Middleton, June 15th, 2007.
It was a little past midnight in the suburb of Middleton, and the place was empty of people except for two silhouettes who were walking up the hill to the Possible family's house, and the two seemed to be sharing a very good time together, talking and laughing and just plain enjoying hand in hand each other's company.
It was Friday, and like every Friday, it was Ron's day, and for Kim there was no reason for today to be any different than any other Friday, except maybe that since the very "unexpected" and very fortunate event last year, they were now an item, and Ron's day became Date day.
Unfortunately the night did not start all that fun at first, in fact, since the invasion they didn't have the time to share any moment together, making the date awkward, but habits being a second nature, the night got better and better, and in the end they could share a very well deserved happy moment.
The happy moment got disturbed a little when at some point they arrived and stopped in front of a house because it was still lit and sounded like there were people working heavy machinery in there.
"Hey, I thought the people living there left a week ago, since, when did this house, is occupied?"
"I heard my Mom telling me that some people moved in this yesterday but I don't know who it is... but we have all the time to introduce ourselves another day, we should just go home."
They continued their walk, exhaustion slowly taking over their body, of course not from walking, but because since the invasion a week before they were helping a lot of peoples, joining humanitarian groups and volunteering in shelters and in many other areas.
Fortunately, only very few casualties were accounted for, and the part of the city that got wrecked during the final fight was already dusted off and wouldn't take too much time before repair and renovation team takes over, many citizens joined forces under a very pro-active architect named Edwin V., to start reconstructing the city even before the help of the Civil engineering, they called their collective The Stonemasons, and they were really good at what they were doing.
They reached Kim's house and stood there for a second, looking at the house that only a week ago was nothing more than a pile of scraps because apparently, an alien pod thought that the living room would make a perfect landing pad, but thanks to the Stonemasons and the fact that most of the bearing walls of the house were mostly intact, the house was made anew in only five days.
They walked the last few steps to the house main entrance slowly, still holding hands, stretching every second of the time they had before saying goodbye, and when it was finally time, they looked each other in the eyes, seeing in each other nothing but love and respect, and they kissed.
At first it was a simple goodnight kiss, the kind they shared much time before, but this time was different, after everything they had lived through in the last week they never had time to just enjoy each other, and the lack of contact, got to them, transforming the simple kiss into something more physical and almost feral, hands started roaming, and breaths became ragged.
Ron was overwhelmed by the situation, the two of them had some romantic moment, even what people called second base before but it was never this intense, the words Kim spoke a week ago became really fresh in his head, and as for Kim, well she was simply in a sensory overload, enjoying the moment.
After an eternity, they broke the kiss, but without breaking eyes contact, she opened the door and got in, never letting go of Ron's hand.
Now inside, Ron turned to close the door behind him, and barely caught Kim when she jumped on him to kiss him again, trying his best not to fall down, he walked in the living room, knowing that in his situation, climbing the stairs was just not happening, and walked to the sofa, but not really in a state of mind to guess the actual position of said sofa he ended up knocking the both them onto it.
Surprised and dizzy by both the fall and the kiss, they shared a laugh before the exhaustion bested the urge and both calmly fell into a fitful sleep in each other embrace.
Middleton, June 16th, 2007.
Something moved in the bleak darkness of the surrounding, but it was too far and too faint for her to really notice what it was, but it was enough to wake her from a very pleasant dream she was having. She opened her eyes and saw that everything was still in the dark, meaning that it was still late, she tried to look at the clock on her Kimunicator when a small rumble right on top of her head made her look up, but the only thing she could see was a round shape of Ron's jaw, and she decided to stay in her present position, not wanting to disturb his slumber.
As usual, Ron was snoring but the sound didn't bother her, it stopped bothering her for a really long time and in fact she found it to be strangely soothing and even helped her sleep, not that she had many occasion to sleep with Ron before, but during the many years of them travelling around the world in boats, planes, and trains, they both had plenty of time to just sleep during those journeys.
Something moved again and a hand closed on her arm and start shaking her gently, at first she thought it was Ron, but he was very asleep at the moment, and even if he was not, his right hand was on his stomach and his left one was on a very pleasant part of her back, leaving the hand that was shaking her to be someone else's.
Starting to feel a little worried, she looked up to see who it was and saw herself in a situation she would have preferred avoiding, her mother was looking at both of them being in a very intimate position, she tried to say something but before she could her mother did.
"Hey honey, I have an early appointment today at 5 am, so I have to go right now."
"huh..."
"There are some pancakes and bacon on the counter if you guys are hungry, be sure Ron leaves some for your brothers."
"O...ok "
"Oh! And I'm happy to see that your date ended well, but you should probably wake Ron up before your father does, you know he is fine with the idea of the two of you being together, but it's maybe a bit too soon for him to see you two like that. You probably still have an hour though"
Kim's cheeks became a shade darker in the darkness of the living room before her mother kissed goodbye her on her forehead.
