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They listened as Splinter’s footsteps got further and further away as he walked away from the lair, leaving the four turtles by themselves. And while Donnie and Mikey shrugged it off and went right back to watching their TV show together like they did before Splinter told them he had to leave to get them some food and basic materials from the world above, Raph remained glowering, his fists clenched by his sides.
Leo sent him a wary look, already bracing himself for what he knew would happen. It was always the same, every single time Splinter had to leave for a little while to get them stuff. Ever since they turned old enough, he picked one of them to look after the others and make sure nothing went wrong. Every single time it was Leo—except for that one time when he was sick and Splinter needed to go get him medicine from above, appointing Donnie as the one in charge—which Raph was less than happy about, too.
“Don’t start,” warned Leo when he saw Raph opening his mouth, preparing to start a whole new spial about how unfair it all was. “Splinter wants me to look after you guys, and there’s nothing you can do to change that. So just suck it up and go punch your bag or something.”
“You’re—you’re so full of it, Leo!” fumed Raph as he followed Leo into the kitchen. “What, you think you’re so much better than us just because Dad thinks you’re more responsible than we are?”
Leo pulled the fridge door open, peeked inside and took out the leftovers they had of Mikey’s new recipe of algae and worms. It was still as terrible as ever, but he was kind of hungry and he knew Splinter would most likely not bring a lot of edible things back with him, so… algae and worms it was. Again.
“Uh… I am more responsible than you,” he threw over his shoulder without looking at Raph. “Last time Splinter left us here by ourselves, you wanted to turn the lair into a wrestling hall, remember? Mikey nearly cracked his head, and Dad was furious.”
“That was ages ago!” exclaimed Raph loudly, his cheeks tainted a little red.
Staring down at the unappetizing meal he was holding, Leo said, “It was last week.”
“That’s not the point!” his brother said, stomping his foot angrily.
From their place in front of the TV, Donnie and Mikey sent the two of them looks, clearly alerted to the argument by the rising voices—or… at least Raph’s rising voice. And while Mikey sometimes sided with Raph and claimed it was unfair that he himself never got the chance to be the one in charge, he didn’t look all that inclined to side with his brother this time around.
“What do you think is gonna happen?” demanded Raph. “Think I’ll blow up the place or something? I mean, it’s not that hard to look after those knuckleheads for a couple of hours! I’ll probably do a much better job than you ever could, Lame-O-Nardo.”
Mikey giggled gleefully. “Nice one, Raphie!”
When Leo threw him a glare, though, he shut up and pressed himself to Donnie’s side as if to hide. It annoyed him that neither Mikey nor Donnie were standing up for him. He knew that they all liked to tease each other and everything, but this name actually hurt. It wasn’t Raph’s first time using it—in fact, his first time came after Leo stumbled upon him trying to perfect it under his breath, clearly wanting to sound really cool—but it only meant that Raph was determined enough to make fun of him to sit down and actually figure out a way to knock Leo down.
When Donnie was upset with Leo, they usually talked it out eventually, even if his brother wasn’t all that great with opening up. When it happened with Mikey, the boy would sulk or pretend Leo didn’t exist until he received an apology from his brother—if he deserved it, because sometimes it was definitely Mikey’s fault.
But there was no appeasing Raph. He had to prove his point every single time, even if he himself knew he was wrong. Leo couldn’t remember a time when his brother didn’t have a hard time apologizing or admitting he was wrong. And if Leo dared press him into a corner, Raph tended to lash out—for example, he would start dropping names left and right; more than usual, that is.
“Look,” said Leo through gritted teeth, “Master Splinter told me to look after you guys, and you standing here, talking to me, isn’t going to change it. So just go sulk somewhere else, all right?”
He pushed past Raph and went to join his brothers in the living room with his less than appealing meal. He didn’t comment on it when Mikey instantly took a chunk of Leo’s food, instead holding the plate a little closer to his brother so he could take more algae and worms easily, without dropping anything on the floor. Donnie scrunched his face and politely stayed away from the abomination.
