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The nightmares didn't start right away.
For a few weeks, Leo was stuck in the med bay (aka Donnie's lab). After the Krang fight left him with several broken bones, a cracked shell, a concussion, and several other injuries, Donatello hadn't given him the okay to leave until he was sure he was thoroughly healed.
Which worked out perfectly, because he was exhausted.
The striped turtle slept for a good chunk of those few weeks, but made sure to eat and drink when told. And if he made the most of it? Well, he can't quite be faulted for that.
After all, he almost died!
… He almost died! Isn't that crazy?
He was almost stuck in a prison world forever with an evil alien whose only desire was to make him suffer. He would've literally been beaten to death.
(He sometimes wonders if it would've been quick. Or would Krang have drawn it out? Not that it matters of course, but… things to think about.
Things he very much thinks about.)
But still. The nightmares didn't start until he was back in his own bed, without the whir of machines or the pain medication to keep him from thinking too hard. Without his genius brother bustling around, acting annoyed that Leo's cot was taking up too much space in his lab. Without Raph constantly coming in to mom over him, or Mikey having him try his latest recipe, or April showing him a new scoop at her college.
They begin when he's alone, with his thoughts, in his quiet room, in the dark.
(Dark like the prison world. Dark like when his eyes were swollen shut from how many hits he'd taken.)
At first, he doesn't even remember them. He just wakes up in a cold sweat, feeling the faint memory of the dream fade away, leaving a chilling anxiety in its wake. After those ones, he just sits up, always feeling that small strain in his shell that he knows won't go away for a long time, and leans against his wall, getting on his phone.
Every time, he considers heeding Donnie's words.
“After a traumatic experience like this, nightmares and flashbacks at the very least are common. If you experience these, I need you to text me or someone else so we can help you out.”
But he can't. They wouldn't be able to understand, they weren't… they weren't there. They didn't have the internal argument, the realization that this was the only way. They didn't have the world hanging in the balance, with their sacrifice the only thing standing between Earth and the Krang.
They didn't have to look up into those beady eyes, feeling their own eyes swell up by the moment, and know that that could very well be the last thing they ever see.
So he stays quiet. He scrolls through his phone for the rest of the morning, and he gets up at his normal time. No one blinks an eye. Probably.
Then he starts to remember them. It's small flashes at first, horrible memories that make him nauseous. He wakes up with a scream caught in his throat one night, and decides to start closing his door after that.
It gradually turns to the nightmares becoming so vivid he needs to grasp at his own self to make sure he's still here, still alive. He hears Krang’s nasty voice, feels each sickening crack of his bones all over again, each blow to the face, the arms, the throat. (Donnie had made a remark that sounded suspiciously like “how are you alive,” but Leo had pretended not to hear.)
And still, he stays in his room, letting himself curl up into a ball and just cry for a bit. He gets up a little later on those days, letting the tears dry and his face to turn back to its natural smooth lime green before leaving the privacy of his room.
The night he sees Raph get stabbed again is the last straw.
Leon wakes up hoarse from his screaming, immediately clapping a hand over his mouth to shut himself up. Tears stream down his face, staining the mask he'd forgotten to take off before passing out, a mistake he rectifies by throwing it across the room. It flutters uselessly to the ground, and for some reason that just makes him sob harder, using the heel of his hand to wipe the tears away as he brings his knees up to his chest.
Raph.
Raph!
“Raph!” Half-conscious, the red-marked turtle stumbles out of bed, throwing open his door and running towards his elder brother’s room. He has to check if he's okay!
Thankfully, the door is already wide open, and he throws himself in. To his surprise, the snapper is already up, sitting on his bed facing the door, chin resting in his open hand.
But he's alive.
Leo throws himself forward, and Raph catches him with a startled cry, wrapping his arms around his smaller brother and sitting up.
“Whoa, whoa, Leo!” he whispers, not eager to wake up his other two siblings. He freezes when he hears Leo's strangled sobs against his shoulder, the slider's arms wrapping as tight around his neck as they can in this state, not choking him but definitely latching on.
“You're alive, you're alive, you're alive—”
“Yeah, yes, I'm alive, Leon,” he tries to placate his brother, but Leo shows no signs of calming.
“Th-The Krang… he—gods, Raph, I'm so—orry—”
It doesn't take Raph long to realize that talking isn't going to get through to his brother right now, if the stuttered breaths and half-formed words are anything to go by. He starts to lightly thrum his fingers on the younger one’s shell, feeling it shake under the force of the slider's cries.
“You're alive,” Leo repeats under his breath, his voice hoarse; Raph pales slightly at the implications of it, but doesn't comment.
“I'm alive,” he confirms instead.
“B-But… the Kra—ang… He—”
“Missed anything important.”
“But if it w-weren't for me being so—so stupid—”
Raph feels Leo's hands clench against his rough scales, flinching slightly as the younger teen’s elbow brushes against the still-sensitive scar tissue where he'd been run through.
The slider tenses, then jumps backwards, stumbling but landing on his feet and putting shaky hands out, tired eyes flitting back and forth. “S-Sorry, sorry—”
“Leo, it's fine.”
The half-dazed turtle wraps his arms around himself, stepping back when Raph stands, trying to wrap him back into his hug. “You need to go back to bed, you're barely lucid.”
“No!”
Raph freezes as Leo looks up with him with some of the most terrified eyes he's ever seen on his brother. “Wh—”
“I can't keep going back!” Leo's nails dig into his elbows as he takes another step backwards. “It was bad enough being there in—in real life, I can't keep seeing it when I sleep, too—”
His shell hits the wall next to Raph's open door, and he slides down it, his knees to his chest as he lets out heart-wrenching sobs. He subconsciously nurses his left side, where his now-healed cracked rib had resided.
Raph swallows. Donnie was definitely right about this one.
Sighing, the snapper approaches his brother again, the slider making no move to get away this time. He scoops his brother up, letting him readjust so that he's still curled up in his arms, then sits back on his bed.
Leo whimpers, digging his face into the spiked turtle's skin again. “Please, just… P-Please. Can I stay?”
A soft, sad smile graces the snapper’s face. He gives a small nod, scooting back to lean his shell against the wall next to his bed. Leo settles in his lap, arms curled around himself still, head leaned on the upper right of the elder’s plastron, safe from grazing those scars again.
“... It was so scary, Raph.” His sobs are starting to subside, likely from just a lack of energy. “It was so dark. And you guys weren't there, and—”
“It's over. I promise, Leo, it's over.”
A sniffle and a nod. Leo takes a deep, shuddering breath, hiding deeper in his brother's neck. “Okay… Alright. Yeah.”
The gentle thrumming of Raph’s fingers on Leo's carapace makes the slider's eyes start to droop. He looks up one last time to see Raph staring back out his door towards the lair, that same distant look in his eyes as when Leo had initially come in.
The slider is asleep before he can think anything more of it.