2

The next day, Kim, Ron, and Wade found themselves in Upperton, disguised as the "Evil Medieval" trio from Wade's childhood comic books. Kim was the 'femme fatale' of the group, "Lady Quartered", decked out in a royal blue dress, a gold collar, and a gold belt at the waste. Ron (playing the role of "Lord Hung") wore a royal blue robe with faux fur at the collar (which, when tied up neatly at the waist, concealed his street clothes). And Wade was dressed as the incompetent jester "Sir Drawn" in blue-and-black.

"Whoa, check it out, Rufus!" exclaimed Ron as he spun around in his robe. "We're royalty, man! Ah boo-yeah!"

"Royalty, uh-huh!" chirped Rufus. Even he had a tiny little crown Wade made up from scraps of cardboard.

"Keep it down, Ron," said Kim as she adjusted her opera mask on her face, "We're almost there."

Ron and Wade slipped their masks on and the three walked up together to the home of Frugal Lucre. "Are you sure we're at the right address, Wade?" asked Kim. "Didn't he used to live in Philadelphia?"

"When his mom busted him out a short while ago," explained Wade as they further approached the house, "she thought a change in environment might help reform her son somehow, and they moved here. At least that's what his blog said the last time I checked it."

"Wait, he has a blog?" said Ron, surprised.

"Even super villains have blogs now, Ron," said Kim as they walked up the front steps.

Ron blinked. "Huh. Interesting."

"Of course, it also makes finding them that much easier," said Kim as she rang the doorbell.

"Wait, did we have a villain blog?" asked Ron.

"I already took care of it," said Wade as the footsteps on the other side of the door grew louder. "Although I had to take a few…liberties…"

The door opened and there stood Frugal Lucre with a few shaving cuts on his chin. He said, "You must be the Evil Medieval trio on VillainBook! So glad you could come!" He sighed, "So many villains don't appreciate good economic sense anymore…glad to see you still do!"

Lucre shook hands with Wade. "Sir Drawn," he declared, "I can't wait to hear your new idea for how to save even more money just by buying only one item per week at Smarty Mart!" He wrinkled his nose. "Although, that would probably mean less customers, but hey—sharp saving is smart spending, right?"

He wriggled his eyebrows at Kim. "And you must be Lady Quartered." He took her by one, glove hand and lightly kissed it. Kim felt slightly queasy, but told herself it could be worse—it could've been Drakken kissing her hand.

Lucre turned to a beaming Ron, anticipating some sort of flattery. "Nice to meet you," was all Lucre said before opening the door further. "Come on in!"

"Wait!" said Ron. "Don't you want to try to guess at my name? C'mon, it's at the tip of your tongue, you know it—isn't it just hanging there? Is it hung on your mind?"

"Mmm…nah, never heard of you," shrugged Lucre. He went back inside just as Ron slouched and sighed, "Even when I'm using an alias, no one remembers my name."

"Come on!" hissed Kim. She grabbed Ron by the wrist, and the three of them walked inside together. Lucre's living room, which was decked in a hideous shade of grape on the walls, ceiling, carpet, and furniture, was filled with Kim's foes from the past. They were all laughing and talking, though Kim couldn't quite hear just what they were talking about. For once, they didn't appear to be talking about anything villainous—they were just getting caught up with each other's lives.

"…and then I tell him, "that's no golf club, that's my weapon of mass destruction"!" finished Killigan. He and the other villains had a good laugh over whatever joke or anecdote he had previously told. Ron forced himself to join in with a weak chuckle. The only one not laughing was Junior, who just blinked and said, "I don't get it."

"What's not to get?" said Ron. "That was hilarious, Killigan, just hilarious!" He forced another cheesy laugh, which gradually came to a stop when he realized the other villains weren't laughing and were instead looking at him strangely.

"Do I know you from somewhere?" asked Junior. "Your face, it looks familiar, but the name escapes me…"

"I am Lord Hung!" declared Ron in an extremely regal manner. The other villains stood and blinked. "What's the punch line?" asked Junior.

"Um…uh…oh, look!" said Ron, pointing over to a nearby pin-up. "Let's go play that! That looks like fun!"

He ran over to the pin-up…only to see it was a picture of Kim from her website with several holes poked through it. Above it was the sign, written in crude paint, "Pin the tail on Kim Possible". The actual Kim Possible, who stood just nearby, did not look amused.

