Funky chronology incoming. Seasons 1-2, Season 3, So the Drama, Season 4 up to Mad Dogs and Aliens, Sitch in Time. This be So the Drama grounds. With that said...

Crud.

It was the first thought that ran through Shego's head as it hit the tower-the electricity came right after. Boiling water was nothing to the scalding feeling that shot across her skin, hot and burning, the overpowering scent of smoke killing her nose. All she could concentrate on was biting back a scream before the tower toppled against her, batting her to the ground like a nuisance fly.

She screamed. She definitely screamed-her throat was raw on the way down-but she couldn't remember doing it.

She noticed the antenna too late to do anything about it besides turn and lose an eye. It slammed into the side of her head, eardrum exploding as her head was jerked aside. A damp fog rolled in. She felt rubble everywhere-in her face, her hair, her limbs-and all of it registered as rain. When her feet hit the ground they crumpled like cards.

A lucid thought sprang to mind as she hit the ground: if the comet had never come, she'd have died tonight. Kim Possible, the Kim Possible had tried the line. She'd stared her straight in the face and, no tricks, lashed out with a kick that had found its way past her form and flung her into the nearby tower. And she had to have seen the whole thing collapse on her. Did she know if that'd kill her? Did she care?

Shego should have gotten a kick out of it-on a better day would've-but under the rubble, all she could do was shiver. She'd brought Kimmy low. Somehow, that wasn't cause for confetti.

Rain was still falling, and hard. The sound was a harsh pounding in her already-ringing ears, every drop in itself an alert to go, get up, go! as her heart went off like a caged hare. But she couldn't. She just…couldn't. Her nerves felt like they'd been pulled to breaking point and left there. She cringed at every twitch that sent the tower coursing through her again.

Hurt. She made a sound; groan, grunt, sniffle she didn't know. Her eyes were at half-mast and no matter how hard she tried to open or close them, she didn't have the energy for either. A bleary, bloodshot middle ground made her eyes sting.

She tried to drag herself up on her knees and knuckles, but her back stung as it connected with a piece of the tower, and the thought of pushing it aside and crawling her way out of here was too much. She fell more than slumped, jaw hitting the damp concrete as it clamped on her already swollen tongue.

She could barely think, her head was so heavy. And her heart refused to settle. It was exhausting feeling it beat against her ribs like a battering ram. How much of that tower's charge had she taken?

She had zero idea of the time before she trusted her thumping heart again. Scraping at the ground with her tattered gloves, she flipped herself on her side. One ear faced to the sky sent nothing back to her brain except the feeling of crusted blood and rain.

Great, she thought, teeth grit and eyes wet, just…great.

She'd hoisted herself up on a shaky elbow, one hand thrusting the slab aside before a blinding light hit her square in the face.

A sharp pain started behind her eyes-she blinked before throwing a hand up. "Settle on the exposure, Doc," she grouched, more out of habit than circumstance.

Then she twitched, limbs flaring as they kicked, and circumstance kicked in. "And get us out of here."

Her voice cracked on the words. Dimly, she wondered if the Doc would recognise them.

At the sound of static, Shego stiffened. "Found her," said a voice so tinged with venom she couldn't be sure it wasn't on their payroll.

Get up. Now!

She clutched to a damp steel beam as she dragged herself up. She had no idea where the sound had come from and her eyes weren't doing her any good. Everything was a black, white and blue blur. She blinked and it sharpened, but not by much. Shoving her soaked hair aside, she wheeled around. A police officer stared at her, his grip on his holster white-knuckled as rain dripped off his peaked cap. At his contempt, Shego straightened.

"You were a hero."

She blinked. Someone who remembered. She'd hoped never to meet a Go City goer again. "Past tense," she said before she lit up.

And screamed. Holy-

She hunched over, staring at her shaking hands through a tightly wound brow. They smoked and stung without a pinch of plasma.

What?

