Ron stood in front of the Possible home. He'd been there for a while. The Ronnicator was weighing heavily in his pocket. He didn't know if it was because it was actually heavier or if the task on hand was drawing his attention to it.

Right. Drakken needed the schematic things from Mr. Dr. P's tablet. He wasn't stealing it, just copying it. It was something easy. Drakken was counting on him to do his part. The plan wouldn't work without whatever thing was on the tablet.

His gut soured at the idea that he was helping a megalomaniac take over the world. On paper it was a terrible idea.

The look in Drakken's eyes, the one that made his heart skip, drew him back. It wasn't any common megalomaniac. It was Drakken, his best friend. The one person that knew him like no one else.

That brought him back to the horrible truth Drakken had shown him.

Monique. Felix. And especially Kim…why didn't they care about him as much as he did them? Was all of it really a lie to get him to do things? It had sounded ridiculous before the dance.

But then he would remember. Drakken getting tossed into the concessions, his friends leaving him alone, KP not only ditching him but also degrading their friendship status?

Drakken had given him something he could've only dreamed of: ownership of the most badical fast food chain ever! Drakken trusted him to run what was probably a crucial part of his plan. Thost facts made his face heat up in a weird way.

Drakken was - had always been - the person that understood him the most. Ron had found he loved making Drakken happy. The mad scientist had somehow burrowed into his heart. He was pretty sure there was a word for that.

"Ronald?"

Ron's gaze snapped to the front door of the Possible house. There, Mrs. Dr. P was standing, the door halfway open to keep out the morning chill. She was already dressed for the day; she even had her doctor outfit on. She had a frown on her face. Quickly, Ron realized he was letting his emotions show. He swiftly replaced his contemplative grimace to chagrined flippancy.

"Heya Mrs. Dr. P! I, ah, wanted to eat breakfast with you guys." He hesitated and carefully asked, "Am I still allowed to do that?"

"Of course you are!" Mrs. Dr. P looked almost offended. "Why wouldn't we want you over?"

Ron's soured gut twisted into itself.

KP hadn't told her parents about their talk. About Kim dropping him like a hot potato. Was she afraid that her parents would disapprove? Disapprove of the way she treated him?

He shook the thought loose. At the end of the day, he was a Stoppable, not a Possible. They would side with KP when they found out.

"Come on in!" Mrs. Dr. P waved him in. He complied, trying to focus more with each step. He needed to find Mr. Dr. P. He needed to find him and get his doohicky into his whatchamacallit and get the info. It was automatic. Ron just needed to keep calm and use his distracting skills to their best use.

The scent of breakfast made his stomach rumble. He was pretty sure it was Mr. Dr. P's turn to cook breakfast. That meant waffles and homemade butter! It was a strange hobby Mr. Dr. P had with the hand-churned butter. He'd mentioned once that one of his bosses had told him how to make good butter. It was a strange skill to have.

Ron hesitantly walked into the kitchen. He was bracing himself for if KP was there. If she was there it would be one hundred MILLION times harder to do this. He had no idea how anyone would react to anything. He both didn't want to risk blowing the mission or to see the Possible 'rents' reactions to Kim kicking him out.

His stomach had settled a little before that. Now, that waffle sounded like a trip to Barf City.

His slowed steps caused Mrs. Dr. P to knock into his back. "Ron, what's wrong?"

He stiffened before sputtering, "Nothing's wrong. Just, uhm. Savoring the smell?"

Suddenly Mr. Dr. P appeared in front of him as if summoned. Ron jumped backwards into Kim's mom before he gripped the doorway and grasped at his chest.

"Whoa now, Ronald. The breakfast rocket hasn't quite launched yet!" Mr. Dr. P said jovially. As Ron scooted into the room, Mrs. Dr. P slid past him and gave her husband a nice peck on the lips.

For some reason that made Ron think about Drakken and whether he's ever been kissed before. And then he thought on the fact that he'd never been willingly kissed either. So the two of them could-

A hand waved in front of his face. "Ron? Are you okay?"

Ron shook his head. A bit higher than he intended, he squeaked, "Y-Yeah! I am! Totally fine, just my never-be-normal self!"

Mrs. Dr. P was giggling while her husband simply looked confused. "Your face went completely red for a second."

"Oh! Uhm, I'm looking forward to breakfast?" Maybe deflecting it like that would work.

Mr. Dr. P looked ready to comment more but was pulled away by his wife. Mrs. Dr. P said in a strange turn of topic, "Kimmie will be down here soon. The boys pranked her and she has fluorescent dye stuck in her hair that she's trying to wash out."

His heart froze. Oh nonono, no, she'd catch on right away, and then his cover would be blown, and then Drakken's plot would fail…

Ron didn't realize he was genuinely hyperventilating until Mrs. Dr. P directed him to the breakfast nook. "Goodness! If you're sick, maybe you should go home and rest."

