It took nearly a week for Raphael to get used to the new rhythm of his life — twice he went to the dojo out of sheer habit, only to remember once he had arrived that he no longer met Toshiro-sensei there. Once he had stood in the middle of the room for nearly half an hour, listening to the silence and wondering what to do next.

Other parts of his life were nearly unchanged. He ate in the dining hall, doing his best to ignore hushed voices and odd stares, and trained in the dojo, heading to the locker room to wash afterwards. But for the most part, he spent much of his time during the day attending Master Shredder. The jonin seemed content to keep Raphael at his side, which made Raphael feel slightly confused and discontented. He wanted to be out on the rooftops, in the wind, under the moon, hunting down Marino and other enemies of the Foot.

It took his nearly two weeks to summon up the courage to tell Master Shredder of his discontent, and his desire to prove himself.

"Patience, Raphael," Shredder had said, when he finally blurted it out. He seemed amused by Raphael's discomfort, and by his eagerness to actively serve his clan. "I am not inclined to waste your strength and special qualities on an ordinary mission. You will have your chance soon enough."

Raphael accepted this answer, though he wasn't satisfied by it. The other Foot ninja still whispered that he was practically a pet, a curiosity that the jonin had taken a fancy to. Staying at Master Shredder's side all day didn't exactly disprove that idea.

So he found other ways to fight his discontent. Often at night, Raphael would slip out of the headquarters and make his way across the rooftops of New York, enjoying the momentary freedom it brought. He loved the feeling of the cold breeze on his face, the steel of his sai in his hands, and the rough concrete and brick under his bare feet. Save for his visits with Mother, it was the best feeling he had experienced, and the closest thing he had felt to being a true ninja.

But someone had apparently noticed him walking out, because after a few nights of roaming by himself, he spotted dark figures following him as he ran. They weren't able to keep up with him, but when he stopped for a while, they also stopped and waited for him to move again. They seemed content to watch him from afar, observing but not interfering.

Raphael gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. He wasn't sure why he was being followed — it wasn't as if he was likely to run away. Where else was he going to go? The Foot was his home, his family, his entire life. It was the same with the guards who still stood outside his bedroom every night, even though he was now one of them. He wasn't a prisoner, but one of the Foot… so why was he watched and guarded so closely?

He thought about shaking them off, which he could do easily if he just ran fast enough, but decided against it. He didn't want to risk angering Master Shredder by evading something he had ordered. So he turned his shell towards the two ninja following him, and leaped onto another rooftop.

It was then he heard a muffled scream.

Something inside him prickled at the sound, and he felt his face shifting into a snarl. He didn't know who had made that sound, but he was suddenly seized by the desire to stop whatever had caused it.

Another scream — this one turning into a sob — sounded from somewhere nearby, and Raphael's eyes flicked from building to building, trying to figure out where it had come from. Finally he heard the sounds of a struggle, and followed them to a wide alley that looked out on a busy street, crouching on the edge of the rooftop as he surveyed what was going on.

A young woman was standing in that alley, her dark features stained with tears that glinted in the moonlight. Two men — skinny, pasty and strung-out-looking — were crowded around her, too close for her obvious comfort, and Raphael caught the gleam of a knife in the hand of one of them. The other one was clutching a purse — presumably, Raphael thought, belonging to the woman.

"Please," the woman was babbling, "please don't come any closer. I swear I don't have any more—"

"Empty out yer pockets," the man holding the knife ordered, jabbing it at her.

Raphael's lip curled. He glanced over at the pedestrians walking in the street nearby — no one seemed to hear the woman screaming, or perhaps they just didn't care. Certainly none of them seemed inclined to help.

He glanced over his shoulder at the two ninja following him. Then he plunged down into the alley below, his sai already out and gleaming in his hands. The woman uttered another shriek as she saw a dark figure hurtling down from the rooftop, with what appeared to be a large knife clutched in each hand. She cowered against the wall, shielding her face with her hands.

Raphael caught the first of the muggers with a kick to the head, sending the weedy figure stumbling straight into a wall. He slumped to the ground, blood trickling from a cut on his head. The other — the one with the knife — cursed and swiped at Raphael, but he was easily able to dodge such weak, predictable slashes. After letting the man have a few seconds to try to defend himself, Raphael swiped upward with his sai, sending the knife spinning off into the dark alley.

"Try gettin' a real job," he snapped.

Then he buried his fist in the mugger's gut, before driving it upward into the underside of the man's chin. The human was unconscious before he hit the filthy pavement.

Raphael stood there for a moment, looking down on the bodies of the two men he had just beaten. He hadn't even worked up a sweat — while he knew that he had improved drastically in his fighting skills, and was more than a match for nearly anyone in the Foot, he hadn't realized that he was good enough that ordinary people were so easy to beat. He could have fought both of those losers in his sleep.

Then he remembered the woman, who was still cowering against the wall, trembling wildly. As he stared, she peered between her splayed hands, gazing at him with wide, frightened eyes.

Raphael sank back into the shadows, letting them enfold him and hide him from the woman's sight. He didn't know how much she had seen before that — hopefully not enough to realize that her rescuer was a giant turtle dressed as a ninja — but he knew that he had better leave before she started screaming again. Which she would almost certainly do when she saw his green skin, his shell, his decidedly not-human face.

"Th-tha-thank you," the woman quavered.

Good. She probably hadn't seen him clearly, or she probably would have cried out and run. Raphael turned and leaped up to the rooftop, feeling the woman's eyes follow him as he went. He began moving back in the direction of the Foot's headquarters, his eyes darting towards the two small figures running in the distance.

But he felt better than he had in days, ever since Toshiro-sensei had left. Finally, until Master Shredder gave him a mission to fulfill, he had something he could do.