~And now the long-awaited continuation. . . you were on the edges of your seats for three years, right? ;) Seriously, guys, major thanks to anyone and everyone who's stuck with me on this. And if you're new - welcome aboard! I hope you like. This is a "fluffy" chapter, but it will get intense pretty soon.~
Him
Dr. Drakken leaned in to examine the plant for the 618th time since he'd woken up that morning. After all, today was Valentine's Day and this was for one of the most special people in his life. Everything had to be perfect, especially since it had been so hard to find the right bouquet for Shego.
Drakken grinned to himself. He liked that word, "bouquet." It sounded sort of French, and saying it made him feel very sophisticated, like Senior. Anyway, it had taken him a long time to find the right one to give Shego. He always saw people giving each other roses on Valentine's Day, the very pretty red kind that smelled like that perfume Mother wore sometimes. But he'd read on the Internet the other day that red roses symbolized love - like, the mushy, kissy-face kind. Ick. He loved Shego, but not like that.
The website had also talked about how different kinds of flowers represented different things, like chrysanthemums meant friendship and tulips meant you were famous and forget-me-nots meant – du-uh – not to forget. But Drakken couldn't find any that symbolized being a great evil sidekick, and he'd started to worry, maybe even panic a little. He absolutely, positively had to get Shego something for Valentine's Day to show how much he appreciated her!
Sure, she was lippy and sarcastic a lot of the time, but she could be nice, too – a couple of weeks ago she'd told him that his teleporter scheme was pretty darn smart, and he'd thought his chest was going to burst with pride. Just yesterday, they'd had fun together reading the jokes in the latest issue of Reader's Digest. Shego read them all in such a funny, dry voice that his sides hurt from laughing so much by the time she was done.
And even though the way she never got excited with him drove Drakken crazy, sometimes it was comforting. Like last week when he'd nicked himself on the broken pieces of his latest success-impaired Doom Ray and was sure he was going to bleed to death, Shego had just cleaned it with some stingy stuff and put on a Band-Aid on it and told him he was going to be just fine, so he could stop whining about it already. Seeing that she was able to be calm about it had somehow made his heart stop pounding quite so hard.
Besides, if he hadn't gotten Shego flowers, who would? She never talked about her family. Maybe she had a really tiny one, with just a mother and a slightly insane cousin, the way he did. Or maybe she didn't have one at all, and that almost made him cry to think about it. She had friends, but they were the kind you talked to at villains' conventions, not the kind of best-best friend who gave you presents. That, Drakken knew, was up to him.
Then a brilliant idea had jumped into his mind, because, as a supergenius, he had the kind of mind that just overflowed with brilliant ideas. Anyway, he'd found a plant that definitely symbolized evil and wickedness, and he'd managed to get his hands on one in time for Valentine's Day! Drakken grinned smugly at the pot in front of him.
The plant looked nice, too. All the important parts that needed to stay underground were safely covered with dirt – no, it was called soil, Drakken corrected himself. Much snazzier than plain old dirt. The leaves were nice and green. It was definitely healthy – would probably even flower in the spring if Shego took good care of it.
Speaking of Shego, where was she? Drakken glanced down at his watch and hissed through his teeth in frustration. How could it only be 8:55 in the morning? Why couldn't she have decided to come early today? He'd waited so long to give this to her – almost a whole week – and he'd managed to keep it a secret, too.
Shego was going to be proud of him, so proud and grateful. Drakken closed his eyes to imagine that, but the picture came in blurry. Because, now that he thought about it, he'd never seen Shego look like that before. It put a strange lump in his throat, like he had something stuck in there that he hadn't bothered to chew.
Ding-dong.
The doorbell! Drakken sprang up out of his chair, toppling head-over-heels across the table in the process. He hit the ground with a loud thump that rattled his teeth and took his breath away for a terrible second. But that didn't matter. What mattered was that Shego was here at long last and he could give her his present and then she would know that he really did care about her – oh, it was just all too thrilling! Drakken scrambled back to his feet, shook away the pain, brushed the Pop-Tart crumbs off his lab coat, and bounded over to the door. He even remembered to close the kitchen door behind him, so Shego wouldn't be able to see the plant right away, because without the element of surprise, giving someone a present would be no fun at all.
"Shego!" Drakken cried gleefully as he flung open the door. "Hi! Good morning! Happy Valentine's Day!" He heard his voice squeal up a bit at the end of each sentence, but he didn't care. There weren't enough exclamation points in the world for the excitement he was feeling.
Shego cocked an eyebrow at him, the way she always did when he did something stupi – uh, something not that smart. For a heartbeat of a moment, Drakken got nervous. What if he'd read his calendar wrong? Maybe Valentine's Day actually wasn't until next week and he'd have to go another seven long, agonizing days before he could give Shego her present!
But when Shego opened her mouth, all she said was, "Did you have coffee this morning, by any chance?"
Drakken glanced down at his feet, surprised by their jitteriness. "Just one cup!"
"Ye-ah." Shego's lips twitched as she let her shoulder bag fall to the floor. "Apparently that's one cup too many."
Well, humph! Drakken folded his arms across his chest and started to give Shego his best villainous glare, the one he'd been practicing in front of the mirror for just such occasions. Then he remembered Valentine's Day – and the plant on the kitchen table – and the possibility that Shego might have something for him, too. That brought his neck prickles down, and the more they went down, the more the corners of his mouth went up. It was an inverse relationship, right on his own body.
"Shego!" he cried, forcing his voice down from an excited squeal. "I have a surprise for you!"
Shego gave him her smirky little smile. "Ah, so that's what this is all about." Her voice was dry and calm, but there was nothing nasty in it right now. "Well, then, by all means – show me."
Drakken bounded toward the kitchen door on light, happy feet. His heart pounded out a joyous rhythm with every beat: It's time, it's time, it's time to give Shego her present! She'll be, she'll be, she'll be, so very happy with me!
"Behoooooooooooollllllllllllddddddd!" Drakken boomed in his most impressive, look-at-this voice, the one he usually reserved for Doomsday devices and genius blueprints and inventions he was about to steal. But this was almost as important, so he made an exception. Flinging the door wide, he gestured to the plant sitting on the table and gave Shego a big grin, the one so big Mother always said she could see his molars.
He stopped and panted, because that "Behold" had just kind of kept going until he'd run out of air. As Drakken bent over and pressed his hands to his knees to try and catch his breath, he caught a glimpse of his sidekick's face. He waited for her eyes to get as big as two-hundred-milliliter beakers, for her mouth to stretch into a happy smile like his, for her to light up and squeal and tell him what a wonderful friend/evil employer he was –
Hmmm. Drakken frowned. Shego wasn't exactly doing what she was supposed to. Her eyes were wide, all right, but instead of turning up at the corners, her mouth sort of hung open a little like it was broken, before she twisted it up into a little knot on one side of her face.
That didn't look like an excited face. Or a happy face. Or a wow-Drakken-how-nice face. Drakken felt his ponytail droop down over his prickly shoulders.
"Well?" he finally blurted out, because there was an uneasy tingle spreading over his body and if he didn't say something, he just might combust. "Shego? What is it?"
Shego opened her mouth and gave a Very Large Sigh, the kind she usually reserved for when something had gone horribly wrong with their schemes. "It's…a Venus Flytrap," she finally said.
Was that a problem? Drakken folded his eyebrow at her and stuck out his lower lip, just a smidge. "Ye-es?" he asked, hearing his voice curl up a little in confusion. He hated it when that happened – made him sound like he was a sophomore in high school instead of the world's future ruler. "It's a plant, right?"
But Shego was looking at him like he was in preschool, and that didn't help anything. "Yeah, but the thing is, Doc –" she stabbed him with her eyes – "generally speaking, people don't give carnivorous plants on Valentine's Day."
Drakken felt heat rising to his ears, the pinkness that always came when he messed up and Shego made that Drakken-why-did-you-just-DO-that face. He had just now realized that the Venus Flytrap didn't smell so great, either. Not as bad as that super-stink chemical Kim Possible had knocked him out with once, but it definitely wasn't a rose. His view of the room constricted, and he knew his eyes were doing that bunchy thing they always did when he was trying not to cry.
