They were not human to me. Black, white, or whatever, they were menaces of nature; they were the fire, the comet, the storm, which could- with no justification- shatter my body.
"Tell us your story, why don't you?" Linka wiggled her fingers while addressing Lyle for this backstory on how he had come to be a pheno in such a cruel world.
As of now, the youngsters were assembled in what could only be described as a meeting room held for conferences at schools, most notably the ones where you ended up whem you got into serious trouble. That was what Linka felt like the room was, but she should have known it wasn't like that at all. Ah, how it brought back those rare, few moments where Lincoln had gotten himself in hot water. In a counter-clockwise position, it was Elmont, or rather, his empty seat now, Linka, Leven, and skipping a few empty seats, Lyle, Lindsey, Caroline, and Sam. The latter four phenos had already sensed the murderous vibes from the two, so they wanted to maintain as much space as possible.
"Well, that's personal, and I don't even know who you are..." Lyle firmly answered. "I don't know anything, if I'm to be honest."
"Yeah, same here," Caroline added. "That Elmont guy just picked me up as if I were a hitchhiker. All that talk about getting revenge on what they did to me... It sounded..."
"Promising?" Lindsey cut in, running her arm on Lyle's shoulder. "After everything that happened to me and my knight in shining armor here, I wouldn't mind seeing those responsible for this to pay what they need to pay. So yeah, if I get to be a part of this, you'd be damn well certain I'll accept in a heartbeat... As you can clearly see from your perspective."
"They kidnapped you two as well?" Sam inquired, narrowing her eyes at them.
"Yeah, cells and everything," Lyle responded. "Only reason we're here is cause this person, an actual... Lizard thing? They attacked the facility that held us three-" He pointed to both Lindsey and Caroline. "-And broke all of us out. I'd like to get the chance to thank them now, or later on if we ever come across each other."
"I second the notion," Lindsay agreed. "They were the true hero of that day."
"I guess..." Caroline muttered softly before turning to Sam. "Now, regarding what happened-"
"Hey, I thought you were dead!" Sam shot out. "They faked your death, had a funeral and everything! I was there, a couple of our friends and even some of the professors, too..."
Caroline rammed a fist downwards from the air. She had a reason to be mad again. "Well, I wasn't, and now that I'm out of there... Hey, what's the year anyway? I haven't been told or found a clue as to when I am."
"Well, we just entered the new decade fresh," Sam filled in. "It's July, and we're here, and- Look at me, I have red fucking skin for all I'm worth!"
"I can see that..." Carol touched her ex-classmate's skin. "Huh, it doesn't feel any different. Cold, maybe."
"Oh, and regarding the one who freed you- She's here with us, too."
"What?" Lindsey leaned closer. "Oh, sweet! I can show my gratitude!"
"Likewise," Lyle grinned, and then looked over the two individuals with white hair. "We've shared ours... For the most part. Now how about you? I don't recall seeing you fleeing from Dadetown."
Linka shook her head. "I'm not from there, no. More like, bred in a big tank for a few months! Holy shit, I gotta be less than a year old!"
As she tapped her chin to ponder it, the four phenos gave each other funny looks. Then, Caroline snorted before coughing to clear herself. "What does that even mean, child?"
"Well..." Linka had not been told of the disclosure rules, and being open was a natural thing for her, brain having been unraveled from the wiring enough to make her chatty. "I am a clone, and so is my big brother here!"
"A, I advise you to not-" Leven had whispered onto her.
"Ha, clones?" Caroline joked sarcastically, thinking it was pure bullshit. "There is no way there's someone in existence with white fucking hair, and also-"
Before she could finish, a scuffle broke out in the hallway, the screaming and yelling catching everyone's attention. The young phenos in the room looked toward the exit, but none of them made a single move. And when the door of the debriefing room opened, the collective of women voices echoed right through the room. In came Lincoln, gripping his loaded 1216 shotgun while Lynn, Luna and Lola were gripping onto him from behind, trying to slow him down. They were trying to keep him from massacring the random phenos.
"Let me go, will you?" Lincoln heavily demanded.
"LINCOLN, THESE ARE CANDIDATES FOR A NEW TEAM!" Luna tried to explain.
"You're only gonna be giving Elmont a reason to drop you, damn it!" Lynn shoved. "He won't like it if you shoot the majority of this new team!"
Luna drew her razor jaws back out and bit into Lincoln's leg, and it slowed him down briefly. He wasn't going to make it to point-blank range, so he aimed his gun at them, starting with Caroline. Luna pulled back her jaws and roared at the phenos, "TAKE FUCKING COVER!"
Linka scooted up from her chair, advancing to the Louds' direction to stop Lincoln. "Wait, don't do that, damn you! Me! You-me!" Linka grabbed- and hugged- the weapon that the barrel end was buried into her chest. And she held onto it as tight as she could, making Lincoln's grip on it weaken. She sank to the floor, laughing away while Lincoln tried to pull and lift the firearm back. "Ha, now you won't shoot!"
"Good idea," Lincoln agreed, doing the utmost unthinkable; he pulled the trigger, blasting away at Linka's chest with enough force to leave a hole running through her. Chunks of flesh and blood came flying out in all directions, covering Lincoln bloody with the clone's innards. Luna and Lola let go of him right after, horrified to see the little girl drop on the floor motionless. For one, Linka's mouth went agape, her face going as white as can be, filled with shock in those copy eyes of hers.
Luna stared intensely at the dead Linka, slowly backing onto the corner of the wall with pure horror. He had done it yet again, when it didn't need to happen. She blinked. She blinked and she saw the young redhead boy again, a bloody body right over her shoulder, one she had wanted to save. Lincoln, uncaring of life in that aspect, had quickly finished the clone before they could even begin to get to know about her. Luna dared not face the dark again and raced out jogging, breath shaking and body heat increasing exponentially dangerous. She was closer to having her inevitable dance with Lincoln; the dance that would see to it who had more reason to follow what they so believed in, what ideology was the superior, dictating one. Luna and the other sisters versus Lincoln... An inner conflict in the making.
Lynn kept her grip on the killer, but turned him around and swiped the shotgun from him while he looked on, automatically becoming distracted by the body of the clone. Whatever he was doing staring at her, Lynn did not know or care. She let him have it, shoving her fists into his face for some quick punches. Next few seconds, he flew over Lyle's head, falling to the far end of the room. The four new phenos scattered away from the shooter in fear, but Leven had remained still in his seat, looking over to Linka, and then Lincoln. "You murderous son of a bitch!" Lynn howled. "Fuck you, let's go!"
Lincoln pressed a hand to the wall and eyed Lynn with no true readable expression. He hadn't the drive to fight the zoomer, only seeing a quad of super-powered inexperienced youngsters bring selected for the next super team. These four, more likely to be dangers to the world, and Lincoln would have rather destroyed them than letting them onboard. The Elmont fuckwit was, for some odd reason, neglecting on the priorities and being careless by allowing these pbenos to enter with welcome arms, and not long ago it was made clear that no guest would ever be allowed, to risk comprising the Division's sanctity and security. Lincoln had all the right questions and words to call out the man, but for now, he sought to try and put down the four.
Lynn rushed him when he tried again, running at him before Lincoln could reach them. "No, you don't!"
Leven moved up from his chair at long last, being carefully observed by Lola at this point.
Lynn wrapped herself around Lincoln and pulled him back as he extended his arms, reaching out for one of the newbies whom were all backed on the wall, breathlessly scared. Lyle guided Lindsay away, making her lean flat and move sideways, where Lola was. Caroline and Sam followed lead, passing by the dead body of little Linka. The girls held their breath, looked away and did their best to not try and throw up at the horrid sight of the corpse with the pool of blood having formed right underneath. Lindsay retched visibly, helped to move forward by Sam.
