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It was the cries that drew him away from playing with his brothers. They had been playing hide and seek and it was Mikey's turn to be the seeker though he hated being it because he wasnt good at finding the other three.And of course, Raphael had to hide in the one spot that Mikey could never find him at. It was a good spot in the deep sewers, on top of a large pipe near a sewer drain and manhole. It was a dark spot where it was hard to see and using the ladder near the manhole, it was where he climbed up. And it was there, he heard the cries from the surface. Raph had been giggling to himself because he could hear the youngest of the four whining about how it wasn't fair that the other brothers were hiding so good from him. He also loved teasing Mikey. It got him into trouble a lot but he had fun while doing it.And that's when he heard it. A small, weak cry.Blinking, Raph turned his head towards the opening of the sewer onto the road up top and listened hard. He could hear something crying. He frowned before pulling himself a little closer to the hole and looked outside. At this time, it was the dead of night and there wasn't really any people out . And it being mid-November, it was really cold out there.The sound was weak but he could still hear it. He couldn't see where it was coming from but it was very close. And if his memory serves him right, there was an alley just out of his sight behind the sewer drain. Sucking in some breath, Raph looked towards the ladder and the manhole. He knew he shouldn't do it. But his curiosity was highly peaked. Scooting over and hopping down from his hiding spot, the small but large in the same turtle went over and climbed the ladder, carefully and very slowly pushed the manhole cover up to peer out into the dead of night. He made sure to keep it partly closed, just in case there was someone on the streets and looked around to make sure the coast was clear. There was no one in sight. Not even a rumbling car. So the turtle pushed the manhole cover over, letting it slowly slid against asphalt and he poked his head out even more into the night and peered around. His green eyes took in the surroundings before falling on the said alley, where there was a large dumpster just in the back of it. And that was where the sounds were coming from. He knew he was going to get into so much trouble for what he was about to do but he couldn't help it. His curiosity was winning over his logic, which was no surprise really. Slowly, Raph climbed out of the sewers and onto the street, slowly and cautiously looking around before making his way into the alley, following the cries. Towards the dumpster. His shell was tingling uneasily. He couldn't deny it to himself that he was a little scared of what he was about to find.....And that's when he saw the body hidden in the shadows. Giving a sharp intake of breath, Raphael immediately froze when he saw the human lying there in the shadows, hidden behind large boxes of trash. He thought that the woman was asleep. A human female laid on the concrete of the alley, still as ever. She didn't even acknowledge that he was even there. She didn't even seem to wake up. Raph frowned as he looked her over, noting that she actually looked nice. She wore clean clothes; blue Jean's, Nike shoes, large dark jacket that was unzipped and just sprawled open for him to see that she wore a deep red blouse......no. Raph felt his breath hitch when his observations saw that her blouse was creme colored, not red. He leaned closer towards her, seeing her pretty face that seemed to just rest peacefully and her eyes closed. But it was the open gash in her neck that told him exactly why she wasn't moving. And that sent him reeling back to realize that this human was dead. It was the cry again that pulled Raph out of his shock and horror and he turned towards the dumpster again. The cry was still there, so frowning, he went over and climbed up on boxes to peer inside. And resting on top of bags of trash was a wriggling, crying baby human. His eyes widened at the sight of the baby human, seeing its scrunched up face as it cried there, thrashing its tiny hands and kicking at the blue blanket that was around it. It was small, so very small. Its round face was so red from crying so long and there were glistening tear trails all over its chubby cheeks. Whisps of white hair peered under a blue cap that protected its head and it wore a yellow one piece outfit with mittens covering its hands to protect them from the cold. But nonetheless, it was a baby. In the dumpster. Frowning, Raphael looked away from the squalling baby and looked back at the dead human on the ground. He might have been very young; only 5 years old if his Father was right, but he understood this situation. Or at least had an idea. The human woman must have been this baby's mother. And she had been murdered in the alley. The baby, either by the mother or the killer had put the baby in the dumpster, probably to die. If it had been the killer though, why didn't they kill the baby or take it? Maybe it was the mother who put the baby in the trash, probably to hide it and protect it from whoever killed her. Frowning, Raph looked back at the baby when he heard it hiccup and choke before going quiet. His green eyes met deep sapphire blue. The baby saw him. And he saw it. It was peering at him, eyes looking into his and its mouth opened into a wide O. It did look surprised to see him but also curious. He looked back, and he felt his mouth twist a little with a smile. Those eyes were quite bright blue. Almost as blue as Leo's or Mikey's. But nonetheless, bright and curious as it looked back at him. Slowly, Raph lift a hand up and over the lid of the dumpster and reached towards the baby with one of his three wide fingers and his smile grew when the baby reached out and curled their tiny covered hand, wrapping it around his. "Heh," Raph couldnt help but laugh quietly as he felt the baby just clutch onto his hand. "You're kinda cute." He told the baby before he used his other hand to reach in and began poking softly at the baby. "What're you doing in the trash? Who put ya here?" The baby gurgled a little bit but a wide smile had formed in those chubby cheeks and it kicked slightly as if excited to see him. "Huh." Raph muttered, smiling back before he carefully and slowly wrapped his hands around the baby and picked it up out of the trash. He remembers seeing a movie once that dealt with a baby and taking it from his memory, he wrapped the blanket back around the baby and tucked into his arms. He knew he shouldn't do it but what else was he going to do? He couldn't leave this baby in the dumpster for it to die in the cold. "Gonna take ya to dad. He'll know what to do." Raph said before he stepped down from the boxes and began walking back towards the manhole.And that's when he heard the car. Inhaling sharply, Raph quickly rushed to the manhole and holding the baby close to him, he climbed in and began pulling the cover back over. He struggled though to hold the baby and pull the cover back over the hole. It was very difficult and the car was quickly approaching now. "Come on! Come on!" He murmured urgently. "Raph! What are you doing?!" He suddenly heard his slightly older brother from below. Quickly glancing down at Leo, Raph abandoned the cover and scaled down the ladder, holding the baby close to him. "Leo! Close the cover! Hurry!" He whispered loudly. Frowning, Leo looked at him before quickly jumping up on the ladder and pulled the cover back over the hole just as the car stopped on it, making him flinch when it clunked loudly above his head. He frowned down at Raph as he began bouncing the bundle that was now crying loudly. "What the.....what's going on?" The third brother now spoke up as he approached the two with the smallest brother behind him. "Shhhh!" Raph shushed them and the baby at the same time. "Come on, it's okay. Shhhh! Shhh!" He urged the baby to stop. Slowly but thankfully, the baby quieted as the four brothers heard the slams of the car doors and they listened. "This is where you left them, Chris?" A man's voice quietly echoed down from above. "Yeah, this where I left Lucy and her spawn." Another spoke. There was foot steps from above and then hissing from the humans. The four brothers carefully looked out of the sewer drain, though Raph kept bouncing the baby to keep it quiet. "Damn, you did a number on Lucy. Did you have to give her a new grin? Ya know, the boss wanted her back alive so he could punish her himself for stealing the brat?" The first man spoke. "She wouldn't stop screaming." The now obvious killer defended himself before he swore. "Oh, man! The brat is gone! I left her in this dumpster!"There was another string of swear words from the other man before the second yelped as a quiet thwack was sounded. "You fucking idiot! The boss wanted that baby back alive! You should have brought her back with you after killing Lucy! He's going to be pissed off, Chris!" "Ow! Dont hit me, asshole! How was I supposed to know that the boss wanted the little bitch back?!" The second man whined. "Tch.....well, it's on your head now! He's going to kill you, Chris! That thing was important to his research and now he's lost it! Do you have any idea what that brat meant to the boss?! It was an important subject for his latest experiment!" "He was really testing on the baby? That's kind of messed up, man. What was he doing to her anyway?" And it sounded like they were unraveling plastic up on the surface. Raph frowned as he listened, his arms tightening a little around the bundle, who was now very quiet. He glanced down to see that the baby's eyes were closing, drifting off to sleep thankfully. "I don't know, don't care. I hate kids as it is. They're just parasites. Loud, obnoxious, messy. All I know is it was some kind of experiment on Genetics. I think he was testing Genetically altered DNA on the child." The first man said as he and his partner began wrapping up the dead woman in plastic sheets. "I know once he was done, he was going to kill the little shit. He doesn't need proof of what he was doing in his science experiments." That brought a quiet growl from Raph and he was shushed by Leo. He didn't pay any mind for once from the oldest. He just drew the baby much closer to his hard chest, arms tightening around her. "Well, let's pack up and get rid of the body. Then we'll look at the local hospitals to see if a baby was turned in. We need to find that brat or it's our throats that will get slashed this time." There was a few grunts and a slam of the trunknor the car before the men got into the car and sped off. Raph just growled as he glared at the sewer drain before looking down at the baby in his arms. He saw his brothers crowd around him but his sole attention in the angelic chubby face. "They were going to kill you." He whispered to her softly. "Raph, what the shell have you done?" Leo hissed at him. "You went up there?! You know we can't go up to the surface!" Raph shot his older brother a look, rocking the baby. "Well, it's a good thing I did, Leo!" He growled back. "Didn't you hear those humans?! They were going to kill her!" Leo frowned before his blue eyes dropped down to the baby and he looked surprised to see her. He hadn't really noticed her before. But now that he did, he couldn't find a single thing to say now. Donny leaned over and readjusted his broken glasses over his eyes to see better. "A human baby?" He asked, his small voice squeaking a little. Mikey giggled as he moved closer to see. "Oh, cool! It's so cute! Do you think Dad will let us keep it? It could be our pet!" He said excitedly. Raph growled at him before shoving him away. He looked back at Leo. "Leo, you heard those humans. They were going to kill her. We can't take her back up there." He said urgently. Leo frowned but slowly nodded. "Let's take her to dad. He'll know what to do." He said before already taking the lead. "But you know he's not going to be happy you went up there."And he was right.Because as soon as they got back to the lair, Splinter had not been happy that Raphael broke the rules of going up to the surface and had his son doing pushups in the Hashi while listening to Leo explain what they heard. He, himself, had the baby in his long thin arms and was rocking her as he fed her some milk he had snatched from above not an hour ago after discovering his sons brought her to him. Splinter frowned deeply as he fed the baby, looking down at her. He was surprised by all of this, he had to admit. And troubled. A baby girl found in a dumpster by one of his sons, the mother murdered for stealing her from someone. Apparently a scientist by the sounds of it. It was too similar to the mutant animals' situation. And very troubling. But it was his big heart for the youth that won over the idea of putting her back for a human to find. He knew by just listening to what his sons were saying that the baby couldn't go back to the surface. Not right now anyway. Because cruel humans seemed to be looking for her and if they were to put her back, they would probably find her. And do what they were trying to do to her. "Raphael, you may stop." Splinter reprieved his son from his punishment. He looked at the four turtles, his tail twitching uneasily. "You were right to save her, Raphael. Therefore, your punishment is done. This child was in danger and you saved her." "What are we going to do, dad? Are we going to keep her?" Leonardo asked now watching the baby as she drifted off again with a full stomach. The rat mutant sighed softly as he continued to rock the baby, using his long tail to put down the bottle. "We cannot keep her. She is not one of us. She does not belong down here with us." He said softly. He almost smiled when all four brothers deflated miserably. "But for now, she may stay. Just long enough for us to ensure her safety. Someone is looking for her and she is in danger to that. Until we know it's safe, she may stay here."The four brothers brightened at that and crowded around him to look at the baby. "So.....what do we call her? She does have a name, right?" Donny asked as he smiled at the sleeping girl. Splinter liked at Raphael as he vent down so the boys could see her better. "Raphael, did you hear a name for her?" He asked softly. Raph shook his round head. "Uh-uh. Those humans were calling her all sorts of things but none of them were a name. The mom.....I think they said her name was Lucy." He told him. Splinter slowly nodded before looking down at the little girl, studying her for a moment. But then he smiled. "Then we shall her Lucy. Named after her mother." He told his adopted sons. All four turtles smiled as they looked at the baby, feeling warm to know she now had a name. "Lucy." All four said happily. "Welcome to the family, Lucy." Mikey piped up cheerfully. "Ya know she can't stay. Technically, she isn't family." Donny said with a shrug. "For now she is." Splinter said when Mikey pouted. "It might be temporary but she can be family for now. Just until we are sure it is safe for her to return to the surface." All boys just smiled and nodded. "How old do you think she is, Dad?" Leo asked curiously. Splinter just hummed softly as he looked at the baby carefully. "She is still very young. Not even a year quite yet but I think perhaps she is eight months." He told his sons. "Now then, let us put her to bed and it's time for your sleep as well. It's almost dawn on the surface. And we must prepare for Lucy's stay. She will be with us for a little while. And taking of a baby like her will take a lot of work. I will need your help." The four brothers were excited about it. Unfortunately, the baby was only with them for two months before she got sick with child Pneumonia. Living in the sewers for two months had not been easy on her and while she seemed to adore her new family, it took a toll on her tiny body. She absolutely loved the Turtles and her temporary rat father but with her immune system not quite as strong as theirs, she caught the deadly illness rather quickly. Splinter had no choice but to deliver her to the hospital, when no one had been looking. He had wrapped her in her warm blanket and when no one was around, he put her on a gurney outside of the ER for a human paramedic to find. He had been quite upset as to having to let her go. He had grown attached to her, like the brothers had. They were upset when she got so sick and they did not have the means to provide for her health. Raphael took it the hardest, however. He had found her, after all and he had been the first she had seen. He had been the closest to the baby other than Splinter. So when Splinter made the decision that they had to return her to the surface, he refused to talk to anyone for a week. But it had been for her survival. They just hoped that she hadn't been found by those humans who murdered her mother and had been hunting for her.
