All-Purpose Disclaimer

Kim Possible is a registered trademark of Disney, Inc. All characters, themes, concepts, and copyrighted whatnots are used without permission or profit in this, the finest thing ever written, period. That's right, Shakespeare, I said it. Nuts to you and your Hamlet. What are you going to do about it?

Kim swept into her bedroom and leaned against the shutting door. Starlight danced in her eyes, and a smile nested in her lips, where it would stay for the better part of a week despite all the taunting her brothers would undoubtedly muster. Afterglow shone from her radiant face to light the darkened loft. Music kissed her ears in the silence, played on the instrument of memory in the key of a soft and masculine voice that had kept her heart atwitter all night, and continued to do so now. A flock of butterflies danced in her stomach, spreading their tingle throughout the rest of her body.

She sighed, swooned, and draped herself over her bed. The folds of her dress fluttered around her calves, swaying to the bounce in her toes. Her mouth still tingled with the taste of him. She relished the flavor with eyes squeezed shut, committing to memory every detail of her amazing, exciting, almost-disastrous, absolutely perfect date with Josh Mankey.

A soft rapping at her window cracked Kim's eye. There in the glass, she saw a cowlicked silhouette crouched on the sill. It scratched at the glass until she rose and pulled the window open, allowing Ron Stoppable to fall headlong into the room. "Hey, KP," he said into the carpet. "Everything solid?"

She grasped his hand and helped him off the floor. "I feel solid," she said. "It looks like that miracle flower trick of Wade's worked."

Once up, he fell onto her bed. Kim's nose wrinkled at the fetid smell of rotting jungle that permeated his uniform. The rest of her rankled at the thought of that odor soaking into her comforter. An exhausted sigh deflated his chest while his limbs spread akimbo. "Good," he said to the ceiling. "I'd hate to have to go back into the jungle. We didn't get along very well."

Angry red lines cluttering his hands and forearms caught her notice when he stretched. "I'll say," Kim said, and knelt down to examine the cuts. None of them appeared deep enough to be of any immediate alarm, but she heard him hiss when her hand traced his palms' injuries.

Concern must have written itself onto her features, for Ron sat up and said, "It's no big." He tried to pull away. Kim tugged his hand back, intent on examining it to her own satisfaction, not his. "'T'is but a flesh wound," he said in a terrible British accent.

"These need to be cleaned," Kim announced. "I do not want to think about what you might have picked up in the jungle." Having a physician for a mother had definite drawbacks; after her first jungle mission, a fourteen-year-old Kim had suffered through an hour-long lecture of all the diseases and parasites a tropical rainforest could impart to careless adventurers. Details eluded her, but some of the more memorable symptoms made Kim stand at once and say, "Mom keeps some stuff in the bathroom downstairs. Hang tight."

When she at last relinquished his hands, he drew them back slow, looking chagrined. "KP, honest," he said, rising to leave. "I'm fi—"

Kim's finger pressed into his lips, silencing him as it pushed him back onto the bed. A motherly tone accompanied her motherly expression when she said, "That wasn't a suggestion. Now park it, and I'll be back in a minute." Still clad in dately accoutrements, Kim kicked off her heels and padded barefoot out the door, closing it behind her. An afterthought made her turn on the third step down and return to her room. Opening the door a crack, she saw that Ron was indeed working his fingers into the window's edge. "And if you're not here when I get back," she said through the door, startling him, "You're in big trouble."

She smirked at his 'aw' as the door creaked shut, and then descended the stairs with the confidence that he would wait for her this time. Her feet stepped with skillful softness so that only the rustle of her dress whispered past the doorways of her sleeping family. The giddy feeling left over from her date made her as light as air, so that she could have floated down the hall if she had desired so.

Once in the bathroom, Kim kept the light off, and groped instead for the knob of the medicine cabinet. The black of night grew thinner with each passing minute, so much so that she could see the outline of the large bottle of iodine squatting in the cabinet's corner. Another moment's searching uncovered a bag of cotton balls that, combined with the faint chemical smell clinging to the bottle, unearthed a host of memories: Missus Doctor Possible must have pulled these supplies from this very cabinet a hundred times before to treat the myriad of minor injuries Kim and Ron had accrued in their early, pre-global misadventures. Now it was Kim's turn, and for no reason she could discern, that notion made her grin.

