I spent an abnormal amount of time looking up American pizzas and deciding what combination of toppings would be Raph's favorite—something very unimportant to the story.

This chapter is a big boy with 8.5k words. I pondered whether I should split it into two, since then they would be only a bit longer than the previous two, but I feel like it flows best if you read it all in one go. It's one of those roller coaster rides. You'll see. ;)

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Spiraling Out of Control

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What is wrong with you?! Why can't you just act normal? Yeah, you're usually a jerk, but now you're chickenshit too? And in front of your own brother!

Raphael's mind is spinning, fuming, shaking—all of these words, all of them at once. He's so frustrated that he just wants to—He just needs to—! Anything besides thinking!

Knowing he's alone, he kicks the white alloy wall beside him with an aggrieved growl, but the little squeak his foot produces gives him little to no relief over the mockery he made of himself earlier.

He's been aimlessly roaming and cursing the vents and corridors ever since he ran out of Fugitoid's laboratory with his tail between his legs. He thought he just needed to get away from Donatello, but he's been unsuccessfully trying to escape himself for the past half an hour too.

A scary feeling has begun to follow him like a shadow he can't shake. He isn't even sure if he really feels it or if it's just his upset and paranoid mind trying to trick him into believing it's there.

He doesn't feel like he's even in his own skin.

It's a stupid feeling, but the unexplained scars on his skin, the made up(?) flashback, a deep hole he feels within him missing something unidentifiable but very much part of him, and an overall notion that all of his memories are slanting into a fuzzy, black oblivion, along with his out-of-character reaction just earlier, all point in a direction that is unclear but feels sinister in at least some way. Or at least Raphael fails to find an innocent and logical explanation for them.

Well, there is an explanation for his pathetic reaction, but he doesn't want to think about himself like that any more than with the other thought.

There's also the thing with his healed fracture that he claimed was nothing worth paying attention to. But the paranoid what-ifs and speculations are starting to lodge themselves into anything he pays any attention to, so why not here too? Dammit, Donnie, couldn't he keep his observations to himself?

His feet turn a corner where the current bright corridor he's passing through branches out into another one, and he halts.

Just for a second, he can see Mikey, Casey, and April before their backs disappear through an arched gate toward the end of this shorter and narrower passage.

He stares at the control panel on the other side of the gate from him. It's vague, but he's pretty sure he knows this place… It's where that simulation room is that Mikey reminded him about earlier. He remembers it now that he's here.

His steps pick up again. He promised his little brother they'd train together. And he needs a good distraction for his mind anyway.

He's about to walk through the gateway when the mention of his name makes him stop at the edge of the frame, just out of sight of everyone in the other room.

"… Raph?"

"I thought I'd find him here. He isn't with you either?"

Oh. Donnie's here too. Raph's not sure if he's ready to face him yet. Especially not in front of an audience.

"Oh, no, we haven't seen him since you two left together," he hears April reply. "Everything went okay?"

"Define 'okay'… He managed to tick me off so bad with his usual stupid, mean and stubborn attitude that I ended up yelling at him, and he—"

Great, now he's going to talk about the very thing Raph came here to forget.

"Doesn't matter," Donnie stops himself to his surprise. "I feel terrible…"

"Sounds about what you'd expect," April huffs with what sounds like sympathy. "I bet he provoked you on purpose just to avoid sitting down for the drug test."

"No, the drug test actually went just great!"

"Uh… why do you say it like that?"

"'Cause I find it strange that we were all drugged while Raph, supposedly, according to his blood analysis, wasn't at all."

April hums.

In the short pause that follows, Raph notices the sound of footsteps approaching in the corridor from behind him. He looks over his shoulder to see Leonardo making his way toward the simulation room too, but he immediately turns his ear back toward the conversation when April continues.

"He was already knocked out from the cold when we got there, right? Maybe that woman just didn't see the need."

"Maybe—I don't know…" Donnie mutters, sounding unsatisfied with the suggestion. "I'm just really worried."

In that moment, a soft hand lands on Raph's shoulder as Leo stops beside him.

"Hey."

"Hey," he murmurs back, but continues to stare at the side of the control panel as he eavesdrops.

"… all are. We should be."

"I can't help but feel like he's hiding something."

"I mean, this is Raph we're talking about. The guy who tried to walk off a sprained ankle. He's not going to share with us what happened to him, no matter how tempting we make it seem."

"I mean, I feel like he's intentionally covering something big. Mikey said that he heard him speaking to that alien in her language—"

"I did!" Mikey sounds off from somewhere farther in the room.

Raph's brows lower. Speaking in what? What the heck are they on about?

"…and I feel like he sometimes acts like he's never been on this ship before, and now this with the blood…"

"What, you think they gave us a clone of him or something? Did'ya check for a belly button?" Casey suddenly laughs right behind the wall next to Raph's head.

What…

"That's not funny, Casey!"

"Yeah, dude! Also, we're turtles, we don't have belly buttons, duh!"

Casey's absurd comment floats around in Raphael's head, and he already knows it's going to sink into the walls of his skull.

The grip on his shoulder tightens. "Casey's a moron, Raph. Don't listen to him."

Raph realizes he's completely stiff all over, and that hand is just rubbing in the fact that it's apparent. He is suddenly self-conscious, and he's not sure what for, except to further his own whirlpool of paranoia.