And then Raph’s footsteps approached them, stomping away from the kitchen and over to the TV until his body blocked the view of the screen. Donnie and Mikey loudly protested, with the younger one trying to push him out of the way so they’d be able to watch the rest of the show. Leo didn’t react, instead just rolling his eyes to himself before looking up at Raph’s angry scowl.
“I’ll take full responsibility, then,” said Raph.
“Mooooooove!” whined Mikey.
Leo slurped a worm while trying to ignore the disgusting taste. “What are you talking about, Raph?”
“Relinquish all responsibility to me for the day until Splinter gets back,” explained his brother as he kicked Mikey away. “Then we’ll see what happens. If I mess up, you have the right to tell Master Splinter it was all my fault and I’ll never bring it up again. If he finds nothing wrong with how things went, though, you’ll have to tell him I took care of everything while he was gone instead of you.”
“Raph!!!!” cried Mikey as he tried to tug on the turtle’s leg, but it didn’t do anything.
“Seriously, Raph?” said Donnie irritably. “Move out of the way. There’s no way Leo’s going to let you do this, so just give up already and let us watch TV in peace—”
“Okay.”
Three sets of eyes landed on him, wide and shocked—even Raph looked like he wasn’t expecting Leo to just accept his deal. Instead of smiling triumphantly, he looked down at Leo with a stunned expression on his face, as if the situation wasn’t computing in his brain. Donnie blinked several times at Leo, clearly speechless. Mikey stopped trying to make Raph budge, instead looking strangely subdued as he stared at Leo along with the others.
“What?”
“Say that again.”
“…Leo?”
Leo ignored their shocked reactions and instead took another bite of the food. It really, really sucked, so he decided he wasn’t hungry enough yet and shoved it into Mikey’s hands so he’d finish it instead. Mikey was the only one who had the stomach for this stuff, anyway. But instead of scarfing it down immediately, Mikey kept on staring at Leo expectantly.
Getting up and walking away, Leo threw over his shoulder, “Good luck, Raph. I’ll be in my room if you need me.”
“W-wait,” spluttered Mikey, “that’s it? You’re just agreeing to this? I thought you didn’t trust Raph to look after the lair while Splinter is gone!”
“Yeah, Leo, what are you doing? Dad wanted you to be in charge, not Raph,” said Donnie.
It took him a moment, but Raph finally spoke up again, sounding like he was forcing himself to sound confident. “No, no, this is great! I’m going to prove to all of you I can handle being responsible. I don’t have to be the oldest one to know how to prevent Mikey from painting graffiti all over the walls.”
“Hey!”
Donnie cleared his throat. “Actually, we don’t know which one of us is the oldest, and Splinter wasn’t there when we hatched, so he doesn’t know either—”
“Doesn’t matter,” Raph cut him off. “This is going to be a piece of cake, guys. That’ll show Leo he’s not the only golden child around here!”
They bickered some more, but Leo silently slipped into his room, sat comfortably on his bed and started reading a comic book he’s been wanting to read for a while now, ever since he stumbled upon it just lying under a manhole cover not too far from their lair. And now that he was finally free of every responsibility that was put on him, he figured he could spend some time just basking in the plot of the story.
A loud, metallic crash from outside made him hesitantly lift his head and turn to the closed door, though. Was this really a good idea? A part of him knew it wasn’t. Splinter would disapprove of his choice on the spot after hearing about his deal with Raph, but he ignored it and instead went back to reading the book. He could use the break, even if later it would get him in trouble…
His first real interruption came in the form of Mikey knocking on the door before snapping it open without waiting for a reply. He was covered in yellow paint from head to toe, though it didn’t seem to bother him all that much. One of his nunchucks was in his hand, dripping color onto the floor and probably leaving a whole trail behind the turtle.
“Don’t touch anything!” shrieked Leo when Mikey went to step into the room.
