Authors Note: A big thank you goes out to all the guys and girls who are supporting this story. Especially the shy ones. Without all of you this tale wouldn't be what it is. You continue to inspire me to try to do better. And thanks to Brandon for beta reading. You are a champion of light, and a defender of all that is good and decent.
Disclaimer: I don't own Kim Possible.
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"How could you know that behind my eyes a sad girl cried,
And how could you know that I hurt so much inside,
How could you know that I'm not the average girl,
I'm carrying the weight of the world, yeah,
So can you get me out of here?"
~Anneliese Van Der Pol, 'Over It'
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Drakken was backing away from Ron. Only a day earlier he had seen what the boy had become. He was as crazed and demented as any super villain out there. Maybe even more so. He knew that for all intents and purposes that Ron Stoppable was insane. He belonged in a mental institution. The fact that he was not only free to harm the public, but more importantly, free to harm him, sent chills through Drakken's body.
He desperately clutched the Tempus Simia with his left hand as he held out his right arm motioning Ron to stop. The attempt failed pitifully.
"Stay back!" he said. "I'm warning you! I have powers beyond your wildest imagination!"
"Smaller air vents!" Ron blurted out.
"W-what?"
"You're such a fool Darken! Dragon! Drakken! Whatever your stupid name is! See how it feels?" he grinned stupidly.
Drakken knew better than to question the mind of a psychopath. But he couldn't help wondering what Ron was talking about.
"Um… what are you talking about?"
"So Kim Possible can't break into a lair!" Ron explained. "Air doesn't care how small the shaft it. It's air. It will still go through. The shaft doesn't have to be big enough to fit a person inside. And if they're smaller then she can't crawl through them and get into a lair."
It was actually a very logical argument from an illogical mind. Drakken wasn't sure which was more surprising: the logic, or the fact that he himself had not thought to build his lairs with smaller air ducts.
He felt himself back against a wall. He had no where left to run. Then out of the corner of his eye he found his rescuer. He felt a mix of relief and disgust as he realized who it was.
Kim lowered her uninjured shoulder and rammed Ron off of his feet. The young man was sent flying several feet away from her and Drakken. The contents of his pockets spilled out onto the temple floor. Almost in an instant he was up on his feet again. Had Kim not known better she would swear that he was foaming at the mouth. But she knew that it was just his saliva.
"Drakken," she said coldly. "Give me the Tempus Simia. Now."
His eyes darted back and forth between her and Ron. The former teen hero was back on his feet and coming back at them. Just a few more seconds and they would be fighting each other rather than him.
"No."
"I said give me the-"
She was cut off again as Ron's fist smashed into her jaw. Her head whipped to the side and she fell to a knee from the impact. She looked up at him and saw his twisted smile. She saw his crazed eyes. She had something more to fight for now. She had to set things right.
Feeling no remorse as she did so, Kim lashed out with her left, uninjured arm. The uppercut caught him in his already injured ribs which sent him back wheezing once more. Not the least bit deterred, Ron was back at full height and ready to resume the fight.
He swung hard and wildly at her. He was either angry, tired, or perhaps both. Either way it gave Kim an advantage. The fact that she was wearing her battle suit only made things easier. Her enhanced strength and speed made dealing with Ron a lot easier than it would have been. Soon enough she had caught both of his fists in her palms and brought her eyes to stare into his own.
"Ron, you have to stop!" she pleaded. "You have to let me make things right! I have to use the Tempus Simia to make it so none of this ever happened!"
Ron's only reply was to spit in her face. Her mind went momentarily blank with rage. She kneed him in his gut as hard as she could. The blow sent Ron down to his knees as he again began gasping for air. He knelt there as he panted, desperately trying to suck enough oxygen into his lungs.
Kim turned her attention back to Drakken, who was by now farther away from her. It looked as if he was trying to escape the temple, but could not find a safe way around all of the people.
"Get back here!" she shouted.
In only seconds she had caught up with the mad scientist. After a brief struggle she had succeeded in ripping the Tempus Simia idol from his tiny hands. She held the stone statue in her hands with a look of child-like wonder on her face. This was the key to everything. It was the cause of all of her problems, and it was the solution. She looked back at the portal that still existed behind the altar.
Without even knowing that her legs were moving, she began running toward the portal. Out of the corner of her eye she saw that Ron was on his feet and coming right toward her. There was no avoiding the impact. She put out her good arm to stop him.
