(3313 words)

In and out. In and out of consciousness Raph slides, groggy and sluggish in the moments he's awake and death like while asleep. He can't see anything while he's awake but he can feel around himself. He feels the bumpiness of a road, then firm hands on his limbs, then cold cement and metal. His arms are pinned behind him and he can't move, all his limbs feel heavy and thick like they were still asleep. "Lil' bastard. Thought he'd get away with it." A voice.

"Gon' be dead when I'm done with 'im." Raph knew the voice, it was so familiar... His head hurt so bad... He feels the pinch of something burrowing itself into his skin, going deeper though his muscle and then back out. Again he slips into the realm of sleep.

"Go. Go now." He was tall, very tall. A knife pressed to Raph's back leaving a small pinhole prick in his skin along side dozens of tiny scars. "I SAID NOW." With a whimper he scurries forward, walking through a busy festival, snatching things here and there, a package of orange slices, a wallet or two, a lost watch left on the ground. Quickly he brings it back to the tall man. "That's it?! That's pitiful! What is this worth? a couple hundred dollars? This is bullshit!" He grabs Raph's wrist, digging his fingers into the young boy's skin.

"You'll go again and you'd better not get caught." The man rasps, shoving him forward. Raph stumbles and ducks through the crowd again. This time he takes in the festival completely. There was so much going on. There was an older man who was buying a lace scarf, probably for his wife or daughter. There was a young woman eyeing up a young salesmen at a tent with produce.

Around the corner there was an old woman who looked either dead, or asleep at a table with nothing but a purple and gold carpet, a clear orb, and an open chest full of money. Nobody was around this tent and the people who were weren't paying any attention to the deathly old looking woman.

Raph swiftly dashes up to the table and reaches up to take the chest, glancing over his shoulder to make sure nobody was watching. The second his fingers touched the chest, the woman wakes up, grabbing his small wrist in a wrinkly death grip. "Nice try young man but I'm not as blind as you may think." She says, her voice nearly quivering with age. Raph's eyes go wide and he tries to pull away. "Stop pulling boy. You haven't much time, the woman from the booth across and just to the right left for a bathroom break, go and take a couple of her jewels, that should pacify that man."

Raph doesn't question anything as the woman lets him go and he walks over to the jewelry booth. There were a few imitation pieces but he knew the ones stored in the containers would be the most priceless. He opens two boxes and takes out a necklace with five large emeralds on a pure gold chain and a bracelet with a light pink jewel in the center with little ones all along the rose gold chain.

As fast as he could he leaves the booth area, feeling the old woman's eyes on his back. How did she know he was there? She looked like she could've been dead, how did she know? Why did she help him? All of these questions were things a young Raphael would never get answered. Sometimes you just don't get to know.

He makes his way back to the man and shakily hands the two pieces of jewelry to him. "This is still a pitiful haul but it'll make do for now. You're lucky you got ones that even look real." The man snatches Raph's hand and tugs him along behind him, his long legs taking strides much too big for the child. "With your eye you're lucky you didn't pick up a candy ring." As they make their way through the crowd, the hoard of people grows thinner and thinner until the streets of parked cars are visible.

Raph has his eyes trained on the car so hard that when he runs into something he falls back on his butt, falling out of the man's grip. "Oh, I'm so sorry, are you okay?" Raph looks up at a beautiful young woman. Her emerald green eyes rivaled Raph's and her long black hair was tied up into a bun. Her skin was a milky chocolate which made her yellow sundress pop against it. Raph nods and stands up. "I'm so sorry, he's really not all there. He runs into things so much." The man says.

"Oh no worries. He's such a cute little thing, isn't he?" The woman says, tucking a piece of her hair behind her ear. "Oh- adorable." The man says with a hint of contempt. "I just adore children. I'd go into the same business as my husband as a social worker if it wasn't for the fact that I'd just want to take all the kids home with me!" She lets out a laugh and smiles. "Sorry anyways." She says. The man smiles and waves before turning and glaring towards the car.

He swipes Raph's hand up again and squeezes it much too tight. They speed walk back to the car and the man glares at Raph. "Don't you EVER fuck up like that again boy or I'll kill you myself." Thrown in the back of the car, Raph curls up in a ball, watching as the tall man gets in and speeds away, jostling him back and forth in the back seat having no seat belts installed. In no time he was inside a house. It was tall and looming, looking as if it'd devour him whole. He scampers inside after the man.

The man heads straight ahead to the kitchen, yanking open the fridge door and taking out a beer bottle. He must've been in a good mood, he went for the bottles and not the cans. Raph stands and watches for a moment as the man struggles with the cap before smashing the top half of the bottle on the counter. He was in much less of a good mood now.

