"Welcome to the wonderful world of Wattpad!" Circa announces.

The teenagers look around in shock, Circa's voice ringing in their ears, and Leonardo cradles Destiny closer to him. Their surroundings are bathed in orange and white light, endless book covers and profiles scrolling past them on a backdrop of ever-changing scenery: forests, galaxies, sunrises, the list goes on. Beneath their feet is a flowing river of words.

"Wattpad?" Casey repeats. "What the heck is this?" He steps back as lines of text wiggle past his knees.

Donatello strokes his chin. "It looks like some kind of reading, blog website, but..." He eyes the torrent of books going past tagged with the words "bad boy" and frowns. "I don't think it's for professionals."

"It's for writing," Leonardo says, voice just above a whisper. He clears his throat. "Uh, it's got some original books but it's mostly fanfiction, or at least...that's what I've seen. It's great for beginners to the community."

"You read fanfic?" Annalise asks, eyes widening.

His cheeks darken. "There are some very well written fics out there for Space Heroes. Sometimes they're better than the show and I feel fulfilled," he admits. His brothers stare at him and he aims a warning finger at them. "Never say a word about this to Destiny or anyone once we get out of here."

"Sure, whatever you say," Raphael says with an eye-roll.

"Guys...didn't Circa say that there's another test thing?" Michelangelo asks, baby blues darting around. "I've got a bad feeling."

Circa appears in a flash, hands on her hips as she bobs in midair. "A bad feeling?" she repeats. "That's funny, because I just got a really good feeling. One of us is off here." She clicks her tongue, shaking her head as she shrugs. "Oh well, that doesn't matter. What matters is that I have another game set up for youuuu..."

"Oh...yay," Michelangelo whimpers.

"For this to work, one of you turtles or Casey has to get through a certain book of my choosing without losing composure," Circa continues, already starting to grin at the thought. "No closing your eyes, no skipping chapters. Oh, and Annalise..." Her hair sparks and the blonde steps back, every muscle tensing up. "You're disqualified because there aren't any fanfics about you."

"Wha..." she starts.

"Or at least, there aren't any in this dimension, and it was hard enough trying to find these. Absolutely exhausting." Circa wipes her forehead and flutters her eyelashes. "The trouble I went through for all of you is truly under-appreciated."

"Bite me," Raphael snaps.

"Oo, I'd love to," Circa replies, making her teeth sharp and pointed as she giggles. "Maybe later."

Raphael shudders. She snaps her fingers and a single book soars out of the sea of other titles and comes to a stop before them, making their stomachs churn. The cover is an image of the turtles staring seductively out at any viewer and the title proclaims "T-cest One-Shots."

The tags make them even more uncomfortable: Raph x Leo, Donnie x Mikey, Casey x Raph, Leo x Donnie, Raph x Mikey, Donnie x Casey.

"There are some people out there who really like these," Circa says with a laugh. "I placed a healing serum at the end of this book and if you make it, Destiny gets patched up. Simple. Otherwise, you're on your own! Good luck!"

She cackles and disappears in a flash of light. The group stares at the book, then at each other, searching without luck for confidence or solace.

"No stupid Wattpad fanfic thing is gonna stop me," Raphael insists, starting to march out across the pages.

The book seems to swallow him, blanketing the others in tense silence. Donatello takes a deep breath and starts toward the book, allowing it to swallow him up too. Seeing them taking their chance, Casey squares his shoulders, glances back at Destiny, and goes in.

A sign appears next to the book and colour-coded arrows point to the chapter that each boy is on. All three arrows are aimed at the Raphanardo one shot, but within a minute, there's a bloodcurdling scream and the book bursts back open, dumping Raphael onto his face. The red arrow shatters to bits.

"OH SHELL WHY?!" he cries, covering his eyes. "LOOK, LEO, I LOVE YOU BUT NOT IN THAT WAY! OH PIZZA ALMIGHTY!"

Michelangelo hurries over and helps up his nauseous brother, then the two of them do the walk of shame back to Leonardo, Annalise, and Destiny. The wolf-raven's body shudders and a rattling breath leaves her, making their terror spike and Leonardo's embrace get desperately tight.

Raphael looks back at the book, hugging his stomach. "Come on, guys," he whispers.

The purple arrow creeps to the next one-shot and lingers there for a while. Just as the others start thinking that they've got a chance, Donatello's scream explodes from the book and he's thrown from it in seconds. Donatello lays there on the ground, hand clamped over his mouth as tears swell to his eyes. The purple arrow breaks.

"No...no, Mikey..." he whimpers. "Never...never...oh, Darwin's beard. It's not even biologically possible..."

They bring him back to the group and settle in to watch Casey's progress. He moves from Raphanardo to Donatangelo, then onto Rasey. Raphael pales at the sight of the chapter title, averting his eyes as he mutters something under his breath.

