Leonardo and Usagi returned and introduced the healer. She appeared to be similar to a koala bear, albeit taller. If Donatello had to guess, she was well into middle age. She had deep brown eyes and a kind demeanor. "My name is Mirai," she said with a bow towards Don.
Don gulped. "Donatello, but you can call me Don."
"Congratulations, Donatello."
Don smiled weakly. "Thank you, Mirai."
"How are you feeling?" Mirai asked.
"Well, you wouldn't be here if I was feeling great," Don replied with a chuckle.
"This is true. Pregnancy with multiples can be exceedingly difficult for beings that are otherwise prone to singletons. Usagi tells me that you are carrying three children. Is this common for your species?"
"I don't really have a species," Don explained. "I'm a cross between human and turtle. Triplets would be rare for humans, but some species of turtle carry many eggs. Some sea turtles lay over one hundred eggs per clutch."
"I see. Why don't you tell me what your worst symptoms are?" the healer suggested.
Don told her everything from the beginning - how the babies were created and implanted, the various modifications that Bishop had made to his body, what ailments arose, and when they occurred. He was honest about how he was feeling now; miserable.
Mirai looked at his eyes and into his mouth. She asked him to spit into a cup of what appeared to be dirt, and then examined it. She felt his glands and pinched his skin. "Ouch," Don yelped.
"My apologies. I am not used to your type of skin," Mirai explaIned.
"I've never seen a turtle on your planet," Don remarked. "So I suppose you wouldn't be."
Mirai nodded. "Indeed. Reptiles are somewhat rare where I come from. I've never tended to one myself. Are you having any problems with your skin?"
Don cast a glance at Leo and then nodded shyly. "Tell me about them," Mirai encouraged.
"Well, reptilian skin isn't the best at stretching," Don murmured. "Mine is no exception. The skin on my sides has been shedding off in sheets."
"And this is uncommon for you?" Mirai pressed.
"It hasn't happened since puberty," Don explained. "And it was more gradual then. Not as drastic."
"Does it pain you?" Mirai asked.
Don looked at Leo, who had his eyes trained on the floor. "A little, but it's more of a nuisance than anything. It doesn't bother me nearly as much as some other things."
Mirai nodded in encouragement. "Such as?"
"My back is the worst. And, uh, my stomach, you know, nausea and stuff. Plus my abdominal muscles are out of place and prone to spasms, and my plastron is achy from stretching. I don't sleep much anymore, even though I'm perpetually exhausted. I get a lot of headaches. Sometimes bad ones. My feet hurt and swell when I stand for more than an hour or so. Sometimes I get dizzy or lightheaded. It can be hard to catch my breath." It felt kind of good to say that stuff, out loud and in front of Leo.
"May I take a look at your belly?" Mirai requested.
"Oh, um… sure," Don stammered. He grimaced and pulled his shirt over his head.
Mirai ran her hands along his sides, his shell, and his abdomen. She pressed each of his scutes, which was quite painful for the turtle. While she had no stethoscope, she pressed her ear to his middle as though trying to listen to the babies. Don patiently tolerated the exam, although the longer it went, the more useless it seemed. Mirai asked a lot of questions but offered no answers.
"How long do you expect this gestation to last?" Mirai asked.
Don was caught off guard, although he probably shouldn't have been. "Uh, I don't know for sure. Perhaps three or four more months?"
"I imagine that your physique was similar to your brother's before all this?"
Leonardo spoke up from the corner. "Virtually identical."
"Well, you are quite large," Mirai commented.
Don's voice took on a sharp edge. "So I've heard."
Mirai either didn't notice or soldiered on anyway. "This is why your back hurts. Are you resting enough?"
"As much as I can," Don began.
"Not nearly enough," Leonardo put in.
Mirai ignored the dirty glances that the turtles exchanged. "At your size, you should rest on your side as much as possible."
Donatello already knew this. Anything he said would have sounded sarcastic, so he nodded instead. Leo's own nod was more smug, at least to Don.
"This would help both your back and your exhaustion," Mirai added, uselessly. "Lessening the stress on your body should help with the headaches as well, perhaps even the nausea. These can all be exacerbated by stress."
"You don't say?" Don snapped. "All I've needed this whole time was a nap, huh?"
"I know that you said you have trouble sleeping. I can provide you with some teas that might help," Mirai offered, rising above Don's outburst. She had dealt with hormonal patients before, and Usagi had explained that this turtle was barely past adolescence.
Don assumed that the exam was over. He sat up and put his shirt back on. He also took a deep breath to calm down. "What's in the tea?" he asked.
"Leaves of the aldimore tree, crushed and intermingled with bark from the highland snaregrape bush."
"I don't know what those things are," Don said, levelly. "What are the active ingredients?"
"Come again?" Mirai requested.
"They are plants that are native to our world, very commonly used in medicine," Usagi interjected.
"Yes." Mirai smiled. "I can also make you a balm of the snaregrape root that may help with the shedding. It is known to ease a number of skin ailments."
"But what's in it?" Don pressed.
Mirai looked at the turtle. "I just told you. It is a common medicine in our world. All natural."
