Kim Possible is not long for this world. A sad fact, given that the show seeming to replace it, American Dragon Jake Long, doesn't have a tenth of its cleverness and personality (though it does feature John DiMaggio). I can only pray they decide to show the remaining episodes before releasing So The Drama.
Kim Possible
The Power of Trust
by Cyberwraith Nine
Few phenomenons in nature can compete with the sensational experience of a sunset. But a sunset seen from the highest reaches of a mountain range just might be the greatest aesthetical achievement nature has ever concocted. Here, in the snowy dips and rises set so high above the rest of the world, colors looked brighter, unfettered by tiny complications like air, or the hazy grease of smog that choked cities. Angled fields of white ice reflected the light, creating prismatic patterns that changed with each passing second as the sun settled in toward its cradle over the horizon. Only a spectacular spectacle such as this could evoke nostalgia in one as hardened as Simia.
She glowed in the twilight, cross-legged atop a rounded stone cleared of snow as she watched this sight and lamented her six year gap since seeing it last. So many years spent in pursuit of her dream, away from the place she loved most. She could see its sleepy temples and ancient walls sitting across from her on an opposing peak. In her youth, Simia had spent hours sitting on this same rock, staring at her home from afar as she considered her destiny. The awe her venerable domicile inspired in person could not befuddle her senses from here, allowing her to put the world into a proper perspective. It was here that she first began planning the world's new Golden Age. It broke her heart to know that soon, her darling childhood home would suffer at her hands, a necessary evil in order for her to claim her destiny.
"Home always seems smaller when you come back, doesn't it?" she asked aloud. Her monkey warriors were already on their way to Yamanouchi, hiking ahead to ensure that any random patrols sent out to stop her were dealt with in a quiet and efficient manner. Brawler Monkeys weren't particularly adept listeners anyway. She would be there with them, but she wanted to see her favorite sunset one last time before transcending beyond her own humanity. Who knew what perceptions she would have upon becoming the world's greatest Monkey Master? "Everything that stole your breath when you were a child never has quite the same impact once you've grown beyond it." As if to illustrate this, she straddled the tiny school with her thumb and forefinger and it disappear through a single, squinted eye as she brought her fingers together. "But the sunsets…It would take a god to resist the sky's magnificence at this time of day. Don't you think?"
Ragged breath was her only answer at first, heaved from the lungs of one Kim Possible. She sat in the snow, buried up to the waist, propped up against a rock outcropping some distance behind Simia's perch. Her arm hung out before her, cradled across her lap at an unnatural angle. Kim couldn't tell if the limb was dislocated as well as broken. It was hard to see, because one eye refused to open any more, forced closed by a purple swelling. The other eye she kept wiping clean, but the blood seeping from a cut on her forehead refused to subside. "Go to hell," she rasped through bloated, bloodied lips.
"Poets often use sunsets as a metaphor for ends," remarked Simia. She looked back at her handiwork, blank faced to Kim's piteous moans and forced breathing. "It always seemed to me a poor comparison. Sunsets and sunrises are all part of the same cycle. Night and day are two sides of the same coin, never ending." Simia stood and rubbed her aching knuckles. "Here, now, we stand on the beginning of something; a new era in my destiny. In all our destinies, really." Framed by her solar delight, the Monkey Mistress crouched before her fallen adversary. "Though, I suppose in a way, this beginning is also an end. And end to the errant tyranny of mankind and its self-destructive ways."
The thought-provoking words splashed across Kim's face and soaked into her stained features. She gathered her response in her mouth, letting it swish to and fro, before expressing it right between Simia's eyes in a wet spray. Even through the blurry red of her blood, she could see disgust welling up in Simia as the ninja wiped clean her forehead with the back of her hand. "Where's Ron?" Kim demanded. The gesture lost some of its ferocity when his name rode a tortured yelp out of her chest. Something inside her leg protested her rebellious movement by way of shooting agony, forcing her to lean back against her provisional chair of stone and screw shut her remaining good eye.
Simia grunted a light, single laugh as she considered the gory spittle on her glove. "You've tracked me for the better part of two days, and that's all you can ask me?" Simia's grasp snaked out and ensnared Kim's injured arm, turning the girl's yelp into a sobbing scream. "Even in your last moments of life, you don't see the incredible events that you've found yourself a part of. The world is changing around you, gaijin! Don't you even care?"
Two days of gallivanting over unfamiliar terrain, trying to keep out of sight. Air's so thin, can hardly breath. Wish I could use the grapnel, but they might hear. Scramble. Keep moving. No sign of Ron from far away. Have to get closer. Be quiet. Closer. Stay quiet. They'll see you, and then…Oh, no. Not quiet enough.