"Oh, I feel very popular here," muttered Kim sarcastically. Upon a double inspection of the line, she noticed Drakken and Shego weren't in line. She looked over to see them sitting on a couch laughing.

"Oh, if only we could actually do this to her," laughed Drakken. He stopped laughing and said, "Actually, Shego, I have an idea…"

"Let me guess," said Shego dryly, "It involves you inventing a machine that shoots out darts and needles at Possible?"

"Close, Shego, close," said Drakken, now grinning evilly and rubbing his hands together. "I won't tell. You'll just have to wait."

"Which means you don't know what it's going to be," said Shego plainly.

"Well, of course I know what it will be, Shego," said Drakken defensively. "You're just going to have to wait and find out what it is!"

Kim rolled her eyes, figuring this was going nowhere. She left to the kitchen to leave the two villains behind to bicker. She had only been here a few minutes and already, she could tell there would be no ultra top-secret plan to be revealed at this party. It was simply a gathering for the villains to come, socialize, and treat Kim as a voodoo doll. But it was better to be safe than sorry, right?

As Kim was wondering if she should find Ron and Wade and discuss whether they should stay a bit longer in hopes of someone slipping up, or leaving on the assumption nothing major was going on, she heard someone say, "Aren't you that dorky medieval queen wanna-be on VillainBook?"

Kim gasped and spun around to see Shego standing there. "Uh, yes, of course," she stammered, trying to sound regal, "It is I, Lady Quartered." She narrowed an eye while raising an eyebrow. "And you had better show me some respect."

"Lady Quartered, huh?" muttered Shego. "Ya know, that kind of sounds like that villain from that dorky comic book my brothers used to make me read…but any-hoo, tell me: When was it?"

"When was what?" asked Kim. She drummed her fingers on the kitchen counter.

"When were you defeated by Possible?" said Shego. "Everyone here has a story to share about that little princess. What's yours?"

Kim stopped drumming her fingers. "I can't tell you," she said, "It's too embarrassing."

"Come on, I admitted to the time I got stuck in that melting cheese block," said Shego with a wave of the hand, "I smelt like cheese for a week afterwards. Whatever it is she did, it can't be that embarrassing."

Kim looked over Shego's shoulder and said, "Oh look, there are my sidekicks! Lord Hung! Sir Drawn! Over here!"

Ron and Wade, who stood in line to play "Pin the Tail on Kim Possible", looked up to see Kim waving her arms and mouthing, "Get over here quick!" They stepped out of line to go to the kitchen at the same time Junior cried out, "Where's the cake, father?"

He pushed Ron and Wade aside, causing them to trip and fall onto the floor, which in turn caused their masks to fall off and reveal them to the villains, who gasped at the sight of the two, blushing heroes. Shego growled, "I knew it!" She snatched Kim's mask off of her face and said, "Oh, Kimmy…comic book super villain style went out of style eight years ago."

Kim took up a fighting stance. This was going to get nasty. "I could say the same about you, but why bother?"

The other villains stood around the two women, eagerly waiting for another epic battle between good and evil. Shego lit up her hands and…

"Frances! I'm home!"

The villains let out a groan at the sound of Lucre's mother coming in through the front door. "Looks like I'm going to have to kick your butt another day, princess," groaned Shego as she unlit her hands.

"Mom, you came home early," whined Lucre.

Lucre's mother walked into the kitchen alongside her son and said, "Sorry dear, but my poker meeting ended a little early." She eyed Kim, Ron, and Wade with surprise. "Why, hello there, Kim Possible! I haven't seen you in a long time!"

"Mom, they crashed my party," Lucre continued to whine. "Aren't you going to do something to them?"

"Oh, maybe I could call their parents and have them come pick them up," said Lucre's mom thoughtfully. "In the mean time, you three may stay in Frances' room. But I'm afraid it's a pig sty up there! I'll go upstairs and clean his room and come back for you."

The other villains smiled nervously as she headed past them and went upstairs. When she was out of sight, there was an awkward silence. The villains were torn between taking Kim for themselves, and letting Lucre's mother take them upstairs. On the one hand, the temptation was great; on the other, Lucre had earlier warned them not to give away any hint of criminal activity while his mother was around.