What did Leo just say? "Something, something, don't listen"? But obviously, he also must suspect something is off about him.

Suddenly, Raph doesn't appreciate his big brother's reassuring presence as much as he did just earlier in the common room. It feels like cheap comfort because… what if…

"I just…" he shrugs Leo's hand off his shoulder as he steps around him, "I'm gonna go lie down. Tell Mikey we'll train some other time."

He doesn't wait for a reaction and hurries away in the direction he came from, toward the sleeping quarters.

His pace keeps picking up, like he's trying to escape something, until he's running through the corridors again.

A clone?

A clone…

Ha! Yeah, right!

But it's not impossible, is it?

Casey said it as a joke, but that's the conclusion he reached when Donnie pointed out everything wrong with Raph. And that's just the stuff they know about.

He could be a clone. Falla's whole family is made up of clones. Her whole planet is full of clones. (That's how they naturally reproduce, though, he reminds himself.) M-Maybe they have the technology to clone other things too… (They live in the middle of the woods, eating wild mushrooms and nettles.) The doors in Falla's house could be voice controlled. (Ah, yes, voice control—the technology one step away from cloning perfect humanoid beings, memories attached and all.) There's no telling what other technology she might have at her disposal. (What? A magic copy machine?) He doesn't know. He really could be a clone, maybe, a-and the real Raphael's memories could have been copied into his brain like computer files. (No, that can't be how it works.) That's why his body and his mind aren't fitting together as they should. (No—) Because they were two separate things existing in different places at first. That's why he has scars and isn't aware of when he got them. Or why his memories from before yesterday feel fake and fuzzy.

That's why Falla was so okay with giving him away! (No, it's because she promised him that!) Because there's a whole other him out there! He isn't the real Raphael! Falla couldn't care less about a promise she made to a pet to make it stop crying at that moment. All she wanted from him was to own him. Why would she willingly give that up? She wouldn't. She didn't! The real Raphael—

Suddenly, Raph halts his run just outside the sleeping quarters. His breath is coming out raspy, and he can feel pins and needles crawling up from his toes.

What is he even saying? How can he not be real? Screw all this weird "evidence" for a moment. Does he not believe he is himself? Like, really, truly believe deep down?

…

"I'm just losing it, aren't I?"

He looks at his tingling hands expectantly, like he'll notice something if he stares long enough. The color, the wrinkles—they're … there. (Wow, amazing observational skills, genius.) It's hard to ignore the wrapping on his left wrist, which hides something very glaring. But that doesn't disprove that he is in his own body. I-It actually proves it more. (But it might. Maybe it's not even a self-inflict—(He stops those words.)) It could be like a weird brand he got at the slave market, maybe. (Or it could be a scar from when he was being cloned in a pod.) He doesn't remember most of what happened at that place. (Did he really get branded like a cow?) He could have forgotten this. (Would he really?) This doesn't necessarily explain the tally marks on his sole, but who knows. They could be another brand… o-or maybe he just stepped on a fork once and it resulted in a funny-looking scar that he hasn't noticed before! (Maybe he sleepwalks and does weird things to himself!) Who knows! Definitely not him!

Raph's throat and jaw suddenly hurt, and his chest is tight. There's a knot in his stomach.

Could Falla actually do something like clone him in the span of, like, two days? Would that mean he—the real him—is still there?

And what would that mean for Raph?

Hesitantly, needing to will his petrified legs to move, he escapes the bright corridor, where he feels exposed, and hurries through the door of the dimmed sleeping quarters. There, his shell hits the wall on the other side, and he slides down to the floor, his limbs practically going numb in comparison to the whirlpool continuing in his head.

According to Mikey, he now even speaks in tongues, but somehow everyone forgot to include him in on this fun fact. What's next? Give him a few more days, and he might start going down the stairs backwards like the little girl from The Exorcist? … Possession could also explain a lot of things, actually.

Shut up!

Why is his throat so tight?!

Raphael's wide eyes land on his feet in front of him, and his stomach and chest twist and choke him, forcing him into a shallow and erratic race for air.

Those tally marks! What do they really mean?! There are six of them. Why? What does—Is he the sixth? The sixth clone or the sixth try? … Six-six-six, the devil's number?

Stop! He wants his thoughts to stop. They're spiraling into insanity. He is himself! He's not insane for thinking that! … He might be in denial, though.

"I'm not…"

He can hear the blood pulsating in his ears and feel his heart painfully pounding against his plastron, like a wild animal trying to escape its cage. His entire frame is shaking, like his thoughts and feelings are running out of space in his head and are spreading out elsewhere.

Maybe he is real, but this isn't real. Maybe he has really gone insane and this is all in his head? He definitely feels insane right now, shaking like a leaf. The entire rescue has felt like a bizarre dream to him, and he's never stopped to wonder if it actually is one. They're billions and billions and billions of galaxies away. They can't find him! He should know that by now! He's delusional!

Suddenly, the dim room doesn't feel safe anymore either. It feels cramped and small and claustrophobic, like he's hiding behind a couch where Falla can't reach him. But he's not safe here. It's a false sense of security. It's a lie.

Every muscle in his body is tense from anxiety, and he's hyperventilating like his body wants him to suffocate.

