I don't own any of this all of the Nicktoons belongs to Nickelodeon.
A loud explosion erupted from the volcano, shooting out a brief fireball into the sky before becoming completely calm and silent.
This is without a doubt the most random volcanic eruption Lincoln has ever seen, and seeing how everyone is going about their daily lives all around him, it looks like it was a daily occurrence. Strange, but that isn't the hot topic right now.
The bigger question on his mind was how did he end up here? By all definitions, he should be back with Arnold and his friends getting burned to dust by the red giant. While he isn't exactly disappointed about missing his untimely death, the mystery of him ending up at an entirely different location (or in this case, a entirely different dimension) since the planet is still here and the sun is completely normal draws his mind to a blank.
The only time he had experienced something like this was during that one time he dreamed of his brothers, but that had only been a dream, or so he thought.
Glancing down quickly at the watch, Lincoln had this very strong hunch. His hunch turned out to be right, as right there on the watch is the exact same name as the town - this could only mean one thing. The watch was actually a multidimensional traveling device, which meant that his troubles were finally over. He could simply set it back to his home dimension, and poof! He would be safely and comfortably back in his own home.
Overjoyed at this discovery, Lincoln switched the coordinates of various locations until finally Royal Woods appeared. Happiness overloaded his systems; there it was, right in front of him on the screen. All he had to do now was just press one of these buttons.
A large hand suddenly appeared out of nowhere; within just a few blinks, it had snatched the watch completely off his wrist. It was so fast and sudden that Lincoln pushed his finger down on the suddenly empty space on his wrist before realizing it was gone. Blinking a couple times, he looked up at the thief who stole it and saw a large, muscular man wearing a black bear hood, bear paw gloves, and bear paw boots. This is someone Lincoln has to definitely have to tread carefully with because this guy could easily beat the living stuffing out of him without even breaking a sweat.
"Oh, man! This looks like a very nice watch, mang." The man said before placing it under his hood. Lincoln had to get that watch back the only way he knew how, although he is very certain that he is going to regret it immediately.
"Hey, uh, excuse me."
The muscular guy looks down at him with a curious glare. Lincoln visibly let's out a great gulp, very unsure if he could continue on. "Can you please hand me back that watch? It's very important to me."
"Beat it, kid. Miracle City rules - supervillains can take whatever they want before getting clobbered by White Pantera and are forced to give it back. Mang."
"S-s-supervillain!" A new sense of dread struck Lincoln harder than a rock. Standing in front of him was an actual supervillain. That was both terrifying and awesome at the same time; on one hand, Lincoln had always wanted to see an actual supervillain because it meant he could finally meet a real-life superhero, but on the other hand, Lincoln would have preferred to have a superhero right by his side when meeting one.
"That's right, mang. El Oso! One of the best thieves in all of Miracle City!" He declared very proudly, his arms stretched out wide towards the sky. Behind him, a couple of birds flew away from the sudden yelling. The awkward silence that followed only heightened the tension; any second now, this El Oso guy could snap him in half with those muscular arms.
"So, you're not going to give me back the watch?"
"No" He answered blankly before grabbing Lincoln by the waist and tossed him away without a hint of remorse.
Lincoln crashes into a fruit stand, knocking over apples and oranges while his head crashes right through the wood, getting him firmly stuck upside-down with his legs dangling above him. His hands grip the side of the stand, but he can't seem to pull his head out. All the while, El Oso laughs at his misery simply because it's the funniest thing he's seen all week.
"So long, mang." He said in laughter as he left Lincoln struggling in the fruit stand.
He was far gone by the time Lincoln finally managed to get his head out of the fruit stand, which then fell on its side from the combination of Lincoln's weight and movements, spilling him onto the sidewalk with a loud thud.
The pain from the hard fall definitely hurt, but it nearly didn't hurt as much as knowing that he had finally found a way back home... only for it to be literally slipped right out of his fingers by a bear-themed villain. Getting himself back up to his feet, Lincoln wondered just how things could possibly get any worse?
"Look out!"
Before Lincoln could register on what was happening, he was suddenly hit hard by a runaway shopping cart with enough force to sweep him off his feet and carry him through the street. Bent over in pain from the cart striking him in the chest, he felt the force of its momentum.
