A Life in Decline

There Was Fire In His Eyes

Author's Notes (Top of the Pops): I'm surprised and flattered by the overwhelming response to this fic, I really am.

As a heads up, chapters are going to vary in length. When I set out to write this story in the first place, I planned for none of them to be longer than 2,500 to 3,000 words, but like I've been saying, I've just been having so much fun with it all that it's hard to put a cap on some of them. But there usually is a cap to them: a line or dialogue or revelation that's just such a good stopping point or a hard blow that it'd be lame to make the chapter continue past it.

Let me show you what I mean.

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He did it.

He couldn't believe he actually did it. Just like that, he made his mind known. Seeing Lucy recoil and her face twist in revulsion and confusion, he knew it was about time to get out of there before the waterworks started. Sure, she was a stoic girl, but he knew he had just pushed her past her limits. He stood and started towards the stairs.

"Ah-bu-bu-bu-bu-but Linc, mah boy!" Lynn Sr put his hands around his son's shoulders. "I know what we said, but.... are you sure? I-it's fine if you really feel that way, I swear! I-I just—"

He politely removed his father's hands from his shoulders. "Sorry, Dad. But I just can't."

Rita shoved her face into her hands.

Lucy stood there, mouth agape at first, then closed, as her whole body sagged. Somewhere, a light had just gone out in her life.

"Linky!" said Leni.

Less calmly, he said, "Don't you Linky me. You all said it, didn't you? That I'm not obligated to forgive any of you." His eyes passed over them all like a judge having just dropped an unexpectedly harsh sentence.

Earnestly, she replied, "But, like, if you aren't oblong gated to forgive, what if you forget?"

Lincoln stopped and snickered darkly, then warmly. "Leni, I love you, I really do."

"Aww, I love you too, Linky."

"But sorry, not sorry. I can't forgive Lucy. Not now. And that's that." He passed by a dazed and confused Luan, ruffling her hair with a sudden palm noogie, and disappeared up the stairs.

"Lincoln, Lincoln! Wait!" shouted Lynn Sr. He looked to his gothic daughter and then to the stairs before bolting after his son, Rita close behind.

Lori sighed and set her head between her legs. 'I literally knew something like this would happen...'

That which she feared came true: that Lincoln would actually take up their offer to not forgive them, or at least one of them.

They weren't lying, she told herself, were they? Part of that process meant giving Lincoln his own agency, and that meant accepting whatever he chose. It was entirely possible he chose to not forgive any of them. It was entirely possible he chose to not forgive one of them.

That didn't make it feel any less offensively painful. And she looked up at the little baby bat still standing there, her hands still outstretched as if holding a poem.

She stood up, arms folded and fingers against her chin, and followed her parents upstairs. Luna also stood, and went to Lucy.

"Hey, Luce... are you... are you okay?"

Silently, she replied, "Yeah..."

Lily looked up, peering past those bangs that had obscured those eyes. The trembling, the twitching, the shock, the horror— she was a window that had been broken, but the rest of the pane had not yet shattered.