THE SOMA SAGA I: DREAMTIME

Underneath all the pressure, Leo's personality shone through in a way we hadn't seen since we were young. With no Splinter around to say otherwise, he'd moved the start of our morning training from 7 AM to 9:30, allowing us some much-appreciated time for sleep and breakfast. While half our sessions consisted of the same katas we'd been practicing for years, every other day he came up with something imaginative and refreshingly new. One morning, I woke up to find him and Raph bare-knuckle boxing with blindfolds on, both of them laughing and grinning like fools as they danced around in lock-step stance. On another occasion, he and Mike were sparring with my and Raph's weapons, the two of them delivering comic impressions as they impersonated us in combat. Any tension that used to fill the lair originating from Leo's being so high-strung had disappeared, and it was clear we all loved it.

Whenever he laid eyes me for the first time in the morning, he showered me with kisses and sweet-nothings, and increasingly hung around my lab instead of burying himself in extra meditation. While not understanding many of the details, he seemed fascinated by my biofuel work, which we punctuated with some informal sessions of therapy. More often than not, this took the simple form of casual conversation about the past and his current sense of self.

"I was sixteen when I started having a crush on you." He said nonchalantly, lying back down on my lab bench while I examined some bacterial cultures under my microscope. "You remember Splinter had us practice throwing each other up in the air to catch a ball before the other team could?"

"Vaguely, yes." I looked up from the lens. "Didn't Raph land on his head when Mike's hand slipped?"

"Oh god, yeah!" He cracked up with laughter. "Well, I think it was when my hands were around your hips…I could feel your heartbeat, and the breath moving in your chest. It felt new, suddenly. Like I'd been living with you my whole life, and never noticed how full of life you are."

"You held onto those feelings for four years, and never acted on them?"

"Tried to block it out of my head. Even though I didn't fully understand what made me feel that way, it seemed unnatural. Distracting, more like. Didn't seem appropriate to think of my brother like that."

"Understandable." I noted.

"What about you?" he asked. "When'd you start feeling into me?"

"Well, I can't say I really had a sex drive until a year or two ago. Even then, I thought of it more from an outside view, than ever thinking I'd take part in it."

"Classic Don." He chuckled. "Reading a biology textbook instead of erotica."

"Hey, now, it wasn't like that at all!" I stammered, a blush creeping across my face. "Really, it started with some dreams. They just seemed…I don't know…inapplicable to my life. Out of my control. And unnecessarily confusing, I guess."

"What kind of dreams?" he prodded, deviously.

"Err…They started with us just kissing and…fooling around. Then, uh…they gradually got more…vivid, and…"

"Relax, Donnie." He soothed. "You don't need to get embarrassed about stuff we've already done for real." Offhandedly, he added, "Maybe you should try these pills too, see if they help loosen you up."

Something about that last sentence piqued my concern.

"How many have you been taking, Leo?"

"Usually one after training, and one before bed."

"Usually?"

"Guess it depends how worked up I feel at the time. Yesterday, I took one after dinner when I called you up to my room. Tell me you didn't notice I was feeling a little more frisky, huh?"

Meeting his devilish smile, I had to admit the sex was wild. It made it tough to complain.

"Well…they aren't candy, Leo. The more you take, the more of a tolerance your body will build up, and the more withdrawal you'll feel when you're not dosed."

"I understand, Doctor Don." He laughed it off. "I'll be a good boy, I promise."

He rocked himself off the lab bench with his legs and landed on his feet like a cat. I watched as he left the lab and ran to the living room, where he jumped like a rocket to Superman across the couch and onto Raph and Mikey's unsuspecting laps. In just a week, his personality had changed so much, but I wasn't wholly sure whether to blame the drugs or to explain it as him flourishing without worrying about having another episode. The one observation that put me at peace was, despite his recent exuberance and lack of inhibition, he hadn't had gone into his dissociative state once since he'd started the medication. Side effects aside, everything seemed to be working well.

Those days, we were still getting back in the routine of living together. We'd only run one mission all together to the surface, which was mostly to visit April and Casey. Raph and Mike eloped topside once every couple of nights, fighting petty criminals dressed in their gaudy uniforms, now with Leo's permission. That left me to dive deep into my research when we weren't training, eating, or sleeping. When he wasn't in my lab, I found Leo kicked back in Splinter's easy chair or sprawled out on the living room floor, reading, writing, and drawing with vigor and interest I'd never known him to have. On one occasion, the sound of unfamiliar music echoing through house at night drew me out of the lab and to his ajar bedroom door. Previously, all I'd known Leo to listen to was more tame classical Japanese compositions. Peering into the dim light through the opening, I saw him gyrating his hips in time with the bass of his speakers, eyes sealed shut as he mouthed the chorus, "Break it, drop it, drink it, spill it baby, touch your body, your body…"

"Leo?" Without a word, he shot me a glazed-eyed, open-mouthed smile, extending a hand out to pull me in while still dancing to the beat. Unsure of how to move, I let him lead me through the rhythm as the ethereal "You gotta keep up, 'cause I've been gone, oh I've been gone…" slid me into the same trance. The wind of our dance put the flames of the candles on his shelves into a flutter, making our shadows vibrate almost in time to the plucky synthesizers of the music. His hands traced down the junction of my shell and sides, until they reached down and firmly planted right where my tail met the curve of my lower back, causing me to shudder as he grasped down. All the while, he ground the front of his shell against mine, sending blood rushing through my veins and putting my mind in a fever. His eyes drilled vacantly into mine as the music broke down into a slower tempo, and with his lips slightly agape, he leaned into my ear.

"Show me what happened in your dreams." His husky whisper sent lightning bolts down my spine, and I didn't realize I was standing square in front of his bed until he pushed us down into the sheets, his lips locking with mine.


Hope you enjoyed the beginning of my new plot arc!

As a warning, the rest of this section will involve drug use much like this one did, though possibly on the part of the other three turtles, too.

For the curious, the song at the end is "Gone" by the Weeknd; if you haven't heard it already, I recommend taking a listen and realizing just how sexy of music these two were shaking it to! He's one of my favorite artists :)