goodlucktai reblogged
To @goodlucktai for T3's gift exchange!!!
Anonymous asked:
Would you maybe do 8 with Leo talking to Usagi? :D
8. “Okay. Okay, here’s what we’re gonna do—fuck.”
x
The subway tunnels are dark, half-collapsed, and the purest pitch black. Leonardo’s eyes are hooded white when Usagi sweeps the beam of his penlight towards him. Usagi’s never gotten a straight answer from any of the turtles about what, exactly, they had been genetically modified for in the first place, but he watches Leonardo pass his own light to one of the frightened humans behind him and figures he could add ‘built-in night vision’ to the column of weird abilities he’s seen firsthand proof of.
The woman takes the light from Leo and passes it to her young daughter, who clutches it like a lifeline. No one from their group makes a sound, hyper-aware that the Krang hounds they barely managed to outrun could make a reappearance at any second.
“Okay,” Leo says, in that steadfast, fearless tone of voice that made heads swivel from every corner of the room to pay attention when he talked. “Okay, here’s what we’re gonna do—fuck.”
“What?” Usagi blurts, jolting forward. “Leonardo, what?”
He tries to keep the panic out of his voice, for the sake of the humans they had not quite managed to fully save just yet, but he can’t help the way his heart starts to race. Leo doesn’t swear. He never swears. Every time he used to, he would look around guiltily, waiting for his big brother to swoop in out of thin air and scold him— “I don’t care if you’re a hotshot resistance leader,” Raph would say, “you’re still my brat of a baby brother, and I’m still bigger than you.”
But Raph died two years ago, and is no longer around to scold him for it. It didn’t stop Leo’s knee-jerk reaction of looking over his shoulder for him, as if he still might appear. And Usagi knows that hurt him every time. So Leo doesn’t swear.
For him to break out the big guns, something must really be wrong. Usagi sweeps the light over him, his pulse pounding in his ears, and freezes when he finds what definitely looks like a piece of metal sticking out of Leonardo’s arm.
Leo tilts away from him, putting the injury in the dark, and says, “Hush, Cottontail. We can’t let the hounds know we’re here.”
But what was already a tricky situation has become a ticking time bomb. The hounds are nearby, their warbling, high-pitched croons reverberating down the dark tunnels, making it nearly impossible to pinpoint their location by sound. They’ll follow the scent of blood from a quarter of a mile away, like sharks. And Leo’s losing it fast—alarmingly fast.
He unties his mask from around his eyes and uses his teeth to knot it around his arm instead, tight above the wound. He’s perfunctory and businesslike about it, and when he looks up Usagi knows he’s going to say something horrible.
Sure enough, “I’ll draw them away,” Leonardo says. “Once I do, you get these people to safety. We’re not that far from the safe zone, you’ll make it.”
Only that’s not how it’s going to go. Because Leo’s siblings are waiting for him. Because Mikey still hugs Leo like an octopus any time one of them leaves without the other, every single time, almost thirty years old and made ancient by grief and fear but still very much someone’s baby brother. Because if Usagi goes through with this, he’ll have to look April and Mikey both in the eye when he returns, and he doesn’t have the stomach for that.
A crooning howl creeps toward them, alarmingly close. The hounds are getting excited, as if they’ve picked up the trail. Usagi shifts one step back, then another.
Leonardo says, “Don’t. Don’t you dare.” It’s his leader voice, but it doesn’t work on anyone who grew up with him. And they were kids together before the end of the world.
“Sorry,” he whispers, because he is. If he had a choice, he wouldn’t go. But this—him or Leo—this isn’t a decision that needs to be made. This just is what it is.
goodlucktai reblogged
Anonymous asked:
7 for Leosagi?? 🥺
7. “No. No, stop. Stop talking like that. You’re gonna be fine.”
i'm so sorry in advance. here's a song rec ❤️🩹
x
It’s not like Usagi expected to get a happy ending out of the apocalypse. It’s not like a happy ending could exist anymore—that idea went up in smoke the day Raphael died and took a part of every single person who loved him right along with him.
Leo hasn’t been Leo since then, not really. That magnetic person Usagi first met in Run of the Mill, with brilliant gold eyes and the loudest laugh in the room, is made up of smaller parts, and those parts run around in color-coded bandanas.
Losing Donatello was devastating for all of them, and in some ways was the final nail in the coffin that no one wanted to admit they had already dug a grave for in their minds.
Oh, Usagi realized that night, in between holding Leo and praying he’d scream or cry or do anything other than stare vacantly at the wall, I’m never getting him back again, am I?
That shining boy Usagi fell in love with was long gone by then.
But the man left behind still woke up in the morning and went to work, and his unyielding heart still beat for them, and his brand-new way of smiling with half the life he used to have was becoming more familiar every day.
Usagi knew that he and April were two of Leo’s touchstones, important and integral and necessary. He also knew that Michelangelo and Casey Jr. were the real miracle workers.
