I'm Not Dead?

Storybook Puzzle

Raph rolled his eyes and sighed. Aqua was very quiet as she slept on his plastron. She was smaller than Spike but she was also much younger than Spike. He petted her shell gently relaxing.

He didn't believe Eleanor when she said she saw the Shredder. He knew she lied. Something was up, and whatever it was, she was not willing to talk about it.

Raph noticed how buff Shredder looked in her drawing. His facial expression wasn't something a normal kid would draw either. She was scared of this man, she's obviously met him before and he left a very bad impression. Whatever it was she was keeping secret, he believed she had the thought it could hurt her if it got out.

Leo groaned as his phone rang. He sleepily picked it up, minding the sleeping child cuddled against his chest. He pressed the answer button without looking at the contact.

L- "Hello?"

? "Leo? Oh my gosh, I've been trying to call Raph but he didn't pick up. Are you guys okay? Where's Donnie, I couldn't get a hold of him either."

L- "April? Hey, yeah, Raph's phone was destroyed and Donnie's is dead. Raph got hurt in an explosion and his leg is in a cast. Otherwise, we're fine."

A- "Raph's leg is broken?! Shit, do you know why these explosions are going off? The police keep saying it was a terrorist attack."

L- "I have an idea and it's sleeping right next to me. When the explosions started happening, after everyone got out, we found a few survivors and a little girl. She has little wings. We found her mother and she's in Donnie's lab sleeping. Her dad was taken by Shredder. The Kraang are setting bombs everywhere."

A- "A little girl? Wings? What do the Shredder and Kraang want with her? Why do they have her dad?"

L- "We don't know. We thought maybe she was like you but we aren't so sure now. Her wings are Screech Owl wings, there are no owls like that around here. At least, not that I know of. We think her dad knows something about either the Shredder or the Kraang and they want to know what it is. A lot is going on."

A- "I'll see what I can do out here since they won't let us in New York. What's her name? Her dad's name too?"

L- "I don't know her dad's name, but hers is Eleanor Fitts. Look up Fitts and see what you can find."

A- "Okay, on it. Talk to you later."

L- "Later."

Leo hung up and yawned. Eleanor yawned and halfway opened her eyes. "Leo?" she said, she sounded scared. He laid his head back down and petted her hair and closed her eyes again. "I'm here, I'm right here," he stated in a whisper and closed his eyes. Hopefully, he can get more sleep without any more interruptions.

________

"So Hugo worked with the Shredder?"

Donnie had flipped to another page. This was a lot of information he was getting. With what little he had made no sense, he had no choice but to theorize. That's what scientists did.

"Yes, 'Shredder' had found a chemical called 'mutagen' that's what he dubbed it. Hugo went along with it. It mutated things with random and spatic changes. No two changes were the same even when used on the same plant. He had discovered so much with this chemical. Until he realized what Shredder wanted to do with it."

Mia had taken painkillers for her nasty headache. Donnie here reminded her of her husband, nerdy and observant. He was so interested in learning that she wondered what would happen if he met Hugo.

"What did he want with it?"

"He wanted to take advantage of the chemical after figuring out what its purpose was. Hugo said there wasn't enough left to even let Shredder do what he wanted. That's where aliens come into play. They knew how to get the stuff. After Hugo found out what was happening. He took everything, the mutagen left over, and ran. Two years later, we found Eleanor."

"That doesn't make sense, what does Eleanor have to do with it?"

"Eleanor has extra... appendages. She's not very fond of them. Her DNA holds a serum for this mutagen. It has reverse effects."

"DNA, so not just blood? She could lick something and it would reverse to what it was before?"

"Not... exactly. It's more complicated than that. Eleanor's had the reverse stuff in her blood so you can do blood samples. However, if she wants to use salvia, it's got to be a lot. She can't just lick it, it has to be a lot more than that."

"How did your husband figure that out about Eleanor?"

"He's a scientist, he took a blood sample when she was a baby. When we found her, we wanted to make sure she was healthy. When we found her, cases of abandoned dead babies were all over the place."

"Wait, she's adopted? She's not your biological daughter?"

"No, I found her in an alleyway on my way home from work. I couldn't just leave her there in the cold."

"That's enough. That's a lot to take in. You should rest, with what injuries you have I'm sure you're tired."

Donnie sighed and leaned back in his chair before mustering up the strength to help her back onto the blanketed table and leaving to his room. Sleep was important if he needed to think straight.

________

Leo woke up feeling refreshed and stretched. Eleanor yawned and rubbed her eyes. "Morning, princess," Leo said. She nodded and mumbled a small 'morning' back.

She sat up and looked around. "What time is it?" she rubbed the sleep from her eyes again and stretched. Leo looked at his phone to see it was... 8:30?!

He should have been up two and a half hours ago!

He groaned and put his mask, weapons, and padding back on. "Let's go get breakfast." Eleanor started getting up.

The door opened to Raph leaning on a crutch. "Kid, we have someone here who you need to see." he sounded thoughtful and it made Leo curious. Eleanor followed behind Raph to Donnie's lab and opened the door.

"Mama?!"

"Eleanor?!"