A/N Well, that happened. I survived the Bayification of the Ninja Turtles. Wow...that was...really?!

Anyway, sorry for the delay. I was really stuck on this one. This little story has definitely taken on a life of its own and while I know where I want to go with this, the journey of getting there has been full of unexpected challenges creatively and in real life. Thanks to everyone for your support, I still can't believe how well received this has been and I still get new readers pretty much every day, which is amazing! You guys keep me going, and for that I am grateful.

Anyway, please keep in mind that when it comes to medical stuff I don't know what I'm talking about so everything in that regard is completely made up, though I hope it's still at least plausible. Please forgive any inaccuracies. :-)

So, without further ado, enjoy!

Chapter Eleven

"Hello?" April called out as she entered the lair, letting anyone who could hear her know she was there. She was met by total silence and she heaved a sigh, her eyes glancing around the room that felt so overwhelmingly empty. The lair, once full of life now held a haunted and abandoned aura that sent a chill down her spine. It had been only four days since the accident, but the toll it had taken on everyone was so painfully clear.

She made her way to Donnie's lab, knocked softly and let herself in. Mikey was still lying unmoving in the middle of the room, still lying on the table that had been converted into a make-shift bed consisting of a foam mattress, clean sheets and a thin blanket. He looked pretty much the same as he did before, still hooked up to an array of machines, still relying on a ventilator to breathe. The only thing that was different was that this was the first time he was alone with no one at his side to keep vigil.

No, that wasn't right. There was always someone with him and sure enough, as her eyes scanned the room further she could see Donnie at his desk fast asleep, books and papers strewn all over the place acting as a pillow. One glance at the computer screen in front of him and the mess of papers and books, April knew that he was doing more medical research.

Carefully she approached him, "Psst, Donnie," she murmured gently, nudging him on the shoulder jumping back a step when he startled awake.

"I'm just resting my eyes!" Donnie blurted as he quickly rubbed the sleep from his eyes and turned his attention back to Mikey, hardly giving April a fleeting glance.

"OK…" she said as he rushed to his brother's side and took his wrist, his eyes glancing to the screen that monitored his vitals. She watched Donnie's face turn to a frown, his brow line furrowing with concern, "What's wrong?"

Donnie's eyes went to the clock and widened as he saw how much time had passed, "Crap, was I asleep? Did I fall asleep?"

"Yeah, but you look like you need it…" she said with concern. "Donnie when was the last time you slept? Like really slept? In a bed."

He turned to her, "Wait, April?! When did you get here?"

"Just now," she said, somewhat surprised that he was just noticing her presence. "Donnie, are you OK?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," he bristled, his words coming out in a quick staccato.

"How's Mikey doing?" she tilted her chin towards him as she approached the lifeless figure and carefully placed her hand on his, giving it a squeeze to let Mikey know that she was there, even as he lay unresponsive.

"Pretty much the same, but he's starting to run a low grade fever and while it's not terribly high it has climbed since I last checked," Donnie replied, sitting on the chair next to his brother, his shoulders slumped with exhaustion, "I can't believe I fell asleep when I was supposed to be watching him…" He buried his face in his hands, aggressively rubbing his eyes as though it would help keep him from drifting off again.

Well obviously it's because you need it.

"I brought more bandages like you asked for," April said, removing her backpack and opening it to reveal a plastic bag full of first aid supplies.

Donnie reached for it and checked over the contents, releasing a weary and grateful sigh, "Thanks."

"Where are Leo and Splinter?" she asked, the other question on her mind was left unspoken. Have you heard from Raph yet? There was no point in asking because she knew the answer would be 'no'. All attempts to find him or contact him had failed. If Raph wanted to be found, they would have found him already. She just hoped that his guilt didn't drive him to do the unthinkable and that he wherever he was, he was OK despite everything.

Donnie shrugged, yawning, "Resting I think. None of us has had much of that lately."

"Clearly," April quipped with worry. "Is there anything else I can do?"

Donnie frowned thinking a moment, "Coffee. I need coffee."

"Besides that."

"Maybe a Red Bull?"

"Donnie…"

"What? You asked and I can really use the caffeine right now."

"No, what you need is sleep," April returned. He looked like he was about to fall over.

"I will," he shrugged dismissively, "I need to do something about Mikey's fever first…and change his bandages…and…"

"Donnie..." April let go of Mikey's hand to grab Donnie's and she frowned by how shaky he seemed, "Look, now that I'm here, how about you do what you need to do to for Mikey, but after you're done, get some rest, real rest and let me take the next watch."

"No, it's OK, I got it."

"Don't you trust me?"

"Of course I do but…"

"You won't do anyone any good if you make yourself sick. Just for a couple of hours, OK? Deal?"

Donnie didn't reply, instead he got up and washed his hands as April watched him with frustration.

"Deal?"

"Can you please just…go? Leave us alone for a few minutes?" Donnie asked, his voice raw and empty, "I need to focus while I tend to Mikey and I can't concentrate with you…"

"Fine," she huffed as she stormed out of the room her worry translating into anger. And she was angry, but it wasn't aimed at Donnie, she doubted he was even fully aware of how he sounded. Her anger was solely directed at the situation, at the whole universe that seemed determined to mess with their lives. The turtles had done so much for her and now their lives were falling apart and there was nothing she could do about it and she hated it. It wasn't fair, it wasn't right.