Her eyes were well adjusted to the pitch now, and she caught sight of her reflection in the cabinet's mirror as she closed its door. The sight of her smiling visage made Kim stop. Her curved cheeks straightened slowly, though they kept the subtle hue that could hardly be seen in the distilled moonlight.

Kim ran her fingertips across the faint color. It occurred to her for the first time that night how lucky she had been. Drakken's plan, however ludicrous, had come close to erasing her from existence. If not for Ron and Wade, she would never have had that amazing goodnight with Josh. Just the memory of it made her blush again, and then the darkening of her cheeks chased her grin back into a flat line.

'He risked a lot to cure me,' thought Kim as she took the iodine and cotton in hand and started back for her room, 'While I traipsed around town with Josh.' A sliver of guilt pricked her post-date joy for a brief moment. She supposed that cleaning his wounds would be a good start to a thank-you.

She reached the door and opened it softly. "Ron," she whispered, pushing through the door, "I've got the…Ron?"

Ron had returned to her bed, where he dozed with a soft snore. Kim slipped into the room and leaned against the closing door. Her eyes drew irresistibly to the rise and fall of his chest. Something compelled her to remain silent and gaze at him as she tiptoed forward. A question pursed her lips, but it had no words to speak, so she contented herself to stand over him in curious study.

She felt her stomach settle, as if the flock of butterflies inside had all landed as one. Then the butterflies began to glow, creating warmth that trickled its way to every extremity. Her heartbeat slowed. Her mind cleared. Watching him like that, she felt as though a great sense of peace flowed out of Ron, across her gaze, and filled her from head to toe.

The moment could have lasted forever, but Ron sensed her presence and stirred, breaking the spell. "Nnnghh…KP?"

His voice chased the peace from her body with start. Its absence left her cold and void. "Oh. I, uh…I got it." She sloshed the bottle, and said, "Sit up. Let's take a look at those cuts."

"As the lady wishes," kidded Ron, doing as she said. An unnatural silence swallowed their conversation, mimicking the sudden emptiness in Kim as she blotted his hands. She guessed Ron could not stand it either, for he then said, "Um…so…how was your date with Monkey?"

The mention of Josh made that flighty feeling jolt back into her body. "It went really great," she exclaimed, welcoming any feeling after the loss of that peace she had experienced a moment ago. She proceeded to regale Ron with a play-by-play of her running battle with Shego, the Tweebs, and embarrassment. In the midst of the story, the fleeting feeling she had while watching Ron sleep became forgotten in a hail of exciting details.

Kim Possible
The Power of Friendship

by Cyberwraith9

Staring down the barrel of Shego's gun, Kim couldn't help but think she had been cheated. Impending death traditionally brought with it the complete recollections of a lifetime in rapid succession. All she got was that one odd memory, and she couldn't understand why. As strange a final thought as it was to have while Shego pulled the trigger, she felt gypped.

Liquid twilight spilled out from the twin prongs of Shego's gun. It split the choking, soggy haze and enveloped Kim's body from head to toe. Kim stiffened as a curious tingle swept through her body. Every nerve prickled, and then, just as suddenly, they didn't. The dark glow around her subsided as though drawn back into the gun, and left the two women staring at each other in shock.

Shego cast her emerald confusion onto the weapon in her hand. She gave it a shake, and muttered, "The hell?" She shook it again, harder, and bellowed, "What the f—"

Kim launched her size seven into Shego's stomach. Her kick knocked the villain over the cusp of the hover car. A furious howl vanished into the crackling fires below. Once she was rid of Shego, Kim wasted no time; she tossed the cylindrical transmitter at her feet and stomped it flat.

All over the warehouse, the massive Diablos jolted upright in mid-rampage as if struck and began to implode. They ratcheted into tiny toys and fell into the flames, vanishing into their own handiwork. Gunfire in the Evidence Locker trailed off as the soldiers who hadn't yet evacuated saw their aggressors become children's playthings and melt into an expensive slag carpet on the burning cement.

Kim allowed herself a second's pause to breathe a prayer of gratitude. Then she grasped the control yoke on the dash and nosedived the hover car toward the ground below, pulling up at the last second. The craft bounced onto a heap of soggy, smoldering rubble, smearing its way to a stop. Frigid water deluging from the ceiling trailed off, now more effective without an army of robots to feed the flames. Kim hopped from the car's edge with a heavy curtain of red in her eyes and a sodden, icy uniform and called through cupped hands, "Doctor Director? Doctor Director, are you all right?"

