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They were soulmates, that was a fact they all knew as far back as they could remember. Even if they didn't initially know how to name it.
They stumbled upon the word in a movie they randomly saw on the television. It was a new word, different from the ones they knew, and they became extremely curious to know what it meant.
"It's when you feel a very powerful connection with someone, as if your heart and soul are connected. It's hard to explain exactly, but it's a very good feeling to have a soulmate. A feeling of completeness." That was their father's way of explaining the word to them. It left the little turtles confused for a moment, but Mikey seemed to have captured the emotion their father was trying to explain.
"It's like how we feel about each other." Mikey said in such an excited, pure, and kind way that it made Splinter give a small, sweet smile. Quickly the other turtles understood, it seemed so easy that their father had complicated.
For them, being soulmates was like knowing that water is wet. It was basic, obvious, unnecessary to say more than once.
So they grew older, met more people, and had many adventures.
Even with Casey and April in their lives, they never felt the same connection they had with each other. Those words that didn't need to be said, but they just knew.
Like when Mikey would start talking about a very specific topic after a distressing situation, and Raphael knew he needed to give his little brother a tight hug until he started laughing. Or how Donnie hated eating tomatoes, so Leonardo simply didn't ask before taking them from his plate and eating them alone.
From complex things to simple things, they knew and understood each other better than they knew themselves. They couldn't take care of themselves properly, but they made sure to take care of each other with fervor.
That's why Donnie had a feeding schedule, or Raph wouldn't be completely alone for too long doing anything.
Despite the fights they had, which hurt each one of them even if it was just two arguing, they never left each other. They couldn't, being alone for too long started hurting more than the pain of the argument.
The four of them needed to be together, they didn't know a world where they weren't together. Even if one of them fell, leaving the other three to deal with it.
Explaining the pain of seeing one of their soulmates fall was difficult. It couldn't be explained by comparing it to a wound, as it was much worse and much more suffocating. It was like the sun exploded, a piece of oneself was ripped away, you were being burned alive or the day never came. Simply terrifying and painful.
They couldn't think, speak or move properly. Like a CD that had been scratched too much and could no longer play the movie inside it. Even breathing became problematic, painful and suffocating.
When they managed to get the one who fell back, they would never go through that again. That emptiness, that pain, that poison spreading throughout their bodies, leaving them no choice but to be paralyzed. They didn't want to feel that again.
A world without the four of them together seemed more painful than a world without their father. They didn't know if they could live without each other for too long.
They were soulmates in both senses of the word. Connected by a love like no other, and dependent on that same love to survive.