Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Fan Fiction ❯ Bad Places ❯ 16 ( Chapter 16 )

Part 16

Raphael arrived at the lair no longer guiding his sibling but half-carrying him. Leo leaned heavy on his good arm, eyes closed, breathing deep. Raphael figured he was somehow sleepwalking and realized this was what people meant by dead on their feet. He was inwardly grateful to his brother for that small favor. He didn't think he could have carried him. Neither of them needed a shower after the long walk through the rain, but the burns and cuts on his brother's arms were beginning to look infected. Thankful that the main room was empty, he guided his brother to the back and into the sick room Donatello had put together. Michelangelo already sat on one bunk with Don looking at the minor damage to his hands, but he immediately turned when Leo and Raph came in and Donatello followed his look.

"Finally," Don said, pulling the blanket on the nearest bunk back. "You're turning out just like him, running around with broken limbs..."

"Quiet," Raph whispered as he set his brother down, but he didn't think it mattered. From the look on his brother's face, Leo wouldn't be waking up for some time. He stood back for a moment, watching Donatello gently turn his brother's arms over to reveal the blood-soaked bandages and the new burn on his right arm.

"I'll be right back," Raph said, turning to go.

"Wait," Don said, "your arm--"

"It can wait. I need to talk to Splinter now." And before Donatello could argue, he left and headed for his master's room. He found him sitting on his usual mat beside his small zen garden, but instead of meditating, Splinter was staring at numerous sketches spread before him and occasionally flipping a page in an art book. Raphael knelt in front of him, looking over the sketches. He spotted himself, angry, accusing, glaring out of darkness at the viewer. He brought it closer and stared at it for several seconds, seeing himself the way Leonardo did.

"That is not the only one of you," Splinter said softly, motioning at two others side by side.

Raph put the first one down and pulled the other two closer. Drawn sitting in front of the television, one leg pulled up with his head resting on his knee, he didn't watch the screen as much as he simply stared into space. The other picture had him practicing alone in the main room, frozen in the middle of a spinkick. The anger was gone, replaced by calm concentration. Raph tilted his head. He almost looked like he was dancing.

"Leo did these?" he asked.

Splinter nodded. "I found them in his room. The...quiet ones...are far and few between. Most of these are angry, poisoned even--" He gasped as he noticed Raphael's arm. "Did Leonardo--?"

"No," Raph said. "It wasn't him, it was...no, that's important right now. Master, we need to talk."

"About the dimension Donatello spoke of?"

"No..." Raph hesitated, then pressed on. As much as he hated to reveal what Leonardo had told him, to help his brother he had to. "Leonardo had left before he was trapped inside that dimension. He was leaving us the night he was caught."

While Splinter's eyes widened, Raphael pressed on. "He couldn't handle being responsible for all of us anymore. He can't stand living the way we've made him live. You taught him how to kill and told him to protect us, but the moment he uses those skills, we condemn him."

"Raphael, he laughed in the midst of a slaughter."

"Who wouldn't?" Raphael shook his head. "Did we ever stop and think it wasn't insane, just...hysterical? That he's coming apart at the seams?"

"But Donatello spoke of disorder--"

"Only 'cause he didn't know what I know. Leo didn't talk to any of you, just me. That way I could do the talking instead of him." Raphael leaned back and looked down. His arm hurt even more, but this had to be taken care of first. "It's not a disorder. It's a nervous breakdown. He can't do it anymore."

Splinter lowered his head, and Raphael followed his look to the single sketch of their master, stern and authoritarian, with glaring eyes staring out of a smoky background. In the past three months, with the weight of the family suddenly placed on his back, Raphael could see where the image came from.

"He said he told you he wanted to stop," Raph said. "That you said he couldn't."

"Yes," Splinter said, "about a month before he disappeared. In truth, I do not know how to proceed. That he felt it necessary to hide this aspect of himself...but at least you managed to bring him home."

"He'll run again," Raph said. "I won't keep him prisoner. I couldn't even if I wanted. When he heals, he'll be just as fast and skilled as before. He doesn't want to leave, but it's the only out he can see."

"Then he must want to stay," Splinter said. "We must convince him that his life will be better if he stays."

"Fifteen years of hating us won't be easy to undo," Raph said. He lightly touched the two sketches of himself, angry and demanding, alone and hurting. "He loves us and hates us."

"If you think it best Michelangelo heal in his own room--"

"No," Raph said, looking up with wide eyes. "No way. That's the worst thing we could do. In fact, it might be better if we keep those two real close for awhile. Make Mike stay in bed a little longer than he has to. Slowly bring him back into the family, and with someone who's seen the game first hand."

"Not you?"

"No...he'd just see me as proof of what he thinks is his failure." Raphael picked up one more sketch, titled Self-Portrait but showing nothing more than Leonardo's two swords, sheathed and in their display stand, with the look of a Japanese woodblock print. "He's gonna be a little...off...for a long time to come."

Splinter slowly gathered the sketches together and placed them on top of the art book. "He would not survive long on his own."

"He doesn't want to," Raph said. He decided not to tell him how Leonardo nearly stayed behind in the game, choosing a lonely, painful death over his family. "But if we can convince him that he can put down the weight, that he isn't responsible for us all anymore, that..." he took a deep breath, "that we won't condemn him for the way he fights now."

"Raphael--"

"If he thinks he has to kill, then he probably has to," Raph said. "Do you want him to fight honorably if it means his death?"

