Sai In Exasperation
First and foremost: THANK YOU ALEXLUKE for your continued support and feedback!
AN 2: Trying something a little different this time. Wanted to give some screen time to our favorite hothead, delving into the missing moments and 'possible' situations that made Raph the turtle he is. For the most part these will be pretty G-PG13 rated, however, if an idea pops into mind of something of a more adult nature, I'll change the rating and apply proper warnings.
As always, feedback is greatly appreciated.
Trigger warning: This chapter contains mentions of domestic violence. If such a thing offends you, please, exit the story and don't read.
o-o-
-o-
o-o
"Carrie, he did it again," a female voice sobbed over the phone.
Raph, not used to females, let alone when they were crying,) immediately began to panic.
"Uhh, sorry?"
"This isn't Carrie?" the voice gasped through sniffles.
"No. You have the wrong number," Raph said, chest knotting with unease.
He was a skilled ninja, but there was nothing in the ninja handbook about consoling an upset woman. Not to mention that despite being twenty, Raph didn't have a lot of experience with humans, especially the female variety.
"Sorry." She sniffed. The line went dead.
Raph breathed a sigh of relief and put his phone in his pocket. Five seconds later, it rang again. It was the same number. He opened his mouth to inform her of the repeated mistake, but she blubbered before he could speak.
"Carrie, he hit me again! Can you come get me?"
Raph mouthed like a fish out of water.
"Uhh, it's still the wrong number."
It was difficult to figure what made him more uncomfortable. The fact he was talking to an upset woman, or the fact she was crying because she had apparently been abused.
"Sorry," she muttered, hanging up.
An idea struck. Raph moved surprisingly fast for a turtle.
"Hey genius, can you trace a call?" he asked Donnie, who was unsurprisingly buried to his snout in electronics.
Donnie's small eyes blinked behind his glasses. "Yeah, why?"
"Some chick keeps callin.' Said a guy hit her and she's really upset. Wanted to find out where she is so maybe later I can swing by to make sure she's okay."
Donnie held out his hand for the phone but it rang again. Raph put it on speaker so Donnie could understand the full gravity of the situation.
"Carrie, can you come get me? Jack hit me again." Her voice quavered through her tears.
Raph's gaze stayed locked onto Donnie's.
"Wrong number, but if you tell me your address, I can send police to help you," Raph tried.
She gasped, hiccupping and muttered, "Sorry to bother you."
"Hey, it's okay!" Raph blurted, trying to gain her trust. "I'm not Carrie, but I can try to help you."
"What's your name?" she asked
"Raph," he said, Donnie motioning for him to keep her on line. "What's yours?"
"Sorry to keep bothering you, Raph," she said. "Just…forget I called. Sorry."
The line went dead.
Donnie perked up, recalling the city map on his main terminal.
"There," he said, pointing to the far side of Queens.
Raph put the address into his phone and checked the time.
Almost 6pm.
The bad thing with living in a city that never sleeps is that any time someone could see a six foot talking turtle. Night gave the ninjas cover to conceal themselves, but with the bright lights and active cameras scouring the city for potential terrorists, the risks were increased.
Raph hated the idea of waiting, but the best time to prowl the city was after midnight. The shadows grew longer, providing better cover for a ninja turtle.
Since Raph was unable to venture out, he bided his time exercising his favorite punching bag, imagining it to be the unknown male who enjoyed beating up on women. Raph's phone remained silent the rest of the evening. He paused every few moments, glancing to the blank screen, but there were no more calls.
He hoped the poor woman was able to find the right number and called her friend to get her to safety.
But to make sure, he would check out the address loaded into his phone.
Not able to take the suspense any longer, Raph grabbed his phone, bringing up the coordinates. It was barely ten, but reconnoitering would take time.
And he was legitimately concerned for the woman who called him, crying, suffering from the pain inflicted by a cowardly male.
"Remember, don't be seen," Donnie called.
