This is a one-chapter follow up to the story Morning conversations. It's rather long, so if you wanna read it, you had better arm yourself with some patience. Also, it starts out with a long stretch of seemingly pointless fluff. However, if you persist in reading, you'll find it all leads up to some more serious stuff.
I do not own Kim Possible, who is © Disney, created by Schooley and McCorcle, and designed by Steven Silver. I just borrow her. Stacey and Kelley are OCs.
House
Saturday breakfasts at the Possible-McGoohan household were always somewhat chaotic and this particular morning was no exception.
The girls had slept in and were now full of energy, talk and shenanigans. Kim dealt with it by retreating into the single-minded enjoyment of her food, while Shelley focused on preparing; cooking and putting more stuff to eat on the table. Both the adults felt their ears being chafed by the uninterrupted chatter from their daughters. They had long ago given up on getting their offspring not to talk with food in their mouths. Oh, it worked for nice dinners and when there were guests, but weekend breakfasts were a free-for-all won by the one who could make the most noise.
Eventually, the family had eaten all that was on the table and by a cosmic serendipity there arrived a moment when nobody was actually talking. Shelley grabbed the opportunity.
"Today," she said, "Kimmie-mummy is going to need some time for studying, so you and me have to go shopping. We need to get sum groceries, but also some warmer clothes for you, for the winter. First, though, Kim and I need to use the gym, so you have to clear away all your toys and stuff."
This met with loud protests. Some were expected, having to do with the boring nature of shopping for clothes. The more violent opposition was, however, to the notion of emptying the exercise room.
"Mom! We have only just finished building a railroad for Thomas the Tank! We can't tear it down now!"
"Well, you'll just have to build it in your room instead."
"There's no room! We can't have a main line and the Vicars town Central in our bedroom!"
"Tough. Deal with it. You can't have it in the gym."
"Never mind," Stacey stage-whispered to her sister, "We'll just put it all in the kitchen."
"That's an excellent idea, Stacey, " Shelley said. "Provided you never want to eat a cooked meal in this house, again."
"Well, so what? We'll just eat at Grandma's!"
"You do that. Remember, it will be brain-loaf every other night."
Both Stacey and Kelley shuddered at the thought.
"But, it isn't fair! We have nowhere to play! All the other kids have big playrooms!"
Shelley started to look dangerous. "This is not a discussion. Get your shit out!"
Both girls were halted in their tracks by Shelley's use of a bad word. This was serious. Kim eventually broke the silence that followed.
"They're right, you know," she said. "We really need a bigger house."
"Yeah," Kelley said. "We gots'ta have a castle."
" 'Cause we're princesses, and they live in castles."
"Not really, kids," Kim said. "Not nowadays."
"No," Shelley added. "Castles are medieval, military fortresses. They're are rather unpractical to live in."
"And, besides, we already have a castle, on the Isla Pequeña.
"That's a ruin!"
"Kids, we need a bigger house, not a castle. Preferably in Middleton, and as close as possible to your grandparents and friends.
"But it has to have big stables!"
"Stables?" Shelley asked, although she could guess where this was going. "Whatever for?"
"To keep our horses in, stupid."
"Stacey Anne Possible McGoohan! Did you just call your mother stupid?"
"Well, what else would you use a stable for?"
Kim and Shelley looked at each other and sighed.
"Let's start again, shall we." Shelley got up to refill glasses with apple juice for the kids and mugs of coffee for her and Kim. She placed a plate of oatmeal cookies on the table. Kelley drew up an extra chair for Mal the cat who, she felt, needed to be part of the discussions.
So," Kim said, "we need a bigger house, and we are not, repeat not, getting any horses."
"Yeah," Shelley said. "Horses are evil. Their legs are much too long for the size of their brains. And then you sit on them, and they move, and you fall off and hit your head. Evil."
"But if their legs were shorter, they wouldn't reach the ground," Stacey said, looking smug.
Stacey and Shelley put out their tongues at each other.