Shakily placing his feet on the front bar of the cart, Lincoln managed to keep himself from falling off. With great effort, he lifted his head up, and found himself staring into the eyes of a girl with blue hair looking right back at him. "You might want to hang on, dude!" She said. "We're going much faster now!"
Taking her advice very dearly, Lincoln grabbed hold of the cart's sides very tightly. The shopping cart then went down a steep hill, where it picks up more speed to the point it started rattling and bouncing from side to side. All the while poor Lincoln thought he might be thrown off the runaway cart by all of this shaking. It certainly didn't help when the cart reached the bottom of the hill and launched into the air like a jet after rolling onto a ramp.
Lincoln's feet slipped from the bar as the cart continues to rise up into the air. His reaction is swift as his hands tighten their grips on the sides of the cart with his nails pressing into his skin a bit, while though all of this, Lincoln released a terrified scream.
They had reached about four stories up when gravity finally began to pull the cart back down to Earth. Looking behind him, Lincoln could just make out a brick wall of a building rapidly approaching him. "This is going to hurt."
With a loud crash, the cart hits the wall with enough force to make everything shake from Lincoln's perspective. Once again, he is spilled onto the sidewalk, while the now tipped-over shopping cart lies next to him, with a large dent in the front and the wheels still spinning right along with his own pupils which spun around like a hypno-wheel, while above his head, a collection of stars orbits around.
Oblivious to the boy lying on the ground, the two cart riders—a boy and girl—crawled out of the cart with their cracked helmets in hand. They were laughing amongst themselves, as that had been the best downhill shopping cart ride yet. "Aw man Manny! That was awesome!"
"You said it Frida! Though on a note, we should avoid this route for future extreme rides."
"It's my bad. I didn't think there would be a curve after the hill." Frida chuckled. "But at least we were wearing our helmets." Tapping the safety equipment with her knuckles, which then promptly cracks the helmet even more before it, right along with Manny's completely crumbled into dust. "Dang. That was my favorite helmet."
Manny soon remembered the white-haired kid who had unexpectedly caught a ride on their shopping cart ride. "Do you know what happened to that guy we ran over?"
They then both looked around a bit, but it was Frida who spotted him just a few feet away from them. "There he is."
Going up to the boy, whom they had both never seen before, they looked down at him curiously, wondering if he was dead from the crash? To find this out, Frida reached down and picked up a stick from the ground and poked him several times until he began to stir.
"Phew! He's alive." She sighed in relief as now she didn't have to worry about going on the lam. Meanwhile, the boy sat himself up with a ache in his head that he gently rubbed slowly. "Oh man. What hit me?"
"Sorry about that amigo. That was us." Manny sheepishly answered, earning a daze look from this mystery guy as he slowly turned to face them.
"Huh? What?"
"We were doing our weekly Extreme Shopping Cart ride when we kind of, accidentally hit you." Frida replied with a sheepish grin.
"Why were you doing that?" He groaned. It's exactly the kind of thing Lynn would do.
"Mostly because it's both thrilling and fun." Manny nonchalantly shrugged.
"It's especially fun when we start at the top of the volcano. When you wanna gain great speed, that's the place to do it." Frida enthusiastically added with her hands proudly on her hips.
"On top of the volcano?!" Okay, these guys must be nuts. Not even Lynn would dream of pulling that kind of dangerous stunt, if she ever did; mom and dad would have a full-on heart attack, and Lucy would already be arranging for her funeral.
Frida suddenly got very close to him, examining him with a very critical eye while tapping her chin. It was so sudden that Lincoln had to take a step back to regain some of his personal space. "Are you new here?" She asked. "I haven't seen you around town before."
"I'm just visiting here for the time being. I only just arrived about a few minutes ago when my watch got stolen." Lincoln explained, while being very careful on holding back on several important details they may not want to hear.
"Oh. That's expected around here. If you don't have anything tied down. You'll be very surprised on how fast someone can snatch somebody else's personal belongings." Manny remarks.
"Yeah. Like this one guy, who one time had just bought this cool CD player. He sits down on a bench, looks away for one measly second, then bam! It gets stolen without so much as a warning." Frida added.
