~And now, my friends, Go Team Go. Expanded version. ;)~
Dr. Drakken had no idea what Superman was doing in his lair, but he wasn't about to let him spirit away his sidekick.
Seriously. This guy was a dead-ringer for the Man of Steel. One of those types. Chin like a brick slab; body thick as a cedar tree, muscles bulging, the lowest percentage of body fat a human being in reasonable health could have. He even had that distinctive haircut curlicuing toward his forehead that Superman sported in the old films.
Drakken had always hated that type. Not necessarily on sight - it just generally worked out that way.
And Superman had never been his favorite character - although, as a megavillain, Drakken had to admit that if any comic hero were going to take him down, he'd have gone with Superman. Batman wouldn't hesitate to break a leg if it would ease his surrender along, and Spider-Man (spectacular as he may have been) could be just as hurtful with his words.
Drakken was certain he'd never seen the man before - he would have remembered someone this nauseatingly strapping - but something about him seemed familiar. Drakken didn't like the way this man was sizing him up, either. It reminded him too much of how jurists looked at him, trying to measure his guilt with their piercing gazes. Shego, she could bury just about anything, but Drakken could never get his own stuff deep enough to relax under a scan like that.
Superman here was the portrait of self-righteousness if Drakken had ever seen it. His purple comrade was skinny and wiry and shouldn't have looked threatening. His dry expression also tickled at Drakken's recognition without citing an exact source.
None of that could compete with the worst of it:
Drakken didn't know them.
And even that in and of itself wouldn't have been such a trigger, except for one other factor - they knew Shego. Stared her straight in the eye upon arrival, the way hardly anyone who wasn't Kim Possible did.
Oh. . . speaking of Kim Possible. She was here, too. Shego, Drakken knew, would've provided some sardonic remark about the quality of the company dropping by, but his own genius brain was too tangled to find one of his own.
Kim Possible had been the first to show up, actually. She'd ripped his front door right off its hinges - the ones he'd just had oiled, too! Accidentally startled him into dropping the very chemical concoction that would've brought the planet to its knees. The girl was so overpowered that now she was foiling him by happenstance. There was no justice in the world.
Especially since, once Drakken whipped around to stare at her, he saw Kim Possible surrounded by a glowing blue aura. They must've built a nuclear power-plant in Middleton since he moved away. How else could you explain why she had a new ability every time Drakken turned around?
"Kim Possible!" Drakken had cried, in something higher-pitched than his usual boom. "Since when do you glow?"
Shego's brows knifed. She said, "Like. . ." and then mumbled something Drakken couldn't make out. It almost sounded like she was saying her own name, and while Shego did glow, she never referred to herself in the third person. Poked fun of Drakken for it all the time.
That was when the entourage had appeared on the scene - Superman, Skinny Purple, and some foolish blond kid Drakken hadn't bothered to search his memory banks for.
Shego had gone white - well, whiter. The smirk that Drakken had almost thought permanently painted on slipped for a second, then returned, frostier than ever in all that icy-paleness.
"Hello, sister," Superman said.
Where did he get off calling her that?
Shego stared straight ahead, saying nothing. Drakken had never seen her swallow in that self-strangling manner before - and never dreamed he would have - but she was doing it now. She was frightened.
A fierce, hot blast surged through Drakken, boiling up under his pores, where sweat was beginning to squeeze out. It shivered there, unsure of what to do, where to put itself. Drakken knew the feeling.
"You know, we never hear from you." Skinny Purple began ticking off a list of offenses on his fingers. "You never call, you never write. . . a card on my birthday would have been nice."
Circus performers, Drakken thought crazily. Perhaps they had all worked for the same traveling circus, and Shego - obviously the only one with any talent - had absconded with the profits, and now they'd hired Kim Possible to track her down in order to take revenge? He'd seen a movie like that once. Weird movie. . .
Drakken glanced at Shego for clues, though he quickly realized he wouldn't be getting any from her. Her face was set as stiff and unyielding as the big guy's chest.
Protect her.
It was less a thought than an instinct, a violent lash through Drakken's head. He steadied himself, trying to ready his fists, but it seemed to have slipped his reflexes exactly how to ball them up in the first place. A physical fight wouldn't do him a lot of good, right here and right now. As manly a specimen as Drakken tried to believe he was, he was a matchstick compared to the big guy.
If he could only stall him for five minutes or so and grab his Battlebot 900. . . It might've been his only chance against a man who very well could have been a pituitary giant. (Drakken understood the science, but not the wording. "Pituitary" sounded like the gland that made you spit stuff out.)
Drakken took a few steps forward and shielded Shego from Superman. "Uh, I believe some introductions are in order here," he said, striving for a light touch - effective but not embarrassing, that one parenting magazine at the doctor's office had said.
Shego treated him to a glare that could've withered a flower - or a mad scientist - from fifty yards. Drakken was almost grateful when the buffoon came running up to him, pumped his arm in his best imitation of those glad-handing salesmen at the weather-machine-lot, and banished withering to the Realm of the Forgotten. "Hi," the kid said, too happily. "I'm Ron Stoppable. We've met, but you never seem to remember my name."