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Her name was Lucinda Vincent and she was 15 years old but everyone called her Lucy. She was a pretty girl with long honey blonde hair and sapphire blue eyes. Small and petite for her age, she was used to being picked on for her size.And her life was weird. It always had been. Adopted by a police officer when she was three, Lucy didn't know a whole lot of her own origins until she was 12, when her mom, Becky, told her that she had been adopted. All she knew was when she was a year old, no one knew who she had been. She didn't know anything about her real name or who her biological mother was or where she even came from. She didn't know anything and neither did her mother, other than what they heard from the adoption agency. The story was about her was that she had been found outside the Metropolitan Hospital in New York with a bad case Pneumonia, abandoned. It had nearly killed her but thanks to hard working doctors and nurses, she survived. But because of her mysterious situation, no one knew where she had come from. And to make things even more odd, when she had been found, there had been a note pinned to her blanket, saying her name was Lucy. After her recovery, the police had tried looking for who her parents were but no one came to claim her so therefore, she had been entered into the adoption program and it took two years until she was adopted by Rebecca "Becky" Vincent, who had been working the case of trying to find out where she had come from. It had been love for two years of working that case at first sight.When she first started the case, Becky had just been a police detective, working to become a Homicide Detective but ended up working the case of of the mystery child. She had not been happy to be given the missing persons case. But as time grew on and she dug into the very little information as she could, not really finding anything at all, she had interacted with the baby girl on a few occasions and she fell in love. She had never wanted to be a mother before now. She thought she had no time for it. She was a cop in New York City, trying to be a true detective. She didn't have time for kids. But one look into those sparkling blue eyes, hearing the circumstances of the child, Becky couldn't help it. She opened up her heart to the child. And she realized just how badly she wanted her for her own. And after finding nothing on her, no matter how hard she tried digging into the unseen past, Becky finally caved and took her as her own legally. For so long, Becky did what she could to be the mother she never wanted to be for that little girl. She did so much to make her home the best for Lucinda, the name that the adoption agency decided to give her, and in the end, it all paid off. If it was not work that Becky loved the most, it was Lucy. The little lost girl had become her sole world and she loved her more than anything. But even her job made it hard on them both. Lucy loved her mother very much and they were very close but with the job her mother had, it was a tight relationship. There were things that did put a strain on them but they still loved one another. When her mother came home late from the job, Lucy was always there, waiting with the babysitter to welcome her home. She used to never want to go to bed until her mother was there to tuck her in. She used to get into fights with the babysitter about staying up until her mommy came home. But even then, with a tired smile after a long day and nights work, Becky always loved the welcome her little girl gave her even when she was supposed to be in bed. The most difficult thing, however, was Lucy's health. Being sick when she was so little, her immune system was not the strongest all so she easily got sick. It was enough to drive Becky mad when Lucy caught a cold or even the chicken pox when she caught it. A simple cold had nearly knocked the life out of Lucy when she was young and it even messed with her physicality. She might have been 15 years old but she was small. She stopped growing at 5' 2" and for years did not grow any taller. She was picked on a lot for being so tiny and it was the doctors theirselves that indicated that she wasn't going to grow any taller. Accoding to the doctors, she had ISS; Idiopathic Short Stature. Her growth hormone were not like others and she wasn't alone in the growth disorder.
It just meant her growth was a little abnormal but nothing to be worried about. She was just going to be short for her age as she grew. However, according to the doctors, she probably had it since she was born so to exactly determine her age, it was very hard to do. So therefore, by theory, she was probably a year older than they believed her to be but they settled with her when they found her. It couldn't be determined if she was actually 15 because of the ISS. For all they knew, she could have been 16 or 17 but they settled with their guess. And so had Becky. Either way, besides the ISS growth disorder, Lucy's life was weird. There was something wrong and she knew it. Becky knew it. And no matter how hard they tried to discover what was wrong with her, they couldn't find the answers. Lucy was rather healthy as a teenager and while she still got sick very easily, it wasn't the physicality that that they were sure it was. It was her mentality. Now dont get them wrong, Lucy was actually very intelligent for her age. She was quite bright, actually. She had started reading full on books by the time she was 5 and she already knew her numbers up to a thousand by 6. In fact, she was actually above average in education. She knew how to figure things out faster than any child of her age and that's what made Becky frown suspiciously. It was just how intelligent Lucy was that made things a little weird. Lucy was ahead in intelligence in her classes and she was an Honor student by the time she was in High school. It was enough to make other kids pick on her for being such a nerd. She got it a lot, actually. But it couldnt be helped. She was just very, very smart and she could read a 35 chapter book in one day. She absorbed information and seemed to have a photograph memory. She remembered every detail she ever seen or even heard.And that's where it was weird. For some reason, and Lucy always told her mother about the dreams she had since she was nine. She dreamed of humanoid animals. The dreams were just so real to her and a lot of the times as a child, she would wake up in the mornings asking where her animal friends were. Becky thought it was cute at first. She always smiled when Lucy woke up asking about her animal friends. But as she got older, the imagination that belonged to a child never vanished. And Lucy always remembered her dreams she had at night. She always remembered seeing turtles in her dreams. And a giant talking rat. As Lucy got into her teen years, it got tiring to heard about the turtles and the rat and many times Becky had to remind her that it was just her imagination. The animals she saw in her dreams were not real.Lucy never liked hearing that and that did have her argue with her mother a lot. She could have sworn that she remembered the animals. She swore that they were real. But as she got older and she matured fast for her age, she didn't know what to believe any more. In the back of her mind, Lucy truly believed that the talking animals were real but she also wondered if she was touched in the head to believe in them. But because of her dreams, she had to admit that her favorite animals was turtles. Box Turtles, to be exact. And she loved rats, especially. While other kids were squeamish around rats, Lucy adored them and had gotten into a lot of trouble for feeding wild rats right off the streets. Her mother, especially, got mad when she found out Lucy was feeding rats. She would just raise hell when she heard her daughter was feeding the disease infested vermin.As it was, because of Lucy's intellect, she was ahead of her class and grade so because of her IQ levels, she was the only 15 year old who was a Senior in High school already and in a few short months, she was going to graduate early. And that did tend to provide some jealousy from her fellow classmates. And made her a complete target for bullies. Making things worse, because she was the daughter of a police detective, she did have the attitude where she fought back and didn't let anyone get to her. Because of her fiesty, intellectual mind, she tend to fight back, even when she got beat up and that was the strain in her relationship with her mother began. And why Becky got called to the office at the high school. Because Lucy fought back. Sitting in the office with an ice pack held to her swollen eye, Lucy was glaring at the much bigger football player, who glared murder at her. He had picked on her and she snapped. Truth be told, she had swung first. He just swung back. And now they could hear her mother screaming with his parents with the principal trying to keep them apart in the office. "You're a freak, Vincent!" The football player growled across the way at her. Lucy glared at him with one icy blue eye, shaking her head. "You're a jerk, Chadwick." She hissed back. "Quiet, both of you!" The secretary hissed at them with look of warning aimed at them. She had been left in charge to make sure they stayed away from one another but was also trying to listen to the heated fight within the office. She was nosy that way. Suddenly the door slammed open and all of them jumped to see Becky coming out of the room, looking pissed off with two equally pissed off parents behind her. She immediately went straight to Lucy, reaching out for ice pack and pulling it away to see the damage. She knew her daughter was going to have a black eye for three weeks. Her mouth pressed firmly together before she turned her glaring hazel eyes onto the football player. "So, you like to hit girls, huh?" She growled before shooting the parents a look when they tried to start up another heated argument with her. "She started it!" The boy snapped but then sunk down when that cold look from Becky froze his very insides with one glance. "I did not! You called me a shorty wimp! I proved that I wasn't.....!" Lucy snapped back only to flinch when Becky thumped her on the head. "Enough! Lucy, you are grounded for starting the fight!" Becky snapped and shut her down when she tried to argue. "You started it, Lucinda Vincent! Words are words!" The police detective then whipped around and glared at the boy, who cringed. "As for you," her voice was dangerously low that made his skin crawl. "If I ever find out that you lay another hand on my daughter, whether she started it or not, or even a hand on another girl, I'll drag your ass to the police department, where you can meet REAL women beaters and see what happens when you hit women!" "How dare you threaten..... " the boy's father began but he now found himself under that cold glare that froze him. "If this happens again, I don't care who started it, Mister Chadwick." Becky said icily. "My daughter is five foot two and she is a tiny young lady, not built strong enough to even do any damage to your five foot twelve son! If it happens again to any girl of this school, I'm dragging your son's ass and yours to the precinct!" And with that, she took Lucy by the arm and dragged her to her feet. "Lucy, We're going home." Becky added warningly before she literally dragged her out of the office. In the car, the shouts began between mother and daughter. They really went at it on the way home. It was a rare moment of fighting with one another but not uncommon either since Lucy even became a teenager. They fought more and more often lately because of the rebellious attitude that Lucy had. Driving down town after the shouting, Becky was radioed in by the precinct about shots fired at the Sacks building and something was going on at the Sacks Radio tower. Something was going on downtown and there were reports of the dreaded Foot Clan.While Becky did not want to take Lucy, she was not about let her out of her sight either. She trusted her to stay out of trouble........somewhat anyway. But she did not have time to take her home when there was Foot activity going on. So speeding down the streets, Becky gave Lucy a look, who was holding onto dear life of the handle of the passenger door. "Stay in the car, Lucy! When we get to the radio tower, you do not move!" She warned her. Lucy would have shot back a retort but ended up swallowing it when her mother came to a screeching halt a block away from the radio tower. She did not have time to say anything else as her mother lept out of the car and was booking it towards the crime scene. Something was going on and she was curious but knowing if she moved at all, her mother would get on her. So folding her arms with a pout, Lucy stayed in the car. She could hear booms and crashes from outside and people were running and screaming down the streets.Frowning, Lucy rolled down the window and peered up, only to freeze to see that the radio tower had collapsed onto a neighboring building, right above her. She felt her breath seize in her chest as she reached for the door handle. She knew she had to move! Suddenly a chunk of building fell from above, landing right beside the car, making her flinch and scream in terror. She looked wide eyed at it before flinching as another piece landed on the other side of the car, crushing the door in the process. "Shit!" Lucy screamed as she tried to open the passenger door but found that the chunk of building way too close to even open it. She looked up and saw the top of the radio tower now falling towards her and the car. Screaming, Lucy covered her head, curling up on the seat as tight as she could, preparing to be crushed. She heard screams as people ran from the area, abandoning her to be trapped. And then there was a ear splitting crunch and the car jolted as something landed on the hood of the car. Lucy shrieked but looked nonetheless. The radio tower top had landed on the car's hood but surprisingly, she was fine and alive. She wasn't even hurt. Just shocked the hell out of. But nothing could prepare her for what she saw when she looked through the cracked and broken windshield of her mother's car. The tower was pretty big, bigger than the car. But there was something inside all of those metal beams and lights. She saw them. Four massive beings, looking quite shocked at their own survival from falling off the freaking building. Their survival and the woman's beside them. They had been holding onto the beams for dear life as they went crashing down. It was a miracle they even survived.Lucy just stared with wide eyes and a gaping mouth at what she saw through dust and debris. Four massive turtles. Shocked, Lucy stared at them as they disentangled their selves from the beams as hurriedly as they could. People were coming now towards the collapsed tower or were surrounding something that had come crashing down. But nonetheless, Lucy couldn't take her eyes off of the large turtles as they helped one another and the woman wearing yellow out of the tower and began hurrying towards a manhole in the street. It was then, one of them as the others were quickly ducking into the manhole of the sewers, one of them turned towards the car, looking around just to make sure no one saw them. Green eyes met icy sapphire blue eyes and the massive turtle froze in surprise. Lucy stared shocked at it and it stared back. It was a big thing. Huge in frame and with rippling muscles, wearing what looked like junk and old clothes and red do rag for a mask. But nonetheless, it was a large, massive turtle, staring right back at her before he cringed back a little and then dropped into the manhole as fast as he could. Lucy sat there, staring in shock before she simply fainted from the shock.
