Re-enter the Dragon

By Eoraptor

Kim Possible and all related characters © Walt Disney Corporation 2002-2007. This work is not for profit and solely for the enjoyment of the audience. Rated R for language and adult content. Reproduction or distribution of this work without the author's consent prohibited.

A/N: All right, right off the bat, expect Kim and Shego and pretty much everyone to be very OOC in this fic, unlike most of my other fictions I don't intend to pay a lot of lip service to cannon character traits with this one. It also ignores large portions of Season 4, especially the finale. And like "Another Sitch In Time" don't expect this one to update very frequently. I have many irons in the fire at the moment.

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"Reunion"

Four years she'd been gone; and now there she was, just shopping? Agent Possible watched the woman who had caught her attention, not quite believing it. It was straight out of her most frequently relived fantasy.

There was the woman who had haunted Kim's thoughts, flipping through a shopping rack in an upscale clothier in New York as though she hadn't been missing from the face of the Earth for four years. Kim took a deep breath, and prepared to finally bring fond dreams to life as she stepped into the store.

-----

It had started out so simply. The summer after graduation it was business as usual; Dementor, Motor Ed, Camille Leon, and a few of the usual assorted second sting villains. Everything went surprisingly smoothly, and most of the villains seemed to actually be taking it easy over the summer.

They got the usual call; Dr. Drakken was breaking into a science lab, and only Kim could get there in time. Kim should have known something was up from the start. The place was crawling with red-suited henchmen. Dr Drakken usually didn't bring his henchmen on actual field missions. In fact, she wasn't sure why he even bothered to keep them on the payroll these days.

Yet there they were, about twenty of them, patrolling the lab, flashing their power-poles, and generally trying to look menacing. Failing miserably of course, but at least trying. Kim and Ron dropped half of them without even breaking a sweat. An outside observer would say, and often did, that this was because Ron and Kim were fantastic and a great team. The truth was that Drakken's henchmen were henchmen in name only. Over-weight, over-paid, and out of shape slobs in tights was a more accurate description than 'henchman.'

When Ron had found Drakken, obliviously rifling through some drawers, Kim had immediately taken up a stance. Where blue was, green could not be far away.

Drakken surprised them by calling not for Shego, but for more henchmen. These, too, were dispatched with ease and then Kim and Ron spent the next ten minutes arguing with Drakken that Shego must be hiding in the shadows, just waiting to attack.

"You know, I'm beginning to think Shego isn't here, and that Dr D brought all these guys in her place…" Ron shook his head and scratched a crown of blonde hair as he pushed Drew Lipsky out the door.

"What do you think I've been saying for the last ten minutes, buffoon?" Drakken snorted and made a show of not going quietly, which earned him a jab in the back as he moved along.

"Yeah… Hmmm, freebie, go us!" Kim grinned at how easily things had gone and nudged a limp, unconscious red-suit out of the way as the police showed up to do their mop-up job.

"Kim… you haven't touched your Nacarito… something wrong?" Ron inclined his head at his girlfriend and studied her face. She didn't seem angry at being taken to Beuno Nacho, for once at least… but something was definitely off that evening as they sat and shared together-time.

"Huh? Or sorry Ron… just feeling… ya know…"

"That time of the month huh?"

"Yeah… What?! No! Ron! No that's not it, and if you ever say that in public again I'll…!"

Ron winced and tried to shrink back into his side of the booth at the fury in the olive eyes he usually adored. The fury, however, quickly faded away and Kim sat back into her seat, sighing. "Sorry… lil over react'ish?"

"…lil… Sorry if I was out of line with the whole… you know… thing." Ron shrugged a bit and reached for another mexi-fry. "So… what do you want to do this weekend?"

"New Zealand?" Kim looked up and smiled hopefully.

"Skiing? I was hoping maybe we could just stay in… been a lot of traveling lately, and I'm a bit bushed. Maybe we could just hang at my place while Mom and Dad and Hana are in Japan. Be nice to not have to baby-sit ninja toddler, huh?" He made a show of yawning, and Kim thought there was something in his eye, until she realized this was what passed for a subtle wink from her boy friend.