Heading outside, the four new members lay witness to a downed Elmont, knocked out by Lincoln, being attended to by Lana. Lindsey grabbed onto Lyle, shaken by the events unfolding. Sam looked around for more help, but didn't see anyone else coming to their aid, apart from Luna, who was still grief-stricken in her own failure. The golden blonde approached her carefully. "Lunes? Hey, Luna-"
She had never become this frozen stiff before, so helpless and unclear of what to do. The everlasting fear of letting all of that darkness, that cold, black death her brother would so easily partake in and never look back even once at it- that was a monstrosity to live with, and even worse was when he did it and he had to have known what it meant to her. Her, one of the Louds with blood on her hands who didn't want it. Would do anything to get rid of it, just the same as Luan would, wanted to, and even Lynn as well. They would have, but not him. Him, a servant for the grim reaper, taking any and all lives he could possibly take and justify it his own way, the way of a true psychopath. No... Quite possibly a sociopath at that, for he seemed to have a lack of empathy when doing what he did.
But was this Loud a true sociopath?
"I tried," Luna spoke out of guilt, "I tried my best to talk to him, to reach some understanding, b-but he won't- he won't stop-"
"LOLA, HELP ME!" Lynn ordered, having a voice crack.
The diva woman jumped back in after she had wrapped up her own mindless staring, and ran right into Lincoln, grabbing him by the front. She used her legs to quickly run forward, a massive repelling force that seemed to work and keep Lincoln back from taking four lives. "This is for your own good, buddy boy!"
"Don't get in my way!" Lincoln barked at his sisters.
Lynn jumped out from behind and redirected to the front, helping Lola repel Lincoln until he had his back to the wall, literally. "Maybe if you stopped stepping out of line, we wouldn't be here fighting you! Damn it, Lincoln-"
He kicked away at Lynn's knees, hitting the left one hard enough to stop her running, but had it recoil back to him that it ached right when it was sent back upwards. She, however, slipped back as if the ground had been pulled backwards, and Lincoln's leg that came up had inadvertently struck the bottom of her chin pretty hard. He had beaten her with only one damn move, when it could not have been, and ever be, that easy.
Lynn toppled to the floor, reeling in the brutal pain. Lola had lost some power on her hold of Lincoln, which played into her doubt and intimidation. She felt she was not enough to hold him back, and her feeling was right when he went for a headbutt, striking at her forehead to disorient the unsuspecting blonde sister.
And then, the opening was realized. The line between him and the dangerous liabilities in the form of children was there, all set for him to perform his ungodly duties onto them. And he sprinted-
"You can stop now," Leven finally spoke up, moving to block Lincoln's exit. "These four are not your concern, so why are you wasting your time with such small fry?"
Lincoln scanned his eyes to the infiltration clone, and then the shotgun left lying on the floor. He would not have enough of the time to both grab it and fight through the clone if it was that Leven knew of all his tricks and methods, proving to be an exact equal match for him to be unable to beat... And vice versa. Maybe the game was not to fight this time, but to listen, the unbearable stalemate he, or rather both of them, would have hated to accept.
Talk was the remaining option.
"Wasting my time?" Lincoln could not believe his own ears. "I can't be hearing this from you, and you're practically me."
"That may be so," Leven agreed, "but did you forget the mission at hand? You're deliberately distracting yourself from the Black Network-"
Lincoln squinted.
"I wouldn't, and you know they are more important than these four here, these kids scared out of their minds-" Leven pointed out the doorway. "Tell me, Lincoln, do they look remotely like threats?"
The bloodthirsty maniac took another scope of the phenos again, and none of them were filled up with a sort of hostile hatred or burning sensation he knew snd recognized in others, namely enemies such as the Freights. No, they weren't looking like the Black Network foes in any way, nor like the long-dead Freights. They were simply human. But Lincoln saw only evil that could be in the future. Freak murderers with unrivaled power, way beyond the strength of the world's biggest and strongest armies. This was, and had always been, at stake since Luna had broken them all out. God only knows when and where the first pheno super-criminal would arise. Hell, maybe they already have, and Lincoln had not been checking on the news these past days.
And Lincoln would go to them and kill the shit out of them.
Now why did Leven here deviate from that ideology? How was it possible that he thought otherwise when Lincoln had already made up his mind? Was it possible that this clone, this Link-N figure had seen something else entirely? A spectacle outside of Lincoln's understanding the man could not even be able to have dreams or nightmares about? What was truly beyond his grasp of understanding, the world he knew not of?
"First rule of thumb, looks can deceive anyone, you understand me?" Lincoln maintained his place back from Leven, going for a verbal work-up as a front to distract him when reaching for the weapon. "Monsters come in all shapes and sizes, so why wouldn't any of these possibly end up as disgraceful excuses for human beings?"
"Yes, I recognize that it could come to be," Leven acknowledged, "but this is not happening yet, so there is no need to concern yourself. If you persist to bring about them harm, it is only logical that you will make enemies of them, they whom have never met you. And by what I can already tell, you and your sisters are locked in a quarrel of morals, am I right?"
Lincoln blinked.
"I understand you in that aspect, really, I do, but you should know it well that-"
Lincoln shot his eyes down to the shotgun quickly, making Leven slow down his appealing speech.
"-You won't be able to win against the Patriots when they deem it fit you are unstable, Lincoln. You don't have to cause unnecessary war with everyone simply because you... We believe our way to be superior. Because it isn't..."
Lincoln hugged Lori, his dear, sweet sister, the only one he had left, and the only one he believed to have bothered to find him with all energy she had mustered left. He consoled her, him being a teenager, and her, a broken mess of an adult, dented from the outside, and crying away over the one first thing she had done in the name of the Freights. Initiation. Initiation to kill, to become one of them, a part of the outcasts gang the world and time had forgotten. Just victims of an endless chain of tragic events that left them all half-dead, nowhere to go. No one to help them. Nothing to keep them alive, except for the illustrious illusion that they so needed each other for they had nothing left.
It was nothing but a lie at most, and no one would have ever noticed it should they think about it deeply. They never did, but it felt good to believe. It felt good to believe in something.
It felt good to hold Lori tightly with his love while she fell apart after returning with the group, having detonated it at a car show that was rigged. He wasn't there, he didn't see the bloodbath she had caused, but there was that thing about it. The speech Chandler shoved into their brains, and the justification that it was for the greater good, to wake up the world, it had all been pure bullshit. Why didn't she see it before him? Why, when she was the adult, far more mature than him? It should have been like that. It should have been her to try and abandon the Freights' world.
And yet, she never turned her back to them.
"When there is death, the bodies dropped in between then and now, there isn't a cheer of victory. There aren't laughs of triumph, or any sort of celebrating for yourself. When have you ever ended someone's life and decided you were happy, huh? You weren't pleased, and you never will be again, not the same way you would be before this, all of this, started."
Lynn and Lola recovered from their injuries and looked up to see the brother's looming silhouette right over them. They would not dare make a move, gaining nothing but fear and a sense of failure, feeling helplessly powerless to stop the unstoppable carnivore. Sam held onto Luna, caressing her gently while also making sure she was on her side to aid if there was going to be a massive fight here. Carol and Lyle were still shaken up, but their adrenaline had put them in a body-hardened situation, and with the tensing of their bodies, they too were ready for a scrap, as little knowledge they knew about fighting. Lindsey kept herself safe by cowering behind Lyle.
