This wasn't their usual neighborhood. The rooftops were getting lower to the ground, his brothers were in a rambunctious mood, and all of these things combined were making Leonardo nervous. He peeked over the edge of the roof, then drew back cautiously. His hand shot up, flashing a hand sign meant to halt his brothers, and hissed, "Hold it, guys! The coast is not clear. There's a girl at the mouth of the alley, leaning against the wall and messing with her phone."

"Ooh! Lemme see her!" Mikey surged forward and his head popped into view.

To Leo's annoyance, his other two brothers joined Michelangelo at the edge of the roof, ignoring his hand-sign completely.

"Aww… that's no girl," the youngest turtle's enthusiasm was quick to wane. "That's just a lady. She's gotta be at least thirty!"

Leo gave the woman a second glance and saw that it was true. He hadn't been looking closely. It was her hair that had thrown him off: dark blonde and twisted up in messy pigtail buns with lots of frizz and wispy bits that fell to frame her face. "I guess so," he acknowledged, not sure why it mattered.

"Too old," Mike dismissed her.

"I dunno, Mikey," Donatello countered sagely. "Older women have their advantages. Plenty of sources claim that the average human woman reaches her sexual peak around that age."

"Are we seriously discussing this right now?" Leonardo complained, rolling his eyes.

Raph shook his head. "I'm with Mikey on this one. Too old… and way too outta shape."

Don grinned slyly and quipped. "I think you meant to say 'too human', stud."

"Shut the fuck up," Raphael grumbled, giving Don a shove that only made his grin widen.

"Anyway, her face is pretty. And I approve of the t-shirt."

Now it was Raph's turn to roll his eyes. "You would!" The shirt was red with blocky white letters that read: SAVING THE WORLD – ONE PC AT A TIME.

Mike eyed Donatello dubiously. "You would seriously hit that?"

The brainy turtle gave an indifferent shrug. "I'm a mutant turtle, Mikey. If I really want to maximize my chances at finding a woman who is willing to accept that, it helps not to be picky."

"Huh," Michelangelo seemed to actually consider this as he looked back down at her.

"Okay, that's enough!" Leonardo wanted nothing more to do with this conversation. "Our priority right now is finding an alternate route underground. Now, almost all of the manhole covers in this neighborhood are out on the street and there's way too much foot traffic to risk it. Donnie? Pull up that map of yours and find us another access point, something off the main drag."

"Ummmm," Don hummed as he opened his phone and pulled up a web-based map with custom markers. "Nothing close," he admitted with a flinch. "Eight – almost nine blocks in the opposite direction?"

"Oh, screw that," Raph scoffed. "Just look at her! She's off in her own world. Are we ninjas or what? Get your stealth on, motherfuckers - and let's do this!" He leapt down into the alley, landed silently, and made a dash for the manhole cover.

Mike grinned at his audacity. He elbowed Leo and pointed out, "Raph's gotta point. Plus, she's got earbuds in. Check it, she's rocking out!"

It was true. Leo had mistaken the thin white cords for a necklace. It was more obvious now that she was rocking her head to a steady beat. "Fair enough," he conceded, making a shooing gesture.

The three jumped down and raced to the back of the alley. By the time they reached the manhole, Raphael had already hefted up the heavy cover and was waiting for them to descend.

The hothead wasn't completely silent as he dropped the cast iron slab back into place overhead. Even if she did hear something and came over to investigate, he could tell at a glance that the woman would be far too weak to lift the manhole cover unassisted. She might find someone to help her get it open, he mused, but by then they would be long out of sight.

He needn't have worried. Perfectly content in her hyper-focused world of techno music and fan-fiction, the woman leaning against the wall never saw or heard a thing.

Author's Note: Yeah, okay. If you couldn't tell, this was my silly attempt to write an author cameo into my own TMNT fanfic universe in a subtle way that didn't suck. The whole thing was inspired by a prompt I got from Angstsplatter over on Tumblr. The challenge was to describe myself as I would describe a character I was introducing.

If you feel like following my Tumblr blog, my name over there is 'Winnyverse'.