No, I didn't mean you! Drakken would've bellowed if his throat hadn't been blocked from all sides like a road closed for construction. He swatted the boy's hand away and felt his pupils drifting together over his nose.
And Shego responded by actually crossing her arms at him - the impudence! She wasn't showing him respect, and she couldn't shut him out like this, not now. How could he be sure these men were trustworthy?
Drakken traded the lightheartedness for a scowl darker than Shego's own. "Shego, as long as you live under my roof, you will follow my rules." He wagged an emphatic finger, ignoring the daggers being thrown his direction. No, he would not cower under Shego's critical eyes this time. "And Rule One is: No secrets. Whatever is going on here. . ."
All the sinew in Shego's forearms tightened. The plasma was about to erupt, Drakken could tell. Now that he would cower under.
Sure enough, when Shego's hands flared to life, it wasn't just a Drakken-get-off-my-case. Real pain flared in her eyes.
Drakken's heart cracked, which gave the spurt of fear easy access, and he quickly initiated the CSP (Cajoling Smile Program) and finished lamely, ". . . is obviously a very private matter. So - later, gator! Have fun!"
And, like a coward, he fled.
Drakken sagged against the double-set of doors, feeling very much like he did when one of his own Doomsday devices exploded in his face and left him standing before everyone charred black and bald, save for a few scrawny strands of hair. Impotent. Laughable. Drakken put one hand up to his ponytail to make sure it was still there.
It was. It anchored him a little bit more to the present instead of miring him in the past - someone else's past. A past he'd never known existed, a life he'd never pondered before the point where it intersected with his own.
He felt selfish and greedy and stupid.
Drakken peered between the cracks in the doors' joining at Shego. From the back, she appeared to be three-quarters hair, and despite her fighter's pose, she looked like a little girl.
She was a little girl, as far as Drakken was concerned, young enough not to remember record players or Richard Nixon. Somewhere along the line, someone hadn't taken care of her. And right now, this exact second, she was hurting.
Drakken wanted to stop it, outlaw it. But he couldn't; he was powerless, and it gave him one more motivation to achieve world domination sooner rather than later.
In the meantime, he couldn't let it go unacknowledged.
Drakken tapped the button to open the doors a tad more, and wedged his head into the opening. "You know, Shego, I always thought of us as some kind of. . . evil family," he said, and if the thin voice hadn't been stuttering what was scrolling through his mind, he never would have identified it as his. "And families stick together. So - if you need anything. . ."
The plasma had eaten a hole straight through the doors before Drakken even saw the blur of green and black twist toward him. He jumped backward - lightning reflexes - just in time to avoid the graze. A squeak, an actual squeak, slipped out of him, and with it came the rest of his speech:
"I'll be here for you."
Too fast, too shrill, and yet there it was.
Shego snapped herself back around, her face still vacant of any visible emotion.
It didn't matter to Drakken as he sank back against the doors, his body tingling as though awakening from numbness. Shego might have been able to plasma him into submission, but she couldn't make him stop caring.
That was probably why his hands were quaking so badly when he brought them up to his mouth and pressed them there.
"So," Shego said, "it looks like all of my least favorite people got together to form a club. Why?"
Now there was the sarcasm Drakken would've expected from her. Perfectly delivered, too. He considered sticking his head back out and praising her for it, until one glance at the still-smoldering hole, green residue dripping toxically from the edges, gave him second thoughts.
Superman said something else Drakken didn't understand, and the rest whitewashed into a blur for him. Kim Possible's sharp commands. Shego's resigned sigh. The buffoon's excitement. Footsteps.
For twenty minutes or so, Drakken waited to hear the screech of door hinges before it occurred to him that his were no longer operational, thanks to Kim Possible. When he peeked out again, blinking his contacts back to attention, the lair was empty.
It had, factually speaking, been emptier before. It had just never felt it.
She's still wearing the jumpsuit, was the first thing to cross Hego's mind when his sister came into view.
After all these years, Shego had never ditched the Team Go uniform. That must have meant there was still some love in her heart toward them, even if her face upon seeing them didn't prove it. Her lips, painted that same Gothic-black that Hego had never approved of, bunched up into something just short of a snarl.
Hego straightened to his full six-foot-three and willed Shego to return his gaze. She did, though hollowly. It was a power she'd always wielded just as fiercely as her plasma. It took him back to a happier time.
It was then that Hego noticed the short-legged man who scampered across the room toward Shego, his fists already cocked and curled onto his pathetic excuses for hips. Here. In Shego's place of residence.
Oh, sweet wings of justice - she's not LIVING with this man, is she?
Hego took a moment to collect himself, even as his stomach sank toward the floor. This was something you had to be prepared to face when dealing with a wayward sibling. Especially since Shego's beauty had only deepened since she'd cut out on them, if that were possible.
Seeing her sitting there, his baby sister all grown up, so lovely and mature - it choked Hego up a tad.
But he didn't like the looks of this man, and it wasn't the blue skin. He was too old for Shego, for one thing, with those dark pouches beneath his wide-yet-beady eyes. He hunched over himself like a vulture, his chin jutted at a pugnacious angle. His shaggy hair rose in peaks and fell in valleys with no actual semblance of order. A devotee of chaos if Hego had ever seen one.
