Disclaimer: The Loud House and associated characters belong to Nickelodeon and Chris Savino

Note: I apologize for the first installment being relatively short and lacking in descriptive narrative. I wrote that piece in the hospital not long ago and was constantly in and out due to the medication. Perhaps, I shall rewrite it one day. In the meantime, here's the beginning of part two!

DOLL: Reissue

By Lola Presents

Chapter 1

A man opens the door to a darkened room, then closes it behind him. The flat soles of his dress shoes tapped a rhythm on the floor as he made his way to his seat at the head of the long table. Illuminated only by recessed ceiling lights, the darkly painted walls offered little reflection, which gave the room a somber atmosphere. After the man got comfortable, he pulled some manila folders from his briefcase and tapped them on the table.

"We all know why we're here," announced Gerald Stoltz, the current biotechnology lead at Starworks Lab. "Our government investors are threatening to pull our funding and terminate the contract if we do not produce soon," he said in case any had forgotten. "And, as you all know, I have a rather personal stake in seeing this project through. So, does anyone have an update for me?" he asked, gazing into the faces of his employees. "Wilson, how about you?"

"Not yet, sir," mumbled Professor Wilson, shifting nervously in his seat. "But, we're further along than before."

Wilson was a short, meek man with thinning hair and pockmarks landscaping his face. He wore thick glasses that made his eyes seem too big for his head. And he was nervous, very nervous.

"That doesn't tell me much, Wilson," noted Gerald with dismay. "How much further along? What do you know today that you didn't know a month ago?"

"Very little, sir," Wilson humbly admitted. "We've finally remapped the connections between the console and the modified A.M.R.I. but still don't understand the modifications themselves."

"But you do know what they're supposed to do. Right?" Gerald demanded to know, frowning as he consulted his notes.

"Of course," replied Wilson, attempting to defend himself and his team. "They're supposed to induce a stored electromagnetic pattern in a human brain. However, we have two problems on our hands. First, we've thoroughly analyzed the circuits, and the design doesn't make sense. It shouldn't even power up, but it does. Second, we've no way to test our theories without a pattern or a subject."

"I see," breathed Professor Stoltz, rubbing the two-day-old stubble on his chin. "Meyers?" he continued a moment later, without looking up from his notes. "What about you?"

Professor Meyers was a tall, thin woman with a stately, angular face. She also wore glasses, though her frames suited her face far better than Wilson's. She wore her brown hair pulled back into a tight bun and minimal cosmetics and had Asian-inspired sticks holding it in place.

"After dismantling the prototype," she began, intending to come off better than her associate, "we've reverse engineered the unit's core and have built several functional units based on the original template."

"Finally, some good news!" declared the man at the end of the table. "Please, elaborate."

However, Mrs. Meyers now diverted her gaze as well, hoping her boss wouldn't be too disappointed. "Well, we've created three units so far. All functioned initially. However, between two and three days, they'd either self-terminate or experience system-wide failures."

"That's it? Do you know why they keep failing?" Gerald demanded to know. "What seems to be the problem?"

"Sir," interjected Mansford, the programming and integration specialist. "One of the most challenging issues we face is the language used to write the programs. It isn't like any programming language we've seen before. While most of the executable wrappers are in common assembly, all the subroutines seem to use a proprietary analog system."

"I'm sorry?" snapped Professor Stoltz. "Did you say analog?"

"Yes, sir," nodded Mansford, a middle-aged black man of average height and weight, sporting a thick mustache. "A symbolic language; one that uses symbols for abstract ideas and relationships, rather than a verbose language."

"So what you're telling me is that we're finished here?" said Gerald, angrily banging his fist on the table, making his colleagues jump. "Is that it?"

"Not precisely," interjected Wilson, leaning forward and placing his elbows on the table. "We could always bring in outside help."

Gerald hung his head and shook it repeatedly, and his employees could see contempt and frustration upon his face and, if they weren't mistaken, a touch of sadness. "We've been over this. Doing so would break our non-disclosure agreements and jeopardize the integrity of the lab. We can't do that."

