This is what some of you have been asking for, so I decided to make this one early and add it up with a special surprise for Lincoln and Luna. Anyway, enjoy this my readers.
Family of two.
Chapter 9. A visit and a surprise.
(The Loud House.)
The day has been set and it seems that the mother and son duo of the house are both dressed for someplace to go to.
Luna goes over everything they have. "Lincoln, did you pack your things just in case you get bored on the trip?"
Lincoln zips his back pack and he puts it on. "Got it mom and I am ready to go."
Luna smiles seeing this, Lincoln's early signs of the common cold have all but evaporated and he was back to being the healthy 11 year old kid she knows and loves and will always protect, she is also glad that he agrees to see Leni today once he was alright. He wants to know how she's been doing. "Okay, I got the overnight bag just in case we end up stuck in traffic or they're might be delays on the road. Let's get going kiddo." She carries the bag and they both head out of the room.
They both get down the stairs and they see Great Grandma Harriet waiting for them at the bottom with the vacuum cleaner moving on its own. "I presume you are both ready to go now."
"Yeah, we are." Luna looks to her son, he smiles because he knows that it's the right thing to do. "We're gonna go and see Leni."
Harriet smiles hearing that. "It is the right thing to do, to see how she is after all that has happened. The one person who has a kind heart within the family and did whatever she could to make everyone happy, but fell for her own low leveled situation and only made things worse. But she is in a way family to the two of you. Do not tell her about me, otherwise she might freak out or something, I shall present myself to her when the time is right."
Luna and Lincoln nod. "You will take care of this house right?" asked Luna.
"I have been known to do this for a really, really long time. Also, this was my house form before, so technically this is my home and I still own it. Sort of."
Lincoln and Luna then say they're goodbyes and they both leave the house and they get into Luna's Ferrari. "We'll be back later in the day, or maybe tomorrow if we have no choice but to stay overnight at Bay City" replied Luna. They then drive away and they're off.
Great Grandma Harriet waves goodbye to them, then she sees them still in view, she's waving, she's waving, she's waving, she's waving and …. They're out of sight. Harriet goes back inside the house and she sees the walkie talkie and she picks it up. "Clyde, Jordan. If you two can hear me, then it is time."
She then puts the walkie talkie down and she looks outside and then she sees lots of construction vehicles have arrived, Harriet smiles seeing this and opens the door to the house. "Glad you all came, now we can get started."
Rick and Jesse Rosato go over to her. "Well, it is umm …. Well it's nice to meet you Harriet" said Rick nervously. "Wow, I have never encountered a ghost before."
"Just as long as there aren't anything racist involving ghosts and movies, then I'm okay with it. Now we should get to work on the house. I still technically own this place and only I have the word to renovate this place and make it safe and secure for Lincoln and Luna."
The others also agree, though some of them are freaked out by the presence of the former resident of the house still living there. Let's do a head count and see who are in this. Clyde, Jordan, Rick, Jesse, Sandra Merris, Danny StoneHeart, Sam, Chunk, Sully, Mazzy, Liam, Zach, Tristen and Dr. Kendrick? What is he doing here?
They all look to the man who was the doctor to Lincoln and Luna's injuries. "What? I know how to do home renovations and I am capable of managing with electronics."
Rick then lays down the blueprints of the place. "Alright, so here's the plan. We all split up and we get to do some renovations to make this house less of a wreck and more of an adaptable living place."
"Jordan, Zach and Rusty. You kids will be responsible for removing some of the debris that we clear out and afterwards offer some assistance to the others."
"Liam has worked on a farm, so he has the strength and the endurance to do lots of work, so he's going to help StoneHeart and Chunk move some of the lumber needed for the whole thing."
"Jesse, Merris and Tristen will be doing kitchen and bathroom renovations."
"Sam, Sully and Mazzy. You three will be on replacing the doorknobs and any loose and critical fixtures, please use gloves and other safety gear."
"Kendrick and I will be on electronics to the house, we'll also be offering out help to the rest of you who need it."
