Maybe it's my love of The Martian and the turtles being in space that inspired this - or maybe it's because I read somewhere a longing for more brotherly support on the show - heehee - but I wrote this today. And I hope you all like it.
An adventure one shot that's also a love story. 'Cuz in the words of Pepe from the muppets: 'I love love.'
Where he Belongs
The lights flash. Red and yellow and blue and green. Every color any color. The rhythm matched by the increasing pitch and screech of the alarms.
She blinks.
It is all in her head.
There are no alarms, no oscillating lights, nothing to reflect the tumult within her. Nothing to measure out the panic she feels.
Her terror is a blank, wordless weight. A translucent stone, massive like a boulder, settling steadily down against her ribcage, restricting the flow of air to her lungs, squeezing her heart. Crushing away reason.
Her lips are parted, but it is as though she has forgotten her line. The script lost.
Mikey's grip on her wrist is tightening and she wants to ask him to ease up, but can't speak. His questions are hammering against her ear drums. Relentless. He keeps asking the same questions over and over and over again.
"He'll be okay, right? We'll get him, right? We can do that, right?"
Fugitoid's arms are moving across the control panel in a blur. The beams of his eyes narrow with concentration. Casey is pacing, shaking his head, in fury at his helplessness or perhaps in denial of such a critical situation. This has all been nothing but an adventure story, something to laugh about, speak lines like heroes would in a movie, acting, always acting. But it's never been more real than now.
Leo is in a wild, silent, panic, knuckles whitening where he grips the edge of the sill, staring out of the view-screen as if keeping the dot that is the ever-receding figure of his brother in his line of sight will somehow offer a form of protection, and ward against harm.
But it's too late for that, now, isn't it?
It's when she turns in desperation for comfort or support or maybe an answer to Mikey's never-ending questions that she finds Raphael gone. He was behind her, right behind her. Her throat is tight and her voice is high as she calls out to no one, "Raph?"
Had she imagined his presence moments ago? No, she's sure.
He was there with Casey arguing over who was the better action hero Jet Li or Chuck Norris when Donatello's com-link broke the calm of the monotonous afternoon. When his voice erupted through the brief burst of static to announce, in his always-so-calm-not-to-bother-anyone-but tone, that his tether had ruptured.
"What?!" April asked in a shout, sitting bolt upright, tossing the manual she'd been reading to one side. Her gaze riveted to the ceiling of the control room.
Wasn't he just there, beyond the sheeting of metal and insulation, just above their heads? Making a simple adjustment to the communication panel or the solar-power grid? Be back in ten - wasn't that what he'd told them only minutes ago? Or was that an hour? Had it been that long?
Fugitoid had turned his torso and addressed her and the room at large, "No need to panic. He won't be lost to the vacuum of space, beep blorp, haha. You earthlings are so quick to panic. Beep. He's firmly and safely attached through the gravity boots, you see."
The static roared, making Mikey duck, and in a small, trembling voice, Donatello said, "I turned them off."
No one moved. No one spoke.
Donnie laughed, a short, sharp, ironic whelp of a sound. One meant to chase away the chill of panic he was no doubt sharing with the rest of them. He went on to clarify the situation.
He'd needed the maneuverability to finish the job on the grid, so he'd switched the gravity boots off, diverting power to the torch he was using. He added something vague about home is where the motherboards are, but it was forgotten as he spoke more clearly directly at them again.
Voice distorted through the poor feed of the com, thinner and slightly higher than his usual tone, he explained that he was currently drifting in a concentric circle roughly forty-five degrees from the rear dock, fifteen, or maybe now twenty-five yards away. And counting.
"Also," he added, breathlessly, "I'm, uh, yeah, oh, I'm injured. And my suit's life-support functions are fluctuating. I-I think I may have damaged my helmet when I hit the back of the ship when the tether snapped." Static interrupted him. He said something, but it was too muffled to hear. As the noise cleared, his asked, "Where's the problem, April?"
April froze, feeling every gaze in the room turn in her direction. "What?" she swallowed around the word. "Donnie?"
