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Ensuring Discipline	By : hummerhouse Category: +S through Z > Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Views: 5482 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: The TMNT are not mine. No money being made.

Chapter List
- 1-Ensuring Discipline
- 2-Part 2
- 3-Part 3
- 4-Part 4
- 5-Part 5
- 6-Part 6
- 7-Part 7
- 8-Part 8
- 9-Part 9
- 10-Part 10
- 11-Part 11
- 12-Part 12
- 13-Part 13
- 14-Part 14
- 15-Part 15
- 16-Part 16 Final
- 15
- 16
Ensuring Discipline

part 16 final
            Moving back to his original position near the head of Leo’s cot, Don waited for his brother to speak. He had no idea why Leo wanted to have a private conversation, but Don meant for Leo to give him a lead and to volunteer nothing.
            Leo was studying him and Don returned the look as steadily as he could manage. Don recognized the tactic as one that Leo used as a way to get his brother’s to rush into unnecessary speech; the uncomfortable silence making them feel the need to fill it with words. Raph and Mikey often incriminated themselves when Leo did this, but Don didn’t mind the quiet. He always had something else he could think about while waiting for Leo to speak.
            They could both hear Raph and Mikey yelling across the lair to one another, followed by the unmistakable sounds of pots and pans rattling together in the kitchen. A television commercial blared out its advertisement and the sound was quickly lowered, and then the other sounds faded as well.
            When Leo sighed again, Don knew it was because his brother had concluded that his ploy wouldn’t work.
            Without taking his eyes from Don’s face, Leo asked bluntly, “What aren’t you telling me?”
            Since the question wasn’t altogether unexpected, it didn’t jar Don. “Details, Leo. The only thing we’ve left out is minute details of every interaction we had with the other Leo because you don’t really need to hear that and we’d just as soon forget him now that he’s gone.”
            Leo’s expression remained serious. “You can’t know what I need to hear. The only things I’ve had to think about over the last few weeks were survival, escape, and the possible havoc my counterpart was wreaking. That journal brought me a great deal of concern over what was happening to the three of you. You may think that sparing me those details will assuage my feelings of guilt, but my imagination gave me horrific images. I need to put them to rest by learning that they didn’t happen, or exorcise them by coming to terms with the fact that they did.”
            Fear welled in Don’s chest, its tight grip threatening to cut off the genius turtle’s ability to breathe. “You didn’t tell us everything that was in that journal, did you?” he asked haltingly.
            “I didn’t tell Raph and Mikey everything that was in that journal,” Leo clarified.
            Don’s body felt weighed down, his mouth responding almost in slow motion as he asked, “Is that why you called me back? Do you want to discuss it with me?”
            “What did he do to you, Donny?” Leo countered.
            Suddenly Don wanted to blurt out everything to his older brother, he wanted to admit to the verbal, physical, and sexual abuse that they had all suffered under pseudo-Leo’s time in their world. He wanted to explain the mental manipulation and what he had chosen to do to save Raph and Mikey from any more pain. Don desperately wanted to unburden himself of the guilt he felt at surrendering willingly to the other Leo’s seduction and to even beginning to want and need everything that pseudo-Leo gave him.
            It was Don’s agile mind that stopped him from giving in to that urge. Even as his emotional side grappled with the overwhelming need to relinquish his pain by giving it to Leo, his intellect processed what that new burden might do to his brother.
            Added to that was the fact that Leo hadn’t actually said he knew anything. That realization straightened Don’s spine; he wasn’t going to be caught out so easily by that type of trick.
            “I know it’s difficult for you to abnegate control over our lives, even harder because of the responsibility Master Splinter set on your shoulders, but you need to realize there are things we have to be allowed to handle on our own,” Don said. “Don’t assume that what the other Leo did to his brothers is something he repeated on this side of the timeline. The circumstances that changed him also changed his brothers, so however that Leo behaved with us, our reactions wouldn’t have been the same.”
            Don could tell that Leo was allowing his words to sink in, studying each one for clues to what his younger brother refused to tell him. Although Leo’s face gave nothing away, Don knew that Leo was preparing another salvo.
            “That journal kept me going,” Leo said, his voice low. “Even though I knew it wasn’t you who had written it, the words sounded like you. It was the closest thing to having you with me, though I wouldn’t have wished that on you in a thousand years. That Donatello didn’t just write out his experiences and observations, he wrote about the things he felt.”
            When he paused, Don swallowed the lump that had risen in his throat. “What did he say?”