"But, sir," implored Mansford. "None of us have the proper context to understand the entirety of this project. There are too many proprietary systems. Only one person has that knowledge, and she got ejected from our organization six months ago. Without her, I'm afraid we can do little else."

Gerald Stoltz folded his arms, leaned back in his chair, and pursed his lips as he pondered how to proceed. Several minutes passed as his employees shifted their weight or shared anxious glances. Then, finally, the man looked up.

"I'll bring her in myself," he breathed heavily. "That way, all liability is on me. That will be all, thank you."

Since the events at the lab, things had settled back into a typical routine at the Loud house, save for one significant change. Far fewer explosions sounded, and no clouds of oddly colored gas emanated from Lisa's room. True to her word, Rita had all of Lisa's things moved and stored. She was adamant that Lisa get a normal childhood, free from things that might distract or isolate her from regular activities.

However, that didn't sit very well with the young scientist, who believed her talents were getting squandered. Still, she had to do something. Moping around wasn't her style, and at the least, it wasn't productive. So, she swallowed her pride and slowly began engaging her siblings in small talk and the occasional board game. And she quickly learned how deficient she was.

Jokes, innuendos, and references all passed between siblings and parents alike, the import of which remained elusive to Lisa. She was trying her best, though her inadequate knowledge of social media, current culture, and human interaction inevitably left her feeling left out. On a bright and sunny Saturday, when she should be out playing with her siblings, she sat, utterly puzzled over an image of a frowning cat.

"I don't get it," mumbled Lisa. "'I'm not angry, I'm happiness challenged?' They mean the same thing. How is that funny?"

"I think you're just comically challenged," griped Luan. "It's funny because it means the same thing."

"By that logic, calling bacon fried pig muscle is funny," Lisa spat indignantly. "And, it's not."

"Of course not," argued Luan, shifting her weight and folding her arms. "That's just gross. Learn the difference."

Unfortunately, Luna's lesson would have to wait, as a rather urgent sounding knock echoed throughout the house. "Who could be calling this early on a Saturday morning?" thought Rita as she rose from the comfort of her couch and answered the door. "Hello?" she said, addressing the somewhat familiar man. "May I help you?"

"Yes. My name is Gerald Stotz, and I'm with Starworks Labs," the man said, announcing himself, "and I urgently need to talk with you and your daughter, Lisa."

The sun was nearing mid-sky, which meant lunch was soon approaching, and her kitchen would quickly get overrun by ravenous children. She hadn't the time to listen to the man. After all, the Loud's now owed their lab a sizable amount in damages.

"I'm rather busy," she declared defiantly, placing one hand on the door to indicate it was about to get closed. "You should've called ahead."

"Please?" begged Mr. Stoltz, positioning one of his feet just inside the door. "What if I said that I could make your debt disappear."

Rita knew better than to trust the suits at the lab, but her interest had gotten piqued. "Fine," she conceded under her breath, moving aside and directing him to the dining room table. "You have five minutes," she told him before calling her daughter. "Lisa! Get down here, pronto," she yelled, intentionally to put the man off his guard.

Lisa looked at Luan, then left the comedienne shaking her head. "Just when I was about to make a breakthrough," Luan mumbled. "Forget it, kid," replied her dummy. "The only that will break through that is nuclear fusion."

"Yes, mother?" asked Lisa as she cleared the stairs, stunned to see her old subordinate present. "I see," said Lisa, straightening her glasses and finding a seat. "May I ask why you're here? You've already gotten me fired; what now? Gloating?"

"Negative, Lisa," replied Stoltz. "Quite the opposite. We, no, I, would like to offer you a tentative position. One in which, should you be successful, could result in full reinstatement."

"Let me guess," sighed Lisa. "You couldn't put Humpty Dumpty back together again? Tell me, why should I do this for you? Doll is gone, and better left alone."

