So, as I mentioned, there were a few plot points I meant to explain, but completely forgot when the time came up. They're too short to actually write a drabble over, so I thought I'd add them here, plus answer some commonly asked questions. To make it more entertaining, I wrote the answers in story mode.

Why didn't the Hamato Allies know about Leo?/Why was April and Donnie's relationship such a secret?

Music and cheering echoed down the hallway of the compound, as faintly, off in the distance, the celebratory party continued long into night.

And the Hamato Clan had a lot to be excited over. Master Yoshi was finally awake after all these years, Dun's plan to take over the clan had been foiled, his henchmen were in jail, the EPF had been defeated in a dramatic rescue of a long lost Hamato brother. Any one of those events would have been a reason to celebrate, but all this happening at once?

Yeah, this party was probably going to last all week!

Hence, the reason I was sitting back in a side room, far away from all the jubilant reverie, with only my few trusted humans surrounding me.

The clan, for the most part, all seemed to be surprisingly okay with me. This still blew my mind. All those humans out there, and not one of them had screamed at me or thrown the nearest convenient item at my face in terror. This was definitely a novel concept for me. But most of the ninja out there seemed to be of the opinion that, yes, I was a mutant, but I was their mutant, a Hamato, and, apparently, a hero.

Of course, when one was a mutant turtle who up until recently was terrified of any and all humans, all that attention quickly could become a bit much. Thankfully, everybody seemed to be pretty understanding about that as well. The clan members cheered me when I made an appearance, but gave me my space when I got overwhelmed by the mass of humanity and had to retreat to a safe space for a bit.

Currently, I was seated in a comfy, overstuffed armchair that accommodated even my shell easily, my legs crossed as I happy nommed on a slice of pizza. Next to me, Master Yoshi was back in his hospital bed, which was raised up so he could sit and watch us all.

"So, I have a question." I chewed thoughtfully, looking around the room. I swallowed and tilted my head curiously at my brothers. "How come you never told your friends about me? I mean, Bradford and Stockman knew, and I could tell right away that you didn't trust them. Why didn't you inform your allies?"

"Oh, I can answer that." April scoffed from where she was leaning against Donnie. She looked up at the genuis in the purple kimono with amusement, and shrugged simply. "It wasn't their secret to tell!"

I blinked, confused.

"We didn't have a choice whether Dun's creeps knew. The bounty hunter bastards that caught you were their employees." Raph explained, eyeing Mikey suspiciously and moving his plate of pizza further away from our youngest brother. Satisfied that his food was safe, he wiped his hands off on a napkin and turned back to me. "But we weren't going to just go blabbing about to you to anybody without your say. I mean, yeah, we trust our friends with our lives, but you didn't know them yet, and you obviously valued your privacy." He shrugged, then absently punched Mikey, who was trying to sneak one of his pizza slices from behind his back.

Mikey yelped, and quickly retreated, rubbing his head ruefully, before narrowing his focus back on Raph's pizza, obviously determined.

"Raph is right." Donnie nodded. "Ultimately, you obviously wanted to remain a secret, and it wasn't our place to give out such privileged information without your consent." He looked thoughtful for a moment, and shrugged. "Of course, if had it turned out in the end that you were unable to talk or communicate clearly, like you led us to believe to be the case for a while, then we might've brought a select inner circle in to help protect you, but we wanted to make absolutely sure first."

"Ah. Yeah." I looked a little sheepish. "Like I said, I am sorry it took me so long."

"Leo, bro." Mikey was crouched, hips wiggling like a cat. "We told you already that we're not mad about that." And then he pounced for Raph's pizza slices, and was promptly flipped and tossed, his attempt foiled. Not discouraged in the slightest, he lay on his back and looked at me. "Technically, we did kinda kidnap you. It was totally understandable."

"So, speaking of secrets, why were you and April being so sneaky about dating, Donnie?" Angel wondered, holding a paper plate and perusing the many boxes containing pizzas of various topping selections on a table thoughtfully.

"We didn't even know about that, and we're you're brothers!" Mikey agreed accusingly, still laying on his back and obviously inwardly pondering his next move.

"Oh, that." Donnie groaned, leaning back against the wall. He grimaced. "Yeah, Dun would've had a fit if he found out about me and April. He wanted to set me up in an arranged marriage, hoping for an alliance with a powerful family."

"Wait, what?" Mikey and Raph's heads bolted up at the same moment, both obviously unaware of this little tidbit of information. From his bed, Master Yoshi shifted and frowned

"You never told us that!" Mikey rolled over to sit up, Raph's pizza apparently forgotten in the moment.

"Apparently, there was no shortage of enterprising fathers salivating at the thoughts of gaining the chuunin of such a powerful clan as a son in law." Donnie brought up a knee, his face darkening at little at the memories.

"And, as the common and lowly daughter of an ordinary, middle class scientist, I didn't quite make the cut." April agreed, sitting up to brush Donnie's hair out of his face. She sighed. "It was tough. Donnie was constantly torn between what he wanted, and what he felt like his duty as Chuunin was. We broke up and got back together several times over the whole thing."

"The more I hear about what Dun was doing, the gladder I am that he's probably going to be in prison for the rest of his life." Casey growled.

"What about Leo, then?" Irma asked, sitting on the floor close to my chair. I glanced down to see her looking up at me worriedly. "He's the Chuunin now. Does that mean he's going to have to deal with an arranged marriage now?"

"No." Master Yoshi spoke up calmly from his bed. "That is not something I would ever force upon any of my sons."

