Chapter Text
It was the third night in a row waking up with the crushing notion of failure and idiocy sitting hard against his chest. In his dreams he could sort of forget about it, fall back into the comfortable routine of old fantasies; after all, he'd spent countless nights for many years dreaming for the chance to talk to the only scientist in the world who had written about the possibility of animals mutating to demonstrate humanoid intelligence. He'd scoured the darkest recesses of the internet and even the local library for every paper ever written on the subject, and they all had the same name on them.
The name of the guy who'd strapped him to a table, more like sample in a Petry dish than a scientific equal. Not exactly the kind of first impression Donnie had hoped to have on the one scientist in the world who thought it was even possible for a turtle to be intelligent.
Today, it was Leo leaning over him, knocking obnoxiously against his shell. He groaned irritably, and had the passing notion to take a swing. He was either too tired or too magnanimous to follow through.
Once he was sitting up, Leo moved on to Mikey. Knocking his shell, pulling him to his feet, practically shouting at him; Mikey was a deep sleeper. Even as he hung limply in Leo's grasp, more or less on his feet, a gentle snore escaped him.
"Rise and shine, green machine," Leo's voice was way too chipper for--well, any time of day in Donnie's opinion. Nobody should be happy when their one chance at really understanding their own existence had been conscripted to work for the Dragon Lord.
"It's gonna be a beautiful night and we're not gonna sit here and miss it," Leo was saying, way too loud. You'd think years of ninja training would've helped with his volume control.
"Alright, so don't sit here and miss it," Raph grumbled. "Lay down and sleep like the rest of us."
"Mmm hn," Mikey yawned, "Wh' time is it?" he started looking around, barely seeming to care that Leo had him by the shoulders. "Where's Venus and Splinter?"
"The three of us have been up for some time," Master Splinter's voice from the dining room made his three still-partially-asleep sons jump. "Your brother has been reading about healthy habits, and he is very excited to share his findings with you."
"His findings," Donnie echoed with profound melancholy. He sure wished he had findings to share. He could learn so much from Dr. Quease if only the Dragon Lord hadn't got him first.
"We're going for a jog!" Leo announced. "It's good for our bodies and our brains!"
Suddenly, Mikey was wide awake. "All of us? What are we waiting for? Let's get breakfast started so we can get out of here!"
A spike of irritation was the only thing strong enough to get Donnie to his feet, glaring at Mikey as he shambled towards the kitchen.
"Where was all this running mania the other day on the way back to the lair?"
Mikey leaned back to peek at Donnie over the open cupboard. "That was running to rescue a wacko scientist from a wacko dragon lord. My brain doesn't give me any rewards for that. This is running for fun as a family activity! Lots of happy juice!"
He swung the fruity pebbles out of the cupboard as he spoke, leaving it open as he twirled towards the fridge.
Donnie settled into the chair beside Master Splinter, watching blankly as Mikey squeezed various sauces into his cereal--caramel, chocolate, strawberry. Then he was sprinkling in sweetened coconut flakes. And peanut butter, lots of peanut butter. Hm, peanut butter didn't sound too bad for breakfast. Maybe he'd put some in his oatmeal.
Finally, Mikey was pouring cream over his concoction and bringing it to the table. Donnie felt an unexpected pang of jealousy, thinking of how his hobby had been ruined. He wondered how Mikey would react if a chef he admired were kidnapped or hired by the Dragon Lord. Would figuring out what else he could mix into his cereal even be fun anymore?
And that was exactly the problem, he thought bitterly. He hadn't been studying their mutation for fun! Did he have fun doing science? Absolutely. But it wasn't like he could stop just because the situation with Quease had, as Mikey would put it, reduced the happy juice his brain used to reward him for it with.
"Come on Raph, you have to," Leo implored a little too forcefully. Donnie winced at his authoritative tone; Leo hadn't figured out yet how much worse it was to come across controlling than whiny.
"Have to, nothing," Raph disagreed, predictably. He gave Leo a passing shove as he moved to the kitchen, almost hitting his head on the cupboard Mikey had left open. It slammed shut, making everyone at the table jump.
Donnie thought for sure Mikey was in for an earful, but Raph just said, "Yo Venus, you want oatmeal?"
Venus prattled off a response that Donnie didn't pay attention to. It was stupid, but he felt annoyed; he was sitting right there, and yeah he could make his own breakfast, he'd been planning to, but so could Venus. And the point was that Raph hadn't asked him. He and Leo and even Master Splinter were all about Venus lately, which was double annoying because Donnie was the one being civil to her while Raph fumed over getting beaten by magic and Leo and Mikey fumbled with the idea of having a sister. Now she was everybody's favorite and she hadn't even done anything.
