Thief.
Such a strange thing to call one of the greatest criminals in the world. Thieving was such a minor crime compared to pretty much everything else and yet Shego, practically Public Enemy Number One always got classified as a thief. Then again, perhaps it was simply because 'thief' was so much easier to remember than 'accessory to failed attempts at taking over the world'.
Well… whatever.
Among all the things she was, thief was still one of them, which was why Dr. Drakken had sent her out to break into Kim Possible's house. The break-in had been remarkably easy. The security systems were a joke. It was as if the Possibles really didn't expect one of Kim's many and varied enemies to try and kill her in her own home.
Ah well. It made the job easier anyway.
The bedroom was dark, but Shego didn't mind. She didn't need much light to look by and anyway she could make her own light if she had to.
Quietly, Shego walked to the bed and the sleeping figure of her arch-foe. She was struck for a moment by how young she looked. With all the fighting and the snarking and the saving of the world it was easy to forget Kim hadn't even reach college yet. But as she lay sleeping, hugging her little stuffed toy to her chest, her face had a girlish innocence that made it hard to believe this was also the girl who fought and snarked and saved the world.
Well, back to business. Shego was here on a mission, and a mission that would totally ensure Kim Possible's ultimate defeat and ultimate World Domination for Drakken. Or at least, that's what Drakken had said. At great length. Of course the blue-skinned yokel hadn't thought of the fact that, if Shego had to break into Kim's room at night anyway she might as well kill the girl. That would've been the ulimate defeat of Kim Possible.
Of course, Drakken hadn't thought of that and Shego was kind of glad he hadn't. The world wouldn't be as much fun if it didn't have a Kim Possible to fight. And besides, she wasn't a murderer.
She was a thief.
The room was large and barely lit. The only light that was there was aimed at a tube filled with some kind of liquid and the naked body of Kim Possible. Drakken walked around the tube, smiling, rubbing his hands. Shego was sitting in a chair in the shadows, filing her nails.
“Perfect, perfect,” Drakken said.
“Told you I could get it,” said Shego.
“I had no doubt,” said Drakken. “Soon it will be complete. The perfect cl-” He stopped suddenly and stared at the body floating in the tube.
“What?” said Shego. “Something wrong?”
“Yes,” said Drakken. “This is not a perfect clone of Kim Possible.”
“Really?” said Shego. “Why do you think so?”
“Kim Possible has a very obvious birthmark on her… her… somewhere below her belly-button.”
“How do you know that?” Shego said.
“I saw it on… err… somewhere… on the internet, you know.”
“Uh, Dr. D., you do know all that Kim Possible porn on the internet is just photoshopped, right?”
“It is? I- I mean, I…”
“Oh goddammit Dr. D. I was only joking,” Shego said. “I really don't need to know about your surfing habits.”
Drakken cleared his throat. “Yes, well, uhm, so this is the perfect clone of Kim Possible after all, yes?”
“Who knows?” said Shego. “Personally I hope not because that'd mean there'll be two Kims out there saving the world.” Shego paused to consider that sentence. “Actually, that might not be so bad.”
“No, no, Shego, that's quite impossible,” said Drakken. “Everybody knows that when a good person is cloned the clone is evil.”
“Yeah?” said Shego. “How does that happen?”
“It just does!” said Drakken. “It's just one of the rules of cloning.”
“Uh-huh,” said Shego.
“Ah you'll see. Once I have my perfect, and evil, clone of Kim Possible you and her together can defeat Kim Possible and then the world will be mine! Ahahaha!” Drakken laughed.
“Yeah, big whoop,” Shego said.
Ron Stoppable was pretty sure today was gonna be a good day. The sun was shining, his buddy Rufus was with him and da ladies… were ignoring him actually, but at least they weren't obviously laughing at him behind his back so it was all of the good.
Unfortunately, it was still a school day, but hey.
“Hey KP,” said Ron, as he reached his locker. “Nice day, huh?”
Kim looked at him strangely for less than a second. “Oh, Ron, hi, yeah. Yeah it's pretty nice, I guess.”
“I for one am all set up for a nice afternoon on the beach. Or at least I would if there were any beach nearby. Hey, what's with the outfit?”
“What about the outfit?” Kim asked.
“Never seen it before. Went a bit shopping crazy yesterday?”
“Actually…” Kim said. “Never mind, you wouldn't believe me. Anyway, have you… no, never mind about that either. Look, Ron, I gotta go. See you in class, OK?”
“Sure KP.”
Ron opened his locker and fiddled around with the books. He wasn't quite sure which books he needed right now and which ones he didn't, but he had never let that stop him before and he wasn't about to start now.
“Hey Ron.”
Ron looked. “Oh hey KP.”
“Nice day don't you think?”