"Oh. Oh! Sure Ron." She grinned a little bit, some of the sparkle returning to her eyes.

The rest of the night went better, of course, as did the weekend. It was the weekend Kim lost her virginity, in fact. And despite the awkwardness, everything was just as she could have hoped. The act wasn't planned and fretted over, it just happened. It continued to happen, and got better with practice, every time they were alone that summer.

The next weeks and months went pretty much as the last five years or so had gone. School, now Upperton U rather than Middleton High, an evening job to make ends meet, and saving things ranging from a cat in a tree to the whole world.

Ron was still there, boyfriend and sidekick, as was Wade. Occasionally Monique and Felix would help out as their own busy schedules allowed too. It was Christmas before things started to really change.

The listlessness from that night after fighting Dr. Drakken and his hench-goons had come back. It had come and gone occasionally, and Ron or Kim or both would chalk it up to being a slow stretch, or tiredness from their hectic schedules, or some other banal reason.

Christmas-day afternoon was the first time Kim actually snapped. She didn't hit anybody. She didn't shout or scream or break down in tears… but for the girl who could do anything, raising her voice to her boyfriend was just as bad.

"What do you mean you couldn't find my boots? I left them in your closet last time I stayed over. Darn it Ron, those are my favorite pair! Jeeze! All I want is my favorite boots before I have to go tromping out in the snow and deal with your family!"

Ron just stared at her, brown eyes blinking occasionally. The outburst had seemed, to him at least, to come out of no where. The verbal sting of the words 'last time I stayed over' didn't help any, but that wasn't the point. Kim treating his family like an obligation also stung the brown-eyed boy since he though of them as Kim's adopted family as much as the Possible's were his.

"KP… I- What's the matter, really?" he reached out to touch her shoulder and draw her closer. Kim was a hugger, and she looked desperately in need of one now. Her usually fiery olive eyes seemed dull and listless.

She shrugged him off irritably. She gave him a pained look, as though he should know what the problem was, and picked up her coat. After she'd left, he called his parents and let them know he'd be coming over, alone. Ron was, needles to say, Shocked that Kim would want to spend one of her favorite holidays alone instead of with either one's family, but hey, everyone needed 'me' time, right?

Kim and Ron hadn't been living or sleeping together as much in the past few weeks. In fact, a few days later when he and Monique sat down to talk about it at a new-years gathering, they tried to work out what had changed. All parties involved had basically been blowing it off as their hectic lives, but as the jewish boy and the black girl sat and talked about it, a pattern began to emerge.

"So let's see here…" Monique looked at the cocktail napkin she'd been scribbling on and tapped an ink pen on her lower lip. "Babygirl blows you off for sex here, here, and here. Then she decides not to go out to fancy dinners here and here." Blowing Ron off when he offered to take her somewhere that qualified as nice, that was definitely not Kim's style in Monique's opinion, "And then last week, she just plain blows you off. Any connections on these dates?"

Ron sighed and sat back, looking at the dates, and shaking his head slightly. Monique was putting her business classes to use and being very analytical about the whole thing. Maybe that was what the sitch called for, Ron thought.

Ron was missing Kim yet again. She'd skipped out on the party that Josh Mankey had invited them to while he was in town, and hadn't even said where she was going. Wade could only confirm that the Sloth was still parked in town, and that Kim hadn't called in any favors for rides either.

"Nope… just the usual stuff each week Mo. Stop the bad guy, finish a term paper or, three, catch the late shift at the photo-hut..." Ron chewed on his drink straw and sighed. Nothing was out of the ordinary.

"Yeah, you're right, that's your guys normal SSDD. She didn't stay out late any nights? Didn't come in with a hangover or anything?"

"I know what you're saying Monique, but no, I don't think KP is keeping something on the down-low. She just wouldn't cheat ya know?"

"Yeah, you're right Ron… girlfriend is many things, but she's not a she-playa." Mo shook her wavy-topped head softly and pursed her lips, looking over the napkin and trying to figure out what might be afflicting her best gal.

"Yeah. so just the usual, fight Drakken, polish off a… waitaminute…" Ron grabbed the napkin, then took out his Kimmunicator and called up the resident techie.

