Meetings
Andrea waited as they landed the VTOL. Shego had insisted on flying and Andrea didn't bother to argue—the thing was mostly autopilot, anyway. Anything that took Shego's mind off of where they were going… was a good idea.
"Where to?" Shego said, "The Bueno Nacho or the GO Tower?"
"Bueno Nacho." Andrea said, "I haven't heard anything about the Go Team coming back."
"With Hego as a leader? Not a chance." Shego said. "I'll…wait outside."
"OK." Andrea said to her. "Shego… I know this is…"
"Like pulling teeth without a novacain shot? Yep." Shego frowned, as they landed in the parking lot, not raising a lot of surprise.
"Get that a lot around here?" Andrea asked.
"Hey, you're from the town that had giant mutated monsters running around."
"Touche" Andrea looked down the street, to where a crew was busy around a large hole in the ground. From the radiation suits, she assumed it was one of the warheads Baby had disarmed being disposed of. She took a deep breath, and got out of the VTOL. Shego took her arm.
"Here." Shego said. "It's a comlink…for the VTOL."
"Shego… do you think you should listen?"
"It's not for that—you can yell for help if you need it." Andrea blinked.
"Do you think I may have to?"
"Before this last week…nah." Shego paused, "But after what I know now…I don't know." Andrea paused…and took the comlink.
Inside the store, people were going too and fro, buying meals. Evidently this Bueno Nacho had no trouble keeping stocked up, Andrea thought sourly.
"Andrea Possible! Welcome!" Right, there was Hego.
"Hego, I need to talk to you…alone." He frowned. "Well, Dr. Possible… I'm needed here…is it about my sister? I heard that she had decided to renounce evil…has she decided to join us again? We can forgive her-"
Oh, enough of this shit. Andrea thought.
"Yes it has to do with Shego…more specifically, Shego's baby."
"Baby? Oh, that sad event…yes, very sad it was, but with her lifestyle, it was to be expected-"
"I know about the adoption, I know about the hospital, and we can have this conversation in public, or in private—your choice. But we are having it." Andrea said. Hego looked around at the people eating and then frowned.
"My office, then…it is secure from all forms of eves dropping." Andrea folded her arms and walked in after him. The door closed behind her and Hego gestured to a chair in front of his desk.
"No thank you. I would prefer to stand." Andrea said. She felt no need to be polite, or disguise her dislike.
"Very well…. " Hego said, "Now… Please explain to me about the child."
"Shego became pregnant about eight years ago." Andrea said, "I have conclusive evidence that the child did not die, and you know where she was placed with. I want to know where. Now."
"But why-" He paused, "This is about Shego, isn't it."
"I'm here as her doctor and her friend. Yes."
"Dr. Possible, you of all people cannot be serious—this decision was done to aid the child and Shego could only be a bad influence on her-"
"Shut Up." Andrea said coldly. Hego did…evidently he wasn't used to being told to shut up. "You had neither the moral, nor for that matter, the legal right to remove her child from her…minor or not, that takes a court order, and no such case is listed." She continued, "And beyond that, do you know that Shego has spent the last eight years believing she killed her own baby? Believing that were she ever to become pregnant again, the same thing would happen?" Hego looked nervous.
"Well, it was for the best-"
"It was? Tell that to Shego. I don't know what she would have done if she'd kept the baby, but it was her right… Explain to her why you took her right to choose—to have a future, or a husband."
"Shego, married?" Hego raised an eyebrow.
"Yes, with a baby to care for she may not have ever become a mercenary, or a lot of things…things you took from her."
"Yes well, Dr. Possible, the team had to come first."
"Over your own sister? Your own niece?" She paused, "What's her name and how many times have you visited her."
"Ah…"
"none?" Andrea said.
"Well, she exhibited no signs of comet power…and so…"
"So you weren't interested." Andrea said, eyes slitting . "Why am I not surprised?"
"See here… I did it from the best motives."
"I hear that a lot, as well." The doctor said, "Sometimes they mean it, sometimes they just want to say it…and in the worst cases, they really, really believe that their desires are the best motives." She shook her head. "In any case, that's not important. Name and Address. Now."
