3115/Name Dropping

Name Dropping
Date of Scene:	27 August 2020
Location:	April's Apartment
Synopsis:	Terry is in trouble (again), and April wants to find out what the heck he has been doing to be blamed for making a turtle want to join a moon base.
Cast of Characters:	Terry O'Neil, April O'Neil

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Terry O'Neil has posed:
April's text had come just as Terry needed to take a break from the long re-editing of his article. When the phone buzzed, making his desk at the Planet buzz, he eagerly snatched it up and replied:

<<Be there in ten.>>

Ten. From Metropolis all the way to New York? It was easy, when you were your own faster-than-hyperloop transport system!


The Rabbit Hole deposits him at the entrance to the apartment and, after checking to see there were no witnesses, the Cheshire Cat uses his mirror compact to transform back into your every day Mild Mannered Cub Reporter/Intern/Coffe Gopher. He rings the buzzer and waits for April to open the door. Or Harley. You never knew.

April O'Neil has posed:
April had sent the text shortly after she got home from work. So she hasn't been home that long. When he arrives, she's in the kitchen getting some food prepped and ready. She moves to the front door to open it up for him, giving him a smile as she steps out of the way to let him into the main room.

"Heeeey there." She says to her cousin. Inside her apartment she's got her tv set to a music station that's playing some jazzy music to add to the ambiance of the apartment. The food in the kitchen is cooking up and adds a nice smell of eats.

"You are the fastest come-overer of all time, ya know that?" She says to him with a grin, knowing full well about his new-found 'power' that she witnessed him display here shortly after he acquired it!

"Hows things?" April asks as she turns to go back to the kitchen.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"Craaazy as usual," Terry says, dropping his satchel by the door after he steps into the main room. "I sorta came clean to Lois about me being... you know. Rawr." He makes an unconvicing claw with his hand, and then stops. "Oh, that smells gooood... whatcha makin'?"

The teen retakes the thread he had interrupted by adding, "Mom still doesn't know. But telling Lois... it went in a different way than I thought it would. For one, I'm not fired. But, I've got some extra complications... how about you? How are things in April-land?"

April O'Neil has posed:
Back in the kitchen, April tends to her food. "Spaghetti. Nothing special, though I did make my own sauce for it. Some stuff that Grandma used to make." Terry's grand mother too, no less. She's wearing a Baseball Jersey with the name 'Jones' on the back, one of Casey's things he'd left over here at some point, a pair of jeans shorts and some yellow fuzzy slippers.

"Things are currently... good." She says from the stove where she gets the fixings all good and ready. "So Lois took it well?" She still hadn't had a chance to meet Lois Lane in person, so it was a jealousy of hers that her Cousin had a whole 'thing' with one of April's idols in the news field.

She looks back in his direction. "To be honest, I asked you to come over because your name has been coming up a lot lately." She says as she looks back to the food. "With the Turtles." She just lays it out there, not even sure if Terry knows that she knows them.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"From her sang froid, you'd think every hero in Metropolis has revealed their secret identity to her. But I now have to make a decision as to how I present myself when I write about the Titans..."

He looks over April's shoulder as she works on the meal, "Ah yes, Grandma's secret. She never told mom, you know. You might have to write it down for me, it'll give her such satisfaction..."

He trails off when April mentions the fact that the turtles have been name-dropping him. His mind starts whirring away at all the possibilities that have his name coming up. He weighs the potential positive situations, and the negatives. Then he decides how he wants to approach this...

It's disappointing, then, that all this processing ends up with him saying, in the most casual way that he can muster, "Oh, really?"

April O'Neil has posed:
April's eyes are on the food, but her ears are on his words. She's grinning at what he says about Lois. "Which is one reason I don't want to meet her, because my introduction won't amount to anything that that woman has ever experienced, that's for damn sure." She states as she takes the noodles off of the burnder and steps over to the sink to drain them.

April then motions to the fridge. "The recipe is right there." She points, it's underneath a magnet that has Harley Quinn's picture on it, with her mouth open like she's screaming out a song on a stage somewhere, happily... of course. "Snap a picture of it with your phone." She's well aware of how their Grandma was always fighting with Terry's mom. She remembers those arguments from when they were kids in fact...

Back to the food, the young April keeps doing her food prep and then smiles back at Terry for a second. "Michelangelo held a big family meeting. I got to sit there and listen to the four of them argue with each other about the pros and cons of 'trying to join the Justice League'. And apparently, this is... you're doing?" She pauses to grin over at Terry.

