Kim and Ron continue their lives after finally getting together at the junior prom, they have to face the trouble that lies on the road they have ahead of them.
Disclaimer: Kim Possible and related are the property of Disney which, contrary to common belief, I do not own.
Thanks everybody for reviewing, I hope you keep enjoying the story.
Special thanks to Kwebs for beta reading.
Chapter 2: A hostile hospital situation
"Good morning Kim, what are you doing this early in the hospital?"
"Good morning Dr. Hendrikson," Mrs. Dr. Possible greeted her colleague, "Kimmie needs a check-up on her leg, I think she's got a sprained Sartorius muscle."
Seeing Kim's annoyed expression Dr. Hendriskon chuckled, "And I guess Kim isn't too happy with it," the physician knew Kim's aversion of examinations very well, seeing as she had been the redhead's doctor for over fourteen years, "Let's check it out, and I'm sure you're out of here in no time."
Kim sighed and hopped on the examination table; she actually liked Dr. Hendrikson, even though the woman still frequently treated her like a child.
"Yep, that's sprained," the doctor said after some prodding on Kim's leg, "Did you get injured when you were fighting those Diablo robots?"
"Yes," Kim admitted, "Although I'm pretty sure it was the fight with Shego afterwards that got my leg."
"Well, don't worry, your leg isn't injured that bad," Dr. Hendriskon reassured, "Take a couple of days rest and you should be fine, I will also write you a recipe for some medication that will prevent inflammation."
"See Kim, it wasn't that bad," Kim's mother told, "Now you go and pick up your medication and call Ron to pick you up, I have some business to take care of at the neurology department."
Kim said goodbye to her mother and Dr. Hendrikson and walked over to the pharmacy to get her anti-inflammatory meds, then she called Ron to pick her up at the hospital.
As Kim walked past the paediatric ward on her way out, she almost tripped over a young girl who tried to exit the ward.
Kim crouched down and smiled at the girl, "Hi, I'm Kim, what's you name?"
The girl looked up, "I'm Samantha, I lost my teddy bear, will you help me look for it?"
"Sure," Kim said, "Why don't we look at your bed first?"
"I'm having surgery tomorrow, but the doctors said it wouldn't hurt because I will be sleeping the whole time," Samantha babbled happily to her new friend, "Are you sick too? Or are you a nurse?"
"I guess I'm a bit sick too," Kim smiled as she held up the bag with her medication, "I hurt my leg and now I have to take these pills for a week."
"Pills taste yucky," Samantha scowled, "I have to take two every day."
When they arrived at Samantha's room, her parents rushed over to the little girl, "Samantha, where were you? We were worried about you," her mother said as she picked her daughter up.
Samantha's father nodded grateful at Kim "Thank you for bringing her back, miss…"
"Kim," Kim told, "Kim Possible."
"Are you related to Dr. Possible?"
"That's my mother," Kim told, "She's a neurosurgeon here."
"I know, she's going to operate our daughter tomorrow," the father said, "oh, excuse my manners, my name is William, but you can call me Bill."
"You are Kim Possible?" Samantha tried to squirm out of her mother's hold, "Why didn't you say so?"
Kim grinned sheepishly, "I'm just a normal person, nothing special."
"You are!" Samantha said, "You save the world, and you fight bad guys and you do all these things…"
"Samantha dear," her mother said, "Don't excite yourself too much, I'm sure miss Possible has other things to do."
"Don't worry," Kim assured them, "I can stay for a while if you like. Why is Samantha here, if I may ask?"
"Of course," Bill said as he picked up Samantha and placed her in the bed, "She has a weakening in some arteries in her brain, at the moment they are of no threat but when she gets older it could lead to a stroke."
"During the operation the doctors are going to reinforce those arteries," Samantha's mother continued.
"I see," Kim smiled at the little girl, "Well, don't worry, my mom is the best brain surgeon in the world."
Kim chatted for a little while with Samantha and her parents until Samantha's mother announced she had to leave for work, "But I will be back in a few hours."
"I am going to get some lunch," Bill said shortly after Samantha's mother left, "Do you want to come Samantha?"
"No, it smells too much like food there," Samantha told, "and I'm not allowed to have any because of the surgery. Can't Kim stay here with me?"
