Chapter Text
Raphael emerged from his den, his yawn loud enough to alert everyone in the lair of his presence. He rubbed his eyes with the palms of his hands, forcing the sleep fog from his vision. His bandana hung loosely around his neck as he lumbered into the open area.
“Well look who finally decided to join the living.” Raph turned his gaze to the couch, seeing the back of two of his brother’s heads. The blue light from the array of televisions lined their figures in the dark. He could hear the roaring sounds of the racing game before he could make out the images on the TVs.
“Don’t agitate him,” Mikey elbowed Leo, “you know how cranky he gets after his beauty sleep.” The motion caused Leo’s car to swerve off screen, causing it to collide with the railing before exploding.
“Hey!” Leo glared at him.
Mikey jumped up, whooping with victory as his car passed the finish line. As Mikey chanted his win at the unamused brother, Raphael trudged into the kitchen. He could hear Mikey’s sudden cry as he entered, confident that Leo had smacked him with one of the throw pillows.
He opened the fridge, his eyes grazing over its contents. There were several expired leftovers, no doubt their maker being Mikey. Everyone was too afraid of the contents to brave eating them. He sighed as he spotted a few mystery liquids in containers on the top shelf. Donatello had written in bright purple lettering ‘do not eat, highly dangerous’ on them all. Raph had gotten after him before for keeping his experiments in the same fridge as their food. Especially after the time Mikey had used one of his beakers in a cooking experiment, the heat from the pan causing a smokey explosion. The kitchen smelled like death for at least a week after. His stomach churned at the memory. Needless to say they ate out a lot that week.
Everytime Raph had chastised him, Don had sheepishly replied that he hadn’t set up the fridge in his lab yet, but that he was working on it. Soon Raph spied the cardboard box of pizza half hidden under the leftovers, obviously being the only edible thing in here at the moment. He grabbed a slice of the cold cheese and spun the box onto the counter, calling out to his brothers as he stuffed his face with the heavenly garlic encased bread.
“Any of you guys seen brainiac around?”
Leo replied as Raphael landed on the sofa next to them. “He said something about grabbing some parts for his new project earlier, but I don’t think he’s left yet.” Leo was leaning towards the screen, intensely focused as he managed to get his car almost in touching distance of his brother’s. As soon as Leo’s car did touch the backside of the orange one, Mikey swerved his into Leo’s, causing it to yet again run off the road.
Leo straightened his back, letting out a long and drawn out “No!” as he did. Raph shoved the rest of the pizza into his mouth, clapping his hands together to dust off his crumb ridden palms as he stood. Mikey called out to Raph, telling him to move his big butt out of the way of the screen. Raph slowly obliged, making sure to swipe at his younger brother on the way out. Mikey’s mask became askew, blocking his vision. Leo took this chance to pass his brother on the road, only for an AI racer to knock him back into third place as he attempted to pass the finish line.
Now satiated, Raph sought out his purple banded brother. He entered the garage, stretching as he called out. “Hey Don, did you finish the tune up on the bike yet?” He let out a low grunt as his back popped before continuing. “I was hoping to take it out for a spin.”
This particular part of the garage itself was starting to look like it’s own junkyard. Raph wondered how in the world his brother managed to find anything in the mess. It was almost as bad as Mikey’s bedroom. Almost. At least there wasn’t the smell of rotting food from long forgotten wrappers. Although, with how often his brother forgot to eat, he almost wished it had. He looked around any big piles of projects, figuring the brainiac had been too occupied to have heard him. Raph tentatively made his way through the chaotic maze-like path, only to stub his toe on a stray chunk of machinery. He cursed, attempting to right himself before he stumbled into a large pile of potentially sharp metal.
“Jeez Don, you’d think this stuff is a fire hazard!”
Donatello popped his head out from a pile of tech, flipping up his goggles to get a better look at his brother. His form was completely hidden behind the half complete projects surrounding him. “Don’t be absurd, half of this stuff isn’t even combustible.” He thought a moment before quickly adding, “Yet.”
