A/N: Just a heads-up, this is technically a sequel to An Average Day. BUT! You do not need to have read it to understand what's going on. Some smaller things would make more sense, though. It's not the one-shot that I'd suggested it'd be in An Average Day. Looks like it'll be a three-chapter fic, with a rather large second chapter.
Another note: the details are sparse on purpose. Partly for plot reasons, partly because I'm experimenting with brevity a bit. I think I'll use this entire fic as a way to experiment with my style.
Anyways, on with the fic!
Kim brushed at the bust of her jacket as she adjusted it along her frame. Taking a breath in, then out, she examined herself in the mirror that hung in the bedroom she shared with Ron.
Her familiar visage looked back at her. Her bobbed hair was tamed and lined up with her jaw, sharp tailored blazer freshly pressed, stylish slacks laying properly on her frame…
Powerful. That's how she looked. It was also how she wanted to look. This meeting… It was important. Probably the most important one she would ever attend. The negotiations were sure to be fierce. But it was okay.
This would be doable. After all, she could do anything.
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Kim growled to herself as she tapped her foot impatiently against the carpeted floor of the generic so-called 'waiting area' of the office she was visiting. She had been right on time. Right on time! There was no reason she should be waiting. None!
But of course she had to. Because her 'host' wouldn't be nice enough to be on time. Probably set it all up from the get-go to have this happen!
She perked up as the doors across the room opened up. Kim knew from past attempts at negotiation as an agent of GJ that the room they would end up in was in that direction. Her face twisted in disgust, however, as she saw who was entering the room from there.
The Go sisters.
It always threw Kim for a loop whenever she saw them; they mostly took on Drakken's characteristics save for their eyes, lips, and body type… Those had all of Shego's snark, condescension, and all-around nastiness piled into them. It was just plain odd seeing those particular expressions play off on a face she was used to seeing nothing of the sort from. The only unique thing that was all their own was that one of them was orange with shorter pigtails while the other one was yellow with a long lower back-length ponytail.
Just as she noticed them, they noticed her.
"Well well well…" one of the twins purred in their deep silky contralto, lips quirking in amusement. "What do we have here!"
"Looks like a relic," the other one answered. "Of a bygone era. Tell us…" She walked over and leaned towards Kim. "What's it like having a hip replacement?"
"Or memory problems? I bet you have all kinds of excitement when you find that your supply of adult diapers is still full!" The two tittered as the one hovering next to Kim stood up straight and rejoined her twin in jeering at the redhead. Up close it took all of Kim's willpower not to react as she could see they were wearing all sorts of high-class stolen goods. Especially the necklaces, which she knew they'd managed to rip from Falsetto Jones before he retired. The jewels complimented their skin well, to her ire.
Kim opened her mouth to retort when a familiar voice cut in.
"Now now, girls, no point in rubbing salt in the wound," the smooth voice chuckled from behind them.
Shego.
Kim's eye narrowed in frustration. She'd been hoping to be dealing with Drakken. He was at least up front about where one stood in discussions. Shego liked to lead people in verbal wild goose chases before cutting the strings on them.
Pushing down her feelings, she let a quiet curt grunt of, "Hello, Shego." come out of her mouth.
"Princess! Hello there!" Shego walked between her two daughters who parted like water for her and stood towering over Kim in her usual thigh high-booted outfit. "It's so good to see you…" The tiny thin scars on either side of the green woman's mouth stretched as she grinned widely. "Or should I call you queen now? You're getting up there, after all…"
The three Go family members chuckled together. The noise ground at Kim's nerves. She reminded herself of why she was there. This was more important than her pride. As grating as it was, they held most of the cards. Kim would have to deal with the hand she had.
"Our meeting was supposed to be an hour ago," Kim pointed out harshly. "I'm sure your time isn't unlimited. Neither is mine."
"Oh, Cupcake… If there's anything I'm not lacking, it's time." The villainess shrugged. "We just got lost in planning the next set of construction efforts for Shegoton. These places won't run themselves, you know."
And again Kim was reminded of another thing that Drakken and Shego had gotten one over on her. Transforming the various little properties into small city-states was both brilliant and aggravating. It was annoying how well their plans had worked. But considering what living under them offered…
It was tempting for most. Overly much for many. Drakken and Shego kept a firm hand on their assets, though. No one yet had managed to crack the one big technological breakthrough that Drakken had achieved.
Her feelings must have played across her face as Shego chuckled and noted, "Well, I suppose you must be counting down the seconds…" The green woman stretched her neck up and kissed both of her daughters on the cheek. "Time for you two to get back to it. Mama Shego has business to tend to. See ya later, Bella, Donna."
