Disclaimer: I do not own the Teenage Mutant Ninja turtles and nor do I own the song, Doukeshi, sung by the anime character Trowa Barton from Gundam Wing. I advise that you to search and download this song. It's a real beautiful song and is a real heartrending song. This fic is based on Mikey's inner feelings and how he feels after about a fight with one of his brothers. Yes, this is angsty! I wrote this when I was put up with all of the 'Mikey is stupid' fiction out there! I'm tired of the abuse of an excellent character! So, here is what I see deep within Mikey. Enjoy!
The Truth about the Clown
By Raphangela
It's in the heart of the night that the owner of the setting sun-colored bandanna is running so swiftly that he looks like he is soaring to rooftop to rooftop. His bandanna seems to flame brightly as well as his poignant eyes, which seem to shine like sapphires in the pallid moonlight. Michelangelo essentially had gotten himself into a big fight with his older and most heated brother, Raphael. A futile fight that had disastrous consequences, a fight which brought out the dark horse settled deep within the confines of Michelangelo's psyche. It was a fight that initiated like any other fight he had gotten into with his brother. It started off with the diminutives of things, mainly inane things that seem to be a fool's egotistical deity. Those diminutive things, or thoughts, that only a foolish individual would find obscure and dwell all thoughts on those particular things that are pointless or need any fret over to begin with. It was a fight that started off with many pointless things, which then turned into mockery and accusation. It was a terrible corollary waiting to happen, but it needed somewhere to grow. It was a barbed wild flower that needed some place warm where it could plant itself, its seed, and grow out the plethora of sharp extremities that had been used to pluck out someone's eye and had severely wounded the sides of the unexpected victim. That wicked weed had chosen that person; his brother, and it also chose its victim; himself.
It's so cold
I'm getting frozen in the moon's embrace ---
And so it's all pouring down on me…
All alone in the night that just draws closer and closer…
It was a fight, a fight to the death, but not that of a corporeal one. No, it was a fight that would kill the spiritual rapport of two brothers that once shared proximity like no other. They had such an understanding of each other that it could have made the other two brothers turn greener than that of the color of their skin. The bond's deep roots go far back into that of earlier childhood days, when they knew little about the world above the sewers that protectively hid them. However, being as young and as inquisitive as they were, they thought of themselves more like prisoners of the sewers than that of being sheltered by their locale. Their Master and surrogate father had tried to teach them that when he was among the living, but neither of them wanted to accept such a fate even until this day as to always hide away from the world as long as they live. It isn't fair; to be born or made different, as well as it isn't fair to be an outcast all because the world doesn't approve of you. It's not fair to be called a 'freak' and all because you look different they think you don't have any feelings at all. The saying about 'fish can't feel, so it's alright to hurt them' is entirely wrong. Fish can feel, too, they're living creatures; they can feel physical pain as well as think. Therefore, if a simple thing as a fish can feel so can mutant turtles. So, underneath the bustling world above them, they hid themselves from everyone and only had each other to rely on. So, naturally they had bonds with each other and some were stronger than that of others, while others were weaker.
Raphael and Michelangelo's was the strongest of them all. They shared a bond like as if they had adopted each other in some strange way. They were inseparable and they counted on one another for support. Raphael had the strength needed while Michelangelo had the emotional support needed and sometimes it was vise versa. They were yin and yang, good and bad and neither could do without the other no matter how one would differ. Raphael had the boldness and the fire to take action, while Mikey had the kindness and the free spirit that only a few seldom have. They were the best of friends since the very beginning and neither of them seemed like they would ever be torn apart, that is to the untrained eye it was. Silently over the years, without anyone acknowledging, the two had began to slowly drift apart. While one was clever and aloof to himself like a tiger, the other one was tricky and unpredictable like a rabbit, but you could never figure out what either of them was thinking. Although it has its advantages, it also has its drawbacks, their own ways of things started to bring them apart. It's simply said; they view the world much differently from each other and have their own thoughts on how to deal with it.