"Hey Wade, Sorry to interrupt your New Years Everlot:DungeonMasters quest, but I need a quick fact check…"

"No problem Ron, we're just encamped at the moment any ways. What's up?"

Ron read off the dates he had in mind and Wade nodded. A moment later he'd come back with the results. "Let's see here… Drakken, Drakken, Drakken, Drakken… Dementor AND Drakken, and... FTW, Drakken on Xmas week, breaking his usual holiday truce. What's up?"

Ron sighed and sat back, nodding resignedly and looking at Monique. "Nothing to worry about Wade-man. Enjoy your quest, and say hey to Tunnel Lord and Master Larryious for me. Ron out."

Monique waited for Ron to let her in on the hunch. Finally, the wait got too long. "Okay big brother Ron, what's the big about Drakken and those dates? You two been fightin' him for bout as long as Kim's been a hero."

Ron sighed heavily and shook his head. He seemed to deflate visibly as he began, "Why didn't I see it before Mo? The way she always had the banter going double-time. The wanted poster in her locker. Those internet rumors…"

Monique looked askance at her best male friend and blinked. "Clue me in here baby boy… cause you're about two pages ahead in the script."

Ron gave her a haggard look and tapped on the napkin, which happened to be a left over Christmas napkin… a green one. "That color mean anything to you?"

"Um, the fat Benjamin's I'm not earning? A color that I look horrible in? Over-used holiday trimmings? J. Crew's favorite fall pallet?"

When Ron let Monique in on his suspicions she railed against them. Kim, firstly, didn't go that way. Secondly, that person in question was way too old for Kim. Thirdly, Kim didn't go that way. Then there was the fact that the person in question was a hardened criminal, while Kim balked when she was given too much change for her mexi-salad. And had Monique mentioned that KP didn't go that way?

Kim showed up January first, and seemed back to her normal self, so Ron wrote his fears off as too much holiday spirit and they resumed their lives as normal, until February 14.

----

"What do you mean you don't want to go out?"

"I'm tired Ron. I spent all week in Belize helping with a damn break!"

"Yeah, you've been tired a lot lately."

"What the heck is that supposed to mean?"

"And headachey too."

"You're on thin ice here Ron..."

"Yeah, so are you. Do you even remember the last time we went out? Or the last time you stayed over?"

"Oh, jeeze, is that what this is about? You're pissy cause you're not getting laid as often as you want?"

"Or at all? Felix gets more than I do, and he's paralyzed."

"God, what a pathetic thing to be whiney about!"

"It's not about the sex, Kim! That's just a part of it."

"Then what is it about. Enlighten me, oh monkey master."

"How's Shego, Kim?"

She couldn't even respond. Her eyes were flashing with anger, but the ability to use her mouth suddenly failed her. She opened her mouth several times, but a proper angry retort refused to appear on her tongue.

Her furious mind had been completely broadsided by something that didn't even fit into the neat little argument of Ron being unfulfilled. Finally she found something to say, and to her enraged and inflamed tongue, it sounded like a sufficient retort.

"What the fuck does Shego have to do with any of this?!"

Ron had been working up a rage to match his redheaded girlfriends, but her complete and utter denial derailed him. The use of a curse word only caught up a second or two later, and caused him to stop and look at her, to study his girl friends face intently. Kim didn't curse, and her language had been much shorter than usual lately.

"You don't even realize, do you?"

"What don't I realize?!" Kim hadn't lost her steam. Unlike her boyfriend, she was now elevated to full on shouting and clenching of her fists.

"You're even starting to act like her. Why? Kim, what did you just say, just now?"

"What do you mean what the hell did I just say?! What are you going on about you idiot?!"

"Language, Kimmie…" Ron knew what to say to get his girlfriend's attention.

The words met Kim's consciousness like a slap across the face and got her attention. She stopped and replayed the last three exchanges. Then she gave a tired sigh and leaned back against the counter in Ron's kitchen and shook her head.

"Fine… Sorry… whatever."

"No, not whatever… Kim… do you even realize what's going on with you? Why you're moody? Why you're not into 'us' anymore?" He motioned between them a moment, "I'm beginning to wonder if you ever really were."

