Chapter Text
Intro;
By atinyaccount.
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Roaring cheers and the thunder of clapping and stomping from excited fans became a muffled hum as Big Mama and The Daimyo duck under a heavy curtain. The Battle Nexus was loud and raucous, usually music to Big Mama’s ears, but everyone needed a break from time to time. The tea kettle’s whistle dies down as she takes it off to pour herself and her new acquaintance a drink. It cools as she preps the sugar and honey before she hands it to him on a small matching plate.
The Daimyo politely takes the tea and sets it down next to him, resting an arm on the backrest of the couch. As she sits down across from him, Big Mama crosses her legs and smiles cutely.
“The Nexus always gets me so frazzled-dazzled, Daimyo! I love putting on a good show to get myself in a better mood.” She took a sip of her tea and set it down in front of her, relaxing further into the couch.
The Daimyo cleared his throat. “That I agree with you, Big Mama. Nothing more enjoyable than people fighting for honor and triumph!” He shook a fist in the air, but slowly put it down as he noticed Big Mama’s smile curl down.
He tilted his head at her, confusion evident. “Is something wrong?”
She tapped her tea cup with her fingernails. “There’s just something missing. All of our battles tend to be… samey. It’s always one versus one, and one person wins. Never a tie,” she lets out a sigh of boredom, shaking her head at her own words. The Daimyo studied Big Mama for a moment.
“What are you trying to say?” He raised an eyebrow. “Everyone loves the Battle Nexus. It’s a great tradition people can enjoy and bond over!”
At this, a small smile began to creep over Big Mama’s spidery face.
“Yes, but it’s not something I’m quite enjoying as much as I used to. Every fight almost ends the same and is almost always predictable. We need more… stakes involved,” Big Mama put her hand in her pocket, and the Daimyo heard something lightly clatter around. Something stirred in his gut at her subtle change.
“I found this deep in Witch Town, at quite a hefty price too.” She chuckles out, sickly sweet. “It’s such a pretty set though, I simply couldn’t refuse.”
The spider pulled out two, equally sized orbs. The Daimyo’s eyes widened in surprise as he recognized the first one. The orb had a faint glowing hue, the colors constantly changing. In the simplest terms, it was a teleportation orb, a dangerously powerful one. The size and fluctuating color denoted its power.
The second orb shined gold, with storm clouds brewing deep within. It hurt his eyes to look at, like the orb was trying to blind him for glancing at it. Even though he had seen his fair share of artifacts, he wasn’t sure what its purpose could be.
Big Mama twirled both orbs in her hand, as if they were nothing more than toys for her to play with. Her lips curved upward at the Daimyo. “Last I checked there was a certain set of… turtle-wurtles that the both of us know all too well..”
Her words were dripped with tease and the Daimyo stared at her as the gears in his mind began to turn.
There’s something sinister about Big Mama’s smile, mischievous and plotting. But to the Daimyo it seemed like she was always plotting. His mind wandered more about what exactly Big Mama had in mind.
“I suppose seeing Raphael and Michangelo fighting once more would be a nice change of pace.” The Daimyo commented thoughtfully.
Thinking about their fights in the Battle Nexus from his universe still gave him a thrill years later. He watched as Big Mama gently places the golden one on a podium like it was just a fancy decoration. She continues playing with the teleportation orb as she sits back down. A small sense of caution dinged in the back of his head.
“Well, I think that settles it, don’t you? We have the turtles fight, bring a sense of thrill to the Battle Nexus I’ve since missed,” Big Mama suggests with a wicked laugh. The orb in her hand brightens as the hues begin to change faster and faster. The wind around them picks up for a brief second, chaos surrounding the two as the Daimyo’s stomach fills with apprehension.
Then, just like a snap, it all stops. The Daimyo and Big Mama stare at each other in silence for a moment. The curious question of old:
Did it work?
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Raphie swore he was just at home with his brothers, but apparently not as he suddenly found himself someplace completely different. He frantically looked around and took the new area in; an arena with loud cheering… mutants? He couldn’t make notes of anything.
“Behold, our new champion!” A woman’s voice cried out.
Raphie stiffened and tried to pinpoint where it came from, only to match it with a woman wearing all purple, purple skin no less, and short white hair with a bang just covering one eye. Alarm bells went off in Raphie’s head.
“What the hell is this?!” He called out. “What’s going on? Who are you?!”
“Oh, just running a little test, sweetie!” She cooed in delight. “I hope you don’t mind, I need to make sure these things work before the main event!”
“A test-? What main event-”
“Don’t worry your little head about it, this won’t take long.”
The turtle glanced around frantically, finding nothing but plain walls and a long corridor. No brothers, no father, only a woman he’s identified as an immediate threat. He growled angrily, snarling at the spider with bared teeth and red gums.
“Where the Hell are my brothers?!” He demanded, tone sharp and force.
Big Mama smirked wide as she waved a hand as if to dismiss this, rolling her shoulders in a near nonchalant, patronising way that made the mutant’s blood boil hotter.
