I actually started this story about three years ago but didn't know how I was going to end it until recently. It's set during season 4 of the 2k3 series after "Samurai Tourist" and immediately before "The Ancient One".

Song lyrics are from "Kryptonite" by Three Doors Down. This story originally featured the song "Bones" by Little Big Town, but I heard "Kryptonite" on the radio when I was driving to work a few weeks ago and realized I had to use it. :)

Kryptonite

I took a walk around the world to ease my troubled mind
I left my body lying somewhere in the sands of time
I watched the world float to the dark side of the moon
I feel there's nothing I can do

It was as if some magnetic pole had shifted, making him the center. Ordinarily, he wouldn't mind – might even relish the thought of being the center of things for a change – but it felt wrong, like a compass pointing west. Even the ground felt different beneath his feet. He felt heavier and more solid, feeling a new gravity as his brothers started to walk behind him instead of Leo, looked at him in the middle of a training session. Responsibility was a heavy weight.

Raphael growled under his breath and turned over aggressively in his hammock, giving the blanket a violent yank. Stupid Leo. If he wasn't being such a colossal jerk, I might be able to sleep.

It might have been true, but it wasn't fair to his brother. Leonardo had been steadily withdrawing, drifting away since the Shredder had finally been defeated, and now Raphael was beginning to wonder if the family might lose him.

Even Usagi's visit hadn't helped. When they had first met the samurai, Leo's entire family had been surprised at how quickly the Rabbit had been included in Leo's small but solid group of close friends. Leonardo was friendly, but he had a cautious nature and he did not give his unreserved trust easily, nor was he quick to form deep friendships. The ronin had been the exception to the rule. Raph had hoped Usagi's calm, steady manner – and outside perspective – would be able to help his brother. But nothing had changed. If anything, things had gotten worse.

Don and Mikey knew what was happening, but they couldn't do anything to stop it. They had both tried to reach out to Leo multiple times, but had been calmly and coldly rebuffed, something that had never happened before. If there was one truth about Leonardo, it was that he was keenly attuned to his brothers. When Mikey's playfulness couldn't reach him, Donny was there with his understanding and friendship. And the times when Leonardo's heart couldn't be reached by Don and Mike, Raph was there to help him blow off steam with a sparring session or, once in a rare while, just sit with him with their shoulders barely touching as his older brother sorted out his thoughts.

Not this time.

Not this Leonardo.

Truth be told, though, this time Raphael had taken a decidedly hands-off approach to the changes in Leo's attitude. This hadn't gone unnoticed by Don and Mikey. He knew they wanted to ask him about it, but he had studiously ignored Donatello's probing glances and Michelangelo's hurt confusion. He knew their big brother just wasn't ready for it. Leo thought he was walling himself off, but he had never been able to hide anything from Raphael, and the red-masked Turtle knew that the time for him to intervene hadn't yet come.

It didn't stop them from dropping hints, though. Even April had pulled him aside a couple months ago, a few days after their camping trip downriver.

"I think I know what Leo's problem is," she had said. "Or at least part of it."

"You mean besides the fact that his skull seems to be about ten inches thick?"

April didn't rise to the bait. "Raph…what exactly happened on Shredder's space ship?"

Her question surprised him. Certainly he had never told the full story – throwing himself headlong into the arms of death while his father and brothers died around him wasn't something he wanted to talk about – but he had been certain one of the others would tell her. And he could have sworn she and Leonardo had had some discussion about it. "Leo didn't tell you?"

She shook her head. "He started to, but that was the night we met the Y'Lyntian mer-people." Her mouth twisted wryly. "Blowing up a nuclear cooling tower kind of put a damper on our conversation. I've tried to talk to him since then but he's been avoiding me. I think I got the gist what happened but I want to hear it from you."

Raphael swallowed thickly. He wasn't keen on digging up the memories he'd (rather unsuccessfully) tried to bury, but April deserved to know; not only because she and Casey had taken care of his family – no questions asked – when they could hardly take care of themselves after the battle...but because she was family, too.

He forced himself to look her in the eye instead of dropping his gaze. "We couldn't beat the Shredder. He's…he was too strong. So we decided to blow the ship to hell." April paled visibly but didn't interrupt. He gave a humorless chuckle, shaking his head. "Once the little bug took off in his ship I think we realized we might not be coming back. Well, at least I think Leo and I did. Mikey and Don wouldn't think that way, and Master Splinter…I sometimes think he thought he might buy it, but I know he wasn't counting on us cashing in our chips."

