Chapter 7

whitem sat in his dressing room in front of his personal mirror. He hardly ever used this room, and Slipgate didn't seem to be in his much either, but nevertheless… this was where both currently were. Alone, inside their separate dressing rooms.

At the time though, whitem seemed to be more agitated than his co-host.

"Jarvis… are you sure your calculations are correct?"

"Yes sir. With the data at hand, I calculate that my calculations are calculated to be 96.6 percent accurate."

"That's… very calculating, J." the host said with an irritated sigh.

whitem rubbed his nose with both hands, leaned back hard in his chair, and said to no one, "So it looks like there WILL be an attempt by an unknown party to disrupt the Fannies. But who can it be? All big-name villains are here, and each one of them has a surveillance drone hovering just out of sight. Who have we forgotten about?"

A knock sounded at his door, and whitem immediately got up from his chair. Just after he unlocked and opened the door, the last thing the host saw were two red glowing eyes before everything went black.

…x x x x…

Slipgate was relaxing in his room as much as he could for the short time they had before the next set of awards. At least here he couldn't hear the caterwauling of Junior as he finished another song. Surprisingly, people hadn't minded "The Complete 14 Batman Window Cameos" that much, but that hadn't been long enough for the whole intermission. Slipgate was listening to his headphones when a knock was at his door. The volume was low enough so he could hear.

"Oh hey there whitem, is it time?" he said as he opened the door. The last thing the host saw was a fist coming at him, and everything went black.

…x x x x…

The audience seemed to be getting either nervous or anxious, as it seemed to be quite a while since they had seen their hosts for the evening. After Junior had assaulted their ears, at least three more songs from the 70s had played over the speakers.

Just when it seemed like the two hosts weren't coming out, suddenly they began walking across the stage. They seemed a bit stiff, but nothing else looked out of place. Both walked over to the table holding the rest of the Rufus Statuettes, which was about a dozen or more. Each took an end of the table and began walking off stage.

Just as they were about to walk out of sight of the audience, two very disheveled men appeared wearing nothing but robes! It took a few seconds for everyone to realize that they looked just like Slipgate and whitem!

"Stop!" Slipgate yelled, halting the other two who were carrying the table of awards.

"Ladies and Gentlemen," whitem started, "Don't be alarmed, but these two are imposters! In fact… they are BeBe Bots made to look like us!"

"It's not me!" Came the immediate cry from a blue man in the audience.

"We know, Drakken!" Slipgate said, and pulled out his J.A.R.V.I.S. II Pad. whitem pulled out his as well, and both robed hosts pointed the Pads at their counterparts and started pressing their respective screens.

Suddenly sparks flew out of the imposter Slipgate's neck and it dropped that end of the table and crumpled to the floor. The table only fell a few inches, knocking over two or three statues. The imposter whitem, which was carrying the far end of the table, seemed unaffected. It put down the table and started to advance on the two actual hosts.

This was when something happened that no one at all expected. Realizing that the scrambling program from the Pad wasn't working, whitem handed his to Slipgate, and turned around toward the BeBe imposter yelling "No one copies me!" Then, surprising everyone (and himself as well) whitem bull-rushed the BeBe-fied version of himself and slammed a shoulder into the android's mid-section. The BeBe bot had a look of surprise as it moved back a good three to four feet.

The titular star of the show had been wanting a chance to shine here, and she got it as she grabbed the mini-grappling gun she was carrying in her clutch purse for just a situation like this. Using the swing line Kim somersaulted from her chair and sailed to a standing position on the stage.

She only stopped for a moment though, as Kim immediately leapt into action against the BeBe bot that was still functioning. While the imposter had enough warning to get out of the way of Kim's initial strike, the BeBe didn't have a chance to attack. Our young hero was fast enough on her feet to immediately launch a roundhouse kick at the BeBe's new position after she landed. The foot caught the BeBe's head and knocked it to an angle, with some cables separating. Before the BeBe could react, Kim followed up with a knife-hand and the head went clean off!

The crowd cheered the show's hero as she blushed self-consciously at the response of the audience. Not wanting to take too much time from the show, Kim quickly jumped off the stage, went back to her table and plopped back into her chair.

whitem, who despite his earlier attack on his imposter had quickly had the sense to get out of the way of Kim Possible going all out, walked over to the podium. "Sorry folks…" he said. "The BeBe Bots were thought to be a non-threat since Kim had last taken them out, but apparently there were a couple still in operation. The theory is that they were after the Gold/Titanium alloy that the awards are made of." He absently rubbed the shoulder he had slammed into the BeBe bot earlier.

"What!?" Slipgate exclaimed. "You… you mean the awards are made of the same metal that an Iron Man suit is made of?"