"Goodbye, Mother," the two drolly said in sync with a shared eye roll before they began walking off. The yellow girl, Donna, called over her shoulder, "We'll tell your brothers that you said 'hey'!"
Kim sneered at her retreating back.
"Shall we?" Shego motioned for Kim to follow her. The redhead's eye narrowed in frustration at the entire situation but complied, getting up from her chair and swiftly making her way through the open doors.
In less than a minute the two were situated in one of Drakken and Shego's meeting rooms. It was always annoying when she entered them. They looked like generic meeting spaces, lacking the normal flair the rest of the building had with displaying the two's colors and patterns. Even the staff in this area lacked the normal boringly common fashions those two encouraged in their cities, instead looking like average office drones. It gave them an air of legitimacy that didn't sit well with the redhead at all.
"So then…" Shego settled back into her seat and plopped her head into her propped-up hands. "What does lil' ol' Kimmie need from DraGo Co?"
"That's still a stupid name," Kim couldn't keep herself from saying.
Shego frowned for a second, then narrowed her eyes, smirking. "Well, if all you did was come here to mock us-.."
"You know as well as I do what I'm here to bargain for," the redhead interrupted, trying to place herself in a slightly better position.
Shego was having none of it, to her frustration. Instead of rising to the bait, she relaxed back into her chair and asked, "No, I can't say I do."
Kim resisted grinding her teeth. "You know I want-.."
"Okay okay, maybe I do!" Shego interrupted with a smug chuckle. Shaking her head, the villainess said, "The answer is the same to you as it is to everyone else: no. Do you know why?" She straightened up in her chair. "The world simply isn't ready for it, Kimmie. Overpopulation is still a problem, and this would just make things worse." She spread her hands out magnanimously. "We at DraGo Co feel a deep connection to our fellow man! We're trying to think of the bigger picture. Limit the use to a few inspiring forward-thinking people making the world a better place! I-.."
"This is for personal use," Kim broke in quietly.
That threw Shego off. Her hands halted, face dropping in a weird way at the revelation. "Eh?" A spark of something went through her eyes. "What was that?"
"I'm willing to give you any and all of my assets to have access to some of your technology." Saying the words made Kim nauseous.
"Oh?" If her chuckle before was smug, then this one was condescendingly so. "Now now, Kimmie, you know there's an evaluation period. If you're considered good enough to be a citizen of Shegoton, Drakkenville, or any of our smaller hamlets, then you'll hear back! The backlog is quite fierce, though, and it may take a few years-.."
"I don't want to join you two, and there's no time to wait!" Kim growled. Sighing, she said, "I'll give you whatever I have to get some of the technology. I…" she shut her eyes "...I won't share it with anyone else. I just need it for my own use."
"Anything and everything, hm?" Shego sat back into her chair and watched Kim for a few moments. Then she got up and began walking to the door. "Give me a minute."
Kim blinked as Shego exited the room. That was…
Her eye narrowed. What was Shego up to?
Carefully, quietly, Kim got up from her chair and went over to put her ear against the door. There was a strange beeping noise that cut out almost the second Kim heard it.
"Shego!" Kim heard Drakken's voice snap loudly with a slight electronic waver to it. "What are you doing calling me? It's your turn to field meetings today, and you know I'm with the little ones!"
"Got an interesting situation…" Shego said almost too quietly for Kim to pick up. "Need you to come to this meeting with Cupcake."
"Cupca-.." Drakken stopped himself short. Then, after a minute of heeing and hawing, he said in a cartoony voice, "Sorry babies! Pop-Pop Drakken has something he needs to take care of."
Crying started up, almost drowning Shego's sigh out.
"Nono! It's okay! I'll be back! Just, just give me a few minutes. You three can even snuggle with Sir Floppington while I'm gone!"
"Pwomise?" a small child's voice innocently asked.
"Yes, I pwo-.. Erm, promise." Some shuffling happened. Then a triumphant, "Here you go!"
Small cheering with a touch of sniffles was audible even through the door.
Grumpily Drakken said, "There! I'll be up in a few minutes. This had better be worth breaking up storytime for!"
"It could be…" Shego said enigmatically. Then, loudly, she asked, "Right, Queeny?"
Kim's nostrils flared. Then, petulantly, she stomped back to her seat.
A few minutes passed with nothing happening. Then the door burst open to admit both Shego and Drakken.
Drakken looked the same as usual. Scar on the left, giant eyepatch - this one decorated with poorly glued-on rhinestones - on the right, dark blue double-breasted overcoat… The only new thing was the platter of cookies he was parading around in his hands.
"Here!" He cheerily placed the tray in front of Kim before taking a couple of cookies for himself. Glaring at Shego, he loudly said as he waved a cookie at her, "Gracious hosts provide refreshments for their guests!"
