Okay, time to give people other than Lincoln something to do.
*RIIING!*
Lori stopped where she stood and reached for her pocket, taking out her phone before answering the call.
"Hello?"
"Lori, this is Lisa. I require your presence alongside the rest of our sisters at the Index System. I already called the others, all you need to do is lock on to me and teleport. Thank you for your cooperation."
Typical Lisa, assuming that Lori was gonna say yes. Not to say she was wrong, but it was still annoying.
So, with nothing else to do, Lori locked onto Lisa's signature and teleported to the middle of a giant white room at the Index System, where the Mad Scientist and the other Loud sisters waited.
"Excellent, Lori has arrived," Lisa stated, clasping her hands with a smile. "Now we can properly begin the testing."
"Before you do that, explain yourself," Luna growled. "What are you up to that would need all of us, even the Antagonists, for assistance?"
"Patience, my dear sisters, everything will make sense soon," Lisa answered while walking out of the room. "Just stretch and prepare yourselves. This is a very important test, and I need you to be at your most competent."
Lisa walked out a sliding door, and as soon as it closed, Leni walked up to it, put on her goggles, and began trying to hack into the code next to it.
"Go, Leni, Go!" Luan chirped, waving her pom poms.
"Can you hack it, Leni?" Lynn inquired.
"No, Lisa, like, reinforced the firewall of this thing," Leni sighed. "There are four layers of code within: it could take me hours to figure out the way to hack into it."
"Then why don't we use Lori's teleportation?" Lana suggested. "Surely she can get us out, right?"
Lori put her index and middle finger to her head, but a loud static caused her to cut it out.
"There's some kind of interference in here, I can't lock on to anything."
"I suggest you stop trying to find a way out of here."
The girls looked up, and saw Lisa alongside a baby looking down at them from the control room.
"I've already taken precautions to ensure each and every single one of you don't decide to ditch this assignment after deciding to come here."
Suddenly, another door opened up, and from it marched out a set of mechanical humanoids.
"Sisters, I wanna present to you the Trainerbots," Lisa said, adjusting her glasses with a smile. "I've been tasked by the Head of Development to reintegrate the Trainerbot program into Royal Woods, and who better to help me with this than my own family?"
"I've heard about these things," Luna's eyes widened. "Most households back when Cliches first appeared had at least one of these to help the Users train their Cliches, until an Antagonist-"
"Presumed Antagonist," Lynn clarified. "The identity and designation of the person was never found."
"Hijacked them to use them as foot soldiers to unleash a war to conquer the world," Luna continued, ignoring Lynn's statement. "They were banned after that so that event wouldn't repeat: why would anybody try to "reintegrate" them after that?"
"I'm afraid neither you nor I are in a position to question my fellow Council Heads' logic,'' Lisa sighed. "Right now, your job is to train the Trainerbots by having them mimic your actions and update their database. Succeed in this, and you'll be allowed to go. The exercise begins… now."
Lisa pushed a button, and the Trainerbots' eyes glowed, prompting the sisters to get ready to react.
Meanwhile, back with Ynovation, the girls and both sets of Lincoln's friends began writing stuff down their notebooks… except for Ronnie Anne, who looked frustrated while looking at some of their classmates playing a game.
"This is a lot more boring than you made it sound like before," Ronnie Anne sighed. "I thought we were gonna get straight into the thick of it!"
"Before you can do the practical, you must first do the theoretical," Haiku answered. "Come on, Ronnie Anne, everybody knows this."
The tomboy rolled her eyes and took out a manga to read, while an unlikely pair had an interaction.
"So, you're a Demon Lord, huh?" Giggles blurted, getting Stella's attention. "Isn't it weird that the name is Demon Lord even if the user is a girl?"
"You can blame the Head of Naming for that," Stella replied, putting her arms behind her head. "They're the one in charge of giving a name to all Cliches that get registered in the Index System."
"And they're really stubborn, too!" Cookie sighed. "Stella's been sending them requests to change her Cliche's name for-"
*SMACK!*
"Ow!" Cookie rubbed her slapped cheek. "Why did you slap me, Stella?!"
"Because you were babbling about private information!"