"You call them monsters, but to them..." Leven raised his hand and pointed at Lincoln, and then dragged the finger to Linka's corpse. "You are that of which you describe to wish to terminate. You are the monster."
"So I've been told..." Lincoln simply responded in a quiet tone. "So I'm always told, but is it so bad that I want to annihilate these so-called phenos to keep it balanced? Am I truly the only person in the world who does not believe these kids, teens, and every single person kidnapped by Vial should gp around freely and wield such destructive power that makes them feel godly?! No, no I don't fucking think so..."
"Lincoln, they do not carry the Freights' main ideas. I don't think these kids here think themselves high and mighty like the ones you have been accustomed to for years, otherwise, why would they be here, right?"
"Y-Yeah..." Lynn uttered from below. "Elmont had been keeping tabs on who and who aren't cut to throw in with us... D-damn it, Linc, you are too distrusting of us and- And you just said it, didn't you?! You just said it..."
"What?" Lola stammered, holding her forehead down. "I don't follow..."
"Don't you see?!" Lynn heaved out louder, beckoning to her sisters and allies around them. "It's not just them he's applying this shit to, but us! All of us phenos here are completely unworthy in his eyes! He just basically said we have not earned what we've received from Lisa! Tell them, Lincoln! Go on, tell them I'm wrong!" For once, Lynn wanted to be wrong. Wrong for the truth to be a lie, a lie not bothersome nor hurtful. She grunted, still bleeding from her mouth while Lola tried to keep her down.
All eyes had centered on Lincoln, who gave no quick answer. And when he didn't, gave none whatsoever. And therefore it had to he true; he did not like the idea of his sisters, naive, weak-hearted and mentally unfit to serve as private soldiers for the Division. He saw it and no one else did... Or maybe the ones who made it this way didn't care, they'd have probably needed anyone at random with powers to fight their wars, and maybe it was all just a trick. Maybe the fact that they were related to Lisa Loud was an irrelevant fact they sold to the siblings as something that mattered. Maybe had it not been for their powers, they'd be looked well past and there would be another team in their place, a better team taking upon the forces of Vial Corp and the Black Network. Maybe it should have been like that all along; who were they outside a team working for a secret agency tied to the government? What were of them once they were reduced from their lives, everything taken from them again?
"Lincoln?" Lola wanted to know it, asking away in her desperation. Luna moved closer, pushing Sam away and going through the other kids. She had been paying attention to the shitshow up until Lynn went and dropped that possibility where Lincoln had secretly believed that his sisters weren't deserving of what they had. The three women came back, forgetting their mutual fear and hatred of Lincoln to understand it more, a desire to wish why this was of him. "Why?"
"I'll tell you why!" Lynn roared out. "It's because he knows we don't believe or follow that code he's taken into account! We're not the shoot-to-kill types like him, therefore we're the fools to him! We're nothing but absolute excess luggage to him, doing nothing but holding him back all this time. If it takes me to ride that very same bandwagon for you to accept and deem me worthy of my speed, then I don't want it from you, I'll never want your approval!"
"We don't want it," Luna chimed in.
"And we won't ever need it!" Lola quivered.
Linka gasped for dear breath and leaned her upper body right side up. "Ouchies, that was unbearably painful!" Her large hole had still been gushing out blood, intestines dangling about. She poked away at the flesh, mouth dropped open in amazement. "Ooooooh, can't say I didn't expect this to happen!"
"H-how-?!" Lynn stuttered.
"Um, hello?! Rapid regeneration!" The bloody hole had begun to shrink, closing away with her white skin. "Agh, I can still feel the fragments inside, just...-" And then she proceeded to vomit out her innards, along with some of the buckshot fillings left in her stomach, nothing anyone around would have expected to see.
"Ah, Jesus-" Lynn whispered.
"Ewwww...!" Lola averted her eyes, quickly evacuating the room. Her own stomach could not double down on the sight of such bloody horror.
Luna's own nose began sniffing away, picking up on a delightful smell that her reptilian form found appeasing- and she dropped on all fours, pouncing right onto the blood puddle. Her long, narrow tongue rolled right out, rubbing away at the stained floor. Her normal eyes had gone to the cold yellow eyes, signaling that she had given in to her beastly temptation. She liked the taste of the artificial blood, taking it in as some great blood, and it was only when she had licked the floor clean of Linka's blood that she turned her attention to the vomit, sensing the delicacies within the mess.
"Luna, for fuck's sakes!" Lynn shook her head and moved in, slapping the older sister across the face. "Control yourself!"
Linka went over to Leven and gave him a shoulder punch. "Don't think I missed that speech, big brother! Nice job, using your logic on Lincoln! Who do you think you are, a clone of Lincoln and Lisa?! Hahaha!"
"Bitch, I might be," Leven teased, forming a rare smile unlike that of Lincoln's own structure. "I'm glad you're alive-"
Lynn dragged Luna away from the room, feeling pretty silly on how things had advanced in under the last ten minutes. She gave Lincoln the stink eye right before exiting the room backwards with the man-eating sister. The look on her face where she was closer to the end of their relationship, just like the others had begun to grow weary.
And at that slow, quiet moment, Lincoln had forgotten his current objective to kill the four strangers just like that. He stood still in that spot Leven had locked him in, the latter clone and Linka both eyeing him back when no one else was left inside.
Linka coughed clearly. "So, what's the game plan?"
Moments Later
The situation had been diffused greatly, but the fear and intensity felt by the heatwave aura of Lincoln Loud's nefarious presence had still been felt by the new phenos, but Linka and Leven were, for the time being, sure that Lincoln had momentarily ceased his bloody need to rip apart the freaks of tomorrow, and, by Leven's own reasoning, Lincoln would have had to set his own sights on them eventually if he were to go that far. And it had to be known he just might have in due time. It was scary, but not to Leven.
Not scary at all. Then again...
The room was filled with Elmont, the current line-up of the Patriot team of phenos, and the fresh batch of phenos Elmont had plucked from the world personally. "Fortunately for the lot of you, I'll overlook this little... Delay, and rush to the main objectives. Louds-"
Linka deployed the files out onto the screen, starting with images and an address of a private estate fit for a billionaire; a perfect glass house with a fancy, decorative design, nothing out of the ordinary. This perfect abode that overlooked at a beach side off the coast of Malibu, California, the last resort of a hiding place for one Lisa Loud.
"The five of you will assemble to this location and extract Lisa. Anyone you see that is not Lisa, you have full permission to drop, unless you wish to leave them to the authorities. Whatever their fates may be will not make a difference to us, so it is entirely your call. Now, with the sudden switch of teams with these clones-"
Linka stood up and finished where Elmont involuntarily left off. "Lisa and company will be expecting us to join in the fight, and as much as I'd love to shooty-shooty, Leven and I will sit this one out-"
"We cannot risk Lisa shutting down the clones with any kill switch she might have. Now, I would know for sure but all files on the five clones are have been wiped thanks to-"
"Pffft, I said I was sorry, you L'oreal bastard," Linka apologized again, crossed her arms and pouting.
"Anyways, we are way less on time now more than ever, and this is our only chance to take them all at once. The Black Network is strategically compromised, so we know they will all be retreating, but Lisa's hiding spot will not be where everyone will go-"
"I can try to locate them," Linka offered. "What I have come to know is that Lisa and Peter McMahon are in cahoots, and McMahon, the current owner of the Kapacity Korp properties, has basically given it all to her in secrecy. That's where they'll continue their work, and the Black Network is intended to be a ruse with a emergency self-destruct sequence. They'd want you all to go back and boom-" Linka snapped her fingers, "they kill you, fake their own deaths, and nobody would bat an eye and continue Project Superior from the Korp facilities. Kapacity Korp switching to a biological interest will only be seen as them stepping up after the defeat of the great titan Vial Corp, and nothing will have changed. In other words..."