The look on April's face communicated clearly that she thought defeating the Shredder was not worth sacrificing their lives, but she refrained from saying anything. Instead, she prompted him to continue. "But you survived."

"Barely. The Utrom saved us. Froze everything in a time stasis field and transported us the shell outta there. I could see the fireball, though. Feel the heat. One second I see death coming at me, and the next I'm surrounded by aliens."

He broke off then, gritting his teeth as he struggled to tamp down the memory once more. The air seemed suddenly thick with the smell of singed fur. He could hear Mikey's teeth grinding together, choking back a cry as he tried to move his fractured legs. Pain roared to life in fiery streaks along his sides as his own broken ribs and cracked shell shifted when he tried and failed to sit up. Don's unsteady footsteps sounded unnaturally loud in the sudden silence as he managed to stagger to his feet, off-balance as his right arm hung limp at his side. Don yelped a little but kept going, because Leo...Leo was face-down on the cold metal deck, fingers curled in a bone-crushing grip around the hilts of his katanas, refusing to let go even as he gasped raggedly for air, even as blood spread in a steaming red pool as it flowed from his side.

"Leo!" The name tore out of Raph's throat, sounding more like a growl than an actual spoken word. He gave his body a sharp twist. The pain whited out his vision and something between a gasp and a snarl escaped his clenched teeth, but when he could see again, he was on his hands and knees. He couldn't stand – his trembling limbs wouldn't support him – so he crawled toward his bleeding brother. His ears hummed – but no, the humming was coming from somewhere above him, and the familiar silhouettes of Utrom on their hover pads were filling the air, swirling over his family in distressed loops. The aliens descended around Leonardo like a flock of ungainly birds, gently but insistently forcing Don back, and Leo was carried off, leaving only a cooling, congealing scarlet puddle behind.

And then Raph hated them, because he was desperately afraid that they had stolen his last moments with his brother. He bared his teeth in a furious grimace as he struggled to rise, but his hand slipped in his own blood. His plastron hit the deck with a thud. His broken body screamed, sparks blasted his vision, and the only sound he could hear was his own thundering heartbeat.

A small, warm hand on his arm jolted him out of the swirl of rage and blood. If April was frightened by his violent wrench away from the unexpected touch, she didn't show it. Instead she looked at him with eyes filled with compassion and understanding.

"Leo thinks he failed you. If the Utrom had showed up just a fraction of a second later…" She stopped when her voice trembled, taking a deep breath before continuing. "I think he's starting to hate himself for not being able to save you."

"That's a bunch of bull. We were in it together. We always are. Since when is it up to him to save our shells?"

She tilted her head, giving him a look that said she knew better and she knew he did, too. "To him? Since always."

Raph had been tossing and turning in the oppressive silence of night for hours, so long that when the first miniscule sound reached his ears it seemed loud as a gunshot. He froze, holding his breath. No further sounds reached his keen ears, but he could sense someone moving, and he had a pretty good idea of who it was. He dropped noiselessly to the ground and crept to his bedroom doorway, taking advantage of the shadow as he looked out into the dimly lit living area.

A familiar silhouette was just slipping silently into the pool in the center of the room. Raphael paused just long enough to grab his pair of night-vision goggles – thank you, Donny – and just as silently glided across the floor and into the pool.

I watched the world float to the dark side of the moon
After all, I knew it had to be something to do with you
I really don't mind what happens now and then
As long as you'll be my friend at the end

His brother's image registered clearly in his vision as he drifted through the waterways, leaving barely a ripple in his wake. It was hard to keep up – Leonardo was swimming fast, while Raphael had to slide along the edges of the pipes and stay in the shadows. He thought Leo might be heading for the river, but he took an abrupt left through a narrow pipe coming from a storm sewer. Raph barely fit through the opening, gritting his teeth when his shell scraped against the concrete. Just when he thought his lungs would burst, the vision field in his goggles grew brighter as light filtered in from somewhere. He stopped moving and slowly let himself be buoyed up until his head broke through above the waterline.

