Spider-Man: LOUD Season 1 Chapter 9
"Gone Missing"
"And on more tragic news, the rate for one going missing is now at an all time high here in Royal Woods. Because of this there is now a mandatory curfew of 10 o'clock PM. Anybody caught outside later than this time will be fined. This is Katherine Mulligan, reporting only the facts. Back to you Linda."
The tv shuts off, Lola Loud holds the remote with a sorrowful look on her face, "Oh those poor poor people, unable to witness my beauty again."
"Lol's, you know people going missing is pretty serious right?" Her twin asked.
"Oh of course I do Lans, but I do believe people who go missing just need to be more careful, don't just trust anyone you meet, so I think it's their fault for going missing, and because of that I don't really feel bad for them." The blonde pageant queen expressed.
Lana furrowed her eyebrows, "Then…then what if I went missing? Would you feel bad then?!"
Lola put her hand on Lana's shoulder, "Of course I would! Nobody could replace my twin! As long as you're careful you'd never go missing. You promise to be careful, right?"
Lana nods her head and the two embrace for a second before breaking. "Well, I told Skippy I'd hang out with him today, I'll see you later Lol's!"
Lana ran out the door grabbing her backpack with a particular frog Pokémon pin adorning the left strap on it. Lola waved goodbye before standing up from kneeling in front of the coffee table to continue her day.
"Spider-Man log number…37? I don't remember, I don't keep track of these." Spider-Man swung through the city on patrol.
"What's new in the life of Spider-Man I ask myself? Well, people are going missing left and right, I put a metal Vulture in jail a few days ago and now my crush hates me, well…she hates Spider-Man, not…me." He talks to himself.
"And on that note, who the hell says crush anymore? That's an elementary school thing, I feel like in high school it's just the person you like. Which is also pretty stupid because you can like someone without it being a romantic type of liking."
He lands on a building and sits down on the ledge, "Ugh, romance is complicated."
Spider-Man looks down on the city, a certain red hat wearing character catches his eyes.
"Lana's hanging out with Skippy today?" Spider-Man falls backward onto the building roof with a loud sigh, "Even Lana has stuff figured out before me."
He sits back up and rests his head in his hands, "I'm starting to think it's less romance being complicated and more being a superhero is complicated." He sits to think for a while, his mechanical black lids shutting over his white lenses, "Still, can't complain, I did choose to be Spider-Man."
He hears a familiar buzz go off in a small handbag he's been carrying around. Opening the bag he retrieves his phone to see a text message from Clyde.
"I heard you and Jordan saw a movie together yesterday, did anything happen?" - Clyde
"Not really. We saw a generic romcom and both agreed it was pretty bad. After that I just walked her home and that was the end of it." - Lincoln
"Dang, sorry to hear that. You didn't try to lay the smooth moves on her? Like the thing they do in those exact movies where they stretch and put their arm around the girl?" - Clyde
"No, I'm too scared to do that. Plus, I'm worried that Jordan wouldn't like me if I did that." - Lincoln
"Something's gotta happen between you two sooner or later, I'll step in to make something happen if I have to." - Clyde
"No need. I'm fine with taking things slow for now, I've got a lot on my plate right now as is." - Lincoln.
"Oh yeah, I forgot that Lynn was moving out soon. How are you handling that?" - Clyde
"About as well as my other sisters moving out. Me and Lynn were never especially close to be fair, but it is still sad to see her go, she's my sister after all." - Lincoln
"True, and after she leaves you become the oldest sibling there. How does that feel?" - Clyde
"I honestly don't know. Sometimes I feel really scared about disappointing my older sisters by not being as good as them, but other times I feel confident that I can do a good job." - Lincoln
"Well, no matter what ends up happening, you know you can always call on me to help out." - Clyde
"Always, Clincoln McLoud forever!" - Lincoln
"Clincoln McLoud!" - Clyde
He puts his phone back in his bag and sits for a while, thinking about what to do next.
"This is Curt Conners, I've stumbled upon a scientific breakthrough." The scientist speaks.
He sits in front of a desk in a dark room inside of the sewers, recording himself talking.
"Lizards are the answer, they always were. My missing arm has been restored via lizard dna. But not just my missing arm. I've become stronger, faster, bigger, I've become a species that finally trumps humans in the evolutionary chain." He shakes as he speaks.
He reaches over to his desk and starts scribbling words onto a page "I need to share this gift to the world, but in order to keep the transformation permanent more testing is needed. I've found that younger humans tend to hold the transformation for longer. Older test subjects such as myself can't hold it for longer than a few hours at most, whereas younger subjects have been found to hold the transformation for days."
"More testing is needed, but I'm running out of subjects. I've been taking more and more people from the surface to test on them. People who are invading my personal space in the sewer, even people walking around at night are fair game to me now."
He puts his pencil down and grabs the camera, "After I show my research to the world we'll be unstoppable, everybody will change, everybody will finally see how superior we can be as a species."
He turns off the camera and stands up, walking over to another desk where he grabs a syringe with a green liquid inside before stabbing his arm with it. He shakes and convulses before falling over, his skin turning scaly and green.
"Bye Skippy!" Lana shouted to her friend as he waved bye before going inside of his house.
She turned to go home, the evening had already set in, the yellow-orange sky, the shadows of buildings casting upon the road and sidewalks. She walked past an alleyway, where a group of boys on bikes watched her from the shadows. One boy in note has fluffy red hair.
"Let's get her boys." The red haired boy orders the others.