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It had been two weeks since the incident that dealt with Eric Sacks and the Foot clan. And in those two weeks, Lucy thought so very hard of what she had seen. She was trying to process it and tried to come up with a logical answer to what she had seen. She didn't even tell her mother what she had seen, knowing that her mom would just drag her to a shrink to help her sort out the shock she probably felt. That had been something. After the tower fell on the car, surprisingly missing Lucy in the process, Becky had flipped out when she found out what happened. She had rightfully lost her mind in fear and shock for her adopted daughter. She dragged her to the hospital to get checked out and thankfully, after hours of being so worried, she finally calmed down when she learned that Lucy was surprisingly fine. She didn't even have any scratches or bruises, other than the black eye the bully had given her. But that still didn't help Becky's nerves. She was paranoid for a week about Lucy, always worrying if she was okay or if she was going to collapse in late reacted shock. But Lucy never did and she let her mother hound her for a little while to calm her own nerves, while herself was trying to sort out her own mind. She remembered what she had seen in the tower collapse. And she wasn't sure if it had been shock or if it had been real. For two weeks, she thought hard and long about it before coming to the conclusion that it had been real. It had been too real to be some figment of her shocked imagination. She had seen them. She had looked into those green eyes and there was a familiarity about them. They were eyes she had seen before in her dreams. She remembered every detail of her dreams. And to have seen those.....those massive turtles....she knew her dreams had not been dreams. They were memories. They had to be. There was no logical explanation to it. She couldn't figure out the pieces to this puzzle without those dreams. She knew those turtles. She had to. Why else was she dreaming of them for so many years and only to see them for herself just two weeks ago?She didn't know how or when she had seen those turtles and possibly the rat but she knew she had to find out. She just had to get answers. If she didn't, it was going to drive her nuts.But where was she going to start looking? She had no idea where to even start. She tried googling up answers about giant turtles but it either lead her to comic books by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird or stupid fake conspiracy theory sites. She tried reading the conspiracies but they were just way too farfetched to even be believed. So therefore, for once, the internet wasn't going to help her. She needed to find something to get started on. Anything but there was nothing. So she tried looking up The Foot Clan and there were hundreds of stories to read about their crimes. There was even the recent story about the leader of The Foot getting caught, which she knew about. Her mother personally arrested the son of bitch when they found out he had been behind the attack on the city just two weeks ago and he was the one who fell with the tower from the building. How that bastard survived, no one could tell. He had been in critical condition and was still in the hospital but with armed police guards, never to be out of their sight for one second. As soon as he was discharged, he was going to a maximum security prison immediately. Because of his arrest, Becky was in line for Police Chief of the New York Police Department. Lucy was proud of her mom and she made sure to tell her that every day since that day of Shredder's arrest. Nonetheless, Lucy come up to a story about possible vigilantes fighting against The Foot and it was there she felt a spark in her brain. She knew it had to be the turtles.There was no mention that it was but she knew it had to be. Reading the stories about the Foot clan, she came up with many draft ideas that vigilantes were fighting back but no one had ever seen them. When there had been attacks by the Foot, it always had been too dark for witnesses to see or all they saw were shadows. Some people claimed that they had seen the vigilantes but no one could really tell what they were. They just claimed that they were big and by seeing them herself, Lucy knew that was true. Question was, where were they hiding? It had to be the sewers. There was nowhere else that they could be but there was miles and miles of sewer pipes and it would take so long to even look in all of them. And it wasn't like Lucy could sneak off to look anyway. She was being closely watched by her mother, since she was still paranoid after two weeks since the incident that nearly killed hundreds of people. Not to mention, finals were coming up and Lucy needed to study. She was a Senior in High School and this was the most important time of the year. Plus she had college exams to look into and filling out applications, though she didn't have a clue to which college she was going to go to. There had been discussions with her mother about it and a fight when Lucy wanted to take a year off from school and maybe get a job. Becky wouldn't hear of it though. She put up the argument that Lucy was still 15 and getting a job was hard enough at that age, not to mention, she wanted her to further her education. It was annoying but Lucy she wasn't going to win that argument. But then.....it sparked an idea in her head. So she asked if she could do work at the police department under her mother's supervision. It would give her an opportunity to keep looking into the whole turtle thing and maybe find some answers. For once, Becky began to consider it. It would be a while before she made her decision on that though. She made it clear to Lucy, however, that she had to study for Finals. Now....it was three months later since the Foot incident and Finals was up. Lucy had spent hours and hours of studying, while looking up information on the vigilantes as a side project. The stress that followed, however, had knocked Lucy's health back down and she had caught a cold because of her weak immune system, it had her down for the remainder of the school year but did not stop Becky from picking up her homework from the school to bring home for her. And finally, Finals were over. Lucy was back in school for the last of the school days, taking her Finals with a lot of nail biting. She was worried about how it was going to go. But she still tried to find information on the vigilantes. She found some stuff but not a whole lot. There were rumors about a weird van driving around at night but no solid proof. There just wasnt enough information on anything about the vigilantes or the turtles. At that point, Lucy was ready to start ripping out her hair in frustration. She was almost to just give up. Until graduation night. Lucy had passed the Finals and she graduated from High school at 16 years old now. She had gotten a lot of flak for it from other students but after promising her mother she wouldn't get into any more fights, she did her best to ignore it all. It wasn't easy whatsoever but she did what she could. But she graduated and her mother had become the Police Chief. It was a big thing to celebrate after all the hard work that they both put into it, a celebration was well deserved. So Becky took Lucy out for some pizza and ice cream down town and both were happy as can be as they walked down the block with pizza slices and laughing about some jokes Lucy had found.Usually her mother wasn't into jokes that Lucy told but she was in such a good mood. And Lucy was counting on that. Finishing her pizza, Lucy bit her lip as she stuffed her hands into her pockets as she walked beside her mother. She didn't know how to start asking her questions. But Becky did. All night Becky knew something was on her mind. She had seen the wheels turning in her daughter's head. Something had been bothering her. And she noticed it for weeks but never pushed. But tonight, it was time to get some answers. Getting into her pocket, Becky pulled out a penny and held it up for Lucy to see. It was something that they did in the past and it always brought a smile to Lucy's face. Penny for her thoughts. Slowly reaching out, Lucy took the penny and placed it into her pocket. "Mom......" she began slowly. "I've been thinking.... that day....when you arrested Shredder and Eric Sacks, who....were they fighting?" Becky frowned at her thoughtfully before shaking her head. "Well.... apparently a Channel 6 camera man apprehended Eric Sacks. Vernon The Falcon Fenwick apparently had tracked down the information about Sacks. And he stopped them." She rolled her eyes and Lucy knew that she wasn't convinced. Lucy had seen Vernon The Falcon Fenwick and frankly, the guy was a joke. He was just......she didn't want to say weird but he was. She didn't believe that he had apprehended Eric Sacks and revealed him to be a Foot agent."But....what about the tower?" Lucy asked frowning at her mother. "Shredder was fighting someone up there, wasn't he?" Becky sighed, shaking her head. "To be honest, I don't know, Lucy. We didn't have eyes up there and investigations clearly said that something went wrong and caused the tower collapse, knocking Shredder off the building when it fell." She told her. Lucy made a face. "That just doesn't make sense, mom. Shredder, Leader of the Foot doesn't make mistakes. He's been leading the police force on a wild goose chase for years. And then he makes a mistake and just falls off a building? It doesn't make sense." She said shrugging. Becky slowly nodded but smiled. "He's still human, Luce. All humans misjudge something in their lives. Even master criminals like Shredder. Karma caught up to him." She told her. Lucy made a face but then looked at her mother. "I've been hearing some stories about vigilantes, mom. Are any of those true?" She blurted out. Laughing, Becky looked at her as they walked. "Vigilantes? Well, that's a new one. Where did you hear that?" She asked in amusement and got a shrug. "No, we don't have proof of any vigilantism going on in the city. What's with all of the questions?" Lucy shrugged before she forced a smile at her. "Maybe.....I want to learn from the best? I'm thinking about following your footsteps and becoming a cop. Maybe a detective." She offered. Becky paused but smiled as she gently nudged Lucy. "This is a hard job, Lucy. You've seen it first hand of how tough it is on me when I come home on late nights. Would you really want to follow that career?" She asked cautiously. Lucy thought about it and she was kind of surprised when she nodded. It wasn't a lie or anything. "Yeah. Actually I think I do." She admitted. "If it means doing good and solving crime. Protecting innocent people, yeah. I think I want to be a detective." She then frowned as something else entered her mind. And it wasn't the turtles. "Mom, I know you told me before. But.....where did I come from?" Lucy asked a little troubled. Becky paused for a long time before sighing and licking her lips. She hated that question because she didn't know how to even answer it. "I don't know, Luce. I've spent years trying to find out. Even after I adopted you. I've tried over and over trying to find out your past. But nothing ever came up." She said softly. "But does it really matter now? The past is past and we can't change it. What matters is now." Lucy nodded solemnly and lightly kicked a rock. "I know. It's just.....I don't know. I'm happy with you. You're my mom. And I love you. I'm just...." she said weakly. "You just feel like something is missing." Becky said in understanding. She wrapped an arm around her daughter's shoulder, giving her a gentle squeeze. "You want to know who your parents were and why they gave you up. I get it, Luce. I really do." Sighing softly, Lucy looked at her. "What I want to know is why they left me at the hospital like they did? Didn't they want me?" She asked, a slight choke catching in her throat. "Oh, Lucy. I'm sure they did. Maybe....because you got so sick as a baby, they just.....couldn't take care of you and they wanted you so much but they couldn't afford the bills. Medical finances are just bad in this city." Becky said softly, knowing just how hurt her daughter was. This was not the first time they ever had this conversation. "Maybe they were scared that you would die. You came so very close according to the medical reports." Lucy sighed heavily before she smiled at her and leaned against her mother. "I guess it doesn't matter.
