The henchman John Carter flushed in fear and hyperventilated as Shego's grip held him pinned against the inner hull of the airplane. "No… No, you've got it all wrong. I'm loyal. I'm loyal, I swear," he said, gasping.
Shego released her grip, allowing Carter to slide back into his seat. "Is that a fact? I'm not a Sherlock Holmes type, but I'm not stupid either. Let me go over it for you," she said. "Drakken doesn't exactly have crack security at the lairs, but we don't just let people walk in and out. Those spy flies don't have enough range to have flown in on their own. They had to catch a ride with somebody, and you're the most recent hire. The trouble with Gemini started not too long after you got here."
(flashback)
As Carter stumbled
down the stairs, Shego watched in amusement. She was interrupted by
a fly buzzing in her ear, and she waved it away in annoyance. Spooking the newbies is fun, thought Shego to herself.
"Maybe Gemini's ninja snuck them in! It wasn't me," said Carter.
"Maybe. But then how did Gemini know about Project Firebreak to steal it in the first place? Drakken wasn't talking to anyone about that; not even me," replied Shego.
(flashback)"So what is Project Firebreak supposed to do?" asked Shego as they walked.
"Well I was going to tell you all about it," said Drakken. He raised his head, pushing his nose into the air in a gesture of superiority. "But since you're in such a snit today, you can just wait to find out until everyone else does."
"You were working in his laboratory. You could have studied the plans, figured it out, and reported in. You had plenty of chances to look at Drakken's notes and a lot of other stuff coming through there," she continued.
(flashback)They walked out into the lab bay to the table cluttered with Drakken's current pile of work. The new henchman, Carter, had a clipboard in one hand and was studying a humming machine, apparently taking notes on its performance. Drakken searched around the table and finally found what he was looking for near where Carter was working.
"Doctor Drakken… is… is a great man, but he's not the best at keeping secrets. There's lots of ways Gemini could have heard about what he was working on. I bet those spy flies saw more than you think," said Carter, defending himself.
"Those goons of Gemini knew too much for that. They were able to roll right through everything we had, one step ahead of us the whole time," said Shego.
(flashback)Cursing in Japanese, Alpha leapt straight at the exoskeleton. As he moved, he drew a short-bladed weapon and executed a slicing motion with it, cutting a cable running along the exoskeleton's surface. There was a soft thrum as the suit's laser cannon immediately powered down.
"What are you, some kind of ninja engineer? How did you know how to do that?" griped Drakken.
"But let's say it was the spy flies. We got rid of them and Drakken came up with not too half-bad of a plan to track down his machine," Shego continued.
(flashback)"Shego, don't bother with the jet! I do have another plan. Instead of letting Gemini track the parts to us, we keep a watch on where the parts are being sent. I can hack the proper computers, and when I do, the shipping patterns will tell us right where Gemini is hiding. Then we take the fight to him," said Drakken.
"He might have just figured it out. Gemini is a very dangerous man," said Carter, letting a bit of defiance leak into his voice.
"Figuring it out is one thing, but Gemini was personally waiting for us at the museum. He knew just when we'd be there. Somebody tipped him off. Somebody made sure we'd walk right into his trap. And somebody made sure there was no way we'd see it coming," replied Shego.
(flashback)"We've got him, sir" shouted henchman Carter, running into Drakken's laboratory with a bundle of papers under one arm.
(flashback)
Behind Drakken, the
door to the Paleolithic Sky Pavilion slid open. Drakken turned at
the sound, seeing Gemini revealed in the doorway. Shocked, Drakken
could only protest, "Impossible! My biometric scanner said
there was no one in this museum." He waved the biometric
scanner at Gemini, as if hoping it would make his foe disappear.
"Perhaps you should have double-checked it before you left," said Gemini.
"This is all circumstantial! Gemini could have worked any of the people working with Dr. Drakken. What makes you so sure it was me?" said Carter.
"You make a good point. Let me double-check," said Shego. Using unnecessary force, she pushed Carter to the side until she had access to the back pocket of his pants. Then she took his wallet.
"Give that back! That's mine!" said Carter.
"It is? Good, then there's no mistake that this Worldwide Evil Empire membership card is also yours," said Shego, opening the wallet and displaying the card in question. She smiled at Carter the same way a shark smiles at a fish it's stalking.
All the blood drained out of Carter's face. "I… really shouldn't have kept that thing in my wallet, should I?"
"Probably not," agreed Shego.
"But… but, how did you know I had it?" asked Carter.
"Hello! Master thief here. I stole your wallet, looked inside it, and put it back without you noticing before we even left the lair," said Shego.
"So what was with all of the explanation?" said Carter.
"Pretty much just me bragging about how I figured it out," confessed Shego. "Now to business." Gripping the cargo door, she released the handle and gave it a fast push, sliding the door open to reveal the long fall to the ground just outside of the airplane's safe confines.
Carter swallowed hard and clutched his seat.
"Now if at any time this conversation makes you uncomfortable, I want you to feel free to leave," said Shego cheerily. She gestured out the door.
"I don't know anything! WWEE doesn't tell me anything. I can't help you," said Carter.
"That's really too bad," said Shego. She grabbed Carter by the collar and began dragging towards the open door. His efforts to resist were completely ineffectual.
"Wait a minute! Maybe- Maybe I can help," shouted Carter desperately.
