Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Leo clings to Raph's back while Raph sets up these things called curtains on the inside of his room. The walls are still glass, but with all of the curtains pulled wide and flat, no one will be able to see in. Only Leo will get to decide when he's out in the open.

He tips his head forward to nuzzle the back of Raph's, and Raph tips his head back to lean into the touch. Leo's only orbiting distantly around his mind right now, barely meshed with him at all. Not close enough to borrow his understanding of words, but no one's talking. Close enough to feel love you—make better—likes this?

Love you—likes this—love you, Leo sends back, snuggling in and twining his tentacles through the even rows of spikes. His room is—first of all, his room is a word that means no one can take him out of this hideaway, it's his his his, and no one else can come into it and hide in it unless Leo says they're allowed to, and if Leo doesn't say they're allowed to then they have to stay out.

Sorry, Raph had thought to him, careful and clear, full of something deep and sad over the fresh memory of coming into Leo's room and making him scared. Even though it wasn't his room yet, just a hideaway. He called that sad feeling guilt when Leo asked.

His room looks different now. It's the same size and shape, but it has more things in it. Curtains. Little colorful things called toys that fit in his hands and move under his fingers and squish or click or spin. Big soft things called pillows that he can pile together with his blankets and burrow into even better than before.

It's okay for Leo to touch soft things now. It turns out Donnie's not scary. He had sat down outside the glass and explained through Raph about these things called claw caps that keep the points from catching. Leo had let him put one on, tested how fast he could chew it off, and then agreed to all of them. So now he doesn't destroy soft things anymore. And his claws look blue.

Raph steps back from the wall and the curtain, and everything stays up and in place. Leo chitters happily and squeezes his limbs around him a little tighter. "Good!"

"Thanks!" Raph says, reaching up with one hand to rub Leo's head. "You like it?"

"Yeah!" Leo climbs up to Raph's shoulders so he can lean over him and tug at the curtains, open, closed, open, closed. Raph's mind is warm and pleased, and he makes room for Leo when Leo wriggles closer. "Liigk it!"

The bad part of listening to words through Raph's brain is that he can hear all the ways his own sounds are wrong. The good part of listening to words through Raph's brain is everything else! Raph says, "Donnie made these heavy-duty enough that you won't pull them down if you climb on them," and Leo understands all of it! He snickers at Raph's memory of pulling down a curtain rod and getting tangled up in everything. "If you want 'em down, there's release buttons on the ends, okay?"

Leo saw the buttons earlier! They're purple. "Ogay!" He makes a face and sticks his tongue out. "Ogay. Ohk… Oh-khay. Kh. Khuh."

Raph pats Leo's leg, gentle and concerned and helpful. He doesn't say anything, but he thinks, borrow how it feels? and before Leo can even answer he's shoving the sensation of how the sounds fit together in his own throat at him.

Leo yanks all the way out of Raph's head and scrambles off of him up into the curtains. "Go."

"Leo?" Raph says, in his worried voice. Usually Leo likes his worried voice.

"Go!"

"Okay, okay!" Leo buries his face in his curtains and listens as Raph walks away, and as the door opens and the door closes, and as the outer door opens and the outer door closes. He stays up there, wrapping dark blue around himself, until his hands and feet start to hurt from the way he's gripping bunches of the fabric, and then he adjusts so he's hanging onto the curtain rod instead.

He knows Raph knows how to make the right noises. Everybody knows Raph knows how to make the right noises. Everybody knows everybody but Leo knows how to make the right noises. He's not dumb. He knows he could ask him to teach him. Raph would be nice. It would probably be way easier.

And then Leo would have another part of his brain be in the shape someone who knows better than him put it in.

…Maybe that would be better.

He drops to the floor and tugs all of his curtains flat and closed, so no outside light can get in. Donnie made colorful lights he can turn on and off himself, and Mikey's given him toys that light up. Leo avoids all of them and crawls into his nest, curling up between heavy layers of soft things.

It's not a good hideaway if everyone knows where it is, but. This is all Leo has right now. They don't want him leaving it and looking for a new one on his own.

Maybe that's better too.

Chapter Text

"Sweet," Mikey says, holding up a small red shape with light dots on it.

"Seet."