"Psh. Like something like that would ever happen anyways." I scoffed, wrinkling my nose. "Could you even imagine such a scenario?"

Raph suddenly noticed that his plate was empty, and turned to see our orange brother gleefully fleeing across the room with the pilfered pizza slice dangling out of his mouth. He quickly scrambled up to his knees and lunged for him. "MIKEY! You little...! That's mine!"

And the rest of us settled back to watch what promised to be a very good show.

A/N In case you were wondering, yes, Raph was able to wrestle his piece of pizza back, and yes, he did eat it while sitting on Mikey's back. He could've just grabbed another slice, of course, but it was the principle of the matter.

Did Leo ever learn to drive?

"... And slowly straighten the vehicle out, and then put it in park." Donnie instructed from the passenger seat beside me.

The car came to a halt neatly in the center of the four orange traffic cones in the parking garage. I obediently shifted the car into park, before sitting back in the driver's seat, exhaling in relief, my hands resting on the steering wheel.

"And there you go, Leo!" Donnie beamed at me. "Good job!"

"Well, that was disappointingly anticlimatic." Mikey sulked in the back seat.

"What, did you want me to crash?" I blinked at him in the rear view mirror.

"Well, no." Mikey grumbled, slouching down. "But it was still anticlimatic."

"Psh. I figured it was going to be boring." Raph was seated next to Mikey, leaning against the window and playing a game on his phone. "Leo catches onto stuff quickly and is like a super perfectionist, plus Donnie the super genius is the one teaching him to drive. I'm not sure why you thought it was going to be interesting."

I decided to take that as a compliment. "Thank you Raph."

"Alright, so I believe that concludes today's lessons anyways. You passed with flying colors, Leo!" Donnie went over the checklist in his hands. "All that's left is to put the car back in its stall, and then we can go grab some lunch."

I nodded, shifted the car out of park, and turned to look behind me as I prepared to back up.

But when I pressed the gas pedal with my foot, instead of going the direction I was expecting, the car suddenly lurched forward instead, bowling over the traffic cones. Just before I could turn back around and slam on the brakes in a panic, there was the unfortunate crunch of metal and steel, and we came to an unfortunate stop.

I paused, then gingerly lifted my hands off the steering wheel. "Oops."

Raph lurched forward to grab the seats in front of him and stare at what we hit in horror. "My bike!" .

"Oh yeah!" Mikey immediately perked back up. "This is more like it!"

How did Irma react to Karai?

Karai blinked. "Is she... growling at me?"

I sighed, resigned to the human wrapped around my neck and shell possessively. "Possibly? Its not outside the realm of possibility, anyways."

"Oh, I got your number, girlie." Irma narrowed her eyes at Karai, and hugged me tighter. "You see this?! This right here?!" She leaned forward to flop over my head and cling to me, pointing at Karai as if proving a point. "Yeah, that's right, ya hussy! Feast your eyes on this! I got 'Turtle Touching' privileges! It took me years to earn this right!"

Karai arched an eyebrow and looked at me.

I groaned and facepalmed, my face red. "It's not as dirty as it sounds. I promise."

"Oh. Pity." Karai looked amused.

Irma bunched back down defensively, her glasses glinting dangerously in the light as she glared. "Don't you think I don't know what you're up to." she hissed at Karai. "Just know that I'm going to be watching you like a hawk."

"You know," I mused out loud to nobody in particular, "This is actually going better then I thought it would."

Irma continued to cling to me possessively as she growled and pointed two fingers at her eyes, then pointed them menacingly at the amused Karai as if to solidify her point.

Alternate Ending: Leo does not get kidnapped

Basically, as I was writing the scene where Leo got kidnapped in Chapter 24, this scene suddenly popped into my head, and thus my muse was almost strangled horribly and murdered for trying to unexpectedly derail my carefully laid out plans at the last moment.

The dumb thing is, it's really not all that out of character, and is totally something that would happen, given the chance.

Master Yoshi looked at me, then swallowed hard and nodded. "It seems like you have quite a story to share with us... my son."

I shyly let go of my arm, glancing at him. "Of course. I owe you that... much..." I suddenly trailed off sharply, my body going stiff.

"Leo?" Donnie apparently noticed the odd look on my face.

I reached up, and carefully plucked the small dart out of the back of my neck, bringing it forward to stare dumbly at it.

"LEO!"

I turned just in time to barely see a hand shoot forward, then it had grabbed my throat and lifted me up in an impossibly strong, iron grip, leaving my feet dangling helplessly an inch off the ground.

"Hello, Leonardo." An all too familiar voice hissed at me, one that shouldn't be talking. "It's time to learn where, and to whom, you truly belong."

Choking for air and clawing at the arm fruitlessly, my eyes widened in horror as I found myself staring into the hateful, single remaining eye of Agent Bishop.

Half of his face had been torn away by Raph's sai, leaving a deep, gaping hole, but instead of showing a gruesome wound of bones and bloodied flesh, the hole and torn skin flaps revealed only jagged steel and sparking wires underneath, a machine merely wearing the mask of humanity.

"He's an android?!" Donnie realized in horror.

"I don't care what he is!" Raph snarled, dashing forward. "You oversized toaster! Put my brother down! NOW!"

I suddenly realized that the helicopter motor that I had been hearing faintly outside had been growing steadily louder and louder. Then it appeared, rising up and hovering just outside the massive window of the executive office, the EPF logo painted on its side and a giant gun mounted to the side and aimed straight towards the building.

"Shit!" Raph skidded to a halt, and, grabbing Mikey, who had been charging right beside him, vaulted over the stone bar just as the gun opened fire, taking cover just in time.