“Oh, they’ll be here soon enough once this works out as planned.” She promised in a cruel voice. “I only need one for this, anyway.”
Purple clouds of smoke formed out of nowhere and circled around Raphie, the turtle grunting in surprise as suddenly he was trapped. It seemed to give off malice, strong energy seeping through the plumes, and a deep weight dropped to the pits of his stomach.
“And, well..” Big Mama continued with a pretend, drawn out shrug. “Since the Daimyo specifically wanted to see you and your Michelangelo have a totally booooring rematch, I wanted to make sure it was one of you two I brought here to help me with this, instead! I didn’t care which one of you though so I let the orb pick and, here you are!
Upon trying to come to terms with his very problematic situation, her words took a moment to register in his brain. However once he acknowledged the name of a friend leaving her lips, he snapped his head up to glare at her.
“Wait, the Daimyo?” He parroted tightly. “He’s here, too?!”
“Yep!” Chimed the spider too excitedly for such a scene as this.
“Where is he?”
“Dealing with last minute preparations! Now, without further ado, let’s get this show on the road!”
Before he could get anything else out, Raphie felt a pressure coming from the purple smoke, then all of a sudden giant mutants-like creatures surrounded emerged from it and closed in on him. They attacked with punches and swung at him with their weapons. He dodged the best he could with some hitting him. It was endless and he couldn’t get his thoughts straight as to what was happening.
The giant creatures surrounded him again and backed him up to a wall. He was trapped. A sudden shock of electricity shot down his spine. He couldn’t move or talk. All he could see were the creatures around him, the woman looking down at him. The sound of thunder roared in his ear, his eyes spun, and everything turned a blinding white. All Raphie could feel was helplessness and dread as to what was about to happen next.
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The crowd’s cheering roars loudly, deafening to the turtles who suddenly found themselves in the center of the enormous battle dome. As they were all doing their own things at home, some didn’t rematerialise as gracefully as others and they ended up on the floor. Face down, eating dirt, while few were lucky to catch themselves in time.
The Daimyo and Big Mama looked down at the large group of turtles, surprise on both their faces as they arrived at their overhead viewing room. The spider woman’s face morphs into that big, plotting, grin once again. She quickly tucks the teleportation orb into her fur coat for safe-keeping
Fearless groaned in pain as he rubbed his head before instinctively looking around for his brothers. “Donnie? What’s going on?”
“How am I supposed to- oh.” Tello and Dontron, neither of which Fearless recognized, stop each other’s same sentence as they stare at each other. The gears in their heads turn as they process what is happening to them.
“Oh great, now there’s two of them.” Leon grumbled before looking at the Battle Nexus around them
“Big Mama,” he muttered under his breath, immediately recognizing his surroundings and pulling his sword from its sheath. He backed up cautiously, only to find himself hitting something- or someone.
Fearless turned around, a frown on his face. “Uh, you wanna tell us where we are?”
Leon chuckled, the odd scene felt like a fever dream. “We’re in the Battle Nexus. Hidden City’s biggest crime fighting match there is. Not crime fighting as we do, but crime as in this should be illegal!” he called, aiming at the people above.
The smaller turtle raised an eyebrow. “The Battle Nexus? What are you talking about? This is nothing like the Battle Nexus. Right, Mikey?”
Leon followed Fearless’s gaze to two Michelangelos gawking at each other and spinning around. The slightly taller orange turtle that’s the same height as their Leo snapped his head their way.
“Yeah dude, this isn’t our Battle Nexus.” He confirmed, lifting Angelo up with one skillful arm. Mikey spared a glance to the arena, mild unease tingling at the back of his mind.
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Raphala scowled, leaning his head back. Just what he needed, a villain tormenting him and his brothers. He looked around the crowd he was in, continuously seeing duplicates of his brothers in various forms. A lot of them were bumping into one another, some already with weapons drawn. Raph contemplated whether or not that was an actually good idea, before the floor underneath all of them began to separate. They turned into smaller individual platforms around the arena, slowly pulling up to levitate low above the ground.
Raphala’s platform shook as he flew above the audience. DonTron and the.. other Donnies were across from him. A Leo was on the platform with two Mikeys slightly below. So if they had counterparts…
“Whoa!”
Raphala heard a cry, whipping his head and instinctively running to the source of the voice. A much smaller, younger looking version of him barely caught on the platform. Pulling him up was barely an effort.
The smaller Raph beamed “Yo, thanks, uh-”
“Raph,” Raphala answered as he pointed to himself, nodding.
“Woah, I’m also Raph!” Ray, which Raphala was now calling him, said with a noticeable amount of excitement in his tone. The snapping turtle couldn’t help but give a small smile at him.
“I noticed,” Raphala said with light hearted sarcasm, before looking back up to where Big Mama was probably sitting. He grimaced, whatever she had in mind, it was no good. Ray was so small compared to him, and so young too.
