Chapter Text
"I didn’t mean to freak him out I swear!”
Scarlet's frantic voice completely shattered the silence that had descended upon the room.
After seeing how freaked out C was, the new Raphael had just up an hauled the guy outside. Raph assumed they wouldn't have gone far, seeing as the new guy wouldn't know the layout of the place, but it was still concerning that C had been so panicked that this new guy thought the only solution was to bodily remove him from the room.
Chompy whimpered from on top of his head, before jumping down and scrambling over to his owner.
Moving stiffly, Scarlet scooped the little dog up and began mechanically stroking his fur.
This seemed to be enough to shatter the silence. Shards of conversation began flying every which way.
Though, the concerned voice of a typically flippant red-eared slider somehow managed to cut through the rabble.
“It's ok, Scarlet. Just take deep breaths.”
Wait, since when had Leon been friends with Scarlet? Raph didn't remember the duo ever really running in the same circles before, and he wasn't sure if the two had anything in common with each other.
(Besides the obvious mutant ninja turtle shtick that they all shared. And their petty rivalry with C, he guessed.)
Today, like so many of the days that had come before it, was turning out to be a right shit show.
It felt like thousands of weights had been strung across Raph's body, dangling from his limbs and forcing him to hunch over slightly.
One of the heaviest of these weights had been accompanied by Don's gaze flicking between Raph and the new guy.
It didn't take a genius to see the parallels between this new older Raphael variant, and the future variant of Raph himself that Don had tearfully described to them so long ago.
But calling Don out on it now would do more harm than good. Raph knew his twin more than he knew his own shell, and confronting Don here, even to offer comfort, would lead to Don closing off entirely.
Plus, there were too many other things to deal with immediately, and Don would feel even worse if attention was drawn to him when so many things were going to shit.
Later, when things quietened down, Raph would have to collar his genius brother to try and help him work through his feelings. Right now, Raph had to make sure that no Hotline wide incidents were sparked that would delay that chat even further.
He wanted to swipe his hand across his face to try and wipe away some of his exhaustion, but moving his arm that high sounded like it would be more trouble than it would be worth at that moment.
Although Raph would deny it if anyone dared to point it out, in a crisis like this, he always knew who he should turn to.
“How are we going to fix this Leo?” Raph whispered to his leader, to his only big brother, all whilst trying to drown out the flurry of arguments being whipped up behind him like red tinted snow.
“I think...” Whatever Leo was attempting to say was abruptly cut off by Donatello shouting.
“You can't just throw out a cheap apology and think we're going to forgive you just like that!”
“I’m not asking for you to forgive me!" I just... I've kinda made a promise to DD that I’ll try and look out for you from now on. Seeing as I’ve been fucking failing him spectacularly so far...”
At first Scarlet's response was just as loud as Donatello's yell had been, but it quietened down towards the end as his rage turned inwards.
A phenomenon that Raph was all too familiar with.
He understood better than most, (well, disregarding the rest of their counterparts, particularly Red), how hard it could be to restrain that first flare of anger. How much effort it took to reign it in afterwards, to not instinctively strike back after being hit with a blow whether it was well deserved or not.
Having the anger turn inwards sometimes helped, (other times it made things much worse), and the edge of self loathing in Scarlet's voice definitely indicated that Scarlet was keeping himself from lashing out further by reminding himself of how he had screwed things up.
“We don’t need looking after, we're perfectly fine!” Donatello hissed.
Sai was the next turtle to stupidly open his mouth.
“Dude, C just had a massive panic attack that's apparently not been his first. That doesn't exactly help sell the idea that you guys are as fine as you keep trying to make out! And that’s ok dudes, we're all a little fucked up here. We're not trying to treat you like kids, we're just trying to take what you've been through seriously, something that you've always complained that we don't do enough!”
Donatello audibly ground his teeth together, and Raph prayed that he wasn’t about to witness an all out brawl, or yet another concussed 90s variant.
“And who’s fault was it that C freaked out Sai, huh? Oh, that's right, this big jerk who has only now suddenly decided that we have feelings!”
Raph glanced back and spotted Donatello pointing aggressively at Scarlet, and he could only be grateful that it wasn't with his bo.
Scarlet may really be trying to make amends here, but a bo staff to the face would probably be enough to set that progress back right quick.
As it was, Scarlet's raised open hands rather than fists in response to Donatello suddenly getting all up close and personal.
Even as one of his counterparts, Raph couldn't tell if this was in self defense or an attempt at pacifying Donatello's rage.
Raph turned slightly so he could keep one eye on the argument and the other on Leo, who looked constipated, a look Raph associated with whenever Leo was trying to figure out whether it would be best for him to intervene in something or if it would be better to let things run their course.
“I know, I know, I’m an asshole. I just... I just want to make it right!” Scarlet declared.
“Oh, now you want to make it right after putting us through hell for so long! What big revelation changed your mind then, huh Scarlet?”
“I finally found DD's suicide note. Well, suicide tape, and that's where his last message said for me to look after you!"
Scarlet almost choked both times that he used the worst suicide, and Raph's heart ached as he watched tears begin beading at the corner of his smaller counterpart's eyes.
Even Donatello seemed to be taken aback by the regret and pain pouring out of Scarlet's voice. The purple turtle could be incredibly stubborn and prideful, but he wasn't a complete jackass. As one tear slipped lose and trailed down Scarlet's face, Raph witnessed Donatello softening his aggressive stance.
If Scarlet had left things there, there was a strong chance that they could have made it out of this without a knock down drag out brawl.
Sadly, Scarlet was really out of practice with his people skills, and continued spouting whatever thoughts were coming into his brain, regardless of how the temperamental turtle in purple had been finally thawing towards him.
"I can’t fail him again Donatello, I can’t! I just… I guess it took watching some of his videos and actually seeing all the good times that you used to have together and all that he wanted to say to you before the end for me to finally get it through my thick head that he was actually your friend and that he wasn’t just hanging around you guys to piss me off. And he cared about you so much that he wanted me to help you out, even, though I treated both you and him like crap, I..."
Cutting himself off with a loud sniff, Scarlet tilted his head and roughly swiped an arm over his eyes.
This meant that he missed how his words inpacted the others.
Raph didn't miss a thing.
The three present '87 turtles all looked as if they had been gut punched. Whether that was because of the new knowledge that Double Dee had left a note but none of them had known the guy well enough to actually find it, or the fact that one of their best friends who they had thought believed in them had decided they needed a babysitter, was anyone's guess.
“You're lying! DD knew better than anyone that we could look after ourselves.” Donatello hissed.
That seemingly answered that question. Donatello hated being treated like he was a kid and would hate it even more from someone who had previously treated him as an equal.
Raph had a sinking feeling that wasn't the full story though. Being coddled was likely not the only reason the genius was upset with the statement. After all, it probably hadn't helped that it was Scarlet of all turtles that had supposedly been tasked with looking after them.