Mission room, quick, Mikey had sent one day with ninpo rather than a communicator, more of a feeling that gave the impression of words than an actual message. But Usagi had been an unofficial adoptee of the Hamato clan long enough that the turtles’ ninpo had a well-worn little nook inside his soul to rest in, and he was moving before Mikey’s voice had faded.
April was already in the doorway when he skidded into the hall, and he didn’t have a chance to ask what the matter was before he heard what had to have put that stunned look on her face.
Laughter.
Leo and his little brother and his little ward were sitting around the table, and what had probably begun as a lesson in strategy had devolved into what sounded like a homebrewed D&D campaign. Mikey was sitting cross-legged on the table, forming little figurines out of light as Casey requested them that became solid as they traded hands.
It was a pocket of goodness Usagi never would have guessed he would find that day. Mikey looked over his shoulder and beckoned them in with a nod of his head, smile widening to include them.
“Living up to your name every day, Angelo,” April murmured, hopping up to sit on the edge of the table and bumping her shoulder into his.
“You guys make it easy,” Mikey said as if his little miracles were unremarkable.
Usagi circled around the table to sit on Casey’s free side, rewarded with a samurai rabbit figurine and a backstory that sounded a lot like a fictionalized version of the horrifying disaster of a mission of four years ago, when he had led a pack of Krang hounds away from a cluster of survivors and somehow managed not to die for his troubles. Casey’s rendition edited out a lot of his panicked swearing, and made him sound more like a hero than anything.
Usagi had only told his fiancé the finer details, so this heroic Yojimbo character had to have come from him. It made his heart warm, and he listened to Casey’s earnest, inherited storyteller voice and Leo’s indulgent, leading questions fill the room for long after he should have gone to find some work to do.
And then the Krang arrived by the hundreds, with their hounds and their parasites, and crashed over the resistance like high tide. Everything fell apart, their forces scattering to survive only to be picked off one by one. Usagi lost sight of his family in the chaos, but then a beacon went up. It attracted attention for miles, and Usagi gritted his teeth and fought like hell to get there first.
He felt it when Mikey’s ninpo went supernova—an echo inside his heart that felt like loss. That felt like grief.
No, Usagi thought. Please no.
Anonymous asked:
7 for Leosagi?? 🥺
7. “No. No, stop. Stop talking like that. You’re gonna be fine.”
i'm so sorry in advance. here's a song rec ❤️🩹
x
It’s not like Usagi expected to get a happy ending out of the apocalypse. It’s not like a happy ending could exist anymore—that idea went up in smoke the day Raphael died and took a part of every single person who loved him right along with him.
Leo hasn’t been Leo since then, not really. That magnetic person Usagi first met in Run of the Mill, with brilliant gold eyes and the loudest laugh in the room, is made up of smaller parts, and those parts run around in color-coded bandanas.
Losing Donatello was devastating for all of them, and in some ways was the final nail in the coffin that no one wanted to admit they had already dug a grave for in their minds.
Oh, Usagi realized that night, in between holding Leo and praying he’d scream or cry or do anything other than stare vacantly at the wall, I’m never getting him back again, am I?
That shining boy Usagi fell in love with was long gone by then.
But the man left behind still woke up in the morning and went to work, and his unyielding heart still beat for them, and his brand-new way of smiling with half the life he used to have was becoming more familiar every day.
Usagi knew that he and April were two of Leo’s touchstones, important and integral and necessary. He also knew that Michelangelo and Casey Jr. were the real miracle workers.
Mission room, quick, Mikey had sent one day with ninpo rather than a communicator, more of a feeling that gave the impression of words than an actual message. But Usagi had been an unofficial adoptee of the Hamato clan long enough that the turtles’ ninpo had a well-worn little nook inside his soul to rest in, and he was moving before Mikey’s voice had faded.
April was already in the doorway when he skidded into the hall, and he didn’t have a chance to ask what the matter was before he heard what had to have put that stunned look on her face.
Laughter.
Leo and his little brother and his little ward were sitting around the table, and what had probably begun as a lesson in strategy had devolved into what sounded like a homebrewed D&D campaign. Mikey was sitting cross-legged on the table, forming little figurines out of light as Casey requested them that became solid as they traded hands.
It was a pocket of goodness Usagi never would have guessed he would find that day. Mikey looked over his shoulder and beckoned them in with a nod of his head, smile widening to include them.
“Living up to your name every day, Angelo,” April murmured, hopping up to sit on the edge of the table and bumping her shoulder into his.
“You guys make it easy,” Mikey said as if his little miracles were unremarkable.
Usagi circled around the table to sit on Casey’s free side, rewarded with a samurai rabbit figurine and a backstory that sounded a lot like a fictionalized version of the horrifying disaster of a mission of four years ago, when he had led a pack of Krang hounds away from a cluster of survivors and somehow managed not to die for his troubles. Casey’s rendition edited out a lot of his panicked swearing, and made him sound more like a hero than anything.
