Raph shivered. He couldn't stop. His entire body shook in an effort to warm him up. The rain had finally ceased but the chill of the fall air dropped his body temperature to the point that he could feel his muscles slowing down.
He was cold-blooded. He was supposed to be stuffed next to a warm heater, not walking around in the muck looking for his brothers. Raph grumbled to himself.
He remembered Donnie explaining something about how their combined human and turtle DNA had left them cold-blooded but with a higher core temperature and human strategies for keeping warm like shivering and physical exertion. Donnie had of course continued with an elaborate explanation of how and why this worked but Raph had blocked him out after that.
Another violent shiver racked his body. He was growing tired fast. However he'd gotten here had left him exhausted and the constant shaking was depleting what little energy he had left in the aftermath of his original adrenaline rush.
The crash was hard. His head still pounded and his legs dragged. It was all he could do to put one step in front of the other, the earth gently giving way with each step. The smell of rain and wet stuck to him like paint coated on his skin.
Eventually, his feet gave out. His knees hit the ground, his hands moving in slow motion to catch him. He glared at the ground, trying to intimidate it out of the way. He gave up his glaring and sat back on his heels to stare up at the sky.
He was sure it was night now. The slight glimmer of moon showed through the thinning clouds and he was alone. He felt no closer to finding his brothers. His muscles tensed. Without the preoccupation of moving, the nasty thoughts that'd been lurking at the back of his mind rushed forward, unbidden. What if he never found them? What if he never found Mikey? Violent images of his brothers aching, bleeding, and alone punctuated each question. His helplessness hit him like another wave of nausea, hard and unforgiving.
Raph let out a yell of frustration and punched the ground, giving him a moment's distraction from the horrors his brain conceived to mock him. His breath was ragged as he tried to calm himself. He was no help to his brothers kneeling here. With grim determination, Raph lifted himself. He'd look all night if he had to and he'd take on anything that tried to stop him, including his own body. Mind over matter. His new favorite mantra. Raph chuckled despite himself. Maybe Leo was getting to him.
About an hour later, his feet about to give out again, Raph finally ran into trouble. At first, he hadn't noticed. Through his tired haze, he'd missed the soft crinkle of leaves behind him until a soft growl broke him from his trance. Swinging around, Raph pulled out his sais in one fluid motion and meet eyes with a monstrous, grey wolf. Its ears lay flat on its head, its eyes narrowed, and its posture lay low and tense. The predator was a perfect picture of deadly.
Raph shifted his stance slightly and glared back. A hushed moment passed before Raph gave a careless flip of his sais. As if on cue, the wolf leaped, snarling. Raph quickly knocked the wolf to the side, using its force against it. The beast was up in a moment attacking again at full speed.
Raph knew his body wasn't going to be able to take on any more. His body shook with exertion so as soon as the wolf hit him, he was knocked off balance. His already fatigued muscles desperately tried to right himself but ultimately lost to gravity.
Raph went down, the wolf's lethal teeth dangerously close to his throat. Raph struggled to keep the gnashing jaws away with his forearm, pushing with all his arms would give him against the neck of the wolf.
It's claws tore down his arms, drawing blood. Raph brought his sai around, striking the wolf in the side. It yelped and scrambled away from Raph. Using the brief brake in the assault, Raph rolled back up on to his knees and leaped for the wolf, his sais' gleaming points aiming straight for the predator.
His blades found their mark on the shoulder and neck, blood streaming forth, dying the grey fur crimson. The wolf howled and scampered away tail between it's legs, trailing blood. Raph slowly brought himself to his feet panting. The cuts layering his arms and legs stung, blood flowing freely from the broken skin. His head grew light and the world spun. Raph stumbled a few feet forward but he fell forward, collapsing in the underbrush.
Raph lay amongst the leaves, the smell of blood and dirt pervading his senses. Leaves prickled his exposed skin and their dead, brown color filled his vision. Raph slowly raised his head. The sun peaking over the horizon, gently illuminating the forest before it. It was almost beautiful but the pain pulled him away. Raph shut his eyes against it and the sun that tore and burned his pupils. His lids felt like concrete, his whole body begged him to sleep and the pain and in his head hadn't improved in hours. His skull felt like it was splitting in half. With the added burn of the gashes, Raph didn't feel like moving any time soon. But the unrelenting brown of the dirt and leaves was starting to drive him crazy.
Raph reluctantly pushed himself off his front, leaning heavily on the trunk of the nearest tree instead. From his seated position, Raph to could see a bird pick it's way through the underbrush. The soft shifting of leaves relaxed him. He stopped fighting and let sleep take him at last.