Okay, so this is my first TMNT human fan fiction I've ever written, or even attempted writing. I hope you like it, I know it's bad, but please review.

RAPH'S P.O.V.

Mikey's wavy dirty-blond hair falls over his bright blue eyes, his freckles standing out. "Come on, Raphie, wake up!"

I grunt, sweeping my spiky red-brown hair out of my face. "What do you want, Mikey? What time is it?" I rub my green eyes. Why do they hurt so much?

"You fell asleep studying," he says. "It's morning."

"S***!" I exclaim, standing up and cramming my books into my bag. "Where are Leo and Donnie?"

"Leo's showering and Donnie's trying to work on one of his projects before school. I made breakfast if you want," he offers.

"Sure." I ruffle his hair. "I'll be there in a minute. Just let me get dressed."

He smiles and dashes off to the kitchen just as my other younger brother emerges from his room. Donnie's dark brown hair lay flat on his head, a little too long to be cool, and the hair on the back of his neck is wavier than Mikey's. His black glasses are slightly crooked on his face.

"Hey, nerd," I call, slinging my bag over my shoulder. My jeans and shirt are a little tight; I must be growing again. "What's up?" His red-brown eyes look tired, though not from studying.

"I'm almost done with the coding on the robot," he says, smiling and showing the gap in his teeth. "You know, for robotics club?"

"Yeah, sure. Sounds cool," I say, not really paying attention. Mikey hands me an omelet with salami in it, my favorite, and Donnie's has green peppers.

"Thanks, Mikey," Donnie says, smiling. The two of them are close, much closer than me and Leo, our oldest brother. I'm second in the age rankings, in eleventh grade. Leo is in twelfth, Donnie in tenth, and Mikey's in ninth.

Speaking of Leo, he's out of the shower and dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. His black hair is slightly wet and his dark blue eyes shone. "Hey, guys."

"Hi, bro!" Mikey exclaims. "I made a sausage omelet for you! And the black tea you like!" He slides them down the table and started eating his own. "Mm, pizza omelet. See! I put pepperoni and cheese in it!" He grins.

"Um, interesting," I say, stifling a laugh. Leave it to my brother to make a pizza omelet.

"And, Donnie," Mikey says, turning to my genius brother. "I told April you like her."

Donnie blushes, eyes narrowing and voice lowering dangerously. "You. Did. What?"

Mikey laughs, then screams as Donnie chases after him. His longer legs give him the advantage as he catches up to Mikey and pins him. "YOU ARE SO DEAD!" he yells, but I hear laughter under it.

I shake my head. "Wow, I can't believe Mikey actually did it. We never thought he would, did we Leo?"

He smiles. "No we didn't. You owe me ten dollars. Remember our bet," he says before I can protest, then turns to our younger brothers, breaking up their 'fight'. "Come on, guys!" Both of them are grinning, not hurt at all.

We pile into the car. Leo drives us to school and I drive back. It's a good arrangement, though Donnie can drive too but Mikey doesn't have his official license, just a learner's permit.

"Why do we have to go to school?" I groan. Donnie's drinking coffee out of a travel mug, even though he's more awake than usual due to his 'game' with Mikey.

"Raph, I've told you a million times-" Leo starts.

"Yeah, and I haven't listened a million times!" I shoot back and Mikey giggles. Leo sighs.

"Hey, Don," I say, turning around in my seat. He's reading a textbook. FOR FUN. What in the world is wrong with him?

"Yeah?" he says, turning the page.

"You might want to put the textbook away. We're almost at school, and do you remember the last time you went into school reading a textbook?" I warn, watching his face tense a little.

"Oh. Yeah. Okay." He slips it into his bag. No matter what, I will always look out for my little brothers. Even Mr. Nerd.

Leo pulls up. "Raph, no fighting today. Donnie, try to talk to someone else outside of your robot nerds. Mikey, don't throw water balloons at the teacher. Got it?"

I nod, but I probably won't follow his 'instructions'. He gives each of us one every school morning, and mine is always the same along with Donnie. Mikey… well it depends on what he did yesterday. Like hitting a teacher with a water balloon.

Donnie's definitely the shyest out of us, but the smartest too. Mikey is the most outgoing, I'm the hothead, and Leo is, well, Leo. The calm brother.

"Donnie," I say, pulling him aside as we walk into the building. I can still see the slightest bit of a bruise on his cheek. "If anyone messes with you, I'm here. Okay?"

"Yeah. Thanks, Raph," he says, smiling at me gratefully.

I head off to class after homeroom, which is just a bunch of crap. Science. Ugh.

I hate school, being trapped in a chair. I would rather be at the gym after school, or at one of my wrestling matches, or at the gym after school. I'm pretty active.

I will do anything to protect my brothers. Take a few hits, beat someone up, and done. But Donnie only has one class without me or Leo. Gym. He has it now, and, well, he's in a higher science class than me, so I have that now.

