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Raph can't sleep. Every time he closes his eyes he sees something he'd like nothing more than to forget: his hands wielding mimics of the Shredder's signature tekko-kagi against his own brothers; Slash and Rockwell hurting Sensei with no power to stop themselves; the worm being dropped on his nose and squeezing into his eye, its silhouette still visible against his eyelids despite its absence; and, worst of all, staring Shredder in the face, sai en-route to pick his brain, and not getting to see it through.
It's infuriating to know that he can kill the Shredder, he has the strength to do it and Raphael had the opportunity twice, yet the monster still stands. He shouldn't have been so impulsive to allow himself to get captured. He shouldn't have been so weak as to allow a worm to control his body.
Tossing and turning in bed isn't helping any so the turtle rises with a grunt, grabbing his mask from his nightstand and wrapping it around his face. As Raphael begins to creep out of his room he takes a quick glance at the digital clock on his end table– it's nearly 4am. His body is exhausted, but his mind just won't slow down. They feel disconnected now, as if working separately from one another.
He drags himself to the dojo, quietly so as to not disturb his father and brothers. He needs to be especially quiet when entering the dojo to not wake Splinter, but despite Ralph's impulsive and loud nature, he is still a ninja. His footsteps are silent as he sneaks towards the tree at the center of the room and sits beside its trunk, putting the plant between himself and the door to Sensei’s quarters. This way if he does awaken Raphael may be able to remain unnoticed. He doesn't want him to worry about his son being up so late after such a hard day, and he doesn't like being seen doing this.
Dropping to his knees, Raphael closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Rarely he'll come into the dojo to meditate when nobody else is around– it's embarrassing to him, for some reason, to be seen centering himself. Focusing on his mind rather than honing his body doesn't fit the mask he wears, it feels vulnerable. Raphael gets angry, and he uses that to fuel each and every attack until whatever's troubling him can't anymore. Raphael does not meditate, does not need to clear his mind with silence but instead the sound of his fists against a punching bag.
This, unfortunately, isn't a problem that can be fixed by stabbing something. Perhaps if Raph meditated more often he'd have been able to fight that stupid worm, to kill the Shredder and end this damn feud once and for all.
He squeezes his eyes shut tighter with a grimace, then relaxes his face once more as he takes a deep breath in. It smells overwhelmingly of scented candles and incense, Master Splinter's way of keeping the sewer stink out of his space. Its strong scent isn't helping Raph focus any.
Once again, he takes a deep breath. He keeps his eyes shut even though he swears he can see the worm crawling under his lids. Raph begins to count, in for one, two, three. Out for one, two, three. It's still there, worse now. He can feel it crawling, he swears it, a stinging in his head like a razor, cutting through his brain matter.
“Fuck!” He growls as he opens his eyes. Regret sets in immediately and he covers his mouth, pressing his body against the trunk of the tree. He waits, listening for Splinter's door to open like a child who isn't allowed out of his room. It's not that Splinter will be angry with him– he'd probably be happy that Raphael was trying to meditate– but he doesn't want to talk about today, at least not yet.
The shoji slides open slowly, sensei’s pawsteps quiet and cautious. Raphael listens to his steps, pinpointing his location just by listening, and quietly rotates around the tree trunk to avoid his gaze.
His father stops for a moment and sighs. “Raphael.”
The turtle freezes, not sure what to do, before slowly crawling out from behind the tree.
“I'm sorry I woke you, sensei.”
Splinter’s eyebrows raise slightly, and while he does indeed look tired, the concern on his face outweighs any frustration. “You do not need to be sorry, my son. What troubles you?”
“I can't fall asleep. I came in here to… To meditate, but that's not working either.”
Raph’s father lowers himself to his knees, waving his paw to invite his son to do the same. The turtle listens, gently dropping himself onto his kneepads and tilting his head ever so slightly downward.
“Something is on your mind.”
“Hai, sensei.”
“It is about today, is it not?”
“Hai, sensei.” Raph sighs, knowing that Splinter is gently prodding, hoping to get his second eldest son to communicate his woes without being asked directly. “I shouldn't have let Slash hurt you, and I shouldn't have let myself get taken.”
