Author Notes - The amount of people who have read and enjoyed this story written entirely out of spite for a cartoon episode is kind of amazing. And each and every one of you readers is awesome for it.

But seriously, this is the final chapter! The fact that this story about Lincoln ending up in an abusive relationship is finishing so close to Valentine's Day, of all days, is a wonderful bit of irony that wasn't intentional, and I love it.

CHAPTER EIGHT - APOLOGIES ARE IN ORDER

That night, Lori helped Lincoln cover up his bruised eye with a little bit of makeup, just for that afternoon. Their parents didn't have to find out about this affair just yet, and the plan couldn't afford to have protective parental units trying to put matters into their own hands. Always having at least one person to cover for you was one of the greatest perks of having so many sisters.

Come the next day, the Louds had found Lincoln's friend group playing at Gus's Games and Grub; Lisa refused to elaborate on how exactly she managed to find them. So, it was arranged that this would be the location where the staged break-up would take place. Even when standing at the entrance, not quite inside the building yet, Bella felt unease. She growled at that white-haired boy standing next to her, and his little smirk too. Her fists were clenched, and she certainly would've used them too if it wasn't for the jock watching her every move right behind her.

'Don't. Even. Think. About it.' Lynn said, narrowing her eyes.

'If you pull literally anything,' Lori said. 'We will take action. So you better stick to the plan.'

Bella certainly didn't want ten angry girls on her case, so she merely groaned and accepted her fate.

'Alright,' Lincoln said. 'When we get inside, I go looking for my friends. Once we do, you show up, and then I-'

'YES!' Bella cried. 'I know! I was there when we discussed it this morning. Something something we break up something something you start it. Do I get to knock your lights out afterwards?'

'If you want that video to leak, then sure!'

She growled again, but managed to reign in her anger before she got herself into any real trouble. Lincoln went into the building first, with Bella following close behind him. Lori and Lynn remained outside the building, as to not bring too much attention to themselves, though Lucy was watching the boys and Bella from the shadows just in case she needed to alert them.

Lincoln found his friend group in just a few minutes. The guys - and their new female member - sat at their usual spot. A spot so usual for them that the waiters always knew they were at that booth, even if they didn't say anything about it.

'I keep telling you!' Rusty said. 'It just takes me a while to get into the groove.'

'Y'all always stay that.' Liam said. 'Ah don't think it makes a difference.'

'Pam's, like, six.' Zach said, giving Rusty a deadpanned look. 'You know that, right?'

It made tracking them down a lot simpler. Leaving a groaning Bella behind for a moment - as per the plan - Lincoln approached the fellas with a confident grin on his face.

'Hey guys!' He said, waving to them.

All five members of the group turned to him, giving him looks of utter shock. It was as if they couldn't even believe that he was truly there instead of hanging out with that girl.

'Is… that Lincoln?' The new girl asked. 'He's got the white hair.'

'Okay, good.' Clyde said, sighing in relief. 'I thought I must've been hallucinating again…'

Aside from this brief exchange, his friends remained silent. It bears repeating that they hadn't seen him once over the past week or so, since he could never even make it to them until Bella swept in and took him away.

'Look, I know it's been a while,' Lincoln said. 'But I'm finally back!'

'Is that girl still with you?' Rusty asked, narrowing his eyes.

Lincoln wanted to reply to this statement, but Bella decided that this was the time when she would enter, instead of waiting a couple more seconds.

'LINCOLN!' She yelled. 'Where are you?'

She stomped her way onto the set, apparently refusing to wait for her cue and giving up on appearing so kind and sweet now. Immediately upon seeing her approaching them, Zach groaned.

'You gotta be kidding me…' He muttered.

Bella adopted the kind of smile someone gives you before they snap and stab your eyes out. Her eyes twitched incessantly, and Lincoln was just slightly worried she would try to kill him at any moment.

'What are you doing with them, Linky?' She asked, her fists twitching too. 'I thought you said you were gonna go out with me.'

