Lord Monty Fiske was not a sane man. Most men in his position would deny this, claim to be one of the few truly sane people on Earth. However, he didn't just acknowledge his insanity, he reveled in it. True, most people that the world called "insane" were invalids, people whose illness damaged their minds and warped their perceptions. But he had dared, like a few other truly great souls in history had dared, to leave the sheltering prison of sanity willingly. He had faced the truths that the "sane" couldn't face. Like Ezekiel, his was the madness that touched the Holy. And soon, he would share that madness with the world.
Holding the Ancient Text, he stepped to the edge of his throne-dais. "Today, my Monkey Minions," He began. "Our true destiny begins to unfold!" He raised the Ancient Text over his head, and the monkey ninjas began to screech and leap about in excitement.
Slowly, Monkey Fist lowered the Ancient Text and hugged it to his chest. "All this time, I've been trying to become the Monkey King, never realizing how much of a blasphemy that was. There is only one Monkey King – he who even the gods could not control. With this book," he lovingly stroked the Ancient Text's spine. "I shall break the bindings that the Buddha placed upon him, and unleash his chaos upon the world. Only we – " He waved an arm at the room, indicating his simian followers. "His true disciples, shall be left standing. We shall dance in the streets as the cities begin to burn, and we shall rule in the ruins when they've crumbled."
"Yeah, see, I'm gonna have to disagree with you on that point, chief."
Monkey Fist's head snapped toward the doors. "Ron Stoppable!" He shouted.
"You still remember my name. I appreciate that. If you can guess my little buddy's name right…" He fished Rufus out of his pocket. The naked mole rat waved and chattered 'Hello'. "…You'll have the whole set. I'll still have to kick your ass, though."
"Spare me your stale attempts at humor," Monkey Fist said, looking around the room. "Where's the cheerleader?"
"Oh, come on. Don't tell me you know my name, but can't remember hers! And you were doing so well!" Then Ron's face turned serious. "We don't waste Kim's time on milk runs like this," he said.
Rufus shook his head. "Unh-uh, unh-uh."
"Oh, no?" Monkey Fist asked with exaggerated, mock politeness. "And it has nothing whatsoever to do with her ability to handle such milk runs? Or lack thereof?"
Ron bristled. "She could kick your hairy biscuit on her worst day."
"And she's had some pretty bad days lately, hasn't she? I saw the pictures in the paper."
"You don't want to go there, Monkey Freak."
"She's looking quite hideous these days. Are you back to being 'just sidekicks'? Or are you staying with her out of pity? I suppose the latter would have more benefits than it might seem at first – it must be much easier to get into her knickers now that she doesn't have any other options."
Ron was beyond bristling. It looked like he was about to charge: his head was lowered, his shoulders were up, and he was glaring like a bull watching a flapping cape. "You know, all this talk about ugliness would be a lot more hurtful if it wasn't coming from DNAmy's man-bitch."
Monkey Fist growled and bared his teeth.
"So are we done throwing poop at each other?" Ron asked. "Can we get down to business now?"
Monkey Fist forced his snarl back into an expression of aristocratic disdain. "I don't have time for this," he sniffed. "Monkey ninjas, attack."
What happened next wasn't a "fight" so much as it was "animal abuse." The lead monkey ninja was punted into a wall halfway across the room. The next was snatched out of the air in mid-leap and slammed into the floor. Two tried to grab Ron's arms and got their heads knocked together for their trouble.
In their desperation, the next wave started pulling weapons. That's when it got ugly.
Less than thirty seconds after Monkey Fist gave his command, half of the monkey ninjas lay unconscious at Ron Stoppable's feet. The other half were retreating to a safe distance, hands and weapons raised into frightened, defensive positions.
Monkey Fist raised an eyebrow and set the Ancient Text back on its podium. "It seems that your rage has allowed you to tap into the Mystic Monkey Power more than ever before." He grinned nastily. "Or is that your frustration?"
"It still comes and goes," Ron said, still in a guard stance. "But believe me, it's here right now."
Monkey Fist took a guard stance of his own. "It takes more than instinct and attitude to defeat a true master of Monkey Kung Fu, boy."
"Rufus," Ron said, not taking his eyes off his opponent. "Can you handle the cleanup here?"
Rufus popped out of his pocket, slid down his leg, snatched up an escrima stick from one of the fallen monkey ninjas, spun it about in a display of his staff-skill, then snapped into a ready position back-to-back with Ron's back foot.
"Hahhh!"
"Good. Okay, monkey-boy." Ron held a hand out toward his opponent and made a 'come here' gesture. "Bring."
