Panic Attack

After the party, Ron, Kim and Yori headed back to Ron's mansion. Tomorrow was Saturday, and Kim had wanted to spend it with her friends.

"I'll try to make it." Ron said, "But tomorrow I have to go over a speech to some of my stockholders on how Bueno Nacho still adheres to the highest standards of food preparation… etc, etc."

"I could stand by you." Kim said.

"And?"

"And serve something I whipped up so they would have a comparison."

"mmmm….. 'Mad CEO poisons company, film at 11…'" Ron said, grinning.

"I'm not that bad." Kim said, giving a pout.

"Okay. 'mad CEO mutates company…'" Kim giggled at the joke. Yori shuddered, the gesture not entirely feigned. Once she'd made the mistake of promising Kim she'd taste test one of her attempts before giving it to Ron.

They had dined out that night, although Yori didn't eat much. The next day, they had also thrown out several pans that were completely destroyed.

"And you are…" Ron asked.

"Shopping." Kim said, "Joss and Monique." She paused, not entirely certain of how to handle it, but she didn't know how Yori and Joss would get along… But Yori solved the issue for her.

"I am going to spend the day in." Yori commented. "Next week I must fly to Yamanouchi, and there is much to be done—not the least of which is making certain I am in shape so that Sensei doesn't feel I have been slipping."

"Sensei?"

"Not the one you remember, Kim." Ron said, a flash of regret on his face, "He passed away a few years ago."

"I'm sorry." Kim said, remembering the times she'd met him.

"A fully lived life is never to be regretted, nor is proceeding along the Wheel." Yori said, "But you would remember the current leader—Hirotaka." Kim blinked, remembering a long ago hottie… Then she blushed.

"I see you do remember him…" Yori said, smiling.

The next day, Kim had breakfast with Ron and Yori, kissed Ron and headed out to where Monique and Joss waited in their rented car. Joss and Monique had both flown in, but as Monique said, "That's what freight trains are for" when Kim asked how much stuff they could take back to New York with them. Kim laughed at the comment and they all took off. Monique was wearing good walking clothes, but obviously hadn't lost her fashion sense, while Joss had a light wind breaker on over her clothes with an FDNY cap perched jauntily on her head.

This time, they didn't spend much time at the mall.

"Girlfriend, I don't know about you, but those kids make me feel old, and thefashions…." Monique commented, shuddering.

"What about Club Banana?"

"That place? That's not club banana, that's a Captain Constellation transporter disaster waiting to happen."

"I thought you liked Zita!"

"I do." Monique said, "But it was only the good I could do mankind by inventing new surgical techniques that could drive me away from my beloved Club Banana… none after me were equal to the challenge." Kim blinked at Monique's theatrical presentation. She even put one hand to her forehead. Kim turned to Joss.

"She does this often?"

"Sometimes."

"And you room with her?"

"New York Rents are crazy." Joss said. "And they wouldn't let me live at the fire station full time." Kim shook her head at that.

"Have you been in Middleton much?" Kim asked.

"I was here last month." Joss said, "There was a Friend's meeting and I was a delegate."

"Friends?"

"Society of Friends," Joss said and then elaborated. "Quakers."

"Oh." Kim said. "So what do you do when you're not on duty as a robo-wrangler?"

"Mostly? Sleep." Joss grinned. "That job is full time and a half."

"She's not kidding, Kim—never thought I'd see someone put in as many hours as I have during my residency." Monique said, "But Joss does."

"It's all the wireless stuff." The younger woman explained. "No matter how many brains we try to put in 'em, they still need to be hooked up to the network."

"why—I mean couldn't you just make each one autonomous?" Kim asked.

