A little bit of a shorter chapter. But it had to be done. =)
Thank you to rinpup14 and forgotten forever for your awesome reviews!
Chapter 34
Donatello looked at Leonardo. "How do you feel Leo?" He asked as he sat at the kitchen table eating some lunch. All of his brothers were sitting around the kitchen table. Casey and April were still sleeping as was Katherine. They had decided to let her sleep, they had needed to talk anyway.
Leonardo closed his eyes and lowered his head. "Truthfully Donny?" He asked quietly.
Donatello looked at him in confusion. "Yes truthfully."
His bother opened his eyes and looked at him. "Why does it always have to be her?" He whispered."Why is she the one always making things right? Why is she always saving us? I should have been the one who protected her, and instead I was used to nearly..." Leonardo stopped his voice choking on his words.
"Leo, that wasn't your fault." Raphael growled.
Leonardo sighed. "I know that Raph, that's not the point. Instead of trying to fix things, instead of trying to make things right, make sure she was okay, all I could think about was my own horror, my own misery at what I had almost done. I tried to think of ways that I could atone for my betrayal, and not once did I think about what she would want, what she would need. My only though was of what my code of honour demanded." He said wretchedly. "Then she...she comes to me, she helps me, saves me. She made things right, not me." Leonardo looked at him desperately. "Why? Why didn't she hate me, why wasn't she scared of me, why was it her who had to make things right?"
Donatello looked at his desperate brother. "Leo, Katherine...doesn't think like you do." He said softly. "She views the world differently than I think any of us could even comprehend, especially now. Her thinking is very logical. She knows it wasn't you and it wasn't your fault, therefore she assigns no blame to you. She probably more blames herself for putting you in the position of being able to be possessed in the first place. I can't pretend to understand how Katherine's mind works, but from what I have seen she protects us all, even if it is from ourselves. She knew she had to make things right, because she was the only one who could make things right. Even though you were just as much a victim as her, you don't see yourself as the victim, but the perpetrator. She knows you would think this way Leo, she knew she would have to fix it, but first she had to keep us safe."
"But why does she have to always fix everything?" Leonardo said miserably.
"Because Katherine loves us enough to know how to fix it." Michelangelo said softly.
"So if I love her so much, how was it that I couldn't even begin to think how to fix it?" Leonardo asked Michelangelo.
"Because you couldn't fix it Leo. Don't you get that? In the state you were in, you couldn't fix it. Katherine does what needs to be done, no matter the cost." Michelangelo said softly looking at the can of pop sitting between his hands.
"But how can I love someone who won't let me protect her?" Leonardo said desperately.
Michelangelo looked at his brother seriously. "Because you didn't need someone who you needed to protect Leo. You always protect us, watch over us, guide us and comfort us. You needed someone who could protect you, watch over you, guide and comfort you."
Leonardo looked at him in stunned silence. Michelangelo looked at his stunned brother and gave a small smile. "Think about it Leo, I mean really think about it. You probably thought your perfect mate would be a woman who would be a delicate flower who always needed to be protected. A woman who needed your constant attention; a woman who listened to every word you said and who would never challenge you on whether it was right or wrong; a woman who bowed to your authority. That was your image of your dream woman wasn't it? That was why it took you so long to finally admit you loved her, because she was everything you didn't want. She can't fight, but she's brave enough to try. She is so low maintenance it is almost unwomanly. She doesn't need a constant barrage of compliments or attention to make her happy. She challenges almost everything you do. She tips your world on its side and you hate it because you always want your world to be perfect and orderly, but she won't let you, and there is part of you who stands in awe of that."
Leonardo closed his eyes and put his head down on the table. "When'd you get so smart Mikey?" Leonardo grumbled into the wood of the tabletop.
"I'm not smart Leo, but I'm your brother, I get how you think." Michelangelo said with a shrug. "She is to us what we need her to be. Raph needed someone who wasn't afraid of him, who would stand up to him, but not constantly be trying to change who he was. She taught him how to control his temper without him even knowing it. By making him realize that he could control it, he was finally able to. Everyone always yelled at Raph to control his temper, and gave him hell because he couldn't, Kitten never did. She practically ignored his tempers and chatted at him as if he wasn't in a blinding rage, which confused the hell out of him, which made him control his own temper because she would say things that would get through the rage. Now Raph still gets mad as easily, but he can control it."
Raphael's mouth hung open in shock.
