tori_angeli | The Halfway Point, chapter 8

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The Halfway Point, chapter 8

Here it is! Chapter nine should follow soon.

It makes a difference
That I'm feeling this way
With plenty to think about
And so little to say

Except for this confession
That is poised on my lips
I'm not letting go of God
I'm just losing my grip…

What is a love
If the love's not my own
This is not my home
This is lonely
But never alone.

Over the Rhine, “When I Go.”

“I told him the truth. Lying to him wasn’t helping.”

“Seems like the truth made things worse.”

“I was out of options.” Donatello stopped talking and gritted his teeth as he hurtled over an alley between two rooftops.

As soon as he landed, and Leonardo landed behind him, Splinter, several yards in front of them, froze. “Stop,” he said suddenly, holding out a hand behind him. Don obeyed, catching himself in mid-pace and straightening to catch his breath.

Leo walked up behind him. “I’m sorry, Don, I’m—“

“You’re frustrated with Raph and need to argue with someone while he’s not here. I know that. Argue aw—“ Don was interrupted when his cell phone rang abruptly. He glanced up at Splinter, who was looking at him expectantly.

He knew that was going to happen.

Don swiped the phone from his belt and answered it. “Yeah?”

“Raph’s back.” The voice was Mike’s.

Don’s eye ridges lowered in concern. “Is he okay?”

There was a pause. “I think you should come back.”

Don’s heart skipped a beat. “Is he hurt?”

“I don’t think so, but he’s…please come back.” The last three words were pleading.

Don nodded. “We’ll be there in a second, Mikey, just hang on.”

“Raph?” Leo cracked Raphael’s door open and peered inside. The lights were off—there was nothing but a sliver of silver light coming in through the door Leo held open, illuminating a floor littered with small items and furniture. He opened the door wider and dodged a book that sailed in his direction. “Raph?”

At last the sliver of light, darting across the floor, fell on Raphael, sitting crosslegged on the floor, hunched over, head bowed, arms folded and pressed against his plastron. He made a small sound as though trying to speak, then stopped.

Leo took two slow steps through the door. “What happened?”

“G-g-g-“ said Raph. He almost sounded like he was choking.

Leo paused, then continued forward. “Are you hurt?”

Raph made a sharp, truncated exhale, but said nothing.

“Raph, you have to talk to me.” Step. Step. “If we don’t—“

Suddenly, Raph lashed out at his legs, forcing Leo to take a few steps backwards. After a tense moment, Raph resumed his previous position and was silent.

Leo had come so close—surely he could get close enough to touch Raph. He wasn’t sure what he would do then. Maybe wrap his brother in his arms while Raph cried his heart out—unlikely, he knew. It was the image that sprang to mind, though, a picture-perfect movie moment. Realistically, Raph probably wouldn’t let him get that close.

“Leo.” Mike stood in the doorway, beckoning to him. Leo followed, and the door was closed behind them.

In the kitchen, Mike poured a glass of soda. “He’s been like this since he came back,” he said softly. “He couldn’t even talk. He kept trying to yell at me when I asked him questions, I could see it in his face, like he was gonna…” He paused, then sighed. “Pop, or something. But he couldn’t talk. Not like, mute. More like, really bad stutter. Really bad, Leo, something happened.” He fell silent.

Leo started to make tea. It was the only thing he could think of doing until he thought of what to say. Fill kettle with water. Place on stove. Turn on stove. Hands working, eyes watching, not quite seeing. Something had happened to Raph, that was definite. There was no doubt in Leo’s mind that House was a part of it. He plucked a mug from a cabinet and a jar of loose leaf Tanganda tea he’d obtained while traveling through Zimbabwe.

“Raph left Casey and April. House disappeared as well. Either Raph took House with him, or House woke up and followed Raph.” He glanced back at Mike to see if he was following. Mike’s eyes were fastened to him. Leo continued. “Either way, House…probably overpowered and attacked Raph. Whatever he did then, or almost did…I don’t want to think about. Whatever it was…probably forced Raph to kill him. What do you think?”