There was the sound of breaking glass, and the whole floor to ceiling window seemed to explode and collapse in a waterfall of shimmering glass shards. The room was laid bared to the outside world as it was filled with the pings and explosions of a heavy showers of bullets, shredding everything they touched.

Donnie had quickly launched himself behind the bar as well, the sturdiest cover they could find, and shoved his father over, pushing him to safety as the remaining glass spirit bottles were decimated above them, showering them all in glass shards and expensive liquor.

I couldn't breath, couldn't talk, the hand like a metal vice on my windpipe. I desperately clawed at his arm, trying to hit pressure points, anything, but he ignored my struggles completely.

"Don't ever forget that you will always be the property of the EPF, mutant." Bishop snarled at me, and then pulled out an all-too-familiar device from his belt. "Now let's-"

He never got to finish his sentence, as a heavy, thick glass bottle smashed into his face, spraying amber liquid everywhere. His head was snapped back from the force of the impact, forcing him to drop me to the ground as he staggered back several steps.

"Don't worry, Leo! We found the secret stash of booze kept under the bar!" I heard Mikey call out encouragingly.

The gunner in the helicopter paused to stare at Bishop, dumbfounded by the unexpected attack. The momentary pause proved to be enough of an opening for my brothers, as a second bottle smashed into his helmet with enough force to knock him clean out of his seat to fall back into the interior of the helicopter, effectively ending the barrage of bullets.

I sluggishly push myself up off the floor just in time to see Bishop get full body tackled and buried underneath an angry, charging Raphael, his sai flashing among the snarls and curses. At the same time, Mikey leapt into the helicopter with cackles of glee, disappearing inside, which didn't bode well for any other EPF gunners left in there.

Donnie slid down on the floor next to me, looking me over worriedly. "Are you okay, Leo?" He wrapped an arm around my shoulders to help support me. "That was a close one!"

"Don~nie..." I muttered thickly and with some annoyance, feeling the drugs from the dart coursing through my veins and starting to take effect. "I am getting... REALLY... sick and tired... of getting tranq'd..."

Donnie winced, though I wasn't sure if it was from my words, or that really painful sounding crunching noise coming from Agent Bishop that Raph had just caused. "Yeah. I bet." He draped one of my arms over his shoulders and helped me get sluggishly up to my feet. "Come on... let's get you back to Dad where you can rest while I'll go help Mikey with the helicopter. Everything's going to be okay."

Road Map/ Behind the Scenes

So, two things I thought I'd share about this story.

First off, I mentioned in a few places that this story was actually a little plot thread I had rattling in my brain that basically involved Leo and a family of OC's, which I had no plans of writing. For those curious, the original contained Mai, the goth store clerk who gave baby Leo a peptalk in my one shot, 'Job of Big Brother'. Basically, she was what Master Yoshi ended up being in this story, and it was her brothers that kidnapped Leo and brought him to their family mansion. Yup. The whole story started because people kept asking me for a sequel for Mai, and I allowed myself to muse on such a possibility.

But then the idea suddenly struck me that, instead of using OC's, I could turn Leo's family into humans, and that made such sense that plot just basically exploded everywhere! I was able to quickly scribble down a complete road map to a story, sat back, and thought, yeah, I think I can write this! This is something I've never done before, and I was curious to see how much having a game plan written down would help.

Turns out... not much at all.

On the upside, though, it allows me to share it so you guys can see how much my stories evolve as I write them. Honestly, when I begin writing, many times I'm just as surprised by what ends up happening as you guys.

So, kinda an obvious warning, but this isn't an actual story, but just a very rough draft skeleton of a story structure. There is only a summarizing of things I had planned to write. Obviously I had plans to flesh things out with description and details as I actually wrote them, so, right now, it's non-descriptive and not terribly engaging to read. But it's still interesting to read over it again (I abandoned it pretty early on), and see just how certain parts turned out in the actual fic, and which plot points got changed completely.

Obviously, the biggest changes I ended up making were the villains, and the scene with Raph and Stockman.

I decided to get rid of the Shredder early on, just because there were enough villains on the board. Dun was supposed to just be a board member who was a puppet for Shredder/EPF, but he ended up becoming more then that as I wrote. We didn't need three factions to muddy up the waters, and I realized it could be more interesting later with Karai.

And it became quite obvious to me early on in the story that it would be extremely out of character for Raph to trust Stockman's word about anything. There's no reason he wouldn't have called Donnie up and asked him for advice first. Plus, while I was amused by the follow-up scene with Yoshi having a tea party with Leo, the speech felt too much like victim blaming. I didn't like it or what it implied. Thus, I cut out that entire plot thread, which simplified the story immensely. It was probably for the best, it was just unnecessary drama that would've interfered with the fluff and the pacing, and the story was long enough as it was.

Three boys and their father walk down a street with a new pet turtle. The father, Hamato Yoshi, has a pet rat named Splinter. They discuss what to name the turtle, and since the three boys are named after artists, they decide to name the turtle after one as well, Leonardo. Then the youngest boy, Mikey, runs out into the street. Yoshi rushes after him and pushes him out of the way of a speeding van, but is hit instead. The turtle and the rat are thrown to the gutter, mysterious green canister crashes around them, and they're swept into the sewer.

