So, here it is: Chapter 11, the final chapter of "That Was You"! I'm pretty happy that I was able to see this through to the end, despite my little hiatus from December to March. Thanks so much to everyone who's kept up with this story, especially because I'm not exactly well-known on FF. I wouldn't have kept going if people weren't reviewing and helping me with this!
Dr. Rex Greylin: You've helped me out with this story since Chapter 3 and have been a major inspiration. So thanks, and I will continue to formulate our plans for world domination.
EmmseySquire51011: (wow, I had to look up your screen name because I forgot what it was...XD) Thanks for putting up with my FF obsession! You're an awesome friend and YOU NEED TO START POSTING YOUR POEMS 'CAUSE I KNOW YOU WRITE THEM! RIGHT NOW YOUR ACCOUNT IS AN EMPTY, DESOLATE PLATEAU!
Honulicious, M-dog14NCISgeek, & Jay aka Jordan: Thank you guys for constantly reviewing! It feels good to know that you are all following the story so closely!
Everyone else who's bothered to read this far: Just...thanks! Merci! Gracias! (etc...etc...etc...)
I don't own Kim Possible.
Given the stress and the pain that she was in, it wasn't really that surprising that Kim had fainted at Hego's mention of GJ. What had really surprised Ron was that it seemed to hit Shego just as hard. He had never, not in all his years of watching Kim fight her, seen the emerald villainess lose consciousness simply from hearing words.
He had managed to rouse both of them after about ten minutes or so. Then, with the help of Hego (after pressing the red button, of course, at Kim's insistence) the still-unconscious Motor Ed was loaded into the back seat of the Stoppable family car to be taken to the state prison. Ron drove, Hego crammed into the back seat beside Ed's bulky form, and Shego sat in the passenger seat, still cradling a bleeding Kim in her arms. Ron, on his way to the prison, had dropped Kim and Shego off at the Possible family residence.
"So what now?" Shego asked softly, kneeling down in front of the young redhead sitting on the couch.
Kim shook her head. "I'm not sure. I just don't really know where to turn at this point."
Shego opened the first aid box she had found on top of the fridge in the kitchen and removed a large roll of gauze and a handful of antiseptic wipes. At the sight of the wipes, Kim bit her lip and glanced away.
"You okay, Princess?" Shego inquired, noticing the movement.
Kim shook her head. "This is gonna hurt like hell, isn't it?"
Shego nodded sympathetically. "You want me to get a towel or something for you to bite down on?"
The redhead shook her head again. "No, I think I'll be fine. I just don't want to wake Mom or Dad. Or the Tweebs. It would be kinda bad if they walked down and saw you here."
"They still think I'm the Big Bad Shego?"
"You are." Kim smiled. "But you're my Big Bad Shego."
Shego smiled gently and tore open one of the antiseptic wipe packets. "You ready?"
Kim nodded slowly, and Shego pressed the wipe to the nick on her left cheek. Her lips pressed together in a taut little line, but to her credit she didn't cry out. The pain was evident in her eyes, though, and it nearly broke Shego's heart just to know that she was the one causing it.
"I know it hurts," she whispered, planting a soft kiss on Kim's uninjured cheek. "I'm sorry, Princess."
"It's okay," Kim replied quietly. She sucked in a sharp breath when Shego moved down to her torso and then stopped, her bright green eyes looking back up hesitantly at her own olive ones.
"The knife tore through some of your clothes," she pointed out. "I can't get to them enough with the medicine. Would you...I mean, can you please..."
Kim saw the dark green blush spreading over the woman's face as she averted her gaze nervously, and she immediately understood. She wasn't quite comfortable with it, though - not after Motor Ed. Not this soon. Even so, she knew that Shego just wanted to help.
Shego heard the rustle of fabric, and her gaze was drawn back to Kim to see the redhead pulling her shirt up over her head. She winced visibly every time the cloth dragged over her wounds, but she managed to get the garment off without much trouble. She dropped it on the floor next to Shego and stared at her knees, fighting the urge to wrap her arms around her chest.
Shego moved up to sit on the couch next to her and cupped her chin gently, lifting her head back up. The hero stared into the criminal's bright emerald eyes, trying to read what she saw there. She could see the pure trust and love dancing around in there, and she visibly relaxed. She trusted Shego, plain and simple. Shego wanted to do her no harm. Shego wanted her safe.
The green woman shifted closer to Kim and brought a fresh wipe up to her near-bare torso. Kim stiffened momentarily as her hand neared, but when Shego drew back she shook her head.
"No," she whispered. "It's okay."
Shego pursed her lips hesitantly, but she obediently began to dab at Kim's wounds. That's a word Kim never thought she would associate with Shego - obedient. Love did things to a person. Weird things.
"Is it bad to want him dead?" she ventured after a moment. "To want to kill him myself?"
Shego faltered for a moment before resuming her cleaning, moving down to Kim's stomach. "It's certainly not something I'd expect to hear from you."
