(The following is a nonprofit work of fanfiction and is outside of the original canon. All names, characters, businesses, places, events, and/or incidents of any kind depicted within this story are being used for entertainment purposes only.)
(The Loud House and all related characters were created by Chris Savino and all rights belong to Nickelodeon. Spider-Man and all related characters were created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko and all rights belong to Disney)
- Issue #06 -
A Lesson in Power
Back at school...
When Lincoln came back on schoolgrounds and into the building itself, he looked at the clock on his phone as he darted through the second-floor hallway for his locker. Class was about to start in less than one minute. But thanks to his increase of speed, he was able to make a lot of good time with it. If he was still normal, he would have been a whole lot more than five minutes late. He quickly got out his history books, shut his locker, and darted towards one end of the hallway until he came upon a door to his left. Wasting no time, he opened the door and walked inside to the classroom.
"Sorry I'm late!" he said to his teacher, who sat down on his desk in front of the other students. "Lost track of time."
"Actually, you're right on time," the history teacher said kindly in a matter-of-fact tone. "You may go ahead and take your seat, Lincoln." With that, Lincoln nodded his head and muttered a quick "Thank you", before maneuvering passed the other students to his assigned seat next to Clyde.
"Dude, where have you been?" Clyde whispered to the white-haired teen, leaning towards his direction. But Lincoln paid him no mind as he speedily got out two of his history books, a notebook, and two freshly-sharpened pencils, and he placed them neatly on top of his own desk. And with that, the rest of the school day had gone on as usual in the next number of hours; History, English, Math, the whole stupid bit.
When gym class rolled around, and when they were changing into their gym clothes in the boys' locker room, Lincoln put on a pair of sporty-looking wristbands as a way to help conceal the glands and the tiny slits on his wrists. And also, he had to be very careful not to show off his newly acquired abilities for fear of arousing suspicion. He thought about it for a second. Maybe he could show off just a little bit. It would all depend on how he did it. But then, a voice abruptly spoke, pulling Lincoln from his own thoughts.
It was Conner.
"Guys, look at this!" he said, holding up his cellphone for everyone to see. Their friends, Zach, Liam, Rusty, and Clyde gathered around him and they saw what he was referring too. They looked down at it in disbelief and frustration. Lincoln quirked an eyebrow curiously.
"Unbelievable," Rusty muttered, shaking his curly redhaired head. "The nerve of that creep."
"What's going on?" Lincoln asked. Conner, with a look of clear hesitation on his face, showed him the screen on his phone. When Lincoln saw it, he couldn't believe his eyes. Chandler had recently posted a TikTok video about ten minutes ago. What the video was about was what made them all upset. It was of the other day, when Lincoln was desperately chasing after the school bus, on the day of the field trip to the university.
The day when that mutant spider had changed the course of his life forever. The gang saw that the video had already garnered nearly a thousand likes, and almost one million views. In under ten minutes? The comment section below was filled to the brim with many "LOL's" and laughing emojis. One commenter, who went by the name of KrustyPatty98, had posted, "Run, Forrest! Run! LOL!". A low growl escaped from Lincoln's throat as he angerly clenched his fists.
You're gonna pay for this, McCann! he mentally snarled.
And then, they heard the ear-piercing sound of the gym teacher's whistle, telling that P.E. was about to start. Conner put away his phone and the gang headed out into the gym, seemingly forgetting about the existence of the video. Lincoln's mind eventually wondered back to wanting to familiarize himself with his powers. When they started playing dodgeball, he used this moment to perfectly test out just how much his spider-sense was really made of.
Luckily for him, Chandler happened to be one of the many students who played on the opposing team. And every time, he always singled out Lincoln the most, and he thought that today was going to be no different. Immediately, Lincoln's mind was brought back to the video. And he could have sworn that he was starting to see red, despite his now absurdly enhanced vision. His frown slowly turned into a devious grin when a delicious idea came to him.
So, not only would he be able to test his spider-sense, but he could also have the chance to get his long overdue revenge on his tormenter at the same time. Oh, he was going to have so much fun with this. And McCann was none the wiser. When the game started, Chandler threw his ball directly at him. The white-haired teen felt his spider-sense quickly tingle all over his body. In less than a heartbeat, Lincoln's head swooped to the side, the ball narrowly missing him by a hair.
