It was morning again in Middleton. There was no alarm clock awakening Kim Possible from a disturbed slumber. Kim had almost forgotten what it was like to wake up on her own, in her own bed. It felt good, although she would have preferred to wake up to someone at her side. The Tweebs had lately developed a propensity for conducting acoustic, pyrotechnic or otherwise very loud scientific experiments early in the morning, but on this particular morning, either they decided to sleep in or their parents had received one too many noise complaints. Regardless of the reason for her unstressful awakening, this combined with Jim and Tim's noninterference last night led Kim to wonder what they were cooking up. Kim emerged from her room and made her way downstairs for breakfast, with plans for the day as of yet unfinalized, except for the fact that Ron would be involved somehow.
--
Ron Stoppable was awakened by the sound of the door to his bedroom being kicked off its hinges. The first time it had happened, Ron and Rufus were terrified and made a mad dash to the panic room, only to emerged sheepishly upon discovering who had been responsible. This time, as soon as he verified that the same person had kicked her way into his room as the first time, he simply stayed in bed as Hana took a few laps around the floor, walls and ceiling before she decided to take a break. Unfortunately for Ron, Hana did not yet understand the difference between "hug" and "choke."
"Why do you always wait for Mom and Dad to go to work to wake up?" Ron's question was nearly inaudible due to his adoptive sister's continued stranglehold on his neck. Rufus retrieved a crowbar from downstairs in an attempt to separate the two, but his efforts were in vain. Hana did eventually let go before Ron's skin tone began to resemble Drakken's. Ron ran downstairs and began to scour the fridge for breakfast. He was not sure what he was going to do on his day off, but he did know that first of all, he would need a good breakfast, and second, that whatever he would be doing would be with Kim.
--
The last few days had been ferociously weird for Bonnie Rockwaller. From lounging on a luxurious private island, to making a deal with someone who clearly wished he were the devil. And part of that deal involved lowering herself down to the point where she was actually being nice to Kim Possible. But if everything came together, and after her meeting last night, she was more confident that it would, she would be rid of one, maybe two of the greatest scourges in her life. It could even open doors to ridding herself of two more, if she played her cards right. Speaking of which...
"Hey idiot, get out of there! This isn't your room anymore!" Connie yelled through the door.
"I need to get something out of my closet, Quasimodo!" added Lonnie. "Why don't you come out of it?"
"Yeah, we know the real reason you're going with Kim Possible!"
"Girls, leave your sister alone!" The voice of Bonnie's mother echoed down the hallway. "Bon-bon, why don't you come down and have some breakfast?"
"I'll run it up to her," said Lonnie. About a minute later, she returned to Bonnie's door and knocked lightly. "I'm sliding your breakfast under the door. It's your favorite!" Bonnie was confused at first, but when Lonnie slid a scrap of carpet under the door and into her room, it made all too much sense. "Munch away!" yelled the gruesome twosome as they ran away laughing their asses off. Bonnie grabbed her camera, shot a quick picture, printed out two copies and slid one under each of her sisters' doors. She grabbed a granola bar and ran outside, telling her mom that she was going wherever her sisters weren't.
"Have fun at not the mall!" said her mother. Bonnie kept walking; she had to quickly formulate a Plan B. It looked like her destination would be Tara's house. It was a fairly short walk over there, but she arrived at an abandoned house. It was then that she remembered that Tara had orientation in Upperton today. Had Bonnie never met Señor Senior, Junior, she likely would be there as well. Another change in her life plans chalked up to Kim Possible. Bonnie noted that very few of these changes were positive, but she had a feeling that this latest one would buck the trend.
--
In a conference room at a five-star hotel on some random Caribbean island, the board of directors of Henchco, including CEO and son of the corporation's founder Jack Hench, was meeting to discuss their plans for the upcoming fiscal year.
"In an ordinary year, I would have been disappointed with our past year's performance. But this was no ordinary year. Our stock has dropped less than twenty percent from its highs of eighteen months ago, in a time when many stock indices have shed nearly half of their value. This CEO isn't crawling before a House sub-committee begging for a bailout. While our leadership is a big reason for our success, there is one person who is not here who has been just as invaluable to Henchco remaining afloat in these uncertain economic times. She has done more than nearly any other individual to ensure a steady stream of return customers. I refer, of course, to one Kimberly Ann Possible."
"It's ironic, isn't it?" said one of the few females in the room. "We are the world's leading supplier of villainy equipment and support, and yet we owe so much to a hero."
"I think it's best that we not think too much about it for the time being," Jack Hench interjected. "In the meantime, let us get down to the next item on our agenda. Mr. Senior, you had something that you felt that you needed to tell us?"
--
"Ron's house. Call me if you want to reach me, we probably won't be doing anything that absolutely must be uninterrupted."
