AN: Yo real quick. I was looking up the turtles' canon heights for this story and turns out canonically Leo is two inches taller than Donnie but like, everybody in the fandom has been drawing him two inches shorter, which I find is probably the funniest thing.
Chapter 1: Weapons
It had been a few weeks since Shredder had been defeated once and for all. The brothers, April and Casey were enjoying pizza in SeƱor Hueso's pizzeria. They were happily discussing the fight, to a point that Hueso had to tell them off for being disruptive.
Across the city, in a human pizzeria, Bro's Pizza, four teenagers were eating pizza as well, discussing the much less exciting topic of school. One girl, Ming, had blonde hair tied into a braid, blue eyes and freckles. She wore a flannel coat over her Sonic t-shirt, and was furiously scribbling in a notebook. Her best friend Helen, who was sitting across from her, had curly dark brown hair with black streaks, and hazel eyes. She wore mostly black, except for the one rainbow bracelet she had agreed to wear only because it was Pride Month. She was a year younger than her companions, but was smarter than them. She had skipped a grade to be in their class. Beside Helen sat her brother Jason, a year older than her but the same age as the other two. 15. His hair was black and his eyes were grey. He had black, swirly tattoos on his arm and face, and was absently texting his other friend Ricardo (who he may or may not have a crush on) on his phone while also trying to help Ming finish her late assignment. Next to Ming sat her twin brother Damien. His eyes and hair colour and freckles were all the same as Ming's, except he was taller than her by at least a half a foot, and was more attractive and more popular than her. However, with all his good sides, he wasn't the sharpest crayon in the box. That wasn't to say he was stupid, but school and grades were not high on his list of strengths.
"What did y'all get for number 12?" Ming asked, trying to finish her homework from last week to get caught up.
"18." Helen replied, taking a bite of pizza.
"I got 9.5." Jason frowned, looking up from his phone.
"I got Abraham Lincoln..." Damien added, looking over his notes. "Wait, what was the question?"
"An algebraic equation." Ming groaned. "Ugh, I hate school! This is so pointless!"
"That kind of attitude is why you're doing your homework now and not a week ago." Jason replied. "How did you get 18?"
Damien rolled his eyes, and grabbed another piece of pizza. "Hey, who's paying again?"
"You." Jason replied, now looking over Helen's shoulder at Ming's notes, debating with her over the equation.
Damien groaned. When the waiter came back around with the check, he payed, and they packed up their things to leave.
On the walk back, Helen made a mischievous suggestion that they all ran with, of course. "We should make a graffiti mural in an alley tonight."
Jason sighed. "Fine."
Damien grinned. "Great!"
Ming nodded. "Sounds better than homework."
Later that night, around 1 am or so, the four were all wearing black hoodies, with bandanas pulled over their faces. Helen, Jason and Damien had all gone with plain black bandanas, while Ming's had a drawing of a bear's face on it. They started on their mural in a dark alley in the crummy part of town. They agreed the mural would be of their favourite animals, each representing themselves. Ming was making a red fox with a fluffy tail in her corner, while Damien was making a green and orange cobra, curled and ready to strike. Helen was painting a black panther with bright amber eyes, and Jason was working on a black wolf.
Ming was adding flames to the paws to her fox when Helen grabbed her arm. "Sirens. Let's get outta here."
The four took off around the corner as the sirens grew closer. They passed a wall with graffiti of some skulls and fire. Shoot. The sirens were really close. They needed somewhere to hide.
A dumpster. Perfect. Ming grabbed Helen's arm and led the others headfirst into the half-full dumpster, there they hid, holding their breaths not out of anticipation, but for fear that one inhale would knock them unconscious from the smell.
Jason shifted, and felt something hard jab into his back. Hey, cool. A sword. He pulled the sword out from under him and looked at it. It was blue, and had a crack down the blade that, as he watched, healed itself.
"Woah..." he muttered.
"Shh!" Ming snapped automatically. Damien whacked her shoulder.
