Lincoln Loud woke early on the morning of June 28, his eyes grainy but his mind clear. Thin daylight trickled through the single window of his closet bedroom and the gloom gradually dispelled as the sun rose higher and higher over the rim of the earth. Birds greeted the new day with song and a dog barked at someone or something - probably squirrels. There were many trees and bushes along the length of Franklin Avenue, which made it the perfect haven for small animals. On any given morning, the yards fronting the street teemed with squirrels, chipmunks, and even possums, though the latter usually withdrew to their burrows before sunrise like white-faced vampires. It was not uncommon to come across fat skunks rummaging through unsecured garbage cans, and if you weren't quick, you'd get sprayed. Lincoln had never had the pleasure of being doused in skunk piss, but Lana had, and the smell was almost impossible to get rid of.

Sitting up, Lincoln yawned and stretched, his back muscles popping. He threw the covers off, swung his legs over the side of the bed, and got to his feet. His tiny body trembled with excitement as he hurriedly dressed and he got tangled in his pants, pitching forward with a cry and landing face first on the floor.

Oof.

Pushing himself up on shaky arms, he pulled his pants up and then stood, swaying back and forth like a tree getting ready to topple over. He thrust his arms out on either side of him like an airplane and kept his balance, but just barely.

Okay, maybe his mind wasn't as clear as he thought it was. Wobbly or not, though, he would never be able to fall back asleep.

Every year, Mom and Dad took Lincoln and his sisters on a summer vacation. Usually, they went camping on the Upper Peninsula, to one of the many beaches dotting the shores of Lake Michigan, or to Dairyland. Well, there was that time they went to Scotland, but that was different. Anyway, this year they were taking a road trip to Hollywood. Everyone was super stoked and had been restless for weeks. Leni wanted to meet some fashion designer idol of hers, Lola had dreams of being "discovered" by a scouting agent, and Luan was determined to perform at the famous LA Laff Factory. "That's where Kramer went full racist," she said in reverent tones. Lincoln had no idea who Kramer was but whatever, he didn't know half the people his sisters liked.

For his part, Lincoln was excited not only for the destination but also for the trip. He had never been out west and he wanted to see everything: The Texas desert, the Kansas plains, Salt Lake City, Las Vegas, and above all, that golden movie-magic Mecca Hollywood. He had been waiting for this day ever since Dad announced the trip three months ago and now it was finally here. It was like Christmas, his birthday, and Halloween all rolled into one.

It was going to be awesome.

Dropping to one knee, he reached under his bed, grabbed his duffle bag, and sat it on the bed. He unzipped it and rummaged through the contents to make sure he had everything he needed; he packed this bag last month with plans to add whatever last minute items he had. He put his phone charger in, a baggie of toiletries that he packed last night, and a few other things that he couldn't pack when he originally put the bag together. He zipped it up again, went to the dresser, and fetched a pair of socks. He sat at his desk, pulled his socks and shoes on, and shoved his phone into his hip pocket.

He slung the back over his shoulder and went out into the hallway.

At this hour, the house was dark and silent. He had a hard time believing he was the only one up but he met no one as he used the bathroom and went downstairs. In the kitchen, however, Lynn, Lori, and Luan stood around in their night clothes drinking cups of coffee and looking like something the cat dragged in. "Morning, Krusty Crew," Lincoln said and went to the fridge.

Luan grumbled, Lori smacked her lips, and Lynn took a sip of her coffee. "Chum Bucket's better," she said in a tired murmur.

Every Loud kid had a "thing." Lynn's was competition. She was the kind of person who turned everything into a competition. She loved sparring on and off the field. If you said day, she would say night, even if it was high noon.

Her other favorite hobby was picking on people, especially Lincoln. She could spend hours poking fun at him about everything from the way he walked to the things he liked. Sometimes it got to be too much and he would verge on crying. A good day with Lynn was a day she focused on someone else, like Lucy. Lynn loved bullying Lucy just as much as, if not more than, she did Lincoln. Lucy took it in stride but Lincoln knew for a fact that it really bothered her; that was why Lucy was always hiding in a "dark place" like the vents and the fireplace.

"Everyone knows the Krusty Krab is the best," Lincoln said and poured himself a glass of orange juice. "No one eats at the Chum Bucket."

"I do," Lynn said. "It's raw protein."

Lincoln crinkled his nose. "So that's why your breath always stinks."

