I hope many of you got a feel for the content of this story from that Prologue last week, and I'm really glad to see it was met so warmly from this community.
Thanks to those that review, it is always a great feeling to receive those emails on my phone when I get up in the morning.
As time progresses you will see that I have a slight addiction to action scenes and a bit of ADD when it comes to scene changes, but I promise you they're all necessary.
This officially marks the start of the story. Enjoy.
Chapter 1, Old Memories
Shego reread the same paragraph from her villain magazine for the fourth time, before lowering it just enough to flick her eyes over the top and examine Drakken's moving shoulders. It had been a while, almost three weeks, since his latest takeover scheme and Shego was getting restless. She sighed closing the magazine and tossed it over her shoulder then lifting her legs off the armrest and swinging them to the floor to stand up.
Dr. Drakken just continued to work on some very small gun before him, patiently directing the soldering iron to catch the flux on his device. "Whatcha doin' Dr. D?"
"Gah, Shego!" The soldering iron in his hand flipped through the air, his instincts forcing him to reach out and grab it. With a cry of pain he released the hot metal and it clattered to the floor. "Shego! This is a very delicate procedure, and now my hand is going to blister up like the face of a small child going through puberty."
"Blisters and pimples aren't the same thing, Dr. D."
"Yes… well. What do you want?" Shego looked at him in surprise and feigned innocence, directing an index finger to her person.
"Me? Oh nothing." She put both hands behind her and leaned over him as he went back to work. "What's that?"
"Shego, do you mind?" This response actually did surprise her. When wasn't Drakken trying to shove his latest scheme down her throat, whether she wanted to hear it or not?
Whatever- Shego didn't depend on him for entertainment. She had other things to do.
As the double doors to the lab shut behind her, Drakken looked carefully over his shoulder before standing up and letting out an evil chuckle. His hands clasped together and he rubbed them vigorously. "Kim Possible today is the day I have finally managed to outsmart you!"
Kim and Ron walked leisurely down the sidewalk to the Possible residence, Ron with his hands in his pockets, and Kim still troubled by the events of the day.
"I've got a bad feeling about this, Ron."
"Yeah me too, KP." After Betty Director told them Shego would no longer be required, the Director had arranged to send Kim and Ron home. "But hey," he interjected, "you'll see, everything's gonna work out just fine like it always does. Team Go's going to help out too, there's no way we're going to lose."
"I hope so, Ron." Ron looked down at the naked mole rat sticking out of his pocket, and they exchanged worried looks with each other.
A few days passed by without hide or hair of the Comet Commanders, and more than likely they were plotting which kept Kim on edge. She knew what Shego was capable of just by herself, and now there were four new villains and she couldn't even prepare for the powers they would have.
Kim pulled out her Kimmunicator on the way to school.
"Hey, Kim, what's up?"
"Hey, Wade." The boy picked up a soda near him and sucked at the straw while Kim watched.
"Uh… you're not calling to wish me a happy birthday are you?"
"It's your birthday?"
"No, just teasing." He waited for her to say something, but soon realized what she was after. "There haven't been any hits on your website, well at least none worth checking out. It's been pretty quiet."
"Tell me about it." Kim stopped walking and looked at the houses around her. In fact… "Wade, call Ron A.S.A.P. tell him to meet-" An explosion erupted from a house behind her, showering the cheerleader with splinters of wood and glass. She did a barrel roll before hitting the ground, her Kimmunicator projecting a few feet away, the screen smashed in a web of cracks. Kim got up, a drop of blood running down her left temple, and she took a defensive stance as the house that had been there just a second ago transformed into a massive ball of metal.
It rose on cylindrical pillars, which twisted out to form a tripod of legs for the mechanical marvel. The grinding of metal was loud. Kim, still a bit disorientated from the previous blast, had trouble staying up. Finally the machine, in its full transformation, lowered itself so the metallic ball was within twenty feet of the teen and a panel near the front glided backwards to reveal her greatest arch nemesis.
"Drakken!"
"Hello, Kim Possible!" His usual voice now held a bit of venom behind it as he leaned forward to speak into the microphone before him. "I took a bit of a proactive step in today's world conquest scheme, and decided to get you out of the way first. I hope you don't mind the reversal in order." His hands pushed forward on a variety of levers, as a maniacal laugh erupted from his throat.
The metal beast raised upwards, the pillar legs each sprouting triangular toes which opened and shut like a claw machine. The ball then rotated to rest on one leg while the other two flew at her, Kim did a series of back handsprings to avoid the blows- shards of concrete and dust filling the air with each miss. This was bad.
While their normal battles usually took place in areas where civilians were scarce or limited, the battle now raging on would take out the entire neighborhood unless Kim got to a large clearing. She sprinted forward, still dodging the quick metallic claws and dove for the Kimmunicator, somersaulting just in time to escape a close call. While dashing down the street, Kim popped the back of the Kimmunicator off and pulled on the cord beneath, stretching it and shattering the glass bottle at the end like a glow stick creating a doughy substance from the chemical reaction. She jumped on a nearby motorcycle, covering the keyhole with the new clay. It expanded into the hole taking a few seconds to harden and she turned the key, flicking the accelerator and taking off in a spin that kicked up some of the grass on a nearby lawn.
