I do NOT own Kim Possible
Pacing of this story so far has been set by Jenny. Her escape, her nightmares, her seeking out Kim, her nearly dying, her capture, her unmerging from the alien,... Eventually Willow will play a major role and will be vital to several aspects of the story. But before that can happen Sara must be unmerged. Had planned to include that with this chapter but I messed up the pacing a bit. Ron needs more time to modify the mutator while he said Jenny's sister could visit the following day.
Remember the original Diablos could be taken out by simply painting over their sensors.
Time: The next day.
Meeting,... Diablos,... Jenny Again,...
He pulled another cybertronic circuit out of the mutator and went to work adding a small radiator to it. Tedious, repetitive work. The device would hold four hundred cybertronic circuits when finished and he had to modify each of those four hundred. It was time consuming. On the plus side when he finished this and reordered the circuits into arrays, each with they own power supply, the machine would have enough power to do just about anything. On the down side it was scary to think what DNAmy could do with it now if she were to revert to her villainous ways. Very scary. He sighed and stood up. With no time spare time of his own he'd asked Kim to go and collect Cindy. He still had to tell Jenny her sister was coming to visit.
He peeked into her room. Miranda was sitting by her side, feeding her breakfast. Other than to keep her from committing suicide he wondered just how necessary the restraints were. Jenny obviously had no interest in hurting anyone. Quite the opposite. He'd argued with Dr. Betty Director over the restraints and had gotten approval to have them removed for the duration of Cindy's visit. That argument had made fighting a Lorwardian pale in comparison. He figured he'd only won because the three of them, he, Shego, and Kim, were pretty vital at the moment to Global Justice. It gave them some leverage. Pushing it, as he had, seemed like an abuse of power. It didn't feel nice. He walked into the room.
"Hi Miranda." He said. "I see you haven't ravished the patient yet." He joked.
She felt her face turn red. "Keep teasing me like that and maybe I will just out of spite." She threw back.
He shrugged. "Oh well. I'm pretty sure she won't mind."
"Hrmph." Was all the red faced woman said.
He turned his attention to Jenny. He recalled she'd been twelve when she'd severed her ties to humanity. The conversation had her a little confused. But she understood enough to be red faced too. She was peeking at Miranda out of the corner of her eye, trying not to be too obvious. He sat down beside her.
"How about we bargain." He told her.
"Bargain?" Jenny asked.
He pointed at the restraints. "You get those off for a few hours, but no doing something stupid during that time. And by stupid I mean no thoughts of killing yourself." He was blunt.
"Off?" Jenny looked down at the restraints. She would give anything to be able to move around for a bit. But to give up her one chance to atone, to make things right. It was too much to ask. She would lie and ..."
"Remember what Kim said." He told her. "What you did before isn't on you. What you do now is. If you lie that's something that will be your doing and it will affect the way people think of you. Honest and trustworthy, or a liar."
She gulped. She peered at Miranda again out of the corner of her eye.
"And two of us will be with you all the time. Me with either Shego or Kim. If you try anything we will be obliged to try and stop you. If you hurt one of us then that will be on you too. There's no alien anymore to take the blame for it."
She frowned, thinking on that. Hurting herself was one thing, hurting someone else was something entirely different. She searched her mind for any presence of the something that had once been inside of her and wondered how safe it was. There was no sign of it. She looked down at the restraints.
"Even if it was still there you wouldn't be able to get far." He said. "There are devices in your body. At the moment if you were to get free and leave this room they would automatically put you to sleep. While the restraints are off you will have to stay within fifteen feet of me or the same thing will happen. There's no way you will be able to leave the base. And if that isn't enough I reprogrammed them last night to sense how fast they're moving. If you run excessively fast then you go to sleep. If you move your arms with the speed you need to throw a punch then you go to sleep."
"Oh." She'd been afraid of that but it seemed they were taking no chances. And he was the one who'd set the trap that had caught her in the first place. He was pretty smart.
"Besides, you don't want to hurt anyone, right?" He asked.