Luan burst out laughing and the corners of Lori's mouth twitched up in an amused smile. Lynn's face darkened and her lips peeled back from her teeth. "You're lucky I'm not awake yet, you little shit."

From the hateful gleam in her eye, she meant it.

Juice in hand, Lincoln went to the pantry and rooted around until he found a lone cereal bar hidden behind a box of mashed potatoes. Lynn and the others drifted off to get dressed, leaving Lincoln alone. He sat at the table, ripped open the cereal bar, and crammed it into his mouth. While he ate, he looked up pictures of the Desert Southwest on his phone. He had been fascinated by the desert since he watched a bunch of old Westerns with Pop-Pop. The land was stark, clean, and beautiful, and looked unlike any place he had ever been. It reminded him of Mars, and to him, visiting it would be a once in a lifetime experience. Maybe they could stop by the Grand Canyon on their way out there. Dude, that would be awesome.

Shortly, everyone started coming down for the day: Lucy dragging an overloaded suitcase, Lola with her nose in the air and a couple boys from school carrying her luggage, and Leni with a plastic bag full of light bulbs. "Uh, Leni?" Lincoln asked.

"Yeah?"

He shook his head. "Why?"

Leni looked down at the bag in her hand. "Oh. Lori told me to pack light so I did."

Ah.

He should have known.

Mom and Dad came down last, Dad carrying two suitcases and Mom carrying Lily. "I wanna get started as soon as possible," Dad said. "We have a looong trip ahead of us."

Outside, everyone packed their things into Vanzilla's rear cargo compartment until it was crammed full. Luna tried every which way to shove her guitar in but gave up with a disappointed sigh. "I guess you gotta stay here, girl," she said. Head down, she took it back into the house like a pallbearer carrying a coffin. Dad slammed the door, but the van was so overloaded that it didn't catch. He leaned all of his weight against it, but the latch still didn't catch. "Give me a hand with this," he grunted. Lincoln took up position next to him and pushed with all his might, but it wasn't enough. Lynn, Lana, and Lori joined them and it took all of them combined to force the door closed. Dad dusted his hands for a job well down and sighed. "Whew," he said, "I sure hope this doesn't pop open while we're on the highway."

"Way ahead of you, Dad," Lana said. She pulled a fat roll of duct tape out of her overalls and proceeded to secure the hatch, applying long strips of tape in a big X. She pressed it down with her fingers, then stepped back to consider her work. "It'll hold," she declared.

Before they left, Mom made everyone use the bathroom. "We're not going to stop a million times," she said, "so you better go now." Lincoln didn't have to pee but he dropped a quick duce. In the hall, Lynn grabbed him in a headlock and ground her knuckles into his scalp. He thrashed and screamed, trying in vain to break her hold. Lynn looked small and thin, but her muscles were toned and powerful, and once she got a hold of you, you were stuck until she decided to let you go.

"Get off of me," Lincoln squealed.

"Your jokes aren't so funny now, huh?" she asked.

He tried to break free, but she held fast, squeezing tighter; her forearm pinned his throat to the back of his spine and his air supply cut off completely. For a moment, he thought she was going to strangle him into unconsciousness, but then she shoved him away and he fell to his knees. "Next time the head comes off," she warned him.

"I got your head right here," Lincoln muttered under his breath.

Lynn loomed over him and his heart sank. "What was that?" she asked.

"Nothing," Lincoln said.

"That's what I thought," she said. She went into the bathroom and closed the door behind her, and Lincoln took the opportunity to skedaddle before she changed her mind and guillotined him after all.

Because he was second to last getting to the van, Lincoln didn't have many seating options. There were exactly two spots open: The springy seat and the seat right behind Dad. Both sucked. With the former, you had a metal rod poking your butt cheek like a prison rapist's cock in the shower, and with the latter, you were in Dad's direct line of sight, so good luck having any privacy. Lincoln hesitated for a moment, then climbed in behind Dad. Better there than the springy seat.

A minute later, Lynn came out of the house and bounded over, probably racing her own shadow again. She stopped, poked her head in, and groaned when she saw where she would have to sit for the day. "Aw, man," she said, "my butt can't handle this. Lucy, switch me seats."

"No," Lucy said.

Lynn balled her fist and started to say something, but Mom cut her off. "Get in, we have to go."

