Disclaimer: ..It's a good thing that I don't own the Turtles. Just sayin'.

A/n: Hello. Do you remember me? Do you remember this fic? I do. I was updating descriptions and uploading some stories when I stumbled upon this. As I was scanning through this (truthfully, I was uploading it to another site) when I realized how horrible the last two chapters were. (And how badly I needed a beta or that I needed to learn how to spell some words.) So I decided to rewrite them. Most of it is the same, but I assure you that this time, it won't be an almost-sort-of-deathfic like before. I deleted the old chapters, so now you can focus on this one. I figured that Donnie needed some real closure and thought the ending fit this time. I hope I don't disappoint you guys like last time. Also, yes, I realize how dense Mikey seems to be. I'm sorry for that. My perception of him changes, now, but my excuse could be that he pretends to be stupid when he's not. Regardless, I hope you enjoy this updated version.

Dust flew, everything around them scorching, waves of intense heat rolling off of the helmets, nerves rattled, and a strong, steady, consistent pounding in their heads. They landed sourly on their shells, softening their fall for only fraction. Stiffly, the purple masked terrapin got up, unfastening the buckle beneath his chin, the leather feeling as hot as spilled coffee as he gripped underneath the helmet along the side, before wrenching it from his head, feeling like he was being suffocated. Inspecting his hand, he realized that he had burned himself, and he only half-registered this. He swallowed, before something gravelly constricted his throat. Coughing meaningfully, he spat out soot and looked at it blankly. "Never doing that again," Don whispered out hoarsely, wobbling to his feet and rubbing his hands across his legs, brushing the dust off. He coughed before placing a hand on his head and a fresh pain waved through him, and when he withdrew his hand he noticed small rivets of blood had coated it. "Great, just great." He muttered, wiping his burned hands across his legs, hoping to smear the blood off, only resulting in a bigger mess. "Not my brightest of ideas but-"

"Don?" Don froze, his bandanna tails flapping loosely in the wind, and he turned slowly towards the voice. Oh shell, it sounded like- "Where are we?" -Mikey. The orange masked terrapin fumbled out from the crater in the wall. It looked like someone had taken a battery ram to it, someone could sit in it, if they were their size. Mikey patted at his shell, just below his shoulder, and brought back a hand of blood. He let out a small 'eep!' and waved his hand frantically away from him, spraying blood on the rubble at their feet.

Wait... rubble?

Don looked around, for a moment forgetting that Mikey was there, his grey eyes scanning around them. The whole place was trashed and didn't even look like their living room anymore. He sucked in a deep breath, his eyes frantically darting around. "Oh shell," he muttered out, causing Mikey to look up in alarm. "We're here. Home. Th...thirty years in the future... oh shell, oh please, no." He fell to his knees, arms hanging limply at his sides as he looked around dully with a fogged mind. He grabbed tightly on the rubble nearest the clutches of his hands, running it through his fingers absent-mindedly. "This... is the alternate dimension I had been sent to. This.. is place where I watched you all die." His voice cracked, and he tried to laugh, but it came out like a strangled sob. His eyes grew hazy and then he began to cry, letting all his emotions pour out, wrapping his arms around himself and rocking himself, his cries sounding like a dying cat's, tears and blood mixing on his cheeks before dripping down his chin.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Mikey's voice broke through Don's haze, although he still continued to mutter and cry. Don vaguely realized that Mikey was coming towards him. "We could have.. we could have comforted you, bro. You wouldn't have to be alone."

With a hiccup, Don hoarsely replied back, "I didn't want to be a burden. I didn't.. I didn't want you to feel my pain too. It's my fault you died anyways.. my fault. It had been my plan and- Mikey! Your poor arm, you poor arm had been chopped off.." He hiccuped again before bursting into tears again. He blundered on, not wanting to stop the words, now that they had started to spill. "Shredder ruled this world; this future. Raph lost his eye, Leo his sight, you.. your arm. Master Splinter was dead and.. I - I had gone missing! With me gone, all of this... all of this happened! None of you spoke to each other anymore. You.. you didn't smile, Leo didn't lead, but Raph, heh, he still caused fights, I guess." He forced a weak chuckle. "Besides the point, though, right?" He coughed, blinking through his tears. "I thought of a plan, I did. A plan to end their -Shredders and Karai's- and.. I got you all killed! It's my fault!" His head fell onto his open palms as he cried into it.

Mikey rushed forward, wrapping his arms around his immediate older brother, a fresh wave of pain rolling through his shoulder as he did so, but he would comfort his brothers, yes, at all costs. "Don't worry, bro," he said, his voice cracking and he frowned in displeasure before speaking again, "It's not really your fault. At least their dead, though, right? Shredder and.. Karai. Not us, although we are dead in this period, I guess. But it's not your fault. It was meant to happen, right? Couldn't save us any other way? Lemme guess, you teleported back just as soon as you finished killing them? Yeah, I see that look on your face. So you did, huh? Well, it happened for a reason. You went to that time period to save us. And you did, by ending his terror, dude. You saved us."

