Holy crap!! I seriously apologise to everyone, this took far too long to write, but between exams, Christmas, writer's block and a hard drive failure you can kinda see what took so long…

EDIT: uhh. I actually finished this a few days ago. Forgot to post it… whoops

Sayonara

Chapter 3: Shadows

Three days after the Jade Monkey/Monkey Fist Incident:
Unknown Location:

The room had taken a lot of time and effort to assemble; intricate runes and symbols adorned the walls in complicated patterns.

On the floor was a large circle, eight unlit candles evenly spread around its circumference; slightly off to one side was a much smaller circle of runes, far more intricate than the rest.

Shade silently entered the room, locking the door behind him. He slowly made his way around the room, checking and double checking the symbols; he only had one chance at this, he didn't want any mistakes.

Satisfied that the symbols were correct he sat down in the lotus position inside the larger circle, facing towards the smaller one. When he had settled down to a comfortable position, Shade pulled the slightly glowing jade fragment from a pouch at his hip and placed it reverently inside the smaller circle.

Almost immediately the glow spread from the fragment to the smaller circle, form the smaller circle to the larger, from there to the runes on the walls. The room was bathed in a faint blue glow.

Ancient texts began to stream through his head as he moulded primal and arcane energies through will alone. Around him the candles seemed to ignite on their own, each burning with a different colour of the rainbow. Shade stared at the eighth, and last, unlit candle; bending his entire will towards it.

A few minutes later it ignited. A small black flame that gave off not light, but pure shadow. Shade visibly relaxed before steeling himself once again and turning towards the softly glowing jade fragment.

'Now comes the hard part…'

Middleton General:

"Well everything seems in order here, Mr Stoppable," Ron was vaguely surprised that the doctor remembered his name, "your ribs are healing nicely and the impact fracture in your left radius is set and also shows signs of healing. So do the other minor bruises and contusions, so in a couple of weeks you should be as good as new" 'or at least better than you look now… damn that's a lot of damage, but he is healing fast.'

It was true. Ron looked like crap.

Two black eyes, various other facial bruises, swellings and scratches as well as a taped up chest and a cast on his left arm… he looked every part of the beating he had received.

"You'll be able to sign out when your parents come and collect you tomorrow morning."

"Thanks doc," he replied as the doctor left, after a while he spoke again; "I wish KP were here… she'd bring nachos, hospital food is so… ick." He looked down at the tray a nurse had left earlier; it was indeed 'ick'.

"Ask and you shall receive," his head whipped around to see an amused looking Kim with a bag of Beuno Nacho in one hand and a naked molerat in the other. The latter gazing at the former with unbridled hunger, sure his master was hurt, but he's in no real danger anymore and more importantly: FOOD!

"So how you doing?" she queried as she dumped the takeaway bag in his lap, Rufus diving after it.

"Much better now," he opened the bag and inhaled the sweet aroma of cheese and salsa goodness, "What would I do without you Kim?"

"Live a sad, cold, boring, normal life?" she replied with a teasing grin.

"probably…"

Present day:
GJHQ, Medical facility:

It had been a few hours since the impromptu reunion and now Ron was in a place that he hated the most: a hospital.

"Tell me, why did I agree to this again?"

"The money."

"Oh yes… the money, can't forget the money." In truth Ron would have agreed to a much smaller pay check, his sense of heroism still hadn't died over the years, but he didn't need to tell them that.

It was also why he was getting a very thorough check-up, 'please not the glove, please not the glove…'

"But why – ouch- careful, but why the medical?" asked Ron whist sending a glare at the young nurse who was drawing blood.

"Its company policy, you may not be an agent, but you will be travelling with us on occasion… it's an insurance thing," explained Will.

"Great…. Glad you're looking after my wellbeing," voice thick with sarcasm.

The nurse had finished with his arm and pulled the needle out, she was about the bandage the small wound when Ron, almost absentmindedly, flicked his wrist. There was a small blue flicker of light, and the wound was gone.

They both just looked at him.

"What?" Ron looked between them and then down at his arm, "oh, right"

"H-how?" was all the poor girl could stammer out.

"Magic."

"ah….magic…" –thump- the nurse passed clear out.

"She's new," was all the explanation that Will offered, "Anyway, that means you can heal with your magic?"

"uh, yeah," he noticed Will staring at his crippled leg and decided to answer his unasked question, on the grounds that he'd have to sooner or later, "Its an Old Wound, I cant heal them the normal way. If a wound is less than eight hours old I can heal it, but after that it gets tricky."

"Tricky? Can you still heal it? If so why haven't you?"

"Very, yes and I am. My leg should be fully healed in about five or six years…"

"Five or six years? Why would it take that long, you're using magic,shouldn't it be faster?"