Terry O'Neil has posed:
Playing the super-spy, he takes the photo of the recipe and sends it as a quick text to his mother, with <You're Welcome!> as a message. "Don't be silly, you and Lois will get along great. She likes your podcast, you know... and I thinks she even had a session with Harley here, if you can believe it. Unless she's pulling my leg."

Getting himself a glass of water, Terry frowns "My doi- what? No. I never told them to join the Justic League. I told Mikey that if he wanted to join the Titans, that I'd definitely put in a good word for him, and all of his brothers."

He pauses. "What else did they say about me?"

April O'Neil has posed:
April finishes up mixing the food and getting it ready, then prepares them both a plate without asking if Terry even wanted any. She turns and walks them both over to the table to set them down, then moves to the fridge to get them both a drink.

"A lot of things." She tells him, showing him a smirk to emphasize it. "Mikey is... incorrigible... what you said to him, it compounded into ideas of all manner of varieties. Including hanging out with the Avengers, or going up to that 'Moon Base' that the League has put together."

She offers him the bottle of tea and then settles in at her kitchen table. "He got everyone together to tell them... that he wanted to push for this. Which, I don't fault him for that, but it's complicated. Because their enemies are still 'out there' and they'll take any chance they can get to get at the Turtles. I've experienced it myself. I've been roughed up by some of these hooligans, they're no good."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
Never one to say no to dinner, Terry amiably follows along. He takes a sip of his drink and waits for April to also be sitting down to eat before he starts. Giving an appreciative "mmmmmmmmm" for the sauce, he listens to April in silence.

"The 'Foot' clan people, right?" Terry asks for clarification, because you never knew just who had it out for April. It depended on what news item had hit the channel. "They go around in these black pajamas and do the ninjas stuff?"

April O'Neil has posed:
April grins at her cousin's approval of the family recipe. She then goes about forking up a mouthful for herself, then reaches for a napkin from the wicker basket in the center of the table. She dabs at her lips before she leans back in her chair and puts her left slippered foot up onto its edge.

"Right." She says about the Foot Clan. "Do you remember the crime wave last summer around this time? It was getting really bad here in Brooklyn. The Foot was amping up their operations here, they were recruiting all kinds of... wayward kids to join their ranks. Give them rudimentary Ninja training, and then give them tasks to set out and do. Robberies mostly. Though there were way worse than that also. Thats when I met the Turtles. I was reporting on it, it was my first big story... and the Foot came after me for it. The Turtles caught wind of the attacks planned on me, and they... showed up, saved me."

A sip is taken from her drink then and April sets it aside. "A lot happened back then. But we took out their leader. A real nasty bastard, from Japan. Old, old Japan. He called himself 'The Shredder'. The last time we saw him, he was in the back of a dump truck, headed for the Brooklyn Bridge."

She exhales sharply then. "I worry about them, Terry. The Turtles. They're ... the best of us, you know? Sweet, innocent, but so full of hope to do good in this stupid world."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"I did run into them the other day," he comments quietly, "The Foot. Feet. Whatever. They were kidnapping people in Brooklyn, but I got the jump on them... alongside a dude who goes by The Nightwatcher." He watches real close to see if April reacts to the name, and continues, "But we've all got enemies, April. Look at you- you live with Harley Quinn, and half of the goons in Gotham that the Joker pissed off must want /her/ dead. It's a testament to their self-preservation that they haven't actually tried it. But me? I hang out with the Titans all the time. I'm a target just because of that. And that's without people knowing I'm actually Vorpal..."

He takes a good forkful of spaghetti and eats it appreciatively, before adding "And let's not forget that the world almost ended just a few weeks ago. The way I see it, there's strength in numbers. Robin has all those Gotham enemies, and Troia has every villain pissed at Wonder Woman pissed at her. Gar must have every villain the Doom Patrol ever foiled gunning for him... and I could go on. But you notice that they don't come for one of us, because that means coming for /all/ of us..."

He holds up a finger, "And let me tell you, you /don't/ want to come for any team that has Raven in it. That woman is terrifying when you piss her off..."

He holds up a hand, "I just thought... you know. They're down there, all five of them, plus the add-ons of that dog-woman and maybe some others. But they're alone. But when you're a Titan, or a Titan ally, if we don't hear from you in a while, we check in. We're family. We watch each other's back... that's what I was thinking. Obviously, Raphael thinks I'm the furry devil in a blue dress, though."