"And of course Harriet will be going around to assist in things, oh and Clyde is cooking the food we'll be eating on our breaks."
They all agree. "Okay, so we all have our tasks. So let's do this thing!" said Jordan.
"Yeah!" They all role out and maneuver through the front yard and get to work, they even do some renovations to the basement and the garage and try to be careful with the other bedrooms of the former residents.
Just then someone else puts on a hard hat and a hammer. "Just cause I'm old doesn't mean I can still do some work" said Mr. Grouse. "Count me in!"
They are all shocked by this, but they all appreciate the help. "Welcome to the team Bud Grouse" said Merris. They all get to work on fixing up the Loud House.
(North road out of Royal Woods.)
The Ferrari already bypasses multiple road side attractions and other places, but they are not planning to stop for them and neither is Lincoln even asking to go.
Luna is playing some of her music, not too loud as she drives. She then looks to the rear view mirror and she sees Lincoln reading his comic, he then stops and he looks out the window. "You okay back there son?"
Lincoln snaps out of his small trance and looks at Luna. "Yeah, I am. Just wondering how long till we get there."
"Well, Bay City is a long way to go. Let's just hope that this long stretch of road doesn't have any delays like traffic, otherwise we'll have to spend the night at a motel" replied Luna.
They both remain silent for a few short minutes. "Do you wanna visit Luan someday?" asked Luna. Lincoln thinks about it. Luna could tell he was thinking about it and that he's also troubled about the former prankster who was once their sister. "You don't have to think it through Linc, it was just a question."
Lincoln then looks to Luna. "Maybe I do wanna see her, like somewhere after a few more months. I still have some mixed feelings about meeting Luan again. After all that has been happening to all of us, and to think I thought she would at least have seen the signs that I wasn't feeling alright, then maybe we could've spared her the trouble of getting sent into an asylum."
Luna sighs and makes a right turn past a gas station. "Lincoln, she was blinded by her ambitions and her career. She wanted to make others happy, and we know that she wants to make all of us happy, but we can't fully blame her for not seeing you were struggling. She may also have a bit of a troubled mind to go by, so we can only assume she might be unstable. Combining both her demented prank self and her guilty conscience must be battling in her head, maybe we should check on her at January. How's that?"
Lincoln smiles and looks to his mom. "Yeah, that does sound like a good idea. Let's go with that one."
They then continue on the road to they're destination, then the radio changes into country. Making them both annoyed. "What the heck?!"
(Medical treatment and rehabilitation facility, Bay City.)
The purple Ferrari arrives to the location and finds a suitable parking space for them. This is a whole new city for Lincoln and Luna, Lincoln has been to Great Lake City so he's used to going someplace different, but to Luna this is her first time since she was four. She did had to go visit Pop-pop who was living in Detroit once.
Lincoln and Luna get out of the car and they look upon the large building to where Leni is. "This is it Lincoln, you ready?" asked Luna. She then offers him her hand to hold.
Lincoln holds her hand. "Ready to go and see Leni." They both walk into the large facility and through the doors.
As they go inside they can see some patients being tended too by the staff, some of the patients were wearing white and/or light blue clothes and most are just occupying themselves through TV.
Luna goes over to the desk. "Excuse me, we're here to see Leni Loud." She then presents the man her ID, and some papers.
Lincoln looks around and feels both nervous and sad. These people who were once part of human society, are nothing more than just lost causes and are struggling to regain what was left of them. He can see some are playing chess and some are being carried away by the staff for acting off. Lincoln felt sick in the stomach that Leni has to go through all of this, he feels bad that she was stuck in a place like this and not back in the comforts of their home.
"Lincoln?" Lincoln looks up to his mom. "We're gonna go see Leni now, are you okay bud?"
Lincoln sighs and nods. "Y-Yeah, let's go and see her." Luna could tell he was feeling troubled being there, and like him she too was feeling bad for having Leni be sent here. But this place was told they could help those who have some traumatic and/or brain problems, like Leni.
One of the employees leads them to the stairs and straight into a large room where they keep more of the troubled people.
