I don't own them. I don't own anything. Geez, just get me a gun so I can end this.
The Lazarus Factor
Chapter 10 - Burnt Bridges
"A man who has never made a woman angry is a failure in life" - Christopher Morley
It was a small group that piled into the van to find Kim. The sensei, Yori, Lt. Yun, and two others. But what they lacked in numbers, they made up for in equipment. Yori and the other two fighters had several weapons strapped and hidden on them while Lt. Yun had borrowed a shotgun and a couple tear gas canisters from a patrol car. They followed the signal of Kim's walkie-talkie to the abandoned steel mills.
"She's in one of the warehouses," Yori stated, staring up at the buildings.
"What makes you think so?" Yun looked around, trying to get an exact location for the signal.
"They're wide open," Yori explained, "she can lock the door. No where for him to run." The sensei nodded and looked toward Lt. Yun. All the steel was disrupting the radio's signal, but soon Yun pointed over to one of the warehouses.
"There," he shouted, "she's in that one." Yori's blood ran cold. She could see from here that the door to the warehouse was open. She prayed that they had arrived before Ron, for she knew that if Ron had shown up, Kim would have closed the door to keep him from slipping away. 'She wanted it to end', Yori thought, 'she was determined to end it here'. Yori only hoped that determination was enough. The group ran over to the warehouse and Lt. Yun and one of the fighters pulled the doors completely open. They walked in and Yori screamed in shock and grief.
Kim was laying face down on the ground, a small stream of dark red blood oozed its way across the floor. Her face was turned toward the door and they could see the blank stare in her wide open eyes, her mouth hung open, blood and saliva mixing underneath.
Yori was the first to move. She ran over to Kim, crying, kneeling down and carefully turning her over. Lt. Yun was already calling 911 on his cell phone as the others moved over to the lifeless body. The sensei looked down at Yori, kneeling in Kim's blood, crying over her motionless friend. A horrible agony was in his eyes as he knelt down. He closed his eyes and laid a hand on Kim's forehead, tilting his head as if listening for something.
"Is....is she....she," Yori looked at the old man, waiting anxiously for his answer. The sensei frowned.
"There is a small spark," the old man said quietly, "but it is already fading away. I am not sure she will survive." He looked sadly at his young student, grief and guilt apparent on his face. That guilt was mirrored in Yori's own feelings. How could she have been so selfish? To abandon her friend just because of her own petty fears. A small voice inside her insisted that the fear was not petty, but it did nothing to make her feel better.
"An ambulance is on the way," Lt. Yun walked up behind Yori, pausing he looked to the sensei, "should we call her parents?" The question was not an easy one. If they called the Possibles, their existence might be discovered, not to mention the explanation of how she was shot which would end up involving the Stoppables as well.
"We have to call them," Yori continued to cry, still holding Kim's body.
"Of course we will child," the sensei soothed her, "but we cannot reveal ourselves." He looked to Lt. Yun who nodded.
"I'll take care of it," he said simply as the ambulance sirens started to draw near.
"Thank you Yun," the sensei bowed, "now the rest of us must depart, quickly."
"No," Yori shook her head frantically, "I can't leave her. I've got to stay."
"I could tell them she was a witness," Lt. Yun offered. The sensei smiled gratefully at him, and placing a hand on Yori's head for a second, turned and left with the others. The ambulance arrived a couple seconds after they left. Lt. Yun gently pulled Yori away as the paramedics began working on Kim. They did their best to stop the bleeding and gently loaded her onto the gurney, putting her into the ambulance. Yori and Yun road in the back with one of the paramedics while he used a mask and breather to try and get Kim breathing again.
When they got to the hospital it was around 1:50am. Yori and Yun were told to wait while Kim was rushed into the emergency room. The Possibles showed up soon after, frantically asking every doctor and nurse they passed were their daughter was. Yori watched numbly as Lt. Yun went to meet them.
"Mr. and Mrs. Possible?" Yun walked up to the two parents.
"Are you the officer that called us?" Mrs. Possible ran over to Yun, "What happened? Is she alright?"
"Is she stable?" Mr. Possible walked up behind his wife, placing his hands on her shoulders, "Can we see her yet?"
