The robin and rabbit disappear once the storm gets worse. There's rocks on all sides now, surrounding Diaval as he gets further and further in, with the sky remaining as an inverse river high above him. He shivers and desperately wishes that he still had his cloak, his hands rubbing circles against his arms.

The rain starts to come down, pounding against the rocks and against Diaval's body. The ground beneath him becomes slick with mud and his shoes become swampy, his pants and socks clinging to his skin, which only serves to make him feel colder. He hunches over, holding himself as tightly as he can.

There's a loud crack that rattles him to his core. A flash of lightning splits the sky and a clap of thunder comes in quick succession like a well-conducted weather symphony. The earth trembles and Diaval goes stock still, unable to move his feet even if he wanted to. Boulders crash down the mountainside and land directly behind him, blocking off his only known exit. He startles and stumbles forward a few steps as he looks toward the raging sky. More rocks are falling.

He tries to run, but he's got no traction against the mud. He's practically running in place, one step forward and two steps back. He slips and falls hard on his butt, mud splattering him in the process, and he exhales heavily. His hair slips into his eyes, a soaking blindfold to add to his difficulties.

Another sharp cracking sound resonates from above and Diaval knows that he can't get out of the way in time. If there's more boulders coming to crush him, he's doomed, but he's so exhausted already from the running and the anxiety and everything else that he can honestly say that maybe a little rock crushing could be relaxing right now. He could use the sleep.

As the rocks get nearer, a stab of fear rolls through him and he suddenly wants to get out of the way, but it's too late now. They're coming. Three, two—

There's a roar and Diaval is jolted from his place, the wind getting knocked out of him as a dark, furry blur pins him to the ground. The boulders smash into the mud right where Diaval had been sitting, harmless as cotton balls.

Diaval stares at the animal above him. It's a wolf, a very black wolf with familiar green eyes. He blinks a few times, unmoving, and the wolf shakes out her coat and makes a snorting noise. She's still hovering over him, caging him with her legs.

"Destiny?" he asks, his raspy voice drowning in the downpour.

The wolf doesn't answer. She gets off him and starts nuzzling her nose into his side, making him frown. Why is she acting so strange and so animalistic? Sure, Destiny has tendencies, but not like this.

He gets to his feet and the wolf keeps nudging him, this time with her muzzle against the small of his back. The pressure is odd and he automatically curves away from it whenever the cold wetness of her nose makes contact. He looks down at the wolf and comes to the realization that she's a lot smaller than Destiny, and by a lot, he means by a sizeable and noticeable margin. This one is the size of a regular wolf and lacks the scars that Destiny's wolf form has.

His heart sinks and he didn't even realize that it had been lifted up in the first place. His friend isn't here after all.

"Who're you?" he asks as the wolf pushes her broad head against his elbow. "Why d'you look like Destiny? Is she in trouble?"

The wolf keeps pushing him and he obeys her. He turns his gaze to the path ahead of him and feels his shoulders sag as a moan leaves his mouth, one that says "oh, come ON" better than words can. The mountain ravine is blocked off by, you guessed it, boulders, and the rock walls are so slick with rain that there's no possible way to find handholds and climb over.

"End o'the line," Diaval sighs. "Knew it..."

The wolf walks past him, right up to the wall. She sits down on her haunches and tilts her head back, howling into the sky, and the noise echoes, twisting and drifting as if carried by the hand of an invisible child at play. Diaval looks around, wondering whether there's another path that he missed that could take him home.

There's a low hissing sound and he sucks in a sharp breath. A white snake—a python, perhaps?—curves out of a crack in the wall, right near the wolf. The animals regard each other briefly before the snake curves its body upwards, forked tongue flicking between its scaly lips. Its eyes, slitted and poisonous green eyes, latch on Diaval and he goes rigid.

The wolf stands and trots to Diaval's side, giving him another nudge towards the snake. The reptile bobs its head once and sweeps around, heading for the crack in the wall. Diaval hesitates, but the wolf nudging at his legs gets him to follow.

The crack isn't much of a crack once he gets closer, in fact it's more like a doorway. Diaval lowers himself to his hands and knees in order to peer inside, where the snake is still waiting. It turns to him and flicks the end of its tail, scales glimmering in the gloomy light.

Diaval stares at the tunnel and all he feels is tight, compressing terror settling against his chest as if a hippopotamus has sat on him. He shakes his head and starts backwards, but the broad, steady body of the wolf stops him.