"Well…we could, but NY would be able to afford one, and most other places might be able to buy a picture of 'em." Joss said, "part of the reason for them is to go into places too dangerous for firefighters, and they get messed up a lot. " She sighed, "Typical trade off- buy the absolute best and don't have enough or buy enough and don't have the absolute best." She shrugged, "But anyway, so I and the rest of the Wranglers have to make certain we have up to date maps of all sources of wireless transmissions and keep them as accurate as possible—it doesn't' solve all the problems, like the interference you get when a building goes up in flame, but we try to avoid dead spots."

"Harder than the Middleton Mall bots?" Kim asked with a slight bite in her voice. Joss evidently chose to ignore the tone.

"Oh you wouldn't believe how hard—those bots only work because the entire mall is wired for them—that's why they can be so cheap."

"Ah," Kim said, and then decided to dive in. "So you and Ron—you used to really idolize him…"

"I still do…sort of." Joss paused, looked over at Kim, then nodded to herself. "But we disagree."

"About the pacifism."

"Yeah." Joss said, "Ron's not bad, you know that, and he'd charge into a burning building in a second, but…"

"Sometimes you have to use violence." Kim said, "Remember me and Ron?"

"Yes." Joss said quietly, "But that's part of the problem, Kim." Her voice roughened and got more of her old accent in it. "Thou shalt not steal…unless you really want it. Thou shalt not kill…unless you have a really good reason and they deserve it." She paused, "When you prepare for something, you're deciding to do it later, no matter what you say. When you bomb to stop a "threat" you become the threat…."

"But if you need to protect yourself." Kim said.

Joss shook her head. "How many of our modern problems come because the 'threat' we needed to protect ourselves from was more of an inconvenience? You go back to Iran with the Shah and we were supporting a man who had thugs that tortured at will." She looked over at Kim, "And when he fell, another madman came to power, but what if we hadn't kept him in power, hadn't helped him at all. Not overthrown him, but just said: we will not? You can say things would have been worse, but the fundamental fact is that our hands would have been clean and we would have shown the rest of the world that we respected the idea that everyone needs to be free, even if it's inconvenient to us. She paused, "Think about how much misery we bought getting doing things that "we just had to do" or "were real politik?" We need to show people that the Laws we talk about so much are just that: Laws, and not suggestions we drop when it gets hard."

Kim didn't say anything. She remembered missions where the thanks had taken the form of lush banquets—while people starved outside. She also was dealing with the fact that Joss was no longer a kid with a Kim Possible obsession—but an adult, a firefighter, and someone was ready and willing to defend her point of view, no matter how unpopular it might be.

Since when did my family turn into radicals? Kim wondered. Problem was, she didn't know who the radicals were—the ones who just decided that you needed the protection or people like Joss.

The rest of the day went quickly, but then towards the end, it happened. They were walking and talking as they wandered back towards Ron's home through a food court frequented by civilians and people from the space center alike, when someone started calling from behind them.

"bwak-bwak-bwak…" The badly imitated sound of a chicken rose. Kim blinked. She'd never heard that before and turned to see three untidy individuals walking towards them. She looked around, but they were coming towards them.

"We may want to leave." Monique said, "Good thing we had the bags sent back already."

"It's okay, Monique." Joss said, face tight, before she sighed and smoothed out her frown. "It's happened before. They probably saw me at the last meeting here."

"Hey look, it's a laydown." One called, as they got closer, and Kim reassessed them. They were larger than the three women, but fatter and rather poorly dressed. Sloppy, not casual.

"And look! It's the great Kim Possible with her! We'd better be careful…" Another said, while the third grinned at Joss and started making the chicken noises again. Kim felt her face start to heat up. This was Joss, her cousin they were bothering.

"I hear when they're not laying down and dying, they like to turn the other cheek." The first one said and raised his hand to… Kim didn't know, slap Joss? Smack her cap off?

Suddenly Kim was moving forward to show him what for when Monique grabbed her and held her back.

"No Kim." Monique hissed.

"But Joss-"

"She won't thank you for helping. Not like that." Monique said, as the man flipped the cap off her head and on to the ground. Joss bent down to get it, but the other two men were faster and they zipped down to grab it… only to have it be plucked out of their hands by someone else. None of the women had noticed the other men who appeared behind them.

