I love suffering, don't you? Inspired by this art by @sarathrwizard
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Donnie stared at the screen with a slack jaw, eyes glued to the You died! message that had popped up. His latest Minecraft build was absolutely destroyed. He could see the remains in the background of the death screen. He'd been almost finished! Just the last few bits of decoration had been left! And now… hours upon hours of work. Gone in an instant.
A long, frustrated groan escaped him and he tossed the controller to the side, prompting Leo to glance up from his phone and take in the words on the screen, as well.
“Wait,” Leo said. “What happened?”
Donnie pursed his lips. “...Nothing.”
Leo smirked, putting away his phone and leaning closer. “Oooooh it’s embarrassing, isn’t it? Tell me. Tell meeeeeeeee.”
Ugh. Here we go. “Drop it, Nardo.”
“Come on, Don-Tron.” The amusement in his tone made Donnie cluck his tongue, and he pointedly ignored his brother. Leo leaned closer, practically draping himself across Donnie’s right side before he was irritably shoved away, only to start repeating “tell me” over and over, poking Donnie in his side with each utterance of the phrase. Donnie reached for his tech bo just to have something to squeeze that wasn’t Leo’s neck and shot him the nastiest look he could manage. It did nothing whatsoever to deter Leo, though, who was still smirking and poking and being an annoying goddamn menace. “Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me, t-”
“Oh would you - Kassinove! Fine!”
Leo sat back, giving Donnie a smile that somehow managed to look both completely innocent and infuriatingly smug at the same time. Donnie sighed and looked at the screen again. You died! still stared back at him. He shook his head, looking anywhere but at Leo, his mouth twisting into a grimace as a noticeable blush crept up his neck. “I was trying to fix the lighting system and… I placed down a block of TNT instead of a block of redstone… and…”
He glanced back at Leo, whose eyes widened. “Wait, so you killed yourself AND blew up your house? With your own TNT?”
“...I forgot it was in my hotbar.”
Leo was still for a moment, and then he burst into hysterical laughter, bending forward and clutching at his stomach. “PFFFFFFFT oh my GOD!”
Donnie just scowled, watching with growing self-consciousness as Leo continued to lose his absolute shit at what was apparently the funniest thing he'd heard all week. He waited for the laughter to die down, but each time he thought it would, Leo suddenly dissolved into renewed giggles once more.
As the laughter dragged, on and on and on, Donnie found himself getting more and more annoyed. He'd put a lot of time and effort into this stupid build. Leo knew that - he'd been hanging out here a lot over the last two weeks, just chilling while Donnie worked, so he'd actually seen most of the progress in real-time.
Donnie heaved an enormous sigh as Leo continued laughing, smacking his knee obnoxiously.
Okay, enough. It wasn’t that funny.
Leo swiped a finger under his eye before wheezing out, “Donnie, that was so dumb of you!”
Donnie bristled, feeling the embarrassment and annoyance spill over. He let out a harsh breath, snarling, “Oh just- wipe that grin off your face!”
A sudden choking sound had ice shooting through Donnie's veins, his irritation instantly disappearing. Leo was still as stone, his expression of mirth replaced by wide-eyed terror. His eyes held a faraway look, and for a long, terrible moment it seemed like he couldn’t quite manage to inhale.
Donnie felt his brows furrow. He reached out but left his hand hovering in the air between them, hesitant. “Leo?”
Leo didn’t answer, but he did finally start to breathe. Short, rasping breaths stuttered out of him, and he blinked rapidly a few times, clutching at the fabric of his hoodie over his chest. Leo was shaking, Donnie realized, and then Leo let out a high-pitched whine and Donnie started to panic.
“Leo, what’s wrong? How can I help?”
He still didn’t answer.
Donnie clenched and unclenched his fists uselessly, floundering. Not wanting to make things worse and unsure what he could do to make things better. He didn’t know what was even - didn’t know what had - maybe a scan would tell him? - but when Donnie lowered his goggles, Leo jerked away from him so hard he fell onto the floor. Donnie watched, horrified, as Leo scrambled backward until his shell hit the wall hard, his eyes never leaving Donnie’s face. His entire body was trembling, little, terrified sounds slipping out of him that made Donnie’s chest tighten and his stomach drop, and now Donnie was really fucking panicking.
He stood and took a step toward Leo, but that made Leo flinch violently again, his hand raising as if to shield himself and his shell making an unpleasant scraping noise as he pressed himself further against the wall. Donnie stayed still. Unsure and panicking and useless useless useless.
An agonized sound clawed out of Leo’s throat. There was a slight shake of his head, his eyes still glued to Donnie, before he started to whimper. “No, no, no. No, I - I escaped from - this isn’t - you’re not real, you’re not-”
A box popped up in the interface of his goggles, pulling Donnie’s focus. NO MEDICAL ANOMALIES IDENTIFIED. PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS CORRELATE WITH EMOTIONAL DISTRESS. PRIMARY CONCLUSION: PANIC ATTACK.
Fuck. Fuck. Okay.
Donnie swallowed and licked his lips, thinking. Should he call Mikey or Raph? Would more people make it worse? What was he supposed to do? He pushed his goggles back up, still trying to think think think, and Leo’s babbling abruptly cut off.
For a long moment, both brothers were frozen. Staring at one another. And then something in Leo’s eyes changed and he took in a sudden, shuddering breath before lowering his arm and clutching at his hoodie again with a trembling hand. He swiped his other hand across his face, and when it dropped he was no longer looking at Donnie. He stared at the floor, his face perfectly, completely blank, and the silence was so, so loud.
Donnie wrung his hands and watched his twin, still afraid to advance. “Leo? Are you-”
“I’m fine,” he said flatly.
That was very much a fucking lie, but before Donnie could say anything Leo pushed himself unsteadily to his feet and stumbled out of the room. Donnie blinked in shock, his mouth hanging open and his brows furrowed. He watched Leo retreat until he disappeared around the corner, then pressed his lips into a thin line.
He should go after him. Right? He should… find out what the fuck just happened. And why. And whether it had happened before.
Donnie sat down, twisting his fingers in his lap and trying to keep his breaths steady. He needed to go talk to Leo. He needed to go talk to Leo. He needed to go talk to Leo.
Why wasn’t he moving?
…Donnie would go to him. He would. He just… needed to do some research first. He needed to be prepared. In case it happened again. Just some research. Some preparation. And then they would… talk.
Winner gets chosen by T̵̺͍̖͇̬͚͚̙͕̻̳̹͈̹́͗͜h̶̨͕͍̲̀ę̵̛̘̲̥̝̳̥̑̈͊̎͆̓̃̎̾͋͆̕ͅ ̷͕̺̤͕̲̩̬̱͕͕̉̏̓̃͐̎͠͝ͅw̷̝̻͙͓̫̓̒͛̏̑̽͛͘̕ͅh̶̨̆ẽ̸͚̆͐͒̌e̷̲̼̺͚̹̼̿̀͒̃̀̍̔̍̀́̓͝͝ĺ̷̮͑̿ (also known as random)
Winner gets a lineart drawing with flat colours. Character of choice!
Don't care about winning? Just tag :3c
Ps: feel free to @ me in your finished product!
Ibis records everything, apparently. How Donnie of it!
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