Author's Note: Mild April/Donnie fluff in this chapter. Really I'd say it is more of a love story between Donnie and science :0)

In regards to a few comments: Enula mentioned music in a review a few chapters back and I thought it might be nice to share the songs I have been writing to (obsessively and on repeat) Distance, by: Christina Perri, ft. Jason Mraz has to be one of my favorites. Tee Shirt By: Birdy is also in heavy rotation. Along with Human By: Christina Perri. There are a few others, but those have taken over especially in the later chapters.

Servantofclio: You must be reading my mind because the next chapter will actually take place from Raphael's POV. I'm a little nervous about it, but I hope everyone enjoys it.


Chapter Eleven

"All right, so I start from this side, right?" Mikey asks and the tremble to his voice and worse his hand fills me with dread.

"Yes, that's right," I say, trying my best to sound supportive and not terrified that my brother is going to maim me. "Start about a quarter of an inch from the cut, no that's more like a whole inch. Here, start here," I instruct, pointing. "Don't go too deep," I say with a little more worry behind the words than I intended.

He holds the needle and thread up and takes a step back. "I can't do this," he says, shaking his head. "I'm going to mess it up."

"No, no you'll do fine," I say quickly. "It's only a couple stitches. Just start here where I showed you, don't go too deep and don't pull the skin too tight."

"He's going to stab through your finger," Casey says from his seat at my computer desk

His feet are propped up on the desk and he's chowing down on a bag of cheesy popcorn like he's watching a movie. I shoot him a glare and try to smooth over his less than helpful commentary.

"No, he won't. He'll do just fine," I insist.

I don't want to move my hand off the surgical towel I laid down for fear of contaminating the wound I just spent my time irrigating. I would sew it up myself if I could. I tried, but couldn't get a good enough grip on the small needle with my left hand. Normally I'm the one stitching up my brothers. I've done it enough times where the sight of needles going into skin doesn't bother me anymore. It bothers Michelangelo. He's going to have to get over it. I need him to do this. There is no way I'm asking Casey for help.

"Come on, Mikey. I can't do it myself," I admit.

He takes a deep breath and squares his shoulders. It's his determined look and it is far more comforting than his uncertain one. "All right, I'll do it," he says, pointing the needle at me. "But if I mess up you can't get mad at me."

"Deal."

He takes a few more calming breathes before sliding the needle into my skin. I try very hard not to wince. It can't be helped. The wound already throbs up towards my wrist and the added insult of jabbing a needle through the skin around it isn't doing me any favors. I try to hide the wince behind encouraging words and further instruction. Mikey takes his time. He winces along with me every time he pushes the needle through my skin and lets out a long-held breath when he reaches the end and carefully ties off the thread.

"Th-there, see, nothing to it," I say, motioning with my head towards the tube beside my hand on the towel. "Put some of that on the cut and wrap it," I add, letting out my own held breath.

He sets the needle down and carefully puts some of the antibiotic ointment over his work before tying it off with a clean bandage. He really did do a good job, especially for his first time. I'm sure he would be more inclined to believe me when I tell him so if I wasn't still grimacing every time I move the digit. The throbbing pain will go away soon. As it is I don't have time for it. I have work to do. Mikey starts to clean up the medical supplies as I lift the box of Kraang devices up onto the table top. The box is mushy with rainwater and heavy with the unpleasant aroma of wet cardboard. I start to reach into the box and think better of it.

Gloves, put on gloves.

I walk over to my computer desk and push Casey's legs off the top so I can gain access to the drawer. He gives an annoyed grunt and spills some of his popcorn. I take out a pair of leather gloves and further push him aside to open the bottom drawer to fetch the mutagen tracker. Casey makes a big show of backing away from the desk to give me room and wipes off his cheese-covered fingers on the fronts of his jeans.

"Cue the boring science stuff, think it's my time to exit," Casey says.

He shakes the remaining popcorn into his mouth before crumpling up the bag and tossing it in the trash. Part of me thinks he might be disappointed that Mikey didn't puncture my thumb. He cracks his neck and reaches back to pull his mask up to rest atop his head.

"I'll see if Raph and Leo need any help," he adds, picking up his weapons bag from the floor.

I'm not sad to see him go. Even with his supposed acceptance of April and I, the mood has been nothing but uncomfortable since entering the lair. I give a slight nod to acknowledge that I heard him, there's no real need to be outwardly rude after all and Mikey waves and shouts out a goodbye. He'll stay in the lab with me. Usually that is a recipe for slowing down my progress, but I don't particularly mind the company right now. Casey clomps out of the lab and I turn my attention to my work.

"Heya, Red."