Raph nursed his foot as he continued, trying not to let the anger from his stubbed toe seep into his words. “Did you finish the tune up on my bike? I’m really itching to take it out for a spin.”
He watched Don’s shoulders hunch a bit, still looking over the contraption in his hands. “Sorry Raph, I’ve been really busy. I promise I’ll get to it soon.”
Raph couldn’t keep his frustration at bay. “Don you’ve been saying that all week! It’ll only take you like an hour tops to fix. You know how cooped up I get around here, I’m going crazy! Can’t you just take a break from whatever you’re doing and take a look at it?”
“Whatever I’m doing?” Don pinched his brow. “Raph, this calliper is essential for the tank. I need to make sure it’s my priority before I work on anything else.” He glanced at his work desk, “No matter how badly I want to work on other projects.” He turned back to the device in hand, twirling a tool in his fingers. “Besides, I’d have to go out and find the piece that I need for your bike. I don’t have one here to replace the damaged gasket with.”
Raphael let out a forceful breath through his nose, “Donnie it’s been a week. I’ve been real patient but I can’t wait any longer. You keep promising and promising you’ll get to it but you don’t! I’m starting to think your promises don’t mean anything.”
Donatello closed his eyes, setting the caliper in his lap. He turned away from his brother, letting out a pent up breath. If Raphael was more observant he’d have seen the way his brother carried himself, how the intense prolonged stress had built up in his muscles. The goggles and mask hid the tired sunken eyes of the engineer well, making his brother’s none the wiser. Donatello preferred it that way in all honesty. He’d never allow his brother’s to know just how stressful it was making sure all their tech was in working order. Donatello told himself it was because he really did enjoy it, and if Leo knew, he’d no doubt tell the others they should stop coming to him when they needed help. Don enjoyed being helpful. Although he knew it wasn’t healthy, it made him feel important. It made him feel needed.
Suddenly Don felt a pair of rough hands force him to his feet. He clutched as he yelped. He was so focused on his thoughts he hadn’t realized that his brother hadn’t left. With a firm hand and a gentle voice, Raph moved him towards the exit. “You already told the others that you needed to go dumpster diving tonight. Why don’t we just get that over with, then you can fix up my bike and I promise I won’t bother you the whole rest of the week, alright?”
Don sighed, knowing that Raph wasn’t actually giving him a choice. Accepting his fate, Don placed a hand on his chin, “A week of uninterrupted work would be heavenly.” As much as Don hated to leave, having the garage to himself without Raphael working out, buffing his bike, or playing his music at irritating levels of volume wasn’t without its perks. Donatello set the calliper down on the table, grabbing his bo as he made his way towards the door. “Alright, I’m just going to be out for a bit. Shouldn’t take long.”
Raph chuckled, ready to finally let off some pent up energy with the fast speeds of his ride in the city. Without the foot around, it was one of the only ways he could. Sparring with his brothers was also an option, but Raphael enjoyed the occasional alone time. “Don’t forget this Einstein.” Raph threw Don’s coat at him as he searched for his duffle. “It’s cold as shell out tonight.”
Don thanked him, putting the warm coat on as well as a hat as he entered the main living room. Raphael jumped over the sofa, joining his brothers again as Don called to them. “I’ll be back in an hour.”
Without missing a beat, Mikey replied. “Can you bring back some pizza? Raph ate all the leftovers!”
Raphael smacked his brother on the back of the head, “Check your math bozo, I only ate one slice.”
Don sighed, shaking his head. “If I remember on my way back I will.”
“No!” Mikey dramatically cried out in defeat, “That’s ‘Donnie talk’ for I won’t!”
Suddenly Leo shot up, taking advantage of Mikey’s resignation to surpass him, finally claiming first. Don could hear the whooping cheers of the eldest as he exited the lair. Mikey pouted, placing the controller on the cushion next to him. “You only won because my heart was broken.”