As it turns out, the lower floor is where they keep the low intelligence people, or in other words Infant or shattered minds. Second floor is where they hold the people who may have little to know knowledge of things, or in slight words toddler minds, then the third floor has people who need help and feel as if they're intelligence is lagging.
Lincoln and Luna then see all of the patients there, the employee tells them to wait there while they go and get her.
Lincoln and Luna look around and see many of the people here are reading books and learning things they should and watching some educational TV. They see Teenagers, grownups and the elderly.
Then they see the employee come back and behind him, is her. Leni, the sweet-hearted 16 year old, wearing a light blue polo and pants. She's carrying some reading books that are advance in High School. The very sight of her is enough to make Lincoln and Luna happy, Lincoln looks to Luna and smiles Luna nods which means he can go.
Lincoln then walks towards Leni, and he also picks up some speed. Leni then notices Lincoln going towards her and her eyes go wide and she runs to Lincoln and they both embrace. "Linky!"
Lincoln and Leni embrace each other with some tears in their eyes. "I missed you so much Linky!"
"I missed you too Leni!" cried Lincoln as he hugs her. He missed this, he missed her hugs and her soft and caring voice. Next to Luna, he would also find comfort and safety within Leni and her warm hugs.
Luna then approaches them, Leni opens her eyes and she looks up. "Hey there Leni, we have to talk. All three of us." Leni understands and she breaks the hug with Lincoln, even though she doesn't wanna let go.
"Come on, let's sit someplace private" Leni leads them to four chairs and one table near the window. They look outside and this window has a clear view of the Bay City Zoo. "This is where is sometimes do my studying, or when I wanna look at the Zoo and see all the animals from the distance, the other people here don't know about this table. Only me."
They were amazed that she knew about this and is studying. "So, how are you doing Leni?" asked Lincoln.
"Well, I am trying my hardest with my learning skills, I have passed grade school and middle school knowledge" replied Lein. "Passing …. Kindergarten was a breeze as well, I really felt embarrassed going through that one. Now I see how you all feel when I mess up my words and think of something else instead of taking things seriously."
Lincoln and Luna see that she's hurting inside after understanding what they have known all about her. She then looks to them. "Be honest with me guys, please. Am I ….. Am I really that stupid? Or dumb?"
Luna wanted to answer her because she is the mature one in the conversation, but then Lincoln says it. "Yes. Yes you are Leni." They both look to Lincoln stunned at what he just said. Lincoln looks to Leni sternly. "Leni, I am going to be honest with you. You don't have the mind or even the knowledge to even know about anything, you only have the smarts in picking locks and fashion, but when it comes to even the basic things for teenagers and they're education you seem to drift off and forget what you were even doing and you have a hard time trying to remember things and even keeping secrets like surprise birthday parties."
Luna doesn't know what else to say, that was something she might say but not too much. Luna then sees Leni looking at Lincoln as if she was listening for once, and she also has some tears forming.
"You never understood what make the bed meant from Lori, you wouldn't understand the meaning of a small competition between siblings and bets, you always spoil the surprise, you call playing with a 6 part babies puzzle your lifework, you once thought that the kitchen really was outside through the signs, you would run into walls when you already see them, you would take things way too seriously when we were pretending, you thought Lori was going to get you a dress, you didn't understand the meaning of each part of the car and made up your own term of a language for it and said that it was named after a country for you, you barely understand the games we do or even the rules, you always come to some of us for your homework when most of us don't do advanced high school knowledge, you didn't take the whole flu epidemic seriously, you barely understood every metaphor and sarcasm from us and to top it all off, because of your little to know brain span, you fell for the others belief and thought it was bad luck! And you didn't even see how I was suffering when the models and the bouncer beat the living crap out of me!"
Luna fell silent hearing that, and some of the people there slowly back up and try not to get involved in this. The staff send them back to their rooms, they all know who these kids are and why they're all here.
Lincoln then calms down and wipes away his tears. "But in the end, you always try your best to help us feel better, or make us feel wanted again and at most times you do have some slight knowledge when it comes. You're a kind-hearted soul, and I know you would never truly mean to cause me any harm, the only time I get hurt from either you and/or Luna is when we all fight for something, something we all greedily want."
