Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

I'm dumb enough to storm the shores, yeah
There’s a red-light up ahead
I drive my car into it
I’m a little kid with a big death wish

- Baby Boy by Mother Mother

[]

It was quiet.

Leo didn't like the quiet.

Quiet was three AM. When he was the only one awake, the worst part of his insomnia because it would inherently create a pocket of time in the day when Leo was alone as everyone else was asleep. Except for Leo, who would lay in silence and convince himself that the quiet was just rest, it wasn't abandonment, it wasn't loneliness. It was needed. He hated it anyway.

Quiet was meditating. His least favourite training activity, where they sat still and silent and tried to centre their minds. Leo was not someone who was made to be left alone with their own thoughts, as they were often far more cruel than anything anyone had ever said to him. But still they would sit in the quiet and Leo would ache and ache to break it, and often would, because he couldn't stand the sound of his own head.

Quiet was the med bay. Even with the tick of a heart monitor, no one was ever cracking jokes or laughing if they had to be there. The med bay may have been his domain, the place he felt the most safe and the most comfortable, but that didn't mean it wasn't heart-breakingly quiet.

Leo was currently experiencing a very different kind of quiet. He didn't quite think he'd ever been in a quiet like it before, actually. A sheer absence of sound, a void, consuming and crushing.

The void. An endless space, like a prison dimension.

Terror managed to pierce the apathy. Was it the prison dimension? He had a shoddy memory of being pulled from it, but it was all blurred and there had been rather a lot of blood. But with the terrible quiet still surrounding him, sending a haunted chill down to his bones, Leo wondered if maybe he'd been imagining that rescue.

He was almost certain his brothers had managed to drag him home in one piece. Well, maybe not 'one piece'.

The panic, the need to know, was it real or fake? A distant beep shattered the fragile shroud. Repetitive. Changing one quiet for another.

The familiar hush of the med bay. Leo felt inside his body, the sensations of pain and heavy, leaden exhaustion. There was something on either side of him, warm and sturdy. Braced against his aching shell.

Leo needed to know. He wiggled his fingers. The left moved. The right did not.

It was funny, because that was relief. Definitely not the emotion most people felt at realizing they'd lost their right arm, but for Leo in that moment it meant that the rescue had been real, and the void was gone, and he was safe. Even as awareness filtered in more and the understanding that the strong, unwavering support surrounding him was his big brother.

Then the second thought hit. The 'oh I just lost my arm'. His breath hitched, true crawling terror pin-pricking up his spine, compounded with the real honest pain from blows he didn't want to think about.

"Hey, hey." Raph's voice came to him as if listening through a waterfall. Distant, muffled, and quiet. Too quiet. "You're okay, Raph's got you. You're fine. You with us? Leo?"

The panic intensified when Leo realized he couldn't actually respond. His eyes were sandbags, no matter how hard he struggled with his body it did not cooperate. No flicker or vibrations from his throat.

Raph curled closer, giving Leo's plastron a soft rub like he was still a kid vomiting in the night again, and a fond kiss to the top of his head. "Everything's gonna be okay."

The beeping was fading into white noise. The tone of Raph's voice disappearing into the quiet again. Leo tumbled back into the void, unable to escape.

The panic remained. He didn't want to be here. He wanted to reassure everyone, he wanted to see if they were okay. But the relentless wrenched horror of his missing arm and the Kraang and --

Oh. The quiet shifted. And the void wasn't like the prison dimension. It was more like 3AM. Alone, but with the promise of something else.

Leo desperately tried to grasp onto the feeling, but he was tired and weak. Instead his upset mind wailed for a while, letting his psyche become sore, because he didn't have the strength to try.

A pinch of real pain pulled Leo back into his aching body. Someone apologized, the gnawing feeling at the end of what remained of his right arm getting softly padded.

Leo realized, startled, that his eyes were actually open. They were focused on a blur in the middle distance, but he hadn't been asleep like he'd assumed. His eyes were open and he couldn't get them to cooperate, to focus.

"I think he flinched." Raph said. He was nearby, though not surrounding like last time. He was on Leo's left.

"Could be a reflex." Donnie said, leaning into his line of sight from the right. Leo couldn't get his gaze to focus, leaving an indistinct purple blur. Donnie pulled out something from the pocket of his hoodie and used it to shine a light in Leo's eyes, flicking in and away.

Leo was freaked out that he couldn't open his mouth and tell Donnie to knock it off. The best he managed was a tiny flinch away from the light.

"A little awareness, at least." Donnie reported. "Hi Leon, you're okay. Can you try and focus on me?"

With no response, Donnie reached out and took Leo's hand, giving a tight squeeze. The feedback raced up his arm, but he couldn't manage to squeeze back.

Donnie gave a shaky breath. Raph said, hopeful, "Anything?"

"I don't think so." Donnie said, quietly. It was too freaking quiet.

The hands let go. The purple blur moved. Leo's hand felt cold. The encroaching void sat on the edge of his awareness and the more he noticed it, the closer it got, until his vision was swallowed on either side by darkness. Terrifying. Alone.

It was quiet. There was a ringing in his ears. Leo was alone in the void.

No. It was 3AM. It was metaphorical 3AM. He could feel in the void, the shroud, like sitting in the shade. There was--

His body prickled with goosebumps. Because he had a body. The horror, chilled and wormed into his marrow. He blinked slow, because his eyes were open again before he'd even sunk into his skin.

Still his med bay. The beeping, like listening through cotton. He was sitting up, but otherwise unmoving.

Donnie was taking notes, just barely in Leo's middle-distance stare. The beeping continued. Leo's lungs spasmed as he fought for control, as he tried to suck in a breath, and it stuttered.

The tapping paused. Donnie put down the tablet and touched Leo's knees as he stood in front of him.

"Leonardo." Donnie prompted, firm. "Are you with me?"

Leo's body only provided the automatic nervous system cycle of breathing and the thoughtless blink of his eyes. He couldn't push harder than that to break through. Donnie didn't move this time, staring searchingly. Leo managed to harness the blink a few times in succession, trying to clear the middle distance blur and focus on his twin.

It settled. Heart-wrenching worry was painted on Donnie's face, a miserable twist to his mouth, a darkness heavy over his expression, dread hot-mixed with concern. When Leo's eyes focused on him, his twin immediately caught the change.

"Hi Leon." Donnie tried again, swallowing hard. "You're okay. You've been experiencing some catatonic disassociation. I'm going to need you to work with me. Do you think you could do that?"

Leo would love to. That terror, however, clasped talons around his heart and yanked him back into the void so quickly it was as if he'd never surfaced at all, plunging head first into the shade. Like free fall.

The claws of fear pierced his armour, a mental shell encasing him. The darkness was not protection, it was a prison echoing with the thunder of his own heart. Lonely and scared. It was quiet. It was 3AM.

It was 3AM. Why was that important? Leo hung in the suspension, trapped and writhing, the loneliness physical and painful, more than the bruises and the cracked shell and broken ribs and missing arm. It was the quiet. But the thing about the quiet of 3AM was that he could always wake someone.

But who could he wake in here?

A squeeze, his left hand fingers crammed together so hard it pulsed his body into itself again. Ah right, his body, his damn stupid body. Broken and stupid. Stupid.

Something was wrong. Leo's eyes were closed so he opened them. Beside him was a spot of orange. Med bay. Mikey had his hand and he was crying.

That took longer to comprehend. The ringing in his ears cleared slow. The tremble of Mikey's indistinct shoulders, and that was wrong. That was so wrong, Mikey wasn't supposed to cry in earnest, with whole body sobs wracking his form and stealing his breath. And since he was clutching Leo's hand, it gave the uncomfortable knowledge that maybe he was crying over Leo. And Leo sure as hell couldn't have that.

He couldn't get his eyes to focus, he couldn't push his head up. It took every inch of willpower, but Leo curled his fingers. It was meant to be a squeeze, but it didn't quite get there.

The sobbing stopped so quick that Leo was afraid Mikey wasn't breathing. Then his baby brother raised his head slow, eyes red, and stared at Leo. He gave a trembling, "Leo?"

Leo wanted to reply. An impossible weight crushing his chest wouldn't allow him to inflate his lungs enough to push anything past his lips.

"Are you there?" Mikey leaned forward, bottom lip trembling, glancing between Leo's unresponsive face and his fingers. "Can you focus on my voice? Don said we've got to ground you, I did a bunch of reading--"

Then Mikey's voice broke, it shattered, and he turned away to sob into his hands, hiding his face. The miserable sound became wails, "You're not there! I'm just making it up, I'm--"

Leo wished he was there. He really, really did. Instead, the shade returned. The backslide was sudden and fast, plummeting and launched out of physical sensations at top speed.

Fine. Whatever. He could stay here. Like sitting alone underneath a large tree. Branches swaying, casting uneven shadows. It was quiet. It was 3AM. Someone else was awake.

... what?

Leo's mind rebelled against the sensation. The heaviness burst into awareness, body, limbs, lungs, blinking. The middle distance he'd apparently been staring in focused. Leo was awake. Leo was aware. Leo was alive.

Being alive wasn't something he thought he'd be. It was maybe hard to cope with. But right now, he didn't want to sink back into the void, he wanted to know why he was sitting across from his dad.

Leo was on the floor, cross legged. Splinter was in front of him, mirrored position. He narrated, in a calm measured voice like he'd been speaking for a while, "Deep breath in, Blue. Hold it. Think about it. Then we release, slowly. Let your thoughts brush away. You are in control."

That was a cute thought. Leo let his eyes shut. He listened to Splinter talk, and with enough slow care, he convinced his lungs to follow the pattern his father was setting.

After a minute of Leo following, Splinter asked, "Are you listening, my sweet baby blue? Inhale deep, from the bottom of your lungs."

Leo inhaled deep from the bottom of his lungs.

"Oh." Splinter said, voice wobbling a little. "It is good to have you back, Leonardo. Exhale, with purpose. Keep your pace steady."

Leo exhaled, steady.

"Good boy. Your brothers will be happy to hear you have found a small amount of purchase. Inhale again, keep it slow and hold."

Inhale. Hold.

"Exhale, careful, and try to open your eyes for me, my son."

Leo exhaled. He didn't let himself think, eyes flickering open, starting with the middle distance but focusing on his dad after a second.

Splinter's eyes were wet. "I am relieved to see you. We are going to take things slow right now, okay? Let's inhale together."

They inhaled. Splinter's was very shaky. He kept steady eye contact, like Leo might vanish.

He might. Leo didn't know how to feel. The calm instructions were a tether but it was undeniably precarious, as if he was standing on the very lip of the shade, toes inside, waiting for any slip to hurtle him back into the protective walls.

"You are fine and you are safe. You have nothing to fear. We are taking care of you and we are taking care of each other." Splinter told him, incredibly precise, everything in his posture screaming grave. Nothing like his silly dad. Leo would give him a hard time if he could move.

"Inhale. Keep it slow, remain calm. There is no rush. We have lots of time. Feel the dojo under your heels. Keep looking at me. Exhale."

Dad didn't think there was any danger. Leo tried to take solace, tried to let the edge creep away.

"I am so incredibly proud of you." Splinter said, and that made everything wobble in a different way. "You are so strong. You are my sweet baby blue. You can get through this like you get through everything, with resilience and tenacity. You survived."

Leo fell.

The shade took him back. It did not hesitate, it enveloped him immediate and fast, all progress gone immediately. It was discouraging and painful.

The void was cold and quiet. There was a thick emotion swimming in it, like grief. It consumed and made everything sludge. The shade was muck and contaminated.

It took too long to realize the grief made no sense, because no one was dead. Almost as if the grief belonged to someone else. A feeling of being watched, like glancing out a dark window and spotting a person-shape looming. Leo panicked. He woke up.

He was in his own bed. A fan was buzzing in the corner. All his brothers knew the song and dance for the local insomniac to drift off: the night light that Donnie graciously pretended wasn't a night light when he made it for him, the perfect temperature mitigated by the fan in the corner providing both a breeze and white noise, three blankets, one over his feet and two stacked over each other, skincare routine, face mask, fifty pillows approximately --

Someone had put Leo in his exact specifications and let him sleep. The only thing different was a finger clip, just the smallest pinch. It looked like a heartbeat monitor, but small, wireless, and purple.

Leo didn't like the pinch, so he took it off, turning his finger into his palm and tugging. That was the extent of his movement capabilities, laying on his side and staring at the purple in the palm of his hand to try and figure out what it was.

Only when his door burst open did his slow brain connect that perhaps it was a heartbeat monitor, and Leo had just taken it off.

Donnie had an enormous red hoodie on, almost past his bare knees. He was breathing hard and said in a strangled voice, "If you're dead I'm actually going to kill you."

His twin crossed the room in two strides and immediately stumbled when he saw Leo's face. "Oh shit, you're awake. Did you take the monitor off yourself?"

After a moment of no reply, Donnie crouched beside Leo's bed and with surprising gentleness took the monitor from his palm. "Thanks for the heart attack. Do you mind keeping this on? It's letting me know you're alive."

The clip was carefully placed back on his finger. There was a long pause. Leo hated the quiet.

"Are you with me, Leon?" Donnie said, and the worst part was that there was absolutely no hope in the question. Donnie must've asked a hundred times and gotten no response to sound so defeated.

Donnie rubbed his face hard and gave a deep sigh. "You must've taken it off. There's no other logical explanation. I feel so stupid to try when I don't think you can actually hear me, but Dad said he got really far doing grounding with you. So let's try? Hi Leon. It's three forty-two AM. You are safe at home, in your bed room, wrapped in your blankets. You are here with your twin brother Donnie. I'm not going anywhere. You can breathe. Okay? Let's breathe. Inhale with me. Hold. Exhale. Slow. I hate this, for the record. Inhale. Hold. Exhale."

Leo breathed. Something lit in Donnie's eyes. He gave an awful smile. "Oh. Hi. You're actually here."

Leo inhaled. Without thinking too hard, he took the monitor off into the palm of his hand again.

"I... hate you." Donnie said, but his eyes were sparkling. "Why is that the first thing you do? Do you exist to annoy me?"

That wasn't it. Leo knew the reason he was doing it, but couldn't articulate. He stared at the purple in the palm of his hand.

"We're exhaling." Donnie said, doing it too. "Hold. Inhale. You don't need me to tell you that we all love you very much, I trust you're smart enough to know that. Exhale. Do you think you could answer a question or two? It's really important."

Hm. That sounded hard. He didn't know how he'd manage, when he was barely a fingertip above the dark water of the void.

"Leon, look at me." Donnie reached out and held his face with his palm, eyes intent and serious. "Are you in any pain?"

Pain.

"You're okay, hey, keep looking at me, keep looking at me." Donnie had never sounded so gentle in his entire life. It was putting Leo on pins and needles. Precarious tenterhooks in his body, keeping him there.

"Right now, is there any pain? Focus on the feeling."

Feeling. Leo hated that. He knew Donnie did too. Donnie was only asking because it was important. And Donnie kind of looked like he might cry, and if Mikey crying was bad then Donnie crying was apocalyptic, end of the world. He couldn't have that. Leo let himself feel his body.

It was pretty sore. But in an old way, like it'd been healing for a few days and he hadn't been there for it. Bruised, through muscle and bone. Burning lines of pain, running up and down his nerves if he focused too long, especially around the missing arm. It was all fuzzy, like he wasn't really sitting in it properly.

Leo dropped the clip in his hand and raised his fingers in an 'ok'.

Donnie gave a full body shudder. His head fell against Leo's shoulder, quivering a little, and didn't speak. After a long moment, Leo pushed his head into his twin. Just enough that he could feel the intent.

"Okay." Donnie whispered, and pulled away, immediately wiping at his eyes with the long red sleeve of his borrowed hoodie and destroying any evidence of tears. "You're okay. I'm okay. We're all okay."

Leo felt bad for making him cry. He reached out and grabbed the edge of Donnie's sleeve, giving just a little tug.

Donnie froze, midway through the scrub of his face with over-long sleeve, turning to see Leo holding the other side.

Leo tugged again.

"You are metaphorically breaking my heart right now, I hope you know that." Donnie said, sitting back down and scooting closer. When Donnie blinked, the statement was proven by the single tear that escaped down his cheek. "I'm right here. Everything's okay. I know it's a big ask, but if you need something, could you let me know? I've been trying to anticipate everything you might need but, I'm flying a little blind without your input. Anything feel weird? Are we missing anything?"

Leo ran the rambled sentences through his mind a couple times, still clutching the too-long sleeve. Donnie always looked smaller when he wore Raph's clothes, all his lithe lines cut into shapeless, little brother in his big brother's clothes.

Nothing was uncomfortable. All the hurts seemed tended to. If Donnie said he was okay, he would've made sure of it. He let go so he could raise the 'ok' symbol again.

Donnie gave a reluctant nod. "I'd like to discuss grounding, if that's okay. Our research suggests developing a system. They tend to use a one-to-five scale, since the human bias of five fingers, but I think we can adapt three fingers if we use zero to get four levels."

Leo had no idea what Donnie was talking about and the familiarity of it almost made him smile.

"We want to know how grounded you feel in a given moment." Donnie explained, holding up his hand in a fist in example. "A zero is not very grounded at all, very close to losing grip again."

Numbers. Of course Donnie wanted to introduce numbers into his crisis. The line of determination in Donnie's brow provided Leo more bemusement. His twin was taking this very seriously.

"One finger." Donnie raised his first finger in show. "Somewhat stable. Two fingers. Aware and capable but not completely present. Three digits -- " Donnie raised his thumb for a full hand. "You are completely present and aware. Understand?"

Even Leo could count to four. He raised the 'ok' symbol again.

"For this moment, can I have a number on the scale?" Donnie prompted.

Leo considered it. He would not give himself even remotely stable. His closed the 'ok' into a fist.

Donnie visibly chewed his lip, then offered an uneasy grimace that maybe was meant to be a smile if Donnie was someone else. "Gotcha. Thank you for working with me. Can we try and get that up to a one, maybe? I can talk you through some more breathing exercises."

It was so much effort to try and communicate, but Donnie was worth it. Leo raised his open hand underneath his chin, pulling to the side and closing his fingers. Dull.

Donnie laughed brokenly. "Yeah, I bet. Can't say you've been doing anything too exciting lately. I'd be..."

Whatever Donnie was saying disappeared, as the racehorse of Leo's thought galloped ahead of him and fuzzed his hearing. His mind signalled panic, and it was stupid, but his thoughts went so fast. He hadn't done anything exciting lately because he'd been in pain and alone and he shouldn't have let himself think because thinking was bad.

The shade returned, bringing quiet. Stuck. Rock and a hard place. The shade swallowed him, wrapped around his throat, crushing his chest.

Leo was relatively sure that the shade was no longer the metaphorical 3AM, where Leo was alone because everyone else was sleep. It felt more like the quiet of meditating. Leo was alone because everyone else was quiet.

The oppressive quiet was just as hard to cope with as when he was actually conscious. But he could no longer deny the sensation as he sat in the flickering shade. It was as if there was someone sitting silently in there with him.

'Who's there?' Leo asked, scared.

There was no reply. The void was as nothing as it always was. Not even a flutter of change, no acknowledgement.

Leo didn't ask again. He didn't like the feeling that he was losing his mind. It was unsettling.

Chapter Text

It didn't feel as long this time when Leo managed to reconnect with the idea of his own body. Starting with his toes and moving up, following a pattern of goosebumps.

It had started with his toes because someone was painting them.

"... I've got like, six classes that were cancelled because of the invasion, but for some reason horticulture feels like it's more important than the end of the world, so I'm stuck trying to cram and it's the worst. I feel like that -- that -- you know, the people living normal lives during the fall of Rome? Sure, it's great that the world will continue to spin on. But dude, I can't ride my bike to school when there's too much alien debris in the streets, can you cut me some damn slack?"

Leo felt the sure brush strokes of his sister painting his toenails, and he was washed with incessant curiosity. He blinked multiple times and inhaled like the air was drawing him back into his physical self.

April looked up and met his eye. Visible shock crossed her expression, but her voice was the same when she said, "Oh hey, Leo. Fancy seeing you here."

Amusement broke through the apathetic barrier. He raised his aching left hand in front of his chin and wiggled his fingers. Colour?

"Aw, come on, what kind of question is that?" April laughed, something strained in the sound betraying her cool normalcy. It was the hard fissure down the middle of her lips, just barely suppressing an emotional tremble. "Blue, of course."

He knew he could trust her. Leo dropped his hand and breathed again, trying to find purchase on the whole being conscious thing.

"Do you remember that grounding scale Donnie made up for you? Think you could give me a number on it?" April asked, looking back down at his nails and not keeping the pressure on him.

Leo swallowed. He did remember, and felt bad that he'd dipped on their conversation so quickly. In this moment he certainly didn't feel stable at all, so he gave a closed fist.

"Cheers." April replied, without much inflection either way. "So I obviously didn't go to class, because I'm not an idiot for things I don't care about, and the prof..."

Leo loved her relentlessly, for making things so easy. He listened to her talk, getting the multi-coat treatment with the base layer, the colour, and the shine. She talked like it was a podcast and she had absolutely nowhere else to be. He wasn't sure how she'd figured out exactly what he needed, but he was so, so grateful.

"Sparkle?" April asked, fishing around in her backpack and offering a truly dangerous looking bottle of glitter.

But Leo had managed to ground himself with her actions and voice enough that he'd realized he had no idea if Raph had been okay after everything that happened. They'd barely managed to pull him from... from...

While the panic and fear had his teeth biting the cusp of the void, but his family was more important. Leo raised his hand, tapping a finger-spelled R to his bicep. Or, where his bicep would be on the opposite arm. He wasn't thinking about that right now. Raph had been...

"Raph's fine." April reported, immediately. "We've been looking after his eye, and once you're up maybe you'll have a better idea. But other than that, he's right as rain, don't worry your pretty blue head about it."

Raph's eye? That didn't sound good. But there truly wasn't any fear in her tone, and Leo did trust his big sister. His fingers trembled as he shifted them into the 'M' and tapped his heart.

"Mikey's fine too." April said, more of a smile in her voice, like she'd been waiting for him to ask and was glad he was. "Took a lot out of him to open the portal, but Draxum's been a huge help in making sure he's gonna be okay. His hands are still a bit off, but it's a work in progress."

Leo exhaled, trembling through his nose. Surely April knew his next question. But she didn't volunteer, watching and waiting expectantly.

Fine. He wanted to know badly enough, even if pushing to communicate was literally torture. He knew that Donnie was okay, he'd literally saw him earlier, but still. His fingers shaped a D against his temple.

"Donnie's fine." April chuckled. "Had some damage to his shell and it's healing without complication. I finally got him to sleep about an hour ago, he's been working pretty hard. I hope you won't consider it spoilers if I tell you he's been drafting an arm since the moment you fell out of that portal without one."

Leo brushed over that, because he recognized when a dangerous topic encroached the darkness on either side of his vision. He pointed at April.

"Little old me?" She bat her eyelashes and laughed. "I'm great. Pretty over the moon in this moment, actually. I wasn't hurt, and neither was Splints or Casey. We've been helping you four, trying to get everything back under control. Did you know Future Boy can do a ton of medic shit? It's pretty handy with you down for the count."

A small part of Leo felt offended that there would be any question of Casey's abilities. He doesn't know why. Instead he gave a thumbs up.

"And what about you, handsome?" April asked, tapping an 'L' to her mouth.

When they were little kids coming up with their name signs, Donnie had said it meant 'loudmouth'. It had been a joke. Leo thought about it every single time he saw his name sign. Donnie, the brains, Raph, the strength, Mikey, the heart. And Leo, the loudmouth.

Leo vocally claimed it was his charm and brushed it off. He never knew how to tell his brothers when things actually hurt him, because every time he did it just made things worse.

He raised an 'ok' sign.

"Any higher on that scale?" April prompted. She had set aside the little bottles of polish. He wanted her to go back to the easy chatter and repetitive movements, it was so much safer.

He'd been thinking about the invasion, pushing away panic to make sure his family was okay. So he wasn't stable. He turned the 'ok' into a fist once again.

"That's fine." April said, with a little disappointment in her voice that said otherwise.

Leo turned his hand out, flicking a flat palm with thumb tucked in for a quick blue before offering his fingers to her.

"Can't be mismatched." April agreed, and brought her chair closer to reach his remaining hand.

Leo stayed with her for almost an hour, watching with half lidded eyes as she painted meticulously and continued to discuss without any pause her current going on's. She had Casey sleeping on her couch, Donnie had already forged him enough documents to fool the FBI if necessary. She had explained everything to her parents and they were enjoying the constant novelty of introducing a kid from the future simple life pleasures.

When Leo drifted off, it was because he was tired. The more he settled into his body, the more the pain was apparent. It was tiresome. He fell asleep to April blowing on his nails.

The pain followed him into his dreams, where he had two arms again but the right was on fire. It hurt so badly. When he roused, it was deeply painful, lightning bolts up his spine, centered on an arm that wasn't there.

The pain was fresh and new. The pain was old and familiar. Those thoughts felt weird. The quiet in his mind shifted. It fell into complacency again, like meditation.

Leo opened his eyes and hoped he wasn't alone.

He was. It must've been night again, he was tucked in his bed, only the purple clip on his finger. He immediately took it off and held it in his palm. He waited.

"Jokes on you, I've accounted for that now." Donnie greeted, swanning in the room at top speed despite his words. He still had Raph's hoodie on, and it hung off him in drapes. His goggles were over his eyes and headphones over his ears.

Leo's heart was pounding and he was scared of something he couldn't name. The quiet. Whatever else was in the quiet. Leo chucked the little purple clip on the floor.

"Yes, yes, you live to make my life harder." Donnie said, scooping it up as he came closer and putting it immediately back on Leo's finger. "April said you retained the scale, so can I get a number?"

Zero. Leo communicated that then threw the clip again. He recognized the tone of voice, the clipped words, and the fidgeting movements. Donnie was going to leave again.

"Why." Donnie said, flat, staring at Leo.

Leo stared back. He wanted Donnie to figure it out without him having to say. His twin usually knew him better than that. But the harried look said lack of sleep and his comfort items said sensory overload. If Leo wanted something, he was going to have to put the legwork in. Donnie had practically begged him to tell them if there was something he needed.

This was something he needed. He was weak and scared enough to admit it, the crushing fear of catatonic disassociation crumbling walls and tearing down shields. Leo raised his only hand, finger up, and circled it back towards himself.

"Alone." Donnie translated, then his expression did something half-hidden with the sudden duck of shadows and his goggles. "Right. Of course. That's... that's my fault. I shouldn't have..."

Leo tried to reach for him. But Donnie straightened and moved away. "I'll get Angelo."

If Leo had the capability, he would've stopped him. He understood, if he was catatonic for so long it made sense to work out a system where he didn't need a babysitter twenty-four seven. It wasn't sustainable. It wasn't Donnie's fault that Leo was a fucked-up mess who couldn't stand to be alone for longer than ten seconds. He knew his brother was just trying to help, and now Donnie was going to blame himself, and--

Shit. Leo wasn't going to get to see Angelo after all. The shade leapt on his mental slip and dragged him back underneath. Leo knew better than to tell his brothers when things hurt him, it only made things worse.

Leo felt a foreign ripple of displeasure. This time, he seized on the feeling, of something not belonging and he demanded, 'Show yourself.'

The void remained unmoved. Leo's conviction faltered. The sensation that maybe he was losing his mind grew stronger. Why did he feel like he wasn't alone in this void? Like he was sitting, knee to knee in the dojo, trying to meditate while the silence suffocated him?

Leo was sick of this. He struggled out of the shade. It hadn't been long again, because there was his angel, wrapped tightly around him.

Mikey was humming in his ear, rubbing Leo's arm up and down.

Leo was usually the one humming, getting songs stuck in his brothers' heads. This was 'Anything Could Happen' by Ellie Goulding, one of his favourite hype-up songs.

Leo laid surrounded by warmth, basking in it, the feel of the vibrations of Mikey's hum, blankets tangled, his little brother hot and half-asleep. Still gently rubbing Leo's arm, humming a song he liked, in the dark and perfectly set up bedroom.

It was the best possible world to emerge into. The clip was back on his index finger but there was no need to remove it, he wasn't alone this time.

Leo didn't realize he was humming back until Mikey's cut off abruptly, leaving Leo's soft hum to fill the silence.

"Ohmigosh." Mikey breathed, and pulled back enough to be a silhouette in the darkness. "Please tell me I'm not imagining things. Please tell you're actually here."

Seriously hard to communicate by only faint blue night light, but Leo drew his hand and pointed down twice. Here.

"Okay. Okay. We're not freaking out, we're fine. Where are you on that scale?"

Leo found it almost amusing that anyone thought he was going to be anything but a zero. He closed into a fist again.

"What about pain? Are you in pain?"

That was harder to answer. Leo was pretty sure he was, but it was all so disconnected from him. Like yeah, it hurt. But did it really? He lied with an 'ok'.

"It's so dark." Mikey complained, beginning to move to fix it, possibly.

But Leo didn't allow him, giving up the arm he needed to communicate to wrap around Mikey and tug him close. Words weren't important right now.

"Leo, you're gonna make me cry." Mikey said, in a choked voice.

Eugh boy, that was not the intended outcome. He hoped the returning squeeze conveyed that.

"It's just... it's been so freaking hard to see you like that. I kind of got scared you weren't... and I've got so much I want to talk to you about everything, too."

Mikey's voice got strangely angry at the end of that. It tugged on Leo's heartstrings.

But Mikey didn't need an answer, at least. "Not right now though. Right now I'm just going to enjoy your presence so much. This is the best day ever."

Heh. He was such a cute kid. Man, Leo was lucky to have the best little brother in the world. He caught Mikey's head and pressed it closer to his shoulder, humming some Taylor Swift. He really just wanted to make Mikey do that hiccuping smile. It was the most grounded he'd felt so far, and if asked he might've even been a one.

But no one asked, because Mikey fell asleep. Who knew what time it was. Leo kept humming, even as Mikey's breathing went even, because it was keeping him in the room. Not in the void, not sitting in the shade with... with...

Awake, conscious, and with one finger level of grounding, Leo grimly realized that the fact that he felt like someone was in his catatonic void with him was probably a really big problem. Now that he could put that into context and conceptualize it into words... it painted a pretty frightening picture.

Was he losing his mind?

Donnie would probably make a joke that he never had a mind to begin with. Or, maybe, he'd reasonably panic over the fact that Leo either was either losing it or maybe picked up some nefarious demon possession during his rescue. Not cool.

He should probably tell someone. Logically, Leo was incredibly aware of this. But he felt resistance against the idea, and he had no idea if it was his own.

Yikes. Leo tabled that for now. Next concern, please.

April's rundown of everyone's status was nice, but Leo was the team medic and he really wished he could give some proper evals right about now. At least with Mikey so close, he could sneak a little peek at his pulse and a glimpse at the cracked fissures at his arms. It did nothing to soothe him, because he had no idea how to treat mystic wounds. Maybe he should check the mystic library. Donnie would love the chance to go back. And while April said Draxum was helping, it wasn't that Leo didn't trust him, it was just that Leo didn't trust him.

The chance to think was good but the longer and more grounded he felt, the brighter the pain was shining through. It was beginning to run a line of sweat down his back. He struggled against pain induced exhaustion and eventually lost, falling into a normal sleep. 

Pain in his dreams again. Arm on fire. Awful. Leo woke to voices, easily floating to the surface since he hadn't touched the void.

"... you're sure?"

"Never been surer in my life, D." Mikey shot back, the rumble through his plastron.

Donnie sighed to their left. "I don't doubt you, Mikey."

"Sounded like doubt." Mikey replied, but didn't chase the argument further. "He was humming songs with me, Donnie. I asked the usual, grounded was a zero and pain was okay. Not sure if he's lying or if he really can't feel anything."

"Hard to say." Donnie said, monotone. It was the kind he got when he was really tired. Had he gone to sleep at all? Leo hoped he wasn't fretting about the whole, giving him a piece of technology that accidentally removed something Leo needed.

"Mind scooting over? It's breakfast time." Donnie asked.

Mikey moved away, the warmth fading. Before Leo could mourn it, Donnie took his hand. He said, "Feel like waking up so we don't have to endure feeding tubes again today, Nardo?"

His words were monotone. As he held Leo's hand, he traced letters on his palm: L O V E Y O U.

It was an old trick they'd taught themselves, twins sharing a room in the middle of the night trying to find any many secret ways to communicate as possible. Lip reading, sign language, tactile tracing, foreign languages... Donnie loved to learn and Leo loved to talk.

Bonus that it helped Donnie express things that were pretty hard otherwise. Good that it did, because those simple letters on his palm were like anti-void. He was definitely grounded to a one now.

Feeding tube? How long had he been like this? Never mind, Leo didn't actually want to know the answer to that. But he definitely didn't want a feeding tube. He opened one eye just a crack, to try and scope out the situation.

It was immediately noticed by his captive audience. Donnie inhaled sharply. Mikey grinned wild and happy.

"I told you so." Mikey said, managing his particular cocktail of cheery and smug.

"Hello Leon." Donnie said, smacking Mikey in the face and pushing him away.

"Good morning!" Mikey pushed back, still grinning like it might fall off his face.

Leo raised his hand and wiggles his fingers at them.

"Number on the scale?" Donnie asked, leaning closer as Leo got both eyes open.

He raised a single finger for them. Mikey bounced up and down.

"Pain?" Donnie asked next.

Leo immediately lied with his usual 'ok' sign. Everything hurt. The stump of his arm was a distracting and exhausting throb along with his heartbeat. And despite most of his bruises turning various healing colours, the broken ribs were definitely still reminding him they existed with every breath.

Donnie met his eye. His twin brother saw right through him, raising a perfect eyebrow. "Of course, he said with disbelief."

Leo touched his fingers to his mouth. Food.

"I'm on it!" Mikey said, hopping off the bed at top speed and out the room.

"Don't think you can distract me." Donnie was unmoved. "Rate your pain from a scale of one to ten."

Leo incredulously showed his grand total of three fingers.

Donnie's lip twitched in amusement. "Give it to me in multiples, I am capable of basic addition."

Leo snorted. He mentally tried to figure out what a safe answer would be. The reality was, Leo hadn't actually ever been in this much pain before. Sure, he'd been hurt, but he'd never been crushed and pinned and torn apart like this. Even what was probably at least ten to twelve days into his recovery, judging by the healing time, he still felt acutely aware of everywhere that hurt.

He was fragile and weak. It was terrible. He didn't want to worry anyone. The amount of pain was fuzzy and vague, even at the worst of times, from the way his body and mind shut down afterwards. Any number he gave wasn't going to be totally accurate anyway.

Nine or ten wasn't right. Even if it still hurt now, it didn't hurt as bad as when it happened. Anything less than a five was wrong too, because pain was all he could think about. Fire and sharp tingling, sore and throbbing. The jostle of his ribs with every aching breath. It was probably a seven or an eight. Leo raised his hand and flashed the full fingers twice, giving a six.

"So an eight." Donnie said, immediately, because he was the fucking worst. "Do you want some more painkillers?"

The sign for chart needed two hands. Instead of conquering that, Leo finger-spelled it.

"I've kept adequate notes." Donnie handed over his tablet, flicking through the screens letting Leo see. "Future Boy was a lot of help. Dad and Draxum too."

Leo couldn't focus on the screen. His mind was still floating a little bit to the left. He tried shaking his head, as if it might clear it, but it didn't. The more he tried to force himself to read, the more his control slipped and the shade loomed.

He knew that the arm was already gone by the time he'd exited the portal. He missed what the notes told him, that his family had to scramble to stop the bleeding and cauterize the wound. The immediate blood loss of losing a significant portion of his body weight combined with the shattered ribs and enough bruises and contusions that they'd been worried about internal bleeding and hemorrhaging... it was a miracle he was awake at all.

But they healed quicker than a human. And judging by the notes as he flicked through them, his timeline was correct. It had been about ten days since the incident. Some of that unconscious, the rest awake but generally unresponsive, gaining awareness again slowly. They were giving painkillers as needed, using visible distress as their signal. Leo hated to think what visible distress meant.

Leo handed back the tablet, moving to cover his eyes with his hand instead. It was making his head hurt. He didn't know what the right thing to do was, he could barely think straight. Would painkillers make the dissociation better or worse?

His mind shuffled. He knew that he couldn't heal properly if he was in pain. If he really was an eight, that meant he needed more.

Leo sighed. He dropped his hand, finding his twin inspecting him with a frown. He held his fingers close together. Little.

"Sure, Nardo." Donnie reached for the med bag and dug inside. By the time Mikey showed up with breakfast, they had compromised with a medium dose of painkillers.

"Casey said nothing heavy." Mikey balanced a bowl of broth and set it beside Leo. "But I promise once your stomach is up for it, I'm making you a five-course meal, baby."

Leo managed a thumbs up, and took the spoon. His hand shook, and while he was certainly more ambidextrous than some thanks to his katanas, he was still right-handed. And the right hand was somewhere in the prison dimension. He could barely get the broth from the bowl into his mouth.

Shame washed up his body, hot and flushed, and Leo shut his eyes wishing he were anywhere else. He did a slow exhale through his nose, feeling everything wobble. The frustration and the daunting sudden reality of being without his dominant arm was crushing and threatened to push him head first back into the void.

"Do you want--" Mikey wasn't able to finish his offer, because Leo cracked his eyes back open to glare at his little brother and dare him to suggest something as humiliating as hand-feeding.

Mikey raised his hands and said, "Never mind, nothing. Take your time."

Leo took another slow breath, trying to calm the sudden onset of anger. His emotions were whips, unpredictable and sharp, cutting. No amount of wrestling with them in his mind helped. He pulled the table closer, leaning up enough to keep the distance small, and managed to spoon some broth into his mouth. His stomach turned a little, but he was hungry and the warmth felt good.

Leo ate as much as he could, which wasn't much, then took a moment to try and breathe through the sensation that everything was getting further and further away. One of his brothers spoke, but it felt like they were talking across a football field. He raised his hand and gave a fist, a zero.

The strangest part was that this frustrating feeling, this sensation that everything was going to be different now... there was a shadow in his mind, like deja vu. Not his own. The moment he touched on this feeling, it yanked itself away, it retreated and hid. Despite the fact that he was sitting with his brothers, Leo raced after it, leaping head first into the void to try and catch it.

What did it mean? Why did it feel... sorrow? Loss? Familiarity? Why was this happening to him? Leo pushed through the thick dark fog, searching, but the sensation in his mind was stronger. It wasn't like 3AM. It wasn't like meditating. It was like sitting in the med bay with his brothers, where it was quiet in the worst way possible. It made Leo want to scream.

'Show yourself!' Leo vented, so incredibly frustrated and pained and tired. He pushed and pushed on the mental barriers, feeling the give and the weight. The strength separating them. In the shade, there was nothing but a void of darkness, swallowing his whole self.

When the voice finally spoke to him, it was soft and indescribable. They said, 'I'm sorry. I'm going to leave you alone.'

'Why are you here in the first place?' Leo demanded, loud, but the voice refused to raise to meet him. It didn't speak again.

Leo's mind felt scrunched up like a spring pushed down, tension running through him. The presence in his mind did not stir.

Leo didn't know what to do anymore. He was tired, all the effort draining him. He stayed in the dark.

Chapter Text

There was pressure and warmth around him. His heart ached. The surface broke, the shade lightened, and he knew where he was. Leo was cradled in Raph's arms. They were listening to Taylor Swift. It was 'Peace'.

Raph was rubbing a hand up and down his shell. Leo had no idea how much time had passed. He didn't really want to know, because the idea of all this lost time was enough to wrench his panic to the surface before any other thought. What was happening to him? It was terrifying, the loss of control.

"You're okay." Raph muttered, still giving him the best shell rub ever, Leo's cheek pressed into his plastron. I'd give you my sunshine, give you my best - but the rain is always gonna come, if you're standing with me.

Leo absorbed. He tried to breathe. The panic was right there. Everything was right there.

Raph was right there.

Would it be enough, if I could never give you peace?

The song changed. It was 'I'll Call You Mine' by girl in red. They must've had Leo's phone, as this definitely wasn't any playlist of Raph's. Leo made his with vibes, this one was definitely the one he'd labelled 'quiet'. He used it when he couldn't sleep.

Funny enough, Leo would actually like to be sleeping less right now. Though he wasn't entirely sure if he was actually asleep while in the void, and how much of it was genuine rest.

He wanted to give Raph a joke about his sudden music taste change. But the idea of forming words from his throat was too daunting, and the sign needed two hands.

He wanted to ask if Raph was okay. April had said he was still having problems with his eye. Leo could still feel the echoed relentless crush of adrenaline and emotion at his big brother being in the hands of the enemy, the fear pushing him harder than he'd ever felt.

He wanted to cry, just sob until all the horrible collisions of emotion left the cacophony in his chest. But he couldn't, restricted by this feeling that he wasn't properly seated in his body, just a bit to the left, the world not actually happening to him. He couldn't scream, talk, cry...

A foreign brush of concern. Leo mentally whirled on it, giving it a hard push, because the presence said they were going to leave him alone. 'So then leave me alone.'

Quiet. The med bay. No, it wasn't. His fan was in the corner. Raph was there. It was his bedroom. Right. Right. 'Shadowless' by Wintersleep was playing.

Raph slowly stopped rubbing his shell. Leo wondered if he'd fallen asleep. He didn't know what time it was.

He wanted to tell Raph to keep going. He wanted to try, even with the thick cotton around everything. He considered some signs in his head, but 'continue' needed two hands. So did 'rub'.

Fine. He could do this. Raph wasn't moving, resting against his shell but motionless. Leo swallowed, feeling the stick in his throat, and rasped, "Why'd you stop?"

Raph jumped. His head bent down close to see Leo's face, and he said in an awful voice, "Leo?"

That was all the words he had, thanks, so hopefully Raph heard him. He blinked slowly at his older brother, cataloguing the chasm between his brow. Poor guy. Leo reached up with his only hand to press his thumb into that line.

Raph released a shuddered breath, capturing Leo's hand and pulling it away. "Yeah, you're worrying me, are you really surprised bud? It's good to see you awake. Do you wanna use Donnie's fancy scale?"

It really wasn't that fancy, it was a scale from zero-to-three. He wasn't quite a zero, because he'd actually managed to talk, to his own surprise. He raised one finger.

"Okay." Raph didn't seem to know what to do with the information once he had it. He gave a wavering smile.

Leo was annoyed that the shell rubbing still hadn't started again despite all his effort to speak. He took Raph's hand and placed it firmly on his shell.

"Oh." Raph said, then stroked the carapace in gentle motions again. "Sorry, of course. I just got lost in thought. I know Donnie said that he really wants to ask you some questions next time you were aware, do you mind if I get him to come in?"

Leo would like it if all his brothers were in his line of sight all the time, actually, but that wasn't always feasible. He gave a thumbs up. He was sure the questions were going to be mostly medical anyway. He was just as curious as to what was happening to him.

Raph's free hand sent a text message. Donnie came in less than a minute.

"Hello Leon." Donnie greeted, pulling up the chair beside his bed, holding a tablet and flicking through it. He still looked that perpetual tired. "It has been four hours and twenty minutes since your last lucidity. Today is Sunday, and the time is twelve thirteen PM. I was hoping to catch you early so we could try and answer some questions before..."

Donnie didn't seem to know how to refer to the shade. Raph's hands tightened on Leo, like he might disappear at the mention.

"How would you like to communicate?" Donnie decided not to finish the sentence entirely. "We are limited with one-handed signs or finger spelling, but I'm sure we could muddle through together. Otherwise I could provide you with something to write or type."

"Leo spoke before." Raph volunteered.

Donnie's head snapped up. "You did?"

Leo's throat felt like it might close. He gave no answer.

"Just once. And I didn't quite hear what you said." Raph reported, but at least they weren't speaking about him as if he wasn't in the room.

"Would you be willing to try again, Leon?" Donnie questioned, adjusting his goggles on top of his head, inspecting Leo closely.

Leo signed 'no', fingers tapping together. He knew his twin well enough that Donnie was stopping himself from prying further. Leo was grateful and did not offer a reason. He didn't want to move from Raph's grounding hold on him, so he pulled his arm up and finger-spelled, 'sign'.

"I can work with that." Donnie allowed, tapping his tablet quickly and visibly pulling up a list of questions. The first few were the same pestering he'd gotten about pain and if anything hurt or felt uncomfortable. His arm and ribs hurt, but that was nothing new and nothing worse, so he didn't report it. Then Donnie ran through the cognitive tests, orientating Leo in time and space, passing basic short term recall and long term recall.

It was a lot of signing and a lot of attention span. Leo took too long to answer sometimes, staring off into the middle distance, but with Raph still holding tight he was present enough in his body to answer every silly question Donnie had.

Until they got to actual dissociation.

"Thank you for using the scale to notify us of the lapse the last time we spoke. We'd appreciate it if you could keep that up. I'm well aware that this is a dangerous question to ask, so feel free not to answer. If possible, I'd like to identify things that trigger this lapse."

Leo was definitely not going to answer because that would be the absolute quickest way to fall headfirst back into the shade. He hid his face in Raph's shoulder. The big hand cradled the back of his head and Raph rumbled, "Don't worry about it, Leo."

He wasn't trying to think about the triggers, but it was hard not to think about something once you started. He shuddered, trying to focus instead on the song that was playing, trying to stay as the room began to slip away.

Right. Notifying. He raised a fist, a zero, and put all his energy into not returning to the void.

"Don." Raph said, with a little annoyance.

"It's a necessary conversation." Donnie snapped back.

"We literally just got him back--"

The sign for stop needed two hands, but shut up only needed one. Leo sharply closed his fingers by his mouth.

The quiet fell. Then Raph and Donnie said, contrite and monotone in turn, "Sorry, Leo."

The song was one he didn't like. He did the sign for phone against his head. Raph leaned over and handed him his blue-cased phone from where it was plugged in on the bedside table. Leo took a moment to change the song, hearing it shuffle through the playlist and the speakers that were playing... somewhere? Had Donnie installed something? He didn't have speakers before, only headphones.

He settled on a different playlist then navigated through all his apps. He could feel Raph leaning over his shoulder, looking along with him. Leo had never been one to hide his phone. All his brothers knew his password as he frequently asked them to read out notifications if he was skating or his hands were full.

There wasn't too much to look at -- everyone who knew him was aware he wasn't about to text back. There were a few tense messages in their family group chat about Leo's status, but they must've moved the conversation somewhere else as they didn't keep going. It changed to April updating them about Casey.

Something yanked on Leo's heart when he read those. It was still hard to focus on the screen, the words getting blurry and weird easily, and he only managed a few minutes.

The stupidest thing was that he'd lost his thousand-plus Snapchat streaks with his brothers and April and his multi-hundred streak with Hueso. He considered sending them all one that just said 'I lived bitch' but then thought that might be bad taste, even for him. He stayed on the screen for a few moments, finding the idea of having to restart his streaks too much to handle, and locked his phone again.

All of his usual efforts just seemed so beyond him. It was just... so discouraging and hard and he had no fucking arm and he'd leapt in a portal with the intent to die and how was he supposed to go forward from that?

A darkness fell over him, different and heavy. After a moment, the presence inside him stirred, and Leo's body felt numb and weird. It was like watching a movie to have his hand raise, an 'M' to his heart.

"You want Mikey?" Donnie confirmed, looking up from where he was tapping hyper-speed at his tablet.

Leo -- was it Leo anymore? -- nodded his fist.

Donnie fetched Mikey. His youngest brother came trailing in the room, wearing what was definitely one of Leo's hoodies, sleeves past his fingers, and said in a watery voice, "You rang, Nardo?"

Leo merely opened his arm in offer. Mikey wasted absolutely zero time crawling onto his bed, inserting himself wiggly and warm in a tight hug to his front, Raph on his back, Donnie tapping away beside him.

The darkness inside him could not possibly face the brightness of his brothers. The presence in his mind relaxed, giving control back, with Leo settling into his body and bones again.

Oh.

Leo sandwiched in love, not capable of keeping that dark mindset, whatever the presence was in his mind it was trying to help and knew exactly how. Knew not to ask Donnie for cuddles that weren't initiated by his twin. It knew them all well.

Soft music played. Mikey dug his chin into Leo's shoulder, and murmured, "What's goin' on?"

Leo didn't try to answer. After a moment of his silence, Raph offered, "Leo's was a one for a bit, now he's a zero again. We're hanging out, trying to ground him. He asked for you."

"I was just..." Mikey cleared his throat, and tried to sound more like himself. It was like a funhouse mirror -- a parody. "Never mind. We can ground. Hey Leo, ever heard of progressive relaxation? I promise it's a lot cooler than breathing exercises."

Leo had heard of that, actually. It was one that was mentioned to be good for insomnia. He'd tried it a couple times but was never successful as he usually got distracted by his own thoughts.

Mikey kept a steady narration, keeping him on track, making him tense and relax all the muscles in his body. It started at his toes and went up. Leo tried to be good and follow, even as the storm of his mind didn't allow much calm.

"Did that help?" Mikey asked, scrunched up close. When there wasn't an immediate response, he continued with a sad little, "Are you still here?"

Leo pushed through apathy and pain to pat Mikey on the shell.

It ran a shudder through his baby brother. Mikey mumbled, "Good. That's good."

Quiet. Like no one knew what to say. God, Leo hated it. He wanted to crack a joke, to cut the tense silence. Sure, Donnie was tapping away and his chill playlist was still going, but he could feel the tension in both Raph and Mikey on either side of him. Leo was just ruining everything just by being there--

Leo jumped, because the presence in his mind had reached out and poked him. 'Stop that'.

Offended, Leo tried to poke back. But the presence retreated back. He thought at it as it slunk away, 'What happened to leaving me alone?'

".. gotta work with us here, Leo." Raph was saying in his ear.

Right. He'd jumped. And now he was staring into the middle distance again. Leo blinked rapidly and focused on the blur of red, offering Raph a half smile. He rubbed his fist on his plastron, sorry.

"You're good. Where'd you go?" Raph asked, and Leo was beginning to hate the kid-gloves way everyone talked to him all the time. He wanted to be better, he wanted to not be like this either.

And like hell he was about to tell his brothers about the ride-a-long in his head. He still didn't know if the aversion to the thought was his own. But either way, he felt it, and it was there.

The sign for 'hard' needed two hands. He was getting frustrated at his deficit in communication due to the throbbing lack of arm. He finger-spelled it instead. He wasn't entirely sure anymore why trying to verbally talk wasn't on the table. It was just... daunting.

Raph sighed, giving a soothing rub to his shell. "We know it's hard. You're doing great."

"You're killing it, bro." Mikey mumbled.

"Way to remain attached to reality." Donnie chimed in, voice utterly flat in a way that would be insulting if you didn't know him.

But Leo knew him, he knew all of them, and their support meant everything to him, especially now. He touched his fingers to his mouth and blew them a kiss.

Mikey gave a damp chuckle.

Leo wanted to do a lot of things, he wanted to inspect Raph's eye that his big brother seemed to keep turned away from him at all times, he wanted to examine the cracked marks and tremble in Mikey's hands, and he wanted to address the fractured expression on Donnie's face that came from persistent lack of sleep or self care.

But he couldn't do any of those things. He was hurting, and his grip on reality meant that it took all his strength just to even stay in the room with them, listening to music. He pushed and managed to have some more broth after a while, not stepping into the void even once. Now that Leo was closely monitored by his brothers, the presence in his mind didn't shift or move or make itself known at all. Leo could've imagined it, maybe.

Donnie was satisfied with his consumption of food and let him look at his chart again. Leo still had trouble getting the screen to focus, but at least he felt confident enough that he could look over the models Donnie was designing for a port implant. He needed something for his stub to interface with his future prosthetic.

The presence chose then to speak up again, 'That will hurt.'

'What's the alternative?' Leo challenged. 'And hey, better yet if you're not actually going to fuck off, what's your name?'

Unsurprisingly there was no answer. Leo tried to reach into the shade to poke him, but it just made his control slip. Voices around him. Worried. Leo stopped trying to chase down the presence and concentrated on his toes, trying to flex them tight and release. His heels. His ankles. By the time he got to his calves, he could hear reality again.

"... it just always feels so random." Mikey was saying, not loosening his grip in the slightest, hugging Leo desperately tight around the stomach. "I just don't understand. I want him to be okay and I feel like we're never getting anywhere."

"That is untrue, Angelo." Donnie said, using the logical-reassuring that came out the most when trying to be soothing. "We have made leaps and bounds with Leo's disassociation. In the beginning he could not remain grounded for more than a few seconds, maybe minutes. He has been present with us for hours now. Just because he has slipped at this point does not negate the progress we've made."

"But where does he go?" Raph said, pained.

Donnie sighed. "I don't know." and if that wasn't the worst words to come out of Donnie's mouth. He continued, unhurried, "But the mind is a complex and protective thing. Whatever happened in the prison dimension, let alone the infuriating mystery of what happened to his arm... he is trying to cope with that. It's going to take time."

Infuriating mystery? Leo raised his hand and shook it. 'What' usually needed two hands, but he figured the meaning  would come across anyway.

"You're back." Donnie said, even tone that betrayed just a little satisfaction. "What what, Leon?"

Urgh, so many words. He blindly tried to slap at his stub, opening eyes that he couldn't remember closing to look at his twin in question.

"Your arm?" Donnie said. "Hate to tell you this, bro--"

"Donnie." Raph interrupted. "Really?"

"It was a joke!"

"Too soon."

Leo's shoulders shook, because the laughter bubbled up before he could think too hard about it.

A small, stunned silence, then Mikey said, "Nah, not soon enough, I think. You're just dying to make some one-handed puns, aren't cha?"

For a stupid moment he wished that he'd lost his left arm instead because he wanted to be able to joke 'I'm alright'. But what he actually wanted was for this whole thing to be a distant laugh in the past, not a looming figure of his life irrevocably changed and soaked in pain.

Leo poked his chin with just his finger. Serious. Then he tapped his arm again.

He wasn't sure he would be able to stay present long enough to get the answer to his question. But Donnie sighed again, that thick weighted tired, and rubbed the back of his head.

"I don't know how you lost your arm, Leo." Donnie said, like admitting he didn't know twice in one day wasn't a felony. "When we spotted you through the portal, you had two. Once we pulled you out, you had one."

Leo remembered that much himself, thanks. That he'd come through and there was nothing but white-hot lightning of pain, and a thunderbolt into his skull, and --

Oh, this fucking asshole in his brain. Leo felt the room waver, and anything else Donnie was going to say vanished. Fine, he'd exhausted himself staying present for so long anyway, time to chase the ghost in his mind.

'Hey!' Leo stomped, searching wildly and blindly through the dark sludge and not finding anyone. 'You came into my head when we went through the portal, didn't you?'

The presence didn't answer. Leo staggered under the weight of the darkness, but persisted, searching. Hand out. Because in his mind, he only had one arm. That was stupid.

This whole thing was stupid. 'Hey! Listen to me, you're in my head, buddy! You're the unwanted guest here.'

'I don't want to be here either.' The presence said, in a completely different direction than Leo was assuming. He twisted to go in that way instead.

'Leave then.' Leo suggested, sharp and bitter.

'I don't think I can.' The presence admitted. 'I'm trying to stay out of your life, it's just... hard.'

'How'd you get in here? Where were you before?' Leo demanded, getting closer and closer, feeling out into the blind footsteps.

Flash of light. Not much else. The presence said, 'I don't know. I should be dead.'

'So you are a ghost.' Leo found him. He gripped on tight, trying to pull him from the darkness--

"Sensei?"

A lurch. Momentum. Sudden movement, but not Leo's own. He felt his body inhale. He felt his eyes open. He could see, but it was far away, it was tunnelled and strange. He was not in control. His mouth said, barely a breath, not even a sound, "Casey."

Emotions were an unidentifiable whirlwind. Chaotic and painful. Leo felt battered by them, like standing defenseless in a hurricane. His eyes were rushing with unshed tears, blurring his vision as he stared at his kid.

His kid?

Oh.

Leo grabbed the presence and yanked him out of control as hard as he could. The two of them tumbled back into the void, but this time Leo understood. He could make out the figure before him, he saw what could not been seen. Shrouded, the two of them a warped mirror.

Leo stared at an older version of himself. One arm. Tall and strong. Weathered and beaten down. Everything he wanted to be. Everything he was afraid of.

'Dude.' Leo said, because he couldn't possibly think of anything else. 'You're Master Leonardo. Casey's Sensei.'

'I suppose so.' The older Leo shifted uncomfortably, looking away. It was weird to call someone else his own name. He went with Sensei.

Leo hadn't been told much about the future version of himself, beyond that he was the greatest ninja of all time and that he'd saved some people and lost everyone else important to him. Staring at the miserable turn of Sensei's brow, he couldn't help but think about how he had once shouted at Hueso that he was nothing without his brothers.

Here was nothing.

'Well how'd you lose your arm?' Leo asked.

'I forgot to cherish it.' Sensei replied.

Leo reached over and touched the place where his own arm disappeared into the void. His mental state couldn't decide how to depict a wound it hadn't actually set eyes on past the bandages, so it was just... gone. He didn't want to think about it. 'Why are you just hiding in my mind, dude? I'm sure Casey in particular would be thrilled to know you're here.'

The older version was already shaking his head before Leo even finished speaking. 'No. I'm not supposed to be here. I don't want to take over your life.'

'Because I'm doing such a great job.' Leo said, with thick sarcasm, then flapped his hand at him. 'Whatever man, you keep claiming you don't want to be here, but you keep taking the wheel anyway. I've got your number. It's fine, I'm not eager to tell the others I'm crazy anyway.'

'You're not crazy.' Sensei said, a little more gentle, a little more rough.

Leo couldn't help but roll his eyes hugely at that. 'Are we calling catatonic disassociation super well-adjusted now?'

'You went through a lot of trauma in a short time. And I suspect having mine shoved into your head too isn't helping. You're doing pretty well, considering.'

Leo didn't believe that in the slightest. He smiled so the older version would think maybe he did. 'Sure. I'm exhausted, though, so I'm going to see if there's any freaking rest to be had in an endless void. I appreciate that you've finally let me see I'm not just imagining things.'

The casual aura did not completely hide the mild hysteria Leo had at this whole situation.

'Sure thing.' Sensei said, sounding horribly tired.

Leo wondered if he rested, did it give that to Sensei too? Because he sure looked like he needed it.

He let himself sink into the inky black. The limitless void wasn't particularly restful, but it was better than the constant effort of being awake.

Chapter Text

Dreams took over. Pain and fire. Leo was in pain, and it was constant, never ending, impossible to ignore.

"Leo? You okay?"

Sound broke through. He was breathing hard. Leo couldn't do this right now. He was scared and tired and sad. And it hurt so bad.

Instinct took over. The presence took over. Leo understood, with a foggy clarity, that Sensei was used to this. His hand moved, finger-spelling hurt over his missing arm.

A sharp inhale from the other person in the room. Mumbling about medication. The problem was fixed. Leo didn't have to do anything, grateful, slipping back into a dreary darkness.

Sleep wasn't nearly as marred with suffering this time. But Leo still didn't have much energy when he woke, eyes fluttering to inspect the room he was in.

Casey was still there. He was asleep in the chair next to him, scrunched up small like a little kid.

Sense memories flooded in: A scrawny tyke wearing a over-large purple hoodie, hugging his legs and sleeping in a chair with his cheek squished against his knees. A sick, flush-faced kid on a bathroom floor, giving a glassy eyed stare with eyes too big for his small head, feeling indescribably tiny when picked up. A barely-teen scrunched by the mattress on the floor, pretending he was keeping watch but asleep, chin against his chest.

The love and sorrow fought a war in Leo's chest. No. In Sensei's chest. His kid.

A shuddered breath. Leo was awake. It wasn't Leo, it was Sensei. Who thought he'd never see Casey again, never know if he'd made the right decision.

For once, he had. Because Casey was right there. Scrunched up small like the kid he was, wearing April's school sweatshirt and looked like he'd been actually eating.

Sensei knew exactly what he'd say. He'd rub the back of Casey's neck and whisper, sleeping on the job, Case? Then his kid would shoot up, flushed and apologetic but thrilled to see him, and--

Sensei couldn't do that to him. Couldn't give him that hope that he was still there. He wasn't. He wasn't about to take away life from this other kid, who'd barely gotten to live at all.

'Hey.' Leo thought, from the corner where he'd been watching from the inky black.

Sensei sank back there too. For a moment, there was nothing, as neither of them had the reigns.

'If someone loved me as much as that, I'd want to know.' Leo told the presence in his mind.

'You have lots of people who love you that much.' Sensei replied, steady, even in heartbreak.

'But Casey doesn't.' Leo reminded him.

Sensei was silent. He didn't move. Leo took the front.

Leo, the littler Leo, felt badly about leaving Casey behind and forcing him to shut the portal. So he woke up the kid by elbowing him.

"Huh?" Casey sat up, pillow-lines on his face from sleeping against the bed. Then he lit up, a smile breaking wide, "Sensei! You're awake! You... you are awake this time, right?"

Leo raised a single finger for their scale, because he wasn't about to tip back into the void. Then he switched it to an 'ok', and drew the question mark sign, pointing at Casey.

Hopefully Casey knew sign, or else this was going to get harder. Sensei immediately snorted in his mind, 'Of course he does.'

Casey tracked the movement knowingly, because of course he knew sign. His smile went more crooked and he said, "I'm okay. It's all been... a bit overwhelming, but I'm really enjoying the past. It's all so..."

Casey didn't seem to know how to finish the sentence. Sensei offered more than one suggestion, like he couldn't help himself, 'Big? Loud? Crowded?'.

"Different." Casey said at last, but it sounded like it wasn't really the word he was going to say.

There was a long moment of quiet. Casey eventually said, "I wanted to apologize."

Leo blinked in surprise. He touched his forehead then dropped it into a 'Y'. He didn't understand what Casey could possibly think he'd done wrong in this situation -- they'd won. They did it.

"For what I said to you." Casey amended, avoiding eye contact, fidgeting with the end of the cuffed fluffy sleeve he was wearing.

Sensei thought fondly of how he'd never seen his kid ever wear something that soft and warm looking. And how he still, even as a teenager, sat and squirmed when he felt like he'd done something wrong. Like the little kid with a miserable twist to his mouth, fidgeting as he was set on a counter to avoid broken glass. The same expression on his face, a ghost superset over the image Leo was staring at now.

"Sensei?" Casey ventured, unsure, notch between his brow.

'You make it hard to focus.' Leo chided, because he could barely sustain his attention as it was, let alone when Sensei was having a Moment in his head.

'Sorry.' Sensei did sound sorry. 'I'll shut up.'

'I doubt that.' Leo replied, because if he knew anyone, he knew himself. He blinked back into focus, trying to unsettle from the middle distance he'd fallen into. If he wasn't careful, the claws of the void would drag him back under. His ability to focus was truly shot, and he notified Casey with a raised fist for zero.

"Sorry." Casey said, and it sounded so much like Sensei had moments ago it almost made Leo snort. "I probably shouldn't be having this conversation right now. I just... I feel bad about how everything went down."

Okay, Leo did snort this time. Then, firmly he stuck his thumb under his chin and moved it forwards, pointed angrily at his kid, then cupped his hand into the same shoulder, motioning down. Not. Your. Fault.

Casey's lip wobbled, then he looked away as he shook his head. "I was a jerk to you for no reason. I shouldn't have thrown it in your face like that. You didn't... you didn't have to prove anything."

Except that he did. Leo had to prove himself constantly, all the time, because no one believed in him. For good reason, really.

Sensei started to grumble. Leo mentally kicked him back, not wanting to get distracted again.

For Casey, Leo pointed at himself then plucked something invisible from in front of him. My choice.

"I hate your choices." Casey gave an uneven smile.

Leo felt Sensei's heart break. After a second, the presence fled and disappeared into the void, but not before the repeated image of the pain on Casey's face as Sensei threw him into the portal alone replayed in vivid clarity.

Leo rubbed a fist on his plastron. Sorry.

Casey reached out and stopped the motion with his hand, holding on. He shook his head, but didn't elaborate further.

Leo's mind felt huge and echoing without Sensei sitting in the corner. He was tempted to dip into the void and join him, but the lack of control over his own body during dissociation made his skin crawl. He couldn't believe he'd been catatonic for over a week. He signed Casey for food, which Future Boy immediately ran off to fetch.

Casey came back with more broth. Leo had been trying to sit up, itchy with how long he'd been in his room. He signed, usually a two-handed sign but it would still make sense with one, a bend hand tapped from one side to another. Move.

"No, no, I don't think you should be moving, Leo." Casey said, voice a little high, hurrying to set down his load.

Leo flapped his hand dismissively. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and swayed, dizzy.

Apparently deciding he couldn't stop him, Casey hovered nervously instead, close enough to catch him should he collapse. But Leo wasn't an idiot, he took a moment to slowly stretch his legs out, feeling the uncomfortable tug of pain and stiffness.

"Why don't we eat first?" Casey offered, trying to sound sensible even as the nerves ran deeper.

Food was energy. That was a good idea, really, so he could have the strength to get up and get moving. He needed to get better so he could--

So he could what?

A cold darkness stopped him up short. What did Leo have going for him now? After his truly shitty performance as a leader, and his lack of arm... he was good as useless. He was a dead weight, a loud mouth idiot who almost got everyone killed.

Hm. Leo had almost felt grounded for a minute there, but that was slipping fast.

"What are you thinking about?" Casey leaned into his line of sight, apparently reading something on Leo's face he wasn't aware he was giving away.

Immediate instinct to lie, Leo put an O shaped hand to his chin then threw it out loose. Nothing.

Leo didn't need knowledge from the future to know that the expression on Casey's face said that he did not believe him in the slightest.

The only option was to distract, so Leo held out for the food he'd been brought. All his insides felt fragile and weak, swallowing some huge ridiculous task, but he committed to it.

Donnie joined them at the point where Leo was fighting with the last few spoonfuls of broth.

"Number?" Donnie greeted, brisk.

Leo abandoned the spoon to raise one finger.

"Going somewhere?" Donnie asked next, tapping Leo's leg where he was still sitting on the edge of his bed.

Leo stubbornly repeated the same sign he gave Casey earlier, hand tapping from one side to another. Move.

"We're pretty bored, I think." Casey said, eyes crinkling with his smile, hands braced between his knees and looking up at Donnie. Leo appreciated that despite his earlier protests, Casey was immediately on his side and phrasing it like this was something they were in together.

"You've never been one to sit still." Donnie exhaled out his nose, amused. Leo knew he was thinking about how they'd sit next to each other during movies and Donnie would share his stim toys, otherwise Leo would fidget and move and watch the movie while standing on his head.

Leo gave up on the last bit of broth and handed the bowl to Casey. He immediately tried to stand and his knees did not lock.

"Idiot." Donnie said, catching his elbow. "Why would you think that was going to work?"

He didn't. He wanted Donnie to catch him. Leo leaned into the touch, giving a smug little grin, and flopped his arm over Donnie's shoulders.

"Yeah, yeah." Donnie said into his ear, and squeezed back. "Don't just leap to your feet. We can come up with a more regimented rehabilitation schedule."

Leo only had one arm to talk with, and had to wring it practically around Donnie's neck to reach his own nose, twisting a single finger against it. Boring.

A few expressions flashed over Donnie's face, but he didn't give anything away when he answered, "Yes, I know, getting strength back is very 'slow and steady wins the race', which has never been your style. However, you will have to, as they say: suck it up, buttercup."

"You don't want to hurt yourself more, Leo." Casey chimed in, something rote in his tone. He'd said this a lot, probably to him. Sensei was still hiding and didn't chime in if Leo was right in his guess.

"Future Boy is correct." Donnie took the opportunity to lower Leo back down onto the edge of his bed.

Leo didn't want to, however, because sitting still and staring at the walls was actually driving him wild. If everyone wanted him to be grounded in reality he was seriously going to have to do more than just sit there. Being left with his own thoughts was just dangerous. It was like being locked in a room with the one person who hated him the most.

"What's going on in here?" Splinter said, hovering in the door watching Leo try his best to elbow his twin with only one elbow and struggle back to standing with weak knees.

"Leonardo is bored and decided now is the time to run a marathon." Donnie reported dryly.

"Surely some supervised activity couldn't hurt." Splinter said, because he was the best.

Donnie sighed. He gave Leo a very pointed look. "You saw your own charts, mellizo. If it was me, would you be letting me walk yet?"

Turning his medic powers against him, vile fiend. Leo gave him a look that conveyed the sentiment, causing a twitch of Donnie's lip. But Donnie was right. Severe blood loss alone, the ribs singing with slashing pain with every twist of his body, the weakness and muscle stiffness that would've come from a prolonged inactivity... if this was Donnie or Raph or Mikey he'd be chaining them to the bed and only allowing small, supervised walks with crutches at minimum.

Leo tapped his hand down at his side. Crutch.

"Stubborn..." Donnie muttered, but went to go find if they still had crutches somewhere.

Splinter approached where Leo was sitting on the edge of his bed, touching his knees and smiling up at his son. "It is good to see you up, even if Purple thinks it is too soon."

Leo gave him a wink, the motion more tired and forced than he really liked.

Splinter's smile grew, only to falter, and his grip on Leo's knees tightened. He said, "I do miss the sound of your voice, Blue. Is there a reason you aren't talking yet?"

Casey tensed from where was watching, like he recognized this was a sensitive question. Leo didn't have a good answer and shrugged.

"Would you mind saying something for your Pops, then?" Splinter asked, taking Leo's remaining hand and holding it with both of his.

Small and strong, holding tight. Leo looked down, a pressure in his throat, sore and hurting. He opened his mouth, wanting to joke, wanting to make everyone happy and talk and be normal and --

Wipe that grin off your face.

His throat closed tight, sealed.

Leo's hand went loose in his dad's grip. He felt his gaze unfocus into the middle distance. He felt the ripple in the room as his family recognized his slip.

"Stay here with us, Blue." Splinter reminded, sounding a million miles away. Like he was speaking to Leo from another universe -- another dimension.

Nope. Leo was a zero. Leo was sinking into the void, losing grip, face going numb, stomach dropping.

"Focus on us, sensei." Casey begged.

His body moved. Leo felt his broken ribs inflate with air. A flutter of his eyelids, his vision focusing, and another in the driver seat -- summoned at the beg of his child.

"I'm fine." Leo's mouth said, rasped and broken, but there. Present.

"Oh my sweet baby blue." Splinter said, squeezing hard on the remaining hand.

Leo felt washing waves of grief, an ocean rolling up the shore over and over.

"Of course that'd be the first thing you'd say." Casey said, painfully fond.

Leo was not driving his body. He turned and offered Casey a smile that felt weird on his face, something careful and well-worn. Something that made a mirror of grief erupt on Casey Junior's face before it shattered away into blankness.

'Oh kid.' Sensei thought, a big messy ball of sorrow.

"Still with us?" Splinter asked, squeezing his hand once again.

Leo nodded. Or Sensei? Or both of them. It was hard to say, they were both there. Sensei had stopped him from falling into the void. And now he was stepping back from the controls, gently drawing Leo to the front.

'I'm tired.' Leo complained, because the sudden zap of energy he felt from experiencing panic was relentless.

'You've got this.' Sensei encouraged, and settled back to watch again.

Leo wanted to complain, but bit back on it, uncertainly pulling himself back into his body, wiggling his toes and blinking until he focused. It took a minute.

Donnie was there now. He'd found the crutches that had more than their share of use from four skateboarding kids who grew up with 24 hour access to a half pipe.

"... he's in and out." Splinter was saying, gesturing.

Leo raised his fist in a zero.

"Thanks for the update." Donnie settled at Leo's elbow, giving him an unimpressed stare. "Are we still wanting to move?"

Leo almost, almost gave up on the idea. The pulse of panic and bone deep exhaustion compounded with the lurching pain that never left, never abated. He wanted to curl up in a ball and surrender to the endless void.

But Donnie said 'we'. That same supportive wording Casey used. Because whatever stupid thing Leo was doing, Donnie was doing it too. Even if he disagreed. Hell, especially if he disagreed.

It was a beat too long, but Leo reached out for the crutch. He didn't know why Donnie brought both, it wasn't like he could use two.

Donnie seemed to realize that in the same moment, mouth twisting, darkness hanging over his already exhausted face. But he shuttled it away, moving the spare crutch to the side and supervising Leo's efforts to balance.

It was easier with something to lean on. Even if his ribs exploded with pain that took his breath away and required a moment of cautious breathing to overcome. But he took a step, then two, then paused in the middle of the room.

He had bitten off more than he could chew. Leo's knees were trembling. He wanted to move, he thought, but now that he was moving it was all overwhelming and heavy and hard. And painful, why was it always so fucking painful? His lungs wheezed. A panic of barbed wire wrapped around his diaphragm, not allowing it to inflate.

His only hand to communicate was tied up with the crutch. He couldn't even lift his chin to shoot a panicked look. He was left with one option, and choked out loud, "D."

His twin must've been hovering pretty close with how quickly he plastered himself to his side, arm around his waist and taking most of the weight. He said, "I've got you, Nardo."

Leo shuddered through a painful breath. Too soon. Too much. With slow purpose, Donnie turned them back to the bed. Splinter helpfully relieved Leo of the crutch and set it aside, while Casey manually lifted his legs back up onto his bed.

Shame burst his face hot. He covered his face with his arm, breathing in shuddering turns, wavering in the pain and the tempting void.

'You did great.' Sensei commented quietly.

Leo sullenly thought that Sensei was probably running marathons the day after he lost his arm. He didn't project that, letting just an aura of bitterness return the comment.

Casey was holding his feet. Splinter had climbed up on the bed and had a small hand rubbing patterns over Leo's heart. Donnie was close, murmuring something in Leo's ear.

'Why the shame?' Sensei prodded, when Leo made no move to do anything but mope. 'Look at all these people who love you. They don't see anything but how hard you're trying.'

'And failing.' Leo reminded him.

'Yesterday you'd walked zero steps. Now you have two.'

Leo scoffed mentally. 'Great. Two. I'm really racing along.'

Sensei sighed. 'I know you've got lots of medical knowledge rattling around in here. Are we wanting to push ourselves more than that right now?'

Pushing led to things like reopened injuries, stomach ulcers from too much painkillers on empty stomach, and many other exciting complications that could make things worse.

It was better to start slow, and not expect to be able to achieve the things possible before the injury occurred. Leo probably used to be able to run a mile without a sweat. It was unrealistic to expect that now and to try would lead to disastrous consequences.

Sensei told him, slow and tired, 'I'm not expecting you to have positive thoughts, I know I've spent enough years arguing with Mikey that it's simply not in my -- well, our -- nature. But listen to your inner healer and at least you'll survive.'

Leo breathed slow and steady. He didn't want a therapist in his head, trying to fix him. 'Did I ask for your advice?'

Quiet. After a long moment, Sensei replied, wry, 'I suppose not.'

'Thought so.'

Chapter Text

Leo reluctantly flexed his toes, giving them a thorough wiggle until he could hear the room again. Someone had put his music playlist on. Everyone had moved around. Leo didn't realize he'd lost time, it hadn't even felt like a minute had passed. But the rotating cast had shifted. Splinter was traded out for Mikey squeezing his hand. Raph talking on the other side of the room. The words refused to become coherent.

Leo pulled his hand free so he could rub his face. Both his brothers present fell quiet. Then he dropped, he moved it to his plastron and signed a reluctant fist in a circle. Sorry.

"You're fine, Leo." Mikey gave a gap-toothed smile, not quite landing on the truth. It wasn't really fine. None of them were about to acknowledge it.

A ball of sharp ice lodged underneath his ribs. It took a too-long moment to realize it wasn't any of the things Leo thought it was -- it wasn't the fissure-ache of his broken ribs stretching with every torturous breath, the act of being alive a terrible chore, it wasn't the sight of his brothers having to cope with his stupid incapability of remaining grounded again, no --

It was a gaping maw, a hole where there was strength, standing to find your support pillar gone and not being allowed to collapse because you were needed needed needed, it was burying your big brother with as many stuffed animals as you could find so he wouldn't be alone because he hated being alone.

It was a moment of hope clouded by loss, by a wink of an eye, by the fact that he could never forgive himself for asking his little brother, his baby brother he'd carried since they were small to die -- it was, of course, grief. Sensei was trying to muffle it, to cover it with his hand, but the darkness spilled out between his fingers.

'Shit, I'm so sorry.' Sensei choked out, and vanished into the mist.

"Leo?" Mikey said, a million miles away, distant and worried, worried, worried.

And he had a right to be worried, apparently, because Leo's body was crying. Whether or not it was because of Sensei or from Leo's own bone-deep, spinning emotion at having to deal with the flashed images of his dead brothers -- whatever the cause, tears dripped down his cheeks.

Leo choked on a sob, the pain of his ribs lancing through him with a shattered breath, and he fumbled to sign sorry one more time.

"What for, Leo?" Raph asked, a hint of something else, like this was a test.

Leo felt a hangover of possible answers. Sorry for leaving his brother alone. Sorry for asking his brother to die. Sorry for jumping into a portal in the relentless always hungry never satisfied quest to prove worthy.

Leo wasn't about to sign any of that, whether his or Sensei's, not that Sensei's would make any sense to them.

The sign for 'everything' required two hands. The world required two hands. It felt stupid to have a radiating punch of grief over something as insignificant as an arm when compared to the consuming grief of his own brothers, but it took precedence in his mind anyway. Self-absorbed. Failure.

The frustration at the lack of communication built into a growl in the back of his throat. Both his brothers present jumped when Leo let it rattle. He smacked the mattress with his only hand. That immediate surge of uncontrolled emotion, flushed with shame and indignity.

"Woah." Mikey said, surprised, but didn't shy away. "What's up?"

Leo jerkily touched his second finger to his forehead and twisted hard. Annoyed/irritated.

"Yeah, we got that much." Raph said, jaw working in the way when he was trying seriously to solve a problem. "Can you tell us what you're thinking about?"

The fact that he couldn't articulate himself, how could he communicate that he couldn't communicate? Down a hand, voice fled somewhere else, mind in shambles. The assaulted sense of loss, of grief. The pain. The -- the everything, and he couldn't sign everything, it took two hands!

"Okay, okay." Raph said, voice super weird, and the frantic motion in Leo's body was stalled by his big hands reaching out and encasing Leo's, firmly squeezing. It took Leo a moment, like playing back a video tape, to realize the hot rush of emotions had pushed out his body and the throbbing in his leg was because he'd started to hit there over and over before Raph intervened.

Leo felt mortified and yanked his hand away. He finger-spelled 'can't' because it was a stupid fucking two handed sign then tapped his perpendicular flat hand to his chin repeatedly. Talk. Can't talk.

"It's okay, Leo." Raph said, eyes huge, voice a little breathless as he looked at Leo. Mikey right beside him, knuckles white as he gripped Raph's arm.

Leo furiously tapped his fingers together. No. No. No.

"We don't care if you--" Raph started, that mockery of patience.

Leo didn't let him finish, cutting him off with a sharp stab of his own finger into his chest followed by a two handed sign that he made work with only one, a grabbing motion down in from his neck. I care. The severity of the action as he did it meaning I care so much.

"You're talking to us lots with ASL, it doesn't have to be out loud." Mikey was quick to assure him.

Leo tapped his fingers together again. No. All the freaking signs he wanted needed two hands! He finger-spelled the whole sentence out of frustration, sharp and too rapid fast to read. 'Too hard with one hand.'

Raph practically went cross eyed watching the signs fly by, mouthing the letters as they passed.

"Missed most of that." Mikey said, reluctant.

"Too hard with one hand?" Raph got after a moment.

Sharp nodded fist. Yes.

"Alright. Would it be better with your phone?"

Mikey very helpfully handed it over. Leo unlocked it, blinking quickly already as the LED screen hurt and his eyes struggled to focus. A hot bubble of rage came up his throat. He switched to the notes app long enough to type with one shaking thumb, slow and painful, 'screen hurts. can't focus. hard w one thumb.'

He tossed his phone back. Mikey read it out loud, voice going dejected at the end.

"Pen and paper?" Raph suggested, hopeful.

Leo snorted, and he could feel his red rimmed eyes well up with more tears. He pointed to himself, crossed his fingers and moved them to the right, and was forced to finger-spell the last word. I'm right-handed.

The two brothers guiltily looked at his lack of right hand. Leo sniffed, nose running while tears returned in full force.

"We get it now, thank you for explaining." Mikey said, in his sweetest voice, climbing up onto the bed and leaning into Leo's side. "You have no real way to communicate with us right now and that's so shit-- sucky."

Raph rolled his eyes, as if he didn't know Mikey swore. He took Leo's hand again, and said, "I know you can't stand not being understood, but we'll get there again. We'll find a way. Don't tear yourself up right now, you really gotta be focusing on healing."

Can't focus on shit, Leo wanted to tell him. Instead he tucked Mikey closer and pressed into his neck, feeling the tears flutter against his little brother's skin. He shouldn't be using them like this, wasting their time.

If only he were stronger. Leo sniffled and cried, hiccupping with it. Raph was squeezing in patterns, regular intervals. Mikey hummed along with the quiet music in the background.

Leo wanted to open his mouth and talk so badly. He wanted to pour out thousands of apologies, he wanted to make a million deflecting jokes and pretend none of this ever happened. The idea of speaking was so disorientating and hard and completely out of reach. He was such an idiot --

'The harder you push yourself to talk, the harder it becomes.' Sensei said, from where he was sunk into the scenery of the mindscape. Leo had no idea how long he'd been there.

'I know I have been thinking of you as Sensei but I don't actually want you to try and teach me anything.' Leo replied, just as miserable in his mind as he was in the real world.

'Sorry.' Sensei said again, that same cold and tired wryness. 'Habit. It's fun to watch myself think things I've thought for years and realize I really was just a damn kid. If you think of yourself as stupid so much, you'll believe it.'

'I literally didn't ask.' Leo gave him a weighted glare, trying to pack it with all the hatred towards himself, since it was. Some idealized version where he grew up strong. While simultaneously being an enormous failure that got everyone killed. Leo was capable of many levels of complex feeling towards this unwanted guest in his mind. It seemed he was the only person Leo could actually talk to.

'Listen to me or don't.' Sensei gave a shrug. Leo realized the two of them were squared up, having abandoned reality entirely. They were on the edge of a void filled pond, rippled reflected of their mirrored pose. Leo, short and lithe, Sensei tall and strong. Both missing an arm.

Leo always liked his red stripes. Seeing them on Sensei made something in his stomach churn, the way the bags underneath his eye like bruises marred the colour, how the lines of his face aged and weathered, how miserable he could look and he didn't even need a mirror.

Leo couldn't feel his body. Stuck in the shade again, frustrated, and he pointed sharply at Sensei's chest, 'I don't know what you want from me, dude.'

'There's not really a precedent for this.' Sensei said, tired. He always sounded so freaking tired! 'I'd say I'm trying my best but I think we both know I'm flying blind as much as you. As much as me. Eugh boy, that's confusing.'

'I seriously don't want your advice.' Leo reiterated. 'You said you didn't want to take over my life, so don't.'

'I know.' Sensei's smile was so sad and small it kind of hurt Leo's heart. 'You're really doing great, kid--'

'Stop!' Leo pushed him. The ripples in the dark pond moved in earnest. 'I don't want that either! I'm not some project for you to fix. Just be a passenger if you want, I don't care.'

Sensei stared at him, a little puzzled. 'Except you were trying to get me to talk to Casey. You seemed to think he might want to know I was here.'

'That's different.' Leo shook his head. 'I don't want you hovering over my shoulder like some all-knowing jerk. I never asked for that. But Casey... he lost you. And you're right here. I feel shitty knowing I'm withholding that from him.'

Sensei was quiet. When he didn't speak, the entire place felt a thousand times bigger, consuming and swallowing whole.

'I'm not what Casey needs.' Sensei said, eventually, painfully. 'And maybe I'm not what you need either. I'm just incapable of shutting up. I'm sure you get that.'

Leo snorted, but with more humour. 'Well, yeah. Obviously. Listen, we're in a bit of a pickle. If this is gonna be in any way bearable, we've gotta try harder to stop stepping on each other's toes. I won't bug you about Casey. You won't bug me about my wonderful decision making. Deal?'