She tried again, a sucker for more pain as the glow sputtered and went out, leaving a dull throb in its place.

"What?" She said it to herself, then shot her head up at him. "What?" He said nothing, did nothing as his hand fell from his holster. His stare didn't soften, but there was something new to it she knew too well. The same stupid shlock that she'd had thrown to her like a bone, that her brothers had somehow taken with shaky smiles and empty thanks-that got her hands wringing then and had her hands wringing now.

Just twenty or so minutes ago she'd have rained a parade on the bastard. Rain done, all she had for him now was a stop-you-right-there glare. "Don't."

His shrug was faintly sardonic as he lifted a pair of cuffs from his belt. "You deserve it."

She turned her head to the sky, like maybe that guy would offer an explanation. Nothing. Nothing. If He was there, He was too busy bawling his eyes out to notice.

Her lips quivered, half out of rage and half out of the sudden, crushing urge to cry. It was that easy for the officer to walk up and crank the cuffs to her back. She could've gone down kicking and punching, but without at least the promise of her powers it just felt…petty. Pointless.

That and her nerves were fried. She swallowed drily as she was dragged by the arm. Even from here, with her ears playing a shrill staccato beat, she could hear Drakken putting up a hell of a fuss.

"What did you do?" he said. "Kim Possible? What did you do?"

Can't! Breathe! By law of conservation, it was his most pressing priority. But Drakken hadn't pegged himself a law-abiding citizen for years now, and besides there were so much more important things than breathing right now-much as he'd like to make sure all of Middleton couldn't keep at it.

Kim Possible had done it. He shook with energy he didn't even know he'd had, tremoring on the van's seat as he stared at Kim Possible. Not smug this time. Hate was radiating from the both of them, hers a choking first, and yet his a close second-

No. Ron Stoppable. He was right there.

The one person in the world who'd ever jumped to a well-timed boo from Drakken himself was glaring at him like he was the gunk on his favourite shoe. It made Drakken's tummy sting, and he had to swallow the urge to throw up before his thoughts came together again.

Then-then a respectable third. The night was cold and he'd never known himself so soaked before, but before the despair could sink its teeth in, Drakken drew from his fast-thinning bank of full-fat evil and concentrated it at Kim Possible. There and then, he'd have willed the heat death of the universe if it'd coalesce into his eyeballs and let him laser the Possibles into tiny, insignificant atoms.

Ridiculous! She's just trying to scare you! She'd never stoop this low!

He had tonight. Who was to say she hadn't fought fire with fire…extinguisher?

But she can't, she just can't! It's not possible!

"Anything is possible for a Possible."

Rrrrnngh!

"Nothing," Kim Possible said, rudely cutting a swath through his red-misted mind. But she kept glancing over her shoulder, aside, anywhere but at his eyes, and he knew she knew.

"Then where is she?" His voice broke, skittering into high pitch, and he couldn't have cared less. "Why aren't you looking for her?"

Barely over the sound of the deafening downfall, Drakken thought he heard her teeth grinding. "Because I can't be sure I won't kick her while she's down."

It sent his world spinning off-kilter again. Off it went and Drakken let it, because whatever world was being made here he wanted no part in it.

Where's Shego where's Shego where's Shego where's Shego-

Oof. His face felt runny. He hoped to heavens he wasn't doing what he thought he was doing but he couldn't tell, his cheeks were so wet already.

That's-good, then! No one can tell if you're-

"Kim Possible!" he screamed, cutting that thought well off. "You think you're all that, but you're just a murderer!"

At that, her face fell. Riposte! Drakken thought, teeth gnashing on some intangible but tangy thing between his molars.

The buffoon-Ron-stepped in, placing a hand on her shoulder. "Dude. If Kay Pee's a murderer, what does that make you?"

Error. Does not compute.

He heard the words, but they slid right off him like blood off a damp duck's back.

