Chapter Text
Casey came after his classes were finished, finding them all in front of the TV trying desperately hard to pretend to be normal when it was painstakingly obvious that none of them felt even remotely normal. Sensei gladly took the escape and brought Casey to his room so they could talk without an audience.
Casey fiddled with his phone case, and his smile was crooked when he looked up at them. "Is it terrible of me to say I'm not surprised?"
Sensei gave a pained little laugh. "No?"
"Don't get me wrong, I'm not thrilled. I've always hated your stupid choices." Casey shook his head. "But I've known you for a long time. Angie used to tell me to watch you closely if you looked sad, to hug you extra hard. Donnie would say that if you looked like you were going to do something stupid to utilize my 'large, innocent eyes' to convince you to do something safer instead. And Commander O'Neil used to swear at least once a week about how you were a 'fucking suicidal idiot'."
Sensei had never told them but of course they knew anyway. And helped him as much as they could without him needing to ask. He gave Casey a heart-broken smile and offered his hand to squeeze. "Sorry. That couldn't have been easy to deal with growing up."
"Not harder than being the one struggling." Casey stuck out his tongue. "So shut up, I'm glad to hear you're getting real help. April was telling me all about their plans. Can I talk to Leo for a minute?"
"Right here, Casey Junior." Leo swapped in, giving a fake and tired smile.
"How are you feeling?"
Overwhelmed and cringing from the fallout of his own actions. Shrivelled up and unsure if he was making the right choice. Scared of the future, something he'd pretended for years that he'd never have to actually be a part of, that he'd find his exit before then. Horrifically loved in the worst way because it only highlighted how much he'd been set up to lose. Flayed alive in guilt that he'd hurt the people who loved him all because his thoughts were a battering hurricane that never allowed him to admit weakness earlier. Ashamed that it wasn't really that bad, ashamed that it couldn't have actually been any worse.
"I'm feeling like I'll have a lot to say to that therapist, once I get them." Leo said, eventually.
"You should write it down." Casey jerked his chin towards Leo's phone in show. "So you don't forget between now and then. You wouldn't have to show anyone else, just to get all your thoughts in order before you sit down with them and forget how words work."
It wasn't a terrible idea. Even just to put it all into words so he could stop trying to roll it around in his head and get a more coherent shape. "I might do that, yeah."
"Can I give you a hug? You specifically?"
Leo snorted and opened his arm. "Of course, dude. Anytime."
Casey hugged tight just like Sensei. "Thanks for not dying yet. And thanks for dragging my dad along with you."
"Don't you wish you had him back properly?" Leo said, throat sore.
"Are you kidding? This is more than I ever thought I'd get again. I have him in all the ways that matter. He's alive." Casey said, fierce.
"Aw, kid." Sensei fronted to roughly kiss his hair.
Casey hugged them both for ages. It was the day for hugs, because Carol came to fetch Casey and April after dinner solely so she could also give him a suffocating hug. And a gift.
"I brought you a plant." Carol said.
"You brought me a plant." Leo repeated, surprised. It was in a cute pot with an octopus on it and had green leaves. "I hate to be that guy, but there's no sunlight down here."
"You'll just have to get a sun lamp." Carol pat his cheeks. "Keep the plant alive, okay?"
There was an unspoken thing hanging in the air that Leo was getting very familiar with. "Yeah, okay."
April also gave him a hug. Except she then put him in a headlock and told him, deathly serious, "You are going to be okay, Hamato Leonardo."
"If big sister of the whole wide world says so, it must be true." Leo replied, because he knew how this went. She told him what was going to happen and he agreed.
"Good." April crushed his windpipe in the headlock-slash-hug. "I'll see you tomorrow."
"Yup." Leo said, throat tight, because he'd promised at least for the next seven days, and unfortunately he did not break his promises.
Leo put the plant in his room. Mikey followed him in, cooing over the octopus pot, apparently the one who was going to make sure he wasn't alone right now.
"What kind of plant is it?" Mikey asked, stroking the little leaves.
"I don't know, I've never met a plant in real life." Leo replied.
Mikey gave the joke a pity laugh.
Leo sighed and his legs were too weak to keep standing, which was so freaking annoying. He didn't bother to drag himself to the dojo, instead kicking some clothes off his floor and set up to start stretching right there instead.