"Oh great. I happen to land in a place full of thief's and villains. That's just fantastic." Lincoln sarcastically remarked.
"Don't worry. Once you get pass all the supervillains, bandits, thugs, street gangs, and the occasional giant robot or monster attacks. You'll find that Miracle City is a nice place to live in." Frida exclaimed.
"You're really selling it." Lincoln sarcastically remarked.
"Frida's right amigo. Besides maybe we can help you get that watch back." Manny offered.
"How so?" Really, they are just a bunch of kids. They couldn't do anything to that guy without ending up at the hospital.
"Glad you asked." Said Manny as he suddenly reached down for the buckle on his belt. Spinning it around a flash of light envelopes him, when it faded, it revealed that he transformed into a tiger-themed superhero complete with chains attached to the end of his clawed hands. With a dramatic pose and a Jaguar roar, Lincoln felt his jaw dropped to the ground.
"EL TIGRE!"
Frozen completely solid from shock, Lincoln kept his eyes wide and mouth open right until Frida came up to him and closed it with one finger placed underneath his chin. Regaining all his senses, along with taking in a huge breath of air, Lincoln finally found his voice. "Holy guacamole! You're a superhero!"
His dreams are finally coming true. Now if only he had some superpowers, then this would be even more awesome than it already is.
"Technically no. He's half hero and half villain." Frida informed.
"What?"
"It's what happens when your papa is a superhero and your grandfather is a supervillain."
Doing a double take for he had to make sure he absolutely heard that right. Lincoln stuttered over his words at first, but finally found the proper words. "His dad's a superhero... and his grandpa's a supervillain?"
"Yeah, that's right."
"Um. I taken they don't get along very well." Lincoln could already see it. His dad and grandpa fighting and bickering constantly as they unleashed all kinds of neat gadgets.
"Actually, they're all very close with each other." Frida corrected.
Well that's very surprising. Though Lincoln suppose it's a very good thing that they are close, instead of constantly getting at each other's throats to the point their house is a entire warzone.
"Anyway" El Tigre spoke up in order to get themselves back on topic. "Who exactly was it that stole your watch?"
"Oh right." Lincoln remarked, suddenly remembering. He had been so distracted by seeing a real-life superhero and the topic of his family that he had briefly forgotten about his stolen item. "It was some beefy guy, who called himself El Oso."
A sudden groan escaped from Frida as she lurched herself forward, like a zombie. "Aw, man! El Oso! I figured it was just going to be a harmless bandit."
"Not ideal for me either, but come on we dealt with El Oso before and came out on top." El Tigre reassured.
"But don't we loose badly sometimes?" Frida pointed out.
"Only a few times. Besides this gives me a chance to try out the new move I've been practicing." El Tigre had been practicing it for weeks and was eagerly awaiting his opportunity to finally execute it on some bad guy.
"Where exactly are we going to find this guy anyway?" Lincoln asked for no doubt he is long gone by now.
"No worries amigo. We know exactly on where he lives, just fallow us." Dashing away with Frida close in tow, he leaves Lincoln who just stood there in excited, while deep in his thoughts.
"I'm spending the day with a superhero who's about to go kick a bad guy's butt. Oh man! If only Clyde was here. Then we can join in as Ace Savey and One-Eye Jack." Not wanting to miss any of this for a second, Lincoln races to catch up with the two who are already quite a good distance away from him.
Exiting out of the city, they traveled a few miles before finally arriving at the base of a cliff that led all the way up to a flat-topped mountain with visible buildings on the top.
Looking up at the tall mountain, Lincoln is awestruck with dread as it appeared to be a very tough climb. The visible signs with warnings of rattlesnakes, cactus patches, feral dogs, barb wires, and killer quicksand didn't help at all, especially with the hungry vultures eyeing him with forks and knives held up in the tips of their wings. "You're saying he lives up there?"
"Yep. Only the baddest of the bad can live here. You have to have bones of steel, teeth of tough concrete, and the nastiest attitude to kick a small puppy without any hint of hesitation or the slightest remorse in order to even consider calling it your home." Frida explained with such extremeness that Lincoln swore he could see flames rising from behind her.
