2.
Though it wasn't what they wanted, it came as little surprise to Kim and Ron when they were put in different classes. Kim was put in Class 1-A and Ron in Class 1-B. To Kim's annoyance, she found that Bonnie was also put in her class, and was quickly socializing with the rest of the student body. She was relieved to find that Mai Tokiha was in class with them. Then she got a text message from Ron in the next room over.
"SOS, KP. Motorbike Girl is in my class!"
Kim sent an urgent reply, "Don't panic! And don't let her know you recognize her!"
Ron looked directly into the emerald green eyes of the young woman in front of him, looking over her shoulder at him with an icy glare sent shivers down his spine.
"Um, hi?" Ron waved nervously at her, "Help you?"
She looked at him a moment, then sighed softly, closing her eyes, and spoke in English to him, "Your little pink friend is in my desk."
She reached over and set Rufus down gently on Ron's desk. She was holding him with the same hand that Rufus had bitten the night before, and there was a bandage on her wrist.
"Please don't hurt him," Ron said softly.
She opened her eyes and looked at him, her expression mild confusion, which actually made her look youthful and vulnerable for a moment.
"I'm not a monster," she said, "I don't like hurting small animals. Just…keep him with you. And don't let the Executive Committee know about him."
"Um…sure. Thanks."
~~*~~
"So, her name is Natsuki Kuga," Ron said as he, Kim, and Mai met for lunch. Bonnie was busy chatting away with two girls from 1-A, whom Mai identified as Chie Harada and Aoi Sennou.
"Got her," Wade said over the Kimmunicator, "Guys…I'm not sure, but I don't know that she's the bad guy in this."
"What do you mean, Wade?"
"You want the details?" Wade asked.
"Please and thank you," Kim replied.
"Okay, but it's not pretty stuff. When Natsuki Kuga was eight years old, her mother was killed in a car accident. Natsuki was in the car at the time, and she spent the better part of the year in a medically induced coma, and the rest of the year learning to walk again. She's a year behind in school because of that. While she was still comatose, her father left to Europe, and hasn't been back since. He sends her money for her upkeep, but that's pretty much it."
"She's been on her own since she was eight?" Kim was bordering on outright livid, "No one looking out for her?"
"Nothing in the files, Kim," Wade said, "Told you it wasn't pretty. Oh, but get this, her mother, Saeko Kuga, was working for a place known as D-1 Laboratory when she died, and D-1 Labs covered all of Natsuki Kuga's medical costs when she was in the hospital. In fact, there's a file here. Her father signed over all of his parental rights to them. After that, no mention of them in the records."
"Labs?" Kim and Ron exchanged a glance.
"That might explain her ability to summon guns and that robot wolf out of thin air," Kim suggested, "Some sort of experiment gone wrong? Or worse, gone right!"
Ron shook his head, "That doesn't feel right, KP. The birthmark. Wade, is there anything in the files about Natsuki Kuga having a birthmark?"
Wade frowned, then typed on his keyboard, "There is! An addendum added by Dr. Kuga herself about a vascular birthmark on her back on the left side. There's a sketch…"
Wade showed them a picture of a dot surrounded by an open circle with a long sharp tail at the top.
"Same as me and the girl from the water," Kim said.
Mai sighed, "And me. Mine's…"
She looked down at her chest and blushed sheepishly.
"Yeah, don't need to see it," Ron said, "I think that birthmark is the key. And what did that kid with the silver hair say? That you and Bonnie were He-Man?"
"Hime,"Kim corrected him, rolling her eyes, "Princesses."
"Wait, if Kuga found out that the girl from the ferry is here, too," Mai rose rapidly, "Excuse me, I've got to check on her!"
"Tell you what, after class, we'll try and talk to Kuga," Kim said, "You check on the other girl."
~~*~~
Kim and Ron followed Natsuki quietly, and watched as she slipped into a large black building they'd been informed was the library.
No sooner had they entered than the door shut behind them, Natsuki emerging from behind it, a pair of guns in her hands.
"You two are good," Natsuki said, "Very good. Most people wouldn't have even noticed you following them. Even blondie here. But then, I'm not most people. I always expect that I'm being followed.
"So who sent you? District One? CIA? Global Justice? SHIELD?"
"No one sent us, Kuga," Kim remembered Wade telling them that it was considered rude to use someone's given name without permission in Japan, "We were invited here on scholarships from Mashiro Kazahana. We're not here to spy on you. You're the one who sunk a ship out from under us, remember?"
Natsuki scoffed, "I'm not the one who split the ship in half. That was the girl with the sword. I was trying to warn her away, trying to keep any more HiME from congregating on Fuuka. But she was more interested in fighting."
Kim and Natsuki locked eyes, emerald on emerald, and Kim spoke softly, "Promise me by the name of your mother that you're telling us the truth."
