Disclaimer: Not mine, though I wish that one day I'll be a millionaire and can buy them.

Author Notes: This is probably one of the oldest stories I have ever written and I must admit that proofreading this is a pain in the butt. I had horrible writing skills way back when. Beware the evils of foreshadowing.

The Bitter Truth

Prologue: The Journal

This was wrong on so many levels but he had made a promise to his Sensei, friends and brothers to figure out what was going on and he wasn't going to let them down.

She had been acting weird for the past few days, at least weirder than normal. On a normal day she could even out weird Mikey which was a skill that he wasn't even sure that someone could possess. What had been happening lately, however, was enough to even bring Master Splinter to him, asking questions that he had no answer too. It hurt his pride –even if he would never admit it out loud- that he just didn't know what was going on.

That had led him here, standing on her doorstep shortly after he had watched her leave, heading off to start her day.

That didn't make him any less uncomfortable. He still had issues going into Casey and April's apartment when they weren't there. It was a huge invasion of privacy, it felt so wrong to break into a friends' home, even though he had been invited countless times and assured that it was okay. He didn't think it was okay.

Daontello heaved a sigh as he continued to look at the door leading into her apartment. He was stalling and he knew it. She had never gotten mad at any of them when she had come home in the past to find them lounging about her apartment. Of course, he was going to be doing more than just lounging. He was going to hack her computer.

Maybe that was why he was having such a hard time going into the apartment. He wasn't just going in to make himself at home. He was going in to hack her laptop while she was away at work. He knew it was for a good cause but that reminder still didn't help to get rid of the unease he felt.

For the past five days, she had been very un-her. She just sat around, typing feverishly on her laptop whenever anyone had seen her, all but ignoring the world around her. As far as he could tell, Donatello was sure that she was missing sleep and skipping meals to type. Her face the last few times he had seen her had been pale and her eyes had this haunted look in them that he had only seen her with a handful of times. Something was eating at her and whatever it was it had something to do with her laptop. When April found out that she had been calling into work sick for the past few days so she could type, Donatello knew that he had to do something.

When she had left earlier, she had seemed to be in a better mood than usual and from what he could tell she looked a little better. No doubt she had used some make up to hide some of her exhaustion but the happy bounce to her step was back. He hadn't even realized that it had been missing until then. She looked better, which was a good thing, but he still needed to know why she had been so upset.

And the answer to that was somewhere on her laptop.

Steeling himself, Donatello reached up above the door frame and picked up the spare key hidden on the small ledge. She had left it there for them, in case they ever wanted to come over when she wasn't in. She still joked about having the best security system on and off the planet. Which she did. Professor Honeycutt and Leatherhead had helped him devise the most powerful security system possible with a combination of earth and utrom technology. No one was getting into her apartment without everyone knowing who it was and what they were doing.

He replaced the key after the lock clicked open and slipped into her apartment. He knew that a tiny, high powered scanner that he couldn't even feel did a quick DNA check on him, registering that he was not a threat and therefore did not set off any of the alarms. He relocked the door, silently wishing that they had never had to install such a measure before and reminding himself that is was necessary to make sure that Bishop didn't come back and try to take her again.

He stood for a moment and just looked around the small flat that she lived in. It had been part of a large open space up above April's three bedroom apartment that she had sectioned off and renovated part of into a small one bedroom apartment. The rest still held whatever April happened to find and gather up but the apartment had become all her own just in a matter of days after April had given it to her as a place to live.

Though the actual floor space was maybe five hundred square feet at best, the way she had spaced everything out and the way she kept it nearly immaculate made the room feel eight times larger. Five large windows that ran along the front of the apartment helped keep the place feeling open, despite the clutter of plants she had in the wide sills of each one. A series of short bookcases sat below each window and ran the length of the wall as well. Each shelf was filled with books, occasionally broken up by a small basket holding various items from who knew where. One shelf had been completely cleared off and a relatively small wakizashi that Usagi had given her sat there in a place of honor. He had told her to use it if she needed to defend herself and she still didn't have the heart to tell him that she had no idea how to use it.

Directly to his left, before the run of windows and bookcases, was a large television with various game consoles on the stand below it. He had never seen her play any of those and Don was fairly sure that the only reason they were there was because Mikey would come play them for hours on end. There was a small glass coffee table between it and the sofa and beyond that up against the back of the sofa was a desk that was actually a repurposed banquet table. He could see the laptop sitting on it from there, hopeful with the answers on it that he wanted.