For the next couple of hours they continued playing video games. Raph even opted to join after a while. Eventually Leo had given up challenging them. Getting last a few dozen times would knock the wind from the sails of anyone in all honesty. Raphael and Mikey were still racing, an AI having taken Leo’s place. Leo would be lying if he said he wasn’t a little salty that the AI was actually doing a better job than he had been. Instead the eldest had resigned to sit back and read a book as his brother’s continued to play. Leo had tuned them out, completely enveloped in the japanese novel in his hand.
“Alright, I’m done for the night.” With a sigh Raphael put the controller down, flicking Mikey in the head as he moved around the couch. “Gonna go see if Ol’ Donnie finally fixed up my ride. It’s dark enough to finally go out.” He made his way back into the garage, searching the untouched piles of tech for his brother.
“Donnie you in here?” Raphael blinked at the silence. He didn’t sense his brother anywhere. Raph grumbled, scanning the lab for his red motorbike. He moved gracefully around the chaotic path once more, this time aware of the jutting metal slab that had tripped him last time. He caught a corner of the red polished metal nearby and made his way over to it. Since he was no longer in the garage, maybe that meant his brother had finally finished it’s repairs. Raph really didn’t feel like waiting on his brother any longer.
Unfortunately as the bike came into full view, Raphael noticed that it was indeed still not finished. In fact it wasn’t even rideable. The wheels were off and parts of the engine were on the floor next to it. Frustrated, Raphael growled, kicking the nearest hunk of junk into the wall with a loud clash. He stomped over to Donnie’s lab, figuring he had yet again forgotten about his bike when he got back. He yelled for his brother as he entered the hollow train car, letting him know just how very little patience he had left. Raph searched under the tank, the tables, even the subway car itself, searching for the hidden genius. Donnie was nowhere to be found.
He stared at Donnie’s main desk. Papers, blueprints, intricate gadgets, and a flurry of sticky notes covered every visible surface. He picked up a particularly large blueprint, whistling as he made out the design. It was an armored sub, several notes lined the side. Raphael couldn’t make heads or tails of the names of each spec, but he did know what each drawing was of. There was a large main cannon that seemed to tuck into the belly of the sub, as well as a personal propelling motor that someone could use at the back.
Raphael felt his anger slowly drain away. Don really was amazing. It must be impossible to find time to finish all these ideas he has, especially when the only technology he has access to is the leftover junk they find in the metal trash lots. His brother really was something special. Raphael admired many qualities about Donatello, and as much grief as he gave him, his intelligence was one of them. A while ago Raphael had asked Don to show him how to tune up his bike. The real reason was that he was sick of waiting for Don to do it when he asked, but when Donatello’s face lit up at the opportunity to teach his older brother about mechanics, Raph had felt a twinge of guilt. So Raph stuffed his reasons down, and asked Don to teach him more about machinery as time went on. He really enjoyed seeing how happy sharing his knowledge and teaching him had been for Don, and Raphael himself started to feel more accomplished.
Eventually Donatello was confident enough in Raph’s abilities that he occasionally asked for help with repairs of the tank. There were still things that Raphael didn’t know how to do, and certain kinds of repair just went over his head. A lot of machinery was like a puzzle, and although it was difficult for Raph to understand at first, he could see why his little brother enjoyed it so much. Being able to repair something on your own, and have it work, was thrilling. Being in the garage and learning with Don had been a nice way to spend time with his brother. They didn’t have too much in common, so finding ways to hang out was hard, so repairing things under the guise of hanging out had been Raphael’s way of doing things.
He looked back to the blueprint in his hands, his eyes gazing over his brother’s chicken scratch lining the side of the paper. Most of the words had been scrawled out, but one had been circled in red, several question marks trailing after.
“The Sea Turtle?” Raph read to himself, chuckling, “A little on the nose Donnie-Boy.” He set the blueprint back on the desk, noticing a stray sticky note on his computer screen. Getting some parts at the junkyard. He must have written this before Raph had found him in the garage earlier. Resigning with a sigh, he returned to his other brothers in the living room. Raph looked down at Leo, who was laid back on the sofa, his arms crossed as he watched his little brother through the pages of his book. “Anybody know when Don’ll be back?”
“He should be back soon, it’s only been like an hour.” Mikey replied without taking his eyes off the screen.
