Leo inhaled and breathed in Raphael's scent. He smiled to himself as he pushed himself up to leave their bed for his morning meditation.

Raphael's arms snaked around him and pulled him back down into his side.

"Uh uh," Raphael mumbled. "If you get up to meditate then that means I have to get up soon for practice and I want to stay right here today."

Leo smiled into Raphael's neck. "Ok."

"Yeah?"

Leo felt the emerald arms tighten around him. He nudged Raph's face to the side and pressed his face in Raph's neck again before angling his mouth enough to allow his tongue to reach out and swipe at one of Raph's pulse points.

Raphael rumbled out a laugh. "There's no way you're actually gonna stay here in bed with me so don't even start."

"Who says I'm not staying here with you all day?"

"Papa up! Papa up!"

Raphael groaned. "The lady of the house says so. Why doesn't she ever call for you first thing in the mornin?"

"Because she knows I'm usually not even here," Leo said, giving Raph a quick kiss before rising up out of Raph's arms and leaving their bed.

Raph groaned again and climbed out of bed himself to head to Machi's room as he watched Leo leave the apartment to head up to the dojo. He made breakfast for both kids and headed upstairs almost an hour later when Master Splinter arrived to babysit so he could go to practice.

He met Mikey in the hallway and jogged up the stairs with him as Mike told him about a new dinnertime location he and Woody were going to try out with their food truck because it had the added benefit of being next to a video game store. He swatted Mikey's annoying hands away from his face as they reached the fourth floor where they found Leo and Donnie standing in the hallway waiting for them.

"We're heading out," Leo said, passing them as he headed back into the stairwell.

Donnie shrugged at them and followed along. Raph frowned. Leo hadn't said anything to him about a practice run this morning.

They'd sprinted for almost fifteen minutes before Leo stopped abruptly and turned to them.

"We're going to meet Karai," Leo said suddenly.

"Wait, Karai – Karai?" Mikey asked.

"How long has she been back?" Donnie asked.

"Yes," Leo said with a nod to Mike before turning to Donnie with an, "I don't know." He glanced a look at Raphael and noted his frown. "She has a proposition for our clan and I wanted you all to come with me to hear it."

"Wait, we're on our way to see Karai right now?" Donnie asked, looking alarmed.

"Karai – Karai?" asked Mikey, still looking confused.

"Why do you want us to come with ya?" Raph asked, still frowning. He'd assumed Leo would meet up with Karai on his own. And he'd been determined to be ok with it.

Leo paused and looked to the ground. He felt only anger when he thought of Karai and he didn't want that anger to cloud his judgment at her request, especially since his initial response was a flat out refusal to help. He wanted his brothers there to provide their own opinions on whatever she had to ask of them. Leo glanced up and met Raphael's green eyes.

Raph smirked and shook his head before saying, "Fine, but don't get mad when you hear what we have to say."

Donnie and Mikey glanced between Leo and Raph. Donnie nodded. Mikey shrugged. Leo turned and began running again, feeling comfort in hearing his brothers behind him.

They landed on the rooftop of the former TCRI building and Karai turned around to face them. Seeing the four of them together surprised her, and for a split second she felt the same relief at seeing their familiar faces that she'd felt the night before when she'd happened upon Leonardo. She pushed the feeling away.

She watched as they stopped a few feet away from her. Leo stood with his arms crossed a miniscule distance ahead of his three brothers. Their faces were stern, except for Mikey who appeared to be curiously staring at her. She couldn't imagine what he found so interesting.

Her eyes scanned over Leo again, taking in the newest scars before narrowing on his arm as she recognized the symbol for the letter R, which appeared to be drawn on with marker. She wondered again if Leo had someone waiting for him at home who would've had such easy access to his arm.

Karai realized they were waiting for her to start speaking and since it had taken her weeks to find them to set this meeting up, she figured she'd better hurry and take advantage of it.

"No one else knew that the Shredder was not my true father. And after his death, I was asked, as The Foot clan heir, to return to Japan." She paused for a moment and cursed the turtles' ability to keep emotion from their faces at will. "It took some work but I have managed to re-organize The Foot into an agency that no longer harms people." She allowed a small amount of pride on her face. "We have reduced the crime rate in the cities of Japan by 83%."

She paused again. They continued to stare at her with narrowed eyes. She sighed inwardly. They were clearly going to be hard to win over.

"Since you all do not advertise what you do for the city and The Foot clan does, we were contacted by a man here in New York who has requested our help. His name is Winters and he asked that we help welcome some friends to the city." She rubbed her hands together as she scowled, thinking of her group's pitiful attempts to collect any of the creatures. "However, it turns out that these friends are ancient monsters from another world. They're not easy to find, nor are they easy to capture. Winters has some Stone Generals that he insists I work with, but I'd feel more comfortable if you would help as well."

"Generals made of actual stone?" Donnie asked with a raised eye ridge.

She nodded. She knew how that would sound to the smart turtle. "Winters hasn't said himself, but from the research we have gathered, he managed to gain immortality thousands of years ago, but at a price. His generals were turned to stone and the monsters were released into this world. If he can return them when a portal opens, the curse will be lifted. But we're running out of time. We only have three days left to find all thirteen monsters."

