Sins in Twisters

by Blonkess

When Lincoln is destined to never have success like his family, after surviving the Royal Woods' Tornado, his future takes him on the path of becoming a renowned storm chaser. But as years pass since that day, his family tries to hold together after freak disasters put a halt to the sisters' lives when Lisa discovers a past family secret that tells Lincoln's time is running out.

14. And I Call It Losing My Mind

Sins in Twisters

Chapter 14: And I Call It Losing My Mind

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A thousand miles away from the chaos in Royal Woods, the morning was just starting to get underway for many in central Oklahoma. The weather across the region was cold at best, gloomy, and depressing at worst. Rain was in the forecast with a slight chance of freezing rain into the night, with temperatures dipping low enough that made people put on the layers.

Over in the outreaches to the east of the metroplex, after they had gotten the work done in upgrading or fixing their vehicles, the crew had opted to take a week to help recharge the batteries. The twins had gone back up to Hayes for the winter, Erin was over in Colorado tending to work for the upcoming months, and Rex had gone back to his home in Del City to check up on some personal R&R.

For Clyde, this morning didn't at all feel like he was recharged. If anything, he felt more drained than when he went to bed last night. The worst part was he didn't do anything last night to warrant this.

He could hear his phone alarm going off, but his hand grabbed onto it in his haste to silence the annoyance. Pulling it closer in an attempt to hit the disarm button but accomplished in pulling the phone off the table to the floor. Hearing it thunk against the carpet and the alarm still going, Clyde sighed as he accepted his defeat. Twisting in place, he pulled his face out from the crease in the couch to face the ceiling, rubbing his eyes in an attempt to get his body moving.

Staring up to a light gray ceiling, very little light filled the living room. Even without his glasses on, he could look out the window to see the rather bleak sky outside, speaking the language of how much this day would be a drag.

Reaching an arm down, he grabbed his device, silencing its sound, and placed it back on the table. Groaning as he rubbed his face, "Lord, just smite me now…" before slowly rising from his makeshift couch bed.

"Morning, Sleepy." he heard a voice behind him that felt like an angel had greeted him. A smile bloomed as he reached for his glasses on the coffee table. Plucking them on as he pulled the blanket down to his lap and looked back over the rear of the couch.

In a little nook by the door to the hallway, Shay sat at her computer desk with her laptop open and bathed the small section of the room in its light. Her hair had been pulled back into a braided ponytail. Dressed in a pair of red sweatpants and an Oklahoma University hoodie, she took a small sip from her coffee as she typed away on the keyboard.

It was a sight he wouldn't mind at all waking up to more often. Usually, he would have crashed at Rex's place, but the Texan was out for the past two days tending to other business. For now, he was staying at Shay's apartment down in Moore. Normally, she'd take the bus to travel the 15 minutes to get to the university, but with the options of online classes and the day really not feeling like traveling much, she had opted to work from home. Having the need to get out of the farmhouse for a bit, she offered Clyde her couch since she really didn't have much of a guest room set up.

But he was entirely fine with it. Not having been the first time he was over here, it did feel awkward in the beginning. Nearly two years on, and while both he and the couch have become well accustomed to each other, it still made his heart jump a little at how casual the two had grown. Even as he got up and headed to the kitchen to get a drink, he could see the coffee maker still having some of its brew on the warmer with a cup sitting next to it.

Pouring what was left in the pot and adding what sweetener he needed, the first sip he took wasn't exactly the fresh boiling hot he normally got himself, but he wasn't going to complain once it started working its mystical magic.

With a drink in hand, he returned to the fairly sparse living room that had best had the basics of a TV, coffee table, and couch. The white walls were a bit faded, but not to the degree they'd need to be repainted soon. It could do for some plants to give the place some color, but in the life of either college or on the road, why bother?

Coming up behind her, Shay glanced over her shoulder as he approached, "Sorry it's not fresh. Made it about half an hour ago."

"It's fine." He said, taking another drink, licking his lips after, "Thanks." He smiled down at her. Looking away from her gaze when she returned to the computer, he leaned in, looking at what she was working on. "That doesn't look like homework."

And it was far from it. It was a mess of weather models, all dated for today, with several graphs and maps running simulations. One was of the GFS showing blobs of blues, purples, oranges, reds, and even some tiny bit of white across the country. Another had the ECMWF running a similar simulation through the next 24 hours, with both showing the areas west of the Mississippi River up into Indiana having a kind of heat that would typically be seen for mid-spring with temperatures in the low 60s to high 70s expected.

Another window had the GFS showing several messes of lines everywhere that any normal person would think they were just scribbles. Some blobs of various green formed as a massive dip on the lines swung down from central Colorado across the plains. A visual representation of a trough in the jetstream, with storm activity like what they got last night, a clear idea of how it was dragging any polar air from the Northwest down to the plains and smashing it up into the sector of warm air getting pulled up from the gulf coast.

Then there was Hurricane Olga. Or what was left of it.

The sixth hurricane of the year, a formerly 500-plus-mile-wide Category 3 that had been brewing in the Atlantic for weeks before it went through the Caribbean Sea and started tracking slowly northward. A lot of people were concerned that once it got into the Gulf of Mexico, it could quickly intensify as a Category 4 or 5 once it hit those warm waters and made its way to Texas. Many people in Texas were bracing for a repeat of what they feared was Hurricane Harvey part 2.

But a lot of people were in the debate on what would have happened when it interacted with the trough plunging so far south. Some were comparing it to the situation with Hurricane Lee back in 2023. A high-pressure ridge was through it and whatever warm area in the tropics up into the States, but if it would meet the jetstream was questionable for the time. If the trough were weaker or further north, Texas and Louisiana would have taken a heavy hit. Instead, it got pushed further East and decided to introduce itself to Mississippi and Alabama as a slow-moving Category 1.

For the most part, the jetstream would magnetize the system and carry it over the eastern US. Eventually, they fell apart with whatever storms that survived coming on land to fizzle out or use the warmth to keep going till they got back to the sea. But the biggest concern had people like the Knights watching closely—the Wind Shear. The changes in the wind pattern at different heights are literal poison to hurricanes but might as well be crack cocaine for supercells and tornadoes.

Between the massive blast of cold air coming across the plains, the surging warm air across the south had been building up for days. A deep trough plunges down and the remains of a hurricane, giving the atmosphere an extra boost in creating rotation in the air.

All the signs were pointing towards a large-scale outbreak.

These kinds of setups were often what kept the team on their toes. The fact that tornadic activity had been quiet since the end of June had probably made many people starved for the chance to get some big numbers again this year.

And Clyde started to get a numbing feeling in the back of his head. He remembered a few days ago, talking with Shay about the future forecast and its potential. With today expected to be higher than expected, he could only imagine how much Lincoln would be fuming when word starts getting out about a significant tornado outbreak only hours away now.

"Can you pull up the outlooks?" He asked, leaning closer.

Nodding, Shay tabbed out some of the displays and brought up the utter mess that showed a large area from Northeastern Texas streak all the way across the Mississippi River Valley into northern Michigan into parts as far as Western Pennsylvania to west North Carolina was under a broad Marginal Risk. But the closer you got towards the epicenter, it shifted rapidly through Slight and Enhanced Risks across eastern Missouri and Arkansas into east Kentucky and central Tennessee.

But the real kicker was the tornado probability over the later two: High, with a 35 percent chance of EF2 or stronger tornadoes in a given area—a place where significant catastrophic damage and death were expected to take place.

"Jesus, you'd think they'd have this as a high risk," Clyde muttered, shaking his head at how the outlook painted the picture of a very active day. He chuckled at the thought, "Think there's a chance to catch this?"

Shay tisked once at the idea, "Maybe if we were already in Memphis, we could. A lot of these southern storms they're expecting to be flying."

She switched the tabs back to a future radar model set to 12 hours in advance. The remains of the northeastern section of Olga were still present with parts of it traveling through the greater risk area by 11 a.m. and developing into some thunderstorms in Indiana. But then there was the line of storms that had passed over them last night, chugging eastward, trying to get their acts together. Until around one o'clock, there were signs of multiple explosive storm developments from the previous system, causing the air to become more unstable.

Western Tennessee was preparing to become a powder keg ready to blow at the first spark.

"God, I can just feel today is gonna be a mess beyond belief…" Clyde muttered into his cup as he left to fetch his travel bag. He glanced up at a clock on the wall, saying it was already past 7:30 and felt like it was a long day already.

"You can use the shower if you want. I'm already packed and ready." Shay said.

"I'll get a shower once we're back at the farm." He said. Just as he went to take another drink, a truck horn blasted from two floors down.

"There's Rex," Shay said as she closed up her laptop. Clyde quickly downed the rest of his coffee as Shay walked past to grab it from his hand and place it in the sink for later. Grabbing his bag at the end of the couch, he fished out a gray jacket and quickly slipped into his shoes as he made sure to have everything he needed. Strapping the bag over his shoulder, Shay returned from the kitchen, picked up her bag from the edge of the hallway, and slipped her laptop in as the two headed towards the door.