"Kapacity Korp will be the next Vial for sure," Lincoln surmised. "We don't have long until Lisa is notified and makes another run for it."
"Maybe we're too late..." Luna drew, worried about it. "It's been half an hour already, and... What if we're too late?"
"No, we won't be!" Lynn believed. "We will not be too late to stop this, even if we lose Lisa forever, we'll have the advantage and be able to dismantle all of Kapacity Korp, right?"
Elmont did not keep a word, which stunned and terrified Lynn. And then she understood again. She understood how it really worked. Without Lisa, the one and only person to drop the multitude of confessions, they had nothing. Lynn then turned to Linka, hoping the clone would have something, even as small for a piece of evidence, to use as leverage that said Lisa had taken over Kapacity Korp, but the clone shook her head at the zoomer, telling her wordlessly that it was Lisa or they would never be able to win this particular war, and never be able to get justice for all those who were turned into phenos.
"We need Lisa, and nothing else, no one else," Elmont confirmed. "Either her or McMahon, which is why I called in for these four youngsters here. We have Lyle Jefferson, Lindsey Sweetwater, Caroline Pingrey, and Samantha Sharp present and accounted for, three of whom have been modified to become phenos in Vial Corp labs. As for Sam here-"
"Don't even get into it," Sam scolded. "I hate it so much..."
"This team, along with clones Link-A and Link-N, as their codenames seem to be, will also be joining this secondary team, the Junior Patriots, if you will-"
"Tsk, we're really going superhero..." Luna thought.
"Government sponsored, mind you," Elmont reminded them. "No wild west shit in my country, I'll tell you that much. Peter McMahon is making an appearance. Presidential public meet going live nationally to address the current affairs of the world, and McMahon will be there and he'll walk along the podium. Ever seen Vantage Point? We're going that direction but with no casualties-"
Lincoln burst out of his seat. "You want these kids to set off a bomb?!"
"Okay, so maybe that was not the best reference here. No, I need a little rain of chaos to happen, enough that it looks like an assassination attempt. The five of you not performing will be in the crowd and take McMahon during the mess, you got that?"
"Jeez, this is methodically insane," Lyle thought. "You really want me to actually stage a false flag operation?"
That teen knows about something like that?! Lincoln was outraged. I knew he was dangerous...
"Um, this is really too much..." Lindsey was no longer on board about this. "I want revenge, not to end up a fugivite-"
"If it all goes well but you get caught, any of you, I promise that you will all be cleared, and that's a fact should we have McMahon in our custody."
"Why them?" Lola wondered. "They have not had any training! You just brought them in and expect them to be-"
Linka switched out the images of Lisa's house to news reports of mysterious parties attacking Vial Corp convoys and facilities, all spread out in between the time Luna had freed them to the day they were in. Lyle and Lindsey had begun a campaign. Caroline left behind a bloody trail of butchered staff. More phenos had been freed, all starting from the chain Luna had created, and it was Sam who helped her start it. Luna and Sam, having both started a revolution together without ever truly realizing it. Luna, who had always come to know herself as the pheno woman who free the other captives. Anything they did after that, she would say she was responsible, but she didn't fully know to what extent had her responsibility reached to. Lisa had created the phenos in them, but Luna's example had been followed the moment they saw her rise up and defy them. She, a symbol of rebellion, the first freedom fighter to rise amongst the pheno era, the savior who turned the tide on the long-running oppression campaign dedicated for the purpose to realize the superior human being, and she may not have ever been planned to survive her ordeal.
The face of the rising rebellion started with the Superbeast of Dadetown.
"They are brave enough to pull this off, and I genuinely believe that," Elmont admitted. "You are not kids, but fighters who want to make the impossible difference, and this is it. This right here is your greatest challenge, my young Patriots. We have to try, and we have to succeed so that it won't happen again-"
Lindsey shut her eyes and witnessed the empty nothingness of her house, finding herself reliving that same horror experience when she returned to her home she'd been taken away from. Sometime in between then, when she had been nabbed, and now, the era of the new world with its new rules, they had moved out. Moved out to some other part of the world...
And forgot her.
She could not help but come up with that thought of, while she was crying, that they chose to leave because these memories made of each other, all revolving around her, were simply too much for the collective to endure that it broke the family. They could not bear the pain of losing their daughter, and as much as Lindsey could ever theorize, maybe she really was dead in the world's eyes. She was dead, and only Lyle, the kind-hearted softie with the role of her white knight, did his damn best to remind her that the end was not, and could not be so forever.
She'd see them again, he told her. She would, and hope had to be kept alive. Alive so she would be, and she had to be alive to keep it alive. One could never live without the other.
"Yeah!" Lindsey agreed, throwing her fists in the air. "So that it won't happen again!"
Lyle turned to the girl he protected and gave her a strong, pleasant smile. She had her reason to fight, to live, and for that he was grateful. She had him to push and remind her to keep going until the end would eventually be reached. The end.
They were all in it, united as one to prevent another chain of incidents and tragedies to spare those at risk, a number set in the hundreds range. It came down to all of them to put an end to Lisa's reign of power once and for all.
"I have complete faith in each of you... Let's get you all set up for your designated mission at hand."
Later - Washington, DC
Linka joined the crowd, bumping into some of the people while she discovered that she was too short to see squat while the crowdgoers, all taller than her due to them being adults who cared for these types of politics, were placed around like an endless treeline, and the sun was concealed away when blocked by their heads.
Lyle had no issue while blending in, and Lindsey had been riding piggyback to get a good view of the spectacle. Reporters were live on the scene, cameramen capturing the event for the news channels. The men at the podium, clearly the important officials, were currently discussing the recent events involving Vial Corp and how they were still trying to find James Shepherd, and McMahon, present behind the current talker, Edwin Bowen, was keeping a straight face while Linka had known that he knew of the location most likely and would have never revealed it.
"Everyone, check in," Linka spoke into her earpiece. "How gucci are y'all?"
"How what?" Lyle blinked, arms set around Lindsey's legs to keep her from falling in any direction.
"I think she means to say how we're looking," Caroline reiterated, sitting at a bench far behind the crowd.
"Oh, well, I'm just doing well, you know, apart from this whole..." Sam was currently paired with Leven, for she could not appear in public the way she was. Sure, she might have played that terror role to rev up the crowd, but Linka and Leven had orchestrated a better play. And by better, it was sure as hell an explosive one. The clone and the blonde with the red-pale skin were nested on a rooftop just a little aways from where it was going down- and the opposite building from them, a hotel, had a room rigged with a homemade that had Freight written all over it. No, the four kids would not be setting it off, but Leven would be, and Linka seemed to be fine with it, being all good for it. "Jesus, what the actual fuck am I doing? Not long ago, I was just up to property damage and nothing more than that. It feels so weird... Always weird that..."
Leven witnessed the young woman touch the skin on her arm, which he felt that she was still in denial in some degree, unable to cope the fact that the world had changed for her so immensely- and she had not ever been prepared for this. No one in their right mind could have ever readied up for a new life such as this one. "Can I ask something?" He turned his back to the target area and gave her all his attention, feeling like he could ease out how lost and uncomfortable she had felt. "Before this, before you turned into... Whatever that is, what did you do? Who were you?"
