Lynn found herself in an empty room, surrounded by darkness. After getting savagely beaten by her older sister, everything that transpired afterward was a blur. Lynn tried to feel her way around the room, only to realize that she was grasping nothing but pitch blackness. She fumbled around trying to find something to light her way. However, the further she went into the room, the wider the room seemed to get. In desperation, Lynn tried to call out in the darkness a few times for signs of life, only for her inquiries to rebound on her in the form of an echo.

"Where am I?" wondered Lynn. Whilst contemplating her surroundings, a noise rustled throughout the room, startling her. Clenching her fists together, Lynn stood her ground fully anticipating fighting whoever was in the room with her. "Come out you coward," boasted Lynn "Show yourself!" The noise became louder as it overtook the room. Though she was frightened, Lynn tried to muster up the willpower to take on the potential threat. As suddenly as the sound entered the room, it disappeared just as suddenly. A quietness fell over the empty room. At ease, Lynn slowly loosened her grip. Lynn breathed a sigh of relief and continued her pursuit for a way out. With the alarming noise dissipated, the room was silent again. Too silent to be exact. Lynn tried to feel around the room again, when she heard a soft voice emanating from the pitch blackness.

"Why?"

Lynn turned around surprised to hear another voice that wasn't her own. Confused, Lynn's eyes darted around the room for the source of the sound. "What?" she asks anxiously. From the corner of her eye, she saw something emerge from the darkness. Squinting at the odd spectacle, Lynn made out the silhouette of a figure that was close to her in size. She focused her eyesight on the mysterious entity. She knew who it was. "Lincoln?" she asks. She could recognize that white hair any day. Lincoln fully emerged from the darkness, his eyes being stained with tears. He also seemed paler than when he was alive, almost as if he was a reanimated corpse. His shirt was drenched with his blood, and dirt was falling off his body. Lynn beheld her brother as if it were the first time that she had ever seen him.

"Why Lynn" asks Lincoln accusingly "why did you do this to me?"

His words were as sharp as a knife piercing her heart. Lynn tried to turn away from the spectacle, but something in her mind forced her to continue looking at him. Tears streak her face the longer she looked at her brother's spirit. "L-Lincoln...I-I had no way of knowing that-" Before she could finish her response, Lincoln pointed his middle finger at her in an accusing manner. "You said that you would always protect me." His words rang true in her mind. For as long as she could remember, she had always promised Lincoln that she would be his guardian. The fact that she let her superstition determine her brother's fate made her feel more guilty for herself. "I know. I promised that I would always keep you safe from harm." Lynn watched the tears drop from her eyes before continuing. "But I failed you. Please forgive me."

A low growl emitted from Lincoln, making her more frightened. "Do you not know how much suffering I had to go through?" he yelled. Lynn fell to her knees in fright. "Linc, please," she begged.

Lincoln's voice became lower, dare say demonic even. "He took my life!" shrieked Lincoln "he took away all of my happy memories." He looked down at his older sister, giving her a dreadful look. "And it is your fault, Lynn! You left me! You left me to DIE!"

Fire erupts from the ground, engulfing the two. Much to her horror, Lincoln melts in front of her eyes, and merges with a wall of flames. Other heads materialized from the flames, each one screaming in writhing agony. This very much matched what some hold as being the true depiction of Hell. "You left me to rot," roars Lincoln. He surrounds Lynn with the searing fires, threatening to burn her. "No, no, Lincoln, she whined." Lincoln gives her a sadistic grin, and he breathes fire towards her, engulfing her in the flames.

Lynn wakes up from her deep sleep, sweating profusely. She looked all around the room, realizing that it was only a nightmare. Even then, she felt that it was far too real to be a random dream. Guilt caressed Lynn's mind the moment she remembers that Lincoln truly was gone. Lynn leaned forward on the couch and clasped her knees.

"What have I done?"


Lynn was so enraptured in her thoughts, a knock on the door caught her off guard. "Great, who can that be now..." droned Lynn. She walks over to the door, and she opens it. Upon opening the door, Clyde falls to the ground, apparently having leaned against it. Perplexed, Lynn helps Clyde up. "Clyde," she began "what are you doing here?"

Clyde wipes his shirt. "I saw your parents just get taken away by the police! What's going on?"

"Well, they're doing some...interrogating" explained Lynn.

Clyde notices her bruises while they were having a discussion. "Where did you get those injuries?" he asked quizzically. Lynn looked down at her injuries. She cringed at the mere memory of being on the receiving end of her older sister's beating, but she felt that she needed to cover up for her.

"I...fell down the stairs," says Lynn. She giggled nervously at the young boy who didn't seem suspicious about her obvious lie.

"Well, what about Lincoln? Did they find them?"

Lynn nodded her head. "They found him."

Clyde was delighted by the news. Ever since Lincoln was first reported missing, he was practically considering investigating his disappearance. At least until his dads talked him out of it. But now, it seemed that everything was finally going back to normal. Little did he know, things weren't going to ever be the same.