Stepping out of the apartment, the pair was greeted by the cold and wetness the world around them had become. Feeling that Fall had truly come and that they were wearing the basics, the two dashed down the wet sidewalk to the waiting KnightTwo. Shay was the first to reach the truck and jumped into the back, with Clyde taking up the front seat. Rex sat there with the window down, letting the cold air cycle into the truck despite having the heater on low heat. He reached for his thermos as he waited for the two to buckle in. Taking a few gulps, he reached down and shifted the truck forward.

The usual drive took them a bit longer in the hour than expected, a couple of drivers having been a bit careful when driving through possible ice spots. Rex had opted to take I-44 instead of going straight to the city and taking I-40 directly.

Yet the route was a bit of a hard one to really speak about. Passing through the Treadwell Hills and Mayridge areas, memories of the hell that was May 16th materialized as they passed street after street of empty lots where houses once stood. Some piles of debris still sat at some, others with houses that survived left abandoned or were even luckier to be repairable. But looking out in the direction of the city, the scars from this year were still as visible as ever.

The ride to El Reno was a bit more somber once they were away from the old damage path, but no one spoke. Rex was content with just driving, Shay had her laptop back out, and Clyde was struggling to get himself awake. They were already planning to get the coffee maker going once they got to the house.

Coming up the north road, the looming mass of the house on the hill slowly came into view. Rex pulled off a bit sooner to pluck the mail out of the mailbox before taking a sharp turn up the driveway. The truck rocked back and forth as the wheels dipped into uneven spots of gravel or splashed in puddles from one of the more bottomless pits.

But as they rolled into the backyard, bare and empty of anything minus the oddball piece left outside, Rex immediately took notice that the place was far too bare and empty. Something was missing.

"His car's gone." Rex pointed out as he pulled the truck into its regular spot that was usually parked as the others took notice that Lincoln's Forerunner was absent.

"You think he ran to town?" Shay asked with a false sense of certainty. Both McBride and the ranger glanced at one another, silently conveying the message that something was up.

They could be wrong, and Shay was right. When he had called Lincoln three days ago for a check up Clyde wasn't surprised to find he was mostly sleeping or binge-watching television while consuming whatever snacks were left in the house. Their food bill had practically doubled since he got put on medication, the doctors explaining it might be part of the side effects like the bursts of exhaustion and energy, but that was quickly followed by him eating enough to feed three people and sleeping it off.

If Clyde had to guess, he would be up in his bedroom right now out like a rock.

Hopping out of the truck and stepping up to the backdoor, Clyde fished his keys out and pushed open the door into a relatively medicare warm house. Most of the lights, minus one above the kitchen sink were turned on, leaving the bulk of the house dark. The kitchen was mostly clean with some extra trash in the can, probably from Lincoln, but everything else seemed just like how they left it days ago.

The three of them split up. Rex instantly went to the coffee maker to get a brew going while Shay headed for the basement to warm up the system. With his original plan foiled, Clyde headed through the living room, hooking around the wall and up the stairs to the second floor.

Upstairs was practically as dead as it was downstairs. With the sheer number of bedrooms alone the house had, doors left ajar or closed with sunlight coming into the hallway or not gave off that kind of feeling that it felt like there should be the sounds of people at least somewhere in the house. Yet as he slowly moved past one room or another that used to serve as double guest rooms, the bare bones that some rooms had were hard to think anyone lived here at all. Sure, there were beds and dressers for when the film crew stayed with them, but that was just for a moment now that they were all empty.

His room was close to the end of the hallway by the second set of stairs that led down into the den. Their second bathroom was right off the side door, so it worked in his favor that he didn't have to go all the way across the house to do his business. Pushing the door to his room, he was greeted with the sight that felt oh so much like home. It wasn't as extravagant as what his room looked like in the past; it was a bit smaller compared to him as an adult, but it had the blend of adults still holding onto their older teen selves with sprinkles of their childhood still among them.

Along his dresser were a row of pictures showing his dads and him when he was younger. He and Lincoln at graduation. The two of them stood back to back with an unfinished Storm Shrieker in the hanger like they were posing for a movie poster. All small frames of past memories that he could still recall like they were just yesterday bring a smile to him. How he wished those days would come back…

Dropping his bag onto the bed, Clyde wanted more to throw it onto the floor, drop himself onto the bed, and maybe get a little nap. But the reality was he still would need to unpack sooner or later, and he needed to check up on Lincoln. Walking past his room, he could see his lights were out, and there was no sound; he was probably still sleeping. Clyde wanted to join his best friend in the dream realm, but he was starting to wonder where did his pillows go.

"Hey Clyde!" he heard Shay call out as her shoes echoed up the stairs.

"Yeah?" he shouted back.

"Do you remember taking out two of the supply bags? And Lincoln's camera is gone." She said, arriving at the top of the stairs.

Clyde paused his unpacking to think. They hadn't touched any supply bags since October after any chance of chasing down hurricanes this year was dead on arrival. He remembered him and Lincoln spending a good portion of an afternoon going through them all and seeing what needed what and to store them for the next season.

"Not that I remember. And it could be in his room. You know how much he likes to tinker with it." Clyde said, stepping out into the hallway to head down to the closet at the end. Opening the door and pulling the light cord to be greeted by a stacked tower of towels, dusty luggage, bed sets, and spare pillows, he went to pull out a new set when his eyes drifted down to a noticeable empty spot. He pulled the sheets down in a cloud of dust, waving his hand to clear it away in the dim light as he looked over the space. Everything was there, but one of the duffel bags they used for long-distance traveling was gone. It had been recent; fingerprints covered other cases that were covered in dust, with the only particles having been from his actions just now.

Something was wrong, and he could feel it.

Whipping around and dashing down the hall, he briefly saw Shay tending to her suitcase until she saw him run past. Stopping by his room and dumping his armload onto the bed, Clyde jumped out and approached Lincoln's bedroom door.

*Knock, Knock* "Lincoln? You in there?" He called out through the wood, receiving no response. He shoved the door open into his friend's room with more force than was needed.

The curtains were drawn, making the place a bit darker, with only the hallway lights being the only source untill he flipped on the light switch. The room was mostly the same, with a bit of a mess around the sides of the bed. The dresser was half open, and the closest was left ajar with some clothes piled on the floor. Looking around, aside from the large mass laid under the covers right in the middle with the blanket pulled all the way over the head, his computer desk was its organized chaos while the little workbench he kept his camera storage on was devoid of the device.

"Lincoln." Clyde came up to the side of his bed shaking his shoulder, "Wake up. We…" his words died in his throat as Lincoln's 'head' suddenly rolled off his pillow. Dumbfounded, Clyde pulled back the covers enough to see dull black plastic greeting him instead of white hair. Grabbing both fists full of the blankets, he ripped it clean off the bed and let it pile on the floor.

Just as Shay walked through the door, both looked on in confusion at the mass of pillows and twisted blankets, with a white towel on the pillow where the helmet was resting. They had both seen this trick before. In movies or in Clyde's case, once in a while during his childhood. The fact he had just fallen for such an old prank might have been cause for him to think at any moment Lincoln would appear with some mischief in his eyes. The fact there was no sign of anyone else in this house with things missing only made his panic begin to panic mode.

"Clyde! Get out here!" They heard Rex shout from the backyard. Clyde and Shay bolted out of the room and back to the kitchen, trading a glance that spoke of where this could be going.

Bursting through the back door, they saw Rex standing by the hanger with one of the main doors slid open enough for them to see the front face of Sky Spy sitting in the darkness. Running through the wet grass and gravel, Rex stepped back into the building as they jogged to a halt.

"What's wrong-" Clyde was silenced as the overhead lights came to life—blinding the two of them momentarily as Clyde took his glasses off to rub his eyes clear of sunspots.

"We have a problem," Rex said as his wet boots squeaked on the concrete.

When he could see enough and put his glasses back on, Clyde looked around for the problem. Everything seemed like it was where they had left it. The radar truck was mostly closed to keep the cold from affecting any electronics. These were still piles of parts strung about from when they stopped work; the machines were cold with some dust on them, and the office was untouched. It all looked fine until he noticed Rex standing towards the back of the hanger on the truck jack. The scene before him looked fine, but he could see something was wrong with the picture. Then it finally hit him.

Lincoln was missing, his camera was missing, two supply bags and his duffel bag were gone, and Storm Shrieker's berth was utterly empty.

"Oh my God… you gotta be kidding me, Lincoln..." Clyde shook his head, storming out of the hangar as he fished out his phone.

"Guess the captain didn't want to miss the chance for some hunting before the holidays." Rex joked as he followed out.

---

To say Lincoln had never had an actual heart attack before was true, as what he was experiencing now felt like he was missing one final step that was needed to ultimately push him into that territory.

Once Storm Shrieker came to a halt with both his shoes pressing the brake pedal almost flush to the floor, Lincoln's left hand clutched his chest as he tried to get his breathing back under control. He could physically feel his heart beating through his rib cage like a pair of angry fists trying to break loose. In the short span, it took for his panic to happen, he felt himself becoming hotter from a sudden sweat, and his mind, like a filing cabinet containing everything, had just blown up.

How long it took him to get down, he didn't know or care. Gripping the steering wheel, he put the tank in the park and let his feet off the pedal as he slowly turned to look behind him. He was hoping, praying that what he had just seen was a figment of his imagination. At least with that, he could easily blame it on the pills, stress, or both.