"No, Shego, listen!" Drakken snatched onto every word he had in his head before they could disappear and leave him with just noises and frustration. "You see, I was doing research on flowers on the Internet and they were talking about different flowers that stood for different things like red roses meant love and white roses meant friendship and tulips meant you're famous but I couldn't find anything that symbolized the wonderful bond of evil between criminal mastermind and crafty sidekick!" He stopped to suck in a breath, because he suddenly realized he hadn't taken one for a very long time.
Shego waited, arms folded over her chest. Her eyebrows were pointed down like she was suspicious, but her eyes weren't as hard as they usually were. She was listening!
"So then I remembered Venus Flytraps and thought, What could represent evil better than flesh-eating flora? I got one for you and I know it doesn't look very nice right now but if you take really good care of it might grow flowers in the spring and then it'll be really pretty but still evil, sort of – " Drakken stopped himself before he could say "sort of like you." That might sound wrong, and his ears were pink enough already. "And anyway –" he coughed – "if you keep it in your quarters, you won't have to worry about bugs and such things when it gets warmer!" He flung his arms out to emphasize his conclusion and gave Shego a hopeful smile.
And she actually smiled back. "'Kay, you know what?" Shego crossed the room without tripping over a table leg or walking into a chair (he always envied her that quality) and smirked down at the plant. "That's actually sort of nice."
Drakken felt his jaw scraping the ground. "It is?"
"Yeah." Shego rolled her eyes, but she didn't look too annoyed. "It is."
"Did you hear the part where it would keep pests out of your room?" he asked joyfully, crowding right in next to her so she could hear him better.
Shego edged away from him, mouth twitching. "At least the insect kind," she whispered, and it sounded more like she was talking to herself than to him.
Drakken tilted his head to the side, then shrugged. She probably meant Commodore Puddles. Even though his dog's potty-training was progressing quite nicely, Shego still wasn't too crazy about him being in her room.
"So – do you like it?" he dared to ask.
Shego gave a shrug of her own. "I guess so. I mean, it's not like it's a hydrangea or anything, but it's the thought that counts, right?"
That did it! Drakken felt himself spring up on his toes as reliefitude washed over him. He was so happy now! Shego liked his gift and she'd said it was nice and oh wow it was just almost too good to be true.
"Oh, and by the way."
Drakken looked up just in time to see a little red package sailing toward him. He stuck his hands up in the air and caught it effortlessly. Okay, so maybe he fumbled it around in his hands a little bit, but he didn't drop it, and that was the important part.
The package, he could see now, was shaped like a heart and covered with that infernal shrink-wrap. On the front of the box, a little cartoon skunk was smiling at him, holding out strange-looking green plants with smell lines coming off them. "Stinkweeds for a stinker," it said.
For a moment, Drakken's smile wobbled. Strange sentiment, and not exactly the nicest – oooh, was that chocolate he was smelling? He turned the box over in his hands and found himself staring at a Nutrition Facts label.
He grinned so big it hurt his mouth. Candy! Shego had gotten him candy. Flowers were nice and all, but this – this was the best Valentine's Day gift he could ever get!
Drakken heard himself yip happily. Shego must have heard it, too, because she looked up at him and her lips did their almost-smile thing. "Happy V-Day, Dr. D," she said, voice still deadpan.
"Thank you!" he bellowed in reply. "Shego, thank you so much!"
Shego rolled her eyes again. "You're welcome," she said and walked off toward her special sidekick-quarters carrying her plant, the plant he got for her.
To get the shrink-wrap open, Drakken had to use both hands – and a few teeth – but it wasn't really that hard. If he wanted something bad enough, he could be pretty strong. He hoped someday that would help him in his quest for world domination. But, for right now, it was just enough to have chocolate.
He snatched three of the plumpest pieces out of the box, dropped them into his mouth, and took a huge, wonderful bite. Ohhhh – there was coconut in one of these. Peanut butter in another. And was that a hint of caramel in the third? Drakken closed his eyes to savor the delicious taste and tipped his head back in pure bliss.
Strange thing about those flowers, he thought as he chewed. All flowers belonged to the same scientific kingdom, and biologically speaking, they were quite similar. He was no botanist, but he was pretty sure they all reproduced the same way (or maybe there were two ways). Made their food in the same way. Had the same basic structures. What made one of them stand for love and another for fame and yet another for friendship?
Drakken shook his head to dismiss those tangled thoughts and swallowed his mouthful of chocolate. It felt gooey and comforting going down his throat. Well, whatever they symbolized, he'd felt very, very good when Shego had said the Venus Flytrap was nice. It had given him a warm little tingle in his chest, where he was used to feeling all nasty and itchy.
It made him feel like he'd done something good. Drakken wanted to hang onto that feeling, but he wasn't quite sure how.
Well, there were a few things he did know! He stood up and grabbed his mad scientist logbook, a pen, and a few more chocolates just for good measure. Opening the logbook to the first blank page, he wrote in his neatest printing, Use stink bomb to SMELL the world into submission!
Drakken tilted his head down at the page as he examined it. Yes, that was a brilliant idea. And with an idea that brilliant, world conquest would soon be within his grasp.
There was another discovery to write down, though. Drakken flipped the page over and stared at its white back, smooth except for the tiny dents that marked where he'd written on the other side. Fascinating.
Blah. He shook his head, hard, until stray strands of hair escaped from his ponytail and tickled the sides of his face. He was on a mission, and he couldn't let himself get distracted, even by something as amazing as the scientific effects of pencil on paper.
HI DRAN GEAS! Drakken scrawled across the page in huge letters, the kind it would be impossible to miss when he was reviewing his logbook.
Huh. Was that spelled right? He wasn't sure.
HIGH DRAIN GEEUHS! HYDRAANGEEAS?
Grrgh neh. Whatever. Drakken clutched the pencil firmly, bent over the paper, and wrote in letters as small and neat and precise as he could make them.
The flours Shego likes. Get them for her nxt V-Day. DON'T FORGET, DRAKKEN!
Once he'd added a satisfactory number of exclamation points to the end of that sentence, Drakken sighed with contentment. And popped another chocolate into his mouth.
Her
From humble beginnings, to the assassin's bullet that cut his life cruelly short, Abraham Lincoln's wisdom and integrity made him one of our finest, if not the finest, president.
There! Kim Possible wrote the final word with a flourish and scanned her paper to double-check that she hadn't made any ferocious "write-o"s, as Ron called the written version of typos. None caught her eye.
The essay was a study-hall-rushed sloppy copy, but she'd managed to get her thoughts in order. She'd type it up as soon as she got home, proofread it, and by tomorrow morning she'd be ready to hand it over to the mercy of Mr. Barkin's red pin.
Not to mention his super-strict schedule.
Kim peered uneasily at the clock on the wall over Barkin's desk. 2:15. Already an hour and forty-five minutes from when it was due, so by tomorrow morning. . . Any essay that was that late was a good candidate for an F, no matter how well-written it was – unless you had a good excuse.
Kim just hoped Drakken and Shego's latest caper qualified.
She glanced across the aisle at Ron to see how he was managing. From her seat, she was able to make out the words George Washington:
Was a really cool dude
Father of our country
On the dollar bill
First in war, first in peace
And his teeth weren't really made of wood. That was just a nasty rumor.
Ron himself was gnawing on the eraser end of his pencil, occasionally tilting his head toward his pocket to get Rufus's input on something, scribbling down a sentence, and then resuming staring into space. Kim felt both a ripple of annoyance and a stab of sympathy.
The bell rang then, and Kim slipped her rough-draft essay into the green folder marked "History." Cradling it and her textbook to her chest, she tried to head for the door with dignity and avoid the mob scrambling to get out.
Somebody had beat it out of there so fast they'd even dropped a folder right in front of Barkin's desk. Kim sighed under her breath as she got closer and recognized Ron's overstuffed, every-subject folder, adorned with a doodle of Mary Gariana, the quadratic formula, and the words "Nacos rock!" She bent down to pick it up -
"Ah, Possible. Just the person I wanted to see."
Kim stifled a groan at the sound of Mr. Barkin's voice – as big and booming as Drakken's, only Barkin had the body to match. She turned to face the teacher, who was tucked neatly behind his desk, looking as square and militant as a Hummer. At 10:30 this morning, Kim had been glued to the wall of a mad scientist's lair while he paced the floor not five feet away from her, raving about how he was going to conquer the world and periodically shooting her a triumphant smile that was meant to make her feel like some eight-year-old pipsqueak trying out for the high-school cheer squad.
This was more intimidating.
