August 7th, 2030
Leia cowered behind Lyle once the shots echoed the natural setting, squealing with pure horror, fearing death yet again. Lemy had allowed himself to drop to avoid being hit. Darcy and Loanne themselves had been shot; Darcy's uninvited guests were three that intruded on her shoulder, chest and leg, and Loanne had two on her abdomen and one centered directly on her left cheekbone, stuck halfway through. And once the shooting had stopped, Leia peeked over Lyle's slender shoulder to see the madman lowering the weapon, that of which had its barrel emitting smoke. "Oh my God!"
Lyle, having not sustained any injury by a miracle, had seen fit to finally back away from the battlefield for Leia and Lemy. "Leia, p-pick him up, head down."
"Wait, what are you thinking?" Leia shifted her head, swinging her pigtails, to see Lemy rotating onto his stomach in a desperate manner to get away from Lincoln. "Oh, God!"
"I will so rest assuredly promise you me and my team will hunt you down," Elmont had vowed to the albino, his hands still trying to pry Lincoln's own from his neck, but all of his effort had proven to be insufficient, a futile action. "Mark my words!"
"Consider them marked!" Lincoln swung his right arm upwards, folding a fist and then brought it down against Elmont's head, knocking him out cold for the meantime. His arms loosened and swung down, dangling about before Lincoln allowed him to fall in this state. "Okay, cretins, where were we?"
"M-m-m-my face," Loanne wailed, heart rate having pumped up. She picked away at the bullet, serving herself a plate of stinging pain of pure discomfort along with a side of yells, rendered helpless without the help of the black cloak that decided to disappear right after she had been shot. "Help... Help me, please," she begged to the demon.
Darcy had fallen on her back, twitching about, her own hands hovering over the fresh wounds made by her old friend, the bloodthirsty maniac that he was. The bullet that had pierced her chest was only a dreading three inches away from her heart, but was it a mistake or his mercy at work? He had indeed made it clear where his position was in all this. She had heard him say, to suggest that she wasn't Darcy to him, whatever that meant, and there was no probable coincidence considering the treatment she had received the past few days. That mystery had just yet to be solved, but it truly hurt to know that Lincoln Loud seemed to ignore their history. It had meant something despite it being so long ago, a suicide run that proved to go their way. Who could have imagined a pair of off-grid delinquents managing to break in and out of a Vial Corporation facility with one of their projects manufactured into transparent test tubes?
Right now, right this second, Darcy Holmandollar's nostalgic fear, just like that night, had come right back; today could have been the perfect day where she passed away, a forgotten memory with nothing to show, nothing to leave to the world but a great shame. And even worse, the one and only terrible secret that she had been hiding from those who were ever close to her, including her killer himself. That secret...
I'll bleed out, and then I'll die, Darcy told herself in the loneliness of her mind, due to break when she'd go into shock. I'll never come back, I'll never-
"Please, I need your help-" Loanne became the object for batting practice when Lincoln swung the rifle right into her face, injuring the mess of bloody gore right on her face, and down the blonde girl had gone, powerless and abandoned fully by the dormant entity with a horrible schedule.
"There will be no one to help you here, blondie," Lincoln cold-heartedly expressed, "not for any of you!"
Leia grabbed Lemy's hands and drastically jogged backwards, dragging him further away from danger, and Lyle remained in between both minors and the madman when he'd inevitably tail them. "Come on!" Leia called to him, still terrified.
"Go, get to the base and tell the others!" Lyle valiantly instructed. "I'll try to hold him off!"
"Show me something that I've yet to see, dog boy," Lincoln directly challenged. "Match me!"
"Let the boy go," Lyle shouted at Leia, "get the others!"
"B-but-"
"NOW!"
Leia unlocked her hands free of Lemy and raced away towards the cloak, to discover the base and alert the potential back-up inside. It couldn't be fast enough, but Lincoln had already come to face Lyle that there was no way to get to Leia now. And as a plus, if he were to consider it, the rifle had indeed been empty on ammo. These lucky kids had been missed by his spray-and-pray hipfire, if it weren't bad enough a day for him so far.
Lupa had already died by then, bleeding out and fading in and out of consciousness up until the point Lincoln had started firing, slipping away to nobody's notice yet. Lincoln moved past the downed Luna, Lupa's corpse, and the dying Darcy, moving closer and closer to the only one left standing. "N-no way you'd kill a teen boy, man... You're not that cold-"
"Would you allow me to let you mature properly? So that you get stronger and much, much more dangerous?"
"Hey, I- I could never!" Lyle denied. "All I've wanted was to see my family and to see that this would never happen again! That's why I was there, among you! With you guys!" The sandy-blond kid raised his arms up and made fists out of them, but the wiggling in his arms had betrayed his eagerness, his pure willingness to fight the man. "Don't make me-"
"I'm not scared, brat... Are you?"
Northeast
Lyra sat on the curbside, right on a No Parking zone, happily licking a vanilla ice cream cone while in the comfort of a yellow fire hydrant, and she had savored the heavenly flavor, her tongue going vertically upwards and with no such rush as to take her sweet time in making it last. And she'd have to tell Lynnette all about the merits of ice cream when the latter girl had come back after their little time trip was over.
Across from her stood the firm park where she'd been laying at, perfectly comfortable under the large oak tree. The scene was still lively as it was a half hour before, but nothing had bothered her. She was not a girl to complain over the ruckus of children playing tag, but as she looked closely, she had noticed a little girl pushed on the swingset by a man she knew had to be the girl's father. And that gorgeous smile formed by the dairy delicacy had flipped upside down; Lyra was missing this unobtainable bond with a father figure. If only... I wish things could be different...
"I KNEW I'D FIND YOU HERE!" Lynnette had howled to the top of her lungs right behind the brunette, giving her a great startle. "LYRA, FUCKING RUN!"
"Wha-? Hey, do you-?" The sight of a red blur behind Lynnette, streets away but coming in real fast had made her give up her ice cream cone. "WHAT THE FUCK HAVE YOU DONE?!"
"GO, GO, GO, WOMAN!"
"LYNNETTE!"
"I'LL EXPLAIN ALL LATER, CAN WE JUST-? HOO BOY, I'M SO EXHAUSTED!"
Lynn rubbed her eyes when she saw a second zoomer run behind the imposter in green, tangling the mystery with even more questions now, but she had to stop one of them if she were to get the truth, and fast, for this was also a race against time. What is happening?
Black Network base
"I'm sorry girls..." Ray Robertson expressed his grievance in silence to Liby and Lacy, but would not be known to them now or ever; he had just dropped them off into the Black Network, promising them the trail to Lupa. And what was really there but the recovering Dylan Blood with his final seven syringes full of Medi-Sin?
