"My brothers might be clumsy, but they're not cold blooded or mean. At the end of the day, they do care about me and it's only right if I care about them as well. It took me a while to realize that. So don't talk about my brothers that way, it's not right.": Kim speaking to Ron about her brothers 20xx
Kim sighed wearily and stifled a large yawn as she managed with a trembling hand to switch off the loud alarm clock rousing her from peaceful sleep. Her so called younger twin brothers the "Tweebs" had that stupid talent show at their school today and her parents had insisted they all be there to witness the big event. This was just great, she thought.
She already had to deal with the usual stresses that High school forced upon every student trying to tough through it, as well as having to anticipate the ever present possibility that some power hungry criminal was going to start wreaking havoc on some major city or whatnot only to make her day as a teenage crime fighting student leading a double life, even less bearable.
Now another hour of having to sit through performance after performance at a elementary school, just so that she could anticipate whatever crazy stunt those two troublemakers were bound to have up their sleeves to make this night truly unforgettable for them all. The best she could hope for was an poorly played song which would probably leave her unable to go to bed afterwards.
She sighed. There were times when she felt she'd give anything to trade away Jim and Tim for someone even slightly less rambunctious and more passive. But then again, she was never going to say that to their face, or at least try her best not to.
They were her family, and she did promise herself when she found her calling was to go on mission after mission far away from home that she would still put her family first and foremost in her priorities and thoughts.
To do otherwise was to break her word, and a good girl never broke her word when her loved ones were involved.
So she stifled another yawn as she wearily managed to throw on her clothes before brushing her teeth and trudging down the stairs. She could go another day without a shower, and really she didn't feel in the mood for that now.
She exchanged usual formalities with her family as she took her place at the table, and began to place bite after bite of buttered toast into her mouth. She needed a lot of energy for the day ahead.
School passed surprisingly uneventfully. For one day, no new messages about any particular threats disrupted the monotonous humdrum way of a typical school day for a typical teenage student trying her damnedest not to fail the upcoming exam that decided whether or not she would sit crying at the mark collecting day. It wasn't exactly easy, even for the daughter of a rocket scientist and Brain surgeon, especially when you counted the meager some of how much time she really had when she wasn't on some new life threatening mission to "save the world".
Her parents did have a pretty good point about not letting her dangerous hobby get in the way of her work, and setting times for when she needed to be at home under their supervision no matter what. They were a duo of good people, always well meaning and firm but always for her sake. It was difficult to imagine why anyone could hate two very nice people who you would be lucky to stumble upon even once in a lifetime. But then again as she had learned, a lot of people didn't need logical reasons to find an excuse to flout the law, and even more were more than ready to take advantage of any kindness that was given to them.
Perhaps it was why many of the adversaries she faced were where they were, while she kept her faith and more importantly never lost sight of her original self appointed goal. A noble goal, of doing whatever she could to uphold a set of rules that had only been created in the first place to protect and maintain order in an otherwise chaotic and unfair world we lived in. Why anyone would fail to realize that this was the purpose of the law, she might never know.
But that was enough thinking to herself, she realized as she woke with a start at her name being called by the great big bear of a man known to her class as Mr Barkin. "Face the front Kimberly, or it'll be detention after school for you young madam" he ordered, staring her coldly in the face "it's the last lesson of the day but come on".
She only nodded nervously as she snapped her eyes as wide as she could manage in her wearied state, and did her best not to let every word of what remained of the lecture drift away from her memory. It was important test material after all.
Even a typical day where her school rival Bonnie, who she preferred for some bizarre reason to think of as a big purple robotic bunny than a human being, decided to be tame and leave her be was difficult. Made worse by how good friend Ron had not turned up to school on account of a blocked nose he had been complaining about some days ago which had only worsened as he battled to be with Kim at school as long as he could.
Other boys never understood why a girl as popular and talented as only Kim could ever be, would want to even talk to a bumbling weirdo like Ron who pretty much screwed up any attempt he made at being popular. And that was why Kim would never accept any other than Ron as her one true soulmate.
It sickened her to remember how she had come dangerously close to betraying the poor boy on several occasions back in the days when she was still naive and selfish only caring about herself despite her goal being to help others. She vowed to herself that those days were over. Not the slickest, wealthiest or smooth mouthed man could persuade her to forget Ronald Stoppable now. Her Ron Stoppable.
But when she did reflect on the early days of their relationship as just friends to begin with, bile would coat her tongue and she would come very close to tears which took a genuine effort to force away. She was much better now to him, or so she told herself. She could only pray that he had sustained no permanent harm from those sad, sad days.
Somehow, she managed to sit through the rest of the lecture without drifting back to sleep. She understood how it broke her parent's hearts to see a detention slip clutched in her hand when she came home from school.
She shook her head sadly when asked whether she could go for a walk with good friend Monique, who looked upon the red haired heroine with sympathetic eyes rivaling those of her parents. Monique knew that now was not the time to provoke Kim further by pestering her fellow friend with unneeded questions. She herself knew how hard Kim worked each day for the good of everyone she cared about, and even some she didn't know.
She only waved respectfully as she let the red haired girl step wearily out of the corridor and through the exit door without closing it after she went.