Years later, Leo is training under Splinter, who is very elderly now. He often speaks fondly of his Master Yoshi, who he learned martial arts from by watching. Leo listens respectfully, but doesn't trust humans at all, and is offended at the thought of being a 'pet'. They live in squalor, and it's cold out. Splinter grows sick, and Leo tries to take care of him the best he can, cutting bananas into small slices for him to eat. Splinter wishes that he could see his old Master one last time, then turns to Leo and starts to wistfully wonder what will happen to his turtle when he's gone. Leo tries to shut down such talk. Splinter mentions that he should look for the Hamatos, as they're family, but Leo scoffs at such a thing. They're human, and they would never see him as anything but an animal. He doesn't need anybody to protect his back. That's what his shell is for! Leo goes out to scavenge for more food, and when he comes back, Splinter is dead.

Some weeks later, he realizes that he's being hunted. He tries to evade his pursuers, but is hit with a tranq dart, and falls off a roof. The last thing he remembers is two humans arguing that the other should have been more careful, the target was supposed to be brought in alive and unharmed, after all. The other comments that accidents happen when you're hunting monsters. Leo drifts in and out of consciousness. He vaguely remembers a voice apologizing to him (Donnie) and reassuring him that he's safe and with family now.

When he wakes up, he finds himself in a large indoor garden, complete with trees and a large pond. There are three human boys nearby talking, and he listens for a little bit. They're talking about him, and he quickly realizes these are the Hamato Brothers, and somehow they know who he was and that he now has their father's DNA. He decides to play the dumb animal and try to escape later. If they were prepared for a turtle, they wouldn't be expecting a ninja. They get excited when he gets up, and try talking to him, but he just watches them warily, then slinks off and slips into the pond, hiding in the water. The brothers are a little disappointed, but understanding, and while Mikey really wants to stay and watch their new 'brother', Donnie says that it's best that they give Leo time and space to get used to his new home first. Before they leave, Mikey says goodbye to the pond, and leaves out some food he says is for Leo.

Leo realizes that there's probably cameras around, so he stays hidden for a while, thinking. He realizes that they must have run medical tests on him if they checked his DNA, and he feels ill thinking of all those humans touching him while he's unconscious, doing who-knew-what with his body without his consent. Even his shell feels clean and freshly scrubbed. He spends some time panicking for a while.

Finally, though, he realizes he's extremely hungry, and creeps out of the pond and grabs the food, pulling it under cover to try and remain hidden from the cameras, as he hasn't quite figured out where they all were yet. He looks down at the cut-up fruit cake, and realizes that it spells out 'Welcome home, Leo'. There's also a small, neat shelter with a hammock inside for him to use if he wished, and a few toys like soccer balls. Leo scoffs that a turtle bowl is a turtle bowl, no matter how big or nice it is.

Later that night, when he's convinced he's figured out where all the cameras are, he picks a blind spot near the ceiling, and crawls up into the vents, determined to escape. While crawling up there, though, he comes across a vent that shows the three brothers sitting around a table, watching monitors. He realizes they're watching his enclosure, and inwardly scoffs, feeling like he had been stuck in a zoo. But then he listens in. Mikey is sitting close to the screen, searching eagerly for any sign of him. Donnie laments the fact that they didn't find him sooner, and is horrified by all the scars he bears from his many battles, attributing them to human cruelty and abuse. Raph snarls, and says that he wished that Leo could speak, if only to help him make a list of who to track down. NOBODY hurts his brothers! Ever! Donnie reminds them that they'll have to be patient with their brother, as he probably doesn't trust humans. Mikey leans forward to touch the screens, still searching, and absently murmurs Oh Leo, if only you knew how loved you are! You're our brother!, and hopes that they can help him be less scared tomorrow. Donnie also casually brings up that he plans on bringing their father to the building in a few weeks, once the hospital bed is set up.

Leo is quiet for a moment, then slowly heads back. He decides that he should at least wait until he meets Hamato Yoshi, if only for Master Splinter's sake.

The next morning, Raph and Mikey visit him. Mikey brings in some gummy worms, and tosses him one as an offering. Leo doesn't react at all, letting it bounce off his face. Mikey doesn't seem bothered, and happily tells him all about their adventures, and Leo is baffled by how talkative he is. Dear Kami, that human boy must have lungs that rivaled his own! 'And that's how I became the Battle Nexus Champion!" Teases Raph about beating him, they start wrestling. Leo watches for a while. Eventually, he picks up the gummy worm and eats it. Mikey notices that, thrilled, pushes a startled Raph into the pond, and zips over to toss Leo an orange one, as those are his favorite. Then he's plowed over by a furious, dripping wet Raph. Leo steals the whole bag of gummies while they fight, and finally Raph pins down Mikey and makes him say how wonderful he is. Once finished, Mikey flips up, covered in grass stains, and acts completely normal, like nothing happened, and begins telling Leo more stories.

The brothers each take turns visiting Leo. Donnie sits in a chair and reads books out loud. Mikey brings him gummy worms and other snacks, and when he noticed that Leo took interest on the Space Heroes cartoon he was watching on his phone, he played that as well. Raph decides to try and teach Leo exercises to keep him healthy, since he knows Mikey is probably sneaking him candy, and Leo decides to play along, as he's been wanting to keep up his training without giving himself away, and this is a good excuse. He and Raph get into a push-ups contest, as Leo is determined that no human could possibly do more push-ups then him, and Raph thinks that Leo is untrained and unskilled, and neither are willing to give in. Finally Donnie and Mikey walk in to find them both almost exhausted, but still doing push-ups. When Mikey learns what they're doing, he declares that he's on Leo's team, and immediately tickle-tackles Raph, which causes him to lose. Leo is surprised and somewhat amused by the brotherly banter. Donnie had packed a picnic lunch, and leaves an offering of fruit a little ways off for Leo, so he would feel more comfortable. Feeling a little cheeky, Leo sneaks around and steals Raph's sandwich, leaving him a few pieces of fruit in exchange. The brothers are amused and encouraged by this.