It was both concerning and baffling. This guy didn't seem like Shego's type.
She could certainly do better.
Nevertheless, Hego had the presence of mind - that was something all good superheroes needed to have, presence of mind - to peg the man in an instant: Aggressive. Possessive. The kind he'd seen over and over again in comic books and on courtroom dramas.
He wanted to punch the guy, but a good superhero always remained professional. "Hello, sister," Hego said in his most formal tone.
She didn't even nod, wouldn't acknowledge him.
Nor did she reply to Mego's never-ending complaint about her missing his birthday. Not even when the no-account boyfriend stepped in, walling her off from Hego, and said, "Uh - I believe some introductions are in order here."
Hego added controlling and entitled to that list.
That Ron kid, who grasped the concept of Go-Operation in a way very few civilians did, ran right up to the blue man and shook his hand. How the likable kid could even manage to touch this man was beyond Hego. Ron said, "Hi, I'm Ron Stoppable. We've met, but you never seem to remember my name" - which left the man cross-eyed and stupefied.
Hego fought back a smirk. This guy was clearly not as bright as his nerdish appearance would suggest.
The look the man gave Shego wasn't the drooly one Hego had feared. "Shego," he said, "as long as you live under my roof, you will follow my rules. And rule one is: no secrets."
Ah. Now he was trying to invoke the authority card. He wasn't privy to the fact that Shego had been scoffing authority ever since she was old enough to roll over. This man couldn't have known that, because he'd never been the one to try and feed her strained peas.
Sure enough, Shego lit up her plasma, and the man blurted out something too quick and desperate for Hego to catch, and skittered toward the nearest set of double doors with his lab coat tucked between his legs. For once, Shego's rebelliousness came in handy.
She'd never respected Hego as the leader of the team, always second-guessing his plans and even rewriting them, as if she were his old English teacher taking aim with her red pen. Her modifications were good, Hego had to admit, but he'd wanted to spare her that responsibility. Shego already shouldered far too much for such a young girl -
"Shego. . . I always thought of us as some kind of evil family." A voice interrupted Hego's thoughts, a man's voice drained of the thunder that would make any big brother tense. Hego didn't have to turn around to be sure it was the boyfriend, though he never would've thought shy fit on that list. "And families stick together."
Family. About the last word Hego would've expected him to use.
When the man continued, Shego turned around and threw plasma straight at his head. He jerked back, was missed by an inch, and the words that came out of him were as squeaky as Ron's: "I'll be here for you."
Hmm. Either Shego had chosen a guy who would take great risks to manipulate her - or one who actually cared somewhat.
For her sake, Hego hoped it was the second one.
The man gave Shego one last imploring glance before vanishing behind the doors for good. Hego waited for the hostility that was thick in the air to follow him out, and he was still waiting when Shego swiveled back to them, expressionless as ever save for the smile-without-a-smile that she played over the group in general.
"So," she said, "it looks like all of my least favorite people got together to form a club. Why?"
She had to say that. She couldn't let on that she was concerned. Not in front of her boyfriend.
Although the little speech that man had just given didn't have Hego entirely convinced that was the reason. "Aviarius," was all he said.
The once-hated name didn't even earn a flinch from Shego. "And I care because. . . ?"
"He stole my superpower," Mego answered. "I mean, our superpowers," he added after a glare from Hego.
It was nothing compared to the green darts Shego's eyes were throwing his way. "Yeah, not my problem," she said, snapping herself away from them.
Out of nowhere, Hego's memory blasted two decades back. Mom and Dad had gone on a date one night and left him to be more of a referee than a baby-sitter to toddler Shego and kindergarten Mego. Only once they were both settled in bed did Hego have any peace.
Even that was fleeting. He'd just settled in with a bowl of microwave popcorn and an episode of Fearless Ferret when a scream ripped through the upstairs.
Shego's.
Hego was in her bedroom and had dropped to his knees beside her bed in a flash. Shego was sitting straight up in bed, crying in hiccups instead of tears, her fingers stabbing in and out of her already-long black hair.
"What's the matter, sis?"
"I had a bad dream."
"About what?" Hego remembered sitting down, pulling her into his lap. She slid in neatly with plenty of room left over.
"Clowns. Big clown monsters with angry faces and mean teeth. In my room. It was really creepy. I know it sounds silly. . ."
"No, it doesn't." Hego's reply had been in all sincerity. "Clown villains are the worst. But anything that wants into your room has to get past me first."
Shego's fingers had clenched around his, so much stronger than they looked.
"Do you want me to stay with you for a bit?"
And instead of answering, she'd nuzzled her head into his chest and sighed.
Back then, Hego had watched her face slowly relax as she eased into trusting him. Her present relaxation was studied and cold.
Who was this girl turning away from them, and what had she done with his sweet little sister?
As if the Wegos' kidnapping wasn't bad enough -
"He has the twins," Hego heard himself say. "Aviarius has the Wegos."
"There's no telling what he could do, armed with my powers," Mego added.