"Close! Sweet." He puts it on the little plate and starts up the food door. "Suh-weet."

"Su-eet."

"Yeah! Good!" The inner door opens, and Leo carefully picks up the red food. It's big on one end, with a white core exposed by what look like cuts, and narrow on the other. The dots are pressed into little indents. It smells alive. "It's sweet. It tastes sweet. How does it taste?"

Leo puts the whole thing in his mouth. It's soft, but not mushy, and it bursts passively between his teeth. He chews slowly, like Mikey showed him, and pushes it around his mouth with his tongue. The little dots are harder, but not enough that he can't crunch them. It tastes like… the kind of food that gives him energy fast, but not for very long?

"It's su-eet," Leo agrees.

"Do you like it?"

"Yeah!" Leo says, because it's food.

Mikey looks through the other things he has on his big plate. "Ok, next… salty!" He holds up something brown and twisted.

"Saau-ty!" Leo says, which definitely isn't right.

While Mikey helps him through the lt sound, something creaks in the distance. A thin metal structure, Leo's pretty sure even though he's never actually seen it, and it doesn't always mean something, but sometimes…

"Hey, y'all!" April yells.

"Abril!" Leo yells back, shoving his face to the glass so he can watch the door for her.

He doesn't have to wait long. She bounces in and throws her arms wide, as excited as he is. "Leo!"

"Hi, April!" Mikey says, lifting the big plate out of the way as she sits down with them. "I'm blahing Leo about flavors," he adds. Flavors is a new word. Leo still doesn't really get it, but it's fun!

"Cool!" April says. "My new blah blah blah blah—"

Leo gets comfortable and lets her voice wash over him. Mikey says things every now and then too. He can pick out words he knows sometimes, but it's hard to make sense of them when they're surrounded by so many words he doesn't understand. Mikey's forgotten to give him the next piece of food, but that's okay. He always remembers eventually.

"—So! Leo!" April says, turning to Leo with a grin.

"So Abril!" Leo agrees, leaning forward.

April reaches into her bag. "I got you a toy!"

Leo taps his hands on the glass and leans in. The thing April pulls out of her bag is soft-looking, like a blanket, and has shiny half-spheres on one of its parts like what Raph says are supposed to look like eyes. It's green and blue.

April holds it up under her chin. "It's a turtle!"

"Turr-tul," Leo repeats as April puts it into the little door.

"Yeah, you got it!"

He ducks his head shyly. The door opens, and he gently loops a tentacle around the turtle to inspect it. Its limbs, head, and tail are all light green. Its underside is light blue, and its domed back is dark blue.

He turns it over, squinting thoughtfully at it. He looks at Mikey. He looks back at the toy. It has a round, smooth head, missing a bright crest, and its limbs end in simple rounded shapes like tentacles instead of branching into fingers and toes, but… he points at Mikey. "Turr-tul."

Mikey lights up like the first time Leo tried to say his name. "Yeah! You know it, baby!"

"Ravf, Donnie, Migey," Leo lists off, just to be sure. "Turrtul!"

"Don't blah you," April says playfully, pointing at Leo. "I got you that blah 'cause he blahs me of you!"

Leo?

Leo looks down at it again. It only has two, symmetrical eyes, and they're dark, with round pupils. Each of its limbs is self-contained, ending as one limb each instead of splitting halfway down into hand-and-tentacle the way his forelimbs do. It has a black line for a mouth, no sharp teeth poking out from it. It's blue, which is strange, because Leo only likes blue, doesn't look blue. Except for his claw caps, but it doesn't have claws. And there's no pink on it at all.

The Leo in Raph's memories has a blue crest.

The Leo in Raph's memories doesn't have any pink anywhere at all.

April and Mikey are still looking at him.

Leo curls his tentacles around its middle and holds it up for them like April did. "Toy Leo!"

Mikey puts his hands on his cheeks. "Is that his name?"

It doesn't need a name, but they both look happy, so he says, "Yeah!"

"That's so cute! I love him!"

It's just a toy. They love Leo, and Leo's not a toy. "Yeah!" he says, because they like it when he likes things, and then—"Saal-ty?"

"Oh right!" Mikey says, grabbing the twisty brown food again. "Here, salty!"

The salty food is brittle and dry, and it gives Leo an excuse to leave the toy turtle on the floor.