Act VII: Revolution, Chapter IX: The Seven Deadly Medi-Sin Kids
"Uh, hello?" Lacy wandered through the base, her echoes bringing the lone wolf known as Dylan Blood out of his hole, steadily walking to the source of the noise. The last thing he needed was the Louds here, all as a group ready to take him on while the world was still in the process of losing its head. He armed himself with nothing but a simple Medi-Sin needle and came across both clones once turning into one of the longer corridors. Liby had stopped dead in her tracks, heart sinking upon seeing the pale-skinned figure with dead-serious eyes and uncombed hair. "Lynn-"
"Oh yeah, I see the dork-" Lacy waved her hand to greet the man casually. "Hi, we're looking for our sister! White hair and bad temper! We were told she was here?"
Dylan Blood had an eyebrow raised in confusion, but cast the reel to lure them in. "Yes, she was here, doing favors for me, but I have some bad news!"
"What... Do you mean by that?" Lacy asked, exchanging a concerned look with Liby. "Is she okay?"
"No, as a matter of fact, she was fighting with others!" Dylan feigned a state of worry, shuffling his hands randomly and uncontrollably. "She was with me when we've been attacked, but she allowed me to escape! I- I have no powers, I couldn't do anything, b-but-"
Lacy, an artificial creature of a big heart but a little brain, bought what the Tacitus Kid had sold, eager to go and help her dear sister, the Lucy clone. "Where were you guys? Where did she-?"
"I-in Colorado, uhhh-" Dylan played his role perfectly, pretending so well to be in and out of reality, "there's a base, we went to go investigate-"
"Another base?" Lacy scratched herself. "L-like this?"
"I- I think it was bigger than this," he shared with shaky breath. "We were closing in, and then we were ambushed by a group of pheno people! I don't... I don't know what happened to her-"
"TAKE US THERE!" Lacy pleaded heavily. "TAKE US THERE NOW!"
Northeast
Lyra and Lynnette had turned a corner and concealed themselves under the porch of a one-story house right at the corner of a four-way intersection, when Lynn happened to race right through after she followed and made the turn. Lyra, having broken sweat, had exhaled when it had stopped, wiping the sweat off her forehead and drying her hand on her purple mini jacket. "Oh, my God, we- we just outran your mom..."
"Yeah," Lynnette wheezed out.
"IN HER PRIME!" Lyra's ego had gotten the best of her, heightening her pride to a sort of cockiness that could very well go out of proportion. But Lynnette was there to shut the brunette's pie hole both figuratively and literally.
"Yeah, now shut the fuck up, we can celebrate later."
Lynn had stopped when she saw no pair of life-size blurring lights in front of her, knowing right away that her unidentified zoomer targets had hidden nearby. "Come out, come out wherever you are!" she called out in sing-song. "I just wanna talk and ask you why-"
A swinging door had been kicked open from the inside of another house just opposite of the girls' location. The resident of the sturdy home was a middle-aged man who had already hit the balding phase. Walking down the steps of his house in a white tank top and cargo shorts, with a hunting rifle in his hands, he advanced to the sidewalk and stopped just before stepping on the road's cement, looking down on Lynn like an unholy, unwanted animal. "You, I know you! Yer one a them's creations, the ones causin' all that ruckus in them big cities!"
"Wait, let's not..." Lynn raised het hands up at shoulder level. "You've got the wrong idea, mister."
"Bet not," the aging man believed, loading and cocking the rifle back. "You'se is causing us nuff problems! Not no more, cunt."
"That- that lump of dogshit... Trying to kill my mother?!" Lynnette took her hand off of Lyra's mouth and escaped her hiding spot, prioritizing the safety of the mother-to-be. Lynnette stood in front of the original zoomer of this bloodline, catching the bullet in between her fingers and redirecting it away from them.
Oh, you freaking idiot, Lyra cursed mentally. She was able to stop it!
"Another?!" the man bellowed, reloading the rifle. "Pair of cunts!"
"I don't have time for this-" Lynn's only chance to detain the blonde doppelganger was here, in an unusual moment when the displaced girl had her back to Lynn. "Greenie!"
"Not now!" Lynnette dashed across the street, pushing the hostile man back into his house.
"H-hey-" Lynn's quick window had somehow eluded her- she had forgotten that this other zoomer was as fast a thinker as her, actions moving in equal time just as her own. Right, I'm not dealing with a regular...
Through the window on the left side of the house, Lynnette forced the man right back out, the force of which shattered the window easily. "I'll make you pay for that..." Lynnette had become angry and wished that she could go off and vent on why this wasn't wise, their relevancy in the future, and that this man should have been truly grateful just for the pair of girls' reason for being there. Maybe down the line, years to come, and maybe certainly in their future, he was dead, one in a million, of countless lives lost during the written wartime that was not yet in play. All these people here, they knew not of the stakes, they knew not of the idea of how good they had it, and how they took it all for granted. There was a time when Lynnette had pondered a question, and had been disregarded quickly, but after she had looked out the window to see the injured man struggle to get up, with her mother staring back at her as if she was a true enemy, the question had come back into mind. All these people, are they truly worth saving?
Far From Now
"Discrimination?" It was the first time Lynnette had heard a big word, looking up to her mother as some college professor with what she assumed was advanced jargon. "What- what does that mean, mom?"
Lynn had taken her young to a high mountaintop that overlooked a darkened city in this post-apocalyptic world. The sight of the skyline, a plateau of death and destruction, was but a steady one; its sky occupied not by cloud but by smoke; where there would be cars along the streets, going in all directions taking people to and from work on an endless loop, there were corpses and debris and even moss and wildlife (a deer had once wandered into a barbershop here on Lygatos Avenue) accommodating on those cities too close to Mother Nature territory.
Lynnette closed her eyes and sniffed the cleaner air here, even with a faintly musty odor she picked up on; the smoke of fire. Somewhere down there, someone was setting fires, perhaps it was some Prime Federation soldier torching a fresh pheno body whose life they had just taken. No gunshot from what the zoomer mother and daughter had picked up on. "Hey, that's-"
"It always is, little one..." Lynn raised a hand and pointed to the heart of the city. "In the old days, we'd all be there, we'd all be grounded commoners, regular people living our lives. Just walking, just driving, talking with our friends who were with us, or directly on cellphones, smiling and laughing... That's the life I wish for you, Lynnette, and most certainly a better one than I had."
"Mom, why... Why did you bring me here for?"
Lynn set her hand down and stood staring into the distant city. "I wanted to tell you that, even when there's this change, when there's a lack of populace, this place has stayed standing."
"I don't follow..."
"And everything else exists," Lynn continued. "Whatever side wins, either us or the Prime Federation, the world we walked on with be left the way it was when we've stepped foot into it... Born..."
"When you put it that way..." Lynnette had never wondered about the entire planet when all the conflict would come to an end, and now that she thought about it, she had realized she never thought about the end; it was so odd for her to consider a point in time where their years-long war had ended. A point in time on the planet where Blader bots were no more, where the Primers unit would no longer patrol the eastern side of the country. "Mom, so what is that word? Why did you-?"
