Chapter Text
The lair was silent.
Not peaceful. Not calm. Just… quiet .
Too quiet.
Thunk.
Thunk.
Thunk.
Each punch drove into the heavy bag like a heartbeat. The chain overhead rattled. Raph’s breath came out ragged and sharp, not from exertion, but from a feeling, something he couldn’t really name.
It had been two months since the invasion.
Two months since the Krang. Since the world turned inside out and Leo got left behind.
Granted, they all came back. Eventually. But something about Leo never really did .
Raph growled and drove his knuckles into the bag again. Sweat trickled down his brow. His fists ached. That was good. It helped.
The family had been recovering in their own ways. April was back in school. Mikey spent most of his time honing his mystic abilities, working with Draxum. Donnie threw himself into his lab, inventing things he didn’t talk about. Raph tried to keep it all together. Tried to lead, even if no one called it that anymore.
Leo?
Leo was the problem nobody knew how to fix.
At first, everything was normal, but something was off. Unsettling. It took some time for anyone to realize that it was the silence. Leo used to be so loud, so bright. The kind of loud that filled a room, whether you wanted it or not. Now, he was... quiet. Like he was trying to be as insignificant as possible. As time went on, it changed. When he was loud, it was the wrong kind. Mean. Sharp. Like he was trying to bite them all away.
He’d throw out cruel jabs disguised as jokes. He’d try to pick fights with Donnie. With Mikey. With Raph.
But none of them took the bait.
They knew .
They tiptoed around the Krang stuff, especially with Leo. Mikey tried once, Raph remembered the look Leo gave him. Cold. Empty.
Draxum and Donnie had run diagnostics, bloodwork, brain scans, mystic reads, anything . What they found scared them all: Leo had spent longer in the Prison Dimension than they’d thought. A lot longer.
Time worked differently in that place. They didn’t know what he went through. And Leo wasn’t telling.
Raph’s fist missed the bag and hit the post with a crack. He hissed, clutching his knuckles. The pain flared hot, but not enough to quiet the crawling dread in his stomach.
Something was wrong. He knew it.
He left the gym and made a beeline for Leo’s room.
The door was shut. Too quiet on the other side.
“Leo?” he called, knocking. “You in there?”
Nothing.
He tried again, harder this time. “C’mon, bro. It’s me.”
Still nothing.
A cold pit settled in his gut. “Okay. I’m comin’ in, alright?”
The door creaked open.
Raph’s breath caught in his throat.
The room was... empty .
Not tidy. Not cleaned. Empty.
No posters. No figurines. No clothes. No mess.
No Leo.
Just a phone. And a note. Folded once, sitting dead center on the pillow.
Raph moved on instinct, his heartbeat spiking. He snatched the paper up with shaking hands. Just a few words in, and his chest seized.
No.
He didn’t read the rest.
Didn’t need to.
“DONNIE!! MIKEY!!” he bellowed, stumbling out into the hallway. “HE’S GONE!”
Doors burst open.
He slammed the note into Donnie’s hands. Mikey gasped, grabbing it over Donnie’s shoulder. His fingers clutched the edges like it might vanish.
Donnie’s face was blank. Too blank. “He left his phone,” he muttered. “But, wait. The tracker—”
“Don’t tell me he disabled it,” Raph snapped, already pacing.
“No,” Donnie murmured, already working on his wrist screen. “I still have a signal.”
He paused.
“Big Mama’s Hotel.”
“What?” Mikey asked.
“That’s where his tracker is pinging.”
“Why the hell would he go there ?” Raph demanded, already grabbing his weapons.
“Does it matter?” Donnie hissed, eyes suddenly blazing. “He left a suicide note , Raph!”
Raph’s heart pounded in his ears. “Then we find him. Now. ”
They stormed into Big Mama’s hotel like a hurricane, shoving past workers and guests alike to get to the elevator. The opulence of the lobby, the glittering chandeliers and velvet carpet, always made Raph’s skin crawl.
When a worker led them up to her office, Big Mama sat perched on her golden throne in her yokai form, sipping some kind of sparkling drink through a fancy straw, clearly entertained by their dramatic entrance.
“Well well well! If it isn’t my favorite shell-backed troublemakers. Come to cash in another favor? Make a deal, perhaps?”
Raph distantly realized that they actually needed to ask her for help again, but he couldn’t bring himself to speak.
“Or perhaps you’ve finally come to beg forgiveness for destroying half my ballroom. Again.”
Mikey opened his mouth, but Donnie stepped forward sharply.
“We’re looking for Leo.”
“Blue?” Big Mama blinked, lashes fluttering. “Oh, I would’ve remembered if he came in. Always such a firecracker. Hasn’t been by in ages , dearie.”
Donnie’s voice snapped like a whip: “Cut the act. He’s here. His biosignal is pinging from this hotel, and we don’t have time for your dramatics.”
The fan froze mid-flutter. All the humor dropped from her voice.
“You’re serious.”
“Deadly,” Donnie said. “We think he’s trying to… do something drastic.”
A rare silence followed. Big Mama’s many eyes narrowed.
“I see.”
Raph’s fists clenched at his sides. “So. Where is he?”
“If he were inside, I’d know. I have eyes everywhere. My security wouldn’t miss him.”
“You sure about that?” Mikey whispered, voice tight.
Big Mama’s gaze shifted toward the towering arched windows that looked out onto the city. The sky outside was slate gray, sunset just starting to fall.
“…check the roof,” she murmured.
Raph didn’t wait.
He turned, storming toward the stairs, but something outside caught his eye. A flicker of movement in the corner of the window.
He froze.
It felt like time slowed.
A figure fell past the glass.
Blue bandana.
“ LEO—! ”
Raph didn’t think. He launched himself at the window, shattering the glass in a single shoulder-tackle.
Wind screamed past his ears as he dove after the falling shape. Leo was limp, arms spread like a marionette with cut strings, spinning slowly in the air.
Raph tucked into a dive and activated his ninpo, arms outstretched, everything burning.
“ I got you, ” he gritted through his teeth. “ I got you—! ”
He caught him midair.
The force knocked the breath out of him, but he didn’t care. He wrapped his arms around Leo’s torso, shielding him with his shell as they plummeted.
The world slammed sideways as they hit the ground. Pain erupted in Raph’s side, but Leo was still in his arms.
Still.
Too still.
“Leo?” Raph croaked, already shaking him. “ Leo! ”
No response. No groan. No movement.
Donnie and Mikey dropped down seconds later. Donnie skidded to his knees, already scanning. His breath caught.
“His pulse is fading. And he’s cold, too cold. He must’ve taken something.”
Raph pressed a hand to Leo’s chest. “Don’t you do this to me,” he whispered. “You don’t get to do this. Not after everything.”
Leo didn’t stir.
Mikey choked on a sob.
Donnie’s hands moved faster.
Time was running out.
And Raph couldn’t stop shaking.