I love all the missing brother angst but I've been thinking.
What if? It was funny instead?
What if the missing bro was raised by Draxum, who regularly sends him out on multi-dimensional missions to find other ways to defeat all humans. You know, since one super soldier on their own probably won't cut it. (We already know Draxum has knowledge of how to access other planes/dimensions, and there's even that mysterious portal stone in front of his lab beside the one that leads to New York.)
And what if he got sent off on his latest mission right before the start of the series.
Assuming his missions are long, like 1-2 years on average, for maximum data collection in each new place, he wouldn't get back until after the events of the show, possibly even the movie.
So, like, what if he gets back and it's just…
---
Missing bro:
Hey dad I'm back I found some more mystic weapons but I'm not sure if any of them are strong enough to defeat all humans why is the lab destroyed? Is that a HUMAN?? WHY DO YOU LOOK LIKE THAT?!???
Draxum:
Oh, welcome back son, don't worry about that humans are cool now, wanna meet your brothers and also other dad?
Missing bro: ⁉️⁉️⁉️⁉️⁉️⁉️
---
And suddenly this poor kid has to speedrun a redemption arc that took his dad the better part of a year to get through. All while processing the fact that his family has suddenly quadrupled in size and one of them is a human??? And he has two dads now??????
I imagine that just as he's finally getting used to…everything, Draxum casually mentions Frida and he just goes FUCK THIS and moves in with, like, Cassandra or something. Like seriously Draxum you can't keep springing family members on this poor kid! He's tired!
Once again the base is by @kittpunk144 , you should check out their other bases they're amazing!
Playing around with potential outfits for William, I think I'm liking this one so far.
Outfit ref & more info below the cut
Exclusive medieval eastern Europe natural flax-linen garb. Great design inspired by original medieval pattern, perfect materials and accents
I love the vibes of this outfit ngl. I took the button sleeves off the overcoat and removed the shirt entirely. Still haven't decided if I'm gonna give William pants or leave him in shorts. And I am NOT drawing all that fancy embroidery on the silver trim, you'll just have to imagine it.
Also this is definitely for sure absolutely the last piece I'm doing for my Missing Bro AU, at least for a while. I've decided it's going to be a lighthearted sequel to No Light, so y'all are just gonna have to wait for me to finish that first.
Also I realise the overcoat isn't going over his shell, I don't know how to draw that without it looking absolutely ridiculous so we're just gonna say it's a backless overcoat and leave it at that, kay?
Probably gonna change the boots to dark brown, like oiled leather, but this'll work for now. Might also give the overcoat a contrasting lining but I haven't decided on a colour for that yet. Maybe dark grey linen to go with the silver embroidery?
This is less than half of what I have planned, but damn if it didn't take me forever already oh heck I can't feel my eyeballs. The timing isn't quite right yet and I feel like maybe that's too many transitions in such a short space? Who knows. Not me that's for sure.
@snowbriar @hi-im-pluton @jellyfishsketches
This is all in relation to this little what-if scenario
Thinking about William and what might have happened to him during the Bad Timeline. I was wondering how long he might have survived for as part of the resistance.
But then I remembered. William isn't there when the invasion happens. He's in another dimension, another world, on a year's long mission that won't end until a few months after the day of the invasion.
So what does that change?
Well. I don't think Will ever makes it home.
---
The krang descend upon the world, and for the first few days, Draxum is hopeful that they can win.
But his hope is shattered with the wards around the hidden city. His home is invaded and overcome faster than he can think. There’s no time to send a message to Will, let alone bring him home. Draxum wouldn't dare bring him back to this ravaged world, anyway.
But he can't leave the way stones as they are, either. The risk is too great. The Krang with the power to hop between dimensions would put countless other worlds at risk.
It would put Will at risk.
There's no time to alter the spell, either. To make it a one-way portal and give Will a way back home. There's no time for anything!
Anything, except complete and total destruction.
A well aimed spell severs the enchantment on the way stones. Then, with the help of a few vines, the stones themselves are broken down to rubble. Draxum hurriedly layers a few mundane spells over the area, ones you might find anywhere in the hidden city, to disguise any lingering traces of the portal's mystic signature.
It's the work of mere minutes. By the time he's done, there's nothing but bits of loose gravel and some softly glowing moss from a juvenile ambient light spell.
He forbids Huggin and Munnin from ever mentioning Will. The risks are too great, and the reward, Will's return, would be no reward at all. He locks all memories of his lost son deep inside himself, destroys any physical reminders of him, and does his best to forget.
He tells himself it's better this way.
He hopes he's right.
William, for his part, continues the last few months of his mission blissfully unaware.
But eventually the day comes that he's finally meant to return home. He treks back to the way stone, hidden deep in the forests of this world, and with a weary sigh and eager smile he places his key upon its surface, and draws his sigil.
Nothing happens.
He tries again, and again, and once more just to be sure. It's not the first time the way stones have malfunctioned, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating when they do. He huffs, dropping his bags and himself on the mossy forest floor as he waits for his father to send a signal, as he has every time before.