"Oooh, yeah. He could change sizes until the twins break." Shego hissed in the derisive manner that a good superhero never employed. "Get over yourself, Shrinking Violet!"
"Do not call me that!" Mego said, finger poised as if to jab her.
Shego ignored him completely.
Good, good. They were bickering again. Just like old times.
The coldness stayed in place, but Shego sighed like a villain resigned to a prison sentence - the exact opposite of the contented, three-year-old sigh he'd never forgotten. "Fine," she said, in a huff that blew her bangs up. "Let's go get the Go Jet and fly over to his stupid lair. . ."
"Go get the Go Jet," Ron repeated with a giggle.
Hego could appreciate the play on words. Shego couldn't, and she frosted the room with a single look. She was better than The Spectacular Ice-Man (first appearance Kazaam Comics, May 1972).
"Okay, the lame gets put away now." Shego zippered her hands through the air. "You think of any more wonderful jokes, feel free to write 'em down and send 'em to Reader's Digest. That goes for Stoppable and anyone else who doesn't want second-degree burns. Now - here's what we're gonna do."
There she went again, taking charge of the mission while Hego was standing right there in front of her. And why? He was the eldest and as such, it was his job to glue the family back together, not hers. What happened to Mom and Dad was taxing enough - Shego hadn't needed any more stress in her life.
Hego had seen the rage as she'd repeatedly kicked the villains, until their uniforms tore and they begged to be whisked off to jail. He'd heard Shego's sass spiral into deeper and darker places with every argument. He'd been there when she snatched her high-school diploma away from her principal and held it over her head with a triumph that almost seemed vicious.
But none of that mattered now. They were a team again, a family again. Maybe the power of that would be strong enough to lure her back home, because without her -
Without Shego.
Five years later, and here was the team - scattered like so much confetti in the wind.
Hego was suddenly hit by a prospect that scared him more than any of Aviarius's avian artillery.
Did I fail my family?
Mom would've said there was no such thing as failing as long as you tried your best. Shego wouldn't have.
Don't think about Shego. Don't think about Shego.
That mantra was about as effective for Drakken as, Don't think about my giant pimple; don' t think about my giant pimple had been in the eighth grade when he was talking to the only girl in class who didn't treat him as though he had bird flu or something else hideously contagious. Every few minutes - or seconds - his brain kept scurrying back to Shego: Shego all afraid and bitter in her jumpsuit that matched theirs. Shego with the skin on her forehead actually puckering. Shego wheeling on Drakken at his offer to help.
Why did he let her go with them? Why?
Because he'd dreaded her plasma punches - a perfectly legitimate reason that was starting to sound more and more like a yellow-bellied cop-out.
From a scientific standpoint, he was being ridiculous, Drakken decided after the last of the chemical spill had been wiped up and safely deposited in the nearest biohazard box. He yanked his biohazard suit down to remove it; the cuffs caught on his knobbed ankles, forcing him to kick it off with a wild flail and a grunt. Shego was the strongest, most capable person he knew. She could clean the floor - or whatever the term was - with Superman and Skinny Purple without breaking a nail.
He just needed to get his mind on other things, was all.
Drakken growled under his breath. Yes, well, that would have been a lot easier two hours ago, when he'd still held chemical warfare in a test tube. Before Kim Possible busted into his lair, busted a perfectly good door, busted a foolproof scheme, and made off with his sidekick. Drakken tried not to believe in bad omens - but if ever he did in a moment of weakness, he would rank redheaded teenagers above black cats any day.
What else was a mad scientist to do but pace?
Drakken took the floor in determined-if-shrimpy strides. No, there had to be some way to salvage this - some shortcut, some fail-safe, even some copycat that might work to fool the absolute children they hired to be global ambassadors these days.
There was a whole world of evil out there, Drakken reassured himself, and he had just scratched the surface of it.
He would defeat Kim Possible yet, through the Law of Infinite Probability if nothing else!
Within half an hour, Drakken was standing in the lair's Command Central, his nose buried in a five-pound chemistry textbook. He was just beginning to adjust his giddiness, transfer it to a new scheme, when he heard someone say his name.
Drakken jolted like a puppet whose strings had been grabbed from behind, even though it was painfully far from professional. Nobody else was in the room with him. The henchmen couldn't sneak up on anyone to save their lives. That was what he had Shego for.
(Oops. Thought about Shego again.)
There was only one other possibility. Drakken glanced down at his computer terminal. A freckle-studded face, topped by a dark cotton ball of hair, stared back at him.
Drakken jolted backward again, not as far this time. He knew this face, could tell by the tingling at the base of his neck where his hackles hadn't risen yet but were stirring to alert. That had to mean it was associated with either the Possible family or Professor Dementor.
And this kid was wearing such a disgustingly pious, I'm-just-trying-to-help expression that it had to be. . .
"You're Kim Possible's computer interface!" Drakken said. Ah, yes, he could see now why it had taken a moment to place it; the last time he saw that face, it was twisted in fear of him. What ever happened to that? "And now you're inside my computer! How did you get past my firewall?" That was the virtual equivalent to having five deadbolt locks on each side of your door.
