Finite Middletons (Freshman year, Possible Home, Master Bedroom, Saturday after meeting with Yamanouchi, 12:45 PM)

"Like a waffle dear?" James pulled off the cover of a platter of still steaming waffles.

Anne blinked and looked at the bedside clock. She must have fallen asleep after giving her husband a thorough hands-on review of the body that was the pattern for Erica.

"What's everyone doing?" she asked, sitting up against the headboard, "Aren't we late for a meeting with Nana and the others?"

"Mom said you packed away a lot of Japanese whiskey last night and to let you sleep. There was a conference call this morning between Erica, Hiero, and the monastery. They all thought it was best to make sure the data Erica is carrying is still intact and to have Slim and the boys start looking at the designs she carries. Mistress Sensei and Mom both figure that there isn't a lot for you and me to do until we all meet in person with the folk from Yamanouchi. Hiero and Erica are off currently meeting with Vivian Porter," James explained, putting a lap table on the bed.

"Vivian?"

"Yeah, Erica is carrying a copy of Dr. Porter's computer files, in particular the files that controlled the artificial intelligence subsystems of the boys' last prototype," James explained as he poured his love some coffee.

Anne listened for a moment, then asked, "It's too quiet. Where are the kids?"

"Kimmie-cub is catching up on all our laundry," then seeing the panicked expression on her face, quickly added, "Ronald is helping her, so we won't all have pink underwear. The boys are packing for a trip to Slim's ranch. They will do their preliminary work at the ranch. Hiero will drive them there tonight.

"I guess we should write a note as to why Tim and Jim will be out of school for a while?" Anne took a bite of waffle and noticed that the plate also had bacon and scrambled eggs.

"The boys said that their homework would be turned in on time, they'd be marked as 'present' and that the school wouldn't miss them," James poured coffee for himself, then paused, looking a little confused and concerned, "Should we worry about that?"

"Probably. But since we need to take them to Japan soon, I figure that we can ignore it for now," Anne took a bite of bacon.

"We can't go until after the annual Rocket Boosters open house in three weeks. Kimmie-cub would be devastated to miss it…"

Anne started to correct her husband, but her man was on a roll and she was happy for the moment not to have a dozen tasks bearing down on her. After taking a sip of coffee, she asked,

"So Doctor Possible, what's on the schedule for today?"

James smiled, "Why Doctor Possible, I thought maybe a shower, a walk in the park and maybe dinner at Blob's Park West."

"Polka Dancing?" she asked, "Are you serious?"

"I won't tell Kimmie-Cub if you don't," James replied.

"I won't tell if you scrub my back. I'll scrub yours," his redhead suggested.

"I'll go turn on the shower…"

Finite Middletons (Freshman year, Possible Home, Living Room, Saturday after meeting with Yamanouchi, 4:15 PM)

"Well, we're off and will be back late tonight, so why don't you spend the night at Ronald's. In fact, if you are going to come back home tonight, send us a text, OK?"

"Sure daddy," Kim answered, "Where are you and Mom going?" The request didn't make sense. Jim and Tim had left a few minutes ago with Hiero on their way to their Uncle Slim's ranch. Surely they weren't worried about her being in the house alone at night?

"Honey, don't ask a question that you don't want to hear the answer to, " grinned Anne, "We aren't worried about you, we just don't want to wake you up when we get home."

"Okay…" Kim looked at her parents, they were dressed neatly, her mom was wearing a skirt, the kind that would flair out when you spun. Their shoes were dressy, but comfortable like you would wear dancing…

Giving a visible shudder while muttering 'folk dancing' just to tease her parents a little, she gave them a hug and sent them on their way.

"So, KP, are we alone at last?" Ron gave her a goofy grin, the grin that seemed to be getting rarer these days.

"Looks that way," Kim smiled. She thought that she should really arrange for them to have a designated Kim/Ron day. Lately, it seemed like random circumstances seemed to pop up to keep them separated or distracted. Her musing was interrupted when Ron's cellphone rang.

"Hey, Crystal, what's up?"

