Lisa's time loops

It had been a long day.

"Urgh…" the pitiful moan emitted from a very tired, and more than slightly bruised Lincoln Loud. The boy's face had found itself planted in the carpet of the hallway between his and his sister's rooms, and his body lay splayed in the middle of the passageway.

"There you are!" A gleeful Leni spotted his fallen form from her doorway, "we still have like; four outfits for you to try on- how come you left?"

"So, you were hiding with Leni hunh?" A menacing Lynn Loud strode up from downstairs, a wooden bat in hand. "I still need an answer Stincoln, are you coming to my game or not?"

She 'playfully' tapped her bat to her other hand.

"TWERP!?" Lori's shout of rage momentarily distracted Lynn from her 'questioning'. There was a series of rapid thuds up the stairs, and a second later an enraged Lori Loud skidded to a halt next to the trio. She scowled and plucked Lincoln from the floor by his turkey tail, holding him aloft so she could shove her phone into his battered face; "what's the big idea- I go replace your stupid toy and you give me hate mail anyway!?"

One of Lincoln's eyes twitched open for a second, but it slid closed soon after as his mouth drew slack. His entire form remained limp and loose as the boy clearly passed from consciousness once more.

"Geeze Dudes," Luna poked her head out of her and Luan's door to survey the carnage. "What'dya do our Little Bro, he looks like he got in a fight with Vanzilla!"

"Well…" Leni tapped her chin. "Like; for the entire morning and a little bit after he was helping me model some clothing-"

"But before that he left his stupid headset in the bathroom again," Lori rolled her eyes. "And like I literally said, he sent me hate mail even after I went out to go get him a new one- again!"

"I just went and asked him to go to my game," Lynn huffed. "He's been sneaking around all day to try and get out of it, but he's the only one who hasn't gone this month and I need a full set for luck!"

"Sorry Lynn," Lana poked her head out of her room, head clad in a dark balaclava. "Linc's helping me break the frogs out from school, we've gotta go get 'em before the science teacher dissects them!"

"What are you talking about?" Lola pushed Lana aside with outrage, then thrust out her hand to the hallway to reveal a book gripped in it, "Lincoln was helping me read-"

A low voice came from the vent; "if anyone's interested-"

"Hey guys, has anyone seen Lincoln?" Luan called up from downstairs, "he's supposed to be helping me with my show later this afternoon!"

Lucy sighed in her dismissal.

"Got 'im here!" Luna called back, then folded her arms as she looked between the already gathered sisters. "Dang Dudes, sounds like we've had him flat out!"

"Yeah, who hasn't had Lincoln doing stuff today?" Luan wondered as she came up behind Lynn and Lori. "He's been octuple booked, and he's only got two arms!"

"Yeah… yeah, he has…" Lori frowned as she watched the boy sway slightly from her arm movements. "Hey Twerp, you alright there?"

Lincoln's finger twitched, but there was little other movement.

"Oh…" Lori found her hand gripping nothing as Leni swept the boy into her arms. "We're sorry Lincy, we should have like; used a schedule for you so we all got fair Lincy time!"

"Eh, I dunno Leni." Lana shrugged; "it's not like we plan most of this stuff ahead of time."

"Yeah, we just do stuff day-to-day." Lynn caught her bat in her hand again, "sure, my sports and Luan's stuff has kind a schedule, but that's just for the big games and shows, the rest is just what we feel like just then; not much room for a timetable."

"But Lincy totally has one of those!" Leni insisted, she held Lincoln by the waist with one arm and briefly popped into his room through the loose door. A second later she strode out, her Lincolnless hand now bearing an opened calendar aloft for all to witness, "see!?"

There was a murmur that ran through the sisters as they bunched up to see. And indeed, the paper calendar depicted that month with innumerable stickers in the image of the sisters' heads covering each and every day, completed with little written notes underneath of what they 'needed' him to do-

Save today, which just had 'help' written over it.

"Oh wow, how'd the little Dude even put this together?" Luna took the calendar into her hands and looked it over, "I mean, I only just talked to Sam about when we were gonna do the next sesh, and he's already got himself down for base next Tuesday, I hadn't even asked him yet either!"

"I was going to get him to be my caddy-" Lori's eyes widened as she pointed to her own planned golf day. "But I hadn't asked him either!"

