Brotherly Bonds

Never Alone

Just a little Leo and Raph bonding set in Season 2 after Race with the Demon, but before Vision Quest while they're still at the farmhouse. I had a lot of fun writing this.

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"How you doin', buddy?"

Raph's eyes slowly moved up to give Leo a look and the eldest turtle's wan smile quickly melted.

"Bad time?"

"Nah, just not exactly the type of thing I hear from you."

"What would you have me say?"

He thought for a few moments then looked back up at his older brother, who was waiting expectantly. "It's time for training."

"But it isn't time for training."

Raphael shrugged. "That's not my fault."

Leonardo frowned and limped closer to the couch so that he could lean against it. "No, it's mine. Guess I've been so concerned with training, before and after all of this," Leo nodded pointedly down at his injured leg, "that I allowed it to pull me away from the four of you."

"Three."

"Four." Leo reaffirmed, staring straight ahead. "I refuse to believe that Splinter is gone."

There were a few more moments of silence after that. Leo took that silence as an opportunity to examine his younger brother in greater detail.

Raph felt Leo's eyes on him and looked up, glaring defensively. "What are you looking at?"

"How are you healing?"

Raph's eye-ridges flew up to the top of his face and a grim smile flashed across his face. To Leo it was a smile of forced good humor. He used to be able to read Raphael in a way that his younger brothers could not, but sometime over the past year, he'd fallen out of touch. Raph had changed a lot and Leo felt as though he'd been a little bit out of the loop. All of them were when it came to Raphael. Since Splinter had granted them the gift of venturing to the topside, Raph had taken advantage of it more than any of them ever had. Leo sensed that it was Raph's experiences up in the human world that had catalyzed the change in his younger brother.

"Isn't that my line?" Raph asked, the grim, saddened smile still curved upon his lips.

Leo frowned. "I wasn't the one who lost all my mutagen to some deranged plant mutant."

"Don got me back to normal, I'm fine."

"I can see that you're fine, physically. But that wasn't exactly what I was asking."

Their eyes met. Raph tore his gaze away, knowing that his older brother, despite their recent changes, would have no difficulty in seeing straight through him.

"I'm fine. Any trouble I might have had getting over that whole 'plant' thing is done."

The sound of a screen door slamming made them both look up in time to see Donnie and Casey on their way to the kitchen. "Dude, Donnie! Those new turbochargers you've been working on are totally awesome!"

"Yeah, they are. And they are going to make that old van wicked fast! Next I'm gonna start working on the weapons systems."

Raph could hear the happiness and enthusiasm in Casey's voice being echoed in Donnie's own. He drew his head in a little closer to his shell and exhaled slowly. His eyes followed the two of them to the door as they headed back out to the old barn and as soon as they were gone, he sighed and rolled onto his carapace to stare at the ceiling.