"Now Dr. Possible…I really think that isn't the best thing to do, turning an international super villain lose on a small child. If you'll just think about it, I'm sure you'll-"
"Hego. There are two ways we can do this. You can tell me. Or, I'll have Kim's friend Wade put this story on the internet…and I guarantee you that there will be lots of interest, because the next stop for Shego and I will be the local FBI office, to report a case of kidnapping—for which there is no statute of limitations. Even if they don't go through with it, by the time I'm finished, you'll be able to count the number of people who still trust GO-Team on one hand." Suddenly, Hego was standing directly in front of her, and Andrea had to stomp on the urge to back up.
"You can't do that!" He said, angrily. "Do you know what it would do to the world… to the team? I'm just getting the others to agree and if they foun-" His mouth closed with a snap.
"Oh…they don't know." Andrea purred. "So public opinion might not be the only thing you have to worry about. Do they all know they have a niece?"
"Ah, um… I worried that Mego might have made an issue of it, and the twins didn't need to know."
"Oh. The name, and the address." Andrea said, implacably. Hego wilted and wrote it down. She looked at it, nodded, and came close to the superhero.
"Hego…that power of yours… it only protects you when it's glowing, right?"
"Right….why?" Andrea's answer was bringing her knee up, hard. Hego turned the color of old milk and bent over.
"That's why." She said, turning and walking out. She paused. "By the way. Shego didn't leave because she turned evil…that came later. You lost her the moment you abused her trust. She worshipped and adored you and she would have raised your niece to love you. If you're lucky, maybe someday she'll let you beg her forgiveness….but don't hold your breath." With that, she closed the door behind her and walked out.
Shego was by the VTOL, looking nervous. When Andrea walked up, it was all Shego could do to avoid jumping out and hitting her with questions.
"Yes, I have the address." She said, "It's in Upstate New York.
Upstate New York
They landed the VTOL at the airport. Andrea had considered going back home, but Shego was adamant that they continue…and only the fact that they'd arrived well past ten kept her from marching out and finding the house. That and another petit mal seizure. The town didn't look to have been badly hit by the disturbance, so Shego and Andrea found a room at a local hotel. Andrea had long since gotten into the habit of taking a change of clothes with her, incase surgery called, and Shego of course traveled with just about everything she needed.
"How are we going to meet them?" Shego asked, from her bed. Andrea sighed.
"Go up and say hi—what were you considering, a commando raid?"
"I don't know…" Shego said, rolling over and looking at Andrea in the other bed. "I'm not used to, well…asking." She paused, "What if they're bad parents? What do I do then…or what if they're good parents, until they find out about me and then they go-"
"Shego."
"What?"
"You're talking yourself into a frenzy. Stop it." Shego nodded… but two hours later was still mumbling, thinking up scenarios and what she could do.
"Shego!"
"Huh?"
"Go to sleep before I come over there with a club and make you go to sleep. This is your doctor talking."
"Threatening to hit me?"
"Not at all I'm a brain surgeon. I'll just disconnect the parts of your brain that you don't need tonight, like speech and movement until the morning . It won't help if you're stumbling around like a Zombie tomorrow."
Middleton High.
The school was buzzing. Other kids had shown up to work—and many of them were actually there to work. The others, Bonnie had tossed out. She had enough to do without worrying about someone there to just graffiti up a room. Kim was the one for second chances. Bonnie had just frowned at her. You wanted to show up for work, you were here to work. You got one, count it, one chance. After that, go have fun with your summer vacation.
On the other hand, work was not a problem with Kim or any of the rest of the inner circle, or the slightly not so inner circle of foremen Bonnie had dragooned to keep watch on the rest of the workers. Kim hadn't been able to get construction tools, but she had managed to lay hands on enough construction site walkie talkies so that they didn't have to keep running back and forth or talk on celphones, where they had to call the individual number.
"No, no, NO!" Bonnie was saying, of course, even with all that, she couldn't stay in the office all the time…which meant she was on the other side of the school. A rolled up map was opened up on the floor and she looked at it. The cheerleader was dressed in coveralls… with a yellow work helmet that Kim's dad had provided. Bonnie had taken masking tape and obliterated the original title on the helmet and replaced it with a more accurate one: BOSS.