Why would DD have thought that was a good idea? Unless Scarlet was lying about finding a note, or lying about the note's content, or…
Ok, Raph needed to stop this paranoid line of thinking before Red's 'Scarlet has come back to the Hotline to murder us and kidnap our Donatellos' conspiracy theory started to look like an actuality rather than delusion.
“I’m not lying, I swear that’s what he said! He just knew you’d take his death hard and he wanted me to make sure you guys were ok! Something I did a pretty piss poor job of. I'm guessing he didn't want me to, like, spoon feed or tuck you into bed or anything, more like just be a big brother or some shit. I don't know, I don't even know why he picked me for this job! I was a massive failure of a brother to him and he knows, fuck, knew, that I didn't like you guys!”
“Scarlet, shut up, you're making it worse.” Oh great, Night had decided to weigh in.
Raph was trying desperately not to fully turn away from Leo to look directly at the unfolding chaos.
Maybe if he just ignored it, it would all go away.
“Kick his ass Donatello.” Red jeered, his viciously excited voice coming from the corner where he was still presumably plastered to Dee's side.
Of course Red would chime in now just to make things worse. Why had Raph not seen that one coming?
“I just ... let me just expla…!” Scarlet stuttered.
He'd been doing a lot of that during this fight, and it was really out of character. Or, maybe it wasn't anymore. Raph hadn't seen the guy in a while, maybe this lack of confidence wasn't a new thing.
(It's not like anyone could blame him for it. If Raph had lost Don... well, shell, he didn't have to think about what he'd be like if he lost Don. After all, Don had told him himself. A missing eye had been the least of that guy's problems.)
“Haven’t you done enough!”
Raph honestly would have thought that it was Donatello who had yelled again, but he could see the little guy fairly well with how he was angled and his mouth had stayed closed. Unless Donatello had added ventriloquism to his already insane list of bizarrely specific talents, he hadn't been the one to call out.
Plus, Raph had recognised the voice, despite how much anger had warped it into something unfamiliar.
Begrudgingly, he turned around to give the unfolding drama his full attention.
There, standing with his fists clenched, was Leonardo. Squishy little Leonardo, who Raph didn’t think had ever been more than mildly irritated at anyone in the entire time he had known him, was squaring off against Scarlet. His two brothers had been pushed protectively behind him.
Looking back at this scene in the future, Raph would come to realise that he didn't really know the little guy at all. The kid had been pretty ticked off for a long time before he had reached the point of yelling at Scarlet. He had just been better than most at hiding it, especially when none of them had ever taken the time to really get to understand the guy before writing him off as being less of a serious leader than his counterparts.
(Except, maybe the other Leos would have known something about the anger brewing in their smallest counterpart. Despite everything, Raph had always considered the Leos to be a pretty close knit group, content to geek out over sci fi rather than squabbling about who was the better leader.)
“I...”
“No, you don’t get to play nice now! I won’t let you hurt my brothers anymore!”
Both Donatello and Michelangelo's eyes widened at Leonardo so boldly declaring them to be brothers, but Leonardo was clearly too distracted giving Scarlet a piece of his mind to notice.
“I don’t want to hurt them! I don't want to hurt anyone, I just want to make amends.”
Scarlet's voice cracked on that pleading sentiment.
Leonardo was unmoved.
“Well you can’t bucko! That ship has long since sailed and, if it hadn't, it would be on its way for sure after what you did after Double Dee’s death! You made your own brother feel inadequate before we ever met you! You made my brothers feel inadequate for no reason! You never once showed us any respect just because our way of being ninjas is different than yours! You've hated us from the minute we turned up in your dimension, all of you did and we just want to know why? What makes us so unlikeable that you all just hate us!"
If Raph though that Leonardo's explosive rant was bad enough, he was about to be proven sorely mistaken.
Breathing heavily through his nostrils, Leonardo's cold eyes surveyed the room.
Raph had never seen the guy so worked up. This was spiralling more than he could have ever anticipated.
How were things still going so wrong? Hadn't they had enough to deal with recently, why did it seem like a billion and one issues were being unearthed all at once?
Raph snapped back to attention when an alarmingly bitter snort escaped Leonardo's pursed lips.
"You know what you guys are all just, all just...”
“Assholes.” Donatello snarled, finishing his leader's sentence.
Clearly, even in this enraged state, Leonardo still couldn’t bring himself to swear. Raph thought the multiverse might actually collapse in on itself in shock if Leonardo of all turtles cursed.
(The fact that the little genius had recently gained the ability to swear at all should probably have been a massive red flag pointing towards what was lurking on the horizon, but everyone was too busy dealing with various emotional fallouts to reflect all too deeply on it. In the times to come, they would regret this oversight immensly.)
Not for the first time in the last few days, Raph was forced to confront the realisation of just how badly they’d fucked everything up.
This was somehow going worse than Leo had anticipated, and he'd had a long list of ways that things could go wrong and potential contingency plans in place to deal with them.
Admittedly, he'd been partially distracted from the drama after catching a glimpse of Don and the way his younger brother was staring at this new turtle with naked horror.
His brother shook himself out of it fairly quickly, and plastered on an alarmingly nonchalant expression, but the genius seemed unable to stop glancing between Raph and this new Raphael.
For a moment, Leo was confused as to what Don's hang-up was here.
It wasn't news anymore that they had other counterparts out there, so it likely wasn't scientific curiosity, and the guy hadn't been acting too strangely for a Raphael.
And the other turtle may have an eyepatch, but Don had never been one to discriminate over things like that so...
The realisation, when it came, hit Leo like the train Don had once begged to be allowed to bring home.
Although the new guy was much more liken to the '87 in terms of general appearance, he was an older Raphael with a missing eye.
The descriptions of those apocalyptic future selves of himself and two of his brothers had been ingrained into his mind when Don had finally told them of his experience during the Ultimate Drako fiasco.
They would have been hard enough to forget considering how unsettling it was to hear about grim versions of himself and his loved ones, but having Don hiccuping out the descriptions through bouts of sobbing given the mental picture a fresh layer of horror that had ingrained itself into Leo's mind forever.
The big brother side of him yelled that he needed to keep this new guy away from Don, to fight to ensure that none of his younger brother's trauma bubbled to the surface.
His pragmatic leader side noted that Don would probably be one of the only logical choices to be assigned as the medic dealing with C's arm. From the brief introduction they'd had of the guy, it didn't seem likely that he'd be easily parted from C, and C seemed to be depending on him for support and stability.
Leo hated when his big brother side had to clash with his leader side, because it was rarely ever the big brother side that won out.
Leo had always been proud of his role as the team leader, but he had also come to understand that it was a position that came with many burdens.
His training under the Ancient One after what his brothers had affectionately dubbed the "Leo's emo phase", had helped him center himself and better understand how to balance himself in his various roles, but that didn't mean that there weren't times when he slipped up.
Sometimes he would be a big brother when a leader was needed. Other times he would lead when what was needed was a listening ear.
With the Hotline in such turmoil Leo knew that he had to step up.
