CHAPTER 29 – Prom Night Part 6
Bueno Nacho HQ Gym
"You're not a killer, Shego, you've been moodulated!"
The villain turned her head sharply at the voice she never expected to hear again. A figure entered the room dressed in a blue and white striped full-body costume.
"Stoppable! You're supposed to be dead."
"Yes well, it appears I'm not. Step aside from Kim."
Shego chuckled. "Or you'll do what? Looks like it's down to me to finish the job Eric seems to have failed miserably with."
An orange plasma ball appeared in her hand as she flung it towards the boy. Ron staggered backwards from the impact but stayed upright. To Shego's surprise, he appeared unscathed from her attack.
"Learnt some new tricks have you, sidekick? Well so have I."
She held her hands together as two white-hot balls appeared.
"Bet you can't stop two of these!"
She unleashed her attack, turning her head back to Kim as she prepared to administer the coup de grace.
Ron had been racking his brains trying to remember how the battle-suit worked.
Three direct hits and I'm dead. The scoop – how do I work the scoop?
The answer to his silent question came to him as the balls flew towards him. Curling his fingers, Ron reached out and caught one of the plasma balls in his right hand just as the other one hit him square on. Grimacing through the pain he rode the storm.
This has to be one hundred percent right or we're both dead. Sensei, guide my arm.
Shego was on the very point of dispatching the teen hero when she was struck on the back of the neck by a flying ball of plasma. In anger she turned her head, ready to deal with yet another interruption. To her surprise, Stoppable was still standing. And as she stared, an older man entered the room and joined him. It took her a moment to recognize the new arrival as Steve Barkin.
"Miss Goh," Barkin barked. "You have sworn an oath as a teacher to allow no harm to come to your charges!"
Shego gaped. Is this guy for real?
"I'm not a teacher, you moron," she snarled. "Now leave me alone while I ..."
The villain shook her head, trying to recall what she had been doing when she was struck.
She looked down at the stricken girl whose eyes were wide with pain and fear.
Was I just about to kill Princess?
She snatched her hands away from her quarry's head.
"Who did this to me?" she screamed at the room.
She fired up her green plasma and flung it indiscriminately about her as she ran to the gym exit.
Ron flew across the room while Barkin hastily dodged the fusillade. The freckled boy flung himself protectively over Kim but Shego had fled.
He switched off the battle-suit to preserve power.
"Hang in there, KP. We're getting you out of here," he tried to reassure Kim as he helped her to a sitting position. Steve Barkin came over and swore a silent oath as he saw the mass of bruises and burns disfiguring his student. The last time he saw burns like that they were caused by napalm in 'Nam. She wouldn't walk again tonight. Maybe never. The girl looked dazed and out of it and Barkin gave silent thanks: when she regained her wits she was going to be in serious pain.
The familiar voice and presence of her sidekick finally penetrated Kim's misery.
"Ron?" she breathed, "Is it really you? They told me you were dead!"
You're alive! Omigod, you're alive!
"Long story, KP. I'll tell you more when we get out of here. Can you stand up?""
Kim tensed her leg muscles, then grimaced. Ron took her hand and squeezed hard as she gritted her teeth against the pain, sweat covering her face. At last she relaxed. She shook her head despairingly.
"Don't be a fool, boy. The only way Possible is going to leave here is on a stretcher," Barkin told Ron. "We need immediate medevac."
Ron felt a moment of panic. How was he going to get Kim out of there in her state?
She tugged at his sleeve. "What is it, KP?"
"I kissed a synthodrone," Kim spoke listlessly.
Ron started. "What, one of those creatures?"
"No, Eric. Why couldn't I see he was a fake?"
"Eric is a synthodrone?" That certainly explains a lot.
He pulled out his Ronnunicator. "I'm calling Wade - we need backup and medics." He muttered as the screen snowed over. "There's something jamming the signal," he grunted in frustration.
"Kim," chirped the naked mole-rat. Ron looked hard at the girl but could see nothing unusual, that is, other than the bracelet Eric had given her earlier that night. Eric! He hurriedly tore off the bracelet and flung it across the room.
The screen cleared and the panic-stricken face of Wade appeared. "Thank god, Ron, I lost contact."
Ron interrupted. "Wade, I need backup. And Kim needs an ambulance. She's in bad shape."
