"Oh Raph, dear, sweet brother of mine?"

Raphael looked up from his copy of The Watchmen as Michelangelo's voice interrupted his reading. When his brother spoke in that saccharine tone, it was never a good sign. It was even less of a good sign when his brother had both of his hands behind his back, hiding something. "What is it, Mikey?"

Michelangelo slowly approached the futon where Raphael had been enjoying his graphic novel. "I've got a question. Say, hypothetically, that there was this guy, right? And this guy's got this hypothetical new CD. And the guy's brothers were all reading or meditating or doing whatever it is that computer nerds do, and he didn't want to disturb them by hypothetically blaring his music to its optimal listening potential. So he instead gets out his portable CD player, only to find that it's out of batteries. And, well, he figured he'd borrow them from his brother's CD player. But, uh, the brother's CD player kinda slipped and fell on the floor and is now in two pieces. Should the guy trust the forgiving nature of his brother, or get on the next bus to Albuquerque? Hypothetically, of course."

Putting down his book, Raphael merely glared at the other turtle. "Did ya just… are ya sayin' what I think you're sayin'?" As Michelangelo nodded and got ready to defend himself from any kind of verbal or physical attack, Raphael looked down, thinking something over. "Lemme see the damage."

Hesitantly, Michelangelo revealed the base of the portable CD player in his right hand, and the cover in his left. Raphael looked down at it grimly. While the shiny black surface earned itself a few scratches, it actually didn't look too bad. Nothing Donatello couldn't fix, anyway. Still, he'd told Michelangelo about touching his things without permission.

"Heh," Raphael grunted with a shrug. "It's okay."

With unveiled shock, Michelangelo asked, "Okay?"

"Yeah," Raphael replied, leaning back in his seat. "Did me a favor, actually. I was plannin' on upgradin' and gettin' me an mp3 player. Guess who's pocket that's gonna come out of now?" Smirking as he watched his brother go pale, he added, "I had my eye on a Zune, so ya should look at the Best Buy and Circuit City circulars and do some price comparisons."

"No way," Michelangelo blurted out. "No way, no way, there is no way I'm gonna get you an mp3 player. I'd have to use up like every penny I have. Every penny I've ever seen."

"Then where'd the new CD come from, huh?"

"That was hypothetical!" Seeing Raphael's raised eye ridge, Michelangelo retracted that with, "Somewhat hypothetical. Seriously, bro, I don't mind fixing what I broke, but you're not gonna connive me into springing for a top-of-the-line music machine that you don't even listen to on a regular basis."

Rising to his feet, Raphael queried, "Then how about I just kick your shell now?"

"Look," Michelangelo told him, backing away, "there's only one way to settle this."

"I save ya the bus trip to Albuquerque by knockin' ya there with my fists?"

"We live in a civil world, Raph," Michelangelo explained. "When someone's got a debt they can't pay, you don't just beat him up and consider yourselves even. Not unless you're a character in Grand Theft Auto, anyway. No, the best way to solve things is with, uh… with a…." Spotting a deck of cards on a nearby table, Michelangelo quickly picked them and displayed them to his brother. "With a card game."

"A card game?" Raphael asked dubiously.

"Yeah," Michelangelo said. "Some rounds of poker until we're even, using the cost of the mp3 player as my stakes. And you can bet whatever you want against them, and we keep going until, y'know… even Stevens."

Raphael seemed to consider it for a moment before replying, "Right, so instead 'a me sittin' here and readin' Watchmen,I get to spend all night playin' cards with ya so I can just pretend like ya didn't break my CD player because ya had your grubby paws all over my stuff. I kinda like the beatin' ya into a pulp idea better."

"Aw, c'mon, Raph," Michelangelo grinned. "What's the worst that can happen?"

Raphael groaned inwardly as he lost another hand.

"I shoulda known," he growled as Michelangelo collected the cards on the table. "Every time somebody says 'what's the worst that can happen,' I always end up either fightin' giant radioactive bugs or being sucked into another dimension."

