I got bored and impatient with a drawing of Brainstorm I had sporadically started one night (cause I couldn't stop adding body to it) and ended up deciding to go ahead and turn it into a headshot XD thought it was cute, so now you get to see it~!
a very late submission to tmntflashfic‘s valentine’s day prompt thing, since it got insanely long, and has to be broken up into parts.
Master Post of Chapters.
————————————————————————————-
Chapter Five.
Casey slammed his bag down on the table, and slumped into his seat. His fellow arts student, directly across from him, raised her eyebrow.
“What crawled up your sorry ass and died?” She asked, eyes skimming over the dark circles under his eyes, and the scratches on his arms. “Or better question, what attacked your sorry ass?”
“I went from having one demon, to two demons, to three demons, all of them pissy little assholes-” Casey counted on his fingers quickly. “-in under, like, a week or two or some shit. I don’t even know anymore. Jesus.”
“You got another cat? Cats? Two new cats, plus the first one. Yikes.”
“Yeah. Sure. My cats.”
“Three cats is a lot of cats, Casey. Even for a currently single art student.”
Casey dug out his energy drink, cracked it open, and took a sip before answering. “You’re telling me.”
“So what happened to you last night? The cuts and shit. Your cats turn on you or something?”
“Or something.” Casey grumbled, nursing his drink. Caffeine. Sweet, sweet caffeine. “Two of them got chased off by the other one, and then showed up again in the middle of the night- not even after four AM, god- and proceeded to continue their piss fit in the middle of my living room, trash my kitchen and couch in the process, and bring my neighbor’s wrath down on all of us. Again.”
Two extraordinarily angry demons dropping out of thin air- right onto another demon, who’d finally gone to sleep maybe an hour ago- in the middle of the night hadn’t been fun. Casey had woken up to the loudest racket he’d heard in… probably a few hours. Maybe.
There’d been fire involved. There’d been purple electricity involved. And just for shits and giggles- knowing Mikey- there’d been balls of pure energy launched into the fray that left chunks missing from whatever they hit.
And then April had kicked down his door, broom and water gun in hand, and everything went straight to metaphorical hell.
Not literal hell, thank god, but they certainly were heading that direction for a while there.
Donnie had tried to kill Casey at least twice more. Maybe Mikey too. That being- Mikey maybe trying to kill Casey, and Donnie maybe trying to kill Mikey. At the same time. Casey hadn’t been able to tell for sure if Mikey actually tried to kill him or not, but he had a very deep suspicion of that one stray plasma shot.
April was the only reason anyone actually went to bed afterwards. Casey now had three new words to live by: Witches Kill Bitches. Yikes.
Casey took another long sip of his drink.
He’d gotten electrocuted, beaten, and just a tiny bit burned. Fun night. Maybe one of the wildest he’d had in a while.
Whoop-dee-fucking-doo.
“Why don’t you just give two of the cats back? The first one sounded chill enough without the others.”
Casey laughed dryly. “Oh I wish. I really fucking wish.”
If April couldn’t chase the other two off- and damn if she hadn’t tried- then no one could.
Casey’s classmate shook her head sympathetically and despairingly. “Casey, I do not envy your life, nor do I understand it.”
Casey slumped over the table, balancing his already empty drink in his hand. “You and me both. God.”
april
april
april
APRIK ANSWER ME
fuck april*
CAPS LOCK STANDS THO
Casey for god’s sake
What is it?
It’s not even three AM yet why are you texting me
I JUST REALIZED RAPH MIGHT ACTUALLY KILL ME
…how is this news?
He threatened your life at least five times the first day you met.
YEAH BUT I JUST REMEMBERED THE SOUL THING
THE SOUL THIGN APRIJG
THESOULTHING
You’re worse than I am at three in the morning.
What ‘soul thing’, Casey.
THE SOUL THING ABOUT HOW IM SIGNING MY SOUL OVER TO HIM FOR WHATEVR STUPID CNTRACT I MADE AND HOW ILL DIE ASSOON AS HE TAKEE IT
Typos galore, and
Yikes.
THIS IS WHY IM SITTING IN MY EMPTY BATH TUB AT THREE AM IM GOING TO FUCING DIE
APRIL HELP IM FUCKED
I FUCKED MYSELF OVER RLLY BADLY THISTME
H E LP
And somehow, I’m betting you still find him ‘hot’.
