Hi! I haven't left yet, but I didn't think that I'd update before I took off, that's why I prepared you not to expect another chapter soon. But the other day, something happened that made me so happy that I wrote the whole chapter in a rush. You see, one of my classmates (she's 35, the ages are mixed up at the university as you might know) told me that she's having a baby in November! Can you believe it? Her little son will become a big brother. I'm so happy for my friend! I squealed when she told me! (jumps up and down in joy)

NOTE: Until now, I have been quite kind with the language, but this chappie has a swearword in it! (insert dramatic music here) Just so you know.

Disclaimer: If you still think that I own them, I'm getting pretty concerned for your sanity.

Chapter 9: Homesick

Splinter came out of his room, just in time to get crashed into by Donatello. They both ended up on the floor, but the purple-clad turtle got up again in less than half a second and ran off again, shouting "Förlåt, Mäster Splinter!" (1) over his shoulder.

The old rat stared after him and frowned, and barely got time to get on his feet again before he was run over by April O'Neil. She scrambled to her feet and dashed after Donnie, screaming "COME BACK HERE, YOU IDIOTIC REPTILE! I'LL BASH YOUR BRAINS OUT!" Splinter saw her waving wildly with a frying pan. He frowned a bit more and stood.

"What on Earth…?" he started, but didn't get the time to finish the sentence before his three other sons knocked him over and they all took the form of a heap on the floor. Raph, Leo and Mikey got on their feet with practised ninja speed. Splinter opened his mouth, but was interrupted by Raphael.

"Sorry Master, no time to talk!" He ran after Donatello and April. Mike sent his father an apologetic smile and followed his brother. Since Leonardo, on the other hand, was the teacher's pet, he gasped and helped Splinter to his feet and dusted him off. "We are so, so sorry, Sensei! Really! We didn't mean to nearly kill you by our disrespectful behaviour – which, by the way, was mostly my fault, since I'm the leader. I have brought dishonour on the whole family and I must be punished."

The rodent gave his oldest son – who started to look a bit frantic – a weird look, and stopped his ranting by holding up his paw. "Really, Leonardo, do not worry about it. Such things happen. I am sure you meant no harm. Now, what is going on?"

Leo's eyes widened. "Geez! Donny!" He whirled around and ran off again.

Splinter stared after him, his eyes narrowed in confusion. He sighed. "Why do I even bother?" He went back into his room again, convinced that a meditation session would do him some good.

Donatello had been running for longer than he could remember, or at least for ten minutes, which doesn't sound like a very long time but certainly feels like it if you're chased by a crazy woman with a frying pan. Several times, he'd shouted over his shoulder "Jag är ledsen! Jag menade inte att såra dina känslor! Färgat hår är ingenting att skämmas för! Snälla, gör mig inte illa!" (2) But April hadn't stopped chasing him.

Don had run across the big living area at least seven times, he'd taken a tour through all of the bedrooms, he'd passed the kitchen twice, messed up his workshop when he hurried through it, but he hadn't been able to shake the red-head off. He'd even tried to hide in the bathtub, but was quickly discovered and barely had the time to move before April had taken a swing with the frying pan and made a dent in the porcelain.

By now, Don was pretty exhausted. Apparently his good shape had left with his memory. When he crossed the living area for the sixteenth million time, he did the only thing he could think of – he threw himself into the pool.

SPLASH!

April, who wasn't far behind, got soaked. Her face twisted in a grimace. "Ugh! Disgusting! Get up from there, you chicken!" Donatello was treading water four or five meters away and understood her body language pretty well, but wisely enough decided not to follow her orders.

Just then, Raph and Mikey appeared. "Um… April?"

April turned to Raph, and Mike took the opportunity to sneak up behind her and snatch the frying pan from her grasp. April whirled around. "Hey!"

"Sorry, but we really don't need ya to kill Donnie for the moment," Raph said.

"And why not?" April snarled.

Leonardo showed up behind them. "Because it isn't his fault that he's behaving a bit… well… unusual," he said.

O'Neil looked from Leo, to Raph, to Mikey, to Leo again. "What do you mean?"

"Well," Raph started, "he's not really himself."

"Yeah, I can see that."

"I don't know how to say this in a good way," Leo said, "so I'll just tell you the truth – he's lost his memory."

"What?"

"It was Mikey's fault!" Raph hurried to say. "He electrocuted him."

"It was an accident and you know it!"

"Well, you still did."

While the two youngest turtles were bickering, Leonardo sighed and turned to April. "Well, to make a long story short, Mikey electrocuted Don by mistake when he was fixing the television, and now he's got amnesia and thinks that he's Swedish."

April blinked, thinking that she must have misunderstood what the oldest turtle was saying. "What did you say?"

"Mikey electrocuted Don by mistake when he was fixing the television, and now he's got amnesia and thinks that he's Swedish."

April still couldn't believe her ears. "What?"

"Mikey electrocuted Don by mistake when he was fixing the television, and now he's got amnesia and thinks that he's Swedish! Shell, woman, what's wrong with you? Have your ears fallen off?"

April's eyes started shooting daggers again, and Leonardo realized that he'd made a fatal mistake.

"Oops. I'm sorry, April! I really am!"

It seemed as if Leo now had taken Don's place on the top of April's 'Turtles to murder-list', but apparently some kind of higher power had decided to avoid any massacres today (maybe because of the fact that dead bodies spread a pretty nasty stench and the lair had a quite bad ventilation), 'cause April's eyes softened. "Okay, you're forgiven."

Leo blinked. "I am?" Not that he was going to complain.

"Yes, you are. But tell me, what're you going to do with Don?"