The silence was interrupted by Ron noticing the nearby cake on the counter. "Hey look! There's cake!" he said, pointing to the cake. "Everyone loves cake! What do you say we all have some cake, huh?"

"And what do you say you just shut up?" said Shego dryly. She got a sudden idea and said, "Or how about you have a slice and tell us for yourself, Kimmy?"

On the word "Kimmy", Kim soon found herself going from facing a crowd of angry villains to facing the vanilla frosting in the cake. She felt the cold frost on her face, and also felt humiliation and fury to hear the villains howling with laughter and Lucre groaning, "Aw, Shego! Now you've ruined my cake!"


"That was so not cool," said Ron as he helped Kim wipe some of the leftover cake off her face up in Lucre's room. His room was indeed quite untidy. Oddly enough, it also had some sort of microphone on his desk. "Don't tell him," his mother had said, "it's his birthday surprise for later tonight. My darling little Frances needs new equipment to practice for when he gets back to making announcements at Smarty Marty."

Of course, it wasn't like the three of them particularly cared about this detail, especially not Kim. "That…was so humiliating!" she said angrily as she flung the cloth onto the floor. "It's bad enough that we get caught, but then Shego felt she just had to go out of her way to…to do that! I swear, she's like an evil version of Bonnie!"

"On the bright side, at least Bonnie isn't a super villain," said Ron. He paused. "Sometimes." Another pause. "I think." Another pause. "Wade, do a double check on her when we get home, okay?"

Kim let out a frustrated groan and sat down at Lucre's desk. "At least Bonnie had her own humbling moments, if only for a few minutes. I wish that for one day—just one day—Shego would have her own humbling moment!"

To emphasize that frustration, she slammed a fist down on the desk—not noticing she had just switched the mike on as she spoke: "I know I shouldn't wish stuff like that, but it's sometimes like Shego just forgot that she used to be a superhero!"

Only Ron and Wade noticed Kim's voice was suddenly amplified throughout the room, and that they could hear gasping downstairs. They tried to signal for her to stop, but Kim, caught up in her emotions, went on: "In fact, it's like she forgot that time she put her evil reputation behind to help out her own old team mates. I saw another side to her that day, Ron—a more heroic side."

"Uh, Kim…"

"We both worked together as if we always had and hadn't just started."

"KP…"

"Sometimes, it's very hard for me to believe that there was a time and a place where Shego used her superpowers for good, not evil."

"KIM!" Wade and Ron burst out.

"What?" said Kim, finally coming off her cloud. She heard the slight feedback…and the snickering from downstairs. She noticed the mike and realized just what it was she had done—just in time to hear Shego let out a furious growl and run up the steps.

Kim quickly switched the mike off, but Ron said, "It's too late, KP. Everyone here now knows Shego's deep, dark secret."

"Uh-oh," said Rufus.

The door was kicked open by Shego, with a look that as a mixture of fury and humiliation. Her hands lit and she charged towards Kim with a fierce cry. Kim had planned to charge right back to flip Shego over.

What happened instead was that she tripped and dodged the attack by falling over to the side, resulting in Shego charging and tripping over Kim, and crashing right into the wall. She fell to the ground as the snickers of the nearby villains grew louder.

"Ay, have we grown a wee bit soft, Shego?" taunted Killigan. "Knowing how you and Kimmy are such good friends and all…"

"Hey, what if you were actually working with her all along?" said Lucre angrily. "How do we know you're not some spy or something?"

"It's not like that," growled Shego. "I just had a temporary lapse in judgement, and that is all."

"When you teamed up with her," Lucre gestured to Kim, "or when you teamed up with your brothers before ever meeting us?"

For once, Shego was speechless. She rolled her eyes and snapped, "Yeah, you know what, Frances? I am so out of here."

She stormed past the other villains, but not before Kim caught the slightest hint of growing humiliation on her face. And it was this look that cast a feeling of guilt onto her.


"This party was so lame, Dr. D," said Shego, trying her hardest to walk tall and proud as she and Drakken left the house.

"Shego," said Drakken suddenly, "Meet me at the park tomorrow. We need to talk."

Shego kept up her bravado, but inside, she began to feel the slightest threat in those words—those were the words that usually meant what was coming would end in tears.