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Leo’s dreams tasted different that night.

After watching his worst fears paraded before his eyes, he wondered (head heavy on his pillow) if they would follow him into slumber, a never-ending repetition of his recent nightmares. Or would he actually sleep soundly, his brain exhausted from the day’s chaos?

Mmm. No such luck.

It’s cold. And dark.

Where- where am I? Where’s-?

“-Raph?”

“Leo.” His brother steps out of blackness, green eyes shimmering (in what light?), Leo’s name sibilant and mocking on his lips. Leo opens his mouth, caught between relief and confusion, and suddenly Raph is flanked by Mikey and Donnie and April and Casey and- The ensemble becomes a pantheon of all the people he’s met, the relationships he’s formed, all there, all…watching him.

“…What…?”

“Poor Leonardo,” Raph drawls, and Leo’s gaze snaps back to him. “The oldest, the favorite, the leader… It’s lonely, huh? All alone with your duty, your responsibility.”

“Raph-”

“Doesn’t it make you wonder, sometimes, if it’s even worth it? You try so hard to do the right thing, to make your family proud, to protect people the way you've been taught, but… What has it gotten you? Sure, you’re fulfilling your obligation, but it’s just you, isn’t it, up there on your pedestal of leadership. By yourself. All. Alone.”

Something icy brushes Leo’s spine, whispers its chilly breath down the back of his neck. “What are you talking about?” he demands, the words echoing harshly into the darkness.

Raph spreads his arms, and Mikey and Casey step into his embrace, pressed tightly against his sides. Slash looms over Raph’s shoulder and Leatherhead over Mikey’s, their teeth sharp and aglow in the not-light. April has one hand entwined in Casey’s, while the other beckons to Donnie who leans toward her, reaching out with scarlet eyes lost. Timothy’s frozen, mutated form stands at Donnie’s back, motionless stare watchful. Bradford and Xever. Stockman. Kirby O’Neil. The Purple Dragons and the Foot. Karai, sharing an embrace with Shredder and Splinter while she holds a knife to each of their throats, and her amber gaze rests on April from afar.

“I’m talking about you, Leo,” Raph says, and Mikey giggles. Leo can’t breathe. “All of us here, we’re tied to each other. Together. But who do you have, up there where your duty is heavy- will it crush you?- and the air is thin? Just you, Leo. It’s only ever going to be you. We don’t need you, Leo, and where does that leave you?”

“Alone,” Leo whispers without thinking, and Raph laughs, as if Leo has just told the best joke, and then they’re all laughing, and the ground rises beneath his feet, carrying him up and up (“-where your duty is heavy- and the air is thin-”), and he cries out their names but they don’t hear, laughing, laughing as they fall away into blackness, and-

“-RAPH-!”

-He woke up.

In the stillness of his bedroom, his gasping breaths were loud and his pounding heart louder still. His chest heaved. Six fingers clenched and unclenched the sweat-dampened tangle of his blanket. Real. Tangible. He was awake now. A nightmare couldn’t touch him here.

But the fear of it, digging its claws into his mind, was real too. So real.

“Just you, Leo. It’s only ever going to be you.”

“All. Alone.”

“-will it crush you?-”

Tears splashed hot on his fists (clenched again), and he jerked, surprised. He hadn’t even realized they were there to be cried.

And then the door creaked open, and he nearly jumped out of his shell.

“Leo?”

“Poor Leonardo.”
A phantom snickered in his head, and Leo swallowed. “R-Raph?” His brother was silent, a shadow in the doorway; Leo’s heart, only recently calmed, beat fast again. “What are- what are you doing here?” His voice was high-pitched.

“…Did you have a nightmare?” Raph asked finally, slowly. Leo flinched at the word.

“I-It was just a bad dream,” he hedged. “Sorry if I woke you.” A wordless instant, and the lamp by the door clicked on suddenly, Raph’s hand lingering on the switch. Leo blinked in the unexpected light, dim though it was.

“You were screaming my name,” Raph said lowly, and Leo stared at him. Those green eyes fixed back at him (like the dream, but-), he couldn’t move or speak. He was laid bare. “You were crying,” Raph noted, almost absent. Leo’s hands came up to sticky-wet cheeks. He’d forgotten.

“I- you-”

“It’s lonely, huh?”

“I’m sorry,” he murmured, and before he could draw another breath, Raph crossed the room and climbed into Leo’s bed, wrapping Leo in his arms. “Raph-!”

“Whatever you saw today, I know it wasn't cockroaches, or rats, or comic book super-villains,” Raph whispered, breath warm by Leo’s ear. “But I think I can see it sometimes, when we go out on missions, the way you look at me, and Donnie, and Mikey- It reminds me of Splinter, kinda, the face he makes whenever we go topside, and- I’m sorry, Leo. I’m sorry. I’m sorry…”

Leo twined his arms around Raph’s neck after a moment, face buried in Raph’s throat. “Don’t be,” he breathed. “You don’t have to be sorry. I don’t regret it. I don’t.”

Raph’s voice was hoarse as they fell back against Leo’s pillow, as they held each other tightly. “There are other things I’m scared of,” he said. “Other than stupid ‘roaches. Things I’m scared to lose.”

“I know, Raph.”

“But who do you have, up there where you duty is heavy- will it crush you?- and the air is thin? Just you, Leo.”

You’re wrong. It’s not just me. I’m not alone.

It’s just a dream.