Work Text:
Mikey hummed a little to himself. His art playlist had paused, asking if he was still listening, but he was too in the zone to reach over and resume playing it. Practicing drawing with his left hand again had spiraled into a multi-page doodle sesh. It was still a little shaky (there were wiggles in lines where there should not be) but overall it wasn’t bad. He was better with his right hand, anyway, but after his left arm was inop for so long he needed to knock the rust off.
And the lair was surprisingly quiet. Leo was gone who-knew-where. Mikey suspected April’s place, but didn’t know for sure. He’d been doing that a lot, lately. He didn’t care so long as it kept him from doing his weird ‘checks’ before their upcoming basketball game. Either they really were doctor follow-ups that Leo was taking unusually seriously, or they were a way for his brother to spy on his basketball moves. Knowing Leo, it was probably both.
Raph and Splinter had gone grocery shopping, which Mikey may or may not have encouraged for just the two of them. They seemed to be doing okay after the whole ‘round room’ thing. But a little more father-son bonding couldn’t hurt, right? This way Raph wouldn’t be alone, and Splinter could get that particular brand of sashimi he liked.
Which just left Donnie… though his neurotic brother had been holed up in his lab for some time now. Mikey knew he needed to talk to him, but right now the lair was quiet and his dinosaur-rave pictogram was looking sweet-
The silence was shattered by an enraged shriek. “YOU TOOK MY PHONE?”
Mikey’s head snapped up. That was April’s voice. He didn’t realize she was finally ungrounded, much less in the lair. He poked his head out of his room.
“We talked about this!”
He cringed. She sounded pissed. He couldn’t make out what Donnie was saying back, only that his voice was starting to raise as well. Not sure what he was going to do (intervene? eavesdrop?) he began tiptoeing closer to the lab.
He was just outside the door when a tell-tale crash echoed through the lair.
There was a breathless moment of silence. Then, “WHAT THE FUCK, DONNIE!?”
“Now you have to let me fix it!”
“Not so you can sneak your stupid blocker back in! I can’t believe you!”
“Oh, excuse me for trying to ensure the security of our inner circle!”
“Dee: CHILL. I know you’re paranoid that Bishop might rise up from wherever he is-”
“It’s not paranoia if it’s actually plausible!”
“-but this crosses a line. A big, fat, neon-”
“IT WAS YOUR PHONE!”
Mikey blinked. What? He didn’t know that part. Judging from the shocked silence that followed, neither did April. There were several ragged breaths before Donnie resumed, sounding strangled.
“He found us through your contacts. Hacked all your social media tags. That’s how he learned who we were, our names…” His voice dropped to a whisper Mikey could barely catch. “April, please.”
Mikey held his breath and pressed his ear against the wall. It amplified the sound of his heartbeat, but he was able to hear April’s frustrated sigh. “Lead with that next time, dummy.”
Her words sounded begrudging and concerned, but also disturbed. His own sigh of relief muffled Donnie’s reply, and then April suddenly sounded much closer. “Don’t ever take my phone without my permission again.”
“I shall purge the thought from my mind.”
Mikey scrambled back from the lab as April stepped out. Fortunately, he was very fast and could make it look like he was headed towards the entrance instead of running away from it. “April! Didn’t know that you weren’t grounded anymore. Want to watch a movie?”
She looked drained and frustrated, but afforded him a strained smile. “Yeah, that would be cool.”
“Awesome!” He cast a quick look back at the lab as they left. “Is Donnie busy?” he asked innocently.
“Yeah, he’s fixing my phone,” she grumbled hotly. “I’ll let this one go, but he can forget about helping with my science final.”
Mikey wisely didn’t comment.
“Dee?” It was late at night when Mikey poked his head in the lab. “You in here?”
He knew he was, of course. Donnie rarely left his lab the lab these days, except when he was rewiring parts of the lair in a frenzy. It was a question with an obvious answer. He also knew that his brother had to be up, because his sleep schedule was utterly whack, too. Mikey only tiptoed around just in case he had crashed at his desk or something.