Finite Middletons (A random place in a stagnant pool at a bend of the time stream, Bueno Nacho, Some meaningless point in time)

The Mystical Monkey Monk placed three baskets, each containing one order of Nachos Supreme onto a tray. Pausing at the soda machine, he placed three Slurpster sized drinks, one iced green tea, one unsweetened orange pekoe tea, and one diet cola alongside the nachos and took the tray onto the patio and sat at a table to wait.

Triple-M, as he thought of himself, was the definition of patience itself. He was a creature of the time stream as all creatures of prophecy had to be. He repeatedly spent large amounts of time just waiting around to tell yet another hero that the time of gaining the Mystical Monkey Power was upon them, which taught patience.

His current task was sheer excitement compared to that. He had stumbled into consciousness at the most opportune time. He met a pair of, well, none of his known mythologies had a name for them, they called themselves shoulder-angels and their function was to act as a guide to the mortals they were bound to. Kim Possible's shoulder angel referred to herself as "Shim" and Ron's was "Shon."

Investigating the new and obviously artificial time loop, he was intrigued by the effort those trapped within it were exerting to straighten out the time stream for the foreseeable future. Deciding to help, he grabbed the creatures called Shim and Shon to have them investigate broken segments decaying in eddies to make them better to advise their human clients.

He had no concept for how long his 'students' had been surfing the stream because inside the time stream, time is fluid and hard to measure. But there is always a beginning and an end; the end was rapidly approaching as the next hero had discovered the location of the golden banana and would soon have it on its golden stand. The Monk would have to travel to that reality to be ready to tell this hero that his greatness was at hand. At the same time, without his anchoring them, Shim and Shon would snap back to the reality they came from.

A blonde-haired young man rode up to the Bueno Nacho with a red-haired companion whose arms were wrapped around his middle tighter than strictly necessary. As he held the scooter upright, she dismounted, carefully swinging her leg over the rocket engines exhaust nozzles, softly glowing from heat even though her partner hadn't been rushing to get here. Standing up by a table on the patio, a monk in robes and adorned in coins waved them over.

"Shim, Shon," the Mystical Monkey Monk called, "Over here, I have nachos and drinks waiting for you. How was your exploration? Did you find out what happened to the original timeline?"

The pair walked over and sat with the monk at a table under a large umbrella. Looking around, it appeared as if a wall of fog surrounded a bubble of clear air. There were maybe fifty feet of apparent 'reality' ending at the wall of fog. When they had been here before, reality stretched as far as the eye could see.

Apparently, Triple-M did not carry the same charge of mystical energy that the real Kim, Ron, or Rufus did. The same limit on their bubbles of reality had hampered them in searching through the discarded remnants of discarded time threads, washed up in stagnant areas of the time stream.

Still, the drinks were cold, and the nachos were warm. As the blond took a sip of his Slurpster, the redhead spoke.

"No, master," she said, "We were unable to find the correct thread in the backwash of the time stream. The ones we found were awful."

"Yeah," the blond added, "in the last thread we looked in, Shego was trying to destroy KP and me by making everyone hate us. Drakken had gone insane and was preparing to destroy the entire planet."

"You managed to win in the end, did you not?" asked the monk.

"It wasn't us that saved the world, this time," she numbly replied.

"It was Tina and Tara, they paid with their lives," the boy spoke softly, his mind flashing images of Justine's charred body, burned beyond recognition by an energy discharge. The blonde genius had realized that Drakken's out of control energy bubble was about to expand and kill a lot of people. She, without hesitation, had shorted it to ground using her body as a lightning rod. Her sacrifice had only delayed the danger. He choked back a sob thinking of Tara's family, who didn't even have a body to bury. The perpetually cheerful young woman hijacked a JG hoverjet. Her plan was to crash it into the bubble, ejecting at the last moment. She was partially successful, allowing much of the built-up energy to vent into the sky. Unfortunately, she was caught in the energy stream while attempting to parachute to safety.

"Surely there was a path where you two were successful, wasn't the Mystical Monkey Power of any help in any of these timelines?"

"There was this thread where I defeated an alien attack using it, but I so was fixated on keeping a damned promise to keep everything a secret that I erased some of KP's memories and replaced other ones. I wanted her to get the credit for the win." the blond looked at his partner and cringed.