'That's a terrible deal.' Sensei said, equally amused.

'Good talk.' Leo turned on his heel and began to inspect the dark. 'I didn't want to dissociate again, dammit. I'm trying to stay present so I don't freak anyone out.'

'I know.' Sensei said, letting his foot trace in the shallow water, then gesturing. 'This way.'

'What's this way?' Leo said, but followed because the void was far more comfortable with Sensei than it was when he was alone and terrified.

Sensei brought him to the tree with the shade. Leo pressed his back against it, shutting his eyes and trying to feel his toes. Wiggling them.

The older turtle settled beside him. A bare brush, almost phantom, it was presence. No matter where Leo went, he wasn't alone. He wiggled his toes more intently and felt his body. He opened his eyes.

It was dark. Cut-contrast blue light intersected across the room, falling in broken shadows from his nightlight hitting all the obstacles along the way. A running fan. Someone sitting up beside him on the bed, tapping away on a tablet.

All the tension relaxed, because there was nothing more soothing than the company of his twin. He wasn't alone. He was never alone. The little purple clip was on his finger, and just to be a total shit bag he took it off into his palm.

The tapping stopped. Donnie gave a little chuckle, looking over to say, "You're just asking for a subdermal implant, bro."

Leo fought exhaustion to raise his arm, poking his finger to his chin then his chest with raised eyebrows. Missed me?

"No." Donnie said, monotone, as he leaned down and bonked their foreheads together.

Leo managed to smile, leaning into it for a second.

"Can I get a number on the scale?" Donnie asked.

Leo raised one finger. He was still pretty tired. But he was present in the room for sure. Then, just because he desperately missed the sound of his twin's laugh, he turned the gesture into a rude one.

Donnie didn't gift him a real laugh, but he did snort, pushing Leo's hand down and saying, "Yes, yes. I am annoying at my insistence on checking your well-being. Somebody went and incapacitated our team medic and now we've all got to suffer my bedside manner. How's the pain?"

It wasn't great. But it'd been worse. Leo lied with his faithful 'ok' symbol.

Donnie rolled his eyes at his predictability, and said, "Scale of one to ten?"

Leo gave it a four, flashing three fingers then an extra one.

"Six then. Painkillers?"

Leo shook his head.

Donnie tapped away at his tablet again. "Do you want me to fetch someone else for you?"

It was Leo's turn to roll his eyes. He elbowed Donnie in the ribs.

"Ow." Donnie said dryly. "Fine. But I've got work to do, so don't distract me."

Leo splayed his hand on his chest, giving a mock-wounded look, like he'd ever distract anyone. Donnie ignored him with practice, the deep furrow between his brows.

Leo could bet that the amount of sleep the genius had gotten in the last week was in the single digits. Unfortunately, he wasn't currently capable of fixing that. If he stole Donnie's tablet like he wanted to, his twin would simply leave and fetch someone else to watch him. It wasn't as if Leo could run after him.

It was dark, hard to inspect, but impossible to miss that Donnie was wearing a silk robe that their father bought him for Christmas. Every time Leo had seen him, Donnie was only been wearing soft clothes and not his battle shell. While Leo should've been thrilled that his twin was not torturing his shell with heavy machinery as usual, it didn't fill him with joy. Because Donnie hated going without his battle shell for long periods of time, so if he wasn't wearing it then something was wrong. There was no way to ask that wouldn't have Donnie deflecting, even if Leo had the communication capabilities.

Urgh. Stupid. Leo rolled over, wincing as his ribs stung, and managed to grab his phone off the bedside table. The screen hurt. He suffered through it for a few minutes, bored and curious, reading his messages.

More group-chat messages about Casey settling into April's life, into a world that wasn't over, trying ice cream and signing up for high school classes. They seriously must've had a separate group chat that didn't include him, because no one was talking about him. And he knew that April would be requesting hourly updates at minimum.

But they weren't putting that where he could see. And that worried him, because he didn't want to worry them. And if they felt it wasn't something he'd want to see, then it probably wasn't good discussions. He couldn't even imagine if one of his brothers went catatonic...

Leo checked the news. He immediately navigated away, as it was disaster recovery and he had enough of his own disaster recovery to deal with. He scrolled through his social media apps for ten seconds, annoyed at the algorithms giving him fear-mongering end of the world shit.

He opened Snapchat again and looked at his dead streaks. He hadn't opened anything other people had sent him since the incident, keeping the other end of the streaks even if Leo wasn't. Though not Hueso, but the bone-man only ever replied to Leo's snaps, never sent his own.

He checked April first. She had started all their streaks, so hers were always the most interesting. Workplace shenanigans, spotted graffiti, cute pics of Mayhem. This was consistent, with the new addition of a few snaps of Casey trying various things.

Donnie sent incomprehensible photos of tech or blueprints. Usually intermixed with a perfect mirror selfie, but he hadn't sent any recently. Instead it was specs, with long jargon-heavy captions that went right over Leo's head. One of them might've been the specs for his new arm. He couldn't focus on the screen well enough to tell.

Mikey always snapped his cooking. This was the same, with a few definitely taken on Draxum's kitchen counter. Leo didn't want to think about that right now. Although there weren't any of Mikey's usual snaps of his artwork, not even one. Worrying.

Raph was the worst at Snapchat and their streak had been broken many times before. He wasn't like Donnie, who was a selfie fiend, or Mikey who had at least three meals a day of ammunition. But Raph tried because his brothers wanted him to, and mostly sent photos of his feet. He'd sent only three since the incident, all three with the matted floor background of the dojo. There was a lack of cats Raph saw on the street. He must've not gone out much.

Leo exclusively sent photos of his brothers. Preferably asleep, but he wasn't picky. A habit he'd developed with Donnie was to turn his selfie camera on and indulge his twin's love of the art whenever they were next to each other. Leo's camera roll was full of literal hundreds of them.

After a moment of thought, Leo whistled between his teeth. Donnie glanced down, blinking, like he wasn't expecting Leo to make noise. He held his camera so Donnie could see.

"Really?" Donnie said, but leaned into the frame never the less. It was too dark to make out more than just the outline of their heads in faint blue glow. Leo took the picture anyway. It was stupid. He used the little time sticker, pasting 3:42AM over his shadowed forehead and sent it to all his streaks after only a moment of hesitation. Starting from zero.

Starting somewhere, he guessed.

April read it right away. She snapped back instantly, also a shadow in the dark, pasting the 3:43AM on her own forehead. With a blue heart emoji.

Leo smiled a little. None of the other messages were read, so no one else was awake. Beyond Donnie, tapping away obnoxiously in his ear.

He wished that there was any way he could get Donnie to go to sleep. He leaned over to try and see what his twin was working on, but the spec was zoomed in enough that it was just meaningless strings of wires. He had a separate tab open with something long and technical. Leo's eyes could not get the small font into focus.

Leo felt helpless. He hating feeling helpless, especially when it came to his brothers. That was why he became team medic in the first place. He knew that Donnie wasn't sleeping, it was written on the line of his shoulders and the bruises under his eyes. Yet here he was, still awake in the middle of the night while babysitting Leo.

He elbowed Donnie again. Face lit by the tablet, Donnie glanced over, breaking his intent focus on his project immediately for the second time, giving Leo his full attention. Nothing like the usual battle to get even an acknowledgement while Donnie was absorbed in his special interest.

'It's because he's worried about you.' Sensei remarked. He was such an ambient presence in the back of Leo's mind he'd completely forgotten he was there. And while the lack of intrusiveness was nice, the commentary on Shit He Already Knew wasn't. Leo knew his twin. He didn't need to be told. So he didn't reply to Sensei, not wanting to lose focus.

"Leon?" Donnie prompted, when he took that too-long second to do anything.

Leo struggled his arm out of the blanket and put an open palm in front of his face, closing it down by his chin. Sleep.

"You can go back to sleep." Donnie replied, being purposefully obtuse.

Leo let his face show that he knew exactly what Donnie was doing by misconstruing the question.

Donnie stared back, undaunted. Immovable object against unstoppable force.

Except the unstoppable force was exhausted and had deep hooks of pain in his skin, dragging him down. He didn't want to argue with Donnie over his basic care.

The signs needed both hands. His phone was right there, so he navigated to the note app and typed slowly with one shaky thumb, 'medics orders'

Leo turned his phone towards Donnie, who's eyes flicked over the text then shot his brother an annoyed look. Leo raised an eyebrow, keeping his phone in place, stern.

"I'm glad you're feeling better enough to order me around." Donnie said, tone blank enough that it was hard to tell if it was sarcasm or genuine. "However, I have a lot to accomplish at the moment, and an idiotic twin brother to watch over. One that perhaps should go back to sleep, since he can barely keep his eyes open."

The unstoppable force was feeling very stoppable. Leo was probably moments away from losing his battle. He hated losing. He cast out to Sensei, not sure what he was asking for -- strength to win, maybe, just to stay awake long enough to argue properly.

Sensei hesitated, but then stepped forward, taking the front. Leo felt his body wake a little, drawing from a reserve he wasn't aware he had, and blinked hard to clear it. Sensei gave Donnie a sleepy, half-hearted smile that didn't reach his eyes. He said, raspy, "Five minutes?"

Donnie visibly startled. Leo was a little jealous that Sensei could talk when Leo couldn't -- though that wasn't true. Leo himself had spoken since the incident, it was possible. It was just... hard.

Not as much for Sensei. It immediately melted the ice in Donnie's posture, shoulders slumping, reaching up to tiredly rub his eyes. He said, a little wrung out, "Okay, Leo. Five minutes."

Donnie set the tablet aside, face down beside him. He stayed above the blankets, settling down like he really intended it to be a short nap.

Sensei wasn't having that, reaching down to the bottom of the bed where Leo always kept an extra blanket folded over his feet. The contortion of movement cracked a bolt of pain from his ribs, but Sensei didn't even flinch, dragging the blanket one-handed over Donnie.

"Thanks Mom." Donnie muttered, sarcastic, but pulled the edge to his chin.

Sensei's heart broke a little. Leo could feel it. It was weird, the whole sharing a body thing was so incredibly weird. Sensei laid back down, the room darker without the flickering screen of the tablet, and the calm predictable cycle of Donnie's breathing. It couldn't have been thirty seconds before all the tension left Donnie's body, falling asleep.

Sensei stared at the silhouette, some creature of guilt and grief and ache clawing up his throat. He shoved himself away, leaving Leo to scramble to retake control before they both fell into the void.

'Dude.' Leo complained, but Sensei was already hidden away.

Chapter Text

Leo contemplated chasing after Sensei again, but he was so incredibly tired and he was never sure if the void was restful or not. Instead he let himself indulge the success Sensei had created for him, wondering if his own emotions could be simple for once. Was he achingly grateful that his beloved twin was finally asleep or desperately envious that Sensei could accomplish what he could not?

The insurmountable weight of his eyelids won. He sunk into a quicksand of sleep, surrendered. Leo dreamed of --

A figure, harsh cut lines, shadowed with only a haunting ruby glow from a haloed eye in the middle, the reach pull back before the hit, Leo's entire body jolting with the force of it, helpless as it rained blow after blow and death would be a welcome release but it did not come, there was nothing welcome there, stuck in a loop --

Gasping awake, feeling a light touch on his forehead. For a moment, both Leo and Sensei scrambled at the front of the mind, both trying to take control at the same time and leaving a kind of jerky spasm, eyes glazed.

"You're okay, Blue." Splinter promised, the touch moving down to cradle his cheek instead.

There was panic, suffocating and pressing. There was fear, surging instinct to protect, and it withdrew with Sensei as he seemed to get his bearings and allow Leo the control of his own body. Then Leo sucked in a huge breath, and said, "Dad?"

"Right here." Splinter whispered, and smiled huge with his eyes crinkled and such blatant fondness that it cut Leo deep through all the agony of his dream. "You were having a bad dream, I think. But you are at home, with me and Purple right beside you."

Still disorientated, Leo turned and discovered that his twin had managed to sleep through his terror-stricken awakening.

"He has not slept very much at all, I would like it if he could get a little more." Splinter said quietly. "I figured you'd want to be woken from such distress anyway."

Leo nodded faintly, watching the rise and fall of Donnie's chest for a second. It was impossible to tell in that moment if the pounding thought of 'I never thought I'd see him again' was Leo or Sensei.

It didn't matter. He turned back to his father, who was still giving an encouraging smile. Splinter said, "How grounded are we this morning, my son?"

Leo wiggled his toes. He raised one finger. The terror was still on his teeth.

"I am glad." Splinter said, cutting through Leo's immediate annoyed reflection that he couldn't do better than a one. Soothed to the root of his soul by the proud little beam on his dad's face. "We should work on getting your strength up today. How do you feel about trying some solid food?"

Hunger was a foreign concept. Leo shrugged, picking at the edge of his blanket.

"We'll give it a shot." Splinter encouraged. "I will get you something."

His dad hopped off, leaving Leo to his thoughts. Bad idea. He grabbed his phone, seeing that he had a reply to his snap even though it was only 6AM. It was from Hueso.

For a second, he was wracked with nerves, unsure what his Tío had been told about the situation. But when he opened the message, it was a shot of Run of the Mill, all the chairs flipped up, and the caption, 'Te extrañé, pepino.' I missed you.

It was almost a hilarious statement, considering 90% of the replies Leo got to his Snapchat was 'stop bothering me with your nonsense'. It put a pained smile on his face, feeling weird at the sensation of being missed. He wasn't sure why it made breathing harder, like the idea that people would miss him was another broken rib.

Splinter returned with peanut butter toast. Leo struggled up on his elbow, leveraging to sit up enough to eat. The hunger stayed a separate entity until he was partially through the first piece then it woke to something small and searching. He ate both pieces and drank the water he'd been given. He signed thank you to his father.

"You're welcome." Splinter nodded, satisfied. "Your brothers should be up soon and they'll be happy to see you awake already. I'd like to try and keep it that way. Would you be willing to do a grounding exercise with your old man?"

Pops, I'd do anything for you, Leo thought but couldn't push past his teeth. He smiled, trying to convey that way, but the medium was inadequate. Leo was inadequate. The best he could do was breathe along with his father.

Donnie slept through it. Leo engaged with the physical action of breathing enough that he felt like he could pin-point all the individual broken ribs in his chest, and if he sat still enough with his only hand in his lap, his mind could imagine there was a right hand there too. But when he peeked, it was just as startlingly absent as before.

He missed his right arm. He had a little scar on his right thumb from accidentally slicing open his finger with scissors trying to make Raph a birthday card as a little kid. When he saw the singular hand in his lap, sparkling blue nails, it was so awful that there wasn't another there. He had two katanas, he needed both arms to fight. To protect his family.

'Donnie will make you a new arm.' Sensei chimed in, apparently reaching his limit of silence.

'It won't have that little scar. I won't be able to paint the nails.' Leo snapped back, shoulders going tense.

"What are you thinking of, my sweet baby blue?" Splinter asked, breaking through his foggy concentration.

Leo inhaled and exhaled slowly. He reached up and tapped his stump. It tingled with pain when he did.

"It is a lot of yourself to lose." Splinter acknowledge, calm and solemn.

Leo forced himself to meet his father's eyes.

"It will not be easy." Splinter said, not cutting corners. "But I am confident in you. As I am confident in all my sons. Purple will create you something miraculous. And Orange and Red will help you adapt. You are not alone, one handed in the world. We have many hands, we can share."

Leo huffed, a little wet, and looked down at his remaining hand with the lovely blue nails. He finger-spelled.

"Nail polish?" Splinter said, sounding very much like he wasn't following Leo's train of thought. It didn't matter, because they didn't get to continue, interrupted by Raph letting himself in the room.

"Morning." Raph looked awfully hopeful as he came in. It lit brighter when he saw Leo sitting up and awake. "I got your Snapchat, I was hoping you'd still be, uh,"

Present? Aware? Leo couldn't volunteer a non-awkward word even if he wanted to. Instead he gave his big brother a wave with his remaining hand.

"Softly, Raphael. We are trying not to wake your brother." Splinter said.

"Donnie?" Raph snorted, coming over and immediately grabbing a pillow to wallop the genius with. "He's awake. I can tell a sleeping little brother a mile away."

"Leave me alone, Raph." Donnie's voice came, muffled and undeniably awake underneath the pillow.

"How are we doing this morning, Leo?" Raph asked, eyes raking up and down his form nervously.

Leo didn't know how to answer, and decided to give a rating on his groundedness instead of an introspection on his emotional or physical state. He raised two fingers.

Raph looked pleased. "That's awesome, bro."

Leo realized, in the morning light and a bit of actual attention span, that Raph had some pretty noticeable scarring around his eye. He also remembered April saying that they were still having problems with it. He crooked his finger, beckoning Raph closer.

"What's up?" Raph said, even as he obliged his brother.

Leo leaned close and held Raph's eyelid open with his thumb. There was half-healed scarring around the eye, still pink but not looking infected. The real problem was the cloudiness in the lens of his actual eye. It was a pattern Leo knew, something starburst-like called a stellate that was hallmark of a traumatic cataract.

Leo let Raph's lid go so he could sign, a finger V facing his eye then gesturing away. See?

"Less from that eye." Raph admitted. "It wasn't so bad at first but it keeps getting worse."

Leo chewed on his lip, considering. The thing was, traumatic cataracts were treatable. But you needed surgery to replace the lens and it wasn't exactly Leo's wheelhouse. He grabbed his phone and fought his trembling grip to type out a message.

'looks like traumatic cataract. clouds ur vision. lens can b extracted and replaced w surgery.'

Leo handed Raph the phone. His big brother helpfully read the message out loud for the room.

"Right. Surgery." Raph said after handing the phone back, a little wry. Because they were mutant turtles in a human world. "Is it bad if I can't get the surgery?"

Leo hesitated, hitting enter twice and starting a new line. 'depends. if there's high pressure or globe rupture or infection then u need surgery for sure. otherwise ppl live w cataracts for years, its just the longer u wait the denser it gets. u can lose sight in that eye.'

Raph read the message, sounding more reluctant as it went on. Beside Leo on the bed, Donnie went tense under the pillows. Leo nudged their feet together.

"How do we check for those complications?" Splinter prompted, looking confidently at Leo.

He didn't have the imaging or a slit lamp to check for infection or rupture, but he did know how to do a rudimentary pressure check. That one was important to catch early, if the intraocular pressure was too high it could silently kill the optic nerve. He typed, 'can check pressure quick. head in lap + close eyes raph pls.'

Raph read it and rumbled. "Are you gonna poke it?"

Leo nodded, and rubbed his fist on his chest. Sorry.

Raph set his jaw but didn't argue, pulling up onto the already crowded bed and laying his head in Leo's lap. He shut both his eyes, visibly braced.

Leo gently laid his thumb and forefinger on Raph's good eye, pressing down on one side then the other, feeling the bounce back.

"Wrong eye." Raph rumbled.

Leo smacked his arm. Splinter chuckled beside them. He got a good feel of the sensation of a healthy eye underneath his fingers, then switched sides. He made sure to be quick, not wanting it to hurt and disturb his eye too much. Luckily for them, it had the same tomato-like feeling as his first eye.

"You're good." Leo said, patting his shoulder.

Raph raised himself off Leo's legs, making pins and needles run up his bones. Leo realized he spoke out loud without thinking, since Raph's eyes were closed and he was trying to signal him up. He froze.

Leo felt a slam of weight, which he placed as heavy expectation. He didn't want everyone to think he was going to start talking again because it was too much pressure. He didn't want to get their hopes up. Saying even a single word felt like signing up for Speaking Forever and he couldn't handle that right now.

Claws of fear gripped Leo's throat. Sensei was unceremoniously pushed forward, blinking into the immediate light, orientating himself.

"Still with us?" Splinter prompted, sounding like it wasn't the first time he asked.

Sensei hesitated. He soaked in the sensations the body had -- warm blankets around his knees, an imprint of Raph having been just there. The rush of capability, at getting to be useful again as a medic. The press of his toes against Donnie's legs, between two layers of blankets and the reassuring presence on his right. The attentive gaze of both Raph and Splinter.

Sensei didn't know what to do either. He didn't want to make it harder for Leo by speaking. He wasn't sure what to say if he did. He was suddenly horribly aware that he was in a room full of people he'd mourned. Fuck.

He wasn't expecting the panic, nor the way that everyone was staring at him, and the numbness wavered and went loud, and he was fundamentally a coward because he submitted to the wash of darkness.

'We can't both dip.' Leo complained, as soon as Sensei fell back.

'I panicked!' Sensei replied, still panicking, their heart going way too fast. Both of them contorted around their chest.

'I can tell.' Leo stuttered, as they tried to get the body to cooperate. It was shaking, panic from both sources overwhelming the flesh.

Leo couldn't get a grip if he wasn't present. He dug his fingers into his palm, trying to calm the shake by pushing hard. Trying to settle back into the room, pouring the fog out of his mind, knowing that he was sitting up, he was staring into space, someone was talking, Leo was there, he was there, he could feel the bite of his nails. And after a long moment of struggling to breathe, another hand carefully unfolded his and squeezed.

"Careful, you've only got one hand left, better not ruin it." Raph said, voice neutral and non-judgmental, the sound of it as if listening through a static radio.

Leo tried to ground himself on the knobs of Raph's knuckles. He pushed aside the throb of Sensei's grief, like coughing through a cloud of second-hand smoke, and focused on his own panic.

They'd all learnt ASL years ago for Donnie. Since they had no teacher and only three fingers, it was a surely not fluency, but with adaption they could get by with each other. Leo had been excited for yet another way to fuel his want to talk, L against his lips, the loudmouth.

But he hadn't really understood the feeling of non-verbal. Donnie had struggled with it more when they were younger, though he still certainly had episodes.

Dad told them when they were little that Donnie often just didn't feel like talking, and it was okay. Leo didn't get why you wouldn't want to talk when it got you so much attention, but didn't question it since Dad said it was okay and Dad knew everything. He supported Donnie, even if he didn't understand him, which was pretty much the running theme in both sides of their twin-ship.

However right now Leo felt like he'd never understood Donnie better. The idea of opening his mouth and speaking was insurmountable, as if there was literally a leaden weight in his mouth instead of a tongue. He could physically feel the effort it would take to speak and he just couldn't do it. The things he wanted to say still came to mind, it was just this mountain crawl to get there.

But even more noticeable, Leo didn't want to speak. He didn't want to have the expectations on him that he'd be his usual self because he didn't feel like that at all. And if he wasn't speaking, then there was a layer of his usual performance he didn't need to get on stage for.

And lastly, there was the thing getting his heart going, it was that moment he laid down and didn't fight, it was the word pest repeating endlessly into a void.

It just felt safer not to speak. No danger. No expectations. More complicated, sure, and a bit annoying when he was handicapping an already broken system. But it didn't really feel like there was a second option. There wasn't any way to surpass the hurdle with how little strength he had, and the only option backwards was into catatonia again and he didn't like that much either.

Raph's hand still intertwined with his, Leo raised it to his chest to sign sorry.

"Shut up, Leo." Raph said, fondly.

Leo couldn't remember who was in the room anymore. He blinked and tried to focus, finding that it was just Raph and Donnie, the latter still buried in blankets and pillows. Leo inspected the pile as if he might miraculously gain Raph's uncanny ability to determine if he was asleep.

"He's awake." Raph supplied, following his gaze.

"I will practice lobotomy on you." Donnie threatened from two pillows deep.

"Aw, so you think I have a brain." Raph teased, pretending to be flattered. His tone only betrayed a little of his stress.

A murderous hand emerged from pillows. Raph dodged it easily.

Leo caught the hand instead, trading Raph's hand for Donnie's. He turned it up and traced a little 'Hi' on his palm.

"Salutations, Leo." Donnie said, voice monotone. It was the same when he was trying to pretend he didn't feel anything. "You know, you do not need to force yourself to speak out loud if it going to make you panic."

Leo felt still-sharp panic prickling chest, making it tight, bursts of painful constellations. He didn't reply.

"Be easier to take you seriously if you weren't buried alive right now, Don." Raph commented, poking a toe through the blanket and again dodging the instinctive kick.

"You all wanted me to sleep, I'm sleeping." Donnie complained.

"You're not, you're thinking under there, I can hear it." Raph complained back, peeling the pillow off to reveal a poisonous glare. Donnie didn't look particularly rested, still ruffled and drained, dark bags under his eyes.

"Like you're one to talk." Donnie spat, defensive, shoulders going up. "Only because Leo asked did you let us look at that eye, you've avoided everyone else."

"Are you gonna do surgery on it then?" Raph challenged, equally annoyed.

"I could." Donnie retorted with instant ego-sharp confidence.

"You just threatened to give me a lobotomy."

"Unrelated." Donnie flapped a hand and looked away.

Leo didn't doubt that with enough time and resources Donnie's brain could do anything, including delicate eye surgery. However that wasn't an immediate option that would be ready any time soon. They really needed to consider other avenues.

"My eye is fine." Raph dismissed. "Why don't you show Leo your shell if you think we should be sharing so much?"

Leo gave an undeniably curious look at the figure beside him. Donnie reached up to grip the collar of his sleep-rumbled robe, flickering a pained look before saying, "We're supposed to be grounding Leo after his panic attack."

"Nothing grounds Leo more than doing his medic duties." Raph said, which was so true and so awesome of his biggest brother, brother who was the biggest, to argue for him. Leo nodded eagerly.

The grip on Donnie's collar tightened dangerously, eyes flashing. His twin snarled, "We should not be allowing Leonardo to compartmentalize his feelings by utilizing his desire to put other's needs above his own."

Before any reply could be given, Donnie scrambled off the blankets and left the room, door shutting firmly behind him, nearly a slam.

"Oops." Raph said, and ran a tired hand down the front of his face before offering Leo a tired smile. "Sorry. Tensions have been a little high for all of us. I am worried about his shell, though. He hasn't let anyone near it. He let April see under a sworn oath not to touch, and she says it's not infected, but..."

Raph trailed off, then shook his head. "Maybe Don's right. I shouldn't be putting this kind of burden on you while you're still healing yourself."

Leo shook his head, because nothing was more grounding than his brothers, especially their well-being. He tapped a finger-spelled M to his heart, desperate for more information.

Raph's whole face softened. "Mikey's handling it with Draxum. They're trying to make sure he doesn't have permanent damage to his hands. I don't even really think that would be something you could help with, even if you wanted to."

Leo definitely wanted to. He didn't like the idea of trusting Draxum with something as precious as his little brother.

"Mikey's there right now, actually." Raph explained. "I'm supposed to tell you that he'll be back later and can bring back donuts if you want some."

Damn. Donuts did sound good. Maybe that was almost dying, or maybe it was the presence in his mind that hadn't eaten a donut in twenty years.

'Get a honey crueller.' Sensei surfaced long enough to beg.

'Who do you think I am?' Leo asked rhetorically, then blinked back. It must've been like two seconds but Raph already looked worried. Leo finger-spelled 'honey crueller' just to clear it.

"Duh." Raph grinned, relieved. Then he rubbed the back of his head and said, "Don was right, though."

'He usually is.' Sensei commented with long-suffering fondness.

Leo did a better job of keeping his footing while Sensei spoke in his head. He raised a quizzical eyebrow.

"You don't gotta talk if it's gonna freak you out." Raph said, voice going a little rough at the end.

Leo pointed at himself then tapped the fingertips of a flat hand to his forehead twice. I know.

"Really, Leo." Raph emphasized. Sounding at his very most big brother. "Don't push yourself because of anything you think we'll want. If it's not time to talk, then it's not. You've never tried to rush Donnie out of an episode, don't do it to yourself."

Once Donnie went non-verbal for a month when they were about seven and he had an ear infection, which healed in a week and he spent three weeks being upset at having a body. Leo remembered missing the sound of his brother's voice, but never any desire to make him talk when Donnie didn't want to.

And while Leo wanted to argue that he talked more than Donnie and therefore the silence was weird, that wasn't true. Donnie could out-talk him during an info dump and make himself light-headed with how fast he spoke. Anyone who asked Donnie about his special interest would never describe him as quiet. And yet, it was always fine if Donnie needed to not talk for an hour, a day, or even a month.

Sometimes Leo felt like the whole thing about having a twin was that it just made you look at someone who had so many differences and just as many similarities, and that you would love them anyways and always, and having to cope with all the justifications you made to hate yourself when you loved those same things in your twin.

Sometimes having Donatello as a twin was the best thing that ever happened to him.

'Sometimes it's the worst.' Sensei barely hummed, not directed towards Leo.

'What's that supposed to mean?' Leo bit back, offended on Donnie's behalf.

Sensei bristled.

Leo didn't know why he'd say something like that. He sent annoyed vibes at the guest in his head.

"Hey, do you want to try get some more steps in?" Raph asked, coaxing, fishing, lifting up the crutch. A little bit of trepidation in his gaze.

Leo snapped back into focus from the middle-gaze he hadn't realized he was staring in, and gave a weak smile. Trying. He shifted over, grabbing his legs one by one and giving them each a thorough stretch, wincing at the feeling of stiff muscles. His ribs protested, but they were slightly better. Today the pain was maybe a five overall.

Raph helped him up onto the crutch and Leo slowly circled the room, each step a marathon but worth the effort. Worth it to feel centered and present and moving. Leo hated to be stagnant, to lie still and behaved and quiet.

Leo didn't need his voice to be loud. He climbed back onto the bed after circling the room and banged the crutch on the floor a few times, grinning exhaustedly and waving one wild jazz hand in the air.

The joy was contagious and Raph threw his head back to laugh, giving him double jazz hands in return. "You killed it!"

'You really did.' Sensei added.

Leo was very pointedly Not Talking to Sensei. Instead he settled back down, grabbing his phone and trying to pick some music to put on. He chose K-Pop and checked his Snapchat notifications. Mikey had sent a blurry selfie, all motion and excitement and no caption.

Now that he was actually awake for the slog of healing instead of dissociating through it, he was reminded that he hated being bed-bound quite intensely. The stir-crazy feeling kicked in almost immediately, all pent molten-hot, the sensation that he wasn't doing enough, that there needed to be more. Resting was so difficult. Leo was terrible at it, as evidenced by long time struggles with insomnia.

Raph hung out with him like he didn't have anywhere else to be, playing games on his phone and grumbling at the results. He kept glancing up at Leo and seemed consistently surprised when Leo looked back. Leo seriously hated to think about how the last week had been for them, to hang out with an empty shell of Leonardo --

Hm, bad thought. He'd been hovering quite comfortably at a two on Donnie's scale, and the idea of imagining himself catatonic pushed him firmly back into a one. Annoying. Especially since going catatonic was the actual last thing he wanted to do.

'You have grounding exercises you could do.' Sensei suggested.

'Still not talking to you.' Leo replied.

Mikey finally returned from Draxum's and brought donuts. Leo beamed when he sat up, already eagerly awaiting the honey crueller.

"Bro!" Mikey cheered, crossing the room to give Leo a big hug and squish their cheeks together. "Raph said you walked all the way around the room, you're amazing!"

Leo's suspicion that they had a separate group chat for updates about him grew. He gave a toothy smile back and pretended to bow for his adoring crowd.

Mikey laughed, and shuffled over the box he'd brought. "I got you like, four, but Future Boy said I can only let you eat two because otherwise you'll hurt yourself or something. I made Barry take me to that cool donut shop in midtown that doubles as a car wash. They're sooo good!"

Leo accepted his donut and hesitated before taking a bite. He poked Sensei.

'Really?' Sensei said.

'Eat the damn donut.' Leo grumbled.

They shared a body, so it didn't really matter who ate the donut. But Sensei was the one who leaned forward and took a bite, the tension in his shoulders relaxing and a warmth filling his middle, all sticky and sugar.

'Well now I really know I'm dead.' Sensei said, dazed and blissful.

'Yeah, yeah, enjoy asshole.' Leo grumbled, but the joy was impossible to ignore. He shared the front with Sensei and the experience of eating something good was equally lovely.

Chapter Text

Leo's stomach did cramp after only one donut, and they had to set aside the rest for later. It was all Sensei who signed 'thank you' to Mikey with nauseating sincerity, then flopped back to let Leo have full control again.

"You're very welcome." Mikey looked thrilled. "I'm glad you're having a good day."

Leo nodded, then reached out for his baby brother to trace the wrapping around his hands and wrists, hiding the cracked mystic scars he'd seen before. He raised an eyebrow in question.

"Leo's conscious enough to go total medic again, full warning." Raph said, lightly amused. He was poking at his big phone with intent to win the game he was absorbed in.

"Not much for you to 'medic'." Mikey shrugged, tucking his hands away.

Leo hated that everyone kept saying that, as if he hadn't been the one putting band-aids on Mikey and kissing them better since they were tots, tipping his baby brother's head forward during nosebleeds or dosing his cold medicine using some dodgy mixed human-turtle mathematics. He gestured more intently for Mikey's hands.

It seemed the only benefit of this whole situation was that absolutely no one was capable of denying him anything he wanted, and Mikey allowed Leo to take one of his hands. Leo unravelled the bandage to see the same peek of crackled scars he'd spotted in the dark of night, fissured in deep geometric patterns. There was a tremor that twitched and got stronger the longer Mikey held his hand out for Leo. After a moment of watching it shake, Mikey turned his gaze away, cheeks flushing.

Leo tested the tenderness of the scars, inspecting to see if it ran through any arteries. A worm of worry was niggling him. He kept his gaze on the injury but implored Sensei, 'How did your Mikey heal from this?'

'My Mikey never had scars like this.' Sensei carefully joined him at the front, taking their hand up Mikey's forearm. 'He was trained carefully, since Barry said the mystic powers were dangerous. He'd always had perfect control, up until...'

The hand paused its trace. Leo felt a tug of pain and horror and resignation, and a moment of watching Michelangelo disappear into a flash of light.

'It killed him.' Leo filled in the blanks, dark and bleak.

Sensei didn't confirm or deny. He stared at the hand in his, the power Sensei knew Mikey was capable of wielding, and that it could destroy so much. It could tear apart a timeline, and it could tear apart his last brother left standing. At his own request.

Mikey had always followed in his footsteps. Even when his own skills and talents surpassed Sensei, it still gave a sense memory of a tiny baby brother loudly proclaiming that the thing he wanted to be the most when he grew up was Leo. And he took that, the trust that whenever Sensei said jump that Mikey said how high, and he asked him to die for the cause.

And he did.

'Okay, old man having a moment needs to go in time out.' Leo told him, and shoved Sensei out of the front. He retook control, letting Mikey's hand drop and turning away to rub his face hard, trying to ground from the void that Sensei had encroached on their vision.

"I told you there's nothing you can do." Mikey said, uncharacteristically meek.

Leo hummed an annoyed sound at him. Sensei was floundering in the background, making it hard to think straight. He had an ocean of misplaced grief, intrusive thoughts popping instinctively into his mind and offering many different ways Leo could've lost his Mikey, in this time. He snatched up his phone and tapped out with his own shaky hand, 'that couldve killed u mike'

Leo held out his phone and held onto reality with fingernails and teeth, everything a little bit dark on the edges. He was definitely a zero.

Mikey's expression slammed and went strangely cold. He said, "That's not true."

Raph blinked and looked up from his game, pausing the repetitive music. "What's Leo saying?"

"Nothing." Mikey turned away.

Casey hadn't told anyone else other than Leo that they all died in the future. And Leo couldn't exactly reveal his other source of information for how he knew the specifics. He typed quick, even as the whole room ringing in his ears, echoing. He shoved the message at Mikey until he looked over again. 'it's not safe.'

"Really don't think you're one to talk here." Mikey said, and his shaking hands in his lap closed to fists. "Not like you could've stopped me considering you jumped into the portal to die."

The rush of anger at the end, and Mikey's mouth twisted miserably, like he regretted speaking at all, and got up with all his lightning quick ability to escape the room at top speed. The door breezed shut, final.

Leo's mouth was dry. His vision was tunnelled. Raph put his phone away and said, trying to ease the tension, "Want me to storm out too so it's three for three?"

It was very obvious that Raph was joking. But Leo still panicked at the thought of being left alone, his stare glazed over and he lost grip.

"Oh buddy." Raph said, getting up and crossing the room in one stride to swallow Leo in a hug.

Leo tried to grasp him around the shoulders, to clutch at the soft shirt Raph was wearing, but before he could get any traction his hand went limp.

He desperately didn't want to, scrambling against the pull, like laying in the sand while the tide ripped back into the ocean. The feeling of water dragging with inevitable tidal gravity, as the basis of the sand beneath swiftly disappeared.

The void was inky black, ringing ears, numb limbs and face. Leo tried to hang onto the feeling of his lungs inflating in predictable cycle, tried to cling to the sensation of being alive, but it was nothing against the unrelenting shade.

Head dunked underwater. Leo drowned.

It was not kind, it was a crushing weight, pushing and pulling his mind in unpredictable currents. He submitted, feeling like a limp body waiting for the next blow as it rained down again and again, you wretched. Little. PEST.

Then an anchor shored him. It dragged Leo's aching self to rest underneath the tree. The spider-webbing branches seemed even bigger than last time, with burgeoning roots poking up.

Sensei's eyes were crinkled with worry. He rubbed his only hand down his face and said unhappily, 'That's probably my fault.'

Leo had no sympathy, only a throbbing headache. He snapped, 'Yeah, it is.'

'I'm sorry.' Sensei told him, and he really sounded like he meant it. There was something so resigned and solemn, it made Leo angry to hear it out of his own distorted voice.

'I hate this!' Leo stayed laid on his back, swallowed by void encroaching up his limbs as he threw his only hand in the air, glaring at it. 'This is so stupid. I don't understand why it's so hard for me, why I'm so useless all of the sudden. I don't want to be here. I don't want anyone to think I'm broken or incapable or --'

Sensei set his hand on the top of Leo's head. He didn't say anything, but it cut Leo off nonetheless. He looked up at the older and found a very crushed emotion written all over him, shadows in his gaze, something dark and hurting. It made Leo's throat hurt to look at.

'Don't touch me.' Leo rasped, after a moment, because the bigger hand was still cradling his head.

Sensei dropped it. He looked away, visibly pained, jaw working. The void swallowed half his face. A terror struck Leo, and he said just as quickly, 'Don't leave me here alone.'

In the void by himself, only the quiet and the darkness to keep him company. Why his own psyche decided to torture him with his own personal prison dimension, Leo had no idea, but he wasn't a fan.

'Make up your mind.' Sensei replied, just the wrong side of teasing.

'I am large. I contain multitudes.' Leo said.

'Walt Whitman.'

'You know I know that.' Leo told him, unimpressed.

Sensei snorted, a small piece of sharp tension broken off. 'I know, sorry. Habit. I used to recite stories and poetry for Case all the time. A lack of media in apocalypse kind of reverts you back to oral traditions.'

A kindling of fire, just a bare spark. The memory of this was wry and fond in a bundle. It made Leo's heart warm. He said, trying to keep it alive, 'What was his favourite?'

Sensei visibly hesitated, biting back a smile. 'Okay, you can't judge me for this.'

Amusement snapped through the apathetic barrier. 'Oh?'

'... Homestuck.'

Leo threw his head back and laughed so hard it punched the void with its echo. 'Dude! You can't be serious.'

Sensei was laughing too. 'He really liked it! I had a little kid I needed to entertain! It's a post-apocalyptic found family story that has a happy ending!'

'Yeah, and Betty Crocker is an evil alien dictator who mind controls people!'

'In my defense, that's just like the Kraang.'

Leo hooted and hollered with laughter.

Sensei continued, 'Listen, there's only so many times you can describe how Lou Jitsu was 'so cool' before they want something with more substance.'

'It's also the worst possible medium I could think for oral storytelling. It's a webcomic. Not even a particularly coherent one! How did you convey the typing quirks?'

'I told you not to judge me!'

Leo grinned, aching with it. Aching all over. They both giggled until it settled back into the unnerving quiet. Leo sat up and inspected his surroundings. It was still a void. There was no exit. He wiggled his toes. Nothing happened. He breathed slowly and purposefully. Nothing happened. A locked cage.

'You pushed a bit too hard, I think.' Sensei commented, trying to sound neutral and not managing to cover the soft sadness.

'You're saying you don't think I should push hard when our brothers are out there waiting for me?'

'Your brothers.' Sensei corrected, sore. 'My brothers are dead.'

'Continuing to remind me of this fact is not helping the dissociating, dude.'

'I have no desire to take over your life, Leo.' Sensei reminded him. 'I don't want you to think I'm going to have a place here.'

Leo didn't know what to think. If he wanted to eject the spirit from his head, or convince Sensei to take something for himself. If maybe Sensei would live Leo's life better than he was. He didn't say any of that.

'I hate this.' Leo said again.

'I know.' Sensei said, tiredly.

'This is all so complicated. Everything's all fucked up and it's all my fault.' Leo bonked his head against the ephemeral shadow tree roots.

'All of you are still alive.' Sensei reminded him, the void rippling around him with things he didn't say, a rock in the center of a pond.

'Is the bar that low?'

Sensei's haunted gaze said yeah, it kind of was.

Leo didn't acknowledge, returning to desperately trying to ground himself, to get any purchase against the sheer cliff face in front of him. He tried every fucking trick in the book, all the weapons in his arsenal. He was still in the void. Trapped under the shade of the thick, crossing branches and leaves of a dark tree. Better than drowning in the ocean. Better than dead.

Leo blinked tiredly at the nothing and thought, or maybe if I was dead all our problems would be solved.

The panic punched his rib cage, as it sprouted from nothing. He looked at Sensei and it didn't appear as if he heard. Or maybe he was just really good at hiding it. Leo was terrible at grounding by himself, it just left him alone his own thoughts and his own thoughts fucking sucked.

'How do you ground?' Leo nudged the bigger turtle beside him.

Sensei looked surprised he'd been asked. 'Ah. I haven't really thought about it. Most of the time if I stared into space too long someone would nudge me back to focus. That was usually enough. I gotta admit, I haven't had to deal with this before.'

Not encouraging at the level Leo had fucked up that he created new problems his own apocalyptic future self hadn't even experienced. Achieving new levels of terrible never before seen. Leo wanted to die.

Woof, that self-deprecating humor was hitting way too close to home right now. Leo really needed to get out of this stupid void. 'Yeah, well, maybe our powers combined we can push out of here. Let's do stupid breathing exercises. Can you narrate? Believe it or not, I've got a bit of trouble focusing right now.'

Sensei exhaled through his nose, only barely amused. He said, 'Yes. Let's do that.'

They did breathing exercises together. It didn't really feel like it did anything. But there wasn't anything else to do in the void, so they kept doing it, until Leo's head was swimming with something that might graciously be called awareness. The room blurred and provided colours and shapes. It all felt hungover. Leo had never drank, but experienced a sense memory of Sensei miserable around after swallowing a whole bottle of whiskey after Donnie--

A wavering ripple. Leo didn't want to know. If he could ground into reality, he'd be in a world where Donnie was alive and waiting for him. Hopefully.

Leo skidded around, trying to hold onto his body, the gross-awful hungover feeling clinging to his skin, lighting with the other maladies like the sore ache of his ribs and the haunting pain of his arm. When he managed to creep open his eyes a little, there were colourful little shapes on his leg.

Confusion and curiosity burst the sealed bubble, and Leo opened his eyes to try and figure out what was going on. A crinkle of paper. A song playing. April humming along.

His sister was beside him, confidently folding another colourful origami figure on the face of her book balanced on her lap. She was lining them up on his leg. When he inhaled deep, she looked up and smiled.

"Hey dude." April said. "Can I get a number?"

Leo tiredly raised a zero.

"Understandable." April wasn't fazed. "It's been about ten hours. I was just wondering if I was gonna have to go home without getting to talk to you, so thanks for coming up just for me. I appreciate it."

Leo gave a warmly amused exhale. But he was sore and tired and felt like he was dangling off a cliff.

"You'll have to forgive our idiot brothers for earlier." April said, focusing back on the precise folds in her lap. "They haven't been dealing with any of this at all while they've been waiting for you to... wake up. Tension has been high for a while. And now that you're doing better, I feel like it's all boiling over all at once."

Leo's jaw went tight. He reached over and picked up a little frog. It was suitably green.

April continued, "They feel terrible that they're making things harder for you, I hope you know."

If that was meant to make him feel better, it definitely did not. He blinked slow at April, still unstable and not really in the room.

"Here." April said, setting the book on the edge of the mattress and presenting him with a new piece of paper.

Leo wiggled his singular hand.

"I can help if you need." April told him, stubborn. "Do you remember how to make a crane?"

That was a stupid question. There was that story about how if you made a thousand cranes, then you got a wish. Leo had heard about it when he was younger and folded a thousand for each of his brother's birthday as presents so their wishes would come true. He couldn't forget how to make a crane if he wanted to, after that.

Leo took the page and folded it in half both ways, bracing it against the flat surface of the book and carefully turning each side. April's hands hovered, ready to help.

But he didn't need help. Though he sat for a long moment on the stage to fold the wings up, brain not providing a way to do so and trying to wiggle his stump subconsciously to help. He realized the problem wasn't the lack of hand but the fact that he was doing it with his non-dominant hand and tried to reconceptualise the movement backwards. April waited. He tried again. It was flat and very sloppy, but it looked like a crane.

A blue crane.

It kind of made him want to cry. Leo propped the friend up with all the others balanced on his legs.

"What do you think?" April asked.

Leo mumbled, "I've never had a thought before in my life."

April laughed, easy. "No, should we get the boys to come back? I know Mikey was really upset when he heard you dissociated again after he left."

Shame. Guilt. You ruin everything.

"Or we can keep folding cranes." April offered, holding out another paper. Purple.

Leo took it. The contortion that his hand needed cramped a bit, but he could still make a freaking crane. April returned to folding her own and they made a little army on his blankets. She talked about a movie she'd recently watched and why it was terrible. Leo listened and folded.

"Ah, Leon." Donnie greeted when he breezed in the room, carrying a tablet and a cup of coffee. "Good, you're awake, tube feeding is a nightmare. Dinner?"

Leo finger-spelled, 'Coffee?' just to bug him, because he knew it wasn't for him.

"Not for you." Donnie held it possessively to his chest. "Mikey'll make whatever else you want, as soon as he knows you're up. I was just coming to relieve April."

"I'm good." April said. "I could hang with him if you want to actually sleep tonight."

Donnie straightened his back, on defense. He had a baggy shirt on that said 'WEAPONIZED AUTISM' in a funky font. Headphones around his neck and slightly red eyes. He said, "I got at least five hours last night."

"You know that's like, nothing, right?"

"And yet it is quite sufficient for me. Stay if you like, but don't assume that means I will abide by any sleeping sanctions."

"I would never assume." April said, dry.

Donnie came closer, raising an eyebrow at the origami but not commenting. He said to Leo, "Number?"

Leo raised one finger. It might've been a two, had the hangover from before not been making him feel a bit dizzy.

"Food request?" Donnie asked next, tapping on his tablet.

Leo couldn't remember a single thing he'd ever eaten. He grimaced.

Sensei hovered.

'If you have an idea I'd love to hear it. I don't want broth again.' Leo told him.

'There are literally so many things I haven't gotten to eat in eons.' Sensei replied, longingly. 'But most of them aren't going to be a good choice for our healing body.'

'Pick something that is, then. Foods rich in protein help to restore blood cells. Something like that.'

'Fine. Um... one of Mikey's famous omelette's.'

Leo blinked to clear the slight glaze, then raised his hand to finger-spell: 'Omelette.'

Donnie stared at him a second too long, a frown on his lips, but broke the spell and tapped quicker on his tablet as he turned away. "Understood. I will communicate your request with him. Contact me if you require anything else."

Leo wanted to be annoying and require a hug. But his twin was already gone before he could ask. Leo sighed.

"Yeah, he's being frustrating." April agreed, chin in hand. "Can I ask how you're doing?"

Leo gave a faithful 'ok' without even thinking about it longer than a second.

April levelled a stare at him, waiting.

A slower hesitation. He grabbed his phone and typed on the notes app, 'been better'.

"I appreciate the honesty. Is there something I could do to make it a little easier?"

Leo navigated to his Snapchat app and offered the camera, gesturing for her.

"Dork." April said, fondly, and gave a peace sign as she leaned in for the picture. Leo almost tried to raise a peace sign with his right hand before he remembered he didn't have one. It made his smile in the selfie incredibly strained.

Luckily April had leaned in enough to hide the missing arm, but still the photo taken in proper light really made Leo uncomfortable with how terrible he looked. He put a unicorn sticker over most of his own face before sending it to his streaks.

"Do you wanna talk about what's been on your mind?" April prompted again, eyes searching.

Leo's mouth twisted in a way he couldn't stop. He tried to morph it into a smile, but it was fundamentally flawed and pained. He wasn't fooling anyone. Make a joke. Smile. People are looking. What do they see?

Even if Leo wanted to give her an honest answer, he had no idea what he'd say. It was like trying to isolate a single hornet in a nest, the relentless frightening buzzing, all doom and hurtful intent. Thoughts whirling past at a million miles an hour, hunting for old and new insecurities. All weakness in a battered body --

Leo recognized the slip and raised his hand to a zero, while the room went grey on the edges.

April sighed, not quite able to muffle the sound. She didn't look impressed, she was upset with him for dodging the question using his dissociation.

'I think you may be projecting.' Sensei told him.

'I am two seconds from the edge right now, please don't push me over before we can eat the omelette.'

Sensei didn't wait for the tip, he took control. Leo felt the burden lift off his shoulders and sunk away from the front gratefully, trying to ground quietly without an audience.

Chapter Text

Sensei took a moment to center in the light of the room, dim in respect for Leo's healing but still brighter than the void. The music was practically a whisper, currently stuck in a showtune time-loop from what Sensei had caught while listening from the back of Leo's head.

He flexed his fingers. Damn they were small. Still all lithe and fragile. He was almost Casey's age, fuck if that wasn't a trip. It yanked and played all his heartstrings like a harp. This poor fucking kid.

"Can I anchor off you, Leo?" April asked suddenly. Actually, Sensei had no idea how sudden it was. Maybe she'd been speaking for a minute and he was still trying to settle into this tiny freaking body.

Sensei wanted to abide by the standards Leo had set with his own body so he didn't speak out loud like his immediate first thought. Instead he moved a hooked finger downwards in question. Anchor?

Relief flashed on April's face. She dug out in her bag, setting aside the colourful paper to bring out equally colourful string. Ah. Sensei had been trapped in enough hospital beds over the years and attended to April's own bedside to know what she was suggesting. He offered his second finger for her.

April smiled. "What colour?"

Sensei levelled her with a look that said without any communication necessary that she knew exactly what colour he wanted.

April laughed, the sound a little too high, a little too frantic. Sensei's throat was tight with understanding that she was struggling too, that she was being her very best big sister and not letting anyone see. And unlike the peanut gallery of the lair, she was capable of hiding it without anyone suspecting that she was probably sobbing herself to sleep every night.

Sensei wondered which part of the situation was the most upsetting. Was it his dissociation? The scattered states of all four brothers? The temporary end of the world?

She let none of it show on her face as she strung out three different shades of blue string. Before she could begin, Sensei tapped his hand flat and perpendicular to his chin repeatedly. Talk. Then he held his hand out for her to anchor the braid.

"Heh." April said, and began the knots. She was doing something tight and fancy, and didn't speak for a moment.

Sensei waited, cataloguing the small frown and tight shoulders. Then she said, "I told my parents about you guys, did I say?"

Sensei had no idea, and shrugged, hoping she'd elaborate more either way.

"I mean, you've all talked to them on the phone a bunch. They've always known about you, pretty much everything except the turtle part. And since I was bringing Casey in ... I dunno. I figured if aliens were gonna be real and in the news, then I could show them the most important people in my life were turtles. Donnie came with me to tell them. He made a really terrible first impression."

Sensei raised an amused eyebrow. Leo from the back of the mind barked a laugh.

April chuckled too. "Yeah, I know, not the best choice, but he volunteered. I thought he was being sweet but then I discovered later that he'd come to set up security in my house, so."

Predictable. Sensei huffed.

"Anyway. My parents know. So I can hang out here for a while because they're aware of the whole situation now. Mom's really excited to meet you in person. I just didn't want to bring her into this right now when I wasn't sure how you'd be with... an audience. I guess."

'I wanna meet her!' Leo immediately piped up, echoing.

Sensei only gave her a small shrug. Because it wasn't time yet for parading around into social situations.

'Why not?' Leo complained, practically vibrating with the desire to meet Carol O'Neil.

'You literally put a unicorn sticker over your face earlier.' Sensei pointed out sensibly.

Leo deflated.

"... just a minute ago." April was saying.

Sensei blinked twice and looked up. Mikey was there, and reflexively Sensei smiled at the sight of his young and healthy baby brother.

Hesitation that had encased Mikey's expression broke and he grinned back. He held out a steaming plate that smelled divine. "I've brought dinner! I didn't know if you wanted veggie or meat so I made both."

Sensei packed rather a lot of sincerity into his signed 'thank you', dragging along April's half-finished bracelet.

"Eat, we'll finish that later." April promised, tugging the end off Sensei's finger carefully to hold the tension.

Sensei could not wait, holy shit. He grabbed the fork provided and slotted it easily into his hand, years of forced left-handedness making it second nature, even with a moment of adjustment for the smaller hand.

Then he ate the best omelette he'd had in twenty years. Buttery and soft and packed full of different wonderful foodstuffs he hadn't encountered in decades. Taking care of this body he found himself in, giving nutrients and warmth down the middle.

"Glad you've found your hunger." April commented, watching as he swallowed the last piece. He'd eaten both. "If that was too fast and you puke, though, you're the one who has to face Mikey."

"He won't puke." Mikey smiled serenely, sticking to a cool threat, "If he knows what's good for him."

Sensei huffed, warmed further by the familiar teasing, even if it was young and silly. He set aside the plate and offered back his hand for April to finish her task.

"Oh, can you show me how?" Mikey said, dragging up a chair.

"Sure." April dug him out some thread. "What colour?"

Mikey gave her the exact same look that Sensei had earlier. It made Leo sing with laughter in the back, and Sensei's shoulders shake with amusement. April handed over the orange threads.

Sensei's first finger was an anchor for Mikey. The problem became, even as he stayed side by side with April as she gave intent instructions, Mikey's hands began to shake too hard to coordinate the strings with the correct order and needed tension.

Mikey's smile went wooden. He turned his face away, dropping the orange and saying, "I guess I better get some sleep, if that's happening."

"Guess so." April replied, reluctant.

"Are you gonna be here in the morning? I'll make waffles."

"I'll hold you to that." April tucked Mikey under her arm for a squeeze.

His expression was a little troubled, but at least he didn't hesitate to hop over and hug Sensei around the middle too.

Arm a bit tangled up, it took a moment to get it wrapped around his littlest brother. Some ice cold feelings intruded on the moment, encasing his heart in frost and fear. Sorrow, maybe. Something sticky and sour like grief that never got to happen, because Mikey was right there.

'He's upset, hug him properly.' Leo complained, and elbowed his way to the front, suddenly putting all his strength into the hug and wrangling Mikey to give a big exaggerated smooch on the top of his head.

"Leooo!" Mikey complained, breaking composure to try and push off in that way that all big brothers knew was only meant to get them to pull little brothers closer. They both hugged him tight. Neither moved to let go.

"Leo." Mikey repeated, this time with a tremor like he was struggling not to cry.

"Goodnight, Angelo." Leo whispered into his ear.

Mikey's body jerked with a sob and he threw himself somehow harder into the hug. Sensei rocked him back and forth, eyes crinkling for a second of comfort.

Leo didn't want to think about the cracked scars on Mikey's arms and what that meant, the afterimage of a wink before a flash of light. It was too painful and he was already struggling pretty hard.

Mikey sniffed, gathering himself, and said in a hoarse voice, "G'night, Nardo."

Sensei let his crinkled eyed smile stay on as they separated, so Mikey could see. Only once his little brother was gone did it slide off, a gross heart-sick drained and detached. Ah. The detached was Leo, still hovering near the front. Sensei gave him a gentle pat and turned back to April.

"This should be long enough now." She told him, taking off the bracelet from his finger and offering it out. Sensei gave his wrist and she tied it on, just loose enough that he could touch it with the tips of his fingers. He signed thank you, hand away from his mouth, a grateful smile.

April mirrored the sign back to him, you're welcome.

Sensei wondered where Casey was, if April was here. He didn't want to torture himself to ask. Instead he grabbed the unfinished orange string, holding it out.

"Sure." April said, and worked on Mikey's bracelet, anchoring off Sensei's finger again.

April talked like it didn't matter that Leo wasn't, until it really was Leo in the room again, slowly sinking back into his skin. It was nice to ground without tumbling into the void, and he sent a weak and grateful feeling to Sensei for the help, for keeping the body in place and not worrying anyone. A natural, heavy exhaustion was pinning him in place, and he fell asleep about halfway through.

Seemed that the healing exhaustion was not enough to stop the eventual return of his sleeping problems. He managed a few hours of rest before startling awake, heart thundering, not remembering his dream but remembering being afraid. His pulse thudded in his ears. April was there, wrapped in the quilt she'd brought years ago to use for sleepovers, just a poke of dark hair out the top. She was definitely asleep.

Leo was not. That sucked. He did the thing he usually did when insomnia crept in, which was grab his phone. This often ratted him out to Donnie, who could easily tell from his activity on various social media that he'd been awake at 5am, but it wasn't as if Leo ever tried too terribly hard to hide things from Donnie anyway.

He checked Snapchat. April had sent hers earlier in the day, picture of Casey having a staredown with Mayhem. It was unclear who was winning. Leo hadn't noticed that Sensei had woken up at the same time as him, until their hand screenshot the picture without him moving.

'Go back to sleep.' Leo told him.

'We haven't figured out how this works yet but I'm pretty sure that's not how.' Sensei said, releasing his hand.

Leo rolled his eyes and opened the next picture. It was Raph's feet, shocker, still in the dojo. Mikey had sent the finished omelette with many exclamation marks.

Hueso only replied to Leo's snaps, so his was after he'd sent the unicorn covered selfie with April. It had no caption, just a shot of his desk, slightly focused on the small pink unicorn souvenir he had tucked between his pens. Softie.

Donnie hadn't sent anything.

Leo sent a chat, 'snap or we'll lose our streak'

Read. Typing. Immediate: 'We don't have a streak right now.'

That was true. They needed three days before the little fire emoji appeared. Didn't matter, it was the principle of the thing. 'dont make me come over there'

There was a pause, like Donnie wasn't sure Leo would follow through with the threat to drag his injured body across the lair to prove a point. Then apparently decided yes, Leo was that dumb, and sent a snap of a schematic. It was definitely a prosthetic arm, multi-layered blueprint with the words overlapping and incomprehensible in their detail.

Leo sent back 'ty' and closed Snapchat. He hated to think Donnie was losing sleep over something like an arm for the idiot who lost his. He switched to his social media sites and scrolled through the end of the world bullshit until it left a sour pit in his stomach, sore and hurting.

'Stop doom scrolling.' Sensei contributed tiredly from the back.

'Can't make me.' Leo snarked.

Sensei sighed. 'Wake up April and talk to her, don't torture yourself.'

'She's tired. She's stressed. I haven't missed that.' Leo tried harder to focus on his phone, even as the room wavered and the LED of the screen finally started to get to him. He was lasting longer, at least.

April was snoring. She never believed them when they said she did. There was nothing to say even if he did wake her.

His phone gave a chat notification. Donnie. It said, 'Go to sleep, Leon.'

'u first'

Donnie's reply took a minute and it was a meme that said: 'You're telling me a home made this soup?'

Leo snorted against his will. He scrolled his camera roll and sent back a jpeg of a fake hat: 'women want me, the minds of fish are unknowable' then added an extra message, 'except men bc im gay'

Donnie replied, 'Lost an arm AND gay? Pick a struggle.'

Leo laughed out loud and had to suffocate it with a pillow.

April rolled over, "Hmm?"

"Sorry." Leo whispered back, still swallowing giggles.

April blindly pat his shoulder then turned away.

'u made me wake april laughing.' Leo accused.

'Double kill.'

His eyes were burning with exhaustion and his thumb hurt from the awkward position and April was snoring in his ear as if she was trying to tempt him to sleep. Leo gave in, texting back, 'ok fine sleep now love u d'

'I love you too. Sleep well Nardo.'

Leo smiled, lip wobbling a little with it.

Then he set his phone aside and shut his aching eyes. The world spun a bit, but the obnoxious sound of April beside him was a constant reminder that he wasn't alone. Sleep was a slippery fish, gliding in and out of his grasp for a while.

The question of where was Casey answered itself in the morning, because his kid was sitting beside him, reading a book with his chin in hand. For a moment Sensei stared, cataloguing everything about him almost desperately.

Hair still long, but neatly washed and brushed, pulled back into a small ponytail with strands hanging down. He was wearing a long sleeve that must've been April's as it had a small cat shooting laser beams out of its eyes on it. The book appeared to be Shakespeare, though he couldn't catch the title. School work? The furrow between Casey's brows suggested the old English was being a pain to read. He looked fairly tired, but well-fed with a glow to his cheeks Sensei had never seen in the future. Not the scrappy young thing Sensei dragged into battlefields and felt endless guilt and fear over. He was going to be so much happier now.

Leo stirred, pointing out to Sensei that Casey's nail beds were wrecked, he was actively chewing the inside of his cheek while he read. He was sitting at the bedside of the younger version of the man who raised him, having presumably lost the most important person in his life, only to watch a stranger parade around looking and sounding like him but not remembering.

They had a stalemate. Sensei slunk away, reluctantly not getting his kid's attention. Leo could've rolled his eyes, but instead made a big show of stretching and yawning.

"Sensei." Casey smiled, not hesitating to set the book aside, face down and cracking the spine.

He waved, and did April's name sign in question since she was no longer beside him. She had wanted to follow their naming theme but claimed they had taken all the good spots, and had jokingly offered an 'A' signed against the tip of her nose. As all good things done ironically, it stuck.

"April?" Casey echoed. "She's helping Mikey with breakfast."

Right. Breakfast. Leo was actually kind of hungry, which was a nice change from the sensation that he was entirely removed from his body all the time.

Sensei was creeping forward, as if on the edge of his seat. Leo nudged him, 'You could talk to him.'

'Stop.' Sensei replied.

Casey really needed him. Though that was assuming Leo was right and Sensei was who he once knew. It was almost funny how quickly Leo had accepted that Sensei would be a future version of himself instead of some kind of fabrication of his mind. It just seemed like after everything that happened, with aliens and time travel and all, that it was stupid to even question if it might be true. But Leo wondered if maybe he should make sure. To have some kind of empirical evidence that Sensei was who he said he was.

'Sensei.' Leo summoned, with intent. 'Tell me something only Casey would know.'

'Why?' Sensei replied.

'Donnie'll kill me if I've got this long without any data collection. I just want to prove to myself that you're actually from the future and not made up in my head.'

'Mm. Okay. Casey's birthday is December 31st.'

'New Year's Eve?'

'Yes.'

Leo zoned back in with a blink, finding Casey studying him quite intently. Leo wondered what it looked like, if his face went blank or something else. He raised his finger and moved it from himself towards Casey, curling it down. Then a question mark.

"Sure, ask away." Casey sat on his hands, leaning forward.

Leo smiled, and with an open hand touched his second finger to his chin then his heart. Birthday?

That definitely was not the question Casey was expecting. He said, "Who's birthday?"

Leo pointed firmly at Casey then finger-spelled the annoyingly two-handed sign, when?

"Um. December 31st?"

Whew. Leo didn't expect that much of a rush of relief that he wasn't making Sensei up in his head.

'As if anyone could imagine me.' Sensei told him, amused.

"Why...?" Casey said, seemingly automatic to raise his hand to touch his head and drop it into a Y.

Leo mirrored it back just to give the smart ass reply: because.

"Okay." Casey gave him a weird look.

Time to distract. Leo made a grabby hand towards the crutch on the wall.

A mild panic flashed over Casey's face. "Are you sure?"

Leo painstakingly finger-spelled W A F F L E S with care and dramatics.

"I'm sure they're going to bring you some." Casey replied, but did hand over the crutch because he was a good kid.

It was what, fifty steps to the kitchen? Leo had done a whole circle around his room yesterday. What was fifty steps?

"For the record, this is a terrible idea." Casey hovered on the side missing an arm, watching Leo stretch his legs for a moment before setting them on the floor.

Leo stuck his tongue out at him in a very mature response, and enjoyed the fact that the pain in ribs was a solid four that didn't tear him apart at the smallest contortion of his body. He got the crutch under his only arm, effectively silencing his communication, and began to walk. Casey got the door.

Chapter Text

Leaving the room was an unexpected breath of fresh air. Leo hadn't realized how full of rot and dust his lungs were from stagnating and dying alone --

'Focus or we'll fall over.' Sensei chided, stepping in for a second to stop the dangerous sway that came over them as Leo spiralled into dark thoughts briefly.

'We're fineeee.' Leo replied, flippant. He blinked rapidly to clear his blurry vision.

"Sensei?" Casey said, worried from his side at the sudden unsteady stop, hand on Leo's shell.

"Just making sure you're paying attention." Leo rasped, and took another step with his trembling legs. Oof, a lot more work than when he was imagining the distance between his room and the kitchen.

But he could hear the distant sound of Mikey's laughter and Leo was pretty sure he'd walk through hell to get to that. He leaned heavily on the crutch, feeling the hesitant touch of Casey on the pattern of his shell, a constant reminder that he was ready on the other side in case he faltered. Leo breathed unsteadily through the tweak of his ribs, the shake of his stiff legs.

Casey stepped forward to open the kitchen door, and Leo staggered in, throwing himself to the nearest chair. He put a hand over his face, shaking from head to toe from effort and breathing hard.

"I tried to talk him out of it." Casey defended from his left, coming through the cotton in Leo's ears.

Leo was amused, because the kid certainly didn't try all that hard. He dropped the hand to raise his eyes up and grin at him, full force.

There was a hitch of breath from the other side of the room. Leo turned his bleary gaze that way, beaming his grin at Mikey and April.

"Ohmigosh." Mikey breathed, looking absolutely floored.

Leo blew him a kiss, and another to April beside him.

"Good morning, Leo." April said, looking significantly pleased. "Come for waffles?"

Leo made a grabby hand towards the waffle maker.

"You got it!" Mikey said, recovering with absolutely contagious sunshine. Trying not to make it weird, even though it was the first time Leo had moved around on his own in weeks.

Casey hesitantly pulled up the chair beside Leo, tugging at the ends of his sleeves and glancing around the room. Mikey's kitchen was a thing of beauty, all perfectly curated kitchen utensils and appliances. With their unexpected and impromptu move, Mikey took the chance to design the kitchen he wanted. The fridge door had a million little sticky notes and pictures, while the counters were dusted with flour.

Raph entered and stopped immediately in the doorway, staring.

Leo raised his hand in hello. His grin got wider, excited to see his family and surprise them with his presence.

"Leo." Raph said, coming over. "You're awake! And in the kitchen!"

"The man walked here." April reported, like a snitch.

"From your room?" Raph demanded, immediately on edge.

Leo spread his hand, gesturing like and here I am.

Though he hadn't taken a moment upon leaving to throw something on, and sitting up without any blankets was kind of making him shiver. Raph made a complaining noise and gruffly unzipped the big sweater he was wearing to toss it over Leo's shoulders.

Leo's grin grew shit-eating and he signed, hand up and miming squishing something, soft.

"Raph loves his brother, boo hoo." Raph refused to be teased, and leaning in to wrestle Leo's arm through the hole before grabbing both sides and zipping it up like he was helping an actual toddler.

It made Leo feel about that young too, cheeks going red. He finger-spelled, 'stop'.

"Never." Raph's lip twitched, straightening the collar of the sweater he'd fixed around Leo's shoulders like he didn't want to pull away yet.

Leo exasperatedly tapped his head and dropped it into a 'Y'.

Raph replied with unbearable fondness, "Because being your big brother is my full time job."

Instead of coping with any of how that made him feel, Leo pretended to gag, and reached out to push away Raph's face.

Raph laughed and said, "Alright, alright."

Leo felt like he wanted to cry, which it took a second to realize wasn't entirely his own fault. Sensei was curling up in a small ball in the corner, miserable.

'Why is this making you upset?' Leo demanded.

'Sorry.' Sensei replied, shaking with it and drawing his legs in closer to hug. 'Just... be nice to Raph. I miss being his little brother.'

"What's your number on the scale, boss man?"

Leo blinked into reality, the world where he was Raph's little brother still. All the effort of walking there had drained him, but actually sitting in the room surrounded by family was making the groundedness pretty high. Especially with Raph's warm sweater and his stupid words. If it wasn't the pain of pushing to walk there and Sensei's misery, he'd probably be a full three. As it was, he raised two fingers.

Raph gave a thumbs up in return. He didn't look like he completely believed him on that.

"Someone grab Donnie, he promised he'd come too." Mikey said to the group, flipping a steaming waffle onto his growing plate.

"He never wakes up this early." Raph said, snorting.

Mikey scowled. "Yeah, I don't think he went to sleep. I walked by an hour ago and his light was still on. I said I wouldn't make him go to bed if he would come eat. Can you go get him?"

"I can." Raph said, in a tone that left no argument. This was proven when Raph returned a minute later with Donnie thrown over his shoulder.

"I want it on the record that I was going to come willingly, Raphael was just impatient." Donnie said, finger raised from where he was slung like a doll. Then he blinked and said, "You didn't tell me Leon was up."

"Would that have made you come faster?"

"I'm busy!" Donnie whined, and wiggled until Raph put him down, directly in a chair. The spot with his back closest to the wall, still wearing the WEAPONIZED AUTISM shirt and his headphones.

Mikey doled out waffles, setting Leo's in front of him first with blatant favouritism. Leo cheerily blew him another kiss, picking up his fork and having a stare down with it for a second trying to figure out how to hold it with his non-dominant hand. Then he gave up and speared the whole waffle in the middle and ate it round in circles.

It was really good. Sweet and fluffy and hot.

"Not even syrup?" April bugged, sitting opposite him.

Leo pointedly took another big bite, enjoying the waffle too much to slow down for things like toppings. It was helping the pinched feeling in his stomach, stuck somewhere between hunger and anxiety.

April watched him closely, chin in hand and a frown, ignoring her own waffles. Leo raised his eyebrows at her.

“Nothing.” She shook her head and reached for the syrup. “Ever had waffles before, Casey?”

‘Nope.’ Sensei answered in Leo’s head at the same time that Casey shook his head.

“Give this man the whole experience, then.” Mikey leaned over the table to dump a load of whipped cream right in the center of his waffle.

‘Blueberries.’ Sensei suggested.

‘Absolutely no colour favouritism there.’ Leo replied, but cheerfully complied, setting down his awkward waffle fork spear to grab a fistful of blueberries onto the masterpiece they were creating for the wide-eyed kid.

“Thanks.” Casey said, at the inelegant addition of fruit. He picked up the knife and fork and tried a bite. He gave an interested little smile. “That’s pretty good.”

“Another point for the past!” Mikey grinned.

A funny expression crossed Casey’s face, one he suffocated. He kept his mouth shut, eyes dark when he refocused on the food.

‘What’s that about?’ Leo asked Sensei.

A small hesitation. ‘Grief.’

‘Ah.’ Leo wished that everyone else in the room knew how much this hurt Casey, to see all these people he used to love and had watched die. Maybe it would be easier if they knew.

‘It’s going to be hard either way. Let Casey talk on his own time. Maybe he’s enjoying the normalcy.’

‘Can it be called normalcy if this was never your normal?’

Sensei sighed. ‘You just want to be able to talk about what you know. But it’s really up to Casey. Give him time.’

‘You just don’t want him to — I don’t know, talk about you. Don’t act like I’m being selfish.’

‘I did not say that—‘

Someone squeezed his hand. Leo blinked rapidly, sound pouring in his ear like an ocean. It was a spin, like chasing something running in circles, he wiggled his toes and worked his jaw with a pensive frown.

Leo snapped at Sensei, 'Can you fuck off? I'm trying to enjoy breakfast with my family.'

A whisper of hurt. Sensei disappeared, sinking into the void. There was a sting in Leo's chest, like maybe regret, but he didn't have time to analyze that. He was busy trying to place himself in the chair -- damn, even in the room would be nice. Like his mind was floating around the ceiling, untethered and lost.

Leo tried to ground. Breakfast. The kitchen, smelling of crackled sugar and citrus. The blur of mosaic photographs on a shiny fridge, each one a pin-point moment of the family he loved more than life itself. That family, sitting all around him at the table with mis-matched chairs, watching him with worried and wary expressions.

Shit. Shit. Exactly what he didn't want. Leo tipped his head back a little, blinking harder, drawing air in, and then tried his best to offer a winning smile. He dragged the hand holding his up to sign sorry with him against his aching plastron.

Unfortunately he wasn't grounded enough to hear more than a garbled buzz, the words nonsensical. Leo slid into a pretty solid zero, feeling the edges of the shade encroaching on his vision. He didn't want to join Sensei in the void, he wanted to be here! He wanted this so bad, why was it so hard!

The split ache up the center of his chest was like the compounded steal of breath from a fist relentlessly pounding against him, punching him through the surface, like his own body dropping through the floor, and --

The desperate grip on the hand in his. It was squeezing in a pattern. Sequences of three, grouped in long or short bursts. Sitting on a bunk bed with his twin, learning every possible form of communication. Morse code. Letters, in bunches. It took focus, feeling the pulse of pressure up his arm in sequence. C O M E B A C K P L E A S E.

Leo didn't bother trying to blink into focus this time. He clung to the hand, he clung to Donnie, because of course it was Donnie. Dragging him back from the edge inch by inch. Donnie had traded places to sit closer, and was pretending to look at his phone with an expression that was very calculating and hid many things behind it, all dark and shadowed.

No one held his hand in the void of the prison dimension. He was home, chasing stupid rabbits in his head and ending up where he didn't want to be.

There was low, uneven chatter around him. His family was still there, but they didn't look happy. Leo's waffle was sitting on his plate, stabbed by the fork and barely eaten. It was definitely cold, because everyone else was done.

Leo squeezed back. He summoned the morse code formula in his head, giving it unsteady and stuttered but putting all his energy into it. H E R E.

"... he's coming back." Donnie reported, from his left, through the water plugging Leo's ears. He shook his head for a second, as if it was actual water he could get out, making the room spin again.

"Do you think it hurts?" Mikey asked in a little voice.

"I don't think so." April assured quietly.

It took Leo a delayed second, but he turned to Mikey and tried to give a reassuring smile, even as he couldn't quite get his eyes to focus on him yet.

This effort did not seem to reassure him. Leo struggled harder to the surface, like fighting against a tide, and squeezed Donnie's hand really tight to feel the pressure between his knuckles.

"What are you thinking about?" Mikey asked from the other side.

Leo shook his head so hard and rapid it made him nauseous.

"Sorry, I-- I'm sorry." Mikey stood up, chair scraping the ground, then didn't seem to know where to go from there. "I'm making things worse again. I'm gonna -- I'm gonna go see Barry again, okay? I'm not leaving."

Funny, it definitely felt like leaving, to watch the swish of the door as Mikey escaped.

Raph gave a world-weary sigh.

"Where is Orange off to in a hurry?" Splinter greeted as he came in the room. "Oh good, Blue is up."

"Leo's pretty in and out, he was a two earlier but dropped to a zero again." Raph reported, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck.

"And Orange?" Splinter prompted, since it wasn't volunteered.

Raph grimaced. April said, "He's gone to Draxum."

Splinter's body tensed, and he said, in a not-normal voice, "I hope that Orange is finding value with his presence."

The 'or else' was unstated. Splinter approached the table and casually ate the remaining blueberries. He said, "Well, I would like to borrow Blue for a while. Red, could you transport him to the dojo for me? It is time to meditate."

Leo wanted to grab the crutch and bang furniture with it to get everyone's attention and prove that he was perfectly capable of walking. Unfortunately, despite his best efforts his brain was still sitting in the rafters and he couldn't move.

Actually, Donnie was being way too quiet, even for someone pretending to be on their phone. His twin had a blank stare at the unmoving page of some info-dumped tiny text.

Donnie let go as Raph was on his other side, picking him up with a warned, "Hang tight." Arms under his legs and around his back, head against the big chest. From this angle, Leo could see up close the scarring around Raph's eye and perfect circle carved out of his carapace. It wedged panic in his throat and choked him with it, breath catching.

Raph brought him to the dojo, setting him on the mats and carefully putting Leo's legs crossed and with his hand in his lap and the empty sleeve beside it. Leo felt strange as Raph did it, realizing that they had been moving him around a lot over the last while so it wasn't weird to them anymore. To position his empty body.

But Leo wasn't empty. He was there, just not quite seated entirely in his limbs and skull. He cleared his throat, the sound as if it was coming from somewhere to the left.

"Yeah bud?" Raph asked, huge hand on the side of his head, halfway through getting up.

Leo couldn't conjure a reply or even a smile. Dad settled down across from him, making a shooing motion with his hand.

"Let me take care of him." Splinter ordered. "Give us space to work. You know Leonardo gets self-conscious around others."

"You got this, Leo." Raph promised, and the warmth of his hand pulled away.

The door shut. Leo was made of carbonation, fizzing and bubbly. The edge of his vision was indistinct, feeling in his fingers and lips gone. Sensei wasn't present to keep him in the moment, it was just Leo and the yawning expanse of the void at his feet, beckoning him back in. He was tipping forward, nothing to catch him, the swallowing nothing eager to contain him again. Panic squeezed all the muscles in his heart, that skip-a-beat steal-your-breath, standing on the edge of a cliff and unable to suffocate the intrusive thought to jump. As if just conjuring the idea of it was enough to go into action, to feel the phantom sensation of your body hurtling to free fall and inevitable death--

"Do you think it is cotton?" Splinter asked. Leo paused, swaying with inaction.

"Your stolen sweater, do you think it is cotton?" Splinter prompted again. "I can see the seams from here, it looks very well worn, with pilling from the wash. I bet Red washes it many times, but I'm sure it still smells of his sweat. Does it?"

It did. The fabric was much too large and it hung off him in drapes, the familiar whiff of Raph and stress. Both gross and comforting.

"Are your feet cold? Red always keeps the dojo at a lower temperature. Every time I turn it back up he's changed it again. Always makes me want to wear slippers in here."

Leo could feel all his individual toes, aching with ignored cold.

"I saw you did not finish your waffle. I was surprised you didn't put blueberries on it, they have been your favourite since you were very little. Besides watermelon, but tiny turtles are very easily bribed with watermelon. Also hugs. You grew out of the watermelon, but not the hugs. I may have been remiss in not providing enough, but I am right here and I will provide as long as I am breathing. Would you like a hug?"

Well duh. Leo hadn't realized but he'd settled completely in the body, heels against the mat, flexing his hand to tug on the end of the bracelet around his wrist. He nodded.

Splinter shuffled closer and said, "Lay on your stomach, little turtle."

"Dad..." Leo said, with a bit of a whine, because he was bigger than him now.

"You are always my little turtle. I will rub your shell, just like when I had this tiny baby blue. You are still that small turtle, no matter how big you get." Splinter offered his lap.

Leo could not deny. He laid down, sprawling over his Dad's knees and melted into the soothing touch, firm circles and little scritches through the sweater.

"I see how hard you are trying, Leonardo." Splinter told him, calm and undeniably hurting too. "You have suffered greatly, and we all want you to heal at your own pace. I am aware this is hard to discuss without risking your dissociation, but understand that we all want to help. You have no idea..."

Splinter visibly shuddered. He paused the shell rub, then continued with a very pained voice, "Please stay with me when I say this. Focus on the floor beneath you. Leonardo, you have no idea how much it tore us apart to watch you sacrifice yourself for us. I know that you wish to prove yourself. But my son, you do not need to die for your life to have value."

Leo breathed. He tried really hard to stay in the room this time. His eyes prickled, and it was aching to think about the decision he made, to think about throwing the sword into the void and plunging in to carry them both, to make the sacrifice...

It wasn't about him.

A sense memory. Sensei gripping Casey, and saying a lesson he'd learned the hard way over much longer and more blood-shed, "It's not about me."

'When did you get here?' Leo asked tiredly.

'I can't miss a good shell rub.' Sensei replied, equally tired. 'Stay present. Don't freak Dad out.'

Leo zoned in on the sensation of small hands on his shell. The warmth of his father. The cool of the dojo.

'Who's right?' Leo couldn't help but ask, because the ideas conflicted in his head. 'Us, or Dad?'

Sensei hesitated. He replied, 'I don't know. It was easy to think that about myself. It's harder to think that about you.'

'I am you.' Leo reminded him.

'Believe me, I know.' Sensei still sounded so tired. It hurt all the nerves in his body, like they were twenty years into a losing war and he'd give anything to rest without the hangover of adrenaline and fear. No. That was a sense memory.

"Stay with me, Blue." Splinter reminded him, an ocean away. Leo scrambled but couldn't get a grip.

Sensei helped. He heaved them back into place, and almost immediately recoiled, the body moving.

Splinter gently pushed them back down. "Relax. Breathe. Everything is fine. I have you."

Sensei tried to flee and give Leo back the front, overwhelmed with the love and affection being poured onto him.

'It won't kill you.' Leo told him, quietly amused, elbowing Sensei into place.

'My dad died twenty years ago.' Sensei shot back, lip wobbling, almost immediately flooding their body with the desire to cry. 'Everyone else is hard enough because the versions of them I knew are gone. But this Splinter, he's exactly the dad I knew. He was the first to go.'

'I already share my dad with four siblings, I think I can handle one more.' Leo replied, steadily not conceding, practically pushing Sensei to keep him in the front even as he struggled.

Their body stuffed with tears. Sensei sniffed, nose running as he blinked back the overflow from fighting the urge to cry.

Splinter practically leaned double over him, and began to sing in a sweet, low voice, "Neneko, neneko, ya, Sleep, my little one, sleep. As the bottomless pit of the ocean, so is my love so deep."

Oh, fuck. Sensei shuddered with a sob and brought his only arm to his face to bury in it, muffling the cries.

Splinter hummed reassuringly, following his melody around, singing like Sensei wasn't crying at all, "Neneko, neneko, ya. Sleep, my little one, sleep. As the unexplored vasts of Nirvana, so is my love so deep."

Sensei trembled and shook and cried in his dad's arms. He wasn't sixteen anymore, yet inexplicably he was.

'I shouldn't take this away from you.' Sensei told Leo, unable to collect himself even in their mind, wracking with shaking sobs.

'I can share.' Leo repeated, and tears were streaking down his own face. 'It's helping both of us.'

Sensei couldn't imagine that was true, when this kid needed to heal and Sensei was taking all the comfort and making it about him. He tried fumbling to give Leo the front back once again, and instead Leo just settled in beside him, sharing the crying jag and the misery as Splinter looped the lullaby and sung it again, rubbing soothing circles on his shell.

The two of them cried. Sensei cried for everything he lost. Leo cried for everything he was afraid of. The body didn't care who or why, it just cried and cried and cried until neither of them could feel their fingertips for a different reason, lightheaded and tingly.

"Let it all out." Splinter encouraged, still there, still holding on. "You were so strong but now it is time to let go. You are safe."

"I'm sorry." Leo said, babbled into the crook of their arm where they hid their face.

"It will be okay." Splinter promised. "You will be okay."

"I wanted to f-fix it." Leo hiccupped, twisting to look up and see his dad through the blur. "I'm scared, why am I so s-scared?"

"Because it was scary." Splinter said, looking a little bit like he'd been stabbed to hear that, and curling over to hug Leo's face to his chest and kiss his forehead tenderly. "You scared us too."

Leo sobbed, and clung to his dad. He tried to use both hands, the stub wiggling. A wash of familiar misery. He fisted his only hand in Splinter's robe.

Sensei hesitated, but the precedent for speaking had already been set, and he only had one thing he'd been desperate to say to his dad since the moment he died, packing it full of a hundred compounded emotions, twisting into something weak and hurting, "I love you so much, Dad."

Splinter did not hesitate, giving them more kisses all over their face and on each stripe. "I love you more, my son."

They blinked and more tears managed to fall, deep from the well they had inside themselves.