His voice travels from the other room and I instinctively curl my hand into a fist at the sound of the nickname he calls April. I'm not thinking and the movement sends a fresh sting of pain shooting up from my newly-stitched thumb. I can't make out her quiet response even as I strain my ears in an attempt to overhear.

April? April is here? You didn't text her. He must have.

My eyes go wide and I stumble around the desk, nearly tripping on my own feet. She's at the door before I can reach it. She's wearing a polka dotted rain coat and black Wellington boots. The tendrils of red hair that sneak out around the coat's hood are wet with rain and I resist the urge to gently wipe them from her face. She smiles when she sees me and I forget. I forget about the constant throb of pain from my thumb. I forget that I'm supposed to be working. All that matters, the only thing that grabs my attention is that smile.

She's happy to see you.

"April," I say in place of a more eloquent greeting. I hope my own smile says what my words don't.

"Hey," she replies, pushing back the hood of her coat. "Mikey said you might need help with some new Kraang tech."

Mikey?

His hand clamps down on my shoulder and I turn slowly to look at him, not entirely surprised that he's grinning back at me. "Yeah, yeah I sure did," he says, nodding at me as though he's urging me to agree. "You could really use the help. Right, D?"

"Umm, yeah," I murmur, still in shock or awe that my brother took the time to invite her over.

He lets go and slaps me on the back of the shoulder, causing me to pitch forward slightly. "I'm gonna get something to drink," he says, pointing at April. "You want something?"

"Uh, tea would be great, thanks," she says with a smile before hanging up her coat to dry.

"Tea, got it," he says with a snap of his fingers and a less-than stealthy wink in my direction.

April waits until he's left the lab before speaking. "I think we've been set up."

I can't tell if it's a blush that crosses her face or if it's just her skin letting go of the chill from outside. Either way the tint makes the freckles across her nose stand out and makes my mind wander. I want to rush over and take her in my arms, but I stay rooted to my place beside the computer desk.

"He feels bad about interrupting our…movie," I explain, clearing my throat around the last word.

The color darkening my own face is most obviously a blush. I reach up to take hold of the strap across my chest and stop short of closing my fingers around it when I catch sight of the worried expression on her face.

"What did you do to your hand?" she asks.

She's beside me and cradling my hand in her own before I can even register that she's moved. She turns it over with a grimace and it wouldn't surprise me if she is attempting to see through the white gauze wrapped around the cut.

"It's just a cut," I assure her, adding in a smile for good measure. "All stitched up, nothing to worry about."

She purses her lips halfway to a frown and I know she isn't convinced. "Uh huh," she says.

She lifts my hand and rests the lightest of kisses against the underside of my wrist. It makes me shiver and I tilt her chin up to capture her lips with my own. I don't know when I became so bold. She leans into the kiss and doesn't pull away when I move my hands around her waist. Kissing April at her apartment was something like a dream. A reprieve from my life, where I could almost imagine we were just normal teenagers. In the cool light of my lab, with the rumble and smell of the lair ever present our differences somehow seemed heightened and the experience more real. This is my domain. This is where I feel most at home and it's where April is kissing me.

"So, Kraang tech?" she says, pulling back slightly with panting breaths and heavy lidded eyes.

You have a job to do, focus. The sooner you figure it out the sooner you can get back to kissing.

I clear my throat and swallow with a nod. "Uh, yeah, right, of course," I say. "I think it's a device to dispense mutagen."

She puts her hands on my upper plastron to lightly push away and I try not to let my mind wander to the last time she put her hands there. "Sounds like we have some work to do," she says with a wistful smile.

She said we.

"Let's find you some gloves," I say, feeling cold when she pulls away entirely.

"I'm immune to mutagen, remember?" she says, perching on the edge of the computer desk while I search through the drawers for a pair of gloves I haven't modified for my own use.

"Not immune to sharp edges though," I reply with a wiggle of my bandage covered hand.

The small movement causes a sharp pain to travel up through my wrist and I try to cover it with a cough. I'm sure she doesn't buy it. She doesn't push the subject and we get to work. The last couple years have been a new experience for me. My lab, my work has always been a place for solitude. Sure Mikey occasionally joined me, but it was more for company than any true assistance. With April it is different. She not only wants to help, she's competent and capable of doing so. It only makes me like her more.

We don't talk much while we work. We don't have to. I appreciate that; the comfortable silence that only exists between people who trust one another. My brothers tend to fill every available space with noise. It isn't that way with April and the quiet lets me think, it lets me work. It lets us work. Mikey took his time getting drinks. I'm sure he thought he was doing me a favor and after returning he sits off to the side in very Un-Mikey-like silence. He lets us work.