"I don't get it, how could Stincoln know this stuff ahead of time?" Lynn wondered aloud. "The entire month's filled up already too!"

"If I may offer a solution?" Lisa piped up, as she wandered into the hallway crowd. "It's obvious that our 'lifestyle' within these walls follows a distinct pattern on a weekly basis, it is probable that between his constant involvement in our affairs and the personalities of certain Sister Units that Lincoln has developed a 'sixth sense' of sorts to determine the likely demands on his time-"

"That's literally ridiculous Lisa!" Lori exclaimed. "If there's anything this family is not, it's predictable."

"Yeah; who could guess I'd win at Tuno last night!" Lynn laughed, "ah, who am I kidding!? It was never a question."

"Okay, but seriously we're some of the most spontaneous people in town," Lori looked between her sisters. "How could Lincoln have the days we'd want him on picked out before we even knew we wanted him?"

"I dunno chief," Luna frowned. "Me and the band don't even have a set schedule or anything, we mostly just roll with the waves and see where we're at that week."

"HEY LUNA!" Lynn Sr called up. "THE BURNT BEAN WANTS TO KNOW IF YOU'RE STILL ON FOR SATURDAY!"

"SURE THING POPS!" Luna called back, "SAME AS ALWAYS!"

She looked back to see the rest of the sisters staring at her with blunt accusation, "what- oh," she deflated a little. "I guess I might be a little more railroaded in this life than I thought."

"Well, even I don't know where I'm going most of the time," Lana puffed her chest. "No way Lincoln can guess-"

"Mud puddle in the garden, or the park." Lola primly suggested while 'examining her nails' through her gloves. "Usually in the afternoon, but sometimes in the early morning when you think no one's looking."

"Oh, but I thought Lana went to the shelter in the afternoon to break out the animals!" Leni wondered aloud.

"Or the mall to see if any toilets need unclogging," Luna offered.

"Okay- well-" Lana reddened in embarrassment, and promptly turned on her twin with an accusing finger, "you just spend all your time doing frou-frou stuff!"

"Oh darling, anyone could have told you that," Lola chortled. "I-"

"You spend all day at homeschool!" Lana declared, "and when you're not doing that, you're doing all your weird spying for secrets, or playing tea parties in our room- the only thing besides that is all your show prep with Lincoln!"

"Well, I-" Lola paused as she thought for a moment. "… Dang it."

"What about Luce? She's pretty hard to keep track of!" Lynn insisted.

"Actually, no, he's got her here for…" Lori squinted as she read the fine text under the Lucy sticker. "Poetry Readings and Mortuary Practice?"

"Sigh," Lucy 'sighed from the vents. "It is true, our brother has determined the limited path I travel upon this mortal plain, surely only the release of death will grant my soul the freedom to-"

"Okay so Lucy's grim, so what?" Lynn shrugged. "We all know we've got hobbies and stuff, and a lot of that stuff has days you've gotta do stuff on. It's not like Lisa said we're uncreative or anything, we've just got passions and stuff that have timetables we've gotta meet, and Lincoln's got his 'Man With A Plan'," she doped up her voice for an accurate representation of Lincoln's self-appellation. "-Schtick. Of course he's gonna have all our stuff down pat at this point!"

"Oh yeah!" Leni clapped. "Like, that makes total sense Lynn!"

And there was approving murmurings through the group as the assorted girls were satiated by Lynn's proposition- ignoring Lisa as she rolled her eyes for some reason.

Then Leni continued; "I mean, how many times has Luan done April Fools this year? It's like; yeah, who wouldn't know it was coming?"

She laughed and some uncomfortable giggles emitted from the crowd before an uncomfortable silence settled over them as the implications of Leni's words settled in. The peppy blonde looked between her suddenly disturbed sisters with a fading smile, "girls?"

"Leni, could you just- could you just repeat what you said just now?" Lori's eyebrows furrowed as she focussed on a terrible thought.

"… girls?"

"No, before that." Lori looked up with pale lips. "You said that Luan's done April Fools more than once this year- right?"

"Um, like; I guess?" Leni frowned and looked between her sister's suspicious faces once again. "Did I say something wrong?"

