SuperRon

Disclaimer: I own nothing in this story, accept no substitutes.

Chapter Four: Divided Loyalties

Tierra del Fuego, Argentina – One month later

Lighting flashed and thunder roared amidst clouds pouring down torrential rain with an unearthly fury. Silhouetted in the periodic flashes of light brought by the lightning was a large and imposing structure, covered in a grotesque façade of simian gargoyles and overgrown with centuries of nature the place seemed to defy anyone to breach it and discover its secrets.

A lone figure seemed determined to take up that challenge, dropping from the arch over the gaping main entrance whose massive wooden doors had long since decayed, the figure straightened though oddly enough it still had both hands and feet on the ground. Surveying his surroundings the figure smirked and then pressing his hand to a small earpiece spoke, "I'm at the temple entrance, the power hidden inside will most likely sever communications, I'll contact you again when I have the artifact."

"Very good Monty," the voice on the other end spoke, "you are sure that this will enable you to fulfill your end of our bargain? I've invested quite a bit of money in this little trek of yours."

"How many times do I have to tell you," the figure rubbed his temples in aggravation, "it's not Monty, it's Monkey Fist. And yes the Omega Simia will allow me to defeat Stoppable once and for all."

"Good," Monkey Fist's benefactor spoke again, "I cannot impress upon you enough the importance that Ron Stoppable be removed from the picture as soon as possible, with him out of the picture Kim Possible should prove quite pliable to my plans."

"And I shall be the undisputed master of Monkey Kung Fu!" Monkey Fist raised his fists to the heavens and shook with laughter well over the edges of insanity.

"Yes…" the voice on the other end interrupted his euphoric visions, "just get the thing would you?"

"With pleasure," Monkey Fist felt an evil grin cover his face. He walked into the ancient temple, as he had thought once he crossed the threshold static sounded in his ear as modern technology ceased to function. Treading carefully Monkey Fist walked through the great hall connecting the entrance to the large central room from whence he would descend into the bowels of the temple to retrieve the Omega Simia and achieve victory over that thieving imposter once and for all.

Twenty Five minutes later Monkey Fist was beginning to question the zeal with which he'd set upon his descent. The temple didn't just have traps, it was one giant trap. And even for a man with monkey hands and feet the place was just plain creepy. The hardy foliage that had managed to intrude on the temple cast eerie shadow throughout, but what really scared the half man half monkey were the many holes in the roof, and the glowing green rocks that seemed to have embedded themselves in the temples surfaces after apparently making those holes.

Sliding under a section of wall that had just shot out in an effort to slice him in two, Monkey Fist stood up, brushed himself off and walked out onto a ledge surrounding a giant pit. There in the middle on a pedestal was what he had been looking for. The roof was caved in, casting a sickly green ambiance across the vast chamber from the rocks covering the floor. Looking closer, he saw spears, darts, and sharpened discs littering the floor as well, a sign that when the rocks had fallen to the floor they had set off all the traps leaving a safe corridor for anyone who got this far to traverse.

Still though Monkey Fist didn't feel like taking any chances, he leapt down, making sure that he landed on the odd green rocks. Then he carefully made his way towards the Omega Simia making sure to never touch the floor. At last he found himself in front of the statue itself, the Omega Simia certainly lived up to such a grim name, it was deathly black with the fangs made of a blood red stone.

"At last," he breathed in wonder, "legend says that when someone possessing Mystical Monkey Power holds the Omega Simia their powers will grow beyond recognition, and it's mine!"

With a chortle full of malice and grim anticipation Monkey Fist reached out with trembling hands and grabbed the Omega Simia. The statue's fangs glowed dark red and Monkey Fist could feel power surging into him, but then a bright green light erupted from the back of the statue and the power changed. Monkey Fist turned the statue around in his grasp; one of the green rocks had embedded itself into the statue and was glowing with a near blinding light.

