Loudest Dungeon: Ch.8 - Loss and Gain

Run!

The quiet of the forest was broken by the sounds of broken branches and crushed leaves underfoot as panting langured breath echoed through the still air where not even birdsong dare intrude.

Have to run!

The crashing through the undergrowth filled the ears. A bright burning light in the eyes and a dizziness of the head drowned out all other senses. A single-minded desire, a fervent need above all others, blotted out all intelligent design.

Gotta get away!

Lungs on fire, legs screaming in pain, arm bleeding a crimson trickle to stain the leaf litter, and head throbbing with a persistent buzzing noise… and yet these thoughts came. Instinctual commands a millennium in the making. Such as that is wasted on the common riffraff, on minds that can barely comprehend such things.

All the man knew was that he had to run.

He had no choice.

With a haggard gasp the man burst through the brush, hacking at the brambles that threatened to ensnare him with manic sweeps and stabs. Holding his blades tight in his fists he turned and slashed at the vines impeding him, and then tore his leg free from the vines. He stumbled forward three or four steps and hunched over, sucking in lungfulls of fetid forest air and wheezing it back out.

And as he rested, he listened, he watched. His body was kept tensed, muscled ready to spring in an instant, his entire mind on alert for even the slightest—

Somewhere in the distance a twig snapped.

With something between a moan and a scream then man sprang forward and resumed his sprint. Though the body screamed in protest the mind ignored the pleas for rest. Sheer adrenaline kept the worst of the fatigue at bay, but fear can only prove so effective a motivator and sprinting blindly into the forest can only get a man so far.

Not that he was entertaining such thoughts, in his terror addled mind he was going to escape, the exit was just ahead, just behind the trees or over the bend; so tantalizingly out of reach that he could almost grab it.

He leapt over fallen logs, he scrambled through the underbrush near knee-high, he ducked errantly under low-lying limbs and hacked wildly at the vines that reached out to ensnare him…

And all the while the noise followed. That undeniable presence that stalked him, that hunted him. Relentless in its pursuit, assured in its hostility.

Unfathomable in its terror.

A demon, came the unbidden thought, horrible enough to send his senses reeling. It was a bloody demon!

Bloody indeed when it was done with the rest of his patrol.

The man was having trouble now. Air was coming harder to him with each breath and his legs felt heavier than lead. His focus was coming undone and the world swam around him in a whirlwind of color and shapes before his vision went white and he felt like he was floating…

Pain brought him back to reality as his body hit the cold hard ground and he realized the earlier sensation wasn’t floating but falling. Pushing himself up with a groan the man looked about and with a pit in his stomach realized he fallen into a ravine. Looking behind he saw where he’d come from, a good hill near twice as tall as he with slanted trees growing taunting him. He looked forward and saw a more daunting prospect, a wall that was twice as tall as he loomed overhead.

He’d have to scale it, or risk running down the ravine in search for a more suitable climb.

He stood there, transfixed, paralyzed by indecision. His body despaired at the climb, aches and pains all over making themselves heard. But his mind, still aware of the pursuing horror, urged him on.

Climb, it whispered, make haste and it won’t catch us!

He stood there a moment more…

Behind him the faint sounds of rustling leaves and disturbed brush rang out in the silence of the forest.

…and with a cry he threw himself at the dirt wall, stabbing deep into the earth with his blades.

Please don’t come apart, he thought to himself desperately as he put his weight into it. Fresh terror brought fresh blood to his aching joints but he knew it wouldn’t last much longer so re-doubled his efforts, digging his boots into the ground to push himself up as he scaled the wall as quickly as he could.

It was rough goings; the dirt was wet, and his strength had left him. Every movement burned and every breath was a labor unto itself. Once or twice his grip slipped and so did he, and every second longer sent him into a panic attack as sounds, real or imagined, rang out behind him and that horrible looming presence he could feel behind crept up ever closer, ever quicker!

But he was tired. So very tired. Exhaustion mounting and strength failing the man felt the prickling of a quaint notion that only the helpless entertain. That fuzzy little desire to just… let go. To fall. To give up. How hard it is to continue, and how easy it would be to give up, to trust his life to fate, to simply—

The buzzing hornets’ nest of his mind was put to rest in that one instant as instinct took over. Eyes wide and bloodshot, teeth barred and frothy with spittle, and with a primordial scream hissed through those clenched teeth the man suddenly began scrambling with a new burst of energy borne from those last reserves of pure life or death adrenaline. Where before he slid his fingers now found purchase and grasped tightly to the earth as he hauled himself up and up and up…

And over.

He was free.

With a sigh of victory and pain he pulled his body over the side of the wall and onto solid ground. He inched along the ground until his legs had cleared the side of the ravine and then he laid there, breathing hard and deep as the edges of his consciousness swam with color until slowly growing ever darker…

Eyes no longer bloodshot snapped open and a gasp echoed in the wind. Propping himself up on his elbows the man snorted, shook his head, and looked about sleepily. What was this, he thought, where am I? This isn’t camp? Why am I out in the woods?

And then it all came flooding back.

Eyes once again wide with alarm the man gasped and pushed himself to his feet where he staggered about, looking wildly in all directions. How long had he been out, a minute, an hour, a day!? Where even was he, he could hardly think straight.

Turning around he saw the ravine he’d scaled, still just as tall and imposing though now from a different angle – and for a moment the man allowed just a hint of pride in himself for his accomplishment. Before him, of course, laid the forest, only now that he wasn’t blinded by fear he could plainly make out... the trail!

For a moment he stood there, bordering on terror and hope, not even daring to breath as he listened to the forest around him, waiting for the sounds of something, anything besides the reverberations of his own heartbeat sounding off in his skull.

Somewhere a crow cawed.

He sighed and smiled lightly as the fear that had been dragging him down suddenly evaporated. He felt light as a feather, he felt he could take on the world! He felt nothing could get him down, he was invincible!

All in all, he was feeling mighty fine to be frank.

With a chuckle he gave a salute to those dark, awful woods behind him and turned down the trail that would no doubt lead back to camp. Actually, he was certain of it! He remembered those trees, and that rock sure looked familiar.

With a whistle he went on his way, shaking his head ruefully. And to think he’d been so scared. Of what? Some kind of monster too craven to show its face? Probably just a mangy old wolf. Nothing worth all that fuss no doubt.

Why, he’d bet his last coin that when he got back to camp his patrol would be right there, laughing about how he got scared and ran off. Bet the lads were having a laugh at his expense alright, might have to embellish that old monster a bit to save face. Oh, he’d have tale of his own to be su—

There was a flash of movement to his side and something small but far, far too heavy threw all its weight into him, slamming him into the ground hard enough to knock the wind from his lungs. All at once the memories resurfaced, reminding him of what it was that he had been afraid of, and what had happened to his patrol.

It would do him little good, and despair reigned because he knew that he was caught.

Before he could so much as scream a hand – tiny but hard and strong as steel – grabbed his wrist and bent it back until it popped, whereupon it quickly moved down to the elbow and with a series of twists and cracks the arm suddenly found itself bending the wrong way before he was lifted and thrown into a tree.

All in less than seven seconds.

Groaning in pain and misery he looked to his arm and sobbed when he found it impossible to move. The arm, unfortunately, would prove to be the least of his troubled when something cold and oh so sharp found itself pressed into his throat, just under his jaw.

It was a glaive, wickedly curved, notched and chipped and dull with use and age but still sharp as it needed to be as proven by the stains of dried blood that coated the weapon. His eyes travelled down the wooden shaft until his eyes alighted upon the wielder, no less fierce than the steel at his neck.

She was a wild woman… no, not a woman. A child! A little girl barely past her first bleeding, one of those barbarians from the wild and uncivilized corners of the world no doubt. Auburn hair tied into a horsetail, face painted blue to highlight her wild eyes and barred teeth, and body adorned in animal hides, leather straps and bone fetishes. Her body was short but compact, and he could see the muscles of her arms straining against the leather that contained them.

Their eyes locked and she glared at him, her narrowed eyes only partly hidden under the shade of the tree to cast an ominous shadow across her features. She pressed the blade to his Adam’s apple, and he choked on his spit.

“Where is he?”

Warm piss trickled down his trouser leg and the agony from his splintered arm was making itself known. He closed his eyes and tried to suck in a breath, his throat trembling as the metal point pressed in ever closer, as he tried to focus past the pain and on the question.

“…W-who?”

Wrong move.

With a feral scream the woman pulled back her glaive before swinging it in a wide arc. With shriek of his own the man ducked down as the blade tore through the tree’s trunk, leaving deep gaping wounds in the wood right where his head was.

“HIM!” the woman howled, grabbing her quarry by the leg then flipping him over her shoulder and into the dirt. “WHERE IS HE!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” the man howled back in agony, the pain too much to bear as he held his ruined arm close to his body. “Who?” he sobbed as he tried to crawl away in some last-ditch effort of futile escape, “WHO?!”

Pointed steel was buried into the ground next to his head and he gasped as he felt tiny, cold, strong fingers wrap around the back of his neck and squeeze tight. A whimper was torn from his throat as he was lifted up, helpless as a kitten in its mother’s jaws, and a shudder wracked his body when he felt teeth scrape the side of his head and her hot breath in his ears as she hissed...

“Where. Is. My. Brother.”

The words echoed in his head and once the realization sat in the man knew he wasn’t going to get away alive.

None of them were.

Lynn Loud leaned in close to her prey, drinking in his fear with a feral glint in her eyes as she redefined the question. Her question. The only question that ever mattered.

“WHERE. IS. LINCOLN!”
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Luna didn’t feel real.

