It’s going to be a longer story than I expected so I decided to break it up into three parts that will slowly introduce the brothers and their families.
I’ve been pretty busy this last month so hopefully I’ll add some cover art in the near future.
Thank you all for being patient and I hope you enjoy reading the first part of Baby Steps!
Story: Baby Steps
Summary:
While the family is together for Jitsu’s first birthday, Zari decides to take it upon herself to teach her baby brother how to walk on his big day and enlists her cousins into helping. As the brothers watch over their shenanigans, the four each start reminiscing about when their own kids took their first steps and the hilarity that ensued.
It was late at night when Raphael and Silvertail were in the kitchen, the two looking over various snacks and supplies they had bought for tomorrow’s special event. While Raph was putting away the party food, Sil looked over the checklist in her hand as she went through and marked off each item on the list with the red banded turtle confirming.
“Chips?”
“Nacho, barbeque, and original flavored.”
“Juice?”
“Grape, apple, and one flavorless for Donnie.”
“Balloons?”
“Three packs, I also got the plates, napkins, streamers, and tablecloth at the store while coming back from patrol.” Raph said confidently.
“Impressive. You really went all out on this, huh?” Sil looked over at her husband with a smirk.
“It’s Jitsu’s first birthday, I want everything to be perfect for his big day!”
“I know, I know,” The mutant gator replied. “I still can’t believe he’s turning a year old, it’s surprising how big he’s gotten in that time.”
“Yeah…” Raph said as he tried to hold back tears from remembering the day Jitsu was born; that proud feeling of getting to hold his son for the first time was something he would never forget. Noticing this, Silvertail walked over to her partner and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder in comfort which seemed to snap Raph out of thought.
“Um, yeah, right, so looks like we got everything for the party.” He said trying to change the subject. Silver couldn’t help but laugh a bit.
“Yep, Mikey said he’d bring the cake over tomorrow, so the only thing left is to hide these.” The gator picked up a paper box from the counter with the clear top revealing a dozen cupcakes alternating between vanilla and chocolate and decorated with pastel frosting.
“Can’t we just put them in the cabinet?” Raph said gesturing to the cabinets above them.
Silvertail shook her head. “No, I don’t want the kids being able to reach them easily, plus it’d be the first place your dad would look.” A yawn suddenly escaped from Silvertail and she shook her head a bit trying to ward off the tiredness, Raph took notice of this and looked over at the clock on the far wall to see that the two of them have been up for a while.
“It’s getting late, we should get to bed.” Raph said as he took the box from Silver. “I’ll take care of the cupcakes; you go ahead, and I’ll join you after I put them away.”
Sil hummed in agreement and gave the turtle a kiss goodnight before walking out of the kitchen.
“Be sure to put them somewhere that your dad and the kids can’t reach.” She called out from the hallway.
After she left, Raph looked around for a decent hiding spot before deciding that the top of the fridge would be the best place, as he was about to put them behind the boxes of cereal however Raphael glanced over at the doorway to see if Sil was truly gone. Once he was sure no one was around, Raph opened the box and carefully took out one of the cupcakes and looked at the dessert eagerly, but as he prepared to pop it into his mouth a young voice suddenly spoke out from behind him.
“Hey dad!” The mutant snapper nearly jumped out of his shell and fumbled with the both the box and cupcake as he turned around to see who snuck up behind him.
Looking down he saw a little gator child looking up at him curiously and dressed in a large t-shirt as makeshift pajamas; it was his young daughter Zari. A relieved sigh left him after recognizing that it was his kid before Raph realized that she was in the kitchen instead of being in bed.
“Zari, what are you doing? It’s way past your bedtime.”
“I got hungry, so I was looking for a snack.”
“It’s 10 pm; you should be sleeping not snacking.” Raph told her.
“Then what are you doing?” Zari asked pointing at the half-squashed cupcake in her dad’s hand.
Looking back between Zari and the cupcake, Raph realized the compromising position he was in and tried to come up with an explanation.
When he was unable to come up with one, he offered his daughter some of the damaged cupcake and put the rest of them away on top of the fridge as Zari happily started eating some of the larger crumbs that were held together by the frosting.
“Don’t tell your mom about this, okay?” Raph told her to which the little gator nodded. After Zari ate her fill, Raph ate the rest of the cake crumbles and tossed the wrapper into the trash can before picking up Zari and the two of them walked out of the kitchen.