Unfortunately, his lucky streak for today seemed to have finally ended.

As he stared back at him with a pair of brown eyes, he honestly had to mentally pause all operations to think if he had seen them before; his passenger looked back at him with an almost bored expression. Like a child that was dragged to something they didn't want to be part of with their parents asking if they had fun on the trip home. The kid himself looked more like he belonged with a group of hippies: a gray tank top with a sleeveless jean jacket, a dark pair of blue jeans, fingerless gloves from how much of his right hand he could see propping his head up with a blue bandana wrapped around his light brown hair with a cow skull on it.

And somehow Lincoln honestly thought he could smell something illegal.

If he had to take a guess, the kid was maybe between 10 to 14. But size couldn't mean jack if somehow there were six-foot-ten 15-year-olds out there someone would mistaken for a young adult. The long hair was a bit of a mixed signal on whether it was natural or grown out. He knew his own hair was in the same department, but the fact of how tired the boy looked didn't help his guesses either.

However when he began to speak it ripped Lincoln out of his thoughts; "Saw the door wide open. So I thought, "why not?" The boy shrugged.

"Why not?" Lincoln countered in the audacity of this kid, "Why would you get into someone's truck like that? How the hell didn't I even notice you for the last 40 miles."

"I just sat behind you for most of the way. Guess you really don't check your mirrors that much." The boy shrugged again. "Plus, I was waiting for a ride. Saw this was the tank from that tornado show my parents watched a while ago and thought it would do."

'Stay down headache, stay down…' A voice in Lincoln's mind pleaded.

"Oh my god…" He turned back around and buried his face in his hands. A dozen scenarios ran through his mind, and his mental battle was now fighting a multifront war. He had literally just kidnapped someone.

No. Scratch that. Someone had gotten into his vehicle without his consent or knowledge, and only now he had just noticed. The fact a minor was out and about around a gas station at eight in the morning in the fog was something people would have to speak to his parents about, but the fact Lincoln had just driven him entirely out of the city from wherever he came from felt like God was playing a cruel joke in making his plan fall apart today. Why did this have to happen today of all days?

He'd have to abandon his plan for the day. It'd be a quick half-hour drive back up to Royal Woods from where he was but that, along with dealing with the police about a runaway or missing kid along with the drive back, meant he'd be maybe two to three hours behind. He'd never make it down south in time. But for the life of him, he couldn't just keep going with his new passenger. There were reasons he never offered up van tours during the season and having a kid in something meant to go inside twisters was high on the list of do not allow.

But did he really have a choice?

"ALRIGHT." Lincoln exhaled, "Alright. Today is half a disaster in the making; might as well finish it." he said, dropping his hands and shifting the truck into gear. He turned the wheel to straighten them out as he looked over the dashboard to look in both directions for any traffic.

"I wouldn't bother going back." The kid said behind him, seeing what he was about to do.

"And why not?" Lincoln shot back, looking over his shoulder again as he winced at feeling the slight whiplash from turning so fast.

"I'm…" The stoic look in his eyes faltered for a moment. Lincoln couldn't miss it. He thought this stuff was what you'd see in movies but reality was what inspired the art. "I'm just… trying to… get back..." Looking out the window, the boy forced himself to keep his gaze away from Lincoln's reflection. The Loud could see the boy really didn't want to be part of this situation, and he both did and didn't blame him. He didn't want to be in the situation that had happened up in Royal Woods and dodged bullets to do it. The kid had willingly put himself in a trap of his own making.

When Lincoln said nothing, not looking away from the mirror, the boy tried to look as zoned out as possible but made the mistake of glancing in the mirror. Brown met Blue, and he suddenly felt himself lose his defense.

"*Sigh* I'm trying to get back my father."

"Your father?" The boy nodded, "So then why didn't you tell someone? What about your mother or family?"

"They're looking for him too. Or, really, we know where he is. But we can't reach him. We've tried calling before and asking around, but nothing went through. It's… like he's locked us all out of his life."

Lincoln winced a little at his words. He was already seeing the parallels between his situation for the past four years has been compared to what this boy's father might be doing. But how could he really judge him? He was doing it to keep his loved ones safe and away from the danger. What his father was doing could be for a shipload of good and bad reasons.

"And we've tried everything we could think of, but nothing worked. I just can't stand seeing my mom like that and thought I'd go give him a reason to come back. Or punch him in the nuts. Whichever works," Lincoln winced a little at the last part, mentally sending the poor guy a get well soon card at the implications of what pain would be coming his way.

"And your mother was okay with this…?" Lincoln asked.

The boy just shrugged again. But the look in his eyes told Lincoln the message that what he was about to say wasn't exactly true to the fullest.

"Well… she was a little bit mad and worried." He raised his hand with half an inch of space between his finger and thumb. "Really, it was a plan me and my siblings cooked up to help her and the rest of the family. We thought that with the fifteen of them keeping her and the others occupied enough, she wouldn't see me gone until I was closer to Dad."

Lincoln looked away from the mirror and stared out into the outside world. Thinking about how it would be something like he would plan with his sisters to-

'Fifteen?!'

"You're from a family of sixteen siblings?" he asked with astonishment. Seeing the shock in Lincoln's eyes, the boy sheepishly grinned and nodded. "Your father must be a… a busy man. I come from a family of eleven with me as the middle child."

"Hehe, yeah. That's what Mom said once we reached the double digits." As fond memories came forward, he laughed, "I'm number seven out of the original ten. My folks felt more in line to adopt more afterward; thus, sixteen has been it."

Leaning back in his seat, Lincoln couldn't help but feel amused at the insane idea of having half a dozen more siblings on top of living as the middle child to it all. "You have my condolences for being almost the middle child. I didn't have that kind of luck back then." He chuckled.

The boy did the same, "Hey! It's not all that bad! At least whenever we have a family event, the numbers are more even!" he countered with a bright smile. Lincoln couldn't help it; he laughed with the mental image of what kind of chaos something like that would be, and he was surprised how the headache from before was gone. The whole feeling in the truck somehow felt more like the feeling you'd get from a family reunion than discovering you have a runaway with you.

To Lincoln, it oddly felt peaceful. Like this was a normal kind of conversation a parent would have with their child after a dreadful situation, and the two would somehow find a way to make some light out of it. A few times he remembered doing it with his dad often in the van after some disaster plagued them both. The fact he was somehow feeling it again here made him cease his laughter and wonder where it was coming from.

But as fast as the warm atmosphere had filled the vehicle, once he glanced back into the mirror, he could see the smile on the boy's face rapidly disappear as thoughts towards the reason why he was here in the first place took center stage once more.

"I'm just worried about all of them…" He said in a low voice, "Most of the time, I'm trying to get attention because I was the first son in the family. I resented my dad for not paying as much attention to me as he did to the others, and I... didn't know what to do. Then things start falling apart. Mom and everyone try to say it's alright, but I can see it. The fake smiles, the lies in saying it's alright. I… I can't stand it anymore." He punched a fist into the door's armor. Wincing as he shook his now aching hand from the rather stupid idea to punching three inches of steel to vent out frustration.

Even when he muttered a little sorry for hitting his truck, Lincoln didn't acknowledge the action and apology. The kid's words were thundering throughout his brain, worse than being parked in a hailstorm with grapefruit-sized chunks of ice smashing off the roof. It wasn't how the kid said those words; it was just how deeply he said those words that made the Loud feel like it was something he had said many times before.

"...Climb up here, kid." He gestured to the front seat as he leaned off to the edge to give some space.

Confused at the gesture, the boy hesitated momentarily before lifting himself out of the seat and stepping over the glovebox, and standing on the seat before sliding himself down. Almost immediately, he was a bit taken aback by the sheer complexity of the dashboard. Numerous switches, levers, knobs, gauges. All serving a purpose other than looking technical.

"Woah…" Lincoln nodded in approval at the boy's enchanted look at mission control. Often, many kids were when they got the chance to tour around or sit in the vehicle. "This thing really is a beast."

"Indeed she is." Lincoln lightly patted the steering wheel. For a moment, no words were traded between them, and awkwardness began settling like a layer of ash. Thinking of what to ask next, he opted for the simpler means to address him better.

"So… got a name? Figured it'll be better than just shrugging it through."

"...Lemuel. But I prefer going by Lemy."

"Lemy?" The boy nodded, "Like Lemmy Kilmister from Motorhead?" He nodded again.

"My mom really likes rock music. Says it's been in her veins since she was a little girl." Lemy said with a bit of a blush on his cheeks. Finding it a bit odd on how he was essentially named after a dead rock star.

"Heh, she and my sister Luna would probably bring down a house if they met. Knowing her, she'd blast SMOOCH like it was artillery on the frontline." Lincoln missed it for a moment, but something had briefly changed in the boy's eyes before returning to normal.

"You like SMOOCH?"

