“Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm late for my dinner. Mr. Dr. Director is going to skin me alive”, the Director said.
The four of them watched her walk away, their mouths hanging open, wondering who in hell could ever skin her alive.
By the time Kim had released Shego from her bear-hug, the Director was long gone. Ron and Josh were standing there watching them with their arms crossed, smiling. Shego looked long and hard into Kim's eyes before taking her arms from around the red-head - who was looking equally long and hard back - then turned to the boys to say:
“Getting our fill, are we?” rather sarcasticlly. Then she smiled at them, as if to say, so am I. “I don't know what you said to her – I probably don't want to – but thanks.”
“Hey, I had a little to say, too, y'know!” Kim piped up.
“I bet you did, Pumpkin. Did you tell her you woke up this morning drooling on my stomach?”
“Well… no…” Kim confessed, “… good thing she didn't ask.”
The four of them wound their way to the elevator and got in.
Ron was thinking, Hookay, boo-yah. A new chapter starts. Where do we go from here?Mundane details were crowding his brain: where's she going to live? What about when school starts? She's going to work for the GJ, and Kim doesn't… how'sthat going to work? Andwhen am I going to have a chance to be alone with Josh? For that matter, when are THEY going to have the chance to be alone? They must both be dying…
There was something else, though, nagging him. What else… what am I missing…And then it occurred to him, oh, yeah. Lee-Jinn. I gotta have Josh look over what I've done.
“Shego, while you're getting ‘outfitted', I think me and Josh are going to go on back home… to the apartment, I mean. I need to show him some stuff” Ron said.
“I bet you do” came the sarcastic reply, and not from Shego – but from Kim. She hadn't meant it as mean as it sounded, but everyone was looking at her.
Josh said, “Now, Kim. Don't be that way. Or you're going to start getting it right back.”
“You know I didn't mean it in a bad way. Sorry.” Kim apologized. She turned to Shego. “Look, getting outfitted is going to take awhile, and I really need to check in with my Mom… I haven't been home in what, three days? I'll take you down there, and then pick you up in a few hours. Okay? Guys, see you out front.”
The boys got off on the ground floor, while Kim and Shego continued the ride down. As soon as the doors closed again, Kim turned to the other girl, threw her arms around her neck, and jumped up onto her, wrapping her legs around Shego's waist.
This time, the kiss was greedy, sexy, long, and Kim's tongue explored Shego's molars. Kim was pushing Shego's head toward her mouth, mashing the other girl's nose into her cheek. Shego was actually shocked by her girlfriend's apparent lust – she hadn't expected, well, had never thought, anyway, that Kim could be so… horny! Ever! Shego's eyes never even closed. She kept it going for as long as she could, but then she had to fairly push Kim off her mouth, because she simply couldn't breathe with her mouth and nose both blocked.
The elevator stopped as Shego was still holding onto the girl wrapped around her, panting for air. The door opened, but Kim was too occupied with the taste of Shego's neck and ear to notice. Kim was voracious, rapacious, starved… she needed.Luckily, no one was there waiting for a ride back up, and the elevator opening only presented an empty hallway.
“Kim… Kim!” Shego tried to snap her out of it, but Kim was lost. Her breath, fast and deep, was blowing back Shego's jet-black hair. It was as if she couldn't breath enough. “KIM!”
The teenager looked her lover in the face, panting like a cheetah, mouth still open, legs still tightly holding on, as if Shego might slip away if she didn't squeeze tightly enough.
“Uh…” Shego forgot what she was going to say. The look in Kim's eyes held the older girl spellbound. Kim was feral. She had the look of a wild animal, a predator, gazing back at her as if Shego was intending to steal her kill. It was actually a little frightening.
“Uh… we're here…” Shego managed to get out, but still Kim stared hard into her eyes, her pupils frozen into place.
Then, just like that, Kim blinked. Her eyes widened, and she scrambled to release her embrace and stand on her own two feet again. Once she was, she just stood there, panting, hands out as if about to fend off multiple attackers, eyes alert but downcast. One would have thought she was surrounded by lions about to pounce. When the elevator doors started to close again, she whirled to face them.