Sam sighed with pure grief and rubbed the back of her head, waving her hair around in the process. "Had my whole life ahead of me, I guess. College student, career set for me to walk on. I just needed to give all my time and energy towards it, you know? To devote myself into what I was aiming for... And then-" Sam raised her left hand and kept opening and closing it as if she was experiencing a vengeful feeling. Maybe it had been that, who was to say? "I met Luna Loud, and my whole world went topsy-turvy. Like, I decided to help her because of how wrong it all seemed to be, so... Tell me something, albino boy... Why was it that trying to help her ended up in me being... Well, punished for that? I thought I was doing good, and the Dadetown facility fell on me. No notice, no warning, it just-" She squeezed her fist hard enough to make herself bleed from the palm. If it didn't infuriate her by then, it certainly made her mad now. But only there and now, she had gotten nore clarity on who wasn't at fault here. It wasn't Luna who turned her, and yet she could not say she was a Vial Corp product at the same time.
It just happened, be it part of fate luring her for something bigger, or it was just a thing at random, a case of the "Wrong Place, Wrong Time" occurrence. Seeing it now, it might have been the first one, a gasket-blower of an event she was destined for, and quite possibly more. She wasn't thinking of that agency that recruited her, not about the older woman she had grown down romantic feelings for, but Sam's mind was on the current mission at hand, and how dangerous it might have been, even with her own superpower she had gotten. She was no immortal being, and there was not testing that, ever. She, and the others in this second team, were still as human as can be, regardless of being a pheno or not.
"I was someone, and now... Look at me... I'm someone else entirely..." Sam unclenched her fist, revealing her bloody palm. "And someone who knows anger like no other, it seems... I don't understand it but, I had these thoughts where I didn't want to go back to what I had. I just feel like-"
"Like you had the weight of the world on your shoulders removed only for something else to take its place?" Leven asked with tad curiosity.
"Oh, God! Yes, yes that's it! That's... That's how I've been feeling if we were to narrow it down..." Sam sighed again. "I feel selfish when I look at it like that, when I recognize that my old life... The one before, I felt trapped, not free to do what I long for. Never free."
Leven made no emotion.
"You do understand me, right? It's like this woke me up and made me see how chained up I've been, but even still..."
Far From Now
"You aren't free," the shadow far back on the other end of the alley had explained it to Leven. "They made you to be like the original, so tell me, what have you done up to here? How long have you been roaming around and would you have considered that you were, at least once in your entire lifespan so far, free from their agendas and conflicts?"
Leven remained still, taking the silhouette's words into account. "There is some truth to those words, yes, but I make my own decisions, as does Linka-"
"And yet you both are constantly roped into battle alongside them to no end. I know you bleed, I've seen it, so there's no need to ask of you if you think yourself godly and immortal." The man pulled out a handgun and aimed at Leven. "It only takes a special anti-pheno bullet to kill you, you know? And yes, this is a clip full of them, don't you worry."
Leven winced, trying to not show his inital fear of the man with the trump card. "What's your game here? Are you trying to preach to me about how I'm a drone, a mere weapon to use by them?"
"Trying. I like that. It means you aren't convinced yet, which is odd..." The man lowered his gun snd set it on the ground, then kicked it swsy to Leven's direction. "It can all be over now with one pull of the trigger, Leven. You know who I am and you know what's gotta be done..."
Leven picked up the gun and had turned the tables onto the other guy, which had been adding to their objective. "I fire this and you die here, and the crisis will be averted-"
"My motives have been for the greater of mankind, and I'll see it through to the end that I be the last one standing. You, the Louds serving the Patriot Division, and the other smaller teams scattered all over the place, you're all just puppets serving greedy masters who can afford to make endless wars so that they can profit and maintain their good front row seats and watch us all go to war and kil each other off. Just you wait and see, they'll deactivate you and disavow the Louds, or worse."
"That'll be my problem, not yours," Leven decided, cocking the gun. "You have a date with the devil and those you've murdered."
"Are you so certain you want to do it? You want to prove you're a puppet?"
"I am no one's pawn," Leven believed.
"Wrong... You are bound by Lincoln's own personality and ideology... Or should I be more accurate and say you have never fully let go of the Freight MO?" He smiled under the lights of the building, cornering Leven in that aspect. "You're trapped, a being of no free will created by the Network to kill the way he does. Nothing has changed, apart from the targets. Kill me to prove my claims are true, or let me live, to prove to yourself that you are not like him. Prove to us that you are more worthy than him. Prove to me that you will do this by the book. Go on, play this cat-and-mouse game with me, entertain me."
Leven was so tempted to pull the trigger... And then, he found himself actually hesitating to do that simple thing. A movement of his finger is all he needed to do. For the life of him, Leven did not.
Now
"I think I do," Leven replied. "I guess everyone starts up chained to something, but we don't ever think about it at all during our lives, unless something happens. A cruel, dark and twisted thing we can't ever predict or mentally prepare ourselves for. But I think it would be that, be it a house fire..."
Malibu, California
"...or seeing your friends get killed..."
Lincoln and company circled the area, all of them closing in on the target house. They made slow advancements, ready for the long-running goose chase to finally come to an end, if it just so happened that fate decided that the conclusion was here, right through those birch doors with a security pad on the side. They were ready to breach.
Michigan
"Maybe someone who hates you, or someone who's seen a golden opportunity to pin hot shit on you, has done so to hide some truth they want to steer away from to protect their image or keep their injustice out of the light..."
Marsha drove on for awhile, passing through yet another city around the state. Leia, having called shotgun, had lowered her seat back and promptly fell asleep about ten minutes in, and so had Gwen, only half an hour later. They were lightly snoring, and Marsha could only guess what it was they wete dreaming of, if they were. Either way, she'd let them have it for the time being, seeing as how they had been on the run for quite awhile, prime suspects in the case of the death of Lord Tetherby.
Elsewhere - Far From Now
"Or perhaps it's something bigger, an event that leads to other things, problems, and that'll leave you with out with it, and up to bringing innocent people into it."
The teenage girl of long, straightened brown hair, wearing a purple leather jacket and torn blue jeans, centered herself perfectly aligned to the large, metal contraption just a few inches away from her. The machine itself had just been activated, and she, a girl given a very special mission alongside her relative, the blonde girl with scorching red eyes, and of a height just as equally balanced as the brunette here.
"You ready, Lyra?" the blonde girl with a hairstyle of a ponytail with bangs, sporting a skin-tight suit of green and black, had asked of the brunette. In her hands was a black set of goggles she needed for her pheno specialty.
Lyra turned around and gave the blonde a nervous smile. "This is a huge weight on me, sis," Lyra shakily responded. "Mom's asking too much of me to do this."
"Yeah, well, we're on the same boat, Lyra," the blonde reminded Lyra, flashing a thumb up. "We just have one person to kill, and it's the end of the war. Simple as that."
The machine spewed up a large portal of blue swirls, the time-traveling gateway to the past, readying up for the two young girls in their quest to assassinate a key figure responsible for a chain of events that would ultimately lead to the devastation of the world they had grown up and lived in. A world lost to the Prime Federation.
Lyra looked behind Lynnette to catch sight of her mother, the elder Luna Loud dressed in a ragged uniform with a light green patch sewn on her left sleeve, the insignia to identify Domicile rebels long distance. And Luna, huddled around some of their many allies thrown into the resistance force, had her eyes go red, watering freshly with tears. This, Lyra interpreted as her mother expressing the most concern for her daughter's safety, a fear that had every right to exist within the both of them. The danger was here, and it would also be there, to the place Lyra and Lynnette would go to; a never-ending game of life and death to be played by them all.