Raph sneered. He was six and half feet tall and nearly four hundred pounds of sheer muscle. He was a hefty turtle, almost a mountain by human standards. But despite his enormity, Raph was as adept as stealth as any of his brothers. If he chose not to be seen, he wouldn't be.
"I'm only going to swing by and make sure nothings going on," Raph said gruffly, waving a beam of an arm. "Make sure she got away from the guy beating on her."
Donnie never retorted because Raph was already gone.
As pedestrians traipsed above and loitered on clogged subway terminals, Raph easily bypassed the congestion, sliding on his shell along the water drains. The main sewer drains he avoided, not wanting that particular smell on him.
While humans waited at traffic lights and screamed at the slow moving traffic and distracted drivers, Raph took the landscape with the ease of an acrobat. A quick train ride, taking a moment to savor the rush of air over his shell, and Raph found himself in the tunnels below the woman's address.
From the drain he watched as the street lights flickered orange, doing very little to stave off criminal elements slinking about in the shadows, unknowing they were being monitored by reptilian eyes.
But they weren't Raph's concern this night. At least not at the moment.
His target was on the seventh floor of a shabby apartment complex. Keeping underground, he used the advantage points of the city drains and manhole covers to perform a full circuit around the building.
It took nearly an hour for Raph to be able to see everything, calculating the height of the building, neighboring buildings, alleyways, activity on streets, broken lights to offer shadow, and an easy to climb fire escape. A few windows were open on this June evening, inviting a cool Canadian breeze to ease the balm of a near ninety day.
Raph's target was in the upper most eastern apartment. The lights were on showing a dingy ceiling and fans whirling to circulate fresh air. A nearby skylight offered view into the neighboring apartment, but also provided some much needed shelter for a sneaky turtle on a mission. The ridges threw sufficient shadows to the apartment of Raph's interest.
Waiting until the coast was clear, Raph slid aside the manhole cover in the east alley, trying not to make a sound with the cast iron lid. As he expected, the alley was devoid of homeless eyes who would report a giant turtle coming out of the sewer. Replacing the lid, Raph bled into the shadows, remaining motionless for several minutes before scaling the building.
The pock marks allowed footholds, giving him the chance to get some height and grasp the ironwork of the fire escape. Like a jungle monkey, he swung up and over each balcony, eyes in constant motion to make sure no one poked their head out the window and got a face full of turtle.
Making it to the top, and scaring the hell outta some pigeons, he slunk into the shadows by the small wall that supported the skylights and waited. Several minutes passed before Raph chanced a peek inside the apartment his damsel caller was living.
The light showed him a skinny man, hollowed cheeks and sunken chest, with stringy hair and scruff at least a week old, smoking a cigarette, staring at a phone.
The scene seemed ordinary. Nothing uncommon… until a woman walked in, carrying a beer. She handed it to the man with downcast eyes and slumped shoulders.
Her arms were mottled purple and her face was red and swollen from crying. Her lip was also split, ringed by dried blood.
"Here, Jack," she said softly.
He took his beer, eyes still on the phone. He held up the screen so she could see.
"Whose number is this? I don't recognize it."
She squinted, and Raph could see the left side of her face was tinged purple. "It was a wrong number."
"You called it several times," Jack said, puffing madly on his cigarette.
"I thought I had gotten the right number, but I misdialed," she explained hurriedly, "You know me. Always clumsy. Messing up. Making mistakes. The guy got pissed at me for disturbing him."
"Guy, huh?" Jack said, setting his beer on the floor and standing.
The woman cowered, arms automatically lifting to protect her face.
"You expect me to believe you called some random guy several times?"
Jack threw down the phone, stomping it with his foot. He ground it into electronic components, sneering at the cowering woman.
"Well, guess you can't call your loverboy now, huh?"
"Please Jack! It wasn't like that!" she sputtered, crying. "I got the wrong number! I made a mistake. I won't call him again."
"You're damn right you won't," Jack snarled, drawing back his fist and slamming it into the woman's face.