Lincoln nodded, "Fan since I was eight. Once my sis got a taste of it, I kind of got some secondhand effects till she introduced me to the rock world. Heck, back when I was just around your age, I was helping her band, the Moon Goats, as their manager occasionally." He said as he slowed and started easing the truck out of the grass. Both of them rocked back and forth in their seats as the front wheels went over the edge of the curb. Keeping a tight turn to at least get them on the shoulder, they braced a bit more as the back sets of wheels slipped off. Rolling a few feet, once a few cars passing them had switched to the other lane, Lincoln eased the tank back down the road.

Lincoln had a plan in the works, being fast-tracked with every inch they traveled. He knew there was no way in hell he was going to take this kid to wherever south was deemed to be his destination. Too many questions and suspicions about why someone like him was traveling with a runaway minor. At best, the plan called for him to at least get a bit closer to his destination to cover some ground, wait somewhere like a gas station, and see if he could get an Uber to take the boy back up to Royal Woods. It was a bit cruel; he'd have to agree to some but not even half. But it was the fact that this kid just wasn't his responsibility.

Though not even minutes into the trip, he couldn't help but glance over to his passenger. He could see the curiosity in his eyes like high beams on a moonless night. Darting back and forth from everything from the hive that was the deployment controls to the laptop on a swivel mount he (or really the co-pilot) would use to map out their routes and keep an eye on the storms. Flicking between the numerous gauges and displays, he could see his lips move like he silently said 'wow'.

"She's a beast, isn't she?" Lincoln said, making it look like he wasn't watching.

"She absolutely is…" Lemy said in childlike wonder he didn't hide. Lincoln couldn't help but smile and nod at the compliment. No matter how old the person, they were somehow constantly amazed at how futuristic the dashboard looked.

"What's this to?" he pointed to one of the main switches.

Taking just a half-second glance to see which one he was pointing at, even unlabeled Lincoln knew precisely what each one did. "The fog lights all around the outside."

"And this one?"

"The siren."

"And this?"

"The ejector seat."

"And this?" Lincoln had to take another glance when the boy's finger pointed toward the new switch with the nuclear symbol on it.

"... The warp drive."

"Nuh-uh." Lemy grinned, knowing he was just being played with now.

"Okay, I'll admit…" Lincoln said, holding his hands up on the wheel, "That switch isn't for the ejector seat. It's for the pop tart dispenser."

"Really?" Lemy asked, amused.

"Sadly, no. Haven't worked out how to get the space for it."

"Maybe get rid of this?" Lemy knocked on the glove box. "I bet I could whip something up. I am pretty handy around a tool set."

"Hmph. Maybe… You like building?"

Lemy made a so-so with his hand, "I mean, I like taking things apart to see how they work and how I can fix it. My older sister loves gaming and has a lot of really old consoles she sometimes asks me to help fix. But it really doesn't compare to this." He gestured to the tank.

"Give it time, kid." Lincoln said, like a father encouraging their child, "It took me years learning through everything I can get my hands on designing this thing before I put paper into reality. You gotta keep at it and eventually the next step."

They were clear into the countryside by this point, with Detroit far out of view behind them. Reaching over as a curious Lemy watched Lincoln open the laptop and pull up maps. Taking only half a second, he glances at the screen to ensure he is doing what he wants. He watched momentarily as the map recentered on their current position on Route 24. They were still some twelve miles away from the farm, but to him, it was becoming more that he was risking it every mile he went further.

With his hand on the screen, he pinched his fingers and spread them out. Zooming in and moving the image further down the road as icons for businesses, he saw the icon for a Sunoco gas station half a mile up the road. Lincoln thought for a moment and agreed that it was a good spot.

Not some six minutes later, the 9-ton tank slowly decreased its speed as it rolled into the empty station. A white Buick was the only other car present, but they were already rolling out back onto the street. With the space available, Lincoln rolled them up to the row between the pumps and the market. Coming up to give his door enough space not to hit anything, the tank came to a slow stop. Turning off the engine, Lincoln knew he was going to be here for a good minute, and in this day and age, if they weren't moving, then don't let the fuel keep burning.

Looking around, Lemy was confused at why they stopped. "What are we doing here? Bathroom break?"

"We are stopping here," Lincoln said, emphasizing the we, "So that I can focus on getting you a ride back to Royal Woods," he said, turning both himself and the laptop to face each other.

"WHAT?!" Lemy exclaimed like he was betrayed. "But I- I thought you were-"

"Not once did I say I would take you down south. Especially to where I'm going." Lincoln said sternly as he started entering in information for the closest Uber. "I understand your mission. I don't doubt there are thousands, maybe millions of people worldwide with the same goal in mind. Sometimes its a stroke of luck; sometimes, it's all about the right place and the right time. Jumping in a tank thinking its going all the way to where your father is located with a stranger is not one of the best or good ways of going about it."

A heavy silence filled the cab, thicker than the fog that was seen earlier that morning. With his words final, Lemy looked away from Lincoln, gazing off to his side to avoid looking at the white-haired man as he continued typing.

"Wanna know something that oddly funny?" Lemy asked, to which Lincoln let out a low hmm as a way of answering, "A lot of the times, a hero really has the short end of the stick when you step back and look at it. All they have in their final moments is hope, hope that what they have done will be enough. That everyone else will live to see the next sunrise. They don't get to see the future that they sacrificed themselves for. They can only close their eyes and hope that it's enough to reach their greatest potential. Sometimes they may see it from a different view, or never be able to."

As Lemy spoke, Lincoln felt his fingers slowing down his typing as his brain decided to latch onto the boy's words instead of the forum on the screen. He had just finished typing Lemy's full name but was missing the last name. By the time the boy had finished, Lincoln's hands rested on the keyboard like workers having lost their motivation to work. He remembered hearing or reading something similar to that somewhere he had long forgotten. He thought back to his ride with his grandpa Leonard and what he saw that became a piece to cement the life he was in now.

The kid was trying to guilt-trip him. He knew that. He always had a soft spot for kids ranging from late teenagers to newborns. If he had to say, it was part of his ten years acting as a big brother to five and maybe a surrogate father to one. Every time kids would come up to him and ask about the tank and what he does, he always made something in him click. But sometimes, he had to keep that part of himself down to focus on what was in front of him.

"*sigh* Look kid… I'm not a hero. Back then, I would have loved to have that dream, but then reality woke me up. I realized that years ago. We can't stop what the world will do in the next ten years or the next ten minutes. Everything I do is to help try to make others either have a better life or be prepared to weather the storm so that after it, they can enjoy life. I'm not trying to-"

The words died on his lips when he looked back at the now-empty seat. His heart rate skyrocketed as he pushed himself up against his door, looking for any sign of the kid. It was impossible in every form that he couldn't have gotten out. The door was still locked, and he highly doubted a kid with his stature would have been strong enough to push it open enough to slip out without making a scene. The roof hatch was locked, and even if he somehow crawled into the back without him noticing, he would have seen him before trying to get the rear door open.

"Wha- what the…" In haste, Lincoln ripped his seatbelt off and pulled the lock back. Shoving his door open as it made a massive clang against the truck, he didn't care as he wandered into the middle of the gas station. Spinning around like he had just gotten off a roller coaster, trying to see if he could spot where the boy had run off.

"Lemy?" he called out. He approached the opposite end of the lot, thinking he might see him going down the road, but there was no one.

Feeling the headache from before was now starting to unleash blitzkrieg upon him, Lincoln stumbled back before dashing back to the truck. Hooking a hand on the front brush guard as he launched himself into the store, the bemused cashier behind the counter jumped in his shoes at the sudden entrance.

"Excuse me, but did a boy with light brown hair wearing a bandana and a jean jacket walk in here a few moments ago?" Lincoln quickly asked in a single breath as he held onto the counter.

"N-no, sir." The man sputtered, trying to get his brain and lips to work. "Aside from you pulling in and sitting in your vehicle, no one else has been in here."

"Do you have cameras?" The cashier nodded as he pointed to an RT screen hanging from the ceiling showing four views of the outside gas pumps. Reaching down below the counter, the man procured a remote and reversed the video by roughly two minutes.

It showed the moment of Shrieker rolling up to the pumps. The angle was head-on to where you could see into the windshield, and Lincoln went from fine to having a panic attack and jumping out and running back and forth before charging into the store. At no point did it show anyone else in or getting out of the truck.

"I…" Lincoln tried to think of any reason behind this. Anything that could help make sense of what the last 15 minutes have done for him, but right as one idea tries to form, it gets into a head-on car crash with another. "I- sorry… thank you for your time." he quickly said as he headed back outside.

Stumbling outside, he immediately approached the passenger side door and tried opening it. But the door wouldn't budge; the lock was still engaged. He remembered locking up the truck just after he left Phil's. The kid said he got in when Lincoln wasn't looking and didn't precisely check if anyone else had entered his door before he locked up. But the fact the kid literally vanished faster than Thanos dusting someone made his mind feel like it was becoming scrambled.

He knew disappearing tricks were a form of art that mastering naturally was possible. Look at his sister Lucy. But this… this didn't feel right at all-

"Huh?" His thoughts were derailed by their schizophrenic episode. He could feel his phone going off in his pocket. Sitting against the wall, he pulled it out to see who would even be calling him.

And Clyde's caller ID stared right at him.

