Chapter Text
Donnie ducked as a sword was flung his way. He pressed a button on his tech bo - one of many buttons he'd spent hours memorizing. The end of his staff elongated and suddenly, it was a chainsaw, whirring noisily. The foot soldier in front of him let go of his arm and suddenly fled. Donnie swung out his staff and it caught the foot ninja's side, shredding it into confetti.
Leo flipped up beside him, swinging his sword madly and slicing through several ninjas at the same time. Confetti showered around them, as if they were at a party.
"'Tello, you good?" Leo asked.
"You know it, 'Nardo," Donnie replied.
Donnie blocked a punch and stabbed his staff forward, piercing through several more. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Raph punch a couple off of the roof of the building. Mikey fought beside him, and with his mystic weapon, actually caught several of them on fire. He let out a whoop as they writhed, attempting to beat out the flames.
Donnie was so distracted by his directly younger brother, (a fact that he would never admit to Leo; even if he was biologically younger he was still mentally older and that still counted) he didn't realize someone was behind him.
He didn't realize they were pressing down on his battle shell's release button.
He only realized when he felt cold night air on his softshell and whirled around to stab the ninja in the gut.
His battleshell fell to the ground with a clank that was muffled by the sounds of the battle. Donnie bent down to pick it up.
Along his softshell, he felt a thin line of cold metal.
Donnie froze. Whoever had him trapped was smart. And from the way they were silently threatening him, he knew they wanted something. He stood there, waiting for them to speak.
They never did.
Donnie took a deep breath and darted away.
He didn't miss the way they pressed the blade down as he escaped, or the way his shell burnt like fire afterwards. It felt like got lava was being poured onto it. It took all his willpower to keep from screaming.
Donnie stabbed the ninja in the head and watched as the confetti rained down. He picked up his battle shell and put it on his back, wincing at the touch against the wound.
This was bad.
But the fight was pretty much over. Raph and Leo were working together to chase off the rest of the ninjas, while Mikey was gazing around for any more. The remaining ninjas were few in number and were easily killed by a swing of Leo's sword. Leo gave a dramatic flourish as he turned around and gave Donnie a triumphant grin.
"We ought to make paper mache with those guys," he said, and Raph pushed him afterwards. Leo stumbled, nearly falling off of the roof and waving his arms wildly. Once he'd regained his balance, he turned to Raph. "If you push me off a roof, you'll be as bad as Baron Draxum," he said.
Raph chuckled. "Didn't Baron throw you off the roof?"
"It's still the same thing!" Leo insisted.
"I don't believe it is," Donnie said, trying to seem as monotone and aloof as he always was. "The words 'thrown' and 'push' are not synonyms."
"Well, what do you know?" Leo said angrily.
"I know more than you," Donnie said, staring down at his wristpiece as he typed in several buttons. His battle shell started to hover and he watched in displeasure as Raph grabbed the edge. "Please be careful this time, Raph."
"What do you mean?" Raph replied angrily. "I'm always careful!"
"Last time, you dented the titanium. Seriously, how do you dent titanium?"
"And you've forgotten your wallet!" Mikey added, suddenly eager to talk. "And you've gotten slammed into a tree! And you-"
"Alright, I get it!" Raph fumed. "I'll be careful."
Donnie tuned out the conversation as he lifted off with the three of them dangling off of his battle shell.
It hurt.
It was like fire and volcanoes and ash. And it didn't help that blood had already dried against his battle shell and was being pulled off with every motion his brothers made. It also didn't help that the cut spanned almost his entire shell, slicing from top to bottom, left to right.
His heart was pounding in his ears and he could see blackness marching in on all sides of his vision. His thoughts slowed from their normal hyper-speed pace as the blood loss caught up to him.
Donnie blinked.
And then he was in his lab.
He blinked several more times in confusion. How did he get here so fast? Why did it feel like everything was sliding around?
Well. No matter. Now he needs to focus on fixing his shell.
"Initiate Code Red: Operation Shell 32," Donnie said to his lab. The 3 stood for how old he was - he was the 3rd oldest - and the 2 stood for how many pieces his shell was in. Basically, it stood for 'Donatello's shell is broken into two pieces.'
A metal table rolled out of a compartment, and he laid along it. A screen popped up, showing the question, 'Is the battle shell still on?'
Donnie clicked 'yes'. A pair of mechanical arms descended from the ceiling. One clicked the release button, and then they both hefted the shell up and dropped it to the side.
It fell with a loud CLANG, and now Donnie was very glad he'd soundproofed his lab.
Donnie clicked a few more buttons, and then a camera screen of his shell opened up along with a series of pictures of different cracked shells. Donnie gagged when he saw what his shell looked like.
It had a large crack in it, with blood oozing out of it and a couple shell fragments floating in the scarlet liquid. It was so horrible, and sickly gory; he was glad none of his brothers had seen it.
Donnie tapped on the pictures that looked the most like his shell, and he did that for a while, until the computer had a perfect analysis of what it looked like.
With a sigh, Donnie clicked the 'okay' button on the screen.
The arms came down and started working.
It was some time later when the work was finally done, and Donnie had been screaming for a while. He was grateful for the opportunity to get up and get a glass of water. As he slid off of the metal table and watched it slide back into the wall, he felt the stitches be tugged on a little by his movements, and he winced.
Donnie put on his battle shell, which had been polished and cleaned by his mechanical arms. He opened the door to his lab and walked out and over to the living room.
"Dee!" Mikey immediately shouted. "Where have you been?"
"I had a very minor wound," Donnie said, which was true. The shell thing was minor, he shouldn't bring it up because it wasn't that big of a deal and all his brothers have faced much worse than that. "It just needed a few stitches."
"Stitches suck," Leo said, from where he was playing Mario Kart 8 on the floor with Raph. Leo shot out a blue shell and it hit Raph's car right before he got to the finish line, giving Leo, who was in second place, the perfect chance to get past him. Raph gave Leo an angry glare as Leo grinned at him.
"Rematch!" Raph shouted, and Leo shrugged.
"Okay, big man."
Donnie smiled as he turned away from them and sat on a kitchen chair to watch Mikey cook.
It was going to be fine, he told himself. All fine.
Hiding an injury isn't that hard... right?