"I'm gonna need you to remember something, okay?" Lynn had not raised her voice like she would often when lecturing her daughter and niece Lyra along the way, or any wisdoms and advice to be passed down while they moved about in the shadows, under the radar of the Federation. "Do you think you can remember it when the both of you are back there in the past?"
Lynnette was quick to nod her head to please her strict-hardened mother, eager to live up to the original's expectations as well as roll out the pride to maximum level. "I can, I promise it on my life!"
"The place you both are going, the Prime Federation won't be your biggest obstacle, but I'm sure you knew that."
"Of course I did," Lynnette agreed, "it's just one person, the Loud bastard... My dear dad, I mean."
But Lynn shook her head. "That's the narrow-minded thinking that may cost you both your lives. Your true obstacle, the biggest enemy you'll face is..."
Now
The inhabitants of the living world, that's what she told me, in a time where the twin zoomers were looked down upon like deformed children- all in all, she made it clear this was an age of pheno discrimination. And guess what? My mother-
Lynn swung her two fists about, but failed to hit the green zoomer.
-is also my enemy for the time I'm here. And I'm to treat everyone as hostiles unless they prove otherwise. Lemy and Allie had nothing but dumb fucking luck, being in the right place and doing what I so greatly approve!
Lynnette had ducked and performed a straight kick upwards that smacked against Lynn's chin, bobbing her head backwards and along with it, the rest of her body. "I don't want to hurt you, but if you're gonna follow us, then we'll both fight you."
Lynn rubbed her bottom jaw. "Lucky shot, but you can't bluff your way out of this, you two have been running for a reason, right?"
Lyra had cautiously moved behind Lynn without making a sound.
"Maybe you knew you couldn't take me both at once, so you decided to retreat..." Lynn faced the bloodied man now unconscious from the pain, wondering how vicious the knockoff could be. "Yet I see that you are no pacifist, maybe a little psycho..."
"What are you, a psychiatrist?" Lynnette coughed out a wad of spit and sent it to her mother's direction. "Bring it on, you aging hag. NOW, LYRA!"
"Lyra?" Lynn felt something hit against her stomach, leaving her gasping for air; Lyra Laude had raced up to her and winded her with a rotating punch that came from the side. Once Lyra had reluctantly jumped in the fight, she backed up and allowed Lynnette to have the rest. From where Lynnette stood, point A, to where Lynn stood, point B, there was a clear run, no thing to have gotten in the way.
"End this now, you idiot!" Lyra berated, irritated greatly.
"Here goes-" Then, Lynnette had tripped on herself without warning and no explanation. "OW, FUCK!"
"Sis!" Lyra yelled.
"WHAT HIT ME?!" Lynnette glanced after rolling on her back, facing the force behind her fall at work. Lupa dragged the zoomer by her feet with little effort and choked her where she lied down, tightening her neck to the point the girl couldn't breathe. Lynnette's current thoughts were drawn from confusion, there was no possible way this clone had followed them all the way here. But then, this Lupa didn't match the one she had seen back there. Who the hell is this one?!
"Chayyyyy- chaaaaaange it!" Lupa, if this happened to actually be her, dragged Lyra with her powerful telekinesis right to her. "Stop the g-girl- stop Luh-Luh-Lola!"
"L-Lola?" Lynnette scratched her hands upon the lawn, trying to flee from the powerful telekinetic. "What is this about Lola?!"
Lynn had not made a move, hoping that Lupa would defeat them herself to make things easier for her. Lynn had accepted it, already exhausted as it stood. "I don't know how you got here, but take them down, they're very suspicious!"
"L-L-Lynn-" Lupa gagged up fresh blood and had dropped her arms, slumping over on her back before suddenly and inexplicably disappearing before their very eyes.
What just happened?! Lynn stood dumbfounded, questioning what she had just seen- and the nonsensical message she spoke out in a desperate cry. "Lola...?"
Lynnette made a comeback and sucker punched her mother right in the face, earning both time travelers enough time to elude the red zoomer while she herself recovered from the punch and the dizziness it came with. The main Loud woman felt rather stupid for being distracted like this, as her old FBI training did not have such a memo for this, a disgraceful mistake that could have cost her her life.
"GO, WE CAN AVOID THIS FIGHT!" Lynnette sped off, leaving Lyra in the dust, albeit for a few seconds. It was then that Lynnette knew and felt she had an obligation to return to the Prime Federation base where everyone else had come to, armed for a fight. "THE BASE, LYRA!"
"BASE?!" Lyra had caught herself up, running parallel to the blonde. "BASE WHERE?!"
Prime Federation base
Carly had two jobs at the hangar floor; she kept the twins safe while her eyes kept moving back to the captured foes. James Shepherd, Phoebe Ward, Caroline Pingrey had seemingly given up trying to persuade the Asian girl to free them, going only quieter but not fully silent. Leven, hurry it up over there.
Lana had opened her blue eyes, turning herself front and upwards, moaning out in pain. "What- what's happening?"
"Oh!" Carly held out her hand to help the adult tomboy up. "Hey, you're awake!"
"Wait..." Lana checked her surroundings, quickly finding her twin sister lying down on the cold, dark floor. "Lola!"
"She's fine, but take it easy!" Carly set her hands on the tomboy, guiding her as if she were the woman's personal caretaker. "You've both been roughed up, I think you need to-"
"Where- where are the others?" Lana stopped and gulped heavily upon seeing their enemies standing on their knees, so perfectly subdued without a worry that any single one could escape. It seemed to her that Carly felt safe as was, so Lana took a chance and sat down close to Lola. "Is it over, Carly?"
"Almost, Lana," Carly responded, a powerful smile of pure confidence setting in. "We're all counting on Leven up to here!"
At the top floor, thick layers of metal in between Carly and the zoomers, Leven stood feet away from the impenetrable safe room the cornered Supervisor figure had retreated to. Here he was, the final step in the long mission both Leven and Troy Lindemann had orchestrated, with the help of their co-shared Primers squad. As the bodies continued to drop in all directions, and no longer limited to the two sides partaking in the conflict that took the nation by storm. At this point, who could really say just how many innocent bystanders were caught in the waves of the crossfire?
"Ice dude's role was to give us a vulnerable way in, but we can't-" Chad McCann smacked his hands against the thick wall to show them no way in. "We had it, but someone had to leave poor ice dude vulnerable! Shit!"
"I told you we should have disabled the Supervisor's back-up generator prior to this," Benny threw in. "I mean, that's basic common sense!"
"Sure, if you'd have wanted to be caught," Troy voiced. "He'd have known something was up if one of us sabotaged it right away. Leven, care to do the honors here?"
"I'd be delighted to!" The albino clone stepped up to bat, shoulders broad with perfect confidence for a change, to surprise even the first clone currently an icicle. Ici-clone. "There is one thing I've never disclosed to the rest of you, nor has this little secret popped up directly in my own project file-"
Both of Leven's arms turned to a shade of sparkling silver, lighting up in the dark and disturbing the night vision sight on their goggles. Then, his entire arms had broken away; the millions of nanobots that made up both of his arms moved like dust particles, acting like the collective they formed, gradually moving down to slip under the narrow slit beneath the impenetrable gate. And where Leven's arms were supposed to be, there had been nothing left but metal circles at the stumps, built in at the side of his shoulders, a rather bizarre and surprising sight that caught the younglings off-guard. "The genius Lisa Loud meant to keep this away from the official report."
