Chapter Text
Damn..
Was all Donnie could think as he narrowly escaped the officers alongside April, his tech in hand. He was annoyed, and his entire body ached with effort as his webbed feet moved in rapid succession, one after another.
Every part of him ached, especially his neck and shell. New York City was still sleeping, which Donnie couldn’t find himself to be more grateful for. He can’t imagine trying to make it back home like this during the day.
It didn’t take them long to make it to a sewer cover, both of them were running on pure adrenaline. They were also trained ninjas but that was beside the point..
He and April were both gasping for breath. April put her hands on her knees and rested for a moment, groaning loudly. Donnie chuckled breathlessly while watching her, the laughter was short lived as he was cut off by a groan of his own.
“Are you all good there, Apes?” He muttered in between trying to catch his breath, Donnie isn’t good at apologies, or, hell, admitting that there’s one necessary. He still doesn’t think this is his fault, but feels bad nonetheless, damn his bad-boy persona, what if his sister is hurt? God, what if she’s really badly hurt? How would his brothers forgive him?-
“Just a little bit banged up from the fall, that’s all.” April interrupted his progressively dark thoughts with a thumbs up toward him with one hand, whilst dusting off her jacket with the other. “Let’s get down to the lair, I meant what I said about us having a talk.”
Donnie quickly remembered her small, annoyed quip as they were in the alleyway dealing with his hacked technology. Damn, she’s just like Leo in all the most annoying ways. He concurred whilst laughing nervously.
They pull open the sewer hatch with a loud thud, the metal scraping against the concrete of the road. Donnie tried to help as much as he could, but with his adrenaline slowly wearing off, his body wasn’t far off from one giant crippling soreness spreading through him like wildfire.
Donnie offers April to go first, but she waves him off dismissively with her old April-fashioned smile, beckoning him to go first. He bows over dramatically to her, which earns him a smack upright the head.
He stepped onto the metal ladder, taking his time on his way down, being as careful and quiet as he could manage. He did not want to wake up any of his brothers when he looked like this at 4:00 in the morning.
He went nose blind to the smell of the sewer years ago, but, of course, there’s still certain days, or nights, he supposes, when it bothers him to no end.
He was the first one to make it down the hatch, he looked up to April, catching the tech she threw down to him with a grunt. He took a moment to inspect the now crushed, dirty, and faulty technology in his hands, whilst calculating how long he thinks each one will take to repair.
Damn.
He thought again, as he was now more aware than before of how the dirt from the battle was clinging to his green skin. He felt gross. Sure, he feels like this most of the time after a mission, but this time it’s a bit more complicated, April being here and all, he assumes.
He groaned, rolling his eyes in annoyance. Can his tech survive one mission without friendly fire? He swears, one of these days he’ll show his brothers what it’s like to have something broken that you care about.
To push away the thoughts, he waited for April to climb down the hatch. “Donnie. I forgot to ask, are you alright? You uh.. ya took a pretty nasty fall on your shell..” his sister hesitated, poking a finger toward his shell about half-way down the ladder, before resuming climbing down.
No, No I am not okay.
He wanted to say, but he didn’t. Him describing to her the feeling of dirt surrounding him, and the way every part of his body ached after that fight, especially after that fall, wouldn’t do her any good. “Yeah, like you said, a little banged up, but that’s all. The hoodie cushioned most of my shell.” He assured her.
She finally made it down the ladder, and they started walking the stretch of sewer lining back to the lair. Donnie was aching in places he didn’t know he could ache, and April just looked genuinely exhausted.
Of course Donnie felt bad for dragging her out of the comfort of her home at 3 in the morning to go throw hands or wires, hehehehe with a high school tech club, but he’d never dare to admit apologetic emotion over such a meagre issue.
“Alright, finally back at the lair!” Donnie exclaimed happily, putting his tech down on a counter nearby and stretching with a jaw-splitting yawn. Ughhhh he could sleep standing up by now, he was sure of it.
He could hear the couch creak and April sigh as she sat down. He could practically feel the tension drain from them both now that they were back home.
He turns to look at April, resting his elbow on the counter and relaxing his posture. His shell and shoulders feel so much lighter without his battle shell, but god his shell hurts. He can only hope it’s nothing serious.