"Right." She automatically agreed.
"Think of how much it would hurt your sister if you were to die in front of her eyes when she hasn't seen you for nine years."
"My sister?" Her eyes went wide. "She's coming here?"
Ron nodded.
"But..." She gulped, terrified to face the person she'd hurt so much.
"Promise." He said.
"Okay." She agreed, swallowing. Her heart was pounding.
He turned to look at Miranda. "No ravishing the patient while she's changing." He said.
Miranda gulped. "I can't help her change. She protested."
"Why not." Jenny asked.
Ron smiled. "I will let Miranda explain that."
Miranda stared daggers at him.
"Don't worry. Shego will handle it. We just need someone in the room at the time to make sure she keeps her word. She will be able to put her to sleep in seconds if she does try something." He turned his gaze back to Jenny. "Not that you will. Right?"
She shook her head.
"Good." He turned to leave. Just outside the door he heard Jenny ask Miranda why she couldn't help her change. He wondered if he should be extra cautious of the next few cups of coffee he took from the woman. He dismissed the thought. Miranda would never spoil a cup of coffee for revenge. It would be like going against her religion. He wondered how Kim was doing explaining to Cindy why her sister would look seven years too young. Maybe, he thought, modifying cybertronics circuits, tedious as it is, was the better job after all.
Cindy watched as the red haired woman chewed her lower lip. She seemed to be worrying over something. "Anything wrong?" She asked.
Kim sighed. "Not as such." She said. "Just a few things I was supposed to tell you before you met your sister." Figures Ron would leave it up to me to explain why a person hasn't aged seven years, she thought.
Cindy gulped. "But she is okay right?"
Kim nodded. "Yeah. Perfect physical health. And other than suicidal thoughts her mental health is pretty good too. Given the way she lived the last few years it's amazing she's still sane. Those sorts of thoughts are to be expected. I think Ron is even getting her released from her restraints while you're there."
"So what were you supposed to tell me?"
Kim sighed. "She's really strong, really fast." She explained, reaching up to rub her throat.
"I know. At the time I didn't think about it, but she was able to toss around people six or seven times her size."
"She was considered too dangerous for a normal jail. She would have broken out as soon as she was put in it."
"Then what sort of prison was she kept in?" Cindy asked, worried.
"That's just it. It was less of a prison and more a place where people are ..." She paused. "kept asleep." She finally added. That sounded much better than people are kept dead.
"Asleep?"
Kim nodded. "You will understand when you see her."
The jet landed and they climbed out.
Cindy looked around. The whole base seemed to be underground. There had been no signs of it from the air. She wondered at that for a second but turned her thoughts to her sister. She wasn't sure if being informed that the restraints were being taken off while she was there was good or bad. She was afraid. Terrified. Unconsciously she reached up to feel where her artificial eye was. She used her cane and slowly followed the redhead. She could walk a short distance without it but for longer distances she needed some support.
She paced around the bed, carefully not to move too fast. It wouldn't do to be put to sleep right now. On the other hand it was tempting. She was about to face her sister. She gulped and kept pacing. After so long, day after day after day, in one place she needed to move.
"You're making me dizzy." Shego said from a chair.
"Sorry." Jenny said and tried to sit on the bed. She found herself standing and pacing again.
Someone entered the room and she turned. It was Ron.
Ron grinned at the pacing girl. "Either stay within the room or fifteen feet of me okay? Anything else and you go to sleep."
She nodded. "Why is she coming though? She must hate me after what I did."
Ron shrugged. "I guess she is afraid. Extremely so. But I guess she also loves you." He tilted his head as he heard what sounded like a cane tapping in the hallway.
The door opened and the two sisters turned to stare at each other, looking each other over.
"She looks like she's fourteen or fifteen." Cindy finally said. The girl looked like her sister but...
"As I said. She was asleep for seven years. Very deeply asleep." Kim said.
