�A/N: Well, here it is. The first chapter of the next story in the 8 Nights arc. I know I ran a poll, and the story of Shego and Drakken won, but I'm having a helluva time getting that one where I like it. This one, however, flowed from me (that sounds dirty), much much easier. So I went with this one.

Disclaimer: Kim Possible is owned, operated, ran, and basically lorded over by Disney.

Remember Ran's Three R's: Read, Review, Responce!

Special thanks to cpneb and the writing team of JAKT for their beta work.�

8 Nights: Coming Together

Chapter 1

Wade Load pushed a couple of buttons on his computer screen, killed an overhead screen, and leaned back in his chair with a sigh. He really did not like getting his head bitten off when he was just trying to do his job, especially by someone who wasn't doing there's. Kim and Ron were back from Germany, having spent those eight horrid nights in the cave, which lead to Kim having a miscarriage. And now, it seemed like it would take an Act of Congress to get them back out into the field. Hell, it would take an act of God to get them to stop fighting.

The past few days had not been going well for the super genius. Team Possible, for all accounts, was out of commission: which was a bad thing, considering how desperately the world needed the two heroes. What remained of the villains, super or otherwise, was causing world havoc. Motor Ed was crushing used car lots all over the Garden State with his new tricked out monster truck. Rumors were flying that Dr. Amy Hall, a.k.a. DNAmy, was looking around for genetic samples of alligator and crocodile along with cobra and black widows. Camille Leon had been spotted at V-Con, a villain's convention in Dallas. Not to mention a couple of newbies who had popped: the Gamer, who used video game accessories as weapons, and the Movers, who committed crimes using a moving truck and were actually dressed as movers.

Wade grabbed the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes. Global Justice could only handle so much, and they had their hands full with Gemini and his cronies as well as Jack Hench deciding to get in on the villain action by trying to take over the world. No, the world needed Team Possible, and they weren't coming. It almost seemed like they would be breaking up, if anything.

Joss Possible, the love of Wade's life, was doing all she could to keep the minor hits on the site answered, such as big cats in bigger trees, bank robberies, and hostage negotiations. However, her place wasn't out in the field, it was with Wade helping him in the "Q" front. The super suit she wore out on missions, which was Kim's old one, was taking a beating. Wade couldn't remember in the last week when the suit had a full charge.

Sighing one more time, Wade looked at some of the awards hanging on his wall. Several times he was pictured next to Kim and Ron. One was an award was from Global Justice for their years of service and dedication. Another one was the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which they received shortly after the Lorwardian attack. Then there was one from Smarty Mart after they had stopped Frugal Lucre from destroying the Internet. The pictures and awards reminded him of how well the three of them worked together as a team.

Wade was dropped out of his thoughts when he heard the door open up behind him. Spinning in his chair, he saw something that he hoped to God that he would never see. Never had Wade moved so fast in his life.

There was Joss Possible, his fiancée, in Kim's old super suit, leaning on the door frame to keep herself upright.

She looked horrible. As if she had gone ten rounds with Monkey Fist. Joss had several scrapes across her face, some deep enough to draw blood. Her face was pale and she almost looked like she was dead on her feet.

The suit itself was all but shredded. The lack of a full charge prevented the nanobots in the suit from mending the damage. The cuts that were in the suit were struggling to repair themselves, showing Joss' exposed flesh which displayed several deep purple bruises. A couple of the tears had red at the edges from where the young lady was bleeding.

"Wade, I'm, I'm so tired…" Joss sputtered out before falling into Wade's arms, out cold. Wade gently lifted her head up and softly pushed some hair out of her face. Hooking his arm under her legs, Wade carefully lifted Joss into his arms and carried the young hero over to his bed, laying her gently out above the Space Passage sheets.

Darting over to his desk and grabbing the prototype to a new model of Kimmunicator that he had been working on for Ron, he went back over to Joss and tapped a few buttons on the device. A green light lit up, which he aimed at the top of Joss' head and brought it downwards towards her feet.