Wade looked desperate. "Sorry Ron, Drakken's got a shield up so no-one can get in. And these Diablos are about to start an all-out worldwide attack on civilians. You've got to disable their signal from the inside else we're all dead. I've figured out what you need to do. There's a new aerial assembly on the roof: that has to be how they're controlling the Diablos."
"How much time have we got?"
"Minutes only," Wade swallowed hard. What the heck, Ron has a right to know. "If you don't succeed, the President has authorized a nuclear strike on your location."
"No pressure then," Ron spoke laconically. Nukes, synthodrones, Diablos – what difference which one killed them. Dead was dead.
"Okay Wade, tell GJ that Rufus and I will stop the Diablos so please can they call off the nukes. No, on second thoughts, tell them that Kim is stopping them. They're more likely to believe that. Over and out."
Ron disconnected the Ronnunicator and turned to Kim.
"KP, I've got to do a save-the-world thingy. I wish we could do this together, but you're in no fit state. I'll leave you with Mr. Barkin and I'll be back as quickly as I can." He removed two cans of soda from his pocket and popped them open before setting them down beside Kim and Barkin. "If you see any synthodrones, spray this into their eyes."
"I'll take care of her, Stoppable. You go do what you have to do to stop this maniac," Barkin reassured his student.
Kim smiled weakly, the strain evident in her face. "Be careful Ron, Eric is really strong. And Shego's out there somewhere too."
"Nil problemo Kimila," he responded, giving her a last comforting smile as he picked up Rufus and the two of them left the room.
ooOooOoo
There was a long silence as Kim and Barkin contemplated their immediate future.
"I should never have come. I'm worse than useless now," Kim whispered.
"Hey Possible, that's quitter talk!"
Barkin looked her in the eye.
"Enough of this pity fiesta. So you were played by Drakken and Eric Drake. There are guys out there who are better for you than Drake. Guys that are real for one thing."
She shook her head. He ignored her.
"The world needs its teen hero, Possible. And you're not off the hook just because of one mission that didn't go to plan. You're going to get yourself fixed up and back on the horse you hear me?"
His tone changed.
"And I have a feeling that your best friend wants you back. He's kinda missed you these past few weeks."
Kim looked hopeful. "Oh, really?"
"Well look who's here!"
Eric walked into the gym, a smirk on his face. Kim blanched.
"So Shego didn't have the guts to put an end to you, Kim?" He smiled evilly. He took a closer look at her wounds.
"Though she seems to have done a good job with the hurtin'."
Steve Barkin stepped forward to block him from approaching Kim.
"Ah, Mr. Barkin. So nice to see you this evening too. You're just in time to witness the surrender of the world to Dad. If you'll kindly get out of the way I'll put in a good word for you – we'll need obedient teachers in the new world."
"Leave her alone, you slime-ball," snarled Barkin.
In a flash, Eric leapt at Barkin and hand-chopped him heavily across the neck before the former soldier had a chance to react. The teacher folded like a concertina and fell to the ground, breathing lightly.
"You just can't get the staff these days," Eric chortled.
The synthodrone walked up to Kim, who grabbed a can of soda and flung the contents into Eric's face. He spluttered, wiping his face with his hand before grinning evilly at her.
"Was that supposed to hurt me or something?" he laughed.
Kim shrank from his gaze.
"Oh don't be like that, Kim. Remember how you shared with me your innermost thoughts that beautiful moonlit evening when we sat on the swings?" His voice changed and suddenly it was Kim's own voice that emerged.
"Sometimes I feel like a freak."
"Will you laugh if I told you that I haven't had a date this year?"
"Just thinking what a lucky girl I am to have had you take me out tonight."
Kim had thought she had no more tears to shed that night.
Eric sniggered at her distress as she was forced to confront the depths of his heartless betrayal of her.
The synthodrone snapped his fingers. "Reminiscence is a fine thing, Kim, but I'm afraid it's time to complete what Shego started."
He reached out with both hands to wring her neck.
Only to recoil as he felt something sharp pierce his torso.
He stood back and reached down to pull out of his stomach a nail-file with a sharp end. He laughed.
"Don't you know that synthodrones can't be harmed by knives? Nice try, Kim, but that was your last shot."
"I don't think so," Kim responded, pointing to the thin stream of synthoplasm that was beginning to emerge from the all-too-evident wound.
Eric looked down in shock as the stream rapidly became a torrent. He tried to stem the flow with his free hand. "How …?" he tried to ask but his voice was rough.