Hearing that was enough to make Luna feel bad, then Lincoln and Luna see Leni shedding tears and whimpering. Lincoln sighs. "Leni, I'm … I'm sorry, but you …. I had to be honest, like you asked."
Leni then stops her crying and wipes away her tears. "A tumor."
They looked to her confused. "What?"
"When I was brought here, they did some medical tests on me and they found the source of all my brain issues. I had a tumor in my head" replied Leni.
Lincoln and Luna are at a loss for words from what she said. "What?!" said Lincoln and Luna.
Leni nods. "It's true, when I woke up I had some stitching on my head and the doctor explained to me what had happened. While I was passed out they took the opportunity to perform some surgery on me, and as it turns out they found a really big tumor in my head and it was latched onto the part of my brain that is responsible for learning and remembering things, it neutralized the cells there. Resulting in the Leni you all had to endure, the Leni who can't do even a simple one plus one equation, but some part of my nerves was able to hone onto my talent."
"They asked me when I had my last proper checkup and I told them never, none of us have had any proper checkups from the doctor! Rita and Lynn Sr only gave us kid based checkups and they thought I was just fine, only having some slight memory loss, like normal people. But I'm not like normal people! I lost 16 years of proper learning and all they cared about was my happy nature and my talent for fashion, they didn't even bother to run a CAT scan for me, and now I know what that is!"
Leni then calms down and sees the stunned looks on Lincoln and Luna. "Yeah, so now you know the truth about me, the once great mature girl Leni Loud, or should I say Leni former Loud. After they ran the tests and got rid of the tumor, they sent me back to my room where I fully understood everything. Everything was clear to me now, I felt like I lost so much and I needed to regain all of it! Everything I lost! All of it!"
Lincoln and Luna can see she was in distress from now realizing the truth. "So, now I am working hard so I can be able to find my true self and be out of this place, but then I thought about it and I saw some of these people are like me and need my help. I know I can't help those on the lobby level, but perhaps I can help the ones up here learn the right knowledge. I am working really hard, so hard to be who I truly am and now I am also tutoring the teens, grownups and elderly here so they can also find a way back to society and be with their families, and I don't care if my time here is done, I wanna help them. I guess with my new found and learning view, it helps with my kind hearted nature."
Lincoln and Luna smile hearing this, she's learning, she's helping and she's doing her hardest. Luna and Lincoln knows that it was time to tell her. "Leni, we wanna help you get out of here. We wanna help you return back home, with us. Like now."
Leni is stunned and wife-eyed from what Luna had just said. "Leni, we know it's hard here and we're glad you're learning. But do you wanna come back home with us? Be a family again?" asked Lincoln.
Leni couldn't believe it, they wanted her to come back to Royal Woods, to be with her friends and her old school, to be family once again and to be accepted into society. But she only had one answer. "No."
Lincoln and Luna weren't surprised by this, they figured she would say that and they know that it would be her choice and not there's. She has changed and that was a good thing about her. Then Lincoln asks Leni. "Are you sure Leni?" Luna also wants to know.
Leni nods her head and smiles. "It's nice of you two to come by and see me to see how I was doing. But I'm not going anywhere until my time here is done and this is a good thing, I can also get my graduation permits cleared and even get to the high school graduation level. I'll leave when the time is right, when I feel like I am ready to rejoin society and be the new Leni people will know and love."
Lincoln and Luna both weren't disappointed at her choice. "Very well then Leni, but just so you know. We're lightening your sentence" said Luna. Leni is confused and looks to Lincoln.
"We were able to pull some strings with some help from our friends above the law and they said that you'll be released from here after … A year." replied Lincoln. "I-Is that okay with you?"
Leni is stunned, she only has to spend a year instead of five years? She then looks to the smiles from Lincoln and Luna, the two siblings who are now understanding and also, forgiving her. But she knows trust is one thing that is not easy to gain.