He did not go for her arm. Instead he grabbed for the idol with both hands. Kim then resumed her two-handed grip on the statue as well. The two teens, once the best of friends, stood there struggling for the object that had torn them apart. It was a battle of good and evil. A battle of the past and the future. A battle of life and death.
"Let… go… Ron…" Kim said through gritted teeth as she fought desperately to hold onto her prize.
"Precious!"
"You're seriously going to make that reference at a time like this?" she shrieked. "Just give me the idol!"
Ron did no such thing. Instead he snarled and bared his teeth. He was about to lunge at her nose with his open mouth.
Then a third set of hands entered the fray.
A green fist came up from under the Tempus Simia idol. It flew high into the air as Kim and Ron both fell backwards from their efforts of trying to pull it from the others hands. For what seemed like an eternity it hung in the air. Kim had fallen onto her backside after she had lost her grip on it. She could only look on helplessly as the idol fell to the floor.
It shattered on impact.
A red starburst of energy shot out of the broken pieces of the idol. The temple itself shook with pain as it felt the idol die.
"No!" she screamed.
Terror seized Kim's heart as she saw her only chance to set things back to normal disappear. Her breathing became ragged and her lip quivered when she saw the portal disappear.
The Supreme One too looked up. She had been busy fighting first two, but then all three members of Team Impossible. She had had the upper hand against only Dash and Burn, but bringing a third highly skilled operative into the melee resulted in a stalemate. The look of horror on her own face made Kim's seem mild in comparison.
"You broke the time monkey…" she whimpered. "You broke the time monkey!" she repeated with the fury of an enraged lion.
"No!" Kim yelled. "I- I can fix it! Really!"
Apparently her words were of no consolation to The Supreme One. She looked down at her feet. They were no longer there. Slowly but surely, nothingness was travelling up her legs. She was a time paradox. She was impossible. And yet she somehow remained here because she had the conditions to return to where she had once existed. Her meddling in the time stream had sent her back with Kim and Ron to the first day of their junior year. But without the conditions for her to exist in this universe she could no longer be here.
Everyone in the room stared in shock and awe as they saw the second Shego disappearing right before their very eyes. At first the Supreme One had looked frightened. But she knew that she couldn't let that be their last glimpse of her. If she were to vanish from this universe she would ensure that the memory she left was not one of fright.
"Like I said, kids," she grinned. "There's an infinite number of timelines out there. I've been to plenty of them."
The last thing they saw before the nothingness consumed her was her dark, menacing grin. And then nothing remained.
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Kim had been so focused on the shattered idol and the woman vanishing in front of her that she didn't even realize that her world's Shego was standing only a few feet away from her. After the Supreme One had faded away she felt her legs getting weak. She fell to her knees as tears threatened to spill from her eyes when she remembered what the villainess had said. She wanted Kim to know what she would be losing. She wanted Kim to know that she had a chance to go back and fix everything. And now what was said had come true. She had let the opportunity slip from her grasp. Literally.
She turned to see Shego bracing herself against one of the walls of the temple. She may not have been unconscious anymore, but it was clear that she was still feeling the effects of the drug Ron had injected into her. Kim stomped over to her and roughly grabbed the older woman by the front of her green and black cat suit. She violently shook her to get the full attention of her still weary mind.
"Why did you do that!" she screamed. "Why did you destroy the Tempus Simia?"
Shego blinked hard as she tried to focus her eyes on Kim.
"Hands off, Kimmie," she growled. "I don't have to answer to cheerleaders."
"Then maybe you'd prefer to answer to my fist!"
Kim slugged Shego in the face. The villainess collapsed to the ground clutching her cheek.
"What is wrong with you!" she yelled. "You should be happy that you beat the bad guy. Well, the bad me. Badder me. Whatever she was. The point is that you should be happy little miss supreme is gone."
"Don't you realize what you've done? You've made it impossible for me to go back and save my friendship with Ron!"
"Why do you need a stupid monkey statue to do that?"
"Because… because it's complicated."
"Yeah, whatever. If your friendship was as good as you say it was then maybe you wouldn't need some lame excuse like time travel to fix it."
Life was so much easier when there was someone to blame. For Kim that was several people. The Supreme One, Camille, Drakken and Shego topped her list. They were the reason for every horrible thing that had occurred in the past several weeks. At least that's what Kim desperately wanted to believe. She didn't want to admit that her denial and involvement with the tracking chip had been a major factor in Ron turning against her.