"Once I knew that you were a synthodrone I realized that you didn't have a thick skin like the others," Kim answered him with a smirk of her own. "I guessed you'd be vulnerable to sharp objects."
And thank goodness I was right.
"Kim, save me. I love you. I know you love me. We can be together forever in Drakken's new world. We were made for each other," Eric pleaded.
No, you were made for me. Literally.
Despite everything, Eric's appeal pulled at her heart-strings, a reminder of the strength of her feelings over the last two weeks.
I really thought he was The One, she thought sadly. There's no-one else out there for me. I know you were trying to be reassuring, Mr. Barkin, but how can I ever feel about anyone else like I felt about Eric?
Kim watched as her former boyfriend collapsed into a heap on the floor like a balloon bursting in slow motion. Despite her relief that Eric was history, she felt like a murderer.
He trashed my heart and he wasn't even human but I loved him. Who's the freak now?
She sat in silence for a minute or two before painfully crawling over to check on Barkin, who had not stirred. Barely had she started to move when her good leg gave way and a wave of agony and tiredness washed over her.
Kim finally gave into her injuries and heartache as she collapsed to the floor in a dead faint, her strength exhausted.
ooOooOoo
Ron and Rufus hurried through the building, avoiding the patrolling synthodrones. Everyone else seemed to be preoccupied with the imminent deadline. As he passed the control room he could see some humans he didn't recognize at the controls, but no sign of Drakken, Shego or Eric. He wasn't sure if that was good news or bad news.
"Okay buddy," he murmured to his companion. "It must be up those stairs."
He took the steps two treads at a time. Time was so short now that it hardly mattered if he was spotted. A second flight of stairs beckoned as he caught sight of the sky, dark with rain clouds scudding across his view.
Ron emerged onto a catwalk that circled the roof of the building. The roof itself was the shape of a Mexican sombrero, circular with a crown in the center, from which emerged a tall tower that Ron took to be the antenna which controlled the Diablos. The tower was topped by a metallic cap. The catwalk ran around what would be the brim of the hat.
Thick high-tension cables emerged from the sides of the roof and entered the crown at rooftop level. He assumed that these cables connected to and provided the power for the antenna. It was immediately apparent that there was nothing he could do there – not only were the cables not easily accessible from the catwalk but severing them would take a serious cutting tool, and probably deliver a lethal shock.
The boy started to walk around the catwalk, looking for some way he could gain access to enable him to sabotage the antenna.
A humming sound made the boy look up towards the sky. What he had characterized as rain clouds revealed itself as a huge swarm of Diablos flying across the sky, obscuring the moon from sight. Even as he watched, the swarm was splitting into smaller clusters headed in different directions.
"A beautiful sight is it not, buffoon?" Drakken emerged from the staircase behind him. He pointed to the sky, gesturing. "That group is headed for New York. That one to Washington. This smaller one will reach Middleton in a couple of minutes. And this is just one swarm. The entire northern hemisphere is now saturated. The southern hemisphere will be covered in about five minutes."
He took a remote control from his pocket.
"My babies are just waiting for me to press this button. Then I, Emperor Drakken, will unleash hell on the world!"
Drakken giggled as he saw Ron's dismay.
He's completely insane, the boy realized.
Drakken consulted his watch. "Unless the UN surrenders within the next … two minutes."
He smiled maniacally at Ron. "But they won't, the fools. I never expected them to. They'll wait for something to turn up until it's too late. Or they'll try and attack me. No politician ever wants to admit defeat. They all think they can outdo me."
"Just like the so-called teen hero Kim Possible. She thought she could outdo me. And now she's dead."
He looked more closely at Ron as if he had only just realized who he was talking to.
"Thinking about it, buffoon, aren't you supposed to be dead too?"
Ron stared at Drakken, mind working furiously. The mad scientist was monologuing again. Maybe if he could keep the villain talking, he could snatch the remote control away from him.
The old Drakken may well have spent the next ten minutes explaining just how clever he was, but this one was not to be distracted. Ron's skin crawled as a preternaturally calm Drakken walked back to the top of the stairs and called down. "Synthodrones, come up here and deal with this intruder."
Ron glanced at the tower. There was no obvious vulnerability, no ladder, and no access.
Wait, the antenna cap.
