Of Turtles and Lizards

Enter: Casey Jones

Arnold Casey Jones was thoroughly pissed off. The reason for his emotional state? A short gothic nerd chic, aka Irma Langinstein. All he wanted to do was go on one date, ONE DATE, with April, but Nooooo! Irma just had to come along every stinkin' time! Dammit! The human teenager pulled a duffle bag from under his bed. Pulled out the black and white face paints and smeared them on hurriedly before putting his hockey mask over his face. Casey pulled out his phone and held down the speed dial.

He had all the turtles' cell numbers, but there was only one he bothered to put on speed dial. Uh-huh. You guessed it.

"Hey Raph."

"Um—hey Case. What's up?"

"Haven't seen you in a couple a weeks. Whatcha been up to?"

"Usual. You?"

"Stayed at my Grandma's place in the country, helped her out a little."

"So that's why you haven't been coming down."

"Yep. Uh, Raph..." His voice trailed off.

Raphael sighed, "Sorry, Case. I'd love to but I can't tonight. Mama Leo won't even allow to stand less than ten feet from the door."

"What happened?" The human asked, with no small degree of concern. He heard his friend groan.

"It's a long story. Look, come on down here anyway, you can take it out on my punching bag."

Casey scoffed. "I'll be right down. Thanks Raph."

"Don't mention it."

Less than five minutes later the teenager was making his way through the sewers, heading for the turtle lair.

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Raph's POV

Leo had canceled tonight's patrol probably because he thought I'd run off on my own the first chance I got. Leonardo also decided that my arms weren't healed enough for training so we decided to have a family movie night. I was seated on the couch, one of my arms on the back of the couch behind Mona's shoulders. I stared at her for a moment before wrapping around her shoulders and pulling her towards me. The lizard mutant let out a happy sigh and snuggled into my plastron. I grinned back at her before we returned our gaze to the screen. I heard someone snickering and I glared at my younger brother who was waggling both eye-ridges at me. I was about o growl at him when my T-phone rang. I stared down at the oddly-shaped cell phone in my belt for a moment and then at my brothers. I gave Mona a regretful and apologetic glance as I got up and moved away towards the kitchen, not wanting to distract them from the film.

"Hey Raph." Casey's voice rang from the other end of the line. Great of course he had to call on a night when I'm itching for action. Unfortunately sneaking past my brothers, Sensei and Mona, when they definitely don't want me going out? That's not just insane. That's suicide!

"Um—hey Case. What's up?"

"Haven't seen you in a couple a weeks, Whatcha been up to?"

"Usual. You?" I said rather curtly, I never was one for small talk. Or stalling for that matter...

"Stayed at my Grandma's place in the country, helped her out a little." Casey said kinda meekly.

"So that's why you haven't been coming down." I said, finally understanding why I hadn't seen my best bud in a while. Still...the numbskull could have told me he was going out of town.