If not for the infrared viewer making everything, well, red… Kim could have been ‘shooting the tubes’ at the shore somewhere. Although Kim had never been claustrophobic, the experience was bizarre to say the least. The earth itself smelled damp and rank, but not much more than a garden after being tilled. Fortunately for Kim, the remaining aperture of the partially collapsed pit was large enough for her and the rocket-board to ‘surf’ over and around any obstructions.
Kim did her best not to touch or disturb the surrounding soil any more than necessary, lest the tunnel close completely, not only sealing off the only known means of escape, but possibly crushing her as well. Even so, she was rapidly becoming filthy from the dirt all around her. She knew that once this was over she would need a nice, long shower. An image of Shego in the shower with her, and their usual caresses, brought her out of her reverie. This was not the time to lose focus. Another image of her entire family, Shego and the children, sharing a bath as they often did, made a lump form in her throat.
It was at this point that Kim noticed something different about her decent. The rocket board was reasonably quiet and she hadn’t wanted to make any unnecessary noise, but she was aware of something going on behind her. Not quite a noise, but more like a pressure wave and a slight rumbling in the tunnel.
Glancing behind her, Kim was horrified to see that the tunnel was indeed collapsing. Moving almost like a fluid, the hole was being filled behind her by a moving wall of earth. Uncertain about boosting the power of the rocket, Kim instead used what she knew about surfing to gain additional speed. Even if the way behind her was closed, Will’s parting comments gave her the information she needed to return her and Shego home.
Suddenly, something else caught her attention. It was another noise, this time from underneath the board. With her infrared viewers on, Kim could not immediately tell what the reason for the sound was, then it became clear to her. Though she had started her decent on loosely packed soil, she was now sliding over rock. The board jerked and bucked under her feet, no longer as able to follow her direction.
Before Kim could think of any way to slow down, speed up, or do anything, the tunnel opened up around her. What had been a sloped chute was now a black void, with nothing close enough to register clearly on her viewer. Kim fell like a stone into the stygian darkness. Kim thought of her children…
“Princess, wake up. Princess… ”
Kim ached all over. She lay on her back and at a very uncomfortable angle, with her neck bent down and her chin pressing against her chest. She’d heard the voice speaking to her, but her thoughts were too muddled to form a reply.
Taking one experimental breath… then another… Kim decided that she was alive, but apparently blind. After several blinks, Kim realized that her infrared viewer was either broken or had been lost, and that she wasn’t necessarily blind but that there was nothing to see.
“Come on, Princess, talk to me… please don’t be hurt… ”
Kim knew the voice to be Shego’s. She could also tell from its proximity that Shego was right next to her. Furthermore, the reason that her head was at such an uncomfortable angle was because it was resting on Shego’s lap.
“Don’t… don’t you know that you’re not supposed… to move an accident victim?”
Shego sobbed loudly with relief and her hand found Kim’s face. A second later, her mouth found Kim’s mouth. Kim would have preferred to take a few more breaths at this time, but Shego didn’t relent. Only after Shego began to cover the rest of Kim’s dirty face with kisses could the younger women catch her breath.
“I’m alright, I think. I guess I was out, huh?” Kim had begun flexing her muscles and shifting her body, testing for breaks and damage. She felt intact, but very, very sore.
There were a few sniffles in the darkness before Shego’s voice returned. “You could say that. You could also say that while I was sitting here in a nasty pool of who-knows-what, you came flying into this hole in the ground and almost took my head off.”
Shego was combing her fingers through Kim’s hair. Kim felt a drop of water hit her face and wondered if Shego was crying. “Are you OK, Shego? Are you hurt?”
“Of course I’m not hurt.” Shego’s voice was slightly muffled and there was a sound as if she were wiping at her face. “You just made such a mess when all of that dirt followed you in here, I got all sorts of crap in my eyes.”
Kim decided to let the matter drop. She slowly and carefully rolled over onto her side, then up into a kneeling position. With Shego’s help, Kim stood on her own feet. Yes, she was going to be very sore for a while.
“I brought all kinds of survival equipment with me, so let’s see if any of it survived the crash.” Kim kept looking around her, failing to pierce the black veil of the cavern. “Shego, could you fire up our plasma flame? That should be plenty of light.”
“I… I can’t.”
This made Kim pause. “Are you sure that you’re not hurt? Is there gas down here?” Kim sniffed the air but couldn’t smell anything that might explode if Shego ‘lit up’.
“No, I said I’m fine… but… I can’t generate any plasma, no matter how hard I concentrate.”
Puzzled, Kim groped in the darkness for Shego, wanting nothing more than to embrace her lover. She located Shego, the other woman standing just next to Kim, but Shego was rigid, and seemed unwilling to accept the embrace.
“What then? What is wrong?”
“First, you tell me, what in the HELL made you decide to come down here after me? This isn’t your job anymore, Kimmie… you are the mother to our children! Who will look after them if something happens to us?!?”
Shego was almost yelling now, the anger in her voice shocking Kim as it echoed within the confined space and came back at her from all sides.
Feeling that her decision to assist in the rescue had been sound, Kim felt a little defensive.
“Hey, who did this sort of thing everyday of the week, and sometimes twice on Sundays? I saw a news report of you in combat with those critters… I was watching the news and thought I had just watched you DIE! There was no way that I could NOT help to save you… ” Kim felt the heat of her own anger rising. “Even Dr. Director and Agent Du agreed that I was the best suited or this mission!”
