Well, it took me long enough to get it out, but here it is, the next chapter of kidnapped. Once again, this chapter is going to be lacking in the excitement category, but I think I made it intriguing enough. Sorry about the absence, I was temporarily distracted in the middle of writing this chapter, but I'm back with it again. I hope you enjoy this chapter of Kidnapped!

Chapter 7

"Lincoln..."

"huh? what is it? what time is it?" Lincoln woke up in his sister's room, nearly forgetting the events of the previous night. "What's going on?"

"Lincoln, go get yourself ready, we gotta go to school."

Lincoln rubbed his eyes as he sat up, and looked around the place that was normally forbidden to even enter except on special occasions. Lori was standing in front of her mirror applying makeup and getting herself ready for the day. He looked over at Leni's empty bed and stared at it for a solid minute before averting his gaze back towards Lori. She turned around right as he looked at her, giving her the opportunity to say something to him. "Okay good, you're up," she chirped. Then with a booming, yet relatively soft voice, told the boy, "Now go..."

Lincoln jumped out of the bed faster than a startled cat, and paced briskly to his room to make sure he was ready for the day. He slowly started recalling everything that had happened the previous night, from the moment he saw Lori sitting in her bed doing nothing, to the moment she told him Leni was actually adopted, to the moment he finally fell asleep. As it all came back to him, his mood became more and more depressed. He really didn't want to go to school today, but he knew that he already had more than enough homework to catch up on, which he wasn't looking forward to doing, so he forced himself to continue on.

The normal chaos ensued that morning with nothing out of the ordinary except for Leni's absence. Everyone did what they were supposed to, ate breakfast, then got into vanzilla to go to school. One by one Lynn Sr dropped off the kids at school, waving goodbye to all of them. When they got to the high school, Luan and Luna left and Lori was about to leave, but her dad stopped the young lady in her tracks, taking her completely by surprise.

"Lori!"

"Yeah dad?"

"I totally forgot to tell you. Your mother wasn't able to get today off and has to go to work, so she and I have decided that you're going to be staying with Leni today."

"I am?"

"I'm sorry I forgot to tell you, but yes. That's what your mother and I have decided."

Lori was quite confused by hearing this and even voiced complaint to her father, but secretly, she was glad that she didn't have to go to school that day. She was especially ecstatic about seeing how Leni was doing. Knowing that neither mom and dad could stay, therefore making her the one to watch Leni, came with a sense of pride. It wasn't just your typical pride that automatically comes with knowing you're the oldest, it was the fact that Rita and Lynn Sr actually trusted her and only her with this responsibility. It wasn't just that either. The only time that Lori had ever been in a hospital was when mom was pregnant so she only knew what happened there. But she was curious as to how things worked when a case similar to Leni's came along. With pregnancy, it's planned out. Everyone knows what to do and what's going to happen, but when someone is suddenly taken to the emergency room, nobody knows what's going on until just a few minutes after it happens, and Lori was more intrigued by wondering what went on than she would care to admit.

Lynn Sr drove to the hospital to drop Lori off and pick up his wife. He hated leaving any of his kids by themselves. If he had his way, he would have preferred to keep an eye on them himself, or for his wife to stay there, because then he would know for sure that everything was okay. But he trusted Lori enough to not only keep watch over Leni, but to let him know what was going on as well. It was always hard for him to leave any of his kids by themselves, but he knew that there were some cases where he didn't really have a choice. This, among many other instances, was one of them. Leni was not going to have parental supervision either way, but if Lori was there, then at least she wouldn't be by herself. Really, the only thing he was worried about with Lori staying there, was that she may end up getting too angry at Leni for some reason. But even with that worry, he fully expected her to stay calm and be totally in control of her emotions.

"Be sure to keep us updated," he said as his eldest daughter was walking away.

"Don't worry dad, I will..."

"Okay, love you..."

"Love you too dad..." and with that, he patiently awaited his wife to come to the van.