Something jagged unravelled and Sensei stepped back without resistance, shaking but soothed in a way he hadn't felt in twenty years. Leo stayed on the surface, shuddering through the breathing exercises Splinter gave to calm the sobbing jag. Much needed and overdue, on a few levels.

Chapter Text

Leo stayed present, though he was undeniably red-eyed and sniffly. He refused to let Splinter summon Raph, signing insistently for his crutch until it was brought to him, then painstakingly limping through the lair to take over Dad's armchair. He sprawled over it, challengingly.

"All yours, Blue." Splinter didn't even argue. "But I pick the show."

Leo rolled his eyes, making a spectacle of settling firmly into the coveted armchair, utilizing his injured status to the fullest. Splinter merely took the remote and dragged a bean bag chair closer to the projector. He put on the worst show Leo had ever seen.

Leo watched it half-heartedly for a while, and even though he understood Japanese it did nothing to help the absolutely incomprehensible plot. Raph found them just at the point that Leo was beginning to wonder if maybe he was starting to root for the villain to kill everyone involved in the show. He reached for his brother as soon as he saw him, signing for his attention.

"Hey Leo." Raph said, mouth stuttering into a frown once he saw Leo's face.

Right, he'd been crying and his eyes were probably red as hell. He scrubbed at them, then insistently put his hand to his ear. His phone was in his room and he had zero desire to drag his body across the lair again to fetch it.

"Your phone? Where is it?" Raph pat his pockets, like it might be there, the goober.

Leo spelled bedroom. Raph snapped his fingers and retrieved it for him immediately. Then he pulled up another bean bag and settled beside Splinter.

"You can stay but you must be quiet like Blue." Splinter told Raph, patting his cheek fondly.

"Quiet like Blue." Raph repeated, in a weird voice. "Yeah, Pops. Raph can do that."

Leo was just glad to have his phone again. Mikey had snapped the waffles from breakfast, predictable, and April had sent a pic about twenty minutes ago with a picture of a subway rat with a heart filter and 'Splints!!!' as the caption. Leo screenshot it with a snort.

Raph glanced up at the sound. Leo immediately took a picture of his brother, and then took ten minutes to draw a little crown on his head and kitten sitting in his lap before sending it off as his streaks.

Donnie hadn't sent one, but read Leo's immediately. About a minute later, his twin showed up, draped in blankets and flopping onto the armchair to squish Leo.

Leo complained with a grunt, as he moved over to give them room to share the chair not big enough for two teenage turtles.

"Shh! You can stay and crush your brother but no talking over my show!" Splinter said, leaning forward on his knees to watch the weird drama unfolding in rapid pace on the screen. Raph was getting invested too, leaning forward with him.

Donnie rolled his eyes in response, and dug his tablet out of the heap of blankets he was in. He was heavy and warm and the pressure of his twin beside Leo was very welcome. It was almost like a hug.

Leo smiled a bit, and returned to his phone. He navigated through various open tabs and started a new research hunt on traumatic cataracts, reading for about an hour before his own eyes truly insisted that they could not handle the screen anymore, burning with exhaustion and fatigue. His overall pain was about a five. The grounding was a never-before-seen three. Leo turned his face into Donnie's arm beside him and breathed.

He had a regular nap, easily roused when Mikey's voice cut in. "Was he doing okay?"

The TV was on the familiar tones of Jupiter Jim. Splinter must've moved on.

"He was crying with Dad earlier. I don't know if that's a good or bad thing." Raph reported uncomfortably.

"Hm." Mikey replied.

The silence stretched. Donnie tapped the screen right by Leo's head.

"How are you guys doing?" Mikey asked, hesitant.

"I'm alright, Mikes." Raph said, a little tired but mostly going for reassuring. "How about you? How was Draxum?"

"It's fine." Mikey was immediate, dismissive. "Are you NV now too, Donnie?"

Donnie didn't answer. Leo blindly grabbed his phone, a joke too good to pass up. He typed it on his notes app through half-asleep eyes and then handed it to Donnie. 'If you're nonverbal and I'm nonverbal then who's flying the plane?'

Leo felt extremely rewarded with a barked laugh from his twin. Donnie tossed him the phone back, looking that delicious combination of annoyed and amused that only Leo could invoke.

Raph leaned over to read it out loud and gave a laugh too. Then he said, "Sorry, did we wake you?"

Leo yawned hugely, stretching out dramatically to smack Donnie then wave his dismissive hand at Raph. Donnie retaliated by trying to push Leo off their shared armchair.

"Let's not knock the injured one around." Raph stopped them, pointedly pushing both further into the chair.

Leo grinned up at him, pleased to win. When he turned to Mikey for solidarity, his littlest brother was staring with a terrible expression, hands tucked away in a tight cross over his chest.

A flicker of worry. Leo knew something was wrong and he wanted to fix it. But when Leo gestured for Mikey, his brother just shrugged and turned his back to watch the Jupiter Jim they'd all seen a million times before.

Leo tried not to feel rejected, he knew that there were deeper things going on, however it was impossible to tell that to his emotions. It just felt like he'd done something wrong and that Mikey wanted nothing to do with him anymore. All the internal struggle couldn't get any traction on either side.

'Mikey loves you.' Sensei chimed in.

'What did I say about telling me shit I already know?' Leo replied, trying not to come off as annoyed as he felt.

'As a consequence of our situation, that's probably going to be common.' Sensei was dry.

'You sound like Donnie.' Leo complained, and ignored the flickering projector screen to snuggle into Donnie's arm again, the only piece of his twin he could freely interact with that didn't result in getting pushed off. The rest of Donnie was intently focused on his tablet, not blinking. Leo peered over the side, reading enough that he saw nerve connections for prosthetics. Leo felt bad for the millionth time that Donnie was putting so much work into it.

Sensei gave an incredulous vibe considering what Leo had just been doing prior. 'Hello Mr Pot? This is Mr Kettle--'

Leo cut him off. 'Of course I'm gonna be researching eye trauma, I'm the medic.'

'Of course he's gonna be making you an arm, he's the tech guy.'

'Now you're on his side. The first time the prosthetic came up you warned me it was going to hurt.'

'Oh yeah, hurts like hell. The weight is one thing, the nerve connections are another. That's not the point.'

'Yeah, the point is that Donnie doesn't have to waste all his time on this. He's worth more to me than tech.'

Sensei sent a wave of warmness, tone calm and coaxing. 'Yeah, bud. And you're worth more to them than as a medic. But it still makes you happy to help, doesn't it?'

Leo had no good counter argument. Foiled by the twin mirror again. He replied, begrudgingly, 'You're really annoying, you know that?'

'I've been told once or twice over the years.' Sensei chuckled.

Someone touched Leo's knee. He blinked and turned his head, finding Raph on the beanbag looking at him.

"Number?" Raph requested.

Leo raised two fingers.

"You seemed a little far away." Raph explained.

Leo shrugged, picking at the edge of the borrowed sweater sleeve. It was beginning to bother him that he hadn't told them about Sensei, now that things were getting better and he was more grounded.

'Don't tell them.' Sensei objected, immediately.

'I know you don't want me to.' Leo replied, not addressing it otherwise. He wasn't sure how to feel himself, and how much of his feelings about it were tangled up with Sensei's. He side-stepped the problem, and raising a hand over his head, flicking his fingers out. Shower.

"Oh, sure. You should probably have someone hanging out in case you need help, though." Raph agreed.

Leo scrunched up his face but didn't argue, knowing that dissociating in the shower might not be something that would have a great outcome.

Part of him wanted to ask for Mikey, to force his baby brother to spend time with him. But it was obvious Raph had already decided it would be him, his own incessant need to help. Raph always protected and looked out for them. It would be cruel to deny him. So Leo squeezed Donnie's arm and let go, reaching for his crutch.

"I could give you a lift." Raph suggested, hesitating to hand over the crutch.

Leo shot him an extremely unimpressed look, because if he was conscious enough to put his two feet on the ground, he wasn't about to let his brother carry him around like a child. He was sixteen, for fuck's sake, and entirely self-sufficient.

"Offer stands." Raph said, and hovered close as Leo struggled up from the black hole the armchair had become with the warmth and gravity of his twin. Donnie had no qualms of overtaking his spot the moment he vacated it, almost swallowed in the blanket he'd brought, just an intent set of eyes and a finger prodding the scroll of his tablet.

Movement hurt his ribs, spiderwebbing up his nerves with every step, reminding him that his body had been quite the ragdoll. The crutch helped his shot balance and weak knees, but did nothing for his speed.

It had been far too long since Leo had showered. He agreed to keep the door open but forced Raph to remain in the hallway.

"Okay, but you've got to find a way to check in with me so I know you're okay." Raph agreed, sitting with his back against the wall.

Leo gave an 'ok' hand and left the door open a crack. He started the shower to get the hot water going. Then he reluctantly unzipped Raph's sweater with his only hand, revealing the bandage wrapped shoulder and stump arm. Leo had yet to actually see it and he had been actively avoiding looking.

The room spun in a circle, scalp tinging, and Leo carefully pulled the wrappings off, piling them on the counter. The mirror was beginning to cloud with steam, but it did nothing hide the injury. A fleshy pull when he moved the stump, the top of his humerus cut off abruptly. They'd padded the end with flesh to ensure the bone wouldn't punch through his skin and sown together with black thread, in neat rows that were familiar. It was his own hand. Or his own hand, taught to a student.

Leo had taught himself to stitch using orange peels. It gave him a hatred for the scent of citrus and a steady hand. Then a quiet, forlorn memory: when Sensei taught Casey, it was fresh into the fire, no practice runs. These close knots and even threading were all Casey Junior, puckering the skin closed for a slow recovery.

When Leo raised the small stump, it felt as if a phantom arm raised as well, disorientating and cruel. It was like he could imagine the fingers opening and closing, even as he stared at nothing. His heart began to pound in his mouth. The rush of water from the shower was drowning white noise in his head. His grounding dropped to a one, maybe a zero.

Then Raph said, echoing from the hallway, "Check in, Leo."

Leo swallowed, and turned away from the mirror as the steam obscured his view. He loudly began to hum Welcome to the Black Parade and climbed inside the shower.

"That's gonna be stuck in my head all day." Raph complained, distantly, but it didn't really sound like complaining. Leo had been getting various songs stuck in their heads for years, it was his favourite hobby to see if he could get all three brothers humming along by the end of the day.

A welcome distraction. Leo tried to stand in the shower for all of ten seconds before admitting a quiet defeat to sit and let the spray run down his shell. Someone obviously had sponged his wounds, but it still felt blissful to get the sweat and cottony feeling off the skin.

Leo looped a couple other MCR songs to stay focused and managed to lather his sweet-expensive soap, soothing some aching part of himself he hadn't been capable of acknowledging before now.

It also filled Sensei with nostalgic enjoyment. He stole the front to inhale the soap, white jasmine and cedar. Sensei smiled.

"Give me a better song, Leo." Raph called.

Sensei realized he'd made Leo stop and began to hum the only song that came to mind, which was Toxic by Britney Spears.

Clean and warm, Sensei pulled them from the shower, wavering on legs that struggled against the syncope caused by the low blood pressure in hot water. He sat on the floor with a towel, inspecting the amputation wound with far more practicality than Leo's earlier agonizing. It would probably heal better than his had, with the immediate care and proper rest he'd been given that Sensei in the middle of a war hadn't had time for. He'd allowed Donnie to slap the port on his stub before it had even healed all the way. Maybe things wouldn't be so dire here, they had so much time and resources.

With practice, Sensei dug out the med kit from underneath the sink and one-handedly rewrapped the bandages on himself, humming all the while. Leo sat back and let him, tired from the effort of the shower. Then Sensei rezipped the enormous sweater on, easily managing the zipper with a practiced juggle and tucking the empty arm sleeve into the front pocket. Finally he walked out, taking the crutch so he could immediately whack Raph in the knee with it.

"Ow." Raph said, even though it definitely didn't hurt, just the principle. His eyes crinkled, pleased, "Better?"

Sensei nodded, trying not to focus on the scarring and cloudiness of Raph's eye. He'd never had to see that before, but alive and maimed was better than dead, wasn't it? Sometimes Sensei wished he'd never looked at the sight of his brother buried, surrounded by stuffed animals, because the heavy limbs all limp, sucked dry of life and the image of his brother's corpse was a constant intrusive thought in his mind, more than the sight of his smile.

'You seriously cannot be trusted to drive.' Leo told him, and the body staggered as they shifted control.

'Wait--' Sensei started.

"Woah, bud." Raph got up fast, hovering like Leo might topple over.

'Please hug him.' Sensei begged. 'Just so I can feel that he's not dead. I need it out of my mind.'

Leo wanted it out of his damn mind too. He remembered the first time he saw roadkill, how a living thing could be so hauntingly still, flesh immobile and empty. The image of his own brother, his hero, just lifeless flesh was nightmare fuel. Let alone to think Sensei had to carry that as reality for so long.

"Number, Leo?" Raph requested, ducking his head down to try and see Leo's face.

Between the sight of his own grotesque injury for the first time and Sensei providing him with his own personal hell, he was probably a zero. The shade waiting for him in the way he had to blink six times just to get his eyes to focus, how all thoughts of doing anything carried this impossible weight. Leo raised a closed fist, zero. Then opened his arm for a hug.

Raph had no hesitation to squish him and said to his ear, "What's wrong?"

Leo gripped his neck. Sensei squeezed. They could feel Raph's heart beating. He was very much alive.

'Dude, did you seriously have to take us down this rabbit hole right now?' Leo complained, mind swinging around a little desperately, clinging to Raph like they might sink or drown.

'Hey, you know how you don't like to be left alone with your own thoughts because they go places you don't like? Well, you don't grow out of that.' Sensei was in a similar state, pressing burning eyes into Raph's neck, swallowing down the undeniable urge to break down for what felt like the millionth time.

"Raph's got you." Raph squeezed back. "What's going on, buddy?"

Equal flashes: one, a lifeless corpse of someone beloved, the gaping hole that never stopped aching, never stopped punching the air from Sensei's chest no matter how much time passed, the feverish desire for this exact moment, to hold him just one more time, one more, one more.

Two, the lurch of pure fear, the sight vanishing sight of Raph hunched over him, saving him, taking the hit and whisking Leo away. Sacrificing himself for Leo like the real hero he was, except that it shouldn't be that way, Leo was nothing without him, he shouldn't have done that--

They finger-spelled with a trembling hand, 'lost you'.

"I'm right here, dummy." Raph bonked their heads together, trying to give a reassuring smile, eyes crinkling. But one was scarred and damaged and clouded, unseeing. Leo's fault.

Raph's hand rubbed the back of their neck and made shushing sounds, as Leo was gasping for breath, trying to swallow back tears.

Raph insisted, "Everything's fine. I'm fine."

Leo struggled his arm up to thumb the edge of the scar around his eye.

"It's nothin'." Raph brushed the touch away, not lingering on it in the slightest.

But when Leo blinked, two afterimages fought to overlay themselves over Raph's face. Two miseries competing, dead and captured, lost to them.

"I'm not going anywhere." Raph promised, jostling Leo a little by the hold on his neck. "Get that through your head, kay? You haven't lost me, I'm right here. Don't work yourself up over it."

Leo didn't exactly get to choose what he worked himself up about, especially with the traumatized old man occasionally hijacking his neurons for some second-hand horrors.

Guilt sunk in, slimy and foreign, Sensei's own. Leo tried not to let him sink into the void, clutching him to the front and remaining in the grasp of Raph. 'I don't have a good grip on reality right now, if you leave I'll fall.'

'I'm hurting you.' Sensei replied, stricken and struggling against him.

Stronger than Leo, he broke the hold and vanished. Leo was tired and the grey immediately swallowed his peripheral vision. Alone with his own thoughts. He frantically raised a hand and showed Raph a zero.

Despair washed with a new, exhausted terror. How the hell was he expected to live like this? To keep going through the endless struggle that could not seem to gasp for a single breath of air before his head was pushed back under the waves?

Motion. Words. Through a foggy cotton, distant, just beyond reach. Leo refused to fall, but he was hanging off the edge. He couldn't gather himself enough to think of anything that would help, just the bare amount of power to hold on.

There was a rumbling sound, indistinct words. Colourful movement in his middle distant vision. Soft blankets. Security surrounding him. It couldn't have been too long, he could still smell the fresh whiff of his soap. The steady words came in slow, matching the visual in front of him.

"... and Mikey said if I watered my flowers they might make hybrids. I was just watering them because I thought they'd need water."

A little avatar walking with cartoonish steps, meticulously watering flowers.

"I was thinking about putting a bridge here, since I always end up wanting to cross the river at this point." Raph explained in his ear, wiggling the avatar in circles next to a flowing river bank. His avatar was a pink haired villager with big black rubber boots and overalls, band-aids over their nose.

Raph chased after bugs for a few minutes, reading out loud the bad jokes with each catch.

Leo had played more than enough Animal Crossing, though he didn't realize Raph started to play too. His character was still in the early stages of developing the village. He brought the bugs he caught to the museum then went fishing.

Leo settled in his actual surroundings, back in his room with the fan running, sitting up on the bed with Raph surrounding him, the arms around him playing the game in front of both of them, chin on the top of Leo's head.

Raph caught a sea bass. Before the caption even popped up, Leo muttered, "It's at least a C plus."

Raph exhaled gustily and gave him a squeeze. "Hey, there you are. It's been about an hour, thanks for coming back."

He didn't leave on purpose. Leo blinked rapidly, keeping the screen in front of him in focus, and asked with the curiosity fueling him, "When'd you start playing Animal Crossing?"

"Just recently. Mikey suggested it since I needed something to do that was... occupying and calming." Raph explained, a little uncomfortable but honest. Then more sheepishly, "Also I got too angry at Hades."

"Oh, I wanna watch Hades." Leo snuggled more comfortably in Raph's hold, because his big brother was awesome at the rouge-like.

Raph didn't hesitate to save and change games. Hades involved a lot of furious button clicking, but Leo found it far more engaging. He opened his mouth to mutter something about the choice to pick a Zeus boon then realized he'd spoken multiple times without thought. It made sense with the position, not facing Raph to sign, but it still had his skin crawling with expectations. The moment he was aware of it, he was instantly thinking too hard and intimidated himself out of speaking. He switched to watching silently, occasionally reaching out to very unhelpfully poke the screen and make Raph grumble.

It was nice to be clean, even if the shower had been a bit precarious. His grounding was about a one and his pain levels were about a three. Just the persistent ache of his ribs, leftover soreness that lingered with every breath, and the gnawing at the end of his missing arm, like it was constantly trying to draw his attention that way.

Leo stayed with Raph, watching him play until Mikey brought them both dinner, putting visible effort into acting normal.

Without Sensei there to help, Leo had a stand-off with the fork that refused to cooperate in his non-dominant hand. The chicken and rice dish was not friendly for someone struggling with coordination, and like hell he was about to let anyone hand-feed him. Sensei did not helpfully appear and Leo took about triple the amount of time to consume half the food. He was mentally exhausted by the end, taking his phone and curling up on his side.

The frustration of the missing right arm coloured his mood sour, so he wasn't expecting to be punched with emotion upon opening his Snapchat. He had a reply from Hueso, after his streak snap of doodling on Raph.

Hueso had sent a photo, no caption, just a picture of his Wall of Champions. Framed and glossy, right in the center, was a picture of Leo. Not posing for the camera, not mid-action, but sitting at his Tío's counter, in a blue unzipped jacket and beanie, chin in hand and giving a warm smile to someone off camera, eyes crinkled.

His hand started to shake, but he managed to take a screenshot. The amount of thought and care that went into not only choosing the photo, but framing it and placing it on his Wall of Champions...

Leo sent a chat, 'tio omg ur gonna make me cry.'

He sniffed and tried to swallow the feeling, because that was stupid to get emotional over. Raph and Mikey were on the other side of the room, talking to each other, but when eerily silent when Leo sniffed.

'Do not be ridiculous, pepino.' Hueso replied.

'im your champion???' Leo sent back, with ten crying-face emojis.

Hueso typed for way too long considering how he gave essentially the same reply. 'Do not be ridiculous.'

Leo sniffed again, biting back a smile as he typed, 'ur getting the biggest freakin hug next time i see u tio'

'Heal first, I will not be pleased if you hurt yourself showing up at my door just for a hug.'

'so that means u will give me one??'

Hueso didn't reply. Leo rubbed his eyes, still shaky but so overwhelmed with care.

"What's going on, big man?" Raph asked, having abandoned all pretense that they weren't watching him closely.

Leo wanted to brag, so he opened the family groupchat he hadn't personally touched in ages to send the screenshot he'd taken. He added the message, 'being emotionally compromised by a skeleton'.

Mikey pulled his phone out and audibly said, "Awww!"

Raph leaned over to see. "Oh, that's a good picture of you."

April popped in the chat with ten confetti emojis: 'You're a Champion!!!'

Donnie chimed in, 'Scoff. He should've used this picture.'

Then his twin sent a truly horrible photo where Leo had collapsed in a heap following a failed skateboard trick, limbs everywhere, but one arm raised to give a weak thumbs up.

Leo barked a laugh then buried his face in his elbow to muffle it. He sent back, 'hate u'

Mikey, the traitor, replied, 'No he doesn't, he just laughed out loud!!!'

'Of course he did, Leonardo recognizes genius when he sees it.'

'How about this genius?' April sent.

Leo groaned. Her photo was Leo crouched beside a dropped pizza slice, dramatically clutching his head. Dropping the pizza had been an accident but the photo was posed, hamming it up for the joke.

Raph called her out on it, tapping away at his phone. 'Fake! This is real quality.'

He sent a photo of Leo asleep, mouth wide open, crunched up in a truly uncomfortable position on a chair, drool and all. It was blurry and unfocused and very unflattering. The ultimate revenge for the insomniac turtle who had an arsenal of sleeping photos of his brothers in his own phone.

'bruh.' Leo sent.

Mikey was scrolling far too intently. Leo's suspicion was correct when his innocent baby brother sent a photo next. The worst part was that it was almost a good photo. Leo was grinning from ear to ear, making a heart with both his hands and looking through the hole. But he was also wearing a shirt that said BABY SLUT in hot pink letters because he'd made a bold claim to April that he'd look good in anything and she had challenged him on it. And Leo never backed down from a challenge.

'no one send any of those to hueso pls.' Leo's shoulders shook with suppressed laughter.

April sent more laughing emojis.

Leo saved all the photos to his phone. The restlessness of trying to heal was really getting to Leo, even with his ambient pain and lack of energy the desire to move and do things was still nagging at his brain. He wanted to go to Run of the Mill anyway, to see his face on the wall and to get that hug from Hueso.

As soon as the bad idea came to him, that familiar presence settled in the back of Leo's mind. Sensei was back, summoned by Leo's decision making.

Leo wasn't angry, he didn't like the echoing silence of his mind, trying to drag him into the shade. Having Sensei's firm presence lingering gave him something to hold onto. Leo told him wryly, 'I don't think I have the energy to make a portal to the kitchen, let alone go to Hueso's. You can relax.'

Sensei was quiet. Leo poked him in the forehead but got no reaction. He rolled his eyes and left him alone to sulk in the back of his mind.

"Do you have a preference on who hangs out with you tonight, Leo?" Raph asked, making Leo focus into reality quick.

Leo knew exactly who he wanted and immediately tapped the 'M' to his heart. Mikey could try and avoid him, but the moment he got his littlest brother alone he would crack and talk because he could not suffer in silence long.

Mikey obviously knew this, because he visibly blanched. Then covered it up and said, "I mean, I can, but I've just got so much to do..."

Leo pointed firmly and finally at Mikey, leader-face on, not taking no for an answer.

Raph's smile was knowing when he clapped Leo on the shoulder. "Sounds good. Text if you need me."

Leo saluted. Raph left them alone.

Chapter Text

Mikey stayed on the other side of the room, rubbing his wrists through the bandages and fidgeting, avoiding Leo's eye.

Leo knew he didn't have to say anything -- whatever was bothering Mikey would come to the surface given enough time.

'I give him twenty minutes before he cracks like an egg.' Sensei told him, undeniably fond.

Leo pat the chair set up beside his bed invitingly, then curled up with his phone again. After a moment, Mikey took the spot, propping his legs up on the bed and leaning back to stare at the ceiling.

It was quiet. There wasn't even music playing. Leo was tempted to put it on, but knew the oppressively silent environment was only going to help him win this battle. Though being left alone with his own thoughts was dangerous, at least Sensei picked up the slack and started to beat-box in his mind to fill the quiet.

Twenty minutes on the dot, Mikey said, "I know what you're doing."

Leo lowered his phone from where he was reading about consequences of sleep deprivation and gave a very innocent expression. Sensei cut off his soundtrack, also smug.

"But I don't want to talk to you about this right now." Mikey was reclined back, and put his hands over his eyes, pushing in. "I mean, I do, because it's eating me up inside, but also I don't want to make things worse for you. You have no idea how awful I feel when I trigger you. And how freaking hard it is to see you like that! You're Leo, you're not supposed to be..."

Mikey trailed off, uncomfortable, and his hands trembled with effort. He dropped and tucked them away. It left his big watery eyes to stare resolutely at the ceiling.

Leo put away his phone and sat up, fidgeting with the end of the bracelet in his palm, still waiting. Giving Mikey the space to be honest, as faithfully he could trust Mikey to always be honest. His driven by emotion-and-heart baby brother, so talented and strong. So small and young.

So quiet. Mikey whispered, "I don't want to hurt you."

The room was too quiet. Leo struggled in the void of noise, and Sensei steadied him, keeping him present. They wanted Mikey to have space to speak. After a moment, Leo offered his only hand for Mikey to hold.

Careful and hesitant, Mikey took it. Immediately, Leo squeezed, silently communicating that he was present. He was listening. He wasn't slipping. He had a feeling he wasn't going to like what Mikey had to say, but he was going to listen anyway, because it was better than his beloved brother avoiding him and being weird around him. If Mikey held his hand then it took away his communication, then maybe it was better if Leo couldn't rebuke him. Maybe it was better if he just listened and held on.

Mikey watched his face uncertainly. Leo merely squeezed his hand again. There was a fine tremor that he ignored for Mikey's sake.

"When I was scrolling through my camera roll to find a good photo of you, I thought..." Mikey lingered, unsure. His mouth twisted and there was an undeniably heartbroken sound when he continued, "You almost left us with only photos."

Ah.

Leo squeezed his hand, both for himself and for Mikey.

Emboldened that Leo didn't immediately slip, Mikey continued, bottom lip wobbling a little, "There was a moment where I lived in a world where I would only have photos of you. It was, hands down, the worst moment of my life. And we can talk about my choice to save you and the danger behind that later, but not right now. Right now I want to talk about your choice. Please?"

They definitely would be discussing Mikey's choice later, especially with the knowledge from Sensei that it could and would kill him. And while he was not eager to talk about his own choices, he would do anything for Mikey. So he would try. He squeezed Mikey's hand, nodding a little along with it.

Mikey stared, shining eyes searching Leo's face, then cracking a fissure as he said, "I'm so unbelievably mad at you, Leo."

Ouch. Leo felt the wash of emotion, letting his eyes shut as he braced himself against the pain of that statement. Mikey felt things with his whole heart, and Leo didn't doubt that the sizzling-hot anger directed at him was sour and hurting.

"It's one of many things. But I am." Mikey added, tugging Leo's hand and making him open his eyes, to ground and focus on the extremely important thing in front of him.

Leo swallowed, trying to keep his returning gaze steady, even as his own mouth started to tremble with the suppressed urge to cry. He didn't want Mikey to be angry at him. Leo wanted to protest that he had to fix it, that he was nothing without his brothers, that he had to save them. The words summoned to his tongue but he couldn't open his mouth. He squeezed back, telling Mikey to continue. To dig this hole further.

"I just can't get over that you took my brother away from me." Mikey shook his head rapidly. "I know it's irrational. I know it's not fair. I know the situation sucked and something needed to be done. But I didn't want you to do it. I didn't want to lose my brother. In an instant I lost your contagious laughter, waking me up at three in the morning to go get slushies, all your love, all your --"

Mikey cut off, ragged breathing. Leo struggled and Sensei was a shored anchor to keep them stable. Listening to what Leo had hurt when he made that impossible choice. It sucked to hear.

Mikey's voice cracked, "And we got you back but we didn't. Not whole. You lost a whole piece of yourself in there, and more than that, you..."

The dissociation elephant sat in its corner of the room.

"You came back hurt." Mikey said, softly, eyes dark. He curled his whole body around Leo's hand, like the misery was crushing him. "Hurt in a way that I couldn't help. It was, it... it is so hard to watch. I'm not saying that to make you feel bad. It's that you're my invincible, fearless brother. You're Leo, you're larger than life, you're... you..."

Mikey's expression twisted into something haunted and cold and scared and Leo squeezed hard. It did nothing to draw the poison from his face, the chill. Mikey was silent for a long, drawn out minute, trembling and visibly chewing over his words.

"I know that you've been hurt." Mikey said, voice dragged over coals. "I know that. I didn't want to get into this right away, to drag you through my own hurt when you've got so much going on. I don't want to make it worse.... but I'm so angry and upset and it's all I can think about sometimes."

Leo swallowed against the razor blades in his throat, and gave a weaker, encouraging squeeze. He was almost grateful for the shield of his stolen voice.

"I'm also relieved and desperately happy that you're alive. I feel like doing cartwheels at all your progress. I swear, every time you look at me and smile I could suffer through a million more days waiting for you to come back, because Leo you've got no idea how much I missed you."

Leo had to shut his eyes, washed with a sensation he couldn't ignore. The feeling of being missed made it hard to breathe, another broken rib.

The guilt it invoked. The terrible undeniable reality it uncovered. The one where he would do it again. The one where he had laid still and let the fight drain from his body. Leo couldn't bear the thought of saying anything because he knew, deep inside, that he was only going to make things worse.

With how upset Mikey was, that was the last thing he wanted to do.

The guilt twisted and twisted and Leo's fingers loosened as his mind ran away from him. A flash of concern came over Mikey's face, and it was motivation enough for Sensei, who took the front and steadied the body.

Sensei withdrew their hand to cover their face, breathing heavy for a moment, feeling dizzy and uncentered. Leo had just begun to panic, clawing dark thoughts of death taking over.

In the future, Sensei had been no stranger to death. The death of the people he loved. The endless craving for his own. It was all the sides of the same coin, that desperate envy that others ceased to suffer. The others didn't have to mourn. Didn't have to push through, didn't have to try. How could he not fantasize about it, when it had been a silent companion since he was an insomniac teenager with an inferiority complex and something to prove that he felt he never could?

Sensei shouldered through these murky waters with grim determination, breathing heavy, then straightened up to offer back his hand to Mikey with a set jaw.

'You knew I felt like this.' Leo quietly put in, from the back where he'd curled up in a ball, trying to stay present. Barely there.

'I know how I've felt. I hoped you were escaping it.'

'I can't escape anything.'

"Am I losing you?" Mikey asked, blossoming guilt painted painfully all over him.

Sensei firmly squeezed his hand. He met his dead brother's eyes with all the strength he had. He let his gaze stay, even as it seared him from the inside out.

Mikey opened his mouth, then hesitated. He sighed, squeezing his hand back. He said, slowly,  "I... I hope you understand why I'm angry. But I also hope you know that it's not the only thing. I'm also just so freaking happy you're here. It's all I want. Okay?"

Sensei nudged the scrunched up little Leo in the dark corner, seeing if he understood.

Leo replied, 'He's right to be angry.'

A breath. Then Leo stole forward and withdrew their hand from Mikey's grip to finger-spell viciously, Be angry.

Sensei gently pushed Leo down, parting the waves of panic that washed up on the shore, retaking the hand hovering in the air to add, Be happy.

For a moment, the two Leo's combined gazed at their brother, who was all twisted up. Conflicted and hurting and trying. They broke and gave a crooked smile, before spelling, Be Mikey.

Mikey's throat clicked with a swallow. He said, wavering, "Okay."

His hands were shaking like earthquakes, tugging at the edges of the bandages. Leo gave them a pointed and troubled look.

Mikey drew his shaking hands out of sight. "We are talking about you right now, not me." His voice was cool, but the heat grew high in his cheeks, as he avoided Leo's eyes.

Leo sighed. He let it drop. The room echoed with quiet, bouncing between them, tangible and thick and heavy.

"I don't know what to do with my anger but to hold it." Mikey kept his gaze away, his hands tucked to his plastron, the heat in his face. Eyes shimmering. "It's like... I don't want to be the one who's angry. I don't like it. And yet, here I am, seeing red and prickling hot with it, and... I'm mad that I'm mad and that doesn't help anything. I... I can't help anything."

Mikey's jaw was ticking, tight with tension.

Leo wanted to take the burden from Mikey. But he couldn't.

"I can't fix you. I can't fix myself." Mikey said around gritted teeth. "It makes me so furious. All of this, I know -- I know that I shouldn't, that the situation was impossible and people were in danger but damn it Leo, how could you--"

Silence, as Mikey cut himself off, breathing hard through his nose, still turned away, shoulders and hands tight as they trembled.

There was practically steam rolling off him. It all stayed quiet. Hauntingly, like a void, 3AM, a prison dimension --

Sensei began to hum in their mind. The tune was the lullaby Splinter sung for them. It wasn't quiet. Leo bit his lip and waited.

"I don't want to make you promise you won't do it again because I don't want you to lie to me." Mikey said at last, voice gone ice cold.

Just like the bucket of ice dropped down Leo's back at the words, at how incredibly well Mikey could read him, because that had definitely been his plan. A lie to placate, anything to make Mikey sound less like the world was ending here and now.

Mikey turned his head and met Leo's eye. He didn't say anything else, just letting his gaze of anger and hurt and blazed love be the only line of communication between them.

Sensei kept the steady loop of a lullaby, curling their fingers around the bracelet on their wrist, and purposefully kept Leo meeting Mikey's gaze. Feeling the full force of it.

Leo wanted to give Mikey the lie anyway, because he deserved that comfort. But it wasn't right. It wouldn't work. Mikey saw right through him, because Mikey had done the exact same thing, even if he didn't know the extent yet. A wink and a flash of light.

After an eternal minute, Mikey broke the stare, and mumbled, "Don't tell anyone I got mad at you."

Leo mimed locking his lips and throwing away the key. A crumbled smile flashed over Mikey's face, not stable enough to stay.

Mikey fidgeted, then stood up and paced in a tight circle. He said, "I need a minute. I don't... I just want a minute. Can I go get someone else?"

Leo thought it was funny and wanted to say, actually, there was someone else there. Just ephemeral and annoying.

Sensei chimed in, mild, 'Hey.'

Leo shook his head for Mikey. He was fine.

Mikey hesitated, all pent-up energy. "We're not supposed to leave you alone. Donnie said that."

Leo rolled his eyes and tapped a 'D' to his forehead.

Mikey left and Donnie filled his space less than a minute later. He was carrying his tablet and took the chair, wrapped in a purple hoodie and huge fluffy socks. "Michael said he wouldn't be long. What'd you do to piss him off?"

Leo grabbed his phone off the bedside table and typed in the notes, 'better question why have you got a 24/7 guard on me'

"Scoff." Donnie said, when he read it, then his grip on the tablet tightened. "It's not a guard. You were the one who asked for it."

Leo did not remember asking for it. He blinked at his twin.

"You know I won't apologize for things that aren't my fault." Donnie said, not looking away from the tablet. "However I feel I should explain myself. It wasn't my intention to create a piece of tech that removed a source of support from you."

Oh. The clip. Leo remembered raising a finger up for Donnie, circled back towards himself. Alone. And since that moment, he hadn't been left alone.

Donnie dug the clip from the pile of supplies on his bedside table, the little purple monitor blinking softly, ready. Donnie flipped it over, inspecting it with a twitch of his mouth, rueful.  "It had been days and you weren't improving. I wasn't thinking about what you would need when I made it -- well. Of course I was thinking about what you'd need, it has all the necessary vitals to ensure you would be safe if left alone. But it wasn't for you, it was for our beloved brothers."

Leo wasn't really expecting that, humming in question.

His twin sighed, placing the clip back into place and drawing his knees up, balancing his tablet against it and hunching into his hoodie. He mumbled, "It getting too hard for them to see you like that. They needed a break. They weren't doing well just sitting here staring at you. It was the only way I could convince them to leave your side for even a second."

Leo couldn't help but smile at Donnie. He signed, hand away from his mouth, thank you.

Donnie shook his head, scrunching up into a smaller ball in the chair. "Don't thank me for that. It meant you woke up alone at a time where you needed support the most. I know that hurt you."

Leo considered a few different responses. He could point out that it was getting dangerously close to an apology despite Donnie's initial statement. Use it as an opportunity to barter Donnie into showing him his injured shell. Leverage it into guilting Donnie into giving him a proper hug.

Instead of any of those things, Leo closed his fingers by his mouth. Shut up. Then pushed up a pair of imaginary glasses with his finger. Nerd.

Donnie didn't give him an apology because it wasn't needed. Leo didn't forgive him because it wasn't needed. Some of the tension left Donnie's shoulders, and he signed back something far ruder. It made Leo laugh, loose and pleased.

Though the signs reminded him that Donnie had been non-verbal earlier, and apparently improved since then. Leo signed, touching his head and dropping it to a 'Y', and adding the long-established Donnie sign for non-verbal, a quick 'N-V'.

"Ah." Donnie avoided his eye, wrinkling his nose. "It was just a rough morning. I'm doing okay now."

A rough morning? They'd sat around and had waffles. Sure, apparently his twin hadn't slept at all the night before, but he'd shown up and was talking when he got there. It was only...

Right. It was only after Leo slipped that Donnie went non-verbal. Perhaps the statement that Leo dissociating was 'hard on their brothers' included Donnie too.

The desire to demand a hug increased, but he restrained. Leo didn't want to force Donnie to touch if he was against it right now. Instead he kept his mouth shut. He didn't call Donnie out on being upset over his dissociation. He didn't know what to say at all. He stared at the dark shadows under Donnie's eyes and the restless twitch of his fingers.

Donnie flicked his eyes up after a minute and met his gaze. He sighed again, unscrunching and offering out the tablet.

The schematic for a prosthetic arm was in stark contrast on the screen. It was sleek and blue, a complicated joint for the elbow and a detailed section for the port connection.

"It has been pointed out to me that perhaps I should get your input." Donnie said, audibly uncomfortable.

Leo wondered who, probably April. He pinched to zoom in on the port, thinking about what Sensei said about the nerve connections.

"For most arm amputees, a prosthetic is more trouble than it's worth." Donnie said, chin in hand, watching Leo's face as he inspected the schematics. "Adaptability for one-handed life is not the end of the world. A leg prosthetic is comparatively easy -- it just needs to be walked on. An arm, let alone a hand, is very complicated. Our hands are some of the most complex systems in our whole body, the fine dexterity within our fingers. I quickly came to the conclusion that if the prosthetic was going to be any use to you, we would need to utilize nerve connections."

The arm blueprint was really quite well done. It had a near identical shape and structure to Leo's left arm. When Leo flicked through the layers, he saw some different aesthetic design options. One with neon-blue backlights. Another with clear cut-outs to show the wires underneath.

Donnie continued, "Making a prosthetic that would work as effectively as your hand requires a nerve port installation, which would mean surgery and recovery. It may be more trouble than it's worth, since many people find that they can adapt just fine to having one hand. So I'm asking, dear brother, is this something you actually want?"

Leo flicked the tablet again, finding the last design. It was smooth-lined, with simple patterns to match Leo's arm stripes. Then his heart went into his throat and he zoomed in.

Painstakingly added to the design on each individual finger was a fingernail.

There was a little note about what material to use in order to make sure nail polish wouldn't affect any of the surrounding systems. When he swallowed, his heart bobbed against his tongue, sore.

Leo looked up at his twin, beyond touched at the level of care and thought he'd put into the arm. Enough to give him fingernails to paint.

"Don't look at me like that." Donnie said. "Answer the question."

Leo gave it actual thought. He knew it was going to hurt, Sensei had warned him a long time ago. Even if Donnie made him an arm, there was still going to be times that he would be without. He would still learn to adapt. But... he was a fighter. He was a healer. He wanted both hands, if he had the option. Donnie was giving him a choice.

Leo rubbed a flat palm against his chest. Please.

"You don't have to ask me twice." Donnie reached for his tablet, looking at the design Leo had stopped on. "This one?"

Leo nodded.

"I will make it happen." Donnie said, with rock solid confidence.

Leo tapped the side of his head twice with flat fingers and a misty smile. I know.

Donnie hovered on the schematic, and looked up at Leo again, a little more troubled. He asked, obviously careful and hesitant, "Don't answer if it'll cause problems, but... do you have any idea how you lost your arm?"

Leo spoke automatically, "I forgot to cherish it."

Sensei snorted loudly in the back of his head. 'Stole my line.'

Donnie rolled his eyes so hugely they almost could've fallen out of his head. "Terrible joke. Zero out of ten."

Leo grinned, the response on the tip of his tongue was 'I aim to please.' He couldn't quite push past a sudden rush of insecurity to actually say it.

Donnie must've gotten at least some of the sentiment from the look on his face, because he leaned over to flick Leo's forehead. "Idiot. How's your pain?"

His ribs were tender but breathing was no longer an endless chore. The bandaged stump might've been achy, but there was a constant itchiness that was far more distracting, as if he could feel all the individual threads closing back together and he wanted to scratch the shit out of the stitches. More distracting than painful. He held up two fingers.

Donnie looked like he believed him for once, nodding firmly. "Good."

A small tap on the door. Mikey leaned in, wringing his hands, and said, "Still up?"

"We're awake, dear Angelo." Donnie reported, gesturing for him to come in. "Do you want to inform your favourite brother what the two of you were fighting about?"

"Nope." Mikey said, fake-cheerful, taking the reaching gesture as an invitation, hopping over to Donnie.

But Donnie flinched away before he could get too close. "Don't touch the shell."

"Okay." Mikey aborted the hug he was going for and flopped himself over Donnie's lap instead, squeezing his legs. "We weren't fighting. Right Leo?"

Leo raised an 'ok'.

"Hm." Donnie didn't push, setting aside his tablet to lean over Mikey and squish him, bonking his forehead against his shell.

Mikey giggled. "Are you tired? Wanna sleepover with us? We could turtle pile."

"Leon is still healing." Donnie chided, a little muffled with his head down, tapping his fingers in patterns on Mikey's shell. "Let's not pile on top of him."

"We could make room for you." Mikey begged, shamelessly like a proper baby brother.

Donnie sat up, kissing his hand then smacking it on the top of Mikey's head. "Enjoy your sleepover with Leo. I've got work to do."

Mikey tried to turn his pleading eyes before being dumped unceremoniously on the floor.

Leo laughed. Mikey groaned, but he was grinning when he propped himself up on his elbow to look up. Donnie grabbed his tablet, kissing his hand again and smacking Leo between the eyes with it as he left.

Chapter Text

Mikey stayed on the floor, his grin souring at the edges. He met Leo's eyes and informed him, matter of fact, "I'm not done being mad at you."

Leo nodded, even with the heart-sink at his beloved baby brother being upset with him, completely understanding his reasoning even if it made him sick to his stomach.

"But I've missed you too. Let me in?" Mikey added, a sweet little lift at the end of his question.

Leo opened his arm, pulling the blanket up for Mikey to climb in, which he did immediately and without any further hesitation. Mikey loved to snuggle, whether it was riding on Raph's back to nuzzle his head, worming next to Donnie at movie nights, or crawling into Leo's bed after a nightmare because he knew he'd be awake. That same easy lift of the blanket, swallowing the smaller turtle into the sleep-warmth.

Mikey made himself right at home, undeterred by the lack of arm, weaseling his own arms around Leo and pressing his cheek against his plastron. He melted, going pliant and syrupy.

"Don't go anywhere." Mikey mumbled, the tenderness tainted wrong.

Leo wanted to make a joke to break the tension. Where would he go? But it wasn't funny in the slightest. Instead he leaned down and kissed Mikey on the top of his head, cherishing the affection he did not deserve after their conversation.

Leo didn't go anywhere. Mikey fell asleep first, still holding on.

This was a familiar world for Leo, pulling his phone out behind Mikey's back and scrolling through social media. Checking his Snapchat, but not sending anything. He felt tired but his body was buzzing. His own brain was loud and repetitive, ruminating on old thoughts.

'Hey.' Sensei had been quiet.

'Gonna tell me to go to bed, old man?' Leo snarked, sure that he was annoying Sensei by not sleeping.

'Oh hell no, you think I don't know what insomnia feels like?' Sensei snorted. 'No. I was gonna say, you should download a chess app.'

'Why?'

'So I can whoop your ass at chess, of course.'

'Big words.' Leo downloaded a chess app, picking one with an open play option so they could each have a side of the board.

Sensei whooped his ass at chess. Eventually the warmth of Mikey wormed against him lulled him to sleep, the drag of exhaustion letting his phone drop onto the blankets, arm sore from holding it up.

Leo slept well, deep and solid. He did not remember his dreams.

The morning brought more painstaking steps with the crutch to the kitchen and oatmeal. Donnie didn't emerge from his room. Leo wavered on about a one-two for grounding.

After breakfast, Raph asked Mikey, "Are you heading to Draxum's again today?"

"Actually, he was going to come here." Mikey said.

Leo scrunched up his nose, not liking the idea. He didn't trust Draxum.

'He's fine.' Sensei said, flippantly. 'And don't say--'

Leo dramatically finger-spelled so everyone would see, R O O F.

"He did throw Leo off a roof." Raph supplied helpfully. He was washing the dishes, elbow deep in bubbles.

"And he's very sorry for that." Mikey said, the absolute liar. He was sitting on the counter beside him, swinging his legs, wearing a shirt he'd tie-dyed himself.

"If Leo doesn't want to see him, he doesn't have to." Raph said.

"Aw, Leo, please?" Mikey put his hands together, pleading.

Leo touched his forehead and dropped it to a 'Y', deadpan.

"I want him to check and make sure everything going okay for you, mystically, after what happened." Mikey pulled out the baby-face pleading eyes.

Leo was far more susceptible than Donnie. He wavered in his conviction, because he wanted to give Mikey the peace of mind that he was fine.

'Can you still use your mystic powers?' Sensei asked, curiously.

Leo hadn't actually tried. But he was fairly sure he could, the fire in the pit of his stomach smouldering.

'It might be good for Barry to check.' Sensei encouraged. 'Considering I lost my mystic powers a long time ago. We should probably make sure I didn't mess anything up for you.'

'You what?' Leo whirled on the older turtle in his head. 'Dude, that's awful. You couldn't portal anymore?'

'Nope.' Sensei's eyes crinkled at the reaction, like he was amused. 'It wasn't the end of the world.'

'Boo.' Leo cupped his hand around his ephemeral mouth. 'Seriously, you didn't think to tell me that?'

'Either I've fucked you up or I didn't, telling you while you were too weak to do anything about it wouldn't have changed the answer.' Sensei shrugged.

'Well now I have to know.' Leo blinked back into reality, realizing Mikey and Raph had moved on, speaking to each other.

"It's obviously too soon for visitors, Mikes." Raph said, low.

"I didn't mean to trigger him." Mikey was wringing his bandaged hands, voice agonized, teetering between upset and maybe still a bit angry. "I just, I do think it's a good idea to get Barry to check and make sure his powers weren't affected. He's much better at this kind of stuff, I wouldn't even know where to begin."

Leo snapped his fingers. Both of them turned, relief sagging Raph's shoulders and dropping the wring of Mikey's hands.

"Oh, I'm sorry Leo--" Mikey started, but Leo waved him off.

He took his phone and typed on the notes app to hand over. 'i havent tried my powers since it happened. maybe get him to come over and ill try them while hes here so we have a safety net. yeah?'

Mikey read it out loud, nodding excitedly as he got to the end. "That's a great idea, Leo! I'll tell him to come over right away."

They finished up the dishes and Raph supervised Leo's crutch-aided walk to the dojo. Splinter brought his swords and a sour expression. "What's this I hear about allowing Baron Draxum into our house?"

"Play nice, Dad." Mikey said, incredibly patient, tapping on his phone.

"I'll play nice if he plays nice." Splinter grumped, and knelt in front of Leo, holding out his swords. "Here you are, my son. Back where they belong."

Leo gave his dad an indulgent grin, taking them both and folding them over his legs. He didn't dare try anything yet, just letting the familiar weight of them soothe something in his soul.

"Number?" Splinter asked next.

Leo was doing okay. He gave a two, because it seemed too optimistic to call himself a three.

"That's my boy." Splinter pat his knee and stood up, addressing Raph next, "Keep an eye on Draxum. Make sure he doesn't try anything."

Raph gave a double thumbs up.

"We've talked about this, Dad." Mikey sing-songed.

"Hm." Splinter said, and left.

Leo ran his hand up and down the grips. A sense-memory of the same handle with purple and red tied around it.

'Fucking yikes.' Leo told Sensei.

Sensei deliberately redirected, the memory overlaying with the echo of laughter -- a stumbling little Casey pretending to spear an older Donnie, who dramatically collapsed to the ground and waxed poetically of the hero who'd slain him. Bubbles of fond joy popping in Sensei's chest, the unrestrained grin on Donnie's face, the miracle of Casey's shrieking laughter -- the moment had been well-worn in Sensei's mind, like rubbing the edges of a photograph over and over. Weapons of death used in play. His twin and his kid. Laughter in a world that could've been devoid of it. But it wasn't.

Leo curled his fingers around the swords in real life, feeling the cool metal warm to his touch. When he flickered his eyes up, it was just in time to see Mikey bring Draxum in the dojo.

"Good morning, Leonardo." Draxum said, curt, giving a nod.

Leo raised his hand in hello. And witnessed an incredibly peculiar expression cross Draxum's face. Something momentarily searching, confused, then narrowing to suspicion.

'Oh shit.' Sensei told him, a little hysterically. 'We've been had.'

If Leo was going to convince Draxum that he didn't have another version of himself in his head, he really needed to not dissociate right now. He risked a quick, 'He can tell?'

'I didn't consider it, but yeah, I think so!' Sensei lurched away from the front, sinking into the void at top speed. 'I've gotta hide.'

'Don't--'

Too late. Sensei fell away and Leo lurched a little, trying to steady himself without his presence. The darkness encroached and he fell to a one.

"Woah." Raph sat beside him, nudging their arms together. "You gonna stay with us, big man?"

Leo shook his head, trying to clear it, blinking rapidly. He shot a nervous glance at Draxum, waiting for him to say something.

But he didn't. Draxum stayed in the doorway, watching with a contemplative expression.

Raph tucked Leo under his arm, and leaned in to whisper, "Want me to make him leave?"

The damage was already done. It would probably be more suspicious to back out now. Leo shook his head again, resisting the urge to crawl and hide behind Raph like a shield. The residual adrenaline from Sensei's panic was activating his brain in way that was making him want to bury himself underground and never emerge. He painstakingly took a very deep breath from the bottom of his lungs and looked at Draxum.

Draxum said, all emotion wiped from his face, "Should I remain at a distance?"

Leo steeled his muscles, setting his shoulders and exhaling slow with determination. He beckoned Draxum closer.

The goat approached. He still hadn't made any indication he knew what was going on with Leo. Maybe Sensei over-reacted.

Yet still the worm of paranoia made holes in his logic. He ignored it firmly, letting Draxum get close enough to sit across from him, folding the fine purple robes under his shin as he knelt.

"Have you tried to use your powers at all?" Draxum got right to business, gesturing to the swords still folded in his lap.

Leo tightened his grip, the heated metal weight soothing. He shook his head.

"Can you feel your ninpo?" Draxum asked next, intelligent eyes scanning over Leo's face. Was he looking for Sensei?

He wasn't going to find him now. The jerk was buried deep, swallowed by the shade and making it seriously hard for Leo. It was like rock climbing in the dark. He felt like he had no sense of his footholds, of the shape of reality around him. He had not realized how much he'd started to rely on Sensei's presence to keep him from dissociating.

"Give him a second." Raph said, distant as if through a straw, voice rough on the edges. He grabbed Leo's hand and squeezed, pressing into the sword hilt. "Stay here, buddy."

Leo blinked, dizzy, trying to focus out of the middle distance he'd settled on. He sucked in a surprised breath through his nose, not even noticing how floaty he'd become. Mikey slotted on his other side, pushing their knees together in solidarity.

Draxum was still looking at him. Leo didn't like it, because his gaze wasn't as reassuring and caring as his family. It didn't make him feel safe. He felt vulnerable and exposed, dissected, split open for viewing. He shook his head, trying to focus.

"You cannot feel it?" Draxum prompted.

No, Leo could feel his ninpo, it was flickering and waiting. He untangled his hand from Raph and the sword to quickly close his fingers by his mouth.

"That means shut up." Raph said, helpfully.

"Ah." Draxum said, dry.

Leo breathed. He tried to stop the room from spinning away from him. He raised his hand to finger-spell 'ninpo' then nodded.

"He can feel his ninpo." Mikey translated, voice warm and encouraging.

"Good." Draxum said simply. "Does it feel any different than before?"

Leo was hesitant to touch, thinking about Sensei telling him that he'd lost his. What if having Sensei in his head had negatively affected his own?

Well. It wouldn't be the end of the world, according to him. Leo wondered how he became Master Leonardo, the best ninja Casey knew, if he didn't even have his powers.

He reached out to coax it, feeling the same responsive touch he'd come to know. Ever since unlocking their powers, he'd spent a lot of his time when unable to sleep just practicing drawing from that power source, determined to never have it fail in an important moment. Picking at the edges of the flames provided the same little jolt of power. A little weak, a little tired, but in the same way it was after a big fight. He gave a thumbs up to Draxum.

He didn't need a translator for that. Draxum gave a firm nod. "Good. I'm going to cast a monitor spell. You are going to create a portal. I will see if everything looks as it should."

Draxum cast his spell. The floor lit a circle cut with criss-crossed lines, faintly glowing, almost tickling. Leo grabbed his sword and let his power open, the soft light of his markings as he made a portal.

He hadn't wanted anything far. He opened a portal to the other room, beside Splinter. He reached through and his father obliged him with a high-five. Then he withdrew and closed it, heart in his throat. He didn't want to accidentally portal chop his only remaining hand. That would be bad.

The lines on the floor hummed and dissipated. Leo lowered his sword, feeling the burning after-image of magic fade away.

"Everything seems normal." Draxum reported. "I didn't sense any damage to the system. Just a little tired, needs some more rest. But nothing to be worried about."

On either side of Leo, his brothers relaxed.

"That's great!" Mikey said, beaming at Draxum.

The goat did not smile back. He was stiff. He said, "Yes. Shall we go continue our own training, Michelangelo?"

"Sure!" Mikey hopped up, taking Draxum's hand and dragging him along. "Come on, let's go to my room. I can show you some of my art I was telling you about while we're there!"

Draxum went without protest. Leo felt that burn of paranoia like acid in his throat, at the stiffness of Draxum's shoulders. The goat knew something was up. Maybe he didn't know it was Sensei, but Leo was pretty sure he'd clocked that there was something different about him. But not in his ninpo -- no, because Sensei didn't have any.

Why wasn't Draxum saying anything, then? What did he think was wrong with Leo? How close was it to the truth? Leo didn't know how apprehensive to be and it was exhausting to be on guard. Sensei's desire to remain secret chaffed. Sure, he didn't want everyone to think he was... out of his mind? But he also wasn't particularly fond of lying to them. Even if he did it all the time. Idiot.

Something cold shocked Leo into a deep inhale. Perception spun like a top, his hand wrapped around a stinging freezer-burnt feeling. Smoothed corners. An immediate glide of wet as it melted against his fingers. He looked down, confused, and saw that Raph had put an ice cube in his hand.

"Dude." Leo said, the sound from his mouth like it was coming from across the room. The ice was too cold to hold onto, so he did the natural thing and dropped it down the back of Raph's shirt.

"Leo!" Raph complained, tipping off into a laugh, shaking it out. The ice slapped onto the mats around them. "It worked, then?"

"I'm dizzy." Leo said, feeling like his whole body was swaying with it, blinking in spurts against the sensation.

"Try again." Raph picked up the ice and put it back in his hand.

The chill cut through. It was uncomfortable to hold. "It's cold." Leo whined.

"Yeah, doofus, it's ice." Raph jostled their shoulders together. "Focus on it."

"Focus on it." Leo mocked in a terrible mimic of Raph's voice, then said, "You realize that's literally my whole problem, right?"

"I realize." Raph didn't rise to the bait, curling Leo's fingers tighter around the ice. "Stop thinking about whatever stupid thing you're thinking about. If I could crawl in your brain and beat up your thoughts I would."

Leo snorted, confident that he absolutely would. He rolled the ice between his fingers, making the bones creak, the skin damp and freezing. It was distracting. He thought about how much he wanted to drop it down Raph's shirt again.

The ice cube melted. Leo dripped on the dojo mats. While it slowly disappeared, his brain slowed the frantic spin and settled Leo back into his limbs. He wanted to shiver. Instead he reached over to press his freezing fingers against Raph's bare neck.

Raph yelped and said, "Watch it, bucko, or you'll lose that arm too."

Leo threw his head back and laughed.

Raph's eyes were a little misty. He smiled huge, splitting his face. He grabbed Leo's crutch and offered it. "Come on, Dad said if you came around then he'd let you pick what to watch."

Oh, score. Leo struggled to his feet, using the crutch and letting Raph put away his swords.

Splinter was typing on his phone in the armchair when they came in. He was frowning and when he looked up at Leo that frown didn't abate, it deepened.

Leo didn't like that. He stole the remote and half the armchair, trying to peek over Splinter's shoulder to see what he was reading. For a moment, he saw the feed of a groupchat before the phone locked.

Shit. Leo knew they had a separate groupchat to talk about him. What had Draxum said? Leo wanted to know.

"You may have the TV, Blue." Splinter said, patting his head and hopping off the armchair. As if that wasn't putting up a million alarm bells in Leo's head, let alone the wary twist to Splinter's voice.

Splinter stopped to murmur something to Raph, and left them alone. His older brother pulled out his phone, scrolling with a frown. They were so not subtle.

Leo pretended to put a lot of thought into picking a TV show. Raph carefully settled on the bean bag beside him, looking troubled, glancing over at Leo every few seconds.

He should've just told them in the first place. Now what the hell was he meant to say? Sorry, I forgot to mention that there's a future version of myself possessing me, it's a whole thing.

Eugh boy. Leo ran his hand down his face. He stayed on a medical drama that he had no stakes in, and willingly dipped a toe into the void.

'Sensei?' Leo called, trying to not tip into the shade himself. 'Draxum's gone. We've got to figure out what we're gonna do now.'

A wash of misery was given in return. It dug claws into Leo and tried to drag him into the darkness.

'Nope, nope, nope.' Leo scrambled back. He breathed, trying to go slow, trying to calm his suddenly racing heart. Sensei was terrified. It was seriously threatening all the hard work Raph had put into grounding Leo in reality.

He fiddled with the remote, and using the keypad he counted by threes, tapping the 3, the 6, the 9, then 1-2, 1-5 -- until the repetition filled his mind. Until he wasn't thinking about anything else.

He accidently tapped hard enough to change the channel. Raph leaned over to look at him, face unsure. "What are you up to?"

"Counting by threes." Leo replied, still going. He was in the five hundreds.

"For a reason?" Raph said, hesitant.

"It's a grounding technique." Leo huffed.

"Where are you on the scale?"

Leo held up a zero. Sensei was still nearly dragging him down. It was hard to stay in the room.

"Is that helping?" Raph asked next.

Leo shrugged, because he was two seconds away from submitting. The effort needed to stay grounded was an endless uphill climb, it was a shark unable to stop swimming because it'd die, it was annoying. He was tired. He said, "I'm tired."

"Math is boring." Raph agreed.

Leo rolled off the armchair onto Raph's shoulders.

"Oof." Raph steadied him, careful of the bandaged stump. "You're a giant brat."

"It's because you always made me eat my vegetables." Leo said, snarky, hugging Raph's head and reclining on the top of his big shell, avoiding the spikes with years of ease.

Raph rumbled a laugh from deep in his chest. He gripped Leo's arm, a fond squeeze. A smaller hesitation. He said, almost fake casually, "Leo, you know that you can tell me if something's up, right?"

"You're really going to have to be more specific." Leo rolled off Raph's head to slink beside him on the bean bag, leisurely crossing his legs over Raph's lap.

Raph tucked Leo underneath his arm and gave him a noogie. Leo shrieked with laughter, loud and contagious. The floaty bubbles burst from a too-sharp feeling of forebrooding. He knew that Raph wasn't about to drop it and Leo was concerned with how he was going to react to being questioned.

"Have you noticed anything weird?" Raph tried.

"Again. I've had like, so many problems." Leo continued to pretend he didn't know what Raph was fishing for. He wasn't sure how the hell to answer. "I really don't know what you're asking."

Raph sighed, then pasted a smile on. "Don't worry about it."

Leo stayed tucked into Raph's side, getting the remote and changing it back to the terrible medical drama. Everything still felt so heavy. He really wanted to stay in the room. But bone-deep exhaustion like his marrow was stone and made it feel like he was treading water with cement shoes. Even the predictable, reassuring chur of Raph's breath did nothing to anchor him. The zero stayed unmoved, the void hungrily waiting beneath him.

He should've warned Raph that he was going to slip. He should've asked him do to some more grounding techniques with him. The problem was that Leo didn't want to. He was tired. It was too much to ask to keep trying, to keep fighting this. Didn't anyone understand how inhumane it was to ask him to keep going?

They'd be better off without him anyway.

The world greyed at the edges. He did nothing to stop it.

Cotton in his ears. Face numb and tingling. He couldn't get his eyes to focus, not that he was trying very hard.

Muffled, garbled, eavesdropping through drywall. A finger snap in front of him. "Nardo?"

Leo wasn't answering. He was just barely anywhere.

"Oh, damn it. He was here. But I think he was a zero." Rumbled through his side, vibrations.

"You guys said he didn't react well to Draxum." Farther away. Clinical and logical. "It's probably from that. I know he doesn't trust him, so he probably didn't feel safe around him. The dissociation is a coping mechanism."

"Mmm." Raph hummed, and gave Leo a squeeze that felt like it happened to someone else, somewhere far away. "What do you think about what Draxum said?"

"I don't know." Donnie replied, promptly.

"I tried to ask Leo about it without tipping him off, but he didn't give a helpful answer." Raph rubbed Leo's arm up and down, steady, consistent.

"What did he say?"

"That I'd have to be more specific, he has a lot of problems right now."

"Hm. Was it deflection or does he genuinely not know?"

"Or maybe Draxum's wrong." Raph sighed. "I don't know. To all of it. Leo's always been an annoyingly great liar. If he doesn't want us to know, then we won't. I'm just concerned, with what Draxum said..."

The sentence trailed off, uncertain.

"There is a chance he's wrong." Donnie agreed. "But he's had some inconsistencies. April brought to my attention that he seems to be able to function well at some times and not others. She specifically noticed his capability with silverware. Our immediate concern was brain damage. Maybe what Draxum saw would explain it instead."

"Brain damage?" Raph echoed, a little frightened. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"I was looking into it." Donnie replied, annoyed. "I didn't want to concern anyone until I had specific results. Which I don't have. All my scans came back as normal as can be expected in this situation. It would make more sense if Draxum was right and -- "

"You should've said." Raph repeated. "We're all looking out for him, we need to know what to look for. This is a team effort, Donatello."

"And give you more to worry about?" Donnie scoffed, the sound of him moving away. "As if you haven't completely loaded the burden of his recovery on your own shoulders. I can handle the technical logistics--"

"You can withhold--"

"Stop interrupting me!" Donnie snapped.

Quick breath. The grip on Leo loosened, and he was gently placed down onto the bean bag as Raph got up.

"Don't touch my shell." Donnie said, far away.

"I won't." Raph replied. "I'm sorry I interrupted you. I know you hate it when people do that."

"Stop trying to look me in the eye." Donnie bit back.

"I won't. I'm just holding you in place so you won't run away again. I know you've struggled since what's happened to your shell--"

"My shell is fine."

A long beat of silence.

Donnie mumbled, "I'm sorry for interrupting you."

"I appreciate that. I know you only apologize when you mean it. And I know you're very overwhelmed and frustrated right now, and things haven't gotten easier. We're all here for you, buddy."

"It's not about me right now."

"You're my sweet little brother, it's always gonna be about you when it comes to me."

"Shut the fuck up, Raphael. We're just gonna gloss over you mother-henning everyone as an excuse to avoid your own problems?"

An unamused snort. "Well, it seems we're at an underpass."

"... it's impasse, dearest brother."

"Really?"

"Really."

"You're not making it up to mess with me?"

"I would certainly try harder than that. Remember when I told you that a coconut is a mammal because it grows hair and produces milk?"

"It is?"

"Bro. Why would you fall for that again." There was pure disappointment in Donnie's voice.

Raph laughed. A shuffle.

"Stop -- don't put me in a headlock!" Donnie squawked.

"I'm not touching your shell!"

Raph oofed and audibly fell over. Donnie made a victorious sound and laughed, the evil-villain one.

Then suddenly the sound was cut off, a loud thud joining Raph on the floor. The laughter went wheezing, a little hysterical.

"Ohhh Galileo." Donnie said, exhaling hugely. "What are we gonna do, Raphie?"

"Wing it." Raph said instantly. "Just keep taking it day by day. We can handle anything. We just gotta do it as a family. Right?"

Donnie gave a warm hum. "Yes. Do you need a break? I could stay with Leon."

"I never need a break from him." Raph defended.

"I'm not saying -- sigh." Donnie verbalized the sigh. "Let's hang out with him together, then. Maybe both of us here will draw him out. You said nothing seemed to trigger him?"

"Yeah. He's been off-balance from Draxum coming over. I know the dude's been helping Mikey but if he's gonna cause problems for Leo then maybe we shouldn't have him come over right now." Raph got up and his heavy footfalls returned to the bean bag.

A touch on his arm and head, gentle and sweet. "You back yet buddy? Think you could focus here?"

A crushing silence. Footfalls behind, coming closer and a body joining him on the beanbag. Warmth up the whole of his side, taking Leo's arm and pressing fingers into his pulse.

"Hey, dum-dum." Donnie implored. "It's your favourite twin. Feel like coming up for me?"

More of the same non-responsiveness.

"He was talking to me earlier." Raph reported, voice undeniably sad. "Easy as can be. We had a whole conversation. I really, really didn't want to make him feel weird so I tried not to like, make a big deal. But it was incredible. And now he's..."

"It's not linear." Donnie reminded him, leaning more into Leo's side. The crawl of body-heat sinking into his skin. "Progress is progress. Imagine having an entire conversation with him a week ago."

"Even if it's mostly jokes."

"Are you surprised?"

"I've gotta deal with the first full sentence out of my brother's mouth in weeks being the freaking sea bass pun."

Donnie snorted. "Yeah, well, I asked how he lost his arm and he said he 'forgot to cherish it'."

"That's... the worst. He's the worst."

"Yeah, he is." Donnie said, undeniably fond, giving Leo's arm a pat, still taking his pulse.

Quiet. The TV had moved to a sitcom, with a canned laugh track. It bounced around the room. Raph settled on Leo's other side, dragging the other bean bag chair. Donnie had stopped taking his pulse and now was tugging rhythmically on the bracelet April made him.

"Do you remember when we were little," Donnie said, tone very purposefully blank. "And whenever Leo would get upset, he'd yell that he wanted to be alone."

Raph huffed. "And then he'd immediately turn and say, 'come on, Donnie, let's go.' and drag you to his room? Yeah, Raph remembers."

"To be fair, if he was angry with me, he'd get you or Mikey instead." Donnie said, wry.

"Yeah. I know that I get weird when I'm alone, but Leo gets..." Raph trailed off.

Neither of them finished the sentence.

Raph asked instead, "Why are you thinking about that?"

"It's not a good thought."

"Hit me."

"The prison dimension."

Hm. Leo had been maybe hovering, like he might've gained a bit of ground, but the room suddenly lacked air.

"He was alone." Raph confirmed, sounding a million miles away.

Donnie's grip on Leo's arm tightened. "I just... it hurts to think about. I wish I could've gone with him."

"We got him back." Fading.

Soft. Barely there. "... did we?"

Chapter Text

Ringing silence. Darkness. The shade and shadows twisting. Everything was so far away and he couldn't reach it, even if he wanted to, which he didn't. He didn't care. What did it matter? What did any of it matter? It wasn't like it was going to be okay.

A barbed wire knot of anxiety knocked around his chest, poking and hurting and dragging him further into the hole. Too much. All too much.

Leo didn't want to be here anymore, with just the ball of anxiety for company. It grew bigger, impossibly, beyond the size of his ribcage. It felt entirely too large, like it swallowed the whole world and blotted out the sun, molecules blowing up to a ridiculous size.

Through the haze, a tear slipped out the corner of his eye, burning, too hot. A hand wiped the tear away, but it was a void, the touch from what might as well be centuries away.

He was trapped. If he could beg for release, he would. Reality was a nightmare and the void was worse. Leo was so fucking tired of being trapped. He didn't want this.

Leo laid in sludge, thick and immovable, attacked from the inside out, starting to fill his nose and mouth. The heart-race panic of suffocation. He was going to die in here.

The shade stayed over his eyes. Leo distantly recognized that at least half of this misery was not his own. Above his head was a familiar laced spider-web growth of branches. He pulled himself up from the sludge to his knees and dragged himself through it, looking. Reaching out.

He found Sensei in the mud. Leo crawled on top of him, digging his face out of the cold, crouched on his plastron, clearing the mud from his mouth and nose. Then he shook him, weak but trying.

'What are you afraid of?' Leo demanded. 'Fuck, just tell me and we'll try to cope. It's got to be better than this.'

The sharp anxiety ricochet around, painful and overwhelming. Sensei didn't move.

Leo gripped Sensei's face, digging his thumb by his jaw. He said, voice breaking, 'Please. We've gotta work together. We can't both fall.'

'But we're so good at it.' Sensei murmured, reaching up to grip Leo's arm, finally opening his eyes. 'Sorry kid. I keep saying I'll stop hurting you and I don't. I'm fundamentally a liar.'

'You know I know that.' Leo squeezed, pinching Sensei's face angrily.

Sensei stared at him, tired, still half-drowned in mud, buried underneath a flourishing tree planted in the roots of his mind. He said, 'What do you want from me?'

'Draxum knows something is up. Hiding this from everyone was never going to be a long-term solution. You've got to find a way to deal with it, because it's going to happen. Tell me what you're afraid of.' Leo told him, kneeling on his chest, fiercely holding his gaze in place. Covered in head to toe his own mud, speaking through the anxiety assaulting his lungs and heart and blood and bones.

Sensei stared at him, eyes damp. He rasped, 'I shouldn't take over your life. You should find a way to get me out of your head.'

Leo scowled. 'You're still a person. I'm not about to kill you.'

'We're the same person.' Sensei reminded him.

It all felt wrong. He shook his head rapidly. 'No. I'm not getting rid of you, not just like that. I can feel how much you love Casey. You think I want to be the one to take his dad away?'

'He doesn't know I'm here!' Sensei let go in order to smack the sludge, body tense and trembling with emotion. 'That's why I didn't want to tell anyone I'm here, because then I can go and it won't hurt anyone!'

Leo dug his knees further into Sensei's plastron. 'There's a hole in your plan, old man. And that it's I know you're here.'

'You don't get it.' Sensei flopped his head back, mouth twisting miserably.

'You're right, I don't.' Leo got off his chest and laid beside him, looking up at the branch patterns. Without leaves, it could be roots, inverse.

The mind curled around the two of them. Sensei said, 'I'm thinking about how my Donnie put it. Once, after I'd been hurt. He was so mad at me.'

Leo shut his eyes and could feel it. The sense memory taking over, washing him with the well-worn scene of Sensei's mind.

The smell of cotton and antiseptic, the air moist and damp, half-lit with a flickering light. There was a distant rumble through the ground, like earthquakes.

Sensei knew it was the Kraang, so used to the vibrations it didn't even worry him. No, he was worried about his family, because if he was in the med bay then something was wrong, something failed, he failed again. He fought exhaustion and the yank of painkillers that were wasted on him, just to open his eyes.

There was Donnie. His twin, hunched over his tablet with horrible posture, the scene completely familiar, with the addition of the child sleeping in the crook of his arm. Casey Junior, about five years old, snotty nose on the army print jacket Donnie had to cut the chill of the underground.

"I am so incredibly furious with you, Nardo." Donnie told him without looking up, voice utterly blank. A front.

"Can it wait a little?" Sensei rubbed his face with his only hand, the prosthetic off. Hopefully he hadn't destroyed it, though that would explain why Donnie was so pissed. "It's only 5AM. Man, I miss coffee."

Donnie handed over his chart. Sensei winced at the laundry list of injuries and the effort Donnie and their med team put into making sure he hadn't died.

"Did I wreck the arm?" Sensei figured he might as well get the scolding over with, wiggling his stump in the air.

"No, which you should be grateful for, or else I'd end your bloodline." Donnie snapped.

Sensei couldn't help but smile indulgently at his twin, aware it would piss him off further. Donnie just looked so domestic, the hang of his purple mask ties twisted in Casey Junior's fingers, the easy way he worked around the snoozing child. Sensei said, amused and prodding, "I dunno, my bloodline seems pretty safe with you, gemelo."

"He's not your blood." Donnie replied, with the same level of heat he argued the legitimacy of their twinship -- no heat at all. A token logical protest, undermined by the fact that Donnie would be the first one to fight anyone who dared to say twins by choice wasn't as valid, or that Sensei picking up a kid to raise made Casey Junior any less a Hamato.

It had been five years prior just after the turn of the new year, their medical team had brought the week old baby to Sensei's attention. It was unclear how the baby ended up in their care -- there had been an attack and a lot of injured, a quick movement from one base to another, the child with his parents lost or gone, and the med team didn't have the resources to give long term care. They had brought Sensei the child expecting him to decide who he would be passed off to.

Sensei looked at the tiny child without a home and without a family and thought, I have enough, I can share.

He was called 'the baby' for weeks. Sensei was often busy and his whole family helped to look after the kid in shifts. Cassandra became particularly offended that he wasn't named, after years of being referred to as merely 'foot recruit', and started calling him Casey Junior. As all good things done ironically, the name stuck.

Everyone helped raise Casey. Sensei was Master Leonardo, but everyone knew he was his dad, he was just also the leader of the resistance, so it was more complicated. Cassandra called herself Mom mostly because she was a hilariously terrible influence on him and thought it was funny. Then there was his Uncle's and Commander O'Neil and Barry refused to let himself be called Gramps so of course they did at every opportunity -- and Sensei never once regretted his impulsive decision to share his family, because they were the ultimate village to raise a child.

But that wasn't the point. Right now, Casey Junior was five and so asleep he didn't even twitch when Donnie laid a hand on his sleeping chest.

"You make my life so difficult." Donnie said, voice hard. All steel posture in contrast to the delicate hold on the precious goods in his arms. "It's hard enough to love you when you're trying to die all the time."

"Ouch." Sensei said mildly, even though he got it. He ran head first into danger, trying to fix everything so no one else needed to get hurt. Preferably no one else other than him. "Being mad at me for my poor decision making is old news. I'm fine, what's the problem?"

"Because you gave me this." Donnie's cutting gaze turned downwards to the soft inhale-exhale of the fluffy haired, pink cheeked child. "I'm furious that you gave me another person to love. Because he's just like you, and one day I'm gonna be sit here with him, and it's going to hurt just as much as it does every time I have to put you back together."

"I'm... sorry?" Sensei gave a lop-sided smile.

"You're not."

"You're right, I'm not. You love Casey Junior. I'm never going to apologize for love. It's kinda my goal to make sure you get as much love as possible, actually."

"Shut up." Donnie said, voice rough. He curled around Casey in his arms and lovingly kissed his forehead. "I hate this so much. I'm so angry. It's the apocalypse. There's no way this will end well. Someone will get hurt. I can't lose you. I can't lose him."

Sensei's whole heart beat for Donnie. The half-smile stayed, not quite capable of surpassing the barrier holding him down. The fear of his own. "Would you rather I'd let someone else take him?"

Donnie's face flashed with panic. "But what if they didn't love him right?"

"Exactly. I knew we would. And we do. You're not going to lose me, D. Not yet, at least. I've got too much shit to do. And I can trust that you and Cassandra and Raph and Mikey will make sure we don't lose our kid yet either. Love is always going to be a danger. But it's better than no love at all."

Sensei held out his hand. Donnie took it and held on so tightly it hurt. It felt like the most painful hope. The sense memory shimmered, the vibrations in the concrete floor and the whiff of chemicals whisking away.

Sensei always thought it was almost funny in the worst possible way that Donnie had been so scared of losing them. Sensei hadn't lied, at least, when he promised that he wouldn't lose Sensei or Casey. Donnie never had to live without them.

Leo's body swum with leftover emotions. He was still in a deep mud. Sensei was drawing in ragged breaths beside him.

'You know,' Leo said, faked casually. 'If that was meant to be a point in your favour, it wasn't. I'm assuming you're trying to say you agree with Donnie, that to tell Casey you're here now is to give him someone else to love that he could lose.'

'I know you guys are gonna love him right, you're the past versions of the ones who did.' Sensei tiredly returned. 'It's better he doesn't have to worry about losing me again. Just let me be gone. I don't want to hurt him a second time.'

'We're the past versions. Not the same versions. We don't know anything about him. We'll love him, sure. But you're his fucking dad.'

Sensei squeezed his eyes shut hard and tears leaked from the corners, streaking clear through the mud.

'You want me to think Donnie's right. But you yourself undermined his argument. Love hurts. We do it anyway because it's worth it.' Leo reached over and wiped mud and tears from Sensei's face. It made Sensei blink his eyes open, staring up at Leo with a truly devastated expression.

'It's gonna be okay.' Leo said, gently.

Sensei's throat clicked as he swallowed. 'You shouldn't have to deal with this.'

Leo shrugged, letting his hand fall away, pressing into the sludge that had hardened, an earthy layer. He pulled on Sensei's arm, trying to get him to climb out of his filthy hole. 'I shouldn't have had to deal with a lot of things. At least with this one, I can give Casey his dad back.'

'But what about your life? Your brothers?' Sensei pushed painstakingly up onto his elbow, struggling with the effort.

'Don't know.' Leo said, yanking harder until the hardened mud torn away and freed Sensei. They were both covered in it from head to toe, flaking off as they moved. 'We'll find out, I guess. Do you think I should kill myself?'

'What? Of course not.' Sensei said, horrified.

Leo stared back at him fiercely, point made.

The roots-branches of the tree above them swayed in a non-existent wind. The murk and shadow pierced the light and noise in a meaningless void.

After a long moment, Leo covered his face with his hand and tried to breathe.

'Are you doing okay, kid?' Sensei asked.

'I'm really tired.' Leo said, voice cracking a fragile line down the middle. The barbed wire was still sharp and relentless.

'I know.' Sensei put himself in front of Leo and helped to scrape all the dried mud off him. 'You're doing great.'

Leo merely shook his head and let it happen, whole body exhausted from trying. Always trying. Sensei flicked the dirt away and said, 'Okay. We're not hiding here. It's no good for your brain. Let's do progressive muscle relaxation, that one has a lot more feedback. Starting with our toes...'

Leo took a few minutes of dazedly giving no effort, before he actually tried, coaxed by Sensei's patient voice as he narrated each section of their body -- tense, and relax. Feel the pull. Feel the muscles.

Leo was discomforted to find when he flexed their arm that it had an IV in it. He focused on that pinch of pain, using it to drag himself to the surface. He was in the med bay again, and while it didn't have that same off-damp smell and foreboding vibrations, it was still an unpleasant experience to rouse to. Aware that the med bay meant he'd fucked up again, Leo shied away from the surface, afraid.

'I'm right here with you.' Sensei promised, urging him forward. 'There's nothing to be scared of.'

'They're going to be upset that I fell again.' Leo told him, anxious.

'They're going to be happy you're back.' Sensei softened. 'Take it one moment a time.'

Leo wiggled his toes. He blinked and saw colours resolve into shapes. It was dim. It must've been late. On the cot beside his head, Raph was sleeping with Mikey pinned to his chest like a teddy bear. Mikey certainly didn't seem to be complaining, clutching Raph's arm tight. Both were asleep, facing Leo.

For a moment, Leo stared, watching their chests rise and fall with their breathing.

'This is a good opportunity.' Sensei suggested. 'We should figure out what they know.'

'The groupchat.' Leo immediately enlightened upon the idea Sensei had, desperately latching onto the excuse to avoid thinking about how anxious he was. 'If I could borrow someone's phone...'

It couldn't be Donnie's, they'd have an easier time breaking into Fort Knox. Mikey had a passcode that Leo didn't know, but Raph always kept his unlocked. Leo scrutinized the pile of brothers across from him, trying to see if he could figure out where they'd put their phones. If Raph still had it on him, there would be no way to get it without waking him.

'I don't think so. They've got a blanket, they meant to go to sleep. Mikey never forgets to charge his phone.' Sensei said.

'Hopefully he reminded Raph to do the same.' Leo finished his thought, sitting up and squinting in the low light. As suspected, on the other side of the room with the unused plugins, two phones were set up to charge.

'Careful.' Sensei reminded, as Leo immediately swung his legs off the side of the bed.

'It's like ten steps.' Leo complained, then felt the tug of the IV. The purple clip was on his finger again. He was careful not to remove them, taking the pole and sneaking like the ninja he was to crouch beside the phones on the floor and pick up Raph's huge and red one. A lockscreen of a selfie of the four of them, laughing their heads off. Messages in a groupchat labelled, 'leo updates'.

Leo didn't even hesitate, despite knowing he'd been left out of the groupchat on purpose. According to the clock it was yesterday that Draxum had been there, so he scrolled back a day in the messages before starting to read.

Mikey: ok guys um Barry had something else but he didn't want to talk about it in front of Leo

April: Something else of what, sorry?

Mikey: Oh yeah he came over and we tested Leo's mystic powers and Barry said they're fine. But then he said he sensed something weird.

Donnie: Define weird.

Mikey: He can't really. Just that there's... something else there. Not just Leo. That's why he didn't want to say anything to Leo and let the thing know.

Splinter: Like demon possession?

Mikey: Not sure. It's a possibility, but it could be anything. Draxum said it would be hard to get a good read on it without tipping the thing off.

April: Is it hurting him?

Mikey: Barry says we'd have to ask Leo. He can't tell, he just had a momentary glimpse of something not being right.

Splinter: Maybe he brought something back from the prison dimension.

Mikey: Hard to say. Barry says he didn't sense any Kraang. Just something different.

Raph: What should we do?

Mikey: Barry says try not to tip it off. Maybe Leo doesn't even know it's there and we could get rid of it before he's even aware there's a problem.

Splinter: It would be best if we could avoid more problems for Blue.

A couple hours later,

Raph: Don and I are with Leo, he's gone dark again.

Mikey: Shoot. Any trigger?

Raph: He's been struggling since Draxum came by. We're keeping an eye on him.

A few hours later.

April: Any updates?

Donnie: Still down. He wasn't awake for long this morning so I may need to put an IV in for fluids again.

April: Aw :( he hates the med bay.

Donnie: And he'll hate dehydration more. His body is still healing.

April: Any thoughts on what Draxum said?

Donnie: I have been wondering if it might have the connection with what you noticed with his capability with silverware.

Mikey: OH like how he knew how to use a fork sometimes but not others??? That was so weird but it felt rude to point it out.

Donnie: Yes. Perhaps that is the influence of whatever 'difference' Draxum is noticing.

Raph: Not gonna mention to the class that you were thinking before this that the fork thing might've meant he had brain damage?

Donnie: I already told you I had no proof of that, it was a running hypothesis.

Splinter: We need to ensure we are all on the same page regarding Leonardo's recovery, I do believe that concerns of brain damage apply.

Donnie: Raph has already yelled at me once for this today, let's not do it again. I had no hard evidence, so it wasn't a valid concern. Instead we're focused on demon possession. Science lose!

Mikey: Are you saying the demon helps him eat an omelette?

Donnie: I'm saying that this has officially gone beyond my wheelhouse, call me back when we're discussing biometrics again.

