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It’s been a few months since the end of the Kraang invasion, lots of crying, panic attacks, and sleepless nights filling the weeks since. It was finally settling down, just like the snow on the surface.
Mikey’s cracked hands have healed mostly, completing the physical therapy Donnie had assigned him. It took months before he could even write his nickname again, forget drawing and painting. He tried so hard to quicken his therapy, resulting in jagged white lines forever on his hands and arms. The box turtle wore a shoulder brace, colored and signed with the names of his brothers. If he knew the tendon damage throwing that building would have caused, he wouldn’t have done it. He felt useless. Mikey was always the one comforting the others, and they didn’t know how to help him.
The scar in Raph’s eye has healed, the peripheral of his right eye slightly blurred, and the missing chip of his shell rounded out to get rid of sharp edges. He could still feel the tendrils of the Kraang invading his brain, stealing his memories. The most private place to someone was ravaged, and the lasting effects were still seen. He continued to have nightmares of watching through his own eyes as his body attacked his brother, and he wanted to cry whenever Leo flinched.
Permanentant scars littered Donnie’s shell after his battle shell was torn up, but he suffered the worst mentally. Constant nights in Leo’s room to make sure he was still there, and not trapped in an unreachable dimension. He refused to go to the Hidden World and see a therapist, despite the persistent begging of his family. He fixes things, no one needs to fix him. He was fine, and if he tightened his fingers around Leo’s hand, the blue brother didn’t say anything.
Leo tried to hide what happened to him, but mumbled words in his sleep, and constant panic and PTSD attacks led to the truth being spilled. How he was there for days, instead of a few minutes. The constant words of Kraang Prime ringing in his head and dreams, ‘ Wipe that grin off your face!’ on a loop. It took two months to feel safe around Raph again, but even then he couldn’t help but keep his guard up. Just in case a piece of the Kraang was still lingering in his brother. The guilt after he was in a different room couldn’t compare.
He was scarred, as prominent as his stripes. He passed out almost as soon as he was back in New York, and didn’t wake until a whole week later. Cracked shell, broken ribs, infection, concussion, swollen eye and much more. He had joined Mikey in his physical therapy after being all healed, trying to encourage his younger brother. He felt useless.
Splinter and April were wonderful supports, along with Draxum’s attempts to try and father his sons. He’s gotten better over the years. The boys knew Splinter had nightmares, but it was obvious the rat didn’t want to talk about it, so they never brought it up and it seemed to fix itself on its own. April came by often, bringing pizza almost every time. The government paid all those affected in New York compensation for the disaster, and hers was mostly put towards bringing the turtles food.
Casey was…adjusting. For the first two months it was so weird for him, seeing his sensei’s, alive and young. He never got to meet Raphael, and he was young when Donatello died, about ten years old if he remembers correctly.
“M-master Leonardo? Where’s…where Uncle D?”
“C-Casey? I thought you were asleep?”
“Master Donatello said he’d show me what video games were but…it’s been a week…”
Once Master Leonardo started training him to fight the Kraang, the years blurred together.
Master Donatello buried the key, down in the middle of the ocean and twelve feet under the ocean floor. He installed a tracker, and if it was ever to be moved loud alarms would go off on everyone of his inventions. It was a relief, knowing all the precautions that had gone into making sure the Kraang would never reappear, and the protection of it passed down from Hamato to Hamato.
After the first month of processing, the brothers took Casey on a tour of their part of New York, Master Leonardo leading them around, trying to hide his suffering. Casey tried not to compare them to his timeline, and just enjoyed the brightness and joy of the city.
He didn’t have nightmares of the Kraang, the fighting and pain. Over and over again the scene of his masters dying in front of him played, never ending. So many times he wanted to go to their rooms, go lay down in bed with them like he used to do when he was younger when he couldn’t stop repeating his mothers death like a record in his head.
“Casey, you should be asleep.”
“B-but I had a n-nightmare Leo…”
“Oh alright, come here. Wanna hear some stories?”
But these weren’t his masters, he didn’t grow up with these turtles, despite how much he wanted to have.
Casey’s heart hurt with how much he missed them, remembering the excitement coursing through his veins while watching Master Michelangelo showing off his mystic powers, in awe at how easily Master Leonardo cut down Kraang. He couldn’t reminisce on those stories with them, and it hurt all the more. These turtles weren’t his masters, they were Leo and Mikey. Kids barely older than him. It was so hard to remember that.
Back to present day, it’s been five whole months since the consealment of the Kraang, and they were knee deep in winter, Christmas right around the corner. So many stories of a time where a family got together and exchanged gifts by a tree lit up with lights and shimmering orbs.
“Uncle M-Mikey? What are you guys doing?”