Chandler stared wide-eyed, becoming bewildered by what he just saw.
"Care to try that again, McCann?" Lincoln challenged the redhead. Chandler sneered at his arch-rival. And throughout the entire course of the game, Lincoln had swiftly dodged all of Chandler's projectiles with perfect ease and grace each time, which only made the bully progressively more frustrated. Throughout the entire game so far, Lynn and Clyde watched in complete disbelief. The two of them could not believe what they were seeing.
Even Conner, Zach, Rusty, and Stella were left speechless. Last they checked, Lincoln was no good at dodgeball, and all kinds of physical exercise. Just the other day, before they went on the field trip, Lincoln found himself on the short end of the stick, getting creamed by a heavy torrent of dodgeballs. But now, he was like a totally different person. Like he had become a professional over a single night. How was this even possible?
If only they somehow knew. When he looked over at a now flustered Chandler, Lincoln started to frown angerly. Every single prank, every single jibe and trick that Chandler had thrown at him for all these years since elementary, even the video he posted recently, were starting to come back to him. And now, it was his turn to suffer like he did, to know what it's like to be laughed at and made fun of.
Time to put some dirt in your eye... With little to no effort at all, Lincoln threw his ball and landed a perfect hit at Chandler, who had no time to evade, striking him square in the right arm.
Chandler fell to the floor, clutching his arm in pain. And just like that, he was out of the game. When the next round came, he tried to hit Lincoln again, only for him to miss just like the last few times. And the white-haired teen responded by hitting him again with his dodgeball, putting him out again for the remainder until the next round—only to lose again, and again, and again, and again, each and every single time he came back onto the field.
When gym class had finally reached its end, Chandler didn't waste any time the moment the bell rang, and he ran into the boy's locker room, his face flustered red as a tomato, and his preciously fragile ego now very bruised, and his eyes started to water a little bit. Lincoln paid him no mind, as he gathered up his belongings and put his own normal clothes on over his gym shirt and shorts. Lynn emerged from the girls' locker room opposite from the boys' in her normal clothes and spotted her brother.
"Lincoln!" she called to him, Clyde and the gang following suit. "Lincoln! Just..., wow!"
"Yeah!" Conner said. "Lincoln, that was amazing!"
"Yee-haw!" Liam exclaimed, giving the white-haired teen a high five. "You were outrageous out there, pard!"
"I'll say!" Rusty added. "Where did you learn to do that, dude?"
Immediately, Lincoln's confidence deflated a little bit, now feeling quite unsure of how exactly to explain what he had done. How does one explain that he got such sensational skills after being bitten by a genetically modified spider that escaped from its respective container back during a certain field trip yesterday at a certain Royal Woods University? How does one explain all of that? So, Lincoln blurted out the first thing that came into his mind.
"Figure skating program!" He lied. Lynn immediately saw a bit of a flaw in his fib.
"You learned to do this over a single night?" she questioned her brother, now looking at him suspiciously. Lincoln smiled nervously.
"S-Sure," he said, nodding his head. "I-It was really good." And after that, there was a wave of awkward silence around them, as all eyes were still trained right on him. Wanting to quickly break the ice, Lincoln looked down at a nonexistent wristwatch.
"Oh, will you look at that!" he nearly exclaimed. "It's almost time for science class! I better get going or I'm gonna be late!" As quick as he can, Lincoln ran out of the gym through the double doors, leaving his friends wondering and confused by his strange behavior. Thankfully, they decided to let it go for now, and bring it up when they had the appropriate time. And so, school had continued on as usual, until the school clock finally rang at three o'clock.
Lincoln extended his legs and arms out in all directions as he let out a big yawn, feeling quite relieved that his class was over, and so was school as a whole for today. It wasn't that he didn't want to pay attention, unlike some of his classmates. It was mostly because he was far too anxious to go home for the sole purpose of wanting to test out his spider-powers and see just how far they could go and take him.
He was so deep in thought that he pretty much had trouble listening to the class and whatever it was his English teacher was spouting about. With school now over for today, and no more than that on the weekends, this gave him the opportunity he needed. He pulled his school supplies back into his backpack and he quickly followed after Clyde and the gang, joining with them into the school's east second floor hallway.