"We'll be fine, Kim. Not sure we can say the same about Pandaroo..." said Jim, the elder of Kim's brothers by eight minutes. Kim stormed back inside.
"You two have seen the film of what Ron did to Warmonga and Warhok, right? You know who he was doing that for? Just thought I'd remind you just in case you forgot." After a moment of silence, all three Possibles went about their business. Kim made sure that her car was ready in case someone really needed her. She began to take the long way to Ron's house, the one that took her close enough to Bueno Nacho to see if Ron was there. Ron was nowhere to be seen, but she did hear some nasally profanity that sounded like it was coming from behind the restaurant. Coming closer, she saw Ned frantically trying to manipulate a coat hanger.
"Did you lock your keys in your car?" she asked.
"No, I'm trying to give my car an abortion," Ned replied.
"Okay, that is just so wrong on so many levels. Let me see if Wade can do anything."
"Please and thank you," said a somewhat calmer Ned.
"Wade, Ned locked himself out of his car. Can you help him?"
"Piece of cake. Just hold the Kimmunicator next to the lock." Kim did as Wade instructed, and after a quick scan, and a short burst of typing on Wade's end of things, the young genius announced the good news. "Your key will be there in about one minute."
"Thanks Kim. Thim." said Ned.
"No big, Ron and I will probably be back later today."
"Did you figure out anything else with the whole Bonnie thing?"
"Not yet." Kim resumed her trip to Ron's house. As she was walking away from Bueno Nacho, she thought she saw a tiny parachute descending towards Ned's car. Within about ten minutes, she found herself in front of a familiar residence. She opened the door to let herself in, and found herself under attack almost immediately.
"KP!" yelled an extremely excited toddler. About ten seconds later, a rather exhausted and slightly disheveled-looking Ron Stoppable emerged from a side room.
"Kim," Ron gasped between deep breaths, "you found her!" Ron collapsed to the floor at Kim's feet, much to Hana's delight.
"You can run for a hundred yards to gain ten in a football game, eluding eleven guys who want to embed you in the ground, you can dodge death rays and henchmen for as long as it takes for me to beat Shego or whoever is hiring the henchmen and firing the lasers, but leave you alone in a house with your adopted sister, and you're toast!"
"KP, I'm not really in the mood for paradoxes right now. Rufus might be, I don't know. Hey Rufus, buddy, wake up!"
"Huh?" The naked mole rat arose wearily from Ron's pocket, and promptly slumped down to the floor.
"I guess you've got your answer there, Ron."
"Okay, we've got this house to ourselves for the next six hours. Now what do you suppose we could do with that?" The way Ron asked the question indicated that he already had decided what he wanted to do with Kim for the next six hours.
"Ron, in case you haven't noticed, we don't have it to ourselves! I'm surprised you were even thinking about that!"
"I was just thinking twelve episodes of The Fearless Ferret. It's never too early to help Hana develop good taste in television. What were you thinking that I wanted to do for six hours?"
"I think you know, and I must confess, I'd be really impressed if you could keep it up for six hours."
"I still don't...wait a minute, you thought..."
"Yes."
"I can go without when it is necessary, but I don't like to." Ron glanced around momentarily. "KP, have you seen Hana?"
"Now that you mention it...oh, there she is!" Kim took Hana down from the bookshelf that she had scaled while the grownups were talking. "Why don't we take Hana to the park or something?"
"Think about it for a minute. If we have such a hard time keeping tracking of Hana when we're all inside, how are we going to manage when we don't have, you know, walls and doors?"
"Did you ever notice the Hana seems a lot more, well, normal whenever there are witnesses? Besides, it's too nice a day to spend curled up in your ferret hole, even if it is with me."
"Now that you mention it, I haven't seen her do any sort of ninja superbaby stuff when anyone else is around. The park it is."
--
Señor Senior, Sr. finished his statement to the Henchco board of directors. The majority of the people in the room seemed troubled by his words. Jack Hench, however, was not among them.
"Mr. Senior, you know how Kim Possible has affected so many of my company's clients. What makes you so certain that this ex-girlfriend of your untalented, intellectually unremarkable son could be any more of a threat to her than the likes of, say, yourself?"
"Junior's former girlfriend, much like his mother, seems to have no sense of honor when it comes to villainy." A few of the older men snickered, which drew glares from the women in the room. "I fear that she is inclined to spit in the face of years of tradition; she makes everything personal. Unlike myself, she looks only at the end goal, and from what I have said about her, I think you can divine what this goal is." Everyone let the billionaire's words sink in for a minute, then Jack spoke up.
"Your concerns are not completely unfounded. However, I still feel that Miss Possible can fight off whatever gets thrown at her. Anyway, who's up for daiquiris?"