With an eye roll, Lynn climbed in and pulled the door shut behind her. She sat in the spring seat, put her safety belt on, and then sullenly crossed her arms, her face falling into a hard glower. Lincoln suppressed a snicker and pulled out his phone. That's what you get for being a bully, Lynn. Enjoy being butt plugged for the next 10,000 miles, LOL.

Lincoln put his earbuds in and went to YouTube. What should he listen to? Music? Nah, he wanted something longer, like a podcast or something. There was that series on World War I hosted by Indy Neidell. It was a week by week breakdown of the entire conflict in real time. Each episode was pretty short (about ten minutes long) so he could probably listen to the whole series on the way to Cali. If not, he'd definitely be done by the time they got back home.

Could he stand 12 hours of talk about World War I, though? Lincoln was a huge history fan but too much of a good thing can sometimes be not such a good thing. A lot of people can immerse themselves in something that they love and camp there like a sniper in COD, bit not him. He needed to change things up every once in a while.

Starting that series was a big commitment, he didn't know if he should do it.

He pursed his lips in thought and finally decided to do it. He went to the channel and found the playlist tab. The episodes were divided into five parts. 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917, and 1918. All but 1914 and 1918 had 52 episodes. That was so much content.

Oh well.

He had the time.

Hitting PLAY on the first episode, Lincoln sat the phone in his lap and gazed out the window as Dad backed into the street. They turned onto Shire Street and then Main. It was barely nine'o'clock but the sidewalks bustled with activity. Mr. Greene, the butcher, swept the sidewalk running before his shop, and a couple of old men sat outside the barber shop presumably talking about the good old days. They passed the bank, the Union Hotel, and the white clapboard Methodist church where most of Royal Woods' residents were married, buried, and regaled with tales of hell. Lincoln had heard the term "Rockwellian" used to describe Royal Woods, and after looking at some of Norman Rockwell's paintings online, he could totally see it. It was the quintessential small town, like the kind you'd see on the back of a postcard, and not much had changed from the fifties.

Lincoln didn't hate his hometown but he also wasn't crazy about it either. He was young and energetic: He wanted action, bright lights, and things to do. When he was old enough to live on his own, he was going to move to the big city. New York, maybe, or Chicago.

Main Street crossed the Royal River via a bridge with a humped metal exoskeleton on either side. Shaped roughly like a pair of upside down U's, they earned the bridge the nickname "the Dolly Parton bridge," Dolly Parton being a famous country singer with a set of big ones. Everyone called it that; Lincoln didn't know its real name or if it even had one. It was only a couple hundred feet long and didn't seem grand enough to have an official name.

On the other side, Highway 55 wound and twisted through a range of heavily forested hills. Next to Lincoln, Luna scrolled through her phone and in the front, Dad danced in his seat to someone on the radio. Lincoln could hear the sounds of chatter, laughing, and Lola and Lana bickering over Indy's narration, and he increased the volume until his eardrums ached. Lincoln was two episodes in when they picked up the interstate south of Pine Lookout. A giant hill swept back from the far lane and woods pressed against the near one, breaking here and there for villages and gas stations.

Lincoln had only been out this way a handful of times, and never passed Exit 12. He was excited to see what lay beyond. Sea monsters? The edge of the earth? Endless, icy mountains inhabited by vampires? Obviously, he knew it wasn't any of those things - Luca was in Italy and Dracula in Pennsylvania - but he couldn't wait to see all the awesome sights that lay ahead.

Face glued to the window, Lincoln watched the world and listened to his podcast, learning a shit ton about WWI that instantly faded from his memory. Who's this Franz guy leading Austria-Hungary? Didn't he get shot? Wait, when did Bulgaria join the war? WTF, Indy, slow down. He was almost on episode four when something hard and sharp stabbed him in the side. He whipped around and Luna nodded in greeting. He paused his video and took his earbuds out. "What'cha listening to, bro?" she asked by way of conversation,

"Well, I was listening to something about World War I."

"Rockin'," Luna said, "that the one with Hitler?"

"No," Lincoln said, "that's World War II."

"How many people did Hitler kill?" Luna asked.

Lincoln sighed. He was starting to become annoyed. "I don't know. Millions, I guess."

"Dude shoulda chilled," she said. She reached under her skirt and pulled out a plastic Tupperware container with a red lid. "He woulda if he had some of this." She opened the lid and took out a brownie. Lincoln grimaced in disgust as she shoved it into her mouth. Ew, crotch brownies. She chewed with her mouth open and soggy crumbs littered the front of her shirt. "Want one?" she asked, spaying him.

