Chapter Text
You viewed Leonardo with great respect.
Despite your less than graceful meeting—you watched him fall off a 3 story rooftop into a greenhouse before he fell an extra 2 more floors down into a dumpster—he made it clear that he was respectable and honorable.
Nothing like the animal you teased him to be.
You never really believed what you said to him. You'd just tease him by making him salad when he came by instead of pizza or saying how his dreams of being an animal ninja were nothing compared to you working at your ice cream shop.
You loved to see the way his face would twitch in annoyance and how he would always take a deep breath to compose himself.
He also never showed any animal behaviors, which was strange in your opinion. He had been "a turtle from a pet shop" and "mutated" into what he was today. The only thing he could do is go into his shell. He couldn't chirp or "churr" which you assumed was similar to what a cat did until you looked it up and almost died in embarrassment. How could you have asked him that with a straight face? Thank god he didn't seem to know what it was either.
But anyways, he wasn't a total animal like you tried to paint him out to be. He was actually nice and kind, more than what you were. He always stopped by to tell you if he saw more Foot than usual near your house or if some store got robbed a few blocks down.
He even taught you a few self defense moves just in case. He ignored you when you told him you'd never even seen these foot soldiers before. He countered with, "Other people could hurt you, too."
So, yeah, he was pretty cool in your opinion. He was a better human than you were.
That's why you were really concerned when he showed up to your house, panting and growling and snapping his teeth at you.
At first, you thought he was hurt. He was hunched over with his arms wrapped around himself and his eyes were almost pitch black. You could just barely make out his irises and pupils.
But after you brought him inside and looked him over, you didn't find any blood or wounds or anything. Just a large nasty looking red bump on his arm. And an egg in his hands.
"Leo..." You stared at the disgusting thing, lips curling downwards in a grimace. "What is that?"
He didn't answer and you led him over to sit on your bed. He didn't tilt his head back to look at you and simply stared at the egg in his hands.
"Hey, Leo, are you feeling alright? Do you need me to call your brothers?" You should not have said that. His neck cracked with the speed with which he turned his head to stare at you.
"Don't." He blinked and his eyes were back to normal. "I'm... sick is all." He turned his head back to the egg. "Don't want them... seeing me like this."
Turtles with complexes... You sighed and rolled your eyes. You guessed this was a mutant sickness where their eyes turned black like some weird version of pink eye. "Alright. Why do you have this egg thing?"
"They... would've broken it." He cradled it closely to himself. You guessed 'they' meant his brothers.
"...Right." You took in the sight of this weird gigantic jellybean looking egg and decided that you wanted nothing to deal with it. "Look, you can stay here if you want."
He looked up at you.
"But I gotta get to work," you shrugged, turning around and heading towards your closet. "You know, my real job? Unlike yours."
You waited for him to get mad and correct you on every way he saved the city in the past month, but he didn't say anything.
When you looked back over your shoulder, he was staring at you. "Leaving?"
"Uh, yeah?" You were beginning to grow uneasy. Why was he talking like that? "It's how I get money and I kind of need that right now."
He started to look frantic, looking between you and the egg.
"Leo, what's wrong? Do you need me to call Raph or something?" You didn't know what to do.
"No!" he snapped. You flinched, looking at him in shock. "No..." He shook his head, one of his eyes twitching. You slowly closed the closet door, seeing him visibly relax.
"Alright..." Your hand fell back to your side, hanging uselessly. "Um..."
He slowly sat on your bed, egg wrapped up in his arms and tucked close to his plastron.
You had no idea what to do or what to say. "Leo, do you want soup or anything? Since you're, uh, sick?"
He nodded so subtly you barely noticed. You ran off downstairs to your kitchen, suppressing a huge shudder once you were alone. This was some weird mutant sickness. You assumed he would be okay, especially since none of his brothers had called or came looking for him. There's no way they would've let him leave the lair if it was too bad, right?
You fixed up some soup and when you went back upstairs to your room, you could openly sigh.
Your bed that had been completely made and fixed up had been torn apart. The comforter and sheets and pillows were strewn around the egg, creating some weird bird nest thing for it.
Leo looked proud of his work, kneeling in the middle of your bed and just staring at it.
Your new pillows... You gave the egg a nasty look. It looked slimy and gross. You handed him the bowl of soup and he slowly began to eat.
"So!" You nervously watched him. "Where'd the egg come from? Did you lay it?" You joked. He didn't answer. "Uh, was it from a mission?" He didn't answer. "Leo?"
He cut you off with a sharp growl.
You flinched again, stepping away. "I'll just stay over here," you squeaked and weakly sat down at your desk chair. You watched him with wide eyes, but he didn't even glance at you. He adjusted a few blankets that were around the egg and let out a satisfied chuff.
You had never seen him act like this ever. This egg was definitely very, very important and maybe his sickness combined with that made him revert to a more animalistic side of his brain?
You turned away, rubbing your cheek absentmindedly. "Hey, I still got to go to work, so..."
He growled again. "No. Stay."
Okay, you were getting tired of this. "Dude, get back in your right mind and realize that you're acting freaky!" You stood up from your chair, crossing your arms.
He glared at you, shoulders tensing.
"I don't mind if you stay over, but stop acting like... this," you gestured to him, walking over to your closet, "and stop telling me no. You can't tell me what to do."
When you walked by the bed to get to your closet, Leo jumped at your back, sending you both to the floor. You smacked your chin painfully on the wooden floor, "Ow!"
You tried to push him off of you but he held you down easily and you froze when you felt his breath and something slimy on the back of your neck.
"Are you... Are you drooling?!" You tried to fight again but he placed his teeth on the back of your neck. He wasn’t biting, but you could definitely feel his teeth.
You stopped, suddenly super, super afraid of him. “Stay,” he hissed out.
Well. You were staying.