I got asked for a sequel to chapter 1 and this happened. There'll probably be more coming honestly. I actually enjoy writing about this and eventually it will be a lot happier. For now, enjoy the angst.
"Mikey," Donnie whispers brokenly. Don doesn't need to be quiet—there's no point. No one's with them in the lair anymore. Haven't been for a couple hours now. But they're both hurting, and the quiet is all that Donnie seems to have now. "Mikey, why didn't you tell me? This should have been treated hours ago."
Mikey's sitting on a stool in Donnie's lab, his mottled arm held gently, reverently in Donnie's hands like just squeezing hard enough will break Mikey into little pieces.
And Mikey shrugs. "I dunno," he says dully. "Raph was mad, and you were mad, and you and Raph and Le have been going at it basically since we all got home and I just-" Mikey breaks off, 'cause Donnie's face falls with each new word that falls from Mikey's mouth, and Mikey had never meant to make Donnie look like that. Ever.
A few months ago, Mikey wouldn't have hesitated to say something goofy and stupid, and Don would roll his eyes and say something about Mikey being an idiot, but he would be smiling—if a little bit reluctantly—and all would be right with the world.
But those days are long past now that Splinter is gone. Now all Mikey can do is try to avoid looking into those sad eyes all of his brothers carry around with them everywhere they go.
"You just what?"
"Forget it," Mikey murmurs, carefully keeping his eyes on his own arm. "It was stupid."
Donnie hesitates, but he doesn't let it go. "Mikey, it's…I know things have been rough lately, but you know you can always come to me, right?"
Mikey's gaze sweeps over Donnie's face, and Don's expression is a mix of tentative hope and agonizing sadness, and it has Mikey's heartstrings tying into a knot and prompting him to say, "'Course I know that, Dee," with a smile that used to feel hollow and wooden until just now. "Who else would I go to?"
Donnie returns the smile, and even though it's wobbly, it's a small piece of what Mikey remembers having way back when they were still a family, and it's heartbreaking.
"Let's get you pathed up, okay?"
"…Yeah. Thanks, Donnie."
"No problem, Mikey. Just come to me straight away next time," Donnie tells him. "Yelling at Raph and Leo can way. You can't."
Mikey nods. "Right."
And he says nothing more, but there's one piece of his family right where it used to be: beside him. And it's probably the best feeling the whole entire world.
Mikey's sitting on the couch when Leo finally comes back. It's probably one or two in the morning at this point, and Donnie had sent Mikey to bed as soon as he'd tied off the last piece of gauze, telling him, "No patrolling for a couple days, okay Mike? It's not bad, but you shouldn't do anything to aggravate it. Go and get some sleep for now."
So here Mikey is. Granted, the couch isn't exactly his bed, but Mikey doesn't think he can make it to his room when the lair feels so, so empty. At least on the couch he can see the light to Donnie's lab through the crack under the door. And it also means he knows exactly when his big brother gets home.
He ends up scaring Leo.
Leo, the leader and admittedly the best ninja out of the four of them, flips on the lights and yells. Mikey just blinks at him.
"Mikey," he hisses when he gets his breathing under control—so different from the way Donnie had whispered it earlier. He's got one hand on his plastron and the other resting on a katana. "What the heck are you doing?"
Mikey shrugs, picking at the gauze wrapped around his hand. "I dunno. Don told me to go to bed, but I couldn't sleep."
Something flashes in Leo's eyes that's there and gone too quickly for Mikey to understand. He doesn't try to, anyways. He stopped trying to a long time ago.
"Did you have a nightmare or something?" Leo asks, looking almost afraid to ask.
Mikey's face twists. Besides his and Donnie's heart to heart earlier, and whatever this thing he and Leo are doing is, this family has become arguing and lying and avoiding. It was the true nightmare here, and sometimes Mikey didn't know how he lived with this. But Mikey doesn't say any of that. Instead, he just settles for a small, "No."
Leo sighs. "Mikey, please don't lie to me."
That's rich, coming from Leo, who has done nothing but lie for the last couple months. He acts like he's still leading, like he's still in charge, but all does is sit in the dojo and stare at his swords. Like if he stares at them long enough, he can make everything better.
Somewhere along the way, Leo started to lie. He pretends he's Leonardo, their leader, but now he's just Leonardo, a lost soul that refuses to go on patrol or eat dinner with his brothers or acknowledge that Master Splinter's gone and he's not coming back.
But Mikey doesn't want to start another argument. "I'm not lying," Mikey says. "I was with Don earlier, so I haven't gone to bed yet."
Leo blinks, and something settles in his expression—again, Mikey's not really sure what it is. He doesn't have mind reading powers; he can't look into Leo's head. So he lets it go. Again. It's not worth more fighting right now. Maybe if it were earlier in the day, maybe if Mikey wasn't so exhausted, maybe if his father were still alive and the lair still felt like home, Mikey would have. But it's late, he's tried, and Splinter's dead, and Mikey's wondering if this is what it feels like to lose the rest of his family while they're still alive.
"Mikey, you know you can talk to me, right?"
Those words. So much like Don's from before, but they're all wrong. The expression, the eyes, the tone. It's all wrong.
He feels sick. "I'm going to bed," Mikey murmurs, picking himself off the couch. And when Leo just sighs, nods, and heads towards the dojo so he can just start lying to himself and everyone else some more, Mikey tries his very best not to run to his room and slam the door in frustration and anger and sadness.
He succeeds, but he wonders what would have happened if he hadn't.