Ron started to run along the catwalk, in part to get as far away from the synthodrones as he could, but also to conceal his actions. Once out of sight of the madman, Ron pulled Rufus out of his pocket and held him in his right hand.
"It's all up to you little buddy", he told the mole-rat. "Get in there and do what you do so well. Mayhem, Rufus. Mayhem."
He swung his arm and flung Rufus as high as he could towards the antenna. Rufus made contact a few feet below the antenna cap and Ron held his breath as his pet scrabbled for purchase on the metal covering. As the mole-rat disappeared under the lip of the cap, Ron saw two synthodrones coming towards him together.
The idiots didn't even split up to trap me, he thought. Drakken's fancy programming isn't so clever after all.
He ran in the opposite direction to the synthodrones and soon approached Drakken again. He was talking to a henchman.
"Sir, we've detected a missile launch from Vandenburg. Looks like a fission warhead. We estimate impact in three minutes."
Drakken waved dismissively, then smiled as he saw Ron again.
"Just as I thought," he said. "The morons think they can bomb me out. All they're going to do is wipe out the city before my Diablos do it."
Ron stood despairingly. His Ronnunicator buzzed. "Ron, we couldn't stop the military launching. You've got to stop the Diablos now. What's happening?"
The humming got louder.
Ron looked up. The dark cloud was growing larger. No, the Diablos were coming closer. They were falling. And getting smaller as they fell.
And as he stared up at the tower, a pink face emerged from the antenna cap with a huge grin.
"Hello," chirped the mole-rat as he rapidly climbed down the tower and leapt onto Ron's shoulder.
Ron smiled at his pet. "Wade, Rufus has sabotaged the control tower. He's stopped the Diablos. Tell them to abort the attack."
He turned back to Drakken, who was looking to the sky. A shower of Li'l Diablos started to rain down on the pair, carpeting the catwalk. Ron picked one up. The toy looked harmless now. He shuddered.
"Ron, NORAD have copied the disconnection of the Diablos. The missile has been aborted. You did it!" The relief in Wade's voice was evident.
Ron released a pent-up sigh of release.
"It's over, Drakken," Ron told the madman. "And by the way, Kim is alive."
A look of annoyance crossed the villain's face at the news, but Drakken seemed nothing like upset enough for someone whose world-takeover plot had just been foiled.
Why is he looking so smug?
The two synthodrones finally caught up with Ron and grabbed him by each arm.
Drakken grinned. "Sorry to disappoint you, buffoon, but it's far from over. It's 9.30. Take a look over there," as he directed Ron's attention to the horizon.
The night sky was temporarily turned into day as a fireball rose from the ground and into the air, where it quickly disappeared from view.
"Right on time," Drakken chortled.
Ron looked confused.
"Middleton Space Center," Drakken explained. "That was my satellite launching. It'll reach orbital height shortly and then deploy. You see, Project Nemesis had a back-up plan. There was a slight possibility that my control tower could be compromised. So I took the precaution of ensuring that if my antenna was damaged, the control signal would automatically reroute itself via satellite. And don't you just love the irony that it was Kim Possible's father who launched my rocket for me, though he doesn't realize it yet."
His eyes gleamed.
"In other words, my Diablos are about to be reactivated. And they are now controlled from the satellite. Even if the world were to figure out a way of getting through my shield and destroying this place, my babies will continue their attacks. I'm predicting three to four hundred thousand deaths in the first five minutes."
Drakken cackled at the look of horror on Ron's face.
"Well I think the UN's time is up, don't you?" he said gleefully.
He theatrically raised his right hand and depressed the button on his remote control.
As soon as the Diablos reawakened, they would start to attack. Indiscriminately. All eight million of them.
"You lose. Everyone loses. Except me," he laughed insanely.
"Toss him off the roof," he instructed the synthodrones.
As Ron found himself being dragged to the precipice, he could see the Diablos starting to grow in size once more.
ooOooOoo
At the foot of the stairwell, a figure listened to Drakken's words in shock. Three hundred thousand deaths in five minutes time? And that just the start? Had she really signed up for this?
Shego shook her head, trying to recall what had happened to her. She remembered being in Dementor's lair. Then something had happened, and after that she just felt blood lust.
She had killed Dementor! She dry-heaved as she recalled the stench of cooked flesh.
I'm a murderer, she thought.
Who else had she killed?
She'd tortured and almost killed Kimmie. She shuddered at the recollection of the terror in the girl's eyes. And how good she felt as she inflicted more and more pain on her victim. How she wanted to erase Kim from the face of the earth.
