Hey everyone, DR41 here. Here's the next chapter of ROTN.
I do not own Kim Possible, Disney does. All OCs are mine unless otherwise stated.
Many great thanks to Stormchaser90 for beta reading.
Peace and serenity pervaded the early morning Sunday air. The great orange fireball of the sun rose slowly over the horizon, painting a mural of brilliant colors in the sky. The cheerful sound of birds chirping floated on the gentle breezes circulating throughout Middleton.
Kim sat up and stared out of her window. She noted the sharp contrast between the cheery morning and the violent storms of last night. Rolling out of bed, she bounded energetically down the stairs. She detected a familiar mole rat squeak before her foot hit the bottom step, and deduced triumphantly that Ron must have dropped by – probably in hopes of extra breakfast. How that boy did love to eat...
Below, she found Ron wearing a hole in the living room carpet with his dogged pacing. His usual optimism was overshadowed by an equally characteristic expression of overreacting panic. Mrs. Possible emerged from the kitchen at this point, and Kim shot her a look of inquiry that clearly asked, "What's up with Ron?"
Mrs. Possible shrugged, as if to say, "I don't know, Kimmie." Aloud she said to their guest, "Ron, why don't you and Kim go eat breakfast? I'm sure James won't begrudge you a simple bowl of cereal."
The voice of Kim's other parent floated into the room, remarking with a distinctly Barkin flavor that, "Stoppable shouldn't be popping in at the crack of dawn and wandering around in our house all morning," and that "if he overstays his welcome, I'm sure I could find great accommodations for him in a black hole..."
Ron's eyes brightened nonetheless and he eagerly followed Kim out of the room and up to the table. Over breakfast, Ron became talkative. Kim felt it would be safe to start asking questions. "What's bugging you?" she said casually, almost teasingly. "Don't even think about telling me you're fine, 'cause I know you're not."
Ron sighed. "I'm just worried about that clone."
"Rose? She's no big. I'm more worried about how the gang that tried to blow up the high school got their hands on experimental explosives. Apparently they were the same type as the the ones that have been stolen recently."
Her attempt to change the subject wasn't entirely successful, as Ron looked at her in surprise.
"No big? Do I need to remind you how she nearly killed you?"
Kim brushed off his concern. "She did go and risk her neck to get me out alive."
This seemed to stump Ron, for he said nothing in response. Kim put her arm around his shoulder.
"I'll be just fine. Maybe Wade can dig up something on her." She fished in her pocket for the old Kimmunicator Wade had given her to replace the one Rose had helped herself to.
Wade's image popped up on the screen, still wearing his pajamas. "Hey Kim, what's up?"
"Can you get me all available information on this Rose character?"
Wade nodded. "I started a search a couple days ago, but didn't get any results until last night."
"Well?" Kim asked in a 'what did you find' tone of voice.
"When everything else turned up blank, I went to GJ's classified data banks. There, I found a 'Project Dragon.'"
"How does this relate to Rose?" Kim asked.
"There's a set of messages linked to the project," Wade explained. "They're voice logs of a conversation between Dr. Director and an Agent Red about a cloning project involving you. Most don't make sense, but I think the latest has what we're looking for." He tapped a button on his keyboard and the conversation began playing.
"How's your little investigation going?" Director's voice spoke from the Kimmunicator.
"Fairly well," a female voice replied.
"Have you had a chance to look her over? Is Rose the one we need?"
"Everything checks out. She's a stable clone with all the right readings. There are few things which were not as expected, but ten years is a long time."
"Agreed," Director's voice replied. "So what's next?"
Kim could hear the sound of a sharp breath being dawn. "There's one way to know for sure, but I'm going to need your complete trust."
"Why do I think I'm not going to like this?"
Red's voice chuckled. "Because you have every reason not to. I need you to allow her to make a raid on a GJ installation of your choosing and extract a prisoner from there. The tighter the security, the better."