What Shego said made sense. If her friendship with Ron was so wonderful then she wouldn't need to use the Tempus Simia to repair it. They had known each other since pre-K. They would endure. They just had to. Her thoughts immediately turned to him. He was still here. She had lost her focus on him when she saw the idol break. Time was desperately running out.
She turned and saw him kneeling before the stone shards of the idol. His great plan, the plan that he didn't even know the details to himself, was ruined. The same applied to every other villain in this room. Whether they knew the true potential of the idol or not, they had all wanted it for their own reasons.
"It's gone…" he grieved. "Gone! Gone gone gone! My beautiful monkey statue. I didn't mean the harsh things I said to you. Come back. Please, I'm sorry. Don't do this to me!"
The cries of the raving lunatic stung Kim's heart, but for different reasons than he would have wanted. She felt no sympathy for the fact that he believed he had lost a friend in the idol. She mourned for the loss of his sanity. The thing that Ron had become was nothing like her best friend. Now it was time to get him back.
"Ron, you're coming with me," she said as she raised her fists.
His head snapped up at the sound of his name. His right eye twitched as he stared at Kim hatefully.
"You did this to it!" he said accusingly. "You killed my best friend!"
Kim wanted to make a comment about how she felt the exact same way about him. The decaying of his mind was killing him; her best friend.
"Ron… it was a monkey statue. A lifeless monkey statue. You hate monkeys, remember?"
"No! I hate you!"
He stood up and ran at her with flailing arms. Kim desperately tried to block and evade the blows without striking back. She didn't want to harm him. And she didn't want to risk doing any damage to his head. His mind was in a fragile enough state as it was. There was no telling what might happen should he suffer a concussion or other kind of brain injury.
"Ron stop!" she pleaded. "Please! Let me take you to the jet and cure you!"
His response was a feral growl. That was perhaps the most frightening thing about his transformation; the loss of his humanity. She didn't know how he had come to have dried blood staining his mouth and chin, but she knew it had to be bad. She knew that he had tried to tear her nose off with his teeth when they had been struggling for control of the idol. The side effects of the attitudinator were far worse than what Jack Hench had told her. Maybe it was only in his case though, she had no idea what anyone else had gone through. But when Ron fought he was becoming little better than the mad dog he represented at school, or the monkeys he feared so much.
She continued blocking his strikes trying to get him under control. It wasn't much better than wrestling with a rabid wolverine. She had control of his wrists, but still he fought. The crazed look in his eyes terrified her more than any super villain ever had. And then… his eyes drooped.
His resistance began to wane. His body was starting to get heavy. He was no longer fully supporting his own weight. He was leaning on her as his eyelids fluttered. And then he was out cold.
Camille stood behind him with one of his syringes in her hands, one that had fallen out of his pants pocket when he had taken one of his latest falls.
Kim gently laid him on the floor of the temple. He looked surprisingly peaceful when he slept. His face held no resemblance to the beast he had become. Had his face not been stained red he would have looked normal. He would have looked like the Ron she knew and loved.
She looked up at her newest partner. She took the thought back immediately. The thought of that disgusted her. Camille was not her partner. They just had a common enemy.
"Thanks…" she said uncomfortably.
"Whatever," Camille shrugged.
The three members of Team Impossible came to stand beside Kim. They looked down at her unconscious former sidekick before turning to Drakken and Shego.
"So I see you two are out of prison again," Dash said. "I think it's time to take both you and Monkey Fist back into custody."
"I'd say that's a good return," Burn added.
"What did we discuss about the income tax puns?" Crash asked.
"Oh lighten up," Dash said. "Let the guy have his moment. He's not a survival or medical specialist like you and me."
"Hey! I'll have you know that being an accountant is very demanding work!" Burn protested. "I get more work than either of you two during tax season!"
"Anyway… Dr. Drakken and Shego, we are hereby placing you under arrest."
Shego's hands ignited as she set herself in a combat stance.
"Three against one? Figures that you nobodies would need odds like that to stand a chance."
Kim began to panic when she saw what was unfolding. They didn't have time for this. Ron didn't have time for this. They needed to get out of here as quickly as possible. She needed to get him to a secure location where he could be restrained once he woke up. She didn't know what would happen if the attitudinator was used on an unconscious mind, but she didn't want to find out. Therefore she had to not only tie him up, but find a way to secure his head so he couldn't smash the device when it was placed on his head.