With no signal by the next day, he tries his key again. Then again at noon, and twice more around dusk. And still, nothing.
He waits another day. And another. And another. A week. A month. Two. Three.
Days blend together.
Frustration gives way to anger, then to worry, until finally settling on a deep ache that clings to his bones. He's loathe to leave the area, to risk missing something, but after almost a year it's become clear that whatever problem is afflicting his way back home won't be resolved by sitting around.
He stashes his bags inside the crude hut he's built over the past few months, and sets back out once more. This world is almost barren of mystic energy, and the people who can wield it are few and far between, but they're still out there.
He travels roads that had become familiar during his stay, and forges ahead on paths yet undiscovered. He taps into existing contacts and finds new mystics and listens to every rumour he can.
Every few months he travels back to the stone, just in case.
Years pass like this, and Will's cloaking brooch begins to flicker and, eventually, fail. The mystics required to power it are entirely foreign to this world. There is no one here to fix it.
He returns to his little hut in the woods for the final time.
He may be unable to travel freely anymore, but that doesn't mean he gives up. Everyday, he tries again. First thing in the morning, and last thing before bed, he tries his key. It becomes routine, an intrinsic part of his new life, one that he continues doing long after the glow fades from his key and the way stone becomes indistinguishable from any other boulder in the forest.
Will spends the rest of his life this way, known to the people of this world as nothing but the rumours of a strange creature in the woods.
Anyway I finally made a new/proper ref sheet for William (and his Wyrm Burpy)
My desire for him to have Fancy Trim for his coat warred with my desire to Not Draw That. So I compromised and drew it once, then turned it into a brush 😂
Behold: My child! Isn't it lovely?
Necessity truly is the mother of invention 🥹
Anyway if you use Ibis here's the QR code. Go forth and Be Fancy!
Base courtesy of @kittpunk144 , the Wyrm species belongs to @tamale4prez
Some test dialogue for the fic I am definitely not writing. Just a little to get a hang on William's interactions with our main boys.
In this scene, Mikey is Not Impressed with William's name.
---
“He needs a new name.” Mikey states plainly.
William's brows draw together in confusion. “Why do I need a new name?”
“Because there's no old timey artists named ‘William’ that's why!” Mikey answers, managing to sound personally insulted by the question.
“Au contraire mon frère,” Donnie chimes in, “there are a number of ‘old timey artists named William’, as you put it. There's the 18th century William Hogarth. And then William Blake and JMW Turner, the W stands for William of course, who painted through the 18th and 19th centuries-”
“Thank you, Tron-atello.” Leo rolls his eyes at his twin. “But I think Mikey meant it doesn't really go with our vibes. Like what are we supposed to nickname him? Willy?”
“Just ‘Will’ is fine. Please.” William all but begs.
“Listen here, Shakespeare, we're trying to help you! You can't go around New York with a name like William! You sound like you're just begging to get bullied.” Leo jabs a finger towards William.
“Yeah! Or mugged!” Raph adds.
“Or mugged!” Leo agrees. “So you shush while we figure this out.”
Leo ushers the other three off into a football huddle on the other side of the room. William can hear them whispering amongst themselves. Occasionally one of them will pop their head up to look at him, and other times there's giggling.
William is…unsure what to make of the situation. Usually when he first enters a new dimension he sticks to the shadows for a bit, just until he gets a read on the language and culture. Then he selects a name, a common one, and slots himself into the society as smoothly as he can. Which is very smoothly.
But this isn't some other dimension, this is his home, and William is his name. These complete strangers are calling him ‘brother’, and a rat mutant has moved in, and there's far too many humans around for his comfort, and his dad is just…fine with all of this? These people have completely taken over his life, and now they want to take his name, too?
“William.” Draxums voice cuts through William's thoughts. And like a well oiled machine he turns to face his father, standing at attention.
“How are-” Draxum begins, but pauses to raise an eyebrow suspiciously at the turtle-huddle at the other end of the room. “What are they doing?”
“Renaming me, apparently.” William replies, and despite his best efforts he can't keep the exhaustion from seeping into his voice.
“They’re what? Why? What's wrong with the name I gave you?” Draxum demands, indignant.
Mikey's head pops up from the huddle before William can answer. “The vibes man! The vibes!” He yells at Draxum. “Seriously, Barry, what were you thinking?”
“Well, I was- I mean-” Draxum flounders in the face of Mikey's judgement and he glances over to William for support.
If Draxum thinks William is bailing him out of this, he's got another thing coming. William is still cranky with him for, well, all of this. “Go on, Barry.” William jeers, letting his natural smile take over his face. “Tell them.”
Draxum sighs, even he's not immune to William's disarming smile. He once called it Williams ‘greatest asset and most dangerous weapon', and William is inclined to agree.
“William is named after the Blanding’s Turtles namesake, William Blanding.” Draxum admits finally.
Mikey blinks. “That's it? Man, that's got to be the most boring way to pick a name, like, ever!”