Donnie watched her go and felt a pang of something in his gut, something indistinguishable. He knew she was on edge, they all were as Mikey lay slowly deteriorating and Raph still remained AWOL. No one knew how to react to it all, but he somehow made April angry and couldn't bring himself to care. She wasn't the first one to insist he get some rest, as he already had that fight with Leo and Splinter, but didn't they understand? Didn't they get it?

Sure, he wasn't a doctor but he studied. They were ninjas so injuries were a certainty. For that reason he had been in the process of learning all he could even before Raph…before the Incident. But now with Mikey so badly injured like he was, Donnie studied like he never did before. Didn't they realize that he was the only one who had the knowledge to do something if Mikey made a turn for the worse?

Like now? He thought, frowning at the turn Mikey's vitals had taken. It wasn't critical at emergency levels, but Donnie had yet to see any significant signs of improvement. There had been fluctuations over the past few days, but for the most part, his condition remained the same. Except now Donnie was starting to observe a slow but steady decline. It wasn't enough to cause for alarm, yet, but it was enough to worry Donnie who knew that his status could still change rapidly for better or worse. Who else among them was even remotely qualified to treat him if that happened?

He knew more than anyone in theory, despite having no experience in practice beyond the minor stuff. Sure, Splinter knew field and holistic medicine, and taught them some of what he knew but in comparison his knowledge was as limited as their resources. He had been building an infirmary for quite some time already but being forced to live in hiding because you're a mutant made it difficult and time consuming. He had already been forced to improvise on more than one occasion over the past four days due to lack of equipment and know how.

The burden of saving Mikey fell on Donnie's shoulders. No matter how much he studied it was still somewhat of a guessing game as there was tons of info on human anatomy and turtle anatomy, but obviously nothing on mutant turtle/human hybrids like he and his brothers. It was a lot of pressure, and he still marvelled at the miracle that Mikey somehow beat the odds and even made it through the first day, let alone the initial surgery. The odds of Mikey's survival were still not in his favor, but Donnie would do whatever it took to keep Mikey alive and make him well again.

He leaned in close to Mikey's chest and listened, not liking what he heard. As Mikey was still fully reliant on the ventilator to breathe for him Donnie could hear the whoosh of the machine pumping air into his injured lungs, but he could also hear more fluid building up inside.

"Not good, not good…" he muttered in a quiet panic, "you're supposed to be getting better Mikey, not worse…"

Donnie carefully started to lift the bandages covering the three parallel wounds on Mikey's chest and the cut he had to make to repair the internal damage he had sustained. He hissed at the sight as the area looked swollen and was turning an angry shade of red.

"It's OK Mikey," Donnie said, "I'm going to fix it, I'm going to take care of it and you're going to be fine." He sighed, clenching his fists to steady his hands. This was fixable, a minor setback. He just needed to clean away the infection, drain the fluids from his lungs and administer stronger antibiotics. Antibiotics that we don't have… OK, that was a problem, but he could figure something out, he always did. He did a mental check of his limited inventory and realized that he needed more than just antibiotics. Donnie had been prepared for emergencies, not long term care, and the longer Mikey was unconscious and reliant on machines to sustain him, the longer Donnie's checklist of supplies he was lacking grew.

"I'll figure it out, don't worry," Donnie murmured, ignoring the tension building within him, "You just focus on fighting this and getting better, OK Mikey?"

I'll figure it out.

He finished cleaning the infection from Mikey's wounds and inserted a tube into his lung to drain the build-up of fluid. When he was done he cleaned up and sat down at Mikey's side, as he rubbed a kink in his neck and leaned forward, resting his head in his hands.

"How is he?"

Donnie looked up to see Leo at the doorway, behind him Splinter and April stood. "Not good," he replied.

"Still hasn't woken up yet?"

"Not yet," Donnie sighed, his voice hoarse from exhaustion.

"Shouldn't he have woken up by now?" Leo demanded helplessly, "It's been four days!"

"He will when he's ready," Donnie replied tiredly, "but I don't think it'll be any time soon. I think he's developing pneumonia but I'm not a hundred percent positive, all I know is that he's not healing like he should be."

Leo swallowed hard, not liking what Donnie had to say, "Well, what are you…what can we do about it?"

"I don't…I don't know yet," Donnie replied, "but I'm working on it. I'm kind of learning as I go unfortunately and my resources are limited."

"What do you need?" April asked.

Donnie barked the hopeless laugh of someone at the end of their rope, "What don't I need?"

Leo watched dumbfounded as Donnie proceeded to go on a hysterical rant about all the things he needed to help Mikey. Things like, 'a real medical doctor with training and experience', 'better equipment', 'proper medicine' and some big words that sounded more like gibberish to Leo than actual words but probably made a lot of sense to Donnie, and just when he was starting to go on a tangent about how lucky it was that they had anything of use at all, Splinter finally stopped him.

