It was a normal day at the Loud house, which of course couldn't be anything but loud. In particular, the older sisters sat on the adult table with their parents, eating their food as their father read the newspaper.

"Huh, would you look at that," Lynn Sr. remarked. "It's been a while since I saw a set of news concerning Chuckles."

The mention of the name "Chuckles" caused Luan to stop eating altogether and freeze in place, shivering in apparent fear, which Luna soon noticed as Lynn asked, "Who's Chuckles, dad?"

"Chuckles is a clown girl that specialized on ironic or cruel humor, who disappeared years ago," Lynn Sr. answered as he read the news. "Basically, the last time anybody saw her was during her final performance, which involved pyrotechnics that caused a great fire. Nobody died, but quite a few were injured, including Chuckles. And according to these news, she's yet to be found."

Luan shivered some more. "Darling, they've been looking for her ever since the fire started," Rita remarked, putting a hand on her husband's shoulder. "Wherever she is, she's most likely dead by now."

"I-I-I need to go do something," Luan stated before getting off her seat and bolting out of the room, with Luna watching her all the way.

Then, a couple minutes later, Luna got up and said "I'm gonna go see how she's doing," before going after the panicking comedian.

So she looked around for a bit, and eventually found Luan in the attic, hugging herself and rubbing her arms as she constantly whispered "Leave the past behind" in a clearly frantic tone.

"Luan?" the rocker uttered, causing the comedian to jump and shriek. "Whoa there, dude, calm down, It's just me."

"L-Luna?" Luan stuttered, calming down a bit. "W-W-What are you doing here?!"

"I saw you freaking out over the Chuckles story downstairs, and I was wondering if something's wrong," the musician answered with a reassuring tone. "If something's bothering you about it, you can tell me about it and I'll help you."

While the smile and reassuring tone helped Luan calm down a bit, she still felt reluctant to tell her sister what was bothering her. "Can I trust you won't tell anybody about it?"

Luna nodded. "It'll just be between us."

"Chuckles is who I used to be before mom and dad..." she paused, took a deep breath, and finished, "Adopted me."

Luna's eyes grew wide as the realization kicked in, culminating in her shouting, at the top of her lungs, "Adopted?!"

Luan covered her "sister"'s mouth, then looked to the left and right to see if anybody was coming. Luckily, the area was clear, so she uncovered Luna's mouth, and she whispered the inevitable question:

"You're adopted?"

"Come on, it's not that surprising," the comedian answered in return. "We got over 10 siblings! It'd only make sense that one or two of them were adopted."

"Yeah, I agree, but I'd expect Lincoln, Lucy, Lynn, anybody but you to be adopted," then the rocker asked, "How did you even manage to go from being Chuckles to being... You?"

Luan took a deep breath and started, "I ran away as soon as the fire started..."

A long time ago...

Luan, or Chuckles as she was known back then, ran away as fast as she could as she heard the sirens from the police, the ambulance, and even the firefighters.

"I was scared, it was one of the worst things I had ever done. I mean one moment I was enjoying the fact that I got somebody to laugh with my sense of humor, and the next one, I was running for my life."

As Chuckles continued to run, she glanced at her back to see the flashlights of the adults approaching her. Then she jumped into a bush and took several deep breaths.

"I was cornered, they had flashlights, and if they found me, it was all over. And so, there was only one thing left to do."

Chuckles looked at her clown costume, then took it off until she was only on her underwear.

"I took off my clown clothing, then ran off to somewhere far away from the incriminating clothing."

Chuckles got off the bush... And slipped on something next to a downward hill.

"And then I fell."

The young semi-naked clown gal rolled down the hill, occasionally clashing against rocks and other things that gave her a couple bruises, and in the case of rocks outright struck and hurt her teeth, until she landed right at the end of a pond, with the squad finding her soon afterwards.

"The pain was unbearable, and once I saw who was surrounding me, I did the only thing I could think of: Cry."

The younger Luan cried her heart out as one of the paramedics grabbed and lifted her. "Good lord, she's really bruised," she said as she inspected the injured girl. "Hey, where are your parents?"

"I-I don't know," the brunette said in the middle of her crying.

"Got it," the paramedic handed Chuckles to her partner, a policeman. "Take her to the nearest hospital to fix her bruises, then take her to the nearest orphanage."

"Understood."

Back at the present...

"So I was taken to the hospital, where they helped fix my bruises and adjust my teeth with braces, then put me on an orphanage until Rita and Lynn adopted me," Luan said, taking a deep breath as she remembered what happened next. "My clown clothes were found, and ever since then, people have been looking all over for Chuckles, while I decided to start life anew as Luan Loud."

Luna looked with disbelief as Luan finished with, "But even after I managed to adapt to being Luan, which was my name to begin with so it wasn't that hard, the guilt of what I did as Chuckles never went away and..."

"And...?"

"Every April Fools Day, what guilt I have left from the Chuckles incident makes me do tons of dangerous pranks that could harm or even kill someone!" Luan confessed, holding back tears at this point. "The goal of these pranks is to catch the attention of the police, or anybody who could send me to jail, so I can finally pay for what I did as Chuckles!"

"So all those April Fools Day pranks-"

"Are the Chuckles side of my being acting up," Luan looked away. "And I simply can't help it: Chuckles wants to be taken in by the police, to get her comeuppance for the fire and everything else, but I don't want any of that!"

Luan looked at the ground. "I just want another chance at living a good life..."

Luna took a deep breath and scratched the back of her head. "Geez, the heart attacks everybody would have if they find out about this-"

"You promised you wouldn't tell anybody!" Luan exclaimed in a panic.

"I'm not! I'm just stating the obvious!" Luna clarified, putting a comforting hand on her "sister"'s shoulder. "After all, this is some pretty heavy information to take in!"

"...Sorry."

"Don't be, I perfectly understand," Luan shot a "really?" look at the musician. "Okay, I only partially understand, but I understand enough to know the consequences of what would happen if this information were to be discovered, so, we'll keep this a secret."

Luan smiled in relief. "Thanks, Luna."

"No problem, now come on, let's go back to the dining table," Luna helped her sister get up. "Maybe we can get there before Lynn tries to eat your portion."

"Wanna race?"

"Yeah, that's a much better idea."

And so, the rocker and the comedian ran off back to the dining room to save Luan's food from the nefarious hands of Lynn's appetite.