Shortly after their little confab, Eve took up residence on the couch and positioned herself so that she could easily gaze out the window over the back of the couch. Don glanced at her every now and then as he continued to work on fixing one of the kitchen appliances. Not fifteen minutes had passed before Don noticed Eve was trying to fight the exhaustion she was feeling. He got up from his makeshift work area, went over to the couch and gently placed a hand on her shoulder.

"You're tired. You should rest."

"Huh," she scoffed tiredly. "You would think after two weeks of nothing but sleep that I wouldn't be so tired so quickly." She scrubbed a hand up and down the side of her face as she tried to stay awake.

He sat on the couch, positioning himself so he was facing her. "Your body is recuperating. So, it's going to be a while before you are ready to go about doing the everyday things the way you normally would. But you'll never reach that point if you don't give yourself the proper rest your body needs."

She sighed, her eyes barely open. "I know…I know. You're right. It's just hard to give in to that knowledge and accept having to be looked after." Eve yawned and shook her head slightly, obviously loosing the battle to stay up.

Don cupped the side of her face in his hand, gently rubbing his thumb back and forth over her cheek. "Come on. Let's get you lying down before you find yourself on the floor."

"I don't suppose you'd care to join me?"

He gave her a lopsided grin. "I guess I could do that."

…..

The next thing Don knew, he was being pulled back into consciousness by someone pulling on his elbow pad. He looked in the direction of the disturbance and couldn't help but chuckle a bit at the realization of who was responsible for his wakeup call. Yoshi was up, and no doubt determined to resume his earlier fixation of being within arm's length of his mother at all times. No doubt Tori would be following suit within a short time.

Don spoke softly, "Ready to play some more?" His son nodded eagerly. Don shifted his gaze to his other side. Eve's head was still resting on his chest, and her breathing was slow and deep. Automatically, his hand began stroking her hair the same way he had when she had fallen asleep. He turned back to his son, "Well, I think you are going to have to play by yourself for a while. Mommy is still resting, and we need to let her sleep." Yoshi gave him displeased look as he crossed his little arms in front of his chest. Don raised an eye ridge. "Now that's quite enough of that." Don ruffled his son's mask a bit. "Tell you what, you and I can go get lunch ready. How does that sound?"

Yoshi seemed to think about it for a bit. "Kay." He replied.

"Good." Don smiled. He glanced back at Eve, knowing the trick would be to not disturb her. He carefully shifted her, and managed to get off the couch without waking her. He led his son to the kitchen, and helped him get up on one of the chairs at the kitchen table. "Okay, buddy, what do you want for lunch?"

Yoshi looked around the room a bit, seeming to think about the question. "Umm…P-B-J."

"Pickle, banana, and jelly beans? Hmm…not the most usual choice."

"No, Daddy. Peanut butter and jelly sandwich!" Yoshi giggled.

"Oh," Don said with a smirk, "well, that makes much more sense." He got the necessary supplies and put them on the table. As he opened up the containers he looked at his son, "You remember how to make it?"

"Yeah, it's easy, Daddy!" Yoshi said dismissively as he reached for the bread, making Don chuckle.

…..

Tori came downstairs after her nap, and found her mom asleep on the couch. She climbed up and snuggled next to her. Feeling the small motion, Eve slowly opened her eyes and glanced around. Finding her daughter next to her, she smiled.

"Hi, sweetheart. You have a nice nap?" Tori nodded. "Ready for lunch?" Again Tori nodded. Eve sat up and looked around. "Is your brother still sleeping?"

"No." Tori shook her head.

Eve stood up and turned back to face the couch. "Alrighty then, lets go to the kitchen and see if lunch is ready." she said as she picked Tori up off the couch and headed for the kitchen. She entered the kitchen to find Don and Yoshi at the table working on lunch. "Hey, what's for lunch?"

Don looked up, and looked slightly stunned for a moment before his face fell into a look of disapproval. "Eve," he started as he got up from his chair, "What are you doing?"

She looked at him confused, "What do you mean? What have I done?" she asked as he came towards her.

"You promised me you would not do anything even remotely strenuous, remember?"

She slowly nodded. "Yes, but I-"

"And that includes carrying the kids around." He stated firmly as he pulled Tori out of her arms.

'Seriously?!' she thought as she looked at him in disbelief as he took Tori to the other side of the table. 'Honestly, the kids are practically feather light! True, Yoshi weighs a bit more due to his shell, but that hardly justifies that decision.'

"Look, Mama, I helped Daddy make lunch!"

Eve looked at her son, and immediately the fight went out of her. Yoshi's hands and face were covered in peanut butter and jelly. She chuckled. "I can see that." She went and got a dishcloth and wet it under the faucet before she returned to the table. "I can also see that you are quite a sticky mess. What do you say we get you cleaned up?"

"I not that messy."

"Oh, yes, you are." Eve grinned as she held up one of her son's hands for him to see as she started to wipe it clean. Once Yoshi was cleaned up, she returned to the sink to rinse out the dishcloth. By the time she returned to her seat at the table, Don had their lunch ready as well. She peered into the steaming pot that sat between them. "Soup." She stated a bit dejectedly.

"In a day or two, we'll see if your stomach can handle solid food again. Until then, I'm afraid soup is your best option."

