Archive of Our Own ^beta

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He saw so many similarities in Raph on what he experienced that he felt scared, even if he insisted that he was fine he obviously was not. Not when he couldn't remember doing or saying stuff he supposedly had told his brothers or when he placed stuff on places he didn't remember, not when he sometimes could stare at how his body moved and interacted with others but couldn't actually control where to go or what to say and obviously not when his voice wasn't the only one inside his head.

So he, obviously distressed by the lack of memories and the overwhelming feeling of having other people with him in his body, started researching on his own.

And he didn't like what he found.

All of his research pointed to OSDD, a type of dissociative disorder, which only meant one thing.

Those voices inside his head weren't him going crazy, just alters.

But he wasn't convinced, to have such a disorder you had to have trauma and Mikey couldn't recall any sort of traumatic memories.

“That's what I'm here for” had told him Dr Feelings. “To keep you safe from your trauma, you are not ready to remember yet but you do have it”

So then Mikey almost ruled out the possibility or being a faker but he still wasn't sure about what he should make out of... this whole situation.

That is when he decided to join a forum with people that had similar (or the same) type of disorders.

He learnt then that he was part of a system, that switching could be scary and cause migraines if doing so fast and in a short amount of time, he learnt about alter roles and how he was the core of the system.

When he was convinced enough that all of this could be real he decided to join the chat, ask for a few experiences and maybe help them figure out how to work their whole system thing.

“Can you control when you guys switch?” had asked him a girl. “People usually say that if you truly can control it then you're faking but don't worry, that isn't true! Besides, for the most part they aren't systems themselves so don't pay much attention to them”

“I haven't thought about that yet to be honest but I think if I wanted to shove someone else to front I could”  Mikey answered her. “I do know that I'm able to cofront though”

“That's a start then! And forgive me if I'm overstepping but have you thought about telling your family?”

“Actually I would like to keep it a secret... Just for now” 

“I understand... Well, it was good talking to you, hope you figure it out and you guys have fun while you're at it!”

Mikey logged off from his account and deleted the browser history.

She had been too kind to him, someone who was not diagnosed and possibly a faker, yet she showed him nothing but compassion.

It made him feel sick.

Because he was fine, wasn't he? Raph and his alters often experienced migraines and major memory loss, he barely experienced it. So maybe if he tried to tell his brothers they would tell him off or write it as him being confused.

Maybe they would believe him but what were the chances?

He They were fine as it was, there was no need for them to know (at least just yet).

So why did he need to tell them? It's not like it could be noticeable neither was something really necessary that they needed to know.

It wasn't that important (right?).

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When Doctor Feelings fronted for the first time he remembered being in a small body (too small for a 18 year old... but as time passed by he adapted himself to the situation), not knowing what to do or what to make out of the situation he isolated himself for a while. He knew there was someone else with him (because he had memories of things he most certainly hadn't done and he could hear that person talking to him) and as time passed by there were more and more of them. For the most part they got along just fine, sometimes they fought (because no matter what good friends they were, they couldn't simply get along all the time) and sometimes they got angry at each other but that usually didn't last.

All of them also had discovered their roles by accident, Doctor Feelings was usually the one that broke the fights and talked to them (and others outside their system) about, well, feelings (and that made him the therapist and protector of the system, he had learned later), Doctor Delicate Touch tried to help but usually came off as scary and tended to do more harm than good (a persecutor and trauma holder), Doctor Rude was straight up rude as his own name said (and that made him another persecutor), Doctor Sweet was a small kid (and a part of Mikey was jealous, he too had wanted to enjoy his childhood to its fullest but he wasn't able to do so because of trauma) but outside of that he didn't have a role (he was simply a little).

At first it had been weird, given that they all had to share one body, they didn't know how to make it work or how to communicate which each other, which lead to it being more difficult but as time passed by they managed to make it work.

It was agreed that Mikey would (for the most part) front the most for now but if any of the members of his family looked or felt sad, any of the others could front to help.

Right.

Because Mikey was a good person and even with him being the core of their system he wanted them all to front more and express themselves however they wanted, the only downside is that they had to do so as privately as they could because Mikey was sure if his family knew they would totally not believe him.

What if they thought he was weird for behaving differently with similar yet different personalities when he didn't have any type of disorder?

They didn't even know he had some sort of trauma (he had shoved it far deep down on his memories, even when he started to remember a bit of it he refused to even think about telling the others), he couldn't, didn't want to risk them not believing him.

“Earth to Mikey! You okay there, dude?” Leonardo seemingly materialized himself before him, making him snap out of his thoughts.

“I most assurely are, do not worry” Doctor Feelings replied, widening his eyes when Mikey's brother in blue rose an eye ridge.

“Ouhh, fancy words today? What's the occasion?” he teased, his words not having any sort of malice behind them. “Donnie! This is going too far! Trying to turn our own little brother in a second you...”

“Donatello needs someone as sofisticated as he is, wouldn't want him to get bored, would we?” and with that Dr Feelings turned around and walked away.

“Wait, what did you mean by that, Mikey!?” he could hear the frantic screams of Mikey's older brother behind him. “I could be as smart as Donnie if I wanted to! I constantly learn book words!”

Doctor Feelings gently shook her head and smiled to himself, hiding their identities wouldn't be as hard as he thought.