"Where's Ron?" Kim moaned around her pain. Her tongue felt too big for her mouth, slurring her words. In times of stress, she always fell back on humor and mockery for a twofold result. Her banter would unbalance her opponents and cloud their judgment with anger, but more important was its calming effects on her frazzled nerves. Kim knew she was not as brave as the world thought she was. Oftentimes, a simple quip, a jab at Drakken's latest inane scheme or a scathing assessment Killigan's garish tartan was the only thing keeping her from going mad with panic. There, in the mountains of Japan, Kim could muster no such defiance to combat the grim twist fate had handed her. Appropriate, her lingering rationality mused, that a mechanism she inherited from Ron should vanish in his absence.
Monkeys. Too many, surrounding her. She lashed out with everything she had, breaking their formation, breaking their weapons, breaking their spirits and the vessels that held them. Half of Simia's forces lay in heaps, the other half retreating. Then Simia…too fast. Too strong. Tired, so tired. Pain. Arm doesn't work, switch sides, use the other. Ribs just cracked. Block, counter, punch, do something. Nice side kick. Feels like…knee, shattered. Leg…Don't pass out. Don't pass out. Don't…
"Your Pretender is dead." Simia's words banished everything from Kim's mind. A dark smile settled onto the ninja's full lips, one that twisted her graceful features with petty pleasure at the hopelessness infecting Kim's red-stained emerald eye. "His body still lives on. The power blessing his unworthy meat keeps him alive. But he is mine, now. A tool with which I will save the world from itself."
Simia wouldn't let Kim fall. One blow shocked her in one direction. Another bounced her the other way. Head, face, chest, legs, hips, sides…Couldn't keep up. No more strength. Couldn't stop her. Fist pounded into her eye. Couldn't see her.
She leaned in closer, tilting on the balls of her feet. Snow crunched beneath her knees as Simia straddled Kim's broken body, but she felt neither pity nor the cold. "Soon enough, even his body will fail, as the power is transferred to its rightful owner." At this proximity, Kim could see the madness dancing in Simia's eyes. Her words were no mere boasts. They were her dogma. "And should you live to see the glorious moment when his powers become mine, you will bear witness to a great wrong being righted."
No. No, it couldn't be. "I don't believe you," Kim grunted. "You're lying." The twilight silhouetted Simia's face, leaving only her dark brown eyes glimmering in the living shadow. "I don't believe you," she said again.
"Denial will only prolong your grief, Possible." Simia stood and brushed the snow from her clothes. Clearly, further conversation with Kim would accomplish nothing. "Mourn your unrequited love, and prepare yourself for the future." Turning, she walked into the lingering wisps of her sunset, gliding across the snowy ground without noise. "Hmf. As if anyone could ever love a pasty creature like y-"
An icy rock bounced off the back of Simia's skull. No larger than an egg, it nonetheless possessed enough heft and force to stagger the spry woman and blur her vision. Sharp, stinging pain jumbled her senses so that she did not hear the war cry howling from Kim's throat as the teenager threw herself on top of Simia's shoulders. Armed with another rock of equal size, Kim brought her weapon to the side of Simia's head again and again. Blood seeped through waves of luxurious black hair and dribbled to the ground, quickly followed by Simia. Down on her knees, dizzy from the head trauma, she could offer no defense as Kim cracked her hard in the face and drove her onto the ground.
Kim tossed her primitive bludgeoner aside and climbed atop Simia. The ninja's struggle sent Kim's mangled leg into a fit of hysterics. Bones ground against one another with such force of pain that should have made her black out, but a pure fury, fueled by adrenaline, kept her focused. "You're lying," she bellowed, bringing her fist hard into Simia's face. Kim flailed against her prone enemy, striking anything and everything that presented itself as a target. It wasn't easy with only one functioning arm, but she became a living blur, crushing Simia and her arrogance with blow after blow. For all her high ideals, for every time Kim had promised herself to never allow this moment to come, there existed within her the profound desire to destroy Simia. She would kill Simia with her bare hands. "You monster," she sobbed, "You couldn't have. He-"
A strong hand grasped at the shoulder of her limp arm. Kim's collarbone bent and snapped beneath the pressure as that hand lifted her bodily from Simia, who laughed at Kim and her anguished scream. "He's right behind you," cackled she. The hand spun Kim in place, confirming what Simia said. A pair of blazing red eyes thrust themselves into Kim's face, angled by an omnipresent glare where an easygoing smile should have sat. "Ask," Simia said, rising unsteadily from Kim's attack, "And ye shall receive."
'God,' Kim thought to herself as Ron grasped her by the arms and lifted her off the ground, 'He's a lot taller than I thought.' Her toes dangled in the snow as he held her aloft. "Ron," she slurred, "Don't. You have to fight this. Put me down." Ron's brows lifted a notch. His features softened a moment, and Kim felt her boots sink further into the snow. "You can do this, Ron. Fight her. I believe in you."