He had no need for the goggles anymore. The soft sound of dripping water echoed around the half-full pipe. He could hear the faint hum of late-night traffic. Above him, a wide grate spanned the top of the tunnel. Raphael immediately recognized where he was…it was a sidewalk grate downtown. Through the grate, the New York City skyline could be seen shooting up against a sky bleached yellow-gray from the city lights, overwhelming the stars.

Over at the edge of the pipe, Leonardo was just pulling himself out of the water to sit slumped on the edge of a concrete walkway. Light from the street lamps glistened off his wet skin, draping him in distorting blocks of orange and black as the glow beamed through the sewer grate.

Well, Leo, looks like now's the time we're gonna have that discussion I threatened you with, Raphael thought grimly. Making no more effort to be silent, he emerged from the shadows, swimming casually over to where his brother was sitting.

Leo looked up at once, tensing in readiness for battle. The tension stayed even after he recognized the swimmer, but it was defensive rather than offensive. Raph decided to ignore it.

"I didn't hear anyone following me," Leo said, almost accusingly.

Raph smirked. "Did anyone ever tell you I was a ninja?"

Leo turned away, refusing to be baited. "I want to be alone, Raph."

"I want to talk. Looks like one of us is gonna be disappointed." Raphael hoisted himself up to sit next to his brother, dangling his feet in the water.

"Go back to the lair. You need your sleep. You haven't quit tossing and turning since you went to bed."

"You were listening?"

"You were noisy."

"You need a new hobby."

Leonardo ignored him, tilting his head back to stare up through the grate at the sky. He didn't visibly move as Raphael sat next to him, but somehow when the red-masked Turtle settled, their shoulders didn't touch like they usually did.

This was going to be harder than he thought. "Listen…you gotta talk to me, man," he ventured. "You got a problem. We can all see it. I mean…you've been acting like me lately, and as flattering as that is, you can't pull it off like I can."

No response. Well, that wasn't a surprise. Teasing had never gotten anyone very far with Leo. It was time for some serious offensive measures. It was time for the truth.

"Leo, things ain't been the same since we got rid of Shredder. You're not the same. You don't smile any more, and you've been acting like the rest of us ain't even here – unless you're yelling at us. And what's more, you've been fighting dirty during our training sessions. Don't think I haven't noticed. That's not like you at all. Where's all that honor you're always going on about?"

"I do what I have to in order to protect the family," Leonardo said tightly. "Our enemies don't fight with honor, so why should I?"

"Shut up!" Raphael cut in. "Snap out of it! This isn't about them, Leo, it's about you! What the hell is wrong with you? We won! Why can't you just let it go?"

"Because you died, Raph!" Leo's harsh outburst tore out of his throat and scraped against the walls of the echoing concrete corridor. "You died, all of you! After Karai stabbed me – that was a fatal wound. I could feel it. I was dying, and the Shredder was going to slaughter the rest of you. And the only way to save you from him was to take you down with me. I failed you all."

Raph swallowed hard, staring at his brother in stunned silence.

Leo slumped forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he buried his face in his hands, dragging in a ragged breath. "And no matter what I do, no matter how much I fight, it's never enough. How long have we been at war with the Purple Dragons? With the Foot? We chip away at them, but it's not enough. I'm not enough. And someday I'm not going to be ready, and they'll murder us all."

Slowly, carefully, Raph extended his hand and very gently rested his palm over the deep gouge in his brother's shell that had been carved out by the Shredder. Leo flinched slightly when he felt the touch but made no move to dislodge him.

"Hey…Leo…We didn't have a choice."

"There's always a choice. I chose wrong." His voice sounded as if it had been dragged over broken glass. "I ordered Don to blow the ship, and he did. Didn't question me, didn't ask why – he just did it. I ordered him to kill himself. All of you. And none of you questioned me, and I was wrong. If the Utrom hadn't shown up when they did, we'd all be dead and the Purple Dragons would be ruling the city without anyone to stop them. Because you obeyed me. Because I couldn't defeat him."

Raph could feel Leo's control fraying like an old rope, snapping one weathered strand at a time. "No...that's not – "

Leo rounded on him then, so suddenly that Raph flinched back in spite of himself. "Why didn't you fight me?" he snarled. "Why, Raph? I ordered you to die! Is that what you want? You're constantly fighting me, you never listen, and when the order is suicide you jump right in?" His hand shot out and gripped the top ridge of Raph's plastron, giving his brother a sharp shake. "You should have tried to stop me!"