A mound of debris rustled, parted, and spat out a disheveled Doctor Director. She was covered in soot, and her dark uniform sported several bleeding slices. Her hands pressed into a deep gash at her ribs. An awestruck eye opposite her crooked patch found Kim, and gave direction to her staggering steps. "Remind me to give you a raise," grunted the spymaster.

Kim fished a handkerchief from her pocket. She lifted the Doctor's hand from the gash and pressured her wound with the folded cloth. "You don't pay me," Kim reminded her with a thin smile.

"One of my luckier deals," Doctor Director muttered back with a grimace. "I don't think I could afford to keep you on-staff anyway. Too much collateral damage."

The weak humor failed to cement Kim's smile. She sobered as she looked about through the dying flames. Without the threat of immediate death, panic ran free through her innards. She searched wildly for some sign of a yellow tuft, or sooty freckles, but nothing appeared. "Has anyone seen Ron?" she asked. It was a hollow gesture, as only she and Doctor Director remained in the area.

"Kim!" A tiny squeak came from above. Kim looked up in time to catch a pair of black claws on the forehead as a dripping balloon of pink flesh landed and deflated on her forehead. The resultant mole rat scampered down her neck and across her arm to jump up and down on her lofted palm, chattering at a panicked speed too great for Kim to follow.

She held up her other hand. "Rufus! Slow down, Rufus, I can't understand you. What happened? Where's Ron?"

Rufus jabbed his foreclaws toward the field of scattered crates, still hopping anxiously. "There! Hohh, Monkey Fist!"

"Monkey Fist?" Kim's brow dropped at the name, and her entreating hand clenched into a fist. Shego and her Diablos were bad enough. Who knew what Monkey Fist could do with the resources of this villain treasure trove? "Where?" she demanded.

Piles of burning boxes burst apart at the onslaught of two intertwined missiles. Embers spilled from the fire and were snuffed out beneath a wave when the missiles plunged into the massive puddles swamping the floor. The two fighters rolled over and over one another, kicking, biting, and struggling to best the other. Kim caught sight of a yellow flash fly from the tussle as the two fighters separated, and her heart leapt into her throat.

She started to shout his name, but another explosion of debris cut her voice short, as Shego rose from the ashes of ruined crates. Dirty rivers of water rushed down her scowl. "First I get a lemon gun," snarled Shego, "And then I get kicked off of my own car? Oh," she uttered, "That is not gonna fly, Princess." Her eyes found Kim's torch-like hair in the gloom without delay, and the gun still clutched at her side leveled with Kim's chest.

Another ray of nebulous blue light warbled from the end of Shego's gun. Kim sidestepped with wide shot and tossed Rufus clear, realizing too late that Shego hadn't aimed at her. Her chest seized up as Ron became a nimbus of cobalt energy. But as was the case with Kim, the ray did not harm him in the slightest. Ron glanced back at Shego as though she had just shocked him with carpet static, and said, "What the hell was that?"

Or rather, he managed, "Wha—" before hairy knuckles plunged into the pit of Ron's stomach and lifted the blond off his feet. Ron's breath rushed from his body in a grunt. He fell to his knees, unable to move, unable to see past the stars in his eyes. "A fine Chosen One indeed," sneered Monkey Fist to his fallen rival. "Taking your eyes off your opponent. Sloppy."

"Get away from him!" Kim sprang at Monkey Fist with every intention of tearing him apart, only to fall with a cry when a wave of green flames broke upon her back. Water splashed up as her knees met with cold concrete. Agony lanced through her back as Shego grasped Kim from behind and crushed the heroine against her chest.

Flickering fingertips teased Kim's neck as she struggled against the steely arm binding her to Shego. "You should listen to him, Kimmie," Shego hissed in her ear. "Just because my ray gun doesn't work, it doesn't mean you and I can't—"

Kim relaxed every muscle in her body and fell limp. There, Kim planted her hands beneath her and swung both feet up in a double-kick aimed square in the middle of Shego's face. A satisfying crack erupted between Kim's boot and Shego's head, which snapped back, streaming twin ribbons of blood from her nose. Shego barely had time for an incomprehensible roar before Kim dropped down from her handstand into a sweep kick that knocked the villain flat.

