39. Chapter 39 - Lori's Origin Continued

AN: This story is still a thing. I promise.

So basically, the deal here is that Hero was supposed to write the next chunk of the story, but a lot of stuff has come up over the last few months, and its been difficult for us to get our collaboration on, which is also one of the reasons I've been writing other stuff. But I figured the story's been dormant long enough, so I'm going to try and get a little bit more of it written, and hopefully in a way that avoids stepping on Hero's toes while he's taking care of business.

Anyway, enjoy.

BEEP BEEP BEEP

Lori looked up from her phone as the familiar chirping of the Loud family's coffee maker announced the completion of its one and only designated function, and breathed a quiet relieved sigh. The Loud house, ever true to the name of its inhabitants, was always full of life, and the various clamors that were made as a product of that life going about its business. Even before she'd gotten her superpowers, Lori had long been used to the sounds of the Louds at work coloring the extraneous details of her reality. And while the emergence of her super hearing had initially made that facet of life...difficult to live with, to say the least, eventually she had adjusted once more, and in time even came to appreciate the strange sense of reassurance that came with the din. After all, a loud Loud was in its natural state of being, which likely meant that they were healthy, and most important of all, safe. In that state of mind, she'd come to associate a literal loud house as a sign that everything was right with the universe.

On this particular day, the house was oddly quiet. There was no maliciousness at work here, it was just the way of things. Aside from Leni, who was at work, and Lily, who was out running errands with their parents, the remainder of Lori's siblings were off at school—

BOOP BOOP

EEEEEEEP, EEEEEEP

—save for Lisa, who had exercised her special dispensation to stay at home and work on...something. For which, Lori was grateful. Normally she herself would have been long gone, out patrolling the city or doing whatever specific tasks called for her particular abilities, but due to the terms of her agreement with Carol, Lori was entitled to a few days off. While happy to have a rare opportunity to unwind a little, the abundance of solitude with which she'd found herself had quickly become more than a little unsettling, and so Lori had quickly found herself grateful for the oddly reassuring noises emanating from Lisa's lab. Speaking of which...

Lori glanced back down at her phone to check the time. Half-past ten, plus or minus a few minutes. A flick of her finger opened up her messaging app, which confirmed what she'd already suspected. No messages from Carol. Which, at this point, meant that it was very likely that she would actually get to keep her day off. Imagine that.

Relatively certain that she wouldn't have to rush off anywhere, Lori got up from her seat and walked across the kitchen to the waiting coffee maker. Normally she wouldn't have bothered, since as far as she could tell caffeine didn't seem to do anything for her, but that was precisely why she was indulging on this occasion. The ritual of making the beverage, however pointless, cemented the day as being one designated for relaxation, and so on the rare occasion when Lori had a day off, she tried to start the day with a cup of coffee.

Lori poured herself a mug of the steaming hot beverage and then took an experimental sip. Finding it lacking, she held the mug at arm's length, took careful aim, and gave the liquid a light zap of her heat vision. Tiny and thin though it was, the beam evaporated the top layer of the liquid in an instant, leaving her with about a quarter less than she'd started with, but the remainder of the drink bubbled violently, its enthusiasm far outshining the coffee that still remained in the pot. Taking this as a good sign, Lori quickly mixed in some cream and sugar, and downed the nearly molten beverage in a single gulp.

"Much better," She thought, allowing herself a moment to bask in the warmth that was now spreading throughout her body.

"Lori?"

The eldest Loud sibling's ears perked up and she detected the soft intonation of her name coming from upstairs. And that, would be Lisa.

"Alright then," She muttered, crossing back to the table and snatching up her phone. "Time to get this over with."

"Greetings, eldest sister," Said Lisa, not looking away from her computer monitor, as the very audible sound of her lab door sliding open rang through the air.

This, naturally, was by design. While she had more sophisticated security measures in place to protect her work, should the need ever arise, Lisa made a point of reserving those measures for times when she was not physically present in her lab, so as to reduce the possibility that her family might be on the receiving end of her security. The noisy door, therefore, served as a simple, but surprisingly effective way to keep her from becoming so absorbed in her work that she might fail to notice that a visitor had come calling.

"Have a seat," She continued, her fingers flying across her keyboard as she began wrapping things up. "I'll be with you in a moment"

"You couldn't have sent a text?" Lori asked, padding softly into the room.

"I could have," Lisa answered, knowing full well that the question had been rhetorical. "But my hands are otherwise occupied, as you can see, and I knew there was a statistically favorable chance that you were listening for my call."

Lori huffed in annoyance, but didn't press the issue, which allowed Lisa to more fully focus her attention on the work before her.

"Finished," She said at last, saving her latest results, and tacking on a few layers of encryption just for good measure. "I apologize for keeping you waiting."

"It's fine."

Lisa spun around in her chair to find Lori lounging on her couch, just as the previous time they'd met. Save for the fact that this time, Lori had opted to remain in her sleep ware.