His voice fizzed as Leonardo, Mikey, Raph and Casey exchanged confused and worried looks.
"Did you check to see if it's plugged in? You do that sometimes," he added, "with snakes."
April was on her feet and next to Fugitoid before she realized she'd even moved. Flanked by Mikey, Fugitoid murmured, "Oh dear."
# # #
Now, it's been fourteen seconds since that first communication and Donatello is still not retrieved. And the room is a filled with a suffocating panic. It reeks of unearthed fears, fears that have been systematically buried, shoved back and down in order to concentrate on the mission at hand. They rise and multiply like poisonous mushrooms. No one is immune.
They are all hurrying in different directions, adding to the chaos, moving with purpose but aimlessly, for there is nothing that can be done other than what Fugitoid is attempting. "We won't lose him, beep. We won't," he repeats in a tone meant to instill confidence but sounds weaker by the second.
Her legs are too heavy, too stiff and slow-moving to belong to her, but she manages to pull free of Mikey's grip, push her way past Casey who continues to pace and occasionally curse, out into the hallway, leaning far out and glancing in both directions. Unwilling to leave the control room, not when there's a chance he may start speaking again.
Raph emerges from the bend on the left, rushes past, face grim and set with determination. He is in his spacesuit and it glows blue, leaving behind a streak of haloed light, giving him the appearance of running in blurred slow motion.
She wipes her face and finds her cheeks hot, eyes wet.
"I've got 'em," he grunts at her as he passes and is gone around the bend to the right. The swoosh of a portal opening and closing tells her he's already left.
Still, she whispers, knowing he is out of earshot, "Hurry." Unable to find the strength to say it any louder. Unable to do more than wobble back onto heels and whirl around. The room continues to spin in a lazy loop around her head. The dizziness drives into her stomach and she feels sick.
"April, where did you," Donatello's soft, wandering voice breaks out over the room and fades back into a static fizz and April snaps herself free. She darts towards the back of a seat, grasping it to steady herself.
"Donnie?" she asks the ceiling and looks around, waiting. Waiting.
There is no response. There is only silence within the buzzing nest of static.
Inside of her fear, at the center of it, there is disappointment. If he's talking, he's still alive. He's got to be alive. Of course, he's alive. He's just outside. She turns her head. Mikey's eyes meet her own, he turns to the place where Leo stands rigidly looking out where Donatello drifts alone. Out there. In the vacuum of space. Her knees wobble.
She needs him back. She needs him here. She needs him safe. She needs him.
"Donnie?" Leo asks the ceiling and turns sharply to Fugitoid, eyes full of questions, mouth open. April looks around, looking just as pale and frightened and lost as Casey and Mikey.
The robot doesn't look up, but answers the unspoken question, his rounded fingers flying across the panel. "He can no longer reach us. It is the growing distance, but also, his suit is most definitely damaged, blorp. The power of his communication link is diminishing. The jet-pack is giving no readings. I believe it may be damaged."
He hesitates and looks up, the room seems to fall into a void, a gap separate from reality, a terrible bubble where every shallow inhale is one made of terror and every thin exhale burns with dread.
"But, he's going to be okay, right?" Mikey asks. "We can get him, right?"
"The readouts from his suit, those that are still able to be read, beep, are reporting various minor injuries, nothing to worry about," he explains, but adds, "except one rather bad injury to his, beep, head. The source of the breach in his helmet. The reason he is losing oxygen."
Fugitoid allows that to sink in. "His rambling is due to, bee-orp, his suffering from oxygen deprivation."
No one speaks. The weight of reality smother them.
Quietly, Fugitoid says, "We don't have much time."
"Oh man," Casey moans. "Then hurry up, will ya?! Do something!"
"What do we do?" Leo asks, coming in close, eyes wide and wild, voice hoarse, commanding and cold with fury, close to losing control, crowding the robot so that he steps away from the panel, raising his hands defensively. "What do we do to fix this? Huh!? Answer me!"