"Donny needed someone who could bring him out of his shell. Donny's the most isolated of all of us. He's so damn smart he has a problem relating to any of us. The only one he could have a half decent conversation with was April. But Donny needed to realize that there are different kinds of smart. Kitten's smart, but not science and technology smart, not genius smart, but smart none the less. She pulled Donny out of his shell because he wanted to hear what she had to say. And when he talked, she listened. If she didn't understand, she would get him to explain it. We just wanted the results, we never cared how Donny managed to get there, she did." Michelangelo said to Donatello who was looking stunned.
"And what about you Mikey?" Leonardo asked softly. Michelangelo smiled softly. "I never really needed anything. I was happy just the way things were. I laughed, I joked, had my bro's as my best friends, played video games, saved the world, I was good."
"So why do you love her Mikey, if you never needed her to be anything to you?" Leonardo asked.
"I was happy Leo, thing was, I needed someone to see me for who I really was, and she saw right through me the moment she opened her eyes." He said softly.
"What do you mean Mikey?" Raph questioned in confusion.
Michelangelo gave a half smile. "Ask Kitten. Ask her why I am who I am, why I act like I do." He shrugged.
"So if she is everything we need her to be, are we everything she needs us to be?" Leonardo asked Michelangelo. "Is that why she can't choose between us? Is it because just one of us alone can't be everything she needs us to be?"
Michelangelo shrugged. "I don't know Leo."
"But if one of us can't be what she needs us to be, why doesn't she just find someone who is everything that she needs them to be?" He asked desperately.
Michelangelo laughed. "Leo, no one person can be everything you need. That is why you have friends and family, to fill in the pieces that are missing. With Katherine though...you can't choose who to love, you can't just tell your heart to start loving someone, or even stop loving someone. Maybe there is something going on that we can't even begin to understand." He said as he shrugged. "But what I really want to know is, how did Kitten fix it Leo?" Michelangelo asked lifting an eye ridge at him.
His brothers all turned their attention back to him. Red flooded Leonardo's face as his startled eyes met Michelangelo's.
Raphael's eyes narrowed. "You didn't touch her, did you Leo?" He growled.
"She..."Leonardo stopped his face paling slightly. He turned his face away. "She is badly bruised." He whispered.
Raphael closed his eyes in comprehension. "I'm an ass. Sorry Leo."
"No Raph, you didn't know." Leonardo said softly.
"No, but I should have guessed. How badly was she...?" He asked.
Leonardo shrugged. "Badly enough. Donny was right though, she blamed herself, she never blamed me for a moment. She knew it wasn't me. As soon as she entered the room, she knew it wasn't me. Knowing that she knew almost the instant the angel completely took me over, it was like a balm on my very soul." He said softly. He quirked a humourless smile. "She knew exactly what I was planning." He said softly.
"What were you planning Leo?" Raphael growled.
"The only thing my honour would let me do. I felt as if I had betrayed her Raph, betrayed all of you. There was only one way I could atone for my betrayal." He looked at his brother in the eye.
"You're an idiot." Raphael roared. "How could you think that by killing yourself you could have made this right?" He yelled.
"Because I couldn't look any of you in the eye, couldn't even think of looking her in the eye again." He said miserably.
"How do you think we would have felt if we would have found you dead? Did you ever think about that?" Raphael shouted.
"There was a dagger on the nightable." He said softly.
Raphael paled. "What do you mean there was a dagger on the nightable? We made sure there wasn't anything sharp and pointy within reach, just in case you decided to do something stupid!"
"When I opened my eyes, there, glinting in the moonlight like a soft invitation, was a wooden handled dagger. I thought that one of you had left it for me, known what I had intended and left me the ability to assuage my honour." Leonardo said softly.
"We would never do anything like that Leo, ever, you hear me!" Raphael yelled. Leonardo looked at Raphael, fear rolling around in his honey brown eyes.
Leonardo smiled humourlessly. "But it was Katherine who had placed the dagger there."
"Katherine would never..." Raphael began in her defence.
Leonardo ignored his brother's outburst. "But she did, and then she says to me that, 'Only I would see a dagger sitting on my nightstand and believe it was meant for me to use upon myself'. So she walked over and picked up the dagger and looked at me as if expecting something from me, but I don't know what she wants, I don't know what she wants me to do." He said wretchedly. "She looked at me with those eyes of hers, those eyes that strip away everything, every defence, every lie you tell yourself, and all you are left with, is your soul laid bare for her to see. Then she looked at the dagger and there is this look in her eyes as if the dagger is important, that it is something to her, that she is expecting something from it. And she looked at me again and I strip the shirt from my body. I tell her how to kill me. I request only that she strike hard and true and to make my death, at her hands, as quick and painless as she can." He whispered to his shocked brothers. "She then tells me in a voice filled with nothingness, that 'she knows how to kill me. That there are so many other more effective ways to kill me than trying for my heart.' I just nodded, looking away from her as she puts the cold steel of the blade against my skin."