I've got you." She said softly.Smiling lovingly back, Becky nodded and tightened her hold onto her. "And I've got you. I love you. And I am so proud of you. I can't believe you've graduated and at 16." She said happily.Lucy still made a face. "Its weird, isn't it? That I'm 16 and now I'm out of High school?" She asked skeptically. Becky made a scoffing laugh but nodded. "It's a little bit weird of how smart you are. That's for sure. You never cease to amaze me. But either way, you're smart, you're beautiful and you're going to rock this world." She said laughing. Lucy laughed with her but nodded as she pumped her fist. "Hell, yeah, I am. I'm going fucking rock!" She cheered. "Hey! Language, young lady!" Becky scolded but laughed as they walked on. "Who taught you such language?" "Uh, you did when you came home with the really hard cases." Lucy scolded back playfully."Did not!" "Did too!" And they bantered back and forth all the way home. Since she graduated from High School, Lucy did continue to look into the cases, trying to find any evidence of the turtles. She kept up on her education as well and she got the internship at the police Department after nagging at her mother for so long.It was simple secretary work to start with. Becky wouldn't let her go to the police academy yet because of her age and it had been that that made her decide to let Lucy begin work in the department. For the next year, Lucy was to be her mother's own secretary for now and would shadow her mother around for the entire year. She would learn what to expect from the police department. When she started, she had been teased mirthlessly by the police officers. A lot of them had not been fond of the idea of a 16 year old working in the department but they learned pretty fast not to be cruel in their teasing. Because if they liked it or not, Lucy was the daughter of the Police Chief and there was a secret nickname for her by many, that they tried desperately to hide from the Chief. She was the Chief Vagina with teeth. Unfortunately, someone made the mistake of telling Lucy that and it kind of bothered her that some of the officers were making fun of her mom like that. So, naturally, she told her mother. So her new nickname was Snitch. Becky shut that shit down pretty fast when she found out and the officers learned she could be brutal, especially when it came to her daughter. Most of the time, the officers respected Lucy and actually liked her. They were amazed of how smart she was and she already had studied the police protocol manual. She already knew a lot of the rules and codes. They couldn't believe of how just smart she was. When she wasnt working on stuff for her mother, she was doing file work in the archives and using that job excuse as a favorite, she got to look through the cases about the Foot. And even Eric Sacks and the Shredder. That was when she began finding hints and clues about the vigilantes. About the turtles. It was never mentioned that there was a possibility that the vigilantes were giant turtles. But there were mentions of vigilantes in the city, fighting against The Foot. No solid evidence of what they looked like but witnesses always claimed that there were four of them and Lucy knew it had to be the turtles. She studied and read the files in between her work for her mother. She was never allowed to take the files out of the archives but no one stopped her from reading them. More than half of the time when she did get caught, Lucy claimed that she was just trying to learn how to do detective work. Most of the officers thought it was cute that she wanted to follow her mother's footsteps so they never bothered her about it. But nonetheless, it was the information about Eric Sacks that sparked ideas in her head. Especially when it mentioned in his files of the science he had been doing so long ago. He had been working on Genetics. And it was proven he had done some animal experiments when it was still legal at the time. It briefly mentioned that he had been experimenting DNA Genetics, trying to find a component that could cure all diseases and illnesses. Of course, a fire had destroyed everything in his lab and quite a few people died. Including the specimens they had been using to further their research. It did mention briefly that the specimens had been baby box turtles and a rat. And that's where Lucy got very excited. She knew this was it. She had found them. She knew that the turtles she had seen must have been Genetically altered and mutated science experiments by Eric Sacks. However, unfortunately, the file was incomplete. It did not go on from there and Lucy was left disappointed when she couldnt anything else about the turtles that Sacks had been experimented on. It only said that they had died in the fire. Somehow, Lucy doubted that. She had seen them, herself and since Sacks had been proven to be involved with the Foot the same day she had seen them, she knew it was them. His science experiments. Question was......how did she seem to know them? There was just something that ate at her. Something about the turtles. They were familiar to her and she swore that she felt it. She knew that somehow, they were in her memories. How? She didn't know. But they were there in the back of her mind. And so was that rat. It took months of digging around in the files, writing down clues about the turtles; which were nearly nonexistent. But there was a gang tag that seemed to involve the whole Foot thing. A symbol that she had seen herself several times when going to school but never had she ever realized that it might have had something to do with the turtles. A Japanese calligraphy symbol that meant Family had been recorded at every scene that involved the Foot. Scenes where it had been rumored that they were attacked by vigilantes. Lucy knew she was getting closer. It wasn't enough to piece everything together but it was something. She knew that she had to see one of these symbols herself. It was time to check out one of the Foot crime scenes. And maybe, just maybe, she would find something about the turtles.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
It was Autumn when she got anywhere.Halloween night. Lucy had been working in the department for six months now and while she looked for any traces of the Turtles, she didn't find anything. She even went to the old crime scenes to see the Japanese Family tags and she did find them. But there still wasn't anything to find. And no matter how hard she looked, she just couldn't. There was one cop who didn't know the details but knew she was looking for something. He didn't really ask questions and he was one of the officers who Lucy got along with the most. His name was Casey Jones.He was one of the only officers who didn't tease her. He was quite welcoming, actually. He didn't mind her age or intelligence. And for it, she liked him and talked to him quite a bit. She did not tell him about the Turtles though. She did, however, hint at him that she was looking for evidence of the vigilantes so he did actually try and help her in looking into those things. He was the one who drove her to the Foot vs Vigilantes hot spots so she could take a look. And he would have continued to help her if it the one night she was going to start looking in the sewers for the Turtles hadn't been an important night.Tonight was a crucial night though and there wasn't a whole lot of what she could to continue her research on the Turtles.It was the night that Shredder was finally being transferred to a maximum security prison, out of New York. And Casey was on the transfer team because of the criminals that was going with Shredder. He had been the arresting officer of these two, so it was only natural that he was ensuring their transfer out of the city.Lucy had met these two and while they were criminals, she actually liked them. They were funny. And while they were bad people, they treated her with respect in their own way. Rocksteady and Bebop were interesting characters and when they had seen her, sure they teased her for her size but they weren't mean to her. She had been one who sometimes brought them meals while they were in lockup and they always teased her by calling her Little Lady. Lucy had talked to them a few times, not that her mother was happy about it. They made crude jokes, always dissed the other officers but never her. In fact, once, when she went down to lockup to deliver their meals, another criminal in lockup kept making remarks at her. He kept saying what he was going to do to her if he ever got out and a lot of what he had said had drawn tears and brought a fear out of her. Simply of what he said, he said he was going to beat her and then rape her. And that had Lucy drawing back, while an officer was snapping at him to shut the hell up. It scared her pretty bad. That is, until the criminal wandered a little close to the side of his cell, while sneering at Lucy, Rocksteady, himself, lashed out, grabbed him by the head and slammed it against the bars, knocking his ass out. He might have been big, bad and dumb but he did not appreciate what the other criminal had said to the "Lil' Lass". And neither did Bebop when he managed to stick a foot through the bars to give the knocked out criminal a swift kick. Lucy, even with tears in her eyes, thanked them, even while they were getting yelled at. Bebop just gave her a wink and a warm smirk as he and Rocksteady took the verbal beating they were getting from the officer in charge. Nonetheless, tonight, Halloween night, Shredder was being transferred with Rocksteady and Bebop. Lucy had been there, watching the procedure of their transfer, learning new things of what she was to expect in this line of work. Her mother was up in her office, doing some paperwork and had allowed her to go down to see Casey off because she knew that they did have a friendship. Watching the officers pile the two large criminals, Bebop and Rocksteady into the truck, she did make eye contact with them. The big pale criminal just grinned at her and waved his goodbye while the shorter, dark skinned, purple haired criminal gave her another wink. She couldn't help but smile at them and wave. "You know, you're not suppose to be so friendly with them. They're bad guys, Luce." Lucy laughed as she looked up at Casey as he stepped up to beside her before she shrugged and looked back at the two being chained in the truck. "Ah, I know they're bad guys but they were nice to me." She told him. He placed an arm on top of her head and leaned over on her, making her spit and hiss at him. "It's because you're so short!" Casey teased just a little. "Casey! Get off!" Lucy laughed as she shoved at him. "It's not because I'm short!" "It's cause she a lady!" Bebop piped up from the back of the truck having heard their squabbling. "Yeh don't treat a lass with nothing but respect! Even bad boys like us knows how to treat a lass!" Rocksteady joined in before grinning at Lucy as she laughed. Casey snorted as he gave the two a look before looking back at Lucy. "Can't believe I'm getting lectured by bad guys." He said laughing before growing serious. "They're bringing down Shredder, Luce. I need you to back up. I don't want him even looking at you soni need you to go over there." He pointed to the farthest wall of the compound.Lucy nodded as she already started moving to where he told her to go. She had not really seen Shredder, other than what was on the news it never seen him with her own eyes. She was finally going to. And it did have her a little uneasy. It didn't take long for the armed guards to bring the dreaded criminal down to be transferred and the very second Lucy saw him, she felt as if her blood turned to ice. She looked at him, her arms wrapping around herself as if giving herself comfort to even look at the dreaded Leader of the Foot. He was a cold looking man. Just by looking at him, Lucy felt uneasy and she knew Casey was shifting nervously, himself. Even as he spoke to him, telling him that he was leaving, she knew he was nervous. Unfortunately, those black eyes of the master criminal turned from Casey and onto her. Lucy felt the air suck out of her lungs as those black eyes looked at her. She felt frozen as she met them. They were cold. Emotionless. And honestly, she felt a deep void just by looking into them. She couldn't help but swallow hard as she broke the eye contact first. And then he was loaded up and she felt like she could breath again. "Welp, time to run." Casey said as he looked at her and waved. "See ya when I get back. We'll go get some pizza and check out more those hotspots you were talking about".Lucy smiled and nodded as she started towards the door to head back in. She couldn't wait till he got back. She really wanted to start looking in the sewers and seeing she couldn't find something familiar about them. Heading up back to the offices, Lucy met with her mother on the way and they both smiled at each other. "So, you went down to see them off? Did you see him?" Becky asked as they walked towards the doors of the department. Lucy nodded, grimacing. "Yeah, I saw him. He's kind of scary looking. I'm so glad he's finally gone. He looked at me. And I swear, it was like looking at the real live Satan." She said shuddering. "Yea-ah, he tends to have that effect on people." Becky said as they walked out into the cool night. "I remember seeing him for the first time, well, technically the second time since his fall, I swear to God I was going to shit myself when he looked at me." Lucy believed it. "So.....home or the Halloween parade?" Becky added as they headed towards the car.Lucy made a face but shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe the Halloween parade. But I think it's almost over anyway. We missed a good chunk of it. And I got some reading I want to do so let'sjust go home." She said with a sigh."You're still looking up the vigilante thing, aren't you?" Lucy stilled in surprise as she looked at her mother. She hadn't ever told her mom she was looking into the whole thing. Becky looked amused as they climbed in the car. "Jones told me. He was trying to sneak a file out for you from the archives. And I caught him." She paused. "So why are you looking into it? I thought we discussed this, Lucy. There are no vigilantes in the city." Lucy sighed as she got in the car and buckled up. She folded her arms as her mother began driving. "Something just doesn't add up, mom. It's been driving me crazy since the Sacks thing. I know