Gerald shifted nervously in his chair and adjusted his tie. "What if I said this was about more than just Doll? Some people could benefit from what she was trying to do at the lab. And, we'd be irresponsible not to provide it if we could."

Lisa smiled and leaned back in her seat. "Only, you don't know how it works. Do you?"

"Ehem," choked Mr. Stoltz, clearing his throat. "No," he said plainly. "We don't. We need you, Lisa. Please consider coming back, won't you?"

"I don't know..." replied Lisa, looking toward her mother for some unspoken message. "I'm not convinced this isn't some scheme to get me to comply, only to toss me aside again."

"Do you feel like taking a ride?" asked Gerald, holding his keys up. "There's something I'd like to show you. Something that should change your mind."

"Fine," conceded Lisa, still unwary of the man's intentions. "But only my mother gets to come along. She needs to see my work isn't for nothing."

"By all means," responded the smiling man as he stood. "Ladies?" he said, extending his arm toward the door.

"Leni!" Rita yelled with a stern look on her face. "I have to go somewhere with Lisa. You're in charge until we get back."

"Yes, ma'am!" Leni yelled back with similar pomposity.

Rita and Lisa followed Mr. Stoltz's car to Starworks Labs, which seemed deserted. Appropriate for a Saturday, though still creepy, given their past with it. Gerald parked near the service entrance on the right-hand side of the building, and Lisa could see that the door had since gotten replaced.

"Keep your eyes and ears open, mother," Lisa said before opening her door. "These people speak between their words."

"You don't have to tell me," Rita sighed, thinking mainly of her lost daughter. "Still, we owe it to Doll to see if this goes anywhere."

Gerald led the two women down the long hallway until they arrived at a small service elevator. Grabbing his I.D., he swiped it through the reader, opening the door. "If you please?" he offered, waving them inside. Then swiping the card an additional time, several more entries appeared on the digital display, indicating four sub-basements that Lisa never knew existed.

Mr. Stoltz pressed the bottom-most button, then stepped back. "Where we're going is top-secret, and though I know you don't yet have clearance, I thought maybe this would suffice as a gesture of goodwill."

The lift stopped, and the doors opened once more, leading into another darkly lit room with recessed ceiling lights. Neither Lisa's nor Rita's eyes adjusted until the lift door closed behind them. Along one wall was a standard A.M.R.I. machine, and a new console, followed by an amniotic cloning vat and another A.M.R.I. unit. Along the opposite wall resided a desk, several shelves, complete with volumes of knowledge, and along the far wall were two vertical cylinders. Everything in the room was sleek and black and gave off an ominous presence.

"What's with all the doom and gloom?" Lisa hesitantly joked, much to Gerald's dismay.

The man turned toward Lisa. "I assume you recognize the equipment present. Yes?" he said, standing before them, unmoving.

"Well, sure," sighed Lisa. "The only thing missing is a tissue fabricator."

"Yes," replied Gerald. "We won't be needing that for this project. Please, tell nobody what you see here today," he pleaded as he turned and opened the first of the two black tubes.

Lisa stared in disbelief and took a few steps forward. "Is she real?" Lisa asked. "Did you actually create another Doll?" she inquired, placing her hand upon the glass. Floating in amniotic fluid was a little girl, roughly eight years of age, obviously breathing though unconscious. "Do you realize how risky and irresponsible this is?"

"No," sighed Mr. Stoltz. "This is my daughter Sylvia. Not long after your creation destroyed the lab, she began having seizures. Her brain is riddled with metastatic tumors. There was little I could do. So, I brought her here and put her into amniotic suspension. She's still alive. Only, her metabolism has slowed to a near crawl. I hoped that you could help me; help her..."

"You want to clone her and transfer her consciousness to the clone," Lisa surmised, finally understanding everything, including the urgency and secrecy.

"As precise in your assessments as usual," Gerald said, his eyes more watery than Lisa recalled. "I'd do anything, including break our code of ethics regarding experimental technology. You do understand, don't you?"