That wasn’t new. For over a month now she’d been lost in a dream, a sleepwalker barely aware of her surroundings when not caught in the throes of pitted combat. And even then, that was mostly instinct, it hardly ever felt real after she’d almost… after that first battle on that lost and lonely dirt road.

Last night shattered that illusion. Last night shattered a lot of things come to think of it.

Luna didn’t feel alive.

Now that was a new feeling. Real was one thing, being stuck in this nightmare could make anybody feel like nothing matters, like they don’t matter. But not alive? That’ll take some getting used to.

Yeah… not likely.

There was a hole. Right in her chest where her heart should’ve been. But it wasn’t there, that hole was empty and so was she. Luna had been heartbroken before, but this was different, this was new, and she didn’t like it one bit. It was too raw, too visceral, too…

It was too real.

She didn’t like feeling real.

Luna wiped her eyes with the back of her hand but all that really accomplished was irritating them further. Not too long-ago Luna wasn’t sure she’d ever stop crying but it turns out there is a limit and that happens to be around an entire night’s worth of emotional turmoil and psychological trauma.

Now she was tired, and in pain. Her entire body protested with each step and she kindly told her aching joints to shut the hell up.

Slowly trudging her way down the cobblestone road, she kept her steely gaze and miserable face pointedly fixed on the ground a few paces before her. The Hamlet was surprisingly bustling this morning, or maybe it was always bustling in the morning. That would make sense, get all your shit done early so you can go home, Luna didn’t know she never came out here if she could help it and besides, she liked to sleep in.

“Are you alright?” a man asked, and all he got for his troubles was a shoulder to the chest as she shoved him aside, not even sparing this rare Samaritan a backwards glance.

Luna ignored the villager’s reaction – a good shaking of the fist and a swear besides – and just kept right on marching, head tucked in and desperately trying to avoid any accidental eye contact whatsoever. She’d been like this ever since she’d crawled out of that alley where she’d tucked herself away to mourn, but once the sun rose and her fresh sorrow had mired into a deep and overwhelming despair she’d managed to rouse herself to her feet, her destination clear.

Luna briefly looked up, gloved hand held up over her eyes to shield them from whatever dismal rays of sunlight this bleak land offered, and focused on the manor on the hill that overlooked this awful place, a rundown symbol of corruption and decadence if she’d ever seen one.

That’s where she had to go. That’s where she had to be.

With her baby sisters.

With a deep, withering sigh Luna resumed her trek back to that somber place. And she ignored the looks from the villagers that counted her among their nobility. She ignored the confusion and fear in their eyes, their worried whispers as they openly stared at their downtrodden leader. She ignored their pity, their sympathy. She ignored the way the parted before her, giving this lady of privileged standing a wide berth as she solemnly stalked their streets. All questions were ignored, and any others that she bumped into were paid no mind as Luna simply went on her way with nary a comment or even glance.

Like they didn’t even exist.

They didn’t. Not to Luna. Nothing mattered anymore to her, nothing but her little sisters.

They were all she had left.

So, she pressed on. She pressed on heedless of her body’s aches and pains. She pressed on regardless of the loss and grief that gnawed at the fringes of her soul. She pressed on regardless of how empty she felt, how hollow and nothing she was.

An image of Lori flashed in her mind and she faltered.

For a moment she stood there, eyes wide and mouth gaping, but then she shook her head, clenched her fist, and resumed her march.

Lori was gone too. Not in the same way that… that… that Leni was but she was gone all the same and now it was just Luna. It was up to her to look after the rest, to take care of them and keep them safe and by all the power of God and by all the armies of Hell she was going to do her damn job!

That’s why she kept going because she owed it to them to keep fighting.

She was all they had now.

And she wasn’t going to fail. Not them, not again.

So, she marched. And she ignored the masses. And she ignored how much she wanted her older sister with her. And she ignored the sorrow and self-loathing that threatened to swallow her whole.

She didn’t have a choice.

And when she found herself finally standing before those great doors – looking all the world like the very gates to hell itself – she found herself short of breath and resolve; it had all but been used up. And as she stared up and sudden and terrible notion reared its ugly head.

Run, it said, run away. Just like you always do.

And by god Luna almost did. She wanted to, in that one terrible moment frozen in time she wanted to run more than anything. To leave this horrible place and never return.

To abandon all those she knew and love.

Because it would be easier!

Luna Loud grit her teeth and clenched her fists and hunched over as a great spasm overtook her.

What… what was this? What was happening? Luna… she had to help them. She had to help her baby sisters so why… why…
Why didn’t she want to!?

Just the thought of it, of hauling them around, of taking care of them, of them slowing her down, sent another reeling spasm throughout her body and Luna doubled over as her bones trembled.

STOP IT! Luna’s mind was a maelstrom of inner turmoil as the thoughts, quick but poignant and oh so painful, poured forth like some great deluge from the inner reservoir of her psyche; hidden away in the deepest most shameful corners of her mind. DON’T THINK THAT! IT’S NOT LIKE THAT!

As the roaring tide of hateful thoughts died down to a mere trickle of wicked whispers Luna shuddered in revulsion. Where had that come from? She wasn’t like that; she wasn’t some coward that would just throw away her own sisters! Luna Loud was motivated! She was wild and untamed, and she rose to each challenge that life threw at her like any Loud! She didn’t shrink back when things got hard, she pressed on dammit!

Without thinking Luna stepped forward and threw open the great doors barring her way, stepping confidently into the manor with all the swagger of a hero.

A terrible, foul-smelling wind surged from the house itself, rushing past her and stealing her breath away.

It was over as soon as it had begun, leaving Luna stunned and short of breath. For a moment she stood there, deaf and dumb, barely able to think. As her senses returned, hazy and out of focus, Luna stumbled ever forward into the mansion she’d called her abode these last few weeks.

The door shut closed behind her as she crossed the threshold and the sound brought her back.

Blinking and rubbing her temple Luna looked around wildly, taking in her surroundings. Once recognition set in, she reluctantly calmed down as much as she could in this awful place. A place to stay this manor might be but it wasn’t home and just being surrounded by these foreboding walls filled her with a palpable tension that on her worst days left her physically ill.

There was something about this place… something off…

Wasn’t she… wasn’t she thinking about something… earlier?

Luna stumbled a bit mid-stride as that thought flashed through her mind. Was she? Yeah, it was… it was about something. Something important? Something about her sisters…

Luna’s heart stopped and her eyes shot wide open.

Her sisters!

That deep well of sick resting heavily in Luna’s stomach began to boil and froth up to her throat. A sense of urgency overcame her as she glanced about the foyer, desperation only fueling the nausea already bubbling up inside her.

Where are they, she thought, stumbling as a bout of lightheadedness overcame her. Dark thoughts clouded her mind, the people in this hovel couldn’t be trusted, what if they broke in, or what if Lucy managed to convince Lisa to take her out into the Hamlet proper. Who knows what those degenerates out there could do to them?

Luna grit her teeth at the thought of it. Those filthy people out there, wallowing in their own waste, mired in their poverty and misery. Dirty fucking peasants!

And where is that so-called Caretaker, hmmm? She never liked the look of him, the sallow-skinned creeper lurking along the shadows with that horrible grin. Why the hell did she ever think it would be okay to leave her baby sisters with that… that thing!

Anger and disgust broiling and mixing inside her Luna seethed and rambled to herself as she half marched half stalked down the empty halls of the manor, body tense and fists clenched as she searched.

This wouldn’t stand, she wouldn’t stand for it. None of it! This place… this horrible diseased place wasn’t safe. She’d have to make it safe. She was going to make sure her sisters were safe. And if she had to tear that bony old man apart to make sure that happened, she’d do so!

With extreme prejudice.

Thoughts of violence and images of bloodshed flashing amidst the tempest of her mind the ringing in Luna’s skull had reached its crescendo as she focused red eyes on the door at the end of the hall. This was her prize, a voice not entirely her own issued unto her, this was it but what it was had no real bearing.

An air of excitement welled up inside her and for the first time all day she felt alive. It was hot and thick, swelling inside her heart till she was fit to burst. Each step echoed like a thunderclap, just barely cutting into the static that was her mind.

She thought of Lori, her elder sister, so self-assured and indifferent to her suffering, uncaring in the face of her own little sister’s terror.

She thought of Leni, cold dead eyes to never open again and fill her life with sunshine and good vibes, alone in the dark of the earth far from home and her family.

She thought of her little sisters, of Lucy and Lisa and poor lost Lola. Their bodies twisted and mangled, her name echoing in their screams as they begged her to save them.

She thought of her lost siblings, her name cursed with their dying breaths because they were the ones she couldn’t hope to save, because she had given up on them.

She thought of bandits and marauders, of cultists and monsters. She thought of old, hateful dead things that lived in the bowels of the underworld and their cold bony fingers and empty eye sockets judging her and judging her and JUDGING HER!

With a snarl Luna burst forth, tearing the mahogany wood door half off its hinges. She stood there in the doorway, a malignant shadow red-eyed and ominous and growling with each breath. She stared into the library; open hostility radiated from her as her eyes spied a shape in the middle of the room.

No, not a shape. Three shapes. Three little shapes, all hunched over and pressed close. Three little shivering shapes that held one another and stared back at her, eyes open and wide with frights, jaws hanging in a silent scream of terror. Three little…

Oh God

Luna stood there, numb to the world as her breathing gradually slowed, as the static in her mind dissipated, as the haze of violence that clouded her eyes vanished away and left her naked and bare to the reality of the situation.