"If you start painting that room, you'll just have to stop, because Felix hasn't been there to check the lights and if he has to do anything, then we'll have to wait until the paint dries, do it, and probably repaint. Stick to the schedule!" She paused, "OK, if you're finished, than go join Justine in the library." She ran a distracted hand through her disordered hair poking out from under the helmet. "I could tell you that all the books were dumped and she and the others are trying to get them back up on the shelves. I could even tell you that we need strong backs to get the shelves back up off the floor. But I think I'll tell you it's because Bonnie tells you to go do it, understand?"
"And there was darkness upon the world…and then, Bonnie said: "Let there Be light!"" Bonnie blinked and looked over at Felix.
"Oh, hi Felix." She said. "How is it going?" Felix had a similar map to Bonnie, this one covering electrical conduits.
"Pretty good. I'd say that except for busted lights, there aren't any major electrical problems in the main building."
"Good."
"Now for the out buildings." Felix said, and his face looked more somber, as he indicated a cluster of outbuildings. "These….I can't do anything about. They're trashed Bonnie." Bonnie nodded.
"And they're prefabs…."
"Right, which means they really aren't designed to be repaired at all. Best we can do is take out all the salvageable stuff and store it."
"What about these?" A delicate finger pointed to another cluster of buildings.
"Better—some water damage from the sprinklers when someone threw a Molotov cocktail inside…but nothing unfixable… except for the carpets."
"Kim's got that covered. A carpet company owed her a favor."
"For what?"
"Something about Duff Killigan and astroturf." Bonnie said, "I didn't listen—it made my head hurt."
"The astroturf?"
"That someone would really name their kid 'Duff'" Bonnie said primly.
Unfortunately, Bonnie found that time was relative. Every time she looked at the clock, more time had passed then she'd expected. That was bad. They only had so much time… And of course there were problems. Two people wanted the same tool, or decided they wanted to work over there, not here where the map and work schedule said they should be. Ron and Kim were handling that end of it—they had the personal mojo so that people didn't try and go over their heads to Bonnie…much.
Not only that, but they'd finally beaten the food problem. Yori's mom had been a baker and Yori had taken over the cafeteria, after they'd gone over it (Using Kim's Kimmunicator and her techno-nerd Wade's computer skills) and verified that there were no gas leaks. Now, Yori was keeping the place full of baked bread and other food, as well as the food and snacks Zita had liberated from the theater…probably the best food the place had seen since Ron had taken over before falling afoul of the board of health.
All of which meant they were only a little behind schedule…and Bonnie couldn't remember being so happy and so tired at the same time. She shrugged. Maybe it was because she wasn't in competition with a moving target any more. Just a project, where she knew what she had to do, and how to go about doing it.
Bonnie stretched and kept working. The sun came down, but now that they had Monique's dad's floodlights, that wasn't a problem—they just worked on one part of the school…in this case the library. Floodlights or no, Bonnie didn't want to risk people stumbling over themselves at night, and they had a lot of work to do here, sorting and re-shelving books. It was nine before Bonnie decided to call it quits for the day and chase everyone else out. Kim and Ron left, in each other's arms (big surprise there), Brick was waiting for her on his bike, and all Bonnie had to do was go lock up the office and she was out of here…which was good because she'd told everyone else to come back at 6:00 AM.
Bonnie walked into the office, and looked at the white boards, the status sheets, the blueprints…the chow mein that someone had left on the desk. She frowned and swept that into a plastic bag. She was not going to have the office smelling like that. She'd dump it off-
It was then that she noticed the large individual, back turned to her, muttering under his breath as he looked at the main school map, with its color coded sections.
"May I help you?" She said, acidly. I tell them they have to check in and out, and not come back in after they check out. There was still a ridiculous 10 O'clock curfew in effect. You are so-.
"Miss Rockwaller. I'm pleased to see you've recovered." Steve Barkin said as he turned to face her.
Upstate New York
"Eat." Ms. Possible told Shego for the fourth time. She'd wanted to make the journey when she woke up….at about 5:30 AM. Andrea had refused, and made her wait until 9, whereupon they went and got breakfast.
"But what if they've gone to work-" Shego said.
"Then we wait until they come back." Andrea replied. "Do you really want to ambush them with this on the way out the door?" She looked at the younger women. " 'Oh hi! Hey, in the five minutes before you have to catch the bus, I'm the real mother of your kid. Let's bond.'" Shego wilted.
"Ok…" She said.
"Good. Now eat so you don't pass out." Andrea continued.
"But if I-"
"I have some stomach medicine in my bag and your comet power won't neutralize that, so eat."