Chapter Text

Leo's whole body feels buzzy and he doesn't know why.

This is the third time today he's rearranged his toys. This time, he's stacking them all in a big pile. The toy turtle is on the very bottom, so it's trapped and crushed and he doesn't have to look at it. He's finally gotten to the part where he balances the last of the round toys on the very top so it doesn't fall off and roll away. The first few times Leo piled his toys up like this, it was tricky, but now the only thing that makes it hard is that his limbs get shaky sometimes.

He finishes and doesn't feel anything from finishing it. He stares at the pile, fingers tapping on the floor and tentacles rubbing against themselves, then pulls a toy from the base and watches everything fall over.

He has a few puzzles that they hide little bits of food inside. Donnie trades them out for new ones all the time, but in-between trades they're no fun to do, because once Leo's solved one he remembers how to do it. He solves them all again now anyway, just to check whether there's anything left in any of them. One has a few crumbs he missed last time, including a grain of salt that feels like a colorful flash on his tongue for a few moments before it dissolves.

He pulls all his curtains shut, so he's not out in the open. Then he pulls them all open again, so he doesn't miss it if anybody comes in. He doesn't really know where they go when they leave. Maybe their own hideaways and rooms. Maybe the brighter place they say exists outside here. Leo asked once, if he could go to the brighter place and see it with his own eyes, and they all…

They all pretended they weren't upset Leo had asked. So Leo pretended they weren't upset Leo had asked, too. He hasn't asked again.

He's never had one hideout for this long. He believes them when they say Destroyer is gone—Leo would have heard him screaming by now, if he wasn't. But it's still starting to feel… weird.

Mikey says there's no way they're ever going to run out of food here. Leo's pretty sure that means whatever they're taking their food from, it grows back, like Leo does. He doesn't remember if Destroyer ever ate pieces of him, or even if he ate pieces of himself, once Destroyer pulled them off of him. It would have made sense, though.

He turns over his entire nest of blankets. He shakes them out, one by one, then tucks them back into their corner. He layers them carefully, in order. The thickest one goes on bottom, then the softest, then the prettiest, which is bright blue like flashes of light in Raph's memories. After that it doesn't really matter what order he puts them in, as long as the darkest, grayest one goes on top, covering the whole thing so it's hard to see from far away.

Leo climbs in between the softest and the prettiest, like always, and goes to sleep.

…He goes to sleep.

He goes to sleep!

He wiggles out from between the blankets and groans, loud and crackly, until he runs out of breath and has to take another one. Then he flops face-first on top of his blankets and groans again.

It's supposed to be easy to hold still and do nothing! His mind is supposed to go quiet and empty and alert, at least! But nooo, now he feels like there are itty-bitty little things skittering around in his veins and his brain, and he can't even make them hold still long enough to fall asleep!

He paces up and down the long side of his room. It's not long enough to run from one end of to the other. He's never missed running before, because it's always been away from Destroyer, but now he wants to do it. He wants to push himself from rock to rock and corpse to corpse as fast as he can. He wants the world to fly past him until he feels dizzy. He wants to land hard enough that his bones ache and the ground under him shifts in the floating darkness. He wants, he wants…

He wants out.

He drops to the floor, eyes going wide. He… he doesn't need to leave. He doesn't need to scavenge, or look for new places to hide, or figure out paths to take next time he has to run. He has food here, and water, and soft things to lie on, and interesting things to hold and look at, and… and he thinks about all of that and none of it makes the wanting stop.

Leo bites one of his fingers, hard enough that it hurts, and stares at the big door.

…The big door works the same as the little door, right?

He picks up a toy, sits down in front of the little door, and starts trying to convince it he has a food plate to give back.

Chapter Text

"Tshhhhhhhuh," Leo says. Not because he's still sounding the word out. It just feels good in his mouth. "Tshekka. Tshekka."

"The echolalia continues to be a heartening sign," Donnie says without looking up from the bag he's digging through.

"Ekko. Ekko." He hits the kuh sound like a click, holding his tongue in place longer than he's supposed to and feeling the pressure of the air in his throat against it. It's fun.

"Yes, echo echo to you too." At first Leo thought Donnie didn't have a play-voice, but it turns out he does, it just took a while for him to start using it in front of Leo. Now Leo wants him to use it more often.