Don blinked up at Mikey, before smiling for the first time in weeks. "Y-Yeah.." Stretching his arms, he hugged Mikey, the scent of blood, sweat, and chocolate reaching his snout. Mikey returned the embrace, enjoying the heavy smell of coffee and oil off of Don, they continued to hug until a shadow fell over them.

They glanced up in alarm, reaching for their weapons before realizing they weren't there. Jumping apart they attempted to get into battle positions. The foot ninjas spread out in the ruins of the lair. "Oh, am I ruining this friendly little reunion? Good. We came to avenge our masters - Karai and Shredder. Prepare to die, turtles!"

"You really think that this'll work? We're even lucky that Leathehead had another copy. Did you see what happened to our living room?"

"Which is why we're doin' this in a tunnel. Now quite yer whining, Fearless."

"Let's just get this over with and rescue our brothers. I... I'm worried about what happened to them there."

"I'm sure ain't nothing happened to 'em."

"For their sake, I hope you're right."

Throwing wild punches, Mikey called out to Don, "Hey, dude! You holding up all right?!" He could hear Don grunt an affirmative somewhere near his right, despite the constant drone of the machine gun. "Good!" Blood pooled from his shoulder, spraying everything as he whipped around. His leg had begun to send waves of pain up his body, thousands of needles prickling through. It was all his fault, anyways, they were here because he wanted to show Don the teleportatoin device. He sighed, after knocking out another ninja; it was his fault, but he had gotten over it. It wouldn't scar him like it had scarred Donnie when he had come to this world.

He thought again of his brother, and turned around to go help his brother fight off the horde of the Foot ninja, his mouth opening when a soft voice uttered: "Your dead turtle." A gun was pointed towards his chest and he fell back, stumbling to get away, when a loud ringing filled the air, powder falling through the air, the bullet firing.

Mikey closed his eyes; waiting for impact. He waited a moment, but still he felt nothing.

Opening his eyes, the terrapin glanced ahead of him, and stared at Don's shell. Had Don caught it? His subconscious screamed at him the answer, but denial sunk in, it had already sunk in the moment he opened his eyes. The ironic thing was, Don was still standing there, teetering, just swaying there, before leaning sideways, and Mikey simply stared. Everything seemed so.. unreal. It couldn't be happening. This was just a dream. Just a dream. Just a dream.

Blood touched his foot and he glanced down before confirming that indeed; it iwas/i blood. Numbly, unseeing, he reached out for his fallen brother, sobs wracking through his chest, tears streaking down. "Oh sh-shell. Please, Don... no! Donnie, oh shell, why... why did you... why did-?" he cried out, his smooth palms reaching forward. Everything was fine before. Not even two hours again, everything was fine. Donnie had still been unaccepting, but fine; not fatally wounded. "Oh, shell, please, Donnie, don't do this to me. Who... who will I bug? Who... who will play video games with me?" He had sputtered the first thing that he thought of, and now out in the open, it sounded utterly stupid. "You can't be.. oh shell, please, NO. C'mon, don't do this to me, bro." Realization was sinking in. Don had saved him. Don had watched his own brothers -okay, alternate dimensional brothers, but still brothers- die, and Mikey was freaking when his brother was still alive, fatally wounded, but still alive? Oh shell, what had Donnie been through? It was like Mikey had been shot himself, his thoughts blown to smithereens, a hole where everything connected to his brother had been. His brother was dying and he could practically do nothing.

"I'm sorry."

Mikey blinked down in surprise, glistening tears slithering down his cheeks and falling onto Don's pale olive face, Don reached up with his bare hand and gently brushed the tears away. He smiled, shakily, blood spilling out at the corners of his mouth. Mikey hefted Don up some more, so that he could have been in a sitting position -if Don could've managed to support himself- but yet still Mikey clung to him, gasping out and crying. "No, Don, do-don't... apologize, dude. We're gonna pull through this! You aren't.. you aren't gonna die on me!" Mikey held Don closer, the foot ninja seeming to have decided that it was only Don they were after, and now that they had hit him, they simple didn't give a damn. "Donnie, please, ple-ase don't do this to me!"

