Lost in the Fight

Chapter 13 - Finding Donnie

Maybe sticking old Fearless Leader with a sai wasn't such a bad idea . . .

Craning his neck to peer around the pile of crates and cement slabs that they were taking refuge behind, Leonardo studied the warehouse with careful scrutiny, taking every observation he made into account. Just as Raph had suspected, the oldest turtle was completely lost in the planning process. He was currently sifting through the various ideas materializing in his head, categorizing and ranking the feasible ones accordingly, while at the same time, mentally eliminating those that had the highest likelihood of failure or were too dangerous to even consider attempting.

Though Leo was trying to focus all of his concentration on sorting through and weighing their options, his attention was suddenly captured by the windows of the warehouse and he felt a pang of worry seep into his thoughts. One of the first things that he had noticed about the building was that a majority of the glass window panes lined up near the roofline of the warehouse had been busted out. Leonardo, Raphael, and Michelangelo were only about twenty feet away from the building at this point and there were barely any windows left intact to act as a sound barrier, but yet, they hadn't heard any noise come from the warehouse. If Donnie was inside of the building with whoever had taken him, why hadn't they heard anything?

Unless they knew we were coming . . .

The silence was unnerving. Much like the uneasy silence that had come from Master Splinter just after Leo had been forced to tell his father why he had gotten that unusual text message from Donatello.

The memory of his father's reaction to the news made Leonardo cringe in his shell.

Shortly after the three brothers had left the junkyard to track down Donnie, Leo had received a call from Master Splinter, who had been looking for an explanation for the mysterious message that he had received from his missing son. Once Leo had gotten over his initial shock that his father had actually had his T-phone on and had figured out how to read the text message, he then had to inform Sensei what the message had meant and what they had found in Donatello's duffle bag. Telling Master Splinter what they had discovered at the junkyard had been almost as hard as having to tell his father that he had hit Donnie. Leo could still hear the tragic way that Master Splinter had gasped out the words 'my son' just after he had told him about the piece of carapace that had been left for them to find, but what had been even worse to hear was the prolonged sound of silence that had followed his father's gasp. At least a full minute had passed before either of them could speak again and when Master Splinter's voice did return to him, it had been unusually quiet as he had spoken his last words of their brief conversation.

"Please . . . bring your brother home, Leonardo."

The oldest turtle had heard the desperation and fearfulness in his father's voice as he had made his heartfelt plea. Leonardo could have also sworn that he had heard disappointment coming through in his father's words. Whether that disappointment that Master Splinter had been feeling was in himself for not being there to help rescue Donatello or if it had been in Leonardo for what he had done to cause all of this, the turtle in blue was not sure. Not that it really mattered. Either way, Leonardo still felt nothing but shame.

The oldest turtle shook his head from side to side when he thought of the last words that he had said to his father before abruptly ending the phone exchange.

"I swear on my honor, I will find him, father. I will not return home until I do."

The vow had been made with as much passion and conviction as Leonardo could call upon, but it still did not feel as though it had been enough. After all of the hurt that Leo had caused Donnie, the eldest son worried that his father might think that his words were nothing more than an empty promise, spoken out of guilt. And how could Leo blame Master Splinter for thinking the worst of him when he had failed his father and brothers so badly?