The guys - minus the highly-confused girl - looked about ready to throw up their hands and storm off in frustration. Well, except for Clyde; he appeared to be on the verge of spiralling once again. That all changed when Lincoln put up his hand like a stop sign, right in her face.

'No,' He said. 'I didn't. I never said that. You try really hard to convince me that I'd said and done things that I didn't. And it worked a few times too. But I'm not falling for it anymore.'

'B-But Lincoln-' She said, before he interrupted her.

'I get that relationships require compromise, but what we had wasn't 'compromise'. I didn't see you giving up a lot of your time for me. And the way you keep trying to tell me that I did things that I didn't isn't helping your case much either. And, of course, you bullied me before and you still bully me now.'

He couldn't help grinning, just a bit. While this set-up may have been staged, the words he was saying certainly weren't. Every word that came out of his mouth was genuine. The result of all the crap that this girl had put him through. All the things he wanted to say before but couldn't in fear of terrible retribution.

It was simply amazing.

'Lincoln, I-' Bella said, before she was interrupted again.

'I'm not putting up with this anymore.' Lincoln said, putting his hands on his hips. 'So, starting from right now, you and I are through. Goodbye!'

He got one last look at her shocked face full of indignation, and turned around to give his friends a smirk. They couldn't look more surprised. Even though he couldn't see her, he knew that Bella was about to murder him and would've done so if there weren't so many witnesses about.

She adopted the fakest smile you can imagine. 'Oh well, I suppose it wasn't working out anyway. What a shame. But I guess that's the way the cookie crumbles!'

Clyde winced. 'Are you okay, Bella?'

'I'm fine!' Her twitching eyes proved otherwise.

Despite how obviously not fine she was, she left the building with that same fake smile on her face. She spoke not a word to Lori or Lynn as she passed them, nor did they say a word to her. Her nervous grin and their death glares said more than words ever could. The two sisters kept their eye on her until she vanished behind the corner, muttering curse words to herself.

Lincoln's friends stared at him, unable to say a word until he sat down right next to Clyde.

'Does this mean y'all are back and we don't hafta worry about that there lassie again?' Liam asked.

The white-haired boy nodded. 'Oh yeah! Look, sorry for the absence. That won't happen again, I promise.'

The fellas greeted him with smiles, as though he had never left.

'You don't have to apologise.' Clyde said. 'We understand.'

'Yeah, there was something kinda off about that girl.' Rusty said, narrowing his eyes a little. 'Can't say I liked her very much.'

As he sat there with his friends to play catch-up, Lincoln decided not to reveal his black eye to them, preferring to keep the gritty details between him and his family only.

'Uh, I don't really know what we're talking about…' The girl said, before waving. 'But hey there, Lincoln! My name is Stella.'

It felt so good for everything to go back to normal.

After much discussion - and plenty of persuasion from Lola - the Loud Kids decided it was for the best to reveal the black eye to their parents. It wasn't an easy choice, but what tipped the scale in favour of 'tell them' was one simple fact: they were gonna find out eventually. It was the sort of thing that would be revealed after some sort of crazy shenanigans, such as getting splashed during one of Luan's pranks or Lily getting (erm) creative with her 'yellow arches'. Or simply forgetting to put the makeup on after a shower.

So, they figured it was for the best to bite the bullet now. While his sisters were watching over him from the top of the stairs, the boy approached their parents while they were watching old people falling out of boats, when…

'LINCOLN!' Rita yelled, almost jumping to her feet in shock. 'What happened to you?!'

Rita stared at the injury in terror, with Lincoln unable to do anything but smile nervously. Lynn Sr was in no position to say anything in this discussion, because the mere sight of a black eye on his son had made him faint onto the carpet. Lynn Jr had to quickly step in and push him into a more comfortable position, so he wouldn't wake up in pain.

'Uh, sooo…' Lincoln said, rubbing the back of his neck and looking anywhere but his mother. 'You know Bella, that girl I was dating?'

'You mean the same girl that your father needed to prepare a five-hour-long party celebrating?' Rita asked, still quite shocked.