Amongst the other plethora of other students roaming around the halls to collect their belongings, Lynn and Conner eventually found their way to the group. They did not look the least bit happy, judging from their scowling faces.
"What's the matter, guys?" Clyde asked curiously.
"The homework Mrs. Hamilton just had us do contain two questions," the sporty Loud girl grunted. Rusty looked at her weirdly.
"Huh, well that doesn't sound so bad," he pointed out ignorantly. Conner shot him an unamused expression.
"Each one of those two questions had twenty-six parts," the Pingrey teen corrected, with a humorless frown. They all cringed when they had heard that.
"Ouch," Zach Gurdle said. "Now that doesn't sound very fun at all."
"Gee, Zach! Ya think?!" Lynn cried in exasperation. Stella patted her on the shoulder to ease her up.
"Well, at least it's over," she proclaimed.
"Whatever," Lynn groaned, signed deeply. "I'm just glad school's over today. When I get home, I'm just gonna relax, drink a bottle of Powerade, and watch the big game." As the group continued to talk it up while retrieving their belongings from their lockers, that was when Clyde and Lynn noticed that Lincoln had not said a single word when school just ended.
When they saw him, he had a very neutral-looking expression on his face, almost like he was deep in his own thoughts—which he actually was. This got the two teens curious, even Conner and the others noticed and had become concerned as well. Lynn moved her hand over and gently nudged her brother's shoulder, causing him to flinch and whip his head up to her direction.
"You okay, bro?" she enquired.
"Yeah, I'm fine, Lynn," he answered with a raised eyebrow. "Why do you ask?"
"You've been awfully quiet," Conner said. "Something bugging you, dude?"
"Er, no. Not at all, Conner," Lincoln assured. "I've just got a lot on my mind right now."
"Still thinking about that whole dodgeball thing?" Stella asked. Lincoln shook his head.
"No, it's not that either," he said. "Just some other stuff. But it's nothing to worry about, I swear."
Not wanting to push it even further, the gang decided to let it go once again. After they all gotten their stuff in their backpacks, the gang walked down to the first floor and exited out through the front doors and into the schoolyard. Right as they all made it getting close to the curb, waiting for their own family members to pick them up, Lincoln's spider-sense immediately went off, causing his entire body to tense up a little bit and lag behind his friends.
Conner turned aside and noticed this. But then, he immediately let out a gasp when something caught his eye behind his friend.
"Lincoln, look out—!" Conner exclaimed.
Before Lincoln knew it, he swirled around, and caught something firm but rubbery in his left hand's palm. He looked down in front of himself and a large red dodgeball was held nice and tightly in his fingertips. The gang stared for a moment before realizing that their friend barely even flinched right when he caught the dodgeball. This sudden action caused all the other surrounding students closely around the schoolyard to notice what had just happened
"Loud!" an angry and familiar voice called out to him. Far out in front of them, standing at the front steps of the high school, was a very not-so-happy Chandler, his fingers coiled into tight balls of fists. Chandler stared his arch-rival down, teeth clenched and nearly red in the face. Lincoln's brows knitted together. He was not in the mood for this right now.
"What do you want, Chandler?" he called out annoyedly. Steam seemed to huff through the teenage redhead's nose.
"Don't you 'What do you want, Chandler?' me!" he snarled hatefully, his arms trembling with rage. "You think you're pretty funny, don't you, Loud?!"
"Chandler, if you're still sore about what happened at gym class," Conner said, "you need to get over it, man!"
"Stay out of this, Pingrey!" McCann snapped angerly, before turning back to face Lincoln. "You made me look like a chump out there, Loud! You embarrassed me in front of everyone! In front of my teammates!" Lincoln sneered at him. And I'm gonna make you look like an even bigger chump in front of the entire school if you don't quit it right now.
"Sorry, I missed the part where that's my problem!" Lincoln shot back indifferently. "And besides, I think you pretty much deserved it. After all the years of torment and humiliation you put me through since elementary, middle school, and now, I think it should only be fair that you get a taste of your own medicine!" That seemed to only make the McCann teen nice and fuming.
"Nu-uh!" he growled. "It is not gonna go down like that! No more messing around, Loud! Let's do this! Right here, right now!" Lincoln blinked a couple of times before realizing what the teen had meant by that. Was he really being serious right now?
"Forget it, Chandler," he declined, turning back around to his friends. "I've got better things to do than bother with the likes of you again!"