"Mikey.. Don't cry for me. It's my fault you died. Anyways. I couldn't stand to see another one of my brothers die; not again, not by them." He took a shaky breath, before pressing his palm loosely against his side. His eyes glistened with unshed tears. "I understand now, Mikey. I was.. sent there for a reason. And I messed things up. I was.. supposed to know that I.. that it wouldn't be my fault. Dam.. damn Shredder. Betting that he... took me away... that's why it happened..." He chuckled, blood pooling on the plates of his plastron, large amounts dribbling down his mouth and chin, before weakly raising one of his hands to brush it aside like an annoying fly before grunting in pain. He no longer attempted to stop the bleeding. "It wouldn't be my fault, ever, Mikey. So don't think that this..." he gestured weakly to himself. "..was your fault either. It was meant to be, I guess. I proba-bly... would change it though, yeah. But... don't ever think it's your fault, Mikey. That'll... be my dying wish, okay? Don't.. don't ever think that this is your fault. I want you to be happy, Mikey. And I'm sorry, I didn't really break your Xbox or anything. Tell them I'm sorry too and.. and.." He closed his eyes briefly, taking in a shaky breath before smiling, a sad and heart wrenching smile. "...it's not their fault either. Don't let them believe that. Mikey, don't you believe it. Don't let... don't let them rule the world though, Karai and Shredder... Tell Leo and Raph I'm sorry too.."

"No, Don, you can tell them that," Mikey suddenly said, his heart pounding too loudly in his own chest, the pain wrenching through him, for him to even interrupt Don during his rant. "You can tell them... everything. Just don't... don't give up, okay?"

"Mik... ey... always been... one of my favorite brothers.. don't... ever forget that... love you," Don mumbled, smiling before reaching up to hug Mikey. That was what pained Mikey. His brother was dying and still trying to comfort him.

"I'm going to miss you," Mikey sobbed out.

"I... know..."

"You.. were always my favorite brother, dude."

Don smiled and gently released his grip on Mikey. Mikey arranged Don into a better position so that he could hold him in the crook of his arm. Mikey continued to sob as he listened to Don's labored breathing, the slowing drizzle of his blood, and watched his closing eyes. Mikey wanted to suddenly talk to Don, say how sorry he was, and everything he never got to do. Don suddenly but slowly opened his eyes, almost causing Mikey to drop him in surprise. There was a dying fire in his eyes, but that was all the hope that Mikey needed. Pressing his hands tightly against the wound, he applied a furious amount of pressure.

"Don, wait, no," he was gasping out, suddenly finding reason to not give up. "I know you can do this, I know you can make it... please, Donnie! Hang on ... j-just a while longer... okay?" Donnie blinked up coolly into his brother's bright blue eyes, seeing him in a great and fuzzy haze.

In Don's near-dying state, he could see Mikey. The older turtle was staring down at him, the flat disk applied to his missing arm, the torn bandanna fluttering loosely in the wind. For the first time, Donnie saw a small grin on the other's face. Even aged thirty years, this Mikey was the same Mikey. Distantly, he remembered that this wasn't the real Mikey staring down at him, holding him, applying pressure to his chest.

But then the older turtle smiled wider, despite the tears pouring down his cheeks, and for a hazed moment he saw the younger Mikey, screaming at him to hold on, but then the older Mikey phased back and gently shushed him.

"Don," he whispers. "Donnie, Don, Don." He's smiling and crying and hiccuping, as far as the olive terrapin could tell. "We forgive you." The hands on his chest are a bit tighter now, but Don doesn't care. "It wasn't your fault. You saved us... I'm so proud of you." A sudden relief flooded Donnie's eyes and then everything seemed right in the world. "Just hold on, Donnie. We're coming to get you. We're coming to bring you home; to bring you back to us." Don was closing his eyes, smiling through the haze and crying viciously.

Then multiple hands grabbed at him after a deafening boom and Donnie almost cried out that, 'no, Mikey, wait' but the darkness grips him before he can hear an answer.

Through the fleeting moments of consciousness, he feels his body moving, warping through time and space, and hurried whispers. He thinks he sees green and bright colors but he isn't sure because he faded back into darkness once more. He wakes up again when he feels himself being dropped gently, a gentle gruff voice overlapping whoever else was speaking. Everything was fuzzy and unknown to Don until he faded again into nothingness.

The last time he woke, it was to sleeping bodies around him. "He's awake," Leatherhead roars, softer than usual so as to not disturb Don, but then the others are nudged awake and sleepily hug him, apologizing and sobbing and asking him questions.

Don dazedly answers most of their questions, and when he leans back to go to sleep to let his wounds heal, he sees his brothers stand back, smiling down at him and enfolding him in hugs. Through the haze, he sees his brothers. Not his young and current brothers, no, but the ones he let die from that universe.

They're smiling at him, though, and as Donnie watches through half-lidded eyes, he sees them become younger, limbs growing and wounds healing right before his very eyes.

"Thank you, Donnie," they're saying. "Thank you for saving us and living for us." Then, before they become whispers of their current selves, Don hears their final words, "Welcome home, Donnie."

He's home, they're safe, and he's never going to leave. "I'm home," he whispers to himself, watching his brothers and knows it's true. He smiles and knows that everything will be okay.