He tried to throw the obviously damaged statue away, but the thing seemed stuck to his hands, the light grew brighter and brighter, a mix of blood red and vibrant green till Monkey Fist had to screw his eyes shut. As the world flashed white behind his closed eyes his mouth opened in a soundless scream and he felt a rush of power like nothing he had ever known surge through him.

Then it was done, the Omega Simia fell from his grasp and hit the ground with a thud, Monkey Fist stood there with his head in his hands gasping in breath. Then he heard something, a faint click, opening his eyes he saw the stairs drop away and a giant scythe flipped up, one last trap it seemed, and one he knew he couldn't possibly avoid. Raising his hands in front of his head in a futile gesture of protection Monkey Fist saw his life flash before his eyes. Then he felt a pressure on his hands and heard the scraping of crumpling metal, opening his eyes, he saw the scythe had flattened itself on his hands.

Slowly and disbelievingly Monkey Fist drew his hands back, when he looked at his palms there wasn't so much as a mark on them. Gasping he heard his voice say, "So this is the power of the Omega Simia, Stoppable won't stand a chance."

Picking up the Omega Simia, Monkey Fist couldn't contain his joy and with a whoop of joy he leapt into the air. However he was mildly surprised when his whoop caused an entire section of the wall to compress against the bedrock and his jump not only carried him some forty feet into the air but he stayed aloft.

With a feral snarl Monkey Fist turned towards the open ceiling and willed himself forward, Luthor could have Kim Possible for whatever he had planned for the pesky redhead. Stoppable was his, and with these new powers the imposter wouldn't stand a chance, once and for all he would be supreme monkey master.

Metropolis

Ron sat in the trendy café waiting nervously, Kim's appointment with Lex Luthor had been going on for over an hour, afterwards he was going to tell her his secret, along with the condensed version of the month long history course he'd plowed through, and then see how she took it. At least that was the plan but the blonde couldn't help being very nervous, it didn't help that his sleep last night had been filled with nightmares of monkeys, monkeys with glowing red fangs, and laughter that he was sure was Monkey Fist's.

He might have been worried enough about it to try and do something, but Sensei hadn't contacted him about anything. And Ron had full trust that his old one time master had everything watched and would tell him if there was anything that needed his Mystical Monkey Power to take care of. Still though, those had been some really freaky dreams, he might make a call just to make sure Monkey Fist wasn't up to anything.

Speaking of nervous, his water was shaking in his hands. "Come on Ron," he muttered to himself, "get a hold of yourself. This is Kim we're talking about, Kim who's been your best friend forever, Kim who took it fine when you told her about Yamanouchi, Kim's going to take this fine, Bonnie took it fine, and if she can take it fine then Kim will definitely take it fine. Not just fine, perfectly, she'll be cartwheeling around in joy at how easy missions are about to get, yeah that's it."

Ron stopped his nervous ramblings as the picture of Kim actually cartwheeling around anything in joy tried to process in his mind. Biting back a wholly unmanly giggle at the picture he ended up with Ron forced himself to drink some water, and ended up with about as much on his shirt as went in his mouth.

Scowling angrily, he reached into his pocket and managed to wake up a sleeping Rufus. The naked mole rat poked his head out of Ron's pocket and started shaking his fist and generally making known his anger at having his sleep interrupted. "Sorry Rufus," Ron reached into the right pocket, "I'm just a little nervous." Having retrieved his cell phone and calmed Rufus down Ron flipped the phone open and scrolled down to Bonnie's number.

"Ron," she picked up after only one ring, "Kim is going to be fine with it. I've been your friend for a month and you don't see me having problems with anything. Kim's been your best friend since forever; she's going to take it just fine."

"Am I really that predictable?" Ron whined into the phone.

"About this?" Bonnie's voice carried across just how much she wanted to laugh, "Yes."

"But what if she's angry that I told you first, or that I waited so long before telling her?" Ron's foot was tapping at a near frenetic pace.

