Foreign
"Oh, now that's appetizing."
He glances up from his donuts and his Destructo-Bot blueprints. He's pretty proud of himself for managing to work on both at once. Okay, so sometimes he bites his pencil, which doesn't taste very good, or tries to draw with the sprinkle-filled donut, which is kind of messy, but it's working out pretty well, all things considered.
But Shego looks annoyed, so something must be wrong. He glances around the room. No doomsday devices are destroying the kitchen. Nothing's on fire. Kim Possible isn't descending from the ceiling. "What?" he asks, since he can't see what's the problem.
Shego points. "Your socks. On the table. At my place." She raises her eyebrows at him.
Oh, that's where his socks got to. "Sorry about that," he mumbles, returning to his blueprints. Because he is sorry, but this is much more important. "You can move 'em if you want to."
Shego's eyebrows go even higher. "Dr. D., even I have my limits. Touching your sweaty socks is beyond them."
His feet were hot; so sue him. Sweeping his socks off the table in one not-too-clumsy (if he has to say so himself!) motion, he opens his mouth, waiting for a witty retort to come to him.
It doesn't. It's in his brain - somewhere - lost, with a flat tire. So all that comes out of his mouth is a burp. Not exactly a quiet one, either.
Shego whacks herself in the forehead so hard he flinches. It doesn't hurt, of course, but for some reason he always expects it to. "Lovely," she groans.
He squirms in his seat. He really doesn't like it when people are mad at him. Especially Shego, because she can throw him through the wall. Besides, he always gets a little itchy feeling whenever someone's unhappy with him.
So he smiles sheepishly at her. "Sorry," he explains. "But it's a natural digestive reaction to -"
Shego brings her head up and holds her hands into the time-out signal. "TMI, thank you!"
Too much information. He remembers that from his book of teen slang. "Sorry," he says for the third time in one-hundred-sixty seconds. "But villains don't have to have good manners, right?"
If Shego's eyebrows go up any farther, they'll go right off her face. He tilts his head to the side, trying to picture that. "Actually, Doc," she says, "there's a lot to be said for villains with class."
"Class?" he asks, wiping his milky mouth on his sleeve.
"Yeah, class." She grunts. "Like using a napkin."
Oh.
"Matter of fact, I think I'll introduce you to a classy villain I know," Shego continues. "You've heard of the Seniors, haven't you?"
He cocks his head to the other side, but his brain doesn't come up with any results matching the search word "Seniors." Of course, he has some trouble with names. . .
"I don't know," he admits.
"Older guy?" Shego holds her hand out about five-and-a-half feet from the ground. "Got a son, dude about my age?"
Oh, now he remembers! The kinda-old guy with all the money and the kid who smelled like hair gel. "Senor Senior, Senior, and Senor Senior, Junior," he announces triumphantly.
"Good job." Shego smirks. "I think we'll pay them a visit today."
Senor.
There's only one problem. He doesn't speak Spanish.
Oh, sure, he knows the basics. Like adios is "hello," and hola is "goodbye" and paradox is "two ducks."
But if these guys are Spanish, he needs to be able to do more than say hi and bye and talk about ducks. He scratches his chin in thought. He'll need to know important words, like "yes" and "no." Isn't "no" nein? No, that's German. He remembers that from Dementor.
Internet time!
He searches for a Spanish translator website and finds all kinds of cool stuff. Azul is "blue," galleta is "cookie." There are about fifteen different words for "evil," and they all sound so - professionalish that they give him the shivers, and makes him want to use them. He's malvado, which sounds so. . . well. . . evil.
He carefully scripts a conversation then, and runs his parts through the translator. When they come out in Spanish, he prints the page out and tucks it into his pocket.
Now he's ready to meet these Seniors.
Senior's a lot shorter than he thought he'd be, but there's something. . . solid about him. Like you could lean on him and he wouldn't fall over and drop you.
He sticks out his hand and grabs Senior's, shaking it as firmly as he can, trying to ignore how much bigger the other man's hands are. With his other hand, he reaches into his pocket and fumbles around, pulling his script out. "Hola, amigo. Usted debe conocer a mi amigo. Querría usted ayudarme conquisto el mundo?" he reads slowly and carefully.
Shego looks at him like he's nuts. Senior, on the other hand, smiles, making lines crinkle around his blue eyes. "Ah, Mr. Drakken," he says in a voice that sounds like potato chips being eaten. Even his voice sounds solid. "You are every bit as enthusiastic as Miss Shego said you were."
He feels his jaw about scrape the ground. "You speak English!"
"Yeah, and better than you do, I might add." Shego gives her eyes a disgusted roll. "Did you think he wouldn't?"
He closes his eyes and pictures the Destructo-Bot blueprints back on the kitchen table. Stupid people can't design Destructo-Bots, and right now he's feeling very, very close to a stupid person.
But Senior doesn't look at him like he's stupid. He just keeps smiling and shaking his hand. "Come on in, Mr. Drakken," he says politely.
"It's Dr. Drakken," he corrects him.
"Ah, yes. Forgive me." Senior leads the way into a huge, gleamy kitchen that's probably never had anything spilled on the floor. "Do you like juice boxes?"
He licks his chops, already tasting fruit punch. "Yes," he answers, careful to keep that evil smile on his face. Shego's unimpressed, he can tell.