Wade brought the device to his face and looked at the results. "Nothing broken," the genius said with a relieved sigh, "just a few bumps and bruises." Wade eased himself onto the edge of the bed and looked over at Joss.

'Not to mention the pure exhaustion she must have,' Wade thought to himself. He leaned over and gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and whispered quietly as not to wake her up, "Never again. Never again will you have to go into the field. Damn it Kim and Ron, will you hurry up and work through what you two are going through?

"Can't you see how much the world needs you?

"How much Joss and I need you?" Wade put his face in his hands and drug it upwards to where his eyes were peaking out over his fingers. His gaze had returned to the awards on the "Attaboy" wall.

'A team, that's what we were, before Dementor had to go rig up that exploding kiosk, and cause those two to be trapped in that damn cave. Wait a minute…team,' Wade thought then stood up from his spot on the bed and returned to his chair, looking at his computer screens.

"A team: one that can work well together. A team that can handle themselves in the field," Wade said aloud to himself, unintentionally forgetting about Joss in his bed, then tapped a few buttons on his keyboard.

"By God, if Team Possible can't rise to the occasion, then I'll form one that will!"

Wade's fingers flew over the keyboard as brought up files on anyone and every one that Team Possible had had dealings with.

Then, he looked over at the digital clock on his desk. It was almost nine in the evening, and he hadn't eaten yet. He grabbed a PDA that he himself had built and hit a button on it, which synced it up to the computer he was currently working with. The image on the monitor and the image on the screen were now one in the same. "Computer," he said, "activate voice command program Alpha. Authorization, Load, Wade."

"Voice print confirmed. System now running on voice commands, big boy," a rather electronic version of Joss' computerized voice said.

'I never get tired of that,' Wade thought with a smile.

Getting up from his chair, looked down at the PDA in his hand and while making his way to the kitchen, he looked over the files he had manual brought up. Not seeing anything he liked on the first one, he spoke into the PDA. "Close file: Yori. Access file: Hirotaka."

The PDA beeped and half a second later, a picture of Hirotaka and some text was displayed in front of him. He skimmed over the information and then spoke at the device in his hand, "Minimize current window. Create new folder on desktop, name: Maybes." Wade stopped and flipped on the living room light. "Place copy of file: Hirotaka in folder: Maybes." The computer beeped and a copy of Hirotaka's file was placed in the folder he just created on his desktop.

The young genius walked into the kitchen and pulled open the fridge, scanning the food items that were available to him. Then he looked back at the PDA. "Bring up file: Tara," he said and then went back to the ice box, pulling out a bag of ready to toss Caesar salad. Shutting the door to the chill chest, he placed the PDA down on the counter and pulled a bowl from the cabinet above him. While he opened up the bag and dumped the contents into the bowl, he looked back over to the PDA and looked over the file he had brought up. Liking what he saw, he told the computer to repeat the actions of Hirotaka's folder while he tore open the dressing pouch and poured the liquid over the salad that was in his bowl.

After a quick toss of the salad, Wade jabbed the fork he had used into the food in the bowl and took both over to the dining room table. He sat the items down and took a seat, then grabbed the PDA and told it to access the file on Bonnie Rockwaller. He looked over it while he ate and sent it to the maybe file.

After his dinner, which also involved running his search, he had wound up with four maybes. He decided to save himself a few hours, he would limit his search to just those he thought could handle themselves in the field. Wade placed his bowl in the sink and rinsed it out quickly before grabbing his PDA off the kitchen table and returning to his room.