A few hours later,

April: You know I get antsy when he's gone dark, more updates please.

Donnie: No change. I've taken care of his bodily needs and set him up in the med bay. Raph and Mikey couldn't decide who would stay with him so they're both are.

April: But he's okay?

Donnie: ... he appeared to be in some distress, but he didn't rouse. He's settled down now.

April: Should I come over?

Donnie: Maybe tomorrow. There's nothing urgent tonight. He's not going anywhere.

April: Alright. Smooches to all y'all.

Donnie: I bat away your smooch with a tennis racket.

April: It's heat seeking.

Donnie: Gasp! Foiled again.

Splinter: Sleep well, April.

April: Night Splints!!! Casey says gnight too and he hopes Leo is doing better in the morning.

Donnie: I hope so too.

Groupchat end.

'Way to be subtle with the omelettes, dude. Though Donnie thinks I'm possessed by a demon? Oh how the tables have turned.' Leo thought at Sensei, knowing he'd appreciate the joke.

Sensei laughed, though it was strained. 'It does seem that them finding us out is inevitable at this point. How should we tell them?'

'Don't know. It's made slightly complicated by the fact that they think you're a demon.' Leo set down Raph's phone and straightened up, grabbing the IV pole for support and creeping back to bed as silently as he could.

"Leo?" Raph mumbled, at the shuffling of Leo getting back under the blankets.

"Shh, go back to sleep, don't wake Mikey." Leo said, without much hope.

"Leo!" Raph whispered, gently moving Mikey aside and scrambling to the chair beside Leo's bed. "Hey, welcome back. How are you feeling?"

Hm. The giant sharp ball of anxiety was still having a fun little party, rolling in high speed circles and piercing his armour over and over and over--

Leo raised his hand, flicking between a zero and one a couple times to show he was on the edge. Then he drew his legs up and hugged them, trying to press into the uncomfortable sharp feelings inside him.

'We're fine. Breathe.' Sensei told him, steady like a rock.

"Hey, that's fine." Raph got closer, shuffling in the dark to see Leo's face as he hid behind his knees. "Are you wanting to go to sleep, or do you want to do some grounding?"

Raph literally woke up ten seconds ago and he was already completely focused on taking care of Leo. There was still a sleep-rasp to his voice. Leo definitely wasn't eager to, but he wanted Raph to go back to sleep, so he lied and reached up to close his palm in front of his face. Sleep.

"Sure." Raph's expression said he wasn't fooling him. "You gonna lie down then? Or sleep sitting up?"

Leo felt his lip tremble with the suppressed things inside him. He turned blindly in his mind to Sensei.

'You got this.' Sensei encouraged.

'Convince Raph that he should go back to sleep.'

'Ah, that won't work. I can guarantee Raphael is not shutting his eyes now until he's secure in the fact that you are also asleep.' Sensei said, ruefully.

Leo didn't particularly want to sleep when his thoughts were so dangerously on edge.

'You could talk to Raph about your thoughts.' Sensei said.

'Serious suggestions only.' Leo replied.

A hand reached into his line of sight and Leo flinched away from it, surprised.

"Woah, just me, just Raph." His older brother said, leaning in to try and see Leo's face through the dark. "Didn't mean to scare you. I was just checking to see if you'd drifted off. More a zero now, huh? Maybe we should ground a bit."

Leo shook his head.

"No?" Raph said, wondering. Searching.

Leo screwed a finger into the side of his nose, filling the motion with all the irritation he felt. Boring.

"It is pretty repetitive." Raph agreed, inching closer, still flickering his eyes over Leo's face. It was so stupid that he was keeping his brother awake when he'd been all nice and cosy snuggling with Mikey just a few minutes ago.

It was so, so stupid that Leo's whole body felt like it was strung up with sparking electricity, dangerous voltage humming at the edges of his consciousness. There was a frustrated anger brewing like an oncoming storm.

"Can we at least try?" Raph implored. "I'd really rather not lose you again."

Raph's voice went all weird. Leo wondered if his supportive, wonderful brother had any time to cope with this whole thing emotionally. He'd always waited until the worst had passed to cry. Did it still feel like they were in it? Was he still holding a tight lid?

Leo pointed at Raph and did the 'ok' sign with a question mark.

"Oh ho ho." Raph shook his head, a snaggletooth smile. "You are not deflecting onto me, big man."

Leo crossed his arm over his chest and pouted, because if not now, when? He'd heard enough of him and Donnie bickering to know that there had been nothing for Raph, it had been the Leo-show all the damn time and he was so beyond sick of it. He didn't want to talk about the overwhelming anxiety sitting inside him, even if it was threatening to dunk him like a basketball.

Even if the world went grey on the edges and he swayed dizzily, the breath catching in his throat, eyes unfocusing. The ricochet of pain was over and over, not letting him rest, not letting him breathe.

"Leo. Talk to me." Raph said, muffled.

'Talk to him.' Sensei pushed.

"I'm scared." Leo blurted, and hated himself.

Raph inched closer, face screwed up in second-hand misery. He said, coaxing, unhurried, "Of what?"

There was no 'of what' -- there was only scared. All reasoning left a long time ago, any anchor to the upset washed up and gone.

Leo felt the room tip sideways. His hand shook when he held up a zero to signal it.

"I know, buddy. Can we please do a grounding exercise?" Raph practically begged, and it made Leo sick to his stomach.

His body raised an 'ok'. It was Sensei. Leo thought, 'Traitor.'

'I'm sorry, do you want to fall?' Sensei pushed, annoyed.

'I don't want to keep trying! I'm tired!' Leo snapped back.

'Look at Raph. Leo. Look at him.'

His throat swallowed against the spiked rock in his throat. Leo's eyes struggled to focus, falling on the crestfallen expression on Raph's face. His strong, amazing big brother was saying, "Come on, Leo, please don't go. You don't need to be scared, Raph's got you. Raph's always got you."

Leo's heart shattered. He found the strength to try again. He drew in a ragged breath and reached for Raph's hand.

It was given immediately, tight around his. Leo squeezed. Raph squeezed back. Leo squeezed twice. Raph squeezed twice. A smile twitched the corner of Leo's mouth, and they kept going, counting up to ten then back down. Focusing on the numbers, on the tension, on the physical feedback. Until Leo could think whole thoughts again.

The IV in his arm was sore, like the hand putting it in missed his vein a few times. His body felt weird and awful and stiff. Raph looked so tired. Mikey was still asleep behind him, curled up in an abandoned blanket, small. The kid always slept the deepest.

Leo wanted to be him. Asleep. His limbs felt heavy and his eyes burned with exhaustion. He eventually drifted off squeezing Raph's hand.

"... not sure. I really don't want to bring Draxum back in here if it's gonna freak him out, but I don't know how else we're gonna figure out the, you know." Raph was saying.

It was morning. Leo woke angry. He was so unbelievably sick of this. He was annoyed at himself for everything. He stewed it in, staying completely still. He was on his side, the stub arm pressed into a pillow, legs tangled in a blanket. People were in his room talking. He wanted them to go away.

"I do not know what to look for." Donnie replied, stiff. "I've run every scan I can think of. They always come back normal."

Mikey sounded tired, literally mid-yawn, "I don't know either. But Barry was certain something's there. I don't feel like he'd make it up."

"Hold on. Leo's awake." Raph said.

"He literally has not moved." Donnie said.

"I can always tell a sleeping brother a mile away." Raph confidently replied. His footsteps got closer. "Morning bro. You joining us for breakfast?"

The irritation was thick and stuck to him like glue. Leo grabbed his pillow and moved from under his head to over, hugging it over his ear.

"See, he's up." Raph said, muffled and a little amused, if still concerned and a bit dark. "Can we get a number, bud?"

Leo blindly provided a rude gesture instead. He did not want to be introspective on his mental state right now. He was sick of it, so fucking much.

"Classy." Raph replied. When he peeled one corner of the pillow away, Leo mustered up a nasty glare that told him exactly what he thought of being awake right now.

"Food?" Raph tried again.

Leo wrinkled his nose in distaste.

"Keep being pissed at me?"

"I'm pissed at everything, you're not special." Leo mumbled, and pulled the pillow back over his face. Mildly tried to suffocate himself. He couldn't stomach another minute of this constant attention.

'We should eat, though.' Sensei chimed in, annoyingly sensible. When Leo whirled on him internally, Sensei added, 'Yeah, yeah, I know. You hate everything, including me. You can keep hating but can you hate and eat?'

'No promises.' Leo huffed, because doing things was far beyond his capabilities at the moment. Continuing to exist underneath the pillow was the extent of his power.

Someone touched his arm and Leo jumped, not expecting it.

"It's just me." Mikey said. "I'm gonna bring you breakfast in bed, how about? What do you want?"

Leo shoved Sensei into the front. 'You answer him then, if you care so much that we eat.'

Sensei carefully pulled the pillow off his face, blinking and orientating himself in the sudden place he'd found himself. The blood pooled in his stagnant limbs, the after-taste soreness in his ribs and arm, and the pull of the IV still run into his veins.

Mikey voice echoed, he'd asked something else while Sensei was centering. Sensei blinked a couple times, and said, "I'm sorry, what was the question?"

"I said, I could do breakfast burritos if you'd like." Mikey offered a hesitant smile. He was sitting on the lip of the mattress, looking ready to help in the best way he knew how. All soured and weird from everything.

"That works." Sensei said, because that was an easy solution at least.

"Sure thing, I'll make the best burritos you've ever seen, baby!" Mikey burst with enthusiasm, flashing excitement before getting up to make it happen.

On the other side of the room, back to the wall and holding his phone, Donnie was watching Sensei with very narrowed eyes. Eugh boy.

"Michael." Donnie said. "Wait."

'Leo.' Sensei poked, warningly.

Leo was still a very angry little ball in the back corner of the mind. 'Leave me the fuck alone right now, Sensei.'

"Wait for what?" Mikey rocked back and forth on his heels, looking between Donnie and Raph.

"Wait for what, Donnie?" Raph echoed, wary and watching the alert and suspicious expression on Donnie's face.

"No way you just stopped being mad that fast." Donnie got closer, putting his phone away into the purple hoodie pocket, keeping his hand there. "If Leo really gets pissed off, it lasts for hours."

Sensei ground his teeth together, carefully sitting up and putting his shell against the wall, not taking his eyes off Donnie as the purple turtle got closer. 'Leo, we've got a problem.'

'No, you've got a problem.' Leo snarked, because once Leo really got pissed, it lasted for hours.

The hand in Donnie's pocket flicked out the tech bo to full length, spinning once, agile, before landing underneath Sensei's chin.

Donnie's eyes were rock hard ice. He said, "You're not Leo."

Chapter Text

"Donnie." Raph said, standing behind him, gripping his shoulder. It was unclear if it was a warning or an encouragement.

Sensei swallowed, feeling the bo against his throat. He met Donnie's eyes, feeling a shock-wave of emotion that he couldn't quite dismiss. Here was his twin at his fiercest. It was such a sight to see, though it had never been against him.

'Any help?' Sensei implored Leo.

The ball of anger snapped at him, like fire crackling from a burst ember. 'You're the one who wouldn't let me tell them, you're the one who has to deal with the fallout.'

"D, it's Leo." Mikey said, quietly, shuffling over beside Donnie's other side, tugging on the extended arm. "Don't hurt him."

"It's not Leo. I recognize the change. I know my twin. Before, I had been assuming Leo had been affected by what happened, but this... this is different. Explain yourself. Where's Leo?"

"He's still here." Sensei said, voice scratching, not attempting to inch away from the bo pressed to his trachea because he knew it would only follow his movements. "Still pissed off. Doesn't want to talk right now."

Something incredibly dark flashed over Donnie's expression. "So I'm right. You're the thing in his head."

Sensei carefully, slowly, nodded. Watching the mimicry of his own brothers. So young. So scared.

The line-up of them crumbled. Mikey dropped his hand in shock, staggering back and staring at Sensei as if he's grown another head.

The hardened length of Donnie's shoulders shored up, and the iron grip on his tech bo did not waver, did not allow room to breathe, the flint and steel of his eyes promising absolute destruction.

And Raph's lips parted and his brow furrowed but he didn't look scared or angry or any of the expected emotions. He looked contemplative, squeezing Donnie's shoulder, appraising Sensei with still-gentle eyes.

"Get out." Donnie snarled, like the words were poison he was spitting onto the floor.

"I'd love to." Sensei said. "Don't know how. I offered to try and Leo turned me down."

"Leo knows you're there?" Raph asked, tone a mile and a half in the opposite direction from Donnie's.

"Course." Sensei shrugged, keeping his chin up, neck hurting from the pressure that Donnie had on him. "I tried to hide but he found me anyway. I don't want to be here either. It's just how it ended up."

His voice rasped at the end and he blinked a couple times to keep the suction of emotion from attacking him. Focus on the current terribleness, forget the past for the minute. Don't think about dying in a laser blast.

'Come on.' Leo complained about his line of thought, bitter.

'Are you seriously not going to help me with this?'

'I seriously don't want to deal with the fallout of my recent stupidity, no.'

"Where's Leo?" Donnie demanded again, a small jab that stole Sensei's breath away.

"D." Mikey complained, shaking hands tugging ineffectually on Donnie's arm.

"He's here." Sensei repeated.

"Let us talk to him." Donnie said.

'They want you, dude.' Sensei pushed.

Leo pushed back. He fronted for a second to say, "Fuck off, I'm not dealing with this right now." then practically dove out, full of anxious and upset motion.

Sensei had to shake his head to clear it, the sudden dizzy on-and-off like repeated roller-coaster rides. When he blinked rapidly into focus, he gave a lopsided smile to the trio and said, "He's not dealing with this right now, apparently."

The tech bo had loosened its bite on his neck. Donnie's narrowed eyes stared. He said, "Well, he's still pissed off, that tracks. But I don't really want to talk to you."

"I do." Raph said, taking control and fully guiding the tech bo away, appraising Sensei. "What are you?"

"Ah." Sensei said. He cleared his throat. "I don't really know. I was dead. Then I was here, in Leo's mind. I'm tempted to say a ghost, because that makes the most sense, but it's, uh. A little more complicated than that."

"Complicated how." Donnie said flatly, the tech bo at his side but not collapsing it.

Sensei really wished he didn't have to talk about it, actually. But they weren't going to take no for an answer, and Leo was fuming and refusing to help.

Sensei put care and thought on how best to approach it. "I'm not... your Leo. But I am a Leo." 

"I'm a Virgo." Raph said.

A bark of begrudging laughter from the furious little Leo in the back of his mind. Sensei's lip twitched and he said, "Leo liked that. But yeah, I'm just a version of him."

"Of course Leo liked that." Mikey muttered, fond and anxious all at once.

"He's listening?" Raph said.

"You're a version of Leo." Donnie repeated overtop his brothers, skeptical.

"Yes, he's listening. We both usually are, unless we've dissociated. And version is maybe bad word for it. I'm... okay. Remember the future Casey came from? Well, that's mine. I was Casey's sensei. Leo said it was weird to call someone his own name, so he's been calling me Sensei. If that helps."

"It does not." Donnie replied, tightly. "I have many follow up questions, but the most important is how the hell did you end up in my brother's head?"

"Don't know." Sensei shrugged, putting his palm out helplessly. "Last thing I knew, I was throwing Casey into the portal to go save the world. Then I died, and I woke up in Leo's head as he was recovering from the prison--"

Sensei shut his eyes and turned away, as Leo suddenly snarled and went, 'Shut up. Don't talk about it. I can't deal with that right now.'

'I wasn't.' Sensei calmed. 'I was providing context.'

'This would've been so much easier if you'd let us tell them the first time I noticed you.' Leo snarled.

'Okay, excuse me, don't think I haven't heard all your thoughts about how they were going to think you lost your mind. You weren't jumping to tell them either.' Sensei replied, undeniably defensive, tight with it.

A hand touched his knee. Sensei opened his eyes, blinking, and said, "Sorry, Leo doesn't want to talk about that."

It was Mikey who'd come close, eyes wide. He said, "We don't have to talk about that, but can I ask about you? You died?"

"I died." Sensei confirmed, giving a sad smile.

"That's awful." Mikey's face wrenched.

Sensei's said, gently, patiently, "It's okay."

"That is definitely not okay." Mikey told him, sharp. He glanced back at Donnie and Raph. "He's a Leo, you guys. A lost Leo."

"We don't know he's telling the truth." Donnie replied, icy.

Raph didn't look like he knew what to think, still contemplative.

"I do not trust that thing." Donnie campaigned, pointing at him, firm.

"And what's your suggestion, D?" Raph asked. "He's in Leo's body."

Donnie scowled, flicking his bo in a tight circle, jaw ticking. "Exorcism."

"But what'll happen to, uh, this other Leo if you do that?" Mikey said, rocking on his heels. "What if that kills him? It's a Leo, we can't hurt Leo."

"We don't know it's a Leo." Donnie reiterated.

"Okay then, we find out if he's a Leo." Raph said sensibly, gesturing wide.

"We can't trust his answers, he has access to Leo's head. Anything we'd ask he could just get from that." Donnie denied.

"Hm." Mikey turned and inspected Sensei, bouncing back and forth like he was working off excess energy. "You said you're Casey's sensei?"

"No." Sensei blurted, cringing.

"No, you're not?"

"No, yes, I am, but don't bring him into this." Sensei covered his face with his hand, knowing that Donnie would hate that answer.

"That's awfully convenient." Donnie said, angry and dry.

"Why not?" Raph asked, not nearly as accusatory.

"It's complicated." Sensei said weakly. "Can you -- I just need more time. Before I see him. Is that okay?"

"Absolutely not." Donnie replied.

"How much time?" Raph pushed at Donnie's face, moving him aside.

"Just... Leo and I are having a bit of trouble at the moment staying present. If you bring Casey in, I guarantee I'll drag us both down." Sensei said, absolutely using the dissociation as a reason to avoid having to confront Casey longer.

"Aw." Mikey said, brow tight, sounding a bit more unsure.

"So you both struggle?" Raph prompted, stepping a little closer, looking for more information.

"With the dissociation? It's kinda push and pull. We're still learning. One of us can help the other stay grounded. And one of us can pull the other away. I tried to stay out of his way at first, but..."

"But Leo can leave anything well enough alone, even in his own head?" Mikey suggested, with a saccharine smile.

"Yeah. And, you know, I'm also Leo, so that statement goes both ways." Sensei shrugged and looked off, tugging on the bracelet on his wrist with the tips of his fingers.

"And why is this the first we're learning about you?" Donnie asked, guard not down in the slightest, posture tense.

Sensei wrinkled his nose. "A few reasons. We didn't really understand what was going on and it took us a bit to figure out for ourselves, let alone to articulate it to someone else. The second is that, well. I'm from an apocalyptic future. This whole thing is..."

"Leo can hear us, right?" Donnie asked, abrupt and sharp.

'You listening?'

'Eat my ass.'

"Yes." Sensei said.

"Leonardo, you should have told us the moment you realized there was a foreign entity in your head, not gotten all buddy-buddy with it. What if he's a demon masquerading as a version of you?" Donnie demanded, incensed.

'I'm only gonna come out if he promises to stop being mad at me.' Leo replied, sour.

"He says he'll only come out if you stop being mad." Sensei reported, in a reciting voice, like telling on someone to the teacher.

Donnie visibly fumed, nostrils flaring. "How is that fair? I know you're pissed right now too, why do you get the monopoly on it?"

"Because he has leverage." Sensei echoed Leo's response. "You want him to come talk. It's on his rules."

"I won't stop being pissed off but I'll let Raph be the one to ask questions." Donnie conceded, crossing his arms, still holding his bo.

'I don't believe him for a second.' Leo replied, pissed-off-fond. But relented, cautiously moving up.

Sensei stepped back. For a moment, neither of them drove, and Sensei put his hand on Leo's shoulder.

'Don't touch me.' Leo said, still very on edge and annoyed.

Sensei squeezed and let go. 'Sorry. They love you. They're just scared.'

'I'm sick of this.' Leo repeated for what felt like the millionth time.

'I know.' Sensei said, simply, not refuting or arguing the point.

Leo sighed hugely, exasperated, and reluctantly stepped into the front.

"... really obvious now that I'm looking for it."

He blinked a couple times. His eyes were burning. He was still pissed off about everything, his situation, being awake and alive and the works. Leo gave a long, drawn out exhale as he let himself fall back into his limbs. Then he flicked his annoyed gaze up, meeting his waiting brothers.

"Leo?" Mikey ventured, uncertain.

"If he's a demon he's a pretty shit one." Leo said, grinding his teeth together. "He mostly tries to get me to eat or do grounding exercises. I wasn't too concerned because he wasn't vying for world domination, and I kinda had more important things going on."

"Okay, you're Leo." Raph said. "Though the other one is also Leo. You said you've been calling him..."

"Sensei." Leo rubbed his eye, feeling sticky and weird and tired. "Because he's Casey's sensei. And he hovers over my shoulder like fucking Yoda. It's annoying as hell."

"Raphael, you're not asking the right questions." Donnie snapped, losing the battle almost immediately. "Doesn't matter if the demon isn't trying to take over the world, it's something we should be aware of."

Leo pointedly looked at the watch he wasn't wearing and raised a judgmental eyebrow at Donnie.

Donnie fumed.

Leo fumed back.

"How many times did you let us think we were talking to you when we weren't?" Donnie asked, sharp.

Leo's tongue got tied. He didn't have a good answer, guilt joining the screaming-hot anger living inside him. He jerkily closed his fingers by his mouth. Shut up.

He felt pissed off and overwhelmed and dizzy. He pulled his legs up and breathed harshly through his nose.

Raph dropped a heavy hand on Donnie's shoulder, making him flinch and glare up at the biggest brother.

"Don't answer that." Raph said to Leo. "What do you think about him? Sensei?"

Leo chewed on his cheek, eyes narrowed. His voice was stolen by the whipping hurricane wind of his mind. He snatched up his phone and typed with a fumbling thumb at his max speed, 'annoying. dealt w a lot of shit in the future. really loves casey. has helped me a lot w whats been going on. annoying.'

Mikey took the phone and the three brothers read it together.

"So then why doesn't he want to talk to Casey?" Raph said, chasm between his brows.

Leo tapped a frustrated spelled 'i' to his forehead. Idiot.

"Hm." Raph said, handing Leo's phone back.

Leo put it face down and rested his cheek on his knees, eyes half mast.

"I think maybe we should eat." Mikey volunteered, looking pointedly between Leo's posture and Raph.

"Good idea." Raph agreed, nodding. "It's still early. Mike, do you also want to chat with Draxum and see if he has some thoughts too? I can talk to Dad."

Mikey gave a big double thumbs up, an obvious show, turning them to Leo before exiting.

"We're just going to leave it there?" Donnie snarled.

"You can't kill Sensei, he's in Leo's body." Raph reminded him. "What else are we gonna do?"

Donnie scoffed, loud, and stormed out, brushing past Raph.

The silence reigned. Raph turned to face Leo, eyes still cataloguing.

Leo met his gaze, dull and irritated, then raised his hand to point at Raph then the side of his forehead.

"What do I think?" Raph repeated, then gave a half-smile. "Still figuring it out myself. Don't mind Donnie. You know how he is."

Leo scoffed, a remarkably similar sound to his twin, and turned his head to face the wall instead of Raph, still resting on his knees.

"Forgetting any demon-related revelations for the moment." Raph said, approaching the bed properly, taking his usual seat. "Do you wanna let me know why you're so pissed off today?"

Leo popped his lips, meant to be a non-verbal 'nope'. Raph knew him well enough to get the idea.

"The quicker you tell me, the quicker I'll leave you alone about it." Raph reminded him.

Leo gave a big gusty sigh in the hopes it would convey all he felt about the matter. The weight of everything dragging his shoulders and head down.

But Raph didn't give up, waiting.

The room was too freaking quiet. Leo raised his hand to tap the thumb of his open hand to his forehead. Dad. Raph had told Mikey he was going to talk to Dad.

"He can wait." Raph replied, simply.

Leo's nose flared with annoyance. He swallowed and bit out, "I'm just sick of this, okay?"

"I know." Raph agreed, and it was almost funny how similar it sounded to Sensei, earlier.

'I learnt from the best, I guess.' Sensei replied, fond and a little uncomfortable.

Leo was sick of it and being sick of it included talking about it. He didn’t want to elaborate, he didn’t want to go into detail, he wanted to curl up in a ball on the floor and disappear.

Raph’s face was nothing but understanding and it sucked that the sight of it just filled Leo with more anger. He didn’t want this, he didn’t want understanding and kindness. He wanted to be normal. He wanted to have everything be okay and nobody worry about him and hover over him and treat him like he was made of glass. Like he was as visibly broken as he felt inside. It was as if he was failing the unspoken rule of his existence — the face man. The medic, the team support. Everything boiled down to Leo trying to be the best he could and never actually managing to hit the mark.

“Is there something we can do to help?” Raph attempted.

Leo gave an almighty scowl, because like hell he would to put in the work to think of something, even if he wanted to burden his brothers with his problems.

Raph reached out and squeezed Leo’s knee. “I get that you don’t wanna talk about it. You don’t have to if you’re sick of it. How about, do you want company that is quiet, company that talks about other things, or to be left alone?”

Some of the tension loosened. He wasn’t going to be forced to talk about it. He wavered and stuck in indecision. He wanted to be left alone to be miserable. He did not want to be left alone to be miserable. He did not want to be left in the quiet. He wanted this all to just stop.

Leo shrugged, face hot, feeling sticky and gross.

Raph kept waiting patiently for a choice. Leo was starting to get pretty pissed off with how great he was.

“Talk to Dad.” Leo rasped, because he didn’t want to have that conversation. “Then come back and I’ll decide.”

“I’ll come back.” Raph promised, getting up and giving Leo one more fond pat. After a moment, Leo was left alone for the first time in a while.

Except not really. Sensei was still close to the front, obviously not trying to set off the landmine of Leo’s temper but not straying far either.

‘Are you worried about Dad?’ Sensei ventured, after he could only stand the quiet for about ten seconds himself.

‘I don’t know.’ Leo replied shortly. He wasn’t thinking too hard about how that conversation would go. Splinter was fairly predictable, so it would depend on if he viewed Sensei as a threat or not. Otherwise it would pretty much be a non-issue.

Leo didn’t really understand Donnie’s reaction. Sure, it made sense logically. It was a bad thing to discover someone you love had a foreign entity in their head. It was at best an invasion of privacy and at worst an attempt to ruin their life.

But Leo just didn’t have that. Because it couldn’t be an invasion of privacy when it was literally himself. Sure, Leo was annoyed at Sensei often, but that was because Leo was annoying. He wasn’t afraid of Sensei any more than he could be afraid of himself.

‘Donnie’s not angry at you.’ Sensei told him.

‘No, he definitely is.’ Leo snorted. ‘Don’t give me that ‘he’s angry at himself bullshit’. We both know in his logical world in his head I tell him the moment I have something wrong with me and he fixes it. He’s mad that I didn’t do that.’

Leo didn't want to pursue the icky mindset anymore and instead grabbed the crutch.

'Where are we going?’ Sensei asked with wary amusement.

‘Bathroom.’ Leo’s legs shook but he was pretty sure he could handle it. ‘Then I think I’ll take over the world.’

‘We’d need Donnie’s help for that.’ Sensei replied but didn’t stop him, even stepping up a couple times to steady his shaking movements.

Leo used the bathroom and washed his face. The drip of the tap echoed and it was too quiet. He was so incredibly weak for how much he needed his family, all the time.

He didn't want to be alone. He grabbed the crutch and hobbled down the hallway to find the murmuring voices coming from Splinter's room. He sat down outside the door, leaning his head against the wall. The voices were too quiet to make out what they were saying.

The anger boiled. It stayed. The frustration with his situation. The desire for it all to just stop being so difficult for like five seconds and he could breathe without the band around his chest. He shut his eyes and tried really hard not to dissociate. The stupid that was that trying really hard not to dissociate kind of felt the exact same as dissociating.

"... I should get back to him -- oh." Raph stopped himself, the door opening beside his head. "Hi Leo. Did you want to see Dad?"

Without opening his eyes, Leo let himself scowl, still in a bad mood, still not wanting to socialize.

"Too bad, you will see me anyway." Splinter padded in front of Leo.

Leo opened his eyes, his father at a much better height with Leo on the floor.

"Red has explained to me." Splinter said.

Leo waited, not acknowledging further.

"I have my own ways of verifying if this is the truth. May I speak with spectre?" Splinter requested, hands behind his back, eyes giving nothing away.

'Do I have to?' Sensei didn't move to take the front, uncertain.

'Apparently he thinks he can verify you without needing to drag Casey into this, isn't that what you want?' Leo asked, dry.

Sensei sighed. He reluctantly moved forward and blinked, vision clearing to the sight of his father. His heart ached, throbbing against his tongue when he swallowed.

He didn't say anything, but Splinter apparently caught the switch, as he said, "Hello. You are the one who sent Future Boy back in time, yes?"

Sensei nodded, slow.

"Was I gone?" Splinter asked next, with no particular emotion in his voice.

Again, Sensei nodded, wondering where the line of questioning was heading. Unsure how Splinter thought he could verify the truth when he'd been dead about three days into the end of the world.

"I did think so. Future Boy has made a comment that I looked different than he expected." Splinter tweaked his own whisker, mulling. "Being a single father, I have worried for a long time about leaving four young sons to fend for themselves. There was a point where I had written letters for my eventual death in anticipation that they would be found if I passed. I am wondering if you found those letters."

Oh. Sensei's throat practically sealed itself shut, a sense memory of digging through their father's room and finding old yellowed envelopes with their colours written on the front. How Sensei had managed not to cry up until that point and ended up sobbing for hours after reading it. It was the end of the world but the real end of the world was having to read how much his dad loved him and never getting to see him again afterwards. He lost the letter during one of their frantic underground moves but he would never forget a single word his dad wrote for him.

He gave the smallest nod he could.

Splinter's smile was equally tiny. "You were probably about ten when I wrote them. Children really come into their personalities at that point and I remember staring at all of you thinking that you had completely surpassed everything I could ever offer you. I had been depressed and consumed with this thought that I would die and leave tiny children alone with no one to even know you needed love. I'll be honest, I don't remember most of what is in those envelopes anymore. But I do remember the poem I gave to you, because every time I've heard it since, I think of you."

'Don't cry.' Leo told him, because their throat was so tight and their eyes hurt with how hard they burned.

'He gave me my greatest weapon.' Sensei replied, nonsensically.

Splinter softened greatly at the watery eyes Sensei was barely keeping from tipping into tears. He said, "This poem is not something my Leo would know. If you can tell me it, then we will have our proof."

Sensei opened his mouth and his voice was gone, just on the precipice of terrible emotion. He shut his eyes, swallowing, even as the tears leaked out the corners disturbed from their fragile film. He sniffed, roughly scrubbing at his cheeks, and cleared his throat. When he finally spoke, his voice was very rough, "Hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul. And sings the tune without the words..."

"And never stops -- at all." Splinter finished when Sensei couldn't. His face was as easily adoring for Sensei as it always was for Leo. "Hello my son. I apologize for dying, I have always been afraid of that for you. I hope you still had the love you needed."

Sensei wracked with a singular sob, burying his face in the crook of his arm, before pinwheeling away from the front. 'Oh, that's too much. That's way too much.'

Leo caught him. He pat Sensei's shell and told him, 'You're okay, big guy.'

'The rat got me.' Sensei bemoaned, trying for humour.

'He sure did. I gotta get out there before they worry.' Leo gave him a one-armed squeeze. 'Go cry in the corner.'

Sensei slunk off to do so.

Leo took the front and found the body crying into his sleeve. Splinter was rubbing his shell in circles, murmuring reassurances. Raph was nearby, hovering, a whiff of stress sweat.

Leo raised his head, brow furrowed and irritated, and gave a big snotty sniff as he said, "Gross."

"Ah, baby blue." Splinter offered a tissue. "Is big blue alright?"

"He's the baby." Leo muttered, annoyed, and loudly blew his nose. "He's fine. It's not the first time you've made him cry."

Understanding flashed over Splinter's face. "Ah."

Before Leo had to come up with anything else, he was saved by the bell, as Mikey's voice rang out that breakfast was ready.

Chapter Text

They continued down the hall, Leo grumpy and struggling with the crutch. The breakfast burrito looked extremely well made. Leo was still trying to settle the body from the sudden crying jag, his throat too-tight and his own anger simmering on the surface. He pulled out his phone and scrolling through social media to try and distract himself enough to eat.

He covered the camera with his finger and sent a black screen as his Snapchat streak for the day, not in the mood to try. He didn't listen to the conversation Mikey and Raph and Splinter were having, even though it sounded like they were talking about him. Confirming his story of a future version of himself in his head. He hoped someone was telling Donnie that it was the truth.

He was pretty sure it wouldn't matter if they did. Leo's temper burned for hours. Donnie's could simmer for days.

'Are you going to finish eating?' Sensei asked, when they'd sat there for ages staring into space, fiddling with the edge of the bracelet.

'Get off my dick.' Leo thought back, bitter and tired and really not in the mood.

'Do you want me to finish?' Sensei offered, kind in the face of Leo's sour anger and making it incredibly disarming to uphold his furious brigade.

Leo released and didn't go far, just forcing Sensei to put the effort in. They finished breakfast an eon after they started.

"Hey." Raph finally left the very long conversation he'd been having with Splinter and Mikey to check on Leo again. "April's coming over soon. Do you want to go watch TV to wait for her?"

A thu-thump of panic. Sensei couldn't help but flash his eyes up, heart-stopping fear. He asked around the rock jamming up his throat, "Casey too?"

"Yes...?" Raph said, unsure.

Leo full-body winced as Sensei fled the scene. He cradled the side of his head at the rapid loss of the presence in his head and said, dryly, "And he's gone."

"Gone?" Raph said, brow tight.

Leo shook his head, feeling floaty without Sensei. "Hiding again. He doesn't want us to tell Casey about him."

"That still doesn't make sense."

"He's an idiot but unfortunately he is me so it's kind of inevitable." Leo kicked the table legs and made it tremble. "Can I go to the dojo with you instead?"

"Sure." Raph agreed reluctantly, and hovered while Leo fought the crutch to cooperate with him back down the hallway.

Leo set up in the middle of the mats and began a slow and in-depth stretching routine, focusing on every pull of the muscle instead of the fact that his brain was mulling and chewing on thoughts in strange patterns, not letting him settle on any one thing.

Raph took to the punching bags. The rhythmic sound was knowledge he wasn't alone, despite the void in his head. Then it stopped. Raph said, "Hi Casey. How's things?"

"Hiya Raph." Casey's voice was warm, the tap of something in greeting. "All good. How's it going in here?"

"Alright. I should probably warn you that Leo's in mood."

"I've seen it before." Casey brushed off, not even hesitating.

"You have, huh." Raph replied, a little wondering, but not searching. Instead he continued, "April here?"

"She's trying to pry Donnie out with a crow bar."

Raph snorted. "Good luck to her. You can hang with Leo, if you like. I'm not sure how grounded he is at the moment."

Leo stopped pretending he wasn't listening to them and raised a one for both to see.

"He's a one." Raph reported.

"Cool." Casey approached, settling down cross-legged from where Leo was stretching out his calf a millimetre at a time. "Hi sensei."

"Leo." It was hard to see himself with that title, especially now that he actually knew the person Casey was referring to.

"Sorry, Leo." Casey grimaced, but pushed through, looking determined. "It's fine if you're in a bad mood, I don't care. Can I stretch with you?"

Leo shrugged, because he couldn't stop the kid. Casey was wearing a hockey jersey, black leggings, and a stubborn set to his mouth. No shoes on.

'Look at your kid.' Leo tried to coax, because it was a great picture.

Sensei did not reply. Leo gave an annoyed sigh that leaked into reality, and he switched to stretching the other calf. Casey followed his motion, apparently not deterred by his audible sigh.

Casey stayed and mirrored him for a long time, keeping him company even as Leo's muscles began to protest the longer they went. The lightest tug on the stitches in his stump arm stole the air from his lungs. He steely breathed through the pain.

Leo thought multiple times about opening his mouth and telling Casey the truth. He never quite managed it, always stopping before the words could pass his teeth.

After a while Leo dragged his legs up and sat with his back straight. He breathed through his nose and listened to Casey do the same.

Inhale. Exhale. The ferocious milling and grinding thoughts. How much of a slog this whole recovery thing was. How many mistakes he'd made. How complicated the situation had become.

Quieter. The softness. The fluff of Casey's hair, an echo of tangled locks of a grimy apocalypse child, grinning up with the teeth his Uncle Angie taught him to brush. They didn't do the tooth fairy, but Cassandra found the collection Mikey kept in a jar one day and asked if she could make them into a necklace. Casey Junior thought that would be so cool, but when they tried to drill through it just shattered the enamel.

'That is the weirdest fucking memory to give me right now.' Leo told Sensei, unable to keep the bite on his anger, coloured more amused than anything. The sense memory of such family shenanigans really reminded him of his own. It was his own.

No response. Leo didn't push Sensei, meditating, breathing, waiting.

Sensei joined him properly. He looked at his kid. They'd kept him alive and fed in the end of the world, handing off the ends of their meals, sleeping between Casey and the cracked concrete, a warm little bundle, singing songs and telling stories and the amount of times Sensei wished he could've begged for a camera to capture even a moment of the insane growth his kid went through, to slow down his relentless race forward, how strong and capable and talented and tenacious his baby was, his little boy that once fit in the palm of his hand all steady at his side with a hockey stick modified for maximum damage.

Now in a hockey jersey and barefoot. Breathing slow, no rush, just... there. Present. Sensei stared at him.

Casey cracked open one eye, then gave a bashful smile when he caught the look. "What? Something on my face?"

Sensei shook his head, yanking his gaze away and rubbing his eyes.

'What if he doesn't need me anymore?' Sensei asked, desperate. 'He's getting by without me.'

'Did you stop needing Dad?' Leo asked, knowing. 'Or did you just get by without him because you had to?'

Sensei didn't answer. Leo didn't push. He was too tired for that. Instead he retook control and dropped their hand from their face, centering and breathing.

Whether or not Sensei was going to work up the courage to say something, Leo didn't find out. April came in, carrying a smoothie.

"Brought you something!" April cheered, plopping beside Leo and giving him a jostle. "Hey Casey, Angelo said if you join him in the kitchen he'll make you any kind of smoothie you like."

"What kinds are there?" Casey asked.

"Tragic. Go find out."

"Aye aye, Commander." Casey saluted as he left, which made her laugh.

"Yeah, yeah." April waved him off and peeled Leo's hand open to give him the blue concoction.

"I'm here now, you can stop moping." April said, because she didn't put his with his bullshit. "Drink the liquid blue I've brought you and talk me to about the demon Donnie says you've got in your head."

Raph sighed from the other side of the room and thumped over to join their cross-legged circle on the mat. "Did Donnie tell you about Splinter's conversation with him this morning?"

"Yup. And also that we're avoiding telling Future Boy at the moment. I don't wanna hear it from you idiots, though. I want to hear it from Leo. You've gone and really put a new turn on the phrase 'ten pounds of asshole in a five pound bag', huh?"

Damn, that was a good one. It made Leo bark with laughter then shoot her an amused glare.

"Am I wrong?" April bat her eyelashes at him, fake-innocent.

"Never." Leo said, with a smirk. Then he shook his head. "I don't know what to say to you that I haven't already said."

"How do you feel about it?" April prompted.

Leo let the question sizzle, shrugging like it didn't matter.

"Alright. If I want to ask him a question, is that rude?" April said next.

"Depends on the question." Leo replied, wary. He turned inwards to Sensei. 'Wanna talk to April?'

'Depends on the question.'

'I'm not in the mood to play telephone right now. Either front or don't.'

Sensei fronted. He blinked and gave April a wary smile. "Okay?"

April searched his face. "Sensei?"

"That's what we're calling me." Sensei agreed, rolling out their tense shoulders and trying to make the back crack.

"It's nice to meet you." April said.

Sensei didn't point out they had met before. "You too. What did you want to ask?"

"How do you feel about this?"

Sensei wrinkled his nose. It was weird, because two minutes ago he'd been staring at his child, the one he'd thrown into this chaos just at the mere breathing chance of a better life, the two of them in a world Casey had never seen and Sensei never thought he'd see again. He was usually better at coping with the death of his family, but admittedly he'd never had to cope with it while staring at living versions of them. And the life he was stealing from a little Leo, the life he was threatening from his baby Casey, and the life he'd lost in a flash and the only thing he'd felt in that moment had been release--

"It's fine." Sensei lied instinctively.

April raised an eyebrow and exchanged a look with Raph.

"Really." Sensei shook his head. "It's an adjustment. I'm trying not to make things harder for Leo."

"Not really what I asked, but okay. I had one another question."

"Only one?" Sensei said, just a small tease.

"For now." April winked. "You're just an older version of our Leo, right? Not some alternate universe?"

"As far as I know." Sensei agreed, with a shrug.

"Our Leo is right-handed, though. And part of what tipped me off was how much ease you had using your left with the fork."

'Those damn omelettes coming back to bite you again.' Leo practically chortled, very amused at his expense.

Sensei grit his teeth, then said slowly, "I lost my arm a long time ago. I learnt how to use my left more."

"How did you lose your arm?" Raph said, alarmed.

'Oh! Oh!' Leo elbowed his way to the front and burst with a grin, "He sold it to an arms dealer!"

After a moment to compute, April groaned and Raph covered his face.

"Good one." Sensei literally pat himself on the back. "I haven't thought of that one before."

"Hate you both." April sing-songed.

Leo signed I love you with a grin.

"Is it always big sister privileges to immediately break all grumpiness?" Raph complained, flopping backwards.

"Yes." April agreed, tugging on the tails of Raph's mask. "That includes you. I demand one smile and hug, please and thank you."

"Only because ya asked so nicely." Raph agreed and gave her a grin and a squish.

Leo realized the smoothie in his hand was melting and kept the front to drink it. Wonderful and blue. Leo idly drank while April wrapped her arms around Raph's head and squeezed.

"Casey's told me a lot about Sensei, you know." April said, eventually.

Sensei tried to yank away. Leo mentally tripped him then sat on top of him to keep him in place by the front. He said after only a momentary loss of focus, "Like what?"

"He was telling me this morning about some arm-wrestling competition we had. Commander O'Neil and Sensei, I should say."

"Who won?" Leo asked.

"Me." April beamed.

'She cheated.' Sensei complained, from where Leo was pinning him in place.

"Sensei says you cheated. How do you cheat at arm wrestling?" Leo said.

"Don't know, haven't done it yet." April said, with a cheeky grin, adjusting her glasses. "But that does sound like me."

Sensei provided a fond memory of April's wild grin, the strength of her arm, and the sharp pin she poked into his side to break his concentration and slam his arm down on the table. Leo smiled into his smoothie, but didn't want to give her any ideas if she hadn't thought of them yet.

The intensive stretching had drained Leo. His legs were shaky as he rose to the crutch and willingly went back to bed, too exhausted to think about doing anything else. With the added bonus of getting to lay in a dark room and work off the excess annoyance by breathing in a slow circle. April and Casey left but Raph stayed, putting on a podcast called the Basement Yard that Leo had no idea what actually about. Instead he slept through it, sleepy and still a little annoyed that his life was reduced down to do-small-task and recover-from-task.

Mikey traded with Raph in the evening and brought him dinner, seasoned potato wedges and mixed fried vegetables and barbecue chicken. It smelt amazing but Leo was half asleep and not feeling particularly like fighting his body to eat.

'Put me in, coach.' Sensei joked.

Leo was too drained and immediately allowed him the front. Sensei felt Leo settle back, hungover with emotion and the physical tug of their sore muscles. He blinked a couple times at the delicious food and was happy to eat things he hadn't tasted in twenty years. He changed his grip on the fork to something more natural and immediately dug into the chicken.

"You switched, didn't you." Mikey said, eyes on them.

"I have more practice using a fork left-handed." Sensei shrugged, taking a deep drink of water. He wasn't about to explain to their brothers that Leo was disinterested in eating right now, it would only make them worry.

"Do you want us to call you Leo as well?" Mikey asked, having finished his own food a while ago, plate set aside and scrolling through his phone. It was a feed of graffiti artists on the screen at the moment, and his hand was shaking minutely.

"Sensei's fine." He shook his head.

"Yeah, but your name is actually Leo." Mikey pointed out.

"Or Master Leonardo, or Leon, or Nardo, or Blue. Our family has always used names interchangeably, it's not a big deal." Sensei chased a zucchini around his plate with his fork, not particularly bothered by Leo's unilateral decision to call him Sensei. Casey had called him sensei for over ten years, it wasn't as if he didn't answer to the name.

Mikey's eyes searched his face, twisting the pop-socket on the back of his phone in anxious circles. He said, "This must be a lot to deal with, if you're from the future like Casey. Are you alright?"

"No, but I still have this left." Sensei replied, raising his arm.

"And -- I need no further proof that you're a Leo." Mikey groaned, sliding his hand down his face and giving an exasperated smile. "Seriously, though."

"Seriously, I'm fine." Sensei gave Mikey an indulgent smile in return. "Don't worry about me. I used to be the leader of the resistance. Single-handedly."

He waited a beat for Mikey to get the joke then beamed when his baby brother dropped his head in his hands.

"You know, it's funny," Mikey said, muffled. "Because when you told us earlier I was like, oh cool, two Leo's! And now I'm like, oh no, two Leo's."

Sensei gave a small laugh. Leo rolled over, joining him in the front to say, "Play stupid games, win stupid prizes, dear Angelo."

Mikey looked up, squinting at them. "That sounded more like Leo. Am I right?"

"We're both Leo." Leo said, promptly. Then allowed, "But yes, it's the original Leo."

"That's kinda cool." Mikey told them, watching with attentive eyes. "Your whole body language changes. And your voice a bit too. Are you both sharing right now?"

"I was trying to force Sensei to eat the veggies but he's being slow." Leo complained, inspecting the fork in their hand and immediately making it feel weird and out of place.

Sensei rolled their eyes. He pointedly stabbed another green bean and wrestled the control back of the fork to get it moving properly.

Mikey was still watching, phone abandoned to the side. He asked, curious, "Is it hard? To be sharing a body?"

"It's interesting." Sensei hedged. "It's taken a bit of trial and error. We're still working on it."

"Are you worried you won't get your own body back?"

Sensei squished a mushroom with his fork, keeping his head down. He wasn't sure how to answer that. He wasn't really thinking about it as getting his own body -- his body was decomposing twenty years in the future. If Sensei wasn't here, then he'd be dead.

"Now he's brooding." Leo complained, catching the drift and course-correcting, the fork loose in their fingers.

"Right. You died." Mikey said, tightly. "Sorry."

Sensei waved him off, throat tight, and stared down the remaining vegetables on their plate. He felt like he might choke if he took another bite. Kill them both.

'And we're done.' Leo placed the fork down and set the plate aside. 'Stop freaking out in front of Mikey, you're going to make him feel bad for asking.'

Leo said out loud for Mikey, "Thanks for dinner, Miguel. It was awesome."

Mikey gave a hesitant smile. "You're welcome. Do you want any more?"

"Nah, we're pretty tired." Leo leaned back into his pillows, fighting the exhaustion and the annoyance at being trapped in his bed.

"Okay. Sorry for asking, Sensei."

Sensei swallowed and gave an 'ok' hand before retreating away from the front entirely.

Mikey still looked vaguely guilty. Leo patted the mattress beside him in invitation. "Do you want to watch something? I'll probably fall asleep, but you can put on whatever."

Mikey didn't hesitate to hop up. "Do you wanna see this cool time-lapse graffiti channel I found?"

"Sure."

Leo watched maybe five minutes before he was asleep. The downside of drifting off so early was that at 3AM he was wide awake. Mikey had moved to sleep on the cot, likely to be closer to the wall-charger as the repetitive beat of the time-lapse music echoed from his phone. Leo stared at the rise and fall of his chest for a minute.

The sleepy feeling was still there but it didn't submerge him again. Leo begrudgingly opened his phone, checking his social media then Snapchat. Hueso had sent an equally black screen. Raph sent his feet in the dojo. April also sent Raph's feet in the dojo, which was obviously meant to be a joke capitalizing on his predictability. Mikey sent a snap of his chicken soaked in barbecue sauce. Donnie sent nothing.

'snap or we'll lose our streak.' Leo sent, because he was also predictable.

Donnie read it immediately. He did not respond.

A knife wrenched into Leo's gut. He never dealt well with fighting with Donnie. Not when it was real. They fought about stupid, competitive and meaningless bullshit all the time. Second nature, almost recreationally. But when it was actually arguing? Leo just wanted to get on his hands and knees and beg for his twin back.

He didn't know how to fix this. But he knew he wasn't about to take it lying down. Leo got up and quietly fumbled for his crutch.

'Don't wake Mikey.' Sensei chided, steadying their hand.

'Not going to stop me?' Leo asked.

'Do you think that somehow in the future I stop being you? Of course we need to go talk to Donnie.'

Hm. Leo more thought that with the whole 'being the leader of the resistance' thing he'd become more of a stickler.

'I took the job because no one else wanted it.' Sensei told him. 'I didn't think I could do it. Every day I waited for the more capable person to step up and take the job. And every day I got up and had to do it myself.

'Not Raph?' Leo asked.

'Raph was dead.' Sensei reminded him, gentler.

'How long ago did he die?'

'Depends on which direction we're measuring time.' Sensei told him, the sickest kind of amused. 'It would be seven years from now, or thirteen years ago for me.'

A hard lump formed in Leo's throat. 'That's a long time.'

'It was a very long time.' Sensei agreed. 'Are we visiting Donnie or not?'

Right. Leo shook his head, clearing it, and crept out of his room. The crutch clicked on the lair hall. It was dark. Leo was alone.

'You're not alone.' Sensei reminded him.

'Just me, myself, and I.' Leo replied, shakily.

Sensei kept their grip on the crutch stable. And made it to Donnie's lab. As they approached, the door unlocked and slid open automatically.

"Do you have cameras in the hallway?" Leo asked, as he came in.

Donnie was hunched over his work table, carefully soldering wires together. "Is that a rhetorical question?"

Leo got closer and inspected the tight-knit and complicated wires. He tiredly dragged Donnie's abandoned desk chair and curled up in it, leaning his crutch against the table. He didn't answer, watching his twin work for a few minutes.

"Is the knock-off here too?" Donnie asked, not looking up from his delicate wire work.

"Is that a rhetorical question?" Leo replied, blinking slow and drained, leaning cheek on his palm.

Donnie ignored the bite back. He said, "Can we talk without him?"

Leo blinked drowsily. He asked sedatedly, 'If you go dark will that drag us both down?'

'It does tend to.' Sensei admitted. 'I could just not contribute.'

'Do you really think he wouldn't know?'

'Hm. Fair point.'

"Don't know." Leo said out loud. "If he goes dark it makes me want to as well. He's offered to just not contribute, if you want."

"I suppose that will have to do." Donnie muttered. He did not stop his intent wirework, but he did flick his goggles up on his head and glance once at Leo before returning to his laser focus.

"You're mad at me too." Leo said after another minute of watching him work and not even try to start the conversation.

"Too." Donnie parroted, in a mocking voice. "So you were fighting with Angelo."

"Less fighting, more letting him rant at me." Leo shrugged, picking at the edge of the blue bracelet on his wrist, the paint on his nails matching the colour where it wasn't already chipped.

"You're an idiot." Donnie said.

Leo could've laughed. His grounding was probably an unsteady one-two but he didn't volunteer it. His numb lips tweaked in a rueful smile. "Tell me something I don't know."

"Vultures vomit battery acid when threatened." Donnie said promptly.

"... you're right, I didn't know that." Leo admitted.

Another moment of quiet. Donnie's hand finally went still, but he didn't look up.

Then Donnie said, "I thought you might have brain damage."

"Wow Donnie." Leo said, because he didn't want to deal with that. "Just because I'm gay--"

"Shut up." Donnie grit through his teeth. "Why didn't you tell me?"

There wasn't an easy answer to the question that was going to make Donnie happy. Leo really wanted to make Donnie happy and he was upset that there wasn't some quick solution to do so, and got defensive. "I actually don't have to tell you everything, Donathan."

"We're twins." Donnie said, staring at the mess of wires and not him, hands closing into tight fists. Pulling the twin card just to weaponize it, the asshole. "And I was in charge of your care while our stupid medic was incapacitated. You should've told me."

"Well. I didn't." Leo wasn't looking at him either, tight with tension and feeling his grip on reality getting weaker, like catching fish barehanded. Slippery. Wiggly. Weird.

"What am I supposed to do with that?" Donnie demanded, sharp, thumping his hard fist against the table and making all the tiny tools jump. Leo flinched.

Darkness flashed over Donnie's expression and he got up rapidly. Leo's heart flew into his throat, but all Donnie did was fetch a rubix cube. He retook the seat across from Leo and nimbly flicked through the algorithms and solved it in ninety seconds. Then he started again.

Leo watched him, trying to breathe and ground and get through. It was hard. After Donnie solved the cube three times he finally spoke again, voice very controlled and monotone, "You haven't told me anything that I need to fix things. You didn't inform me of the other being in your head. You didn't inform me of your dum dum plan to sacrifice yourself. You still haven't even told me how you lost your arm."

"Easy." Leo switched to laying his only arm on the table, resting his chin on it and giving Donnie a winning smile. "I was trying to answer the philosophical question of 'what's the sound of one hand clapping?'"

'That's a really good one but I don't think Donnie will appreciate it right now.' Sensei contributed despite his promise, because he was a Leo and of course he wasn't about to shut up for long.

The stone expression on Donnie's face said that was true and he did not appreciate it. "Come back when you actually want to talk."

"Aw, Don, I do." Leo whined, because he hated this and he wanted to be good with Donnie again.

"You don't understand that I'm actually really pissed at you." Donnie snapped. "I want you to take this seriously."

"I always take you seriously." Leo responded, because he did, his mouth just said shit and maybe it'd be better if he cut his tongue out. A lovely little intrusive thought of doing just that came into his mind. His stomach curdled a bit in response.

"Do you get why I'm upset about your copycat?" Donnie prompted.

Leo opened and closed his mouth but yet again he didn't have a good answer that wasn't a shitty joke. He was frustrated with himself and felt like he couldn't fix anything, even if he tried.

"Did you even think about what I was going to do on our birthday?" Donnie said, and it was almost non-sensical.

Leo blinked at him, mystified.

Donnie threw his hands up. "Of course not. Think about it and tell me when you actually want to talk, because I'm not listening to you say platitudes you don't mean or jokes I don't want to hear when I'm genuinely upset with you. Goodbye."

The goodbye was firm, in the same cadence Donnie always did when he reached the end of his rope of a social interaction and wanted everyone to leave him alone.

So Leo fumbled for the crutch and left.

When he limped back to his room, Mikey stirred, murmuring, "Okay?"

"Bathroom." Leo said, shortly, and crawled back into bed. He pulled the blankets over his head.

Chapter Text

Leo waited to hear Mikey's breath even out again. His heart beat in his ears, almost too loud. It was the middle of the night. The fan was running in the corner of the room. He was sick of the people he loved being mad at him. He knew he deserved it. He didn't understand why he always ruined everything.

'Do you remember why we became a medic?' Sensei asked, almost sudden.

'Yeah.' Leo replied, wary, 'I wanted to help.'

'But do you remember the first time we got the med kit out?'

 The sense memory was both of theirs at once. A little five-year-old Leo, who fell and hurt his wrist trying to skateboard.

Their dad loved them so much, but when Leo was little sometimes he didn't get out of bed. His wrist hurt so bad, but Leo couldn't get him up. So Leo dug through the cupboards to find the med kit and took care of it himself. Once he realized it was an option, he helped his siblings too, when they needed it.

Leo took on the role of healer as a way to help his struggling family. He knew this. He wasn't bitter, if anything he was sympathetic more now that he knew how much Splinter had lost.

'Dad always loved us. He always did his best.' Leo defended, because he loved his dad.

'I'm not attacking Splinter, you know I'm just as much of a daddy's boy as you.' Sensei raised his hand, truly not sounding accusing. 'I'm just trying to answer your question.'

Leo furrowed his brow. 'Which question? Why I always ruin everything?'

'Why you find your own actions frustrating.' Sensei amended. 'It was something I learnt as I grew older and took on more responsibilities and really looked at my behaviour and what I was actually afraid of.'

Leo breathed slowly. He wasn't really sure he wanted to know the answer to this, because it just seemed like it was probably going to upset him. Leo always ended up saying or doing the wrong things and beating himself up for it later. Knowing why wasn't going to make that better.

'Just listen.' Sensei calmed. 'As children we rely on others to survive so it encodes us with social connection as a basic fundamental necessity. So being ignored is hard to pin down as a problem since an absence isn't as easily noticeable, and has no end date.'

'I thought you weren't attacking Splinter.' Leo told him dryly, heart still thudding, trying not to think about the endless sight of his father not turning his head even when Leo tugged on his sleeve.

'I'm not. I'm saying, you experienced this social pain, that you couldn't complain of because it wasn't physical and it felt ever-lasting. You developed a way to avoid experiencing more. You don't want to be ignored. You want to seem perfect and untouchable so no one abandons you. You deflect with jokes. As you grew up, you tried to be something you felt your family needed, as you constantly compared yourself to our brothers and wanted to prove yourself to be someone who can be loved.'

Leo's whole body was beginning to shake. He snarked, 'What the fuck, dude. You're just going to come in my house and analyze me like this?'

'I'm just analyzing myself.' Sensei shrugged. 'We just happen to share a childhood. I'm really not saying Splinter was a bad dad. He loved us so much. But that doesn't mean he was always there for us.'

'Can you please shut the fuck up?' Leo asked, way too close to dissociating now.

Sensei shut up.

'I didn't ask.' Leo told him eventually. 'I seriously did not ask.'

'I'm telling you because when Donnie wants to know why you didn't tell him about me, you'll actually have an answer this time.'

'What, because I'm the only one who got fucked up by Dad?'

'Look at Raph for ten seconds and tell me that's true. And no. That you have a fear of social pain.'

'That's not it.'

'Okay, then why? I couldn't have stopped you from telling Donnie about me if you really wanted to. So why didn't you?'

Leo was suffocating in the blankets, hot from condensation. He wrestled one-armed from the cocoon and burst into the cool room, into reality, feeling the full blast of the fan and the sudden unmuffle of noise. Mikey was breathing in slow cadence, the music still playing softly from his phone. It was dark, the shadows cross-cut by his faithful nightlight, the hang of a poster half-fallen from the wall, the restless body-warmth on his mattress.

'I didn't say anything about you because I didn't know what they would think.' Leo admitted, after a hard moment of thought that was painful and sore. 'Which I suppose would be a fear of rejection. But knowing that doesn't make me any better equipped to deal with it.'

'We do things we're afraid of all the time. We just do it scared.' Sensei told him.

Leo grumbled and flopped into another position, trying to settle. His arm ached, it was distracting. He didn't know how the hell he would have a better conversation with Donnie but leaving things unfinished with his twin made him want to claw his skin off.

The two of them laid there uncomfortably for a while longer. Leo didn't really want to continue this stupid train of thought with Sensei but it wasn't like there was anything better to do. He asked, 'What the hell did Donnie mean by our birthday?'

Sensei went still. Then he sighed. 'If I answer this question, it might make you slip.'

'Awesome.' Leo braced himself. 'Okay. Go.'

'Remember when I said that sometimes being a twin was the worst thing that ever happened to me?'

'Yup. Still salty over it, actually. What the fuck was up with that? If you're me, then Donnie is the best. Always has been, always will be.' Leo defended, sharp like a knife and relentless. He loved all his brothers, to the literal end of the world but Donnie was his ride-or-die. Donnie was his mirror. Donnie was his better half.

'Being a twin is the worst when you're not a twin anymore.' Sensei said.

The train in Leo's mind came to a crashing stop. He whirled on Sensei, eyes huge, and felt the echoed heartache bounce between them in a terrible feedback loop.

'Ah.' Leo said, realizing.

Sensei's face was truly painful to look at. Haunted. 'I lost my Donnie. And I do mean lost, because I never actually got his body back. I always thought that burying Raph was hard but it's absolutely nothing compared to the feeling of losing someone and not actually knowing if they were gone. He'd been missing for two years when I died.'

Leo's body felt numb. Tears streaked down Sensei's face, an unstoppable force.

Sensei's voice cracked as he kept going, 'That's two birthdays without him. I know exactly what Donnie's talking about because I've lived that reality. And I can tell you that I might as well have been dead because there was no greater hell than that.'

Leo knew. He was crying too, because his whole numb body could feel the waves of devastation, the never-ending grief and solitude and fear and misery.

'If you never saw his body, do you know he was actually dead?' Leo whispered, horrified.

'He was dead.' Sensei covered his face, shaking with tears. 'I know he was dead because there is no universe where he's alive and he didn't come back to me. But it didn't make stopping looking for him any easier.'

Leo couldn't imagine. And yet he could, because he could feel it, and it hurt worse than anything. Worse than losing an arm. Worse than any perceived social pain. Worse than dying.

They were standing under the tree. The roots were deep into the void, and the branches were just inverse roots dug into the ceiling, buried in the mist. Their feet were both encased in murky shadows. They stood facing each other. It was terrible in the void, as if they couldn't breathe.

'I wish that didn't happen to you.' Leo said after a moment, because nothing else would make it better, and he could feel exactly how much it wasn't okay.

'I do too.' Sensei agreed, wiping at his snotty nose and sniffing hard. He just looked so pathetic, Leo couldn't stay back anymore. He charged across the void, feet struggling from the heavy murk and kicking up shadows, managing to collide with Sensei in a crushing hug.

Sensei clutched Leo to his chest and squeezed, body shaking with sobs, trying to pull himself up. Trying to be better for this kid who deserved better --

'Will you shut up already?' Leo demanded, pressing his forehead harder into Sensei's plastron.

'I also don't want me to do be doing what I'm doing.' Sensei curled his fingers against Leo.

Leo hummed, swaying them back and forth, ankle deep in heavy darkness. The silhouetted tree swaying in nothing-wind, harbouring them in the shore of the void. Thick stable roots knotted together, a robust trunk and spidered limbs. Time stood still. They both cried.

Then pulled away, and said in unison, 'Gross,' as they wiped their own faces. Then Leo laughed, a hoarse and sparkling sound that made the shade seem just a little lighter.

'Sorry.' Sensei said, scrubbing furiously at his face. 'Fuck, I knew this would happen.'

'We got this.' Leo flexed his arm, face still streaked with tears, a watery-goofy grin. 'Come on. We'll punch back out in no time. Our powers combined, right oyaji?'

'Oh, definitely not calling me that.' Sensei complained, but obligingly gave Leo a flex. They were both distracted from their goal of grounding as Leo oo'ed and aah'ed at Sensei's impressive bicep.

Then the two sat cross-legged and meditated. Sensei was wavering and weak and Leo was tired and lost, but they scaffolded off each other and managed to wiggle their toes. The sensation of a weight against their body was surprising.

Leo ran his mind up his limbs. Something was tangled around him, clutching tight, and for a weird moment he wondered if they'd managed to translate their mental hug into reality. But no, it was a real hug, and the familiar leathery feeling under his fingers --

That woke Leo up fast. Because that meant he was hugging Donnie, and he definitely wanted to present for that.

Warmth, surrounding him. The soothing smell of lavender as Donnie hated most scented things due to sensory reasons, but always made an exception for lavender things to upkeep his purple aesthetic.

If Donnie initiated the touch then it was safe to nuzzle in closer, drawing the warmth into his heart like a heat lamp directly into his soul.

As he tightened the hold, Donnie muttered, "Leon?"

"Hey D." Leo mumbled back, trying to get feeling back into his numb face, cranking his sore jaw. He'd been clenching his teeth. There was crust on his face, he must've been crying in real life too. That was unfortunate.

"What are all the bones in the hand?"

Leo's brain slowly turned gears, fighting the grey on the edge of his vision as he stared into Donnie's shoulder. He understood the question after a moment, even if he didn't understand the motivation for asking. He said, slowly, "Phalanges, metacarpals, or carpals?"

"Let's hear the carpals."

Ah, the more complicated cluster at the base of the wrist. Phalanges were easy, it was just all the fingers with the distal, middle or proximal portion. He mentally tried to summon the diagram in his mind from the medical textbooks, which he'd forced Donnie to test him with flashcards to make sure he'd memorized them.

He had a bunch of dumb mnemonics for all of them. "Trapezium and trapezoid are right by the thumb... trapped by the thumb. Then the scaphoid underneath because it 'holds'. Triquetrum is between three other carpals, thus the 'tri'. Hamate like Hamato, I don't have a good mnemonic for that but it's by the pinky. Hm." Leo wracked his brain.

"One was something about the moon." Donnie reminded him.

"Lunate! Oh, and the other one had some stupid thing about a baseball cap. Sensei, don't tell me, I'll remember." Leo added, feeling Sensei lingering and wanting to say it. "Cap... capitate?"

'That's right.' Sensei said.

Donnie hummed. He sounded a little disturbed, but he didn't comment on Sensei, instead he asked, "What's your grounding, Nardo?"

Leo realized the reason for the question now. "You tricked me, you sly dog. Two."

"It's not a trick, it's a legitimate scientific method." Donnie curled closer, inhaling through his nose. Leo leaned into the touch, like they were two halves finally made whole again.

"What time is it?"

"Hasn't been too long. It's about lunchtime. It took us a while to realize you weren't just sleeping." Donnie's fingers creaked as his grip tightened. "It was not my intention to trigger you when we spoke last night."

"Oh, it wasn't your fault." Leo huffed, sinking into the comfort of the hug. He missed this so much. "That was the lovely old man in my head telling me exactly what a birthday without your twin would be like."

Donnie went rigid. The tense atmosphere leaked.

Leo held on tighter, afraid Donnie might draw away. Then realized leathery shell under his hand was just past the boundary of the tank top, a strange uneven texture to the shell. He was not so stupid as to use this moment as a time to try and get him to inspect it, and instead shifted his hand, settling on Donnie's neck instead. He didn't want people touching it, he'd said.

When Donnie didn't say anything else, Leo tried again, desperately wanting to fix things between them, "So I get now, what you meant when you said that. In the worst way possible, but I'm sorry. I didn't think."

"I know you didn't think." Donnie said, very tightly. "Or at least, you thought about what you felt was the right thing to do. I know that you value our lives above all else, because you are brave and compassionate. Everyday you have shown us how important we are to you. But why do you not consider how important you are to us?"

The way that Donnie spoke was so measured and logical it was impossible to deny, even as Leo's whole body wanted to scream out, wanted to defend his decision. It was a leader's choice to prioritize their safety over his own.

But how could he open his mouth and defend that when he felt exactly the pain he'd be giving Donnie by doing so?

"Because I'm an idiot." Leo said, after a long moment.

'That's not the right answer.' Sensei told him.

Donnie gave an annoyed huff. "We already know that. Try again."

'Why does everyone keep throwing this stupid sacrifice thing back in my face?' Leo whined, already done with being raked over coals for it.

'Focus.' Sensei reminded him.

"I don't know what you want me to say." Leo told him. "Tell me what to say to make this better and I will."

"The next time you need to make a decision that will affect me so much I want you to consult me on it." Donnie snapped, losing his composure and whacking Leo a little with a hand unintentionally with a flickering stim. "We are a team, Leonardo."

"I'm the leader." Leo pointed out, because sometimes leaders made unilateral decisions for the sake of the everyone.

"I'm not talking about the Mad Dogz." Donnie said through gritted teeth. "I'm talking about you and me. The disaster twins. Two for one. Buy one get one free. You don't get to decide things on my behalf like that. And you don't get to have something in your head without telling me too. That's not how this works. That's never been how this works."

"You just don't like Sensei." Leo couldn't stop digging himself in a deeper hole, but it was hard.

"I don't know the sham." Donnie corrected.

"He's me, Don."

"Not my Leo."

"He lost his twin."

Silence. Leo pulled back far enough to see Donnie's face, which was not very kind, blank and unforgiving.

"He's here?" Donnie asked, monotone.

Leo nodded a little.

Donnie completely disentangled, putting an arm's length between them. He said, "Let me talk to him."

'Batter up.' Leo told him.

'Nope.' Sensei made a buzzer sound. 'No thank you.'

Leo rolled his eyes and blinked his twin back into focus. "Oh, he does not want to."

"Fine, I will just tell him." Donnie set his jaw, brow low and tight. "I do not have ill will towards you. However I am wary of a foreign entity, even if you claim to be an older version of my brother. And yes, I know you have theoretically proven yourself through Splinter. I prefer more data points if possible."

"Is there a point to this speech, Dontron?" Leo asked dryly, idly rubbing his opposite shoulder. The healing stump was really itchy and sore today.

"He's not my Leo. I'm not his Donnie. We have nothing in common." Donnie said, pulling his rhythmically twitching hand closer to his chest and scowling.

Sensei sighed deeply and reluctantly took the front. Leo immediately stepped back, glad not to be part of this shitshow conversation for even a minute.

Inhale. A couple blinks to adjust to the light. The scowl deepened on Donnie's face as he recognized the change. Sensei said, "I have said to Leo many times since the beginning that you are all not my brothers. I know that you are not my twin. I don't want you to be my twin, because he spent almost twenty years suffering through an apocalypse. If there was a button to eject me from Leo's head, I would click it in an instant."

Something flinted in Donnie's expression. "You would?"

"Yes." Sensei said, no loopholes. "I didn't ask to be here. I don't want to take over his life."

"Hm. That is enlightening." Donnie nodded. "I appreciate that. Give me Leo back now."

Leo whined. But took the front back, immediately returning to rubbing his stump, a little grumpy and sore. At least when he was away from the front it wasn't so distracting.

For a moment, he breathed, then flicked his eyes up to look at Donnie. They had a momentary stand off.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Donnie asked, plain, searching.

Leo didn't want to answer. He thought about the stupid conversation with Sensei. The same fear that kept him from saying anything now, the urge to make a joke and deflect away on the tip of his tongue. He never knew how to tell his brothers when things hurt him because he was afraid it would make it worse.

When Leo failed to speak, Donnie sighed and turned away.

Panic thundered. He just wanted them to be okay. Leo blurted, "I was scared."

Then averted his eyes in shame, feeling it burn his cheeks. That was always his stupid answer. He hated himself for it.

Donnie didn't volunteer anything else, waiting for Leo to elaborate. He didn't want to, didn't want to, didn't want to.

He did anyway. He did it scared. "It's not that I don't trust you. I trust you more than I trust me. It's that I get all caught up and anxious about... I don't know."

Leo was not about to start explaining Sensei's social pain bullshit. But he didn't have to. Donnie's voice said a rough little, "Yeah. Well. Tell your dum-dum brain that your trust in me should be more powerful than your fear in everything else. Got it?"

"I'll work on that." Leo swallowed, giving a wobbly smile.

"Acceptable." Donnie nodded and opened his arms again in invitation.

"You sure? Your shell..." Leo didn't want to look a gift spider in the mouth but the genius had literally been pushing people away from his shell for weeks.

"I'm not thinking about it right now." Donnie said firmly.

"Is it still injured?" Leo was sick to think that Donnie's shell might be festering.

"I'm not thinking about it right now." Donnie repeated, then reached over to flick Leo's forehead. "I'm not an idiot, I'm not out here to give myself an infection. It has healed from the injuries."

Leo searched his face, trying to figure out the problem.

"Hug offer will expire soon." Donnie threatened.

Leo resigned himself to having the discussion later. He surged forward and hugged Donnie again with full force.

Donnie oofed and pat his shell, burying his nose in Leo's shoulder. After a moment, he thoughtfully said, "You know, I'm still not discrediting demon possession, even if it's a version of you. I've always found you a bit demonic."

They kicked him. Donnie laughed, a bit hoarse, and held on. Leo held on. It loosened something in his chest, something dangerous and scared.

"I just didn't want you to hate me." Leo rasped, and squeezed his eyes shut at the admission, too close to his heart. Laid bare.

"You are not actually an idiot, don't pretend to be one." Donnie scoffed.

"Sorry." Leo muttered.

Donnie squeezed him so hard it made him wheeze then laugh. He tried to squeeze back but his only arm felt weak.

"Love you, D." Leo whispered.

"I love you very much, Leo." Donnie replied, a little monotone but packed with heart. "Tell me next time. I need all the information. It doesn't matter what it is. If you kill a guy, I'll help you bury him."

Leo gave a wheezing laugh.

There was a tap on the door and Splinter leaned in. Immediately his face softened exponentially, and he gave a fond little chuckle. "Suddenly I am fifteen years in the past, and I have two little twin babies who refuse to let go of each other."

"Shut up, Dad." Leo and Donnie said, simultaneously, then laughed, curling closer like they might be pried apart.

Splinter crossed the room on silent feet, coming to lay a hand on each of their foreheads. Leo turned up a smile, eyes crinkled, and Donnie leaned into the touch with his eyes shut.

"Are you feeling okay?" Splinter asked.

"Two." Leo verbalized, since his hand was too tied up to answer with sign. It was a fun little role reversal after weeks of non-verbal communication.

When Donnie didn't answer, Splinter prompted, "That was a royal you."

"Oh, I am just fine, Papa." Donnie sounded mystified he'd even been asked.

"And I was born yesterday." Splinter said, in a grave and wise voice, that was half-mocking, half concerned. "Michelangelo says you haven't eaten. And Raphael says you haven't slept."

"Snitches get stitches." Donnie muttered, turning to hide his face in Leo's arm.

Splinter stroked his thumb on Donnie's brow line and said, "You must take care of yourself, Purple."

"I am just fine, Papa." Donnie repeated, stubborn.

"Ah yes, because you frequently cuddle with Blue when you are well."

Leo snorted.

"It's for Leon's sake, not my own." Donnie sniped back, muffled, still hiding. Probably the biggest red flag.

Splinter knew that and merely said, "Hm."

"Leave me alone." Donnie protested.

"Silly turtles." Splinter said fondly. "Is it lunchtime for silly turtles. Orange is away with Draxum, unfortunately, but your father can surely microwave some soup."

"Hot soup." Donnie and Leo recited, together, and giggled immediately.

"Hot soup." Splinter agreed, leaning over to kiss each forehead, even Donnie's half-hidden one. "Will you eat if I bring it to you?"

Leo knew exactly what he had to say, "I'll eat if Donnie does."

"Curse you, fiend, do not weaponize my love for you." Donnie bemoaned.

"Ha ha, you love me." Leo sing-songed.

"Silly turtles." Splinter reiterated, getting up. "I will return. If you run and hide Purple don't think that I won't find you."

Splinter was always the nuclear option in hide-and-seek. Donnie groaned again, still not unburying his face. Splinter left.

"I don't want to hear it." Donnie said, grumpy.

"You don't want to hear what? That you're a genius and you should know that avoiding food and sleep is a really stupid idea?" Leo told him, turning his side of the hug into more of a stranglehold.

Donnie urk-ed and dug his fingers into Leo, pressing his teeth against his skin in a warning that he would bite. They had a momentary stand off. The rough-housing was two seconds away, but Leo's arm was sore and he didn't really want to accidentally jostle it. Donnie must've been tired because he didn't escalate either.

"I'll try to eat." Donnie allowed, after a long minute.

Leo loosened his death-grip. "Mm, 'sall I want."

Donnie got up and immediately started to dig through Leo's drawers. He stole a blue hoodie and pulled in on over his loose tank top, obsessively tugging it over his shell, fingers twitching. Then he dragged a folding table over just in time for Dad to teeter in with three soup bowls.

"You're staying?" Donnie said.

"I have twenty minutes until my show is on." Splinter replied, tossing a Gatorade bottle at the bed. "So you better both make a good effort before then."

"Or what?" Donnie said, eyeing his soup with visible distaste.

"Do you want to find out?" Splinter asked, tail twitching behind him.

Donnie had the look that said he was fairly confident he could take whatever Splinter was threatening.

"It's miso." Leo tempted, spooning the salty broth. Sensei joined the front, stealing the tofu for himself.

"I want it on the record that I complying under duress." Donnie stated, hunching over his bowl with a scowl. He made no move to take the spoon, having some Gatorade to delay further.

"Statement noted and discarded." Splinter scoffed, picking up his own bowl and forgoing any utensils to drink directly from the lip in one large slurp.

Sensei very helpfully consumed all the tofu from the broth. Donnie had a stare-down with his bowl, spooning unenthusiastically and not making any move to put any in his actual mouth.

'I wish I could give you to Donnie for five minutes so you could eat the tofu for him too.' Leo complained, aware that he was helpless to actually force his twin to eat.

Sensei reached over with his spoon to try and steal a piece of tofu from Donnie's bowl. It was immediately smacked away with a hiss, and Donnie finally actually took a sip.

'Nothing like invoking the Cain instinct to override everything else.' Sensei told him, fondly.

'You liar, you just wanted more tofu.' Leo laughed, then spoke out loud, "Dad, can I have more?"

Chapter Text

Splinter brought two bowls of seconds while Donnie struggled with his first. But he did eat most of it, even if there was still a thin layer of salty broth at the bottom that he made no move to finish. He was typing on his phone and reported that April was asking if Leo was up to visitors today.

"Casey?" Leo asked, a little hesitant. He was a stable two, but if Casey was going to come around then Sensei would probably drag him back down.

"Raph is with Casey at the moment. It's actually April's mother, Carol." Donnie said.

"Oh yes." Leo replied immediately. "I wanna meet her! I'm so jealous you got to first."

"I was fairly sleep deprived when I met her." Donnie said, wrinkling his nose.

"How is that different from right now?"

Donnie tried to kick him, but Leo grabbed his leg and almost tipped him over instead.

"I am going to watch my show." Splinter said loudly, taking the mostly empty bowls with him. "If you kill each other then you're cleaning the floor."

"If we kill each other how can we clean -- and he's gone." Donnie wrestled his leg back into his own possession. "I will let April know that she can bring her mother over. Just tell me if it gets too much."

"Pish posh." Leo dismissed, because he'd wanted to meet Carol for years. He called her on the phone a bunch of times, especially when he first came out as gay because she'd sent along a bunch of rainbow shit with April and immediately endeared herself to Leo.

He didn't want to meet her while in bed and insisted on getting up and properly dressed. Donnie already had his favourite hoodie, so he put on a t-shirt, frowning at the empty arm hole for a minute. Was it vain to dislike looking lop-sided?

'Are we pretending we're not vain?' Sensei said, amused.

Since Sensei was sharing the front with him, Leo reached up and flicked himself in the forehead.

'Ow.' Sensei said.

"Should I be concerned?" Donnie asked, from the other side of the room, where apparently he'd been watching.

"Sensei's just being a smartass." Leo defended.

"Well he is you." Donnie said, his humor a little hesitant, like he wasn't sure he wanted to make the joke or not.

Leo grinned, glad that Donnie was warming up to the demon in his head. "Does Carol know about Sensei, by the way?"

"I think so." Donnie looked back down at his phone. "April's wondering when they can tell Casey."

'Don't you dare run.' Leo threatened, as the lurch of Sensei trying to escape the conversation. The older turtle retreated out of the front, but didn't go into the void at least. Baby steps. Leo verbalized, tightly, "We're working on it. Not yet."

They moved to the kitchen to meet with April and Carol, who said she was bringing something that would work best with a table. Leo was sitting on that table, legs swinging and eagerly waiting.

"Hamato Leonardo, it's great to finally meet you in person." April's mother said as she came in, grinning from ear to ear and unhesitatingly coming for a hug.

Carol was tall and had a hug like a steel trap. Her smile was contagious and she was wearing a fuzzy sweater with lots of colourful jewellery. There were rhinestones on her glasses that sparkled in the light.

"Carol O'Neil!" Leo exclaimed, practically bouncing when she held him at arm's length. "You are taller than I thought."

"And you're more of a turtle than I thought." She said, but winked when she said it, so it was okay.

"And you're a human! It's fine, I love humans. I'm half human on my father's side."

"Isn't your father a rat?"

April laughed and inserted herself in. "Come on, Mom, let him breathe."

"I'm fine." Leo said, undeniably giddy. "What did you bring? Why do we need a table?"

Carol pulled out a pack of cards and a bag of candy. "I was trying to think of something that didn't take much energy and you could do with one hand that was still fun. Have you ever played poker?"

Leo cackled with glee. "Yes! I love this game! Especially since I'm great at lying and Donnie's terrible at it."

"There are other strategies." Donnie said tightly, poking Leo off the table and into a chair.

"Donnie, don't count cards." April chided.

"What?" Donnie gasped dramatically. "I would never count cards."

"You're right, he is terrible at lying." Carol said idly, setting up the candies for poker chips.

Leo barked a pleased laugh as Donnie put a mock-offended hand to his chest.

April took the green candies. "What colour do you want, Don?"

"April O'Neil we were assigned colours at birth, what colour do you think I want."

"No need to be a smartass about it." April threw a couple purple ones at him, then immediately pushed his chair to the side and took his spot beside Leo. "No way we're letting the disaster twins sit beside each other. They smuggle each other cards."

"Hey, sometimes to win, sometimes to mess with each other. It's a fifty-fifty shot." Leo defended.

"Leo always tries to give me every seven he picks up, regardless if I need it or not." Donnie said, counting his pile of candies.

They were wrapped sour gummies. Leo wanted to eat his already. He separated out the blue ones. Sensei said, idly, 'Casey accidentally grew up thinking all decks had six extra aces in them thanks to Donnie making frankendecks.'

Leo laughed again, amused at the unintentional gaslighting.

"Share with the class, Leonardo?" April said, leaning into his line of sight.

It startled Leo, and he gave a sheepish smile. "Oh, sorry. I forget you can't hear him. Um." He gave a nervous glance to Carol.

"April has informed me of your... unique situation." Carol said, delicately, separating out her own pink candies. "Sensei, we're calling him?"

It was weird as hell to share after spending so much time hiding him. Leo bit his lip around his smile and said, "He said that his Donnie accidentally made Casey think that all card decks had six extra aces."

"Oh, poor Casey." Carol laughed, as she'd been taking care of the kid for a few weeks now.

"Heh." Donnie said, not quite shaking his discomfort, but not pushing Sensei's contribution away either.

Carol was the dealer. They played Texas hold 'em. Donnie immediately won the first round, lording it over everyone. Leo took a picture on his phone and sent it as his Snapchat streak -- Donnie with his hands up, the weary bags under his eyes just overweighed by his confidence and colourful pile of candy.

Leo's attention span was not quite at 'winning poker' capability, but he enjoyed watching Donnie win. Leo folded most rounds, hoarding a small collection of blue candy and smuggling a couple into his mouth, dying his lips a damning blue. It was fine, because Carol's were an equal pink with a mischievous smile.

There was a small, inconvenient wasp nest living in his brain, making the it hard to stay focused on the task at hand. They played for just under an hour, at which point Leo completely lost track.

Carol gave April the rest of her candy to placate the fuming teenager who was accusing Donnie of multiple forms of cheating.

"Why don't you two settle this somewhere else, and I'll have a chat with Leo?" Carol suggested, in the way that adults do when it's not really an option.

"Oh, I brought that cassette tape I texted you about earlier." April said to Donnie, immediately flipping away from anger, patting her backpack.

"Yes, gimme." Donnie reached for it. "We'll be back in like ten minutes."

"Cassette tape?" Leo echoed, the two leaving the room and making Leo feel like he missed a step on the staircase.

"Something about measuring how crunchy certain sounds are." Carol explained.

That did sound like an April-and-Donnie project. "Right. What did you want to talk to me about?"

Carol offered her hand.

Leo took it, giving a squeeze and a reassuring smile. "Better not be worried about me."

"Better not." Carol chuckled a little. "You know, when April met you, she used to tell me that you couldn't come over because you all had a skin condition. I suppose she wasn't really wrong. But I did worry about you, thinking of little kids cooped up all the time. Especially after we talked on the phone and I heard how much life you had inside you."

The idea of Carol caring so much from his stupid phone calls hurt like his ribs were broken again, hard to breathe. "Yeah, well. We make our own fun."

"We do." Carol agreed, flicking a candy wrapper at him. "I've never been one to sit on my worry, I prefer action. I hope that you enjoyed the poker, even if maybe it was a little soon for something so intense."