No. All he had to do was deny it, and it wasn't true. He was no murderer. The whole world had been set on fire tonight, and else-whereabouts, he knew it must be true, the fires were still raging, the Diablos down but their nozzles not outed, but he wasn't a murderer. For just one long night, the world had been force-fed the fury of the genius denied his birthright, gotten just a taste of the hard life, the heart-poundingly palpable fear, the door-thumping, the pitch black and the sour-smelling, rock-hard gum stuck to the walls of the same place the dolts were dumping their books in. No. He was not a murderer.

But no one was stuffing Drew Lipsky in a locker again.

No. Of course not. They'll be stuffing you into a penitentiary.

He didn't smile at that-the thought of mother made his tummy hurt again-but he didn't flinch from it either, not in front of them. And of course, Possible caught on.

"Are you proud?" she said, shriller than he'd ever heard her. At the sound of that, he shot up.

Kim Possible was angry-Kim Possible was really, really angry!-and that should have been cause for alarm, written all over her face, but all he could think of when he saw Possible's face was a smirk that didn't suit her as she watched Shego-

He still couldn't breathe right, not really. As Possible stared at him, fuming, he saw his chance to pay her back kindly, and an all-teeth grin crossed his lips.

"Are you?" he said, leaning forward from his spot in the van as he drank in her shock and not-quite-awe.

Stupid. Childish. He'd deserve it, he knew, if Possible leapt into the van and beat him half to death. Or all the way.

She was getting there, it looked like, two steps forward as Drakken pressed his back to the van wall and pleaded with his cells to phase through it, before Ron placed another hand on her shoulder. "Kim. He's not worth it."

Possible looked pained. For once he could relate.

Yes I am! he wanted to shout (of pride? Of shame?). But he wasn't going to look a firing squad in the eye. No matter how much he wanted to test Kim Possible now, he couldn't be done, he just couldn't, not until he'd paid her a thousand times over and then some!

And you plan to do that how exactly? Drakken froze at the sound of shoulder Shego.

She was right. No one else had broken him out of prison before. And if Shego really was-well. No one else ever would.

Drakken sucked in as much air through his teeth as he could. His nose felt dangerously snotty. One good sniffle and he wouldn't stop.

And that was when Shego was rounded into the van, black head of hair popping into view as Drakken's heart leapt into his mouth.

"Shego," he sobbed.

"Shut up," said whoever was holding her by the elbow, fingers poised like they were putting distance from a filthy tissue. "She's fine. Get in or I'll drag you."

Shego stumbled towards the van, eyes to the fast-solidifying ground. She glanced up and her neck winced at the whiplash. But she caught what she'd needed to-Drakken in one piece.

Good. I'll tear him apart myself.

"Oh. Oh," Drakken breathed. He was shivering in the suit and his hair was soaked. His face was nursing a Possible-patented welt and the ground was scattered with neutered, nothing Diablos and everything that could've gone wrong had gone ahead and gone wrong on the one night it needed to go anything but, and it had taken Eric and the world and his ego from him. But it hadn't taken that.

The air he took after realising that was in gulps, big, greedy gulps that filled his lungs with the sickly, silly urge to giggle.

"Th-" He bit his lip hard. "Good," he said instead.

"Good," said the officer, darkening a shade as he shoved Shego into the van. She hit the floor, breathing in, out, in as she dragged herself up and into a seat across him, wincing for every piercing, stabbing feeling in her bones. Never been this much of an effort before.

It wasn't until the henchmen came in that the doors were shut, rain, thunder and Possible locked out. It should've been comforting, Drakken thought, but it wasn't, not in the slightest. For one, it was dark in here. And for two, there was a terrifying finality to the sound of steel latches sliding across steel doors. He'd heard it a gazillion times before, but there was a totality to it now that settled in his stomach like an acid-repellent stone. Like they'd lost what they hadn't even known had been the good life, lost it once and forever.