"Oh, what's the matter, Loud?" Chandler taunted. "Are you too chicken?" Right at that last word, Lincoln's entire body stiffened, and his eyes bulged. All of the surrounding students gasped when they heard that. Lincoln slowly twisted his head around to face the redhead, who flashed him a smug smile.
"So, I guess that whole thing in the gym was just for show, huh?" he questioned. "But when it comes to a real fight, you hide behind your friends and your sister, like you always do, because everybody knows that you can't back your words up, like the little chicken you are!" In that moment, a little nerve had been struck within Lincoln and he swiftly turned his whole body over to Chandler. Before he could move forward, Lynn placed her hand on her little brother's shoulder.
"Ignore him, Lincoln," she said to him. "He's just sore because he lost." Lincoln only nudged her hand away in response, as he kept his firm gaze on Chandler.
"It's alright, Lynn," he said lowly, a sense of self-assurance beginning to take effect all over his being. "I've got this. I know that I do." This made his sister very confused. Lincoln was a fighter, but not that kind of fighter. The aforementioned brother slowly walked up to the redheaded bully, dodgeball still in his hand, his hardened gaze not even once faltering.
A confident yet smug smile grew across Lincoln's face. Feeling no need for the dodgeball, he tossed it behind him, and Lynn caught it in the nick of time before it hit the concrete floor. All the other students crowded around the two teens, entrapping them inside a small circle of an arena. And just like that, they all started chanting them on.
"Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight!" Lincoln eyed his surroundings, his confidence growing even further, no longer caring if there were witnesses or if they decided to take out their cellphones and record them. In fact, Lincoln saw it as potentially a good thing. Hopefully, this little schoolyard scuffle will get everyone talking and distracted away from Chandler's stupid video. He locked his gaze at his arch-rival once more, an idea forming in his head.
"Tell you what, Chandler," Lincoln started. "Since I'm in a fine mood right now, I'll let you be the one to throw the first punch." To make it his point, Lincoln stuck his head out at the redheaded teen, and then pointed a finger directly at his own chin.
"Right here," Lincoln instructed, before putting his hands behind his back, his face held high in the air. Seeing this made Chandler stare at the white-haired teen, his eyes blinking a couple of times in confusion. Even Lynn, Clyde, and the others were perturbed by what the Loud boy just said. They could not believe what he was doing. Was he really being serious here? Chandler immediately shook the confusion away and held his fists in out in front of him.
"Come on, McCann!" Lincoln challenged. "Give me your best shot! Hold nothing back! I want to feel your fist hit my face!"
Chandler let out a low snarl, his teeth clenching against each other. He lunged forward at his rival, sending a single fist straight at him in a forward jab. Lincoln effortlessly circumvented to one side, allowing the incoming fist to hit nothing but air. Chandler quickly pulled back, now very befuddled by his rival's sudden movement. Trying not to let that deter him, he attempted yet again with a right hook, but Lincoln easily sidestepped that one as well.
Stella's eyes bulged at what she was seeing. There was no way this was even happening. For as long as she had known Lincoln, he wasn't exactly the fighting type, or the kind who chose to get involved in a fight. Whenever he fought, it was always with his brains, not his fists. What she was seeing before her now was so not the Lincoln she remembered. She gave a look over to Lynn's direction, who was just as confused, but at the same time, very impressed with her younger brother.
"Help him, Lynn!" Stella said to the female jock.
"Which one?" Lynn muttered unsurely.
"You wouldn't hit a guy with a chipped tooth, would you?" the white-haired teen taunted smugly before ducking away from an incoming haymaker. "Who am I kidding! You couldn't hit a guy with a chipped tooth!"
"Just shut up," Chandler snarled in annoyance, holding his fists up, "and fight back!" He let out a fast left hook, but the only thing that happened next was that Lincoln smoothly ducked backwards with great skill like a limbo dancer. This action caused all the other students to gasp and stare in total disbelief, Lynn, Clyde, and their group among them. With each movement he had performed, Lincoln's confidence started to swell even more.
By comparison to him, McCann was a complete slowpoke, with the skills of an untrained brawler to go along with it, and not to mention he was also being made to look like a clown right in front of all their peers. Knowing that filled Lincoln with a surge of a growing certainty that he no longer had anything to worry about from Chandler McCann. This brought a big smile on his face. Chandler glared white-hot daggers at his arch-rival, now becoming sick and tired of being made a fool of.