"You just need a few readings, right?" Raph asks. His voice is nervous. His mind is probably nervous too, but Leo can't tell, because Leo pretended his brain was tired and sore from all the thinking he's been doing so Raph would float on the edge of it, instead of climbing inside or pulling Leo inside his.

The distance is weird. And nice.

"Is Leo asking, or are you?" Donnie asks, tone not mean but definitely shaped like a sharp thing.

"Donnie…"

"We are practicing agency today, my dear big smother."

Leo wrinkles his nose, mouthing the sounds to compare them, then corrects, "Burr-other."

Donnie's mouth twitches up at one side. "Oh, of course, I misspoke. Thank you, Leo."

"La-ffing," Leo accuses, feeling a little bit prickly but mostly happy that Donnie's smiling.

"I would never," Donnie says, silently laughing at him.

Leo slowly swings an arm in Donnie's direction, leaving plenty of space between them so he doesn't actually play-hit him. Donnie leans back in a play-dodge that makes something warm bubble in Leo's chest. He still doesn't really get why they do this with each other, but it's not as scary as it looks.

Donnie's smile gets softer. "That being said, Leo, do you have any questions before we begin?"

What they're going to start is called a check-up. Leo's body is weak, because he was hungry and hurt for so long, and Donnie wants to help him get stronger. To help him, he has to know how weak he is, and what's damaged, and how fast Leo is healing. He's going to find that out by doing a bunch of things that Raph didn't understand all of when he translated them through his brain into Leo's, but Raph trusts Donnie, and he's shown Leo memories of why when he's asked.

Leo shakes his head. "No."

Raph makes a worried hm noise, but Donnie ignores it and he doesn't actually say anything, so Leo ignores it too.

Donnie puts one hand on his weapon. A glowing purple box builds itself on the floor next to them. "This is called a scale." He says the new word separately from everything else, not running it together with the words before, so it's easier for Leo to pick out all its sounds. "Stand on it, please."

Leo hops up from his crouch and stands on it, legs straightened out and shoulders right above his hips, the way the others do. He looks down at Donnie on the floor to make sure he's not doing it wrong, but Donnie's not looking at him, just at a little rectangle on the side of the scale. His shoulders are hunched.

"Alright, thank you, you can step off now," Donnie says, still not looking at him. Leo slinks off the scale and back into a crouch, peering at the rectangle of light Donnie's—typing, Raph reminds when Leo pokes him—on.

"Bad?" Leo asks, wrapping his tentacles around each other.

"You're doing well," Donnie tells him. Leo bounces, grinning.

Donnie tells him to move this, or stand like that, or hold still so he can measure this or shine light at that. He nods, or says good work or thank you, every time, except when Raph says it for him instead.

"Okay, we're almost done," Donnie says eventually. "Now I'm just going to need a blood sample."

Raph makes another worried noise.

Leo looks between the two of them. "Bad?"

"Not at all," Donnie says. "It's just going to be a tiny bit uncomfortable, and then you can have breakfast. Sound alright?"

"Aw-rait," Leo agrees.

"Now, put your arm here," Donnie says. And, "Hold Raph's hand, alright?" And, "Relax your muscles." And, "You're going to feel a little pinch."

And then he shoves something thin and sharp inside of Leo.

Leo doesn't try to yank his arm away or rip it out or run. That never works. He holds still, and doesn't struggle as it slides deeper, and without really meaning to opens his mouth wider to make breathing easier even though he hates when things go in through his mouth and Destroyer always likes to pick the parts that are squirming—

"Leo?" Raph asks. Leo doesn't know what he's supposed to do, so he doesn't do anything.

His head feels weird. It—it shouldn't, his head shouldn't feel weird, there's nothing in his head, there's nothing near his head, there's not—he can't use his other hand to check for new holes because Raph is holding it and Leo is holding Raph's hand because Donnie told him to and he's being good and he wants to eat breakfast because he's hungry and—and his head is getting heavier, and it's getting darker, and there's something sharp in his body under his skin that Donnie put there Donnie put it there Donnie's holding it there Donnie wants it there—

"Done," Donnie says, and how loud his voice is doesn't make Leo flinch because Leo's not flinching. Raph repeats it at the edge of Leo's head, done, it's over, we're done.

