Broken Sword, Broken Spirit
After his encounter with The Shredder, Leonardo was left gravely battered.
His swords no more.
Now, as his son's blood scent pierced his nose and aching heart while apologetic, feverish cries drowned his ears, Splinter couldn't help but foolishly wonder which of the two—weapon or warrior—was more broken.
It was an image that would haunt his old soul for the rest of his life.
Splinter would never forget it. The sight of his son being thrown through Miss O'Neil's window, of his unconscious body brutally landing on the floor and lying spread out on top of scattered shards of glass like a disposable marionette. He would never forget the scent of his poor boy's blood that made his stomach twist and whirl, the tips of his hair stand up straight, and his heart prick with so, so much pain. Pain from the cruelty his once strong, radiant son endured, leaving him battered, bloody and broken.
He had a feeling his son's spirit wasn't the only broken thing in that instance; the once proudly wielded Katana swords were nowhere to be seen.
But the swords were the least important thing then. Because in that moment, when the name of a revengeful shadow of the past crawled out of dry, bloody lips. When three scared children circled in protectively on their poor brother—while perhaps seeking some kind of protection themselves. When the innocent woman turned to him with shock and horror in her eyes—that she shouldn't had been experiencing to begin with—searching the wise rat's face for calmness, guidance, control. His body failed to restrain the equal amount of shock and horror that appeared clear as day on his visage.
The moment he heard his name, the sensation of his blood flow ceasing in his feet wasn't even what bothered him. What truly perturbed him was that, for the first time in his life, he didn't dare move from where he stood. Not even to attempt to keep order in such dire, chaotic times. Not even to urge his family to hurry and escape through the door and out of the apartment as fast as possible.
Not even to approach his beaten child, who lay motionlessly in front of him with all the life sucked out of his face. Not a single step.
And in that moment, he truly hated himself.
Leonardo would've reacted much faster, would've been more efficient. He was almost certain of it.
And that made him hate himself even more—as a sensei, and as a father.
If only he hadn't let his son leave the apartment for his morning run. If only he had listened to his gut feeling, the one that kept persistently telling him something horrible was about to befall them. If only he had done something, anything to prevent this. But here they were. And now, his entire family was in grave danger.
Not his family. Anything but his family.
As Splinter helped April maneuver a nearly unconscious Leonardo behind the couch, several Foot soldiers broke through and shattered the remaining windows, entrapping him and his entire family like a pack of blood thirsty wolves, and so, he fought with all his might to keep the wolves at bay.
An entity born from immense grief and fear possessed the old rat during that fight, for he was ready to take a life if it meant keeping his loved ones safe. He couldn't—wouldn't lose his family. Not again.
Time felt like an angry sea storm washing through the old ninja master as he went from fighting Foot Ninja in April's living room to fending them off at the top of the staircases using two wooden spindles he had ripped out with his own, bare paws, all in an attempt to clear and maintain a safe path for April to aid Leonardo downstairs and through the antique shop. That wasn't until after he had encountered the Foot Elite—the deadly assassins he immediately knew were responsible for the state his son was in—within the shop and warned his sons about them before switching places with Raphael upstairs. The sounds of clashing metal, painful howls and bodies slamming into one another and all over the place—both from the enemies and from his sons—were engraved into his mind like a record on loop.
At some point, after the shop's door was harshly broken down, Splinter found himself face to face with the one responsible for sending those assassins after his son, the one behind this cowardly ambush. The one that took his beloved Master Yoshi from him.
The one he thought he had killed that night.
Yet, there he was, more powerful than ever. And very much alive.
He never thought he would have to confront that murderer again, but there was no other way around it, especially when he had a family to protect. And especially when the murderer in question clearly had no problem taking the life of a child.
While the ninja master was preoccupied with The Shredder, he was grateful for the sudden appearance of their friend and ally, Casey Jones. More grateful than he had ever been for the young man, if he were to be honest. With Mr. Jones' assistance, he was able to concentrate on battling and momentarily knocking out The Shredder without having to worry as much for his sons' and April's safety; he was proven right when Casey stopped Hun from harming April and Leonardo just in time.
"Mikey, look!" Raphael yelled out all of a sudden, making Splinter's ears twitch toward his son's voice.