Kim didn't even notice the pain screaming in her leg as Ron placed her back onto the ground. Her heart fluttered as Ron drew back, looking confused. His red eyes shifted about, as if searching for what to do. She hobbled forward, reaching out to him. "K…Kahhhy…P…Puh…" He struggled with the words, fighting to say the nickname that set her heart ablaze every time he said it.
"That's right," she winced. "KP. Remember? You have to remember. You have to fight."
"Yes," Simia called. "Fight, Stoppable."
The sound of a wet splatter accompanied intense pressure that spread all throughout Kim's chest. She felt the ground fall away from her distant toes as something warm spread all through her body, followed quickly by a chill that chased the warmth's heels. Ron's fingers twisted her mission shirt until it tore, letting her drop to the ground in a heap. She couldn't breath. Blood and bile bubbled in her throat, gargling her few remaining breaths. The snow was so cold. Inside and out, the cold became her world.
"Hmm. Wrong again, gaijin," Simia's voice floated through the ether. In the final rays of the setting sun, Kim could see one half of Ron's face hovering above her. Far-off footsteps crunched in the snow, growing further away by the second. "But perhaps not. Shall we find out?" Ron's face drew closer, intensifying the chill that shredded Kim's body. "Stoppable, do with her as you see fit. I know you were fond of her, and I'm sure one last moment of ecstasy will send her into her ancestors' arms with a smile."
Kim's lips pursed as tears of blood slithered down her cheek. The snow at her face turned cherry as silently gargled a single word; Why. But even that final question could not escape the bile of her ruptured organs poisoning the rest of her body. She felt Ron's hands press against her stomach, probably to worsen his handiwork. Even now, the heat of his touch fought against her shock, like fire against the unseen bleeding. He tore at her clothes, exposing more of her flesh to run his boiling hands across ivory fields of perfect, purplingskin. 'Not like this,' she sobbed to the enveloping darkness. 'Please, no. Ron…'
A cherry blossom broke from its branch with a gentle caress of the breeze. Taking flight, the tiny petals spiraled through twisting currents, pausing only in pockets of lazy, still air before continuing on. Its vibrant pink hue added color to the crisp blue sky before settling down onto the tip of Kim's nose. The gentle touch of the petals stirred Kim into wakefulness, and her eyes fluttered open to consider the flower a moment.
She had no idea how long the blackened coma had held her in its clutches, or why she now found herself free of its grasp. The pain that formerly riddled her body and rendered it useless had evaporated, leaving her with a euphoric sensation. Even the more traditional aches and pains her adventurous life had bestowed upon her, like the twinge in her left knee (a souvenir from a bad parachute landing in Nepal), were nowhere to be found. Simply put, Kim felt fantastic.
Kim sat up, bracing herself against the softest grass she had ever felt, and brushed the playful petals from her nose. A warm summer sun imparted a warming summer's embrace onto that skin left bare outside of a silken kimono. The snowy material kept her modesty well intact, yet breathed easily enough to chase away the light sweat threatened by a very agreeable temperature. She patted down its ashen folds to check for that agony Ron's fists had pounded into her, the pain that had stretched her final seconds of wakefulness into eons of torture. Only healthy flesh revealed itself beneath her roaming hands. Far from relieved, she felt greater confusion seed itself in her already considerable worry.
"Well," Kim said, and then proceeded to express her confusion with the use of a word that would mortify her father and shame her mother.
Even as she stood and eyed her mountainous surroundings, she felt a sense of familiarity about this place. Snowcapped peaks rose on all sides of these rolling, hilly fields, and in the distance as well, guarding her napping spot and its venerable cherry tree. The scene she found herself in was a far cry better than rape and certain death at her best friend's hands, but she had learned the hard way to always look a gift horse in the mouth. "Where am I?" she muttered, brushing back her perfectly coifed waves of red hair with carefully manicured hands.
"Welcome to Mount Yamanouchi, Kimberly Possible," a wizen voice greeted her from behind. Kim turned to see a short man well-possessed of years descending the hill above her with measured, casual steps. His simple brown robes rustled between footfalls, and his smile was warm and inviting beneath a long, groomed moustache. Eyebrows like shrubbery lifted in examination of her defensiveness at his approach, which kept him a respectful distance away. "I have awaited our introduction with great anticipation," he explained.
She blinked at the newcomer, neither running nor returning the salutation. Her hands hovered halfway between ease and action, curled into fists near her hips. So far, Japan hadn't made a lasting impression of friendliness upon her, and this elderly addition, despite his reminding her an awful lot like her grandfather, wasn't about to catch her off guard, even if he did deviate from the painful pattern. "And you are?" she asked with open suspicion.
The tips of his facial hair swept through the grass as he bowed in greeting. With a twinkle in his eye, he said, "I am the headmaster of the Yamanouchi Academy. You may call me Sensei."