"No Ron… tell me, why do you think I'm not into 'us' anymore." She mimicked his gesture, irritation and weariness replacing the fury in her eyes.

"You miss Shego. Heck, I think you might even be crushing on her. Every time you get like this; it's because we fought 'him' and 'she' wasn't there for you to duke it out with. Now you're even starting to act like her."

"Crushing… on Shego… GOD!!!" Kim's righteous fury returned, and she stormed passed him and grabbed her coat off the rack. She stopped as she tugged it angrily over her shoulders and gave him the full force of a green eyed glare that could melt steel. "Goodbye Ron. Call me when you're over this paranoid delusion of yours."

She gave the door an almost superhuman slam on her way out and didn't bother to look back to see it bouncing open and Ron leaning against it, trying to hide the tears threatening his eyes as he watched Kim walk out of the apartment, and possibly out of his life.

Ron didn't call. Kim, in a potent display of her essential Kimness, didn't call either. Eventually, Ron transferred out of state to go to culinary school, effectively ending Team Possible. Monique wasn't happy with Kim, and she made her feelings known.

-----

Kim just wanted some retail therapy. It was September and she'd just been dumped, again. Worse… It was her first girlfriend who had done the dumping. In fact, they'd just gotten to the point of feeling comfortable calling each other that.

Apparently Kelly didn't think that Kim was paying enough attention to her, and that she was being distant. Kim responded that she was incredibly busy, and had just gotten back from saving the pyramids from Doctor Drakken's scheme to use them as reflectors for a giant solar mirror.

Kelly yelled that it was always Drakken doing something, and that Kim should just let the authorities handle him some times. Why couldn't Kim just pay attention to her for a change and let the world save itself for a change? Was that blue skinned dork really so dangerous?!

After she'd cooled down a bit, the blonde girl tried to curl up with Kim and share a snack with her on the couch. No doing. Kim made it apparent that she wasn't in a cuddly mood. Kim had been very cuddly once she'd given in to Kelly's advances two months ago, so what had changed? Was she suddenly paranoid about being 'one of those gay people?'

Thus ended Kim's first same-sex relationship.

"...as if…" Kim grumbled and made her way into Club Banana.

Mo had just come back from getting in touch with her roots in Africa, or so Kim was led to believe by the store staff the last few time's she'd come by. She'd not seen her best friend since at least March between world saving, school, internship with GJ, and Mo's spiritual retreat.

"Monique, thank goodness! I need something in leather with a lot of push up here. I need to feel sexy and price doesn't matter." She was pleading. She really did need to feel validated right now, and there was only one person in the world that could validate her without feeling weird about it, her personal fashion consultant.

Monique though, didn't look to be in a validating mood. Her chocolate eyes narrowed at Kim and she tsk'ed softly. She'd heard about some of Kim's relationships over the past six months, if they could even be called that. Apparently Kim did 'go that way,' and she didn't do it any more successfully than she did the traditional way.

"No girlfriend. You need something with strong knees. Cause you need to be on 'em, apologizing to your best friend. You broke Ron, Kim."

"I what?" She stopped, parsing the words Monique used… Mo didn't say Kim had broken his heart, she'd said she broke him.

"You seriously messed with the boy's head, girl… do you know what that boy did before he left for New York? He tried to put the moves on me. Me of all people. Now, I'm not complaining, 'cause I am one fine prize… and I know what they say about the son's of Abraham in the endowment department… but this is Ron."

It took Kim a moment to process what Monique was so upset about. It started to upset her, not that she needed much help in that area these days. "Yeah, so? You didn't miss much, he's not spectacular."

Her eyes stayed narrowed and she prayed, to whatever god over-saw wayward teen heroes, for patience. She was going to give Kim a ration of it, and she needed to keep it below shouting level for the good of the shop as well as the good of their friendship.

"Whose fault is that Kim? It's the girlfriend's responsibility to train boys in that department. Or are you fully on the other team now?"

"I'm not on any team. Not like I'm getting any myself, ya know."

"Not with that screwed up attitude of yours, no you're prolly not. It's a shame too, That Kelly was a sweet girl, reminded me of Tara King back in the day, before she went all Marine Corps."

