Ron felt a whole new level of sore when he awoke to his morning alarm. "Oh today's going to be great," Ron sarcastically mumbled as he quickly dressed and headed down the stairs to make himself breakfast. However it was the human shaped lump on his couch that caught his attention and made him pause. 'She actually stayed the night,' Ron thought to himself as he looked at the sleeping director of Global Justice. 'Just to make sure that I was okay,' Ron shook his head with a small smile forming on his lips.
"Mmm," Betty moaned as she woke up hearing the sounds in the kitchen, what hit her next was the pleasant smell of coffee, eggs, bacon and… "Pancakes," she said as she straightened out her uniform and shuffled over to the room where the noises and aroma was emanating from.
"Good morning Mrs. Dr. Director," Ron waved as he looked over his shoulder to see the woman who had crashed on his couch. "I made breakfast. I figured it was the least I could do for you." Plating up the woman some food.
She eyed it cautiously, not that she didn't trust Ron Stoppable to make her food, but her years of training to be one of the top agents meant that she always checked what she ate before digging in. Betty's first bite told her that even if this food was poisoned, she'd eat every last bite. "This is so good Ron," Betty let out an undignified sound as she tasted the first home cooked meal in a long time.
"Well cooking is one of the few things I'm good at Mrs. Dr. Director," Ron said bashfully as he was proud of his culinary skills that he had honed over the years of making almost every meal for himself when his parents were away.
"Why do you…" Betty said before taking a sip of the hot coffee to help wake her up. "Call me Missus?"
"Oh I uh, just assumed," Ron stammered. "With you being so, you know…" nudging his hand at all of her.
"Know what?" the proud woman smirked as she knew what Ron meant, but she wanted to hear him say it.
"Hot," Ron quietly said as his cheeks turned a deep shade of red. "I just figured that you were married since I can't imagine that you don't have to beat the guys off with a stick."
Chuckling as she heard the very nice compliment. "Unfortunately no," she sighed. "The job keeps me too busy to even so much as cook myself anything that doesn't come out of a microwave, let alone meet anyone."
"I well…" Ron stuttered as he tried to find a way to remove his foot from his mouth. "You could come here if you wanted."
"Oh, you'd be my own private chef?" Betty rested her chin on her palms, it wasn't often she got a chance to playfully banter with someone.
"I mean, it's not like I have anyone to share what I make with besides Rufus," Ron shrugged as he turned his back to Betty hoping he wouldn't have to show how much he was blushing to her.
"That's a very tempting offer Mr. Stoppable," Betty pondered the deal. She knew it wasn't that big of a diversion to leave the office and come here since headquarters was fairly close by and the prospect of not having to go home to an empty apartment for more cheap takeout was already making her want to ignore the potential impropriety of hanging around the younger man.
But she couldn't just accept right off the bat, Betty had a little more teasing to do. "I'm not sure, this could just be a ploy to get me alone. Just you, an energetic young man and me, the innocent, unsuspecting older woman," she said with a sly grin, even with his back turned to her, the deep red shade of Ron's ears told her exactly what was going on inside his head.
"I mean it'd… it'd just be di-dinner Be-Betty," Ron stammered as he was struggling very hard to keep his voice as neutral as possible.
"Just dinner," Betty pouted. "You wouldn't try to have your wicked way with me?"
"Yes, no! I mean, if you'd like to, I-I-I-," Ron quickly shut his mouth as he didn't know what to say to the woman who was clearly toying with him.
Betty couldn't hold it in any longer and let out a mirthful laugh. "Calm down Stoppable, I'm just messing with you," hoping to assuage his worries about even being alone with her. "That sounds lovely, even just having someone to talk to after work would be amazing, the mouth watering food is just icing on the cake."
"Cool, cool cool cool," Ron exhaled as he felt silly for being this flustered, it wasn't as if someone as badical as the director of GJ would even be interested in him. "Just send me a text if you have any preferences and I'll do my best." Glad that his nights wouldn't always be spent alone on the couch with whatever he threw together that night.
"I will Ron," Betty smiled as she felt this could be a really good thing for her, to socialize with someone outside of work and have food that didn't come out of a freezer or a drive-thru window. "However it seems like our time together is at an end, you have to go to school and I have to get to work," she sighed as she was enjoying the banter with the blonde but unfortunately the world wouldn't keep itself safe and she needed to helm the ship that was GJ. "How about I give you a lift to school?" she offered as it wouldn't be far out of her way to drop him off before going into work.
Ron took the offer and knowing that he had a few extra minutes he quickly put together two sack lunches, after putting his in his backpack he hurried out of his house and locked it up to join Betty for the ride to school. "Thanks Betty," Ron said as he hurried to get into the building.
