Raphael (When the Dust Settles)
The amnesia stripped him of so many of his memories.
But he did remember some things. Donnie often retold some of their adventures to him if there were ever parts he was foggy on.
Don was there to fill in the gaps.
And so, he remembers.
He remembers Donnie. The Donnie from his memories is not like the Donnie he knows now. At least, not physically. He's still... him, he knows, but he always felt like there was something missing.
He can hear Donnie's smile when he talks but can't see it. Finds that he misses it. He misses the gap in his teeth and the way his reddish-brown eyes would go a little wild whenever he had a crazy idea. He missed the lively, excited expression on his face when an experiment proved his hypothesis true (or rather, did not prove his hypothesis to be untrue, as he used to say) or when he successfully engineered a new invention.
They were so uniquely... Donnie. Inspiration struck his younger brother often and the Donnie of his memories used to exude pride in his own genius shamelessly. He found it obnoxious back then but finds himself longing for it now.
Don's returned from scavenging, hauling supplies over his titanium shell. It's vaguely reminiscent of the way he used to position his bo staff on his shoulders and relax his forearms over it. "This should be enough firewood for a couple hours," he says.
Donnie retained the lisp from the gap in his teeth, despite no longer having any.
Raph smiles because of it, and decides to be grateful for it; another one of Donnie's uniquely Donnie attributes that he vows to never again tease his brother for.
His younger brother seats himself next to him, huddles by the fire he doesn't need to keep warm and the smoke he can't smell. He reminds himself to be grateful that he still has Don, who is, most certainly, still the Donatello. Even if his flesh and bones have been replaced with titanium and steel.
He's old and grey now, and one day, Donnie'll outlive him and he'll never stop outliving him because he won't age. He won't feel the weathering of his shell or the looseness of his skin. He will never know elderliness. He will just... be.
But he thinks Don will be okay.
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Currently emotional over Ad Astra per Aspera.
Because both @the-redhead-in-a-dress and @emonydeborah are brilliant and reminded me to check my facts.
Except my facts include a baby Una at 12 having to watch her parents genuinely debate over getting her medical attention because without it she would die, but with it she might be condemned to a life of prison and torture.
And definitely not going to talk about the moment where Neera realized that Una had listened to her, had tried and it came back to bite her hard. And then Una turning that back around at her but you were still right and I'm still sorry.
Nope. Not thinking about it.
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