"I don't know, maybe she wants to go home," Bill said.
"I can stay for a little while," Kim told, "I'm waiting for my boyfriend to pick me up anyway."
"Thank you," Bill smiled as she walked out, "I'll be back shortly."
"You have a boyfriend?" Samantha asked after her father had left.
"Yes," Kim smiled, "and he is a really nice guy."
They talked for a short while until Bill returned, by then Samantha was starting to get drowsy and soon after fell asleep.
"Thank you for taking time out for Samantha," Bill said.
"It's no big," Kim told.
"Well, thanks anyway, it means a lot to my daughter," Bill said gratefully, "Now Samantha's sleeping I might as well go home and get changed, maybe I'll see you again sometime, I know Sammy would like to."
Kim and Bill said goodbye and left Samantha's room.
As Kim walked to the exit of the paediatric ward, she bumped into Lily, a classmate of Kim, who was wearing a sunshine spreader costume.
"Hey Lily," Kim greeted, "trying to get some last extra-currics?"
"Yes," Lily grinned, "I've been slacking a bit too much last year, and I love working in a hospital. What are you doing here?"
"I injured my leg," Kim explained, "and my mother insisted on having it checked."
The girls walked together to on of the exits of the pediatric ward.
"The pediatric ward sure is quiet right now," Lily said.
"Yeah, most parents have left for work," Kim told, "no life-threatening diseases at the moment. I think except for us there is one nurse doing rounds, but that's it."
At that moment the nurse Kim mentioned walked past, "Hey Kim, what brings you here? Lily, could you keep an eye out here for a moment? I have to bring these reports to the supervising doctor."
"Uhm, okay," Lily reluctantly said, "Kim could you stay here for a while as well? Otherwise it will only be me and Sharon."
"Sure," Kim smiled; by now she was pretty sure that Ron had taken his scooter, so it could take a while before he would arrive at the hospital.
"Hey Kim, hey Lily, where is everybody?" Sharon, another sunshine spreader who was a year younger, asked as she walked into the ward.
"Gone for the moment," Kim explained, "the head nurse will be back in a couple of minutes."
While Kim and Lily went back to check up on the children, Sharon walked to the bathrooms.
When she passed the elevators Sharon heard a 'ding' and one of the elevators opened, she was about to say something when she saw five armed men in black jackets step out instead of the nurse she had expected. Sharon let out a frightened scream before she passed out.
Kim and Lily heard the scream and spun around, "That sounded like Sharon, stay here, I'll check it out," Kim quickly walked over to where she had heard the scream.
When Kim spotted the armed men she immediately grabbed the Kimmunicator and pressed the panic button, she didn't wait for Wade to pick up, "Emergency situation in the pediatric ward; four armed men, probably more, no nurses and staff on site."
"Hold it right there," one of the four men said as they all aimed their weapon at Kim.
"Alright, put away that devise and walk slowly over here," the man ordered.
Kim carefully placed down the Kimmunicator and started walking over to the men, "Just a few feet more…"
"Stop!" a fifth man appeared behind the others, "Haven't you noticed who that is?"
"A girl who just called the police," the other man said.
"Idiot," the man who had just appeared was clearly the leader, "That's Kim Possible."
"So?" another man asked, "We have guns, we can take care of one girl, famous or not."
"First you allow her to come too close and then you think your guns are still useful," the leader growled, "she would have taken you down already if she had been sure there were no others around."
Kim was not sure to take this as a threat or a compliment. However, slowly she tried to creep closer to the men.
"Don't even think of doing that," the leader stepped in full view and showed he was holding Samantha, who was still half asleep, "You may make it past my men and me, but not before the girl get it."
Kim's eyes grew wide, but then she held her hands out in front of her in surrender, "What do you want?"
"First you pick up you phone-thing and tell the police exactly what is going on," the leader told, "I don't want them to try anything funny. If they do, the children here die."
Kim relayed the information to Wade, who was now on full alert, "What do you want to do Kim?"
"Nothing at the moment," Kim said, "these guys are serious, they haven't hurt anyone yet and I want to keep it that way."
Samantha squirmed and tried to wring herself loose from the strong grip of the leader and kicked his legs, "Let me go!"
"What is your name?" the leader turned away from Kim and looked at Samantha.
