Trust

Raphael tossed on the cot but kept his eyes firmly shut, wondering how long he had to fake being asleep before his father and Don would let him return to Jenna's bedside. He knew it was best if he did get some rest, but despite the fact Don was watching over Jenna, he didn't think that was gonna happen.

But he had to think about something other than her while he lay here or he was going to drive himself mad. So instead he thought about Shredder, and how he was going to kill him.

I shoulda' done it the first time.

But Raphael had been out of his mind with grief when Shredder was captured after Jenna's death. And killing him had been far too easy a punishment.

"He needs to suffer!" Raphael yelled, straddling the fallen Shredder. The monster was pinned to the gravel rooftop by Raph's sai. He pulled one free and plunged it into the bend of Shredder's inner elbow, twisting it when the evil man dared to howl and writhe underneath him.

"For years!" Raph shouted, drawing back his other sai to stab him again.

Blood already coated the building. Shredder's, the turtles', and numerous Foot Soldiers' had combined to paint the old warehouse with a sticky residue. Raphael himself was covered with it. The slippery surface made holding on to his captive a little more difficult, but now that he was pinned with a dagger he was at Raph's mercy.

He didn't have any left.

Before he could complete the motion, Leonardo grabbed Raph and yanked him off. Michelangelo darted forward and stepped on Shredder's arm to hold him flat but none of his brothers attempted to remove the weapon already piercing his flesh.

Not even Leo.

Nobody wanted to. Jenna had been beloved by them all. They did not pity the man who had slain her.

"I understand your pain," the leader said in a rough voice, holding Raph back, "but I'm not going to let you keep and torture him. We are not butchers. He has lost all honor. I'm not letting you throw away yours." He released Raphael and handed him a tanto. The short blade flashed in the moonlight.

"Kill him and be done with it."

"Honor?" Raphael snorted, "Why should I worry about d'at? It won't bring Jenna back!"

"Neither will getting your hands bloody every day!"

Behind them, Donatello cleared his throat and the argument died. In his hand was an object so slapdash looking it was almost cartoonish—like some god-awful cross between a ray gun and a blender. But they didn't dare mention it as it was currently pointed in their direction.

Without speaking, Don aimed to the left and fired. A beam of light shot forth and a weird triangle-shape opened up about waist-high off the ground. The portal wasn't normal. It was only a few feet wide at the base and behind it lay… nothing. The darkness beyond was blacker than the night.

"Donnie?" Leonardo asked, drawing out the name with caution.

"Yes, Leo?"

"What the hell is that?"

"Pocket dimension," he stated succinctly. "I've been thinking about this scenario for a while and this is the perfect solution."

Nothing should have pulled Raphael from his anger at this stage, but something about the crazed gleam in Don's eyes spoke to him. It lent him the strength to ground out actual words.

"Why? What does it do?"

Donatello shrugged.

"It stores things. Securely. One of the Neutrinos gave it to me years ago. Whatever you put inside is preserved precisely as it is until you take it out again. You can place any number of objects in it and they'll never go bad, never collide, and never interact."

"So what's in there?" Leonardo asked.

"Right now? Nothing," Don answered. "It's a scrap of null space between dimensions. And each one is unique. One gun, one entrance, one exit. It's the perfect prison. He won't need to breathe or eat. And no one has to spend resources to support him."

"We aren't trying to save ol'Shred-head for a rainy day," Michelangelo said.

"I know," Donnie agreed, "but you see, they warned me about what not to put in as well."

"Like what?"

"Mostly sentient beings."

"Why? Is it toxic?" Leo asked, eyeing the doorway.

"Nope," Don said and stuck his arm in. He pulled it back a second later and wiggled his fingers. "See? Perfectly safe."

"I don't get it," Mikey complained. "If it doesn't hurt, why the restriction?"

"Ah, therein lies the beauty. You see the suspension is only on the physical form… it doesn't affect the mind. So it's like being in a sensory deprivation tank. Once the door is closed, there is no light. No sound. One can't see, or hear, or move."

"Donnie, that's terrible," Leo objected in horror.

"Why?" Mikey asked again, still not understanding.

Donatello shrugged again. "The brain is still receiving signals, it just can't do anything with them. So if say, someone who was injured and bleeding out"—he gestured to the Shredder's broken form— "was placed in such suspended animation, he would feel exactly the same amount of pain he does now until he's transported back into a real dimension."

"So he'll suffer all the time?" Raph said.

"Yes. He'll neither heal nor die."

Raphael grabbed the sagging body and shoved it through the hole without a second thought. Don pulled the trigger again and the portal closed. He put the gun in his ever-present duffle bag.

"Raph, this is insane," Leo hissed. "How long are you going to leave him?"

"Dunno. Don't care."

"You're basically torturing him!"

"That's the idea."

"You're better than this," Leo pleaded.

"No," Raph said. "She was better than this. I'm not."