As Lori walked into the hospital, she was surprisingly nervous. It really wasn't that big of a deal that she was doing this, but there was something, some kind of aura in the air that made her completely jittery. It was so much so that she actually ended up forgetting what room Leni was in. Pivoting her foot, body following suit, Lori started walking to the reception desk. It would have been easier to ask her mom what room they were in, but the decision had already been made and Lori was already making her way to the desk. It was too late to turn back now.

"Excuse me," Lori stated. The lady at the desk looked up. "What room is Leni Loud in?"

"Oh! She's going to be in room..." the woman at the counter typed at her computer before responding again. "Room 327, on the third floor, and from here it's going to be just down the hallway to the left once you exit the elevator."

"Thank you," and with that, Lori continued on her way, entering the chrome door elevator and entering into it.

Lori didn't really know what to expect. It wasn't even an hour ago when she had been asked to do this, forgetting to even tell Bobby what was going on. Normally, she would be texting him non-stop, but for some reason, she couldn't even bring herself to reach into her pocket and take out her phone. All she could think about was Leni. Was she okay? Was she going to want to talk? Or was she going to want to stay quiet? Maybe Leni didn't even want anyone to be there. It was possible that she just wanted to be by herself for a moment after being bombarded by everyone all at once the previous night. Thinking more about it, Lori started to understand why Leni might want to be alone. If she was being completely honest with herself, Lori was kind of hoping that Leni would want some alone time, that way they wouldn't have to talk to each other or anything.

"Hey lady, are you gonna get out? We're at your floor."

"Huh... Oh! I'm sorry..."

Lori awkwardly walked out of the elevator and proceeded towards Leni's room. With each step she took, her tennis shoes echoed through the nearly empty halls. The fact that she wasn't wearing shoes with a hard bottom didn't make a difference. The squeaking well made up for it. Occasionally she would pass by a nurse carrying a clipboard, which she refused to make eye contact with, deciding instead to stare at the floor as they occasionally passed by. It felt like it was taking forever to get to the room and temporarily considered that she might have gotten lost. She nearly decided to get help from the next reception desk until she looked up at the wall and saw that she was only a few rooms down from Leni's. Those next fifteen seconds crawled by agonizingly slow as Leni's room slowly came into view until finally, she was there. The fear of not knowing what to expect made her freeze before she lifted her hand to open the door. It seemed to take even longer to force herself to grab the faded chrome handle, then more time to turn it. Finally, the door opened up to reveal the hospital room Leni was staying in. Lori's heart stopped for a split second as she took that first step into what she considered the unknown.

In a whiz, Rita jumped up from her chair and gathered her things. "Oh, wonderful. You're here. I've gotta go sweetie. Love you Lori, Love you Leni."

"Bye Mom!" Leni replied enthusiastically as they watched their mother pace briskly out of the room, almost slamming the door behind her. Leni looked at her elder sister with glee in her eyes, "Lori! You're here!"

So much for wanting some alone time, "Hey Leni. You doing okay?"

"I'm like, super excited! We get to hang out all day!"

"Yeah..." Lori wasn't too enthusiastic about this encounter. It wasn't that Leni was a pain to hang out with. Sure she was slow sometimes, and didn't really think about too many things, but if anything, despite the two of them having been around each other all of their lives, Lori preferred to be with Leni than most or even all of her other friends, except for Bobby of course. Lori was just down in general, feeling sorry for what happened to Leni. It wasn't unnatural by any means for her to feel like this, but why was it just now? Why was Lori feeling the most sorry for her sister a few days after it happened? It's not like anything much had changed, but for some reason, Lori couldn't help but feel different this time. It wasn't something she felt when they visited Leni last night, she didn't even feel like this when she woke up. There was something about seeing Leni one on one that made her feel strange.

Leni was staring intently at Lori, wondering why she was so down about this. And Leni, despite having gone through so much in the course of just a few days, couldn't help but want to make Lori feel better, assuming there was something wrong with her in the first place. "Are you okay Lori?"