And this tear…
It's always hidden in this smiling mask…
But there's still that painful truth in my heart ---
Left somewhere there…
Raphael is the realist, which is he has concerns for the fact or reality and rejection of the impractical and visionary. He sees the world as a dog-eat-dog world, eat or be eaten, where you either are ahead of others or they will be ahead of you. To him, everyone is against everyone another in the big fight for survival. "When you fight, do it in style and make sure you take no prisoners with you either." Raphael had several times told his little brother this and he meant every word of it, too. Raphael fights more aggressively in each battle, taking out all of his rage and anger at those who had carelessly embarked into his path. He is headstrong, and like that of a wild and wrathful bull, he'll plow, knock down, and barge through anything that gets in the way of his razor-sharp and perilous horns. Once he makes a verdict, he acts upon that verdict until it's consummated and he won't stop until it is the way he wants it to be. Raphael thinks of things negatively and takes them in negatively as well. He hasn't been named the ant-social outcast and the rebel ninja for nothing.
Although Michelangelo can be very indomitable, he is the absolute opposite of that of Raphael. Michelangelo is the idealist, the one who doesn't settle for things, that he doesn't believe that things are the way they are simply because they just are. No, he believes that one can change things, which is if they want things to amend and will make a move to do so, it can be made possible. You don't have to settle with things just because people say that things can never be changed. No, you can make that difference and change things in this world. Anyone can do it, even if it's just one individual, it can be done. Michelangelo believes in that fully, especially when it comes to following your heart. He believes if you let your heart guide you, you can never go wrong. Be who you are, say what needs to be said, no matter how hard the odds are, never let anyone change you into something else or lead you astray. "Always follow your heart." He always says to his brothers and loved ones.
And while performing in the middle of the light,
I'm just supposed to feel nothing but happiness…
I'm just supposed to leave behind all my sadness…
I feel loneliness --- but the show must still go on…
Although his kindness has brought him good fortune in his life, it has also brought him pain and suffering. No matter how kind and forgiving his is, everyone either exploits him, abuses him, and deliberately and fortuitously people have harmed him to by no ends necessary. His unlimited trust and the chances he gives towards everyone has made him bad at character judgment and has often found himself into sticky, detrimental, and even deadly situations. His good will and love for everyone and life has made him the easy and the majority victim of criminals and villains alike. People see him as a feeble coward that hides behind his ideas, only coming out to get hurt, laughed, and ridiculed. Instead of whining and drowning himself in self-pity, Mikey thinks good of things and has an optimistic view on life, which is he doesn't let things get him down. Although he'd rather forgive and forget and put the past aside, to say that it's over and done with, he does have inner pain. His inner pain and turmoil builds within deep inside his heart, it aches greatly each time when it hurts, which is always. But don't fret, for this pain only makes him stronger, making him become that someone that will change this world and it's views. His heart aches not for himself, but for the ones he loves and cares for so much, his heart aches with the pains of this world. In his heart, he loves and cares for everyone, even the most unlikely people.
With that being said, it makes for no surprise why they are different and how they have grown apart from one another. While one is boiling over with scorching hatred, the other is overflowing with love and kindness. One is serious; the other one is a clown. One is the pessimist and the other is the optimist. Two brothers that had slowly grown apart had unintentionally broken their bond. In one day, that night actually, they have become mortal enemies. While one spewed hatred out of his mouth and acted maliciously to the other, the other acted confused and hurt, feeling the sharp and poisonous daggers that the other one had sent him. It was a fight, a fight that left the others speechless, especially Michelangelo. Raphael had gone on a full on rampage and brutally attacked his brother's heart more so than hurting him physically. Oh, sure, there was physical contact, there always was and Mikey had received the scars, cuts and bruises from it to prove it. However, it wasn't the physical pain that bothered him most; it was what his brother had said about him and even deliberately into his face. His words had cut into his plastron, ripped into his flesh and yanked his heart out. Those hateful words keep on repeating and repeating itself inside of his mind, which makes his heart hurt worse than his head. Those words, those spiteful words, oh how they hurt him so. To actually hear them not only come out of the mouth of a brother, but also his one and only best friend hurt more so than the words themselves. Those words… "Useless", "unreliable", "liability", "irritating", "meaningless", "weakling", "clown", and the list goes on, those words were directed towards him. Raphael had spat those words at him with such vengeance in his voice that it utterly confused the poor clown.