"You've been holding out on us, you lanky assclown!" Chad finger-pointed, accusing Leven of hiding such a relevant secret.
"Do your legs...-?" Meli looked down at Leven's feet.
"No, just my hands..." Leven forced an awkward smile and laughed in a nervous manner. "You'll have to excuse my current appearance, it surely must look rather odd of me-"
"Buddy, you have no idea," Flagg's Raganoxer-based OC joked.
"I trust you have a great number of questions, but the tight schedule will not permit us a Q and A session just yet, so please hold-"
"Motherfucker," Chad cursed to himself.
"-your thoughts to yourself until later." Leven stepped back from the entrance. "Everyone, stand your ground, we may just face another challenge within the saferoom-"
The power had gone off from inside the saferoom, suggested by the disappearance of the light shining through the slit, a small taste of victory the teen phenos had smiled at, but Leven and Troy Lindemann had maintained the seriousness of their faces, standing tall and prepared for another fight; the Supervisor could have a grand surprise waiting for them at the other end, and they would have never known it if they weren't prepared for such a possibility, however small that was. And at long last, the wall between them had begun to move, splitting away from each other slowly, but at a rate slow enough for them to look into the dark room.
And right in front of the computer panels in the center of the room was the single occupant, an aging man with visible white hair, clad in a high-end business suit, looking like a misplaced character due to be in a meeting with some CEO with a net worth of billions. "Clone, and company..." he clapped slowly, applauding the lot. "You've made it this far, so I give you credit where credit is due. Why, clone, you've made me very proud, and I'm sure you've made Lisa Loud and Peter McMahon proud as well. Such a perfect human specimen you are, but I'm afraid to say how... Shameful it is that you choose to side with the weaker side of man."
"The weak, as you suggest, have come a long way to be here!" Leven voiced from the center of his artificial heart. "The Patriot Division put us all in this path, a campaign that proved just as difficult as any other! We've lost some of our own, I can't deny that, but that's the risk we've all agreed to take upon if it means to succeed and take away the tainted, diabolical plans you've all set in motion! And if today just so happens to be the day we fall, then I'll make damn sure..."
The tiny silver components that floated around had returned to the round stumps on his body, reconstructing both of his arms. They maintained the shiny silver color, to finally show off one of the many tricks these arms could do.
"Our deaths will not be in vain!"
Outside
Leia ran as fast as her tiny feet would allow her to. Shamefully, she wasn't in the top ten of her old P.E. class, but she had an advantage as long as Lyle stood firm and strong, holding his own against the Ungodly Stormbringer. Run inside and get to those currently partaking in the base operation. Maybe, she believed, praying loudly in her mind, they were all done- who knows how she'd react if she were to walk into the hands of the enemy, the very same one interested in her for her connections to Dylan Blood? Secondly, that pale man's face had also crossed her mind; she felt naive and quite humiliated as the shitshow progressed, scared to the brim, wondering just how this ugly mess would be resolved. She didn't turn around just yet.
Behind her, Lyle took another punch to the gut, succumbing to the pain right as his world flipped upside down, ending with him falling belly side up. Lincoln presented the teen with his display of brutality, kicking him right in the chest and not lifting his leg away. "Stay down, boy, I'll be finished with you fast-"
Lemy snuck a surprise move, despite being terribly maimed already, staggering fast to jump on him from behind and claw at the man with those clipped fingernails that needed to sink in real good for damage- which could only be done properly with a dampener to weaken the pheno cells in Lincoln's body. "B-B-BASTARD, JUST DIE ALREADY!"
"Irritable brat, you just never let up, do you?" Lincoln easily pulled the boy and tossed him over on top of Lyle. "Fine, you first!"
Leia's feet had wobbled at this point, causing her to slip on her feet and have a soft fall on the grass. She tried to break her fall with her petite hands, stammering out gibberish while trying to keep it together, and that had proven folly. She'd lose it here, give in to the fear and madness and stay here sniveling like the weak pansy Marzon Dillon had made of her, and without her best friends, the layer of confidence and bravery had tumbled down along with her, to her painful acceptance. What difference could she have made, being the messenger girl to go and acquire the reinforcements the unknown heroes and heroines sorely needed? Had life literally set in her hands their lives to be at stake, or had it been just a foul play, where she was nothing but the butt of such a cruel joke? No, it didn't seem that way when she figured it out, after all, it was written to be nothing but ugly for her from here on out, when she was all alone and surrounded by strangers with super powers- she might have just been a burden to them as well, a mere little blonde girl scared out of her mind and way out of place, another child to be taken care of by those who weren't in the business to babysit some unlucky bitch like she was. That was it, she was utterly useless and probably deserved to die if the maniac decided it for her. "C-come on... K-kill me already! Hurry-"
Liby and Lacy stared the mentally fatigued girl and then gave each other the same look of wonder but concern. Lacy coughed to mark her presence and helped Leia up, tugging her back up on both feet. "And why would we wanna do such a thing?" Lacy asked Leia, adding a laugh of triumph ultimately.
"A-are you the-?" Leia's body still trembled about. "Bah-back-"
"Hey, what powers do you have?" Liby asked. "Don't tell me..." She glanced over Leia's shoulder to see Lincoln Loud slowly approach them, as well as the downed heroes scattered all over the place. "Oh, my God, he actually-"
"D-d-don't let him kill me-" Leia stammered fearfully. "Oh, God! He's gonna k-kill me-"
"No, we won't let that happen!" Lacy declared, going up for the challenge. "He'll have to deal with us now!"
"We had an understanding," Lincoln reminded the clones, "you three were perfectly safe in that little town those phenos established, so I wonder what reason you have for coming back-"
"What, three?" Lacy sharply gasped. "What have you done with Lucy?!"
"I'll allow you two to take her body if she's all you came for!" Lincoln offered. "I know you're not exactly fighters-"
"Body?" Lacy felt her blood boil intensely. "What did you do to her?!"
Lincoln realized the error in his words. "She's been shot but not by me!"
"LIAR!" Lacy accused, not giving this a second thought. "YOU EXPECT US TO BUY THAT?! YOU'D HAVE KILLED HER FOR SIMPLY STEPPING OUT OF GRIMMTOWN..." Lacy unveiled her secret weapon, a single syringe filled up with Medi-Sin. "And you just might do the same for us..."
"Is that...-?" Lincoln broke into a sprint. "HEY, DON'T YOU DARE!"
"YOU'RE GONNA PAY FOR WHAT YOU'VE DONE TO MY LUCY!"
"LUAN, STOP HER FROM TAKING THAT!"