Well, okay, maybe that wasn't totally fair. She had taught them dream-walking and saved Master Splinter's life, and defeated the Shredder. But it was kind of cheating because she used magic for all that and magic was the cause of all their troubles lately. Master Splinter wouldn't have been in danger if it weren't for dream-walking. If the Dragon Lord had never escaped and never killed Venus's sensei, Splinter wouldn’t have been in danger and Dr. Quease wouldn’t be working for a maniac and Venus wouldn't even be here and technically that would be a better situation for all of them.
As soon as that thought passed through his mind, he felt guilty--of course he didn't wish they'd never met Venus, just because the Dragon Lord was giving him pain.
Something slamming down in front of him made his eyes fly back open; he hadn't even realized he'd closed them.
"Don't offer to help or anything, Dipstick Van Winkle," Raph grouched, settling down next to Venus with his own bowl of oatmeal. Donnie blinked at the bowl Raph had set in front of him. A string of apologies and protests came to mind--I didn't know you were making me some, how did you even know I wanted oatmeal, I think I fell asleep, also are we going running or not because I really don't want to--
But all that came out was "Dah? Uh, thanks."
"No one will be required to go," Splinter stated, "But I want you to realize that Leo has put in much effort looking for ways to better himself, and it is important to him to include you. And it would benefit some of you to get out of the lair and do something active."
Donnie didn't have to look up to see the way Splinter's gaze lingered on him. It wasn't exactly a secret to anyone that he'd been a bit mopey for the past few days.
Well, sue him. His computer blew up and his hero betrayed him all in the same horrible night. He had the computer running perfectly again now, but he felt the damage to his spirit would be a much more complicated fix.
Ugh, now even his own internal dialogue was starting to sound like Venus.
And did that mean that Leo had made this plan specifically to cheer him up? That would really suck, because it meant he practically had to go, and it definitely wouldn't make him feel better.
A glance towards Leo, fidgeting self-consciously with an unfortunately endearing mixture of self-doubt and righteous purpose, had Donnie's heart sinking with the realization that he was definitely going running today.
"Yeah, yeah, I'll come on your little mental health run," Raph reached over to rap on Leo's arm with his knuckles. "But I'm still gonna give you a hard time about it."
"All that negativity is only gonna slow you down, Raph," Leo retorted. He started jogging in place, as if to demonstrate how much his energy was boosted by his apparently more positive thinking patterns.
"Not as much as Mikey's breakfast is gonna slow him down," Raph said, raising his eyebrows as the turtle in question lifted his bowl to his face and started licking out the last remnants of caramel-chocolate-cereal sludge from it. "Betcha he crashes hard about ten minutes in."
"He's getting grains and protein," Donnie said around a mouthful, a drip of oatmeal landing on his wrist instead of back in the bowl. He was too tired at the moment to care.
Venus crinkled her snout in disgust, though, so he stuck his tongue out at her, clumsily swallowing the last of his current mouthful in order to do so. She pointedly looked away.
Master Splinter was eyeing him now, so he quickly directed his attention to his sad peanut-butter-less oatmeal and shoveled the rest of it into his sad understanding-the-nature-of-his-own-existence-less body, this time mindful of his table manners.
It was going to be a long night.
---
He'd been right; it was a long and miserable night. Now it was nearing its end and he hadn't done a thing except run himself haggard and worry about a baby sea turtle.
For one thing: Leo had been a total jerk about the run, not appreciating at all that half of them were only going because they wanted to be supportive.
Second point: Mikey was acting weird with him. Nothing too crazy, just a little quicker to jump to name-calling and a little more distant, but he couldn't help feeling like things hadn't been the same between them since he'd gone to rescue Quease and ended up getting kidnapped. Maybe it was Donnie who was acting different; he couldn't deny he was still annoyed, especially with Mikey, for being so glib about the whole thing from start to finish.
Third: Venus was perfect. Of course she liked running. Of course she loved the baby turtle and wanted to help. Nobody was going to remember it was Donnie who had talked them into going back for the baby turtle when she lost it. She didn't even seem to appreciate that he'd stood up for her. She and Mikey and even Raph had gotten all defensive when he told them they couldn't keep the baby turtle in the sewers. Like they thought he didn't care about her! He had literally told them he logged on to the turtle website every day! Of course once he explained about her needs and their total inability to meet them, they'd been on board with calling animal services, they'd practically had no choice. But it still sucked to be misunderstood.
He just needed to focus on updating security systems. With a new enemy who already had a habit of hanging out underground, they really needed to keep on their toes.
He wondered how Dr. Quease handled feeling misunderstood. The thought made his stomach twist uncomfortably, but not nearly as bad as the thought of Quease had for the past few days. He wondered if it was because the hurt was starting to heal, or just because this time he was alone instead of with his family.