Draxum huffs angrily. “Well, how were you four named, then? Because I certainly can't imagine Lou choosing to name you after Renaissance painters completely out of the blue!”
“Well hey, at least Draxy chose to name you after the guy's first name and not his last name, right?” Leo grins at William. “‘William’ is bad, but going through life being called ‘Bland’? Eugh, that'd be the worst.”
Despite himself, William finds himself smiling at the slider.
“Oh, he didn't, dad named us after our eye colour.” Raph chimes in. "Ain't you ever noticed how he calls us by our colours?"
“Yeah, it wasn't until Donnie found an old art magazine that we chose our names ourselves.” Mikey adds.
“'Tis true, the magazine had a featured article on Renaissance painters and I immediately fell in love with the works of one Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi, more commonly known by his mononym; Donatello. And so I took his name as my own.” Donnie says with appropriate flourish on his namesake's full name. “My brother's, never ones to be left out, subsequently chose their own names from the same article.”
“Ah.” Draxum says flatly. “That…makes a surprising amount of sense, actually.”
“So you see, being named after a painter is kinda tradition now.” Leo adds.
“Well, unless I've completely missed the point of your story, I would argue it's more traditional to choose your name yourself, maybe?” William points out.
“Huh.” Raph muses. “He does got a point guys. Maybe we should let him choose his own name.”
“Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.” Mikey draws the sound out for far too long, clearly thinking hard. “Okay, fine. But it has to be a painter!”
“And if I choose my own painter name, you'll accept my choice? No more trying to change it?” William asks, skeptical.
“Promise!” Mikey holds out a pinkie.
William is familiar with the gesture and takes the pinkie with his own, bobbing their hands once in a sort of handshake before letting go. “Excellent. Then I choose to name myself after the 18th through 19th century painter William Blake. But you can just call me William, or Will for short.” William's smile takes on a teasing edge.
There's a beat of silence as the four turtles process what he just said.
Then Raph and Leo collapse into each other, howling with laughter, and Mikey's face goes through all known stages of grief in a single second. “Why you-”
“You were…paying attention?” Donnie cuts Mikey off, dumbfounded. “You were listening to me?”
“Of course, why wouldn't I be?” William asks, confused. William is always listening, that's what he's for.
“This is the greatest day of my life.” Donnie whispers, seemingly to himself, before loudly announcing to his brothers. “Gentlemen, I have decided we're keeping him! Please welcome the newest member of the Mad Dogs: William!”
Draxum lays a hand on William's shell sympathetically. “Good luck.” It's all he has time to say before William is hauled into the air and carried off by the other four turtles.
Anyway here's what I think the missing bro might look like. If I were to expand upon my fic idea for him. Which I'm not. But here he is anyway.
Base by @kittpunk144
Meet: William (Draxum named him after the namesake of the blanding's turtle: William Blanding. Because Draxum is many things but creative is not one of them.)
Species: Blanding's Turtle
Age: 17 (Same as Raph)
Height: 5'9" (4" taller than Leo, 3" shorter than Raph)
Fun facts:
The shape of blanding's turtles beaks make them look like they're perpetually smiling. I'm calling it resting uwu face. People find it disarming, and our boy definitely uses that to his advantage.
He always looks like he's smiling. He is not always smiling. Do not assume he is happy.
Blanding's turtles shells are hinged like a box-turtles, though they don't close as tightly. So much like Mikey, our boy can easily retreat into his shell whenever needed. Though he prefers to use his extra space for storage.
He keeps a lot of knives hidden in his shell.
His colours, outside of his bright yellow markings, are dark and muted. With long shorts, a t-shirt, and a half-mask to cover his markings he can easily blend into dark environments.
As well as his prominent chin/throat stripe, he has 3 yellow markings on his shell, similar in size and shape to Leo's but with additional inward spikes. He also has small to medium yellow spots on the underside of his upper arms and inner thighs.
Draxum mainly used him for fact finding mission in alternate dimensions, where he would stay for 1-2 years before coming back. As a result he is very good at getting along with people on a surface level, but struggles with deeper long-term relationships. He can code-switch on the fly to suit almost any situation but handles changes close to home very poorly.
His weapons of choice are knives, mostly thrown. He wasn't raised by a ninja so his knives are distinctly european/western. Just like all the turtles he is a dangerous opponent, but he's very slow to resort to violence. Fighting people rarely gets him the information he wants.
Because of his appearance and skillset he winds up being a different kind of faceman to Leo. Quiet and disarming to Leo's loud and boastful. He prefers to listen instead of speak, which makes him great at gathering information. He's also very good at drawing accurate inferences from minimal information, but not so great at putting that information to more practical uses. He's a thinker, not a planner.
I don't think Leo will like him very much. Or possibly will view him as some kind of faceman rival? He definitely won't like that William is taller than him.
Mikey will have fun coming up with new names for him, since "'William' doesn't really fit with the whole Mad Dogs vibe, y'know?"
If he were to ever pick up a mask it would be yellow, same with his ninpo if he ever unlocks that. No clue about his powers tho.