"Yeah, but he didn't do a perfect job, then he refused to follow me to Europe for school. I start having dreams about what really happened, became convinced I was going insane and cut myself off from everyone, including Ron. Then Brain-Manipulator Boy here decides that I have rejected him and disappears along with Rufus and his family. When I finally find out what happened, I go looking for him, but when anybody that knows that I still love him tries to tell him that, he sticks his fingers in his ears and runs off screaming, La, la, la, not listening! Don't want to hear about her new perfect boyfriend! Idiot." She scowled at her partner.

"Did that one turn out OK in the end?" asked the monk.

"Don't know; we got tired of watching Ron avoid me." the redhead snarked.

"That was still better than the time you shot me in the head!" protested the young man. "On purpose!" he added.

"You shot him?" the monk was shocked, "in the head?" finally blurting out, "on purpose?"

"Hey, this whacked-out ninja guy, Mr. F-something, had brainwashed me using drugs provided by some geneticist! Besides, it was only a flesh wound, he got better!"

"How did that one end?" the monk was starting to think that all the young heroes' possible timelines were doomed.

"I came back, found her, and we got married. Had kids, in fact, all our friends were getting married and having kids. We gave up on that timeline because we were getting tired of going to weddings and baby showers all the time," he added with some pride, "Yup, the Ronster really kicked butt and cooked in that one!"

"So you didn't learn anything of use to your Kim and Ron in searching discarded timelines?" the monk sighed and popped a cheese-laden chip into his mouth.

The redhead reached for another chip while saying, "We learned the IRS is the equivalent of at least half my forms of Kung Fu in raw destructive force."

"Yup," the boy grinned, "one time I called the IRS and told them about Drakken's not reporting payments he was getting for carving company logos on the moon and in another one, 'someone' told them about all the favors Kim is getting from people she helped. The IRS decided that was advanced bartering if not outright money laundering and gave her a considerable tax bill. That shut down Team Possible."

Putting her face in her hands, "We can definitely tell them that the IRS is too terrible a weapon to use. It also makes no distinction between good heroes and evil supervillains."

"is it just me or is our bubble of reality getting smaller? the blond looked a little nervous, "I'm not sure how real we are, I don't think we can afford to lose any."

"The Golden Banana has been located and will be put on its stand in the near future," said the Mystical Monkey Monk, "I must leave when that happens, and my absence will cause you to return to your timeline. Maybe something you have seen will help your true selves back in your home timeline. You might have time to investigate one or two additional time eddies. Try to get lucky."


"OK if I drive?" the redhead swung into the seat careful not to kick her BF who was kneeling at the back of the little vehicle checking to make sure the rockets had mystically refueled themselves and the heat cracks in the engine mounts had vanished.

"Sure, I'd be happy to sit behind you and wrap my arms around you," he tried a lascivious grin, but it looked like he just had an attack of intestinal gas to her.

"OK, lover boy, I've got another time to look at so just hold on… and Ron?"

"Yeah KP?"

"This might be the last time your fingers get to be Roman if you know what I mean."

"Veni, Vidi, molesti, KP," he murmured, dancing his fingers around the waistband of her cargoes,

Shim laughed, "Yes, sometimes you are a little disturbed," as the rocket engines ignited with a soft roar.

"Not disturbed, just lucky-eeeeeeeee," Shon yelled as his girlfriend twisted her throttle-grip all the way to the max-thrust detent and then a little farther to engage afterburner mode.

Finite Middletons (Freshman year, Stamos Home, Crystal is preparing to go to Ron's house and thinking of a mission they went on, Saturday after meeting with Yamanouchi, 4:45 PM)

Crystal really liked Ron. She was even thinking perhaps graduating to "like-like," but she was cautious about dating and romance (ever since the dating fiasco with Ramone Roth. Don't ask. Seriously, just don't.)

Crystal had been secretly dating Ron for over a month. The secret was that Ron apparently didn't know they were dating. They met before school for running and sparring under the watchful eye of Yoriko Tanaka, Ron's trainer, and the live-in assistant to the Stoppables. They had gone to four movies, met at the mall several times for dinner and video games. She and Ron were scheduled for a late dinner and an even later movie that evening. She had planned to clue the clueless blond in on their dating situation and maybe do a little making out in the dark theater, but Ron found her between classes and said that he couldn't make it, that he had to help make a delivery to a disaster area and would be gone for a couple of days.