“Kim? Uh… are you okay?” Shego asked.
Kim whirled again to face Shego, apparently having forgotten she was there. Finally coming to her senses and realizing where she was, Kim put her arms down, and stood up out of her battle-crouch. She looked up into Shego's eyes with something like humiliation mixed with fright.
“I… Shego, I don't know what, uh” Kim began, but had to turn away as she felt her face start to burn. “I… got carried away, I guess…”
I'll say… Shego thought. Carried away in a straight-jacket!
Still embarrassed, but almost able to breathe normally, Kim turned to hit the “Door Open” button. “I need to… find the restroom” she lied, “The door you want is on the left side, just around the corner up there, to the left. Uh,” she looked back into Shego's eyes to find her still surprised, “I'll see you in a few hours? Say, 9?”
“Yeah. Nine. See you then, Pumpkin” Shego said without conviction. She stepped out of the elevator, and the doors started to close again. Until Kim stopped them.
The words coming in bursts of one and two syllables, Kim said, “Shego… I just… never… knew… that I… could feel… like that. Like this.”
Shego went up to her girlfriend framed in the elevator doors, and kissed her on the forehead.
“I never knew you could, either, Kim. I'm a little surprised, is all. Strike that. I'm extremely surprised. See you at nine, Pumpkin.”
“Yeah” was all Kim could say as the doors closed a final time.
It was a long hallway, lined with doors on the right, a blank wall on the left. Kind of drab, Shego was thinking, making her way to the end.
Suddenly, a door about halfway down opened, and a rather good-looking man – broad shoulders, square jaw, blue eyes – stepped out and began walking her way. He looked at her in an odd way.
Yeah, don't usually pass ME in the halls around here, do you, secret-agent-man,Shego thought.
But as he got closer the man's face brightened, a look of recognition coming across his features. “Sheaghen! Hey, hardly recognized you in those clothes! ‘Bout time you had a change of fashion! Hey listen, I'm late for a dinner-date, so can't chat, but tell Elle ‘good job’ on the belly-button! It suits you!” The man hurridly made his way to the elevator, then, deciding it would take too long, took the stairs instead.
Shego just watched him carefully, almost expecting an attack as he went by. Then she watched him until the door to the stairwell silently closed. Sheaghen? Good job on the belly-button? She glanced down at her own belly, exposed thanks to her shirt borrowed from Kim. Good job?
Okay, THAT was weird. Then she considered. Okay, maybe for this week, that wasn't so weird, after all. She smiled to herself.
Turning the corner, she saw a group of people at the far end of the hall. One of them, then two, waved at her. She waved back. Her brow furrowed, what's going on here? Why aren't these people asking me what I'm doing here, or attacking me, or SOMEthing! Do they have a LOT of green-skinned sexy women roaming the halls? Without belly-buttons?
A double-door on the left came into view, on it a large letter ‘L’ was painted. Ah, ‘L’. Not ‘Elle’. I get it. It's a ‘Men in Black’ thing. She stood in front of it awhile, trying to decide whether to knock or just go in. Normally, of course, she would have just barged right in. But then again, normally she didn't turn herself in to the Law - after having been employed by Satan - in order to be able to spend time with her lesbian girlfriend. She knocked.
When the door opened, she was looking into her own face, at her own body, albiet clad in her formerly ubiquitous green-and-back catsuit.
The new version of Shego said, “Well, if it isn't the prototype. Is this a social call or have you come by for a long-overdue upgrade…” She'd said it all very sarcastically but playfully… just the way Shego always spoke.
“Who's bothering me now, Sheaghen?” a familiar voice called from the distance.
“Um… friend of yours. Maybe you'd better come see.” Sheaghen shouted back, then looked slyly back at Shego. Shego was too stunned to speak intelligibly. The other girl looked exactly like her. Well, like she used to look. Like she would look again, she reminded herself.
