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Again, her core pangs, but again, she dismisses the pang to focus on his words.

"I know much about you. The hows and whys are unimportant." Emeryl states it like it is the weather, before moving on to other much more important things. "You trapped the Kraang away, thus making you and your brothers also knowledgeable in how it works. You think, but do not know, if this Foot Clan is truly gone."

She stares back at the boy before smirking. "To my people, I am the Empress of Destruction."

And then she transforms to loom over him, only mildly upset that she's only 13ft tall instead of her near 40ft. Yes, yes she is claiming to be the Empress of an entire race, so sue her.

More to the point, she is sleek and dangerous, and her purple Decepticon badge is now on full display.

"No, we don't. The Kraang opened a portal big enough to pull their ship through. I piloted it back through, or tried to- before we were caught. We managed to distract them long enough to unplug the key on this side of things, closing the way on their ship to effectively destroy it and seal them back in the Prison Dimension."

For some reason he doesn't seem nearly as intimidated as he thinks she probably means to be upon hearing her title.

But then the robotic beast does something else, plates and limbs shifting and rearranging until she's standing on two feet instead of four. Maybe Donnie should be a little more startled, but all he can do is stare, in fascination, in awe...

His attention falls upon that crest, and it's like the world around him gets tuned out.

He...he knows that symbol. Where has he seen it before?

The lack of fear is interesting in itself, though she puts it down to being smaller than she typically is.

She could bask in the awe, yet now is hardly the time for it - or the pointless staring at her symbol.

Esmeryl hisses, irritated and dismayed in this version of her son. Perhaps, if the wooden bō is any judge, this one isn't as tech savvy.

How disappointing. "Then you are useless to me... Unless..." She cocks her head, considering before a "You said the key is indestructible. Where is it now?"

"De...cepticon..?" The word floats up, unbidden, an alien word that he feels he shouldn't know, and yet he does, somehow.

Being called useless feels like a slap in the face, making Donnie flinch again. It seem to sting even more than it should have any business to. But before it can truly sink too deeply, the question about the key stokes that fire of defiance again, a sharp look in his eye as he glares back up at the supposed empress.

"I don't know." He wouldn't tell anyone where that thing is, not after all the trouble it's caused.

Whatever Esmeryl was about to say dies in her throat as his words catch up. She blinks, then squints.

Things just took a turn for who knows what, but it isn't something she expected out of him. The flinch at being called useless, yes, but that's ignored. It has to be ignored. This isn't her son.

"How do you know that word?"

Donnie shakes his head. "I-I don't... It just...came up," he admits, frowning, not liking being uncertain, but that's the best he can offer for explanation.

And yet that word's meant something to the big robot. No, it's what she identifies as, somehow he feels this to be true, his eyes falling upon that purple insignia again.

"I appeared in your mind after I transformed, then?"

Interesting if true and potentially a game changer.

Potentially. "What else is coming to you?"

She'll back track to the Key in a second or two.

Edited 2025-08-04 05:02 (UTC)

Phrased like that, Donnie's unsure what to think. His hand tightens around his staff, but he resists the urge to step back. To step back is to show weakness.

"When I saw that symbol. But...something about you changing...was familiar, somehow."

He shakes his head, frowning. "It doesn't make sense."

"Interesting..." Esmeryl does not quite purr, but it's clear Donnie's become interesting for more than one reason now.

She could easily take him up in the sky again and shake all the answers out of him, but something makes her hesitate about it. Something tells her that might not be the best idea.

That said, she does need answers about the Key, and she is far from naive. "Any tech you have on you, give it to me."

She crouches and holds out an expectant hand.

He can't help but immediately go on the defensive when she crouches down, hugging his staff close as he looks at her. His tech? Why would someone so clearly advanced as herself want his tech?

Donnie's hand drifts up towards his goggles, but he hesitates, looking at her cautiously.

"What do you want it for? There's nothing to track these through..." he warns, not seeing why she'd break any of his things save for those earlier concerns, but he's still very guarded about letting anyone see his tech, especially given the treatment she'd shown him earlier.

Perhaps it's curiosity that allows him to continue with the motion, slipping his goggles from his head, holding it out carefully for her to take.

For a second, Esme half expects the googles to turn into a baby mimic. Yet it doesn't, and despite knowing this was to be the outcome, her wings droop.

"And the bracer. I will not destroy them. However, I know you record everything."

Again Donnie might be caught staring. How does she know? He glances down at his arm, pulling up the sleeve of his hoodie to reveal nothing but the black wraps he's taken to wearing, that match his leg wraps.

"I haven't used the bracer in over a year. I've updated the model..." he says, still looking somewhat stunned, even as he awkwardly sweeps his other hand (and bō) over his left forearm to bring up the holoscreen in demonstration.

She knows who I am, somehow. I know what she is... Why do I know??

Edited 2025-08-04 05:51 (UTC)

"Pity. Ilex was fond of the form." The words will mean nothing to him, but how many times did she listen to Donnie's aggravated grumble over the mimic's choice?

Too many. Never again.

The holotech would have been a solution to that. She would be what she stares at and not the black wraps, the colour of his stone arms. No, just wraps. Flesh and blood where stone once was. It would be easy to break it, to remove the limb, assuming the tech is inbuilt.