His brother froze, then grinned sheepishly, trying to look innocent and unassuming. “Say, Leo, would you happen to know how to make paint that glows in the dark without trashing the lair? Or, uh, Splinter finding out…”
Leo stared at him, his eyes trailing over Mikey’s body pointedly. His brother shifted and chuckled uneasily. Nervously messing around with his nunchucks, he started twirling it around thoughtlessly, making paint splatter all around Leo’s wall. He shielded his face the best he could, but still ended up with a spotted body because of it.
“Mikey!”
“Oops!” Mikey stopped and held the weapon behind his back with a bashful smile. “Sorry, bro. Totally my fault. Although, technically I didn’t touch anything.”
Narrowing his eyes at him, Leo shook his comic book that was dotted with yellow paint, as well. He really hoped it won’t ruin it too much because that would be really frustrating, and he didn’t feel like hunting down his little brother for this right now.
“Whoa, hey, is this the new issue?” Mikey said excitedly as he went to step inside again, touching the door frame as he did so.
“MIKEY! Go take a shower and clean all this—”
Leo stopped himself, closed his eyes, took in several deep breaths and tried to calm down the way Master Splinter sometimes did. When he looked over at Mikey again, he found his brother turning on the spot to go and do as he was told—of course, his hand came right back up to touch the door frame on his way out, too.
“Wait,” he called tiredly after him.
Mikey glanced at him over his shoulder, looking much smaller than the ten-year-old that he was as he waited to hear what else Leo had to say.
Plastering a smile on his face, Leo forced his voice to remain calm as he said, “What does Raph have to say about all of this?”
“Uh… to stop, clean everything up and go to my room.”
“Then shouldn’t you listen?”
Mikey shrugged.
Leo pressed his fingers to his eyes tiredly and shook his head. He had no idea how long it would take Splinter to come back to the lair, but he figured Mikey’s mess was most likely driving Raph mad right about now. Actually, he could hear his brother’s grumbly voice shouting something at Donatello, who was yelling right back, although he couldn’t make out their words.
“Are you just trying to annoy Raph?” he asked.
Shuffling his feet, Mikey said, “Of course not.” Then he swung his nunchucks again, spraying more paint all around, while adding, “I want glow-in-the-dark colors and to annoy Raph. I have levels, you see?”
His eye twitched. “Yeah, yeah, clearly.” He opened his comic back up again and waved Mikey off. “Just go back out there and deal with Raph yourself. And listen to him. He’s in charge, remember? If he tells you to do something, you need to do it. You’re not supposed to sabotage him on purpose.”
Instead of leaving, though, Mikey remained standing there, now twisting his fingers around the handle of the nunchucks. It took Leo a moment to realize his brother wasn’t moving, instead letting his gaze dance around the room, always moving back to Leo for a moment before looking away.
“What?” he said.
Mikey scratched his plastron thoughtlessly, somehow getting even more drenched in the yellow color. “I don’t want Raph to tell me what to do,” he said in a small voice.
“I don’t think anyone wants that, Mikey.”
“No, but… I mean, he’s my brother. I don’t want to have to listen to him. We’re supposed to be at the same level,” he explained uneasily.
Tilting his head to the side, Leo stared at him. “Uh… I’m your brother, too, remember? And you usually listen to me when Splinter puts me in charge. It’s not that different. Just a different brother you’re supposed to listen to.”
“But you’re not just—” he started, then clamped his mouth shut. Shaking his head, Mikey went away. “Never mind.”
Leo stared at him until he was out of his sight, feeling mostly confused at the interaction—and plenty annoyed at the sight of the yellow droplets that were covering almost everything in his room. With a groan, he shoved Mikey’s words out of his head and instead went up to go get himself something to help him clean up the mess.
The next time Leo was interrupted was when Raph burst into Leo’s room, disregarding his annoyed and surprised look as he just stormed right in, not even looking at Leo as the boy glared at him from behind his comic book (that now had yellow stains on it, which meant he was going to kill Mikey later).