"Well you didn't exactly tell me," Bonnie said, "not unless trying to take off your finger is some sort of secret code. And if she's angry you waited, she'll get over it, you had a perfectly good reason."

Ron managed to hold back his sigh, "You're never going to let Kim live it down that you knew before her are you?"

"Of course not!" Bonnie's laugh wasn't so much malicious as it was simply a statement of fact. "And since Kim's going to know, would you mind stopping by St. Louis and getting some ribs?"

"What am I to you, a pack mule?" Ron knew she was egging him on but he was feeling much less nervous so he let it slide.

"Not necessarily," Bonnie's grin came across the phone, "but you like ribs, I like ribs, and you can be there and back with ribs in about the time it takes you to get through the line."

"Aren't you on a diet or something?" Ron wasn't too sure on his role as a pack mule but Bonnie had managed to do away with his nervousness so he figured getting her some ribs was about the least he could do.

"I am till you bring those ribs back," Bonnie said, "and as long as you're at it, mind stopping off in Abilene Texas for some watermelon?"

"We'll see about Texas," Ron saw a familiar hair of head coming his way, "but I've got to go, Kim's here."

"Good luck," he heard on the other end before both he and Bonnie hung up.

"Kim!" He stood up and shouted to get his best friend's attention.

"Hey Ron," his best friend ran up to him and hugged him, something he noticed she'd been doing more and more often since he and Bonnie had been making a stab at being friends. Not that he minded the attention, he was well aware of the fact that Kim was not only a woman but a very good looking one at that. And to a man who was used to being shunned by the opposite sex the affections of any woman much less one like Kim were very welcome.

"So," Ron said as he and Kim started walking down the street, "How'd it go?"

"It went great!" Kim practically skipped down the sidewalk, "Next August I'll be starting as Lex Luthor's personal assistant, and I'll have professors from Oxford flown over just for me. I'm thinking about a degree in International Relations with a minor in business."

Ron just smiled at his best friend as Rufus poked his head out of his pocket and waved at Kim before going back in. "Sounds like someone's moving up in the world KP, but you sound way to gung-ho about this for someone who was as nervous as you about all the shady stuff Luthorcorp's done in the past."

"Yeah," Kim calmed down a bit and started walking next to him, "but I asked Lex about it and he really made me see that I only had half the picture, it really changed how I thought about a lot of the things that Luthorcorp has gotten its bad PR from."

"Kim" Ron said, "You do realize this is the same Lex Luthor who was connected with Dark Thursday, something that twenty years after it happened no one can explain. And need I remind you that that's just one among many. We're talking about the same person right?"

Kim looked at him like she knew something he didn't, "See that's what I thought till today. This might sound a bit stupid, but you've heard of Kryptonians right?"

"Um yeah," Ron felt the nervousness he'd gotten rid of come back and something told him this would not be the point where he should let slip he was in fact a Kryptonian, "I mean I've heard of Superman so I'd sure hope so."

"Well," Kim sounded very excited, "they have some unbelievably advanced technology, stuff that makes what my dad works with look like tinker toys. Just think about it Ron, you could end world hunger, poverty, war, crime, everything with this technology. And I'm not saying it totally excuses what Luthorcorp has done, but it's not really evil or anything, just misguided. And that I think I can change, Lex is a man who values results, I just have to show him my way will get them."

Ron was very much beginning to lean towards not telling Kim about his powers for the foreseeable future but he still thought he should try and talk some sense into her and then see where he wound up. "I don't know about that Kim, I mean even if that's true and that's a really big if I've still got two big problems with that. One, if I were Superman I wouldn't just hand over all that technology, and since he hasn't I'm guessing he's got a pretty good reason. And I think the second thing is that reason, the first thing we did with airplanes was stick machine guns on them, the first thing we did with nuclear power was make bombs with it. I don't even want to think what mankind would do with that."