“So, Apes, are you gonna stick around for the night or head home?-- Eh- Either is fine of course, just double checking.” He stammered out the last sentence, it's a habit of his to clarify his own words, but maybe he’s just projecting something, who knows, who cares.
“Yeah, I think I’m gonna crash here for the night, if that’s cool. I’m pretty tired after that whole.. Shabang.” April stated, using her hands to accentuate her words.
Donnie couldn’t blame her, he could feel the exhaustion creeping into his bones, despite a good long night's sleep. (Of 3 hours, but, hey, by his standards that’s practically sleeping like a baby.)
He offered her an apologetic smile, which he and April both know is the closest she’s going to get to an actual apology from him.
“Of course that’s fine, do you need anything before I go?” He replied, picking at his hands subconsciously. His want to wash his body off is only growing with each agonizing second this conversation goes on for.
“Nah, I’m all good. You go get comfy, we’ll have our talk another night, I’m too tired to be mad. G’night Donnie!” How does April always seem to know the basics of what he’s thinking?.. Oh well, he’s not complaining.
He observes for a moment as April takes off her glasses and puts them on the table next to the couch.
“Need me to pull out the couch for you?” Donnie offers, resting a hand on his hip.
April let out a long sigh in return “If you insiiisttt.” she said jokingly.
Donnie walked over and leaned down next to the couch, both of them on either side, and pulled out the makeshift bed Donnie had installed a couple years back once his brothers and April had started hanging out a lot more.
“Thanks Dee!” April exclaims, throwing herself back down on the couch.
Donnie walks back over to his scrap heap tech and mutters something April is 47% sure is a goodnight, then scurries off.
The walk to the lab takes an agonizing fifteen minutes, Donnie has to stop occasionally and lean against the wall to catch his breath. His body ached so bad. Honestly, if he wanted to he could fall asleep right on the very floor he’s standing on.
By the time he makes it to his lab, the exhaustion coating his body is bone deep.
But, alas, he can’t sleep until he cleans himself off. He can’t even lay down or touch anything in his lab until he does, otherwise it’ll get dirty. He grabs a towel from the closet nearby and places it on the floor, discarding his tech on the towel for the time being as he goes to get ready for a shower.
Donnie stretches, some of his joints popping in a way that makes him wince in discomfort.
He never liked the sound of bone cracking.
Whilst walking toward the shower, he sees Leo on the other side of their skate ramp.
Oh, that's right.
Donnie faintly recalls seeing Leo before he left to go get his tech back after it was stolen by those satin wearing punks. He was still sipping his coffee- no, scratch that. Knowing Leo it’s probably his third one of the night, damn their insomniac genes.
Donnie stares for a moment, his lips curved in an uncomfortable scowl with his sharpie-brows furrowed toward the blue brother.
Donnie rarely bothers trying to get the insomniac to sleep, it’s a losing battle after all. The stubborn baby blue only occasionally entertained Donnie’s pleas for his slumber, and even then, he wouldn’t sleep for long. As the years went on, Donnie slowly stopped caring whether or not the sword-wielder slept, because Donnie slowly picked up on the sour habit. It would only be hypocritical to ask him to sleep, after all.
In the middle of one of his sips, Leo finally notices Donnie.
Donnie’s still fidgeting with his hands and staring at him with those tired, calculated eyes that he always does when he’s either in the middle of judging somebody or studying them.
Leo stares back for a moment, and he looks as if he’s buffering.
Sure, Leo usually becomes confused or buffers a bit when he sees somebody else up late at night with him, but the blue-screen seems to come more from Leo’s own exhaustion than surprise.
“Don-Tron! How’d your late night excursion go? Where’s that purple satin jacket you’ve been flexing all day n’ night? Thought I’d never catch you without it again!” Leo teases with that same annoying, punchable smirk on his face.
It’s truly a mystery to Donnie how he’s avoided getting his teeth punched out by somebody with all of his quips and comments.
“Go to bed, Leon. It’s 4:00am for crying out loud. Get some sleep before dawn, for all of our sake. You and I both know your magic fails you when you don’t sleep.” Donnie snaps back, maybe with a little more venom than he intended, but he’s honestly too tired and too overwhelmed to care. Donnie keeps walking and slams the bathroom door behind him.
He can hear Leo’s hesitant footsteps as he walks away and turns down one of the hallways.
Damn.
After getting his hoodie off he decides to take the time to inspect his body for any injuries he might want to look out for.