"Ahem!" Lisa spoke up and hastily intervened. "I would suggest that perhaps Leni made a teensy error in her chosen words," her face twitched as she offered up two fingers held barely apart to demonstrate the depth of said error. "I believe Leni is inf act referring to separate incidents that she has mistaken for occurring during the same annum-"

"No." Luan shook her head with dread, "I remember, I remember doing April Fools twice- no wait-"

"More than that," Luna shivered. "You've done it a lot of times Dude."

"Hey…" Lana drew off her balaclava and stared at it intently. "Didn't we already break out the frogs from the school?"

"And I already replaced Lincoln's headset after I broke it on accident," Lori shook her head. "He even left the same message…"

"It's like we're repeating everything over and over again!" Lola's eyes widened and she grabbed onto Lana for support. "Oh Gosh! IT'S LIKE WE'RE IN THAT WEIRD MOVIE WITH THE BIG RAT!"

"Woodchuck Season?" Luna offered.

"T-THAT'S THE O-ONE!" Lola's arms tightened around Lana.

"She right." Lori gasped, "there's literally no other explanation- but who could've done something like…"

The group collectively turned their gazes to Lisa.

"Um, well-" Lisa's faced twitched as she attempted a smile. "I would suggest that perhaps you are all 'jumping the gun' so to speak? Luan's proclivities towards pranks could have resulted in her mistaking the date-"

"No, no Dude." Luna scowled at her. "We all know when April Fools is coming."

"And literally all of us remember being scared for weeks before each time Luan went psycho." Lori looked to the other girls. "Right girls?"

"Yeah!"

"Totally!"

"Didn't even get to sleep the night before…"

"So spill Lisa." Lori commanded the younger girl- swiftly housing her up by the back of her sweater as she backed away to glare at her face to face. "Or I'll Pretzel you. Then I'll tell Mom and she'll take away your surgery privileged again."

"I-I think you may be misplacing the blame here," Lisa spluttered. "Perhaps Lucy cast a spell from Great Grandma Harriet's book?"

"A: You don't believe in magic-" Lori snapped.

"That was before the 'business' in Loch Loud-" Lisa sourly remarked.

"-And B," Lori drew nearer, "Lucy usually asks us before she does something weird. You never do."

The family's stares bored into her in silent agreement with Lori's accusation, and try as she might, Lisa couldn't find a single supporter in the many faces of her siblings.

"… Fine," Lisa sighed, then suddenly found her free hand grabbed by Lori's own. "Wait, stop-"

Lori's fingers pried a little handset from Lisa's hand, before tossing her to Lynn who nimbly caught her. "Search her."

"Will do!" The Athlete promptly flipped the protesting genius down so that she was held aloft by her ankles, and began shaking her down.

"I must protest this-" assorted devices starting falling from various nooks and secret pockets the scientist had secreted away into her clothes, "-insufferable and barbaric treatment of a prisoner!"

"Tell it to the U.N.," Lori laughed, "oh wait; you're literally banned again."


Upon verifying that Lisa was clean of any inventions by the usual methods, and then subjecting her to a few more extensive examinations to be sure; the sisters gathered their parents and informed them of their discovery and Lisa's 'suspected' part in it.

Needless to say, neither Lynn Sr nor Rita was pleased.

Finally, under threat of not only losing her surgical privileges but also being banned from all experimentation on her siblings for a year, Lisa gave in and invited them to her bunker to explain.

"So, young lady," Rita stood in the metal-lined bunker with the rest of her family- Lisa's arms each gripped by one of the twins beside her in their 'guard uniforms' to prevent any 'funny business'- "what exactly have you been doing down here?"

Lisa gave her arms an experimental wiggle, but the grips of the twins remained too solid for her to even get a millimetre of give. She drooped and finally accepted her defeat with a huff; "very well… please turn your attention to the large machine in the far back of the bunker."

"Uh, which one Dude?" Luna queried in confusion, "there's a million machines in here!"

And indeed, the bunker was filled with Lisa's countless inventions, and more than a few of them in the back were quite 'large'.

"The white device resembling a dryer," Lisa sighed- and indicted as best she could with her restricted hands. The family collectively followed it to was very clearly-

"Is that my old dryer!?" Lynn Sr gasped and rushed over to what was very clearly an aged clothes dryer- albeit one with several new knobs and switches at the control board, "I thought it was thrown out after it gave out!"

