Chapter Text
"Comeon, Lily!You'rethe one who wanted to watch the meteor shower with me and the gang. If you want us to be there on time, you need tohurry!" Lincoln Loud called up the stairs to his no-longer-baby sister. Lincoln was seventeen now, making the youngest member of the Loud family seven years old. The teenaged son of the Louds now wore his hair short but shaggy, with a black denim vest over an orange hooded T-shirt tucked into black jeans with a black leather belt and black steel-toed boots.
A lot had happened to the Loud family over the years. Lori originally moved into an apartment with her boyfriend-turned-fiancé Bobby in Great Lakes City, but shortly after she did, a vicious neo-Nazi/pro-KKK gang took over the Casagrandes' neighborhood. For their own safety, the Casagrande and Santiago families uprooted once more and relocated to New York City, taking Lori and a few of their friends/tenants with them, including the Chang family. The rest of Lincoln's older sisters got jobs and moved out one-by-one. All except for Lynn Jr., that is; she was living at home while attending Royal Woods Community College, where Lisa worked as a part-time science professor. Lynn had also started a relationship with Clyde of all people, which surprised everyone when the two of them announced it.
Lincoln himself worked a full-time summer job making horseshoes and fixing tools at his friend Liam's farm, and the hard work helped bulk up his scrawny muscles. That much-needed bulk-up managed to land him a girlfriend, a former classmate of his named Cristina. They'd already been dating for about two months, but Cristina had yet to meet the approval of Lincoln's friends and family. Everyone kept saying she wasn't a good match for him, and he should leave her while he still could, but he didn't believe them. This was his first romantic relationship EVER, not counting the time he'd kissed his friend Ronnie Anne back when they were eleven, and he didn't want to call it off just yet.
Lincoln also got a new pet after Charles got run over by a drunk driver who, immediately after crushing the small dog, collided with a tree. In the back of the vehicle was a heavily abused white wolf cub (Lisa confirmed that it was an actualwolf); after rescuing him from the wreck, Lincoln took him home, patched him up, and named him Scout. The wolf-dog had been his faithful companion ever since the family buried Charles.
He and his friends had heard about the upcoming meteor shower from Lisa, and Liam had organized a small Star Party to watch it. The site he chose was his favorite fishing spot on a cliff under the highway. Lily, the smallest (and by far theclingiest) of the Loud sisters, heard about the Star Party Lincoln was going to secondhand and begged Lincoln to take her with him. She absolutelyadoredher big brother, and Lincoln affectionately referred to her as his little sidekick. There were times that they might as well have been joined at the hip. Speaking of Lily...
"I'm trying! Scout won't let go of my shoe!" she called back down to Lincoln. Lincoln chuckled and shook his head. He walked up the stairs and reached the top right as Scout ran past him with Lily's shoe in his mouth, Lily herself not far behind. Lincoln pursed his lips and gave a short, sharp whistle. Scout immediately turned around, ran toward Lincoln, and sat in front of him, wagging his tail. Lincoln had surprised himself and everyone else with how easy Scout was to train.
"Okay, boy, you've had your fun. Nowdrop it!" he commanded. Scout whined and put Lily's shoe on the ground at Lincoln's feet, making Lincoln smile. "Good boy, Scout!" he said and scratched the wolf cub's head between his ears. Lily immediately snatched up her shoe and put it on her foot.
As previously stated, Lily was no longer a baby. She was now half Lincoln's height, wearing a lavender T-shirt and white jeans with purple sequin-covered slippers. Her chin-length pale blond hair was wild and wispy, and a purple headband was haphazardly stuck onto her head in a failed attempt to tame it. After straightening the headband with a smile, Lincoln led Lily and Scout out to his weather-beaten orange Vespa that he bought secondhand. Lily climbed into the sidecar and Scout hopped into her lap, then off they went.
Liam was already cooking hamburgers and hotdogs on a small grill when they got there. Rusty and Zach were sitting on the tailgate of Liam's pickup truck, drinking sodas and talking. Clyde and Stella bounced a volleyball back and forth, and Cristina boredly sat in a lawn chair, scrolling through her phone. Knowing she'd get mad if he didn't greet her first, Lincoln walked over to Cristina and thanked her for accepting his invitation with a hug and a peck on the lips. He let Lily and Scout run around freely, since Lily looked up to his friends almost as much as she looked up to him and Scout would never stray too far.