Something sticky touches Leo's arm. When he looks, Donnie's smoothing it down, a colorful little flat thing over the spot where the sharp thing went into his body.

"I did not mean," Donnie says, slowly, frowning, mad, "to frighten you."

"Sss… ssoo… sor…"

"You have nothing to apologize for," Donnie says. He doesn't look up as he starts putting things back in his bag, so Leo hides his face against Raph's arm. "Here, this—ah. Raph, could you…"

Raph's body turns a little as he reaches out and grabs something. "I got you."

"Right. Thank you, Leo."

Leo opens a smaller eye to watch the big doors open and close as Donnie leaves.

"You were really brave," Raph says.

Leo doesn't feel brave.

"I've got your breakfast," Raph says. "Do you want me to stay while you eat, or should I go?"

Leo doesn't know how to answer.

Chapter Text

The outer door rumbles open, and Leo—

Leo hesitates.

He shoves his back against the inner door. He forgot. Open spaces are the easiest place to get caught. And now he's in one.

It smells. So much. He thought he'd smelled the cavern before, whenever the doors opened and shut and let in little gusts of air, but this is completely different. It smells like dark metal oil and water and the warm scents of each of his brothers, the way Leo's hideaway smells like himself. And sound. There's echoes coming from more than one direction, so much louder out here than they were on his side of the door, weird and unfamiliar.

Some of the sounds… sound like talking? Voices. Ones he doesn't know.

A voice in the distance has always been bad before… but here, voices mean brothers and April and laughing and new words to learn. So…

So Leo follows the sounds of voices through the tunnels.

In the next cavern, he can see lights flickering over the ceiling and walls. There are a whole bunch of caverns connected to this one, but the lights are coming out of the same one the sounds are coming from. He creeps closer, silently, ready to run.

The next cavern is lower than this one. The tunnel into it has a blocky, jagged floor, slanted down, and when Leo stops at the top of it he can look around the inside from above. The far wall has yellow light moving and changing shape across it, too weird and fast to really make sense of. And… in the middle of the room, sitting on something that looks like a weird pile of pillows, there's…

Leo tilts his head as one of the thing's… ears? Twitches.

No, not a thing. He's pretty sure it's a person. Like his brothers and April and him. A small one. Not small like April, small like really small. Leo didn't know words last time he saw it, so he doesn't know what it's called.

The last time he saw it, Donnie was screaming. Leo had thought…

Leo doesn't have to be scared of Donnie. Donnie is nice to Leo. Donnie likes Leo, and Leo likes Donnie. Donnie didn't scream at Leo, even though back then Leo thought he did.

But Leo is sure that Donnie screamed at this one.

Leo should go away now. If Donnie hates this one… Leo shouldn't risk it. Everything's good right now. He can go somewhere else, somewhere quiet and safe.

Leo creeps down the jagged floor.

He pokes his head up over the side of the weird pillow thing. This one is round and fuzzy. Not like April's head is fuzzy. Not like Leo's blankets are fuzzy, either. Another kind of fuzzy. And it's gray, like metal. Better for hiding. It's staring at the lights and shapes on the wall. It doesn't move. It doesn't look at Leo. It… it is alive, right? Its eyes haven't gone all bad yet…

Its nose twitches.

Leo flinches and hides behind the weird pillow thing.

If they really hated it, they would have gotten rid of it like they got rid of Destroyer and the dark place, right? So it's probably fine, right? They say they won't hurt Leo, so they wouldn't keep something around if it would hurt Leo, right?

Right?

"Blue?" this one says. Leo blinks. "Blue, is that you?"

Leo makes a face. Blue isn't a you, blue is a color. And anyway, there's nothing else here.

"Leoblah?" it says. It pokes its head out over the side of the pillow thing and looks at him. He freezes. "Ah, there you are."

Then it goes… away? It goes back to sitting how it was? It doesn't… grab Leo or anything.

"Come sit with me, my blah," it says. There's a sound like it's patting part of the pillow thing.

Leo…

Leo pokes his eyes up over the side again.

