There's Still Fireworks: Part IX
(Title removed for being too cliché)
"Mmmmmpphhh!!!"
The first indication that something was actually quite wrong was that the hallway started to get very quiet. A thought crossed Kim's mind that they were perhaps getting a little too into it, and the students around them were starting to enjoy the show. For her that was a strong indicator that it was time to cease and desist before a teacher or other faculty member happened by, or worse, Barkin, landing Ron right back in hot water with him, and her as well. Quick pecks, hand holding and the like were tolerated, but making out on school grounds was clearly a violation of the Public Displays of Affection policy.
Just as she had taken charge in initiating the kiss, Kim started to back away from it. Her notion was to look Ron in the eyes, letting him see how much she was blushing, all the while trying to ignore the staring faces all around them.
Only, Ron wasn't letting go. He still had his arm tightly around her waist and even as she backed away even more forcefully, he followed, his lips still pressed hard against hers. Her eyebrows immediately dropped down into a scowl. Much as she liked kissing him, 'mashing' just wasn't something she was going to tolerate.
Then she did actually look him in the eyes, seeing the distress there. Every time she pulled away, he was being dragged along with her, their lips seemingly glued together. His face would stretch out until he moved along with her to keep it from becoming painful.
With a slight twist of her waist, Kim also realized his arm was stuck to her back, just as her hand was stuck to the back of his head.
"Mmmmmpphhh!!!" both of them moaned through involuntarily locked lips.
"Opf gong onf?" What's going on?, Kim took him to mean.
"I on oh." I don't know, she responded. Kim could see the terror start creeping into his eyes. They were at school, which normally meant they were safe from most of the really weird things that happened to them. Usually, all they had to worry about were the more prosaic things that would cause normal teens to be embarrassed nearly to death.
Okay, being glued together in a passionate kiss pretty much had the same effect.
Slowly, Kim eased both of them closer to the floor so she could reach her backpack. Brushing the ball aside, her fingers closed around the Kimmunicator, her thumb hitting the call button before it even cleared the folds of her pack.
The mildly concerned face of her younger friend popped up immediately. "Kim, I finished analyzing the contents of that orb. It's a super-strong molecular adhesive, so be careful…uh, is this a…bad…time?" His cocoa skin managed to pale a couple shades as he realized the couple appeared to be kissing.
Kim shot him a glare that said We are so past careful. She tried speaking, but she couldn't manage anything that sounded like more than just a moan.
"Whoa. So I guess the device got activated somehow while you were…oh man! You guys were smacking lips again!" He made a face like the imagined cooties could jump right through the connection between his system and the handheld screen.
So not helping, Kim thought at him as Ron did his best to join in on the glare.
"CHEESE AND CRACKERS! What do you two think you are doing?" Barkin bellowed as he appeared, looming large above the two of them. "Break this up this instant!"
I wish we could! Unable to speak, Kim simply passed the Kimmunicator to the teacher, hoping Wade would be able to offer up some kind of solution to him.
It was starting to dawn on the broad shouldered man that something else besides a gross violation of the PDA policy was taking place. Stoppable he could believe doing something of that nature, though actually kissing a girl, even Possible, was something he really couldn't have imagined before the previous week, but the do-gooder cheerleader? For the moment he forgot about the apparent make-out session and concentrated on the fact the two of them seemed to be stuck in that position.
"Explanation now!" He demanded of the tiny screen.
"Apparently the two of them were exposed to a super-strong molecular adhesive. In effect, they are pretty much glued together, like super-glue, but much stronger."
Barkin arched an eyebrow. He was only familiar with Wade Load in passing, as in, he knew he was the guy Possible talked to on the device all the time, but all he could think of was how a child like that was able to spend so much time sitting at his home playing with computers instead of being properly enrolled in school. He was totally unaware that the young man was not only through with high school, but college as well and was already on his way to earning a doctorate. "OK, Mr. Computer Guy, maybe you can offer up a solution here."
Wade pondered that for a moment. All he had to work with at that point was a quick reading the Kimmunicator had taken, which was woefully incomplete. "Maybe if you could just hold the Kimmunicator up to Kim and Ron I can take a better reading.
Barkin did just that. "Hmmm. I'll need to run some computer simulations, but exposed to air like this, the compound has taken on different characteristics. Let me see the container again."
Carefully, Kim leaned over slowly, picking up the ball and handing it to the teacher. "Bad news." Wade said after the second, more thorough scan. "Apparently it's empty now, so all I've got to work with is the resulting compound. The good news is there's gotta be a solvent."
"Check. Get on it." Barkin ordered.
"...Right. Hey, I found out what was stolen from the lab. A prototype. High yield kinetic modulator. From what I can tell, it's very dangerous. I don't have to tell you how bad that is in Dementor's hands."
"I don't care about this Demental guy…" Barkin growled.
"Dementor." Wade corrected him.
"Whatever. What is important right now is the problem at hand." He fumbled with the keys for a moment, finally managing to shut the tiny device off before handing it to Kim, who slipped it into a hidden pocket in her cheer skirt.
With a sweeping gaze, Barkin managed to clear the entire hallway within seconds. "My office, now!" He barked at the two.
Getting there was a lot easier said than done. The way the two of them were joined, it was hard to see where they were going, not to mention the fact that it was actually starting to get a little painful as both their faces stretched whenever they got out of synch.