"I'm gonna wipe that stupid grin off your face when I'm done with you!" he roared in outrage.
"Done with me?" Lincoln quipped smugly. "Chandler, you haven't even laid a hand on me since we started." Upon hearing that, Chandler became even more raging mad as he let out a high-pitched battle cry and threw every attack and punch he could swing towards Lincoln's way. But no matter what attack he had thrown out, Lincoln dodged and parried every single one of them.
Feeling tired, worn out, but not wanting to give up, Chandler laid out one final punch straight ahead at his opponent. But this time, Lincoln did not even try to move out of the way. Chandler smiled. He had him right where he wanted him. Or so he thought. To Chandler's complete dismay, his arch-rival caught the flying fist with only his left bare hand, without even flinching in any way. A serious frown was now displayed on Lincoln's glowering face.
In that moment, he brought his other hand up, and pulled it back, ready to deliver the coup de grâce. And then, he let him have it. Lincoln slammed his opened palm against Chandler's chest, sending the teen flying across from him, and landing down hard on the concrete floor flat on his back. All the crowding students gasped and gaped in total shock as they now started to gather around Chandler, who now sunk to the ground with a groan, grasping at his chest.
In that instant, Chandler's eyes rolled in the back of his head and he just laid there unmoving and continued to moan incoherently.
"Jeez, Loud," one student muttered towards Lincoln. "I think you knocked him out."
You're ding dang right I did, Lincoln proudly thought in his head. And it served him right. Justice, thy name is Lincoln Loud.
"What in the world is going on around here?!" a woman's voice was heard nice and clearly.
All the students parted the way to reveal a tall and slim light-skinned adult woman with long curly black hair, and a lavender-colored scarf was worn on top of her head. Lincoln and the gang quickly realized who it was. Mrs. Rivers, the current principal of Royal Woods High School, knelt down to Chandler, and she quickly put two and two together on what had just gone down.
"Who's the one responsible for this?!" she questioned firmly.
"He did it!" one student tattled, quickly pointing straight at Lincoln's direction.
Lincoln could not help but freeze right on the spot, his confidence and bravado instantly draining away from his being. From his objective standpoint, he just fought against a notorious bully known for committing the most obnoxious pranks he could ever come up with. But the principal had only just arrived on the scene, and Lincoln knew that wasn't how she was going to see it.
Now that he noticed it, Chandler was the only one on the ground, most likely bruised from the ordeal and was knocked unconscious. Lincoln, on the other hand, did not have a single smidgen of a scratch on him. And that was not going to bowed well for the white-haired teenager. Principal Rivers scowled daggers at him as she pointed directly at the school building behind her.
"My office! Now!" she ordered authoritatively. Lincoln audibly gulped before looking back at Lynn and their friends, who only stared in complete shock of what they just witnessed before them. Lincoln's shoulders slumped defeatedly as he followed after Principal Rivers, all the while the surrounding students continued to watch on and record him with their cellphones.
"I'm gonna go with him." Lynn told Clyde and the gang, before running off after her younger brother.
More than fifteen minutes later...
The car ride home from school was awkwardly quiet.
So very quiet that everybody heard only the sound of Vanzilla's car engine revving whenever Lynn Sr. pressed down on the gas petal. Lincoln sat down in the front passenger seat, not having dared to utter a single word, not since after being picked up from Principal Rivers' office. A slow and steady exhale came out through his nose. Lynn Sr. took a couple quick glances over at his son. He pursed his lips as he tried to find the exact words he wanted to say to him. Guess he would have to start with the basics. Finally, he opened his mouth to speak.
"Is it true, Lincoln?" he asked. Lincoln turned over to look at his father with a quirked eyebrow.
"What is?" the fifteen-year-old Loud boy asked.
"What I heard Principal Rivers say back in her office," the father explained, without taking his eyes off from the road. "Before I can make my final decision, I want to hear your side of the story. I want to hear what really went down. So, did you really start a fight with Chandler, or did the principal tell me what she wanted me to hear?" Lincoln paused for a moment, trying to find the right words to say of the matter. He sighed defeatedly.
"Yes... and no, Dad," he admitted. Lynn Sr. raised an eyebrow.