Splinter hesitated, torn between life and the honor that made that life worth living.

"I'm sorry, master. Like it or not, we have to choose our own honor. Leonardo has seen too much killing, it makes it easier for him, but even if he hadn't been under so much pressure I think the only difference would be that he'd feel regret he had to kill." Raphael fought down the awful ache in his arm for just a few more minutes. "But he'd still kill. You've trained him to kill to keep us safe. All he was doing was keeping us safe, defending himself."

"I...must think on this," Splinter said. "You must be in pain. Have Donatello treat it. And if he is awake, tell Leonardo that...that he was right."

Raphael decided he wouldn't phrase it like that, but at least tell his brother that the weight was off, at least most of it. "Yes, master." He stood and walked out, heading for the sick room and not looking forward to the re-setting Donatello was going to perform.

Much later, as if fighting his way out of the ground, Leonardo slowly woke. The only light came from Michelangelo's bed, a soft night light that went no farther than his pillow. After watching his brother sleep for a few minutes, he sat up, wincing as the wounds on his arms flared. His body protested every move. He was breathing hard by the time he was sitting straight, and he leaned against the wall beside him. What was wrong with him? He hadn't been this bad off the first time, and that had been for three months.

A blanket covered his lower half, and his bandaged arms stood out on the brown cloth. They must have changed the dressings several times since there was no more blood visible. He lightly touched his right arm, swathed from wrist to upper arm in pristine white bandages, and winced. The acid burn was still sensitive.

He'd never been in this room before and figured Donatello had put it together while he was gone. The chamber was smaller than their rooms with its own door, and Don had moved some of his scavenged medical equipment inside. There were four beds, two by two, but he and his brother were the only ones inside. At every bed stood a nightstand, and Mike's held a playstation and two controllers coiled on top of the console. He looked down at his nightstand and found his sketchpad and pencil.

So they'd found them. Of course. After attacking them in their home, no doubt they'd gone through his room. They must have found the sketches quickly since there was little else inside beside books and weaponry. He looked at the door but realized he couldn't leave. He didn't think he could even stand yet.

The door suddenly opened and light spilled into the room. He turned toward the wall, shielding his eyes and wincing as he moved his arm to do so.

"Oh geez, sorry," Don said, closing the door quickly. He reached for a switch on the wall and turned the lights up to something resembling twilight. "I didn't think you'd be awake yet."

"Just for a few minutes," Leo said, his voice sounding as tired as he felt. "How long was I asleep?"

"A day and a half. Any longer and I was afraid I'd have to put you on an IV."

His eyes fully adjusted now, he watched Donatello walk around the room, setting down a small cereal box and milk carton on Mike's nightstand, an apple and a water bottle on his. "We have one?"

"We have plenty of new stuff," Don said. "While April and I were at the computer, I had Casey moving truckloads of equipment from the lab to here. Stockman wasn't gonna be using it anymore."

"He's still alive?" Leo asked sharply.

"No, he's dead. I don't know how you did it, the cut really wasn't that deep. But he's dead."

"Cyanide." Leo stared at the blanket, remembering that fight and the look in Stockman's eyes as he stabbed his sword through his gears and components. "I laced my swords with cyanide before I left."

Donatello paused. "Is that why you didn't draw on us?"

Leo shook his head. "No. I didn't draw because...I can't do that."

After looking over Michelangelo, Donatello sat next to Leo's bed and gently took his right arm, unwrapping the bandages and revealing the long burns. "You're lucky," Don said, "these aren't too deep. Whatever that thing used for stomach acid, it wasn't very strong. And that I cleaned it while you were out. Scrubbing burns is no fun."

As Donatello took new bandages out of their plastic wrap (plastic wrap! he was in heaven) and started rewrapping the burn, Leo looked away, suddenly fascinated by the lines on the wall. He quietly sat through the redressing of his smaller laser burn, not seeing how his brother noticed. Donatello took his other arm and revealed the deep punctures that went from the middle of his hand to his forearm.

"Mike says you got these protecting him," he said softly.

Leo shrugged. "Not so much."

"He said you kept him from being bit by hundreds of...screamers?" Donatello pulled fresh cotton gauze (in neat plastic baggies and there was a crate more where that came from) and packed it carefully around the bites, then redressed it. "I didn't know my plan was so dangerous. I'm sorry."

"If we hadn't, we'd still be in there fighting. I had to get Mike out of there. A bite's small price to pay."

"Not just a bite," Don said, leaning back. "You fell into a pool of blood and bodies with open wounds. Considering how unstable their genetic structure was, I've been keeping a close eye on your own DNA."

Leo looked up with wide eyes, his fear obvious. "I might--?"

"No, no," Don said, covering his good hand. "You won't turn into them, I promise. It's just small things, like your hearing, your sight. Okay, that's not really small, but this is all conjecture, I may be totally wrong--"

"Wait," Leo said. "How do you know that? How can you even look at DNA?"

Donatello couldn't stop the grin from spreading over his face. "You wouldn't believe the equipment I've got now. Centrifuges, microchips, recombinators, the little box that sends light back and forth in scifi movies, everything! True, I didn't get everything in the lab, but I picked out the best stuff first and who wants a lousy pocket atom smasher anyway--"

Leonardo listened to his brother ramble about things he vaguely understood, occasionally waving at something in the room with one hand but always keeping the other on top of Leo's good hand. And Leo figured that this was the way he should have come home the first time, only he hadn't known the way back.

TBC...