At night, Leo feels a little claustrophobic, trapped in the room, and decides to scout out the building. He realizes there's a lab, which makes him extremely nervous. It's late at night, and only a single red haired scientist is hard at work. Suddenly, Leo notices a ninja in the shadows, sneaking up on her, and is suddenly torn, not sure what to do. But it turns out to be okay, the ninja is Lieutenant Casey Jones, coming down to retrieve April O'Neil at the behest of their friend Irma, as she's not supposed to be working this late. They mention that April is secretly dating Donnie, Casey is friends with Raph, and they're not sure what their ninja bosses are up to, only that they're up to something secretive, which isn't completely unusual for the Hamato boys.

As he grows more comfortable around them, he really doesn't like the doctors and some of the staff the brothers keep on site, Baxter Stockman, Xever, and Bradford. He feels like they're up to something, and thus keeps up his act of being simple. Plus, on his sneaks around the building, he hears them arguing for more tests to be run on him, which Donnie, who appears to be head scientist, absolutely refuses to do. He will not turn his brother into an experiment.

One day, Donnie and Raph left to go do something with their father, leaving Mikey there alone. Mikey seemed to be up to something, and once night came and all the staff left, he encouraged Leo to follow him out of his enclosure. Leo was very uncertain about this, knowing that medical labs were out there, but Mikey begged him to trust him. Leo decided to, and followed Mikey to a series of rooms that turned out to be Mikey's own apartment within the complex. He explained that all the brothers have their own apartment, just like Leo had his. Giddy that he had his new brother over, he declared a Space Heroes movie marathon night. Donnie called in, and while Mikey was distracted talking to his brother and not trying to let slip the situation, Leo went poking around. He found frozen pizzas in the freezer, and when Mikey hung up, he turned around to see Leo peeking at him over the table, then slowly slid a frozen pizza towards him, giving almost puppy eyes. Mikey is delighted to find out that Leo likes pizza, and promptly pulls out a pizza oven. In his excitement, he tells Leo that he has awesome taste, and asks for a brofist. Leo is startled by the extended fist, and Mikey quickly apologizes and tries to show what a brofist is, tapping his two fists together, then making little explosions and finger wiggles. See? Awesome? Thumbs up. Leo thinks about this for a second, then decides he really should properly thank Mikey for making him pizza and hesitantly offers his fist. Mikey is shocked at the offer, then swallows, and his five fingered human hand gently bumps Leo's three fingered green hand. Then they both do the explosion and finger wiggles. Mikey is over the moon happy over this, as this is the first voluntary touch that Leo's allowed. He also makes popcorn, and they eat pizza and popcorn while watching movies long into the night. After one movie finishes, Leo looks up at the couch, and realizes that Mikey fell fast asleep. He is touched, realizing that Mikey was showing an incredible amount of trust in him, letting him come over and even comfortable enough to fall asleep. Leo is an incredibly dangerous mutant, even without his training, and could easily kill Mikey with little effort, but the human didn't seem to care. After a moment, Leo gets up and carefully covers Mikey up with a blanket.

Donnie and Raph return, and there's a flurry of activity. Then one of the walls of the garden is transformed into a window, and Leo sees Hamato Yoshi, laying in a hospital bed in a coma. Later, Donnie comes out and talks with him, telling him about the accident. He starts growing emotional, and whispers how he misses his dad. Leo, sympathizing as he just lost his own father, slips forward and puts a hand on Donnie's shoulder. Donnie is surprised by the contact, but welcomes it, and slowly, carefully leans in against Leo, telling him how scared he is that his dad will never wake up, and how then he'll be the leader of the clan, and he doesn't want the job, everybody is looking up to him and depending on him and expecting him to lead them all and he's terrified that he's going to mess up. Leo holds him close as he sobs for a while. Then Donnie sniffs, leaning his cheek against Leo's plastron, and says that this is stupid, that Leo probably doesn't understand what he's saying anyways, but... can Leo be his big brother?

Leo stares at him for a long moment, takes a deep breath, opens his mouth, and then Stockman enters the area, looking for Donnie. Donnie is mortified and quickly wipes off his face, standing up and angrily stating that he was having a personal moment. With a sniff of obvious disdain, Stockman says he noticed. Leo doesn't like the condescension on his face while Donnie was so vulnerable, and steps between them, glaring at the scientist. Donnie calmly tells him it's okay, and goes off to tend to his business with Stockman. Leo watches them go, and then turns to stare at Hamato Yoshi laying on the other side of the glass for a long moment.

That night, Leo sneaks out and steals a bunch of candles, all the while wondering just what he thought he was going to be able to do. He finds a safe, secluded area where he won't be seen, and sets up the candles in a circle, before settling into meditation in the middle. . He remembered meditating with Master Splinter, and had been immensely proud of the fact that he could touch the Astral Plane. To wander there proved that he had a soul, and was no less then any human. He settled back and let his mind drift there now, and began searching. It isn't long until he sees a rat, and immediately realizes who it is. Desperate to find his adoptive father, he chases the rat through the twists and turns of the Astral Plane, following it down a steep, rocky crevice. At the bottom, he found a quiet pond in a meadow, and the human man sitting there serenely. The rat scrambles into the man's lap, and he smiles gently at it. "There you are, my old friend." Leo sits next to him, and Yoshi looks at him curiously. After a moment, he blinks. "Leonardo?" Leo affirms this, and Yoshi smiles, saying that he's changed quite a bit. Leo kneels, then respectfully bows to him while he tells him that his sons need him. Yoshi grows sad, and says that he's been trying to find them, but he's so lost, and he's too weak and tired to climb the rocky cliff face back up. Leo tells him not to worry, that he's a turtle, and he can carry the weight of the world on his shell if needed. It is difficult, but Leo manages to climb back up the cliff with Yoshi on his back, Splinter climbing ahead and showing him the way. At the top, Yoshi sighs, "Oh yes... there I am..." and the Astral Plane fades away, and Leo wakes back up in his meditative pose, exhausted with the candles burned out.