everyone believes that Vernon Fenwick caught Sacks and Shredder. But come on! The guy is full of himself." She stated. Becky didn't deny that. "Maybe he got lucky, Lucy. Tell me what this is really about." She said as she drove. For a moment, Lucy just sat there thinking before she sighed and turned towards her. Maybe it was time to tell her the truth. Of what she saw. "Mom......do you remember that day? When Sacks was caught and you arrested Shredder? Remember how the tower fell on top of the car?" Becky looked at her and nodded. "We only talk about it all the time." She ye her. Lucy bit her lip, wondering if this was even a good idea to say. She had thought about it all year. She knew it was going to sound crazy. But if she got her mom on board, maybe she could finally find answers. "I......I saw someone in the tower, mom. Someone was up there, fighting Shredder. There were four of them. Big guys. Really......really weird looking." Lucy said slowly and her mom was now staring at her. "They....uh....were in the tower when it fell. But no one else saw them but me.""There was people in the tower?!" Becky asked flabbergasted as she looked forward again. Lucy shrugged weakly. "No.....not people." She paused, swallowing hard. "Okay, I know how this is going to sound. It sounds crazy. And I've been thinking about it all year. But I swear to you. I saw them with my own eyes." She told her."Saw who, Lucy?" Becky asked a little exasperated. Taking a deep breath, Lucy looked right into her mother's eyes. "They were big, massive, green turtles, mom." She said rather slowly.There was a dead pause as Becky stared at her in surprise. For a good long moment, neither one said anything. Becky kept shifting her gaze from the road to her daughter before making a sharp laugh. "Did you hit your head recently?" She finally asked. Lucy scoffed sharply as she threw her hands up. "I knew you weren't going to believe me!" She cried in exasperation. "You're damn right I don't believe that, Lucy! Turtles! Big turtles fighting the Foot! You're still going about that childish fantasy you used to have about your imaginary friends!" Becky said loudly, shaking her head. "I thought you grew out of that, Lucy! The dreams you had! There weren't real, Lucinda! There are no turtles!" Lucy folded her arms and glared out the window. She should have known that was going to happen. She knew she shouldn't have said anything. Her mom didn't believe her. Before anything else could be said, the radio kicked alive and they got the call about an attack on the transport for Shredder. Immediately, Becky responded and began racing through the streets to get to the location where the transport truck was found. Lucy hung onto the door, her mind reeling in shock. Shredder, Bebop and Rocksteady had escaped. Getting to the warehouse where the truck was, Becky went to find out more and Lucy got out to hurry over to a sudden looking Casey. He looked miserable as he sat there with an ice pack held to the back of his head. "Casey! What happened?!" Lucy asked as she quickly approached him. Casey looked up at her before sighing as he dropped the ice pack. "The Foot clan happened, Luce! They attacked us and helped Shredder escape! He's out there now! He's loose! A freaking murdering maniac is out loose on the streets and those two idiots......! They're out!" He cried miserably. Lucy made a face before looking over as her mother began approaching them and immediately Casey was up on his feet, like a soldier. Coldly, Becky stared him down. "What happened, Jones?!" She snapped, clearly angry that this happened. Casey sighed and began explaining everything. He told them that the transport was on the highway and the Foot attacked on motorcycles. He told them that they were like ninja with swords and stuff. And then he said the craziest thing. "A garbage truck that threw manhole covers?" Becky asked skeptically, her eyebrows raised. Lucy stared at Casey in surprise as she listened. She knew it sounded crazy and her mother didn't believe it but she did. She knew it had to be the turtles. They were driving around now. They apparently had a garbage truck that spat out manhole covers from the grill. Were they.....really that smart then?! Of course, Becky spoke her skepticism and ordered Casey off the force until further notice; just until he got a Psychological diagnosis from a Psychiatrist. But Lucy turned to case, her eyes bright with awe. "I believe you, Case." She immediately said as she took his arm in hand, giving it a light squeeze. "I know it's true." "Lucy, let's go!" Her mother called over her shoulder as she was walking away. Lucy looked back at her. "Mom! It has to be them! It has to be....." she was saying. Impatiently, Becky turned back and she looked furious. "Lucy, there are no Turtles! Get that through your head!" She snapped in front of everyone, making them all freeze to stare. She started to walk back to level eyes with a cringing Lucy. "There are no such thing as giant, walking, talking turtles! They are not vigilantes fighting the Foot! They are NOT real! They are a figment of your childish imagination! You dreamed of them when you were nine, Lucinda! But they are not real! It's time for you to grow up! You just graduated High School! You want to be a police detective, you better get that notion out of your head about those turtles that you dreamed up as a kid! GROW UP, LUCY!!" Becky snapped angrily. Lucy cringed, her face burning red with embarrassment. She felt quite belittled right at the moment. And the fact that she just got yelled at by her mother in front of Casey and everyone else, she felt ashamed. Someone coughed. Lucy had tears in her eyes and she was shaking under the glare of her mother. She couldn't find a single thing to say to defend herself. Glaring at her for a moment longer, Becky turned sharply away. "I'm taking you home, Lucy! You're done with the department and you're going back to school! You're obviously not ready for the real world!" She snapped. "Come on! Now!" Lucy flinched a little before sharing a glance with Casey before she exhaled shakily and followed her mother back to the car. When they got home, Lucy went straight to her room and slammed the door while her mother slammed the front door as she went back to the police department to begin the procedures to find the three dangerous criminals. Lucy, however, cried the whole night.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
For two days, Lucy did not see her mother and even if she saw her for a brief moment, she did not talk to her, nor did Becky talk to her. Lucy was still very upset about the blow up and she didn't know what to do about it. She regretted even saying anything to her mother. She wished she hadn't said anything at all but keeping it all a secret. Depressed and angry, she didn't leave the house but tried to come up a solution. She had to find some kind of proof that the turtles were real. She had to find them. See them. She just had to and it was digging at her brain. It was driving her nuts and she knew she was getting obsessed about it. She had to know the truth. She felt like she was going insane by not knowing! What did the turtles have to do with her? She knew she knew them and she had to find out how!Unfortunately she was on house arrest and her mother said so in the past two days in the 30 seconds of being home. She told Lucy that she was grounded for her stupid fantasy and when this whole thing was over, she was enrolling her back into school and making her go see a shrink. Lucy was angry. And for the two days, she sat in her room, plotting a way to find proof of the turtles. She tried to come up with plans of what to do but because of the stress, she couldn't figure out anything. Her strategic side of her brain just didn't seem to work. She thought long and hard of what to do. She couldn't come up with anything though. She tried and failed, tried and failed and all it did was make her more and more......Suddenly, while writing down plans, someone began banging on the door of their apartment. Lucy jumped as she looked at her door before she got up up and went to the front door. She just barely opened it when a hand lashed out and grabbed her by the arm, pulling her outside. Shrieking in surprise, Lucy looked wide eyed at who it was and froze, even as she was being dragged. She barely had time to close the door to the apartment as Casey was dragging her down the hall of the complex with a very shocked and alarmed woman right behind them. "Casey!?" Lucy yelled as she was being pulled after and she spared a glance at the woman he was with.The woman looked just as shocked as she did as she quickly hurried after them. She was a beautiful woman with dark hair and red highlights. Her eyes very blue and she had a face to die for. She was wearing a police standard outfit and was Casey. "Casey?! What......where are we going?! Who's is.....?!" Lucy was saying as she was dragged out of the apartment complex, towards his black mustang waiting out front. "Lucy, April O'Neil. April, Lucy." Casey immediately said before opening the door to his backseat before turning to both shocked ladies. "Lucy, the turtles are real. April, she knows about the turtles. We need your help, Lucy. I'll explain it on the way. Get in!" He said and he was already moving to get in the car. Both Lucy and April looked stunned at one another before they quickly clambered into the car and barely enough time to buckle their selves in as Casey sped to go. "What do you mean she knows about the guys?!" April exclaimed. "You saw them?!" Lucy exclaimed at the same time and they looked at each other again. "I don't know, O'Neill! Ask her! All I know is she and her mom, the Police Chief got into a huge fight the night Shredder, Bebop and Rocksteady escaped! She said it first!" Casey exclaimed back as he drove down the night street. "Lucy, how do you know about the turtles?" Lucy had a million questions flying around her head as she looked at him and then the woman. Now that she thought about it, she did know who she was. A reporter from Channel 6 news. And her mind went back to that day. She was the woman who fell with the turtles in the tower. "I don't.....I don't know, Casey! I just do! Plus I saw them in March, when the radio tower fell! And I saw them! The big one! The really big one looked right at me!" Lucy said quickly before grimacing when Casey made a sharp turn. "Yo-you saw us?!" April asked stunned as she looked back at her. "And Raph....." she scoffed as she rolled her eyes. "He saw you see us?! Leo is going to kill him! He never said that someone saw us!" Lucy flinched at another sharp turn. "Who.....what are they?!" She asked the other woman. April sighed as she shot Casey a look before looking back at Lucy. "Well.....they're turtles. Mutant turtles, to be exact. They were experiments of Eric Sacks, like years ago. And they mutated into what they are now. They walk like people, they talk and they're Ninja!" She told her. "Your turn!" Lucy shook her head, wildly. She didn't even know where to start. "When I was a kid, I had dreams about them! Them and a rat!" She said before squeaking as Casey had to slam on his brakes. "Casey! Slow down! You're going to kill us!" "Splinter." April said breathlessly. "We don't have time, Lucy! We got to get to the police headquarters before the Foot does! They're after purple goop that was taken by April!" Casey shouted back. "Two of the turtles are there, waiting on us to getting there! We got to get it back before the Foot breaks in and steals it!" Lucy was confused but excited at the same time. She was finally going to see them! "Why do we need her help?" April asked skeptically. "Because her mom is the Police Chief!" Casey shot back. "If we run into Chief Vincent, Lucy can distract her while we get the mutagen to the big guy!" "Casey, I don't...." Lucy began frowning as she held onto the seat in the back. "Look! Both of you! Lucy, you're a backup plan! If anything goes wrong, we need you to distract your mom! The Foot are after something in thenHeadquarters and the turtles are breaking in to get it before they do! You get to meet them later, okay?! But first, we have to beat the Foot there first!" Lucy was still a little confused and even uneasy about this but she nodded in agreement. She would go on with it as long as she got to meet the turtles. Finally getting to the department, all three hurried in to begin the operation. Of course, imagine Lucy's surprise when she saw Vernon Fenwick there, distracting police officers while the three snuck in. She looked surprised and so did he when he saw her. He actually looked confused as she snuck past the front desk with Casey and April. But nonetheless, the three hurried through the halls, pausing a few times when they came to locked doors. They even went through a hall where Casey immediately jumped to the side, pushing April and Lucy into a door way when Becky was walking past. Thankfully, her mother didn't notice them. As they were walking down another hall that lead to the Evidence lockup, April paused for only a single second to snatch a falling key card that had come falling out of a vent. Lucy couldn't help butnpase to look up at the vent and she barely saw something up there. And that something seemed to be quite big. And it froze over the tight grates before leaning closer to look through back at her. Green eyes peering at her, looking confused. "What the shell?" She heard a deep gruff voice spoke quietly. Lucy would have said something back if Casey hadn't grabbed her arm and dragged her after April, shooting the vent a pointed look before hurrying on. And that's when hell broke loose. Turning a corner to head to Evidence, all three suddenly halted when they the Foot soldiers, running towards them, with a container full of purple liquid. All of them froze at the sight of each other.It only took a second for April to lunge towards a fire alarm and pull it. Immediately the alarms blared and the action followed.It happened so fast that Lucy barely registered any of it. She saw the Foot lunge towards them, leaping over their heads and she briefly remembered lashing out and grabbing the purple container from one of the Foot's hand. That sent an immediate reaction as the Foot spun around, lashing out at her head. For some reason, her reaction was in full throttle mode and she barely had time to duck as she felt a blade whiz over her head, slamming into the wall. She, on the other, ran as