This one is looking at the lights on the wall like before, but this time when he peeks it looks over in the corner of its eye to peek at him back. Leo squeaks and ducks. He's not… scared. He's not scared. He's just…

It laughs, only a little but not mean, and doesn't do anything. "You know, it was always Raphblah who was this blah when you were small…"

Always Raphblah who was this… "Shh. Shaaa. Shaaa-yee? Shaai."

"That is very good, blue," it says, as warm as Mikey. "Yes, you are shy. You are quiet and like to hide. You watch and listen. Very shy."

"Shai," Leo agrees. He raises his head again and rests his chin on the pillow thing, looking up at it for real now. "You?"

It laughs again. "I am not shy, no. I like meeting people!"

That's not what Leo meant. He huffs. "No. You?"

"Hm. I am not sure what you are asking, my blah," it admits. "Can you help me blah it out?"

Leo rolls his eyes, which he learned from April. It's hard to make them all go in the same direction, but she says as long as he does all the ones on his face it means the same thing. He holds both his hands up to point at himself. "Leo," he says. Then he points at this one. "You?"

"Oh!" It smiles sadly. "I see. I am—"

Something close makes a loud noise. Leo yelps and darts to the cavern entrance. This one doesn't run with him, though, so he—hesitates. Looks over his shoulder.

"Purple, you blahed me!" it says.

Donnie's voice comes out of somewhere close. It's loud, but it sounds like he's talking through something long and narrow. "Leo's blah went off. I need you to go check in on him, we can't blah—"

"It is alright, purple, Leo is right here," it says. It leans out and smiles at Leo. "I am talking with him. Leo, would you like to say hello to your brother?"

Leo hops up on the pillow thing, perching on the part taller than this one's head to look around for what's making the noises. "Donnie? Where?"

"Oh thank blah," Donnie says, still sounding like an echo coming back from the other end of a tube. "Blah, you can't just go in there without blah, it's a blah blah blah—"

This one holds up its wrist, which has a thing wrapped around it that looks like the thing Leo used to have wrapped around his wrist, before he came here and they took it and never gave it back. Leo loops a tentacle around its hand and gently lifts and turns it, looking for the opening of the tube. "Donnie here?"

Donnie sighs. "No, Leo, I'm not here, I'm… I'll show you later, okay?"

"Okay?" Leo sniffs at it. It doesn't smell like Donnie…

"Blah, though, blah! He's blah blah and you don't know how to blah him—"

"He is also right here," this one says, putting its other hand on Leo's arm to pet him carefully. It scoots over to make room as Leo flops forward and squishes himself into half of the divot in the pillow thing. "Don't blah, I can blah myself!"

"That is not what I'm blah about—!"

"Oh look, my show is back on!" It taps the wrist thing.

Donnie doesn't say anything else. Leo sniffs at the wrist thing again, just in case.

"He blahs too much," this one says. It starts petting Leo's head. "So, you got tired of being in a blah, did you?"

Leo blinks at it. It blinks back at Leo, still petting.

"Kay-juh?" Leo says.

"Yes, a cage," this one says. "A place someone else makes you stay inside, even if you do not want to be there."

Something in Leo's stomach feels weird. He twists around so his head is in this one's lap. It starts petting him with its other hand too, which feels a little better.

"Kayj," Leo repeats. His face is right in front of this one's belly, which actually seems a lot squishier than Raph's and Donnie's and Mikey's and his. Maybe April's? He's not sure, she's always stayed on the outside of his room.

…Of his cage.

This one's belly is right in front of his mouth. He could bite it open, easy. And it just keeps on petting him.

It's weird. His brothers were around all the time before they started coming close enough for them to touch him. Or for him to touch them. He still doesn't really get why. They'd touched him before, when they brought him out of the dark place. And he'd touched them, and they'd all found out they were stronger than him.

"You?" Leo repeats, not biting this one's belly open. He doesn't know why he's thinking about it. Maybe because they don't know who's stronger? It's weird.

"My name is Splinter," this one says.

"Suh-puh-lin…" Ugh.

This one laughs. It also scratches under Leo's chin, though, so it's okay. "Are those sounds hard for you?"

"Yeah," Leo groans, kicking at the air. He can get it, probably, but ugh!

"You could also call me Dad," this one says, moving its claws a little higher up Leo's jaw. He makes a happy noise.