"Leo!" the orange-clad turtle cried out.
After overpowering yet another Foot soldier, Splinter risked a peek over his shoulder as he raised his stick in the air to block a sword attack. His heart pinched with both relief and concern when he registered the sight of Leonardo standing on his feet—or, at least, attempting to before crumbling weakly to the ground. But after deflecting the attack and taking out his adversary, the old rat fully turned around to find that his son was now in great danger; Shredder stood right above the hurt turtle, his claw raised in the air.
The image of his master's life being taken by the same monster, in the same manner, erupted in the father's eyes. And his heart screamed—
"No!" Splinter quickly jumped in to defend his son by sending the dishonorable enemy a violent kick in the chest. “You strike a wounded warrior,” Splinter spat out with the utmost hatred and disgust. “You have no honor!”
“I fight to win,” Shredder hissed venomously, like the snake that he was.
And just like that, another one on one fight broke out between the two. Despite Splinter giving all he got, Shredder still managed to get some pretty good hits on him. The prolonged duration of the fight must've finally started taking a toll on his old body. Before he could properly react, somehow, hard, metallic fists succeeded in knocking the air out of his lungs and sharp claws managed to graze the skin beneath his fur. He was growing increasingly sloppy with each move. He would've most likely gotten severely injured, or worse, if it weren't for—CRASH.
"Leonardo!" the old rat gasped out, his brow furrowed from heartache as his son collapsed into April's arms after having knocked over a cabinet full of china in front of The Shredder, creating a distance between his father and the enemy.
Even when wounded and barely clinging onto consciousness, his son still fought to keep his family safe, and that created a bubble of warmth in his father's chest, but even more so, it hurt him more than he could ever put into words. Splinter watched with sorrow as the remaining signs of awareness fled Leonardo's face, hanging limply in the woman’s arms. His head then snapped towards his other sons to discover them getting cornered by a large number of Foot soldiers, and it all became painfully familiar.
"No!” Splinter refused to allow his children to succumb to the same fate as his master’s. “I will not allow you to destroy my family!" he barked at the monster standing before him with heinous pride. "My sons, retreat!" he then loudly commanded before dodging a few hits and knocking over another cabinet, this time right on top of The Shredder, imprisoning him beneath it.
But as he turned to regroup with everyone, Splinter was shocked to find a fire that wasn't there before. Shock quickly turned into sheer terror as the flames reached up to the ceiling and danced around the shop as though they had a mind of their own, swirling around his family as they all bloodily screamed his name. Raphael, Donatello, Michelangelo, April and Casey—one by one, they were swallowed up by the hungry flames, the blaring cries for help ceasing all too suddenly. And all too painfully.
A sound of utter horror tore out of his dry throat as his walking stick slipped out of a trembling paw with a clatter, the scene that just unfolded before him finally hitting him like a solid brick as he nearly stumbled backwards over his own feet. He then quickly turned back toward where he had entrapped The Shredder, only to find that he was standing straight and had somehow gotten his hands on his wounded son, holding him in mid-air by a shoulder scute, not a single soldier in sight. Leonardo looked so pale, so vulnerable and so helpless as the tips of The Shredder's sharp claws slowly traced the turtle's bloody jaw, his head lolled to the side, his body fully limp… and his eyes closed a little too peacefully. The boy's eyes then open just barely, meeting his father's. He was making no physical effort to resist whatsoever.
Before Splinter could even think to lunge himself at The Shredder, he gasped aloud as two metal cuffs magically burst through the floorboard behind him and locked onto his wrists, bringing them close together behind his back as he was restrained in place thanks to the heavy chains connecting the cuffs to the floor. With gritted teeth, he pulled and pulled on the chains to try and liberate himself, but to no avail. During his attempt, his eyes returned to his son, then to the enemy. His old heart raced in his chest as panic overtook his body, heavily dreading what undoubtedly would happen next. As The Shredder clenched his free claw, the father started trashing around.
"No!" he screamed miserably. "Take my life, instead. Leave him be!" He dug the nails in his feet into the floorboard and kept on pulling and trashing, not caring if it would tear or break every fiber, every muscle, every bone in his body. Not caring for his dignity.
"Please, I beg!" Tears burned his eyes as his lungs crumbled in his chest.
