@ilovebeingaturtle @tmnt-crossover-polls @iamheretemporarly
Poll shenanigans with For Future Reference '12 Mikey and Team 2 of A Mixed Bag! Featuring minor cameo of the Sunset Linings crew!
Donnie finally admitted to himself that this was useless. They’d been all over the theater, and no sign of any other mixed-up group of turtles like them.
“Figures,” he grumbled bitterly, shoulders slumping. “We get a solid lead from that… space cat knight lady and it doesn’t pan out.”
“We’ll find them again,” Michelangelo said determinedly. “Maybe not here, but we will. Eventually.”
Wordlessly-- thank goodness-- the Leo draped his arm over the little guy’s shoulders.
Uselessly optimistic. For a second, Donnie wanted to snap at him. But, he was just trying to help. And he could hear an echo of his own Mikey in the words. So he simply nodded. “Yeah. Sure. Eventually.”
The peace is broken by a passionate shriek.
“HOLY CHALUPA-DEE?!”
Donnie’s head snapped up and around. Where was-- there! Staring at him was an extremely familiar face. “MIKEY!?” he shrieked back.
Not even a second after he yells, Mikey barrels him over with a hug more akin to a football tackle.
“DUDE I CAN’T BELIEVE IT’S YOU! THERE WERE ALL THESE OTHER TURTLES, AND I COULDN’T EVEN PROCESS WHAT WAS GOING ON BUT IT’S-IT’S-“
“It’s you!” Donnie laughed-- cried-- some mix of the two, wrapping his arms around his brother. “Oh thank pizza supreme in the sky I found you.”
Mikey sniffles, enthusiasm crashing the second he has the case to hide his face into Dee’s neck, “I-we’ve been falling apart man, I can’t-I was trying to hold us together but no one was listening to me, and we-I-“
The rest of his voice cuts offs, and he squeezes Donnie tighter, “I missed you…”
“Me too,” Donnie said quietly, returning the squeeze.
He could have stayed like that for a while, but the other Michelangelo he was currently stuck with decided to interrupt by crouching down and tapping Mikey’s shoulder. “Hey, sorry to interrupt the moment-- and good to see you again, other me, but, you wouldn’t happen to know where any of the guys from my universe are?”
Mikey blinks.
“Say what.”
Huh. So, were Donnie and the others the only ones that had been turtle-napped then?
“Hey, can we see your sticker real quick?” Leo asked, and without waiting for an answer picked Mikey up.
“Hey!” Donnie snapped, scrambling to his feet. He grabbed Mikey’s arm and jerked it, pulling his brother away from Leo. “That’s my brother!”
Mikey, meanwhile, gawks at Leo, “Dude…are you another version of Leo?!”
Attention entirely redirected, he turns back to Michelangelo and enthusiastically points, “So you must be another version of me! Dee, you didn’t tell me you’ve been making friends!”
“...Not sure I’d put it that way,” Donnie grumbled. “But yeah this is a version of Leo, Raph, and-- you,” he said, gesturing at each in turn.
“Okay but are you sure this is actually your brother--” Leo started to say.
Mikey waves eagerly at the other versions-pausing to stare at Raph-before jabbing a finger at Donnie’s chest, “Heyyyyy-so you’re not trying to replace us then, are you?”
“Wh-- what?!” Donnie sputtered. “No!! This whole incident has been extremely stressful and--” his voice cracked for a second, “and I haven’t even had you guys around.”
Mikey’s frown drops into a more serious form of upset, “Aw, Dee…”
“But you’re here now!” Donnie said grinning and throwing his arms out. “Where’s everybody else?!” he asked, looking around. “Did April and Casey make it too?”
“Nah dude, she’s out looking for you!” Mikey beams, “But I found you! Not a moment too soon too, Leo was starting to flip his lid! What with you vanishing, and then Raph being captured by the Krang on top of it, and-“
“KRAANG?!” Donnie-- and Leo-- shouted at the same time.
“The Kraang are involved?!” Donnie continued. “Okay the evil versions of us were one thing but--”
Mikey sounds dazed as Donnie rambles, “I am so lost right now…”
Donnie’s mind kept whirling with possibilities. “Then again it is our evil counterparts-- could they be working with the Kraang?” he said, beginning to pace. “It might explain the level of technology we’re seeing in our prison.”
“Or that’s not actually your brother?” Leo said. “Look, his sticker says--”
Raph shook him. Just a little bit, but enough the threat was there. “That’s enough outta you,” he snapped.
“Evil counterparts?! There can be evil counterparts?!” Mikey grabs the side of his head, “But then that could be any of us! There’s so many here! It could be you, or you, or-oh my god it could be me! Have I been the villain this whole time?!”
“HEY!” Michelangelo yelled glaring up at Raph. “Leave him alone!” He grabbed at Leo’s arm, pulling. Raph let go, and Michelangelo shoved himself between the two. “You and Donatello need to chill out and leave Leonardo alone! He’s on our side!”
“And the Kraang are able to travel to other dimensions,” Donnie continued to ramble. “They’d have a vested interest in finding out what we’re capable of. Maybe our evil counterparts made a deal to help in exchange for their dimension being left alone?”
“I always knew I couldn’t trust myself!” Mikey flails his arms at seemingly no one, “I’ve got like an evil double! I knew it! One time, I got something to eat-and I blinked?! And someone else had already eaten it!! Or, wait. No. Yeah that was still me-“
“Leave it, Michelangelo,” Raph said, warning heavy in his tone.