Wade quickly looked over at his bed, and saw that Joss was still dead to the world. He sat down in his computer chair and once he was settled, he ended the sync with the two computers. "Computer, end voice commands. Return to manual," Wade told his computer. A quick beep later informed him that he was on manual operations again. Accessing the folder of maybes, the young doctor started to read more in depth into the files. Hirotaka was eliminated, and that left him with three choices. Tara, Bonnie, and retired Global Justice agent Cass Station. She was currently running her own gas station, so the chances of her joining were slim…

XXX

Tara ran her fingers through her platinum blonde hair, pulling a few strands out of her eyes as she looked at the work out dummy in front of her. She wiped the sweat from her hand onto her light grey cotton shorts and thought of the attacks she needed to work on. The students she had been teaching had left, and she was left alone for her private work-out.

Running a Shou-Lin dojo meant that you had to keep yourself sharp on all the moves that you were teaching, and Tara took that part seriously. She had already assaulted the dummy with a furious barrage of punches and kicks that would have landed a normal person in the hospital. Now it was time to work on the aerial attacks. Bending her knees slightly, she jumped high into the air and brought her right leg up to the dummy's chin in a crushing blow. She repeated the action several times, alternating her kicking foot.

Looking over at a clock on the wall, Tara saw that it was getting close to ten at night. "That's enough for tonight," she said to herself and walked toward the locker room. The young martial arts master went over to her private locker and stripped out of her work-out clothes. Opening up the locker, she pulled out her gym bag, tossed her clothes into it, set the bag on a bench, and headed for the showers.

Once inside the shower room, the blonde bombshell turned the water onto cool, but not freezing, and stepped in. A cool shower after a sweaty work out, as she discovered in high school, was the best thing to relax her. Of course, she also had another relaxing hobby, and it was one that she really didn't talk about except for a few people.

She smiled to her self as she lathered up with the moisturizing bar of soap and rinsed the suds off. 'Who, oh who, am I going to own tonight,' she thought with a smile as she poured a bit of shampoo into her hand and worked it through her hair. She had cut her hair short during her junior year in college after she realized that heavy activity and long hair don't mix all that well. Plus she actually liked it in a bob style.

Tara wondered why one of her best friends, Kim Possible, kept her hair as long as she did. Thinking of Kim brought to her mind the time she had the pleasure of serving as one of the maids of honor at Kim's wedding. It broke her heart to think about how much trouble she and Ron had been having, but it did give her a chance to get to know Wade a bit better, and found that he, too enjoyed one of her hobbies.

After a total rinse job of her body and hair, Tara walked back out to the locker room and grabbed a towel, drying herself off. She was thankful that all the students had left and she was alone in the dojo, seeing as how walking around nude and soaking wet probably would have turned off a few of her students. She wasn't a nudist, by any means: and was comfortable with her body. But she did respect the others around her, and she wore a towel on the very rare occasion when she did have to wind up sharing the locker room, usually with Kim or Ron when they dropped by to give a demonstration of their various forms of their own martial arts.

After taking care of her usual routine of applying deodorant, running a brush though her hair, and putting on her undies, she reached into her locker and pulled out jeans and t-shirt she had worn to the dojo and started to shut the place down.

She walked back to her office and killed the lights and several of the breakers, leaving just two security lights on so she could see to get out of the place. Tara looked at the catalogs on her desk and quickly put them out of her mind. She would look over them tomorrow. Right now she just wanted to get back to her apartment and partake of another hobby.

Tara walked across the floor covered in safety mats and posters on the wall of several famous martial art masters. When she took up Shou-Lin during her senior year of high school, she never realized that, by the time she was out of college, she would be running her own dojo. As she pushed open the door and closed it behind her, she turned around and locked it up then looked up at the sign above her head.

"TARA BYGHT SHOU-LIN DOJO"

"Teaching you to 'Byght' into self defense"

The pride she felt in owning the dojo made itself known every time she had taken a moment to look up at the sign. A smile crept onto her face and the whistling tune of We Didn't Start the Fire came from her lips as she started her walk to her apartment, which was only a couple of blocks from the dojo. It was a cold and clear Colorado night as the moon shone down on downtown Middleton. As the young lady walked to her apartment, the tune she had been whistling started to come out into a full song.