Jason ignored the two and turned the blade over in his hand. When he held the grip, energy crackled from the sword. Not sure what prompted him to do so, Jason made a circular motion with the sword. As soon as the circle was complete, the area underneath him glowed blue. At the very moment he and his friends fell through the portal, the lid to the dumpster started to open.
They landed in a pile, first Ming, then Damien, then Helen and Jason landed on top of them.
"Woah... Jason, how did you..."
"I don't know. This sword... It must be magic." He replied, gazing at the weapon.
"Lemme try it!" Ming grinned, reaching for the blade. Jason smacked her hand away.
"It's mine!" He growled, suddenly feeling protective of the sword. Besides, Ming was far from responsible enough to handle a portal sword like this. It could be a powerful and dangerous weapon in the wrong hands.
"Okay..." Ming glared at him.
"Where are we?" Helen asked, catching the others' attention.
That was a fair question. They seemed to be in a crumbled building, surrounded by debris and carnage. It looked like a war had torn this place apart.
"Careful." Jason hissed, holding the sword in front of him as they made their way through the debris.
Ming pointed out the Statue of Liberty. "We're still in New York."
The others nodded, looking around. It looked to be the remains of an old hotel.
Helen suddenly noticed a red crackle of energy. Curious, she moved closer to investigate. Moving rocks and rubble aside, she discovered a pair of tonfas, electrical energy crackling every few seconds. She reached for them, and as soon as her hand touched the handles, the crackling jumped to her hand, but it didn't hurt.
"Woah..." she muttered, picking up the sticks. They had a huge crack down the middle of them, like they had been snapped in half, but they quickly repaired themselves, the splintered wood fusing back together like nothing had happened. She grabbed the handles and shifted the tonfas into a defensive and offensive position. They fit almost perfectly, as though they had been crafted just for her.
"LOOK OUT!" Ming screeched suddenly. Helen looked up to see a chunk of roof falling towards her quickly. With no time to think, she raised the tonfas above her head.
Suddenly, everything appeared red. Helen felt the roof chunk hit, but it felt like it was blocked. Slowly, she looked up, to see her arms covered in a bright red shield like glow. The roof chunk had broken in half upon hitting the magic glow and was laying at her feet. As Helen inspected the shield, she noticed it was more like an extension of her own arms, like a protective armor around herself.
"HELEN!" Jason ran to her. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah... I'm fine..." She shifted her grip on the tonfas, and the magic disappeared. "I found another magic weapon."
"Cool! Can I try them?" Ming asked, eyes lighting up with wonder.
"No!" Helen growled.
"No fair! I want a magic weapon!" Ming whined.
"Aren't you supposed to be older than me?" Helen taunted. "You're way too irresponsible to be trusted with something like this. Besides, finders keepers."
"Fine. But if I find a magic weapon, I get to keep it!"
"Be my guest." Damien snorted. "But if I find it first, I get it."
"What are the chances we're going to find another magic weapon?" Jason scoffed.
That was a fair point. Ming and Damien both growled at the injustice of it all.
"Come on, let's start home. We might be able to make it before sunrise if we take a few shortcuts." Damien sighed, waving the others to follow him.
"Shortcuts?"
Damien led them to a manhole and lifted the cover. Helen and Jason both groaned in disgust.
"There is no way we're taking the sewers home."
"Yeah. You wanna smell like shit by the time we get there?"
Ming just shrugged and climbed in without complaint. She and Damien had been raised on a farm before moving to the city, and she was used to a bit of manure and ammonia. Damien followed her. He would take the sewers of New York over mucking out a pig barn again, or being caught out this late past curfew.
With more complaints, Helen and Jason followed, tucking their weapons into their belts and trudging unhappily through the muck and slime of the sewers.
After a while of walking, they came to a crossroads.
"We should go left." Damien pointed.
"We went left last time. I knew you didn't know where you were going!" Ming hissed.
"I do too!" Damien shot back. "I know exactly where we are!"
"Oh really?" Ming pointed above her. "There's a manhole cover. You tell me exactly where we are right now and I can go and check. If you're right, I'll give you three bags of Skittles. If you're wrong, I get the giant value-sized bag of salt and vinegar chips you bought yesterday that I know you haven't opened yet."