Mike was silent for several seconds, then, “I shouldn’ta let him go.”

Leo turned to face him fully, eyes narrowing. “What?”

“Last night, when he went out. You were right, I was so stupid—“

“Mikey,” Leo sighed softly, coming over to the table and sinking into a chair. “You…I don’t know what to say.” He rested his elbows against the table and covered his eyes with his hands. “He didn’t get hurt last night, he got hurt tonight. At least you didn’t learn this from your own mistakes.”

“I knew he heard my conversation with April, I shoulda known he’d—“

“You couldn’t have known. I wouldn’t think Raph would be interested in trying to find Casey...” He glanced up at Mike, then lowered his hands. “What?”

Mike had frowned. His eyes met Leo’s. “April didn’t think you’d be interested, either. Or Don. ‘S why she called me.”

Leo sighed and slid his eyes closed. “Mikey…”

“All I’m sayin’ is you shouldn’t treat Casey like he’s the one that did it.”

A sharp, bitter laugh escaped Leo. “Trust me, Mikey. If Casey was the one who did it, I would have killed him by now.”

It was the endless scene of watching a movie with Mike, the scene he couldn’t seem to escape. He excused himself to go to the bathroom, unusual calm and resolution in his gut. He was going to do this.

He locked the bathroom door behind him.

Immediately his eyes searched for his resources. Soap. Toxic. A glass. He filled the glass and inserted the bar of soap. Toothpaste. A squirt went into the glass. He sifted through the medicine cabinet, where there was a variety of pills, from the mundane to the potent. He took down a bottle of the most powerful painkillers they had and popped it open. One pill went down, then another, and eventually the bottle was empty. Nothing yet. He seized another bottle.

The water in the glass was turning cloudy, and he removed the bar of soap, stirred the mixture with a finger and drank it down. It tasted bitter and dry. Mouthwash, cough syrup, he started to swallow both. When they were gone, he reached for a box of decongestants and took the five that were left. Still nothing.

Frustrated, he filled the glass of water again and drank its contents, hoping to speed the medicine along. When that wasn’t immediately effective, he growled and punched the mirror. It shattered, shifting from one to thousands of images of himself, pathetic, insane, helpless and unable even to do this.

He grabbed a nail clipper from the cabinet and used the sharp nail file to dig into his left wrist, picking away bits of flesh, savagely delving for the living artery, pulling it out of his arm, but unable to sever it. The pills still weren’t working, he wasn’t dying fast enough, nothing was happening.

The shower rod. He broke down the rod holding the shower curtain and snapped it into a manageable length, then started ramming the sharp edge against his face. No, easier access to the brain through the mouth. He stabbed with it at his soft palate, in the back of his throat. It would not penetrate.

With a cry of rage, he flung the bar across the room and threw himself at the mirror, plucking the shards of glass up and crushing them in his hands until they lay in dime-sized pieces. One by one, he swallowed them, just like the pills, their sharp edges torturing his throat as they went down, cold bolts of fire in his esophagus, and he still did not bleed enough.

Blood.

He scraped his hands against the rough brick of the wall, attacking the knuckles, the webs between his fingers, any place where the skin was relatively delicate. It peeled the outer layer of his skin, but did not access blood.

Blood. Punishment.

Hands curled into fists, and Raphael was punching the walls, hard, harder, and blood began to fleck the walls before it sprayed his face, wearing his hands down to the bones. Blindly he struck, and continued to strike, the sounds of his blows lessening until there was no noise, no sight, nothing but the slick warmth of blood, his blood, everywhere, running down his wrists and dripping off his elbows.

Suddenly his hands froze on the wall, bracing him, and he rammed his head against the brick. There was a whirl of dizziness, but no sparks, no brain damage. His head hit the wall again, again, again, until the blood ran. The wall was a sheet of crimson, dark, uniform, perfect.

Blood. Punishment. Death.