He clapped his hands together loudly, dozens of eyes suddenly fixing on him.
"Right, this isn't productive right now. Don, you and I will catch up with C and the new Raphael. We can take them to medbay. Sprinkles, once everything is settled there, I'll head to my office. I'm going to need you to join me at some point today to give me your report on the mission. Everyone else disperse. We have enough problems here without adding petty infighting to the list."
Leo knew he'd made a mistake the minute that final sentence passed his lips.
Donatello puffed up, taking one step closer to Scarlet.
"Petty infighting? You think this is petty infighting? Oh boy, how about I show you some real fighting."
Usually Leo would turn to Leonardo to stop Donatello from attacking people, but he had a sinking feeling that his counterpart would let it happen this time.
Thinking on his feet, he scanned for someone else who was close enough to step in who was at slightly less risk of being completely pulverised by Donatello for interfering.
Strangely enough, his instincts pointed him to Night.
Night and Donatello had definitely had a rocky start, but there did seem to be some comradery growing there. Leo hoped his next order wouldn't rock that too much.
He managed to catch Night's eye and, praying that their universes were close enough for this sign to work, stealthily signed that Night needed to grab Donatello and make his way out the back exit of the room, opposite to where C and the older turtle had escaped.
(Once upon a time Leo might have questioned if there had always been another door to this room, but he'd grown used to weird things happening ever since the '87 turtles had started popping round semi-regularly. If none of the Donatellos raised any red flags about it, he could only assume it wasn't too big of an issue.)
Night stared at him for a beat, and Leo worried that maybe he hadn't understood his message.
But it seemed like Night just needed a second of resistance, (so typical for a Raphael), before following an order.
The guy somehow managed to swoop Donatello up and over his shoulder before the guy could react.
It was probably lucky that he'd been so hyper focused on Scarlet, otherwise that definitely would have been more of an ordeal.
Of course, as soon as Donatello had registered what was going on, he started picking up a fuss, but it was already too late by then.
Night swiftly carted Donatello out of the room, the smallest turtles protests and threats towards Scarlet trailing behind them.
"Sai, how about you and Leonardo follow along and make sure Night and Donatello don't get into any trouble?"
Leonardo shot him a surprisingly ferocious glare, and Leo had to wonder if the guy was about to become a whole new problem of his own.
Thankfully Sai, despite looking bone deep tired, gently pat the guy on the shoulder.
"Come on Leonardo, we don't want those two chuckleheads to be alone together for too long."
Leonardo blew out a deep breath from his nostrils, but his shoulders slumped and he allowed Sai to guide him from the room.
Watcher and Sprinkles followed them, which Leo supposed he had no real issue with. Watcher probably wasn't up to being dragged into a major medical issue, and Leo didn't want to risk the guy pushing himself too far because he felt like people were relying on him.
He'd hate driving someone to the point where they were so insanely overworked but felt like they couldn't let anyone down.
He just hoped that Sprinkles would remember to come meet him at his office later. The guy was by no means incompetent, but he was definitely one of the more easily distracted Donnies.
Michelangelo had also elected to ghost along behind Watcher and Sprinkles.
(Leo was a little ashamed to admit that he'd almost forgotten the little guy was there when he was being so unusually restrained.)
With the impending fight put to bed, Leo turned to the room at large.
"Everyone else, I'm sure you all have better things to be doing than standing around here. If you don't, find something."
Perhaps Leo should give some more specific instructions, but he had to trust that most of the people here knew what their duties were.
With any luck, the Michelangelos would break up their meeting soon, and someone could send Michael round to check on Scarlet.
Leo felt a pang seeing how the guy was scrunched up so pathetically in the middle of the room, stroking Chompy's fur like it was the only thing tethering him to reality.
But, there were enough people here to take care of the guy until Michael could get to him.
Leo had a new turtle to interrogate. Plus, he was concerned about what could have prevented C's arm from healing. If there was some sort of glitch happening between universes, Leo would rather be made aware of it now rather than later.
With that in mind, he inclined his head towards Don. So many years of living and fighting together had helped them all become well attuned to each other, and Don had materialised by his side before his head could even raise up from the dip.
This synchronicity meant that Leo wasn't at all taken by surprise when a second pair of feet joined them.
If Leo had noticed Don's predicament with the new guy, there was no way that Raph wouldn't have also picked up on it.
Honestly, Leo was grateful to have Raph there for Don to lean on if things got to be too much. It meant more of Leo's attention could be freed up to study there newest guest.
Said guest was eyeing them somewhat warily as they exited the room.
C was cradled in his arms still, looking to still be lost somewhere between immediate panic and the lethargic fog that would always descend once panic had drained away.
"I apologise for that situation. The Hotline is currently going through some turbulent times and some unresolved issues are cropping up. I promise that getting C's arm fixed is a top priority though. If you will follow us, we will take you to the medbay, where my brother Don over here will be able to assess what has gone wrong. On the way, maybe you could tell us a little bit more about your world and what C has experienced there?"
Leo was about to ask if the older turtle wanted to discuss what had happened to his Donatello, but he clamped his mouth shut quickly as he remembered Don's presence.
As much as he wanted to be fully in leader mode right now, he could at least avoid subjecting Don to that side of the conversation.
They could deal with C first and then tomorrow, once everything had settled down and Leo had had a chance to meditate today's stresses away, Leo could bring that matter up privately.
Maybe he could loop Dee in. He didn't think the guy had any particular portal trauma unlike and Don and Von Ryan. Yes, Dee was the best candidate to set to working on trying to find this missing Donatello.
Glad that that was mentally settled, Leo smiled as calmly as he could at the new turtle.
Admittedly, he expected some resistance here purely due to the fact that this was a Raphael. Even though he seemed to be a closer alternate to C, his personality had definitely seemed to be skewing towards the typical Raph hotheadedness.
Yet the guy followed him as he started walking without complaint.
(Leo noticed that the newest turtle kept darting looks towards Don, but couldn't place if it was because he'd caught Don doing the same thing earlier, or if it was connected to his missing Donatello. He decided that it would be best to not question that now without risking the several cans of worms he'd firmly put on the shelf to be opened the next day.)
After a few paces, the guy spoke up.
"I guess it will be best if I start from the beginning, when this mini me dropped out of the sky and straight into the Hudson."
Night hadn't put 'hauling away a pissed off, pint sized ninja turtle from a prospective punch-up' on his bingo card. This was clearly a mistake on Night's part as, here he was thanks to Leo's non verbal command, with Donatello draped over one shoulder as he beat a hasty retreat from the room they'd previously all gathered in.
All the while, Donatello was continuously hurling abuse at Scarlet.
Sai was following close behind Night, gently guiding an equally pissed off yet much more cooperative Leonardo away from the chaos. Michelangelo, Watcher and Sprinkles were all bringing up the rear of the group exiting the room on mass.
Michelangelo was disturbingly quiet, trailing along with his gaze pinned to the floor.