            The edges of Leo’s lips quivered, but he quickly controlled them. “Donatello didn’t want to abandon Leo. He thought that if they built themselves another home and recreated their lives as it was before Master Splinter’s death, that Leonardo would become himself again. That Don felt as though running away from Leo would push him into viewing his own brothers as enemies, thus Don’s warning to Raph and Mikey about Leo possibly seeking retribution for their disloyalty.
            “Don desperately wanted to remain at Leo’s side, but he was afraid to. He never had any intention of staying away from Leo permanently; he just wanted time to set things up in a way that would hopefully bring Leo back to his senses. It was obvious from the discussions Don had with Mikey and Raph that they were washing their hands of Leo and that they hated him. Donatello didn’t hate Leo; far from it.”
            Tears pricked the corners of Don’s eyes and threatened to spill over. He knew that Leo could easily read the emotions on his face, but Don refused to break down completely.
            “He was really lost, Leo,” Don said in a near whisper. “He didn’t understand why his brothers wouldn’t stick with him in his darkest hour. His confusion alienated them, his need for revenge scared them, and so he tried to hold them by force. He didn’t know what else to do.”
            “Did you get close to him?” Leo asked as his own eyes misted over.
            “As close as anyone could,” Don answered truthfully, taking a deep breath. “He needed someone who would be steadfast even in the face of his rages. I could do that for him. It kept his focus off of Mikey and Raph.”
            “Did he beat you, Donny?” Leo asked softly.
            Don sniffled and then laughed lightly. “It was no worse than what Master Splinter does when he thinks we aren’t focusing.”
            “You’re a terrible liar,” Leo told him.
            “You’ll remember I seconded what Mikey fussed at you about earlier,” Don said.
            “I’m not trying to borrow guilt,” Leo said. “Give me a way to get this out of my mind.”
            “That’s so like you, Leo,” Don said. “You worry things like a dog with a bone.”
            “And you try to find a solution to every problem by throwing yourself in front of it,” Leo said. “You purposely drew his attention to you and did everything you could to hold his focus and his retribution, didn’t you?”
            Leo kept picking away at Don’s defenses, his guesses forcing answers from the younger turtle. Every answer gave Leo another clue as to what he should ask next. It was one of Leo’s greater talents and a good reason for not trying to keep secrets from him.
            “Any of you would have done the same thing,” Don explained.
            “But somehow you knew you had to be the one to do it,” Leo said thoughtfully. “You knew you could do what the others might not have been able to accomplish. You knew that the other Leo needed you.”
            Don’s eyes drifted down, away from Leo’s gaze. He could almost feel the heat of his blood as it rushed into his cheeks.
            “When I thought it was you, I wanted him to focus on me not only to keep him away from Mike and Raph, but because I thought the more time I spent with him the more it might help me to know what had happened to your mind,” Don said slowly. “After I knew he was a fake I used the fact that he wanted my acceptance much more than that of either Raph or Mike. He manipulated me by threatening them, but I manipulated him in return.
            “I knew deep inside that he had mistreated his own brothers and I think I knew that he had driven them away. Part of me wanted to help him find his way back to the path of sanity. I wanted to help him understand how he needed to change so that he could find his brothers and make things right with them. I simply couldn’t take the chance because once I let him know that I’d guessed he wasn’t you, my one advantage would be gone.”
            “As soon as Raph and Mikey attacked me, I knew that something had gone grossly wrong in their world,” Leo said. “They were together and I had come into that timeline to find that no one was waiting for me, so I knew that it was my counterpart who was responsible for their alienation. Up until then I’d held out hope that everything there wasn’t lost if the family itself remained strong.”
            “Leo, I can’t even begin to imagine what you must have felt when they came at you,” Don said.
            “Something similar to what you felt when you thought that Leo was me,” Leo responded. “I escaped from them and kept out of their sight after that. You couldn’t avoid my counterpart because you needed him in order to rescue me. What did you have to suffer through just to retrieve me, Donny? What did you have to give him to allay his suspicions? That journal was damaged but enough of some entries survived to make me think he wouldn’t have treated you to the same level of violence he reserved for Mike and Raph. Was there more between you than his trying to beat you into submission?”
            “Isn’t that enough?” Don asked. He felt like he should say something more intelligent in order to lead Leo away from the sensitive topic, but he couldn’t trust his voice at the moment.
            Leo reached out and took Don’s hand, holding it tightly. “I don’t know exactly what happened there, Donny, I don’t. But I think that other Leo loved Donatello; loved him in a way that went beyond the bonds of brotherhood. I also think the Don of that world was torn by his loyalties to all three of his brothers and couldn’t bring himself to respond to Leo the way he might have wanted to. I know it was painful for that Don and he shouldn’t have had to go through any of it. No brother should ask that of another and no brother should tear his family apart the way that other Leo did.”