Nope. Donnie was hunched over what looked like a mini satellite or cell tower. His goggles were low over his face and he wielded a tiny screwdriver and solder like he was performing surgery. It seemed super delicate, so Mikey went over to his corner and sat down.
He hadn’t used his station in the lab recently. There were some half-finished drawings from before… before everything… still on the table. He started doodling them to completion to pass the time, stretching and clenching the fingers on his left hand.
Donnie looked up when he dropped a pencil. “Mikey? How long have you been here?” Before he could answer, an arm from Donnie’s spider shell extended and grabbed something. “You know what, it doesn’t matter. Here.”
An object flew through the air. Mikey fumbled it with his left hand but saved it with his right. It was a cell phone.
“That’s for Draxum. It’s connected to our private network so he can contact us at any time with the utmost security. It’s also as user-friendly as Father’s so even he should be able to make it work.”
Mikey stared at it for a moment, surprised. “Why – thanks, Dee.”
His brother didn’t respond, already absorbed back into work mode.
Mikey sighed. Okay, this wasn’t going to happen easily. He suspected it wouldn’t, but at least this provided a tiny opening he could use.
He sidled up closer. “Do you need to upgrade my phone?”
“I already did.”
“What? When?” He whipped out his baby and started scrolling through it.
“You were asleep.”
Oh… okay. Well, it wasn’t entirely out of scope of things Donnie normally did. He cringed as he thought of April again. At least Donnie had returned her phone quickly. He couldn’t let any of that distract him, though, because he had a mission. Expressing the wrong emotion now would be counterproductive. Instead, he took a deep breath and said, “thank you.”
Donnie stopped working. His dark brows scrunched together. He didn’t look away from the satellite, but his voice sounded cautiously confused. “You’re not mad?”
Mikey shrugged. “I know how hard you’re working to protect us from spies and hackers.” He carefully avoided saying Bishop. “And I appreciate that you took the time to update my phone in a manner that was the least intrusive to me.”
“Uh… yeah. Of course.” Donnie seemed at a loss, which concerned Mikey. Sure, April’s reaction was bad, and yeah, Mikey himself was slightly creeped out by it, but was a positive response really so surprising?
Time to push deeper.
“Can you tell me what you’re working on?”
Donnie finally turned to face him, searching his eyes. Mikey searched back. Was that wariness? Suspicion? It made his gut sour. Is it too unreasonable to think I’m genuinely interested?
Ooh, you know what, that was probably it. The last person who had asked about his tech was Bishop. Yikes.
This would take some work.
“Well, since you ask, I’m hardening a mock cell tower: making it impervious to electromagnetic pulses. This way our ability to communicate with each other won’t be impeded should anyone attack in this way.”
“That’s impressive.”
“Okay, what do you want?” Donnie set down his tools. “I have a lot of work to do so just spit it out.”
“What makes you think I want anything?”
“I know my tech is impressive, it couldn’t be anything less. Hence the term: state of the art. So obviously you’re just trying to butter me up before hitting me with a request.”
“I’m not Leo, Donnie.”
A frustrated, semi-apologetic expression flitted across his face. He turned back to the satellite.
Yup, definitely a lot of work. No more beating around the bush, it was time for the big guns. “You know, I get it.”
“Get what?”
Mikey sat on the edge of the work table, forcing him to look up. “You meet someone you think you can look up to, who has the same passion for the same interests, and then they rip out your heart and stomp on it while laughing evilly. And it makes you feel silly and stupid for trusting them, but it also makes you wonder if you can believe any of their praise. And I don’t just mean praise that they gave you – but praise you hear from others about your passions that you wind up doubting because ‘hey, I’ve heard that before and it was all lies’. It’s hard.”
Donnie sat frozen in his seat. He cleared his throat. “Mikey, I don’t-”
“Did I ever tell you about Meatsweats?”
“… what about Meatsweats?”