Leni smiles and looks towards them. "That …. That sounds okay, I'm fine with it. As long as I can still spend the next 11 months left of my sentence here to help the people and also help with the laundry duty I have been given, and I'm fine with it."
Lincoln then gets off his eat and hugs Leni and she hugs him back. Luna was happy to see all of this going so well, they were rekindling the shattered bonds they all once had, the bonds that made them siblings.
Leni and Lincoln then break the hug. "Okay, so enough about me being in this place" said Leni. "I wanna know how you two have been doing, as the mother and son duo of the loud house."
Luna and Lincoln were happy to tell them what they have been doing for the past 8 chapters and other two chapters from the "What If" scenarios. To Leni, this was all news to her ears, to listen to the great and not so great things Lincoln and Luna have been through.
(Skip, an hour later.)
Lincoln and Luna are now standing by the doorway of the facility and with them is Leni. "We'll come by and try to visit" said Lincoln.
"I look forward to it, and I also look forward to leaving this place after a year, and also seeing the girl you have been seeing Lincoln. She sounds really nice" replied Leni.
They then give her one last hug. "Goodbye Leni, see you soon" said Lincoln and Luna.
"I'm gonna miss you guys, but I know we'll see each other again, soon" replied Leni. They then break the hug. "and one more thing, I know that the last name Loud is no longer part of me anymore, and I know you two wanna offer me the name again, but no. I was able to make my own last name. So call me, Leni Lauren."
It is true that Lincoln and Luna wanted to offer the loud name back to Leni, but they were proud she was taking responsibility into her own hands. "Then I guess we'll see you again soon, Leni Lauren." said Lincoln. He then gives her one last hug. "Good bye Leni, I'm gonna miss you sis."
Hearing that last part was enough to make Leni smile once again and have hope in her heart. "Good bye Linky, I'm gonna miss you too little brother." She kisses his forehead and hugs him. They then part from the hug, Leni watches as Luna guides Lincoln back to the purple Ferrari, which Leni is amazed.
They hop on board, but they do one last wave goodbye to Leni and she waves goodbye to them as well. She then watches as the car leaves, and is soon back on the main road, back home to Royal Woods.
Leni sighs and heads back into the facility. She then puts on some reading glasses, she never told them about that, she gets the books and she gets ready to head in to help some troubled and distressed minds, the new Leni will be out soon.
(Royal Woods.)
It's now late in the afternoon and the Purple Ferrari arrives and stops near the house, but they don't come out yet. "Lincoln, we didn't tell Leni we were going to visit Luan next year" said Luna.
Lincoln sighs. "I know, I think we should only tell her when it is time, so she might be happy to know about it."
Luna smiles. "Alright then, let's get back inside and see what Great Grandma Harriet has been doing while we were gone for the day." Luna grabs he overnight bag.
Lincoln grabs his backpack. "At least we didn't have to face any traffic or any delays on the road, so we didn't have to stay at any motel."
They both come out of the car and they are shocked at what they see.
"Welcome back home Lincoln and Luna!"
Lincoln and Luna could see some of their friends, and loved ones. They look to the house and the changes it had. (See "What If" Scenario Crime Aftermath.) They then look to the others.
Sam and Jordan go to them. "So, what do you guys think?"
Luna faints seeing this. Lincoln, Sam and Jordan check on her if she was okay and so does everyone else.
Harriet is the only one who just watches. "Did not see that one coming at all." But she was lookin forward to how Leni has been doing, once Luna wakes up.
"Mom, wake up" said Lincoln with concern.
"Looks like the new house must've made her shocked out of her mind" said StoneHeart.
"Reminds me of when I was surprised by my family on my birthday" replied Mr. Grouse.
"She'll be fine when she wakes up guys" said Dr. Kendrick. "Once she sees the rest of the new changes with the place with you Lincoln. Then we'll explain things." And they had a lot of changes added to the house for Lincoln and Luna.
A/N: I hope this was okay, to let them visit Leni early and to do the renovations to the house early as well. Come soon, will be some time with Pop-pop. Leave a Review and tell me what you all think.
Date made: 5/15/20.