You guys told me I could, so here's another draft. This time from an unposted story that was meant to be a 2003 and 2012 crossover. The premise was that the 2012 are still fairly untraumatized and continually act like their goober selves, which leads the 2003 turtles to doubt them and their abilities. They don't take them very seriously on missions. And the 2012 boys think they're really cool and want them to like them, so they let themselves be micromanaged. But, one by one, the 2003 turtles realize that these boys have some tricks up their sleeves
(This is too long to screenshot, so have a draft segment instead.)
Splinter watches curiously as one of the turtles splits from the group, inching closer to the machine despite all previously given warnings. When he makes it there without intervention, his eyes light up, and he disappears behind it. Nobody notices.
Splinter says nothing.
"I could redirect the signal so that it doesn't take out half of New York while Shredder is trying to get to us," Donatello says as he glances over what's left of all the brothers and his father. "But that would still leave some danger."
"Why not just break tha thing?" Raphael demands.
"He could just build another," Leo says with a furrowed brow as he cups his chin. "We're looking for a permanent solution here."
"But the longer we stand around chatting about it, the closer the baddies get!" Michelangelo speaks up, earning several nervous nods from Mikey.
"We can handle the bozos." Raph scoffs dismissively; his certainty earns him a frown from the older turtle's father. "Finding yourself cocky in the face of danger could be your undoing, young Raphael."
"Yeah, yeah." Raph sighs before Donatello brings them back to the matter at hand. "I could try a virus that would take out all the data, but that would take too long to configure, and I don't know if we'll have another chance to-"
The room was suddenly bathed in darkness. By the time the light returned, all the ninja were stiff in preparation and scanning their surroundings. A nervous laugh drew their attention to a sheepish Donnie as he pops up from behind the machine. "Sorry, sorry, my bad- Hit the power cord. That thing is huge. Takes a lot of juice. I'm surprised the foot can get it to run."
"Wha- Don't touch that!" Raphael commands as he pops back out of their eyesight. All four of their alternates head forward to stop him, only for Donnie's brothers to instinctively move in their way. Leo has both his swords in the path of Leonardo and Donatello.
Leonardo's eyes are narrowed. "What are you doing?"
While his brothers look for his direction, Leo's are doing the same. He nods approvingly at them and then quietly snaps, "Wait."
"But he-"
"Wait," Splinter repeats cooly. His sons reluctantly stand down.
Leo gives him a grateful look and then raises his voice with a calculated politeness, "Donnie, why are you in the machine?"
"I'm fixing our problem!"
"Oh, yeah?" He asks innocently. "How are you doing that, Dee?"
"I am..." The young genius is out of breath but eager, completely oblivious to what's happening in the same room as him. "Working... To.. Reconfigure... The blast radius... So when the Foot... Try... Turning this thing on... Done!"
He gives a short, satisfied cheer and then reappears, dropping down from the platform and next to them, dusting off his hands. "It'll self-destruct on itself. The Foot will be taken down by their own weapon, and presumably believe it was their own fault. Classifying the weapon as unstable and leaving you some more time before they even consider using it again."
The young Donnie beams a gap-revealing smile at the startled older turtles and stops by Raph's side; Donatello separates from the group to hurry over to the machine.