"Oh boy…" He knew this was coming. But as his thumb slowly flicked over the answer button, he cursed out to whoever would listen at the inconvenience of now being all of the time for his best friend to call him. "Hey… Clyde-"

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU THINKING?!" Lincoln winced and immediately held the phone away from his ear when he heard the first word. Even at an entire arm's length away, he could clearly hear everything. "SERIOUSLY. JUST WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING!? PULLING A FUCKING STUNT LIKE THAT!?"

'Yep, he's pissed…'

"Clyde, I know Shay and or Rex is there with you and can probably hear this, but you need to calm down. I know you're angry-"

"YOU'RE DAMN RIGHT I AM."

Lincoln winced again, "But I have several reasons for doing this."

"LIKE WHAT?! Two days ago, you could barely walk! Now we find out you're all the way back in Royal Woods!?"

Lincoln frowned at the meaning of Royal Woods. Not recalling how Clyde could know where he was. As far as he was aware, no one in the network knew he was even in the same time zone. "What do you mean by that?"

"Linc, there are pictures of Storm Shrieker on the Internet with hashtags of of 'Tornado tank in Royal Woods' or 'Storm chaser truck spotted on the highway in Detroit' with at least four dozen photos. There was even a brief video of you almost wrecking posted not even half an hour ago." Clyde explained like he was repeating old information.

Lincoln was a bit confused by this. Given the time of day and the weather, it should have been practically impossible for people to get any real photos unless they wanted a wonky dark shape with lights. The highway one was more believable given the time of day it was, but he had been so caught up in his thoughts that he didn't notice anyone around trying to get photos like they did out on the plains.

"So I'll ask this… and for the love of god, it better be a good answer, but why were you in Royal Woods?" Clyde demanded, but it petered off to more of a sad request that he had only heard him do a few times in the past.

Aside from his family, Clyde was the one person he trusted the most and felt like a brother to. They had been in all kinds of hell that made the others worry, but they were always there for support when the situation came to light. This whole day was him practically going behind his brother's back not telling him what he was doing. It was saying he didn't trust him to know where he was when his health still wasn't the greatest after months since the incident.

"I'm…" He took in a deep breath. Clearing his mind, "I'm trying to tie up loose ends, Clyde."

"Loose ends? But Linc, didn't we-"

"I know what he did, Clyde." Lincoln snapped back, "I know very well about it and remember every second of it… this is Part Three."

If he heard his friend gasp at what he implied part three was, Lincoln had to guess it was a 50/50 chance. After the situation back in May, before the mess with Kingman and even further when they had just gotten to Oklahoma, he had devised a series of 'plans' meant to help keep things as separate but connected as possible. The choice in how the farm was hidden and the network his old friends and allies made up around Michigan were just two cogs of the giant machine. A sad, ironic part that he could see in it now was that everyone was together now. Ronnie was back home, and Bobby could keep a closer eye, and his family was practically all back under a single roof for the time. It gave him assurance as to where things were with his loved ones, which meant he could focus on other matters.

"My Toyota's already with Bobby. It just needs his name on the paper, and that's that. I was able to run into my father and hand him the documents when I took a little detour to get fuel and…"

"And how did he take it?"

"He…" It was hard for Lincoln not to see the tear-stricken face appear in his mind. Closing his eyes, he tried to banish the image away. "He.. was against it for a bit, but… he came around to realizing the bigger picture."

Trying to keep himself together, Clyde could hear the distress in his friend's voice as he spoke more softly. "Bro, I'm sorry that-" Clyde began but was cut off.

"As for the others..." Lincoln paused. Trying to keep focused, "I… I don't know about Ronnie. Bobby said she was spending most of the time racing Gracia while he worked, and they were doing pretty well so far. I'm hoping that with the last bit, things can get back on track for her. I was on my way to go talk to Liam but made a quick pit stop first."

"... And them?"

"They…" He pinched his eyes like it would keep the images away, "They'll find out soon enough… By the end of the day, maybe in a week at most, we can focus completely on work."

"Lincoln," Clyde said in a voice that, if he was physically present, would have sat down next to his friend and placed a comforting hand on, "You don't need to do this… No one has any more right to say you went above and beyond what anyone could do for their family short of going to war. You've heard from Stella, Jordan, Carol, Haiku, Polly, and God knows who else at this point how much they miss you. There's always going to be more storms in the future, Lincoln. We're still young and have plenty of time. But you need to move some of that time to something more important when waiting."

"I have to, Clyde." Lincoln stressed through his teeth, "We've both seen what the alternative will do to everyone. No one can afford that. Not right now."

Silence filled the air as both ends of the line went quiet. From cars on the road, birds somewhere in the trees, or the sputtering motor of the ice machine nearby, Lincoln felt like he was in his own bubble meant to seal off the rest of the world. Even his phone felt more like the complicated piece of technology was as silent as a brick in a wall. Lincoln knew he could be stubborn at times. His sisters all embodied it at times, but he kept it quiet for the most part. He tended to be more in what his words said instead of how much he repeated or how loud he said them.

"Rex ran the math," Lincoln jolted out of his thoughts when Clyde spoke up, "if you're already an hour south from home and from how long it took between there and Great Lake to here, you drove through the night didn't you?"

"Yep…" he answered back like he was a bit prideful at pulling off the trip, "Only one stop for gas and grub and the rest for a bathroom break. Made it to Great Lake around 5 a.m."

"That was about eight hours. So after you talk to Liam, we hopefully going to see you tonight?"

"Yeah…" Lincoln tried looking around for a distraction as he strung out the one word a bit too long.

"... For the love of God, Lincoln, what are you thinking?" Clyde pleaded once more, "Don't tell me you're trying to chase today. I know these past few months have been shit all around for you, but please, take this as both from your best friend and a voice of reason… You're not in any condition to go out there alone."

To a degree, Lincoln had to agree with his friend. This entire day had been its own brand of a train wreck that he was pretty sure if his dreams long ago about that weird watch gave him any idea, it was that there were other versions of him somewhere dealing with either less, worse or nothing at all in this kind of situation.

Many people chased solo. Some of the biggest names in the community often did with just themselves in a car, a few cameras, and a laptop and sometimes got some of the most recognizable footage and photos around. They were the kind of people who would sometimes capture the more 'out there' stuff that most wouldn't bother getting out of bed for. Lincoln had been in the same boat back when he first got his license. His little adventures chasing in Vanzilla were him testing the waters to see if he could run by himself. It was part of the reason he tried to automate and condense a lot of the stuff in his creation in just the case.

How different that could have been; he couldn't figure it out completely. Shrieker might have taken longer to build because fewer people were on hand to build it. Funding might have been offset between him sitting out the 2022 year to focus on building it or staying out there to get more funding for later in the off-season. Would he have linked up with the siblings, joined forces with Rex, and gotten some of his best intercepts still to this day? The chance of Ronnie coming down to Oklahoma for the better part of two years and chasing him could still have happened, but how could that have worked as a branch in the greater multiverse? He had no idea where it all led.

So many possibilities but so few endings…

After their first true full impact intercept, an EF3 in southeast Kansas that moment before it hit had loaded its funnel with so much material from a cargo facility that it was less like a sandblaster and more like a buzzsaw coming at them, the way he remembered Clyde panicking the whole time and being shaken up afterward had made Lincoln think many times that would have been the moment Clyde would have bailed.

Would it have hurt that his best friend didn't want to help? It would, but it would be understandable, and he knew that. Chasing alone is a gamble to where if you make a wrong move and all alone, nothing can be done if you can't do it. Having two or three people with you meant there was someone else to help you, be the second guess, or make a suggestion to help better the situation.

Storm Shrieker was designed to have that in mind. A part of his lone wanderer that involved building so much into the tank from the turret being remotely controlled so with a flick of a joystick, he could have it aimed anywhere and film. All the go-pros mounted around the hull meant there were eyes at practically every angle. If he needs to, he could even fold down the rear seats and have plenty of room in the back to camp out for the night. Driving and deploying was practically one in of the same as the job could be part of and he had plenty of radio connections that allowed him to stay in contact with others. Probably the hardest part would be manning the computer in plotting a route or keeping an eye on the storms while driving and trying to keep the turret aimed in the right direction, but multitasking like that was in his blood.

He might be on the verge of losing his mind today, but he knew that he had enough sanity within him that with the prospects of chasing today were high, his battle plan for the future could begin on day one of his endgame.

"Just… please promise you won't try to intercept. I know with the upgrades and radar, it's tempting to get close, but please…" Lincoln felt his veins run cold once again that day. At this rate, he questioned when his skin would start turning blue as he heard Clyde practically beg him.

Lincoln was a bit taken aback by what he said. It wasn't the way he said it, but more in the context of what it meant. "I…"

"Lincoln?"

"I'm just… a bit surprised you're not pissed or going off again. I knew this call was coming when I left the state, but…"

"Lincoln, you're a thousand miles away from me. Even if I could teleport to you, the chances of you just driving the six hours to just chase after the front is a practical guarantee. Even if we hid all the car keys and locked you out of the hanger, you'd still somehow find a way. You've always had some wild plan cooking in under that white hair of yours."

Lincoln shook his head. Any counter thought he might have planned in advance falling apart like dust. "...I promise I won't try to intercept. I'll try and stay, maybe… 50 yards out?"

"500."

"100."