Usagi had only told his fiancé the finer details, so this heroic Yojimbo character had to have come from him. It made his heart warm, and he listened to Casey’s earnest, inherited storyteller voice and Leo’s indulgent, leading questions fill the room for long after he should have gone to find some work to do.
And then the Krang arrived by the hundreds, with their hounds and their parasites, and crashed over the resistance like high tide. Everything fell apart, their forces scattering to survive only to be picked off one by one. Usagi lost sight of his family in the chaos, but then a beacon went up. It attracted attention for miles, and Usagi gritted his teeth and fought like hell to get there first.
He felt it when Mikey’s ninpo went supernova—an echo inside his heart that felt like loss. That felt like grief.
No, Usagi thought. Please no.
Anonymous asked:
if you’re taking suggestions for the leosagi series you wrote - maybe leo with champion when shes a little older being a menace? or just leo and yui on a date. idk whatever u want :)))
x
At first, Yuichi didn’t know why Leonardo was so annoyed about his family crashing their dates. The Hamato siblings were fun to be around and folded Yuichi into their shenanigans as though it cost them nothing to include him. And it was always worthwhile to see Leonardo in his natural habitat—those sweet and silly and childish sides of him that only came out of their shell at home—so he never minded when he drove down to the lair to visit Leonardo and their time together was never time alone together.
Then Leonardo came over to Yuichi’s house to watch a movie and Yuichi’s cousins invited themselves into the den and each made it their life’s mission to make Yuichi wish he was an only child. Leonardo thought they were hilarious and encouraged their antics like the troublemaker he was but Yuichi firmly resolved to never laugh at him for complaining about his brothers ever again.
“We should go out sometime,” Yuichi said pointedly, staring very hard at the unrepentant little fluffy faces peeking at him from the porch windows. “We could get dinner. Or go skating. Or vandalize public property. I’m not picky.”
“Or all of the above!” Leonardo chimed brightly, the blue light of a portal flickering playfully behind him. He squeezed Yuichi’s hands and added, “I like the way you think, Snowball. Let me know when you’re off work on Friday and I’ll come steal you from tío.”
He leaned in like he was thinking about going for a kiss, then seemed to remember they had an audience and backed off again with a nervous giggle.
Goddammit, Yuichi thought with feeling. The constant scrutiny was actually ruining his entire life.
So that’s how they end up here; Yuichi has his bike helmet tucked under one arm, watching with amusement as his boyfriend stands in front of his assembled family and lays down the law.
“One last time: what are you not going to do,” Leonardo says in a no-nonsense tone, arms folded across his plastron, borrowed purple bomber jacket glittering where the living room lights hit the sequins. He’s unfairly cute.
“Stalk, supervise or spy,” his siblings recite with varying levels of agreeableness.
“And what will happen if I catch any of you doing any of those things?”
“You’ll portal our favorite belongings into the ocean.”
“And I will catch you,” Leonardo adds dangerously. “My phone is on, I’m sharing my location, I’ll be with Yui the entire time, and we probably won’t do anything crazier than trying that new Greek restaurant on 9th Ave.”
“You’d try Gyros Stop without us?” Michelangelo demands with a look of absolute betrayal and wet, shiny eyes. Yuichi honestly can’t tell if he’s kidding or not, but Leonardo is completely unmoved.
“Pushing your luck, Miguel. I’ll bring back baklava.”
The crocodile tears dry right up. One camera shutter sound later, Leonardo is staring at Casey and Casey is staring at the floor, new phone clutched guiltily to his chest.
“I promised April I’d get a picture,” he whispers.
“If you go into the settings you can turn the sound effect off for next time,” Donnie says, leaning over his nephew’s shoulder.
“Next time?” Leonardo all but shrieks.
“Hey, so you two should get going, huh?” Raphael interjects quickly—probably because he can sense the situation rapidly deteriorating by the second. “Have a good time! Tell Raph all about it later!”
goodlucktai reblogged
Anonymous asked:
I'd love to see some of the events in Give Me Something That'll Haunt Me from some other perspectives, especially Leo's brothers. You're a very skilled writer so we already have some idea as to how each of them warmed up to Usagi, but it would be really cool to see their thoughts on the situation! How April thought Usagi hated Leo at first, how everyone was dealing with a mopey Leo after his breakdown with the farmbotto, Usagi winning Donnie over in like two minutes, all of that stuff!
x
They’re halfway through Legally Blonde when April gets a text that makes her frown. Her attention is fully arrested by her phone for the whole Bend and Snap scene, which attracts her most perceptive brother's attention. Leo is too sore to throw the projector remote at her himself, so he makes eye contact with Mikey. Ever-reliable Mikey snaps a quick salute and lobs the remote at her in Leo’s stead.
“Ow! Angelo!” April snaps without any real heat, returning fire with an empty cup.