"First you can't, and then you can…. Quit jerking me around here, Carter. All I want to know is, where is Gemini's base? Where is he keeping Drakken?" said Shego.
"It's not that simple. WWEE headquarters is a huge airship. Gemini keeps it constantly moving, so that the Global Justice Network can't track it. They're not going to tell a spy like me where it's going to be," said Carter.
Shego considered this. "A spy like you, huh? First thing's first. I want you to tell me why you were assigned to spy on Drakken, what reported back, and everything you know about Gemini."
Nodding vigorously, Carter began to speak. "I used to be a graduate student. It seems like it was only yesterday I was working on my doctorate, trying to set up an experiment to test possible industrial uses for nano-constructed fibers. But I got greedy, got lazy, and I tried to steal the work of a professor who was renting out one of the labs. I got caught, and it was-"
"Bo-ring! I didn't ask for your life story, sobby-McSob. Just concentrate on the spy gig and leave your sad sack life for someone who cares. 'Kay?" said Shego contemptuously.
"This is my life we're talking about here!" shouted Carter angrily. He was upset enough to pull back his arm and take a swing at Shego.
She caught Carter's fist easily in mid-air, arresting his punch without visible sign of strain. Green plasma began to flow as Shego held Carter's hand trapped in her grip, and the traitorous henchman gasped in pain. "If you don't get back on topic, I'm going to take over telling your life story. Specifically, the end. Got it?" inquired Shego.
Carter nodded, tears welling up from the corners of his eyes. Shego gave his fist a final squeeze, then released it. Carter clutched his injured appendage against his chest, trying to relieve the pain by putting pressure on it. His breaths were short and ragged.
Eventually, Carter managed to continue. "So… kicked out of school, fear for my life, recruited by WWEE, yadda-yadda-yadda. Then one day I'm assigned to spy on Dr. Drakken. It wasn't tough getting hired. You know his pay isn't the best compared to HenchCo, so I don't think there were a lot of applicants and- Uh, anyway, I don't think WWEE knew about Project Firebreak to start off with. They knew Drakken was working on something, and I guess some of the parts he stole got Dr. Vachslo interested. My handler told me to snoop around, see what the components were being used for, and report back anything interesting. Oh, and plant the spy flies as well."
"But then they got you to help steal Project Firebreak," prompted Shego.
"Yes, once they figured out what it was supposed to do from some plans I copied. They had me steal some of Dr. Drakken's other technology too, but Firebreak was the main thing. Then after that… Well, you've already guessed the rest," said Carter.
"What about Gemini? What do you know about him? What's he likely to do with Dr. Drakken?" asked Shego.
"Gemini? I've never met him, not in person. Just as glad I haven't, either. You know how people like to say about dangerous guys, 'He'd as soon kill you as look at you.'? Well with Gemini, they mean it!" responded Carter.
Shego nodded. "Now for the one million dollar question, college boy, and you had better hope you can figure out an answer. Where can I find Gemini's flying fortress?"
"I told you, they're not going to tell someone like me something like that. Now I'm not saying I can't help you. I can help you. It's just going to take some time. If you'll only let me- What! Why are you looking at me like that?" said Carter.
Shego had been staring at him with a somewhat far-away look in her eyes. She spoke. "You're boring me again, so I was thinking of a joke. Wanna hear it?"
Carter nodded.
"How does a henchman smell after you've burned off his nose?" Shego paused a beat. "Just awful! Get it? It's a double-meaning thing." She reached out with her right hand, covered in plasma flames, slowly moving it towards Carter's face. "Why aren't you laughing?" she asked quietly.
Carter's nerve held out until Shego's claws were about three inches away from his nose. "I know where the headquarters will be! I know where it'll be!"
Shego paused, not moving her hand any farther away. "I thought they weren't going to tell something like that to a guy like you."
"They don't, but I'm a spy, right? Finding out things I'm not supposed to know is kind of what I do now. People tell me things. Gemini is keeping the fortress parked above Chicago. That's where he wants to make his first strike. I heard it from a friend of a friend. It's cloaked, but I can tell you how to find it anyway," said Carter.
Shego listened as Carter spilled more details of WWEE's operation. She made the occasional note as he talked. Finally he finished, pale and sweating.
"WWEE will hunt me down and kill me for this. You're going to get captured and Gemini will know what I told you and then they'll come after me," said Carter, sounding resigned.
Shego gestured towards the still-open cargo door.
"Don't think I'm not tempted," responded Carter. "So what are you going to do with me now?"
Shego considered for a while. "I'm going to steal all your money and then drop you somewhere I can find you if it turns out you're lying," she finally said.
"You're going to steal all my money!" said Carter.
"I'm a thief so it… you know, seems appropriate. I want all your bank account numbers, access codes, credit card numbers, and all of that. That includes what WWEE was paying you to spy on us," said Shego.
"I guess I don't have any choice," said Carter bitterly.
Shego put an arm around his shoulders in a friendly fashion. "Aww, look at it this way. Since you won't be able to access any of your money, WWEE will have a harder time tracking you down. You'll be living off the grid. In a way, I'm doing you a favor."
"Yet in another, more accurate way, you're totally screwing me," said Carter.
"You're feisty when you're not pretending to be all meek and bootlicking, college boy," said Shego. She started to head back to the cockpit to correct course towards where she planned to leave Carter.
"Shego?" asked Carter.
She turned back towards him. "What?"