Leo turned to his brother, placing his arm across the couch to get a better view. “Mikey, he’s been gone longer than that.” Leo placed his hand on his chin for a moment, thinking. “In fact he should have called by now.” Leo took out his phone, checking the screen. There were no missed calls, but Donatello had sent him a text message that simply said ‘on the surface’. It wasn’t totally uncommon for him to do that instead of calling, but that still didn’t explain why Don wasn’t back yet. While it was entirely possible he simply lost track of time, something didn’t sit right with Leonardo.
He pulled up Donatello’s location, using the GPS connected to his shell cell, only for it to be non-existent. Confused, Leo clicked on the text message his brother had sent, bringing up the meta data connected to it. Their text messages had locations tied to them, Don had made sure of that, but when the coordinates popped up on the map, it only confused Leo more.
“That’s odd.”
“What?” Raph leaned over Leo’s shoulder, trying to get a better look at the screen.
“The location he sent me isn’t at the junkyard, it’s at a freight yard near the river on the east side of Manhattan.”
Mikey finally turned away from the screen, trying not to let Leo go into full blown mother hen mode. He really didn’t want to quit playing just because Leo felt the need to track down their brother in the freezing cold. “Maybe he just needed some very specific junk, like ship related junk?”
“I can’t believe it!” Raph roared, surprised that Mikey’s suggestion might actually be right. “He blew me off again!” The anger from earlier in the lab appeared back in full blown waves, “He was supposed to get parts for my bike tonight, he promised! Instead he’s still working on his own dang projects.” Mikey and Leo looked to him, both brothers waiting for Raphael to elaborate. Raph crossed his arms, “There was a blueprint in his lab for some kind of submarine.”
“I suppose that makes sense.” Leo was quiet for a moment, still staring at the dot on the screen. “I’ll still call him, just in case.” Leo stood, his phone already ringing at his ear. Raphael was already fuming, thinking of the confrontation he’d be having the moment his brother walked through that door. They’d be having words. Raph and Mikey were quiet as they waited, ready for Donnie’s voice to finally put Leonardo at ease.
They continued waiting.
Leo ended the call, having only received his voicemail.
“Maybe he’s got his hands full on a nice find at the moment.” Mikey offered, “I’m sure he’ll call back soon.”
“Yeah, you know how focused he gets, dude’s always forgetting to eat or sleep when he gets on a roll.” Raph added, his voice low and seething. “Sometimes it feels like the genius even forgets his own brothers at times.”
Leo ignored them, dialing Donnie’s number again. When that too, went to voicemail, Mikey and Raph looked at eachother.
“Maybe we should check it out, just to be safe.”
The night had grown colder. The winter winds having picked up speed, causing the soft snow flakes to feel like small shards against their tough skin. Donatello’s signal had still not reappeared, the missing dot causing a deep knot to form in the leader’s stomach. The brothers dived behind the crates outside of one of the warehouses. There wasn’t anyone in sight, but the howling in their ears made for good cover for their enemies.
Mikey pulled his scarf closer to his face, a violent shiver running up his spine. “Let’s hurry before my fingers freeze off!”
Leo silently motioned for them to climb the fire escape on the side, pushing open one of the windows lining the very top of the building. The three jumped down into the warehouse. The building was cold, but protected them from the harsh wind. The warehouse was completely silent, not a single light was on. Several boats were suspended with ropes. Large tables of tools and parts lined the nearby wall. A tall electric ladder was extended up to one of the far seafaring vehicles.
Mikey stared up at the empty industrial hooks. The light from the street caught on the metallic hue, creating an eerie atmosphere. Mikey whined, sticking close to his brothers. “Dudes this place has some serious horror movie vibes.” A long drawn out rusty creak was heard overhead, causing Mikey to let out a yelp and draw his nunchucks. “Okay, Don’s not here. Let’s go back home!”