She wanted to be angry at Camille for using the tranquilizer on him, but deep down she knew there was no other way to safely bring him back to the United States. She knew she couldn't risk injuring his head and knocking him out herself. And she knew that in his condition he would never come quietly. Right now was their best chance to return him to his normal, good, sane self.
"Guys, we don't have time for this," she told the trio of men.
They scowled back at her. Despite the fact that they were non-profit now, and that they were technically assisting her, they still didn't like being told what to do.
"This is a golden opportunity to rid the world of two of its most notorious super villains," Dash said.
"Yeah? And how long will it take to get Shego under control? I don't have time fight her, subdue her, and then bring her and Drakken onto your little jet. There will barely be enough room for Ron and Monkey Fist now that we're bringing the two of them along. Just let it go. Okay?"
The three men grunted their acknowledgement. They knew that she was right. She had informed them of Ron's condition earlier. Even if they did have time to capture Drakken and Shego they still had very little room on their hover jet. Capturing Monkey Fist would be considered a good day for anyone.
"Fine. Let's go."
Kim and Dash carefully picked Ron up from the floor and began carrying him out of the temple. Crash and Burn did the same with Monkey Fist, being extra careful not to aggravate his arm injury.
Camille glared at Junior as she walked past him following the rest of the team. Junior himself simply fiddled with his thumbs nervously before following her at a safe distance. He did not like this mission work. Already today he had seen fights, blood, madmen, and a disappearing Shego twin. If this is what being Kim Possible's sidekick meant, he wanted no part of it.
Left in the lair were two confused, if not grateful super villains. Shego may have been arrogant. She may have been a very skilled fighter. But she knew there was no way she could have taken on Kim and Team Impossible at the same time. She would have fought fiercely and maybe even taken a couple of the men down, but she would not have won. And then she and Dr. Drakken would have wound up in prison once again.
She folded her arms and looked at him. He was apparently just as nervous about the events that had taken place.
"So Dr. D, what now?"
"I don't know. I'm feeling pretty good about that liquidized EMP that I gave Camille to use at the museum to steal that diamond."
"Liquidized EMP?" Shego scoffed. "You didn't invent that. It's called water. You gave the chick water. And it shorted out the security console. How can you say you invented that?"
Drakken grunted in defeat.
"Well… I did have this plan involving synthodrones. But when I heard about what Camille could do I decided to scrap it for a new plan. But I guess it wasn't really my plan, now was it?"
Shego shrugged.
"I don't know. You heard more of their conversation than me. You think the other me was telling the truth?"
"Maybe. You don't just vanish into thin air like that unless there's at least some truth to what she was saying."
"Or you get sprayed with that Aurora Orchid stuff."
"Yes but I didn't have any of that with me. And the other you didn't get embarrassed."
"Whatever. You can come up with theories once we get back to the lair. How about we do that before Kimmie changes her mind?"
"Yes, good idea."
The two villains began walking towards the exit of the temple, their latest plan having failed. After only a few seconds Shego stopped and looked at her employer. He stopped a few feet ahead of her.
"Oh, and remind me to track Senor Senior Sr. down once we get back to the lair. The old man stole my jet."
"The green and black one?"
"Yeah. He managed to steal it and escape when I was knocked out, and while you were apparently cowering in fear after Stoppable stole the Tempus Simia."
He grunted at the accusation that he had been cowering.
"How did he even manage to do that?"
"Apparently the guy can fly. Remember he was piloting that helicopter when Junior and me teamed up at that cookie factory?"
"Oh… right. Good times. You learned that there are worse villains than me out there to be teamed up with."
Shego let a soft laugh slip out of her mouth at the thought.
"Yeah. Worse than you…" she said as she walked past him to the exit.
He didn't exactly like the sound of her response.
"Shego?" he called after her. "He was worse than me, right? Right?"
He quickly jogged after her.
The last two people exited the temple on their way back to Drakken's hover jet. Shego sighed as she looked back inside. She couldn't help but wonder what would have happened had she been more focused when she had attacked Kim and Ron. She had still felt woozy when she struck and had hit the Tempus Simia rather than her intended target of Ron. She wondered if she truly could have travelled through time. She wondered if she had been just one step away from total world domination.