“Never everyday of the week, Princess. You had to go to cheerleading practice, remember?” Shego was taunting her now, just like the old days, with words selected to cut like razors. “I’m the one that made her living by getting myself into, and out of, dangerous scrapes. Some rescue mission… now we’re both trapped down here!”
Even without the viewer over here face, Kim was seeing red.
“Did it ever occur to you, Princess, that maybe ‘GJ’ was just hoping to keep you out of their hair? That you might make a bigger mess from being out of practice for so long? That now our children will be alone… have to be raised by strangers… hey, OOW!!”
Still holding her spouse tightly, Kim’s embrace had turned into a viscous clench. With all her strength, Kim pushed Shego away from her. Shego must have lost her footing in the inky blackness because Kim heard the clattering of stones as Shego slipped and fell over.
“They are not strangers, they are my PARENTS and they love those children and they love you and… and why would you say such… such horrible things like that?” Kim’s legs became weak with anguish and frustration and she sank down to the floor of the cavern. She began to weep.
Shego followed the sound to its source and gently enfolded Kim in her arms.
“Get AWAY from me!” cried Kim through her tears.
Shego did not move away from Kim, nor did she let go.
“Kimmie, Kimmie… I am so, so sorry. Please, please, please… ” Shego began rocking the both back and forth, like an infant in a cradle. “Please forgive me.”
The rocking and the warmth of Shego’s body spoke volumes to the scared and angry little girl buried as deep in Kim’s psyche as they were both literally buried in the earth. Kim let herself be coddled without returning the gesture.
“At least shut up, then, if you won’t get away from me.”
“Forgive, forgive, forgive… ” The voice was barely a whisper; Kim knew she heard tears in Shego’s voice this time. They remained in the darkness, holding each other as if their souls depended on it, rocking like frightened children.
After what could have been minutes or hours, Kim raised her head and found Shego’s mouth with her own. Kim made the kiss short but heartfelt.
“Fancy meeting a girl like you in a place like this.”
“Still love me?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Shrew.”
“Hag.”
“Bitch.”
“… poopie head.”
“Judas PRIEST, Princess, you never could swear.” Shego punctuated their embrace with a firm squeeze and let go of her wife. They moved apart but held hands in the darkness.
Shego began to think of their immediate situation. “Let’s see if we can salvage any of the stuff that you brought down with you. I couldn’t see much of your entrance, but was that a surfboard I saw you riding? It shot out a flame that lit up everything for a second or two.”
“Yep, and it’s probably the most important piece of equipment I had, except for the viewer.” This made Kim pause. “Exactly what did you mean when you said that your plasma wouldn’t generate?”
Shego was silent for a moment. “Well” she sighed. “It’s like this: you know that my ability to generate plasma fields with my hands is fueled by my body’s ability to store and convert ultraviolet radiation, primarily from the sun, right?”
“That’s the textbook answer, but yeah, sure. And?”
“Well, you were watching me fight those creatures on the news, right? Believe me, I wasn’t sparing the horses on that fight, let me tell you… ” Shego lifted Kim’s hand and gave it a little nibble. “Just like we used to go at it.”
“Don’t change the subject! What exactly is wrong?”
“What is wrong is that I’ve apparently used all of the energy that I’d stored recently. Usually just walking around in normal sunlight for a few minutes each day is enough to keep me going without a reduction in power, and sunbathing can keep me topped-off for days. But now it looks like I can’t even strike a match until we can find some sunlight. Which isn’t likely, down here… ” Shego lapsed into silence.
“Wait a minute. We’ve been together for how long and I didn’t know about this??”
“Hel-loo! Sworn enemies, bitter foes! We don’t tell each other about our ‘Achilles Heel’. Hel-loo!”
“That sucks.”
“Tell me about it. So, let’s see what equipment we can find in this dump… ”
After several minutes of blindly feeling about on the cavern floor, the women reached the conclusion that they were in dire straights. The ‘Moon Doggie’ board seemed intact, but since it had only thrust and no lift, they would have to carry it instead of riding it. The water-purification tablets were located, as were about half of the protein concentrates. The infrared viewer was definitely gone, and probably broken as well. The only other piece of equipment they could use was the wrist compass.
“We’re lucky to have what we found, Shego. It sounds like I hit pretty hard when I came down here.”
“You did, Princess. That rocket lit everything up like a flare. I thought… I though you were dead.”
Kim knew that even after all these years, Shego hated feeling ‘weak’ or ‘helpless’. These words, Kim also knew, where the closest that Shego ever came to admitting fear or defeat. Love and passion were to be had from by Shego in abundance, but only to a select few, namely her wife and children. Therefore, Kim saw no reason to make Shego suffer.
“Listen to me. We’re both alive and healthy. Will Du said that if we follow these caves, we would eventually find a path to the surface. And they can track our movements so they’ll know we’re OK when they see that we’re moving. Right?”
Shego made a noise of derision. “OK, little Miss Possible. How are we to find our way anywhere when we can’t see a blessed thing?”
Kim thought about that. “This is a good point. Let me think about that. Remember, anything’s possible for… ”
“Oh, for the love of Mike, please don’t start that again!”
To Be Continued…