"No!" he accidentally shouted. Then, resuming his mask, he chuckled, looking down at the table, "There are some tests today that I'm gonna bomb. I was hoping for a last-minute cram session with KP."

He caught sight of something out of the corner of his eye. He lifted his head ever-so-slightly to look at it.

His eyes widened.

A tablet. He could tell it was Mr. Dr. P's because the pen was dripping coffee. That must be what he needed. Like a brick to the head, he realized: how was he supposed to do this stealthily?

He was on a time crunch. Surrounded by opponents. It was like Globe of Armaments; sometimes you had to be completely brazen to pull off the win.

Ron made his move before he could second-guess himself. He grabbed the tablet and began messing around with it. "Is this one of those new tablets that lets you take selfies?"

Mr. Dr. P halfway reached for the tablet before chuckling and pulling back. "That's my top-secret project tablet." He puffed out his chest. "Project Hephaestus! We're working on making machines that can multiply like living cells! I'm the head researcher for it." He noted, "I can trust you with it, can't I?"

"Definamundo!" Ron crowed even with the sweat rolling down his face. He lowered the tablet into his lap. As Drakken had said, the Ronnicator's cable slinked out and attached itself to a port with a soft 'click'.

Now, to keep it there until all the data was collected…

"How've things been here?" Ron asked, subtly dropping the tablet into his lap.

"Not much different than normal." Mrs. Dr. P asked, "You haven't been over much lately! Are you and Bubble-Butt getting along?"

"Yeah, we are," Ron lied through his teeth. "Nothin' wrong on the BFF train!"

"And where's Rufus?" Mr. Dr. P queried, flipping what was probably the last waffle onto the iron.

"We're…fighting." Ron didn't want to lie about anything related to Rufus. He was still a good pet for being worried about him.

"Oh no!" Mrs. Dr. P said, "That's a shame."

"What in the world would you two have to argue about?" the older man asked.

What was the lie he'd told Kim?

Oh! That's right.

"He doesn't like that I joined a club that I am not at liberty to discuss," Ron explained.

"Like I can't discuss my project?" The words should've been angry but didn't have the edge that should've been there.

"Yeah!" Ron made a show of looking at the tablet and scrolling through the symbols and data he shouldn't understand. "Man, I can't even read this."

That part was also a lie; he understood some of the words even if he didn't know what they meant in context. Everyone knew him as a clown, so he never cared to admit that he understood more than he did. That bit of bitterness made him feel better about what he was doing.

They cared about Ron the carefree loser. Not the real him. Only Drakken cared about him.

"It's a little more advanced than high school math," he managed to catch Mr. Dr. P say.

"Just a bit." Ron gave a weak laugh. "If I actually understood this stuff, I would probably do better on tests."

"Psssh!" Mr. Dr. P waved his hand. "If you understood my work, you'd be too advanced for high school! Anyway…" Mr. Dr. P held up a plate full of waffles. "Time for breakfast!"

Mrs. Dr. P set silverware and plates around the table, directly handing Ron his. As the waffle plate was set down, she urged, "Go on and eat, Ron. I'm afraid that Kimmie might miss breakfast. Wouldn't want you to too!"

"Right." Ron dug in, making sure to keep the tablet balanced in his lap. In no time, he'd torn apart two buttery waffles and down a glass of milk while the Drs. P had gotten through their own with some juice and a crisp newspaper. He had swallowed his last bit when he heard a faint 'bing!'. His gaze darted to his lap where the Ronnicator was disconnecting from the tablet.

"What was that noise?" Ron's gut dropped as Mr. Dr. P looked around, newspaper crumpling against the table.

"I didn't hear anything," Mrs. Dr. P noted as the older man's gaze went to Ron, then down to his tablet.

Ron gulped.

"I realize I'm being cavalier with my research, but I didn't expect you to download games onto my tablet, Ronald," Mr. Dr. P chastised.

Ron sat up straight and ran with it. "Sorry! I, uhm, wanted to play Minesweeper. Silly me!" He made a show of looking at the tablet. "Looks like the download failed anyway."

"Of course it failed! It already has Minesweeper," Mr. Dr. P said with one of his Dad laughs.

"Right…" Ron was handing the tablet back when Kim walked in, her red hair still displaying some of the bubbles from the shampoo.

"Dad, the tweebs used some of the rocket fuel to-" She cut herself off as she realized Ron was there. "Ron? What are you doing here?"

"He's eating breakfast with us!" Mrs. Dr. P said. She looked between Ron and Kim and asked, "Is there something wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong!" both Ron and Kim shouted. That made the older redhead frown. Trying to cover, Ron rushed, "Breakfast was great, our friendship is great, EVERYTHING is great! Except time's running out and oops I gotta go!" Ron flipped his way out from the middle of the nook and jumped to the door. "See ya later!"