The number of gifts she'd sent through April over the years proved her action-based worry. He smiled and said, "I had a great time, thanks."

Carol hesitated, adjusting her glasses, then leaned forward, "I don't like to sit on my worry. So I'm going to need you to do something about Sensei."

Leo's heart skipped a beat. For a moment, his immediate assumption was that she wanted him to kick Sensei out of his head. It surprised him how much he rebelled against that thought. Then he remembered that Carol was awesome and there was no way she was suggesting that. "What about Sensei?"

"April explained to me that he is the one hesitating for us to tell Casey. But I really need you to tell that boy you're here. He's suffering, Sensei. He needs you."

The room spun in a violent circle. Leo gripped the table edge, feeling ill, and turned inward to try and grapple Sensei.

'Holy fuck, dude, relax.' Leo said. 'You cannot freak out like this every time.'

'You know why.' Sensei snapped back.

'What the hell did you say to me earlier, mismo? So you're afraid. Do it afraid.'

Sensei's nose flared, but he bit back whatever response he was going to give. Leo grabbed him by the neck and dragged him to bonk their foreheads together.

'Then what?' Sensei asked, mirroring to cradle Leo's neck in return. A wash of uncertainty, how they'd deal with Casey when he was in Leo's body, if they were going to give Casey his dad back it couldn't just be just a little. But Sensei didn't want to take over Leo's life.

'Then we figure it out.' Leo said. 'You act like I don't wanna spend time with Casey too. He's great. You did a great job.'

'I can't take the credit.' Sensei scoffed, dropping his head down into Leo's shoulder and mumbling, 'He had six huge personalities raising him and somehow he was still the sweetest, strongest, most badass kid ever made.'

'Can you please stop freaking out and we can maybe work towards giving him back at least one of the six he lost, then?'

Sensei didn't say it out loud, but the mind echoed that he was the worst possible one.

Leo let go the half-hug to smack him, glaring.

Sensei laughed, surprised, burst with it. He said, 'Why are you so mean to me?'

'Why are you so mean to yourself?' Leo demanded.

Sensei's eyes softened. He said, 'Why are you?'

Neither of them had a good answer.

After a tense moment, Sensei sighed hugely. He said, 'I don't know how to do this.'

'What, you missed the memo on how to reunite with the kid you sent back in time who watched you die and now you're inhabiting your younger self? Damn, we've been having weekly meetings.' Leo said, horribly sarcastic.

'You think a good way to do this doesn't exist.' Sensei summarized.

'Well I can tell you that continuing to avoid doing it is, in fact, the wrong way.' Leo grabbed Sensei's shoulder and shook him.

Sensei let it happen. 'We should get back.'

'Wouldn't be a problem if someone didn't plunge us into the abyss the literal moment someone mentions Casey!'

'Let's not play the blame game.'

'But I'm so good at it.' Leo sighed, and pushed on the void. It rippled and stayed firm. 'Great. You broke us again.'

They begrudgingly set up to try grounding. Leo argued against deep breathing because it was boring and they attempted progressive relaxation. It didn't work.

'You've gotta calm down about this, dude, you're locking us in.' Leo said, feeling the unrelenting pressurized void desperate to keep them there, safe, where they didn't have to try.

'I can't.' Sensei repeated, agonized.

'Fine! Don't calm down! Suffer and die!' Leo threw his hand in the air.

Sensei covered his face with his hand. He muttered, 'Do it scared, do it scared you idiot.'

They breathed. Sensei struggled and struggled but put the work in. He took the time to try, to push.

It was noise that broke past the shroud first. Thud-thump. A shriek. Sensei blinked slow, feeling the grit of his dry eyes, the gross feeling in his mouth. They could use to brush their teeth. He was sitting in a soft chair, it smelt like Splinter and fur. There was a big blanket over his shoulders, a fluffy eye-sore orange one of Mikey's. He had a stuffed animal under his limp arm, judging by the size it was the Blahaj that Leo always stole the moment he stepped into Raph's room.

Another thud-thud-thump. Sensei could feel the itch-ache of their stump, decade-old annoying background noise. His jaw was sore, like he'd been clenching his teeth hard. For a moment, he focused on loosening the muscles there, flexing his jaw, staring straight.

Movement in and out of his sight-line. Donnie was standing, a big shirt hanging off him with 'enemy of the state' on the front, pointing dramatically at Raph. "Don't you dare."

"What's that? Suddenly I can't read." Raph said, and put Donnie in a headlock.

"We're having a verbal conversation!" Donnie shrieked, immediately barring his teeth.

Raph had years of experience and shoved Donnie's goggles down over his face before he could bite.

"What's going on?" Mikey's voice asked, from just out of Sensei's gaze.

"Donnie started a fight he can't finish." Raph said, undisturbed at the furious turtle he was handling. Donnie wiggled like an eel and managed to kick Raph in the head.

Mikey laughed, stepping into view. He had his spray-paint gear on, the puffy orange vest and the breather hanging around his neck. He said, "Need help?"

Donnie managed to catch purchase and dislodge Raph's iron grip, immediately darting away and hiding behind Mikey like a shield.

"Who says I was on your side?" Mikey asked, amused.

"You'd never turn on me. B-Team for life." Donnie said, confident, even as he warily eyed Raph from behind his littlest brother.

"Donnie hasn't slept in three days." Raph said.

Mikey's eyes went wide. He immediately turned on Donnie. "You what?"

"What are you, me?" Leo asked.

He surprised everyone in the room, whirling to face the armchair.

Leo had surfaced to find Sensei watching the shenanigans with misty, nostalgic eyes. And a fluffy blanket and a shark. They were both hunkered at the front, scaffolding their grounding together to try and stay in the room proper. It was hard, their body felt very off. Spinning.

"Hey look, it's Leo, let's focus on Leo." Donnie said, immediately moving towards the door.

Mikey tripped him mercilessly, sending Donnie sprawling. "That's it. Turtle pile. Now."

"It's only 6PM!"

"Doctor Delicate Touch says does it look like I care?"

Donnie deflated into the floor. He said, "Leon, back me up. Sleeping is for the weak."

"Hard pass."

Raph grabbed Donnie by the ankle and dragged him into the middle of the living room. Donnie whined, "I hate every single one of you slash j. No one touch my shell slash srs."

"Does it still hurt?" Raph asked, worried, peering at the back of the over-sized T-shirt.

"No. As I have said a thousand times, it has healed adequately with no infection. I am not so foolish as to lie about that." Donnie repeated, stubborn, brushing the edge of his collar and tugging hard.

"Then what's the issue?" Mikey started to grab all the blankets and pillows in the room and throw them in a pile.

"The issue is that I do not want anyone to touch my shell." Donnie said, through tight teeth.

"Why not?" Mikey asked.

"Because I said so. Stop fucking asking!" Donnie snapped, then hunched his shoulders higher, turning his head away.

Mikey made a sound and his heels were sharp when he stomped off.

"Don't." Donnie said harshly, when Raph opened his mouth. "I know. I know."

Mikey returned dragging all the pillows and blankets from the rest of the lair. His face was set and his stride was tight. He got close enough to Donnie to whack him in the face with a pillow, and said, cooly, "You're an asshole, Donnie."

Donnie exhaled through his nose, slow. "Sorry, Angelo. I do not wish to discuss it as it makes me uncomfortable. Just because you are a brat who cannot leave well enough alone doesn't mean I should be short with you. I am just tired and irritable."

"I've got a wild idea to fix that." Mikey said. "And it's fine, you're not the only asshole brother I've got, anyway."

"Hey." Raph said.

Leo was too woozy to argue if he'd be the other asshole. Mikey was probably still a bit mad at him.

The real hallmark of the B-Team was their capability to switch from fighting with each other to building an optimized blanket nest without missing a beat. They had an easy trust that nothing they could say or do would change their dynamic.

Hitch in breath. A sense memory.

The rumble of the apocalyptic floor, concrete beneath his feet, cracked and unstable. But the impromptu base they were in had a single warmth, a floating Mikey wrangled a mattress and a blanket, saying something scathing to Donnie who threw his head back and laughed.

They were hiding out for the night. Sensei leaned against the wall, trying to catch his breath from the heavy smoke inhalation he'd suffered, eyes half-lidded as he stared at the forever easy back-and-forth of Donnie and Mikey. He couldn't breathe.

Then the two turned, having made space for Sensei, and pulled him into their orbit. They fussed over him the whole night. And any other feeling he had fell away, leaving just the grit of dust and smoke in his teeth and the warmth, the tug back-and-forth between Donnie and Mikey that Sensei laid right in the middle of because they always had room for him too.

Leo blinked out it with a haunting sensation that he wanted to cough smoke from his lungs. He merely told Sensei, 'I know.'

'I know you know. But it's nice to remember.'

As if they knew the lines of their part to play, Donnie and Mikey turned as soon as they had the nest built up to draw Leo into their space. With the irreplaceable Raph already there, reclined back and flicking through the channels on the TV.

"Still with us, boss?" Mikey asked, wiggling his fingers in front of Leo's eyes.

Leo realized he'd been dazedly staring into the middle, just a bit lost, and shook his head to clear it. Everything spun. Dizzy.

"There he is!" Mikey said, pleased. "Knew you wouldn't go far when there's a turtle pile waiting."

"Pile." Leo echoed, intelligently.

"You got it, we're right here, we're holding Donnie hostage."

"I did not consent to this." Donnie said, bracing Leo on the other side as they pulled him from the armchair onto shaking legs and down again to settle on their nest. His stomach lurched a little at the movement.

"I know I'm not about to tell you the definition of the word hostage." Mikey said, cheery.

"Careful of his arm." Raph put in, eyes watching the transfer.

"It's hurting him again." Donnie added. "He keeps rubbing it."

"He's right here." Leo mumbled, because he hated it when they talked as if he wasn't in the room. Sure, he was halfway in the rafters at the moment, but still.

"It's hurting you again." Donnie told him directly. "Do you want painkillers?"

Leo wrinkled his nose. The pain was forefront and contributed to everything being strange and disorientating. He wanted to lie, but his tongue felt heavy to speak.

'Can I?' Sensei asked.

Leo allowed it. Sensei took the front and didn't lie, instead saying, "It's about a four, and very itchy. It gets distracting."

A long pause from his brothers, as a fleeting shadow passed Donnie's face. Mikey squinted. Raph ventured a guess, "Sensei?"

Leo kicked him out of the front and covered his face with his hand. "Jerk."

'He wouldn't have believed your lie anyway.'

'The lie is a part of my brand.'

"We're taking painkillers." Donnie decided, moving to fetch the med bag. "If you're back at a four."

Leo gave loud and dramatic groan, not moving to uncover his face. The room faintly spun, the void still right there, still on the edge of his vision. Donnie crouched in front of him a minute later with a bottle of Gatorade and a handful of pills.

"Leo." Donnie said, firmly, when he didn't move to take them.

"'m dizzy." Leo complained, quieter, not lifting his head.

Donnie waited. Raph shifted from where he was, a faint sound from Mikey. Leo's arm hurt. The solution was literally right in front of him. Sensei hovered, ready to help.

'Fine, whatever.' Leo moved over to give Sensei room to rejoin the front.

Sensei straightened up and held out his hand for the pills. He swallowed them dry then had a big mouthful of orange Gatorade to chase it. He squinted faintly forward, trying to focus their vision as the vertigo spun them. "Wow, that is dizzy."

"And it's the imposter again. How do you decide who's in control?" Donnie asked, voice curious despite the undeniable bite, eyes scanning their face and posture.

"He wanted me to front and take the pills because he was too dizzy to do it." Sensei blinked rapidly, trying to find any degree of steadiness as everything spun. "Yikes. Zero out of ten."

"Hot take, but try laying down." Mikey piped up from behind them.

Sensei turned to see that Raph had pulled Mikey into his arms, holding him close enough to nuzzle the littlest brother against his cheek. Mikey was inadvertently smearing leftover spray paint on Raph's face from where he was clinging in return.

The floor felt like it was moving further away from them. He also felt like they might throw up. He shut his eyes and focused really hard on not doing that. They hadn't eaten nearly enough to start puking.

"Leo?" A longer pause before Donnie spoke again, "Sensei?"

Sensei wanted to crack a smile at Donnie finally calling him by 'name'. Instead he said, slowly, "Any chance we've got ginger ale?"

"Ginger tea?" Donnie offered.

"Alright."

Donnie got up. Sensei breathed. Raph and Mikey muttered something quietly to each other, but didn't move to distract Sensei from his mission of not puking.

He was given tea. Sensei waited until the feel of the mug didn't burn his fingers then drank. Resolutely, determined to drag this body back. The hot liquid blazed a path down his throat and got the blood back to his brain. The nauseating dizziness abated a little, enough that he could eat the crackers and fruit that Donnie brought in addition to the tea. He trooped through the task like it was any other battle to win.

Leo only rejoined properly once the chore of eating was done. He grimaced at the hanging leftover feeling of vertigo, an echoing sensation trying to tug him back in. He squinted at the TV and said, "Why are we watching Animal Planet? Our lives are Animal Planet."

Some of the tension left his twin beside him. "Hi Leon. Is the dizziness better?"

"It's gross." Leo complained, rolling out his shoulders. "But yeah, it's not a carnival ride anymore."

He turned to find Mikey had pulled into his shell and was tucked neatly into the crook of Raph's elbow. Raph's eyes were half-closed, but they flicked to Leo when he looked over.

"Are we piling?" Leo asked, pulling at the orange blanket around himself and dragging it closer to Raph. His biggest brother immediately enveloped him, endlessly gentle to watch his stub arm, pulling him on the opposite side to Mikey.

An expectant beat. Donnie didn't come any closer.

"It's still early." Donnie protested, tugging on the edge of the big t-shirt.

"Donatello." Raph said, not needing any other words than that to convey his intent.

"Three days, D." Leo replied, images of sleep deprivation stats flying in his head.

"I've slept some." Donnie defended. "Do you think that sleeping out here is really going to be a more restful experience?"

"More than going back to your lab and not sleeping at all, yeah." Raph rumbled, quiet in respect for Mikey, even hidden away as he was.

"Five minutes." Leo bargained.

"That's not gonna work forever." Donnie grumped, dragging a pillow over and joining Leo's side, flopping next to him.

'Yeah, it is.' Sensei said, soft.

Donnie pulled his purple bandana down over his eyes and crossed his arms tightly across his chest. "Just five minutes."

"Okay bud, five minutes." Raph agreed, fondly, taking the arm stretched over Leo's shoulders and holding Donnie's wrist. The genius tensed, then relaxed. Then relaxed more. And his head drifted to the side, against Leo's arm.

Leo shut his eyes, content.

He fell asleep for maybe an hour and woke to probably the best moment since the end of the world.

It was dark in the living room. The low light of the projector flickered one of Splinter's absolutely terrible game shows, the lowest volume floating ephemerally through the room.

Raph had turned, keeping Mikey tucked in his free arm, and curling over the two intertwined. He was protecting the twins, completely cognizant of Leo's arm, even in his sleep. Someone, likely the rat currently reclined in his armchair, had draped them with more than one blanket, making the echo-chamber of heat of four turtles snuggled together quite enjoyable. Donnie still had Raph's fingers clutched on his wrist, and his other arm wrapped around Leo's only arm, pressing his forehead hard into Leo's bicep.

Raph was breathing in his ear. Donnie was breathing against his skin. Some of Mikey's paint had managed to find its way onto Leo's arm. Splinter muttered something scathing in Japanese under his breath.

Then Leo realized he was crying.

'You or me?' Leo asked.

'You, I think.' Sensei replied.

The stolen breath of the prison dimension was so far from this moment. Yet it had never been closer.

A ringing, haunting silence. As if there was no sound outside of themselves, the echo of the TV far away.

'Do you know what stupid fear I have?' Leo asked, warbled, distorted.

Sensei pulled in closer, alarmed, tugging on the front. 'Hey Leo? Can you focus on me for a second?'

Leo felt like the air was being stolen the moment before it entered his lungs. The stupid fear was sitting right there, an unspeakable enemy.

'Leo.' Sensei repeated, flexing their fingers and toes, taking deep breaths from the bottom of their lungs, even as it shuddered with their silent tears. 'Hey, come on. Open your eyes a little, okay?'

When did he close them? Leo flickered up, looking at the distant projector screen, of colourful sets and movement. Blurred. The damning fear came forefront.

'What if this isn't real?' Leo whispered.

'It is.' Sensei said firmly. 'Hey. Feel your body. You're home, you're safe, everything's okay.'

The dizziness began to make the room sway. Leo felt the very dangerous fear, flash frozen cold like smoking dry-ice, that none of this was real, that he was still there, he was still in the prison dimension. He didn't have his brothers. He wasn't safe.

Leo retreated into his shell, pulling his limbs and head in, dislodging from Donnie and from Raph. Mikey had the right idea, this was much better.

'Shit.' Sensei thought. 'Come on. Don't do that.'

"Mmm?" Donnie mumbled, because he'd been asleep pressed against Leo's bicep that was now gone. "Nardo?"

The fear was a rolling thunderstorm, crossing the sky with a leisurely and heavy hand, pummelling all his mental capacity in its wake. This moment was too perfect, it couldn't be real. He couldn't be here.

Donnie sleepily picked Leo up and hugged the compact shell to his chest. Cradling Leo closer into Raph's protection.

Compressed emotion, bottled up in the tight space of his shell with him. Leo hated crying in there because it got too hot, like buried underneath the blankets. But it was safe here.

'Buddy.' Sensei coaxed. 'This is real. You're alive and you're fine and you're with them. Can't you feel how tightly your brothers are holding onto you?'

Donnie was clutching him, curled all the way around, breathing, the rise and fall of his chest moving them both. Raph was the solid anchor around them. Protecting all his brothers, even in his sleep.

Leo practically burst with the emotion, 'I don't want to be scared anymore. I'm tired of being scared.'

'I know.'

'I'm tired of everything.'

Darker. But still the same, 'I know.'

'What if it's not real?' Leo begged.

'You're drifting. Can you focus on Donnie for me? Is his breathing normal?'

Breathing normal? Leo listened. His twin cycled through a few breaths, steady. Nothing abnormal.

'He's fine.' Leo told him. The bouncing sound of the TV soundtrack caught his ears again, like a wash of noise.

Then lost any ground as it hit him like a ton bricks yet again, immediate. 'What if it's not real, though? What if I'm still there?'

'Will freaking out about it fix it?'

Leo felt a big purposeful inhale. That was definitely Sensei.

'Do you have any proof this isn't real?' Sensei coaxed.

His enthusiastically pumping heart didn't want rational. 'No. But I don't have any proof it is, either.'

'Yes, you do. It's all around you. They're all around you. They're here and you're safe with them.'

Leo wanted to believe him. But the fear stayed, re-surging with full strength every moment he felt he'd pushed it down. He stayed in his shell, even when his worry exhausted himself, the drag of the painkillers they'd taken pulling him away.

Chapter Text

It wasn't a surprise to dream of the prison dimension after that, though Leo had wished perhaps that the universe might be kinder in its miseries for once.

The hang and drag of a different gravity. How it did nothing to stop the force of the hits pummelling his body. Mikey had said had he lived in a world where he only had photos of Leo.

For Leo, he had lived in a world where he only had a photo of them. A world where the rest of his future was exactly as the Kraang described. The wrath reserved for him alone, for as long as he wanted, over and over. That future laid out in front of him and Leo thought... he thought...

If Leo had gotten his wish, then his brothers would've been dragging a corpse through the portal. He'd given up and then they saved him anyway.

It just didn't seem like it could be real. That he would long to die and find life again regardless. Like it was all just the feverish dreams of a tortured soul, hanging in blackness and pain and suffering. Alone. Losing them.

In his dreams, he was there.

When he woke, his brothers were there. But which side of the coin was the truth?

'You've gotta stop.' Sensei begged, sleepily, groggy. There was murmuring around them.

The tight, compressed warmth. Someone was rubbing his shell. His shell, that he was still crammed in, hiding. The weight of sleep was deep, it must've been at least morning. Another signal of time passing was the renewed soreness of his arm.

'I can't do this anymore.' Leo croaked, miserable. 'What if I'm still there?'

'Focus. Listen. You're safe, you're home. Listen to them.'

They were so far away. Leo tried.

"... a worrying escalation, yes."

"He might just still be asleep."

"Or gone dark."

"If he needs help are we going to be able to get him out?"

"Should we be forcefully pulling him out?"

The hand rubbing his shell continued in calm, firm motions. It was a smaller hand. His dad said, "Blue is awake."

"How can you tell?"

"I've been carting turtles in shells around for years, I can tell." Splinter grumped.

"He's right." Raph agreed, crouching closer. "Morning big guy. Are you gonna come out?"

Silence.

Sensei prodded, 'Coming out?'

'I'm afraid if I leave it'll somehow prove it's not real.' Leo told him.

"Hm." Donnie was very close by, Leo was pretty sure he was resting on his legs. His twin tapped patterns on the slope of his carapace. Morse code. Y O U R E O K

"He definitely would've made a coming out joke by now." Mikey said, a little further away. Nervous.

"You all hid in your shells for different reasons." Splinter said, calm and providing a spine-tingling shell rub. "Red did only when he was very little if he was tired. I always felt it was so I would carry you. I still would, if I could."

"I know, Pops." Raph rumbled, amused.

"Orange, of course, chooses any reason at all, even to this day. But you were the only of the four who would sometimes go into your shell because you were too excited. I always found that very endearing."

"Hah! I am pretty cute." Mikey's sunshine beamed.

"Purple used it to hide when overstimulated, though I think it often overstimulated more to be in such a small space so it was never for long." Splinter hummed.

The tapping hand paused. "Yes. And Leo?"

"Always during thunder storms." Splinter said. "For years if I heard thunder start on the surface I'd go hunt down my little portable Blue and carry him into bed with me until he felt safe enough to emerge."

"Scared." Donnie translated, in a very blank voice above him. "Only when he's scared."

"Yes." Splinter confirmed. "So we need to make him feel safe enough to emerge. Don't stop your little taps, Purple."

The tapping returned, hesitant. Donnie said, in a twisted voice, "What about last night was scary?"

"Nightmare?" Raph guessed.

"Hm." Donnie tapped out in morse, P L E A S E

They shuffled around him. Mikey brought food which Leo didn't emerge to eat.

'I could do it.' Sensei offered.

'No.' Leo denied, hiding. He could feel Sensei sitting in the front with him, making them breath slow and even. It was the most the older could manage through the shade of depersonalization, thick and heavy and immovable.

"You need to eat, D." Raph said.

"Leo needs to eat too." Donnie was unmoving from his position hunched over Leo's shell, tapping out what felt like the entire periodic table.

"You're not eating won't make Leo eat faster."

Donnie didn't reply. He tapped, I L L E A T I F Y O U D O

'Bastard.' Leo thought, but it wasn't enough to escape the relentless fear.

"You're sure he's awake?" Donnie asked.

"Positive." Splinter moved away for his breakfast. Mikey took his place with eager hands, hopefully not smearing more paint on his shell.

More time passed. Leo felt his toes. Then his fingers, all three of them. The morning dragged on and he couldn't breathe past the pinhole in his throat, Sensei forcing them to continue to draw breath after breath.

Every single time he thought Leo might be over this stupid attack, it hit him like a freight train. What if it wasn't real? Then he couldn't even bear the thought of emerging.

"Donnie." Raph said eventually, more stern.

"I've got him." Donnie snapped, clutching Leo closer.

"I'm not saying -- how much sleep did you even get last night?"

"It doesn't matter."

"You should get some more sleep, Purple."

"Right now? While he's like this?" Donnie demanded, voice cracking.

"I know it's hard for you--"

"I'm fine."

"Why don't you go rest and take Blue with you, then? It always seemed to help him when I did it." Splinter suggested.

A long pause.

"No one's trying to separate you. We're just worried about both of you."

"I'm not the one we need to be worried about."

"I know you think that. But that's not gonna stop me." Raph said.

A huff. Donnie staggered up, taking Leo with him. "Fine. If only to escape this conversation."

"Actual rest, Donatello." Splinter reminded.

"Yes, yes, goodbye."

Movement. Leo heard Donnie's muttering. Sensei kept them breathing. A plop onto a mattress and a huge, world-weary sigh. Lavender. Softness, and then the body warmth surrounding them, blankets and darkness.

After what felt like ages, Donnie tapped meticulously,

I F Y O U C O M E O U T

Y O U C A N S E E M Y S H E L L

A pin-prick of anticipation scattered up his vertebrae. Shit.

If this was real, then he definitely needed to come out, because that opportunity was not going to arise again. Except when Leo went to move, none of his limbs cooperated. Stiff and hurting and stuck. The fog of his mind holding him down. Drowning, suffocating, oh fuck, help, help --

Help came. Sensei exhaled, pushing. He pulled their limbs from the shell and broke the surface with an inhale. Fresh air, damp with moisture, popping out pained limbs, especially the little stump.

Leo settled into his body. He heard Donnie say, like he was in another room, "Of course that worked."

Donnie had the darkest expression Leo had ever seen on his face before it was whisked away into careful neutrality.

"Welcome back to the world of free limb movement and bright lights." Donnie said, in a fake-announcer voice. "Hope you enjoy your stay."

Leo appreciated the attempt at a joke, because he was crushingly embarrassed for hiding and also like two seconds away from disappearing back into his shell at the slightest sign that things were unsafe. He pulled his legs up to hug, like a mimicry of protection, taking in the surroundings.

Donnie's room didn't have any of the same comforts as Leo's, no fan, no blue nightlights, but it was still as familiar as his own. He shuddered through a breath, definitely still heavily relying on Sensei's presence to keep it slow and measured.

"You're okay." Donnie muttered, quieter.

There were more important things. Leo raised his head and rasped, "Show me."

Donnie clearly regretted the offer, grimacing. "Can we talk about what happened?"

"We're talking about you, not me." Leo wasn't going to let it go this time.

His twin shuddered, head to toe, and squeezed his eyes shut. He relented, "Fine. Fine."

A long moment passed. Then Donnie turned away from Leo, hand trembling where it gripped the collar of his huge T-shirt. After a lingering, bracing moment, he pulled it off over his head, exposing his vulnerable back.

"Oh, Donnie." Leo breathed, heart breaking.

"It's fine. It's not infected." Donnie rushed to defend, shoulders tight, so visibly uncomfortable, fingers twitching on the edge of his shell. Just barely touching the leathery carapace.

It was awful. His once beautiful moss-green shell was cut with deep reddish-brown marks in squiggly circular patterns, ripped through with jagged edges. The whole shell was marred from top to bottom, looking painful and invasive.

The only upside was that Donnie was correct, it didn't seem infected. It was healing, crusted scabs and pinkening flesh, not swollen or oozing. But a lack of infection didn't mean it wasn't terrible.

"Does it still hurt?" Leo whispered, sitting on his own hand to stop the immediate instinctive reaction to test the springy reactivity and feel for any hiding festers. The offer was to look, not touch.

Donnie's jaw ticked. He said, tightly, "It's not pleasant."

Leo couldn't stop the desire to be a medic and assess. "What measures have you taken?"

"For the first few days I kept it clean and wrapped with anti-septic. I took some ibuprofen when the pain was the worst in the beginning, and April offered to bring me some with codeine but I didn't want to affect my mental capacity." Donnie reported, eyes a little distant, jaw still ticking.

"Donnie." Leo said, because if it hurt enough that April was offering codeine then it must've been bad.

"It's not the pain that's the problem." Donnie rushed out, then ran a tired hand down his face. "That's fine. It's gotten better, really. It's... it's..."

Leo waited, earnestly not wanting to interrupt and ruin Donnie's nerve.

'What are those scars from?' Sensei asked, horrified. He hadn't been there.

Leo admittedly didn't know much of the specifics, because they'd only discussed in quick passing between Donnie taking over the Technodrome and everything that came afterwards.

A jolt of emotion from Sensei. 'The Technodrome? Holy shit. That's...' Something wry and proud. 'Donnie's such a badass, fuck. Okay. Well, those patterns are from organic matter. Ooey, squishy, leaking organic matter. That our texture-sensitive brother allowed that disgustingness to fuse to his most vulnerable part of himself.'

'Shit.' Leo agreed.

Donnie's fingers twitched a nervous pattern where he gripped the edge of his shell, flashing up haunted eyes to meet Leo's. He said, "I can't get it out of my head."

"I bet." Leo replied, throat dry.

Donnie's lips wobbled then set into a shaking line. "I try to sleep but it feels like it's crawling on me. I try to eat but my body is just so stuck in this echo chamber of revulsion. I can't look at my shell, touch it, even think about it. I dream about prying it off."

Leo winced.

"So yeah." Donnie shook his hands out violently. "That's why I didn't want to talk about it. It's not something you or anyone could heal. It's just... stuck."

"That fucking sucks, dude." Leo said, adamant.

Donnie pulled his stimming hands into his chest and curled around them. He nodded, rocking a little back and forth.

"Have you found anything that helps?" Leo asked.

"I've been avoiding it."

"Would you be willing to try?"

Quiet. Donnie stuttered his rocking and cut his eyes up at Leo, red-rimmed. "I don't know."

"Come on, D. Data collection?" Leo pleaded. "You can't keep living like this."

"I don't know." Donnie repeated, stubborn. "I can't think right now, my mind is..."

The room felt too small. Leo said, "Yeah. Yeah, I get that."

A small stand-off between the two of them. Shuddered breath.

Donnie broke first, looking away and fiercely rubbing his eyes. He grabbed his phone, his crutch when uncomfortable.

Leo got up to reduce the pressure and searched for snacks. He said, idly, "Don't forget to tell your secret group-chat that I'm up."

"It's not a secret, I would've told you if you asked." Donnie replied, typing.

"Omission still counts." Leo said, finding a box of cheese crackers and bringing them over.

"Don't eat in my bed."

"Are you gonna make your sick brother eat on the floor?"

Donnie glared. Leo wiggled the box of crackers.

"I hate you." Donnie said, and let him climb back up. "Since you apparently know about our group-chat, I'll tell you that they want me to try and figure out what triggered hiding in your shell and I lack the energy for any social subterfuge."

Leo struggled to open the box one-handed. He said, "Either I can eat some food or answer your question but I guarantee you will not get both without losing me again."

The cardboard pulled open. The sealed plastic bag inside taunted him. Leo glared at it.

'Is there an easy way to do this I'm missing?' Leo asked Sensei.

'Nope. Use your teeth.'

Leo put the bag between his teeth. Donnie immediately said, "I respect your autonomy but please let me open that so I don't have to rearrange your bones in alphabetical order when you fill my sheets with crackers."

The laugh let the bag fall from his mouth. Donnie pried it open and gave him a handful of crackers.

Leo ate a couple, trying to find his hunger. Donnie got up and fetched sparkling water from his mini fridge, giving them both one. He ate a couple crackers himself, as equally slow and disinterested as Leo.

"This whole thing fucking sucks." Leo said, sudden into the quiet of Donnie's room.

"It does." Donnie agreed, tired and monotone.

"Like, dude. Everything about this situation bites." Leo made sure to lick the crumbs off his fingers so Donnie didn't have to come up with more creative threats. "I just want things to be normal again. I'm so sick and tired of like, I don't know. This never-ending assembly line of struggle. Ya' know?"

"I know." Donnie said. He ate a couple more crackers, splitting them in halves and quarters before putting them in his mouth.

"I just feel like I can't get a breath in." Leo stared at the tab of his sparkling water that he hadn't even opened. It was blueberry, handed to him without question. "Like..."

Like the world was spinning too fast to handle. Like the void was swallowing him whole, every second he was awake, like he couldn't get a grip. Like none of this was real.

'Buddy.' Sensei interjected. 'Talk to Donnie. Tell him. Don't pull back again. If you hide, no one can hurt you, but no one can help you either.'

It wasn't real. It wasn't real. The thought took over, icing his veins and crushing his windpipe. He wasn't home, he was making it up in his head, he was trapped in the prison dimension, he was never going to see his family again, he was suffering, he was --

"Donnie." Leo's voice said, and it was a disconnect, because Sensei took the front by force. "Leo needs help."

Donnie took the box of crackers and the drinks and set them aside, face flashing through dark emotions again and settling on neutrality. He said, "What's going on?"

"He's going to hide. Can you ground him in reality?" Sensei said, firm and concise.

"Can you articulate the problem for me so I know what to address?" Donnie asked, shuffling closer.

'I don't want to break your confidence.' Sensei begged. 'Please tell Donnie what's wrong.'

'It doesn't matter, it's not real.' Leo's neck was pinched with nerves, heart double time, anticipation for more hurt. The prison dimension hurt, he didn't have his family, the hurt was coming, it was coming.

'If it doesn't matter then it shouldn't matter if you tell him, right?' Sensei tried desperately.

A long beat.

Sensei yanked, encouraging him to the front. 'Do you trust Donnie to tell you the truth?'

'Yes.' Leo's mind was a boggy swamp, a swarm of bees, a foggy sky, but Donnie was a universal constant.

'Then ask him if this is real.'

Leo struggled with his response. Because what if this was just a Donnie he made up in his head?

'Ask him.' Sensei repeated. 'You can still hide later but try asking him first.'

That reluctantly allowed Leo to front. He was ready to withdraw at the slightest sign of danger, the feeling of his body floating in the weird gravity, molecules hanging suspended.

Donnie was looking right at him, eyes searching his face, frowning miserably and his brow together tight. His intelligent eyes caught the moment Leo focused on him, and said, "Who have I got?"

"Me." Leo mumbled, blinking hard.

A squeeze. Leo hadn't even realized Donnie was gripping his hand with both of his own, fiddling with his knuckles. Donnie said, "Stay here, mellizo. Talk to me."

Leo looked at the hands holding his. Donnie's calloused fingers, methodical and intent. A wedge was stuck in his throat, hard to speak past. He disentangled from Donnie and raised his finger to his mouth, tapping his lip and pulling away, adding a question mark. Real?

"Real." Donnie repeated, with no small amount of dread. "Are you asking if this is real?"

Leo nodded his fist.

A huge breath gusted from Donnie and he ground his teeth, grimacing. "Yes, it's real. But I'm assuming that the question is not so easily answered, if it's making you hide. Okay. I can do this. I can help. Give me your hand again."

Leo obeyed. His hand was guided to press Leo's finger firmly on Donnie's pulse. The rhythmic and predictable rush of blood, just a little fast, repetitive.

"What's my heart-rate?" Donnie asked, the vibrations clattering through the cartilage of his trachea.

Heart-rate. Beats per minute. Leo didn't have a watch and time was fluttering by in unpredictable waves. He looked at Donnie's alarm clock, and waited for it to change. Counted the beats for the whole minute, until the numbers flashed again. Donnie sat perfectly still and waited.

"Seventy-two." Leo reported, voice gravelly. Donnie lowered both their hands from his throat.

"There is no way for me to prove to you that I am real, because anything I would say you would just use as proof that I am trying to convince you I am." Donnie said, measured and slow. With extreme care and thought. "So I cannot provide you any proof that will ease your mind. Instead you must approach this like as any hypothesis. Look objectively at what is happening and decide for yourself. Look for how likely the statement is to be true. Let's go through the facts, okay?"

"Okay." Leo echoed, a little dizzy, a little sick. The prickling desire to hide not abating, practically tugging on his limbs. He wasn't safe. He lost them. This wasn't real.

"What do you hear?" Donnie asked.

Leo listened. The quiet hung. But it wasn't completely silent. Down the hall, a muffled voice from the TV. A little bit of shuffling from the kitchen. The hum of Donnie's mini-fridge. The steady inhale-exhale of both their bodies sitting cross-legged facing each other on the bed. The thunder-crushing beat of his own heart.

"TV. Kitchen. Fridge. Us." Leo replied, after sorting through it all in his head.

"What do you smell?"

"Crackers." Leo inhaled, trying to see if anything else stood out. "Lavender. White jasmine and cedar. Hm. Dust."

"Yes, yes, I don't spend enough time in here." Donnie dismissed. "Taste?"

"Crackers." Leo repeated.

"Touch?"

Leo flexed his grip with Donnie's hand.

"Yes, what else?" Donnie prompted.

"Bed." He pushed his heels in. "Blankets."

"Good. What do you see?"

"Purple blankets. Posters." A deep breath. "You."

Donnie gave a weak smile. "Yes. Hi Leo."

"Hi D."

"Based off that information, where do you think you are?"

"Your room. With you." Leo replied. "But..."

Donnie waited. He raised an eyebrow. "But?"

"It might not be real." Leo told him, throat coated in ash. It was hard to articulate, but Sensei was still there, urging him to continue.

"Do you have any evidence to suggest it might not be real?" Donnie asked, remaining reasonable.

"It... I don't know that I got out. I could still be there."

Silence.

Donnie let a long beat pass, then said, "Ah. I understand now. The question remains the same, however. Is there any evidence that your hypothesis is correct?"

"It's too good to be true. That I got out." Leo said, feeling the instinctual desire to retreat crawl up his limbs.

Donnie kept a tight grip, however. "Losing your arm and suffering from catatonic dissociation feels too good to be true?"

"Compared to ... yeah."

Donnie visibly shivered, ducking his head and letting the shadows cover his face for a moment before looking back up with a steeled expression. "But is there any reason to believe you would be under a mirage? Inconsistencies in reality, an event that would trigger an illusion? Think about when we were trapped in Hypno's spell. Have you noticed anything like that?"

Leo thought hard, but no, there wasn't. Just the harsh world of recovery, the bone-picking conversations with his brothers, the pain and needles of real-life healing. "No."

"Good. So using our logical brain, your senses are telling you that you are in my room, with me. Your experiences say that the past few weeks have been consistent with normal reality. While there is no such thing as absolute proof for a question like this, using all the facilities available to us, what is your conclusion?"

Leo hated that the answer was, "It's real." because the actual fear was, "But what if it's not?"

"It's real." Donnie repeated. "The statistical likelihood that it's not real is so astronomically low, I can safely promise you the fear has no basis in reality. Because this is reality. You are here, with me, in my room. We are safe. I would not lie to you."

Leo dragged in a ragged breath. He squeezed Donnie's hand hard. His twin squeezed in return. Instant feedback. Reality.

"Sorry." Leo mumbled.

"Stop." Donnie said, and some of the composure was broken, the sound just a little wrecked.

Leo stopped.

"Thank you for telling me." Donnie said, after a moment. "We can go through this as many times as you need. You don't have to hide."

Leo's face heated and he looked away, ashamed.

Donnie reached out and flicked his forehead. "I love you."

"Ew." Leo said.

Donnie's face cracked in a relieved smile. "Dumbass."

"I love you too." Leo said.

Donnie hugged him. Leo wound his arms around Donnie's neck and hung on tight, trying to breathe normally, trying to just get through this stupid moment into the stupid next one. He could do this.

Leo held on and breathed. Some of the fear leaked out, losing the intense pressure instead him.

Though Leo could feel all the tension still wound up in Donnie, the exhaustion dragging him down and the twitch of his muscles.

"You should sleep." Leo murmured.

"I told you." Donnie bonked his forehead against Leo's shoulder. "I just close my eyes and... it's all I can feel."

"Not sleeping isn't going to make that any better." Leo said, pulling away to inspect him. Totally not using Donnie as a way to deflect his own mental state. "Have you tried a weighted blanket?"

"I don't want anything touching it." Donnie reminded him.

"Yeah, sure, don't put your freaking battle shell on there. But maybe having a constant pressure might help." Leo suggested, sinking into problem-solving mode. "You can always take it off if it doesn't work."

Donnie grumbled and complained, but went to fetch the weighted blanket from the laundry room. It was a few extra minutes before he came back with Leo's phone and a loaded food tray as well.

"Michelangelo caught me." Donnie explained, placing it beside them. "Apparently crackers aren't a substitute for real food, despite my campaigning that it was."

There was possibly hunger there, like maybe Leo was hungry in another country. He looked at the homemade pizza, which should've been impossible to turn down, all stringy mozzarella and Mikey's signature garlic crust.

'You should try.' Sensei prodded. 'Eating isn't going to get any easier, if you keep making me do it.'

Leo sighed. He picked up a piece and took a bite. The mouthful felt about three times larger than it was, but he managed to chew and swallow.

'This is going to take forever.' Leo complained. 'I'm tired and I want to lay down. Please?'

'Thank you for trying.' Sensei allowed, then took the front and happily ate the pizza. It was fucking delicious.

"You switched." Donnie said, something just the borderline of accusation. He was holding his pizza and pretending it wasn't there.

"Good eye." Sensei replied, taking a second piece.

Donnie fidgeted. He said, "I appreciate that you told me that Leon needed help. Sometimes I feel as if I won't discover that fact until it's far too late."

Sensei shrugged. "I knew you would help. It's harder for me to convince him everything is real when I'm already something so ephemeral."

"Yes... you know, it's funny, because when I asked if there were any inconsistencies with reality, he didn't even consider having you in his head to be a problem."

Sensei didn't know what to say to that.

There was a moment of quiet. Donnie had a few bites of pizza. Then he returned to the cracker box and sparkling water, breaking them in halves and quarters again. He stimmed his hand against his side.

"I had assumed that your presence was inherently making Leo's dissociation problems worse." Donnie said, blunt.

"Sometimes it is." Sensei agreed. "It hasn't been easy for both of us to find a balance."

"But you are finding one." Donnie said.

"We're learning." Sensei didn't really want to go into detail on who was at fault for which of their recent slips.

"Hm." Donnie offered the blueberry sparkling water.

Sensei drank it. Leo rejoined the front and went on his phone, checking his Snapchat and sending a streak snap of his and Donnie's feet on the bed.

"Are you done? We're napping now." Leo said, placing the empty can on the bedside table.

"Ah, Leon. Could I perhaps convince you we should go to my lab instead? I'll let you play with my power tools."

Leo took the carbonation bubbled in his throat as an opportunity to burp in Donnie's face. Then he grabbed the weighted blanket and walloped it over-top of his twin, taking him down like a lead balloon.

Donnie stared dead-eyed at the ceiling. "Urgh."

"Urgh." Leo agreed, crawling up beside him, wrapping the normal blankets around himself like a burrito. "Lay on your stomach. See if it helps."

"The only thing that would help would be to cut it off." Donnie muttered morbidly but rolled over. He buried his face in his pillow and shuddered audibly.

"I hate it." Donnie said. "I hate it, I hate it, I hate it."

Leo scooted closer. "Does it hurt?"

"No. A little. It just feels like it's moving."

"Does the weight help or should I move it?"

A long pause. Another shuddered breath, unsteady. Donnie muttered into his pillow. "It's a little better. It's consistent, easier to tell nothing's actually moving."

"Okay. Close your eyes, genius."

Donnie scowled but did so. "I'm not tired."

"Me either." Leo agreed, snuggling up to his side, a big old lump of blankets. "We'll just lay here."

They laid there. It was the middle of the afternoon, but Donnie went boneless after a while. Asleep against his will, as was predictable. Donnie could work through any amount of exhaustion but actually get him to slow down and stop then the exhaustion always won.

Chapter Text

Leo slept a little, letting the tide carry him around, waking about every ten minutes or so, never sleeping deeply enough to dream. Allowing the drag of sleep to wash over him, the ache in his stub arm and the shaky weakness in his limbs from leftover adrenaline.

Eventually Leo bored of the task of sleep and extracted himself slowly and carefully. Since Donnie had carried him in his shell, the crutch wasn't there, and Leo traced the wall with his hand as he escaped. Hopefully the weighted blanket was going to help keep Donnie asleep. Leo slipped out of the room and closed the door silently.

He made the executive decision that he needed a shower and took over the bathroom. He didn't quite have the strength to stand, sitting on the shower floor and liberally using as much soap as he could get his hands on. At some point since the last time he'd showered, someone had taken the stitches out, leaving scarred and healing skin.

The unbandaged stump looked so weird and Leo waggled it like a chicken wing, actually managing to crackle a laugh in his throat at the sight.

Sensei did the rebandaging and gripped the counter to rise when they were done. Walking was slow but possible, just a bit off-balance and unstable without the crutch. Leo let Sensei drive, asking to go to the dojo.

It was empty. Leo sat in the middle of the mats and started his careful stretching routine. He put music on his phone to fill the silence, going for a rock playlist to keep his brain busy. Sensei stayed in the front with him, humming along.

The music was cut with a ding. Leo leaned over to check his notifications. His family groupchat, from Raph, 'Leo are you not with Donnie??'

He tapped with one finger, 'dojo', then went back to stretching. 'So Much (For) Stardust' by Fall Out Boy was playing at the point when Raph's heavy footsteps came down the hall, a little too quick to be natural.

"I'm fine, Raph." Leo said, in greeting, trying to grab the bottom of his extended foot. It made his ribs twinge, but he persisted.

Raph stuttered in the doorway. "Number?"

"Two." Leo still felt that leftover adrenaline, not quite a confident three, but definitely closer than he'd been in a while. Probably from actually managing to help Donnie. He cracked a glance at Raph. "Gonna join me or just stare?"

Raph shook his head, breaking the frozen stance. He took Leo's offer literally, joining him on the floor and stretching too. He was always surprisingly nimble for a guy of his size.

"Leo." Raph said, hesitantly starting something.

Something Leo didn't want to do right now. "I'm doing good, let's not ruin it by asking questions."

Raph exhaled. "Okay. But Raph's proud of you."

Leo wavered between deflecting with a joke and bursting into tears. He did neither, staying completely silent. Raph didn't push, eventually getting up and going to the punching bags.

Collapsing back on the mats, Leo checked his Snapchat. It was the usual replies, April stuck in traffic, Mikey's pizza, Hueso's restaurant, and Raph's feet. But at some point Donnie had gotten a snap of Leo's sleeping face, the jerk. The caption said, 'can't believe i'd commit atrocities for this loser smh'

Leo screenshot it, again stuck between making a joke and fucking crying.

Mikey leaned in the room and beamed when he saw Leo sitting on the floor scrolling on his phone. "Hey! Can I borrow Leo?"

"I'm all yours, baby." Leo got up, legs trembling with effort, and Mikey took his hand as he reached out.

"Where's your crutch?" Mikey said.

"My room, I think."

They left Raph in the dojo. Both of them ambled down the hall to fetch the crutch, and also one of Leo's swords.

"Oooh." Leo grinned at Mikey. "Where to, hermano?"

"Hueso's." Mikey beamed back. "He asked me if I wanted to change the designs on his chalkboards. I figured you could come too and watch, and get to visit your favourite Tío."

"Didn't want to tell Raph we're sneaking out?" Leo laughed, offering Mikey the crutch to hold. If he was actually going to be leaving the lair he got dressed, jean jacket and black t-shirt, with the holster for his swords.

"We'll tell him once we're a safe distance away." Mikey waved a dismissive hand.

"Better to ask for forgiveness than permission." Leo agreed sagely. "I've taught you well."

The smile split Mikey's face. Leo made the portal, feeling the little breathless punch at the distance required between their lair and Run of the Mill. But the portal set and stabilized, sparking blue and waiting. Leo stepped through first, undeniably eager, and Mikey followed with his crutch, handing it over once Leo sheathed his sword.

The first thing was the noise, alive and humming. After weeks in the general quiet of the lair, it was instantly noticeable. Along with the low grade humidity, the smell of busy city, and bright colourful sights.

For a moment, Leo thought, is this real?

And Leo was annoyed, because was this the rest of his life? Being assaulted with this thought, this insecurity? He had been fine moments ago, and now he staggered under the weight of it.

"Woah, did that take too much power?" Mikey said, instantly slotting into his other side to support him. "Shoot."

"I'm fine." Leo said, dazedly, shaking his head, trying not to think the thought. Impossible, snake eating its own tail. He stared at the floor.

'What about this made you think that?' Sensei prompted.

'It's just so... alive. If that makes sense.'

'It does not.' Sensei said, fond. He nudged Leo into the front again, from where he'd slipped.

Mikey had brought them through the entrance and inside Run of the Mill, and they were seated at a table. Mikey was crouched directly in front of him, looking serious. "... everything's fine. What should I... hey, bro, feel this?"

Mikey took his hand and squeezed, really hard.

Leo focused on his face. Mikey immediately smiled in response. "There you are! We're fine, you're safe, I'm right here dude. Can you tell me where you are?"

"Tío's." Leo said, around the rocks jumbled in his brain. He shook his head, trying to clear it. When he looked up, trying to place himself in reality, he almost jumped when he saw that his Tío was right there, standing over Mikey with a hand on his littler shoulder, watching.

For a moment, joy overrode all anxiety and fear. A huge smile split Leo's face, heart pumping enthusiastically, and he said, "You owe me a hug!"

Señor Hueso heaved a sigh that was all show. "Hello Pepino." Then he gave him a hug, holding him so tightly that it betrayed his faux indifference.

For a moment, Leo was confused when only one arm wrapped around him in response, so caught up in the excitement he actually forgot he was missing one. But he didn't let that slow him down, drinking in the affection happily. His throat was tight with emotion, impossible to ignore.

Then Sensei joined the front, just for a moment, to give a squeeze.

'Don't tell me what happened to Hueso, I don't want to know.' Leo told him, already defensive. He didn't want to ruin the moment.

'Okay.' Sensei didn't argue, hovering.

Hueso allowed long enough that Leo was the one pulling away, grinning with only a little leftover dizziness. "It's so good to see you! Mikey broke me out, he's the best."

The skeleton gave an indulgent look, a little up-twitch of his mouth. "It's good to see you too."

A starburst of emotion in his chest, making the whole mess of it unidentifiable in its intensity. Leo's lip wobbled just a touch in his beaming smile, and he blinked a couple times to try very hard to stay in the room.

Mikey had experience watching him and knew to ask, "Number?"

"One." Leo admitted, wishing it were better but definitely unstable from the continued assault of derealization. "I'm good to stay, though."

"What is this scale?" Hueso asked, handing Mikey the box of chipped and half-used chalk. The restaurant wasn't busy, it was still early, and they had the corner to themselves.

"Dissociation, baby." Leo tried to wave jazz hands before he remembered it was a Jazz Hand, letting his stump wiggle a little too. "How much have you heard? I can give you the tea."

The skeleton waved dismissively. "I will bring actual tea, give me a minute to get your brother set up."

Hueso took Mikey to his freshly cleaned menu chalkboards, gesturing as he described what he wanted, Mikey eagerly taking notes. Leo waited, leaning chin in palm to watch the server on the other side of the restaurant make his rounds.

A mug clicked on the table. Leo said, "Did you miss me?"

"My life has been very quiet." Hueso told him, his own mug of steaming tea placed perfectly on a coaster.

Leo sighed, pulling his gaze away from the cute boy and circling his finger on the rim of the hot ceramic mug. "Yeah. It's been weird."

"Is a 'one' on your scale a good or bad thing?" Hueso prompted.

Leo couldn't actually stand to make eye contact with Hueso while they discussed this. Instead he turned to watch Mikey trace out colourful chalk lines, slow and purposeful, tongue out in concentration. "It's a thing. Measures how grounded I am, zero to three."

"Your brothers have been kind enough to provide me with some updates on your condition." Hueso said, sipping his tea even though it was still molten hot. "That is no easy feat to overcome."

"I never take the easy route." Leo's bark of laughter was far too bitter to be anything nice.

"And I'll admit, they didn't go into much detail with injuries. What happened to your arm?"

Both of them scrambled to say their joke first. Sensei beat him to the punch, "I had a case of the Monday's."

Leo shook his head and complained, "That wasn't even good!"

"Sorry?" Hueso said, a little thrown.

"Oh, they didn't tell you everything, huh." Leo bit his lip, leaning his chin on his hand again. "So dissociation, yup, lost an arm, mhm, let me know when you find it, but uh... I also got an extra ride-along in my head."

"A ride-along." Hueso repeated, wary and disbelieving.

'We're telling him?'

'I'm tired, I thought that they had told him everything. We might as well.'

When Leo tried to explain he realized that Hueso didn't even know about Casey and had to do a whole round of story-telling to explain the time travel in the first place. It gave enough time for the chalkboard to become a colourful explosion, complete with sunflowers and cherry blossoms and spiderwebs and birds filling the corners. Leo kept his eyes on Mikey's gorgeous work as he went over what happened during the invasion. Then he skipped completely over the prison dimension, going straight to waking up with Sensei in his head.

It was the most he'd spoken in weeks. His mouth was dry and he drank the tea right to the bottom.

"I see." Hueso said, at the end.

Leo hadn't realized how much he'd failed to organize the events in his head until he had to spill them out for Hueso, retracing and amending constantly. It really put into perspective how fucking little time he'd had to save the world, how heart-thunderingly scared he'd been from the moment they lost Raph onwards -- bringing time to a stand-still, seconds dragging on like hours with the petrifying terror that he'd lost his big brother and it was all his fault and now the world was ending -- and it had been barely over a day.

"I think I understand better than most. It reminds me of working together with my brother, though that is a lot more fusion than your situation. May I speak with Sensei?" Hueso asked.

Leo blinked the spots from his eyes, having been staring at the lights without realizing. 'Okay, I'm sure I'll regret asking, but how did Hueso die?'

'Don't know.' Sensei replied. 'Never saw him after the apocalypse started. I liked to pretend he had somehow managed to escape the chaos and was living his best life somewhere.'

The coolness in their veins told them both how likely that was. But Leo willingly let him step forward.

Sensei straightened up, cracking their back from the slumped posture and stretching out their arm. He offered Hueso a wry smile and said, "Hey bone man."

"Hello." Hueso said, not too phased. "How odd."

Sensei snorted. "You're telling me." He glanced down at his phone, which was vibrating. "Hold on, Leo never texted anyone where we were going."

'Oh, right.' Leo had totally forgot, distracted by the server.

Sensei unlocked the phone. It was Raph again, 'damn it leo where did u and mikey go?'

'Hueso's.' Sensei replied.

'You did not portal to Hueso's when you are still healing.'

'Be back soon.'

"We should bring back apology pizza." Sensei said, locking the phone and setting it down. "Which is totally not at all because I haven't had your pizza in twenty years."

"Hm." Hueso frowned. "That is a sad world. I will see what I can do."

Leo rejoined the front and made their smile big. "Thanks, Tío."

"Ah, I can see the difference." Hueso nodded. "Alright, I will get your usual going."

Leo raised his mug. Hueso vacated the chair and Mikey took his place, his littlest brother sorting through a big pile of half-broken chalk bits and checking on Leo with a cheery smile.

"I'm almost done." Mikey said. "Like ten minutes."

"No rush. Hueso's making us pizza."

"Score!" Something about Mikey's tone was twigging Leo's brain. Just a little too bright, like it was painted on his face. He returned to his work.

Leo pretended he wasn't trying to spot the cute server again, looking over at his own photo on the wall. But then he noticed that Mikey's joy slipped the moment the attention wasn't on him.

Carefully observing from the corner of his eye, he could see Mikey's hands. They were trembling so hard the chalk fumbled from his fingers before he could raise it to the chalkboard's height.

His brother picked up a new, uncracked red and the moment it touched the board a tremor cut the red in a sharp line through one of his sunflowers.

The tension racked up Mikey's shoulders and he whirled around, throwing the chalk at the wall with all his strength and storming off. Ragged breathing, like he was struggling not to cry.

'Aw, Mike.' Sensei said, frowning. 'That must be killing him.'

Leo got up, jamming his crutch underneath his arm and hobbling in the direction Mikey fled. The restaurant wasn't busy but there was still enough people that Mikey wouldn't have wanted to cry in public. It wasn't a surprise to find him in the bathroom, back against the wall, face in his knees hiccuping.

There was no acknowledgement. Leo settled beside him, careful of his off-balance drop to the floor, instantly punched in the gut at Mikey's misery. He tucked the littler turtle under his only arm and squeezed.

"I'm sorry." Mikey said, pushing through sobs and muffled by his knees. "I know it's not a big deal. I know."

"Of course it's a big deal." Leo admonished. "What are you talking about?"

"You lost your arm, Leo." Mikey's head snapped up, eyes red rimmed. "My stupid hands won't stop shaking. That's it."

Leo jiggled Mikey in his hold. "Sure, and there's over a million people who die of tuberculosis every year. That's worse but it doesn't make my arm grow back. Your suffering is your own, Angelo."

"It's not suffering, it's just -- I'm just --" Mikey inhaled a big sniff, wet and upset and trembling all over.

Leo waited for the end of the sentence and jostled Mikey again when it didn't come. "Come on, spit it out."

"You're just going to refute it." Mikey's lip shook.

"Of course I am." Leo laughed a little. "That means you already know I'm right."

"It means that you're blind when it comes to your brothers." Mikey replied.

Leo rolled his eyes. "I can see you just fine, Michelangelo."

A visible struggle to hold it in before Mikey burst at last, "I'm useless. Okay? I'm useless like this. I can't use my mystic powers, every time I try to do anything either I screw it up or it hurts and I have to stop. I can't help you, I can't help anyone--"

He broke off with a sob, tucking his shaking hands into his armpits and hunching over.

"Buddy." Sensei couldn't watch this and not say anything, shifting up and giving a little squeeze. "You don't have to be useful when you're healing. Or ever, if you don't want."

Mikey gave another almighty sniff. "Sensei?"

"Sorry." Sensei's smile was rueful. "I'm not good at keeping my nose out of things."

"It's okay." Mikey leaned into the touch. "I just. I want to be useful. I want to help."

"You are helping." Sensei assured him.

"Are you going to say something ridiculous like 'my presence is helpful'? Because that doesn't mean anything. I'm not actually doing anything." Mikey stared at his trembling hands like they were personally offending him.

Fuck, he was such a kid. It genuinely hurt how young this Mikey was. He was trying so incredibly hard, for what?

"Don't tell him I told you," Sensei said, inherently a joke because Leo was listening, "But Leo never would've gotten out of his head at all without your presence. You have no idea how instrumental just having you nearby is to his mental health."

"It doesn't feel like it." Mikey murmured, turning his head away.

"You guys are everything to him." Sensei said, well aware on multiple levels how true that was. "It's not something you're doing. It's just being Mikey. Being here."

Sensei gave him a little jostle too, because he was just so dang small and he couldn't resist.

Mikey gave a wet giggle, then shook it off. "Sensei?"

"Yes?"

"Was I really a badass mystic warrior?" Mikey sniffed hugely. "Or was that just Casey who thought so?"

"Oh, Mike." Sensei let a really big smile split his face, leaning down so that Mikey could see it. "I've never in my life met anyone more badass than you."

The tears welled and spilled over again. He said, "You're just saying that."

"Your mystic powers were beyond anyone's. Even Draxum, and he trained you. You were so powerful you..." Sensei trailed off, a stab in his ribcage at the sight of his baby brother tearing himself apart at Sensei's word. He sighed. "You don't have to try so hard to be useful. You have value just being you."

"You wouldn't rather I was the super-powerful-me that you had before?" Mikey poked, wiping at his eyes with his sleeves.

"In all universes, I would rather you were alive." Sensei said, then winced. That wasn't quite where he meant to go with this conversation.

"Alright, that's enough." Leo said, loudly, taking back over. "Geez, can't let an old man talk for two minutes and he starts getting into his trauma. Come on, hide in my jacket, little brother. We'll get the pizza and bounce."

"Okay, Leo." Mikey accepted the hiding place in the front of Leo's jean jacket, keeping his teary face from the public as they got up and crossed the restaurant to get their pizzas.

"What about the chalkboard?" Mikey whispered, sticking close.

"What about it? Looks fantastic to me." Leo couldn't see what Mikey had even needed ten more minutes for -- all the menu items were there, surrounded by vibrant drawings smashed together like a graffiti artist made a tattoo sleeve on a chalkboard.

"I was gonna do more outlines." Mikey protested, but when he reached out a hand towards the chalk again it shook like an earthquake.

"Rest if you're sore." Leo recited, and immediately relented. "I'm sure Hueso would let you come back and finish tomorrow, if you wanted."

Mikey hummed. Leo brought him away from the prying eyes of the floor space, letting himself into the kitchen.

"There you two-- or three? -- are." Hueso pat a stack of pizza boxes. "These are yours."

"Thanks Señor." Leo gave Mikey a squeeze. "Sorry Mikey, you've gotta let go a second, I've only got one arm to portal with."

"Right." Mikey said.

"Left, actually." Leo unsheathed his sword from his back. He paused to grin victoriously at the laugh that broke through Mikey's upset.

That cute server was striding through the kitchen with plates easily balanced on a tray. He had to pass by them to get through the doors and said, "Hey, great katana."

"Thanks." Leo managed. The doors swung shut behind the rabbit just in time to hide the fact that Leo promptly turned bright red.

"Ohmigosh, are you blushing?" Mikey crowed, all tears forgotten.

"I'm sorry, what's that? The sound of you wanting to walk home?" Leo put his hand to his ear, ignoring how it was burning.

Mikey grinned at him, full force, well aware Leo would never do that to him. It was only fine because anything was better than the sight of Mikey crying, and the hell that would've been raised by his other two overprotective big brothers if they brought him home actively in tears.

Instead Leo blew Hueso an exaggerated kiss and made a portal home, the two of them juggling sword and crutch and pizza and the fact that the moment Leo made it back to the lair, his knees gave out.

Chapter Text

In a snap, Sensei took the front to catch them one-handedly before they hit the floor, instant vertigo and the flint-flicker of their ninpo scraping the bottom of the barrel.

'Eugh boy.' Leo tried to help but neither of them could get the body to cooperate. They bowed over their sword, braced against the floor, and Mikey was swearing colourfully by their ears.

'We fucked it up.' Leo thought.

'This was pretty much all you, dude.'

'Oh come on, you didn't even try to stop me! You wanted to see Hueso too.'

'Yeah, well, I haven't had ninpo in like fifteen years, forgive me if I forgot how it fucking works.'

"Leo?"

"Sorry." Sensei cleared his throat, pushing against the floor and managing to lift his head a little. "We were just arguing about who's fault this is. We may have pushed our ninpo a little too much."

"You think?" Raph asked, a little sarcastic, brow tight, and when did Raph even get here?

"We'll be fine. Maybe. Probably." Sensei tried harder to get up and the drag of power loss was kind of like having been pounded into the sand.

"The rest of us aren't as content with a maybe. Do you mind if we get Draxum to check your ninpo again?" Raph asked, a little hesitant. Which was fair considering their reaction last time.

'Are you gonna freak out if Draxum comes by?' Sensei asked.

'Oh you hypocrite, you were the one who freaked out!' Leo replied, affronted.

'Yeah, because he was figuring us out. That's fine, that's done. You're the one who felt unsafe in his presence.'

'I've just got no damn reason to trust him.' Leo grumped. 'Why should I?'

'Fine. Then trust me. If he tries anything, I'll kill him.'

That broke past Leo's stubborn barrier, humour in an incredulous wave. 'You think we could kill him?'

'I'm the greatest ninja ever, remember?'

'Yeah, in the body of the world's most mediocre ninja.' Leo scoffed.

"Have you gone dark or are you two arguing still?" Raph cut through.

Sensei blinked, trying to get the world into focus. It was all blurry. "I'm talking Leo into it, give me another minute."

"Okay, but can I get you off the floor?"

"I can do it." Sensei tried to lift up and their limbs collapsed again.

Leo internally laughed. 'Yeah, not gonna happen. You're not committing any murder in this body, Sensei.'

'Fine, then trust that I knew Draxum in the future and he was nothing but a surly grandfather to Casey, taught Mikey literally everything he knew, and one time told me that he thought I was pretty cool and I've been riding that high for years.'

'Solid argument. But future-Draxum tells me nothing about present-Draxum. They're different people.'

'I would like to issue a universal apology to my brothers for putting up with me for years, I am so fucking annoying.'

Leo kicked Sensei. They tussled, until Sensei had Leo in a headlock and the smaller turtle was whining.

Sensei said, 'I don't know shit about ninpo and Draxum does. Plus he knows I'm here now, he might be able to help us.'

'Help us with what?'

'Uh, this whole situation.'

Leo didn't know why that made worms writhe in his stomach. He didn't know what he was afraid of happening if Draxum poked at Sensei in his head.

'Absolutely no one here is going to let anything happen to you. Currently you are the most watched turtle in New York.' Sensei said, fondly. 'It'll make everyone feel better if you let Draxum check we're okay.'

Leo really wasn't sure if they were okay -- the leaden feeling as if all the electric impulses were stolen from their muscle fibres. He caved with a sigh and retook the front, finding that they'd been moved off the floor. They were in the med bay, with Donnie prepping the IV.

"Let me do it, you always miss." Leo said, blinking into reality, holding out his hand.

"First of all, I'm better at it now that I've had so much practice against my will." Donnie said, immediate and brisk, not questioning Leo's sudden presence. "Secondly, explain to me how you are going to place an IV in your own arm. I will wait."

Leo tried to move his right arm before he remembered it wasn't there. He glanced down at the stump for a moment, betrayed.

"I could put it in my foot." Leo said, after a second.

"We're not putting it in your foot." Donnie replied, prompt. "Give me your arm, dum-dum."

"Why am I getting an IV? I'm fine." Leo complained loudly. Then flinched when Donnie missed his vein on the first try again. "Ow, come on D, I'm not a damn pin cushion."

"Because you look about ten shades paler and your limbs can't support yourself anymore." Donnie sniped back. "Are you going to allow Draxum to check you over?"

"He can." Leo scowled. "But I'm not happy about it."

"Is that going to cause problems for your mental state?" Donnie asked, blunt.

"Dunno. Maybe." He kicked the sheets of the sterile bed, equally not happy to already be back in the med bay, his leg barely managing to lift. "I'll just make Sensei talk. It's fine."

Donnie's expression stayed blank as he began to tape down the IV line, keeping it steady. "And that's okay? For him to talk for you?"

"I'd still be here." Leo shrugged, and picked up a little of Donnie's discomfort. "Hey, Tello. Don't worry. I have the power to kick him out of the front whenever I want. He's not taking over my life. I know he's said to you and he's said to me, it's not what he wants. It's still my body, I still have control."

Donnie scoffed, pressing the tape down harder than he really needed to, even as some of the tension left his shoulders.

Leo winced and whined, "I'm gonna bruise like a peach from that one, come on."

"Galileo, how is it that you lose an entire arm and you repeatedly insist your fine, but you get something as little as a papercut and you whine like the world is ending?" Donnie said, that wonderful exasperated-fond.

They just got the IV settled when Mikey leaned in the doorframe. "What's the verdict?"

Donnie kept his eyes on Leo. "Send him in."

Leo tried really hard not to be a total wimp and tense the moment he saw Draxum again. It was just that his home was his safe place, where he didn't need to be on guard or perform for strangers. Even if Mikey claimed he was their dad, it wasn't like Draxum was the one who held his hand as they walked the sewers or taught him how to read.

Okay, Splinter taught Donnie how to read, who taught Leo. But the principle was there.

"Should I remain at a distance?" Draxum offered coolly once again, staying at the other side of the room. There was something far more knowing in his gaze this time.

"Oh good, Draxum's already here." Leo said, dry. He wanted to give some kind of rude gesture. Instead he gave an unwelcoming stare.

"You gotta make sure Leo's okay." Mikey said, and all those layers of upset earlier were coated in guilt now. "It's my fault, I shouldn't have -- "

"Woah, woah, hold on." Leo raised a brow. "What's that? I'm a grown ass turtle who can make his own bad choices and you did not hold me at gunpoint and force me to go anywhere? Yeah, that's right."

"You are not nearly healed enough to be portaling anywhere." Draxum told him, still in the doorway.

"Yeah, I've got that now." Leo waved him inside, exasperated. "Come on, do your stupid spells, make Mikey feel better than I'm not dying. Because I'm not."

Draxum stepped in, with Mikey following and Raph taking up the rear.

All the reassurances and all the reasoning that it was fine to have Draxum there did nothing for Leo's fried brain. The paranoia and the fear that lived in him especially because he was weak as hell and unable to protect himself at the moment. Draxum raised his hand -- to do what, Leo had no idea, because he panicked and flinched back.

Draxum stopped mid-motion. By the time their head raised again, it was Sensei looking back.

"You." Draxum said.

"Me." Sensei gave a lop-sided smile. "Hello."

Draxum appraised him, eyes scanning.

"Take a picture, it'll last longer." Sensei said.

"Why have you inhabited the younger version of yourself?" Draxum asked, brow line low and contemplative.

"You ask that as if this was any kind of choice I made." Sensei snorted, feeling the uncomfortable squirm of Leo in the back of his mind. He leaned back just a little reassure, 'Relax, we're fine.'

"You communicate with each other within the mind." Draxum said.

"Did you come all this way to just state the obvious, or what?" Sensei kept alert, trying to ease Leo's paranoia.

"I'm gathering information." Draxum told him. "Why did you hide from me the first time?"

Sensei raised a brow, tinting the smile roguish. "Because I didn't want you to know I was here, obviously."

"That doesn't actually answer my question."

"Who says I wanted to do that?"

"I see that you do not get any more cooperative in your old age." Draxum said, tucking his hands behind his back, chin up.

"Eh, I'm just following Leo's lead. Wait, how old do you think I am?"

"Hard to tell, you currently look twelve." Draxum deadpanned.

"Hey." They both said.

Draxum blinked. "Fascinating."

"What is?" Mikey cut in, nervously from where he was watching on the left.

"How do you decide who is in control?" Draxum said, leaning forward a little.

"That's what I asked!" Donnie added, vindicated.

"We're mostly winging it." Sensei said, shrugging. "It's Leo's body, so I try to let him drive unless he wants otherwise. He doesn't really want to talk to you, so here I am."

"Hm." Draxum's cataloguing eyes scanned up and down again. "And what is your plan? Do you believe this is sustainable for the long term?"

"I believe that we should try getting through a single day without having some kind of crisis before we start causing more problems for ourselves." Sensei said, flat.

"And Leonardo? Are you not concerned this is permanent?" Draxum prodded.

Sensei turned inwards to find Leo squished himself into a little ball, not answering. 

"Would you like me to start pursuing avenues to remove the spectre from your head?" Draxum asked, when there was no response.

'Make him stop.' Leo whined, because he could not articulate how the line of questioning made him feel.

Sensei could feel it -- a miasma of confusion and fear and uncertainty. He faced the goat again, steeling his spine as best he could with the rampant weakness in the body, and said, "Ask again another time, can we move onto the original problem?"

'I don't want him to ask again another time.' Leo said, a little lost.

'You will have to think about it at some point.' Sensei reminded him, and when the room went grey on the edges, he said, 'Not now! Calm down.'

'Oh calm down, why didn't I think about calming down?' Leo sarcastically replied. A band of anxiety was compressing him slowly.

A hand on his arm. Another patting his shell. Sensei shook his head, trying to dislodge the heavy fuzz creeping in his peripherals. The panic was growing, pushing past Sensei's cool aura and taking over. Leo was not enjoying this.

"Still with us?" Raph said, the hand on his shell, bracketing his side. Mikey was on his left, squeezing his arm.

Sensei really wanted to focus but the fact that Leo was anxious was bleeding into him and reminding him that the wonderful brothers on either side of him had died and left him alone. He muttered, "Shit." and raised a zero for the room to see.

"Who have we got right now?" Mikey asked.

Sensei raised his hand to his mouth and tapped a finger-spelled 'S' there.

"Should we make Draxum leave?" Raph questioned next.

Sensei wasn't sure. Their body and ninpo was suffering and it would help if Draxum could give them some insight. But also his presence really seemed to complicate things for Leo.

Sensei snapped his fingers. Quick.

"Okay, Barry, can you check..."

'I feel like there's more to this you're not saying.' Sensei told him, the ocean of white noise getting too loud for even him to handle.

'I don't know what you're talking about.' Leo said, stiffly, the ample shade hanging thick and taking advantage of their already weak body to prey on their weak mind.

'This isn't just about being uncomfortable around Draxum. It's because he asked about taking me out of your head.' Sensei pointed out.

The world spun rapidly around them. Leo was panicking. 'We can't do this right now! Draxum is literally casting spells on us. Go back to the front.'

'Leo...' Sensei shifted uncomfortably. 'It's going to have to happen, you know.'

Off-tilt axis. Skid and slid. Pretend not to know, hoping for a different answer. 'What?'

'I've told you a hundred times. I can't take over your life.'

'But then what happens to you? To Casey?' Leo snarled back, heart pumping, mind fuzzy and bleak. 'What about what I want, huh?'

'What do you want?' Sensei asked, confused, gentle.

Leo breathed hard. He couldn't keep a grip. He slid into the shade.

Sensei shut his eyes, fighting the immediate tug to follow, to sink into the void. But he didn't, because their body was currently with someone Leo didn't trust and he didn't want to leave them unsafe. He did what he hadn't really done so far, and took the front without Leo present at all.

It was shaky and unstable. Sensei fought his eyes to focus, the fog to clear his vision and the cotton to fall out of his ears. Raph was still on one side, Mikey the other.

Dead brothers. Dead. Sensei let his brow pinch together, fighting the horrible crushing memories. Lost everyone. Lost.

"Only the older version is present." Draxum said. There was a spark of magic in the air, spells recently performed, tasting of salt and electricity, licking batteries.

"Sensei, you've got this." Mikey encouraged, squeezing.

"Tell me, have you noticed anything strange?" Draxum asked, leaning into his sight line.

"Now that you mention it," Sensei spoke past his mangled tongue, to the instant full attention of everyone in the room. "I have a sinking feeling one of my arms is missing."

A beat. Donnie distantly said. "Oh, for fuck's sake."

"Unfortunately your sense of humour also remains the same." Draxum predictably did not sound impressed. "Anything weird from my testing, you belligerent turtle. Did you notice anything off?"

"Belligerent, Don is he insulting me?"

"Yup."

"You forget I've got future blackmail on you." Sensei fought and struggled to stay in the room, the anchor of Leo at the bottom of a blackened ocean still trying to drag him into the depths relentlessly. "Want me to tell everyone about your collection of Celine Dion albums?"

Draxum froze. Mikey said, in an interested voice, "Oh really?"

"Answer the question." Draxum said icily.

Sensei flexed his limbs. Still beyond heavy and weighted, but nothing new. "We're fine. It's just really hard to move right now."

"That would be because you're an idiot." Draxum reported. "Overuse of your ninpo can permanently damage your system."

Sensei could've laughed. It wasn't funny in the slightest, so he didn't. "Yeah. I know."

"Then why did you allow Leo to make a portal when he should be resting?"

"Allow? Gramps, it's his life. And I thought it'd be fine, we had more than enough for the trip there. The trip back just cut us a little close."

"Did you just call him Gramps?" Mikey said, even more interested.

Sensei really wished he actually felt like he was in the room right now. He was pretty sure he was sitting in a hole in the ground, for all the tunnel vision and distant voices he was experiencing. He hummed, "Yeah, he was Casey's Gramps. Hated it when we called him that so we did it all the time."

"Oh, I have many follow up questions." Donnie said, from that same far away.

"It may have to wait." Sensei couldn't actually really breathe beyond the second-hand panic and clawing nails of the void piercing him. "Will our ninpo recover?"

"Yes, with rest you should've been getting in the first place." Draxum said.

"Then good." Sensei nodded. "I'm sorry. I can't hold on any more."

"Wait--" Someone said, but it was too late.

Sensei plunged into the ice head first.

A shock to the system. Blurry and scrambled. Inhale did nothing, like all his airways were clogged. Sensei fought through the feeling, hunting for the smaller Leo in all the crushing ice.

The stiff and immobile claustrophobia of inherently being trapped in your own mind. The rancid, unbearable sensation of attempting to move limbs with no response.

A whistle of wind, following an unseen path, the rustle of gliding through tree branches. Cutting and cold, moving straight through.

Sensei approached the tree shivering, struggling to lift his knees to move, like slogging through quicksand. There was no sign of Leo, just the tree planted in the void, the enormous roots woven together disappearing into the thick darkness, and the mirrored branches tangled in complicated knots up into the limitless sky.

The wind battered him, panic in spinning cycles. Sensei steeled his spine against the desire to lay down and let the cold take him. Somewhere in here the kid was terrified and he wasn't about to leave him alone if he could still crawl.

So he did, following the wind into the branches, footholds unsteady and branches quivering with his weight. The trunk of the tree felt as wide as it was tall, sending off shoots of twiggy limbs in all directions. Hidden in the nooks and crannies was Leo.

Curled up and held by intertwining branches. Leo's eyes flashed up, red and hurting, and he said, 'How'd you find me?'

'Once you become a dad, they send you a pamphlet on how to win at hide and seek.' Sensei replied, settling beside him, straddling the branches and not touching the miserable turtle.

Leo didn't laugh. He hugged the branch he had, the set of his shoulders down. He mumbled, 'Did Casey hide a lot?'

'Some.' Sensei's heart instantly ached. 'He was taught when he was little to hide if we were attacked. Then I'd have to go find him. But he was really good at it, so we had a codeword that it was safe. I'd yell it and he'd pop out of whatever hole he'd tucked himself away and come barrelling straight into my arms. But since we taught him to hide like that, he did hide sometimes when he was upset. Like after we lost people, I'd be wandering around the camp looking in every hole and shouting our codeword.'

'What's the word?' Leo rasped.

Sensei's lips twitched into a smile. 'Echo.'

'Mikey's idea?' Leo guessed, giving a weak chuckle.

'It's not something you'd be yelling unless it was safe. Or Mikey.' Sensei huffed, amused, then looked away.

The quiet reigned. Leo made no move that he wanted to be anywhere but hiding in this tree.

'Are we gonna talk about it?' Sensei prompted.

'Does it look like I wanna talk about it?' Leo replied, scathing.

Sensei sighed. 'So we're just gonna hide forever, then? That's it?'

Leo scowled, rubbing his red eyes, leaning back into the branches.

'I don't want to take over your life, Leo.' Sensei reminded him.

'Well maybe I do.' Leo finally snapped, mouth trembling. 'Maybe you're not as perfect as I thought when we'd first met but you can still do this better than me. You could have it all back. And I could stop causing problems for everyone.'

Sensei felt sucker punched, staring at the little version of himself and soaked with ache. It was so hard to even know what to say, because it wasn't as if these kinds of thoughts were new. Sensei knew exactly how Leo felt and hadn't really figured out the best way to deal with them. He just had, because there wasn't another option.

For Leo, suddenly Sensei was here, another option, like there was some loophole to escaping the misery of existence without actually having to die. Sensei really couldn't blame him for wanting to take the out.

'You don't mean that.' Sensei said eventually, after watching Leo bat at the tears escaping with an angry wrist. 'Because then you wouldn't get to be with your brothers anymore.'

A choked off sob and Leo said, 'I know. I know. But wouldn't it be better? For them?'

'They're not my brothers.' Sensei reminded him. 'Some smart kid told me that it wasn't the same if Casey had you guys instead of me. And that logic tracks the other way around, too.'

'What about Casey, then?' Leo leapt on. 'You can't leave, you haven't even talked to him yet.'

'Is that what this is about?' Sensei crept closer, keeping just a small distance. 'No one said anything about leaving.'

'You did. You did.' Leo accused, tight with it. 'You were talking with Draxum about finding a way out of my head.'

'Not yet.'

'Yet means later.'

Sensei reached out, projecting the movement, and squeezed Leo's arm. 'And later means not now. At some point when you feel stable enough for the conversation, we'll have it. But until then, it's tabled. I'm not leaving and I'm not taking over your life. We're in homeostasis.'

'I think you mean homostasis.' Leo cracked.

Sensei cracked too. He gestured open his arm, and Leo immediately launched to hug him around the neck, crushing his throat with the force. Sensei pat the smaller patterned shell under his hand, wrapping around the painfully young mirror of himself.

'Why do you want me to stay so bad? I thought I was annoying.' Sensei gave a sore laugh.

Leo practically strangled him he was holding on so tight. His voice wavered. 'You are annoying.'

Sensei waited for the reason. He would obviously have to keep waiting, because Leo said nothing else, hugging him like his life depended on it.

Sensei held on. He really wished that things could be easier for the younger version of himself, that they could stay grounded and feel safe instead of drifting and riddled with paranoia and anxiety. Sensei knew it was partially his own fault, because he carried pain and grief with him and no matter how well he coped, he would always have that for the rest of his life. He would never stop being an orphan. He would never stop being without the foundation of his life, his big brother. He would never stop being a half of a whole. And he'd had all of ten seconds to cope with the death of his baby brother that he'd ordered to die. The only solace he'd had in the decision at the time was that he couldn't bear the thought of giving Mikey the burden of losing everyone.

It was a cold comfort. It was throwing his child into a Hail Mary, with no knowledge it would ever work. Giving up his very last reason to live, seconds before living was no longer there anymore.

Sensei would never stop being affected by that grief. And he hated that he'd put himself into this poor kid's body, who still had his whole fucking family right there, and he was making it worse.

Leo cleared his throat and asked, gravelly, 'Did I break my ninpo?'

'No.' Sensei pulled Leo to look at him properly, giving a reassuring smile. 'Draxum said it'll be okay. You do have to be careful, though.'

'I know.' Leo grumbled. 'So we're just going to be tired and weak? That's so boring.'

'That's the consequences of your actions, baby.' Sensei laughed. For all the recent thunderslam of responsibilities, Leo was still an immature teenager. Still learning to take things seriously. Sensei was glad that the world hadn't ended and he'd have a chance to do so without the steep learning curve Sensei underwent.

Leo made annoyed teenager sounds, then sighed. 'I don't want to go back out. They're going to be fussing and treating me like I'm made of glass again.'

'Probably. But is it better in here?' Sensei gestured at the vast nothingness.

'Yes.' Leo said sullenly.

Sensei gave him a look that said how much he believed that statement. He reached out and rubbed the top of Leo's head. 'How about I cut you a deal? You go back. I'll... I'll let you guys tell Casey.'

'No joke.' Leo's eyes lit up. 'Really?'

'Gotta happen sometime.' Sensei said, with weight. He was still worried, especially if it ended up that he was just giving Casey back someone he was going to lose again. But it did seem inevitable, especially if they put Casey in a room with someone like Donnie who couldn't lie or Splinter who didn't care.

'Done.' Leo clapped his hand to his thigh eagerly, beaming at Sensei. 'Let's go. Breathing exercises. Hit me.'

'You think breathing exercises are boring.' Sensei reminded him, charmed by the sudden energy.

'They are. Everything about this is boring and exhausting. I don't care, I want to centre and I want to give Casey his dad back.'

Chapter Text

Leo sunk back into his lungs first, the sensation of air filling the alveoli.

He traced the path of oxygen mentally through its course with each inhale and exhale. In through the mouth, past the pharynx, the larynx, pouring down the trachea splitting into each bronchus. Into bronchioles. Into alveoli for the gas exchange through the membrane separating the red blood cells in the capillaries, taking the oxygen and returning carbon dioxide to exhale back out through the system. Passing the cartilage rings holding open the trachea, the epiglottis flap separating the lungs from the stomach and an important landmark when performing intubation --

The air carried through his system smelt sweet. Leo felt his brow twitch as he tried to place what it was. Visual input was needed, so he rolled over from where he was apparently facing the wall to find Raph eating cookies.

"Can I have one?" Leo asked, voice weak.

"Get your own." Raph defended immediately, almost automatically.

Leo pretended to start to move. "You're right, I'll just get up and -- "

Raph rolled his eyes, offering out the baked treat. "A guy can't eat a single cookie without little brothers popping out of the woodwork to steal 'em."

Leo struggled to sit up enough to eat without choking and ate his stolen goods. It was obviously recently baked, though not still warm.

They didn't taste like Mikey's. Leo said, mouth full of chocolate, "Who made these?"

"Carol made them." Raph replied, stretching a little like he'd been sitting there a while. "She felt bad that last time she was here she triggered you."

"She's not the only one who has." Leo said, trying for humour and the darkness of his tone not quite hitting the mark.

Raph gave a smile that was more like a grimace.

"Is she still here?" Leo licked his fingers of the remaining chocolate, blindly slapping the bedside table for his phone. His arm felt about a thousand pounds, the IV line still threaded around it. His phone was very thoughtfully plugged in, the time a disorientating 10AM. He couldn't really remember what time it had been when he went dark.

"No, April brought them, she's with Mikey to show Casey his mural." Raph explained.

Leo blinked at the time for a moment longer. He'd missed dinner, hadn't he? They'd brought pizza. Sensei never got his pizza. "What happened to the pizza?"

