Chapter Text
The lair was empty. At least it felt empty, Something was missing, and everyone knew what it was.
A year. That's how long it had felt empty, and it still did.
The crushing weight of the emptiness seeped into every action and inaction, Every sentence and word said or unsaid.
No one spoke about it, all that was wanted to be said was left unsaid, because what was there to say?
The first month was hardest on Splinter.
He had to be coaxed by his sons to come out of his room, to eat, to watch his shows. (The boys agreed it was better to see their father watch TV than not to see him at all.)
Although, the sight of splinter after that first month wasn't great either. His shoulders were hunched further in grief, so much so that it felt like had shrunk.
He had eyebags, the kind that Leo would sport with a grin and joke to ease their worries, it made it harder for the boys to look Splinter in the eyes because this time there would be no easing joke.
Now the rat sat on his recliner, one of his shows playing, but he didn't watch, he instead stared blankly ahead.
Splinter's mind was only hazy, it was clouded and blue.
Why was it blue? There wasn't any blue left. It had been squeezed out, It was gone.
The blue was everywhere, painted across the shells of his remaining sons, and the faces of the news people on his TV, but the painter was nowhere to be seen. The painter was no longer wearing their usual smile as they coated everything in swatches of blue.
The swirls of blue, green, and stripes of red smashed together in Splinters' mind, and it was filled to the brim with those familiar colors, but his family could not see it, they could not see the mirage of colors, only the husk of the former man who had receded into his mind to think.
Nobody had to guess what he was thinking about. They were all thinking about it too, thinking about him.
April thought about him too.
She remembers crying that first night and the nights after that.
Those nights always started the same. She would forget.
She would send a text or a meme and just as she pressed send, she would be flooded with grief, and for a second she wouldn't be able to remember why.
As she felt the tears run down her face and her body start to tremble she could hear him, the last words he said, it was not goodbyes but grim begging to go. To be forgotten. She did just that, she forgot. She forgot he wasn't there.
Wasn't that as bad as forgetting he was here? His death was such a big part of him, of April's future of everyone's future and April couldn't even remember that?
April hated to forget, all the while Casey only wished he could forget.
He yearned to no longer remember. He didn't want to keep any of it, not the nights of his life where the only thing left in the dark with him was his dread. Not the constant need to survive with no chance to live.
Not the days, hours, minutes, or seconds he spent with Master Leonardo, future or past.
If Casey was honest he wasn't sure whether he wanted to forget, On one hand, he would be allowed to restart, able to be alive on his terms, with a purpose he chose, but then again who would he be without those memories? Without Master Leonardo?
He would be a blank canvas. He wouldn't be anyone.
But then again he owed it to his Master, He owed it to his father to remember him. He did so much. Good and bad, He was alive, he was mortal, and he proved it when he sacrificed himself. Twice. In both timelines he saved Casey.
Casey knows that in all of the timelines he would have tried to save Casey.
He always wanted to save everyone but himself.
Mikey knew this, He knew, deep down in his core that there was a way. A way they all could have survived.
Leo gave up.
If someone told Mikey before the entire incident Leo would give up, and Mikey would have gone Dr. Delicate touch on them.
But now Mikey could only laugh, the same rueful laugh, the last laugh Leo gave them.
He must have always been like this, despite being the loudest he never spoke.
Mikey knew why Leo did it, why he didn't say anything, Leo knew they would try and stop him to find a better way, a way they all stayed together.
Leo never told them anything, he preferred to handle everything by himself and keep the others safe.
Honestly, Mikey didn't know. He didn't know why they couldn't have just stayed together, why things didn't stay the same.
Why he didn't stay?
Mikey felt like he was putting up string and pins on a board, trying to make sense of it, to make sense of him.
All he knew was nothing will be the same again.
Nothing.
Donnie's birthday will never be the same, because for once in his life it was just his.
Not Donnie's and Leo's, just Donnie's.
It was one of the worst days Donnie ever experienced. The day was dull, there was no celebration. There couldn't be, not for Donnie.
He asked it to be that way, he remembers the concern on his brothers' and father's faces when asked.
