"Have fun at school," Leonardo says, his voice laced with a fake cheery tone.

Dakota and Asher nod, not feeling happy at all. Donatello didn't leave his lab the entire weekend. He just...sat there and stared at a wall, mumbling to himself. The twins came in regularly to clean his injury and make sure he was eating a little, drinking too. Their dad ate little bits of the offered food and drank a few sips of water, but remained unresponsive otherwise.

"Just try to take your mind off of it, alright?" Raphael suggests, patting Asher's shoulder.

"Yeah, I guess," the boy returns sadly.

"Don't want to be late! Kids! Get out there!" Destiny calls as she slips Venus' backpack over her daughter's shoulders.

"Bye!" Dean calls, flashing a smile as he tries to make his family feel less worried about them.

"Keep smiling, little dudes!" Michelangelo shouts.

As the kids disappear out the turnstiles gate, Donnie pokes his head out of the lab slowly. His lips purse with slight guilt when he sees Asher and Dakota's obviously forlorn feelings, his eyes filling with tears again.

"I'm the worst father ever," he whispers, turning away from the door and placing his hands over his face.

Sarina wouldn't want me to be like this... he thinks. She'd want you to keep going on without her, stay strong.

He shakes his head, wiping his eyes. "No, Sarina doesn't want anything but my death now. She doesn't even remember that she loves me..."

He clenches his hands into fists, tears blurring his vision as his muscles tense. He grinds his teeth together, trying to keep his anger and his sorrow and every other insatiable emotion at bay.

Then, with a scream of agony, he turns and punches the nearest thing he can reach, which happens to be Sarina's computer. Not he monitor, the computing unit that actually runs the whole thing. It topples off the lab table, crashing to the floor and breaking apart with the loud crackling sound of electricity.

"Donnie?" Mikey's concerned voice sounds from outside. "Bro? What did you do?"

"N-Nothing! I knocked my computer over, a-accidentally. It's n-nothing!" he stammers, hoping that his youngest brother doesn't decide to pry.

He releases a breath as the footsteps recede. He turns to the crumpled mess of wiring, feeling absolutely awful for possibly destroying his wife's work.

"I'll get the microchip and the hard drive. She backed everything up, it'll be fine," he mutters to himself.

However, when he kneels next to the broken computer, his eyes catch sight of another thing; a USB drive. It's not something that belongs inside a computer, and Donnie knows that. His heart rate picks up as he scoops the drive into his large green palm, wondering what she has inside.

"Well...she won't mind if I look, right?" he asks.

Judith, the robotic hamster who spent most of her days rolling around and making little noises, let out a confirming beep. Metalhead also stuck his thumb up.

Donnie races to his computer and plugs the USB in, his eyes brightened with excitement as he clicks on the file. Inside, there's a folder labeled "My Memories". Donnie frowns a little, assuming that the folder is full of photos from the years. However, he highly doubts that pictures are so secretive that they must be hidden inside a computing unit. There's a video file next to the memories folder, labeled "For the one who matters".

He clicks it without hesitation. The screen becomes completely black as the video boots up, going into full screen. Then, there's a small blip of white light and a familiar face appears on the screen. Donnie has to stop himself from crying at the sight of Sarina, still blue-eyed and happy, albeit much younger, eighteen at least.

"Donatello, if you're watching this...well, it's not the best of times right now," she starts.

"Sarina..." he whispers, his heart aching horribly as he reaches out and touches the face on the screen.

"I don't think I'll ever need this, but I couldn't leave it alone," she continues, her expression troubled. "This file is incredibly important. Inside is every single one of my memories from the day I met you onwards. I took to backing my hard drive up to my computer so, in the event that our worst nightmares come true, you'd be able to restore me. I've been doing this since my eighteenth year, when I recorded this video, continuing on until whatever present you find yourself in now."

The tears trickle down Donnie's cheeks uncontrollably, mainly from relief.

"Oh, my princess...my beautiful, amazingly smart princess," he whispers, his heart bubbling with hope.

"Remember when we helped defeat Circa?" She forces a small smile, turning around. "Well, it's time to make use of my port again."

Slowly, she lifts her soft white hair, revealing the back of her neck. She presses a spot right at her hairline, where a small port opens up, a USB port.

Donnie's mouth falls open. Of course he knew that this port was used to send her subconscious into cyberspace, but the way she's describing its use now...it must be connected to her brain in a much more complicated manner.

"Plug the USB into here, and I'll be restored...hopefully." She spins back around and flashes a sheepish smile. "I'm not sure it will even be successful, but I'm willing to allow you to test that theory on me. Good luck, my love. Stay strong for me."

The screen blacks out. Donnie looks to the simple drive and ejects it, holding it close to his chest as he dries his eyes.

"Don't worry princess, your prince is coming to save you," he promises. He gets up and dashes out of the lab, calling for his brothers. "GUYS! You won't believe this!"

🍕🐢🍕🐢🍕🐢🍕🐢🍕

"You guys are really off today," Lukas comments. "Bad weekend?"

Dakota sighs and flops back into the grass of the field outside the school, her one visible eye flickering to her brother's best friend. Asher bites his lip and keeps playing his violin softly, whilst Kelly looks between the twins with nervousness inside her deep green eyes.

"You two can tell us anything, you know?" she whispers. "Did something happen?"

Dakota starts to fabricate a lie, remaining silent. Asher thinks of his mom and dad, wishing that he could find some way to make it better as he practices a simple song he'd been learning with Ruby.

Lukas scoots over to Dakota and lifts her head into his lap, starting to run his fingers through her hair. A tiny smile breaks across her lips as she arches an eyebrow.

