Disclaimer: I own nothing of Kim Possible.
Coloring Outside the Lines
By: Imyoshi
Guilty Pleasure
Snow—Snow everywhere.
Thanks to Drakken's latest failed take-over-the-world scheme, it was now snowing heavily in the middle of July. Summer had officially been put to a stop, taking a leave of absence from half the globe. And by Wade's satellite readings, it was here to stay for a few days.
With everyone's summer plans put to a stop, there was relatively nothing to do, except sleep, read, watch some out dated TV Trashy, or in Kim's case... play some video games.
Yes, Kim Possible, 'the' Kim Possible currently had her legs scooted closer to the couch, toes curled into the clad carpet, back solidly arched closer to her midriff, and mind focused solely on the flashing lights that flickered on her screen. Her fingers raced on the controller with break neck reflexes as she unconsciously fought the urge for her tongue to leave the wetness of her mouth. One by one zombies on her screen got killed, slowly racking up her never ending score.
Focus purely on the game, Kim couldn't quite recall how she let this mind numbing habit of hers grow, but she did know when and where it started. Oh she most majorly remembered how it started. She quickly flicked her thumb over the joy stick—promptly cutting off the head of one of many countless zombies. Excitement flashed in her determined eyes only for a brief moment, but they re-harden with un-bottled focus as more zombies swarmed the screen.
Yes, Kim did know when she took solace in this guilty pleasure of hers.
...
A few days after stopping Motor Ed and Drakken from using their Doom-V to wreck unstoppable havoc, Kim found herself alone again after Ron and Felix left to go play more Zombie Mashers. They asked her if she wanted to go, but the girl had refused, figuring she had enough video games for one life time.
Or so she thought.
Thanks to her best friend's carelessness, Ron had forgotten to lock the door to his house, and had nervously asked Kim if she could run over and do it for him. After a very frustrated sigh, she had grudgingly accepted, glaring at him the entire time through the Kimmunicator.
It took little than a minute for Kim to reach Ron's house—being next door neighbors and all, and she quickly entered to retrieve a spar key from his room. Upon entry of his humble abode, Kim mentally noted how dirty his room was compared to well... hers. Shirts laid scattered across the floor, bags of Bueno Nacho were messily left aside in the corner of his room, his trashcan being significantly over filled. There also happened to be an undone bed and he even had the audacity to leave his TV on with the screen flashing GAME OVER in an almost mocking salute to his failure at the game he had happened to be playing, before leaving his home in a rush.
Kim sighed hard, rubbing her temples.
Ron and his video games. She sometimes wondered if he liked playing those waste of time paper weights, more than spending time with her. Just like last Friday on her apparently non-official Ron night.
Note to self: Make Friday my official Ron night.
Shaking her head, Kim began searching for his spare key in his room, every so often carelessly tossing a sock or shirt over her shoulder. Now and again her eyes would glimpse on the screen in the corner of her eye, the big bloody letters of GAME OVER flashing repeatedly over and over again. Eventually she caught glimpse of the 'Press Start' option beneath the GAME OVER banner.
She stopped rummaging in his room, staring at the 'Press Start' option, contemplating whether or not to grab a controller and press it. Having played at the Zombalooza convention with Ron and Felix for a brief moment before Motor Ed and Drakken barged in and stole Felix's chair, Kim got a weak, but passable grasp on the concept of video games. So the hero girl did know how to 'Press Start' as well know that there was an 'Option' button too.
So in a weird way, the game was now challenging her to play with that damn start option. And she did wonder if there were more moves other than that jump kick she made her character do–!
Wait a minute!
What was she thinking?!
How and when did her sudden attention become focused on this lame game? She had more pressing matters to attend to. Like finding Ron's spare key and getting out of his house.
Huffing in a fit, Kim turned away from the screen and re-attempted to find the spare key. Every once in a while she had no choice to but to see that 'Press Start' option whenever she turned, challenging her. And every time she looked away, knowing nothing good could come out of it. But that didn't stop the voice in her telling her to press start.
