for her, so she simply stood with her back pressed into the counter, taking small sips of her drink.

"So, you…live up here alone, with your kids?"

Shay glanced up at Donatello.

"Yeah. Yeah, just me and the kids. And my parents actually live about fifteen-ish minutes away. They moved up here about four, five years ago. Wasn't long for us to follow."

"No…boyfriend? Or-or husband?"

Shay snorted and deadpanned with a sly smirk, "You looking to fill that position?"

The small choking sound he made had her chuckling as she waved a hand dismissively at Donatello.

"Relax. I was kidding. And no, there's neither of those things hanging around. I'm divorced, actually. But I'm on relatively good terms with my ex, which is better than I can say for others in this fucked up world. I did date a lady a while back, but she was fucking crazy. And well…I don't know. Shit's hard with kids and being a single parent. The balance just wasn't there."

"I suppose so. Um…sorry to hear about being divorced and the crazy ex, though. That isn't easy to go through—or, I assume it's not easy, I've heard it can be and…ahem. Especially with kids."

Shay shrugged and as her shoulders fell back down, the tension that had settled like a hard knot in between them eased up just a little bit more. It provided her with a much-needed reprieve. "It is what it is. Shit happens in life. I'm not dwelling on it for now."

"That's a surprisingly Zen point of view on the matter."

"Well, don't get used to that attitude. I'm usually the type to spew all kinds of creative and colourful vitriol and profanity before I get my shit together. And apparently, I have a chip on my shoulder. Or so a few people have pointed out to me."

"I'll be sure to make a note of that," he replied, matching her jovial tone and a hint of a smile traced across his face. Shay found a smile of her own threatening to yank her lips upward, but the moment was interrupted when Michelangelo appeared around the bend and stalked into the kitchen.

"They won't stop. They're just going in circles. It's not like they haven't had the same kind of argument, like, a hundred times every other day, ya know?" He took pause, glanced between Shay and Donatello, and then landed it on the fridge. He pointed at it and added, "Soda?"

"Dr. Pepper and Coca-Cola."

"Eh. I'll take it."

He busied himself with that task. She took the opportunity to probe further into the unseen situation.

"They ain't gonna break anything, are they?"

"Leo won't—not on purpose, anyway. Raph is…a different story."

"Well, I got a bunch of deformed, rejected pottery out back he can smash, if he needs to break shit so bad."

The two turtles turned their gazes on Shay. Her eyes ping-ponged back and forth.

"What? I do it sometimes. It's better'n getting mad at my kids. And surprisingly very cathartic and therapeutic. I hear that those kinds of things are getting more and more popular by the day, business-wise."

"You just buy broken pottery? To smash up even more?" Michelangelo worked out with a puzzled look on his face, a soda can in hand. He flipped the tab down and took a swig from his new prize.

"No. I have one of those pottery wheels. Got it from a yard sale in Eureka last year. Me and the kids use it, and when Korra's friends come over, it usually serves as a great timewaster and creative outlet for them. Kids love to make a mess, so I'd rather them do it out in the workshop than in here." She broke out in a wicked, playful grin. "Plus, I'm just waiting for my very own Patrick Swayze to show up and reenact that one scene from Ghost."

"Oh, nice. That sounds like fun." The smile that breached faded just as quickly as realization dawned on the orange-banded turtle. Donatello coughed politely, although when Shay glanced sideways at him, she could see he was having troubles disguising his smile.

"But…if we're here, that means the kids can't have their friends over, doesn't it?"

"Um…I mean…" Shay thought on the comment, processing the problem before answering, "Actually, no. They don't come over often and we usually end up meeting up all over the place. Sometimes in town, sometimes in the woods, sometimes at others' places. If they did come here, I could easily distract them with horseback rides or time with the goats and the chickens—"

"And pottery, apparently," Donatello interjected. Shay bobbed her head, pointing at him.

"Exactly. And pottery, among other things. We go fishing, berry-picking, wildlife watching, swimming. Lots to do out here in this Podunk backwoods dump."

Both the brothers flinched and averted their gazes.

"Raph isn't much of a wilderness guy. He can't even sleep that well without the sound of the subway going back and forth over our heads."

"The only way I can relate with that is my insomnia. I don't sleep all that much myself. The only time I slept like the dead was boot camp."

That throwaway comment lingered in the air between them all, undisturbed…for about ten seconds. Michelangelo was the first to breach the silence.

"…boot camp?"

He exchanged a glance with Donatello.

"Yeah. Boot camp."

"Army?" Donatello perked up beside her, drawing himself to his full height.

"Marines, actually." Shay replied breezily. Offering bits and pieces of her life, giving it to them freely, it felt like it was a step closer to equilibrium. A righting of the balance between herself and the four brothers.

"…the…Marines? As in…the United States Marines?"

"Yeah. I got my awards hanging up out in the living room, all my plaques and memorabilia too."

"Dude," Michelangelo's face split apart into a wide grin. "You're like, Demi Moore in that one movie."

"G.I. Jane was about the Navy Seals, actually," Shay immediately corrected, mostly out of habit like a kneejerk response.

"Same difference," he continued with a wave of his hand.

