Crestfallen at The End of The World

Chapter 2: Hot Potato

Bby Casey is my life

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Leonardo gently shushed the baby quietly crying in the crook of his arm, standing in the middle of their eating/kitchen area while rocking Casey back and forth tiredly. The baby was close to tears, but he has been for the past hour, quiet hiccups escaping every now and again.

Casey, at the precious age of four months old, had almost mastered self-soothing. It broke everyone's heart, but it was a necessity. But that doesn't mean he doesn't have his moments. Leonardo was just lucky Casey hadn't begun to wail yet.

Cassandra tiredly watches from where she rests on the floor, sitting cross legged. She doesn't offer any help, not that Leo would ask for any, since it's his turn to take care of Casey as his makeshift dad. A reluctant title, as Leonardo had lost to Donatello and Michaelangelo and therefore earned dad rights.

Previously, Leo had been sitting quietly in the dark, prosthetic abandoned beside him as he feverishly sipped from his flask, pinching the skin where his left arm used to be. Then Cass had sauntered in, son cradled in her arms who was on the verge of tears, and deposited Casey to Leo's hold before dropping to the ground, a muttered 'You lost rock paper scissors,' trailing behind her.

Alcohol abandoned, he'd pulled himself together as best as he could, but honestly at this point his own tears threaten to join the baby's.

This is how Donatello found the pair when he woke up, with Leonardo slumped on the ground unconscious, and Casey held uncomfortably in his grip, his little head bent wrong to sit on Leo's shoulder. Cassandra was slumped forward in a sitting position, chin to her chest.

Donatello clicked his tongue in sympathy and disdain, removing the little boy from the uncomfortable position to save his fragile neck from the pain. He carefully adjusts his hold so the boy's head rests just below the top of his plastron. Casey quickly made himself comfortable, squishing his face against the softshell mutant.

Hiding a sappy smile, Donatello turned back to Cass and used a spider limb to carefully push her back so she wouldn't wake up complaining about her back in the morning.

He contemplated doing the same for his twin before said brother snorted awake, clenching his fingers before snapping awake. He looked around for a moment, disoriented, before he caught sight of Casey sleeping peacefully in Donnie's arm. Donatello raised a tattooed eyebrow at the slider, before nudging the prosthetic closer to Leo so he could put it on.

He obliged, though only after a long suffering sigh, as if the arm were a burden. (It was a burden, designed specifically for him.)

"What's eating you?" Donnie asked, tucking Casey's arm back in from where it lazily hung by his side. Leo shrugged, and suddenly Donnie was hit by a wave a dejá vu and they weren't twenty-four anymore, just two teenagers struck by insomnia, confiding in each other in the early hours.

"A real answer, 'Nardo." Donnie chided, lowering himself to sit shoulder-to-shoulder with his brother. They sat in silence for mere moments, before Leo cracked and slumped forward.

"I failed again." He quietly admitted, hiding his face in his hands. He refused to see the realization cross his twin's face.

"I should start hiding that flask, why do we even have alcohol in the first place?" Donnie rhetorically asked, because they both knew why. It was supposed to be used to disinfect wounds.

Leo only looked up, eyes cloudy. "I'll let you hide it." The lighthearted tone fell flat, and sounded solemn. Donnie still nodded though. He'd hide it, if only because he couldn't burn metal.

They basked in each other's presence, only Casey's nasally breathing breaking the silence.

"Maybe I should let you have dad privileges, huh?" Leo attempted to joke. Donnie cringed and gagged.

"SHELLDON is enough for me, thank you." He politely declined the offer as if it were a gift.

"I dunno, you're doing pretty good here."

"No. You lost rock paper scissors fair and square, you're the dad."

"So what I'm hearing is that it gets passed to you when I die then, hm? Since you beat me and Mikey."

"You know that wasn't funny."

Leo swallows shallowly because yeah, he knows that wasn't funny. But he's nervous, okay? He doesn't know how to be a dad.

"Have any tips for parenting then, since you had SHELLDON?" He extended an olive branch, hoping to move past his poor attempt at humor.

It was reluctantly accepted, but Leonardo has a feeling Dr. Delicate Touch will be hearing about this.

"There's not much to share, since there is a difference between a robot turtle and a human baby." Donnie snarked. Leo rolled his eyes.

"You know what I mean."

"I'm afraid not, please shed some light."

A pleading look.

"You just gotta love 'em, man. I dunno, what do you want from me?" Donnie helplessly shrugged, mindful of the sleeping baby.

"So you finally break your emotionless bad boy persona?"

"I never said that."

"Pretty sure love counts as an emotion, bro."

Donnie spared a glance down at Casey, joined by Leo soon after.

Casey was… Soft, in a literal sense. He was new, and helpless. Someone that made you want to cradle him close, to keep him safe from the world. He made the world seem lighter when he was close. He made you waver, and you couldn't help but soften your heart for him. It was a powerful feeling, one that threatened to break open Donnie's ribs and crush his own heart more times than he'd care to admit.

"It does, huh? But you just gotta love him." Donnie swallows down any other sappy words that threaten to escape, and instead brushes a thumb across the baby's cheek, gently swiping across faint freckles. Casey hums softly, a gummy smile spreading across his little face.

Whelmed by sudden emotion, Donatello surrenders Casey back to Leonardo and escapes the room, finding refuge in his room, where he pretends to busy himself with plans until it becomes actual work to do.