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Ron's eyes slowly opened to see a familiar room. He had been there many times. Even in his current state he could remember that. His vision was swirling around him, but he could still recognize the place. Just a few more seconds and it would all become clear.
It was Kim's kitchen.
But then he realized there was a problem. He couldn't move. At least not his arms and head. His eyes darted around to see that he was tied to a chair. Ropes secured his arms, legs and torso to one of Kim's kitchen chairs. And while he couldn't see it he knew that his head had been somehow immobilized as well. He desperately tried to move his neck, but to no avail. He figured it had to be duct tape.
He continued to strain and struggle in the grip of his restraints. He didn't seem to realize that he was making no progress. Had he been able to move his head he would have gladly chewed off his own limbs like a wild animal caught in a trap. But even that wasn't an option for him. He ceased his struggling when he heard Kim's voice.
"Stop it Ron," she said calmly.
His eyes looked to his right to see her standing there with her arms crossed. Her face betrayed no emotions that might be swimming in her head. She was all business.
His face was clean. He had not washed it in days. The henchman's blood that had been there for almost a day was finally cleaned off. He almost looked normal again. But he still did not act like his old self.
"Let me go!" he yelled.
"No. This ends today."
"I'll get out! I'm a genius! I'm a lyrical word-smith! I wrote the naked mole rap!"
"Believe me. You'll thank me once you're back to being yourself."
"I'll never thank you! You hear me? I remember what you did to me! I will destroy you Kim Possible!"
Kim shook her head sadly. She knew he wasn't himself. But it didn't change the fact that there still might be a hint of truth in what he was saying. He would still remember the tracking chip incident. What if he still held that against her? Even though he knew the truth about what Camille had done to both of them, the tracking chip didn't involve her. He had a big enough reason to still hold a grudge against her.
Camille came into the kitchen and handed the attitudinator to her. Kim moved closer to Ron as he thrashed in the chair. He knew what was coming. He knew that it would make him good again. And his twisted mind didn't want to be good. She remembered how he had told her how wonderful it was to live a life without fear or consequences. Of course he wouldn't want to go back to being normal. It would be like putting his mind in a cage. At least that's what it would seem like to him now. But once he was normal again he would know it was for the best.
His struggling increase as she put the device on his head. Camille moved to stand on the other side of him just in case something went wrong or Kim needed a hand. His eyes were wide with terror. They darted back and forth between the two girls before finally settling on Camille.
"Camille?" he sniveled. "Camille!" he repeated more forcefully. "Don't do this to me! Remember the good times? Remember us being partners? We can be partners again! Just you and me. No Kim, no Drakken, no Monkey Fist. No one else. And we can take over the world! Isn't that what you wanted?"
The blonde looked down at him sadly.
"No. I never wanted to rule the world. You never knew what I wanted."
The fright left his face and was in an instant replaced with pure rage.
"Don't do this Camille!" he screamed. "If you flip that switch I'll never forgive you! You hear me? I will never forgive you for doing this to me! And I'll never forgive you for everything else you've put me through!"
She averted her solemn gaze to the floor. She stood there for a moment as he continued staring at her with the attitudinator stuck on his head. After a few seconds she looked back into his hateful brown eyes. She gave him a weak smile.
"I know. Nothing can change that now."
She flipped the switch on the side of the attitudinator. His body convulsed violently as the machine did its work. The fragile, glowing glass bulb emptied its blue energy back into the helmet which in turn travelled back into his mind. Even against his restraints it was hard for his body to not shake. Camille didn't know what it felt like to have the attitudinator do its work. But from Ron's reaction it could not be comfortable.
After several seconds he stopped moving. The bulb was empty and the attitudinator had apparently shut off.
Kim looked hopefully at him as he sat in the chair with his eyes closed and his head slumped forward. It had to have worked. She didn't know what she would do if it didn't. As if the twisted device was reading her thoughts, the attitudinator began to fracture once more. Like it had done in Drakken's lair months ago it split in two and fell off of his head. When it hit the floor it shattered into hundreds of pieces along with both empty glass bulbs. The last attitudinator in the world was no more.
Kim's heart skipped a beat. This was it. This was the point of no return. It either worked or it didn't. Ron was either going to live or die. The anticipation was gnawing at the pit of her stomach. She had to know.
"Ron?" she asked weakly.
A pair of tired, grief-stricken eyes slowly looked into her own.
"Hey KP…" he almost whispered.