Drakken shuddered, only a little bit from his soggy state. Anything but. Anything to get that back. He glanced at Shego, but with her head down all he saw was a black spill of hair, parts of it strung out like some idiot had been twirling their hands through it. Outrage without outlet left him shaking.

They'd turned a corner when the window flashed and the clap came three seconds later.

It was a gross understatement to say Shego flinched. She jumped, every part of her stiff and rising at once, eyes shooting all over the place like pinballs as a look he'd never ever ever ever ever seen on her before took hold.

"Shego-"

She turned sharply at the sound of the Doc. The sight of him in the flash in the flesh was surreal. It was that stupid suit, she thought, the sparkles on it that made him hard to look at in the blinding light. She kept her eyes above it, on his sky-blue face and wide, worried eyes staring her right back. Putting her chin to her chest, she killed a flutter that had no right to be there tonight.

Then she twitched it upwards, sharpening it to a point. "This is all your fault."

Drakken's throat turned to cotton. "No," he yelped. "No. This isn't my fault! Everything was going as planned-everything was going like it was supposed to-"

We struck at midnight! It pained him more than anything that the thought was in the past tense. Doodled. Dusted. Done. They'd struck at midnight, he'd thrown his entire self on the oh-so rickety scales of destiny and it had still tipped the other way, catapulting him off into some damp and grungy distance that looked suspiciously like a cell bloc.

Again! Again, he sucked air through his teeth, let his grimace wobble away, because if he tried to straighten it his eyes would take their chances and wring him dry.

"Evidently not," Shego spat. "You complete idiot. I can't believe I thought this was going to work, what the hell was I thinking-"

"Shego," he said. It took all the breath left in him and still felt grossly inadequate, irregular. His throat itched. Why was she yelling? Why was she swearing? Why was she being so mean?

"Shego, it's-it's fine, really!"

"Really."

"Yes, yes, really!" and he forced himself on, not a sentence in sight. "Rrgk-you. You-break yourself out, and then you break me out, and-and we can…"

We can what?

This had been the one. This had really been the one. He'd forced himself to bury all the banter and cutesies and itches in his chest in the deepest six feet hole he could find. He'd patted down the spot and not even bothered with an X-if he won, he'd never come back for it! What had it ever done for him anyway but keep him second-guessing? No, it wouldn't do, he'd thought then-he'd work better without it.

And he had. It was cold without the warmth, but it was intoxicating, like hypothermia without the purple nastiness-he'd been floating on office-cold air, watching it all from the comfort of heated seats, sleep-starved brain staring at room-sized screens until it clicked and came to him.

But it was still starved now, and nothing had clicked, and no matter how hard he clawed for the words they never came.

"We…can." He finished lamely.

Shego stared. He closed his eyes in anticipation of a crude, cutting remark that'd clip them right open again.

"I lost my powers."

Drakken blinked.

"Say what?"

"I lost my powers," she said, with such vehemence that the henchman beside her leaned hard into his co.

Drakken blinked again. Words! he thought. Please, words! A sentence! Sense unnecessary! But they stayed well out of spouting range. He had nothing to say.

Shego glared at him, keeping the tears well behind her eyes. Well, he wouldn't, would he?

Drakken licked his lips, tongue jerking from the numbing welt. "Is-is it permanent?"

Her shoulders rose and fell like there were straps to them. "I don't know."

Silence.

Drakken swallowed. "It doesn't matter," he said, "as long as we're-"

"It doesn't matter?" Shego wanted to scream, to hurl something at his head. "Doc. Do you not get it? This-this gig of ours, it's over. Name one time you even came close to world domination without me."

"I-I-the Bebes," he screamed.

Shego scoffed, giving the rapier in his ribs a flick. "Oh, your little vendetta trip. Ye-ah, how'd that go for you?"

Why are you doing this? Drakken wanted to cry. I'm trying to help!

