~Editted~

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"Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live." ~Norman Cousins


"I told you they would betray us," the doubtful hissed.

"I did not see this at all," the wise murmured, sounding stunned.

"But they did not use them to even bring back their leader. It shows how insolent they are," the peacemaker mused.

"They did bring back their leader. They sold the five jewels for money which they can use to pay to bring back their leader. They did not need the jewels to bring back their leader," the leader informed. "Never did. Don't any of you know this? The Shredder still lives now. He simply waits for his armor to return. Yet we are the ones who led him and his colony here to Earth. We are the ones who showed him how to build the armor. Maysa may have been able to use the jewels, but Shredder had a direct link to us. He did not need the jewels to be able to communicate with us. Like Maysa, he is a reincarnation, but he has the same goal still. To take this world. And now he has a stronger armor. It was brought down once before but he plans to reinforce it to fit his needs."

"What shall we do now?" the wise consulted, which was rare.

"Wait."

"What about Maysa?" the doubtful inquired.

"We cannot use her. Do you forget that she is but a child? If we try to use her now, she will probably either be hurt or get scared," the wise told the doubtful.

"So we will wait until she is fifteen, that is how old she was when she came to power," the leader commented. "And her advisors will be sixteen, the age of which they were when they came to power under Maysa at the same time she came to rule."

Maysa had met her four advisors under strange circumstances. Just before she came to rule, the annual gladiator's festival was happening. Here, champions from all over the world would come to test their skill, if it was not good enough, they died. It was a fight to the death. Four strange creatures came from a neighboring country of Maysa's own. Their trainer who was but a farmer said he had found them, all four sick from the plague. Earlier in time they had shown their skills through silent stealing of poultry or an occasional bovine so the farmer knew that he could get his money lost in their steals through this competition. So he chained them and nursed them back to health. Then, still chained, the four were forced to be brought to the fight for the prize money. Even though against the rules, all four were able to enter because of the crowd's desire to see these creatures fight.

One of these creatures wielded two slim swords, katanas, as they were called in some countries, the second skilled with sais, the third a bo staff, and the fourth nunchuks. And all four held the name "the turtle men." In the ring, the four refused to fight when only one was placed in the fight and could still be perfectly safe by simply flipping over and dodging their opponent, so all four were placed together. Maysa was forced to watch as royalty always had to. Normally, she disliked the blood-spill and everything else, but she was intrigued by the four's companionship, especially when there were no more opponents and they refused to fight each other. She knew she was coming into power and had to pick an advisor, so she stopped the fight and took the four under her wing to be her advisors. Their wisdom held her kingdom together even after they left for a journey from which they never returned, she ruled her country with their wisdom.

"So we just sit and wait like ducks in a pond until she becomes of age?" the uninvited sounded skeptical.

"It is all we can do," the lead voice replied.


Raph sat, hugging his knees to his chest, lifelessly. It had been a week. It had been a long week. It had been a long, miserable week, since he had seen Cally. He had searched most of the city every night, but his search was fruitless. Raphael had looked everywhere he could; he looked in every window from the tops of buildings but still nothing. He had looked for a flashing light three times every five seconds for his best friend but he never found her.

As Raphael sat in the corner, his brothers watched from a distance. They didn't know what to do. Leonardo had come around earlier and asked what was wrong. Raph's answer was, "None of ya business." And because Leo assumed that Raph was upset because of something small, he gave up thinking that Raphael would get over himself later-but he didn't. Donatello asked Raph if he wanted to be the first to try the antenna he finally got to pick up channels, but Raphael ignored him. And after a long while, Michelangelo came over to Raph's corner and asked if he wanted to play a game. Raphael chased him off and went back to his corner. Even Master Splinter tried to consult his son, but like everyone else, could get nothing out of Raph.

All Raphael did was sit in his corner. Master Splinter excused him from training out of concern, his normally physical son was now but an emotional lump and for the first time since he had begun to father the four, he could not find the source of trouble. A lot of people do that when they're upset so it was nothing new. When our world crashes, we don't act like ourselves. We're a lump of emotions. A mix of anger and sadness towards the trouble takes over our souls if we don't know how to overcome things quickly.

After a few days of sadness, it had turned to anger. Raphael felt used and abused. He felt like he had fallen for something. He had become short tempered and easily aggravated. Master Splinter was right, he thought. The world won't truly accept him, not one piece of it. Cally kept him for the bad to comfort him, then when her life turned around, she didn't need her freak friend anymore; or at least that's how it went in his head.

Raph's biggest problem and why he couldn't get over it was because he had no one to vent to. People need to vent when they go through a tough time. To just let it all out. It helps a lot, but Raphael didn't have that. If anyone knew what he was up to, he would be in so much trouble he'd be in trouble till he died or Master Splinter died. And Raph- just like the rest of his brothers- hoped that Master Splinter wouldn't die before he did.

The sadness and anger switched places every once and a while they would mush together. The mix of emotions effected Raphael's stomach to where he could not eat or hold down food much. He began to lose weight and Master Splinter became extremely worried. He would manage to get Raphael to hold down soft foods like bread, tea, or bananas, and he would get Raph to eat at every meal whether it would hold or not.

-
After a month of misery Raph finally woke from his temporary death. He was easily ticked at things that he used to accept. Michelangelo for a while could not call Raphael 'Raphy' without getting a good pummeling, Leonardo could never tell Raph what to do without being turned on, and Donatello could borrow nothing of Raph's for experimenting without being screamed at. He was told that he wasn't always this easily snapped and Raph remembered not being as hot-headed but he couldn't remember why he changed. Master Splinter still did not know what had caused a sudden change in his son but began to help him learn how to control his anger.

Raphael also hardened towards what the world thought of him. He became less self-conscious of what he was. If they didn't like him, well, then it was their own problem. Raph knew that someone caused that change but he couldn't remember who, all he knew was that he was changed.