I don't own these characters; Disney does. I do own Trin, Shin (the non-cute one), and Tatsu. Shin (Kim and Shego's child) belongs to Blackbird. Ryuijin and Mirage are owned by YogurthFrost. This story is based on a concept and several pictures by YogurthFrost.

5.4: Battle cry

"Guys, you have to move faster than that!" Kim called to her team as they ran through a simulation. The fight that they were working through included battling against Try-Acid and Hyperion. Kim also ran them through her training regime, having them fight against the holograms of the Elect.

"Faster than that?" Monique let loose an exhausted sigh.

"This is worse than cheer practice," Tara commented through a series of pants.

"It should be! This is war!" Bonnie reminded the two newcomers. "We have to be ready and we have to take Junior down!" Of course, she was wiped out, too. Kim ran a tight ship and was putting them through the ringer with her practices.

"So, you have to be faster! All of us have to be faster and stronger! Paladins included," Kim said.

"Hey, we're working hard!" the Celt argued.

"Work harder and smarter!" the Toltec declared.

"Let's go through this again," Kim ordered and she started a new simulation.

The hero rarely allowed them to run through the same simulation twice because war was not predictable and it was not likely that they would see the same thing twice, especially since Vivian was out of the war and the Bebes, if they were there, would not be the same. Every now and then she would rerun a battle to see what they remembered from the first time. More often than not, she combined battles to see how they would react.

She also treated their practices like a job. They worked for at least eight hours with a lunch break in between; she used the time to visit her family while they used it to eat as much as possible to stop feeling completely drained. They were expected to carry ration bars and drinks on their persons to make sure they kept their energy up.

"Come on, I know you're better than this! The Paladins wouldn't have accepted you if you weren't ready for this! And, Paladins, you wouldn't have woken up if you weren't ready for this! We can do this!" Kim declared.

Tara was always the first one to go down the simulation, but she was coming along and lasted much longer than she had when they first started practicing. Her reflexes were improving and her eyes were becoming keener, sharper. She worked well with the Zulu, being polite and respectful. Her personality made the Zulu the most polite Paladin amongst them. They typically were the first down in simulations because they were the first to take a shot for someone else. Kim had already figured that they would work well as support, providing cover for ground troops.

Monique seemed to be getting back into her soldier mindset, but she needed to get back in shape for it. Her body needed to be reconditioned, even though she was in a Paladin. She clearly wanted it badly, though, continuing to push herself despite her complaints. She had actually made herself sick the first couple of practices under Kim.

The Celt pushed just as hard as Monique. Sometimes, the suit got caught up in trying to react before things came, getting ahead of itself. But, that worked out well because Monique often had to correct the Celt as much as it corrected her. They were able to get on the same page with each other quickly and learn to depend on each other. Once they got their acts together completely, Kim knew that they would be a force to be reckoned with.

Bonnie and Joss were doing well with their Paladins. Bonnie had put herself in a support role, watching Kim's and Joss' backs. She did it well, so Kim made sure Bonnie knew to keep that up, even though Kim considered teaming Bonnie up with Monique. She would have to see how things played out. She and Joss might need Bonnie to watch their backs with the way that they fought. Kim and Joss were the most aggressive of the group and the Comanche was possibly the most aggressive Paladin, but Joss handled it like she was born to pilot the Paladin.

"Keep moving! Tara, act as Monique's spotter! Watch out for each other. We're a team," Kim barked. Once they moved as a team, she came up with formations and tactics. "Come on, guys! Keep it together!"

"We got this! Just stay together!" Joss chimed in, figuring out Kim was trying to be encouraging.

"We can make it through this simulation!" Bonnie joined in.

"Yeah, no problem!" the Qin agreed.

The team kept pushing and they eventually made it through a simulation with no casualties amongst them. They celebrated for a while, but not long. Kim kept pushing them. They had to make it through more simulations and keep it up.

