Cleo could feel the presence of the flames, but thanks to the personal force field she'd just created, they didn't affect her. Almost as suddenly as it appeared, the blaze was gone, and Cleo finally got the chance to look around. She sincerely hoped that Ron hadn't been hurt, she'd positioned herself in front of him to protect him from the attack she'd known would come.

Cleo instinctively checked behind her to see if Ron was alright. He was slowly rising to his feet, his hair a bit singed, but that was the extent of his injuries. "Are you OK?' Cleo asked, giving him a helping hand up to his feet.

"Yeah-yeah, I'm alright." Ron saw the police officers at the same time and both gasped. (Cleo's was faked of course.) They were unconscious and badly burned.

Ron turned to Scorcher, who just stood there grinning. "You-you killed them," he accused.

"Killed them? No, dear boy I did not kill them. I chose to merely incapacitate those unfortunate law enforcement officials." His smirk turned into a scowl. "Don't expect that I will do you the same courtesy." He put his hands together and shot a stream of fire at Ron, who dodged to the side. Cleo took the opportunity to attack, ducking under the line of fire (pun intended) and striking Scorcher with a graceful, yet powerful back kick to the groin. Even through the armor, the impact was enough to make Scorcher double over in pain, and stop with the offensive.

WHAM! Cleo heard the impact, but she didn't see Ron until Scorcher had already gone down. Ron had snuck up behind the supervillain and simply hit him as hard as possible with a two handed blow. Scorcher didn't look like he would be getting up any time soon, perhaps Ron had unknowingly struck a vital nerve cluster in the back of Scorcher's neck.  Cleo grinned at him. "You took him out," she said. "Hard."

Ron shrugged. "It's a little maneuver that Kim-" His eyes went wide in mid-sentence. "Kim! She didn't come up yet, but Scorcher did. Something must have happened to her" He checked to make sure that more police were coming in to secure the Scorcher, and then raced towards the open vault entrance. Sighing, Cleo followed suit..

They cleared the stairs in a matter of seconds and almost bowled right into Kim, who was at the foot of the stairs. Instantly, Ron could tell something was wrong. Kim was feeling along the walls and had a hand over her eyes.

"What happened?" Cleo asked Kim.

Kim raised her head. "Ron? Cleo?"

"Yeah, its us," Ron assured her. "Now why are you-"

"He caught me in the eyes with that lighter fluid stuff, I can't see."

Cleo had to work to suppress a snicker.

Ron took out his Communicator and flipped it on. There sat Wade on the screen, eating a hoagie. "Hey Ron, he said, whaddup? You defuse the situation yet?"

"Yeah. We got a problem though, Kim got some kind of flammable liquid in her eyes. She can't see."

Wade was interesting in hearing how Kim Possible had managed to get it in her eyes, but decided to ask about that later. Do you have any residue?" he asked.

Kim nodded in response to the question, she began to furiously rub her eyes. "How-how much do you need, Wade?"

"Not much."

Kim reached up to her temple and rubbed her finger against it, taking with it some of the fluid remnants. She pulled out her own Kimmunicator, wiped her finger against a small fold out tab, and then folded it back in.

Wade furiously typed on his computer for about a minute before giving a low whistle. "Boy," he said, "you sure are lucky. Apparently, this stuff should do no permanent damage, and if you wash your eyes out your vision will be good as new. Funny though, I've never seen a substance like this . . .but oh well, I'll examine it more thoroughly later." Wade leaned forward, his eyes turning to where Cleo was. "Now who's she?" he asked, his voice not at its most genial at all.

Cleo's eyebrows went up when she realized he was referring to her. She let Ron give Wade what he thought was the correct answer, that she was a new girl who'd just recently come to Midleton. Cleo even managed to affect a look of surprise, as if all that had happened was just overwhelming her.

"Why is she here then?" Wade asked, frowning.

Kim glared at Cleo. "We sure didn't ask her to tag along."

Even with that flammable crap in her eyes, she still finds time to make jabs at me Cleo thought with some amusement.

Ron in turn glared at Kim and said, "But she's really been a big help, so its no problem."

Wade still seemed to harbor reservations, but said nothing more on the subject. "I'll get a high speed chopper over there to get you back to school as soon as possible," he told them.

"Thank Wade." Ron clicked his communicator off and pocketed it.

Kim had stopped rubbing her eyes and was now blinking with reckless abandon. "How did you beat him?" she asked. 'That guy with the fire, I mean."

"Cleo's mostly to thank, said Ron, "I K.O.'d him at the end. You should have seen Cleo in action, she had him under control in no time." Ron turned to Cleo, "your dad must have done a pretty doggone good job training you, I still don't know how you can be so good."

Cleo blushed, and it was actually real, no pretending this time. "I'm a good learner I guess."

Kim shook her head in something reminiscent of disgust, watching how tight Ron and Cleo were becoming. "I'm gonna go find some water for my eyes," she muttered, leaving the two to exchange flirtatious compliments by themselves while waiting for the helicopter that would come pick them and take them back to school. Kim had helped beat the Scorcher, but she felt as if she was losing something else, her friendship with Ron. It certainly felt as if Cleo was muscling in, taking over what Kim had always taken for granted. The thought bothered the teenage superhero more than she would admit, even to herself.