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Dr Sweet knew he had messed up the moment he was caught by Mikey's oldest brother while playing on his room. It wasn't like they were doing anything wrong though! He was only playing with a teddy bear he had found around while laying on a cozy blanket and wearing his signature clothes.

Raph (was it Raph?) looked at him warily, which made sweet chirp on response, quickly attracting his attraction.

“Hey little guy, you okay?” Dr Feelings was telling him to look at the bracelet on his wrist, the color would tell him who was fronting.

It was yellow, which meant Brain was on the front right now. Out of all the possible alters, Brain was the most rational one which could mean two things: He would either catch on quickly or he would get suspicious and tell the others about it.

Dr Sweet chirped again and reached his little arms towards him with a questioning look, would he pick them up? He would, right? He was a little kid after all, he surely would lift him up!

And he indeed did. Brain slowly approached him and carried them in its arms, making sweet coo softly and hide their face on his plastron.

“You okay there? You haven't done this since you were really small...” Brain gently brushed Doctor Sweet's head, making him chirp again at the attention.

And Brain could totally notice that his youngest brother was indeed in distress, he looked like he was age regressing and by the looks of it to a really small child, he also seemed to be maintaining the mentality of one so it decided to be careful around them.

“You want us to get you anything?” he had asked, voice soft and caring which made sweet snuggle more into its hold. “Also if this happens again tell any of us, even if it's one of our other brothers, I don't feel comfortable letting you all alone while you're regressed like this, you could accidentally hurt yourself”

Dr Sweet wanted to argue and let it know that he indeed had had company while laying down on that blanket, that Dr Feelings had been monitoring him the whole time but he knew he couldn't shouldn't, it was a secret for a reason.

“I sowwy...” Dr Sweet whimpered and hid their face on Brain's plastron, making it tighten its hold on him.

“Why are you apologizing? You did nothing wrong”

“I wowwy you...”

“I'm worried something bad could've had happened to you while you were alone and you could get hurt without any of us knowing, you need a caretaker while you're like this” he looked right into sweet's eyes and flashed him a warm smile. “If this happens again you come get us, okay?”

“Oki!” he enthusiastically replied.

“Now, you wanna take a nap? Or wanna play with some toys?” at that Dr Sweet looked hopefully at him, he could have a playmate! That was the coolest thing ever!

“We play!” they pointed at his plushies and beamed at him. “We play house?”

“That's a fantastic idea, lil guy!”

At that Dr Sweet squealed happily at it and Dr Feelings whom was co-fronting tiredly sighed, maybe keeping it a lowkey thing wouldn't be so easy after all.

Chapter Text

When Raph woke up he had thought that it was gonna be just another ordinary day.

Key word being thought.

As soon as he entered the kitchen he could feel his two brothers that were already there looking at him intensely, a deep sense of uneasiness settled on him, what was going on?

“Hey guys! Everything okay?” when both of them stiffened he knew something was definitely off, his brothers always replied to his morning greetings. “Guys?...”

He was suddenly met face to face with his baby brother who looked uncharacteristically angry for some reason, was that the reason his brothers were all tense?

“Do I not exist to you?!” Dr Delicate Touch bellowed angrily, who did this turtle thought he was to ignore him? “Are they the only ones who get a “hey” out of your mouth? Why not me?!”

“I'm sorry little guy... Didn't see you there” he awkwardly laughed but it only caused for the tension to grow more between them.

“It's always like that! I'm fed up!” he turned around and walked out of the kitchen after adding a last sentence. “Make the breakfast by yourselves!”

Raph stared at the spot from where his brother had just left, seemingly a bit lost in thought. 

“What was all that about?” Raph finally snapped out of his train of thoughts and took a seat across his little brothers, looking confusedly at them.

“Be our guest, I just told Michael “hello” and when I sat down he was onto me” Leon replied while nervously sipping on his tea, his fingers tapping gently on his leg like he always did when he felt anxious.

“I only arrived here a few minutes before you, big brother and he was already on me asking why I hadn't greeted him” Donnie absentmindedly looked up from his drink to stare at Leo and Raph for some seconds, then went back to staring at his coffee. “I didn't even have the time to greet any of them, not even Nardo so I do not get why he was so angry over it”

“Maybe he has been feeling a bit left out? It doesn't have to be just about the greetings” Mind fronted to give them a piece of their wisdom. “Also greetings, it is I, Mind”

“Great, Donnie 2.0” Leo mumbled on his hand, annoyance replaced by concern in a second. “So we apologize to him and he'll be back to being our cute, angelic baby brother, right?”

“Yes, though it might not be that easy, we do not know if he has been feeling frustrated for long or it has been a recent development” Mind supplied.

“Please stop talking Donnie language, I can't understand” Leon joked while standing up and looking at the rest of his brothers. “¡Es hora de pedir perdón, hermanos!”

“Yeah, yeah, just come on”

Mind was the first one out of the kitchen with Leo and Donnie following a bit far behind them. They waited for the inevitable scream when xe knocked on Mikey's door but nothing was heard, not a single sound. Mind waited and knocked a second time, this time a bit more loudly.

“Mikey, can we talk? We're worried about you!” when he didn't reply Mind decided to just open the door, what if something had happened to him? What if they were hurt? “Mikey I'm going inside”

Without thinking much about it xe opened the door and stared worriedly at the room before them, xe then turned around and looked at their two immediate younger brothers.

“Guys, Mikey isn't here!”