Bold is thought.

Disclaimer: I do not own the TMNT, I just torture them for kicks.

Warning: Blood, Language, and an OC. (Also, Raph/Don somehow managed to get its way into this story too, sorry! Also there are hints of Don/Leo if you lean towards that pairing.)

I kept on changing and adding things for DAYS because I wanted this chapter to be pretty good. So, I hope you like it! ^^

//////////Review Responses//////////

the-bunnys-echo: Thanks for the review and for the compliment about the pizza comment. I thought that part would be pretty good, just as a bit of fun info. ^^

Quoth the Raven: Thanks for all of the compliments about my story. I hope I please you just as well with this chapter!

Dark-Princess-Hikari: *laughs* You'll get to see what happens to your Donny-baby! (Don't worry about the rabid thing, I'm a rabid Donny fan too. ^^)

Deana: Looks like you got your wish! I hope you like it!

//////////Fifteen Years Later…at 4:00 A.M//////////

The bright lights of computer monitors cut through the darkness of the near silent lair like a knife. The purple wearing turtle couldn't help but wince when the bright light hit his sensitive and tired eyes. He knew that he should have gone to sleep hours ago and that he was going to get another lecture about pulling all-nighters, but he could not stop himself. Don just had to finish that one anti-hacker program. His logical, incredibly tired side told him that the Foot hackers would not hack into his carefully lain defense system if he went to sleep. However, Don wasn't too keen on taking that chance. Taking one big finger from each hand, he rubbed under his eyes.

The scratchy surface of the mask rubbed on the black bags under his eyes, and he suppressed a small moan. Maybe the guys are right, perhaps I do need more sleep… Don thought to himself, laying his chin on his keyboard. The keyboard always gave a small beep along with a click whenever he typed, and due to Don's chin being somewhere between the Z and ? keys it was giving out a long, streaming beep that annoyed him to no end. Finally lifting his head, Don yawned and got up out of the computer chair. Only the thought of getting coffee passed through the teenage turtle's head as he passed through the living room to the dark kitchen.

Without missing a beat, he turned on the light with a flick of his finger against the switch, and proceeded to the cabinet where all of the coffee was. If there was anything more in abundance in the household than tea and pizza, it was coffee. Don knew he was probably a caffeine addict and that it was unhealthy, but he was prepared with a counter-argument should the topic ever come up. It was centered on the fact that Mikey had a pizza addiction and Leo was addicted to tea. So, according to that, why couldn't the purple-wearing turtle like a bit of coffee in the morning? He set up to make a nice cup of coffee, taking a purple, cracked, cup out of the cabinet above the coffee machine and setting it on the counter gently. Don opened a new packet of ground coffee (along with a new filter) and prepared a pot of it, rejoicing internally as the heavenly smell woke him up almost immediately.

He started to hear whimpering coming from where they all had their bedrooms. Don couldn't help the sort of concerned expression that came on his face when the whimpering became even louder. At first, the turtle had no idea who was whimpering in their sleep, and then it hit him as he heard a few growls. Raph, Don sighed internally as the sounds became a bit louder. He was glad it was just whimpering, not screaming like it used to be. Raphael, his brother, had always had night terrors. Before, when and before he was 13, Raphael had always done his best to keep his brothers away from his room so that they wouldn't know about the frequent problem. However, Don had found out and now forced Raphael to take medicine for it. The medicine, unfortunately, did not keep the red-banded turtle from having a lower version of the night terrors, though, and Don always heard his brother whimper at night.

He turned his head towards the pot of coffee, relieved to see that it was not done yet. He could attend to his brother without any interruptions. Don quietly crept into the main part of the lair and jumped up to the second floor. That was the level where all of their rooms were. He walked in a semi-circle from where he started at, eventually ending up at the open doorway that lead into his whimpering elder brother's room. Don knew that Raphael wouldn't kill him for disturbing his privacy in this way, now. In fact, Don thought that the turtle might actually like being disturbed if it got him away from the nightmare he was having. The terrapin took a step into Raphael's room, nearly tripping over one of the hand-made barbells that littered the floor. He looked at the blue stone floor and the rusty orange wall that was decorated with violent posters of even more violent movies. The stone wall was also "decorated" with cracks, signs that the turtle had spent the majority of his angry moments in this room.