After a few more feeble attempts to block out the ludicrous voice in her head and sudden burning desire that erupted from her chest, Kim stubbornly surrendered to her damn curiosity, and grabbed the discarded controller from the floor. She pulled out Ron's wheel chair from his computer desk and sat with her back pressed firmly back to the stool, not really wanting to do this.
But the abnormality bubbling in her chest didn't allow her to freely ignore the subject anymore.
Rubbing her fingers on the foreign yet familiar sensation that was a game station controller, Kim recalled the first thrill of adrenaline she got when she went up two whole levels. Even she had found that small measly accomplishment to prove quite satisfying. And upon learning that her character could do a jump kick... well, that was a whole other level of worth for her.
Recalling the fun she had, Kim regained her composer, and stared back at the GAME OVER screen. She looked at the 'Press Start' option with grimace. The faster she got this out of her system, the faster she could go home and scroll through the latest fashion catalog of Club Banana.
"Just one game," she told herself.
Looking at the hallway door, Kim made sure that Ron hadn't come home anytime when she had been lost in thought. No? Good.
She relaxed more in the chair and her finger hovered over to press start on the controller, and the game came to life. The GAME OVER screen vanished and was quickly replaced with a decapitating side scroll character selection menu. Four characters to choose from appeared and Kim slowly scrolled through the options.
A barbaric type of man holding an axe came first and Kim shook her head. Next came a ninja like dude, sporting a pair of duel wield katanas. A tad too much for her taste. Next a female strapping a knife on her thigh in a cat-like suit and Kim rolled her eyes at the sexist design for the female character. Finally she came upon a second female commando who carried a firearm and had her blackish bloodied hair wrapped in a messy plait.
Kim sighed, looks like that she only had one choice to choose from.
Selecting the commando woman, she immediately was thrown into a graveyard environment. Tombstones laid the foundation of the background and were either broken, torn apart, or non-existent. Crows scoured the night, wings flapping beneath the night sky. Trees appeared dead, leaves covering the floor, and the crescent moon overshadowed the cycle on the upper corner.
The girl's lips twitched – she remembered playing in this level at Zombalooza.
Falling a bit further into the chair, Kim moved her character one step and in no time at all, zombies sprouted from the gravel flooring, arms clawing at her and bodies digging themselves out. Right away the zombies ran towards her, attempting to tear apart at her character. Kim in response tried to attack the first wave of undead, but failed to do more than hit herself on the dome repeatedly, sometimes shooting herself in the leg. In no time at all, the zombies had surrounded her, making her health bar deplete rapidly in their successions of attacks.
Kim tried to fight back in a pathetic attempt to survive, hoping her jump kick could save her digital life. But they beat her down, slowly consuming her character's flesh in the process. Seconds later the screen darkened and the words GAME OVER faded into reality. She hadn't even made it past the first step, let alone the first level of the game.
Kim frowned, but shrugged in defeat—that was the end of that.
Having lost in the game only proved that these were indeed a waste of time and only fueled her passion to toss the controller off her lap and proceed to finish looking for Ron's spare key. Preferably the faster the better.
Tossing more articles of clothing around, Kim finally stumbled onto his spare key beneath one of his random red jerseys. She grabbed the key ready to leave, when her eyes looked back at the GAME OVER screen. Unknowingly, she glared hard at the screen, finding the once mocking message that had been for Ron to see was now doing the same to her. Mocking her. And for some unknown reason, it really ticked her off.
How dare the game mock her?! No one mocked Kim Possible. No one! Definitely not some overrated 2-bit game.
Biting her lip, Kim looked back at the key in her hands and sighed. She tossed the key on Ron's desk. One more game couldn't hurt.
Besides, it was just to prove to this damn game that no overly price paper weight was going to show her up. And nothing else!
Sitting back on the chair, she picked up the controller, ready to show this game whose boss. And Kim didn't notice it, but she gripped the controller a bit tighter.
...