“Alright, now let’s get you back to bed young lady.”
“I’m not a lady!” Zari protested. “I’m a fierce warrior!”
“Well, even little warriors need their sleep.” Raph said as he tickled Zari and was rewarded with some laughter from the little gator as the two of them walked down towards Zari’s bedroom. Raph pulled back the curtain and walked inside when his foot bumped against something, curious he flipped the light switch on to reveal a scattered mess of toys on the floor.
“Zari…” The red banded turtle looked over at his daughter with a brow raised in question.
“I was gonna clean it up!” Zari explained.
Raph simply rolled his eyes and started navigating through the sea of blocks, action figures, and various toys that littered the concrete floor, grateful for the years of ninja training him and his brothers went through, until eventually the two of them reached Zari’s bed where he proceeded to tuck her in.
“No more late-night snacks, okay?” Raphael placed a kiss on her forehead and got up from the bed. As he was about to make the treacherous return to the door, Zari suddenly sat up in her bed and stopped her father as she asked him a question.
“Hey dad, how old was I when I started walking?” The question caught Raph off guard for a second as he looked back at his daughter.
“About a year old I think?” He told her.
“And how old were you and mom when you started?”
“Um, probably around the same age I guess.” Raph replied honestly and sat back down on the bed, curious to see where this was going. “Why do you ask?”
“Well, I heard mom talking to Uncle Donnie and Aunt Lisa on the phone today about how Jitsu’s still crawling around.” Zari explained. “And I was wondering if there was something wrong with him?”
Oh, so that was it. About two months ago Jitsu had started using furniture or people nearby to pull himself into a standing position which had prompted him and Sil to start teaching the toddler how to walk, but while there had been some significant progress their son had yet to walk on his own.
They had started asking the rest of the family for tips and advice on different techniques to use on Jitsu; apparently Zari was in the room when Silver made that call and it had gotten her worried.
Raph gave a reassuring smile to his daughter. “There’s nothing wrong, princess. Your mom was just asking for advice that’s all.”
“Advice about what?”
“You know how your mom and I have been trying to teach Jitsu to walk lately?” Zari nodded and Raph continued explaining.
“Well, we tried using the same techniques from when we were teaching you, but they don’t seem to work for your brother, so we started asking your aunts and uncles for tricks they used from when they were teaching your cousins.”
“And they worked?” Zari asked.
Raph gave a shrug. “Sort of, it’s been a lot of trial and error, but he’s been improving a lot. Anyway, there’s nothing to worry about Zari, your brother is just fine.” As he said this, Raph started tucking the young gator back into bed.
“When he does start walking, it’s gonna make things a lot easier for me.” Zari said as she got back under the covers. “I won’t have to carry him around as much; he’s been getting real heavy.”
Raph couldn’t help but chuckle at that. “Hopefully Jitsu will start walking soon, until then we gotta give him all the support we can, okay?”
Zari hummed in agreement and Raph placed another kiss on her head before getting up and tiptoeing his way back over to the door, upon reaching the other side he turned to give Zari a loving smile as he bade her goodnight.
“Goodnight Zari.” He said before flipping the lights off and walking out into the hallway.
“’Night dad.” Zari replied as her dad left the room.
After Raph left, the little gator looked up at the ceiling in thought as she processed the conversation they just had and the whole situation regarding her little brother. While Jitsu had been improving over the past few weeks, and had even started cruising a little, he’d mostly stuck to clinging onto furniture, crawling, or having someone carry him around.
The main problem seemed to be coming from her brother’s hesitation to walk around without something to support himself on, often resorting to crawling towards mom and dad whenever their parents tried encouraging him to walk on his own. Zari couldn’t tell how many times she had watched her parents get Jitsu to stand on his own and encourage him to walk over to them across the room, only for him to plop back down and do a running crawl towards either mom or dad much to their confusion.
At one point they tried to get him to walk towards Zari when he propped himself up using the couch, and it seemed that he was about to walk towards her, but for some reason he hesitated and climbed up to take a nap on the arm instead.
Thinking about that memory led Zari to a realization which was quickly followed by an idea. Reaching under her pillow she pulled out a tablet and turned it on, squinting a bit as her eyes adjusted to the screen’s brightness, she made a few taps on the screen before sitting up in her bed.
After waiting a bit a jingle sounded from the tablet and a tired voice answered. “Hello?”
“Hey Matt! Sorry to wake you, but I need your help with something.”