Mr. Barkin nodded her forward with a curt "Possible," which did nothing to soften his drill-sergeant aura. Kim had seen quite a few poor little freshmen emerge from his office struggling against tears.
Kim slowly approached his desk, trying to ignore the fact he was nearly as tall sitting down as she was standing up. "Mr. Barkin," she began in her most respectful tone. "I can explain -"
"Then kindly do so!" Barkin snapped. "I trust you have a good reason why your American History 1000 curricular essay on the president of your choice is exactly -" he paused to consult the watch on his wrist - "one hour, forty-eight minutes, and thirty-three seconds late! Thirty-four, thirty-five, thirty-six. . ."
Kim cut him off that time, as politely as she could. "Mad scientist threatening to flatten the nation's capital with a stink bomb," she reported, gathering up a smile and displaying it with as much wattage as sincerity could muster. Anything beyond that and she felt like Bonnie, sweet-talking her way to whatever she wanted.
A rare moment of surprise flashed in Mr. Barkin's eyes before he nodded as though that made perfect sense. "If it were anyone but you, Possible," he grunted, "I would flunk them just for saying that."
Kim wasn't sure whether to take that as an insult or a compliment. She settled for a cautious "Thanks?" and held up her history folder. "But I've got the rough draft done, and I should have the finished product in first thing tomorrow." She forced her voice up, Dad-like, at the end of the sentence and watched Mr. Barkin's face carefully.
He almost smiled – or maybe it was a grimace. Hard to tell with Barkin. "Is that a guarantee?" he demanded.
Kim gave an automatic nod and was about to trace her fingers over her chest when the realization of just how unpredictable her schedule was slammed her in the ribs. Sure, she could have it in by morning – provided Duff Killigan didn't decide to ransack Cog Hill Country Club or Monkey Fist didn't get it into his head to bring the skeletons of prehistoric apes in the Museum of Natural History back to life.
"I'll do everything in my power," she finally said honestly. The thought of failure was one of the few things she couldn't handle.
Mr. Barkin jerked his chin in acknowledgment. "Fair enough. You have until the end of first period tomorrow." He folded his hands on the desktop and glanced at the door, and Kim knew she was free to go.
She smiled gratefully and began to edge away, mind spinning in a hundred different directions. Really, how could she be sure tomorrow wouldn't be like today? She hadn't even known today would be like today. Kim stifled a sigh as the events that had lead her to miss first-through-third periods replayed in her head.
She'd been totally prepped for that history paper, knowing exactly what she wanted to say and how she wanted to say it. Then Wade had beeped her with the news that Drakken had broken into a long-abandoned research lab in Washington D.C., and she'd had to grab Ron and jet. Literally.
Kim had managed to jot down a basic essay-outline on the plane, but foiling Drakken's latest goony plot kinda had to take priority once they arrived at his newest lair. The building looked cold and echo-empty and creepy – just the way Drakken liked them, with the ceilings a mile high, rust on every surface that could rust, and cobwebs on the ones that couldn't.
All thoughts of the Gettysburg Address and Emancipation Proclamation vanished, replaced by the instructions, Scan the place for anything that might be scanning for you. Tread carefully to avoid setting off traps. Look for an entrance point.
Those first two weren't hard. Drakken had managed to reactivate the facility's security cameras and attach them to motion-detecting laser cartridges, but he'd planted them parallel to each other like he always did. Kim popped up between them, then went into that duck-and-roll routine she always did, leaving them to blast each other to bits. If Drakken hadn't caught on to that little move by now, she doubted he ever would.
The land around the lab wasn't rigged, either. Each tentative step Kim took yielded firm ground, not quicksand or the sink-and-click that would tell her she'd triggered something that would be bent on destroying her.
As for the entry point – hello, giant skylight? Once again, Kim was thankful for her archfoe's total cluelessness – the glass smudgy from years of not being clean, but unobstructed by guards or weapons, seemed to gleam a challenge at her.
And Kim Possible could never resist a challenge.
She slipped her gloved hand into Ron's clumsy paw, fired her grappling hook, and what seemed like seconds later, they were on the roof. If it had been Dementor or the Seniors they'd been sent to stop, Kim would have flung some of the baby powder Wade had given her around to rule out an invisible laser system. But one of those went for three thousand dollars at HenchCo, and that was a luxury Drakken couldn't afford.
Instead, she reached into her backpack and pulled out her dissolvant nail polish, painting the glass with it until she had a hole big enough for her and Ron to slip through. The grappling hook was shot again, and Kim made her way cautiously down its rope, into the lair of her nemesis.
A quick jolt of suspicion nagged at her brain. Leaving the skylight unguarded was awfully clueless, even for Drakken. Most likely, she'd be greeted with a trap of some kind. Kim squinted down at the floor to be sure she wasn't about to land right over a shark tank, but it was as white and smooth as the ones in operating rooms. Either Drakken was as dumb as he looked, or he was planning to attack from above.
Kim studied the wall on her left for any trapdoors a henchman with a knife could pop out of to slice her rope, searched the vast darkness on her right for the blinking lights of a robo-drone. Nothing.
Which probably meant Shego was lying in wait for her somewhere in the shadows. Kim dropped silently to the ground in her best ready-to-fight pose – legs coiled under her, one palm pressed flat against the floor, folding herself into invisibility.
And couldn't get back up.
Her left hand and both feet were stuck to the floor. For a best-case-scenario of a second, Kim considered the idea that Drakken might've planted wads of chewing gum in strategic points around his lair, but even Frugal Lucre wasn't that cheap. She grabbed her left wrist and yanked on it, but the white smoothness held fast.
It did twitch a little, jerking back and forth as she tried to twist her hand free, and now Kim could see that it wasn't even a floor at all. Something had been spread over the entire floor, draped so tightly, you couldn't see where it ended or began. It looked like a long, silky bed sheet, or maybe a huge piece of -
Flypaper! Kim's heart sank into we're-in-trouble zone, a place she never let herself stay for very long.
Bracing her legs as far apart as she could get them to steady herself, Kim clamped higher on her arm and gave it a mighty heave with a hint of Mantis Kung Fu and every last ounce of her cheerleading strength.
For a fraction of a second, she was sure she could feel whatever freakish supervillain glue this was release her knuckles. Before she could even start to hope, however, her hand was forced back to the ground again and she was stumbling backward into a wall.
Kim froze, not out of fear but because every part of her that had even so much as brushed the wall had immediately fastened to it with a "shhhp" sound like a sick toiler plunger, leaving her nearly incapable of movement. She couldn't even turn her head to see what, exactly, she was sticking to – the entire back of her hair was caught, too, and Kim was pretty sure there was no way she'd be able to escape with her 'do intact.
"Ron!" she hollered up into the nothingness that held her very-likely-terrified friend somewhere. "Don't come down he -"
Too late. Ron plummeted from the sky like a broken parachute and landed belly-down right beside her. The hands and feet that seemed several sizes too big for him barely brushed the sticky goo, but it was enough to instantly fasten him to the floor.
A sinister laugh rumbled from the depths of the lair, as if it had been waiting for its cue. Annoyance bristled its way up Kim's backbone, the way it always did when she heard that too-big voice getting ready to gloat.
Drakken's shoulders and ears preceded him into the room. He wasn't a whole lot more gracefully-proportioned than Ron, actually. Light slowly washed over his face in a way that would have been ferociously creepy if he wasn't Drakken.
"A-ha! Kim Possible!" her nemesis boomed. His cave of a mouth was crimped into a smirk that looked unnatural on it. "You have fallen right into my trap!"
"What are you up to, Drakken?" Kim shot back with as much firmness as she could. Her heart started to sag, just a bit, at its edges. She had fallen right into his trap. She'd been overconfident, cocky even, underestimated him.
Rather than answering, Drakken began to stalk slowly toward them in that way he probably thought made him look super-menacing. Kim wished he would just hurry up and do something stupid that would allow them to escape and save the world – she had an essay to write, after all.
Kim couldn't hold back a smirk of her own as Drakken's boots stomped right onto the massive sheet of flypaper. Wouldn't it be just like him to get stuck in the very trap he'd been bragging about?
But he kept coming, sliding smoothly – well, as smoothly as Drakken could do anything. He must have coated his boots with some kind of anti-bonding formula, Kim realized.
Okay, so this was a good day for him. That wasn't a very comforting thought.
