Evelyn was lost from the world. The voices that came from the darkness had shaken her to the core and her whole body was in pain. It was as if someone had pressed pause in her brain. She was only vaguely able to hear voices around her, but couldn't determine to whom they belonged. When it seemed the darkness would swallow her completely, she felt her body being pulled forward and something soft pressing against her lips. It took a moment or two to register what was happening, but once her vision returned to her, she stared in shock at the red cloth that covered Raphael's face. After being pulled back, she couldn't remember the fire, nor the pain. All she felt now was a cooling sensation against her lips. She was being kissed.

The raven-haired girl gasped lightly before she pushed against his chest and separated from him. Her cheeks were flushed and her heart pounded as she stared at the hot-tempered turtle. Raphael seemed unable to speak for a moment as he simply stared back at her, a blank expression on his face. Even if he had announced that it was only to help her, he couldn't deny that his heart was skipping frantically over what he did.

"Duuuuuude..." Michelangelo started; breaking the stunned silence after a moment or two.

Evelyn was shaken mentally when she heard his voice and was suddenly aware that everyone was standing around them. She felt her heart drop to her stomach when she saw Leonardo staring down at her in silence. All at once, the mix of emotion that churned in her stomach started to complicate her thoughts. She made an embarrassed little groan before she scrambled to her feet and rushed off into the tunnels without a word. Of all people, why did Leonardo have to see something like that?

"Eve!" Raphael shouted as he shot up and quickly began to run after her. He was embarrassed as well, but his main concern was that Evelyn wasn't upset with him and that she wasn't running into danger.

Leaving the rest of them to stand there in surprise, Donatello found himself glancing at April every now and then. Leonardo wasn't sure what to make of all this. In any case, it complicated things. This mystery around Eve was just gaining more questions than answers.
"I should go after them..." Leonardo sighed, "...after what just happened...we shouldn't let Evelyn run off. She could still flip out or-"

April stepped forward and shook her head. Surely being confronted by Leonardo right now would only make Eve feel worse. "Just let her be angry at Raphael for now. They'll sort it out."

As April bought her some time, Evelyn was running through the tunnels with no particular goal in mind. She wasn't even sure why she was running away. It wasn't like she was scared of Raphael or anything. She just couldn't process everything at once. The last thing she remembered was hearing a strange voice and the next thing she knew, Raphael was kissing her. In front of Leonardo. Why?

"Evelyn!" Raphael shouted as he ran to catch up to her.

She gasped and looked over her shoulder to see him coming up fast, "Why are you chasing me?!" she asked in a panic.

"Because you're running away!" He shouted back simply.

"Don't follow me!" she demanded; her voice echoing in the tunnels as she tried to pick up the pace.

"Yeah, right!" Raph replied as he closed the gap between them and did a quick flip in the air to land in front of her. Forcing Evelyn to stop. She nearly fell backward as she stopped on her heel. Raphael grabbed her arms in order to keep her steady.

Catching her before the fall, he kept her arms in his hands gently as he stared evenly at her face. The two were silent for a while, unsure of what to say. Eve kept her gaze on the floor so she wouldn't meet his eyes. What was she supposed to say? After everything that happened today, she wasn't exactly ready to deal with any of it. Not to mention the fact that he kissed her after their argument. Even now, he was holding her arms so carefully and she knew he was staring right at her, but she couldn't bring herself to look at him.

"I had to shock you. I couldn't think of anything else," he started, visibly nervous.

This response was probably the last thing she wanted to hear right now. To shock her? He kissed her, to shock her?! Turning to look at him now, her expression was not encouraging. Once again, he was forced to see her angry and upset.

"...that was all you could think of...?" she repeated sardonically.

Raphael found his gaze drifting down to her lips as he looked at her face. He shook his head, trying to shake the blush from his cheeks.
"Y-yeah. Sorry." he stumbled on his words now, feeling his heart pounding. He was a mutant. For all appearances, Eve was human. She was a beautiful human girl. Even if she seemed to have a crush on Leonardo, that didn't guarantee that she might ever choose a Mutant. Not that he hoped at all. He wasn't going to let himself. He was not going to even try. Raphael was always telling Donnie that it could never work. He needed to remember that, but it was difficult when he was close to her like this.

"...Well that doesn't mean I'll forgive you for it so easily..." she started. "I mean...Leonardo was right there! He saw everything and...now..."

Raphael felt a strange wrench in his chest as she spoke, but instead of releasing her arms, his grip became firm and he pulled her into an embrace.

"Raphael?!" she exclaimed. Did he really think this would fix anything? He couldn't just hug her and make it all go away. She flared up a little and opened her mouth to shout, but he squeezed her a little tighter and spoke before she got the chance.

"Your memory loss..." he started softly, keeping his gaze at the floor now, but refusing to loosen his grip on her so she wouldn't see his face, "...Leonardo told you...that Stockmen dropped you...but...he didn't tell you that it was my fault."