"Please," Lt. Yun motioned to the chairs along the wall, "sit down." The three walked over and sat down a couple seats away from Yori. "As I'm sure your daughter told you, she was assisting the police in the investigation of the vandalizing of Ronald Stoppable's grave. She followed a lead down to the steel mills on 54th street alone. She had a police radio with her, but we were not able to get to her before she was shot." Yun knew it was a flimsy story, but the Possibles were so concerned for their daughter that they didn't question it.
"Is she with you?" Mrs. Possible asked shakily, looking over to Yori.
"She was nearby when the shooting occurred," Yun nodded, "and I want to question her on anything she may have seen or heard." Mr. Possible looked rather suspiciously at Yori's clothing. The black form-fitting outfit DID look somewhat odd. Yun had reminded her to leave her weapons with the others when they left, but the belts and straps that they hooked to were still there. But once again, Kim's well being over-shadowed any doubts he might have had.
They waited for hours, Mrs. Possible often getting up and pacing the floor, unable to sit still. When the doctor finally came out of the operating room time seemed to slow down for the four waiting people. Yori could have sworn that it took the doctor 15 minutes to walk over to them.
"Mr. and Mrs. Possible," he asked the two parents who nodded, looking like deer caught in headlights. "Well, we've got her stabilized. She was very lucky, the bullet didn't hit any organs, which is honestly, a miracle given where she was shot. It went between her lungs, under her heart and just above her stomach. If you HAD to be shot in the torso, that's where you'd want to be shot." He paused, wiping off his glasses as he continued, "I won't lie to you though. It's still touch and go right now. She lost a lot of blood and there's still a chance she could take a turn for the worse. We should have a better idea of her chances in the next couple hours."
"Can we see her?" Tears rolled freely down Mrs. Possible's face.
"You can look in on her through the observation window," the doctor pointed down the hall, "but you'll need to wait a couple hours until we're sure she's going to pull through." The Possibles thanked the doctor and hurried down the hall, followed closely by Yori and Lt. Yun. None of them spoke as they reached the window, Mrs. Possible covering her mouth with her hands and crying into her husband's shoulder. Kim lay on the table inside, a white sheet covering her up to the neck. A tube ran from her mouth and an IV was in each arm. Blood could still be seen on the sheet and on her neck and arms.
None of the four left the window for the next two and a half hours, watching various doctors and nurses check Kim's IVs and read-outs. After about three hours the doctor returned.
"She's still relatively stable and the blood transfusions seem to be working," he spoke calmly and slowly, trying to relieve the panicked group, "we'll be moving her to a room where you can sit with her. She'll probably be out of it for quite a while, but barring any unseen complications, I think she'll pull through." The Possibles fell into each other's arms, crying in relief.
"I'm going to call sensei and let him know," Lt. Yun whispered to Yori, who nodded, tears running freely from her eyes.
It took about 15 minutes for Kim to be moved from the operating room to an actual bed. Mr. and Mrs. Possible followed the doctors the entire time, sitting quietly with Kim after they had left. Yori wanted to go in with them, but she was only supposed to be a witness, and the parents might get suspicious if she insisted on being there. So instead she waited outside the door, listening carefully for the rhythmic beeping of Kim's heart monitor. Lt. Yun had been forced to leave briefly to fill out a report on what happened. Yori hoped that the other officers believed his story, she'd feel bad if he got in trouble for helping, even if he was a member of their order.
Inside the room Mrs. Possible sat in a chair beside Kim's bed, her husband stood behind her, his hands resting on her shoulders.
"You know," Mrs. Possible started quietly, "I always knew that something like this could happen, but I never really worried about it much. I'm really not sure how. It seems like something that I WOULD worry about." Mr. Possible frowned at the guilty tone in his wife's voice.
"It wasn't any lack of thought on our part," he said, sadly, "I never worried much about it either, but I think that was mostly because of Kim. She never made it seem dangerous."
"True," Mrs. Possible smiled, "she always acted like it was more of a fun hobby than anything dangerous. I guess it just seemed for anything to actually happen to her."
"Though her missions seem to have gotten a little more dangerous recently," her husband added, "she's been hurt a lot more recently."