When he parted from Cristina and turned toward Liam, Rusty, and Zach, the three boys were giving him looks that could curdle milk. Lincoln gulped as he walked toward them to join the conversation.
"Dude. I may flirt with every woman in my vicinity, but your girlfriend is a totalkilljoy!" Rusty complained.
"Yeah. When I told her what I was cooking, she saidyou're lucky I'm on the Keto dietand started demanding that everything is cooked well-done," added Liam. Lincoln sighed and hung his head.
"Please don't be too hard on her, guys. She's still getting used to the fact thatoursocial life is different fromhers. People from her background spend less time outdoors than we do," Lincoln pleaded.
"I still think she could look up from her phone for five minutes at least. And that's saying something coming from me," said Zach, who out of everyone in the group relied the most on technology. He was actually planning to take a concurrent enrollment Robotics class at the local college (taught by Lisa, of course). As a matter of fact, the whole Star Party was supposed to be the group's "last hurrah" before their senior year of high school began.
Lincoln was about to reply when Cristina called out, "Lincoln! Your sister's being a pest again!" Lincoln facepalmed and gave his friends an apologetic look.
"I'll be right back," he said and walked over to where Cristina was attempting to scooch away from whatever Lily was holding up to her face. "Lily! C'mere for a second!" Lily immediately jogged over to her brother. Lincoln sighed and knelt down to her level. "Lily, youknowCristina doesn't like it when you get up close and personal, don't you?" Lily's eyes started to water, and her bottom lip started to tremble.
"I'm sorry, Linky! I just wanted to show her the cute li'l hedgehog I found!" she whimpered, opening her hands to reveal the tiny creature curled into a ball in the middle of her palm. Lincoln sighed again and patted her shoulder with a smile. He couldneverbe mad at her when she made a face likethat.
"It's not your fault, Lilybug," he said, using his nickname for her. "I need to talk to Crissy about having more of an open mind around you and the rest of the girls. Tell you what, I'll do that right now. Why don't you and your new friend go play with Clyde and Stella?" Careful not to squish the hedgehog between them, Lincoln pulled Lily into a hug and kissed her forehead. After Lily ran off, Lincoln stood and walked over to Cristina.
"This party's lame. Yourfriendsare lame. And your sister is just as annoying as ever," his girlfriend said without looking up from her phone. Lincoln pinched the bridge of his nose; this wasn't the first time the two of them had this argument, and he doubted it would be the last.
"Look, Crissy, Lily's just a kid! Kids like to show off the cool things they find!" he said.
"You need to tell her to stay away from rabies-spreading flea feasts like that. Your family has too many stupid pets as it is without her bringing in more. And while you're at it, keep her away from the outdoors in general. All the germs and bugs out here are bad for her health," Cristina told him, which made him frown.
"I can't do that! Lilylovesplaying outside! And for the record, most of our pets are technicallyLana's!" he argued. Cristina suddenly stood up and put her phone in her purse.
"I'm outta here. This conversation is totally wrecking my vibe," she said and fished out the keys to her car. Lincoln stammered a handful of weak protests that fell on deaf ears as she got into her convertible and drove away. Lincoln sighed and slumped into the lawn chair his girlfriend vacated, holding his head in his hands. Sensing his master's distress, Scout came over and laid his own head in Lincoln's lap, and Lincoln absently scratched his ears. He only looked up when he felt Clyde lay a hand on his shoulder.
"Hey, man. Where's Cristina?" Clyde asked. In addition to ditching his glasses in favor of contacts, Clyde had grown out his hair and wore it in braided cornrows. He also started working out (at Lynn's insistence), and it was starting to show. He was wearing a gray two-piece track suit over a white T-shirt and black running shoes.
"She bailed.Again," Lincoln groaned.
"Ha! Good riddance to that whiny bi-" Rusty began, only for Stella to clap a hand over his mouth.
"Not in front of Lily!" she hissed at him. Clyde simply clicked his tongue.
"I keep telling you, and you keep ignoring it-" he began, but Lincoln interrupted him.
"I know, I know. I should leave her. But I don't want what we have to be over so soon!"
"Almost nobody's first relationship lasts very long," Stella told him, joining the conversation. "It's really just an experiment. To see what kind of people you click with, and what kind you don't. See what we're getting at here?"
"Yeah, yeah. I'll think about it." The rest of the evening passed fairly smoothly. Liam served the hamburgers and hotdogs he had been cooking, and Clyde started a small bonfire, on which Lily and Stella cooked s'mores. The sun went down, the stars came out, and everyone laid down on picnic blankets for the best view of the meteor shower. Lily was laying on top of Lincoln, using his chest as a pillow, and fell asleep as soon as the meteor shower ended.