Lisa, Lola, and Lucy Loud huddled in the middle of the library, their cocoon of warmth and mutual comfort suddenly torn, leaving cold and vulnerable amidst this intrusion. They stared up in confusion and alarm as this beast in front of them, a monster that came barreling forth from the darkness in a flurry of violence and wrath, suddenly changed before their eyes. As barred teeth morphed into slack-jawed shock, as glaring eyes opened in horror, as the shadows drew back and the looming shape shrank down into itself, now far more vulnerable than it had been a mere moment ago.

Luna Loud stared down at her baby sisters and they stared back.

There was silence, a tense fragile silence that neither side dared break for fear of the consequences. Every breath, haggard or quick, came with a flinch and neither side moved.

Luna stared with wide eyes that reflected only horror and guilt. The feelings that had all but consumed her a mere minute ago had faded but remnants still lingered, and it made her sick to her stomach.

Something wet and hot ran down her face and Luna reached out to her sisters—

The girls shrank back, mistrust and terror mirrored in their own eyes as their sister drew towards them.

--Luna shrank back with a breathless gasp, slapping a hand over her mouth. Their eyes… they were scared of her. They were so scared of her…

Just like with Lori.

Luna tried to say something, but she just choked on the words. She sank in on herself, bending her knees and leaning forward as she screwed her eyes shut and slowly shook her head and the tears began once again in earnest.

The sisters watched in earnest as Luna quietly sobbed to herself. The terse air of the earlier encounter was still there, but quickly it was wearing down in the face of familial concern.

Lucy was the first to disentangle herself from the bundle, but she wasn’t the first to approach. They all did that together, Lisa holding her hand tight and Lola hugging her in turn as they stumbled forward to their elder sister’s side.

It was surreal, seeing Luna on the brink of a breakdown like this, to see your elder sister so openly distraught. Luna wasn’t as good as Lori or Leni when it came to providing the young ones with comfort and hope but she’d never cried around them before and it was a strange and it was something none of them wanted to see.

Lucy reached out and grabbed Luna’s coat, giving it a good shake till she got her attention.

“…where’s Lori?” Lucy asked, her voice a harsh whisper and Luna shivered at the question.

Lori. Where is Lori? Where did she go? Is she in the Hamlet, is she anywhere? Is she still there, lying in the graveyard, covered in her own blood? Is she dead? Did you kill her? Have you killed your own sister Luna?

Luna’s mouth opened and closed, and she stared down at Lucy with unfocused eyes. Unfocused, but still sharp enough to glean behind her bangs and spy those bloodshot eyes, those tear marks on her cheeks. On all their cheeks.

Lucy watched and her heart sank as she spied the conflict on Luna’s face, a mixture of anger and resentment but also guilt and sorrow. Lisa had told her things were tense between the two of them but what did that mean? Did they get into a fight, did something happen. Surely Leni wouldn’t let something like that ha—

Leni.

And suddenly all that fear, all that sadness that Lucy had felt earlier, that deep and pervading sense of loss and despair, it all came rushing back.

“…w-where…” Lucy stammered, licking her lips before pressing on, asking the question she wanted no answer to, “where is… where is Leni?”

Luna went still and cold.

Leni. Cold. Dead. Below. No throat. Where’s Leni’s throat Luna?

“Where is Leni?” Lucy asked again, a tone of urgency to her inquiry as her younger sisters suddenly keyed in on her desperation. Lucy shook her sister as the fresh flames of anger began to smolder in her tiny breast. “Where’s Leni, Luna!?”

You left her behind. You left your sister behind. She’s all alone and you just left her.

Luna couldn’t breathe. The blood in her veins turned to ice and her heart stopped. She was there again, in the dark and cold, hard stone under her knees and the stink of rot and burning meat assaulting her senses as her sister’s blood flowed freely between her fingers when she cradled her head.

...my sister... look how they’ve massacred my sister...

Fresh, boiling bile rose in her throat and Luna slapped a hand over her mouth and gagged. The girls immediately flinched back except for Lucy who instead tightened her grip and shook her little fists again. As the nausea, but not the sickness, faded, Luna looked down at her sister and tried to smile, tried to say anything, like a good responsible big sister would do. Like she’d seen Mom and Lori do whenever the kids got upset, like how she wished she could be.

She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She smiled but it was strained, painful and wrong and far too heavy to keep up as it slowly fell. Tears poured from her eyes as that cultivated mask of warmth and insurance Luna so desperately wished she could make fell apart all around her and all she was left with was pure abject misery.

“…I…” Luna began and immediately stopped, the guilt and sadness tearing up as she gagged on the words she knew she had to say but just couldn’t. Too afraid of what would come after to know how to deal with it.

Lucy was stunned. Luna’s face was misery and pain and nothing else, and the purity of it was enough to knock the air from her lungs. What exquisite, agonizing anguish she conveyed, what torturous grief and suffering born only through the truest throes of heartache…

No.

It couldn’t be.

Not Leni.

Dead eyes. Cold skin.

“You’re lying,” Lucy whispered, her voice tight and thick with emotion.

Luna swallowed and reached down—

“YOU’RE LYING!” Lucy thundered, smacking the hand away from her. In that instant her bangs upended and exposed her face, once blue eyes tinted red, cheeks burning and fresh tears pricking at the corners of her eyes. “YOU’RE LYING! STOP LYING!”

Not Leni. It couldn’t be Leni. Not her, never her.

In all her eight years Lucy had been entranced by the idea of death. She’d make believe being a ghost, wanted to be a mortician when she was all grown up, and even planned funerals for all her sibling’s ends. But this was merely the fancies of a child too young to understand the end and all that entailed, the growing mind of a child thoroughly entranced in the romanticism of the grave and ghosts.

She didn’t understand the pain of it all. The pain of losing a loved one, the suddenness of it. She couldn’t comprehend the sheer grief it would put her through… that it was putting her through now. There was an empty space in her heart, a Leni shaped hole that needed and yearned to be filled but to her horror and dismay she suddenly understood that could never be.

Never again would her angelic face be there to greet her every morning. Never again would golden hair brighten her day as a voice resonating only unconditional love asked her if she was okay. Never again would she hear those sweet honeyed words so intent on cheering her up. Never again would she experience that strange mix of irritation and quiet joy as a bubbly voice wavering with good-natured confusion asked her what something meant.

It was gone, gone forever. Lucy knew this for a fact as she stared up into Luna’s miserable face, praying desperately for her older sister to tell her she was wrong, hoping against hope that another much bright and happier face would fill that doorway and sweep her up into a powerful hug with a cheerful laugh.

Alas, it was not to be.

Leni was gone.

Lucy let go of Luna’s trousers and stepped back, shaking her head and mumbling to herself as a wave of emotions crashed down upon her; anger and confusion shifting before becoming replaced by altogether more powerful forces until before long her face was a mirror of Luna’s, all pain and dolor and despondency beyond compare as the full weight of her woe overcame her utterly.

She scrunched up her face as grief-stricken spasms wracked her tiny body and a strong, yet silent sob tore up her insides until she was red-faced and teary-eyed and letting her misery and hate be known to whatever could hear.

And behind her Lola sobbed and suffered with quiet dignity, hunched over her little sister as if shielding her. Lisa stood there, stock-still aside from the hand that absently patted her sister’s back, as unflinching, and mechanical as clockwork. Her face was a cool mask of incertitude as confusion reigned over her senses, as though she couldn’t believe what she was hearing, what she was feeling and knowing to be true as much as she might like to deny it.

“Impossible…” she muttered to herself in clear but distant disbelief, “…impossible…”

Lucy paid neither of them much mind, so consumed was she by her desolation that naught else mattered but the emotions coursing through her insides and the stormy contents of her stomach. She felt sick. She was going to be sick. She was going to be sick and she wished she was home, she wished she was back home and everyone was okay and everything was fine and Leni was there and she was hugging her and telling her that everything was going to be ok like she used to do when Lucy was real little and she’d just woken up from a bad dream.

And as this emotional hurricane bedeviled her mind and harrowed her senses, she could not feel the presence of a larger force bearing down on her. She could not feel arms strong and warm wrap around her, pressing her tight to a body she could lean on. She could not feel her little sisters being pressed close to her, their little arms holding onto her tight as the three were squeezed tight by arms that could encircle their whole world.

She couldn’t feel Luna pressing her face to hers, hair tickling her nose as she kissed her cheeks and whispering to her that she was sorry, she was so, so sorry and that she loved her little Lucy so, so much and she was going to make things right again.
But what Lucy did feel was the love, radiating like a warm wave off her elder sister and she sank into it, pulling it as close to her as she could as she vented her torment.

And so, she did. So, did they all, embracing one another as sisters and as a family as they made their grief known and mourned for their lost angel. And exhaustion claimed each of them one by one, from eldest to youngest, and as Lisa laid her head on Luna’s arm and joined the choir of snoring sisters Luna sat there, still awake and consumed by her thoughts.

She glanced down at her sleeping siblings so tired and torn by the horrors of this world, of this awful god-forsaken place that had taken so much from them. Taken the one thing it had no right to take, the one thing they all needed to survive…

Luna flinched as an image of Leni, face pale and throat torn, flashed in her mind and at once Lucy mewled and shifted in her arms. Luna quickly straightened herself and waited breathlessly for Lucy to fall back into her fitful slumber. As she calmed Luna sighed, glaring upwards at the ceiling.

It wasn’t fair. They had taken not only Leni from her but her memory as well. Never again would Luna remember her as she was in life, now all she could recall was her sister as she was in the end, dead on the floor.

It just wasn’t fair.

And as Luna sat there, thinking, and absently running her fingers through Lucy’s long raven hair, she began to truly resent this place. To hate it. Not with the petty, childish hate of a teenager, but with a deeper and more powerful hate, a kind she had never known before but embraced all the same as a man might his liquor.

