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shuffling into the pile of blankets in front of the fire, two of Splinters sons attempted to warm themselves up after their adventures out in the snowy day. Raphael was helping Splinter make tea, and Leonardo sat nearby on the couch, listening to Michelangelo recount the days tale. the rat noticed his youngest sons usually dramatic storytelling being weighed down, his boisterous voice closer to a tired mumble. he sounded like Donatello would after a night on the town, trying to deny he needed sleep. said final turtle was sitting next to him, quietly watching the fire and trying to rub feeling back into his feet.
the turtles tended to get a bit sluggish in the cold, even being older now than they were when they scared splinter as kids.
fire, blankets, tea, and their fathers warm fur helped though.
Raphael finished helping Splinter, setting one of two trays on the coffee table before he sat down next to Leonardo. the oldest boy was still healing, and leaned against his brother subtly. Raphael shifted to put an arm around him, bouncing quips back and forth with Michelangelo easily. it always surprised and pleased Splinter how the red turtle could ease a room so easily. hot-tempered as he was, he knew what his brothers needed and when they needed it.
Splinter served the two chilly turtles their cups, holding their hands steady at first so their shivering wouldn't spill the hot liquid and hurt them. He helped Michelangelo first, until he'd sipped enough that the tea wouldn't spill over the sides with the shaking, then moved to aid Donatello.
as Michelangelo finished recounting their tale, April and Casey set up a small space heater, then seeing the situation was well handled excused themselves back upstairs to clean Casey up properly. Splinter tried to push down the usual anxiety hearing what his sons had done, especially being seconds away from being flash frozen. he worried if Michelangelo had brought along a different brother, would they have been captured and taken from him? would Leonardo or Raphael have known what was happening in the back of the truck?
the rat shook the thoughts away. Catastrophism after the fact never helped, not when he was needed in the moment. he slipped between Michelangelo and Donatello, letting them lean against him for more warmth. the younger of the two chose to pull his knees up and lean against Splinters side. Donatello instead laid his head on his fathers lap, Splinter setting a hand over his brow.
the room quieted for a while, the sound of the fire crackling and the space heater thrumming creating a gentle ambiance. even with the turtles pressed to him, Splinter found himself attempting to meditate. it wasn't like they were moving much anyways.
time passed as Splinter cleared his mind, tuning out the wind outside, creaking of the house, shuffling behind him from his other two sons rearranging. he sat until the breathing around him seemed to even out and quiet. He'd found that the boys shells and plastrons acted like a drum, making their heartbeats audibly louder than most. He could pinpoint where one of his children were in a crowded room usually by their heartbeats alone.
Their heartbeats slowed, and Splinter listened to the rythym of them, focusing on one for a while until he could imagine his own was in sync. He wondered which of his sons he'd chosen for that?
Tilting his ears, he found it was probably one of his elder two behind him, their own chests almost in beat with each other.
His ears tilted to the two against him.
It was suddenly a lot quieter.
Jumping out of meditation so suddenly made him dizzy, but he looked down at Donatello's head in his lap, where his hand was still on his skin. The turtles skin was still icy, like it hadn't raised a single degree.
And splinter couldn't hear his heart beating.
The rat felt his own chest clench in fear, shifting to try to push his youngest off, only to find Michelangelo in the same state as his brother. A noise tore its way out of splinters throat unwillingly as he tried to lay Michelangelo down, looking between the two with no idea what to do.
"Father?" He heard Raphael mumbled behind him, like he'd dozed off and was just coming to.
Splinter glanced back, seeling Leonardo shifting against Raphs shoulder, trying to stay comfortable.
Raphael must have seen something in splinters face, cause he jumped to alertness, pushing Leo off — which got an offended squawk out of the eldest — and dropped off the couch to beside splinter, "what's wrong?"
Splinter couldn't find the words, reaching back again for Donatello's head, his cold skin, his lack of shivering or puffs of breath. The moments ticking on without any signs from the pair dug deeper into the rats heart, scoured the panic further in his mind.
"Guys?" Leo tried.
"Oh my god." Raphael had reached out, "Don's not breathin'."
"Huh?" Leonardo squeaked, scrambling up holding his side.
"Is Mikey?" Raph reached over splinter, pulling back quickly, "what-" the end of his voice cracked a little, on the edge of his own panic. The sound of both splinters eldest sons hearts hammering away faster almost drowned out any other noises.
Then a faint asynchronous thrum.
Splinter froze, reaching out to place a firm hand over each of the twos mouths, making them freeze as well. Their heartbeats spiked as Splinter had them remain still, loud and furious.
Then another thrum, from the other side.
Splinter sucked in a breath, letting his hands lower slowly. He felt a sense of deja vu he hadn't experienced in years, not since the boys were little and the cold was far more biting. Not since he was too inexperienced as a father of four young box turtles to avoid a winter of grief.
"They are not dead." He said softly, setting his hands instead over each of the cold boys foreheads. "Get more blankets, and whatever heating options you can find."
Leonardo nodded quickly, getting up and following instructions, Raphael tried to argue, "but they-"
"Will be okay." Splinter assured him, turning and looking in his eyes to show his own confidence, though internally it wavered. They weren't babies anymore, if this wasn't done properly… "let us warm them up and we will talk."
Raph frowned deeper, but did as he was told, getting up. Splinter adjusted the pair of turtles on the floor, wrapping their current blankets tighter around them, and pulling them both more against himself. He took the warmed beanbags Leonardo handed him and set them under the blankets too, more heat for the fabric to trap. They set up everything they could, even bringing both turtles heads up against the fur around Splinters neck. He held them both in a quiet embrace, and Leonardo and Raphael sat close in front of him, hands in their lap, waiting.
"My first winter with you boys," splinter spoke softly, rubbing the two younger shells, "one by one, you all grew cold, and fell into a sleep like death." His ears folded back, remembering the fear and grief he felt watching them drop one by one, with nothing he could do to stop it. "I had thought I'd lost you all, but you woke up in the spring like you'd just been sleeping. You hadn't been breathing, and as I discovered later, your heartbeats slowed to almost 6 beats an hour."
"What?" Raphael stared at him in shock. "I don't remember that."
"You were young, and it only happened the once." Splinter sighed, "I made sure to keep our homes warm enough to prevent it after. As it turned out, some species of turtles have their own form of hibernation called brumation, your specific species is the only one that sleeps so deeply it can be mistaken for dead. They bury themselves in the dirt until they get thawed out in spring."
"So Don and Mikey are… brumating?" Leo asked.
Splinter nodded, then hearing a light thrum from Don again, and he gave a small smile. "I can still hear their hearts, though far between. If we warm them up they should come to on their own."
"Is that safe?" Leo added.
"As long as they are not warmed up too terribly fast." Splinter said, "though you four are sturdier than your average turtle."
The breath of relief from both of them was palpable, and Splinter felt some of the fur on his neck shift like a light breeze swept through it. He held Donatello tighter, thankful for the breath and sign that he was slowly waking up.
Perhaps this experience would be informational. Knowing their own weaknesses to the cold may help the turtles later down the road, when they didn't have Splinter to tell them what happened.
Far later, he hoped. He didn't want his children to ever experience that feeling he had when he thought he'd lost them. They were still young after all.