"Samantha," the little girl said in a small voice.
"Well Samantha, I want you to act really nice," the leader's smile never reached his eyes, "Because if you don't, I shoot her."
"You can never hit her," Samantha said defiantly, "She's Kim Possible, she'll take you down."
"She will hold perfectly still," the leader said as he gestured his gun toward Samantha, "Or won't she?"
Kim's mouth went dry, "Samantha, just hold still for now, okay?"
"Good," the leader smiled, "Now that's settled, who else is here in the ward?"
"Just me, Lily and a couple of children," Kim told, "and Sharon, but I think you already found her."
"Alright," the leader ordered his men to assemble all the beds in the room where most of the children already were, then he turned back to Kim, "Make sure to tell the police that I don't want anyone to come up here with the elevators or stairs."
After she had complied the leader looked her over, "I've seen some footage of you, I know you have gadgets hidden on your person. Put all the gadgets down in a pile, if I catch you keeping one behind one of the children here loses a limb."
Kim emptied her pockets of lip gloss and a lipstick, she put off her watch, took everything from the hidden compartments in her belt and pulled off her shoes, then she briefly moved her fingers through her hair to make sure she hadn't forgotten anything.
The leader and two of the men who had just returned looked surprised at the stack of gadgets, "She sure is prepared…"
"Put it in a bag and toss it out the window," the leader ordered. When that was done the whole group assembled in the room.
Wade quickly went to action after Kim had explained the situation; first he called Global Justice because they were the ones who could respond the quickest, then he called the local police department and let them contact higher federal offices.
Then he called Ron and explained the situation to Kim's best friend, pressing that Ron would only make things worse by trying to enter the hospital.
After setting these gears in motion, Wade checked the status of Kim's gadgets; as he had feared, the invaders knew of Kim's gadgets and had ordered her to take them off.
The hospital didn't have cameras in the pediatric ward so Wade was not able to find out what was going on in there, he could only hope Kim could keep the situation under control.
Sharon was still out cold, and one of the men had put her in an empty bed. Kim walked over to the girl, "Lily, could you get a wet towel or something?"
The other children were more confused than frightened at the moment; fortunately the men had been considerate enough not to show their guns.
"So what is it that you want?" Kim asked after she had place the towel on Sharon's forehead.
"About a month ago there was an attack on the US embassy in London," the leader explained, "The attack failed and two of our men were killed and one was captured. He has been surrendered to the US government and put in prison. We want him out."
"And you plan to achieve that by kidnapping a pediatric ward?" Kim asked in disbelief.
"You'd be surprised how quickly people can be persuaded when children are involved."
"You're not making yourselves very popular this way, you know," Kim said, "not even with other criminals."
"Or aim is not popularity, we want our man out of jail."
"But by holding a pediatric ward hostage?," Kim questioned, "And why here in Middleton?"
The leader smirked, "Because the son of the prosecutor is here, he was hit by a car three days ago."
"Jonathan Stone," Kim looked over to Jason Stone, Jonathan's son, who was sleeping in one of the beds.
"That's right, he has quite some influence in high places."
"I don't think the government is willing to deal with criminals," Kim said, "especially terrorists."
"You know what happens in that case," the leader told, "so you better use whatever influence you yourself have as well."
"…And those are their demands," Kim told over the hospital phone; the Kimmunicator was thrown out together with her gadgets.
"We do what we can," the negotiator said, "In the meantime, do the terrorists agree on freeing one or more of the children?"
Kim looked at the terrorist leader, who was standing next to her, he shook his head, "No, they don't."
"Alright, at least keep trying; we don't want children dying from lack of healthcare."
"They won't," the leader said after the negotiator hung up, "None of these children has a life-threatening disease."
"True, but they're starting to miss their parents," Kim told, "and some of them have wounds that need treatment."
"Take care of it if you can," the man simply said, "Or hope very hard the government caves soon."
"Is there anything I can do?" Ron asked; he had arrived shortly after Wade had called him and was standing in the area the police had cleared where the negotiators and anti-terrorist agents were setting up.
"I'm afraid not," the negotiator told, "Unless you have an idea what plans Miss Possible might have."
"KP won't do anything that could harm the children," Ron told, "she will probably hold off any action until she is certain she can act freely."