“—just keep on going even though I told them like a hundred times to put it all away! They never listen! I swear, I thought at least Donnie would be easy to handle, but I think he’s developing some kind of unhealthy obsession with coffee right now just to see the look on my face when I tell him to stop brewing it all the time. He says he likes the smell, but I don’t believe him!”
He paced up and down in front of Leo’s bed, nearly knocking off all of the Space Heroes thing he’s managed to collect over the years from scavenger hunting around the sewers. His arms were waving around wildly as he spoke, one of them gripping the handle of his sai tightly, like he was holding himself back from stabbing something with it by sheer force of will.
“Raph, what the—”
“And Mikey started cleaning all of the banana explosion in there, but now instead of cleaning, he turned this into a game and he just slides around the place on his skateboard with a mop, pretending to be cleaning when instead he’s just getting everything even more messy than it was before! That’s not normal, even for him! He never goes this crazy when Splinter is out! I’m gonna knock some sense into them—”
The rest of his rant was lost on Leo as Raph turned sharply and left his room, his voice drifting away as he marched right back to the other two problems he had to deal with.
Blinking at the open door in bafflement, Leo shook his head and got up to close it, deciding not to think about this too hard. Raph was just upset and needed to vent, and seeing as Leo was the least destructive one around here right now, he came to him. That was all.
He went back to reading, although now he lifted his head and gazed at the door uncertainly from time to time at the loud noises from outside, an uneasy feeling creeping up inside him at the thought of what exactly Raph was dealing with all by himself.
Leo wasn’t even surprised when he heard a set of frantic knocks on his bedroom door a short while later. He groaned and put down his book a moment before the door creaked open, this time revealing Donnie standing there—or… more like bouncing. He was going up and down on his toes, his fingers moving agitatedly as he looked all around the room before zeroing in on Leo, his face breaking into a wide grin.
“I drank too much coffee!” he exclaimed abruptly.
Frowning, Leo set aside his comic book and looked at Donnie carefully. He was never all that great when it came to studying healthcare stuff. Donnie was much better at handling the entire thing since he liked the detail that had to be learnt while studying it all. Leo… not so much, although he tried to listen when Donnie would come to explain some kind of new horrific thing people could suffer from—just in case.
Anyway, with his very limited knowledge, he wasn’t sure what to expect from Donnie or whether or not he was in any actual danger because of the amount of coffee he’d consumed. He hoped Raph managed to stop Donnie before it went too far, but he wasn’t sure if the clear agitation his brother was feeling was a good or bad sign.
“So I’ve heard…” he mumbled.
Donnie didn’t seem to hear him as he walked into the room with a skip in his step, heading straight toward Leo and plucking his comic book up to squint at it the same way Mikey sometimes did with Donnie’s big, fat books. When Leo tried to snatch the comic away, Donnie simply pulled it out of his reach and kept on observing it.
“You’re still reading this stuff? You know how inaccurate the science is? I managed to disprove half the things they claim in this the other day because I wanted to show Mikey that his ‘science knowledge’ doesn’t mean anything, and then Dad caught me before I blew up the garage and he made us stop. But the point is that you shouldn’t read it too often because it’s stupid, and you shouldn’t read stupid books, Leo, when we have some much better material down here. You can read my books if you’d like.”
Leo’s mouth opened but no sound came out. He was used to Donnie rambling quickly about things he was passionate about, but this time felt different. He was talking so fast, Leo’s brain was starting to hurt just from listening to him. And his annoyance spiked when instead of just putting the book away, Donnie clutched it more tightly between his fingers, crinkling the pages as he gasped.
“I have an idea! Let’s see if the science here is any good. I haven’t tested this issue last time. Ooh, this is going to be fun! Come on, Leo, you’re gonna love this!” said Donnie brightly as he turned on his heel and left the room with the comic book still in his hand.