-8-8-8-8-

Junior believed that his army was back to its former glory. Perhaps better with the clones and their armor since they only added to the Bebes, which were up and running. Drakken had also been able create more Bebes. Now, the Emperor wanted to act before Shego dared to go on the offensive again.

"Time to teach you a lesson, Shego. I'll show you an army that you could never expect or even think to deal with," Junior declared. "I'm through fucking around."

Junior decided on a head-on attack. He was going to take Isabella, the capital of Shego's country and he would take Shego. He would rule the world. Everyone will bow down to me as Emperor!

-8-8-8-8-

The alarm blaring was not surprising, but the fact that they had knocked Junior so off balance by taking out the Hive that he would counter by sending forces directly toward Isabella was beyond surprising. Shego's troops acted automatically, going exactly where they were supposed to, where they had drafted to go as they had been anticipating Junior attacking before they had a chance. They would not let Junior make it to the capital.

"Everybody, make sure you keep it together. Don't freak out, no matter what the fuck Junior has. He's panicking, that's why he's attacking us here. He's making a mistake," Shego informed her forces through her Kimmunicator. "He blinked on this one and that's the truth. We've got him. We've got him."

"Let's go throw a monkey wrench in whatever the hell Junior thinks he's doing," Kim called to her team. They were going out in the Paladins automatically. They were going to be the first line of defense.

"Let's do this!" Joss cheered.

"Just don't shout yee-haw," Monique commented dryly.

"Stay focused. You guys are ready for this!" Kim assured them.

"Damn right we are!" the Celt concurred.

The Paladin team intercepted Junior's forces a few miles from Isabella. They all could not help muttering "whoa." In the sky, there was a swarm of Bebes. In that mix, there were planes that Kim suspected were clones. It was almost like a Biblical plague was upon them.

"Toltec, run a scan on the Bebes and on the planes and relay that information to everyone as soon as you can. Get us weaknesses for everything that you can," Kim ordered.

"On it," the Toltec replied.

"I'm on it with the aerial troops," Joss chimed in.

"Good. Bonnie, Monique, Tara, divide the ground forces as best you can and delay them. Joss, you and I got the air," Kim commanded.

Everyone followed orders with no discussion. Bonnie, Monique, and Tara drew their guns and rained down shots on the marching forces, wanting to scatter them. The Possible cousins charged into the swarm.

"Joss, be careful of the planes! Drakken made clones of me and Shego and those are probably the clones," Kim warned her cousin.

"Clones? You mean those are Shin in there?" Joss asked incredulously.

"Maybe."

"Shit, fucking Drakken, man!" Joss growled. It would be hard to fight and impossible to kill Junior's new soldiers if they were her cousins. All she could see were flashes of Shin as she went to shoot the planes down. "What happened to just using goddamn robots and crazy science experiments that have nothing to do with us?!"

Joss and Kim opened fire toward the swarm, easily taking down Bebes because there were so many. They actually put their guns away to conserve ammo and decided to use their secondary weapons. Kim swung her energy poleaxe while Joss handled her knives through the Bebes. Soon, they were completely covered in the robots.

"Missiles?" the Toltec suggested as the Bebe cloud was so thick its sensors could barely make anything out.

"Good idea," Kim agreed.

The Toltec and the Comanche both let a couple of missiles fly to clear the air. They blew away some Bebes, only for more to get back in their faces. The great thing about it was that there were too many Bebes packed in too tightly for them to do anything beyond get cut down. Kim and Joss moved, so that they were back to back to watch out for each other.

"It's fucking endless!" Joss groaned as she sliced through dozens of robots.

"How the hell did Junior manage to put so much together in such a short time period? How does he have the damn resources to do this?" Kim wondered aloud.

"Their response time isn't the same as the other Bebes," the Toltec pointed out.

"Well, we can't take advantage of that until we get their numbers down," the Comanche replied.

They were not sure how long it would take to get the numbers down, but they fought on. Kim made sure to check on the rest of their team, in case they needed help. Bonnie, Monique, and Tara were pretty much doing the sane thing as Kim and Joss.

