Hello everyone, and welcome to my latest fic! I've always been fond of "next-generation" type scenarios, and there's something about the idea of Kim and Ron potentially finding out that they eventually end up together before they've realized their feelings for each other that amuses me, so it was probably inevitable that I'd take the chance to combine these concepts together. This first chapter is a little on the shorter end for my fics, so I'm putting it and chapter two up at the same time to help get the ball rolling. Anyway, onward to our opening chapter, in which a revived Monkey Fist brings together a few strangely familiar elements in his latest scheme against the grown Team Possible...

Chapter One: Deja Vu

It said something about Maxwell Possible's family that this was almost a fairly typical day.

For one thing, there was the sitch itself. Most teens wouldn't consider it ordinary to be vaulting through an ancient jungle temple after a raving criminal, dressed in an outfit specially designed by an old family friend and fellow agent.

Then there was the fact that he was related to every other crime fighter currently on the field: his mother and father busy dealing with one of the latest crazy's new toys, an aunt slipping in and out of the shadows in hopes of taking the madman by surprise, and an uncle fiddling with some gadget just below where Max himself perched on a high ledge with the family pet peeking out of his pocket, the three of them blocking the only path of escape. It wasn't that everyone on Team Possible belonged to the same extended family, but… Well, there was a reason they still used that name.

(In his opinion, it was because his family was awesome. Come to think of it, that kind of opinion was probably also unusual for a guy his age.)

Under most circumstances, even the fact that the criminal they were chasing had extreme genetic alterations and a ridiculously rare power would only rate about a 3.5 on Max's weirdness scale. But it was the man's identity – or, more precisely, his particular history with Team Possible – that made this mission stand out.

"Who," Kim Possible, illustrious leader and world-famous original member of the team, growled as she dove out of the way of a toppling statue, "decided it was a good idea to break Monkey Fist out of his stone prison?!" Pausing just a moment to flick her long braid out of her face, she added, "I mean, I know he was bound to get restored eventually, but couldn't it have been done in a cell or something?"

Ron Possible, Ultimate Monkey Master and the team's second-in-command, managed to effect a shrug even as he grappled with the life-size stone gorilla that had knocked the statue over. The gorilla, and its partner that was now making its way toward Uncle Tim, were the reasons Team Possible had been called on the case. They didn't yet know what Monkey Fist was planning here, but he had somehow managed to animate the things after spiriting them away from a museum a week ago.

"To be fair, whoever did it probably didn't want Monkey Fist in jail," Ron pointed out. "Dunno if they wanted him to do this either, but crazy is as crazy does."

Max, who thus far lacked any cool titles of his own but at least got to claim the former two as his aforementioned mom and dad, frowned and dropped down in front of the second stone gorilla. "Need a hand?" he asked his uncle, already vaulting onto the behemoth's shoulders and swinging around to throw it off balance.

A concerned chittering drew as much of his attention as he could spare to his lower left side. Rufus had clambered out of his pocket and was scampering up to where his arms were wrapped around the thing's neck. The aging mole rat gave his youngest human an equally concerned look before squeaking again.

"I've got it under control!" Max snapped defensively, shifting his grip and smacking the stone gorilla on the head for good measure. That did nothing to harm it, of course, but his main goal right now was distraction anyway. The sudden shift of weight under him and the awkward turning of its head told him he'd succeeded.

"Ha! See, Rufus? No babysitting job nee- Whoa!"

The gorilla had just started swinging its body in sharp arcs, and Max scrambled to simultaneously keep his grip and dodge massive arms that were now reaching back at him.

In the midst of all this, Tim just scowled at the device in his hands, barely paying any mind to the grappling contest his nephew was swiftly getting caught up in. He pointed it at the thrashing construct, pressed a button to no effect, and then scowled harder and smacked it sharply in the side.

"I can't figure out the frequency this animation spell is working at," he said in the same tone one might use to complain about a busted toaster. "And I can't disrupt it if I can't get the frequency!"

"I was wrong, I do not have this under control!" Max shouted.

Uncle Tim shrugged. "You're doing fine. And anyway, that's what the babysitter's for." He casually took a step back from the impromptu wrestling match and started muttering to himself and fiddling with his disrupter again.

Scratch that, my family is awesome except for Uncle Tim.