Drakken finally came to a halt a mere four feet from Kim, and she rocked backward to widen the distance between them. Drakken wasn't especially big, but he had a large presence – not exactly an intimidating one, but definitely one that got all up in your face and made itself impossible to ignore.
And then he stepped even closer. "I bet you'd like to know, wouldn't you?" Drakken hissed. He folded his glittering eyes down to slits. "Well, get this – in a matter of minutes, Washington D.C. will fall, and Dr. Drakken will bring the entire nation to its knees!"
"You know, technically speaking, nations don't have knees," Ron piped up from the ground.
Kim didn't even bother telling him to shut up. She forced an eye-roll, but inside her heart rate had gone up a couple notches from what Drakken usually brought on. Bring the nation to its knees by attacking the Capitol? That sounded like something some ruthless dictator would try – somebody who would actually knew how to conquer the world, not some big dweeb like Drakken.
Drakken arched his eyebrow so far Kim was sure part of it actually left his forehead. "Aren't you going to ask me how I plan to do that, Kim Possible?" he asked with what she knew was practiced coldness.
Kim rolled her eyes again. "Do I care?" she retorted with a scoff. She DID care – she cared a lot – but one of the best ways to get an advantage over Drakken was to not react the way he wanted you to.
Sure enough, the mad scientist's eyes crossed and his mouth drooped like it was always did when something didn't go according to plan. "Well, fine," he sniffled, and for a second Kim thought he truly did sound hurt. "Be that way; I'm going to tell you anyway!" Kim fully expected him to add "Because I'm evil – so there!"
The smirk slipped into a sloppy grin, Drakken's big ol' mouthful of honkin' white teeth flashing in her face. He rocked up on his heels the way the Tweebs used to do when they were about seven and boomed, "Soon, Kim Possible, the entire nation shall crumble to the awesome power of my In-Crud-ible Stinktacular Flesh-Eating StenchNuke of Apocalyptic Nightmares!"
Drakken decided to punctuate that sentence with another demented laugh, which gave Kim the time she needed to dig through the layers of her foe's mad-scientist jargon, not to mention the stuff he'd just made up, to find his meaning. When she did, she had to bite back a laugh, from relief as much as anything else. That was so vintage Drakken.
"You're going to stink-bomb the country into submission?" Kim questioned incredulously. She didn't have to fake the sneer that rose to her lips.
Drakken nodded smugly, but Kim could see a wisp of uncertainty in his eyes. For an instant, she was reminded of a little boy presenting his idea for a science fair project to a grouchy teacher, waiting to be told it was stupid.
Ron brought her back, of course, with a nervous squawk. "Does it really eat flesh?" he asked, voice cracking in that way Kim knew embarrassed him so much.
Drakken ignored that question, which answered it as far as Kim was concerned. "Behold!" he thundered, dragging the word several syllables past normalcy as he reached into his lab coat with a flourish and pulled out –
A perfectly round, shiny-black bomb approximately the size of Rufus, with a fuse that bore a striking resemblance to dental floss.
Oh, get out!
"That's the Supercrud Stink Flesh-eater?" Ron gasped, sounding like he was trying not to give way to chuckles. He was jerking his body back and forth, probably attempting to get the mutant flypaper stuff to release its sticky hold on him, but only succeeding in looking like he was having a seizure.
"The In-Crud-ible Stinkacular Flesh-Eating StenchNuke of Apocalyptic Nightmares, yes," Drakken replied tightly. One of his infamous temper tantrums obviously lurked just below the surface.
Kim jerked a brow at the little pool ball of a weapon. "Kinda dinky, isn't it?" The sight of it had chased away anything even vaguely resembling fear.
Drakken smeared a hand down the entire length of his face, elongating it another two inches, Kim was sure. He took several more steps toward them, stretching his tiny legs as much as he could in an effort to achieve long, casual strides. By that time, he was close enough to raise warning bumps on Kim's arms, so close she could smell him.
Those were a couple of things Kim had learned over the course of the last few years: Most villains had extreme personal space issues, and they each had their own distinct odor. They didn't all reek of garlic and tobacco the way they did in books, either. Duff Killigan smelled like fresh-cut grass, Senor Senior, Sr. like expensive cologne, and Monkey Fist. . . don't even get her started on Monkey Fist.
Drakken's usual scent was a mostly-bearable blend of fourth-period chem lab and Snickers bars. But today, Kim noticed with a nose-wrinkle, he did not smell so great, probably from building his stink bomb. She didn't even want to know what THAT process had involved.
"Oh, you think you're a very clever girl, don't you, Kim Possible?" Drakken snarled, the words hissing out on hot, angry breaths. "Shego said the exact same thing." His voice went up to a nasally pitch that sounded nothing like Shego. "What do you plan to wipe out with that, Dr. D, a mouse hole?"
Kim gave the room another, more studious sweep, as her muscles stiffened into battle-readiness, like that was going to do a whole lot of good when she was frozen in a half-sit with her head glued to the wall. So far there hadn't been any sign of Shego, but half the time you couldn't see or hear – or smell – the girl until she was right on top of you. She'd rather face a hundred Drakkens than one Shego. At least with him, what you saw was what you got.
Even now, he was turning the bomb around and gesturing to a little knob on the back, as if relaying exactly how he wanted her to defeat him. "This is just the travel-sized-for-your-convenience model," Drakken explained gleefully. His fingers twitched excitedly over the knob, and Kim half-hoped he would accidentally flick it and leave his lair smelling like a Garlicholics Anonymous meeting for the next two years. "When I twist this knob, the Inc-Crud-ible Stinktacular Flesh-Eating StenchNuke of Apocalyptic Nightmares shall expand to a billion times its current dimensions!"
Kim pulled her thoughts from wondering he'd really just said "shall" in the 21st century to some quick mental math. That thing times a billion equaled not good. Not surrender-control-of-the-country bad, but D.C. could be facing evacuation, serious property damage -
"Okay, question," Ron butted in, and Kim knew it was killing him not to be able to raise his hand. "What if everyone just wears gas masks?"
Drakken chuckled with a sick satisfaction, as though he'd just been waiting for someone to ask him that. "They'll never get the chance," he bragged, each syllable higher and steeped with more excitement than the one before. "One whiff of this stuff, and all but the strongest-nostriled will be out for twenty-four hours!"
Drakken flung his long, gangly arms out like he was on Broadway, and Kim knew if anyone had been standing within several feet of him, they'd have gotten smacked in the face. As it was, he wobbled for a moment, and she briefly entertained the hope of him falling flat on his face and becoming every bit as stuck as she and Ron were.
Klutziness aside, he really was on the ball today. And – strongest-nostriled? That was so weirder than the "shall."
Well, whatever. Kim focused her attention back on Drakken. Or as much as she could with him going off on a variation of the how-the-world-will-bow-before-me spiel that she'd only heard about ten thousand times in the past year-and-a-half. She didn't especially care about Drakken's flights of fancy, except to prevent him from ever living them out. Which was why it was good to at least half-listen to them in case he let something useful slip.
"And once America falls, the rest of the world will soon follow!" Drakken was nearly squealing now. "You see, I will use the top-secret government technology stored right here in D.C - oh, there'll be precision-honed lasers and freeze rays and beams that turn steel into chocolate -" he paused to lick his chops - "to attack every other nation on the planet!"
Okay, that upped the threat factor a few notches. Kim was hit with just enough fear to strengthen her determination. She was pretty sure there was some gadget in her backpack that would help them escape, but she was careful not to even flick her gaze back that way to show she was considering it. She'd play to Drakken's ego, let him think he'd rendered her helpless. Eventually, he'd get tired of taunting her and leave, probably with the intention of returning to finish them off later.
Only they wouldn't be here.
Kim hadn't known it was possible for Drakken to get any nearer, but he took another step in their direction anyway. By now he was so close that she could feel the breaths that fanned his nose, steaming hot with anticipation, could hear the grind of his teeth as he shifted his jaw, could see his eyelashes.
Aww, man – why do GUYS get all the good eyelashes?
Drakken's bleary, baggy eyes were fringed with the kind of long, thick, dark eyelashes a pale-lashed redhead like Kim could only envy, and they curled in a way that half the girls at Middleton High paid mad cash on fancy wands to imitate. That was so not fair to give a man, especially one with blue skin and a hairstyle that went out in the -
Kim gave every part of her body that wasn't fastened to a surface of Drakken's lair a firm shake and let the thoughts roll off of her like she was made of Teflon. Okay – keep it together. This is no time to be shallow.