The kid blinked as if he didn't understand, and maybe he didn't. Just as Drakken was contemplating switching over to binary, the boy said, "I'm not a virus. . . I'm a person."
"Gghk." Drakken got his arms arranged in a crisp fold to remove the image of goofy gullibility Kim Possible and her team always managed to detect in him, even though it wasn't really there. "That's what they all say!"
"Look, Dr. Drakken. We don't have a lot of time." The kid's firmness was surprisingly paralyzing, considering it hadn't yet reached beyond the cusp of adolescence. Drakken could feel his entire face expanding into one giant pimple, glowing red as a strawberry. "You might wanna sit down."
Drakken plopped directly to the floor.
"We need your help," the kid said.
A full-fledged guffaw teetered on Drakken's lips. It only died when the kid locked his eyes right into Drakken's. "Lemme rephrase that," he said. "Shego needs your help."
Drakken had always wanted an underwater lair, and now he was pretty convinced he'd been abruptly shifted into one. Pressure built in his ears, gravity went helter-skelter, and he couldn't quite breathe no matter how many gasps he yanked out of the air.
"Is it the circus performers?" Drakken blurted.
"Circus performers?"
"Yes!" Drakken said. "Those strange men who dropped by and took her away. They had to have all been in the circus together, because they were wearing the same uniforms! And I knew they were bad news! That big fellow was trying to act like he was noble, but -"
"Drakken," Wade said, as though exasperated - and what right did he have to be? "Those weren't circus performers. Those were her brothers."
Everything Drakken knew turned inside-out.
"Her. . . what?" he said, and then promptly bit the inside of his cheek. The last thing he needed was for this child to start rattling off the technical definition of a brother, which was what Drakken would've done in his shoes. What was the point of being a genius if you couldn't rub it in now and again?
This kid, however, didn't. "You were right about them all wearing the same uniform," he said, tapping away at his keyboard. "They all used to be part of a superhero team called Team Go."
The inverted picture of Drakken's life sat up and taunted him.
"I. . . I think I need to sit down," he said.
The kid coughed into the heel of his hand. "You're already sitting down."
"Oh. So I am." Drakken grasped for the side of the nearest computer shaft, feeling the cold comfort of technology against his glove, and closed his eyes. No, actually, the kid defining a word for him, however condescendingly, was far from the last thing he needed. Twelve or thirteen worse scenarios had just walloped him in the gut.
Skinny Purple had the general U-shaped jaw that Drakken could commiserate with, but his narrowed down at the edges until it almost formed Shego's signature point. And the you're-all-wasting-my-time smirk could have only been created by her DNA.
Shego had a family. Has a family. A big one, it sounds like. Then why - why did she become evil? The villain business was intended for quirky loners who hadn't seen any family except for their coddling mothers since the day of their high school graduation.
But Shego's my family! And I thought I was hers.
The thought poked at Drakken with the threat of puncture. If she really did have multiple brothers - one of whom was as big and strong as Superman to boot - what niche did Drakken fill in her life now? Or did he at all?
Ugh. He'd presented that whole dissertation on their "evil family" in the presence of her biological family. The invisible-but-oh-so-present pimple throbbed someplace Drakken couldn't reach.
The only thing that soothed it was the truly scrumptious realization that Shego had once been a superhero. That was ammunition of the highest order. Whenever she next got onto him about wriggling around with his puppy, Drakken could just dangle that in front of her and they'd be even again.
"I know this is a lot to take in," the kid said, jarring Drakken's eyes back open. Drakken leaned in closer, and everything mischievous and lighthearted in him went down his mental garbage disposal. "But, like I said, Shego needs your help."
"All right," Drakken said, panic scraping the sides of his pitch. "I'm here. Did her brothers hurt her?"
The curly head shook. "Shego and her brothers are all at the mercy of a villain named Aviarius. He stole all of their superpowers to use against them!"
All of the many fears that had clawed their way into Drakken's nerves over the years - fear of Kim Possible kicking him in the face, fear of jail, fear of Mother finding out his true occupation, fear of spiders - none of them were in the same neighborhood as this fear. This turned him into one big blue block of ice, spiking his eyelashes together.
Aviarius. The name brought to mind - well, a zoo's aviary. Not any of those pretty parrots from the rainforest, though. More along the lines of a bird of prey, whose beak's curve was designed to tear flesh, whose senses were honed to find prey.
There was a whole world of evil out there, and he'd just scratched the surface.
Those talons would never get the chance to close around Shego, Drakken vowed. Her brothers were obviously hapless, unseasoned do-gooders who were unaware of a villain's tricks. Only the great and glorious Dr. Drakken would do!
This time he would not run away. Shego needed him.
Drakken discovered how rapidly the human heart could slow from its pounding into the steady beat of a promise. He uncoiled his fists, stiffened his posture, and was able to contain the anxiety into one part of his body, the way a Time Lord could do with radiation.
"I'm on my way," Drakken said. The cold sound clinking between his words would have been wonderfully disturbing under other circumstances. He'd never been able to achieve it before.
"Thanks," the kid said. He actually seemed relieved. "I'm faxing you the coordinates now."
Drakken pressed both palms against the screen. "Tell her I'll coming! Tell her I'll be right there!"