~~~
It was late the next morning, after cleaning up from another round of Breakfast Catapult, when Raph and Silver started getting everything set up for Jitsu’s birthday party. Zari was tasked with keeping Jitsu occupied while their parents were busy with the decorations; Silver was observing not too far as she set up the snack table, meanwhile Raph was attempting to set up the ‘Happy 1st Birthday!’ banner over at the entrance and was trying to make it not look crooked.
The kids were currently bopping a balloon back and forth from each other with the balloon occasionally bouncing off of Jitsu’s head and making the little turtle giggle each time. Sil looked up and smiled at her two kids as they played together, that smile quickly left when she looked over at her husband and saw what he was trying to do.
“Come on,” Raph muttered as he concentrated. “You almost got this Raph, just a little higher.”
“Raph, are you sure you don’t need me to hold the ladder?” The gator mutant asked.
“It’s fine Sil, I’m being extra careful.” Raph assured, keeping his eyes on the wall before him.
Suddenly a loud popping sound startled everyone in the room, the sudden noise nearly causing Raph to fall over before regaining his balance. The two parents looked over towards the kids where they saw Zari holding the tattered remains of the balloon in her claws.
“My bad.” The little gator apologized, having popped the balloon by accident.
Shaking her head, Silvertail turned her attention back to Raph who had resumed his work on the banner. “I just don’t want you falling off that thing.” She said worriedly. “Remember what happened last year at the Christmas party?”
“First of all, that was not my fault.” Raph stated. “Leo was the one who opened that portal. Second, you worry too much Sil. I’ve been climbing ladders since I was a tot, trust me I’m not gonna fall-”
“Wha’cha doing Uncle Raph?”
The sound of a yelp followed by a crash immediately caught the family’s attention and looked over to see Raphael lying on his shell, the ladder having been knocked over during his fall, and the banner hanging limply on one side of the archway.
“You alright hon?” Silver called from the table.
“Yep.” Raph managed to groan out.
Looking up the mutant snapper spotted a young gecko child standing at the entry with an innocent smile on his face; an orange and yellow metal pack was secured onto his backside with the design resembling a smaller version of a certain softshell’s handiwork.
The sound of hurried footsteps sounded from deeper in the subway tunnel as Raph sat up and two more figures appeared at the entrance: his younger brother Donatello and his wife Ilisa, both of whom were wearing concerned expressions after hearing the crash.
“Oh my goodness! Raph, are you alright?” Ilisa asked, rushing over to help the red banded turtle up onto his feet.
As the gecko yokai was aiding his older brother, Donnie turned towards his son and started lecturing in a disapproving tone. “Matthew, what have we told you about sneaking up on people while their working?”
“Sorry dad…” Matt rubbed the back of his neck and looked down sheepishly.
“I’m not the one you should be apologizing to.”
“Oh, right.” The gecko boy turned to Raph who was back on his feet and picking up the ladder. “I’m sorry Uncle Raph.”
“It’s fine. I’ve fallen off of much higher places, this is nothing.” The mutant snapper assured, the pained expression upon his face said otherwise. “Glad you guys could make it.”
Ilisa smiled at her brother-in-law. “Of course! We’ve all been looking forward to this; the boys have been working all week on their presents.”
As the orange gecko said this both Donnie and Matt pulled out a gift from their battleshells. While Donnie’s present appeared as a simple box in Jupiter Jim wrapping paper, Matt’s was lumpier and had splotches of glitter covering the yellow wrapping.
Raphael eyed the presents suspiciously before Ilisa whispered to him. “I made sure they didn’t go overboard this time.”
“That’s a relief.” The eldest relaxed a bit. “Where’s DJ?”
“Over here.” At that moment another young gecko appeared at the doorway carrying his present, they stood next to his brother and father while watching the scene before them.
A lilac bandana was upon his head while a purple jumpsuit covered most of his body, a pair of blue goggles was worn around his neck while a remote bracelet was secured on his left arm.
“Hey Uncle Raph, you okay?” The boy asked nonchalantly. “That sounded like quite the fall down in the tunnel.”
“I’m fine DJ.” Raph told him as he set down the ladder and started climbing back up. “Zari! Come over and say hi!”
Zari ran over to the group and gave Ilisa a hug. “Hi Aunt Lisa! Hey guys!”