Alas, no amount of screaming, pleading or begging would change the outcome, for The Shredder raised his free claw in the air and—SLASH.
The sound of flesh being monstrously torn was somehow worse than if someone had taken a thousand arrows and shot them through the rat's head.
Leonardo's pained, sharp gasp was caught off just as it came out, like a cassette broken in half, accentuated by heavy choking and sputtering of blood and, finally, low, wet gurgles. And they so happen to be the last sounds the boy made. Unnaturally wide eyes rolled back as the soul's unsettling way of declaring its departure. Stiff hands jerked sideways—as though still clinging onto a chance of safety—fell flat.
The old rat's heart may just had stopped right then and there—along with his son's—as he lost all sense of his surroundings.
A double-teethed claw ruthlessly ripped out of fleshy green painted in red, aggravating the damage.
A gut wrenching silence befell him, broken only by the sound of blood dripping from his child that not even the persistent rumbling of the flames could muffle. Not to the father's ringing ears.
Splinter stared with wide, watery eyes and numb legs as Shredder tossed away his son's… body. Leonardo landed on the ground with a thud, lifeless eyes staring off into nothing as crimson blood covered and smeared his plastron and throat, pouring over and onto the floorboard, creating a pool of brilliant red that kept enlarging beneath the unfortunate soul.
Splinter couldn't swallow, couldn't breathe. He felt violently nauseous. He didn't blink once, shocked, tearful eyes fixated on his child's dead body with an amalgamation of agony and disbelief.
Dead. His son was dead. And so was the rest of his family, he painfully reminded himself.
His legs finally gave out as he crumbled to the ground from the weight of it all. From the weight of this loss.
It was all too much. Too much.
The poor father fell to weakened knees as the chains clacked behind him, tears streaming down his face from wide, unblinking eyes. Feeling utterly helpless. And for a moment of time that he didn't have the capability to measure, it was just him, what remained of his child, the one who took everything from him and the endless popping and snapping of the fire surrounding them.
Oh, the pain may just had surpassed the one he felt for his master. Whom he had failed a long time ago.
These were his children. Not students. Not soldiers. His children!
And he had failed them. He had failed again. He had failed his family. He had failed the only good remaining things in his life as they were taken from him, just like that.
"I've warned you to say farewell to each other while you still could." The deep, mechanical voice echoed distantly in the poor rat's ears, but he didn't process it. How could he? When he couldn't even process his son's dead body laying in front of him.
The more Splinter stared, the more it felt like an invisible knife was being twisted in his chest. His eyes never left his son's, even if there was no more life behind them. No more. Trembling paws were feebly extended out as though it would magically make the boy reawaken and run into his father's arms, as though it would allow him to feel his child's embrace. Just one last time.
He wanted his children. He wanted them more than life itself, for they were his life. He might as well have been a dead rat from then on.
And death he would gladly accept.
The flames seemed to close in on them, but he couldn't bring himself to care, let alone notice. Either he was unaware or decided to ignore The Shredder approaching him, his claw—the one dripping with his child's blood—raised in the air to put the powerless rat out of his misery. And he didn't fight it, not that he could to begin with. If it meant no longer having to look at his dead son, if it meant reuniting with his children and the rest of his family, then so be it.
Splinter gasped as he looked around frantically. Where was The Shredder? Where was the fire? Where was—
A familiar, almost child-like feeble cry brought the old rat back to reality. His eyes went down to find his—very much alive—son lying on a couch with several blankets covering him. Realizing he was breathing rapidly, Splinter took a deep, shaky breath and looked around one more time in order to ground himself.
The farmhouse. The warm, crackling fire in the chimney. The contrasting, loud whistling of the snow storm just outside. Him persuading his sons and their adult friends to turn in for the night while he kept an eye on Leonardo, insisting on them getting some much needed rest due to how exhausted they all naturally appeared from the events of the day before.
He supposed he hadn't realized just how tired he was until he dozed off in a chair near the couch.
Splinter looked at the fire in the chimney one more time, contemplating the way the red and orange entity danced and moved, and an uneasy feeling in his stomach—along with ghost-like screams whispering in his mind—made him look away hurriedly. He swallowed hard and closed his eyes, but immediately reopened them with a sharp gasp as the image of his blood-covered son flashed before them. He clenched his chest but winced as he was reminded of the minor wounds beneath his fur inflicted by…
His breath stuttered in his throat as he brought up two fingers and rubbed the spot between his eyes.