He wearily goes back to his sanctuary, and smiles when he sees the three ecstatic brothers embracing a dazed and confused Yoshi, who had just woken up after 12 years. Leo watches them for a long, sad moment. The humans were obviously a family. Would a turtle really fit into such a perfect picture?

Feeling like he had just climbed a mountain, he heads to his hut and quickly falls asleep, worn out by the effort.

When he wakes up the next morning, Mikey is sitting right in front of his face, waiting eagerly with a huge smile on his face. "Leo, bro, I don't know how you did it, but you're absolutely amazing!"Apparently Yoshi remembered a dream where he was lost, but Leo came in and carried him back to them. Mikey takes him back to meet Yoshi for the first time. Leo is shy, uncertain how this man, spoken of with such reverence by Splinter and technically his father, would react to a mutant turtle as a son. Yoshi, very weak from the years of being bedridden, welcomes him warmly. He is rather surprised to learn that Leo doesn't talk, as he did in his dream, but it doesn't matter. He says he now had four sons.

Leo is starting to realize that he should probably let his family know his secret, that he's as intelligent as any human, and is capable of talking, but he's not sure how to bring it up. Donnie wants his father checked out medically, which they can't do with the limited facilities there, so he and Mikey leave, and Raph is left in charge of Leo again for a few days while they head to the hospital.

Leo decides that he'll come clean and tell the Hamato family everything when everybody gets back. However, he notices Raph having an argument with Dr Stockman out in the hallway outside the sanctuary. Stockman seems to be trying to guilt Raph into something, and Raph looks unsure and unhappy. Whatever it is, he wants to wait for Donnie to come back, but Stockman says that it will be too late by then, and he showed Raph a picture of what would happed if 'it' wasn't taken care of immediately, whatever 'it' was. He told Raph that it was the responsible thing to do. Raph looked stressed, then slowly nodded, but then he gives Stockman a dark look, and tells him that if he finds out that he was lying, then the Hamatos would tear him apart. Stockman smoothly tells him that he only serves them.

When Raph comes in to visit Leo, he's obviously hiding something and nervous, though he tries to remain upbeat. Leo writes it off as him just being upset over the argument. Raph is quiet for a moment, then asks hesitantly to see Leo's shell. A little confused, Leo trusts him by now, and doesn't protest his brother closely examining the gouge, as if he's looking for something. He absently wonders if it hurts and Leo fondly headbutts him, trying to cheer him up. As has become custom, he eats the treats that his brother brought him, but he quickly realizes something is wrong as very quickly, his body slows and grows heavy. He realizes he's been drugged, and grows furious. Raph's voice speaks to him as he is surrounded by other people and sinks into darkness, trying to calm him down.

When he wakes up again, he finds himself in his laying enclosure, smelling of medical disinfectant. Raph is there with a bag of treats, smiling and telling him that he was good for his check-up, and deserved a reward. Furious at the betrayal, Leo shoves him away hard and hisses angrily, before bolting into the pond to get away from him. Realizing that Leo is upset, Raph panics, and tries to tell him that the doctors were worried that he might have shell rot, and they just ran a few tests and Raph was just worried about his health, but Leo refuses to listen, hissing at him every time he tries to come closer. He feels panicky and ill again, wondering what the doctors had done to him while he was unconscious and feeling his skin crawl at the thought of their hands on him. He's still feeling wobby and unsteady after the sedatives as well. He decides to make his escape as soon as he can. He will not stay in a place where he could be drugged and experimented on at any time.

Raph is miserable and when the others come back, he confesses to Donnie that he messed up, bad. Donnie storms out with Raph in tow. Once he's convinced the coast is clear, and that his dizziness has disappeared enough for it to be safe, Leo starts to make his escape, planning on leaving and never returning. He gets outside, and starts climbing down the building. But he stops when the side door is opened, and Stockman is thrown out by all three Hamato brothers, who were all clearly furious. Raph especially felt betrayed, and Donnie had to hold him back. All three of them threatened him and told him in no uncertain terms that they would not stand anybody drugging his brother Leo like that again, or tricking them like that. Donnie informs Stockman that he never wanted to see him set foot inside this building again. Leo watches out of sight as the brothers slam the door shut. After a long moment of composing himself and straightening out his clothes, Stockman glares at the door as a ninja clad in black appears next to him. Stockman casually tells the ninja to tell his master that the Foot was going to have to go forward with the plan sooner then they thought. Then they both walk away.

The Foot. Master Splinter had told him about them, how they were the mortal enemies of the Hamatos for centuries, The Shredder killing Tang Shen, the brothers' mother.

Leo was torn. On one hand, if he stayed, he would continue to be little more then a freak exhibit in a turtle bowl, at the mercy of the doctors, and could be drugged and dragged off to be medically prodded and poked again. But... if he left... the Hamato brothers were in danger... Perhaps he could just warn them? But what could they do? Raph was always saying that Hamatos didn't abandon one another, but he wasn't really a Hamato... was he?