"Sensei?" The name, repeated by Kim, sparked something in her memory. "I don't suppose that means you're the one who taught Yori how to fight. You taught Ron to fight like that, too?"
"I among several other instructors." He nodded back in the direction he came, gesturing for her to follow him. "Will you walk with me? Our destination is not far from here, and I have been quite anxious to show you our school ever since Ronald came to us. Through his constant praise of you, I and the other tenants of Yamanouchi feel as though we already know you."
'Where have I heard that before?' she thought. "Why should I trust you?" she asked aloud. "You show up out of the blue and drop my name and Ron's name, and I don't even know where I am? Not good sense to go somewhere else until I know where I am, is it?"
"You met Ronald when you were four years old," Sensei responded with a placid tone that rocked Kim's core into silence. "On your first day of preschool, you encountered a young and rather disparaging girl named Bonita Rockwaller, who then proceeded to make you cry with a judgmental analysis of the ducky overalls you had picked out all by yourself. Ronald, armed only with his unimpressive wit, rushed to your defense by pushing Miss Rockwaller into a mud puddle."
Kim's mouth flapped open and closed, gasping for words without effect. "I never told anyone that story. Even my parents…"
Sensei smiled. "Ronald spent a week's worth of isolation indoors for that rescue. On his first recess following his sentence, you introduced yourself and kissed him on the cheek, to which he replied…"
"-'Are you trying to kill me?'" Kim finished in unison with Sensei. She laughed at the memory of his twisted, disgusted expression, and the hysterical hyperventilation that followed. "I don't believe it. Ron really told you all that?"
"Among other things." Sensei again extended his hand in the direction of the hill he had come down. Far above it, the towering peak of a mountain faded into the wispy bottom of a cloud. "Please. I know you have little reason to trust me, and I do not ask you to. All I desire is to give you the answers you have sought since the beginning of your quest for the Idol of Simor."
Kim felt torn. She tugged at the immaculate edges of her kimono's sleeves, biting her painted lower lip in indecision. Every instinct she had told her to find her own way. But then again, every instinct up to this point had gotten her flat on her back in the snow, with a best friend for her murderer and organs spilling God knows what into the rest of her body. "Well, I guess if I'm dead, you can't do much worse to me."
Sensei led the way, careful to stay a step in front of Kim to put her mind at ease. As they crested the grassy rise, they came across a beaten path of dirt lined with polished volcanic stones. The winding trail followed a short, flat portion of the mountain, walled in on one side with solid vertical rock, the other side open to the sprawling valley half-hidden by mist that was actually clouds that aspired to the peak's lofty heights. "You are not dead, Miss Possible," Sensei informed her. "Far from it. One of my students found you in the foothills and brought you to our school for recuperation."
Not dead. That was good, right? "So why is it summer?" she asked, still just as confused. "And why am I dressed in this?" The kimono's hem spread as she pulled at its edges to display the intricate pattern of blue leaves crafted into its edges. "Not that I mind, but this isn't how I thought my number would be punched."
"Once again," said Sensei with stanch patience, "You are not dead. At the moment, you are lying in the school. What you see before you is merely a psychosomatic representation of a physical realm, constructed and shared by my mind, and projected into yours."
"Like telepathy?" Doubt once again tinged in Kim's mouth. It seemed a little sci-fi for their oriental fairy tale excursion. "How is that possible?"
"There are many things humanity has forgotten," Sensei said sagely, "In their blind quest forging toward the future. It takes considerable practice, which is why my student must assist you in our connection."
"And the kimono?" pressed Kim.
He shrugged. "I thought you would look lovely in white. Clearly, my premonition was accurate." Kim blushed at the fatherly comment, but chased the redness away when he added, "Now, are you adequately sure of your surroundings? I regret my own rudeness, but the effort my student must expend to maintain this link is significant. She will not be able to maintain it indefinitely."
"I'm sorry," Kim apologized. "Please, continue."
Their path angled upward and took them around a sharp bend. Though the atmosphere must have been very thin, but her lungs moved air in and out with no added effort. Such detailed care in a pathway spoke well of Sensei's affection for this mountain. Without any words, Kim could tell he loved this place. "Here at Yamanouchi, I have devoted my life toward the continuation of our way of life."
"I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that you guys don't teach algebra here." She laced her fingers behind her head. As long as she was in someone else's dream, she might as well enjoy herself. The summer sun felt nice, and the air smelled sweet, like fresh flowers plucked from a field.
A grunted laugh answered her glib interruption. "Did Ronald return from Japan with any expanded skill in mathematics, or any other ineffectual skills your educational system offers?" He shook his head. "No. It is here, on this hallowed mountain, that the ways of the ninja have found their final refuge in man's technocracy."
"Ninja." Kim thought back to all the amazing things Ron had suddenly discovered himself capable of since his return last September. "That actually makes a lot of sense. But tell me something. Don't you people usually trust outsiders? I mean, no offense, but I've been called a gaijin so many times, it's started to lose all meaning."