"I'm okay," he tries to say between loud, rapid inhales.

But he is not okay.

It's just a matter of time before Falla tires and pulls the whole couch away from the wall. He can see it right in front of his eyes, like it's actually happening. The metal wall with the door in front of him being ripped back on one side, and Falla's large clawed hand reaching in to grab him.

His mind is screaming at him to move, but he only manages to choke out a desperate sob, wanting this sudden feeling of intense dread to go away, but it's blooming right out from deep within him. He pulls his legs to his chest, holding himself closer in hopes of shoving it all back inside.

Go away!

A flash of light and, suddenly, there are arms around him, holding his trembling frame, and Raph's pounding heart skips a few beats.

"Raph, what's wrong? … Calm down; you're safe. It's okay, it's okay."

The sobs burst out of him.

"NO!" he cries out, unsure who he's even addressing.

"Everything's okay! Breathe!"

It's not okay! Even they know something is wrong with him. That's why they talk about him behind his back and give him weird looks. They already suspect he's not… What if they give him back? They wouldn't do that, would they? Not to him! Is he even him? Where even is he?

He still can't breathe properly, and it feels like it's all only getting worse and closing in on him faster, but he still desperately tries to speak through his sobs.

"—on th' ship!"

"Yes, we're on Fugitoid's ship."

"An' I'm really me!"

"What?"

"An' 'm not pos-essed ei-ther."

"Uh, Raph, no, you're not possessed… But—But maybe you need to lie down?"

He feels his body being pulled up and led to the closest bed, but his vision is unfocused and skewed, and his mind can't take in much else. The moment his body hits the mattress, he falls forward and sinks into it. He squeezes his eyes closed, trying to block everything out.

There's a blanket over him, weighing him down in an all-too-familiar way. His breathing must have gotten even worse because it's almost immediately removed again, and a gentle hand on his head replaces it, stroking it tenderly.

"Breathe…"

Falla. S-She has him! He needs to get away, but his chest hurts too much for him to move! He can't breathe! He can't breathe! It's like that morning. In the sheets—legs kicking uselessly—like in the river—under the cliff—at the clinic—under the glass—in the pod… Kinya?

"Breathe… Raph. Breathe…"

The pod.

That's where—

That's—

"You're okay. You're safe… I'm here with you; you can relax."

"Don't tuh-uch me."

The hand reluctantly pulls away, and for a moment he's left lying there, confused, dazed, and exhausted, still trying to calm his rapid breaths so he could get some oxygen into his lungs, but then the hand returns, lying over his own fisted and trembling one, and squeezes it reassuringly.

"Just breathe, okay? It'll all be over soon."

Kinya? For some reason, she floods into him like a draft, scattering the dark clouds swarming him.

She is comforting, despite his brain blanking on the reason for this feeling. (S-She shoved an earwig in his mouth. She threw him over the cliff and laughed!) But Kinya's safe. Not like his brothers, but she's there. She's on his side.

On the opposite side of the glass.

"I'll remember for both of us."

The clouds in the sky above him are moving away from him. Faster and faster, until they melt and blur and everything starts to swim. Textures escape the tips of his reaching fingers like they're made out of colorful light, like he's being stretched and sucked away through a blackhole behind him. His entire body is vibrating, cracking, crumbling like sandstone, and parts of him are seeping away and joining the disappearing light ahead while he's being swallowed by blackness. He's traveling without moving, changing while staying the same. It feels like forever before, suddenly, it all stops.

…

…

…

He's cold.

…

"—el, take it easy."

"Maika?"

"No, Mikey's not here."

… What?

…

He moves.

The thin mattress underneath him is uncomfortable and stiff.

Where…?

Slowly, Raphael blinks open his eyes and is greeted by a white alloy wall inches from his blank face. It's not what he was expecting to see. He's not sure what exactly he expected to see.

Confusion doesn't give relief any room to spread out, as Raph needs a moment to take in his surroundings. Slowly he rolls over, eyes dragging over the white metal framework of the upper bunks in the darkness of the room, before stopping on the other end by an orange-glowing table lamp.

"How are you feeling?" Leonardo asks. He is sitting there on the bed opposite him with a book forgotten in his hands, watching him carefully.

All of Raphael briefly wonders if he's seeing things before his mind focuses on the question.

"I…"

His forehead wrinkles in thought for a moment before he tries propping himself up on his elbow. "How long was I asleep?"

"Couple of hours. It's early in the afternoon," Leo answers, and lays the book down on the bed without removing his eyes from him.

Raph can tell he's resisting the temptation to come closer.

"Mikey's not here, but he brought you some pizza earlier."

Raph's eyes wander to the nightstand beside his bed with a plate of four pizza slices on it. Pepperoni, pineapple, and jalapeño. He stares at them for a moment—or rather, somewhere beyond them—before plopping his head back into the pillow. He feels worn out for someone who just had a nap.

"April went after you. Said she found you … having a panic attack," Leo says hesitantly, his voice strained from holding back whatever he's feeling. "When I got here, you were already asleep."

Raph's not sure if he's talking to fill the silence or if he's caught on to Raph's confusion.

That was a panic attack, he thinks numbly. Just all in his head, like he's some schizophrenic mental patient.

"That bad?"