For a moment Kim wondered if they'd been suckered, then she looked at the four men, and recognized Taggert. Next to him was a black man she'd remembered seeing at the base in the observers' gallery after her disastrous drill and two of Taggert's subordinates. She'd gotten one of them killed.

Surprisingly, it hadn't been Taggert who had grabbed the cap, but the African American—Kim remembered him now, one of the Marines observing the Australian Special Forces units.

"Ma'am." He said, in a southern drawl, "I believe this is yours. "

"I-Thank you." Then his eyes rotated to the three men, who suddenly looked far softer and smaller then they had a moment before.

"I am Sergeant Major Thomas Collins." He said calmly, "I was showing Captain Taggert and his men around to see more of the United States then the base. I am not happy at the part of the United States you have just shown them." He paused, "I would suggest you apologize."

"To her? She's a Laydown." Taggert was looking completely impassive, but his two subordinates were slightly nervous, like someone seeing a family squabble they'd prefer to avoid.

"She is Joss Possible." He said, and Kim blinked,

How did he know that-

"And," He continued, "If you bothered to watch the newsfeeds, you would know that she is an FDNY firefighter, and has been decorated for bravery three times. The last time was when she crawled through a pipe because the interference was too severe for remotes to rescue two children who had fallen down and were injured." Kim turned to Joss.

"It wasn't as scary as they made it sound." Joss said, glancing at Kim, her voice tense. "The news always exaggerates."

"That's not how I heard it ma'am." Collins said calmly, before turning back to the three men. "Now, before I call the police, and report that I, and several other reliable." He stressed the word, "Witnesses saw you harassing these ladies, I would suggest you apologize." The three tried to look nonchalant but they couldn't meet Collins' eyes, and didn't have much better luck with Taggert, who was looking at them with the fascination of a man seeing a rabbit right before the wolverine got done with it.

"I…um…sorry."

"Good. Now leave. Quickly." Collins said. The three paused, turned, slouched away trying to seem nonchalant, but they were half running before they got to the end of the street.

"Thanks," Monique said.

"It was my pleasure ma'am."

"It was… okay." Joss said, "I've dealt with worse."

"You shouldn't have to deal with it at all, Ma'am." Collin's said, "Never did much like Bullies, on the school ground or off."

"You really heard-" Joss said, "I didn't think it was that widely known. In spite of herself a smile formed on her face, "The department wasn't happy—the first month the system is fully on line, and then it turns to junk and I have to go wiggling down myself."

"Technology breaks—that's why you have people." He shrugged, "But the fact that my niece went to the same school your lost lambs did might have something to do with me hearing about it." He smiled.

Kim wasn't smiling. In fact, she was slowly turning pale.

They didn't throw the first punch. What was I thinking? What if I had hit them. I could have gone back to prison, I could be on my way now, I could… and then, suddenly without warning she was back in Prison. She'd screwed up, she was going to spend the next ten years there, and it was her fault and-

"Kim? Kim?" Monique said, looking concerned, then suddenly her and Joss were by her side.

Kim found herself gasping, eyes wide but she couldn't see anything. All she could think about was the fact that she was going back.

"I didn't… I can't go back to prison, I can't-" She started to hyperventilate, as Monique and Joss looked at each other and suddenly got a different look on their face.

"I need a chair." Monique said, and Collins immediately reached over the low divider where the men had been eating and lifted up a chair putting it down behind Kim. Monique and Joss guided the unseeing Kim to sit in the chair. Taggert gestured and his two men moved away, one behind and one in front of them, to intercept any looky-loos.

Kim could barely feel her hands, they were on pins and needles like they'd gone to sleep and she was getting flashes and blotches in her vision. Joss touched her neck with something that was cold.

"BP and pulse are elevated but within norms." She said.

