Someone is watching me.
Whoever it is, they're close enough to set my internal alarms off and wake me from my peaceful sleep.
I can feel their dark and heavy presence flowing through my room and over me like oil. It presses down on my chest, making breathing a significantly more difficult function.
The Footclan.
Panic begins to settle in my stomach like pebbles tossed into a pond, and I fight the hysteria with everything I have to keep my mind clear and my body prepared for whatever—or whoever—I may have to face.
Luckily though, I don't have to face it alone.
"Raph?" I whisper as loud as I dare, but it's not enough because his light snoring remains undeterred.
I can feel them stalking closer, and somehow I know that it no longer matters how loud I am. With that knowledge in mind, I roll off my bed and land right on top of him.
And still, he doesn't wake up.
Oh god. He's not waking up, why is he not waking up!?
They continue to gradually creep closer, giving me less and less time to wake up Raphael, which seems to be impossible. It's like he's dead, yet still breathing—comatose. But that's not okay because I can't protect him and Olivia and me!
Then they're upon me and I'm left with no other choice.
I wrench a sai from Raph's belt and hold it up to deflect an incoming blow, but I'm tossed aside like a rag doll. I look up in time to see them draw a sword and promptly slice open Raphael's throat. His fearful, jade eyes shoot open to meet mine for a nanosecond before permanently fluttering shut. The assassin rips his mask from his face and ties it onto their belt, completing their collection of trophies. Red, purple, blue and orange. Somehow, I know that Splinter is gone as well.
And I shatter into more pieces than I can possibly hope to reassemble.
I try to fight it but the anger and the rage is burning red across my vision—a never-ending, uncontrollable wildfire of fury—and it's utterly unstoppable. The hungry flames spew promises of vengeance, so I allow it to consume me.
And then I unleash myself upon the Footclan assassin.
But it's not enough. They're stronger than me and I can do nothing to stop them.
And then Olivia's dead too. I can feel it in my very being—as if the threads holding me together have been severed. Her death presses down on me like an irremovable weight on my chest, compressing my lungs and once more rendering respiration a painful and miserable task.
I can't stop them, and I know without a doubt that soon, Uncle Tom will join the death count as well.
And I can't do anything…Not one, single thing.
Just when I found myself a place in the world and a real family, it's torn effortlessly from my weak, incompetent grasp.
And I feel so utterly alone in this cruel world I can hardly recognize who I am. I just keep breaking over and over and over again into smaller and smaller fragments until I feel as if I'm no more than dust suspended in the dead, unmoving air.
••• 影の秘密 •••
"Raiya?" I did my best to suppress my groan when he whispered to me in an undoubtedly concerned tone.
Of course I woke him up.
"Yeah?" I sighed, reaching a hand up to rub the exhaustion from my eyes, only to find them wet with tears. I scowled and wiped my face dry.
"Y'okay?" His low voice was raspy from sleeping and lifted my mood a bit.
"Uh, y–yeah. I'm fine." I shook the fearful stutter from my voice in frustration. "Did I wake you up?"
"Nah. I was only shallow sleeping and it sounded like you were having a nightmare."
"Sorry." My words were still irritatingly shaky. "I'm fine." I repeated, though I felt far from it. And even without me admitting to it Raph knew as well as I did that I was not fine. But he didn't say anything about it, and I was grateful for that.
"What's shallow sleeping?" Based off what he'd called it I had a pretty good idea, but the last thing I wanted right then was to sound like a total idiot when I was already being a fearful toddler.
"It's like light sleeping on purpose so you're aware of most of what's going on around you but still sleep at the same time. Me and my brothers figured it out so we could avoid getting pranked by Mikey in our sleep."
"And yet, you still tried to tattoo Donnie." I shook my head with a grin.
I couldn't imagine even half of all the things the turtles had gotten up to throughout their lives. Mikey never seemed to run out of entertaining stories from their childhood, and listening to them all was easily becoming one of my favourite pastimes.
"He looked like he was in a coma," Raph argued. "I even jabbed him a few times before he woke up."
"So he has a random black dot somewhere?"