Mikey sighed. “Well, I convinced Todd to stalk him with me one day. Things went wrong, it was my fault, and Meatsweats wound up absorbing his niceness. And so suddenly he was… great. Like, suuuuper nice, an absolute bloke, you know? And I just latched onto that. I ditched Todd because holy moly, when would I ever have this chance again? I was hanging out with my idol! As BFF’s! And he complimented my mandolin playing, my cooking, and we hung out at the boardwalk and it was awesome.
But then it wore off and he was an asshole again. Only he kept up the charade. He just used me to get this truffle for him, and Todd had to pull my shell out of the mess I’d made and it… it still hurts.”
Donnie remained silent.
“So yeah, I get it.” He looked down at his fingers. “What Bishop did-”
“It’s not just Bishop.”
His head jerked up. Donnie looked… frustrated? Pained? It was really quick before it was replaced by his patented exasperation. “Maybe you had one bad call with Meatsweats, but I’m batting 3-0, in favor of the villains.”
“3-0?”
Donnie ground his teeth. “Big Mama, the Purple Dragons, Bishop, oh, I guess it’s 4-0 if you count Montcrief, though he at least had his own tech-”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Mikey’s mind whirled. There was a lot to unpack there. “Are you keeping a score of betrayals?”
“Yes! No!” His brother agitatedly threw up his arms and knocked the screwdriver into the air. They cringed as it clattered noisily into something distant and metallic.
“Look, Mikey,” he began a bit more calmly (which meant, read: Logical Mode). “I see what you’re trying to do, and I appreciate the attempt. But this isn’t something for Dr. Feelings. These are raw statistics pointing to an obvious conclusion concerning the nature of our respective skillsets. So you stick to reading and redeeming people, and I’ll stick to my beautiful, beautiful tech.”
His smile was stretched too wide on the last line. Which meant he was at the edge of his tolerance limit and it was time to back off.
Mikey reluctantly pushed off the table. “Alright. Though I don’t think I entirely agree with you.”
“Doesn’t matter whether you agree, facts don’t care about your feelings.”
And you live by that, don’t you?
He knew how to exit gracefully, though. He paused by the curtain until he heard the squeak of Donnie’s chair: his brother getting up to search for that screwdriver.
Yeesh, this was going to be more of a struggle than he realized. He was going to need some extra help.
It wasn’t until after the basketball game to end all basketball games that the moment Mikey was waiting for presented itself. There was the familiar rumble of the garage door and he was immediately chilling by Turtle Tank, watching Donnie approach.
“Going to the junkyard?”
“Yes,” his brother dragged out suspiciously.
“Repo Mantis Salvage?”
“That is correct.”
“Good.” He hopped in and buckled up. “There’s someone I want you to meet.”
-
“Turn right, here.”
“Should I be suspicious that you’re directing me to a secondary location?”
“It’s not that far from the junkyard, I walk there all the time.”
“Since when?”
“I dunno, awhile. Not every trip. Just sometimes. You’re normally deep in The Zone when I leave and when I come back. I often wondered if you noticed I was gone.”
“…Don’t tell Raph that.”
“Pssh, like he knows?”
“Is this it?”
“Up a little further, under the bridge.”
They rolled the Turtle Tank closer till they hit a chain link fence. Mikey hopped out and led the way through a gap. They were short distance behind the junkyard, now. A short bridge went over a stretch of the river. In a secluded corner, shielded from the road, was a collection of tents and sleeping bags.
There were about fifty homeless people camped out on the plot. Most were men, with grizzled beards obscuring their age. Some leaned against the supports of the bridge. Some shuffled around slowly. Others tended barrel fires as the sun began to set. A dog poked its head up from beside a woman sleeping on the ground. It watched them carefully as they passed. One sleeping bag had two people wrapped up tight and already asleep with only their hair poking out from one end. A rainbow flag was draped over them.
A man with no legs and a Desert Storm hat sped by them in a wheelchair. He waved at Mikey with a tooth-chipped grin, who waved back. “Hey, Hauser!”
“How long have these people known you?” Donnie asked, pointedly knocking on his shell.
“Long enough. Don’t worry, Dee, this is the land of misfits! We fit right in.”