(No doubt JB would probably be following them as well, lurking somewhere behind to keep tabs on them, but Night had enough literally and figuratively on his shoulders right now without having to also deal with his older brother's nonsense.)
“Put me down Night!”
Donatello yelled, wriggling violently enough that he almost toppled off of Night despite the death grip he was currently using.
Fearing that Donatello would somehow manage to fling himself to the floor and find his way back to Scarlet, potentially injuring himself in the process, Night transferred him swiftly enough that Donatello had no room to escape.
The feisty genius was now tucked snugly under his arm. Perhaps a less dignified position, one that Night would feel more guilty for making the other turtle endure if said turtle wasn't currently viciously kicking and punching any skin in his reach.
(How could someone so small pack so much force into hits with no space to wind them up?)
“Dude, attacking Scarlet now isn't worth it. If you still want to fight him later, when you're a little calmer, you can take it to the dojo.”
“Night, should you really be encouraging him to start a brawl right now?”
Sai's tired voice gave the impression that he was just about ready to run off into the sunset and never return if it meant he could avoid dealing with anymore nonsense.
“Hey, Scarlet might have been kinda alright to me but, from what I've heard, these guys deserve to get a few cracks at him. He's a Raph like us, he can suck it up and take his punishment like a turtle," Night felt his lips curl into a smirk. "Plus, I can't be the only one around here to fall victim to a Donatello brand concussion.”
“You're going to get another concussion yourself if you don't put me down!” Said purple turtle spat.
Even with the smaller turtle securely stowed under his arm, the threat did send a chill down Night's back.
All jokes aside, he really didn’t want the business end of Donatello's bo staff to meet any part of his body again, nevermind his head.
As such, his next statement was a lot more pleading than he was usually knowing for.
“I will let you down once I know you're not gonna run right back in there and start swinging like an overenthusiastic child playing little league!”
“What if they deserve to be whacked?!”
“They probably do. But, face it, you're not exactly at your best right now man.”
“I'm fine.”
“Donatello, let's just cool off for a bit, ok?”
Oh, thank shell Leonardo was now stepping in to help corral his teammate, even if he too looked like he to wanted nothing more than to run back in and start throwing hands himself.
“Look, you guys want to see how C is doing, right? You can't do that if you're too busy fighting, can you?” Watcher stepped in to attempt to appease his fellow genius.
It was strange, Watcher was using the same tone that he used to break out when any of the rest of them, namely JB and Night, were annoying him with their arguing.
Watcher has always had a pretty unique ability, (maybe not so unique anymore as Night had the feeling that Don also shared this trait), of talking things through without coming across as condescending.
Night hadn't heard that tone in a long time. Or had he?
After JB had left, and Watcher had been made leader, that tone had seemed a lot more patronising.
Night couldn't help but wonder now if Watcher had actually been intentionally more arrogant, or if Night had just perceived him that way due to his own issues with his younger twin being handed leadership of the team.
Recently, those early days without their eldest brother had become more hazy, fading behind a fog of anger, irritation, and admittedly some fear and perhaps a tiny bit of depression. Just a little bit.
For a long time, Night had been pushing blame onto Watcher for how shitty their relationship had become. If his brother hadn't been such an uppity prick after being made leader, Night wouldn't have had such a bone to pick with him. Sure, he'd have been pissed at the ban on patrols, and would have snuck out anyway, but if Watcher would have just stopped acting like he was better than Night things would have been so much better between them.
Or so he'd thought.
With the benefit of hindsight, Night could see things in a different light. Had Watcher started out as being hostile towards him, or had his brother only ended up reacting in kind because Night had been the one attacking him from the start?
Damn, Night had a lot to consider, but now really wasn't the time. Maybe he'd have to make an appointment with Michael later to talk through his new revelations.
(Or he could just sit on them by himself for a while. Yeah, that sounded better than spilling his guts right away without getting his thoughts in order first.)
“C wants to leave the team, so he's not our problem anymore.” Donatello hissed.
The venomous words were a poor attempt to hide the small turtle's hurt. Night could feel how he was trembling and although some of that could be attributed to rage, Night had had enough experience in his life to be able to pick out those moments when the pain was a living thing trying to hatch itself out of your skin.
Was this stress how the rest of the Hotline had felt when watching Nights' own family implode a little while ago? Because, whilst being in the midst of his own family drama hadn't been great, watching the '87 boys struggle was also not a fun experience.
Also, what was with the epidemic of Raph’s trying to leave their teams. Had Night started a new trend?
(Technically, Night had been kicked out but, as he'd agreed to go if it would be better for his brothers, he was still going to count it.)
“The four of you need to have a long conversation. You can't keep going back and forth like this!” Sai yelled.
Exasperation with the situation had lowered his eyes ridges enough that dark shadows were cast like bags above his cheeks. Or maybe they actually were eye bags and not just shadows. This had been an exhausting time for everyone.
Night couldn't even blame Sai for starting to lose his temper, his counterpart had basically been on some form of damage control duty the entire time that he'd known him.
If Night was Sai, (wait, was he technically Sai? No, someone had said that they were more like a mix of two worlds, so Night would be both Sai and Raph. So he was partially both of them. And, ew, that made it sound like he was their kid, and he was hopping right of that very Carl-like train of thought before he wigged himself out even further), he'd probably have quit the hotline and ran as far away as he could get to avoid being saddled with another mess.
A horrible silence lingered in the wake of Sai's scolding.
Donatello was no longer struggling against Night's hold though, when he glanced down, his jaw was jutting out and his eyes were shooting flames. The trembling had died down. Night wasn't sure if that was good or bad right now, seeing as Donatello seemed to be resolute in pushing C away before C had the chance to harm him further by up and choosing to leave.
Sai was partially concealing his face with one hand, taking deep, steady breaths. Watcher was nibbling his lip, seemingly having a wordless conversation with Sprinkles who was wringing his hands and rocking lightly on his feet.
Michelangelo, still eerily quiet, remained still, though his eyes flitted between his present teammates rapidly.
Leonardo blew out a harsh breath and fixed his hands on his hips.
“Well, I'm going to go check on our friend, with or without you fellas.”
Despite projecting confidence in his stance, Leonardo’s voice wavered over this ultimatum.
“Go ahead. Why don't you ask when he's going to abandon us next, I suppose it would be nice to have a little warning next time that we're getting left behind for a better offer. It's funny, C always whines about how little he has in common with his counterparts, but he sure is great at running away like them when he's in a sulk.” Donatello all but growled.
It shouldn't have been intimidating seeing as the guy was pint sized, and dangling from Night's arm to boot, yet each word was infused with so much acid that Night was half surprised that his skin hadn't started corroding from sheer proximity.
Night didn't think Donatello particularly wanted to hurt Sai, or even Night that much anymore, but they were definitely in the splash zone of his fury.
Those words sizzled through Night's thick skin, finding the places weakened by everything that had happened here and his own contemplation earlier.
It hurt.
But it wasn't really personal. Night could lick his own wounds later. Right now, they needed to get this shit under control.