A heavy sigh. "I'll do what I can."
"Over and out," Drakken replied. He'd always wanted to say that. Shego wouldn't have taken it seriously, would've swarmed it with critiques.
Surely she wouldn't keep criticizing his every movement after he had come to her rescue. Why, he'd be her hero!
Drakken reached forward and snatched up the fax with fingers he could see trembling. He stuffed them into his pockets as he marched toward the special closet where his latest Doombot stood dormant.
And he went forth to rescue his Shego.
"Look, after I left, I went to work for a guy who wants to take over the world!"
Forced into a submissive curl a good superhero rarely found themselves in, Hego vaguely recalled watching the families of those who'd turned out to be supervillains interviewed, asked if they'd seen it coming, if there had been something about the criminal even in their childhood. Some said yes. A few said no. Many were too shaken to remember one way or the other.
His answer would have been no, Hego decided now.
Sure, Shego had been cranky from the time she was a baby. But her tantrums had been the same as any other toddler's - sobbing screams, toys being thrown, hot, angry, desperate. There wasn't so much as a trace of the cold, devious woman standing here now who pulled it off with almost a touch of class.
Not even in her middle-school years, when she had developed the caustic attitude and perfected the eye-roll. Not even in high school, when she crouched over the villains as if just waiting for one of them to twitch and give her permission to demonstrate violent force -
All the threats in the world to her phone time and car privileges wouldn't save them now.
Or the world. Or their sister.
It might all fall apart right here in front of him, because for the first time since Hego was eight years old, making a citizens' arrest didn't feel synonymous with justice.
Shego had always had a little something unfamiliar to him and the rest of the brothers. That didn't mean it had to be evil. Hego had assumed it was just some feminine thing.
"I. Am. Evil!" Shego spit the words like Dad's old pickup backfiring. "Have I made myself clear?"
"Yes!" Mego said - hurriedly and minus his cockiness.
"Perfectly clear!" one of the Wegos said.
"Totally evil!" his twin chimed in.
And then they all fell silent, as if the Mighty Silencer (first appeared in a short-lived, self-titled series in the '60s) had flown in and silenced them. Hego had never been so disappointed in his family.
It appeared to satisfy Shego, however, and maybe that was the greater priority at the moment. She swept back to face Hego, her eyes - those pretty eyes she'd gotten from Mom, shaped like a cat's - cutting into his like a pair of scissors. Bring it on so I can take you down, they said.
Hego tried. Doggone it, he tried. He climbed to his feet briefly and started to head toward her and her ill-gained powers. . .
. . . and he felt her little head against his chest, saw the bit of pale scalp showing through her part.
What happened to you, sister? What made you this way? What did we do wrong? Hego longed to ask.
And he knew he'd receive an insult in response.
A filmy layer blocked Hego's vision, and he sank back to his knees. Shego was wagging her head from side to side, in the same manner she always had when she was pointing out how lame one of his plans was, jerking the sharp features that had all once been so cute and pixie-like.
She was still his sister. No longer sweet, and not innocent anymore - yet still his baby sister. He couldn't harm so much as one prolific hair on her head.
A good superhero didn't let their personal feelings stand in the way of upholding the law.
But Hego was a brother first and foremost.
He was actually relieved when the back wall caved under the foot of a giant robot. It didn't look like one of Aviarius's gizmos - no wings or beaks to be seen - and even if it was something of Aviarius's, Hego would've given up the superstrength he didn't even have anymore if it meant they'd go back to fighting a foe he could slug. Guy as scrawny as Aviarius, you didn't need superpowers to knock his block off.
The robot's visor squeaked open, and the voice that called down, "Shego!" was stretched into shrillness as if from a too-tight shirt. Hego glanced up. If it had been the Oh Boyz themselves, he couldn't have been more flabbergasted.
It was Shego's boyfriend.
Except he no longer seemed a prospective suitor. The man's dark eyes, which didn't look so beady and sinister now, darted around frantically, then softened with relief. It was like he'd been expecting to find Shego locked up in a cage or something.
Hego knew the feeling well.
Shego was frozen to the spot, brandishing the staff cockeyed over her head, her mouth agape as it had been in second grade when Mom had shown up waving the lunchbox she'd forgotten that morning. If Hego weren't mistaken, she was embarrassed.
"Shego!" the blue man said again. "Kim Possible's computer kid called me and told me you were at the mercy of a villain. Where is this Aviarius?" Those eyes slit down to someplace dangerous, and Hego briefly considered that this might be the world conqueror of whom Shego had been speaking.
Looking at the frightened blue face before him, though, Hego couldn't see the punk he'd met a few hours before, much less some monster who had lured Shego into a life of depravity. There wasn't even the leering expectancy of a guy who hoped to date her.
His chopped syllables and sweat-soaked cheeks belonged to a hero, and only one particular breed of hero: a big brother.
Such utter terror blazed across Aviarius that Hego almost felt sorry for him, although of course the little vulture found a way out almost immediately. "Right here," he said, pointing to the Stoppable kid.
The man's gaze went stone-blank.