Raph tensed, feeling the reflexive surge of defensive ire boiling up in his chest – but the wild, desperate look in his brother's eyes checked it. No matter what Leo said, he didn't blame Raph. There was no blame in his burning gaze; only confusion and self-loathing.

No, looking into Leo's eyes, feeling the blunt pain of fingers digging in to the sensitive skin of his throat, Raphael wasn't angry. He wasn't angry because he understood. He knew what it was like to feel rage raking its claws against your insides, hearing the wild howls of fury until they drowned out everything else and swept you along in the gale.

Rage made Raph strong. He had learned – okay, was learning – to ride the crests of the wild waves of his soul instead of drowning in them. But Leo...Leo's strength was his ability to still the winds, find his center, make the roiling ocean smooth as glass. No matter how violently he'd had to fight, his skill came from a place of inner peace. And now when he reached for his center...there was nothing. Only turbulent fury and a sense of failure. His soul had lost its anchor, and it was only a matter of time before Leonardo violently imploded like a dark and dying star.

You call me strong, you call me weak
But still your secrets I will keep
You took for granted all the times I never let you down
You stumbled in and bumped your head
If not for me, then you'd be dead
I picked you up and put you back on solid ground

He took a cold breath, locking eyes with his brother. "None of us wanted to die, Leo. But when it came down to it…we were okay with it. We'd go together. You think any one of us wanted to be left behind?" Raph swallowed hard and held his breath until the harsh knot in his chest uncurled just a little so his voice would be steady. "If I've gotta go out, I'm going out fighting. And if I'm fighting, well...it's gonna be with you."

Leo's grip on Raphael's plastron tightened painfully for just an instant before his hand relaxed. No longer gripping now, his fingers were splayed out, pressing against the smooth goldenrod plating. The blue-masked turtle bowed his head. His shoulders shuddered as his chest unlocked and he took a breath, hand sliding away from Raph's shell.

The brothers sat side-by-side for several minutes. The only sound was the chilly trickle of water against concrete, echoing softly in the tunnel. The wail of a siren pierced the air somewhere above and a police car flashed past, briefly illuminating the turtles with brilliant blue and red light.

When Leo spoke again, the anger was gone, but the bitterness that had laced his words for months was was left in its wake. "You don't understand. Every time – every time I fought the Shredder, I failed. I never once defeated him. It doesn't matter that he's gone. There's always someone else trying to tear us apart. It's only a matter of time before there's someone I can't defeat. And that...that can't happen. Everything I do is all for nothing if I can't protect my family."

Raph's heart sank like a stone. He had never heard his brother's voice sound so bleak. Leo had made a tactical decision to defeat the undefeatable enemy by sacrificing himself...and along with himself, the ones he had vowed to protect with his life. He had had to choose between victory and certain death, or surrender and very likely a slow, excruciatingly painful death. It didn't matter that they had been saved; the choice haunted him and would not let him rest.

Leo inhaled sharply and rose to his feet. "I should go back," he said, all cut glass and barbed wire. "Master Splinter wants to start my katana lesson first thing."

Raph jumped up as his brother – his best friend – walked past, hands clenched in impotent fists. "The Shredder's gone now, Leo," he said, voice low but rough. "He almost took you from us once. Don't let him take you now."

Leo stopped and bowed his head. For a brief moment, Raph thought he might turn...but the slumped shoulders straightened and his flat voice echoed coldly off the damp walls. "Don't stay up too late. Weapons practice for everyone tomorrow." He slipped noiselessly into the water and disappeared beneath the surface. Not a single ripple disturbed the surface.

And just like that, Raphael was alone. The door he thought he'd managed to wedge open had just slammed back in his face. He leaned back against the side of the tunnel and slid down the curved wall to sit heavily on the ground, feeling the vibrations thrum along his shell as it rubbed against the concrete.

Despair curled in a painful, cold lump in the pit of his stomach. Don and Mike were wrong: he didn't know what to do. Not this time. He let his head fall back against the wall and stared up through the grate. The half-lit windows of the office building across the street reflected in his amber eyes, but his gaze wasn't on the city. Instead, he saw a snug farmhouse and a worn but sturdy wooden barn surrounded by snow-covered pines.

