Chapter Text
He's in an orchard, picking apples. Donnie doesn't question this yet.
"Hey, you nearly done up there? We have a whole order to fill still!" His unnamed boss who he doesn't question how he knows yells up the tree, a large human with broad shoulders.
"Yes, just-" He looks back at his basket at the sound of a small yipping.
All the apples he spent ages grabbing, all the way up this ladder on a tree, they were turned into puppies! Whichever bastard did this is going to pay , he had a quota to reach for chrissakes!
"There's, uh, a slight problem! They're-"
"DONNIE!"
"The apples, I nearly filled th-"
"DONNIE!"
"I nearly filled the basket b-"
"DONNIE!"
And this is the moment he notices something is off. Why does his boss sound exactly like his brother now?
" DONNIE !!"
He wakes, blinking up at his yelling brother, still trying to work out what is going on here.
"Donnie?" The yelling tone of 'pay attention to me' was replaced by the quieter tone of 'you look like something is up, what's going on?' He tried to answer this unsaid question.
"I was having the weirdest dream, I was picking apples or something? And they turned into puppies, and-"
"Alright that's cool and all but, Donnie! You gotta see the news! Come on come on come on come on come on-"
Still in a haze of remembering how to be conscious, he was yanked violently out his bedsheets by the wrist, sternly whispering 'grumble' at the whole experience.
Raph turned around in time to see an energized Leonardo yanking along a half-sleeping Donatello, missing mask, eyebrows, and anything else. This posed an obvious question to ask Leo.
"Did you wake him up?"
"Yeah, he was probably up till like, 3:30am doing nerd stuff again, but this is important!"
Before he could get annoyed at Leo accurately guessing his bedtime, the word 'important' coming from Mr Doesn't Care About Important Things Too Often surprised him enough to fully wake him up. He rubbed the sleep and fuzz out of his eyes and looked for what could possibly be cataclysmic enough to make Nardo say something like this. He briefly considered this was something minor to everyone else and only important to his idiot twin, but his eyes focused on the projector playing the news.
" -and after a sudden outburst of them across the country protesting in unison, the president, in a split second decision, has allowed the mutants to walk among us with no punishment!" Mikey briefly giggled and repeated 'amongus' to himself and the feed cut to the current president of the United States, Boe Jiden, sternly looking into the camera.
"These mutants claim to want peace, to freely walk the surface and roam in public. And in the name of peace, we shall allow it. However, if they show themselves to be a threat, we shall swiftly and decisively rescind that decision! If they act as equals, we shall treat them as such, and if they won't, it is their choice!"
"Joining us now, from both sides of the argument, is a man wearing nothing but blue, and a man wearing nothing but red." Now all the important things were out the way and it was 'two guys arguing' news time, the brothers and their rat father all looked towards each other, each at a different point on the scale of 'nervous to excited', but all at least slightly toward the latter. The red and blue guy started yelling in the background and it went ignored entirely. Leo took over with his own yelling.
"DUDES! We should TOTALLY go up and walk around New York while we can openly do that without disguises, or without being worried about being discovered, and we-" Leo cut himself off as Donnie sprinted out the room. "Oh. Anyway... we could totally just, like, be ourselves! That sounds so cool, come on guys let's go! What if they take it back in like, a few hours? We need to take this opportunity!" Raph, the most concerned of the facial expression scale, took this moment to express his concerned opinion.
"Guys, you know what humans are like, a law meaning you can't treat certain people like-" He glanced at Splinter, remembering he was there, and the response was "Like crap."
"As dad said, doesn't mean they'll LISTEN! We need to be safe first!"
Mikey seemed a little dismayed, but Leo popped his thoughts in quickly.
"Uh, hello, we have beaten up a TON of mutants with way more powers than any random human could have," he waved his sword for emphasis, "they wouldn't stand a chance!"
"BOYS!" Splinter cut in, "You will not take your-"
"WELL? ARE WE GOING NOW?" Donnie cutted into Splinter's cut-in, cutting into the room with a sprint, "You guys can look like losers if you want but I shall be dressed for the occasion!" And he was - the outfit he remembered from the time they fought Hypno and got caught in an 80s montage of clothing, the pinnacle of it; Loose white tank top, grey pants and dark purple beanie, on top of his regular ninja bindings and mask and wrist tablet of course. He refused to make his first official debut to the human race looking like a dripless loser. Splinter continued loudly.
"You will NOT be bringing WEAPONS!" Leo sighed,
"But what if, on the off chance , we encounter an angry human who doesn't care about the law? What then?"
"You said it yourself; you have beaten far greater enemies. You could easily take on a few people with your bare hands. I trained you myself! Your first impression as a mutant should be peaceful, and if you have weapons they will presume you came expecting a fight."
Leo groaned and Don briefly quacked out an 'okaycoolnoweaponsletsgoBYE' before sprinting off. He wanted to know what the first open, public interactions of human-to-mutant would be like, and ESPECIALLY be a part of them! How could he say no to passing up or being slow to such a historical event?! (He also had a battleshell to rely on in a scuffle, unlike them. Not the most weaponized one, of course he chose the nicest looking one, sleek and thin and shiny, that only fit a hover device and a couple of gadgets and a few smaller weapons, that's all.)
The rest of the family looked at each other, having picked up some of Donnie's enthusiasm. (And in Raph and Splinter's case, some concern about the wellbeing of the younger three.)