You guys told me I could, so here's another draft. This time from an unposted story that was meant to be a 2003 and 2012 crossover. The premise was that the 2012 are still fairly untraumatized and continually act like their goober selves, which leads the 2003 turtles to doubt them and their abilities. They don't take them very seriously on missions. And the 2012 boys think they're really cool and want them to like them, so they let themselves be micromanaged. But, one by one, the 2003 turtles realize that these boys have some tricks up their sleeves
(This is too long to screenshot, so have a draft segment instead.)
Splinter watches curiously as one of the turtles splits from the group, inching closer to the machine despite all previously given warnings. When he makes it there without intervention, his eyes light up, and he disappears behind it. Nobody notices.
Splinter says nothing.
"I could redirect the signal so that it doesn't take out half of New York while Shredder is trying to get to us," Donatello says as he glances over what's left of all the brothers and his father. "But that would still leave some danger."
"Why not just break tha thing?" Raphael demands.
"He could just build another," Leo says with a furrowed brow as he cups his chin. "We're looking for a permanent solution here."
"But the longer we stand around chatting about it, the closer the baddies get!" Michelangelo speaks up, earning several nervous nods from Mikey.
"We can handle the bozos." Raph scoffs dismissively; his certainty earns him a frown from the older turtle's father. "Finding yourself cocky in the face of danger could be your undoing, young Raphael."
"Yeah, yeah." Raph sighs before Donatello brings them back to the matter at hand. "I could try a virus that would take out all the data, but that would take too long to configure, and I don't know if we'll have another chance to-"
The room was suddenly bathed in darkness. By the time the light returned, all the ninja were stiff in preparation and scanning their surroundings. A nervous laugh drew their attention to a sheepish Donnie as he pops up from behind the machine. "Sorry, sorry, my bad- Hit the power cord. That thing is huge. Takes a lot of juice. I'm surprised the foot can get it to run."
"Wha- Don't touch that!" Raphael commands as he pops back out of their eyesight. All four of their alternates head forward to stop him, only for Donnie's brothers to instinctively move in their way. Leo has both his swords in the path of Leonardo and Donatello.
Leonardo's eyes are narrowed. "What are you doing?"
While his brothers look for his direction, Leo's are doing the same. He nods approvingly at them and then quietly snaps, "Wait."
"But he-"
"Wait," Splinter repeats cooly. His sons reluctantly stand down.
Leo gives him a grateful look and then raises his voice with a calculated politeness, "Donnie, why are you in the machine?"
"I'm fixing our problem!"
"Oh, yeah?" He asks innocently. "How are you doing that, Dee?"
"I am..." The young genius is out of breath but eager, completely oblivious to what's happening in the same room as him. "Working... To.. Reconfigure... The blast radius... So when the Foot... Try... Turning this thing on... Done!"
He gives a short, satisfied cheer and then reappears, dropping down from the platform and next to them, dusting off his hands. "It'll self-destruct on itself. The Foot will be taken down by their own weapon, and presumably believe it was their own fault. Classifying the weapon as unstable and leaving you some more time before they even consider using it again."
The young Donnie beams a gap-revealing smile at the startled older turtles and stops by Raph's side; Donatello separates from the group to hurry over to the machine.
Title: I Only Sink Deeper the Deeper I Think
Day: Whumptober 2023, Day 29
Prompt: “I only sink deeper the deeper I think” Scented Candle/Troubled Past Resurfacing/ “What happened to me?”
Fandom: TMNT 2003
Word Count: 896
Author: aquietwritingcorner/realitybreakgirl
Rating: T
Characters: Donatello, Splinter
Warning: NA
Summary: The Triceriton Mind Probe didn’t leave Donatello unscarred. While he managed to keep himself together for a few hours, trauma doesn’t go away. Now, with his memories shattered and broken, all Don can do is try to understand what’s happening to him.
Notes:
AO3 || ff.net
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I Only Sink Deeper the Deeper I Think
Don shivered. Where was he? What room was he in? It was dark, and the only light came from candles. There was a blanket around him, brown, scratchy, but familiar somehow. He wasn’t sure how it was familiar, but it was. The room seemed the same. Familiar, but not. He was on some sort of bedding, and one wall seemed to be some sort of screen. Thin wood ran in rows and columns, making squares, and light filtered through the paper over them. And the candles. They were everywhere. There was a warm yellow light from their glow, and a scent. There was something about that scent…
Something moved, taking his attention and Don slowly looked over towards the movement, drawing the blanket closer around him. Where was he? What was that? His brow furrowed as he tried to think.
The room was familiar and warm. It felt like safety. But he also remembered feeling terrible in here. But when he felt terrible, he could remember someone there. A soft hand, a warm voice. Comfort. Yes, yes there was comfort. He remembered being sick in this room. He remembered his father taking care of him, singing to him.