Casey screams so loudly that anyone using Wattpad at the moment can hear him. The book ejects him and he stays on the ground for a few seconds, tugging his bandana over his eyes as he retches and chokes.

"Bro, what...what the actual..." He groans. "That was so...kinky..."

Raphael grimaces. "At least it wasn't with your own brother. Count yourself lucky, Jones."

Casey stumbles to his feet and points at Raphael, eyebrows furrowing. "You don't get to judge me. You haven't seen half of what I've seen." He looks Raphael over, then looks away. "I can never look at you the same way again."

"Guys, who's going next?" Annalise asks, strained. "We're running out of time!"

"Leo, you need to go," Raphael says. "Come on, bro!"

Leonardo shakes his head. "I won't be able to make it. Just looking at that book is—" He swallows hard and trembles. "No, I...I can't."

"I'll go, dudes," Michelangelo whispers.

"You...can't?" Casey repeats, his teeth gritting. He motions to Destiny, hand shaking and inches away from snatching Leonardo's chest-strap. "Wolfie is bleeding out and you're not even gonna try to save her?!"

Leonardo bows his head in shame and Annalise reaches out to touch Casey's arm. "Casey, give him some space. I'm sure there's a good reason—"

"There is no good reason to give up!" Casey retorts, turning to her. "Giving up means Circa wins and then we lose everything! You lose your mom, I lose April, my dad, my sister, Donnie loses Sarina, Raph loses Taylor again, Splinter loses his whole family—" He seethes and jabs an accusatory finger at Leonardo again. "He's already losing Destiny and he isn't even gonna try."

"Uh...dudes?" Michelangelo asks a little louder.

"He's letting Circa win," Casey continues. "We're supposed to be heroes! Heroes don't let the bad guys win."

"GUYS!" Michelangelo shouts. Casey stops and everyone looks up at the turtle, silent. "I'll go," he says, gaze flickering with fear.

Donatello shakes his head, gripping Michelangelo's shoulder. "Mikey, you don't understand. I can't let you read that," he says.

"If Leo isn't going to, then I'm the only one left. I've got to try," he says. He steps towards Leonardo and kneels down, his expression serious. "Leo, dude, if I fail this...you've gotta try. I know what Circa told you while we were stuck in those tunnels, but she's a liar. You've gotta shake it off and do it for Destiny, right?"

Leonardo's eyes are red around the edges. "Mikey..."

"Promise me, big bro?"

He nods. "Promise."

Michelangelo turns around and starts toward the book, but he doesn't reach it. Annalise hurries over and takes his hand, squaring her jaw, and his lips part in shock.

"I'm coming with you," she says. "Circa said I couldn't get the serum, but she never said I couldn't help."

He smiles, freckled cheeks getting a little pinker, and he nods. "Okay, then let's go."

They step inside the book, hand in hand. There's a brief flash of light before they reappear on a platform next to a giant title card. Stretching beneath them is nothing but platforms made up of black letters. Before they go any further, Annalise turns to Michelangelo and takes his hands.

"Focus on me," she murmurs. "If you see something that makes you think you're gonna react, just focus back on me. Squeeze my hands, anything." He nods and she smiles. "Ready?"

"Ready."

They step down onto the first platform and walk along it, Annalise moving backwards. He gets a sort of tunnel vision when he looks at her, blurring everything around him out of focus, and even when he sees words that shock him to his core, she is there and she calms him.

They make it past the first one-shot. The orange arrow inches to the second chapter.

"Lisey?" he asks.

"Yeah?" she replies.

They hop down to the next line of text and he steadies her. "There's something I've been wanting to ask you for a while," he says. "Maybe it's just me, but you seem sadder in your videos now. Why?" Her face falls, eyes getting misty, and his hands shake as he grips hers tighter. "You don't have to tell me, though, I just keep thinking about it and—"

"No, it's okay," she interrupts softly. They shuffle to the next one-shot as she speaks, "I wasn't sure why, honestly. I love YouTube and making videos is super fun, but for a while now I've just felt burnt out. I never expected to be even moderately popular and the more subscribers I get, the more worried I get about the future."

He frowns. "So...being popular scares you?"

"I already get hate, the regular stuff, but I see other YouTubers with millions of subscribers and hear about the problems they have and...I don't know, I guess I started thinking about how difficult it would be to keep my privacy. Like, my mom doesn't let me reveal anything about where I live and I'm not allowed to meet up with fans, but that would have to change if I get more popular and honestly, I can't imagine it. I'm not even sure that I want that anymore."

"Then what do you want?"

She thinks for a second. "I guess...I want to make videos because I want to and because I like doing it," she admits. "Right now, I post videos because people ask me to. Every time I try to post something that I like, like my video game betas, people just kinda shrug it off and ask for more gaming or rant videos. It's...tiring. Does that make any sense?"