Liby shook her head, refusing him. "Lynn wouldn't be a match as she was, but taking that, as Mister Blood insists-"
"Blood?!"
"You've made this our fight the second you decided to shoot my sister, Lincoln," Lacy said right before the tip of the syringe entered through her arm. She pressed down on it, letting the amplifying liquid flow through her bloodstream.
Lyle and Lemy both moved quietly from behind while Lincoln had become occupied with the transforming Lacy, noting that Leia was still safe but needed to inform the base team. "She isn't going, shit!"
"Maybe none of us have to!" Lyle directed his attention at Lacy. "Look at the girl's face, it's changing!"
"It's just like..." Lemy faced back to see Lupa's corpse. "It's the same... Whatever it is!"
"Let's give her a hand, man," Lyle suggested, already moving ahead of Lemy. "At best, three versus one is looking pretty good right now-"
Lemy wiped blood from his mouth, groaning. "This day has been kicking the shit outta me non-stop."
Lyle gave a slow nod in agreement. "Yeah, you've thrown yourself into our world and went toe-to-toe against Lincoln Loud!"
"More times than I care to count," Lemy lamented.
"You're either real brave or rather just stupid... Either way, I commend you for staying alive up to here. If we make it out of this, a full arcade session on me."
"Ahhh!" Lemy smiled at the idea. "Yes, shooters! I love the Tomb Raider one. Well, my good sir, consider me onboard."
Lacy charged from the front, Lemy and Lyle moved quickly to flank him and attack from behind. Lincoln himself was only focused on Lacy, staying in place until she'd throw the first punch. It would be the first time the pair fought, and in equal terms as well, he hoped. Was there a chance the formula could perfect Lacy's enhanced performance, proving to be his true match?
And she arrived right at him, swinging out her small arm. Lemy and Lyle each grabbed one of his arms and held it back so not as to give him a chance to counter Lacy's offense. And only then did the future zoomers Lynnette and Lyra come running into the picture, Lynnette being the only one to dish out the violence willingly, lashing out a mean left hook. "Guess who?"
"Nyla!"
Lincoln's face was met with a hard punch at either side of his face by both Lynn-related girls. With the arm Lemy had held onto, Lincoln brought it forward and tossed him right into Lynnette, freeing the arm and swinging it upwards, striking his knuckles against her face. Lyle let go of Lincoln and fall on all fours right behind his feet, "Girl, push him!"
Lacy slapped her hands in front of him and knocked him down to trip over Lyle, to which Lyle rolled right over him and started punching him rapidly before the big man could get up. Lincoln kicked at him, finding a way to then lock his legs around Lyle's neck. Lynnette ran around and dragged Lincoln several feet back by his arms, using the momentum against him; she dropped on her back but had thrown Lincoln's arms high, sending his upper body to fly up just enough to connect her feet to his back- and dragged them back and kicked hard enough to cause severe injury. This has undone the tightening over Lyle's feeble neck, leaving him to scurry away while coughing and breathing for steady air. Lacy and Lemy joined back in and started cheaply kicking at Lincoln, who now struggled to get up.
Leia and Liby moved back towards the group, sensing they could win the way they fought. Lyra herself only followed Lynnette and laid witness to the determination of the girl. The determination and eagerness to complete the one task Lyra hadn't felt right about.
"We've got him!" Lynnette declared contented. "Finish him, don't let up!"
"Yeah, yeah!" Lemy cheered, shoving the sole of his shoe wherever he could on Lincoln's body. "Here's a souvenir for you! And another for you!"
Will we cease to exist if he dies? Lyra wondered, finally noticing the other attackers next to her sister. Particularly, Lacy had caught Lyra's attention. Wait a second, that's...
And her head turned to her backside, followed by her body partially. Oh, no... Liby.
As much as she opposed her own task, Lyra kept her distance from her sister, not cutting in to object when Lynnette could turn her attention to the wrong party right behind Lyra. And just maybe, some weird time travel rule would invalidate their own existence on the planet, proving to be a good thing more for Lynnette than for Lyra.
Loanne coughed from the ground, twirling about to find help, hearing nothing but a bunch of overlapping voices far enough from her location. Darcy's own cries were close but fading, Loanne knew the young woman had received gunshots, but as far as Loanne could help... Could she?
The telekinetic of white hair had already succumbed to their own wounds, dying in silence but surrounded by enemies that she herself didn't make in those final moments. That very same fate awaited both girls- Wait, Loanne had forgotten Luna had been shot upon as well, and, lifting her head with her struggling neck, she saw Luna not moving at all, breathing in slow intervals only. Elmont had failed to call in his team before being subdued.
Death, a fate most unusual but universal- Loanne opened her mouth, letting out the air right from her body. And with it, a black puff of smoke evaporated its way out, following a singular pattern akin to the way a slinky would move, with the destination point being right into the fallen Lupa's nostrils. -is it time for these meatbags to leave so soon?
The possessing entity had brung unto the clone another breath of life; Lupa ventured back on earth, her blue eyes opening up with wonder yet horror all the same. There was a scream that was forced out of her, created from her worry that she was still condemned as a dying body, and the bullets that had succeeded in their job had been ejected out, albeit in pieces, to finally clean and heal her body to top shape. "H-holy-"
Spare these girls of your fate, the odd creature of supernatural origin beckoned, but had not cared enough to force Lupa to save Loanne, Darcy and Luna. It had always been dealer's choice to it, always anyone's game. Save or let die... Hahahahaha...
Lupa pushed herself upright and waved her hands up, concentrating right on the three downed women, struggling quite a ways before she advanced closer to perfection, yanking out the lead out of each heroine. "Wait, you-! Why did-? How did you g-get-?!"
I ssssserve another, assss I sssssee fit... I'll come back to you upon expiration of my current vessel, don't you worry a thing! Lupa retched out a small pool of black ooze that only poured down, never splashing among the grass. The black substance acted with a mind of its own, as if were the T-1000 in its liquid metal state, slithering back to the rising Loanne. Lupa stood there gawking at it stupidly, wondering how the stirring demon had chosen its host, and how deep into this world the blonde woman was in. Didn't matter now, not when the fight was more centered on science-related territory that only Lisa Loud could understand expertly. Lupa spotted the clan of youngsters beating on Lincoln, and without a second thought, she jumped right on her feet and rose some inches off the ground, diving into the beatdown with Loanne running in tow.
Lynnette, Lyle, Lemy and Lacy never saw Lupa flying toward them until they were all pushed out by a singular invisible force, propelling them all towards the direction of Lyra, Leia and Liby. The second Lupa had stopped to check on Lincoln, Loanne sought to take Lupa on, knowing how much of a threat the girl posed, forcing her away from Lincoln. "Not on my watch!"
"I just saved your ass," Lupa reminded her. "G-get out of my-" But then, she touched her face and found that she hadn't trouble speaking, her words no longer being slurred like a drunk. "Wait, my face... Am I-?"
