This is what I get for listening to my iTunes while working. I'm supposed to be working on some of my fanfics and an assignment, but this plot bunny just won't leave me alone. Ah well.

Disclaimer: I don't own Nickelodeon's TMNT or the song "Hurt" by Christina Aguilera.

It's You I Miss

Universe: TMNT 2012, before Annihilation Earth episodes

Pairings: None

Warnings: Some coarse language

I'm sorry for blaming you

For everything I just couldn't do

04:42:27 AM

They say that when you're about to die, your life flashes before your eyes, a film on fast forward.

What most people don't know is that the same can be said for those who are seconds away from losing someone too.

And no one knew that better right now than one Donatello Hamato.

This can't be happening! The purple masked genius cried out in his mind. Oh God, this can't be happening! This was supposed to be a simple mission on the get to go! This can't be happening!

And truth be told, it had been.

From the very start, from the break-in to the retrieval of their target, to a few meters from their exit, everything had gone so well for them.

So why did it have to end with one brother being separated from three others by an unyielding steel wall? Why did it have to end with one of them having to run down a path of seemingly no return?

Why did Donatello overlook such a fatal flaw in the brothers' plan?

How could he let it come to this?

"The plan wouldn't have worked, guys. I'm sorry I didn't tell you earlier but what would that change? What would you guys have done that wouldn't have ended with you being where I am right now?"

"Don't do this." Donnie heard himself speak, voice desperate and cracked like flimsy fine china. "Please, please, I'm begging you, bro. You can't—d-don't do this. There has to be—you don't have to—!"

The sepia colored flashes came unbidden, burning through eyes already laden with tears, all those moments, beautiful, ugly and missed. The last few cruel hours, the stupid fight and the fit of temper that in hindsight was so petty and so goddamned ridiculous in the face of the present scenario.

If only I have known. Oh God, I didn't want this! I didn't—! If I have known, I would have—!

"Better me than any of you, am I right?"

"…I'm sorry, D."

Donnie's breathing hitched as the barely audible apology went on.

"I tried. I really tried, you know. Back then, when everything was so simple, when I could still understand, when I could still reach you…" A hitch. "But you're so far away. You're meant for bigger and better things if only we were more than this. You deserve all that in the world and…I'm sorry I can't be good enough for you."

There was barely a pause before the telltale sound of firing lasers rang behind the metal wall, and the rising hysteria in Donnie's other brothers' voices when they heard it as well joined the cacophony.

"NO! NO, PLEASE NO!" Donnie's bruised fists landed useless, so utterly, pathetically useless, against the wall again. I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! Don't do this! Don't do this to us! Don't—!

"Look at it this way, at least now you can be proud of me for something."

"I love you bros…all of you…always..." The swinging of chains against metal. "BOOYAKASHA!"

"Now this is what I call going in a blaze of glory, right guys?"

"Mikey! No! NO, MIKEY!"

…

BOOM! BOOM! BOOOOM!

…

04:44:44 AM

And I've hurt myself, by hurting you...

You guys remember how it was like in Still Right Here, when it was meant to be a one shot but it evolved and I had to cut it into parts? Well, it happened again! :P Like my usual, the prologue is super short but the chapters after it will more than make up for that, me thinks.

Don't worry though, this fic is mostly done as of this writing so it won't really get in the way of my other works. Anyway, let me know what you guys think and whether I should continue posting this.