Kim blinked, she didn't realize her best friend had ever met her now ex-girlfriend. The stopping of her rage got her thinking. Ron, Steve, Josh, Kelly… Seven months, four people… and the most she'd gotten were a few dates, a few good laughs, and maybe three trips to second base. And all seemed to end the same way… a big fight, slamming of doors, and Kim alone once more in the romance department.

"Mo… Am I really messed up?" She sighed heavily and flopped down onto a bench in the store.

Monique's expression softened and she moved to settle down next to her best friend, rubbing her shoulder a bit. "I don't think so, Boo. But something is throwing you off. Yeah maybe you and Ron weren't right for each other as a B/G thing… but you shouldn't have broken up like you did either. And what about those others? Josh Mankey was like your ideal guy since you were old enough to think about them that way."

Kim sighed again and nodded, deflating even more. How many people got a second shot with their high school flame and blew it because… well because.

"And Kelly? Well, I can't say I understand that myself, I needs me some Y-chromosome… but she was so into you, just like Ron was. Hell, like Ron still is. He'd still crawl across broken glass naked for you if you asked, just to see you smile."

That got a small smile of pride and memory out of Kim despite her deflated state and she sighed a third time. "Yeah… Maybe something is getting to me. I dunno what it is though."

Monique bit her lip slightly. She was beginning to believe what Ron had said. Once he'd explained it, and once Mo had found out about Kim dating Kelly… Really dating. It seemed to fit with his suspicions a heck of a lot better than just the drunken musings of a teenage boy.

"Maybe you need to find out what happened to Shego. I mean-," She felt Kim's shoulder tense and knew she'd just lost the slight clarity she'd instilled in the girl by pushing for too much too soon.

"Don't… Don't you start that fucking shit too. First it was Ron, and then Josh… now you too?!"

Kim's volume was steadily rising. "Why do people think I have the hots for a villain whose probably dead anyway?! If I wanted a bad girl, there's plenty who email the site every day! I'm still not even sure I'm totally in to women!"

Kim's body had risen along with her volume, and she was striking her fist at the air as she worked up a good tirade. "God Mo! I figured at least you wouldn't buy into that shit! Jesus, of all of the…! I don't even…! Gah!"

She stormed out of the store angrily, fists clenched, and not caring about the display she knocked over on her way out.

Monique sighed softly at their shared stupidity. Her's for pushing Kim in a fragile moment; and Kim's for trying to deny there was something she was missing, and what it was.

-----

Monique and Kim eventually reconciled, after several weeks worth of avoiding ach other at school and parties, and phone calls that each should have made but didn't… but even after reconciliation, they both pointedly ignored discussions about Kim's personal life from then on.

Kim got her bachelors in Criminal Justice, and accepted an offer to go to work for Global Justice. This put an end to her teen hero'ing days and her site, in a very emotional moment, was officially retired by Wade; who himself had moved on to bigger and better things in computers and corporations. Now she was a Global Justice field agent, and that meant she had things like a chain of command, requisition forms, and no time to get cats out of trees.

She also experienced a late growth spurt, and soon found herself able to look her mom right in the eyes, and even look down at Betty Director. Not only did it help her combat skills, but it was something she took a secret little thrill in. How many people could now say they looked down at the person they'd always looked up to?

Somewhere around her third high school reunion (yes, after Middleton High graduated Kim, they decided to have them yearly, just because so many of the students led such 'interesting lives') and the break up of her third lesbian relationship, Kim was forced to come to a realization about herself.

Waking up next to your girlfriend, and finding her staring at you and asking just who in the hell "Shego" is, has a way of forcing your hand like nothing else. Susan Justice was Global, just like Kim, but she had no reason to know who Shego was outside of dry and now dusty criminal records.

"You said her name in your sleep, a few times. At least I assume it's a her. So, who is she KP? Is that the high school crush Monique told me about on vacation last month?"

She left when Kim didn't have any forthcoming explanation or rebuttal. She left behind a well deserved black eye for Kim though, mentally as well as physically. Susan didn't mess around. She also didn't come back or call.

