Cowa-booyakasha! | TMNT Oneshots

Static World, Broken Words

Summary-    Donatello lashes out after feeling overwhelmed by his fears: of being ignored, and that he's unable to make enough of a difference in a broken, crazy world. 

Note-    This fanfic is dedicated to my brother, one of the most brilliant people I know and someone who refuses to accept the world as entirely unchangeable. I know you feel like your voice isn't heard, and that some days you have trouble seeing anything but how broken everything is. I believe in you.  

~~~

The clock should have registered some time past midnight. Like everything else in the lab, however, it had stopped working days ago. So Donatello substituted by reaching out a shaky hand for his T-phone, or ignoring time altogether.

After all, time is just a construct, right?

The backup power converter in his hands barely reflected the hours (he knew it had been a few, at least) wasted, and he slowly deposited it amongst other partial projects and empty coffee mugs.

Eh, I'll get back to it later.

His hand hovered by the phone before he turned back to yet another gadget. This one at least more obviously needed repair: a defense mechanism for the Shell-Raiser's tires, split cleanly into two pieces with the offending throwing star still wedged into the core.

"Great. Just great. A dozen things that need inventing, and I'm stuck patching up yet another useless attempt at making myself useful. And not a word of thanks for any of the less exciting jobs. The menial tasks that fall to me, it's always me."

The genius grumbled a few more choice words to the empty room, even as he pried away steel shards.

After a miniature eternity, a now battered device broke free of a rather wicked looking shuriken.

Huh. Maybe the Foot have finally made some upgrades after all. Not that that's a good thing, but they've really lost their touch.

Donnie examined the weapon, first turning it over in his hands, then eventually sliding the thin metal beneath a scope.

Junk. The metal splintered and frayed from where it had mashed into the framework of the shield generator. He doubted it would even be worth melting down and either forging or welding it into something new.

Absolutely useless.

"Heh, kind of like me. Or at least my accomplishments, anyways." He laughed without a scrap of joy or amusement in the sound.

"Way to go Donnie, you pulled two pieces of metal apart and wrecked part of the Shell-Raiser in the process. Real winner, huh. No wonder April doesn't—"

The manic smile left his face when he refused to finish that sentence. The thoughts kept on, though, the doubts returning in the lapse of activity.

So he picked up another project, pushing through the aches in his fingers and heart and mind because even the supposed genius of the family could only distract himself with technology for so long before he turned to static himself. One thing after the other, one push at a time against the anxiety and numbness gripping him tighter than his shell.

"Pull it together, Don. Just until you get to bed. Whenever that happens."

He paused. Contemplated the empty coffee mugs and lack of anything remotely useful to do, fix, create. He could always sleep. Not that resting would do much to help.

Metaphorical beaker half full, however: the exhaustion would almost certainly remove the possibility of nightmares. Hibernating, his brothers unwisely chose to call his all-or-nothing sleep patterns.