"As a rule," explained Sensei, "No. Ronald is our first Caucasian student. The school's governors disapproved, of course, but it isn't the first time I've defied tradition and protocol based on my own intuition. So far, I've had a fifty percent success rate with such radical decision-making."
Kim frowned. "I'm a little afraid to ask what the other fifty is."
"I trained my daughter, personally, in the arts of Tai Shing Pek Quar. I taught her of our ways, our traditions, and the destiny of our school." At this, the twinkle in Sensei's eye faded, replaced with a heavy sadness that dipped his chin down onto the collar of his robes. He slowed, forcing Kim to do the same. The sunlight actually faded, providing Kim with direct evidence that Sensei was indeed the master of this realm, and not just the weaver of a fanciful, entertaining lie. "Because I loved her as her father, and not as her teacher, I failed her. I may have failed us all."
"Simia…" The name of her hated enemy burned across Kim's lips in a hoarse whisper as the sunlight returned, and their gait became steady once more. "Tsuruko. She's your daughter, isn't she?"
Sensei nodded. "My pride and joy. But when we discovered that Ronald is our Chosen One, Tsuruko could not bear the loss of her dreams. She believed herself to be Chosen by the Ancients. Distraught, she left Yamanouchi." A long, dreary sigh forced struck Kim with just how old Sensei really was. His wrinkles deepened as he brought forth long-fought memories. "I had not seen her since, until this very day."
She waved back his depressing reminiscence with a "Whoa, whoa, whoa…What's this 'Chosen One' business all about?"
The change of subject lifted Sensei's spirits. Kim watched as he straightened, gaining a new spring in his step as they continued to circle the peak. One glance beyond the safety of their path was enough to give even a seasoned adventurer like Kim a dash of vertigo. "Legend speaks of a Chosen One." Sensei busted with pride, as if he had crafted this legend himself, and was personally responsible for its implementation by way of her best friend. "A Monkey Master who will one day change the world. This Master will wield our sacred weapon, the Lotus Blade, and use the unmatchable power of the Ancients to bring about a new epoch."
"But what kind of changes are you talking about? I don't understand." Why were ancient prophecies always so goddamned cryptic? Couldn't those musty ancient guys get any details recorded on those endless pages of foretelling that seemed to crop up all too often in their atypical lives?
Her unspoken question somehow reached Sensei's ears, for he answered first with a knowing smile before saying, "Sight into the future is often unclear, indistinct. Perhaps you will notice that the next time your eyes show you into what is yet to come."
Kim returned the smile. "Point taken." Their path began to level off, heralding their destination's proximity. She felt her excitement growing at the thought of finally seeing what all the hoo-hah was all about. "But now, Simia's put all of that in danger, right? She's using that idol to control him. She said something about 'transferring his power' or something."
"The next natural step in her plans," nodded Sensei.
Now Kim became the mind reader. "Ron won't survive the process, will he?"
Sensei shook his head. "I'm not entirely sure he survives even now. His spirit could be lost to us even now, a victim of the Idol's spell." A pause, and then, "Which is why you must not fail him, one way or the other. You must stop Simia at all costs, which will mean stopping Ronald."
As they crested the last rise, Kim felt her attention splitting away from Sensei and to the majestic walls seated atop the peak of Yamanouchi. Stonework older than anything Kim had ever seen weathered the test of time with unbelievable grace, no doubt aided by Sensei and those like him, those whose very lives revolved around the prestige and venerability radiating from the school. The tops of red-tiled roofs peeked over the walls' edges, veritable skyscrapers for buildings of their time. A pair of cherry trees old enough to be Kim's great-great-grandfather stood guard on either side of towering wooden doors, wooden sentinels that hadn't wavered in their duties for generations.
Sensei's words sunk in, poisoning the wonder inspired in her by Sensei's home. "Me? Don't get me wrong, I'm all about helping out. But you have a whole school devoted to this kind of thing. You must be sick with ninjas."
"Perhaps. But in this case," Sensei clarified, "A ninja is not what we need." He led the way across a dizzying ravine, comfortable with the swinging, creaking wood-lined rope bridge that set Kim on edge (though, thankfully, not in a literal sense). "Simia is intimately knowledgeable in the ways of Yamanouchi and its secrets. She has beneath her thrall the most powerful force on the planet. Our only hope is the one person that knows that force better even than herself."
Stop Ron, by any means? Kim didn't like the sound of that, and said as much. "I don't know if I can do what you're asking of me."
"Perhaps," Sensei said again. They reached the double doors that would lead them into Yamanouchi Academy. The gateway held a plethora of monkey icons carved into its wooden frame. The mirthful creatures danced with different Japanese kanji, some of which Kim recognized. Honor. Duty. Stealth. And in the center: Destiny. "But we both know that you will."