“Who… what… who…”
“Bit of a shock, isn't it?” Shego's copy smiled back. “Ooooh, this is going to be such wicked fun! C'mon in, Shego. Let's party!” she chuckled to herself.
Footsteps could be heard coming from another room, off the main laboratory floor. “I don't haveany friends, so what in blazes do you…” a blue-skinned man in an equally blue frock coat was saying, then he saw her.
“Shego!” he cried, he smiled widely, showing all his teeth. Then, as if remembering something, he forced the smile away, and turned around, crossing his arms. “I'm not talking to you!”
Shego looked back and forth between the two. It was like walking in on her own past, and she briefly looked around the room to see if it was an illusion, a hologram or something. A trick. Drakken. Drakken and Shego. In a laboratory. But, shewas Shego! Dammit!
Drakken? ‘L’? Lipsky? Here?
“C'mon, Drak. Aren't you going to introduce me to your old ‘friend’?” the other Shego said, then turned to look at her, “Oh, we're just going to have so much fun! I just know we have lots in common!” She could barely get the words out between the chuckles.
Drak?
Drakken turned back around. “Sheaghen, this is Shego. My former assistant. Shego, Sheaghen” he said, then looked at Shego and frowned, “Now go away. I don't want to see you.”
Still unable to form a coherent thought, Shego said, “Shee-gin?”
The cat-suited version cleared it up for her. “SHE-GEN. As in, Shego-again. Sheaghen. Get it? Yeah, I know, believe me, it wasn't my choice. I wanted to be named ‘Sparkimus Rexx', but he wouldn't go for it.” She smiled ear-to-ear. Obviously, Sheaghen was having fun with this whole thing.
Shego gave her a look of, You're just weird, and turned her attention back to “Drak”.
“YOU'RE working for the GJ?” she asked.
“We came to an agreement, yes. Nearly unlimited funding, but they pick the projects. Room, board, rather small salary, but I got to pick the assistant of my choice…” he said, regretting having added that last part. “And in return, I don't try to take over the world.”
“YOU made a copy of ME?” Shego cried, some of the pieces coming together for her. “You CLONED me?”
Sheaghen corrected her, “Oh, my dear Princess… a clone? Oh, yuck! Besides, You think he could carry off a cloning operation? I'm a syntho-drone, of course. God, I wouldn't be able to stand it if I were a meat-bag. Clone? Please!”
It took awhile for Shego to absorb that. “You made a ROBOT of me?”
“Synth,if you please” Sheaghen interrupted, “… anatomically correct, too!” she added with a wicked smile.
“Sheaghen!” Dr. Drakken cried.
“Anatom… correct? You mean…” Shego paused as more pieces fell into place. Anatomically correct? She has… she can… HE built her… Oh. Oh! OH!
“YOU SICK BASTARD! YOU ARE SO DEAD!” Shego screamed, instinctivly lighting up her hands.
Seeing the look on her face, Dr. Drakken shouted to his drone, “Sheaghen! Protect!”
At the sound of the words, Sheaghen's face went stone dead, devoid of all emotion. She said mechanically, “Protect. Programmed response: protect Dr. Drakken at all costs.”
The drone took a step and did a half-twist, crouching into fighting position, arms out, feet apart, eyes looking into Shego's. Shego did almost exactly the same thing, facing the robot. They were squared off, ready for battle. Shego had never seen a syntho-drone move as fast as Sheaghen had, and never faced one that actually looked like it knew what it was doing.
They glared at one another, Shego and her copy. Then, Sheaghen did something unexpected. She winked.
The drone stood, obviously relaxing, and an amused smile came back to her face. She leaned back against the lab-counter, and crossed her arms in front of her. “ ‘Programmed response?’ I don't think so.” She started to giggle.
“Sheaghen! I order you to protect me!” Drakken shouted worriedly.
The drone looked at him, and nodded toward Shego, who was still crouched and still flaming. “She has a point, you know. You are a sick bastard. You programmed me with her personality, ya know…” she said, then glanced back at the ex-theif, “Maybe he programmed me a little too thoroughly, eh?” She began to giggle again.