"What do you mean by 'yes and no'?" he asked. Lincoln twiddled with his fingers.
"Well, yes. I did get into a fight with Chandler," he explained. "And also, no. I was not the one who started it. Chandler did. I was only defending myself."
"Hmm..., I see," the father pondered, not even quite sure if he was getting the full story. "So, what do you think his main reason for having started it in the first place was? Surely he must have had some kind of motive in doing so. Did he do it to get attention for himself? To get a rile out of you? Those do sound like something he might actually do. But he doesn't strike me as someone who randomly starts a fist fight. So this tells me there's more to this tale than what you're telling me."
Lincoln's shoulders started to sag a little bit, a feeling in his gut telling him exactly where this conversation was leading up to. And it was a lot closer than he initially realized.
"W-Well...," he hesitated, after recognizing that the jig was up. "Truth be told, it might have something to do with what happened at gym class." Now that got the father's full attention. From there, Lincoln begun his explanation with little to no choice.
"Y-You see, I kind of..., well, humiliated him at dodgeball."
"Humiliated him?" Lynn Sr. inquired; a little bit surprised to hear such a thing from his son. "And how exactly did you do that?"
Lincoln distinctly swallowed a nervous lump in his throat. He just knew whatever else was going to come out of his mouth was for sure going to land him a full week's worth of grounding in his bedroom. He just knew it. But he also knew if he continued to withhold the truth, it would only make his situation a lot worse than what it could possibly be right now. Either way, it felt like a lose-lose situation, no matter what.
"We were playing dodgeball," Lincoln explained finally, trying carefully to figure out what words to use. "He tried to get a hit on me, like he always does every time we play. But I kept easily dodging him at every turn."
"Lincoln's right, Dad," Lynn spoke up from the backseat, sitting right next to Lily. "And you should have seen him too. He had such awesome skills and reflexes, almost like a ninja. Chandler wasn't able to land a good hit on him. Nobody on the opposite team could either."
"Really?" Lynn Sr. said in mild astoundment. Even the other sisters were surprised to hear this.
"Yeah," Lincoln added as he started to smile. "And so, in response, I used that opportunity to get a lot of good hits of my own on him, and he was out for every round of the game, which only made him very angry. At the end of class, he ran out of the gym completely flustered. He even looked like he was on the verge of crying too. And let me tell you something, Dad. It felt soooo satisfying to finally get back at that punk."
"Ah-hah! So, that's what this whole thing was really about," Lynn Sr. concluded, not sharing all of his son's sentiments. "It was about getting revenge, wasn't it? Because you wanted so badly to get even with him. If so, then I guess you must feel very proud of yourself now, don't you?" Lincoln frowned when he heard that, and then he nervously massaged his right arm.
"W-Well, yeah," he half confessed. "And why shouldn't why feel proud of myself? That jerk deserved every single bit of what came to him. And besides, he posted a video of me chasing after the school bus on the day of the field trip, all the while he and the other classmates were laughing like hyenas." Lynn Sr. looked at his son, very much surprised to hear that.
"He did?" he asked. Lincoln mildly scoffed.
"Are you really that surprised, Dad?" the teen asked his father. "Like I just told you, he deserved what came to him. After all the years of making my life look like a living nightmare, I think it's only fair he got a taste of his own medicine."
"By going down to his level?" Lynn Sr. retorted. "By behaving in a way that made you look like a bully, yourself? The same way like him? To be as less like him?" Lincoln blinked a couple of times when his father said that, before furrowing his brows in confusion.
"You may have been only defending yourself in that fight, son," Lynn Sr. continued. "But if you think about it for just a moment, and in a twisted kind of way, it was actually you who started the fight, because you used your skill, your power, to hurt somebody back. And for that, the consequences of your actions came and nipped you right in the bud. And it resulted in you getting in trouble instead of him. You think that by doing what you did would make you a bigger and better person than Chandler? Come on, son. Your mother and I raised better than this."
What was I supposed to do, run away? Lincoln thought defensively. An abrupt thought came to him.
Wait..., did his father just say the word, "power"? That made Lincoln a little bit nervous. How did he find out? About his spider powers? His spider-sense? And if so, then when? Was it around dinner time the other day, and he just somehow put two and two together? Lincoln's mind was pulled back into reality when he saw that they made it back to their house, and Lynn Sr. parked Vanzilla up and into the driveway in front of the garage, twisting the ignition and turning the van's engine off.