"When does this ever end?" Tara wondered as she cut down rows of Bebes. "Where's everybody else?"

"Just hold on, Tara. The rest of the army will be here soon," Bonnie assured her.

"The rest of the army is here now!" Shadow Eyes proclaimed as she seemed to appear out of nowhere with the Shadow Hand ninjas rushing onto the battlefield and going right at the Bebes.

"Good job at holding them off!" Ryujin complimented the Paladins and their pilots.

"Keep supporting the ninjas," Kim commanded her squad.

"Sure you don't need the help up above?" Bonnie asked, taking a glance at the aerial assault. Because of the scarce resources, the Paladins were pretty much it for Shego's side as far as aircraft went, so Bonnie did not want Kim and Joss to be overwhelmed.

"Amy's been working on more flying beasts just for this type of battle. They should be here any second," Kim answered.

"They're headed this way and should arrive in under a minute," the Toltec reported.

"All right. Let's take as many of these suckers out as we can, so we don't lose a bunch of critters!" Joss crowed.

Amy's animals did show up shortly after. They tore through anything that moved, except for Kim and Joss. The Bebes tore right back. More animals joined the land battle, including their mistress. Amy usually just commanded the animals when she was on the battlefield, but so close to home, every soldier counted.

"Trying to invade us? Big mistake!" DNAmy roared as she transformed into a huge dragon. Thanks to her suit, she could morph into any animal her mind came up with and she was going to show Junior how creative she could be.

Dragon-Amy whipped out her tail and toppled lines of Bebes. The robots opened fire on her and she laughed as the small lasers burned her thick hide. She took out any enemy within the range of her over fifty-foot long body. She noticed too late that a few Bebes in the distance were charging larger weapons and there was no way that she would be able to move in time. She actually closed her eyes, not wanting to see the shot that killed her. Instead of dying, she heard an explosion, but did not feel any pain. She opened her eyes to smoke coming off of her husband's hands.

Wade smiled at his wife. "My shield works. Maybe you'd like to have one?"

"Oh, thank you, sugar bear," Amy cooed as she changed back into her human form.

He quickly attached a device to her wrist. "Be more careful, babe. We still have to have kids some day."

"Don't worry about kids while we still need to keep our home," she pointed out.

Wade nodded in agreement and charged off to go study the Bebes while fighting them. He was getting information feeds from the Paladins as they scanned and fought the Bebes, but he needed to see things for himself. He was certain that because Drakken had created them so hastily, then they had to have a weakness that he could exploit.

"Trin, non-cute Shin, have you figured anything out about these Bebes?" Wade asked over his Kimmunicator.

"Bebes?" Shin echoed. "We'd kill for some fucking Bebes!"

"We're surrounded by clones, I'm guessing," Trin replied dryly.

"Oh? What was your first clue, the fucking plasma? Could you be anymore blond?" Shin snapped.

Wade left the pair to their own terror and hoped Trin did not kill Shin with the enemy. Trin was actually having trouble with the killing part. They surrounded by five people wielding plasma and covered in thick armor that had nasty surprises of its own. She was certain they were like her niece Shin, so that made them her nieces, her family.

"I can't …" Trin whispered in disbelief. She could not kill their enemies. She could not kill Kim's blood. She fought them, but even that was half-assed because of who they were. One hit her hard enough to drop her to the dirt and draw blood from her lip. "But, I don't have to kill them to stop them," she remembered with a growl.

"This shit is crazy!" Shin proclaimed as he tried to beat back a couple of clones.

"Don't they seem to be big compared to the cute Shin?" Trin mused aloud as she launched her counterattack, pushing back a pair with a powerful swing of her sword.

"Yeah," her evil twin agreed. "Me thinks something is rotten in the state of Neo Roma."

Trin could not argue that and wondered what Junior was up to now. Of course, she did not have long to contemplate it as she had to fend off clones. Things only got worse as Bebes landed to join the fight.