Raph slapped his brother upside the head, “Cool it Jackie Chan, it’s just the wind coming through the window.” Although, Mikey did have a point. It didn’t seem like anyone was here, let alone if anyone even had been in the last few days. Raph cupped his hands around his mouth, taking in a lungful of air. “Don, we know you’re here! Come out already!” Raph’s booming voice echoed, bouncing off the metal walls of the building with a crisp sharpness. Leo gave his brother a look, having taken out his katanas on instinct. Raph simply shrugged his shoulders, “What? There’s no one here anyway.”
But Raphael was right, there was no one here. Nothing stirred after Raph’s voice had shattered their element of surprise. If Don had been here, he would have greeted them by now. Leo called his brother’s cell again, this time leaving a concerned voicemail. Before he could finish the message, he heard his own cell beep in his ear. Quickly he ended the call, checking the notification. In an instant Mikey was on him, questioning him if it was their brother. In fact, it had been. Sort of. It was a singular ping from Don’s GPS location. Trouble was though, it immediately disappeared again.
Raph crossed his arms, still believing they were worrying over nothing. “Maybe he butt dialed you.”
Leo narrowed his eyes at the screen, opening up the data for the new message. “No, something’s off. I can feel it.” He read over the timestamp, clicking on the location information tied to it. The map loaded on their current location in the shipyard for a second, before shooting across town.
“Is that where he is?” Mikey questioned from over Leo’s shoulder.
Leo’s brows were still knit together as he zoomed in on the building housing the dot. “At least, that’s where the message came from. I’ve never seen this building before. It looks like a research center.”
Raphael pulled out his own cell, growing impatient. “Maybe he’s blowing off some steam of his own with other nerds who know what his techno babble means.” He pulled up their brother’s number, happily allowing it to go to voicemail. Mikey and Leo watched as their hot-headed brother left a very loud and threatening message on their missing brother’s cell. It contained several curses, as well as a promise to kick his shell the moment Raph saw him for making him come out here in the cold with his brothers instead of the relaxing alone time with his bike he was promised.
After Raph finished, Mikey turned to Leo. “Well now he’s definitely not going to call us back.”
Leo placed his cell back on his belt, turning his brother’s attention back to him. “We should get to the research center, hopefully he’ll still be there.”
Raph groaned, stepping up close to Leo. “Just leave him be, whether accidental or not, he sent us a message. Clearly if he wanted to talk to us he would have already.” Raphael was done. It was cold, he was disappointed and angry. And in all honesty he didn’t really feel like seeing Don at the moment. The longer this went on, the more likely he felt his next greeting to his brother would be with his fist.
This time it was Mikey who stepped up, “I dunno Raph, I’m with Leo on this one. What if he can’t call us and the message is his way of sending his distress?” He placed his weapons back in his belt, pleading to Raph with his eyes. “There’s no harm in checking it out on our way back.”
Raph clenched his fists. He was still angry at his brother for continually blowing him off, but he was outvoted. He considered going back alone, letting his brothers trail after their AWOL brother, but if Don actually did need their help, Raphael didn’t want to be the one who ditched him when Don needed them most. Raphael sighed, conceding. “Alright leader, where we headed?”
The brothers moved silently through the halls, careful of the cameras lining each corner. Leo checked his cell once more before beckoning to the far door in the hall. “The signal came from over there.” Leo rolled up to the door, noticing the keypad next to it, the red light indicating that it was locked. Still, Leo tried the door, hoping for the best. When it didn’t budge, Raph snickered. Instead Leo peered in through the slim window on the door. The room was completely dark, but he could see a few emergency lights lining the counters under cabinets. The room looked like it was some kind of testing area, several computers and file cabinets littered the rest of the area in open cubicles. There was a single computer screen on, alerting Leo that someone had been here recently as the display hadn’t gone to sleep yet.
Leo turned back to his brothers, keeping his voice low. “If not Donnie, then someone was here recently.”
Raph shook his head, “Why would Don even come here? It doesn’t exactly look like the kind of place we would break into. There’s not even that creepy ‘secretly a delusional scientist organization’ vibe.”
“That’s true, it said online that this place dealt with electronic signaling and communications, which hardly sounds threatening.” Before they could come to any conclusions, Leo’s phone went off again. He quickly checked it, his expression unchanging.