Leo turned away from her and walked to the edge of the roof with his brothers swiftly following him. Karai was so busy watching Leo duck his head into a circle with his brothers that she almost didn't notice that Mikey had stayed behind until he sidestepped to the left and effectively blocked her view of the turtle huddle.

She raised her eyes up to his blue ones and found him staring at her curiously again. He tilted his head to the side as if the different angle would help him see what he wanted from her.

"You messed up big this time," Mikey finally said.

She narrowed her eyes at him. She knew Michelangelo was the joker in the family, but he certainly wasn't smiling at her right now. "All I'm doing is asking for a little help from my family." She watched Mikey tilt his head the other direction and frown at her.

"I don't think that you really believe we're your family. Family doesn't disappear for six years without even dropping a note once to say that they're alright."

"Clearly I've been alright," she said with as little emotion in her voice as she could manage.

"You haven't even asked about Master Splinter," Mikey said.

Karai ducked her eyes away from Mikey's intense glare. Damn if didn't look exactly like Leonardo when he did that. There was something about having the disapproval from the most easy-going of the turtles that was beginning to anger her.

She raised her eyes back up and suddenly found the other three brothers standing on either side of the orange-clad baby brother. She hadn't even heard them move back across the rooftop.

"We've decided that we will help you," Leo said, his arms crossed with a blank expression on his face. "But only because we cant allow these monsters to roam the streets and hurt innocent citizens. We'll meet up tonight and break into teams to cover more ground."

Karai frowned again and began to protest. "This is still my job."

Leo raised an eye ridge that made her want to smack the blue cloth off his face, but Raph beat Leo to a response.

"I'm afraid if you want help from the Hamatos, yer gonna have to do what leader turtle says."

"Is that what you do, Raphael? You follow all of Leo's orders now?" She expected an angry response. In fact, with the mood she was in now, she was counting on it. She wanted to see Raphael charge at her. Either Leo would stop him and she could smirk at the red-clad turtle for following orders again or she could engage in an actual spar with him and burn off some of her frustration. Either situation worked for her.

Instead, she watched as amusement instead of anger filled Raphael's eyes. And when he opened his mouth it was only to say, "Every day," with a goddamn smile on his face.

She scowled at him before turning back to Leo. "Are we meeting back here or are you going to share with me where you all have moved?"

"We're definitely not doing that," Donatello said before Leo could release the laugh that Donnie could see building up in his big brother. Leonardo was definitely angry and Donnie was going to try to keep as much peace as possible.

Leo bit the hysterical laugh back, thankful for Donnie's good judgment. "We'll meet back here at eight."

Raphael cleared his throat and Karai watched Leonardo's eyes dart to Raphael and stare at him for a moment before looking back to her.

"We'll meet back here at nine," Leo finally said and Karai was left to wonder not only about their silent conversation, but also about what would keep them so busy that they would push patrols back an hour.

The four brothers were sprinting away from her before she got a chance to ask.


They sped home in silence which was only broken once they reached the rooftop of Hamato Engineering.

"Eight pm is a little early for me to be finished with the dinner shift plus clean up on the truck," Mikey said. "So I'm not complaining about you pushing patrols back, but why can't you make it at eight?"

"We put the kids to bed at eight," Raph said, following the others into the stairwell.

"Good call," Mikey responded.

Leo listened to their conversation and suddenly let loose the hysterical laughter he'd kept in earlier. He tried to rein it in when he realized his three brothers had stopped in their tracks to turn and stare at him. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry," he said, still laughing. "Seeing Karai just reminds me of us as teenagers except right now I'm listening to Mikey being responsible about his career and Raphael is reminding me that we have to be home to put our kids in bed." He couldn't contain the loud laughter, especially when he saw laughter begin to erupt out of his brothers as well.

"If I don't clean up the kitchen in the truck every night, it's nearly impossible to get the crusty food off the stove the next day!" Mikey said, sliding to the ground as he wiped tears from his eyes from laughing so hard.

"And if you don't find Machi's stuffed turtle by bedtime, she refuses to go to sleep!" Raphael said, his rumbling laughter echoing off the walls of the stairwell.

"And Casey and April are going to have a baby!" Leo said, pressing his fist into his tight side muscles, which were beginning to become sore from excessive laughing.

"Casey couldn't hang out last night because he had to go to a birth class with April at the hospital!" Raph said.

"Stop! Stop, dudes!" Mikey said, rubbing at his own sides.

"Sadie and I decided to get married," Donnie said through his giggling. His three brothers abruptly stopped laughing and turned to him with smiles and sincere congratulations.

And then Leo threw his head back and burst out laughing again as he slid to the ground as well. "You're going to need a tuxedo!" He felt Raphael slide down next to him, his rumbling laughter shaking Leo's shoulder.


A/N: Yes, these guys are still 2012-series based (although I've gone way off course, there, amiright?) And yes, now I'm referencing the 2007 movie. But I'm about to take a TON of liberties with that plot-line as well…