Chapter Seven: Past Tense

Montgomery Fiske fought the urge to glare at his fellow passengers. None of them were human – while he had been unable to retrieve his contemporary counterpart's personal jet, he at least had enough sway in this time period to commandeer the services of a small plane for himself and his minions. But he couldn't shake the sense of betrayal that had plagued him ever since he first laid eyes on this era's monkey ninjas.

To distract himself from his discontent, he pulled the Tempus Simia from his bag and took a few moments to admire it. The literature on the artifact had been curious: detailed plans on the rare components and spells necessary to craft such a thing, a fully functional temple already built and designed for the explicit purpose of activating it, and yet the project had by all appearances been abandoned the moment the Mystical Monkey Monks were ready to begin its construction. He had come across the first manuscript back in his purely scholarly days, and spent the next few years seeking out others when he could and trying to decipher whether or not the Tempus Simia had been completed and simply well-hidden. Alas, he had eventually come to the conclusion that it simply did not exist, and that if he wanted time travel for himself, he would have to put in some extensive legwork.

He never seriously considered that idea until many years later, when some grasping fool had awoken him from his stony tomb in the naive belief that the rightful Monkey Master would be beholden to aiding him in his own inferior schemes. All at once, Monty had found himself with nothing – decades lost to the Yono and that blasted child, all his resources confiscated or bequeathed to less worthy members of the Fiske line. Even his personally trained monkeys, having long since abandoned their duty, refused to return to his side.

That had been sufficient motivation. There were many ways to add the scattered powers of the ancient Monkey Monks to his own. But there was only one way to reclaim the power, the life, that was once and still should have been his.

Digging up the information he needed on the Han's origins had not been quite as difficult as constructing the Tempus Simia, but finding all the information he needed, and planning out his perfect revenge, had taken time. There were new minions to acquire – he couldn't quite explain why he had chosen the stone gorillas, but something about them had seemed right. There was the acquisition of the precise minerals he needed to properly draw in and channel the chronal magic that would make the Tempus Simia into something more than an ordinary statue. And all of it done in hiding, plotting his course of revenge to the finest detail while avoiding the attentions of the infuriatingly successful Team Possible until he was finally ready to mark his triumphant return to the world at large.

Now Monkey Fist did glare when he returned his attention to his not-so-loyal minions. At the very least, he could have retrieved the other half of the troop instead. Curly and Marchioness, two of his most skilled, were still back in that Middleton prison, and instead he was stuck with Chippy. The one who had betrayed him — would betray him, he supposed — even before the incident with the Yono. And all of it thanks yet again to the meddling of young people who insisted on denying him his rightful glory!

Like that whelp who had somehow made it through the time portal. If Kim and Ron's little mini-meddler hadn't gone running to mummy and daddy, Monkey Fist would likely have had all his old minions and more of his resources together before their team was any the wiser. Now that they had someone who more or less knew his plans, he had no doubt that he would be dealing with them again before this was over.

His building frustration must have been showing on his face, because Chippy caught him still scowling her way and turned to give him a look that was as concerned as it was questioning. His blood boiled at that oh-so-innocent expression, and he snapped, "Eyes forward! As distractible as you are, you could stand to learn some discipline."

Chippy leaned back in her seat, startled at his outburst. The fabric of her ninja mask stretched as she bared her teeth in a mild act of defiance. Still, she complied, and so Monkey Fist turned his glare out the airplane's window. Hmph. Ungrateful traitor.

The reflection of the Tempus Simia in the window caught his attention, and he pulled it closer. None of it, not even the whelp, was of any real consequence, he reminded himself. After all, he had time on his side.

Max had always known on some level how much travel time could affect the length of a mission. He remembered once when he was young, when he had to stay with his grandparents for almost a full day while his parents were on a mission somewhere overseas. He'd later overheard his dad complaining that they should have sent someone closer because the actual busting of the bad guys had taken less than fifteen minutes. That was an extreme case — most missions were comparatively closer, and the team usually had access to one of several ultra-high-speed forms of transportation — but he was still getting used to the long stretches of simply waiting to get to the place he needed to be.