He remembers missing it all.
Missing the fact that if his twin was there Leo would have stayed up the night before, to be the first to wish Donnie.
Leo was the one who would constantly cheer the both of them on throughout the day, and make paper crowns with drawn-on purple and blue jewels.
He misses how Leo would have waited with Donnie till the end of the day, right until midnight. he remembers the last birthday they had together:
Everyone had gone to bed, it was just the two of them. They said nothing, they were just huddled together trying to fight the sleep that weighed on their eyelids, Donnie heard him sigh. They fell asleep.
Donnie wished there was more, he didn't want the last of it to be silence. He was never silent. He was The loud, The voice in a room, The chuckle or snicker, The dad joke, The quip. The pun. He was Donnie's twin.
Now it was the year anniversary of that day. The day he lost a part of himself, when the sky swallowed his other half and left Donnie only with a tear, left to feel incomplete and empty.
Raph spent a lot of his time feeling angry.
He was angry he couldn't save his brother. He was angry he needed saving. (He wasn't angry at Leo, but at fate, The universe, and The bifurcated time branches.)
He was angry that The Krang ruined their lives.
He was angry at himself.
For not being smart enough.
Strong enough.
He wasn't enough. He couldn't protect all of them. If Raph couldn't protect then what was his purpose? He was useless, and he proved to be useless exactly a year ago when he let his brother die.
The anger boiled inside of him, it festered and rotted till it was one of the only things Raph could feel.
Soon after that day, Raph became more like the species of turtle he was, he was constantly snapping.
There was so much anger, yet there was nowhere to put it. He was left to watch it grow like a cancer in fear, but soon that fear would be consumed by rage, and once again he would be infuriated.
It was a brutal cycle, he would feel completely and utterly useless, then he would be angry by the fact, then he would fear himself for his rampaging emotions, then he would be angry he was letting his anger control him.
Raph didn't know who he was anymore, he was just a sweltering mass of rage ready to explode.
Deep down Raph knew he wasn't just angry. He was scared, he was upset, he was disappointed. But the red-hot wrath felt better than the freezing fear and the icy disappointment that ran tracks down the back of his neck and spine.
So he was left with the never-ending cycle, just as his brother had been left in the Prison Dimension.
If his brother couldn't get the help he needed, why should Raph?
Leo couldn't tell, was he alive? Maybe, maybe not. Probably not.
It felt selfish; To not be alive.
He caused the invasion to die would be to take the easy route, to quit on his family... Wasn't sacrificing himself quitting on his family?
Did he leave everyone just because he hated himself? Leo had surrendered himself to what felt like years of torment and torture at the tentacles of a psychopathic wad of gum.
Leo stared at the picture he had coveted during his time in the prison dimension. He had torn himself out of the picture a while ago in a raging temper tantrum of self-hatred, It was probably floating out there in the dead space just like he was.
They all looked so happy.
He used to cry whenever he looked at it, but this time felt different.
Sure, he missed them but soon he wouldn't have to.
A part of him wailed: "This isn't it! I was supposed to die in a blaze of glory! In battle! I was supposed to die surrounded by my family. I was supposed to see them one last time. I was supposed to make it back. I wasn't meant to fade. I don't want to."
His skin prickled over the aches and the broken bones, He was scared.
He was going to die. That was worse than being dead.
Couldn't he have died before? Gone before he knew?
Gone before he could choke out a "Please. No." to the bland misery that surrounded him.
No one could hear him.
The endless grey blanketed and smothered the whimpers and begging of a child crying his last breath for his family.
Even though Leo was dying he could only wonder what his future self would say about him. The one Casey looked up to the one who was so much better than him. The greatest ninja the world had ever seen.
Some great ninja he was.
He was pathetic.
He was dying and he couldn't even do anything about it.
He was tired.
He didn't want to be tired.
He didn't want his eyes to droop, to feel the aching dull, it only intensified the panic coursing through his mind.
Oh god, he was dying.
He needed to keep his eyes open.
He wanted to see his family again.
He needed to.
His grip on the picture tightened.
His eyes kept fluttering, he didn't want to die.
He didn't.