They walked into a fairly large park, where Ron had originally intended on telling Kim his secret with Kim looking at him with a cross between a glare and not quite believing how… intelligent his last statement had been. "Ron," he absolutely hated that look of betrayal on her face, "you can't tell me you're siding with someone who'd want to keep technology like that from spreading. And where the heck did you come up with that last little bit, it just didn't sound like you."

"Yeah," Ron's nervous laugh failed utterly to lighten the situation, "remember that history essay you basically threatened me to do? Well turns out it was on technology and warfare, and my two big things were aerial warfare and nuclear weapons. So yeah, I guess I am saying that people shouldn't get their hands on this stuff, I don't think we're ready for it yet."

Kim just sighed in irritation as they sat down on a bench; Ron ranked fighting with his best friend among his least favorite things to do. "So," Kim definitely sounded like she was trying to force a change of subject, "you said you had something to tell me, something that you wanted a bit of privacy. Well we're here, and this is about as private as it's going to get so what was it you wanted to tell me?"

Ron bit back several choice words, it had occurred to him that telling Kim about his being a Kryptonian had become a bad idea, but he hadn't quite thought just what he was going to tell her instead for his 'grand confession.' Why oh why hadn't he though of this when he'd been ranting out all his nervousness to Bonnie? Wait that was it; Bonnie was definitely getting her ribs and watermelon when he was done here. Bonnie had been constantly bugging him to take journalism class next semester, and he hadn't given her an answer. And with Kim and Bonnie's rivalry he could probably get away with thinking Kim would blow a capillary. Today was really just his day for thinking, and he'd be going to temple next Saturday to profusely thank God for it.

"Um…" he started out rubbing the back of his neck, "you know how Bonnie's been trying to get me to take journalism class right? Well I've been thinking and I decided that I'm gonna do it."

Kim looked at him very flatly before speaking, "Any other time I probably would have gone off on how bad an idea that is, and I do think it's a bad idea. But right now I'm so angry at you that it just doesn't really do anything."

Ron looked over at Kim and then up at the sky, "Fighting sucks, doesn't it?"

"Yeah," Kim stared down at the ground sadly, "you're my best friend but I don't like you very much right now."

"You gonna be alright driving home alone?" Ron still found concern for his best friend easy to come by even if they were fighting.

"Yeah," Kim scooted closer to him and gave him a friendly hug, "I'll talk to you later alright?"

"Sure thing KP," Ron said as she stood up and walked out of sight. Sighing Ron stood up and started walking the opposite way quite glad he and Kim had decided to take separate cars that morning. Though Ron hadn't actually driven, he'd managed to get his speed under control over the last month and had simply run the distance. He still had one stop though before setting out to be a pack mule, the park wasn't that far from where the Kents lived, so rather than take less than a second Ron decided to take closer to fifteen minutes to walk there.

Knocking on the door he waited a few more seconds before the door opened and Clark Kent let him into the apartment suite. "Where's your friend?" He asked seeing that it was just Ron at his door.

"About that," Ron sat down in one of the chairs in the living room, "I don't think Kim would take the news too well right now."

"Her interview with Lex?" Clark sat down in another chair.

Ron rested his arms on his legs and let his head settle in his hands, "She's under the impression that he's a good guy who just hasn't figured out how to be good yet. And apparently since we, Kryptonians, haven't shared all the fancy technology that got us here we're the bad guys in this."

Clark sighed, "I've known Lex since I was a freshman in high school and the man gives a whole new definition to smooth talker." Ron heard the toilet flush and looked around to see a man, about Clark's age walk into the same room, he was blonde and had his short hair in spikes, dressed in a rather nice suit Ron knew the man was familiar but couldn't place the name.

Clark stood up and motioned for Ron to do the same, "Ron I'd like you to meet Oliver Queen, Oliver this is Ron, my… protégé."

Ron stuck his hand out, thankful once more that he and Kim had met enough famous and powerful people on their missions that the shock had long ago worn off. "It's an honor to meet you Mr. Queen."