It could dig its claws into his throat.

It doesn't dig its claws into his throat.

Huh.

"Dad," Leo tries.

"Very good!" Dad says, smiling really big. "Got it right the first try!"

Leo laughs and loops his tentacles around his ankles.

"You also call me Daddy when you want to be cute," it says, tapping the tip of his nose.

Leo doesn't want to be cute. Toy Leo is cute. But the others like Toy Leo, so Dad might too? "Daddy," he repeats.

Dad sort of smiles, but also sort of starts crying. It curls over and for a second Leo thinks it's going to bite him in the face, but all it does is gently put its mouth on the top of Leo's head. Leo squeezes the closest eye shut just in case. "Yes," Dad says, sitting back up. "Just like that, yes."

So Leo's definitely only going to call it Dad.

Chapter Text

Leo gets bored of the lights and sounds eventually, so he gets up. Dad gets up too.

Leo squints at it. It just smiles and says, "I'm bored. What should we do next?"

Huh.

"Go," Leo decides. He hasn't even run yet.

—Oh! He can run!

He does. Right back up the way he came, back to the big cavern. Dad chases after him, laughing, which should be scary, but it already caught Leo and didn't hurt him at all. Then when Leo gets to the big cavern and starts running around the outside of it, it just stands there in the middle and lets him.

Leo runs over and under and around and on everything until he's panting, and then he picks a tall shape to lie down behind. He doesn't need to hide, and it wouldn't be a good hideaway if Destroyer were here, but it's next to the wall and its shadow is big. He likes it.

Dad's soft pat-pat footsteps come closer and closer until it peeks into Leo's hideaway. That's not scary either. "Are you having fun?"

"Yeah!" Leo says, rolling over to lie with his head on his arms. "Having fun!"

"Good! I am very blah."

"Guh- laad," Leo sounds out.

"That's right, glad! It means the same thing as happy, do you know that one?"

"Happy," Leo repeats, kicking his feet. "Yeah!"

"Good, I am glad! And you know what, I am happy too!"

Leo laughs into his arms.

"So, what next?" Dad asks. "Will we sit here for a little while?"

Hmmm. Leo can sit in one place all he wants in his room. His cage? His cage-room. "No," he decides. "Go!"

"Sounds good to me!" Dad steps out of the way, so Leo can leave his hideaway in that direction if he wants.

He does, because leaving his hideaway when someone's there is weird and new. There are… four big tunnels out of this cavern, one for each of the walls, and then a small one up by the ceiling that they could climb to.

"Ah-ah-ah," Dad says, looping its tentacle around one of his. Leo freezes, and his insides pound on his chest. "It is a little scary up there. Your brothers will want to go with you, to keep you safe."

It doesn't pull Leo down, though. It just waits while he thinks.

He climbs back down. "Go?"

Dad points at each of the four big tunnels. "All of these ones are safe."

He hums and looks around. One of the directions is where he found Dad in the first place, and one is where his cage-room is. That means there are two he doesn't know yet.

He picks one and points. "Go?"

Dad smiles and nods. "Let's go!"

They go, down the same kind of blocky, jagged slant as all the tunnels here have. There are things shaped like Leo's room in the cavern below, except instead of glass walls they have metal ones, and there are holes in the sides instead of doors on the ends. One of them is lit with pretty green light, so he goes into it. It has blankets and soft things and toys and other stuff. It smells just like Raph.

"This is Raph's room," Dad says.

Leo scrambles out as fast as he can. "Sorry! Sorry sorry sorry—"

Dad puts its hands on Leo's head and gently rubs them back and forth, making soothing noises. Leo hides his face against its belly. "What are you sorry for, blue?"

"Raph's room," Leo whimpers. "Not say come in."

"Oh, I see," Dad says, still petting him even though he did something bad. "Raph will not be mad. But it's good you blah."

"Rememem," Leo mumbles.

"Remembered," Dad repeats. "When you think of something you already knew, you remember it. You remembered we do not go into other people's rooms without asking. Raph will be glad you remembered it."

"Rmm."

Dad laughs again, quietly. "Are you tired, little turtle? Do you want to be done for now?"

Leo shakes his head.

"Alright." It keeps petting until Leo's done hiding.