He looks at the wolf and he wishes desperately that she was Destiny. If she was the real Destiny, he could tell her that he can't crawl through this tunnel because he's too afraid. She would understand his fear. She would finally understand why he chose Saskatchewan as his safe haven, she could see why a flat, endless expanse of Canadian landscape felt better than any closed in space.

He feels something smooth brush across his hand. The snake is closer to him now, staring right into his eyes as if telling him that if he doesn't come now, the avalanches waiting outside will finish him off. He swallows, closes his eyes, and crawls forward a few centimetres. The snake leads the way, he can hear the hissing, and he refuses to look. If he looks, he'll notice the dark. He'll notice the way the walls close in on him and he won't be able to breathe.

The ground drops out beneath him and he's free falling head first into the unknown. His mouth opens in a silent scream just as impact hits him like a brick wall. He inhales but that brick wall has invaded his throat and he ends up sounding like an asthmatic old man.

A soft muzzle brushes his cheek and his eyes snap open. It's still dark, far too dark for his liking, and there's not an exit in sight, just stone on all sides. Standing above him is a fox with wise, black eyes and auburn-coloured fur, like the burnt red of a dying sunset. His mouth goes dry and a pain resonates in his chest as he thinks of Melanie's hair; red, ruddy, beautiful, the exact colour of the fox perched next to him.

The comfort fades and he squeezes his eyes shut, trembling with cold even though the cave itself is warm and humid. This cave is too small, too dark, too lonely. He doesn't want to think about the smell of smoke mingling with iron, the way the barrel of a gun glinted in the headlights of that awful van, the rain. Too late, he's thinking of it and every breath is stolen from his body.

"Can't...l-live...like th...this..." he croaks. Rainwater escapes his hair and drops onto his pale cheeks like artificial tears.

The fox kneads the ground with her paws before curling against his side, her fluffy tail brushing his bellybutton. Diaval takes gasping, weak breaths as the fox rubs her cheek against the rise and fall of his ribcage, a soft churring rumbling in her throat and vibrating against his pectorals.

He starts to feel sleepy, comforted, even as his head feels dizzy with pressure and lack of oxygen. His calloused hand drifts to the fox's head and traces its way down her neck, back, tail, repeat. His lungs release, the tightness uncoiling bit by bit, and he starts to feel just a little better, a little warmer, a little stronger, the way Melanie made him feel when he was last with her.

He wakes to open sky. Whatever cave he was stuck in before is gone and the fox is nowhere in sight. He's still surrounded by walls, but this time there's a shimmer to them. Untapped minerals nestled in the earth, waiting to be discovered with eager, shiny faces staring out at the world. Diaval gets to his feet and turns in slow circles, taking in everything. He's in a quarry. There are torches dotting the varying levels leading both down and up, meaning he's standing somewhere in the dead centre, and far below him is a pool of water. He can't guess its depth.

"Well, well, well, lookit who's here," a voice from the past calls out. The New York accent is the same. Every hair on Diaval's body stands on edge. "Pretty thing, you ain't so little anymore, huh?"

Diaval doesn't want to turn around. He doesn't want to see who he thinks he's going to see. It can't actually be him, right? Diaval got away from him for good at fourteen.

"Innocence," the voice muses. Diaval feels bile rise in the back of his throat. "Lookit you, already half-dressed and dolled up. Let me get a peek at you, it's been so long." When he doesn't move, the voice gets harsher. "Turn around, boy, before I make you."

Diaval turns around. His blood runs cold. The man directly in front of him is exactly as he remembers, rotund in the belly area and wearing a bulky fur coat, fingers adorned with gaudy rings glittering with jewels. He has sunglasses resting on his broad nose and a white fedora settled over coarse, greasy black hair. His skin is deeply tanned, so much so that it looks almost red. Diaval can already smell the tobacco on his breath, still so potent and engrained in, what was back then, a young and impressionable mind.

"That's a good boy." A grin riddled with greed and malice shoots daggers into Diaval's soul. The man extends his greedy arms forward. "Come on, come get a hug from your old poppa."

"D-Don..." Diaval stammers, taking a step backwards. "Can't be you. Not you. Anyone b-but you."

He couldn't have survived. Diaval witnessed it. He experienced it. It's impossible.

"Oh HO!" the bejewelled man crows into the cloudy sky above. "You calling me Don? I told you to call me Poppa. Disobedient, ain'tcha?"