"Bye R-"

Ron slammed the door closed, not bothering to hear any responses, before he raced for his room. He didn't bother being quiet or sneaking; his parents didn't care about anything related to him, including if he was late for school. Even if they noticed - which they never would - they wouldn't ask.

That made him feel even more bitter and a little angry. How was it that no one actually cared about him?

At least Drakken had found him. Found him and shown him he was worth something. That he was worth caring about.

Ron's brain sputtered at the thought that he was worth being loved. Because he was pretty sure Drakken was so emotionally stunted that he couldn't understand anything about love unless it smashed him in the face. Even then he probably would get angry and think he was being mocked.

Shaking the thoughts from his head as things he could muse on later, he triumphantly burst through his door and went for his computer. Rufus looked to be asleep. At least Rufus wouldn't angry-chitter in the background while he talked with Drakken this time.

He put in the super-secret code (his password) into his super-secret chatroom (game server lobby) and pulled up Drakken's name. '1337drakmaster' was on and playing some more Globe of Armaments.

Ron put in the sequence that Drakken had told him to put in if there was any sort of breakthrough or emergency related to his plot or Ron's life in general.

'My parents left me home alone and I need an adult'

Frankly, Ron felt a little annoyed at the phrase. His parents were never around. He was always alone. And Ron was close enough to an adult to feel a sort of petulance at the idea that summoning Drakken because of his being an adult meant anything. He was basically his own babysitter at this point.

Also, it hit home a bit about his crush. If Drakken only saw him as a kid…

Suddenly the computer's screen flared before a rather tense Drakken appeared on screen. Ron could tell he'd been marathoning Globe of Armaments that day; his face had stubble and there was that wild look in his eyes that he got after at least a good twelve-hour binge of the game.

"What's wrong?! Did Kimberly Anne figure it out? Have you changed your mind? ARE THOSE BULLIES GETTING AFTER YOU AGAIN?!?" Ron started zoning out after that point, letting Drakken blow out all the hot air of paranoia before he said anything.

Once Drakken was down to simply sputtering nervously, Ron said, "Mission accomplished!"

Drakken stared. "Mission? What mission?"

"Uh, hello? The Hephaestus project! Mr. Dr. P's project on the tablet thing!" Ron huffed. Man, he must've been going at that game ever since the last time they talked.

"What? WHAT?!" Drakken's gaze shot to the side of the computer. "It's already Wednesday!?"

"Yeah?" He decided to just ask. "Dude, have you been gaming since we last talked on Monday?"

Drakken picked at a spot on his desk. "...maybe." He shook his head. "Bah! It doesn't matter. What does matter is that you got the data!?"

"Yup! It should've uploaded to your system by now," Ron noted cheerily.

Drakken typed madly as he accessed his computer. "I don't see it." He squinted. "Wait. I'm looking at uploads. My own uploads, not yours. It would be in downloads for me…"

Ron stifled a chuckle at Drakken being goofy like that. He watched as Drakken looked through the files faster than Ron could read. Drakken did the thing where he picks his ear while he's thinking. At least he stopped doing his nose after Ron commented on it.

"Right…RIGHT! YES! I UNDERSTAND!" Drakken jumped up and cheered. Then he started to excitedly dance as he said, "I wish you were here so we can celebrate together." He straightened up. "I know! Why don't you play hooky and you come here with the tubes. While I'm waiting, I'll go ahead and clean up."

"And nap," Ron said insistently.

Drakken frowned but acquiesced, "And after I take a nap." He huffed and complained, "Really, you should get your GED and be done with it!"

"I'm not dropping out!" Ron let out a little whisper, "yet."

"Alright. I'll be going then. Once you get here, I will finally inform you of The Plan."

Ron froze. "Wait, really?"

Drakken nodded. "Really really. You'll be as up-to-date as Shego is, with all the pieces in place."

"Aw man! You're gonna make me have to figure it out?" Ron complained.

"If Kimberly Anne and her lackwit computer guru haven't a clue, I doubt you'd be able to piece it together," Drakken said.

"That's not fair! They don't even know what's going on!"

"Even if they did they wouldn't be able to figure it out," Drakken defended. "Anyway, I'll see you in…an hour?"

"If I don't get redirected to Cairo again, that sounds about right," Ron agreed.

"I still have no idea how that happened," Drakken said, shaking his head. He started walking away before he stopped suddenly and about-faced. "Almost forgot to disconnect. See you in a bit, Ron!"

"Bye!" Ron replied.

The screen went blank. Once he was sure the connection was gone Ron went for the backyard. It was time to get started on the next step of the plot!