Trying to ignore the obvious signs of distress and anger that showed itself in the messy room, Don gulped down a load of air as he walked over to his brother's hammock. Raphael was muttering to himself, giving out tired whimpers as he turned over every few minutes. Don hated seeing his older brother like this, but he knew it was better than the night terrors that they had had to face before. Putting a hand on Raphael's shoulder, Don gently shook the hothead. At first the only response to his incessant shaking was a small grumble and an even louder whimper, but Donatello continued his shaking until amber eyes opened and he was glared at by his elder brother.

"Whacha doin' here, Don?" Raphael asked, annoyance lacing his tone of voice like venom on a rattlesnake's fangs. He absolutely hated to be woken up, especially in what was, probably, early in the morning.

"Is the medicine really working, Raph? I heard you whimpering from the kitchen again," Don asked, ignoring the acidity of his brother's voice as best as he could.

"Again?…Damn it, yes, the freakin' medicine is working. Now let me sleep you mo- Hey, what's wrong?" Raph bit back bitterly at first, but then asked matter-of-factly.

Don had noticed a headache starting to form as he talked to Raphael, but he did not notice his hiss of pain or when he put both of his hands on his now throbbing head. He jerked his hands off of his head and looked at his brother, muttering something along the lines of a yes. Don smiled internally when he saw how concerned his brother now was. Raphael always tried to be the stone wall, the turtle without the "bothersome emotions", but he failed so utterly at it that it was hilarious. That sent a small chuckle running through Don's throat into the open air.

Raphael immediately stiffened, embarrassed slightly, and turned over. His back was facing Don now as he muttered something about the medicine working and to get off his shell about it. Don sighed when he heard Raphael's steady breathing echoing around the room. He was asleep and the coffee machine had probably already gone away from his brother's bed, he gripped his head in one hand when another large throb of pain went through his head. This sudden pain came so quickly that Don nearly fell on another barbell as he stumbled out of Raph's room.

I didn't expect to have another one…I mean; I haven't had these kinds of headaches since I was a kid… Don pondered, jumping from the second floor down to the main floor almost gracefully. The hard smell of black coffee seduced and dragged Don into the kitchen similarly to a well-trained and wickedly vivacious prostitute. He couldn't help but not focus on his headache as he removed the pot of coffee and poured himself a cup full. Don sipped on the coffee, holding himself back from pouring the entire cup into his mouth in one fluid gulp.

His elbows dropped onto the counter as he sighed for the millionth time that night, taking another sip of coffee with one hand holding the cup. The other hand, his right hand, put the coffee pot back into the machine. Don heard the captive coffee sloshing inside the pot, but overlooked it. The headache seemed to be farther away now due to the caffeine from the coffee, and the turtle was grateful for that. Donatello yawned, turning away from the counter and walking towards his computer lab with silent, fluid steps. Just a few hours more of working, and maybe he could get some sleep.

//////////8:02 AM//////////

Don could feel turtle hands on his shoulders. Those hands almost gently pulled him from the fitful two hours of sleep that the techno turtle had managed to get. He wished that whoever was pulling him from his slumber would leave him alone, especially when he was sleeping in his computer chair with his face on the keyboard. Unwillingly, Don opened his eyes and winced again as his sensitive eyes nearly burned against the harsh light of the computer screen again. Clumsily and lazily, Don wiped the drool off that dribbled off of his face, in his sleep, to form a pool of sorts on the keyboard. He could hear his brother leave the room as the tired turtle rubbed his eyes. Don would have fallen asleep again on his keyboard if the sweet smell of pancakes hadn't caught his attention. He did not really like pancakes because of their sweet taste, but his stomach considered it food and growled all the same.

He turned his computer chair to his right so that he could get up and go to the kitchen for breakfast. Klunity Klunk Klunk, Don heard the cup fall to the ground due to his own clumsy hand. The cup skidded across the ground with a small screech before stopping in front of the door. Thankfully the cup had been empty, or else Don would have had to clean up yet another puddle of spilled coffee off of the blue stone floor of his computer area. He stumbled out of his computer area into the bright sounds and smells of Mikey cooking breakfast while bickering with Raph. The red-cladded turtle was next to his younger brother, growling and staring at what Mikey was cooking. It seemed like the hotheaded dark green turtle wanted something to eat even more then the mild-mannered olive green turtle. All of the playful fighting between the two stopped as Don entered the room. Everything was awkward for a minute with Don's arrival, but Mikey soon found a way to dispel the strange moment.