"At least this thing is comfy," The older girl continued, stretching her arms out, seemingly unaware that doing so caused her already snug nightshirt to be pulled even more implausibly tightly against her ample bust, several magnitudes beyond what should have been the garment's breaking point, a feat which Lisa presumed was due to Leni's fashion wizardry. "How come you haven't gotten one of these for the living room?"

"I didn't buy it, I made it," Said Lisa. "But I'll see what I can do about upgrading our existing furniture."

She made a mental ote to destroy the security logs of this session as soon as she'd gotten the data needed from them. Lisa's lab operated on a closed system, completely isolated from the internet and making it impossible to access her data without having physical access to the machine that the data happened to be stored on. In theory, nothing recorded here could ever be seen by an outsider without the incredibly unlikely occurrence of someone mounting a physical assault upon her lab, and managing to fight their way through Lisa's defenses, which included five extremely powerful, and extremely protective older sisters. Nevertheless, happenstance being what it was, Lisa still felt that she owed it to Lori to ensure that this extremely candid footage of her sister, in a very vulnerable state, could never see the light of day.

Besides, with the way things tended to play out these days, it would be Lincoln who inevitably found this video, completely unaware of how implausible his achievement was. And the poor boy already got enough stimulation from their older sister. Too much, as far as she was concerned.

"I appreciate that you agreed to meet with me again," Lisa said getting up to grab her notebook before situating herself across from Lori once more. "I had wanted to wrap this up sooner, but—"

"We've been busy," Lori concluded. "Tha was that whole thing where the Lord of Terror attacked the city. Plus, Lincoln went on that not-a-date with Carol..."

"One of those clearly being more pertinent than the other." Interjected Lisa.

Lori's eyes narrowed and her lips flattened into a thin line. "I feel like you're trying to say something, without saying something."

"I'm just making an observation," Lisa replied, flipping her notebook open. "In addition, I understand you and Lincoln are preparing for a trip."

"Yeah," Lori's frown deepened. "That's been more than a little time-consuming. We're taking a trip to Carol's homeland so Lincoln can help her weasel out of her cultural obligation to wrangle herself a guy. Honestly, I was kind of hoping he'd find a way to weasel out of it. Or at least be able to solve the whole thing from here by just giving Carol a heartwarming speech, like he usually does."

"I also understand that you weren't actually invited to go along on this trip."

Lori chuckled. It wasn't a particularly nice one. "Yeah. Carol pointed that out too."

"How'd that go?"

"I respectfully disagreed," Lori said, her lips curling up into a smirk. "And now I'm going too." Do you have a problem with that?"

"Impressive."

"Not really," Lori shrugged. "I just put my foot down and told her—"

"I mean it's impressive that the city is still standing," Lisa corrected her, the barest hint of a smile on her face.

"Very funny," Lori muttered, rolling her eyes. "Do you really think I'd let things get that out of hand?"

"I seem to recall that the last time a blonde superheroine got too close to Lincoln the collateral damage was so severe that we accidentally made contact with a civilization of mole people that had been living right under the city without our knowledge." Said Lisa, stroking her chin thoughtfully. "Lucky for us that they turned out to be non-confrontational, that could have gotten complicated in the worst possible way."

"That was Irol!" Lori snapped, "And she was literally trying to steal my life! It's not my fault she didn't want to go back to her own stupid dimension!"

"Didn't she offer to go back peacefully, provided she got to take Lincoln with her?'

"Are you saying I should have let her?" Lori asked incredulously.

"Of course not," Lisa scoffed, jotting down a reminder to consult her records of that particular incident while she was processing the data from this session. "If you'll pardon my French, you gave the harlot what she deserved."

"...I can't decide if I should take an insult against my dimensional doppelganger personally or not," Mused Lori.

"Based on my own personal experiences, I would strongly suggest that you don't. It's far easier to process such encounters if you simply consider the two of you to be separate people. Regardless, the city has long considered you and Carol strongly disagreeing about something to be a scenario that would call for immediate evacuation, so I'm extremely grateful that the two of you were able to work things out."

Lori frowned, sinking a little deeper into her seat. "I wasn't actually going to do anything. I just...don't like the idea of Lincoln going on that sort of trip on his own. I mean, am I wrong?"

"Are you asking if I have a problem with you accompanying our brother to an island full of beautiful, scantily clad, physically imposing women with a propensity towards violence? Not to mention an ecosystem absolutely brimming with natural-born crimes against nature?" Lisa asked sarcastically. "Not at all. In fact, when we're done here, I'd love to show you a few things from my armory that might make your trip go a little more smoothly."

"I...appreciate the sentiment," Lori said, cautiously. "But we're going to need to be able to make it through customs. Besides, I'm just looking to keep Lincoln safe, not start a diplomatic incident."

"I would remind you that at this point in time, a locator beacon keyed to one of the orbital weapons platforms that I may or may not have backdoor access to would not technically count as a weapon." Said Lisa, conversationally. "But that's fine. I trust in your ability to protect Lincoln."

"Good?"

"Indeed," Lisa nodded. "Now, shall we resume our conversation about your origin?"