"Fuck," they both sighed.

-8-8-8-8-

Shadow Hand was the first to find out that they were not just fighting Bebes and clones. He stayed close to Shego, but noticed Hyperion approaching the section of the battlefield with his ninjas. Hyperion wasted no time setting the field ablaze.

"Go get him! I'll be fine," Shego ordered as she noticed Hyperion.

Shadow Hand did not object, knowing that Shego was waiting for her "rival." He charged off to take on Hyperion. Junior's general of fire and ice did not see the master ninja coming and was caught completely by surprise when Shadow Hand hit him. Hyperion skidded through the dirt before focusing on the martial arts' master and growing.

"How could an insect like you hit me?" Hyperion demanded.

"Your fire and ice mix means very little to my style," Shadow Hand replied before jumping at Hyperion and coming down on him with a strong punch.

Hyperion threw up his right hand, forming an ice shield to block the fist aimed at his head. There seemed to be a light blue mist that came off of the ninja's fist as the blow landed and took ice chips off of the shield. Shadow Hand landed and moved right into kick – at Hyperion's flaming side nonetheless. Hyperion gasped as the blow landed and caused him to buckle slightly. Growling, the super-powered general pushed against Shadow Hand to put space between them. He then let loose a column of blazing fire that engulfed the ninja.

Shadow Hand surprised him by charging out of the fire with his sword in hand. The blade crashed against solid ice and Hyperion flung the ninja back. There was more fire, which Shadow Hand cut through with his weapon. He then blocked and dodged several ice daggers that Hyperion let fly from his forearm.

Hyperion saw a chance to get the drop on Shadow Hand and charged at the ninja. He tried to slam the martial artist with a massive block of ice, but Shadow Hand cut through it with one swift motion of his sword. Hyperion came over the top with another column of fire. Shadow Hand ducked.

"Give it up, ninja. You know you can't beat me," Hyperion said.

"I haven't yet, but I'll keep on going. Besides, you can't beat me," Shadow Hand pointed out. History had proven on several occasions that they would fight to a stalemate.

-8-8-8-8-

Shego was fighting off Bebes and a couple of clones that wandered into her battle area. She was careful of the clones for the same reasons as everyone else. There was something different about the new clones and she could tell from just the way they moved that they were not Kigo-one. They did not speak either; they just attacked. Something was wrong.

"What the hell is going on and where the hell is that kid?" Shego muttered with a frown. "If Junior did something to her, I'll fucking yank his spine out of his goddamn back piece by fucking piece."

Just as she was planning Junior's demise, Kigo-one showed, all gung-ho. She rammed the western ruler head on while Shego was dealing with several Bebes. Shego grunted upon impact and coughed as Kigo-one pushed against her.

"I'll kill you!" Kigo-one howled with more passion and venom than she had used before.

"I feel like this about more than just me being the original fire starter?" Shego remarked as she got her footing under her to push back against the screaming clone.

"You're not the original! I was the first! I am the first, so I am the best! I'm the most powerful because I survived and you'll die!" Kigo-one hollered.

Shego was not sure what she could do to reach the clone. She did not want to mention Shin (the cute one) in case Junior was listening to the battle for whatever reason. She could not risk him finding out what her daughter was. But, in at least a biological sense Kigo-one was her daughter, too, and she would like a chance to bond with Kigo-one just like Shin.

"Stop fighting me and just listen," Shego huffed.

"Never!" Kigo-one slashed at her with plasma-charged hands.

Shego threw up her hands to block. "Fucking stubborn brat!" She flung her hands apart and hit Kigo-one with a powerful plasma that knocked the teen back.

"I won't let you beat me again! I won't let anyone beat me again!" Kigo-one proclaimed in a crazed, panicked tone while catching her balance and flaring her hands higher.

"Who else beat you?" Shego asked, even though she was certain that she knew the answer to that. Junior had beat and abused Shin probably moved onto Kigo-one when Shin vanished. I'll rip his fucking fingernails and tongue out before I rip his spine out then!