"Wow, who woke up on the wrong side of the keyboard!" Mikey laughed, pointing at where the keys had imprinted their shape onto Don's forehead, beak, and cheeks.

"At least he wasn't talking in his sleep," Raphael quickly shot back, reaching over and whacking his youngest brother on the head.

"Is that the best you've got, bro? That was so GIRLY!" Mikey laughed, ducking with a scared squeak when Raphael let out an angry roar and sent a barbaric punch towards the terrified turtle.

"You want to see girly?! YOU WANT TO SEE GIRLY?!" Raphael yelled, ready to beat Mikey into a punch despite Donnie's attempts to calm him with words.

"Raphael! Calm your temper!" an old, but nevertheless powerful voice echoed in the kitchen from the voice of a very old and wise mutant rat.

Everyone stopped everything when they saw Leonardo and Master Splinter in the battleground of the kitchen. Raphael was still poised to knock Mikey into the next life, but his muscles were less tense now that he had been brought out of his angry rampage. With a soft growl echoing from the soft pallet in his throat, the hotheaded turtle backed off from the youngest and stormed out of the kitchen. The turtle did not acknowledge any of his brothers or his father when he stormed out, but that was probably a good thing in Raphael's current mental state. Don sighed, looking at how everyone was reacting to Raphael's sudden temper tantrum. Don shrugged when there was no reaction; he did not expect that much of a reaction because Raphael was a hothead and he was their brother. In other words, they had seen it all too much for it to be considered nothing more than a common occurrence.

Don could see Master Splinter sigh and ask Leonardo to do something. It was probably to fetch Raphael, from the leader's slightly annoyed expression. The turtle knew how much fetching Raphael from one of his fits was annoying to the leader. Just to make things run a bit more smoothly so that the two would not erupt into one of their fights, again, Don was going to go with them. However, the headache returned suddenly with a ruthless attack and halted the genius' little plan in its tracks. He settled for going into the main area of the lair and sitting down on the scratchy sofa in front of the noisy television. Mikey called for him to come back since breakfast was almost ready, but Don just shrugged it off and did not reply. The desire for food was no longer in the workaholic, but a new desire for going to the bathroom and retching was rising up in him like a geyser.

"My son, are you feeling well?" a concerned, elderly voice sounded behind the genius turtle, making the teenager nearly jump. He was so out of it he hadn't even sensed his father!

"Yeah, Master Splinter. I'm just not that hungry right now," Don lied, looking back at his father with a small smile on his olive green face.

Don looked at Master Splinter's worried face, and felt a bit guilty for lying to him about his condition. He was especially guilty since he could see that the father had seen through the lie. Before the rat could point out that there was something wrong, though, a miracle happened. Raph and Leo stormed into the lair, both angry with each other but in different ways. Leonardo was mainly silent, seething in his own anger that was similar to a silent, but nasty computer virus. Raphael, on the other hand, was yelling at Leonardo and acting like a system failure that almost instantly would murder a computer. Don turned his head back towards the blaring television, giving a sigh of annoyance. He heard their father get near to the back of the couch and lay a hand of him. A light one-second touch that was soon taken away as Master Splinter's soft, furry, footsteps followed the two angry turtles into the kitchen.

Giving a groan as Mikey started to tease Raph again in the kitchen; Don got up off of the chair and walked over to where his lab on the other side of the lair was. The cool stone of the floor felt good against his feet. That cool sensation distracted him from the rising nausea and the abusive headache that pounded his body even more than the Shredder on a bad day. He started to feel a bit dizzy, so he stopped his stride halfway to the lab and just stood there. Don did not know how long he was there, or that it was very long until he heard Leo's voice calling for him in the dojo. Jolting up from his thoughts of pain and nausea, the techno turtle immediately ran for the dojo. At first, he felt fine with running, but soon he had to resign to a quick walk as he could practically feel the vomit threatening to go up into his throat. Inside the dojo, his brothers were all in a row, seated, and waiting for him. Apologizes went out of the turtle's throat like a hurricane as he rushed to sit down and blend in with the others.

Master Splinter stood in front of them, as strong as he ever was in his old age, and started to explain about agility and the ability to dodge attacks. It was a lecture that everyone had heard almost a dozen times, and it was obvious how each of the brothers took the repeat of the lesson. Michelangelo was sitting next to Raphael and seemed to be more focused on avoiding the red-banded turtle. Raphael was sitting between Leonardo and Michelangelo, and he was about to burst again. Leonardo, however, seemed to be keeping back a lot of anger behind a wall of interest at their Master's lengthy speech. That wall seemed about to break, and Don, who was sitting next to Leo, could not help fidgeting like Mikey was doing with Raphael.