"So, Dr. Drakken," Senior begins, handing him a juice box. "What are you currently working on?"
YES! He loves that question. "I am building a new line of destructive robots," he says, taking a deep breath, ready to blurt it all out. "I call them. . . Destructo-Bots!" He throws back his head and laughs evilly. On the way back, though, his hand hits the juice box and sends it flying.
Shego catches it .2 seconds before it hits the ground. "Nice going, Butterfingers."
He feels his cheeks go hot. He really would hate to be responsible for the first stain on that nice shiny floor. "Sorry," he whispers.
Senior gives a solid shrug. "Quite all right. Please, continue."
But before he can, there's a high-pitched shriek from outside, like the sound a Pixie Scout makes when you take her cookie money (if you're Shego) or her cookies (if you're him). That, or a rat getting its tail caught in a trap.
"That's Junior!" Shego yelps. Her eyes actually look worried, and that doesn't happen often.
Senior's already halfway out the door, and Shego's about two inches behind him, so it only feels right to follow. After all, the kitchen feels eerily big with just him in it.
A guy almost as big as his cousin Eddy is lying flat on his back on a raft in the middle of the pool, clinging to it for dear life. "A little help here," he whimpers.
He feels his eyebrow shoot up. Junior's voice sounds like his own did at age twelve. It seems out of place coming out of someone that huge.
Shego reaches a hand down into the pool and hauls Junior out. "You okay, sport?" she asks.
Junior nods, but he doesn't look happy. "Except now my hair is all wet!" he squeals. "And I had just finished coming the cowlicks out of it, too!"
Shego's lips twitch as she turns to him. "Hair care's important to Junior."
Apparently, and that's just weird. He fiddles awkwardly with his own ponytail. He can't even count all his cowlicks.
And who named them that, anyway? His hair might be messy, but not because a cow licked it. He's never been within ten yards of a cow in his life.
"Junior?" Senior's potato-chip voice snaps him back to here-and-now. "What happened, my son?"
His voice and eyes are soft, like a father's should be, he guesses. His chest gets tight. Sure must be nice to have such a good dad.
"Well - " Junior wiggles his shoulders around a little - "I was scanning the sky for any airplanes that might happen to be flying over our enormous private island. And then I saw one, but I could not tell if it was sufficiently stocked with anything for us to rob! So I was trying to climb to the roof for a closer look, but I became dizzy once I stepped off the ground, and I fell back into the pool! And messed up my hair!"
Is this guy for real? Suddenly he doesn't feel so stupid anymore.
Shego covers her mouth with her hands, but he can see the skin around it twitching. She's amused, but she doesn't want to show it. She - she doesn't want to hurt Junior's feelings?
"Did you know I am going to be a teen pop sensation?" Junior whirls on him now.
A what now? He didn't know that soda could even be teenaged. "No," is all he can say.
Junior blinks, as if he just now realizes that he doesn't know this guy. "Father, who is our guest?" he asks.
Senior puts a hand on his arm. "Junior, this is Dr. Drakken. He is Miss Shego's employer."
"Ohhh." Junior nods. "Pleased to meet you, Dr. Drakken!" He slaps him on the back - hard.
It hurts, and he yelps. And kind of falls flat on his face into the pool in the process.
The water's cold and it's deep and he's not the world's best swimmer and his back's throbbing. He thrashes his hands around, trying to grab onto water that keeps slipping through his fingers because it's liquid and you can't hold liquids, except he's forgotten that in his panic. "SHEGO!" he hollers.
There's a sound like an alley cat engaging in a fight with a chalkboard, which he's sure must be Junior shrieking. Just as his head starts to disappear under the water and even worse panic starts to set in, two sets of hands grab him. They're both strong, and they pull him right out of the pool.
He's safe.
"And once the world leaders are cowering in fear of the Destructo-Bots, I shall rule the world!" It doesn't quite have the same effect, because he can't throw back his head and laugh. His hands are warm and toasty on the mug of hot cocoa Junior brought him (while apologizing twenty-five times), and he doesn't want to lose the soft towel Senior wrapped him in.
Senior nods. "Sounds like a very clever plan. Unfortunately, I have no plans of my own at the time - villainy is more of a hobby for me, you see."
He takes a sip of the cocoa and nods. And sneezes.
"We probably better getchya home," Shego interrupts. "Have you get into some dry clothes before you catch your death of cold."
He wipes his nose on his sleeve. "What are you, my mother?"
Shego snorts. "Some days I wonder."
Senior reaches over and helps him to his feet. "Some other day, we shall discuss this further. When you get those Destructo-Bots running - "
"If he ever does - " Shego mutters.
" - perhaps you could send one or two over," Senior finishes. "I would like that very much."
Despite his dripping-wet clothes, he feels warm and dry inside. Someone wants one of his doomsday devices for themselves! Someone thinks he has a clever plan! Someone is being nice to him!
He grins from ear to ear as he follows Shego out the door. "Adios, mi amigo!" he calls over his shoulder.
Senior smiles back, making those cool crinkles around his eyes again. He hopes he gets some of those when he's old. They make him look so distinguishfied. "Goodbye, my friend."
Note: The Spanish that Drakken fired at Senior when they first meet roughly translates to, "Hello, friend. I believe you know my sidekick. Would you like to help me conquer the world?" . .. at least, that's what I ran through the translator website. :)