XII
"Angel of Darkness" by Alex Christensen played in the jet ride to Germany.
Angel of darkness
Angel of darkness
The world is in your hand
But I will fight until the end
Angel of darkness
Angel of darkness
Don't follow your command
But I will fight and I will stand
When darkness falls
Pain is all
The Angel of Darkness
will leave behind
and I will fight
The love is lost
beauty and light
have vanished from
garden of delight
The dreams are gone
midnight has come
the darkness is our new kingdom…
Hunt goes on
deep in the night
time to pray
down on your knees
you can't hide from the
eternal light
until my last
breath I will fight( I will fight...)
Now realize
the stars they die
darkness has
fallen in paradise
but we'll be strong
and we will fight
against the
creatures of the night…
The music cut off. "Enough already!" shouted Shego.
Kim blinked. "Hey, I was enjoying that!"
"Forget it!" shouted Shego. "Don't you know any hip hop?"
"I like some of M.C. Honey's stuff."
"Now you're talking. I think I even got something by her in here somewhere."
While Kim was looking through the CDs, she asked, "Many people try to hide their bad traits and show only their good, but you're the opposite. You have a lot of good in you, but you try to hide it and try to show only your bad…"
She was interrupted as Shego did a barrel roll. As she straightened up, she asked, "Want me to do that again, Princess?"
Kim, holding tight to the sides of her seat, said, "I was just thinking the reason you didn't like that song was because you don't like to think of yourself as one of the angels when in fact, you are…" She tensed and shut her eyes as Shego did another barrel roll. "Fine, I'll talk about something else." She found to her amazement that the CDs beside her seat managed to stay in place. She pulled a MC Honey CD out of its holder and put it in. "I'm so looking forward getting to Germany." After a few minutes, Shego relaxed.
--xxx
At Professor Dementor's lair in Germany, Shego and Kim relaxed after they looked around. It appeared that they found the traps and Shego was now cracking his hard drive, using software that would also help translate the German. It took close to an hour before she felt she hit paydirt and excitedly began downloading the information onto her own discs.
"This should do it," said Shego. "The schematics for his whatever Vortex, and a lot more on the tech toys of the other world. With that, those ninjas shouldn't have any problem in shutting down the gateways or at least in creating a sufficient defense."
Kim leaned down, resting on Shego's shoulders, saying, "Nice to see that that the side of the angels is likely to win this one."
Shego frowned, but said nothing; she didn't protested Kim leaning on her either. Then she said, "As long as you're going to lean on me anyway, mind rubbing my shoulders? I might've pulled something when I picked your broken body up from that beach."
Kim snorted, knowing that even if that were true, which it wasn't, the nanites would've already fixed it. Nevertheless, she rubbed her shoulders.
"Oh, that feels good, Kimmie," said Shego, relaxing into it, while another disc recorded the data. "Finally, an easy job."
Kim stopped. "Shego," she warned, "don't ever say that!"
Shego opened her eyes and looked up at Kim. "Why?"
They were interrupted by a crash and Team Impossible running into the room.
Frowning, Kim said, "That's why."
"Kim Possible, Shego," shouted Dash, the sound of vocal cords infected with nanites ringing clearly in their ears, "You are ordered to desist and stand trial for 4 counts of breaking and entering and criminal trespass, 8 counts of kidnapping, one count of kidnapping a federal agent, one count of assaulting a federal agent, several counts of homicide, including the murder of one federal agent, Will Du. The building is surrounded, you cannot escape. Come with us quietly, and you will be treated well. Resist, and you will be shown the same mercy as all your victims."
Shego pointedly and loudly yawned.
"Look," said Kim as she straightened to face them, "you work with Global Justice now. Global Justice is supposed to guard against threats such as invaders releasing bioweapons like the nanites they've infected GJ with. We're trying to help you. Do your damn job and help us, not them!"
Dash approached, while Crash and Burn remained standing where they were. "I understand your confusion," said Dash in a more friendly tone. "But remember when you convinced us that it was wrong to work for profit?"
"Not exactly wrong," said Kim, "except that you were trying to sabotage me from doing what I wanted to do because you felt we were cutting too much into your business."
"You made a strong case that we go work for Global Justice, and we did. It was still for profit, paid for by the tax payers, and the benefits rocked. What convinced us the most was that it was not only easier working for GJ, it was also more profitable, especially since you were cutting into our business. Burn examined the pay and benefits and determined we were actually paid more for less work working for GJ and that's the real reason we did. We were actually grateful that you and Wade made that option clear to us when we hadn't even realized it yet."