Raph turns his head just enough to see Leo still watching him. "What?"

"You're not even trying to deny it," his brother says tentatively.

"I'm just tired," Raph admits.

Leo is quiet for another few seconds before whispering. "What happened?"

Raph stares at the frame of the bunk bed above him with a blank face.

Nothing on this ship feels lived-in or alive to him. It's devoid of any human personality.

"You know how in dreams things usually make no sense when you think about them too hard?"

Leo doesn't reply.

"I just wonder if I'm dreaming."

"Raph… It's completely normal to feel confused after everything you've gone through."

Says the guy who doesn't know what he went through. Or is going through. Not that it's Leonardo's fault that Raphael won't confide in anyone.

"Whatever you say."

Leo can't hold himself back anymore and gets up to sit down on the edge of Raph's bed. Raph sits up straighter too and lets the bed cover pool over his lap.

"We're here for you. But you have to reach out too."

Raph avoids his eyes and starts to absentmindedly fidget with the end of the duvet cover. He hates these conversations.

"You guys don't even trust me," he finally says, almost in a whisper. Then his voice rises a bit with his next words. "You think something's wrong with me." Something is deeply wrong with him.

"That's not true."

After another tense pause, Leo opens the cover to scoot in next to him, forcing Raph closer to the wall.

"We trust you, Raph. You're our brother. We just—You've closed yourself off all of a sudden. I mean, you're kind of a pro at that, but I know you're hurting bad right now."

Raph involuntarily shrinks into himself while he focuses his attention on the corner of the duvet cover. He doesn't know how to respond. Part of him wants to reach out, but he also doesn't want to say anything.

"You were a mess yesterday when we got you back, and now you're avoiding everyone like you're embarrassed about it or something."

His head lowers even more, but Leo's hand lands over the fidgeting fingers in front of his eyes and grasps them tightly.

"You have nothing to be ashamed of—Raph, look at me—you don't need to hide anything from me."

Raphael is straining to keep eye contact with his big brother's intense and tender gaze. Why did he have to wake up to sentimental Leo? It's so much easier to convince Mikey he's fine or brush off Donnie's list of questions. He feels trapped between a wall and a hard place. The hard place being a chance to finally confess what's bothering him.

"Don't you trust me?"

"Of course I do," he blurts out instinctively.

"Then trust me."

Raph's chest hurts. He turns his eyes to the wall again. He should probably say something before his worrywart brother finds a way to get even more in his face… right?

"Did that alien touch you?"

Raph's head snaps back, green skin turning pale.

Falla did touch him—a lot—but that's not what his brother is asking.

"No, god, Leo, no, she didn't do anything like that!" Slowly, he pulls his hands out of Leo's grasp, trying not to tremble too much, and covers his face with them to take a deep, still breath to banish that horror from his mind. He doesn't want to think about that. That that was something that could have easily happened to him if he ended up being bought by basically anyone else.

"Did she hurt you?"

Physically? "No," he mumbles through his hands.

Emotionally?

With a sigh, he drops his hands into his lap and diverts his eyes back to the wall. Physically, Raphael is completely fine and normal except for those two places where he's not. Emotionally, in his head, he's not sure where he is. He's still processing how to go about walling it all off from his conscience.

"Then tell me."

Leonardo sounds desperate, even though Raph can tell he's holding back most of what he feels. His brother spent this entire time Raphael was missing wondering if he was being abused in the worst way possible, and he's still feeling his way around in the dark thanks to Raph's unwillingness to say anything.

There's suddenly a lump in Raph's throat and a painful knot in his stomach. His nervous fingers are barely resisting the temptation to start fidgeting again.

"I just… I, uh, feel like there's a whole chunk of me that's missing." He immediately feels stupid for saying that. "Or whatever…"

"What?"

"Nothing. Forget it." He'll think he's lost it.

"That's the problem, Raph. I can't just forget it. I've been going insane with worry since the minute I learned you were taken. I thought we'd never find you! I-I thought—" Leo's voice falters for a second before he recollects himself and continues. "But we did. And now I'm worrying you're hiding something from us that you shouldn't be facing alone."

"What if I'm not what you expect?"

Leo is staring at him. "What do you mean?"

"I don't know! But nothing's making any sense! A-And at this point, I'm even wondering if maybe—Maybe I'm a clone?"

Why did he just blurt that out!?

Raph can see Leonardo also wasn't expecting to hear that come out of his mouth, if the dumbfounded expression on his face tells him anything. Raph doesn't really believe it either. Not like a couple hours ago when he spiraled into a paranoia-induced psychotic episode. He doesn't even understand why he brought it up just now. It's like there's something inside him working against his own will and forcing him to open up. And starting with something improbable and outrageous was just the safest and easiest.

"Is… this because of what Casey said earlier? You know he was joking, right?"

"It makes some sense."

He observes Leo's reaction from the corner of his eye. A part of him is secretly—or maybe not so secretly—craving reassuring words after everything. Even if it's something as dumb as "you're real" and "I'm here."

"In what universe does that make sense?" Leo utters in disbelief. "Raph, l-look at yourself! Your scars—even your shell's jagged and cracked in the exact same way it's been since we were ten and that pipe broke and you protected me! You remember that! There is no technology in the world that can grow a replica of you with everything only your life could have given you. And clones aren't even exact copies on the outside. Just the inside. They're like your identical twins. You can tell twins apart if you know them well enough, right?"