“How’s it hangin’ Mike?” Hauser called.
“Pretty good! Is the Professor in?”
“Yeah, he’s over there.” He waved towards the shadow of the bridge.
“Thanks!” Mikey grabbed Donnie’s hand and walked faster.
As they approached, they could make out a silhouette under the bridge writing something in chalk on the concrete slope of the overpass. It paused once in a while, tapping the chalk against its head, before resuming its scrawl.
Mikey hopped up and down. “Hi, Professor!”
Bright white teeth broke up the silhouette as the Professor smiled, looking reminiscent of the Cheshire cat. He set down the chalk and stepped out of the shadows. He was a large, aging, black man with frizzled grey-white hair poking out much like Albert Einstein’s. His shoes were worn, and his brown coat had several patches dotting it. The most striking was his square hat, which had a black, green, and white pattern wrapping around it, and was kept in very good shape.
“Salutations, Michelangelo.” His voice was deep and rich. “This must be one of your intrepid brothers whom you’ve told me so much about.”
“Yup, this is Donnie!” He grabbed Donnie’s hand and waved it for him.
“Uh, hello, Professor…?”
“Jean-Bartholome Onyilogwu,” he flashed a warm smile. “But most people just call me ‘Professor’.”
“Alright, well, I can’t really say anything against long, complicated names.” Donnie cleared his throat and stuck out his hand. “Donatello, or Donnie for short.”
“A pleasure to meet you, Donatello.” The hand that shook his was warm and comforting. “Michelangelo says you are quite the inventor.”
For a moment Donnie’s eyes lit up like he was about to launch into a well-practiced boast. Then something shifted and he withdrew his hand warily. “Yeah, well. I tinker.”
Mikey frowned.
“Any activity from which one derives enjoyment is worth doing,” the Professor said.
Mikey stepped forward. “So, speaking of, whatcha teachin’ today?”
A twinkle appeared in the man’s eyes. “A break from the usual life skills. We are exploring the very fabric of the cosmos by pushing mathematics to their limits.”
Donnie peered at the neat handwriting on the overpass. “Is that… is that describing a Turing paradox?” he gasped.
“Very astute! Today we are discussing aspects of the Observer Effect in quantum physics. As I stated, a break from the usual.”
“You consider teaching quantum mechanics to be a break?”
“From what Michelangelo has told me, I suspect you do, as well.”
Once again Donnie made a weird little shift – a happy bounce aborted into an aloof slouch. “It’s a good brain exercise. When you’re bogged down in applied physics it’s refreshing to explore the theoretical.”
“Indeed it is. Would you care to sit in on our little lesson?”
“Yup!” Mikey answered before Donnie could say anything. “Wouldn’t trade it for the world!”
The barrel fires crackled as the night deepened. The Professor’s rich voice carried over the tiny group of attendees. Donnie sat cross-legged, Mikey to his left and the vet, Hauser, to his right.
“-as we learned last week, particles exist in a state of superposition until they are measured. They are all the probabilities that they could be at once: Schrodinger’s cat is both dead and alive. But once measured, the wave function collapses into a definite state: either dead or alive, in the example of the cat. In the case of a particle progressing through time, frequent measurements can arrest this pace. In essence, you can “freeze” a system’s evolution by frequently measuring it in its initial state.”
Ha. It doesn’t actually freeze a state, so much as suppress a transition, Donnie thought.
He turned to whisper to Mikey but noticed his brother’s eyes were glazed over with a sleepy film. His head was propped in his hands and while he was still facing the makeshift board his valiant effort at paying attention was clearly slipping.
An affectionate smile fluttered at his lips for a moment. He turned towards Hauser and noticed he was still watching the lecture with bright, keen eyes.
His attention piqued Donnie’s. “You’re still following all this?” he whispered.
Hauser glanced at him. “Eh, maybe. Dunno for certain, I could be way off. But I always liked this kinda math. It’s cool math, y’know?”
“Oh yeah, definitely.”
They lapsed back into attentive silence when Hauser suddenly spoke again.