Mikey had zero hesitation to join him, doing slow and intent wrist stretches. He tapped on his phone to put some music on. Leo scanned his baby brother's face, looking for any signs of what he was thinking. Surely he was thinking something.
Leo swallowed, thinking about all the conversations he'd had with Mikey recently. He opened with, "You know that you never make things worse for me, right?"
Mikey froze mid-stretch. He said, in a remarkably casual voice, "I've done really good not to cry all day, if you're not careful we'll break that streak."
"Sorry." Leo said immediately, because the conversation was probably going to make him cry. "Are you angry with me again?"
"I don't want to make things--" Mikey obviously put together what Leo just said and shook his head. "Damn you."
"It's okay if you are." Leo said, pretending to be light, curling over his calf and grabbing the underside of his own foot. A sore achy stretch, holding ten seconds between rests. "It was shitty of me to try to take your brother away again when you'd already gotten pissed at me for that exact thing."
Mikey shivered and drew his hands into his chest. "I don't know if I'm mad at you."
"You can tell me if you are." Leo wasn't sure why he wanted that, if it was to punish himself, or to break this fragile saran wrap around their interactions.
"I really don't know." Mikey repeated. "It still doesn't feel real. I was so sure you were going to wake up and tell Donnie it wasn't like that at all. But at the same time it's not like I didn't know you were struggling, with everything else going on. I guess I just thought... I don't know. That it happens like that to someone else. But not to you."
Leo stopped his stretch to reach out and take Mikey's hand, gently massaging the quaking tendons in a way Sensei told him Angie used to like after over-extending his magic.
Mikey let him, staring at the motion. As Leo suspected, once Mikey got started, he needed no encouragement to keep talking, "Not you, because you'd escaped the thing that was trying to kill you. I didn't think about how maybe you brought some of the thing trying to kill you along. I don't really think I'm angry, because it's not like you asked for this. I think I'm just... frustrated. That I didn't notice there was still danger and I didn't do anything to help you fight it."
"Angelo, if it wasn't for you guys, I would've been dead years ago." Leo told him, painfully frank. "I'm not just saying that. I know you think it's stupid, that it's not really helping. But buddy you have no idea what it's like to be in my head, the battles I've had to fight, and your smile can win almost every single one of them."
There were the tears. Mikey let them fall, not moving to sweep them away, staring at Leo with shimmering eyes.
"Almost. But not all." Mikey choked out. "Because you still ended up there."
"Which is why April's gonna get me a therapist." Leo told him. "It's not me trying to take your brother away. I want to be with you so bad, it's just not easy for me like it seems to be for everyone else."
"Maybe I am angry, then." Mikey sniffed, wet and loud. "At depression for trying to take my brother away."
That made Leo feel something he couldn't identify. It might've been relief. "You can be mad at me too. I won't blame you."
"I don't know yet." Mikey repeated, pulling his hand away from the gentle tendon press to wipe at his face. "Maybe later. Right now I'm just so glad that you're gonna get help and you'll try. And that Sensei pulled you back and Donnie took you home before anything happened."
Leo wasn't quite at the point where he could say that he was glad for that too. Instead he gave Mikey a weak smile, and said, "Keep me updated. Maybe once I'm on my feet you could kick my ass at a spar to get your anger out."
"I might hold you to that." Mikey said, giving a shaky smile back, getting the tears all off his face with disturbing practice.
The soft music played off his phone. They kept stretching, but it was only a minute or two before Mikey spoke again.
"Hey Leo?" Mikey said, hesitant.
"Yeah Mikes?" Leo replied.
"How do I know if... I need to be worried that I'm..." Mikey bit his lip and his face flushed with colour. "It's just. After that conversation with Dad I felt like we were similar, with the whole self-sacrifice thing. And now I'm wondering if that means I need to watch out for ending up where you are."
"I think if you need to ask the question, then you already have the answer." Leo replied, and holy shit how the hell did his brothers deal with this? Because the thought of Mikey possibly killing himself suddenly ran Leo's body up and down with white-hot pricks of horror, like the sensation of the prison dimension times a thousand. "I'm sure we could find a therapist for you too."
"I don't really think I would do anything." Mikey said, too-quick.
The amount of fucking times Leo thought that exact thing was terrifying. Leo wasn't sure if his horror was showing on his face or what, so he tried to blank the expression and return to a reassuring smile. "Of course. I'm pretty dang proud of you for being self-aware enough to even ask for it."