"As I said – bigger house. We need a master bedroom and a bedroom for you two girls, preferably with en suites.
"What's 'an sweet'?" Kelley asked.
"It means the bedrooms have their own bathrooms, that you can enter without going out into the hall."
"Yeah," Shelley continued, "and two guest-rooms with double or twin beds."
"What for?" Stacey asked.
"For having guests staying over, of course."
"Oh, like your brothers!"
"On second thoughts, let's skip the guest-rooms."
"Not at all! We must be able to have guests staying."
"And a big play-room for us!"
"Yes, a playroom for you, so you can have friends over for play dates."
"And then we'll want a big living-room. A library for all the books from your work and my studies. A separate dining room seating up to twelve people. And a big kitchen."
"A very big kitchen. Bigger than the one I had built in this house."
"And then we need a big gym, perhaps with a sauna."
"And a games room with a huge TV, game consoles and stuff!"
"Yeah, alright, Kelley, maybe a den of sorts. With a snooker table. And we need working rooms for both me and Shelley, and also for you when you get older and start to get homework."
"And a grand piano!"
There was some silence.
"Stacey, why would we need a grand piano? None of us can play the piano."
"I'm sure princesses are suppose' to have grand pianos. They're so shiny."
"Well, if you promise to try taking lessons, we might get a baby grand and then we'll see."
"What, will it grow up if we play a lot on it?"
The grownups laughed.
"Yeah," Shelley said, "you gotta feed it music every day, or else it will shrink into a small upright."
"Shelley, don't tell them stuff like that. What I meant was, if you like playing on the small piano, we might exchange it for a bigger, better one later."
"Oh."
"Also, we need a place for Mal to have as her own," Kelley said. " With one of these big cat towers with scratching poles and platforms. And a nice big cat bed."
"Mrrp," said Mal.
"And a room for the cat, check," Shelley said. "And then, outside, we need a big patio, garden furniture, sun loungers, and a hot tub!"
"And a stable."
"No stable. No horses."
"But we do need a rather big garage," Kim said. "For, like, five cars at least."
"Yeah, and a small repair shop. And a carpentry shop. And a place to work on electronics and stuff."
"And a small stable. For two ponies?"
"Kelley, read my lips. No bloody horses!"
"But if you get a garage for your cars, why can't we get a stable for our horsies?"
"Well, to begin with, you don't have any horsies. And you will not get them either. If you want to sit on top of a stupid animal so much, you can go with great-uncle Slim next time he visits his farm in Montana."
"So," Kim said, "where could we find such a house?"
"I don't think we can find it. I think we need to have it built."
"Okay, so where?"
"You can build on the other side of Grandma's and Grandpa's house," Stacey said.
"Unfortunately not. That's parkland belonging to the town on Middleton. You know, with walking paths, running tracks, picnic spots and stuff. We can't build there."
"Oh."
Shelley sighed and looked at her family. "But I do know where we could find a plot of land to build on."
"You do?"
"Yeah. There's an old farm just on the other side of the Northwest Highway that's up for sale. You can't walk there from Grandma's 'cause of the highway, but it's only, like, five minutes by car."
"And how come you know this?"
Shelley sighed again. "I got an offer from the owners just this week."
There was a bit of silence while Kim thought this over.
"Shel'," she said, "I know you enjoy fixing things and stuff, but I don't like it when you keep secrets and do things without us knowing. We're family now. When where you planning to tell us about this?"
Kim, along with kids and the cat, looked at Shelley with serious faces. Shelley felt a bit hurt.
"I was gonna tell ya'll tomorrow, actually. I was being considerate! You did say that you wanted to get some serious studying done today, so I decided not to distract you with talk about houses until tomorrow!"
Kim's expression softened a bit.
"And I knew about it because I tried to buy that farm five years ago, before I managed to convince the Mitchell's to parcel of the lot I built this house on.
"And in the end, the owners of the farm decided not to sell. But they offered to give me first refusal if they changed their minds. And just now, they did!"