"...300."

"150, I'll even deploy everything just so that I can't go any further."

"Please do go abusing the EDS. We haven't had the time to properly field test it."

"Well," Lincoln pushed himself off as he felt his mood lighten, "What a great day to test some of the upgrades." He could imagine Clyde shaking his head at him.

Then, as he's passing around the front of the tank, right as he's about to pull him inside, he hears someone else on the call. "Lincoln, it's Shay. What's your target area?"

"Give me a sec…" He grunted as he put his phone down on the dashboard. Climbing back inside, pulling the door closed, he mentally told himself he wouldn't open that door again until he got into Kentucky. Plopping back into his seat, he went to close the lock but felt his instincts scream out and look back. Looking from the passenger seat, the back row, and further back to where he kept his camera and supplies, there was no one else with him.

Trying to keep his breathing controlled, he pushed the lock forward. Clicking the switch to make sure everything was locked, he picked the phone back up. "My current idea is around Louisville. But part of me is thinking further south towards Nashville if storms down there don't fire up early."

He could hear typing in the background, but it immediately stopped, "That a nearly a-"

"Eight-hour drive. I know. But I'm willing to bet I can cover it in less than six. What's the outlook calling for?"

"Coby, Kansas," Clyde answered. Lincoln's eyes sprung wider as memories from events a year ago started pouring in.

It was a nearly nine-day outbreak last year where a system had become stalled out across western Kansas, with three being high risks. It was one of the most active chase periods they ever had. They missed the first day due to chancing a closer setup in Texas, but once that high risk came up, every chaser in the country was in Dorothy's backyard. Cobly would become ground zero for two of those three days, with storms dropping some 18 tornadoes within a 14-mile radius of the town. That outbreak alone, despite being only 95 tornadoes in total, was the reason Lincoln had managed to get such a high intercept count in the first place for the 2024 season.

It's the storm that he met and teamed up with Rex to get his famous triple intercept. And if today had the potential to be on par with the energy that was unleashed upon that area, Lincoln had little doubt that once storms did begin to fire, it wasn't going to be a matter of where to find a tornado but in the matter of which tornado did you want to chase.

"Damn…" Lincoln said with a batted breath. Looking up at the clear blue sky, ask any regular person if they were prepared for severe weather coming in the next few hours; they'd probably brush it off for how beautiful the day was already. "Guess we're in a loaded gun situation…"

"That's why I want you to promise me to be careful. We'll try to get any updates we can to you when it starts firing, but please, I know the mind says to gun for it, but this time just sit back and watch."

Rubbing his temple, Lincoln held the phone up with his shoulder as he started the truck back up. Feeling it rumbles around him like a beast purring. "I'll… see what I can do. I'll probably call you when I get to Louisville."

"Alright. Please stay safe out there. Lincoln. Today is not going to be a smooth day. Goodbye."

"Bye." At that, Clyde's end disconnected the call first. Ending his line, Lincoln slowly reached down and dropped his phone in one of the cupholders. Leaning back in his seat, he tried to think of how strange this whole conversation had been. He had expected Clyde to put up more of a resistance to the idea, but it seemed he understood there wasn't much he could do right now.

"This is gonna be a long day…"

Pulling his seat belt over and switching into drive, Lincoln slowly eased Storm Shrieker out of the gas station and back onto the road. Taking a moment, the tank rapidly started picking up speed as Lincoln knew between the Royal Woods, the call, and if his medication was making him hallucinate, he needed to make up for lost time. Nature wasn't going to wait for him.

---

It felt like history was repeating itself. Or that fate had seen them getting so far out ahead that in one mighty yank of the leash, they were suddenly back to where they were months. Ago. A dark cloud hung over the house once again.

Gathered in the living room, the six oldest daughters and Lisa sat gathered around the living room. The oldest five had returned home not some 35 minutes ago in Vanzilla. All looking deplorable, on the verge of rage, and already in a freefall of letting the cries of their heart be heard by the world. They could still hear their father crying in his bedroom just behind the couch. The whole trip back home was a struggle to get him off the ground and into the van because of how much he just wanted to stay where he last saw his son.

Even now, it barely eased. It was only made worse when they could hear their mother trying to help him calm down until they started to hear her cries, too. It got to the point that only their mother's cries could be heard for a brief moment before becoming silent. When Luna was the one to get enough strength to rise from the couch and check on them, opening their door, she was greeted with the sight of her aging parents hugging each other tightly on top of their bed. Rita rested her head under Lynn Sr.'s chin, with both having streaks of tears down their faces. It took her a moment to realize that had practically passed out from their crying, which made her nearly break the doorknob out of its hole and quietly rejoin the others.

Around the living room, Luna took a glance at each of them as she took her previous place next to a crying Leni, who was trying to be comforted by Lori in the form of the older sister taking her younger in a tight hug resulting in her work uniform becoming stained with tears. Between them, Luan sat with her knees up to her chest, staring aimlessly into space. In the chairs across the room, Lucy was in a similar state, only her posture was more like she was trying to merge into the furniture.

For Lynn, she had the look of someone who had accepted utter defeat. Her head was tilted down to where her untied bangs flowed over her face, blocking her eyes, which were covered up by a hand as she took in long and shallow breaths. She was on edge; they all knew that. They could feel it like burning metal that was ready to explode the second a little bit of cold touched it.

Lisa had disappeared around the same time their parents went into their bedroom. She only had come back down for a moment when everyone else had returned home. Being one of the few sisters to be still able to think straight, Luna could see clear as day the look of hope but realization on the scientist's face when they all came into the house without the one she was looking for.

Alone upstairs, the 13-year-old brainiac sat at her desk chair facing her computer. But she wasn't typing away algorithms to try and find any clue to where her target went or some way to reach out. Instead, like Lynn, she had her elbows propped up just below her keyboard, her glasses off to the side, and her hands dug deep into her hair. A maelstrom of emotions and thoughts was devouring her mind. Like a thousand voices trying to speak at once, and for only brief moments, she could clearly hear one before it was drowned out by the next.

Raising her head up so that it rested on one hand, she reached over and pulled a pen-shaped microphone with a few finger taps; the console changed away from its display of the Royal Woods traffic cameras to the massive file that contained her logs. She remembered clearly making one today. It's just the usual statement of the date and only three words. That was all she intended, but now there was more to be said. Clicking on the option to start a new file, she held the device up to her lips.

"Log Entry Date: November 10th, 2025... This entry is to be separate from the entry that was previously written early last night before I took a brief hiatus to acquire needed sleep. I've decided to record this entry with the intent of writing a transcript for it later when I am in the right of mind."

She paused and stopped the recording. Taking in some more deep breaths to try and keep herself focused, she continued, "Today was originally expected to be no different than the previous in the beginning. Though I must say that the heavy accumulation of condensed water particles at ground level had been something, I didn't account for being a crux in what had unfolded, not when an hour's worth of time away from this recording…."

*Deep breath*

"... I had intended to wait later today to make my announcement. After everything, hundreds of hours of sleep lost, gallons of coffee consumed, and nearly enough stress that I had gone through with my old project of turning emotion into a usable form of energy I estimate I could have given the house free electricity for up to four straight months but I digress. If I had any way of explaining how last night came to be, I could only say it truly was sheer dumb luck. Or, as Lincoln puts it, at the right place at the right time."

*Deep breath, and exhale…*

"I had been monitoring the traffic cameras around the western Oklahoma City to El Reno for some time. After the TV show had shown some of the same locations being visited multiple times, a quick search confirmed that Lincoln was in the proximity of El Reno itself. I tightened my search to the surrounding area when an idea came involving microwave radiation produced by the radar system the weather network uses. I'll most likely describe how I came about this in full detail in the combined transcript." She paused again. Leaning to the side, she rubbed her eyes with her free hand.

"I had my presentation just about ready. I was preparing to continue final adjustments until my older sister exclaimed that Lincoln was here…" Her voice trailed off into a whisper as the microphone dropped from her hand to the floor. Leaning back in her chair, the scientist felt like all of reality around her had suddenly become null but more real than she'd ever felt.

"Lincon… He was here. He had come to us, come to our house, but we couldn't get him. Couldn't stop him… I could have done something. I… I could have tampered with the traffic controls and gotten him stuck at a red light or... Or had been watching the cameras or…. Or I…. I could have…rrrraaaaaHHHH!" She stood from her chair and, with all the power her adrenaline gave her, brought both fists down onto her keyboard. Giving a little to the damned piece of plastic and circuits, part of her knew she'd just through it out and get a replacement out of one of her dozen of spares.

Hell, if she didn't know how to control her emotions, there was about an 89.156 chance she would have demolished the center screen by putting the keyboard through it. How she oh so wanted to send her chair at it, too, like it was the reason she had missed an opportunity that she had been trying to get for the better part of almost four years.

She wanted to scream, To try and vent out this anger that almost felt like a foreign illness to her. Sure, in the past, she would get angry and frustrated over things not resulting in the outcomes she planned or predicted, but this couldn't compare to what everything this year had brought upon her and the family. She felt she had lost a year of her life just trying to make sure her family was healthy and whole again. Once that was done, it felt like she could focus on the long-term goal that was physically over a thousand miles away today, a mere ten feet.