“Donnie, get back here!” called Leo as he bolted out of his bed and followed his brother out of the room. “Give me back my book, you—whoa!”
He waved his arms wildly to try and regain his balance as he slipped on a big puddle of yellow paint. When he looked back up at the lair that was spread before him, his eyes twitched and he clenched his fists. Everything was yellow—even parts of the ceiling. There were marks left all over the place from Mikey’s skateboard’s wheels smearing even more paint everywhere.
The TV was still turned on, thought the screen was covered in the paint as well, so he couldn’t even tell which show was on. He recognized the algae and worms still resting before the device on the floor, now even more inedible with a thick layer of yellow color frosting. And the worst part was that some of the surviving worms—yellow now—were crawling away slowly, leaving trails of paint behind them.
When he turned around for a moment he saw Mikey dancing and singing in the kitchen while working on some food, his earbuds most likely blocking out the sounds around him. He was still mostly yellow, although his hands were clean enough, he supposed. He waved at Leo when he noticed him, beaming brightly like he figured Leo would love the new design of the lair.
“Okay, all I need is some hydraulic acid, sulfuric acid, copper and a little bit of orange juice—” Donnie said as he leafed through the pages of the comic book carelessly, nearly slipping in the wet paint on the floor as he tried to make his way over toward the garage he used to do his experiments in. “Oh, wait, I’m not feeling too well…”
Leo snapped his head toward him just in time to see Donnie drop the comic book onto the damp floor in order to bend over and lean his hands on his thighs, his body shuddering and heaving like he was going to be sick.
“Aw, come on!” whined Leo at the sight of the utterly ruined book. Then he tore his gaze away from it and cautiously made his way over to Donnie. “Hey, you all right?” he asked, a hand landing on Donnie’s shell to try and soothe him somehow.
“I just feel a little nauseous…” muttered Donnie, and then his eyes widened at once and he turned sharply and ran toward the bathroom, somehow managing not to fall flat on his face from the yellow paint.
Leo grimaced at his back, considering going after him to make sure he was all right, but eventually decided against it—mostly because he finally spotted Raph. The turtle was sitting down with his chin resting in his palm as he looked at his feet with a scowl on his face. He was covered in the yellow paint, too, which made it difficult to notice him at first glance.
“Raphael!” he called, carefully treading his way over. “What in the world happened here? Why are you just sitting there?”
Raph grimaced and kept his gaze down. “What do you want, Leo? Just go hole yourself back in your room and then tell Splinter he can never trust me when he comes back, okay? I don’t need to hear you gloat right now on top of everything.”
“I’m not—I wasn’t going to gloat,” he said, sending a look around. “Believe it or not, I don’t want Splinter to get here and kill all of us for this. I mean, I didn’t think things would get this out of hand, but… come on, get up, let’s clean this up before it’s too late.”
“What’s the point? Donnie can’t help us even if we asked—he’s too… weird and sick right now. And Mikey won’t listen to a word I say because he says I’m not perfect, precious Leo, who always tucks him in at night and lets him come to his room at night when he has a nightmare and encourages him to try new recipes—which is, by the way, your worst idea yet, just so you know.”
Sending a look over his shoulder, Leo watched as Mikey danced around the kitchen some more, humming to the tune he was listening to and whipping something up that he was sure would taste absolutely horrendous, yet they would have to hum and pretend to like it so it wouldn’t hurt his feelings.
“And Donnie’s the same,” continued Raph in a much more subdued tone of voice. “I’m pretty sure they both think you’re our mom or something. I mean, we never actually knew our mom, so they probably just clung to the next best thing they got, which is you. They don’t want to listen to me. I’ve tried. It didn’t work. I’m just… I’m done, okay? You take control. You win.”
Leo kicked him in the shin. “You’re an idiot!”
“Ouch! What?”