Jenny let her eyes roam over her sister. She noted the cane and gulped. There were some white lines on her face where she'd been slashed all those years ago. She looked at the eye, the one she'd destroyed. Why did her sister still have two eyes?
Cindy saw the look and pointed at it. "Artificial." She said.
"Oh." She gulped again, the brief hope fading. And she'd noticed that her sister's hands were deformed. The bones hadn't healed quite right and the fingers didn't move as they should. It wasn't something obvious, but when she moved her hands you could see it. She couldn't take it any more and closed her eyes. Tears ran down her cheeks. She heard the sound of the cane come closer.
"Open your eyes and look at me." Cindy ordered.
She gulped. She couldn't refuse the one she'd hurt so much. She opened her eyes and looked. It became a staring match. Her heart was beating like crazy and she was terrified, but she kept looking.
Cindy smiled. "It's gone." She simply said, looking away.
Jenny blinked her tears away, confused.
"You used to always beat our staring contests." Her sister explained. "But when you turned eight it was different. You couldn't keep eye contact with me and you were always afraid. You're afraid now, but it's different. Whatever was wrong then is gone." She reach out and pulled her sister in for a hug.
Jenny kept blinking as she felt the arms close around her. Then slowly, still frightened, she hugged her sister back, tears running down her face.
Ron studied Cindy's face. She was still terrified, and he doubted the fear would ever fully fade. But it seemed to be a price she was willing to pay to have her sister back. She, like her sister, was sobbing tears of joy.
Beep! Beep! Beep!
He pulled out his Kimmunicator and backed away from the group. "What is it Wade?"
"You know the junkyard you were at yesterday?" The genius asked.
"Yeah." He answered.
"Well a random signal has activated nearly a dozen Diablos in it. Actually we found out from Motor Ed that was the reason he was there, to find Diablos."
"Shutdown the signal?" Ron suggested.
"That's just it. It's an automatic satellite, designed to study the solar wind. It sends its signal back to earth in a form very similar to the one the Diablos expect. We can't shut it down. Everything is automatic. It's just bad luck that the Middleton Space Center, where the signal is directed, is very close to the junkyard."
Ron sighed. "Now's not a good time." He said.
"There's more. There's a school group at the junkyard. They're there doing a project on waste control and recycling. Given the way those cars are stack on top of each other even a nonlethal move by a Diablo could have lethal consequences."
"Arrange a ride." He sighed. "And try to evacuate the area."
"Ready at the hangar." He was informed.
He nodded. "Okay then." He signed off and looked up. "Sorry Jenny but you got to stay in the room. I've got some business to take care off. Kim you stay here. Shego you come with me." Kim nodded and Shego stood up. Briefly he wondered just when did the group start taking orders from the sidekick.
"It's okay." Jenny said, still hugging her sister. The sister who still loved her and who said the something wouldn't return. She believed her.
"If I'm back in time we can still take a tour of the unrestricted part of the base." He smiled at her.
She nodded. Even being able to stand and walk was good enough at the moment. She wanted to run, and race around, but that was definitely out. And besides, she had her sister beside her. It was enough.
They flew over the area in a Global Justice jet with him sitting at the open door while Shego piloted. It should have been a good strategy. Just fly over them and take them out with the paintball gun he had. It wasn't working. The stacks of wrecked vehicles meant they couldn't fly close to the ground, making the shot difficult. They would have to get on the ground. Wade had determined the total number of Diablos to be nine.
They walked through the canyons of dead vehicles with guns ready, looking much like a couple out of a horror/sci-fi movie. It really didn't improve his mood. In those movies someone nearly always died. He shuddered. From ahead came the sounds of a monster at work. Something the duo would have to confront. They turned the corner and came face to face with the beast. They let fly with the paint balls, but not before it noticed their presence and the guns they carried. Several fireballs flew at them even as the paint balls covered its eyes with paint, blinding it. It began spinning, preparing to die. The duo weren't paying attention. The fireballs had destroyed the base for several columns of the skeleton like wrecks. Much like Motor Ed the previous day, there were being caught in an avalanche of the dead vehicles. They ran but Ron found the way blocked by the falling giants. He flared plasma around himself and threw all he could upwards. It left him standing in a pit around ten feet deep, formed by two now doubly dead giants that had had holes basted clear through them.