He's the one who needs protecting the most.

DONNIE'S P.O.V.

I walk nervously to gym after my homeroom, which I had with April, the most popular girl in school. She also happens to be my crush. This is the one class I have without a big brother to protect me. The class where people gang up on me the most.

I slip my backpack onto the bleachers. Justin is already there, lying in wait with Alex and Nico. Why do bullies always need a group of friends when they're picking on a single person? It really makes no sense.

I can do complex equations in my head, make robots, and make useful items out of everyday objects. So why can't I navigate social circles?

"Hey, nerd!" Justin yells, walking towards me. Oh, no no no no no. Not now! I just walked in. Can they at least wait a little bit?

He slams me into the wall. "Looks like your brothers aren't here to protect you." He can't quite manage to lift me off the ground, I'm too tall. "Little loser, friendless, nerdy freak. What are you going to do?"

"Well, first a nerd is an individual persecuted for their superior skills or intellect, most often by people who fear and/or envy them, so thank you. Second, I'm not a proctologist but I sure know an a**hole when I see one." Why am I mouthing off to him? Why? "And I don't need my brothers to protect me," I add, both of us knowing that it might be a lie.

He growls and cocks his fist back. He should know better. Me and my brothers will do anything to protect each other, especially Raph towards me. But I'm still scared.

If the first punch to my face stings, the second one burns. They crash into my cheek, at least the ones from Justin. The others jab me in the stomach and ribs, but mostly on my face.

I cry out, but just for a moment. Then I fight back. Sort of.

I wriggle out of his grasp, hitting the floor hard. I run around the track, thankful for my long legs and they chase after me as the teacher comes in. "Good start, Donatello!" he calls, unaware of what is actually happening.

I run as fast as I can in my gym clothes, shorts and a T-shirt. I am faster than them, but just barely. Suddenly, Justin is in front of me, both of us halfway around the track. He must have gone the other way.

I check the clock as they corner me. Leo usually comes in halfway through my period to check on me, but it's only been ten minutes. Twenty more…

The rest of the boy's gym class trickles in, most of them friends with Justin, the others friends with other people. No fellow nerds. The ones who are with Justin circle me while the rest just do their laps. I wish I could join them.

Justin grabs me by the neck. Mr. Seagulworth, the gym teacher, walks into his office. He's probably the worst teacher ever. He just trusts us to not beat each other up. He shouldn't.

He punches me in the mouth and blood runs down my lip. "Stop!" I shout, kneeing him in the stomach. Justin hisses. "What?" I say, furious. "Just leave me alone!"

"No!" he says, laughing. "Come on, let's have some fun." The next punch hits my shoulder, then my neck. I stagger.

"Stay away from my brother!" I know that voice anywhere.

Justin drops me immediately. "Hey, Raph."

"Don't 'Hey, Raph' me," he says, pulling his red-brown hair out of his eyes. Justin kicks me in the stomach and looks at Raph.

"He's all yours," he says, sniggering. I climb to my feet, just a little dizzy, wincing at the pain in my shoulder.

"Donnie, you okay?" Raph asks, concern in his green eyes.

"I'm fine, Raph. Just a little sore."

He scowls at me. "You call a black eye and a busted lip fine?"

I feel my face. My lip is split. "Okay, maybe a little beat up. Raph, I'm fine. I can deal with this." I drop my voice. "It's been happening for the past year. Ever since I got to high school."

Raph looks up at me. "You sure you're okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Hey, do you have a hall pass?"

He snorts, holding one up. "Really? That's your main concern?"

I duck my head a little. "Come on, let's get you an ice pack." He shoves me into the office where I say I fell while running, a pretty lame excuse. Mr. Seagulworth sends me off without a second glance.

Raph looks at his watch. "I've been gone too long. You sure you're okay?"

I nod. "Thanks, big brother."

He grunts. "Yeah, whatever."

We part ways and I duck into the nurse's office. She hands me an ice pack and I just sit there. I wish I had a book, but I left my bag in the gym. I'll have to go back later.

Leo walks by, probably headed to the gym, but sees me. "Donnie!" he calls, running over to me. "What the heck happened?" He adjusts the ice pack so that it covers my eye better.

"It was only Justin and his friends. I'm fine, Leo." I'm really getting tired of my brothers treating me like a baby.

"Okay. Are you going to go back? Where's your bag?" He looks at me, worry in his blue eyes.

"My bag's in the gym, and no, I don't want to go back," I tell him. "I can't do anything right now anyway."

"Okay," Leo says, furrowing his brow. "Do you want me to get your bag for you? You can change out of your gym clothes too." I had forgotten I was wearing them.

"Yeah, that would be great Leo. Thank you." He merely smiles and walks off.

I don't know what I'm going to do when he's gone.

