His boss was sitting at his desk writing something on a near blank piece of paper when Shi arrived, stepping silently through the door and roughly pulling off his mask. The man who called himself Finch Gray looked up, eyes sliding up to Shi's face.
"You're late," he said flatly.
Shi shrugged and tossed the disk case onto the desk. It made a loud clatter on the wooden surface, and he stepped back, maintaining a blank face to hide his contempt for this stupid, stupid man.
"You're late," Finch repeated. "Why?"
"Only by thirty seconds," Shi replied steadily.
"I pay you too much for you to be late."
Shi snorted, and walked out the door, ignoring the man's calls. He didn't give a damn about the money; this job was only a filler for his time. As the door swung closed he called, "When you're in a reasonable mood, you can reach me in the cell that's called a bedroom."
Whistling a ballad from the high plains of Saturn, Chandre's homeworld, he opened the door to his room and locked the door, going through a cursory examination of the little closet. Once again, Finch had had his goons place both listening and optical bugs in his room, this time in the tiny air vent on the ceiling. Yesterday it had been the door. Casually he removed them, still whistling, and crushed them underneath his heel, sliding the remains into a corner with the debris of their little cousins. In the unlikely event that he missed something, he placed his jammer on the nightstand and undressed quickly, sliding out of the full-fades and into a comfortable pair of pants and shirt, standard wear on this planet.
As expected, Finch called in five minutes after he had finished putting his combat boots back on. "Jaime Cass, report to my office."
Shi shrugged and muttered, "What the fuck," scooped his jammer from the table and tucked it into the vest pocket of his full-fades, then wandered back over the office.
Finch was looking slightly annoyed, yet uncomfortably pleased with himself. "I have an idea to get rid of Kim Possible," he said.
Shi raised an eyebrow and fell gracefully into one of the chairs before Finch's desk. "Oh?" he asked politely. "I thought your bid was taking over the world."
"Something not possible with her in the way," Finch said. "Anyhow, my plan is to lure her into a trap."
"And you want me to do it?" Shi asked. "Fine. How do you want her dead? Any preferences? Snipe shot, execution style? Poison? Personally, I don't like torture, but I'll do it for a much higher price."
Finch actually flinched. "That would be murder," he said, his voice actually raising an octave.
Shi smiled, or rather, bared his teeth in something like a snarl. "Yes, well, that's kind-of what I do," he said, growing quickly irritated. "So you don't want her dead. What sort of trap, then? I'm assuming something to delay her from saving the day or whatever sort of crap it is she does. All right. When? And around what time? How long would you prefer that I held her for?"
"Actually, you wouldn't be doing the trapping," Finch said. "One of her other arch-nemeses, Doctor Drakken, will be doing that."
"How many foes does this kid have?" Shi asked, slightly startled. The files had said nothing about this; they had been related entirely school-related.
"Quite a few. She had thwarted many plans to take over the world," Finch said. "I, however, am going to succeed."
Riiight, Shi thought. "Then what do I do?"
"You'll be luring her into a trap. Something about the captured substitute teacher. Drakken's henchwoman, Shego, will be doing the capturing. You don't mind being kidnapped by a woman, do you?"
"I prefer not to be 'kidnapped' at all, but if I must be, then the sex of my captor doesn't bother me in the least," Shi answered.
"Perfect. Mr. Bartlet, Middleton High's P.E. teacher, was injured this morning due to a car accident. They need a substitute, and you are it. Get to know Kim Possible, play the mysterious card, and in three days' time, you will be having a nice little meeting with Shego," Finch said.
"I hope I can meet this woman before she kidnaps me," Shi said dryly. "Just in case someone else tries to. You know, I don't want to get confused if it isn't her."
"She wears green and black. About five six, black hair, you can't miss her."
"And when do they need the sub?"
Finch glanced at his watch. "In twenty minutes, so I suggest you get going. You're already scheduled."
Shi rose from his seat. "I hope I get transportation and free gas. The Ninja?" Finch sighed and nodded, and Shi gave him a two-fingered salute, then walked out the door to Finch's private automobile stash.
The 'evil' villain was about as evil as dirt, and richer than most men in the world. Shi didn't know what it was about rich men, but they liked their cars. Personally he didn't care so long as he got to drive one, or at least one of their bikes. The Ninja wasn't a Harley, or even a BMW cycle, but it was good enough, and added to the mystique.
Before going to the garage he grabbed his well-worn black leather jacket. It wasn't really leather, more synthetic, but it looked real. It was hard to buy leather jackets in space, and so he had had to make do. Zipping it up and tucking his ID (false, of course), into his back pocket along with some cash, he ran to the garage and hopped onto the bike after grabbing the key and a black helmet.