This, this was reality finally giving her little janga tower that final piece on top after pulling out ever part it could and watching it struggle to stand up as it awaited her turn. Lisa could see that she had the losing turn and felt her legs starting to give out instead. With enough willpower, she moved away from her console, pushed over her chair in frustration, and crawled up onto her bed. Turning to where her back faced the wall, she was seconds away from punching her pillow but felt the rage begin to take its toll. No matter how much or how strong the coffee was an hour ago, Lisa felt herself drifting off. She laid her head down as she looked out her window to the sunny world that felt like it was trying to deny everything.

Back downstairs, the others, no matter their current state, all snapped their heads towards the stairs when they heard the sound of pent-up rage being unleashed on an innocent object. Through her fingers and a parting of her hair, Lynn looked up at the stairs and sighed. Almost feeling like her own fire had just been quenched. It didn't take a lot to get her angry; that was something everyone in the town knew. She wasn't often labeled the aggressive one for a reason.

She knew Lisa well. The past three years it did feel like all of them had suddenly gotten closer and knew more about each other than the last two decades had. Those who weren't particularly close could say with confidence that all of them had closed that gap. She understood that Lisa was a girl on a mission and that she supported her success. What happened today felt like she had just missed the call to being given the job of a lifetime. Lynn couldn't blame her. After years of trying to find their brother, all of a sudden, he shows up like this, and none of them are quick enough to reach out and even see his face in person. The older siblings were a bit frustrated that Lynn and Lucy were the only ones actually to see his face, even if it was separated by glass or a couple of yards. But did little to be even worth using as an accomplishment for anything.

She knew that they were thinking to some degree of going up there to check on her, but the athlete had felt that they agreed to let the scientist vent off in what peace could be offered. They didn't hear anything else getting tossed or smashed, no cursing or stomping that would shake the light in the dining room. Lynn had to guess she was either trying to clean up and focus on something else or had gone the same route as their father had.

With a sigh, she leaned her head back into the recliner. Feeling the wetness of her hair had dried up by itself; she felt like she could really use a second shower right about now after running faster than she had in months. Her sore feet agreed when she had to pick some loose rock out, but the pain was a welcomed distraction that she wished lasted a bit longer. Her brain felt like it was a tench-filled battlefield that went in one big circle with soldiers charging into the smoke only to wonder where the hell they were and where they were going. They ran back to where they started to try and figure out what was happening, only for them to find an enemy in their trench.

Lynn knew her dream for the past few months was for this day to happen. For Lincoln to come home, he had no one around as he went upstairs to his old room only for him to run straight into her. She'd be surprised, pissed, overjoyed, and sad, but above all; she would through dignity to the wind, grab him by the shoulders, and give him the biggest hug and kiss she could to him regardless of what she looked like at the time. She had seen how Lucy slept at night like she was leaving space for someone to lay down beside her, and Lynn had to admit she didn't start trying it herself. Sometimes, she wished she didn't when all it did was make her realize there was no one there to fill it.

Today could have changed all that. While the thoughts she had back up in the bathroom were cold but still felt like they were heating up again, just seeing her brother walking home made her heart feel like it was a machine suddenly having twice as many boilers lighting up and picking up speed. She was ready to tackle him to the ground or, if he had gotten there, pull him right out of his truck. But she was too slow to be blinded to take a moment and try to see the problem in front of her before it got away. It felt like when playing a game, all you needed was that extra five seconds to make the winning point, only for the buzzer to sound before you could make the shot.

Why did Lincoln come home only to turn and walk away? Why was he here that caused their father so much grief? Did he not bother trying to knock because he thought the house was empty and no one was home? Why today of all days? Just… why?

At this point, Lynn Loud Jr. had no idea where to begin. Usually, someone like her would be trying to build a plan, stand up with growing confidence, and say her piece.

But she had nothing. Just nothing.

Any words she might have at the ready merely came out as a heavy sigh. It was enough to catch the other's attention. Those not crying or being human shadows glanced in her direction so quickly, like they were waiting for her to make an announcement. Even Leni was able to briefly break away from her endless waterworks, expecting her little sister to say something that would give some light in this dark hour. But when she just turned away to look at the floor, Leni felt more cracks begin to form.

"L-Lincoln…" she choked as she buried her face back into Lori's shoulder. "Why…" Luan brought a hand up and started rubbing small circles on her back. She tried to give her sister some comfort but wished she was the one getting some of it in return.

"What should we tell the others?" Luan asked, referring to the three sisters absent from the insanity that had unfolded.

"I… I think it'd be best to have a sibling meeting once they get home…" Lori suggested, "The twins… If Lola isn't on her phone much today and isn't getting tagged in a bunch of photos saying her brother was in town, then maybe we can be a bit careful. With Lily…" She tried to think of a plan, but like Lynn, felt any words die out and shook her head.

Everyone dreads telling their baby sister what has happened that day. It would be impossible to hide their grief; Lincoln practically trained Lily to read them. Some of their emotions could be explained for something else, but once it came to Lisa's anger, Leni feeling like she had the break up of the century and their parents broken as their son had died, she'd be all over them in wanting to know what happened.

Lori knew today was going to be a long day. While the prospect of not having to go back to work was high and usually a welcomed one in stressful times, today felt like it looked like a fantastic way to distract herself. She could hold the fort while her dad got his mind straight. For Luan, it was a bit of a different story. In a few hours, she'd be there with her little sis and would probably be the first one she would see that something was wrong. She couldn't cancel the party; it would be a stain on her reputation and make her feel all the more like a pile of crap that her negativity had cost someone's special day.

Luna knew that for now, she'd be the one to watch over the house for the day. She'd have to go check up on Lisa after she got the motivation to her legs to get moving. She glanced over to Lucy, Lynn, and back to Leni. Already knowing the former two would spend the day trying to distract themselves while she'd have to keep an eye on Leni. She'd probably go back upstairs to her room and cry before getting back to work on her progress.

Just then, the sun began to shine into the house. Like a cloud had finally moved away to allow the neighborhood to radiate a colorful glow that beamed into the house, it was enough to get everyone's attention, and to Luna, it felt like a sign that maybe they could get through this day in one piece.

But despite the warmth, it did little to stop a streak of wet mascara from running down her cheek.

---

A few blocks away from the house stood the tried and true facility of Royal Woods Elementary School. For the better part of over a century, it has been a place that many would say held such a mix of different ideas and stories that it became its own identity to embrace.

Whether it be from the ludicrously strict principle from years before the mystery of the abandoned lower levels, one thing that most of Royal Woods can agree on is that the place had been ground zero for many things that this town had endured for the last 25 years. From the early 2000s to the present day, at any given moment, at least one Loud family member was attending the school. Eventually, it trickled on into two, three, and even briefly five at a time until that started falling. And now, the last and youngest of the 11 Loud kids spent her time in her favorite class during the day.

Despite the fog and everyone feeling a bit gloomy, Lily Loud felt today would be a day that would start dull but end on a shining note.

After being dropped off at school by her sisters, she went straight to her homeroom with time to spare, where she found her classmates Max and Jackson. The two boys were some of the few friends she remembered making long back when she was still a toddler and even now was still part of her homeroom during the past few school years. Don't get her wrong, with her mentality; it was impossible for her not to stay connected to her other friends and even gain new ones despite, at times, losing some due to the changing nature of the world.

She was well mannered, behaved in every way a school expected all its students, was remarkably book smart thanks to her sister Lisa more often than not being her tutor, and to many saw a bright future ahead for her. Unlike some past incidents, she knew she didn't have to worry about the realm of bullying; those in the school knew fully well that to mess with the youngest sibling, the might of all nine older sisters would be brought down with a level of justice that even Thor himself would say was overkill.

Coming into the classroom with her supplies and sitting down at her assigned seat, Jackson gave her a friendly nod from the otherside of the room where his seat was, but Max had his back to her due to sitting in one of the more forward seats. He seemed to be trying to get a little bit more sleep in before the bell started the day, so she didn't bother him.

Sifting through her desk, she pulled out a set of coloring pencils and a doodling book, a birthday gift from Leni last year to help make sure her drawing skills never went to waste and were always ready to craft what her heart and mind could imagine.

Turning to the first page, in a rainbow of colors was an almost comic-like scene showing a rough version of her family and the world 'My World!' above it with the letters all colored in a merging mess of reds, greens, blues, oranges, pinks, purples and yellows. Below it was a rough version of her house; the portions all off with the garage really tiny and stencil of Vanzilla looking more like a subway train than a van. In each of the windows were rough stick versions of her family. Lori and Luan in the van with their phone and what was to be a pie, and Luna was on the roof with her axe guitar. Lynn, with basketball in hand by the garage with the twins on the opposite side of the tree. Lucy looked more like a shadow figure in the dining room window, with Leni on the porch with their parents and Lisa waving out their bedroom window with thick glasses.

And just below it all stood herself. Drawn with as close to her creamy blonde hair, a white shirt, and a light purple skirt she wore when she was around five with a big smile and an arm stretched out like she was pointing to the scene behind her. But the way she was drawn, it didn't have her standing tall out front.

