He was alone one second, and not the next. Raphael had good hearing - honed over years of living in a situation where discovery could mean disaster for everyone he loved - but he had never managed to perfect the art of hearing his father approach.
He lay on his side, staring at the small fire in front of him, as a furred paw came to rest gently on his shoulder. The darkness behind him was absolute; his father's presence an admonition. Raphael could feel the disappointment almost as a physical touch, cold, wet, slipping down beneath his shell to worm its way down his spine and settle right in the heart of him along with the chill of that place.
"I'm sorry," he said, before Splinter could say a word.
There was a sound, half sigh, half chuckle. "You always are, my son. And yet I fear I will meet you here again in the future." He blinked, his eyes dry and aching from the heat and light of the flames. The faintest of tremors shivered through his body. He was freezing. It was a strange dicotomy, to be so close to burning and yet penetrated with nothing but bone deep cold. "Won't you go closer?"
Raph shook his head, his gaze mesmerised by the patterns in the flame, the colours - blue, purple, orange - exposed for a split second and then gone forever. Leonardo found peace in meditation, in closing his eyes and seeking out his centre. For Raphael it was found not within, but out there. He daren't close his eyes for fear he'd miss it.
There was the faintest whisper of sound, his father was sitting down. The hand on his shoulder shifted, sliding down his arm to rest on his wrist. Raphael twitched, sensation exploding to life in a limb previously forgotten about. His shoulder was a second heart beat, white hot and pulsing. But it faded, flickering out after a second, like the twisting flame in front of him.
A log shifted, grey and ashed, bone white and blistered, sending a shower of sparks up to catch the updraft and swirl heavenwards.
They remained in silence. Raphael reveling in this rare moment, just he and his father. There was no lightening of the sky to show the passing of time but somehow, Raph knew, they had been there for an eternity.
"The fire is dying." Splinter said, an unfathomable time later. "You must feed it."
His heart was hollow, his body, the little he could feel of it, iced and aching. "I have nothing left." he whispered in plea.
"My son," came the reply, soft as the furred paw that smoothed over his temple. "You must dig deep."
He had spent most of his time here feeding it, until everything he could lay hands on was gone, fed to the hunger of the flames. And when everything had been consumed and he was hollowed out, he had curled up at the base, in a bed of ash, and waited for it to finally be smothered. Now the flame was banked, orange heart beating amongst grey bone ash. "It needs fuel." He was reluctant to leave in case it flickered out while he was gone. Something deep inside told him it would be hard, if not impossible, to restart the flame.
"I will guard it for you."
He looked across but the darkness was such that, close as they were, Raph couldn't pick out his father's face. "You will?"
"Always." A squeeze against his wrist, his pulse point. "But you will need to hurry if you are to save it."
The act of standing was the hardest thing he had ever had to do in his life. He uncurled his aching limbs and stood on feet numb with cold and grey from ash. The blackness behind him held nothing within it that could or would burn. He knew this to be a certainty, just as he knew there was still one thing there that could fuel the flame.
"Sensei?" His sentiment was unspoken, but the words were loud and, unseen next to him, Splinter smiled.
"You are my middle child, one that I have not always appreciated as much as I should have done." The paw cupping his jaw was warm and he leaned his head into the touch. "Your brothers' flames have cast you into shadow many times, and for this I am truly sorry. Your own talents have not always been something I have rewarded, but your passion still burns bright. Allow it to fuel you now, my son."
He was stepping forward before he even knew it, wading ankle deep through ash and bone. For his brothers he would do anything.
Even return.
The ghost touch of Splinter's hand slid from his wrist as would the mooring of a boat from port and Raphael felt the loss keenly before the flames reached out to lick around him, family, friends, welcoming him home, holding him fast from the cold and the dark to which they had almost lost him.
The flames leapt, and in their grasp he burned bright.