She rose with the splash of Shego's body hitting the floor, moving like lightning personified, hearing her voice shout Ron's name from a great distance. She would be too late; Monkey Fist's hand was poised for the killing blow, and there was no way she could reach him in time.

"Last words, Stoppable?" asked Monkey Fist of the gasping, choking boy. His speared hand trembled with anticipation.

Ron still lacked the wind to speak, so an answer of 'Banzai!' came for him as a pink blur leapt from behind Ron and blanketed itself over Monkey Fist's face. The villain cried with a muffled yelp and staggered back, tugging at the impish film on his face. Clumsy fingers tore at his body, but Rufus dug in and refused to budge, sinking his overbite into Fist's forehead, and savoring the resultant howl.

Still running, Kim leapt over Ron's knelt shoulders and into Monkey Fist. Her foot pounded him into a neighboring pile of blackened crates. Rufus unseated himself from Fist's face and fell into Kim's waiting palm. The two of them took a half-second to admire their success while it disappeared beneath tumbling boxes, and then turned back to attend to Ron. "Are you okay?" Kim asked, offering her hand to help him up.

Then she gasped as Ron's fist streaked up at her face. Kim's instincts guided her head left, exactly as Ron expected, which allowed his fist a clear path to the lurking Shego about to impale Kim from behind with a fist of flaming green. His knuckles crushed the bloodied mess that was Shego's nose, reeling her head back. This left her wide open to Kim's horse kick. Shego flew back onto the cement and did not stir, moaning softly as her face bled a pool for her head to rest in.

"Never better," croaked Ron. He allowed Kim to help him up this time without incident. Still working air into his protestant lungs, he said, "Y'know, in retrospect, it was a really bad idea to put all of this really dangerous crap in one place." Rufus jabbered on his shoulder until he received a grateful scratch under the chin from Ron, who gave silent thanks as well in his meaningful look to both of his rescuers.

Kim smirked as she felt him lean against her for support. "I'm starting to agree," she replied.

A violent tremor spiderwebbed the concrete beneath them, and flung their feet up into the air. When they landed hard, another tremor of greater force jostled them on the floor. Powdered concrete leapt from the racks at a third tremor, clouding the air and choking their breath, making it impossible for Kim to see anything. "What is that?" she coughed, and rose to her knees.

"Konnichiha."

Ron, still on his back, saw the dark shadow through the haze first; a giant's silhouette surrounded Kim from behind. Its arm lifted with a glut of gathering light poised at the end of its open palm. "More bad news," he answered.

"Ach, look't wha' I found," Duff Killigan's amplified voice exclaimed from the unseen speakers of the Z-Boy robot. He sat in the cockpit at its midsection, one-handing the controls. His other hand held a microphone to his fuzzy grin. "An' it had th' keys in it 'n' everything!"

The dust settled, giving Kim, Ron, and Rufus clear view of the cerulean titan about to vaporize them. The teens took one look at each other and then rolled opposite ways. Both felt the heat and the impact of the plasma cannon atomizing they spot they had abandoned. The blast was brief, and a second show was slow to come, for Duff couldn't decide which target to chase. Then a flash of flipping red caught his eye, and the Z-Boy's arm swiveled to follow it. The cannon powered up and fired again, this time in continuous burst.

Dust and fear clung to Ron as he rolled to his feet. He looked for Kim, and found her a half-step ahead of a yellow column of death that tracked her across the floor, leaving scorched nothingness wherever it touched. "Kim!" he shouted, and bolted toward the legs of the robot.

A clothesline strike caught him across the throat. His feet flipped up while he gagged, horizontal, and dropped flat onto the floor. He swung his legs up over his head, rolling back into a crouch on instinct, but the move carried him into a kick from behind that sprawled him face-down into the wet, ashen floor. "Going somewhere, Stoppable?" Monkey Fist's voice sounded like a whisper in Ron's ringing ears. A second kick pounded into Ron's side, rolling him over with an agonized groan. "Why not stay and catch up?"

Kim found shelter between the Z-Bot's legs, where its cannon could not follow. The immense robot could hardly move for all the scattered bric-a-brac in the warehouse. She sucked in a breath of relief, only to expel it as a cry when she saw the robot's torso swivel around to aim an arm at a living blur of arms and legs that had a familiar streak of cowlicked straw in it. The whine of plasma buildup filled the air, but neither Ron nor Fist had any inkling that they were the new targets. With no grapnel gun left, Kim clicked her heels together and rocketed up the Z-Bot's back, praying her boots had enough fuel for this last full-burn jump.