Except that it wasn’t this room, was it? It was a different room. He was thinking of a smaller room, in a different place. Yes, a different place where his brothers and him slept on bunkbeds together. Why wasn’t he there? With his toys and his brothers and his father?
Wait—toys? Did he even have toys? No. No, now he had tools. He could make things. Things that brought water and heat and electricity. And that brought them to… to where? Where was he bringing those things? It was like the answer was there, but it was slipping away from him.
Slipping away… like he did. Like they did. Like they did because they were ninja. Only they didn’t always slip away. Sometimes they got caught. Sometimes things happened. Like the home that crumbled with his toys in it.
He remembered his toys. He remembered that place. He remembered playing in there. Watching TV, wrestling with his brothers, playing games, hearing stories. These things passed through his brain quickly. He smiled at them, or at least he did at first. But something was wrong. He could see himself doing these things, but he couldn’t remember why. He couldn’t remember anything but that moment. All other context was gone.
Was there other context? Or was this all there was? His brow furrowed deeper as he tried to think. Those were his brothers in his memories, but why couldn’t he remember things about them. He remembered Mikey with a hurt ankle, but he couldn’t remember how he hurt his ankle. He remembered Raph with a pipe standing over Mikey, but he didn’t understand why that was happening. He remembered looking at Leo, beaten, but he had no idea how he had gotten that way. He didn’t know who the red-headed human woman was, or why she felt safe. He didn’t understand why he wasn’t upset at seeing Raph and a dark-headed man rolling around on the ground. He didn’t know why he saw his father floating in an orange pod. Why was the robot man important? What were the little rounded creatures? Why were there dinosaurs?
Why couldn’t he remember anything? Why was his memory in pieces? He could feel the panic start to kick in. He tried to think harder, tried to recall what had happened, but it was like the harder he tried to catch the memories, the deeper he went into them, tried to sink into them, the deeper into confusion he went.
He couldn’t remember details of his childhood. He couldn’t remember things that he knew were important. There were gaps, there were holes, there were pieces. It was like something had come into his mind and taken a hammer to his memories, shattering them and leaving the pieces scattered.
One jumped out, and he tried to grab it, to look at it. It was the dinosaurs. Only they weren’t exactly dinosaurs, and they were putting something on his head, and he couldn’t get it off and—why, why, why, there was so much pain, it felt like he was breaking into pieces—
“Donatello! I am with you!”
There was a familiar smell. Candles. Candle wax. That particular scent. It was familiar. It was comforting. He looked up. Warm gray hands were on his. A concerned, but loving face stared into his.
“M…Master Splinter?”
His father nodded. “Yes, my son. I am here. I am with you.”
Don looked at his father with scared, terrified eyes. “What happened to me?”
Splinter reached up and cupped his son’s face. “You have been injured, my son. An injury of the mind. But I am here. Your family is here. And we will help you.”
Don stared at his father. His breath hitched. “I don’t—I don’t—”
Splinter watched as his son’s eyes clouded over again, the moment of clarity once again lost to the inner turmoils of his broken mind. Splinter closed his eyes too, the grief for what was happening nearly overwhelming him. And then he opened them, took a breath, and returned his attention to his panicked and shattered son, and to the work of helping him rebuild his mind and traverse this hardship.
Aight. I’m bored, and have no new art to post, and I don’t feel like writing about my lore, sooo…
Ladies and Gentlemen, Goblin Inquisition presents a brand new feature (published on a strict “Whenever I’m bored and have nothing better to do” schedule] called ✨Goblin Just Ranting About Characters And Stories He Likes✨
(better name pending)
Today’s target? My personal Favorite Villain Ever: The One True Shredder, also called The Demon Shredder [Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles].
What makes this one so great? does he get a lot of screen time? No. Does he have good goals? Absolutely Not. Is his story arc in the show unique? Kinda.
Then what makes him good?
Short answer? Everything. Let’s start at the basics: Demon Shredder is basically a combination of the normal Shredder from that incarnation of the Turtles (2002, the best one.) combined with Dracula from castlevania, and Dio from JoJo’s bizarre adventure. His goal is simple: “Remake the world how I see fit”. He views everything with a sadistic sort of glee. Everything it a toy to play with and break. From reality to basic human emotions. Add in the excellent buildup to his big reveal, AND the absolutely chilling voice acting, and it all adds up to one Villain absolutely dripping with power and Evil. I HIGHLY recommend you seek out the entirety of the Ninja Tribunal arc for yourself, and seeing one of the best incarnations of The Shredder ever.
And if you disagree, well, at least he’s more competent and has a better voice than 80’s Shredder.