When most of those high-speed transports didn't exist yet and the mission was both time sensitive and all the way in Japan, the wait was nothing short of agonizing.

"We made good time," Kim reassured him for the upteenth time when they finally got out of the Matsumoto airport and into the city where Monkey Fist's target apparently lived. "We're not too far behind Monkey Fist, and Wade's managed to track his movements enough to know he hasn't met with anyone yet. Whatever move he's about to make, we still have time to stop him from making it."

The team followed Monkey Fist's trail — one upside to his new giant bodyguards was that his trail wasn't hard to find, especially when he was in a hurry — to a small shared home near the edge of town.

Kim blocked the others with an arm shortly after the house came into view. "Monkey ninjas," she explained, pulling them behind the corner of the building next door. "I just saw one looking out a window. Monkey Fist must already be inside."

Max tensed. "Then we have to hurry!" he whispered insistently.

Kim's jaw clenched as she considered the situation. "If he's going to the trouble of posting sentries, there's a good chance he'll do something drastic the moment he knows we're here. We have to find a way to sneak in and take control of the situation before that happens."

Max frowned thoughtfully and pulled the Maxiever from his pocket. "Then let me go on ahead. I've got something that can help with that."

Taking care to keep it clear of too much scrutiny, he strapped the watch onto his wrist and started navigating its settings. He might not have been able to contact anyone with it at the moment, but he could still interface it with the tech in his mission wear. With a few button presses and some assistance from the wiring in his shirt, a kind of holographic haze blurred his form and dulled the colors of his hair and clothing to softer, more neutral tones. It wasn't quite the thorough cloaking the battle suits could manage in full stealth mode, but it was enough to help him blend into the shadows of the tightly packed houses.

Kim's eyes widened at the display. "Wow. We have got to get one of those."

Max smiled awkwardly, although he wasn't sure if she could pick out his expression through the cloaking. "Uhhh… maybe later."

Max had to take care picking his way toward his destination. It was around midday at this point, and his camouflage wouldn't work nearly as well in bright light as it did in the relatively scarce shadows. Still, he managed to edge himself to a corner and dart across the thin strip of lawn to the target house. From there, he kept low, hugged the wall, and crept his way to the window Kim had pointed out.

A faint murmur of voices filtered through the closed window, and he picked up the pace as much as he dared until he could carefully peer just around its edge. After confirming that none of the monkey ninjas were currently paying it their direct attention, he turned his focus to the human occupants of the room.

"This is… a very strange way of making an offer, sir," a woman said, her voice hesitant. He wasn't sure if it was because she was unused to speaking much English or because of her palpable tension. She was sitting stiffly in a corner armchair and giving the monkeys scattered throughout the room a wary eye. She seemed young — maybe college age, maybe a little older — and she wasn't showing any visible signs of pregnancy. It struck him that if this was Aunt Han's birth mother, it might be his family's one chance to learn more about her.

It wasn't exactly a happy thought. Would she have wanted to meet them, especially like this? Would his aunt even want to know, after living a happy life with her adopted family?

"It is a very strange set of circumstances, my dear," Monkey Fist replied. He was standing in the middle of the room, a central living area by the looks of it, and his posture was stately and poised as if he hadn't just broken into her home and literally cornered her into some kind of leonine contract. At least the gorillas weren't there – they must have been too big for the house.

"Though your family has long forgotten it, your lineage is that of Toshimiru, the first master of the Mystical Monkey Power. That in itself is a great honor, but I fear it gets more complicated with your unborn child. You see, she is at the heart of a very crucial and dangerous prophecy. That is why, as an expert on such matters, I am strongly suggesting that when you put her up for adoption—"

"That is not a decision I have made yet!" the young woman snapped, hands clenching as she leaned forward in the chair. "And I am more concerned about how you knew of my child, much less how you could be so sure it is a girl."