LEO'S P.O.V.

Donnie's bag is on top of the bleachers and I grab it, slinging it over my shoulder. I didn't have many classes as I have most of my credits. As a senior, none of the kids really mess with me or Raph. But they like to prey on Donnie and Mikey, though Donnie usually sticks up for Mikey. There was this one time Mikey was going to get stuffed in his locker (for admitting he liked school) and Donnie decided to take his place. Thankfully, Justin's pretty dumb and stuffed Donnie into Mikey's locker, even while Mikey was standing right outside and knew the code. Meatheads.

I sigh. A cool girl named Karai passes me and waves. I wave dorkishly back, admiring her hairstyle, short and black with blond highlights. I've had a crush on her since tenth grade.

I rush back to the nurse's office. "Here, Donnie," I say, handing him his backpack.

"Thanks, Leo," he says, gratitude shining out of his eyes. He goes to the bathroom to change and comes back in his regular clothes, gym shorts and shirt balled up in his fists. When he comes back, the first thing out of his mouth is a question. "Do you know if it's ever going to stop?"

Donnie rarely asks questions, he's the one who always answers them. This bullying is going too far. "I don't know, Donatello," I say, using his full name. "I just don't know." The bell rings. "Off to class," I tell him. He hands the ice pack back to the nurse. "Come on, we have English with Raph." We get to do independent reading books right now, and I'm in the middle of the Divergent trilogy; I'm on Insurgent. Then we have to write a paper about the book, so that's fun. We also have a vocabulary test and we have to finish A Tale of Two Cities. Donnie's already done with his book, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind and our assigned book. Raph's done with the assigned one and is reading To Kill A Mockingbird. Surprising choice for him, but I'm not one to judge.

Karai is also in our class. I know some people make fun of her for how boyish she is, but I kind of like her. She's only a grade below me, in Raph's grade.

I open up my laptop to submit my book update to our teacher. My laptop is thankfully on silent mode as a message from Mikey comes in through our group chat.

hey dudes, i need to talk to you in art, it says.

Raph responds and I see his computer is open too. Did something happen?

Mikey, you okay? I ask.

i'm fine. something almost happened.

Okay. See you then, Donnie tells him. I gnaw on my lip, worried. What did Mikey mean by something almost happened to him?

The rest of class went by in a blur. Donnie, always meticulous, took careful notes while Raph tapped his foot impatiently. I paid attention, but nothing really stuck to me. I hoped Donnie would let me borrow his notes later.

The bell finally rang and we headed off to third period: art. We all had it together, so that was nice. It was an elective, and the only three others were April, Karai, and Shinigami.

I knew Mikey had a crush on Shinigami, who was from Japan and moved here in seventh grade. She wore all black and, when she could, an elaborate witch hat.

I got to work on my mini charms- katanas for me, sais for Raph, a bō staff for Donnie, and nunchucks for Mikey. Raph was making some kind of spike set to wear on his hands and Donnie was doing a wire sculpture. I hadn't seen Mikey's yet.

I walked over to him, peeking over his shoulder at the big drawing pad. On it was a sketch of the four of us, Mikey hogging a box of pizza and Raph trying to wrestle it from him, Donnie smiling as he tinkered with something in his hands, and me about to give Raph a noogie. It did so much more than just show us, it captured our very essences and personalities: Raph and Mikey's close relationship through their little arguments and games, Donnie's need to constantly be working on something, and the side of me that only came out with my brothers. The side that liked having fun.

"Mikey…" I breathed. "How did you do this?"

He looks up at me, confusion in his bright blue eyes. "Do what? Draw?"

"Yeah, and so well," I say, unable to bring my eyes off it. He shrugs.

"I don't know, it just comes to me," he says. The pencil in his left hand moves again, adding shading to the scene. "It's pretty easy, you know." I notice he isn't fidgeting like normal.

"Hey, Raph, Donnie, look at this!" I say, heart filling with pride at Mikey's drawing. They come over, having about the same reaction as me.

"Wow, Mikey," Donnie murmurs. Raph just stares, speechless.

"Dudes, you're kind of creeping me out! It's just a drawing," Mikey says.

"Well, it's really good," Raph tells him, still kind of in shock. I have to intervene before Mikey gets really freaked out. I mean, Raph is basically never impressed. With anything.

"So, what almost happened?" I ask, changing the subject.

Mikey looks at Donnie and changes the subject again. "D, what happened?"

"Gym happened," Donnie answers.

"Did you use any of the one-liners I gave you?" Mikey asks, looking strangely excited. I know he wants Donnie to be able to stick up for himself.

A hint of a smile plays at Donnie's face. "No, I came up with my own."

"Ooh! Let me hear them, pleeeeease!" Mikey begs.

Donnie rolls his eyes. "You're not going to stop asking until I do, right?"