"Well… yeah," whitem said matter-of-factly away from the microphone. "Mr. Stark had some extra material lying around and he offered to make the awards this year. Didn't I tell you?"

"No, you didn't," Slipgate replied.

"Umm… sorry." whitem said sheepishly. "So, why don't we go get changed before we have an unfortunate 'wardrobe malfunction' and embarrass ourselves?"

"Oh… right." Slipgate then turned back to the microphone. "Ladies and gentlemen, please excuse us while we… get cleaned up." The two hosts headed offstage, following the stagehands that were carting away the now deactivated BeBe Bot copies.

…x x x x…

The stage was once again empty but only for a couple of minutes. Then the hosts finally reappeared, this time dressed as they had been before.

whitem walked up the podium and spoke, "Sorry about that folks, that was a close one. So… now that that… issue… has been taken care of, why don't we get on with the show?"

With that said, the audience settled in for the next part of the show.

"The next Award we have is for something near and dear to my heart, mainly because I've written so many of them... this is the Best One-Shot award."

The audience cheered, and someone called out "Shouldn't Slipgate be a shoe-in for this one? That's all he writes!" Slipgate looked for the source of the voice but didn't spot it in time to catch who said it.

"Do you have the envelopes for this segment?" whitem asked Slipgate, as he realized he himself did not.

"Be RIGHT back." Slipgate left the stage and immediately came back within a few seconds, carrying the envelopes. "Sorry…" he said, a bit out of breath. "I had put them in my robe pocket."

"Why were they… never mind," whitem said while shaking his head and taking the one now being offered to him.

"The winner for Best One-Shot Overall is… CaptainKodak1 for She Misses Him!"

The highly decorated and well-known author approached the podium and immediately started his speech. "I accept this award in honor of my Father, the man who brought me into this world and raised me. We worked together in a father/son business for many years until his health forced him to retire. Since then this disease has taken him from the family in little pieces. He is still with us but only a small part of what he once was."

The audience was hushed. "Recently on a particularly bad day he could not recognize me. I can only imagine the heartbreak of having someone as close to you as your partner in life to be like that. I wrote the story in a way to relieve my own pain and the pain of others. Pain shared can make the overall problem seem smaller. Thanks to all of you for this honor."

There was a brief silence after the author's short, yet heartfelt speech, and then applause slowly filled the auditorium. Both whitem and Slipgate appeared to be wiping something from their eyes as the legendary author walked off stage holding his award.

Slipgate had caught his breath while whitem had presented, though he'd been overcome a bit during the Captain's speech. He approached the podium, scratching an itch on his cheek absently as he did. He began fingering the envelope he was holding as he talked.

"Our next category is for the Best Novel-Sized Story." Slipgate began. "These are the big, longer stories, where a lot gets to happen. Sometimes a whole lot! I know some of us who end up doing lots of one-shots… and I include myself in that… who would really like to do these longer continuous stories. Sometimes the idea just suits a one-shot or the inspiration doesn't carry things out that long. Still, I can at least say that I aspire to write fics like this, and I'm sure I'm not alone. Here we present an award to someone who has written (or is still writing) such a story, and communicate to them that we think they're great at telling us a compelling story we're still following."

Slipgate looked across the audience as he worked his fingers on opening the envelope. He pulled the slip out and his hands let the envelope fall to the podium. He looked down at the slip in his fingers, and then announced, "The winner for Best Novel-Sized Story is Molloy for Kim Possible: The End!"

The applause began loudly. In a corner of the auditorium, a young girl was taken aback. Those she sat with gradually coaxed her to go forward.

As the applause from the announcement died down, Mariko Stoppable, a lanky Asian-American teen with freckles and cocoa eyes, rose from her seat in the audience and began to make her way to the aisle. She was wearing jeans and a black Neil Young "Tonight's the Night" t-shirt. In white lettering on the back of the t-shirt is the cryptic message, "Everything is cheaper than it looks."

The girl gave appreciative smiles to the audience, but also seemed fairly pre-occupied. The cause of her distraction was the object she was holding in both of her hands: an old-fashioned black bowler hat that looked much the worse for wear. She was holding it by the brim upside down while peering inside the hat. Every few moments she gave the bowler a slight jostle. Once she reached the aisle, she placed her left hand inside the hat and continued her "search."

Without taking her eyes from the inside of the hat, she managed to easily navigate the stairs to the stage. However, she was so intent on the possible contents of the hat that she walked right by the podium. Quickly, she realized her mistake and with an only-slightly-self-conscious grin made her way back to the podium and placed the hat, still upside down, on top of it.

"Hey!" She smiled with a wave. "Sorry, about that. You wouldn't believe what he keeps in here." Then something dawned on her. "Oh, I'm not Molloy, by the way. He asked me to accept this award and read his speech – if I can find it." Here she began to take out small balls of paper – some clustered in cobwebs, bits of moss, and handfuls of small stones from the hat and spread these contents out on the podium.