She'll allow him to keep it, for now. "Record anything else and I shall remove the arm. Understood?"

To back it up, she summons her naginata, blade pointed up, but ready to be used.

Illex. Latin for decoy... but somehow Donnie feels it also pertains to something more significant.

He replaces his goggles, feeling better for it, but a frown once again creases his brow at the threat. His eyes widen as she brings her naginata to being, the impression two-fold as the implications of how she means to remove his arm overlap with ...something else.

A memory.

He stands across from her, bowing as one would to a sensei before sliding into a stance, his grasp firm around the cool alloy of his modified tech-bō, the glowing energy blade that tips it almost a match for the color of his own mystic tech-

Once again his breath catches in his throat, and Donnie brings up his free hand to his head, wide eyes staring at nothing.

"Wh...what was that..."

Esmeryl squints at him. Something happened because she brought out her weapon? Or mentioned the mimic?

The Empress isn't sure what to make of this, and she can't help the concern that slips into her voice. Something softer, more open than she has so far.

"What was what?"

It's a different sort of fear that's on his face as Donnie looks cautiously back up at Esmeryl, not necessarily in fear of her, but of things he can't understand.

"I...don't know," he says carefully, shaking his head slowly. "It was like...a thought. A vision of some kind?" He frowns, confused. "Like we were...about to spar or something..."

Donnie looks down at his weapon, very much wood rather than metal.

Esmeryl stills, then cocks her head. "Describe it?"

It could be anything. It could be everything.

It had been both fleeting and yet so clear, somehow. Donnie blinks at her, then closes his eyes, trying to hang onto the memory.

"...you were standing across from me. But you were much bigger. We bowed, and then I stood..."

He shifts his position, mimicking what he'd felt, even though he hadn't seen himself, but he has a feeling he'd been mirroring the stance Esmeryl had taken, and he angles his staff the way that she had, eyes still closed.

"How?" It's a choked demand, filled with more emotion than she'd like displayed to this - this whatever this Donatello is.

Not her son, but with his memories. It doesn't make sense. No of it does, and it's only the sharpest invent that keeps her from snatching him up and shaking him until answers fall from his mouth.

"You are not him, yet you recall? Know the stance I -"

Taught him to take before spars and practicing the katas. Something to focus the mind and hone it.

A memory floats up. You did well today. I am proud and so you should be as well.

"... My true height is closer to 40 feet."

Muscle memory is stronger, tugging him to go through with the motions, a simple routine of strikes and blocks. He shouldn't know these. It's both similar and yet so very different from what he's been taught with a bō.

The difference in Esmeryl's tone is enough to have Donnie's eyes snap back open. He looks at her, shaking his head once again, lacking in the answers he's sure both of them are seeking right now.

"But you're...so small." Even then, he's sure those wings could still be suitable enough a cover. ...why does he keep thinking that?

"You keep talking like you know me. Where did we meet? We...had to have, somewhere, right? I wouldn't be remembering these things otherwise, why do I know these things???"

"The R2. Does that mean anything?"

It's another demand. A test, this time, as hands fist and wings flicking out before sitting tight against her back.

If he is her son, just returned home without his memories - she knows that can happen - then perhaps she has triggered something by coming here.

If he is not her son yet is with powers from his mystics she does not know about (unlikely), then this world, this universe, ill be down a Donatello.

"The R2..."

It shouldn't mean anything, and yet it's like the final straw that breaks the camel's back. It's a key that unlocks a door he hadn't realized had been there and sealed shut until things had started seeping from beneath the crack.

Several years' worth of memories pours into his mind, an alternate life he hadn't realized he'd lived, rushing in, and with it so many flashes of faces, a whirlwind of emotions...

It's almost overwhelming, and while only a handful of seconds pass, inwardly it seems like so much longer. Donnie's eyes go out of focus, his balance faltering as he loses all sense of where he is in that moment. His grasp slips from his staff, and the turtle doesn't look long in following suit, legs giving out beneath him as he starts to collapse like a marionette whose strings had just been cut.

The reason Esme's hands hover close is many. Yes, it is to ease the boy down. Her son would appreciate it, even if she hands are rough.

There is, after all, still the dwindling option of this not being her son, its a threat and a reminder she's not above pinning him again.

"Well?"

Oh, he does, even though he doesn't immediately register it, but he automatically clings when he feels something near him. That's about all Donnie can do until he feels the ground beneath him. Well, sitting works. For a moment he just tries to breathe.

"...I forgot everything. I...don't know if I was supposed to be able to remember it all," he says, sounding shaky. Slowly, he lifts his head to look up at Esmeryl, only lifting a hand to scrub a sleeve across his eyes once he's sure he's not going to pitch over.

"Stupid Primes..." Because that clearly has to be the reason. Donnie sighs.

"I'm sorry..."

"I do not believe we were to remember when we went home to our worlds." Slowly, the roughness fades into something far more gentle as she sits beside him.

"You have nothing to be sorry for, Donnie. It is I should be sorry. I was rougher than I had any right to be."

She does regret it, in her own way. "Though I believe you have grown stronger with your mystics."

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