"You," and he came dangerously close to choking on his spit, "you don't need your powers to protect me, or help me with my inventions-I'll-I'll break you out." He'd done it once before, he distinctly remembered-Commodore Puddles had been huge-

"You. You're going to break me out of prison." Shego hacked out a laugh as harsh and grating as her nail file.

Irate, he tried to recount Area Fifty-One. "Gkkk-!"

No no no no no, words, not now!

"You can't even break yourself out," she started, before the flash came again. Forcing her lips into a line, she pressed her entire self to the van's side, grit her teeth and closed her eyes. The thunder came in as she kept herself still.

Drakken's heart twisted into knots at the sight of it. Shego, back to the wall, eyes and mouth clamped shut. Like she was scared. Like she really thought she was going to die. The spite ping-ponged between them evaporated.

"Shego-"

"Forget it," she said, muted more than he'd ever known her. "Just…forget it."

He stared at her for a while after she said that. Her hands still stung, Middleton was still bawling buckets and all she really wanted to do in the moment was cry, sleep, and have a tall glass of water in no particular order. But her heart still hurt it was beating so fast, and she figured (correctly, as it turned out) it'd keep at it until all the excess electricity was out.

At least I got her, she thought, and she wished she'd fallen asleep right after that thought. It would've been perfect for it. Of course, her heart was still going at it. And so she played the scene in her head, the moment she'd raked a claw across Kim Possible's arm. With luck, little miss priss'd be too preoccupied with dragging the survivors from the rubble to notice how deep the wound was. Maybe she'd pass out. One for one.

She blinked, and an entirely different pain sprang up in her heart, hurting so much more.

No. Oh, please no.

But if she jerked her head towards the thick plastic pane they'd come from, she could hear it just fine. The sound of fire. The wailing of sirens and of people. The van jerked to a stop.

"Drakken."

He lifted his heavy head her way.

"People died tonight." Her voice broke apart, splintered into pieces they never had before.

Drakken went stiff as a rod, head shot up.

"What?"

But she never repeated herself.

He convulsed, and for one long second he thought he was going to throw up. His stomach roiled, again and again, at the invasive thought of the Diablos raining death and destruction from their glorious places nigh-high. He'd been so proud of it just minutes ago, why did he care now? This-this was absurd! He was clinical, he was detached, he was-

Heavens. He'd always thought himself the head of every trodden-on Drew Lipsky live-alike out there. Hell. How many of them had looked up and died tonight? There must've been one in Washington, in Paris, in Sydney, in Samarkand-there were too many places he'd launched them and too many Drew Lipskys he must have run roughshod over. But how many, he thought as he broke into a cold sweat. He needed a figure, something specific and sensible, something that could make sense of this-

The doors were flung open, and the cold breeze came in. That got him. Then he really did throw up, staining his suit as he brought up a piecemeal breakfast, lunch and dinner. All the Bueno Nacho 'food' he'd been living on for the past and present days came up foul mash as Shego leapt up on her seat and the henchmen backed into their respective corners.

Her nerves might be ruined, some of them forever, but she could still dodge projectile puke like the best of 'em. "Jesus," she said, upper lip curling. She backed away towards the open door, where the henchmen were hastily filing out.

A female officer grabbed her by the arm as soon as her feet hit the ground. "Come on," she said.

"Don't rush me," she shot back, but it was half-hearted, and the officer did little more than grunt. As she was hustled along, she stole a last glance at Drakken. It was a hell of a coincidence that his salt-stained eyes just happened then to look up from his muddied lap. He looked her right in the eye, entire body shuddering with a sniffle that sent snot dribbling down his face as he wheezed like a dying dog. She could see in his slump and the constant bob of his throat that he wasn't anywhere close to done. And they were not grabbing him like that. They'd let him puke his guts out in that tight, dark place and never lose any sleep over it. And if she'd felt even the slightest bit sorry for him that night, she would have said something. Anything.

But she was saving all the sorry for herself.