"Well, the government isn't likely to budge, so there is a good chance a strike force will attempt an attack tonight."
The rest of the day Kim, Lily and Sharon did their best to comfort the children and treat wounds if necessary and possible, Sharon was still a bit shaky but she managed to put up a smile so not to worry the kids any further.
The negotiator called twice more and the second time he arranged to get food up to the ward.
After dinner two of the men went to a different room to sleep so they could stand guard later during the night.
The leader had Kim call the negotiator once more before nightfall, "They say that if their demands are not met by tomorrow evening, consequences will follow."
"You have to stall it," the negotiator urged, "We can't do anything in such a short time."
"Please try what you can," Kim said, "but keep the children safe."
When they walked back to the room, the terrorist leader produced a set of handcuffs, "I don't want you wandering off tonight, these cuffs are rigged with an alarm; if you try to open or break the cuffs, you can be sure one of us hears, and you know the consequences."
He chained Kim to a hospital bed and then went to one of the private rooms to get some sleep himself.
Shortly after, some of the children began to cry that they couldn't sleep and that they wanted their parents.
"Let's pretend this is a campout," Kim suggested, "we can sing a few songs and then we go to sleep."
Reluctantly at first, the children began to sing along as Kim went through her repertoire of camp songs. After the singing, Kim dragged her bed a bit more to the centre and began telling a story she remembered from when she was a pixie scout.
"…'Join me at my table as a Knight of the realm, as you have shown greater courage, bravery and self sacrifice than any man in this room.' The King said. The surprised knight stood, still shaking at the thought of loosing his head, and still with the tears he shed for his father on his face. He looked at the King and noticed a smile and a tear on the face of the King."
Kim looked around and saw that most of the children were asleep; it didn't take long for the others to fall asleep as well.
"How do you do that?" Lily asked, "How can you stay so calm?"
"I've faced worse," Kim said, "this is the first time children are involved though."
"Aren't you scared?" Sharon asked, "They ignored us most of the time, but they've put a gun you your head at least two times today."
"This isn't the first time I've been threatened by guns; if they don't pull the trigger at once, you're mostly good if you stay calm."
"But you got to get scared by that," Sharon insisted.
Sometimes I wonder if that part of my brain is malfunctioning," Kim chuckled without humor, "I freeze up seeing a roach larger than my arm, but falling out of a plane without a parachute somehow gives me a rush. Guns though I don't particularly like."
"Eww, roaches as big as your arm?" Lily shivered.
"Quiet there," one of the men ordered as he glared at the three teens in the dim light. Lily and Sharon quickly went to their own beds and Kim looked around the room once more to check if all the children were alright.
Her attention was caught by something plush under one of the beds, with a little effort Kim managed to grab what turned out to be a teddy bear; on one of its paws it had a hospital wristband saying Samantha.
"So there was the little bugger," Kim was about to ask one of the guarding men to hand it to Samantha when an idea hit her.
Quickly and quietly she put her plan together.
"Sir, we found this," one of the patrolling guards walked over to Dr. Director holding a teddy bear, "It appears to belong to one of the children who are held hostage."
"Where did you found it?" the head of Global Justice asked.
"In the parking lot, under the windows of the pediatric ward."
"Do you think it was thrown out?" James Possible asked; he and his wife had come over worried about Kim, but seeing they wouldn't do much good Anne had left again to watch Jim and Tim.
"Most likely," the agent said, "the teddy bear seems to be a little torn at the seems, maybe there is a message hidden inside."
"Torn seems?" Ron walked over to the group and picked up the bear, "Let me see… no way."
"What is it?"
"Plush babble," seeing some very confused expressions, Ron explained, "Kim and I used to have a secret language we exchanged by our shared stack of stuffed animals, KP had worked out a whole code displayed by a bit of plush pulled out of certain seems. The only animal that was never used for that was the Pandaroo I bought for her, it's been almost eight years since we last used it though."
Ron chuckled as he thought back, "KP once tried to tell me she wanted to learn kung fu, but we didn't have a word for that so she used 'fight' and 'art', and I thought she was attacked by the statue in the park."
Will Du, who had been preparing the strike force, did a quick calculation, "You mean to tell me two eight year olds developed a code based on plush?"