"So?" asked Kim.
"So you said we should serve the public good, like you do, because we wanted to do good, not get paid. But that's not us, and it still wasn't us after we went to work for GJ. But it IS us now."
"Now you're slaves…"
"Now we care about doing the right thing, Kim Possible, and we're asking YOU to do the right thing now."
"By robbing people of their free will," Kim replied.
Dash shook his head. "The human brain already controls us. There is no free will; it's all chemical reactions that determine what we do. Because our brains were in chaos, there was war, rebellion, crime, and a host of other social ills. But this other world, they fixed that. They still have all the free will they've ever had, but that free will is simply made so that people feel good about serving others, not about serving themselves."
Kim shook her head. "But it's wrong."
"Is it?" asked Dash. "We have intel that you and Shego both were exposed to the moodulators."
"What of it?" asked Kim.
"Did you know that several governments have bought their own moodulators to work with, as have more than one corporation? The corporations hope to study them to use in advertisement, and make their products produce extreme happiness, but the governments are looking at them in order to make the populations safe and orderly. You see, Kim Possible, given enough time, our world will also evolve all on our own. Already the work with the moodulators is approaching the technology of these nanites. In time, everyone will have nanites in them. But thanks to other worlds that are more advanced, we get the benefits of that so much sooner, so that there will be LESS war, LESS crime, and LESS suffering. It was going to happen anyway, but now it will happen sooner. Don't you see that it's you who are refusing to do the right thing?"
Shego spoke up, a hint of derision in her voice. "Let me get this straight. You're saying, that the GOVERNMENTS of the world are endeavoring to make the very same technology to use in the very same way, all at taxpayer expense, but thanks to the LAWFUL GOVERNMENT of another world, paid for by their own law abiding tax payers, our own society can be 'evolved' ahead of schedule?"
Dash frowned at Shego, but nodded. "That is correct. It's a necessity before we destroy ourselves as a species."
"There," said Shego to Kim, "they're on the side of the angels. So which side are you on? Theirs? Or your own? Will you be a hero, or a villain?"
Kim growled.
"That's an excellent question, Shego," replied Dash. "And I ask that now of both of you. Which side are you on? Order, or Disorder?"
Shego snorted. "You have to ask?"
Dash said, "If you think you can take us…"
Then all 3 began pantomiming fight moves, saying together, "BRING! IT! ON!"
They'd barely gotten the last "on" out when Shego blasted Dash into the wall.
Crash and Burn jumped at them with superhuman speed, grace, and strength that far exceeded their previous levels. Kim tried to block, but Crash kicked her across the room. Shego was knocked back by a blast from a fork, though she managed to avoid most of its energy. She responded in kind, destroying the fork, but then Burn smashed into her.
Burn was grappling with Shego, but then her hands began glowing and Burn screamed as she gripped his forearms. As quickly as he could, he slung her across the room. Shego was up and running back at him, a look of fury on her face, when Dash crashed into her from the side. Shego fell, rolled, and started to get up when Crash kicked her in the side. She again fell on her back with Crash and Dash on either side of her. And then they pulled out stun spoons.
Kim growled and ran toward them, but Burn landed beside her and hit her with a stun spoon. Kim yelped in surprise and twisted away. Burn lunged at her again with it, but Kim managed to grab the stun spoon and twist it against his thumbs. She twirled it so that she now held it, and struck him with it. Burn yelled in surprised fury before slapping it out of her grasp and picking her up, putting her over his shoulder and purposely fell down, his weight on top of her. Pain wracked Kim's body. Her back spasmed, and her breath was knocked out of her body. Then he bounced up, picking Kim up again. Despite the pain, Kim's mind remained clear, and she lashed out at his knee with her foot. Burn yelled in surprised fury again and slung her across the room into a wall with cabinets.
Shego was fairing a little better. Both Crash and Dash were bleeding profusely from where Shego had hit them, their stun spoons were nowhere to be seen, their GJ uniforms were scorched in more places than one, and they were obviously injured in other ways, but she bled green blood from her nose and mouth herself. However, she seemed not to care, as she continued to fight Crash and Dash, trying to always keep one of them between her and the other.
Kim saw this, as well as Burn measuring her steadily as he cautiously approached her, as she steadied herself on her feet. She quickly opened the cabinet and began throwing the dishes at Burn. That was 2 plates, a glass, and…
"A bondo-ball?" asked Kim, just before she tumbled out of the way of charging Burn and kicked his head into cabinet before tumbling away. "Shego!" she shouted, "Get out of the way!"