She didn't need to see or hear anymore. Kim leapt at him and grabbed hold of his body in an immense bear hug. He could do nothing to return the embrace with his arms still bound to the chair. He couldn't even rest his head against her as she openly wept on his shoulder. All he could do was sit there. All he could do was cry as well. And he did.
They both sat there for long moments as they cried for everything they had almost lost. They cried for everything they had been through. And for everything they had saved. Somehow, someway, they were going to get things back to normal. They were going to be friends again. They had endured and conquered.
"I'm sorry…" he sobbed.
Kim pulled back to look into his tearful, sorrowful eyes. She saw how bloodshot they were. She didn't know the last time he had slept. She figured it might have even been days. And the crying did nothing to help his appearance.
"I'm sorry…" he repeated. "I'm so sorry…"
He continued to repeat those words as he wept. He couldn't control himself even if he wanted to. He had been aware of all of his words and actions since he had been changed on Thursday. He had heard himself say the horrible things he said to her. He had seen himself commit the horrible actions to her and everyone else. He remembered the night he had spent with Camille. Without the attitudinator making him immune to remorse and guilt, the memories that came flooding back threatened to overwhelm him. It hadn't been some separate entity in his mind that had done everything. It had been him. And he knew it.
Thanks to the traveling to and from Africa it was now a very early Tuesday morning. It was still several hours until sunrise. Kim thought for sure that she would lose him thanks to Jack Hench's deadline. She was thankful that it had turned out to be five days rather than four.
She understood how he was feeling. While it was true that she herself had never been turned evil, she tried to imagine what was going on in his head. She knew that he was a good man. He would never have willingly said and done the things that he had. Seeing his breakdown only further confirmed what she already knew. He didn't hate her. He didn't hate anybody. He didn't have an evil bone in his body.
She cut through the ropes around his body and the duct tape that secured his head. Finally free from his bonds he wrapped his arms around her body and continued to cry. The aura of pain he was emitting was staggering and she felt herself crying with him, for him. But she knew that now was not the time for her to feel sad. She had to be there to comfort her best friend. She had nearly lost him on two separate occasions. She wouldn't let it happen again.
She held his head against her left shoulder and rested her own head against his.
"I'm here Ron," she whispered comfortingly. "I've always been here. And I always will be."
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Camille saw the display of emotion between the two reunited best friends and tried to feel nothing. She didn't want to feel anything. She was working hard to ensure she didn't. But it didn't matter. Whether she liked it or not her emotions were getting the better of her. And she hated letting that happen.
A wave of depression hit her as she saw the two continue to embrace each other. It was so typical. She had worked hard to try to help him. And what thanks did she get? None. Neither of the two teens had so much as looked at her during their pathetic little display of sorrow and forgiveness. This is what she got for reaching out to help others. This is what she got for feeling empathy. She got nothing but pain and betrayal. Just like her friends who had only liked her for her fame and money. Just like everyone at Middleton High School. Just like Ron who had used her for his own evil scheme.
Kim saw the heiress wander out of the room as she continued to hold Ron. She didn't care though. She wasn't about to let go of him until he asked her to. Camille's actions didn't matter to her the least bit. She could go over to the United Kingdom and steal the Crown Jewels and spray paint graffiti on Buckingham Palace. And she wouldn't respond to a mission call until Ron said it was okay for her to go.
They sat with each other for a good five minutes of silence, save the sobs they unashamedly let out. But finally Ron looked up at her, the tears in his eyes mostly gone from being shed on her battle suit.
"Kim… I'm really tired."
She smiled down at him. If anyone deserved to sleep it was him. And she would do nothing to deprive him of his wish.
"Come on. I'll set you up in the guest bedroom."
She took his hand and led him to the room he had slept in plenty of times before. They had come back from missions late at night so many times that it was much easier for him to just spend the night there rather than going home and waking his parents up. Kim's guestroom was his home away from home. At least the part of his home that he slept in.
It took only a few seconds after his head hit the pillow for him to fall asleep. She looked down at him and knew that things were going to be okay. Finally, after so many weeks of torment, things were going to be okay. It was no trick this time. It wasn't one of Camille's disguises. It wasn't an act. It was real. He was real. He was back. And she was determined to never let anything ruin their friendship again.
Kim went back downstairs and headed toward the bathroom. She personally wanted to see the extent of the damage to her right shoulder. While Crash had put it back in place, she wanted to know if it had swollen or left any kind of ugly mark. She was surprised to see who was in there.