Drakken felt the rib-tucked rapier in him tugged here and there, tearing him to shreds as Shego turned around, shoulder rolling, away, aside, not here, there and making way away.

His tummy stung and again he couldn't stop himself. He felt like he'd swallowed a grater as bile dribbled from his lips. He tried to bring a hand across his clammy forehead and one cuffed wrist tugged at the other.

Not like this, he tried to cry. But all came out ragged huffs and puffs, sounds too wet and discordant to form words.

She thought about him one sundown evening. Actually she'd been thinking of him the whole time, but always in asides, accepting (after several headache-inducing days) that he'd be there a while.

Fine by her. He was easy to keep there as long as she kept a constant buzz going in her head. But one day while the sun was drooping, she sat tight and stared at it through her window. A perfectly good bottle was left uncorked in her sink as she rubbed at her wrists. And she couldn't explain it. It wasn't because she felt like it. She'd have held it off longer if she could stand it. But it was exhausting to smile and sigh away, feeling at her temple every now and then, wondering if resistance to alcohol poisoning came with the comet. What comes up stays up, she thought dismally.

And just like the real Doctor D, he seized at the sober moment, twirling a hundred and twenty one percent of her attention around his fingers, trying to spread it out like play-dough and make it last. She'd have smiled at the thought pre-Diablo Day.

She'd left him there a month.

"Eh," she said, lips falling as she tugged the blinds shut. A month and four days if you counted Eddy and Junior.

"Oh, for." She slapped a hand to her head, surprised just a little bit when the other didn't come along. He wasn't surprised, she bet-he couldn't be, he was still in them.

Shego felt like being bludgeoned. Handy, dandy way to get her mind off things. But no one was offering and she'd never a' let them.

She strode over to her drawer and wrenched it open, lock snapping like a twig (or a bone). No time for the key, she needed something now. Her eyes flitted twice over the grain before she settled on a raspberry bottle of polish. Ugh. Crappy California brand. A kid woulda been proud of that dink.

"Uh…thanks?" was what she distinctly remembered saying to the hornball that'd thought this would cheer her up. And here she was, snatching it up. Maybe she should give him a call.

Yeah, no.

"You're getting burnt as soon as I'm done," she said, setting the bottle on a table as she threw her legs across a nearby chair. And let herself think for once, really think as she tugged the cap round.

Her powers were fine. A week after everything, she lit up in the relative safety of her own cell. She'd been glaring daggers at anyone who'd even thought to cross her beforehand, but even they noticed that the shoving and the pummelling had come distinctly plasma-free. She was well past desperate by the time she'd thrown her hands out, begging and pleading for it to be true and not true.

True because if it was, she didn't have to regret a thing she'd said on Diablo Day. Not true because she was going to die in here if it was.

She blinked down. The plastic cap was crushed between her fingers. She brushed most of it off against the table and started with the brush against her thumb.

If it tickled she didn't notice. That was how it had started. Diablos and the day literally up in flames. Doctor Drakken-Drew Theodore P. Lipsky as her maman called it, was a mass murderer. And she was an accessory. If Global Justice's hardasses weren't bashing her door down, it was only because she had friends in the lowest of the low places.

Like Midas. Not bad with his golden touch.

But she'd never done it before, and she wondered if they knew that. Oh, she'd tried. No one, not even herself could deny that she'd dumped Kim Possible in a vat of uh-who-cares and thrown in the blender blades for good measure. There was malice aforethought and there was whatever she'd always been playing at. Kim Possible she could kill and sleep right-side up the day after.

And you're sure about that, came a painfully droll voice that tried and failed to shame her. Sounded like her. Wasn't her. Way too much of a bleeding heart. But she kept its snark apart from the fact.

Because the little miss messiah in her was right about one thing. She hadn't been sure of it that day. She could match Drakken in grin and stride as she hit all the buttons she needed to turn Kimmy into a frappe, but when they'd actually come down, she'd-she'd-

She'd froze. Then she'd bolted. Come back a few seconds later and brought them up with no idea what she'd find. Confirmation, she guessed.