Dr. Drakken chased her down the street, shaking the ground with each new step, as his monstrous machine struggled to keep pace with the now racing bike. Kim pushed the motorcycle as fast as it would go as she sped off in the direction of an abandoned factory just a few miles from where they were. It wasn't very spacious, but it was the closest place she could reach that set the stage for a casualty free fight.
Drakken seemed to pick up speed too, as his device sprouted an extra two legs, and positioned themselves like a table, the front and back moving in simultaneously opposite directions. It ran after her, like a pouncing cat, one free arm still punching the ground around Kim, and she zigzagged down the street as Drakken's monster crushed the vehicles parked around them.
The cheerleader knew he was getting close; they wouldn't make it to the factory. She took a brief second to turn her head and watch as a claw came directly at her. Kim jumped from the bike flipping through the air and got hit by a green ball of energy, knocking her hard to grass as she struggled to move. "That's it, Shego!"
The villainess who belonged to that name casually strolled over to Kim, as the girl on the floor pulled herself along the grass. "Hello, Cupcake." She didn't stop to listen however and continued pulling with her arms forward. A hard foot pushed into her spine, as Shego put all her weight forward onto Kim's back, forcing her to stop and listen. "You've lost, Pumpkin. We both knew this day was coming."
Kim could feel the ground shake as Drakken got closer to them, his familiar metal grind stopped as he waited, waited for Shego to do… something. She couldn't see however, her face pushed into the ground beneath her, could only wait as she was possibly crippled or even killed. "Do it now, Shego!"
Shego stood atop her reaching for the holster in her costume, and pulled out the gun Drakken had been working on for the past few weeks. The villainess pointed it at Kim and paused. "Now you can live the life I never could. I'm giving you freedom, Kim. Don't waste it." She took one more second to look down at the redhead and pulled the trigger, the space around them erupting into a bright yellow mist. Shego was propelled away from her and landed on her back getting up immediately, and without another look jumped onto a leg of Drakken's machine as he lit up some rockets and flew off into the Middleton sky.
Kim woke up in the hospital. A barrage of questions assaulted her as soon as her mind registered sound. She let out a rumble in the form of a question, and gripped at her temple, a stabbing pain still present from the time of the accident. Wait the accident! "Where's Drakken?"
"So it was Drakken!" Leave it to him to pull something as dirty as a surprise attack while Kim was walking to school. Ron took a step back to give Kim some space. "KP I found you lying on the side of the road." He turned his head to avoid showing Kim the brief expression of guilt that crossed his features. "How you feeling?"
"My head hurts, a lot actually."
"Stay here. I'll go get your mom." What a silly command. Kim was currently exhausted and had tubes running every which way from her arm. She felt around in her gown and noticed some of the heart beat monitor pads on her chest. A few moments later, her mother rushed into the room and took Kim's head into her hands, looking into both eyes before letting out a sigh of relief.
"Oh, Kim I was so worried when Ron brought you in."
"I'm fine, Mom."
"You've got a laceration on your temple- seven stitches, honey," Kim's mom stood straight up and smiled, "but thankfully that's all it is."
"What about the light?"
Ron stepped into the room; sure this would be a hint as to why they had left her instead of kidnapping the girl. "What light?"
"The light Drakken… he was…" Kim gripped tighter at her head, trying to remember how it had happened. "I was on the floor and all of a sudden there was this light, but I don't know where it came from. Bright yellow, and then he just flew off."
"Wait, so only Drakken was there?"
"Who else would be there?"
"Oh I don't know, maybe the only person in the world who's ever managed to beat you in a fight?" Kim looked at him with mass confusion.
"I've never lost a fight."
"Oh come on, Kim. I've personally seen Shego hand it to you."
"She-who?"
"Shego?"
"And that is?" Ron and Kim's mom paused and turned to each other, that was not a good sign.
By the day's end, a grueling 4 hours of testing had taken place on Kim's body. Everything from MRI's to CT scans, to blood tests and urine samples. The whole nine yards, but nothing told them that there was anything wrong with Kim, other than some memory loss which Kim's mom had chalked up to blunt trauma from her head wound. It looked like this Possible had yet again, gone to hell and back with only a few scratches to show for it.
"Step one complete!" Drakken paced back and forth in front of Shego, who had taken the magazine back up and was currently flipping through it. "Oh I can only imagine what must be going through Kim Possible's mind, or what isn't." He started laughing like a mad man. "At last, Shego, we have her out of our hair, and with that we can move on to step two."
"You mean you actually had another plan?" Shego dropped the magazine just low enough to see Drakken looking at her.
"What do you mean actually? Of course I did, evil genius here, hello?"
"Well I mean it's just that your plans never succeed. Or am I the only one thinking this is too good to be true." Drakken stared at her for a bit, squeezing the small remote in his hand out of anger.