'Yeah, that one. She… she was the one who did this to me.'

'She WHAT?!'

That was enough to spring her to her feet. She rushed over to her only son and placed her hands on his shoulders, feeling only a little relief when he gave her a genuine smile.

'Are you okay?' She asked.

He nodded. 'It still hurts, but it was all she did to me. Physically at least.'

Rita scowled. 'Oh, I am going to teach that girl a lesson!'

'No, Mom! You don't have to do that. My sisters and I have already taken care of it. I've broken up with her, and I don't think she'll be causing any more trouble. If she did, she'd have my sisters to deal with.'

'Oh thank god…'

Rita sat on the floor and leaned back a little, sighing in relief. It still made her cringe to see that black eye, though. She knew that her kids - Lynn and Lola especially - could get rather violent when angry, and all-out dustball brawls were far from rare, but she hadn't seen an injury quite like this to be the result.

'I'll be having a chat with her family later.' She said. 'Preferably, one that won't get you labelled as a 'tattletale' at school.'

'That would be nice.' Lincoln said.

'But, there's just one thing I don't understand. I know that most - if not all - people who end up in a bad situation like that are not there by choice, but… how did it end up happening to you?'

Lincoln gulped, glancing back up at his sisters for just a moment. His first instinct was to admit the truth, that it was his sisters who got him caught up in this. But he couldn't bring himself to do it.

'Well, she was kinda cute.' He said. 'I-I guess she was so cute that I didn't think about how mean she seemed to be.'

He could tell by his mother's facial expression that she wasn't really buying it. Any chance of her believing it went out the window pretty quickly.

'THAT ISN'T WHAT HAPPENED!' Lola shouted. 'That's not even close to what happened!'

'Usually, I'd get mad at your tattling…' Lana said. 'But I was just about to say that he's lying!'

'And not even well.' Luna remarked. 'The little dude's a lot smarter than to let her 'pretty' looks fool him.'

'It was all our fault, Mom.' Leni said, slumping over just a little.

Rita did a double-take. 'Wait, it was your fault? How, exactly?'

Lori, by virtue of being the oldest, decided that she should be the one to deliver the truth. After all, none of the other sisters could quite bring themselves to do it, lest they admit their horrible mistake. The eldest sister could hardly even look her mother in the eyes.

'You see, Mom…' Lori said, rubbing her elbow. 'When Lincoln admitted to us that he was being bullied by a girl, we told him…' She sighed. 'That she was bullying him because she liked him.'

'You WHAT?!'

Rita jumped to her feet once again and shouted loudly enough to stir Lynn Sr from his 'nap'. The patriarch looked around in confusion, as though he had been out for hours, and screamed like Leni once he saw Lincoln's black eye again. Fortunately, he didn't faint this time.

'I'm sorry,' Rita said. 'You told him that she liked him?'

Lori nodded, and hung her head in shame. The other sisters, even Lily, did the same, all at once too.

'Why would you tell him something like that?!' Rita demanded.

'Wait, they told Lincoln what?' Lynn Sr asked, still really confused. 'That kind of advice sounds… unhelpful at best. There's… so much to unpack there.'

'There's so much to unpack,' Luan said. 'That I think we're better off throwing out the whole suitcase! Get it? … No, but seriously, we screwed up big time.'

'Even if we assume that you were right,' Rita said. 'Which wouldn't be very likely, bullying someone is a terrible way to show that you have a crush on them! And Bella is eleven. She's more than old enough to know it isn't right. By the looks of things, it seems like what she actually liked was beating him up!'

'Unfortunately,' Lincoln said. 'You're right. She just really liked torturing me, and I have no idea why.'

Rita looked up to the stairs and gave each and every one of her daughters that look - you know the one. The kind of look a kid always fears getting from their mother. The kind of look that would make any kid tremble in their shoes.

'Girls,' She said. 'We'll be having a very long talk about this one. And there's a good chance it'll end with every one of you - except for Lily, of course - getting grounded.'