She never knew why she asked the question, it seemed like a good idea at the time, a question that any good-hearted young woman would naturally ask. A question that was now posted on the wall in the MHS girls locker room under the heading of "Things to never, ever say to Ron Stoppable."

"Can I help?"

Twenty-four hours later, she had asked teachers for assignments she expected to miss, made an emergency run to Club Banana for boots, long skirts, conservative long-sleeved tops, and headscarves and now was racing across the Atlantic riding in a colorful giant cargo airship piloted by a crazy Scotsman and his niece. The airship was carrying seventeen tons of transformers and generator parts along with her, Ron, Kim, Rufus, and Raider Costa Sideris from the Delta Raider Squadron (Greek Special Forces).

The mission involved the delivery of generator parts to a small town in the middle of nowhere in Yemen. At least Ron and Kim said it was Yemen. From the air, it looked like some desolate alien planet, just dirt and rocks with the only green found in canyons that looked like they had been carved into the desert by long-gone ancient rivers. She had returned from that trip resolved to study world history and international politics because something was seriously screwed up with that part of the world. The report was that an earthquake had messed up the town's generators and the roads. Even though Yemen shares a border with Saudi Arabia, the parts they were delivering were purchased from a company in Canada, and a Scottish firm was hired to deliver it with the financing going through a Greek bank. There had to be severe politics and kickbacks involved. Raider Sideris was additional security and assigned to Global Justice Peacekeeping forces. Kim was not happy to hear that, but the young man was too busy flirting with Kate, Duff Killigan's niece, to talk about his job responsibilities. Or maybe he just didn't want to worry the young heroes with details. Raider Sideris was delighted to find that Crystal was a dual American/Greek citizen and even spoke a little Greek. He insisted that she would be best used acting as the bank's assistant manager trainee in charge of making sure the goods were delivered.

While she and Kim went over delivery manifests with the Raider, Ron and Rufus napped. When Crystal asked Kim if that was normal, her old cheer captain snickered and said, "Usually," but then looked thoughtfully at her snoozing partners and added, "They are worried about this mission, and want to be well-rested." After a break for a snack, Raider Sideris started an impromptu lesson on "Greek 101: How to Swear in Greek." Both young women thought that was being silly, but in the few hours they would be on the ground, both found themselves muttering "malakas" (a-hole, jerk) too many times.

Crystal was asleep, wrapped tightly in a sleeping cabin's "bed burrito" when the airship started to vibrate, waking her. Looking around, she saw little beady eyes looking at her.

"Bathroom!" squeaked Rufus, "Dress! Show-time!"

Squeezing out of the restraining safety blankets, she stopped by the tiny restroom, quickly changed into boots, a long skirt and matching top, grabbed a headscarf and with Rufus climbing onto her shoulder, walked down the passageway running the length of the ship toward the gondola. Sliding down the ladder, she saw the captain looking grimly through the windscreen and his first (and only) officer carefully examining her radar and telemetry displays.

"Kate?" asked the kilt-wearing captain.

"No radars on us, no satellites overhead, Uncle," she replied.

"Is something wrong, Captain Killigan?"

Killigan spun the airship's wheel, and the airship turned around to retrace its path.

"Call me Duff, lassie. I've na seen many earthquake-damaged areas, but I ken bombs make round craters," the explosives expert said.

"Bombs? You mean this wasn't a natural disaster? Where are Ron and Kim?" Crystal wondered if she missed something and was supposed to be somewhere else.

"Ron and Kim parachuted down with the Raider on our first pass to make sure we are expected and welcome," Kate pointed to a video display from either a drone or some sort of camera with a heck of a zoom lens. She continued, "Next time, I'll do a serious check. The money was good and there wasn't any mention of armed conflict."

Kim was standing talking to a group of men, in addition to the ones that looked like locals, there were a dozen men dressed in muted fatigues wearing a winged sword emblem on their berets. Raider Sideris had pulled a couple of those aside and were talking to them. Looking for Ron, she eventually spotted him checking the perimeter or something.