“Always wanted to know more about this stuff. Cool math is cool math. But ain’t no folk in the family ever had enough for college so I joined the army like everyone else.”
Donnie eyed where his legs ended at the knees. “You ever think about trying now?”
“Dead broke. GI Bill and VA screwed me over big time. Like the Professor, though. He’s cool.” He reached down and popped open a flask, offering it to Donnie after taking a long swig. “Want some?”
Donnie scrunched his nose at the smell. “I think I’ll just have some water.”
“A’ight. Get it from the pot, though.”
“Why’s that?”
“It’s been boiled.”
“You guys don’t have a water purifier?”
Hauser gave him a bug-eyed look. “Does it look like we got a water purifier?”
Donnie winced.
Mikey let out a snore.
The Professor continued with his lecture.
Everyone who was still awake lined up to shake hands with the Professor. Donnie propped Mikey up on his arm, who mumbled sleepily. “Ah, thank you for having us. That was an excellent lecture, though I wish you’d spent more time on the Quantum Zeno Effect as it pertains to quantum computing.”
The Professor’s eyes twinkled. “That is an excellent topic we shall surely dive into next time. I would love to discuss more deeply about quantum computing in general before tying the two together. Though I do have a theory about utilizing the effect in regards to suspended animation.”
Donnie’s eyes bugged. “What? No way – how would you even begin to do that? You couldn’t; not for any length of time that matters.”
“With sufficient measurements made of all the subatomic particles of an object at an accelerated frequency for a given length of time, something akin to suspended animation could potentially be achieved.” The Professor winked. “Not indefinitely, of course. The paradox only suppresses the transition of a state; it does not prevent the change entirely.”
Donnie stared.
“But it is invigorating to think about.”
“Heck yeah it is!” Donnie exploded, waking Mikey. “I’m so going to have to look into that. Man, once I get home, I’ll…” he trailed off, excitement suddenly dying. He looked around the fires of the camp.
“I’ll play with it,” he muttered. “And get you guys a water purifier.”
The Professor cocked his head, eyes searching. “Very well,” he said at last. “I do hope you’ll join us for next week’s lesson; you are both welcome any time.”
“Yeah! …yeah.” Donnie shrugged nonchalantly and looked away.
“Thanks, Professor,” Mikey yawned.
“Be safe, boys.”
“Soooo, whadja think?” Mikey asked in the Turtle Tank.
“I think I still need to get those parts I set out to retrieve.”
“Dooooonnnnniiiiiie, I meant about the Professor and the physics stuff?”
“Oh, it’s cool. Real cool.”
“Sure is.”
“You were asleep half the time.”
“He’s got a melodic voice! It’s like a creamy, velvet, lullaby.”
“…okay.”
“You going back next week?”
“Maybe.”
“I’ll go with.”
“I said maybe.”
Maybe meant returning the following week for a lesson with a water purifier in tow. Maybe saw solar-absorbing thermal blankets make their way to the shantytown under the guise of ‘dropping them off while in the area’. Staying for a debate on the existence of white holes was purely coincidental. And when asked if the frustrations surrounding the upgrades to the lair prompted the next several visits, the answer was a huffed ‘maybe’.
Then April declined his help for her science project final.
The number of ‘upgrades’ and ‘repairs’ suddenly doubled, if not tripled. Donnie’s textbook agitation skyrocketed in tandem. Shelldon flew all over the lair delivering materials to wherever he was working away his troubles this time, and the brothers learned to not comment on his work. A comment led to a rant about frayed wiring, hacking junction boxes, and that yes of course it was reasonable to have a 15-digit code for the lockbox protecting the wifi router that changed hourly. Raph had to stare blankly at a corner for a good 10 minutes after a mere mention of a break led to an inescapable lecture on biphasic sleep cycles.
All of them thought Donnie would pop a vein soon. Tempers were fraying. He and Leo had a fight in which names were called. April kept her distance. Nothing was great, but it was the showdown in the TV room that looked like the best candidate for actual vein-popping.