            “I hated him, but then again I didn’t,” Don admitted. “Does that make sense?”
            “Responding to our needs is what you do,” Leo said firmly. “Your soul is beautifully gentle and caring.”
            “No,” Don said adamantly. “It wasn’t just that. I was selfish too, I wanted his undivided attention.”
            “That was empathy, Donatello,” Leo said. “You began to feel his sorrow and longing. He trapped you in a situation that required you adapt to a belief that you needed the things he was offering to you, even if the price for them was too high.”
            “Just before we sent him back, he pleaded with me to go with him,” Don said in a small voice. “I can’t stop hearing his words. There was even a brief second when I actually thought about going with him. I knew he was going back to a life of loneliness and probable death. Maybe if he can find his Donatello they can figure out a way to repair the damage.”
            Leo didn’t say anything for a long moment and Don’s mind drifted into thoughts of those final days with pseudo-Leo. That other Leo had treated them badly but Don felt as though pseudo-Leo didn’t really know what he was doing. His desperate desire to hold onto what was left of his family after their father’s murder had warped that Leo in many ways.
            Raping them was about rage and control, but it was also the only way Leo could find to remain connected to his siblings. Despite everything that had occurred, Don realized that having that type of intimate closeness with someone felt right, but that it had to be within the context of a loving, safe relationship.
            “I think he already knows exactly where his Donatello is,” Leo murmured, his face contorted by pain and sorrow.
            It took a moment for the words to filter through Don’s thought processes. When it finally did he felt as though someone had poured ice water over his body.
            “He didn’t, he c . . . couldn’t have,” Don choked out, the intensity of Leo’s surmise almost too much for him to accept.
            When Don tried to pull away from Leo, he found his brother’s grip surprisingly strong.
            “Donatello would never have left that journal,” Leo said, “and he was much too smart to be caught by their enemies. I hope I’m wrong. After I read their story I empathized with that Leo too. Now I can only despise him for causing misery to my family. I cherish all of you immensely; my ordeal and the experience with the other Leo’s brothers made me realize how important it is that we all treat each other well and with love. Using fear and bully tactics don’t motivate, they only kill the spirit.”
            “P . . . please tell me he didn’t . . . that he didn’t . . . .” Don couldn’t finish the sentence, his teeth were chattering from shock.
            Leo pulled on Don’s hand, bringing his brother close enough to him so that Leo could put his arm around his younger brother’s shell.
            “I’m sorry,” Leo whispered. “I think you were his second chance, his last grasp at retaining some semblance of sanity. If you could become his Don, then he would never have to accept what he had done.”
            Don burrowed into the crook of Leo’s neck and sobbed, allowing his injured brother to comfort him.
            “I wish this had never happened,” Leo whispered against his head. “He was sick and he needed his Donatello so badly. You are extremely special, Donny. I need for you to know that. I need for you to know that I’m here for you; I always have been and I always will be.”
            Don released a shuddering sigh and pulled back enough to look into Leo’s eyes. “I would never abandon you.”
            Leo smiled. “I know that. I’ve always know it. The entire time I was gone, I thought about you and wondered what you were doing. I knew that you would solve the puzzle and would probably just about kill yourself to bring me back. Holding onto thoughts of you gave me strength and courage.”
            Impetuously, Don leaned forward and kissed Leo’s cheek. He was immediately sorry for the action, flushing brightly and trying to step away from the cot. Leo held onto him though, not allowing him to move. Carefully deliberate, Leo lifted his head and kissed Don’s cheek as well.
            “Thank you, little brother,” Leo whispered in Don’s ear.
            Don nodded, momentarily too overwhelmed to find appropriate words. Leo finally released him and allowed Don to straighten up.
            “You need to rest now,” Don said, seeing how tired their conversation had made Leo. “Do you want me to give you something to help you sleep?”
            “I have a choice?” Leo said with a smile. “I don’t need anything, Donny. I’ll sleep. You were much better for me than any sedative could have been.”
            “Okay,” Don said, reluctantly turning to leave. At the door he switched off the lights and looked over at Leo one more time.
            His brother’s eyes were already closed, but before Don stepped out of the room, Leo told him, “I love you, Donatello.”
            “I love you too, Leonardo,” Don said in a low voice, not even sure if he was loud enough for Leo to hear. The upward curve of Leo’s lips told Don that he had.