Shego instantly did a flip and jumped and Crash and Dash finally got side by side as they intended and charged her. They were stopped when the bondo-ball broke just in front of them, hitting them both with the gas. Then Shego leaped to the side and blasted Crash into Dash, and they were bonded together.
"So how do you like my bondo-ball?" asked Kim with a smile. Then she saw Burn almost upon her and she rolled out of the way, just in time. Burn turned quickly and was about to kick Kim as she was getting up, but another blast from Shego put him against the wall.
Picking up the stun spoon, Kim made short work of Team Impossible and they were soon taking a nap from which they'd awaken with a horrible hangover. Then trotting over to Shego who was by the view screens and computers, she said, "Damn it feels good to be a gangsta."
Shego laughed. "Good to hear you say that, Princess. But you might not feel so good in a few minutes."
Kim hopped up enough to put her butt on the counter and maneuvered herself to drop beside Shego. "What's the sitch?" She whistled as she saw that Dementor's lair was surrounded by cop cars with flashing cop lights, cops in body armor, and guns aimed at the building.
Shego looked up at Kim. "I say we don't have long before they send in the men with guns, Princess."
"There's got to be a way out of here!"
"There's ALWAYS a way out. Even Dr. D never forgot to have emergency exits. And I've already found one." Pointing to a computer screen, Kim saw schematics for the lair, including an opening to the sewer.
"Of course," said Kim frowning. "I HATE sewers."
"Not the place where angels choose to tread," agreed Shego mockingly. "Uh, oh."
"What?" asked Kim. She saw that a SWAT team was now heading for the door.
Shego blasted the hard drive and the schematics on screen disappeared. Then she hit the self-destruct button and a timer began flashing from 5 minutes. A dire electronic voice said, "Fuenf minuten, und zahlend."
"You can't!" shouted Kim, as she ran beside Shego.
"Can it, Princess, this is a war. They'll see the timer and they'll run out in time, which is exactly what self-destruct buttons are there for: to give villains like us time to escape the authorities!"
--xx
Hours later, Shego parked her jet at a Caribbean villa.
Getting out, Kim asked, "Where are we?"
"This is one of my vacation spots. These last few days haven't been very pleasant for me, ok? I need to get my vacation time or I get cranky."
Kim frowned. "You mean crankier."
"Whatever," said Shego, as she kept walking.
"We need to get the data and helmet to Mom and Dad in Kyoto or the Yamanouchi School, stat!"
"No, we don't," said Shego. "Both of us are exhausted and have been through a lot. We're both pushed to our limits and are losing our edge. A day or two here and we'll be as good as new. Your 'rents have that other technology to keep them busy, they can spare us a couple of well-earned days of R&R."
"First deliver the goods, THEN vacation!"
"Kimmie," said Shego, a tone of warning in her voice, "they don't trust us right now. I can't say I blame them, but if I have to put up with their crap now, I'm likely to go unleash a meteor swarm on them. Just a day or two. No one knows about this place. I kept it a secret so that Dr. D couldn't find me here."
Kim blinked at that. Her arch foe was revealing secrets she even kept from Drakken. Had Shego truly become her shining green knight? Was it the nanites, or something more? Unseen by Shego, Kim shook her head in amazement.
They came into a kitchen, and Shego opened the fridge and pulled out some juice. "Here, get what you want. Wait! I got something better!" She went into the spacious living room with many doors and windows and ceiling fans, which she turned on. Kim saw that the theme colors were green and black. That's so Shego, with an emphasis on ego.
At one end was also a bar, and she grabbed two glasses, and pulled out a bottle of rum and another of lime juice.
"Oh, no," said Kim, "I don't drink."
"You don't?" asked Shego, mocking her subtly with a tone of surprise. "You kidnap and assault agents of the law, you thwart Global Justice time and time again, you're wanted by the law with a huge reward on your head, soon to be a bigger one I'm sure, are now living well off the proceeds of villainy outside the law while resisting villainy that's on the other side of the law, but you don't drink?"
Kim glared. "No," she said stonily.
"Well, now you do," replied Shego cheerfully. "Here, I'll add a strawberry, it matches your hair." Then she handed Kim the daiquiri. "Come on, Kimmie, I made it just for you."
Kim crossed her arms and shook her head, her face the picture of resolve. "It's not going to happen." She blinked at Shego's expression. Bringing a hand up to her face, she sighed, "Not the puppy dog pout." She kept her eyes closed for a full minute before she opened them to see Shego still pouting, holding the drink to her. "Fine," she muttered. Before she let herself think of it, she took a drink, and felt its heat settle within her.