Donnie stood before Splinter, hands on his hips. Warped images of Scorpion Treadmill played across his form and around his shadow behind him. Mikey clutched his bowl of popcorn as he the tension grew with each second of the stare-down.
“Dad, all I need is 15 minutes with the projector and cable box, and then you can go right back to watching. No more, no less.”
“Hmm. ‘Fifteen minutes’ is normally geek-speak for ‘half an hour to an hour’.” Splinter said. “Does it have to be right now? I would miss the marathon!”
“I’ve already put it off for as long as I could manage. Maybe you could interact with your sons or something,” Donnie ground his teeth.
“Purple, perhaps you are taking all of this too far. The TV works fine; surely you can leave it alone.”
“Not if I want to make sure we don’t get hacked! One weak spot and it all comes undone!”
Splinter laughed. “What, hack this TV? You’re always talking about how ancient and backwards this is.”
He chuckled some more as Donnie’s mouth twisted. Surprisingly, instead of saying anything further, he stormed out of the room. Mikey scooched closer to Splinter, releasing a breath in his brother’s wake. The rat’s chuckles trailed off and he shook his head with a sigh. “That boy needs to relax.”
“He’s feeling vulnerable right now,” Mikey said. “You should at least humor him.”
“But it’s fine,” Splinter waved at the screen. “And this is getting out of hand. He’s worried about surveillance and hacking but how could anyone get to us through Scorpion Treadmill?”
The screen flickered. Static fuzzed over the reality show for a moment, then the picture was replaced by Donatello angrily splayed in his large lab chair like a Bond villain.
“This is how!”
“Ohhhh, boy,” Splinter gulped.
“Greetings, Donatello. You seem quite pensive today.”
“Yeah, well.” Donnie yanked open his toolbox. “As they say, no day is perfect.”
“No,” the Professor agreed. “But something does seem to be bothering you moreso than usual.”
“What’s with the interrogation? Everything’s fine, I said!”
The Professor hummed. Instead of pressing the issue, he bent down and grabbed a screwdriver from the community repair kit – the latest gift Donatello had brought. Settling across from the teen, he picked up one of the prosthetic legs they were working on for Hauser. Quietly, he began tinkering with one of the joints, mirroring the turtle.
“I mean, it’s not like I’m asking for much,” Donnie said after a moment. “Just twenty minutes with the TV. That’s what’s wrong with the world these days. Asking people to take twenty-five minutes away from their source of entertainment is too much to ensure their safety and security. Don’t come crying to me when we get hacked again.”
“I’m sure your family appreciates all your hard work,” the Professor replied. “Much like we do, here.”
“Mmm.” Donnie grunted. “I suppose. I thought at least April did. You guys don’t ask me for anything, though. I wouldn’t trust you if you did.”
“Perhaps not now. Needs can blur into wants as people grow more comfortable.”
The turtle snorted. “That’s one way to put it.”
“Wasn’t this current rewiring project your idea?”
“It’s a need! So that we won’t-” Donnie put down his screwdriver and rubbed his brow. “Just thirty minutes with the TV and Dad couldn’t step away for a snack break or something.”
The Professor gazed at him solemnly. “That does seem trivial.”
“Yeah. But…” Donnie picked the screwdriver back up and hunched forward, hyperfocused on the fake leg. He exhaled heavily. “But he’s always been like that. And I get it. Now. Honestly, finding out Dad was Lou Jitsu made so much sense. I wondered for years why he never let me install an HD TV instead of that old projector. But he spent ten years trapped down in the Hidden City. He missed the entire dot com boom. He jumped straight from CDs in a boombox to YouTube. I think tech kind of intimidates him, because he doesn’t understand it.” He sighed exasperatedly and looked up.
“But too-freaking-bad. I understand it. Can’t he trust me to do my thing?”
The Professor cocked his head. “I thought you didn’t want him to.”
Donnie startled. “What?”
“Donatello, it was clear to me from the beginning that you take great pride in your work. Yet you downplay it in a way that is not borne from modesty. From the way you rebuff even Michelangelo’s compliments, I have a theory as to why.”