"Ron, you forgot your lunch," she shouted through the open window when she noticed the brown bag still on the seat.
"That one's yours Betty," Ron waved to her just before the door shut and he let out a happy sigh and headed to his locker.
It was a few hours later when she took her lunch break in her office, which was really just a five minute period of time when no one was bothering her with reports, schedules or meetings that she opened the bag lunch and saw the note on top.
"Thanks for being there for me Betty," she read what Ron had written but noticed that he had scratched out a word on the bottom where he'd signed "Love Ron", she smirked as she could imagine that the boy's natural Ronness had almost gotten the better of him. The simple sandwich was better than whatever vending machine food that she normally scrounged up on her break and made her glad that she'd now have a home cooked meal every now and then.
Ron opened his locker to gather his books for his classes when he was pushed from the back into the same locker. "Oh hey guys," Ron said, knowing the identity of the bullies who made a habit of coming to him in the morning without even having to face them.
"Hey Loser ready for your morning pounding?" the football player chuckled as he cracked his knuckles ready to beat up the mascot.
"No, could we maybe skip this today?" Ron suggested, as he would prefer to not get accosted two mornings in a row, especially since he was still sore from the big fight he had the previous day.
The large bully seemed to ponder the request for a moment before shaking his head. "Nah, without Possible here for a whole week, we get a rare chance to wail on you every day without her stopping us," the bully advanced on Ron before another blonde head of hair stepped in front of him stopping him in his tracks.
"Leave him alone!" Tara shouted in the football player's face. "You touch one hair on his head and we're through." She threatened as the football player stumbled back, surprised that his girlfriend was telling him off.
"What for, he's just a loser?" The bully looked around for backup with his other players but they too were suddenly dealing with the other members of the cheer squad. He had no idea where this sudden support for the blonde came from.
"No, he's not." Tara folded her arms. "And I should never have let it go the first time," regretting having sat on the sidelines, watching other students get bullied, it disgusted her. But after the lengths that Ron had gone to trying to keep them all safe, it was time that she acted as brave as she knew Ron was.
"Hey babe, come on," the bully stepped forward again and wrapped an arm around Tara's shoulders and tried to lead her away from the conflict. "How 'bout you and the other girls just go back to looking pretty, we'll be quick with Loser and then I'll forget you did this, probably just your hormones," the football player said before Tara ducked under his arm.
"First of all, his name is Ron Stoppable, not Loser," Tara said looking furious. Ron thought that Tara's angry face was more cute than intimidating, but he was also smart enough to know that saying that would not be good for him, so he kept quiet. "Secondly, this is about being a decent human being, lastly, we're through." She finished stepping next to Ron and taking his arm, cementing her decision for all those around to see.
"Same," Crystal said as she pushed away from her boyfriend and took Ron's other arm. "I'm sick of the way you guys act, just because you can throw a ball. I've seen what Ron can do, it's way more impressive."
One by one the cheerleaders dumped their boyfriends who were trying to justify their bullying, but Ron wasn't their only victim and even if he was it would still be unacceptable. "You're going to regret this Loser," Marcella's ex-boyfriend warned as he and the other guys stalked away not wanting to have it out in a crowded hall, especially after a blow to their coolness by all being collectively dumped for the person sitting at the lowest link on the food chain.
"Wow, thanks," Ron said both impressed and grateful for what just happened. No one had ever really done anything to stop the bullies before, even Kim just told them off after they had gotten to him.
"It's the absolute least we could do after yesterday," Jessica said as she and the other girls started to lead Ron away from his locker. "You really came through to keep us safe from those villains who could have really hurt us. Stopping our ex-boyfriends from harassing you is something we needed to do."
Bonnie rolled her eyes about how hard the other girls were coming onto Ron now with how tightly they were pressing themselves to him. "Plus you'd probably have broken them in half," she said as she felt she had a more practical reason for her joining the other girls in solidarity. There'd be no sense in letting him get expelled for hospitalizing those jerks, even if she wouldn't mind watching Stoppable get into another fight.
"Nah," Ron shook his head. "I wouldn't have." Denying that he'd have gotten violent with the bullies.
"Why not?" Hope asked. "We all saw you yesterday, those goons were bigger than any of the football players and Shego is well, Shego. You could probably wipe the floor with them one handed."
"Maybe, but why would I?" Ron shrugged as he figured that with the difference in how hard the highschoolers typically hit him and the weaker of Dr. Drakken's hired help, they don't even compare.
Bonnie scoffed. "Because you don't have to take their crap. You could be king of the school if you threw your weight around."
"That's not me though," Ron said. "Sure I can fight, but I don't have to with them. Plus KP doesn't want me too." He rubbed the back of his head.