The gorilla twisted itself around in its efforts to dislodge its attacker, and now Max was able to see what was happening in the rest of the temple. His parents were still tag-teaming their own stone gorilla, but while they evaded its swinging fists with a fluidity borne of vast experience, they couldn't disengage to approach their real target without the thing getting right back into their path.

Meanwhile, said target was perched on a raised platform in the center of the room, clutching something tightly within his robes and watching his harried opponents warily. As Max looked, the man glanced up at a beam of focused sunlight that shone through a precise hole in the ceiling, one which seemed to be creeping its way toward the very heart of the platform.

"You thought you were rid of me," Monkey Fist snarled. "You let yourselves forget about me for over twenty years. I was on the cusp of having the very world in my hands, and thanks to an infant I lost everything!"

"Yeah, after you made a deal with a monkey demon to attack a baby!" Kim snapped. Max could no longer see what his mom was doing, as the construct he was clinging to had chosen that moment to redouble its frenzied thrashing, but he could at least keep an ear on what was happening around him. "Forgive us for being a little short on sympathy."

Rufus was growling now as he clung to Max's arm. He knew better than to bite unyielding stone, but during a brief pause in the scuffle, he shimmied his way forward and started batting at the gorilla's face with a tiny paw.

The gorilla rumbled in response and reached up to smack the offending rodent off, but Rufus leapt out of the way and back onto Max's shoulder. The end result was the construct comically slapping its own face, and Max couldn't help but cackle as he readjusted his grip around its neck.

"Nice one, bud!" he said. With the thrashing briefly disrupted, he looked back into the room just in time to see a pair of black-clad arms wrapping around Monkey Fist from behind and pinning his own arms at his side.

"Not that you have to worry about babies anymore," Aunt Han appended to her sister-in-law's earlier comment, a smirk evident in her voice.

Monkey Fist snarled and threw his weight forward, unbalancing Hana enough that he was then able to twist around and throw her off of him. He glanced at the beam of sunlight again, and an evil smirk played across his lips.

"Oh, I don't plan to," he purred. "With the Tempus Simia finally complete, I will stop you from ever getting in my way!"

Several things happened at once then. A resounding crash erupted as the stone gorilla that had been harassing Max's parents slammed into a wall it had weakened earlier, toppling it. That must have been their plan; they were already well clear of the crumbling masonry that swiftly buried the construct, and they wasted no time in bolting for Monkey Fist. Aunt Han sprang to her feet and began to charge back up the stairway she'd been thrown halfway down. Monkey Fist cackled wildly and pulled two items – parts of a statue, it looked like? – from where he'd hidden them in his robe. And with a sharp lurch, the stone gorilla Max had hitched a ride on finally threw off both of its passengers, sending him crashing into his uncle and Rufus flying off somewhere behind them.

Max was scrambling to his feet when some kind of shockwave pulsed through the room. His assailant grunted and slid a foot or so toward him, unintentionally shielding him from the blast. Three shouts, followed shortly by the rough impact of bodies hitting the stone floor, told him that his teammates had not been so lucky.

"Guardians, to me!" Monkey Fist ordered. The gorilla that Max had tangled with turned and began to make its way toward the raised platform in the center of the temple. Across the room, the pile of rubble from the collapsed section of wall shifted and gave way as the other gorilla pulled itself free.

Max looked up to find that a shimmering red portal had opened up behind Monkey Fist. The criminal grinned triumphantly as his gaze swept over the temple and the adult agents still just beginning to recover.

"Now I can ensure that your precious Han never has a chance to defeat me," he said. "And when I do, I will be the unstoppable one!"

Max snarled. "Not if I have anything to say about it!"

With that he took off at a dead run for the madman and his new… whatever it was. Monkey Fist only had time to startle at his voice and turn.

The nearest stone gorilla was quicker to react, though. Before Max could even think to dodge, a massive hand swatted him to the side. The force of the blow was enough to both knock him dizzy and throw him off the edge of the platform.

But his forward momentum, coupled with the size of the portal, meant that he still managed to tumble right through its crimson expanse. That wall of swirling red was the last thing he saw before he blacked out.

And the last thing he heard was his mother's voice, screaming his name in pure, unfiltered horror.

A/N: One fun thing I learned while making plans for this fic is that naked mole rats actually have absurdly long lifespans for rodents (with a maximum of over 30 years). That fact isn't really very relevant to this story, but I figured I'd mention it in case anyone was questioning how Rufus is still around this far into the show's future. Hope you all enjoy, because it's gonna be a wild ride!