Kim took a sabbatical and spent a few weeks on a beach in Jamaica. It was Ironic, considering who else she knew who liked tropical beaches. She thought about her history since high school, bouncing from relationship to relationship, men and women who came into her life with hopes, and left either hurt or indifferent. Each and everyone ended the same… Well, not true, the last one also ended with her getting her karmic comeuppance over breaking so many hearts. She rubbed her eye subconsciously.

She replayed in her mind over and over everything she could remember about Shego, about their fights and their banter, about the past seven years. The close touches, the fast and furious footwork, the fact that Shego could easily have killed her a number of times. Finally she had to admit it… Shego had given her butterflies, and not the kind that came from impending combat.

Then she flew home to Middleton and visited Ron.

"I owe you an apology."

Ron, who was helping Hana get ready for her first full summer vacation after a legendary year of Pre-K, gave Kim something she never thought Ron capable of before… He gave her a cold look.

"You were right…"

"What about?"

"Me… and Shego."

He simply nodded.

"I don't know how... or why… or when… or even how much and I… I…"

He nodded again, still listening, still giving her that cold look.

She couldn't take it. How had she lost more than two years with him already? He had been in her life almost longer than she could remember and she'd just thrown it away over a stupid argument. One that she'd lost anyway.

"Ron I'm so sorry!" it was blurted out as she rushed him.

That was all it took. Kim tackled him and melted into his arms, sobbing and begging for forgiveness for "breaking" him and their friendship, and Ron gave forgiveness as only he could. He couldn't remain cold and hard against the woman who had once been a little red haired girl in pig tails running from bullies in Pre-K.

They weren't kids any more, and they things they'd said to each other that Valentine's day couldn't simply be forgotten, but they fast fell back into friendship; and all was forgiven if not forgotten. They spent the next week rebuilding things, and Kim had left Ron with a cryptic question about just what he really thought about Monique.

Kim found when she returned to Global a week later that she felt liberated. Admitting she'd had… a crush perhaps, or something more, she wasn't sure… but admitting her feelings about the absent villainess made her suddenly relaxed, free, and open to other reexaminations.

Even Betty Director welcomed back "the old Kim" and noted on her reviews how much more diligent and effective she was. She began to build a reputation around Global for being friendly and easy going, and always willing to help out in any operation she was asked. This ran a little counter to her old rep as an adrenaline junky with a temper problem, so things were a bit awk-weird every now and again.

Her epiphany also had two other entirely surprising results. She stopped going from relationship to relationship, instead just being happy to be herself and be by herself. She also started having little daydreams that a younger Kim Possible would, and indeed had, vehemently denied.

-----

Now, as she stepped into Shilo's Clothier, she was about to finally live out one of those daydreams. She had often, over the last year or so, dreamt about the day she might cross paths with the verdant villainess again.

It would go one of two ways. Either Shego would drop what she was doing at that moment, ignite her hands, and begin trading razor-sharp banter with Kim just like the old days. They would trade kicks and blows, and finally laugh it off over a drink or three and talk about the good old days.

…or Kim would throw her arms around the emerald mercenary and tearfully admit that she'd missed, and indeed pined for Shego, and they would become best friends, just as she had with Miss Go years before, and then maybe more.

Kim wasn't prepared for the third outcome: Reality.

Shego did something that Kim would never, in a million years, have thought she would do when Kim called out her name.

"Shego. I knew I'd find you one day…"

The malachite thief didn't turn to face Kim, she just raised her hands and whimpered quietly.

"I give up."

----- ----- ----- ----- -----

Author's notes additional; Okay, before you ask, Susan punching Kim was NOT spousal abuse. She's just not the kind of woman to settle for a slap in the face to get her point across, and Kim pretty much deserved it, as she herself realized. ((we'll explore this and their relationship more in another chapter so it won't seem so sudden))

Those of you who have read my magni opus "The Darkness Without" will also recognize Susan Justice as "the pretty blonde bitch" as Shego calls her at the end of that story. She's something of a transplant, and we'll see her again in both works.

We'll also be seeing Marine Corps Tara and a few of Kim's other Highschool friends eventually, or so I have planned.