“You’re making Leon feel neglected,” Donnie supplies without looking up from his tablet, like the hypocrite he is. He’s been stubbornly nestled next to Leo for most of the evening, though, so Leo is willing to give him a pass on most things.
“Aww, Blue, you know you’re my number one man,” she says, to an immediate chorus of “say what now?” from Mikey, Raph and Donnie. “Suna just wanted to know if I’d be able to drop by tomorrow morning,” April adds, which is not quite the truth.
Leo brightens, a sly grin curling across his face. “Is it a date?”
“No, it’s not a date,” April says. She can’t help feeling helplessly fond when she looks at him.
All four of her little brothers were equal parts supportive and obnoxious when she and Sunita started officially going out about a year ago, which was pretty par for the course. Splinter demanded to meet the yokai, to make sure that she was good enough for his girl, which was enough to make April tear up even as she joined the boys in giving him shit for being such a typical boring dad.
But the most remarkable thing to come out of it was Leo approaching her right before she went home, mask tails all twisted up in his fingers in a blatantly anxious display, to say, “You’re a girl, and you like a girl. And it’s okay.”
“Yeah?”
“So is it—would it be okay to like both?”
And April had hugged him so hard that the pattern on his scutes left faint imprints on her arms, and she kissed him all over his face until he was laughing helplessly, and said, “You can like whoever you want, baby. Whoever treats you right. And if anyone ever gives you shit for it, you come right to me, capisce?”
What April was really saying back then was that she would never let anybody hurt him. And she meant it, of course she meant it, but—god, she failed.
goodlucktai reblogged
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter one: keep on keeping your eyes on me
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 1k title borrowed from sparks fly by tswift post-movie
(next)
x
Usagi Yuichi doesn’t have a crush on that striped turtle guy who used to come into Run of the Mill all the time, because that would be stupid.
Because that turtle guy, Hamato Leonardo, is such a joke—he’s loud and obnoxious, all swagger and big talk and dad jokes that don’t even land half the time. He’s annoying, and it’s annoying that he acts like he can do whatever he wants just because Señor Hueso treats him like an unruly nephew, and it’s super annoying that he has the audacity to stop showing his face around here now that everyone has come to expect it.
It’s not because Yuichi misses him or anything! He just—noticed that Leonardo hasn’t been around lately, because Yuichi is very observant. That’s all.
The restaurant has felt weird and off-kilter in the turtle siblings’ absence the last couple of weeks. Yuichi brings it up once, a casual “I haven’t seen those Hamatos around here lately, have you?” that makes his coworker Qiao lower their glasses to stare at him over the rims so pointedly that Yuichi blushes to the tips of his ears and resolves to never bring it up again.
Okay, so maybe he’s always been a tiny bit preoccupied with Leonardo—it’s not Yuichi’s fault the guy is so distracting.
Always propping his hip against counters and door jambs while he waits for a table, long and lean and dangerous, striped arms tight with muscle when they cross over his armored chest. Ugh.
And his stupid picture-perfect smile—the way it warms into something crooked and affectionate when his siblings are being particularly crazy, like those same ridiculous antics that send normal people running in the opposite direction are the absolute highlight of his day—ugh.
He’s so nice to look at. When he’s not fronting like he’s got something to prove, he’s really funny. He helps out a lot around the restaurant just because he can and he portals Yuichi’s coworkers home when it gets too late and they don’t have a ride and he’s. It’s. Ugh!!!!!
And he’s a fellow swordsman. He loves kenjutsu the same way Yuichi does, in a way that lights him up from the inside.
The first time they ever talked, months ago now, Yuichi struggled to sound cool and collected under the spotlight of Leonardo’s sharp golden eyes, trying to channel the samurai spirit of Miyamoto himself to possess Yuichi and keep him from stammering like an idiot.
Somehow he managed to maintain a flat, level tone as he casually mentioned that he trained with a sword, too. Leonardo’s face brightened in a way that Yuichi was woefully unprepared for. Mentally, he had to take a knee.
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter ten: standing here hoping it gets to you
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 3k title borrowed from message in a bottle by t swift post-movie
(previous) (next)
x
Free-climbing up the side of a high rise in downtown Manhattan might be considered an extreme sport in most other circles, but Yuichi doesn’t know anything about those circles. They sound boring.
It’s drizzling a little, and the next window ledge he reaches for is slicker than he’s expecting. The second his grip slips, a huge green hand shoots out and catches him by the wrist.
“Thanks, Raphael,” he says when he’s found a better foothold. His heart skipped with the close call, but otherwise he isn’t fazed.
“You’re gonna have to break and call Raph by a nickname sooner or later,” the eldest turtle says, playfully stern.
Yuichi busily looks down at his hands as he climbs, flustered. It makes Michelangelo laugh, ringing and bright.