“No way, dude!” Michelangelo yelled. “You’ve had it out for Leonardo since the beginning, and I’m getting sick of--”
A loud whistle cut through the air. Donnie’s head snapped around to the source-- Leo.
“-BUT ANOTHER TIME, I LOOKED INTO A MIRROR? AND I SWEAR THE OTHER MIKEY IN IT LOOKED RIGHT BACK AT ME MAN-“
“Mikey,” Leo grabbed ahold of his shoulders, staring right into his eyes. “You’re not the evil counterpart.”
Mikey blinks again.
“Oh, okay!”
Leo grinned, rubbing Mikey’s head and then turning, arm now draped over Mikey’s shoulders. “Hey, Shrieky-D--”
“I do not shriek--!”
Mikey wraps his other arm around Leo, now also grinning, “You kinda do Dee.”
“Mikey--!”
“Anyway!” Leo interrupts loudly. “Have you noticed his sticker,” he said, patting Mikey’s plastron, right over the sticker.
Donnie glanced at it and felt the anger fizzle and fade. The sticker on Leo’s chest said “Mixed Bag”. The sticker on Mikey’s… didn’t.
“Oh snap, we got free accessories?” Mikey promptly begins straining his neck to see his own sticker, “Sweeeeet!”
“There could be other reasons for that,” Donnie said. “We were in different dimensions before we came here-- the stickers could reflect that.”
Leo shot him a look and then turned back to Mikey. “Hey, Miguel, you ever meet alternates of you and your bros before?”
Mikey tilts his head, with a distinct lack of recognition for the concept in his eyes, “Uh, only in my dreams dude! I have this good one, right- where me and all the other Mikeys of the multiverse team up together to create the greatest superhero team ever! I’m the leader, obviously, and-“
Donnie’s stomach sank. His Mikey had been too excited by meeting Michelangelo and his brothers to forget. His Mikey would have gone off on an excited ramble about their team-ups with that crew.
“Mikey,” he interrupted. “I. I don’t think-- I don’t think I am your brother.”
Something akin to terror flashes in the other Mikey’s eyes, before he goes right back to beaming.
“Aw c’mon man, who else could you be? You look just like him!”
Donnie silently gestured behind them. A group of five were walking by. Four looked just like Donnie and Mikey and their brothers-- the fifth a much older turtle that Donnie didn’t recognize. A Slash, maybe?
“We’re not the only ones that look like… us around here, Mikey.”
Mikey’s grins gets wider from the force of upholding it, and his voice picks up, “No-no-it, it’s gotta be you dude! We can’t-we need you back home, you disappeared! We-we don’t know where you are, and-we’re all fighting worse than ever and-and we were going to search with Master Splinter but now we’re-he-it just-it has to be you!”
Master Splinter. Donnie’s heart clenched. He must still be alive in Mikey’s dimension. This really wasn’t his Mikey.
“Oh hey it’s okay, it’s okay,,” Leo said, pulling Mikey around to face him. “Breathe, Mikey.”
Mikey squeezes his eyes shut and clenches his fists in response, breathing practically rattling his whole body, “It’s not-fair, it’s gotta be-it-I-“
“Oh hey whoa, dude,” Michelangelo said, patting Mikey on the shell. “I’m sure your Donatello is just fine! We all got kidnapped by evil alternate versions of us and stuck with these shock bands that are like, mondo painful, and could also kill us so that’s a major bummer. But I’m sure yours isn’t in nearly as bad of a situation!”
“…WHAAAAT?!?!”
“What the shell are you guys doing?!” Raph said. He huffed and shouldered by Donnie, pulling Mikey away from Leo and crouching to be more at his level. “Hey. Breathe with me,” he said, and pulled in a long, slow breath in.
Mikey looks anguished, but he forces in a harsh shuddering breath at the larger turtle's request. Slowly, Raph keeps helping him until it’s no longer a struggle to keep his breathing steady.
“You all right?” Raph asked quietly, with a surprising amount of gentleness.
Mikey sniffles, and glares at the ground, but his hoarse voice is finally steady, “yeah…”
“Good,” Raph said, getting up and patting Mikey on the shoulder.
“Soooooo,” Leo drawled. That tone meant nothing good was about to come out of his mouth. “Remember when I suggested that maybe you guys weren’t brothers, and you shook me,” he said, crossing his arms and glaring at Raph.
“Oh my god, dude,” Mikey’s voice is simultaneously brittle and biting, “shut up.”
Something very hurt flashes in Leo’s eyes as his jaw clicks shut.
“But hey!” Donnie said, “You could keep hanging out with us till you find your brothers? If you want?”
Mikey barely responds, seemingly now lost in his own thoughts. His mood seems drastically soured, “Yeah. Sure. Whatever…”
So, Donnie needed to give him something to get out of his head. “Have you seen the costume area yet?” he asked. “We only poked our heads in for a second but you might be able to whip up something like Turflytle--”
It’s like a switch gets flicked, and Mikey’s eyes fill up with sparkles.
“You mean like…maybe even for…all, of us?”
Donnie’s stomach dropped. He started to deny it but--
“Yeah!” Leo interrupted with a smirk. “Especially Donnie, right?”
…Donnie was going to kill him.
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