DISCLAIMER: I don't own the guys or anything associated with them. They belong to Eastman and Laird. Not me. Kay?
QUICK NOTE: This is an edited version of a story I had up previously, called "Broken." It is set directly following a specific episode, which I never reference. The idea is that you can figure out which episode it is without me telling you. "Broken" did not accomplish that, but I'm hoping this version will. Please let me know whether or not you get it, because I would like to fix it if it still doesn't work.
SPOILERS: If you haven't seen the episode, you won't have a clue what I'm talking about. Does that count?
Summary: Sometimes the only way to fix something is to take it apart, to remove every little bit and create scattered, meaningless nothing. Then when he rebuilds it, frame by frame, nut by nut, wire by wire, he can finally create something whole.
Inhale.
Hold.
Release.
The physical act of meditation relaxes him. Pushing out with his diaphragm, concentrating on letting air flow through the top of his head and the tips of his toes, he releases thought and lets the darkness fade. For a moment, it's gone: the clashing, the running, the screaming.
The death.
Wisps of white smoke meander upward from more than one of the monitors. All of them have cracked – some have shattered completely – and something in the pile of scalded wreckage is still hissing. It seems like years ago that it first happened. A lifetime ago. Ten minutes, he tells himself, not sure whether to laugh or cry. It's been almost ten minutes. Ten minutes or thirty years; when did he come to live in a world where they were interchangeable? Just looking at the wreckage makes his muscles ache.
Inhale.
Hold.
Release.
Become one with the sounds of the room.
Leo has resumed training. No surprise there, he thinks. Forget what they've just gone through, Leo's practice time was interrupted, and far be it from him to let it be uncompleted. Give Leo hell on a stick, seventy-two hours of fighting, and he will come home and work out, just to relax a little. Sometimes he'll have his own inner demons to battle, but today his mood seems generic. From the sounds of it, he'd had a relatively good time where he went.
Master Splinter is still coaching, but the sound of that voice sends something cold and sharp through his chest and if he listens to it for too long, his breath will stop.
Raph is back in the garage with Casey, resuming whatever they had been up to before this whole mess began. It's refreshing, in a way, how casually Casey reacts when things like this happen. It's like he's internalized the fact that their lives – and his by association – are full of the sudden and unexplainable. By this point, he downright expects it.
Mikey has sprawled out on the couch, leafing through one of his comics and humming quietly. The TV will probably turn on soon.
His brothers seem relaxed, unphased, excited even, to be back from another wild adventure thrown into the middle of another typical day. It's one thing when it's Casey; with them it doesn't seem fair. This has never happened before, that a single member of this team, should literally go through hell, by himself claim victory at unfathomable prices, miraculously wake up from the nightmare world and still end up on his own. Whatever they've faced in the past, they've always been together, but this time their nonchalance leaves him feeling more lost and alone than before.
Inhale.
Hold.
Release.
Angry shards of plastic, glass and metal litter the table and floor. Shattered remains of his computer system, months of hard work destroyed in a millisecond, lay dead on cold stone. He knows what he has to do; it's the same role he always plays in the aftermath, but today it's different. Today he's not at all sure he has the energy.
Leo said it was good to be home, but why he wants to kiss the floor, hold his family tight and never let go, promise them over and over that he will never leave them, they cannot and will not understand. Because this is how it always happens around here: once it's over they settle back into their everyday routines as if nothing had gone wrong. It rolls off the shell like droplets and he ignores the fear that he will not always be so waterproof. He finds himself wondering how they would react in his position. He can't figure out what he's supposed to say to them now. If there's one thing to which he is unaccustomed, it's not having answers. It's the simple helplessness of not knowing. There has been entirely too much of that lately.
Still, the system isn't going to repair itself. Without him to clean up the mess and put it back together, here it will remain, broken and lifeless. Images of crumpled stone threaten to flash in front of his eyes, but he forces them away. This, at least, is fixable.