"Would you really have…." Carter trailed off and tapped the side of his nose to indicate his meaning.
"You don't think I would?" said Shego.
"I don't know. You're a real piece of work, but you couldn't know for sure that I knew anything," said Carter.
Shego cocked her head to one side. "You folded, so you don't get to see my cards, drop-out."
"Fine. For what it's worth, I hope you kick Gemini's butt. Those guys are all jerks, and I only worked for them because I had to," said Carter.
"Suuuure," said Shego as she once again resumed moving to the pilot's chair. This time, Carter didn't try to stop her.
As she sat in the chair and took the controls, Shego couldn't help but think about Carter's question. Shego had done a lot of things over the years, but torture wasn't her style. Sure she'd stick somebody in a deathtrap if that was what Drakken demanded, but that wasn't the same thing. She didn't have to get her hands dirty. Knocking someone around; well most people were asking for it. The thought of bloody, cutting pieces off, torture was…. It wasn't a place she wanted to go.
I'll do whatever I need to in order to find Drakken. I'm glad I didn't have to do that, though. I could have pushed Carter out of the plane and maybe I still should, but I guess a girl has to have some limits. I just hope people don't think I'm going soft, thought Shego.
It was a small pier near one end of the massive river docks where cargo entering and leaving Go City was unloaded and loaded. The small ship and its disreputable crew made port a couple of hours before sunset. They were greeted by a crane, several forklifts, a trailer truck, and a team of men ready to make immediate acceptance of their cargo.
The captain, a woman with long dark hair swept back by a bandana and an eyepatch so oversized that one might suspect her of wearing it for effect, climbed down to the dock. "Got your goods," she said to the leader of the transport team in a gruff voice.
"About time," responded the man. He was bald and thickly muscled, but past his prime, with a growing paunch in the stomach area that constantly threatened to burst free of his shirt.
"So what is this stuff anyway? The instruction we got, I figure it's nothing anyone wants going through regular channels," said the ship's captain.
"I'm not paid to ask questions, and neither are you," said the transport team's leader.
The captain shrugged and moved back to supervise her crew's portion of the unloading. A steady stream of crates and cargo containers soon began moving out of the ship's hold and into the back of the truck. The containers contained different appearances and labeling schemes, though none of them seemed to say precisely what was inside.
On in particular was bordered by a green stripe around the top, with lettering on the side saying 'Do Not Stack'. Because of this, the transport team left it until last so that it could be placed on top of the other containers in the rear of the truck. The forklift operator, who had been having a very hard day, accidentally bumped his forks against the side of the container when he tried to pick it up. The container was shoved hard a foot across the dock and there was a sound of something thumping around the interior.
A few seconds after the thump, there was a brief sound that sounded suspiciously like a groan. The forklift operator, who had been maneuvering around for a second attempt at a pick-up, stopped his lift and listened suspiciously. There were no further sounds, but he was still considering getting off his forklift to check the container when the crew boss shouted at him.
"Jenkins! Quit messing around and get that thing loaded so we can get the truck in gear," shouted the supervisor.
Jenkins gave a sort of mental shrug and resumed loading, telling himself that whatever was inside the crate was somebody else's problem.
One loaded, the truck drove off to a parking lot attached to a dilapidated warehouse just outside the city proper. Despite the condition of the warehouse, which looked as thought it had been abandoned for years, the parking lot looked well-maintained and recently paved. The only other vehicle in the lot was a small van, beside which lounged six dangerous-looking men wearing sunglasses.
One man, apparently the leader though he wasn't dressed any differently than the others, waved the truck forward until it had assumed a position boxed in by four painted lines. The other men then ran out to start disconnecting the trailer from the truck, not waiting for the driver to shut off his engine.
The driver rolled down his window. "I have a delivery here," he said.
"We know. We've been waiting for you," replied the leader. "Stay in your truck. When we have the trailer disconnected, you can leave."
"Doesn't somebody need to sign for this stuff… or… something?" asked the driver.
"No," was the leader's clipped response.
Once the driver had left, the truck trailer and its guard continued to wait in the parking lot, no one making any move to start unloading. After a few hours, darkness fell. When the sun was completely gone and stars had appeared in the sky, the leader walked over to a spot of the concrete and opened a hidden panel. Inside were several switches. Flipping one caused a blurring camouflage field to appear around the truck trailer. It wasn't quite invisibility, but in the dark without any lights being shone upon it, it was close enough.
A second switch flipped caused the entire section of parking lot pavement they were standing on to rise up into the air, riding on hidden lift coils. The truck trailer, guard team, and their car all moved swiftly towards the sky. Soon a patch of dark-than-the-sky darkness appeared above them as their target. The rising section of pavement pushed neatly up through the darkness and into a brightly lit cargo hold, where hatch doors closed beneath it, allowing it to come safely to a rest.
This was Gemini's flying fortress, mobile headquarters of the Worldwide Evil Empire.
A crowd of jumpsuited henchmen moved into action, pulling open the doors of the truck trailer and beginning the unloading process. Because it was the last one on, the green-striped container was the first one off. Using a sleek-looking hover dolly, one of the henchmen carted it through several doorways and to an opened storage area away from the main hold. Even as he turned away after dropping it off, another mover arrived pulling his own hover dolly. Completely ignoring the 'Do Not Stack' label, the second mover stacked his container atop the green-striped one.
