Warm.

Comfortable.

Safe.

HOME.

It had been so long since he had had the luxury of feeling reluctant to wake up. Leo couldn't remember the last time he had allowed himself to sleep this hard or deeply, and he briefly wondered to himself just how much time had passed. What time was it now? Leo let his tongue run against the roof of his mouth distastefully, and his face scrunched up slightly. Bleh. His body felt sluggish and groggy from oversleeping, his face felt grimy and puffy, and he noticed he also had that stuffed up headache one got when they just had a solid, over-emotional cry.

And yet, despite all that, he felt so completely, totally, unbelievably happy right now.

Slowly pulled from the cozy and serene fog of happy dreams, Leo finally allowed himself to wake up a little, and gave a long, drowsy yawn, his sightless eyes fluttering sleepily open. He blinked languidly, and then the corner of his mouth twisted into a small, contented smile.

He couldn't see anything, of course. His world was still blanketed in a dark fog. But he could feel the three still-slumbering bodies draped over him, pressing him down into the soft pile of pillows and blankets that made up a makeshift comfortable nest on the main floor of their new home. He spent a moment just basking in their auras, picking out each individual color and assigning it to the physical presence of a brother.

Miky had, at some point, burrowed under Leo's arm once more, and was now sleeping curled up tightly against his plastron. Leo couldn't help but notice that his youngest brother was perfectly positioned so his head was resting on Leo's chest, right above his heart. Leo absently brushed his hand against the knot of the mask wrapped around Mikey's head, feeling the smooth scales and thick fabric, just enjoying his brother's presence for the moment. Then he squeezed his little brother just a little tighter, and, in response, Mikey gave a sleepy little murmur and snuggled in closer.

On the other side, Leo could feel Raph's heavy body draped over his shell, his red brother taking a protective position and securely pinning him down with an arm and a leg thrown over him. Listening and feeling the deep, even, and calm breathing, Leo knew that his red brother was currently sound asleep, his chin still resting possessively on top of Leo's head.

Donnie was the least entangled brother in the pile, but that was because, as far as Leo could guess from the various tools and books scattered around him, he had been staying up to monitor Leo's health, even while he was sleeping. A few faint memories flittered up of being drowsily awakened while his purple brother was checking his heart rate or blood pressure. But at some point during the day, even his genius brother had finally given out and was now sound asleep, leaning back against them all in a somewhat awkward position and snoring slightly. Even in sleep, though, he still held Leo's wrist lightly in his lap, his fingers curled reflexively around Leo's pulse point.

Judging by how relaxed and still the warm, heavy bodies pinning him down were, Leo was fairly certain that he was the first one awake. A sleepy grin pulled at the corner of his mouth, and he sighed and snuggled down further into the warm pile of brothers and blankets, content for the time being to just lay there and listen to the slow, steady breathing of his brothers as they slept. He was fairly certain that untangling himself from this cuddle puddle would be impossible without waking at least one of them, and he wasn't in any hurry. This was nice.

Eventually Leo found himself lulled by the rhythm of his brothers breathing back into a state of somewhere between half asleep and half awake. And it was in that dream-like hazy state when, in the back of his mind, he absently registered the sound of a humming engine as some machine kicked into action.

Hm... It sounded a little familiar. Sleepily, he let his mind wander, trying to place the sound. Was... was that the elevator? It must be.

There was the sounds of the doors whooshing open, and two auras stepped into the lair. He wasn't alarmed by the newcomers, though. They were both familiar and safe and...

"EEEEEEEEEEEEeeeek!" **CRASH!**

The lazy peacefulness of the lair was instantly shattered by a very familiar female voice screaming in surprise and a loud clatter as a load of small boxes, glass bottles, and canned items smashed to the floor.

A startled and somewhat confused male voice next to her yelped out, "The hell April?!"

Startled by the scream, Leo started to bolt upwards, but he had only managed to push himself a fraction of the way up before he was immediately crushed back down into the blankets as three very alarmed and only half awake brothers instinctively lunged forward and threw themselves on top of him protectively.

"LEO?!"

Suddenly the familiar scent and aura of April was rushing up and then kneeling there in front of him, completely ignoring the somewhat dangerous bristling of the other three still-not-quite-awake turtle sibling on top of him. He felt her push Donnie's hand off of his face and then her smooth, warm human hands were cradling his cheeks. "Oh my gosh! LEO! It is you! Oh my god! You're alive! You're ALIVE!"