"We saved you some." Raph replied. "How do you feel?"

"Like, one or two, maybe." Leo might've been grounded higher had the mystic exhaustion not been so freaking heavy. "I'm not going to portal again, if that's what you're asking. Damn that wiped me out."

"I'm asking if you're okay."

"I'm okay." Leo said, and all the different reasons that was a lie stayed conveniently out of his mouth. "Super hungry though. Can I have that pizza?"

Leo checked his Snapchat, giggling at the funny picture of Mayhem that April sent. When Raph returned with the pizza box, Leo immediately snapped a picture of him holding it with the caption 'my hero', adding the heart eyes emoji and sending it as his streak.

"Stop it." Raph grumbled.

"You look great, especially holding the goods." Leo made a grabby hand towards the pizza. "Gimme gimme."

'Coming?' Leo summoned, because Sensei hadn't eaten Run of the Mill in twenty years and that was an actual crime.

'I didn't want to interrupt you actually being hungry for once.' Sensei replied, shifting forward. 'You eat first.'

Sensei's rolling anxiety at the prospect of seeing Casey would've made it hard to eat anyway. Leo ate a whole slice, taking the offered Gatorade without complaint, bracing the bottle between his knees for his own hand to open. Raph watched him eat while pretending not to, a phone in his hand that he wasn't actually looking at.

The hunger tide was washed away as his stomach cramped. Leo ate two more bites before putting the pizza down, returning to sipping the Gatorade and trying to keep the food he'd just eaten. The amount of energy it took to chew and swallow was worryingly high.

"Done?" Raph asked, the tone suggesting that Leo should eat more.

"Maybe more later. Trying not to overwhelm my stupid stomach." Leo allowed, hugging his elbow into the cramping muscles. It made a hot prickle of sweat on the back of his neck, uncomfortable. He immediately wished he hadn't eaten anything, because the sensation of it was not pleasant. Setting the food aside, Leo took a minute to convince Raph to help him remove IV line, annoyed at its existence, threatening to do it with his teeth if not assisted.

"Knock knock." April audibly said, letting herself in just at the point where Raph was taping a band-aid to his inner arm. She beamed when she saw Leo. "Hiya handsome, good to see you up."

"I live to serve." Leo replied, opening his arm for a hug which she immediately obliged.

A tight squeeze from his sister, bright and warm. Then she pulled back and said, "Did you get Mom's apology cookies?"

"Once I pried them from Raph, yeah." Leo gave a crooked smile.

"Brat." April swatted at Raph. "I told you to share."

Raph stuck his tongue out at her.

Casey leaned in the doorway, a hesitant smile. "Hi Leo."

Sensei lurched, uncertain. Leo blinked through it, and said, "Hi Casey. Coming in?"

"If you'd like." Casey picked his way inside, wearing a completely different hockey jersey this time. Either he'd switched team alliances already or he had no idea who he was rooting for.

"We should give them room to chat." April said, either because she'd magically discerned Leo's intentions or because she was trying to manufacture the situation herself. She tugged on Raph's larger arm, pulling as if she had the strength to move him. Which she did, because Raph readily followed.

"Sure, wanna go bug Donnie?"

"Is that even a question?"

Raph and April left, shutting the door behind them. Casey looked a little mystified, but didn't question his luck, taking the vacated seat beside Leo's bed. The smile remained tentative.

"Carol really did feel bad that she upset you." Casey said, after a moment. "I hope you're not mad at her. She's been really nice."

Sensei deflated entirely, moving backwards. Leo shot mental daggers at him, daring him to try him and escape right now. He said out loud, "Nah, I love Carol. She wasn't telling me anything I didn't already know anyway."

"I'm glad, sensei." Casey said.

"Leo." He reminded gently, because the distinction was about to get very important.

"Sorry, Leo." Casey stayed steady, but his cheeks did pinken a little.

"It's fine. But I'm not your sensei." Leo inhaled, and couldn't really figure out how to start this fucking conversation.

'I'm assuming you're not about to jump in and give me any help here?' Leo asked wryly.

'I'm sorry, which one of us left the other to the wolves once already to explain? This seems like a you problem.' Sensei replied, not nearly as sharp or angry as when Leo did it to him, but undeniably not going to be any damn help.

Casey gently touched his wrist. "You okay?"

Leo blinked into focus and gave a weird sigh. "I've got to tell you something, Casey."

His expression shuttered carefully. "Oh. Is it bad?"

"No." Leo answered, with equal care. Still unsure how to proceed. He knew that Casey would want to know. But he wasn't sure how he would react. He assumed it was good to get his dad back, but he didn't know the kid that well. When he directed the question at Sensei all he received was that same unarticulated fear, so he was no help either.

"I haven't been completely honest with you." Leo decided on, because the most negative reaction was probably going to come from that part of this situation, once he could figure out how to explain time travel.  How was it so easy to tell Hueso? Though to a kid who'd time travelled, maybe this wasn't going to be that hard.

"Okay?" Casey prompted, still waiting, obviously braced for the other shoe to drop.

Leo sighed, fidgeting with the ends of his blue bracelet. "There's been something going on with me, beyond the dissociation problems."

"The others noticed something like that." Casey provided. "They said that Barry saw there was something else. But since then I haven't gotten any other updates. Is that what this is about?"

"Yes." Leo knew he was a smart kid.

Casey visibly hesitated, and prompted again, just a touch of nerves, "It's not bad?"

"It's not bad." Leo confirmed. "It kinda affects you, though. Which is why I've hesitated to tell you."

Well, Leo would've told him ten seconds after he found Sensei. But to explain that would require far more context than he had at the moment. He could beat that dead horse later.

Tucking a strand of long hair behind his ear, Casey visibly looked like he wanted to ask for a third time if it was bad. Raise a child in the apocalypse, surely it won't fuck them up at all. But Casey steeled his jaw and nodded, ready. Game face on.

"I have a presence in my mind." Leo stated, clearly and concisely. "I discovered him after Mikey rescued me. I was dealing with dissociation problems and losing an arm, so it kinda fell on the wayside. But I have someone else in my head."

"Oh." Whatever Casey was expecting, it obviously wasn't that, brow twitching together and mouth small. The confusion painted wary and he said, "How does that affect me?"

Leo had watched through Sensei's eyes the moment that Mikey sacrificed himself to make the portal. And Mikey had winked. Leo had a little theory. 

"Mikey sent you back in time." Leo said, sounding it out as he spoke. "But I think he sent someone else too."

Casey went very still. He didn't breathe.

"The logistics are only a hunch, but I think Mikey's portals are pretty special. When I went through one of his portals, I picked this someone up. It wouldn't have been an issue for you, but what happens if you send someone back in time who's already here?"

Quiet. Intense, thick, and palpable quiet. Casey stared, eyes flickering over Leo's face, like he was looking for the joke. It didn't come.

"You have Master Leonardo in your head?" Casey whispered.

Leo nodded.

"Mine? From... from the future?" Casey could barely push the words past his lips, immobile like stone.

"Yes. He's just hiding right now because he's been afraid to tell you."

"Afraid..." Casey broke his frozen posture to drop his head and shake it. "I... I... is this real? He's really here?"

When Leo thought about telling Casey the truth, he'd imagined being a shitbag and using a Homestuck reference as a way to prove that he had knowledge given to him from Sensei. But now he knew something probably a lot better. He smiled warmly and said, "Maybe he'll come out if you yell 'echo'."

A hundred emotions flashed on Casey's face at once, colliding into each other. The most painful was an earnest hope, and he repeated in a broken voice, "Echo."

It wasn't a yell. But it summoned Sensei all the same. Leo eagerly stepped back, practically shoving Sensei into his place at the front.

The world fell into place, framing a halo of light around his kid. The same fluffy hair, the same clever eyes searching his face, but a haunted desperation that was new and aching. As Sensei sunk into reality, Casey reacted, a hand coming up to cover his trembling mouth.

"Hi Case." Sensei swallowed, throat horrifically sore. "I'm sorry. I'm right here."

There was no further hesitation. Casey barrelled forward, colliding with a hug so hard it hurt. Sensei responded without pause, wrapping his arm tight and curling around him, burying his face in Casey's hair, pressing his kid into his shoulder, clinging with all his feeble strength.

An explosive sob broke through Casey's chest.

It was absolutely crushing to hear, that terrible grief and pain he'd never wanted for his child. Sensei shushed him gently, even as the sound of it only seemed to increase the sobs in earnest.

Then just as suddenly, Casey disentangled and immediately began to whack Sensei's plastron repeatedly. "I can't believe you! Why didn't you say anything?"

The plea was broken with a huge voice crack down the middle, face screwed up and soaked in tears. Casey's hands shook where he thumped them hollowly against Sensei's chest.

"I'm sorry." Sensei said, a little wobbly himself, staring at the miracle of his child. The hockey jersey. The healthy glow to his cheeks ruined by the dark bruises of exhaustion under his eyes. He was alive. He was well. He was safe.

But until now, he was alone. Casey curled his fingers against him, tight into fists, and said, "You should have told me."

"I'm sorry." Sensei said again.

Casey hiccupped with the force of his sobs. He scrubbed irritably at his cheeks, immediately ruining all efforts by more tears streaming down. He choked out, "I needed you, Sensei."

"I'm sorry." Sensei reached for him, cradling his baby against his chest, heartbroken. Pained by the force of Casey crying against him. He'd done this before, after chasing the child down in the base yelling echo, after Raph died, after Cassandra and April died, after Donnie went missing. It was all grief. It was all Sensei's fault that he let it go on this long.

"Echo." Sensei muttered in his hair. "I'm here now. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

"It's really you? It's really, really you?" Casey demanded, all squished against him.

"When you were nine years old you were ran a con where you had regulars that paid you in treats not to annoy them." Sensei spoke the first memory that came to mind.

"That was Mom's idea. I split the profits with her." Casey defended, voice going weak. "It's really, really you."

"It's really, really me." Sensei agreed.

"But... your younger self is there too?" Casey sounded a little confused, a little overwhelmed, cheeks pink as they did when everything started to happen all at once and he pretended he was okay even as he hid in the folds of Sensei's cloak.

"It's his body. He's just being kind enough to share." Sensei rubbed Casey's back, feeling the line of his spine and connective ribs.

"I'm... wait. You came back with me? This whole time?"

"No. Only since Leo came back from the prison dimension. And he's just speculating, we don't actually know if it was Mikey or not. But it's a good guess."

A thinking quiet. Casey repeated, agonized, "Why didn't you guys tell me?"

Leo gave an irritated jab at Sensei, to either defend his honour or let Leo speak up in his own defense. Sensei kept the front and did it for him, "Leo wanted me to tell you. He was very adamant and campaigned since day one for us to tell you. But I... I was unsure how this worked and I didn't want to get your hopes up. I just... I didn't want to hurt you more."

"You're so stupid. I hate your choices." Casey thudded his fist against Sensei again, tight with tension. "I don't care if this means I only get five minutes with you again. I want those fucking five minutes."

"Geez, who taught you to swear like that?" Sensei said, utterly and unbearably fond, cradling the head of soft hair.

Casey glared at him. Sensei tugged his head down to kiss the top of, putting all his love into it. He said, helplessly again, "I'm sorry."

"I'm gonna be mad at you forever." Casey informed him.

"Forever's a really long time." Sensei teased. "Can I get a raincheck?"

"I thought you were gone." Casey didn't take the tease well, voice shattered.

Sensei sighed, and pressed his cheek against the top of Casey's head as he held him close. "I was a little lost."

"I missed you. I thought I lost everyone. I thought I was alone."

Ouch. Ouch ouch ouch. Sensei felt the jab-ache of his mistakes. What his fear cost him, cost his kid. The worst was he still wasn't even sure if this was the right choice. Because how were they going to go forward, with Leo and Sensei, the push and pull of two different interests.

'Idiot.' Leo chimed in. 'They're not different interests. I am invested in Casey too. I want him to be happy.'

'At the expense of your own freedom? That you're in the back seat while I'm living through your body?' Sensei asked him, tightly.

'Do I sound miserable to you?' Leo asked, and he sounded warm and pleased.

Casey touched their face. Sensei blinked alive and gave a wry smile, "Sorry. Just bickering with Leo."

"Can I...?" Casey's cheeks were streaked with tears, breath still too-quick from crying, but that familiar determined set to his mouth.

Sensei didn't retreat, he shuffled aside to make room in the front for Leo.

Leo took control and gave Casey a huge, beaming grin. "Hiya Casey."

"Hi Leo." Casey sniffed and gave a more watery smile. "Is he doing okay?"

"Oh, he is a hot mess." Leo laughed and gave a wink. "But I've been watching out for him."

"You two are getting along?" Casey asked uncertainly.

"Sure." Leo said, lying only a little bit. "He's a pretty great guy, you're right. Sorry for being picky about you calling me Leo, but I've been calling him Sensei."

"It's okay." Casey shook his head. "Thank you for convincing him to tell me."

"He loves you so much, kiddo. Believe me, I've felt it." Leo promised.

The flood of tears overflowed again. Leo gracefully stepped back and Sensei took the reigns again to give a tight squeeze.

"Sensei?" Casey guessed.

"Mhm." Sensei inhaled against his hair.

"I'm really glad you're here." Casey shuddered. "Even if you didn't tell me right away. It's... I'm just so glad. I don't think I --"

It was broken off by another sob. Sensei jolted with alarm, trying to soothe the intense and violent punch of sobs.

Casey said, "I can't do this alone."

"You are so strong and resilient. You could've done it." Sensei promised with his whole heart. "But... I'm glad you don't have to."

"Resilient doesn't stop it from hurting." Casey said, weak.

"It doesn't." Sensei agreed, with a thousand weights of his own, clawing at his heart and soul with every moment.

Casey cried himself hoarse. Sensei rubbed his back, feeling the universe settle. Their body was still weak, all the strength zapped, but he had infinite energy to sit there consoling his child.

He cleared his throat and sang, low and sweet, "Neneko, neneko, ya. Sleep, my little one, sleep. As the bottomless pit of the ocean, so is my love so deep."

It managed to renew the sobs, a high-pitched whine in the back of Casey's throat. Almost hysterical, clinging to his dad with creaking fingers. Desperate to keep him right there. To hear the words sung so softly, echoed across a thousand sense memories. They all sung it to him. Baby Casey in a laundry basket crib, rocked by an attentive Mikey. Little Case cuddling with April after bad dreams. Casey Junior with fever flushed cheeks, dozing on Raph's lap. CJ in a loose piggy back as Cassandra carried him on a long trek. Casey holding Donnie's hand in the med bay, asleep against the lip of the mattress. And Sensei singing this song, stroking his hair, carrying him through the death of everyone they loved.

"Neneko, neneko, ya. Sleep, my little one, sleep. As the unexplored vasts of Nirvana, so is my love so deep."

Sensei promised, promised, promised, for the thousandth time, for a thousand more. Just like his dad promised him. Carrying love from hand to hand to hand.

"Angie's gone." Casey whispered.

"Yeah." Sensei said, barely a rasp. "He is."

And more and more and more still, because he was just the most recent. Splinter dying so long ago now, snapping off what remained of his innocence. Raph falling and buried with all his stuffed animals, taking his foundations and replacing them with responsibility and incomparable loss that he had to pretend every day wasn't the real end of the world. Cassandra and April taking down an entire base at the cost of their own lives and Sensei wishing everyday that he'd just kept them instead because he started to feel like winning was never going to be worth the cost. The unreal hell of never knowing what happened to Donnie, if his twin suffered, if he was gone, if he tried to get back but couldn't, if he needed Sensei to save him and he didn't. And now Mikey, immediately giving everything he had. Vanishing his last brother into dust, because there was nothing else left.

Sensei was nothing without his brothers. Here was nothing. Here was nothing holding a child and reminding himself that there was always hope. Perching in the soul, singing the tune without the words, and never stopping. At all.

"No one gets it." Casey said, wrecked and damp sounding. "They all just walk around like. Like everything's normal. But it's not. I feel like I'm trapped in a room of mirrors, disorientated and lost. Reflections but never the real thing. I'm so tired. I'm so, so tired."

"I get it." Sensei assured him, because he did get that. The younger versions of everything he'd ever loved with almost none of the heartache. Like reaching your fingers out to the mirror only to hit the glass. "I've got you. Take a minute. Rest a little."

"I'm afraid if I look away for a second you won't be here anymore."

"Listen, then." Sensei said, and began to hum the lullaby.

Casey shut his red eyes. Sensei hummed and hummed and hummed, long after Casey relaxed. Rubbing his back with endless patience, even though their arm was weak and body tired.

At some point Sensei realized Leo had rejoined the front, slowly taking the arm and the vocal cords. He kept the steady pattern but did change the song to 'Time Warp' from the Rocky Horror Picture Show.

'See?' Leo thought smugly. 'That wasn't so bad.'

'He was inconsolably upset.' Sensei replied.

'Yeah, but that's gotta happen. Part of the process. Now we can help. Carol seemed really worried about him, I don't think he's been coping well.'

'Who is?' Sensei asked sarcastically, then sighed. 'I just feel like I've failed him.'

'Failure is temporary if you're still alive.' Leo shrugged.

'That's a good one. I'm gonna totally use that against you later.'

Leo groaned, dramatic and entirely for show. Then refocused on the incredibly important task of humming Time Warp for the dozing Casey Junior.

It was only about twenty minutes before Casey tensed up. When the humming registered he relaxed, and muttered, "I'm still mad."

"Hear that, Sensei?" Leo teased, giving Casey an affectionate tap.

Casey rolled over and pushed at Leo's face. "Tell my dad that he's on my shit list for the next ten thousand years minimum."

Leo threw his head back and laughed. Sensei grumbled internally, less amused and sore with causing his child upset.

Casey sat up and rubbed his face hard. "I feel awful."

"Yeah, crying sucks." Leo agreed. "Drink some liquids. Oh! There's still leftover pizza, too."

Leo offered the box of Run of the Mill.

"Oh, pizza." Casey said, inspecting it seriously. "I haven't tried this yet."

"Criminal." Leo shoved the box more insistently. "Come on, try it."

It was a good thing that Sensei wasn't driving, because the sight of Casey enjoying pizza for the first time almost made him cry. Just at the point where Leo was forcing Casey at metaphorical gunpoint to drink Gatorade and replenish his lost fluids, April leaned her head in the door.

"How's it going in here?" April asked, deceptively casual.

"You knew this whole time and didn't tell me?" Casey immediately turned on his new roommate, incredulous.

"Oh thank fuck you finally told him, it was killing me." April sling-shot a hair elastic from her wrist to ping Leo directly on the forehead.

"Hey, I wanted to!" Leo defended, fishing up the elastic and shooting it back at his sister at lightning speed. Except his lightning speed was directly impeded by his drained energy and the shot had little power to actually hit her.

"Boo." April cupped her hands around her mouth and came closer, leaning on Casey's shoulder. "Don't worry, Casey. If Leo Squared hadn't told you today I was gearing up to take matters into my own hands. Can't trust boys to do anything right."

"Except we did." Leo reminded her, sticking his tongue out.

"I'm sorry, would you like to remind me who floored themselves over-using their ninpo? Hm?" April asked sweetly, putting her hand on her ear.

"Statement rescinded and I would like a lawyer."

"Denied." April gave him a noogie. Leo squawked and tried to elbow her. He had zero strength to do so.

"Mercy!" Leo plead far quicker than he normally would, because his limbs hurt with the tug and pull of trying to get away with no energy to do so. He didn't even try to give her a wet willy.

Luckily April could read him and let go, grabbing his face and squishing his cheeks instead. "You drive me crazy, Leonardo."

"It's a short trip." Leo said.

April lunged like she was going for another noogie.

Chapter Text

Leo whined, but April didn't follow through with another noogie. She said, "We're gonna chat."

"Are we?" Leo said. "Me or Sensei?"

"You." April pointed firmly at him. "Make time for me in your busy calendar."

Leo made a complaining noise. He didn't want to have more terrible conversations where people got mad at him, he thought he'd avoided it with April. But she was just waiting until he was more healed, apparently.

"It won't be long. I know exactly what I'm gonna say and you're gonna agree with me if you know what's good for you."

"Should I give you two space?" Casey asked, sitting on his hands, watching April bully him.

"I wasn't about to kick you out. But Leo may not appreciate the audience." April said.

"It's fine. Um. But can you get Sensei to text with me? April's got me a phone now." Casey asked.

Sensei stole the front. "Of course I'll text you. You can call me too, anytime."

"Okay." Casey darted forward and hugged them again. "I love you."

"Love you, Casey Junior." Sensei said, with everything he had.

Casey gave a wobbly smile that was barely contained from crying again, and a salute to April as he left the room.

"Junior?" April echoed, curious.

"Oh, that's a whole thing." Sensei waved the hand. "Incredibly long inside joke, you know how it is. Anyway, I'll let you yell at Leo now."

"Nooo." Leo lamented as he was given back the front. "Can we not do this? I've already heard it twice. Maybe even three times. It's all blurring together."

"And you'll probably hear it a few more." April told him, stubborn. "What's your grounding?"

Leo wanted to lie with a low number so he could avoid the conversation. The spark in April's eye told him not to fuck with her right now. He raised two fingers.

"Tell me if that drops." April ordered. "Do you know what I was voted in my highschool yearbook?"

"Yeah, duh." Leo said, because he'd ordered like three copies specifically because he was so proud of her for graduating and wanted to have any potential blackmail the yearbooks might contain. "Most capable."

"Do you agree with that statement?" April asked.

"Yeah...?" Leo said, wary that he couldn't see where the trap in this conversation was and he could feel the jaws about to close on him. "You're the most capable person I've ever met. I feel like if we locked you in a tiger pit you'd come out with plans for lunch plans with the tiger next week."

April's responding grin was wild and warm. "Yeah. Most capable April O'Neil. Apparently the Commander of an apocalypse army in the future, if Casey Junior is to be believed. Do you remember what Mikey used to call me when he learnt what a sister was?"

Leo snickered, because Mikey became convinced that if April could be the big sister of four whole brothers, then she was: "Big sister of the whole wide world."

"Big sister of the whole wide world." April agreed, chin up, making her glasses flash in the light. "That's me."

"That's you." Leo confirmed. "What's the catch here? Because I can talk you up all day, baby. You are the best sister ever, I fail to see why you needed to sit me down for this."

"I'm just establishing the baseline here." April grabbed his face again, not squishing his cheeks this time but holding his chin so Leo was forced to make direct fierce eye contact with her. "Look at me, Hamato Leonardo. I am capable of almost anything. Do you know what the one thing is that I am not?"

"No?" Leo said, seeing the stress lines and the tiredness she carried too.

The vicious strength of her words. A knife between his ribs. April said, "I am not capable of losing you."

Leo swallowed, feeling the hurricane of emotion battering his heart. He said, "April..."

"I told you how this was going to go." April said, only betrayed by the smallest waver in her voice of otherwise absolute conviction. "I am going to tell you and you are going to agree with me."

The knife between his ribs twisted. It felt disgusting to consider lying to her, especially when she held his gaze and his heart in her hands. He turned blindly to Sensei for help.

'Sorry mijo.' Sensei shrugged. 'While I know that I can survive the loss of everyone, I genuinely have no information on if they'd survive the loss of us.'

'That's not what I'm--' Leo was tapped insistently on the forehead and found April scowling at him.

"Nope. Stay here. I'm not talking to Sensei, he has his own problems. I'm talking to my Leo who threw himself into a portal--"

"I had to!" Leo cut her off, biting his lip and pulling away from her hands. "I had to fix it, okay?"

"Literally don't care." April shook her head. "I care that I'm your big sister and I am not capable of losing you. The reasons why don't matter. The justifications don't matter. Agree with me."

April must've known more than she was letting on, the spark of her eyes desperate. She must've known what else she was begging for here. That the danger wasn't quite gone, the cloud hadn't passed, and Leo was just as likely to throw himself into death this moment as he was the last.

His heart was jamming up his esophagus. He thought about Mikey saying that he didn't want to make Leo promise he wouldn't do it again because he didn't want him to lie. Leo didn't want to lie to April either.

"I'm fine, April."

"The fuck you are!" April shouted, then got up to pace a tight circle in the room. Leo watched her, and he was making everything worse. He always made everything worse. The lie was better. Even if it made him feel scummy and terrible, the lie was a comfort.

Leo raised his hand in surrender. Packing sincerity, pulled from nowhere. "I wouldn't, April. I wouldn't do that to you."

April whirled on him, intense eyes scrutinizing him. She was trying to figure out if he was telling the truth, but he was bulletproof.

Sensei offered, 'Should we really be lying to her about this?'

'Got a better idea?' Leo asked dryly.

'Accept help?'

The idea was sour and bitter, it felt claustrophobic, like shutting a door you always left open. 'We're fine. I'm not about to do anything. She just... she wouldn't understand how our brain works.'

"You're just telling me what I want to hear." April said.

Leo blinked and returned his flawless smile, knowing that as long as he doubled down on the lie she'd find no fault in it. "Because it's the truth. I was trying to fix what went wrong. But I wouldn't hurt you like that, not now. I know how tired you are. Have you been sleeping?"

"You're deflecting onto me." April accused, but her defence was wavering in the face of his surety. She was getting what she wanted, agreement from him. He'd even given enough push-back at first to seem real.

'The amount of effort you're putting into not appearing suicidal is genuinely worrying.' Sensei commented, coloured cool and worried.

'I just don't want her to worry about something that's not an imminent problem.' Leo shot back, trying to stay on the surface so she wouldn't notice the waver. He said out loud, "My capable big sister of the whole wide world has to deal with an alien invasion, a new roommate from the future, and her little brothers in pieces. If you were sleeping well after that then that's more reason to be worried."

"Well, you're giving me a heck of a lot to worry about." April slumped back into the chair, tugging insistently on his blue bracelet. "You promise you're telling me the truth?"

"I promise." Leo said, smooth and calm.

'Grab that shovel and dig.' Sensei hummed.

'Not gonna tell on me?"

A contemplative silence. 'I can't imagine me telling April will make you cooperate with any help given. You've got to ask for it yourself.'

April tugged harder on his bracelet. "Something to share with the class, Sensei?"

'I wish you'd take away from this conversation the intent she was trying to give, instead of another reason to hide yourself.' Sensei told Leo sadly, then fronted. "Hi April. Just keeping him in line."

"Good. Keep an eye on him for me, okay?"

"Yes Commander."

April grinned like a shark. "How's the grounding?"

"Two." Sensei reported.

"Perfect." April gave a double thumbs up. "I've got to take Casey to an appointment where we're giving him the world's most delayed immunizations, but just text me if you need me, okay?"

"Oh, damn it, he's not immunized." Sensei said, blinking rapidly. "Thank you for thinking of that, it completely slipped my mind."

"Not me." April held her hands up. "Mom did. She set it up too."

"Tell Carol thank you. For that, and the cookies, and for attempting to kick me into gear. Even if it backfired, I appreciate that she's looking out for Casey." Sensei said, rubbing the back of his head tiredly. Still sore and exhausted, held down by it.

"Of course." April said. "Should I send someone else in my place or are you guys good by yourself now?"

'Want anyone?' Sensei asked.

Leo retook the front. "We're good. Can we borrow your nail polish, though?"

April went to grab her bag and brought him all the little bottles she had. Then she wrangled him in a hug and a sharp kiss on the cheek. "Love you, little brother. Always."

"Love you too." Leo tried to ignore how it made his throat hurt. April left him alone.

'Hate to poke a hole in your plan here but we might need a hand.' Sensei said, as Leo picked through the little nail polish bottles.

'Oh I fucking forgot.' Leo complained, annoyed. He could probably paint someone else's nails with only one hand, but not his own. 'Think we could do it with our toes?'

'Yeah, probably. But maybe not when our limbs still feel like they're full of sand.'

'True.' Leo sighed, setting aside the bottles. The exhaustion was a third entity in their head, taking up way too much space. 'I'm sorry that I broke our ninpo. I really wasn't thinking.'

'Your ninpo.' Sensei didn't sound too worried. 'You didn't break it, believe me.'

'You broke yours?'

'Yup.' Sensei popped the 'p', a tired little sound.

'How?'

'How do you think? I pushed way too hard. People were in danger and needed help. I didn't stop to think of the consequences. The people I could've helped if my ninpo was intact later on if I'd had restraint in the first place. But I was impulsive and young and couldn't see past my own ego.'

'Couldn't be me.' Leo said, weakly.

Sensei borrowed their arm to pat their shoulder, a real life feedback instead of relying on the mindscape.

'Well I was going to try and paint our nails to stay awake but I guess that plan's shot.' Leo sunk down into the blankets. 'I'm so tired.'

'Yup.' Sensei popped the 'p' again. 'We could go to sleep?'

'Only if someone doesn't wake me up for more stupid conversations later.' Leo grumbled, the weight of his eyelids dragging them away.

His dreams were loud. Incomprehensible and loud. When he woke, he felt too-hot, and the ache of his arm carried over. Missing arm. It felt as if he was laying on it, pins and needles, as if it fell asleep too. But it wasn't there. Leo tried to roll over and accidentally whacked his stump against the bed, giving a pained little yelp in surprise. Completely forgetting that the arm ended in a far different place than his half asleep brain was imagining.

Leo shivered through the sudden onset of agony, too weak to move and really do anything about it. Then the door opened.

"What'd you do?" Donnie asked, coming to the side of the bed.

Leo hugged his stump to his plastron. "How'd you know? Do you have me bugged?"

"If you're alone, yes." Donnie didn't deny, reaching for the stump and inspecting the bandages. "Let me check."

Leo couldn't move enough to fight. He let Donnie check. There was no blood and nothing more than the sensitive nerve endings being jostled.

"Well, doc?" Leo asked. "Will I be able to play the piano?"

"You couldn't before." Donnie said primly. "And my arm won't miraculously give you the ability to... actually, you know what, that's an idea --"

"Let's not add more to your plate, D, I was kidding." Leo said, gently amused. "Hey, since you're here, wanna paint my nails?"

Donnie heaved a big sigh, but sat down. He was wearing another one of the silk robes Dad gave him, a shimmering pink and purple pattern. "Done with blue?"

Leo lined up the orange, red, and purple on the bedside table. "Yup. One for each of my grand total of three fingers, please."

Donnie first chipped off the old polish. He said, "You know."

Leo replied, "I know."

And that was the entire conversation about Leo's decision to portal to Run of the Mill. Donnie silently painted Leo's nails, meticulous to almost an annoying degree, taking his time to get each stroke perfect. Leo allowed it mostly because his bones were jelly and his muscles useless noodles. With Leo's only hand held hostage, he couldn't even scroll on his phone.

Red for his thumb, purple for his first finger, orange for his second. Then his blue bracelet on his wrist.

"Thanks." Leo said, quiet.

"Anytime." Donnie replied. "Do you want me to stay?"

"Do you have better things to be doing?" Leo asked, and he tried really hard not to sound insecure about it.

"Perpetually." Donnie's lip twitched. "Draxum said you'd be pretty tired for a while. You could go back to sleep."

Leo groaned. "Well I can't now, my nails are wet."

"True." Donnie agreed. "You could come watch me work."

That immediately perked him up. He loved spending time in Donnie's lab. The infodump was probably going to even be related to something he was actually interested in, since he was working on the arm. "Can I?"

"Under one condition." Donnie said. "You can't walk there."

Leo honestly probably couldn't, with how terrible he felt. "You gonna carry me, Tello?"

The logistics visibly flashed past Donnie's eyes. Leo was sure his sensitive shell was a part of the equation. He said, "Raph will."

"Don-nie." Leo said, stretching his name out into a ten-syllable whine. "I don't like being carted around, I'm not a child."

"Stay here and suffer, then." Donnie got up, unperturbed.

"Fine, fine." Leo immediately caved. "Whatever. But I'm pretending I'm a king and he's my servant the whole time."

Donnie gave a startled laugh, shaking his head. "If that works for you, Nardo. Gimme a second."

Donnie vanished and Leo used what little energy he had to struggle into a hoodie and put his phone in the pocket. By the time Raph arrived, Leo held up his arm and said, "Hello chariot."

"Your majesty." Raph replied, because he was good sport.

Raph picked him up, making his sensitive stomach swoop. He hid the shiver from it, trying to hang on Raph's neck. Each step pricked his nerves, the heavy weight and tingling pain in his stump. He wanted to make more smart comments, but the sensations of it all stole his breath from his larynx. Instead he blinked through the struggle and tried to inflate his lungs.

"Still with us?" Raph asked, looking down at Leo's dazedly blinking face.

The hallway looked weird, like it was warped, curved material he'd never seen before. He tried to catch the lines in the floor.

"Leo? Are we losing you?" Raph prodded again, and Leo had completely forgot he'd even spoken.

"Mm, 'm here." Leo tried even harder to blink into focus, looking at Raph instead of the weird hallway, choosing to put all his mental energy in the fluttering red ties of his mask. They didn't really look real either. That probably wasn't good.

"Are you sure we should be doing this, D?" Raph asked over his shoulder.

"Staying in one place is driving Leo up the wall." Donnie replied. "I think he's just a little floaty because he woke himself up from jostling his arm."

"Doesn't look real." Leo muttered, because the haloed lights on the ceiling waved in multitudinous patterns.

Raph's steps stuttered. He said, "Hold on, bud, let's go sit down first."

Leo wasn't going to complain about that, the struggle of keeping his head up was exhausting with the added momentum from the motion of walking. Raph got to Donnie's lab and settled Leo into his desk chair, before crouching in front of it and holding Leo's hand.

"Hey." Raph said.

"Hey." Leo's throat clicked when he swallowed. "It's fine. I know it's real. Just... looks weird."

"I'm glad to hear you know it's real. What looks weird?" Raph prompted.

Leo glanced around and it felt like he was sitting in the middle of a movie set. Plastic and manufactured. "Everything."

"It's still a type of derealization." Donnie muttered, coming up from Leo's left and gripping his shoulder. He continued in a sing-song, "You know what that means!"

"Grounding." Leo said, in tandem with Donnie. Then he hung his head and complained, "I'm too tired."

"Something more passive, then. Do we have any ice left, Raphala?"

"Think so." Raph squeezed and stood up. "I got it."

There was a beat of silence, where Leo swayed and tried to get the room to look less like a dollhouse. Then Donnie said, "Do you have your phone?"

Leo pat his pocket and pulled it out, the battery almost gone. He offered it to Donnie, who unhesitatingly typed in Leo's password and navigated to Snapchat to take a selfie with the two of them. Leo took a moment to realize what was happening, then did a k-pop finger heart to cover his mouth. Donnie mirrored him and took the picture.

"Cute." Leo murmured, taking his phone back and saving it to his camera roll before sending it as his streak. He didn't really like how glazed his eyes were, but Donnie looked so pleased with himself.

"I am no such thing." Donnie protested. "That is the Sunrise Duo's domain. We are irrevocably cool. Raph, agree with me."

Raph walked into the lab carrying ice. He said, "Whatever you say is probably right, Don."

"Always." Donnie nodded.

"Lemmings." Leo reminded him.

Donnie gave a very rude gesture. "I wasn't wrong, I was misinformed!"

"Same thing." Leo took the ice Raph was offering and held it in the palm of his hand. The shock-shiver of cold ran up his bones.

"Don't do that twin thing where you have an entire conversation without any context, Raph's right here." Raph said, laughing a little.

"Lemmings don't actually jump off a cliff in mass suicide." Leo said, rolling the ice in between his fingers.

"Good...?"

Donnie growled. "I wasn't aware that it was a myth perpetuated by the Disney corporation and tried to stick to my guns against Leo only to be proven wrong the one singular time in my entire life. And now he will never let me forget it."

"I'm just saying, if you can be wrong once, you can be wrong again." Leo mumbled, pressing the ice to his lips and feeling the stark feedback.

"I am omniscient." Donnie announced grandly, and shuffled around Leo's chair. "Are things looking better?"

Leo yawned, pulling his knees up to rest his cheek on his knees. He moved the ice to the hot nerves on his neck. "It's not worse."

"Do you still wanna hear about what I'm working on?"

There was a skeletal frame of an arm on the metal worktable. "Yeah."

"Even if it's an infodump?" Donnie's lips tweaked in amusement.

"That's my cue to leave." Raph gave a loud and obnoxious smooch on the top of Leo's head. "Have fun with that."

"Shut the door behind you!" Donnie sung.

Raph left the door wide open. Donnie pinched his brow exasperatedly, then closed the door himself. "How much do you know about the nervous system?"

"Makes you nervous." Leo said.

"Sigh. I know you have studied this before."

"Yeah, but you have a new special interest and you're gonna make it my problem. Listening to you talk will be grounding. Hit me."

"You find it annoying." Donnie pointed out.

"That has literally never stopped you before."

Donnie made a frustrated sound. "I don't want to make things worse for you."

"Dontron. I am asking you to infodump me about nerve connections so I can try and think about something else other than the shit in my own head. Capisce?"

"Fine. The central nervous system includes your brain and spine. The peripheral nervous system branches off from your spinal cord. Specifically for our situation, we're interested in that, with the somatic nerves. They are responsible for the sensations of touch and the control of muscles." Donnie explained, fingers working with the skeleton he was creating on the table in nimble movements as he spoke.

That was in fact all things that Leo had studied previously. His ice was melted against his neck. "So how can you replicate that in tech, then? Nerves are like, tiny."

"They're made of neurons wrapped in myelin. A neuron is essentially a microscopic wire, transmitting electric impulses from one side of the cell to the other." Donnie waved his hands in the air illustrating the shape of the neurons and the motion of the electric current.

"Right. Using actual electricity, then?" Leo prompted.

"Almost. There's an additional component involving a chemical signal to connect the nerve cells using neurotransmitters. If it was just carrying a signal from one side to the other, wires have been doing that for a hundred and fifty years. Then there's the myelin, which is comparable to rubber in its protective qualities but not it its conductivity. Myelin is fatty and speeds up the impulses."

"Can't you use something fatty then to reproduce it?" Leo asked, eyes tracking Donnie's hands as they switched between small tools, discarding and picking up rapidly.

"Except that this isn't organic, it can be exposed to oxygen or moisture, causing oxidation and hydrolysis reactions." Donnie pointed out. "Either I need to find something that I can control the reaction of not to damage the fabricated nerves cells underneath, or I need to create an environment within your arm that more simulates organic material."

"What are you leaning towards?"

"I'm still researching materials at the moment. Plus looking into the current research on nerve connections. Most are utilizing an implant at the base of the spine. Which."

Donnie and Leo looked at the shell covering the entirety of Leo's spine.

"So I've been focusing on seeing if I can reconnect the nerves at the point of exit instead." Donnie shook his head, frowning at the mess he'd made of the wires on the table. "But it's not as if they're something I can just grab."

"Right." Leo agreed. "What's the plan, then?"

Donnie met his eye across the table. "You don't have to humour me. I know you're exhausted."

Leo was still curled in the desk chair, cheek on his knees, because he absolutely was drained to the bone. "Yeah. But I'm thinking about nerves now and not anything else. It's really nice. Keep going."

"I don't know." Donnie shook his head. "I don't know if the high standards for results I want are even possible."

"Hm." Leo cast out to Sensei.

Slow, Sensei joined the front, taking it between a long blink. He cleared his throat and said, "Do you want to know?"

"Sensei." Donnie said, wary. Then something flinted in his eyes. "Wait. You said that you lost your arm a long time ago too. Was I successful in making you an arm?"

"Yes." Sensei said, with a crooked smile. "It was amazing. Even when you had probably half the resources you did now."

"Do you know how I solved these problems?" Donnie leaned forward, intent.

"Not the specifics. I know you didn't need any implant in my spine."

"And it still worked?"

"Like a charm."

"What about the myelin?"

"No idea. But obviously you can figure it out."

Donnie swayed forward then turned around, clutching his hands to his chest. "Of course I can. But... I'm glad to hear I will. It would be more helpful if you had perhaps listened to anything I told you ever and knew how the neurotransmitters can be replicated, but fine. Can't expect a Leo to be useful, after all."

Sensei took the gratefulness sandwiched between confidence and scorn as it was intended. "Neither of us doubt you for a second."

Donnie's back curved down, and he said in a smaller voice, "Give me Leo back now, please."

Sensei stepped away.

Leo stepped forward and said, "Come on, D, he's not that bad."

"He's not you." Donnie replied, not turning around. "If he's here then I don't have you."

"You always have me." Leo promised.

Donnie inhaled slowly and purposefully through his nose, jaw flexing. He was obviously restraining himself from speaking. Or maybe it was only obvious because Leo knew him better than he knew himself.

"Spit it out." Leo said.

"I don't want to hurt you." Donnie said.

"If you don't stop fucking walking on glass around me, I'm gonna hurt you!" Leo snapped. Then he broke off, panting a little, a frustrated furrow between his brow.

"You don't know." Donnie clenched his hands, head down and eyes shadowed. "I know you've been suffering in other ways but you have no fucking idea what it was like. To... to talk to you and get nothing back. Nothing on your face. No laugh. No smile. No joke. Every time your face goes blank my heart stops because... I got you back but I didn't really. So forgive me if I really want to try and avoid triggering that again."

Leo's heart thundered, making his vision blacken on the edges. He stared at his twin and the wash of pain. He swore he could feel it.

Twins always get asked if they can feel each other's pain. Leo never felt Donnie's actual physical pain, it was more that if Donnie was upset, then the universe felt wrong, the stars out of alignment, an itch underneath his skin. A relentless nagging feeling, regardless if he could see the twitch of Donnie's brow or they were nowhere near each other.

He'd asked Donnie once if he felt the same way. And after a lot of scoffing about mysticism and science, had gotten the response that he could tell if Leo was doing something stupid. That tracked, since Leo had always noticed Donnie knew if he was in trouble. Or if he needed help. Whether that was truly a twin connection or just the fact that Donnie was a genius and could follow patterns. And Leo always knew if Donnie was upset, sometimes before Donnie did.

A sudden slam of a sense memory. Sensei feeling that unbearableness, the universe was wrong, everything was wrong, and that meant Donnie was upset. It lasted over an hour, then abruptly stopped. In the moment, Sensei had felt relief, that whatever was upsetting his twin was gone.

Except then Donnie never came home from that mission.

Leo took a steely, focused and shaky breath through his nose, pushing out the feeling of lost grief pain pain pain. 'That fucking sucks, Sensei. That must've been really hard.'

'Yeah.' Sensei agreed, distantly, like he'd sunk to the bottom of a lake. The guilt. The unending guilt. He'd felt relief. It haunted him, it sickened him.

'It's understandable. He wasn't upset anymore.' Leo said.

'It means he probably died upset.' Sensei snapped.

"Leo?" Donnie asked. Completely devoid of emotion.

A flicker of eyes up. Leo said, "I'm sorry, we're having a bit of a moment, give me five minutes." Then returned to the misery inside him.

'He's right to hate me.' Sensei told him. 'I'm the reason. I'm taking you away from him. I can't keep this shit from leaking through and ruining your life too.'

'I would never ask you to stop being upset over losing Donnie. That fact that you lost him and you're not just screaming twenty-four seven is more than anyone could ask of me.' Leo shuddered a breath and said firmly, 'It's really awful that all of that happened to you. Being upset at yourself for it won't make it better, they'll still all be dead and you'll be upset too. Give me another memory.'

'There's nothing else left of me.'

'Go through and give me a good memory. Wallow in how much you loved your Donnie. Show me that instead.' Leo was trying very hard to keep one foot in the internal conversation and one foot in reality, so he didn't dare try to interact with Sensei in the mindscape as it was the quickest way to fall. The real Donnie had moved on, fidgeting with a small piece of metal and not otherwise interrupting.

Reluctant and slow, Sensei sorted through piles and piles of misery photographs to come up with a different sense memory. It was simple and bleached of colour, but Leo could see the intent in all the motion. An older Donnie, with a shit-eating grin, happy stimming in a circle at something going right. His joy spilled over and he came over to bonk heads with Sensei, and their face burned with the force of their responding grin.

'I'm not a specialist on grief or anything.' Leo said gently. 'But it seems to me it might be useful to spend some more time on things you loved about them.'

'Donnie's waiting for you.' Sensei said, instead of acknowledging that. 'Tell him I'm sorry that I'm doing exactly what he didn't want.'

'You didn't do anything but love Donnie a whole lot. I'm not about to apologize for that.' Leo purposefully grabbed the edge of reality and pulled himself back in from where he'd been in the wading pool of focus.

"That was very bad timing." Leo said out loud, past the TV static his tongue had become.

"I'm beginning to at least recognize the difference between talking to your parasite versus dissociating completely." Donnie said, with faked levity. "What was it now?"

Leo wouldn't even really know where to begin on that one -- a let-loose train of thought of Leo's accidentally triggered a trauma memory of Sensei's? Woof. "We've got twice the trauma in here, baby, there's a lot of landmines. It's fine, I'm not slipping, I'm good."

"So it was Sensei." Donnie extrapolated easily. "The not-secret group-chat that is not a secret is beginning to suspect that all of us must've been dead in the future."

"Oh yeah?" Leo raised an eyebrow. He wasn't exactly against them knowing, so he wasn't about to discourage the avenue.

"You told me yourself that Sensei lost his twin." Donnie ticked a finger. "Sensei told Splinter that he was dead. After a recent conversation Mikey has concluded he also dies. Which just leaves Raph, who we've heard very little about from both Sensei and Casey, leading me to believe there isn't much to hear."

"Raph died first." Leo confirmed. "Well, second after Dad. Some of the things he said are gonna make me cry next time I see his stuffed animals. But yeah, you're right."

Donnie fiddled more intently with the thing in his hands. After a long moment, he said, "I don't know what to say to that."

Leo snorted a little. "It's okay."

"Don't think I'm ignorant to the fact that losing all of us would be your absolute worst nightmare. To think that Sensei..."

The smile Leo was wearing fractured. A little of his breath was stolen away from already weak lungs. Donnie was looking at them. After a moment, Sensei reluctantly took the front again.

"I'm fine, Donnie." Sensei said, thoughtlessly reassuring. Not wanting him to waste any time worrying over him.

The look grew searching. Then Donnie's eyes lit with a moment of recognition, of understanding. Like staring at a crowd of people and suddenly seeing someone you know. Painted in the blood-coat of sorrow.

"Don't give me that." Donnie said, slowly, disbelief in his tone, shaking his head. "I can't imagine how you'd be fine."

Sensei blinked at him like an owl, taken off guard by the sudden shift in attitude.

Leo chuckled. 'He can see the me in you. And despite multiple attempts to sell me as a child, he is really quite fond of me. And that means he could be fond of you.'

'Don't be ridiculous.' Sensei scoffed. He said out loud, "I can handle myself. I'm trying my best not to make things harder for Leo."

"There's only so many neurons in that brain." Donnie said, wrenching whatever little metal thing he was working on intently with his pliers again. "Seems to me your problems are undeniably shared."

"I don't want to cause problems for him. I don't like it when I'm the reason he's slipped or I'm the one dragging us down. I never wanted to front in the first place for exactly what you said, I didn't want to take him away from you." Sensei ranted, swallowing hard against the pin-pricks of emotion in his throat.

"But you're Leo. And you can't leave well enough alone." Donnie turned around and dug in his organized shelves for something else. A thin chain?

A long silence as Donnie carefully threaded the metal he'd shaped through the chain. There was a deep thinking furrow between his brows. He looked up and met Sensei's eye, tone cool but not harsh, "I'm upset over this situation because it can take Leo away from me and that's a threat in my eyes. But you... you're not doing this to hurt me, or hurt him. Really, if you've lost everyone, you're probably the one who's the most hurt out of all of us. I do not apologize for things that are not my fault. Given the information I had on the situation, my anger was justified. However going forward I will not treat you as if you are a threat."

Donnie rounded the worktable and approached, carrying whatever he'd just made. He held it up, the chain dropping to show he'd made a necklace with a stiff wire bent into an endless spiral, about the size of a quarter.

"I noticed you fidgeted with the bracelet but it's hard to reach with one hand." Donnie explained. "So I made you both a new fidget."

The 'both' warmed Sensei's heart more than the stilted not-apology did. He blinked rapidly, fighting tears. Leo stole the front, making a rapid switch of overwhelmed to teasing, "Donatello, you love me so much it's stupid."

Donnie's lip twitched, humour and irritation, the beloved combination that Leo so enjoyed inspiring. Indulgent and long-suffering. "I don't have to give this to you, Leonardo."

"If you don't give that to me I will burst into huge, disgusting tears all over your lab." The amount of emotion Sensei had pumping through their body as they co-fronted could probably tip them over the edge at any second regardless.

"Do not cry, that's illegal."

Leo sniffed loudly. Donnie sighed irritably and stepped forward to clasp the necklace on him, letting the copper coil click against his plastron. Leo immediately reached up to fiddle with it, the ridges of the perfect concentric circles against the pads of his fingers. It hit Leo for the millionth time that he was so loved, that he wasn't alone, and the tears immediately tipped over with that slightest push.

"I said don't cry!" Donnie complained loudly.

"Don't point it out, you'll make it worse!" Leo complained back, sniffing hard and gross and scrubbing his eyes with his wrist.

"I've never done nothing wrong in my life, ever." Donnie said.

"I know this and I love you." Leo memed back through the tears and sniffed again. Donnie elbowed Leo's tired fumbling hand out of the way and intently helped him clear the tears with the sleeves of his sweater.

"I do love you." Leo murmured, his whole self practically buckling under the weight of it. "I'm sorry I keep going away. I really don't want to."

"Don't apologize for things that aren't your fault, dum-dum." Donnie scowled, even as he still took care of the tears when they fell quicker.

"I'm sorry, I'm really tired." Leo felt like he was practically blubbering at this point and pulled away from Donnie's hands to hide in his knees instead. No control at all over his emotions.

"Do you want to go to sleep?" Donnie asked.

"I don't want to go back to bed it's so boring." Leo said, muffled into his knees.

"You're not sleeping in an office chair. I'll drag the cot in."

Leo accepted that, because it was a partial win. He also accepted the protein drinks Donnie had brought along, having a lovely liquid dinner. Then he curled up on the cot with burning eyes and stuffed sinuses and fiddled with the coil, running it up and down the chain.

Chapter Text

Leo's phone was plugged in and laying next to his head. It lit up when Casey texted. The background noise of Donnie muttering at his toolkit faded away as Sensei ran to the front, swapping them fast.

The text said: 'Sorry to bother you can I talk to Sensei?'

'I'm here.' Sensei replied, lightning fast and fighting against the heavy weight. They'd been sleeping on and off for a few hours, not quite settling all the way down.

There was a much longer pause before Casey's reply came through. 'Can I please have an actual answer on why you waited so long to tell me? I don't understand.'

Sensei stared at the text on the phone screen until it swum. Leo offered, sarcastic, 'Trying to think of how to phrase: if you didn't know I was here then I could kill myself?'

A stutter of the diaphragm, stolen breath. Sensei burnt with shame. 'He's my kid. I can't put that on him.'

'Doesn't he deserve an answer?'

'An answer, yes, not a trauma dump.'

'He's literally asking you to tell him, that means you're not dumping it on him.'

'I don't want to burden him with it.'

'Am I seriously this fucking annoying? How have my brothers not smothered me in my sleep yet?'

Sensei sighed. He fiddled with the phone case then eventually typed, 'I wasn't trying to leave you alone. Leo's been struggling but I have too. I was scared. I wasn't ready.'

Immediate ping back. Accusatory. 'You still haven't said what you were scared of.'

Sensei struggled with the reply. When he took too long, Casey sent another text that said, 'You owe me.'

'Help.' Sensei caved and asked Leo.

'Finally.' Leo shook out their hand and picked up the phone to type as rapidly as he could with one thumb.

'L - it was a lot for him to deal with at once. first i'm in here making us dissociate every ten seconds so he can barely get a coherent thought. second he literally just died and he wasn't really sure if he was actually alive or what. third he has this immense guilt that by doing anything he's taking over my life and ruining it etc which is not true but it was hard for him to decide to do anything for himself. fourth the moment he told you what was going on then that was a commitment to staying around bc he wouldn't leave you behind. does that answer your question.'

'Dude.' Sensei complained, but wasn't quick enough to stop Leo from hitting send.

'You asked for help, here's your help.' Leo watched the 'read' notification appear. 'Too late now.'

'I hate you so much.'

'Is that true, Sensei?' Casey prodded.

'Yes.' Sensei begrudgingly sent back. 'Sorry. I just felt Leo could articulate it better.'

'It's fine I just wanted to make sure that was the actual answer. I don't like it. But thanks for answering anyway.'

'Still mad at me for a thousand years?'

'It's ten thousand.'

'My bad.'

'I'm going to try to sleep now. My arms hurt from the shots.'

'L - did u take ibuprofen?'

'Yeah. Couldn't sleep because I was thinking about some idiot.'

'L - sounds like a jerk want me to kick him.'

'Can you hug him actually. I'm mad for ten thousand years but I'll love him for a million.'

'L - you got it jr.'

'Gnight both of you.'

Sensei replied, 'Gnight Case. Love you for ten million years.'

'Ok nevermind kick him.'

Leo lurched in the mindscape towards Sensei, expecting him to at least try to dodge. He didn't, instead he gave Leo a big hug and squished hard.

Leo hugged back. A little laugh escaped. When he let go, he gave a small kick to Sensei's shins, and said, 'You make everything harder than it needs to be.'

'Oh, I am so not hearing that from you.' Sensei said, mirth dancing in his eyes.

Leo retook the front, locking the phone and setting it face down. Their eyes burnt and their limbs weak. The exhaustion won.

Time was an unpredictable elastic, bouncing back and forth. He woke three separate times from nightmares to find Donnie still working, humming along to low-level dance music.

Leo's whole body struggled with the simple task of even rolling over. The nightmares made it hard to want to go back to sleep but the exhaustion gave him few other options. It was with unsatisfying rest that Leo heard voices.

"Are you hiding Blue from us?" Splinter asked.

"Not hiding, he's right there." Donnie replied promptly.

"Have you slept?"

"I'd like to be asked some other question." Annoyed.

"Have you eaten?"

"Not that one."

Splinter gave a humourless chuckle. "Come here, Purple."

"Why?" Donnie asked, suspicious.

Leo cracked his eyes open a little, curious. They were crusted and sore. The silhouette of his twin and his father, by the worktable.

"I won't ask you any more questions." Splinter told him, gesturing his hands inwards. "Come."

Donnie hesitated, then knelt before him, hands in his lap.

Splinter smiled indulgently and cradled Donnie's face in his small hands. He stared at his son, even as Donnie kept his eye contact to the floor on his left. "You have done an amazing job taking care of Blue. All your hard work in creating an accessibility tool for him is truly remarkable. I hope that you will look out for yourself as well as you do your brothers."

Donnie blinked rapidly. "I am fine, Papa."

"You are a terrible liar." Splinter said, fond. "Orange has made us a meal. You will eat it. Understood?"

"Yes, Papa." Donnie said, resigned.

Splinter held his face, thumb stroking his cheek. "I am forever incredibly proud of you, Donatello."

A fragmented beat of silence, and Donnie said in a wavering voice, "Oh."

"If that is a surprise to you, then I should've said it more." Splinter's crooked smile had a sour-bitter wryness.

Donnie leaned into his hands and shut his eyes. He didn't confirm or deny the claim.

"I need you to take care of my son for me. I love him very much." Splinter said quietly, taking both Donnie's hands and encouraging him up.

"Ah. You're talking about me." Donnie asked, monotone.

"Yes I am."

"Hm. Are you staying with Leo, then?"

"I have Blue. Go eat."

Donnie gave a salute that was betrayed by the tremor of emotion in his fingers. Leo quickly shut his eyes and pretended to be asleep, because it was a well-known fact that Splinter couldn't resist kissing the forehead of sleeping turtles.

Leo was rewarded with exactly that, and immediately opened his eyes to grin at his dad, triumphant.

"Sneaky." Splinter said, smiling back warmly. "How are you two feeling?"

Sensei hesitantly joined the front, heart in their throat at being included.

"Really tired." Leo said, scrubbing at their burning eyes. "We kept waking up even though we're still exhausted."

"You drained yourself quite a lot." Splinter said.

"Yeah, yeah. Suffer the consequences, I know."

"Next time, ask for help. Then there are no consequences." Splinter told him, firm and sage and just a little shaken.

Leo almost said, 'I don't want to be a burden' then remembered that he recently wanted to suffocate Sensei for saying the exact same thing. Sensei started to cackle in his mind, vindicated.

"We won't make the same mistake twice." Sensei replied for them, unable to keep the slight amusement out of his voice.

'Let's not make such big promises.' Leo snorted.

"Do you want to join us for breakfast?" Splinter asked.

Laying in the cot for any longer sounded awful, but sitting up and eating sounded worse. Everything was just so heavy.

"What day is it?" Leo said, brain fuzzy. He felt like he'd been stuck like this for eternity.

"Tuesday." Splinter replied promptly.

"How long has it been?"

"Since what?"

A jack-hammer to the throat. A cold shell around his heart. When Leo thought about the prison dimension, it was the same gravity-defying feeling, the lurch of his stomach to his toes, prickle of fear up his nerves. The same senselessness. He didn't say that, he said, "Since the invasion."

"Almost twenty days now." Splinter told him.

That felt far too long and not long enough. His toes were numb. Had it really been that long since he got back? It always felt like he was still there. Maybe this wasn't real.

Annoyance had a fist-fight with fear inside him.

"Look at me, love." Splinter encouraged.

Leo hadn't realized he'd lost focus, and centered on the worried face of his father. He wanted to ask if this was real but insecurity clogged the words in his throat. He wanted his dad to make this okay. He wasn't sure he could handle it if he couldn't.

"What is going on in that head of yours?" Splinter wondered, thumbing the furrow between his brow.

Leo couldn't bear the thought that he was developing a chasm but he couldn't make it go away. He voiced his fear, "What if I can't stop thinking it? What if I'm trapped in this stupid thought forever?"

"What thought?" Splinter prompted, without pause.

Cold. Gravity shift, inverted and dizzy. Pain. Loneliness.

"If this is real." Leo croaked through a bone-dry throat.

Splinter hummed thoughtfully. His tail was flicking behind him, betraying the illusion of calm. His father said, "Many times you have gotten songs stuck in our heads. It is easy to do, right? Just sing a little for us. If I do not want your song in my head, I will not get it out just by thinking I want it to stop. I need to listen to another song. Right?"

Sensei unhelpfully began to hum Britney's Spears' Toxic in the back of their head. Or maybe helpfully, it was hard to tell.

"Do you know this is real right now?" Splinter asked, when Leo didn't reply.

"I'm pretty sure." Leo said, hesitant. "But it just keeps coming back up."

"Then tell that thought, thank you very much, I am going to think about tacos now." Splinter said, grinning.

"I don't want to think about tacos."

"Too bad. I'm hungry. Do you think Michelangelo made tacos?"

"For breakfast? Probably not."

"Shame. Are you coming to eat with us?"

That indescribable weight would not allow it. Leo sighed and rubbed his face. He wanted to be with his family. He didn't think he could get there on his own. He didn't know if he'd be able to stay long without falling asleep again, the dull scraped out feeling of his ninpo. He couldn't decide.

"I can fetch Red to help you there." Splinter suggested, guessing part of the problem.

But the solution wasn't one he really wanted. Leo scowled and said, "I don't like being carried around."

"We don't have much other mobility aides, unfortunately. Do you think you could get there with assistance?"

'If you take one step we are going down.' Sensei advised him.

Leo grudgingly shook his head no, having learned his lesson the hard way, the rock-solid weight of every individual bone in his body.

"It makes Red happy to help." Splinter offered. "No one thinks any less of you."

A sharp stab between his ribs. Leo wasn't really sure maybe he was fit for consumption right now anyway, everything seemed to be putting him on pins and needles. He didn't want to think about the uselessness and the sensation of being carted around like he was just dead weight to be dealt with. Incapable. Gravity against him.

"Psh. Of course not, I'm amazing." Leo said, flopping back onto the cot with blank eyes on the ceiling. "I'm just really tired. Go ahead and eat without me."

"Hm." Splinter said, which wasn't encouraging. He pat Leo's hand. "Take time to replenish your ninpo."

"Yeah, yeah."

Leo was left alone in Donnie's lab. Something was humming, which was hopefully not a bad thing. It was stupid, but even though gravity was so much lighter in the prison dimension, just the fact that all his limbs felt twice as heavy right now kept twigging his mind back to it.

'We're drifting.' Sensei advised him, and Leo realized his eyes were dry from how long he'd been staring at the ceiling without blinking.

'Sorry.' Leo inhaled suddenly, no idea if a minute or an hour had passed. Exhaustion dragging. It was just like... like...

'How long were you there?' Sensei asked, making Leo's blood cold. Instant snap back.

'Where?' Leo played dumb.

Sensei didn't dignify it with an answer, because they both knew what he was asking.

'I'm not...' Leo shook his head. 'I'm pretty sure from the moment I closed the portal and the moment Mikey dragged me out, it was fairly quick. I've read Donnie's notes about the invasion, there's no mention of me being in there for that long.'

'That's not what I'm asking.' Sensei had control over their hand, holding the coiled pendant and running it through the chain repeatedly. 'I'm in here. I've felt what you felt. You've avoided every thought of the prison dimension but the sheer enormity of how much room it takes in your brain... that wasn't five minutes, kid.'

'No.' Leo agreed, blinking rapidly. 'I don't think so. But I don't know how long it was, either. Time was weird there. It clung to me.'

'Clung?'

'Donnie never said anything about my injuries. If time had passed, they would've been in different stages of healing. But they weren't. And I never got hungry or thirsty. So it's possible I was really only in there for a few minutes.'

'But your actual experience says differently.' Sensei said, uncertain.

'I really can't tell.' Leo's heart was starting to race at the memory. 'Because, well...'

'You dissociated for most of it?' Sensei suggested, wry, feeling the incredibly disconnected sensation that came with the memories of the prison dimension. They stretched on. 'Do you have a best guess?'

'No.' Leo said, small. 'Not five minutes, I can say that much.'

'Give me a ballpark. Five hours? Five days? Five months?'

Leo shrunk back, hurting. His mind shied from it. 'Not that long. Maybe... maybe two weeks.'

'Two weeks.' Sensei repeated, flatly.

'It's not that bad.' Leo was quick to assure. 'Three weeks, max. I don't know. It felt like eternity. I only had my heartbeat to measure. And time clung, like I said. And I had no where to hide. So ...'

'So you hid in your mind.' Sensei sighed, pressing the coil of wire to their mouth, thinking. 'No one knows.'

'No.' Leo agreed, voice very small.

'That isn't great, buddy.' Sensei inflated their lungs through a few cycles.

'It's not that bad.' Leo insisted again. He was scrunched up, making himself tiny, out of the front completely. 'You were in the apocalypse for twenty years.'

'With at least one person I loved by my side every step of the way.' Sensei reminded him, gentle. 'Let alone whatever physical or mental toll the prison dimension takes, relentless unending trauma for upwards of three weeks straight without a break... yeah. No wonder this happened.'

Leo said, weak, 'Can we please stop talking about this? I'm like, a zero.'

'Sorry.' Sensei had the whole of the front, keeping it steady for him. 'I'll hold the fort. You get back into your toes. Just... you need to think about talking about this a bit more. It's not going to get better by ignoring it.'

'Yeah, sure, over my dead body.' Leo radiated weary annoyance.

There were footsteps, heavy. Sensei didn't turn his head when Raph walked in, saying out loud, "Leo doesn't want to be carried, big guy."

"Not carryin'." Raph came over, dropping a tray of food beside them. "I'm the delivery boy instead. Leo ok?"

"Mm." Sensei didn't really want to lie so he evaded, struggling to sit up on one elbow to inspect the hashbrowns and bacon that had been sent their way. "We're tired. Thanks for the food."

"Course." Raph was inspecting them intently, eyes flickering up and down. The damaged eye still cloudy, even more so in Donnie's lab lighting.

Sensei buckled down and ate some food, hoping it would ground them more than the floaty, unreal feeling that was tingling through all three of their limbs. All the effort it took to chew and swallow was almost beyond their energy level, but Sensei was an old champion of suffering through things he didn't want to do. He used to run a resistance, after all.

When he managed a significant portion of the food, Raph offered him a protein drink, and Sensei had that too.

'Do you want to come back out?' Sensei asked, once he'd finished the task of eating for their body.

'No.' Leo said.

"Everything okay?" Raph prompted.

Sensei blinked and offered a lop-sided smile. Neither of them wanted Raph to worry. "Our drained ninpo is a bit much to deal with. Leo's just taking a break."

"Alright." Raph said, a little uncertainly. "Is there anything else you guys need?"

"We're good. Just tired." Sensei gave a thumbs up, letting his eyes crinkle reassuringly.

Raph gave a weak smile back. He fidgeted a little, looking down.

"Something on your mind?" Sensei asked, knowing.

"I wanted to say thank you." Raph kept his gaze on his fidgeting hands, the constant chasm between his brow an old friend.

"Thank me?" Sensei said, surprised, putting his hand to his plastron.

"Yeah." Raph's voice was rough and he cleared it. "I haven't missed that you've been taking care of Leo. Eating for him. Jumping in when he gets scared. It's really great that he's got you to give him that kind of help."

"Yeah, well." Sensei was uncomfortable with the praise. "Unfortunately I think the help I give is outweighed by the problems I cause. So it's kind of the least I can do."

"You're not trying to cause problems." Raph shook his head. "Everyone's been saying that you've had it pretty rough. It's... it's hard to think it's something you're doing on purpose, when you're just trying to get by the same as him. I wish there was more I could do for both of you."

Ah, this wasn't really about Sensei at all. It was about Raph. That was easier to deal with.

"Actually." Sensei considered multiple approaches and decided that he needed to abuse the fact that he was older than Raph for once to make him take care of himself. "There is something I was wondering."

"Sure." Raph straightened up, meeting his gaze, totally ready. Earnest and eager to help.

Sensei turned to face him head on, dragging the tired body up. He held his finger up and said, "Follow my finger with your eyes without moving your head."

A twitch between Raph's brow. Sensei moved his finger from one side to the other, watching the stabilization of his gaze and seeing where the peripheral vision stopped.

"Cover your good eye?" Sensei asked.

Raph visibly hesitated, but did as he was told. Just the singular eye with a milky starburst framed in scar tissue stared at Sensei.

"Can you read this?" Sensei said, and finger-spelt 'red'.

A long, telling pause. Raph said, "Last letter was a d."

"Does it hurt?"

Raph let his hand drop back to his lap. "It's a little uncomfortable sometimes. But it doesn't hurt nearly as much anymore. And I can see well enough when both my eyes are open."

"Hm. Is it causing any diplopia?"

"Dip what now?"

"Sorry. Double vision."

Another hesitation. Raph admitted, "Yeah, a bit."

"When you covered one eye, did that go away?"

"No."

Sensei hummed. "If light hits the cloudy part it scatters, creating a ghosting effect that can be very distracting. The cataract can also cause reduced peripheral vision and depth perception, as well as light and glare sensitivity. Yes, you have two eyes, so the remaining one can compensate to a degree. But that doesn't mean you should suffer through it."

Raph audibly scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest. "Yeah, well. It's not a big deal. And it's not important right now."

Sensei could've choked on a laugh, his smile coming out all funny. He said, faux-lightly, "You know, last time you said that to me, you died."

Raph stared at him. Sensei ran the sentence through his head again and realized he'd just said that out loud and covered his face with his hand.

"Sorry." Sensei said, expecting Leo to contribute, but the littler turtle said nothing. He was still holding on, a zero, unstable.

"Leo can just pull out a trauma demon all the time to win arguments now, huh?" Raph said, letting him off with a wry look.

"Sorry." Sensei repeated, dragging it out into a whine, before raising his head back up with a fiercer look. "It's true, though. You can't brush aside yourself all the time. Eventually something's gonna give."

"And what's your big plan, then?" Raph shut his good eye and waved a sarcastic hand in front of the bad one. "It's not like there's a mutant eye doctor or anything."

"Well, actually, there might be." Sensei offered. "Draxum always seemed to have a bunch of different yokai connections to help us in the future. I can't see why a yokai eye doctor would be any different."

"It's really not a priority at the moment. Raph's doin' just fine. And it's not... this is not like in your future, whatever happened to me. I'm not about to die, it's just an eye."

"You're wrong." Sensei shook his head, giving an incredulous smile. "You are always a priority to us."

Sensei had thought Leo was tuning them out, but the presence shifted up and he easily moved aside to let him join. When Leo fronted, the weight of their exhaustion sagged his shoulders, and he blinked slow and tired, before adding, "Come on, dude. What would it hurt to just ask around and see? Haha. See."

Raph's composure fractured. He shook his head rapidly and stalked away. He didn't go far, immediately turning around to point sharply at them. "I'm surprised you'd want that, Leo, you hate that guy."

"We're not saying he'd be the one doing eye surgery." Leo said, leaning back because sitting up was way too much work. Talking was actually starting to wind him. "Just asking if he knows anyone who could. Preferably someone other than me asking, because fuck that guy. Whew, we're really tired. Sorry, I can't focus."

"You guys should be resting." Raph approached again, the mask of concern not covering the flicker of anger.

Leo promptly dipped, retreating back, the relentless weight straining his already fragile resources for staying grounded. Sensei let their head drop, trying to stop the dizzy on-and-off feeling he got, looking up only once he felt like everything was in his own bones again. Raph was still there, waiting.

"What's the best time to go to the dentist?" Sensei asked, hoping to defuse the upset washing off Raph's tight shoulders.

"What?" Raph echoed, mystified. "Hold on, Sensei or Leo?"

Sensei tapped a finger-spelt 's' to his mouth, then repeated, "What's the best time to go to the dentist?"

Raph stared a moment longer. He said, slow, unsure, "What's the best time?"

Sensei grinned, weak but as full-force as he could manage. "Tooth-hurty."

An incredulous snort. "You're... an idiot."

Sensei laughed, the sound fragile. He didn't tell Raph that he was washed with the memory of the hundreds of times he'd thought in the future 'I bet Raph would be dying to call me an idiot right now'. Instead he said, "I get that you feel like everyone else has to come first, you're the oldest and you're the protector. But your family wants you to be taken care of as well. If you can't decide that for your own quality of life, think about how your fighting might be affected if your depth perception gets worse."

The scowl settled back on Raph's face. "I'd learn to compensate."

Sensei rolled his eyes and reached out to flick Raph in the middle of his forehead. "But you don't have to, oh my gosh."

Raph touched his forehead, looking offended.

"Getting help for yourself doesn't take away the help others need." Sensei said, ducking his head to force Raph's irritated gaze to meet his. "Care is not a finite resource. Not in this family, at least."

"You should be resting." Raph repeated, unmoved.

Sensei gave a loud, dramatic sigh and flopped back onto the cot. "Why are you always so difficult? I'd have an easier time convincing a brick wall to spontaneously disassemble. Promise you'll think about it? For me, the poor, poor Leo who lost his big brother and just wants to see the alternate version of him healthy and happy?"

"Are you... weaponizing your grief?" Raph seemed uncertain how to react.

Sensei let his grin be sharp. "Yes. Promise me you'll think about it."

The quiet was heavy like the exhaustion deep in Sensei's marrow, but he rode it out patiently, challenging Raph to contradict him. Eventually, Raph said, "I'll think about it."

"All I ask." Sensei pulled the blankets over their shoulder, the movement a Herculean effort. "Wake me for lunch."

Sleep was immediate like the flick of a light switch. The drag of their expended energy. Mistake after mistake after mistake. An unending assembly line of failures, nothing without them. Here was nothing. Here was nothing squared.

It was unclear when their crusty eyes opened who was driving, a smash of both of them trying to rouse from the gentle shake of their shoulder.

"Time for lunch." Someone said.

The haze of sleep like gun-smoke, the aftermath of carnage. Their dreams had been fogged with adrenaline fear, the drag-drag-drag of their exhausted body trying to sensory tell Leo that he was still there. That it wasn't safe, that the precipice zero he hovered on was a void, a reality, there was no reach out and touch flesh of his family.

"Still half-asleep?" The person said fondly, a shapeless being. A hand touched their head and Leo flinched away, confused. His body was vulnerable. He wasn't safe. The punch of his heart hurt.

"Hey, you're okay." He was told, the face crouching down to their level, hands drawing away. "Are you with me?"

Leo wasn't anywhere.

"What's going on?" Another person asked.

"Not sure. Someone's awake but I don't think they're very grounded."

"Leonardo, whichever we've got, can you take a deep breath for us? It's just after twelve on Tuesday. You're safe at home, in New York. Mikey's was out this morning and he's brought you back an overloaded food truck hot dog. I'm serious, there's like fifty toppings on this thing, it's disgusting."

'You're okay.' Sensei said.

'Am I?' Leo asked, disorientated.

Sensei drew Leo back a little from the front. 'Can't you see? It's Mikey and Donnie.'

Leo stared at him, uncomprehending.

Sensei sighed. 'Just hold on tight, okay? I'll eat that abomination before it spills on something in Donnie's lab and he has to harvest our organs. You try to ground a bit more, you're a little lost.'

'I don't understand.' Leo said.

Sensei gathered the smaller turtle in his arm and roughly kissed the top of his head. 'I don't want to us to drift away, so I need to take the front. Why don't you sit with me as I do it, feel our body, focus on our surroundings?'

'I'm so tired.' Leo told him. 'I want to rest but time won't move.'

'It's moving.' Sensei promised. 'Come with me.'

They pulled back into awareness. Sensei squeezed their eyes shut hard, trying to reset the spin of reality, then fluttered open to see the two brothers still crouched in front of the cot.

"Are you with us?" Donnie asked, again.

Sensei clumsily tapped an 's' to his lips, then took three bracing breaths, one after another.

"Sorry." Sensei greeted, clearing his throat when it came out rough. "The ninpo exhaustion is making this really difficult for Leo. He's here, he's just a little lost. We're trying really hard not to slip right now."

Sensei dragged their body to sit up, as he could feel Leo, just right there, confused and tired. Donnie was watching with a calculating eye, while Mikey searched their face nervously.

"We're good. We need to keep eating to get our strength up." Sensei held his hand out for the truly ridiculous hot dog. "That looks great Mikey, thank you."

"Do you still like an everything-chili-dog?" Mikey asked, giving it over and setting a drink cup on the table beside them as well.

"I like anything hot and fresh." Sensei replied, and nudged Leo mentally to enjoy the hot dog with him. It took a bit of concentration to chew and swallow, but the combined effort of both of them made it go quickly enough.

Donnie had turned away to work, though it was deceptive because his gaze flickered over their way about every ten seconds. Mikey was still crouched beside the cot, pretending to type on his phone and also watching them with a wary eye.

'What's going on?' Leo asked, sounding a bit more coherent.

'We just ate a chili dog.' Sensei told him, keeping them in reality by grabbing the necklace and running it through the chain repeatedly.

Leo frowned. It made the body frown. Mikey said, "Did you like it?"

When Leo didn't immediately respond, Sensei prompted, 'Well? Did you like it?'

"Yeah..." Leo said, slowly. He looked around. The room was not his, not the med bay, it was... the lab? They were on a cot? They just ate a chili-dog?

'Three for three, buddy.' Sensei confirmed, not moving too far back but letting Leo take the driver's seat again.

"Sensei?" Mikey prompted.

Leo took the same thing he'd noticed Sensei did and tapped the 'L' to his mouth.

"Oh! Hi Leo. Are you still a little lost? Do you wanna play a game?"

Leo swallowed around his dry throat. He wasn't sure if he really understood what was going on still. He shrugged, glancing uncertainly around the room. Right. Donnie's lab.

Mikey fetched one of his notebooks and two pens. He drew a cross-hatch and started tic-tac-toe.

It was embarrassing that Mikey won the first four rounds they played, Leo incapable of planning ahead more than a moment to place his 'x's. His baby brother should not have been able to beat him, when Leo was the chess master of the household. He should be able to win freaking tic-tac-toe. His competitiveness was enough to drag his mind out of the frosted encasing, putting more than two seconds of forethought into his moves.

Leo won the fifth round. He gave a sigh of relief, and then turned to rub his eyes, feeling the full weight of his mistakes.

"Number?" Mikey prompted, watching Leo scrub at his face.

"Zero, probably." Leo muttered. "Sorry, I'm being stupid, I really am just tired."

Doctor Delicate Touch grinned back at him, fierce. "Shut the fuck up, don't talk about my brother that way."

Leo felt a laugh bubble up his throat. "My sweet baby Angelo, where ever did you learn how to swear?"

"I've got three really stupid older brothers."

"You... literally just swore at me for calling myself stupid?"

"It's different when I do it. Mine is fond. Yours isn't."

Raph tapped on the door. "How are we doing in here?"

Leo latched onto the distraction, tipping his head backwards to see his older brother as he came in. "Can we watch a movie?"

"If you want." Raph said. "What were you thinking?"

Leo shrugged, because he hadn't thought that far ahead. He was exhausted but wanted to spend time with his family in a way that wouldn't be too taxing.

"We can vote. I'll go see if I can convince Dad to share." Mikey said, grabbing their stuff.

Leo swung his legs off the side of the cot and tried to breathe. He knew he couldn't walk, not even assisted. He could barely keep his head up. Resigned, he raised his hand up to Raph.

He was picked up effortlessly, Raph tucking him under his chin and saying, "Come on, Donnie."

"I never said I was coming." Donnie didn't look up from the small blowtorch, goggles over his eyes.

Leo was too tired for subterfuge. "I want to spend time with you, D."

"You've been in my lab for ages." Donnie complained, but he shut off the blowtorch, so it was a win. Raph carried Leo out of the lab and down the hall, with a quick bathroom stop. By the time they made it to the couch, Mikey was sorting excitedly through their DVD collection.

"I told April she should bring Casey over and we could show him some Lou Jitsu classics!" Mikey said, enthused, holding up a selection of well-worn cases.

Sensei bubbled with joy in the background. 'I never got to actually show him, though he's heard more than enough.'

April brought not only Casey, but Carol, the trio of them coming in clutch with lots of snacks. The moment Carol set eyes on Leo she crossed the room to give him a hug.

Leo weakly hung on, and muttered, "Hi, you're a surprise."

"Had to come check on my favourite blue boys." Carol smiled, giving him a friendly jostle. "Plus apparently it's a crime I haven't watched these movies either, April insisted that I come and see the fuss."

"Oh, she's correct, you are missing out." Leo gave a full force charming smile, though the wattage was dimmed by his lack of energy. "Plus you get to see my dad be awesome."

"Speaking of." Carol pulled back to greet Splinter, who had actually gotten to his feet to shake her hand. "It's nice to finally meet you."

"Carol O'Neil. I'm a huge fan of your work." Splinter said, giving a roguish smile, jerking his head to April.

Carol threw her head back and laughed, delighted, the gems in her glasses sparkling in the light. "Oh! Me too, you've got some wonderful boys."

"Mom." April whined.

Mikey hopped over to say hi to Carol as well. Hiding behind everyone, Casey leaned over, glancing anxiously and nervously at Leo.

There was barely a moment, a wordless agreement, in between one blink and the next, and it was Sensei giving a careful and well-worn smile. He opened up his arm in offer.

"Sensei." Casey rushed out, audible relief, and climbed up to hug him tightly.

"Geez, brat, they've got hairbrushes in the past, you know that right?" Sensei teased, immediately running his fingers through the tangled knots.

Casey just held tighter, eyes squeezed shut. Sensei hummed, coaxing and amused, tipping their heads together as he stroked his hair.

"I'm still mad." Casey muttered.

"I can feel that." Sensei chuckled, being thoroughly squished.

His kid clung to him. Raph and Mikey were laughing with Carol, and April left and came back with a grumbling Donnie, who was dragging a weighted blanket. They all settled around, dragging in soft blankets and bean bags chairs and arguing about what was the most important Lou Jitsu movie to show first.

"Gotta have your eyes open to watch a movie, Casey Junior." Leo joined the front to tease, flicking his ear.

"Sorry." Casey's cheeks went pink, drawing back a little. "Did you guys switch? I can move."

"Nah, we're both here." Leo answered, cracking his jaw with a yawn. "We're pretty tired, so don't be surprised if we fall asleep."

"What's the Junior for?" Mikey asked, apparently listening, leaning in.

"Oh, you guys are gonna love this." April said, with glee. "You know Cassandra?"

"You're her son?" Raph immediately said, reasonably alarmed for the concept.

Sensei reigned Casey back in, chuckling warmly. "In spirit. She named him and was his general bad influence for most of his life. But no, not his actual mother. Our family picked up little baby Casey like a kitten off the side of the road."

"Until I was ten Barry told me that I was a demon sent from hell to punish them for their sins." Casey chimed in, not ever particularly bothered by his orphan status since everyone in the apocalypse was practically an orphan and he'd gotten a pretty great family out of the deal.

"That's because you made it your mission to put your sticky fingers on everything he owned and I love you so much for it." Sensei praised, pressing a loud smooch to the side of Casey's head.

Casey grinned so wide his face split with it.

"Ohmigosh, it's if Leo was a dad." Mikey whispered badly.

Leo flickered in, sticking his tongue out at Mikey. "Obviously I'd be a great dad, Miguel."

"Mid." Casey said.

The room erupted into laughter. Leo exclaimed over the noise, "Who taught you that?"

Casey gave a mischievous smile, pleased with himself and the reaction. The group moved onto voting for the movie, causing arguments over whether or not Leo and Sensei got one vote or two, and if Casey and Carol could vote if didn't know what they were voting for, and if Splinter got multiple votes since he was in the movies.

It was loud and chaotic. Leo hadn't felt this tired in his entire life. But when his ears rung with the clashing voices and the vibrations of Casey's laughter from where he was still clinging to him like a barnacle, it wasn't so bad.

Chapter Text

Leo did drift off, even during his favourite parts of the movie. Casey was unwilling to loosen his grip even the slightest, and Donnie was leaning against Leo's feet on the floor, wrapped in the weighted blanket and presumably sleeping as well with how little scathing commentary he was giving the most scientifically inaccurate parts. April was beside Donnie, eating a bowl of popcorn and occasionally offering it up over her head to Casey.

Carol paid little attention to the actual plot and spent more time asking Splinter for behind the scenes knowledge of how things were shot. Mikey and Raph were quoting along with the movie line for line, pushing each other off the bean bag chair for maximum drama.

Leo didn't really feel like he was in his body. It was like the flesh was placed slightly to the left, an empty corpse hanging in suspension. Trapped. The moment was nice. He liked it. But it felt like it was happening to someone else. The annoying, endless song stuck in his head now -- it felt like it wasn't real.

He was so surrounded by love. It was everything, sticking to him. He wanted to bask in it, to enjoy it, but it was so soured and so starkly contrast with how the void felt. Both the internal and the external.

They had tacos for dinner. Leo got another hug from Carol when it was time to go, pulling him aside to say goodbye.

"You're a million miles away." Carol told him, with a wry smile, patting his cheek fondly.

"Sorry." Leo said automatically, around his tangled tongue.

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

Leo shook his head, because he didn't really.

"You probably should anyway." Carol advised him. "Doesn't need to be with me, but maybe just bring it up with someone. No one wants you to go dark again. Right?"

"Right." Leo agreed, reluctantly. He didn't want that either, though in this moment going dark might be nice because he wouldn't have to try. He was too tired to keep trying.

Carol gave him another tight hug. Followed by April, then Casey to finish the line.

The hug switched halfway through to Sensei, who ruffled Casey's hair. He said quietly, not wanting to draw attention, "Get some more sleep, Case. You look exhausted."

Casey pulled back to make a big show of rolling his eyes. "Hadn't thought of that. Yeah, I'm trying. It's been a long few weeks."

"I bet." Sensei sighed. "Take it slow."

"Yes Sensei." Casey said, automatically. "I'm starting my upgrading classes. Can I come do my homework here?"

"What do you need upgrading for? Donnie taught you everything you needed to know, didn't he?" Sensei gave a teasing elbow.

"Sure, I can code a security system from the ground up, but apparently they need me to be able to analyze literary themes or know the presidents."

"Those old guys? Just tell them that the government won't last long anyway." Sensei chuckled.

"Well, it's gonna last a little longer this time, thanks to Leo." Casey bit his lip.