Drakken continued his monologue, complete, of course, with dramatic full-body contortions and those elaborate hand gestures he really should've had patented. But all Kim could see were those curly little eyelashes, resting daintily against his cheeks, reminding her of the look Bonnie Rockwaller had spent hours practicing for picture day last fall. It was so completely not villainous, the first real giggle she'd experienced in quite a while rippled up her throat and out her mouth.
The mad scientist stopped in the middle of explaining how the world's bakeries would soon be forking over their supplies of cookies and donuts, and his face went completely blank. He turned his gaze to Ron, drained for now of the ability to wrap the constant muddle in his head in evil. "Is she. . . why is she doing that?" Drakken stabbed a finger, which could have been borrowed from a Barbie, at Kim the way she had seen him point out machines that were on the fritz. "Should she be doing that?"
Those thick-lashed eyes blinked rapidly, like something out of a mascara commercial. Ron shrugged as best as he could glued horizontally to the floor. The total ridiculousness of the whole sitch made Kim spatter out another guffaw. The bonus of what that was doing to her nemesis's ego just tickled her even more.
Drakken evidently was not tickled, because he took several uneasy steps away from her, eyes wary as a trapped cat's. Kim felt a sizzle of triumph flare in her chest that he was the first one to back down – and while she was pasted to the wall, at that.
"Laugh all you want, Kim Possible!" Drakken said, voice clawing at the edges of manhood. Villainy was obviously out of the question, even as his lips quavered upward into a smile that might have scared her when she was four and his eyes slit down into bloodshot dashes. That would have been creepy if Kim hadn't remembered the supermodel-lashes framing them. At least he was far enough away that she couldn't SEE them anymore.
"The Capitol will crumble - " Drakken paused for a sec, the corners of his mouth reaching for his earlobes, obviously relishing the phrase - "before the wrath of Dr. Drakken within -" he hiked up his cobalt sleeve to examine the Smarty-Mart-off-brand watch sliding down a wrist that narrowed the relative sturdiness of his arm down to that bony little hand - "anywhere from ten to thirty-five minutes, depending on traffic." Drakken jutted the natural pout of his chin even farther at her. "And there's not a thing you can do about it, because you're stuck on spypaper!"
The last of the eyelash-induced snickers found their way to Kim's lips, and her eyes rolled almost of their own volition. "Spypaper?" she repeated in disbelief.
The precision-somber expression Kim recognized from fifteen years as a rocket scientist's daughter slid over Drakken's face. "Yes!" he cried, pitch reaching toward a happy shriek. He held his hands like stone statues on either side of his waist, fingers pointing toward the ceiling she'd just descended from. "You, see like flypaper -" He wiggled all the fingers on one hand at once, which was about the extent of Drakken's coordination. "Only -"
Kim didn't have to search far for the Drakken-getting-on-my-nerves groan. "We get it, Drakken,"she informed him matter-of-factly. "It's just not funny."
The hand that had been poised for further explanation began to chop the air.
"Yeah, and -" Ron's face scrunched pensively, and Kim knew he would've been rubbing his chin in thought had his hands been free. "We're not really spies. More like crime-fighters."
That was Ron for you, always in the mood to argue semantics. Drakken's eyebrow shot up in a peak that he could have used as a weapon, and doubt once again flashed through his eyes, followed by the near-crazed frustration Kim knew so well.
The mad scientist's entire body sagged into his middle as if he'd been kicked in the gut, and noises only Drakken could make exploded from his hanging-open lips. "Yes, but – but – but – spy – fly – ggregh!" Drakken doubled up his fists and darted his angry glare in five different directions. "Does no one have a sense of whimsy anymore?"
It was all Kim could do not to laugh, watching him unravel like that. You never knew what Drakken was going to say when somebody got him that riled up.
Probably a good minute passed before Drakken was able to pull the tattered threads of himself back into the picture of megalomania. "Whatever it's called, it's got you stuck fast, Kim Possible," he bragged. "You know, only a true genius could invent -"
Kim left him babbling to himself and took stock of the sitch. The dissolvant nail polish would eat straight through the "spypaper" - sheesh, she felt like a dork just calling it that – Rufus could probably retrieve it from her backpack – and Drakken's bombs had always been fairly simple to defuse – cut the red wires, and you were good to go. Still, Drakken was having a good day, cunning-wise, and she wasn't eager to underestimate him again.
Drakken turned to Kim, and she watched him deliberately form a swaggering smile. "And even if you could escape," he hissed, "WHICH YOU CAN'T – it would all be for naught!" He jutted out the chin, and Kim had the sudden urge to sock it back into place. "The In-Crud-ible Stinktacular Flesh-Eating StenchNuke of Apocalyptic Nightmares is programmed to self-destruct if handled by anyone other than Shego or I!"
Well, stink – that complicated things. Kim flinched mentally – and only mentally. By now she'd become an expert on disconnecting what went on inside from the reactions she let her foes witness.
Drakken suddenly snapped himself up to his full height and his arms met in a lanky tangle over his chest. "You'd be left covered in the most hideous smell known to mankind. And then," he added smugly, "no boy will ever want to go out with you."
It was as pathetic and childish as any of Drakken's insults, but it found a tender spot and nestled in. Some degree of that must have shown on her face, because Drakken's grin widened, lips once again reaching for lobes. His eyes were unabashedly triumphant.
Kim fixed him with a glare that usually melted at least some of his villainous brattiness. This time, though, Drakken spun on his heel, barely managing to keep his balance, and headed for the door. Once he reached it, he turned to glower at Kim one last time. A thin layer of creepiness formed over his face, keeping her apart from the Drakken she could deflate with one smart remark. She hated when it did that.
"Farewell, Kim Possible!" Drakken boomed in that nasty, stainless-steel voice he could only maintain for about two minutes at a time. The ghost of a chill ran up and down her arms, more disgust than fear. He quirked half his eyebrow in some pretty obvious glee. "I shall return to deal with you later."
With that, he galloped off down the hall, with all the stealth of a Great Dane sneaking around in an apartment, his tiny feet making more of a racket than Kim would have guessed they could. And then he was gone, and not a moment too soon.
At least her intuition had been right about THAT. Good ol' Drakken, Kim found herself thinking wryly.
Yeesh. He could give the Tweebs a run for their money in the obnoxious department.
Kim breathed in annoyance and breathed out a plan. Glancing down at her best friend, still attached to the floor by his stomach like a penguin frozen to the ice in mid-slide, and said simply, "Ron?" After eleven years as best friends, there was nothing else needed.
Ron took his cue, slipping one hand out of the glove pinned to the floor, fumbling in the depths of his pocket and producing Rufus. The little guy didn't have the sleepy-eyed look he usually wore when Ron plucked him out of his cozy home to help them on a mission. Every muscle in his plump little pink body was taut, poised for action. There were days he was more with-it than Ron, who now nodded at his pet.
Rufus returned a salute – after three years, they didn't need to use words anymore, either – and walked with precision down to Ron's fingertip, the way a determined kid would approach the end of the high dive. Then he sprang through the air with a move that probably would've won him a spot on the cheer squad. Still, Kim held her breath until his tiny paws caught on her backpack and hoisted the rest of him inside.
Kim could hear Rufus rattling around in there for a minute, before his triumphant "Boo-yah!" squeaked in her ear. The naked mole rat emerged, holding the dissolvant nail polish over his head like it was a barbell – which, to a naked mole rat, it probably was.
"All right, Ruf!" Ron cheered from the ground. He was way into positive reinforcement. Now he slid his other hand from its glove and began plucking at his shirt, robin-pecking-for-worms style, seeing if he could get a good enough hold on it to yank it off. "Just toss it to me and I'll go un-stick KP's hair."
Kim gasped "No!" into the suddenly-clear image of that big, clumsy hand losing its grip on the bottle and leaving her half-bald.
When Ron's face sagged in dismay, Kim wished she hadn't said it quite so enthusiastically. "I think we should let Rufus do it," she added in her best cheerleader-perky voice. "His fingers are way smaller."
Ron nodded sagely, as if that had been his idea all along. Any evidence of hurt feelings disappeared, and Kim didn't want to risk bringing them back with even the friendliest eye-roll.