Kim placed her hand on top of her wife's on the table. "Sorry, Shel', I know I should thrust you more."
Shelley sighed for the third time. "Well, now the cat's out of the bag."
Stacey and Kelley looked at Mal, who seemed a bit confused by the sudden stares.
"I mean, now you all know, and you're all curious, so we can just as well go look at it today. You'll just have to do all your studying tomorrow."
"Yeah!" Kelley said.
"Cool!" said Stacey.
"So go wash up, brush your teeth and dress for a trip to the country!"
_\o0o/_
Half an hour later, they all (except for the cat) sat in Shelley's car; the one she drove for everyday trips around town. According to Shelley, it was a machine for getting from A to B, and not a car for actually driving. For the latter, she had a number of high-performance sports cars, as well as the Morgan they had been given as a wedding present. Being Shelley Possible McGoohan, however, the car wasn't exactly an ordinary shopping wagon, but a black Mercedes GLE Coupé with all the extras.
The kids sat in forward-facing child seats in the back and Kim rode shotgun.
"Everybody strapped in?" Shelley asked, backing out from the drive. "We'll just go down to Schooley Boulevard and take a right up to McCorcle Road. From they're to the access ramps to the highway and we're almost there."
"Can you tell us a bit of the house on the way?"
"Yeah, all right. So, perhaps you remember this, Kim. Like seven or eight years ago, they rebuilt the Northwest Highway to cut through the hills to the west of us instead of going round.
"This meant a number of cabins and small houses were tore down. It also meant that some fields and croplands belonging to this farm disappeared. Granted, it wasn't very good farming land, lying on the hillside, but it meant most of the livelihood for this particular farm was gone. The house itself still stands, though. And until now, the owners have lived there, getting by through switching to growing flowers and exotic veggies in hothouses.
"Now, though, they have decided to retire to Florida. They gave me the keys a coupl'a days ago while they went to Boca Raton to look at houses.
They were now taking the turn onto McCorcle Road.
"The one condition they have for selling is that we should keep the old farmhouse standing, and that we should be living on the property. What they really don't want is for the land being sold for development, with petrol stations, highway services, motels and stuff.
They were now already on the bridge over the highway to the access ramps on the western side.
"But it's okay to build a new house on the land. There's still quite a lot, by the way, like where they have the greenhouses, and also some forest."
Shelley now took a narrow dirt road to the right.
"There's electricity, and the water is from a deep, private well. There's a septic tank system for the waste and sewage."
The car wound up on a large dirt drive.
"And," Shelley said, "we're here!"
Everybody got out of the car and looked around. In front of them, there was a sort of unkempt meadow. To the right, were the ground rose, a large, old farmhouse stood on the ridge. To the left, there were a number of dilapidated barns and sheds, as well as a lot of greenhouses. And straight ahead, there was an astonishing number of wrecked cars and farm machinery.
"Cool," Stacey said. "There must be at least sixty-six cars!" She had formed the opinion that six was a big number, and that, consequently, sixty-six was a lot.
"Well," Kim said, "that probably depends on what you mean by a car. Is that pile of rust with two leaf springs a car? Or that old pickup without wheels and engine?"
"Uncle Ed might want them! He can make rat-rods out'a them!"
"I sincerely doubt that. They seem to be all rat and no rod. Though I guess great-uncle Slim might be interested in some of the tractors …"
Something else had, however, caught Kelley's interest. "Look at that big barn," she said. "Perfect for keeping horsies!"
"What did I say? No horsies!"
"Aw, let's look inside, at least."
"I'm not so sure about that, "Kimmie-mum said. "It looks a bit unsafe."
"We can just peek inside," Shelley said.
"Yeah!" Kelley said.
"Cool!" said Stacey.
But the barn was a disappointment. It was full of more broken and rusty farm equipment, broken furniture, more wrecked cars and crates of junk. The roof was sagging, and there was badly boarded up holes in the walls. The kids had to agree that it was not a good place for horses.