"Keep 'em talking," Mikey answers, coming in between them. Separating them. Gently, he guides Leo away from the main panel, giving the Fugitoid space to resume. "And let Mr. Robot-o do his thing."
Leo steps back. He is shaking as he crosses his arms, but nods.
Fugitoid says, sounding relieved, "Correct. His direct com-link has lost all power. But his personal apparatus within the helmet should have some remaining." He presses a few buttons and presses a handle forward, the ship veers and banks slightly to the right. "You may try with the devices there," he motioned brusquely to the side panel. "Forgive me, beep, but I am trying to get within retrieval distance for Raphael to exit close enough before he jeopardizes this operation."
A red light flashes and he speaks into a mic close at hand, starting slow and quietly, but steadily raising his voice until he is yelling, "Raphael, beep, if you exit before I give you the go-ahead you will be forcing me to abandon your brother currently in peril, to retrieve you, as you would be in closest proximity. Which would mean certain doom for Donatello. So. Please. Do. Not. Try to open the airlock without my express authorization AGAIN! IS that CLEAR!?"
A rough grunt that might have been a curse is the only reply.
Fugitoid sighs. "Thank you for your cooperation."
The room falls into uneasy silence. Pressure builds and April can only think of Donatello tumbling out and out and still farther out of her reach, beyond them, into the black emptiness, the coldest void. She curls and uncurls her fingers, clenches her fist. She wants to fight someone. Hit something. Anything.
She fights the urge to scream at them. All of them. To bring him back. To save him. Don't they understand? He can't breathe out there! April pushed her palm against her mouth and shudders.
Mikey is at her side, turning her away from the chair to the place Fugitoid gestured to a moment ago. "Can you try with one of these?" he asks.
She stares at him as though he speaks another language. Casey reaches over and picks up what looks like a blue-tooth device. He hands it to her limply.
April leans heavily on the side panel, sinking bonelessly into the chair that Leo has appeared behind her with - she glances at him, then at Mikey and Casey, grateful. With a hand that shakes, she affixes the earpiece and adjusts the padded microphone near her mouth.
"Donnie," she starts tentatively, then clears her throat, "can you hear me?"
"I think so," he says and his voice is slurred as if he were tipsy.
Leo and Mikey are leaning close, she can feel their breath against each cheek as they pant with shallow gasps.
"I'm in trouble."
"You're going to be fine," Leo says firmly, sounding more convicted than he appears on her left.
"Yeah, bro. We're coming to get ya," Mikey adds with a thumbs-up. "Almost there."
Almost there, April mouths, like a prayer. Almost there.
When he speaks again, his voice sounds smaller and April fights the urge to imagine him growing tiny in the blackness of space. She pinches her eyes closed. Tries to imagine him right next to her where Leo or Mikey is.
"I got sick."
There's a pause. April opens her mouth to tell him it's to be expected. But he goes on.
"I'm a little scared."
"There's no dishonor in that," Leo says, voice catching a bit at the end.
"I'm scared, too," Mikey adds.
"Don't tell him that," Casey admonishes and the look on Mikey's face makes him immediately back-pedal. "I mean, it's okay, but just maybe keep it upbeat. Positive, you know?"
Mikey nods, but says nothing more. No doubt afraid to make things worse for his brother.
Fugitoid announces, making everyone in the room jump, "Airlock open. Go, Raphael. BLORP, Go, now!"
"Donnie," April says, "do you see the ship? Can you see Raph?"
A pause. Then, "No."
In unison, Mikey, Leo and Casey turn and look at Fugitoid's back. They shout all together, voices jumping over one another, "Honeycutt, he doesn't see Raph." "What's happening?" "Aren't we there, yet?" She feels them surrendering their position next to and on top of her to crowd around Fugitoid in their panic.
He ignores them all.
"April," Donnie's voice is the only thing April can hear right now.
"Yes. I'm here. I'm here, Donnie. Look for Raph, he should be right out there near you. Look, can you see him?"
"No. There's . . . nothing. I can't . . . there's nothing." Her heart sinks with his reply.