"I feel like I do. I mean, I know it's wrong and ferociously unethical, but I just...want to. I want to make him feel like we did." She paused. "He lied, you know."
"And you're surprised?"
"Of course not. It's just...before it...it happened, he told me that his selection was random. That we weren't special."
Shego snorted. "Don't go telling me that you care about how special he thinks you are."
"I don't, but...he lied. He meant to choose us all along."
"Why does that bother you?" Shego accidentally pressed down too hard on one of Kim's cuts, and the girl winced. "Sorry. Motor Ed is smart, though he might not seem like it all the time. If we knew it wasn't random, we would have done some digging. We would have probably found something he wouldn't have wanted us to find."
Kim dipped her head in an allowing nod. "I guess so. I don't know why it's been bothering me so much."
"I think I do. You've been living with his words for three years now, believing them with every fiber in your body. And now, to find out that there's been an ulterior motive all this time, that people have been watching you since long before the incident..." Shego trailed off. "I can understand."
"I guess so," Kim repeated. "It sort of makes me want to hurt him even more. I don't know. Maybe I'm just crazy."
Shego finished wiping down Kim's wounds and dropped the bloody wipe on top of the discarded shirt, picking up the roll of gauze bandages. "I know. I do, too. It's just...I don't want you to go off saying you want to kill him. People might take that the wrong way."
"I don't care at this point. I want to fight him." Her gaze dropped again. "I'm tired of being all scared and weak around him."
Still clutching the roll of gauze bandages in one hand, Shego cupped Kim's chin again and made the redhead look at her. "Kim, honey, I want you to listen to me. You are not weak. You are the strongest person I have ever known, and nothing, not even Motor Ed, can change that. As for being scared, everyone gets scared at least once in a while. Don't let it convince you that you're weak."
Kim blinked. She hadn't ever heard Shego speak to her like this, and it moved her deeply. She couldn't put what she wanted to express into the right words. Eventually, all she managed to say was, "I love you, Shego. Selena."
Shego smiled warmly and pressed a chaste kiss to Kim's lips before busying herself once again with bandaging her wounds. "Love you, too."
Kim sat there in silence for a moment, watching as Shego wound the bandages around her torso. She felt the nick on her cheek begin to trickle blood again, but she disregarded it. It didn't feel like much, anyways.
"So why don't you like your name?" she asked eventually.
Shego faltered again. She had known this was coming, though she hadn't expected it to come right now. "What makes you think I don't like it?"
"Well, you've never told anybody what it is, except for me. If you liked your name, you'd be flaunting it around like the great Shego does with everything she has and likes."
Shego had to smile at that. "Touché." She was silent for a moment, focusing on the task at hand. "The name is just so...not me, I guess. Whenever anyone thinks of the name Selena, they think of pop culture actresses and bubbly music. I'm not that kind of person. I'm an evil villainess. It just doesn't fit."
Kim shrugged, wincing as her wounds throbbed. "Well, I think it's a beautiful name, and to hell with everyone who thinks you're one of those pop-obsessive people. You're not that Selena. You're Selena Go, my Selena Go." She grinned. "I would like to hear you sing someday, though."
Shego scowled, though her eyes were sparkling. "If you weren't cut all over, I would punch you."
"If you weren't bandaging me, I would punch back."
"Lift up your arms, Miss Violence."
Kim stifled a small giggle and raised her arms, allowing Shego freer access to her torso. The villainess continued to wrap the bandages around and around her body, stopping just below her bra. She tore the bandage with a deft twist and tucked the end into the previous layers, leaning down and retrieving a roll of medical tape for good measure. She tore a piece off and gently patted it down over the tucked-in end of the bandages.
"Selena?"
Shego looked back up into Kim's eyes, her hand still pressing down on the tape. She was still unaccustomed to hearing that name from anyone. "Yeah?"
"What you said before...about being evil..." Kim glanced down, just then noticing exactly how close Shego's hand was to her breasts, and she blushed. "Well, I don't believe it."
Shego's lips tightened. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing bad!" Kim said hurriedly, seeing the fire begin to grow in Shego's eyes. "I didn't mean it like that."
Shego seemed to relax slightly. "Good, because I want to get this straight. I am evil, plain and simple. I will always be evil."
Kim shook her head. "That's not true. Sure, maybe Shego was evil,and maybe you still have a lot of Shego in you, but first and foremost you are Selena. My Selena." Her voice softened. "You're not as evil as you think. You're not cruel. You're not an awful person. Because anyone who can love and care as much as you do..." Her hand drifted down and grasped Shego's, moving it from her torso to just in front of her lips. "...well, they have to have a good heart underneath all of that dark cover. They can't be that bad."
Shego was momentarily speechless. Slowly, she set down the roll of medical tape in the first aid box, her impassive gaze never once breaking from Kim's.