Shelley got a briefcase out of the car. "Let's go up and look at the house, instead," she said.
The farmhouse itself was large, but not in the best of repair. The kitchen was big, but lacked modern equipment. There was an electric stove, but there was also big wood-fired kitchen range. The fridge was surprisingly small. Everything looked rather worn.
"Well," Kim said, "I guess we can keep it but we really have to build a big modern house to live in."
"Yeah, that'd be the plan. Here, you can look at the plans and the maps. I'll take a look outside."
The kids explored the house while Kim spread out documents on the big kitchen table.
Kelley and Stacey, however, soon got bored with the inside of the house. From the porch on the back, though, they could see the forest.
"Mum," Stacey asked, "can we go for a walk in the woods?"
But Kim was occupied with the papers for the property. "Not alone, you can't. Go ask Shelley-mom."
But when they got outside, Shelley was on the phone. "Mom, can we go for a walk in the woods?"
"I can't talk to you just now, kids. This is important, and about secret work."
"Oh. If it's Aunt Betty, say hello from us!"
"The kids say hello. Yes. No, we can talk. Yeah." Shelley covered the phone with her hand and addressed her daughters. "Go on. Talk to Kimmie. I'll be along later."
The girls went back inside, but now Kimmie-mummy was also on the phone.
They conferred.
"Did Shelley-mom actually say that we could go into the woods and she would come along later?"
Kelley was not so sure that this was what Shelley had meant. But it was a bit open to interpretation. "She did say we should talk to Mum, though," she said.
Stacey took on the task. "Mum, we'll get started. You can come after. We'll take the path starting at the back door."
Kim waved at them, said 'fine', and nodded, focused on what the person on the telephone was saying.
"Cool!" Kelley said.
"Yeah!" said Stacey. "We go look at the woods, and the mummies will be along!"
They started off along the path, happily doing small, skippy steps. The sun was shining and casting golden shafts of light down through the leafy branches and pine trees. The ground was covered in round, mossy stones and there were pine needles everywhere. Here and there, there were creepers and bushes. Some had blueberries on them. They heard birds and saw butterflies. There were a lot of ants with black and red bodies. It looked like a forest were elves and goblins would be living.
Kelley picked up an old branch from the ground to use as a walking stick. Stacey wanted to pick flowers, but could not find any. Instead she picked some twigs with leaves from bushes and ferns.
"This is a much better enchanted forest than at the wedding party," Stacey said.
"Yeah, this must be were the unicorns really live."
After a while, they crested a rise and could look down into a little forest valley. A small stream ran through it from left to right. There was a meadow in the middle, and the edge of surrounding forest was mostly made up of small, beautiful trees with leaves; not pine or fir. Dragonflies hovered over the water, their wings glittering in the sun.
"Cool!" Stacey said.
"Yeah!" said Kelley.
"If we sit on the boulders over there, maybe we can see a unicorn come grazing," Stacey said.
They sat, but after only a short while, Kelley saw something.
"I don't think any unicorns will dare come," she said. "On account of the really big cat over there."
Stacey looked where Kelley pointed. A really, really big cat was lying on the trunk of a tree that had fallen down into the meadow. It was a tawny, sandy colour, with white around the nose, and black sort-of eyeliner.
"Wow!" Stacey said. "What is it, do you think?"
"Well, it's not a lion, 'cause it hasn't got the hair-do. And it's not a tiger, 'cause it isn't stripe-y."
"And it's not a leppard, 'cause it ain't spotty. And not a Bagheera, 'cause it ain't black."
"But it's really, really, really big."
They looked at the cat and the cat looked at them. Then the beast gathered its paws under its body and crept forward slowly, its belly close to the ground. It looked a lot like Mal the cat when she stalked small birds in the flowerbeds.
"Stacey," Kelley said, "I'm not sure that it is a very nice cat."
"I think it wants to eat us," Stacey replied.
They slowly stood up. The cat kept coming.
"Should we run?"