Instead, she was being lifted up, resting on the right shoulder of a man colored in orange and blue with a faded gray crayon meant to give some contrast to the white paper for hair. One of his arms stretched out like he was gesturing to the rest of the family, the other holding her high above his head.

At a flick of her finger, page after page filled with dozens to nearly hundreds of drawings from times before went past her eyes. Simple doodles, ideas that were barely started and never touched again or some that did get some progress through but were abandoned halfway for something new to come take its place at the forefront of her mind. When she pinched a good chunk of the pages and skipped midway through the book, the style began to change.

Crude marker and crayon began to fade away in more refined pencil and sometimes pen. Sharper lines focused on making faces and bodies more proportional along with shading and some color gradient. Some were a few traceovers of older images she found in the family photo albums, but over time, she had looked to look at the current details more than the past.

Her most recent sets of drawings had been some of her best yet. A 'self-portrait' that involved sitting in front of a mirror and basically drawing yourself was her first honest attempt, though she'd argue it wasn't the greatest. Twelve others followed in the back-to-back pages with her sisters and parents in various places around the house. Mostly doing their normal everyday thing but with a few actually taking a moment to pose for her to get the rough idea solidified.

One on page, a collection of printed-out photos were taped to the back of an unused page. Showing a collage of images she had found when searching the internet. A bunch of them were pictures of medieval knights. Mostly those you'd find up in the northern parts of the United Kingdom centuries ago. Some were more of a mix between knights you'd find in Scotland, England, and France; she didn't exactly care. What she did care for was the second set of images that took up the second half of the page.

Various images of Lincoln, both from her age all the way up to the most recent one she could find online at the time. Most show him smiling at the camera in a pose, others of him out in the field during severe weather. Some of the pictures she had were mainly of Lincoln standing beside his tank or just the tank itself. Enough to give a full 360-degree view of the truck in various times of day, weather, light, and setup it gave her the needed resources to help build what she wanted.

On the page opposite to the collage sat what she considered her masterpiece to be.

She called it "The Knight of 10"

It was a rough draft, a bit crude from how her more recent work was, but Lily knew that this was going to be a project that took time and dedication and possibly future versions as well. When she first showed some of her drawings, a lot of people confused it for a transformer with how the armor was designed. She was a bit peeved at this but took it as another idea.

The piece was of her brother standing tall in a field that was currently lacking grass and detail. Lincoln stood front and center, looking over his right shoulder so that you could see his full face yet with his back mostly facing the view. She had based his face more on how he appeared on the TV show's posters but refused to draw any facial hair. To her, it took away that youthful glow she remembered her brother always had.

His 'armor' was a bit of an amalgamation of the suits of armor from the photos of knights, with bits and pieces of his tornado tank fitted in to look like the various parts that a suit of armor would resemble. Where there were joints were mini wheel wells with white and black caution stripes down the sides of the shin guards and gauntlets. His helmet was even based more on how his turret was, retracted just enough that his white hair was 'moving' in the wind with his mask meant to look like two pieces of metal with a visor like the windows.

On his back was a large Fleur-de-Lis Heater shield, a bit of a cheat so she didn't have to draw his other arm and part of his back. A bit bigger than it should be, it had a flat, curved surface with the image of Lincoln's orange shield-blue tornado icon with ten gold rings around the edge of the shield. At the moment, she had been working on what would be his sword. A bit of her own idea in taking one of the really big spikes that the tank used to stretch out and plunge into the Earth; she imagined it a bit narrow but as a long blade with a large crossguard and hilt with his hand resting on the pommel.

She was still debating how to make the armor's color itself. She had imagined using the colors he always wore: orange top, blue bottom. But part of her wanted to make it a dark gray like it was the truck's steel or glimmering white like it was crafted in heaven.

Leaving back in her seat in thought, Lily glanced up at the clock; school was just moments away from starting for the day. Looking back down at her drawing, she looked towards Lincoln's completed face with his eyes as the most vibrant blue she could find to color them. It took hours for days and nights for her to get them right. To make them feel like she was staring right into the same eyes, she remembered from years ago.

Did she hate him for leaving? Did she blame him for leaving her to deal with all the insanity her family had endured the last three years?

They'd say yes to anyone else in her shoes, even to some degree. But not her. Even before he left, long before her sisters were starting to leave the house one by one since she was but a 15-month-old toddler, she had been smart enough back then to understand (to a degree) the situation. She understood her brother every step of the way. Every day, something was down in the dumps, and she reminded herself that her brother would try to look at what positives there were and embrace them.

He didn't leave to get away and never see them again; he left because he loved them all. This whole year had proved it. His love was what drove him to play with danger. He went into the maw of monsters that terrorized millions, standing in their path to get those people away and with the spoils of battle he would send their way. The show from last month only reinforced that.

Lincoln was their knight. Gone from their home to travel across the distant land far beyond the town they've known for their whole lives. Off on a mission to do battle against the forces of evil, and he hopes to make a difference to save lives. Through his efforts, he gave them hope to keep looking to their future and their hope that one day he would be done with battle and come home…

Her thoughts were brought to a halt when she heard the morning bell ring. All around her, the room soon became filled with nearly 15 other kids, Max walking up from his little power nap and their teacher coming to the front of the room with a large binder full of today's lessons to be started after attendance was taken.

With a sigh, she closed up her book and slid it back into her desk for later. Already planning to continue it during recess or art class when she has the time to focus and enjoy her time. She knew her big sis Luan was supposed to come here later for one of her classmate's birthday being held here, so maybe she could squeeze in some more free time.

In any case, Lily heard her name be called and raised her hand, "Here!" she said before feeling a ray of sunlight enter the classroom.

She could feel it. Despite everything, today was going to be a good day.

---

(Note: These AN notes are written before, during, and after hand to convey my thinking. Not based on what's changed, reviews, etc., and is borderline me ranting out loud my way of thinking.)

This chapter was fairly straight forward in where I'm going, but mainly, it made me feel a bit more accomplished in that by trying to keep it down below 15k words, it didn't feel like I was slaving away at it. (In that it got done within about a week given I chopped off about 5k words and put that into the next one.) With this chapter, the story has officially blown past the 200k word mark. Yet an odd thing I want to accomplish is to get to the story over 300k by Chapter 22, which is somehow looking actually possible with how much I write. With a projected end count of possibly close to 500 to 700k words once it is all said and done. In an oddity of just how much bigger this story is getting then when I planned, right now we'd be far into Oklahoma. With what was originally two chapters now on track to become six. The original chapter 25 has now become the new chapter 30.

(At the time of this and seen in another part of this note; Chapter 15 is currently in the works and is expected to be far bigger than the Lightning Loud/Chapter 10. How this will be broken up if possible will mean that once its reached the point it can be divided then it'll be separate back to back releases. This chapter was to be dropped before it, but I figured to let it out to give people something to chew on for now.)

For the most part; the meteorological part with Clyde and Shay was based on past events that often involved tropical storms/hurricanes often being the cause of widespread tornado outbreaks. Hurricane Ida from September of 2021 and the Tornado Outbreak of July 28-39 2021 being the main inspirations for what is to come. The choice in using the name Olga is one of the names in the list for the (future) 2025 Atlantic Hurricane season and is purely a fictional storm at the moment until the name is officially used.

The route taken by Lincoln was mainly to give a reason for him to not just speed down the highway, as stated before 90% of the locations in this story are REAL places that you can look up on google maps/Earth, go to street view, and see exactly where the scene was taking place. (With of course some exceptions included with the Loud House world.)

In part to this, as the Loud House itself is physically based on the childhood house of its creator, located on 1216 E Lincoln Ave in Royal Oak, Michigan, I more or less opted to change 'E Lincoln' to the in-universe Franklin Street. This in part made me think of just how events from both the show and in this story make sense in terms of locations. Such as how a lot of the TLH media and fics often have the younger kids walking to their elementary school, the closest school to 1216 is Oakland Elementary just a mile away from the house. (Which fits in how early the family usually wakes up and the kids still somehow have time to walk there, socialize/have breakfast before going to class.)

I had originally finished this chapter with three segments, but upon starting the first part of Chapter 15 realized that with what I was making wouldn't really fit in with the context and timeline that it was setting up later. So the Loud Sisters part was integrated into this chapter instead.

Lemy's part was another bit that I imagined would be a parallel to Lynn's interaction with Lacy and more in how the community kinda views him as the butt of the entire family. Either unable to live with himself being the son of the man that has done this or the character that would invoke part of the Second Generation (if you're reading this story for the Cest elements then you know what I'm talking about.) Different stories that involve him taking a look at his dad can vary from accepting to complete rejection. So how would it be to someone who's yet to reach the point of their lives that has yet to be judged in either way? Lemy is based on the collective that he dislikes his father for what he's done, but yet here sees what he was like beforehand.

I originally intended for Lemy to appear as a hitchhiker along the road that Lincoln would have passed, turn around and picked up to start the interaction, but then I remember how Lacy was done and thought this would fit a bit more in line to give Lincoln a reason to see if he was still alive.

As said before, time travel is NOT part of this story in any way.

(Note: These AN notes are written before, during, and after hand to convey my thinking. Not based on what's changed, reviews, etc., and is borderline me ranting out loud my way of thinking.)