I could get tired but not forget such things as dreams
I could never bring myself to disappoint one's love…
And although my heart still remains in this emptiness,
I can never leave behind my memories…
Learn all you can about that clown…
"Does he really hate me that much?" Mikey quietly asks himself as he peers down over the ledge of a building and down at the now quieting city below, the bright moon shines upon his backside. "Does he really think all those things of me?"
Mikey doesn't know what to think, all he knows is that his brother hates him for the reasons he had mentioned toward him. After his favorite brother had screamed angrily at him, Michelangelo took no hesitation upon leaving the lair. He ran without a single thought about how cold it is tonight, that it is now late in the fall and that the nights are getting nippier by the hours and the days counting down into winter. No, at that giving moment, he doesn't care. All he wanted to do was to stay there in the lair, but his courage had failed him and he ran in fear, hurt, and shame. Those words his brother had said are much colder and much worse than the biting cold that surrounds him in the late of the night. No matter how much Michelangelo wants to go back, he keeps on fighting the urge and tells himself that he can't go back. For if he does go back, he would be laughed at, ridiculed, pitied, and feel shameful as his brothers and others would talk endless about how their littlest brother reacted. No, he doesn't want to go through that. No, he won't be laughed at anymore. It doesn't matter how strong the urges are, he'll fight them and be stubborn just like everyone else is, just like his favorite brother.
And once again,
I'm walking away from the spotlight
Embracing only these pretensions…
Yet tonight, this curtain would still rise…
When it comes right down to it, Michelangelo realizes to himself, no one really ever knew who he was and still doesn't know who he is. Everyone thinks he's just some clown. A clown that does nothing but play around, put on an act for attention in the limelight, is selfish, always smiles and is carefree, and feels no sadness or any feeling whatsoever. They think he always thinks of happy things, that he always does happy things, never in regret, he is always happy. That's not true, though, is it? No, it isn't. Clowns do feel, like fish and like mutants, they feel. Clowns don't only feel happiness; it's known that most clowns are anything but happy. They've put on the happy act so much for so long that they are use to always smiling and some don't even know how to feel or what to feel anymore. That is the same with Michelangelo; he doesn't know what to feel. All he feels now is emptiness and loneliness and a sense of lost for who he is, which he doesn't even know and neither could he recognize himself if he did. He is the clown of the four brothers and that's all he is. Everything he had visualized, everything he hoped for and dreamed of seemed to have washed and faded away with the insipid moonlight. The fake happiness that he had acted, that happy smile put onto his face was nothing but a fake mask he had made for himself. That mask had fallen loosely off his face and had crumbled down onto the dark and cold streets below him.
He feels warm fluid pour down from his misting eyes and down his cold and pale cheeks. He begins to shake as tears violently fight their way out of him. The hot tears sting his flesh and starts burning his eyes, making his face warm and stained with shades of crimson. His heart aches terribly with each moan of pain and heart ache. His heart had been broken, it had shattered down below with the mask he had once wore since the early days of his life. For the first time in his life, he realized that he doesn't know who he is. His master had always told him to never forget who he is, that he is a ninja, a ninja turtle. However, even then he questioned himself of about being a ninja and saw that he really wasn't good at it and neither did the others think so either. His master had told him many times that he must find out who he really is, only then can he fix himself and to never hide himself anymore. Splinter told him that in his life Mikey has to make choices and those choices shape you into who you really are. Mikey already feels the lost of choosing to hide beneath the fake smile that he had made, for it kept him from getting to know himself.
