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[Even without looking, Don knows that Raph is probably having one of his Preventative Raph Rages on shore, yelling and growling and throwing boulders around. He sulks in the water, watching some larger rocks plunk into the water and sink to the bottom closer to shore. Raph could have easily thrown them further.

UgggGGHHHH.

Eventually Don allows himself to float back to the surface, though he bobs there facedown like a nasty dead body as a small act of defiance, waiting until a giant red mystic hand grabs him like a naughty parrot and hauls him back to shore.]

[ Aha. There he floats. Like a gross dead body, only a sulky irate teenager ninja turtle who also happens to be alive. Little shit.

Raph mystic scoops him like a dutiful keeper of naughty parrots and deposits him on the ground... mostly gently. Gently enough that it's not NOT gentle. Just in case. ]

You ever say somethin' like that again and Raph's gonna fold you like a paper airplane. Got it?

[ He's got all day and infinite emotional core power to burn. He'll be the angriest affirmation factory ever mutated. And also perhaps the most violent one. ]

[And the mutinous little fucker says, glaring down at the sand like the chickenshit he is,] Which part?

[Like he doesn't know which part Raph hated. Like he hadn't already lost that fight before Mayhem got invovled. Like his big brother didn't just scoop him ever so carefully from the water after terraforming his anger out.]

[ Pizza Supreme give him patience. Because giving him more strength right now would possibly end in a murder. ]

YOU KNOW WHICH PART, DONNIE! [ HE SHOULD DROWN YOU RN. ] No more "only thing I'm good for" bull-hockey outta you! 'cause it's wrong and you know it's wrong and you hate bein' wrong whether or not you do it on purpose!

[ And also it hurts Raph's heart. But that's secondary. ]

[desperately casts about for something he can use to win against his increasingly more right and more angry big brother. don't you dare point out how much he hates being wrong]

Why are you still using words like bull-hockey! Dad's not even here to ground us anymore, and we're eighteen!

[ STOMPS HIS FOOT

STOMPS HIS FOOT SO HARD ]

I use words like bull-hockey 'cause if I let myself start sayin' you're fulla shit every time someone acts up, that'll turn into half the words I ever say to you bozos!

[ See! Fine! He did a swear! But he's still winning, he thinks, so it's. FINE. IT'S FINE. EVERYTHING IS FINE. The siblinghood is reaching critical mass out here. ]

[ALSO STOMPS! It is both literally and figuratively not as impactful!!]

Well what else are we supposed to do besides act up?! It's just been me and Leo for ages! And he has Peter! [The implication here that Donnie has had nobody, which is silly because he still had Leo they both had Rue, and it's never just been one of the brothers having only one other, until it was (Leo and Raph fighting, Donnie and Mikey coping), for months. Until it was Leo alone, for a month, finding Peter and then Donnie alone, for months, because they'd been fighting. And everything was new and horrible, and then it was new again and only somewhat less horrible, because anything new is horrible for Donnie even if it's supposed to be an improvement.

But no, the crux of the problem is,] And you weren't here! And it's not like it's your fault, and I didn't want any of us to be stuck here! I wanted us to go home! I wanna go home, Raph! [Oh...oh this got serious again suddenly. Oh that was not intentional, oh Donnie is on the verge of tears yet again-]

Edited 2025-06-30 01:46 (UTC)

[-SPINS ON HEEL AND RUNS FOR THE LAKE

CAN'T CRY MORE IF YOU'RE ALREADY WET AND ALSO MAYBE YOUR BROTHER CAN'T SEE YOU]

[ eh?

a cartoony blinking dotted outline of where donnie was just standing?

very upsetly? ]

[ GIRL, YOU THOUGHT. ]

OH NO YOU DON'T, MISTER!

[ It's literally no wonder why Mikey workshopped Doctor Delicate Touch so early on. Apparently being yourself just isn't enough to demand that attention sometimes. Raph is putting his own pain at seeing a little brother in pain aside, for now. He'll get back to it later. Put it on the list.

Get GRABBED, Donnie. Get absolutely YOINKED. WE'RE NOT SPRINTING OR DIVING AWAY FROM THIS ONE. ]

[DISAPPEARS INTO SHELL

Maybe brother will mistake him for a rock and skip him across the lake]

[ Absolutely not. This makes Raph's job even easier.

He is KEEPING this shell brother. He's plunking down on the ground with him. And he's gonna hug so hard that he risks being compressed into a turtle diamond in there.

Because if Raph doesn't hug he risks just shaking Donnie around like the little bastard he is, which would be mean what with the crying. ]

[The pancake is flattened further into a crepe in his big brother's loving arms.

Even when the squeezing becomes nigh-unbearable, Donnie still manages to stay in his shell for a good couple minutes before finally popping out, going limp like a wrung out dishrag via some deeply ingrained self-defense mechanism as Raph still continues to squeeze. Thoughtfully, at least. Raph is always careful with them, but...a little more careful with him, and Donnie knows it.

He doesn't say anything though, just letting himself be held and squeezed as if he's one of Raph's teddy bears, simultaneously sulking and feeling terrible for himself, and then genuinely feeling terrible because he hadn't meant to just blurt all of that out. He hadn't meant to come off as...as unhinged. Or like some little child, yelling about wanting to go home. None of them are kids anymore. It's not like he's being beaten to death in the Prison Dimension and thinking about wanting his dad.

He's literally just in some other place.

What's he got to complain about.]

[ Okay, good. If Raph had a strategy, that would be step one successful. Man. Imagine being someone who had a whole strategy instead of feeling like a bull in a maze made of china shops.

The anger sputters out while Donnie is stubbornly becoming a crepe, as fast to leave as it was to flare up. ]

I love you. I'm sorry. [ I'm sorry I wasn't there. I'm sorry you're hurting and scared. I'm sorry the project you worked so hard on didn't work. I'm sorry we gotta walk back to the apartment because of the yelling. I'm sorry I yelled. I'm sorry I can't make everything better. I'm sorry pops isn't here. I'm sorry we made you feel like we don't want you forever, no matter what, always. I'm sorry I didn't know you felt like that in the first place.

I'm sorry I got so much stuff to apologize for when I'm supposed to take care of you and keep you safe, and I'm sorry I can't pick just one thing to apologize for, and I'm sorry I can't go down the whole list because the list never ends. ]

Raph wouldn't trust anyone but you to give him a robot eye. Ever. I just-- ain't ready to think about it. That's all. [ He's not sure he could handle the thinking-about-it, let alone the planning-it-then-having-it. The handling of it. He doesn't know how long it would even take to get to being able to handle it. Something in his head that he knows, knows, technically isn't his, but it also feels like his?

Eugh. He's getting the willies just imagining it. Been there, done that, can't convince his brain it wouldn't feel like the exact same thing. Not touching it with a ten foot pole.

(Maybe he should've led with the "not ready." In hindsight. Instead of making Donnie feel like... like all the ways Donnie was feeling about it.)

Which works fine for him, because he thinks it should be lower on the priority list either way. Raph can wait. He can always wait. And he's got brothers to watch his blind spot for him in the meantime. ]

So I'd rather think about all you guys instead. Y'know?

[ Raph has the ever-so-slight suspicion that Donnie does, in fact, very personally know.

Jeez.

What a pair. ]

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