Flicker in a blink. Leo brightened their grin. "Thanks to you too, Casey. Come on, give yourself some credit. Couldn't have done it without you."

"Team effort." Casey amended, and held out his arm.

Leo tapped it. He said, "Come visit us literally whenever, dude. We're not up to much."

"Okay. Thanks." Casey gave a weak smile. Carol and April were waiting for him, so he stole one last hug and left.

Leo graciously allowed Raph to carry him back to his own bedroom, his older brother setting up all his blankets and his fan and his nightlight. Leo's mind ran in tired little circles, not able to settle or to calm down from the weird feeling that everything was just slightly to the left.

"Where are we at, Leo?" Raph asked, helpfully plugging Leo's phone in to charge. "Do you want someone to stay with you?"

The idea of forcing someone to stay with him, to suffer the indignity and boredom of 'healing' with him just seemed ridiculous. But the thought of being alone was almost inhumane. He didn't know where he fell, especially since he was still struggling with derealization.

Carol told him to talk to someone. He felt stupid and about ten years old, but he asked Raph, "This is real, right?"

A flash-freeze of heartache on Raph's face before it vanished. He said, utterly serious, "Yeah, Leo. This is real."

"How do you know?" Leo hated to beg, to give into this persistent and terrible thought. Donnie had proven it was real. Dad told him to think about something else. But it didn't change the tempting lure that it just wasn't real, that he was still there.

"Donnie said that your mind is worried you're still in the prison dimension." Raph said, looking thoughtful. "But there's no Lou Jitsu there, right? So shouldn't that tell you it's real?"

It was an endearing attempt to prove it, even if it did nothing to help. "But I was there and I know all the movies."

Raph took a long minute to think. Leo fidgeted with the edge of his bracelet, waiting, unsure what kind of answer he was going to get, wondering if he should've even said anything in the first place.

"Was Sensei there?" Raph asked, a furrow between his brows.

"No." Leo shook his head. "It was just me."

"Do you think you could tell me about it?"

"I don't think that's a good idea."

"If I'm going to prove to you that it's not, I should know what it is."

Leo shut his eyes, feeling the sting, breathing slow. This wasn't where he wanted the conversation to go at all.

'You should talk about it.' Sensei reminded him.

'I'm well aware that I should.' Leo replied, testy. 'But it's going to break their hearts. And I don't know if I can cope with it myself, let alone if they know.'

The void encroached on the edge of his vision, threatening. A moment in the shade, tempting, offering cool and protection. There was absolutely no way he could open his mouth and talk about it, as much as anyone claimed it would help. He hadn't gone dark in a while and wanted to hold onto that streak.

Shit. His Snapchat streaks. He'd been so exhausted, he had no idea if he'd sent anything recently enough to upkeep them. It broke a little twig, like some kind of final straw, and Leo pulled the blanket over his head. He muttered, "Nevermind."

A muffled and distant soft sigh. Raph said, "Do you want to do some grounding exercises?"

"They're boring." Leo complained. "And I'm tired."

"Are you still worried this isn't real?"

"No." Leo lied. "I'm fine. I'm just tired."

Tired tired tired. Endlessly begging his mind and body for something he'd never have. Something he didn't deserve.

"Do you want me to stay?"

Leo wanted to stop making decisions. He didn't know what the right choice was. He mumbled, "Do whatever you want." and stayed underneath the blanket, falling asleep because he was so damn tired.

Really, Leo should've talked about it, or done something about the fear before he fell asleep, because it seeped into his dreams and he woke up choking on a scream, suffocating on it, throat sore. And Raph definitely hadn't gone far, because he was right there, rubbing Leo's shell, murmuring reassurances.

"Fuck. Fuck." Leo swore, spitting, head spinning wildly around to gauge his surroundings. Sensei was right there as well, metaphorical hackles up, eyes pricking on all points of exit, all potential threats, as their heart galloped and --

It had been only a few hours, judging by the blinking glow of the alarm clock. The worst part was that Leo was still exhausted, and the frustration of it all sprung tears to the corners of his eyes, and he swiped irritably with his wrist to clear it.

'All clear.' Sensei reported. 'We're safe.'

His throat hurt from how loud he'd screamed, so it wasn't a surprise when his bedroom door briefly opened and closed, and the lithe padded footsteps of Mikey came closer, plopping over their feet.

"Careful, Mikes." Raph muttered, still rubbing Leo's shell in firm circles.

"I am the most careful ever." Mikey replied, chin digging into Leo's knees.

Door opened and closed again, another flash of hallway light and purple with a glowing tablet. Donnie asked, "Did you hit your arm?"

"No." Leo rasped. "Didn't mean to make it a party in here."

"Hm." Donnie replied, sitting on the floor with his back against the mattress, still tapping away.

"Seriously, I'm fine." Leo's voice was weak, even to his own ears. He scrubbed more furiously at his face, trying to erase any sign of upset, trying to be this fabled 'fine'.

"Okay." Raph agreed. No condescension, just patience.

"Why'd you yell that, then?" Mikey said, from his feet.

Leo froze. He asked Sensei, 'What the fuck did we yell?'

'Don't know, also wasn't there for it. Must've been from the dream.'

He'd been dreaming of the prison dimension. Leo grabbed his shovel and dug, "Yell what?"

Obviously none of his brothers wanted to say it, because the room suddenly got awkwardly silent. It definitely wasn't good then. Leo tried to remember what he'd been dreaming, but all that came to mind was desperate fear.

Donnie cleared his throat. He reported in a robotic tone, "Let me go."

Leo's blood went a little cold, even though it really could've been worse. He could've been begging to die, like he'd done quite a lot. Though judging by the chilled silence, maybe it wasn't great either.

"Are you still struggling with what's real?" Raph asked.

Hadn't stopped ever, really. Leo didn't answer quick enough, because Donnie jumped in, "I said that we could go through that as many times as you needed, Nardo."

"It's fine." Leo struggled to say. The weight of his exhaustion and failed sleep and taunting nightmare and burning eyes making everything just that side of too-much.

"What was your dream about?" Mikey asked, in a very quiet voice.

Leo's heart skipped a beat. There was a thunderstorm brewing inside him, dangerous, volatile. "I don't remember what I was dreaming about. It was just a nightmare."

A long, heavy silence. Mikey whispered, "But I've never heard you sound that scared."

Alright, well, Leo was never fucking sleeping again.

'Not the solution to this problem.' Sensei said.

'I do not need your bullshit at this exact moment, dude.'

'What good is hiding this from them going to do?'

'Are you for real? I can't just... drop that on them. It's better that I don't get into it. It's better this way.'

'For who? Not for you.'

"Did we lose you?" Raph cautiously asked.

"Give us a second." Sensei fronted to speak. "I'm just trying to tell Leo not to be an idiot."

"We'll be here a while, then." Donnie muttered.

Sensei blindly kicked him. Donnie said, monotone, "Ow."

Leo murmured, 'Aren't you sick of this yet? Begging me to be even a fraction of what I need to be? I've failed them, I failed everyone, I can't do this--'

'Can I show you something?' Sensei interrupted, being louder than his hatred filled thoughts.

Leo gave a reluctant, 'I guess.'

'You don't know Cassandra well yet, but I think this'll be helpful anyway. I've held this memory close for a long time because ... well. Look.'

Leo sunk willingly into the sense memory, letting the colours starburst into whisked shapes. The rumble underfoot, ever-present and rolling. Cassandra, Casey Sr, sitting and rocking a sobbing Casey Jr to her chest. He must've been about seven or eight, watery eyes too big for his head.

Sensei was beside them, carefully applying layers to create a cast on his left arm.

"Come on, Case, we're gonna match." Sensei tempted, and the joke didn't land in the slightest. The child was too inconsolable and sobbed harder.

Cassandra laughed, grinning even as she continued to rock the kid back and forth. "Little guy probably doesn't want the comparison since your arm got chopped off."

"Right. We're not chopping your arm off." Sensei said, cringing and biting his lip. He tugged on Casey's tiny fingers through the cast holes he was creating and said, "You're gonna be just fine in a few weeks."

"It's not the end of the world." Cassandra promised, still grinning huge, raising an eyebrow when Casey's response was a harder sob. "What? You don't believe me?"

Casey shook his head, face damp, hair flying everywhere.

"Casey Junior." Cassandra said, with a grandiose and magnificent voice. "The world has not ended. I know you look around every single day and it seems like it has. But that's just the thing -- it hasn't yet. You've got to believe that the world will still be here tomorrow."

Casey's tears weren't quite so dramatic and wobbly. He sniffed loud and gross and said, "Like Sensei says. It's hope."

"It's hope." Cassandra agreed, loud and proud. "The world's not over yet. It sucks, so have a cry. Then get up and get back to it, because until the world actually ends, we're going on hope, baby."

"Damn, dude." Sensei said, impressed at how it finally abated the constant tears and had Casey stubbornly holding out his broken arm for much easier access.

"I was trying to sound like you rallying the troops. You're not the only one who can pull stuff out of their ass." Cassandra let her big grin go smug.

It was pretty stupid that at least once a week Sensei woke up and got out of bed entirely on the power of Cassandra's voice proudly proclaiming, 'Until the world actually ends, we're going on hope, baby'.

The sight of Cassandra's grin pressing into Casey's soft hair faded. In the present, Leo tiredly asked, 'What's your point?'

'Telling your brothers what happened to you will not be the end of the world.' Sensei replied, succinct and pointed.

'It might be.' Leo grumbled.

'No. It's not. The world didn't end, it's still here, and it'll be here tomorrow. You've got to make decisions with that in mind. It's not over yet.'

'We're going on hope, baby.' Leo echoed, with a little mild hysteria. He shook with it. 'I don't think I can, Sensei. Genuinely. Like I actually can't, I'll just... I'll...'

'Do you want me to start the conversation?'

'Isn't that cowardice?'

'Who cares? The end result is the same. I'm not saying I'm getting you out of talking about it. I'm saying I can get past the hard part.'

A long, searching silence. Leo admitted, 'I don't want to.'

'I can feel that.' Sensei urged forward more. 'I appreciate how hard this is. How much you've hidden from it, both from them and yourself. But I think it's important for everyone to know, and for you to share.'

'Why?'

'The more you avoid it, the more triggering it will become when it does come up.'

The instant shot-pain of fear when the prison dimension was mentioned was already so devastating. Leo couldn't imagine it getting worse.

Leo wanted to take the offer, to hide behind Sensei. But he didn't want to be a coward. He could do it, he'd just do it scared. 'Fine. But... I'll do it.'

'Yeah?'

'Yeah. Come with me and stay close. Help me stay present.'

'You got it, bud.'

Leo reluctantly tugged on reality, where it was hovering just to the side. He found his bedroom, blue light cutting through darkness and the consistent fan breeze against his skin. Mikey wiggling on his legs, unable to sit still. Donnie's tapping on his tablet. Raph was muttering, hand on Leo's carapace but no longer giving a shell rub. Shame. There was no good indicator of time passed, but they were all still there, so it couldn't have been too long.

Leo opened his mouth to make a joke, to cut the tension, to return with drama and flair. All of his showboating faltered, because the hooks of terror where tearing through his flesh, dragging him around helplessly. He rubbed his eyes again, feeling the crust of salt.

"Sensei?" Raph abandoned whatever he'd been saying to Mikey, attention drawn easily back to the blue turtle having a breakdown in the middle of the night.

"No." Leo muttered, voice cracked. "Sorry. Me now."

"What was he telling you not to be an idiot about?"

Leo let a long silence hold before admitting, "He wants me to talk to you about what happened."

"Are you going to?" Donnie's voice carried no inflection. His twin was trying to convey no particular bias, but his worry was betrayed because Leo could see the silhouette of his hand in the halo of his tablet screen picking anxiously at his nails.

"Try, I guess." Leo immediately felt so awkward and performative, inching back from Mikey's weight on his legs to sit up properly, hugging a pillow to his plastron. Sensei was right there, using their hand to fiddle with the coiled necklace they were still wearing.

"We're very down for trying." Mikey encouraged, shuffling to something more comfortable, just a flash of eager teeth in the dim lighting.

"Are you finally gonna tell us how you lost your arm?" Raph said, from his side.

Leo automatically came up and discarded six different deflective jokes arm he could make. Instead, the moment hung too long, and he said, "That's... I don't know. Like, actually don't know. That wasn't really a part of ... it. That was a last second addition. Not really from the prison dimension, it was just something that happened when I left it."

"Consistent with what I observed, we spotted you through the portal with two arms and pulled you out with one." Donnie reported, brisk and scientific. Then immediately shifting to dark wariness, "What was a part of the prison dimension, then?"

Leo felt like he'd swallowed something too fast, stuck in his throat, a slam-shock suffocation. A hit to the diaphragm, reflexive suck of air. He was pretty sure he couldn't answer, despite all his best intentions going into the conversation. He shook his head, miserable with it.

"Judging by your reactions to the topic, I feel as if there is more to it than we know." Donnie said, because he was a genius and he'd have to be a fucking idiot to miss how his twin was avoiding every mention of the place.

Regardless, Leo shook his head again, desperately afraid.

'Offer still stands.' Sensei said.

'I just can't say it.'

'Don't say it then. You've got other ways to communicate.'

Right. Right. Leo fumbled for his bedside table and turned the lamp on. The downside was the immediate illumination of all the worry on his brother's faces. Eugh boy, that wasn't helpful. He avoided their watchful eyes and raised his hand to sign. Then stopped because the sign he wanted needed two hands.

Leo whistled and gestured Mikey closer.

"What chu need?" Mikey scooted up the mattress. Leo positioned him on his left to steal his arm, which Mikey let him manipulate like clay.

Leo tapped his finger to the back of Mikey's wrist.

"Time." Donnie said, blank.

"Time." Raph echoed, careful.

"Time." Mikey said, to complete the set. "For the prison dimension? Time?"

Leo's hand trembled as he nodded yes with his fist.

"You weren't there long." Raph said, slowly. "I mean, Mikey made the portal almost right away."

Mikey willingly let him move his hand to a flat palm, which then Leo ran a pointed finger across the length of it.

"Week." Donnie translated, the blankness in his tone ruined by the growing dread.

"Week?" Raph repeated, alarmed.

Mikey didn't complete the set this time, turning to face his brother with horror. "Wait. Are you saying it was longer than just a few minutes for you?"

"Time dilation." Donnie whispered, pained.

"Ohmigosh, what if I'd taken longer to save you?" Mikey pulled on the ends of his orange mask with huge eyes.

"A single week, Leo?" Raph prodded. "Or...?"

All three heads swivelled back. Leo's heart pounded against the back of his tongue. He raised all three fingers. Then flashed an extra one.

'You told me two, maybe three weeks.' Sensei asked, weary.

'Maybe four.' Leo admitted. 'I really don't know.'

Donnie got up and left the room without a single word. Raph watched him go, emotion flashing over his face, and a tremor up his arms. Mikey lurched forward then stopped himself, hands hovering uncertainly.

"Hug?" Mikey asked, and Leo wondered what about his face told his baby brother that he wouldn't want one right now.

He gave an 'ok' and Mikey gently and slowly hugged Leo around the middle, careful of his stump arm.

The whole universe felt wrong, off axis from it. He raised his arm to tap a 'D' against his temple.

"I'll get him." Raph said, voice rough. He followed the trail Donnie blazed, leaving Leo's room like a vacuum sucked out of space.

Heavy, oppressive silence. Mikey broke it with a wobbly, "Thank you for telling us."

Leo exhaled through his nose, the breath shaking. A moment later, Raph was leading Donnie back in, tucked underneath his arm and whispering urgently in his ear.

"I apologize." Donnie said, robotic, entire posture painfully rigid. "I just -- how could I have missed that? I noticed no inconsistencies with your health and surely weeks there would have affected you."

Raph didn't let go of Donnie, fingers tight on the genius' shoulders. The chasm between his brow could be seen from space.

Leo had no idea how to describe something like what he experienced, especially to the scientific standards that Donnie would want. He carefully pulled one of Mikey's arms away from him, using the wrist to sign 'time' again, then signed his hand sliding inwards in front of his face, crunching his fingers in. Weird.

"Weird how?" Donnie predictably questioned immediately.

An audible sigh fell from Leo's lips, because it was too hard to explain.

'I can tell them what you told me, if you're struggling.' Sensei offered.

'I don't want to give up, it's just hard.'

'We're not giving up, we're supplementing.' Sensei said.

Leo relinquished the driver's seat and let Sensei slide over from where he'd been supporting him.

"Sorry, give me a second." Sensei verbalized, looking at the ceiling and blinking to stabilize the swirl from the change.

Raph scrutinized them. "Did you guys’ switch?"

"Yeah." Sensei's throat was so dry. That screaming really did a number on them. "Leo's struggling to explain but he does want you to know."

Donnie's back straightened up, attentive. Mikey wormed closer to their side, a miserable little sound from his throat but otherwise didn't interrupt.

"You weren't there." Raph said, because they'd talked about that earlier this evening.

"I wasn't there." Sensei agreed. "But he's told me about it. A bit, at least. Some of it I get from just being in the mind too. It's a very fragile trigger, so I'm hoping we can get through this without slipping."

'I'm going to dip to avoid this conversation.' Leo grumbled.

'The fuck you are not.' Sensei took no chances that he wasn't joking and held the littler turtle like a kitten by the scruff, keeping him in the front with him.

The body purposefully took three deep breaths. Three sets of worried eyes stared back at them. It was three in the morning.

"We don't know how long it was really." Sensei told them, slow and measured, taking mercy by staring at the shadows crossing the floor instead of the agony on their brother's faces. "Leo said time was weird, it clung to him. He didn't get hungry or thirsty, his wounds didn't change state. He could feel his heart beat, so that was the only measure of time he had. When I pressed him to guess, he told me two to three weeks. Which he's apparently amended to four weeks now."

Sensei took another couple deep breaths. Mikey, clung to his side, sniffed loudly but didn't move otherwise.

"Did you sleep?" Donnie asked, tone level. Information gathering.

Leo made no move to answer. Sensei poked him internally.

'Don't know.' Leo refused to speak out loud, telling Sensei.

"He doesn't know." Sensei played telephone.

"And the Kraang was there with you?" Mikey asked, voice crackling.

Sensei didn't bother to direct the question at Leo, because he knew the answer and he knew it'd be triggering for him. "Yes."

Too late. Sense memory. The weightlessness of his body was the Kraang's plaything. He'd gather Leo in the sharp talons and fling him, playing long distance cat-and-mouse. Pummelling him back down onto any debris he could find, an endless chase where Leo did nothing but let it happen. Listen to the countless things the Kraang conjured to say about him, his life, his family. Crashing and flung. Weightless rag-doll, breath punched from his lungs, heart going double-time for what felt like days. A panic attack that never stopped. A relentless game that never slowed.

Leo determined pretty quickly that the Kraang didn't want to kill him because that would ruin his fun. It was a shame, because Leo would've given anything to die, and it wasn't as if he could seemingly dehydrate or starve to death like he'd prayed for in the beginning. So the actual physical attacks weren't the worst part, it was just the senseless handling, his body tossed back and forth, shot into space and the void, nothing to hold onto, over and over, never knowing if the Kraang would leave him to float for a minute or days before retrieving him again.

A lack of control. A highlight reel of his failures. A personalized hell.

Air. Leo couldn't get air. He was trying to breathe through a straw. Someone was counting in his ear, cool as a cucumber and steady. Someone was squeezing his hand in time. Someone was crying into his shoulder.

"I shouldn't have asked." Mikey said. "I only ever make it worse for him."

"It was bound to come up." Raph assured. "Come on, Leo, breathe buddy."

Ah. Leo was hyperventilating. Donnie was counting tactical breathing for him. Sensei was sharing the front but didn't have the power to override Leo's freak out. His vision was blurred on the edges, faded like he might pass out. He hoped he didn't, that would suck.

'I want to fall.' Leo begged Sensei, everything grey and soupy.

'I know, mijo. I know it's hard. But tell me, when you were there, what was the thing you wanted the most? Of anything?'

A photograph dotted with tears. Leo in the prison dimension wanted his family. He wanted them to be okay. He wanted to be there with them, selfishly.

'You don't want the void. You want them. They're right here, buddy. Look at them.'

Leo blinked through watery blurs.

Mikey was close, trembling fingers digging into his side, stuttering breath against his shoulder. Wet and upset. Donnie was still on the floor, tablet face down, counting in an even voice while as he stared dead-eyed at the opposite wall. Raph was leaning in, squeezing his hand encouraging, a pillar of strength.

There was absolutely nowhere else in the entire world that he'd rather be. He didn't want to fall. He breathed, stuttering through the hitched catch in his lungs, following the instructions. Dragging himself back from the brink hand over hand with sheer bullheaded determination. He wanted his brothers. He loved them so fucking much. It was cruel to deny the metaphorical Leo still trapped in the prison dimension the comfort he would've killed for.

"Sorry." Leo rasped, practically gasping for air, then shaking his head. "Sorry, sorry, I'm here, I'm still here."

"We've got you." Raph promised, squeezing his hand tighter.

"I shouldn't have--" Mikey began, but was cut off when Leo bonked their heads together.

"No, you did nothing wrong." Leo insisted, because he could and would help Mikey get away with actual murder. A soft spot for the baby of the family a mile wide. "Let me. Just give me a second. Let me think."

The room descended into quiet. It wasn't a bad quiet. Leo breathed and thought about what to say.

"The -- the Kraang was there. I had no where to hide. No control. He broke my ribs right away, and it never healed, it just always hurt. And he'd, I don't know how to describe it. The pull of gravity made everything difficult -- I was just floating or falling or I don't know. I don't know. He would be there, he'd grab my body, but I was -- I'd hide as much as I could, even when I had nowhere to go." He gave a strained, hurting laugh. "I think I broke my coping mechanism, though, because I can't get out once I go into my head anymore. I can't think about the prison dimension without everything going wobbly, so I'm sorry I didn't say anything sooner. I have no idea how long it was, it felt like eternity, like it'd never end. But it did, and you saved me, and --"

Leo broke off, panting for air. He risked a glance at his brothers.

It was dim but emotion was plain to see, thick and palpable in the air. All of the carefully constructed aura of Raph's endless compassion was busting at the seams, revealing a boiling anger, practically crackling his skin with flickers of his red ninpo. The tightness of his jaw, fire flashing in his eyes. It collided underneath the facade, misery with guilt with fear. Just barely covered with a still holding mask of care and patience.

Mikey was hiding his own face in Leo's shoulder, trembling like a leaf, hands clenching into fists. He hiccupped every couple seconds but didn't speak, tight with tension, wormed close and shaking relentlessly.

Donnie wasn't looking at him either, intelligent eyes scanning the opposite wall like it had all the answers. Leo saw more sleepless nights trying to fix the unfixable in the future and he hated it. He hated that Raph had some ridiculous kind of misplaced guilt that he was unwilling to voice to Leo. That Mikey felt helpless and like he couldn't do anything right.

That Leo leapt into the portal to fix what he broke and after everything he went through he wasn't sure if he'd even managed that.

'Everyone's still alive.' Sensei reminded him. 'You've won in my books.'

Leo didn't want to think about the impossibly of losing Donnie's mind in his world, how unstable he'd be without Raph to hold him up, and how dim the sun would be without Mikey's smile. He thought about it anyway and wrapped his singular arm around Mikey's whole head, squishing it.

"Leo." Mikey said, muffled.

"I'm glad I'm here now." Leo said, rough.

"You know that you're not there anymore?" Raph prompted, clearing his throat, looking unsteady.

"Nope. I think I need Donnie to crawl up here and share his weighted blanket with me. That's the only possible solution to this problem."

Donnie didn't react. Raph prodded his shoulder, making the genius jump.

"I heard you." Donnie said, defensive and delayed. "I don't have time to--"

Raph physically picked Donnie up like a stray cat and deposited him on Leo's other side. "I'll be right back with the blanket."

"I am not someone to be manhandled, Raphael." Donnie hissed.

"You all need to stop being so small and pick-up-able, then." Raph snorted, heading out the door.

"Not a word!" Donnie called back, settling in a corpse-like position beside Leo. "This bed is not going to be big enough for the predictable moment when Raph joins us."

Raph apparently thought of that too, dragging the cot over as well as the weighted blanket. He carefully arranged it over Donnie and Leo's shoulders and settled the cot to connect to the edge of Leo's bed.

Quiet remained for only a moment. Mikey said, muffled, "That's really awful, Leo."

"Yeah." Leo agreed, gravelly.

"We're all glad you're here too." Raph said, not quite hiding the emotion in his voice. It sounded shattered.

Donnie said nothing, a hitch of breath in his throat.

Leo knew this was a bad idea. He knew he shouldn't have said anything, he never should say when something hurts him, it just makes things worse.

Sensei sighed, but didn't bother trying to argue with him. 'Focus on them. Try to calm down. You're still so strung up.'

'I wonder why?' Leo bit back, but the sarcasm wasn't nearly as sharp. It was more tired. The two of them did breathing exercises, trying to wrangle the pressurized feeling that took over every inch of their flesh. Mikey plastered close and matching their breathing, coming down from his own tears. Donnie rolled over and faced the wall, tugging the edge of the shared weighted blanket with him. Raph was on his phone, just a pin prick of light on the other side of them.

Time moved slow. But at least it moved.

Chapter Text

Leo's breathing evened out with conscious effort, the cobwebs of the nightmare clinging to him, and the persistent press of exhaustion that was inescapable under the pressure of the weighted blanket. Leo dozed uncertainly, roused slightly when someone spoke.

"You okay, Don?" Raph whispered.

"What makes you think I'm not?" Donnie asked in a cool monotone, impossible to tell if he was digging his own grave or being sarcastic. The genius must've realized that as he added, "Slash gen."

"Robot Donnie." Mikey said, still muffled and unwilling to move further away from Leo.

"Why are you on me? Interrogate Mikey, he's the one crying--"

"Because I can trust Mikey to actually feel his feelings." Raph said.

"Scoff." Donnie curled closer to himself, making his form smaller. "That's such a ridiculous statement, of course I feel my feelings, that's literally in the name--"

"That's not what--" Mikey started.

"Stop interrupting me." Donnie snapped, teeth gritted.

A hesitant breath from each of them. Raph and Mikey murmured, "Sorry."

"You're forgiven." Donnie said promptly, then sighed. He continued, the startling words a contrast with his completely normal voice, "What do you want me to say? I'm in excruciating pain. And I have no idea how to deal with it."

Leo never should say when something hurts him, it only makes things worse.

"Deal with it with us, stupid." Mikey said, nasally from his snot clogged nose. "We're all here for him and we're all here for each other. I'm so happy he finally feels safe enough to tell us what's going on."

"You're crying." Donnie pointed out, voice confused.

"Yeah, because, what is it Dad always says about me?"

"You've got more empathy in your baby toe than anyone else has in their whole body." Raph rumbled. Or enough empathy to power a small country, another thing the exasperated Splinter would say when Mikey tried to convince him to foster cats and dogs and rabbits and toads.

"I can't bear the thought of him there for so long..." Mikey said, voice wavering and failing. "But this is good. He trusts us, and we can help him. We will help him. I'm sad and I'm happy. I'm all of the above."

"How do you not explode?" Donnie asked, weary.

"I'm Mikey." A small bit of smile in his voice.

Donnie gave a weak laugh. Then he ventured, "Raph?"

"Oh, I don't think I've actually ever been this angry before." Raph said, with faked casualness. "But that's my problem to deal with."

Another wave of self-loathing washed over Leo. Sensei poked him hard and went, 'That's enough. Either tell them you're up or go back to sleep. Stop torturing yourself.'

'I shouldn't have said anything.'

'Why?'

'Because I hurt them.'

Sensei yanked him into the mind and took his shoulders to fix him in a fierce gaze. 'Why did you want Donnie to show what was wrong with his shell?'

'So I could help.' Leo said, 'But that's different.'

'Why? It hurt you to see that. You were in pain knowing your twin was in pain. But you wanted to know, to share the burden with him, to give him solutions and understand his struggle.'

'It doesn't matter if I'm in pain.' Leo stared at the floor, the nothingness beneath them, unable to meet Sensei's sharp gaze.

'Bullshit. Bullshit. Hey, Leo, look at me. Look at me.'

It was an order. Leo didn't want to comply, but he respected Sensei, and he looked up reluctantly, eyes flickering.

'You are reckless.' Sensei told him, and it pierced like an arrow to the heart. 'Hey, keep listening, I'm not done. You are reckless, but not with them. Never with them. You're the first to say don't go semi-lethal, let's not go home on a stretcher -- you leap into danger so they don't have to. You're reckless with yourself. You would do anything for them, and you just laid out the proof of that when you told them exactly what you went through to save them.'

Leo's bottom lip quivered. He said, in a failed attempt of a challenging voice, 'So?'

'All you can see is how you think you've failed. You feel like you should be able to take everything on by yourself, and if you can't, what point is there for you to even be here?'

'Are you going to get to the rousing part of this speech yet, oyaji?'

'Don't call me that.' Sensei sketched out an amused smile. 'The leader isn't meant to replace the team. We both know that we're nothing without our brothers, and fine. Probably not the healthiest thought, but it's not one I've ever been able to shake. However you've got to take it to mean that you're everything when you're with them.'

A shiver ran down Leo's spine and he was barely able to look at him.

Sensei's words keep going, a warm syrup, 'You build them up. You give them hope. You are all stronger together. They want you here, they want to work with you, they want you to be happy. You would do anything for them and it hurts if you won't let them do anything for you. When you won't do anything for yourself. No one deserves pain. Not even you. Hell, kid, especially you.'

Leo's emotions fought a cage-match fight inside him, unable to settle into one single entity. His attempt to argue felt like struggling against a rip-tide with knees quaking in the surge of water. 'They're all... they've always been so amazing. Raph is a true hero, he's strong, he's courageous, he's kind. Donnie's a genius, he's passionate and giving and so freaking talented. Mikey's a damn force of nature, compassionate and creative and full of so much heart. I'm... I'm just needlessly arrogant, a compulsive liar, and immature as hell.'

Sensei blew out a breath, thinking for a moment, and then gave a sly grin. 'Sure. And Raph's impulsive, he can't be left alone for longer than ten minutes, and he loves to put things on the top shelf where only he can reach. Donnie's over-dramatic and violent and has more pride than a pack of lions. Mikey's irresponsible and a scaredy-cat and can't lie to save his life. But you love them anyway. Just how they love you anyway! Because you're incredibly clever, fun, you've got relentless stubbornness and dedication, and of course how freaking much you care about them...'

A small pause. Sensei added, hand over his face and shaking with helpless laughter, 'Damn, I hate you for how introspective this is making me, fuck's sake.'

Leo felt the tide win. His shoulders fell in Sensei's hold, and the same moment that he lurched forward into his grip, the older turtle wrangled him into a tight hug.

'I know it's hard.' Sensei whispered, pained and voice laced with true understanding that comes from being the same fucking person. 'I know, I know buddy that it's so hard and it feels like it'll never stop being hard. Just because your brain tells you that your pain doesn't matter, that doesn't mean it's true. Your brain can tell you whatever the hell it wants, it's just chemical soup making shit up. You've got to move past your fear of rejection, your sense of inadequacy, all the logical fallacies you've built up over the years and approach the situation like you'd want Mikey to. Like you'd want Donnie to. Like you'd want Raph to. Take a single ounce of love you have for them and apply it to yourself.'

All of Leo's limbs felt weak and every part of him was so drained and tired of trying. He sagged in Sensei's grip, fingers curling against his plastron, trying to take some solace, trying to listen.

It was hard. The words rattled in his brain but didn't seem to sink in. He wished they just would, that it would be easy. He was still annoyed at Sensei, for not letting him linger in the ease of self-hatred. For being a hypocrite and talking a talk that he never walked himself. He didn't want this stupid pep talk in the first place.

'Until then, I've got you.' Sensei promised. 'We'll learn together. Failure is temporary if you're still alive, right?'

'You suck.' Leo said, thoroughly crushed.

Sensei chuckled and leaned their heads together. 'Yeah, that's me. Champion of suck. Breathe, kiddo. Let's just breathe a while.'

They breathed. The motion of air swayed through the branches. The void was cross-cut with the huge growth, mass accumulated and spreading. The roots making the floor bumpy and uneven, pollen hanging in the atmosphere, giving the void an almost homey feel.

'Why a tree?' Leo asked, watching the sprouting leaves wave with motion. 'I grew up in the sewers in New York, you've spent the last twenty years in an apocalyptic wasteland. Why the hell did my subconscious give us a tree of all things?'

'Is this a rhetorical question or do you actually want an answer?' Sensei asked, moving to sit peacefully cross-legged underneath its branches, eyes closed as he meditated them hopefully back to reality. They hadn't slipped so much as gotten completely caught up with talking to each other, so it shouldn't be too hard to return.

'Do you have an answer?'

'I could definitely come up with something sarcastic if you want. Like, say, how am I supposed to know?'

Leo leisurely laid his legs over Sensei's lap and reclined back, staring at the gentle roll of spidery limbs above them. 'You're a dad, did you miss the pamphlet on how you're supposed to know everything?'

'Must've gotten lost in the mail.' Sensei replied, amused. He laid his big palm on Leo's calf, holding him there.

Silence. It was warm, like soaking in a bath. Leo said, hesitant to break the pleasant peace, 'I'm glad you're here.'

Sensei hummed, eyes still closed, fingers clenching on Leo's leg.

'Really.' Leo asserted, tracking the flutter of newly formed leaves instead of watching Sensei's face. 'I don't think I could've done this without you.'

'You are so strong and resilient. You could have done it.' A pause, the same words he gave Casey Junior. 'But I am glad you don't have to as well.'

Leo smiled when he remembered Casey's response. Resilience doesn't stop it from hurting. He didn't say that, because he wasn't Casey, a bad ass kid raised in the apocalypse. He was Hamato Leonardo, whatever that meant, for better or for worse.

The thawed quiet swam around them. Leo shut his eyes too, just to bask in it. They breathed. Cottony sound filtered from far away. Pins and needles in his toes which he tried to wiggle.

"Better focus in, you two, I've brought you Starbucks." Donnie's voice tempted from beyond the veil.

'Ooh, Starbs.' Leo surfaced readily, finding his room lit up, Mikey piling his clothes in a laundry basket, and Donnie in a bomber jacket carrying a tray of drinks.

"If only it was always that easy." Donnie said, smile wry, and asked, "Number on the scale and which version I have present, please?"

Leo blinked rapidly, trying to settle his double vision. He raised his hand to rub his eye, then flashed a one-two, and an 'L' against his mouth.

"Good morning, Leon. It is eleven-twenty on Wednesday. We are unsure at what point you slipped, but it's been at least four hours since you didn't rouse this morning when we got up. Do you require anything?" Donnie asked, brisk and business like.

Leo tried to speak, found his throat clogged and managed a raspy, "What'd you get me?"

Donnie dislodged the drink from the tray and handed it over. "Iced green tea."

"My favourite." Leo said, hoarse and cracked but giving a teasing smile. "You're such a stalker."

"Leonardo, I have known you for sixteen years." Donnie said, exasperated.

Leo chuckled. Mikey abandoned the laundry basket and came closer to ask, "Ooh, can I try?"

"You won't like it." Leo offered the drink.

Mikey took a sip and his face scrunched up immediately. "Yuck."

"Told you." Leo snorted, unsurprised. He took a sip and the cool liquid cut a path down his parched throat.

Donnie gave Mikey his actual drink, a venti java chip frap with more whipped cream than any turtle needed, and took his own plain coffee. It left a mocha remaining. Donnie said, "Where's Raph?"

"I don't know. He said he'd be back in a bit." Mikey shrugged, looking uncomfortable.

"That's not ominous at all, he said sarcastically." Donnie muttered. He took a big swig of his coffee and winced.

"It's hot." Leo provided, to be a smart ass.

"Oh thermodynamics you are a cruel mistress." Donnie said. "Are you two alright? I'm going to find Raph."

"We're golden, baby." Mikey winked, somehow having already gotten whipped cream on his nose.

Donnie saluted them with his coffee cup and left with the remaining drink on the tray. Leo gestured Mikey closer, "C'mere."

Mikey held still as Leo cleaned his face. Then he gave a brilliant, thousand-watt smile and said, "Thanks bro!"

"Are you doing my laundry?" Leo asked, amused.

"Donnie washed your hoodie, but you've got nothing else." Mikey bustled over and handed his favourite blue one to him. It smelt like nothing at all, courtesy of Donnie's unscented laundry detergent.

Leo struggled the hoodie over his head with one arm, then smacked Mikey repeatedly with the empty sleeve on his right side.

"What? What?" Mikey said, through bubbly laughter.

"Love me." Leo whined.

"On it, boss!" The immediate full force cling of a little brother.

Leo enjoyed the hug and rush of positive physical feedback. Then he said, "Laundry's boring. You should break me out again."

Mikey went a little stiffer. "I don't think that's a good idea..."

"Not far." Leo rolled his eyes, giving his brother a squeeze. "Take me to your room. I wanna make stickers."

"Ohh!" Mikey perked up. "Okay! Um. How?"

"If you get me my crutch, I can do it. You carry the drinks."

A further hesitation. "Are you sure?"

"Trust me, Miguel. I'm a pro." Leo gave his most charming smile.

'We're a little better today but better doesn't mean we're well.' Sensei warned.

'If I don't start moving around again I'm going to explode.' Leo warned in return.

Mikey disentangled and fetched the crutch. Leo took it slow, feet flat on the floor and testing his weight. It wasn't going to be easy, the pull of gravity--

Don't think about gravity. The room spun. Leo shut his eyes.

"Alright?" Mikey said, hand on his shoulder, hovering nervous and close.

Leo held up a zero. He set the crutch back down and tried to ground himself by pressing his feet harder into the floor.

"I could bring the stickers here." Mikey offered.

"I want to move." Leo ground through his teeth, frustrated. "I want to not look at my walls for like ten minutes. Please."

"Okay. Okay. Hold on." Mikey took the drinks away, then returned, leaving the door open. "I'll help."

Leo stuck the crutch under his left and Mikey under the stump of his right, his nimble arm around his shell. Slow and steady, they broke out of the prison of his room -- ooh, bad thought -- and into the light of the hallway. There was no audible sound for where Raph or Donnie had gone. Splinter's TV could be heard distantly. Leo focused on the dance of Mikey's fingers tapping nervously on his patterned carapace.

Mikey's room was like a bomb went off. Leo loved hanging out in there because he never felt like touching anything was off-limits, unlike Donnie's, and it smelt pretty good, unlike Raph's.

They swept clear some floor space and grabbed Mikey's sticker paper. It was a hobby of theirs to make as many stickers as possible then stick them around New York on patrol. Leo enjoyed using fun typography to write out memes, while Mikey did the most gorgeous little art pieces interspersed also with various memes.

Mikey put on his portable speaker, a revolving playlist of soundtracks from various musicals that they both liked.

Leo sipped his drink and started to plan the placement for the letters of CAN I GET A WAFFLE on the sticker paper. Mikey was still sorting through all his thousands of copics, flexing his left hand open and closed at his side. It had a fine tremor.

"I should've asked if you were up for it." Leo said, jerking his chin at the hand.

"It's fine." Mikey defended immediately, tucking the offending limb behind his back. "Besides, I'm not the one who --"

Mikey cut himself off, visibly biting his tongue, then ducked his head to shadow his face as he picked carefully through his marker bin.

"I've always tried not to baby you, Angelo." Leo said lightly, chomping off the cap of a marker for himself and spitting it onto the floor. "Please don't start babying me."

"I'm not--" Mikey grimaced and sighed, running a hand down his face then leaning back, abandoning the markers. "I just really, really hate screwing this up with you. I can't do anything right, I always make it worse, and I don't want that."

Leo thought about the breakdown in Hueso's bathroom and examined the wobbly writing on the sticker paper. He'd forgotten he wasn't left-handed, and the usual careful and precise font was out of the question. An immediate rush of frustration -- and how it must feel for Mikey to lose his outlet, his release, the fountain for his endless creative spark all because his hands were shaking.

"Fine, let's not talk about me then." Leo took another drink of the lovely beverage his twin brought him, thinking. "We've had our turn for that, and you said we could talk about you another time. I wanna cash that in."

Mikey avoided his eye. "I don't think you're in the right head space for that. Let's just do our stickers."

"I'm right handed and you're shaking like a leaf." Leo pointed out, then conceded immediately. "Fine. We can do our stickers. We'll take it slow."

'You're letting it drop?' Sensei asked.

'Oh, I give him five minutes.' Leo scoffed.

After five minutes of both carefully attempting to draw under the haze of Hamilton, Mikey cracked, "What are you thinking about?"

Leo smiled, smug and triumphant. "You're ridiculous, you know that right?"

"Hey." Mikey said, trembling hand on chest, offended.

"You are." Leo reached out to take the smaller hand, feeling the quake and giving it a squeeze. "You are pushing yourself so hard. Spending so much time with Draxum, giving it everything you have to get better because, what? You feel like you need to be useful?"

The echo of their conversation at Hueso's. Mikey grimaced, tugging on his hand but Leo didn't let go, clutching tighter.

"Sensei said..." Mikey shuddered a breath, and when he met Leo's eyes it was in confliction. "He'd rather I was still alive. So I died. Right?"

"Yeah." Leo's mouth tasted like ash. Sensei shifted uncomfortably.

"Right." Mikey swallowed, throat bobbing. "I was wondering about... when you were looking at my hands, after you first woke up. And you told me it could've killed me. Was that Sensei? Is that how I..."

'Actually, I've realized I don't know how to approach this.' Leo told Sensei, daunted by the scope of this conversation.

'Here comes the next contestant.' Sensei joked, grim, and stepped up. A flutter, an easy step on with Leo gracefully stepping back.

Sensei separated their hands to tap an 'S' to his mouth and said, "Hi Mikey."

"Hi Sensei." Mikey's voice was a little weaker. "How are you?"

"I'm fine. To answer your question, yes, I was contributing then. And yes, that's how you died in the future. Is that a surprise to hear?"

Mikey itched a frown onto his face, looking out of place. He squirmed a little, caught, and said, "Opening the portal felt like it might tear me apart. So. Not really I guess."

"So why throw yourself so hard into the rehabilitation if you know it's dangerous?" Sensei prompted, knowing the answer already. He wanted to lead Mikey into a little trap, because he was not above emotional manipulation.

"Because it's my biggest asset. Because it makes me useful. Because..." Mikey trailed off in a whine. "Don't make me talk about this, Sensei. I know what you said, that being Mikey is all everyone needs and blah blah blah. I understand that, I've got more than enough emotional intelligence for this whole family combined."

"And it's good that you do, or we'd be lost without you." Sensei winked.

Mikey huffed a little laugh, nervous.

"No, really." Sensei insisted, doubling down, letting the joke turn serious. "Every single one of us would be lost without you. And if you know it's dangerous, that you risk yourself... was that fun when Leo did it to you?"

"That's not fair." Mikey burst, anger a defensive cloak.

"Of course it's not fair." Sensei said, incredulous, not afraid to push back. "None of this is fair! None of you should have to be in any situation that involves anyone sacrificing themselves! That's just the thing, Mikes. You're safe at home now. You can slow down the pressure. No one, not Leo, not me, not anyone else wants you to kill yourself for us. You know exactly how much that hurts. You know that."

Mikey threw a marker at him. Sensei dodged, only barely, their body not quite ninja reflexes yet.

Leo silently requested the front. Sensei returned it immediately, staying close. After a second, Leo said, "You need to be more careful."

Mikey squinted at him for a second. He announced, confident, "Leo."

"What gave me away?"

"The swagger."

Leo couldn't help but snort, though he didn't let the amusement linger. "I'm serious."

"Hi serious, I'm Mikey."

'Ohhh.' Sensei chuckled.

"What are you, me?" Leo accused.

"It's a very effective strategy, I'll give you that." Mikey bit his lip. "Sorry. I know you're serious. I know you're scared that I'll get hurt. I know because I'm the same thing for you. We're two idiot peas in a pod."

"So you'll promise me you'll never do it again?"

"That's a pretty bold question, are you gonna do the same?"

'Should've expected that one, dude.' Sensei told him.

'Infuriating little brothers.' Leo fumed.

Then he said out loud, "Are you suggesting that we just lock ourselves in some kind of self-sacrificing cycle forever, then? I'm older, what I say, goes."

"In that logic, then what Raph says, goes. And I don't think he's gonna agree with you." Mikey said, smug.

'Never mind I'll kill him myself.'

'No, you won't.' Sensei replied, warmly amused.

"What's your suggestion, then?" Leo bit out.

"I don't know." Mikey said, his usual bland honesty. "It's scary to know my powers might kill me. I can't say I want that to happen. But I also can't say that I won't try to help when I know I can."

"Ahem."

Leo jumped a mile, hand on his chest, and said, "We need to put a bell on you."

Splinter smiled grimly, standing in the doorway he apparently had let himself in. He said, "Can I come in?"

"Looks like you're already in." Mikey pointed out, but he was smiling too. He gestured their dad inside, saying, "Shut the door behind you, then. Did you want to make stickers with us?"

Splinter shut the door and joined them, sitting on his heels between the two turtles.

"I find it incredibly endearing that when I sit with you, all four of you will duck your heads to my level." Splinter laughed, reaching out to cup Mikey's face with an unbearably fond smile.

Leo hadn't even realized he had, but of course he did. It was his daddy, and he never wanted to tower over him. It felt weird.

"I worried when you all shot up that you would outgrow me." Splinter told them both, slow. "Both physically and in the way that you needed me. However I see everyday that my boys can get as big as you want, you will always be my little turtles. My precious babies."

"Did you just come in here to be incredibly soppy, Pops?" Leo asked, undeniably amused.

"I came in here because I could hear my babies being idiots and I needed to set the record straight." Splinter said, straightening his back, tail sharp.

"Eugh boy." Leo had kinda hoped he'd missed that. Mikey looked the same, biting his lip.

Splinter beckoned Leo closer with a single crooked finger. Leo reluctantly scooted so that Splinter could reach him, taking his only hand and holding it tight.

"Are you listening?" Splinter asked.

"Yes Dad." Leo and Mikey recited.

"I did not raise either of you to die."

A whoosh of air from Leo's lungs. His face spasmed, guilt and something else.

Splinter continued, "It was specifically what I did not want, when I stepped away from my family. When I raised you, I was not creating soldiers for the greater good. I had irreplaceable little boys that have become wonderful, talented, courageous absolutely irreplaceable men. Understood?"

"But--" Mikey began.

Splinter squished his face, giving a fierce stare. "We are not arguing over who gets to sacrifice for who. Blue. What did I tell you, the first time we discussed this?"

Leo remembered a mess of tears and hysteria. But also, a sore spot of words, "I don't need to die for my life to have value."

"I'm glad you remember." Splinter squeezed his hand. "Orange, I say the same to you. You do not have to tear yourself apart to be of value to us. If it is true, that you die in the future from this power you have... then you have a responsibility to ensure that it will never happen. I would rather that you learned a hundred ways to save yourself before you saved a single other person. Why is that?"

It was a leading question. Mikey sighed, and ventured, "Because you didn't raise me to die?"

"My boys." Splinter said, pleased. "I am so proud of you both. No more arguing about who gets to die, I don't want to hear another word. And I am the oldest, so what I say, goes."

"Yes Dad." Leo and Mikey chimed together again, thoroughly chided.

"Now tell me what the point of the stickers are." Splinter picked up the sticker paper, turning it over curiously.

Mikey grinned, loosening his tight posture, handing their father a bunch of copics. "To stick on stuff. Wanna make a hot soup one?"

Leo felt his heart in his throat, leaning over his own paper to hide how the conversation made him feel compressed and small. Stuck on remembering their first conversation with Splinter about it.

'I've been thinking about that too.' Sensei chimed in, hesitant, steadying their hand on the careful typography for their waffle meme.

Beside them, their brother and dad were tracing a sticker as Mikey gleefully pointed out that if Splinter wanted him to learn his powers to better not hurt himself, he'd have to spend more time with Draxum. The song in the background was fucking Michael in the Bathroom. Surreal.

'The whole, 'it's not about me', thing?' Leo prompted, digging in the messy pile for a blue marker.

'I've had that as my, I don't know, protective mantra on how much I fucked everything up.' Sensei shared the front, curling the tip against the glossy paper. He'd spent a lot of time late at night, prosthetic off, writing mission reports with his left hand. The effort was steady and thoughtless thanks to that. 'That I took the immaturity and desire to prove myself as a teenager to a be-all, end-all for the reason that the world ended, and used it as this defense that as long as I wasn't focused on me, then I couldn't fuck it up again.'

'Sounds reasonable, honestly.' Leo told him, stealing a yellow marker for the highlights, biting off the marker cap and spitting it down.

'Right. Sounds it, but that's just being a fucking teenager. Look at Mikey. He's immature and he wants to prove himself too. Does that mean he deserves to die?'

Leo's throat hurt at that. It wasn't helped that he could still see bandaged hands trembling in the corner of his vision.

'You know he doesn't.' Leo replied, rough.

'We do know. When Splinter looks at both of you, that's what he feels. Of course it's about you, he loves you. You are his boys. He did not raise you to die. He spat in the face of a legacy of sacrifice for his whole life.'

'Can we please think about something else?' Leo asked weakly.

'You can't deflect forever, you know.'

'I actually think I can, thanks.'

Sensei gave a weary sigh. 'Why won't you listen to people when they tell you that they love you?'

'What kind of question is that? I don't know. Why can't I fall asleep at night even when I'm exhausted? It's senselessness. It's stupidity.'

'Leo--'

'If I could walk away from you, I would. But I can't. So will you shut up?'

Quiet. Despite Leo's anger, the two of them were still collaborating on their sticker. It was popping with colour and style.

'I'm sorry.' Sensei said, eventually. 'You've been trying so hard and I shouldn't push you more. I know I'm only winning hypocrite awards out here, but you've got to understand that even if you're not going to do anything about it, wanting to die is not a good thing.'

'I understand that.' Leo replied, placidly, pushing down his anger and annoyance, trying to seem a calm unaffected river. It was difficult when Sensei was privy to the undercurrent of his thoughts. 'And I said, I don't want to talk about this.'

A hand waved in front of their face and they jumped, jumbled together. A retroactive replay of the last few moments had them realize their name had been called and Mikey was crouched in front of them, frowning.

Both struggled, unsure who was driving since they'd been working together on a task.

'You.' Leo said.

'No, you.' Sensei insisted.

"Doing okay?" Mikey asked, a little worried.

The body tipped backwards to stare at the ceiling, blinking like it might distill control. In the struggle to settle just one person, they both withdrew, stepping on each other's toes.

'Don't be difficult.' Leo snapped. 'I just want you to stop giving me a hard time about my mental state. I am so fucking aware it sucks and there's nothing I can do to fix it anyway, so leave me alone.'

'Getting help is a wild first suggestion.'

'Don't give me that. Not when I can feel you, when I know that you never would do that for yourself either. I know you're a hypocrite, I'm you. You're me. We both suck. Stop trying to pretend I'm ever going to be something I'm not. As always, I didn't fucking ask for your help.'

The words were sharp and biting. Leo pushed Sensei away.

There was a shade over his face. Sensei nodded, once, and vanished into the void.

Leo hesitated to return for a moment, tempted to just give up entirely. Wallow in his own self-imposed misery. But he knew Mikey was just right there, waiting for him, and he could never willingly walk away from his brothers. He wiggled his toes.

"Hey." Mikey said, warm, when Leo met his eye. "Who've I got?"

"Me." Leo said, and tapped an L to his lips since that was a generally unhelpful statement. "Sorry. Sensei was pissing me off."

"Oh?" Mikey asked, curious.

Leo shook his head. "It's fine. Where's Dad?"

"Back to the TV. Said to come get him if we're gonna be idiots."

A quiet snort. Leo rubbed his face, tired and sore and a little floaty without Sensei there. He wasn't really mad at him, he was just tired. He regretted pushing him away immediately. He implored into the void, 'Come back?'

No response. Leo sighed, and said, "Wanna make a sticker together too then?"

Mikey did. They designed a unicorn, trading between their hands for Leo's lack of coordination and Mikey's tremor. The fog hung thick and immovable.

There was a hesitant tap on the door. Donnie asked, sounding troubled, "Do you have Leo?"

"Yeah." Mikey called back, currently colouring his finger to try and make prints on the page, tongue sticking out.

Leo was immediately put on edge by the tone of Donnie's voice. He glanced up, anxious.

Donnie leaned in and said to Leo, "He's actually going to kill me for fetching you, but I don't want to screw this up. I need you to come see if Raph's broken his hand."

Chapter Text

Despite the fact that Sensei had fled, Leo was immediately a well-grounded three. He said, grim, "What happened?"

Donnie threw him a look that said 'guess'.

"Where is he?" Leo asked next.

"Med bay. I told him I was fetching the scanner. Which I have." Donnie held up the purple tech. "I did not mention that I was also fetching you because I felt in supremely over my head."

"Okay. I don't think I can walk all the way there. Can you help?" Leo said, humbled by the cumbersome weight of his own limbs at the moment.

"We can do it together." Mikey said, firm, and put a brother on either side of Leo to escort him to the med bay.

Leo's heart began to pound, imagining a hundred worst case scenarios all at once. The sight that greeted him was the ashamed hang of Raph's head and shoulders, cradling his hand in his lap.

Raph raised his red-rimmed eyes and flashed through what felt like a thousand emotions at once. The thudding heart stuck in Leo's throat, punching up hard. But he fell into medic mode regardless.

"Stop trying to move it." Leo ordered, because he knew his older brother like -- hah -- the back of his hand.

"I said don't tell Leo." Raph gave Donnie an icy glare.

"Scoff." Donnie replied, tight. "Do you even know me? And he was going to find out eventually, I'd rather we had the actual medic ensure we don't fuck up your hand even more."

Leo ignored the bickering. He grabbed the stool to perch on, legs tingling with the pressure of standing, and quickly flicked on the swing-arm lamp, manoeuvring it to shine on Raph's hand. He asked, business-like, "Angelo, could you get us some ice?"

"You're just trying to get rid of me." Mikey accused, tense and nervous, watching the taut line of Raph's shoulders like they were upholding a mountain.

"I'm trying to get some ice." Leo said, entirely calm.

An annoyed huff. "I'll be right back." Mikey told them, managing to sound threatening, vanishing from the med bay.

"Whatever you're gonna say, I don't wanna hear it." Raph said, frosted over.

Leo ignored him, taking the bigger wrist and turning it with terrible care. Raph's right hand was swollen, almost double the size. Fingers like sausages and a telling scatter of darkening purple bruises on his knuckles.

"Can you grip my hand?" Leo asked.

"You just told me not to move it." Raph said, a cutting kind of snark.

"And now I'm telling you to move it." Leo kept his voice even and prim, not offended since Raph was probably in pain.

A moment of hesitation. Then Raph attempted to grab Leo's hand, barely a moment of grip before Raph made a panicked whine in the back of his throat, a sheen of sweat on his brow.

"Stop." Leo ordered, watching the fingers relax. No obvious deformity, but the increased pain when trying to grip meant it was probably broken. "Wiggle each finger for me, starting here."

He touched Raph's finger with his own, watching it give a little wiggle. Then the inner finger, and the thumb. Another pained noise, but at least they could all move. Leo turned and dug through his med cart, pulling out a little pin and pricking the pad of Raph's thumb. "Feel that?"

"Ow. Yes."

Leo did it to each finger. "And that?"

"Mhm."

"Numbness? Tingling?"

Raph shrugged, looking away.

"Shrug means yes or shrug means no, Raphael." Leo said, insistent.

"Can we get to the part where you're mad at me before Mikey comes back, please?" Raph snapped.

"No, I'm doing the part where you're visibly in pain before Mikey comes back." Leo said. "Who says I'm going to be mad at you, anyway?"

Raph's jaw clenched. He said, in a strained voice, "It's too hard to tell if it's numb or tingling."

Leo couldn't be sure if that was shrouded from pain or shock. He hummed thoughtfully, considering that since Raph could still feel the pin-pricks, then he hadn't severed a nerve or anything. It there was numbness or tingling present it would likely be from the swelling compressing a nerve. Not great, and it'd be better if Raph could give him a solid answer, but fine. He could work around it.

"Pain on a scale of one to ten." Leo asked, holding his hand out for the scanner Donnie brought. He clicked through the settings, raising an eyebrow to his twin at some of the impossible options available. Donnie gave a smug grin, even if it was rather stilted.

"Never better." Raph said through gritted teeth.

"Constant or recurring?" Leo pretended he had been given a more useful answer, and got immediately derailed. "Is this seriously going to be able to do an x-ray? How is that possible without giving everyone in this room radiation poisoning?"

"Of course I can create a portable x-ray. It's electromagnets, scientists have been playing with them for centuries. I'm not reinventing the wheel here."

As Donnie spoke, Mikey returned with ice. Leo turned to take it, nimbly wrapping in paper towel and passing it to Raph, saying, "Hold against the injury, please."

"I'm not an idiot." Raph said, placing it against his hand. Then he visibly braced himself.

Leo realized he was waiting for the rebuke that he was an idiot since he just broke his hand. Fortunately for him, Leo wasn't about to give him that, because he needed to figure out some way to isolate this ridiculous scanner Donnie gave him to make use of it. "D, please tell me you have a protective shield for this and you weren't expecting us to raw-dog radiation."

"Not a good enough reason to use the words 'raw-dog'. And yes, of course I have a lead apron. I'm not an animal."

"Technically..." Mikey began, then bit off the trail end of his smile when Donnie swiped him, both of them unstable from the tension in the room.

"Lead apron, please." Leo requested. "The other scan options on here won't show me what I need to see."

"Not even the dermis density option?"

"I don't think his skin has changed thickness, Donnie. I need to see his bones. Apron please." Leo repeated, persistent.

Donnie heaved an annoyed sigh but did as he was told. Leo turned back to his patient, finding Raph staring hard at the opposite wall with his jaw working overtime. Desperately trying to hide the pain now that Mikey was back, as Leo suspected.

"Did you hear anything crack or pop?" Leo asked, taking Raph's unbroken hand and holding it beside the other to compare the swelling size.

"Hm?" Raph said.

"When you punched the wall." Leo clarified, keeping his tone clinical. "Did you hear anything crack or pop?"

The innumerable tension in the room wracked higher. Raph said, tight through his teeth, "No."

It could've been a lie, with how uncooperative he was being. Leo ticked it mentally as a maybe and shuffled through his supplies to see what had available, depending on what the x-ray showed. He was hoping surgery wasn't going to be needed, because while he'd been studying medicine for a long time, a textbook did not make a surgeon.

Donnie brought the apron and convinced Mikey to follow him out of the room to avoid radiation poisoning. It was possibly the only plea that would get him to leave his big brother's side a second time, determined not to be left out.

"Hold it here." Leo placed the scanner. "It's set to take the picture in fifteen seconds. Don't move."

Raph said nothing. Leo left the room as well, rolling out on the stool, since they only had one apron and he'd covered Raph with it.

"Don't get mad at him." Mikey said, to the quiet of the hallway.

"Why does everyone think I'm gonna be mad at him?" Leo said, counting to fifteen then letting himself back in. He said to Raph, "Did you move?"

Raph did not answer him. Leo picked up the scanner and reviewed the photo taken, eyes flickering back and forth at the sight of the distinctive fissures in three places on two metacarpals right by the knuckles and another on his middle proximal phalange. It was like the world's worst grounding exercise.

"That doesn't look good." Donnie said, blankly, looking over his shoulder.

"It is good, actually." Leo didn't see any bone fragments displaced. "So despite breaking your hand in four places, they're all stable fractures. The bones are aligned, so we don't have to do anything beyond keep it stable and slow down the swelling in case you're pinching a nerve. How's that ice?"

"It's ice." Raph replied, not meeting anyone's eyes.

"Pain management as well." Leo hunted through his supplies. He wordlessly handed a bottle to Donnie, who opened the child-lock for his one-handed brother without any comment, and Leo shook two pills out for Raph.

"I'm good." Raph denied, for whatever reason that was going through his head.

"It's just ibuprofen." Leo explained, waiting. "Helps with the pain and reduces the swelling. Do you need water?"

He phrased it that way because not-taking them wasn't an option. Raph seemed to catch on and dry swallowed the two pills.

Leo ran down his mental checklist and turned to root through his drawers again. He needed to make a splint and nothing he had would fit Raph. "D, can you lend me a hand? We seem to have a shortage at the moment."

Donnie glanced between Raph's newly broken hand, Leo's missing arm, and Mikey's shaking fingers. He sighed, "We're not touching something gross and wet, are we?"

"Can't do a cast yet, we need the swelling to go down first." Leo stole the rigid support from a smaller splint and placed it in the palm of Raph's broken hand to see if it would fit. "Keep your hand loose, don't move."

Mikey approached Raph's uninjured side and opened his arm, "Can I?"

"Not right now." Raph denied, sounding strange as he did so.

Mikey's expression wavered, visibly biting his tongue and giving a curt nod. He was such a tough kid, because his Raph denied Leo a hug then he probably would burst into tears.

Leo directed Donnie to wrap bandages around Raph's hand and wrist, padding the splint into place and securing it's hold.

"Comfortable?" Leo asked, returning the ice to its place. "Keep icing in twenty minutes intervals every hour or so."

"Yes." Raph said. "Are we done?"

Leo stared at him, fairly sure that if he said yes to the question, Raph was going to get up and walk away. He wasn't really sure what to do with that. He said, slowly, "Depends."

"I'm not going to break the other hand, if that's what you're thinking." Raph snapped.

It was kind of what he was thinking, yeah. Leo couldn't help but feel like this was an uncomfortable mirror with his current argument with Sensei. So he said, "We're done."

Raph left.

"You let him go?" Donnie said, tight.

"What am I gonna do, sit on him?" Leo asked, tossing a used roll of bandages into the garbage. "He's upset, he needs time. Had he already broken it when you found him?"

Donnie looked like he was contemplating if he was going to answer, but caved quickly enough. "Yes. I found him walking the sewers. When I asked what was up, he said, and I quote: 'broke my hand. Like a boss.'"

Mikey gave a really weird laugh, hugging his own elbows with trembling fingers. Leo shook off his metaphorical medic coat and gestured for his little brother to come closer to wrangle in a hug under his arm.

Mikey squished him hard. He said, "Are you going to go talk to him?"

Leo reached out blindly in his mind for advice only to find Sensei still wasn't there. A hollow sense of disappointment followed, empty and sad. He hummed under his breath, and said, "I think he wants some space."

"This is Raph." Mikey stated, and yeah, that was true.

"I don't think he wants to talk to me." Leo saw how the anger was rolling off Raph in waves, the defensive posture and tight shoulders.

"Well, I just tattled on him, so he's not pleased with me either." Donnie said, crossing his arms.

"He didn't want me close either." Mikey said. "But we can't just leave him alone."

Leo didn't know what the right answer was. His instinct was to send Mikey, but it seemed unfair to risk him getting rejected again. Donnie was safer because he was impartial, but he also just went directly against Raph's wishes and fetched Leo. Not exactly a comforting presence. Maybe Leo was the best option.

What a horrible thought. Leo fidgeted with his necklace, running it through the chain and thinking. He wished Sensei was there.

Donnie turned his head towards the hallway and listened. Faint talking. He said, "Nevermind, Dad's got him."

"What's he saying?" Mikey scrambled away from Leo and eavesdropped by the door.

Donnie joined him. "I believe he's whacking him with the newspaper and telling him to use better coping mechanisms."

Leo couldn't help the snort, even if his humour felt dark.

The orange and purple turtles practically stacked on top of each other to listen, Donnie holding Mikey up by the armpit. Leo felt a little sick at the thought and stayed on the other side of the room where the voices were too faint to make out.

'Sensei, come back.' Leo implored, not dipping his foot into the void, staying firmly on the side of reality. The adrenaline of going into medic mode for his brother had him so solidly grounded it made him feel a faint sense of shame over how foggy and weird he'd been for so long.

No answer. Leo demanded, 'Come back come back come back come back come back --'

'Why?'

A slump of relief. Leo turned away from his brothers, covering his face with his hand, hiding in the shadow. He replied, 'Don't be difficult. Did you see what happened?'

'I don't know how to be anything else.' Sensei replied. 'And kind of. Raph hurt himself?'

'I'm not sure if it was on purpose or not.' Leo told him, grim. 'I don't know what to do. I feel like he doesn't want to talk to me about it, and I get that, but also... dude. That's a lot.'

'I guess it depends on why you want to talk to him?' Sensei asked reasonably. 'To get answers? Or to help him?'

'Funny. Everyone else thinks I'm going to be angry with him.'

'You wouldn't. We wouldn't.' Sensei sighed. 'He's in pain and he knows he made a mistake. The last thing he's going to want right now is someone telling him exactly what he already knows.'

Leo wondered how the conversation with Splinter was going, then. Hopefully more support and less newspaper whacking now.

'Come on, join the stack, you know you wanna.' Sensei tempted, wry.

Leo caved, shaking off the shroud that clung to Sensei and rolling closer. The voices became more distinct through the crack in the doorway.

"How many of my conversations have you guys eavesdropped on recently?" Leo asked, immediately suspicious at the level of coordination between them.

"Shh." Donnie and Mikey said, hushed.

Leo rolled his eyes and listened.

"... I really don't know. I just... I lost control, okay? It won't happen again."

Leo mentally ticked the 'not on purpose' box. It was admittedly not actually that much of a relief, that he would be so upset that it happened thoughtlessly. Raph was a big guy and he hit things a lot. The amount of strength it would take to break his own hand was not a small amount. 

"Oh, my sweetness." Splinter said, sad. "I fear for how strong you feel you need to be. And for so long. You have barely taken a moment for yourself since this began."

Raph bitterly scoffed. It immediately unnerved Leo, skin prickling.

"Red." Splinter said, voice shadowed with a similar unnerved. "Would you explain for an old man your thoughts?"

"Yer not old." Raph said, gruff. "I'm sorry I've caused so much trouble, it won't happen again, now I just need to--"

"Sit down and watch TV with your old, old man? Yes, that is right." Splinter cut off, ruthless. "We are watching shows. You are sitting with me."

A tense beat of silence. Raph said, "Please, Pops. I don't want to make a big deal about this. Let me go."

"Not making a big deal. We're watching my show. You can push away your brothers all you like but I am like a piranha. I do not let you go. Sit."

It took a minute, but there was a faint thud of sitting. And the volume on the TV turned up.

"Problem solved." Donnie said, sounding shaken from the whole situation as well.

"Yeah." Leo said, reluctant.

"Now what?" Mikey said, still hanging off Donnie's arm while his older brother pretended he wasn't there.

Leo looked back over at his domain. "I'm just gonna organize my med bay, Donnie's fucked up my organization system."

"How dare you?"

"Do you want us to hang out?" Mikey said.

"Nah, I've got Sensei." Leo shook his head. "Come get me whenever we're eating, I want to try and sit at the table like a normal person today."

"You've never been a normal person a day in your life." Donnie told him.

Leo threw him a wink.

They left him alone. He did actually want to fix the organization, so he started with that, taking advantage of an actual working brain. TV down the hall. Donnie clanging in the lab. Mikey must've gone to the kitchen, the mixer going full speed. A house full of noise.

And silence from Sensei in his head. They lingered in it for a while, taking the time to get all the drawers back to normal, until Leo poked him internally. 'Why'd you run, jerk?'

'You did great with Raph's hand.' Sensei praised, immediately avoiding the question. 

'Stop. I know that. Are we fighting or not? Commit to the bit, dude.'

'I don't want to fight with you.' Sensei told him, making their foot tap rapidly against the stool. 'Especially when you can't run away.'

'Is that what this is about?' Leo sighed. 'I just being shitty. I don't actually want to run away from you. You should get that since I literally asked you to come back like a dozen times.'

'You should be able to run away from me, though.' Sensei defended.

Leo made an annoyed noise and shook his head. 'You just don't listen -- I want you here. Even if I can't run away, because if my options are with you always and not having you at all, I know what I'd pick.'

'Don't be ridiculous. We can't stay like this forever.'

'Why not?' Leo challenged.

'I don't want to take--'

Leo cut him off with an incredibly loud groan. 'I cannot believe that you were lecturing me about being suicidal earlier when you're literally pulling this bullshit with me right now.'

'It's not the same thing.'

'It's pretty close, Sensei. You're essentially sacrificing yourself for me.'

'I'm not meant to be alive right now!' Sensei snapped, voice uncharacteristically hard.

Leo let the words echo between them. Sensei had their chest breathing hard, hand tight fisted at their side, task completely abandoned.

Leo let his reply be icy and firm. 'And yet you are. So deal with it, Sensei. World hasn't stopped spinning yet. Not even close.'

"Sorry to interrupt?"

Leo realized he was staring at nothing and blinked into awareness, finding Donnie leaning in to address him.

"It's okay." Leo verbalized, shaking his head as if to clear it, stinging from the internal argument. "What's up?"

"You wanted to know when food was ready." Donnie told him, with a wary look. "Everything okay with Sensei?"

Leo didn't really know how to answer that, because the answer was no but he didn't want to inspire any protectiveness from Donnie if he thought that Sensei was giving him problems. "Yeah, it's fine. We're just talking about some stuff."

Donnie stared at him, eyes narrow. Leo tried so freaking hard not to squirm, not to give himself away.

"Mikey said Sensei was pissing you off." Donnie said, raising a perfect eyebrow.

Leo really should've spent more time teaching Mikey the importance of lying. He sighed and rubbed his face, avoiding Donnie's intelligent eyes, fidgeting with the necklace his twin made for them. Physical proof of how much Donnie cared for him, and for Sensei. He had to trust that Donnie wouldn't just assume the worst.

"Sensei's trying to help." Leo admitted, like pulling teeth. "But his hypocritical methods annoy me. Just imagine for two seconds that you've got the older version of yourself in your head telling you to not stay up all night on projects. It's like, okay buddy, how's that glass house going?"

"That would be annoying." Donnie agreed. "What is he giving you advice on?"

Oooh, Leo was definitely not going to say that out loud. He pulled a face despite himself. He didn't want to say it was personal, because they were twins and they told each other everything. Theoretically. He tried to turn 'suicidal thoughts' into a more swallow-able offence. "... coping with things."

"Things." Donnie repeated, unimpressed, waiting for more information.

"It's really fine. We're working on it. Anyway, you said that food is ready?"

"Don't change the subject. Is this a situation where I should be worried about your mental state?"

'Tell him.' Sensei implored, quiet.

Leo mimicked a hysterical laugh internally. 'What? Are you serious, right now? You're joking.'

"No more than usual." Leo said out loud. "I'm starving, D, come on."

"Sensei?" Donnie asked, practically cutting over him. "Do I need to be worried?"

Leo practically leapt at Sensei, trying to keep him away from the front. Unfortunately, Sensei dodged him easily and took the vacated space.

"Hey Donnie." Sensei said, pushing back on Leo's struggles like holding a small child away with superior arm length. "I have no intention of abusing my access to Leo's thoughts and violating his privacy. I would only say that you should continue to provide Leo with the same excellent care you always do."

Leo went limp. He told him, 'Hate you.'

'That was diplomatic!'

'Yeah, and it wasn't a fucking no. Donnie's gonna read into that.'

Judging by the flicking of Donnie's eyes as he thought, he was definitely reading into it. He said, slowly, "Thank you, Sensei."

Sensei gave him a wink, and moved to give the front back.

Leo did not take it, stubbornly turning away. 'You do the walk to the kitchen, then. It's too much work.'

"Ah." Sensei said out loud. "Alright, it's me now, I guess. Do you have our crutch?"

"Nope. Where is it?"

Sensei thought back to the last time they had it. "Mikey's room, I think."

"That bombsite?" Donnie complained, but went to fetch it.

With the crutch, they struggled back down the hallway, Sensei's knees feeling rather liquid and his energy level getting more and more drained as the day was dragging on. He trooped through but didn't want to push so hard that it hurt Leo, thinking that the next step after food was definitely some more sleep.

Sensei ate the steak pie Mikey made in the moderately tense atmosphere as he quizzed him on what types of food they ate in the future. Raph and Splinter were decidedly absent from the room. Then Sensei retreated to Leo's bedroom to rest.

But instead of sleeping, he stared at the ceiling and felt a million thoughts chasing each other for purchase in his head.

Leo had been eerily silent, to the point where Sensei almost thought he was gone into the shade. Then Leo spoke, breaking the fragile quiet: 'Do you want to stay?'

'What do you mean?' Sensei asked, wary.

Leo made a frustrated noise. 'Forgetting all the complicated shit. I like having you around. But do you want to stay here with me?'

A heavy pause. Sensei said, droll, 'I can't quite forget all the complicated shit that easily.'

The heart-heavy sigh pierced him, and Leo said, 'Fuck it, nevermind, dude.'

'Kid--'

'Not your kid.' Leo laughed, hurting. 'Just a failed version of you. Look, your actual kid is calling you right now.'

Sensei blinked in reality and saw the phone on the bedside table lit up with a call. He started, 'Leo, it's not that--'

'Answer it.' Leo said, monotone. When Sensei didn't move, Leo did, taking their hand and hitting accept. Then he pulled away, far away.

Sensei staggered between competing interests. Casey Junior's voice filtered through, distant, and Sensei carefully hit speakerphone.

"Hi Case. Everything okay?" Sensei asked, slow, thinking.

"Yeah. Sorry. I tried texting but you didn't answer." Casey replied, tinny down the phone line, service underground not the best.

"We were just... it's fine. What's up?" Sensei felt cold, Leo sunk into the shade. He felt like he should chase him. He felt like the real failure.

"I just wanted to talk for a minute. Is that okay?"

"It's always okay." Sensei said, throat dry. He cleared it, and said, "Have your courses started?"

"It's weird." Casey complained. "Someone asked me if I play hockey and I said yes then I learned that it is very different from what Mom and Angie taught me. Did you know it involves ice?"

"Yes, it involves ice." Sensei said, heart managing to beat unspeakably fond even through his inner torment. "Are you going to play hockey, then?"

"I don't know." Casey said, uncomfortable. "The class is already so many people, it feels really crowded, and they're all so..."

"Boring? Untraumatized?" Sensei suggested with sardonic glee.

"Normal." Casey chuckled. "I dunno. Carol said I could switch to online classes if I don't like it in person. But April told me it builds character."

"There's building character and there's actively stressing yourself out. Don't push it if it doesn't work."

"I'm willing to try." Casey said, and Sensei could just imagine the stubborn chin lift. He remembered once when his-Donnie saw Casey do that, he held the kid's chin and said, 'Look, there's your dad showing'.

"Ah well, you know what I always say." Sensei chuckled.

"Try anything once, but if it goes wrong, make sure to kill it twice." Casey recited, bubbling with laughter.

"That's my boy!" Sensei enjoyed making up nonsense advice just to see how seriously people took him. Since he was the leader of the resistance it often meant they took him very seriously. Casey knew his game and found it just as amusing.

Casey's laugh went a little watery, and he said in a wavering voice, "I really missed you, Sensei."

"Get better aim." Sensei joked reflexively, and when Casey started to growl in annoyance, he amended, "Yeah, I know, I know. You're still mad at me for ten thousand years. I missed you too, kiddo."

"You don't get to miss me. You sacrificed yourself for me. And then you were right there the whole time." Casey sniffed, offended. "Can I say hi to Leo?"

An uncomfortable void was sucking at Sensei's heels. He gave a ginger hum and said, "Not at the moment."

"Is he okay?" Casey asked, switching to sweet so easily.

"My flawless parenting skills do not seem to extend to talking with my own younger self." Sensei admitted, somewhere between his joking arrogance and sarcasm.

Casey made a thinking noise. "Well, yeah. If I had like, a ten year old Casey, I'd probably want to make sure he doesn't make the mistakes I did. But if you think about it from the baby Casey's point of view, that's like punishing the kid for things he hasn't even done yet. And those mistakes made me who I am, why would I deny him the chance to grow?"

Sensei felt a little ill and didn't want to point out that Casey's mistakes, while often high stakes because of the apocalypse, weren't quite on the same level as causing the apocalypse or being latently suicidal for twenty years with zero attempts to fix it.

Instead of arguing the validity, he figured he should ask the sweetest person he knew how to not be an asshole. "Alright, let's hear it: what do you think is the best way to handle your hypothetical little Casey?"

A bit of shuffling in the background. Casey said, tempered, "I remember once I had been assigned med bay and I was like... twelve, maybe. And I still wasn't great at everything and I felt like I should've been further along. I was trying to put an IV in for a patient and I kept screwing it up. Someone else took over for me before I poked like twenty holes in their arm."

Sensei remembered that actually, because Casey came to him after with a determined furrow in his brow and asked to be taught how to practice on himself. Sensei insisted that he practice on him instead, and his arm hurt for weeks. It was worth it, though, because of the gleam of Casey's steadfast joy every time he effortlessly inserted an IV.

"When I was washing my hands, Uncle Angie caught muttering under my breath about how stupid I was." Casey continued, a little dry. "He pulled that Doctor Feelings stuff, you know, but I've thought about it a lot since. He said that I need to be careful how I talked to myself, because I was always listening."

Sensei gave an amused little exhale. "That's applicable in multiple ways for me, now."

"Well, yeah." Casey huffed too. "You need to think about how you talk about yourself, not just because you're listening, but because he is too. I'm pretty sure the answer to the question isn't that you need to parent him or control him or whatever. I think it's just that you need to be kind. To him and yourself. And listen to him, just like you always listen to me."

"I don't actually think I'm capable of not spouting off motivational advice at the smallest sign of struggle after twenty years of everyone coming to me for help." Sensei said.

"Try harder." Casey told him, unsympathetic. "You can learn. Wait for him to ask, or offer. But don't just bulldoze over him. You are essentially locked in a small room together. Of course you're going to bang elbows."

"Has anyone told you recently that you are the best Casey in the world?" A long running joke to bug Cassandra.

Casey gave a loud, hurting laugh. "Not recently enough!"

There was a presence hovering, like just a peak above the surface of water. Sensei didn't want to lose focus on his conversation with Casey but sent a mental prod at his younger self.

Leo pulled out of the stagnant pond, hovering.

Sensei said, "Leo's here now, do you still want to say hi?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, one sec."

Sensei stepped back to meet him. 'I'm sorry.'

'You apologize too much.' Leo replied, and took the front. He blinked at the phone screen, the ticking call duration. He always appreciated little signs that time was moving. He tugged on his blue bracelet with his colourful nails and said, "Hiya Casey, how do you play hockey if it's not with ice?"

"Oh." Casey said, easy as pie. "It's like, when you take a Kraang hound and pass it back and forth with whatever weapon you have. You score when you've cut off the most limbs."

"I genuinely can't tell if you're messing with me." Leo admitted, only tipped off by how hard Sensei was trying not to laugh in the back of his mind.

Casey cracked and laughed. "Yeah, I'm messing with you, that's Kraangball. I've learned our hockey was pretty much street hockey, except Mom took away all the rules she thought were pointless and added a bunch. I'm still figuring out which ones are which."

"Okay then." Leo said, bemused.

A moment of pause. Casey offered, "I'm sorry my dad is so annoying."

Leo snorted. He didn't deny it. "It's not your fault."

"Yeah, but I always encouraged his advice. He's my dad but he's also my sensei. He probably could've used me telling him to shut up more, but usually what I did instead was agree with him to his face then go do whatever I wanted anyway if I felt it wasn't the right move."

'Not surprised.' Sensei sighed.

"But you can't do that because he's always with you watching you do everything. That would be a lot of pressure."

"Yeah." Leo rubbed the back of his head, thinking. "I should probably cut him some slack. I'm obviously going to grow up to be an annoying dad too."

"Who says? Life is only lived forwards, and it's going to be different now. Any value of hindsight is going to diminish more and more every day that you grow into someone distinct."

"You sound like someone took all the best qualities of the four of us to make a human being." Leo replied, charmed by the logic of Donatello, the emotional comprehension of Mikey, the kindness of Raph and the motivational wisdom of himself.

"That is a great compliment, thank you." Casey said, proud.

Leo thought about everything him and Sensei had been arguing about -- Sensei's hypocritical approach, Leo's denial of help for mental struggles, and the unanswered question of their continued status sharing a body. He didn't see an easy solution. But he also felt like the kicked dog of Sensei in his mind didn't deserve the strength of his ire.

"I'll pass your dad back." Leo said. "We both appreciate your mediation. I hope your classes go well."

"Thanks Leo." Casey's voice was warm.

He switched. Sensei said, rubbing his eye, a little dizzy from the back and forth, "It still blows my mind that you guys are almost same age."

"We could be brothers." Casey quipped.

Sensei's heart squeezed affectionately. "Yeah."

'Gross, don't be sappy, I'm right here.' Leo complained. But maybe the strength of the emotion at the words was from the effect being doubled, it was hard to say.

"Thank you for letting me help you guys." Casey said, slower. "I know you never want to burden me with stuff, but I really do like it when I get to help."

"You are an incredible helper." Sensei praised. "We are lucky to have you in our lives."

"Correct." Casey practically beamed down the phone line. "I have downgraded my anger by fifty years."

"Whatever shall I do for the remaining nine thousand nine-hundred and fifty?" Sensei replied.

"Get good."

Leo barked with laughter in the back. Sensei put a hand over his face and said helplessly, "Who is teaching you modern slang?"

"It's a group effort. Mikey really wants me to find a key moment to use 'yeet', but I still haven't quite figured out what the one actually means."

Sensei was soothed and pleased that the younger versions of his siblings did exactly what they always did, which was absorb someone effortlessly into the family and raise them on love and shenanigans. "Just yell it the next time you throw something."

"Yeah, that's what he said, but what does it mean?"

"Oh buddy, you're not gonna find much meaning in memes."

Casey giggled. He said, "Alright, alright. I should get back to my readings. I love you."

"Love you too, Case. Don't spend too long reading, it'll melt your brain then you'll be like Donnie."

Another giggle and a goodbye. Sensei hung up, and waited to see what Leo would say.

'I'm still tired.' Leo said. 'We should actually sleep. We won't solve anything tonight.'

It had gotten late, almost a reasonable bedtime. Sensei curled them up on their side, hugging the stump that had an annoying persistent ache, and shut their eyes. The desire to sleep was strong, hunted down by insomnia, and they both tried to do progressive relaxation to beat it. Through physical pain and mental anguish, they eventually drifted off.

They roused in the middle of the night to someone opening their door. It was a little bolt of fear, rolling over to meet the threat, heart already racing. Sensei scanned the situation with a sharp eye despite their heavy lethargy, and found a big figure. Shoulders slumped, clutching something small and soft. Trembling with heavy sobs. It was Raph.

Chapter Text

"Oh, buddy." Sensei said, shifting up and opening his arm. "Come here."

"Sensei?" Raph guessed, in a trembling voice.

"Yeah, it's me, come on over, we've got room." Sensei shuffled the blankets to the side, anxiously waiting for the crying turtle to join him. The moment Raph got close, Sensei wished that he had his old body, the much bigger one that could've crushed Raph in the kind of hug he deserved. Instead he just put his whole weight on Raph, squeezing tight, feeling the bigger arms curl around him in return. A stuffed animal squished between them.

"Did Raph wake you guys?" Raph asked, in a miserable snotty voice.

"No, we were awake." Sensei lied immediately.

Leo couldn't take another second of not saying anything and overtook the front. "Hey, hey, big guy. What's going on?"

"Sorry, Leo. Sorry, I shouldn't have --" Raph began, trying to pull away.

"No, no, you promised." Leo accused, not letting him get further than that.

It was an age-old pinky promise, born of the fact that Raph was the eldest and never felt like he could break down. When he did, Donnie was terrible with emotion and Mikey was the youngest, so Leo had made him pinky promise at like ten years old that he could come cry on Leo so he didn't have to be alone.

"You are the one struggling, you shouldn't have to help me." Raph told him, muffled into his sleep shirt. He thumped the splinted hand against Leo's shell.

Leo scoffed, tightening his grip, aware that no matter how hard he squeezed he couldn't hurt Raph. "I'm the medic, dummy."

"You shouldn't have helped. I did it to myself."

"Bro." Leo said, and wasn't really sure where to go from there. The panic of seeing Raph upset swung him back around to Sensei for help.