fast as she could with Casey shoving at the Foot soldiers and April scampering after her. They just ran as fast as they could, shouting as they went. "Run, Lucy! Run! Don't stop!" Casey yelled as hismlegs were pumping to keep up with her. "NO SHIT, CASEY!!" Lucy shouted back before gasping as a small blade went whizzing by her head. "Wha-?!" "Throwing stars!" April yelled to inform her as they ran down the halls and ducked down another hall. The Foot were right behind them, throwing blades and thankfully missing. But they were getting closer to hitting the three. Suddenly, there was a loud crash as the ceiling above them caved through and making all three flinch and skid to a halt. It came from behind them so they stopped to look and Lucy felt the breath stall in her lungs and her heart pounded hard in her ribcage. There they were; two of them.Massive compared to her. Their heads nearly touched the ceiling of the hall and they were facing down the Foot, already springing to action. Big, muscular, and with huge, hard shells on their backs with that Japanese tag painted in red and orange on them, the two Turtles attacked the Foot. And all Lucy could do was stare with wide eyes as she felt Casey place his hand on her shoulder to remind her he and April was there. The two turtles moved so fast for their size, attacking the foot with weapons; a pair of Psis and nunchucks, springing and slashing. Lucy could not believe her eyes as she watched them move. She was finally seeing them. She now knew she wasn't crazy. The one in red noticed the gaping humans and he shot them a look as he bashed at the Foot. "Get out a here with the mutagen! Get it somewhere safe!" He boomed at them. April nodded as she grabbed at Lucy's arm and yanked her to run. Lucy quickly tucked the container into her pants, thanking that she was wearing skinny jeans today. She ran after Casey and April, bursting into the main lobby where police officers were now running towards them, guns drawn. "Freeze!" They shouted and the three skidded to a halt but Lucy stepped forward, raising her hands. "Stop! It's me!" She shouted, knowing they knew her. And they did hesitate in surprise to see the Chief's daughter. "Lucy!" Lucy turned her head when she heard her mother yell and she saw her racing towards them with a group of officers. "What.....?!" Suddenly there was a thump behind Lucy and she didn't even gave time to turn around when arms wrapped around her waist and throat and a blade was pressed against it. She screamed and then saw April and Casey get thrown forward from behind. She could only barely see in the glass window that she was trapped by a Foot soldier. And he had a sword to her throat, ready to slash it open. She felt the fear paralyze her as she struggled with no success at all. "No!" Becky screamed now covering her mouth with one hand and her other raised to hold back her officers from firing their weapons. "M-Mom!" Lucy cried out terrified. "Let......Let her go!" Becky demanded, her eyes wide with fear. Casey and April were on their feet, looking on with horror, their selves as Lucy was trapped. They were frozen in terror, expecting they were about to watch her die. "The mutagen! Give it to us and she will be let go!" The Foot who had her ordered. Lucy, terrified, used one hand to cover the container in her pants. She knew he didn't even realize she had it. She just looked at her mother with terror and her mother looked back. "Sh......shoot them!" She yelled and felt the blade press against her skin, nearly breaking it. Suddenly there was a loud crash from behind the Foot and startled, Lucy was shoved forward, only to be caught by a massive arm and swung away from the danger as glass and blades were swung. She barely had time to glance up to see that big red guy again as he shielded her from the sharp bits flying around. Green met blue for only a moment before he was spinning away, his three fingered hands pushing her towards April, who grabbed her and pulled her further back away from the fight. Lucy saw all four of them together now, attacking the Foot. They fought back fast, moving in and out of one another while all humans looked on with horror or shock as the four huge turtles drew the Foot back. The Foot immediately retreated into the night as fast as they could, leaving the turtles to face the police. The four of them turned to look at the humans and only froze with hands raising when guns docked and were trained on them. Lucy glanced back at her mother, who was pale with shock. Her eyes were wide as she looked at the turtles. She knew that her mother just could not believe what she was seeing. "Get down on your knees!" An officer exclaimed and slowly, the turtles did what they were told. "What are they?!" One exclaimed with shock. "They're monsters!!" Another yelled. The turtles flinched at that word and the one in orange looked heartbroken to hear that. "We're not monsters." He murmured weakly. Lucy felt her heart twist as she looked at the four before her face twisted in anger and determination. She yanked away from April and spun around, putting herself between the officers and the turtles. Becky gasped as she watched her daughter shield the creatures, her eyes baring right into her own. "Lucinda! Move!! Those things are dangerous!" She shouted and was stunned when April and Casey quickly joined her to shield the turtles, their hands raised high. "Turtles, mom!" Lucy shouted as she looked firmly back at Becky. "I told you they were real! Don't hurt them! They just saved us! The big one saved me! His name is Raphael! And I remember him now!" She shouted. She saw April look stunned at her and she could feel the surprise from the turtles from behind her."What?!" Becky asked flabbergasted, looking confused. Slowly, Lucy looked back at the turtles and saw they did look surprised as they stared at her. She smiled slowly, taking in their eyes and it was coming back to her. The dreams and the memories. She remembered their names. She heard them from her dreams. "Raph. Leo. Mikey. Donny." Lucy said and saw each one perk up at the mention of their name. She turned fully around before pulling the container from her pants, holding it out to the big one. "Raph." "Huh.....how does she......?" Michaelango was asking bewildered. "It's me, guys." Lucy said smiling. "You saved me. Raph found me. Remember?" There was a long pause as they let her words register before a dawning formed in Raphael. His eyes widened and he sucked in deeply as he looked at her. "Lucy?!" He gasped. Lucy smiled widely and nodded and she saw the other turtles stiffen as they remembered. "Wait! The baby?! The one that that Raph found?!" The purple wearing turtle yelped. There was a stunned pause as they all stared at her with realization. But then Lucy turned and looked at her mother, who just looked stunned and horrified. She frowned before looking back at the turtles. They were in danger of staying. Becky was not understanding what was happening and she was on the edge of breaking. "Go. Get out of here! I'll deal with my mom! Go now!" Lucy said before turning back around and raising her arms to shield them. She heard them all shift to their feet and suddenly felt large arms wrap around her, pulling her into a back hug. "Thank shell you're still alive." She heard Raph say into her ear before he was turning and running with with his brothers. They were gone quickly with Lucy, Casey and April to take the heat. But at least they were safe and now gone. Becky approached Lucy, still looking stunned as she faced her daughter. "You have a lot to explaining to do!" She said and there was anger in her tone. Anger and fear."Hey, I told you they were real. You didn't believe me." Lucy said just as angrily.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
There was a shouting matching going on and everyone could hear it in the office. They knew it was best to just stay away until it was over. "THOSE THINGS ARE DANGEROUS, LUCY!! AND YOU LET THEM GO!!" "I TOLD YOU ABOUT THEM! AND THEY'RE NOT DANGEROUS!! NOT TO US!! TO BAD GUYS!! SHREDDER AND THE FOOT!!" "WE DON'T KNOW WHAT THEY ARE!" "THEY'RE TURTLES!! BIG, BOX TURTLES!! AND THEY HAVE NAMES!!" "LUCY! THOSE.....THOSE CREATURES.....!" "TURTLES!! RAPHAEL! LEONARDO!! DONATELLO!! AND MICHAELANGELO!!" The two blondes glared at one another, both folding their arms as they just glared angrily at one another. They just just had laser fire going off between them before it was Becky who took a deep breath and unfolded her arms. "Okay, you told me about them. I'm sorry I didn't believe you but how do you know that they're not dangerous? You could be wrong about them." Lucy shook her head as she flipped her ponytail back. "I'm not, mom. I know they're not bad. They've been fighting the Foot all this time. They were the ones who took down Shredder. They have been fighting back against bad guys." She told her how wearily. Becky sighed before shaking her head. "How do you know about them?" She asked. Shrugging, Lucy knew it was finally calming down between them. The fight was pretty much over now. "I don't know. I just....." she tried so hard to recall everything. "My dreams.....they weren't dreams, mom. They were memories. I remember seeing them. I remember their names. They found me. Raph.....he found me somewhere. I can barely remember it. It.....it was cold and I think I was crying. And he just showed up. He was small then. Not very much bigger than I am now." She told her. Sighing, Becky began massaging her nose bridge before turning away. She then frowned and turned back. "You said there's a rat too?" She asked skeptically. "Mom." Lucy sighed heavily. "I can't answer anything. I barely remember. They can tell us where I came from. They know. I'm sure of it." She told her. "Well, for right now, I need to go interrogate Casey Jones and April O'Neill. You stay here and if you leave this room, I will ship you off to boot camp!" She said firmly before she turned and began leaving the room. Lucy rolled her eyes before going to the window in her mom's office, looking out at the rising sun. She was so annoyed. She just wanted to go find the turtles and find out what they knew about her. She was so close now. It was a few hours long before Becky came back, looking weary and fed up with everything. She took one look at Lucy and motioned to her to come out. Lucy rolled her eyes but did as she was told. She wanted to know what happened and that's when she noticed Vernon Fenwick in the room, along with Casey and April being escorted over to where Becky was with The Falcon. It was then that the whole building shook, startling everyone. Lucy halted from where she stood before she, with everyone else turned to look out the big windows when they heard cracking of lightning and thunder. And the breath neatly left her when she saw a massive whirlpool of clouds swirling in the sky. "What the......?" Lucy asked before going over to her mother. "Mom, what's going on?" Becky, stunned, slowly shook her head before wrapping an arm her and pulling her close. "I don't know." She said and she truly sounded scared of what they were seeing. "I have to call them." April spoke up now quickly approaching them. "Donny will know what's going on. He's like super smart and he will figure it out." Becky looked at her with impatience. "What, do they have something to do with this? Is this their plan?!" She demanded. Lucy nudged her mother's shoulder. "Mom!" She scowled. "What?! I don't know what's going on! I don't know who or what they are!! I don't know them!" Becky argued sharply. "Then why don't you listen to what they have to say." Casey spoke up as he held up a cellphone to her. Irritatingly, it was Becky's phone and she snatched it with a glare at him. "Nice." She huffed then looked at April. "And they will come if you call for them?" She asked irritably. April shrugged, with a dry look. "As long as you dont try and shoot them, yeah, they'll come." She glanced out the window. "They're probably the only ones who can deal with whatever that is. And Donny, he can tell you what it is. He figures things out pretty well." "It looks like....some kind of inter-dimentional portal from space. We're probably being attacked by aliens." Lucy piped up as she stared at the thing in the sky. "Might even have radiation near it. If the turtles were mutated from a genetically compound, they are the only ones that can go close to that without being poisoned or anything." She was being stared at by everyone. Becky made an impatient sound but amused. "You and your IQ level, Lucy. I swear to God that more than half of the things that come out of your mouth is garble." She gave a light jab at her daughter. "Just because you don't understand biological and astrological science, doesn't mean it's garble mom." Lucy shot back but was smiling. "Huh?" Casey said confused. "Jones, you know better than anyone that Lucy is smarter than anyone in this damn precinct. Just go with it." Becky said irritated. "Ye-ah, she's a nerd. I'm a jock." Casey snorted. April smiled either way as she looked at Lucy. "You're a science girl?" She asked shifting her weight. "What's your IQ?" Lucy shrugged. "230, give or take." she answered.April laughed. "Oh, Donny's gonna love you. His is 245 if not higher. He hasn't had any intelligent talk for a long time and most of the time it's to himself." She said smiling. Lucy just grinned back. Becky sighed heavily before turning to the former reporter. "All right, O'Neill. Call them in. I'll give them a shot. I'll listen to what they say." She told her. April nodded before she raised her arm and touched the wristwatch she wore. It suddenly emitted a cartoonish turtle face with a purple mask and Lucy's eyes lit up. "Ooh, a communicator?! Did he build that?!" She asked excitedly. April laughed but nodded. "Yeah, Donny did. He built all of his gizmos and gadgets. Even that garbage truck you saw, Casey." She said in amusement and would have laughed when Becky stiffened in realization. But her attention went to the watch as a voice rang out. "April? Going okay?" April smiled at the watch and nodded as if Donny could see her. "Yeah, we're okay. We've got trouble up here, Donny." She stated. "Already on it, April. It's an inter-dimentional portal from another world called Dimention X. What's coming through is a death machine called the Technodrome and the alien species is called Kraang. Its here to destroy the city and totally hostile take over." Donatello explained immediately.