"Sel...Shego..." Kim said slowly, squirming slightly. She wasn't sure if the stare that Shego was giving her was a loving stare or an I'm-gonna-murder-you-for-saying-I'm-good stare. She almost didn't want to risk calling her Selena again in case it was the latter.
"Call me whichever," the green woman murmured as if reading her mind. "You're right. They're both me."
She leaned forward and slid her arms around Kim gently, pulling the young redhead into a tender embrace. Kim buried her face in Shego's neck as her own arms threaded around the villainess, her hands weaving themselves into her sleek black locks.
"Don't leave," Kim said softly, her voice muffled. "Not now."
"I wasn't planning to."
"I believe you missed the cut on her cheek."
Kim and Shego broke apart quickly when they heard this new voice. Their eyes scanned the dark room until they found a dark shape leaning up against the doorway.
"Mom," Kim breathed.
The figure reached forward and flicked on the light switch, fully revealing herself. She was clad in a lavender robe and fluffy white slippers. Her hair was mussed up slightly, like she had been sleeping for a while but not the whole night.
"Mom, what are you doing down here?" Kim asked nervously.
"I live here, hon." Ann Possible walked over to the couch and sat down on the other side of Kim, reaching down into the first aid kit. "Would've thought you'd known that by now. Hello, Shego."
Shego had to suppress a confused grin, instead replying jovially, "'Sup, Mrs. Dr. P."
Kim blinked, swallowing anxiously. "Wait...you're not...surprised or anything? You're not scared of Shego?"
Ann met her daughter's eyes sincerely. "You certainly aren't."
Shego studied the elder Possible's face for a moment. Then, unexpectedly, she grinned. "How long have you known?"
Kim's head snapped around to look at Shego faster than she thought possible. "What?"
Ann shifted her gaze to Shego, not at all surprised that she had asked the question. "Since that night you fell asleep on your motorcycle and Kim brought you inside."
Kim paled involuntarily. "You...were watching us?"
Ann nodded. "For a while."
Kim averted her gaze, staring at her knees nervously. She didn't want to be scolded now of all times.
Ann continued to rummage around in the kit, eventually withdrawing a single Band-Aid. "So what happened?"
"You don't sound too worried for a mother who just found out that her daughter was injured," Shego observed.
Ann shrugged. "I don't know. It seemed like she was in pretty good hands to me."
Kim nodded, still not looking at her mother. "Yeah. Yeah, I am."
Shego felt a warm feeling spread throughout her, and she allowed her lips to spread into a soft smile again.
Peeling the plastic away from the adhesive of the Band-Aid, Ann pressed it to the nick on Kim's cheek. "So tell me what happened. And from the beginning, please. I'll be the first to admit how confused I was when you brought Shego in that night."
Kim and Shego exchanged nervous glances. Ann didn't know anything past what E had done to her daughter that night. She didn't know that Shego had been the other girl - she didn't even know that there was another girl.
Shego was the one to break the short silence that ensued. In an uncharacteristically small and slightly hesitant voice, she began to tell Ann all of the events that had transpired since that first day, the day Kim had been pushed into the snow. Kim watched her mother's face carefully as Shego spoke. She hid her emotions well for the sake of the two younger women in front of her, but her daughter could see the roiling rage and astonishment hiding deep in her eyes. At certain points Shego faltered in her story, but Kim squeezed her hand gently each time and kept her going.
When the green woman finished, Ann leaned forward slightly and wrapped her arms around the two of them, pulling them both into a very motherly hug.
"I'm here," she said softly. No pity. No gushing tears. No panic. Just a gentle assurance that the other two would never be alone.
Shego blinked away an involuntary tear and mentally forbade any others from making an appearance. "Mrs. Dr. P.?"
"Yes, Shego?"
The villainess swallowed. "If I had to switch out my mother with anyone else...I'd want it to be you."
Kim glanced back at Shego, somewhat surprised that she had made such an admission to someone she had barely spoken to before. She half-expected for her mother to make a face of disgust or confusion, but Ann merely took it in stride.
"Well, Shego, you are welcome in this family," she replied gently.
Kim blinked. "Mom, you're...okay with this? Okay with us?"
Ann shrugged, but her lips were curved in a warm smile. "I'll admit that it's not my first idea of Kim's ideal lover, given Shego's criminal past-"
"And present," Shego put it.
"And present," Ann allowed, giving Shego a stern look. "But I expect it to stop soon. Even so, I've seen the way you two interact. I trust you with my Kimmie-cub."
"Mom," Kim whined, pulling out of her hug. "Really? Nicknames in front of her?"
"I've heard worse," Shego teased, tipping Kim's nose lightly with her finger. "Bubblebutt."
Kim blushed a dark shade of red. "How did you remember that?"
Shego merely grinned and shook her head, reclining back on the couch and letting out a small sigh of contentment.
"I assume you want to keep this on the down-low from your father and brothers," Ann said after a moment of silence.
"Please and thank you," Kim affirmed quickly. "And anyone else who happens to ask. Not that I'm expecting anyone to, but just in case." She glanced at Shego, worried that the woman would be offended that Kim wanted to hide their relationship from the public, but the villainess was also nodding her assent.