Kim stared up at the door, reaching out to touch its ancient lines. The wood felt smooth and cool beneath her touch, worn down by centuries of love and use. "How can you be so sure?"
Sensei reached out to push the doors open. They twitched with a long, moaning creak as he reminded her, "Because you can do anything." And with that, Sensei leaned heavily against the doors, bringing Kim at last into the world Ron had secreted away from her.
Those aches Kim felt the absence of during her walk with Sensei returned to her as her senses once again became her own to experience. They complained at her sudden sitting up, though not to the incurable extent that Kim had expected after Ron had shattered her insides. Rather, it was akin to a day following too many crunches, or a nasty case of cramps. Her pupils, still pinpoints from her jaunt under a summer sun, took a moment to adjust to the flickering light that fought the darkness all around her. Musty smoke and dust strangled the air flowing in her lungs, clenching her chest with a series of coughs that racked her troubled frame until she adjusted to that, too.
"So," a familiar voice intoned from behind her between coughs, "You're awake."
Kim turned around, and found a fatigued facsimile of Yori Akamatsu kneeling on a mat of reeds identical to the one beneath the teen heroine. Though a floor of sturdy wooden planks rested beneath those mats, Kim could just make out a blanket of pinpoint lights framing Yori's fallen face. Inside, yet outside…the answer came to Kim when she looked about with now-ready eyes, and saw a sight which wrenched her heart into her throat.
The remains of a room formed a squared perimeter around the girls, blackened at its stubby rim, still touched by the heat of waning flames in one or two spots. A multitude of fires lay elsewhere, casting the light by which Kim saw the remains of a once proud school in the throes of its final, tortured moments. Buildings and trees older than entire nations lay in heaps, mutated into rubble and ash by the omnivorous blaze. The green grass Kim had felt wriggle between her toes in Sensei's vision, turned a crinkled brown by winter's slumbering effects, were charred into a crispy black that could not stand against the icy breeze that now blew unimpeded through the ruins of Yamanouchi's protective walls.
Yori shifted, revealing a slight, stirring shape on a third mat behind her. Even in the firelight, Kim could recognize the wispy beard and bushy beetle brow of the school's attentive headmaster. "Welcome to Yamanouchi," Yori said with exhausted sarcasm. "I would give you the tour, but I fear you can see all remaining points of interest from within Sensei's meditation room."
"KIM!" A pink blur leapt from Yori's side and crashed into Kim's chest, ignoring the bare flesh exposed by her shredded shirt. Rufus nuzzled his bristling whiskers against Kim's chin as she folded her arms around his tiny form and returned his hug with equal ferocity. As soon as their reunion was spent, he launched into a series of unintelligible chatters. Even one as experienced with mole rat-ese as Kim only caught one or two words, the most important phrase of which being, "never alone again!"
Still cradling her naked friend, Kim looked to Yori with a questioning green gaze. "What happened here?"
"Ron-kun happened." Yori exorcised the words from her mouth, sounding as though she herself needed further convincing. "As I tracked you while you were tracking Simia, I found you lying in the snow. You were unconscious."
Kim recalled the shock setting into her body with a residual chill. "I was dying," she amended Yori's retelling.
A shake of the head sent Kim's thoughts tumbling elsewhere. She barely heard Yori say, "No, merely out cold. I bore you upon my shoulders in hopes of getting us safely to Yamanouchi. I was but three kilometers away when I first saw the fires…" The firelight danced in her eyes, further haunting the young ninja with a constant reminder of her own failure. Rubble sifted through her hands as she ran them along the floor, letting the ash and particles dance in the air as they fell through her fingers. "By the time we arrived, we were far too late. Simia and her forces had already absconded with the Lotus Blade."
The mention of their sacred weapon sparked Kim's memory, furthering the gears turning in her head, but she would to keep her thoughts to herself until Yori provided her with all the details. "What about the students? Your teachers?"
"All gone," whispered Yori. "They must have retreated with our dead and dying down the mountain. Those they did not carry, they left." Her eyes flickered to a particular fire set several dozen yards away, a mound set aflame that Kim could not bear to look at twice. "Only Sensei remained. I found him when his spirit called out to mine, and dug him from the rubble of this meditation chamber. But now I am too fatigued to hear him, and I fear his spirit wanes with the effort as well…" Yori brushed Sensei's flowing hair with the gentility of a child, and blinked back sorrowful tears that Kim found mirrored in her own eyes.
Kim sought the professional within her, and buried all her delinquent emotions as deep as she could. "I'm sorry," she offered Yori, knowing full well how pitiful the gesture was. "I don't know what it's like to lose a father, but…" She trailed off, at a loss for words. Such was not a comfortable feeling for such an eloquent woman as she to be in, not knowing what to say.