"Holy cats! It is Leo!" Casey's voice came up from behind her, sounding just as dumbfound and flabbergasted. " I-! But! What?! How?! When... When the hell did this happen?!"

"April! Casey!" Leo said happily from the bottom of the pile, relieved to see that his two oldest human friends were here safe and unharmed. "Hello! Oh man, I am so glad that you're both okay!

"Oh." Mikey relaxed and let out a loud yawn, stretching out languidly on top of Leo, before smacking his lips sleepily. "Huh. Yeah... I guess we probably should've called you guys and let you know? Our bad."

"The heck! We thought you were dead, dude!" Casey's aura moved over to set his armload of what Leo assumed was groceries on a counter and hurried over to stand near the turtle pile as well. "When did you get back?!"

"Last night. He broke into our garage last night trying to find us, and Donnie gassed him." Mikey offered, curling back up on Leo's shell and getting comfortable again. "Completely knocked him out cold for like, half an hour."

"WHAT?!" April sounded shocked.

"I...! He..! It-it was a complete accident!" Donnie sputtered indignantly, while clutching Leo just a little tighter.

"It totally and completely was." Leo agreed, testing his ability to push himself up, only to quickly find that yes indeed he was quite firmly buried under the brother pile. "It wasn't really his fault. I was in disguise, and should have probably taken off the scarf at least when I snuck into the garage. Donnie was just protecting our family, and actually, I'm very proud of him."

Donnie paused, then shakily buried his face into Leo's arm and sniffed quietly. "Leo... I..."

Leo smiled softly and reached up around Mikey's leg to ruffle his purple brother's mask fondly. "I'm really, really glad to be back. I missed you guys so much!"

"What happened to you?!" April's voice was frantic and quivering with overjoyed tears as her soft human hands ran over his arm and hand. "Where were you all this time, Leo?! Are you okay?!"

"Careful, careful!" Raph pushed himself up and seemed to be motioning for them to back off a little, though thankfully not quite as aggressively as he had been last night. Right now, his red brother's low growl had more of a concerned undertone then a panicked one. "Leo's been through a lot, and we don't want to rush him."

"I'm FINE, Raph." Leo huffed indignantly, and wiggled to try and free himself out from under the pile. "A little squished right now, but I'm otherwise perfectly okay!"

"And once again, our eldest brother has a tendency to understate his condition." Donnie sniffled, then huffed as he slide off of Leo and assisting him with the process of untangling himself from the brotherly heap. "Unfortunately, it seems as if his eyes were damaged from that attack back on the plane incident, and he was blinded." His voice grew just a little more strained as he quietly added, "That was why it took him so long to find his way back to us."

"WHAT?!"

Leo winced as both April and Casey's aura's flared wildly with panic.

"Blind?! Oh... Oh no! Leo!" April breathed out in horror, and reached down to take Leo's face in her hands, temporarily halting his extraction. "You're...? You mean...?"

"I'm fine, April. I promise." Leo took her hands and gently held them, giving her what he hoped was a reassuring smile in her direction. "Yes, I am blind, and I know it may seem bad, but I have this figured out. I'm going to be okay. Even if this isn't fixable, I will be okay."

"So... so you're really blind?" Casey asked in disbelief. "Oh. Oh man. Leo. How are you even going to...? Like... like you can't see anything at all?!"

"I may not be able to see with my eyes, but I do have other senses." Leo sat back in the blanket nest, finally out from underneath Raph, but still working on peeling off the pretending-to-sleep Mikey who was still stubbornly clinging to his shell. "I've learned to adapt fairly well, actually."

"But Leo... you... you're BLIND! And... two years... How did you even...?" April asked worriedly, standing up and stepping back a little. "Donnie, you-you can help him? Right?"

Donnie exhaled. "I'll... I'll try. Of course I'll try. Our options are pretty limited, though, and I have to do a lot of research first." He rubbed his eyes with the fingers of one hand. "Like, a LOT of research. Most likely something like this would require surgery, and that's something I don't want to take lightly. "

"Until then," Raph said firmly, standing up to help pull Mikey off. "We'll take care of him. Leo's going to be okay."

"But... guys... what about the whole thing with-" Casey started to say, and Leo was startled by how intensely Raph's aura spiked in panic as his red brother immediately lunged forward to grab at something that Leo couldn't sense on a side table nearby, and began scribbling on it. A piece of paper, maybe?

"Casey, Leo's going to be okay!" Raph emphasized hurriedly, quickly cutting Casey off. "He's been through a lot, but he's home now, and he doesn't need to worry about anything anymore. Okay?"