"I'd like to know more," Giggles said, raising her hand.
"You wanting to know more or not isn't the problem!"
And as the trio had their argument, Clyde noticed Ronnie Anne closing her manga and sighing in frustration.
"Is something wrong?"
"I just don't know if I'll be able to keep up with this manga series," Ronnie Anne handed the manga to Clyde. "It's been 20 chapters, but I feel like next to nothing has been done that actually matters!"
"Ah, I know this series. Well, I agree that it's a pretty blatant slow burn, but I think that's cuz it wants to introduce the world-"
"What kind of story spends 20 chapters doing nothing but worldbuilding!?" Ronnie Anne snapped. "These things are supposed to have an overarching plot, but I can't even imagine what that might be! And besides-"
*BONK!*
Ronnie Anne's complaints were briefly stopped by a ball hitting her in the face, the ball bouncing off as she quickly recovered and groaned.
The ball bounced back to a guy's hands, and they went back to playing the game as if nothing happened.
"HEY!"
They stopped, however, when Ronnie Anne stood up and stomped to them.
"Isn't there something you'd like to tell me?!"
"Oh man, she's mad," Clyde frowned. "And not in a joking manner, either."
"We should probably do something about this before it's too late," Cristina remarked.
"Agreed," Stella tented her fingers and lowered her eyelids. "Let's sit by the sidelines and watch this unfold without interfering."
"That's not what we meant!"
"Something to tell you?" the guy hummed. "Oh right, thanks for catching the ball!"
*SMACK!*
The boy hit the ground, cheek steaming as Ronnie Anne clenched her fist and yelled:
"You're supposed to say you're sorry, you prick!"
The guy tried to stand up, but he wobbled as he hit the ground again, his teammates running to his side as Ronnie Anne backed away and looked at her palm.
"Hey, what's wrong?!"
"Call the coach!"
It was then that the rest of the group went to Ronnie Anne, grabbing her as Coach Pacowski arrived at the scene.
"Alright, I heard someone calling for me," the man stated before facing the weakened guy. "What happened?"
"I dunno, I felt weak after…" the boy pointed at Ronnie Anne. "After she slapped me."
But when Coach Pacowski turned to see the one who slapped the boy, the group was nowhere to be seen: not Lincoln's childhood friends, not the former Antagonists, or even the Ynovation quartet...
At Darcy's house, the haunted girl levitated some objects and threw them at Lincoln, who swiftly struck them with his enhanced bo staff.
This resulted in the objects being sliced in half, Darcy flying to Lincoln's side to show her excitement.
"Whoa, they got cut like it was a sword!" she chirped. "How did you do that?!"
"It's what I learned from Polly: I can make the edges of objects like these extra sharp," Lincoln put the normal staff behind his head. "And that's not the only thing I can do."
Lincoln promptly began dashing across the room, Darcy giggling as she kept up with him before he narrowly dodged her attempt to hug him.
"And I also have greater intuition," Lincoln winked and snapped his fingers. "So I guess you could say I have… an edge."
Darcy clapped her hands while laughing, pausing before she hugged Lincoln for real, the guy returning the hug shortly after.
"Hey, Darcy?"
"Yes, Lincoln?"
"If you don't mind me asking," Lincoln took a quick look around. "Where are your parents?"
Darcy promptly separated from Lincoln, folding her arms behind her back and kicking the air.
"Do I need to have parents here?"
"Little kids like you aren't supposed to live alone, Darcy," Lincoln pointed out. "Even if you can handle yourself, the fact your parents aren't here-"
Darcy frowned. "Could we change the subject, please?"
Darcy's parents were a sore point for her, it seemed.
"Alright, let's talk about something else," Lincoln raised an eyebrow. "Why are you dressed like that?"
Darcy looked down at her dress and dusted it. "Is there something wrong with my dress?"
"I mean, no, but it sticks out like a sore thumb compared to the other kids I've met," Lincoln scratched his chin in thought. "If you changed your clothes to something a bit more… modern, I think, it'd be less notable."
"But I want people to notice me!" Darcy chirped. "Especially if you notice me, Lincoln."