Raph has tucked his chin against his collarbone to take in this chipped plastron. Somehow he's failed to consider this. What Leo is saying makes sense. It should be impossible to replicate all the nicks and scars he's earned throughout his life. And Raphael has a lot of them. If he was actually a clone, he should have almost no scars, not more.

What he's wondering now is why Leo was able to list all of this off the top of his head. "How do you know all that?"

"Because I listened to Donnie give that moron a piece of his mind after you left."

"You listened pretty carefully."

Leo's shoulders lower, and he hesitates before opening his mouth again. "You know Donnie loves being a smartass and proving Casey wrong any chance he gets! I listened because it was amusing. And Casey was joking."

Raph catches himself relaxing a tiny bit while imagining the scene unfolding.

He can feel some of his fear lifting away. It's good to know they're on his side—even if that should have already been obvious to him—and ready to shut down his paranoid thoughts. He's feeling stupid for even letting delusions of cloning and whatnot send him into a panic attack earlier.

But there are still some outlandish things that are real and right on his skin. Raph isn't sure he should reveal them when he can't see himself receiving any straightforward, desirable responses to either of them.

"Why would you think that?" Leo asks.

Raph shifts uneasily.

Just trust him.

"I'm blanking out on a lot that happened. And my head's just been stupid in filling in the gaps."

When Raph puts it like this, his panic actually feels somewhat understandable. Maybe talking really isn't that bad.

Then trust him with the whole truth.

He nervously glances at his brother, who's regarding him pensively.

"Well, we all know it's you, Raph," Leo says seriously after a moment. "You're just … like you said…"

"Not myself?" Raph cuts in dryly.

Leo leans forward to give him a pointed look. Then, after he's sure Raph's seen it, he relaxes back against the headboard and leans against his shoulder.

"Finally wanna talk about it?"

"We did just talk about it," Raph mutters, still gathering the courage to say more.

Leo snorts. "More like 'scratched the surface,' but I guess with you that counts as a win."

"Jerk."

He sees Leo grin for the first time since they've reunited.

"Here," his brother teases him, "eat some food. You're cranky."

Raph scowls at him but reluctantly takes a slice of the pizza from the offered plate.

Instead of eating it, he ends up staring at it again. Mikey brought him his favorite. He stared at it earlier but didn't realize. Would he even be able to guess his favorite toppings if someone asked him about them a minute ago?

Leo sounds softer when he speaks again. "Seriously, Raph. I haven't seen you eat since we got back. You'll feel better."

He doesn't have an appetite, and his short-lived breakfast is giving him second thoughts on whether he's ready to eat again, but he would be lying if he said he wasn't hungry. He reluctantly takes a bite, and to his relief, he immediately remembers why he loves this cheesy combination of flavors so much. It's the perfect blend of savory, sweet, and spicy. Wait… That's very spicy.

"Hoth," he mumbles through a mouthful.

"What?"

"It's hot."

"Yeah, I would guess so. It's got jalapeño," Leo chuckles. "How hot is it?"

While Leo takes a bite of a slice himself and chews thoughtfully, Raph continues to roll his tongue against his teeth. He knows the taste. It just feels like it's amplified by a lot. Like he hasn't had anything spicy or salty in a very long time. …

"Man, I don't understand how you like pineapple on pizza."

"It's good," Raph mumbles through his stuffed mouth.

They finish their slices in silence, leaning against the pillow and headboard and each other in the dim room, and Raph feels like he could fall right back asleep. Maybe actually wake up rested this time around. But just as he lays his arms over his plastron and gets more comfortable against his brother's warm arm, the door slides open, letting in the bright assaulting light from the hallway, before it closes again, and they get a visitor.

"Aww, you guys look sooo comfy."

Raphael cracks his momentarily throbbing eyes open to find their baby brother standing in the middle of the room.

"Scoot!"

"Mikey, can you get me my book?"

"Scoot where?" Raph mumbles, his eyes falling closed again. "This bed is barely big enough for one turtle."

Leo shifts when he leans to take the offered book he was reading earlier, ruining Raph's perfect, snug position. He frowns. And just as he reopens his eyes, the lamp on his nightstand turns on, chasing away any of the lull he still felt.

He doesn't move while watching Michelangelo stand there for a prolonged moment, staring at him and Leo hopefully, before eventually puffing his cheeks.

"Fine, I'll make some room myself."

The shortest turtle stretches above them to grab a pillow from the upper bunk, then, without a warning, hops onto the end of the bed, making Raph and Leo bend their legs so there's enough room for him to sit against the footboard. In the end, he even wiggles under the duvet and presses his cold feet against Raph's, much to Raph's displeasure.

"Ugh, Mikey!" He sits up straighter again.

Mikey ignores the green daggers he's sending his way and leans over to grab a slice of pizza from the plate still on Leo's lap.

"Mikey, you brought it here for Raph, remember?"

"Oh, yeah?" Mikey quickly replies. "What's that on your chin, then?"

"That's not—" Leo wipes his face with the back of his hand. "I mean—"

Despite his freshly spoiled mood, Raph enjoys watching Leo fumble for a response. "Let him have it if he wants it," he tells him. "We can always get more."