“I wanted you to succeed, you hothead! I wanted Splinter to pick you to be in charge next time, for a change. I wasn’t setting you up to fail!” He crossed his arms over his chest as he glared down at Raph. “I know Mikey and Donnie think I’ll always be there for them, okay? I will always do my best for you guys ‘cause you’re my brothers, but…” He swallowed, turning his head away from Raph, “sometimes I wish I could just ignore you and have some time alone.”
Raph was silent.
Leo’s eyes burned as he pressed the heels of his hands to them and groaned deeply. “I feel terrible every time I so much as think anything like that, but… you just—you made the offer, and I figured you would be able to handle it, so what’s the harm, right? I thought I’d just get a few hours without being responsible for everyone else, but you all apparently decided to just go insane!”
His brother still didn’t say anything, but even without looking, Leo could feel his eyes trained on him, staring openly.
Breathing shallowly, Leo sat down on the floor, ignoring the feeling of the wet paint sticking to him as he buried his face in his knees. He just wanted to have some time to himself; he wanted to read his comic book in peace, without the need to look after the others to make sure they weren’t trashing the place. Naturally, this blew up in his face by leaving him with both a yellow lair and a ruined comic book.
A small part of him thought about the way Raph had brought up Mikey and Donnie thinking he was like their mom. His heart clenched at the thought. His immediate reaction was to recoil and shove it away, thinking it was insane and stupid. But he also remembered the way Mikey had looked at him earlier, sheepish and almost like a chided kid as he told him that he didn’t want to listen to Raph because they were brothers whereas Leo was supposedly different.
Was that what he meant? Was that the reason Mikey tended to come to him instead of Splinter sometimes when he needed help or someone to soothe and calm him down? Was that why Donnie usually ranted to Leo about his newly acquired knowledge or his harmless experiments? He always thought it was because he was the only one willing to listen—or pretend to listen—but Donnie was anything but stupid, so he must have noticed time and time again how Leo zoned off during his spiraling explanations, yet he still always came back to him.
He let out a disbelieving bark of laughter—or maybe it was a sob, he couldn’t tell for sure. He was nothing like a mom. He wasn’t even sure what moms should be like because… well… he never had one, either. And he never tried to act like one, that’s for sure. Not to mention how he was the wrong gender to be a mom, although he could see how with Splinter for a dad they would immediately pin the second title to the other parental figure they were seeing in their life, even if Leo was definitely not a ‘she’, nor was he a parental figure of any kind.
“Leo?”
He tensed a little and made sure to subtly dry his eyes before looking up to find Mikey peering down at him, his earbuds now gone as he looked at him with a pinched expression, as if suddenly worried something was wrong. Raph’s dumbstruck expression wasn’t helping, either.
“Dude, are you okay?” said Mikey uncertainly.
With a frown, Leo said, “Mikey.”
“Uh… yes?”
“Did Raph tell you to clean?”
His brother shifted his weight a little between his feet, throwing a look over at Raph. “Um… he may have…” he muttered; then, when he noticed Leo’s darkening expression, he quickly said, “Yeah, you know what? I think he did. I’ll just… I’ll go do that…”
He left quickly, slipping on the yellow paint and humming in surprise at the sight of the leftovers of algae and worms on the floor. Leo stared after him for a minute, just to make sure he really was going to clean whatever he could this time around. Then he turned back to Raph and offered him a tired smile.
“Come on. We should help him,” he said and pushed himself back to his legs before he offered Raph his hand. “Unless you want to stay here and sulk until Splinter shows up and punishes all of us, that is.”
Raph grabbed his hand, though he still looked slightly shocked. “You wanted me to succeed?” he said at long last, still sounding incredulous.
“Yes, Raph. Believe it or not, I don’t actually want you to fail all the time,” he said with an eyeroll. “I’m not trying to be against you—you just drive me crazy half the time so I retaliate. I know it’s hard to imagine, but it gets old when you tell me I shouldn’t be left in charge, like, a bazillion times.”
Ignoring that, Raph asked, “You think we can really clean all of this up before Master Splinter comes back?”