“Hiya Zari!” Matt greeted eagerly as he ran up to hug her as well, DJ gave a nod in acknowledgment while Donnie simply waved hello.
“Good to see you Zari.” Ilisa greeted and returned the hug. “How have you been little one?”
“I’m alright Aunt – Hey, who are you calling little?!” Zari’s little realization caused the adults to laugh a bit while DJ and Matt gave amused looks.
“Why don’t you show your cousins where to put the presents and you guys can go play?” Raph said.
“Okay dad!” Zari gestured DJ and Matt to follow her. “Come on guys, the table’s over here!”
As the kids ran off further into the lair, Ilisa walked over to where Silvertail was and the two started chatting while Donatello stayed behind to talk with Raphael as the other resumed trying to hang up the banner over the doorway.
“So, how’ve you been Don?” Raph asked. “Leg still alright?”
“More than alright dear brother,” Don said with enthusiasm as he tapped his robotic leg. “I’ve just put the latest upgrade on this baby, now I can launch my own foot and kick butt without even moving.”
“Sweet! Just don’t go setting it off in the lair.” The eldest told him.
“No promises!”
Raph rolled his eyes and concentrated on setting up the banner, leaning further and further while attempting to reach the other side of the entrance, in doing so he failed to notice the ladder starting to slip and lose its footing.
“Almost…” Just as it seemed the eldest was going to fall off again, Donnie quickly used his mechanical arms to hold the ladder in place and his brother was able to pin the other half of the banner.
“There!” The mutant snapper said as he climbed down and stepped back to look at his handiwork. As the eldest was looking at the hung-up banner proudly, Donnie stood next to him examining the decoration before speaking up.
“I think the right side is a little too low.” An uneasy feeling came upon the softshell and he glanced over to see his brother giving him the most frustrated look that made him realize just how long Raph had been working on this thing.
“On second thought, it looks great! Good job Raph!” Donatello quickly said before immediately walking away to avoid the eldest brother’s wrath.
Donnie walked over to a cooler next to the snack table and pulled out a box of flavorless juice, as he pierced the top using the attached straw he looked over to where the kids were and noticed that they were fitting something onto the birthday boy.
Curious, the purple banded turtle walked over to the group to see what they were up to and overheard a bit of their conversation.
“…Are you sure this’ll work?” Zari asked.
“Yep, this thing is literally designed to keep him from hurting himself.” Matt assured. “Dad used to make me wear this when I was little to keep me safe.”
“Actually, it was to keep the house safe from Matt.” DJ said jokingly to Zari making her giggle.
Matt didn’t seem to hear his younger brother as he continued talking. “It’s been a while since this thing was last used, but it should still work!”
“If it’s made by me of course it should.” The sound of Donnie’s voice from behind them startled the three who turned around to see the softshell mutant’s unamused expression.
“What are you guys up to?” He asked.
“We’re trying to teach Jitsu how to walk.” Matt said without hesitation, causing his brother to face palm at his brother’s bluntness.
Donatello raised a brow at this, honestly not expecting to hear that, but still maintained his neutral expression. “You really have a knack for creating more questions, don’t you Matt?”
“Matt got a call from Zari last night asking if we could make something to help Jitsu keep from falling.” DJ explained. “Since it was short notice, and past bedtime, we didn’t have time to make one ourselves so we kinda borrowed one of your inventions.”
The words ‘borrowed’ and ‘invention’ made Donnie narrow his eyes. “Which one?”
Before DJ could tell their dad, his brother beat him to the punch as he lifted up Jitsu to show their dad.
“It’s my old bubble suit!” Matt said happily. The little turtle tot was dressed in a yellow rubber jumpsuit which Don recognized immediately, replacing his emotionless expression into that of shock and followed by irritation.
“How did you get that?” He asked, though the softshell already knew the answer.
“I found it in a box in the closet.” Matt told him.
The purple banded turtle pinched the bridge between his eyes in annoyance, cursing every cosmic being known to man for allowing his son to find that accursed suit. At that moment Ilisa’s voice called over from the other side of the room, having coincidentally looked over and seen her son holding her nephew in a familiar jumpsuit.
“Don, please tell me you did not put that on him.” Ilisa asked as she quickly walked over to the group
Donnie let out a sigh. “No, Matt found it in the closet.”
“What was it doing in the closet? I thought you said you got rid of it.” She questioned him.
“I said I took care of it.” He explained, trying not to get frustrated.