She glared at the walls and felt them glare back and was glad they were on the same page regarding one another. This place was evil, and she knew she couldn’t stay here and let it corrupt her as it had corrupted Lori.

She looked down at her sisters and knew she had to save them.

She knew what she had to do.

And as she slowly settled onto the floor, her baby sisters all splayed out but still held near her tummy as they rested on the ground with her, that old flame of determination that was quintessentially Luna Loud flared up once again, and a conviction all her own came and cemented itself inside her.

She was going to save them; this world be dammed.

So, Luna settled down to slumber with her sisters and all her thoughts were on rest. After all she’d need her strength for the morning, steeling herself for what would come next and the responsibilities she was going to have to undertake.

Because she was going to take them far away from this place.
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The hustle and bustle of the camp rang out loud and clear through the fetid air, echoing among the treetops and drowning out all but the most raucous of crows and ravens. Men arguing with each other, the rattling of pots and pans, the clucking of poultry and squealing of hogs, and the occasional gunshot accompanied by the appropriate cheers and whoops of the men mixed together in a cacophonous roar that clouded the senses and instilled a sense of ordered chaos among the bandits. This was their place, their territory, they were safe here, they could lower their guard and act up all they wanted.

From her place in the mulberry bushes Lynn smiled to herself. Idiots, she thought as she stalked around the campsite. The bandits had made good clearing out a nice big spot for themselves here but everything about three meters away from the tents was just as thick and impenetrable as the rest of this godforsaken forest.

Lynn didn’t mind though. She was tough, what was a few scratches and twigs in your hair to a girl like her? Nothing, that’s what! When a Loud girl fixes her mind to a task, she gets it done. And brother, there wasn’t a girl alive that could match Lynn Loud Jr. in tenacity, let alone sheer pigheadedness.

It had taken a bit to find this place. These bandits liked to keep themselves busy, always moving from site to site. Plenty of times Lynn would burst out of the tree line ready to fight only to find an empty clearing, a few leftover pots, and the smoldering embers of a doused campfire. It was frustrating to say the least – Lynn liked games fine but only when she won and as far as she was concerned running away was cheating – but Lynn wasn’t about to give up either.

And whaddya know? Lincoln was right, it turns out patience does pay off!

Not that she’d ever tell him that.

See, she had to think about this logically. If she just ran around after them then she’d never catch up, but if she figured out where they might go next, then she could cut them off! See, Lynn was more observant than people gave her the benefit of, and she’d caught on quick that these guys had little bases all around the place that they’d hold up in for a week while they hassled the locals before dipping out. She never found out where their big place was, these were just little guys after all, but she figured out right quick they were making their way to the big forest.

So, she stopped following their trail of leftovers and made a beeline there instead.

And what should happen after a day or two of reaching this stinking place, but she should stumble upon a whole raiding party, just for her!

Truth be told it was only a couple guys, and she killed two before the rest even knew what hit them, but all in all it was a good hustle, a nice warm-up, something to get the blood pumping, y’know? Then it hit her, like a flash of inspiration from the gods themselves.

Grab one, and he can tell you were the camp is!

Of course, by the time she’d thought that up she’d killed all but one of ‘em. And the one she hadn’t had run away like a coward…
Yeah, chasing down some sweaty, ugly, fat guy through the woods wasn’t exactly how she wanted to be spending her day but them’s the breaks. Gotta crack a few eggs to make and omelet and all that jazz. She was actually a little worried she’d lost him at one point, but then there he came, strutting along the path like he’d gotten away from her.

Heh… she taught him better when she got ahold of him. Nobody gets away from Lynn Loud Jr.

Nobody.

He squealed like a pig sure enough. All it took was a little… persuasion. Which in Lynn speak meant she twisted his limbs until he started blubbering. What a pansy that guy was, she gave Lincoln worse pretty much every day and he hardly ever whined that bad. Hell, he usually fought back!

Pussy-ass bandit aside once she got what she needed from him she tied him to a tree with the promise that she’d untie him later and that if he was lying she was definitely coming back, and this time she’d really hurt him. But, hey, looks like he wasn’t lying after all. Cool, looks like he’d get to die with a clear conscience at least.

Creeping along the edge of the open field, her body shrouded by shrubbery and concealed within the greenery of mother nature, Lynn felt totally at ease, completely within her element.

Which was strange, because all things considered Lynn may have been a jock, but she was never the outdoorsy type. She wasn’t like Lola – who screamed and cried at the merest notion of being out in the elements – but Lynn also wasn’t like Lana – who regularly rolled in the dirt and actively sought out wildlife to pester – and the last time they went camping Lynn came back with, like, ten ticks in her hair and that’s enough to put a girl off nature for a bit.

So yeah, not the woodsy type. But here she was and seeing as Lynn wasn’t the type to complain about a good thing, it looks like she was a wild child now. Which is fine, this stuff is actually pretty cool. Getting all up in nature and all that, creeping through the bushes like a tiger ready to pounce on her prey. Now there was a mental image that Lynn could get behind!

And a tiger she was, seamless in posture and gait, sleek and designed for maximum speed and poise, her body, every muscle of it, perfectly sculpted by regular rigorous activity, a marvel of biological engineering. And no, it’s not bragging when it’s the truth. Even before she came here Lynn was tough, tougher than most probably thought she had any right to be but that sounded like whining to her ears. She worked for what she had, worked hard, and it paid off.

But here? Here was different, she felt different. Like the same, but different. Better different, stronger different, faster different. Then there were her clothes, and this cool glaive thing. That was definitely different. But like she’d been saying, the cool kind of different.

She felt invincible, better than ever! Felt like a tiger? Hell, she was a tiger! Have you ever seen a tiger move, like at the zoo or on TV? The way they can be so graceful yet so powerful at the same time? So seamlessly perfect? That was her, she could do that too! And like a tiger she was a machine, perfectly designed for one thing and one thing only…
Killing.

See, that’s another weird thing. If you’d ever asked Lynn how she felt about things like murder, she’d probably… well she’d probably get creeped out. That’s normal, she’d hear about stuff like on the news and get grossed out. Murderers? Who needs ‘em! Get rid of ‘em, send them to jail where they belong!

Like, the idea of murder was repugnant to her. Killing, like, a chicken or even a deer for food was one thing, but a person? Ew! Wrong! And it was, she could never see herself doing something like that. Hell, she could never see herself hurting another living thing. Yeah, she was rough, off the field and on, but she’d only ever hurt Lincoln one time after accidentally pushing him out of the tree in the front yard when they were kids and she felt so bad about it she promised never to do it again. And she did, or rather didn’t.

But here? Here was different.

The first time Lynn had ever killed something was when she was, oh… seven. Yeah, that sounds about right. It was a frog (don’t tell Lana!) and she had found it in the pond at the park. She was throwing it up and down only she grabbed it too hard by mistake. And boy, did she feel awful. Not only because of its slimy frog guts all in between her fingers, but because she’d killed an innocent creature. She felt like garbage after that, never told anyone neither because she was worried that she’d get yelled at, and after a whole day of being a glum little sad sack she decided to do what the pastor man at church (back when they used to go every Sunday) said to do when you feel like trash.

Pray for forgiveness.

So, she did. That night she waited until Lucy was asleep and then she got on her little knees, put her elbows on the bed, and with her tiny tear-stained face illuminated by the moonlight said she was sorry and prayed to God that he’d take away these awful feelings.

And he did! Not all at once of course, she felt pretty crumby for a few days, but then slowly, over time, the feeling faded away and she hardly even remembered that silly old frog except when she was feeling down about something else. And, yeah, thinking back on it now she still felt sorry, but not bad. She was a kid and it was an accident, gotta learn them lessons and all that.

The second time she’d ever killed something was when she came here. It was near a week after she and Lincoln and woken up here, her in this fancy little number like something straight out of one of Lincoln’s fantasy movies and him… all dolled up in some kind of old-fashioned schoolboy getup. Oh boy now that was a riot, really took the edge off being stuck on the side of some weird old road.

Which, naturally, they followed. The road that is. Not like they had anything better to do. Lincoln wanted to just sit right there and wait for help, but Lynn got him moving with a swift kick to the rear. Had to keep him moving, no sense in just sitting alongside the road and hoping for a rescue. Lynn had learned by now that if you want something done you have to do it yourself and it was a value she’d long tried (about a whole year now actually!) to instill in her little brother to apparently no avail. It wasn’t that he wasn’t smart or even determined, it was that he was lazy, and when he didn’t get immediate results he just shut down. It was honestly a bit disappointing; she knew he could do better if he just tried a bit harder and didn’t get discouraged. Never let it be said that Lincoln couldn’t do something, he just needed to commit and not get frustrated when his plans invariably failed.

He compared himself to her, she knew that much. He looked up to her and all her shiny trophies and she could see a need in his eyes so fierce and desperate that it broke her heart sometimes.

That’s why it was so nice those first few days with just him and her. Sure it rained a little and the road was tough and they were lost and alone but it was just the two of them and it felt so nice to have Lincoln all to herself and it made her wonder just how long it’d been since she last had her little brother with her like this. Guess time just got away from her, what with practice and all that. She liked to think of it as making up for lost time, and the two siblings talked and laughed and cried and screamed at each other more in those couple of days than they’d done in, like, a year, and connected in a way Lynn had always secretly wanted but never came out and said because, c’mon, who wants to hear all that mushy crap?