Stifling a shudder, he coerces his legs into letting him sit and forces his hands to sort through the rubble, to separate the fixable, the salvageable and the beyond saving. Jagged edges poke his carelessly rummaging hands; some scrape and one draws blood. Normally he's more careful but today he doesn't notice. Physical pain grounds him, keeps him focused. He has a lot of work to do. Sometimes the only way to fix something is to take it apart, to remove every little bit and create scattered, meaningless nothing. Then when he rebuilds it, frame by frame, nut by nut, wire by wire, he can finally create something whole.
The work is mindless, something like meditation in itself. His hands move as if on autopilot: find a piece, evaluate it, toss it into a pile, find it, evaluate it, toss it, find, evaluate, toss. A few pieces manage to find their way into a stack of relatively untouched parts, but most form a grotesque heap of jagged, charred ruins that give off the pungent odor of burned plastic. The lighter ones look like desecrated shells. He shudders violently and looks away.
He tries to fit himself back into the mold, focus his mind so that he falls back into the rhythm of creation, of innovation. The rhythm of finding the broken things that he knows how to fix, the ruins he knows how to make whole again. This is the beauty of technology: even the unfixable can be replaced. With the right equipment and expertise, any broken object can become as good as new or better. The simplicity, the logic in it all is comforting. This is here. This is now.
Eventually he's cleared all he can reach from the desk. It's time to go to the other side and sort through the chaos of charred and tangled wires. He makes his way around the piles of rubble, avoiding jagged edges and refusing to look at how dead it is. He only lets himself pause for a moment before starting to untangle the meshes that have not fused together. Attached to a power socket and they'd kill him in a heartbeat. Amazing it didn't blow a fuse.
It's always a struggle for the first few minutes, but once he takes enough of it apart, he'll start to find order again. That's how it has always been; the familiarity of the process gives him something to hold onto. He knows this, understands this; here he is in control. This he does have the opportunity to make right, and he'll be damned if he lets that go.
Slowly but surely the grotesque entanglement vanishes. The trash heap grows as scarred and mangled wires pile limply, one atop the other like bodies in a mass grave. He can salvage surprisingly little.
Lastly, he moves to the big stuff. The computers themselves. The fames, the intricate setup of motherboards and tiny metal chips; the delicate blend of utrom technology with bits and pieces of copied styles and a touch of personal flair: this part will hurt the most. Seeing what he can patch up and what has lost all hope.
Often he sets his sights too high. Many times, he has thought himself able to fix something that could not be repaired. It's a mistake he's made repeatedly since childhood, and watching the pile of salvageable pieces grow, he's sure he's doing it again. It simply isn't in his nature to give up on something just because it's broken. Especially now, when there's a desperation in the process. Fixing is what he does, and when he can't do that, he has nothing.
Still, the heap of trash grows until it seems to fill the lair with rubble. Bits of the mangled and charred, some beyond recognition and some just familiar enough to send chills down the spine, have taken over part of the floor. It will take him a long time to clear it all away, but he can't think about that now.
At long last, he sorts the final piece. He surveys the desk, clean and miraculously untouched. Bare brown wood waits patiently for him to continue. He starts to make his way back to the chair around the piles of trash. After a step, he changes his mind and walks around the other side of the desk, past the pile of parts he has rescued. The ache in his muscles has evolved into a dull burn.
Despite himself, he collapses into the desk chair and rests his head on trembling hands. It's like organizing a desk drawer; half the effort is taking everything out until you're back to the basic, the nothing. The danger is gone, but so is everything else. Now it's time to find the scattered remnants and try to piece them together. This time, he has no choice but to see it through. He strongly prefers building to rebuilding, but for now this will have to be enough.
Inhale.
Hold.
Release.
Leo has stopped practicing. Raph and Casey are still in the garage, but he can hear what sounds like a football game on the TV sets, and Mikey, through mouthfuls of chips, is cheering. Master Splinter is having a cup of tea. Their presence is less jarring now. It almost begins to soothe him. It dawns on him that he should call April. She'll be worried and she'll want to know they're okay. Besides, hearing her voice will be comforting.
Once his hands stop shaking, he surveys the organized mess around him. There isn't much to work with, but he can manage. This is technology: fixable and inanimate. There are spare parts and welders and there's always a way. Bracing himself on the table, he rises.