"You're back to normal," Loanne confirmed, still acting cautiously around her. "The black marks around your eyes are gone-"
"L-Lucy...?" Lacy tapped on Lupa's shoulder and spun her around to see if it wasn't some mirage from the drug. Lacy had then seen Lupa again, alive and well that she had then formed a shaky smile, but for Lupa, the sight of Medi-Sin Lacy was the opposite, a dreadfully horrifying sight to make her wanna turn away. "You're okay!"
"Y-you shouldn't be here..." Lupa slapped her sister out of negligence. "Why are-?"
"OH MY GOD!" Liby dove in, arms raised up so that she could deliver a group hug to her sisters. "YOU'RE ALIVE!"
"WHY ARE YOU BOTH HERE?!" Lupa pushed Lacy back. "AND WHY- HOW DID YOU GET THAT?! WHY DID YOU TAKE THAT?!"
"Lucy, your friend told us you came here," Liby shared, taken aback by Lupa's sudden shouting. "You were in danger, we had to come-"
"M-my friend?" Lupa shook her head, unclear what Liby meant. "I came here-" And she gasped when it made all the sense in the world. "Oh, no..." Lupa waved her finger at Lacy. "He tricked you two..."
Lyra closed in on the statue that was Lynnette, the latter girl suddenly taking a pensively deep interest on Liby. "Hey."
There's no way- Lynnette closed her eyes, clearing her throat to try and collect whatever of her thoughts circled about in her mind. And rather a screen of infinite darkness, she came upon the ancient house on Franklin Avenue in the dead state of Michigan. They who stirred were none other than the mothers without a partner, their young, aunt Lana and the other woman of light-brown hair that could be easily confused for the color of autumn in the sunlight. This woman was Liby Loud, the babysitter of the three daughters of the new Loud generation, and permanently a pacifist who could never fight in the war. Liby and her signature freckles, which moved up upon her unleashing of the genuine smile she made to let the growing Lyra and Lynnette everything would be okay, had smiled her last smile when they were locked in a board game session. Lynnette had never forgotten that it was the four of them around Monopoly, when Liby had reached out a hand to grab another card- You were there... And then-
Lynnette's breathing switched to the labored setting, making Lyra shake her. "Hey, hey, look at me, sis! Look-" Lyra had to rotate Lynnette's face away from Liby. "Eyes on me, okay? Look there! You were beating him, weren't you?"
"Beating him-?" Lynnette snapped back into reality once it kicked in. "Lincoln!"
Loanne was the only one standing guard, setting her foot upon him. "Hey, get that white-haired girl, she's working with him!"
"Huh?!" Liby thought she heard wrong. "Lucy, tell me you didn't!"
"God, shut up, all of you," Lupa slapped her hands to her ears. "God, let me think! Idiots, all of you!"
"Are you with us or with him now?" Lyle demanded of her. "It looks like you're okay but-"
"Shut up, twig," Lupa spat, insulting Lyle's physique. "Don't take me for an ally of his in the long run, but I've got some serious bone to pick with that damn Tacitus son of a bitch, so I have no intention of harming Lincoln just yet- and I surely hope none of you get any funny ideas either."
"Okay, that sounds fair," Lyle leveled, "but let's hold off on the Tacitus Kid, just make sure the big man there doesn't stand until we're all done. Leven and his guys are taking care of things without an issue, I'd imagine."
"Hey, you in the green," Loanne called to Lynnette, "zoomer chick, can you go back to those three back there?"
"No need, I'm sure they're gonna be okay," Lupa thought. "You're still walking, are you not?"
"Hmph... Not long ago, you were fighting us!" Loanne reminded the clone girl.
"I'm not gonna give an apologetic speech, so cry me a river or something," Lupa returned back in her snarky nature. "Better yet-"
Lacy broke the scene by suddenly toppling over on her knees, puking out a mess of red and green innards. This was followed by a burning, painful feeling that took much of her body, centering right in her stomach, proving to be an overwhelming force that left her frozen. Any single twitch amounted to a sharpened wave of pain, as if her entire inside had multiple needles poking against her flesh, organs and bones. "Ahhhh! Ahhh-" She did it again, scaring both Lupa and Liby more than the others' freaking out. No one had known yet that the concoction had actually been rejecting Lacy slowly, even when she had made it work for enough time. "L-Lucy-!"
"What's happening to her?!" Liby guided Lacy and had her bend over forward, rubbing a tender hand over her back. "No, no, no... Lynn!"
"L-Lynn...?" Lyra raised a curious eyebrow and turned to see her sister's reaction, to which the blonde had also done the same, confused just as she was; they had both known this wasn't the one true Lynn Loud, but now the similarities were clear as daylight, another odd mystery to land at their doorstep yet. Did mom... Have a clone herself? Wait... Liby is one from what I've been told... And this albino, I know that there were two of them, but this one isn't the one they called Linka- Then that means it was the other one I've met! The other one who somehow knew my name! No, she knew who we were! She-
"WHAT'S HAPPENING TO HER?!"
"Ewww..." Leia peeped, covering her nose and mouth, turning away from the sight.
"Give her some room," Lyle motioned at the gazers, waving his hands, spreading. "Keep her there."
"I don't-" Lacy forcibly gurgled, her throat making for a croaking voice.
It was there, how Liby was positioned, that Lupa could see her own vial of fresh Medi-Sin poking out of her clothes. Lupa dragged it out and levitated it behind both latter clones for all to see. "AGH, HE'S SO DEAD!"
"What should we be doing?" Lemy asked Lyle.
"I have no real idea," Lyle answered with honesty, looking back toward the base, hoping to catch the unit.
"It's this," Lupa showcased. "The same thing he gave me-"
"Not the same," Lyle theorized. "She's reacting... Like that when you didn't. Is- is she-?"
"Don't you dare suggest that!" Lupa angrily glared. "No, she's not dying! It's- it's nothing-" But her own voice and the body language she displayed for the others to see had worked to betray her, and there was that moment again, the grave, terrifying moment where she was going to lose a loved one.
Always miss gloom and doom.
"LYNN, WHY DID YOU-?"
Would it kill you to smile?
Lupa filled in the space next to Lacy, dropping on her knees and symmetrically copying Liby's actions. "You're gonna be okay... You're gonna be fine, just breathe slowly!"
Why am I being punished for your mistake?
The color in Lacy's face had been drained away. Liby and Lupa hooked up each to one of her arms. They were patient, waiting for her to walk on her own so that she could lead them. Instead, after a single step, blue ovals cracked through the ground and dragged all the minors and clones right through, leaving Loanne to guard Lincoln while Darcy, Luna and Elmont were properly back in the fight.
"Guys?!" Loanne awaited their sudden return like the hopeless blonde she was.