"A really small one on his…right side. Can't see it unless you look real close though."
I held back a giggle. "I'm sure he really appreciates that."
"Yeah," he chuckled. "Mikey used to always poke it and die laughing when Donnie freaked out." I grinned to myself, containing my laughter over the sight I could so easily imagine.
The stars on my roof seemed to shine brighter than ever, possibly because I felt absolutely no desire to sleep. And it wasn't even entirely due to my nightmare, I just felt so energized.
"I'm bored," I groaned, twisting in my bed so I laid on my stomach and my head was turned toward the window. Though it only served to worsen my restlessness with the knowledge that I could just hop right out and onto the roof.
"What?" He hissed. "How the hell are you bored?" I sighed through my nose and shrugged my shoulders even though I knew he couldn't see me.
"I dunno, I just can't sleep. I wanna do something."
He snorted. "Like what?…It's one in the morning."
"That's it?" I said in surprise. "We could totally do something."
"Like what?" He repeated.
"I don't know!" I rolled out of my bed, making sure not to step on the mutant terrapin laying on the floor. He propped himself up on his forearms and peered incredulously at me through the darkness.
"What're you doing?" I shrugged, grabbing a hoodie off a hook on the wall beside the door.
"Going outside." I pulled the thick fabric on over my head and strode over to the window to open it.
"You're serious?" Raph hissed in disbelief. I threw my hands up and spun to shoot him a look of annoyance.
"Yes." And with that, I turned back around and climbed outside. The cold wind washed over my face and seeped in through my thin, fleece pants. I stared up at the sky, hoping against hope that I'd spy a star through all the light pollution and smog. But—once again—my desperate search was unsuccessful. Knowing they were up there and just outside of my reach absolutely killed me.
"Whatcha lookin' at?"
"Nothing." I exhaled and I could just about see my breath suspended in the brisk night air. "Just looking for stars." I didn't even hear him but suddenly I could feel him right behind me. "Wanna spar?"
"Hell yeah." I thrust my elbow out behind me but he caught it and sent me stumbling forward with a laugh.
"Come on Raiy," he mocked in a teasing tone, "kick it up a notch."
"Don't tempt me," I warned, gritting my teeth and lifting my leg in a kick as I spun back around. "I'll fight dirty."
"That'd be interesting," he agreed, dodging my foot effortlessly.
You're asking for it. I only needed half a moment in which my vision went blank with all the knowledge from a life lived long ago, and then I was ducking under Raph's blow and swiping a sai from his belt with all the grace of a fox and more.
"Alright," he nodded and slipped his remaining sai from his belt. "Let's fight dirty, then." He spun the weapon in his palm and widened his stance. I weighed it in my hand, adjusting my grip accordingly to accommodate for it's overly-large size. I knew how to use it. And thanks to today's sparring lessons with Raph, I was able to determine how he fought. So when he struck, I knew when to block and where he was exposed. I knew how to move past him and how to read his intentions. Unsurprisngly, it still wasn't enough; I could never come out on top. But dancing in the dead of night beneath the light of the moon and the stars that hid from sight, I hadn't a care in the world.
AN: I was kinda iffy writing this one with Raiya's dream and stuff, but it's the only way I could think of to bring her fears into play since she always maintains a strong exterior. But I though it'd be cute for Raph to kinda help her through it in the end so I just went with it lol.
Do you guys like the nightmare scenes? Is there anything I could do to improve them? I'm totally open to suggestions cuz I find writing them to be kinda difficult sometimes. And the nightmare are not going away anytime soon so please let me know what I could improve on!
Like Raphael, Raiya is a super reserved person and she keeps a lot of stuff to herself. So she ends up dealing with everything alone, and her fears kinda just build up and you know you dream about whatever it is you're thinking about so that's why she has these nightmares. And they're gonna start getting more and more constant because some shit's gonna go down real soon lol so hold onto your hats people!
btw you guys I have the best ending planned for TSS I'm literally already screaming I'm so freaking excited !
ANYWAY, thank you so much for the reviews and please leave me some more! I love reading them! You guys are the best!
