May gasped in awe, turning her head all over the place, trying to get a good view of everything. There was a whole wall of weapons, a huge computer, six TV screens, an area in the center with candles on it, so on and so forth. May didn't know what the candles were for, but she didn't really care.
"This... This is... Wow." May stuttered.
"Yeah, it's pretty cool. Not the same as it used to be awhile back, but it's home." Raphael nodded.
He gave May a few more minutes to soak everything in, before picking her up and carrying her to a couch in front of two of the TV screens.
"You rest here. I'll go get Donatello." Raphael started to leave, but turned around quickly in a second.
"Oh, and if anybody asks about you, like why you're here and who you are, just say you are April O'Neil's daughter, and that you're with me. If the turtle that asks you is wearing a blue mask, don't answer any other questions." Raphael added, leaving the room.
Hardly 5 minutes after Raphael left, just as he had predicted, another large turtle saw May, and asked her who she was. The turtle's voice wasn't as gruff as Raphael's, instead sounding a little higher and less intimidating, but it was still hard as stone and cold as ice when talking to her. This turtle wore glasses, and had a lot of tech stuff on his shell and head, making it kind of hard to see his mask, but May was certain it wasn't blue.
"Hey! I asked you a question! Who are you, and how did you get here?" The turtle repeated. May did what she always did when being interrogated. She shut off any ability to show her fear.
"My name is May. My mother is April O'Neil-Jones from Channel 6 news. Raphael brought me here, because my leg is broken and I can't walk." May answered exactly how Raphael had told her to, keeping a piercing glare on her face.
"And where is Raphael?" Another voice echoed behind her, with a pitch in between Raphael's and this turtle with lots of tech on his shell. May turned to see two more turtles, one with an orange mask, looking like he couldn't care less, and one with a steely expression on his face, wearing the blue mask that Raphael had warned May about.
May shrugged. This was definitely going to get the turtle mad at her, but she was told not to say anything else.
"That's not an answer." The blue turtle growled. The orange masked turtle quickly cut in.
"Wait, O'Neil-Jones? You mean, April chose Casey Jones over me?" He sighed.
"Mikey, that's not important." The tech clad turtle rolled his eyes.
"Still... I even told her where my secret stash of Orange Crush is hidden..." The orange masked turtle, Mikey, sighed.
"It was never meant to be, bro." The tech covered turtle put a hand on Mikey's shoulder.
The blue masked turtle bent down in front of May, ignoring the other two. "Where is Raphael? You'd better answer directly and honestly." He was very close. May could smell pizza in his breath.
"Or else what?" May asked daringly. The blue turtle's teeth clenched.
"Where's... My... Brother?" He asked quietly, but aggravated and impatiently.
"I'm not telling you anything." May hissed in reply.
"A tough girl, huh? Well, I got ways to make a tough girl talk." The turtle stood up and pulled a katana blade from out of a sheathe attached to his shell. He pointed the blade at May's throat. She stared back, unafraid, not talking and undeterred.
"Leo! Stop! She's a kid! And she's injured!" The turtle with all the tech on him spoke up. The blue masked turtle pulled back his sword, and put it away.
May could barely believe it, or understand it. Nobody had defended her like that before. Nobody had ever spoken up on her behalf. Not even her mother, who was always trying to calm her dad down. She thought for a moment. Was it a good idea to ask them about themselves? She decided to ask just for their names. It was all she was really curious about, anyways.
"So... You're Mikey..." May pointed at the orange clad turtle. "And you're Leo..." She added pointing at the blue masked turtle. "And I've met Raphael, so... Who are you?" May turned to the tech covered turtle. Close up, she could see his mask was purple, and his eyes were a golden brown color.
"Oh, their actual names are Michelangelo and Leonardo. Mikey and Leo are just nicknames. My name is Donatello." The turtle replied.
"Ohh... Now that makes sense." May wondered aloud, putting two and two together.
"What makes sense?" Michelangelo asked.
"He's the smart guy, right?" May countered the question.
The three nodded. May took a deep breath.
"RAPHAEL!" She screamed, startling the turtles. Donatello rubbed his ear.
"What'd you do that for?" Leonardo asked, uncovering his own ears, and drawing his blade again, pointing it back at her throat.
A moment later, Leonardo was thrown backwards, Michelangelo was flat on his shell, and Raphael stood between them and May, his sai out and poised to fight.
"What the heck is wrong with you, Leo? She's a kid! And she's hurt!" Raphael growled angrily, walking up to Leonardo and getting in his face.
Again, it startled May how Raphael defended her. Her father had never even done that to anybody. He'd never tried to help her, and yet, already two of these turtles, who May had only just met a few minutes ago, were fighting for her, defending her.
They don't know me, that's why. May thought. They don't know what I've done, or where I've been.
May had only called Raphael to tell him that she had found Donatello, the guy he was looking for, but it still satisfied her to watch this blue masked turtle get beat up.
"May, did he hurt you?" Raphael asked, sitting down on the couch beside her. She shook her head.