Arms? Bruised and dirty, a little sore.
Legs? Just dirty and sore. Really sore.
Face? Dirty. Dirty. Dirty Dirty Dirty dirty dir
Plastron? Banged up and scraped.
Shell? Some small cracks, bruising, and scrapes, nothing dangerous that won’t heal in a few weeks time if he doesn’t bang it again during a mission or something.
Cracks are always dangerous for them, but he heals rather quickly. And plus, the crack wasn’t deep, just a small chip on the end of his shell next to his right shoulder.
After taking a second to breathe, he gets into the shower and lets the hot water soak through his body and relieve the tension. He tries his best to ignore how the water stings his shell when he enters, and instead faces his front toward the shower-head to avoid the onslaught on his shell. I’ll clean it another day. Donnie settles, taking a deep breath in the steam the hot water produces.
He thinks about how he’s going to deal with his technology, and what he’s going to be doing while he fixes it.
Obviously, he can’t go out on missions without his tech-bo, let alone a faulty battle shell. How will his brothers react?
“Donnie! You got taken down by a couple a’ random highschool kids, and now your outta commission!? We can’t be doin’ this kinda stuff! Work on it!” He imagines Raph saying in an overly aggressive tone, which, realistically, given Raph’s soft heartedness he’d never say, but hey, can you blame him for having a broad imagination?
Donnie has an obsession with imagining scenarios breaking out between him and his brothers, most of them being more angsty than not, admittedly.
As a teenager, ever since he was 11, honestly, he noticed he’s a lot more externally angsty than the rest of his brothers.
He’s managed to write off his strong, yet hidden emotions as teenage angst for 3 years now. He doesn’t want to talk about how he’s felt like this for as long as he can remember.
After around 10, 15? 20 minutes, he gets out of the shower after basically scrubbing his skin raw of any dirt particles he thinks might be there.
He rolls his shoulders and dries off his legs and feet before stepping out of the shower, wrapping the towel around his lower plastron, tucking it slightly under his shell.
He doesn’t bother wiping the steam off the mirrors, he doesn’t want to face his own reflection anymore in his current state.
After completely drying off, he hangs up his towel on the drying rack, exiting the bathroom and starting the exhausting, bone-crushing task of walking back toward his lab.
He doesn’t see Leo on his way back around the skate ramp.
Donnie feels a little bit bad for snapping at his twin twice tonight, but it’s an around the clock thing for them to take verbal swings at each other. Logically speaking, Donnie shouldn’t feel anything regarding the short interactions. After little much thought, he forgoes the idea of getting back to sleep until he can get at least a little bit of work done. He has too much to do, given some of his most important pieces of tech are currently damaged because of those satin fools.
Leo’s rubbing off on me. He thinks to himself, recalling his encounter with the insomniac a couple minutes ago.
5? 20? 40? An hour? Donnie’s not sure. After nearly avoiding face-planting on his way there, he gets to his lab and the first thing he works on is his spider shell. Everything else can wait, but the spider shell is something he absolutely needs. All of his other battle shells have been broken recently because of other missions and his brother's ignorance.
Put that there… rewire this.. Oh, dang, his tech is kinda flawed, might wanna fix that, make a new version..
Donnie continues to explain the new 15 step blueprint plan in his head, subconsciously chewing on the inside of his cheek.
He yawns again, stretching his arms out, he just needs to do a couple more minutes of work before he’s satisfied enough to fall asleep. Donnie is like a machine, he goes when he’s told and stops when he runs out of battery, then he recharges.
God, he’s really exhausted. Showers really just make Donnie 10 times more tired. But- so much work to do! Ugh.. he has so many other projects to work on on top of now having to fix his most important pieces.
He has to either finish or get rid of the hundred prototypes he has tucked away in the garage.
He sighs to himself, “I can close my eyes for a few minutes, I suppose. It’s 5AM right now, I’ll set a timer for 30 minutes..” He mumbles sleepily to nobody in particular.
Donnie groans, wrapping a hand around his plastron and bending over slightly. Ugh.. everything hurts. There’s no use going to Leo this time of night, especially if he’s convinced his twin to sleep with his outburst. He doubts he has, but he hardly has the strength to think about it too much.
Donnie lays his head down on the corner of his desk, setting down his wrench next to the spider shell. Darkness swarms him almost immediately, before it swallows him whole.