"Where is he now?" Clyde asks "in his room?"

Lynn attempted to tell Clyde the truth, but her words came out in a mumble. Clyde takes this as permission to head to Lincoln's room, and he began to climb the stairway. As he was approaching Lincoln's room, Lynn ran in front of him. Clyde was confused. "Lynn, what's the meaning of this?"

Lynn wrestled with herself to figure out what she could possibly say to keep Clyde from getting too suspicious, but how could she possibly hope to withhold her brother's death from him? Suddenly, an idea struck her mind. "Uh, Linc's just...sleeping right now. You know with him going missing and all, he'd be pretty bushed.

Clyde scratches his head in curiosity. Beams of sweat rolled down Lynn's forehead. She was sure that Clyde had figured out the truth. What should she do now? How would he react to her admitting that she and her family deliberately locked Lincoln out of the house. Yes, they had no idea that a serial killer would take advantage of that situation and make Lincoln his recent target, but they were just as guilty. Thankfully for her, Clyde couldn't telepathically read her mind. Clyde shrugged, and he began to head back down the stairway. "Well, I'll just come back later."

Frightened, Lynn grabs him by the arm. "Wait, you can't!" Clyde tilted his head to the side, analyzing her. "Why can't I?" Lynn twiddled her thumbs nervously. Clyde stomped his foot on the ground in irritation. Finally, Lynn came up with a half-decent answer. "He-he's sick."

Clyde looks at Lincoln's door, and then back to Lynn. "Sick?" Lynn nodded her head. "Yup, he has explosive diarrhea." Clyde's eyes widen. "What?" he proclaims. Lynn nodded cautiously. Even she wouldn't believe that obviously stupid explanation. She was pretty sure that if Clyde didn't believe her claims earlier, then he most certainly wouldn't buy a word that she said. "Yup, seen it myself; it was so gross. It was all slimy and thick brown, bleh." She flinched a bit in a mental mechanism as she fully anticipated him to tear her words apart. Clyde thought to himself for a moment. "Well, shouldn't someone check on him, then?"

Lynn didn't anticipate his question. Clyde walks around Lynn and continues his walk towards the door only to be stopped again by Lynn. "No, you shouldn't go in there! It's so disgusting. It's contagious!" It was at that moment that Clyde was getting fed up with Lynn's strange behavior. "Lynn, what's the deal with you?" he asks. Lynn forced a smile across her face. "I'm just concerned for your health. After all, you don't want to catch Lincoln's fever, do you?"

Clyde gave a defeated sigh. "No I guess not." As he was descending the stairs, Lynn's last comment stood out to him as especially odd. "Wait fever" he stated "I thought you said he had diarrhea." Lynn's smile quickly disappeared from her face. Undoubtedly, Clyde was seeing through her facade. "Well I..." Clyde gives her a scornful look. "I demand you tell me where Lincoln is," Clyde exclaims, crossing his arms.

Lynn sighed, and bowed her head. "I knew I couldn't keep this hidden from you for long." Seeing that Clyde was fully waiting for an answer, she decided to stop stalling for time. "Clyde," she began "Lincoln's dead."

Clyde's eyes widen in shock, causing his glasses to nearly fall off his face. Strangely, Clyde began to laugh almost as if he felt this was some kind of joke. "Ha, ha. That's funny, Lynn. I could've sworn that you said that he was dead. However, Clyde immediately stopped laughing when he notices that Lynn was keeping a straight face when she was delivering the news. Retelling the events of Lincoln's murder proved to be difficult, but she felt the need to explain everything to Clyde. "They found his body in the woods earlier today. They suspect foul play." Clyde leaned his back against the wall, and he began to weep bitterly for his fallen friend. His breathing became more rapid and forced. Lynn gasped in fear, realizing that he was having an asthma attack. "Clyde!" she screeched. Clyde reaches into his back pocket and retrieves his inhaler. He takes a large whiff of the medicine, and his breathing lessened. "Lincoln, dead..." groaned Clyde.

Lynn walks over to Clyde, and she places her arm around his shoulder. "I'm sorry that you had to find out this way." Clyde looked at her with tear-filled eyes. "How...how did it happen?" Lynn chuckled nervously again. "Well, you see. We..." She stopped momentarily out of hesitation. Clyde was slowly becoming incensed by her stalling. "Tell me right now," he demanded. Lynn scratched the back of her head. "Well, you see..." Clyde lost his temper with her. He was trying to be sociable, but this was proving to become more difficult overtime. "Tell me now, you bitch!" he yelled.

Stunned, Lynn rushes to finish her recounting of what happened that day. "Well, we locked him out," Lynn explained. Clyde's jaw nearly dropped on the floor. "What?" He was hoping that she was joking in that last part, but her nodding her head was enough for him to decipher that this was what really happened. "It all happened when I had a softball game. So, I asked for Lincoln to go. He did, and my team lost. So, I assumed that he jinxed it."