Even after meticulous calibrations the mutagen tracker seems unwilling to detect the small amount of mutagen in each device. It buzzes and whirs anywhere near the box, but refuses to so much as blip when it is just a single container. I try to change my course of action. If I can't detect the mutagen inside the devices perhaps I can find a way to control the containers themselves. Despite April's insistence that it isn't necessary I keep the containers under glass while I work. I'm not going to risk spraying mutagen all over myself or the lab. The dispenser's trigger is easy enough to deduce. The notch in the side sets the mechanics into motion, whirring and trembling for 2.45 seconds before spraying mutagen in a four foot radius.

"There isn't an electronic power source," I murmur, after setting off the fifth device in a row. "It's a fixed cycle. You press the start here and it sets off a reaction that turns the gears and uncoils the spring to open the reservoir."

I sit back in my chair with a frown. "It's…it's not very Kraang like," I admit. "It's so…rudimentary. Only the metals are alien."

"Well, you could track electronics, right?" Mikey says, taking a loud, slurping sip of his hot chocolate. "Maybe they're trying to make something that can't be tracked."

April and I slowly turn to him in unison. "That's…I think you're right, Mikey," I say and he grins in response.

"Well, if we can't track them how are we supposed to destroy them?" April asks with a huff and pout.

"Too bad you can't just blow them up," Mikey says with another slurp of his drink.

You can always blow something up. It's easier to tear down then to fix it. What blows up Kraang stuff?

I drum the fingers of my uninjured hand on the desk and tap my foot in time. There's an answer here, there's always an answer. I just have to find it. I press my forehead against the glass and stare at the empty container and puddle of mutagen inside.

Be still.

I close my eyes and take in a steadying breath. I try to ignore the persistent pain in my hand and the knowledge that April is sitting close enough to touch. I can do this, this is what I do.

Breath, calm, be still. What explodes Kraang stuff?

I live for the moment of discovery, for the breakthrough. When all of my hard work and struggle come together in a glorious heartbeat of understanding. It doesn't always happen. Most science experiments end in failure. So when it does occur I cling to it with manic delight and try to make it last as long as possible. It sets my hands shaking and my heart pounding in my chest. I push away from the desk and carefully remove one of the containers from the box. I slip it into the glass case before dropping into my chair and sliding over to my computer.

"Sound," I say in place of an actual explanation when I catch sight of both of them staring at me. "Mikey, when we were in Dimension X you used sound to control some of the environment."

"Yeah, but D. That place was upside down, crazy land. Yelling at the Kraang here doesn't do squat," he says, dipping his fingers into his drink in an ill-fated attempt to snag one of the disintegrating marshmallows.

"We're not going to yell," I reply, typing with wanton abandon. "The chemical makeup of these devices is entirely alien. It might not react as violently to sound as it would in Dimension X, but all we need is a fraction of that response to destroy the mechanism. I just have to find the right resonant frequency. The mechanics are so rudimentary and the coil is wound tight enough even a slight push should be enough to snap open the reservoir."

"And disperse the mutagen before it even reaches the population," April finishes.

"Exactly," I say with a grin. "We've used sound against Tiger Claw before. I should be able to change the sound cannon to a new frequency."

The trial and error takes longer than I would like and results in more than a few headaches and one stubbornly closed mutagen dispenser. I can sense the others getting frustrated. Mikey rolls his now-empty mug around on the floor beside him and April is resting her head atop her folded arms. I'm not so quick to give up or give in. Rome wasn't built in a day and scientific breakthroughs don't happen in minutes. If this was easy everyone would do it. I dial back the resonant frequency another decimal, marking the change on my growing chart of failures. I point the sound cannon at the glass box and try to sound optimistic.

"All right, here we go," I say, pressing down on the release button.

At first I think it is another failure. The frequency is too low for my own ears to detect so I can't be certain if the sound is even emanating. I sigh and turn towards the computer to mark the next frequency. A pop and hiss like the release of a soda can tab sounds louder than a gunshot and when I whirl around to stare at the glass case the inside is covered in a fine, green mist of mutagen.

Eureka!

"It worked," I breathe, completely aware that I sound as though I doubt it.

April lifts her head and Mikey lets the mug roll out of his reach.

"It worked," I say again.

I turn off the cannon and bolt over to the box, carefully placing another device into the glass case. I have to make sure it isn't a fluke. One success doesn't mean the experiment is over. It could have been a mistake, there are variables to consider. I close the case and position the cannon. I press the button and stare, unblinking at the metal square at the center. Two horribly, long seconds pass until there's a pop and hiss and mutagen oozes out of the now open reservoir.

"Ha!" I shout, pointing at no one in particular. "I am awesome!"

I'm not exactly at my most humble in the moment of discovery. I'm sure my boasting isn't attractive or entirely called for. I don't particularly care. I live for this. This is what I'm here for. This is what I do and no one can take that away from me.