"M-mom..." Lyra had to toughen herself and her stomach up for this, and if Lynnette hadn't, then so would the latter. "I'll come back, mom! There's no need to cry! I'll be back soon enough and I'll make you proud of me! I'll make you proud of me, I promise!"
Lynnette scoffed, placing her goggles right before they ventured into the dead era of yesterday. Just then, a red silhouette raced up to her in the blink of an eye. Dear mother Lynn Loud had dropped in to say her temporary farewell. "And I thought you'd be busy fighting the Prime Fed guys."
"Plenty of guys to fill in for my absence," Lynn explained, "plus I was not going to miss this. It's going to be the last time I'll see you again in a while."
"Yeah," Lynnette said without empathy in her voice. "It'll be fast, right? I mean, it sounds all too simple if you ask me..."
"It should be, yes..." Lynn closed her eyes and looked down on her, placing an arm on the daughter's shoulder. "I'll be with you, okay? Always, in your heart..." Lynn turned to Lyra. "My niece, c'mere."
Lyra was invited for a bear hug composed of a motherly love in mutuality for both girls. "Ah, auntie-"
"Sing it again, girls..."
"Ew, aunt, no!" Lyra shrugged.
"Come on, mom, we're too old for that-"
Lynn hugged tighter now. "I won't let go until you do it on behalf of me and your mother," she told the girls. "Lyra, start it off, why don't you?"
"Oh, fine, aunt..." Lyra agreed, trying to recall how the three-line lullaby went. "Um... If you find yourself lost, deep within the woods..." Her voice sang it with a perfect angel's voice, one such calm and gentle audible stroke that could soothe the calm into the crowds, a sort of superpower within itself. "Follow the sunlight to the end of time..."
"And all the happiness from the world will be waiting to meet you again," Lynnette finished for her, carelessly whispering and breaking the vibes. "Still freaking short if you ask me."
"Maybe it is, little one, maybe it is..." Lynn let go of both girls, revealing her own eyes to have gone teary red as well. "We'll see each other soon, okay? You guys go on now... Time awaits you..."
Lyra nodded once while Lynnette processed those words. Lynn said they'll see each other soon, not that she'd see them soon. What did that mean exactly? But she never questioned it, and if she would have, it would have not ever been answered perhaps; Lyra had taken her by the hand and dragged her in, and then, they were off to the races. Off to prevent a war.
Now
"Point is, we all go through something that changes us, and regardless of how cruel it is in nature, it happens for a reason, right? Yes, I do agree that it pushes us away from the crowd. You see people who follow society, play by the rules. You said you were a college girl?"
"Yeah," Sam answered, mouth agape.
"Then those people, all the other students you see when you walk to class, those are the ones not broken free, but that's not to say it's a bad thing. Maybe we're all supposed to be chained, never to see the darkness. Then again, the place we're both does have its advantageous pros. It depends on whoever winds up with tragedy, I know it's not the same for everyone."
"Supposed to be chained..." She looked down on her hands. "Is this really the price to see something I haven't before? Is this the price to have my eyes opened? ...Are they really opened?"
"That I can't say, but it's for you to go and find out. Who's to say that I've been right all along? Maybe my words are not to count on, and I'm just wrong."
"Well... If you are, I would also be wrong, because what you say doesn't feel wrong... I do feel free... And the ugly truth is that I entered a messed-up pile of shit. And then I realize it's just the state of the world, the rules of mankind. I know that... I just needed to be reminded..."
"That's so goddamn deep like this penis I don't have right inside of you," Linka cut in through their earpiece comms.
"Um..." Sam exhaled all her air out. "What's the deal with the girl? Why is she so perverted and sexual?"
"She's not exactly in her right state of mind, it's complicated-"
"No, it's not! I can't have slurp beverages, and that kills me! Hang on, I'm reading a fanfic of ourselves. This Spag character wants me to dominate with... A Linka Log! Yes, I totally deserve a penis!"
"What the hell is she on?" Lindsey hissed through the comms. "You guys are really odd."
"Mwuah!"
"Heads up," Leven notified his teammates. "Almost five minutes since Sam and I worked the room. Distraction coming up, and remember, no casualties. Elmont's trusting that you have mastered your powers... Whatever they are, you didn't mention them, and leader didn't tell us either, so surprise us."
"I still don't feel good about this..." Carol reported. "I mean, if we get caught, those government guys can actually disown us, you know. Throw us away and deny their involvement in this, and for that reason I can't say I fully trust Mr. Elmont. Trust me, these guys are all about power, image and resources. Someone in their branch does a crime, they'll cover it up by redirecting media and public attention to something else just as worse."
"That is so fucking scary, I'll take it with pepperoni!" Linka gurgled.
"What, you know of such figures personally?" Leven steered away from the opposite building's direction, leading Sam away. "That's a bonus, but are you interested in that field?"
"I might have been, but my controlling parents... Well, it's like you said, that was the chain around me. I've heard tale of a great many from dear old dad when he'd get too drunk, but yeah, toppers are scary to be fucking with in any way around. Toppers and the millionaires or billionaires, what have you?"
"Are you telling me you're scared?" Leven poked at the blonde, eyeing her for an expression.
"I- I mean, I have been since the beginning, yeah... Fighting these guards Vial's got on the payroll, such who know they're doing bad but don't care because of the money- Its scary because it proves to me that it's easy to sell your sense of right, but at the same time it enrages me to the point that- That I do want to be here. My heart is beating wildly because we are asking to die by going this route, and I don't think our powers make a different. Sorry, but I'm not trying to sound paranoid, it just behooves me to watch around what... Well, what this agency will want us to do."
"Interesting... Linka?"
"Are you asking me to hack the Pentagon?!" Linka assumed of Leven. "That's crazy! I like the way you think, OddCombo creation! Maybe we should shut down the entire nation of China, too! They are the face of multiple economies, no?"
"Linka..." Leven scolded like the big brother she'd label him as.
In the crowd, Linka rubbed her hand on the spare white shirt over her damaged spandex suit, feeling the fabric with admiration. "I love how this is loose, but... The suit underneath me brings out the size of my ass. I can't help but feel like I'm pandering for perverts and pedophiles and people named Flagg1991."
At long last, an explosion had kicked off and set the start of the high-octane thrill amped within the crowd. Leven and Sam ducked for cover when the rooftop rocked violently almost like an earthquake had struck. Glass shattered all at once in a greatly synchronized sound, everything feeling all-too surreal, and at the same time, familiar for Leven. It was a bomb that had gone off, just like the fragment of the Freight construct inside of him knew to have whipped one up with Linka's help. Weird to say it was not for a sickening agenda this time, and yet...
"Thanks for that image..." Leven plucked Sam by her shoulders. "You ready?"
"Wait, what the fuck is the plan?! You didn't-"
Linka rushed into the crowd, pushing her way through the scared civilians and reporters around. Up ahead, Peter McMahon and several of his friends he accompanied were immediately surrounded by Secret Service agents, all arranged in a circular position, guarding the special VIPs from anyone who thought to snipe them from afar. How could they expect the attack to be the work of phenos and clones of ex-Freights? How could anyone?