"No, I think we should try to frighten it." Kelley waved her stick and shouted at the prowling animal, but this only seemed to irritate it.
Suddenly, the cat took three big bounds and jumped towards Stacey. Kelley reacted like the blond woman in the church at the wedding, and took a swing at it using her stick as a bat. She hit it right on the nose, but the stick was old and brittle and broke in pieces rather than doing any real damage.
Nevertheless, the really, really, really big cat was distracted from attacking Stacey, and it turned around and tackled Kelley with its shoulder. Kelley fell from the boulder she had been standing on, and all but disappeared in the bracken and ferns around it.
The cat returned its attention to Stacey. It crouched again, preparing a leap. Stacey backed slowly away, screaming at the top of her voice, but the cat didn't care. It sort of wriggled on its back paws, seeking traction for its jump. Stacey could see the teeth in its half open mouth, and smell the stink of its breath. The claws on the front paws looked really big and sharp.
Stacey had never been as scared in the whole of her life. She swayed and fell to her knees as the cat leapt.
Suddenly, a green flash struck, right in front of Stacey's face. It hit the beast square in the head, totally disintegrating it. It also struck the grass and the trees behind, causing a small forest fire. Stacey didn't see it. She had fainted. She didn't see the decapitated beast tumble to the ground by her feet. She didn't see Kelley, standing on the boulder again, with green fire surrounding her hands and arms. She didn't see Kelley slumping down on the ground, a totally empty look on her face.
_\o0o/_
Shelley had just finished her call and put away her phone when she hear a loud scream coming from somewhere behind the house. She rushed around the corner just in time to see a flash of green some way into the forest.
Kim hurtled out of the back door of the farmhouse, dropping her phone on the way.
"Shelley! Where are the kids?"
"I don't know! They wanted to explore the woods, but I said they should ask you!"
"And I told them to talk to you!"
It took only a fraction of a second to realise where the kids were. Both Kim and Shelley took off at full speed along the path by the back door. Kim had a small head start, but Shelley soon overtook her; not so much running as bounding up the path, a nimbus of green fire surrounding her hands and feet.
Shelley topped the rise and looked down into the little valley. The sights crowded into her mind: A grass fire and a toppled tree in flames. Stacey lying crumpled and unmoving in front of a rocky patch by a stream. The body of a mountain lion draped over some boulders near her daughter, looking twisted and wrong. Kelley sitting on a flat slab of stone a few yards to the left; her eyes vacant and her mouth slack; her arms held out from her sides with her hands engulfed in pale blue-green flames. Someone was shouting 'nooooo!' in a long wailing shriek, and it took Shelley a few seconds to recognise her own voice.
She ran down the slope at full speed and threw herself down by Stacey. Turned her over and searched for injuries. No blood, no wounds. Did she have a pulse? In her agitation, Shelley couldn't find one, but just before total panic set in; Stacey drew a shuddering breath and opened her eyes.
"Stacey! Sweet child! Are you all right?"
But Stacey seemed stunned and didn't answer.
By now, Kim had reached their side. Shelley ran over to Kelley, leaving her wife to cradle the confused red headed girl.
Shelley kneeled before Kelley, grabbing her by the shoulders.
"Kelley! Darling! What happened? Speak to me!"
Kelley focused her eyes on her mother. Her words came in a long rush.
"We were looking for unicorns, and then the really, really big cat came, and then it wanted to eat Stacey, and then I was really scared, and I hit it with a stick, but then I got really, really angry, and sumthin' happened and the head disappeared, and Stace' fell down and the cat fell down and my hands are on fire! Mom, please make it stop!"
"Hush, sweetie, it's all right. It's not dangerous. It doesn't hurt does it? Just try to calm down and let it go."
"I've been trying that for hours but it won't stop!"
"Take a deep breath, pet. I'll take the flames away from you."
Shelley took one of Kelley's arms in her left hand while stroking the girl's forehead with her right, all the while mumbling soothing words. When her daughter seemed a bit calmer, she wrapped both of hands around one of Kelley's burning hands. As she had hoped and guessed, her daughter's flames did not hurt her at all. She let a small cool flame of her own engulf their hands.