Rufus made quick work of the "spypaper" that held her hands and feet to the ground. When he was done, one of Kim's knuckles was bare and there was a hole in the heel of her left shoe, but – so not the drama. What she was worried about was her hair.
But Rufus went over it carefully, delicately, like he knew how much this meant to her. Knowing Rufus, he probably did. Kim could feel the tiniest release of pressure on the strands, the way she always did when she was having split ends trimmed, and she silently prayed that was all that was happening here.
Once Rufus was done, Kim pulled her compact from her backpack and flipped it open – because if her hair was five different lengths, Shego would never let her hear the end of it. She was pleasantly surprised – Francois didn't have to worry about competition, but it wasn't hideous.
It was Kim's turn to give Rufus a thumbs-up, and she could have sworn she saw him blush before he settled into brushing Ron free. Meanwhile, Kim shook the bottle upside-down and let a stream of extra-strength dissolvant ooze onto the spypapered floor, clearing a path just wide enough for a couple of skinny teenagers to crab-walk through.
Kim wedged herself into place and skittered back to their point of entrance as fast as she could, the adrenaline she was born for itching in her veins. She was pretty Drakken wouldn't really be able to achieve world domination via stink bomb, but the thought of his scheme being responsible for so much as a citizen's rash – not to mention the property damage involved – gave her the same bladed hollow in the pit of her stomach as when she had to turn in a half-completed assignment.
Her grappling hairdryer lay expectantly on one of the multitude of boxes stacked up under the skylight, as if it were only a matter of time before she returned for it. Its hook gave a tantalizing gleam, even though it was hidden well out of the range of the room's 20-watt-bulb lighting.
Behind her, Kim could hear Ron fumbling his way through the crevice the dissolvant had cut down the middle of the "spypaper" like the Red Sea being split in half. She gave his footsteps a few more seconds to catch up before she fired the grappling line, straight and sure as her spring to the top of the cheerleaders' pyramid, curled her fingers around Ron's anxiety-tightened wrist, and they were airborne.
Faintly aware of Ron's arms wrapped and shivering around her ankles, Kim grasped the edges of the hole she'd cut fifteen minutes ago and hoisted herself up into freedom. She reached a hand down to her best friend, which he accepted gratefully and then all but collapsed into a heap on the corner of the roof. He was panting, clearly ready to take five, and she would have let him if they'd had the time.
As it was, she allowed him a moment to reinsert Rufus in his pocket before she grabbed her hairdryer in one hand and the Kimmunicator in the other. Wade had a lock on Drakken's position before they even hit the ground.
It was only a mile away, and Kim assured herself even as she made tracks in the direction Wade pointed her in that they would get there in plenty of time. Drakken, of course, would have the bomb on some kind of timer for a big, dramatic countdown – because, even on a smarter-than-average day, Drakken was still Drakken.
Once they were back on the city sidewalks, Kim was able to flag down a hardcore cyclist couple on a bicycle-built-for-two, give them the high-points-only version of the story, and offer them her ten-dollar emergency stash of cash as a "rental fee" for that bike. The husband recognized her from the news, and the wife seemed to think Ron was adorable when he chipped in a few quarters he'd found in his pocket. At any rate, they were more than happy to lend it to them. Kim called "Thank you!" over her shoulder as they pedaled their way to the Capitol building.
She pumped her legs furiously, her mental timer ticking down the way the one on the StenchNuke had to be. Ron yammered in her ear the whole time, his chatter pretty evenly divided into thirds: proclaiming that they were going to kick Drakken's tail, worrying that they wouldn't get there in time to stop him, and wondering if Washington D.C. had a Bueno Nacho – and, if so, whether they'd "embraced the naco." He was pretty sure they had, being way more sophisticated than Go City. There were times when Kim thought it would be easier to go on her missions alone.
The idea, however, slunk just as guiltily out of Kim's head as it had crept in to start with. Missions-without-Ron may have seemed like an appealing prospect when he was being a whiner, but in that instinctive part of her she'd long since stopped questioning, she knew it would be a major bummer. Who would distract Drakken and Senor Senior, Junior while she took on their more formidable cohorts? Or hand her Rufus when she needed a wire-cutter or make her smile when she was seriously considering strangling Shego? And who would be there to cheer her on and believe wholeheartedly that she'd get them out of any sitch in one piece, even when they were surrounded by crazed henchmen armed with laser cannons?
There was also something vaguely familiar and way-unfocused that pinged in her mind whenever the subject crossed it. Could have been the felt-so-real nightmare she'd had recently, where Ron had moved away and she'd been so ineffective on her own that Shego, of all people, had taken over the world. Randomness much?
But she couldn't deny its truth, and it jolted Kim out of her flashback to the here-and-now. Mr. Barkin wore his caught-a-student-daydreaming expression, which would have looked right at home chiseled into Mount Rushmore.
Kim flashed him another cheerleading-smile and watched his face ease into something a fraction less stony. She could almost hear him reminding himself that "Possible" rarely spaced out during his classes.
"Look, thanks a lot, Mr. Barkin." Kim toyed with saying that she'd just momentarily lost her focus because she was so blown away by his sheer generosity, but the man was a walking lie detector. "Oh – uh – that whole extending-the-deadline thing? Could you do the same thing for Ron?"
Mr. Barkin's eyebrows slammed together at the edges, the middles reaching for his cropped-short hairdo. "Stoppable?" he asked suspiciously.
Kim had to shove the words, "Uh, so not Ron Reiger," back down her throat. Nothing good ever came from pulling attitude with Barkin, no matter what kind of 'tude HE was evincing. "Yeah – yes," she corrected herself, employing the voice used to instruct people to file slowly away from the sparking doom ray Dementor had parked in front of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. "During third period, he was helping me save D.C."
Barkin's eyes slitted and his thick neck bulged against his collar until he reminded Kim of Pain King in a suit. "Helping?" he all but snorted.
There it was. The disbelieving tone. The scornful expression. The dismissive wave of the hand, writing off Ron like he was a split end that needed to be snipped away. She suddenly wished Shego were around to kick, though Kim had probably been guilty of all of it herself as recently as that morning.
The smile stayed in place, though she felt it turn to plaster, teeth clenched together, and a rush of heat singed up Kim's neck. The thought of scowling barely lasted a moment – to show offense was to admit defeat. "He was a majorly big help," Kim responded as graciously as she could, though she heard the whisper of a shrill edge she rarely let out to play. "I couldn't have done it without him."
Barkin's jaw muscles flicked, trying to decide whether or not to believe her. Kim kept her eyes widely genuine and locked right onto his, but her mind paged back to exactly how Drakken's latest plot had bitten the dust.
Once they'd reached city limits, she and Ron hopped off the bike like one person. Ron was already peeking into his pocket to make sure Rufus was ready to do his part while Kim plucked the Kimmunicator from her own. "Spotted Drakken and Shego yet?" she inquired before the screen was even through turning on.
Wade answered with a clothespin clipped to his nose. "Sure do," he said in a pinched-up voice that made Ron chortle behind her. "But I'm not sure you're gonna need me. Just follow the smell."
Kim sniffed at the air and, yep, there it was – the faint but unmistakable odor of what had to be a skunk carcass wrapped in aged cheddar. Ron swallowed a bunch of choking sounds, noticeably trying not to add vomit to the menagerie of stenches now attacking her nostrils. She was so going to have to take a shower after this.
"You guys get in closer, and I'll try to find out more about this bomb," Wade continued.
Ron frowned. "From half a mile away?"
Wade flicked him a mysterious smile, wiggling his brows in ten-year-old-attempted sophistication. "I have my methods, Watson," he replied.
Kim didn't doubt that for a moment.
They tracked the disgusting aroma down back alleys and crawled the wrong way down one-way streets. Ron, at one point, picked up a ginormous, dead leaf he'd found on the ground and held it over his face which, per usual with Ron's stabs at camouflage, only made him that much more obvious. Finally, they reached a domed imitation-Capitol building with two tiny figures and a horrific smell perched around the ring of the roof. Either Drakken didn't think anyone would notice him on this second-rate version of its famous twin or he'd mistaken it for the real deal. He didn't exactly have a nose for direction.
Sure enough, when she pulled her binoculars out of her backpack and peered through them, there was Drakken, shivering in the D.C.-in-winter air, the skin around his mouth a shade bluer than usual. Shego, as always, stood next to him, her mouth wrenched into a vulpine smirk. Kim knew it was only a matter of time before the bored gaze the villainness was currently aiming at Drakken would turn sharp and scan her surroundings – and land on them and tighten with the anticipation of ripping their guts out.