Natsuki blinked, and there was again a softness to her face, before her eyes narrowed again.
"What do you know about my mother?" Natsuki demanded with an edge.
"We know she was taken from you," Ron said, "We know you were just a kid at the time, and that you got a raw deal after that. We have a tech friend who looked you up. I'm Ron. Ron Stoppable. And this is…"
"Kim Possible, international heroine," Natsuki said evenly, then upon seeing their confused faces, added, "I have friends with access to computers, too."
"Then you know I don't do things to hurt people," Kim said, "And I'm not out to hurt you…But by the same token, I can't just let you hurt other people. So, promise me that you're not out to hurt anyone."
Natsuki dissipated her pistols, "I'll promise you that I'm not looking for an unnecessary fight. But my Mother was murdered, and I will bring her killers to justice."
"Justice?" Kim raised an eyebrow, "Or revenge?"
"Sometimes they're the same thing,"Natsuki said, "But the only people I'm after are the ones who ordered it. If you need proof of that, talk to Sakomizu-sensei. He'll vouch for that."
"Natsuki, I'm not looking for a fight, either. And I help people. So…if you promise me that it's actually justice that you want, I'm willing to help you, too."
Natsuki scoffed lightly, then smiled, "You seem sincere. But this is my fight. No one else's. And for your own safety, if you meet a guy named Nagi, don't do what he says. Like I said, for your sake."
"Oh, we've met him," Ron said, "That guy is 100 miles of bad road."
Natsuki laughed a bit, then smiled, a true, genuine smile, "Heh. I don't think I've ever heard anyone describe it quite like that, before, but I have to say, that suits him well."
The trio walked into the woods to Natsuki's motorcycle, where she looked at Ron, "You mind?"
"Huh? Oh, sure," He turned his back and put his hands over his eyes. Natsuki still looked at him warily.
"You can trust him," Kim said, "I change clothes for missions all the time in front of Ron. He's never peeked. Not once."
Natsuki gave a short laugh, "Sounds like a trustworthy kind of guy. Not at all like the perverts at this school."
She began to change out of her school uniform, at first keeping a wary eye on Ron, but gradually realizing that what Kim had said was the truth, that Ron wouldn't look. She slipped into her leathers and zipped up. Then she clapped Ron on the back.
"You're a decent guy, Stoppable," she said, "Don't ever change. You two a thing?"
"Yeah, yeah, we are," Kim said.
Natsuki nodded, "I'm glad. It's nice to have someone like that in your life. I've only got a couple of friends in the school, y'know. Akane Higurashi…"
"Oh, the girl in our class!" Ron nodded, "She's nice!"
"And Shizuru Fujino, the Student Council President. I think…I think I'd have gone crazy a long time ago if Shizuru weren't looking out for me."
Just then there was rustling in the bushes, and Mai Tokiha emerged, "Takumi? He's not…YOU! I should go to the cops about you!"
"Your pals and I already hashed that out," Natsuki shrugged, "Besides, even if you called the cops, they'd be powerless against the shadows lurking at Fuuka."
"She's right," a familiar, oily voice sing-songed from above them, and they turned to see Nagi Homura standing on the branches of a tree, "Hello, Mai-HiME, Kim-HiME, Natsuki-HiME. Oh, and Ron-san, greetings to you, as well. You know, I have to say, you're the first Yamanouchi transfer we've had here. And also the first with Mystical Monkey Power. Ought to add quite a bit of spice, this time around."
"What the hell do you want, Nagi?" Natsuki demanded.
"Can't you feel it?" Nagi said with a slick smile, "There's a poor lost one, nearby."
"An Orphan," Natsuki growled.
"This especially concerns you, Mai-HiME," Nagi smirked, tossing a small plastic box at her feet. Kim recognized it as a pill caddy.
"Takumi!" Mai looked near panic stricken.
Maybe it was just that she was irritated with Nagi, or maybe it was that she was feeling a bit more sympathetic after talking with Kim and Ron, but Natsuki turned to Mai, strapping her helmet on her head, "Hop on."
The motorcycle, a Ducati Dr. III tore through the woods, Mai holding tightly to Natsuki's trunk as they whizzed through the trees. Kim and Ron were following behind them with their jet propelled skates.
"What's going on?" Kim demanded.
"An Orphan," Natsuki's voice was muffled under her helmet, "A type of monster that seems very prone to congregating around Fuuka. And they're dangerous. Only someone with the powers of a HiME can fight them."
"I see Takumi," Ron called.
"Got him," Natsuki said.
There was a swirling mass of shadows that seemed to converge, forming a solid mass with crimson eyes that glared at them from the darkness. They found themselves in a cave, the beast, sporting fangs and claws, drooled steaming acid by the unconscious Takumi.