----
Monkey Fist learned a great deal from their first exchange. First, he learned that he'd been absolutely right: the buffoon had little training, little experience, and no discipline.
The second thing he learned was that, unfortunately, he had also been right about the boy's rage driving him to tap more deeply into the Mystic Monkey Power than ever before, which rather negated the advantage he might have gained from his first set of discoveries. Stoppable wasn't a complete incompetent, and there were limits to just how much raw power could be overcome by skill and experience. Elementary kicks and basic punches came at him in an avalanche, each one faster than he'd ever imagined the boy could be capable of, each one like blocking a sledgehammer. He was being driven back across his own throne room.
Perhaps taunting Stoppable about the Cheerleader had been a mistake.
No. He was a true master of Monkey Kung Fu. He would not be intimidated by a novice who'd somehow gotten hold of more power than he deserved.
Time to take the offensive.
Monkey Fist leaped over a leg sweep, ducked a roundhouse, and launched a jab to Stoppable's solar plexus. Ron shifted slightly, and the blow thumped harmlessly against his chest, a slight grunt the only sign he even felt it. He retaliated with a high spin kick, which was just what Monkey Fist had been waiting for. Instead of blocking the blow, the monkey master caught it and stepped about into a spin, using the boy's own momentum to hurl him across the room.
There. That bought him some time. Not much. Stoppable had rolled on impact and was already up on his feet.
He would not be intimidated. He had Mystic Monkey Power of his own. Hadn't he taken a horde of monkeys who were unaware of their own potential greatness, awakened their minds, and made them his disciples? Taught them the Way of the Ninja and bound them to his will? It was a binding that had only been loosened once – for a short time – by his own absence and the presence of another wielder of the Mystical Monkey Power: Stoppable. An insult that had yet to be redressed.
Oh, yes. He had power of his own. And he would teach this pretender what that meant.
Stoppable was charging, almost upon him again. Deciding not to wait, Fist launched a flying kick into his face.
The boy stopped short, his head snapping back and blood flying from his nose. Monkey Fist had a momentary flash of satisfaction in finally making the little bastard bleed, but as he was dropping to the floor, Stoppable jabbed him in the thigh with two fingers, and the leg went as stiff and rigid as an icicle.
Monkey Fist hit the flagstones hard, and the satisfaction evaporated, blown away by fear.
That hadn't been a pressure point that Stoppable had struck. How…?
No.
It wasn't a physical pressure point that Stoppable had struck. It was an acupuncture point. The boy was using Mystical Monkey Power to disrupt his chi.
"No," Monkey Fist groaned, raising himself up with his arms. "It's not possible. You can't know how to do that. Even I can't – "
"Shut up, Monty," Stoppable snapped, jabbing him at the base of his neck with the same two fingers.
Lord Monty Fiske's entire body went rigid.
Stoppable reached down and turned him over. On his back, he felt even more helpless than before. He couldn't move. He couldn't speak. He could barely blink. All he could do was stare up at his captor.
"You know," Stoppable said. "I had this same conversation with Duff Killigan almost two months ago. About how you super-psychos are all about take, take, take, and how much it pisses me off that you took me away from Kim, even for a little while. But you did something even worse than that: you mocked Kim for what was taken away from her. My solution stays the same, though:" He said, reaching down and picking up a fallen katana from the floor. "Take something away from you." He hefted the katana experimentally, then took a firmer grip. "Something that you actually care about, so you know what it's like for the rest of us." He made a few idle moves with the sword, then turned his attention back to his prisoner. His eyes were ice. "You spent your whole family fortune on getting your hands and feet freakified, didn't you?"
Monkey Fist's eyes widened as Ron Stoppable took a firm, two-handed grip on the katana and stepped toward him. He tried to beg for mercy, but all he could do was whimper.
Ron drew the sword back and swung.
"Hnyyaaaah!"
Something tiny and pink came flying across the room and struck Stoppable's katana in mid-swing, knocking it just far enough off-course to leave Monkey Fist with a bleeding scratch on his left wrist instead of an empty stump.
With a snarl of rage, Stoppable drew the sword back for another swing, but then the boy's naked mole rat was standing on Fiske's chest, holding his escrima stick in a blocking position, chattering "Unh-uh, unh-uh!"
For one wild moment, Monkey Fist was certain, utterly convinced, that the boy was going to simply cut the animal in two before getting back to the business of mutilating him. If it had been one of his monkey ninjas, that was surely what would have happened.
