New York never slept; these half-real pre-dawn hours when drunks slumped in their alleys and a few cars crawled like blood clots in the concrete veins of the city's bloated corpse were as close as it came. Perched like a crumbled gargoyle atop the fire escape of a tower block, Raphael sighed and pulled the knot of his headband tighter on his smooth domed head, the feeling of restriction providing the usual weak catharsis, the fleeting diversion from his infinite misery.

Master Splinter...

Regular as clockwork, the flashes came – A thousand black tentacles, writhing in the void - Oroku Saki's snarling face, and the dreadful snik of metal claw on yielding flesh – that terrible scream, that ripped apart the cosmos, and with it what had once been the world's most fearless fighting team.

The pathetic crumpled pile of blood and fur that had been their Sensei.

Raphael swore, a harsh word lost to the cold night, and flung his sai, the sharp points imbedding themselves in the building's great satellite dish. He stood and crossed the roof to retrieve the twin weapons, running his hand across the pock-marked surface of the dish that was one of many targets for his violent rage. Then the hand went to his face, running over the scar that bit deep across his left cheek and ran down to his chin. There was moisture in the wound, and as brought his hand away he realised he had been crying. He'd been crying a lot recently.

A female scream from below tore him from his thoughts, and he ran to the roof's edge. Bathed in flickering streetlight were a man and woman. He was cursing, clutching at her handbag, trying to wrestle it away from her while she struggled bravely to hold onto it. The man broke away to pull out a blade which glinted dangerously, waved it in her face and demanded the bag.

With the stealth and speed that years of training had instilled in him, Raphael was already halfway down the fire escape before the man looked up, his pupils contracting in the streetlight's harsh glare as he tried to see what lay beyond. The turtle leapt, and his heavy foot crashed into the surprised man's face, flooring him instantly and knocking him out as his skull met cold concrete.

"You OK, lady?" asked Raph. She just stared at him, clutching her handbag tight to her chest, frozen to the spot in shock.

The man groaned as he came to, and the blade flashed towards Raphael's leg, trying to bury itself in his calf. The man's drug-heightened speed were no match for the ninja's reactions, and the turtle's foot came down on his knife arm, loudly snapping the bone as the thief screamed in agony. His cry was abruptly cut off as Raph's fist collided into his chin, replaced with strangled gasps as punches rained down on him. In his head Raphael was fighting Saki once more, fighting to save the life of his master. The man's nose broke under the assault, blood spraying his face as he prepared himself for death.

Then her hands were on the turtle's powerful shoulders, desperately pulling him back. "Stop, you monster!" she shouted. "You're going to kill him!"

The red mist behind Raphael's eyes faded, and he sat back on his heels, his momentary rage replaced with the emptiness he had grown accustomed to. It began to rain, great spats that burst on his smooth head, plastered the girl's blonde hair to her face, cleaned the man's blood away as he lay there dazed.

"Sorry miss, I--"

But she had fled into the night, swallowed by the dark outside the streetlight. Wearily he rose to his feet and began the long walk home, keeping to the relative safety of the lonely alleys and suspicious shadows that most would avoid at all costs. All around car horns blared and shouts rang out as the city roused itself from another restless night, but the sounds were lost to Raphael as he escaped into his mind to once more relive the events of that terrible day.

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(A/N Please review if you want me to continue this. I know where the story's going, but I want to know what you think of the setup. Thanks!)