"See, Kelley! I have your hand in mine and I have taken the fire to myself. I'm going to remove it now and put it out."
Shelley had no idea if this was possible, but she thought that as long as Kelley believed it, she would be calm enough to let her flames go out. And it worked. The slightly bluer fire around Kelley's hand was gone and Shelley held a small flame of her own plasma on the hand she lifted up.
"See, now it's gone," she said, snapped her fingers and powered down. "Now for the other." But Kelley's other hand had lost its glow all by itself.
"But, mom. Look. The grass and the tree are still burning."
"Don't worry, I'll fix that." She raised her voice. "Kimmie, how's Stacey?"
Kim was sitting with her daughter cradled in her arms, rocking slightly. "Fine, I guess. Either she was knocked out, hitting her head when she fell, or she just fainted."
"Can you take the kids up the path a bit? I need to put out the fire."
With Kim and the kids at a safe distance, Shelley threw a rapid series of purely concussive balls of energy at the burning vegetation. The flames went out, a bit like when Red Adair would put out an oil well fire using dynamite. There were, however, still glowing embers over the ground and in the tree. Shelley let rip again with explosive blasts along the edges of the burned area, throwing earth and rocks high up in the air and then down again on the embers. When she had finished, the patch where the fire had been looked like a cross between a freshly ploughed field and the crater of a meteorite impact. There were no signs of anything still on fire.
Kim and Shelley quickly picked up their daughters and headed back to the farmhouse. Kim carried Stacey in her arms and Kelley rode on Shelley's shoulders.
In the kitchen, the kids were stripped and washed. They were meticulously examined for any injuries. Stacey had a small bump on her head and a scrape on her elbow. Kelley had a few bruises from being shouldered down among the rocks by the cougar. All in all, they had been incredibly lucky.
"Kids, how on earth did you get it into your heads to walk out in the forest by yourselves? Didn't you hear me say to go and ask Shelley-mom?"
"We did," Stacey pouted. "And she said talk to you."
"Yeah, and we did, and said we would go ahead and you could follow, and you said fine."
"I thought you meant that you and Shelley-mom would go ahead and I would follow! How could you believe that I were okay with you going alone?"
There was a bit of silence.
"Well, you did say 'fine', …"
"… but, okay, we know that we really shouldn't have gone …"
"We'll talk more about this later," Shelley said, "but for now, we are just so happy you are not hurt."
Then Kim dressed the kids, partly in fresh clothes Shelley fetched from the car. Shelley went outside again to get some air.
"Mummy, what was that thing?" Stacey asked.
"That, darling, was a mountain lion. They have a lot of names. Cougar. Puma. Catamount. Panther. They are big, and they are very dangerous."
"Did it really want to eat us?"
"It probably did. They hunt animals like deer but will also take cows and sheep if they find them. They also kill people, but that doesn't happen so often."
"Oh. So, it's like a tiger with no stripes?"
"A bit. But perhaps it is more like a huge version of an ordinary cat. It will prowl and stalk a bit like Mal when she sees mice."
Kelley was a bit upset. "Do you think Mal wants to eat us, too?"
"No, Sweetie, she definitely does not. First, because she is much too small. And second, because she loves you. Pet cats grow up among human, treating them well, and they get used to have people as friends."
Kim had the kids sit around the kitchen table. "Now, can you promise me to stay here? You can have my tablet and watch a movie or something, but you cannot go out. Is that clear? I have to go check that Shelley-mom is okay."
The children promised, looking a bit shamefaced, and Kim left.
_\o0o/_
Outside, she found Shelley crouching by the flowerbed around the porch, throwing up. Kim walked over and gathered her wife's hair to keep it away from the vomit.
"Shel', love. You can relax now. We're so lucky that ended well."
But despite her stomach being empty by now, Shelley couldn't stop heaving.