It was nice, she’d thought to herself then, glancing over at her brother’s “concentration” face, the one where he knits his brow and sticks out his tongue like he’s putting his all into it. “It”, in this case, would be fishing, and on the riverbank the two were at peace after an especially soul-wrenching and emotionally draining argument that naturally led to a mutual epiphany regarding their exact feelings towards one another and what they mean to each other and all that good stuff. Then he caught a trout and they had dinner and things were even better because now they had full bellies. He’d killed the fish with a rock, and she was proud of him.

It was the morning after that things got exciting. It was about an hour or so after noon, they’d hit the road early as always and were having a nice chat regarding things like potential futures, jobs and careers, and other really important things like how much Lori sucks when the stink hit their noses like a smack to the face. The culprit was soon spotted, but it wasn’t until they got a bit closer that the exact nature of what it was revealed itself.

It was a carcass. Probably a horse, judging by the ruined and destroyed carriage lying next to the bloating rotting heap of long-gone flesh. Yeah, that thing was nasty! The stink was so bad Lincoln was dry heaving and begging her all teary-eyed to hurry up so they could just pass it already.

She wasn’t sure why she stopped, at least not then. She was pretty sure why now, must’ve been her animal instincts, but back then she couldn’t place it. It was a feeling, a sincere belief that something was about to happen, and as the seconds ticked by that belief became all the more steadfast in its resolution and all the grimmer in its prospects.

The carcass lurched and Lynn’s grip on her glaive (which she’d then been using as a walking stick all this time and who’s existence she’d spent pondering in deep thought since she’d first woken up. She’d decided it was awesome and was trying to come up with a name for it. Bloodracker? Grimblade? She’d come up with something…) tightened and, as if by instinct, she moved to a proper battle stance she had no idea existed.

While Lynn concentrated and Lincoln gaped in utter horror the carcass shook and something within writhed and squirmed just under the rotten skin, creating ripples in the flesh that made Lynn’s stomach churn and broil with disgust.

And then it popped. A hail of diseased, rotten scraps and brackish blackened blood rained down upon her as a cloud of miasma rose from the gaping wound to waft over the road thick enough to choke a man with the rank odor of death. And there, emerging from the carcass, coiling among the spilled intestines, covered in viscera and waste, was a worm.

It was enormous, its undulating pinkish body glistening in the sunlight as the rays were caught on the moist meat covering it, a multitude of legs wriggling and clawing at the air with tiny pincers designed to grab and stab and never let go. But it was the face she remembered most, a gaping maw ringed with yellowed fangs, daggers that lined the outside and inside all the way into the dark of its gullet, an empty expanse that promised only eternity and an awful endless hunger that could not be sated merely with the gruel sustenance of the dead.

The carrion eater lunged forward, and Lincoln screamed.

Lynn stepped to the side and swung up her glaive, burying the blade into the soft underside of the worm. If the creature was even capable of feeling pain it didn’t show it as the writhing monster squirmed and twisted, trying to wrap its boy around hers, trying to grab at her with its knife-like centipede legs, trying to sink into her and tear her and hurt her and then she’ll be the bloated one on the side of the road with worms in her belly—

No!

With a snarl and a swing of her arms Lynn hefted all her weight against the worm and twisted her body around, desperate to escape the coils tightening around her and determined enough to give the Devil a run for his money. With a twist and a flex, the blade still buried in the worm’s side cut free and tore into its coiling length and a thick, creamy and pungent bleach-like blood soon covered Lynn from head to toe.

She fought like a wolverine, all slashing claws and snarling teeth. A whirling dervish as her blade scoured the enemy, sending its thick, white blood in wide arcs all around, her body reminiscent of a ballerina as she twirled and spun and set death about her as she punctuated each spin with her hacking glaive, using her momentum as effectively and strategically as possible as she split the worm in half and cut those halves into bloody still squirming chunks before kicking the gasping head off into the tall grass.

She stood there for a moment, euphoric and whole in some strange foreign way that she’d never felt before. Still tense but finally free, gasping heavily from the strain and fear of this near-death experience but more alive than she’d ever felt in her life. It was a rush similar to but far greater than any home run, any hole in one, any strike, any ball in the net or kick to the goal. It was then Lynn Loud Jr. got her first real taste of combat, of blood and guts and the drumbeats in the head that pound and pound until your vision grows sharp and your hearing goes and she drank deeply from its well of intoxication.

In that moment she was real, and she reveled in it.

Later on that night would see Lincoln practically fawning over her as they sat ‘round the fire and enjoyed a nice meal of two lizards (caught again by Lincoln, who knew he had it in him!), gushing on and on about how awesome she was and how cool the fight was and how scared he was and how brave she must’ve been and boy wasn’t she just the best!

She let him of course. Why not? She was awesome, everyone told her so, nothing she hadn’t heard before.

Except that wasn’t true, not exactly. How many times had someone called her awesome for getting the goal? How many fans cheered her name when she hit that home-run? How many called her great and really, truly meant it? The words were nothing she hadn’t heard before but the feeling she got when she heard Lincoln say it, knowing well and truly just how much he meant it by the light in his eyes when he looked at her as he praised her, made it seem so much more real and nice to hear than ever before and she wasn’t entirely sure if it was because of the life or death circumstances that earned her such praise or the fact it was him saying it.

And when he finally tucked in for the night, wrapped up in some blankets they’d pillaged from the broken wagon among other much shinier things, Lynn sat there in the grass and watched him sleep. And as she watched his tiny chest rise and fall with each breath, she did something many, even her own sisters, thought her incapable of doing.

She thought.

The next day would bring its own now familiar challenges. Finding food, fending off some wild dogs, practicing with her weapon, steering clear of the pig-like squealing coming from the darkness of the woods (Lynn was awesome but she’d seen what boars could do online and judging by those sounds it sounded like one big boar), and other such routines that had become regular to her and kept her from going stir-crazy probably. Lynn didn’t know, she wasn’t a doctor.

It wouldn’t be for another three days ‘till Lynn committed her first murder.

When she woke up that day, dew in her hair and an airy feeling in her chest as she pulled her snoozing brother close to her breast and ran her fingers through his chinchilla-soft snowy locks, she certainly hadn’t been expecting to do it. But then again, she hadn’t not been expecting to either, so it doesn’t count.

No, Lynn’s thoughts that day, like most of her recent thoughts come to think of it, were focused on her brother. Not necessarily on finding him food or getting him to some kind of town or home or anything like that, but more so on the… feeling he was giving her. It was weird, all light and puffy and she didn’t really appreciate it. Not because he was giving her these feelings per say, more because he hadn’t asked her permission first and overall she was mostly just frustrated because she couldn’t pin it down.

It all tied into how he made her feel, naturally. They’d touched on this and then some when they’d aired out their feelings during one of their many arguments in those first few days of travelling, when the fear and irritation were at their peak and both were frustrated with the other and before you know it they’re both screaming and hitting and just airing it all out and Lynn honestly wondered why they hadn’t done it before. She’d heard his side and he’d heard hers, like how she preferred it before back when he was her little buddy and they played all day and were always around each other. Then dumb old dad moved him out of their old room and Lucy in and just like that a switch had been flipped. Lincoln liked silly nerd stuff now and never wanted to play with her anymore even when she asked and threatened and wheedled and all but had to beg with tears in her eyes because she just wanted to be with her baby brother again GODDAMMIT!

That seemed to get through to him. And she listened to what he had to say too, of course. Fair is fair and all. After all that mounting tension between them that everyone in the family could see and feel and even tried to talk to her about before getting the door slammed in their faces the two of them had finally talked, after waiting and waiting until the cup had overfilled and all but spilled over they’d finally reached an understanding.

What Lynn hadn’t divulged to Lincoln, not just yet, was just how bitter she felt at how he’d seemingly moved on. She’d demonstrated her anger, her loneliness even, but not the true depths of her resentment. How utterly crushed she felt whenever he brushed her off, just how heartbroken she was whenever he said later but later never came, how teeth-grindingly angry she got whenever he chose to spend time with his dorky friends instead of her, how utterly sick to her damn stomach it made her feel that she had to literally threaten him just to spend some time with the boy. She hated herself sometimes, when things boiled over to that point and it was all she could do to keep herself from smacking him when he looked at her with those bright blue eyes and just smiled that tired little smile of his. Like being with her was such a damn chore, like she was some kind of bully that kept him on a leash. Oh, so sorry your majesty, wouldn’t want to ruin your videogame time I’d just like to spend an afternoon with my FUCKING BROTHER FOR ONCE!

She didn’t tell him how much she needed him sometimes, when the loneliness hit her like a truck and weighed heavy on her chest like an anvil and it hurt so bad she could almost cry. Like at night, when the ghosts of old memories played in her head and she remembered what it was like whenever he snuck out of his bed and into hers so they could just talk, back when they were young and together and close then, they used to be so close but whenever she tried to grasp on to that memory (hold it tight and never let go) it slipped through her fingers like mist and faded away until the next time her chest burned with raw, visceral, burning need and anger and bitterness and, yes, even sadness.

It was funny really, as obsessed as her little sister-slash-roommate was with ghosts all she had to do to find some was ask her big sister. Sure, c’mere Lucy, I’ll hook you up! I got all sorts of ghosts!

But now things were different. Things had finally changed. The mutual anger between the two over slights real and imaginary and not altogether physical was gone. And it was wonderful! It was like old times again and Lynn was happy! She had her brother back and they were talking and laughing and still arguing but that was fine because there was no lingering resentment afterwards, only a sense of self-reflection and maybe a few still-raw feelings but they could share those and get over it together!

When he looked at her, she felt secure, like all was right in the world.

When he smiled at her she felt like air.