Sai had obviously recovered faster from the collateral damage they'd both taken, and he was studying the tension wracking Sprinkles' frame.
His strained voice cut through the very uncanny valley scene of an imminent purple vs blue fight.
(Was this growing unease and dread something that all Mikeys and Donnies of the multiverse endured everytime a Raph and Leo duo had one of their infamous arguments? Was this how Carl had felt watching Night and Watcher frequently turning their home into a battleground after years of watching Night and JB do the same?)
“Sprinks, are you heading to Leo's office?”
Although it was phrased as a question, everyone in the corridor could tell that Sai was offering his twin an out in case thing here became even more vicious.
“Yup, I'm gonna…” Sprinkles choked on a sob. The stress of whatever the mission had entailed, followed up by a string of emotional confrontations was clearly doing a number on his nerves.
“I'll come with you.” Watcher announced, stepping forwards and settling a calming hand on his fellow genius' shoulder.
Sprinkles sniffled, but managed to shoot his counterpart a soggy smile.
“Can I come too…”
The question was so softly spoken that Night barely heard it.
Leonardo looked at his brother with am expression torn between concern and betrayal.
When the orange banded ninja shuffled uncomfortably, his leader's concern won out.
“Michelangelo?”
“I just need a break to shake off some of these negative vibes dude. I'll come see our pal later when I'm feeling more like my totally radical self again.”
The two geniuses again glanced at each other, taking part in a silent conversation that Night couldn't understand.
“Of course you can come with us Michelangelo. The more the merrier after all.” Sprinkles finally responded, voice ringing with false cheer.
Everyone was acting so uneasy, Night was even more curious about just what had happened during the rescue mission to put everyone on edge even before the Scarlet confrontation.
Leonardo looked crushed. Though, to the little leader's credit, he shook it of quickly and his eyes hardened with resolve.
“I guess I'll go check on our friend alone then.” Leonardo heavily emphasised the word friend.
Donatello scoffed, but otherwise kept his mouth shut.
Leonardo lingered for a moment longer, as if half concerned that his brothers would change their minds if he just gave them one last chance.
Neither of the other '87 turtles budged.
Leonardo gave a small little nod, one that Night couldn't interpret at all.
He set his shoulder back and marched off in the direction of the med bay. During the split second that Leonardo brushed past him, Night caught a quick glimpse at his face.
His head may have been held high but Leonardo's eyes swam with barely restrained tears.
Another terrible hush descended on them.
“Should someone go after him?” Sai asked after a few stifling seconds.
“I think he might need a minute…” Night responded.
Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted JB slinking off along the same path the smaller fearless had taken.
Honestly, Night had been surprised that his brother had stayed out of everything up until this point. When he'd noticed his older brother following them, he'd thought for sure that his self righteous ass wouldn't be able to resist meddling.
Hopefully his idiot of an older brother wouldn't hurt Leonardo because Night had become weirdly protective of the gremlins somehow. While he knew they could handle themselves, and despite the 'progress' Night and JB may have made earlier, Night wouldn't hesitate to put his brother in his place if he bullied Leonardo.
“Right, ok. Where are we going then?” Sai directed this at Night and Donatello, the only other turtles still standing by.
Night wasn't too surprised that his counterpart was kicking the question over to them, he was probably sick and tired of playing leader.
That was fine with Night. He'd had a destination in mind from the get go.
“Us three, or at least Donatello and I, are going to the training room. I, for one, need to go hit something. Hard”
Hey, Night was never going be perfect, and working out his emotions through violence would likely always be one of his go to solutions. Especially as he was still trying to recover from spilling all his insecurities to his family earlier, alongside the blood lust that was being stirred up at the thought of having to beat JB up if he went and did something stupid.
Going to the dojo would definitely be better than starting a random brawl, or going for another drink, or even stealing a bike and going for a ride.
(Night didn't always run away from his emotional problems.)
“Great. Can you put me down now?"
Shit, Night had gotten so used to hefting Donatello's weight that he had half forgotten that he still had the guy firmly in his grasp.
Sensing that it was now far less likely for the purple turtle to go hunt Scarlet for a beatdown, Night sheepishly placed him back on his feet.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry dude.”
The genius huffed after finally being placed on solid ground, dusting himself off needlessly before crossing his arms and glaring at Night.
(Night decided it would be in his best interest to not point put that what Donatello actually needed to fix was his mask which had become askew somewhere in the chaos.)
Now, Night just needed to make extra sure that Donatello wouldn't choose an alternate path of secluding himself away somewhere to hatch a million and one revenge plots.
“You are coming, right Donatello? I need a good spar. How about you Sai?"
Night didn't really mind if Sai had had enough of them and wanted to go his own way, but a three way spar would definitely provide both himself and Donatello with more of a distraction.
“Night, do you think fighting is a good idea right now? Your head's still stitched from the last fight you two had.”
Poor Sai, his attempt at reasoning wasn't going to work now that Night had set his mind on training his emotions away.
“It's a great plan. Plus, this time I'm gonna win!”
“In your dreams Night.”
Hook. Line. Sinker.
As intelligent as Donatello was, there was a ferocious streak running through his that resonated with Night. Which made it pretty easy to tug on the strings that would have Donatello following Night's plan with minimal protests.
“Oh, it's so on ya gremlin.”
This session may be for both of them, but that didn't mean that Night would allow himself to get his ass handed to him again by the same opponent. Nope, this time the menace was going down.
“Please at least don't aim for his head Donatello.” Sai groaned, washing his hands of the situation even as he tried to steer them away from more head trauma.
“I make no promises.”
Yeah, this was gonna be fun!
Don was well aware that somehow, somewhere along the way, he'd garnered the reputation of being the "nice" Donatello.
See, even though most of the Hotline residents had know him for a while at this point, and even though the majority of them had witnessed first hand how Don wasn't always the calmest, most peaceful representative of the purple turtle collective, his general demeanor seemed to allow the fact that he wasn't always a pacifist to slip people's minds.
To be fair, between Donatello and Von Ryan's particular brand of cluelessly insulting arrogance and penchant for violent solutions to minor problems, Dee's ability to infuse even the most simple of words with a level of venom that could make an inanimate object feel insulted, and the range of passive aggressive behaviours exhibited by the majority of his counterparts, it really wasn't hard to see why Don of all people might be mistaken as being nicer than the rest.
He'd seen many allies over the years make the same assumption when comparing him to his brothers. They saw Leo's sternness, Mikey's proclivity for Mikey, and Raph's... well, Raph was pretty self explanatory, and quickly labelled the quieter, more mild mannered sibling as the nice one.
Sure, in some instances this was true. Don considered himself to he fairly level headed and polite, and to many that translated into being nice.
He wasn't feeling very nice right now. Considering everything that had happened as of late, Don was owed the right to be a little grumpy at yet another problem landing in his lap in the form of a broken arm that apparently wasn't healing.
Don was inclined to believe that he'd more than earned the right to be irritated, even if he was trying not to show just how much he was starting to panic.