Once she was gone Kim was left with her though, pondering what had just happened and what it meant, finally she was happy that her mother was ok with the situation, before glancing at the clock her Kimunicator, 4.30 am.
"An hour..." She whispered, before a bit loader." Ron."
"Mhm..."
"Ron."
"... please NOO!" Ron hastily sat up, breathing heavy and looking both troubled and scared.
"Ron?! What was that?"
"Huh?" He turned and look at Kim for a long moment, before finally calming.
"Nightmare?"
"Huh... yeah, yeah, the syntho-Kim, you know,he he, sorry."
"I... see... mhm... been a while since the last time you had one of those, I'm going to get you some water, I'll be right back." She got up and went to the kitchen leaving Ron behind.
"Syntho-Kim..." Ron whispered, no, it wasn't that long-forgotten nightmare, no, it was something way more recent, way more fresh in his memory, way more horrific that almost happened to Kim barely more than a week ago."
Kim came back with a glass of water, Ron took the glass from Kim's hand, and drank, never letting go of her hand in the process, she noticed that he was shacking.
"Hey... is everything alright?"
"...Sure..."
"Ok... Look I'm going to get a shower, and you could use one too before you go."
"Yeah."
After Ron got up, Kim led him up the stairs to her room, and closed the hatch behind them, before sitting him on the chair next to her computer.
"I am going in first, ok. You stay right here, take some of your clothes in the drawer."
When he nodded, she turned, got some of hers, and went in the bathroom.
Once Ron heard the water running he got up walked to her dresser picked whatever he thought he would need and closed the drawer with a bit too much force, making something fall to the ground.
He looked at his feet and picked the round item on the ground.
From the outside the object look like nothing more than a small sphere made of metal, the surface looked to be a bit rusty, and he could read the word *CR.59: Cyber-Ruffus Project*, in this form nothing could have told you that it was, in fact, a tiny robot version of his Rufus. After they had Wade analyzed the sphere and the hologram, he came to the conclusion that the robot was made with the same metal, the Lowardian used to build their ships and machines, which at first really worried them, worries that faded away quickly when they also learned that the footage was genuine and that it was really another version of Wade asking for help.
A sphere made of an alien material that could shapeshift into Rufus, from a different universe, sent by an alternate version of one of their friend to deliver a distress message about a powerful unknown enemy, who wiped all life in that other universe, and threaten to do the same to theirs'...
After everything, he had lived through why does it not sound that crazy...
He walked to Kim's bed and sat on it, focusing on the ball for a long moment, looking at the imperfection and rust all over the sphere, not noticing the bathroom door opening.
"We can still go. It can't be too late."
"We talked about it, and we agreed that our world needs us more than another right now."
"Is it really why you didn't want us to go?"
"Yea... No. I don't know..."
"Is it about what you are not telling me? You know you can tell me everything, I'm here for you."
"Kim, I... I just don't want to lose you again."
"You didn't lose me, you never did, and never will."
"Yeah I know... but it was so close, and it all happened so fast, I don't know what I would have done if something happened to you that day. And now only a few days after all that, we get a new alien threat on our head... I can let this happened again, not to you. But I also know that if we don't do anything, it might just come to us anyway..."
"Ron, I can take care of my self you know that. But you're right, it was close, way too close this time, but we saved the world, you saved the world, and you saved me."
"Maybe..."
"We can still go see what we can do, help as much as we can and if we can't help then they'll send us back. It will be just like we always do."
"You're right... I'm sorry for being a killjoy."
He looked up from the sphere and lost his train of thought when he found himself in front of a very naked redhead, he looked his head away, and his cheeks turned red.
"Huh."
Seeing the effect she had on her boyfriend put a smile on her face, she then put on her underwears and said.
"We should get ready then."
Ron went for a very long cold shower and Kim got herself dressed in her mission suit, waiting for Ron to finish and when he was finally dressed, she picked her Kimunicator.
Activating it, she didn't have to wait very long before Wade answered the call, but where ever Wade was when he answered, he was definitely not in his room, too many lights and noises.
"Hey, Kim. What can I do for you?"
"Hey Wade, look, I know we talked about it, but Ron and I have changed our mind about helping that other universe."
"WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAT!?" The sound seemed to come from the far distance and all the sounds of power tools in the place Wade was stopped. He seemed to ponder the question a few seconds, before saying. "You guys are sure about this?"
Kim looked up to see Ron nodding to her, she nodded back and turned to Wade.
"Yes, we are."
"Mhm... then get to this address and take the CR unit, I'll be waiting for you."
The call ended and they received a text with the address. Ron walked to Kim and asked.
"So, where is it?"
Later that day.