"Ron?" Shego cried out in panic.
"I'm okay." He called back. "Stay back the Diabo is going to..."
There was an explosion as the Diablo exploded and more columns of vehicles fell on top of him. Thankfully the pit he was in protected him. "He hoped Shego had stayed far enough back to not get caught in it."
"Ron?" Came the cry again.
"I'm okay. Going to burn my my way out so stay away from the top." He called the plasma again and slowly burned through two more vehicles before he saw daylight. He climbed out to see Shego standing close by, in a near panic. He smiled at her. "One down, eight more to go."
She grabbed him and hugged him. "Damn it. Don't worry me like that again." She said.
"Didn't plan to that time." He said, not pulling away. "I'm glad Wade managed to convince the teacher to call off that field trip though."
She stood back and looked him over. He seemed to be okay and she sighed in relief. "Taking them down is going to be dangerous in here. We need to blind them before they see us or do it from some place we won't have an avalanche of cars falling on us."
"I don't see many options." He told her. "We can't lure them out. The fireballs would cause avalanche after avalanche. It would bury us. We just better hope we're faster next time."
The two went on the prowl again. One after the other the mechanical demons fell to them. Three times in a row they managed to attack from hiding and blind the Diablos instantly. The resulting explosion did knock down a few column of vehicles, but not before they had time to make their escape.
"Four down. Five to go." Ron said.
That's where they ran into a problem. It seemed the five remaining Diablos had wandered the junkyard and found each other, forming a group. With the two of them they could attack from two positions and blind two before they could fire. But that would leave three that would return fire, bringing down an onslaught of wrecks that would crush them.
"Blind two from as far away as we can and run." Shego suggested.
"The falling wrecks should prevent the other three from following us." Ron noted. "Unless they used their thrusters to fly pretty high. Who knows, the falling wrecks might even get one of them."
"It's a plan." Shego said.
The position of the five Diablos was perfect. A canyon of the dead vehicles, over a hundred feet long, lined up with the direction the machines were facing and would let them shoot from that distance. They took positions and Shego gave a countdown. As she said fire they squeezed their triggers and two streams of paint balls flew through the air, splattering enough as they hit to blind two of the machines. They whirled around and prepared to explode. The other three though took to the air and fired fireball after fireball at the duo.
They ran as avalanche after avalanche of vehicles began to fall around them. There was no chance to return fire as they dodged. Vaguely they were aware as two explosions reached them, but they had no time to count the victory. The three other Diablos had not behaved as expected and they were in trouble. The machines might not be programmed to be lethal, but on this battlefield that didn't matter. The falling wrecks were deadly.
Finally, caught with no place to dodge, Ron lifted his arms and called the plasma again. Shego did the same. Together they blasted a hole through three vehicles that fell on top of them.
"Stop." Ron ordered as the third vehicle landed.
Shego looked at him. "Why?"
"The Diablos are still looking for us." He explained. "If we blast a way clear through they will see us and fire at us while we're unable to maneuver. Let the wrecks cover us and hide us for a bit."
"Six down, three to go." Shego said.
They looked at each other. Calling plasma of that intensity so close together had left them with some slight burns. "Be so much easier if this was out in the open." Ron sighed. "Be able to run and dodge at will. Plus they would get in each other's way."
Shego shrugged. "This is a pain." She admitted. "So we burn our way out now?" She asked.
He nodded. "Let me do the honors, you keep your gun ready in case there's one above us." He lifted his arms and began burning. Soon he broke through, only to see the face of a Diablo staring down from above.
Shego fired, blinding its sensors before it could react. It started whirling around and vanished from the top of the hole. A few seconds later they heard an explosions. The pile of wrecks around them shuddered and shifted, but didn't collapse.