Camille was slumped against the wall inside the bathroom. Her head rested against the wall. She looked utterly depressed and defeated. Had Kim not seen her chest moving she would have sworn that the girl was dead. She was thankful that that wasn't the case, even if it was Camille.
Kim took a few steps until she was at the doorway of the bathroom. She stood there looking down at her foe. The girl didn't seem to know or care that a pair of penetrating emerald eyes were staring into her.
"Look, Camille…" she said as her expression turned as hard as stone. "I will never forgive you for what you've done to us. You've put Ron and me through more suffering than you could ever imagine. And someday I will bring you to justice for all the crimes you've committed. But… for what it's worth… thank you for helping me save his life."
Camille snorted a cynical laugh as she finally looked up to meet Kim's withering glare.
"Just shut up, Kim. I didn't do this for you."
"I know. You did it for yourself. For revenge and all that stuff."
"No. I did it for him."
"What…?" she asked skeptically.
Camille broke eye contact with her and stared at the wall opposite of her.
"He didn't deserve this. He didn't deserve to die. And seeing how I was going to lose him either way, it was better for him to be alive and good than evil and dead. He was better when he was good."
Kim wanted to laugh. It sounded so absurd coming from Camille's mouth. She honestly wasn't sure if any of what she was saying was true. She never could fully tell.
"What are you talking about? It's not like you ever really cared about him in the first place," Kim protested. "Now suddenly you actually think you can convince me that you had his well-being in mind?"
Camille looked down at her lap and studied the camouflage of her cargo pants as she spoke.
"No. No, you're right. I don't care about him," she said softly. "I just didn't want to see someone get killed because of something I played a part in."
That sounded more like the girl that Kim had come to know.
"That's what I thought," she agreed. "I honestly don't believe you're capable of caring about anyone except yourself. You've done nothing but manipulate everyone you've met since coming to Middleton. And you did it all to get at me. Thanks to your selfishness you nearly got Ron killed."
She shot a glare back up at Kim.
"I didn't nearly get anyone killed! I would never want to kill him!" she yelled. "Shego did! She's the one who used me!"
She felt her heart racing as her breathing became more and more rapid.
As Kim watched and listened to her she saw that Camille was transforming. She looked with horror as she took on the appearance of Shego.
"That's right Camille, I played you," the villainess laughed. "You're no better than a used condom lying on the floor of a sleazy motel. Kinda like the one that's still in the trashcan in your room. The one you gave Ron when he used you too."
"Shut up!" Camille yelled.
Kim could only watch in silent dismay as Camille continued to change before her eyes. She saw herself next.
"Your little game is over. You lost," Kim's face said. "Try not to cry about it. I told you that I'd win. I told that you Ron would never want to be with a sociopath like you. And now look at yourself. You're pathetic."
"No! I don't want to hear you right now!"
"The truth kinda sucks, doesn't it?" Bonnie's face snickered. "It's all starting to unravel. I told you that your stupid little plan with Stoppable wouldn't work. But did you listen? Of course not. Face it; you're doomed to live your pitiful little life without anyone who truly likes you for you. We both know how many guys you've slept with trying to feel what it's like to be loved. You'll never find anyone who cares about you."
"Shut up! Get out of my head!"
The voices laughed at her pain.
"Whore!" Bonnie's face screamed.
"Psycho!" Kim's added.
"Bitch!"
"Coward!"
"Freak!"
"Shut up!" Camille screamed as she slammed her head against the bathroom wall. "Shut up shut up shut up!"
Kim watched as the villainess began to smash her head against the wall repeatedly.
"Camille!" she shrieked. "Stop!"
She did not stop. She continued bashing her head against the wall screaming for the voices to get out of her head. Kim heard her parent's voices from upstairs wondering what was going on. Apparently words alone weren't going to stop what was going on. She rushed over to try to restrain Camille. It was too late.
The seventh time was the charm. After slamming her head the seventh time she had succeeded at knocking herself out. Her head slid down against the wall as her body fell to the floor, unmoving. Kim was at her side in an instant as she put a hand underneath the blonde's head to try to prop her up.
"Camille?" she said worriedly. "Camille wake up!"
Her eyes widened when she noticed a patch of red liquid growing larger in Camille's blonde hair.
"Oh my God…"
Kim rushed out of the bathroom to grab the nearest phone and call an ambulance.