Leo went back to his enclosure.

He would protect them..

He still hid from the brothers and hissed grumpily at them whenever they drew near, though, and refused to eat anything they offered, still extremely upset.

Leo decides to try to investigate what's going on. He sneaks through the facility for a few nights, trying to gather information, but finds nothing. While sneaking back, he ends up by a vent leading to a side room set up for their father to sit in a special chair and look out over the garden. His brothers are in there, talking with their father. Raph is looking miserably out to the garden, and Mikey puts a hand on his shoulder comfortingly. Apparently there's some trouble at a warehouse by some rival gang, so the brothers head out to take care of it.

Leo watches from his hiding place as Yoshi carefully pours himself two cups of tea, commenting woefully about how he has a long road to recovery ahead of him, and then, to Leo's surprise, looks up to the vent and wonders if Leo was going to join him. Stunned that the patriarch of the clan seemed to know he was up there in the vents all along, and not knowing what else to do, Leo meekly crawls out of the vent and joins him, subdued.

Yoshi only smiles, saying that he figured that Leo wouldn't be held by the garden room for long, and comments that he's probably got the whole compound explored by now.

Leo just sips at the tea silently, inwardly panicking and wondering what he's going to do.

Yoshi sips his tea, and then starts talking about the recent trouble with Raph. He says that Leo's got every right to be mad. He was drugged and put through medical tests without his permission or consent. He also observes that, while Raph made a very bad judgement call, he was still a very young teenager, and he honestly wanted to help Leo. There was absolutely no malice behind his actions, and he had stayed by Leo's side the entire time, guarding him and making sure that the doctors didn't do anything to him. He points out that if Leo led them to believe that he was only an animal, then how could he fault them for thinking he was one?

Leo was quiet for a moment, thinking this over.

The brothers return, and are somewhat startled to find Leo having tea. Yoshi brushes it off, and doesn't mention that Leo came from the vents or has been sneaking around, keeping his secret.

Later, Leo watches Raph sitting miserably on the grass, and makes his way over. He sits close by, but turns his shell towards Raph, still acting miffed. But Raph realizes that even though Leo was still mad, he was apparently giving Raph a chance to apologize. Raph does so, trying to show his feelings as best as he can through body language as well as words, in case Leo doesn't understand speech. Leo finally turns around and gives him a hesitant smile, then hesitantly offers him a fist bump. Raph is greatly relieved, and gratefully holds out his fist as well.

Leo spends some time scouting, trying to find out anything he can about the Foot and their plans, but all seems quiet. Then, while having tea with Master Yoshi, Yoshi frowns and lowers his tea, sensing something is wrong. Moments later, alarms start blaring, startling them both. Stockman enters with some footbots, and they're somewhat startled to see Leo in there, but recover and say it's for the best. Stockman says that he's there for the turtle anyways, and the footbots had to make sure Yoshi didn't miss his appointment with an old friend. Oroku Saki.

When the footbot goes to grab Yoshi, Leo stops it. Stockman laughs, saying that Yoshi has trained his pet well, and Leo coldly says that he's not his pet. He's his son. Stockman is startled, but then snarls and sics all the footbots at Leo. Leo easily takes them down.

Yoshi is startled, saying that Leo fought like a Hamato. Leo tells him that Splinter had learned much from him, and in turn, passed it on to Leo. Yoshi is amazed, and then grieved when he learned of the rat and his death. But it wasn't safe to talk for too long there. Leo carries him out, and sneaks through the compound with him. It's soon very clear that they're under attack.

They come across a room where Xever, along with several Footbots, have surrounded and captured a group of Hamato ninjas and scientists, including April and Casey. Setting Yoshi down, Leo leaps down and rescues them.

Leo demands to know where his brothers are. Nobody seems to know, and they try to figure out what's going on from their captives. At first, they won't talk, but then April finally tells them with an evil grin that she hopes they remember the last animal they touched, and they had better hope that a fly hadn't landed on them at some point (says this to Stockman, of course), as one side effect of being a mutant is that their saliva carries traits of the mutagen, and Leo can turn them into mutant as well if he bit them. Kinda like a werewolf thing. She's completely making it up, of course, but Leo plays along with her bluff, and grins widely, showing his teeth. Irma offers to use some dice she uses for her DnD sessions to help decide who gets bit first.

Xever gives in. When scolded by Stockman, he says that the last thing he remembers touching is some freaky fish in the market, and he wasn't going to turn into a fish-faced freak for anybody! He tells them that Oroku Saki and the EPF have partnered up. Agent Bishop is tired of the Hamato Clan, and hopes to get a powerful ninja clan under his control to replace them, thus he's been supplying Shredder with Footbots, making the Footclan powerful once more. Shredder wants the Hamatos destroyed. Bishop wants Leo to experiment on. Right now, the Footbots are attacking the compound, while Shredder and several elite war machines are ambushing the three Hamato Brothers down by the docks.