"And we're gonna have to climb all the way up there?" This is going to be a very difficult climb; he'll be lucky to even reach halfway up the mountain before becoming a skeleton somewhere up there with those vultures happily feasting on him.
"No worries. I got a great shortcut." Raising his arm up skyward, El Tigre launched his hand out with the chain never ending until his hand finally clenched onto the rocky ground atop the mountain. Wrapping his other arm around both Lincoln and Frida, he elevates them all to the top in record time.
Once they all set foot on the ledge, El Tigre retracted his arm back into place as Lincoln looked back down at the long drop behind them. "That's a way to get up here."
"There's El Oso's place." Stated El Tigre, pointing it out immediately. Looking on where El Tigre was pointing at, Lincoln saw a rocky cave that heavily stood out from in-between two regular wooden structures.
"He lives in a cave?"
"What can we say? He was raised by bears." El Tigre shrugged off before getting serious. "Now let's get in there and go get that watch."
"Stealth time." Frida dramatically announced with her hands slowly covering her eyes.
Taking to the rooftops, the three with El Tigre's help hopped all the way across to the top of El Oso's cave. Signaling the two to keep quiet, El Tigre used his claws to very carefully crawl down to the entrance, where he peered in and scanned very carefully around the inside for any sign of El Oso or his little brother.
"See anything?" Lincoln whispers down to him.
"Nah. The coast is clear." El Tigre replied as he jumped off the rocky wall, did a flip, and landed on his feet. Followed by Frida, who landed to his right, then Lincoln, who faceplanted hard on his left, causing him and Frida to wince.
"Ouch! You okay?" Frida asked.
"I need to work harder on my landings." Was all Lincoln could mutter before getting himself back up with dirt stains splattered on some parts of his shirt, pants, and face.
With them all settled, they entered the cave and stopped in the middle of El Oso's living room, where Lincoln had to admit it was a rather nice living room, even if it belonged to a villain who lived in a cave.
"So where do we start searching?" He then asks El Tigre.
"Beats me. It could be anywhere within this cave." He replied while still scanning around the area.
"Then let's start ransacking the place!" Leaping off towards the brown leather chair in front of the TV. Frida ripped the cushion off the seat; she knew from experience that things were always hidden underneath chairs or couch cushions, but not this time as all there was is brown fur.
Shrugging to herself as she moved off to search the couch cushions next, while at the same time El Tigre searched through drawers by tossing out items that weren't important in their overall search. Meanwhile, Lincoln did a more careful search; he was in a villain's lair, after all. The last thing he needed was for that muscular guy to come after him, so he searched around the dining room table very carefully without so much as tipping a chair.
This is what they did for the next hour; Lincoln looking carefully while both El Tigre and Frida did the exact opposite by tossing, knocking, or pushing anything they saw onto the ground in a not-so-subtle manner. They ended up standing in the middle of the room surrounded by trash, knocked-over furniture, a crooked picture frame, and mysterious liquid stains on the walls. Despite their long search, they hadn't found any trace of Lincoln's watch.
"It seems the watch is not here." Frida stated.
"He must still have it on him. We just need to find him and then we can get back your watch." El Tigre exclaimed as he pounded his fist against his palm.
Right besides him Lincoln stares at the large mess in horror. Coming from experience when it comes to making such a huge mess in his own home, when the homeowner comes back to this mess, they are going to be absolutely furious. "We are so dead!"
"Relax, pal," Frida said as she waved her hand dismissively. "We'll be out of here before El Oso even knows we were here. Although when you think about it would be very confident for us."
"But what are the odds of that happening?" El Tigre pointed out.
"I say big."
"Why do you say that Frida?"
"Cause here he comes right now." Pointing towards the cave's entrance. The hulking figure of El Oso entered, laughing loudly while carrying two bags of cash over his shoulders.
"What a great day, mang!" He exclaimed, grinning widely from ear to ear. "First, I stole a nice watch from a kid, then robbed two banks with great success. Now, I can finally rest my feet and enjoy a nice, relaxing evening, mang." Opening his eyes, El Oso stood there with a frozen expression of a wide smile as he laid his eyes on the huge mess that beheld him, including the three children who stood in the middle of it, blinking awkwardly.