"Shego, is it necessary to bring up our past failures in my time of success? The point is, we've finally beaten her, and now we move on to part two!" He looked at the remote in his hand, which was slightly cracked and hit the forward button. The monitor showed a map of the Atlantic Ocean. "Now that Kim Possible has no memory of ever being a teenage crime fighter, thanks to the brilliant effects of my Memory Eraser, there will be no one to stop us from attacking the Mid-Atlantic Ridge!" He hit the forward button again and it zoomed into the ridge. "By placing explosives along the length of the trench with my ROV's, and igniting them all at the same time, the resulting explosion should trigger a massive eruption of lava to sprout from within the trench increasing the amount of land created by 50,000 percent."
Shego looked up from her magazine just in time to see Drakken move onto the next slide, a map of North America.
"Because of this new rapid creation of land from the Atlantic, the North American Plate will move westward at a rate of five feet per day. The resulting stress on the plates will cause massive earthquakes along the San Andreas Fault, as well as several other earthquakes all over the world!"
Shego stood up and moved towards his computer. "Is that it?"
"Well I-" Drakken paused and turned towards her. "What do you mean is that it? Did you hear the part about the earthquakes?"
"Yes, and maybe tens of thousands of people die. Then what?" Drakken just stared at her. "Where is the part where you take over the world?" His eyes shot open and he turned back towards the models. "I knew this was too good to be true."
"Well eventually all the continents will crash into each other forming one super continent that-"
"Yeah- Drakkengea, we tried that before remember? And how long would that even take at a rate of five feet per day? Years?"
"There you go again always trying to put me down, but not this time, Shego. I have the power of invincibility on my side."
The hospital released Kim later that night. The stitches would need a week before they came out, and until then she was free to go about her business as usual… or unusual as the case may be. Luckily it had been a Friday, and Ron had the entire weekend to try and remind Kim who Shego was, or at the very least teach her all over again. Oh boy it was going be a long weekend, thankfully he had Wade on his side to help out.
So they set up Kim's room with a projector, and Ron made the popcorn. "And you say this girl has defeated me before?"
"Well ok yeah it's only happened like two times, but it has happened, KP."
"And she works for Dr. Drakken?"
"Yep."
"It's so weird to think that I've fought Drakken that many times, and I can't remember this woman." Ron stopped munching on his popcorn and offered her the bowl.
"No worries, KP. These videos will set you straight!" She took a handful of the snack and waited as the surveillance videos played.
Kim watched intently, studying everything she could about the way this woman moved and fought. She had even been somewhat impressed with her own style of combat versus what appeared to be a very good fighter. "Wait." Ron paused the screen. "She's… green?"
"Right. Well when Shego's family was much younger a meteor hit their house and it gave them all special powers, but I guess it also changed her skin tone." Ron paused a second grabbing his chin in thought. "You know that's actually strange, 'cause we've seen Hego change from a regular looking guy into the blue hair… thing."
"What does Team Go have to do with this?"
"Team Go are her brothers." Kim looked at him in shock.
"Then why is she evil? Team Go are the good guys."
"Right, well I actually don't remember the answer to that. Something about Shego having a bad temper and getting annoyed easily." Kim didn't appear to be buying it. "Look she was good at one point. A little help, Wade?"
"On it Ron." Wade pulled up various videos in which Shego was seen as leading her brothers in fights against super villains in Go City, even winning awards for their bravery.
"That doesn't make any sense." Kim stood up and walked over to the paused image of Shego smiling with her brothers. "How could someone like that, someone so heroic and full of goodness become one of the most wanted people in the world? Become my nemesis?"
Ron sighed and put his hands in his pockets. Rufus climbed out and stood atop his shoulder shrugging. "I don't know, KP."
"Ron, you don't think that I… Could I become what Shego has?"
Ron looked up at her with his mouth wide open. KP? The Kim Ron knew, and had known since preschool? The Kim who beat up all those bullies for him throughout elementary? The Kim who had saved the world on more occasions than he changed socks? "No way, KP."
"How can you be so sure?"
"Because, Kim. You're not like her. Shego has a bad temper, and no morals. She'd sooner kill you than manicure her nails. In fact I've seen her attempt both at the same time! There's no hope for what she's become, and there's no way she's going back."
"I don't know about that, Ron." Kim turned back to look into the flat eyes on her projection. "I may not know anything about her, but I get the feeling deep down that she can change and I'm going to do it."
"Ya-what?" Ron sprung to his feet holding both hands out as a barrier. "Hold on a second, KP. What you're saying isn't just some game. This is Shego we're talking about here. Most wanted woman in the world. Most appropriately described as a killer glow stick. Most likely to look smokin' hot while making you smokin' hot. That's Shego." Kim cocked an eyebrow at that. "Ok, so some of that was a bit of a stretch, but give the Ron man credit for trying."
"No way, Ron." Kim turned all the way around to face him. "We're going to find Shego's good side."
Ron turned to Rufus with a disheartened expression. "Rufus buddy; I think Kim hit her head harder than we thought."