"We didn't start the fire," Tara sang, "It was always burning since the world's been turning. We didn't start the fire, no; we didn't light it, but we tried to fight it." By the time she had reached her apartment, she was singing, loud and proud, the final verse to the song.

"Homeless vets, AIDS, crack, Bernie Getz," she sang as she walked into her apartment and sat her keys down on the table.

"Hypodermics on the shore, China's under martial law, Rock and Roll, cola wars, I can't take it any more!"

Tara kicked off her shoes as she sat down in her recliner, finishing off the song she was singing. Grabbing her remote and video game controller from the table beside her, she turned on her TV and pressed a button in the center of her controller, turning on the system.

She was greeted with the start-up screen of her system, which quickly launched into the game she was playing last: a World War One shooter named "Call of the Brothers Medal of Victory: Outfit of Blood." It was a funny title, sure, but it was a serious game, and one that Tara very much enjoyed playing.

While she was loosing herself in the role of a French Soldier during the battle of Verdun, a message popped up on her screen.

"Loadinator has sent you a message. Would you like to read it?" the message said. Tara tapped the yes answer, which caused her game to pause. The systems "control panel" of her system flashed on the screen for a bit before the message was displayed. Tara read it out loud to herself.

"Tara, your phone is about to ring. Don't worry, it will be me, Wade, calling."

Sure enough, the moment she finished reading the message, her apartment phone rang. Grabbing it from the holster it was resting in, which was on the same table as her remote and controller, she hit the talk button and brought the receiver up to her ear.

"Hello?" she asked to the person on the other end of the phone line.

"Tara," the voice said: sure enough, it was Wade, "How would you like to work for me for a little while? The original Team Possible is out of commission, so to say, and I need a new team that I can send into the field."

"Um, Wade, are you sure you want me? I mean, aren't there several other, you know, BETTER people that you can ask?" Tara asked, not sure why Wade would chose her.

"Nope: I've been through them all. You and one other person are the only two people I know that can handle what I'm asking of them. I mean, you run your own dojo, for crying out loud," Wade said with a grin, not that Tara could see it…yet.

"Is there some place we can meet, talk about this, face to face, instead of over the phone?" Tara asked, now confused as to what caused her to beat out all the others.

"Sure thing. How about Bueno Nacho: tomorrow at noon?" Wade said, "I've got one other person to call. In fact, I might have them meet us there."

"Sounds good to me, Loadinator," Tara said, struggling to stifle the giggle that came every time she said Wade's screen name out loud.

"All righty: I'll explain exactly why I picked you tomorrow then. After that, you can give me your final answer," Wade told her, ignoring her slightly giggling.

"Now that that is taken care of: how about a quick game of Puzztres before you make your other call?"

Wade laughed. "Okay then, if you think you've got what it takes to beat the Loadinator!" he replied with a smirk.

Tara exclaimed, "Bring it!" before hanging up the phone and turning her attention back to the system. In thirty seconds flat, she was hot and heavy into a one-on-one game of Puzztres. Five minutes, give or take, into the game, Wade was beaten soundly by Tara. Wade sent a quick text message of congratulations to Tara before signing off. The young woman went back to her original game with the smile of victory on her face.

After an hour or so of beating back Germans and helping recapture Verdun, Tara shut off her console and made her way to her bedroom.

Once there, she stripped out of her jeans and t-shirt and pulled on an oversized GameBox 3 shirt, which she used as a sleeping gown, and pulled back the covers of her bed. The blonde eased herself in between the sheets and closed her eyes. She thought about what Wade had to say to her tomorrow at Bueno Nacho before falling asleep.

�A/N: Not to much to say about this one. I'm not sure how long this story is going to last, but it will cover several missions. As you'll note, I've also decided on a last name for Tara. That's right. I listened to my inner, which is also my outer, geek, and gave her a pun name that all nerdcore members will (hopefully) enjoy.