"Please, call me Oliver," he said taking Ron's hand, "and the honor is all mine. It's not every day you get to meet the next Superman."

Even as Ron looked over at Clark with questions racing through his head his fellow Kryptonian was a step ahead in his answer. "Oliver is, well was the Green Arrow, and Queen Industries provides all the tools I've ever had to use. When I realized you were both going to be in town I decided you two should probably meet each other."

"Isn't Queen Industries headquartered in Metropolis?" Ron hoped he didn't sound as stupid as he felt right then.

"It is," Oliver laughed, "but I've been traveling almost non-stop for the last few weeks trying to negotiate an acquisition, we're buying Bueno Nacho, it's a fast food chain. Luthorcorp was also bidding for them, we lucked out that ours was a little higher."

"Bueno Nacho?" Ron felt the blood drain from his face, "and… what are you going to do with it now that you've bought it?"

"Make money," Oliver said, "they're rather profitable. You've heard of Bueno Nacho?"

"Yeah," Ron squeaked out, "I kinda sorta eat there every day. And they had offered me a scholarship for college, but I'm not sure what's going to happen with that now."

"Hold that thought," Oliver pulled out his cell phone, "Queen here, can you pull up the Bueno Nacho buyout files? Their scholarship program, Ron Stoppable. Yeah, put him down for our program."

He then shut the cell phone and turned to Ron, "Well you're still going to college, and now that I think about it can I tempt you with an offer?"

"Um, sure." Ron was still a fair bit numb from how fast his scholarship had been saved from possible doom.

"Well every couple of scholarship groups I like to pick one student out to take under my wing, sort of my personal assistant. And since I'm sure you'd like to be spared the whole sales pitch, I'd like that to be you."

Ron stood there for almost a whole minute, mouth hanging open before he managed to recapture the power of speech, "I'd love to, it's just that I haven't taken any advanced business classes, I kinda ended up having to take beginning journalism next semester."

"That's no problem," Oliver laughed again, "I took journalism in prep school, it was the best thing I ever did for press conferences before Clark here became a reporter and I could just do everything through him."

"Well then yes!" Ron's eyes brightened with happiness, "when do I start?"

"MetU starts in August, so you'll officially start then," Oliver pulled out his PDA and started making notes in it, "but I'll probably ask you to attend one or two events before that, just to get you used to the business world."

"Great," Ron said joyfully, then he realized that he'd more or less ignored Clark for far too long, "um Mr. Kent sorry for just brushing you off like that, you had a schedule for training me?"

"Relax Ron, there's no need to try and be all formal," Clark pulled a small planner from the coffee table and handed it to him, "I managed to work out times that should work for both of us, even if Kim doesn't know about your powers. But it's all rather tentative since it depends mostly on how your powers develop. You'll probably grow a bit faster than I did with me helping you along, but something like flying is still going to take awhile. But other than that the only thing I have for you is that Bonnie called me and reminded me to tell you to stop and get ribs on your way back."

Ron just sighed as he waved good bye to the two and walked out of the apartment. It was a weird day indeed when the most normal thing was running to St. Louis and Abilene to go shopping for Bonnie.

AN: I'm normally not one to complain about real life, but in the last two days I've written a sum total of over twenty pages, not including this. Now once you're all recovered from the vertigo of so many plot twists, let me say this. I think I'm on track with my new scheme for this, it's probably going to hack a few chapters from the story but I think it will be a better work overall. Now to answer the one big question, I twisted Ron away from reporting because one I don't want to simply rewrite superman with a few names changed, and two I assure you it is a part of the plot without which I'd be in dire straits. However I'm terribly proud of this chapter, more so than anything I've written in awhile. Ch 5 will now commence to be worked on since this week is less stressful! Lastly, I'd like to thank everyone who suggested an artifact name, but biology class came to the rescue of my muse once more. Till next time all.