She screamed, staggering back, blood spurting from her nose.
"I'll teach you to cheat on me!" Jack yelled, picking up a belt from the floor.
Raph couldn't sit idly by and watch as a helpless woman was beaten by a cowardly sack of human waste. Snarling obscenities, he broke through the window, landing as a battle machine, dwarfing the man by a foot. Raph puffed his shell and flexed his muscles menacingly, throwing the thin male into stately shadow.
"Wha..?" Jack sputtered, wide eyed with terror.
"Like hurtin' women, do ya?" Raph snarled, stalking forward with the might of a mountain about to rumble with fury.
"What…. Are… you?" Jack gasped, dropping his belt and backpedaling from the giant green retribution about to rain on his head.
"Protector of women." Raph's growl was his only warning.
Years of ninja training gave him speed and accuracy. The human didn't stand a chance.
Raph was a green blur, punching, kicking, even bitch slapping the man who abused a woman. Within a few short seconds, the man was on the floor, nose broken, lips bleeding, teeth loosened, and both eyes reddened as they started to swell from the impact of Raph's anger.
When Raph drew back his fist, ready to deal a crippling blow, the woman threw herself over the bleeding man. Raph caught himself at the last second, narrowing missing the woman who used herself as a shield to protect the man sputtering and coughing up blood.
"Stop! Stop!" she cried out. "Don't hurt him!"
"Da fuck?" Raph snapped, taken aback. "He was beatin' on ya, lady? Did you miss the belt in his hand or when he punched you a minute ago?"
"Don't you dare hurt him!" she screamed, sobbing hysterically, using herself to hide the broken and bleeding man. "I love him. Don't hurt him! He didn't mean it!"
Raph drew up, shell shocked. He readily admitted he didn't understand humans. He knew even less about women. But it was unfathomable why this woman, who was being so horribly abused, was protective of the man who beat her.
It wasn't logical.
It was an episode of the Twilight Zone.
Knuckles red with Jack's blood, Raph simply stared, as if not quite understanding English.
"Get away from him, you… you… monster!" She screeched.
Jack was a choking, moaning lump on the floor.
"Don't come near us, you… beast!" she howled and spat, terrified and protective all at once.
Raph blinked, her words sinking in.
Well, if she didn't want him to help her, then he would oblige. Let her deal with Jack and his fists. If she wanted to let herself get beat up by a worm of a human, then who was Raph to stand in her way?
He huffed, baring his teeth and darted out the window, disappearing into the night.
He raced along the rooftops for several blocks, changing course to lose any unsavory shadows.
Once sure he wasn't followed, Raph perched on a balcony overlooking the vast metropolis of New York. As the cool air caressed Raph's scaly skin, whipping his bandana around his face, the lights far below twinkling in his green eyes, his fists still stained with the blood of Jack, he sighed in exasperation.
She dared call Raph a monster?
Raph was a hero!
A protector.
He was defending her from the person causing her pain and suffering.
Raph scrubbed his face.
He just didn't understand humans, women in particular.
What kind of person prevented their abuser from getting a taste of their own medicine? Who used themselves as a barrier to shield their abuser? The man who raised his hand to her, to break her body and spirit.
He was the monster.
Someone who took pleasure in terrorizing those smaller and weaker than himself. Someone who bullied and intimidated and physically attacked, bringing blood and breaking bone…. And yet… despite all he had done, his victim defended him!
It didn't make sense!
Raph gazed across the innumerable lights of the city.
What kind of person turned away a friendly hand? Rejected a way to escape the pain and suffering?
What kind of person… protected a real monster?
O-o
o-o
o-o
So, what do you think? I don't know if it's already been done, but I know "I" haven't ventured down this particular rabbit hole, so it's new territory for me. Be interesting to find out Raph's secrets and witness the moments that defined him as a person, a brother, a student, a loner, a fighter, a guardian.
Signed reviews are answered, so if you want a response, you must sign in. (guests are always welcomed too, though won't have questions answered)