Donatello only half listened to his master and father, which was a mistake that earned him a whack on the head that came from a walking stick. While the turtle had not been listening to Splinter apparently the rat had given out sparring partners. Raphael was going to spar with Michelangelo and Leonardo was going to spar with Donatello. Honestly, Don was a bit scared to go up against seething Leonardo. Being the leader had the potential for making one very angry, and an angry Leo without control (even if it's only temporary) was not a person to even play fight with. Leo was definitely not acting like himself, Don logged in his brain. The turtle in blue never lost control of his emotions, never! Why is he acting like this all of a sudden? He was just fine- even after his fight with Raph! Don thought to himself, confused as to why his brother looked so close to losing it now that he was closer to the genius turtle.

"C'mon Don, don't be afraid of the big bad Leo!" Mikey quipped from the other side of the dojo where Raph and he had re-located. Honestly, he looked a bit unnerved by being paired with Raph, who still wanted to kill him for the "girly" comment.

Don gulped audibly at Mikey's comment while walking over to the weapon rack and grabbing a practice Bo staff from it. His mind started to formulate some crackpot idea of escape from sparring. He returned to see Leo looking at him. Don was immediately glad that he was not a foot soldier and had, therefore, never received that gaze in its full intensity. The gaze was a focused force (similar to a laser beam) that made a shiver go down the younger turtle's back. The Bo staff was slippery in his hands; threatening to slip any moment due to an overabundance of sweat. Don got into a lower position than his sword-wielding brother and waited for the signal to begin. Just a few hours, Don, just a few hours and then you can figure out what has been making he and you both odd, he thought to himself, trying to keep his spirits up.

"Go," Master Splinter commanded vociferously, and the sparring started.

Leonardo stood there like a zombie, but Donatello was so desperate to end this sparring that he just rushed and went hands thrusted the Bo staff towards Leonardo's plasteron as if it was a sharp javelin. Normally he would not have been so careless, but today he wasn't in the mood to be as focused and as calm as his big brother in blue. It was that recklessness that made him receive a blow to the stomach that forced him to cough up some bile as he fell to the ground. No one noticed the small flecks of bile on the ground, not even Leo. During this one fall, he managed to drop his Bo staff to the ground in a way that made him feel utterly ridiculous. Like he was an amateur. However, Don got up in a very quick moment of clarity and retrieved the fallen staff, twisting it right and left as well as swinging it in order to keep back his brother's Katana blades.

At first, Don could hear the strikes and grunts of both Michelangelo and Raphael, but as Leonardo and Donatello's fight went on those fights melted away like sun into the deep abyss of night. It was sort of like meditation, and now he knew one of the reasons why his leader got up so early in the morning to do Katas. The eldest turtle revved up his attacking as he slashed and kicked at the second youngest turtle, who was trying to dodge most of the attacks. It was of no use, however, because of many factors. The main factor was a big one, though, and that was the fact that he wasn't a fighter. Don was not a fighter now and he, probably, never would be one.

Grunting in pain, Don moved to the side to avoid one of Leo's attacks. He did not calculate where the walls in the dojo were, though, and so he found himself pretty much pinned to the wall. A ninja always lures his enemies into a trap by thinking ahead…Leo's definitely done some thinking, Don thought to himself. He gritted his teeth as his brother turned towards him, unbridled rage definitely on his face. He could hear footsteps, two turtle feet and a pair of rat's feet. They were moving towards the area where he and Leo were to be sparring. Don saw Leo move towards him, and, with a sinking feeling, realized that his rescuers would probably be too late.

He saw Leo raise his right Katana upward, in a position typical of splitting someone's head open, and saw his brother's eyes. They weren't the eyes of his brother, but of hatred, revenge, and anger that had finally spilled out of his brother's cool container like molten liquid lava. Leonardo's mental wall had burst. He had no idea what to do with fear pulsing in his body too quickly and the message of "run away" being screamed in his nerves. He slid down the wall as the sand-papery wall scratched his hard shell, and sat on the ground, looking at his leader, his eldest brother. Don's last sight before he passed out was of Leonardo slashing downward with his blade while the purple-wearing turtle's mouth opened. Don's voice pierced the air like a knife and it was covered in the steel of pleading gasps.

"Leo!"

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