There it was. There was the question that Lori was hoping wouldn't be asked. Once Leni asked that question, she wouldn't let up. Lori couldn't say yes or no, because for one, saying no would be a lie and Leni, even though she wasn't that bright, would see through it in a split second. If she said yes, then Leni would quite intently try to figure out why. Maybe instead of saying yes or no, Lori could pretend to ignore the question. Or better yet, address the problem without answering the question.

"Why are you worried about me?" Lori finally responded after thinking for a few moments. "You should be more worried about yourself."

"Lori..." Leni started. "We're sisters, we're supposed to be worried about each other."

"But your problems are way worse than mine are... I don't want you worrying about why I'm feeling down when you could be in a much worse situation."

"But I'm not. I feel fine!"

"That's not what I mean... I'm saying that there could be something wrong with you, because..."

"Because I was raped?"

Lori cringed from even hearing the word. She was completely taken aback by how blunt Leni was about it. She didn't even make an attempt to sugarcoat it, even though since it was just those two in the room, there wasn't any legitimate reason to. "Well, I wasn't gonna say that exactly..."

"Call it what you want, but that's exactly what happened."

As she starting thinking of a response, she realized that Leni wasn't wrong about what she said. Ultimately, Lori sighed in defeat, unable to think of anything. Normally she wouldn't give up so easily, but because of the way she was feeling, she decided it wasn't really worth it. "Yeah. I didn't want to say it, but... That's exactly what I was getting at."

Leni smiled and started back up again. "I'm not worried about what happened to me because... well... it already happened, and I can't do anything about it anymore. Besides, if you ask they doctors, they'll say that that's not even like, the worse thing." Lori was now intrigued. "Apparently my brain got messed up and now I have to take these pills that change something about my blood."

"Umm, is it blood pressure?"

"Yeah! That's it. They told me that it gets really high, like, super high. Like, so high that they almost couldn't measure it!"

"Wow, really?"

"I think so. It's way higher than any of my grades in school, so it has to be really bad. But it's not fun at all. I hate it so much. Whenever my blood press gets too high..."

"Blood pressure, Leni."

"Yeah, that. Whenever it gets too high, I start to like, feel dizzy and stuff and then my nose starts bleeding right before I fall asleep. The doctors said it's one of the worst cases they've ever seen. They even said they were surprised I didn't have a strike? Streak?"

"A... Stroke?"

"Yeah. I was like, really close to having one apparently."

"Wow... sounds terrible."

"It is, it's like, super tedious. I have to take one of these huge pills in the morning when I wake up, and then another one, like, right before I go to bed."

Lori was obviously feeling sorry for Leni, but at the same time, she was glad to know that her little sister was in good spirits about it all. Leni just kept talking and talking to what seemed like no end. The two of them talked about everything from school, to what's been happening lately. Lori even told Leni about how the previous day, Carol Pingrey thought it would be a good idea to mix two weird chemicals in the science lab. She didn't get hurt, but all of her makeup started melting off of her face and everyone started laughing at her. She got sent home for not following the correct procedure and because she had been embarrassed so badly in front of all her peers. Lori said it was one of the funniest things she ever saw. Leni wasn't too fond of making fun of people, but this sounded too funny for even her to not laugh.

"How's Lincoln doing? Is he okay?"

"Uh... yeah. Lincoln's fine. Why?"

"I just wanna know..."

"Okay..." This made Lori curious. Why was she so interested in Lincoln? More specifically, why did she ask if he way okay? He didn't get hurt recently, at least, not that Lori knew about. It would have been less conspicuous if she had asked about the others too, or even just one of them, but the fact that she was asking very specifically about Lincoln was something that she couldn't just ignore. Was there something that happened to Lincoln that only Leni knew about? Whatever the case, it was obvious that something happened with him that Lori didn't know about, something that only Leni and maybe Lincoln knew. And Lori, being as stubborn as she was, became determined to find out what it was even if it meant poking and prodding further than she wanted to.