Because Don had to be fine.
Even if another one of his counterparts had tried to commit suicide in the very same bathroom where his failed attempt had happened. The bathroom where DeeDee had succeeded in taking his life.
No, Don had to keep it together, had to fix things even if he wanted nothing more than to pull his brothers into a turtle pile and fall asleep like when they were young.
Maybe then his damn brain wouldn't keep spiralling, wouldn't keep asking which of his counterparts was going to crack next, if the small amount of progress Watcher and his family had made would be enough to kick off their healing journey or if they'd end up shattering even further, if the '87 guys were going to no longer be a team if C decided to go back with this new guy, and how this new guy... this new guy was a nightmare made reality for Don.
A portal. A missing eye. A missing Donatello.
Don was getting a sick sense of deja-vu everytime he caught sight of the older turtle.
(If he looked a little too long the cap would disappear, silver belts would become brown, a beat up jacket would lay over different scars.)
When the guy had first stepped through the portal, Don had found himself subconsciously flicking his eyes between his brother and the new turtle. Cataloguing all the differences between the two didn't even make sense as this new Raphael was so clearly not a future alternate of his own brother, yet his mind buzzed with the need confirm over and over again that this wasn't that dark future version of his twin.
(The version that his stupid plan had killed. The version he had killed who had crawled over to Leo, bleeding, dying, but unwilling to not be by the side of at least one of his brothers at the end.)
He had been to distracted by the gut punch he'd just been dealt to pay much attention to whatever was going down between the '87 guys and Scarlet.
It was taking everything he had to keep himself from going to pieces.
Despite his distraction, Don's ingrained instincts were triggered the minute Leo shot him a look. He had been vaguely aware of Leo mentioning that Don would be part of the group heading to the medbay, and he could infer enough from what he knew of Leo's leadership to figure out that Leo was trusting him to find out what was at work here.
Don just didn't have any time to deal with all of the emotions that this walking bad omen was stirring up, not when people were relying on him to unpack all the medical nonsense that said omen had just casually dropped on him.
Mutely, he slid into position behind Leo. He was simultaneously relieved and pained when Raph elected to join them.
(Having his brother beside him would be a double edged sword. He'd be able to see that his brother was alive and whole, but he'd also have more opportunities to keep comparing him to his monocular counterpart.)
Having to compartmentalise before even fully registering emotions wasn't a new experience for Don, he'd been his family medic from childhood and throughout various wars and battles, but the sheer amount of emotions he was stuffing away meant that his usual down to business demeanor wasn't clicking into place as easily as it should.
The questions that had arisen from what he'd been told about C's arm were not helping him calm down, and neither was the conversation going on in the background as they made their way to the medbay and his older brothers tried to get more information from the newcomer.
What did he mean when he said C had been missing for months but his arm hadn't healed at all in that time? Did Don hear things correctly when they guy mentioned that the menace had taken a swan dive into the Hudson at some point?
(Unknowingly mirroring Donatello’s earlier hypotheses, a part of his brain that was always looking to make connections was wondering if Night's near drowning was somehow linked to that event. They'd all learnt by now that the multiverse rippled out in mysterious ways.)
Hence, Don was starting to be pretty pissed. His nerves were on edge, there were a million things he had to deal with and a million more things he had to not think about or else he'd go to pieces and be of no use to anybody.
As such, he was woefully unprepared to deal with C having a panic attack. There was no way Don could be his usual nice self and coach the kid through it when half of his attention was devoted to shoving his inconvenient PTSD into the junk drawer of his mind's filing cabinet, (where it would hopefully be forgotten forever), and the other half was planning out all of the tests that he now had to set up in the hopes of fixing whatever problems C was having with his arm.
Basic math would say that two halves meant a whole, meaning that there was no room left in Don's currently overtaxed brain for dealing with panic attacks.
His body's well honed instincts begged him to run over and help with the current medical crisis, but his mind held him back.
Don was running on coffee fumes and a dream at this point, if he diverted himself away from solving C's arm predicament he'd probably slip up and make a mistake, and then there would be more work for him, or for one of his counterparts, and no one would get a break, and the '87 guys would think that he'd messed things up on purpose, and...
Shit, Don needed to get into his professional mode, now.
He forced himself to refocus on what he would need to set up when they reached the medbay.
Besides, it seemed like the new guy had it handled.
Don's presence probably wouldn't have helped anyway seeing as he was a Planck Length away from losing it himself, and because last time the kid was in a crisis Don had been unintentionally rather harsh on him because, again, everything had been going to shell lately.
If Don wasn't repressing everything as much as possible to make it through the day, he'd likely feel really bad about that. After the incident, he had certainly felt guilty enough, and he had hoped that C had realised that it wasn't personal and that he had just been extremely stressed.
(Ooh, and into the drawer went a new thought of how Don didn't want to see another '87 turtle screaming about how he though they all hated them. Surely the contents of the drawer wasn't all going to spill out later and leave Don shaking and unable to sleep and eat. Don was so good at dealing with emotional trauma. Maybe he could juat handshake this pain away!)
Don had been so absorbed on his internal dialogues that he barely registered that they had reached the medbay. Leo's soft voice brought him back to his body.
"Don, should we call someone else to take over? I can figure something else out if you can't..."
Leo trailed off as Don shook his head, smiling sadly.
His brother was perceptive, something that was both a source of comfort and a source of annoyance throughout their lives. Don had no doubt that Leo had taken one look at the newcomer and how Don was reacting to him, and started putting pieces together around his resemblance to the other future Raph that Don had known.
It was nice of his brother to try and give him an out here, but there wasn't anyone to actually replace him if he did wash his hands of the whole situation. He suspected that was why Leo had elected him in the first place, despite likely being aware of his problems from the start.
Watcher was out, for obvious reasons. Sprinkles would probably need to debrief Leo about the mission at some point. Donatello had looked about ready to kill a turtle when he'd been carried away if Don's fuzzy memory was correct.
(Don did not want to deal with anymore concussions this month.)
Von Ryan was not the most diplomatic of turtles, his blunt nature could possibly cause C to spiral further even if he approached the situation with good intentions and, finally, poor Dee needed a goddamn break!
So, unless his brother in blue decided to extract Big P from his current job, (one that, now Don was thinking about it, was probably breaking all types of child labour laws. Though, it was likely that a teenager working ridiculous hours would be less of a concern to any cops than the fact that the teenager was a giant mutant ninja turtle, and one from another dimension to boot!), there was no one else avaliable to patch the kid up.
"It's fine Leo."
The fact that Don had to be fine right now was left unsaid.
C didn’t think he was ever going to recover from this humiliation. Now would be a great time for the ground to swallow him whole, thanks!
Cheeks burning redder than his mask in shame, he took a brief timid glance at his surroundings.
Everyone was looking at him!
This was worse than having to perform a bunch of jokes for mobsters! At least those guys would likely just rough him up a bit if he did something embarrassing. Everyone here would judge him!
