You're Needed Here Now, Donnie

Chapter 2 - Of Bikes and Sensei

*Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise.

*Author's Note: Here is chapter 2 of 'You're Needed Here Now, Donnie.' The genius turtle's bad night is about to get even worse. I really hope you enjoy the chapter. If you like it, please let me know. I would appreciate the feedback. Thank you!  CJ

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Chapter 2 – Of Bikes and Sensei

The Stealth Bike was parked exactly where Donnie had left it earlier in the night, just outside of the warehouse where Donnie had been kidnapped on account of his own stupidity. Fortunately for Donnie, Karai and her rabble of cronies had no interest in stealing the motorcycle that the genius turtle had built. They were apparently only interested in stealing Donnie. That was actually great news for Donatello, because if they would have stolen the Stealth Bike, Raphael most likely would have killed Donnie for taking it out in the first place. Even though Donnie had crafted the bike for all of them to use, somewhere along the line, Raph had sort of laid claim to the bike and everyone had started referring to it as 'Raph's bike.' Donnie wasn't about to question the claim. Donnie valued his fully functional limbs too much to argue with Raph about something as trivial as whose bike it was.

Using the shadows to conceal himself, Donnie leaned over the side of the dilapidated building he had been perched on top of the past ten minutes and silently inspected the alleyway below him. His aching head throbbed in protest of his decision to bend down and his stomach threatened to expel its contents to the world below. It seemed like even the slightest bit of movement triggered more throbbing in his skull, which, in turn, made him even queasier. It was a vicious circle. Donnie winced and pressed his shaky right hand over the top of his head in hopes of relieving some of the escalating pain from his migraine. He had also been trying to disregard the fact that his skin felt much warmer to the touch than it probably should have, but it was getting kind of hard to ignore it at this point. Especially since he had now broken out into a cold sweat and he was starting to shiver uncontrollably even though it wasn't even cold outside. Much to Donnie's dismay, the aspirin he had taken earlier was not only failing to knock down the headache, but it was also failing to reduce his steadily rising internal temperature. The headache and the fever raging through his body were making it harder and harder for Donnie to think straight.

Focus, Donatello, he reminded himself, knowing that if he let himself dwell on the pain afflicting him, his reasoning faculties would be compromised and his reaction time would be significantly slower.

In the back of his mind, Donnie could hear one of his father's favorite sayings ringing out. 'Pain is an illusion.' As a self-taught scientist and practitioner, Donnie could not be entirely convinced that this statement was, in fact, accurate. Donatello had a respectable understanding of how the body and central nervous system worked and the different types and classifications of pain. He possessed a great deal of knowledge about nociceptive and neuropathic factors, as well as inflammatory mediators and psychogenic disturbances, which all worked in tandem to disprove the theory of pain being said 'illusion.' Not only was their sufficient scientific evidence to refute Master Splinter's philosophy on pain, there was physical and anecdotal evidence as well. Donnie had been in pain plenty of times in his life, and, not once, did that pain feel like a sensorial illusion. It felt like . . . well . . . pain. A part of Donnie had always figured that alleging that pain was an illusion was just Master Splinter's way of getting them to stop whining when they were hurt. Plus, Donnie had seen Master Splinter in pain before. If it was in fact an illusion, why did Master Splinter head straight for the freezer and grab a cheesicle every time he was hurting?

Of course, Donatello had never actually had the guts to verbally question the validity of Master Splinter's hallowed statement, knowing that such impudence would most likely result in a lesson on pain that Donatello would undoubtedly never forget.