When the Kimmunicator vibrated in her hand, she was telling Wade to go ahead while the thing was still chirping out its familiar beep-beep-DE-beep.
"Okay," Wade began, tapping away at his keyboard, "there's an access code you can use to deactivate the bomb. A tiny keyboard's hidden on the bottom. If you type in D-R-A-K-K-E-N-R-U-L-E-S, it'll shut the whole thing down. But there's a problem."
"The fact that I don't know if I can stand typing that?" Kim asked only half-jokingly.
Wade ran both hands through the curls tangling over his forehead. "No. Once the bomb reaches ten minutes, no one can override it. And THEN there's the question of how to get a hold of it in the first place."
Kim's spirit didn't even get the chance to sink. Wade would come up with something. He always did.
She took off across chunks of concrete and prestigously-kept lawns, Ron huffing behind her and managing to run straight into a presidential statue at one point. The wind bit at Kim's cheeks and her belly button and reminded her of how very alive she was. Alive and getting ready to bust a bad guy's chops. It was one of her favorite states to be in.
As she ran, Kim kept one ear cocked toward Drakken to listen for the sound of any immediate threat and the other toward her pocket for the Kimmunicator's tone. It won, and Kim snatched it from her pocket. "Go, Wade."
"Kim!" Wade burst out in barely-held-back excitement. "I've got good news for you!"
"I could use some."
"You know how Drakken said the bomb was programmed to self-destruct if anyone other than him or Shego laid a finger on it?" Wade shook his head. "Well, it turns out that would require a highly attuned genetic replication device that needs at least forty-eight hours to charge."
And if he'd just stolen the parts for the bomb today. . . "So he didn't," Kim concluded, her brain adding, No, duh. Her tight grip on the Kimmunicator relaxed just a fraction, and she stilled the expectant quiver in her legs with calm determination that rose smoothly from her center. She remembered Drakken looking her in the eye as he'd said that, chest puffed out to a ridiculous size. If he'd been bluffing, his grin would have been nervous and extra-toothy, his hands fidgeting with the air, his glare cloudy and unable to settle on her face. "But he wasn't lying, Wade. I could tell -"
Wade cut her off. "He used a slightly different method, that's all. He coded the bomb to recognize the patterns of their gloves!"
Thank you, Drakken, for always leaving a hole. Even at the top of his game, the guy's villainy was rushed and cheap. Sloppy. So not hard to foil.
"Thanks, Wade. I think we can take it from here." Kim slipped the Kimmunicator back into her pocket and was hit with a double dose of resolve. Dr. Drakken was going down.
Once they'd reached the fake-Capitol, it didn't take long to slip on their suction grips and begin their ascent. Kim picked her way soundlessly up the side of the building, ignoring Ron's claims of altitude sickness. She'd heard his I'm-about-to-hurl voice quite a few times, and that wasn't it.
At the top of the building, Kim flattened herself behind the dome and allowed only the tips of her eyes to peek out over the hump. Drakken had his back to her, railing Shego out for something sardonic she must have just said. It was the perfect time to confront him. No point in sneaking around when she needed to take one of their gloves.
Kim strolled up behind them and cleared her throat. "A little domestic squabble?" she asked through a hiss. It really was way too much fun to taunt them now and then.
"Kim Possible!" Drakken said. Shrieked. His arrogant posture broke, releasing frightened trembles. Just like it always did. Honestly, it would have been monotonous getting the exact same reaction from Drakken every time, except that it virtually guaranteed a win. Kim wasn't about to be ungrateful for that.
"Sorry to ruin your good hair day, Drakken," Kim continued, watching in amusement as Drakken's hand went to the jagged shag of his ponytail. "But this plan, like the others, stinks."
As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Kim cringed inside. Could that pun have BEEN a little more obvious? But Ron let loose an appreciative guffaw, for what that was worth.
"G-g-get her!" Drakken stammered. He jabbed a finger at Kim - and kept jabbing, like an inexperienced sister trying to pierce your ear with a needle.
Shego, on the other hand, only registered surprise in a few blinks before moving in for the kill. She sprang from the ground like a panther and was on top of Kim almost before she had time to prepare herself. Her legs came out to meet Shego in the chest, and the villainness stumbled back a few steps.
It gave Kim enough time to go on the offense and leap toward her, contorting her body into martial arts positions to avoid Shego's fiery plasma. Evidently Shego wasn't impressed by any of it. Her eyes glittered flat death, not Drakken's drawn-out doom traps, and in that split second, Kim knew why she'd dreamed Shego would have been the one to conquer the world.
Kim blocked the wiry forearm with her own and then twisted herself around to keep an eye on Ron. He was standing in front of Drakken, hopping from one foot to the other and spurting out, "WHUH-YAH! HIJAH! BOO! YAH!" Kim's only consolation was that Drakken looked as clueless about what to do with Ron as Ron did with him. He simply stuttered "But, but, but, but, but, but" until he reminded Kim of the backbeat on her favorite M.C. Honey song.
After about two minutes of that, Ron came forward, locked his thick fingers around the knobs of Drakken's wrist, and squeezed. Drakken's face froze on a grimace, but Kim could see the uncertainty in the scrunch of the bags under his eyes. Lots of things could send Drakken through the roof, but few more so than being touched, especially unexpectedly.
So when Ron pried his hand free, and it came away still holding Drakken's left glove, Drakken didn't respond especially quickly. He was still cradling his wrist in his right palm as though he expected it to rot and die.
Then it registered what Ron was doing; Kim could see it in his eyes. Drakken lunged haphazardly for Ron and he, by some clumsy miracle, sidestepped it.
Shego gave Kim a rough shove and started toward the boys, but Drakken waved her off. "It's just the buffoon!" he hollered. "He's nothing! Get Kim Possible!"
Kim felt the defensive stab that always pierced her when she heard Drakken belittle Ron. Like he was one to talk about being a klutz or a "buffoon."
One of these days, Drakken was going to be sorry he underestimated the kid, and Kim wanted to see to it that today was that day. She also had to make him pay for the little burn he'd thrown at her about no boys wanting to date her.
Still, Kim focused her attention on avoiding the punches Shego was raining down on her. Things got messy when she took a scheme to heart, her fighting choppier, her moves harder to control, which was probably why Shego tried to bait her every time they crossed paths.
Ron ran, baggy pant legs flapping, to the bomb and somehow pushed his hand into Drakken's glove. With knuckles straining against the seams, he grabbed the now-giant knob atop the towering pimple of a thing and wrenched it to the right. The bomb rattled and rocked from side to side, growing smaller with every wobble.
As it shuddered its way back to the size Kim had first seen it back at Drakken's lair, Shego turned on Drakken as if she were going to leave claw marks down his face. "Dr. D-eeee," she said, warningly, between her teeth. "You did program that thing only to respond to our DNA, RIGHT?"
Drakken's mouth worked into a smile that refused to consider an alternative. Kim could almost feel sorry for him. "Yes!" he retorted, not booming quite as much as he probably would have wanted to. "Well. . . yes. . . I mean, basically. . . sort of. . . "
The mad scientist's head jerked around in a fashion that didn't look humanly possible, and he pointed vaguely at the sky. "Look, a flying squid!" he cried.
Kim wasn't sure if he was trying to distract her, Ron, or Shego. Whatever the case, she spurted out a laugh, and Drakken gave her a crestfallen look. You'd think he would have been used to his lame lies being seen through and his stupid plots foiled, but every defeat made him wince as if it were the first time.
Even Ron only jerked his gaze skyward for a fraction of a second before rolling the bomb up and down his shoulders like the wannabe-jock he was. Drakken stayed statue-frozen to the spot, no doubt gearing up for a tantrum that would quake the earth's foundation. His eyes blazed with the kind of anger that often came before overturned furniture. It was one of the few things about him that could steal a few drops of moisture from Kim's mouth.
Once again, however, Shego wasn't one to let the unexpected knock her for a loop. She sprang toward Ron and clawed his hand. He yelped, which pinched at Kim, and released his grip on the stupid StenchNuke. It teetered there for a moment, as though in surprise, before sliding down the dome's slanted side.
Ron dove for him. Kim would have joined him, except that Shego took a swipe at her and nearly succeeded in nicking a hole into Kim's ultra-hip Club Banana crop top. Hello! Way beyond rude.