“C don’t you dare have another panic attack!”
Raphael's gentle threat went unanswered as C shrank into his shell to avoid all of the eyes on him.
Hiding was probably not the most dignified of moves but at least he didn’t have to look at the others' scathing stares as he was bundled out of the room, presumably by Raphael.
(He hoped Donatello could distract the hoards by breaking their brains with a description of how his cast could fit into his shell due to cartoon logic.)
For a while, drifting in the darkness as he remained motionless, distantly aware of Raphael's soothing voice attempting to talk him down.
That calming voice abruptly cut off and C was tempted to pop his head out just to make a snarky comment about Raphael's old man voice not being up for talking to long, but the fact that he was now moving distracted him from the lack of a vocal distraction.
Besides, a new string of chatter soon started up, and C was content to bask in this brief moment as Raphael presumably began carrying him to the medbay to get checked out.
Wait, Raphael didn’t know his way around the lair yet! So how could he...?
A new sense of alarm shot through him, and C risked peeping ever so slightly out of his shell to see just how doomed he was.
His angle wasn't the greatest, but he could see enough to figure out that Don was amongst the turtles leading Raphael.
C tucked his head back down right away, praying that he wasn't about to puke in his shell. That had never happened to any of them before, and he could quite confidently say that it wasn't something he wanted to experience.
Something else C didn't want to experience was Don going full doctor mode on him again. At least he’d been drugged the last time the genius had fixed him up.
He was doing his best to not to linger too long on how harsh the other had been a few months back when him and Night had turned up at Raph’s door. Don though he was an idiot...
And that situation had been a lot more recent for Don than for C, he'd remember in greater detail just how dumb he thought C was!
That was it C, was moving into his own personal shell-ter permanently!
“C, you're going to have to come out so I can examine you.”
Oh goodie, C had somehow missed the fact that they had arrived at the medbay.
Even better, Don was using that tone again that implied that if C didn’t pop out of his hiding place soon, the genius would get a crowbar and pry him out.
Maybe he could just...
“And no kid, you can’t just stick your arm out.” Raphael interjected.
Sometimes he hated sharing a brain cell or two with his older counterpart. He was always able to guess his next move.
Sighing in defeat C decided to face the world once more rather than risk Don getting more irritated with him.
“Okay, had your arm been x-rayed recently?”
As Don hadn't yelled at him for delaying the process by cowering in his shell, C decided it was time to try and lift the mood some.
“No, we didn't have an x-ray machine chilling in our house unfortunately. I'm sure if we did have one it would just reveal that I'm photogenic to my core.”
Don simply glared at him. Leo and Raph, who C hadn't even noticed until now, were also giving him less than impressed looks.
Yeesh, tough crowd.
“How do you know it’s still broken if you haven't had it x-rayed?”
C really regretted his joke now. Don was doing his calming breaths, which was never a good sign.
“It's still all bruised and shit, and you can still feel the break, I think...”
Oh, C appreciated Raphael steping in for him, but that probably wasn't the best follow up when Don was already mad about C not having an x-ray.
“Exsqueeze me, what do you mean you can feel it sometimes? You’ve just been what, prodding his arm for the last six months?!”
“Yeah, pretty much...” Raphael sheepishly didn't complete his sentence, likely seeing the murder in Don’s eyes.
“Wonderful. It looks like we’re starting from scratch. Again.” Don stated through gritted teeth.
C was starting to think there was very real possibility that Raphael was about to get his very own coma arc once Don was finished with him.
At the very least, it appeared a torna-don might be in the forecast, with a slight chance of it raining concussions upon the Raphael population.
“The kid's fine! Look, I couldn’t take him to a doctor, I don’t have any documents to prove his existence! Plus mutant hospitals aren’t exactly common and normal ones treat mutants like shit! One way or another someone would probably try and take him away, and I couldn't just let that happen. So what else was I supposed to do, summon my presumably dead brother to come fix the problem? Maybe see if the missing turtle with the big brain would have all the answers.”
Don inhaled sharply, a brief expression of mingled shock and pain playing across the planes of his face.
C was starting to think that summoning the dead would solve a lot of the problems around here.
Raphael's harsh words lingered, and C glimpsed a hushed discussion taking place between Raph and Leo who were watching the paralysed Don with naked concern.
C didn’t like the look on the purple banded turtle's face after he'd been hit with the reminder of the missing Donnie.
Raphael couldn't have known the nerve he was striking, but C had some idea what wound had just been reopened and salted.
After all C knew what happened to the '03 verse when their Don disappeared...
C didn't want to linger on that. He didn't want to think about missing Donatellos right now. It was bad enough that Scarlet was back!
C shuddered at the thought that he might end up joining the ghostly ranks of the Hotlime if Scarlet managed to get a hold of him when he was down an arm and two weapons.
Oh, he'd have to remember that one for later! If someone asked him how he'd ended up with a new counterpart he could totally say it cost him an arm and, hmm, maybe not his sai, (C swallowed back bile at the thought of his weapon coated in blood on an all too familiar bathroom floor), but he had lost his key!
Yeah, if someone asked about how C had gained a new ally, he could say that it had cost him and arm and a key.
Fingers snapping in front of his face pulled him out of his pun prepping session.
Oh, zoning out like that really hadn't lessened Don's annoyance with him if the furrowed brow bones were anything to go by.
(It was good to see he'd snapped out of the emotion induced paralysis, though C could do without the fingers in his face.)
After gaining C's attention, Don drew in a deep breath, closing his eyes for a beat, before opening them again with a much more professional expression.
(Any lingering traces of grief had been completely eradicated.)
“C, come over here. I need to x-ray your arm again.”
Despite the clear demand, Don's voice was slightly less hostile than before.
It was clearly taking a lot of effort for Don to keep his tone level when he was probably thinking about how C and Raphael were some of the biggest idiots he'd ever come across whilst also dealing with an unexpected jab right to his trauma.
C was reluctant to follow the genius back to where the heavy duty medical equipment was kept, but he didn't make a fuss.
He didn't even argue when Don sternly prevented Raphael from following them, citing a need for less situations and pointing out that it would be hard to get any work done with Raphael hovering.
C had half expected Raphael to ignore Don's orders, but he'd sat back with Raph and Leo without much protest.
Had Raphael had to listen to orders like that before from his own Donatello? Had he grown used to being pushed away from the bedsides of those he loved so that the family medic could concentrate?
Before joining the Hotline, C had never been in a situation quite like that, couldn't understand that unspoken obedience drilled into those that had to follow the commands of their doctor brothers or face causing a fatal distraction.
So C didn't protest either, even if he wished Raphael could be next to him for this.
Besides, C was a big turtle. He could handle a doctor's appointment by himself without someone to hold his hand and give him a lollipop.
It didn't matter that the only reason he hadn't freaked out the last time that he'd been back here was because he had been so high on painkillers that he didn't have the ability to feel anxious at the memory of how a lot of these machines had needed to be upgraded in the pursuit of keeping himself and Donatello alive after the whole situation with Big Red.
