Polar Opposites

Chapter 4: Reasons to Trust

Leo's voice scared the life out of her and she flinched, tripping inside and landing at the blue-masked turtle's feet. He offered her a hand and tilted his head, expecting an explanation.

Cora smiled meekly. "I was sleeping on the roof."

"Why?"

She shrugged. "Well after last night, I didn't really want to sleep in the shack."

"Why do you sleep in the shack?"

"Why do you ask so many questions?" She retorted, walking around him.

Leo followed her to the kitchen and watched as she started to make breakfast. He felt useless, just standing there while she worked, so he headed to the sink and began to do the dishes.

"You don't have to do that, Leo." She said, not looking at him.

"I know, but I wanted to thank you for last night." He told her, his own eyes focused on the plate he was scrubbing.

"It's the least I could do, considering how many times you've saved the world." She replied.

Leo frowned, slightly annoyed that she wouldn't just take the compliment.

"AHHHHHHH!"

Neither of them moved, continuing their task casually as Mikey continued to scream, no doubt being chased by Raph for doing something stupid.

When Leo finished, he wordlessly helped Cora set the table, but he was having trouble finding everything. When they finished, Cora pulled out her computer and typed up a quick note to label the cabinets before heading off.

"Where are you going?" Leo asked.

"To fix the shack." She told him.

He frowned, a facial feature that was becoming very common for him when Cora was around. Her mannerisms perplexed him. Leo had never known someone to act the way she did. Like a ghost, drifting in and out of existence.

Mikey walked in, not surprisingly being the first person to smell food. Leo looked at him and decided they should have a chat. He was practically overflowing with curiosity about the girl.

"Where is Cora?" Mikey asked, glaring at Leo before he could even say a word. "Did you ruin it again?"

Leo blinked. "Ruin what?"

Mikey dragged a hand down his face. "Ugh, teenagers. So clueless."

Leo shook his head in confusion and sat down, trying to take some weight off of his injured leg, which was starting to hurt after all this standing.

"Actually, I wanted to ask you about Cora." He started.

"What about her?" Mikey asked, searching Leo's eyes intently, their faces inches apart.

Leo leaned back, "Uh, well, I kind of figured that if you ever made a friend, they would be... like you. Why did you pick Cora? She's so..."

"Quiet?" Mikey asked and Leo nodded. "Dude, of course she's quiet, Cora is super shy, but she's really fun once you get to know her."

Mikey elbowed him playfully. "Aaand Cora likes Space Heroes."

"Tons of people like Space Heroes." Leo rolled his eyes.

Mikey huffed, leaned back and did something that absolutely terrified Leo. Mikey was thinking.

"So... I'm gonna go now." Leo told him, standing up slowly and watching him until he was safely away from the strange turtle.

Leo turned as more footsteps approached. Raph grinned at him humorously, leading Donnie to the kitchen by his shoulders.

"Foooood." Donnie muttered, sleepwalking past.

Wow. Donnie hasn't sleepwalked in forever.

Leo headed out the door and made his way to the shack, where various tools laid about, but Cora was yet to be seen. He walked through the broken wall and looked around.

It had been cleaned since their small kidnapping yesterday, no longer covered in dirt tracked in or bits of Leo's puke that had been splattered around from when Raph had attacked it originally.

A screen caught Leo's eyes and he stepped closer, reading the various notes that were on the screen.

Grocery shopping, replenish wood supply, fix shack, label cabinets for Leo, clean out sick tub, get the chicken poop from the coop (haha, I made a rhyme), drug Donnie, check with Bernie about an axel and something called trisodium phosphate dodecahydrate, invent sturdier hockey sticks because Casey is an idiot, fix the creaky step on the front porch...

Leo tilted his head. It was really thoughtful of her to think about labeling the cabinets for him. There were a lot of cabinets in the kitchen.

And she was helping Casey and Donnie with their work, and in Donnie's case, get the sleep he so often pretended he didn't need- Leo paused, connecting the dots between his sleepwalking and her drugging him was last night, which she somehow managed to pull off after the whole plant fiasco. This meant that all these notes here were from yesterday and today.

Leo heard a snap and moved away quickly, walking to the broken wall and spotting Cora. She carried a ton of logs in her arms, dropping them by the wall and huffing dramatically.

"You do that next time and I'll burn this whole forest down, ya understand?" She glared.

Leo stiffled a small chuckle. She probably talked to chopped up wood more than she talked to him. And he realized at the same time that Cora was standing not five feet away from him, and yet, she had failed to notice that he was there.

Cora walked over to a hatchet laying on the ground and frowned to herself. "Now, how do you turn a piece of wood into a wall?" She muttered, picking it up.

Leo cleared his throat and Cora yelped, whirling around and throwing the hatchet at him. Leo turned his head, watching as the hatchet bounced off the wall a few feet away from him.

"You missed."

Cora glared, "How long have you been standing there?"

"Since before you got back." He smirked. "I was wondering if you needed help turning that wood into a wall."

She huffed and nudged the dirt with her foot, "Yeah."

Leo smiled and walked forward.