After spending countless hours trying to beat the game, Kim had to narrowly dodge Ron when he got home, hiding in the corner of his room for him not to see her. She couldn't let him know she had been playing his Zombie Masher game, the sidekick would've never let her hear the end of it. And a gloating Ron Stoppable did not make for a happy Kim Possible.
Sitting on her bean bag chair and scrolling through the know uninteresting catalog of Club Banana, Kim had felt not fully satisfied for not beating the game. She didn't even ponder at the fact she had been playing for a little over 6 hours straight. All her mind could focus on was the fact that she didn't finish it. Normally Kim would finish anything, but she always died on some point during the game. Sometimes due to no more health, running out of ammo, blushing whenever she called the game a cheater. Ironic as it was, it left her feeling empty for every time she had gotten a bit farther, but never ever reaching the end.
And in a sad way... it made her feel incomplete, unsatisfied, empty.
Beaten.
And Kim Possible hadn't liked the feeling one bit.
...
And now here the hero was in the living room on a cold July's day, playing the latest Zombie Mashers video game she had bought under cover, and using the game console, she had, um, secret borrowed from the Tweebs. What? Don't look at her like that. No way in heck was anybody at the mall going to see her buy a video game. Kimmie had a rep to protect.
The hero girl only played when left alone and it helped that the fam went out to eat a lot. Luckily she normally lied, saying she wasn't hungry. Of course that proved to be a flat out deception, but through the course of playing video games, Kim became more accustom to eating snacks and other unhealthy foods.
Especially fast food like from Bueno Nacho. Mmnn... she had grown accustom to those cheesy works of art. Now Kim could see Ron's fathom with his Naco creation. The taste was heavenly and the aroma made her shudder in a good way. Of course that was another guilty pleasure she would keep for herself.
Leaning closer to the TV, Kim heard the phone ring and groaned in disappointed. Looks like slaying the werewolf queen would have to wait.
Pausing the game and forcing her feet up, she picked up the phone, seeing the caller ID was Ron. Without worrying of whatever he could be asking, Kim answered the call, leaning on the wall and twirling the cord between her fingers.
"Hey Ron, what's up?" she asked.
"Oh! Hey KP! I was wondering if you wanted to go get some Bueno Nacho? You know, some hot delicious Nacos would hit the spot right about now."
Kim fought the urge to dance with joy, instead she just smiled warmly. "Yea that sounds perfect. I'll be over in a second."
"Coolness, later KP."
"Bye."
Hanging up the phone, Kim didn't bother to stop herself from running up to her room and putting on a winter jacket and a crimson scarf. She just as quickly put away the evidence of her even playing games and headed out the door.
The cool air brushed against her nose and she snuggled a bit more into her scarf with every step she walked over to Ron's house. Kim's steps seemed lighter as well, and she almost skipped over to his house. Good thing she didn't though—the floor was slippery.
Reaching Ron's door, Kim let herself in with the spare key she had kept that day. As soon as she entered his home, the loud ruckus in Ron's room filled the house and quickly Kim recognized the sounds of some zombies get decapitated. Every pore screamed out to her and go play, but she hid the eagerness well, only allowing her curiosity to go so far as to allow herself to see her best friend play the game.
When she slammed open his door, Ron fell off his chair. He grumbled as he rubbed the sore spot on his neck and when he heard the GAME OVER screen come up, he grumbled even more.
"Ready to go Ron?" Kim teased, hovering over him.
The blond got up, rubbing his neck. "Yea, yea, Kim, just let me try to do one more level and then we can go."
Kim reluctantly agreed, her overall expression annoyed, she so did not want to wait for Ron to die again. That could take forev–!
"Aww man!"
Never mind.
In the background Kim could hear Ron complain how his character wouldn't do the power combo after mashing Down–X–X–Triangle–Square. Kim simply smiled under her scarf, finding Ron's raging antics humorous. Silly Ron, even she fully knew the combo special was Down–X–O–Triangle–Square. Of course Kimmie refused to tell him that. After all, a girl's gotta have her secrets.
...
A/N: I know, I know, cliché chapter name. Damn, cut a guy some slack.