It was very clear which had last done a major overhaul of the machinery, even if C didn't know that it had been Sprinkles and Von Ryan. They had been the only two geniuses who had not been enlisted in the medical drama and had chosen to spend those weeks perfecting all of the equipment as much as possible to help prevent Donatello and C from shuffling off this mortal coil.
A lot of them, i.e. most of them, were now Von Ryan’s trademarked shade of purple. His logo was also hidden somewhere on every one.
When pulled on why he had implemented this new look, Von Ryan had allegedly claimed that he didn't remember rebranding them, stating that he must have done it out of muscle memory.
Don had let him get away with it seeing, presumably because that was the happiest the two had been with all the chaos unfolding.
(C may have been a little distracted, but even he'd noticed how Von Ryan had been the only one of his brothers hanging around for a while there, expression and tone made carefully flat as he threw himself into work in order to avoid being at his own home where he could potentially put his foot in it and make things harder for his big brother.)
Sprinkles had admitted in private to DD, who had then later relayed the gossip to C during one of their ‘I feel useless and need a pep talk’, sessions, that Sprinkles had let the soft shell paint them however he wanted so that he could still feel useful.
After all, Von Ryan had been barred from helping the medical team, the guy was very open about not being great at dealing with emotions, and his soft shell had still been pretty sensitive after the whole alien invasion in their world, so he hadn't able to do much of the heavy lifting, even with a battleshell to support.
Sprinkles had apparently even encouraged Von Ryan to make the tech more cheerful as a lot of it would only be used in situations that could use a little bit of whimsy to counteract the negative emotions.
(Who knew those very same machines were going to be used to try and keep one of the other Donnies alive not too long after the revamp.)
As Don guided him to the x-ray machine and began prepping him, he also started rattling of some questions.
“So, do you feel any tenderness in it still? How much can you move it?”
“I can barely feel it at all anymore, unless I poke it or knock it against something. I can move my fingers though, if that helps!”
C pasted on a falsely bright smile to match his falsely bright admittance that moving his fingers was just about the only thing his arm was up to at the moment.
“Are you on any painkillers for it?”
“No. Raphael didn’t want to risk future meds messing me up. I had, like a half a paracetamol a day in the beginning for the pain and to help prevent any infection from unexpectedly drinking half the Hudson, but then, like I said, I stopped really being able to feel it after the first couple months.”
A look of alarm flashed across Don's features before the professional veneer dropped down again.
C really didn't like that his answer had briefly broken Don's professional demeanor.
He'd take the guy being annoyed at him, even angry with him, if it meant nothing C confessed to would be alarming to him.
“Can you describe what you mean when you say you can’t feel it? Can you not feel any pain, or can you not feel your arm at all?”
“Both, kinda? I don’t know how to explain it, it's just kinda numb. Is that bad?!”
C's false cheer had slid away and splattered on the floor faster than he'd expected, like gooey cheese slipping right off of a nice thick slice of pizza.
“I don’t know yet. Hopefully it’s just a quirk of your universe which is blocking out the pain for you, resulting in you not being able to feel anything. Otherwise...” Don cut himself off with a wince.
“Otherwise what?!”
“Otherwise you might have seriously damaged the muscles or tendons in your arm. I have to be 100% honest with you here C, any damage like that would be a worst case scenario. Even with the combined expertise of myself and my peers, with how long you've had this injury, and the implications of near complete numbness, I’m not sure how successful we’d be in regaining full limb usage through surgical means. If that is the case then, I’m sorry C, we might still have to consider amputation as an option.”
Don looked remorseful as he dropped the bombshell, but his remorse didn't make the impact any less devastating.
C forced himself to breathe, forced himself to shove back the tidal wave of panic threatening to knock him off his feet.
He desperately wished that Don hadn't taken him back here alone.
Screw being a big turtle, he wanted Raphael. He wanted his brothers. He wanted Master Splinter and April.
He wanted to not be facing the possible loss of his arm without any of his family standing beside him.
But they weren't.
C sucked in a deep breath.
“So how will we know?” He was proud of how his voice remained mostly even as he pressed for further details.
Don gave him a supportive smile, all earlier irritation either forgotten or stashed away somewhere.
C was glad to be back to Don's nice side. He could use a friendly face right now.
“First, I’m going to x-ray your arm to see the full extent of the damage to the bone. Then, if I think there's a possibility after that scan that your muscles have also sustained some damage, were going to have to jury rig up an MRI to see what we're working with. Depending on if there's any damage, as well as the severity of any internal injuries, it will be up to you whether you want us to attempt surgery."
Don crouched slightly, making direct eye contact with C.
"If I believe that surgery is in anyway possible, and if you would like to proceed down that route, it will give you the slim chance of being able to regain use of the arm. If the surgery is a success, you will still have to go extensive physio therapy to combat any atrophy and rebuild strength in the limb. Even with a 100% successful surgery, you will likely still suffer some bouts of pain and weakness in that arm, potentially for the rest of your life. If the surgery isn't fullly succesful, or if it doesn't succeed at all, you’ll likely have limited mobility on that side, with increased risks for potential episodes of pain, weakness and muscle spams in the long run.”
Don paused for a second, probably letting C digest everything he'd just outlined.
His head was spinning, and he didn't want to think about this anymore, so he indicated that Don should rip off the bandaid, (or should it be rip off the cast in this scenario?), and tell him the rest.
It wasn't as if C hadn't already spent many sleepless nights worrying about option number two.
Don slowly reached forward, telegraphing his movement. His hand landed on C's knee, squeezing gently.
Strangely, it was that gesture of kindness that brought tears flooding to C's eyes.
“The other option is amputation. This, of course, also comes with its own risks. But I don’t want to scare you with the bad outcomes now. We can cross that bridge when we get to it. With a bit of luck, this break is nothing to worry about, and the delay in healing has just been caused by it becoming misaligned, or maybe Night might not have set it correctly in the first place. We also don't know how the alternate universe travel may have factored into things. There’s lots of other factors to consider before you have to make any choices. The fact that you can still move your fingers is definitely a good sign that there is no permanent nerve damage. There's honestly probably nothing to be concerned about, but as a doctor I need to make sure that you have all the facts so that you can make an informed decision when the time comes.”
C did not like any of his potential decisions right now.
The tears spilled over silently, as C stared down at Don's hand resting on his knee.
It was strange to look at Don's hand through a film of tears. His misery was distorting his vision to the point of seeing double, it almost seemed like there was phantom hand lying on top of Don's.
C sniffled, and Don gently squeezed his knee again before rising out of his squat.
“Ok, enough of the doom talk. We wont know anything until I run the tests. C, if you could stand here please, I’ll get everything set up.” Don gestured to the x-ray.
Tentatively, C got into position.
Ironically, his cast got caught as he tried to position himself and he had to spend an extra minute wrangling the uncooperative limb.
He was really starting to get sick of his stupid arm.