"Do..." Mrs. Possible looked up at her husband, "... do you think we should make her stop?" They had discussed this before, but had always put off making a decision. Mr. Possible looked down at his wife and smiled.
"Knowing Kimmy, do you really think we could make her?" Mrs. Possible smiled at her husband and squeezed his hand. "No," he continued, "this is Kim's life and we have to support her. But I think we CAN impose a few more precautions on her after this."
"Like what," his wife smiled, "a bullet-proof jacket?"
"I was thinking more along the lines of a tank," Mrs. Possible laughed at her husband's joke, leaning back into his arms. They watched Kim for a few minutes in silence until Mr. Possible finally spoke. "I'm going to see if I can find that police officer. I'd like to ask him more about what happened to Ron's grave." Mrs. Possible nodded. 'How horrible was that,' she thought to herself as her husband exited the room. She could only imagine how Kim must have reacted when she found out. The Possibles had gone over to the Stoppables house when they had heard. The two were in a terrible state. Mrs. Stoppable couldn't stop crying. Looking up at Kim, Mrs. Possible wondered why all their children seemed to be suffering so much all of a sudden. She scratched her neck, feeling a prick like an insect bite. Sitting back in the chair she stared at Kim, the beeping of her monitor a constant but reassuring rhythm. She suddenly felt very tired. Her head slumped forward as her eyelids closed. She was soon sound asleep and couldn't see the figure that climbed through the window.
Ron looked around the room. He had used a small, drug-tipped needle fired through a blowgun to knock out Mrs. Possible and hoped to be gone before her husband came back. Reaching into his pocket he pulled out one of the small wooden beads. Clenching the bead in his hand he closed his eyes, his brow furrowing in concentration. For a couple seconds the room was silent, then the slow beeping of the hear monitor slightly increased in pace. Kim stirred slightly in her bed, her eyes blinking open. It looked like she tried to say something, but ended up gagging on the tube in her throat.
Ron walked over, pulling the tube from her mouth and taking out the IV needles. For a while they just stared at each other, neither saying anything nor showing any emotion in their expressions.
"So, " Ron finally said in a calm, conversational tone, "how have you been?"
"Okay," Kim's voice was still a little weak, "considering." Ron nodded.
"I thought I should apologize," he said, sitting down on a nearby table, "but seems stupid now. Apologizing for shooting your best friend."
"And knocking me out at the club," Kim said.
"Yeah."
"And killing over a dozen people."
"Okay"
"And not telling me your alive."
"All right, I get the point," he held up his hands in surrender. They were silent for a moment, until Kim finally spoke again.
"So how am I here," the last thing she remembered was seeing the gun in Ron's hand and given where she was shot, she was amazed she was still alive.
"Well," Ron explained, "as stupid as it sounds, I WAS really careful when I shot you." He was right, it DID sound stupid. "What I mean is, I didn't hit any internal organs or anything. I figured the others would get you help before you bled to death, but they didn't show up as soon as I thought they would, so I got worried."
"How do you know when they showed up?" Kim looked down at her lap as she spoke.
"I hid up in the rafters to make sure someone came in time," Ron continued, "I was worried when they took so long, so I came here after mostly everyone had left." Kim looked over at her unconscious mother.
"Will she be okay?" It was more a statement than a question, but Ron answered anyway.
"Yeah, it's just a powerful sleeping drug. I actually got the plants for it from that herb shop's garden." He paused, looking over at Kim. "Listen," he said, "I went too far. I know that seems obvious, but I don't know what else to say. I snuck in here to try to use this," he held up the wooden bead, "its power is restoration, and while it's not as powerful as it would be when combined with the others, I thought that it might be enough to put you safely out of danger." Kim sat, looking down for a while, thinking.
"Before," she said finally, "What you said before; you called me your best friend. Am I still your best friend?" It was a question that had plagued Kim for the past several hours. Ever since the club, she had convinced herself that her Ron was dead, and this new Ron was a completely different person. Now, however, with him sitting across from her, talking with her and learning that he had actually watched to make sure she would be okay; now she wasn't sure.
"Yes," he answered her, "though I realize I may not be yours anymore." Kim looked up at him, narrowing her eyes.