Everyone felt uneasy by hearing all of that. "Can you stop it?" April asked sharing a worried glance with the others. "Well, yeah. Our molecular system is far different from humans'. The mutagen in our blood allows us to withstand any kind of radiation that is coming off of that. Problem is, we can't get up there if we're looking over our shells for the police." Donny stated. April shared a glance with the Chief. "I don't think that's going to be a problem anymore, Don." She stated. There was a pause. "They're listening in on this conversation right now, aren't they?" Donny asked weakly. "Yea-ah. They're right here. And they want to meet you guys. They need to hear it from you. Casey, Lucy and I have told them all we can but they're not sure if we're on the level. They need to hear it from you." She told him regretfully. There was another pause before it was Leo who spoke up. "We're coming up. 25th street, a few blocks from the Chrysler Building, where the portal is opening. 15 minutes." The cool blue Turtle leader said and then the communications logged off. April dropped her wrist and looked at Becky. "Well?" She asked dryly. Immediately, Becky turned and began barking orders for everyone to move. She wanted every officer out in the city to evacuate people away from the general area.April, Casey and Vernon all looked at Lucy, curiously and she shrugged. "So.....what's the story about you and the turtles?" It was the old camera man who asked the girl. Shrugging again, Lucy could only shake her head. "You're going to have to ask them. I don't remember a whole lot. Just what I pieced together from dreams I had of them. Raph found me somewhere really cold and i remember bits and pieces. Not a lot. I remember their names and.....the rat. They.....they took care of me. Up until i think i got sick." She said weakly. "Splinter. His name is Splinter." April said smiling. Lucy smiled as she took it in. "He....he used to sing to me. I remember that. I was a year old when I was found outside a hospital. My name written down so that the doctors would know." She told them. "A year old and you remember all of that?" Casey quite amazed. "My brain....is different. From other people's. I don't know why but I'm 16 and I'm really smart. I remember a lot of things. But my health....well, I get sick really easy. My health isn't good when I catch a bug." Lucy told them"Maybe Donatello can run some tests and figure it out. He's good that way." April said with a shrug. Lucy nodded before she turned with them and started to move to follow her mom with the three behind them. "What else do you remember? Your real mom?" Vernon asked as they walked. Lucy shook her head. "I just remember them. I felt...safe with them. Raph, especially. He was always there. With the ra....uh, Splinter. Taking care of me. He was always the first one to jump in when it came to feeding me. He even.....let me sleep with him when it got cold down there." She told him and her face fell. "But there is one thing I remember before them. Before Raph." "What's that?" April asked carefully. Lucy shivered and wrapped her arms around herself as she looked back at her. "Pain. I remember pain. And fear. I think....I think someone was hurting me when I was a baby. I don't know who. But before Raph and the Turtles and Splinter. I was scared to death." That had all three older people slow and look at one another but no one said anything else as they began going with the police to meet the turtles.They were waiting for the turtles to show up now. The police and the civilians were standing on the road by an alley, staring manholes in the alleyway. It was almost time for the meetup and everyone couldn't help but be a little edgy. "Are you sure they're coming?" Becky asked looking at April. April nodded as she folded her arms. "They'll be here." Was her short answer. Lucy shifted nervously beside her mother but kept eyeing the alleyway. She was frowning as she took it all in. She couldn't help but feel that this place was familiar somehow. There was something about this alley. Suddenly, the manholes shifted and everyone tensed as the covers slid off to the sides and all four turtles were carefully and slowly climbing up into the sunlight. They turned to face the group of officers and slowly approached. Some of the officers shifted nervously and some had their guns drawn already, which made the four brothers raise their hands as if to ease them. Becky took a deep breath before stepping forward. "What are you?" She called to them. The turtles shared glances, though Raph looked straight at Lucy, looking more relaxed than the other three when she smiled at him. "Let's just say we're four brothers who hates bullies and loves this city." He answered before giving Lucy a nod. "Hey, Lucy. Good to see ya." Lucy smiled before she walked forward, ignoring the choke her mother made as she dodged her grasp. She ignored everyone as they tended as she walked right up to the brothers, who were all now slowly smiling at her. Immediately, she threw her arms around Raph, who grinned before wrapping his big arms back around her. Then when she tugged out of his arms, she did the same to Leo and then Donny and Mikey, who literally, picked her up and spun around her around making her laugh. Lucy turned back, an around Mikey and his resting on her shoulders as they all grinned at Becky, who looked exasperated before giving the order for everyone to stand down. "They're family, mom." She told her mother. "You....I swear to God, Lucy. Quit trying to give me a heart attack." Becky said a lot more easily before she now moved forward with April, Casey and Vernon beside her. "So why should we believe you?"It was April who answered, now stepping up next to her and then pointing at Vernon. "Why don't you ask him?" She stated before giving her former partner a pointed look. "Go ahead, Vern. Tell them about the deal."Vernon laughed weakly as he shook his head. "What deal? I don't know about any deal." He then got a look at Raph, who growled and cracked his knuckles with a pointed look. "Oh, that deal." He turned to Becky, who folded her arms and raised a brow. "Ah.....so last year, it was these guys who took down Shredder and Eric Sacks. I just was along for the ride. I was a wingman. Because of their situation, we made a deal that I would take the credit so they could keep hiding." He admitted. Lucy snorted and so had her mom. "Told you, mom. I knew it wasn't him. I mean, come on. The Falcon. That was the best you could come up with?" She said snickering right with the turtles."Hey." Vernon said offended.Before anyone could say anything else, Lucy turned to Leo. "Why this alley? There's something familiar about it and I don't know why." She blurted out.The four brothers shared a glance with one another then looked back at her. They looked hesitant to answering but then Leo motioned to Raph. "We knew that question was going to come up. While we don't have time to answer everything, we thought it was best to answer that one. This is where he found you." He said firmly. Lucy stiffened as she looked at Raph and even saw her mom move forward, now very drawn to this. She looked right at him and saw how serious it was. "What happened?" Becky was the one to ask, seriously. Raph inhaled deeply before looking at Lucy. "We were five, all four of us. All of us," he pointed towards the road behind the police, some even looking to where he pointed. "We were playing hide and seek in the sewers under the road. I was hiding on some pipe. By the manhole, there. I heard ya crying." "At the time, we weren't allowed to come up here. Raph broke the rules and came up." Leo added in but not in a reprimanding way. "Its a good thing he did. Because you would have died if he hadn't." Lucy was listening hard and she felt her heart pounding. She knew her mother was listening hard too. Everyone was. Some of the officers even came closer, drawn to the story. "I found your mom first. And it scared me." Raph said seriously. Lucy paled slightly. That tone he used could only mean one thing. "She was dead." She stared the obvious. And there was murmurs from the police officers behind her. Raph slowly nodded. "Someone slit her throat. And just left you in a dumpster to die." He told her. "I knew if I didn't take you, you would have died. Either frozen," his features darkened. "Or by the guy who killed your mom when he came back for her body and you." Lucy felt her breath leave her lungs. She felt crushed by hearing that. "Did you see him?" Becky asked now dead serious. She was stepping into the role of police detective now. Raph looked at her but shook his head. "Nope. I took her and got back down there, where the guys were waiting. We all heard what they said though. Two guys. They said something about her mom stealing her from someone. Their boss. Apparently the asshat was doing experiments on her. Science stuff." He looked at Donny now. Understanding, Donny stepped forward. "They were talking about how their boss was performing Genetically altering experiments on her. As a baby. Her mother stole her to get her away from that. It's not unlike what happened to us." He told them.Lucy frowned as she looked at her mom. "Maybe that's why I'm so smart, mom. And my photographic memory. And my health is so screwed up." She said and even Becky looked serious at that. "What about your health?" Raph asked frowning. Lucy shrugged as she looked back at him and the other three. "My health is really screwy. I get sick really easy. I get a cold, I'm down for weeks. A stupid cold put me on the death bed for a month." She told them. The brothers looked at one another. "Might explain why she got so sick like that then. The reason why we had to give her back to the humans." Mikey piped up. "How long was she down there with you?" Becky asked frowning at the turtles. "Two months. We kept her for two months. The idea was to make sure those guys stopped looking for her. Because they knew someone took her from the dumpster." Leo told the Chief. "Our dad, Splinter, he knew she couldn't stay with us for good. She didn't belong down there but we took care of her until she got sick. Then we had no choice but to give her back. She was going to die down there if we didn't. Splinter, himself, snuck up here to the hospital." "We didn't want to give her back but she would have died. Took Raph a week to get over it. Probably more than that because he's the one who found her. He was the closest to her besides Splinter." Donny said giving a small smile. "Though, we don't think he ever got over it. He became quite a grumpy shell after we had to give her back." Raph growled slightly and nudged Donny but lightly. "And you didn't hear any names?" Becky asked still stonily. All four brothers shook their heads. "Lucy's mom's name. It was Lucy. We named her after her mom. And one of the guy's name was Chris. But that's it. Nothing else." Leo stated. Lucy sighed, quite emotionally. She looked at her mother, who wrapped an arm around her. "Well....we at least know my mom didn't give me up because she didn't want me." She said miserably. Becky nodded slowly before running her fingers through Lucy's blonde locks. "We will find out the truth, Luce. I promise. Even if we have to do a DNA test, we will find out who she was. And why some son of a bitch was hurting you." She said acidly. "Ya let Donny help, you will get those answers pretty fast." Raph gruffed out motioning to the tall thin turtle of the four. "He's a whiz at pretty much anything.