"And just how is this going to help?"
"You'll see in due time."
"All right. Make contact with her. Just be careful not to tip her off to your identity."
A certain tone in Red's response would have given Kim the chills, if Kim Possible was the sort of person to get chills. "Don't worry, Director. I've been planning this for a very long time."
There came a pause. "And that's it," Wade finished.
Ron looked flattened, but Kim fell into deep thought. "Have you checked up on this Agent Red?"
Wade nodded. "Yep. Except for a picture, the GJ records have nothing about her. No measurements, age, blood type, bio, or service record."
"Sounds fishy, if you ask me," Ron put in, recovering enough to speak.
Kim silently agreed with her boyfriend. "Hey Wade, I don't suppose you did any more research on that 'Project Dragon'?"
"Kim," Wade replied defensively, "you know I don't deal with stuff that touchy."
Kim glared at him knowingly.
Wade sighed. "Fine. I looked it over, but couldn't make much sense out of it. As I said before, most of the conversations are way over your heads."
"I don't need the technobabble, just get the point," Kim growled impatiently.
"Well, Project Dragon appears to be a defense against a group called The Dragons of Rodhigan. It calls for the cloning of the next possessor of some dragon power. The clone would remove the power from the current holder, then be placed under the influence of mind control. From there, the clone would be used to wipe out the remaining members of the Dragons."
"How does this apply to Rose?"
Wade frowned. "Not completely sure. I'm going to try and contact King Wallace of Rodhigan. He might know a bit more about these 'Dragons.'"
"Good idea. Anything else?"
Wade nodded. "Just a few minutes ago, I received an anonymous message stating that Rose would be breaking a prisoner out of the Global Justice facility Enterprise tonight."
"Is there any way of finding out who sent it?"
"I wish, but it's too heavily encrypted. One thing I can be sure, no human did it. Trust me when I say it's far too complicated. I'd warn you to ignore it, but I'm pretty sure that won't change your mind."
Kim grinned slightly. "You know me." She turned to Ron. "You coming?"
Ron nodded. "You bet, KP. I got your back."
"Thanks, Ron. Wade, get us a ride."
-KP-
Toadville, Nevada. Nice small desert town, at least at first glance. Population, three hundred or so, though a good bit more would show up during the summer. There was only one thing out of place. Smack dab in the middle of the western-themed town stood a very modern stockade. This small fortress was the headquarters for an elite group of mercenaries, whom a certain red-head was paying a visit to.
"All right, do I need to go over this again?"
Rose looked at them men seated at the table with her. A big burly one whose name tag identified him as "Jenkins" stood.
"I think we got it, right men?"
The other men nodded. Jenkins looked back to Rose.
"We're good. You can count on us."
Rose smiled. "That's why I came here." She and Jenkins shared a firm handshake. "Well, I got stuff to do before tonight. See ya at the airport."
As Rose walked out of the mercenaries' headquarters, the Kimmunicator rang out.
"What's the sitch Scar-" she stopped suddenly. "Wade? What do you want?"
"I see you've picked up Kim's lingo," Wade replied. "And who might 'Scar-' be? Anything to do with the difficulty I had contacting you?"
"I don't like to be disturbed," Rose growled.
"Well, your little 'job' tonight is probably to be disturbed whether you like it or not."
Rose narrowed her eyes. "How did you find out?"
"Someone sent me an anonymous message giving the location, time, and objective of your job. I did some further digging, and have reason to believe that your client is an agent from Global Justice."
Rose fell silent, lost in thought. Then she shrugged her shoulders. "I don't really care. A client is a client. I'm sure there's a reason. Now if you would excuse me, I'm kind of busy." She ripped out the Kimmunicator's battery. She tried to dismiss the worries Wade's call had put in her mind, but they continued to linger.
"Excuse me, miss," a voice interrupted her thoughts. Rose turned to see a woman with green hair standing before her.