Instead, Stoppable took a deep breath, let it out, and visibly calmed. "You're right, Rufus," he said. "That's going a bit too far for a first offense." Without warning, the tip of the sword darted forward three more times, leaving bleeding scratches much like the first at each wrist and ankle. "Consider that your warning shot, dude."
Monkey Fist relaxed – as best he could – with a shuddering sigh. He offered a silent prayer of thanks to the Monkey King, both for his survival and for the fact that he'd been able to keep control of his body functions.
"But still, I don't think a warning is enough. I still think I need to take something away from you for real." Stoppable looked around the room for a moment. Then his face lit up. "There we go!" He said. He walked to the wall and took down a torch, then he turned and strode out of the monkey master's line of sight.
Monkey Fist instantly knew what he was doing. He screamed with force he hadn't been able to muster for himself. "NNNNNHHH! NNNNHHH!"
"Dude, you're mumbling. I can't understand a word."
The crackle of burning paper.
Monkey Fist's jaws finally unlocked. "No! Not the Ancient Text! The knowledge it contains is irreplaceable!"
"Good thing, too," Ron said. "And you never learned this thing's actual title? I guess you're not as good at the name thing as I thought."
----
A half hour later, a near-catatonic Monkey Fist was led away in largely unnecessary handcuffs by Global Justice agents. Most of the monkey ninjas were carried out.
As Ron watched them go, he tried to feel a sense of triumph over defeating his own personal arch-nemesis so totally. Tried to. Couldn't.
Instead, he just turned to Rufus, who was standing on his shoulder. "Nice job playing the Good Cop, little buddy," he said. "I had to make it look realistic if I was really going to scare him, but you picked up your cue perfectly."
Rufus just gave his human a long, suspicious look. Finally, he said "Mmmkay," and climbed down to his pocket, but even that sounded dubious.
Oh, well. Some things you couldn't expect a naked mole rat to understand.
Hero's Welcome
Ron trudged in the front door of his house. He'd been out since late last night, and sleeping in the plane was never really good enough.
Oh, well, it wasn't that late in the morning. In fact, by his standards, it was practically the crack of dawn. He could still grab a few hours' sleep, go over and see KP later, and she'd never be the wiser.
"Hey, mom, I'm home!" He called. "I'm just gonna go up and take a nap."
"Your mom had to go into work today," A familiar voice behind him said. "But she said I could stay here and wait for you to get back."
Oh, snap.
----
Ron slowly turned to face KP where she stood, leaning in the living-room doorway. Normally, he would have been happy – nay, overjoyed – to see her. Six weeks of (vast) diet and exercise had worked wonders upon her: she'd filled out to nearly where she'd been before the last day of school, so she just looked like someone who'd had the flu for a week or two, rather than an "after" picture of an anorexia victim.
Oh, yes. Normally, he'd be happy. As much as it worried him that she was wearing a long-sleeved t-shirt, full-length jeans, gloves, and a scarf despite the late-August heat, he would still be happy.
But right now, her arms were crossed, her eyes were hard, and her lips were set in a thin, angry line.
It didn't take thirteen years of friendship to tell him that he was in serious trouble.
"KP, I can explain."
"You can do it after I finish," she snapped.
Ron swallowed hard.
"I had an idea when I got up this morning," She began. "I would come over here, wake you up with kisses – exactly where I would kiss you would depend on whether your parents were home or not – and then take you out to breakfast. I knew it was early for you, but I thought it would be a nice change of pace for our dates. Besides, you've spent so much time feeding me since I got out of the hospital, I wanted to pay you back a little. But then, I get here, and your mother tells me you've gone to run an errand. I'm a little surprised that you're up so early, but no big. I just call up Wade," she pulled her cell phone out of her pocket. "And ask him if he knows where you are, so I can go meet you." If it was possible (and wasn't anything, for a Possible?), her eyes went harder. "Imagine my surprise when he said Madagascar."
"Imagine," He said weakly.
"Funny thing," she continued. "He was surprised I didn't know. He thought we'd agreed that I wasn't ready to go on missions yet."
Ron tilted his head uncomfortably and rubbed his neck. "Yeah, funny thing."
She glared at him. "I'm done now, Ron. Now's your chance to explain."
"See, KP," He began. "I didn't want to bother you. It was really an easy one, and I thought I could just take care of it myself."
"But if it was an easy one, that's all the more reason for me to go!" Kim protested.
"Huh?"
"Start me off easy, get me back into the swing."
Ron frowned. "KP, you're not ready to get back in the swing."
Kim frowned right back. "I need to be ready, Ron. Drakken's buying as much time for us as he can, but we don't know when it'll run out."