Unfortunately for Raph he had over stayed his welcome for just a little too long. "YOU, get over here and clean this shit up!" Cringing, Raph cautiously makes his way over while the man shoves by him to go sit in the living-room. The young boy bends down and starts to pick up the pieces of glass out of the sticky, throat burning liquid. He would've used a broom but the man had thrown it out a week ago. He throws away the small pieces of glass and a smell wafts up to his nose, a sent that would remind him of this house for years to come.

He wipes his sticky hands on his pants and dashes down the the stairs in the entryway to the basement. There was a small cot in the corner under the stairs with a pole out in front of it and a desk across the room from it. There were a couple toys scattered around and a ripped up backpack thrown against the back wall. Raph grabs the pack and sprints his short legs back up the stairs and out the door as quietly as possible. A little boy still has to go to school doesn't he?

Speed walking down the street he waves at a homeless man under an awning. "'Sposed ta rain today kid, you got an umbrella?" He asks. "No." Raph replies with a smile. "You got a house ta hide out in?" The man shakes his head. "Nope." It was a game they played. They both knew the other didn't have the necessary yet they ask anyways.

It was funny how such a simple thing could change the young boy's mood from one end to the other. Raph jogs on, his backpack feeling as if it'd rip apart if he went any faster. The school was a good twenty minute walk if you stuck to the sidewalks but Raph had to get creative when it came to his route to school.

Instead of continuing down the sidewalk, Raph turns to a fence with a ripped up corner. He squeezes through, ripping his pack a bit more in doing so. "Awe man..." He mumbles, looking at the tear. A pencil falls out and he picks it back up and sticks it into a side pouch. He sets down his bag and pulls out a band-aid, carefully ripping the paper off the back. He lifts his shirt up in the back and feels around a bit before sloppily placing the band-aid over the small bleeding wound on his back with decent accuracy.

The little boy continues on, no longer jogging in order to keep his bag from falling apart. He walks through an alley and it comes out to another sidewalk, this time much closer to his end goal. "Oh no." Just ahead was a group of teenagers, big and scary to little Raph. He had not had good experiances with older kids and it was doubtful that today would hold any new results.

He quickly switches sides of the street, weaving his way through stopped cars and causing a lot of honking from the drivers. His eyes remained wide and attentive, switching back and forth from his path and the teenagers with their menacing laughs and their much too sudden movements. He feels his bag ripping even more but ignores it, making sure the teens didn't follow him as he made his way to his school. For a first grader, the kid was pretty smart.

It was quiet but even that was too loud. He could just barely lift his eye lids but Raph could feel something dried to his scalp. He fights to stay awake and buys himself a bit more time. It was dark and his hands were bound behind him to something very cold. The room looked familiar but he couldn't exactly remember from where. There was a couch all the way to his right, edge just even with what he assumed was stairs.

In front of him was a blurry broken down desk. It was so blurry, so blurry and his head hurt so bad. He just wanted to sleep.

"Raphael! You're late- And what happened to your bag?" A woman in a long skirt asks. "It got snagged on my way here." Raph says, holding his backpack together. If he let go it'd surely fall apart. The woman frowns as her nose wrinkles up. A smell that definitely shouldn't be at a young children's class room came off Raph in waves

The woman looks around the class, making sure all the students were working. "Would you mind stepping out into the hall for a moment honey?" Raph shrugs and walks out with the teacher. Normally he'd be scared to be alone with an adult but some adults were okay. She'd never done anything wrong, nothing to hurt him.

The woman crouches down to be closer to the same height as Raph. "Honey, you know you can tell me if something is wrong, right?" Raph nods. "Nothing's wrong." He says automatically. He didn't think anything was wrong. "Are you sure? Are mommy or daddy taking good care of you?" Raph shuffles his feet back and forth. "Ḿ̧͞͡r̵͝.̴̧͝ ҉͟X҉̴ is okay." The woman frowns. "Is that what you call your dad?"

Raph shrugs. "I guess so." The teacher sits there with him for a moment in silence. "Maybe you can ask him to buy you a new backpack? Yours looks like it's a little... Worn?" Raph shakes his head. "Ḿ̧͞͡r̵͝.̴̧͝ ҉͟X҉̴ says he doesn't want to waste money on me because he doesn't need to." He says with a flat expression. The woman's eyes go wide. "Ḿ̧͞͡r̵͝.̴̧͝ ҉͟X҉̴ Doesn't hurt you, does he Raphael?" Raph just shrugs again, rocking back and forth on his feet. "Can I go back into class now?" He says quietly. He knew where this was going.

He could tell that his caregiver wouldn't like him talking about the other without him there. "Are you hurt now?" The Teacher asks carefully. "CAN I GO BACK INTO CLASS NOW." Raph asks louder. He was so uncomfortable, he just wanted to go through the day and go to sleep. For a moment it's quiet again. Even the class beside them seemed to go silent. "Let's go to the counselor. Do you need a band-aid or anything?" She asks, taking the little boy's hand. Raph shakes his head. "I did it myself." He mumbles, barely audible.