“What’s your theory?”
“That your great technological skills failed you recently. And not in the simple, scientific way of failure, which is to be expected more often than not, but in a way that caused great harm. To you, and to others. Your current project is a way to make up for it. Your aversion to praise, penance.”
Donnie blinked at him. He looked down and fiddled some more with the fake leg. “Yeah, well,” he coughed. “There’s nothing wrong with my tech. So your theory is a bit off the mark.”
“Then it was who you entrusted your tech towards.”
Donnie froze.
“There is evil in this world, yes,” the Professor said thoughtfully. “And there will always be those who wrong us. But to believe that everyone is like that is to ignore the reality of goodness in this world, too.”
Donnie swallowed. “Professor, I’m… I’m not the person who can determine that difference.”
“We have all misplaced trust before.”
“But it doesn’t always get your brother shot, does it?”
The Professor’s eyes widened. Donnie threw down the fake leg and surged to his feet.
“I’m not just good with technology, I’m great at it. It’s what I have to offer to the team, to the world. Which is why when I misplace trust it’s a nuclear disaster. All my tech, all my knowledge and skills get turned on us and that’s how my brothers wind up in a cage. That’s how invasions and robberies and attempted genocide happen! That’s how Mikey got shot!” He stopped shouting suddenly and shook his head.
“I’m too much of a security risk. And I can’t… I can’t be the weak link.”
“You don’t trust yourself.”
“What, no, I totally do! I just know my own strengths and weaknesses.”
“Yet you seem to be doubting your judgement. You may think of it as ‘staying in your lane’, but the truth is you made an unfortunate call and you are terrified of making the same mistake twice. You are falling back on what you know - your tech, most especially - as if your excellence in one area justifies you despite your failures in another.” The Professor peered at him intently. “Am I mistaken?”
Donnie’s jaw hung open. He slowly raised one hand and pushed it shut. “Um… that’s…” His voice shook. He cleared his throat. “That’s a lot to take in.”
“Then take it in.” The Professor rose. “I’ll leave you to it.” His piercing gaze then eased, and his tone turned gentle.
“You are a bright young man, Donatello. But if you are going to view your family as an elite team where one needs to earn and keep their own place, then you are always going to carry some measure of guilt on your shoulders.”
The fire in the Forge crackled, throwing shadows on the wall. Mikey tiptoed down the stairs into the heart of the lair, three pairs of nose plugs over his nose. It was barely enough, in his opinion. He squinted about the dim space. Donnie’s silhouette sharpened into focus. His brother was hunched on a stool, watching the fire.
“Knock, knock.” Mikey tapped the wall. The nose plugs made his voice sound nasally and high.
“I know you’re there.”
“Goody.” Mikey perched on the edge of a slack tub and swung his feet. “Whatcha smelting this time?”
“Just some steel.”
“Noice.” Mikey peered at him. Donnie didn’t take his eyes away from the fire. He casually leaned back and whistled. “We’re planning dates for a Hidden City vay-cay upstairs. Could use your input.”
That tore his eyes from the flames. They didn’t look manic and twitching like they had been lately, just tired and bloodshot. Mikey held still, noticing how his brother looked him over. There was a desperate quality to his openness that was… new.
“My input,” Donnie repeated. He looked down. “Mikey, could I ask you something?”
“Ask away.”
“Can you forgive me?”
Mikey blinked. His knowledge base for Dr. Feelings pointed out that Donnie said can. Not ‘do’, not ‘could’, not ‘may’, but can. Which implied the ability… or inability… of an action.
And Donnie was always precise with his words.
“Of course I can,” he said seriously. “And as a matter of fact, I already do.” He leaned forward and whispered. “What is this about?”
“Bishop.” Donnie looked pained. “The whole mess. You… he shot you, Mikey, because I tangled with him to begin with.”
“So?”
His brother jerked. “So? So? That’s a big deal, Michael.”