"Yeah, about that – "
Kim had no interest in arguing over the plan again. "Ron," she interrupted. "I don't trust Drakken any more than you do, and I promise you that I like him even less. But his stuff worked. My body is healed. What I need is to build it back up again."
"Says you?" Ron challenged.
"Says my mom," Kim retorted.
"Okay," Ron said. "So what you need is building. We've been working out and sparring for a month. Isn't that building?"
"It's not the same and you know it," Kim snapped. "If I'm ever going to get back into climbing walls and crawling through ventilation ducts and swinging on my grappling line, I need to practice! I can't stay on the bench forever! If this one was so easy – "
"It wasn't easy, alright!" Ron burst out. "It was Monkey Fist!"
That gave Kim pause, but only for a moment. "Okay, so it was Monkey Fist. I still could've come with you."
"What?"
"You can stop yelling at me now, Ron. I know I'm not 100 percent – "
"Try not even close!"
Kim ignored him and bulled on. " – but I could still have helped! Taken out a few monkey ninjas, grabbed the Ancient Text – something!"
"No. Monkey Freak was even more whacked-out than usual. It would've been too dangerous."
"If you and Rufus did it alone, I think you would've been okay with me there."
Angry as he was, Ron paused. What he was about to say would hurt her. But it needed to be said. "Or maybe not," He said. "Maybe with you there, needing help and protection, it wouldn't have worked as well. Maybe you would've been in the way."
Kim froze. He took the opportunity to explain further:
"You can't let your Kimness set the recovery schedule, KP. You could do anything before, and you will again, but you can't right now, and trying before you're ready will just get you hurt. And let's face it, you've never been exactly the best judge of that, have you? Remember that time you got hit by that stuff that made you disappear when you blushed, and went out on a date with Mankey anyway? Or even that time you got so sick 'cause you went on a mission with a cold? You need to trust other people on this."
"Like you?" Her voice was little more than a whisper, but it shook with such anger and hurt that it silenced Ron more effectively than a shout.
"Well…uh…yeah."
Her eyes blazed up into his. Green fire almost as deadly as Shego's. "I'm not going to tell you again how I'm not the one setting the schedule at all," She said in that same quiet, deadly voice. "And this is the last time I'm going to tell you that it wasn't me who said I was okay – it was my mother, my own doctor, and three other doctors at the hospital who still can't believe how fast I'm recovering. Instead, let me tell you about something I remember. I remember someone who used to come along on all of my missions, no matter who I was fighting. Someone who wasn't a very good fighter. Someone who could be clumsy or noisy, who kept losing his pants and falling down. That guy needed rescuing and protecting and he got in the way a lot – "
"And that was your mistake, wasn't it, KP?" His voice the same deadly quiet.
"What?"
"That was your mistake. That's where you really went wrong. That's what got you where you are right now, isn't that right?"
"What? No!"
"Go on, KP. You can say it. I've seen it in your eyes when I win one too many sparring matches, or a workout that you could've sleepwalked through before hurts too much for you to go on. Let it out."
"Ron, I'm not going to – "
"Say it!"
"No! Even if I did think it for a second or two at some point in the last six weeks, it wouldn't make me feel any better to say it now, because I don't mean it! Not everyone says everything that comes stomping through their brain, Ron!"
He had no answer to that.
Instead, they both stood there for a long moment, staring at each other. Hearts pounding, breathing hard, their bodies revving up for a reaction they never thought they'd feel toward each other.
Fight or flight.
She was the one who finally broke the silence, in a way that somehow managed to catch him completely off-guard. She held out her hand and said: "Give me back the Kimmunicator, Ron."
"What?"
"You heard me. We've both gone on solo missions before, sometimes without telling each other. You didn't want to ruin my Christmas, and I didn't want to ruin your vacation. Fine. But you're deliberately keeping me out of the loop, and that's not cool. Give."
Ron took a deep breath, and his face became very determined. He reached down and buttoned the pocket that held the Kimmunicator. He could even meet her eyes and hold strong if he focused on the scar across the right one where a piece of glass had nearly taken it out.
"No."
Kim felt her hands trembling with anger. He wasn't going to give it to her, and if she tried to get it back, she might do something that she would regret. Instead, she took a deep breath. "Ron…there've been a lot of times I've tried to…well, I usually thought I was helping you. Sometimes I was right, sometimes I was wrong. But the one time I tried to change you to suit myself – remember, the time with your hair, the time I actually came out and said that I knew what was best for you? I was wrong. And so are you."
With that, she turned and opened the front door. But just before she walked out, she turned back to him.
"Oh. And one other thing you're wrong about: what I was going to say is that, in spite of all the falling and the pants-dropping and the getting in the way, I never left you behind."
