Shredder found Raphael buried under a pile of bodies. His shell had protected him when the Dimension X rock-people fell on him, but he still wasn't exactly with it when he got up. "What happened?" Raphael asked groggily.

"That's what I was going to ask you."

Raphael thought. "You were down, then up, then down again. The first time there were still four or five and I threw at them…the second time there was just one…I came and stood over you…it picked me up. That's all I remember."

"Well, did you kill it?" Shredder demanded.

"I don't know." Raphael was a little irritated. "I was too busy not letting it kill you. Figures, doesn't it? I finally get the chance to pay you back, only you're not even awake to see it."

Shredder answered "Mmmm," clearly not paying attention. He was scanning the room to make sure the last Dimension X soldier had indeed been killed.

"I did do it, you know," Raphael persisted. "It went for you, and I-

"Help me look around. Get up. Come on – what are you waiting for?"

"I dunno – maybe a thankyou?"

Shredder rolled his eyes. "You'll be waiting a long time. Now, did you kill the thing or not?"

Raphael rolled his eyes right back. "Some partnership," he muttered.

Shredder gestured to the piles of bodies surrounding them. "I put my life in your hands," he argued. "What more do you want?"

"Oh…uh…right." Raphael tried to pay attention to what Shredder had asked. "Um…my sais are gone," he noticed, "And I didn't throw them. So I must have-"

"There," Shredder interrupted. He pointed to one of the bodies that had two sais jammed into its neck. "Those are yours. It picked you up and you did that. Good job."

"Thanks." Raphael tried not to feel too pleased with himself. "Let's get out of here."

Shredder shook his head. "We haven't dealt with the aliens yet. And there's more – it's been long enough that the Foot soldiers will be back from whatever wild goose chase the rat thought up."

Raphael winced. "Normally that wouldn't be a problem, but I'm not sure I'm up for another fight right now. What do you think we should do?"

"While I hate to quote you…I do know a one-option scenario when I see one. We fight them, obviously."

"I was kind of hoping you weren't going to say that."

Shredder ripped apart his cape and helped Raphael tie bandages. "You're wasting all that blood, and we need it," he explained.

"That's another thing I was kind of hoping not to hear." Raphael cocked his head. "And speaking of hear…What's that? Do you hear that?"

"Hear what?" The pizza monsters had finally picked the right floor and were rampaging loudly somewhere a few corridors away, but Shredder pretended he didn't hear. Maybe if he ignored the stomping, chomping sounds, they would go away.

"Look on the bright side," Raphael suggested. "We did want to kill them…"

"But we'll need the Foot soldiers to help with that. Come on – run. We've got to lose them until we've found the Foot soldiers. Then we can trick them into killing each other." He dragged Raphael down the corridor until they came to a door marked with a big red X. "This wing is under construction," he explained. "Meaning it's big, open, and Krang hasn't booby-trapped it."

"No interference. We fight fair and square."

"They fight fair and square," Shredder corrected. "We just kill whoever's left at the end." He looked over his shoulder to smile at Raphael, then added, "Leave the door open behind you so the Foot will see where we've gone." He opened the door and, still looking at Raphael rather than at where he was going, took a step.

"No!" But Raphael was too late to stop him.

TBC. I am away in California all this week…and I still updated! How's that for dedication? Review for me, willya?