He, like Kim, was covered head to toe, but unlike Kim, instead of a dark one-piece garment, he was wearing a white Ninja uniform top and hood with a white kilt and heavy white socks going into white tabi. The odd part was that nobody seemed to be paying attention to him.

His voice was heard coming out of a speaker, "Killigan, did you know that we were coming to a freaking war zone?"

"I swear I dinnae ken it was a hot battlefield, laddie! I'd never brought the lassies into danger! Betty Director herself said that the mere presence of you and Kimberly would make the parties think twice about messing with the delivery of these goods."

"OK, well, we're here, so let's just dump and scoot. Set down in the parking lot, they've got the craters filled in with gravel with steel plates on top. You are two weeks sooner than anyone expected you to get here, I'm hoping that's a good thing. Popping a smoke."

A small plume of green smoke appeared in the middle of the parking lot.

"Is that so we know it's the right spot or to let Captain Killigan see the wind speed and direction?" Crystal asked Kate.

"It's a little of both," replied Kate.

The tartan covered airship put down to unload next to the ruins of the old generating station. The problem in delivering tons of stuff, when a few of the items require a heavy crane to move, and the recipient doesn't have a heavy crane, is you can't just dump and scoot. Certain parts need to be placed next to, and in two cases, on top of another part.

Crystal was a natural loadmaster. Unload-mistress? She met the local engineers in the cargo bay with her clipboard with manifest and Rufus on her shoulder providing quiet commentary and the occasional translation. She quickly came up with a plan to unload everything so that the local engineers could assemble everything while at the same time, minimize the number of times the airship needed to move.

Crystal initially had difficulty in getting cooperation from the small group of young men assigned to help unload. None wanted to be told what to do by a woman, many did not want to work throughout the night. Just seeing a small redhead and a skinny white guy helping unload and move outrageously heavy equipment was enough to shame most of them into helping. Both Kim and Crystal got to use their new favorite word, "malakas." Once, she swore that Kim walked past muttering something about sucking on a body part that Crystal was confident that her former cheer captain didn't have; they had shared locker rooms. Ron intercepted an angry-looking young tough who has started to follow Kim, after all, he probably could guess what she said from her tone, not to mention that it was his actions that had set her off. He and some of his associates had also given Crystal a hard time. Sharp words followed and Ron led the tough around the corner of a building followed by two of the tough's companions. Crystal quickly finished directing two workers which containers were to be unloaded next then started to jog after her running buddy because she figured he needed backup.

"What's up?" Ron asked, coming back around the corner.

"Oh, Ron. Uh, nothing, just thought I'd check and see if you needed backup."

The blond looked surprised. "Really? Thanks. I just told those guys that American girls, particularly ones delivering parts your town needs to turn the lights back on, deserve courtesy and respect."

"Uh, thanks, I guess. You didn't cause an international incident or anything?"

"Me?" Ron grinned, "Nope, no trouble at all. They even gave me these cool souvenirs for you and Kim." Ron said, handing her a sheathed dagger, the dagger was curved, but the sheath was J shaped.

"A knife?" Crystal looked skeptically at the blade, drawing it and looking at it.

"Begum Stamas," an older man walked up, "We are ready for the transformers, if you could move the airship, please"

"OK, be right there." Crystal let Ron take the dagger back, replace it in the scabbard and tuck it into her sash, "Come on Ron, come help with the transformer."

"Yes, boss."


Once the sun went down, Ron shed all his clothes above his kilt. Several times, Crystal found herself mesmerized by the strength in his lean body and the movement of muscles and tendons moving under his pale skin glistening with sweat under the floodlights attached to the airship.

The sun was well into the sky the next morning when they had completed.

"Begum Stamas, Begum Possible," the senior power plant engineer walked up to where Kim and Crystal were doing final minute checks on the invoices.

"Your servants," he nodded to Ron and Killigan who flanked him, "tell me that you have urgent business to get to, but I beg your indulgence in stopping by my humble house to refresh yourselves and have a light meal before departing."

Kim looked at Ron who subtly nodded. Killigan just looked unhappy.

"We are pressed for time, but certainly our next clients will understand that we could not refuse such a kind and gracious offer," Kim smiled then in a stern voice commanded, "Duff, get ready to depart. Ron, follow us."