And this tear…
Always stopping short within the shadows of a smile…
But that painful truth in my heart is only mine ---
I'm only crushed, then painted, then… nothing more…
Michelangelo looks down at the puddle he had made with his own blood and tears that had mixed so profoundly together. Looking at his reflection, he sees nobody but an empty shell of a figure, a lost figure with no face or an identity. He sees nothing but an empty and sad smile and sparkling tears that pour from his vacant and unseen eyes. He looks like a useless and abused puppet that had its strings cut and was thrown out as nothing but useless refuse. He looks lifeless, dead; he looks like he has no soul. He is dead, to Raphael, his friends, enemies, and especially to himself and he internally believes it. He remembers full well when Raphael had yelled at him, saying that he is useless and is dead to him. He remembers the times when his brothers hurt him, especially Raphael, who would kick him when he was down. His brother's words had hurt him much worse than they ever had before, he feels immortally wounded by him. He gazes at the reflection and notices all the scars on him and the deep and minor cuts that will soon turn into scars; they are all over his body, some are physical, but most are emotional and mental.
And just as things couldn't get worse for the poor clown, all at once his horrifying and concealed nightmares come back to him to kick him hard with his realizations. He remembers the countless, sleepless and insufferable nights he has when he dreams the countless nightmares of his brothers and loved ones. In his dreams, he suffers the cruel abuse of his brothers' words as they unrelentingly accuse him of being a failure at being a ninja and for being their brother. They call him useless and unworthy of all that which is good. His brother Raphael accuses him of being a liability and a total clown. Leonardo says he isn't focusing hard enough and that he needs to be more serious. Donatello tells him that he's nothing but a pest and wishes that he would just grow up. April concurs with Don and says to him that he's nothing but trouble. Casey is just there saying that he agrees with the others and also adds his own two cents when he accuses him of being nothing but what the others had said and for a trickster and a procrastinator. However, Master Splinter's words were the worst of them all. His Sensei accuses him of failing his brothers, him, and everyone else. He tells him in his dreams that he is nothing but a failure and is a total disgrace upon everyone, upon his master, and especially upon himself. They all agree and laugh grimly at him with horrible grimaces on their faces. They keep on repeating their words endlessly, laughing and mocking him as they watch him scream and cry as he begs for them to stop. They laugh more and call him a weakling as they gather around the poor broken and inwrought figure, who has gathered himself up into a ball to shut out their sounds, crying and hoping that they would all go away. Every nightmare had turned out to be worst than the last and Mikey had found it hard at times to go back to sleep, if at all he was asleep in the first place.
And while playacting for such a drag of time,
There is that happiness abandoned…
Using the sadness locked up deep within me,
I now create that smile on my face…
Michelangelo looks away from the puddle; he cringes as tears more freely pour out of him. He turns his head toward the night sky and slowly opens his eyes to sadly gaze at the lonesome moon. The moon seems to make him begin to metaphorically compare himself of who he really is, like the moon and how it sometimes shows itself, but never at once fully. Once a month, it can only show one half of itself, the part the world sees when there is a full moon, and that's the most the world can ever see. They never see the other side nor would they recognize it if they did, and at other times they can only watch as it again begins to hide itself from the world to see. The moon with its loneliness has shown him of how sad he is, especially at night and makes him realize even more of who he has become. It also reveals more to him; it reminds him of the sun. The sun is the comparison to his happiness and optimistic ways. The sun rules the day, glowing in all its glory for everyone to see. In the day, he is like the sun and everyone sees him as something happy, bright, and care free. He has to admit that the sun does has its dark days, sometimes it doesn't come out at all for the rains, like his enemies, try to prevent its reign of light. However, even through the strongest of storms, through the strongest of enemies, the sun finds its way to shine, to always find a way to put its mask back on before anyone can notice. The sun is the moons mask, his mask; it's what makes the moon shine at night. Without the light from the sun, no one would notice or even care about the moons existence. So without his mask, no one would care much at all about him and see him for the fake he really is. He looks at the twinkling stars and says to himself that they are the shatter pieces of his lonesome and broken heart made of precious and fragile glass.