He almost gagged. "No, thanks, I'm good."

"I'm telling you, man," she said, "these are special brownies." She winked with both eyes and then laugh. "Wait, let's try that again." She winked one eye and the corner of her mouth curled up exaggeratedly.

Lincoln faked a laugh and then put his earbuds back in. He didn't know what Luna's deal was but he didn't feel like putting up with it for 2000 miles. He went back to looking out the window and listening to tales of the Great War. One thing was clear to him already: All of its commanders were drooling idiots who expected epic cavalry charges and cannonfire but got machine guns, poison gas, and airplanes instead. LOl get rekt. So far, the Germans and the Russians were two only ones winning in the field. The Western front was all trenches and bloody battles for ,maybe a couple inches of ground and the Eastern front was Austria-Hungary getting their asses handed to them by a bunch of Serbs with sticks and rocks. Imagine being a huge, respected empire and then being repeatedly humiliated on the national stage by smaller, weaker enemies.

Embarrassing.

Outside the window, the forest gave way to suburbs; houses backed up against the slope leading up to the highway and kids biked and played on side streets. At one point, a giant cross jutted up from a hillside, and Lincoln furrowed his brow. There didn't seem to be anything else around, so...what was it doing there? Just chilling?

At noon, they stopped for lunch at a "family restaurant" (whatever that meant) and occupied three long tables in a private dining room. Lincoln sat between Lynn and Luan: Luan reached around his back and tapped his shoulder, and he whipped around to look at Lynn. "Yeah," she challenged, "it was me. Got a problem?"

"Stop touching me," he said.

She punched his leg and a burst of red pain shot into his hip. He hissed through his teeth and threw out his elbow, hitting her arm. She did the same and knocked him into Luan, who spilled her drink in her lap. She let out a squeal and jumped up. "Mom!" Lincoln cried. "Lynn keeps hitting me!"

Mom shot Lynn daggers.

"He hit me first!"

"No, I didn't," Lincoln said.

Lynn started to argue but Dad cut her off. "Lynn and Lincoln, cut it out. We are having a nice family lunch."

Lincoln sighed.

Whatever.

The lunch wasn't very "nice" as it turned out. The fried chicken Lincoln ordered was dry and tasted like wood and the peas were mushy. The dinner rolls were really good, though, and Lincoln pounded three of them.

Following lunch, they gassed up and jumped back on the highway. Shortly thereafter, they crossed the border into Iowa and the terrain turned flat and open. Lincoln gave up on The Great War and put on some music. He gazed out the window and counted the cars passing in the opposite lane. He saw an SUV, a minivan, a white church bus, and a line of tractor trailers.

The last one stood out to him.

It wasn't really a semi; it was smaller and wasn't pulling a trailer. The first thing Lincoln noticed about it was the rust. The entire thing was covered in rust. The second was the shape. The back was a perfect square while the front end was blunt and rounded. It had a giant grill that closely remembered the cattle guard of a train and running boards along either flank. Lincoln wasn't good with cars, but it looked like it came from the fifties.

He craned his neck as it passed in an attempt to see the driver, but the windows were so grimy that they might as well have been tinted.

You don't see hunks of junk like that everyday.

The afternoon wore on and Lincoln's phone wore down. When it was at 20 percent, he put it away and was instantly roped into a conversation with Luna. She ate a couple of her special brownies after lunch and looked like she was going to pass out; her eyes were bleary, she swayed from side to side, and she talked a bunch of randomness punctuated by annoying laughter. Lincoln said and said "Cool" "that's crazy" and "yep" where he had to. Mushy brown chocolate was stuck to her teeth and Lincoln couldn't help but look at it. Dude, do something about that.

Luna flopped her head back and laughed. "It's, like, karma, you know?"

Thankfully Lori came to the rescue, She leaned over the seat and took the Tupperware container from Luna. "You need to stop," she whispered into Luna's ear. "You're literally acting like an idiot. If Mom and Dad find our, they'll turn around, and I am not going to let you ruin my vacation."

"I'm not ruining it," Luna said. "Will you chill?"

"Just...hush, okay? Sleep it off or something."

She sat back and returned to whatever she had been doing before, probably texting Bobby. The next time Lincoln looked, she was nibbling on one of Luna's brownies and darting her eyes nervously around. She saw him and glared. "Face forward."

"Those were in Luna's crotch, you know."

Luna. head back and eyes closed. Laughed. "How do my puuuuubes taste, Lori?"