Leven threw himself and Sam off the rooftop without warning, causing Sam to scream with all the pent up fear she could ever, and she had not even seen Leven toss a teleporter on the ground right before they could hit, which redirected them right onto-
Linka and the other four assembled onto the podium when the portal's exit manigsted right beside the agents and the politicians, and Leven tossed Sam right into them as if she were a bowling ball being applied to the pins they'd been reduced to. Lyle came running on all fours, still carrying Lindsey on his back. Caroline also joined the fray, and with that, they had surrounded their only target fairly easily.
Fairly easily, when it should not have been at all. And that meant something was definitely wrong here.
"Oh, no, D is saving us for a big boss, I'm sure! Why didnt I fake my death back then?"
"More like, how didn't you die when that guy shot you?!" Lindsey pointed out with hands stretched put towards Linka. "I mean thanks for saving us... But- But what the fuck?! And don't say regeneration, cause that only raises more questions!"
"Enough chatter!" Leven beckoned. "Secure McMahon and let's just get this-"
Among the downed group of powerful men, one such figure had spoken up, clear as the daylight was, directing to the six youngsters. "I can't say I'm surprised, and I have to applaud your courageous efforts it took to come all this way for me-" Peter McMahon, the middle-aged man of around six feet and, now that they were seeing him close amd personal, seemed to be partly Canadian at most, suggested by his hairdo, facial hair and expression that didn't read hostile in any way. But they weren't fooled at all. "Did you come here thinking I hadn't a contingency?"
"Contingency? For that to work, you would have had to know we were coming," Leven figured. "Anticipated us in the least bit of sense."
Linka looked around to see news reporters and their cameramen all locked onto them, filiming the scenery live on all outlets. It caught the phenos staging a seemingly terrorist attack, the goal unclear to those watching at home. "Uh... We're not fast enough, it seems."
"This isn't gonna look good..." Caroline shivered. "I'm not taking the fall for the mastermind behind this."
Leven grabbed the senator with one hand, and looked to Sam to hand out the tiny portals. "We're leaving-"
"Oh, we'll see about that!" A new player had stepped up to the field, ready to play against the dominating team of new Patriots. This player happened to be Allison Taggart, all dressed up in a dark blue uniform from head to toe, and half her face was concealed by a custom mask she brought for the party. The mask did not cover up her hair, revealing it to the group as a mustard-green color hair, medium and wavy at that. "Heeeeere's Allie!"
She had popped up right behind them, landing into the podium with two submachine guns. She centered them on Lyle first, taking aim but not firing.
Linka saw a potential foe, and like an idiot, she had the funny idea to rush the girl like that. "Don't worry, I'm sure she's not-"
Allison opened fire upon Linka, tearing up her body with the special anti-pheno rounds she had, performing for the extra damage regular ammo could never accomplish. She ripped up Linka's face, chest and legs that way, leaving red gashes in Linka's place. The clone stumbled over and bled frantically, body quaking about. Lindsey, Sam and Caroline freaked visibly, but Leven, dropping their target, jumped into battle while Allison was quickly reloading after emptying all rounds onto Linka. "Shit!"
Leven picked her up and slammed her hard on her back. Allison screeched but rolled around, quickly digging her hands into her suit and tossed a gray landmine-shaped device past Leven. The contraption flashed a light blue sparkle, activating away. Leven looked on for a second but wasn't about to be distracted long enough for the mysterious opponent to get the drop on him. However, Allison's next move, a mere punch Leven believed he wouldn't be fazed by, had struck him senseless and confused. He was forced a step back from it, wondering how it was possible to have taken a blow from an apparent non-pheno.
"Hey, I see you are curious!" Allison geoaned while rubbing her back. "Those are portable power dampeners. You've seen the main model, and these are the mobile ones."
"Who are you?" Leven went in for a swing, but Allison ducked it and rebounded for her own counter, a nice elbow to his face.
"Right, you've never met me, but I know you and Link-A," Allison explained. "I worked with Lisa a few times, now... Where are the other three clones?"
"None of your concern..." Leven turned to the phenos. "Take McMahon and get out of here!"
"What?!" Sam gasped. "What about-?!"
"I'll take care of her! Just go!"
"Damn it, I can't use my powers!" Caroline had tried to shift her hands again, only for it to work no more. "You guys?!"
"Nope!"
"What the-?"
Sam gave them each a Matrix Portals, all of the phenos quickly dropping out of the scenery with their objective having been completed, at the cost of Leven and Linka being left behind. And just as soon at the fight had started, it had ended. Leven slipped off the earpiece and broke it when tossing it on the ground.
"Oh, and what would this be?" Allison slipped off her mask and revealed her entire face; she could not have been more than eighteen years, or maybe she didn't age that fast physically. "You got questions for me?"
"You know who I am?" Leven pondered.
"That's easy. Yes, you're a clone, it's as simple as that," Allison dropped, this being nothing he didn't already know.
"Clone of Lincoln, correct?"
"I've been told A had duplicated the files-"
"The one on me has been involuntarily erased, and as much as I'd like to take a look at what exactly I am-"
Allison broke out laughing, mocking Leven up close. "Oh, that's rich! Link-A wiped the file on you, and you're all curious about it! That's- that's fucking funny, dude!"
"Do you know it or no?"
Shs stopped and raised her shoulders. "What makes you think I did read it? Better yet, a more better question would be why it matters to you, Link-N. I mean, you are structured to be like Lincoln Loud, the indestructible Freight creation."
"Yes, but for some reason..." Leven had come out bearing a more peaceful aura, far calmer and more on the logical side than Lincoln was, and that alone had brought him into question of why this was. Why was he not the same as Lincoln? Funny, two clones of him in existence and both were different in terms of character. Linka, the insane one with childish tendencies, who still carried the signature murderous feature, and Leven, who seemed to use his head and apply tactics and direct the resources correctly. He had the rage Lincoln had, but it was toned down gradually, and his own desire to bring about harm to Lori and company... It had never been real to him, because at the end of the day- "I don't feel like I'm the fully clone of him."
"You want the truth, huh?" Allison snapped her fingers, and in turn, all the newscasters around them dropped their equipment and went forward as if she had hypnotized them all with the snap. Eveyone drew out handguns at Leven, trapping him right at center stage. Next, the downed guard and other political figures stood up- and then glitched out of place. Holograms, which bewildered Leven. "I'll let my dear uncle tell you that."
The real Peter McMahon appeared out of thin air, right besides his niece. He placed his heavy hand onto her left shoulder, whispering into her ear on how good a job she had just done. "Hello again, clone, we meet again."
"Never met you before..." Leven croaked.
"Ah, I'm sure you're wondering about who these people are..." McMahon went and gave the gun-toters a firm introduction. "These are but regular people, not direct affiliates of Vial or anything like that, and yes, they are real news reporters and whatnot. Right now, they've just painted you and these new phenos as domestic terrorists. That bomb has been caught, and so has this little stunt you tried to pull, which is just the motivation needed to push towards more anti-pheno movements within the dark walls of Congress, and now that the public eye has seen first-hand what you can do- Well, I need not say anything else, you're a smart one."
"All of this to keep secure all that power Lisa has, huh?" Leven grumbled. "Discredit all phenos so that they'll deny our place with the Patriot Division by force, I can see that as the outcome."
"Exactly right, my boy! Just remember we have the power to destroy each other, take each other apart. All it takes is he who strikes first- And let me say, I have the advantage now, which also means Lisa will remain the victor and replicate the superior human formula."
"R-replicate?" Leven believed that he misheard. "You mean she has already-?"
"Dear boy, let me let you in on a little secret..." The facially hairy man leaned closer to Leven, letting the clone catch a whiff of cigar without intending to. "You are the formula for Project Superior."