"Well, we could quit playing," Michelangelo told him, unsuccessfully attempting to stifle a yawn. "I mean, I won back my debt hours ago, and you're just digging a deeper hole for yourself, bro. Plus, it's getting kinda late. Packing it in really seems like the best-"

"No!" Raphael barked out. "There ain't no way I'm gonna just walk away when I could get ya buyin' me a Zune. We're raisin' the stakes so I can get that back. Now shut up and deal!"

"Raise the stakes?" Michelangelo queried tiredly. Looking to the notepad besides him on which he was keeping score, he remarked, "Raph, you already owe me sole video game privileges for a week, a month free from chores, my choice of TV channels during the premiere of the new fall line-up, and a hundred punch-free uses of various embarrassing nicknames. I don't know how much higher the stakes can get."

"I do," Raphael muttered, determined. "Something you've been complainin' about for a long time." Taking a moment to believe that he was actually resigning himself to that, Raphael offered his brother the new bet.

Michelangelo's eyes widened so much they nearly popped out of his head. "No way! That's going against everything you believe in! Everything that's you!You really want the stupid Zune that bad?"

"I wouldn't make the offer if I didn't think I was gonna win it," Raphael told him. "So what's it gonna be? If I win, I get a Zune. If you win, ya get to watch me do somethin' that'd ordinarily make me gag and want to commit ritualistic suicide."

Flashing Raphael another grin, Michelangelo responded with, "How can I refuse?"

Several weeks later, Leonardo and Donatello were waiting for their plan to start working.

"I don't know about this," Leonardo professed, looking down the skylight. He and his brothers had once again found themselves on a planet in a distant galaxy, caught up in a drama that really didn't concern them. He and Donatello were on the roof and looking down into the main room of a pub filled with dangerous-looking goons from whom they needed vital information. "This looks dangerous."

"Relax, Leo," Donatello told him calmly. "We've run this program before. Bad guys have info, bad guys talk to people they like, we dress Mikey up as something they like, bad guys talk to Mikey. If things get rowdy, we're here to jump in and pull him out."

"I just wish Raph didn't decide to act as back-up by the door," Leonardo told him, keeping a wary eye out down below for signs of Michelangelo's entrance. "He's never done that before. Switching up the battle sequence can be messy, especially where that hothead's concerned."

"Tell me about it, bro."

The two turtles whirled around at the sound of Michelangelo's voice behind them. "Mikey!" Donatello exclaimed in a hushed whisper. "What are you doing up here? You're supposed to be downstairs as the decoy."

"Where's Raph?" Leonardo asked, jumping to his feet. "Did he get himself in trouble already?"

"Cool your jets, Leo," Michelangelo replied, reassuringly clapping a hand to Leonardo's shoulder. "It's all good. See, Raph and I were playing poker not too long ago and, well, the stakes started getting a little high. Unfortunately for Raph, Lady Luck was not too nice with him that night."

"What do you mean about the stakes getting high?" Donatello asked.

"Well," Michelangelo answered, a small knowing smile on his lips as he crouched down besides Donatello, "let's just say that we decided it was time for a nice change of pace."

The other turtles looked down just in time to see what Michelangelo was talking about. Every patron in the club stopped to look at their new arrival. She was a lovely creature, with a flirty black skirt, rose pink blouse, and black pumps. Her red hair was a little on the messy side, but that only added to her charm. No one quite noticed that the green-skinned vision seemed a bit on the angry side, nor would they have guessed that her name was Raphael.

"You're a new face around here, doll," a blue-furred native slurred as he sidled up next to the enraged, mortified turtle. "Lemme buy you a drink, yeah?" His teeth clenched together so tightly that his jaw ached, Raphael only nodded. Glancing up, he caught sight of his three brothers through the skylight as they repressed entertained chuckles. He narrowed his eyes when he saw Michelangelo wave at him nonchalantly.

Staggering forward in his heels, he bleakly thought to himself, I am never, never, never gonna play cards with that chump again.