Black Network Base
Lemy, Lyle and Leia landed in a pile, with Leia's ass pressed on Lemy's hand. She cringed hard and turned her body to suddenly roll right directly into Lupa's own; their faces were inches apart, followed by a sort of tension that could be felt from an erotic, lesbian piece of fan fiction. Behind Lupa, Lacy and Liby fell, poor Liby trying to catch and spare her exposed clone sister from more unnecessary harm. With them, six kids had dropped in. Lastly, the zoomer girls from the near future had fallen in, joining the rest for the mysterious party. Leia jerked herself to keep her distance from Lupa, scared and unable to figure out what harm the telekinetic could unleash. "P-please don't hurt me," she wailed, losing her voice in volume.
Upon Dylan Blood, eight opportunities had fallen right on his lap. The intercom spiked with ear-ringing feedback momentarily before settling in to his own voice. "Greetings, members of the next generation! I'm sure some of you know where you are, but I have no doubt that my identity is obvious up to here, so we don't need to go over the introductions again! I have brought you here so that you may be put to good use!
"YOU'VE POISONED MY SISTER!" Lupa howled in rage. "WAIT UNTIL I GET MY HANDS ON YOU!"
"This is the man's base!" Lyle concluded, scanning the sectors. "Intercoms run both sides! We need to split up in two teams and take him down! That means no intent to harm!"
"Don't tell me what to do," Lupa disagreed, having made up her own decision. "Luan, you stay here with Lynn."
"Hey, Leia," Lyle followed Lupa's lead to shelve Leia, "you're not one of us, you have to stay with the girls here."
"Y-yeah, just be careful..." Leia picked the right time to then lean in and give Lyle a firm peck on his lips. "We'll be fine."
"I'm with the boys," Lynnette chose, moving with Lyle and Lemy to the south end. "Meet you back here, sis."
"Count on it," Lyra nodded, seeing herself away with Lupa. Shit... We're actually going after the past version of the Prime Supreme... I don't like this...
Lupa detected the nervously worried expression on Lyra's face. "Lighten up, we're two of a kind... Could use a smoke right about now..." Lupa patted her chest to unravel a burning ache she felt deep past her chest. "Fucking shit, she wasn't supposed to-" And Lupa only visualized the pair eating in pure content with that aging woman, a mothering one, so kind and patient and fond of the girls, and Lupa hadn't known it yet, but Demonet had known a love for Lupa all the same. It was that Lupa was just a growing child in the eyes of an adult, not a monster bred in a tank full of water. Someone's daughter at most, one of three girls due better lives than the garbage that had been handpicked for them. Was there a sense of pity for that? Why, was there a sense of remorse and sadness when the doors were opened? Were they, this trio composed of borrowed cells, just-?
Lupa faced reality for what it was; she vented to the walls with nothing but her blind fury powered by the pain train, the heartbreaking sense of losing Lynn, and it wasn't a potential thing, it was certain and she was but certain of it, that Lynn would die today. "No! No! No!" she yelled, synchronizing her punches on the wall with these internal screams. Lyra said nothing, helping herself only to watch Lupa break her knuckles and bleed away from them, and then they'd heal automatically, and then she'd do it again. "She can't die! No, not her! Now now! Not yet!"
"Hey," Lyra cut in, having enough of the show. "We have to keep moving, he's brought us here and made a terrible mistake, we cannot take this for granted!"
"The cure!" Lupa drowned in hope the very next second, sucking it all in, breaking into a run. "I KNOW HE HAS IT! MAYBE THERE IS STILL TIME!"
"Not for long," Dylan Blood denied, showing himself right where they had come from, and he waved at them. "You wanted me?! Come and get me, phenos!"
"GET AFTER THAT MAGGOT, PURPLE LEATHER!" Lupa cried out.
Lyra ran, confident that she could so easily catch the Tacitus Kid in the next three steps he made, but her speed had somehow slipped out of her hands when she found herself to run at regular human speed, stopping before she had reached halfway back through the sector she and Lupa were in. "There's something suppressing me!"
Lupa pushed past her, running faster than Lyra to catch a motherfucker. "JUST FUCKING RUN, WE CAN CORNER HIM AT THIS RATE!"
Liby had become weary of the unstable Lacy, whom had already succumbed even worse to the Medi-Sin and had taken to lying down on her side, wheezing violently and dripping blood, had done enough to have the company of a puddle of her own blood. Liby consoled her with slow, sullen tears on her face, brushing a gentle hand to Lacy's pale face. "You're gonna be fine, Lynn," Liby vowed blindly. "We'll get out of this pickle, I just know it!"
Leia had her back turned to them but had failed to tune out the misery that darkened the base even more than it had been with its dim lighting systems. She kept her eyes locked to the end of the creepy, hollow passageway, when she heard faint running footsteps. "Back already?"
Dylan came sprinting towards the three girls, with Leia having a quick heart attack. She opened her mouth to scream but had nothing come out of it. She overloaded her mind from fear, pushing herself away from the wall but managing to fall over her feet, making a heavy thud. Liby looked up and bounced right on her feet in alert, the sight on the opposite end giving her nothing but a spine-tingling chill. "N-no-"
Leia ignored the cold touch her hands and legs felt, concentrating all her body and soul on the Tacitus Kid who had slowed down. A shiny object in his right hand reflected with the light, and both hers and Liby's hearts had sank further than they had when they both made out a silver Magnum revolver. Yet again, the one pale man of short, spiky hair rattled the souls of the young wanderers not meant for such a life, to stain them with the fear of God. "M-Mister Blood-!" Leia choked on her words, hoping to receive mercy. "How do you do?"
"Where is it?" Dylan aimed his firearm at Leia right before he moved to pass her. "Well?"
"Where is what?" Leia sobbed in the flip of a switch, snot trickling down from her petite nose. "D-don't kill me!"
"Up, Leia!" Dylan urged of her. "Your loyalties are to lie with no one else but me only! It was I who freed you from Mayor Dillon's witch hunt!"
"Y-yes..." Leia tearfully agreed. "You did!"
"Say it, Leia!" he forced it on her, leaving her no choice but to swear for them. "And you! Yours too!"
Liby had backed into the wall, leaving Lacy exposed and helpless. She raised her quivering hands and nodded heavily, agreeing to do whatever it was he wanted, now against her own will. "My sister- Please, my sister is sick-"
"So it appears," Dylan looked down at the dying Lacy and had his revolver drawn right on her head. "There is no saving her."
"WAIT, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"
He abruptly ended the clone's life with a single shot that echoed through the entire labyrinth, making Lyra and Lupa stop dead in their tracks right as they had returned and met him right on the feeble girls. Lupa's mouth went agape the moment Dylan had fired one of the special pheno-killing rounds at her, but Lyra pushed on further.
On the other side, Lynnette and the pair of boys had come back to the scene but were moving carefully to not startle the gun-toting maniac.
Liby slid down the wall like slime, letting out her burst of crying, taking her cupped hands against her eyes, her heart breaking into pieces at Lacy's sudden immobility. The poor clone had bit the big one, blood leaking out from the freshly made crater on the side of her head. Meanwhile, the relentless Tacitus Kid blew the smoke from the gun's barrel and set it down next to his hip. Leia did nothing, let no scream out or make any sudden moves this time.
