[voice; action]

[seriouslytwisted]

[voice]

[Exploring and ninja-ing around is turning up a whole lot of dead ends and questions with no answers, so now Raphael is going to try his last resort.

Conversing with strangers.

Making sure he has his voice only function on (pretending that little SNAFU with it in his earlier conversation didn't happen) he reluctantly addresses his fellow...strand-ees.]


Okay, seriously. How many of you people actually buy that "you are in the in-between" story?

[the mystic new-age voice for the quote helps set the atmosphere, yes it is necessary]

---

[action]

[Before this post, Raphael will be swimming around in the Water Sector, trying to keep as hidden as possible but needing to surface to breathe and also sneak back up onto the docks occasionally when he can't cross sections in water. He's a stealthy little bugger, so the average Joe might miss him, but anybody with serious training or extra-sharp senses might find him.

...or you might catch him when he's losing his temper and angrily kicking over a barrel after talking to yet another tree-hugging native yokel, whatever.]

Comments

[notamachine]

...You got me there.

[This would be a lot more satisfying if he could kill things back, wouldn't it? This is the quietest, most polite place to be trapped that he's ever been in and he's waiting for the shoe to drop.]

[seriouslytwisted]

Whatever.

[Raph grabs a pebble from the dock and throws it into the water. He sits quietly for a while, just generally being angry and slowly calming back down into something more manageable. He doesn't know who this dude is, but he at least knows he can take care of himself around him and the guy hasn't actively tried to put him down yet, despite the gun in his waistband that Raph had seen when he'd flipped him forward. He's all right.

If he does try something weird, Raph'll just jump into the water and that'll be the end of that.]

How old're you, anyway?

[notamachine]

[Poor Raph. Poor Dean, too. The both of them stranded here without their families. Both of them worried.

Good thing Dean decided not to shoot, huh.]

34. [Because it's not a big deal to him.]

[seriouslytwisted]

[wow

old]

Huh.

[notamachine]

[What the hell

it's not that old

shut the fuck up]

I'm guessing you're the youngest brother.

[seriouslytwisted]

Uh no, I'm the second oldest, thanks. [Although they're all kind of the same age? But Splinter kind of ordered them and...whatever. They're all fifteen.]

Close enough to it anyway.

[notamachine]

Huh. My mistake. [Dean shrugs] You've just got that younger brother vibe, I guess.

[seriouslytwisted]

Yeah, that's probably because you're old.

[notamachine]

[Uh huh. Shut it, Raph.] You talk to your dad with that mouth?

[seriouslytwisted]

[Twitch.]

You don't know jack about my father or how I talk to him.

[notamachine]

[Oh. Dean knows that tone. That's the protective-of-family tone. Okay, he gets it. He can be nice.] So tell me about him.

[seriouslytwisted]

[Raph returns to glaring down at the water.]

My family's none of your business.

[notamachine]

[Dean is just gonna sit down next to him for the hell of it.]

I was the same way about my dad. My mom, too. Sammy never even said her name for a while. He didn't know her like I did, so I didn't let him.

[seriouslytwisted]

[Raph doesn't say anything, but his feet swing slightly above the water and the line of his shoulders relaxes slightly. He's still glaring though.]

[notamachine]

[Dean stays quiet a minute while he puts a few things together. Ninja turtle, well trained, really big on his family... Yeah, he'll take the guess.]

My dad was pretty hard on me as a kid. Spent most of my weekends learning to shoot, how to fight, things like that. He did it because he loved me, though.

[seriouslytwisted]

Yeah?

[Raph angles his toes down and drags them through the water.]

Why d'you need to learn how to take care of yourself? You're human.

[notamachine]

What, where you're from, people don't need to protect themselves? Must be nice and peaceful.

[seriouslytwisted]

Yeah, uh, most human beings don't need to learn how to fight or shoot unless they're gun nuts or serial killers. Sorry to break it to you.

[notamachine]

Unfortunately, where I'm from, things that aren't human like to eat things that are. My job is making sure they don't.

[He is, however, also a gun nut. And possibly a serial killer.]

[seriouslytwisted]

What, like zombies and vampires and stuff?

[Lame.]

[notamachine]

Zombies, vampires, werewolves. Angels. Demons. Gods and goddesses. Rugaru, kitsune, leshii, dragons, leviathan--and they were damn hard to kill, believe me.

Bigfoot's fake, though.

[seriouslytwisted]

[...that sounds so ridiculously movie-cliche, but he has seen weirder.]

What about the Swamp Thing?

[notamachine]

Things in swamps, yes. Swamp Thing, no. Just a movie. Mothman's probably real. We haven't confirmed it, but it's never killed anyone, so we haven't bothered.

[Dean thinks it might be a weak demon, but he isn't sure.]

[seriouslytwisted]

You're serious.

[Raphael scowls.] You're not just gonna laugh at me later if I believe you, are you?

[notamachine]

[He's deadly serious.]

Killed my first werewolf when I was 12. Went on my first solo hunt when I was 16. Nothing big, just a poltergeist. Simple salt and burn. Didn't know what I was doing so what should've taken a weekend took a week, but I got better at it. So yeah. I'm serious.

[Raph can probably guess why Dean just watched him for a while now.]