“I can’t believe we used to think you were scary,” the spotted turtle says. He’s perched on Raphael’s shell like gravity is a neat concept in theory but not one he’s particularly interested in.
“Come oooon,” Leonardo’s voice calls down from the roof. “¡Vamos hermanos! Hey Cottontail, I thought rabbits were supposed to be fast!”
“Hey Stripes, I thought turtles were supposed to be quiet,” Yuichi calls back without missing a beat.
There’s an immediate chorus of “oooh”s at the burn, and Leonardo makes offended squawking noises, and Yuichi is smiling when he finally pulls himself over the parapet onto the flat rooftop.
goodlucktai reblogged
taizi
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter nine: don’t know where we’re going but i’d like to be by your side
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 4k title borrowed from are you bored yet? by wallows post-movie
(previous) (next)
x
The next time Yuichi is invited to the lair, five very significant things happen.
1. Leonardo meets Yuichi’s friends
The first thing Leonardo announces to his family when he tumbles through the portal between Usagi Farm and his own living room is “Kitsune and I are gonna STEAL!”
His siblings take a moment to absorb that and then look behind him at Yuichi, who had all but shoved Leonardo in and then hustled through himself.
Yuichi, feeling harassed, says, “They are not going to steal.”
The last forty-five minutes have felt like a four-day marathon.
Yuichi is spending the day at the lair, on Leonardo’s invitation, with the added assurance that his family would love to have him. When the striped turtle initially offered to portal him there and back, Yuichi leapt on the offer embarrassingly quickly.
He would never admit it on pain of death, but here’s Yuichi’s reasoning: if he doesn’t have to spend nearly an hour driving each way, that’s an additional two hours he gets to spend with his favorite person, so yes. As much as he loves his bike, he’s team portal.
They made these plans a week ago, and Yuichi’s first mistake was mentioning it to Gen. So he wasn’t expecting his friends’ ambush the second Leonardo stepped through the portal into the yard, but he probably should have been.
“Let’s go for a walk,” Chizu said, in a way that made it clear she was not asking. “We’ll get parfaits.”
Leonardo, who had been on the farm for all of three minutes at that point, which was more than enough time for him to have collected two small children and one small dinosaur, said, “Uh, yeah. Okay. Can lizards have dairy?”
goodlucktai reblogged
taizi
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter eight: please save all your questions for the end
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 4k title borrowed from pancakes for dinner by lizzy mcalpine post-movie
(previous) (next)
x
This bold new world in which Yuichi is aware of his feelings for Leonardo—where he has a name for that sunlight that sleeps in his heart, and understands why it feels like dawn every time they’re together—sort of looks exactly like the old one.
His revelation may have changed the landscape of the universe as far as Yuichi is concerned, but nothing much seems to have moved for anybody else.
Chizu, Gen and Kitsune look so full of pity when he gathers his nerve and bares his heart to them that it’s abundantly clear they’ve known all along. Yuichi has never felt any particular way about being a rabbit yokai, but now he’s learning to be fervently grateful for his thick, downy fur.
No matter how hard he blushes, it doesn’t show. And he’s been walking around with a face on fire lately. That wouldn’t do wonders for his reputation.
At least his friends are supportive, in their own way. It’s like a dam has broken and they’ve got nothing but comments and opinions on his love life now that the secret is out and it’s fair game.
Kitsune makes fun of Yuichi relentlessly, but also promises that if Leonardo does anything to hurt him, she’ll curse him so hard his descendents a thousand years from now would feel it. Yuichi has the sinking sense that she isn’t kidding. He darts a sidelong glance at their voice of reason, but Chizu only looks mildly impressed by the ferocity of the threat and also like she would be on board with seeing it through.
“I can take care of myself,” Yuichi says, bristling a little.
“Sure you can,” Kitsune replies indulgently.
Gen even pats him on the head, like that was an adorable sentiment and he was adorable for sharing it. Yuichi is going to keep them all far, far away from the Hamatos for as long as he possibly can.
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter five: don’t usually swoon but i’m over the moon
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 2k title borrowed from fallin’ for ya by grace phipps post-movie
x
Friday morning, Yuichi is waiting on the corner of the street, directly across from the exact spot Leonardo portalled to last time. He’s twisting the front of his shirt, anxious and excited and mostly just dying for Leonardo to show up already.
Granted, he got here forty minutes early, so he’s had plenty of time to walk around in circles and collect strange looks from vendors setting up for the day. He’s also had four cans of milk tea from the vending machine nearby so he’s comfortable blaming the jitters on caffeine.
Yuichi just—really wants to see him. He wants today to go well.
He’s just sunk into a reluctant seat on the edge of the bench when he catches a glimpse of blue in the corner of his eye. He shoots right back up to his feet at the same time a portal blooms open across the road and three people step through.