The more time passed on, the more curious Lori became, and the stronger her resolve became to find out why Leni was so interested in Lincoln all of a sudden. Lunchtime had approached and Lori wasn't able to get any information from Leni about why she was so interested in Lincoln all of a sudden. It was like she was intentionally trying to avoid it. Maybe she wanted to talk to Lincoln about it. If this piece of information Lori was trying to purge out of Leni was bout him, then it actually made sense that she would want to talk to him about it. Maybe Lori shouldn't keep trying to prod Leni about it. Maybe Leni would even decide to tell her once she told Lincoln. No. She had to find out what it was.

"I'm gonna go get some lunch, literally, real quick. I'll be right back."

"Okay."

Lori got up from her chair and started speaking again, "Text me if you need anything, especially if you need me to come back."

"Okay Lori." Leni chuckled.

"Literally, Anything!"

"Okay," Leni couldn't help but giggle now. "Just go, I'll be fine!"

"Okay..."

With great hesitation, Lori finally left the room, taking long yet slow strides down the hallway. The sound of her footsteps were once again echoing throughout the hospital, seeming to get quieter with every step she took. Multiple times she saw nurses wheeling gurneys down the hallway, some of them being in quite a hurry. Most of them were just being transferred to different rooms, but the ones that looked really bad were quite the sight to behold. One of them was completely bandaged up from head to toe. "At least Leni's not in that state..." she thought. "I'd hate to see Leni like that..." Just the thought of Leni, completely covered up, being swiftly wheeled down the hallway made her stomach churn. All of a sudden, she wasn't that hungry anymore. Her appetite had completely vanished without a trace.

Lori stopped in the middle of the hallway and clutched her other arm that was still hanging to the side. Imagining Leni being rushed down the hallway made her freeze up. There wasn't even any reason to worry about Leni, she seemed to be fine. But her imagination got the better of her. Things that seemed impossible kept popping up in her mind without a way to get rid of it. It was terrifying to think about her little sister being in a state like that, nightmarish almost. It could have been so much worse. What if Leni didn't get away in time? What if Leni got even more hurt or even worse, killed.

Lori shook her head and started walking again, desperately trying to keep the mere thought of that out of her mind. Leni was way too young for something like that to happen to her. She had to think of something else, something that would take her mind off of it. Lunch. She was going to go get some Lunch and then come right back to Leni. If something was going to happen to her little sister, then she had to be there. She also had to be there just in case the doctors had some news to tell.

"Man, this test is hard..." Lola thought to herself. She wasn't exactly the best at math tests. Most of the time she would be able to make do, but this test, being the big quarterly test was especially harder just for this purpose. She scanned the room for a brief second, trying to see if there was someone she could get some answers off of, but as she did, she caught a glimpse of the teacher turning around in her chair. The two of them locked eyes for a moment and glared coldly at each other. Lola's teacher was one of the nicest ladies in the world, but when she needed to be, she could deliver a stare more menacing than Medusa. Not once breaking eye contact, she pointed two fingers at Lola and then sharply curved them straight down. Lola wasn't normally one to give in so easily, but it wasn't like there was much of a choice. If she was caught trying to cheat, she wouldn't be allowed to take the test, and with her grades already suffering in math, the last thing she needed was to have a major test grade with a big fat zero on it. So, reluctantly, she bowed her head back down, not once breaking the menacing look on her face.

Once she did look back down at her test however, she realized how she got herself into that situation in the first place. This was not going to be an easy task. The hardcore look she had broke down as she struggled to understand why Jane and John were moving at two different speeds on the same road. It was a shame that Lisa wasn't here to help her out, but, thinking about that did help her remember how to solve the problem. Furiously, she started scribbling down numbers and added, subtracted, and divided a few numbers together to come up with some kind of an answer. Finally finished with the test, she picked it up and proudly strolled down the aisle of desks to the teacher's, turning in her paper. She actually finished it. If there was one person who would have been proud of her, it would have been Leni.

Why did Leni have to come to her mind right now? Every time she thought about her sister getting beaten up by strangers who just wanted to hurt her, it made her start to tear up. Lola does usually only look out for herself, but she did care about her other siblings, even if she didn't want to admit it. And now she was struggling to hold back tears in the middle of class. She stared down at her desk, desperately trying to make sure that not even a single drop left her eyes. The more she held back, the harder it was for her to not cry. Finally, it got to be too much for her.