Shego drowned her daiquiri in one gulp and said, "That was good, I'm going to have another one." She made one and asked, "Ready for a refill?" When Kim shook her head, she said, "I'm going to take a shower. I'll give you some money and I want you to go into town and find a swim suit of some kind, and some clean clothes. Feel free to use the washer and dryer in the next room."
"Money from running drugs?" asked Kim grimly.
"That's what paid for this whole villa. At least you weren't forced to pay for it. How do you like being forced to pay for moodulators so that your government can control you? Or to fund the laws that make drug smuggling profitable to begin with? The money you earn represents your time and labor on this earth stolen to screw you and everyone else over, so that the SUCCESSFUL villains can retain domination of the world, or at least their share of it."
Kim sighed. Then, despite her doubts, she gulped down the daiquiri. She was pleased when she saw Shego blink in surprise. "Ok, that probably wasn't wise. But maybe I need to get a little drunk to think about this sitch soberly. Can I get a refill?"
Blinking, Shego took her glass and refilled it. "Careful," she said as she handed it back.
"You're not my mother," growled Kim.
Shego laughed. "Fine, but let me drive you to go shopping and THEN we'll go spend some time out by the pool. I may be an infamous villain, but I'm not going to let you drive drunk, especially when it might result in damage of my property." Seeing Kim give her an enigmatic look, she raised her glass, saying, "Ok, toast! To Kimmie, may she save the world yet again!"
"And to fallen angels," said Kim, touching her glass to Shego's. They both took a drink, but neither one gulped it down.
Kim walked over to one of the big doors that faced out toward the Caribbean Sea. Without looking at Shego, she asked, "You have a green and black yacht? Do you list your own name in the phone book for here, too?"
"No, I own this property under the alias of Sheila Gonkin. And it's not that obvious. My tankini is green and black, too, but no one caught it. But I admit, I generally only sunbathe here on my own grounds, since my skin IS a bit obvious. Still, most of the tourists are self-absorbed, if not drunk, and the locals enjoy a reputation of making sure life doesn't get complicated for those of us with money. By the way, the neighbors may seem nice, but many of them are villains, too, so you probably should avoid them. Even if they believe you've crossed over to the dark side, they may still want revenge against you. Still, it's not like they'll start a war that would draw attention to the rest of us, so maybe it's not important, as long as you stay out from under their roofs."
"But it IS important that we save the world."
Shego spoke the last part with her with, "Save the world," and followed it with, "Jinx! You owe me a soda!"
"Ok, this is getting too weird for me."
"Give it a chance, Princess. There's no point in saving the world if you can't enjoy it a little."
--xxx
An hour later, Kim and Shego were clean, refreshed, while their threads washed in the machine (Shego even took care of that herself, though Kim suspected Shego feared Kim, with her lack of sobriety, might damage the colors of her suit). Shego wore her black and green tankini while Kim wore a new pink bikini. Each had a daiquiri next to them. They felt the tension melt out of them under the sun, the cry of gulls, and the lapping of the waves on the shore.
Later they'd swim in Shego's own pool. So much better than painful fights with goons on either side of the law, falling helpless to a beach below, betrayed by friends, or hearing how the former teen hero was now a wanted international criminal, as she'd heard over the radio just a few minutes earlier.
Kim had to admit, vacation time had a nice ring to it. After awhile, the problems of invasion and her own infection went to the back of her mind, only barely remembered, and she just didn't care or think about how it was Shego had gotten this marvelous villa to begin with. Nor did she care that she and Shego were now partners, and the world—infected and non-infected a like—hated her for it.
Dusk made her heart soar with its beauty. Yes, tomorrow, or at least the day after, she'd make sure Shego got back to saving the world, but for now, it was enough to just be in the moment.
The Belinda Carlisle song that played over the radio as twilight spread over their tropical villa just seemed so perfect, too. As Kim Possible sipped another daiquiri, pleasantly buzzed (maybe more than buzzed, she honestly wasn't sure, nor did she care), she was comforted by knowing Shego was near, and by seeing the stars appear above them.
Sundown all around
Walking thru the summers end
Waves crash, baby, don't look back
I won't walk away again
Oh, baby, anywhere you go,
We are bound together
I begin, baby, where you end
Some things are forever!
Circle in the sand
round and round
Never ending love is what we've found
And you complete the heart of me
Our love is all we need
Circle in the sand...
Shego turned the radio off. "Hey, Kimmie, your new clothes are ready. Put on that green dress and let's go get some lobster."
Mmm, lobster, thought Kim happily, It's good to be a gangsta. Yeah, she should go on vacations more.