Ann twisted around slightly on the couch so she could lean back comfortably next to her daughter. "So...about this Global Justice thing."
All traces of lightheartedness immediately evaporated.
"Yeah..." Shego said slowly, prompting her to continue.
"Well, what are you planning to do?"
Kim glanced away from her mother, resting her head on Shego's shoulder. "I don't know. I don't think there's much we can do."
This elicited a slight shake of the head from Ann. "You know I won't tolerate that kind of talk in this house. Anything is possible for a Possible."
"So what can we do, then?" Kim shot back. "Just throw out a few suggestions here. Anything helps at this point."
Ann was silent for a moment. Then she said slowly, "I'm not suggesting you do this or anything, being that I'm your mother and I'm not supposed to encourage confrontations like this, but when I was young and rebellious I always found that direct arguments helped out with my anger. If I were still like that, which I'm not, I would go and talk to Dr. Director - loudly and firmly."
There was a brief moment of silence as Kim worked through her mother's words in her brain. There was something in her tone that suggested an underlying message, one that Ann didn't feel comfortable saying directly.
"We're still like that, though," she said after a moment.
The elder redhead winked in a secretive way that reminded both Kim and Shego of each other. "If you say so."
Kim furrowed her brow, thinking for about four more seconds. Then, out of nowhere, she wrapped her arms around Ann tightly. "You're an amazing mom, you know that?"
Ann smiled, resting her chin on her daughter's head. Her bright sapphire eyes found Shego's, glinting with the reflected ceiling light, and they exchanged a look. They both loved Kim, and they both understood most of what she was all about, but sometimes even her train of thought confused them.
"You really are," Shego mouthed.
It was an odd feeling for Ann, having been moved by something spoken by a villainess of all people. Nevertheless, she replied wholeheartedly, "Welcome to the Possible family, Shego."
It had been relatively slow lately for Global Justice, and Betty Director wasn't exactly partial to the feeling of having nothing to do. GJ's main source of missions, both recon and capture, involved Drakken and Shego. Now that Shego had seemingly dropped off the criminal grid, Drakken's schemes had ground to a halt.
I miss being a field agent, she thought ruefully. I've been on week-long stakeouts more exciting than this entire month has been.
The truth was, Betty almost wished that Shego would commit some sort of major heist - anything to alleviate the utter boredom that ran rampant through all of GJHQ. Drakken could barely stand on his own two feet without Shego there to help him, and with her missing...well, maybe it was better after all that Drakken wasn't attempting anything without her.
Betty reclined in her chair and closed her eyes, interlacing her fingers behind her head. She felt like she would drop off to sleep at any moment.
"I really need to get a bed in here," she muttered to herself. "Something soft, with pillows. Pillows would be nice. Oh my God, I'm talking to myself. I'm losing it."
Out of nowhere, her office door slammed open with such force that she could hear the wall next to it crack as the inside handle was forced into it. The director's eyes snapped open and she bolted out of her chair faster than she would have if a bomb had started counting down. Two figures stood in the doorway, barely more than silhouettes in the dim light of the office. One of them was about half a foot shorter than the other with familiar blazing orange hair, and Betty visibly relaxed. "Ah, Miss Possible. Why the dramatic entrance?"
Kim didn't reply, an oddity in itself. This immediately sent up a red flag in Betty's mind. The young hero always responded to her superiors. It was a sense of respect, something that went along perfectly with her morals.
"Miss Possible?" she tried again. "Is something wrong?"
"There sure as hell is something wrong," the taller person spoke up.
Betty blinked. She knew that voice. She had heard it in enough prison interrogation tapes to recognize it anywhere.
"Shego," she said flatly. "Miss Possible, why have you brought her to me?"
"Actually, Princess didn't 'bring' me anywhere," Shego drawled, reaching over and flicking the switch for the overhead light. The room was suddenly flooded with bright white light, causing Betty's hand to fly up above her eyes like a visor. "I came here with her, and she came here with me. Don't make it sound like I'm an object."
"I'm not here to obey the wishes of criminals," Betty said sharply.
"But you're here for the side of justice," Kim retorted quietly. "Which means you're here for both of us, for our rights. Or maybe you aren't."
Her olive eyes, Betty noticed, were full of emotions that battled with each other. Hate, fear, compassion, disgust, betrayal, love...what on earth was she thinking about?
"What do you mean?" she asked slowly, as if testing out her every word and gauging the redhead's reactions.
Shego folded her arms and shifted her weight to her left leg. "Think back, Betty. Think back three years ago, maybe a few months more."
With her good eye, the director of GJ squinted at the villainess. "What are you talking about?"
"We were told," Kim began slowly, "that Global Justice paid someone to test us and see if we were worthy of recruitment."
Realization dawned on Betty's face. "That? That was years ago...but I don't recall having paid anyone."