"Huh?" Casey sounded surprised and confused, but then seemed to catch on as Raph finished whatever he was writing (Probably writing? Leo couldn't see exactly what he was doing.) and held it up for him to see. He then cleared his throat, still sounding a little confused, but apparently now following some sort of script. "Oh! Uh... Yeah! Nothing to worry about at all! Everything... Everything is fine! Completely fine"

Raph gave the kind of sigh that indicated he was probably facepalming.

Leo narrowed his blind eyes suspiciously. Hm. Casey was a terrible liar. Were... were they hiding something from him?

Either Casey realized just how awkward he had sounded, or Raph had shot him a warning look that Leo couldn't see, because he cleared his throat and tried again, this time more composed and smooth. "Leo, don't you worry none. Everything is completely cool and under control. Completely. And you know that Casey Jones will watch over your bros' shells while Dee works on fixin' your eyes. Practically nothin' to worry about at all, dude!"

Hm. Better. But still not very believable.

"Uh, thanks, Casey." Leo said somewhat diplomatically. He finally gave up on trying to peel Mikey off, and finally stood up from the nest of blankets with the orange brother still on his shell, joining the others. Donnie immediately took his elbow to guide him, which was completely unnecessary, except at the moment he wasn't going to complain about any contact with any of his brothers offered to him in his world of darkness. "I... appreciate that. Although I think you guys are seriously underestimating my ability to ninja, even while blind. Now, tell me. What exactly is going on?"

All five auras in the room with him seemed to buzz with slight nervousness as they shifted in place. But then Mikey jumped in, leaning over Leo's head and booping his nose, his aura and voice sincerely eager and gleeful. He apparently didn't need to pretend in the slightest in that regard.

"Bro, we're just so excited to have you back! That's what's going on!"

And, before Leo could question them further, Mikey reached down to pull something off his belt. He balanced easily on Leo's shell, resting his elbows on his big brother's head as he brought up the item and used both hands to type away at it, which clued Leo in that it was probably his Tphone. "This whole thing with Casey and April reminded me, though..." Mikey hummed happily. "There's something very important that we've been neglecting to do."

"Hm?" Leo tilted his head up towards his youngest brother, not quite sure what he was up to. Was he calling somebody?

"Shhshhshhh!" Mikey hushed him gleefully. "Its going to be a surprise!" He tapped the phone, and leaned forward on top of Leo with the phone pressed against the side of his face. Leo could faintly hear the dial tone rhythmically sound through the speaker above him, and then a click as a female voice answered somewhat resignedly.

"Karai! Hello!" Mikey said in delight.

Leo sat up just a little straighter and quickly felt a little excited flutter in his stomach as he realized just who was on the other end of the line.

"Hey big sis, man, do we ever have some good news for you!" Mikey beamed impishly, obviously scheming to play out this scenario to its fullest. "Hm? Yes. Yes, I know what time it is over there." Mikey scoffed in obvious answer to a question. "It's like what, 10am? Psh. Most humans are awake at that time!"

Leo did a quick calculation. Yup, that would be probably be in Tokyo. So Karai was over in Japan now? How long had she been there? Man, if she was as close as Japan back when he was stuck somewhere in China for what felt like ages, Leo could've saved himself a LOT of trouble.

"Well... yeah... you're a ninja, and ninjas usually stalk the night, so... I'll give that to you. You have a point. I guess it makes sense that you'd be a little crabby at getting a call at this time." Mikey continued the phone conversation. "But! This is really, really, really good news! You'd be, like, super crabby at us if we waited any longer to tell you!" Another pause. "Yes, of course I'm quite sure that you don't want to wait until later! Trust me, Kar-Bear, try and think of the best news you possibly can right now. Are you imagining it? Kittens and ice cream and rainbows and all that good stuff? Well this? This is that times a bajillion!" As he spoke, he hugged Leo happily.

Leo listened to the joy in his brother's voice as he spoke and reveled in it. Oh, to think that not even a full day ago, he was still wondering if he'd ever hear Mikey's laughter again, and here he was, alive and healthy and as ! He hesitated for a moment, then tentatively reached up to touch Mikey's cheek. To his delight, his orange brother leaned into his palm, and he suddenly was able to feel the wide grin and impish crinkle by his eyes. Through this simple touch, it was as if he could see the expression on Mikey's face as he talked.