The gecko raised a brow at this. “Hiding it in the closet is ‘taking care of it’?”
“He wasn’t tall enough to reach the top shelf when I put it there!”
“He was a year old!”
“Whoa, whoa, what’s going on?” Raph stepped in trying to calm his brother and sister-in-law. Silver walked over as well to see what was going on, meanwhile the kids stood there perplexed by the situation that was playing out before them.
“The kids are trying to help Jitsu to walk and Matt put him in an old suit I made when he was little.” Donnie explained while gesturing to the yellow suited toddler.
“Okay…” Raph said, not really understanding the problem.
The third brother sighed and further explained himself. “The suit is designed to inflate if it detects the wearer is about to fall; it’s basically a toddler version of Mikey’s old suit.”
“So it’s like a wearable airbag?” Sil asked.
“Simply put, yes. I originally made it for Matt when he was younger, but-”
“Yeah, it’s really cool.” Matt interjected. “Watch!”
Before anyone could stop him Matthew raised his arms high in the air and released his grip on Jitsu, causing the toddler to start plummeting towards the ground.
In a panic both Silvertail and Raphael ran forward and crashed onto the ground to catch their son when a beeping noise sounded from the suit, it then instantly inflated as Jitsu made contact with the ground and bounced off the floor, flying over his parents’ heads and onto the other side of the room. The little toddler laughed as he happily bounced towards the snack table as the group looked on in shock, watching as Jitsu crashed into the table causing some of the food to be knocked over.
Eventually the toddler’s bouncing escapade ended when he landed in one of the chip bowls, after a moment the suit deflated and Jitsu returned to his usual baby form all the while still laughing as he sat in the bowl and started throwing chips in the air.
Raph and Sil quickly got up from the floor and ran over to their son, Silver quickly scooping him up in her arms as the two parents looked him over. The toddler simply smiled up at his parents and fortunately seemed completely unscathed by the whole ordeal.
“Oh thank goodness, he’s alright!” Silver said in a relieved tone.
Upon hearing this, the others relaxed and were thankful that the toddler was alright. Suddenly Zari punched Matt in the arm causing the gecko child to cry out in pain.
“Ow! What was that for?”
“You literally dropped my baby brother and you’re asking why I punched you?!” Zari yelled angrily as she went in for another punch.
“Ouch! I thought you wanted – Hey! To know if it still – Oof! Worked or not?” Matt said as the little gator continued to throw punches at him.
“I’m pretty sure she wanted us to test it without dropping him in the air Matt.” DJ told him, arms crossed as he watched his cousin wail on his older brother.
Donnie and Ilisa also watched the fight in front of them but didn’t bother to step in even as Matt began running away from Zari in an attempt to escape her wrath. As they watched Zari chase after their son, Ilisa looked over at her husband with a smile and nudged him with her elbow.
“This reminds you of anything?” She asked teasingly.
“Yes, but I recall there being a lot more property damage than I remember.” Donnie smirked in her direction, recalling a memory that was the very reason why the suit was put away in the first place.
**Flashback: Eleven years ago; Hamato-Sunblossom Residence**
“No, no, NO!” Donatello shouted as his first born bounced off of the walls of the house, knocking over furniture, pictures, and anything else that wasn’t nailed down all the while Matthew was laughing in excitement over the ordeal.
The experiment was supposed to be simple enough; after spending countless hours going over blueprints and testing various prototypes, Donnie believed he had created the perfect device that will keep his son from hurting himself while learning to walk.
He waited for Ilisa to go out before conducting the test, wanting to both surprise her with his genius invention and to avoid another lecture about using their son as a test subject. Especially after the whole robotic nanny incident from last week; neither of them was particularly happy about that.
Everything was going smoothly, at first, but once again Matt had somehow turned the tables and instead of keeping him from causing trouble the suit was now being used as a tool of destruction.
Don was so glad that Ilisa wasn’t around to see the state of the house and he hoped he’d be able to clean up the place before she got back, that is to say if he could manage to catch the laughing bouncing ball responsible for this mess. The softshell desperately chased after Matthew using his hovershell to zoom around and keep up with his son, though it was proving difficult as the inflated suit bounced the toddler off of every wall and corner and nearly causing him to crash more than once.
The frustration grew with each missed catch Donnie made and the sound of something being broken or knocked over, pushing the softshell to the point of setting the thrusters to the highest setting in an effort to keep up with his bouncing ball of a son. As he neared Matthew midair his arms extended forward and finally, finally, Donatello managed to catch the little gecko and put an end to the whole ordeal.