"No, man!" Ron chuckled. "Dr. Drakken knows who I am!" He glanced at the blue man hopefully.
Dr. Drakken. It did have a menacing ring to it in many ways, not the least of which that it gave no clue as to his powers. Aviarius, Electronique, the Mathter - all of their gimmicks were innately obvious.
But the man named Dr. Drakken was nodding slowly, fingers drumming as he stared at a random point. "Yes," he said. "The name escapes me, but I do recognize the air of buffoonery."
Stoppable's spirits fell and hit the ground with an audible crash.
Hego startled at the sound, turned, and saw that it hadn't come from the Stoppable kid at all. It was the staff, now lying smashed in hazardous bits of broken glass a good superhero would clean up before anyone could get themselves hurt. Great clouds of blue, purple, red, and green puffed up from it and settled back down over their rightful owners.
Through their haze, even as he felt his superstrength return, Hego could see Kim Possible perched on the ground in a successful post-kick squat. Shego's fingers were sticking out in a halfhearted swipe.
The girl had reaction time like a tigress's. She could have caught it -
Shego recovered her tigress-growl in nothing flat. "Let's go," she said, disgust pouring, as she swung herself up onto one of the robot's external ports.
Dr. Drakken flashed her a toothy grin that reminded Hego of the Joker, back when he was written as a deranged prankster and not a sadistic murderer. "You can thank me later," he said smugly.
Hego wanted to thank him now. He'd saved Shego from herself.
Shego didn't reply. She just dropped herself into the seat beside him, as graceful as ever, while Dr. Drakken leaned over her. He was all earnestness, and Hego didn't need to read his lips to know he was mouthing the question, Are you okay?
Something gave unexpectedly in Hego's chest, and he reached out one arm to snag Aviarius before he could slip away in the chaos. What surprised him was that Shego kept her focus on them until the robot disappeared from sight. It wasn't hatred in her eyes anymore. Something. . . else.
Whatever it was, it was concealed so well, Hego could tell why she no longer needed to wear the mask.
He glanced around at the room's other occupants. Kim Possible and Stoppable were high-fiving. The Wegos' faces struggled. Mego looked more awkward than he had since he'd been caught sneaking into the girls' locker room, shrunk to the size of a bean, as a freshman.
Hego wouldn't lie - he was fighting back some pretty un-heroic weeping himself. Yes, the four of them had reunited and worked as a team, a team that would continue, and that was something worth celebrating.
But - Shego -
How were they ever going to live with the truth of what she'd become?
Hego did the only thing he knew to do. He hefted Aviarius over one shoulder and cleared his throat. "Looks like this bird is ready for his cage," he declared.
That prompted a squawky groan. "Must you say that every time you capture me?" Aviarius said.
He whined it so miserably, Hego threw back his head and roared with laughter. A laugh that only grew when he glanced down at the scattered pieces of that staff.
At least there was that. That and the fact that there was someone in Shego's life - whoever he was - who still sought to protect her. Mad scientists were generally emotionally-wrecked show-offs, Hego had learned, but they didn't waste a wall-obliterating entrance on someone who meant nothing to them.
Not that it made this Dr. Drakken noble or anything. Just. . . maybe, possibly, more complex than Hego had pegged him.
A good superhero was willing to keep an open mind.
"For the last time, Dr. D., I'm fine."
They'd see about that. Before ten minutes had passed, Drakken had activated the Doombot 900's emergency health-and-safety function, which would scan all occupants for everything from from lacerations to pinkeye. And he let them run to completion, despite Shego's insistence that Aviarius was a joke villain who couldn't have hurt anyone even if he'd wanted to.
Of course, Shego said that about guys as formidable as him, too.
At this moment, however, the results jived - err, jibed - with Shego's account. She was fine. Physically.
It was the first time in recent memory that Shego had appeared as anything less than invincible. The hatchet look that always chopped so deeply into Drakken seemed more of a dull blade, and sequins of perspiration had formed on her forehead. Drakken himself was breathing like a chainsaw, and he hadn't been the one facing a humanoid eagle - or eagloid human - so he could only imagine what Shego felt.
Seriously, he could only imagine, because Shego had buried whatever it was all the way down at her core. Her body language revealed as much as her face - which was to say, nothing. To even begin to guess her thoughts, X-ray vision would be required.
Like Superman's.
Drakken's mind tripped over that thought as if over a crack in the sidewalk. The Superman impersonator who'd shown up at his lair a few exaggeratedly-long hours ago - whose real name Drakken had already misplaced, except that it wasn't Clark Kent - was Shego's big brother, her very big brother. And he'd crashed cluelessly onto the scene to find his sister in the company of a strange man. It couldn't have been more out of context if it were designed to be anti-Drakken propaganda, but Drakken could understand it all now: the critical once-over, the bunching of those enviable muscles, the instincts sharpened and readied with the same fearful courage that had wriggled inside Drakken.
After all, the brother had undoubtedly once driven Shego to school. Made sure she ate her vegetables. Helped her learn to ride a two-wheeler.
It was no longer Superman's muscles Drakken was envying.
The man hadn't been playacting at being noble. He truly was.
Which left Shego as big a question mark as ever.