            As emotionally draining as the session with Leo had been, Don knew that more repairs were required. Looking around, he saw that Raph and Mikey were side by side on the couch, engrossed in some action movie, a gigantic tub of popcorn propped up between them.
            The scene appeared so normal that for a moment Don wondered if he’d imagined all that had happened to them. Then his slightly clouded vision reminded him that his mask was wet with tears and reality once more held him in its grip.
            Removing the mask as he walked, Don retreated to his lab before his brothers could see the state he was in. He still wasn’t sure how much Leo had surmised about what had transpired between his brothers and pseudo-Leo, although he thought that Leo probably had a good grasp of the situation.
            There was still work to be done. Talking through some of it with Leo had been cathartic, but the residual guilt, fear, pain, and self-loathing still burrowed inside of him and wouldn’t be easily exorcised. He knew that the same held true for Raph and Mikey. Although Don was intelligent enough to recognize the symptoms of their victimization in himself and his brothers, he knew he was ill-equipped to deal with it at the moment.
            Sitting in front of his computer, Don prepared to do what he did best – research.
            Several hours later Don exited his lab, went upstairs, and took a long, hot shower. He was by no means an expert therapist just because he had read everything he could get his hands on about the subject of rape and abuse victims, and about the victims of Stockholm syndrome, but he was the closest thing his small family had to one.
            When he came back downstairs, Don noticed that Raph and Mikey were still on the couch. The remnants of a meal was spread out on the coffee table in front of them and Don guessed that going in search of sustenance was the only time the two of them had separated.
            Don entered the infirmary on silent feet and was happy to see that Leo was sleeping soundly. Sliding up to stand near his brother, Don looked down at Leo’s peacefully resting face. Even after all of the things they had been through in their lives, Leo’s face still had a youthful innocence to it. His counterpart did not have that and Don wanted to kick himself for not noticing such a big difference right away.
            With a last long look, Don left Leo to his much needed sleep and crossed the lair to where his younger brothers sat. It was obvious that their independent spirits had suffered from pseudo-Leo’s abuse and in the lingering fear that still clouded their minds, they sought what solace they could attain from one another.
            Taking a deep breath, Don walked around to where they could see him. Both of them turned reddened eyes in his direction, each of them wearing identical expressions of fatigue.
            “How is the movie?” Don asked.
            Raph merely shrugged but Mikey said, “Mediocre. The acting sucks but some of the special effects are okay.”
            “That means he ain’t really watching it,” Raph said, his voice deep but not animated.
            “Can I steal you away from it? I’d like to have a little meeting in the dojo where there’s no chance of Leo hearing us,” Don said.
            Mikey turned his head to glance at Raph, who narrowed his eyes as he contemplated Don. There was a sinking feeling in the pit of Don’s stomach as he met those golden eyes and read the obstinance in them.
            Before Raph could refuse, thus committing himself to that stance, Mikey looked back over at Don and said, “Yeah, we’ll be there in a second.”
            Don saw the youngest rest a calming hand on Raph’s thigh and nodded at them, turning away to precede his brothers into the darkened dojo. Rather than flicking on the harsh overhead lights, Don moved around the room to light the candles that occupied the stone niches in the walls.
            With the room bathed in a soft, non-threatening glow, Don sat down on a meditation mat and waited. In a few minutes his brothers came in; Mikey talking to Raph in a low tone while the larger turtle kept his lips pressed tightly together.
            Mikey spotted Don first and veered over to join him. For a moment Raph glared at them stubbornly and then he spotted Leo’s katanas lying on a low bench near the box that held his oldest brother’s cleaning kit. Marching over, Raph snatched up the swords and the box before coming back to sit with Don and Mikey.
            Raph didn’t look at either of them as he pulled the swords from their scabbards and then set about cleaning Leo’s weapons. It was obvious they had not been cared for with Leo’s usual precise attention and Raph frowned as he worked.
            “Go ahead and talk, Donny,” Mikey said. “He’s listening.”
            Something that sounded like a low growl issued from deep inside Raph’s throat but he didn’t protest Mikey’s assurances on his behalf. It was clear that Mikey had settled into a kind of caregiver role for his red banded brother.
            “We have ghosts,” Don said quietly. He cleared this throat and continued. “Everywhere we look in the lair we see the lingering shadow of that other Leonardo. It isn’t because our home is tainted by his presence, it’s because he’s locked inside of our heads. Every action he took against us leaves behind a stain that isn’t going to disappear on its own. If we don’t deal with that darkness, we’re going to start seeing him in our Leo, and that isn’t merely unfair, it will destroy our family just as surely as that other family was destroyed.”