One of them is Leonardo, in a purple jacket this time. He’s also wearing a sling now—probably his siblings’ desperate last-ditch attempt to keep his left arm as immobile as possible, given that Leonardo seems to act as if it’s not broken in eight places and the cast is just someone’s tacky idea of a fashion accessory. He’s fiddling with the long tails of his blue mask, brushing them over his shoulder and then drawing them back over it again, like he can’t decide how they should lay.
April and Raphael are with him. They’re both hanging back a little bit, indulgent expressions on their faces.
Leonardo bounces eagerly in place, scanning the crowd, and Yuichi gives himself just a second to absorb the sight of him. For a second he feels the way he used to before he ever knew Leonardo’s name—when he was just an annoyingly handsome stranger with rowdy siblings and an unfairly nice smile, and Yuichi would hold his breath every time he walked into work half-dreading, half-hoping he would be there. Back then, he did a lot of looking without speaking.
Now, their eyes meet, and Leonardo’s face lights all the way up, and Yuichi feels a surge of something fierce and toothed and achingly tender at the same time.
“Usagi!” he yells, like it’s been weeks since the last time they met in person, instead of like two days.
Leonardo can still smile like that. After everything. After an invasion and a coma and a concussion and his whole world being thrown into chaos, he’s still here, making a noisy nuisance of himself on an otherwise peaceful street in Yuichi’s rural neighborhood.
Yuichi is so fond of him he doesn’t know what to do with it all. He’s so lucky he didn’t miss this guy before he had a chance to really know him.
“You’re late,” Yuichi calls back. He doesn’t know what his voice sounds like or what his face is doing. “That’s what I get for waiting on a turtle.”
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter four: what’s gonna be left of the world
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 2k title borrowed from good grief by bastille post-movie
x
Somewhere in between overthinking Leonardo’s ‘date’ comment, being reassured by every single one of his closest friends and Leonardo’s own unchanged nature in their texts that it was just a figure of speech, and picking apart all of his other mild panic attacks over things that were probably pointless to determine how much of a freak he actually is, Yuichi breaks his promise to his aunt.
His thoughts are all turtle-shaped. Turtles all the way down. So his total ignorance about that invasion a little over a month ago has become this black hole in his brain. His curiosity is overpowering. He has to know.
Here’s the thing: the Hidden City has its own dedicated cell service, network space sourced from one of the major human carriers, but the internet is another story.
Yuichi’s phone doesn’t have a tether to an internet hotspot the way most of his friends’ do. It’s a lot of money and auntie already has enough monthly expenses as it is. Besides, between work and training and helping around the farm and wrangling five cousins, Yuichi has always had plenty to keep himself busy. When something really worthwhile happens online, Yuichi can count on Kitsune crawling through his bedroom window to make sure he sees it, or hearing all about it from Sunita at work.
He could probably ask one of them if he could use their WiFi and they would most likely say yes. There’s even a tiny hole-in-the-wall internet cafe somewhere in the more urban side of the Hidden City. Yuichi has options that don’t include breaking the rule Auntie has yet to rescind.
Here’s the thing. Yuichi is going to the human world.
He tends to jump in without thinking. It’s something every adult who has had more than a passing influence over him in his formative years has despaired over. He’s impulsive, reckless, he’s heard it all a hundred times.
But when his intuition points him somewhere, Yuichi follows. It’s the only time in his life he doesn’t overthink, he just goes. Sometimes it gets him into trouble. Other times it leads him toward something amazing. It’s how he found his sensei, how he met his best friends, the reason he has a magnetized yo-yo in his pocket, plucked cheerfully from the wall of an ancient temple he had no business wandering into, one that had disappeared by the next day when he tried to show Gen.
Now his gut feeling is telling him he needs to see for himself. He needs to understand.
goodlucktai reblogged
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter three: me and you and the whole town underwater
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 3k title borrowed from dark blue by jack’s mannequin post-movie
(previous) (next)
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Usagi: Good morning Leonardo. Unknown: USAGI Unknown: there are so many snacks in here oh my god Unknown: what the hell 😭😭😭😭 Unknown: im heavily medicated its not fair to do nic ethings ill cry Unknown: tell ur aunt i said THANK YOU!!!!!!! and the blueberry buckle was SO GOOD😭😭 Unknown: i shared some w mikey and he wants the recipe like yesterday Unknown: we actually ate like. all of it in one sitting. raph was pissed lol
Yuichi lays in bed smiling at his phone for a while before he gets around to pulling his braincells together to form a reply.
He starts and stops typing so many times that it’s embarrassing. He’ll pretend he didn’t do that.
Usagi: Those snacks were specifically meant to aid in your recovery. Unknown: so idk how familiar u are w baby brothers but typically mike gets whatever he wants
Yuichi thinks of his youngest cousin Jomei. Tiny and soft, with huge gray eyes, and unfortunately already self-aware at four years old. If Mike—Michelangelo, Yuichi thinks he remembers the boy being called—is even half as powerful as Jomei, then Leonardo’s blueberry buckle didn’t stand a chance.