This process continued several more times, even as other cargo containers from the truck trailer were moved to different storage areas. Finally the lights were flipped off and the storage area was left silent and dark. A few minutes passed.
There was a quiver from the lid of the green-striped cargo container as someone attempted to open it from the inside. The combined weights of the containers stacked on top of the lid prevented this from occurring. After a pause, there was a grunt of effort as the person inside made another attempt, putting more force behind it this time. The lid failed to open so much as half an inch, however.
Another pause, as the container occupant thought things through. For a while nothing seemed to happen, and then a spot on the side of the green-striped container began to bubble and burn. The smell of burning plastic filled the room as a circle was slowly burned into the side of container. Flickers of green light were visible from inside. Finally the circle was complete and with a quick push the occupant popped it loose from the container wall, allowing egress from the container. Coughing quietly from the burnt plastic fumes, Shego crawled out.
She got to her feet and looked at the 'Do Not Stack' labeling on the container, an expression of absolute rage on her face. "Do people around here not read!" she whispered to herself, jabbing her finger furiously at the disobeyed instruction. Unsurprisingly, there was no response from the otherwise unoccupied storage chamber. Shego breathed out heavily, aware there was no one around to vent her rage on.
The passing of her anger had another effect on Shego. She clutched her sides with both hands and moved swiftly to the sliding door marking entrance to the storage chamber. Her teeth were clenched together as if in pain, but she nonetheless took the time to listen at the door for a few seconds. Hearing no sounds, she carefully slid it open enough to stick her head out and looked up and down the corridor.
Several doors down, she spotted the object of her desire. With a quick hopping motion, Shego slipped into the corridor and ran for it, entering her target door heedless of whether anyone was already inside.
Two minutes passed. There came the sound of a toilet flushing. Seconds later, a much-relieved Shego eased herself back out into the corridor.
Teach me to drink a soda before hiding in a shipping crate. Still, they didn't have to wait so long to load it, she thought.
Shego pushed herself forward, wriggling through the ventilation shaft. This just isn't working, she thought.
The problem wasn't getting around. For a vessel this large, good air circulation was a necessity. With time and effort, she was fairly sure the ventilation ducts could take her anywhere on the airship. The problem was; Shego didn't know where she needed to go. Carter hadn't been able to provide a very good description of the ship's layout, and anyway, he didn't know where they would be keeping Dr. Drakken. Shego had hoped that if she started wandering around, it would become apparent where she needed to go.
That proved not to be the case.
It was time to take some chances. Shego began seeking out the ventilation grills where the ducts peeked out into open rooms, looking for the proper target. It took some time, but eventually she found what she was looking for. Gemini didn't have a lot of female 'henchmen', but there were a few here and there. After considerable searching, Shego had finally found one who was:
About Shego's size
Alone
The woman in question was curled up in a darkened corner of one of the engine rooms, reading a magazine with a flashlight. From her posture and semi-hidden position, it seemed likely she wasn't supposed to be there, which meant that she wasn't likely to be missed for a while. Perfect.
There was only the slightest noise to alert the woman. One moment she was sitting, reading here magazine in comfort. The next moment, Shego loomed above her. All she had time to think or say was one word. "Uh-oh."
"You said it," agreed Shego. She reached out with the extended index finger of her right hand and touched the henchwoman's forehead, applying a quick jolt of concussive plasma force. The henchwoman instantly collapsed unconscious, only a small blister on her forehead indicating what had happened to her.
Five minutes later, Shego tugged on her new purple jumpsuit, attempting to smooth the pinkish-white strip running down its center. She had tied back her hair, tucking most of its body down the back of her uniform, as well as concentrating to remove some of the green highlights from the exposed skin of her face. The red sunglasses, which Shego considered much classier than the visors that Drakken's henchmen usually wore, provided the final touch. Shego was pleased to find that despite their appearance, they provided only a slight red tint to the world when she looked out through them.
Shego tested this last fact by looking through the small viewing window in front of her. Inside the escape pod, she could see the henchwoman whose clothing she had just stolen. The woman was still unconscious, so Shego hadn't bothered to bind and gag her. She wouldn't be staying around long enough to wake up, anyway. Despite the woman's unconsciousness, Shego gave a small wave before pressing the button to launch the pod. It seemed like the thing to do.
Shego had done her best to disable the circuitry that would alert the rest of the ship that an escape pod had been launched. Of course, it was possible that she hadn't managed it, or that someone on the ship would see or feel the pod launching. That was okay, though. By the time anyone had sorted out what had happened, Shego planned to be long gone, and it might provide a useful distraction in the meantime.
Whistling to herself, Shego headed out into the corridors of the airship, looking for someone of whom to ask directions.
The first people she encountered were two men occupied doing maintenance work on an electrical conduit. Shego considered talking to them, but she ultimately decided against it. They looked like they knew where they where and what their job was, which meant they would probably be made suspicious at someone who didn't know where she was or what her job was. They did serve one useful purpose, however. When Shego walked by, they didn't seem alarmed or startled by her appearance. Shego took this to mean that she hadn't forgotten anything major in her disguise.
Granted, one of the men did seem to spend a lot of time staring at her back as she moved away from them down the corridor, but Shego took that as no more than her due. Still got it, she thought to herself, slapping one thigh absentmindedly.