Mikey bit his lip then lurched forward to hug Leo around the middle.
A momentary oof, then Leo curled around him. Sensei stole the front to whisper, "Hey little turtle, you are so brave."
Mikey's grip tightened impossibly and he said, muffled into their hoodie, "I'm really happy you're both here."
Leo's heart hurt, clogging his throat. Sensei was the one who spoke, "We're not going anywhere. And neither are you."
Mikey's fingers creaked with how hard he gripped them. It felt like he really needed to hear that.
After that, Mikey helped him brush his teeth, which was humbling to have his little brother hand him the pre-toothpasted brush as he sat on the toilet and tried not to sway. Then Mikey traded with Raph.
It was still too early for anyone other than Leo to go to sleep, but he was exhausted and really wanted to be underneath some blankets. Raph tucked him into bed, the thoughtless flick-flick of changing the lights over and getting the fan on, done a hundred times, flapping the blankets and folding the extra one over his feet.
Leo kept his eyes on his ticking watch. He said, without looking up, "What are you thinking?"
"That we should get a sun lamp for that plant Carol brought you." Raph replied promptly.
"No, about... what happened." Leo said, uncomfortable and not wanting to bring it up but hating that he couldn't read the vibes. If he'd screwed everything up.
Raph plugged Leo's phone in to charge, settling down beside him and forcing Leo to meet his eyes. "I think I would be really fucked up if you were dead, Leo. So I'm glad you're not."
Leo flinched. He hated to sound like a repetitive child, but he asked, "Are you mad?"
"Nope." Raph crossed his arms over his chest, tense. "I told you last time. You scare me. You've always scared me, ever since we were little. You leap then you look. You care and you pretend you don't. I've tried to be what I feel you needed but I've been going blind this whole time as much as you. But I've been thinking after we talked to Sensei this morning about how it was only when he finally reached out for himself, that he was a good role model, that you actually listened. So I'm going to ask Draxum if he knows anyone who does eye care in the Hidden City."
Leo's head snapped up, surprised.
Raph looked grimly vindicated. "Yeah. It shouldn't be that much of a shock that I would do something to take care of myself. Obviously I haven't been emulating the type of behaviour I want to see from you. I want you to take care of yourself, because you're important."
"Cataract surgery is really easy when done by someone qualified. A routine procedure takes like ten minutes." Leo assured him, then added uneasily, "It's good that you're willing to try."
"Something needs to change with our family." Raph said, putting his hand over his face. "We can't keep going like this. Because I know how you think, Leo. I know that the reason you never told me was that you didn't want to hurt us. As if any reaction I would have ever outweighs the importance of your life."
"That's not all." Leo said with a little croak. He swallowed through it and added tiredly, "I knew the moment I said anything, you'd save me. And I... I didn't want you to."
Raph's face finally broke the careful shell he'd upheld, the torment and agony showing. "Why not?"
"Because I wanted to be done." Leo said, heavy.
But Raph didn't accept that. "Are you sure it's not because you felt like you didn't deserve to be saved?"
Leo's mouth dried up. He'd thought he was coming into the conversation with all the cards in his hand and always managed to be surprised by his big brother. There was a desperate little waver, a stitch swap, and suddenly it was Sensei in the front as Leo panicked.
"Ah." Sensei touched their aching head. "Sorry."
'I don't want to talk about that yet.' Leo gasped, the issues of his self-worth writhing like worms in his stomach.
Sensei offered Raph a sad smile. "I will make sure Leo talks to his therapist about that as soon as we get one."
Raph's face went stony and pointed directly at Sensei. "You."
"Me." Sensei echoed, wide eyed and startled.
"What the hell are you thinking? That you'd get to just disappear? As if you're not one of us." Raph scoffed, reaching over and getting the element of Sensei's shocked surprise to push his head down. "You are wanted here just as much as Leo. Idiot."
Sensei got their heart pounding. "Ah. Thank you, Raphael. Could you give me just a second?"
Joining Leo in the mindscape, Sensei gave a panicked scream. Leo shakily laughed, patting his back before retaking the front. He shook his head, settling the rapid switch, and said, "You've given oyaji too many emotions, congrats."
Raph grumbled. "He's not allowed to leave. Hamato for life."