"Do I look like a gracious host?" the green woman shot back, resuming the seat she had been in previously.
"Hmph!" He flopped into a chair next to her. Then, ponderously, he nibbled a cookie while looking at Kim. Curiously he asked, "So, Kimberly Anne… You'll give us anything?"
"I'm not going to join you," she stated clearly, deciding to set it all out on the table. "But I will let you have whatever I own. My home? Yours. My car? Yours. My…" she sighed "...any technology I can access… It's yours."
Shego and Drakken shared a look. Then, to Kim's frustration, they chuckled.
Drakken shook his head. "Anything you own? Please. You talk as if we couldn't get our hands on the same things if we wanted to!" He tilted his head. "Everything has a price. It's just a matter of finding out what it costs to get it!
"So no, we don't want everything you own."
Kim outwardly frowned, but internally felt herself start to collapse. If, if she couldn't get this… This was the last chance. There was nothing else. How could she-..
"...but…"
Shego's conditional statement brought Kim's attention back to the table.
"There is one thing you could do for us…" Shego said, looking at Drakken skeptically. He motioned with his hands for her to keep going. Rolling her eyes, the green woman continued, "We were curious…" Steepling her fingers, she asked, "Would you be willing to take down Dementor for us?"
Kim blinked. "What?"
"Sounds silly, I know," Shego said with a wave of her hand. "Since when does that old troll register on our radar, right? Well…" her lips quirked in amusement "...that moron has been doing small raids on us. Trying to get our tech. Now, there's no way he can get it. Doesn't make his efforts any less annoying to us. So if you could knock him down a peg, that'd be peachy."
"You'll give me some of your tech… For taking down Dementor?" It seemed easy. Too easy.
"Only a week's worth!" Drakken proclaimed peevishly. "No more!"
"And no less," Shego noted.
Kim's eyebrows came together as she confirmed, "All you want is for me to stop Dementor's plans?"
"Wow. Is old age really taking that big of a toll on you?" Shego shook her head, then smirked. "Yeah. Just need you to distract that old man from us. As you say, it's 'no big'. Especially for a bigwig GJ agent like yourself. So then…" Shego stood from the table and leaned over, reaching a hand out. "Do we have a deal?"
KRKRKRKRKR
Kim slowly opened the door to her and Ron's home. It used to be her parent's home, but it was passed down to the two of them. They'd reasoned that they would need the room for any children they had.
The thought made Kim internally wince.
Ignoring it, she shut the door and locked it. She took a second to stop and listen. The television sounded like it was on, flipped onto… Bricks of Fury 8, if her ears didn't deceive her. Excited laughter echoed from the same room. It was a relief; Kim had been worried that he would've tried cooking for her again. Considering his condition…
But that would get better. It had to!
She shook her head and, after taking her shoes off, went into the living room. As expected, Ron was in his usual spot on the couch wearing the clothes she'd helped dress him in, leaning forward excitedly. At her entrance, he looked up at her, eyes sparkling with delight.
"KP! Look at this!" He waved a hand at the tv. "Can you believe it? It's a new Bricks of Fury movie!" A cheer burst out of his mouth. "It said it was the eighth one, but hellooooo~ They've only made up to six! Must be a PR stunt." Blinking, he motioned at the couch. "You should watch it with me!"
Kim sighed. It was her seventh time seeing this particular movie. She could quote most of it by heart. Nevertheless, she watched a few minutes with him, taking a quick seat by his side.
Absently she took his hand in her own and began playing around with it. It was, as expected, just as wrinkly as normal. Same bulging veins, paper-thin skin… Time had not been kind to her Ron.
...but that wouldn't matter.
Kim squeezed his hand and stood back up. Stretching, she wandered over to the side of the couch and made like she was looking out the window. Instead she pulled the little ray gun that Drakken and Shego had given her out. She looked at it for a few moments, flipping it around in her hands. It looked like a generic everyday mad scientist ray gun. Nothing spectacular about it. Save for what it did.
Closing her eye, taking a calming breath in, then out, she shot Ron in the back with it.
A strange purple halo surrounded her husband for a moment before fading away. He didn't seem to notice, too enraptured by the movie to care. The gun itself made a small snapping noise before it collapsed slightly, some of the circuitry blowing itself out.
Kim waited a minute to see if anything extra happened. Nothing seemed to have changed. He was still the same Ron as he was a few minutes ago, potbelly and all.
She wasn't sure why she had gotten her hopes up. It was only a week's worth of charge. It couldn't cure his age-based dementia just with that little bit of time.
...that was the wrong way to look at it. It gave her something: another week with her Ron. With him at home with her.
It was more than she had a minute ago. And that was worth the little detour to take down Professor Dementor.