A short while later, Shego spotted what she considered a much better target for her questioning. There was a door off the corridor partially opened, and inside Shego could see a dark-haired man with a pencil-thin mustache sitting at an office desk and typing on a laptop computer. He was wearing the same jumpsuit as everyone else, but unlike most of the henchmen Shego had seen, there was a Greek letter emblazoned in the center of his uniform's chest. Shego figured him for a management type, which no doubt meant he'd be happy to tell her what to do.
"Yo," said Shego. She paused and cleared her throat, attempting to make her voice more gruff than usual. "I was told I should report to where they're- we're keeping the prisoner. You know, the blue one who's always whining? I'm new here, and I'm a little lost."
The man with the pencil-thin mustache stood up, startled. He closed his laptop, though not before Shego got a glimpse of a game of Solitaire on the screen. "Come in here!" he ordered.
Shego walked into the office and up to the desk, shifting her eyes from side to side in order to keep an eye out for anything unexpected. She was a woman of many talents, including both stealth and fighting, but this acting business was outside her usual range. She hoped she hadn't screwed up somehow.
"Do you see this?" demanded the man, jabbing his index finger at the symbol on his chest.
"Yes," said Shego.
"This marks me as Agent Epsilon. I have a letter! Not everybody gets a letter, you know. There aren't enough to go around. I am an important man in this organization. I go on the vital missions, and I report directly to Gemini! You, have no letter. You're just staff," said the now-identified Agent Epsilon.
Shego silently counted to three. She wasn't accustomed to being talked to this way by anyone, and she found herself wondering what Agent Epsilon would look like with his head shoved clear through the room's back wall. After taking a careful breath she responded, "So I shouldn't have asked you for directions?"
"You shouldn't interrupt the very important work I'm doing," said Epsilon.
As Shego was attempting to figure out the proper response to this, a voice sounded from behind her. "Speaking of important work, Agent Epsilon," said the voice. Shego recognized the speaker immediately. It was Agent Alpha, also known as Masuyo Ichikawa.
Epsilon's face paled. He turned to Shego and snapped an order. "Attention!"
Shego was glad to obey, straightening her posture ram-rod straight and keeping her eyes faced forward. It gave her a good excuse not to turn around. It was just barely possible that Alpha would fail to recognize her if he saw her only from the back, but if he saw her face the jig would be up.
Though she never would have admitted it to anyone, butterflies filled Shego's stomach. Sensei had doubted her ability to beat Masuyo in a straight-up fight, and here in a fortress filled with WWEE soldiers would be just about the worst possible place to fight him. It wouldn't be like a fight with Kim, either. Losing would have… consequences.
Reassured by having exerted his authority over 'staff', Epsilon turned his attention back to Agent Alpha. By pure coincidence, Shego realized that Epsilon was positioned perfectly for Shego to see Agent Alpha's reflection in his sunglasses. It was difficult to make out clearly, but it appeared that Alpha was in his usual ninja garb. Shego could make out four indistinct figures standing behind the ninja.
"What can I do for you, Agent Alpha?" said Epsilon.
"It would please me if you could deliver the completed Markov report. With a due date of yesterday, so unfortunate that it does not already rest on my desk. That I must depart from my schedule to come here and ask you for it; very poor sign," said Alpha in a mild tone.
"I've been delayed by circumstances beyond my control! So many of the staff need my guidance," said Epsilon, gesturing wildly in Shego's direction. "I promise I'll get it to you by the end of the day."
"It is to be hoped. Do not worry if you cannot succeed, Agent Epsilon. Perhaps reports are not your strength. They are not mine. I am currently training Lord Gemini's new Twin Squad. I can always ask Gemini that you be relieved from your other duties to assist," said Alpha.
In the reflection of Epsilon's sunglasses, Shego could see Alpha move back into an indistinct blur. However, he gestured for one of the four figures behind him to step up into his former position, presumably so that Epsilon could get a better view. Shego could see that it was a woman wearing some sort of a jumpsuit and a helmet that concealed most of her face.
"I'm not that great of a fighter," confessed Epsilon, looking puzzled.
"Oh, your American-style humor. Of course it would be your honor to help as a mobile target. Good day, Agent Epsilon. I look forward to the report," said Alpha.
Alpha started to move away, then stopped and looked at Shego's back. Something seemed to tickle his mind as being… familiar, but whatever it was refused to congeal into anything coherent. He couldn't place the source of the feeling, not even sure if it was due to the woman standing in front of Epsilon's desk or something else in the room. Perhaps… no, I had better get back to the training. I don't have a lot of time to get this 'Twin Squad' ready, he thought.
As Alpha led his 'Twin Squad' away, Epsilon occupied himself hyperventilating. Shego couldn't resist the temptation to take a quick peak out the office door down the corridor at their retreating backs. The women appeared as identical as you might expect from a group called 'the Twin Squad', though since Shego was seeing them only from the rear, the effect might have been merely due to similar builds and matching uniforms. Their jumpsuits were tight black leather and the helmets appeared to conceal the upper half of their face, at least from the brief glimpse Shego got.
Shego stepped back inside the office just as Epsilon regained controlled of himself. "Who ordered you to report to Drakken's detainment cell, anyway?" he said.
Shego smiled. "Why, it was Gemini himself… sir. But if you're too busy to give me directions, well I'm sure he won't blame anyone but me for me being late. Don't you think?"
"Well I… Let me just take a moment to give you those directions," said Epsilon.
