"Raph?"
Raph blinks. He's standing silently in the hall with probably a stupid look on his face, and no clue how long he's been there, and Mikey's leaning through the kitchen doorway to stare at him.
"You okay, bro?"
You're not worthless, is the only answer that comes to mind, the only words Raph can remember out of the entire English language at the moment, but even they get stuck somewhere between his brain and his mouth and he ends up not answering at all.
"Hey, do you need to sit down? You look kinda... pukey."
Mikey reaches for him like he's about to guide him to a chair, and that little gesture- one hand outstretched while the other remains tucked against his plastron- is enough to resurrect Raphael's voice.
"Didn't I tell you not to move?" he says gruffly, and it comes out a little sharper than he meant. Mikey rolls his eyes.
"You also said you'd BRB but I found you out here in La La Land."
"I didn't say BRB." Raph steers Mikey by the shoulders back into the kitchen and desposits him in his chair. Ice Cream Kitty has her eyes on him, and he's pretty sure he's not imagining the way she starts to glare. Sure enough, once he's back with ice and presses the makeshift compress over Mikey's wrist, Mikey hisses at the cold, and his cat hisses, too.
"Kitty!" Mikey admonishes, tugging her bowl to the far side of the table when she takes an icy swipe at his brother. "What's gotten into you?"
She growls in the back of her throat, leaning her head down to rest her chin on Mikey's fingers where they curve over the rim of her bowl. Raph's got a pretty good idea why she's angry with him, and shakes his head at Mikey's nervous glance and muttered 'sorry.'
"Nah. I think I deserve that much, little brother."
Mikey isn't worthless.
He's the one who sensed a wolf in sheep's clothing- or the monster in Mrs. O'Neil's- even when it had the rest of his family fooled, and he's the one who survived an alien world for months on his own. Mikey saved Raph the night they lost their father, when Raph almost lost himself in turn to grief and rage. Mikey sees all the kinks in his brothers' mental armor, Mikey protects them in a way swords and sais can't.
But Mikey doesn't protect himself as much. Mikey's cat is the one defending him against hurt right now- against the brother that hurt him- and he's sitting there with a confused look on his face, like he can't think of a single thing in the world that Raph's done wrong.
Raph moves the icepack back over Mikey's wrist when it starts to slip, and then cups Mikey's face in hand, meeting round blue eyes bravely.
Michelangelo is the most annoying guy on the planet. Raph will be the first one to say it. Mikey's practically the posterboy for Atypical Ninja, obnoxious, and cheerful, and loud, and not as funny as he thinks he is. He's everything that gets on Raph's nerves, he's everything Raph isn't, and he's everything Raph will fight tooth and nail to keep safe.
It's a little brother thing.
And his little brother ran away from home because Raph lost his temper over a messy room. The thought freezes his heart, and his fingers on Mikey's chin tighten.
"Oww, Raph, what're you- "
"You're not worthless." Mikey blinks at him again, mouth still hanging open where Raph cut him off mid-word, and Raph doesn't let go. His brother ran away because of him, and that can't ever happen again, not ever. "I owe you an apology for the stuff I said, big time. It's been rough on all of us out here, not just me, and I had no business cuttin' into you like I did. And I'm sorry, Mikey."
It's frank, and honest, and Mikey looks like he has no idea what to do with it. "Hey, Raph, it's- "
"It'll take longer than this one conversation to fix the way I've been makin' you think lately," Raph says over him, relentlessly. "I know that. But I'm gonna fix it, okay? And I'm starting here." He frees Mikey's chin to hook the back of his head instead, guiding him forward until red and orange meet where their foreheads come to rest together and there's nowhere in the world for Mikey to look except right at Raph, and all the bare sincerity in his eyes. "Okay, Mikey?"
It seems like forever- even though it can't really be more than a minute- but finally that ice cream cat starts purring up a storm at about the same time Mikey's free arm slips around Raph in turn, and Raph can hear the smile in his baby brother's voice when he says,
"Okay."