Moonlight Mutation (A TMNT Fanfic)

Chapter 15: Purple Power

Destiny stands in the dojo, her entire disposition coming off as drooped. She yawns and stretches her arms up to the ceiling, feeling the pull of her muscles. Donatello stands in front of her, holding a bō staff and looking rather annoyed by her lack of attention.

"Des, can you focus please?" he sighs.

She smacks her lips, running her hands over her face. "Sorry Donnie...I'm just really tired..."

He raises an eye-ridge, resting his free hand on his belt. "You didn't sleep well?"

She shrugs, another yawn leaving her. "I dunno. I guess so...maybe?"

She looks away, tugging at the hem of her shirt. It's like she can feel Donatello's eyes on the back of her head, like if he stares hard enough he could see into her mind and be able to see that she went on a late night rendezvous with his older brother.

"And...maybe I watched some TV when I couldn't sleep?" she says with a sheepish smile.

Donatello sighs, shaking his head slowly. "Des..."

"Well geez, Donnie, I haven't watched TV in at least five years. Give me a break!" she defends, holding her hands up in a surrendering motion.

His lips form a straight line, but with another long breath he shrugs his shoulders and brushes it off. "Fair enough, but you need your sleep if you're going to be at your best." He hands her the bō staff. "I want you to try the spin again, just like I showed you."

Destiny takes the staff from his hand, adjusting her grip and attempting to perform the maneuver Donatello wants to see. She manages to spin it in one 360 degree motion before her hand twists around and the weapon clatters to the floor.

She shuffles backwards, her fingers knitting together at the small of her back as she bites her lip. Donatello chuckles, stooping to get the bō back.

"You were close," he encourages, noting her expression. "It's more like this."

He moves slowly, hand over hand, flipping the staff over and over. He picks up speed, going quicker and quicker until the wooden length is spinning so fast that Destiny can't keep track of where it is. The smoothness of the motions mimic helicopter blades, so much so that his hands don't even look like they're moving.

He stops just as fluidly, flicking the staff up, sliding his foot back, and planting himself as the end hits the ground. A triumphant smirk decorates his face.

Destiny opens and closes her mouth a few times. "Uh...could you go back to the part where you did the thing with the weapon?"

He laughs. "You just need more practice, Des. Don't expect to learn how to do it like how I do on your first try, or the second, or the third..." He pauses. "Okay, even the fiftieth time could be unsuccessful. Point is, you've got to keep going."

He hands her the staff. She takes it, adjusting her grip hesitantly before her green eyes flicker to him for confirmation. Donatello shakes his head, stepping closer.

"No, like this. You've almost got it," he says.

He stands behind her and grasps her wrists, moving them into the correct position gently. Her back hits his plastron, instantly causing a rush of heat to surge through her face. Donatello stops upon noticing her expression.

"You good?"

She nods, flicking her curls over her cheeks. "Fine..."

He makes one more minuscule movement, stretching their arms out in sync. "And now, you just do this."

He moves her hands and arms in the correct motion, going as slowly as possible and then increasing the speed as they go on. After running through it a few times, Donatello steps away and gestures for her to begin.

Destiny takes a deep breath and focuses, trying to revert back to muscle memory. She maneuvers her hands on the weapon carefully, the staff wiggling and wobbling whenever her fingers hit the wrong spots. She gets it to do a more fluid spin only once before it flips out of her hand and knocks her on the head.

The bō hits the floor as Destiny claps her hands over her head, the pitiful whimpering sound of an abandoned puppy leaving her mouth. Donatello hurries over, trying to hold back laughter as he pries her hands from her head.

"Ow..." she whines, her tail hiding between her legs.

"Believe me, Des, that happens a lot," Donatello says, unable to stop himself from smiling faintly. "I got my fair share of hits when I started."

She pouts. The coy look on his face only serves to make her embarrassment deepen, her shoulders becoming hunched. He reaches over, checking her head for any emerging lumps in silence, his fingers brushing her wolf ears in a way that she finds quite pleasant. Destiny bites her lip, her toes shifting in their pressure against the floor.

His hands suddenly stop moving, making her look up. Donatello's russet eyes are focused on the sides of her face, the centre orbs flicking back and forth. Destiny fidgets in place, his hands still hovering over her hair.

"What?" she asks, reaching her own hand up to tug the black streak in her hair.

"You have four ears..." he observes, tone slow, face still slack with some form of awe.

"Oh...yeah," she mumbles. "The human ones don't work."

"Really?" When she nods, he looks down at her. "They never have?"

"Never."

He hesitates as his attention returns to her ears. His eyes almost glow with curiosity and excitement at the prospect of learning something new, something that Destiny has come to notice that about him; he's always ready to learn, despite how it comes across that he knows everything.

"You can examine them, if you want," she whispers.

He grins at the idea, not even stopping to give a response as he drops his fingers to brush her human ears. Destiny tries to keep her breathing steady, although she finds that increasingly difficult what with someone being this close to her face.

"You can't hear anything out of them?" Donatello asks softly.

She nods. "Mmhmm, but the wolf ones work fine." She exhales as his pointer finger graces the helix of her left ear. "If I focus the wolf ones, I can hear the fluctuation of someone's tone...but that's it."

Donatello leans in close to the side of her head, the feeling of his breath against her skin the only indication that he's whispering. She can hear the tones of his voice changing, lifting, falling, rippling like the waves of an ocean.

"Did you hear that?" he asks, pulling away.

She shakes her head. "Nope."

The look on his face is mischievous at best. "Interesting..."

A thoughtful look remains alongside amusement as he watches her. It's the kind of look you give someone when you know something they don't.

Destiny picks up the bō staff and twirls it, taking another deep breath. "I've failed at least five times. If I'm lucky, I'll only have forty-five more failures to go," she says.

He laughs. "Way to stay optimistic, Des."