"Of course she did that," Bonnie gagged. "You need to stop listening to every word she says like it's gospel. Stoppable you let everyone walk all over you." Bonnie got in front of the group making them stop. "I can somewhat understand not going and looking for a fight when you don't have to, but they come to you. It's no different than when that maniac came to our school yesterday."
"I mean, it's a little different," Ron tried to deflect as he didn't think that schoolyard bullying was anywhere close to world threatening behavior.
"Only with how much damage they can do maybe," Tara agreed with Bonnie's reasoning, even if she didn't like the way it was being said. "But if you fought back even once, it wouldn't have just been you that they stopped picking on, but more people down the line."
"I guess I can understand that," Ron admitted as he could see how they might not be so sure of bullying someone else if they knew some people would fight back. "I'll think about that, okay?"
"Good enough for me," Crystal happily said. "Oh and, this is for yesterday," she said standing on the tips of her toes and kissing Ron's cheek. This was enough for Ron to freeze in place as each girl in succession gave him the same reward, even Bonnie, who made sure no one else was looking when she did it.
"See you around Ron," Jessica waved as the girls left him standing outside Mr. Barkin's class just before the bell rang.
For the rest of the morning Ron zoned out in class, which he would normally catch an earful from KP for that behavior as it had always come back to bite him down the line with tests, exams and really late night cram sessions that inevitably got interrupted by one of the many villains they dealt with. But right now all he could think about was what the cheer squad had said to him.
"I could probably beat them up," Ron muttered to himself. "But KP would get mad if I started a fight." Starting to weigh the pros and cons of taking action. "However it would be self defense if I waited for them to start it and it's not like I have to really hurt them. I know enough about martial arts, even from just watching KP over the years, that I wouldn't have to strike them." Ron had drifted through his morning classes as he thought about how he could go about standing up for himself without him becoming the bully in the end.
"Yeah," Ron nodded as he concluded his hours-long thought process. "I'll just use things like holds and counters, that way, I can't do anything without them having done something first. And I don't run the risk of causing serious injuries because they just use the other person's strength against them."
Ron was so engrossed in his dilemma that he'd been sitting at the lunchroom table and hadn't noticed what was going on around him. "Ahem," Bonnie coughed as she was tired of waiting for the blond to look up from his lunch.
"Oh, hey, Bonnie," Ron said as he had been startled thinking that he was going to sit by himself again today but then he began to notice his surroundings. "And uh, everyone else." He chuckled as the cheer squad had seated themselves at the same table as him, surrounding him and just watching him.
It was another moment later that the silence in the cafeteria struck him, he turned his head around to the room who were all staring at them as if it was a new zoo exhibit. "What?" Ron questioned out loud before heads snapped back to their own, suddenly more interesting conversations as the noise of chatter started up once more.
"Glad that you could join us Ron," Hope giggled as Ron apologized for being so distracted that he hadn't even noticed that many girls were coming to sit with him.
Jessica hummed as she, like the other girls, was wondering what was so important that it had taken up all of Ron's attention in classes and at lunch. "Would you like to share with the rest of the class?"
Ron looked up from his meal and decided that since the girls had stood up for him this morning he could safely let them know what he was thinking. "Just that you girls were right, I should stand up for myself more often. Had I done that years ago, maybe they'd have rethought about bullying other people in the school too." As he knew on a larger scale people like Dr. Drakken were bullies and had to be stopped to keep other people safe, so it worked just as effectively for smaller bullies too.
"Good, we'd really hate to have to do that every morning until graduation," Marcella said happily.
"And I should thank Bonnie for reminding me that I don't want to sink to their level," Beaming a smile at the brunette who looked confused at what she did that would make Ron thank her specifically.
"Why?" Bonnie raised an eyebrow as she was curious about what went on inside the blonde's head. She knew that sometimes the conclusions he could come to were complete nonsense but other times they were surprisingly insightful. Ron always stuck out to her as a mixed bag.
"You said that I could break them in half and… you were right," Ron folded his hands and rested them on the lunch table. "I don't want to be that type of person, not again," shuddering as he remembered in great detail the enjoyment he had gotten out of causing pain and suffering when he was Zorpox. That was partly the reason he became so passive, the idea that somewhere inside him was a monster who had no problems with hurting those he cared about or even threatening to kill people.
"And I know that there are more passive forms of fighting that I could use," Ron's tone lightened up as he shook off the negative thoughts. "So if they start a fight again, I'm not just going to take it anymore." The resounding cheers from the cheerleaders at Ron's declaration to do more for his own reputation was a cause for celebration.
Ron had started to think that getting his butt handed to him yesterday might have been the best thing that ever happened to him.