The light inside his cell flickered as Drakken held the capacitor against the exposed wiring. His insulated gloves prevented him from taking a shock as he manually jammed the wire against the input lead. After a moment, he sighed and held up the small device.
Regrettably, this small capacitor and a wire-scraping tool were all he had been able to sneak out of the lab. Still, it was high-capacity. If he jammed it directly into someone's exposed skin, it would… not knock them out. Drakken couldn't fool himself about that. It might make them woozy enough for Drakken to hit them over the head or something, though. Of course, where he would go and what he would do after that was open to question. Drakken was sure that when the time came to decide, inspiration would strike.
Now there was just the matter of deciding whether to try and trick the guards into coming inside ahead of schedule or wait for his regular water ration. Decisions, decisions.
A soft thump outside his cell made Drakken look up. For a moment nothing happened, then the viewing panel in the door slid open. Drakken scrambled to hide the capacitor behind his back. "It's not a zoo in here, you know! How about a little privacy?" he shouted.
The face that peered through the viewing slot, however, wasn't that of one of Gemini's henchmen. It was Shego. As per usual, she had a faintly disgusted expression on her face.
"Shego! Gemini told me he left you trapped next to a bomb and that you were blown up," said Drakken.
"You must be relieved," said Shego.
"Not really, no," answered Drakken.
Shego's face twisted in rage, and she shut the viewing panel with more force than was strictly necessary. There was just enough of a pause for Drakken to wonder if she had left entirely, and then the cell door swung open. Shego was revealed to be standing over the unconscious forms of Drakken's two guards, holding the electronic key to the jail cell in her hand.
"After all I've gone through to come get you, I can't believe you have the nerve-" began Shego.
Drakken waved his hands in front of himself in a 'warding off' gesture. "No, no, no! Not how I meant it at all. I was upset at first, I assure you, but after I had time to think about it, I never doubted that you had escaped," he said.
Shego looked skeptical.
"Well, think about it. How many times have I left Kim Possible tied up in a death trap, only to have her escape and thwart my plans? You're at least as good as her, right? Blown up indeed! I wouldn't believe that unless I'd picked through the pieces myself," said Drakken.
This gave Shego pause. "As nice as it is to know I have your confidence, you ever think maybe you could learn a lesson from that Kim Possible thing? You know, that maybe it would be a good idea to do things a little… differently?"
Drakken considered. "So you're saying that I need to use better death traps? I'm trying my best here, Shego!"
"That's not what I- Whatever. Here, let me get that collar off you," said Shego. She moved forward to deal with the collar around Drakken's neck.
Before she could touch it, though, Drakken casually tapped his finger against the collar, causing it to separate into two pieces and fall away. "Oh, I disabled that hours ago. Cheap construction, Shego. Not quality," he said.
"Right," answered Shego, a tiny bit impressed in spite of herself. She took a moment to study Drakken. He looked haggard, and she was pretty sure that he was wearing the same clothing as when he'd been kidnapped. Various strands of his hair had escaped from his mostly intact ponytail and were sticking in the air in random directions. Painful-looking darker blue patches of skin around his neck hinted that his collar had been active before he had managed to disable it. Strangely, though, he had somehow managed to shave.
Drakken brushed off his coat and then walked briskly out of the cell. He bent down and grabbed a gun from one of his unconscious guards, holstering it in his jacket pocket.
"So I figure we can sneak down to the flight deck and steal a shuttle out of here. With a little luck, we'll be gone before Gemini realizes you've been busted out," said Shego.
This suggestion caused a strange reaction from Drakken. He tapped his open-palmed hand against the wall a few times, looking unusually thoughtful. Finally he spoke. "I'm not going anywhere, Shego."
"Drakken, I've had enough of the crazy today. We both know that you're going to rant and rave and then you're going to beg me to help you escape. So seeing as how I had to spend six hours hiding in a packing crate to get up here, how about you just save the speech about your big revenge for the trip home?" said Shego.
"I mean it! Gemini stole my invention, kidnapped me, and now he's on the cusp of using my creation to conquer the world. I won't stand for it, Shego. Gemini will rue the day he trifled with Doctor Drakken," said Drakken, straightening up and looking Shego in the eye.
"He's not going to conquer the world. Global Justice or Kim Possible or somebody will stop him," said Shego.
"Somebody will stop him. Me! I'll stop him," shouted Drakken.
Shego paused. "You're serious, aren't you?" she said.
"Deadly serious. The world is mine to conquer and no one else's. I will not turn tail and run away," said Drakken.
"Doctor D, seeing as how you're crazy and I'm sane, you really ought to listen to me here. Right now, you are in the middle of the headquarters of the Worldwide Evil Empire. Gemini has hundreds of armed henchmen, plenty of gadgets to help him hurt people, and his pet ninja. You have no henchmen and you don't have any of your inventions here with you. Are you seeing the problem yet?" said Shego.
"It doesn't matter. I'll defeat that pompous- pompous, arrogant…. I'm the greatest genius on earth. I'll defeat him using my brains and my hands," said Drakken. He flexed his hands in the air to demonstrate, thought the effect was somewhat ruined by how tiny they were.
"I'll defeat him with my brains and my hands," mimicked Shego in the most sarcastic, mocking tone she could manage. "That's the stupidest plan you've ever come up with, and that's saying something. Remember it's my job to tell you when you're being stupid?" said Shego.
Drakken crossed his arms. "And it's my prerogative to disregard you. In case you've forgotten, I'm the one in charge here."