A placid smile spread in Yori's lips as she gave in to her tears, running her gloved hand across Sensei's craggy jaw. "He truly felt like a father to me," she murmured. "He knew me in ways a blood relative never could."
"I…" Kim could not mask her confusion. "I thought he was your…You said Simi…Tsuruko," she forcibly corrected herself, "Were sister."
"A sister in arms," corrected Yori. "Such bonds can be stronger than any forged by heritage." The tears swelled, glistening on her cheek in the tragic twilight that consumed her home. "I found in Tsuruko a better part of myself. Something to admire…something to aspire to. She always seemed so strong, and I wanted to be just like her."
Rufus moaned beneath Kim's unconscious stroke, allowing the teen to work out her spillover sorrow in the trembling folds of his amorphous flesh. She squeezed Ron's little buddy tightly and recalled the face that Yori's recollection brought forth in her mind. "Someone who you could always count on, even when you couldn't count on yourself."
A nod sent teardrops spilling out onto Sensei's distressed face. "But my sister is dead," she sniffed, drawing her fears and uncertainty back within her and donning the cold, unseen armor of the ninja. "The shell that bears her name has destroyed my home and slain my Master. I cannot allow this to go unpunished."
"We won't," promised Kim. "But we have to figure out where Tsuruko went."
The reality check forced a new weight onto Yori's slender shoulders. Her sinewy frame buckled and dropped, slumping into renewed defeat. "She could be anywhere by now," she lamented with a sigh. "And her training outstrips my own. We will never be able to track her, especially now that she has armed Ron-kun with the Lotus Blade. His power is absolute now."
Something didn't sit right with Yori's version of their plight, and Kim's experienced eye for supervillainy spotted it in a flash. "It doesn't add up," insisted Kim. "You say Simia's wanted this 'Chosen One' power since forever. She's not going to give all that up now, even if she can use Ron like a psychotic Muppet of Doom."
"But you destroyed one of her idols back in Tokyo," Yori reminded her. "The transfer of power was interrupted, and unless she gains knowledge of the idols' construction, she cannot resume it."
"I don't buy it," Kim maintained. "You may know ninjas, and you may know Simia, but I know supervillains. So far," lamented the wonder teen, "She's turning out to be a natural. And like all the pros, I'm willing to bet she has a backup plan prepped in case her first one fell through."
"Perhaps…" Yori began to cave to Kim's way of thinking.
"Think about it," Kim said. "Look at how fast she reacted after I dusted her first plan. She had Ron's blood sponging into her other idol inside of minutes. And," she added, "We know she's had years to plan all this out."
Yori's brow creased in thought. Strands of tussled raven hair fell into her face as she leaned forward, staring intently at the ground. "But why would she attack Yamanouchi? Unless she thought Sensei could stop her…?"
A shake of Kim's head chased that notion away. "Second rule of villainy is, never go picking fights you don't have to. Sensei sent you out to stop her. She could have sucked Ron dry, and then finished this ninja nest at her own leisure. She must have needed something…" The answer came to her in an instant. "The Lotus Blade."
"Our sacred weapon?"
She nodded. "Simia said something about a 'transfer' before she sent Super Ron after me. Maybe this weapon thing is some kind of conduit, too."
"Yes." A dawn of realization arose in Yori's golden features, outshining the death and destruction smothering her from all sides. Her newfound hope brought her to her feet, where Kim joined her in excited deduction. "Yes, the Lotus Blade responds only to the powers of a Monkey Master. It would make sense that the weapon could channel that power as well."
"And when combined with a magic artifact designed to keep a 'Chosen One' in check," Kim began.
Yori picked up on the thought without missing a beat. "-it could transfer the power into whoever controls the Idol." She let loose with an un-ninja-like squeal and grasped Kim's shoulders, jumping with delight. "That's it! She will use the combined powers of the Idol and the Blade to force Ron-kun's powers into herself!" Then she blinked, thinking back over her own words. Her excitement gave way to somber fear. "Oh. This does not bode well for us."
"It's a start," Kim assured her. "You need to think; where could Simia perform something like this? If I know my magic," and years of experience with the strange and unbelievable had left Kim with a far better understanding of the stuff than she would have preferred, "This kind of ritual has to have some sort of focal point."
The answer came immediately. "The First Temple." Kim's confusion drew a further answer from Yori. "It is a chamber in which our founder, the venerable Master Toshimiru, meditated in the fledgling days of the Yamanouchi Academy."
"How far?"
"Three kilometers, possibly fewer." Excitement glinted in Yori's eyes, the reflection of Kim's own enthusiasm. Where moments ago she had felt only loss, the void within her now brimmed with hope. She strode forth and cleared the remaining foot of crumbled wall in a single bound. No height seemed beyond her reach now, for she was as light as a feather, as strong and determined as steel. "Come. I will lead the way."