“Oh Casey! We’re exchanging gifts!”
“Gifts? Why?”
“Back before the Kraang, there was a super cool holiday! I’ll tell you all about it!”
A blanket of soft, cold, white flakes covering the ground. He could never imagine it, not with the desolate wasteland of New York he lived in. He remembers the laughter from his new family at his reaction to snow.
“Comm- I mean April, do we have to have pizza every- AH!”
“Casey! What’s wrong?!”
“S-something cold touched my nose! I-it was white?! Why are you laughing?!”
“Casey! It’s snow! It comes in winter time, it’s frozen rain drops.”
“Leona- Leo, stop laughing! They wasn’t any snow in the future…”
Casey chuckled to himself, realizing how silly he must have sounded, freaking out over something as common as snow. Now he walked next to Raph, the group heading to the park to build something called a Snowman, and have what they called a snowball fight.
Casey wore more clothes than he originally thought necessary, but after going out in the cold with his normal clothing he realized how wrong he was. So now he wore a heavy black jacket with thick gloves and a scarf. He walked quietly, listening in on the soft conversation between the twins.
“Nardo’ we aren’t having the Lair Game early this year. It’s always been in February, we aren’t doing it at the end of the month.” Casey didn’t know what the Lair Games were, but it’s all Leo has been talking about for the past week.
“Oh come on! Casey needs to experience it!” His master argued, pouting, a face Casey never saw in the future.
“And he will, in February. You can wait.” There was a groan following Donnie’s words, and Casey couldn’t help but laugh a bit. He’s slowly gotten used to the banter of the brothers, a good change from his world.
“Donnie you can’t keep doing this! You can’t keep going outside just because you want to test your little toys, especially not alone!”
“My ‘little toys’ could get rid of the Krang, Leo! We can’t keep hiding away like we used to!”
“This is going to get you killed D!”
Leo glared back playfully at the black haired teen, which warranted another laugh. Leo couldn’t help but laugh also, and Casey sped up to stand next to him, feeling uneasy at the back of the pack.
“So, explain to me one more time what a snowman and a snowball fight are? I’m still a bit confused.” He asked, the words from Donnie’s explination leaving his mind.
The slider rolled his eyes, before looking back at him. “Okay, so basically for a snowman, you roll a bunch of snow into giant balls varing in size and then stack them on top of each other. Then you use clothing like scarves and gloves to make him look like a person.” Leo indicated to his own scarf and gloves as he spoke before continuing. “Then you make small balls with the snow, and you throw them at each other.” He looked over at his brother, before whispering. “Watch out for Donnie, he likes to put rocks in his.” He informed with a snicker.
Casey hung onto every word, like it was instructions for a battle. He already knew he’d stay with Leo, watching how he did it all and then copy. Even though they were around the same age now, Casey still looked up to the turtle, admiring how carefree but in charge he has become since he first came to this world.
“Alright, I think I got it.” He confirmed, trying to imagine the situations in his head, a tactic he normally used for plans.
“Casey, you need to stop thinking and fight.”
“Ugh! That’s not possible! You can’t fight and not think at the same time!”
“Hey, calm down. You’ll get it, it takes practice.”
Leo continued talking about his plan for finally taking Donnie down in the snowball fight, and Casey tried to help him come up with ideas. It wasn’t long till we got there, and Casey eagerly followed his master’s instructions on what to do. Despite the lingering fear of not having his weapon on hand, and his face exposed in the open, he found himself having a lot of fun rolling snow together.
They ended up making the snowman look like Lou Jitsu, a action star in ninja movies the boys had made him watch over and over again, and the surprise when they finally told him that Splinter was Lou Jitsu! That day he heard the story of how the turtles became who they were.
About an hour later, he found himself hiding behind a makeshift wall as snowballs flung over his head at lightning speed, a result of Donnie using his mechanical arms. Leo was currently making more ammo, and April was out of commission after her glasses broke due to Raph throwing a snowball right at her face on accident. Poor guy looked like he was going to cry.
Leo finished, handing off half his ammunition to Casey who gladly took them. They had no way of winning, it was an unfair fight from the start. Both knew what the other was thinking, and with a nod, they jumped out, charging at the enemy and throwing as many snowballs as possible.
“Master Leonardo, we’ll never get past them-!“
“Just run!”
Out of the corner of his eye, Casey saw his mentor get hit in the side, and he felt like time slowed as his mind flashed back to that day. Eyes wide, he dropped all he had in his hands and ran to Leo who was dramatically on the ground.
“Dad!”
He didn’t know if it was the ringing in his ear that caused the silence, but he didn’t register what he said as he landed next to him on his knees. He could see him heaving, he was dying, Master Leonardo was dyin-
“Casey! We have to go!”