Not enough punishment.

No death at all.

He screamed, emptying his lungs of frustration and futility, and there was still more, so much more.

When he woke up in bed, he was choking on nothing.

He sat up suddenly, eyes wide and wild, gasping for breath, trying desperately to grasp what was real and what had been dreamt. Wrist intact. Throat hurt a little, probably from trying to scream. Not like he had been swallowing glass. He felt the ghosts of bruises, but they were only fading memories from the dream. Nothing had been real.

It had been so real.

Something small and distant in his mind said, I am so fucked up.

Raph tore away his covers and rolled out of bed, shivering as his feet touched the floor. He padded down the stairs and into the dojo as though led there. It was dark. There were night lights here and there throughout the lair—a necessity for a home in total darkness—but their dim light only made the darkness more oppressive.

This wasn’t his home.

The weapons rack glinted.

If I was going to, how would I do it?

Raph was drawn to the weapons rack, shivering harder as it came closer. He halted before it, staring at its contents. Staves of various sizes, bladed weapons curved and straight, swords and spears, nunchaku and ninjaken, and all of them deadly in their own way. Some crushed, some stabbed, some sliced, some cut. Crushing wasn’t practical. One of the other three would work. He examined the bladed weapons. Leo’s swords were too long and clumsy. The shorter daggers would be suitably painful and easier to use.

The more he looked, the more he was attracted to his own sais. They had seemed a truer friend of late than any he’d had before. He plucked one from the rack and stared at it. On inspiration, he held the point to his eye, leveling the weapon with the ground. Through the eye, into the brain. Painful but efficient. He could die on his own sai, the cold metal sealing his brain and bringing him silence at last. They had been good to him. Very good to him.

A flash of cold perspective, and suddenly it struck him that he was staring down the shaft of his sai, able to destroy his own life with the slightest motion. The weapon clattered to the floor, and he stepped away from it, shivering harder than before. His lungs filled with ice, and he couldn’t breathe, his brain exploding with fireworks flashing hot and cold.

I am so fucked up.

But a part of him was still beckoned by the sai—more of him than he wanted.

He wouldn’t allow that part to kill him. Not yet.

He couldn’t go back to bed. It would find him there, too, in that place where his nightmares took hold.

What could he do?

He could talk to someone. That idea struck a joyous chord in him. Not one of his brothers. He couldn’t talk to them anyway.

Splinter opened his bedroom door to a knock moments later, finding before him his strong son, shivering with an unnamed fever and barely able to speak.

Raph sat on one of his father’s tatami mats and sipped hot tea. “A lot of b-bad things’ve happened,” he said softly when he found his voice. “I dunno. It jus’…seems like I’ve b-been through worse.”

Splinter watched Raph over his own cup of tea. “Have you, my son?”

Raphael’s mind traced over its collection of memories he would rather lose.

A home in shambles.

“Nice blades. Tell me who gave them to you.”

Shattered glass, broken window, broken body.

“I don’t know what it is about you, little fella, but it tastes good to the last drop!”

No letters, no phone calls, he may as well be dead.

“Hey House, gimme your flashlight.”

Pain like he’d never known in a place he never thought he’d know it.

“He likes it! Dirty little whore likes it!”

Tang of blood and filth.

“Swallow.”

I have to get out of this. Where is Casey?

“I d-dunno.”

But probably not.

“I dunno, it just…seems like there should b-be something.”

Splinter set his tea down. “That is not relevant, Raphael. The way you are reacting—I am told it is common and natural.”

“I have these…c-crazy dreams, Father,” Raph said softly, his stuttering lessening as the tea calmed him. “Not just about…that. Like, dreams where I’m…d-doing things. T-to myself.” His mouth was on autopilot even as his mind set off warning flags.

Splinter paused. “What things?”

“Like…I d-dunno, it’s c-c-c—“ He stopped, hands tightening around his mug of tea.

After a moment, the old rat nodded. “You would be wise to tell me, my son. Often, such dreams have meaning.”