"Oh… oh, are you under the delusion that I'm coming with you on this suicide run of yours? Because, no. Not doing that. Let me admit something. I like my job. Most of the time, when I'm not rescuing you from people leading evil organizations, it's a fun job. I get to steal things, have some nice fights, and do some world traveling. Not too bad a life. The fact that I like my job is why I'm bothering to have this stupid argument with you. But it's just a job. I'm not going to get killed over it, and I'm sure not going to die trying to save you from your own stupidity," said Shego.
Drakken looked away in silence for a moment. He sniffed slightly. "Harsh words, Shego. Harsh words hurt. It doesn't change anything, though. As they say, a man has to do… what a man has to do. I'll consider this to be your resignation. Please have your things clear- cleared out of the lair by the time I-" He stopped and sniffled. "Cleared out by the time I get back."
Shego just stared at Drakken, her arms crossed.
Drakken turned away from her, then immediately whirled back around again. "And just so you know, you are not in my will. I didn't want to tempt you," he said.
Shego gave a little nod of acknowledgement.
Drakken turned and began to slowly walk away.
"You should really rethink this, Drakken," said Shego.
Drakken kept walking.
"This is not a good idea, Doctor D," said Shego, trying again.
Drakken kept walking.
"Drew Lipsky," said Shego, raising her voice.
At this, finally, Drakken turned. "Don't call me that!" he snarled.
"I called you that because I'm trying to get through to any sane part of Lipsky that might still be in there. This isn't like going off to fight Kim Possible. They're not going to hit you over the head and dump you in a nice comfy jail cell. Drew, these people will kill you. They'll kill you, and then you'll just be a small, pathetic dead man named Drew Lipsky. What's the point of that?" said Shego.
"You're wrong, Shego. When they kill me, I'll be a dead man named Drakken, greatest genius in the world. If I ran away, I'd just be pathetic Drew Lipsky. On the whole, I think I'd rather be a dead Drakken than a live Lipsky. Goodbye, Shego," said Drakken. Then he stepped out the door and was gone.
Shego clenched and unclenched her fists. It took a lot of training to be able to do that without digging her sharpened claws into the palms of her hands, but she was after all a woman of great skill. Frustration overwhelming her, she summoned her plasma and slashed open the wall beside her. She tore the cell door off its hinges. The very air around her began to superheat. None of it made her feel any better.
"It's just a job, it's just a job, it's just a job," Shego repeated to herself. It had been a good run with Drakken, but there were plenty of other people out there who would pay top dollar for her skills. Hadn't she always known it would end this way, anyway? Drakken was crazy. That had been obvious from the beginning. Sooner or later, his madness was bound to take him somewhere it would be suicidal to follow. The only surprise was that it had taken this long.
It was sad, admittedly. Drakken had been fun to banter with. He never seemed to take her insults seriously, and he gave as good as he got. Well, almost as good. It was pathetically cute, the way he always called for her to show her something he thought was neat, even though it wasn't usually neat at all. It was even fun, in a way, just to hang out near him, listening to him be all enthusiastic about his work while Shego tried to keep her claws extra-sharp.
Bah. Drakken was an idiot. He was crazy. He was bad-tempered, poorly-groomed, and evil.
"And he's sort of my friend," said Shego.
She clapped both hands across her mouth when she realized she had said that aloud.
Once around the corner, what remained of Drakken's confident posture collapsed. Without Shego, he didn't stand a chance. Without Shego, this really was a suicide mission.
Drakken wondered what it would be like to be dead. Before he could stop himself, he had theorized three separate hypotheses, as well as an experiment to settle the matter once and for all. Not that he would have time to set any of it up before he died. Quick as that thought passed through his head, he began imagining all the different ways Gemini could kill them.
Drakken began cataloging them. Short and painful, long and painless, short and painless, and long and painful. The last category was the largest, and Drakken found himself subdividing into methods involving carnivorous animals and methods that didn't involve carnivorous animals. As a scientist, he always took great comfort in having things properly cataloged.
Without thinking about it, Drakken had been following a trail of fresh, cool, air that was blowing through a cross-corridor. Still in his daze, he turned towards the source of the breeze. The hall appeared to dead-end at a half completed section of safety railing, though top two horizontal bars had been left out. Drakken stepped over the lower railing and examined the ground, trying to find the source of the air. It didn't seem to be coming from the walls, so logic dictated that it must be from the ground.
Oh, I get it now. This isn't decking at all. It's a porous cardboard composite designed to be air permeable. They must be using the backwash from the jets keeping this fortress in the air to circulate air directly into these corridors. What a clever design! The only thing I can't figure is, how can a composite surface like this be strong enough to support a man of my weight, thought Drakken.
There was a cracking noise.
"Uh-oh," said Drakken as the floor collapsed away beneath him.
Apparently safety and health inspections and even things like unfinished safety railings were not a priority on the WWEE airship.
For all his bad luck, Drakken managed to grab onto one piece of good luck. Quite literally in fact. When laying down the porous cardboard composite, the construction crew had nailed strips of cloth across the expanse of the decking to support the cardboard while it dried. Even as he fell to his nigh-certain doom, Drakken managed to gain a one handed grip on one such piece of cloth, leaving him dangling over the dark sky below.