Leo sent a look around. “No, I really don’t. Not a chance,” he admitted. “But we’ll have to clean it all later, anyway, so might as well start now.” He paused for a moment, then grinned. “Know what? I’ll help Mikey here. You should go to the bathroom and check up on Donnie.”
“Why can’t you do it?” said Raph in mild disgust.
“Because you’re the boss,” replied Leo as he flashed him a grin, then walked over toward Mikey to grab a rag in order to start on all the mess.
“What happened here?”
They all froze at Splinter’s voice echoing around the lair, their eyes going wide as they turned to glance at each other warily. True, the place was much less yellow than it was before, but there were still big chunks of paint left all around, and despite working hard to try and erase them all, they just ran out of time.
It didn’t exactly help that Donnie was out of commission, sitting on the steps in front of the TV with a hurt look while moaning loudly in pain. He was actually brought back there by Raph earlier, but after he ended up throwing up again all over the floor, Leo had made sure to put a bucket next to him, just to be safe. Anyway, he couldn’t help them clean up in his condition.
Leo felt a wave of shame course through him when he turned to look at Splinter’s face as the giant rat took everything in while holding a bag filled with things he’d managed to find for them all. How could he have left his brothers to handle themselves just because he wanted to have some alone time, while his father was out there, trying to find and gather things to help all of them?
He felt so selfish.
Off to the side he noticed Mikey cringing and avoiding Splinter’s eyes as he tried to keep on scrubbing the floor, acting like he wasn’t aware of the parental figure that had just arrived. Raph, on the other hand, stood completely rigid, his eyes darting between Splinter and Leo frantically, like he knew what was coming his way and he wasn’t sure how to prepare himself for the scolding he was sure to get.
It was honestly sad to look at, especially since Leo knew that none of this was actually Raph’s fault.
Donnie just moaned some more. Frankly, Leo wasn’t even sure whether or not he realized Splinter was there now.
When nobody said a word, Splinter looked over at Leo. “Leonardo,” he said promptingly.
Cringing, Leo said, “I’m sorry, Sensei. I was—”
“No, wait, it wasn’t Leo’s fault!” Mikey cut in. “It was me, okay? I was trying to make this glow-in-the-dark color I saw on TV once, but I just… I accidentally took it too far. Leo didn’t even know about it! I swear, Sensei, it was totally my fault!”
Raph stared at Leo in shock. “N-no, it was my fault! I told Leo I’d keep an eye on things instead of him and I completely failed, all right?” he said heatedly, turning to look at Splinter. “I couldn’t make Mikey stop—he wouldn’t listen to me. It’s none of their fault because I was the one who was supposed to prevent this from happening.”
“But I wouldn’t listen to you,” argued Mikey.
“You never listen to anyone, Mikey.”
“I do, too!”
“Enough!” Splinter cut in, his gaze sweeping over the three of them before landing on Donnie. He arched an eyebrow. “And what is wrong with Donatello?”
“He drank too much coffee,” said Leo as he threw his sick brother an anxious look.
“Coffee?” echoed Splinter.
Donnie shuddered and hugged the bucket close to him. “Urgh…”
Raph sent him a flat look. “Way too much,” he said tonelessly, then turned back to Splinter. “I shouldn’t have made that deal with Leo, Dad. I know that now. It was stupid and I should have let it be. I just didn’t understand why you always pick him to be in charge when you leave. I thought it would be easy to look after those two idiots for a little while… Sorry, Sensei.”
“Sorry, Sensei…” repeated Leo, Mikey echoing the words a moment later.
Remaining quiet for a long moment, Splinter watched them all with an unreadable expression that made Leo hold his breath as he waited to hear what his reaction would be. But then the rat just walked silently toward the dojo, only throwing Leo’s name over his shoulder once before he passed through the entrance and left their sight.