The monkey ninjas all set their full attention squarely on the woman at that outburst, a few even moving a step or two closer. Max took the opportunity to turn toward where Kim and Ron were hiding and gesture them over, careful to keep out of the window's view while still making broad enough gestures for them to see.

"He's trying to convince the mom to give him the baby," he whispered when the others reached him. "It hasn't gotten ugly yet, but she isn't giving in and I don't think he's gonna accept that."

Kim nodded, her brow furrowed in thoughtful concern. "We'll have to act quickly then. Do you have more of that stuff you almost caught Monkey Fist with before?"

Max gave a hesitant nod. "Yeah, but just enough for one more use."

Kim nodded back. "That's fine. I have something that won't last as long, but it should be enough for this. When I get the window open, aim for Monkey Fist and I'll get as many monkeys as I can."

The two of them worked quickly and quietly, Kim shifting around Max to get under the window while he got in position to shoot the moment it was open. While she was jimmying the latch, he could hear Monkey Fist's attempts at persuasion deteriorate into barely concealed threats as his patience waned.

"I am giving you a very generous offer!" he practically yelled. "Your child would live like a queen under my care, and I promise you will not like the alterna-"

Max didn't give him a chance to finish that thought. Kim got the window up at that moment and, in one fluid motion a part of him couldn't help but be proud of, he leaned in and shot the ranting villain with his restraining webbing. A quick thwip beside him signaled Kim's own shot, and a fraction of a second later, four of the monkey ninjas were caught against the far wall in something that looked like a cruder version of his web.

The woman shrieked and pushed herself up against the back of the chair as Kim vaulted through the open window, but she seemed to relax a little when she realized the newcomers were on her side.

"You know, Monkey Fist," Kim said, eyes narrowed dangerously as she positioned herself between the criminal in question and his would-be victim, "you've actually managed to reach a whole new level of low. What exactly is your endgame here?"

Monkey Fist scowled at her, then at Max and Ron clambering in through the window after her. He seemed concerningly unperturbed by the fact that he was trussed up on the living room floor. "Oh, but that would be telling," he said.

The remaining two monkeys backed away from the heroes, all too aware that they were outnumbered. Max advanced on them, keeping them on the retreat, while Kim held position and Ron started coaxing the poor confused woman at the heart of all this out of her armchair and away to safety.

"Of course," Monkey Fist continued, "you seem to have forgotten one tiny detail. Guardians!"

Before Max could react, the house started shaking and one of the stone gorillas squeezed through the doorway he'd been herding the monkeys toward. He suddenly found their roles reversed, scrambling backward as the two monkeys clambered onto the shoulders of their massive advancing companion and started hollering tauntingly at him.

"Okay, time to go!" Ron shouted, bolting for the window with the woman in tow. Unfortunately, their progress was almost immediately cut off when the other gorilla smashed through the connecting wall and cut off their escape.

"You didn't think I would come all this way just to let myself fall to your meddling, did you?" Monkey Fist asked as the trapped monkey ninjas began chewing at their bonds and the remaining two jumped back down to help him with his own. "And to think, this could all have been resolved without any bloodshed. You should have taken my offer, Miss Chiyo."

With that, the stone gorilla guarding the window made a lunge at the woman — Chiyo, apparently. She cried out again and scrambled back, and Kim was forced to leave the monkeys to their work so she could block the guardian's path to her.

"I'll deal with this one! Max, keep the other one busy," she barked. "Ron, Rufus, see what you can do about the monkeys."

Max scowled at the gorilla advancing on him for the third time now. "You know, I am really starting to hate these things."

He rolled to dodge one swipe of its huge arm, then used that momentum to grab onto it and force the gorilla into a partial turn. With a low grumble, it threw him off with enough force to smack him into the wall. As he shook off the blow, he saw that it was turning its attention back on Chiyo.

Max snarled. "Stay away from her!" he cried, springing forward and beating at it with his fists. That was enough to draw away its attention, and for once he was kind of relieved to find himself suddenly having to dodge those massive stony hands.

