Chapter Text
“Aaand- that should do it! Doctor Leon’s got the owies under control!”
Leo turned to place the disinfectants away from his fussy hissing twin on the Med Bed in his father’s lap. “Yeah, I know, disinfectant sucks like a jerk doesn’t it buddy? So that means it’s time for Pops- and Draxum’s too I guess- good ol’ softshell healing gel!”
After explaining everything to their father in the med-bay, he simply sat there in silence and stared at his smartest, and now smallest, son.
“Oh,” his father lamented, holding his son closer as he nuzzled his head, “my poor little Purple.”
Leo looked at his father in sympathy before walking over and gently rubbing the softshell’s head as the little guy tried to practically hide away from the cruel, stingy world in their father’s arms, or in this case, from his medic brother who now held a green bottle in his hand. “I know Bubby, I know, the cold green icky stuff bleg and the band aids aren’t any fun either, huh? But! I checked, and I still have some Atomic Lass and some exotic-plants themed Band-Aids in stock from before the movie- wow it feels weird doing that instead of Donnie-, which ones do you want Twinzy?” Leo asked the little Tot as he finished applying the healing Pops (and Drax) made Donnie and him after the Failed Invasion.
Ah, nothing’s better than the homemade stuff, with Aloë-vera too, freshly acquired through one of Drax’s portals all the way from Aruba.
Fancy.
He grabbed two Band-Aids from their respective boxes and held them out to Tiny-Tello, who took one quick look at them and motioned for both. “Plants and A.L. combo, you got it little Bubs.”
He used both of the different prints then to decorate the Tot’s soft little shell like a canvas and making sure all the wounds were covered well. Seeing as his twin always had a soft leathery shell, when they were kids, they learned that regular Band-Aids itched when they were on Donnie’s sensitive shell and hurt to take off after. So, as they got older, both Leo (self-appointed team medic) and Donnie (self-appointed evil- I mean- mad scientist) looked into ways to bioengineer a new type of specially made Band-Aids that wouldn’t hurt like a witch to remove off of sensitive areas, including human skin, and mutant backs.
It’s times like these that make Leo thanks Pizza-Supreme in the Sky for those late nights and early mornings. It was all completely worth it.
As their father went off to check on Raph and Mikey, placing Donnie gently down onto the medical cot with a soft kiss on his forehead, Leo took the opportunity to finish up with his little brother’s carapace.
“Boom! Finito baby!” The slider pulled away, inspecting his medical craftsmanship with a smile, satisfied with his work. “There ya go Bubby,” Leo whispered softly, fondly letting the soft shelf take his hand after he was done to inspect it, “good as new.”
And when Donnie reached up for him, who was he to deny.
“Pretty cool, if I do say so myself, which I do. Right big man?”
When Donnie was comfortably held in his arms, his now little-twin-brother was trying his best to look back at his now decorated shell, excitedly trying to get a peak at his favourite lass.
The look of enthusiastic shock and joy, and happy little arm flaps he gave the blue clad turtle made it all completely worth it. Though, they could have done without his brother here getting hurt.
Leo chuckled, carefully holding Donnie up in his arms as he softly rubbed their noses together. “Who gave you the right to be this adorable, huh? Looks like Mikey’s gotta watch his back, cuz there’s a new Sherrif in town, and his name is Tiny-Tello.”
The tot giggled and made happy little chirping noises.
“Bubba! Bu- Bub- Bubba!”
Donnie would occasionally smack the now older twin with his hands flapping back and forth, but that only showed Leo that he was starting to feel a little better, which brought such a relief to the weight he had been feeling on his shoulders since this happened.
Of course, peaceful moments don’t last.
A prickly feeling at the back of his head alerted him to someone approaching and turned around to acknowledge the presence of Draxum behind them.
He and the old goat have been on... ok terms for a while now.
If it were up to him, he would have probably never given the alchemist even a slim of a chance. But after a lot of convincing from Mikey- and some talks with Dr. Feelings- he decided to throw the war lord a bone, even if it was only to make his little brother happy.
He was someone glad he did though at the end, especially seeing as the dude was a big help of the physical healing process after “Prevention Day”, as Donnie liked to call it.
Or, as Leo dubbed it: “The Apoca-didn’t”.
Not that Leo would ever admit that to the goat man, of course. Old habits die hard, and got-thrown-off-of-roof-top grudges die harder.
The gist of it though is that things have been getting better, if not at least a bit more agreeable between them.
Which is why it surprised both him and Draxum when a low hiss came from the slider the moment the warrior scientist stepped a little too close for his apparent comfort.
An obvious warning.
After a moment Draxum took a step back instead of trotting any closer, but otherwise seemed fairly unfazed by the turtle’s reaction. Leo blinked away the shock of what just happened, as he’d never done anything like that before that he can recall and sent his reluctantly-sort-of-but-also-not-really-second-dad his signature Neon-Leon smirk.
His, Leo’s, body was turned in a way where he could easily face Draxum but kept Donnie out of view, basically shielding the softshell for... some reason?
The smile he wore directed towards the other felt sharper then usual- which, ya know, weird- but it’s cool.
He’s totally cool.
“Hey, Sheep man!” He leaned against the medical cot with one hand wrapped protectively around baby Donnie and the other shooting finger guns at the old Yokai. “What’s up?”
“... I simply wanted to check in on the wellbeing of young Donatello... and you.”
Draxum, almost cautiously, took careful steps forward until he was nearer the two.
“We’re. Fine.” Leo answered strongly. He coughed into his fist, as even he couldn’t deny that that was pretty off brand for him. “I mean- we’re fine, chillin’, totally cool- Hey! Maybe you should go check on Miguel! I’m sure he could really use some-”
“Leonardo.”