“Sensei! You’re hurt! It hit your kidney!”
“We’ll die if we don’t move! Send the distress signal to Michelangelo!”
“B-but you said that’s only for emerge-“
“Do it! You have to trust me Casey!”
“No way you just said that!” Leo turned back to him, clutching his stomach in laugher. Pulled back into the present, Casey looked around and realized that almost everyone was laughing.
He tilted his head, trying to calm his rapidly beating heart. “What did I say?” And everyone just laughed harder. Confusion settled on his face. “What?” He asked more insistently.
Mikey, who had also fallen on the ground in laughter, sat up and wiped away the tears on the edge of his eyes. “You called Leo dad!” He confirmed through laughter.
Despite the cold weather, Casey felt his cheeks heat up in embarrassment. “W-what?! N-no I didn’t!” He defended, not doing a very good job at it.
He would be lying if he said he didn’t see his Master Leonardo as a father figure, but - “H-he’s only like a year older than me! I-I didn’t call him Dad!” He yelled insistently. If he didn’t convince them, Casey would never live this down.
“Dad!” A scratchy version of his voice played, and Casey hung his head, realizing it the familiar sound of Donnie’s speakers. “You totally called him Dad and I’m saving this as blackmail.” The teen just groaned, face planting into the snow to hide from the embarrassment and cool off his cheeks.
He could hear the laughter coming from his family, and couldn’t help the small smile forming on his face.
Later that evening, Casey found himself alone in the kitchen, eating some leftover pizza while scrolling through photos on his phone. Donnie made him one within the week he had came here, and it quickly filled with apps and photos and chats.
He quickly lifted his head up, heart slightly racing as he heard footsteps walk in, before taking a deep breath and remembering where he was. It wasn’t uncommon to see Leo awake at nights.
“Casey, you should be asleep…” Leo’s tired voice came, too tired to come up with a quip. He rubbed his eyes, blue mask missing as he walked over and sat across from him.
“Got hungry.” Was all he answered with, purposely not making eye contact and the memories from earlier that day flooded his mind. So stupid, so careless-
A sigh came from the slider, “Casey, don’t worry about earlier. I’m sure I can convince Donnie to delete that recording….maybe.” He ended with a small chuckle, reaching over and stealing the last slice of cold pizza.
Casey rubbed the back of his neck, willing the rising blush on his face to not rise. “Yeah sorry… M-my Leo…” he paused, taking a deep breath before continuing. “He was a father figure to me, especially after my mom died… No one even asked him to take me under his wing, he just did and it was one of the best things to happen to me…”
“Donnie please, I need help.”
“Dude, twin, you brought this on yourself.”
“Well I couldn’t just not help, Cassie was a good friend.”
“What about the kids' father?”
“No way in hell is Casey going to that deadbeat. We don’t even know if he’s alive and I’m sure as hell not putting in the effort to find him…”
“You do know I could pin his location in two seconds?”
“I miss Raph…He’d know what to do…He was good with kids…”
“I used to get nightmares a lot when I was younger…” He shook his head, trying to banish the blood stained images flashing through his mind. “H-he always let me sleep with him…Probably one of my favorite memories with him…”
It felt weird, talking to a younger version of someone he saw as a father, telling him all this personal stuff that would never happen again. But…it felt nice, finally being able to talk about it.
“Every night…it’s the same dream over and over… Master Michelangelo creating the time gateway, and disappearing into dust. And… Master Leonardo disintegrating just before I fall through…” The black haired teen set his phone down, and lifted up the sleeves of his clothes to wipe away the tears forming. His heart ached for his mentor and friends, and it hurt more knowing he’d never see them again, even after he died.
There was silence at the table for a moment, and Casey was worried he weirded out Leo, but the turtle spoke softly. “I…keep having nightmares too, and I don’t want my brothers to worry so I face them alone. Before…all this, if one of us had a nightmare we’d do what Mikey called a turtle pile. We all just…kinda lay on one another.” The skin over his eyes furrowed, wondering how to word his next words.
“If you want, maybe we could do something like that. Obviously not in a weird way, just in the same room so we can be there if something happens?” He seemed a bit scared asking the question, and Casey could understand why.
He thought for a second, and the idea of comfort that it brought was more than he’d like to admit. Slowly, he nodded. “Y-yeah…that’d be very nice…” He tried to hide the smile.
Leo got up and made his way over to Casey, slapping his hand on his shoulder. “Will get it set up later son.” He joked in what the boy could only assume was a dad voice, and he couldn’t help but laugh at that.
He washed up his plate and headed to bed, yawning and feeling like he wanted to sleep for the first time in months. This wasn’t the life he knew, but he could get to know it.