The fighters on the floor swung into frame on Killigan's cockpit screen. A red rectagle danced and then solidified around them. "I don' know what happened, Drakken," the pilot sang to himself with practicing innocence. "He jus' leapt into th' line o' fire when I took out th' dippit. Tragic, really." His thumb traced a circle around the top trigger of the controls in his meaty clutches. A sneer dawned in his beard as he muttered, "No more sidekick, an' a bigger slice o' th' pie for Duff. Win-win, Boyo."

Coughing their last, the rockets in Kim's boots carried her into the cockpit. She saw Ron over Killigan's shoulder, centered in his screen, and kicked the robot's controls without a second's hesitation. The robot's arm jerked to the left as Killigan's thumb mashed the trigger, sending a concentrated beam of energy into a stack of crates a dozen feet from Ron and Fist. Whatever the crates contents, they exploded violently, throwing all three onto the floor.

Killigan swiveled his reddening face back at the hero. As he turned, Kim caught sight of the same golden medallion that the others wore on his chest. He moved much slower compared to Fist or Shego, and so she could discern its embossing: a round, plump heart, with a crack running up its middle. Understanding of this strange heist struck Kim just before Killigan did. His backhand spun her in place while he shouted, "Ye tarty little tramp! I'll teach ye to—"

Their cramped cockpit rocked at an unseen force, tossing them about. Thrown against the railing of the open pit, Kim saw a shape down below glaring up at them with one good eye. It was Doctor Director, whose left arm hung in a sling made from her torn sleeves, and whose right arm helped shoulder the massive cannon balanced next to her head. Even at such great height, Kim could hear the Doctor's every word between her cannon's white-hot blasts: "Get. Out. Of. My. Base."

Doctor Director's shots scattered across the Z-Bot, blowing craters in its armor the size of fully-loaded minivans. The controls at Killigan's back spat fat sparks as the systems attached to it overloaded. As Killigan turned to deal with the problem, Kim leapt into a new attack, only to lose her footing when the Z-Bot gave another lurch. She stumbled back and hit the railing hard. The world flipped around her, stealing the floor away as she flipped over the railing bar. Her quick hand snatched the bar and held fast, denying gravity her demise, but not by much. There, she dangled, clinging desperately as the robot shuddered beneath Doctor Director's onslaught.

The Doctor squeezed her trigger again and again, reveling in the jolt that ran through her body every time her gun disgorged another gout of chemical fire. Uncharacteristic fury wrote itself in her eye as she dismembered the enormous and very valuable technological marvel in her care. "Blasting apart three billion dollars' worth of one-of-a-kind robotics," she grunted to herself. "I really shouldn't be enjoying myself this much."

A burst of emerald toppled her from behind. The injured Doctor's head struck the concrete hard, and she lost consciousness before she heard Shego say, "That's enough of that." Cupping a hand to her mouth, she shouted, "That's it. We're gone, now. Killigan, get out of that idiot toy and haul your skirt into the car."

"Jus' a second," called Killigan. He braced himself against the railing of the tilted cockpit and grinned down at the dangling hero and the ground far beneath her feet. A hateful look poisoned her beauty as she watched him draw a drier from his bag. His movements were slow, allowing him to savor the moment. "I jus' need t' take care of a loose end here."

The driver cracked onto the bar where Kim's hand would have been had she not swung it away. She brought it back in time to yank its opposite away from Killigan's next blow. Back and forth, she switched her arms up. Numb crept into her fingers as each near miss made her grip weaken a little more.

The distant clang of metal on metal reached Ron beneath the pile of splintered rubble he resided under. Still groggy from the blast, he sat up and rubbed his head, ignoring the flotsam that slid from his chest. His eyes drew at once to the dancing tail of red at the Z-Bot's midsection, and he flew into a fit of hysterical clarity.

"KP!" he cried, and launched himself from the pile. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Shego and Monkey Fist piling into the hover car, as well as a half dozen henchmen he hadn't seen before, all laden with great sacks filled with who-knew-what. The satchel at Fist's hip caught his notice for a split second, and sent a ghost of a tingle up his spine. But he couldn't dwell on that as Kim lost her grip and fell into the open air.