“AHA!” The purple banded turtle yelled triumphantly. “Gotcha you little – !”
And that was all Donatello managed to get out before crashing into the wall, having been distracted in his little victory to notice where he was going, then proceeded to fall onto a junk pile below where upon he lost his grip on Matt.
The toddler, who was miraculously unharmed thanks to the suit, bounced a few feet away from his father still giggling madly.
Donnie sat up with a groan and looked around to see where his son had gone and spotted him next to a pair of orange reptilian feet, a sense of dread filled him as he looked up to see his wife standing at the doorway with eyes wide at the scene before her.
“I know this looks bad, but let me explain!”
**Present Day**
Eventually Raph stepped in and stopped Zari from seriously injuring Matt after letting the two run a few laps around the living room and Jitsu was back to wearing his usual red jumper; the bubble suit had ‘accidentally’ gotten torn by Sil during removal.
After cleaning up the mess around the snack table the group decided to play a few games while waiting for the rest of the family to show up. Raphael was sitting on the couch with Jitsu and Ilisa as they watched Don, Silver, Zari, Matt, and DJ playing a boys vs girls Twister contest with Matthew sitting on the sidelines instructing both teams.
“Okay dad, DJ, left foot on blue!” The purple spotted gecko said.
Donnie, who was currently in a tangled mess with Silvertail, maneuvered his left foot to the nearest blue dot on the mat and let out a slow exhale. It was taking all of his concentration and sheer will not to collapse despite every muscle in his body screaming to end their torment.
For Sil on the other hand, the gator mutant showed no signs of strain and found it amusing seeing how much her purple brother-in-law was trying to keep his composure; being a previous holder of the Battle Nexus Champion title did have some perks.
“Doing okay there Don?” Silver asked.
“Yep! Too easy!” The softshell managed to say. “Right, DJ? … DJ?”
“Sorry dad, trying to focus here.” DJ told him, his body currently twisted midair like a pretzel.
Silvertail couldn’t help but laugh a little at her nephew’s comment and then turned her head slightly to look over at Matt to speak with him. “What’s our next move Matt?”
“Hm? Oh, yeah!” Matt flicked the spinner and watched it land on a random color on the board. “Right hand on green!”
“Seriously?” Zari griped. Her limbs were currently spread across the four corners of the mat making her appear like a cat after it had fallen off a great height.
“Don’t worry princess, you got this!” Raph cheered.
“You can do it girls!” Ilisa joined in.
Don looked at his wife with a bewildered look. “Wha- Ilisa?!”
The gecko yokai only gave a sheepish smile and a shrug in response, to which Donnie could only roll his eyes at and resumed his focus on the game.
Silver managed to move her hand to a nearby green spot with ease while Zari still tried to figure out her next move, after thinking about it the little gator pushed up and quickly moved her right hand under her left arm in order to reach a nearby green spot.
Matt flicked the spinner again and called out where the arrow landed. “Left hand on red!”
DJ let out a sigh of relief as he untwisted himself and placed his left hand on a nearby red space, his dad on the other hand wasn’t as lucky. Due to his position the softshell knew that any movement he made had a highly likely chance of him pulling something. In an effort to avoid losing the remaining feeling in his limbs Donnie attempted to use one of the robotic arms from his battleshell, but he was quickly called out by Ilisa who saw what he was trying to do.
“Don’t even think about it Donald.” The gecko warned.
“It’s still a hand, isn’t it?” Donatello reasoned. “Also, there’s no rule against using artificial limbs. If that were the case I’d be short one foot.”
“But dad, that’s cheating.” Matt told him.
“Way to set a good example for your kids.” DJ added.
“Ugh, fine.” Don retracted the limb begrudgingly and started carefully moving his left arm to reach the nearest red spot on the mat, his upper body practically supported by his right arm alone as he snaked his left hand under it to reach his target.
Slowly, but surely, the softshell mutant rested his palm on top of the circle and was able to relieve some of the pressure he was putting on his right side much to his relief. Donnie looked up at his wife and eldest son and was about to say something snarky at them when a voiced called out from the entrance of the lair.
“Alright! Who’s ready to party?”