"No, not completely," Ron said, "I think we both were five or six when we started using it."
"What does it say?" Kim's father asked.
"Let's see…" Ron looked the teddy bear over, "Give back… bear…secret…at night…much… sleep… gas…wait…working…hidden in… bear… squeeze…come over… after… noise."
"And what do we make of that?" Dr. Director asked.
"KP wants us to return the teddy bear tonight in such a way the terrorists don't know it was returned," Ron told, "and she wants us to put sleeping gas or knockout gas in it with a delayed working, probably to effect more of them before they find out, and much of it and it has to be activated by squeezing the bear. And after KP makes a loud noise we can enter."
"How do we get the bear back up there without anyone noticing?"
"I think Rufus can help," Ron pulled Rufus from his pocket, "Are you up for a heavy task buddy?"
"Rufus saluted and showed off his muscles to show he was up for the task."
Ron then called Wade to ask the young genius whether he had sleeping gas with a delayed working, "I can batch something up within an hour," Wade promised.
Eventually, it was three in the morning when Rufus climbed through the ventilation system dragging the teddy bear behind him, the time was chosen by the strike force; between three and four in the morning people were sleeping deepest and Rufus would have the best chance to enter undetected.
When Rufus entered the floor he quickly spotted the two guards standing on opposite sides of the ward, a short search provided him with information about the other terrorists who were still sound asleep in the other room.
The naked molerat then collected the teddy bear he left at the ventilation shaft and carefully brought it to where Kim was sleeping.
Having put herself in mission mode, Kim slept very lightly and woke up immediately and silently when Rufus nudged her.
"Good work Rufus," Kim whispered, "I'm glad Ron still knows plush babble. Okay, place the teddy bear under that bed," Kim pointed to a bed just out of her reach.
Rufus obliged and then went to a hiding place.
"Excuse me," Kim spoke just loud enough for the guards to hear, "I really need to go to the bathroom," she held up her cuffed hand.
The guard shrugged, "Either hold it up or let it go, we won't set you free."
Kim hadn't expected to be let free, but now she had the guard's attention, "Well, could you at least give that little girl over there her teddy bear back; I spotted it just yet and she had been looking for it all day."
The guards looked at each other, then one shrugged and picked up the bear, "That girl?"
"Yeah, just put it under her arm."
The guard placed the teddy bear under Samantha's arm and in her sleep the girl pulled it closer.
"Good, she has the bear, now you shut up and go to sleep as…" the guard stumbled a bit, "Whoa… I don't feel too good."
"Peter?" the other guard walked over, "Something wrong?"
"I just felt dizzy for a moment, it's al…" the guard named Peter collapsed to the ground.
"Shit!" the other guard ran to the private rooms to tell the others what happened, but he collapsed halfway the hall.
"Rufus," Kim softly called, "warn the others, I don't want to risk waking up the other three terrorists." But Rufus was already out; either the gas affected him more or he had taken a small dose already when bringing the bear to this floor.
For a moment, Kim was unsure of what to do; her bed was put on the brake and she couldn't reach the break release and dragging the bed to the window while it was on the break wasn't something she could do before the knockout gas reached her.
So she put the handcuffs flat on the bed-rail and with her free hand she slammed down on the cuffs, it took three blows before it broke and immediately the room was filled with a loud beeping noise.
"That's the signal," Ron said, "let's move in."
Several children began to wake up because of the noise and started crying, the leader of the terrorist group had also woken up and ran in, gun drawn, "And what do you think you are doing?"
Kim was barely able to stand on her legs; the gas was already hitting her hard, "Your men are down, I don't know what is wrong with them…"
"When did this happen?" the leader interrupted, "And what is wrong with you?"
Then he started to feel dizzy as well and in a moment he comprehended what was going on. With a feral growl the leader aimed his gun at Samantha.
In the time it took him to aim his gun, Kim mustered all her strength and launched herself at him and swept his weapon upwards.
The team outside heard the sound of a gun being fired.
"Hurry, there might be wounded," Will Du ordered.
The team rushed in, all wearing gas masks, to see three of the terrorists out for the count and Kim draped over one of them, unconscious as well, the still loudly beeping handcuff around her wrist.