With a heavy sigh, Leo followed into the dojo, ignoring the looks of his brothers as he tried to brace himself. He wasn’t sure what Splinter would have to say about all of this, but he was at least glad it wouldn’t be said in front of everyone else. The last thing he needed was to be scolded for doing something stupid in front of his three brothers.
When he stepped in, he found the rat standing in front of the picture of him with his wife and daughter, hands behind his back. The bag he’d had was resting next to his feet, discarded for now. The twitching of his ears let Leo know that he could hear his approach despite how quiet Leo was trying to keep his steps. He still needed to work on that, then.
“Leonardo,” said Splinter without turning around, “do you know why I leave you to look after the lair while I am gone?”
“Uh…” Leo looked at him uncertainly, his hands swinging by his sides, “because I’m more responsible than the others?”
“Precisely.” Splinter turned around to face him. “Raphael is too brash and brazen and tends to overlook the rules if they anger him or stand in the way of his plans. Donatello is more likely to blow up the lair for science, which would be quiet unfortunate. And… I believe Michelangelo is self-explanatory.”
Leo entertained the thought of Mikey overlooking all of them for a split moment and shuddered violently. Yes, it would be a cold day in hell before they let him be responsible for everyone else. He was a good person and they all loved him, but… well, he tended to do stupid stuff—like painting the entire lair yellow, even if it was mostly by accident.
“Yes, well… I’m sorry I let Raph convince me it was a good idea—I should have known better,” he said, unable to keep some of the bitterness out of his voice.
When he saw Splinter’s eyebrows quirking at him curiously, he sighed. “It’s just… sometimes I wish someone else would be responsible for a change. I love them and all, but it’s a bit much sometimes. I want to be able to spend some time without worrying they might blow up or poison or hurt themselves. I just… I really thought it wouldn’t hurt to let Raph watch over Donnie and Mikey for a couple of hours.
“I mean, I know Raph can do it! It’s usually way less chaotic when you’re gone than it was today. They were just determined to make him regret making that deal with me. I… I don’t know why,” he said, deciding not to bring up the whole ‘mom’ thing right this second. Or at all. “I just… can’t you let Raph do it every once in a while? I’ll help him if I have to, but I just want… I wanted to be in my room and read a little without having to keep an eye out.”
He slouched a little in his place, refusing to look at Splinter. He wasn’t sure what the expression on his face would be, but he couldn’t imagine it would be anything good. After all, what kind of brother was he, trying to shove the responsibility he got onto someone else? What kind of brother got tired of taking care of his own family?
But then a warm hand on his shoulder made him look up at Splinter. There was a smile on his face, despite everything, and he looked at Leo like he wasn’t mad at all—he actually looked glad, as if Leo just told him something good rather than bad, bad, very bad.
“I am proud of you for admitting this, my son,” said his father kindly. “I never meant to put this pressure on you, and I am sorry for that. I can certainly let someone else take this burden every once in a while.”
“R-really?”
“Really. But you need to know this—while I’m sure that your brothers had a hand in the disaster that had transpired down here while I was gone, the reason it was also your fault was not because you let Raphael handle the situation instead of you, but because I left, trusting you to be the one who would make sure everything is okay—not your brothers. So in my eyes, you were still the one who should have prevented the whole thing.”
Leo blinked slowly, nodding. “I… I think I understand, Sensei.”
“Good. Now go out there and help your brothers. The sooner you finish, the sooner we can eat dinner.”
He bowed his head and walked away, but stopped right before he left the dojo. “Um… you might want to stay clear of everything Mikey made while you were gone… pretty sure there’s enough paint inside to poison us.”
Splinter’s eyes gleamed in amusement as he nodded his head. “I will keep that in mind.”
Leo smiled and left, rolling his eyes at the barrage of questions he immediately received from Raph and Mikey as to whether or not he was in trouble now because of them.
“I don’t think so,” he said lightly as he grabbed a rag again and went back to scrubbing away at the yellow paint. “I think I’m in the clear for now.”
His smile widened a little when they both sighed in relief, with Donnie still groaning in the background.