He strolled for it, glancing off to his right at the open bathroom door and small kitchen. He paused and smiled down at the mess of dishes on the counter. She must have been running late to leave her dishes piled up on the island. The laptop wasn't going anywhere anyway and Don knew how much she hated coming home to a 'messy' apartment. She nearly had a hissy fit every time she went into Mikey's room or his lab (though he was doing a little better at keeping the clutter down then before she had started showing up on a regular bases). With the small smile firmly in place, Donatello gathered up the eight plates and the several pots and pans on the stove and washed them all in the sink.

That small chore done, Donatello couldn't help but peek in the bedroom door as he headed for the laptop. He chuckled as he noticed the teddy bear sitting as if it had a purpose in the middle of the neatly made bed. Even though he venomously denied it, everyone knew that Raph had given it to her way back when they had first met. As far as he knew it was still one of her most treasured possessions and she slept with it almost every night. That had a certain brother of his, who tried to pretend not to care, smile every time he saw her holding it.

Don sat down in the chair after moving a knitting project that she had left in the seat onto the couch and flipped open the laptop. He waited patiently as it booted up and then immediately began digging through the files once the computer was fully up and running. Other than the occasionally game or school project, Donatello couldn't find anything out of the ordinary. Her laptop looked as it always did when he had gotten on it in the past so what had she been working on?

On a whim, Donatello ran a file retrieval program and finally hit pay dirt, a large word document file that had been deleted rather late last night. His fingers drummed the desk as the file was retrieved from the depths of the recycle bin and he resaved it to her desktop. The file was simply called 'The Journal' and, fidgeting slightly in his seat, he opened it. Don quelled the insecurity and guilt that tried to rise up again. He reminded himself that he was just making sure that she was alright. After everything that she had been through for them, the least they could do was take care of and protect her, even from herself.

The document's first page was more of a title page, simply calling itself the journal and then listing her name below it. The second page had a small series of paragraphs on it. Out of curiosity, Donatello moved the mouse to grab the scroll bar off to the far side of the document and dragged it down to see the rest of it. He watched as page after page filled with writing raced by. Occasionally there was a break in the words but mostly it was just a blur of words that raced by until he reached the last page where a small, centered 'fin' marked the end.

Scrolling back to the top of the document, Donatello glanced at the clock. He had only been there for a little over an hour. She was going to be at work until four, as long as she followed her normal weekday routine, she would go to the gym and then her night class before starting for home. Leo had offered to keep her busy if he needed more time to figure out what was wrong so Don figure that he easily had sixteen hours of time to read and skim through this monstrosity before he had to worry about her catching him. He scrolled to what he considered was the foreword and began to read.

'After everything that's happened, everything I've seen and experienced, I had to put it all down. Flushing out the demons I think is what this is called, I really don't know. I just had to put it down on paper, as if writing it out would make me really believe that this isn't all just a dream, that I'm not really dead or laying comatose in a hospital or something. To help remind me that I am alive and what has happened, really has happened. It still so unbelievable but even with my overactive imagination, there's just no way I could dream this all.

As I said before this entire document is just to flush out my demons. I'll probably delete it when I'm done. I know that the contents of this document would put my friends –the closest thing I have to a family in this world- at risk. I couldn't imagine the fallout of what would happen if some of their enemies got a hold of this so I will delete it when I'm done, to protect them and myself.

I might be selfish writing this out but I have to do something. I feel like I'm being buried alive in the memories and nightmares I've been having lately. It's like there is something inside that I just need to get out and away from me or like there is a crushing weight that is slowly suffocating me. I think they would understand why I did this but I still feel guilty for needing to write this. I can only hope that if by chance they ever read this, they will understand and know that I am so sorry for being weak enough too possible put them all in danger.

I'm so sorry, guys.

Crystal Alexis Mesmer'

Donatello leaned back in the desk chair, slightly disturbed at what he had read. Crystal was suffering from nightmares? It made sense that she would be suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, he would have been more worried if she wasn't, but he couldn't recall seeing any symptoms. Her sudden writing spell was about the only thing out of character that she had been doing lately. She called it 'flushing out the demons', was this really all she needed to feel better?

Donatello sighed and went to the fridge to get a can of soda. This was going to take a while and it was not something that he was really looking forward to doing even though it needed to be done. Crystal was obviously suffering behind their shells and it was time to see how bad it really was. He silently berated himself for not realizing that she was hurting before all this and on a small level hoped that this Journal would shed some light on what he could do to help her.

He popped the tab on the can, and took a swig as he began to read.