Leven's eyes widened in due shock. "I... I'm the...-"
"And you're coming back with me per Lisa's orders," Allison declared.
"Another fact about these people around us, Leven," McMahon continued. "They have loved ones that are dying. Cancer, illnesses, fatal diseases with cures they can't afford. So I'm here with the offer, you know how it goes. Quid pro quo at its finest. I know you would care about the helpless American, that's why Lincoln turned the tables on the destroyers he ran with, and you have that too... So I would like it if you came willingly and helped Lisa out with her problem."
"Problem?" His mind drew back to the main Louds going to storm her hideout. "You mean they-?"
"Have captured Lisa and are on their way back to their base."
Leven analyzed the situation, then looked around and noted how all guns were drawn to him. "What, was that all for show? Or are you trying to pull a deception card on me?"
"The answer we don't want to hear will only injure you enough that we can take you without incident, but we'll hide you at a Kapacity Korp facility instead. What will it be? Play the hero? Or play a slave and an enemy of us?"
"Say yes and do this for humanity, you incoherently selfish piece of shit!" Allison heavily insulted. "You're the fucking key to humanity's step forward!"
"Now, now, Allie, let's not use such profanity to intimidate Link-N into making his choice."
Allison went over to pick up her submachine weapons she'd dropped earlier in the fight. "Dumb fuck-"
McMahon looked at his watch on his left wrist. "Two minutes before the clean-up duty arrives, but I want to be out of here before then. My boy, what will it be?"
"This is insane-" Leven stammered. "What- what am I supposed to do if I say yes? Y-you're asking me to-"
"Well, I've already come up with the schematics for your assignment, and that involves two objectives only." McMahon readjusted his glasses. "One is to free Lisa, and the second is to-" He pulled out a silver hard drive with a blue circle- a button- right in the middle of it, and held it out for Leven to take. "-Hook this up into any computer monitor. This baby here will leech all data and toss it all out into the open sea."
"The open-" It didn't take a second for him to translate what McMahon was getting at. "You want me to... Leak all Patriot Division files on the internet? There are c-classified confidentials, I can't-"
"You can," McMahon believed. "If not... Just so you know, your friends took off with someone..."
Leven gasped at that fact alone. McMahon was right, Sam had left with someone alright, but it wasn't the senator like they thought it was. Then, just who was that? It deeply concerned and terrified the clone.
"Your intolerable insubordination has upset Lisa to no end, but we can forgive that if you agree to this and show Lisa that you have not, and will never be a true failure. You, the perfect infiltration model, will live up to your name, even if it's just the quickest infiltration in history. Now... What do you say? Yes..."
Leven gulped.
"Or no?"
Allison reloaded with no delay this time, focusing her guns on Leven.
For humanity. For humanity, that was the promise of a century. So many people, endless generations could strive from this, from the thing he carried. And he saw it now, with these ordinary people who sided with Vial and friends. Duped maybe, but duped with hope they so needed, and for one thing, Lisa was truly on the verge of changing the world forever. So maybe this was all authentic. "Did all of that go live?"
"It may have looked like that, but no, it did not. It is, however, recorded to a certain point, ready to be aired. Just think, I can destroy your friends this easily, and, believe it or not, your Elmont boss won't be able to save your sorry posteriors from his own superiors. All of them will wind up on the chopping block, but only if-"
"Yes!" Leven reluctantly agreed. "Yes, I'll help you!" He accepted it forcibly and took the hard drive from McMahon's hand. "I'll help you break her out and... Leak it all."
"They'll be too busy trying to find the hard solution that we'll all be home free, and that's not to mention they'll be shut down because of that grave mistake they'll have to responsible for. You'll be safe, forget about the others."
Leven looked down in dismay. What he was being asked to do, too much for him and the soul he wasn't sure he had. That and the fates of the Louds on the line. Luna, Lynn, Lana, Lola, Lincoln and Luan. Them, and the Patriot Division faculty were going to have a real bad time. And he didn't have a choice. Either way he looked at it, they were all going down regardless of what he chose. But rejoining Vial, it seemed to have sweetened the deal for no one was gonna be killed for sure, or pinned as the bad guys. The leaked files would disclose their affiliation and ties to the government, and that they could not be hung for in courts. Only...
It would change everything for them, a grand shift in their lives. That was what Leven had now been in control of at the moment, as the senator had suggested.
"Wonderful, my boy, wonderful!" McMahon cheered, feeling quite pleased with him. "I'll let the captive contact know of your involvement, and don't worry, there will be no casualty of any sort. Now, regarding Link-A here-"
"She lives," Leven requested immediately.
"Mmmm... Very well. You head back now, and wait until our guy makes his move, and then you join him, is that understood? We will guide you from there."
"Understood..."
McMahon turned to the people he had bought with his words. "You all know the drill! Dispose of your weapons and stick to the fabricated story!" McMahon then opened two portals- somehow he had also access to the tech the Division had- and left with Allison, leaving Leven to reel in his thoughts.
Linka's body had not finished healing yet, being only halfway there at the time it was truly over. And she had heard everything, unbeknownst to Leven. Not only that, but her earpiece had been left intact, gone undamaged, not even a scratch on it. Those who heard were only the ones who had been here, meaning the new four phenos. Leven walked over to Linka and picked up what remained of her, the body that was half a carnage mess of a human being, a real sight for sore eyes. Now she's need new clothes when she had healed. "Linka... Please forgive me."
The girl raised her hand and shoved the middle finger at his face, telling him wordlessly that he was the most cruel person in existence as of yet. She made him feel guilty for the actions he had not done yet, and figured he would be doing.
Zoomer Lynn Loud in red had swooped by and picked them up when it was apparent they had been left behind to fend the enemy while the others had escaped. She took them back through a portal, returning to the Division base.
Leven came back to see everyone cheering away at the victory, but only he knew what was going to be. Lisa and "Peter McMahon" were detained and locked in the interrogation room, surrounded by the core members of the current Loud family and Elmont. Just outside, the four non-related phenos stood in absolute silence and terror, and when Leven had appeared with the wounded Linka, things became even more terrifying for them. They looked at him as if they had known what his new mission was, and he, clueless on the very nature of their collective of mortified expressions, couldn't fathom it- until he heard a small clank sound off below him. And when he went to look at the source of the noise, his heart stopped dead; Linka's earpiece had captured all of the dialogue between him, the real McMahon and the bodyguard Allison Taggart.
They had heard it all, and were too stunned to try something, but even so- "H-hold on... I-" He stretched out a hand, and in it was the hard drive that had a huge role to play. He looked at it and realized how immensely dangerous the situation was. "Oh, my God."
And while Leven was there, the terrible storm that had yet to reach land, Lisa and the body double were in the room, taking the hailstorm of the Louds' demonizing words, patiently awaiting for the right moment to stage their breakout- and Leven was all the difference at this point. And Linka, who would not take long to heal, was going to do so and tell the team what was going on. This meant the window was going to close, and Leven, feeling trapped like never before, moved in to make a move.
He entered inside, and found a fully loaded M60 on the corner of the room. Now or never, he went for it.
Act II: Blood Ties, Chapter VIII: The Junior Patriots
AN: And unlike what was seen the trilogy, the entire Louds versus Lisa storyline reaches its conclusion in this act, but don't be fooled; more threats are lining up to take aim at the family, some familiar and some new,more deadlier and more bigger. Things have already been hinted at, moreso than meets the eye. I've come too far to stop this long-running story that will span well over a hundred chapters, despite how convoluted and complex it will become.
Next; Liby, Lacy and Lupa get their own adventure before the act II finale!