Every nerve in Diaval's body is a live wire, continuously sparking and setting fire to his veins and muscles, and all he can do is stand there and stare at the man that kickstarted the life he was forced to begin when he was torn away from his home. The memories are so vivid, even thirteen years after the event has come and gone, and Don Poppa looks exactly the same as he did when Diaval saw him for the last time.

A hand brushes the nape of Diaval's neck and he takes a gasping, starved breath. Don Poppa moved without him realizing it, now standing behind Diaval with his fat, sausage-like fingers trailing goosebumps along the muscle panes of the boy's pale shoulder blades, skipping over his weapons as if they don't exist. Diaval's easily five or more inches taller than him but that doesn't make him feel any more confident.

"You've gotten big," Don Poppa muses as his hand hooks around Diaval's waist and drags him into his beer gut, instantly making the archer screw his eyes shut. "You're so much more muscular, can't help but wonder if that Bradford guy beefed you up. Or...was it you using everything I taught you?"

There's another boisterous laugh that makes Diaval's brain feel like it's rattling and Don Poppa's hand plants a firm slap to his rear. Diaval squeaks and stumbles forward, his knees buckling.

"Still can't plant yourself, ha!" The malevolent laughter never ends. "Guess some things never change!"

Diaval feels his eyes burning but refuses to let any tears fall. He grits his teeth and keeps his face aimed at the ground, the skin pulled taut and white against his knuckles. He feels a hand surround his ponytail, his head is yanked back, and he's suddenly got the perfect view of Don Poppa's jeering red face staring down at him like he's nothing more than a tool for him to utilize—aka, the exact same look that Diaval procured from this man for years.

Don Poppa's fingers trail along Diaval's jugular and the boy automatically swallows, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down like a buoy. The hand tugs his hair sharper and he lets out a pained, nearly animalistic whimper. Don Poppa grins widely.

"Ah, always so submissive," he purrs and Diaval feels a spray of saliva patter against his cheek with the last syllable. "Never was quite sure with you. Some days you was like the worst mistake a guy could make, the next I had people tripping over themselves for an hour with you as their bitch." He leans over, making his gaudy chain necklace dangle from his neck like a swing. The lip of his fedora casts a menacing shadow over his dark, shaded eyes. "Heh, you took 'em all, did whatever they asked of you. Such a good little pet, making poppa so much dough."

"N-No," Diaval croaks out. The hand tightens and his scalp screams for any lapse in pressure as he winces. "S-Stop it."

"You think you can tell me what to do, boy?" Don Poppa asks in his typically loud voice, a faint look of amusement crossing his face. The look disappears in an instant, wiped away with a cloth of pure malice. His hand clasps around Diaval's throat and tightens enough to make breathing a chore. His lips fall to the boy's ear. "I make the orders. You ain't worth more than shit and you know it."

Diaval doesn't want to believe him. He wishes he could block out the sound but he just can't. There's a money-grubbing hand squeezing the life out of him, little by little, and he can't do a thing.

"The only thing you've got that's worth anything is what's in your pants," Don Poppa spits. "You've got nothing else. Not brains, not personality, hell you ain't even all that pretty anymore, not since your hair went white and your eyes went pink. You've got what the customers want, just like any old Joe, but there ain't nothing special about you."

Diaval's entire face goes red and he tries to duck his head downwards, tries to hide his face. There's a quick release on both his ponytail and throat. Diaval imagines for a second that he's being set free, but Don Poppa just spins him around, snatches his face in his hand and takes hold of his throat again. Diaval's head is jerked upwards and he's forced to make eye contact.

"Look away from me again and I'll poke your eyes out," Don Poppa growls.

He doesn't dare blink. Don Poppa steps back, giving Diaval just a second to breathe, then plants his foot smack in the centre of Diaval's chest and knocks him to the ground. He lands hard, the stone cutting at his back and his vision spiralling. Don Poppa does nothing but laugh.

God, how Diaval hates that laugh.

Something catches his attention out of the corner of his eye; a little robin with oddly blue eyes. The bird flits over to Diaval and beats air against his face, letting out an insistent chirp. It's like it's trying to urge him. Fight! Fight! Fight!

"That's a good position for you," Don Poppa booms, patting his belly as his rings throw light onto all sides of the quarry. "Never gonna get tired of you being a pushover."