Leonardo goes into leader mode without thinking, pulling Casey, April, Irma, and Angel to the war room. April pulls up a screen and they watch as war machines march around where the brothers are held, as well as thousands of mousers. Irma points out one of the larger war machines, saying that it was an army all in itself, and incredibly dangerous, they couldn't fight against that alone, much less the army! Casey is ready to take their full force and go rescue the brothers, but Leo says no, they'll be expecting that. He spreads a map of the city onto a table, studying it. He points out a warehouse on the map, and tells Casey to take most of the force and 'stealth' there, under the pretense that they were escorting and protecting 'the last Hamato', aka Leo. It would divert a large amount of Bishop's forces, and that spot was a highly defendable area, the EPF would have a hard time breaking in. Casey turns around, picks out several men, and then 'one two three not it!' and with that, 'Timothy' is now going to be doused in green paint and a makeshift turtle disguise. Meanwhile, April and Angel would take a few of the most stealthy soldiers, and locate the broadcast station that the EPF was using to control the mousers, and disable it. Irma, to her surprise, was going to go with Leo to rescue the brothers. While Leo is talking, he's walking around the war room, taking supplies and arming himself. He takes a pair of kantanas, buckles them on, and then, spotting a blue cloth, rips off a strip, cuts two holes, and then ties it on.

He will protect his family.

They sneak up, and come across one of the highly dangerous walking tanks. Leo grabs a startled Irma, jumps off onto the top of the walker. He shoves a smoke bomb into the vent, and when the pilot opens the lid, coughing, Leo grabs him, knocks him out, and throws him off, climbing in. He seats himself in the pilot seat, and Irma eagerly begins driving it. They walk into the warehouse where the three Hamato brothers are being held. Raph is furious when he overhears Bradford taunting them that they'll soon be dead along with their father, while Leo would spend the rest of his life as a lab experiment.

Leo casually walks the war machine up behind the only other one as powerful as his own machine. Bradford wonders what this soldier is doing and demands to know, just before Leo starts opening fire, immediately taking out the unsuspecting war machine, and then easily mowing down mousers and chasing off other guards as well. He steps forward and the brothers are able to free themselves, and climb up onto the unexpectedly friendly war machine to the top. Leo, realizing this might be a little awkward, goes to let them in.

They're shocked to see Leo. Leo clears his throat and merely says that he thought they might need some help. Mikey grins from ear to ear and leaps forward to hug Leo, saying that he knew it! Raph lightly thwaps him on the back of the head and asks what took him so long? Leo replies that he's a little stubborn. They continue busting their way out of the trap, easily done now in this war machine.

Once free, they talk about charging in to stop the Shredder. Leo brings up the comm link with the others so far to see how it's going, and his brothers are impressed by his tactical ploys. Leo tells Irma to take the war machine. It would be too loud and obvious to attack Dun and Bishop. Instead, Irma was to take the war machine to a specific place and act like she was defending something. If she got into trouble, Leo showed her that there was a sewer entrance nearby, to take it and follow a particular route to safety. He was not going to play by Dun and Bishop's expected playbook. He would make them think that the brothers were still in the war machine, and guarding something else important. Shredder and Bishop would be caught off guard and unsteady. Meanwhile, the brothers would sneak in stealthily, and attack by foot.

They do so, and there's a fight in which Leo learns just how great it is to fight alongside his family. Shredder is using two katana, Hamato family heirlooms that he had stolen when he betrayed Yoshi, and used to kill Tang Shen. Leo manages to take them from him and vows to return honor to the blades, finally dealing the finishing blow. The battle now down, he is standing up on a balcony, glancing down at his family below, when they suddenly cry out for him to look out behind him. Leo turns just in time to see Agent Bishop firing an energy rifle at him, and to feel the impact of the energy hit his chest, then all went black.

There is an intermediate chapter from Leo's point of view describing his first encounter with the EPF, where Leatherhead sacrifices his life to save Leo's life. He feigned unintelligence, which lulls the guards into a false sense of security, and thus they make their escape attempt. This is where Leo picked up the tactic.

Then Leo wakes up in a temporary glass cage with several needles in his arms attached to tubes, ala Michael Bay's TMNT, where apparently the plan is to try and unlock the secrets of mutagen in his blood. The EPF is building a glass tube for him, where, if their plan goes as intended, Leo would spend the rest of his life, unconscious and kept alive for them to harvest blood. Leo is shackled and muzzled, unable to escape.

But then his brothers burst in, along with the rest of the clan assaulting the rest of the base. Donnie tries to break him free, as Raph and Mikey hold off the scientists. Raph beats Bishop up, leaving him slumped against the wall. Fire breaks out in the building, slowly spreading and filling the room with smoke. Seeing that they're about to lose, Bishop sneaks forward and declares that if they can't have the mutant, nobody will, and sets the termination program into motion. Everybody panics as the machine starts drawing blood, and Leo slowly weakens. They try a few times to break the glass of his cage, but its not working. Finally, Mikey gets the idea to tip over a giant piece of medical equipment. They try, but it's really heavy. Casey, April, and the others come rushing in, and immediately rush to help. All of the humans working together, they tip it over, and the glass shatters under the falling equipment.

Donnie hurriedly pulls out the needles, stopping the blood drain and saving Leo, then begins cutting away at the shackles on Leo's arms, while Mikey starts working on the chains around his feet. Raph tells Casey and Angel to get everybody out of there, the fire is spreading!

It's pretty close, but the brothers manage to free Leo, and they jump out a window just in time for the building to explode in a giant fireball. The brothers shield Leo as best as they can, until the fireball dissipates.

'Oh... uh... here..." Donnie carefully cradles Leo and take off the muzzle. The brothers hover anxiously, wondering if Leo is okay. He smiles weakly, and cracks a tired joke. Relieved, they hug him. He asks about Master Yoshi, and they tell him he's okay. Then he tells them he's probably going to pass out here soon. As Raph carries him, he contemplates that even though he's a turtle and can carry the weight of the world, it's nice having somebody to carry him when he couldn't.