Drakken took stock of his situation. The edge of the deck above was out of reach of his free hand. He was maintaining his grip on the cloth only by dint of having one hand completely entangled in it. Trying to grab it with his free hand failed to provide enough of a grip to pull himself farther up. He couldn't see the ground below him in the darkness, but it was virtually certain to be a lethal fall, assuming of course that he didn't get sucked into the jet turbine keeping the ship aloft on his way down.
There was only one thing to do. "Shego!" yelled Drakken. "Shego! Shego!" he tried again.
There was no response, and Drakken heard what sounded like an ominous ripping noise coming from the cloth.
"Shego!"
No response.
So this is it, I'm going to die, thought Drakken. Some genius I am. Of course… I haven't really tried to save myself, have I? Yelling for Shego to help me isn't much of a plan. I got myself into this mess after all. I can figure a way out.
First step was to take inventory of all the resources he had to work with. Drakken patted himself down with his free hand. All his tools had been confiscated. He had the wire scraper and the capacitor, but they wouldn't be much use. He had the gun he had picked up earlier, but that wouldn't be any use unless he wanted to shoot himself on the way down, and Drakken was hardly the suicidal sort. Why, Gemini hadn't even bothered to take away his belt before locking him up, and everyone knew prisoners could use their belts to-
His belt!
Frantically, Drakken unbuckled his belt using his free hand. Once loose, he thumbed the buckle until it locked into place, forming a hook. Gemini had confiscated all his electronic toys, but Drakken's long-ago tinkering with his belt had gone undetected and forgotten. Now it was just a matter of hooking the bottom rung of the unfinished safety rail….
About a minute later, an exhausted Drakken pulled himself over the edge of the deck and rolled under the railing to lie on the floor, exhausted. His eyes were closed, so the first notice he had that he wasn't alone was sound of slow, formal, clapping.
Drakken opened his eyes to find Shego staring down at him. She was still giving him a slow clap, but as he looked at her she gradually let it trail off.
"How long were you here?" asked Drakken, when he had recovered his wind.
"Pretty much the whole time," said Shego.
"You heard me calling for help," said Drakken, forcing himself to get to his feet.
"Yep," said Shego.
Supporting himself with one hand against the wall, Drakken used his other hand to draw the gun and point it at Shego. "Then why didn't you help me?" he yelled.
"Because. If you can't even get yourself out of an air shaft without my help, then we stand no chance against Gemini, so saving you would have been pretty pointless," said Shego.
"I don't care if you- Wait, did you say 'we'?" said Drakken.
Shego rolled her eyes and looked uncomfortable. "Yes. Yes I did."
"So you're going to help me go after Gemini? You're going to help me after all?" asked Drakken.
"That's the plan," said Shego with obviously faked enthusiasm.
"Why?" said Drakken.
There were a great many things Shego could have said in response to this. Some were heartfelt, some were sarcastic. Some would have revealed a great deal to Drakken about what she truly thought of him, and some would have entirely misled him. True to her nature, though, Shego chose to go with something unoriginal, yet appropriate.
"Because as somebody once said to me… I like to think of us as sort of an evil family. So if you need me, here I am," said Shego.
Drakken realized he was still pointing a gun at Shego. He returned it to his pocket. "But… You were willing to let me fall to my death just a minute ago," he said, trying to understand.
"Yeah, well that's where the 'evil' part of 'evil family' comes in. Do you want my help or not?" said Shego.
"Yes. Yes, I do Shego. Now come, we need to get moving," said Drakken. He walked back out to the corridor and took his bearings.
"Do you actually have any ideas on where we're going to go next?" said Shego, coming up beside him.
Drakken picked a direction and began walking. He looked over at Shego, keeping pace beside him and said, "Ideas? Oh, I have a few…."
Author's Notes:
If it helps, visualize that final scene as one of those television 'power walks', where the characters are headed straight towards the camera, clothing blowing in the breeze.
Wow. Much less of the funny in this chapter, wasn't there? I mean, I snuck in a few humorous bits here and there, but this was the drama and action-adventure build-up chapter. Hope it was enjoyable nonetheless.
I had a lot of fun writing Shego's infiltration of WWEE HQ.
I'll tell you a little secret. All that bit that came after Shego got Drakken out of his cell? I've had that outlined in detail for months, ever since I started "Not Quite Heroes". It wasn't quite written out, but I knew pretty much exactly what the characters were going to say and do and why they were going to say and do it. Especially Shego's slow clap after Drakken pulled himself out of trouble. (Though having him actually point a gun at her was a bit of improvisation.)
I've been saying pretty much since I started watching 'Kim Possible' that Shego and Drakken are in many ways this dark, twisted reflection of Kim and Ron. I was surprised, though, at how many parallels crept up between this chapter and the one immediately preceding it. Parallels I didn't even set out to put it. Both the similarities and the differences between Kim's rescue of Ron and Shego's rescue of Drakken are, I think, rather interesting.
Next chapter, Shego and Drakken against all of WWEE! Damn, I've really written myself into a corner with that one, haven't I? We'd better go on straight to review acknowledgements.
Thanks to: Jezrianna2.0, campy, Eva91, Spiffy Tiffy, Corencio, Tito (), and TexasDad.
Jez, in answer to your question… The computer does not in fact speak French. I think that says it all.
Eva91, there's your reaction to Drakken thinking Shego was dead. Which is to say, he didn't.
I'm sorry when I do have grammar errors. I try to read through everything once, but it's tough to proof your own work.