“Have you uh- ever been part of a Battle Nexus before?”
Ray stared blankly. “What’s a Battle Nexus?”
Oh boy. This little guy didn’t know what he was getting into.
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“Okay, you look familiar, but not the same.” Don commented as he made circles with another purple turtle.
The other eyed him warily, and the two stared pointedly with their bo in hand, trying to figure out if the other was good or evil.
“Yeah, you too. But you’re a little taller than last time.” Tello retorted, crossing his arms and leaning on one foot.
The other stopped moving, facing the other. “Same to you.”
“Did you-” The two Donatello’s began at the same time and pointed at each other.
“Have four short teenage mutant ninja turtles siblings being super annoying and risking the mission every chance they got because they didn’t understand your fighting strategies?” They blinked, but then smiles grew widely on their faces in a happy understanding of each other.
Tello held his hand to his head. “Holy chalupa, we crossed dimensions again!”
The screeching of a mic halted everyone, resulting in the turtles covering their ears.
“Welcome everyone, to the Battle Nexus!” A woman’s voice announced, echoing throughout the colosseum. The Mad Dogz took out their weapons, and their markings began to glow at the sound of her voice.
“We didn’t sign any deal!” Leon shouted, his brothers yelled out their own agreements.
“Oh turtley-boo. No deal required from you.” The spider yokai crackled. “This time you have no choice in the matter. The less of you who survive.. the better.” She explained, her hands clapping in delight. The Daimyo grimaced at this malicious choice of words, offering the woman a questioning glance from behind his mask.
Leon, however, just smirked. A sharp tingle bloomed under his skin as his powers charged and his markings glowed. His swords crackled as energy filled them.
“Piece of-”
Thunder boomed as a zap from above struck him mid sentence. Leon instantly stilled as, to his brother’s and onlooker’s terror, his body was slowly replaced with a coating of solid gold. He permanently stared in Big Mama’s direction, his face full of the hint of shock that filled it before it was permanently frozen. His body disappeared from his platform, appearing above Big Mama’s station instead.
“LEO!” His brother’s shouted in horror. Leon’s solidified figure was projected on the screens above, displayed on a pedestal.
“This is your champion, Hidden City!” Big Mama boomed as the crowd murmured in excitement and dread. She caught eye of the many disapproving glances from the many mutants, and she gave a sickening giggle. “What? I can't have the cheating one play with us! His portals would make this less fun..”
“So how bad is this Battle Nexus of yours?” Don asked as he fiddled with his wrist wraps, not taking his eyes off of Big Mama and the very hesitant Daimyo.
Miguel held his arm. “Last time Raph got disqualified, we thought he died..”
He trailed, thinking of that day over again. The sick feeling in his stomach returned, and he took a deep breath, shaking his head to get the thought out.
“Oopsie doodles, did I forget to mention? Fighting between yourselves wouldn’t be very fun, you silly little ninja’s can be awfully careful and slow with your strategic fighting styles. But no worries, you won’t be harmed!.. Too much. The worst that'll happen is you’ll end up like this little thorn in my side and you’ll be as good as dead!”
"Why couldn’t that Leo fight?!” Don shouted at big Mama.
“This one,” she responded, pointing at Leon without looking at him, “can make portals. While he’s still learning, it’s still a cheating tactic. He could just portal you turtley-boos out of there in a blink of an eye!”
Big Mama slid her hand on the railing of the balcony then leaned forward using both for support as she leaned forward. “Cheating is no fun, we can’t have that.”
“She has some real beef with you guys, huh?” Michael asked nervously. The others nodded.
Big Mama scoffed at the Daimyo gently, whipping out a microphone as announcement speakers lowered closer to the turtles and the crowd. She looked at the curious giant next to her with a sprinkle in her eyes.
“It’s much more fun this way, isn’t it?” She teased before gently clearing her throat.
The Daimyo could only glare at her; this wasn’t fun for him at all. He was aware of her plan to add a few yokai to the battles as a way to bring out challenge rounds here and there, but the idea of that didn’t sit well with him. The fights themselves between competitors would be tiresome enough, and she’s putting everyone at risk for entertainment. While that was the purpose of the Battle Nexus, she’s doing it for all the wrong reasons.
However he’d keep quiet and see where this goes.. for now.
“However, just to be super-duper nice, I'll do you all a favour! You work best in your own teams, right?” The spider spoke up, as if an idea came to her and she lit up. “So let’s make this fair! Afterall, it’d be such a shame if this tournament was to end so quickly.. I put so much work into this, after all.”
Purple smoke suddenly engulfed the crowd of teenagers and spat them back out in much smaller groups of families on their own platforms. They all looked around, unsettled and confused.
“There!” Big Mama giggled sweetly, her mirth sticky and cruel. “Now you can be with your own families.. and watch first-hand while you fall one by one. Now..”
A horn blew without any warning, startling all of them.
“Let the tournament… BEGIN!”