"I mean, technically, the Marines are a part of the Department of the Navy," Donatello pointed out. Shay sighed, knowing he was right. She reluctantly but dutifully bobbed her head in agreement.

"Yeah, we are. Unfortunately. And we get the scraps left over when they finished off their allowance from the government."

The slam of something hard striking another hard surface startled her and she jumped in response, heart jackhammering away behind her ribs. Shay pushed away from the counter, alert and on edge as the seconds ticked by in silence.

Leonardo was the one to appear around the bend, much like Michelangelo had earlier on. Upon seeing the three of them in the kitchen, he drew himself up, holding his position at the mouth of the kitchen threshold.

"I apologize if we haven't been model guests up to this point in time. Raphael is taking a walk to cool down, and if you need anything from us, please don't hesitate to let us know."

"Shouldn't that be the other way around, since I'm the homeowner?" Shay queried with a hint of snark as she raised a brow.

"I meant it as your guests," he responded firmly, his tone rigid and formal. "If your offer is still available to us, that is."

"Um…yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah—it's fine. Y'all're welcome to stay, if you lot ain't opposed to it. I dropped a bombshell in your laps, and I don't want things to get any weirder than they already are. I still have damage control to handle when the kids get home, too…so, yeah."

She sucked in air between clenched teeth as she pressed her lower back into the counter.

"Shit, I still have to do damage control with the kids."

This day was just getting better and better.

It only got better when Leonardo requested to speak with her.

"In private," he added with a bit of authoritative force, with emphasis aimed towards his brothers. Donatello was the first to move, pushing away from the counter. He said nothing, but the look he shot her before he left was enough. It was one of those "good luck" gazes that one gave someone else right before they were summarily executed. Michelangelo patted her shoulder as he swept past her with an all-encompassing sigh.

"I know we only met a few hours ago, but it was nice knowing you."

The sound of their footsteps carrying them both from around the bend of the kitchen, further and further away, was like a death knell to Shay's ears.

'Here Lies Shay. Loving mother. I regret nothing…except that one thing.' That it's, that's gonna be on my tombstone. This is going to be that one thing that kills me. I just know it.

Leonardo kept an eye on their departure and when he deemed the area quiet enough, he crossed into the kitchen and settled at the counter across from her. Shay busied herself with draining the last of her coffee down in a series of hurried gulps. The last lingering sips were overwrought with creamer and the taste was almost unbearably sweet. She gulped it down all the same.

Breathing deeply, she set the empty mug down with the softest clink and turned her attentions back to Leonardo.

The liquid courage she had been fueled with last night and minutes before was completely depleted.

Fake it 'til you make it, Shay told herself as she held Leonardo's gaze. Tension and dread clenched tightly within her stomach.

"Should I go first, or do you want to go?" Shay finally said, the waiting having become agonizing.

"What you've told us wasn't exactly an easy subject to accept, and processing it is another ordeal altogether."

"Well, like I said earlier, I didn't exactly get the chance to plan out the more tactful route in telling y'all what's up. Kids are like little drunks. They blurt out things at the weirdest times and often enough, it's never at the right time." Shay picked at a small stray piece of dangling thread attached to her jeans at the thigh, right at the edge of a repaired tear. "But I did mean what I said earlier before, too. Y'all are welcome to stay. It's the least I can do for the bombshell that got dropped into your laps."

"I appreciate it. I do. I just think we all just need some time to adjust. But that wasn't the reason I wanted to speak with you."

That made the knots in her stomach double down and grow in numbers and size. Everything clenched and roiled inside her guts. The momentary respite she had seconds ago disappeared altogether. She held Leonardo's gaze for several seconds longer before looking away.

"Go on," she finally allowed, her words just barely loud enough for him to hear.

"I need your word that we're safe. That we won't be exposed. The last thing we need is for someone to come bearing down on us. I worry about my family and their safety, and I'm willing to bet that you can understand that. I need to know that you'll keep your word."

That struck a harsh chord within her, and the reaction she wanted to impulsively revert to was difficult to swallow back down. The last thing she needed to do was cuss Leonardo out due to her bruised pride. She was bigger than that.

When Shay met his gaze this time around, she held it. Unflinching, unblinking, unbending. Her resolve was iron-clad.

"I meant what I said. Snitches get stitches, remember? I ain't gonna turn on you, and the kids won't either, for that matter." Shay thrust out her hand out in the space between them. There was about five feet, maybe six, of space separating her from Leonardo. She held it out as an invitation regardless.

And yet, the empty space seemed to expand and grow outward until a gorge of epic proportions lay between them and her reach was futile.

"I give you my word."

Those words strung together seemed to be the magic password that Leonardo was waiting for. Only then did he seem to reanimate from his otherwise still and statuesque posture across from her. When his hand reached hers, his hand very nearly swallowed hers up, his grip firm. Shay squeezed her hand tighter in response.

"I'll hold you to that," he said with a hint of a promise in his voice. The unspoken implications of what might happen if she broke her word…

It was enough to send chills to coil around her spine from top to bottom. She quietly vowed to herself that she absolutely, above all else, needed to deliver on her promise. And so did her kids, even if it killed her.

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