All the Love to bcbdrums for being my editor for this fic!
Working the Nerves
Drakken watched wearily as the last of the boxes were thrown out. His migraine had been killing him for days. He was starting to wonder if it wasn't just because of the huge failure at losing his henchman, falling for a haphazard business venture, or even worse—forgetting he'd even been trying to take over the world. Yes, that would make sense for a migraine. It might also be due to all the sugar he'd been consuming, thus the last box being currently crushed by a compactor.
"Last of the fickle temptations," muttered Drakken. "If I ever see another cupcake..."
"You will eat it like the several dozen you already consumed?" came Shego's voice from the stairs.
"Shego, I'm really not in the mood right now," sighed Drakken.
"Well, maybe this will help. After selling off the equipment and not having as many henchman now, we are no worse off than we were before," said Shego as she walked by him with a clipboard. She smirked and patted his stomach. "Well, financially."
"Must you, Shego," glared Drakken. "Yes, I gained a few pounds. You don't have to keep up the dramatics."
"Are you still mad about the Buddha thing?" asked Shego as she flopped in her chair and crossed her legs.
"If you are referring to the crop top that says 'Buddha's My Workout Goal,' which you left at my door," snapped Drakken, "yes, I'm still a little annoyed."
"I made that myself," said Shego proudly.
"Well, that explains why it looked like a kindergartener made it," retorted Drakken. Shego raised a brow.
"We could do this all day," said Shego indicating between the two of them.
"Well it's been three, so yeah we could," Drakken sighed as he tossed several papers in the trash.
"Okay, as CEO of Malicious Activity—" smirked Shego as she tossed a cupcake wrapper in the trash.
"I don't think that was your title," retorted Drakken under his breath as he went to sit down.
"—Regardless, we need to get you back to your evil self, because sweat suits and pouting is bringing me back to your short-lived rap career," cringed Shego. "I don't want to go down that road again."
"You know you could have used your veto on that," said Drakken with a groan.
"I only had one left that month and it was only the sixth, so it was a gamble I wasn't willing to take," said Shego, she looked at her feet. "I do regret it though."
"Considering it was your ringtone for me till a month ago... I don't think you do," said Drakken with narrowed eyes.
"Okay, let's focus. We can't do any world take-overs until you can actually fit into your normal attire again. Because we are not giving Kimmie this angle to ridicule you from. She already has enough," said Shego as she jumped up from her seat.
"Wow. You should be a motivational speaker," said Drakken dryly. Shego gained a smug look. "But you're right."
"Per normal," said Shego. Drakken pushed the desk back as Shego went to sit on it. "Asshole."
"Per normal," he smirked.
"Shego, are you okay?" asked Drakken nervously from where he hid behind the door-frame of the workout room. Shego was lying on her back in the middle of the floor. "May I remind you... You suggested Tae Bo, so you can't blame this all on me."
"What part of 'space' did you not comprehend?" growled Shego as she stared at the ceiling.
"In my defense, you stepped forward when we did the kick back," said Drakken. He slowly came into the door-frame and looked at the still-steaming scorch marks. "I thought you were farther behind me."
"You donkey-kicked me," replied Shego, her eyes narrowing as she looked at him. He stepped back behind the door-frame.
"I'm sorry, again," said Drakken. He peeked around the corner again, anticipating green to fly at him.
"All right, why don't we do something else. Like, weight lifting," said Shego as she sat up with a groan.
"I'm not exactly keen on coming in the room with you right now. Let alone you holding weights over my head," said Drakken. "I think I'm just going to call it a night."
"Fine," said Shego with a deep breath. "I will see you tomorrow morning bright and early."
"Excuse me," said Drakken leaning back in the room. "I had some work in the lab..."
"You kicked me..." Shego glared at him.
"Ohm, so nine then?" asked Drakken with a nervous grin.
"Six," said Shego. Drakken sighed and stalked off.
"This isn't my fault," said Drakken as he attempted to untangle Shego's hair from the chain on the weight press.
"Really, because I distinctly said 'Hold on, while I change the weight,' and then you didn't," glared Shego. She swatted his hands away from it. "I'll get it."
