Chapter Text
“Just relax, it’s going to feel a bit tight for a moment,” said Foreman, looking at the turtle’s book for reference while he pressed on the valve.
The turtle stayed relaxed even as the band tightened around his arm. Foreman wasn’t surprised. Usually most teenagers were difficult patients but this kid in particular was very cooperative. Well, cooperative wasn’t the right word, especially when he felt like they were doing something wrong, but he was very respectful, making their job easier in any way he could, which Foreman appreciated.
Even as one of the fingers in his free hand tapped rhythmically against the table he was sitting on, the kid waited patiently for him to finish.
“Alright,” Foreman said with the gentle, polite smile he reserved for patients. He unstrapped the band wrapped around the turtle’s arm, “everything looks fine.”
The turtle’s eyes flickered towards the screen displaying his blood pressure in disbelief before he sighed deeply, his shoulders sinking.
“Yeah, it really does,” the kid mumbled, almost too softly for him to hear.
He wasn’t looking at Foreman, fidgeting in place, eyes distant.
There were a lot of different reactions when a person realized they weren’t dying anymore. Usually they were happy but he had also seen anger, sadness…
In the turtle’s case, Foreman guessed that the strongest emotion was disbelief. It was all over the kid’s face, plain to see. Numb, overwhelming disbelief.
Foreman hesitated for a moment as he started to put away his instruments.
Even if it wasn’t Foreman’s favorite part of the job, helping with these things was still very important.
He refused to act like House, despite sometimes wishing he could.
He walked closer to the patient and sat on one of the chairs by his side, keeping a respectful distance while doing his best to seem approachable.
“You will be alright, Donatello. The treatment is working. You’ll be back to…” he bit his tongue, his brain catching up to the fact that he had been about to say something like ‘normal life’ or ‘hanging out with your friends’, ‘school’… the things you usually tell a patient of Donatello’s age in these circumstances, “doing acrobatics with your brothers before you know it,” he finished lightly after a pause.
Despite his misstep, the kid gave a hesitant chuckle, finally lifting his head to look at him.
“I guess I just… didn’t really expect it, sorry. I can’t believe…” he trailed off, biting his lip. “Are you sure everything is alright? I know that doctor House thinks there is still something wrong.”
Yeah, House was obsessed with a non-existent missing detail but to the rest of them, the situation was pretty simple.
They treated for an infection that matched every symptom and the patient had gotten better. Over the last few days every last trace of his illness had disappeared completely. They had checked, thoroughly.
The reason his boss was so insistent in them staying, in always doing just one more test that came back clear every time, was that they weren’t treating a human patient. Despite Foreman’s initial doubts, Donatello was cured.
“House is… not what you’d call a normal doctor. He has some interesting ideas about how things should be done and he’s right to be cautious in your case. You’re not the kind of patient we are used to treating.” Was his vague, noncommittal answer.
“So… what’s next, then?”
“Well, since we won’t be able to make sure everything is back to normal once we leave, we think it would be for the best if you resumed your usual routine for a couple of days. We’ll make sure there’s no change and then we’ll be out of your hair,” he explained.
Once again, Donatello became visibly uncertain, his mouth twisting into a frown.
“I would be lying if I said that I couldn’t handle that myself but… honestly, having you here for that is kind of a relief,” he said slowly, like an embarrassing confession.
Foreman raised an eyebrow.
“Everyone needs help sometimes, that doesn’t make you any less smart,”
The kid’s smile became even wider, the amusement breaking through the uncertainty.
“Ah, no. That’s not the problem. I know that but I didn’t expect how reassuring it would be to have someone else help me with this. You don’t know as much as I do about our physiology, but even then, just having another set of eyes on the situation makes things a lot easier.” The turtle took a deep, shaky breath. “When this is over I know that it won’t just be me wishing it is. I will have bigger proof, I guess, telling me that I am really cured. Being both the doctor and the patient is… very difficult in practice.”
Foreman nodded.
“Yes, I can understand that. Even then… I have to say that you’ve done a fantastic job of it.”
The turtle simply smiled brightly and both of them fell back into a comfortable silence as Foreman marked down the results of today’s battery of tests.
As he did, Foreman couldn’t help but stop for a moment, taking another look at all the materials the turtle had lent them for this.
It was like a small-scale hospital, made entirely by a kid sitting on a small metallic bed under the city of New York. And it wasn’t even the most impressive thing he had created.
He must have been staring for a while because, suddenly, he was startled out of his thoughts by Donatello.
“Did you… want to say something?” He asked curiously.
Foreman shook his head, dismissively. “Sorry, I was just thinking…” Maybe now would be the best time to say it, wouldn’t it? This question had been eating at him since he met the kid. “Have you ever considered what you want to do when you’re older?”
The kid blinked at him in surprise before grimacing. “I don’t think there’s much to consider.”
Yes, that was exactly the problem.
“I am not telling you to… reveal yourself. Despite what Cameron believes, I understand why you keep yourselves hidden. Maybe you could write books anonymously, or scientific papers.”
“I tried,” the kid said with a shrug, “But doing that successfully is a lot more difficult than it seems. You need contacts for that, resources I don’t have access to.”