“Is it Don?” Asked Mikey.
“Is it another useless goose chase?” Raph followed up sarcastically.
“Maybe.” Was all Leo offered. He opened the new location on the map, yet again several blocks away.
“Well? Where is he now?” Mikey asked impatiently.
“It looks like another research center.”
Leo’s eyes widened, causing Mikey to force his way into Leo’s space, getting a better look. “What? What is it?”
Leo allowed his brother room to see as he replied. “It looks like the company deals with medical breakthroughs.” He looked to Raph, “Specifically biological treatments and diseases.”
Raphael couldn’t help his surprise from showing. What on Earth would their brother need at a place like that?
“I knew this day would come!” Both brother’s attention turned to the youngest, who burst out, shaking Leo as he spoke. “Don’s finally lost it! He's gone full blown mad scientist, and he’s going to use bio weapons to take over the world!”
“Quit messing around Mikey.” Raphael hit Michaelangelo, abruptly stopping the dramatic outburst. “This might actually be serious.”
Leo turned, already heading back down the hall. “Come on, let’s hurry.”
The icy metal of the fire escape pierced through the ninja’s woolen gloves. Raphael had taken off his, the warmth from his hands melted any snow that managed to stick to it, creating an irritating alternating cycle of wet and freezing. All of the lights in the building were shut off, most, if not all workers, having gone home during the late hours of the night. Leo led them up to the twelfth floor. There were many security doors, but the elevator duct provided a quick means upward without a key card.
The problem arised when they actually made it to the floor in question. Each section of the hall had a security door, which had been active. If Don were here, he could have easily hacked each one to allow them entrance, but well, he wasn’t.
Fortunately, staying up to work on projects was a common trait among scientists, not just their brother. They only had to wait a few minutes before one of the workers returned to the floor, swiping their key against the pad as they ventured forth with a stifled yawn. Leo used his katana to catch the door before it closed, allowing them to follow after.
As they got to the far side of the hall, Leo halted in front of a door. The archives room. Mikey read the plaque next to the door, whispering to his brothers. “If Donnie wanted to read some dusty old science notes, why doesn’t he just go to a library?” Leo and Raph ignored him, quietly sneaking inside. The room was spacious and packed with tall computer servers that hummed and blinked. A singular consol stood on a podium in the middle, its monitor still active.
As Leo moved towards it, Raph chuckled at Mikey. “Guess these archives aren’t in any libraries.”
Leo moved the mouse, causing the screen to light up fully. He read over all of the shortcuts on the desktop, but none of them really gave him anything to go off of. He opened up the archives, struggling to find the recent searches.
“Why the shell is Donnie leading us on this wild goose chase, why doesn’t he just call us? He knows how bad we are at puzzling stuff together.”
“Speak for yourself.” Leo muttered.
The three brothers stood in the quiet lab, the white glow of the screens outlining the ninjas. The only sounds that could be heard was the humming of the servers, and the clacking of keys as Leo typed on one of the keypads. His search held no results, anything his brother had potentially found had been erased, leading them to another dead end.
Mikey was roaming the lab, searching the different rows of servers, eventually coming to a break table. There were sticky notes scattered on the board on the wall. Mikey didn’t understand any of the scrawlings, they were mostly formulas, reminders, or what he had to guess was science jokes. He turned away, a bit disappointed that he didn’t recognize any of the handwriting to be his brother’s. A secret message would have been a cool way to clue them in on their brother’s intentions.
“Leo, it’s no use.” Raph was leaning on one of the servers, his arms crossed as he huffed, clearly irritated. “If Don wanted to be found he would have called us by now, left a message somewhere, anything to clue us in on what he’s up to besides some glitched GPS ping.” Raph placed his hands on the server, letting the electronic heat warm his cold hands. “His cell’s probably gone haywire. He probably forgot to update the darn thing with one of his many firmware updates.”
Leo continued to search what files he could, replying to his brother without taking his eyes off the screen. “This isn’t like Don, he doesn’t just go off on his own.”
