Kim Possible is property of Disney. Original characters are property of author.

A Fan fiction by Six-string Samurai.

Loudness Between Shadow & Light

Chapter 4 - Take My Love Apart (part 1)

The Shego who wasn't lifted her face skyward, eyes closed as she savored the small sounds that escaped the redhead splayed out on the floor somewhere below her feet. After searching for that one something her whole life, she'd finally found it. That taste she'd been missing.

It hadn't been there with her brother's as she'd played at being the hero. Working with the blue dolt, well it had been closer, but ultimately unfulfilling. She'd been lazy there, lulled into complacency. It hadn't been a bad gig, but nothing had really been a true measure of herself. Then she showed up, and for the first time, Shego had realized that she might be missing out on a piece of her life.

It wasn't that the redhead was the final piece of the puzzle, but more like a reminder that there was indeed something that needed solving. But, even that hadn't been enough to really stir the thief. She'd needed a real jumpstart, a whole system shock. Her short stint as Miss Go had been just the thing, a much needed reality check, something that forced Shego to understand she'd been trying to live her life according to someone else's definitions. Just like she'd played a hero as a teen, she'd only been acting out the other side of the coin as an adult.

In many ways, she owed Kim Possible. The girl who could do anything had pushed Shego into challenging herself, to strive to be just a little bit better at what she did. The trouble was, the thief found herself only caring where the redhead was concerned. And it wasn't ever enough. She realized that now. She'd been only doing more of the same thing, improving for the sake of showing off, of looking good in the eyes of the one person she had deemed worth that effort. She'd been doing things halfway, but it had at least been a start.

Had the two of them grown closer in some way because of it? Shego could answer that once awkward question now. Yes, they had. But there was a newer, more pressing question on her mind, not yet formed on her dark lips. In what way?

Those things were something that only the presence of the redhead could answer. Moreover, it was a wordless, formless thing. Something she couldn't fight, burn, melt or beat into submission. She'd come to realize it was a softer, frail and fragile thing that threatened to slip through her fingers, and shatter like glass on the floor.

This was the crux of the matter, at least as far as Shego saw it. Tonight would be the night that she was in a position to truly give Kimmie what she owed her. It was almost a gift, really, to pull the self-imposed blinders from her Pumpkin's eyes.

She smiled, already imagining standing side by side with Kim, the both of them burning with true understanding. It wasn't that the world was against them, but that they'd been using it as a stepping stone the moment the two of them had met. How could it be any other way, when everyone else was but a dying star in comparison?

In the darkness of the empty space, Shego's emerald eyes slowly opened, shimmering with a portent of things to come.

--

Kimberly Anne Possible ached, all of her. There was no single word that could cover how bad she felt. It went beyond exhaustion, bodily pain, the mere trappings of flesh. If there had been light to see by, she was sure that her skin must be the color of twilight with how much every inch of her skin hurt.

The beatings will continue until morale improves…Kim couldn't get the phrase out of her head, she didn't even know where it had come from, but it summed up her feelings in a neat little package that was filled to bursting.'

Had she been beaten? Tormented? Tortured?

She couldn't even tell, not when everything in her head was a blur. Flowers of pain blossomed behind her eyes. God, she wanted to scream out, to cry, but she'd already done that. Had it helped? She couldn't remember any more.

Thoughts came and went; a cracked kaleidoscope of images that scorched her when she reached out vainly trying to gather the remains of her strength. There was no remorse, no regret, and no mercy in the punishment visited upon her self.

There couldn't be.

Why would there, when the hero had fallen? When the girl who could do anything had failed. Kim Possible had thrown in the towel, and for what?

Bile rose in her throat. Her own selfish weakness made her sick, wracking her body with phantom pain that was worse in a way than any torture one of her enemies might have sought to inflict. This would forever be her darkest moment, and a secret shame that she would carry for the rest of her days.

Could she still even be a hero? Who would want to be rescued by a girl who couldn't even save herself? Her stomach turned at the thought, and she couldn't even find it in herself to fight it.

Bile, black with blood and self-loathing splashed out, burning her throat, stinging her mouth. It didn't stop until she could only dry heave. Spent and hollow, Kim collapsed unaware into a pool of her own unmaking.

Above, a dark angel looked down upon the pale glistening figure that lay sprawled, naked on the concrete. It wasn't the fall that killed you, she knew that all too well.

Shego took Kim in her arms, staring into the face of the young woman who had purged herself of the trappings of guilt, doubt, and self-recrimination. There had been surprisingly little, when the ex-thief compared the experience to her own. But really, it was all subjective, and she couldn't say with certainty that she'd suffered more, or less. It didn't matter in the here and now anyway.

Emerald eyes smiled at the weight of refined potential that lay sleeping in her arms. All she could do now was wait. Wait for those jade eyes to open, because in them, her truth would be told.