The other two terrorists were quickly found as well, still asleep and none the wiser of he situation. They were quickly disarmed and restrained.
Kim was placed back on her bed and she and all the children were checked for injuries and possible harm done by the knockout gas.
After a short search, Ron spotted Rufus, he picked him up and placed the little guy back in his pocket; he would wake up in a few hours without problems.
Kim slowly opened her eyes and noticed she was once again in a hospital bed, "How long was I out?"
"Couple of hours," a passing nurse told her, "I want to thank you for what you did, you probably saved those children's lives."
"No big," Kim responded automatically, "Besides, I couldn't have done it without Ron and Rufus. Where are they anyway?"
"Your friend went home to get some sleep," Dr. Director told as she entered the room, "He did a great job tonight, you both did."
"So everything turned out fine?"
"Yes, those terrorists will face severe charges and probably end up with their friend they wanted to free in high security prison."
"And the children?"
"They are all still asleep, in fact, you are the first one to awake from the knockout gas effects. We have just informed your family that you are awake and they will come pick you up shortly."
"KP!" Ron rushed in and hugged Kim.
"Hey Ron," Kim smiled as she returned the hug.
"You got me worried," Ron said, "we heard the gunshot, and then you were on the ground, I thought you were shot."
"But I'm okay," Kim told, "I just inhaled a lot of knockout gas, good thing I got a bit resistant to it over time. Great that you still knew plush babble."
"Yeah," Ron chuckled, "I think Will still doesn't understand how we managed to come up with it back then."
"Slept well?" Kim's mother asked as she walked in.
"I've got a bit of a headache from the knockout gas," Kim admitted, "when will I be released? And how are Lily and Sharon?"
"Lily and Sharon are still asleep," Mrs. Dr. Possible told, "And there are already professionals standing by to help them deal with the situation when they wake up, but I think you can visit them in a couple of hours. As for you, just a small cognitive test to see the effects of the knockout gas have been cleared and you're free to go."
Over the next few days, Kim was on forced rest to recover her still somewhat injured leg. She visited Sharon and Lily a few times; thanks to the counselling the girls were quickly getting back on their feet after the trauma. Kim also went to see Samantha after the girl had been operated.
"Hey Samantha, sorry surgery had to be delayed."
"Kim!" Samantha almost fell out of her bed trying to hug Kim, "You saved us."
"Thank you so much for saving our daughter and all those other children," Samantha's father said, "Who knows what would have happened when those terrorists had gotten their way."
"They didn't," Kim told, "better not get thinking about the could haves and would haves, once you go down that road…" she trailed off.
"You're right," Samantha's mother smiled weakly, "But we still owe you big time."
Shortly after, Kim walked out of the room and saw Ron standing just beside the door, "Don't you want to get in?"
"Nah," Ron shrugged, "she hasn't even seen me during the sitch, I don't need to steal your thunder."
"You won't," Kim told, "you had an equal, if not bigger share in making this turn out well, you deserve credit."
Ron smiled, "Getting credit from you means more to me anyway."
"Ron, you're the best, have I ever told you that?"
"On occasion, and it still is nice to hear."
The two teens walked out of the hospital, arms around each other's shoulder.
When they reached Ron's scooter, Ron suddenly gasped, "Oh no! I totally forgot."
"Forgot what?" Kim asked.
Ron opened the saddle of his scooter, revealing a small compartment with a box of chocolates in it, "I had gotten you your favourite chocolates when you had to go to the hospital for your leg, but I forgot to give them to you."
Ron carefully opened the box; all the chocolates had molten to an unrecognisable mass, "I'm sorry KP."
"Don't worry," Kim laughed and ran her finger through the mess and tasted a bit, "The chocolate still tastes good," she offered Ron a next finger-full.
"You're right," Ron chuckled and scooped up some more chocolate.
Kim then scooped up another finger of chocolate and placed a dot on Ron's cheek.
"KP? What are you… oh," Ron grinned as Kim kissed off the chocolate, "Uhm, we're kinda in a public place here…"
"Yeah, I know," Kim smirked, but she did stop, "Let's go home?"
A/N: This story actually originated as a one-shot, but didn't feel good to me as a stand-alone. I hope you liked its placement in this story and that you have enjoyed reading.