"You girls can go on inside," the father instructed his other children. "I still need to have a word or two with your brother."
And with that, the seven Loud daughters pulled open the sliding doors of the van and hopped outside and into the house, leaving both father and son alone in the vehicle. Lincoln slumped against his seat and groaned lightly. He really did not want to be here right now. He just wanted to go up and his room and rest, try and forget about today's issue. If he wanted this to end faster, then he was going to have to sit there and take whatever his father was about to say to him.
"Lincoln, I understand that there is a lot going on inside your mind these days," Lynn Sr. continued, putting a calm and loving hand on his son's shoulder. "And believe me, I know this because I had gone through the exact same thing at your age."
Lincoln stole a glance at his father, and it took a lot of strength for him to suppress a smile. The exact same thing? The white-haired teen could not help but imagine his dad crawling up walls, vaulting across rooftops, and shooting out web strands from his wrists. Well, at least it gave him relief that his old man still did not know about his spider powers.
"Uh, not exactly," Lincoln differed from what his dad told him.
"Lincoln, the point I am trying to make here," Lynn Sr. went on, "is that you're changing. And these are the years when a man changes into the man he is going to become for the rest of his life. You just have to be careful who it is you change into. And you know how you keep saying that you want to be just as good as your sisters, to find something that you are truly good at and become the greater person than you are now? Well, the same goes for that too."
Lynn Sr. paused for second before taking a quick breath.
"And as for Chandler," the father acknowledged. "He probably did deserve what happened. But what you have to understand is that just because you can beat him up, it does not mean that you should, nor does it give you the right to do so." Lynn Sr. leaned in a little bit closer to his son until he was now at eye level with him.
"So, the next time you find yourself in a situation like that again, just remember this one very important lesson; that with great power there must also come a great responsibility. Think you can to that for me, buddy?" Lincoln paused for a moment to think about it. Guess he did make a good point. And there was something about what he just said. Great power and great responsibility. Whatever it was, it made Lincoln feel a little more wiser than before. He smiled up at his father and nodded his head in acknowledgment.
"I'll try to keep that in mind, Dad," he muttered gratefully. "And thank you for the talk," Lynn Sr. gently ruffled Lincoln's white hair.
"Anytime, son," the family patriarch responded.
"Soooo, does this mean I'm not grounded?" the teen asked curiously. Lynn Sr. chuckled and lightly shook his head.
"Don't worry, sport," he confirmed. "I'll let you off the hook this one time." Well, that was quite a relief. And so, both father and son climbed out of the car and walked on inside of their house. Boy, was Lincoln glad that he didn't get punished right on the spot. Truth be told, he was kind of expecting to be given a good talk down with some yelling and whatnot. He counted himself lucky his father was a very patient man instead.
Lynn Sr. strolled on through the living room and flopped down on his hindquarters in the center of the couch. He stretched his arms out a little bit.
"Alroit then, let's see what's on the telly this aftahnoon," he said in a fake British accent, picking up the remote from the coffee table. With the press of a button, the television had turned on, the blank screen brightening up and revealing a very familiar-looking commercial, one that Lynn Sr. seemed to recall seeing just the other day. A commercial which caught Lincoln's full attention right as he was beginning to climb up the stairs to his room.
"Do you want to see the next lucky contestant win it big?!" yelled an announcer on the tv screen. "Then tune in next week on an all-new episode of 'So, You Think You've Got Talent?'! In this show, each contender will compete on stage and show off their amazing skills in front of a live audience! And the lucky winner will be paid four thousand dollars if they manage to capture the hearts and minds of our judges! And it's all going to be live streamed right here at the Royal Woods Theater, at six o'clock sharp this coming Sunday!"
Lincoln stared at the television, eyes staring down in a glassy fashion. A bright and shiny lightbulb mentally appeared in his gear-turning brain, and a crazily huge smile slowly lit up across his face.
"Well, this show looks fun," Lynn Sr. commented, before turning to face the stairs. "Hey, Lincoln! How'd you like to—" And before the father even knew it, Lincoln was already gone, a tiny passing orange blur just disappearing off to the right-side corner of the upstairs hallway.