"How can you talk about it so casually?" Shego asked incredulously, an expression of disgust spreading across her features. "Do you even know what he did?"
The one-eyed woman held up her hands. "Slow down a little bit. I said I recall the fact itself. I didn't say I recall anything else about it. I didn't even do the hiring."
"Then who did?" came the sharp replies, spoken in unison by the other two in the room.
Betty shook her head firmly. "First tell me what's going on here. Then I'll tell you who I put in charge of it."
Shego scowled, flexing her hands so they both burst into green flame. Kim could feel the heat through her own clothes, and she had to suppress her urge to step away from the cause of the sensation. Instead she looked back up at Betty, into her single eye. Her emotions were masked and hidden away, even more so than the old Shego's emotions, but the redhead noticed the little quirk of her eyebrow, the pursing of her thin lips, the way her head was tilted ever so slightly to the side.
She really is confused, Kim realized suddenly. Aloud she murmured, "Maybe it's not such a bad idea to explain things to her."
The green plasma dissipated, but Shego's hard gaze didn't leave the Cyclopian woman before her. "Why?"
"Because she really doesn't know what's going on," the younger of the two replied.
Shego raised a slender black eyebrow skeptically, but she had been around Kim long enough to know how good her judgment was. She was good at reading people too, but no matter how hard she looked at Betty she couldn't seem to convince herself that Kim was right.
"Fine," she said eventually, though the look on her face told Kim that she was none too happy about giving in. "You got a drink around here and a place to sit down? This might take a little while."
Gesturing stiffly to a cream white couch against the adjacent wall, Betty replied, "There. As for the drink, tough."
Shego wrinkled her brow grouchily, but she took Kim's hand and led her over to said couch. Betty noticed that their hands remained linked for a few seconds after they both sat down. Just a few. For them, though, it might as well have been hours. As far as Betty knew, they never voluntarily touched each other outside of their fights. Never. It was like taboo for them.
Or so she thought.
Surprisingly, Kim began to speak first. Betty had fully expected to hear Shego spill before the redhead, being that the villainess was extremely confrontational and, well, Shego. Yet another item for the "Getting Extremely Odd" list.
"Turns out I had known Shego before she became a villain," were the first words to leave her mouth.
Well, Betty certainly didn't expect that.
"Barely," Shego corrected, her voice low.
"Yeah," Kim amended, her own tones lowering almost unconsciously. "I didn't really know her. I didn't even talk to her. I just...I don't know."
The eldest of the three squinted at her quizzically. Just from their voices, she could tell that there was something there, something major that she didn't know about. She was about to open her mouth and demand to know, but she swallowed the urge just in time and decided to give them the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they were getting to that.
"It was three years ago," Kim said after a brief pause to steady herself. "I had just bought a soda on my way back from the library, and I was drinking it. Inhaling it."
Betty half-expected Shego to make a sarcastic quip, but it was not forthcoming. The emerald woman simply sat there, hands clasped tightly in her lap, her eyes locked on Kim.
"There was a sedative in it," the redhead continued softly. "I don't really know how I didn't notice it either. There wasn't a hole in the lid, and I can't remember if the seal was broken. It might have been...I just don't know how I didn't notice it if it was. I didn't think it was..."
"Princess." Shego's voice was gentle and firm at the same time. "Don't beat yourself up. I didn't notice either."
Either? Betty was tempted to ask Shego to repeat herself just to make sure that she had heard correctly. What the hell does she mean by that?
The woman was jerked from her thoughts by the sound of Kim's hesitant voice. "I woke up in a room somewhere, but I didn't know where. I still don't. I was tied up...to a bed..." The girl swallowed and tilted her head in her companion's direction. "She was tied to another bed next to me."
Betty was beginning to see where this was headed, and she didn't like it. Even though Kim had only begun to tell the story, it was already making her feel like she was intruding on forbidden territory.
"Motor Ed came in," Kim murmured, an unmistakable tremor in her tone. "Ed Lipsky. We didn't know he was Motor Ed then, though. He put a bag over her head so she couldn't see me, but he...he made me watch...and then he put it over my head and made her watch..." Her voice was breaking, tears beginning to flow down her face. "It just hurt...so bad...and it was so scary..."
Shego draped an arm over the redhead's shoulders and pulled her close, the whole time staring blankly at her knees. Betty saw a single tear slip down the criminal's cheek even though she was visibly trying to suppress them. She suddenly realized that she was feeling something for the two of them, especially Shego, that she never would have thought possible to feel for these two powerful women: pity.
"I left as soon as I could," Shego picked up, her voice surprisingly steady. Kim was clearly in no state to continue; she had buried her face in Shego's long ebon hair, but her near-hysteric crying was still clearly audible. "I went to Go Tower. My brothers found me crying in my room, but I wouldn't let them take me to the hospital." She took a slow, deep breath. "I turned evil after that. I didn't have to feel, being evil. I didn't have to show compassion, and I couldn't show weakness. It wasn't an option. It was almost nice, being able to show everyone that I wasn't weak. I could hold my own."