"You'd tell me if you were hurt?" Drakken said. That was a question, too, although it wasn't meant to be.
"I guess." Shego's shrug was so casual it set Drakken's underbite on edge. Where was the gratitude? Wasn't she supposed to be groveling at his feet right about now? "Not that I ever would be. I'm tough."
Drakken laced his fingers together, leaving only his thumbs free for a contemplative twiddle. "Not as tough as you act," he muttered.
"Excuse me?" Shego's entire forehead lifted, evaporating the sweat.
"You let Kim Possible win."
Shego's snort was worth the proverbial thousand words. She thought Drakken was dreaming things, imagining them with the same creativity he used to think up doom weapons.
Drakken counted it up. Okay, so that was only nineteen words. Big deal.
And he wasn't faking it. He hadn't imagined the only sentiment that had ever slipped through Shego's stone-faced force field in all the years he'd known her, and Drakken wasn't going to miss an opportunity to dangle it over her head the way Shego always did with the chipped-up edges of his menace.
"Oh, come on," Drakken said. "I saw it. You practically gave her that staff."
"Whatever," was Shego's answer. There was absolutely nothing soft about her at the moment. She was as prickly as a cactus.
But that wasn't justification enough to let the matter drop. Not when he'd finally found some common ground with her. Drakken cocked half his eyebrow at her with the utmost sophistication. "Now that I know the whole story, I think that, in the end, you couldn't betray your. . . family." Forming those particular six letters gave him an ache in the forefront of his throat, straight down to his collarbone.
"Are you saying I'm going soft?" Shego leaned toward him, smiling like someone who was about to play a Draw Two Uno card.
It fit nicely with where Drakken was going.
He skipped an even bigger grin back at her, showing her he hadn't had anything that played and would've had to draw anyway, so ha! "As a marshmallow," Drakken said happily.
Then Shego lurched forward, fists drawn taut, and Drakken suddenly realized she wasn't being playful. He had the same nanosecond of awareness that always kicked in when he'd poured the wrong two chemicals into the Bunsen burner, and he only had enough time to say Oh snap! before the explosion -
And then Shego lunged at him, lissome as a lynx, and her hands were grabbing his belt, and he was being hoisted and then he was thrown right out the window, below the stars and above an immense bay of water.
Drakken's fingertips shot out and latched onto the robot's blaster-feet. With the engine warmed up and raring, they were hot enough to blister, but to let go meant. . . .well, something far worse than blisters. The only comforting thought was that Shego had thrown him at an angle where it was easy to snag a piece of the robot and hang on, so she couldn't have been out to kill him.
Just scare him. Which - Drakken gulped - might work if he stayed out here too long and lost all feeling in his legs, which were already slackening like melting plastic.
How the tables had turned; it was now his turn to grovel, and the irony was sickening.
"Shego!" Drakken cried. "Shego, I was wrong, okay? Shego, I'm sorry! Please let me back in! Shego! You're not soft at all!"
And she really wasn't, because for several throbbing moments Drakken wasn't at all certain she was going to haul him back inside.
When the Doombot 900's back visor flipped open, Shego's glare had never been a more welcome sight.
"Lemme in?" Drakken's request came out as a mortifying peep.
Shego examined her gloves. "What's the password?" she said dryly.
Hmmm. She was either fishing for an apology or his bank-account password. And since his funds were already lagging in the red, Drakken offered up an, "I'm sorry?"
That seemed to be the correct answer, because Shego shot out, curled her fingers around his wrists, and got the upper half of his body in. Drakken pulled his remaining appendages in himself and collapsed at her feet, one green boot and one black one, his stomach pounding and butterflies in his heart. . . or was that the other way around?
"I really am sorry," Drakken said, dusting soot from his lab coat and wishing egos brushed off that easily. "I wasn't just saying that so you'd let me back in."
She'd gotten so inordinately angry, it was as though he'd reached out to poke her teasingly and ended up stabbing her in a newly-stitched wound. For that, Drakken was sorry.
"Whatever you say, Doc." Shego had already turned away from him, the fencepost-stiffness in her back discernible even under all that hair. "I'm just gonna ask you to add that to my contract when we get home: Never, ever bring up my 'family.'" She twitched quotation marks around the words.
"Why?" Drakken's scientific curiosity got the better of him again.
"Because I hate them."
Drakken wasn't getting that vibe - he'd felt hate coming off her like steam before, and he didn't now - but he nodded anyway. A sense of regret did cling to her - much as, Drakken theorized, it did to any villain when you got within zapping distance of their backstory. There was also something else to her, something that must have been legible in its native language, if only he could have translated it.
It was the same thing there in her eyes when she looked down at the staff - such a wondrous piece of tech, so tragically shattered as though it had been subjected to the complete range of Kelvin temperatures. No, certainly not softness; Shego's face was as hard and white as a bone.
But perhaps a scrap of nobility.
First time writing for Hego, too, so I hope his voice wasn't completely identical to Drakken's, considering they have some remarkable things in common (delusions of grandeur, protective instincts, a flair for the dramatic).
And phew! Is Shego ever a complex character! Hope you all enjoyed and I'll see you next time.~