"We don't know," Leo sighed. "We've tried to tell him about ninjitsu, and he ran off with my swords. We've tried to teach him our names, and he mixed them up. We've tried electrocuting him again, and he got pissed. We've tried taking him topside, and he got lost. Well, he did kick some Foot soldiers' butts, but I'm still pretty suspicious about the whole thing…"

His human friend gave him a sympathetic smile. "At least you've got the dictionary now."

"Yeah."

"Maybe I should talk to him," April offered. "Just to make sure that he isn't afraid of me."

"That might be a good idea," Leo agreed, and looked down at the pool.

He couldn't see Don.

"Oh no! He's forgotten how to swim!" Leo gasped. Mikey and Raph stopped arguing.

"What?" Raph asked.

"I can't see him! He's drowned!" his older brother cried and dived in. Raphael, Michelangelo and April stared after him. "Moron," Mikey said and shook his head.

Leo didn't break the surface until 14, 23 seconds later. "I can't find him!"

"That's 'cause he's left already," Raph said, and pointed to a long line of wet two-toed footprints leading away from the pool and into Donatello's room.

Leo climbed out of the pool and looked at the footprints. He then turned to his brothers. "Well, why didn't you say so in the first place?"

"We didn't have the time before you freaked and dived in," April told him. Leo frowned at her.

A couple of hours later, Donnie sat in his bedroom, contemplating over the drastic 'change' his life had made in the last few days. He had woken up at a strange place, which later turned out to be the sewers of New York, and he'd met three other giant, talking turtles and a rat. He'd been attacked by a bunch of weird tarsier-looking guys and jumped by a creepy little girl, and he'd been chased by an insane woman with a frying pan. Sure, it had been interesting, but there were limits for how much he could take.

"New York är verkligen en intressant stad," (3) he said to himself. "Det vore kul att undersöka den lite mer – jag har till exempel inte kollat på Frihetsgudinnan än – men det får vänta till en annan gång. Jag börjar faktiskt längta tillbaka till Norden!" (4)

As his trains of thoughts developed, he got more and more convinced that he wanted to get 'home' in some way. But how?

"Jag antar att det skulle gå fortast att ta flyget," (5) he mumbled. "Men det har jag inga pengar till. Och det är svårt att smyga sig ombord på ett flygplan utan att bli upptäckt. Det skulle nog vara mindre komplicerat att bli fripassagerare på en båt. Dessutom är det lättare att ta sig till kajen än till flygplatsen." (6)

He thought of the strange humanoid animals that had been relatively kind to him (apart from the two attempted murders from the blue- and orange-clad turtles), and thought that he couldn't just leave them – at least, not without saying goodbye. "Men så fort jag försöker prata med dem, så tittar de bara lustigt på mig," (7) he said to himself.

The next morning, Splinter entered the kitchen to get his usual nice cup of tea. He spotted an envelope on the table. It was addressed to Mäster Splinnter, Raffaiell, Majkelänjelåo och Liåonarrdåo.

Splinter raised a furry eyebrow, opened the envelope and looked at the letter inside.

Kära Mäster Splinnter, Majkelänjelåo, Liåonarrdåo och Raffaiell,

Tack för att ni har låtit mig bo hos er ett tag. Jag har uppskattat att få dela ert vardagliga liv och er märkliga kultur, och ni har varit mycket vänliga. Emellertid, så har jag drabbats av hemlängtan. Jag måste återvända till mitt fädernesland och mina rötter, hellre förr än senare – inget är som en jul i Sverige. Därför har jag packat mina saker och gett mig av. Jag vet att ni förstår och accepterar mitt beslut.

God jul, och tack för allt.

/ Dånnatello

Ps. Jag tog mig friheten att ta med pizzaresterna i kylen som färdkost. (8)

Splinter scratched his head, and picked up the dictionary which lay behind the banana- and chocolate-flavoured ice cream in the freezer (don't ask). While he started flipping through the pages, he called out for Leonardo, Raphael and Michelangelo. They showed up in the kitchen pretty soon.

"What is it, Sensei?" Mikey asked groggily.

"Your brother seems to have left a note here. Please give me a hand in translating."

16 minutes and seven seconds later, the four family members looked at each other, surprised, chocked and frightened. The first one talking was Raphael.

"Darn."

Oh yes, darn indeed. Now they are in trouble... or maybe Don's in the most trouble, but he doesn't understand it, the poor fool. I made Don write their names in that weird way because that's how it'd look if a Swede would spell the names as they are pronounced (in English). I might have exaggerated it a little… okay, I have exaggerated it a lot.

1. Sorry, Master Splinter!

2. I am sorry! I didn't mean to hurt your feelings! Dyed hair is nothing to feel ashamed of! Please, don't hurt me!

3. New York really is an interesting city.

4. It'd be fun to explore it a bit further – for example, I haven't had a look at the Liberty Statue yet – but that'll have to wait until some other time. I'm actually starting to long back to the North!

5. I guess the fastest way to get home would be to travel by plane.

6. But I've got no money for that. And it's hard to sneak aboard on a plane without getting discovered. Probably, it'd be less complicated to become a stowaway on a boat. And it's easier to get to the dock than to the airport.

7. But as soon as I try to talk with them, they just look at me funnily.

8. Dear Master Splinter, Michelangelo, Leonardo and Raphael,

Thanks for letting me stay with you for a while. I have appreciated to be able to share your daily life and your spectacular culture, and you have been very friendly. However, I have become homesick. I must return to my native country and my roots, rather sooner than later – nothing is like a Christmas in Sweden. Therefore, I have packed my stuff and left. I know that you understand and accept my decision.

Merry Christmas, and thank you for everything.

/ Donatello

Ps. I took the liberty to bring the pizza leftovers in the fridge for provisions.