The other members of the team had found themselves in similar standstills. Kim was trying to lure her own opponent away from the window so the group could escape, but every time it started to move it was to advance on Chiyo's corner and she was forced to push it back again. Meanwhile, there were only so many ways Ron or Rufus could swat at the monkey ninjas without meeting the wrong end of their sharp canines or getting ganged up on. Chiyo herself had taken cover behind the armchair she'd been in earlier, and was frantically looking for an opening amidst the chaos that would allow her to flee.

As Max dodged another punch and kicked obstinately at the offending arm to keep his opponent from ignoring him again, a loud snapping sound drew his attention to the far wall. Two of the monkeys pinned there had just managed to break through their bonds, and they dropped gracefully to the floor just a half second before leaping at Chiyo.

There was an instant — and only an instant — of time to fear that everything the team had done to stop Monkey Fist's plot would come to nothing. Before Max could even think to channel that fear into action and rush to the rescue, Chiyo's wide eyes flashed with a sudden determination, and she reached for her assailants. In two swift movements, she intercepted their attacks and threw them bodily past where he and his gorilla were fighting.

"Don't just jump at her, you fools!" Monkey Fist shouted. "She has the Mystical Monkey Power!"

Chiyo's expression twisted into confusion even as she ducked back behind her cover. "Please, leave me alone! I do not even know what that means!"

Max kept one eye on the monkeys as they picked themselves back up. When they started running again, he dove to grab them and push them right in the path of the gorilla. It was enough to disorient all three opponents for a few crucial seconds.

"It means you can defend yourself!" he called out to her. "Just let your instincts and your need to protect your kid guide you, it should help. We'll get you out as soon as we can!"

He couldn't see how she responded to that, as it turned out he'd distracted his own opponents so well that the gorilla and one of the monkeys were now ganging up on him. Still, while he dodged back from swinging stone fists and scrabbled to get the screaming monkey off his face, the sudden shriek and thud of another monkey landing behind him told him that she had either gotten some help or was getting a handle on her powers.

Just as he managed to pull his smaller assailant off, he stumbled back and tripped over something. Falling hard on the ground, he looked over to see that Monkey Fist had finally managed to get free just in time for Max to crash into him and knock both of them over.

Monkey Fist snarled at him, hatred boiling in his eyes. "You!" he snarled, grabbing Max by the collar. "You have been a thorn in my side for —"

Ron tackled him to the ground just then, sending all three of them tumbling. Max had to suppress a sudden yelp when his back pressed into something hard.

Monkey Fist was opening his mouth for yet another indignant rant when he stopped and shot upright, eyes wide. Max took the chance to look back at what he'd slid into.

He sucked in a breath. With a quick glance back at the distracted criminal, he surreptitiously shoved the item further behind him and out of sight.

"Retreat!" Monkey Fist barked to his assembled minions in the same moment Max registered the sound of approaching police sirens. He pushed his way out of the pile of bodies and added, "We will have other opportunities to finish this, but not if we get captured now!"

There was a mad scramble as various primates both real and stonework stopped what they were doing and made their way through the hole the second gorilla had put into the wall. Kim grabbed futilely at the last monkey to untangle itself and flee, but otherwise hovered around Chiyo's corner to keep anyone from trying any last second potshots. Ron sat up in a daze, clearly in less than no position to chase down the entire group.

Max kept silent, holding his breath as he watched them all go.

When the simian shrieks were finally drowned out by the wail of the sirens, Kim visibly relaxed. She turned to the young woman they'd all helped defend from Monkey Fist's assault and asked, "Are you okay to head to the police station with us? I know this has to have been a lot, but I think we'll all feel much better if you can get somewhere safe before that man takes one of those 'opportunities' he mentioned."

"That won't be as easy for him as he thinks it is."

Everyone turned toward Max when he said that. "What do you mean?" Ron asked. "Is there something you know that he doesn't?"

Max couldn't keep the grin off his face as he sat up and set the Tempus Simia out in front of himself. "Yup. Because he clearly hasn't figured out that he lost this."