Betty had to force herself to look at Kim so her eyes couldn't betray the sympathy she was feeling toward the villainess. You've been living with this all these years, she asked silently, glad her words were for herself only, and you haven't driven yourself crazy?
"I ran into Kimmie just a little while ago. Someone had pushed her into the snow, and she was freezing her ass off. She passed out from the cold, and I brought her home. When she woke up in her bed, not knowing where she was, she got scared...really scared. Panicked, even. That's when I realized what had happened, and I ended up telling her. That's when we found out we were both marked."
"Marked?" Betty cut in before she could slap a hand over her mouth.
Shego lifted up the hem of her shirt in reply. Betty had to lean over her desk and squint to see it, but in the end she was able to make out a faint E etched into her skin.
"Things just sort of evolved from there," she said softly.
"He made it like so we're his property," came Kim's muffled voice, her shoulders still hitching with sobs.
At this Shego lost all interest in Betty. She made Kim lift her head and look straight into her eyes. "No, Kim. Don't talk like that. We aren't anyone's property, least of all his. He doesn't own us."
"No," Kim whispered, and Betty got the feeling that the young hero had forgotten all about her presence. "There's something I didn't tell you. Something that...that makes me his."
Shego leaned down so the redhead's lips were an inch from her ear. "You can tell me, Kim. What is it?"
Kim hesitated before whispering something into the older woman's ear, something that was too quiet for Betty to understand. She could only watch as a look of shock came over Shego's face as she drew back to look Kim in the eye.
"Oh, Kimmie," she whispered. "You never...not anyone?"
Kim shook her head, a fresh bout of tears coming on. Shego leaned forward, this time wrapping both of her arms around the trembling girl and pulling her close to her chest.
"Sshh," she murmured, stroking Kim's fiery hair in an attempt to calm her. "It's okay, baby, I'm here. I'm here. I'm so sorry..."
Betty leaned back in her chair, trying to make sense of what was happening in front of her. What had Kim said to Shego just then? What was she missing?
Then something else hit her.
Baby?
The one-eyed woman closed her eyes and massaged her forehead. Kim...and Shego... together? It was all just too much to take in. Nothing seemed to make sense.
"Du," she said finally, causing both women to look up at her in confusion.
"Wh...what?" Kim managed, wiping her eyes with the heel of her hand.
"Du," Betty repeated. "Will Du. I put him in charge of the request because I was busy overseeing a different mission. I had no idea what he did with his authority. If I had known who he asked..." She paused. "It was Motor Ed who was asked, right?"
Both Kim and Shego nodded.
"I'll have him sent up here right away so I can confront him."
"No, Dr. Director," Kim said quickly. Her voice was gradually growing steadier. "Let us do it. Please."
Betty shifted her gaze to Shego, who nodded in agreement. "I'm for it."
"Either way, he still goes through me in the end," Betty stipulated. "And he comes up here."
"But not in the office," Shego pressed. "I don't need to add violent assault to my list of witnessed crimes."
Betty offered a small, brief smile that lasted maybe half a second. "I didn't hear that."
The corners of Kim's lips curved in a tiny smile in return as she wiped the remainder of her tears away. "Thank you for understanding."
"Absolutely. Although, I am curious to know how you found out it was Motor Ed, and how you traced it back to us..."
Now it was Shego's turn to smile, though there was clearly no heart in it. "That's a story for another time, Director."
"Fair enough," she allowed. She pressed a button on a small console on her desk. "He should be up shortly. You can...wait for him in the hall."
They nodded and rose from the couch, making their way to the still-ajar office door. Just as they were about to close it behind them, something slipped out of Betty's mouth before she could stop it. Again.
"What did Kim just tell you?"
Kim and Shego exchanged glances briefly, and then the younger of the two nodded slightly and rounded the corner out of sight. Shego looked back up at the woman behind the desk, her bright emerald eyes full of pity and sorrow.
"I'm sorry," Betty tried to amend. "I didn't mean...it just came out..."
Shego shook her head. "About Motor Ed. How he made Kim his."
Betty shut her mouth and listened respectfully.
Shego curled her hand around the door handle, her eyes still locked on Betty. "Kim was pregnant."
Betty blinked. "'Was'?"
"Was," Shego affirmed quietly.
And with that she closed the door, leaving a stunned and confused Betty behind.
Will Du traipsed up the final flight of steps required to reach Dr. Director's top-floor office, his footsteps heavy and his breathing uneven.
"Damn elevator," he swore. Would it really hurt Betty to invest in a good repair crew? Thing's been broken for weeks...
When he opened the door at the top of the staircase, the first thing he registered was darkness. This struck him as odd; no one ever turned the hall lights off, not after the third time an agent walked straight into the wall. Immediately his guard went up, despite his being in the heart of Global Justice. Something seemed off. If there was one thing Will could do better than another agent, it was judge the severity of a situation. But this...this was just weird.