Diaval doesn't know what his emotions are doing. He's terrified, far more terrified than he's felt in a long time even when he's been around warriors like Donatello and tyrants like the Shredder. He's also exhausted, so drained from his quest that he just wants any reason to relax. He's lonely. He wants Destiny or Melanie or Karai to come and get him out of this. He's given up all hope because Don Poppa has returned, somehow, and with him is every demon of Diaval's past that's clawed its way out of hell.

Don't you see, he's not real, a voice reaches him from far off. He just manages to turn his head enough to see the not-Destiny wolf staring at him. Her tail lashes. Just try...please.

Don Poppa tromps closer, jingling like a pimped out Santa Claus minus the presents and general holiday cheer. Diaval stares at him, honing in on any desires, but none reach him. Don Poppa is as desire-free as every other spirit Diaval has come across: the deer, the woman in the white gown, Splinter, the animals that he's met along his path.

"You're not real," Diaval says as he drags himself to his feet. Don Poppa's eyebrow arches from behind the sunglasses. "Got no desire, can't be real."

A fist knocks him across the jaw, rattling him like maracas. Another punch hits him in the gut and he gulps back any need to hurl just in time for an uppercut to snap his head upwards. Stars dance before his vision and his jaw explodes with pain. He swears that he can feel the imprint of Don Poppa's rings.

"Pain's real, boy," Don Poppa utters, wringing out his hand and kissing the knuckles. He cracks his neck. "Do you need another lesson?"

"No?"

Don Poppa lunges and Diaval goes for his weapons, but the pimp is too fast. He moves in a blur, far too fast and furious for Diaval to catch up, and soon he realizes just what being beaten to a pulp feels like. Elbow twist, sock in the gut, kick between the legs, face-plant to the ground, hit to the ribs, punch across the face, repeat, repeat, punch, kick, pain.

Don Poppa whistles as Diaval tries to stand, his limbs shuddering. His lip is split and fills his mouth with the taste of blood each time he tries to spit it all out. His ribs ache, his crotch throbs, his limbs are heavy, his head pounds, and he can't see straight. Everything is blurrier than it usually is. Blood trickles from his nose.

"This is why you're the bitch," Don Poppa says as if saying a well-known truth. "You lie down and take it like a dog. You suck it up. It makes you the perfect punching bag."

Diaval turns his head. "Not yours though..."

Don Poppa's foot makes an unexpected visit to Diaval's face and the boy goes pinwheeling over the edge of the platform. He tumbles down until hitting one of the lower levels, the momentum rolling him until he hits the wall. Don Poppa's laughter sounds from above.

Diaval doesn't move, breaths shallow. His thoughts ricochet between two things: rest and Destiny. Destiny must've felt like he does now but worse, more permanently, back before it got bad. Guilt comes like yet another unwelcome weight to place on his shoulders, another person on the planet Atlas holds up.

A tiny paw touches his face and his eyes drag open. The blurry figure of a yellow rabbit sits in front of him, the paw just touching his bruised skin enough for him to feel its presence. The rabbit tilts its head and stares at him, but when he doesn't move, it stamps its foot in frustration and its little pink nose begins twitching.

"You're angry?" he asks. "Why?"

It bounces back and stamps the ground again. When he gives back nothing but blank looks, the rabbit hops to his shoulder and latches its teeth on his bow, tugging at it almost desperately. He forces himself up despite everything begging him not to and drags the weapon off his shoulders. His fingers waiver around the handle that's practically moulded to the shape of his hand over the years as he leans back against the quarry wall.

"Don't know if...I can," he admits to the floppy-eared mammal at his side. "Hurts so much, feel so...tired."

The rabbit looks up at where Don Poppa is still perched on the upper ledge, waiting to see if Diaval dares make another move. It looks back at the archer, blinks, then licks its paw and rubs that same paw over its ear.

"Mhm, you have a point," he admits.

"Still breathing?" Don Poppa hollers. "That's a damn shame."

Don Poppa leaps off the platform and touches down in front of Diaval, sending cracks spiderwebbing out from his feet. Don Poppa brushes the dust from his knuckles and flashes a stained smile as Diaval tries to steel his nerve. The rabbit is gone again.

"Funny, ain't it?" Don Poppa asks, wandering forward as if his feet are made of lead. His steps are slow, deliberate, taunting. "I raised you, gave you clothes and shelter, gave you a career, and what do you do? Turn around and stab me in the back for your new master, that's what. Always shifting loyalties, walking around with your thumb up your nose whenever someone ain't telling you what to do. Pathetic."