Mikey shrugged. “So I got shot by a whackadoo bad guy. The same bad guy who schooled us all in a fair fight, took your battle shell, and kept you captive longer than the rest of us. You looked worse off than me.”
He leaned into Donnie’s personal space, cutting off any protests.
“That’s what bad guys do. They shoot people, kidnap people, and all sorts of nasty things. They play mind games and manipulate us, the good guys, into doing their bidding. But when we figure it out we go ham on their butts, don’t we?”
His brother stared at him. Then, slowly, he nodded.
“That doesn’t mean we were bad at the time. We were tricked. We were naïve, we were hopeful. How could I ever blame you for what happened to me?” He held up a hand. “Don’t answer that, Mr. Literal. It was a rhetorical question.”
“But how could you ever forgive me?” Donnie rephrased.
“We’re family, bro.” He shrugged again. “’s just how we roll.”
He hopped off the slack tub. “We all really do need that vacation, though. Come find us when you’re done down here.”
He patted Donnie’s shoulder and trotted out of the Forge.
“… and then she has the audacity to say she doesn’t care about my tech!” Donnie waved his hands dramatically. “That she cares about me for ME. Like, excuse me, April, but I’m the one who makes the Shakespearean speeches around here. How dare thee encroach upon my territory!”
Despite the rant-like quality, there was a layer of affection to his words. The Professor listened attentively, enjoying a sandwich from the picnic spread before the camp. Most of the humans didn’t go for the googly-eyed pizza, but some of the other snacks from the Hidden City were a hit.
Donnie continued recounting his tale, ending with the jailbreak and cake coma. He plopped back down next to the Professor and picked up a slice of the Creepy Supreme.
“Thank you, though.”
“Oh?”
“For what you said earlier. About family, and trusting myself.” He gazed out across the river. “When April spoke it just really threw everything into focus. I get it, now.”
The Professor smiled. “I am glad to hear that.”
“Yeah.” Donnie sighed heavily. “I do need to repair my bo, though. It never stops.” It was back to square one, yet again.
“Perhaps there is some type of ‘mystic spell’ which can prevent heavy damage that you can apply to your staff,” the Professor suggested. “Something like what you said April did with her bat.”
“Ugh, now she has a mystic weapon too, don’t remind me.” Donnie flopped backwards.
“Do I detect a hint of jealousy?”
“Me? Jealous? What could I possibly be jealous of?”
“You’ve never been behind the learning curve, have you?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re very smart, and a hard worker. I can’t imagine there are many things you don’t succeed at once you put your mind to it.”
“Well, that is true. Go on.”
“But you don’t have as much practice with mystic weapons as your brothers, do you?”
“Not… in the conventional sense, no. I am the Science Guy and I do have a brand.”
“No, you have pride,” the Professor corrected. “But it may not completely hinder you in this case. Perhaps you can keep your ‘brand’ while you catch up to your brothers.”
“Scoff. They will never let me live it down.”
“Who said they had to know?”
Donnie bolted upright. “You mean to suggest that I should practice with mystic weaponry… by myself? In secret?”
“If it’s that important to you. I do sense some angst regarding these mystic powers. It would quell your own sense of helplessness and incompetence in this field, and you would be ready to stand beside your brothers in equal measure should a day ever arrive where that would be necessary.”
“That’s… why haven’t I thought of that?”
“You’ve had a lot on your mind recently.” His eyes twinkled.
“Huh.” Donnie took another bite of pizza. He chewed slowly, lost in thought. The river lapped against the shantytown and a few more people partook of the picnic. The Professor reclined quietly beside him, enjoying the breeze. Donnie’s eyes roved over the picnic, the blankets, and the water purifier. Hauser jogged by the riverbank; his prosthetics glinting in the sun.
A testament to the success of tech. To all the good he’s brought into the world.
Yet he was still repairing broken bo staffs and battle shells.
And April did think magic and science were better together.
“There is a lot of the Hidden City you don’t see from inside a jail cell,” he reflected.
“I’m sure.”
“It’s something to think about.” Donnie took another bite. “Definitely something to think about.”