The teacher swiveled her chair and saw Lola's hand raised. Curious, she asked Lola what she needed. "May I use the restroom?"

Odd. Lola never asked to use the restroom during a test, even if she was already finished, but the teacher waved it off like it was nothing and permitted the six year old to take her short leave. With haste, Lola left the room and started walking to the bathroom. As she made her way down the hall, tears began forming in her eyes. She knew when she had reached the point of no return, and she wasn't about to let anyone see the weak, emotional little girl that was hiding deep inside her. What a pain it was that she had to resort to this, but it was necessary to let it all flow out. To let it hurt where no one could see her. No one could see the fragile Lola, or they would tear her apart.

She finally got to the restroom and locked herself in a stall. Slowly but surely, the tears started to fall to the ground. The more she allowed herself to let go, the more she opened up, and the more tears streamed down her face. No one could see the broken down Lola now. She could cry as much as she wanted now and all of the people that hated her, feared her, maybe even respected her would be none the wiser. They would never know why she went to the restroom. Those people would never find out that she was so close to shedding tears in front of them. Not a soul in the world would ever be told of Lola's moment of weakness. Not her friends, not her sisters, not any of her family would ever know that she became so distressed as to excuse herself from the classroom, to go and cry.

What was supposed to be just a few seconds, turned into a few minutes, which turned into much longer than she had originally planned. Nearly fifteen minutes had passed and Lola was still sitting on the floor of the girls' restroom, silently weeping. It was killing her knowing that she let herself become this weak, this fragile. So much so that she actually had to be dismissed so that she could go weep without anyone seeing it. And it wasn't just that either, she was taking such a long time doing it. Anyone who was paying attention would wonder where she was by now.

The fact that she was broken like this though, was a testament. It wasn't that she cracked under pressure. There wasn't any pressure there except any that she put on herself. There was an overwhelming weight on her that any other six-year-old would never be able to muster, yet she carried it with ease. And the one time that she let her defenses down, she beat herself up over it. But the fact that she cracked only showcased how much she really cared for her siblings and parents. If nothing ended up changing about Lola, then never in a million years would she ever admit this, not even to herself. But this breakdown that she was having, only further proved her love for not just Leni, but Lana, and Lincoln, and Lori, and Lucy, and all of the others.

It ended up taking a grand total of about twenty-three minutes, but after she had finished, she quickly reapplied all of her makeup, and rushed back to the classroom. As she opened the door, the teacher looked her in the eye, and nearly scolded her for taking so long, but noticed something off about Lola. Upon further inspection, she saw the most minuscule amount of mascara on her cheek. There was no way that something like that happened, her eyes had to be fooling her, but rubbing her eyes and looking again, she saw it, right as the young girl sat down at her desk. It wasn't obvious by any means, but it was there. Lola's teacher was forced to be hard on her sometimes, but she had been told what happened over the weekend by the principal. She figured it would be best not to say anything. And so, not a word was spoken, and they both kept it that way.

"I'm back, Leni! Has anyone come in yet?" Lori asked with high hopes.

"Well you did, just now!"

Chuckling under her breath, Lori repeated and added to her question, "Has anyone, other than me come in since I went to go get lunch?"

"Oh... No, not yet... I was getting kind of bored without you though."

Lori blushed slightly. If the circumstances were normal, Lori would have brushed that comment off like nobody's business. But there was something about her little sister wanting her attention that made her feel warm and fuzzy inside. Why did she feel like this? Lori never blushed at any of her siblings complimenting her before, despite the frequency of it, especially from Leni. The real kicker though, was that Leni didn't even compliment her, she was merely stating her lack of things to do without her older sister. And yet, Lori was flattered merely by the fact that Leni just wanted to keep her around. The more she thought about it, she realized that Leni was probably just happy to have company and that it didn't matter who that company was. But even so, Lori's heart fluttered anyway, giving way to many happy thoughts.

