You're Needed Here Now, Donnie

Chapter 8 - A Churn for the Worse

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

*Author's Note: Chapter 8 of 'You're Needed Here Now, Donnie' is here. Thanks so much to everyone who has been reading this story. Please let me know if you like it. I would love the feedback. ;) CJ

-------------------------- 

Chapter 8 – A Churn for the Worse

Seeing Donnie's eyelids fluttering made Leonardo's heart instantly begin to palpitate in an erratic rhythm and he thought his heart might stop altogether at the sight of his injured brother coming to. It was indisputably the best thing that had happened all night.

Without any regard for his two other brothers' whereabouts or what they were doing at the time, Leo leaned down and gently lifted Donnie up. He slipped his arm behind the genius's neck to cradle him in a semi-upright position, supporting Donnie's head with the inside of his elbow the way one would when holding an infant.

Donnie let out a small groan in objection to the movement that almost sounded like the kind of groan that one would make when the alarm clock went off earlier than their liking.

"Donnie," Leo said, quiet enough so as not to startle Donnie, but loud enough to help navigate his brother out of the stupor that he was in. Leo repeated his little brother's name for good measure, and then, Leo, Raph, and Mikey waited with baited breath for Donnie to react.

After a bit more fluttering, Donnie's eyelids finally parted ways and his eyes rolled around in their sockets like they were a pair of pinballs, unable to focus on anything in particular. He started making a series of nonsensical babbling and cooing noises that sounded like he was gargling his tongue while trying to moan something along the line of "ooh-ow-eh-awuh-ooh-ow-eh-awuh." The last time Leo had heard Donnie gibbering like that was not long after Mikey had spilled some of the Brain Worm serum on Donnie's hand, which had caused the genius to gradually lose his intelligence for reasons still unknown. Leo prayed that Donnie wasn't having a relapse of the degenerative brain condition the serum had triggered, because he didn't think that he could take watching his brilliant little brother lose his smarts again. It was hard enough to live through it the first time. They had been very fortunate that Mikey was able to concoct Donnie an antidote, using his "phonographic memory," as Mikey had put it. As much as Leo loved his baby brother, somehow, he couldn't bring himself to believe that Mikey could successfully prepare the cure a second time. After all, Leo still couldn't believe that Mikey had managed to do it the first time . . .

Leo continued to nervously peer down at his second youngest brother. Finally, Donnie's reddish-brown eyes settled on him. Donnie's jabbering ceased and he blearily gaped up at the turtle hovering over him, blinking repeatedly as though he didn't trust his own eyesight.

"L – Leo?" Came Donnie's croaky-sounding voice.

It was impossible to ignore how fragile Donnie sounded and even more impossible not to be riddled with concern over it, but at least he was conscious. They all had that to be thankful for.

"Hey, Donnie," Leo chirped elatedly, his voice cracking of its own accord, but he didn't mind at all. He gazed down at his little brother with the warmest of smiles on his face, vaguely aware that he had started to rock Donnie back and forth.

"H – hey," Donnie raggedly exhaled and barely any sound came out. He then tried to shape his lips into a reciprocating smile, but the final product was watery at best and bore only a miniscule semblance of an actual smile. It still managed to make all three of his brothers' hearts melt.

"It's about time you woke up, little brother," Raph said from over Leo's shoulder, trying and failing to sound unruffled by what had happened. His brothers recognized the relief in the second oldest turtle's tone and they saw a faint grin creep across Raph's normally stern features. It was almost . . . sweet.