Usagi: Fair enough.
It’s a good thing he woke up early. He doesn’t get anything else done for hours. Leonardo is an enthusiastic conversation partner at all times, and his texts manage to translate that energy effortlessly.
Typically, Yuichi lets his friends save their contact IDs in his phone however they want. Leonardo isn’t there to do it himself, but Yuichi makes the rookie mistake of giving him free reign anyway. So Leonardo insists his number go in under ⚡️⚡️NEON LEON⚡️⚡️ and Yuichi has something to roll his eyes at every time they message each other.
It also makes him feel warm. There’s an affectionate little tug in his chest at this clear proof of Leonardo in his hands.
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter three: me and you and the whole town underwater
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 3k title borrowed from dark blue by jack’s mannequin post-movie
x
Usagi: Good morning Leonardo. Unknown: USAGI Unknown: there are so many snacks in here oh my god Unknown: what the hell 😭😭😭😭 Unknown: im heavily medicated its not fair to do nic ethings ill cry Unknown: tell ur aunt i said THANK YOU!!!!!!! and the blueberry buckle was SO GOOD😭😭 Unknown: i shared some w mikey and he wants the recipe like yesterday Unknown: we actually ate like. all of it in one sitting. raph was pissed lol
Yuichi lays in bed smiling at his phone for a while before he gets around to pulling his braincells together to form a reply.
He starts and stops typing so many times that it’s embarrassing. He’ll pretend he didn’t do that.
Usagi: Those snacks were specifically meant to aid in your recovery. Unknown: so idk how familiar u are w baby brothers but typically mike gets whatever he wants
Yuichi thinks of his youngest cousin Jomei. Tiny and soft, with huge gray eyes, and unfortunately already self-aware at four years old. If Mike—Michelangelo, Yuichi thinks he remembers the boy being called—is even half as powerful as Jomei, then Leonardo’s blueberry buckle didn’t stand a chance.
Usagi: Fair enough.
It’s a good thing he woke up early. He doesn’t get anything else done for hours. Leonardo is an enthusiastic conversation partner at all times, and his texts manage to translate that energy effortlessly.
Typically, Yuichi lets his friends save their contact IDs in his phone however they want. Leonardo isn’t there to do it himself, but Yuichi makes the rookie mistake of giving him free reign anyway. So Leonardo insists his number go in under ⚡️⚡️NEON LEON⚡️⚡️ and Yuichi has something to roll his eyes at every time they message each other.
It also makes him feel warm. There’s an affectionate little tug in his chest at this clear proof of Leonardo in his hands.
goodlucktai reblogged
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter two: stuck on the thought of you
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 2k title borrowed from sunroof by nicky youre and dazy post-movie
(previous) (next)
x
Yuichi lasts another whole day before his scraped-together willpower completely fails him. Okay, half a day. At work he approaches Sunita in that lull between the lunch and dinner rush while she’s folding linens for the tables and makes his daring move.
Her phone is propped up against the napkin holder, playing a music video by a human performer Yuichi is unfamiliar with. Sunita is bopping along to it and doesn’t notice Yuichi until he’s standing directly in front of her.
When she does, she jumps about a foot in the air, yelping loud enough that a few of their coworkers on the other side of the dining room turn and shoot them judgemental looks.
“I’m so sorry!” Yuichi fumbles. He’s constantly accidentally sneaking up on people, but just watch him try to sneak out of the house on purpose to go joy-riding with Chizu and Kitsune. He gets caught nine times out of ten, usually before he’s even halfway out his window. It’s a joke.
“Ugh, I spend all my time with ninjas these days and I still get spooked,” Sunita says, patting her chest where her heart must have leaped in surprise, but her tone is good-natured. “You’d think I’d be used to people popping up out of nowhere by now, with how often my girlfriend’s little brothers do it, but nope! Anyway, sorry, did you need something?”
“Uh, hi,” he says at length. To his alarm and dismay, he doesn’t actually know where to go from there. It’s very possible he didn’t think this through. “I mean, I just wanted to say hi.”
Sunita saves him with a smile, her visible eye crinkling with the force of it.
“Hi, Usagi,” she says brightly. “Lunch was wild, huh? Did you make good tips?”
“Yeah, actually. It almost made my ten-top worth it.”
His coworker laughs, commiserating the way only a fellow server possibly could, but her eyes drop back down to the napkins. She mentioned to him once that she has to split her focus constantly, to be sure not to leave slime residue behind on everything she touches.
Yuichi is finished with his side work for now, so he reaches for a stack of the linens and drags it across the table toward himself, settling in to help. Sunita seems happy to have his company and doesn’t mind leading the conversation, his brief, generally one-word contributions no deterrent at all. It’s always been easy to talk to her.
“Um, hey,” Yuichi says very casually when he’s bolstered enough courage. “I was wondering if you had Leonardo’s number? I don’t have it, and—it’s been awhile since I’ve seen him.”