Clyde couldn't believe what he was hearing. Sure, he knew that the family quarreled over trivial things, but never in his life had he heard something as petty as this. "And then we all started to think that Linc was bad luck, so we thought that the only way to protect ourselves from getting cursed was for him to sleep outside. But I never thought that Lincoln would be kidnapped in the middle of the night. I was supposed to be his guardian, but I let my superstitions do the talking. Now he's gone, and there's nothing that I can do to bring him back..." She started to cry again. Clyde gets up from the floor, and gently caresses her cheeks in a comforting manner. What happened next caught everyone by surprise. The other sisters were alerted to a deafening sound. Opening their doors, they see that Lynn had a red mark across her right cheek. Apparently the mark stung because Lynn was biting her lip to stifle the pain that she was feeling. She was crying harder than she initially was as well. It was there that everything was starting to become clear as crystal: Clyde had slapped Lynn across the face.

Lori was disgusted. "Clyde? How could yo..." Before she could rebuke him, Clyde turned his attention towards all of them. "You all are terrible sisters!" The Loud girls dropped their jaws in unison. "Yeah, you heard me! You are all the worst examples of siblings I have ever seen."

After a few moments of silence, Luan stood up to defend herself and her sisters. "Clyde, we all have made mistakes, but I don't thin..." Clyde gives her a hateful glare, thus causing her to freeze up. "So the humorless hack has something to say?" he asked.

Luan's eyes widened. Much like a parrot, she repeated that word several times. Seeing that he perplexed her, Clyde continued his accusation. "What happened to all those times that Lincoln helped you with your funny business? Luan bowed her head in shame, unable to say anything contrary. "And yet you show your gratitude by subjecting him to endless pranks?" Lori decided to go next. "Clyde, I'd think it best that you-"

Clyde turns his glance over towards the eldest of the Loud sisters. He was conflicted. He was hoping that she had some say with what her family had done to Lincoln, but the reality of her taking part in ostracizing her only brother pained him. His "soul mate" wasn't an angel. She was far from it.

And then there's you, Lori. I used to think that you could do no wrong, but Lincoln was right: you are a monster!" Angered, Lori lifts her hand up, and forms it into a fist as if she were planning to beat Clyde into a bloody pulp. However, she realized that her physically injuring him would only prove his point further, and she throws her other hand onto her fist. Unafraid, Clyde continued to rip into his former crush. "Don't you remember when Lincoln actually went out of his way to get you that job? So how do you thank him?" Lori absentmindedly nods her head. His accusations were spot on.

Lucy, in her typical fashion, lets out a monotonous sigh right when Clyde was finalizing his rant on Lori. "Oh, you're bored?" inquired Clyde "well, why not we get to you, little miss princess of darkness?" Lucy hardly flinched at his threat. "After Lincoln was grounded for clogging up the toilet, he texted me, and you know what he said? He told me that he did it to cover for your sorry butt."

Luan raised an eyebrow in fascination. "Cover up?" Clyde shrugged. "Oh, Lucy never told any of you, didn't she?" Lori perked up at this. "Told us what?" she asked. At that point, Lucy was noticeably becoming unhinged. "That she was the one who clogged the toilet!" declared Clyde. The other sisters gasped. Luna was the first to express her disbelief. "So the book belonged to..." As she was reaching a conclusion, Lucy suddenly spoke up. "Me..."

Lucy placed her head between her legs in shame. "He gave up his chance of going to that convention just so that none of you could make fun of me for my interests. He always gave and gave, and yet we never did anything for him. Now he's gone." Bitter tears rolled down the gothic girl's cheeks. She had always asked her brother for favors, and come to think of it, she never thanked him for the sacrifices that he had made for her. The fact that he is now gone only made her further realize that she didn't realize what she had until it was gone. She couldn't even hope to apologize to him.

"And it is all of your faults" Clyde added "you guys don't deserve to have a brother half as good as Lincoln. In fact, I wish that it was just me and Lincoln. At least he wouldn't have to be burdened by ungrateful, sorry excuses for sisters like yourselves!" With that, Clyde marches down the stairs, opens the door, and slams it behind him, leaving the guilt stricken girls to ponder their actions.


Hey, AustinDR again to bring you Chapter 3 of "Shattered Innocence." I would personally like to thank each of you for taking the time to read my story. As we speak, I have about 35 faves on the story which surprised me, because I admit that it isn't one of the best stories that I had conceived. It really came about when I watched "NSL." I wasn't expecting much to come out of the story, but I am thankful for some feedback on it. I apologize if the story so far is a little rushed; I am still trying to work on pacing, and I was pretty busy this week, so I didn't have much to brainstorm on. The story is far from complete, but I feel that I need some time off to think where I could take this story. I may ask for some assistance here and there. I'm not sure yet. Anyway, criticism is welcome as long as it's constructive and doesn't boil down to "you suck." Thank you.