"I don't know about Lisa, but I've already lost a daughter over this," interjected Mrs. Loud, looking at Mr. Stoltz with empathy. "I understand, and if Lisa can help in any way, she has my support."

"Oh, thank you, Mrs. Loud," said Gerald, as he exhaled a long-held breath. "You have no idea how happy this makes me!"

"I would be happy to help," Lisa added, her voice carrying a melancholy note. "Only there are several problems before us."

"Such as?" begged Gerald. "Whatever it is, I'll do whatever is needed."

"First, I didn't design the transfer protocols, nor do I understand them," Lisa told the man sadly. "Doll did. Now, I could reactivate Doll. However, she was in the middle of a complete, system-wide failure. She might function long nor agree to help us. Besides, I discard her hard drive."

Silently, the man walked across the room, took one of the volumes from its place among the others, and opened it. Then reaching inside, he pulled the small black box from inside, its backup light still lit.

"I believe this is what you are looking for," he said, offering the device to Lisa.

However, before her daughter could accept it, Rita snatched it out of Mr. Stoltz's hand and stared at it, running her fingers along its surface. "This is all that's left of my baby?" cried Rita, as the tears began building in her ducts.

"Not at all, Mrs. Loud," the man solemnly replied, looking back at the second black tube. "We kept it just in case."

"I'm sorry," cried Rita, holding the little black box close to her chest. "But, I've changed my mind. I can't let you bring her back only to watch her die again. She gets the same treatment your daughter gets if you bring her back! Do you understand? She deserves a real chance at life too!"

"Of course, Mrs. Loud," replied Gerald, humbly clasping his hands in front of him. "I could expect no less from a fellow parent. She'll get her chance. I promise."

"Well," sighed Lisa. "This changes things a bit."

"How so?" inquired Gerald, looking concerned. "I'll need a C.R.I.S.P.R. genetic sequencer with an uplink to the Human Genome Project database, and I'll need a synthetic tissue fabricator."

"What for?" asked Mr. Stoltz, genuinely confused.

"I can't map anyone to a clone until Doll modifies the second A.M.R.I., which can't get done until I reconstruct Doll," explained Lisa, as if it should be apparent. "So, I need to remake Doll in her original form. Her original body will have deteriorated too much by now to work as intended. Plus, it would give her a little more time."

"How can we be sure she won't malfunction immediately?" asked the professor, obviously concerned for his daughter's fate and company expenditures. "These resources aren't cheap, you know."

"Oh, I'd make a few adjustments before reactivating her," Lisa told him. "Namely, some command-line arguments to disable emotional processing of any kind."

"So, we'll have to rely on nothing but logic to convince her to help us?" inquired Gerald.

"I'm afraid so," sighed Lisa. "Unless you happen to be adept at arguing with a homicidal synthetic."

"No, no," sighed Gerald, swinging his arms impatiently. "We'll do it your way. It is your project, after all."

"Then, I believe we're in agreement?" Lisa asked, looking at her mother for confirmation.

Rita only nodded, still clinging to the old hard drive that contained her lost daughter. And while the majority of her desperately wanted to see Doll again, she also felt a loathsome foreboding that something would go wrong.

"Alright, ladies," sighed Gerald, facing his silent child. "If you don't mind, I'd like to be alone with Sylvia now. You can show yourselves out," he said, handing Lisa her new keycard.

"Very well," Lisa said, proudly clipping the badge to her grungy old green sweater. "I shall see you first thing Monday morning."

"Yeah..." muttered Gerald, too lost in thought to utter a proper farewell.

Soon, Rita and Lisa were on their way back home. And, though the van was silent, numerous thoughts ran through the girls' minds. Doll would get a body of her own, a real one, fully capable of processing emotions. She would grow and age, get hurt, heal, and even reproduce. To her mother, this meant a lifetime of love and happiness. To Lisa, it meant trouble.

Nobody, save for those present the night Doll died, knew of Lincoln's and Lola's love for each other.