For a second, Lori looked like she was going to be sick...then she shrugged. "Eh, they were in a Tupperware."

She wasn't wrong about them being in a container, but still, the thought of even touching one of those brownies much less eating it made him want to gag.

For dinner, they stopped at a mega Chinese buffet near Des Moines. Lincoln ate plates of chicken fried rice, beef lo mein, and egg rolls until his stomach threatened to rupture. Dad ate frog legs and teeny tiny squids in broth: Lincoln had to look away from his old man's plate lest he throw up. "You sure you don't want to try some of this, son?" Dad asked. "It's really good."

"No, thanks," Lincoln said.

"That would be cannibalism," Lynn spoke up. "Since he's a spineless little squid too."

Lola sprayed Coke from her nose and Lily laughed and clapped her hands, not understanding the joke but wanting to be included anyway. Lincoln shot Lynn a dirty look and she stuck out her tongue.

By the time they were done, it was late afternoon. Dad looked up motels on his phone and decided on a place almost 300 miles west of Des Moines. "We should get there about ten," he said. "If I'm feeling okay, maybe we can go a little farther."

He and Mom switched, her driving and him in the passenger seat. Lincoln had to poop before they left, so when he got to the van, all the seats were taken save for one in the very back. He wedged himself between Lola and the window and checked his phone, which he had charged in the restaurant.

55 percent.

He could listen to a little more Great War. Or some music. Or something else. Instead, he played a game for a while. It was dusk when he was finished and he was down to 47. He put the phone away. He turned his head to see what Lola and Lana were bickering about now and caught a flash of movement in the corner of his eye. The luggage in the back had been positioned in such a way that you could see a tiny square of the back window. A truck was following them at a distance of two car lengths. That wasn't so strange since they were on the interstate, but there was something familiar about that truck. Its grill was shaped like a cattle guard and it was covered in layers of rust.

It was just like the one he saw earlier.

But that wasn't possible. It was going in the opposite direction and even if it turned around, that was several hours and 200 miles ago. The chances of it appearing behind them were slim to none.

Right?

He guessed it wasn't so weird. They had been stopped for almost an hour and a half for dinner, which would have given the truck plenty of time to catch up to them. Why was it going in this direction now? He hardly thought it was carrying freight; no company on the face of the earth would be caught dead with a broken down heap of junk like that. Unless it was some local handyman outfit. In which case, what was it doing hundreds of miles west?

Was it following them?

That thought froze Lincoln's blood.

As if on cue, the truck swung into the other lane and sped up, getting closer and closer. Lincoln's eyes went to the dented license plate askew on the front bumper, yellow writing on a blue background. BEATINGU.

The truck pulled alongside the van. The dirt and grim on the passenger window was so thick that it was like a skin. Lincoln could just make out the vaguest shape of the driver beyond. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up, and even though he couldn't see very well, he was certain that the driver was looking at him.

For a second, the truck kept pace with the van, then it sped up, changed lanes, and got in front of it. Lincoln was certain that it would come to an abrupt stop and make Dad pull over, but instead it lumbered off into traffic, disappearing behind a Mac truck. Lincoln let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding and melted into his seat. See? It was nothing. LOL. All that stuff about WWI had him worrying about rear attacks and flanking maneuvers. The only enemy present on the Lincoln Front, however, was Lincoln himself.

Which kind of made this a Civil War. Brother against brother, cousin on cousin (step cousin, I'm stuck at Gettysburg, step cousin, what are you doing?). The Civil War was a lot more interesting than World War I, to be honest. Maybe when Indy was finally done with his WWII series, he could do one about the War of Northern Aggression.

That would be lit.

Just like Fort Sumner after the Rebs shelled it.

LOL.

Soon, the last tepid light drained from the sky and darkness stole over the land. They stopped for gas at one point and Dad bought some kind of energy drink that sent him into overdrive, so he kept on going well into the night. Lily was the first to fall asleep, chin lolling against her chest, and Lisa quickly followed suit. Lana and Lola were next, leaning heavily on one another like two soldiers in the field. Lucy nodded off but snapped her head up, only to nod off once more. Lincoln stared out the window even though all he could see were scattered lights. He listened to two more episodes of The Great War, then drifted into a light and fitful sleep, his forehead pressed to the cool glass.