Diaval's throat burns and he gulps it back, a grimace twisting his lips. He nocks an arrow and drags himself to his feet, aiming it at Don Poppa, but the man feigns terror with a mocking surrendering motion of his hands.

"Oh, you gonna hurt me now?" he asks. "You ain't got the guts to do it again."

"You aren't dad," Diaval says, his lips hardly moving and his low voice gaining an even scratchier undertone. "Didn't r-raise m-me. Parents did, r-real parents. N-Not you."

He lets the arrow fly but Don Poppa swings his bulky body to the side and evades it. His shaded eyes land on Diaval, making the boy's blood run cold as he makes a squeaking noise. He missed.

"Cocky, kid," Don Poppa sneers. "I think I can knock that outta you."

Diaval tries to back up but there's only a wall behind him as Don Poppa rolls up the sleeve of his coat. He's trapped like a rat. He throws his arms up to shield his face but the blow never comes. Instead, there's a screech that rings in the air like an alarm.

The crows have returned, pecking and squawking at anywhere on Don Poppa that their dark, cruel beaks can reach. A seemingly endless strain of profanities falls from Don Poppa's mouth as he swats the air, his fat hands always managing to miss the crows, and Diaval shuts his mouth and straightens up. This is his chance.

He readies another arrow and aims, but hesitates so that he doesn't hit the crows. The birds see that he's ready and soar into the sky, leaving Don Poppa enraged and thoroughly pecked. Diaval lets the arrow fly and everything moves in slow motion. Don Poppa's head turns towards the boy. The arrow slices through the air. Diaval's chest swells with hope.

Don Poppa snatches the arrow out of midair and snaps it over his knee before throwing the useless pieces aside. Diaval stares helplessly as they tumble towards the pool of water far below, holding back a choice word.

"I'm done with your shit, boy," Don Poppa says, dragging his thumb over his lip. "Let's finish this."

Somehow, Diaval finds it in himself to nod. "Mhm."

Don Poppa lunges and Diaval goes for an arrow, but again he's too slow. Don Poppa grips the archer's wrist, pins his arm behind his back, and flings him away. Diaval bounces to the jutting edge of the platform, where there's nothing beneath him but a long drop to a cold and watery grave. Diaval starts to his feet but freezes as he feels the rock shift.

Don Poppa flashes his grotty teeth and stomps his foot. The ground shudders beneath Diaval again and he finally notices the cause—a large crack running along the entirety of the stone's width. Don Poppa's foot comes down again and Diaval rattles, feeling his heart jump and startle with him.

Just past Don Poppa, standing on a tiny ledge a few feet above the pimp's head, sits the auburn fox. Her dark eyes watch over Diaval with pleading, her tail swishing back and forth anxiously as she taps her little paws against the rocks.

Diaval gets to his feet, but the ledge is still unstable and whenever he moves, it breaks a little more. He wobbles and wiggles, his already pale face getting paler with every tipping point, and Don Poppa watches it all with a childish glee on his face.

Lost, terrified, confused, Diaval searches his surroundings for answers and only finds the gaze of the fox. She tilts her head, her slender features softening as she makes a small noise, a cry. It breaks his heart. From the breakage, he remembers his quest in a new clarity.

"Shape yourself, plant your feet, find the strength that you lack in your heart."

Diaval takes in a deep breath. Don Poppa is still there, teasing the coming doom with little pokes of his studded boots, but the boy forces it all out. He steadies his feet, his toes curling towards the earth as if to give him extra grip, and readies another arrow. He hooks it in the drawstring of his bow and drags it back, perching it next to his unscarred eye, and takes in another lungful of air. The rock shifts beneath him but he is a statue, a gleaming, ivory warrior with focused eyes and calm breaths in possession of a deadly tool.

"Time's a'wasting away!" Don Poppa crows, sending another shockwave along the stone with a well-placed heel kick. "Goodbye, little Innocence!" he nearly sings with the voice of a chain-smoking grandfather. "I'll love watching you drown!"

Diaval shuts his eyes and exhales. A wind rustles his hair. The bow in his hand is steady and unwavering. "Goodbye," he whispers.

The arrow flies and Don Poppa disappears in a cloud of silver smoke upon impact. Diaval's eyes snap open and he almost grins, his entire body starting to tingle. His brain screams Take that, turtles! and Destiny, I did it! but on the outside his face is a blank canvas.

He shifts his foot and the next thing he knows, gravity's cold fingers yank him away from his short-lived victory and he's plunging into the murky depths of the pool far below.