Kigo-one did not answer, attacking Shego with all that she had. When the plasma proved ineffective, she showed off surprises in her armor. Lasers shot of several places. Shego dodged most of them, being burned across the arm and cheek by a couple. She hissed and then leaped at Kigo-one, cutting through the armor somewhat with her plasma-charged hands that were tipped with talon-like nails thanks to her gloves. The armor sparked a bit.

"No, I won't let you win! Yon can't win! Never, ever, again!" Kigo-one flared her plasma higher and threw a wild blast at Shego, which she ducked. The blast collided with a tree not too far away and broke through the thick trunk.

"Hey, be careful before you make yourself sick again!" Shego warned the teen.

"Don't tell me what to do! Just fucking die already!" Kigo-one burned brighter. Plasma popped off of her higher from her hands, dancing up her arms. "Just die!"

She attacked with blasts and out of control swings. Shego dipped and dodged each try, which only enraged Kigo-one more. The plasma flared higher, blazing in a completely undisciplined, unrestrained. The violent green glow covered Kigo-one, even coming out of her eyes and ears. it popped from beneath her skin, cutting open her own cheeks.

"Dammit, kid, you're going to kill yourself," Shego growled and she flared her hands a little higher. She had to stop Kigo-one before she did kill herself through her powers. But, first, I have to get near her and not hurt her too badly.

The western ruler moved, looking for an opening. I might have to make an opening because she's going crazy. She decided that her best bet was to make an opening because Kigo-one was just letting her powers reign way beyond what she could possibly handle. Hell, her powers were doing things Shego never imagined the plasma could do.

Shego flared her own powers, putting more into it, more than she ever had put into it without looking to kill her opponent. She hoped that her superior energy could just cut through Kigo-one's wild powers. She turned and simply slapped Kigo-one with enough force to knock her down.

Kigo-one grunted as she hit the ground and she vomited as expected from the way that she was pushing herself. Still, she was off the ground, howling at Shego in an instant. Shego was surprised by how quickly she bounced back, even if it was on wobbly legs. Kigo-one was not going to go down easily.

"I will kill you!" Kigo-one hollered. Her plasma so beyond her that she was melting her own armor, causing it to drip from her body, and scorching her face.

-8-8-8-8-

Kim and Joss remained in the air, fighting off Bebes until another dance partner showed up for the Legend and the Toltec. Try-Acid ballooned himself up, just to get their attention. It worked.

"Joss, Comanche, keep taking down the Bebes! We've got Try-Acid!" Kim informed her cousin.

"No problem!" Joss replied.

"We got this!" the Comanche added.

Kim and the Toltec dived down a bit to meet face-to-face with Try-Acid. He laughed and attacked without warning, throwing out his arm and launching his own unique brand of plasma at them. The Paladin easily got out of the way and countered, drawing their side arms. Shots were fired at Try-Acid that sizzled as they hit his acidic body.

"You'll have to do better than that!" Try-Acid proclaimed before countering by letting his plasma fly again.

Kim dodged, only for the plasma to fan out. The Toltec activated its own shield as bits of the plasma almost hit the suit. The jade-colored goo sizzled against the shield while Kim put the guns back on the side.

"We need a new plan of attack," Kim told the Toltec.

"I'm scanning Try-Acid for weaknesses," the Paladin replied.

"Maybe going into Warrior mode will change things up," the redhead decided. "It's something he's never dealt with before. We might be able to surprise him and take him down."

While the suit scanned, Kim activated the Paladin's Warrior mode. It did not affect Try-Acid, who just kept coming at her. She studied Try-Acid as she avoided his attacks. He then surprised her by pushing up into her face. Kim retreated back and pulled her secondary weapon, the energy poleaxe. She cut through the blob that was Try-Acid, but he reformed immediately.

"This is ridiculous," Kim growled in frustration.

Try-Acid chuckled again. "Fool. Don't you get it? I'm the ultimate weapon and you can't win!" he declared with an arrogance that he could have only picked up from Doctor Drakken.