"Donatello, breathe," he said, grasping him by the shoulders, "getting worked up like this isn't going to help."

"I know," he replied, pulling away, suddenly stoic.

Leo heaved an impatient sigh, at the moment feeling completely useless so he turned his attention back to Mikey, sitting down beside him across from Donnie and rubbing the top of Mikey's head affectionately. He frowned at how warm he felt to the touch as he closed his eyes with a weary sigh. Damn you Raph and your stupid temper! This wouldn't have happened if you just…learned to fucking control yourself! He thought miserably.

"I know our resources are limited," Splinter continued to tell Donnie, "but you have done a fine job so far helping your brother with what you do have."

"What can we do to help?" April asked again, "Anything?"

"Actually, there is something," Donnie said, "but it's risky and not entirely ethical but at this point I don't know what else to do."

Leo perked up and opened his eyes, "What's that?"

Donnie hesitated and something shifted in his expression when his eyes locked with Splinter's so Leo looked to their Sensei who seemed intrigued but also wary.

"U-unfortunately," he stammered, "since Mikey's not improving like I had hoped, I've got to start looking at more long term care…" Donnie went to his desk and grabbed a pen and paper and started madly writing something down, a list. "I don't want to do this, but I don't see any other choice…" he handed April the paper, and his eyes met Leo's, "I need you to try and get as many of these items as you can…"

"How? Donnie, I don't even know what half these things are, but I know you can't just go and buy them at a …wait, you want us to steal it?" April asked.

"More like borrowing without asking?" he cringed at how he sounded because no matter how he put it, there was not going around it, "Look, normally I would salvage or create what I can using other means, but it's too time consuming so I hate to say it but, yeah."

Any other circumstance and Leo would've objected. It was important to him to always try and do the right thing, and stealing, especially from innocent people, was wrong. But ever since Raph hurt Mikey, they had been stuck in one giant clusterfuck of a grey area so Leo didn't even question it, "OK, let's see the list."

"No," Splinter said, "I will not have you stealing supplies from, where? A hospital?"

"Yeah, that would be the best place," Donnie nodded, "and with all due respect Master Splinter, but if I'm right and Mikey is developing pneumonia, then he's going to need stronger antibiotics than what I've got because they're not working. And since he's not waking up, I need to look at long term ways to take care of him, we're going to need more fluids, because I'm almost out, and a feeding tube and more oxygen and…" he sighed, "I'm afraid if we don't take action now, then he's not going to make it. This is the only way he's got any chance of surviving this."

"There's got to be another way," Splinter protested, but when Donnie shook his head, his eyes downcast even Master Splinter reluctantly acquiesced without much of a fight.

"If I had the time, sure, but I don't, Mikey doesn't have time to wait and any other option that I can think of would take too long. We'll return what we can after Mikey's better," Donnie said.

Leo's eyes scanned the list, "OK, let's go then."

"I'm not going."

"But we need you to come," Leo protested, "you're the only one who knows what to look for!"

"I'm also the only one who knows what to do if Mikey's condition suddenly takes a turn for the worse," Donnie said, "I can't be in two places at once."

Leo looked back at the list and frowned as it was all Greek to him. He rubbed his eyes tiredly and looked again, as though it would suddenly make sense.

"Just because I can't come along, doesn't mean we can't stay in constant communication," Donnie said as he unsteadily climbed to his feet and rummaged around his stuff, handing April and Leo what looked like a simple, yet slightly modified Bluetooth devices. "It doesn't look like much, but there's a camera and mic so I'll be able to see what you see and we can still communicate back and forth. All you'll have to do when you're ready is turn them on."

"OK," Leo shrugged, "Got it."

"I don't like this," Splinter shook his head.

"I don't think any of us do," April agreed.

"I'm sorry but if there was another way…" Donnie frowned, fixing his eyes on Mikey.

Leo huffed impatiently, "Come on April, let's go."

"Be careful," Donnie added.

"Of course we will," Leo shrugged reaching for Mikey's hand and giving it a squeeze before heading out the door, not even bothering to see if April was behind him or not.

After they were gone Splinter left to meditate, instructing Donnie to try and rest for a few minutes until Leo and April needed to contact him so Donnie sat at his desk and waited. He glanced over at Mikey, his heart heavy with sadness. He blinked heavily, once, twice and then he kept them closed, overwhelmed with exhaustion.

I really need that coffee…

Suddenly his phone rang and he jumped, answering without even looking, "What's up, did it not work?" he asked, glancing at his computer and seeing that they weren't connected yet.

He expected it to be either Leo or April, but there was no reply. He could hear the distant sound of traffic and someone breathing on the other end. "Hello?" he tried, glancing quickly at the call display and seeing an unlisted number. Payphone perhaps?

"Who is this?"

Whoever was on the other end coughed a couple of times, breathing heavily.

Wrong number? Prank call?

"Raph?" Donnie guessed.

He heard a soft little sob and then a click as they hung up. It was all the confirmation Donnie needed.

Raph…

A/N Thanks for reading! I would love to hear what you guys think!