Leonardo sighed. There was no use trying to convince the brother so set on vengeance. "Donnie, open that thing back up," he commanded.

"Oops."

The sound of glass breaking and metal bending made Leo swing his head around. Don had reached back into the bag and pulled out a handful of parts.

"Sorry, Leo. No can do. Looks like I broke it."

Looking back on it, Raphael shuddered. He didn't regret dealing such punishment to the Shredder. But he realized now how devastated the rest of his family had been as well. For Don to have come up with that… plan, well it put him mere steps away from becoming some sort of mad scientist. Raph didn't like the idea at all.

In the intervening years, though, the genius had said nothing about it. Nor had he ever proposed such a sinister plot again. Still… It was a good thing he was getting to spend some time with Jenna, even if she was unconscious. It had been cathartic for Raph. He hoped it helped soothe his brother as well.

He rolled over, sighed, and tried once again to find the oblivion of sleep.

Jenna smiled at the large turtle hovering next to her bedside and shyly dropped her eyes to examine their linked hands resting on the quilt. Donatello fascinated her. He was undoubtedly strong, yet he held her hand delicately, almost tenderly.

The coloring of his skin wasn't solid, but layered colors of green mottled with a darker brown brushed over the knuckles. Scales of various sizes gave him a unique, and rather tempting, texture. Unbidden, her other hand rose to trace over it. Her fingertips followed the thick muscles and ropey tendons that wound around the appendage, skimming his leather arm guards and picking up the trail again on his forearm.

His breath hitched at the caress and she glanced up, her face flushing, as she read his expression.

"Sorry," she apologized, yanking the stroking hand away. "I should have asked before I…"

Her voice trailed off and she gestured to him, unable to finish the thought. She had always been a little too curious. And it seemed rude to insinuate one's companions might not be real, which is what she would be doing if she told him about the visions she couldn't touch.

Donatello shook his head at her, smiling gently and giving the hand he still held a little squeeze with his own. "I don't mind. I just… forgot what it felt like."

Does nobody else interact with him?

Her eyes widened at the thought and sadness enveloped her. Tactile support was vital to sentient beings. She herself could rarely get enough, at least of the good kind. Her stepfather was far too experienced at applying the painful variety.

Nope! Not going there. Time to change the subject.

"Dee. That's… uh, short," she said, then she cringed at the awkwardness, both of the statement and his preferred name. The word didn't sit quite right on her tongue. As if she once called him something similar, but slightly different.

"Do you all go by your initials? Your brother signed my locket 'R'."

This time he laughed and the rich baritone sound warmed her insides. She felt good around this turtle. Though he was a powerful male, she was safe with him. The violet of his bandanna matched the hue of some of her recent memory flashes, and the soul behind his deep brown eyes was so very familiar.

"No. The guys call me Donnie, or Don. Donatello is sort of reserved for formal situations, or… when I'm in trouble."

"Are you often?" she asked with a grin.

The smile made her wince a little. The pain of her cheek throbbed up into her eye socket and started her head pounding again. But she wasn't about to cut this conversation short. Not when she was finally getting some information without all the drama.

"Not usually. I'm the brains of the group. Trouble is Mikey's talent. He's a prankster who never grew up. Though sometimes Raph also causes… predicaments. Like tonight. He doesn't tend to look before he leaps."

Raph. Her mysterious 'R'. The turtle who claimed to love her. Somehow even the shortened version of his name was hard to keep in her mind. It slipped away from her grasping mental fingers, elusive as a minnow in a stream. She grimaced, releasing Dee's hand to massage both her temples.

What is the matter with me?

Generally, it wasn't present events that were all muddled.

"You can call the nurse if you need more medicine," he repeated with a frown. "Your charts read normal, but you took a major blow. I'm afraid it's going to hurt for a while."

She shook her head, cautiously so as not to stir the pounding up further. "I'd rather talk. I'm not sure what they're giving me, but it's messing with my already messed up mind. I'll bear with the pain."

"About that, I— we, are all worried about what you remember. And I know you just woke up, but we have a ton of questions…"

He trailed off at her sigh.

"It's okay," he reassured her, "They can wait."

"No, go ahead and ask. I don't know how much help I'll be though. I can only assume I encountered you guys sometime before my accident."

"True. You were fourteen when I met you."

Jenna's eyes widened and her heartbeat accelerated. Donatello's eyes flicked to the monitor showing her vitals, noting the response. She flushed, but this was the first time anyone besides her parents had spoken of her childhood. And Donatello felt far more trustworthy. Her folks only ever brought up the bad things.

"It was on a rooftop, in the rain, in lower Manhattan. It was quite the thunderstorm actually."

"You were injured." He leaned closer, raised a finger, and stroked a shiny three-inch scar above her left eyebrow. This time it was her whose breath caught. She'd always wondered about the mark because her stepfather never hit her where it would show.