They were whisked off to baths by the engineer's daughters. Ron followed and stood by emotionless and at parade rest as the daughters helped them wash and dress in clean black robes. If Crystal wasn't so mind-numbingly exhausted, she would have said something about Ron being present. He wasn't leering at them or even looking at them, but still, it seemed odd.

While the daughters were drying their hair, Crystal heard Kim snort with laughter. Looking at Kim, she saw the redhead mouth "later." Ron insisted on putting sashes around their waist and Rufus placed their "souvenir" daggers in them.

Feeling clean and refreshed, Kim and Crystal were led to a table loaded with pastries, fruit and tea service. Ron appeared a couple of minutes later with a duffel bag with their old clothes. The girls had a pleasant half-hour listening to the engineer talk about his struggles to get the town into modern times and Kim spoke of some of her adventures. Rufus sampled pastries while Ron stood grimly off to the side in bodyguard mode.

Ron's Kimmunicator warbled a warning and there was a loud whoosh from outside.

"Mistress, time to leave." Ron had on his "serious face." It was such a serious face that the Senior Engineer skipped 99% of the standard formal farewell protocol, simply shook Kim and Crystal's hands, gave Rufus a high five and let them leave with a simple "thank you."

"Killigan, what's the stitch?", Kim asked as Ron pulled her up into the gondola. Crystal grabbed onto the redhead to steady her because as soon as Ron shut the hatch, the airship lifted straight up like an express elevator. Throughout the night, the airship had taken on the water to make up the lost weight of the equipment as it was unloaded. Killigan dumped a lot of it, giving the craft plenty of lift to spare.

"We detected airborne radar - AWACS, I think," said Kate, "Uncle fired off one of our only two anti-radiation missiles."

"Kate, they aren't for sitting around looking pretty, they are to be used," was the gruff reply, "Besides, we don't want to kill anyone or start a war today, that missile has zero chance to actually hitting an AWACS."

"Captain Killigan, why would you shoot a missile that you know won't hit the target?" Crystal asked.

The Scotsman laughed, "Because they don't know that or at least they aren't sure, right Kate?"

"The radar signal disappeared thirty seconds after launch and the missile won't go past them for another two minutes. I'm guessing they launched decoys and dove for the deck. By the time they get back online, we should be cruising at 65,000 feet in stealth mode."


The airship was not an SR-71. Specifically, it could not fly faster at extreme altitudes. Wade couldn't find any evidence that anyone was hunting them, he claimed that the AWACS they fired their missile at was on a training run, at least according to filed flight plans. Raider Sideris, back in the town, reported that the local engineers expected to have the power back on by noon of the next day. He and the rest of the peacekeepers would keep watch on the town and the surrounding area.

Killigan insisted on quietly slipping back to Scotland, switching to his smaller, faster, "personal" airship and from there, take the teens home.

Kate and Killigan claimed that they had taken turns napping and would continue to do so, but the teens should get some real sleep.

Kim and Crystal decided to share a double sleeper cabin. Slipping into the bed, Crystal asked,

"In the shower, you laughed and when I looked at you, you said, "Later. What was so funny?"

"Remember how the engineer called Duff and Ron, 'our servants'?"

Kim pulled the restraining covers tight, their purpose was to prevent sleepers from being thrown to the floor in case of sudden turbulence. She continued,

"Because of the way they were dressed, they assumed that Ron and Killigan were eunuchs and our personal servants."

As both girls pealed with laughter, there was a thumping on the wall and they heard Ron yell, "It's a kilt, not a skirt!"

Finite Middletons (Freshman year, Crystal has arrived at Ron's house, Saturday after meeting with Yamanouchi, 5:30 PM)

Crystal Stamas had walked down the sidewalk past Kim Possible's house and over to the next block where Ron's house was located. She asked for a ride, but she got no sympathy from her mom, it was a bright, sunny late afternoon, not too cold, she was a track star and had been drilling in martial arts with Ron and his Kung Fu trainer most mornings before school, and it was less than a mile between their homes.