“Donnie’s had plenty of adventures without telling us, he probably just wanted to do whatever plan his genius brain cooked up without us around for him to constantly explain his sciency mumbo jumbo to. And for all we know, his cell could just be on silent.”
This time Leo did turn to his brother, “He’s not like you Raph, he doesn’t just go off on his own knowingly without telling us what’s going on.” After a long moment Leo silently turned back, muttering to himself. “Some of us actually care that we worry about each other.”
A beeping on the screen pulled them back into their current task. The video feeds from the archive popped up, allowing Leo to scrub back the last hour, but the screen only displayed a corruption error.
“See,” Raph growled, “same as before. He’s made it clear, Leo. He doesn’t want us to find him.”
Leo huffed, growing tired of Raph’s impatience. “Wait, that’s my bad.” Leo opened the file in the correct program, this time the feed showed their current location in the archive. Leo scrubbed through the timeline of the last hour, but no one had come into this room besides them. Leo placed a hand on his jaw thoughtfully. “Why would he send us this location if he didn’t want us to find him? It doesn’t make sense…”
This time Mikey chirped up, reminding the two that their third brother was still within earshot. “Maybe it’s not himself that Don wants us to find, maybe it’s something else?”
Both Leo and Raph stared at their brother wide eyed. Then, Raph looked to Leo, “Could he?”
Leo turned back to the monitor. “I suppose so, but if he doesn’t want us to find him, what would he be trying to lead us to?” Leo scrubbed through the feed again, this time slowly moving through the timeline as he continued.
“There!” Mikey jabbed at the screen, yelling for his brother to go back. Sure enough, a figure stood in front of the same screen they were looking at. He was wearing a large obscuring coat, and a wool knit hat. The stranger typed hastily on the keyboard, inserting a flash drive into the server underneath. For a moment he was still. There was no audio from the recording, but it looked as though he was talking to himself, slightly irritated. Soon he hunched his shoulders, moving back to the keypad. The computer was angled far enough that the glare from the light blocked what the person was looking at.
Raphael peered over their shoulders, cynically stating that they didn’t even know for sure if that was him. The figure quickly plucked the drive from the server, darting out the door. Leo moved back once more, moving the feed frame by frame. As if hearing Raphael’s previous comment, the figure turned far enough for them to catch his face.
It was Donatello.
Leo paused the video, staring at his brother on the screen, looking for any sort of clue that would give him understanding for his brother’s actions. It did not.
Mikey starred along with him, his eyes squinting as he sneered, “What’s he wearing?” His finger tapped on the screen. The long overcoat looked tight on Donatello’s rounded form, and Mikey could have sworn he saw a light emanate from underneath it. Mikey couldn’t place the memory, but it looked familiar.
Raphael turned away from them, throwing his reply over his shoulder. “We’ve had that wrinkly old trench coat for years. One of these days we really gotta replace the thing before it busts at the seams.”
Leo erased the feed, having served its use. It wasn’t like Donnie to leave evidence like this behind, especially in human view. That meant he hadn’t erased it on purpose, surely he had wanted them to see it. “We still don’t know why he even came here. We need to figure out what’s significant about these locations, then we might be able to get to the next one before Donnie does.”
“Well,” Mikey offered helpfully, “they’re all science or technology buildings.”
“Listen,” Raph said as he made his way to the door, “I’d love to play Don’s little game all night, but I think we should just grab a pizza, go home, and call it a night. Donnie will let us know what’s going on when he’s good and ready.”
Leonardo would be lying if he didn’t consider it, the video had proven that their missing brother was in fact alive and not in any immediate distress. Could this all have just been a misunderstanding on Don’s part? Had the messages really been a simple error? As amazing as Don was, his gadgets weren’t perfect. A lot of their brother’s work was based on trial and error. Donatello himself had stated that there was no better progress than the progress of failure. But if that was the case, why hadn’t he just called them back?
The three turtles moved out of the building, Leo heavily considering following Raph’s lead home. But as they landed back on the fire escape, Leo’s phone buzzed once more. Raphael visibly groaned, throwing his hands up as he complained. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”