"I'm right there with you, buddy." Leo raised his hand in surrender, grinning unsteadily.
His brother gave a firm nod of agreement.
The smile fell off Leo's face after a moment. He asked the other question he'd been afraid of, going all in. "Are you disappointed in me?"
"Never." Raph said, with full force.
Leo glanced up at him, uncertain. But Raph was filled with steel conviction and it did not waver in the slightest. He didn't elaborate, but the rock-solid confidence said no doubts.
"Okay." Leo said, and some of the immeasurable pressure eased. He sunk back into his mattress.
Raph pulled his blankets up, fussing over them.
It had probably been years since he'd been tucked in by Raph. Leo used to ask for a stuffed animal to complete the ritual.
Fuck, it wasn't as if the day could get more awkward. "Squish?"
All the stressed lines on Raph's face immediately softened. "Which one?"
"Blahaj." Easy choice.
Raph went to fetch it. For a moment, Leo was surprised he'd actually been left alone. Then he realized his sword mounts on the wall were empty. He wondered who had them.
When Raph returned, he did not ask. Instead he opened his arm for the shark and snuggled it to his chest.
Raph snorted. He gave Leo's forehead a kiss, then the shark, as well he should. "Love you, little brother. Get some sleep. We'll be right here."
Leo didn't doubt that for a second. He muttered, "Love you times infinity."
Sleep came but it didn't stay. When Leo woke in the middle of the night the brothers shifted around. The cot had been dragged in, Mikey and Raph sharing on the other side of the room with a snore. Donnie was in the chair beside his bed, tapping away incessantly at his tablet.
Leo stared at his twin. After a minute, he said in soft voice, "Talk to me."
"Serotonin is a monoamine neurotransmitter." Donnie replied immediately, without even looking up from his tablet. "Derived from the amino acid tryptophan. A chemical imbalance can be treated with various serotonin reuptake inhibitors, though there are trade offs in terms of side effects. It may be an option worth considering."
Of course Donnie was trying to fix it, first and foremost. He thought about his twin having to find him on the train tracks and said, fractured, "I'm really sorry, D."
The tapping stopped. Donnie still didn't look up. He said, "I'm not angry with you, Nardo."
A spinning feeling in the pit of his stomach said otherwise. Or maybe he just wanted Donnie to be angry with him, for the terrible thing he almost did and how he knew exactly from the sense memory what it felt like to lose his twin. It should've been enough to stop him and he felt abhorrent that it wasn't.
"Hey." Donnie put his tablet down and actually looked at him. Leo immediately understood why he'd been hiding, because his emotions were written all over his face. Distress and fear and worry. "I knew something was wrong. All I ever wanted was to know what was it was. And now you've told me, and we will fix it."
Leo swallowed, sore, and said, "Tell me how you really feel."
"I am not lying." Donnie scowled at the implication, even though it was obvious by his expression that he was feeling a lot. "Yes, I would've preferred that you consulted me before you stood on the tracks. But you told me yourself in the end and that's what matters."
Leo only had to think about if he found Donnie standing on the tracks for two milliseconds before he wanted to curl up in anguish. "That can't be it, D. I pushed you away. That can't have been easy."
"Oh fuck, was any of this supposed to be easy?" Donnie snapped. "I missed that. Because this was my worst fucking nightmare. The stupid thing I kept thinking when I was hunting you down was that you gave me another Leo to lose. And that despite all the warning signs I still stepped away, and if you fell and I wasn't there to catch you, then I would -- I would have to live with that and I don't really think that I could."
Donnie's chest heaved, the whisper-yell falling silent, face paled. Haunted.
Leo felt like he might spit his heart out. He didn't interrupt, because he knew his twin wasn't done.
"But I put my trust in another you." Donnie continued, voice tortured. "Because I have a weak spot a mile wide and he's got red stripes. Doesn't matter which one."
Sensei carefully took the front, feeling like he could read his-Donnie in all the tight rigid edges of his posture and it was sticking his throat. How much he missed him eclipsed the sun for a moment. It took a lot of gathering his strength to say, "Thank you for trusting me with him."
"Thank you for taking care of him." Donnie replied.
Sensei longed to die because then he would've finally rejoined his twin. But this young mirror reminded him that the thing his-Donnie would've wanted most in the world was his-Leo to be cared for.