She wouldn’t tell him all that of course. A girl has to keep some secrets after all, and Lynn was never one for all that mushy stuff. But sometimes when the breeze was in her hair (now loose and free like her) and the sun was behind her Lynn caught Lincoln staring at her with those bright blue eyes and that soft smile of his and she wondered if maybe he didn’t already know. And sometimes she couldn’t help but wonder if that feeling was mutual.

Lynn had always known she’d die for her brother, but it wasn’t until the night after that worm attacked that she came to the equally natural and calming realization that she’d kill for him too.

Perhaps that was why Lynn wasn't nearly as startled as Lincoln was when that cutthroat came out of the darkness of the forest. He was all crooked teeth and equally crooked nose and he had a wolf’s grin that betrayed his predator’s hunger. Lynn wasn’t the most trusting of people on her best days, but this man hid his eyes and his fingers twitched when he looked at them and she hated him. She hated him more than anything she’d ever hated before. Lynn truly didn’t even know what hate was until that moment and the suddenness and the power of it made her knees shake but she stuck out her chin and looked him dead-on with a try me scowl plastered on her face.

Lincoln, after that first startle, proved the more cordial of the two, and he didn’t even bother to hide his hopeful inflection as he asked the man if he knew where town was and if he’d help them.

The man pulled out a dagger and told them to give up everything they had.

Lincoln stepped back and screamed…

And that’s when Lynn got angry. This man just threatened them. This grown ass man just pulled a knife on two kids and threatened them. This thief, this robber, this life-taker, this fucking stinking of piss and cheap whiskey motherfucker just pulled a knife on her baby brother! This walking shit-stain of a human being, this lecherous fetid pond-scum! She could see it in his eyes, she could feel his sin oozing out of every pore in his oily, yellowed skin. He wanted to hurt them. He wanted to hurt Lincoln.

He made Lincoln scream.

…what followed was mostly instinct. That’s the only way Lynn could explain it, same as the worm from a few days back. Her body moved of its own accord and with a swing of her arms it wasn’t Lincoln that was screaming but the bandit as he clutched tight at the end of the bleeding stump where his hand used to be; the knife dropped and forgotten in the dirt where it would remain forever after with no master to use it.

Lynn wasted no time with indecision or some sudden bout of horror to make her pause, to make her stupid and vulnerable and everything Lynn Loud Jr. wasn’t. With a quick step forward, a twist of the waist, and a mighty heft of the arms hard and heavy enough to make her gasp Lynn swung and the air sang with glinting metal as her glaive opened the man’s belly. His organs made heavy, wet sounds as they poured out of him to pool on the dirt in a steaming pile and he fell to his knees in shock.

The man died there, alone, and unloved on that lonely road, on that stretch of barely cultivated dirt. He died mewling through a mouthful of his own blood, desperately trying to pick up his guts to stuff them back in before finally slumping over and, with one last long-winded sob, died.

And it was only then that Lynn finally let loose the breath she was holding in a loud shaky sigh. She pressed her knuckles against her clammy skin and breathed deep and hard as all her pent-up anger and hate flowed out of her in a flood that left only a pleasant numbing sense of relief behind.

Later that night, safely tucked away in some thickets and all wrapped up in their blanket, Lincoln would tell her that she was the bravest person he’d ever met. Lynn barely heard the words; she was just so happy to hear Lincoln finally say something. After the incident, the boy had spent the whole day in a haze, and though she tried to garner some reaction with casual conversation nothing could incite him out of it. Honestly, she was getting worried he was mad at her, good to see that he wasn’t.

Lincoln spent the rest of the night alternatively sobbing into his sister’s chest and holding her close and heaping half-muttered awestruck praise and adulation. He called her brave; he called her amazing. He told her she saved his life and that he loved her more than anything. He said she was the best sister ever and Lynn felt a thump of pride in her chest at that and grinned smugly as she thought of her other sisters, each of them always saying that of course Lincoln wouldn’t play favorites but each equally sure in their hearts it was them. Well move aside girls, looks like Lynn comes in first yet again!

He carried on like this until exhaustion took him, and Lynn held him close like she was afraid something might come in the night to spirit him away (which she totally wasn’t btw, it was just cold out is all). As she stroked his hair she thought, and she pondered, much like the night she’d killed that worm. And, much like that night, she came to the same disturbing conclusion.

Lynn Loud Jr. didn’t feel bad in the slightest.

She replayed the memory over and over in her head, revisiting it again and again, and each time she was left with the same feeling. Nothing. She felt nothing. Not anger, not disgust, not horror or sadness or guilt or even a macabre sense of self-satisfaction at a job well done. Nothing!

It wasn’t at all like the memory of the frog, which even to this day, to this very hour, disgusted her more on some deep, primal level than the memory of the man she’d just murdered. The death of that man was nothing, in her mind, compared to the death of that innocent creature.

And that was the crux of it, Lynn thought as her eyes lit up in realization and a smile scrawled across her face.

The frog was an innocent, it meant no harm and could do no harm. It was her who was truly at fault there, mourning that frog’s memory and keeping the lesson it imparted on her soul was her cross to bear. But the worm, the man? They were the aggressors, they were the ones who meant her harm. They came at her with bloody minds and she staved them off with a stiff hand and an iron constitution. It didn’t matter that one was a man for he was a carrion eater same as that worm, he had evil in his heart and paid the price for it. Lynn was the innocent one, she was simply defending herself and the one she loved, and such was her right as a person, as a living being.
Not all lives are equal Lynn realized as she slowly drifted off to sleep next to her brother. The only thing that matters is the innocence of that life. Evil, true evil existed, and it was her job as the big sister to protect her little brother from it. The life of a sinful man then, was less than that of a frogs’, and she would not waste a single night’s sleep over it.

And before she closed her eyes Lynn made a vow right then and there that she was going to protect her brother. That she wasn’t going to let anything ever happen to him.

And that promise still rang just as true for her now as it did back then.

Creeping through the underbrush Lynn felt the heat rise in her belly though her blood felt cool in her skin, an interesting contrast that kept her alert and feeling fresh. Crawling along Lynn skirted alongside the very edge of awareness itself, pushing out all sensation and focusing her entire being on the task at hand, a level-headed concentration that could not be contested be it by stinging nettles or subconscious despair.

That Lincoln may no longer be alive was a thought that hadn’t even crossed Lynn’s mind. Indeed, the very notion was impossible for her to fathom. He was alive because she said so and that was that. He was alive because she needed him to be alive, because she hadn’t said she was sorry yet.

So very sorry.

It was all her fault. One morning, only a few more days after the bandit (and how long had they been out on that road actually? A week? A month?) they had both woken up chipper and fresh and Lincoln for whatever reason was especially smiley that morning; not that she minded of course, she liked his dorky smile. He seemed insistent that morning that they were going to have a good day, that their luck was finally turning around and they’d find some semblance of civilization and before either of them knew it they’d be back home with their parents and all their sisters again.

Lynn met his exuberance with a strained smile. Of course, she wanted to see Mom and Dad again, and all the girls too, but it was also… nice out here. With just the two of them and all. Almost like she didn’t want it to end really…

At any rate she went out to find some breakfast, a decision she still cursed herself for. Should have brought him with here. Shouldn’t have left him alone! Stupid! Stupid, stupid, stupid!

By the time she’d come back with an armful of wild apples their little makeshift camping spot was a ruined mess. The first thing she noticed was that Lincoln wasn’t there, all that stood in his place was a torn up blanket, and the sight of that little blanket all torn up made Lynn’s blood freeze worse than any of Lucy’s spooky poems ever could.

The second thing she noticed was the dead bodies. They looked like bandits, dressed the same as the guy that tried to waylay them a couple days earlier. The man that Lynn had murdered. That made her blood start boiling, burning and bubbling in her stomach until she was seeing red and breathing so hard she almost couldn’t breathe for how hard she was breathing… if that makes any sense.

They looked like they’d been put through the wringer. Lynn didn’t actually know what that meant, she’d only heard her Grandad say it once or twice, but if it meant looking like the end result of one of Jason Voorhees’s arts and crafts projects then you could say it again. Butchered was too nice a word for what happened to those guys, too clean. Butchers know what they’re doing, these jerks were slaughtered, like somebody had gone to town on them with a hacksaw and then for good measure set the dogs on ‘em.

Yeah, real nasty stuff, but that didn’t exactly help her find out what happened to Lincoln.

Giving one of the corpses a swift kick Lynn felt as close to despair as she’d ever been before her keen eyes picked up on something quite interesting. Tracks, footprints in the mud, as well as something else, a deep trail through the freshly upturned dirt that seemed to mark the impression of something large and heavy being dragged. The details were of little importance in Lynn’s mind, all that mattered was that she had a lead.

It had taken her a good long time. Much too long in fact. Every time she thought she’d found them all she’d find was an empty campsite and more fresh tracks, but still she kept to her dogged pursuit; no matter how tired she was, no matter the weather or terrain she would persevere.

There was too much at stake not to.

And, like everything else in Lynn’s mind, persistence once again paid off. Now she had them, now she had him! All that was left was to find out exactly where he was and get him out of here.

And maybe, should she have the time, teach these bastards what happens when you mess with a Loud.

The mere thought of what she could do to them sent a tremble through Lynn’s spine all the way down to her legs and her fingers clutched tight at the grass as she crept along, hungry for the rusty feel of her metal glaive, itching for some exercise.

