Somebody please explain!?!?!?!?

Those are i think called quadrilateral linkage forks. I remember seeing photos of them on various bikes from the late 60s, 70s. I think honda bought the rights from valentino ribi to build whats in the photo. Decoster liked them. I think he had some made from that ribi guy when at Suzuki.
They were lighter, had less stiction, than the era fork back then. If you look at those crazy sidecar bikes, pretty sure they still use leading links.
I have a mag from the 80s that had a big write up on those, there were alot of versions of leading links made over the years, i bet if you search the interweb youd find photos of them, or info.

It's called the RIBI Quadrilateral I think. I have seen a picture with DeCoster checking them out.

DeCoster tested and raced one for Honda I think. A pic of him on it may have been on a MXA cover.

Decoster raced with the twin shock Ribi Quadrilateral forks a few times.

He influenced Honda to buy the rights / licence for them. You can find many pictures of Works Hondas with them on - twin shock and single shock. I do hope Ribi got a good amount of money from them for his design(s). They are totally different to the leading link forks you find on Sidecars - all of the extra links / pivot points were to give the wheel travel a path similar to Telescopic forks, where std leading links travel in a single arc. Though, there are some that use a wheel mounting system that has the wheel mounted to a plate (think Kawasaki's Foo Bar / Lawwills system, but on the front of a leading link fork) that can change the axle path from a strict arc.

Cagiva tried them on both 125s and the 500s, around the same time that Decoster tried them. Villa did too, but in machined aluminium, rather than welded tubular steel, well before Honda went to Aluminium, .

A fair few others tried them - Eric Cheney made a few bikes with them, and plenty of small frame makers and private individuals made copies of the Ribis.

Now, most Engineers will tell you that Telescopic Forks are an engineering abomination. And that's certainly true - my Engineering brain tells me just that.

But, they've been developed intensively over the decades, and work bloody well.

No matter how light the components of the various Ribis were made, they have quite an inertia / Polar Moment problem, not just by the weight of componentry, but the varying amounts (of PMI) that are created during their travel.

And the amount of individual components to them is substantial.

Then, you get into the huge amount of pivot points they can have - you'll find, at least, on that front end pictured, 20 pivot points (don't forget the brake torque arm and backing plate pivot at the axle, people), not including the steering head bearings. That's a lot of bearings, a Lot of potential for bearing slop. Just check out your average linkaged rear end, for bearing slop - most would be shocked at the amount of 'free movement' at the rear wheel, from slop in linkage bearings - even on new bikes. Then think about that being on a front end. Cripes, the money I spent on high enough quality rose joints on some of my bicycle suspension systems was frightening - thinking of the costs of bearings for a Ribi type front end makes my bank account twitch in fear.

Despite all of this , I do love 'funny front ends' (and weird rear ends, such as the Boyesen Link) . So I'm not slagging the Ribi at all - just putting forward some problems / potential problems that exist with 'funny front ends'. Hell, one of my long term projects Is / are a couple of 'funny front ends', just because I can make them.