'A just punishment.' Lisa said, before she crossed her arms. 'Though I can't say I'm happy about it.'

'And I can't say I'm happy with you roping Lincoln into something like this. This advice was as poor as it can get. I never bullied your father when we were first dating, because that isn't how you treat someone you like. Or anyone, for that matter. Lori doesn't treat Bobby like that. Were any of you planning on bullying your crushes to show that you 'liked' them?'

Leni, Luna, and Luan immediately shook their heads. Lynn scratched the back of her neck, while the younger sisters exchanged nervous looks.

'Mean!' Lily declared, seemingly the only one willing to answer so confidently.

'To be honest,' Lucy said. 'If I couldn't convince my, erm, 'friend' to sign a deal with me… I was thinking about bullying that Rocky kid at school. I-I thought it'd be a good way to get him to notice me, since no one ever notices me anyway.'

'You're actually considering doing that?!' Lynn Sr cried.

The younger sisters, minus Lily, remained silent. All they could do was nod with an unimaginable amount of shame.

'Well, was.' Lisa said. 'To say the least, we're not considering it anymore.'

Lynn Sr sighed in relief. 'Okay, that's good. But I really have to wonder what kind of lessons we've been teaching you.'

Lori stepped forward. 'It's my fault, Dad. I think they all got the idea from me. I'm the oldest, so I'm supposed to be responsible, but… but I ended up putting Lincoln in an awful situation.'

'Hey, let's be fair.' Lincoln said. 'It shows up a lot on television too. I think at least a couple episodes of Dream Boat had that plot too.'

Rita sighed. 'Okay, I understand that you all had good intentions. You were seriously just trying to help out your brother. But we'll still need to have a talk about it. Do I make myself clear?'

The Loud sisters all nodded at once.

'Good.' Rita said. 'Lynn, get Lincoln an ice pack for that black eye. I'll have a talk with the girls right here.'

'On it.' Lynn Sr said, taking his son with him to the kitchen.

Once the two boys in the household had left the room, Rita gave each and every one of her daughters that infamous look. That look was reserved just for when the Loud kids really screwed up, which happened just enough for the expression to be rare but easily identified.

'Alright, girls.' Rita said, with a tone making it clear she didn't really want to have this discussion. 'Let's have a little talk about what happened.'

'I know I've said this about five times now, but seriously… we are so sorry for what our daughter did to your son, Mrs Loud. If there was ever a time for military school, it would be now.'

'That's really not necessary, Mr Walker. Just as long as she knows what she did wrong. She's still young yet. But, you know, look out in case it gets worse.'

'Absolutely. We will definitely be taking her out of school though.'

Rita's phone conversation with Bella's father went far smoother than she was expecting - she had been anticipating a father who yelled about how 'his daughter could do no wrong' and how it was Lincoln's fault that he 'could not stand up for himself', or something equally dumb. Instead, Mr Walker was set to rightly punish her daughter for her awful actions, just as Rita wanted. It restored her faith in humanity just a little bit.

At the same time, Lynn Sr was at the school, telling Principal Huggins about what went down at his own school. Something something 'no bullying policy', which Lynn Sr knew from experience was complete nonsense, if his fifth-oldest daughter was any indication. Still, it couldn't hurt to try.

Meanwhile, all the Loud kids were in the living room, and for once it wasn't to watch TV or cause general mayhem like they usually did. The five younger sisters were spared from any grounding, since they were so young. The older sisters, meanwhile, were considered 'old enough' to receive a two-week grounding each, something they gracefully accepted. Lincoln sat in the middle of the couch, with an ice pack pressed up against his black eye after denying Lisa's (most likely dangerous) treatment for it. The boy found all of his sisters surrounding and staring at him, each with that same puppy-dog look. At least, he assumed Lucy was giving him that look too - it wasn't easy to tell with her eyes so hidden.

'Okay, I get it.' Lincoln said. 'You're sorry. I accept your apology.'

'Do you want some more ice, brah?' Luna asked, leaning forward just a little.