She nodded in accordance, despite her disappointment. 'Great.' She thought. 'Just another reason I loathe being in…recovery.'

…..

Eve couldn't remember the last time she had so looked forward to the twins' bedtime routine. Not that she didn't enjoy spending time with her little ones, but on days like today it was quite a relief to know some kid free time was close at hand. Tucked in and lullaby sung, the little ones quickly drifted off to sleep. Eve returned downstairs hoping to manage to stay up for a while longer.

Don looked up from his book. "I thought you might go on to bed after the twins fell asleep. Guess I should have known that wasn't going to happen."

"I'll get there soon enough. Just thought I'd come back down and enjoy a few minutes of peace." She sighed as she sat down in a chair near the fireplace. "It's been quite a day."

"Mmm."

She rested her chin on her hand as she leaned on the arm of the chair. "So, how long do think this recovery business is going to last." Don gave her a questioning glance. She shrugged. "I just know if I can stand too many days of just reading, board games, and puzzles."

"Hard to say really. A few weeks, maybe a month or two." He rubbed the back of his neck. "A lot of it depends on what—if anything—we can find out from the tests."

"And if the tests results don't show anything unusual?"

"We'll just have to take it one day at a time."

…..

Eve bolted upright in bed. Heart pounding and a bit disoriented, it took her a moment to realize that everything was alright. She was safe at the farmhouse. It was just a nightmare. She shivered as her heart rate began to slow back to its normal pace; she was soaked in a cold sweat. It had been years since that haunting presence invaded her dreams. And what was worse was that this time it involved the children. She froze. 'The children!' she thought. Eve jumped out of bed and grabbed her robe, throwing it on as she dashed down the hall to the twins' room. She quickly opened the door, expecting to find something wrong. Relief flooded Eve as her eyes confirmed that everything was as it should be. Her body released its tension as she leaned against the door frame. She took a deep breathe as she made her way to the beds that held her sleeping little ones. A smile at tugged her lips as she gazed over their sleeping forms. Noticing that Tori had kicked off most of her blankets, Eve adjusted them. Tori stirred slightly.

"Mommy, time to get up?" Tori asked sleepily.

"No, sweetheart." Eve leaned over and kissed her forehead. "Go back to sleep."

"Kay." She replied, barely awake.

Eve left the room, quietly closing the door behind her. She leaned against the wall and ran a hand through her hair. 'No point in going back to bed.' She thought. 'After that adrenaline rush I'll never get back to sleep.' Eve silently made her way downstairs and into the kitchen. She heated some milk and mixed in some strawberry syrup. Making her way out to the front porch, she eased herself onto the porch swing, sipping her warm beverage as she gazed out into the clear, starry night sky.

…..

Don rolled over in his sleep, stretching out his arm to encase Eve. Not feeling the expected form beneath, he moved his hand around a bit. "Ugh," he groaned. "Not again." He pulled himself out of bed. "4 a.m." Don glared at the clock. "What could she possibly be doing up at this hour?" He padded down the hall. Finding no trace of her, he headed downstairs. He noted light shining from underneath the kitchen doorway, but found no trace of her there. The back door was locked. Deciding to check out on the front porch, he opened the front door as well as the screen door far enough that he could just see the full length of the porch. Seeing her perched on the swing he shook his head and turned back in the house just long enough to grab a blanket. It wasn't cold outside, but there was a slight chill. Don called her name a few times as he approached, but received no response. Noting that her gaze was far off in the distance, he touched her arm. She jerked up causing the mug in her hands to go flying. Thankfully, he managed to catch it before it smashed to the ground.

"Don, you scared me half to death!"

He frowned. Leveling a hard look at her, "Do you have any idea what time it is?"

"Uhh…well, not really, no."

"It's four in the morning. What on earth are you doing out here when you should be asleep?" He spread the blanket out over her, and took a seat next to her.

"Nothing really. I…I just couldn't sleep." Her gaze met the floor.

Don noticed something uneasy in her expression. "Insomnia?"

She shrugged, but didn't take her eyes of the ground. "Something like that."

"Still bummed out about being under strict orders to take it easy?"

"No. Well, yes but…that's not what's bothering me."

"Then what is?"

She spared him a brief, painful glance before returning her eyes to the ground. Eve hesitated a moment longer. "A nightmare." She paused. "He was there." She said in a near whisper.

"It has been a long time since you last had one of those nightmares."

She nodded. "Years."

Don remembered well how she had been plagued with nightmares—focused around the fragments of memories from her incarceration—for some time after he and his brothers had brought her to their lair. For a while, the more she was able to remember, the more intense the nightmares became. Eventually, over time they had lessened to the point where such dreams were a rare occurrence. Of late they had been nonexistent. Until tonight anyway.

"I know it's silly…your family having defeated Shredder ages ago and everything."

Don put his arm around her shoulders. "He put you through shell and back. It's no wonder why those dreams unnerve you so much."

"This one was different, though. It started out much like the others, but then…then he was tormenting our children." She shivered, more from the image than the cool night air. "It rattled me so much I ran to the twins' room thinking it some horrible omen."

He pulled her close, and wrapped her in his loving embrace. "Hey, don't you worry. Nothing like that is ever going to happen. Not if I can help it."