I do not own any Disney Character named herein, and am only using them for a tale meant for entertainment purposes only.
Kim Possible: Hearts & Minds
By LJ58
4
"What are you doing now?"
Kim put a finger to her lips, and then continued to walk around her house after arriving at Shego's island, and then being led to the surprisingly comfortable villa just off the beach. She walked from the living room, to the back, visiting even the closets, and inspecting the bathroom. She even stepped out on the back deck of the homey villa where Shego had 'retired' after being let out of her contract by Dr. Drakken, who had gone on to try to adapt his pollinator mutagen to try to help battle the world hunger issue.
The screwball had actually declared she was bad for his image. That if he was to show the world he had truly become a champion for good, then his evil sidekick, had to be kicked to the curb.
After one last kick in his pants, she let him fire her.
After raiding all his bank accounts. He had wisely let her go without complaint.
"Okay, now we can talk?"
"Huh," Shego frowned as she stared at Kim in confusion.
"Jeez, have you gotten soft," Kim asked her. "Your whole house was bugged. They even had cameras in your bathroom!"
"Okay, you had better be kidding me," Shego complained. "Because they weren't there when I left."
"Well, they were now," Kim shot back.
"But you didn't….."
Kim smiled.
"I knocked them all out. Now we can talk. First off, Shego. I'm not crazy," Kim told her with a sly smirk. "Not demented. Not out of control. Not…..anything."
Shego's jaw dropped.
"So, what about the whole…..lovesick thingy?"
"Oh, I do love you, sweetie," Kim cooed, and walked up, and patted her cheek. "I realized that years ago. That's why I fell for Miss Go so hard."
Shego choked hard, just staring at her without saying a word.
"But…..I also knew that you had your own issues. And I would never force anyone into a mold they didn't want to fit. Be it hero. Or lesbian."
"But….."
"When you stepped into my head, though. I got a glimpse at your own mind even as you tiptoed through my subconscious," Kim smiled. "We've both been denying ourselves all this time without cause."
"Now, hold on…..!"
"Just listen," Kim stopped her with a single finger held up to silence her. "I had to…..act out for Dr. Director. It was the only way out of that GJ medical ward without a full-scale fight."
"The only way….? What are you talking about, Princess," she grumbled.
"That whole sitch with Professor Dementor," she said abruptly, back to looking grim. "It was a trap. A GJ trap."
"A….trap? Wait? You lost me, there, because aren't you with the harpy now?"
"I was. Only there are some people inside that aren't with me. Get it?"
"Yes. No. What the hell are you talking about, Kimmie," she sputtered in complaint.
Kim sighed.
"Okay, we have a little time. Let's sit down. Relax. And I'll take it from the start. Fair enough?"
"Time?"
"Ready to listen to what is really going on out there," Kim asked pointedly.
"Sure. Why not? It couldn't be any nuttier than you declaring your undying love," she grumbled.
"Oh, that part's true," Kim smiled. "Which is how I convinced Dr. Director I was being earnest in the rest of my act."
"Act?"
She led Shego back to the living room, and dropped on an overstuffed couch. "Want to park it," she asked, patting the place next to her.
Shego pointedly took the chair across the room.
Kim pouted, but said nothing at first.
"So? Trap?"
Kim nodded.
"Trap. I'm still not sure if Dr. Director is part of it, too, but there are a lot of her staff, and agents that obviously are, so I had to make it look good when I woke up in there. As I said, it was the only way out."
"Want to skip to the part where you start to make sense again," Shego complained.
"Okay, okay," Kim sighed. "Let me go back a few months, to the day Professor Dementor attacked me."
"Uh, you mean seven months ago?"
"Seven. Right. Right. Anyway, it turned out his whole scheme was a plot to lure us there. For Global Justice."
KP
"I don't know, Ron. After all we've faced, this mission seems a little like…..baby-sitting. I mean Dementor? He's like old news."