"Good Lord," Lyle huffed.
"One falls, this is my mercy," Dylan declared to the onlookers. "And it is not my place to massacre mere children who I'm sure don't know how stocks work, but I will shoot you if you will it. See, five of you are fighters, and this weapon in my hands holds five more special bullets that will make you the forgotten-"
"What is it that you want?!" Lemy yelled from his end of the hall.
"Your compliance, for starters..." Dylan so calmly revealed. "There are seven of you standing before me, alive and well, and it just so happens I'm in the market for seven souls. Seven souls against the Patriots' six-person pheno team, which I'm sure some of you know are those Louds!"
"You want us to fight them?!" Lyle gathered the point but had deemed it an absurd impossibility. "And how would you achieve such a thing?!"
Dylan lifted his shirt to show them a strap around his body, created with six pouches that were occupied with syringes. "The last of the Medi-Sin until I can procure a new batch somehow. These, meant for all of you!"
Prime Federation Base
Leven, Troy and their Primers walked out in silence with their captured foes, followed by Carly and the twins keeping guard in the rear, all finally emerging out of the stuffy base. They had expected everyone to be there, but it was a nice hell of a surprise to find that Lincoln's sudden appearance had accounted things to go south. Apart from him were Luna, Loanne, Darcy, and the newly-arrived Alexander Elmont left. "Oh, joy," Leven sarcastically let out. "Good seeing you again."
"Hmph," Lincoln croaked from under Loanne's foot.
"Could you take any longer, huh?" Loanne had too much of a long day, and up to here, hot chocolate and a Lifetime original movie sounded just about fun. "Everyone just disappeared all of a sudden, there were plenty of us, and then-"
"What do you mean they disappeared?"
"Ha!" Chad McCann found his time to play a sexist joke. "Just like a blooooonde woman to fuck it up! See how she's the only one-"
And Lola and Lana cleared their throats once moving to either side of him, knuckles ready to teach him a lesson or two. "I mean, maybe we should have stayed here," he backtracked to avoid a double-zoomer beating.
"These new girls showed up too, gave Lincoln here an ass-whooping, but they seemed to be sent by the Tacitus Kid."
"The Tacitus Kid?!" Troy gazed.
"No way to have reached out to you, but in short, he was here for a moment and left but..." Loanne trailed off. "I didn't think we'd fend him and Lincoln off..."
"Can you get your foot off of me?"
"Are you really that weak?" Loanne grinned, feeling powerful. "If you beg for it..."
"Let him up," Leven allowed, "I'll see to it he is no threat. Play nice with us for now, Lincoln, we've all sacrificed our lives to dismantle the Prime Federation behind us."
Lincoln only narrowed his eyes at the group. To make a move now proved suicidal, and not even then would he bother. Secondly, it seemed Bethany and Lissandra were nowhere to be found- no way he didn't imagine all of that, right?
Right on cue, Lynn found her way back, returning in an exhausted manner. "Oh, oh my God- Hi-"
"What are the known reports on TK?" Lincoln inquired.
"What's it concern you?" Troy fired back. "He's-"
"All our issue if he's got it in for the phenos. I mean, you ought to start telling me all that you know about... Isaac Sanger."
"Hmmm, that's not info so easily passed around, but we've all been running on that speculation-"
"Speculation my ass," Lincoln chuckled. "He's confirmed it."
"H-hold on, who is this Sanger guy?" Loanne felt awkward not being privy to the new information. "What's he to do with Dylan Blood?"
"Issac Sanger and Dylan Blood just so happen to be the same person, girl," Lincoln answered for them.
"Alias?"
"That seems to be confirmed up to here," Troy filled in. "All existing Dylan Bloods do not match with the one we're facing, we know this because we have cross-referenced it."
"How...?" Loanne was left scratching her head. "Uh, alright."
"I'd like to know how you're aware of that crucial fact, at a time when this hasn't been sent out to all agencies, and we're not yet investigating this deeply."
"If we know that much, then we also know about John Kirkwood."
"John Kuh-" Troy Lindemann took a pause and then formed an excited smile, and then found himself laughing. "The dirty bastard found guilty for manipulating Mandel Industries stock shares to his advantage. Boy, that Gamestop fiasco nine years ago really had an effect."
"What's the connection?" Loanne was still in the dark.
"Classified intel shall be disclosed to you now..." Troy cleared his throat. "For the record, the Prime Federation has had access to high-security places, all levels of clearance being in our possession. So, five years ago, this man Kirkwood is found to have siphoned thousands from the stocks utilizing the help of roughly about twenty-five thousand people from a short organization he ran. It's a front, but you could never tell from first glance. They catch him, his followers scatter like rats, but the Feds hardly gave a fuck. FBI wants him. Homeland wants him. Hell, CIA want to question him for their own reasons as well. His networks had run deep, but all that money he managed to collect had been deposited in tiny increments onto an offshore account. He'd be beyond a billionaire but this account, none had been able to locate successfully. So, they relocate him by plane to a secure facility. His only way to cut a perfect life-winning deal was to disclose the account's location. But-"
"The plane disappears," Lincoln cut in. "It was a transport plane moving hardcore criminals to their new home. Kirkwood never fit this particular profile, they hoped to intimidate him. They were only interested in the money so that they could use it on their own war against crime."
"And do you know who else figured that out at the right time?"
Loanne finally got the picture. "The Tacitus Kid was after Kirkwood?"
"The money was incentive enough, I'd say."
"Isaac Sanger goes missing right before Kirkwood is transported, but despite the plane having gone missing, other convicts were found, reported one Dylan Blood to be among them. No connection is made until the Tacitus Kid, or whatever he prefers to be called, makes his official debut for the world to see."
"Oh..." Loanne was fascinated.
"That's the piece of history the public will never know about the man, as preferred by the high officials."
"So, we're fighting a dude who doesn't spend his time with all that money? I mean, he got it, right?"
"Oh, we're positive he did."
"Just to be clear," Dylan's voice entered the chat, "I did something like that years ago and rubbed it right in the face of Cornelius Dietrich. Sure, it landed me in quite the pickle but the very second I learn about Kirkwood, I go to take back more than I've lost because of these..." His hands crumpled into fists in an angsty sort of way. "Oh, these elites just want it their way, where's the balance in that?"
Loanne finally removed her foot from Lincoln's chest while Leven and his group faced not only the Tacitus Kid but the seven slaves he had turned and brought with him. The seven kids, forced to stick the needles and insert the Medi-Sin liquid inside of them, turning them into less-civilized individuals. They sputtered, they mumbled and a few of them dripped saliva from the corner of their mouths. All of them, and Liby, who had dropped hers before she left, was the last one to take hers, already having transitioned to the phase that left her eyes pearly white without pupils, and half of her face blackened, veins visibly green within the black patches.
"My minions, they who face me want me captured!" Dylan boomed. "Well, I say fuck them! All of you fight in my name, for the sake of my safety and your lives!" His revolver came back out again. "ATTACK EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM!"