The open parts of Raph's room aren't covered, so it's okay for Leo to look in from the outside. It looks cozy, like it would be really nice to lie down in. Maybe brother-rooms are always good like this, and that's why they like being in Leo's?

Leo nods to himself and looks at the other side of the cavern. That's probably a room too, since it looks just like the outside of Raph's room except for a few more lines around the door. Leo points at it seriously. "Rember."

"I remember," Dad agrees, following along behind him.

This one's dark. It doesn't smell like anybody, really. There's little bits of Raph, Donnie, and April, and more of Mikey and Dad, but mostly it just smells like dust.

"Room?" Leo asks anyway, peering inside.

"Yes," Dad says, sounding sad for some reason. "This is your old-room, from before."

Leo sits down.

"Mine?" he asks, to make sure he got it right. "Leo? Leo-room?"

"Yes," Dad says, resting a hand on his shell. "It is still yours, if you want it to be."

It's dark and it smells like nobody stays there. "Not remmber."

"I know," Dad says. "That's okay."

"Okay."

Leo goes in.

There are toys here too. Not very interesting ones, when Leo picks them up. They don't click and do things like the ones Donnie gives him, and they're not soft like the ones Raph, Mikey, and April like.

There's a big flat thing that's only kind of soft, but it's raised up on blocks so Leo can stick his head under it. The rest of him doesn't fit, and there's stuff under here anyway. He grumbles and backs out again.

"Not a good hiding place, hm?" Dad asks from just outside the room. Oh, right.

"Not," Leo agrees. "Come in."

Dad comes in. "Here, would you like some light?"

"Yeah."

It hops up on some things and reaches into a hollow shape hanging from the ceiling. There's a clicky noise, and suddenly the hollow thing is glowing blue. It does that a few more times around the room, adding more light every time.

Leo sits there and stares at the blue for a while. It makes the old-room much better.

There's so much more stuff here than in his cage-room. It's stuck to walls and stacked on things and hidden, sometimes under things and sometimes in things like food in puzzles. It's mostly toys, or weird things he doesn't know, but lying on a raised platform in the far end of the room are two long, flat metal claws.

"Those are your blah," Dad says, sounding really, really sad.

"Sssor-duhs," Leo repeats. They're sharp like they cut things. "Hurts."

Dad looks up at him. "Does something hurt? Can you show me where?"

"Mm." Leo doesn't like talking right now. He reaches out and runs a claw along one of the sharp edges. It leaves a slice in the claw cap.

"Ah, that kind of hurt," Dad says. "I thought it might be."

They each have a sharp edge and a dull edge, and then blue parts on one end that aren't sharp at all. They don't do anything when he taps at them with his clawtips, except wobble a little. He doesn't want to do more than tap them with his clawtips.

"You used these to keep yourself safe," Dad says. "And you used them to keep us safe. You were very brave."

They feel weird. They feel important.

"You used them to go wherever you wanted," Dad says, quieter. "Maybe someday you will be able to again."

Wherever he wanted? "Not remember. Not in dark."

"No," Dad says, and it might be crying. He doesn't look. "They were out here, with us. You lost them when you went into that awful place."

He went?

"Dad!" Donnie's yell echoes.

Dad puts itself in front of the door. Then it yelps when Leo puts himself in front of Dad.

Donnie's coming down the tunnel, yelling something fast and angry that ends in "—you let him out!"

"Oh, hello, purple," Dad says, and it doesn't sound scared at all.

"Do not—" Donnie stops, eyes wide, when he sees Leo. Leo doesn't cower.

…But he does shake a little.

"Leo," Donnie says instead of yells. "You weren't in your room. I was scared."

"My room," Leo says, gripping the edges of the open door.

Donnie takes a long breath. That shakes a little. "So it is. Will you please come back to your other-room now? I need to talk to Dad."

"Not hurt," Leo says, as bravely as he can. Donnie jerks back.

"Of… of course," he says, putting his arms around himself. "I wouldn't hurt him."

"He would not," Dad agrees, patting Leo's leg. "We all keep each other safe. That is what family does."

Leo looks at Dad and at Donnie. Dad's smiling, but he looks sad. Donnie's sad too, and… maybe scared.

"Okay," Leo says. "Go?"

They all go back to his other-room.