She ignored the feeling, pushing it down into her stomach. There’d be time for that later, right now she needed to focus. Needed to plan and think, needed to strategize. Can’t win the big game without a little strategy, need to think these things out, need to…

Lynn stopped dead in her tracks, eyes wide and mouth hanging open. There, right off to the side of the camp, a good few meters away, was what looked all the world like of those old timey circus cages. You know the kind, the big ones with iron bars and set on wheels and what usually have lions and tigers or a gorilla in them rattling the bars and roaring at the crowd, like in all the cartoons. This one had all the features, only she couldn’t see inside to tell what animal might be in it because of the heavy cloth curtain draped over it.

Lynn wasn’t about to let a little thing like visual obscurity stop her. She may not have been the brightest bulb in the shed, but Lynn wasn’t stupid. She may not know exactly what was in that cage, but she could spare a guess or two and besides, she had a hunch.

The fact that there was a guard stationed at the cage did little to dissuade her.

Target in sight Lynn made her move, stealthily creeping along the forest edge for the right moment, the right angle. The guard noticed nothing, half-asleep as he was and leaning against the cage with his chin resting on his chest and eyes closed. Lynn grinned to herself and thought, what a moron! How stupid can you get?

Ah well, let him slack off. No skin off her ass.

It’ll be the last thing he ever does anyway.

Lynn wasted no time positioning herself, to be perfectly frank it was instinctual at this point. Always had been really, even when she was little and still had to practice at being the best, she still possessed an undeniable talent for putting herself in the right place at the right time. As far as she was concerned it was easy, you just had to stop thinking about it so much, you’ll just psyche yourself out.

Lynn took one quick glance around, listening for anybody else, making sure there were no other patrols or that some stupid schmuck wasn’t going to be making his rounds and ruin everything at the last minute. She’d fight the whole gang if she had to, and it wasn’t like she was going to let any of them live for what they’d done anyway, but right now her top priority was getting Linc out of here. Then, later, she could come back. Preferably while they were all asleep.

…what? ‘S not like it’s cheating, that’s just strategy right there! That’s what we call a game-plan!

To Lynn’s delight the sounds of the camp were raucous but distant. Sounds like they’d all gathered ‘round the bonfire for drinks and whatnot, probably to split their loot and get stupid drunk and laugh about how much they loved kidnapping little brothers from their big sisters that promised to keep them safe just to prove what giant assholes they were because that’s what assholes do.

Lynn smiled, mostly because the bonfire they’d all apparently gathered around was clear on the other side of camp.

Which meant they wouldn’t hear a thing.

Lynn erupted from the undergrowth like a stalking cat. Quick, silent, and with intense focus. There was purpose in her stride, in the way she kept herself low to the ground, legs swinging outward and pumping with all their strength, the heavy glaive in her tight grasp providing the perfect counterbalance as she sprinted towards her still-dozing target.

The bandit didn’t know what hit him. By the time he’d noticed her his intestines were spilling out onto the grass from the ragged hole in his stomach, cut open with one quick slash from Lynn’s glaive. He died mumbling, confused, unsure of what had just happened, unaware of anything except how cold he felt and of the encroaching darkness that was eating away at the edges of his vision, the numbing of his senses and mind until, at last, there was nothing.

Lynn paid his passing no heed, clutching fingers already scrabbling about his pockets and person for… aha!

Lynn held the keys up with a triumphant smirk, jingling them about before throwing them in the air and catching them with a clenched fist.

Bingo!

With a cackle Lynn turned – but not before giving the lifeless body at her feet a quick kick for good measure – and stood facing the imposing cage before her. It really was a big thing, if Lincoln wasn’t in there, she’d bet they had, like, a grizzly or something bumming around. Probably make it balance on a ball and juggle beer bottles or something, buncha’ assholes.

…it sure was awfully quiet in there though…

Scratching at her arm Lynn idly wondered just why the hell she was stalling and gave her subconscious a good mental smack for the stunt. What the hell dude, she asked herself, quit wasting time! We gotta grab Lincoln and vamoose!

With a quick shake of her head and a scowl Lynn rid herself of her sudden hesitations and began the arduous process of finding out which key matched the lock. Of course, there were only five keys, and she dropped them once or twice in her haste to get them in the lock, so it took, like, two minutes tops, but naturally it was the last key she tried that fit and besides as far as she was concerned two minutes was two too many!

It wasn’t until the door opened, its hinges squeaking and screaming with the best of them, that Lynn suddenly realized her heart was beating. Like, really beating. Beating a mile a minute, like she’d just got done running track.

…something wasn’t right.
Lynn stared into the darkness of that cage for but a few seconds before swallowing the rising lump in her throat and peeking her head in, peering into the black for her prize.

What she saw both horrified and elated her.

There, in the furthest corner, at the back of the cage, was a body. Flesh so pale as to be luminous, hair white as snow, without even a scrap of clothing, sitting naked and alone in the dark and laying on the cold steel floor in a crumpled heap, chained to the bars of the cage by rusty pig-iron links.

“…Lincoln,” Lynn hissed, trying to hear over the sound of her beating heart if he even responded.

He didn’t.

Biting her bottom lip Lynn cast one last quick glance back at the camp before scrambling into the cage. The metal was cold and hard beneath her knees and the silence had an edge to it. There was a thickness here, a sense of pervasive tension that permeated the floor, the bars, the very air. When Lynn exhaled, she saw her breath and winced back. It was so warm outside…

Flicking her eyes back to the pale shade in the corner Lynn bit her bottom lip again before whispering—

“Lincoln!”

This got a reaction. In his little corner the pale boy immediately curled up. Legs curling up into his chest and arms holding them tight to his shaking body as he began whimpering to himself.

Lynn’s heart sank and her blood boiled.

Crawling forward and whispering his name again and again Lynn approached the poor boy, stopping only just within arm’s reach so she could reach out and stroke his snowy locks all tender like. That really caught his attention, and slowly the mewling quieted and the sniffles turned to silence.

“…L-Lynn?”

His voice sounded so rough, so raw, so scratchy and painful. They hadn’t been giving him any water, Lynn realized. They hadn’t been feeding him, they’d been starving her baby brother. They’d made him scream and cry himself hoarse and ragged so he couldn’t even talk right anymore.

She was going to kill them for this.

Every last one of them, let God sort them out.

“Lincoln,” she whispered again, with less urgency, less force. It was a gentle tone, largely reserved for when the little ones needed a shoulder to cry on, the Big Sister voice so to speak. And what Lincoln needed right now was a big sister to lean on.

Leaning in Lynn ran her fingers through her hair, pausing only for a moment when Lincoln flinched at the contact, but continued when he in turn leaned into it himself. They’d hurt him, she realized. Oh, the things she was going to do to them for this… this travesty. Lynn honestly wondered if there was going to be anything left at all when she was finished with them.

“We need to go bro,” she whispered into his ear, trying to let the urgency of the situation betray her here. She had to be calm right now for him, but they still had to go. Had to get far away from here where it was safe for him, he had to be protected. She gave his shoulders a little nudge and motioned with her head. “Time to move Linc, c’mon.”

“…it huuuuurtsssssss,” he wheezed, all hoarse and raw, and Lynn tasted bile in her throat at the pain in his voice, in the way his limbs convulsed as if reliving some phantom trauma. The chains made an awful lot of noise as he spasmed, someone was bound to hear…

“I-I’m sorry bro. I know it hurts, and I’ll get even for ya, get them all back for what they’ve done. But I need to make sure you’re safe first—”

In his spasms Lincoln rolled over to face her and what Lynn saw almost made her scream. It almost broke her; almost took that little mask she’d been wearing all this time and just shattered it. Almost took away everything Lynn believed in right there.

His face was gone. The right side was… it wasn’t a face anymore. A mess of scars and scabs, of burned flesh still raw and red, blisters and pus and infection settling in pockmarked bubbles down to the very skull. That once beautiful, brilliant blue eye now washed out and grey, staring out into nothingness through a milky haze; his upper lip frayed and burned to reveal gum and teeth. The damage was extensive, unmistakable in its nature, all culminating in a single letter, an “A” made of ruined skin and bleeding sores.

They’d branded him…

They’d branded her baby brother…

LIKE A FUCKING ANIMAL!

“It huuuurtsssss,” he groaned again, miserable and suffering, groping out blindly in the dark for his sister’s hand. But she couldn’t give it, she was using it to keep her mouth closed, to try and hold back the screams, to try and stem the tide of vomit that threatened to erupt from her throat.

Lynn swallowed thickly, her face tight in a grimace as she leaned down and pressed her forehead to Lincoln’s, trying to avoid the burned flesh. Jesus Christ the smell, still fresh, still boiling, reeking of burned meat and infection. Don’t touch it, her mind cried, don’t hurt him. They’ve hurt him enough, don’t add to it.

No. Not her. Not ever.

Vomit leaking from the corners of her lips and tears falling on Lincoln’s face to soothe his scars Lynn wrapped her arms around his frail body and held him close, dead to the world around her, dead to all but her brother’s suffering. Lincoln held her tight in turn, possessively, as if afraid the world might snatch this one bright bit of happiness away from him as it had taken everything else.

He sobbed into her chest and she rocked him back and forth. Lynn’s mind was a’buzz, thoughts came and went but they were hazy, immaterial, couldn’t get a grip on them before they faded away into the static. But, finally, one did stick, and as much as she wanted to stay here, wallowing in despair, and sharing this mire of misery with her poor brother she knew she couldn’t.

Besides, it wasn’t her style. Lynn was a girl of action, and right now she had to get him out of here. She had to get Lincoln away from this awful place.

“…Lincoln,” Lynn sniffed, her voice thick and heavy with emotion as she sobbed. “L-Lincoln we need to go. I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I wasn’t there, I couldn’t save you. I let them do this to you, let them hurt you, and I’m sorry. I’ll get even with them; I’ll make them suffer a hundred times over for what they’ve done but we need to go. We need to get you somewhere safe, okay buddy?”