YES THIS IS PART OF THE ‘FUCKED MYSELY OVER’ BIT
Oh Casey.
Casey, Casey, Casey.
How did you make it to adulthood? Really.
SHUTUP THATS NOT HELPGUL RIGHT NOW
APIL IM SCREAMING
SCREMAING AT THREE AM IN MY FUCKIG BATHTUB
FUCK MY FICKING LIFE OH MY GOD
Raph’s kept you alive this long, he probably won’t kill you.
I’m assuming, at least.
You’re very hard to keep alive, Casey. If he just went and killed you after all this, it’d be a waste of time and effort.
Of course I could be wrong and your demon call boy could just be insane.
apl make sure my funeral is a nece one I deserved better ing likfe than this
fkjgb;eiugb;bkbgfjnfgt
Casey?
Casey?
Good grief. None of us are ever getting a full night’s rest ever again.
I’m getting my gun, Casey. I’ll be there right away.
I just need pants first.
In the end, Casey didn’t ask Raph about the soul thing. He was, in a word that he was never ever going to repeat to anyone, too chicken-shit to do it.
If Raph’s reply was “Yup. When we complete the contract and I take your soul- you die. Tough.” then Casey wasn’t sure how he’d handle that. Better to just avoid the whole awkward “will you kill me or not” conversation for now.
And besides, he didn’t really want to bring up the whole ‘ending the contract’ thing. If he did, that meant they’d have to start working on it again, and Casey… didn’t really want it to end. Not just yet.
He focused instead on surviving the transition into having Donnie as a member of their crowded household, and not dying in the process.
The lanky demon, dark as Raph but with way more hair and way less muscle, was a complete know-it-all. He took every chance he had to lord over Casey the fact that he was just some ‘ignorant human’, Donnie’s words not Casey’s.
He also took every chance he had to hint very unsubtly that Casey didn’t deserve Raph’s presence in his home, and Casey tried not to read deeper into that beyond speciest tendencies Donnie seemed to have.
Mostly though, as long as Donnie was preoccupied by the thick textbooks he kept getting from somewhere, or by Mikey or Raph, he didn’t give Casey much attention at all. Just lounged around Casey’s apartment building, and made snide comments at everyone.
It wasn’t intolerable, seeing as Donnie had gotten over his ‘murder the human’ phase pretty quick. Still annoying for Casey though, trying to make it through his own apartment, only to have a long tail trip him up, or a large wing snap out in his face. Casey retaliated with holy water mixed into Donnie’s food portions, smacking the demon’s protruding appendages with his hockey sticks, and sicking Raph on his brother when all else failed.
Or April, but watching the two of them stare one another down, broom and magic in hand, was a bit hard on Casey’s heart, so. Not so much that option. He liked his apartment intact, thank you.
So basically, Casey snapped at Donnie and Donnie snapped at him and they both threatened violence until someone pushed them apart. No blood was shed- no more than what was usual lately- and they somehow found a balance of mutual dislike.
In the end, neither of them liked one another, but Donnie had been very clear he wasn’t leaving until Raph did, and Casey had been very clear that he either shove it or shove off.
But no one was dead yet, so. Kudos to both of them.
Now Casey was dealing with a new problem, created another time over with the newest addition to his already too cramped home: feeding them all.
“Why do you guys have to eat so fucking much?” Casey grumbled, shoving the heavy grocery cart along. “God. This is more than I eat in a month.”
“I need power, because you’re a moron who can’t even remember why he summoned me,” Raph answered as he tossed yet another package of food into the cart. “And because Don and Mike are little shits who like to be as annoying as they can.”
“Yeah, I kinda figured that out,” Casey said sulkily. Accommodating three demons at once was a major hassle, especially when one was liable to set the neighborhood on fire for a laugh, and the other was still in the middle of a silent pissing contest with his neighboring witch. Oh the trials of adulthood. Casey felt like he deserved a vacation.
If it wasn’t for the insane load of cash Donnie had magicked up, Casey knew he would’ve hit broke by now. From where the cash had come from, Donnie wouldn’t say, but looking at all the zeroes in his account, Casey hadn’t felt like questioning its origins.
He had however, questioned why he wasn’t paying some price for the generous donation. Donnie had replied vaguely that his due was being covered by Raph, and then promptly fucked off into the open air; lifting off the ground with sweeps of his wings, and leaving Casey outside the supermarket without a real explanation.
