<div class="floatleft">(http://fc08.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2014/352/3/2/splinter_by_jennyverse-d8a97sl.jpg)</div>The rat woman's tail swayed happily while she collected a pot and set it beneath the running faucet.  April pushed the issue of his compliment, and Splinter supposed she deserved it.  Self-deprecation, no matter how true, wasn't very becoming.  She pondered April's words, then turned to him.  Her arms folded over her chest modestly, she replied in her soft, soothing voice.  "Yes, Raphael did say you were a television reporter. Having our presence divulged in such a way would indeed bode ill for us. I appreciate your discretion in the matter."  A little smile curled on the woman's mouth after that statement.<br/><br/>"Though I suppose you still enjoy asking questions, don't you? Just in your nature, I'm sure."  Mistress Splinter gathered her pot and set it to boil.  She refrained from speaking again until the water was boiling and she could take it to the table.  Sitting down next to April, she prepared their tea and spoke over the steam in her cup.  "If your first question is indeed 'how often' situations like ours arise, I'd say I'm not sure. But certainly it must be rare."  She chuckled, knowing it wasn't what April meant.<br/><br/>The rat took a few sips of her tea before she launched into her tale.  Splinter loosely covered their entire origin; how she was raised as the pet of a ninjitsu master, the finding of four baby turtles after they were discarded down a sewer drain, and the glass container of glowing green oozed that broke over them.  "And so we found ourselves able to speak and walk as humans do. I raised the turtles as my own, since I loved them just as much as any mother would their children. I taught them to be ninja teens. Each took on their own personalities; Leonardo leads the others, Donatello invents wonderful machines, Raphael is a good boy though often rude, and Michelangelo.. well, she enjoys parties and eating. As I'm sure you found out about her!"  Splinter nodded and sipped her tea, knowing nothing about how Mikey might have showed a completely different kind of hunger to April.