Raph knew he couldn't get out of this one. He could try running but where would he go? Where could he go? The teacher leaves Raph outside the office, letting him sit on a bench to wait. This would be his chance to run. He could get up and run, run anywhere. He could run to a closet and hide, he could try and make it to the front doors or maybe- His thoughts are cut off after just a few minutes of anxiety ridden leg-swinging when the office door opens and He's called inside. The counselor was an older man with dark skin and a short white beard, looking as if all his hair had migrated from the top of his head to his chin.

As the counselor spoke the teacher, standing to the side, tries to keep her composure. "Raphael." He starts, hands folded professionally on the desk. "Your teacher has come to me with some... Concerns... You can tell us anything." Raph nods. "I know." He squeaks out. The counselor nods back. "Now, Ḿ̧͞͡r̵͝.̴̧͝ ҉͟X҉̴ , Would you like a better caretaker than him? Someone who really takes care of you and loves you and won't ever hurt you?"

Raph doesn't respond. Yes, of course he wanted someone like that, but now many people could be out there that would want a kid like him? "Yeah..." He says slowly. The counselor keeps a straight face. "Then you need to tell us everything about-"

"Mr. X" Raph grumbles, his eyes flicking open quickly. Sometimes when something bad happens your brain blocks it out for you. Raph pulls his hands away from each-other but they don't move more than an inch. It was all falling into place. He frantically yanks the chain against the pole he was leaning against, his eyes watering. Though he didn't remember it all, it was enough to send him into a panic. Maybe the fact that he couldn't remember it all was what made him panic.

He was still groggy but it didn't help him to calm down, in fact it made him spiral into his panic even more. If he was groggy he could've done anything- He could do anything. "Shit shit sit slit shlit- Fuck." He couldn't even get his words out right. He could hear him upstairs, walking around, acting as if he hadn't just kidnapped someone and stashed them in the basement. The longer Raph was awake, the more he tried to free himself, and the more tired he got.

After a few minutes that seemed to take an hour He starts clanging the handcuffs that bound his hands against the metal pole. He knew it wouldn't work but a part of him wished it would knock something inside it loose. The quick movements along with the force of them weren't helping him much though. With every tug he could almost feel his brain hit his skull, thundering each time and making him feel as if he were about to throw up.

He stops, his vision swirling, just in time to hear his captor stomp down the stairs. His chest hurt. His heart was pounding so hard and his head was pounding in time with it too. Once the man was in view Raph starts hyperventilating. While being on the ground the man looked so tall. He felt so small and weak, him freaking out wasn't helping much either. It was only a few seconds that he was standing there while Raph sucks in breath after breath of air before he lands a swift kick to the boy's side.

"Cállate el coño, you knew you had this coming." The kick knocked what little air Raph had in his lungs straight out, making him cough repeatedly. "Lucky for you I'm not ready yet. Tomar una siesta."

"It's okay honey, that's enough, you don't have to keep going." Raph was sitting in a too big chair, taring at the edges of his fingers and holding back tears. They weren't tears from what had been done to him, they were tears from what might happen in the future. If they didn't take Mr. X away after this then Raph would have a very bad time.

As the teacher tries to console the child, the principal folds a piece of paper and stands. "I'd hope you had someone take over the classroom?" He asks. "Yes, I asked Carol from across the hall to cover for me." The teacher replies in a hushed voice. The principal walks out and the teacher rubs the child's back. "It's okay honey, don't worry, you don't have to go back there." Raph wipes his nose on his sleeve and nods.

Suddenly his head jerks up as a thought pops into his head. "H-He's not coming here is he?!" He asks, panicked. The teacher almost laughs. "No, no honey, he will not be coming here, hopefully never." They stay seated in the office for what felt like hours until finally there was a knock on the door. Raph practically jumps in his seat while the teacher just calmly stands and opens the door. The little boy looks cautiously behind his chair to see a familiar face. Name... Name... -Greg.

Greg smiles sadly at Raph and talks to the teacher for a moment before going over to him. "Hey buddy, it's been a while huh?" Raph shrugs. It HAD been a while but to him, an hour was a while too so it didn't seem like a well worded sentence. "Where now?" Raph mumbles. Greg sighs. It was sad that a kid his age knew all that he did. "To a shelter, just for a couple nights until we have a new foster family for you."

Raph looks very uncomfortable. "Hey-" Greg says, making Raph pick up his head to look at him. "-One down, not many more to go. You'll never have to come back to him again."

Turn your face towards the sun
Let the shadows fall behind you
Don't look back, just carry on
And the shadows will never find you

Towards the Sun

Rihanna

Soooo... I know this chapter is a bit late but I totally forgot how I left off and took a break. I hope this chapter was... Comprehensive. This is gonna be a little wild but when it settles down again I can definitely promise... More craziness.