There is a rough noise like static but she realizes with a twist in her gut that he is trying to breathe.
"But," her voice is filled with tears and disbelief, "he's out there, now, Donnie. Can't you see him?"
It's a long time before he replies and the seconds are pockets of stretched, bloated temporary insanity.
"I wish," he says and takes a long, straining, wheezing breath, "I was braver."
Her tongue is a swatch of sandpaper against the rough wood of her lips. "Don't say that. You are brave. You're the bravest person I've ever met."
It's a tiny, far away sound with the power to shatter her aching heart: "Ha."
She can't respond. She can't help him. Where is Raphael? Where is anyone? Everything has faded into background noise. She doesn't have the capability to do anything other than wait for him to keep talking. To listen to the last words he may ever speak. It's all she can do for him.
"If I was brave," he says, weak now, fading away like a signature in the rain, "I would have told you," he gasps and it sounds too much like a sob to be anything other than that.
And she finds that her nails are digging into the flesh of her palms but she can't uncurl her fingers, and she can't breathe and she can't move and tears are blinding her and her throat is on fire and her heart is rupturing and she is dying. Dying with him. Dying inside the ship while he is out there. Alone. But dying nonetheless.
Someone is yelling behind her.
And Mikey is on top of her and he is hollering something and in the haze of her pain, she fights him, throwing her elbow and punching the air as she tumbles from her seat, clawing at him, a choking scream lodged in her throat, too constricted to allow it to pass. Through the fog she begins to make sense of Mikey's words. And it is a thawing that takes a long time to get through to the heart of her.
"He's got him! He's got him! He's bringing him in!"
When the words strike it is a bell, and the reverberations shatter her.
April dissolves into dry sobs and dimly she's aware that she has Mikey in a bear-hug and won't let go, but through the tears, he's still repeating that Donatello is okay and she won't let him go, she'll never let him go until she believes it herself.
# # #
In the medical bay, Donatello is propped up. There are tubes coming out of him and going into him. His head is bandaged and his left arm is cradled against his chest in a sling. His eyes are sunken and the circles are a bit darker underneath than usual. Raph is seated next to him, where he always seems to be, just within arms reach, as if at any moment should he need to lash out and grip him tight, he would be able to. His arms are crossed over his chest and he is glaring at the air in front of him. A second later, he is adjusting the pillows behind Donatello's shell.
Donnie winces from the effort, but settles back as Raph, seeming happy with his administrations, relents.
Donatello seems without pain, or at least, healing contently, as she enters.
He looks up when he catches her scent. The light in the cocoa-colored irises spark as she slips inside, the door sliding silently shut behind her.
"Hi," he says around a bashful smile.
Raph gets up without a word, casting a quick glance on his brother one last time before exiting. Giving them privacy.
"Hey there, Mark Watney," she jokes as she settles onto the side of the bed next to him.
At first, he doesn't get the reference to the book she'd given him a few weeks ago, but then it dawns on him. A faint blush colors his cheeks and snout. "Guess it wouldn't be so bad to have Matt Damon play me."
"True," she says as she flattens the end of the blanket gently, "but you're much more handsome."
His hand takes hers and she covers it with her other.
"I'm really sorry."
She meets his eyes to find them glassy and bright with apology. She can't hold his gaze lest she risk bawling all over again as she did last night in her bunk, alone. Instead, she juts her chin slightly, and says, "You're not allowed to ever do that to me again."
"Okay."
"You're not allowed to leave the ship for repairs or anything else without me, ever again, either."
"But, Leo –"
"Never, ever again."
Their eyes meet. And the steel she's feeling must show, for his resistance slips away. He settles back into the pillows, smiles and nods. "Yes, Ma'am."
Only then does she ease herself to lay carefully next to him, resting her cheek upon his chest, while his arms drapes around her back, his hand cupping her shoulder firmly. He's warm and real. Hurt, but healing.
She closes her eyes as she listens to the rhythmic sound of his strong heartbeat, confirming that he is in fact, at last, inside, here. With her. Safe.
Where he belongs.