They take off down the sidewalk toward the young girl. The sound of their bikes running across the pavement made her stop to question what the sound was when all of a sudden her hat was snatched off the top of her head.
"Ha ha! Loser!" The red haired boy shouted.
"Chandler? Hey! Give that back!" She ran after the boys on their bikes.
"If you want it you have to catch us!" He shouted back.
She chased them for blocks, getting slower and slower as the fatigue started to set in. She saw a pebble on the side of the road and a trash can near where the boys were riding past. She picked up the small stone and careful aiming threw it at the trash can, causing it to fall over and slam into the boys on the bikes.
They fell off their bikes, dropping the red cap. Lana ran over but before she could give them a piece of her mind, they'd already gotten up and rode off, leaving her hat behind.
"Yeah! You better run!" She shouted at them.
She picked up her cap and put it back on. Ready to face the long walk back home.
Back at the Loud house dinner was being set at the table. Rita setting the table with plates and utensils while her husband Lynn finished up cooking his signature Lynnsagna.
The mother looked up to the clock on the wall and sighed, turning to her husband in the kitchen, "Hey Lynn, has Lana come home yet? It's almost 6:30."
The man walked out of the kitchen with the dish of italian food in his mitted hands, "I don't recall her coming home. She should be home now, I told her to be home by 6."
The woman crossed her arms, "I can't help but worry. I mean, what about the new curfew? If she stays out any later she'll be in trouble."
"Well, hopefully she comes home soon. If not by seven then we set out to look for her." He sets the tray of food down and puts a comforting hand on his wife, "Everything's gonna be fine. I'm sure of it."
"I hope so…how did you become the rational one in these situations? Not 5 years ago you would've been screaming over this." She asked.
"People change I guess. I am still scared for her though." He replied.
Lana walked down a lonely road, night had started to set in, cold wind blowing on her. She held herself in comfort and warmth. She looked around worryingly.
"I can't be lost…can I?" She asked herself.
She continued to walk down the sidewalk before tripping and falling down a steep hill, her knee slamming against a rock and cutting it open. She fell to the bottom of the hill, a small trail of water lay beneath her.
"Ow, ow ow ow!" She sat down and looked at her knee, the cut went across her entire kneecap, other than breaking the skin no more damage could be seen.
Tears started to well up in the young girl's eyes as she tried to ignore the intense pain. She wiped them away and stood up, she started walking in a random direction with a limp. The wind blowing through the trees created an almost unsettling atmosphere for the girl.
She walked for a while longer before stumbling across a large open cement sewer opening under a bridge. She stood in amazement of the large opening before she started to hear things coming from inside.
"H-hello? Is anybody there? I'm lost!" She shouted to the opening.
More sounds of things moving came from the opening.
"Hello?" She said again, quieter and more fearful.
Soon after, a giant beastly silhouette came from the shadows of the opening. The sounds it made were almost otherworldly. She stood shocked in fear from what she was seeing for what seemed like hours, but was in reality only seconds.
She started sprinting in the opposite direction, occasionally limping from the gash in her knee.
"HELP! SOMEBODY! PLEASE!" She shouted at the top of her lungs as she sprinted.
After a minute of running and shouting for help she tripped over a rock and fell face first into the ground. She turned around to find the nearly 8 foot tall beast looming over her.
"No…please! Please, I'm just a kid!" She cried.
The Loud's sat at the dinner table feasting on their fathers delectable treat. Rita still had a full plate, she bobbed her right knee up and down, occasionally glancing up at the clock above her. 6:58 it read. She leaned over to her husband.
"It's two minutes before 7…we should start looking…" She whispered.
Lynn heard this and stood up with his wife, "Kids get your shoes on, we're looking for your sister."
"Why, what happened?" Lynn Jr. asked.
"Lana hung out with a friend today and hasn't come home yet, she was supposed to come home at 6." He explained.
Everyone got their shoes on and rushed to Vanzilla. They drove down the street in hopes to find Lana, calling out her name every few seconds.
"LANA!"
"LANA WHERE ARE YOU?!"
They all shouted in fear of their sister, except for Lola.
Lincoln sat back from the window and looked over his pink little sister, who was holding her knees up to her chest and hiding her face in them.
"Lola…" He said, the girl looked up to her brother, "We're gonna find her…she's gonna be okay." He offered her a sweet smile.
She smiled sweetly back at him. Tears formed in her eyes.
After 20 minutes of searching they came across a police scene. They parked and all got out of the car, rushing to the police.
"What happened here officer?" Lynn Sr. asked the black haired officer.
"Some cries that came from a little girl were heard by a few people living nearby. Someone recalled the girl crying for help." He replied.
"Oh no…" Rita whispered to herself.
"The person who called us managed to get this picture." The officer showed a picture taken from a cell phone on a tablet that showed an unconscious Lana being slung over some large green shoulder being carried into the sewer opening.
"MY BABY!" The mother shouted, grasping the tablet.
"That's your daughter?" The officer questioned.
Lynn Sr. grabbed his wife and pulled her back, "Yes, that's one of our daughters, she's only 11 years old…"
The Loud's were shaken at their sister's disappearance. Too scared to say anything. Lincoln stood there, his brows furrowing in anger.
"This is…this is my fault…" Lincoln was trapped in his own mind.
"If I had focused on being Spider-Man…on researching those missing people…" His thoughts become more clouded and filled with rage.
"He hurt Lana…" He thought.
"I'm gonna kill him…"
To be continued…
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