He closed the door behind him, blocking out the light from the staircase and plunging both him and the hallway into blackness. His hand drifted to his stun watch on the opposite wrist, hovering over the red button on the top that would launch the conductors.
"Dr. Director?" he called hesitantly. "Is everything okay?"
"No, Du. Actually, it isn't."
Will stopped dead. That wasn't Betty's voice.
"You want to explain something to us, Du?" came the familiar voice again.
This time he recognized it. He released a breath he had been unaware of holding and relaxed his stance, dropping his hand from his stun watch. "Miss Possible? What are you doing here?"
"We have a few questions for you," she replied, her seemingly disembodied voice stiff and cold. "About something that happened three years ago."
"Three...years?" he repeated slowly. "'We'? 'Us'? What are you talking about?"
Suddenly, the hallway was illuminated with a flickering emerald light, emanated from a spot about twenty feet away from him. The new light revealed Kim, standing in the middle of the hallway with her arms crossed tightly over her chest, standing next to the origin of the glow - the deadliest woman in the world.
"Us," the woman repeated in a low voice. "You have any idea what we're talking about?"
Will did indeed have an idea of what they were talking about, and he didn't like it. He hadn't expected this to come back and bite him in the ass after this long. It had been years, for God's sake!
"No, I actually don't," he retorted, trying to keep his voice calm. Maybe he could gloss over all of this...maybe. If he played his cards right.
Neither Kim nor Shego were fooled. In the flickering but sufficient light of Shego's plasma, they could see the pallor overtaking the man's face, and the minuscule beads of sweat beginning to form on his brow. They could see the anxiety in his eyes behind the false sense of bravado he was trying to portray.
Will saw their faces change, saw the look of two people who knew they had come out on top, and then he knew he was screwed. Kim had a look of uncharacteristic malice in her eyes, something that would have looked more in place in Shego's eyes. Correction: the two most deadly women in the world.
"Why?" Shego said simply, but that one word was weighed down with pain and hatred.
"I didn't know," Will explained weakly. "I didn't know it was him."
The two people in front of him exchanged skeptical glances. They didn't know if they were ready to believe him yet - especially not if he was the end of the chain. They had gone through Hego, Motor Ed, and Dr. Director to get to him, and they wanted it to end.
"You know what he did," Kim asserted. Her tone made clear that it wasn't an inquiry.
Will swallowed, tensing himself to dodge should either of them decide to lunge at him. "Not initially."
Shego snorted. "Initially. Why are you even fighting for this side? You seem more evil to me."
"Are you trying to recruit me?"
"God, no. I'm trying to get you to the side of evil where you'll likely be wiped out by competition within days. You don't deserve to fight for justice alongside Kimmie."
Will shook his head. "Look, I'm sorry..." he tried, realizing how weak his apology sounded given the state of things. He wasn't entirely sure he would be allowed out of here alive.
"Of course you're sorry," Kim said bitterly. "You're also sorry that this caused Shego to become a villain. That we've both lived these past three years terrified to get close to a man. That we're both marked by his symbol for the rest of our lives. That I lost my child."
Will blinked. He hadn't expected to hear that. "Your...child? You were...he impregnated you?"
"No shit," Kim snapped. At that point, she could care less about the words coming out of her mouth. She was tired of keeping it all to herself, and telling Shego had been the straw to break the camel's back. Because she had finally broken down and told someone what she had been keeping between herself and her mother for years, she felt empowered. Refreshed, even. She didn't care who knew. She just needed to get it out. "Yeah, he got me pregnant. I was going to be a mother at fifteen, maybe sixteen. I lost the child before I even found out the gender, before my stomach actually grew past my hips. And guess whose fault it is? Yours. If my body had been mature enough, maybe the baby would have had a better chance of surviving. I would have loved it regardless of the father." A few tears slipped down her cheeks, but she wasn't about to stop. Not now. "So, thanks. Thanks for getting us raped. Thanks for having him get me pregnant. That's the only good thing that could possibly come out of rape, and I lost it. You ruined our lives, Du. Maybe you weren't the one who actually did it, but knowing you caused it and not doing anything to make amends is just despicable and masochistic."
Shego extinguished one of her hands and placed it on Kim's shoulder. "Princess..."
Kim twisted her head around to look at Shego, her eyes bright with anguish and anger. "Selena, you know what he did."
Selena? Will blinked. Her name is Selena?
He didn't have time to dwell on that, though.
"I know, baby," she murmured in return, placing a kiss on Kim's forehead. Then she turned back to Will, who was trying to decide whether he was more scared by the women or weirded out by their sudden intimacy. "But you're not letting me at him."
Oh God, Will thought. I'm dead. I'm so very dead.
Shego's other hand reignited with emerald plasma, and she stepped forward. "And you know how much more I like physical confrontations."
Late the next night, Kim lay in bed staring at her ceiling. She didn't quite feel like sleeping that night. She just wanted to stay awake and think about the events that had transpired over the past few days.
