This author does not own the Kim Possible and Phineas and Ferb franchises. This fanfiction was written for personal amusement. This author does not intend any disrespect to the victims and survivors of the Rwandan Genocide, any more than writers of WWII alternate history novels intend any disrespect to the combatants, victims, and survivors of that war.

1993

Flynn-Fletcher Residence

Vancouver, Pacific Columbia, NAAA

Joint Government

The apartment was clean, well furnished, and tidy. Well, half of it was. The other half was also clean, but littered with stacks of diagrams, proposals, and reports, most bearing the watermark of FLYNN-FLETCHER ENGINEERING™ (a partly owned subsidiary of PEACH ORCHARD INFRASTRUCTURE CONSORTIUM™/桃花源基建集團).

The dining table had, for the evening, been moved in front of the television, and the apartment's two occupants were enjoying a sumptuous meal, courtesy of the take-out service of J.P Bearymore's Pizza-Party-torium.

"Ferb, would you mind passing me the potato slices? Thanks. Oh, cool! The Knowing Channel!"

Phineas turned up the volume on the TV.

"The deep water of certain lakes is saturated with carbon dioxide and methane gas. When such a lake is destabilized, vast volumes of carbon dioxide and methane gas are released, causing a tsunami and creating a cloud of dense, suffocating carbon dioxide that can travel many kilometers, killing all before it. Such a release event is known as a "Limnic Eruption"."

"Ferb, do you know what this means?"

Ferb looked on blankly.

"There are entire lakes out there filled with natural gas! Imagine what we could do with the stuff! And we'd be doing a public service by getting rid of the carbon dioxide too!"

Ferb blinked.

"Okay, we don't own any refineries or chemical plants that we could use, so we'll have to sell the gas… or use it to generate electricity on-site."

"The 1986 limnic eruption in Lake Nyos, Cameroon, killed 1,700 people and 3,500 livestock. Lake Kivu, on the border between the Congo and Rwanda, is nearly two thousand times larger than Lake Nyos, and its shores are home to nearly two million people. A lake overturn on Lake Kivu would be nothing short of catastrophic."

Phineas placed his hand on his chin. "You know, according to the news, Rwanda's been stabilized. It looks like the peace accords'll hold this time."

He continued his train of thought. "It'll be risky. If the place goes under again, our company'll lose millions… but if we can corner the market early…"

Ferb rolled his eyes, and changed the channel. The visage of Administrator Jiang appeared on-screen, beneath the logo of the Government Broadcasting Corporation.

"…our New Silk Road Initiative will enrich all of Eurasia and Africa, including Russia, through trade, commerce, and industrialization. Through the engines of the free market, infrastructure-driven economic growth, and Pacific expertise and capital, we believe that first-world living standards can be eventually achieved for all the peoples of the world. This great project, with all the opportunities it represents both for ourselves and others, perfectly exemplifies Adam Smith's vision of enlightened self-interest, and is a worthy Project for this New Pacific Century!"

Ferb changed the channel back.

"Okay, the Administrator could have turned down the rhetoric at the end."

Ferb tilted his head.

"Yes, the idea is visionary, and the potential is there, but the risks are… oh…"

Ferb raised three fingers, and began ticking them off.

"Hmm… between the subsidized insurance, zero-interest loans, state backing, and tax credits…"

"Ferb, I know what we're going to do today!"

1993

Applied Scientific Research Center

Cleveland, Ohio Province, NAAA

Joint Government

"…one rainstorm that disrupted the layer of water and KABOOM! Seventeen hundred dead! Imagine the possibilities in a lake two thousand times larger, Shego! Imagine what a single well-placed thermonuclear warhead might do! The terror that would be inflicted! The hundreds of thousands dead! It would cripple a nation for years!"

Shego tilted her head at her longtime friend, and looked around the laboratory break room for any sign of alcohol. She stepped up to Dr. Drew Lipsky, and took a sniff.

"Okay, you haven't been drinking…"

"I never drink, Shego, I always vomit after half a can."

"Uh, Dr. D. If you haven't noticed, there aren't that many lakes that can have these limnic eruptions. The biggest one's in Rwanda, and last I heard, Defense wasn't interested in committing war crimes there."

Dr. Lipsky began to grumble.

"Stupid Somalia stabilization mission. Stupid UNOSOM III. Stupid counter-insurgency emphasis." He mimicked a squeaky voice. "Oh, no, doctor! Changing strategic priorities no longer merit continued research into bomb-pumped x-ray lasers!"

Shego facepalmed. "Oh, Dr. D. Not this again. Teller went overboard on that one, and you got swept up in the mess."

"It would have worked! Teller's lab was crazy! Mine wasn't! We spent YEARS on that feasibility study! We had rigor! And some stupid bureaucrat won't let me go into development!"

"It wasn't your fault. They still need you for that phase B study."

"It'll never get produced… They'll never test-fire my baby in space. Not in my lifetime. I'll never live to see a bomb-pumped x-ray laser go boom."

Drew began to cry.

Shego sighed. "How much do you like this idea?"

"The limnic eruption trigger?"

"Oh, it seems like a delicious exercise. Minimal budget, fieldwork, something completely out of left field…"

Shego nodded. "Okay. I'm in. If you can get a team together, and a budget, I'll be happy to come along."

"Really, Shego?"

Shego nodded. "It'll be just like old times."

In the Real World, the Rwandan Genocide (a dark chapter in human history, to be sure) killed between 500,000 and a million people between April and July 1994. Country-wide socioeconomic (some say Malthusian) tensions and ethnic conflict between the majority Hutu and minority Tutsi group was whipped into horrible machete-mass-murder by a group of power-hungry Hutu elites, who schemed for months to organize, initiate, and manage the genocide.

While the Tutsi were most 'affected' by the genocide, murder rates were substantial (5%) in Tutsi-free, all-Hutu communities, suggesting that pressures other than simple ethnic hatred were present.

The Rwandan Genocide was eventually halted by the overthrow of the Hutu government by the Tutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front, but the aftermath was… very messy. To its discredit, the international community notoriously did very little to halt the genocide, although it remains very uncertain what could have been achieved by intervention. The fallout from an intervention gone sour would have been immense, and any intervention would have been an arduous and expensive undertaking – and most of the world had only limited interests in Rwanda.

Err… thankfully? The fictional Joint Government has accumulated interests in Rwanda.

This author is aware that this AU is not very plausible, for reasons left as an exercise for the reader.