Raph gave a sputtering laugh. “I know what these dreams mean.”

“And what do they mean, Raphael?”

Raph pressed his lips together. If he told, Splinter would think he was suicidal. Which he…almost was. He wasn’t planning to kill himself. He just had dreams about it. Even when he was awake. Nevertheless, he didn’t want Splinter setting Leo on him to watch over his every move. Leo would love another reason his little brother couldn’t do without him. On the other hand, perhaps he could use someone around to make sure he didn’t…Raph’s breath quickened.

Splinter reached out and pressed a hand to Raph’s cheek. “You need rest, my son,” he said softly.

Raph shook his head. “I don’t think I can.” He thought of his bed, where his nightmares assaulted him. He couldn’t sleep there.

The old rat’s ears twitched. He rose to his feet slowly and hobbled to one of his small wooden chests. He opened it and took out a small pouch. “This is an herb that will help you sleep unplagued by dreams.” When he was kneeling in front of Raph again, he plucked a few leaves from the pouch and held them over Raph’s steaming teacup. “Do you wish it, Raphael?”

There was a moment of hesitation. Raph’s mind flashed back to Don’s betrayal. But this was different. This was Splinter, and a few hours without nightmares, a few hours of pure sleep would be…He nodded.

Splinter dropped the leaves into the cup. “Wait for a few minutes, then drink the entire cup,” he said softly. “Now, come with me to the television. I wish to watch stories.” The sensei pushed himself to his feet. Raph did the same, careful not to spill any tea.

When they arrived in the living room, Splinter plucked the remote from the couch’s armrest and turned the television on. He sank into the rocking chair by the couch and began to flip through the channels. Raph set the tea on the coffee table and sat on the couch. As Splinter settled onto the Animal Planet channel, Raph drained his teacup and set it back down, reaching for the blanket hanging over the back of the couch. He wrapped himself in it and lay down, resting his head on the armrest nearest Splinter, eyes falling upon the television screen like slow-descending leaves. After a few minutes his vision began to blur, and he closed his eyes.

He fell asleep to the sound of the television on low volume and the creaking of the rocking chair. And for the first time in weeks, he did not dream.

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*Wibblewibbleflailwibblwibble*

I love this story so much. I really hope it has a happy ending...

Happy endings are simple. This is a complicated story.

Thank you!

D:!!!

D:D:D:!!!!!!!!!!!

.....man, next thing you write needs to have a happy ending. for serious.

You know...endings in general are simple.

And you'll notice I didn't promise anything.

*flails at you and a lovingly frustrated manner*

This is really beautiful. Well ...the nightmares are harsh; the fact that Raph doesn't feel he can reach out to his brothers, and the fact that they don't know how to reach him is bad. (In a well-written way. Heh.)

But I love this last scene with Splinter. It's such a wonderful understated comfort to give; once again I'm in love with the realism of your emotions and writing. Leo especially imagining that picture-perfect hug and knowing it just wouldn't work that way is particularly close.

Much love for this. ^_^

While this is a dark/heavy series, you continue to do a great job conveying the uncertain thoughts & feelings of everyone, their sorrow at not knowing how to help the injured.

And yea - the end-scene w/ Splinter & Leo's wish for happy-hugs... much win!

Thank you.

Depression, I know from experience, is an utterly selfish condition. Your brain/mind just is not capable of seeing things from other people's points of view.

You've captured a part of that, I think in Raph's inability to think beyond "betrayal" with Don; his inability to meet his brothers half way, or even recognise them reaching out to him in LOVE.

I would have liked to have seen a little more from Don's POV in the opening scene - I LOVE his understanding of Leo's understanding and NEED for an argument. You write all of these characters so well, so insightfully. :D

The most important thing in fanfiction is canon characterisation... and you walk away with all the gold stars possible for that.