"What he said," Mikey agrees.

"This one's cold anyway," Raph adds, watching Mikey take a bite the size of half a slice.

"Cold pizza is like my third favorite kind of pizza, dudes."

"After hot and lukewarm?" Leo asks without a doubt in his monotone voice.

"Called my bluff," the little brother mumbles. "It still beats all the other food groups!" He shoves the rest of the slice into his mouth and starts munching unabashedly.

"So what are you two talking about?" he asks before swallowing. "The Haunting of Raphael Hamato?" He wiggles his fingers spookily while grinning.

Raph needs a second to understand what Mikey is referring to. By the time he does, his little brother is staring regretfully at his stunned face, while Leo looks between them in confusion.

"What are you talking about?"

"Uh," Mikey shifts, growing uneasy, "April just mentioned Raph was talking about being possessed or something…"

Leo seems to figure out that Mikey's talking about Raph's panic attack because Raph can practically feel him going stiff beside him.

"Mikey, you can't joke about stuff like that!"

"I know!" Mikey immediately gets defensive. "But he's not having a panic attack now. A-And I just thought… it's kinda funny?" He grins awkwardly under Leo's intense stare. Then his eyes jump to Raph in search of support. "Like that time you got poisoned by Fishface. You were saying nonsense then too!"

Leo shuts him down. "That is not the same!"

Raph doesn't want to admit it or show it on his face, but he's thoroughly uncomfortable. He's not in the right mind to joke about his crazy episode yet. But he also doesn't want to take sides and argue about his panic attack or how to talk to him after one. It's embarrassing enough that everyone knows about it.

"It's fine, Leo," he says eventually, hoping this will be the quickest way to end the conversation. "I probably did sound pretty stupid."

"That's not the point."

"I said it's fine!"

His upset tone gets both of his brothers to shut up.

To avoid their stupid worried gazes, he reclines back into the pillow with his carapace angled toward Leo and closes his eyes. But sleep is not happening anytime soon; instead, he just focuses on blocking both of them out as best he can.

"I'm sorry," he hears Mikey whisper quietly.

When his little brother doesn't receive a response, Raph feels him start to fidget with the other end of the bed cover. He also feels Leo shift to put the plate back on the nightstand with a light clink. When he twists back around, he stills, and Raph knows he's thinking about whether or not he should say something. Thankfully, he eventually hears him start to flip through his book.

"So… Why'd you say you're possessed, then?"

"Mikey!" Leo hisses angrily.

"What? If it wasn't just nonsense, why'd he say that, then?"

Raph can feel both of his brothers' eyes back on him.

Another thick silence falls between them, this one even louder and more uncomfortable than the previous one. Raphael realizes that they won't stop happening and growing in intensity if he doesn't do something to move things along.

Does he really want to go there? … Leo won't stand his shrugging and avoidance of the topic for much longer, no matter how patient his brother thinks he is. Raph knows he has to decide whether to mention his confusion about his newly discovered scars or just straight out lie and come up with something that can't send anyone down a spiral of frenzied speculation, but that can also explain why he was momentarily able to convince himself he could be a clone or possessed or hallucinating, or whatever other insane theory his mind made up.

Yeah, good luck coming up with something like that, he thinks miserably.

He really doesn't want his little brothers to know about the scars, especially not about the one on his wrist. But now the youngest of them is here, and he and Leo are both waiting for him to say something.

"Sharing is caring, bro."

He peels open his eyelids to look at Michelangelo from the corner of his eye. He doesn't move when he murmurs, "For who?" He loves his brothers. He doesn't want to trouble them with this.

His eyes close before Mikey replies.

"You? At least I hope you care about yourself enough."

Raph pulls his crossed arms close to his chest for a few seconds. He can't keep dragging this along. It's making him miserable and everyone else upset. He inhales a long, shuddering breath through his nose, sits back straight, and opens his eyes before breathing out slowly and evenly, trying to calm his pounding heart.

He hopes this first part will satisfy them enough.

"My memories from before I got sick are really muddled. I hardly remember anything clearly."

Wishful thinking. Mikey immediately asks, "How come?" and it's clear from Leo's face that he also wants to know exactly what's going on with him.

Raph has to force his mind to stay with him and try to figure things out without any freaking out or outlandish speculation getting in the way of reasonable thoughts. "I was given pretty strong meds at the hospital."

"You had to go to the hospital?" Leo asks, a new worry present on his features.

Raph nods. The vet clinic, actually, but whatever. He just hopes this information doesn't get to Donnie or Fugitoid anytime soon. He lied to them earlier.

"And that's the reason for the possession thing?"

He frowns at Mikey's question. "Obviously no. I just—"

Okay… here we go…

"I have, like, a scar. And I don't know how I got it."

After a tense pause with Raph trying to figure out how to proceed from here, Leo responds to all of his surprise.

"I noticed it. I just wasn't sure how to ask you about it. I didn't want to upset you."

"Whuh?"

"The scar on your right arm?"

Raph blinks before lifting his upper arm where his brother gestured to see what he's talking about. There, between his armpit and inner elbow, is short and wide scar tissue.

"That's new, right?"

Raph's racking his brain, trying to recall where he got it. … The crates. He fell from a platform.