"-Sigh- look, it's really complicated and you wouldn't understand even if I explained it. Suffice to say that Old Wounds suck. Big time."

"Fair enough then… hang on…didn't you get your power thing before you were… um…" he gestured to the leg again.

"Shot? Yeah, the power should have taken care of the wound when it happened, but it didn't know how," again at Will's quirked eyebrow he elaborated, "The Jade Monkeys were broken when they gave me their power, so the power they gave me was also broken. Well, not broken, just incomplete. Along with the raw power the Monkeys were also supposed to transfer a whole bunch of knowledge and instinct into me, but didn't. Things like how to heal myself, how to sense the flow of the power, how to not accidentally blow myself up; all that I had to learn the hard way, though I did learn it better."

His expression turned slightly sombre as he continued, "unfortunately, not everything can be learned like that, the Safeguards built into the Mystical Monkey Power, which I also didn't get, were essential to its workings and the health of the user. I'd be dead a hundred times over if it weren't for this thing," Ron pulled something from his shirt, hanging from a leather string was a small, jade amulet in the shape of a monkey, "Its called the 'Amulet of the Monkey King', as far as I can tell it was designed to help a wielder focus their power as well as adding another layer of safeguards to protect the wielder whilst using very high level spells, but for me it simply makes the Monkey Power and other magics safe to use."

"…wow, so what would happen if someone else were to wear it?"

"If they didn't have the monkey power?" his face shifted to a sly grin, "they'd get turned into a monkey." Will let out a small chuckle, "you know, its strange how attuned this thing is to me. If it weren't so old I'd almost say it was made for me…"

Six days after the Jade Monkey/Monkey Fist Incident:
The Ritual Chamber

After three days the ritual was finally complete. The Blue glow was gone, the eight candles burned down to stubs, most of the runes had burned completely off. All that remained were the two magic circles, though they barely survived the marathon, but that didn't matter to Shade, he wouldn't have cared if the entire building had fallen apart; it was done.

His tired hand reached over and gently collected his masterpiece. What was once a formless, purposeless lump of jade now had coherent meaning. He had given it one. His body sagged gently as he let his exhaustion catch up with him. He was asleep before he hit the floor, his work still clasped in his hand: a small jade amulet. In the shape of a monkey.

Present Day:
Unknown Location:

The servant entered in the silent and obedient way that only servants can, and approached the large, throne-like chair and knelt before announcing his presence.

"Your Eminence."

The figure on the throne turned away from one of the many monitors hanging from the ceiling and directed its gaze to the knelling servant.

"Ah, Walther, I trust you bring good news." The throne's occupant spoke softly, with no traceable accent, but with a certain silkiness that only a woman's mouth could make.

"Uh, no, your Eminence. I am afraid I do not." To say that Walther was concerned for his life right now would be quite an understatement.

"Report." Cold, Sharp. Yep, Walther was screwed.

"Last night, the villain called Professor Dementor invaded the laboratory on schedule, he and his henchmen were able to acquire the data and would have gotten away before Global Justice troops showed up…"

"would have?"

"Uh, yes, your Eminence. Someone interfered with the mission. Someone new."

"What? Who was it?"

"We don't know his real name, but from security footage and GJ mission logs, we have determined that he is approximately 6'2", wearing an advanced black battlesuit equipped with a voice scrambler. During a short conversation with Agent Possible he referred to himself as…"

"Shade?"

"Yes, your Eminence, how did you know?"

"I have my ways, Walther. You may go…"

Walther bowed and left without further sound, thankful for being spared his master's wrath, but careful all the same, 'The master seemed… happy? Just who is this 'Shade' anyway?'

After her servant left, the occupant of the chair called up the security footage from the lab. Focusing on Shade's movements as he swiftly dispatched Dementor's men and then, with extreme patience and a convenient roll of duct tape, attached the tiny German to the wall.

She gave a soft smile as she set the scene on repeat, idly watching green fire dance across her fingertips, "so my dark little angel, you've finally made your move."

End chapter 3

Gasp! More forshadowing! Who'd have thought it?

Also: YAY! Finally introduced my Big-Bad for this story, any guesses who it could be?

Also also: please accept this as my apology for taking so damn long:

Next time:

"So, this is your apartment?" Kim looked around the smallish two-bedroom apartment that Ron was in the process of moving into, boxes laying all over the place, some labelled in languages she never even knew existed.
"Yeah, its not much at the moment, but once I get unpacked it should be pretty good," he hobbled over to the kitchen and opened the painfully bare fridge, "I would offer you something, but I haven't exactly got anything."
"that's okay, I was.." she was interrupted by a knock on the door.
"that's strange, no one knows I live here yet."
When he opened the door he was met by a very beautiful, yet rather irate young woman.
Ron blanched, "Oh crap…"

Enjoy,
-DS