“And that doesn’t bother you?” When the kid gave a negative answer to that, Foreman frowned. “Maybe I could help you with that. I can’t hire you myself but maybe in a couple of years I could get you some contacts.” he could probably find a way to get him to work as a remote consultant. House wouldn’t mind, and with his reputation they could jump over a lot of hurdles to both keep the kid’s anonymity and have him be taken seriously in the field.
To that, the kid’s eyes widened, visibly taken aback.
“Why would you want to help me with that?”
The fact that he even had to ask…
“Some of the things I have seen in your lab are world-changing. You have a lot of talent. I think it would be a crime, forcing you to stay hidden down here when you could be doing so much instead,” he stressed, “I… know it’s not the same situation by far, but I also didn’t grow up in the best environment. I managed to study hard and get myself a good career, though. I think that you deserve the same opportunity.”
Donatello’s expression had turned thoughtful as he spoke, but he didn’t seem very convinced, unfortunately.
“I am happy with how things are. Maybe one day I will consider it, but I’m not really in a rush,” was the kid’s polite refusal.
“I know it would be a risk, but I believe that it would be worth it,” Foreman insisted. “In any other circumstances you’d become a fantastic doctor and, even if you’re not able to do that, you could make something of yourself with some help.”
At that, the kid huffed a silent laugh, making Foreman fall silent as he looked at him questioningly.
“Sorry, I just… I would never become a doctor. No offense but I find it… boring in general. Sure, there are some things that fascinate me about it but I don’t love it. My passions are engineering, every aspect of it, and chemistry to a lesser extent. I enjoy studying biology a lot and math is fun, but medicine? Most of it is not that interesting to me.
Now it was Foreman’s turn to be surprised. He couldn’t hide his look of shock.
“But… Didn’t you write these books?” He asked.
“Yeah, I thought I was… dying,” he said, his voice becoming higher, shakier, “and that my brothers would need a way to take care of themselves. That’s why I did it. It’s the reason why the medbay looks like this,” the turtle said, gesturing at their surroundings. “I didn’t even bother to build these things,” he clarified.
Still… Writing that must have taken so much time, everything was so detailed.
“Then why are you your family’s doctor?”
The kid’s mouth twisted awkwardly.
“It’s not that I hate it,” he started, not sounding too sure about it. “I just don’t enjoy it that much. It’s like a chore. I don’t think Mikey likes having to cook at 4 when we’re home late, or Leo having to make fifty throwing knives after a bad mission. They do it anyway so… Since I am good at these things, I became our doctor. It made sense, you know? When we were young our dad took care of us but… I knew a lot of biology and I could learn to be good at medicine, so I did,” he finished with a casual shrug.
It wasn’t remotely the same, cooking, replacing their things… Those were just chores to them, weren’t they? Becoming the doctor was a career it tied Donatello down here, making it impossible for him to leave, to do something worthwhile instead. He was responsible for his family’s health and it forced him to stay in a sewer treating colds.
Apparently… There were also alien fights involved in this whole situation but, if the kid was able to modify their tech and turn it into what he did, he also shouldn’t be in the line of fire like he was.
“That’s the more reason to find a way out of this. You should be doing something you enjoy, more valuable things,” he said. He had to suppress a grimace as he said that because… It sounded like he was the teacher in Good Will Hunting, but the sentiment was true nevertheless. He opened his mouth, prepared to continue before being interrupted by the kid’s response.
“Why?”
Foreman fell silent in confusion.
Seeing this, the kid continued.
“Why do you think I would want to do something more valuable?” He repeated. “In fact… What do you think would be more valuable? What’s the metric? Is it helping society? Because I am sorry to say that society hasn’t helped me much.”
Foreman tried to find his words.
“It’s not just about that. The things that you could be doing are much greater outside of here, you could make such a big impact.”
The kid snorted, slightly laying back.
“So it’s about making the biggest impact?” He asked. When Foreman answered in affirmative the kid shook his head. “Sorry but I don’t care about that.”
He opened his mouth to protest but the kid interrupted him before he could.
“You think that I should but that’s just…” the kid trailed off with a sigh. “I… I used to think like that when I was a kid. I felt sad about not being able to leave… something tangible once I died. It was very scary to me. The possibility of just not existing anymore and no one ever noticing when I had so many things to show, so much to discover… I was scared of that but then, I realized that…” he gazed into the distance again, visibly replaying a memory as his eyes shone with happiness. “It doesn’t matter. The universe is so big. Even changing the Earth would be… a waste of my talent in some hyper advanced society’s eyes. I would always be looking for something greater, something better that I could be doing, that I should be doing but that’s just not what I want.” He stopped talking for a moment, his bright smile twisting with deep fondness. “There is an impact already every day, when I help the people I care about. The people close to me. By being with them and helping them… Our world is so small, I know this. I know it’s bigger outside of here, but if this is my whole world then by making things better here, then I am making the world better in a way that counts, in a way that matters to me.”
Foreman mulled this over, unable to reply to the revelation.
They stayed quiet for a while, the conversation having come to a stalemate until the door swung open.
Startled, Foreman jumped slightly before realizing that it was just Cameron.
Then, he took in her expression. Hard, serious, determined.
Something had happened.
“Donatello,” she said without even acknowledging him. “I know that we make you uncomfortable but… is there any way I could stay in contact after we leave? I want to help, even if I have to stay down here to do that.”