In his dream, he crouched in a trench and hugged a rifle to his chest as artillery shells burst around him, shaking the earth and kicking up jets of dirt and rock. The rattle of machine gun fire filled the air and Lincoln waited for it to stop. When he did, he got up and poked his head over the top of the trench.

Ahead, a blasted moonscape opened into infinity. The sky was a steely gun-metal gray and the only things he could make out on the featureless plains were the strands of barbed wire and sandbags marking the enemy's trenchline. He expected to be cut down the moment he cleared cover, but no one fired on him. A shell came down off to his left and exploded, making him wince. Smoke poured from the hole it made, and for a second he thought it was simply the normal gun powder smoke, but then he saw that it wasn't gray.

It was yellow.

"MUSTARD GAS!" someone yelled.

Oh, shit.

Lincoln looked around for his gas mask, but realized with sinking dread that he didn't have one. The smoke wafted over him, and instantly his skin began to burn. His eyes sizzled and his lungs filled with fire. Fat white blisters appeared on his face and his skin started to melt from the bone. He clawed at his cheeks, tearing off long strips of liquifying flesh with his nails. He tried to scream but the gas ate away his vocal cords. His eyes swelled and popped and his lower jaw fell off and landed in the mud. His lower face was a ruined mass of red and his tongue squirmed mindlessly back and forth like a fat, dying worm. He sank to his knees as blood and bits of brain flowed freely from his nose and ears.

Despite the excruciating agony, he and his men were forced to go over the top and charge the enemy trench. Lincoln clutched his rifle in his skeletal hands and ran at the Germans, pieces of his body falling off in his wake. He spotted a machine gun nest and ran toward it, but the Jerry swung the gun around and pointed it at him. In the moment before he pulled the trigger and hit Lincoln with a burst of fire, their eyes met, and Lincoln realized something.

Just like him, the German was already dead.

Someone shook him and he jumped. Luna's face hovered over him in the darkness. "We're at the motel, dude," she said, "come on."

Lincoln ran his hands over his face and chest.

No bullet holes.

No melted flesh.

Whew.

That was a fucked up dream.

He rolled his neck and peered out the window. They were in the parking lot of a two story motel with a giant neon sign on the roof. Red doors lined the breezeways and a pair of vending machines stood in an alcove like drug dealers in a dark alley. Lincoln waited until everyone else had left the van before climbing out.

Mom and Dad rented only one room, so conditions were cramped to say the least. Lily, Lisa, and Lola took one bed while Lynn, Lori, and Luna took the other. Everyone else had to curl up on the floor. Lincoln didn't mind that too much; he staked out a sweet spot next to an outlet and hissed and clawed at anyone who strayed too close. He stuck his earbuds in and listened to a few more episodes of The Great War, finishing long after the lights had been doused and everyone was asleep. He got up, stole into the bathroom, and took a shower, letting the hot water wash the grime of the day away. Done, he got out, dried off, and brushed his teeth. The mirror over the sink was cracked and dirty, and for some reason, it reminded him of that dreary gun metal sky from his dream.

Teeth clean and breath minty fresh, Lincoln went back to his spot and started to lay down, but stopped when it hit him that he didn't have Bun-Bun. He needed Bun-Bun to sleep.

Sighing, he stepped into his shoes and unlocked the door, being as quiet as he could so as not to wake anyone. He slipped out onto the breezeway and started toward the stairs, but stopped when a pair of headlights washed over him. He winced and turned his head slightly to one side just as the vehicle they were attached to passed by. It was a vague shape in the darkness, but Lincoln was almost sure that it was the truck from earlier, the one with the license plate BEATINGU.

His blood turned to ice water and for what seemed like an eternity, he was rooted in place, unable to move. Finally, the spell broke, and he ran back inside, shutting and locking the door. He pulled aside the curtain and looked out at the parking lot.

Nothing moved.

He realized he was hyperventilating and forced himself to calm down.

It was the same truck. He just knew it.

But did he? To be fair, he didn't even see it. It could have been anything.

He licked his lips and searched his memory, trying desperately to get a clearer mental image of what he saw but coming up empty handed. There was no way it could be the same truck. Even if it had been intentionally following Vanzilla before, it passed hundreds of miles back.

It had to be another truck. He was keyed up from listening to twelve straight hours of death and destruction from World War I and his imagination was running away with him. Case closed.

Getting under the covers, Lincoln held himself tightly, wishing he had Bun-Bun to protect him.

It was a long, long night, and when he finally slept, he dreamed not of war, but of rusted trucks.