"I think… I landed with the edge of my shell on it back at the market."

Both of the brothers wince at the mental image.

"Ouch!"

Yeah, ouch…

"So you do know. Is this not what you're talking about?"

Raph shakes his head while absentmindedly running his fingers over the disturbed skin. He forgot about this one. It is almost calming that he has an explanation for one of them.

"Did you mean the scar on your wrist?"

Raphael's entire frame freezes, his eyes growing into saucers against his wishes to appear calm. When did Mikey notice it?

His little brother's expression doesn't seem to hold anything more than innocent curiosity, though, and Raphael allows himself to relax a fraction. His loud, pounding heart isn't cooperating, however. Raph can only hope his brothers can't hear it ramming against his plastron.

That isn't the scar he was planning on mentioning, but what is he supposed to do now? If he denies it, they'll both know he's lying and hiding something they can now pinpoint and force him to show. … Should he just go along with it?

"You have more?" Leo asks worriedly. He takes Raphael's hands, but his wrists are wrapped up, so he can't see anything to get his alarm bells ringing.

"Yeah…" Raph says as casually as he possibly can. "But I just don't know when or how I got it, and it's bugging me." Refraining from twitching and pulling, he manages to slowly take his hands back to his side before crossing them.

"I have one of those!" Mikey twists to pull his right leg from under the cover and shows them the weird, U-shaped scar on his shin that they have all scratched their heads about before.

"I call it The Mystery Scar."

"Catchy," Raph snarks almost instinctively.

"Of course there's others that I don't remember where I got, but they're not as big or cool looking," Mikey says, pulling his leg back under the warm fabric.

"So is this why you thought you were possessed? You thought you were like that mom from The Conjuring that woke up in the morning with bruises on her body?"

Raphael grimaces. He doesn't really remember the movie his brother is talking about, but he's upset that Mikey managed to somehow draw his own conclusion through a stupid horror flick. Raph can't even remember how he came to the idea during his panic, and he hates to think that this might be close to it.

"If I say 'yes,' will you drop the possession thing already?"

"Deal," Mikey agrees, then looks at him expectantly.

After a resigned sigh, Raph reluctantly grumbles: "Yes, Mikey, I thought I was possessed like the mother in The Conjuring. Happy?"

He holds his folded arms closer to his chest, but his defiant fixated glare soon drops when Michelangelo doesn't give any indication that he's going to make fun of him.

He sinks into the pillow. "I just feel uncomfortable not knowing how exactly I got this scar because of the whole, y'know," he shrugs tensely. "And I know it's new, but it's also already healed and old-looking, like I've had it a while, and it's messing with my head, I guess."

"Fugitoid has that cream that super heals everything really fast," Mikey reminds him helpfully. "Maybe there's stuff that works even faster. I mean, the scar on your arm doesn't look new either."

Against his wishes, Raph hazily recalls the kind purple aliens he met at the slave market. They were probably the only good people he came across since getting kidnapped, and they were caged like animals.

"True…" he tries to respond to Mikey calmly, trying not to show his frustration. He doesn't want the conversation to proceed any faster than it already is or for him to say or think about anything he doesn't want to.

"Well, the scar's there whether you know what it's from or not," Leo suddenly speaks up after quietly listening for a while. He sounds a bit solemn, like the conversation is rubbing a sore spot on him too. "Maybe not knowing can make it easier to move forward… If I'm honest, I wish I was fortunate enough to forget how I got some of mine; they're like reminders—Not that I'm saying you're fortunate, Raph!" he fumblingly interrupts himself, like he just realized what he's saying. "I can't even imagine what you're going through."

Once Leo awkwardly looks away, Raph glances at the two long lines carved across Leo's plastron. He's not even surprised that he's still beating himself up for those.

"I have some scars I don't like, too," Mikey tells them with an unusual, understanding tone. "But Splinter told me our bodies are like a map of where we come from and where we've been and stuff we've learned." He shifts, and his voice regains that color it always has when he tries to cheer them up. "For example, this one's from when Fishface managed to nick me with his robo foot," he says, showing the jagged scar tissue running across just under his left shoulder. "The key takeaway from that whole experience was to never let Raph stitch me up again."

Raph's arms unfold momentarily. "Hey! It doesn't look that bad."

"Looks pretty bad," Leo hums.

"I named it The Centipede Fossil."

"Okay. I get it." Raph lifts his hands in surrender. "I suck at stitches. I hate doing them anyway, so it's a win-win."

The mood lifts a bit, but instead of enjoying it, his two brothers use their new confidence to poke around further.

"Is this really all that's gotten your head so messed up?"

"Yeah, I guess that's everything I can think of that's happened recently," he answers sarcastically.

But everything aside, talking has calmed him down a lot. The scar over his wrist still bothers him—it's like a plague he can't shake—but maybe his brothers are right in saying that, at the end of the day, it's just a scar, and they all have a few weird ones they can't explain. He should just stop scaring himself about how he might have gotten it since that's in the past now and he'll never get a proper answer…

Unfortunately, he also can't get himself to write off the strange ones on his foot. But maybe they're the same as the one on his upper arm. He got them at the slave market, which he barely remembers anyway; these ones were just done intentionally to number him or something.