"You must not know me. I can do anything!" the redhead replied as she sliced through Try-Acid again. The same thing happened.

Dammit, there has to be some weakness to this guy! Kim did not have a chance to figure out the flaw as Try-Acid came at her again. His fists flew in a strangely physical assault that she quickly learned was a distraction. Plasma shot out of his shoulder, heading right for the Toltec's face. Moving and countering, Kim used the energy poleaxe to cut through the blast and then charged Try-Acid.

"Toltec, I hope this shield is half as good as we think it is!" Kim said as she rammed their enemy, hitting Try-Acid with a lowered shoulder that was covered in small spikes.

Try-Acid grunted as the surprise blow landed and he was forced back, falling all the way to the ground. Kim then unleashed several missiles on the fallen villain. Smoke and dirt rose up, blanketing the area.

"You got him, Toltec?" Kim asked, eyes searching the sensors.

"On him!" the Toltec replied, locking onto their enemy.

Kim pushed them forward, cocked a fist back and punched Try-Acid dead in the face as he was staggering to his feet. The Paladin's shield acted a buffer to keep its fist from simply going through their opponent, so Try-Acid received the full force of the hit. The blow knocked him dear out of the smoke cloud. Heavy foot falls sounded as Kim gave chase.

"Sometimes you just gotta go low tech," Kim remarked.

"Be careful. The last hit slightly damaged the shield," the Toltec reported.

"Then we'll just have to beat the crap out of him before the shield completely fails," Kim replied.

The Paladin leaped out of the smoke to find that Try-Acid had enlarged himself to twice his previous size. Kim jumped up, going to kick Try-Acid in the face, but the jade blob put up his forearm, blocking the blow. He then unleashed a wave of plasma. A fizzing sound let Kim know that it was burning the suit, so she took to the air. Sensors in the Paladin alerted her to several problems, the damage from Try-Acid and Warrior mode was running out of energy.

"We have problems, Kim, and they're sorta big," the Toltec pointed out.

"I know," Kim grunted and then she looked at the enemy. "But, we're not the only ones."

Try-Acid had certainly seen better days. He looked like he was having trouble holding himself together, his arm sliding off of his shoulder as if it were melting. His chest looked like it was slightly caved in. Toltec zeroed in on the issue, a couple of the orbs inside of Try-Acid's body were sparking from cracks in them.

Try-Acid did not give Kim much time to contemplate what to do, throwing out waves of plasma. The attacks were dodged, but left no room for Kim to come in closer. And then for a split second, Try-Acid seemed distracted. Kim tried to take advantage, charging him, but his attention returned to his opponent before Kim could reach him. He threw out his good arm, letting his plasma flow out in a thick column. Kim dodged with no problem and Try-Acid began laughing like a madman.

"Why is he laughing if he missed that by a mile?" Kim wondered aloud.

-8-8-8-8-

Kigo-one had totally exhausted herself and literally burned herself out. Plasma sparks scorched her flesh and oozing armor. She was hunched over, almost curled into herself, but still on her feet, just barely. Her hair was stuck to her face and covered with sweat, which rose off of her like steam instead of falling to the ground. Burns on her face and arms looked like they had been caused by pure lava.

The fury in her eyes had never diminished, even as she began vomiting, dry heaving now as she had already coughed up everything that her body had to offer. She looked at Shego as if she were the most vile human being on Earth and then suddenly her eyes went wide with shock. Vomit was replaced with blood and she gasped as a smoking, gaping hole hollowed out almost her entire torso.

Shego gasped as she realized what happened. "No!" Emerald eyes shot out to see where that blast came from and seeing Try-Acid in the distance, looking their way with a smile on what was supposed to be his face let her know just who did it. Once he was certain that she saw him and knew what he did, he retreated and Kigo-one breathed her last breath.

-8-8-8-8-

Next time: The aftermath of Kigo-one's assassination and Vivian makes a decision.

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