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter two: stuck on the thought of you
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 2k title borrowed from sunroof by nicky youre and dazy post-movie
x
Yuichi lasts another whole day before his scraped-together willpower completely fails him. Okay, half a day. At work he approaches Sunita in that lull between the lunch and dinner rush while she’s folding linens for the tables and makes his daring move.
Her phone is propped up against the napkin holder, playing a music video by a human performer Yuichi is unfamiliar with. Sunita is bopping along to it and doesn’t notice Yuichi until he’s standing directly in front of her.
When she does, she jumps about a foot in the air, yelping loud enough that a few of their coworkers on the other side of the dining room turn and shoot them judgemental looks.
“I’m so sorry!” Yuichi fumbles. He’s constantly accidentally sneaking up on people, but just watch him try to sneak out of the house on purpose to go joy-riding with Chizu and Kitsune. He gets caught nine times out of ten, usually before he’s even halfway out his window. It’s a joke.
“Ugh, I spend all my time with ninjas these days and I still get spooked,” Sunita says, patting her chest where her heart must have leaped in surprise, but her tone is good-natured. “You’d think I’d be used to people popping up out of nowhere by now, with how often my girlfriend’s little brothers do it, but nope! Anyway, sorry, did you need something?”
“Uh, hi,” he says at length. To his alarm and dismay, he doesn’t actually know where to go from there. It’s very possible he didn’t think this through. “I mean, I just wanted to say hi.”
Sunita saves him with a smile, her visible eye crinkling with the force of it.
“Hi, Usagi,” she says brightly. “Lunch was wild, huh? Did you make good tips?”
“Yeah, actually. It almost made my ten-top worth it.”
His coworker laughs, commiserating the way only a fellow server possibly could, but her eyes drop back down to the napkins. She mentioned to him once that she has to split her focus constantly, to be sure not to leave slime residue behind on everything she touches.
Yuichi is finished with his side work for now, so he reaches for a stack of the linens and drags it across the table toward himself, settling in to help. Sunita seems happy to have his company and doesn’t mind leading the conversation, his brief, generally one-word contributions no deterrent at all. It’s always been easy to talk to her.
“Um, hey,” Yuichi says very casually when he’s bolstered enough courage. “I was wondering if you had Leonardo’s number? I don’t have it, and—it’s been awhile since I’ve seen him.”
give me something that’ll haunt me when you’re not around
chapter one: keep on keeping your eyes on me
rise of the tmnt pairing: leoichi (leonardo / usagi yuichi) word count: 1k title borrowed from sparks fly by tswift post-movie
(next)
x
Usagi Yuichi doesn’t have a crush on that striped turtle guy who used to come into Run of the Mill all the time, because that would be stupid.
Because that turtle guy, Hamato Leonardo, is such a joke—he’s loud and obnoxious, all swagger and big talk and dad jokes that don’t even land half the time. He’s annoying, and it’s annoying that he acts like he can do whatever he wants just because Señor Hueso treats him like an unruly nephew, and it’s super annoying that he has the audacity to stop showing his face around here now that everyone has come to expect it.
It’s not because Yuichi misses him or anything! He just—noticed that Leonardo hasn’t been around lately, because Yuichi is very observant. That’s all.
The restaurant has felt weird and off-kilter in the turtle siblings’ absence the last couple of weeks. Yuichi brings it up once, a casual “I haven’t seen those Hamatos around here lately, have you?” that makes his coworker Qiao lower their glasses to stare at him over the rims so pointedly that Yuichi blushes to the tips of his ears and resolves to never bring it up again.
Okay, so maybe he’s always been a tiny bit preoccupied with Leonardo—it’s not Yuichi’s fault the guy is so distracting.
Always propping his hip against counters and door jambs while he waits for a table, long and lean and dangerous, striped arms tight with muscle when they cross over his armored chest. Ugh.
And his stupid picture-perfect smile—the way it warms into something crooked and affectionate when his siblings are being particularly crazy, like those same ridiculous antics that send normal people running in the opposite direction are the absolute highlight of his day—ugh.
He’s so nice to look at. When he’s not fronting like he’s got something to prove, he’s really funny. He helps out a lot around the restaurant just because he can and he portals Yuichi’s coworkers home when it gets too late and they don’t have a ride and he’s. It’s. Ugh!!!!!
And he’s a fellow swordsman. He loves kenjutsu the same way Yuichi does, in a way that lights him up from the inside.
The first time they ever talked, months ago now, Yuichi struggled to sound cool and collected under the spotlight of Leonardo’s sharp golden eyes, trying to channel the samurai spirit of Miyamoto himself to possess Yuichi and keep him from stammering like an idiot.
Somehow he managed to maintain a flat, level tone as he casually mentioned that he trained with a sword, too. Leonardo’s face brightened in a way that Yuichi was woefully unprepared for. Mentally, he had to take a knee.