"Of Friends and Foes"
Chapter 2: Aftermath
Kim woke up staring at a white ceiling and she quickly recognized it was not her own. She sat up, she noticed there was an IV in her arm and that her shoulder was bandaged as well. The lights in the outer part of the room were off, only the light above the bed was on. She heard breathing coming from a corner of the room and looked to see Ron sitting in a chair fast asleep.
Ron shifted positions, coming to long enough to notice Kim sitting up. "Kim! You're awake!" he said. He stood up and walked over to the bed. Kim looked up at him and smiled.
"Hi Ron," she said.
"Hey Kim, how are you feeling?"
"I feel fine," she told him, "My shoulder is a bit sore though, what happened? The last thing I remember was fighting Shego when something grabbed me. My throat was burning, I couldn't breathe and then everything started to get dark and cold. I could hear you calling for me, but you sounded so far away I could not find you." Kim shivered as she thought back at that.
"It was that thing with Drakken that grabbed you. T wouldn't tell me what it was, but he said it was venom that burned you. He treated you for it. He put some stuff on your throat to keep it from swelling and then he put a piece of red quartz, at least that's what Wade called it, in your shoulder."
"Why did he do that?" she asked.
"He said it would draw out the venom," he told her. "When you were brought here the doctors tried to remove it, but it would not come out. About six hours later it came out on its own. The doctors couldn't find a trace of poison in your body after it came out. Strangely they couldn't find any before then either."
"Okay," said Kim, "what about T? Did he complete his mission?"
"He's gone," said Ron.
"Wh-what? Gone! How?" Kim asked Ron, not believing what she heard.
"After he treated you, he told me to take you and get as far away as possible. The look on his face Kim, it must have really upset him that you got hurt, and he didn't want it to happen to me as well." Ron sat back down in the chair. "When I stopped to call Wade, there was an explosion. The entire warehouse was gone. GJ searched through the wreckage, this was all they found." Ron pulled out a small black box from the cabinet above his head and handed it to Kim.
She opened the box and inside was three items. The first was a gold medallion shaped like a two-inch square diamond with a squared off letter G in the center. Next to that was a red jewel that Kim noticed a part of was missing. Judging by the metal band that ran around the outer edge of it, it used to be part of a heart-shaped pendant. She wondered why T was carrying this around with him and who gave it to him. It seemed to her that it was a token of love from a girl. Did T have someone he cared for? Where was she and what would she say when she found out he was gone? Kim shook these thoughts from her head as she pulled out the third item, a red shard.
"What is this?" she asked Ron.
He looked at it and answered, "That is the piece of quartz that was in your shoulder. It looks like it is the same stuff as the jewel."
Kim placed the shard back into the box and closed the lid. "Are you sure this was all they found?" asked Kim.
"Yes."
"Then maybe he got out in time," she said, "and in a couple of days he'll contact us and let us know that he is all right."
Ron shook his head. 'I don't think so Kim; you've been asleep for two days. If that were the case then he would have already been here. Besides, about eighty percent of the wreckage was ash. Dr. Director said whatever caused the explosion was so hot that it burned itself out quickly. That was all that was found that was not burnt to a crisp. Nothing living could have survived that."
Kim placed the box on the table beside the bed. "It's all my fault," said Kim, tears forming in her eyes. "If I had been paying attention, then I would not have got hurt and none of this would have happened." Ron moved over to the bed and put his arm around Kim, trying to comfort her. Kim rested her head on his shoulder.
"No, it isn't," he told her. "If it had not happened that way then it would have happened some other way, probably with us in it too. You know how T was always saying that things happen for a reason."
"Yeah, I know," said Kim. A 'Everything happens for a reason, and behind every reason is a purpose. It is these purposes and how we deal with them that determine what we will become', that's what he said."
Ron stood up, Kim held onto his arm letting it slide until their hand met. "Look," he said, "It's about two o'clock in the morning your Mom and Dad went home to get some sleep, I said that I would stay here and keep them posted on how you are. Why don't you try to get some rest while I go and call them?"
"Okay, I'll try," she told him.
Ron walked over to the door and opened it. He turned back around and looked at Kim, he smiled at her and said, "It will be all right KP, we'll get through this together." She smiled back at him and he walked out and closed the door behind him, leaving her alone. She lied back down on the bed and thought about all he said. Slowly exhaustion took over and she drifted off