Poor Leo... so... LOST at how to help, how to heal... WANTING, NEEDING to do something about the situation... but being powerless. EVERYONE would love to be able to HOLD Raph while he cries his pain away at this point... and everyone also knows it isn't going to happen and it isn't that easy. And that HURTS. Hurts Leo, hurts the reader. You've captured the situation so well.

Then Raph: nightmares and a part of himself craving death. Not truly understanding himself or his ILLNESS (his depression has gone beyond a mere emotional state in my opinion)... yet knowing he needs help. SO painfully and so truly drawn.

The only thing I would draw attention to is Splinter opened his bedroom door to a knock moments later, finding before him his strong son, shivering with an unnamed fever and barely able to speak. which shifts POV to Splinter and yet immediately goes back to Raphael. I found that a tad jarring, I'm afraid.

I'm SO GLAD about the end scene... about the fact that a kind of comfort and a good night's sleep WERE there for the asking. I'm PRAYING that Raph starts to find a way to communicate and that the others find a way to communicate WITh him.

And I remember House still tied to a post. And I HOPE he's had to piss himself or shit himself while tied there and I PRAY he'll start to respect Raph before he dies. And I want him to die slowly, horribly and with the whole CLAN involved. But I'm a vindictive bitch.;)

THANK you for this update. Goodness knows how you found time during NaNo.

This was actually written before NaNo. :)

"Not truly understanding himself or his ILLNESS (his depression has gone beyond a mere emotional state in my opinion)... yet knowing he needs help."

It's my opinion that Raph is more or less depressed anyway--he (particularly in Mirage) shows all kinds of signs of bipolar as it manifests itself in children and teens. His utter lack of control over his emotions, and sometimes his actions, isn't normal.

Thank you! And thanks for the insight. It was good to hear a concrete explanation of what I was writing (the selfishness thing), or I probably would have ended up being inconsistant.

The shift in perspective isn't really a shift in perspective--it's still Raph's POV, just starting with Splinter's action. It's meant to be a little jarring, sort of leaving you wondering what Raph's going to do and then answering it all at once.

Hmm. Having known people who were truly "bipolar" (clinically) and lived through Clinical Depression both personally and as a child with a Depressive father... I would say that one has to be careful to discriminate between people with an actual affect (mood) DISORDER and those with a disordered emotional state/trait.

It's the same with other psychological disorders -- Mikey can show signs of ADHD (for example) and I've seen people treat Don as though he has Asperger's... but having WORKED with kids with special needs I can say with some certainty that neither of them could have developed and learnt and SURVIVED in battle if their personality quirks went as far as actual disorders.

My friends who had diagnoses of biplarity could hardly FUNCTION (at least without their medication). And Depression as a clinical illness is also far BEYOND feelings of depression. From having seen people with CLINCAL affect disorders I can fully understand why they were labelled as "mad" or "possessed" in days of old.

Raph has mood PROBLEMS and may well be low grade depressive as a personality trait (who wouldn't be with those restrictions on their life?) he also has anger management issues - partly because rather than be "vulnerable" enough to feel "weak" emotions such as fear and sadness he channels them into his anger. I would be cautious of going so far as labelling him mentally ill, however.

"Normal" is a spectrum, a bell curve... and while he may be on the narrow end, I think he still falls within that spectrum. In spite of everything, he does FUNCTION.

Of course I'm also TOUCHY about this because of how strongly I identify, and always HAVE identified, with Raphael. Not in an "emo" way, I hope... but because I recognise pain and anger and channelling other emotions into anger because if feels stronger to hide behind anger and aggression than to admit to feeling fearful and weak. I also recognise depression as a personality trait as well as a clinical disorder.

I hope this makes sense. Disordered emotions and CLINICAL disorders were taught to me as two separate branches of psychology.

Notice I didn't say he DOES have bipolar, just that he shows signs. Nevertheless, I would say that Raph, in Mirage at least, DOES have some sort of mental illness. It's not normal to freak out so much that you actually become unaware of what you're doing, blacking out and going berserk for reasons that don't amount to the amount of control you're losing. It might be that something went wrong in his mutation. Either way, I was not classifying him as bipolar, and while I'm impressed with the amount you know, there's nothing in there that I did not already agree with.