Kim and Ron didn't have to travel very far to get to the rendezvous point, in fact, they immediately recognize the place when they walked to it since it was the very same busy sounding place that they walked in front of the previous night.
"Huh... You're sure this is the place?"
"That's what the message says."
"Ok, so... do we just knock?"
"Considering all the noise we should probably ring, also Wade said he was waiting for us so we should just go for it."
"I guess we'll be introducing ourselves sooner than we thought."
At that Ron walked the few steps to the door, and ringed the bell, some of the noise stopped and after a few seconds someone was at the door, but when it opened, they both were very surprised to see who opened it.
"Princess, sidekick, you took your time."
"Shego!"
"Shego!"
"Surprise..., now come in, the Geek is waiting for you." She left them at the door, both taken aback by the situation.
"Huh, Kim what just happened?"
"I'm not sure but she looked annoyed."
They followed her inside the house closing the door behind them.
Weirdly enough the place seem bigger on the inside than it looked and seems to be built with some of the alien material, and when they got to the living room part of the house, Wade stopped welding the piece of metal he was working on then turned to face the newcomers, once he had pulled his helmet up they could see that he was sweating and that his face was covered in soot.
"Hey guys, welcome to The NG: The NewGround our new base of operation glade you could make it."
"Hey, bud, huh, what is going on?"
"Yeah we would like to know, I mean it all looks nice but first, why is Shego here and what are you doing here with her..."
"Well, I believe we have company... SHEGO!"
"Drakken!"
"Drakken!"
"Quit the yelling Drew, we are no longer bad guys remember?"
"Huh... do not remind me, Shego... Who would knew that buying a house like respectable people could be so expensive in this part of town..."
"Can somebody please explain what is going on?"
"Well it is quite simple Kimberly, we are about to send you two on another universe!"
"Wade?"
"Well yes, he is, we are, in fact, we had to put our resources together to build a platform to send you there, but since we thought you guys were going to make the choice earlier than now, we just put the idea aside and work on other projects like The Newgrounds."
"Wait I thought the Robo-Rufus could send us there on his own."
"Well yes, he could, if you had made the choice a week ago."
"What do you mean?"
"Well Kim, Ron look at it, it's decaying, rusting really fast, and it did since the first day you showed it to me, I figured that mineral like metal can't sustain its structural integrity after that kind of transfer and ultimately disintegrate in time, this machine we built and upgraded can't send you on its own, but it will support the CR units during the transfers from this universe to the other.
"What about us? Aren't we going the decay too?"
"No Ron, not the biological tissue, since the DNA present in the Cr unite, that it used to find you in the first place is still in perfect condition."
"So you are telling me that if we go, we can't have any of our equipment?"
"No, you can have them but they won't have the same durability or simply disintegrate after a few days."
The two genius and the two teens stood in silence, exchanging looks of determination and confusion.
"Princess?"
"Yes?"
"I need to talk to you."
"Huh sure."
They walked out of the living room, and away enough from the boys to not be heard by them.
"What is it?"
"Please don't go." The fact that she sounded pleading, took Kim by surprise.
"Wh... What? Why?"
"You almost die the last time you fought alien, you shouldn't go."
"I already had this conversation... Look thanks for worrying, for me, Shego, it's sweet, really really weird but sweet. You know us by now, this is what we do, we help out people."
She then surprised her even more by hugging her tightly.
"Don't get killed, ok. Or I'll jump in and kill you myself."
"So not happening. Thanks.
They both walk back in eyes shining and a smile on their faces, Kim noticing the small chain on Shego's arm.
"Never thought you were the kind to wear jewelry."
"Oh, this? It's nothing important, just a silly souvenir I got from my first day working with Drew, I thought I threw it away a long time ago, but I seems to still have it."
"Drew?"
"What about it?"
"It's the second time you called Drakken by his name."
Shego turned her face away almost imperceptibly "Oh yeah? Whatever."
Kim smiled before walking next to Ron who had the CR unite in Rufus form in his hand, before the unite start talking, for the first time in days, the voice sounded hoarse and low.
"Your hel... s required, do yo... gree to help."
"Yes"
*Portal activation protocol engaged*
*Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable presence confirmed*
"Ok guys get in the middle of the platform, we are activating the stabilizer... Now"
*Backup system online*
*Opening Portal*
The unite jump in the air, switched into his sphere form mid-air before staying that way, floating, then it became just a hole in the very fabric of space and time.
The hole grew in size and when it was big enough, Ron took Kim's hand firmly, and they walked in, right before all in Middletown went into a complete blackout.
Writer's note: Hey peoples... Sorry for the delay, I had plenty of chapter with good ideas in them pre-written in a folder, and when my computer went Win10 on me, I just lost everything...
This chapter that was pretty well written and took me 2hours now feels both rushed and botch...
But hey I'm back YEAH!
Cya peoples in the comment.
Oh and happy holidays.