Just because Dr. D told her to.
Stoppable said she'd been moodulated.
She felt her stomach lurch. She'd been manipulated, mind-controlled. Ooh how she hated mind-control!
Manfred! He'd attached something to her neck. And Dr. D had controlled her with a remote control.
And now she was helping him to commit mass murder.
Was this what Drakken had had in mind from the start? Not world domination but world destruction. Or was it the Phoebus device that had caused this? Had it driven Drakken insane?
She would have to get out of here. Her boss was doolally. Possible was badly hurt but still alive and would be thirsting for revenge. Stoppable should have been dead hours ago but wasn't. From bitter experience she knew that those two together spelt disaster for Drakken's plans. There was no world-takeover plot any more. Just death and destruction. And she no longer wanted any part of it.
But no-one would ever believe that she hadn't meant to kill anyone.
Which meant she wasn't going to stick around to see what happened next.
I have some safe houses prepared. And those bullion raids that I never mentioned to Dr. D, that are going to come in handy in future.
No more sidekick. From now on she trusted only herself.
She turned and ran down the stairs, quickly making her way to the store room where she had stowed her kit, including her precious Personal Force Field and her Miss Goh fake ID.
Back-pack full she slipped out of the room.
There was one other thing she needed to do before she vanished. To cover her departure.
Shego glanced back to check if she was being followed. Satisfied that no one was in sight, she entered a doorway marked Basement Access.
ooOooOoo
Cyrus Bortel ran through the near-deserted corridors looking for somewhere to hide. Since being made to watch Drakken's "show" he had realized that the man was crazy and actually capable of the mass mayhem he and the other villains frequently threatened but never delivered. And he, Cyrus, had helped the madman. That made him an accessory if he was caught.
He had always thought of himself as amoral. He'd develop gadgets for whoever paid him: spy agencies, governments, wacky so-called supervillains. Never organized crime: he had standards, and in any case he had heard stories of how they dealt with suppliers whose inventions were not up to scratch. And he knew that the authorities – especially Global Justice – kept tabs on him, but he prided himself that his rap sheet didn't even extend to a parking ticket. Cyrus Bortel was very careful not to leave a paper trail of his activities.
Occasionally he'd wonder what his inventions were being used for, but since none of the villains he sold items to ever had any success in their over-the-top crazy plans, he would tell himself that he was actually doing the world a favor by depriving them of funds.
And now, Dr. Drakken had undercut Bortel's entire livelihood by letting his ridiculous feud with Kim Possible take his insanity to another level.
The only thing left for him was to find a place to hole up until he could sneak out of the building. And hope that the authorities could put an end to things before Drakken's crazy plan progressed any further. He suppressed a shudder at the memory of those poor people in the White House.
He stopped abruptly as he saw three synthodrones, backs to him, patrolling the path ahead. Fortunately they did not appear to have heard him, but if one of them turned around he was dead meat.
Mind in a whirl, he backed away slowly, nerves jangling at the slightest sound, until he had rounded the corner and was no longer visible.
That left only one choice. Back the way he had come.
He passed the store-room where he had been detained, rounded the corner beside the studio and found himself at an unfamiliar door. He listened carefully but heard nothing before he quietly slid it open.
There were three bodies lying on the floor of a gym. No, two bodies and an empty husk which he recognized as Drakken's artificial creation designed to seduce Kim Possible.
Whose body was lying there next to him.
It looked like Kim and … what was his name … Eric had fought to the death.
But looking closer, he saw the unmistakable signs of Shego's work.
That poor girl, he thought. She hadn't had a chance against both of them.
He was about to leave the room since someone would undoubtedly be investigating Eric's absence when he heard Kim cough.
Although his sense of self-preservation screamed at him to leave before he was noticed, some residual shame made him walk up to the girl and cover her with his jacket.
Kim's eyes fluttered open.
"Bortel," she exclaimed weakly. Her eyes closed.
"Try to stay awake Ms. Possible," Cyrus advised. "Help is on its way."
He doubted this but he had to give the girl some hope.
He turned towards the door, having decided that the most prudent thing to do now was to return to his store-room and lock himself in, awaiting rescue.
Kim opened her eyes again. She ran her tongue along her dry lips.
"I never got a chance to ask you …"
Bortel looked back at her in surprise.