"No. I'm fine." May replied, flinching slightly when Donatello squeezed her hurt thigh.
"Yeah, it's definitely broken. Mikey, you want to go up to my lab and grab the blue kit? Not the one with tools in it, the other one." Donatello instructed without looking up. Michelangelo disappeared.
"So, um... How are you... I mean, what..." May tried to think of a way to ask her question without being insulting. "Where did you four... come from?"
The turtles looked at each other. Donatello took a deep breath.
"That's a rather long story..." He muttered shyly.
"I've got time! Unless, I mean, if you don't want to tell me. That's okay too." May shriveled back, to her own surprise. She hadn't ever acted like that before.
"Well... It all really started when a little girl got four box turtles for pets. Her father and his colleagues ran tests on them... On us..." Raphael started.
"Oh, sorry... If you don't want to talk about it, you don't have to. I was just... just curious." May gulped.
"It's not that. It's just... We don't know the story very well ourselves..." Donatello admitted, as Michelangelo reappeared with the blue case.
"What are we talking about?" The orange clad turtle asked.
"Your backstory." May replied.
"Anyway, there was another animal there too. A rat, who the girl named Splinter. The girl, well, she was called April O'Neil. Your mom." Raphael continued. "She'd given us all our names, after renaissance artists. I don't really know why, but she did. Everyday, her dad's partner, Saks, would give us injections with green ooze in it. You grandfather would make sure we were healthy, and April would bring us special treats, like pizza.
"Then, one day, everything went wrong. Mr. O'Neil had discovered the truth about Saks, and who he was really working for. He set the lab on fire, destroying documents and years of research. Saks shot him, but it was already too late." Raphael took a deep breath.
Donatello continued. "Splinter told us that we were saved from the fire by a great guardian spirit, a Hogo-sha."
"Turns out, your mother was the Hogo-sha." Leonardo remembered, smiling.
"She saved our lives from that fire, at the risk of her own. 15 years later, she saved our shells again." Donatello added.
"After a little while, a few days after the fire, we started to mutate, change, and grow. Splinter raised us, and took care of us. Eventually, he found a ninjutsu book in the sewers, first teaching himself the art. We followed his lead, learning really fast." Michelangelo finished.
Raphael eyed May. "Breathe." He told her.
It was at that moment that May realized she had been holding her breath. Allowing her lungs to work again, May turned to Raphael.
"Wait, so, why wouldn't my parents ever tell me about you guys?" May asked, angrily.
"Would you have believed them?" Donatello asked, finishing patching May's leg up.
"No, I would have yelled at them that they were liars, and then tell whatever gang I'm in at the time that my parents have gone senile." May replied, then slapped her hand over her mouth.
Smooth, Big-Mouth! She thought. These guys trusted her without question because of her parents. Did she really want them to know that she rebelled against her parents (and the law) any chance she got?
"So what gang are you in now?" Leonardo asked suspiciously.
May gulped. "None right now." She replied.
"Kind of hard to stay in a gang with the parents you got, huh?" Leonardo pressed on.
Okay, now he's just trying to get under my skin. May thought. She turned off her emotions, both the ability to feel them, and her ability to show them.
"Leave her alone, Leo! She's been through enough as it is." Raphael intercepted. For the third time that day, and in her whole life, May was being defended, and she was completely surprised by it.
"Um... Your parents at least know you're with us, right?" Donatello asked. May nodded.
"My parents made Raphael babysit me. As if they think I can't take care of myself." She rolled her eyes.
"Not without reason, though." Raphael added. "Your father told me you had a knack for trouble. Add that to having been nearly killed by the Foot clan, and I think your parents were right to tell me to watch you."
May sheepishly hung her head. How foolish she had been, trusting this turtle and thinking he trusted her. Of course he didn't. Not if he had been talking to her parents. Her mother and father would have told him everything they could. They had probably instructed him to keep as short a leash on their daughter as possible. The fact that he was a ninja didn't help at all. It would be harder to sneak away if she had to.
"It's getting late. I'm going to bed." Michelangelo announced. Donatello nodded in agreement, and followed Mikey to their beds. Leonardo pulled Raphael aside.
They spoke in whispers too quiet for May to listen in on, though she tried, as hard as she could. After Leonardo left, claiming sleepiness like the others, Raphael disappeared, leaving May alone on the couch.
Two minutes later, Raphael came back, carrying two pillows and some blankets.
"Here. You'll sleep on the couch tonight. Unless you want me to take you home?" Raphael dumped the load next to May.
"No way. I would rather sleep on an old couch in the sewers than go home right now. But thanks." May replied, picking up the pillow and pulling the blankets over her.
"If you need anything, just holler, okay?" Raphael said, turning toward the beds. "Goodnight."
"Night." May called groggily. It was only then that she realized just how tired she really was.
With a huge yawn, May fell asleep on the couch. Going home, facing her parents, her ability to trust Raphael and his brothers all washed away with the deep sleep that succumbed her.