Once there, it was clear that sitting down was pretty much out of the question. Barkin circled his desk, propping his face partially behind his hands as he considered what his next move would be. "So, your computer guy said there should be a solvent. Maybe the new janitor has something that will help. Don't move."
They both gave him a plaintive look that said we wouldn't even think of it as he headed out the door. Moments later, he returned with a can of mineral spirits.
"This will take magic marker off the bathroom stalls, so this should do the trick." He dribbled some of it onto a cloth, and as gently as he could, he tried dabbing their bonded lips.
It didn't have quite the effect he was hoping for.
Their lips were still just as stuck as they had been for what was by then about ten minutes, though it seemed much longer. Barkin knew the solvent for super-glue was acetone, but he was loath to use such a strong chemical on them without the supervision of the school nurse.
Problem was, the spirits had a strong enough odor they were affecting Ron in another way. At first he scrunched up his nose, fighting it, but he was clearly losing the battle.
Barkin realized exactly what was happening at the same time Kim did. Her eyes lit up in fear, fully expecting to get a sneeze right in her face! Just in time, a pair of large fingers closed over Ron's nose.
Ron sighed, despite the pain of having his sneeze forcibly squelched. All three relaxed for a moment…
…just as Ron sneezed again.
Being a young, healthy man who spent a great deal of time working out his lungs with powerful screaming, the sneeze was…well, nothing to sneeze at. With his mouth completely engaged with Kim's all of it had to go somewhere, and that meant his nose. Add to that the fact it took him by surprise and was completely unchecked, it came with such force that it reverberated through the entire drab little room.
"AAAAA CHOOOOO."
Kim lost her footing, pulling both of them down onto the floor where she landed hard on her rump, right on the same place she was bruised the other day during practice.
"Owwww." She moaned, rolling to the side to get her boyfriend's weight off of her smaller frame as much as she could.
"Sorry…" sniff "KP!"
It took her a couple heartbeats to realize their mouths were no longer joined. Tentatively, she licked her lips, which seemed none-the-worse for wear. No skin had torn loose, meaning the adhesive was indeed somewhat different from cyanocrylate type glues.
Barkin noticed the change in their situation as well. Standing them up, he tried pulling them apart with as much force as he could muster without actually hurting them. That's when they all realized, while their mouths weren't stuck together, their cheeks certainly were, and their hands and arms were still stuck in the same positions, without giving any indication they were about to budge.
"Whoa, Mr. B, that hurts."
"Stop your whining, Stoppable. If a sneeze can get you loose, then a little pain will be worth it."
Kim grunted against the strain. "I don't think so, Mr. Barkin. Our cheeks weren't stuck together before."
"You mean, wherever we touch?" Ron's free hand came up to cup Kim's cheek. She gasped slightly, realizing what he was testing.
Fortunately, the hand came away seconds later. Slowly, she returned the gesture, finding it just as easy to remove her hand. Where they were stuck, they were stuck fast.
"At least I can breathe." Ron took a couple gulps of air through his mouth, since his nose was still slightly stuffed from the sneeze.
Barkin circled the teens, rubbing his chin in thought. "It seems like the effect moved to another location when the contact was broken." Unasked, he put his large hands on their face, turning them slightly.
With a little experimentation, they discovered they could indeed move what parts were stuck together, and with some rolling and twisting, they finally managed to get their hands free. However, like with a ball of sticky goo, no matter what they did, they couldn't get their bodies unstuck from each other. They finally had to settle for being literally joined at the hip.
As there were only single-seat chairs in the office, they were still forced to stand as Barkin considered what the next step would be. He picked up his phone and called the school nurse. Moments later, she arrived, but didn't have anything helpful to add.
Scowling, Barkin reached for the phone once more.
"It seems I have no choice. I'm going to have to call your parents." He sounded oddly resigned, as if he were as loath to do so as the couple were.
"Mr. B, please, no, not that. Kim's Dad is going to put me in a black hole!"
"So not the drama, Ron. Dad is going to do no such thing." Kim groaned.
"I don't know what that means." Barkin said softly, "But be that as it may, Possible's parents are trained scientists and doctors. They are the best option." His characteristic scowl returned. "Plus there is the fact the two of you ended up in this predicament by making out on school grounds. That would mean a call to them even if it were not for the two of you now being glued together."
Both of them slumped, unable to counter that line of thinking. While she didn't believe the threat her father had leveled against Ron the previous Friday, he was still going to be deeply upset, perhaps enough that he could actually sanction them for their behavior. There was also how her Mom would react to the two of them being disciplined for kissing at school. She really had no idea how that would play, considering it was something neither parent ever actually had to deal with.
No, that wasn't completely true. One of the reasons Kim had never been about kissing guys went back to her first real kiss. Ron tried to keep the Walter Nelson affair under wraps by getting his mother to drive her to the orthodontist, but it had gotten back to her parents in short order anyway.
All of that aside, the logical side of her mind had to acknowledge that Mr. Barkin was correct. If anyone could help them, it would be her parents, and any kind of retribution for her behavior would take a back seat to solving their current crisis. Much as she wanted to be close to Ron, being literally stuck to him was not high on her pri-list.
Looking at the floor, she let out a big sigh. "Make the call." She said softly.
Kim Possible and all related characters © Disney