Ron drew and fired his grapnel gun in one smooth motion. The razor hook shot straight and true for the Z-Bot's knee, from which he could swing up and catch her…

"Yes!" he exclaimed.

…and then he saw his pants fluttering in its wake, taking with them the end of the grapnel line and his chances of reaching Kim.

"No!"

Kim tumbled past the grapnel as it sunk into the bot's knee joint. Freefall pulled at her stomach, making thought difficult and panic easy. But then she caught sight of a khaki flag waving somewhere beneath her, guiding her hands to it as she fell past. She caught the material in a death grip. The world around her lurched against her screaming arms with the sound of ripping fabric, then swung her violently into the leg of the robot. The impact rattled her teeth, and dazed her into inaction while the khaki in her hands tore free from its source. She fell the remaining distance to the floor, and landed atop a fretful mound of friend.

She stared up in mute, winded shock, lying still while the thing that broke her fall wormed out from beneath her. Her eyes locked in on the cockpit railing high above them. Her stupefied brain marveled at the distance of the drop until Ron's face blocked it from view. "Kim! Kim, are you okay?"

Kim caught a fleeting glimpse of the hover car winding its way out the hole it had come in. Its movements were sluggish with cargo. Her shock faded quickly, and she sat up, regretting it in the next instant when her arms and back shrieked shrill protest. Bereft of energy and breath, she leaned forward, staring intently at the disappearing hover car. "No," she said hoarsely.

Ron looked ready to hug her. He almost did so, but some remembered qualm spoiled the relief in his face, and stopped him at the last minute. "I…I'm glad you're not hurt bad," he said.

Odd pressure drew Kim's eyes down to her fists. There, strips of khaki material were clenched in afterterror. It occurred to her what she was grasping as she saw the polka dot boxers Ron displayed in place of his pants. She offered him a weak smile as thanks, and said, "That was some quick thinking with the grapnel."

Ron reddened, slapping his bare thighs. "Yeah. Exactly like I planned it…"

"And then what'd she say?" pressed Monique. She draped herself across the apartment's futon, upside-down, slurping on the juice box she had stolen from their fridge to quell the anticipatory fires of her curiosity.

Ron propped himself off the floor, his breathing slow and deep as he worked through push-ups (or push-downs, as the flipped Monique saw them). Sweat soaked into the mesh tank top draped from his wiry muscles, yellowed the tape pulled taught across his fractured ribs, and dripped from his furrowed brow. He hadn't slept since they'd gotten back in the first hours of morning, searching instead for things to occupy his buzzing mind with into the late hours of the afternoon.

He oscillated a few more times without a sound, rounding out his third set with a grunt of, "…forty-nine…fifty." Then he rolled over onto his back. "Nothing," he tossed at Monique before curling up into crunches.

Monique blinked. "Nothing," she repeated around her straw. "You two are mega mad at each other, save each other's lives, and you didn't say anything?" The last of her juice went noisily before she crumpled the waxy box and tossed it at Ron's head. "Neither of you brought up the topic of, oh, I don't know…last night?"

The box bounced off of his concentration unnoticed. "People died, Monique. People we knew and worked with, and the people that did it got away with all the marbles." He threw a few punches at the apex of his crunch, grunting softly. "You remember that part, right?"

"Sure I do, gorgeous," she said brightly. "But the thought of people I've helped you fight for the past year or so up and killing a warehouse full of trained professionals is too terrifying for me to deal with, because it means my dainty noggin could be next on the block."

"Okay, point." Ron admitted.

"So," continued Monique, rolling onto her stomach, "I bury it by focusing on your defunct love life…which I can't help but notice you avoiding by talking about mission stuff."

"Got me again," he grunted dismissively. The rate of his crunches increased.

"And the idea that you're more comfortable talking about killer robots than your dream girl dumping on you is a level of sad I didn't even know existed. When a guy'd rather discuss bots instead of babes…"

Ron collapsed onto his back and glared her into silence. "Monique," he shot, exasperated.

Her thoughtful expression softened into one of empathy. She leaned forward and rose up on her elbows, drawing closer. "Ron, she's the love of your life. You can't tell me you're not angry. I'm angry, and I'm not the one she heart-broke," she noted with dry amusement.

Ron's face unclenched into a blank wall that stared up at the ceiling. For a long moment, Monique watched his glistening chest rise and fall at a measured tempo. His quivering eyes stared into infinity. "I was so angry at her," he murmured to the air. "I thought I was going to go out of my mind."