Lincoln stiffened in her arms, as though what she had just said struck some deep chord within him.

“No…”

Lynn arched a brow at the whispered declaration. “W-what? But… but Lincoln—”

“It hurts,” he hissed, clenching his fingers into her arms. She winced as his nails dug into her skin, but she endured it. He’d endured far worse than her, she could take this. She could take his hate, his rage, even his pain, she’d take it all if she could.

“It hurts so much,” he seethed, doubling over so that his spine bent at an awkward angle and his scarred face rubbed against the floor of the dirty cage. “I can… I can feel it. Writhing inside me!”

Lynn furrowed her brow. “What? I don’t… I don’t understand.” What was he talking about? The pain was in his face, right?

Lincoln chuckled a bit. It wasn’t a nice sound; it was the kind of chuckle usually reserved for someone that knows a real bad secret that no one else gets and he’s about to share.

“I… I’m a monster Lynn,” Lincoln choked, rubbing his face against the steel. “And monsters don’t get to go home. Monsters deserve to sit in cages.”

Lynn’s heart broke. What was he saying? Lincoln wasn’t a monster; he was just a kid. Sure, he made mistakes, so what!? Everyone makes mistakes, she’d made her share that’s for sure, but Lincoln was good kid! He was her brother!

What had they done to him, Lynn wondered as she watched her miserable and broken sibling sob in a broken-down heap? What had they done to her brother to make him hate himself this much, to make him call himself a monster, to make him think he deserved this torture?

She’d find out. She’d find out even if it took her to Hell and back.

“Hey, hey, hey,” Lynn whispered, grabbing up Lincoln’s head and cradling him in her lap. “Shush, enough of that. You are not a monster Lincoln Loud, listen to me. You are the best dang brother a girl could ask for, and you’re a good kid! You don’t deserve this, the only people that deserve this are the kind of people that would do something so awful to a good bro like you, understand! And I’m going to get even with them Lincoln, I’m going to get back at them for this, believe me!”

Lincoln sniffled and grabbed the hand currently rubbing at the good side of his face. “…I hate them Lynn, I hate them so much,” he growled in that hoarse, ragged voice. “I hate, hate, hate them! I want to… I want to tear their fucking skin off!”

“And we will,” Lynn replied with a smile. “We’ll get even with them; we’ll get back at them for this. Me and you Lincoln, I promise.”

“…me and you?” Lincoln whispered, propping himself up so he could look at his sister. And there he goes again, almost making her want to cry with that smile of his, still smiling even after all the pain they’d put him through.

Too bad Lynn couldn’t see the smile for what it was, the undercurrent of predatory intent just below the surface.

“I’d like that,” Lincoln whispered, a far-away look in his eyes as he imagined it. “I’d like that a lot. I’d like to get my hands on them… the things I’d do to them…”

“That’s the spirit bro,” Lynn said, letting a bit of optimism leak into her inflection. “So why don’t we—”

With a crack and a pop the top half of Lincoln’s head rotated to the left while the bottom jaw went to the right, dislocating his jaw, breaking the bone and sending spittle flying while a thin trickle of blood leaked from the corners of his mouth.

Slowly the smile disappeared, and Lynn’s face went pale.

“…Lincoln?”

With a low moan and another series of savage cracks Lincoln’s skull once again rotated, swerving in the opposite directions, and further breaking his jaw till the bones burst forth from his muscles and his cheeks tore under the sudden alternating pressures.

Lynn let Lincoln’s head slip from her hands, and it hit the steel floor with a bang. Scooting backwards on her butt Lynn just kept shaking her head, a pained expression on her face as she mumbled to herself.

“…no…no…”

A hideous moan emanated from Lincoln as his body twisted and writhed, contorting under pressures unseen. His body suddenly doubled over, and Lynn felt weak when she saw his spine snap upwards, bulging against the skin of his back. His tongue, long and snake-like spilled out from his mouth to lap up at the blood pouring from his torn jaw, and when he looked up at it was with eyes black and empty.

“Llllllllyyyyyyynnnnnnn…”

Lincoln reached out to her as far as the chains would allow, his face marred with pain unbearable, a pain she couldn’t even comprehend. His fingers began to… to twist… to break and reform, to lengthen and bleed as the nails fell out – were pushed out – by long black claws that tore themselves free from his fingers. He reached out as far as he could before the chain went tight, and she reached out back to him, tears streaming from her eyes.

“Lincoln…”

Lincoln’s face made a terrible sound as his skull burst forth from the confines of his skin. Muscles and sinews were pulled taut as they tried desperately to hold his bones in place as they warped, as they shifted and lengthened, blood red and white gleaming out from underneath the gore as the skullcap rotated and the jaws snapped teeth too long and sharp to be her brother’s.

“Llllllllllllllllllyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyynnnnnnnnnnnnn!”

“Lincoln,” Lynn moaned back, not even trying to hold back her sobbing as she backpedaled as far as she could from the writhing monstrosity before her. This twisted, hateful thing wearing her brother’s skin, only to shed it like one might a cumbersome winter coat no longer needed.

Her back hit the iron bars on the far side of the cage and still she continued to kick out, pressing herself as far into the metal as she could in a desperate bid to get away. Run away, her mind screamed, run away! But she nowhere to run, and she couldn’t take her eyes of the wretched display taking place before her.

Arms bulging and twisting until the bones cracked and bent at odd angles, breaking through the skin only for the flesh to warp and regrow around the contusions, leaving the arm lengthened and gnarled as an oak tree’s branches. Lincoln’s outstretched hand, the one reaching out to Lynn, his older sister, in a silent plea for help, slowly withdrew, claws clenched tight into a fist so tight blood oozed from where nails dug into palm and he slammed his fist down into the cage floor hard enough to dent the metal.

Lynn watched in silent horror as Lincoln’s legs bulged, the muscles tearing through the skin, leaking boiling blood all over the floor to burn at the flesh stain the floor with copper rust. The bones there too shifted, adjusted, the flesh pulled and warped as the ankles wrenched themselves free and were pulled back ‘till the legs became crooked and dog-like.

Lynn openly sobbed as her brother’s head began to swell and bubble, as something beneath the surface began to push out, inch by inch, until the skin could no longer take the abuse and something long and black and spiraling finally tore through, growing upwards and outwards before finally two spiraling horns as long as her arms stood there proudly in spite of the damage they had wrought.

Lynn screamed as the thing bursting out from the chrysalis that was once Lincoln Loud let out a horrible moan and it’s spine finally ruptured out of the back, breaking and re-fusing and breaking again as it grew and pulled and twisted its way upwards and out, the flesh and muscle growing alongside it as though trying to keep it tethered to the body. The red muscle, still glinting with raw wetness, grew and spread as Lincoln’s skin fell away, replacing it with crimson leather and glowing veins of bile and venom.

The beast that once was Lincoln swung its mighty arms with muscles of tightly knotted cords and with screaming metal the rusty chains that once held it shackled to the iron bars came undone. It stood, growing taller and taller, as tall as anything Lynn had ever seen, and when it screamed in triumphant rage and malice as old and deep and hateful as hate itself it did so with a mouth so wide Lynn thought it could swallow up the whole of the world.

And as it screamed, she realized there was another sound accompanying it. Soft, faint, almost drowned out by the reverberating wrath but echoing in her head all the same. It was the sound of laughter, small at first but quickly growing, deranged and wild in its abandonment of all delusions of justice and the pitiful world of man and all its constraints.

And then, Lynn suddenly realized, just why that laughter sounded so familiar.

It was hers.

On the far side of camp, where there was once merriment and joviality, there was now only concern, confusion, and a growing sense of undeniable fear; for in the wake of that unholy scream and the dread that misbegotten sound brought there could be no room for anything resembling human warmth.

Yet still, in spite of their fear and their trepidation, the men raced towards their doom all the same. How could they not, it had called to them as plain as the setting sun in the sky. They answered the call, all of them to a man. They came with their guns, they came with their swords and their flails, their maces and spears, and their courage. And when they had arrived at that cast-off cage housing their greatest shame and deadliest secret, they all at once realized that it would not be enough, that none of it would have ever been enough.

Lynn laughed at their faces, at the fear and horror in their swinish eyes as they beheld her baby brother in all his terrible majesty; at the way they stopped and held themselves back, too afraid of the child they’d tortured to ever lay another hand on him again.

She laughed when her brother ran out to meet them. Laughed when long arms and crooked talons scythed through soft bellies to send stinking offal flying in wide arcs. Laughed when strong jaws and silvery teeth clasped tight around necks to send severed heads sailing through the air. She laughed when he ripped out spines and when he pulled out organs. Broken arms and shattered legs, spleens and pancreases and bleeding intestines and pulpy brains leaking from caved-in skulls.

She laughed at the screams they made when they died, at the sheer horror in their voices as they pleaded for mercy or salvation from something that neither owed them as much nor would mete out such sentiments. She laughed when her brother killed them, fast or slow it didn’t matter because in the end they all died choking on their own blood, the last moments of their lives spent in terror and mortal fear not only for their weak shells of flesh but for the very souls.

She laughed as he slaughtered them, and she marveled at his power and glory and the ease with which he tore the ones who had hurt him apart. Nothing was ever going to hurt him again. Nothing was ever going to hurt him again!

And when Lincoln was done, when he howled to the heavens all full of hate and power and told the world to tremble for he was finally free she howled alongside him, triumphant in her exultation because they were both free now, free and wild and untamed and monstrous and terrible and beautiful forever and always.

And in that moment Lynn knew that everything was going to be alright.

They were safe now.

{Chapter End}