She was silent for a while, trying to process what he was telling her. Was he trying to make it all worse? First, he makes her lose her memory, and now he was refusing to tell her what he knew? Not to mention stealing what she believed to be her first kiss for shock value.
"W..why are you telling me this?" Eve asked as she began to struggle in his arms. She was hurt, angry, confused, and all she wanted to do was lash out. That was difficult when he was holding her. She wanted to be upset with him.

"Because from the moment you fell, I couldn't let it go that it was my fault!" he closed his eyes tight as his voice began to rise, "I stayed by your side out of guilt at first, but now..." Raphael's voice trailed off softly, unable to admit it out loud, or even to himself right now, "...now...I just want you to be safe. ...I want you to be happy. I know I keep messing up...but can't you just trust me?"

Evelyn stared over his shoulder, trying to understand all this. He was asking quite a lot. He knew something about her and she needed to know what it was. Losing her memory had made her feel like a broken doll. She was missing pieces and she couldn't feel whole without them. Raphael had some of those pieces, but he was keeping them from her. That was what hurt the most.
"...I can trust you...if you tell me what you found out," she said finally, "...why don't you want me going into the sun?"

Raphael took a deep breath and released her from his arms to step back and look at her.
He didn't want to tell her about the torture he suspected, but even if he was careful with his words, she did deserve to know some things. It was her past after all. He explained the picture he found and that someone had written a note saying they kept her away from sunlight, but he couldn't bring himself to tell her anything else. He also chose to omit the part about the woman in black. He still had to be careful. That woman found him on that roof too easily. Just because the stuff he got from her made Eve better, he wasn't about to trust her unconditionally. Evelyn seemed to take most of it well. The look on her face was more encouraging than before at least.

"...So..." Eve started quietly, slowly starting to process what he told her, "...people were studying me...and said I couldn't be in the sun. ...so...you don't really know what happens. You just found out that it was something they kept me from..." she finished, feeling a little disappointed over not actually finding out much about her identity. Still, it was something and she was happy that he was longer keeping anything from her.

"Yeah. ...So I guess...whatever Mikey saw...might be why they wanted to keep you out of the sun..." Raphael replied, still feeling a little twist in his stomach since he was still omitting a lot of truths.

Evelyn nodded just a little and took a deep breath, "...So...at least that's a start," she said with a smile as she glanced up at him, "thank you...for telling me the truth."

"...yeah," he muttered in response. To Eve, it simply looked as if he were embarrassed, but he was still nervous about keeping all this to himself. He wished she weren't so trusting. It hurt a lot more when she smiled at him.

Evelyn blushed now and turned her back to him, placing her hands behind her back, "And that kiss...was really just for shock value?" she asked again.

Raphael flinched a little and cleared his throat slightly, "Y-yeah. Sorry about that."

Something tightened in Evelyn's chest and she wasn't sure why, but his response hurt a little. His interest in her was purely formed from guilt, she knew that now, so why did she care if the kiss didn't have deeper feelings behind it? She didn't. Raphael was a friend.
Evelyn shook her head, tried to gather her thoughts, and get back to the matter at hand.
"Okay. ...We should head back. I'm sure they are all a little worried..." she sighed, still not willing to let Raphael off the hook so easily.

It didn't take them long to return home. When they did arrive, the others had all scattered. Donnie was in his lab with April, Mikey was cooking in the kitchen, and Leonardo was punching the training dummy. The moment Evelyn and Raphael came into the room, Leonardo stopped and held his hand up to greet them. Evelyn met his blue eyes for only a moment before she blushed and looked away. Leonardo didn't seem upset at all over what happened. Did she want him to be?

"Are you feeling okay?" Leonardo asked in concern, meeting her halfway at the entrance.

"...y-yeah. ...I'm still a little confused...but...I-well I'll be fine..." she wasn't sure how to handle this. Should she remind Leo that she had no control over being kissed? Did he even care? "...um...about...what happened..." began Evelyn awkwardly, searching for the right words to make this better. At the very least, she didn't want Leonardo to misunderstand anything.

"You need to go and let Donnie have another look at you," Raphael interrupted, growing irritated as he watched Eve fumble on her words in front of his brother. "Just in case."

Evelyn was about to protest when Leonardo placed his hand on her head and offered a smile.

"I know you probably have a lot on your mind...but considering what happened today...I think it's a good idea for Donnie to check on you. Please?" Leonardo added, knowing full well that she didn't often refuse if he asked nicely.

Feeling defeated by his smile, Evelyn nodded her head slowly, and instead of trying to explain herself further, walked away from the two brothers towards Donatello's lab.

"We still need to have that talk." Leo insisted once Evelyn was out of earshot.

"...Yeah. I think we do." Raphael agreed as he rubbed the back of his head and sighed, turning to head for his room, "come on."