The utterly painful emotion jamming his trachea pushed knives up and Sensei began to cry, helpless. He heard himself say, through sharp pain, "I ... I miss my you. So fucking much."
Donnie's face flashed dark, and he turned to grab a tissue from the table and offered it out. "Unfortunately, I cannot fix that. But I can promise you that I will do everything in my power to avoid giving Leo the same burden."
Sensei took the tissue and covered his face with it. He shook with grief.
A hesitant hand on his elbow. Donnie spoke measured. "We both know that I'm not your twin. As you said, he spent twenty years in an apocalypse with you that I have not. I couldn't replace him even if I wanted to. But that does not mean that you will be devoid of what it is like to be loved by Donatello going forward. Not as a twin, perhaps. But in the way that a Donnie will always love a Leo."
It was as if Sensei was inventing brand new ways to feel grief, every single day. He might just combust from it, breath hitching, burning and pouring with it. A surge for a storm that never stopped. He struggled to catch his breath.
Donnie quietly counted their breath out loud, encouraging him calmly. Sensei didn't hide, didn't spin away from the front and hide in darkness. He felt his grief and cried and caught his breath.
"Why did you decide to trust me?" Sensei rasped, voice wrecked, stuck on the fact that Donnie knew something was wrong. It normally took literal war crimes to separate them. And yet Donnie walked away and trusted the Sensei would protect his twin.
Donnie was still holding his arm and gave it a squeeze. "When we came into your mind, I saw how easily you two interacted with each other. Yes, memes. But also you hugged each other so tight and he practically hid behind you from Draxum. I know that my Leo would protect those he loves with every single thing he has. So that meant you would too."
Sensei felt a crushing hug like he was wrapped from behind, Leo clutching from where they shared the front. He leaned into the touch.
"Thank you." Sensei said again, because he knew how painful it was for Donnie to let someone else in.
"You're welcome." Donnie replied, prim, and squeezed one last time before letting go.
Leo switched back in, raising the collar of the hoodie to scrub at his face. They breathed, settling back down. Donnie returned to tapping at his tablet.
After a minute, Leo grabbed his phone from the bedside table. He switched to Snapchat, all his streaks still very dead. It took some thought, but he held his camera out to Donnie in offer.
"Really?" Donnie said, with a little sarcasm, but leaned in anyway. There wasn't much light, so they were just two shadows tipped together. But Leo took it and drew a little blue heart before sending it to all his streaks.
Starting over again. It was funny how many times he was able to start again from zero.
April read it immediately. She sent back a chat, 'Go to sleep.'
Leo sent a burst of emojis that conveyed his exact emotion and 'no you go to sleep???'
'Only if you're asleep first.'
'that's impractical how would you know if i'm asleep??'
'I'll know.' Finger pointing emoji. 'Go.'
"April's still awake." Leo reported to Donnie.
"I'll get Casey to start drugging her tea." Donnie said without looking up. After a beat, he added, "Slash j."
"I would hope so." Leo snorted, putting his phone back down. "Or else you'd be opening yourself up to turnabout since you're also still awake right now, dude."
Donnie heaved a big sigh. He locked his tablet with visible reluctance, placing it beside Leo's phone and stealing the charger. Then he climbed over Leo and settled beside him, stealing the extra blanket from his feet and wrapping himself up tightly.
"Do you want your weighted blanket?" Leo whispered, since he knew the pressure had been helping him sleep with the issues with his shell.
"It's too far." Donnie said, muffled as his face was already eating a pillow. He cut one eye from the soft fabric to look at his twin and said, "You can if you don't make a big deal about it."
For the first time since he tried to kill himself, Leo felt a spike of joy pierce the shadow of apathy. A big stupid smile split his face and he said, "I've never made a big deal about anything in my life."
Donnie grumbled. But still let Leo settle over-top his shell, the leathery spring-back even through four layers of blankets and hoodies. A child-like nostalgia warmed him to his core, and it bubbled volcanic emotions to the surface.
If he had killed himself, he wouldn't have gotten this moment. He swallowed through the pain pinging off everything inside him, and repeated, "I'm really sorry, D."
"Apology accepted." Donnie didn't even raise his head. "Go the fuck to sleep."
Leo exhaled. And inhaled again. Somehow, the next morning didn't seem nearly as scary as the last.