Even medical." Becky and Lucy looked at one another before slowly nodding in agreement. They knew they needed to get to the bottom of everything that dealt with her. And if Lucy had been experimented on as a baby, it was best to know what was expected. "First, we need to deal with Kraang." Leo said now looking up at the sky as debris the alien machine began flying over head. "Donny, how much time do we have left?"Donny shook his head as he pulled out one of his gizmos hooked around his waist and activated a computer, which emitted a hologram of numbers and images. "Not a whole lot of time. According to my calculations, the Technodrome is building itself together and once it's completed, it will activate as a weapon. Kraang is going to destroy the city. We need to find the control module up there and shut it down." He then pointed st the Chrysler building. "We need to get up there to get on the Technodrome. And if I'm right, there should be a beacon that is pulling the pieces together. We get to the beacon, we need to send it back through the portal to where it belongs." "Sounds easy enough." Casey muttered with a grimace. "Oh, no, Casey. Here's the hard part. We can't shut the portal down once the Technodrome is through from the same place. The portal is being controlled somewhere else. Someone else opened that portal to let Kraang come here. I'm betting it was Shredder. We need to find the portal controls and at a certain point of time, when we manage to get the beacon, someone needs to close the portal." "Send us the coordinates, Donny. We're going." April said looking at Casey and Vernon, who grimaced. Donny nodded and began speed typing. "What about me? I want to help." Lucy said frowning. It was Leo who reached over and placed his hand on her shoulder. "You can help by staying by your mom, Lucy. We got this." He told her. Lucy scowled, folding her arms. "Hey, I can help! I'm tough!" She pouted. "Yeah, we know, squirt. But we'll feel much better if we knew you were somewhere safe. Don't wanna be worrying about ya." Raph said now ruffling her hair, much to her squeaking protest. Becky placed a hand on Lucy's shoulder, understandably exactly what the turtles meant. "Luce, they're right. There isn't a lot you can do right now. And if they're worrying about you, it'll probably just distract them. You just stay with me and help evacuate people from the area. Let them deal with this." She told her. Huffing, Lucy nodded before looking at the four, who looked back. "All right. Just....be safe up there. We just found each other again. You better come back." She wanted them. The turtles just grinned st her, nodding. "We have no intention to getting our asses beat up there. We're coming back." Raph said to her and his brothers nodded in agreement. "I'm holding it to you." Lucy swore. And they got moving.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
It was the most tense hour of their lives. Lucy kept her promise and stayed by her mother and several officers serving as their guards, by a communications vehicle, keeping in touch with all officers on the field, as well as Casey, April and Vernon. They could see the Technodrome continuing to build itself together but couldn't see the actual fight that they knew that was happening up there. They saw some blasts going off but nothing told them if any of the turtles were hurt.Becky got reports in that the police escort with Casey, April and Vernon had reached the building where Donny said the portal controls were kept but only Casey's car got through a barricade into the building while the police theirselves got blocked out. There wasn't very much radio communication after that. Not with the three. So that meant that they were in the dark of what was going on.At one point, it got very tense when they saw what a big eye push out from the top of the now nearly complete death machine and both mother and daughter grasped onto one another. They were sure it was going to be over for them. Especially when it began heating up and pointing down at the city, looking ready to fire. Lucy gripped onto her mother tightly, closing her eyes tight as she awaited the final blow. She felt her mother tighten her grip on her, watching upward with glaring eyes. They were sure they were going to die. It was just a small piece of the machine was about to fit itself to complete the large machine when it suddenly stopped as something small went flying out of the huge sphere and headed straight for the gaping porta in the sky. Cheers broke out all around the two and Lucy felt her mom deflate with relief, only then she looked up. The Technodrome was now breaking apart, heading back through the portal. Lucy let out a huge sigh of weary relief herself. She knew that could only mean one thing. She knew that the turtles had beat Kraang and managed to get the beacon. As if that wasn't enough, the communications crackled and Casey's voice came through. "This is Casey Jones, reporting. We've had an interesting run in with The Foot on our end but we have everything under control. I'd also like to say, we now have Shredder's right hand, Karai and several Foot Soldiers in custody. As well as the two criminals, Rocksteady and Bebop. They're all under arrest." There were cheers all around Becky and Lucy as the Chief grabbed the mic to report back. "Good work, Officer Jones. Cuff them, book them and lock them up." She stated. "Heh, does that mean I'm back on the force?" Casey asked clearly grinning on his end. Rolling her eyes but smiling, Becky shared a glance with Lucy. "Yes, Jones. You're back on the force. Now get to it." She stated firmly. And then she set the mic down to turn to Lucy. Suddenly, there were several thumps, making everyone jump and turn around but smiles broke out when they saw it was the turtles, having finally come down from above. Lucy grinned before racing over to them and throwing herself into the first's arms, which happened to be Mikey first. "I knew you could do it!" She cheered as she hugged him tight. "Heh, what, you doubted us kicking some serious shell up there, girl?" Mikey asked with a grin. Lucy immediately shook her head as she proceeded to hug all of the turtles, hugging Raph the longest, of course and letting him use her shoulders as an arm rest as they looked over at Becky as she approached them, now smiling warmly. "A job well done." Becky said proudly. "That was a pretty close call though." Leo nodded as he glanced upward. "Yeah, Kraang proved to be a little tough. He nearly had us for a moment. He about crushed Mikey up there but if there's one thing that he won't ever forget, it's if you mess with Mikey," he paused. "You get shell shocked." Both Raph and Donny spoke up, both rubbing Mikey's head, who laughed as he shoved at their hands. "So what did he look like? What kind of alien was he?" Lucy asked excitedly. "Tch, a big wad of bubblegum in a huge robot." Raph remarked as he shrugged. "Technically, he looked like a brain. A slime brain with tentacles and bad hygiene." Donny corrected. Lucy made a face at that. "Ew." She remarked. Becky sighed in content. "Well, you destroyed him, right? He won't be coming back?" She asked them. The four brothers shared a glance but shook their heads. Leo stepped forward. "We don't destroy things, we fix them. We don't really kill anything. Even bad guys. We just beat them down. Might have destroyed his robot though. But we just sent him back to his dimension. He swears he'll be coming back but if he does, we will be waiting for him." He told her. Raph punched his fist into his other hand. "And we'll beat his ass then too and send him right back." He gruffed with a grin. "That is, if you'll allow us to." Donny added and all four watched Becky carefully. Becky paused as she studied them, looking them all over. She eyed them from green skin to hard shell. And even to their ninja weapons of choice. She them smiled and placed a hand on her waist. "After what you just did to save this city, I think we'd be out of our minds to not allow you to continue your vigilance. As long as you're willing to work with us, you're more than welcome to protect this city in your own way." She told them, smiling.The four brothers all grinned and high fives one another and even Lucy when she offered her hands to them. "Turtle Power!" They all chanted. "We're going to make it official tonight." Becky added. "Statue of Liberty Island, tonight, 11 p.m. We would like to properly thank you and show you our gratitude for what you have done for this city. And, please, bring your father. I would like to meet the one who has done a fantastic job of raising four amazing, heroic......." She paused, trying to think of what else to say besides young men."Turtles." Lucy piped in. "And I know I'd love see him again too!""Belive me, he wants to see you too, Lucy." Donny said smiling. "In fact, he's looking forward to it.""So he knows about me?" Lucy asked brightly. The four nodded. "Yeah, we don't keep anything from Master Splinter. He finds out anyway and we end up in the Hashi when we try to hide things or get into fights." Mikey said shrugging. Lucy giggled and Becky looked amused but curious. "What's the Hashi?" She asked. Leo snorted as he shared a glance with his brothers. "Kind of a time out room for us. Whenever we break rules or fight each other, our dad makes us go in and makes us do certain obstacles as a punishment. Example, Raph has become quite good at knitting scarves while doing splits." He said in amusement. Raph growled and obviously was blushing because his face darkened. Both Becky and Lucy laughed, along with the officers around them. "Well, maybe I should have a Hashi?" The Chief said giving her daughter a pointed look, who pouted."Ah, a little trouble maker, huh?" Raph said chuckling as he ruffled Lucy's hair, who squawked. "You have no idea." Becky said laughing. It was very much later that night, on Liberty Island, where all of the police force was standing under the brilliance of the Statue of Liberty, away from prying eyes, did Becky give an honored speech of the bravery and dedication of the four brothers for all they did for New York. The four stood proudly beside each other and Becky while it was Lucy who was putting the lanyards with four golden keys around their shoulders. The Key to the city for all four of them. Everyone stood proud, smiling as they were welcomed as now known citizens of the city. April, Casey and Vernon all stood proudly with the officers, watching the dedication and appreciation that the brothers received from the police officers. It was something they truly believed that the turtles deserved. After, Becky and Lucy approached the turtles, smiling. "You know, you should give us more credit." Becky began, warmly. "People are willing to accept you. You could live out of hiding and live normal lives." The four brothers all smirked at one another and it was Raph who shook his head. "Normal? What's the fun in that?" He asked slyly. Lucy laughed as she glanced between them. "They're not normal, mom. And you know what? That's okay. Being who and what they are is what makes them unique." She said warmly. "No matter what they look like, no matter what their origins, they're heroes." Becky smiled before reaching over and tugging her daughter into her arms. "How did you get smarter than me, Lucy?" She asked warmly with the grinning four around them. "Don't know. I guess I was just raised by the best." Lucy said lovingly as she hugged her mom tight before her face fell and she turned towards Donatello. "Actually, we should probably find out. Donny, do you think you can find out what was done to me as a baby?" Even Becky looked interested. Donny nodded. "Yeah, I can look into it. We will need to do some blood tests and maybe a DNA scan. It might take a little time but I can find out who you really are and who your biological mother was. Probably can find out about your biological father too. Maybe he's alive. And if we can find out who he was, we can find out who experimented on you and what they did." He told her. Lucy heaved a deep sigh before nodding. "That would be great. Because I have to know why my mother was killed for taking me. And why my brain runs differently from others." She said. "We will find out, Lucy." Leo said patting her on the back. "Donny will get the answers. It's probably not as bad as you're worried about. But we will get the answers." He paused, tilting his head before smiling and taking Lucy by the shoulders to slowly turn her around. "In the mean time, someone wants to see you." Lucy blinked a few times as she was turned before she looked right at the large mutant rat that was now approaching and her face brightened as she looked right back into his warm dark eyes. "Splinter." She said breathlessly. Splinter was smiling as he approached, watching her carefully. His long whip like tail curled and unfurled behind him. "Lucy." He said warmly. "It is such a warm feeling to know you are well and to see you again." Lucy smiled as she went over to him and when he held out his arms to her, she immediately drove into them, giving him a hug. "Its so good to see you again." She said brightly. "Thank you for taking care of me for as long as you did." Resting his long face on top of her head, Splinter just held her for a moment then released her. "It was no trouble and gratitude is not needed. It was right of Raphael to bring you from the surface. It was right of us to shelter you from the danger you were facing. You were so young and it was not right of those men to do what they did. It goes against everything I have taught my sons. And the reason why they fight back." He told her, gnarled hand still on her shoulder. "Well, I for one is very grateful for what you have done." Becky said now approaching and meeting Splinter's eyes. "If it wasn't for you, I wouldn't have such a wonderful daughter."Splinter just smiled at her as he rest his hands on his walking stick. "It is I who should be grateful for you taking care of her. When she came to us so young and then falling ill, I and my sons were afraid that she would die. It warms my heart that she has survived. And well taken care of." He told her. Becky just smile as she wrapped her arm around Lucy and gave her a hug. "She's been a blessing to me.
I never wanted kids before her. When she appeared and I was put on her case, I couldn't help it. I fell in love with this little girl." She said warmly before her face fell.
"Of course, we need to find out where she came from and from who." She looked at Donny. "You're the smart one. Think you can figure it out?"Donny nodded immediately. "Yeah, some blood work, DNA tests, and having free access to the DNA database, I can figure out who Lucy's parents were and where they are. Well.....her father at least. We already know what happened to her mom is.""In the mean time, We're going out around the city. Do our runs for Foot activity." Leo spoke up before smiling as he looked at Lucy. "Can she come with us? We'll keep an eye on her and make sure she stays our of trouble."Lucy brightened and so did the turtles as they looked at Becky. Becky hesitated but then relented with a smile. "Yes, but no really high places, guys. And if she falls off a building, you will be in trouble." She warned lightly. Raph just grinned before turning around and slapping his shell. "Climb on up, spider monkey." He said gleefully. Lucy giggled before rushing to do so. She hopped up on his shell, holding on tight. "This is going to be awesome!" She cheered. And they were off, but not before Mikey called over his shoulder and shell, "No worries, Becky! We're just gonna go up on the Empire State Building!" Becky choked and started to reach out to stop them then but they were gone before she knew it. Splinter chuckled in amusement. "Do not fear. They won't let her fall. My sons have excellent reflexes. And even if she does slip, they will always be there to catch her." He told her."That does not help my nerves." Becky said but with a light laugh and he joined in. "Whoo-hoo! This is awesome!" Lucy cheered as Raph was climbing up the side of the skyscraper they were all climbing. The four brothers laughed as they went up and up, with her clinging onto Raph. They kept going until they got to the top where Lucy was treated to the most amazing sight of the entire city. Lights and noise everywhere but it was like seeing millions of stars right beneath her. "The best view of the city, Luce." Raph said as he climbed up onto the roof top with his brothers and then carefully set her down on her feet so she could see everything. Lucy was breathless from amazement and adrenaline. She couldnt help but take in everything. "Best life ever. With the bestest best friends." She said cheerfully as she looked at the turtles as they all grinned down at her.