"Was?" prompted Monique.

His eyes flicked to her. "When she fell," he confessed, "All I could think about was how stupid it would be if she died before we made up."

Monique squinted and rubbed her head. "So," she said with a grimace, "For those of us keeping score at home, you are now…?"

Stubborn scowling slouched across his brow again. He threw his legs into the air and lifted his shoulders off the ground, rising onto flat palms. Once his handstand became stable, he bent at the elbows, rising and falling with smooth, slow repetition. He spoke on each exhale as he pushed up, facing Monique with an inverted, undirected glare. "I'm angry," he rasped. "I'm angry with Kim…for going back to Josh. I'm angry at Monkey Fist…for kicking my ass. I'm angry at Shego…and Killigan…for almost killing Kim. And I'm angry at me…for ever thinking…that Kim would go for…a schmuck like me."

Ron thumped to the floor, breathing hard. He welcomed the ache running through his arms, grateful for anything to dull the ache in his chest. Monique craned herself over him and said, "That's a lot of angry."

"Yeah," he rasped.

He squirmed over to make room for Monique as she descended from the futon. She lay beside him, staring up at the ceiling as he did, and said, "So why not talk to her about it?"

"I don't want to talk about it," said Ron.

She looked over at him. "You're talking to me about it."

He returned the look with mild disgust. "You picked my lock with a credit card and started talking about it after I told you to go away."

"It was a student ID," she stated matter-of-factly, "And you're avoiding the issue. You aren't dealing with this."

A snort rippled Ron's nose. He flipped over and pushed away from the ground, rising onto his fingertips as he started a new set of push-ups. "Sure I am," he grunted into the floor. He didn't need to look to know that Monique wasn't convinced, but he was too angry to care.

Monique propped her feet onto the small of his back on his next dip. "All the push-ups in the world won't fix this. You need to talk to Kim about this." A frown soured her mocha face. She twisted her head against the carpet, searching the apartment as though she had lost something. "Where is Kim, anyway?"

Ron abandoned his push-ups and rested his chin on folded arms. "She's at home," he said. "Whenever Kim has a close call, she spends some time with the folks. Helps her deal."

"And how do you deal?"

He slithered out from under her feet and into another handstand. Once balanced, he raised one of his arms out to one side and then, one-handed, resumed his shoulder presses. "This pretty much is me dealing," he grunted, red-faced.

Monique gazed at the display. A small, impressed noise escaped her curling lips. "By all means," she said, ogling his washboard stomach as his tank top slipped up his chest, "Deal away."

The front door opened and closed, admitting a set of footsteps whose owner remained hidden from Monique on the other side of the futon. "Hello?" Kim's voice called. "Ron?"

Ron bounced, switching his arms. He kept his eyes trained on the ground, and doubled his tempo as he answered, "Nope. Just a burglar. I broke in, and when I didn't see anything worth stealing, I decided to exercise instead." None of the usual humor came in his voice. Monique watched his features harden and seal themselves. Even his anger vanished. She had never seen him clam up before, especially not around Kim, and it startled her.

A joyless chuckle echoed from the kitchen as cabinets opened and closed. Monique kept silent, listening to the running sink and the clap of metal settling onto the stove. "I'm putting a kettle on," she heard Kim say entreatingly. "Would you like a cup of tea?"

"Sure. Nothing beats leaf juice." Ron rolled onto the floor and lay spread-eagle.

The clatter of teacups carried Monique through their terse silence. She found herself holding her breath, both fascinated and upset by this change between her friends. It took great effort to keep herself from poking her head up and over the futon to see Kim's face when the redhead said, "Ron…about last ni—"

"How're the family doctors?" Ron asked quickly. He made no move to rise, and kept is face and voice painfully neutral.

"Huh? Oh." A pang echoed in Kim's voice. "They're fine. Tweebs too, though they're a little steamed that they missed out on last night's mission." She gave another empty laugh. "Can you imagine?"

Ron sat up, staring intently at the dormant TV. Monique guessed he was watching Kim in its reflection. "Yeah," he muttered.

Monique saw Kim's features sidle in over the top of the futon, and suppressed a gasp; Kim looked more tired than she had ever seen. The dark circles of a woman twice her age hung heavy under her dull eyes. She had pulled her hair back into a greasy, unshowered ponytail that bobbed behind her rumpled T-shirt. Kim took a deep breath and began, "Ron, about…" but then her eyes flicked down past Ron's back, discovering Monique at the foot of the futon. "Monique?"