Dr. Drakken regarded his creation with his eyes wide, as it sank in on him that she was not going to be fighting Shego. Then he looked at Shego, who was staring back at him, eyes narrowed, and displaying her usual smirk.
“Aaaaahhhhhhhh” he screamed, as he turned to run back through the door from which he had come, hoping to lose Shego in the labrynthine maze of rooms within the laboratory. “Ahhhhhhh” they heard him scream again, a little fainter.
The drone was sitting on the counter, now, laughing her ass off. “Oh! Oh! This is just he most fun I've had in… well, this may be the most fun I've ever had!” she said to no one in particular. Then she held her arms up in the air, impersonating Drakken. “Aaaaahhhhhhhh!” she screamed, and burst out in laughter all over again.
Shego had to admit, it was funny. But she had too many questions to enjoy the moment. It was too weird, anyway. She straightned out of her crouch, wuffing the plasma surrounding her hands out. Despite herself, she was beginning to kind of like this drone.
So she not only looks exactly like me, but she has my personality, too? How'd he do that?
Once Sheaghen's laughter had died down - and it took a little while, as she'd start all over whenever she'd impersonate Drakken again – she regarded Shego, staring at her questioningly.
“Haaaa” Sheaghen sighed. “That was fun. Aren't you going after him?”
“It can wait. I'd rather ask you a few questions. Like, exactly HOW ‘anatomically correct’ are you?”
“Not at all! I lied. It was a beautiful lie, too, see, because it accomplished two goals: it pulled your chain, and it got him into trouble! It was art! I am SO good!” the drone laughed still more.
Hey, that WAS good… Shego admitted, waitaminnute…
“So, you have my ‘personality’? How did he manage to program that in?” Shego asked, and how did he get it so RIGHT?
“Yeah. ‘member the ‘Compliance Chip’? Well, turns out, apparently, that the personality of the wearer gets sort of ‘burned’ into it. Drak integrated it into my circuitry. And Lo and Behold: Shego-again!” Sheaghen paused, noticing the worried look in the human's eyes. “Don't worry, I only have your personality, not your memories or anything. And besides, it's just a simulated personality, you know. Like my emotions – simulated. I'm not the real thing, but an amazing simulation!” she chuckled.
“Yeah. An amazing simulation” Shego agreed. “But I'm not sure I like having my personality copied.”
“Don't go getting all possessive on me, Princess. It's my personality now. I've had it for almost a year, so it's mine. You can't have it back. Besides,” the drone sighed, “you have no idea how boring it is being a synth without one. Gah. ‘Personality’ is probably the only good thing you humans have come up with, in your whole evolution. Well… and the breasts are quite nice, too, I have to admit. Speaking of which, looks like ole’ Drak may have been a bit – over enthusiastic – in that department, eh, Princess?” Sheaghen nodded toward Shego's chest.
“I've been… on a diet. They'll come back” Shego said with a little chagrin. “And don't call me ‘Princess’.”
“Good. I've always prided myself on being an exact copy of a real person, hate to think I was a cartoon. Princess” she grinned evilly. “You of all people should have known better than to tell me how to punch your buttons.”
It was true, she should have. Another thing was true, too: Shego did like Sheaghen. Even the weirdness of it was… interesting. Shego just smiled, “If you know me so well, you also know not to get on my wrong side, right?”
“Doy” said the drone. “Hey, I've just decided it's time for my break. I bet you like coffee. Since you're the prototype, you get to buy.”
“Actually, I'm flat broke. Seems I've just made a sizeable contribution to the GJ…”
Sheaghen sighed. “Ah, they fined your butt off too, eh? Same with Drak. Okay, I'll buy, then, but you owe me. They don't pay synths, y'know. What money I have I steal from Drak's piggy-bank.”
Shego smiled at that thought. “Y'know what, Sheaghen? I'm liking you more all the time.”