Okay. Sorry. My fault.

I'm touchy about Raph and I'm touchy about psychological terms being used correctly. I guess I overreacted. Sorry.

It's okay. Don't worry about it.

I'm a little late to the party-- again. Let's blame it on my efforts to focus on writing. Which would be a lie, but it sounds good. ;p)

Oh gawd, more heartbreak. This hurts so good.... but, just like real life, working through the painful parts takes so long, and like your characters, the emotionally engaged part of me is anxious to get to the healing. But also, as a reader, not in a hurry, because you paint this agonizing struggle that all of them are going through so skillfully.

I love Leo's struggle to make it right when he can't and its his *job* to make things right. I love their casting about for some physical explanation reason for Raphael to have returned from his encounter with House in even worse shape, because it would be so hard to imagine the psychological damage House could do with mere words. They would be as blindsided as Raph was by the power House still wields over him.
But from what I've seen of people who survive similar traumas, this response is accurate. House, and everything associated with that event has power over Raphael now. He is so powerless...
The nightmares are frightening. I like how you've merged their description with waking events so we experience the same confusion that Raph does.
Gentle Splinter, comes through with some comfort.
Very nice--
(and terrible)

I love your reviews so much, GW. Thank you a million times.

Oh my gosh. It was so intense, as always... My hands were crisped around my blanket all the time of my reading, even more with the description of Raph's nightmare. I couldn't believe my eyes, seeing him doing ot so coldly, then so savagely when he saw it didn't work as he wanted... The details, the violence, the despair, all was very clear and you made an amazing job. Short sentences made the scene even more disturbing. Like the broken shard of glass, the words were sharp. My own throat hurted and my heart is still racing. You know, I can see perfectly your universe in my head like a movie. The pictures come very neatly and naturally inside my head, and can be stuck in my mind for hours, if not days. You have a so visual writing. Feeling Raph's anger, his panic against his lack of control of every single thing... The way he put the sai near his eye and finally let it fall... He is totally sure he's going to do it, he has absolutly no doubt about it, and he's almost peaceful about it - all is good to stop his thought and the pictures in his head. And then, reality strucks him, and he takes conscious of what he's doing, and I know how afraid he is, not longer able to hold his weapon, control his hands and body from shaking. Like two person inside, but only one as well... A part you can't, you don't want to recognize as yourself, who is ready to do the worse to yourself, and it's one of the most frightening thing... The need to escape, escape the place, escape from yourself - you traducted that very well with Raph not wanting to go in his bed again. He's associating the nightmare to the place, for him the nightmares are there, not in his head - and at the same time, he knows perfectly that's nightmares are a part of him. He's trying to escape the place but still knows that he can't because he just can't escape himself. He just wants to all stop, and knows that it's impossible. So much panic, confusion, fear... he is totally prisonner of his own emotions and his lack of control on it. He can only see that and nothin else, that's why he's so panicked. No other perspective.
This review is really centred on Raphael (even if I love too how you work on the others... No one is left behind, they all have their own reactions about that, confusions not knowing how to react and blame themselves - it's a terrible feeling to feel responsible for a thing you couldn't have controlled, but can't help to feel responsible as well) but it made me thought of lot of things, of some memories... I will wait tomorrow to read the next chapter... But this one was painful and wonderful. Thank you again...
(oh, and if you see this review before i'll post the next, there's some new stuff for you on my gallery =) )
Take care.
Crystal

O_O How did you know today was my birthday?

...Well, it's not. But it feels like it is. That was like, four awesome pics! DAH! I LOVE YOU!

And to top it all off, a wonderful review! I am so not worthy!

I AM planning to write you your request fic, but the last month has been hectic. Perhaps in time for Christmas? I'll see what I can do. I love that you asked for what you did.

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The Halfway Point, chapter 8

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