--
Bonnie wandered aimlessly around Middleton for the better part of an hour, taking in the sights and sounds of a city that she had left for dead a few months ago. Bonnie had not planned to return, and if everything were to work out this time around, she couldn't see herself ever coming back to this one-horse town. But where to go on her second farewell tour? One last shopping trip for tradition's sake couldn't hurt, at least while the Bank of SSJ was still open and giving out loans that she didn't have to pay back. On the other hand, once it all went down, she would likely be somewhere with things more to her taste, and anything she could find in Middleton would almost certainly pale in comparison. Next stop was the Middleton City Ballet. Nobody was there to tell her how great she was, so seeing no value in that place, she moved on. She then decided that some fresh air would be good for her, so the park it was. On the way there, Bonnie passed by a couple of construction sites. She heard remarkably few whistles coming her way, but as she turned back, she saw that she did have an affect on the workers after all. Thirty days without an accident came to a crashing halt; anyone who got a good look at Bonnie either dropped what he was doing, or walked off an edge somewhere, or somehow did something that would keep him off the job for at least a little while.
"I've still got it," Bonnie thought to herself. Once she arrived at the park, she found herself dodging an errant frisbee. Her elusive action took her close enough to the preschoolers' playground equipment for her to see that it was in use. Upon closer inspection, she saw that Kim and Ron were there, along with Ron's baby sister. Kim and Ron did not notice Bonnie at first, but Hana did, and her normally sunny disposition seemed to darken almost instantly. Kim sensed this change in Hana first.
"Um, Ron, I think Hana could use a change of scenery."
"Kim, we just got here ten minutes ago, I mean..."
"Forget the 'scenery' part of what I said," Kim cut Ron off before he could ramble on any further. Ron still looked at Kim with a quizzical look on his face before he figured out where she was going with this.
"I don't smell anything...I think she's still dry...maybe it's something else," thought Ron, growing a little more concerned.
"Look behind you," Kim told Ron. He did as she commanded and found himself face to face with Bonnie.
"Oh, hey there, Bonnie. So, um, what have you been doing with your day off?"
"Just reacquainting myself with Middleton. I never thought I'd miss it, and it turns out I was right."
"Come on, Bon-Bon! It's not that bad," Ron insisted.
"If you've never really been anywhere else," Bonnie retorted, "and if you call me Bon-Bon again, you'll never see the little pink thing in your pants for the rest of your life, and you won't see Rufus again either." Kim interposed herself in the middle of Ron and Bonnie's haters' quarrel.
"Let's get a few things straight Bonnie. Only I, or someone I designate, get to threaten Ron like that." Kim paused for a second. "Okay, that's all I've got right now."
"God, it's high school all over again. Oh, and while we're on the subject of things that involve you bossing me around all day, I've come to a final decision about going on missions with you two." This certainly got Kim and Ron's attention, and immediately their subconscious minds began to pray furiously that Bonnie would return to her home planet, never to be heard from again.
"I will go with you two wherever you go next." Of course, Bonnie had a pretty good idea about where "next" would be.
"We were probably going to hit Bueno Nacho soon," said Ron. That was not what Bonnie was thinking.
"You know what I meant." Bonnie's serious face was on display. "After we return from the next mission, wherever it may be and whenever it may be, I would like you to decide whether I can keep coming with you. I will give you as much time as you need to make the decision, and I will abide by whatever you decide." Kim and Ron were dumbstruck on many levels. Was this Bonnie, Camille Leon shapeshifted into Bonnie's form, an attitudinated Bonnie, or something they couldn't think of right now but would seem so obvious in retrospect? Kim was the first to speak up.
"OK, I accept your offer. But remember what Dr. Director told us, and by us I mean you. Your fate is in my hands. You may have had a largely benign introduction to Global Justice, but if you try anything while we're out in the field, you'll see an entirely different side to the organization. Furthermore, no one removes Ron's pants on this mission except for me, or Ron, or possibly one of his gadgets. Aside from all that, I'd like to see what you could do for us. I think you could be pretty good at this." Bonnie seemed genuinely happy about something that Kim had not said in anguish or anger for the first time that anyone could remember.
"Well, Bonnie, I think we've made a real breakthrough here at this session," said Ron. "Why don't we call it a day a few minutes early?" It took a second for Bonnie to realize what he was talking about, but when she did, she decided to play along with it.
"Hang on a second, doctor, I paid for an hour, I'm getting an hour." Bonnie said as she scooped up Hana, who promptly head-butted Bonnie in the face.
"You want me to take that?" asked Ron.
"Pleeth. Ad ged be a Kleedex," said Bonnie, whose nose was starting to bleed.
--
Misc. Notes: I jumped around a lot in this chapter; I plan to get back to more action-oriented writing by next chapter. Due to technical difficulties with my job, I was able to finish this chapter a little faster than I originally planned. Thanks again to everyone who reads this, and especially to those who have written reviews.