"Ask me what?" he responded.
She coughed again.
"Why your moodulator made me fixate on Ron? He was just a friend!"
Cyrus recalled the incident several weeks earlier when his moodulator had got itself attached to Kim.
"Ms. Possible, my Mark I moodulator only magnified existing emotions. If it made you fixate, as you put it, on Mr. Stoppable it could only be that you loved him but could not admit it to yourself."
I loved him?
She opened her mouth to protest.
"Come now, Ms. Possible. I believe that you have known the young man since you were both four years old. He's been your constant companion for thirteen years. You've probably spent more time with him than with your parents. Is it any surprise that your post-adolescent feelings would develop way beyond friendship?"
Cyrus paused, then indicated Eric's husk.
"Which is why I was surprised when you fell so quickly for this artificial creature just because he was a … what do you young people call it? … a hottie. Drakken was right about that – he knew that you would sideline your true soulmate in favor of his ten-day made-to-measure boyfriend."
The truth of his words hit Kim like a hammer-blow.
I thought Ron needed to grow up. But it was me all along.
I did love him!
I do love him?
Eric was just an induced infatuation. It hurts so much now. But I'll get over him. I will.
Despite everything – Bortel's revelation, the continuing pain of her mental and physical wounds – Kim Possible smiled. She may have lost everything, and she had no illusions about how Ron must feel about her after the way she had treated him for so long and especially since Eric had appeared, but she now knew she was capable of love. For a real person. Not a synthodrone.
Mr. Barkin is right. There is someone out there for me. Someone wonderful like Ron.
Kim closed her eyes, feeling some measure of peace.
The door closed behind Cyrus Bortel.
And then the lights went out.
ooOooOoo
Tara shivered as the spring night deepened and cooled off. The Roth's engine had burned out and the ignition no longer worked, so it was no longer possible to heat the interior.
They had been waiting almost twenty-five minutes since Ron had disappeared into the ventilation shaft and they were growing increasingly nervous. Ten minutes earlier, an explosion had occurred above the building they had been watching, and debris had fallen down onto the car, fortunately doing little damage. They had watched in silence as a plane had been shot down – presumably the one that had dropped what they now assumed to have been a bomb.
Josh took off his jacket and wrapped it around the girl. She flashed him a smile of gratitude.
Clearly some sort of conflict was taking place between the inhabitants of the building and the authorities. At least this indicated that someone knew what was going on. But as time passed and there was no sign of Kim or Ron her fears for their safety had only grown. Especially Ron's. Kim had always been the leader, with the almost superhuman talents. Tara felt that she was probably wiping the floor with her foes that very minute.
But Ron – he had loads of courage, that much was apparent. But without Kim's talents, what could he do, protected only by a weird suit that Wade had given him? Did Ron have the skills to save himself, let alone get Kim out?
She shivered again, but this time in fear for Ron.
"Are you still cold?" Josh asked solicitously. She shook her head. "No I'm fine thanks. Just worried about what's happening."
Tara went silent. She was worried, but about a dorky blond who was this very minute putting his life on the line for his best friend. She couldn't help but feel jealous that Kim could inspire such devotion from someone not even her boyfriend.
Or did he really want to be Kim's boyfriend after all?
The events of the last six weeks had led to such confusion about true and fake feelings. She only knew that when Kim had taken up with Eric she had felt unduly pleased about it. And when Wade told them that Eric had lied to Kim, she felt a sense of alarm.
Even if it were forever hopeless, she had reluctantly to acknowledge that her true affections did not after all lie with the handsome boy sitting next to her, behaving like a perfect gentleman.
Josh had turned to face her, seeing confusion in her face. She fought off a feeling of guilt as she smiled at him.
He didn't smile back.
"You're thinking about him, aren't you?" he said softly.
He knew she knew who he meant.
Josh was too good a guy to dissemble with. She nodded reluctantly.
"You know he has feelings for Kim, don't you?"
A tear slid down her cheek.
"But not as strong as his feelings for you," he added.
Tara stared in shock at her boyfriend.
"Monique told me after you asked me to be your Prom date. I know you saw Ron and Kim kiss. You were rebounding when you asked me, weren't you?"
She couldn't meet his eyes.
"She said that you and Ron have been crushing on each other since Lake Wannaweep. And neither of you knew it."
You said nothing all this time, to spare my feelings? Oh Josh, I've treated you as a consolation prize. You deserve so much more than that.