He turned, impassive. "What about her?"

Monique rose from the floor. "Hey," she greeted Kim, adopting Ron's passivity.

They stood in awkward silence, staring at each other. Monique could feel Kim probing her with her eyes. The redhead pleaded for some sign of understanding or support, but Monique wasn't ready to give her either yet. Ron's tale of the disastrous dinner still rubbed the inside of her stomach raw. That made it easy for Monique to keep her expression frosty.

Unable to weather the quiet, Kim glanced at her watch and pretended to realize the time. "Wow, it's getting late." She glanced back at Monique and asked, "You wanna stay for dinner? I'm sure we could throw something together."

Ron rushed Kim's suggestion before Monique could answer. "You've got dinner with Josh tonight," he told the television. Voice steady as a rock, his hands quaked into fists. Monique noticed, and couldn't imagine Kim missing it. "Isn't he supposed to pick you up soon?"

Kim slapped her forehead. "Oh my God," she moaned, and collapsed onto the futon. "I totally spaced on that. He's supposed to pick me up in…an hour!" She paused, staring at the back of Ron's head in contemplation. "You know," she said slowly, "I bet if I called, he wouldn't mind if I rescheduled." Another pause, this one hopeful. "I could stay—"

"You should go." Ron turned around. The hollow look where his smile should have been struck a chord in Monique. "It'd be way rude to flake on him an hour before your date." He swallowed, opened his mouth, and then closed it, and turned away.

"It's not a date," said Kim. She sunk further into the futon. "And we should—"

"No," Monique heard herself say, "No, it's cool. We were planning on heading out around then anyway, Ron." With only a moment's hesitation, she added, "For our date."

The effect was immediate, and exactly as desired; both Kim and Ron whirled around with wide-eyed shock. He said, 'What?' as she croaked, 'Date?' Both were on their feet in a flash.

Ron found his voice again first, but all he could do was reiterate, "What?" His dumbfounded expression alone made it worthwhile for Monique, and put a confident smile on her face.

"Our date," she said again. His mouth flapped without word while she sauntered over, sliding her hips up against his and wrapping an arm around his waist. "How could you forget? We've been planning it for weeks now." She gave him a most un-Monique-like giggle. Her finger traced the hard line between his pecs, which she eyed with a predatory lust.

"Weeks?" squeaked Kim.

"What?" uttered Ron.

Monique leaned in on tiptoe and planted a kiss on his cheek. The gesture lingered long past friendly lengths before she pulled back, and clicked her teeth at his earlobe playfully. Her hand skirted the edge of his tank top and teased his chest. "I'll be back in an hour," she whispered in his ear loud enough for Kim to hear. "Make sure you come prepared. You dig?"

Horror crept into Kim's face. Her fists shook white at her sides, and she whispered, "Prepared?"

"W-what?" said Ron, looking frightened.

She just smiled, and patted his cheek before strolling for the door. "See you in an hour, Hot Stuff," Monique called over her shoulder. The flabbergasted faces Kim and Ron wore almost made her laugh aloud. As she slipped through the door, she looked straight through Kim to Ron with lustful eyes, and purred, "And dress nice. I like my presents to look pretty before I unwrap them."

Ron's lips formed a new 'What?', but he couldn't manage the sound. Instead, he watched the door click shut behind Monique, and felt the hurt and confused gaze pour from Kim's watering eyes, as he tried to figure out exactly what the hell had just happened.

To Be Continued

Dearest reader, I have been unforgivably remiss, both as an author and a human being (or as near as I can pass for one). In the recent months, I received an unbelievable piece of fanart for my story, Finding Providence, and I haven't once plugged the artist or the art. I can only attribute my thoughtlessness to some form of slow-acting brain asphyxiation, and do my best to make up for it:

The artist is Porphyria-Kris, and if you haven't seen her work (KP or otherwise), you're missing out. The art in question is entitled "Yeah, I'm a Bastard That Way..." one of my favorite lines taken from that story. You can find her on Deviant Art under her aforementioned moniker. Check the picture out while you cruise her archive. I for one keep it on the cover of my three-ring binder for Textual Analysis: my favorite picture kept on the binder of the class I like the least. It's just that little extra bit that helps me get through the day.