"Seven down, two to go." Ron said.
They climbed to the top and peered out of the hole, careful not to be seen. The other two Diablos were starting directly towards them. Despite the fact that part of the duo's heads were showing it seemed the machines didn't register them as human. Ron and Shego looked at each other and lifted their guns. They fired, blinding the last two war machines just as they fired several fireballs in return. They dropped back into the pit as the fireballs all flew above them, luckily not hitting the pile of wrecks they were in. They then jumped out and ran. They got far enough away to be safe as the last two Diablos exploded.
"Nine down, zero to go." Shego said, finding a place to sit down.
Ron sat down beside her. "Not the best place for a fight." He said. "At least not this sort of fight."
They returned to the Middleton Global Justice base to find Jenny in her room talking with her sister. Miranda had joined them with cups of coffee for her, Cindy, and Kim, while Jenny was allowed hot chocolate. Kim was sitting in a corner sipping her coffee as the other three talked.
"I'm off." Kim said, rising to her feet. "Mark is training some agents and I'm supposed to help him." She looked at Ron and Shego, giving their faces a good look. "Get that treated." She ordered..
"Ready for the tour?" Ron asked Jenny.
Cindy looked up to see the burns on the face of guy who, her sister claimed, had to be around for her to leave the room. The woman with him had burns too. "You two okay?" She asked.
Ron nodded. "So Miranda." He asked. "You tell Cindy your plans to ravish her sister?"
She glared at him as Cindy looked at her, confused. "For that you're only getting regular coffee from now on." She threatened.
"Doubt it." He told her. "There's no way you can make something as plain as a regular cup of coffee." He grinned at her.
"Hrmph." She said.
"The tour?" He said. "Then I got to get back to work." He smiled at Jenny.
"I'm ready." She bounced to her feet, looking like nothing more than an ordinary girl, dressed in the black pants and green top that Shego had picked out for her..
The tour didn't consist of much. The gym, the pool, a few other places. Most of the base was restricted. They ended up at the cafeteria where he and Shego immediately ordered a pile of food that had their trays drooping in the middle. Jenny and Cindy ordered more regular sized meals while Miranda took off to work in the kitchen.
"You sure you shouldn't get that looked at?" Cindy asked again.
"They heal fast. Just like me." Jenny explained. "Perhaps even faster."
"Oh." Cindy said. She turned and looked them over again.
"You two doing okay?" Ron asked.
The two of them nodded and Jenny smiled.
"It a miracle." Cindy said, looking at her sister. "To see her again and have her back to normal." She reached across the table to touch her sister's hand. "For so long I never knew what went wrong with her, or what had happened to her, and here I am now eating lunch with her." More tears flowed down her face.
Ron smiled. "I'm sure more visits can be arranged. If you wish." He looked at her.
"When?" Was all she asked.
He thought on it. "Since I got to be around when she's out of her room, probably not for while. Unless you don't mind visiting her when she's restrained."
"I don't mind." She said.
"Then just asked Wade. You have his email?"
She nodded, still holding her sister's hand.
He looked at Jenny. She had changed. Her expression was still haunted, but he thought there would be less thoughts of dying. For one she was realizing her crush on Miranda. Hormones were powerful. And she now knew she hadn't destroyed her sister's dream. That dream had been forced to change, to adapt, but it had survived. And that sister forgave her, still loved her. There were a hundred other nightmares to haunt her dreams, but maybe the worse one had been banished.
He sighed and turned his attention to the platter of food in front of him. Using plasma burned a lot of energy. And he'd used a lot today. He dug in. Beside him Shego was doing the same
End of Chapter.
Ron isn't just teasing Miranda when he talks of her ravishing Jenny. It's part of it, but he's also expanding Jenny's horizons a little, so to speak. Getting her to focus on something other than dying. Btw: If I write a third story based on this it will be placed pretty far in the future and if I remember to include it those two will be a couple. Fifteen and twenty, not so good. Twenty-five and thirty, okay.