He ponders for a second. They climb to the final platform and hurry across to the next one-shot. The orange arrow keeps creeping down and outside, hope grows in the hearts of their teammates.

"To me...it sounds like when you're eating a pizza when you're not hungry," he says. "I love pizza, but eating pizza when I'm full will just make me sick. You should only eat pizza when you want to, when you're hungry, not because someone forced you."

She blinks a few times and feels her chest flood with heat. As silly as the analogy is, he's completely right. She's been stuffing her face with YouTube pizza instead of pacing herself. Michelangelo smiles sweetly at her and she can hardly look him in the eyes, her heart hammering against her ribs.

He, on the other hand, can't help but look at her. He developed a crush on the perky girl who joked from inside a YouTube video, a girl with a goofy brace-filled grin and twinkling eyes, but the real girl is different. The real Annalise is smart, sort of shy, apologetic, accepting, and she doesn't have braces anymore.

He liked her on YouTube but truthfully, the real her is the one who stole his heart, and the realization smacks him square in the face. He isn't falling for her. He already has.

Annalise stops as her heels knock against something and she turns around. Perched before them is a small pedestal with a bottle of purple juice on top. Michelangelo gasps and races forward, snatching up the serum and hoisting it into the air in triumph.

"Victory!" he crows.

Annalise laughs and claps her hands wildly. Before she can congratulate him verbally, there's another flash of light and they fly out of the book, landing in front of their family. The book disappears in a puff of orange dust.

"Mikey!" Donatello cries as he reaches them, engulfing Michelangelo in a tight hug as he laughs with relief. "You did it! I can't believe it!"

"And I didn't see anything emotionally scarring!" Michelangelo replies with a grin as he returns the hug. He pauses. "I didn't know what a lot of the words meant though, so there's that."

Donatello releases him and behind them, Raphael shouts, "Guys! Celebrate when Destiny isn't dying!"

The mood takes on a sombre air. Michelangelo grips the serum closer to his chest and moves past his anxious family to Leonardo and Destiny. She hardly breathes anymore and her skin is so sickly that it's almost transparent.

The relief on Leonardo's face says everything that he can't as Michelangelo hands him the bottle. He opens the cap and cradles Destiny's head, tilting it back and pouring the solution down her throat, little by little.

They wait with baited breath as she goes still. Then, she coughs and her eyes flutter open as the coding wounds on her face and body knit back together. The gaping gash in her stomach stops bleeding, coming together at a slower pace as she looks up at everyone and their stricken expressions. She cracks a wobbly smile as her tail thumps against the ground.

"Well, don't look so happy to see me," she croaks.

"Des! Oh, Destiny," Leonardo gasps and he crushes her against him in a desperate hug, a few tears rolling down his cheeks.

She returns the embrace, forehead pressed against his shoulder. She blinks a few more times before she pulls away, her eyebrows knitting together when she notices the bruises on his face and the scuffs on his shell.

"Leo, are you alright? Circa said..." Her jaw clenches and her tail fur raises. "Circa..."

"No, no...I'm okay. I'm okay now that you are," he says, cupping her face in his hands as he rests his forehead against hers. She grasps his wrist and his mouth forms a wobbling line. "I'm sorry, Des."

"What? Why?"

"Wolfie."

She looks up to see Casey staring down at her, body rigid and hands shaking at his side. Her face floods with realization and she stumbles to her feet, an apology ready on her lips, and Casey throws his arms around her. She blinks rapidly and glances sideways at him with just her eyes.

"Uh...Casey?" she asks.

"Next time, I'm helping you," he mutters. He pulls away and grips her shoulders. "You're an idiot and if you weren't already hurt, I'd knock some sense into your stupid head." Her mouth falls open and he shakes her a little. "You don't have to fight everything alone, okay? That's why we're here. We're a team and so help me if you pull this shit again, I'll...I'll..."

She brings him back into a hug, nodding as she swallows hard. "Okay...I'm sorry, Casey..."

He says nothing more as he shuts his eyes, a few sniffles betraying him.

"Aw, sentiment. You truly care for one another," Circa says as she reappears next to Raphael. He startles and reaches for his weapons, but she doesn't flinch. "You managed to save Destiny. Impressive, I must say. Now...what could happen next? I have nothing planned."

The turtles and Casey whip out their weapons. Annalise reaches for her onō. Destiny unsheathes her claws and flaps her wings once as her tail lashes. Circa tilts her head and looks to each teen in turn.

"Murderous, angry, annoyed, scary, determined, ready to kick my arse, oh...now, that one's scary," she mumbles. She shrugs her shoulders as a nonchalant grin spreads across her face. "Can't kill me if you don't catch me!"

She disappears, but the team stays on her tail. They zoom out of Wattpad and back into the flashing, buzzing lights of the cyberverse.