"Sorry about the mess. I'll clean it all up before I go." A small spider scurried out from a pile of dross and waited behind the microphone stand. "He couldn't be here tonight because … ah … what was it he said? … I forget." She shrugged as she combed through the debris that was now spread across the podium, "He was in the woods or his bicycle was in the shop." She stopped suddenly, "– No wait, his bike was in the woods! That's it, that's what it was." She shrugged again and went back to her search, "Although I guess it really doesn't matter; he's just not here."

She now began to separate the crumpled bits of paper from the rest and to spread them out and look them over to see if they were the speech. The crowd was patient but was getting a little restless.

"Just a second, I think I've found it." She held up one formerly-crumbled piece of yellowed paper, nodded, and began to read. "'Mariko, do not read this one,'–oops!" She gave an embarrassed smile and hurriedly flattened out another piece of paper. "Wait! I think this is it … yeah, okay, for real this time." She cleared her throat and began.

"First, I would like to humbly thank everyone who voted for my story. For my incomplete story to be even nominated for an award is a deep and amazing honor. To win it? I don't know what to say. I can only hope that the remaining chapters can live up to this honor. I would also like to express the deep debt I owe everyone who has patiently waited for the infrequent updates over these past few years. And to those kind enough to leave me reviews, let me say that your words have meant so very much and have really helped me to keep going. When I set out to write KP fanfiction, I only wanted to honor the characters – the experience of winning an award in the course of doing that is beyond words.

"I would like to express particular gratitude to UltimateNacoTopping, TexasDad, qtpie235/Wafflesflambe, and bthecatslyer. Each has helped me through dark, trying patches over the years. Their inspiration, encouragement, and, most importantly, their friendships have meant a great, great deal. Thank you very much.

"And, of course, I also owe a great deal of thanks to MrDrP. He was gracious enough to allow me to write this companion piece to his powerful story Kim Possible: Final. Any power my story may have is directly due to the strong emotions his story generated in me. But more than that, he is the one who inspired me to write KP fanfiction in the first place. He has given me his invaluable advice, patience, and, of course, his friendship. 'Thanks' hardly seems enough."

Mariko continued reading, "'And finally I would like to give my eternal booyah to the cruelest beta-reader one could wish for: flakeflippinsnowgypsy. I am confident that my writing would not be half as good as it may be if she didn't gleefully taken her pen/scalpel to it."

Mariko smiled, gave a short bow, and then crumpled the speech back into its original ball. She did the same for the other bits of paper she had un-crumpled and placed them all back into the hat. She gathered up the various pieces of dross from the podium into a single pile and carefully slid it off the podium's edge so that everything fell back into the hat. She smiled again, gives another short bow and then exited to the left – only to hurry back a few seconds later to collect the spider that was still hiding behind the microphone stand and place him carefully back into the bowler. CajunBear was waiting for her at stage right with a Fannie she took on her way back out.

Both Slipgate and whitem watched her walk off the stage, and then looked back at the podium. The two seemed to get into an animated discussion with each of them pointing at the podium. The discussion was ended when whitem's voice echoed, "Fine! I'll do it!"

The author/host walked up to the podium, and seemed to look at it as if the microphone was a snake and about to attack him. He leaned in and continued the show.

"Again… that was Mariko, from Molloy's story Kim Possible: The End. I myself am a huge fan of the story and character. Slipgate and I were… just a little worried that something might have been left behind from her hat."

The host then appeared to wipe something off the podium before continuing. "Although we were just talking about novel-sized stories, short stories are an amazing part of fan fiction. Ideas can be started, written about, and completed in just a couple thousand words." whitem looked as if he was thinking about something before continuing. "At least I think that's the criteria for a short story. Anyway… The next award is for Best Short Story."

whitem cleared his throat. "And the winner is…" He took the envelope from Slipgate, who had slowly walked up behind him and to his left. "Tiger by the Tail by Mahler Avatar!"

The next author to win a coveted Rufus Statuette walked briskly across the stage, received his award, and then went right up to the podium just as the hosts backed away.

"Ahem. Hello? Is this thing on? Well, good evening to you all. And if it's not evening where you are right now, well, it's evening somewhere..."

After a rim shot was heard, a voice in the background could be heard furtively whispering, "Get on with it..."

"Sorry... Well, first off, my deep thanks to you all for voting Tiger by the Tail the Best KP Short Story this year. I feel it's one of my best, and as it starred Kim Possible in the role of babysitter for the redoubtable Calvin and his pet stuffed tiger Hobbes, it was a fic long overdue. I did quite a lot of research to get the flavor just right by re-reading a lot of my old Calvin and Hobbes comics (just ask my wife), so it was a rather enjoyable labor of love, and I'm pleased that so many of you enjoyed it.