"Deal." Damien smirked. "We're just below the main road next to the SuperMall."
Ming climbed up to the manhole cover and took a peek. "WE'RE NOWHERE NEAR THE SUPERMALL!" She yelled down.
"Rats..." Damien growled.
"Where are we then?" Helen called up to Ming.
"I don't know! I think we went the wrong direction." Ming climbed down to the others. "We better go back to the hotel via sewers since we haven't gone too far. Then we'll go home by the streets, and never take Damien's shortcuts again."
"Agreed." Helen nodded.
"Great idea." Jason added.
Damien grumbled to himself as they started back the way they had come, but only to quickly get turned around and lose their way. Worse, there wasn't a manhole cover in sight.
It had now been a few hours since their near run-in with the cops, and they were getting tired, hungry and grumpy. Helen, Damien and Ming were arguing about which way to go, and Jason was trying to get his portal sword to work again. Unfortunately, it didn't seem to want to cooperate with him.
Eventually, Helen started walking, and the others just followed, Damien still growling at her about how they were going the wrong way and if they had just listened to him in the first place, they would be home by now.
"There. A manhole cover." Helen pointed, smirking at Damien, who just growled. Ming and Jason both headed for the exit, Ming climbing up first. She lifted the lid, to find themselves in an unfamiliar part of town. They were mostly just happy to be out of the sewers.
"Okay, now what?" Helen asked. They looked around. Nobody could really pinpoint where they were.
There were tall office buildings on each side, and nobody could see a significant landmark that could've helped them find their way. They just started walking, huddled together, unsettled by the unfamiliar location. Helen walked in front and Jason walked in back, each tightly holding their weapons, just in case.
That was when Damien saw an orange glint in the faint light. Curious, and hopeful that it was either a clue or maybe another cool weapon, he moved closer to investigate.
As he moved some trash bags to get a better look, he heard the others let out cries of surprise. Turning, he saw a bunch of vines... quickly growing around him, covering the alley entrance. They were strange, purple and seemed to move like possessed snakes.
Panicking, Damien turned back to his discovery. It was an orange ball attached to a handle. Swinging it a little, he found the ball was connected to a chain, which only grew longer. Upon closer inspection, he discovered parts of the chain had huge breaks in them, but then sealed themselves over.
There were small blades coming out of the ball, so Damien started cutting at the vines. Suddenly, an evil laugh came from the weapon, and it caught fire!
"Woah!" Damien swung the chain, and the laughing fireball cut through the vines with ease. The vines screamed and shrunk away, revealing his friends, who had been trying to get through the vines, Jason cutting them, Helen punching with the tonfas repeatedly, and Ming scratching away with her bare hands. They all stopped when they saw Damien and the fiery weapon.
"Wow! A kusari-fundo fire spirit?" Ming gasped. "I don't suppose you'd let me give it a try-"
"No way!" Damien snarled. Ming sighed. She had been too hopeful.
"What were those?" Jason asked, picking up a piece of sliced vine.
"I dunno. Never seen purple vines like that." Damien frowned. "It's definitely been a weird night."
"No kidding." Helen agreed. "Come on, we gotta find a way home."
"I'm a bit more worried about those vines, Helen." Jason growled. "They came from somewhere. Why did they attack us? Could it have something to do with these weapons?"
Ming looked up at the now brightening sky. "If you can't get your fancy portal sword to work right now, Jason, then our parents are gonna have everybody from the cops to the Avengers hunting us down."
"Ming's right." Helen agreed. "We can't worry about solving mysteries. We're on a time crunch."
Jason nodded, and started to wave the portal sword a bit. How had he done it before? He had drawn a circle underneath them. Jason carefully traced a large circle in the air, and to his luck, a blue portal appeared. They leapt through, only to find themselves not anywhere near home.
They were spat out of the portal on top of Lady Liberty's head. Ming gasped and grabbed onto Damien.
"JASON!"
"SORRY!"
Jason gave it another shot. This time the portal landed them closer to the ground. Actually, it landed them under the ground.
In the sewers.