April O'Neil has posed:
April enjoys some of her own cooking as well, as she listens to Terry's response and takes a sip of her drink before she leans back in her chair again. "That's the issue though. The Titans... Harley... me even, I'm a public figure, I'm a Reporter with a fairly well known face in the city now. There are consequences for coming after me. But them, they're... alone, down there." She motions vaguely down at the floor.

"They're mutants, Terry. Mutants who are being treated badly all over the world, all the time. They don't have the resources that we have, the 'name recognition'. You're right though, if they joined the Titans, that'd help a lot. It'd make a big difference in their lives. But the reason they're alive, is because of their father."

She pauses then.

"Have you met him yet? Splinter." She hesitates for a second. "He's Old Japan also. He..." Her head shakes back and forth. "he doesn't like the 'Upper World' he thinks it'll only lead to the harm, or worse, of his sons. So there's like... a barrier, for them to enter that world, with the Titans. And if they don't cross it, they'll remain really vulnerable. But if they do cross it, their father will... I dunno. It's, well, it's been an interesting year."

She does't seem to know anyhthing about the Nightwatcher, as she hasn't actually run into him in-person. "I'm glad you've met them though. I think it'll help them, ultimately, to have more friends like you."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"I don't think Raphael would even want me to meet him, and from what I hear of Leonardo, he wouldn't very much approve of me," Terry smiles, somewhat mischievously, "I like Donnie and Mikey is adorable. Heck, I'd love to take Don to Cyborg's lab, I can see him nerding out with Vic over geegaws and gizmos and gadgets and stuff like that. But correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm getting a wiff in the air, and there are strong sentiments of Cheshires Not Wanted. The Cheshire cat is chaos and change, and it sounds like Leonardo is very conservative, Raphael is very overprotective, and ... Splinter is very... very old school. Three bulwarks of resistance to chage. I can't imagine I'm very welcome in that environ."

April O'Neil has posed:
April shakes her head at that last part that he speaks of. "You would be welcome, so long as you didn't force the change. You can plead your case, but you have to let the brothers come to decisions as a group. That's when they flourish best, as I've found. Splinter, on the other hand, is a tough judge of people. But he will relent to his sons' decisions. I mean, they brought me to him after all, and he didn't just say 'throw her out in the tunnels'." She says with a sly smirk.

"I think it'd be fine for you to take Donnie to see that lab. Or Mikey to have dinner at the Titan's place. But if you... ya know, go public with them, their father will be really ... well, he might not be happy to see you in their home at that point."

April pauses to take a drink from her bottle. Then she continues, setting it aside. "It's not really my place, I'm just an outsider in all of this. But I was the first person from the 'above world' that they brought in, gave a chance to get to know. I've felt Splinter's ire myself, on a number of occasions, but now? Well, I go down there once a week to watch episodes of Monk with him. He warms up to you, eventually."

Terry O'Neil has posed:
"I can bring them in and out of the Tower without anyone from the Outside World seeing them. And the Titans would keep their secret- they certainly keep everybody's secrets. Terry makes sure to partake of as much as he can. The sauce really is delicious.

He tilts his head, "I... guess I'll see. I imagine that they'll decide to introduce me to their father once I'm respected enough. As it is, I get the impression that Raphael only tolerates me because I'm your cousin. And half of the time I don't know if Donatello likes me or if he wants to banish me as an un-scientific monstrosity." He gives April a toothy grin, "He doesn't like magic."

April O'Neil has posed:
April grins at this response, taking a moment to sip another mouthful of tea. "Like I said, they just take time to warm up to you. Even if they all fight against Splinter's rules, he's inside all of them. Some part of what he's tried to bestow upon them, is in there, effecting their decision making process. But yeah, the more you play along with their rules, the easier you can blend in with them, become part of their inner circle... yaddaa yadda."

She shakes her head gently from right to left and raises her left hand up to swipe her dark hair over her ear. "You'll be a good asset for them though, I'm glad you ran in to them. I figured you might, after that night in the sewers with the gang fight." She stands up then and walks over to the counter where she picsk up her iPad off of the edge then comes back to her chair to settle in. "Let me show you some pics Ihave of them, I think you might like it. Like, ya know, a slide show that bores people to death, only in 2020." She grins at him for a second then looks back down to the tablet computer.