Natsuki materialized one of her guns and fired, distracting the creature.
"Takumi!" Mai got off of the bike and raced to her brother, "He has a bad heart!"
Natsuki called out, "Duran!"
The metallic wolf exploded from ice, and launched itself at the monstrosity, distracting it away from the Tokiha siblings.
"Ron, we need to distract that thing and get Takumi to safety!"
"You two can't handle this!" Natsuki protested, "You don't have the power."
"Power…power…I have Mystical Monkey Power!" Ron said with realization, "Sensei said…Lotus Blade, to me!"
There was a crack of thunder, and a sword flew through the air, landing hilt-end in Ron's outstretched hand.
"Booyah! That worked!"
"Neat," Rufus opined.
"What?" Natsuki blinked.
"Long story," Kim said, "Short version, Ron has these powers that sort of come and go as he needs them."
Mai was cradling Takumi, looking at the monster. Ron swung his blade, which managed to connect with a claw swung at him. Both the sword and the claw were undamaged, though.
Mai remembered her Mother, laying in her hospital bed. She told her to take care of Takumi. Her fault…all her fault…
Mai stood up, and shed a single tear. Flames licked the ground around her, and then a pillar of flame shot into the night sky through an opening in the cave ceiling.
Natsuki, Kim, and Ron all stared in disbelief.
~~*~~
Earlier that same day:
"I'm Miss Go, and I'll be teaching this class," She said. She noted one young girl in her class, scarlet hair, lime green eyes, gazing absently out of the window.
"Yuuki-san, perhaps you can tell me what's so interesting out there that's distracting you from my lesson?"
"Oh," the girl spoke in a sweet, honeyed voice, "I'm so sorry, Miss Go. I think that I have a bit of anemia. Mind if I go to the nurse?"
Shego's eyes narrowed, and she smirked, but nodded, "Sure."
Nao Yuuki, she thought to herself, I'll be keeping an eye on you.
And so she did. Shego knew how to be stealthy when she wanted to be. She followed Nao Yuuki as she wandered off the grounds of the campus, that night.
Anemia, Shego scoffed to herself, Can't you think up a better excuse for your bad habits, girl? So what sort of vice have you got that I'm going to have to scare you straight on?
It wasn't that Shego particularly thought herself a moral person. She knew full well that she was a criminal, and considered by the world at large to be a super-villain. And it suited her fine. But she was working as a teacher here, and she needed to be taken seriously in that role. And this girl was flouting her authority. So, what would it be? Drinking? Drugs? Sex? Whatever the case, Shego decided she was going to have to play the heavy and set the girl straight about respecting her class.
So when she saw the girl, who was all of fourteen, meeting a man who had to be in his early thirties, on the streets of the city, Shego was beyond disgusted. The guy disgusted her, of course. It's one of the reasons Shego was so comfortable working for Drakken. For all of Dr. D's flaws, he didn't seem to hold any prurient interests for Kim Possible. But it wasn't just the guy that Shego was disgusted by. The girl was encouraging this pervert!
She saw Nao Yuuki walking into a dark alley with the older guy, and she decided she wanted to intervene before any clothing came off. She was going to have to scare the girl, she decided, to keep her from ever doing something like this again. Probably too stupid or naïve to realize the sort of trouble she could get in. Hell, for all Nao knew, she could be hooking up with a serial killer who was planning to gut her in the back alley.
Shego reached the entrance to the alley, and heard a scream.
"Shit!" Shego rarely swore, but realizing she might have been too late to spare the girl some of the horrors of stupid decisions...
When Shego had arrived at Fuuka, she'd been shown that she had access to power beyond that which the meteor had given her. But she decided that in this instance, her usual plasma would do the trick. And if the guy had hurt the girl at all, she was giving serious consideration to neutering him. Hell, even Kimmie couldn't fault her for that, Shego decided.
Shego entered the alley, and looked very surprised at what she found. Nao was standing confidently on top of a vaguely human shaped form lying on the ground, cocooned in webs, a monstrous dryder type creature standing beside her, long claws on her fingers.
"I told you I was going to screw you like you've never been screwed before," Nao was smirking at the bundle of webs, "Can't say you weren't warned, boy."
Nao spun on her heel when she heard clapping at the alley entrance.
A figure stood in shadows, speaking to her, "Not bad. Not bad at all. You've got some serious potential girl."
"Who're you?" Nao demanded, brandishing her claws.
Shego smirked, lighting up her plasma, illuminating her face in a green glow, "Me? I can be your best friend, or your worst nightmare."
"Miss Go?!"
"Shego. And I can't say I disapprove of your extracurricular activities, now that I got an idea what it is you're doing. But if Kim Possible can pull all-nighters and jet around the world and still maintain her GPA, then no student of mine is going to say she can't do the same. Let's talk, you and me…"