"Fine," said Drakken crossing his arms and stepping back. "I also said for you to leave it, and stop changing it."
"Well you've been doing the same weight for two days, clearly it's time to up it…ow," said Shego as she retracted her hand as the chain shifted, the angle becoming more difficult.
"Just… Just let me," said Drakken, he swatted her hands away. She crossed her arms and let him.
Shego stared off towards the mirrored wall and watched Drakken try and untangle her hair behind her. This week's workout had not been going well. Drakken was doing fine physically, but the constant mishaps were getting irksome. The donkey-kick incident was only the beginning. She glanced at her ankle, wrapped from the treadmill breakdown the day before. Her wrist still hurt from the push-up challenge she'd convinced him to join her in.
To her credit, he was losing the cupcake weight and seemed to be a quick learner. It was just the small incidents that kept happening to derail the training—all of them to her. The treadmill had been because his didn't seem to be working and when she stepped on it, the gear kicked in without warning. She'd landed on her feet but the belt had done a number. The push-up challenge had been her showing off by doing one-armed push-ups to challenge him. She'd gotten over-confident and tried doing jump ones and the moisture on the floor had caused a bad slip.
"There, I think it's all out," said Drakken. "What next?"
"I think we'll call it a day," said Shego as she looked at her hair-ends. "Same time tomorrow?"
"Sure." Drakken was looking at the chain. "I can finally work on that project."
Drakken looked at the plans to one of Henchco's latest doomsday devices. They could swipe it easy, but honestly, he didn't want to cross Hench so soon. Their funds were just starting to get stable again, courtesy of a loan from Shego and some stock and business funds that Drakken usually relied on. It wasn't nearly enough to get what he needed for any of his plans. Shego could easily steal some things, but that would draw more and more attention from not only Possible, but Global Justice too. They seemed to be more involved in villain raids as of late.
He was considering taking a page out of Duff's book and going with an underwater lair for a while. It would be cheaper than leasing another lair.
Location wasn't really the problem at the moment; he was feeling a lack of inspiration. Sure, he had all the normal world take-over plots flowing… Weather machine? Done. He'd toyed with the idea of building his own over time. Perhaps one that could create its own condensation instead of draining water beds…
I'm not dealing with Shego's fish concern again.
It had also taken some time to get that smell out of his coat. He imagined Shego had a similar problem with her suit.
He leaned back against his chair, letting his mind wander over his many thoughts, trying to find anything at all. This should be easy, should be quick. He should have a dozen ideas flowing through his head. Some wouldn't make sense, but at least they would be there. Instead his thoughts were muddled and scattered on nothing evil-related. He'd had a few thoughts over the week when he was working with Shego in the training room, but all the embarrassment from the mishaps had tossed them from his psyche. He'd had them mostly on the treadmill, until it stopped working and Shego got thrown off. He cringed at the memory.
"Couldn't hurt to just…go there on my own," said Drakken as he slowly left his lab.
"What are you doing?"
Drakken nearly pulled a Shego as he lost his footing at the sudden voice.
"Shego!" yelled Drakken as he caught his footing and jumped off with a slight stumble. "I was just...doing a quick run."
"Really? Because it seems like you've been down here for a while," said Shego as she looked at the mess of equipment he'd left scattered around.
"I did a quick run, and then I got a little bored. Then I remembered an idea I had, but I couldn't remember a part of it, so I went back to the weights. Then I forgot the first part, had to go back to the running," said Drakken as he held up a paper with a series of notes written on it.
"Did you set it on fire?" asked Shego with a raised brow at the destruction on the paper.
"That belt is very dangerous," said Drakken, pointing at the treadmill Shego had planned on blasting later. "Were you coming down here to work out?"
"Yes," said Shego. "This is my normal time. No offense but our workout thing is more of a practice round for my day."
"I'm not sure how I feel about that statement," said Drakken as he picked up his mess. "Would it bother you if I work on this here?"
"Whatever floats your boat, Doc," said Shego with a smirk. "Just clean up when you're done."