The guy laughed lightheartedly while Darcy giggled back…
*BOOM!*
Lincoln and Darcy both ran out of the house, the latter falling into the former's shoulder as they hopped off and saw the source of the explosion.
From the smoking remains of a nearby spot, a humanoid figure slowly stood up, the smoke soon dissipating to reveal she was a girl about Lincoln's age, with white hair with purple highlights, tanned skin, and a purple bodysuit with matching gloves and boots.
Then, she turned around, and flashed a cocky grin as she reached for her pocket.
"Darcy, call for help," Lincoln instructed while taking out his bo staff. "I'll keep her occupied."
Darcy jumped off Lincoln's arms and ran back into the house, prompting the newcomer to dash after her… in a similar fashion to Lincoln's dash.
Speaking of which, Lincoln dashed to the newcomer and blocked her incoming attack with his staff…
Which was sliced in half, by none other than a leek.
"Wait, dashing and sharpening unlikely objects…"
Lincoln gripped both halves of the staff and tried to smack the girl, but she quickly dashed back.
"Are you an Edgelord too?!"
The girl just flashed a smirk before running to attack again.
Meanwhile, in Cyberspace, the combined force of Ynovation, the former Antagonists, and Lincoln's childhood friends flew away from the school as Haiku scolded an exasperated Ronnie Anne:
"There's a reason why we do the theoretical before the practical!"
"I didn't even mean to do… whatever it is I did!" Ronnie Anne snapped. "I just got angry, so I slapped him to stop!"
"Speaking of what you did," Mollie raised an eyebrow. "What happened?"
"Okay, so, my Cliche is Tsundere: it gives my attacks either a healing ability or enhanced damage depending on whether I like or hate a person."
"Oh, so you're a part of the Healing class too!" Cookie chirped before shaking hands with Ronnie Anne. "It's a pleasure to meet a fellow Healer!"
"Then, in theory," Polly hummed. "We just saw you use Tsundere with something that wasn't meant to be an attack, right?"
"I only wanted the guy to apologize for hitting me with a ball," Ronnie Anne folded her arms. "I mean, that was just rude!"
And as the argument continued, Clyde noticed something in the distance, in the virtual recreation of a familiar house...
"Lincoln's in danger!"
The girls
"We're not gonna make it!" Tabby groaned.
"Leave it to me!" Ronnie Anne exclaimed, taking out her phone. "I know someone who can help in the meantime!"
Back with the Trainerbots, the sisters fought them to the best of their abilities, with the last few bots being defeated very easily.
"These don't seem to be particularly strong, Lisa," Lola stated before cracking a robot's head off. "It's quite unlike you to build something so shoddy."
"Yeah, and why are all of us fighting?" Luan asked. "You know that as a Cheerleader, I'm better built for support, not combat."
"The Trainerbots gather information from their opponents," Lisa explained. "That way, they can replicate it in case their partner is of a similar Cliche. Anyway, that should be enough for today."
Lisa pressed a few buttons, and the interference on Lori's end was lifted.
"Thank you for your cooperation. Have a nice day."
"Oh no, you don't get to go away like nothing!" Luna yelled, flying to the screen. "Get back here and-!"
But just like a fly against a fly swatter, Luna crashed into the wall harmlessly, buzzing to the ground as Lori got a call.
"Hello?... Lincoln's what?!... Alright, we're on our way!"
Lori hung up, and when she turned around, her sisters were already by her side, ready to go along with her.
So she put her index and middle finger to her forehead, and teleported...
"Heh, you really wanna know who I am?" the girl snickered, holding her leek over her shoulder. "It might shatter your whole world, Lincoln. You still wanna know?"
"Oh come on, how bad could it be?" Lincoln asked.
"Well then, you asked for it…" the girl closed her eyes and raised her leek. "The truth is…"
She pointed her leek at Lincoln and opened her eyes, proclaiming:
"I'm your daughter from the future!"
But by the time she finished, she noticed Lincoln was accompanied by his sisters, who all looked equally stunned by the revelation.
Even the girl was shocked, dropping her leek as she realized what this meant.
"W-Wait, when did they-"
"YOU'RE WHAT?!"