Lincoln didn't want to wake her, so he carefully pulled out his phone and texted his mother that they would be sleeping under the stars, all while Stella cooed at how cute Lily looked.
On the cliff above the impromptu campsite, a rattily dressed man who called himself Snake was recklessly driving a white van marked TCRI. In the back of the van were two seemingly ordinary blank-faced men in identical black suits, guarding a shipment consisting of several large vials of a glowing bluish-green fluid.
The suits were only disguises, though. Underneath, the men were nothing more than robots piloted by aliens that resembled brains with tentacles. These aliens called themselves the Kraang, and they were making sure nothing happened to this shipment while Snake was driving it to the Kraang's top-secret research facility in New York City. The van lurched dangerously for the hundredth time, and both Kraang put their hands on the shipment to steady it while glaring at Snake.
"Kraang, it is Kraang's opinion that the one who insists on being called 'Snake' should more appropriately be called that which is known as a 'moron.'" one of the Kraang said to the other in a faintly metallic monotone voice.
"Kraang is in agreement with Kraang," the other replied.
"Hey, you two better get the sticks out of your metal butts and let me drive. We'll be back in New York in no time," Snake said, casually taking a sip from the beer bottle in the driver's-side cupholder.
"The one called Snake does not give orders to Kraang. It is Kraang who gives orders to the one called Snake," the first Kraang protested angrily.
"Whatever," Snake grumbled, taking another sip of beer.
The van began to drift into the wrong lane right as an eighteen-wheeled truck was approaching from the opposite direction. The truck driver blared his horn, causing Snake to spit out the beer and jerk the wheel to the right. A head-on collision was narrowly avoided; however, Snake abruptly swerving like that set off a rapid series of events. First, Snake over-corrected, causing the van's right side to brush against the railing separating the road from the cliff. That in turn caused one of the back doors to swing open. Before either Kraang could react, one of the vials slipped out from the shipment and fell through the open door.
Snake sighed in relief and wiped his forehead with a severely soiled handkerchief. His relief didn't last long, because one of the Kraang came to the front of the van and grabbed his shoulder in a vise-like grip.
"Kraang is doing that which is known as 'taking the wheel,'" it said. Snake reluctantly pulled over and got out of the driver's seat.
"Has Kraang forgotten that part of the shipment is now that which is known as 'missing'?" the other Kraang asked.
"Kraang does not need to worry," the Kraang behind the wheel replied. "Kraang will dispatch a probe to locate and recover the missing Mutagen."
After the meteor shower, Lincoln's friends left one by one until only Clyde and Stella were left, alongside Lincoln, Lily, and Scout. Lily was still fast asleep, curled up on Lincoln's chest while holding the hedgehog she found close to her heart. Lincoln had almost drifted off with Scout curled up at his side, only for Scout to abruptly wake up and start barking frantically. He drowsily glared at the wolf cub that acted more like a dog.
"Knock it off, Scout. It's probably just a critter," Lincoln grumbled.
"Hey, what gives?" Clyde asked, getting out of his car to investigate Scout's barking, having almost drifted off himself.
"Oh, something gave Scout a spook, that's all," Lincoln explained. "Pipe down, will you?" he snarled at his pet as loud as he dared, trying not to wake Lily up.
"L-Linky?" Lincoln grimaced at the small voice and looked down to see Lily stretch and rub her eyes, the hedgehog scampering away once it was free of her grasp.
"Sorry, Lilybug," he whispered and kissed her forehead. "Well, we might as well go home now that we're all awake." He adjusted Lily's position against his chest before standing up, his joints popping after spending so long in just one position. He perked when a metallic clinking sound reached his ears, and he turned in the direction Scout was barking at. Some sort of glowing green canister with large metal caps was bouncing end-over-end down the steep incline from the road at the top of the cliff.
"What do you suppose that is?" Clyde asked, walking forward to stand next to Lincoln.
"I don't know. I can't quite make it out," the white-haired teen replied. He and Clyde followed the canister with their eyes until it bounced off a small overhang and was launched into the air. In their tired state, they realized what its trajectory was far too late to react. The canister hit the branch of a scraggly half-dead tree over their heads and shattered, showering the two boys and Lily with its contents.
It was in that moment that their lives changed forever.
