Work Text:
Leo was scratching at the door to the lab like a cat.
It was not altogether surprising, the shellbrain got bored enough to decide to bother Donnie rather often. He usually had more decorum than this though.
Donnie supposed he couldn’t hold it against him, though. After the Kraangs’ hostile takeover of New York, Leo had been put on quite a long bedrest to heal. Even now, despite being able to get up, he still wasn’t allowed to go on missions. It would be hard to fight with both hands occupied by crutches.
Thus the turtle had been coming to Donnie for entertainment more and more often.
Donnie, of course, absolutely did not enjoy this one bit. The weight on his chest did not lighten when his twin was in his line of sight, fidgeting and chattering and alive. The slider’s ever rambling voice did not help him focus. The presence of his twin did not soothe Donnie’s isolation, or make his long stints in the lab away from any social interaction less depressing.
Most importantly, it should be noted that Leonardo Hamato’s presence absolutely did not bring Donatello a deep seated feeling of safety.
It would probably be nice, though, to have peace from the idiot’s continuous attempts to get into the lab.
Donnie sighed, watching over the security camera as his twin went from trying to pry a knife in between the metal doors that led to the lab, to just hitting the doors with the knife in hopes that Donnie would take pity of him.
Donnie rose from his chair, joints popping as they moved from the position they’d been in for hours. He made his way to the doors and waited until he saw Leo lean on them, probably to plot his next attempt, before opening them. He caught Leo before he fully fell, of course. A sad sacrifice in the name of not worsening his injuries.
Leo blinked up at him, then smirked.
“I knew you’d cave eventually. No one can resist this face.” He said smugly.
“I hope you know your injuries are the only reason you’re not on the ground right now.” Donnie replied tonelessly.
“Aww, you do care!”
Donnie scoffed and pushed him back to his feet, returning to his messy desk.
The lab was even less organized than usual at the moment. There were a great many things that had to be rebuilt or upgraded in order to turn the abandoned subway into a home. Donnie had taken out most of his old blueprints to figure out what he had to remake and give himself a base to work off of. He was currently in the middle of organizing the blueprints into a “to rebuild” pile, a “potential future project” pile and a scrap pile. The work had quite honestly put him in a bit of a slump, organizing was his least favorite part of lab work, so he could privately admit that Leo was a welcome distraction.
Not that he’d ever tell the guy of course.
Leo whistled as he took in the state of the lab car.
“It looks like someone waged a war against those paper ninjas in here. What is all this stuff?” He asked, picking up papers from the piles Donnie hadn’t yet gotten to.
“‘This stuff’ is the basis on which every project I’ve planned was built. You guys are lucky I was able to salvage my blueprint boxes from the old lab, or it would have taken much longer to get started rebuilding.” It had taken a delicate balancing act on the non collapsed part of the ceiling to fish the boxes from the old lab. It was worth it, though , to not have to design everything from scratch. There were also a few sentimental prints in there, not that he’d let anyone know that of course.
“Hold on, this is every blueprint you’ve ever made? There’s gotta be stuff from when you were a kid in here!” Leo immediately started digging into the pile, the nosy twin that he was. Fortunately, the more embarrassing designs were usually more drawing than blueprint and were thus kept separate and safe from prying eyes.
Donnie quickly settled into a rhythm, sorting through the frankly massive piles of schematics to the background noise of Leo chattering about the things he unearthed. It was unexpectedly pleasant, the sorting required just enough brainpower to keep him from going off on a tangent about every design Leo found, and his twin could hold the conversation just well on his own, allowing Donnie to sink into his work when necessary.
Slowly, the tension he’d been carrying ever since he realized he’d have to build a whole new home from scratch released from his shoulders. In the peace of the night, Donnie actually felt excited about redoing the lair with his current skill set, rather than unimaginably behind on his work. In fact, he felt so light that his eyelids began to droop against his will, his many late nights catching up to him. Suddenly, he heard a loud gasp from his brother.
Donnie was in his feet in a moment, but instead of an enemy or a fast growing bloodstain or whatever else Donnie had expected to see, Leo was holding up a blueprint. The thing was obviously old and faded, it must have been one of Donnie’s first designs. He rolled his eyes at his twin’s dramatics and walked over to see what had shocked him so much that he actually looked lost for words.
When he finally laid eyes on the design that had seemingly frozen his brother solid, Donnie immediately snatched the print from his hands, face flushing. He hid the paper behind his back in some last ditch attempt to make Leo have not seen what was on it, but the damage was done.
“Donnie. Donnie. Is that what I think it is?” Leo had gone from staring at the paper to staring directly at Donnie. Donnie averted his eyes.
“You’re behaving ridiculously.” Donnie tried. “It is simply one of my first battle shell designs. Nothing to get excited about.”
Unfortunately, the confirmation only seemed to egg Leo on.
“Donnie. You were going to base your battle shell on mine? Oh my god.” The guy practically had stars in his eyes. He looked like-
Oh god he looked like he was about to cry.
“I am failing to see why you are so up in arms about this!” Donnie retorted uncomfortably. “I made my battle shell to feel safer. This is the design that made me feel the most protected.”
Suddenly, Donnie found himself squished against his twin in a shell crushing hug. His first instinct was to push away, but Leo was warm and solid and damn it, maybe his twin, his best friend and most trusted confidant since he was young, made him feel safe. So sue him! He was only flesh and blood at the end of the day.
Eventually, he ended up putting his arms around Leo as well, causing the guy to sniff loudly in his ear. They stayed like that for a while. Longer than Donnie had let anyone hug him for for a long time. And Donnie didn’t always appreciate physical touch, but for the moment it grounded him, quieted his racing thoughts, let him breathe deeply again.
In the end it was Leo who ended the hug. He pulled away, leaving his hands on Donnie’s shoulders and looking him in the face. Donnie looked down.
“You make me feel safe too, Dee. More than anyone. I know whatever I get myself into you’ll have some magical thingamajig to help me out. And I know that even without your tech you’ll have my back.” Leo smiled, then. And unlike most of his smiles since a portal to another dimension opened in New York City, since he became leader really, it reached his eyes.
He let Donnie go and turned back to the pile of blueprints, still looking sheepishly away from the softshell.
“I love you, bro.” He said, quietly, and immediately busied himself with the papers once more.
Donnie felt a foreign warmth grow in his chest and travel through him all the way to his fingertips. His eyes were misty. He swallowed the lump in his throat and returned to his chair, carefully stashing the blueprint in his drawer to be properly put away later.
“I love you too, Nardo.” He whispered.
They worked in a warm silence for a while longer, until Leo found an unfinished jetpack design and immediately started rambling about how cool it’d be.
By the time they retired it was more early than late, and Donnie felt warmer than he’d felt in a very long time.
And if the blueprint was stashed in a drawer beside his bed for nights when he needed to feel a bit more protected, his family would be none the wiser.