"I was a little surprised that it got the nomination for Best Short Story, since it's actually a crossover, but you won't hear any complaints from me: there were some really great crossovers this time around, and I probably would have gotten snuffed. And who knows, maybe our two antagonists will appear again in the future, when the irresistible force that is Kim Possible again meets that immovable object in the form of an irascible six year old boy named... Calvin.

"Thanks again!"

Slipgate took the podium. As he was about to speak, he looked down, and saw a spider crawling up his hand. He goggled and flicked it away, then calmed his breathing down. Seeing this, Mariko darted up and retrieved the spider.

"Back around when Star Wars came out, movie-going audiences three years later got to learn what happened next with Luke, Leia, and Han in The Empire Strikes Back. Sometimes if you've got a good thing going you try to keep it going. What happened next with this character? What do Kim and Ron do after confronting their feelings for each other in this story? What happens next for Shego if she decides at the end of one story that something about her life needs to change? Some authors in the Kimmunity get a good thing going and then let us keep up with it. Whether it was Commander Argus' continuation of the series years ago, waveform's more recent Fast Track universe where we even get into the next generation of Possibles, Stoppables, Lipskys and Gos, or something else. The authors in this category have done this, basically. They've got a series going that has commanded peoples' interest. It might just be two stories so far, it might be more, but they were all nominated for a reason."

Slipgate straightened up a bit, as he felt he'd been leaning too long. "With that, I present to you the Fannie Award for Best Series… and the award winner is…"

whitem, ready with the envelope, took his cue. "The All Things Probable series by Slyrr!"

Grimm Probable, Rhonda Fatigable, Rueful and Jade trooped up to the podium as the band played their fanfare. Grimm nodded to Rhonda, who accepted the statue and held it up, bouncing on the balls of her feet.

"It's been a while since we were last up here," said Grimm, once the applause from the villain's side of the audience (and the muted boos from the hero side) had died down. "And we want to thank everyone who voted for us, because these awards always come with sacrifice. For the writers, it means a whole lot of time spent hunched over a keyboard – time they probably should have spent dating."

"And for us, the subjects of the stories," said Rhonda, leaning in, "it usually means being put through a wringer of action and drama so the readers can be entertained." She glared sidelong at Slyrr, who cleared his throat uncomfortably.

"But through it all, those who have followed the All Things Probable series have stuck with it, and enjoyed the heck out of it!" said Jade. "Special thanks to the Legacies series and the The Spectre of Death series for providing such stiff competition."

"And," said Grimm, looking a bit resentful, "to the Kim Possible TV show, without whose inspiration, none of our stories would ever have been written. Rest assured, there are plenty more surprises in store for Graduation, our latest story. When the series first started, the team had hopes of winning the 'Best Villain' award. But lately, readers seem to have classified us as 'anti-heroes.' So we'll simply conclude by saying..."

Grimm then fished a small remote from the pocket of his tux and pushed a large, red button. From the refreshment table across the way, there was a loud bang. The audience turned and gasped as a small charge went off. The head popped off from the large ice sculpture of Kim Possible, which dominated the table, spinning into the air and crashing onto the floor where it shattered into pieces.

Everyone in the audience (except the villains) shouted in outrage, but by the time they turned back to the podium, Team Probable had already quit the stage and resumed their seats. A couple of stagehands quickly restored order, and while everyone was ticked off, no real harm had been done, so the award ceremonies resumed.

Everyone on the hero side of the audience was glaring daggers at Team Probable's seats on the villain side. Grimm smirked softly while Rhonda and Jade fussed over the Fannie statuette. "Still got it." he muttered under his breath.

whitem and Slipgate walked back up to the podium, and the former stood in front of the microphone. "Uhh… Grimm?" He then pointed back at the table where the explosion had occurred. But instead of a decapitated Kim ice sculpture, there now stood a new sculpture of Kim, Ron, and Rufus, who was depicted on his owner's shoulder. "We came prepared."

"Well, folks," Slipgate said, "we're through many of the awards. There are 9 left to go, and we're trying to pick up the pace a bit between intermissions here."

"Thanks everybody for being with us so far!" whitem added with a smile.

Sentinel and CajunBear suddenly appeared to one side of the hosts. "And we hope everyone is looking forward to what we have coming up!"

Surprised at how quiet the duo was, Slipgate did a double-take, and then continued. "For our next intermission, we're letting Junior rest his pop sensation voicebox." Junior grinned innocently at this while ducking his head a bit.

"Instead, we will give you the extended version of 'Call Me, Beep Me' by Christina Milian." whitem finished.

As the music started all four hosts walked off the stage. Neither Sent or CB caught a look from whitem, though it would have been hard to read it even if they had seen it.

To be continued…