Even days when she by some stroke of luck was not called upon to take another life threatening mission, had become difficult to enjoy with the constant paranoia that the next minute her communication device that she had lovingly dubbed "the Kimmunicator" as way of some comic relief would ring once more and she would have to nervously grin as she excused herself from whatever lecture she was bound to have interrupted.
So many people seeked to flout the law nowadays, that the dossier she had prepared some years back for recording down the most major and threatening criminals she could expect to commonly face up to had become disorganized and cluttered.
New pages in her head were written up far quicker, than she could ever translate those to the pages of the book. No surprise that much of the later entries were more or less illegible and some no better than blotches of dried up ink from where her concentration faltered while writing.
Kim knew she had some minutes before she would have to return home so that her parents might drive her down to the elementary school her two brothers attended, the name of which she could never commit herself to remember.
She could have spent them walking with good friend Monique in the mall, window shopping all the beautiful new clothes that were just bound to have replaced the older less than attractive looking ones she had seen last time she had that chance.
But time with her friends was not what the red haired girl needed to prepare herself mentally for whatever horrid performance her two brothers would have in store this evening to make what would have otherwise been a more peaceful day with relatively few disruptions, end in chaos and embarrassment.
She'd probably never be able to show her face within 1000 paces of that building again, when the spectators realized that she was their elder sister.
She'd seen what those two smart asses were capable of, being sons of two scientific geniuses and all like herself. And she didn't like it.
So instead she hiked down to a bench which happened to be situated not so far away from the dark and imposing edifice that was Middleton High school.
Checking once more the clock installed in her high tech communication device strapped to her wrist, she breathed a sigh as she sat on the bench putting her legs onto the hard wooden surface to relax them.
Here she could sit for a few precious moments, alone and in solitude as she watched the city go by in the way it always did.
This sidewalk was always totally deserted at this time in the evening after her fellow students had gone home for the day.
Yet even as she closed her eyes to get some rest, she heard a faint but macabre cry. Very faint, very high pitched yet no less desperate or pleading despite that.
Probably another abusive husband beating down on his poor, helpless wife or child again, Kim thought sadly. Shame she couldn't have been there to intervene with that.
She looked across the street to see two men presenting what appeared to be very cheap laptops to a third man, who in turn handed over a large wad of money. She could have sworn she saw one of the two supposed vendors grin as he took the cash and hastily stuffed it away into his wallet. How did she know those laptops hadn't been nicked from, say the back of a truck last week.
But then again it wasn't exactly rational or clever to charge across a busy street still fairly filled with fast moving traffic despite the hour and to go wildly accusing what could simply be two very shadily dressed businessmen about a robbery simply because they smiled.
Very reluctantly she watched the three men part ways, hoping that there wouldn't be any news report on t.v about missing laptops stolen from a poorly guarded store, or worse a store owner who had been held at gunpoint or worse killed when the robbery took place.
Was that a cafe across the street? Were they serving food that had gone off and hoping no one would notice? Kim's small sliver of angst was rapidly becoming a fat snake of panic.
Or how about that office building next to the cafe with that fancy sign on the roof. She could almost picture in her mind, the three people who were bound to be hiding in some backroom this minute, busy printing fake five dollar bills.
What about that smart black car that had just sped past her while she was busy focused on the buildings on the other side of the road.
Was it on its way to some public venue, armed with a deadly bomb.
Her sight blurred, and her blood seemed to freeze to ice as the red haired girl clutched her incredibly sore head, trying without success to get her legs which had turned to jelly to budge even the slightest inch to no avail.
It was only thanks to the alarm she had set on the device strapped to her wrist, which roused the angsty pre teen back to her senses.
She giggled nervously, she must have been imagining things again. All that stress from that save the world thing, must have got to her head yet again. She knew that she had only minutes to dash back to her humble abode if she was not to get told off for not following the strict set of rules they had set for her to be there in time.
This was a family event, and they all had to be there to cheer on the Tweebs even if whatever show they put on did turn out to go badly wrong. "Jim and Tim promised no mischief this time Kimberley, you don't need to worry." James had told her in a reassuring yet taciturn tone when she accidentally expressed her reluctance at the whole charade some days back. But only Kim knew how difficult it was to get a promise out of the two brothers she had been forced to tolerate for how long she forgot. Life had indeed been much easier when they were not there yet. So it stood to reason that any promise they did make, was made only to be broken.
It was dumbly obvious that they wanted their older sister there with them a lot. And that very premise was what worried Kim all the more.
She steeled herself and took several deep breaths to calm herself as she quickly set out for home, eyes half closed and hands trembling.
This was going to be one very special evening those two pranksters had up for their beloved sister. She hoped they realized how lucky those two were to have a sister as tolerating as herself.
Rebonjour! So how is you liking the tale of Kim and her family. I realize that I'm not a very good writer, and I'm not good at writing dialogue or interactions between characters while keeping them in character but I do try. I do work very hard to write each of these chapters, I reassure you and I do read and deeply appreciate any commentary any of you might have. So thank you everyone for reading, and please do review if you have the time. I will see you in the next chapter if it comes out.