Within moments, speeding along the highways at ninety-four miles an hour, he pulled into the front drive of the school and parked the bike, hopping off it easily and setting his helmet neatly on the seat. Before going into the school he cut the feed to the gas, so that the bike wouldn't start, pocketed the keys, and went inside.
At the office, he greeted the secretary and leaned over onto her counter, smiling charmingly. She smiled back. "Hello. How may I help you?" she asked, looking slightly nervous.
"I was told they needed a sub for P.E.," Shi said, running his hand through his military short blond hair. "Jaime Cass. I'm probably on the list or whatever it is you've got for these things."
"Oh, you're the sub for Mr. Bartlet," the secretary said brightly. She typed some things into the computer and printed out a slip of paper. "Here you are, Mr. Cass. Just some things you might want before class starts. You know, a roll sheet and little stuff like that. I believe Mr. Bartlet already has a lesson plan made out for you for these three days, so you won't have to worry about coming up with things like that." She was twirling her hair in her fingers and fluttering her eyes ever so slightly. "Aren't you a bit young for a teacher?"
He flashed another grin. She was old enough to be his mother. Too bad he hadn't known his mother. "Twenty-eight, ma'am." He glanced down at the paper. "Looks like I've got class in five minutes. 'Bye."
The bell was ringing as he made his way from Mr. Bartlet's office to the gym. It seemed that the man was a complete control freak. He documented everything, made notes of everything, and clearly didn't trust Shi to handle any part of his job so he had made him a list of things to do down to the minute.
The class was already assembled by the time the second bell rang, causing him to wince at its noise. It was better than jumping and yelping, which was what he had done at the first bell. He stared at the twenty-eight sullen, bored students for a moment, glancing over each of them, his gaze brushing over Possible's without a second glance, before looking down at his roll sheet, then back up.
"In case you hadn't heard, Mr. Bartlet was injured in a car accident this morning," he said, mildly. "I don't know the exact damage, but he'll be back by Monday. Judging from the tone in his letter, it will be whether or not he's completely healed." Several giggles there, mostly from the girls, who were looking at him with big eyes and cow-like faces. "Anyhow, I'm Mr. Cass, and obviously I'm your sub. So we'll go through roll call and then take a little look-see at this incredibly detailed lesson plan Bartlet gave me." He quickly rattled off names, memorizing their faces as they said 'yes' or 'here,' and made a mental list.
Finishing, he pulled out the lesson plan from his pants pocket and unfolded it. "All right. Says here that you normally go on a little jog before starting class. And then do push-ups, sit-ups—rope climbing? —and some more calisthenics, followed by dodgeball." He raised an eyebrow and looked at the students. "This seems a lot like the military. Does he really make you do all this?"
"Puh. Yes," answered a pretty brown-haired girl. She had overly tanned skin, and he quickly identified her as Bonnie Hunter.
"And you really do have timed mile runs every Friday?" Shi was amused.
"Yes," everyone chorused wearily.
The door slammed and his muscles tensed automatically, but only his head turned to face the incoming student, a disheveled blond boy who wasn't dressed down. He was the same kid who was walking beside Possible that morning.
"Sorry I'm late Mr. Bar—you're not him," the kid said.
"I've realized. I would assume that you are Ron Stoppable?"
"How did you know?" the kid asked, flabbergasted. "Do I know you?"
"No. You were the only one not present," Shi replied. "Get in line, Stoppable." Looking at the students and their sullen expressions, he said, "Well, we'd best get started." Everyone groaned, and he thought he could see several glints of mischievousness in their eyes. There would definitely be trouble if he went along with Bartlet's hellish lesson plan, and he really didn't feel like watching twenty-nine out of shape kids struggle through easy drills. "I don't like this lesson plan, so we're going to play dodgeball. Get the balls out and I'll divide you into teams."
They did, and he quickly separated them. There was an odd number, but they seemed pretty capable. They formed up and began to play, moving somewhat sluggishly, and several people were out pretty quickly. While they played, he watched, and was incredibly bored. There was nothing like watching high school students play dodgeball to really suck the fun out of life.
Finally the period ended, and he resolved to have them do something different the next day. Something that didn't involve the littler kids getting the crap beaten out of them. Although he had to admit, Possible was pretty damn good. She had the moves, there was no question to that, even if she didn't have the discipline. With the proper training she could make an amazing assassin.
"Uh, Mr. Cass?" one of the smaller students asked as they walked out the door. He had almost had his half-inch thick glasses broken.
"Yes?" he asked.
"Could we play something other than dodgeball tomorrow? I really hate that game."
"Don't worry, you're going to be playing something else," Shi said with a reassuring smile.