Completely content to cuddle into Leo's hand, Mikey hummed happily as he listened to the phone. Leo had expected him to tell her the news, and then be passed the phone so he could confirm it himself, but Mikey put a hand on Leo's snout and gestured for him to wait.

"Hold your horses, hold your horses!" Leo could feel the way his brother's snout wrinkled as his tongue stuck out playfully. "I'll tell you in a second, but this news is soooo amazing, sooooo mind blowingly awesome, that we have to prepare you for the sheer shock of how incredible it is."

Leo could almost imagine Karai on the other end facepalming, trying to decide just how much to humor their younger brother.

"Just to make sure, you're sitting down, right?" Mikey asked into the phone playfully. "Okay, good. Good. That will work out well. And you're alone, right? You're probably going to get pretty emotional, and I know that you have that whole 'I'm the REAL Leader of the Foot Clan' vibe going on, so you probably don't want anybody else to see you break down into a full out blubbering cry mode. Not good for the whole rep thing you're going for." He paused, listening to the faint voice on the other side of the phone, then Leo felt his face perk up under his hand. "Oh, Shini's there? Perfect! Put her on quick! ... Don't worry about why! Just... just put her on! Trust me! ... Yes, this is important!" There was a pause, and then, "Shini! Shini, listen to me. This is very, very important! There's a couch in Karai's office, right? ... There's two of them?! Exxxcceeellenttttt. Take ALL the couch cushions, and put them on the floor around Karai's chair."

Leo was pretty sure he heard amused laughter coming out from the phone above him.

"Mikey, is all this really necessary?" Donnie asked, entering the main area once more with an armload of books.

Mikey sat up a little on Leo's shell, moving to shelter the phone speaker with one hand as he protested, "It's totally necessary! Like you always said, Dee, safety first! I don't want our big sister to injure herself when she faints from the sheer shock of the awesomeness of this news!"

Donnie just gave a sigh, though it sounded more amused then anything, and Leo sensed his purple aura move over to take a seat close by, setting the pile of books next to him and taking one to read.

... Leo missed books.

"Okay, ready Shini?" Mikey turned back to the phone. "Karai is surround by a zone of pillowed safety? Yeah, yeah, I'm sure she's got plenty to say about it. But she's going to thank us for it later. Now, can I talk to her again?" There was another short pause. "Karai? Okay, now we- No, no, Donnie already just asked me that. I assure you, it's completely necessary. Now then. Are you ready for this? Are you prepared for the happiest moment of your life? Okay. Here we go..."

Leo felt his gleeful orange brother lean down, and suddenly there was a phone pressed into his hands. "Okay, bro. It's all you now."

At this, all the auras of his brothers and friends in the room slowed down and paused, apparently wanting to watch this moment.

Leo swallowed hard, his heart fluttering hin his chest, and pressed the phone up to the side of his head.

"-swear, Mikey, I have an important meeting later this evening with some very important people, and I have a lot to do before then!" he heard Karai's trying to retain her patience on the phone. "If this is about Ice Cream Kitty getting married again or something like that, then I swear that I'm not going to bring you back any Mizu Manju next time I come to visit."

Karai...

His sister!

Leo felt his heart pound, his chest tightening and a lump forming in his throat suddenly. Oh... how he had missed that voice!

He swallowed hard, then said almost shyly, "Hello, Karai."

The voice on the other side stopped instantly mid rant, and there was a long moment of silence.

"Karai?" Leo blinked, uncertain about the sudden dead silence coming from the phone. Did he accidentally hang up on her? "Are you still there? It's... it's me. Leo. I'm... I'm still alive, and I'm back."

Then, through the phone speaker, he could hear a breathy wheeze and then a cushioned thud.

"Uh... Karai?!" he pulled the phone away from his head, a little alarmed. "Karai? Hello?!"

"Wait. She didn't really faint, did she?!" Mikey sounded startled. "I was kidding about that!"

A/N:

Donnie's brothers are never going to let him live this one down. They'll all be old and in wheelchairs, sitting around a table together eating banana pudding, and then one of them will bring up, 'Hey, remember the time that Donnie accidentally gassed Leo?' and they'll all break down in amused chuckles at the memory.

This chapter was originally meant to be longer. But then it kept going on and on, and I decided to split it into two sections. Hopefully the next one will be done before too long. I keep thinking that 'Oh, now that I'm at this point, the rest should flow smoothly and quickly', but noooo, the characters all want to have 'emotions' and 'feelings' and be all complicated to write. Bleh.