"I… I actually have more," he admits, moving on to what he actually wanted to mention in the first place. "But these are really weird, and maybe the reason I've been acting so… I don't know, I just—" He quiets down to sit up straighter and pull his leg out of the cover.

In that same second, the bedroom door slides open.

Donatello chose the worst moment to show up.

"Hey, Raph—Oh." He stills in the doorway. It seems he didn't expect to see all three of his brothers hanging out on one bed.

Raphael freezes too, immediate regret showing on his face. He hastily straightens his leg back under the cover and recrosses his arms.

Donnie must have misinterpreted his reaction because his face falls even more. "I'm sorry about earlier, Raph. I didn't mean—I hope I wasn't the reason you—"

"No," Raph cuts him off. "You weren't. And it's okay."

Mikey's eyes skip over the thick wall between them. "You two had another one of your classic doctor-patient fights, didn't you?"

"No," both of them reply sharply.

Raph looks at Donnie in surprise. Did he still not tell them what happened? A silent communication passes between the two middle brothers, and Raph feels relieved and grateful that at least that stayed private. Donnie picks up on this because he finally unroots himself from the spot in the doorway and steps closer, allowing the door to slide closed behind him.

Mikey immediately scoots to the wall and pats the narrow spot on the bed next to him. "There's more room than you think," he says when Donnie looks at him incredulously.

"I'm a lot taller than you guys."

"Don't flatter yourself too much," Raph says, and Donnie takes that as an invitation from him too.

After a bit of moving around, they're sitting like canned sardines.

"If this bed breaks, it's not my fault," Donnie mutters awkwardly, still searching for a comfortable spot for one of his feet, his shell knocking into Mikey's as he shifts.

"All in favor of voting for Mikey?" Raph smirks from his spot, his crossed arms lying loosely over his chest.

All three older turtles raise their hands.

"Hey!" Mikey scowls. "You guys are a bunch of jerks! But fine, I'm willing to be your scapegoat if it means we get to nestle together like when we were little." He hugs Donnie's arm close to him. "Leo, pass Donnie the final slice so he can complete his initiation into the circle."

Leonardo hands the newly arrived turtle the last pizza slice and then puts the empty plate back on the nightstand. When he leans back, his head turns toward Raphael again.

"So where are those scars you wanted to show us?"

"What scars?" Donnie immediately asks, pizza lingering inches from his face.

Raph unconsciously sinks further into his corner of the bed, his crossed arms protectively pulled closer to his chest again. He shoots Leo an unappreciative glare before settling his frowning gaze on his legs under the cover. Guess they're all finding out now. He glances at his little brothers across from him before sighing and pulling his leg out all the way this time.

He doesn't say anything as he angles the sole of his foot toward the soft orange light coming from the nightstand. He pulls back the wrapped fabric and his toes to reveal the small, deliberate lines in the fold of his green skin.

His brothers all lean in to see.

"Yo…" Mikey gasps, "are those, like, tallies?"

"How did you get this?" Donnie asks.

"He doesn't remember," Leo answers before Raph has a chance to. "What do you think they could mean?"

"Well," Donnie immediately puts on a focused, speculating expression, "if they work like the tally marks we know on Earth, then they just say 'six'. But those are normally used for keeping track of ongoing results or counting, not for numbering things. But we're dealing with aliens, so it might just be a completely different numeral system or identifying system that some of them use that perhaps works similar to something like the Roman numerals." He straightens a bit and puts his free hand to his chin in thought, the other hand still holding the uneaten pizza slice. "I can ask Fugitoid what he thinks."

Raphael tenses up. "Don't."

"Huh?"

"Maybe I don't actually need to know exactly what it is." He's satisfied with his brother's calm and rational explanation. And the fact that he doesn't remember getting them is just something he'll need to get used to.

"Well, I don't know how much more he could tell us anyway," Donnie shrugs. "It's either some type of identification number you got when you were passed through the slave trade—it makes sense to put it somewhere not visible—or it's something that Fallachis Maika gave you to—I don't know—mark which one of her slaves you were, or maybe mark the date she bought you. Something like that."

"That's sick," Mikey says quietly after a short pause.

It is sick. But Raphael can't even put into words the amount of relief this whole conversation has brought him. He straightens his leg and collapses back into the pillow behind him, so he's lying slack on the bed. His arms cover his face as he takes in just how fucking stupid he's been by trying to hide all this and, in turn, blowing it out of proportion in his head, like he doesn't have enough to deal with.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, I just—" As if on cue, a lump forms in his throat.

He's allowed himself to relax for a fraction of a second, and a sob of relief is already forcing itself out of his chest. His shoulders start to tremble, and there's nothing Raph can do to stop the sudden waterworks. He's only glad his arms are hiding his contorted face from the world.

He sniffs involuntarily, and the sob finally manages to burst through his clenched teeth.

"Raph…"

All three of his brothers move and lean toward him in order to comfort him, but in that moment something snaps underneath and the whole mattress gives in under their weight. It topples down on one side, throwing Leo and Donnie against their unfortunate brothers, who end up with their shells in the newly made hole, the thin mattress being the only thing between them and the floor.

A look of wide-eyed surprise passes between them—Raph revealing his tear-stained face—before contagious, bubbly laughter takes over all four of them.

ⰎⰂⰎ