Stronger

Chapter Sixteen

   "Hmm, I have never seen something like this before."

   Mikey watched, breathlessly, as Donnie, or Donytoo as he called him, studied the powder in a beaker. The once previously white turtle was now an emerald green with a light gold shell. His eyes and face mask did not change colors, however, and the first remained hazel while the other was purple. Every time Mikey looked into those eyes his breath caught. However, only the eyes, the mask color, and his interest in science reminded him of his own brother, who lay on the bed in the lab. Otherwise, this new turtle was too bulky and tall, and his voice and words were different as well.

   "Will you be able to figure out what it is?" he asked, leaning in.

   "Not in a day, no. In a week? I might . . ." His voice trailed off. Mikey deflated.

   "So what? Just keep killing worlds for a week until you have it figured out? I don't want to keep stealing folders for Brief."

   "And I don't want that any more than you do. But whatever this is, it comes from another planet. As does this illness." He stared at the two unconscious brothers, his ever wide eyes drinking in the color and his other self.

   Mikey sighed and rubbed his hands together. When Donytoo had first appeared on his Earth, he had been shocked at the sight of so much color in one room that his body had gone on overdrive and he was unable to move for an hour. Now that he had finally made the turtle even look at the powder, he was no closer.

   "Well, what do you think it is?" he asked.

   Donytoo did not answer him. It appeared that he had not even heard him, because he mumbled to himself and ran his blocky fingers over everything in the lab.

   "Incredible! I have never seen such a geeked out microscope! And all these solutions! I bet I could remember them from their color alone! No more needing stickers to label everything." He paused. "Although I might still need to, with the brothers that I have."

   Mikey tried again. "Donytoo. What do you think it is?"

   He continued to mumble to himself.

   "DONYTOO!"

   The turtle flinched, and Mikey's brothers moaned at the sudden volume. "What?" he asked, somewhat annoyed.

   "Do you even have an idea about what it could be?" he asked, gesturing to the gray mixture of powder with water. "Something at least sort of similar that might heal my brothers too?"

   Donytoo shook his head with a small sigh. "It looks completely different than anything I have ever seen before. I might be able to find something similar, but I doubt it would have the same effect."

   "Well, then, what was the point of studying it through any of Donnie's gadgets that you could get your hands on?" he demanded.

   "Mostly to see if we could duplicate it. But also to see everything here," he admitted sheepishly. Mikey rolled his eyes, realizing that what he actually mostly did was swarm himself with his brother's toys.

   "Yeah, well, that's shell and all, but I didn't bring you here just so you can flabbergast yourself with everything here. That was why you came alone, remember? So nobody would be a distraction! I need you! My brothers need you!"

   Smiling sheepishly, Donytoo placed a bottle with a purple liquid inside of it down on the table. "Sorry. But you have to admit, all this color is amazing! I can't understand it! Back where I live, we have to earn our colors. So when we are born, even our eyes are white. We have two levels to becoming a Warrior. When we complete the first level, we get our Eye Colors. When we complete the second one, we get our Colors. I have purple. So, coming from a world where you have to earn your colors and popping into one where it's even on trash, is like being dunked into a tub full of ice."