"Wade said the sitch sounded pretty grim," Ron reminded her. "He's supposed to have some new device that is making people obey him. He's trying to make himself king of all Europe with it."
"Man, what is it with these guys, and mind control?"
"Who knows. Why are they bad guys at all? I mean, with their brains, they could be making a fortune building stuff for other guys. Or just selling stuff," Ron considered.
"True. True," Kim nodded. "Honestly, I just don't understand them at all. At least Drew went straight."
"Define straight," Ron sniggered.
"Not funny," Kim told him, still remembering having to help stop giant, mutant carrots in South Korea a month ago after Drew decided to help the local farmers.
"Okay," she said, their feet touching down just then as they cut loose their parachutes, and moved to the hidden hatch their reconnaissance told them was near the edge of the plateau where the mad dwarf's latest lair was hidden.
Predictably, inside the mountain, of course.
"So, what are you planning after you graduate next week? Going to do that gradual school thingy, or what?'
"It's Grad School, Ron," she sighed. "And, yes. I'm going to Hong Kong to do my Masters. And probably my doctorate."
"So, you're going to be a Dr. P, too," he grinned crookedly as he followed her down into the bowels of the dimly lit lair. "That's cool."
"Hush. I see light ahead."
They climbed out of the air shaft, seemingly always conveniently sized for easy breaking and entering, and stepped out onto a hard, smooth floor just down from where a row of computers hummed and chirped near a massive, phallic device.
"Boys and their toys," Kim grumbled.
"What toys," Ron asked as he walked up behind her.
Kim didn't answer as she got ready to face the Henches just turning their way when she realized her feet weren't moving.
At all.
"Ah-haa," a familiar voice bellowed. "Now I am finally having you where I am wanting you, Fraulein Possible," the man in the silly helmet shouted as he walked out of a back room, and glared down at her from a raised dais.
"Dementor! What are you up to now?"
"Oh, almost five-four, but I think my boots are giving just a little extra oomph, ja," he grinned, rocking on his toes.
"Dude, that's just silly," Ron complained.
"You want silly, you should be looking in zhe mirror! You walked right into our trap! I mean, my trap. Ja. Mein!"
"You couldn't trap a fly," Kim spat. "Who put you up to this?"
"You think you are so smarty-pants. You tell me," the dwarf challenged her.
Kim looked down, and tried to move a foot again.
"It's obvious. You have to have a plant in Global Justice, probably in ordinance, who not only sabotaged our gear, but even ensured our boots were supplied with metal soles on purpose to trap us when you used this magnetized plate to trap us," Kim declared.
"Well, aren't you the clever little fraulein? But you didn't guess I had allies in time. And I am thinking you are not clever enough to be ducking this," he shouted, and turned a smaller version of the massive device on her.
"Ron," she shouted, glancing his way even as he looked grimmer than ever.
He was already cutting his boot laces away to escape even as she leaned down, reaching for her own laces when she felt the tingling just before her world went bright red.
Then black.
KP
"Damn. So….he didn't….mind control you, then?"
"No. He tried to destroy my brain completely. Wade figured it out after the fact. Turns out, Dementor wasn't taking over minds. He was taking over bodies. He destroyed the brain of his victim, then replaced it with a cybernetic copy he could program at will. Of course, I got this from Wade after I woke up, which would have been nice to hear before we blundered into an obvious trap."
"So, I'm taking it then that your….recovery wasn't part of the plan?"
"Clearly. Ron, obviously, broke free in time to do his own thing, and stopped Dementor. By then, my brain was already….well, down for the count," Kim grimaced at the thought.
"It just didn't stay that way," Shego pointed out the obvious.
"Actually, Wade figured that part out about five minutes after they brought me in," Kim smirked now. "There was just no way to get my body out of GJ custody without the wrong people getting suspicious. Not then."
"That's not the story I heard," Shego scowled, wondering if she was being played.