"Just because it's common and natural doesn't mean that it's safe for a mutant like me," Don argued. "If I'm going to take it, I need more information. For example, willow bark tea is a common and natural remedy for pain on earth. The active ingredient is salicin. It's been used for centuries, but if I were to take it now, it could cause complications such as hormone imbalances, bleeding, and circulatory problems in the babies."
"I can't tell you what's in it," Mirai admitted. "Our ways are not like your ways. We do not have names for these… active ingredients, as you call them. Our healing traditions are based upon millennia of knowledge, passed down and made better from generation to generation. I can't tell you what chemicals are in the tea, only that it works, and that my patients have not suffered for it."
"How could you know that their babies weren't harmed in some way?" Don asked. "Unless you've never lost one?"
"Of course I have lost unborn babies in my care," Mirai admitted. "Loss is a part of the process in some unfortunate cases. It is simply the way things are."
"I'm sorry, but I just don't want to risk it," Don said. "I'd rather bear these discomforts than risk a complication."
"If Don refuses to take medicine, is there anything else to be done?" Leonardo asked. "Acupuncture? Acupressure? Realigning his spine?"
"I know nothing of these treatments," Mirai admitted. "I can offer a variety of herbs, teas, food to help with his stomach, but if he doesn't want them…"
"Well, thank you for coming," Don said, trying his hardest to sound kind. Normally this came naturally to him, but he was just so cranky and moody.
"Just a minute," Leonardo barked. "Mirai, what do you think of Don continuing on with this? Do you think that his body will hold up for four more months?"
"He's clearly under strain," Mirai said, calmly. "But I'm not familiar enough with your anatomy to make a judgment at this time."
"What about the odds of a natural birth?" Leonardo pressed. "His body was physically and chemically manipulated so that he could carry these babies. Don was told that he should be able to give birth naturally, but I'm not sure that we ought to be believing that."
"I did not conduct an internal exam. Did you wish for me to do so?"
"No!" Don yelped. "That really won't be necessary. Listen, Mirai, I appreciate you coming all this way. I really do. I'm sure that you are excellent at what you do. It's just… not for me."
"It was no trouble," Mirai said with a smile. "I wish you luck, and will return if you ever request it."
"Do we owe you any payment?" Leonardo asked.
"No. I charge only for the treatment, which was not conducted," Mirai explained.
"No. You came all this way, and I know I'm a terrible patient," Don insisted. He looked around for something to offer her.
"Please. I cannot accept anything," Mirai reiterated. "It is a matter of honor." With that, Mirai drew a portal. She and the others exchanged bows before she left.
After the portal closed, Leonardo put his face in his hands. "Usagi, could you please give us a moment?"
"What?" Don asked, defensively, after the rabbit closed the door behind him.
"That was an embarrassment, Donatello!" Leonardo barked. "She came all this way for you and you didn't show her an ounce of respect!"
"She came through a portal. It's not like she hiked over from the west coast," Don defended.
"Coming through a portal was far more than you were willing to do," Leonardo pointed out.
"I was looking out for the babies," Don snapped. "Besides, I take umbrage with the 'no respect' thing. I thanked her profusely!"
"And offered no payment!" Leonardo clapped back.
"I tried to pay, she wouldn't accept!" Don disagreed.
"You should've bought the darn tea. That was how you pay," Leonardo barked.
"For all I know it would've poisoned us," Don shouted.
"Who said you had to drink it?!" Leo returned. "You buy it, so that you can pay her for her time and trouble, then you throw it out, or maybe test it and see what's in it. Or, heaven forbid, you try it and maybe feel better!"
"I… I didn't think of that," Don conceded. "We can ask Usagi to buy some, then."
"It's not just about the tea, Donatello," Leonardo continued. "You acted like she was some sort of charlatan, not a respected professional!"
"I did not!" Don countered.
"Oh please." Leonardo threw his hands up and imitated Don's voice. "All I needed was a nap, then?"
Don cringed. "Okay. That… wasn't my finest moment, but in my defense, she didn't know anything about reptiles. That whole thing with my skin. Plus, she made fun of my size."
"She did not! She made a simple, clinical observation," Leonardo insisted. "If anything, she was being sympathetic, and you just cut her down with your smart mouth. You've got to stop being so darn sensitive."
"If it was a clinical observation, it was just about the only one she offered," Don retorted. "She didn't offer me anything useful at all."
Leonardo shook his head. "She might have if you hadn't fought her tooth and nail the whole time."
"That's an exaggeration," Don argued. "I let her poke and prod me for an hour in the hopes that she would give me something useful. It never came."
"Did it occur to you," Leonardo voiced, obviously frustrated, "that she was developing a baseline? She admitted she'd never had a reptilian patient. And, those remedies might have been useful."
"I don't want them!" Donatello practically roared. "Why do you keep trying to force this on me?!"
Leonardo opened his mouth, then closed it. He put both hands in the air. "You know what? This is no good for either of us. I'm embarrassed. You're mad. I'm mad. Why don't we just… cool off? I'm going to go apologize to Usagi. See what we need to do to make this right."
Don wrinkled his brow. It seemed to him that Leonardo was blowing this way out of proportion. He hadn't behaved that badly. Had he? Either way, Leo was right that further arguing would only make things worse.