Finding Shego again - or rather, Shego finding her...
Shego revealing her darkest secret and finding out that it was shared...
Falling in love with her enemy, and having her enemy become her friend, and having her friend become her lover...
Being kidnapped again, and Shego once again coming to save her...
Shego seemed to have wormed her way into every aspect of her life. Like it or not, she was there to stay. Kim knew that Shego, proud and independent Shego, would need Kim for the rest of her life. And Kim, goody-two-shoes hero Kim, would need the villain for just as long.
She heard a faint sound over by her bedroom window, like a cross between a scratch and a tap. She turned her head to look, tensed to leap up and fight if it was an intruder. It was an intruder, but not the kind she had been expecting.
"Shego," she whispered, stumbling out of bed and using the bright moonlight to find her way to the window. With unsteady fingers she unlatched the lock and opened the window, allowing Shego passage inside.
"'Bout time, Pumpkin," she huffed, slipping inside. Her voice was shaking. "You know how cold it is out there?"
Kim threw her arms around Shego's neck. "Shego..."
"Yeah, I know it's me," the green woman snarked, but she wrapped her arms around Kim all the same.
"Why are you here?"
"I just wanted to see you. That allowed?"
Kim grinned and drew back so she could look Shego in the eye. "Of course it is." She took Shego's hand and led her over to the bed, plopping down on the edge and patting the mattress beside her. "Go 'head, sit down."
Shego obediently sat down, and a moment later she felt Kim drape a soft blanket over her shoulders. "Thanks."
"You looked cold," Kim said apologetically. "How long were you out there?"
"Not long. Maybe two minutes or so." Shego was silent for a moment. Then she let out a soft chuckle and glanced at Kim.
"What?"
"It's just kind of funny the way these things work out, isn't it?" she murmured.
"What things?" Kim inquired softly.
Shego gestured around her vaguely. "Just...this. This whole thing started in this bed, and now we're here again after it's all over."
Kim nodded. "It really is over, isn't it? It just seems so hard to believe."
"God, don't I know it." Shego draped an arm over the redhead's shoulders. "But I'm so glad it is."
"Me too." Kim rested her head on Shego's shoulder. "Shego...Selena, I mean...I'm sorry I didn't tell you."
"About what?" Shego asked. "The baby?"
Kim nodded again.
"Kimmie, you don't have to tell me anything. You just have to know that I'm willing to listen and keep it a secret if necessary. You know me." Shego offered a small smile. "I don't judge, Princess. When you're with me alone, you can tell me anything. Something like that...well, I don't think I would have told anyone either. I'm just a little surprised you told me then, of all times." She shook her head. "But it doesn't matter. I won't tell anyone else if you don't want me to."
The green woman was expecting Kim to actually say something in return, so she was caught entirely off guard when the redhead practically tackled her and crushed their lips together. The sudden addition of extra weight caused Shego to fall sideways from her already-sitting position on the bed with Kim on top of her. Once she actually registered what was happening and got past the initial irrational fear, she wrapped her arms around the girl and kissed back, pouring every bit of love she had for the girl into the kiss. It quickly became passionate, a tangle of limbs and questing hands. Finally, after so much time, it was just them. No one else. No more fear. No more pain.
The need for air forced them apart. Their cheeks were flushed, their breathing erratic, and the heat between them growing. Shego looked into Kim's olive eyes and saw the love and desire hidden there. She knew that, despite Kim still being in high school, she was a senior and of legal age. She was free to make her own decisions.
"Are you sure?" she asked breathlessly.
Kim brushed a strand of hair from Shego's face and nodded. She wasn't smiling, but Shego could see the happiness dancing like tiny sparks in her eyes.
"Do you trust me?" she whispered.
Shego didn't answer right away. Of course she trusted Kim; there was no question about that. It was just she didn't know if she was ready to do this. She looked down at their entwined bodies; they had somehow shifted so Kim was straddling her and leaning down so their faces were less than an inch from each other and their breasts were pressed together. It would have been extremely uncomfortable and frightening for Shego - had it been anyone but Kim.
"If you trust me," she breathed.
Kim dipped her head in a slight nod. "Of course I do."
Shego smiled and kissed Kim again, pulling the girl down so she was simply laying on top of her. Her pale jade hands threaded themselves into Kim's vibrant red hair and tangled there, but she didn't care. She was close to Kim, and that was all that mattered.
"We have to be quiet," Kim managed breathlessly when they broke apart again. "We have to be quiet..."
Shego kissed her again, briefly, simply to quiet her. Then, when she was silent, she leaned back and said softly, "I love you, Kim."
"I love you too, Selena," came the gentle reply. "I think I always have."
Neither of them left Kim's room that night.
Et...FINALEMENT! Je suis fatigué...this story has been in progress since last summer, though I only posted it in December. Now I can go and work on "The Green Wraith"!
For the last time for this story, thanks for reading!