"Naturally, he couldn't tell anyone the truth. The very people that had just tried to help kill me were, in essence, holding my body captive. I can pretty much guess that only he and Ron kept them from following up on Dementor's own scheme for controlling me. If not outright killing me. Still, even Wade wasn't sure how long it might take for me to fully recover, so he told everyone he couldn't find any obvious brainwave activity, and had declared me potentially brain-dead. Giving Ron the excuse to stay at my side."
"So," Shego murmured. "How did you manage the comeback at all if you were supposed to be….well, kaput?"
Kim smiled.
"C'mon, how many times have I been hammered, shot, ray-beamed, or whatever? Haven't you figured it out? I have my own healing ability. Not as fast, or as strong as yours, but give me time, and I will always heal. Always."
Shego honestly found herself staring hard at the irrepressible redhead.
"Suddenly, things make more sense," she muttered. "You truly thought you could do anything, because you knew that you would eventually heal even if you got hurt."
"Bingo," she winked at her, grinning as she did.
"But….the TK, and all the rest? How are you even….? Sure you weren't hit by a comet?"
"No. I was experimented on by aliens," Kim deadpanned.
"So, the not so jolly green giants did do something!"
"No. No, not them. This was like….when I was two," Kim told her carelessly.
"Huh?"
"Top secret family history, okay? I was like two, and with mom when we were on our way back from visiting my Nana."
"Let me guess?"
"Yep," Kim smiled again. "Aliens grabbed us. Car, and all. We spent about a week in this weird place where they did all kinds of stuff. To me. To mom. Even the car," she grinned.
"The car?"
"They were curious," she shrugged.
"So, they weren't….big, and green?"
"Tiny, gray, with weird eyes that glowed like neon."
"Okaaaaaaay. So, you started doing…..things after that," Shego asked, wondering why she had never seen it.
Kim smiled.
"I was doing things right then. I kind of accidentally damaged their ship when I threw a tantrum, and after a few similar episodes, they couldn't get me off their ship fast enough," she giggled. "Next thing I know, we're back on the same road, in the same spot, only it's a week later, and mom didn't remember a thing."
"But you do?"
"Every single moment."
"And you were two?"
"Two and a half," she shrugged. "Anyway, after that, even at that age I had figured out I'd better keep that one a secret. Especially after my mom didn't seem to remember a thing."
"So, I'm guessing you think GJ knows something?"
"I'm thinking someone that infiltrated GJ knows something. The 'accidents' didn't start happening until after the Lorwardian deal. It wasn't long before the GJ regulation issued equipment began failing, and the parade of accidents started. Then, the next thing I knew, we walked right into a ready-made trap, and Dementor let it slip that he had allies who were helping to neutralize me. His words."
"And you're not sure that Bets isn't one of them?"
"Or at least cooperating? You do know she's gotten fond of freezing anyone she deems a serious threat to the world now. Still, I don't know if that makes her culpable, or if it's just her usual paranoia," Kim admitted.
"I knew I went straight for some reason when I did," Shego frowned.
Kim sniggered.
"Funny, Possible. Real funny. You know what I mean. So, the whole deal at the hospital was an act?"
"Not all of it. I really did like being with you. I just knew when I woke up that a GJ medical ward was the last place I wanted to stay. Once I was obviously on the mend, I knew it wouldn't be long before they tried something else. I wasn't going to wait around to let them try."
"So you almost leveled their medical wing overacting?"
"You didn't see them. In the cafeteria that first morning? Five men in stealth suits were sneaking up on us. They would have had us sedated, and helpless before you could have fired up your plasma if I hadn't flattened them," Kim told her.
"You're serious. If they were in stealth suits, though, how did you…..?"
"I just….know things now. That, by the way, is new," Kim grinned.
"And that gym, when you brought down the walls rather than finish out sparring?"