"I wish I knew the names of her parents." Shego said.
"Hego didn't remember off hand." Andrea replied, "So we go with what we have. Her name, Cally Lincoln, and her address."
"I'm surprised he couldn't remember anything else."
"He was occupied." Andrea said.
Finally, the two women walked down the street to the house. It was only a few blocks away from the hotel, one reason Andrea had chosen the hotel. The day was bright and sunny, and absent a very few boarded up windows, the town seemed to have suffered no ill effects from the global spate of madness. When Shego brought it up, Andrea shrugged.
"Lot's of work being done on that, Shego—Middleton was pretty bad, but it was close to the epicenter….and Monkey Fist seemed to spend the most of his power trying to go after people in power...or soldiers. He wanted to bring it all down." Shego unconsciously rubbed her wrists.
"Damned Crazy idiot." She said. Andrea nodded.
"I think the first modifier is certainly true." She paused, "Hopefully Kim and Ron won't ever face anything like that again."
"Hopefully none of us will." Shego said in heartfelt agreement. They passed a playground, and Andrea suddenly noticed that Shego had stopped dead.
Oh crap…another seizure? She looked and Shego was staring at the kids playing. It was a neighborhood park, and evidently the kids had taken advantage of no school to get some playing in.
"Shego?"
Shego wasn't paying any attention, looking at a kid in the playground…the right age, black hair in a ponytail and a pair of lambent green eyes. It was her. It was her! Andrea followed her gaze.
"Um, Shego…this may not be the best idea…" Andrea said, but she was also certain. The way the child moved, dancing between her friends in a game of dodgeball…it was… Shegoish. Shego had already entered the playground.
The kids were playing when they felt the presence, and looked behind them, at the red headed lady and the younger black haired woman in a green and black dress.
"Is your name Cally?" Shego asked.
"Uh-huh…but I'm not supposed to talk to strangers."
"Oh, uh…that's, um… good." Shego said. Cally looked at Shego for a long moment, then with an almost audible "click" she blinked.
"You're….Sh-sh." Shego's spirits soared.
She knows me, she knows ME!
"Yes, I'm-" A shrill scream cut her off.
"HELP! SOMEONE HELP!" Cally shouted, "She's here to kidnap us, or or…mutate us!" The kids exploded in every direction away from the stunned woman. Shego, her hands out, palms up, took a step towards Cally.
"No, I'm-" Cally grabbed the first thing that came to hand and threw the ball at Shego. Shego reflexively avoided it…redoubling Cally's panic. Cally actually tripped over a water sprinkler fixture and fell back, frantically scrambling back away from Shego.
"Wait- I'm not-" Shego started after the child, which provoked a scream of panic as Cally managed to get back onto her feet and took off like a bat out of hell. Shego's hands reached out and fluttered helplessly. She could grab the child, but the fear in her eyes paralyzed Shego. It was like the kid saw some terrifying monster come to take her away.
"Help! Help!" Cally kept screaming, as Shego stopped in shock, hands falling to her side. When Andrea got there, the child was vanishing down the street, and the deadly martial artist was wringing her hands together.
"She…she may have just heard news reports about you, Shego. Hego said she didn't know who her mother was, so it…it isn't personal." Shego said nothing and turned and walked out of the park. Fast.
Andrea caught up to Shego as the younger woman turned the corner, out of the sight of the park. Shego was talking to nobody as Andrea walked besides her.
"It's not a big deal." Shego said in a high, fast, unnatural tone, "I mean, it's good in my business for people to be terrified of me. e-ev" Her pace started to flag. Andrea came up to her, in time to see the tears streaking down Shego's face…and the agony in it,
"E-ven when it's my ow-own baby…" Shego said, and like someone had cut the strings holding her up started to fall to her knees in the middle of the sidewalk, shaking as she tried to hold in the sobs.
"Oh G-g-god…" Shego moaned in agony. "I want to die…" Shego didn't say anything else, just sobbed with the choking sound of someone desperately trying not to cry. Andrea knelt down beside her, wrapping her arms around the woman, rocking her.
"It's…" The words died in her throat. It wasn't alright. It might never be alright. Hurt her? Monkey fist, what you did doesn't even compare. "I'm here with you Shego…" Andrea continued to hold the younger woman, curled up and sobbing in her arms.
To be continued.