Fucking demons.
Upside of things, Casey had gotten to send his dad and sister a good chunk of cash, and he didn’t have to worry about student loans anymore. Downside, his dad had texted to check if Casey had switched career choices to become a hitman and his sister had texted with the question if escort prices had suddenly gone up.
No faith from his family, honestly. Couldn’t he make money in a legal manner? Casey could totally make that much money if he tried.
Raph came back to the cart with an armful of hotdog and hamburger buns, and dumped them into the already very full cart.
“For the meat,” Raph explained shortly to Casey’s questioning look.
“What meat?” Casey asked.
Before Raph could answer, a shopping cart went racing past their aisle, and Casey caught a glimpse of Mikey riding it and what looked like majority of the raw meat section stacked in with him.
“That meat,” Raph said, pointing after his brother, and Casey could hear semi-maniacal laughter coming from that direction.
Casey sighed, and started to push their cart towards the direction Mikey had gone. “Guess we’re having a barbeque tonight, since no way this is all fitting in the fridge.”
Something crashed on the other side of the store, and Casey started pushing their cart a bit faster.
After they’d wrangled Mikey, magicked away the witnesses memory of the demon’s full-tilt crash into the flower stand, repaired said flower stand, and Donnie had at some point reappeared mysteriously out of thin air to snark at everyone- Casey managed to herd the three demons towards the check out with their purchases.
Again, he got his usual cashier, and the man gave Casey another look for his newest addition to their gaggle. Donnie admittedly stood out even more than Mikey did, in looks at least, being well over six feet. Mikey still had him beat in aura of crazy though.
In comparison to his siblings, one twitching constantly and the other giving everything a calculative and condescending look, Raph was practically normal seeming. Slightly below average height, and just a tinge of surliness to him.
And then Raph hiccupped a smoke ring, and the image was ruined.
Casey paid for their food, and didn’t give the cashier any explanation for his friend group.
Since Casey didn’t technically have a barbecue for barbecue, and neither did April, the task of cooking the meat got passed over to the walking fire pit. They also ended up relocating to the roof, after Raph set Casey’s ceiling on fire.
A pleasantly warm evening wind blew over the roof top, wafting the smell of cooking meat towards Casey. He glanced up to look at the other roof top occupants.
April had brought one of her folding chairs up with her, and was reading a book near her garden. The position was only semi-protective seeming, and everyone was giving her garden a wide birth.
Mikey was busy playing with a cat that’d appeared out of nowhere, despite Casey’s apartment building being pet free. Casey had started to question the cat earlier, but then he’d seen it had deep, bottomless black eyes, and had figured he’d leave well enough alone. At least it seemed more interested in rolling around on the roof with Mikey, rather than causing extra property damage like all the other demons in Casey’s life.
Donnie was the opposite of Mikey, completely lax and silent. He was laid out on a blanket that he’d probably stolen from Casey’s linen closet. Wings out and tail twitching, Donnie seemed intent on catching the last rays of the sun before it went down, slowly paging through yet another thick book he’d pulled out of nowhere. Eventually, he and April were probably going to bond like the condescending smarty-pants assholes they both were, and then everyone else was probably going to die.
Raph was rotating a couple dozen meat products in the air, flames licking around them in helix spirals. It smelt great, and Raph’s intent focus on keeping the food from burning gave Casey the chance to side-eye him a bit.
Admittedly, Casey might’ve been side-eyeing all the demon brothers, because shit- it wasn’t like they weren’t all relatively to very good looking. Even Mikey wasn’t exactly hard on the eyes, as unlikely as it was for Casey to ever risk going for him. Because he liked his extremities intact and not bitten off, and he totally still caught Mikey eyeing him like food sometimes.
Point being- Casey had a lot of very attractive men staying in his apartment at the moment, and wow was he very gay.
He tried to remind himself that A) two out of the three would probably kill him if they got the chance, and B) his focus was on Raph, as impossible to obtain as the demon likely was, and that he shouldn’t get distracted by the demon’s siblings.
And besides, he liked Raph the best anyways. Better personality, even if no one else would probably think that except for Casey.
Casey refocused on the sketchpad in his hands, and did his best to reroute his wandering thoughts. No gay thoughts for him, no siree. Not while he was in the presence of others.