"Yeah." Monique paused and then spoke in a tone Kim hadn't heard from her before—in fact she'd only generally heard it from mom…

She wasn't going to see mom again. She was going to go to pris-

"Kim—Kim, listen to me Girlfriend." Monique said in that same tone. "You're okay, but you're having an anxiety attack. You're not going to prison. Understand? You're not going to prison." Joss had her hands on Kim's shoulders, while Monique took Kim's hands in hers.

"But I-"

"Listen to me." Monique said, "You're not going to prison." Kim gave a tiny nod, and Monique continued, "I need you to start breathing slower. Okay? You'll pass out otherwise, Take a deep breath, okay?" Kim nodded, "Okay, now hold it and exhale. Good. Take another one—slow, deep breaths so we can get you calmed down." Kim was still trembling. But her shallow, almost panting breaths were getting more normal.

"Doing fine, Kim." Joss said, giving her a reassuring pat.

"Okay." Monique said in that same voice. "Do you want to drink some water?" Kim gave a short nod, and Monique turned to find Collins' had already gotten a glass from the waiter, who had vanished back into the diner.

"Here—just a sip." Kim nodded and took it, and hoped she wouldn't throw up this time. The terror was still there, but now there was humiliation to compete with it.

"I'm sorry-I'm sorry-" She said.

"Don't have to be sorry, Kim, you didn't do anything wrong." Monique said, "Just had a little flashback, I think." She paused, "But we're going to take a cab home to Ron's."

Alone. I might have never seen Ron again. Kim shuddered and took a deep shuddering breath.

"I, I yes..I…I need to see Ron…" And now to her horror she started to cry. That was just too much as she put her face in her hands as Monique let them go, and put her arms around Kim, letting her hide her face in Monique's shoulder.

"It's okay, Kim. This is normal." Monique said, "Happens to the best of us." A few moments later, a cab had pulled up and Joss helped Kim into it. Monique turned to thank Sergeant Collins, who demurred.

"No need to thank me, Ma'am, I just wish we'd been able to head this off." He paused, and continued, "Ma'am, I don't know Kim Possible personally, but that was a Post Traumatic Stress Disorder reaction pretty damned clearly." He paused, "You might want to convince her to see a counselor if she isn't already or tell him about this."

Monique's estimate of the man went up. He'd made the suggestion without prying or assuming that Monique was Kim's doctor. She nodded. "I'm going to do that, but thanks."

"You best be off now, then." Collins said, and as the door closed and the cab left, sighed.

"Pretty bad." Taggert said.

"Yah."

"I'd ask Tara to help." Taggert paused, "But it'd probably be better if the doctor handles it."

Besides, Tara is pretty shitty about handling her own PTSD—the way she manages to avoid any shrink who might get too interested. Taggert didn't say it, of course, Collins was a great guy, but he was also a senior NCO and you didn't say dirt about officers to NCO's—they didn't' like it, because it meant the officers weren't doing their job, just like officers didn't like NCO's who couldn't handle their job.

"So what now?" he asked.

"Now?" Collins said, "We hunt up a cop and go make a report. I didn't say I wouldn't report them after this." He grinned, "And not only that, we can make some friends among the cops."

"How's that?"

"Well, in the US, it's a felony to assault a serving peace officer or emergency worker." His grin got broad, "and they looked pretty assaulting to me, and they can't claim they didn't notice the FDNY cap…" He shrugged, "I doubt the DA would go for it, but a misdemeanor is a different matter, and someone put paint all over the Quaker meeting hall last month." He shrugged, "The building isn't covered by the camera net yet, but think if those three have to choose between discovering a desire to help the police vs. sitting in the dock while an NCO with more hash marks then God tells people how he was shocked, SHOCKED to see their evil deeds…"

"You are a nasty, nasty man, Sergeant." Taggert said. "I think that would be a perfect end to the day…" his smile flickered as he looked in the direction the cab had vanished. "At least someone's day…" He softly said.

TBC.