"The walls were lined with auto-defense lasers programmed to cut us in two five minutes after we walked onto the floor," Kim shrugged.
"I'm not even going to ask how you knew that," Shego groaned.
Kim smiled.
"Yes, I am," Shego contradicted herself. "How did you know that?"
"I kind of sensed the programming," Kim shrugged.
"So, you kind of know when stealth assassins show up, and you can sense programming that is about to fire lasers at you. Apparently, you knew my house had been bugged, too. Anything else I should know about," Shego complained.
"I'd still really like to make out," she grinned, eyes gleaming brightly as she stared at her.
"Gah!"
"But not here. We need to go in…..ten minutes. So you might want to pack anything you really want to keep. This place won't be here in fifteen minutes," Kim informed her.
"When you say won't be here…..?"
Kim's hands pantomimed an explosion.
"I'm not going to ask," Shego hissed, and jumped up, very glad she had put that portrait of Kim she had commissioned away in a secure vault elsewhere after Wade's visit.
She ran to her room, grabbed two bags, and started throwing thing into them.
"So, how do we get out of here without alerting half the damn Pacific Fleet," she asked, following Kim with her bags as Kim carried her own single tote not to the beach, but deeper into the jungle.
"Wade set it up for us. It's why we maneuvered them into putting us on your island in the first place. Well, one of the reasons."
"Wait, you set this up before we came here?"
Kim only smiled, and they walked out of the jungle into a clearing even as she raised her hand. The one with a small watch on it that suddenly reconfigured itself into a familiar shape when Kim pressed a stud. She then pressed another button, and what sounded like a car alarm chirped as the familiar shape of the redhead's Roth shimmered into view.
"Toss your things into the back, and climb in," she told her.
"How is this Detroit nightmare going to get off the island? For that matter, how did it even get here?" she demanded even as Kim climbed behind the wheel, and started the engine.
That roared to life with a sound like a jet turbine on steroids.
Shego buckled up, and frowned at her as Kim pressed glittering lights on the dash that made them glitter all the more, and she just winked at Shego.
"Hang on, Shego."
"Hang on? What are you…..?"
Shego's howl followed them straight up from the island as the car went vertical at more than mach two before they stopped, and began to hover in midair.
"What the hell? How did you….? Aren't they going to spot us? They'll….."
"Nope. Right now, our tracking beacons that I already removed are back in the house. They think we're still there even if their surveillance did fail. They'll likely think that was you. And Annie cloaked us before we were airborne, so no one saw us leave," Kim grinned.
"But….."
"Don't worry. We won't move until they do, so they won't be able to detect us on IFR, motion, or passive scans. Right now, we're completely invisible to anyone looking. And...fifteen minutes in three. Two. One."
"But…."
Her query was cut off as the small car shuddered briefly, and she looked down to see a huge debris cloud rising over the island.
Shego stared down in horror at the rising cloud, and looked back at Kim with wide eyes.
"That's not….?"
"Just a standard bunker buster with mini-bomb cluster. They weren't taking chances with us," she told the green-skinned woman.
"All that conspiracy talk wasn't just paranoia, was it," Shego asked uneasily.
"No. Someone really wants me dead," Kim sighed.
"So….who?"
"That's the part I don't know. Yet. But the only people that knew we were here, or even coming this way, were GJ, and my family. So…"
"What do we do if they come after us," Shego asked uneasily now.
"Right now they think we're dead, incapacitated, or even vapor. They'll check, of course, but it will take them time to check. Meanwhile, Wade will be watching the usual suspects, and tracking whoever or whatever might help us."
"You still trust him," Shego asked her guardedly.
"He's the only reason I'm still here. Well, him and Ron."
"So, what next," Shego demanded hotly in the next instant. "Because someone owes me an island," she complained.
"Funny you should ask," Kim smiled, and put the car in gear, the small automobile banking, and flying off even as the console showed arriving ships, and aircraft just below them.
To Be Continued….