He was in the middle of yet another sketch of a full demon form- this time Donnie’s, because the long swooping tail and wings were fun to draw. He was still trying to get the proper look down, since at the moment it looked too much like a regular dragon, and not a demon.
“Hey Raph,” Casey said, glancing up from his drawing again. “Quick question. How come you all look like dragons? Not very demony.”
“Because that’s what fits this era best,” Raph replied. Which made no sense.
“Elaborate a little more than that?”
Raph gave him a look, but answered anyways. “Our manifesting shapes change depending on the plain of existence we enter, and also with whatever the sentient population will fear best. In this era, it’s apparently big scaly lizards with wings. I’m not complaining, since it’s better than some we’ve gotten.”
“Dragons are cool shit though,” Casey said, twirling his pencil as he watched the meat in the air do the same. “They’re everywhere in media. Not exactly the boogieman.”
“Worked well enough on you,” Raph said, giving Casey a teasing smirk.
Casey scoffed. “Man, whatever. It was morning and I was hung over. ‘scuse me for not being able to keep my cool with a fucking demon in my house.”
Raph gave a warm laugh, and Casey found himself smiling just a tad wider than he usually would.
“Okay, I got another question then,” Casey said, leaning forwards on his crossed legs. “Which one of your ‘manifestations’ has been your favorite? You gotta have one, seein’ as you’re old as shit now.”
“Shut up, I’m young by demon standards,” Raph said, rolling his eyes. “And if you really wanna know, one of them was one I had just a couple hundred years ago. Not on this plain of existence, but it wasn’t too far off in similarity.”
“Yeah? What was it?”
“A turtle,” Raph said, and Casey couldn’t help the startled laugh that came out of him.
“What? No way. How is a turtle scary?” Casey asked in disbelieving amusement. “They’re like- tiny and cute and shit. Slow too.”
Raph shrugged, twirling his wrist so all the meat in the air would too. “I’d show you, but since I’m busy… hey Donnie!”
“What?” Donnie said in a tone that Casey recognized easily from his own sibling.
“Get over here; I want you to show Casey what the turtle manifestation looked like.”
“Ugh, no way. I’m busy right now,” Donnie said, giving them both a grumpy look.
Raph twirled a couple hotdogs threateningly towards Donnie. “Do it, or I use your horns as extra roasting sticks.”
“Raph- come on, don’t be a dick.”
“Don’t be a lazy shit.”
“Raph.”
“Donnie.”
“Fine,” Donnie grumbled, getting up if only because the hotdogs had been getting dangerously close to his seven inch horns.
Casey stood up too, officially and extremely intrigued about what would happen next. He wasn’t alone in that either, since April had set down her book to watch the rest of them, and Mikey and his weird cat had gone still.
Donnie steepled his fingers together, and closed his eyes. For a moment, nothing happened, but then a rune circle appeared under his feet. From the bright purple magic, a wall of water swirled up and around Donnie. The height of the airborne whirlpool grew, and Casey could see that something inside was growing with it.
Then, the water’s surface broke at the bottom, and receded upwards to reveal-
-a giant bipedal turtle.
Casey let out a shocked laugh, and couldn’t believe his eyes.
Donnie had gone from six something to twelve something, now with the addition of a shell, plastron, and dark green scales. A long staff was strapped to his back, held in place by royal purple sashes wrapped around Donnie’s chest and shell. The water receded to pool in the air above Donnie’s head, and it condescend into a sort of reflective disk. Casey mentally compared it to the halos he’d seen on angels in church murals.
Donnie reopened his eyes, which had remained luminous red through the transformation, and looked down Casey with a displeased look. Somehow, even with a beak like mouth, he managed to sneer at Casey.
“Ta da,” Donnie said, giving a half-assed jazz hands. “One turtle reporting for duty. Can I change back now? This itches.”
Casey noted that instead of discordant and harsh, the demon’s words were actually close to lyrical sounding in this form.
“Why’s it itch?” Casey asked, secretly hoping to prolong things so he could memorize the finer details of this form. Shit, this would look amazing in watercolors.
“Because it’s not the right one for this world,” Donnie said in a deeply annoyed tone. “It’s wrong and it feels a bit like wearing a winter coat in summer, I guess.”