Crystal didn't believe in fate, destiny, or unicorns that farted rainbows, but sometimes she had to wonder. Take today, for example. Her mom ran into Mrs. Stoppable at the grocery store this morning. Mrs. Stoppable mentioned that Ron would be home later that afternoon, that his mission was complete. Mrs. Stamas said that Crystal's ten-year-old sister was having a massive sleepover that night. Before the shopper in front of them in the checkout line got through half her coupons, the two moms decided to cut Crystal a break by allowing her to avoid the general commotion and craziness of a house full of nine and ten-year-old girls by letting her spend the night at the Stoppable house.

Life, as usual, was busy for her and Ron both since they got back from their mission to Yemen. This would be the first chance she would have to resume her plan to "make Ron my boyfriend." That is, assuming she still wanted him that way. At the very least, she figured that she would have alone-time with him tonight to get to know Ron a little better and having seen him in mission mode would help keep him honest. Unlike Kim on a previous mission, she hadn't slept next to Ron wrapped tightly in his arms and under the safety restraining covers. Not that she would have "done" anything or that she thought that Kim had, but it would be nice to sleep cuddled up to him. She knew the Stoppables had Japanese style baths. A frisson of excitement of the thought of bathing naked with the blond ran down her spine. Crystal was a good girl by any measurement you would care to make, but bathing in this manner was close enough in her mind to "naughty" to make her feel like she was pushing a boundary. Just to make sure she didn't lose her nerve, she had not packed a bathing suit.

As she approached his house, she saw a couple unload bags of groceries from a car, wave at the driver and the car drove off.

The pair was a small slender blonde along with a huge dark-haired guy. She would have recognized the couple anywhere; it was Justine Flanner and "Big Mike Little." Justine wasn't really small, she just looked small standing next to Big Mike. Most people looked small standing next to Big Mike.

"Hi, guys!" Crystal called out, "Need any help with the bags?"

"We're fine, thanks for asking. But if you could get the door for us, Crystal, that would help," replied Mike.

The dark-haired girl noticed that Justine's face had lit up the tiniest bit when Mike said her name.

'Well,' she thought, 'no reason for Justine to know who I am by sight, and I am out of uniform after all.'

"Crystal, I need to talk to you," the blonde genius said, "I have a theory about Ron."

Going into the house, they found Jeanie Stoppable in the kitchen scrubbing potatoes alongside her husband, Gene who was slicing the scrubbed tubers into French fry slices.

"Hi kids," Ron's dad said, "Ron and Kim are up in his bedroom on a conference call with Wade and Global Justice. Seeing how neither of them looked happy when they went up to start the call, I figure it will be a while before they come down and we can start grilling."

"That's fine, Mr. Stoppable, in the meantime, Mike will put away the groceries and help start the charcoal. I need to talk to Crystal." Justine put action to words and taking her target by the hand, towed her out the door to the living room and headed to the den.

"Mike, dear," Mrs. Stoppable asked with an almost laugh, "is Justine still trying to prove that the universe will only allow Kim to be Ron's girlfriend?"

"Mrs. Stoppable," Mike said in earnest, "she's got maths and equations working to support her. I've learned not to go in against Justine when math is on the line. That's almost as well-known a blunder as getting involved…"

"In a land war in Asia," Mr. Stoppable finished the saying, with both men laughing and Mrs. Stoppable rolling her eyes.


"The Friday before last you and Ron had a date scheduled where you were planning on confessing your undying love for him, right?" Justine got directly to the point, sitting the suspect down in an armchair and standing in front of her.

"No!," Crystal claimed, "Who told you that? Besides, we don't do 'dates', we just go out and do stuff."

"You've gone out several times a week for over a month and nothing romantic happened?" the blonde investigator continued.

"That's right, Ron is clueless, he never even tried to kiss me goodnight or anything."

"So, you decided to take matters into your own hands, maybe dinner to carb-load him and then a late movie where you would take advantage of his reduced reaction time and assault him with your lips!" the interrogation was getting fierce. Or would have except that Justine got a little too much into her role-playing and was starting to snicker.

"Ok, you've got me!" the dark-haired suspect confessed with a grin. "Seriously," she continued, "I was going to ask him if he wanted to be my boyfriend. Any lip-locking assault would have been after that."

"Didn't you think it was strange that a sudden mission pops up to interfere with your plan?" Justine pulled over a chair and sat down.