"What are you doing here, Leafy-locks?"
Red narrowed her eyes. "Don't push it, Rose. I know what you're up to."
"What do you mean?" Rose asked all-too-innocently.
"First of all, nobody comes to this place on casual business. It's not like you can hire mercenaries to go and get groceries for you."
Rose smiled at the image Red's statement brought to mind.
"And second, I happen to be your client."
At this, Rose's eyes instantly narrowed on the agent. "If this some kind of trap, you can forget the whole thing."
Red chuckled. "Rose, I don't need an elaborate scheme to try to capture you. I'm more than capable of doing that right here and now if want to. Now, I need you to listen very carefully. I have hidden numerous caches of explosives throughout Enterprise, which will destroy all communications, neutralize weapons systems, and create an open path to the prison cells. This will activate them." Red handed Rose a fancy device. "It's a Promethean Mk. II detonator. I'll leave it up to you to decide the best time for its use."
"Why are you going through all of this just to get one villain out of jail? I don't see how he's worth that much to you."
"You will," Red replied. "Very soon, in fact."
-KP-
That evening...
"Alright, is everyone clear with the plan?" Rose glanced at he circle of mercenaries surrounding her. The leader, a burly man maned Jenkins, gave her a thumbs up.
"You know us. Don't worry, we'll get everything straight."
"You'd better. If I get captured or killed, you don't get paid."
This brought a chuckle from the group of men. These guys were hard up enough for cash that they could be trusted to do anything, no matter how difficult, to obtain it. Rose knew she could count on them, despite the apparent insanity of her plan.
"Thirty seconds to jump!" the pilot's voice echoed over the plane's intercom. Rose made her towards the back of the aircraft. Glancing down at the glowing red bands of light on the prototype battle suit she had "borrowed" from Wade's closet, she mentally ran over the stages of her plan one last time. Satisfied with her preparations, she signaled the pilot to open the cargo ramp.
"Everyone, grab a secure handhold!" she yelled. Gale force winds ripped through the cargo hold as the opening ramp revealed the forests of North Dakota stretched out several thousand feet below them.
"Five, four, three, two, one." Rose threw herself through the opening. After a brief glance at the rapidly fading C-130 Hercules, she turned her gaze to the brightly lit fortress below. The sprawling structure, home to GJ's elite forces, also served as a high security supermax for some of the more notorious criminals. It was surrounded by a system of guard towers. One of these was Rose's current target. Waiting as long as she dared to pull her chute, she alighted fifty yards from the tower closest to the gate.
Activating the battlesuit's stealth system, she sprinted to the base of the tower as searchlights locked on the patch of ground where she'd landed. It would take them awhile to find her black parachute. Quickly and quietly she dropped four cubes at each leg of the tower. Reengaging stealth mode, she sprinted for the main gate. She managed to sneak in behind a truck entering the facility, then looked for a place to hide. Her eyes locked onto the base's radio antenna, her next target. Navigating an open courtyard with speed and precision, she clambered hastily up the side of the communications building. Crawling up beside the dish-shaped antenna, she produced a remote from her backpack.
"It's showtime."
-KP-
Form the cockpit of the C-130, Jenkins watched as one of the watchtowers exploded in a burst of green fire. Dashing back to the cargo hold he started yelling orders.
"Raleigh, prepare the men for drop. Wilford, is the jammer active?"
"Yes sir," the man replied. "She's got it online. Any calls for help will now be directed to us."
"Copy, that. Stand by to receive distress message."
"Confirmed, receiving signal." Wilford announced.
"This is the Global Justice facility Enterprise, does anyone read us?" the message was laced with heavy static, but still understandable. Jenkins stepped up to their radio.
"This Captain Frederick Jenkins. My team and I are on board an aircraft two miles from your position. What is your status?"
"We're under attack by unknown forces. Requesting any help you can give."