They didn't understand at all.
Of course it was disappointing that Quease had been hired by the Dragon Lord, but they were all acting like that made the two of them equally evil. They didn't understand how the human world worked, not like Donnie did. The guy had been fired from every institute he’d ever worked at, of course he was tempted by a job offer! And the lab Dragon Lord had set up for him really was a nice one. Oh, what he wouldn't give for a particle accelerator!
"How is the security update going?" Master Splinter's voice cut through his thoughts.
"Hm? Fine. Well actually, to tell you the truth," Donnie rested his chin in his hands and sighed heavily, "I'm just having a hard time focusing."
A paw rested on his shoulder. It was gentle, consoling, but also a bit demanding.
"You are distracted by thoughts of Quease."
Of course he could guess that; it wasn't a secret. Still, the frank observation made Donnie feel uncomfortably exposed.
"I can't help it, Master Splinter," he said. "I've been studying the phenomenon of our mutation for my whole life."
Master Splinter tilted his head, listening. Donnie turned his chair to face him.
"I just want to understand where we came from," he found himself practically pleading. "I need to know where the ooze came from, why it was developed." In the past he'd wanted to understand their mutation better in order to know how to help when one of them got hurt, since they couldn't just go grab a doctor, however they may joke about it.
But now they had Venus for that, so maybe it wasn't so urgent. But it still felt urgent.
Master Splinter was shaking his head, gentle but firm. "You do not need to know how you came to be in order to understand who you are."
Donnie wanted to cry. It wasn't a casual scientific curiosity, it was a lifelong quest. He did need it, as badly as he'd ever needed anything.
"But what if that is who I am? What if," he put a tapped a hand against his chest for emphasis, "I need to understand?"
He hadn’t noticed Venus emerge from her subway car, apparently finished with her meditation. He sucked in a breath of irritation as she approached quietly, leaning against his desk to join the conversation.
“I used to be very curious about where I came from and how,” she said pleasantly. “I did not know about ooze, only that Chung I had found me in the gutter. I thought it made me dirty.”
Donatello bit his tongue about how completely irrelevant this story was to the private conversation he’d been having with Master Splinter. She wasn’t trying to be rude, he shouldn’t be rude either.
“He taught me that all things have their place, and many of the most wonderful things are questions that cannot be answered. He explained questions and answers as being in balance with each other, like light and dark.”
"Good for Chung I," he muttered bitterly before he could stop himself. In his opinion, the point of questions was to be answered, and none of Venus's 'internal process' babblings could change that.
Venus didn't seem to pick up on his tone, and he suspected Master Splinter ignored it for her sake.
"Chung I was a very wise man," he said warmly. Donnie felt a surge of anger at how much gentler and more ready to understand he seemed with her than he’d been with him. Of course; Master Splinter was all about philosophy and Venus’s magic seemed to fall in that category. Science was something only Donnie understood.
“With his guidance I studied Tian Wen thoroughly,” she continued. “It has helped me understand myself as part of nature, instead of somehow rejected by it.”
“I always loved learning from Chung I about his cosmology,” Splinter said. “Each of us have opposites within us, and contribute to the larger opposition of the universe.”
They were completely missing the point. This wasn’t a religious question. It wasn’t something he could stop wondering about by closing his eyes and finding peace in himself. And he didn’t want anything to do with a philosophy that separated questions from answers to the point he couldn’t seek answers to basic scientific questions.
"I was this close," He said almost to himself. "Years of hitting the same walls over and over. Now there's an expert--the expert--in the field of mutant biology living two blocks from us. And the Dragon Lord got him first."
"Donatello," Master Splinter's tone was getting terse, "Dr. Quease is not a mere victim of the Dragon Lord. Whatever his scientific discoveries may have been, we cannot trust him. He is dangerous."
"You don't know that," Donnie argued half-heartedly. "He's only human. You know how they are about their careers."
He let out a weak half-chuckle, trying to soften the memory of April and Casey a bit. Their careers had taken them out of New York City for now, and although they wrote, it wasn't the same. Nobody had quite healed from that yet.
Master Splinter looked thoroughly unamused. "Humans are not to be trifled with. You must put these thoughts from your mind. There are plenty of other ways to understand who you are."
Donnie scowled. He wasn’t asking who he was, he was asking about the properties of the ooze that caused them to mutate and the specificities of their individual mutations. He had a whole list of questions that he’d compiled over the years with careful research, questions that decidedly testable.
But Master Splinter didn’t really have a deep respect for science. It was something he tolerated, and it would be pointless to try to explain all this to him.
"I'm not trifling with him. Am I allowed to be upset?"
His father sighed wearily. "Of course you are. How can we help with the security system?"
Somehow, Donnie didn’t really feel like he was allowed to be upset.