So Kim had to turn her attention back to her least favorite foe and her slicing arms. An inner triumph was scripting itself in her brain. If Shego made a grab for her again, she could whisk off her glove and easily disarm the bomb.
Sure enough, when Shego threw her next punch, Kim grabbed for her hand. But Shego was nobody's fool. She heaved a plasma bolt directly at Kim's head and then wrenched both arms behind her back and lashed out at Kim with her legs. They went on like that for what could have been eternity, over the soundtrack of squeals from Ron and noises from Drakken that were saved from being squeals only by his gravel-shot voice.
Finally, just as Kim's strength was beginning to wane, she caught Shego with a perfect leg-sweep that landed the villainness smack on her backside. Shego didn't make a sound, but her face was clearly fighting against a flinch. Kim stored that away to savor it later.
Right now, she reached into her pocket and produced her restraint dental floss. One push of the button, and a spiderweb of reddish-orange thread at least ten feet long tangled itself around Shego and left her kicking indignantly at the air. "Thick as nylon, stronger than steel, and can shoot up to twenty feet," was how Wade had described it. Even Shego couldn't escape from that.
Kim marched up to Shego, doing her best not to swagger, and relieved her of a glove, revealing slender, deceptively harmless-looking fingers. Shego didn't even rake her nails at her that time. The only emotion she showed was the unreadable glitter in her eyes.
That was the thing about Shego. She loved to fight - and Kim had to admit she was good at it - but there were times when, deep down, she just didn't care enough to keep herself from flagging. Catch her at one of those moments, and it was all over for her and her boss.
Only panting slightly, Kim slipped Shego's glove onto her hand, careful to avoid the pointy blades in the fingers, grabbed the bomb, and turned it over. She was searching for the miniature keyboard, but her eyes fell on the timer first. 9:45, it read.
Wade's words ricocheted in her head. Once the bomb reaches ten minutes, no one can override it.
The horrible reality seeped through the cracks Kim had seen in her enemy's performance. Shego hadn't been slacking off. She'd known she'd stalled Kim just long enough - and then let her have a ninety-percent victory that spat in her eye.
Kim had the urge to smack the grin off the little green witch's face. She restrained herself, though. No way she was ever going to stoop to Shego's level.
"Ron, it's too late!" she called back to him, and the words practically blistered on the way out. "We can't disable it!"
Ron crossed his brown eyes and gasped. Drakken chortled as if that had all been thanks to him.
"We need to go to Plan B -" Kim began, but Ron cut her off.
"I know what to do, KP!" he hollered. The confidence glowed right between his freckles.
Those weren't words you heard from Ron often, and since no counterplan was coming to mind right away, she tossed him the bomb. Drakken jumped for it, but Kim whipped out the restraint-floss and sprayed it in his general direction. One loop around his ankles was all it took. He landed on top of Shego in a twisting, squirming mass.
Rufus cheered from Ron's shoulder. "I know what to do," Ron repeated, like he himself couldn't believe it. "Don't follow me, okay?" And with that, he scuttled down the side of the building.
That was Ron for you - weak-kneed and foggy-brained but selfless to the end. Kim turned to watch his descent and subsequent run down the street, wondering how she would break it to his folks that Ron was going to smell like an unwashed water buffalo for the next seven years. Knowing Mrs. Stoppable, she might just sell him to a zoo -
It stabbed through Kim that she'd left Drakken's hands free right at the very second she felt the fingers clamp around her ankles. His grasp was so fierce she expected it to scald her flesh. She could hear his ripped breathing as he jerked her toward the lip of the ledge - or was that her own?
At any other point in the day, Kim would have wrenched her legs out of his grip and given him a nice firm kick for good measure. But the ledge they were on was precariously narrow, and she couldn't remember whether the backpack she'd slapped on as she'd left school was the one that doubled as a jetpack or not. One wrong move, and she could go toppling to the pavement, where she'd smear more than her lip gloss.
But there had to be something else she could do. Kim was almost one-hundred-percent convinced that this couldn't be the end. Not for the girl who could do anything. She forced her heartbeat down to a steady-if-rapid rate.
In fact, she was holding it together better than Drakken was. When she glanced back over her shoulder to see just how scared she should be, his eyes were veiled with the rage and hate that would push him into seizing the opportunity to rid his world of her. But his lips were jagged, betraying another force that pulled him in a different direction. Conscience? A weak stomach? Plain old common sense? Whatever it was, it did battle with the sheer evil until Drakken closed his eyes as if in exhaustion, loosened his grip and took a weak, blind swat at the back of her legs.
It was a halfhearted attempt if Kim had ever seen one, and she maneuvered her way around it easily. As Drakken growled in frustration, she knelt down and bound his wrists with the floss. She opened her eyes as wide as she could and stared straight into Drakken's, to send the message that she wasn't intimidated, she refused to be intimidated, especially not by him. He, of course, started to blink immediately. Drakken always lost their stare-offs. He blamed his contacts. Kim attributed it to the fact that, under all that bravado and bluster, Dr. Drakken was just a big coward.
The realization of her close call was burning in Kim's cheeks, but Drakken's had drained of any color whatsoever. His face crumpled, probably to squeeze back the shame of tears.
What, Kim couldn't help but wonder, had gone through his head when he was debating whether or not to chuck her over the side of the building? There were days when she would have loved to get inside Drakken's mind - and there were days when she suspected it was too scary a place even for her to visit.
The police arrived soon, their wailing sirens a welcome song to Kim's ears. They loaded the tied-up Drakken and Shego into the back of squad cars. Shego didn't go quietly, thrashing every body part she could thrash and even attempting to take an officer out with her hair.
She was definitely the one in charge of the warped little duo. Drakken had his chin held in the air defiantly, but it wobbled. He couldn't have looked less commanding if he'd been wearing a sundress.
He could invent a stink bomb capable of flattening the nation's capital. He could code it to recognize specific glove patterns. He could cover his lair's floor in sticky white tar and leave her immobile on it. Drakken could be smart, he could be competent, he could be evil.
But he couldn't win. Not ever.
Kim grunted to herself. That was Drakken in a nutshell - and what better place for such a little nut?
"Fine."
Kim jerked back to Barkin's big, blocky chin. His teeth were gritted together but didn't appear to be grinding. That made Kim chance a "Yes, sir?"
Barkin gave a hairball hiss in his throat, as if he couldn't believe what he were about to say. "I said, fine. Stoppable has until the end of first period tomorrow, too."
Kim nearly collapsed in front of the teacher's desk. It was the least she could do for Ron. He'd appeared, sporting a sweaty face and soaked bangs and dark circles in the armpits of his mission shirt, right as the police were taking Drakken and Shego into custody. The bomb was nowhere to be seen - or smelled.
"How did you stop it?" Kim asked.
Ron shook his head and pushed his damp cowlicks out of his eyes. "I didn't," he huffed. "It went off."
Kim took another sniff at the air but couldn't pick out anything worse than truck exhaust. "It did?"
"I just took it someplace nobody would notice," Ron explained.
She felt her eyebrows cinch together. "Where?" she said.
Ron's face broke into her favorite grin. "The boys' locker room at the local high school."
And Kim had understood perfectly.
Now even Barkin was acknowledging that, and she was willing to bet Drakken, somewhere in his dark holding cell, was cursing himself for writing Ron off as worthless. Barkin and Drakken in one day? It was almost too good to be true.
"Thank you, Mr. Barkin!" Kim bubbled at him with genuine enthusiasm. "You are the best."
Barkin cricked his neck at her. For a glimmer of a second, a gleam passed through his narrow eyes - his sign that he wasn't tweaked. Well, no more tweaked than Barkin's usual something-is-crawling-up-my-back disposition.
Then he snapped, "Get out of here, Possible, and go work on that report," and the moment passed. Kim treated him to a polite wave and made for the door at a fast walk to tell Ron the good news. If he knuckled down and didn't spend the evening playing video games, he had a chance.
And Kim's essay would be on Barkin's desk first thing in the morning, if all went as planned. Now that her arch-foe had been arrested, the chances of her needing to drop everything and sprint for another country had been halved. Drakken wasn't exactly the biggest threat to world security, but he was one of the most dogged. The guy just did not know when to give up.
And, Kim thought as she slipped out into the hall, she would kinda miss him if he ever did.