Eventually, she sat down and leaned against one of the timbers supporting the porch.
"I love them so much," she said, looking down at her hands. "I cannot think about losing them."
"I do think you love them more than me," Kim answered in an attempt to lead Shelley away from the topic of pumas.
"Well, in a way I do. I am a mother. They are my kids. Try harming a bear cub, and the mummy-bear will show you the meaning of motherly love."
"Shel', this was a major disaster. But I do think they learned their lesson. And I do think we did, too. And it ended well, anyway."
"I can't lose them!" Shelley said again. "And it's not over. We have to tell the Forest Service about the cougar, and about the fire. And if people learn that we let four-year-old kids out alone in the forest, we will lose them!"
"Lose them?"
"Kimmie, we are a same-gender couple. People will look extra hard on us to see that we are good parents. Letting small kids out of our sight like that is not good parenting. The Children Welfare people will take them and place them in a foster home. And I cannot lose them!"
Kim hadn't thought about this.
"But what if we don't talk to the Forest Service at all? Who's to know anything happened?"
"Kimmie, I'm shocked. What if the fire starts up again? What am I going to say to the Coopers? 'Sorry, I wont be buying your property after all. I happened to burn it to the ground, and now it's worth nothing. You can forget retiring to Florida. Have a nice life'."
"Well, that wouldn't be good. But nobody needs to know the kids were on their own. We took a walk, all four of us, and the cougar attacked. You killed it, and put out the fire that you accidentally started."
"Princess, I'm shocked. Are you suggesting that I lie to government officers?"
"Fucking right, I am! I'm a mummy bear too, and I won't place our cubs in jeopardy!"
Shelley hugged Kim and rested her head on her wife's shoulders.
"I'd kiss you, but I can still taste the puke in my mouth," she said. "But you know, it still isn't all right. Kelley has somehow been cursed with my powers. Things are going to get really difficult for her."
Kim sat down beside her wife.
"Why?" she asked. "It's a power. A gift. Why would it be a problem?"
Shelley sighed. "If it's like my own powers, it's really hard to control. And the immediate trigger is anger. She'll have to train really hard and, if she slips up and destroys something, or hurt someone, there will be hell to pay. She may get locked up somewhere for the rest of her life. Or Betty might take her to train as a professional assassin."
"Oh, come now. Having a power like that must be a bit like carrying a gun. It's not the gun itself that's dangerous, it is what you chose to do with it."
"Guns are a problem, says the evil violent mercenary super-villainess. Put one in you glove compartment, and you are much more likely to start shooting people if you get road rage. Put one in you pocket and you might start firing in Smarty Marts if the checkout queues are too long. Have one in your waistband and that guy looking at you funny might end up dead. And Kelley will have the power in her hands 24/7. She can't remove the firing pin and lock it away in a safe. It will always be a temptation for acting out really bad ideas."
"But surely we can teach her to handle it? You could always control yourself, even when you were a mercenary. You have never killed anyone, right?"
"I really don't know," Shelley said in a very small voice. "I hope I didn't, but I really don't know."
Kim took a deep breath and sat up straight. "Well, Miss Gloom, nothing bad has happened yet. Kelley found her powers in time to save her sister. And she did a great job. We can surely teach her to handle them. After all, who's the world's foremost expert on green plasma fire? You are! And who's the second best expert? I am! The girl who fought you and your glow almost weekly for more than four years."
Shelley smiled a bit lopsidedly. "I love them so much it hurts," she said. "I want them both to have happy, successful lives. I want them to have as much fun growing up as possible."
"Well, I certainly do, too."
"Maybe we should buy them a horse?"
_\o0o/_
And there you have it. Reality intrudes. Nature hits back. Problems abound.
I hope the fic does not fall apart, what with the lightness of the beginning and the seriousness of the latter part. The idea was actually to start with the silly conversational style of Morning conversations, and then hit the reader with some violent drama, before clobbering the parents over the head with worry for the future.
Please let me know if it was worth reading.
Yours, Feudor