Digital Mutation (Book Five)

Chapter 4: Reality Ruined My Life

"Hey, Raph?" Leonardo calls, heading into the dojo.

Raphael tenses at the sound of his brother's voice. Leonardo gets further into the room, his expression concerned yet understanding. He opens his mouth to speak but Raphael whirls around and stops him.

"No," he growls, pointing back towards the door. "Don't even try."

Leonardo ignores the request and carefully steps over a toppled rack of weapons. "Mikey wasn't trying to be mean," he starts. "He's just a little—"

"Idiotic?" Raphael mutters.

"I was going to say giddy," Leonardo corrects. "He was just excited about Annalise replying to him."

Raphael huffs and kicks a loose bō staff across the room. "I just..." He stops, sucks in a deep breath, and tries to relax his shoulders. "I can't stop thinking about her."

The blue-masked turtle lets out a soft hum and nods, crossing his arms over his chest. "Yeah, I know."

He sighs again, starting to pick up the weapons that he knocked over. He doesn't meet Leonardo's gaze. "I saw her the other night coming out of the Argosy." He shakes his head, lips pressing together in a wobbly line. "There was another guy. They were holding hands, smiling, the whole thing. She's moved on."

Leonardo picks up the empty rack and sets it back up, starting to rearrange the fallen weapons on it as Raphael hands them over. "You broke up...sort of."

"We weren't together."

"Exactly, so...do you blame her? She couldn't stay hung up on you forever."

Raphael hates to hear it, although he knows that he needs to. Leonardo is telling him the hard truth. He nods and mumbles out, "Yeah."

"You'll be okay, Raph," Leonardo says, fixing an onō axe onto the rack before turning back to his forlorn brother. "As for Mikey, if he teases you again, just try and drop it. Lashing out isn't going to do anything."

"He shouldn't joke about it."

"He shouldn't, but I'm sure he knows that now." A tense smile. "You know, he was just trying to cheer you up. Make light of a bad situation, you know?"

Raphael finishes cleaning up the weapons, crossing his arms over his chest as he glares at the wall. "Well, there are tons of other things he could do instead of mentioning her."

"I know, but Mikey is..."

"Mikey."

"Yeah."

Unbeknownst to them, Michelangelo had heard every word. He backs away from the dojo entrance, stomach twisted in knots, heart heavy. He scolds himself internally as he shuffles back to his room, no longer ready to apologize to Raphael, instead focused on reminding himself of how stupid and insensitive he is. He got so happy about Annalise that he ended up poking a bear with a stick.

He sighs and looks at his t-phone, where one of Annalise's videos is paused. She's smiling up at him, headphones on, cheeks rosy.

"You'd understand me," he mumbles. "Wouldn't you?"

The blonde trapped behind the screen doesn't respond. He presses play and she jumps back to life.

"And you know what? You're the only you that there is, and if you is normal, you is boring." She giggles and Michelangelo's heart soars.

Her words make him smile and he wishes that he could hug her through his phone. He wishes he could hold her close and tell her just how much she means to him, how her videos make him feel better when nothing else will, how she is, in a way, his hero.

Reality smacks him across the face. She doesn't know that he exists and if she saw him in real life, she would be scared of him, just like every other human that he's ever met. He sighs.

The subscription page at the bottom of the screen wiggles as a number one appears at its head. His eyes widen and he exits Annalise's video to press it.

DeepFriedDonutLisey uploaded "Surprise Shoutout Announcement!"

He perks up and presses the video with lightning speed. Annalise waves at the camera, welcoming viewers to the Donut Box, and she continues on to explain that she knows this video is being uploaded at a strange time, but that she couldn't wait.

Michelangelo watches with wide, sparkling eyes as she tells him and any other viewers that she will be doing a shoutout "draw-contest-type thing". He giggles as she sighs at the camera and puts disappointed music over top in greyscale.

"Sorry, I'm not sure what to call it," she says with a shrug. "Basically, I'm going to be selecting 23 random winners to join me in a Minecraft Hunger Games video on my own server. If you want to enter, click the link below. More instructions over there." Arrows pop up on the screen that mirrors where she's pointing. "I'll be announcing winners tomorrow evening, 8:30 p.m EDT, so go go go!"

Michelangelo scrolls to the link and clicks it. It opens another website with a few questions on it and the promised instructions. Heart-pounding, he starts typing out his answers as fast as he can. If he can't meet her in real life, playing a video game with her is the next best thing.