“Oh. Neat.” Casey replied vaguely, still busy memorizing.
“You know,” April spoke up. “I wonder if anyone can see the shit you guys do on this roof. I don’t know about you, but it would be weird to see a giant bipedal turtle on my roof if I didn’t know better.”
“I have spells that erase memories of events like this,” Donnie replied smoothly, with only a hint of ‘duh’ in his tone.
“Yeah, but I’m pretty sure Raph doesn’t, because yesterday a guy at the coffee shop down the way said he saw a really weird ass bird in the sky. About the size of a mini-van? Pointy horns too.”
Everyone looked at Raph, who looked a little embarrassed.
“Raph.” Donnie said in a disapproving tone.
“Sometimes I forget to turn them on, okay?” Raph defended.
“I can’t believe you.”
“Shut up! Do you want dinner or not?”
“I do! We do!” Mikey interjected, waving his cat around in the air like something out of the Lion King. The cat made a long warbling meow, and Casey’s felt goosebumps prickle on his skin.
While the others were distracted, he took the chance to pick up his sketchbook and start a rapid gesture drawing of Donnie. Maybe later, he could get Raph do switch forms too, and draw him as well.
So while Casey hurriedly drew, Donnie got pelted by hotdogs as he kept berating Raph for his carelessness, said hotdogs quickly snatched out of the air by Mikey and his cat and devoured, and April calmly watched the whole show from over the top of her novel.
All in all, a pretty normal evening for them lately.
Casey was about done with being assaulted by demons.
Example: being stalked on the way home from campus, and feeling increasingly evil vibes being aimed at the back of his head.
The first afternoon in days that didn`t involve one or more of his mostly unwanted house guests tagging along- and this happens.
Casey risked a glance over his shoulder.
The man, concealed by his loose black hoodie and blue ball cap, was still following him. He seemed normal enough from first glance, no tail or horns or anything in plain sight, but Casey also knew better by now than to be fooled by that.
Casey thought he saw a flash of icy blue eyes from under the hat brim, and he whipped his eyes back to the sidewalk in front of him.
He was at least a half hour’s walk from his apartment still, and the bus wouldn’t save him now.
Why didn’t demons have cell phones? Raph could probably destroy a small city on his lonesome, but he didn’t have a god damn cell phone.
Casey tugged out his phone, trying to casually speed up his walking as he did.
april help im being stalked by one of raphs crazy relatives pls send help rn
A cold shudder went through Casey, and he knew the guy following him had gotten closer again. On and off as he’d been walking the last five minutes, every time Casey looked back, the guy got closer.
Fear sweat prickled the back of his neck, and Casey swallowed.
He didn’t have a handy bat or hockey stick, and he didn’t have a demon protecting him either. Unless someone got here quickly, he was probably going to end up demon food.
Pretty sick way to go, all things considering, but he’d rather not die on this particular day.
“Respond,” Casey muttered. “Please, god- April, respond already.”
Casey felt a rush of air go past him, and it felt way too fucking cold for this time of year. Something not actually there tried to climb up his spine, and Casey shuddered all the way down to his soul.
He typed an all caps message of ‘HOLY FUCK APRIL IM SERIOUS PLS RESPOND RN’ and started walking even faster.
Wow this was not how he wanted to die right now. Maybe later, maybe a few years down the line, but not right fucking now.
His phone chimed, and Casey gasped out a choked laugh.
Raph’s on his way. ETA should be less than a minute.
Why can’t our lives be normal anymore.
BESNIDELATERIMGONNADIE
What else is new?
Casey would have replied again, but a violent shudder went through him as an ice cold feeling gripped his body. He didn’t want to turn around, really, he didn’t- but he did anyways.
Raph’s brother- probably the elusive Leo- stared Casey dead in the eye, from just a block away. Navy blue eyes froze Casey to his core, and he felt like he was suddenly breathing sub-zero air.
Leo opened his mouth, and something reverberated through the air. The other humans walking down the street around Casey stumbled, and Casey’s knees came close to buckling. He only barely recovered enough to keep standing.
Welp. Time to start running.
Casey bolted fast as he could, and he cursed Raph for bringing this kind of insanity into his life.
Casey might’ve been slacking on his exercise lately- too much demonic influence in his life to even remember- but he could still sprint like the wind. He’d never quite grown out of the skinniness from his teenage years, and he counted his blessing that he hadn’t packed on muscle like he’d hoped he would. Wind whistled past him as he ran, and Casey felt caught between sheer terror and utter excitement.