Slam.
----
He wanted to run after her, stop her, explain it all to her. How scared they'd all been, for how long. How certain he was that he'd killed his best friend, or destroyed her life. How determined he was to make sure that nothing like that ever happened again. How he had sworn to protect her from anything and everything – even herself.
Wanted to. Couldn't.
----
Kim snapped her cell phone open as soon as the door closed behind her and hit speed dial. The person on the other end picked up on the first ring, as she'd expected he would.
"Wade."
"Hey, Kim, I – "
"How much did you hear?" She demanded, cutting him off.
"Uh…all of it," he said sheepishly. "I was worried, so I turned on the Kimmunicator's microphone as soon as Ron's chip reached his house."
"Am I going to have to throw a blanket over my computer every time I change my clothes after you hit puberty?"
"Kim!" The hacker sounded decidedly insulted. "I've sworn to only use my powers for good! You know that."
"Except when you're deleting all references to broccoli from your mom's files."
"Well – "
"Tell me again when you hit twelve or thirteen and your hormones destroy your brain. But forget that for now. You heard it all. Which one of us is out of line?"
There was a long silence. She didn't ask again. She knew that Wade didn't deserve snapping-at. She just kept speed-walking, trying to burn off some of her adrenaline. It wasn't enough, of course. She was going to have to pound on the punching bag in her basement dojo and do backflips across the yard for a while once she got home. Then, of course, she would cry. But first things first.
Finally, Wade spoke. Very, very carefully. "Well…there's no single point you made that I can dispute. Everything you said is true. But he's not the only one who's worried about you, Kim."
She glared at the phone for a second – a habit from using the Kimmunicator – then put it back to her ear with a sigh of frustration. Okay. So Ron was the one being irrational. She'd demand an apology for it later, but right now it was a problem she had to solve. Maybe if she could get behind it somehow…
"Wade, this is what I need you to do:"
The Timer Reaches Zero
"Very well, Shego, that's enough for today."
Shego stopped pouring fire into the target at the end of the reinforced chamber – it was specifically designed to absorb and measure her blasts, but she could tell that it was about to melt down, just like the last sixteen – and wiped the sweat off her brow with a smoking hand.
"Is this really necessary, Dr. D?" she asked, speaking in the general direction of Drakken's control room.
"I'm afraid it is, Shego," He answered over the intercom. "If I'm to use your increased power in my plans for world conquest, I must know its limits."
"Since when have you waited until you had a clue about something before you tried to use it?"
"Hurting with our words, Shego."
Sighing and rolling her eyes in disgust, she walked over to a bench by the door, picked up the towel she'd left there, wiped the back of her neck, then took a drink from a water bottle. "So do you know the limits yet or not?"
"Just a few more tests, Shego. Rome wasn't conquered in a day. Now hit the showers. Like I said, we're done for today."
Shego considered snapping back at him, but decided not to bother. She was going to take a shower anyway, after all. Instead, she just took another drink, dabbed the sweat off her face, and left the room.
----
Alone in his control room, Drakken looked at the readings for Shego's latest 'test' with deep worry.
They were running out of time. No more than a week ago, a session this prolonged and intense would have given Drakken a visit from 'Sheila'. No sign of it now. He'd been buying time for weeks, trying to give Kim Possible a chance to heal while draining off Shego's excess power and maybe even gathering some data that could help her in the longer term. Judging from her behavior (lazy and sullen rather than eager and murderous) and various brainscan readings he'd been able to take without her knowing, it had worked to some degree. But now they were coming to the crisis point. She was regenerating her energy too quickly. Any day now, any advantage gained from Kim Possible's recovery would be rendered irrelevant by Shego's increasing power.
He would have to find a reason to get the henchmen that he'd had to hire lest Shego get suspicious (another purpose for the constant tests and experiments was to insulate her from whatever news a bunch of ignorant thugs might carry. Not that her own tendency to ignore them unless she was giving them orders didn't do that already) out of the lair, and soon, so that Kim Possible wouldn't have to fight her way through them on her way to Shego.
If he guessed wrong on this, if he waited even a day too long – in short, if he made one of the mistakes that tended to ruin his other plans – Armageddon could begin three doors down the hall from his bedroom.
He didn't like that idea.
Unfortunately, all of his uncharacteristic diligence and care was about to be undone by one of the bits of bad luck that tended to ruin his plans when his own carelessness did not.