            Mikey was staring steadily at Don while the genius turtle talked and he said, “I don’t want to jump every time I round a corner and see my own shadow anymore. What can we do?”
            “I spent some time looking into the psychology of abuse victims,” Don said. “People who had suffered through every type of horrific misdeed. The first step in the road to recovery is to talk about it. Each of us needs to talk about what the fake Leo did to us and we have to do it now before our natural inclination to hide from the truth takes over.”
            “Yeah,” Mikey said. “I think you’re right. I don’t wanna keep it bottled up inside of me.”
            Don was watching Raph from the corner of his eye and noted that Raph was steadfastly focused on caring for Leo’s swords, almost grimly determined to ignore what his brothers were saying.
            “We only have each other, Raph,” Don said, addressing him directly. “Each of us went through the same things at Leo’s hands, so we won’t be making any startling revelations. We have to do this or the anger, hostility, guilt, anxiety, and residual fear will eat us alive and Leo will sense it inside of us once he recovers.”
            “It’s over, the fake Leo’s gone, and I don’t want ta talk about it anymore,” Raph said. “I got no problem burying this, why can’t the both of ya’?”
            Mikey leaned towards him, the movement catching Raph’s eyes. “What happens the first time you get mad at Leo? Is it all gonna come out then? He suffered too and he doesn’t need to have what happened to us become his cross to bear. That monster wasn’t our Leo but he sure as shell looked like him. You’ll blow up and take your anger at the fake Leo out on our real brother.”
            “So the solution is ta waste time doing this? Ain’t we got something more important that needs taking care of? What about Master Splinter?” Raph asked belligerently.
            “We can’t do much about him until we’re whole,” Don said. “Leo needs time to recover and we need some idea of where our father could have gone. I read the notes you wrote, there are certain things in what he said that might help us to find him. While we work on healing ourselves we can pool the bits of knowledge we each have and come up with a logical starting place to begin our search.”
            “Your answer is ta sit around talking psychobabble,” Raph said with a sneer. “While we’re in here singing kumbaya, Master Splinter is off somewhere getting killed for all we know.”
            “What happens when we find him and he sees from our auras just how messed up we are?” Mikey asked. “I don’t want to put that on Leo and I don’t want to put it on Master Splinter either.”
            Don could see that Raph was beginning to get seriously upset and he interrupted. “I think the fake Leo was here at least two weeks before he turned his sights on me,” Don began, speaking softly. “The first inclination that I had that something was off was the harsh way he chided me for being late to practice. It was very unlike him, but at the time I remember thinking it was the stress of trying to maintain a routine in Master Splinter’s absence, and the worry over father’s mysterious journey.”
            As Don continued to speak about his interactions with pseudo-Leo, both of his brothers grew quiet and concentrated. Mikey had begun to tremble as Don talked and Raph’s hands were clenched so tightly around the grips on Leo’s katanas that his knuckles had started to blanch, but neither of them attempted to leave.
            Don plugged on, recounting his story chronologically and avoiding none of the shaming details. Part of his mind was detached, leaping ahead in his tale as he wondered if he should tell his brothers how he had started to enjoy the sexual intercourse and pseudo-Leo’s loving attention. This was the part of his experience that wasn’t shared by Mike and Raph and he wasn’t sure they’d understand.
            Partway through his story he could see that Raph had started to relax and was finally looking at Don, a thin film of unshed tears clouding the brightness of his eyes. Don knew that when he was finished, Mikey would want to share what had happened to him. They wouldn’t push Raph, but Don had a feeling that they wouldn’t have to; he was sure that Raph would open up as well.
            Together they would clean each other’s spiritual wounds just as thoroughly as they helped one another with the physical ones. Leo would heal and they wouldn’t project onto him the dark mantle that the other Leo had worn while he occupied their home.
            As a united family they would learn where Master Splinter had gone and they would defy his wishes by going after him. It wasn’t the first time they had done that and Don knew his father wouldn’t be all that surprised.
            What Don and Leo had shared would remain between them. Leo would help him come to grips with the very real possibility that the other Leo had killed the brother he loved most in the world.
            Although Don’s heart felt heavy at the moment, a thin glimmer of hope was hard at work trying to repair the damage inside of him. His Leo had held him in his arms and told him how much he needed Don. He had whispered that thoughts of Don kept him alive and strong.
            Leonardo had told Donatello that he loved him. That revelation was a very good starting point for their future.
The End
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Ensuring Discipline