"Copy that. Instruments are getting a lot of interference so there must be a jammer nearby. We'll land and provide backup until comms are restored." Jenkins nodded to Wilford, who began lining up men by the cargo ramp. He turned off the radio and went to join them.
"Remember," he yelled, "don't fire until I give the word!"
"Twenty seconds to drop," the pilot announced.
Jenkins charged his weapon, a grin crossing his face. "This is going to be fun."
-KP-
Over at GJ headquarters, Dr. Director confronted Agent Red.
"How's your little plan going?"
Red shrugged. "As far as I know,well."
Director snorted. "I'm inclined to think otherwise, seeing as we haven't received a distress signal."
"I don't expect us to," Red replied coolly. "She's better than that."
"You really think so?"
Red nodded. "Just wait and see."
-KP-
From her hiding spot atop the munitions building, Rose could see GJ's forces searching the premises, as well as Jenkins and his men. However, the earlier explosion had done its job and, as a result, most of the GJ soldiers were looking for her outside. Well, they were about to get a rude wake up call, if Red hadn't been lying about the explosives. Her eyes locked upon a figure squatting by the radio antenna. He held something up in surprise.
"I'm sorry," Rose whispered tersely, pulling yet another remote from her backpack.
An eerie green light danced across the base as a wall of fire incinerated the roof of the comms building. The structure collapsed in seconds. Explosions continued to rock the base as additional pillars of green flame reached up into the night sky. Within seconds, the complex had gone from strict organization to pure chaos. Down in the open courtyard below, GJ forces were overwhelmed as Jenkins and his men turned on them. Rose vaulted off the roof and ran post-haste for the prison cells, activating her suit's stealth system as she did. A well-timed explosion the destroyed the entrance and Rose dashed right in. Desperately raking her mind for the directions to the prisoner's cell, she couldn't help but get a feeling of deja vu. Except this time she was breaking a criminal out of jail, not rescuing Kim.
Surprising, there were no guards. Moving quickly,she finally found the right spot. A tube of laser lipstick dealt with the bars and moments later, the prisoner was free. But when she looked at him, her gaze was met with a blank look of shocked disbelief.
"I can't be," he wailed. "I saw you die!" He reached out cautiously to touch her arm. Upon making contact, he recoiled in terror and retreated to the back of his cell. "Please don't hurt me!" he begged.
Rose walked closer. "Why would I want to kill you?"
The prisoner pressed himself up against the wall. "Don't you remember? You threatened to kill me in fifteen horrible ways last time we met."
"You are Gemini, right?" Rose asked, deciding to make sure she had the right person.
The man nodded, looking slightly relieved. "So you have forgotten. Well then-" Whatever he had been about to say was cut off by the sound of boots in the corridor. Rose turned to see Jenkins and couple of his men coming down the hallway.
"You took your good old time didn't you?" she told them in mock irritation.
Jenkins shook his head. "We've cleared an exit and ready to extract on your command."
Rose gestured to Gemini. "Here's the guy. Get him out in one piece. I'll be the distraction."
Jenkins nodded and led Gemini off. Rose retraced her path until she reached a shadowed corridor. About halfway through it, she felt a familiar presence, causing her to stop and turn around. "Why, hello,"she said. "How pleasant of you to join. I wasn't expecting company, but I suppose I can find places at the table for you."
Out from the shadows stepped Kim and Ron, both looking rather displeased. Kim raised an eyebrow when she saw the battlesuit Rose was wearing. The clone simply grinned at her.
"Could you thank Wade for letting me borrow this? Its been most useful."
"Tell you what," Kim replied, sinking into a fighting stance, "you can thank him in person before I send you off to Cell Block D."
"Deal." Rose answered.
"You know," the voice of her conscience interjected, "even with the suit, you're still outmatched. Surrender might just be the best option."
Rose simply rolled her eyes. However, the annoying voice did have a point. Despite his appearance, Stoppable represented the most formidable opponent she had faced up until now. Beating him would take a combination of skill, incredible reflexes, and a whole lot of luck. Especially since Kim...