"I was gonna ask you what you were doing out here."

"Nothing."

"That's too bad, because I know exactly what you should be doing, and I think you do, too."

For the first time in days, Leo smiled.

They didn't talk much while they worked. Raphael brought water to cool the metal, kept the fire hot, and did the heavy lifting, but Leonardo did the actual shaping of the new blades himself. His movements were slow, shortened by pain and hampered by having his left arm bandaged to his plastron, but he didn't stop and Raph didn't step in to help. He watched his brother carefully and picked up the mallet every time the heavy hammer slipped from Leo's slowly strengthening fingers...but he let him work.

At least, he let him work until the fine tremors turned coarse and the sweat beading on his face started dampening his mask and running down his neck. "Okay, Fearless. Let's take a break." He knew he'd made the right call when Leo nodded and set down his tool, wiping the sweat from his face.

They stepped away from the hot forge and moved outside, breath steaming in the brisk winter air. Raph brushed the snow from a low wooden bench by the barn and they both sat. "I should probably get us some water."

"What for?" Leo asked lightly. He bent slightly and scooped up a handful of pristine, new-fallen snow. Raph smirked and started munching on his own fistful of snow. Leo's slightly labored breathing eased as they rested. He paused halfway through his second snowball and cleared his throat. "Raph. Thanks." Raph just grunted and elbowed his brother in the side, but it made Leo grin.

Another moment or two of silence passed, then Leo spoke again. "Hey, Raph?"

Raph turned his head just in time for Leo to push his handful of snow into his face. The red-masked Turtle glowered at his snickering brother. "I suppose," he sputtered darkly through a mouthful of frozen ice crystals, "this means break time is over."

It took nearly three weeks of heating and folding the steel to purify it to Leo's satisfaction, and an additional fortnight to finish shaping, sharpening, and polishing the blades. By the time the blades were ready to be fitted into the hilts, Leo had the use of both his arms and his injuries had all but healed.

Raph brought over the blue leather strips to wrap the hilts, but Leo waved them away. "Hang on. I want to start with those," he said, gesturing to the workbench. All four of the brothers had spent time in the modified workshop maintaining their weapons, and evidence of their labor was spread across the wide wooden table. Raphael looked where Leo was pointing and went very still.

He paused for a second or two, then crossed the room and brought back the box of red leather he'd used on his sai.

Leo carefully wrapped a single crimson strip around each wooden tsuka before padding them with overlapping layers of blue leather. When he was finished, he looked up to see Raph watching him, arms crossed. His brother's face was impassive, but the expression in his eyes was fierce and deep and warm. One side of Leo's mouth lifted in a gentle smile.

Raph snorted and looked away, uncrossing his arms and looking toward the house. "You finally done? I'm getting hungry."

Leo chuckled. "Yeah, I'm done. Let's go back to the house. I think April said something about pot roast." He carefully sheathed the new blades and set them aside. "Don't tell the guys they're finished yet, okay?"

Raph waved his hand dismissively. "Yeah, yeah, you can do the big reveal later. Come on, let's go."

Neither brother ever mentioned the red leather again, but they never forgot it was there.

The rumble of a passing eighteen-wheeler brought Raphael jarringly out of his memory and he shut his eyes against the fresh stab of loneliness. Leo's spirit had been badly shaken after his brush with death at the hands of the Foot four years before but Raphael had seen his brother's struggle and was able to help him find himself again. But this time, Leo wasn't reaching for help. He had drawn his fury around himself in a barrier as impenetrable as the armor the Shredder had worn.

If I go crazy, then will you still call me Superman?
If I'm alive and well, will you be there, holding my hand?
I'll keep you by my side with my superhuman might
Kryptonite

Raph took a deep breath and stood, face set in a look of grim determination. Leo couldn't go on like this much longer. Something was going to have to give. His brother was going to fall – that much was inevitable. He just prayed he'd be there to catch him before he hit the ground.

He slipped off the ledge into the water and started swimming back to the lair. Following Leo.

Always following Leo.

A/N: I don't know where they would have gotten the leather for the hilts. Of course, if you want to be picky, there's really no way Leo would have been able to make new swords with the materials he had anyway...but the TV series assumes we'll employ our suspension of disbelief and just go with it, so I hope my friendly readers will do the same thing. Thanks for reading!