"No, not really, missions just happen, right?"

"I'm not convinced. Statistically speaking, Ron should have a girlfriend. But it seems like the universe doesn't like the idea."

"The universe, really?"

"Well, something, I don't believe in an old bearded sky-patriarch controlling people's fate, leprechauns, evil witches with curses, none of that crap. But Ron seems to be really unlucky, more unlucky that can be described by random chance. For example, at one time I was betting that Ron would end up with either Jessica or Tara. Both are good friends, both were a little interested, both tried dating him, but something always came up and both ended up with boyfriends that were conveniently always available at the right time. The interference wasn't always a mission and often it was something that came up to cause Jessica or Tara to cancel."

"You're telling me that I should give up?"

"No, not at all. Ron would be a great boyfriend, just ask Kim, they were boyfriend/girlfriend for most of the 7th grade. Just be prepared to be persistent."


Crystal eased down into the hot water with the ridiculously small towel folded and sitting on top of her head.

"This is great," she sighed.

"It would be better if Yoriko were here instead of Mrs. Stoppable. She would let us all soak in the same tub," Justine grumped as she blew her boyfriend in the other hot tub a kiss., "but no, Hiero couldn't be without his baby-mama-san, so he insisted that she go with him to take Jim and Tim to their uncle's ranch."

After a bit of general gossip, Crystal turned to Kim,

"Do you have any problems with me dating Ron?"

The redhead looked startled, but quickly recovered, "I don't own Ron, who he dates is up to him." After a pause she answered the real question, "I think you wouldn't mistreat Ron, so I wouldn't tell Ron not to date you or anything like that."

"Is Ron a good guy to date?" the question was asked quietly, "Is there anything I need to watch out for?"

"I don't know," the redhead looked uncomfortable with the topic, "I've been his friend forever. He's a nice guy, he was a good boyfriend, he's not going to yell at you or try to coerce you to do anything you don't want to do or anything like that. He used to be sort of a little bit of a slacker, but something lit a fire under him for the last couple of years."

"I bet it's Yoriko, she a real taskmaster." said the potential girlfriend.

"Maybe. I did hear that some girl started running and sparing with him, maybe that had something to do with it?" Kim grinned at the dark-haired girl. "Anyway, he might be gone for time to time on missions. You went on the last one, you might not want to go on future ones."

"Why is that?"

"Ron worries a lot. On our first trip riding on Killigan's airship, he woke up and practically ripped off my nightshirt, looking for blood. He had a nightmare that I had been shot. You might find that Ron will sleep better at night if you stay at home, safe."

The discussion turned to past missions and general happenings at school.

Finite Middletons (Freshman year, Ron's house, Sunday Morning (technically), 1:30 AM)

"Psst! Crystal, wake up, I need you," Justine gently shook her, "be quiet, don't wake up Kim, she needs the sleep."

Kim watched them through slitted eyes. The pair slipped out of the den and headed for the basement.

She felt like she should object to anyone dating "her Ron", but was distracted by an itch on her arm.

"Good luck, Ron," she murmured, rolled over, scratched the sparkling itchy patch on her arm and went back to sleep.

"What are we doing?" Crystal whispered to the blonde genius

"Bishop, the house Artificial Intelligence, does not allow anyone to soak in a tub by themselves. Three is better. I want to soak with Mike. I am working on getting him used to more physical contact with me. Nothing outrageous, just touching places that jogging shorts don't cover."

"So, I'm just supposed to sit there while you two make out?"

"Don't be gross," Justine opened the door to the baths, pointing to the tub farthest from the door where a blond was already soaking.

"You wanted to talk to Ron, alone is probably best if you want to do some assault with lips."


Author's notes

My special thanks to Uberscribbler and Mindless Violence Fan for their PMs around the first of the year. Their messages greatly lifted my spirits.

disctionarydotcom defines frisson as "a sudden feeling or sensation of excitement, emotion, or thrill."

Credits

Check the details in my profile, but basically,

Disney owns Kim Possible and all related characters.

Sentinel103 was a source and inspiration for details of Yamanouchi Ninjas. Specifically Wanda and Suzy (Wendy and Subira)

ST103, CB73, and Daccu65 continue to help with story ideas. Thanks guys!