Mikey smiles, then tries to hide it. "Please?"

"Okay."

"Yes!"

"So, as usual, Justin called me a nerd. It's getting kind of old, to be honest. But anyway, I said 'A nerd is an individual persecuted for their superior skills or intellect, most often by people who fear and envy them, so thank you. Second, I'm not a proctologist but I sure know an a**hole when I see one'." He looks at Mikey. "What do you think?"

Mikey's eyes look at Donnie's with admiration. "I don't know what a proctologist is but I love them!"

Donnie smiles a little. "Thanks."

"Nice ones, Don! The only problem is, only a nerd would know what a proctologist is," Raph says.

"Oh, and do you know what it is?" Donnie counters.

"Um… no?"

"You totally do." Donnie smirks.

"Guys!" I interrupt and turn to Mikey. "What almost happened?"

MIKEY'S P.O.V.

"Okay. So I was in music," I tell my older brothers. "And we're going to learn to play ukulele, which is pretty cool, but there was a problem."

"Which was?" Raph prompted.

"You guys know that I'm left-handed, so it felt really weird the hold the ukulele the 'normal' way, even though left-handed people do it too. And so I asked the teacher about it. She said that 'everyone holds the ukulele that way'." I look up at them. "I asked if we could restring it so that I could play it how I felt comfortable, but she said no. Now I'm never going to get good at it!" I felt tears pooling in my eyes.

Raph puts his hand on my shoulder. "Mikey, come on. Don't cry. We can figure something out."

Donnie's thinking already. "Ukuleles aren't expensive instruments, so we could probably buy one and restring it for you, Mikey."

"Wait, I'm not done!" I say. "And then Max, you know, the mean kid in my grade? Yeah, so he said that left-handed people are freaks and stupid. So I told him, 'Oh, really? And this is coming from you? So I'm guessing it's from experience'. Then he tried to beat me up, but the teacher intervened."

Raph is laughing now. "Good job, little brother!"

Leo is trying to hide the smirk on his face. "So you almost got beat up?"

I smile. "Yeah, but I got out of it."

Donnie just shakes his head and goes back to his project. Raph follows, but Leo stays for an extra moment. I look back at my drawing of the four of us and I see what Leo is talking about. It really does look like us.

"Hey, Mikey," Leo says. I look back him.

"Yeah?"

"Never stop doing this, okay?"

A huge smile spreads across my face. "Okay!"

Leo smiles too, taking a last look at the picture and then goes back to his project. I notice the other kids at the far end of the table. April's there, along with Karai and Shinigami. I think April's doing some kind of bracelet. Karai, I can see, is doing the same thing as Raph while Shinigami is sharpening something.

I add in shading to the drawing and thicken the lines around my brothers and me. It starts to spring to life in my hands, Raph getting that look of frustration and love on his face, Donnie's love of inventing, and Leo's fun side, the one where he just lets loose. But it's missing something. Dad. I frown. He should be in the picture, but where?

I can't figure out a place to put him without starting over, so I decide to give it to him when I'm done. The last thing I need to add is our masks.

Leo has a blue mask, Raph's is red, Donnie's is purple and I have a bright orange. We only wear them when we do our training. Ninja training.

I have gym next, and both Raph and Leo have warned me not to overdo it. They told me to 'stay in pace with everyone else', but what happens if they're going so slow I feel like I'm walking? Besides, when I was in middle school they didn't tell me anything! But, then again, that's probably because I was way worse back then. But now I've really picked up on my training.

Raph has gym with me. It's nice, but he's in a different section. At least he's there if I need him. I absentmindedly start erasing the small sketch lines and go over the outlines more thickly, but not too thick. Then the bell rings.

I pack up, putting the drawing in my art shelf and trot over to Raph. "You ready?" I ask.

"Yeah, whatever." He shrugs. "Come on."

"Do you know what really happened with Donnie this morning?" I ask. Raph was probably there.

"Yeah. It was Justin this time," Raph says. "Punks. Why do they have to keep beating on him?" He slams his fist into his hand.

"Well, they should learn not to mess with the Hamato family!" I say as we walk into the locker room to change.

Raph pulls off his shirt and I see the solid-packed muscle lining his stomach. We are the first ones here. "Yeah, they should. But I like hitting people. Especially after they hit you." That's his way of saying he'll protect us.

"Thanks, Raphie."

He smiles. "You're welcome."

Landon, one of my buddies, walks in. I'm dressed now and I high-five him as I follow Raph to the gym.

"You'll be okay, right?" Raph asks.

"I'll be fine," I tell him.

He walks over to his group, a bunch of bulky guys and a girl. I think it's Karai.

Landon walks out of the locker room. "Ready to kick butt?" he asks, smiling. I know he's fast, but I'm faster.

I smile. "Ready to kick your butt."

He laughs. "It is on!"