----
His name was Gregory Lawson, and he was a cut above the dumb, obedient thugs that Drakken usually hired. Where they might have gladly participated in Shego's suggested method of breaking Kim Possible's spirit if Drakken had ordered it, he might very well have taken it upon himself if he'd been in the mad scientist's employ any time that the teen hero had been captured. That was the kind of Man of Initiative that Gregory Lawson was.
Yes sir, Destined For Greatness, was Gregory Lawson. At the very least, he was going to rise through the ranks at this creampuff operation like he was riding a rocket-sled.
But he had other problems to deal with right now. Primary among them was the fact that he hadn't ridden anything for weeks. Yes sir, yes sir, Gregory Lawson needed to get laid. Needed it bad. Problem was, the boss didn't seem to believe in shore leave. And why should he care? It was no skin off his ass. The only woman on the island was his bitch, after all.
Oh, they tried to pretend otherwise, act like she was just another skullbuster, but who did they think they were fooling? Did they think anyone would actually believe that they spent all day in that lab testing those blaster-gloves or whatever the hell they were? Please. Who would use a woman to test a weapon?
And then there was the thing the two of them had going with the body paints. What the hell was up with that?
Unfortunately for the Boss, old Greg Lawson did not hold with that. No sir. He did not appreciate one man hoarding all of something to himself while others went without. And if Greg Lawson happened to be one of those others, he generally just took whatever it was that was being hoarded.
If the freaky bitch had a brain in her skull, she'd never tell the Boss about it. Sure, he might be pissed at old Greg, but the dumb cunt would be tossed out like any other damaged goods.
And if the Boss did find out, well…this was a creampuff operation. Maybe old Greg's destined rise through the ranks would have to happen a little faster, and end up with him on top. Maybe if Doc Drakken was lucky, he'd get to stay on and make weapons for a man who knew how to get his damn priorities in order.
----
Shego was hot, tired, and sweaty. Those tests Dr. D ran her through were designed to wear her out, see how much she could take, and they did that very well. Not as well as they used to – a few times, they'd actually caused those weird blackouts that were the primary reason Dr. D was hesitant to just use her as his latest doomsday weapon. But not lately. Lately, she didn't tire out nearly as much, and she felt better much faster. Still, an afternoon of blasting away with her plasma like that was just as tiring as an afternoon of fighting Kimmie would have been in the old days (she felt a momentary pang of regret, then quickly crushed it. The silly little girl had known the risks when she'd gotten in her way).
She pulled off her gloves and tugged at the collar of her fighting suit, trying to let some air in. It was summer weight, but it was still a full-body suit, and she was still roasting. She couldn't wait to get the damn thing off and get a cool shower.
She was just punching in her room's combination when somebody snatched her gloves out of her hand.
She whirled on the henchman standing behind her. She'd known he was there, of course, but she'd ignored him. Unless he was there to deliver a message (or something) for Dr. D or receive some orders from her, he was a part of the scenery. He loomed over her, bigger than most, a nasty grin on his face.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" She demanded. "Give those back."
His grin just broadened. "I don't think you're in a position to be giving orders right now, little missy."
Her eyes narrowed. "Uh, no, see, that's where you're mistaken. I always give the orders. You always follow them. That's how – "
"Not this time," he said, overriding her. "Your man isn't around to give whatever comes out of that pretty mouth any weight."
She could only stare at him. This was stupidity on a scale that she'd never imagined existed before. And considering who her elder brother was, that was saying a lot. Forget the part about where this idiot thought Dr. D was 'her man', insulting as that was. Let's look at the important part:
"You think I only have authority because of Dr. D?"
"If you think otherwise, you're even dumber than I thought," the henchman said.
Shego rolled her eyes and shook her head. "This is what happens when I don't get the chance to give those first couple instructive ass-kickings. They get all uppity." She sighed and held out her hand. "Look, you're not even worth the wit. Just give back the gloves before you get hurt worse than you're already going to."
"You have any brains under that hair, girl? Blue Boy ain't here, and you may be all sorts of dangerous with these gloves on, but I've got 'em now."
And yet further unsuspected depths of stupidity. "You think my glow comes from my gloves?"
The henchman didn't even seem to hear her. "So let me tell you what's going to happen here, sweetcheeks: you and I are going to have a little fun. Well, I am. You might, if you just lie back an enjoy it – I can give you things that blue-painted geek never could – but I'm going to, one way or the other. So you just open that door, and we'll go in and get to it."
Rage didn't just flare in Shego, it exploded. Volcanoes erupted and stars went nova in her chest. This wasn't just some schoolyard bully of a minion thinking he could play keep-away. That would have earned him some hospital time, but this…
He either hadn't heard of her hard-earned reputation, or he didn't believe it. If he even knew about her skills, he discounted them completely. All of her accomplishments (I'm the one who took down Kim Possible, damn it!) meant nothing. She was just a pussy to him. A walking R&R.