Her emotions were in turmoil as she forced herself to look at him. He was making no attempt to disguise his sadness.
"I really thought I could love you, Josh. Can you ever forgive me for leading you on like that?" she whispered in shame.
He sighed ruefully. "I was going to break it off after the Prom. I could no longer kid myself that your feelings were real."
And it was killing me to keep pretending.
Further conversation was curtailed when Josh signaled silence as he saw a familiar figure swiftly approaching the parking lot.
"Down," he hissed, pushing her into the seat well. He ducked down himself while watching through the mirror.
Miss Goh came to within a few yards of the car but mercifully seemed not to have noticed them, or perhaps she was preoccupied. She ran up to Steve Barkin's vintage Cadillac and climbed in through the ripped-off door frame.
Josh watched as a glow arose from the interior of the car, followed by the sound of the engine starting. He spread himself flat as the Cadillac swung towards the exit to the parking lot. It stopped momentarily and then drove off at a pace in the direction they had come from half an hour earlier.
Josh counted to ten then risked a glance at the mirror. The car was nowhere to be seen. He signaled for Tara to come out of hiding.
It was only then that he noticed that the floodlights illuminating the outside of the headquarters building had gone out, leaving an eerie darkness.
As if by mutual consent, neither Josh nor Tara alluded to the conversation they had been having a few minutes earlier.
And as they looked awkwardly at each other, the silence was broken by the rumble of army trucks and the sirens of police vehicles, steadily getting louder.
ooOooOoo
Orbiting 2,000 kilometers above the earth, Drakken's satellite deployed. An activation signal for the Li'l Diablos was transmitted to nearby communications satellites, and from them to others, gradually expanding the radius at which the Li'l Diablos were in range.
Each new transmission increased the load on the power. In anticipation of this, Drakken had inserted the Electron Magneto Accelerator that Professor Dementor had liberated from Cyrus Bortel's now-destroyed laboratory in Rio. The EMA would enhance the power output from the satellite, enabling global coverage within just a few minutes.
Already the Li'l Diablos that had fallen out of the sky when Rufus destroyed the transmission antenna were beginning to come back on line. First the ones closest to the launch site: Middleton, the rest of the Tri-City area, Drakken's HQ. Next came the Midwest. As the radius grew, the area of coverage would rapidly expand. Each expansion would trigger more mayhem.
Drakken hummed to himself as the newly-reanimated Diablos rose once more from the roof of the headquarters building and took to the air.
Ron found himself looking over the edge of the roof. He reactivated his battle-suit, ignoring the flashing amber light on his wrist, and dropped to the floor, twisting both his arms as he did. The synthodrones holding him found themselves flipped over in the air. They hung there for a moment before toppling into the void.
The boy turned back to Drakken as the amber light turned red.
Well that's it then. No power left in the suit and I'm out of ideas for how to stop the Diablos.
Drakken saw Ron and laughed.
"You're a hard kid to kill aren't you?" he commented. "Well it hardly matters now. You'll soon join Possible once these Diablos engage."
As the satellite's power demand increased, the circuitry automatically switched in the EMA. Only to find that the device had been removed. Within seconds, the activation signal generator had overheated. Safety cut-outs cut in to protect the satellite's sensitive electronics.
The activation signal for the Diablos ceased for a second time.
Drakken looked up.
"Why are they coming down again?" he asked of no one.
Ron followed his stare. And goggled as he watched the newly reanimated Diablos one by one switching themselves off again.
He had no idea why, but Drakken's backup plan had failed.
"How did you do that, buffoon?" Drakken asked plaintively.
Ron looked back on the events of the night. This person in front of him had almost cost the lives of Ron and all his friends. Especially Kim. Finally he saw red.
"Don't you ever call me buffoon again. Now say my name."
Drakken looked puzzled. "You're … You have a name?"
Ron grabbed Drakken by the throat. "Say it! Or I swear I'll kill you."
"Ssstoppable … Ron Stoppable," the villain finally got out.
Ron let go and shoved Drakken to the ground.
"It's over, Drakken. You're over. You'll never be forgiven for what you tried to do."
And at that moment, the lights went out throughout the building.
Author's note: This story is almost over. I have limited availability this week so the final chapter will appear in two weekends' time, with a short epilogue to follow. Thank you all so much for staying with this story – I hope you are enjoying the deviation from canon.