“Yes, running into the enemy alone was an impulsive decision, made on the back of your fury.”
“I just- I wanted to get back at him for everything he's done– to you, to Karai, to my brothers– and it was right there but I just… I couldn't get my body to do it. Maybe if I were stronger in body and mind,” like Leo, he thinks, “I wouldn't have let it take hold of me. The Shredder could be dead!”
“Raphael,” Splinter sighs, eyes closed as if deep in thought, but there is a sorrowful expression on his face. “You are on the right path, my son, but you travel it incorrectly.”
Looking up at his father, Raph listens more intently than ever.
“You cannot allow yourself to live trapped in the past. What matters is the present, and your future. Vengeance is a desire to repay a past misdeed– it can be a powerful ally or a dangerous enemy. Miwa allowed her desire for revenge to control her actions, and it became her undoing. You must not think of the action that caused you harm, but instead how to move forward. What is your goal, Raphael?”
He hesitates for a moment, the question is too easy. “To take down the Shredder.”
“That is the same goal you had today, no?”
“It is, sensei.”
“Your goal is not within reach, then, if it could not be accomplished today. You need to start smaller. You have already identified what went wrong today– you feel your mind is not as strong as your body. Seeing where you have gone wrong is the first and hardest step, and now you must work to correct it.”
“Hai, sensei.”
Raphael always feels better after a long talk with Splinter, the elder rat is the best father they could have ever asked for. He watches as father uses his cane to get himself to his feet, posture giving away that he is tired and in pain from the blow Slash had dealt. A pang of guilt strikes through him like ice.
“And Raphael?”
“Yes, Master Splinter?”
“You are not weak for being unable to fight that which poisoned your mind. You must remember I, too, was in such a position not once, but twice. There are some things one simply cannot fight on their own.”
This is… Shockingly comforting, and it makes Raphael feel less alienated. If Master Splinter couldn't fight the control of the Rat King, then it would take someone impossibly powerful to overcome the effects of mind control. Sensei is not only strong, but greatly in tune with both his mind and his body. Maybe there truly wasn't anything Raph could do to fight the worm.
That doesn't mean there aren't improvements to be made. He remains in the dojo when he hears the shoji close gently and shuts his eyes. The worm is still there, squirming and writhing, and Raphael focuses on it. The past has no place here in his skull and he focuses all of his attention on the sound of his breathing, the scent of incense filling the dojo, the quiet so suffocating he can hear his heart beating. A worm crawling around in his brain is not something he can hear or feel, because it is not there. The worm seems to stop squirming.
Raphael pictures the worm being stabbed with his sai and removed from his brain. He grimaces, but the image fades as he breathes the rotten memories out and the pungent aroma of the present in.
When the feeling of the worm finally fades, the turtle slips into a state of peace and focus. His mind clears of fog into a dark, quiet, thoughtless paradise. Raph’s body walks beside his mind, not with it. Its steps seem slightly out of sync, slow and tired. Breath in for one, two, three. Hold, one, two, three. Out, one, two, three.
The footsteps sound closer, but not quite there. He settles there for nearly an hour, focusing on his breathing, on how his limbs feel and how they move, until it feels as though his body and his brain are one once more. Then he stays there for a while longer, becoming intimate with the feeling of the chilly sewer air on his skin, the fabric of his mask on his face, the weight of his shell on his back. With each breath seems to come understanding.
Even after the lengthy meditation session, Raphael doesn't feel the way he did yesterday morning before everything went down. Then again, has he ever gone to sleep the exact same turtle he was when he'd awoken? Unfortunately this feeling doesn't yet feel like growth, but a hole in his mind where something had dug in before being removed, filling in that hole with fear.
Rising to his feet, Raph begins making his way out of the dojo and towards his room. He doesn't notice Master Splinter standing with a paw on the just barely open shoji, watching as his most troubled son makes his exit. And when Raph heads to his room and flops onto his bed with a glance at the clock– nearly six in the morning– he does not hear his father leaving a note on the door. When his brothers awake, they will allow him well needed rest and respite and train without him for one morning.