"Katherine. I can't believe she would want your death Leo, she would never..." Raphael said, voice strained, face pale.
He looked at his brother bleakly. "She removed the blade and asked me why I thought the blade was for me." He looked at his pale, horror stricken brothers. "I opened my eyes to see the blade resting over her heart, a single drop of blood trickling down her pale skin. I managed to stop her before she plunged the knife into her heart, and it was almost the most terrifying moment of my life."
"To think I didn't think Kitten went in for the dramatic." Michelangelo said with a shake of his head.
"Do you know what the most terrifying moment of my life was Mikey?" He asked with barely contained emotion in his voice. "When I realized she would have done it. If I had not knocked the blade from her hand she would have killed herself, and I have never been more horrified. I thought the same thing as you Mikey." He said to his silent brothers. "I thought she was making a point. Showing me that she would feel my loss as greatly as I would feel hers. But later I asked if she would have done it, and looking in her eyes, she would have, but I don't know why, why would she have killed herself?" He whispered miserably.
"Because," Donatello began. "Without her, no demons or angels would be looking for her anymore, we would be out of danger. She would have protected us." Donatello finished with grim realization.
"Leo she's not...you don't think she'd..." Raphael said rising quickly to his feet.
"No, because she gave Leo the choice." Donatello said to his brothers. "That is what she wanted from you. She wanted to know if you were willing to risk everyone to try to keep her alive, because if you weren't, she was just going to end it."
Raphael looked at Donatello and strode from the room. He returned a few minutes later to inform them that she was still sleeping soundly.
Michelangelo turned his attention back to Leonardo. "So how did she fix it Leo. She proved her point, but she did something, something that made you blush."
Leonardo flushed with embarrassment.
Raphael narrowed his eyes and sat down at the table, studying him intently.
"She wanted me to make it right." He said looking away from the question in his brothers' eyes.
"How did she want you to fix it?" Michelangelo asked curiously.
"She made me kiss all of her cuts and bruises better." He said softly.
"Wait, she made you do what?" Raphael asked in shock.
Leonardo shrugged. "She wanted me to kiss everything better."
"But, she was bruised..." Raphael said in shock, then his eyes narrowed. "So did you do more than just kiss things better Leo?" Raphael growled.
Leonardo stood up angrily. "What do you want me to tell you Raph? What do you want from me? You want a detailed description, you want a play by play? Do you want me to tell you how I tasted her and how I have never tasted anything so good. How she encouraged me to drive her over the brink and shouted out my name in ecstasy. You want me to tell you how she touched me, took me into her mouth and did things to me that sent me over the edge calling out her name into the night?" He asked furiously.
His brothers looked back at him in shock as he realized what he had said. He slumped into his chair and put his head down on the table. "I'm sorry. He whispered. "I didn't mean to say that. She said I had to replace our memories with better ones, but she only asked for me to kiss her better, I broke. I was the one who wanted to taste her, and the only thing that stopped me from going any further was that anything more would have been painful for her. I would have taken her, made love to her, and never even once thought about the fact that I wasn't supposed to."
He looked at his brothers desperately. "How can I share? How can I take her and be okay with knowing that she would also be with all of you? And yet after everything that happened, how can I deny her, how can I say no to her?"
"Leo, we already share her. We have already shared her." Michelangelo said to him.
Leonardo froze. "What do you mean Mikey?" He asked slowly.
"Well, it's obvious. You would still have been with her even after you knew she had been with Donny." Michelangelo said with a shrug. "I bet the thought never even crossed your mind, did it Leo?" He asked with a smirk. Leonardo looked at him, stunned. "She kisses all of us, sleeps with all of us, hold hands, laughs, and smiles, at all of us. She looks at you with eyes filled with so much love that it is painful to look at. Sometimes you wonder what you did to deserve someone who loves you as much as she does. She looks at all of us with those same eyes Leo. We already share her, you just have to open your eyes and accept it." Michelangelo said to him.
Awwwhhh little brotherly fluffyness. But that was the second last chapter. So next chapter, the conclusion to Morning Star Part 1!