Leni was about to ask Lori another question, but just at that moment, the doctor came into the room, knocking lightly before entering.

"Good morning Leni! Feeling better today?"

"Lots!"

"That's wonderful! Who is this?"

"That's my big sister Lori!"

Lori once again blushed, being introduced to the doctor who then briefly shook Lori's hand. "Pleasure to meet you. Is either of your parents here?"

"No they had to work today," Lori responded. "That's why I'm here."

"Alright then. Ms Lori Loud. Would you please come with me?"

Lori hesitated for a moment. Why would she need to speak to her in a separate room? All of a sudden, her heart started pounding, racing more and more as she followed the doctor out of the room. As their footsteps echoed down the hall, Lori could swear that she was able to hear her own heartbeat. Staring at the back of the doctors head was the only thing keeping her from freezing right in her tracks. The sheer amount of tension that she was feeling right now was incomparable to anything she had ever felt before. There was only one thing on the young woman's mind. What was wrong with Leni?

"Please take a seat Ms Loud."

Lori did as instructed and sat down in a waiting area close by to where Leni's room was. Nervously tapping her foot against the floor, Lori's breath was rapid and shallow. Her teeth were chattering behind her closed lips and her hands were trembling on her lap. The doctor sat down across from Lori and looked her right in the eye with a completely straight look on her face, which was only further worrying Lori. The doctor was sitting completely still as if there wasn't anything wrong, but anyone could tell that there was just a hint of nervousness in her eyes. Even she didn't want to have to break the news, but it was her responsibility to.

"At the moment, Leni is in a stable position, speaking health-wise. She was extremely lucky to not get pregnant, and even more lucky to not have any Sexually Transmitted Diseases."

All of the tension and stress that Lori was feeling was suddenly gone, and she relaxed with a sigh. Lori herself was wondering how Leni did get that Lucky. "However, Leni's mind, as you probably already know, was severely affected and her body was affected as well by this traumatic incident."

"What do you mean?" Lori asked, now shaking again, though not as violently as before.

"Well, to start off, as you may already know, the damage caused to her, mentally has caused her blood pressure to be constantly extremely high and it's very possible she may have to take medicine for it for the rest of her life."

That was bad, but it was something that could be dealt with. Odds are, everyone would have to give up something monetarily in order to make this work out in the long run, but it wasn't something so bad that they wouldn't be able to handle it.

"Also, the men who molested Leni, caused so much damage to her reproductive system, that..."

"That what?"

"Well... to put it quite simply," The doctor started, again hesitating for just a moment before picking back up. "We don't know exactly how they were able to do this, but Leni is unable to have kids now."

Thanks for reading this chapter. Please leave a review down below. There were some moments of dialogue, specifically Leni's dialogue where I intentionally used the wrong word(s). If you were planning on reviewing it and telling me that, trust me, I am well aware of what I did. I was trying to keep in character as best as I could and I felt like that's how I would do it. Also, the end of this chapter was something that I had planned from the beginning, but when I got there, I realized it wasn't as easy to make it work out as I thought it was going to be. I tried re-working the end several times to where it wouldn't be too bad, and I think I did improve from what it originally was, but it's still lacking in my opinion. I know it's kind of unrealistic for this to happen, but I think it conveyed how terrible the thing that happened to Leni was. Anyway, I give you the normal spiel of thanks for reading, please review it, etc. etc. etc. And as always, I'd like to emphasize that I don't want you to review it if you have something negative to say without giving me a way to improve.

I would also like to say this. Feel free to review it, even if you don't have any critique for me. I think I unintentionally implied that I didn't want anyone to review it UNLESS they had critique for me. This is not the case. I want people to review my story, please tell me what you think, but my point was that I don't want you to just bash it or say bad things about it without telling me how I can improve. Please review it if you so wish. But if you do critique me, I ask that you give me something to improve on, don't just tell me how terrible of a writer I am. Thanks again and I hope to get the next chapter out fairly quick (quicker than I got this one out anyway, LOL).