"Our Maternal Unit engaged in creative license in order to obtain a suitable excuse to replace the device due to long standing performance issues," Lisa primly asserted as the rest of the family filtered through the maze of her interventions to gather around the thing. "Fortunately, it was the perfect size to make for a suitable chassis for my invention, so I recycled."

"And what exactly does your 'invention' do Lisa?" Rita hurriedly questioned, eager to avoid her husband's own betrayed inquiries. "Why do we keep repeating the same things over and over again?"

"Well, it's actually quite simple." Lisa nodded to her machine; her arms still contained. "The Refresher Three Thousand has the ability to create a localised time loop. This permits a perfect scientific method to be used, as all variables- save the initiator of the loop of course- are reset to a pervious configuration. All manner of scenarios may be test ad infinitum, thus allowing for the most precise separation of contributing factors ever conceived!"

"So, we're literally in Woodchuck Season?" Lori's eyes widened, "oh my God- how long have we been doing this!?"

"Oh, no need to worry Elder Sibling Unit," Lisa gave a little laugh, "due to the potential issues with largescale displacement of time, I have largely restricted the use of The Refresher to particularly interesting incidents that were worthy of study, resulting in only few weeks of lost time here and there."

"Oh, okay…" Lori sighed.

"Hey!" Lana tilted her head in curiosity, "if we're all repeating stuff, how come we're remembering it? I mean, shouldn't we all forget or somethin'?"

"Indeed," Lisa's smug tone soured as she reviewed the assorted family around her, Lincoln still limply held to Leni by one of her arms. "It appears that certain incidents," she glared at Luan, "were more deeply ingrained into the subconscious of the participants due to various factors."

"So that's why I remember breaking out the frogs already!" Lana snapped the fingers on her free hand.

"Oh, and the extra Christmas we had this year!" Lynn Sr echoed. "… And the Halloween…"

"I didn't mind," Lucy's voice quietly issued, prompting a little jump from the family.

"Indeed," Lisa dryly remarked. "I believe that the subconscious recognition of these events resulted in a compulsion to repeat said patterns, and as they happened to coincide with each other on one day; our tendency to requisition Lincoln's 'services' induced a 'critical overload' so to speak."

"Lincy got all used up?" Leni hugged the non-responsive sibling closer to her chest. "Aww, don't worry- I'll get you a nice get up and go smoothie that'll make it all better!"

Lincoln's eyelid might have twitched up.

"Well, Lincoln getting 'used up' or not, I think it's time to put an end to this." Rita put her hands on her hips, "don't you young lady?

"What!?" Lisa gasped, " but my research-"

Lana narrowed her eyes and released her grip on Lisa's hand, nodding to her twin to keep her contained.

"It's too much Brainbox," Luna exclaimed. "We've gotta try new stuff or we'll go outta style!"

"Yeah! Don't get me wrong I'm all for April Fools," Luan insisted, "but I don't wanna keep redoing the same routine!"

"And the rest of us don't deserve to literally suffer through that multiple times a year," Lori shuddered, "or just do the same thing over and over again. Like, what if I never move out- I'd never get to marry Boo-Boo-Bear!"

"You demand I cease my research for your banal self-interests!" Lisa spluttered; "never! The cause of science demands exact results and a perfect testing ground- what else but a repeating time zone could provide such known variables to work with-"

DSHHNwwwwwnnnn

There was a heavy whine from the machine, prompting Lisa to stop mid-sentence. Lana wandered out from behind the repurposed dryer holding the power cord, "hey, found the plug." She held up the object in question. "Thought it would be easier to just yank it than see if Lisa pulled something if let her at the controls."

"That was very smart sweetie." Rita knelt down and ruffled Lana's hatted hair as best she could. "Just for that, you get to skip tonight's shower."

"Aw right!" Lana held up her hands in victory.

Rita smiled for a second more, than stood up and sternly addressed Lisa;

"Lisa, your surgery privileges are revoked for a month,"

"-But"

"Three if you try this again, and you're going to take this 'device' apart in front of us so we know you won't."

"Dang it…"


A/N:

Thanks to Nuuo for Beta-reading.