"What are you doing?" she asks, a slight giggle to her voice.

"I'm persuading you...with soothing hair combing techniques," Lukas answers. He frowns a little for a split second. "I think...I saw a video on it while I was scanning for the best way to make a dual quantum encryption computer for cheaper than buying one yourself."

Dakota pouts a little. "Really, it's nothing to worry about. Just our parents having some trouble."

Lukas leans over her, flashing a brilliant smile as his grey eyes seem to light up. He leans far enough down that their foreheads are almost touching, her cheeks heating up.

"Elaborate?" he requests.

She tries to come up with something, but her tongue remains tied. Kelly giggles, her auburn hair quivering with the movements. Asher sighs and puts his violin inside its case.

"My mom got her memory wiped," he starts slowly. "You see...she's a-"

Dakota seems to snap out of her trance, lurching up and nearly hitting Lukas in the face.

"Asher, we can't," she hisses.

"They deserve to know," the younger twin answers curtly.

"Deserve to know what?" Lukas asks, arching an eyebrow. "What's up with Sarina? Memory loss?"

Dakota is about to interrupt again before Asher claps a hand over her mouth. The last time he did that, she licked his palm, but she decides against it today.

"You deserve to know who we really are," the male twin says, pulling up a picture of him and Dakota together in their mutant forms.

He shows it to his friends, whose eyes widen in shock. Kelly gets a mystified look on her face, covering her mouth with her hand. Asher takes a deep breath and flicks to a family photo, allowing them to take everything in.

"That's...that's why you wear the eyepatch, Kota," she murmurs. "It all makes sense."

"Wait, the eyepatch?" Dakota exclaims, shoving her brother's hand away. "He's a mutant turtle, my family is pretty much all mutants, and all you have to comment on is my eyepatch?"

Lukas smiles a little as he looks up at Asher. "Well, you're officially cooler than me."

Asher's heterochromic eyes widen. "You're...you're not scared?"

"Well, it's kind of freaky, to be honest, but I'm over it." He grins. "That explains the sewer...and the fact that you have a dojo and ninja weapons...I honestly expected you guys to actually be hobos or something, but the ninja turtle thing is way cooler." His eyes widen as he looks at the picture again. "Damn...look at you guys! The next Avengers team!"

Dakota breathes a sigh of relief and covers her face with her hands. Kelly smiles and hugs her friend.

"Can I see your eye?" she asks.

The white-haired girl takes off the eyepatch, allowing the two humans to see her robotic red eye. It flashes.

"Cool..." Lukas and Kelly whisper together.

"Point is, with what's up with us, our mom is a cyborg. She got her memories and emotions erased, so now she's like a real life Terminator and my dad is heartbroken," Asher explains.

"That's heavy," Lukas says, patting his friend's shoulder. "I'm sorry you have to go through that."

"You'll save her, right? You're heroes...brave, strong..." Kelly looks down and adjusts her glasses. "I could never be that."

"Anyone can be a hero if they put their minds to it," Dakota points out. She flashes a grin as she puts her eyepatch back on. "And we all have quite the set of minds."

Kelly falls silent again, finger-combing her hair nervously. "Well...I have a secret too."

The other three perk up, looking at her.

"What is it?" Asher asks.

She bites her lip. "I...uh...have mild autism, and I never told you guys because I didn't want to look dumb around such smart people."

Dakota grins. "Seriously? I couldn't even tell!"

"I...I just know that people with autism aren't thought of as smart...so I kept it a secret."

Asher shakes his head and wraps an arm around her shoulders.

"Do you know how many famous geniuses throughout history were said to have had autism? I'll name a few; Albert Einstein, Amadeus Mozart, Sir Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, Thomas Jefferson, and Michelangelo, the painter of course, not my uncle." He smiles at her, which she returns. "I was just playing a piece by Mozart. He created beautiful music, and he never let his troubles stop him."

Kelly hugs him, burying her head under his chin. He laughs and returns it.

"Thank you," she murmurs. "Thank you for accepting me."

"I can say the same, mademoiselle," he responds.

Lukas blinks once or twice, then shrugs. "Well, as long as we're confessing..." he mutters. He looks to Dakota and points dramatically. "I really like you, okay? There, I said it!"

Dakota's face heats up. "You...you do?"

"I love smart girls, especially sassy and smart girls! But I always assumed that you're off limits because-" He laughs awkwardly. "-brother."

Asher shrugs. "I'm fine. Just don't break her heart or ruin this friendship in any way."

Lukas laughs and they fist bump. "Never. The four of us are going to stick together forever."

Dakota grins, moving to his side and gently taking his hand. He grins, feeling as though he just won a lottery. Kelly sighs blissfully as Asher pulls out his violin again, starting to play a bit of Mozart.

Suddenly, Dakota's phone beeps. She looks down at the text message, her eyes widening.

"Ash..." she whispers.

"Yeah?" he asks, focused on the music.

"Dad found a cure for mom."

His bow stops on the strings instantly as his eyes widen. "Serious?"

"I swear on Darwin's beard."

Lukas looks to his friends. "Good thing?"

"Very good thing. We've got to go." Dakota leaps to her feet as Asher puts his violin away.

Kelly and Lukas stand too, smiling.

"Good luck, dynamic duo," Lukas teases.

"I hope your mom is okay," Kelly adds softly.

The twins dash off, and the blond boy looks at the auburn-haired girl.

"Kells?" he asks.

"Yeah?"

"We have the coolest friends ever."

"Yeah, we do."

They smile.

AN: #Lukota anyone? 😏