Of course, being the gentlemen they all were (yes, this included Apeil), you were brought home first. They all left, saying their goodbyes to you after you'd thanked them for a tolerable first day of school. Walking out altogether, you watched them, simply smiling at the newfound group of friends in front of you.

As you nearly closed the door, you heard Mikey call out, "________!!!!!"

You turned as he took a rushed halt at the front of your door, heels of his sneakers screeching against the pavement.

"What is it, Mikey," you asked, folding your arms and leaning against the door frame.

He opened his mouth as if to say something, purses his lips as if he forgot, and snapped his fingers into a gun formation likewise to how he was in McCoy's class earlier that day.

"Do you want to meet up tomorrow for experiments," he asked triumphantly, glad he remembered what to say.

"Yeah, sure," you smiled. "What time and whose place?"

M

"Eh.. 3:00 my place," Mikey suggested, hands in pockets.

"Why not?" You smiled. "Actually, wait... Couldn't you have just texted me about this?"

"Yeah," Mikey shrugged, "but I still get to see your pretty face."

You blushed at this statement for a moment, but Mikey laughed, you following suit.

"Oh, man," you huffed, the laughter causing you to be almost completely out of breath, "the girls at school would love to hear you say that."

Mikey "flirtatiously" ran a hand through his blonde locks, looking like a typical dramatic anime boy. "Well, consider yourself a VIP."

"Very important pizza?," you smirked.

"Yep!"

After a minute of more laughter, Raph called out, "MIKEY, QUIT FLIRTING AND GET YOUR GODDAMN PIZZA-LOVING ASS HERE!"

You suddenly stopped, standing in the line between whether to be surprised by Raph's language. Mikey nudged you reassuringly.

"He's just jealous," he winked.

After that, he ran off as Raph continued to curse him out. You laughed, closing the door behind you and making your way to your room, relishing the rest of the day as you finally fell asleep.

---

You woke up to the sound of your phone buzzing beside you. Turning it on, you see that it's already 12:00 p.m, which was rather late for you. Your notifications were mostly composed of spam from your school's theatre club, which mostly composed of your friend Alexander being dramatic as ever, while another guy, Aaron, simply fueled his passionate anger. Sighing to yourself, you turn on your phone to see that there was a message from Mikey.

You physically slap your hand onto your face, punishing yourself for your stupidity. You quickly type,

But before you even finish typing, you hear a knock at your door. Dammit.

You rush downstairs, throwing on an oversized leather jacket and pulling your hair back into an messy bun, which flopped to the side of your head [] as you opened your door, revealing a Mikey with fluffy hair, which vaguely looked... Combed? You'd only known Mikey for a day, but this struck you as slightly strange. He wore a shirt that read "Pizzanati" which had a picture of a pizza with a pepperoni in the middle. His green hood was opened and rolled up, his jeans ripped.

"Well," you huffed, slightly out of breath from the sudden run, "someone actually took the time to clean up."

"Yeah, I usually don't do this," Mikey laughed, a hand covering the back of his neck, "but Sensei made us wake up early for training?"

"Training for what," you asked, gesturing for him to enter the house.

He muttered a quick "thanks" before replying, "Oh, we don't do much... Just a bunch of exercising, weaponry practice, our battle tactics..."

"So this is what you do in your free time," you mused, grabbing your heavy backpack.

"Nah, that's just my mornings," Mikey laughed, taking a seat on your couch," but half the time, I'm just playing video games, eating pizza, going out with my bros at night.."

"What do you guys do at night?," you inquired, utterly curious.

"I...uh..."

Mikey picked up his phone. "Hey, Raph... Sensei? Oh...okay....yeah, I'm on my way home... Okay, see yah!"

Hanging up, he simply laughed. "We should probably get going now."

"Yep... We should."

And with that, the two of you walked out of the house, the thought of mysterious nighttime activities lingering at the back of your mind.

---

You and Mikey simultaneously knocked on the door, looked at each other, then laughed. Considering the fact that Mikey didn't live far from your house, it wasn't long until you'd reached his home. As expected, the walk wasn't quiet, though it wasn't anything that'd inflict any headaches. The conversation was completely random, the topic all over the place, though the recurring idea of your project came up a few times.

Mikey suddenly stopped when you two were under a freeway bridge.

"We're almost here," he said, kneeling down, opening a sewer.

Engulfed in confusion, you asked a little loudly, "Mikey, what are you doing?"

"Trust me." Mikey winked. "Then you'll know."

You walked through the sewer, disgusted, yet fascinated. It was strange, as you realized that anyone on a regular day would be above this world, unbeknownst to what was going on beneath them, unbeknownst to the world in general. You and Mikey walked on the side, so as to not have to swim through the contaminated water. Mikey then jumped over a wooden barrier, meaning this part of the sewer was not in use.

"You coming?"

Oh. You hesitated.

Climbing over, along with Mikey's assistance, you then followed him along, taking a turn, finding a ladder.

After climbing up, you saw the last thing that even the greatest minds would expect.

'This is their place?,' you thought to yourself.

Before you'd arrived , you didn't expect it to look so... traditional. Two fully bloomed cherry blossoms greeted you, sending you small pink petals as gifts, welcoming you to the front garden, which was infested with more trees, a small lake, a bridge, and a bench next to the lake, overlooking the whole scene. The bridge let a path to the front porch of a lovely, not to mention huge, Traditional Japanese home, wind chimes playing with the wind.

"Like it?," Mikey asked, smiling.

"I..." You spoke, speechless. "Wow."

"Meh. It's not much," Mikey shrugged, seemingly oblivious to the whole adventure they'd had, "besides, it's not as Asian on the inside."

Going back to when they'd knocked on the door, they heard a series of voices call, "NOT IT", the last one being Donnie. He groaned, then went silent as his footsteps grew louder, and the doorknob turned.

"_____!" Donnie gasped. He then turned to Mikey. "Does Sensei know?"

"Yeah!!!," Raph called from the inside. "He used my phone to call Mikes earlier!"

"Well, _____," Donnie opened the door even more, "Welcome!"