In that moment Silvertail looked over to see who was shouting, in doing so the gator lost her balance and fell on top of Donatello with a loud thud. The purple banded turtle let out a short cry as he was pinned under the gator mutant, followed by a pained groan as Matt and Raph looked on with grimaces at the sight of Donnie being crushed by the larger mutant.
Leonardo stood at the doorway alongside his wife Kalea and their twins Hana and Kai, the blue banded turtle had a confident expression on his face which quickly turned into wide-eyed shock after witnessing his sister-in-law fall on top of his brother.
Here’s a sneak peek of a fanfiction I’m currently working on at the moment, it’s going to be part of a series of stories that follows the gang and their families as they get into all sorts of misadventures.
I’ve been pretty busy lately but I’m hoping to finish this first fic within the next two weeks and maybe even add an art cover for the story.
The preview is a small part I’ve selected since the fic itself is going to be pretty long, but I hope you enjoy reading it!
“Hey dad!” The mutant snapper nearly jumped out of his shell and fumbled with the both the box and cupcake as he turned around to see who snuck up behind him.
Looking down he saw a little gator child looking up at him curiously and dressed in a large t-shirt as makeshift pajamas; it was his young daughter Zari. A relieved sigh left him after recognizing that it was his kid before Raph started talking to his kid.
“Zari, what are you doing? It’s way past your bedtime.”
“I got hungry, so I was looking for a snack.”
“It’s 10 pm; you should be sleeping not snacking.” Raph told her.
“Then what are you doing?” Zari asked pointing at the half-squashed cupcake in her dad’s hand.
Looking back between Zari and the cupcake, Raph realized the compromising position he was in and tried to come up with an explanation.
When he was unable to come up with one, he offered his daughter some of the damaged cupcake and put the rest of them away on top of the fridge as Zari happily started eating some of the larger crumbs that were held together by the frosting.
“Don’t tell your mom about this, okay?” Raph told her to which the little gator nodded. After Zari ate her fill, Raph ate the rest of the cake crumbles and tossed the wrapper into the trash can before picking up Zari and the two of them walked out of the kitchen.
“Alright, now let’s get you back to bed young lady.”
“I’m not a lady!” Zari protested. “I’m a fierce warrior!”
“Well, even little warriors need their sleep.” Raph said as he tickled Zari and was rewarded with some laughter from the little gator as the two of them walked down towards Zari’s bedroom. Raph pulled back the curtain and walked inside when his foot bumped against something, curious he flipped the light switch on to reveal a scattered mess of toys on the floor.
“Zari…” The red banded turtle looked over at his daughter with a brow raised in question.
“I was gonna clean it up!” Zari explained.
Raph simply rolled his eyes and started navigating through the sea of blocks, action figures, and various toys that littered the concrete floor, grateful for the years of ninja training him and his brothers went through, until eventually the two of them reached Zari’s bed where he proceeded to tuck her in.
“No more late night snacks, okay?” Raphael placed a kiss on her forehead and got up from the bed. As he was about to make the treacherous return to the door, Zari suddenly sat up in her bed and stopped her father as she asked him a question.
“Hey dad, how old was I when I started walking?” The question caught Raph off guard for a second as he looked back at his daughter.
“About a year old I think?” He told her.
“And how old were you and mom when you started?”
“Um, probably around the same age I guess.” Raph replied honestly and sat back down on the bed, curious to see where this was going. “Why do you ask?”
“Well, I heard mom talking to Uncle Donnie and Aunt Lisa on the phone today about how Jitsu’s still crawling around.” Zari explained. “And I was wondering if there was something wrong with him?”
Oh, so that was it. About two months ago Jitsu had started using furniture or people nearby to pull himself into a standing position which had prompted him and Sil to start teaching the toddler how to walk, but while there had been some significant progress their son had yet to walk on his own.
They had started asking the rest of the family for tips and advice on different techniques to use on Jitsu; apparently Zari was in the room when Silver made that call and it had gotten her worried.
Raph gave a reassuring smile to his daughter. “There’s nothing wrong, princess. Your mom was just asking for advice that’s all.”
“Advice about what?”
“You know how your mom and I have been trying to teach Jitsu to walk lately?” Zari nodded and Raph continued explaining.
“Well, we tried using the same techniques from when we were teaching you, but they don’t seem to work for your brother, so we started asking your aunts and uncles for tricks they used from when they were teaching your cousins.”
“And they worked?” Zari asked.