He stopped and stared ahead at the kind-of-sort-of-Dad, who by now was only a few feet away, looking at them uncharacteristically.
With open concern instead of his usual irritation.
“Michelangelo is not the only one of you four I... worry for.”
The last part sounded like it hurt to say, but hey, he was still learning the turtled guessed, so Leo decided to put his own toe a tiny bit in the water.
They stood there for a second, Leo staring down the yokai with a hard, suspicious gaze.
“... Fiiiiine.”
Leo clicked his tongue and reluctantly turned to face the goat man, and Draxum able to actually see the now smallest Hamato. Donnie in turn looked at him for maybe a second, like, two seconds max, before looking back at Leo inquisitively. “Bubba?”
“It’s okay Bubby, Drax’s a... friend. He won’t hurt you.” Leo snapped his head towards the taller, shooting him a wide-eyed look that promised pain. “Right?”
Draxum for his part seemed to have stayed calm as he addressed the feral child. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”
Warily with a brow raised the older brother slowly handed over the tot, who appeared to be just as unwilling to let go of him but eventually went along with it and Ohmigosh-
The little itty-bitty tot was the size of Draxum’s massive paws!
Leo sniffed dramatically at this revelation.
He’s so cute!
The small softshell and tall goat man just sort of stared at each other, Donnie under Draxum’s scrutinizing and analytical eyes, Draxum under Donnie’s tiny but fierce glare.
“Hello Donatello.” Draxum raised a brow at him, and Donnie, somehow, did the same.
A tense silence followed, and Leo was worried that the two were about to throw hands or something.
‘Maybe this wasn’t the best idea, I should probably-‘
“Woof.”
...
“... Huh?”
Donnie proceeded to point his little finger at Leo, then to Draxum and repeated: “Woof!”
...
At the sound of loud wheezing the rest of the family came running into the med bay, Raph bursting in with his Ninpo at the ready while everyone else got into battle positions. Both Aprils and Mikey had their bat and chains out, ready to start swinging at any moment. Even Splinter seemed on edge, fur ruffled and tail up for a deadly whip.
“What’s wrong?” Raph’s panicked voice asked urgently. “What’s happening? Is everyone alri-”
They all froze at the sight they were met with.
Leo was rolling on the ground, laughing loudly and wheezing hard enough to actually begin coughing uncontrollably with tears threatening to fall.
Why?
Because Draxum was apparently currently being threatened by a small, baby softshell who didn’t even reach his ankles. Draxum was standing to the side, arms crossed while looking both done and yet impressed at the pint-sized turtle before him, who stood protectively over his bigger twin.
“Donathan,” Draxum tried in a jaded tone, “let’s be reasonable-”
“Hissssssss!”
Donnie got on the ground and bowed his spine like a cat, then hopped towards the much bigger being doing all he could to intimidate with his size. Draxum was all laughs about it too until surprisingly sharp, miniature claws dug into his shin, which had the goat man jumping back with a yelp. At that Tiny-Tello scrambled back, running to hide behind Leo, who at this point managed to calm down. He was still hissing, mind you, only now it was accompanied by chirping and warning growls. The tot peeked out at the yokai from his place behind his now bigger twin. But then Draxum took a step forward, not necessarily angry but at least a little offended, and all that bravado vanished, now completely disappearing behind his striped brother.
The tension that had been suffocating the rest of Leo’s family finally broke sighed with collective, sagging relief.
Mikey moved first to Draxum, scolding him for scaring his baby brother, to which the alchemist looked even more offended by. Raph walked over to Leo and Donnie while Splinter walked over to stand next to Mikey to scold Draxum with him. April had to step out for a bit to go pick up C.J. from school and then grab some pizza from Hueso while she tried to explain... everything.
Leo reached behind himself, lifting Donnie up back into his arms. He cooed as the little tot clung to his strap to bury his face in his shoulder. “That was awesome little Bubby! Thank you for protecting me.” The slider whispered to him as his snapper brother came up next to them, placing a hand on Leo’s other shoulder. Donnie looked up at them with big, mismatched eyes that reflected Leo’s own.
“Yeah, little guy!” Raph said. “You were so brave!”
Donnie simply blinked up at them for a second before going back to hiding his face.
“Oop, looks like he’s done with people for today.” Leo rubbed the little one’s shell soothingly. That’s when he had an idea and turned to Raph smiling. “Hey, Boss Man, why don’t you take Tello to his room?” He gave Donnie over to the bigger turtle without waiting for an answer, holding back a squeal at how much smaller his twin was now compared to Raph’s hands. “I’m sure he’d like that. I got something I gotta ask Drax anyway.”
For a moment Leo watched as Raph panicked, standing next to him for support as he was still very hesitant over holding his now palm sized little brother. But the blue ninja watched in fond awe as the stress slowly left his older brother, grinning as the snapper’s face fell into something calm and sweet. He brought the softshell to lay against his own shoulder, churring softly as the tiny tot made himself comfortable.
“Uh, yeah, okay. Raph’s on it.”
Leo watched Raph walk away, laughing softly as Donnie looked up from his place on Raph’s shoulder to half reach, half wave at his twin. Leo waved back and waited until his two brothers were far enough before letting his face fall.
He turned and went to the med bay where Draxum, Mikey, and Splinter still lingered, the two shorter giving the tall yokai an earful.
Leo walked towards them, the energy he was giving off was enough to make the other three stop and look up at him.
Leo was determined to figure out what that asshole did to Donnie, find out how to fix it, make sure the wanna-be-wizard regret ever crossing him and his family.
No one messes with his twin but him.
And that jerk’s about to figure out just why that is.