Kim called, "Wait a minute." She planted Rufus in her pocket, where the naked mole rat took residence in what remained of her pants. Kim's torn sports bra held fast only with help from her calloused fingers, and even then she knew it would be a miracle if it and her shredded mission shirt lasted another moment. "I'm all about the need for speed right now, but I'm not about to face anyone looking like this."
For a brief moment, Yori's face enjoyed a genuine grin, even if it was at her own expense. "Forgive me," she asked, returning to the mats. There, next to Sensei's still body, rested a neatly folded square of black cloth. Further digging by Yori's hands through a stack of rubble arranged by her design revealed a dusty, scratched sheath and hilt, containing a katana which Yori presented to Kim without further delay. "I know you are unaccustomed to such clothing," she apologized, "But it was the best I could find."
Only someone as mindful of manners as Yori would apologize for not being able to scrounge up better threads from rubble, a thought that brought an amused smirk to Kim's lips as she unfurled her very own ninja garb. It looked to be the right size, too, leading Kim to question just how long and how hard Yori had searched to find her something to wear. "You think of everything," she said with more than a touch of admiration.
"Yes," agreed Yori. Her solemnity reappeared, wiping the mirth from her features as a dark thought she had done her best to suppress surfaced at last. "This is why I must now ask a favor of you."
"Name it."
Kim would not have responded so quickly if she had known Yori's next words were to be, "When the time comes, I must be the one to slay Ron-kun."
Kim blinked once, twice, thrice, trying to fathom how her opinion of Yori could flip-flop so violently in the space of mere seconds. "No one is killing Ron," she told the ninja. Rufus punctuated this thought with a 'yeah' and a squeal. "We'll stop Simia, rescue Ron, and save the day without killing anyone."
"Naiveté ill suits you," Yori told her with narrowed eyes.
The brusque observation was ill-equipped to match Kim's ferocious glare. "You said when you found me, I was unconscious." At Yori's nod, Kim continued, "But I remember Ron hitting me hard before I blacked out. Killing hard. And there was this…heat. Like fire, but not."
Her vague description struck a chord in Yori's memory. Unconsciously, her fingers traced along an invisible line beneath the smooth fabric of her uniform, recalling that same, indescribable sensation Kim now hunted fruitlessly for words with which to express. "Ron-kun…is capable of the things you describe. But-"
"But that means there's something left of him in there," Kim said with an air of finality. With one hand lifting her stretchy new clothes by the hood, she used the other to unsheathe her new blade. The glimmering alloy reflected her own determined features in a flash as she drew it through the air, testing its weight. As she suspected, Yamanouchi's weapon possessed unparalleled balance, and swung in time with her skillful, practiced hand. "Nobody dies on my watch, least of all Ron."
Yori drew in a disparaging breath, ready to launch into a tirade to batter down Kim's foolishness. Seeing the redhead's stubborn face solidify further, she simply said, "You cannot save everyone, Kimberly-san. It is impossible."
"Check my name," Kim retorted. With a jerk of her wrist, she tossed the ninja garb into the air. Two quick swipes with the katana's razor edge sliced through the material, creating a thick, circular ribbon where the garment's waist had been. Kim caught her clothes by the hood once more, letting the newly formed bottoms and the eliminated midriff flutter to the ground as she held the refashioned belly shirt up to her chest. From the looks of it, the uniform would leave her taught, sexy stomach appreciably bare, just the way she liked it.
"And if it comes down to it," Yori asked with steely voice as Kim shucked her old clothes in favor of the new ones, "Will you be able to do what needs to be done?"
Kim's head popped through the top. She readjusted the hood to fit her glorious red mane, then brought the mask to fit over her mouth and nose. "Won't happen," Kim assured her, pulling the waistline of the stretchy material up to sit higher on her hips. The katana she looped over her shoulder, tying the strap tight over her chest. She rubbed at her tight abdominals, feeling the twinge left by Ron's fist. "We save everybody. Period."
"But if it comes down to it," insisted Yori.
In the silence of Kim's consideration, only the crackling destruction of Yamanouchi broke the soundless mountaintop's emptiness. Rufus, perched atop Kim's shoulder opposite the hilt of her katana, waited patiently for her answer, just as Yori did. Finally, Kim said in a low, slow tone, "If it comes down to it, I'll make the right choice. If it comes down to it." Emerald fire overshadowed the flames that snuffed in her swirling path as she exited the ruins of Sensei's chamber, intent on leaving behind this dying relic to save the future. "But I won't let it come down to it."
To Be Continued
Sorry for the delay, everyone. When I first wrote this, it turned out all wrong, unworthy of being the lynchpin of the entire story. From here on out, Kim will face the demons of her past, the demons of her heart, and be forced to make a real choice. The Power of Trust will change her life forever…but will it be for the better, or will that power bring only sorrow? Only time will reveal these secrets.