'No, it's-'

'If you need more pillows, I can give you some of mine.' Lola said.

'That won't be-'

'There won't be any jokes at your expense next April Fools.' Luan said. 'And that's a promise!'

'Okay, I like that, but-'

'I promise I won't perform any more experiments on you without permission.' Lisa said. 'I promise.'

'You should really have that standard for everyone, but-'

'What about-?' Lana was about to ask.

'GUYS!'

Lincoln managed to get them all to be quiet for a moment. As he looked at their shocked faces, he couldn't help feeling a little guilty for yelling at them when they were just trying to help. Still, there was only so much doting that he could handle.

'I get it.' He said. 'You feel bad for hooking me up with… that girl. But it's fine! You meant well, and I'm not in a relationship with her anymore, thanks to you! I know you're sorry, but I forgave all of you yesterday. Why are you making such a fuss about this?'

'Come on, admit it.' Luan said with a grin. 'You like being able to get your way now.'

He shrugged. 'Yeah, kinda. But you guys really don't have to do this.'

'Okay, here's the deal.' Lori said. 'Today, we dote all over you. Tomorrow, we treat it like it never happened. Does that work?'

'Fine with me. Oh, except for Lisa and Luan's deals. They get to stay permanently.'

He ignored the slight glare that Lisa was giving him, though Luan's look only lasted a few seconds before she started laughing.

'But what if that mean girl comes back?' Leni asked. 'I don't think being expelled is going to stop her. … Will it?'

'Oh, she ain't coming back.' Lynn said. 'Wanna know how I know? Because she knows she has us to deal with. And she's practically a twig compared to me!'

'And I've been informed she will end up in the underworld if she doesn't change her ways.' Lucy said. 'I hear that's a bad fate for other mortals.'

Lincoln chuckled. 'Okay, I see we won't be letting this one go. You know what? I think we're in need of a group hug!'

His sisters - even the more touch adverse like Lisa and Lucy - took the offer and brought him into a massive hug that he was in the centre of. It was a little suffocating, something guaranteed in a household so big, but as loving as you'd expect a hug with so many sisters could be. Lincoln already had enough, but his sisters loved it, so he stayed in the middle of it all for just a little bit longer.

After a little while, he truly had enough. 'Okay, I get it!' He said with a smile. 'The hug's gone on long enough.'

As per his command, his sister backed off. Well, most of them did. Lily still hung into his chest, burying her face into his shirt.

'Winky is aw'ome!'

Lincoln couldn't bring himself to move her, so he let her stay there, as though she was a cat sitting on his chest. He lifted her into his arms and held her a little closer. It was kind of impressive; Lily could literally throw her, erm, 'produce' at his face, and he would forgive her thanks to her cuteness. She must've known.

'There's one thing we're gonna change, though.' Lori said. 'We won't be meddling in your life so much anymore. That literally just leads to trouble…'

'Hey, you don't have to stop it completely.' Lincoln said. 'A liiittle bit of meddling is fine. Just a little. We gotta look out for each other, after all.'

Lori grinned. 'Well, in that case… if you still want a girlfriend, Bobby has a little sister about your age. She seems really tough and mean on the outside, but she's actually a really nice girl. So, if you want…'

'Yeah, maybe. I'll probably be taking a break from relationships for a little while now. I know most girls aren't like that, but…' He shuddered. 'It could be hard to forget and move on from something like this.'

'Then we won't force you into it for a moment.'

Lincoln relaxed in his seat with a big smile on his face. How lucky he was - no matter what happened, he could always rely on his sisters to be there for him.

THE END!

Author Notes - I prefer my stories to end on relatively good notes, so Lincoln doesn't have to deal with Bella anymore (hopefully) but probably won't be back in the dating game for a while. It was tempting to have it end a lot less happily, but the point of the story was to demonstrate the kind of damage the 'because they like you' mentality can bring. And I think I did a good enough job with that.

And there is the end of this approx. 27,000 word long story that was written purely out of spite for a random episode of a kids' cartoon. The relative success of this story still surprises me.