"Uh-huh, that's an interesting idea, but I have a counter-offer for you: you give those gloves back and do a real good job of groveling and begging for forgiveness, and I might let you live. No promises about keeping your balls, though."
The henchman didn't lose his grin. In fact, it had become a broad, benevolent smile.
"I see you need a little lesson, first. No problem, that's always fun, too."
No doubt that other women he'd "taught" in the past had actually been caught off-guard by the close-fisted backhand that he swung at her. For her, it was like fighting an oil painting.
She ducked under it and turned her duck into a spin. She came around, bringing a hand up to–
Fssh
CHUNK!
Gregory Lawson and Shego both froze.
Her hand was buried in his gut like some five-tined war-fork. The flaming tips of a few fingers stuck out his back, burning a hole in his uniform.
Gregory Lawson had just enough time to look down into the eyes of the boss's bitch, those brown-flecked green eyes, and make a few gasping, gagging noises.
Then his eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed like a marionette with cut strings.
Shego stood there, silent and shaking, staring at her flaming hand as the blood on it cooked to a black glaze, then cracked and flaked off.
She'd killed him. She'd rammed her hand into his belly and cooked his innards.
She had carefully cultivated a reputation of being capable of vast destruction at the slightest provocation. It had been as important to her survival in the criminal underworld as her martial arts skills and her comet powers. True, she'd mostly built that reputation as a thief and bodyguard for Dr. D, but…
So why am I shaking? Why should I care that I…that he's…
Maybe it isn't that easy to get used to murder?
Murder? This wasn't murder, this was burning some trash!
He was a man. And now he's dead. Because of you.
Yeah, he was a man! A man who was going to rape me, in case you didn't notice! This was pure self-defense!
You didn't have to kill him to defend yourself.
Maybe not, but he deserved it!
Maybe he did. Did Kim Possible?
What? What's going on? Who is this? Is this some stupid experiment Drakken's pulling? I'll…
Kill him?
Well? Is it?
Would Drakken think to have me habla Espanol
It was true. The voice in her head was speaking Spanish.
But that's not possible. I haven't thought in Spanish in years. Not since…
Not since you were me.
I stopped being you for a reason. You're weak. You're pathetic. We survived because of me!
Is that what you tell yourself? We had to leave Team Go, but that's not the same as going Evil, no matter what Hego said! We were a hero, and now we blow up schools and murder teenage girls who have the guts to stand up to us!
She knew the risks –
And you're wrong, Shego. You're either wrong, or you're lying to yourself. You may not have thought in Spanish in years…
But I dreamed in it last night! That was you! And all the blackouts, telling Drakken to call me Sheila – it was all you
You can't escape me, Shego. You can't escape your real name.
"No!" Shego screamed aloud, clamping her hands to her head, trying to rip the voice out of her skull. "GET OUT OF MY MIND!"
And her power exploded outward, turning the door into iron vapor and Gregory Lawson into fine white ash.
Lifeline
Ron Stoppable sat at the table he usually shared with Kim Possible at the Middleton Bueno Nacho, and picked listlessly at a basket of nachos.
He hadn't seen Kim for three days. She'd answered his calls, but she'd always answered them with some variation on "Ron, please give me some time. I need to think." Only the first one had been any different, but that was the one that gave him hope. That was when she'd said: "Ron, I love you, but I'm beyond tweaked and into unexplored territory of furious. It's probably best if we don't see each other right now."
So. While it was still entirely possible that he'd fucked up the best and most important thing in his life, at least he knew that she loved him. Or she had three days ago. Maybe she'd asked him to come here this afternoon so she could tell him that she'd changed her mind.
He was prepared to a lot to avoid that. There could be groveling. Begging. Maybe even some weeping. There could be flowers. Not chocolate – after the last six weeks, food was a demanding, obnoxious friend who never knew when to leave the party as far as Kim was concerned. There would definitely be apologies.
He just hoped that, while he was apologizing, she didn't sense that he would do the same thing all over again.
He pushed the thought aside as she slid into the seat across from him. She was dressed much like she had been the last time he'd seen her, right down to the scarf and gloves. She was also wearing heavy – but tasteful – makeup, and her hair was artfully arranged to cover the right side of her face.
It caused him pain to see it, but all he said was "Hey, KP."
"Hey, Ron."
Pause.
"KP, I'm – "
"Ron, I – "
Pause.
Kim held up a hand. "Is it okay if I go first?" She asked.