They were sharing the front, so the switch was seamless. "I think that means you deserve care more, actually."

Raph wracked with a sob and curled closer to them. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have come. I just -- I had a dream, and I -- I couldn't -- I had to see if you were okay."

"I'm okay." Leo promised. "I'm good."

"I shouldn't..."

"Cry it out, buddy." Sensei coaxed. "I know you've been so strong for everyone. It's okay, we've both got you. Let go for a second."

Raph somehow managed to unravel further, lungs stuttering with the force of his whole body sobs, clutching Leo to his chest. It was almost painful to listen to, the two of them rubbing the back of his neck and humming softly in his ear.

"Come on, big guy, gotta keep breathing." Leo whispered, trying not to let his voice show how much his heart was breaking.

Raph tried to inhale and it was a sobbing mess. He held Leo so tightly it hurt, but he didn't dare voice that.

"You're okay." Sensei told him, steady. "You're gonna be okay. You're okay."

Harder bawling. Sensei grimaced, emulating slow breathing in the hopes he might follow. Raph was practically weeping, messy snot, body unable to keep up with the force of the hysterical gasps for air.

Sensei's instinct with a sobbing child in his arms was to sing, and so he did, "Neneko, neneko, ya, Sleep, my little one, sleep. As the bottomless pit of the ocean, so is my love so deep."

"Oh, you can't do that." Raph blubbered, hiccupping loud.

Sensei smiled gently, stroking the back of his neck soothingly. "Neneko, neneko, ya. Sleep, my little one, sleep. As the unexplored vasts of Nirvana, so is my love so deep."

"Sensei." Raph said, pained.

"Breathe." Sensei reminded him. "Don't hurt yourself more."

"I didn't mean to." Raph muttered. "I really didn't, I just, I got so upset and it had nowhere to go. I didn't want to make more work for you, for Leo."

"You're not work." Leo told him, pulling back to properly see Raph's teary face.

"I'm making your pain about me." Raph's lip wobbled horribly.

"Shit, please make it about you. I'm so damn tired of it being about me." Leo said, trying to reign in how much the sight of his big brother breaking down made him want to cry too.

"What Leo means," Sensei took over, "is that this is all connected and everyone is involved. I told you, care is not a finite resource in this family."

Raph's face screwed up and he whimpered in the back of his throat. Leo's heart shattered into a million pieces and he leaned forward to bonk their heads together.

"Hey. Look at me."

A loud sniff, a shuddering breath. Raph's red-rimmed eyes met his.

"I love you so, so much." Leo enunciated, well aware it was going to make Raph cry more, and it did, but it needed to be said. "None of us want you hurt. I don't need you to be okay all the time. I just need you to love me back. Do you?"

"Of course I do." Raph practically wailed, agonized.

Leo gave a grimly triumphant smile. "Then we're golden. Breathe, big brother. Breathe."

Raph tried to breathe. He dropped his head back to Leo's shoulder, dampening his sleeve, clutching with his one working hand.

The high pressure came down a notch in Raph's shoulders. The stressed lines in his face dissolved with tears. He sobbed a little longer, swaying with it, not moving far from Leo.

"I couldn't cope with it." Raph muttered, not raising his head.

"With what?"

A loud swallow. Raph's voice trembled, "With knowing how much you suffered."

Leo felt a flash moment of regret for saying anything at all, then pushed it down. Raph was more important right now than his own self-hatred.  

"You guys saved me, though." Leo murmured, carefully keeping emotion out of it. "I'm not there anymore."

Maybe if he said it enough, he'd believe it.

"It's Raph's fault." Raph said, so quiet Leo almost didn't hear it.

"Uh, what? What the hell did you do?"

Raph shook his head, shivering.

Leo stared at the opposite wall, a haloed illumination of blue night light, brain running through everything and coming up empty. It was really late and he was really tired but that did not matter at all with Raph upset.

"Everyone else has come and gotten angry at me with what happened." Leo said, slowly. "Except for you."

"I'm not mad at you, hell no." Raph snapped.

"Why not?" Leo challenged, because even as much as he hated the terrible conversations they were all completely deserved.

A stinging quiet. Raph exhaled painfully hard. He said, voice just awful, "I hurt you."

Ah.

"Raphie." Leo said, aching. "No."

"Don't deny it!" Raph pulled away completely, snapping, crossing his arms defensively over his chest. "It was me, I was the one coming after you, pinning you down, and you were the one who lowered your weapons. Because you didn't want to hurt me but I sure as hell hurt you."

"That wasn't you." Leo protested, sharp.

"But it was! My hands around your throat. I can see it every single time I close my eyes." Raph's rough voice cracked, utterly destroyed.

"Not really hands." Leo said. "Because you have hands. That thing controlling you had something else. It wasn't you, it was the Kraang."

"Damn it, Leo!" Raph turned away, covering his face. "I attacked you. I tried to kill you and if you hadn't stopped me, I would've. It's unforgivable."

"Dunno. I forgave you already. I think I even apologized. It's a bit of a blur, if I'm being honest. But I can say that I never once, not even for a second, blamed you for what happened. You didn't ask for it. You were trying to save me. If it's anyone's fault--"

Then Leo stopped himself, because beating himself up wasn't going to make things better right now. He inhaled unsteadily through his nose, still wrangling his own desire to cry. Sensei warmed with approval, but very purposefully said nothing.

Leo exhaled. He reached out to grip Raph's shoulder, even as his brother wouldn't look at him. "You have no idea how scared I was when you were taken. I thought we lost you. I wasn't thinking about you attacking me, I was thinking about how desperately I wanted you back and that I'd do anything to free you from them. It makes me sick to my stomach to think about them controlling you."

Raph sniffed hugely, and raised his tear-streaked face to glance unsteadily at Leo. His chest was heaving with the attempts to breathe.

Leo moved from his shoulder to brush his fingers underneath Raph's scarred eye, nerves lurching with upset. He said, just barely keeping a lid on his bubbling emotions, "You went through hell, brother. Being forced to attack your own family is something I wouldn't even hesitate to call torture. That is your own pain and nothing that happened to me invalidates that. I'm so sorry that happened to you."

"Stop." Raph said. When he shut his eyes, tears escaped out the corners and he trembled with suppressed sobs.

Leo stopped. He gave him a moment, thumbing the half-healed scar tissue, remembering with a treacherous careen watching him rip at his own eye. The sick-to-his-stomach feeling got stronger, bile choking his throat.

Raph sucked in ragged breaths. He reached up and grabbed Leo's hand, crushing it tightly in his grip. He said, "I've changed my mind."

A heave of foreboding. Leo ventured, uncertain, "About?"

"I am mad at you." Raph said.

"Eugh boy." Leo wanted to retreat into his shell, but Sensei kept them stable, gripping them both firm in the front and reality. Determined.

"How do you think I would've felt if after all that, I lost you?" Raph said, blinking and the stream of tears was relentless, but he didn't even seem to notice it, the dogged set of his jaw as he spoke with sheer willpower. "If I hurt you and I never got to sit here and listen to you tell me it was okay? You promised me I could always come to you to cry. Where would I be?"

The room wavered. The emotions were there, multitudinous and indistinguishable. They all crowded together tightly and didn't make anything coherent. Leo focused on the metaphorical life raft of Sensei he was clinging onto by his fingernails, frantically not wanting to lose grip at this crucial moment.

"You know what?" Raph was getting geared up, all of the anger he'd suffocated scorching over. "I didn't want to get mad at you because I felt like coming at you in the first place caused all our problems. Because I was yelling over and over, take this seriously, be a hero.... then you tell me, moments before you essentially kill yourself, that hero moves were my thing, that this horrible outcome was because of me -- how the fuck was I meant to go forward from that, Leo?"

Leo choked on a reply. His mouth trembled and he didn't say anything but despite the pressure inside he didn't cry either. He stared helplessly at his big brother.

"The worst feeling in the world was when I realized I couldn't stop you." Raph squeezed his hand again, and Leo had been so numb it shocked him back into place. "I stared into the sky and thought that Hamato Leonardo has never let anything stop him and if you decided this was what was happening, then I could yell until I lost my voice for you to not to do this and it wouldn't matter. I had already lost you. I've never felt so helpless."

There was nothing Leo could say to make that better. He rasped, inadequately, "I'm sorry."

"You scare me, Leo." Raph told him, watery and grave. "You scare me so much."

"I'm sorry." Leo repeated, helplessly.

Raph hugged him again. Leo hugged back. The tears finally broke, silently streaming down Leo's cheeks, clogging his nose and throat and taking up residence with fists of pressure behind his eyes. It was dark and quiet and they both shuddered for air.

Unlike the others, Raph didn't ask anything else of him. No promises to not do it again. He just held on like Leo might disappear. Which he felt a little like he might, so it was nice.

"Raph?" Leo said.

"If you say something stupid right now, I swear." Raph said, muffled.

"Can I check on your hand?" Leo asked.

Raph sighed, and pulled back. Both of them took a second to look away and clear their faces of tears, and then Leo turned his lamp on to better see his hand.

"Have you been icing it?" Leo asked, seeing the still swollen fingers through his splint wrappings.

"As much as I can stand."

"Can you move all your fingers?"

Raph gave them a wiggle, wincing as he did.

Leo didn't like how bloated the skin was, like all the blood in his body was pooling there, and said, "You're taking more ibuprofen, I don't like that it's still swelling."

"Okay." Raph sounded too tired to argue.

"How's it feel?"

"I'm good."

Leo smiled, reaching out for his uninjured hand and giving it a squeeze. "No, you're great."

Emotion bubbled over Raph's face, lip trembling, and he said, "You don't have to coddle me. I know it was stupid."

"And I know you know it was stupid." Leo squeezed again, tight-tight. "I know you are your own biggest critic and you've probably beat yourself up for this far more than I ever could. I'm sad you hurt yourself because that means you were really upset, and that means you're hurting. I don't like either of those things. But Dad's gone over ways to cope with bursts of emotion like that with you a hundred times."

"And a hundred more, now." Raph muttered with a scowl.

"I'm sure. So I don't need to say anything else other than I hope you take a little more time to deal with what you've gone through too."

A shuddered breath, a longer pause. Raph gave a hesitant nod.

"Good. Ibuprofen and back to bed with you. It's late." Leo ordered.

Sensei took the front and tapped an 's' to his mouth. Then he smiled, care-worn and tired, and said, "You're doing a really great job, little red."

"I'm bigger than you." Raph protested, sounding like he choked on the words a little, eyes shiny.

"I am so much older and wiser and I say that you have done amazing." Sensei told him, managing to sound both like a confident shitbag and entirely sincere.

Raph started to get up, and Sensei said, "Where you going, bucko?"

"Ibuprofen and bed?" Raph repeated, hesitant.

Sensei snorted, digging in their bedside table for the bottle that lived there, tossing it to Raph. "Take two. And lie down."

"Yes sir." Raph said, sniffing loudly, and opened the childproof lock with his teeth. Sensei dragged the spare blanket from the foot of their bed and got them comfy with Raph taking up most of the room.

Leo took the stuffed animal that had gotten flung aside, a little fluffy sheep, and made it smooch Raph's nose before handing it back. Raph's red eyes crinkled happily, settling in with them.

That sheet of exhaustion rejoined them the moment they were horizontal. Leo felt stuffed with compressed emotion, the pressure of it expanding his head beyond any normal perimeters. He wrangled Raph close, hoping that proximity would soothe any remaining upset as Leo was too sleepy to be any further help.

The real problem with getting more sleep, with being more grounded, and with grappling with what happened to him was that Leo had more energy and more brain space for confronting the horror of it all.

His dreams were thick and viscous. In the void all shadows curled around him, dragging him down like ropy vines. Pushing fingers through honey. A sickening lurch of the stomach. And when Leo opened his eyes, the shining red light was the only thing he could see.

The Kraang, come for him. Alarming crimson haloed in darkness, a silhouette going from vague to perfect sharpness of the limbs and malicious gleam. Leo's heart began to pound triple-time, thudding like a snare drum as if it was attempting to punch directly out of his chest. Panic and fear, paralyzed, held deathly still as if it would stop the predator from approaching its prey. Leo didn't dare move, a breathy whimper breaking past his lips but nothing more.

'Are we awake?' Sensei's voice came, confused, disorientated.

Leo's heart kept going. Limbs tense, on guard. The sight in front of him remained the same, unmoving, a figure centre-lit with red.

'What...' Sensei took over, blinking their eyes, managing to get them to focus better. The shapes resolved. The blur disappeared, replaced with the unblinking glow of the red numbers of his alarm clock. Six in the morning. All the shadows of his bedroom.

'He's here.' Leo whispered, terrified.

'He can't be, I'm here.' Sensei replied.

'He's found me.'

'You locked him away. You're safe. We're safe.' Sensei told him, firm.

It did absolutely nothing for the dread racing through him, pumped at top speed by his thundering heart. His eyes were dry from his unblinking stare, which for a moment wavering back into the horrible shape. The persistent hallucination.

'I'll prove it.' Sensei regained control a second time, lurching out of the hold around them to grasp the cord and unplug the alarm clock from the wall with a clatter. The red disappeared. The room was only the usual darkness and blue night light.

"Leo?" Raph muttered, because of course the grasp on them had been their big brother.

Leo didn't reply, standing on trembling legs as his lungs heaved for air, still staring where the hallucination had been. It felt so real. He'd barely been awake.

A shuffle. Raph got to his feet and touched Leo's shoulder.

Instantly, Leo flinched away, the panic and fright much stronger, stumbling as he moved back. He fell on his butt.

"Woah, careful." Raph said gently, crouching beside him but keeping his hands away. "What's going on?"

Leo stared at him. His mind couldn't catch up. He swore it was here. The sight of it was so strong in his mind, like he could reach out and touch. All his muscles were locked in place.

"Hey Sensei? Are you there too?" Raph asked, rubbing his eyes tiredly.

'We're okay.' Sensei promised. 'Can I talk to him?'

'He's here.' Leo repeated, senseless.

'Let me tell him what you're seeing.'

No reply. Leo kept staring. Their mind lurched, unsteady, a fuzz on either side of their vision. The longer the panic raced through them, the more the mind began to degrade and want for the fear to stop. To hide. To disappear into the void.

"Can one of you let me know what's up? I want to help." Raph told them, on the floor with them, still waiting. When he started to reach out, it was all reflex that had Leo scrambling backwards until his shell hit a wall. Then he curled his arm around his head, the room swaying around him like he was on a boat in a storm. Air coming in through a straw, quick and short. Heart still slapping his ribs so furiously it hurt.

'It wasn't real.' Sensei reminded him. 'Try to breathe, you're going to hurt yourself.'

Footsteps, urgent. Voices coming distant, like listening from another room, even as the vibrations placed them directly in front of him.

"... different, like he was looking at me but he didn't even see me."

"Did he respond to you?"

"Pulled away. I'm not sure what's wrong but you're the best at grounding him."

Leo didn't know who was speaking. He didn't know where he was, a floating piece of meat to be manipulated and toyed with hanging in an endless void. He was an empty shell of who he used to be, stripped of all the things that made him Leo. The gut exposed, all the defences peeled away, husk of spoiled flesh, no more jokes. What was left of Hamato Leonardo. Here was nothing.

A crumpled photograph. He was nothing without his brothers.

'Well good thing you're not without them.' Sensei said, echoing from far away. 'Listen.'

He wasn't?

"... six fifteen AM on Thursday. You are at home, in your bedroom. The temperature is seventy degrees. You are here with myself, your twin, Donatello, and your big brother Raphael. You also have Sensei, hanging out with you inside that trap of your mind. Listen to my voice. It's Donnie. You are safe, nothing has changed, you are at home. I would not lie to you."

Leo carefully peeled his arm away from his face, a haunted eye peeking out from the shadowed protection and warily looking out.

Someone had turned the light on. The room was no longer struck in confusing shadows, illuminating his posters and the sight of two brothers crouching before him.

Donnie's eyes flashed with relief when Leo actually looked at him. He gave a wavering smile, "Hi Leon. You are okay. Nothing is happening. We are both here and you are safe. Do you understand?"

Leo's eyes flickered to Raph. His brother. Clutching a broken hand to his chest.

Oh. Raph was struggling and here was Leo, making it about him again. Something snapped in Leo's broken little brain and he burst into hysterical laughter. Then it immediately twisted and dissolved into sobs, crying in earnest only moments later.

"Oh no. Tears." Donnie said, monotone.

"I got him." Raph rumbled, darkly amused, scooting forward. "Hey buddy, can I give you a hug?"

Leo flickered his eyes around the room, not looking at anything, nervous and scared and crying.

"Please don't cry, I don't know what's wrong." Donnie said, adorably blank helplessness. It burst a manic little hiccup from Leo's chest.

"Leo." Raph said, and signed as he spoke, an 'L' against his mouth. Then one hand lopsided in the splint, but managing to take both closed hands crossed against his chest. "Hug?"

He was Leo. He wanted a hug. He nodded desperately, uncurling from his ball, reaching out for comfort which was immediately given. He wasn't nothing, he had his brothers, they were right there.

Raph tucked Leo close, churring under his breath and vibrating through Leo's bones.

"I've got you." Raph promised. "Raph's always got you."

Something old and pained echoed in their ribcage. The panic rocketing with the sensory feedback, pressure compressing all their nerves. A bear hug of firm tactile input, making Leo shudder and melt into it. He opened one eye over Raph's shoulder, the lost and untethered feeling making him reach with his only hand for Donnie.

"Sigh." Donnie said, and scooted close enough to hold his hand. "You are ridiculous."

Leo squeezed. Donnie squeezed back. He trembled with the effort of breathing.

"You are safe at home." Donnie began again. "Everyone is okay. Dad's snoring away in his chair. Mikey's asleep like a stone. April and Casey are safe with Carol. You do not need to be afraid right now..."

Donnie kept talking. Leo listened, sinking deeper and deeper into Raph's hold. Chasing away the shadows, pushing back against the fog on the edges of his vision. His twin anchoring him. Everyone was safe. What he saw wasn't real.

'That's right.' Sensei told him. 'You got it, kid.'

'It wasn't real. This is real.'

'One hundred percent real. Can you tell me why?'

'Raph's hug is tight.' Leo buried himself deeper into the hold, the sickly feeling tumbling around him no match for the sheer strength of Raph's arms. 'Donnie is holding my hand. The red was my alarm clock, it wasn't the Kraang. I am at home and I am safe.'

'You're a pro already.' Sensei praised.

"Are you still with us?" Donnie asked, breaking their little mental huddle.

Sensei cleared their throat, and said, "Just grounding a little in here. He's back to reality, thanks guys."

Raph's grip loosened just a little. "You're okay too, Sensei?"

"A little disorientated, but we're figuring it out."

"Why the alarm clock?" Raph asked, pulling away enough to look at the discarded tech in the middle of the floor.

Leo gave quiet permission. Sensei reported, clinical, "The numbers are red. And it was the first thing Leo saw when he opened his eyes."

"Red." Donnie repeated, glancing over his shoulder at the clock with calculating eyes. His grip loosened.

Leo switched back in, sniffling. "Hey, don't let go, D."

Both brothers immediately tightened their grip again. They said, tandem, "Sorry."

"What--" Donnie started, then cut himself off with a wince.

Leo recognized that his twin didn't want to trigger him again. He took mercy on him, explaining in a thready voice, "The light shining out from the Kraang was red. Sometimes it was the only thing I could see in the void for miles."

A light inhale from Donnie, followed by a shudder from Raph. Leo didn't want to see their faces, so he hid back into Raph's shoulder and muttered, "I'm grounding now. I slipped to a zero but I'm back to a one. I know this is real. I can feel that it's real."

"That is good." Donnie said, and his monotone was shaken. He started to squeeze Leo's hand in patterns of three. Morse code. I L O V E Y O U

Raph crushed him. Leo took his all focus and squeezed back. I L O V E Y O U M O R E

The world felt heavy in his toes. He could feel the nerves in his face. His grip was far more solid and his tears dried up. Donnie's hand in his returned, L O S E R

Leo smiled, hidden still, and replied, D O R K

"I can tell you two are being trouble." Raph grumbled.

"We're not called the disaster twins for nothing." Donnie said, with a bit more cheer. "Can I borrow your alarm clock, Leon?"

"Fill your boots." Leo muttered, not raising his head. His twin gave one last tight squeeze then let go, scooping up the clock as he left.

"Is he going to dissect it?" Raph asked.

"Who knows, with him." Leo thudded his forehead against Raph. "I'm sorry."

"What stupid thing are you apologizing for now?" Raph said, gruff, nuzzling the top of his head.

Leo gave a big sigh. "You are the one who was having a bad night and I made it about me again."

"I got some great advice from this guy, you might know him. He said care is not a finite resource."

A big groan. Sensei took the front and said, amused, "Sounds like a great guy, you should totally listen to him."

Leo wrestled it back. "Oh my gosh, shut up, I hate you both."

"You know that Raph feels best when he's helping." Raph rumbled, squishing Leo again and making him oof.

"Yeah, but your helping has been pushing down your own issues for a long time. I don't want to contribute to that problem, dude."

"And part of my problem was having a nightmare that you were dead, so holding you right now is very helpful to me." Raph reported, matter of fact and voice tight.

"Okay, fine, whatever." Leo did not want to acknowledge that land mine, thanks. "But we're not brushing you aside now. I want you to take care of yourself today. How's the hand? Has the swelling gone down enough that we could put a cast on?"

"It doesn't need a cast." Raph said, dismissive.

"Excuse me." Leo pulled away from the hug, sitting on Raph's legs and poking him firmly in the chest. "Who's the medic here?"

Raph rolled his eyes. "Self-appointed medic."

"Something that you, the leader for a very long time, encouraged many times. Especially when our beloved needle phobic Michael needed stitches and you couldn't stand the thought of doing anything that would hurt him."

"My hands are too big for needles anyway." Raph muttered, annoyed.

"And Donnie hates all bodily fluids." Leo said, firm. "So it was always gonna be me."

"It was always going to be you because you care deeply about making sure we're all okay." Raph corrected.

"Alright, so you're not gonna let me show you that I care?" Leo said, and batted his eyelashes.

Raph flicked his nose. "Brat."

Leo tried to flick Raph's nose back and instead was wrestled to the floor. He shrieked with laughter, trying to kick his bigger brother who was the biggest but couldn't manage to twist his leg that way.

"Not fair!" Leo protested. "You're taking advantage of my injury!"

"I'm also injured, idiot." Raph replied, sitting on him. "We're both down a hand."

"You're right. We both have a... handicap." Leo said, with relish.

Raph reached over to get a pillow from the bed and whacked Leo with it repeatedly while trapped. The high-pitched laughter wheezed out of Leo, helpless.

"Why are you killing Leo, it's so early." Mikey said, standing in the door with a blanket cape, rubbing his eye and looking grouchy.

"Angelo, save me." Leo pleaded, reaching his hand out from underneath his captor.

"I'll give you ten bucks to pretend you never saw anything." Raph bargained.

"Leo who?" Mikey said, and left dragging his blanket behind him.

"Traitor!" Leo pounded the floor with his fist. Raph rumbled with laughter and slowly and painfully started to ham up that he was going to give Leo a wet willy.

Donnie returned, unaffected as he returned the alarm clock to the bedside table.

"Donnie, if you love me you will save me from this monster." Leo implored.

Suddenly, no rescue was needed as all of the weight was lifted off him. The loss of pressure that was disappointing to say the least, let alone the horrible expression painted on Raph's face, all the blood leaving it at once.

"Raphie?" Leo said, confused.

A rapid shake of Raph's head as he left, crossing his arms tightly over his chest, tucking his chin down. Both twins exchanged wide eyed glances.

Chapter Text

'You called him a monster.' Sensei pointed out, sad.

'It was a joke.' Leo replied, horrified that he hurt Raph, even by accident.

"Was that related with what upset him last night?" Donnie guessed, hesitantly.

"Yeah." Leo said, mouth dry. "Do you think he ran far?"

Donnie abandoned the clock and helped Leo stand. "We're quick and nimble, we can catch him."

The hallway was quiet, no sign of Raph. Donnie pulled up his tablet and tapped the screen, immediately summoning a small map with dots on it.

"Not even pretending you don't have trackers, huh?" Leo asked, wry.

"You know I do." Donnie scoffed, tense. "He's gone back to the sewers. I swear, if he fucking breaks his other hand, I'm going to break both his legs so he can't run away anymore."

"What a productive solution." Leo muttered, also tense. He staggered along at the pace Donnie set, crutch on his left side and Donnie on his right, supporting most of his weight.

The moment they cleared into the intersecting sewer tunnels, Donnie called in a loud voice, "Raph!"

There was distant swearing which they followed.

Raph was facing the wall, arm braced against it and head hanging down. He said without turning around, "Don't tell me you brought Leo out here too."

"Actually, Leo brought Donnie out here." Leo replied, sharp for only a second before he softened it. "I'm sorry, big guy. I didn't think about what I was saying. You are not a monster."

Raph's shoulders tightened up. "Raph doesn't want to talk about it."

"Fine, don't talk, I will. I love talking." Leo said.

"Leo--" Donnie began, unsure.

Leo smacked Donnie's shin with his crutch. He continued, "What's the thought here, dude? We were just talking about this. And I told you that I don't blame you. You had me pinned and I was laughing. Obviously I trust you. Obviously I'm not scared of you."

"I'm scared of me." Raph snapped, still not turning around, grinding his fist into the wall.

"Well you're an idiot." Leo replied, cool. "If you think that there's any reason we have to fear you."

The tension rose higher. Raph's jaw worked.

Donnie shifted. He inhaled, and said, "Raph, if you are concerned about your behaviour while taken over by the Kraang, that is entirely illogical. None of that was your own decisions. All of us know that you would never hurt us, given the choice."

"But I wasn't given a choice. And I did."

Leo chimed in, trying to remain firm, "You did. Which is awful. And you're gonna have to deal with that, in a way that doesn't hurt you. Pulling yourself away from us hurts you, we all know you hate being alone. Injuring yourself--"

"I wasn't going to again." Raph said through gritted teeth. "I just..."

Both twins waited for the 'just'. It didn't come.

"You should go back inside." Raph replied, not moving.

Sensei took the front, leaning on the crutch. He said, "Raphael."

Raph inhaled. "Don't want to hear it right now, Sensei."

Leo snorted loudly in the mind. 'Yeah, no idea how that feels.'

Sensei hesitated, thinking about what Casey said to him. Thinking about all the well-meaning advice he could spout off without pause. Instead he said, "Talk about it or don't. But don't stay out here alone. Okay?"

Another tense, unending silence. Leo pat Sensei, retaking the front and sagging from the effort of standing. An unconscious pained noise broke from the back of his throat. Donnie tightened his grip, casting a worried look, and Raph turned around finally. His face was wretched, but he said, "You shouldn't be out here."

"Take me back inside then." Leo challenged, dropping the crutch and reaching for him.

"Hate you." Raph muttered, scooping up his brother like he weighed nothing. Donnie picked up the crutch and whacked Raph's shins with it. Raph added, "Hate you both."

"Only as much as you love us. Go find Mikey, we are not complete without him." Leo ordered.

Raph grumbled, but he did as he was told. They found Mikey in front of the TV, fast asleep wrapped up in his blanket like a burrito.

"Michael, wake up." Donnie pushed him off the couch and onto the floor. "Raph's sad, we're making him happy again."

"Oh noooo." Mikey said, half asleep and already reaching for Raph like a little kid, clutching him around the neck when Raph leaned over obligingly. "I love you Raph-a-doodle."

"I love you too, big man." Raph nuzzled Mikey's head, settling in the armchair with both brothers. He reached out and snagged Donnie by the hoodie collar the moment he tried to escape, an 'urk' of momentary choking.

"I wasn't going anywhere." Donnie lied badly, and instead settled to rest his hoodie covered shell against Raph's legs, staying on the floor with his phone.

A sleepy moment, the TV playing a flashing cartoon, Leo tucked against Raph's plastron with the good arm, Mikey clinging to his neck gentle in respect for the splint on the other side, and Donnie pressed against his legs like a cat pretending it didn't care about your existence when it did. It was barely past seven AM.

"What happened last night?" Mikey asked, quietly curious, then winced and hid his face in Raph's shoulder. "I'm sorry, don't answer that, I don't want to make things hard again."

"You never make things hard for me, buddy." Raph replied, raggedly sweet and turning to kiss Mikey's hiding forehead. "Don't you worry about me."

Leo sighed, because this family was the worst.

Raph jumped and let go of Leo so he could jam his good hand between Mikey's face and his own shoulder. "Stop biting me, ow, okay, what?"

"You can't tell me what to do." Mikey replied, eyes flashing in defiance. "So of course I'm gonna worry about you."

"Are we biting?" Donnie asked, from the floor, turning his head towards Raph's kneecap threateningly.

"No!" Raph kicked him, then complained, "Stop, stop, what do you want from me?"

"We want to help you." Mikey said, putting on his best huge and shiny little brother eyes. Which was remarkably innocent looking for someone who just resorted to biting.

"I don't need--" Raph began.

All three brothers groaned loudly. Raph said, "What?"

"I heard you last night." Mikey was the quickest on the draw. "And you haven't had time to be upset at all. It's Raph time. Welcome to Raph time."

"Raph time?" Raph repeated, a little lost.

"Yes, it is the time specifically for Raphael, have you not heard of it?" Donnie said with remarkably authority considering they literally just made it up on the spot.

Leo made himself more comfortable where he was clinging to Raph, settling in for the long haul. "And we're all going to tell you how much we love and trust you, and none of us are afraid of you or blame you for what happened."

Raph visibly winced.

Mikey manifested a pair of glasses from his pocket and said, "Doctor Feelings is here for you."

"You're going to be feeling something up your--" Raph began to threaten.

Donnie interrupted loudly in a robotic voice, "That sounds great Michelangelo, let us talk about our feelings."

"Who are you?" Raph said, audibly betrayed.

"Someone who wants you to be okay." Donnie bonked his forehead against Raph's knee, looking anywhere but up at his brothers.

Raph's resolve wavered. "I just don't know what you want me to talk about. We talked for ages last night."

"And you still freaked out this morning, so obviously there's more to say." Leo sighed.

"You didn't do anything wrong, it's stupid for me to get upset over that."

Leo made a loud buzzer noise. "Wrong. I am the king of stupid-upset right now and believe me, you don't need to worry about it."

Mikey reached over to cover Leo's mouth. "Both wrong. No one's upset is stupid. What is it that we'd be afraid of you for?"

Raph shifted uncomfortably but didn't answer.

Donnie said, "Because of the Kraang."

Leo licked Mikey's hand to get him to let go. Mikey went, "Ew!" and pulled away.

"It's really not important." Raph protested again.

Sensei grumbled in the back of Leo's mind. Leo said, "Do you want me to break out the trauma demon again?"

"Trauma demon?" Mikey asked.

Sensei blinked in, tapping the 's' to his mouth quick. "Someone may have told me their injuries weren't important before they died of said injuries, let's maybe not get into that right now."

"I'm not injured." Raph huffed.

"So the splint is just for fun?" Donnie replied, sarcastic.

"Your mind is." Mikey took a different approach, and rapped his knuckles against the middle of Raph's plastron. "Your heart is. And don't you dare tell me you're not important."

Raph visibly bit his tongue and ducked his head. He didn't say anything. Everything hung around them.

"What do you feel, Raph?" Mikey asked, all Doctor Feelings as he adjusted his glasses. "And be honest."

More hesitation.

"Come on, it's Raph time." Donnie said from the floor.

"What's the worst that could happen?" Sensei said, wry. Leo was sharing the front with him.

Mikey gave a sleepy yawn despite himself, leaning into Raph with all liquid trust. Donnie had even put his phone away.

"Raph knows... that it wasn't his choice." Raph said, really slowly. 

Leo was looking at the hole carved into Raph's shell, the perfect circle, the heart-slam-stop of fear from that moment. Raph saving him. Raph getting taken away.

Raph followed Leo's line of sight and his expression went funny. He didn't continue.

"Okay? And?" Mikey prompted.

Leo reached out and tugged on the hole in the shell. He said, "You were trying to save me, because I was --" he stopped himself, feeling Sensei shift that he'd almost said that he was a fucking idiot. Leo couldn't think of a better way to say it, so he said nothing more.

"Because you were in danger, and I will always try to save you if I can." Raph finished for him. "That was my choice and I'd do it again, even knowing what came next."

"So why would we be scared of you if the only choice you made was to protect us?" Mikey prompted.

"I still hurt you." Raph said, helplessly.

"It wasn't your choice." Three brothers said as one.

Raph shuddered through a breath. "It doesn't change how I feel about it."

"And how's that?" Mikey prodded again.

Raph finally allowed himself to be worn down by persistent little brothers wormed close to him. "Ashamed that... that I could be used like that. Guilty that I couldn't stop it sooner. Afraid that I could hurt you again without meaning to, because I can't control myself. Haunted by the helplessness of being a puppet, that I had no control, that I'll lose control again without knowing."

Mikey took a big old inhale, then blew it out his nose. He said, warm and only a little shaken, "Thank you for sharing. I am so, so sorry to hear that you are struggling. Is there anything that we do that makes it worse that you'd like us to stop?"

"Don't call him a monster." Leo muttered, under his breath, his own guilt a half-blown balloon in his throat.

"Yeah." Raph agreed slowly. "I've been... calling myself that in my head a lot. And it's hard to hear out loud, even as a joke."

"Bro." Donnie said, disappointed. "The Kraang is a monster. You are the brother who insisted that he come give me a goodnight hug and kiss every single night until I was like, twelve. If your brain calls you that, tell me and I tell you seven thousand more reasons that you are not a monster."

"No one, including Raph's brain, calling him a monster. Done. What else?" Mikey said, coaxing.

"I'm... fine. Really." Raph insisted, weak, as if he knew the strength of rebuttal he was about to receive.

"Fine people frequently break their own hands?" Leo asked, mock-innocently.

"It won't happen again." Raph said, lightning quick.

"What about running away when everyone knows you hate being alone? Was that some kind of self-punishment?" Donnie asked, darkly.

Raph growled. "It's not. I just don't want to make things worse."

"Your idea of that means worse for you. And that's not what I'm asking right now. If being alone makes you feel worse, then let's not do that. If you feel bad, tell one of us and we'll hang out with you. Or all of us, like this, because we want to." Mikey explained.

The uneasy silence told them that Raph wasn't about to do that.

Leo thought that they really were all the worst. Donnie who won't take care of himself. Mikey who needed to be useful above all else. The mess of Raph's guilt and shame. Leo's everything.

"Sensei?" Donnie asked, from the floor.

"Donatello." Sensei replied, evenly, smoothing back into the front.

"What do you think?"

"Hm." Sensei untangled their fingers from Raph's shell and tugged on the end of Raph's mask tails instead. "I think that you should all continue to work together to take care of each other, and you'll get there in the end."

"And what does that look like, functionally?" Donnie inquired.

"At this moment, giving the big guy a hug and telling him how much you love him. Then maybe putting a cast on that arm."

"Yes Sensei!" Mikey said, enthusiastically hugging Raph tighter again.

"Yes Sensei." Raph echoed, resigned.

Leo took the front back and immediately nuzzled Raph from the side he was on. "Love you. So much."

"I love you!" Mikey said.

"I love you more." Donnie chimed in.

Raph gave a chuckle that cracked down the middle and knocked his head against Leo's then Mikey's. He said, "I love you guys the most. Thank you."

Mikey was cracked with another yawn. He said, "It's still really early. Do you guys want breakfast?"

They did, of course, though Donnie made a face as he was dragged along to the kitchen. Leo discussed getting ready to do Raph's cast and Sensei suggested they ask Casey to come help since he'd done a lot of casts in the past (future) and it would mean Donnie wouldn't have to touch anything wet.

Despite the dramatic night and early morning, the day went very well. Leo did some stretches in the dojo with Raph and then took another nap. Casey showed up after school with muffins from Carol and helped Leo to set a moderately cooperative Raph's cast. Everyone took a turn drawing on it, then they made the mistake of trying to play Monopoly together.

Donnie was winning. Then he stopped paying attention, staring at the opposite wall with his ultimate 'genius is thinking' face.

When it was his turn and he didn't notice, Leo waved his hand. "Earth to Donaldo?"

"It's about extension." Donnie muttered under his breath, eyes glazed, brows drawing together. "Carrying the impulse forward, not creating an entirely new one. I can't grab it from the spine, but there is such thing as surgical nerve repair, if I can just isolate in the port and..."

"We've lost him." Leo reported. "Hey D, can I have your hotels?"

"Hm? Sure, whatever, can I be excused?"

"Go, be a nerd." Leo rolled his eyes, recognizing that Donnie wasn't even in the room anymore. His twin up and left his almost-won game of Monopoly, already typing on his phone. Leo said, "Mike, we'll have to bring him food later because he's definitely not going to remember to eat if he's had a breakthrough."

Mikey gave a double thumbs up and said, "Of course! And you cannot take his hotels, I will flip this table, don't think I won't."

"No table flipping." Raph said, though the annoyance between his brow as he looked at the board said he was probably the one the most likely to do that. "You're not having the hotels. Let's give them to Casey, he's never played before."

'Mistake.' Sensei mused.

"Oh, sure." Casey said.

Casey then proceeded to wipe the floor with everyone and win. It led to a lot of shouting until Splinter came to tell them to stop interrupting his show with all the noise.

They had dinner together. Raph kept admiring all the writing or drawing on his red fibreglass cast that Casey had skilfully set. He had quite the collection, turning it over and over to read the words in the light of the kitchen.

Leo's left-handed writing was shaky as ever, but he'd done LEO WAS HERE with a big heart. Sensei had done a much steadier job, adding '+ Sensei' with another, smaller heart.

Mikey had taken up most of the inner arm with various drawings, smushed together and overlapping with a brightly coloured I LOVE YOU!!! in the middle. Casey drew one of those middle-school S things and signed his name. Splinter wrote 'hello red'. Donnie covered most of the other side in purple sharpie with geometric shapes, fitting a bunch of 'D's into the spaces.

Donnie had not joined them for dinner, so Leo convinced Casey to help him carry it down the hallway to the lab, since his arm was taken up with the crutch. Then he sat on the lab table and sang the most annoying songs he knew until Donnie ate it, only leaving him to work in peace once he finished the food. After that he took Casey back to his room to look at his homework with him.

Sensei sat with Casey and abandoned the homework almost immediately to talk about literally anything else. The media that April insisted he watch (awesome). How it felt to have the real New York experience (overwhelming). Then they moved onto telling stories about the future, half to reminisce, half because Leo was listening and found it interesting. They talked about the supply run where they found a pound of expired chocolate chips and everyone got sick but it was worth it. About carrying Casey on his shoulders through a toxic swamp. About how they buried Donnie when they didn't even have a body.

The mood was rather dim when the stories found their way down that avenue. Casey leaned against Sensei's side, rapidly blinking his eyes like he was trying not to cry.  

When it got late enough, Casey Junior gave them a hug and wished them both goodnight. Sensei had a hard time letting go, but tried not to let it show on his face. When they sat on their bed, they discovered that the alarm clock was plugged in and the numbers were now shining a calm and steady blue.

"Aw, D." Leo said, bursting with affection for his twin.

'I wouldn't be surprised if that thing has death lasers now.' Sensei replied, eyeing the upgraded clock.

'Can you imagine the I told you so I could give Donnie if he kills me with one of his inventions? I'd win every argument forever.'

'And we'd be dead.' Sensei reminded him.

Right, 'we'. Both of them. Leo hadn't really spent too long thinking about how if he died, then Sensei would too. It kind of gave a weird little wrench to his stomach, uncomfortable and cold.

'Do you want to talk about it?' Sensei offered, halting. Learning, not wanting to trap Leo in a conversation he couldn't escape.

'Talk about what?' Leo asked, wary.

'What you're thinking about right now.'

'Are we talking death or sharing a body?'

'Either or both, I guess.'

Leo wasn't sure. Instead of answering right away, he got them settled in bed -- changing into the clean sleep shirt since Mikey had finished their laundry, putting the fan and the night light on, arranging all the blankets to their perfect arrangement, even managing to do some skin care. Then he got into bed, curling up on his side and hugging the stump. It hurt a bit, but it always seemed to hurt a bit.

'I don't want to talk about death.' Leo clarified, having chewed on it for a minute, staring into the new blue light of his alarm clock. 'But maybe we should talk about the sharing a body thing.'

'Okay.' Sensei agreed. 'You were very resistant the last time we talked about it. Have you thought about it more?'

'You know I haven't, you're in here too.' Leo said, dryly.

'I do try not to listen to your every thought.' Sensei replied. 'Just how you don't listen to every one of mine.'

Leo had been thinking as he watched Sensei say goodbye to Casey. That emotion carrying over through both of them.

'Do you want to be free of me?' Leo asked, something sad and resigned to it.

'I want you to have the opportunity to live your life without my interests holding you down.' Sensei answered carefully. 'What do you want?'

Leo didn't want him to leave. It ached through every inch of his body. But he knew it was unfair to deny Sensei the chance to live independently of him, if there was a chance they could be pulled apart, then he should consider what Sensei wanted. 'I'd be willing to see if it's an option.'

'You're just saying that.' Sensei replied, knowing.

'I am.' Leo admitted. 'But that doesn't mean we can't find out if it's an option first. Then we can decide for real once we know.'

'I appreciate that you're willing to try.' Sensei replied. 'You do realize that means we will have to talk to Draxum again, right?'

Displeasure rippled through him. Leo drew their knees up to their plastron. 'Do we have to?'

'I trust him.' Sensei said, simply.

'I don't.' Leo replied.

'He's kind of our father.'

Leo went rigid and snarled, 'Draxum wasn't trying to make children, he was trying to make weapons.'

A beat, tense and sharp.

'Dad didn't want children either.' Sensei told him, careful. 'But stepped up when he was given them. When Dad died, Draxum stepped up too.'

'Dad's not fucking dead.'

'You're right, he's not.' Sensei agreed. 'You aren't wrong in being wary. I know that my point of view is skewed because I have years of experience of him just being our weird goat dad. I had to rely on him a lot rather quickly after Dad died, and hopefully that won't happen to you. So you'll have to build a relationship with him on your own terms. Can you tell me what the fear is?'

The fear was this big indescribable terror of the unknown, of blindly reaching out, of trusting someone new. He didn't have the emotional energy for it, he barely had the emotional energy to be alive right now.

'I don't know.' Leo replied.

Sensei must've felt some of it, because his voice was more knowing. 'That's okay. You don't have to put the work in to build the relationship right this second. Can you trust me that I will protect you while he's here, at least?'

Leo wished that it was so easy, that he could just turn off the scared frightened part of his brain that made him want to hide the moment perceived danger was there.

He could not guarantee that the moment Draxum actually showed up, that the uncontrollable panic wouldn't take over.

'I want to trust you.' Leo told him, reluctant. 'I really want do. But I thought I trusted you last time and I still freaked out the moment he got close.'

'It's a work in progress.' Sensei assured. 'Just as long as you're willing to try, it'll get easier with time.'

Leo breathed slow. 'Alright. Let's do it.'

'Sounds good. Get some sleep first.'

They hugged the stump hard, pressure on faint pain. Leo shut his eyes, feeling like he was staring at the back of his eyelids. A swirling oil spill of nonsense colour on black. He tried to quiet his mind, to begin to rest, but there was still a jitter inside him. A wake up call.

The gentle touch of Sensei, like a soothing balm. 'Sorry, I shouldn't have brought up something upsetting right before we had to sleep.'

'It's hard to avoid.' Leo allowed, watching the shapeless dance of blackness that was failed sleep. Nothing happened. They stayed where they were. The fan hummed in the background. Their blankets were heavy and warm. He was safe. He was home.

'Can I ask why?' Sensei said, hesitant.

'Why what?' Leo tiredly replied.

'Why you're willing to try.'

Leo blanked his thoughts. He carefully said, 'Because I want you to be able to hug Casey for as long as you want.'

'I'm just... it really upset you before, to think of separating us. So I'm surprised, is all.'

He tugged himself into the shadows, not thinking anything at all. 'I'm being realistic, isn't it what you wanted?'

The emotion that translated from Sensei was something a little ill, a little uncertain. 'Yeah.'

'Then drop it. Okay? We'll talk in the morning with Draxum. However long it fucking takes to get to this fabled morning.'

'Right.' Sensei took control and did some slow breathing that Leo hadn't even realized had sped up. 'We don't have to do it, if it's--'

'I said drop it.' Leo repeated, firm.

'Yes. Sorry.' Sensei obeyed. 'Wanna play chess for a bit instead to calm down?'

It was better than staring at the inside of his eyelids. They grabbed their phone from the bedside table and pulled up the app and played seven rounds, falling asleep with their phone still in their hand.

Leo managed to keep his thoughts away from things he didn't want Sensei to hear, not letting himself linger on his real desire. To untangle them so his death didn't mean Sensei's as well.

Chapter Text

Leo slept in the next day, all the way through breakfast and almost to lunch. When they did wake, Leo spent some time staring half-lidded across the room blankly at the posters.

'Doing okay?' Sensei ventured, barely awake himself.

'Yeah.' Leo lied automatically, then shook their head. 'Sorry. Still waking up.'

He'd had dreams all night of the prison dimension -- obviously not enough to wake him, just so that his whole body felt weird and uncomfortable, like he needed to do something but couldn't. A hangover of fear, seeped into all his dreams. Even if it started somewhere else, it always ended the same. World melting away before his eyes, leaving nothing but void and suspension.

Raph stuck his head in the door and smiled when he saw Leo had his eyes open. "Hey buddy, you're awake finally."

Leo felt like his brain was skipping a section on a record, blinking too-slow.

"Ah, or maybe not?" Raph let himself inside and came to sit in front of his line of sight. "Are you with me?"

A loading screen. Second-hand fog. Leo raised a zero fist when he realized that he could barely get his eyes to focus.

"Okay." Raph said. "Hey, I brought you something."

His big brother dug in his pocket with the hand not encased in the fibreglass cast. He pulled out the analog watch he had as a kid, with little Jupiter Jim figures running along it.

"It fit me when I was ten, so it'll probably fit you now." Raph teased, taking Leo's good arm and carefully threading the strap around his wrist, right next to the blue braided bracelet April made him.

There was a strained beat before Leo raised his wrist to look at it. There was a rocket-ship minute and hour hands, with a tiny spinning one for seconds whirling around the space themed face at top speed. It was really cute.

"I noticed you were watching the clock in the kitchen." Raph explained. "I don't know if having it will make things better or worse, but I figured you could always take it off if it's a problem."

"No." Leo said, clearing his throat when it came out all rough. "It's great, thank you."

"You're welcome." Raph nodded, pleased. "Do you want breakfast? Or brunch, I guess."

He was kind of hungry. He nodded lethargically, trying to decide if he had the power to get up and limp to the kitchen. He didn't, so he raised his hand to Raph.

For some reason, Raph hesitated, looking concerned. "You doing okay?"

What did everyone want from him? Leo nodded, keeping his arm out, and Raph couldn't deny him for long. He was scooped up and tucked under Raph's chin.

Leo was thinking about tightropes. He'd once stood behind Dad while he was watching this movie about a tightrope walker and said it looked boring but ended up watching the whole thing leaning against the armchair. There was a bit in the movie that talked about how tightrope walkers didn't often die in the middle -- the most dangerous part of the walk was actually the end, two steps before reaching the other side.

He didn't want to think too hard about why that was on his mind. Not especially if Sensei was listening. Instead he glanced at his new watch, ticking away to happily show him that time was passing it was passing it was passing. That was nice of Raph.

"Where's Mikey?" Leo asked, when it was Raph making him toast with jam.

"He's with Draxum. He said that he could bring you lunch again if you want." Raph explained, bringing over a huge glass of orange juice.

"Could you ask him to bring Draxum, actually?" Leo said, tracing the lip of the glass but not drinking.

Raph paused, and turned to give Leo a strange look over his shoulder. "Seriously?"

Leo shrugged.

"Not to like, doubt you or anything." Raph said, voice audibly full of doubt. "But last time it didn't go so well. What do you want him for?"

"Sensei and I just wanna talk to him about our situation." Leo explained.

"Alright." Raph said, all hesitation and disbelief. But not denying his request. "I'll let Mikey know."

Raph also obviously let Donnie know as well, because when they finished breakfast and headed to the dojo to wait for Draxum, his twin appeared and took up a sentinel at his side, sitting on his heels.

"I'm fine, D." Leo said pre-emptively.

"Totally fine." Donnie replied in monotone. "I am just going to sit here for the duration of Draxum's visit for absolutely no reason."

"You do that." The obvious protectiveness of his better half cracked just a little smile on Leo's face.

"Pops, don't give Draxum trouble." Raph said, to the rat who'd let himself in and was hovering in the back.

"Hmph." Splinter replied, crossing his arms over his chest. "I only wish to be a fly on the wall."

Everyone did, apparently. Leo was sitting in his meditation posture, pretending that was what he was doing. His grounding was about a one.

'We don't have to do this.' Sensei said, quiet.

'Make up your mind. You wanted this.' Leo tensely replied, then carefully amended, 'We're just seeing if it's an option. That's it.'

'That's it.' Sensei agreed. 'I've got us.'

Leo didn't think about how much it would suck to no longer be an 'us'. He didn't think about what it would be like to no longer be anything at all. He thought nothing, pretending to meditate, somehow circling all the way back around to actually meditating.

Draxum was wearing dad jeans when he arrived. It was jarring and admittedly kind of grounding.

"Can you inform me if there is a way we can meet that doesn't end in everyone in this room glaring at me for triggering your dissociation?" Draxum asked, not stepping further in than the doorway. He had a tailored magenta coat over those dad jeans, hands deep in the pockets.

"I'm working on it." Leo said. "Come on over."

Draxum crossed the room and sat on his heels, keeping a careful distance from Leo. He shot a look over their shoulder where a certain rat was spectating, and then said to Leo, "I was informed you wished to discuss your body sharing situation. You understand why I'm hesitant, since that triggered you last time."

"Everything triggers me, dude." Leo did a lop-sided smile, letting his tone colour humour to cover the dread. "It's time we take a look at what's going on in my head. We don't necessarily want to do anything right now, we just want to know what our options are."

He pulled all his strength to sound sensible, like a leader, not at all like the huge mess he felt like inside. Draxum gave a stiff nod, glancing again at Splinter before saying, "We can take a look and see what's going on. I will inform you of each step before I take it. Alright?"

"Hit me with your best shot." Leo kept his smile sly and joking. Protecting all the soft vulnerable feelings with a playful shell.

"I will require your hand for a connection point. I can let go at any point." Draxum made no move towards him, he did not reach out, he stayed immobile.

Leo's expression broke into genuine amusement. Obviously there was a little more than 'glaring' at him after last time. Judging by the constant glances towards Splinter, there must've been some threats as well. As silly as it felt, Leo actually did appreciate the change. No sudden movements and the narration of events before they happened made this scenario a lot easier to deal with.

Though that didn't mean he wasn't going to continue to be a smartass about it. "Left or right hand?"

Mikey muffled a snort behind him. Draxum stared Leo down, visibly grinding his teeth. He said, glacier, "Left."

"Good choice." Leo offered his hand. He hoped that everyone in the room ignored how it had a little shake as it hung in the air.

Draxum took his hand, holding steady and projecting the movement as he did so. He said, "I am going to cast a spell to look inside your mind. It may tickle."

Leo's arm twitched back, and Draxum let it go immediately. A flash-freeze of fear, and Leo said, "You're going to read my mind?"

"Not your thoughts." Draxum returned to a waiting posture, hands in his lap. "I am going to look at the internal landscape. In order to determine how the two of you are sharing a body, I need to see how he is situated."

"And the only way to do that is to look in my mind?" Leo fidgeted with his coiled necklace, hot waves of anxiety making him want to practically vibrate. He wasn't sure he could do this.

"What did you think was going to happen?" Draxum said, a little exasperated.

Splinter growled, stern footsteps coming up behind Leo and resting tiny hands on his shoulders. Leo could imagine the poisonous glare Draxum was receiving without turning his head.

"I have done nothing wrong." Draxum defended.

"Speak to my son with respect." Splinter stressed the word 'my'.

Leo tipped his head back to grin at his dad. "He's fine, Daddio. I know I'm not making this easy."

"It's not your job to make this easy. It's his." Splinter said, sharp.

Draxum took a deep breath, shutting his eyes for a moment like he was re-evaluating all his life choices.

Mikey nudged Draxum, and gave an encouraging smile when he glanced over. Mikey told the group, "Barry really does want to help, he's committed to doing whatever we need. Helping people is just a bit of a new hobby for him, so cut him some slack, Dad."

"I have cut him more slack than I ever wanted to." Splinter said, squeezing Leo's shoulders. "I appreciate that you want to help my children. We have discussed what will happen if you go back on your word."

"Multiple times." Draxum said, dry. Then shook his head. "I respect that you are protecting your family. I will not discourage it, as annoying as it is, since it protects my creations."

"Pro-tip." Mikey leaned into Draxum with a bad whisper. "Don't call us your creations. It's a little weird."

"Noted." Draxum replied, serious. "Back to the matter at hand. Yes, Leonardo. The only way to find out how to go forward is for me to look into your mind."

"You specifically?" Leo hedged, because he'd be so much more willing to have like, anyone else in the room do it.

"I am the only one capable of performing the spell." Draxum glanced at Mikey. "Especially since Michelangelo is on metaphorical bed rest from performing complicated magic as his hands heal. It would take a long time to teach him the spell, but if you are truly against it, we could wait."

Leo cast his mind to Sensei.

'Up to you.' Sensei replied. 'We're not on a time limit or anything. If you'd be more comfortable with Mikey doing it, we could wait.'

Leo wavered. It was tempting. But he wanted to know, and he didn't want Mikey to push himself if he felt like there was something he was needed for. He swallowed and blinked back to reality, finding that Donnie had nudged their knees together and Raph was bumping their shoulders with Splinter still behind him.

"I'd like to try." Leo said, throat crackling, all humour and bluster gone. "Just stop if I start to freak out."

"Pull your hand away if you need me to stop and I will." Draxum promised.

It helped that the first time he'd barely tugged and Draxum had let go. Reluctant, positively swimming with nerves, Leo let go of his necklace and reached out a second time. Once again projecting his move, Draxum reached out and took his hand.

But Draxum wasn't the only one touching him, family at all sides, their presence strong and reassuring.

"Are they going to see too?" Leo asked, jutting his chin at the others beside him. "Since they're also holding on."

"Do you want them to?" Draxum said.

If it wasn't thoughts, then yeah, totally. If Draxum was required, at least he could have his family too and soften the fear of just having the goat in his mind. "Yeah."

Mikey scooted closer to hold onto Draxum's free arm. "Take me too, then!"

"Family field trip." Leo said, joke falling flat at the apprehension in his voice.

"Wherever you go, we're coming with you." Donnie stated, firm.

An uneasy lurch to his stomach. Leo's smile strained. He looked back at Draxum, the clinical touch connecting them.

"I'm ready." Leo said. "Do I have to do anything?"

"No. I am going to cast the spell. It may be easier if you close your eyes." Draxum told him.

The floor began to light up with runes. Leo shut his eyes, feeling a spider crawl of apprehension up his spine. A whiff of o-zone in the air. Static electricity brushing over his skin. Tension filled his muscles, uneasy and unsure.

Sparks burst behind his closed eyes. For a moment, a clench of panic almost had him pull his hand away and make everything stop. But Splinter squeezed his shoulders again, reassuring, and he waited to see if the frightened feeling would resolve.

The jittery silence was broken by Mikey humming a soft song. Leo was trying to identify the song when that sparks-sparkle feeling flattened out, a whole-body tickle raced up his nerves and he was standing with his feet in the tangled roots.

The shade was lighter than ever, the hang of pollen in the air, the reaching branches and roots covering the endless expanse as far as the eye could see. It was almost breaking into colour, the greys and blacks and seeming like they were seconds from the raising and revealing the world beneath the void.

Sitting at the thick trunk of the tree was Sensei, same as he'd always been. Taller and bigger than him, the exhausted eyes between his red stripes, missing an arm and armed with an amused smile.

"Hello there." Leo said, in the voice.

"General Kenobi." Sensei replied, finishing the meme, standing up to give Leo a hug.

"Fascinating." Draxum's voice said behind them.

Leo tried not to tense up, turning himself in Sensei's grip to face the intruder. But it wasn't just Draxum, his three brothers and father stood in the shade of the tree as well.

"That's so cool." Mikey whispered.

"Do you just recite memes in here all day?" Donnie asked, rolling his eyes.

"Basically." Sensei chuckled, patting Leo and stepping forward as the younger ducked behind him. "What exactly are you searching for, Barry?"

Draxum's head swivelled all around. "I'm pretty sure we're looking at it."

"What?" Leo echoed, glancing up at the branches. "You mean..."

"The tree." Sensei finished the thought, exchanging a glance with Leo.

"Do all our brains have a tree in them?" Raph asked, approaching the trunk and placing a big hand on the vast bark.

"No. They do not." Draxum said, gliding forward to stand beside Raph and tap the surface with his nail. He frowned. "This is not what I was anticipating."

Donnie approached Sensei and stopped directly in front of him, having to crane his head back to see him. After a contemplative pause, he said, "Do I get to be tall as well?"

"Yes." Sensei said, and hovered a hand above Donnie, just an inch shorter. "That much."

"I have no way of verifying your source, because you may be claiming to be taller as a way to annoy me." Donnie said, eyes narrow with suspicion.

"You'll just have to get growing and find out." Sensei winked. "You'll be taller than Mikey anyway. Except it didn't matter, because he just flew everywhere."

"Ohmigosh, I can fly?" Mikey bounced over, grabbing Sensei's bigger arm and laughing when Sensei flexed upwards to lift him off the ground.

"Yup." Sensei confirmed, doing a couple reps with the littler turtle hanging off his arm for fun. "Maybe once you're feeling better you can ask nicely and Gramps will teach you how."

"I don't want to hear you call me that ever again." Draxum said, without looking up from where he was standing, touching the trunk of the big tree with his eyes closed.

Sensei merely laughed.

Leo jumped when he felt a hand on his leg and looked down to see Splinter beside him. His dad had a pensive frown and said, "Blue, it is so... dark. In here."

Leo made a face. "I mean, it's actually lighter right now than it was before. This is an improvement."

"It has changed?" Draxum prompted. "This landscape?"

"Definitely." Leo pointed at the tree taking up most of the world. "That thing was like, a twig, when I first saw it."

"When did you first see it?"

Leo looked at Sensei. Both of them came to the realization at the same time, lit understanding in their eyes.

Sensei said, "God damn it, am I a fucking tree?"

Leo burst out laughing. He came closer to push Sensei in the side. "The tree showed up at the same time as this guy. I'm assuming, at least. I had never seen a tree in my mind before that."

"And it has been growing?" Draxum asked. When he pushed on the branches it tickled.

Sensei gathered Leo under his arm and squeezed. "Yes. It's gotten quite thick in here."

Draxum was frowning. He crouched beside the roots and placed his hand there. The tickling feeling intensified.

Leo didn't like it. He said, "Stop touching it."

Draxum raised his hand immediately. "What did it feel like?"

"It tickled." Leo said.

"Hm." Draxum scratched his chin.

"What does 'hm' mean?" Raph said, looking all around at the large foliage.

"I believe that the older Leonardo is, as he put it, a fucking tree." Draxum replied in a deadpan.

"Is that bad?" Mikey asked, sticking himself to Sensei's other side.

Sensei was short an arm to hug him but leaned into the touch. He watched a complicated emotion play out over Draxum's face.

"Do you not have your own ninpo?" Draxum addressed Sensei directly, appearing annoyed when he approached discovered Sensei's taller height meant he had to look up slightly at him.

"I don't, no. Haven't for a long time." Sensei replied.

"I had wondered if perhaps this was a similar situation to what Michelangelo had described to me with your grandmother. But that hypothesis does not appear to be correct. You do not have the ninpo to sustain yourself in such a way."

"How am I sustaining myself then?" Sensei asked, then immediately answered his own question. "Ah shit. The roots."

"Oh, I was wondering why it was a tree!" Leo exclaimed.

"The roots." Draxum agreed, but with a degree of solemnness. "Without your body, you have planted yourself into Leonardo's mind."

"Is that bad?" Mikey asked again, looking around at the crawling expanse of entangled root systems.

"Depends on your definition." Draxum replied. "The status quo is stable. The situation doesn't appear harmful to either Leonardo. The problem comes with the question of separation. Without his ninpo or his body, uprooting the older Leonardo will most likely kill him."

The space fell into a chilled silence. Leo turned to try and see Sensei's face, but there was no emotion there, even as Leo's stomach curdled with it. Unidentified and complicated, on both of their sides.

"RIP." Sensei said, weakly.

Leo bodily socked his shoulder into Sensei's stomach, making him 'oof'. True, annoyed anger burst from him. "Don't."

"Don't make a joke?" Sensei raised a brow that said 'do you even know me?'.

"No." Leo felt overexposed and he didn't like this, that he was freaking out and everyone was in his head as if they could see it. He pushed through the haze to grasp his hand in reality, pulling hard from Draxum's grip.

Everyone else fell away, sudden, like the world dropped out from under their feet. It left Leo and Sensei and the stupid fucking tree.

"Hey." Sensei crouched in front of Leo, reaching up to grip his neck and giving him an affectionate jostle. "We're fine. Look at me, you're okay. Breathe."

"I am breathing." Leo snapped, tight with tension, wrapped up in it.

"Look at me." Sensei repeated, firm.

Leo reluctantly let his gaze meet the bigger turtle's. The room stopped spinning like a top, nauseating and fast. Serious and intent.

"We're okay." Sensei told him. "Nothing's happened."

"We're okay." Leo repeated. His face felt numb. He wasn't sure if the floor was stable, he felt like it was sinking and sucking him away, like sand eating around planted heels in a riptide.

"I'm still here." Sensei said.

"But you can't leave without dying." Leo replied. "It really does mean either you're with me or you're gone."

"We don't know that yet." Sensei said, reasonably. "I think it might be worth a shot."

"Why?" Leo asked, completely horrified.

Sensei amended. "Let's get back before they start to worry first."

Leo felt his reality grip a fragile string. He had no idea how long he would last. He said, "You go out."

"Let's go together." Sensei dragged him to the front like a kitten by the scruff.

The front revealed that he'd been lowered into Splinter's lap, small hands rubbing his shell, murmuring all around him. Humming a soft song. A lullaby.

"I think it just surprised him." Mikey said, off to the side. "He doesn't really like the idea of Sensei leaving, I think."

"I stopped the spell as soon as he pulled away, you can stop glaring at me." Draxum said.

The humming paused, and Splinter muttered, "You could have delivered the news softer."

"I am not soft." A tense beat. "I am trying."

"Thank you for stopping as soon as he pulled away." Mikey chimed in. "He'll be back any second. He just had to chat with Sensei a minute, they like to talk. They're both Leo."

Leo managed to raise his hand, dazedly striking a 'b' against his chin. Bitch.

Mikey immediately laughed despite the insult. "See?"

They inspected the ceiling, trying to clear the sight of branches cross-cut in their vision, to place themselves in their fingers and toes.

"Hey Gramps." Sensei said, rubbing their eyes and looking back down from the ceiling. "Question."

"I'm not answering to that name."

Sensei snorted. "Fine, Barry, whatever. If you separate us, will it hurt Leo?"

"Hard to say." Draxum replied.

"Did you miss the meeting on separating multiple versions of someone in the same body?" Sensei asked innocently.

"There is not a lot of precedent, no." Draxum said, eyes narrow. "You are an untethered soul. If I tear you away from your anchor, there will be nowhere for you to go. Even if you had somewhere else to occupy, you do not have the ninpo to bind to something that isn't your original source."

"That's not my question right now." Sensei waved a hand flippantly. "I'm saying, if you pulled up the roots, would that tear up Leo's mind as well?"

"I don't know." Draxum intoned, icy. "Certainly with how pervasive the roots are, it's a concern. But we wouldn't know for sure until we tried."

'Why the hell would we try?' Leo asked, stinging with it. 'If he's saying the end result is that it kills you?'

"Thank you for your help." Sensei said out loud, not showing on their face the distraught punch Leo was feeling. "Obviously this is a bit more complicated than we thought. We'll let you know if there's more we need to do."

"I am quickly learning that this family is never easy." Draxum droned. It didn't contain any scorn. He straightened up. "If my presence is no longer required, I will take my leave."

"Aw, we were talking about watching a movie. Don't you wanna stick around?" Mikey said, hanging off his arm.

Draxum glanced at Leo when he said, "Another time, Michelangelo. I think I'll take the win of leaving while Leonardo is actually conscious this time."

"Appreciate it, Gramps." Sensei winked.

Draxum gave a visible shudder. Sensei knew he was repeating over and over in his head that couldn't go back on their progress and kill them now. He'd been counting on it, in fact.

"You love pushing your luck, don't you?" Draxum asked.

"Every single chance I get." Sensei gave him a lop-sided grin.

Draxum heaved a sigh. It wasn't nearly as annoyed as it could've been. He gave Mikey a perfunctory pat on the head, dislodging the smaller turtle and saying, "I will see you later."

"See you Barry! Thanks again!" Mikey cheered.

'Still here?' Sensei asked, leaning back a little.

'Yup.' Leo said reflexively. It wasn't really true. He felt like he was experiencing everything with a fifteen-second delay. Like it was happening to someone else. Which, it kinda was, but it was also happening to Leo and it didn't feel like it. He didn't offer any of this to Sensei, but he must've felt some of it, because a ripple of displeasure came from his direction.

His family talked about the movie they wanted to watch. Leo didn't contribute except when they all ended up setting up around the TV, he requested his phone. It had been helpfully charged by one of his brothers, and he didn't end up watching the movie with them. Instead he plugged his headphones in and listened to his quiet playlist on repeat.

A fuzzy wall between him and reality. Mikey had curled up beside him, all elbows and knees, giggling at the movie Leo couldn't hear but could feel the vibrations and the smile on his baby brother's face. He checked his Snapchat, all his streaks firmly dead but April and his brothers still sending him little moments. Even Hueso had sent a couple unprompted, colourful chalk and a neatly made cup of coffee. He swiped through all his apps like they might distract him but the sensation only seemed to make the gaping hole in his chest larger and larger with each breath.

'Alright, what are we doing?' Sensei asked, after about an hour of this. Surrounded by his family but putting himself into a little bubble.

'I'm sorting all my photos into albums.' Leo replied, because that was what his wandering thumbs had found to do. Something about looking at the grinning faces and the sleeping candids was making his chest hurt worse and worse. Crushing.

'Why aren't you watching the movie with them?'

Leo conveyed a shrug back.

'Do you want to talk about what Draxum said?'

'Dude, we have done so well not going dark.' Leo told him, dry. 'I didn't realize you wanted to break that streak too.'

'We don't have to, I was only offering because you seem a bit off.'

'Of course I'm fucking off--' Leo snapped then withdrew back. 'I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to dissociate. So I'm going to focus really hard on my music and this stupid task I've assigned myself and hope we don't. Okay?'

'Okay.' Sensei agreed. 'Whatever helps you, let's do it.'

Leo grumpily ignored him and kept working on his stupid task. Mikey dug his chin into Leo's arm. At some point, Raph had enclosed a big hand on Leo's ankle, but he'd become so numb to the feeling he didn't even notice. They were watching a movie. They stopped to eat and Leo ate but he didn't take his headphones out. From the corner of his eye, despite doing his best to avoid looking at anyone, Leo saw Donnie's annoyed and worried frown.

When he finally took his headphones out, the sudden assault of noise was too much. Like there was a green sky, a brewing warning sign of a storm. Ominous and dark. He said, "Can I go to my room?"

"I'll take you." Donnie said, and helped him stand. Weak legs. Tired. They left the worried faces of their brothers behind. Leo felt full of a sloshing emotion he could not articulate or overcome.

Donnie got him to bed. He turned on the fan, the nightlight, fetched him a clean blanket for the foot of his bed since Raph stole his. Then he pulled out his tablet and set up in the chair that lived by his bed.

Leo's throat felt dry. He said, "You don't need to stay."

Donnie's finger paused over the screen of his tablet. A flash of emotion flickered on his face then disappeared. Leo always wanted Donnie around. It was unheard of for Leo to kick him out. Obviously Donnie was thrown by the request, and it drew honesty in return, "I don't feel comfortable leaving you alone right now."

"I'm not alone." Leo gave his most reassuring smile. "I have Sensei."

Donnie's eyes went back and forth on Leo's infallible smile, looking for something. He said, slower, "Why?"

"I just..." Leo didn't know. The echo of songs in his head. The tight band of pressure around his chest. He needed... he needed... "I need to think for a bit."

Donnie's hands tightened on his tablet, shoulders hiking up. "Do you want to talk about what happened with Draxum?"

"No." Leo replied, sharp-quick.

"I think maybe you should." Donnie said.

"I think you should leave."

Silence. Crystallized and heavy. Donnie hunched in onto himself, curling around his tablet, and said in a smaller voice, "Only if Sensei promises that he'll make sure you're actually okay."

Sensei requested the front. Leo gave it up with a sarcastic gesture, stepping aside and internally crossing his arms and tapping his foot.

The older turtle tapped an 's' to his mouth, cleared their dry throat, and said, "I promise."

Donnie offered his pinky, expression fierce.

A wry little twitch to Sensei's lips. A sense memory of his-Donnie doing the same thing, dozens of times in a barren and broken landscape, when they only thing they had was their wits and each other and pinky promises to always come home.

Donnie broke his. But Sensei never did. In the present he curled his pinky around Donnie's, the younger but still every bit as stubborn and brilliant as his own, and promised.

"Thank you." Donnie said, prim. "Give Leo back for a second."

Leo took the front, ignoring how he felt all the muscles tighten the moment he had the body again. He scowled at his twin and said, "What?"

Donnie kissed his hand and tapped it to Leo's forehead. Then he picked up his tablet and left without another word.

Leo thought about yelling something at his back but all his witty words died in his throat.

'Now what?' Sensei asked. 'Why did you want to be alone? I know you. I know me. What's the goal?'

'I don't have a goal.' Leo replied. 'I want to curl up in a ball and everyone to leave me alone.'

'We should--'

'We shouldn't do anything.' Leo interjected. 'I am going to lie here.'

Sensei grumbled, hackles all up, but managed to settle back.

Leo laid there. He laid there and laid there and laid there. Sleep did not come. Thoughts spun in nauseating circles and tortured him but he didn't engage. Letting the world fall away, letting the fears and the thoughts and everything slide.

Sensei allowed it for a while. He interjected, 'I think maybe we should try a bit of grounding.'

'I'm fine.' Leo replied. 'I'm like, a two.'

It was a lie. He was a one. Maybe a zero. But he didn't want to stop laying there. He didn't want to think, not really. Because if he thought, then he'd think about Sensei, about the roots, about the tree in his mind. And the fact that nothing was permanent, that he was going to lose everyone he ever loved, they were going to die and leave him alone. That he was doomed to hang in suspension for months, gravity battering him back and forth, shattered mind and the only thing that stayed was the fear.

Dragging down. Grey on the edges of his vision. It was hopeless, there was no point in trying. He'd lost his right arm, he'd lost all functionality, he'd lost an entire piece of himself.

He was irrevocably broken. There was never going to be any way to fix him. He'd been broken since he was born, making him reckless and stupid and annoying and no one actually loved him, they just put up with him. They had to but they didn't want to. He was the one on the team that was replaceable, useless. No one needed him like he needed them.

He needed Sensei. He knew that. But it didn't matter, it didn't change anything.

This was it, forever. A churning crunch of misery, rolling over and over and over, there was no future where he was alive and happy. There was no future, no concept of this version of Hamato Leonardo surviving what he'd been through. Because it was too much, he barely brushed it with his thumb and it all exploded into a mess of feeling and trapped and scared and alone. Only panic and hallucinations and derealization and pain and pain and pain and

Leo didn't slip into the void. Instead, Leo realized he had moved. He wasn't in his bed anymore. He was shivering, holding something, standing with his toes hanging. Tightrope walker. The last two steps.

'Leo.' Sensei said, and he sounded just as scared as Leo felt.

Blink. Focus. Then there was a rush, a slam of air that almost knocked him back. Weak legs barely kept their balance, swaying with the rhythmic pulse of the force beside him.

'Can we take a step back?' Sensei asked, and there was a pressure, like Sensei was trying to move them. But Leo had control and he didn't give it back. Not even when the yank became more desperate.

In Leo's hand was his sword. He'd portalled. The spark of his ninpo said recent use, though he didn't remember the decision. He didn't remember deciding to come here. Where was here?

Damp and unpleasant smell of public underground. Chill of concrete and the screech of the rails. The train beside him passed and left a whirlwind of air in its wake.

Leo realized where he was and a wave of peace came over him.

'Leo.' Sensei's voice shook. 'Don't do this.'

Chapter Text

'Hypocrite. Hypocrite. Hypocrite.' Leo spat back. Their limbs trembled all over, even the stump. It ached. It always fucking ached, like taking the meat and bone and grinding into a pencil sharpener or a lemon squeezer. Like the nerve endings fired and burnt.

'You can't do this.' Sensei pleaded.

Leo practically whirled on him. 'Why do you get to die?'

Their chest heaved. The moment that Leo gave an inch Sensei took a mile, dragging their body away from the edge of the subway platform and pressing their shell against the wall. It wasn't very far from the tracks -- they weren't on the public side, instead tucked where the platform met the tunnels. All access corridors and metal ladders. About a foot and a half between them and the tracks, but it was better than their toes tasting the open air.

'I'm not going to die.' Sensei replied, weak with how much he was aware it was bullshit, trembling equally hard with the fear racing through him, the terror of the kid on the side of the tracks.

Leo scoffed loud and disbelieving in their mind. He stayed grounded, keeping the front by digging their chipped and painted nails into the palm of their hand. 'Do you think I'm fucking stupid? I know what you're going to do. You want me to pull you out of my head, even though it'll probably kill you. Because you want it to. You want this to be over just as fucking much as I do! So don't come at me here, hypocrite! Obviously I'm just speeding up the fucking process!'

'I have to leave!' Sensei screamed, pulsing forward. Fighting him. 'I have to, don't you get it?'

'Why are the hell are you stopping me, then?' Leo fought back, scathing. 'Let's go. Let's dive in and get it over with. You want to die and nothing I've said can make you stay. And like hell I'm going to stick around just for the endless wash and repeat of suffering. No thanks. So let's stand up and get this over with.'

'No.' Sensei trembled with the effort of keeping Leo from moving their body back into that dangerous position. 'Listen to me. You don't understand. There's something I haven't told you.'

'Okay?' Leo demanded, impatient.

'Do you want to know how I lost my arm?'

Strained silence. In the midst of their internal struggle, the teenage boy in a swallowing blue hoodie was struck with another wall of wind. The train passed, going the other way, just gearing up for top speed. Flashes of light and faces in the windows, New York City underground. The squeal of wheels against iron.

'Tell me.' Leo said, the anger and fuel going dull and resigned.

Sensei shuddered a breath with their hurting lungs. He started, slow, 'Raph had just died. I don't really know how to describe my mental state other than that the world truly ended. There was just... I don't know. Survivor's guilt is almost too easy of a concept to explain it, let alone the fact that Raph was the best of us and losing him was like... I don't know how to tell you.'

That was fine, because Leo could feel the crushing misery in every inch of his skin, sense memory hangover like poison. Encroaching on every part of him, grief swimming as fresh as it was the day it happened, waiting only for the thought of burying your big brother with his stuffed animals to keep him company. How cold his skin was. How Sensei spent night after night white-knuckled gripping counters, staring in the mirror and telling himself that he could not kill himself yet, he couldn't leave his twin and his big sister and his baby brother and his little baby to deal with this hell on their own.

He couldn't. He couldn't. Maybe if Sensei told himself that enough times, he'd believe it. Because he sure didn't, he just ran into danger as quickly as he could in the hope that maybe it would do the job for him.

Raph was dead. Sensei wanted to be dead so badly it felt like the only thing on his mind. When the explosive landed beside him, ticking, he did not run. He picked it up and tried to hurl it back to the Kraang.

Reckless. Stupid. Idiot. Donnie probably would've killed him himself if he didn't put so much work into saving him. It was a bad decision, one that he didn't have to make, one that he made because for a moment he thought that either he'd take out some Kraang or himself, it didn't matter which, but either way it wasn't nearly as damning to everyone around him as the pills in the med bay or the blade of his own swords.

The sense memory that came strongest, like chalk coating his teeth, was the furious whack-whack-whack as Mikey pounded on his plastron and screamed at him, tears streaming down his face.

"You're so damn lucky that you only lost your arm!" Mikey glared, red-rimmed and furious-furious-furious. "Because we almost lost our fucking brother."

Sensei learned that it wasn't about him, that he couldn't be reckless and stupid, that Raph was dead and that meant he had to be everything Raph was and more. It only cost him an arm and all the strength he had, to keep going every single day just so he wouldn't make things worse for the ones he had left.

'Are you telling me that I should go on for my family?' Leo asked, in the present, still full of the quiet scorn. 'As if I haven't fucking considered that? I know I should. I just can't -- I can't do this anymore. I can't.'

'That's not what I'm saying.' Sensei said, quietly. 'Because Leo, how did you lose your arm?'

'Is that a trick question?' Leo replied, flexing their fingers open and closed. Sore half-crescents in his palm. 'You know that I don't know.'

'But I do.'

A startled beat. Leo asked, 'You do?'

'I was there when you lost it. I entered your mind and your arm was gone. Like mine. Because it was me, Leo. I'm why you lost it. It's the only thing that makes sense. And so because of a stupid, reckless decision I made, grief-stricken and suicidal, you have to spend the rest of your life without your arm.'

Leo didn't know what to think. He sunk closer to the cold concrete, the flickering unnatural air pushed by thousands of tonnes of metal hurtling through the space. A train roared past, deafening.

'What are you trying to say?' Leo asked eventually, sick with it. 'That because you came into my brain took my arm, that means you deserve to die?'

'I ruined your life. And I'm going to keep ruining it.' Sensei replied. 'But you don't have to let it happen, you can just... kick me out. Pick up the shambles of what remains and try again. You're young and you've got time. I used my time, I wasted it, and the only good thing I ever did was throw Casey back to give everyone a second chance. Me being here is a fluke. It's not supposed to be like this, I'm supposed to be dead. Not tearing you apart.'

Leo gave up holding fort at the front and swung into the mindscape, finding the tree and the roots and the limitless sky intercut by branches and flourishing leaves. He stomped up to Sensei and said to his face, 'But I love you, you idiot.'

'Well guess what idiot, I'm you. So love yourself.' Sensei replied. 'This isn't the right play. I've been telling you from the start, I don't want to ruin your life. I'm not supposed to be here. You just need to take all this misguided love you've got for me and put it towards yourself instead.'

Leo gaped at him. Then shoved him firm and hard, with enough force to knock the bigger turtle back. 'No! What the fuck, dude! That's not how this works at all!'

'I'm the reason you lost your arm--'

'And killing you sure as hell won't make it grow back!' Leo screamed.

Sensei stared at him. Leo's chest heaved, feeling like he was suffocating, like there was no air.

'Breathe, kid.' Sensei said, stepping up and placing his hand on Leo's shell.

Leo slapped his hand away. He turned to glare, one cutting red-rimmed eye over his shadowed face, and said, 'Hypocrite. Don't tell me to live. I'm you. You're me. We both know exactly how hard it is to keep going. How dare you ask me to do what you won't even consider.'

'What about your brothers?' Sensei challenged.

'What about Casey?' Leo snapped back.

The impasse hung in the air. Motion rocked them, another wall of wind, another train, another opportunity lost.

'Why are you trying to stop me?' Leo asked, exhausted to the bone.

'Less stop, more stall.' Sensei said, as he spotted the purple, and they suddenly jarred to reality, rattling to the front.

"What the fuck, Nardo?" Donnie said, out of breath, something hysterical in his voice.

Leo turned his eyes up at his twin. His tongue felt swollen and unruly and he didn't bother trying to move it. He numbly said to Sensei, 'I don't have my phone, so where's the tracker on us?'

Then his ears filled with wasps. Light-headed and darkening peripherals.

'Leo, hold on, wait a minute--' Sensei tried, but it was too late. The thick vicious void welcomed them back gladly, swallowing them whole.

Leo knew if his twin was there, he would stop death himself if he had to. The opportunity was gone and left a hollow, consuming darkness. Slipping headfirst down, collision imminent. Losing himself at top speed because the thought of dealing with this for another second was too much. He was not permitted to die. He did the second best thing.

It was quiet.

Quiet.

Quiet.

It was 3AM. Maybe.

But at least it was quiet.

Leo hated the quiet.

Murk and mist. Infinite darkness. Nothing, blank, clean slate. No pain. No hurt.

No love.

Just quiet. Leo and the quiet. Leo hated the quiet.

There was no room for thoughts. No space to stretch out and feel. Nothing but a claustrophobic sensation, like cramming too-much into a small box all at once.

And then there was the fear.

It always came back. There was no reprieve, not even in darkness. It lived and thrived in the infinite possibilities.

Prickles of nerves, tight intercostal muscles, like breathing constricted by rubber bands. He couldn't do this anymore. But hiding wasn't any better, the fear lived in reality and it lived here too. There was no escape.

There was never any escape. He couldn't die but he sure as hell couldn't live either. Leo let the fear eat him alive, laying in the void and suffering.

Then the panic won. That claustrophobic-trapped feeling, crushing him from the inside out. Fear pounded out over and over until he couldn't think beyond the screaming misery. Overwhelmed.

Stop.

Stop.

Stop.

Then a familiar presence filled the space. And all the tension left Leo's body, relief and solace, and he tried to look for Sensei but found only darkness.

'Leo?' Sensei asked, echoes bouncing like hitting the uneven walls of a slick cave.

'Sensei.' Leo called back, a plea, desperate and lost and alone. He didn't want to be alone in the void.

'I'm coming.' Sensei promised, the tingling presence moving closer.

'I can't do this anymore.' Leo sobbed, reaching out blindly only to encounter more and more nothing. Alone and dying and afraid.

'I'm right here.' Sensei said, and then there he was. Leo collided into him, swept up into a swallowing hug. Sensei nuzzled the top of his head roughly and said, 'I'm here. I'm right here.'

'I can't. I can't, okay? I can't.' Leo begged.

'Shh.' Sensei squeezed as hard as he could. 'Just breathe. Just keep breathing.'

'Please. Please. Please.' Leo didn't even know what he was asking for anymore, just helpless and terrified. He clung to Sensei with all his might, the two of the lost in a void. Lost in nothing. Here was nothing. Here was nothing squared.

If you multiply zero by zero it will stay the exact same. But it will have undergone a process.

'I sure do a lot of talking and not a lot of listening, hey?' Sensei asked, in a soft voice, shifting so he could cup the back of Leo's head. 'Will you talk to me?'

Leo gasped for air, fingers tightening, shaking apart. 'I don't want to. Don't make me. I can't come out right now, I'm too scared, I can't face it.'

'You don't have to do anything you don't want to.' Sensei assured him.

Leo replied, 'But what if I don't want to be alive, Sensei?'

'What if, indeed.' Sensei muttered, and clutched the smaller turtle.

It all just felt like a wave of numbness. Begging to die in an endless void, even if it meant he never would be able to see his family again. He had just wanted it to be over. And it was over, and he got out, but not really. He was going to be dogged, the past and the trauma on his heels for the rest of his life. Nightmares and dissociation and pain. He'd thought he was doing better but he was the tightrope walker on the last two steps of the wire -- seeing the safety of recovery but falling two steps before it because he was still in the danger zone.

Leo was holding onto Sensei in the void like it was the only thing keeping him alive because it was. His voice shook when he said, 'I know I've thrown the word hypocrite a lot but really think about it, dude. What does it mean if you believe you should die, and you're me?'

Sensei didn't reply for a while. His thumb stroked Leo's head in little circles, mouth twisting but not speaking. A swallow, nervous.

Finally he said, very slow, 'I can't look at you and think that you deserve to die.'  

'Well, asshole. I'm you.' Leo told him.

'I don't want to ruin--'