"Fantastic," said Drakken as he went back to his treadmill.
"But pick up your mess. I'm not your maid and Hector doesn't clean the workout room," said Shego, indicating to his abandoned mess.
"Right," said Drakken picking up the weights.
"You know, Doc," smirked Shego as she leaned on her bench press, "this could work. You working on your little plots in here so I don't have to sit around in the lab all the time."
"No one makes you sit there, Shego," said Drakken. "You could come here anytime."
"I could get more stuff done then," Shego wasn't even listening to him. She nodded. "This could work."
"This isn't working," said Shego, her brows furrowed and jaw clenched.
Shego had just walked into the ever-growing mess in the gym from the past week. It seemed like Drakken had started bringing more things from his office and the lab in. She'd let it go. He'd go running, then start jotting stuff down. He'd do stretches with her, then sprint off to make adjustments to whatever he'd been thinking about.
At first it seemed to be a dream set up, she'd even enjoyed their after workout chatter. The downfall was, she never had any time alone now. He was always there. She'd even started spending more time in the empty lab. The few henchman they had left had started complaining that they couldn't use the gym anymore.
Shego narrowed her eyes at Drakken, sitting on the floor, papers spread around him, and his treadmill still running in the background.
"What's not working?" asked Drakken, looking up with a wide grin.
"This... This isn't working," said Shego with an exasperated sigh. "Listen Doc. I don't care you're down here, but this isn't your office or lab. This is the workout space. More importantly, my workout space. You have papers everywhere. You— When did you bring your desk down here?"
"I couldn't sleep," said Drakken, his brow furrowed.
"Well that's nothing new," she sighed. She took a deep breath. "You need to not be down here as much as you are. The henchman are complaining now."
"Shego, for some reason, it's the only place I'm getting my ideas back. I can't just...leave," scoffed Drakken. He glared. "Besides, this is in my lair. Technically, if I want, I can sleep here."
"...There is a small bed in what was once the sauna. So I think you are," glared Shego, crossing her arms. "I'm kicking you out of here, Drakken."
"But, Shego," he pouted. She pointed to the door. "Fine. I'll go. But I will be back."
"Why?" asked Shego as she leaned against the lab door.
"Why, what?" asked Drakken as he looked up from his sketching.
"Why?" asked Shego, gesturing around the lab.
"What does this," he mimicked her gesture and stood up, "imply?"
"Are you trying to be cute?" asked Shego, her hands flaring.
"Whatever do you mean?" asked Drakken as he casually strolled in his lab.
"I mean the fact that I just came from the workout room—which now has no equipment—to come up here and see the lab filled with the missing equipment," said Shego as Drakken leaned on an elliptical machine. "What is wrong with you?"
"Don't hate the player. Hate the game," smirked Drakken. "You said I couldn't work in there...so."
"Whatever crisis you're going through...will not fare well if you continue to try and irk me," said Shego, her eyes narrowed. "So put this all back."
"I can't," said Drakken with a sigh.
"If you need to clear your head or whatever asinine thing you have happening, fine. But this is just childish and a little concerning," said Shego. She flared her fist more. "Put. It. Back."
"I can't," said Drakken, crossing his arms. He dodged a blast. "The dolly broke. I actually can't."
"You're telling me... You moved all this up here yourself?" asked Shego with a raised brow. Drakken nodded and her hands stopped glowing. "Okay I'm a little impressed now. You're still an idiot. But impressive."
"Also, childish? You changed the keypad number to keep me out," said Drakken. Shego glared in response. "Fine. I overreacted. But so did you."
"Let's just drop it," said Shego, rolling her eyes. "I'm not in the mood and I have no way of calming my stress with kickboxing because everything's in here."
"Do you want to go to the local gym to work out your frustrations while I make our henchman move this stuff back?" asked Drakken. Shego nodded. "Can I come with?"
"...Sure," sighed Shego as she threw up her hands. "Let's just go before I change my mind."
"Great, let me grab my notebook," said Drakken. There was a blast thrown past him. "You know what. I'm fine. I'll remember everything this time.
Run This Way →