That was it! Ron's biggest weakness was Kim. He would do anything to protect her. Now all she had to do was use that to her advantage. This bit of information processed, Rose began to do what she did best, executing plans while in the process of creating them. Noting the distance between her and her opponents, she charged forward.
In response, Kim pulled back her fist to strike, exactly what Rose wanted her to do. She grabbed Kim's arm as she struck and threw her into her sidekick. As the two fell to the floor, she activated the suit's stealth system.
Kim and Ron scrambled back to their feet, only to find Rose nowhere in sight. Ron concentrated for a moment, calling upon his mystical monkey power. His blue aura flared into existence, bathing the corridor in light. Moving with extreme caution, Rose positioned herself behind him, then made her move. Executing a clean leg sweep, she caught him by surprise, sending him the floor. Then, before he could react, she leaped on Kim, using the enhanced strength provided by the battlesuit to smash her face into the wall,Kim's nose starting to bleed. With the teen stunned, Rose pulled out a knife and stuck it to Kim's throat, just as Ron made it back onto his feet.
"Why don't you just mosey on out of here," Rose waved her free hand at Ron, "and your girlfriend here won't get hurt. Well,... not badly, at least."
Ron faltered, not sure what to do. Kim nodded at him, and he reluctantly left. After he made his exit, Rose chuckled softly.
"It's so cute, isn't it? Love is such a precious thing. Don't you think?"
Kim gritted her teeth. "If you do anything-"
"I don't think it's him you have to worry about." Rose pressed the knife a little harder into Kim's throat, enough to nick the skin and draw blood. "If I were you, I'd be more worried about myself."
"Why are you doing this?" Kim asked, trying to prolong any rash action on Rose's part.
"Why, you ask? Simple. I'm showing you how the other side lives. I'm showing you what those of us less fortunate than yourself have to do to survive. And now, I'm going to show you how to fail." At that, removed the knife from Kim's throat and sharply kneed her in the spine. Kim staggered forward, then turned to face her.
Rose replaced her knife, then turned and ran. Instinct kicking in, Kim started to chase her, not stopping to consider the repercussions of doing so. It only took seconds for her to realize her mistake, but it was already to late. Her foot caught a pipe on the floor and she went down. She jumped back to her feet, in time to receive a vicious right hook to the face, swiftly followed a side kick. She tried to return a kick of her own, but Rose activated the shield on her battlesuit. Kim reeled backwards from the impact, giving Rose the opportunity to land several more attacks.
"You know," Kim panted, "Ron will be back any minute now. Why don't you just give it up? I'll make sure Director doesn't send you straight to the lockup."
Rose laughed. "While your generosity is greatly appreciated, I assure you that it is not necessary. But, you do make a good point. It will not take the doofus long to get bored and come crawling back here." With lighting speed she lashed out again, striking Kim before she could react. The teen hero recovered quickly and returned several strong attacks of her own. For several minutes, the combatants traded blows, landing numerous hits on each other. Kim finally wrenched the advantage from Rose when one of her kicks hit Rose's right arm, breaking the still-healing bone with an audible, sickening crack. The clone leaned back against the wall, face contorted in agony. She tried to shake it off, but the pain was too much.
"Giving up?" Kim asked.
Rose shook her. "No," she gritted out. Her left hand made it's way to the pouch hanging from the battlesuit's belt. Kim watched the move with curiosity, but didn't move to stop her.
That turned out to be one of the worst decisions she ever made. As Kim was about to activate the Kimmunicator, Rose made her move.
It only took three simple motions. First, she removed her gun from its holster.
Secondly, she raised it up to shooting level while flicking off the safety.
Finally, after marking the look of pure terror on Kim's face, Rose pulled the trigger.
Well I'm off to catch a few hours sleep before school. Hope you enjoyed reading. :)