"Why did you do it?" she asked bluntly, "Why are you after these beads, why did you have to kill those people?" Ron was acting a little more like his old self, but his recent actions still overshadowed any tenderness he might be showing now. Ron sighed, looking at Kim as he began to explain.
"It's kind of hard to explain," he said slowly, "When I first woke up, or came back from the dead or whatever, I was confused. But as soon as I held the Lotus Blade I suddenly knew all this stuff. I knew the history of the Blade, the rosary, the people who took it, everything."
"How did you come back?" Another question that had haunted Kim.
"I can't really explain it technically," he said, frowning, "the best I can say is that the Lotus Blade needed me and so it brought me back." He stopped for a second, staring at the floor, as if trying to come up with the words he needed. "It was like it gave me a piece of itself and forcing that piece in shook up some of the stuff that was already in there." He sighed, "I'm afraid I'm not making much sense."
"And the rosary?" Kim prompted.
"Well, from what I learned from the Blade, the rosary was taken by the Zenryoku, a clan of ninja that's been around for two or three centuries. In order to hide the rosary from those seeking it, they separated the beads and sewed them into the chests of the most powerful of their warriors. As each warrior died it was passed to the child or student of his or her choice. They scattered across the world, protecting the beads and training another to take over when they died."
"So why are they all here in Middleton?" Most of this was pretty much what the old sensei had guessed, so Kim was keeping up pretty well.
"None of the ninja were powerful enough to use the rosary, so the idea was to protect the beads until one of their order achieved this power."
"And someone has?"
"Yes, and now all the beads are being drawn to him."
"And he just happens to be in Middleton," Kim raised an eyebrow, "how did that work out?"
"Hey, don't ask me," Ron shrugged, "it's some weird mystic destiny thing. At least that's what the Blade keeps telling me. You know I was never any good with existential stuff." Kim smiled. He sounded so much like his old self, but there was still one more matter to discuss.
"And why did you have to slaughter all those people," Kim's smile faded quickly as she looked over to Ron.
"It was easier," Ron shrugged, no hint of emotion in the statement. Kim looked down at her lap. She had hoped that somehow Ron was back to normal, but it seemed that the monster from the club was still there, somewhere just below the surface.
"And this guy's evil?" She asked, trying to get her mind on something else.
"Bad as they come."
"Worse than you?" She looked up at Ron, making sure he heard every word. Ron simply smiled.
"Let's say his badness is more of the senseless nature," Ron smirked.
"Then I want to help," Kim stated plainly. It WAS her job to stop evil villains, but also she didn't want to let Ron out of her sight again, no matter what he had become. Ron looked doubtful. "And if you won't let me help," she said quickly, seeing his expression, "I'll get in your way as much as possible." Ron chuckled slightly.
"No pun intended," he laughed. To her surprise, Kim almost laughed too. "All right," Ron continued, "sounds like fun, but you might want to invite Yori in. She's been listening outside the door the entire time." Kim looked over as the door slowly creaked open and a very timid looking Yori stuck her head in.
"Did you get all that?" Kim asked the girl. Yori nodded, shrinking away when Ron hopped down from the table. Kim noticed this and wondered at it. Sure, Ron had changed in a terrible way, but Yori seemed afraid to even look at him. She kept her eyes firmly on Kim or the floor. If this bothered Ron, he didn't show it.
"Well," he said cheerfully, "I suppose this calls for a trip to the herb shop. Your can't fight ninjas in a hospital gown, KP."
"What about my parents," Kim suddenly cried, looking at her still dozing mother, "I can't just disappear. They'll have a heart attack."
"Heart attacks," corrected Ron, which got a venomous glare from Kim. "Well, can't you just leave them a note or something?" Kim didn't like it, but she supposed that it would have to do. Writing out a quick letter she left it on her pillow and turned to follow Ron who was headed for the window.
"Wait," they both stopped and turned at Yori's voice. "In the club," she asked hesitantly, "why didn't you just tell us what you were doing? Why did you…" she paused as if reconsidering what she was about to say. "Why did you do what you did?" She finished quietly. Both Yori and Kim looked to Ron. Ron's mouth pulled back in another menacing grin.
"It was fun."
Next: Preparing for war.