At first he stayed frozen in that expression for a couple of seconds, but soon it changed into a absolute mixture of both rage and a bit of shock. "My cave! What did you punks do to my cave mang?! Don't you know how long it took me to arrange everything during last week's spring cleaning mang?"
"We're here to get back the watch you stolen El Oso!" El Tigre declared as he pointed at him. Behind him, Lincoln did his best to hide himself from the intense glare of El Oso.
"Oh! You want this mang?" Pulling the watch from beneath his hood, El Oso dangles it mockingly at El Tigre. "Come and get it mang!"
Placing the watch back under his hood, El Oso suddenly picked up a large rock and chucked it at them. Lincoln and Frida jumped out of the way, while El Tigre shot his hand into the ceiling and raised himself out of the way. As the rock shattered into pieces, spreading everywhere, El Tigre released his grip on the ceiling and aimed for a punch between the villain's eyes.
However, he was hit on the side by a hard swing from El Oso's arm. Flying towards the wall, El Tigre quickly grabbed hold of a hanging stalactite, flipped back around with his foot out. He made his hit right on the nose, which El Tigre bounced off of and landed in a pose in front of the massive man who quickly recovered from the blow and swung a fist.
Dodging the blows that caused many cracks in the ground, El Tigre punched his chest. But then El Oso grabbed hold of his chains and swung him around like the end of some nunchucks before repeatedly slamming him into the ground and walls.
After the latest slam into the ceiling, El Tigre slashes Oso's arm with his free hand, forcing him to release his grip due to the stinging pain El Tigre's claws caused. He's then punched hard several times in the face, knocking out a good amount of spit.
Punching him once more in the forehead, El Oso was knocked right into the wall, knocking off his hood which spilled out the watch which skidded across the floor to the leg of the couch. Eyeing it immediately after the watch flew out of the hood, Lincoln wasted no time on rushing for it. At the same time, El Oso grabbed one of the bags of money and hit El Tigre from midair with a good throw.
Hearing the initial bang from El Tigre crashing into something. Lincoln strapped the watch back onto his wrist and took a quick look back at the fight. El Tigre was dodging several more of El Oso's punches by rolling, ducking, or jumping.
He should really stay here a bit longer just to see how the fight would turn out; after all, it's not every day you get to witness a real-life superhero versus supervillain fight, and some parts of him really wanted to watch it. However, he finally has a chance to go home literally on the tip of his fingers; he really hated to say it, but a superhero fight wasn't a huge priority at the moment. Besides knowing how most superhero stories ended, he already knew that El Tigre was going to be the victor.
Turning back to the watch, Lincoln studied it for a moment before finally locating the dial that set which world he would go to. Fiddling with it, various worlds passed by on the watchface until finally Royal Woods appeared.
This was it! He was finally going home!
"Bye guys. Thanks for helping me get my watch back." Pushing the button, Lincoln disappears in a flash of green light, stunning not only Frida, but also El Oso and El Tigre, who have both stopped their fight, with El Tigre on his hairy chest with his fist raised and El Oso posed to smack him off.
"What the heck just happened mang?"
"I think he was an alien this whole time and he just beamed back up to his ship," Frida exclaimed as she stood at the spot where Lincoln had completely disappeared from.
"That would explain the white hair." El Tigre pointed out as both Frida and El Oso nodded in agreement.
Zapping into existence, Lincoln smiled brightly for he was finally home. To quote a famous movie, "There's no place like home."
Except he wasn't standing in front of his house or any other familiar area in Royal Woods he would immediately recognize, instead he found himself inside some kind of a ship. Looking forward, he saw a boy and a girl piloting the controls as they navigated through space.
The two as well as a beaver tooth boy in a pink hat with two creatures floating above him, another boy with a crazy hairstyle, four masked turtles, a starfish and finally a sponge looked at him in surprise because as for them, Lincoln had just appeared out from complete nowhere.
The sponge suddenly gave him a kind smile and waved to the unexpected newcomer. "Hi there. Nice day isn't it?"