Instincts

There’s nothing wrong with instincts, is there?
They were given to all living beings to keep them alive, right? So they can’t be bad. Of course. Self-preservation instinct. Sucking reflex. Breeding instincts.
Haha, I’m so glad that the mating season I have feared each year would come hasn’t come to me and my brothers yet. Maybe… being by long sexually matured, maybe it will never come. I certainly hope so.
Breeding instincts, huh.
I clench my fists. That has to be it. Scientifically, it’s absolutely logical. Instincts can’t be overriden. Ignored for a while but not overriden.
/Eight years ago, I kept a box of pet mice. They were all males because I didn’t want them to reproduce. I had an idea how fast these fellas could. One day I came to the box and saw that some of them were together, copulating. They turned to each other just like years later, I wanted to turn to my brothers./
I hear a sound and clamp my hands over my ears. It’s natural, the scientist in me knows. Mutant turtles have enhanced instincts, even if those mostly succumb to their all-human minds.
But I’m worried. /In the night, the mice had attacked each other in order to get those who posed as females. A few of them were lying there, limp and dead./ I don’t want to hurt my brothers. Nor them to hurt each other over me. I’m so scared of this explanation for the whole love-you-more-than-a-brother deal. Because blaming it all on instincts means our rational minds have no say in it. It means we aren’t more than the mice, savage and mindless.
We are so much more!!
But then... Oh God... If we are like humans... then those two and I... are freaks. If we had control over our instinctual behaviour, we should be able to control such urges. They’re much older and they obviously can’t.
I can’t help it. I can’t stop thinking about those two.
/“It was all your fault! It was you! You who let master Splinter die! Your fault!”
“I. Had. No. Choice!”
“You did! I know what happened!”
“You know? And you call that a choice? You call THAT a choice?!”
“Yeah!”
“Well it wasn’t Raph! You call choosing between lifes a choice? Damn you, Raph, DAMN YOU!”
“Why damn me? Tell me Leo, why me? You made a choice and now master’s dead!”
“Why you Raph?” Leo’s voice fell quiet. “Because there was nothing more I could have done for master Splinter.”
“What?!”
“I couldn’t have done more! I knew I couldn’t save you both, so I chose! Aren’t you glad? At least I made a choice!”
“I... I... Leo!” A tormented wail and I winced. Maybe I should save the strategy conversation for later? “Have you got any idea?! ANY idea? How MUCH it hurt?!”
“What hurt?” Leo probed very quietly.
“Don’t you know?”
“Maybe.”
The silence stretched.
“Alright, I know.”
“And you let it be? Why?!”
“I...”
“WHY?!”
“I... didn’t know... if...”
“Did you need a proof?! You saw us break apart without Donnie and... then without master Splinter and... you didn’t take that one last chance... why?...”
“I... I have nothing to say about that.”
“Leo...!!”
And there were fighting sounds, furniture breaking, curses, grunts, yelps of pain, hard breathing and... moans... and I realised I wasn’t going to get a shot about strategy that night. Terrified, I crept from the door./
It isn’t just about master Splinter for them. That separation for years, the way this Leo and Raph almost jumped at each other’s throats the moment they saw each other... It goes deeper than just the death of their sensei. (I give a crooked grin. Just the death of master Splinter, really? I must be losing my mind from this future.) It goes into their hearts. Raphael wanted more but Leonardo couldn’t give it to him. And so they broke apart to ease the pain. They couldn’t grow closer, so they became distant. They became what they are now.
...Does that mean that my Raph – I mean, the Raph from my time, has those feelings, those instincts too? And that Leo couldn’t deal with mine either?
Does that mean that with this knowledge about how wild we can become, I stand a chance?
Does that at all apply when I don’t even know if I survive the next day?

A tak SAINW pomohlo Donově celkové mentální pohodě. Zpátky na fanfikce.