Raph gave a shrug. “Sort of, it’s been a lot of trial and error, but he’s been improving a lot. Anyway, there’s nothing to worry about Zari, your brother is just fine.” As he said this, Raph started tucking the young gator back into bed.
“When he does start walking, it’s gonna make things a lot easier for me.” Zari said as she got back under the covers. “I won’t have to carry him around as much; he’s been getting real heavy.”
Raph couldn’t help but chuckle at that. “Hopefully Jitsu will start walking soon, until then we gotta give him all the support we can, okay?”
Zari hummed in agreement and Raph placed another kiss on her head before getting up and tiptoeing his way back over to the door, upon reaching the other side he turned to give Zari a loving smile as he bade her goodnight.
“Goodnight Zari.” He said before flipping the lights off and walking out into the hallway.
“’Night dad.” Zari replied as her dad left the room.
After Raph left, the little gator looked up at the ceiling in thought as she processed the conversation they just had and the whole situation regarding her little brother. While Jitsu had been improving over the past few weeks, and had even started cruising a little, he’d mostly stuck to clinging onto furniture, crawling, or having someone carry him around.
The main problem seemed to be coming from her brother’s hesitation to walk around without something to support himself on, often resorting to crawling towards mom and dad whenever their parents tried encouraging him to walk on his own. Zari couldn’t tell how many times she had watched her parents get Jitsu to stand on his own and encourage him to walk over to them across the room, only for him to plop back down and do a running crawl towards either mom or dad much to their confusion.
At one point they tried to get him to walk towards Zari when he propped himself up using the couch, and it seemed that he was about to walk towards her, but for some reason he hesitated and climbed up to take a nap on the arm instead.
Thinking about that memory led Zari to a realization which was quickly followed by an idea. Reaching under her pillow she pulled out a tablet and turned it on, squinting a bit as her eyes adjusted to the screen’s brightness, she made a few taps on the screen before sitting up in her bed.
After waiting a bit a jingle sounded from the tablet and a tired voice answered. “Hello?”
“Hey Matt! Sorry to wake you, but I need your help with something.”
Another family photo featuring Leo, Kalea, Hana, and Kai!
Unlike Raph and Donnie, Leonardo and his family live within the Hidden City; they specifically live at Kalea’s apartment, which became her and Leo’s apartment sometime after they started dating.
Feel free to send in any questions you have about the gang!
And here he is, the newest member of the Hamato family and Zari’s baby brother: Jitsu Hamato.
He’s about a year old and takes a lot after his dad appearance wise, Jitsu also has a habit of biting people he doesn’t like so the pacifier serves as more of a chew toy to keep him occupied.
That’s all the kids on the blog! Feel free to send them or the rest of the family questions in the ask box about anything (appropriate questions please!)
A family photo featuring Raph, Silvertail, Zari, and the newest member of the Hamato Clan: Jitsu.
Raph and Silver were the last in the family to have children due to fertility issues they were dealing with when they were trying and after many, many failed attempts they were able to have two incredible kids.
Raph was the most difficult to draw and I may alter his look in the future, but I think I did good for a first try. His left eye is a different color because I have a headcannon that Raph would slowly lose vision in that eye years after the events from the movie.
Zari’s redesign was my personal favorite to work on as I wanted to incorporate her personality into her outfit.
Being the fighter that she is, Zari’s outfit reflects that fighting spirit and is frequently getting into dangerous situations and giving Raph a heart attack.
That’s all the character redesigns of the kids and I plan on showing the parents’ designs in the near future, and I also plan to introduce a new member of the Hamato Family hopefully soon.
Here are the Triplet’s new designs, and I spelled Ocarina’s name right!
I decided to remove their shells but kept their appearance turtle-like since they are half-mutant turtle half-fish yokai. Jazzilne’s forehead marking was a last-minute detail I added since she doesn’t have a head fin like her sisters.
I decided to remove Matt’s shell and made both of them the same color, but Matt still wears a battle shell which also works as a tracking device that Donnie may or may not have installed without him knowing.
The hype from the new ROTTMNT movie inspired me to redesign Kai and Hana, and to be honest I’m really liking their new looks.
I’m hoping to redesign all the characters and maybe even get back to working on the blog again in the near future.
Inspired by the song ‘No Matter What’ from Steven Universe the Movie.
The song fits Kai and Hana’s relationship perfectly because no matter what kind of shenanigans Hana gets herself into, or Kai on occasion, and no matter how many times they fight, these two always have each others backs.
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