Nothing like running for your life to kick the old adrenaline into gear.
Casey risked a partial glance over his shoulder, and regretted it as caught sight of Leo still hot on his tail. The demon wasn’t even running, he was just walking- and yet, he was still only a block behind Casey.
Fucking demons. Fucking demon magic. Fucking life.
Casey pushed himself to run faster, and prayed he wouldn’t land on his knee wrong and wipe out. He’d be screwed if he did.
He yelped as the sidewalk ahead of him was suddenly coated in ice, and he had to stop short before he hit it. Casey turned to the left, and darted across the street. A lone car honked at him as he ran, and for a second, the accident that’d fucked his knee over flashed across his eyes.
Then it was gone, and his feet hit the sidewalk across the street. He kept running, lungs heaving as he attempted to give Raph time to show the fuck up and save his ass.
Casey had to change directions again though, as the sidewalk again was covered in ice. This time with jagged points aimed directly at Casey, ones that would impale him clear through if he fell on them.
Casey dodged away from them, and found himself in an alley. An alley with a dead end.
Shit. Clichés. He hated clichés.
Casey whirled to run back out, and found Leo blocking the way. Casey retreated further into the alley, and raised his hands to the calmly advancing demon.
“Okay, so, I dunno if the other two have told you this yet-” Casey swallowed, trying for bravado instead of nervousness. “-but I’m officially off the menu. Just ask Raph, he’ll vouch for me.”
Leo didn’t pay his words any mind, and the air around Casey suddenly went freezing. With a wave of his hand, encircled by blue runes, Leo sent the alley into the deep freeze.
Casey’s airways went dry from the sudden drop, and he glanced around in panic. The walls of the alley were quickly being covered in ice, sharp points growing from both sides like jagged teeth. Casey’s shoes skidded momentarily, as the ice spread across the ground as well.
“I’m serious, Leo,” Casey said, trying to get the demon’s attention by saying his name. “Raph and me are cool. So if you could, like, be a little less literal with the chill, he’ll be here any second now to explain the shit that’s been going on-”
Leo remained quiet, but shut Casey up with a harsh gust of ice wind. Casey inhaled sharply, and coughed at the sheer coldness. It spread through him, and he coughed harder as he struggled to breathe.
Then-
He realized he couldn’t move his feet.
Casey made the mistake of glancing down, and saw that his feet were encased in ice. Ice that was steadily climbing up his legs, and locking him in place.
The dark ice moved quickly, spreading up Casey’s body almost faster than he could register what was happening. It covered his legs, and then spread to his torso, and Casey couldn’t breathe, ice filling his lungs and chilling him through.
His eyes clouded with tears, as ice wind kept whipping around him. He was half blind, more than half frozen, and came to the conclusion he probably was going to die.
He managed one last cough, before the ice spread to his neck, and froze his lungs in place. He felt the ice spreading down his arms, and Casey couldn’t think it was so cold. Everything was burning, the freezing prison wrapping itself around every piece of his body.
Casey felt the ice creep onto his face, his vision blurring as it did, and he couldn’t fight it at all.
The ice covered his nose, and spread over his eyes and head, and then Casey was trapped in the dark. His eyes frozen shut and his lungs frozen in place.
Then-
Something flared, hot and burning, on his chest-
And the ice shattered around his face, around his chest, and Casey could breathe again.
He blinked rapidly, sucking in as much air as he could, and tried to clear the clinging ice crystals to his face. Everything hurt, his hands and feet and legs and every bit of skin on him- they felt like they were still encased in ice. Cold enough that the warmer air was making them burn.
Casey saw something red flicker on his chest again, but he couldn’t see well enough to recognize what it was.
He spotted Leo, who’s calm, blank expression had broken. He was staring at Casey in shock, visibly confused as to why Casey wasn’t a human popsicle.
Then Raph fell out of the sky, right onto Leo, and threw his brother across the alleyway. Casey managed a short laugh at the sudden shift in mood, Leo looking utterly confused and offended by the turn of events, and Raph looking like he wanted to set everything and Leo on fire, the both of them yelling at one another in increasing volumes-
And then Casey’s vision went black, and he felt himself hit the ground.