She'd understood then why Drakken made his traps so impersonal. And walked away from them every time.

She applied raspberry to her pinkie like something to be over with, not giving a toss that she practically drenched it.

She was in it for good now. Long-term, long haul, however the hell you wanted to put it. Go and co were never taking her back. There was going on a property-pounding spree and there was setting cities on fire, property, people and all. Fine by me, she thought, and she meant it. Didn't mean it didn't sting less.

She wanted to turn back the clock five months and slap herself over the head, the night that Drakken had gone for broke and broke himself. What the hell are you thinking, she'd say, snap out of it and then snap the Doc out of it.

The thought didn't once occur to her to leave. Maybe because she'd been well in it by then. Maybe because she'd really thought this would be the one, and somehow it still felt like it was. And maybe because for all his fits and faults, Doctor D wasn't a bad person.

It sounded like a stupid excuse, but it wasn't stupid or an excuse. It was the weirdest part. She'd known it the second she walked through their door that Drakken wasn't a hard-noser for the gig. He was so-so not a villain in his own time it wowed her. Yeah, she'd busted the bad guys in their pajamas before, but she'd never ever seen them waddle around their own lairs, belting out the beats to some yester-year boy band in said pajamas. She'd never seen a villain threaten the world with a laser bigger than her had-been backyard and immediately stuff his face with Snickers once he was off-air. She'd never met a villain who wasn't eyeballing her when they didn't think she was looking until Drakken. Passing, angsty glances with no shame that never went below her neck. Like he needed her silent permission, or a pat on the back or something. She'd given him both on their first run, and the loon had grinned bashfully like she'd pinned a medal on him. The tight-lipped, no-teeth kind that screamed gee, you're swell! and on anyone else would've looked passive aggressive.

She'd scratched her name on the contract-how freakin' rich was that, a contract?-and never looked back. And she knew deep down, powers or no, that she never would.

Yeah. This guy she could see spending half his college year in a locker. This guy she'd throw an arm across from any kick-flipping teens. This guy a murderer? She didn't buy it.

The blinds flashed.

She stopped her brush mid-stroke. Sweat lined her hairline. Oh, for-

At the sound of thunder she picked up the polish and ran from the villa's living room, heart racing like it had then. Why the heck was she like this? Lightning couldn't kill her, even if it struck her twice-she'd figured that on Diablo Day-and still she couldn't stand at the sight of it.

She stumbled into a room without windows, kicking a wool rug aside as her wine-stained fingers felt for a switch she didn't find that night. There was no flash in here but she could hear it, feel it resounding in her bones and she was suddenly glad she'd let that bottle drip. She backed herself into a corner, toothpick of a brush brandished at the door as the hallway it led from turned pitch white.

No rain. Just thunder. She vaguely recalled the Doc 'splaining it to her once. Shame she'd cut him off.

There was nothing to do but keep count. She eyeballed a clock on a close-by stand on a close-by table, watching the hands tick-tick-tick along as she raised her free hand now and then to swipe at the bridge of her nose. The storm was on its fourth bolt by the time she could breathe again. She lowered the brush after a while and kept at it. But it felt torturous now, like someone was licking her fingers and for whatever degenerate reason she was letting them.

Degenerate. She hated that word. She'd heard it once, thought it once and thought 'never again'.

"First time for everything," she said aloud. She stopped with the polish after a while. Her hands were so shaky, she was batting red between her knuckles.

Yeah. She guessed it suited her. But she'd never tell a soul she wasn't proud of it.

Across the Atlantic, Drakken pushed checkers across cold cardboard and kept count.

They were zero years in and one thousand, three hundred and sixty-five people had died.

Particular inspiration taken from Purplegirl761's take on So the Drama in The Princess and the Dragon.