"Of course it is." He wasn't about to tell her no. Not in this sitch.
"The first day, after I was done hitting things and crying, I talked to my mom. Then I talked to my dad."
Ron winced as visions of black holes danced in his head, but Kim pressed on.
"Then I talked to Wade, Monique…a couple others. And all of them admitted that they wished they could do what you did. In fact, there was only one that was totally on my side. Can you guess who it was?"
"Felix," Ron replied immediately.
"Thaaaat's right. So. Rather than get tweaked at everybody in my life…well, rather than stay tweaked at them…I thought about what they said. A lot."
She slid a gloved hand across the table toward him. He took it with trembling hope.
"Ron, I understand what you're trying to do. I even have an idea why."
Do you, KP? Can you even really imagine?
"But I think you should talk to those people, too. Because as much as they want to do what you did, they understand why it's the wrong thing to do. Even my dad."
Ron's face had been brightening, but now he frowned. He tried to sit back, but she gripped his hand tight and wouldn't let him go.
"You need to let me get back on the horse, Ron."
"Kim, even if that's true – and I'm not sure it is – " He shook his finger at her with his free hand. "It's so hard. Maybe you can do most of what you used to, but I see how much it tires you out, how much it hurts you. Even though you try to hide it. Why do you have to be so…so brave?"
He expected her to be angry, but instead she smiled. A bit sadly, true, but still a smile, and he never got tired of seeing them. "I'm being brave for you, Ron. Just like you used to be brave for me, with all your bruises and cuts and wounds that you didn't want me to know about and didn't let stop you from going on the next mission."
Ron sighed and deflated. "I didn't fool anybody, did I?"
Kim shook her head, her smile now fond and exasperated. "No, Ron, you didn't. I just assumed that it was no big, considering how willing you were to whine about anything else."
"Hey!"
She laughed, then her face turned serious again. "Maybe I shouldn't have let you come on those missions, but I did. And you saved the day more than once. Now you need to do the same thing for me – "
"KP, it's – "
"And," She overrode him. "Trust that I can't 'be brave' and hide things from x-ray machines and MRI's."
Pause. Sigh. Ron dropped his eyes to the table.
"I guess there's no arguing with that," He admitted.
"Good. Hey," She cupped his chin and raised his head to meet her eyes, and she smiled at him again. "Cheer up. I brought you something." She released his hand and dug around in her bag. After a moment, she pulled out a familiar blue object and held it across the table toward him.
"A Kimmunicator?" He asked, puzzled.
"Uh-uh. A Ronnunicator," She said, beaming. "Look."
She tapped the viewscreen. The familiar stylized "KP" had been replaced with a stylized "RS".
For the first time in several days, Ron's face lit up. "That is so cool!"
He reached for it, but when he took it, she wouldn't let it go. He gave it a half-hearted tug, then looked at her quizzically.
Her face had gone serious again. "Before I let you have this, you have to release the hostage."
"The hostage?"
"I meant it when I said I wanted the Kimmunicator back."
Ron just looked at her for a long moment. He felt…manipulated. Like he'd been offered a free gift only to find out that you had to buy something that wasn't free to get it. It was a cheat, and he couldn't believe that his best friend was doing it to him.
Almost as if she was reading his mind, she said exactly the right thing. No fair. That was his trick.
"This way, we can stay in touch no matter what. No more worrying or wondering for you – you can call me or beep me whenever you want to reach me."
She didn't mention that she'd be able to do the same for him…or that he couldn't shelter her from missions anymore. She didn't have to.
"This way, we can't be cut off."
Sigh. Grudgingly, he took the Kimmunicator out of his pocket and held it across the table to her. Just as they were about to exchange prisoners, the Kimmunicator started to play the familiar four-note ringtone, and the Ronnunicator started to play "The Naked Mole Rap".
"Hey, that's cool!" Ron exclaimed.
"Thanks," Kim grinned at him.
Then they both activated the communicators in their hands and said "What's the sitch?" Simultaneously.
Normally, Wade might have been flustered by the regular question coming in stereo. Today, it looked like he had other things on his mind. His eyes were wild, and his face had gone pale. "Kim…Ron…there's a hit on your website."
Without another word, he patched it through.
Drakken appeared on both screens. He was powdered with rock dust, and blood ran down the unscarred side of his face from a scalp wound. The picture flickered and distorted with interference.
"Hello, Kimberly," He said. "Ronald." Something boomed in the background, and the picture flickered again. When it returned, dust was filtering down from the ceiling and he was coughing. "It seems that – hack, hack, hack – we've run out of – hack, hack – time."