Michelangelo sadly shuts his eyes with a heavy heart and with a deep sense of lost. He shivers as the early and cold morning wind sharply caresses his skin, giving him Goosebumps all over. He sighs to himself and looks back over the ledge of the building. Already he sees the light glow of the sun slowly fighting its way to peek over the horizon. He smiles forlornly as he stares into the far off distance of where the sun will rise today. As much as Michelangelo's growing hatred for the morning to come grows, it came. He now loathes the mornings, now since he realizes what it means to him. He will now have to reform that broken mask he had worn and put it on back more securely than he ever had it, now because of the fear of that someone will find out his inner most precious secret. He will not let anyone ever know who he is, what he has become—an empty vessel.
And those small eyes would surely shine
the innocence of children…
And I'll be building now what I believe in
Gently with the spirit right in front of me…
Let the mask fall off…
He will go back to playing the part everyone expects him to play. He will be that clown that everyone wants to see him as, only to make them happy for he no longer cares for anything about himself. He will play the puppet that is controlled by other people's fates and decisions. He will be that hypocrite that he so once hated to become. Nothing matters anymore, he no longer feels any feelings, any positive feelings that he has let on for the world to see. He has never felt any sense of love, so how can he know just what love truly is. He only knows what he has been told and what he has been forced to play, which was chosen by him himself. He will carefully play out the roles he has been rehearsed for, to be the stumbling idiot for someone else's sigh of relief. He will be that clown that everyone sees him to be, and he will keep all of the sorrows to himself. He has no love and nor does he ever think that it's even possible for even a wink of a chance to have any such luck of happiness for himself. It was all a lie, a big lie, and he is the lie. He is the clown, that clown that is doomed to forever wear a facade. He is what he is, and plays what he is not. He is the lifeless tomb that illusions itself and others that it is happy and all is good. He is the silhouette of a forgetful someone who's lost beyond anyone's reach. He is dead and neither has he ever been alive to live. He was that clown…a dying soul that cries out into the night and then dies.
He sighs one more time and smiles that amicable grin that everyone so loves but him. He looks at the rising sun as its rays peek over the horizon and over the tall buildings of Man Hatton. He hears the rustling sound of people as they begin their day, never being mindful of their now very desecrate protector. He quickly makes his way down from the building top by jumping onto smaller buildings and down a railing and then down into a lonesome alley. He quickly, out of routine, skips and leaps over to a manhole located in the near front of the alley. He carefully looks for any sign of anyone that could possibly be watching him. He knew if he didn't his brothers would get angry and curse him out for slightly even giving the chance of blowing their cover. Once he saw that nobody was around, he carefully opens the manhole by lifting up the cover and carefully sets it down when he enters the sewers below. From there, he slowly makes his way back to the lair.
I'm never used to feeling that thing called love…
I'm never ever shown just what love is…
There is no more than once of that brightness for me ---
But my heart is overflowing with a strange something…
A clown also knows what a tear is…
Grinning out of tendency, he readies himself for another day of playing his part. He hopes that no one will ever find out his secret, for he likes to remain it this way, it is his destiny, his choice. Even though he is broken deep within himself, he will never let on the true pains and sorrows of his heart. He will never give away his true feelings like an open book, for he had no feelings, only sadness and loneliness. He will everlastingly remind himself of what he has become, but never really knowing who he really is. He will play the part, the part he has been chosen to play. He will play the part that everyone sees him as, never forgetting all entirely of what he feels deep within himself. He will play his part, hopeful that someday he will find himself and who he actually is. Until then, he will play that part his brothers and others see him as. He will play what he has been nicknamed after. He will be that clown, that clown that everyone will someday never forget in the back of their minds. He is that clown, that lonesome, heartbroken, and sorrowful clown with an unrelenting smile. He is that clown that forever wears a mask.
A clown also knows what a tear is…
The End
So, you've made it this far? Please read and review! Tell me what you think! I must know!