"M'sorry… m'swords… I lost… m'swords…" Leonardo's lethargic apology shifted his father's focus and broke his heart. "M'sorry…" Splinter spotted tears rolling down the sides of his son's face and onto his pillow, having been stripped of his mask and gear shortly after having returned to them from his comatose state.
The father also remembered the fever that began to rise in his son earlier during his shift and retrieving a bowl of water and some cloth.
Even in his shaken state, Splinter hushed his son and brushed some of the tears off his flushed visage with a trembling thumb. He swallowed against the scent of blood traces that were still left on Leonardo's body as he weren't cleaned up thoroughly nor bandaged yet; Casey and April promised to go to the nearest town the following morning to buy all the necessary items to treat Leonardo. So far, Donatello had only managed to remove the tiny glass shards embedded in his brother's scaly skin using an old pair of tweezers he had discovered in one of the rooms, after cleaning it up that is. The lack of any pained reaction from the fast asleep boy during the procedure was too unnerving for the old father.
"It is alright, my son," Splinter whispered soothingly despite the awful lump in his throat, his voice wavering with each word despite his best efforts. "I know how much those swords mattered to you." He felt tears stinging his own eyes. "But you matter to us more."
The image of a bloody Leonardo lying lifelessly on the ground with soulless eyes and encircled by flames struck in the old rat's mind like thunder, making it hard to breathe all over again, let alone speak. That image was still so vivid; he would see to deal with it during meditation. Swallowing, he cupped his son's feverish cheek, as though to reassure himself that the boy was indeed alive. "You matter to me more," he barely whispered.
"M'sorry…" the boy weakly cried as more tears seeped through his closed eyes.
Splinter finally broke down. "I am sorry, as well." He lowered his head, tears escaping his closed eyes. "I am so sorry, my child."
Sorry that he had to face those dishonorable assassins alone. Sorry for not having killed The Shredder when he thought he had. Sorry for all the pain he and this family had endured. Sorry for the loss poor April had suffered. Sorry for never mentioning that demon to his sons and keeping them in the dark until it was too late. For all that, he was terribly sorry.
Tears were now pouring from his eyes as he clung to his son's covered body, refusing to ever let go.
He hadn't cried like this since the day his master passed away.
He should’ve… He should’ve made sure The Shredder was truly gone that night. He should’ve verified he had succeeded in killing him. Perhaps then, his son wouldn’t had gotten so severely injured, and April wouldn’t had lost her apartment.
No. It wasn't real. His son was alive. Alive and recovering. He was right here in his embrace. His family was still whole. They were safe and sound. Everything was going to be alright.
To think that just a couple months ago, his sons were safely hidden in the deepest pits of the sewers. Shielded from the monstrosities of the world. And a selfish part of Splinter wished he could go back to the way things were. Wished he could go back to the days where their lives were restricted to the walls of their home, where the lessons he taught them was all they were ever preoccupied with, where their father's rath was what they feared most. Where they were constantly under his watch, not jumping from roof top to roof top, soaring through the night skies of a city unaware of their existence—up until now.
He felt and heard a soft, wet gasp escape his son before he calmed down enough to go back to a hopefully blissful and healing sleep. Splinter blinked away the remaining tears in his eyes then picked up the washcloth nearby and dipped it in the bowl of water sitting on the only side-table in the room before squeezing it. Gently, he layed it on his son's forehead. His gaze never left his child's scaly, bruised and scratched tear-stained face as he caressed his cheek.
The father drew in a shaky breath.
He had not yet lost his family, and as long as there was breath in his body, he will protect them with his life.
And while he knew vengeance lead to no good, he swore to make The Shredder pay for whenever next time he got the chance, and that was a desire he had no intention of sharing with his sons. And if—when that time comes, he would make sure to personally put an end to him.
So originally, I was going to make this into some sort of "the swords Leo wields used to belong to Yoshi" headcanon but switched to just tormenting the rat dad with a nightmare of his kid actually dying that night LMAO. Hence, the title.