"Raphael found you first. You were unconscious, so he called the rest of us. He thought you'd been struck by lightning."

She flinched and he drew his hand back, much the way she had earlier, with a quick 'Sorry.' But it wasn't his touch or the story that bothered her. It was the name. Every time Dee spoke of his brother, sharp pain stabbed behind her eyes.

"I patched you up. I gave you eight stitches. Is any of this ringing a bell?"

Donatello scrutinized Jenna's face as she shook her head. There was so much agony in her eyes his gut twisted. But with all her physical injuries he couldn't decipher what might be caused by his words. Or his actions.

Touching her was too familiar. I shouldn't have done it. Not when she doesn't remember us. Me.

Jenna was his best friend. The only person he thought truly understood and accepted him besides his father. She helped him find his place in the family and a purpose in life. She cheered him on in every endeavor. Most of his strongest inventions had been created with her help.

No one else had ever touched and supported him; mentally, emotionally, and physically, the way she did. Like she had a few minutes ago. He ached to have her back.

But she was regarding him with a skepticism that wasn't present before.

"What is it?" he asked, horrified when a tear formed and rolled down her cheek. "What did I say wrong?"

"It can't be me," she choked, her voice breaking. "I'm not, I can't be, the girl you knew."

"You are."

He ran through a summary of their conversation again in his head but didn't find anything questionable in it. It was all facts. What had she latched onto that made her so upset?

It didn't matter, he decided. He had to reassure her irrefutably. Right now, when she was scared and confused, she probably wanted more than facts. She needed an emotional connection.

"We weren't merely friends, Jenna. You spent almost two years visiting us every day in the lair. You practically lived in my lab, helping me invent things from utter junk. Items that made it easier for the family, our family, to live.

"You and Mikey played games together for hours. He taught you to ride a skateboard. You showed him how to cook something besides leftover pizza.

"Leo confided in you. You were the only one he could talk to when worry was eating him alive. He loved you like a little sister and protected you just as fiercely.

"And you fell in love with Raph. You told me so. He loves you too. Those feelings are solid. Unshakeable. It's been ten years and he hasn't given up on you."

"You don't understand," Jenna wailed. "I want this, Dee. I do. I want him to love me. I want this family you're describing, more than anything in the world. I feel like I know him. I trust him. I trust YOU. But it's a mistake. I can't cheat you, or him when you've held on for this long. I am not the girl you've been waiting for."

"How can you say that? You have the locket he made for your birthday. And you have this!" He turned her left wrist in his hand and exposed the tattoo. "This is all of us, right here. Raph, me, Mikey, Leo. You even mentioned our colors, when you told the nurse, remember?"

"And 'faith'?" she asked.

"That's what you brought to us all."

Still, she cried as she drew back from his hold. "It can't be me."

"Why not?" he begged. "Jenna, talk to me. Let me help you figure this out."

"Because up until I moved a year ago, I'd never been to New York City. So you can't have met me in Manhattan. And I can't have ever visited you, let alone every day."

"What if you did live here at some point?" he protested. "You said you can't remember much from that time in your life."

She laughed a little hysterically, and Don drew nearer, placing a nervous hand on her bed but not touching her. He didn't want to cause another panic attack. He was only discussing this because she wanted the information.

"It's impossible," she said.

"Nothing is impossible, simply numerically improbable."

As you have proven to me, oh so many times…

"Dee, I lived in rural Illinois my entire life, in an old farmhouse. I went to high school there. There are photos, yearbooks, and the rest of my hellish family still residing there to prove it. They're all backcountry folk and proud of it. The only one who ever came and went to places like New York was my stepfather.

"He didn't think enough of me to take me along. I was his little disappointment. The one he took his venom out on every single night. He did bed checks and when I wasn't in by curfew, well, I'm assuming if you heard the nurse, you know what he did."

"I've seen the scars," Donatello growled, "And believe me, if any of us had known what you were dealing with it would have ended in a heartbeat."

"What? How?"

Donnie shrugged. "Raph would have killed him."

She stared at him in shock, her tears forgotten.

"Killed… ?"

"Without hesitation or a second thought. And if he hadn't been able to for some reason, the rest of us would have been standing in line for the privilege. Even Michelangelo. And he's the nice one."

"In Illinois?" she protested.

Don shrugged again. "We live here, but we get around. It wouldn't matter if he hid on the moon. Raph would still find him. He still will, most likely. Once he gets settled back in with you. He tends to hold grudges."

He reached out to her again, unable to restrain himself at the sight of her red-rimmed eyes, and cupped her cheek in his palm. He locked her into his gaze.

"I don't know how to reconcile what you remember of the past with my version—yet. And I admit, when Raph first saw you again the other night in his room, I was suspicious. But I am certain now who you are.

"You are our Jenna. You said you trust me. So trust in that. The rest we will figure out together."