“Uh… yeah.” Something that had been hammering in Ron's brain for the last two seconds finally broke through. “Hey, how'd you change your outfit that fast?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Kim! Good to see you!”
Ron turned around. And there was Kim, walking up to them.
“KP, are you seeing what I'm seeing?”
“Possibly,” said Kim.
“Hey,” said Kim, stopping just short of them and raising her hand in greeting. “I'm your clone.”
“OK, so here I am, right? I don't even have a mind yet, I don't think I had a body and then I had a thought. You know, where am I, who am I? And then I remember I'm Kim Possible. But I don't know who Kim Possible is until a few moments later when all these memories start trickling in. And then I start becoming aware of my surroundings, right? The warm… water I guess all around me. And through the liquid come the voices of Drakken and Shego, whispering about something.”
“Yeah?” said Ron, chin in hand, eyes wide with fascination. “What were they talking about?”
“Internet porn,” said Kim.
“What?” said Ron.
“OK, that's… fascinating,” said Kim. “But how'd you escape?”
“Well…” Kim started.
“OK people, shut your pieholes,” Mr. Barkin bellowed as he walked in. “Yesterday, your History teacher Miss Chamblers eloped to Canada with your Biology teacher Miss Evans, so I'll be covering both their classes. And to prevent wasting too much time on the subject, we'll be talking about the voyage of the Beagle until we find new teachers. Any questions?”
One hand was carefully raised.
“Stoppable,” Barkin sighed.
“Why Canada? Isn't it terribly cold up there?”
Barkin gave him a long look. “OK people, roll call. Bonnie Rockwaller?”
“Here.”
“Justine Flanner?”
“Present as always.”
“Kim Possible.”
“Here.”
“Present.”
Barkin looked at Kim and then at Kim. “Aow,” he moaned.
“So… Drakken cloned you as a part in his plan to take over the world,” said Kim.
Kim often enjoyed walking home alone, especially on nice days where she could enjoy the sunshine. But today she was walking home with only herself, yet she wasn't alone. It was a nice feeling, actually. Weird, but… nice.
“Yeah,” said Kim. “He apparently expected me to be your evil counterpart or something. Which obviously didn't happen. He was a bit surprised by that, to be honest.”
“I can imagine,” said Kim. “So then you escaped?”
“Yeah. Getting past Drakken was easy and Shego just didn't put up a fight at all for some reason.”
“Really? That's not like Shego.”
“I'm sure she had her reasons,” said Kim. “Anyway, I think I managed to get into Shego's bedroom, grabbed some clothes, jumped out the window and here I am.”
“Those clothes are Shego's?” Kim asked.
“Yeah,” said Kim.
“But they look so nice.”
“Amazing, isn't it? Apparenltly Shego owns clothes that aren't green-and-black jumpsuits.”
“Weird,” said Kim.
“Don't I know it,” said Kim. “Anyway, now that Plan Me failed, I'm pretty sure Drakken is gonna hatch some other scheme to take over the world pretty soon.”
“Ah, we'll stop him,” said Kim.
“You're probably right,” said Kim.
Kim opened the back door and let Kim into the Possible home kitchen. Dr. Possible sat at the kitchen table, newspaper in one hand, cup of coffee in the other.
“Hey dad,” said Kim.
“Hello Kimmie,” said Dr. Possible.
“Hi,” said Kim.
“Hello Kimmie,” said Dr. Possible.
Both Kims waited for a moment to see if anything else was forthcoming, but the only thing they saw was their father taking a sip of his coffee. Kim looked at Kim, shrugged and motioned with her head to follow her.
“So should we both do our homework once or seperately?” Kim asked as she walked up the stairs.
“I'm not sure,” said Kim. “I think we should both do homework. Don't want to risk detention.”
“Ah, it'll be OK,” said Kim.
“Yeah, everyone's gonna live happily ever after. Oh, wait, that's just fairytales.”
Kim stood frozen, the doorknob of the opened bedroom door in her hand, Kim behind, Shego in front of her, on the bed.
“Shego,” said Kim.
“That's me,” said Shego. “And I'm here to take back what's mine.”
“I'm not going to help Drakken do anything,” Kim growled.
“You always think it's all about you,” said Shego. “I just want my clothes back, that's all.”
“That's all?” said Kim.
“Cross my heart,” said Shego. “Girl scout's honour.”
“You don't have any honour,” said Kim.
“You're right, I'm a thief,” said Shego. “Clone girl over there isn't. Gimme my clothes back.”
“Look, Shego, she won't just-”
Kim's sentence was suddenly interrupted when she saw Shego's clothes being flung past her.
Shego grinned. “Thanks, Princess. You know, you look a lot hotter in natural light instead of inside that stupid tube.”
“Go. Now,” said Kim.
“See you around Princess. And Princess.”
Shego stood up, gathered clothes and sauntered towards the window.
“I know you may not believe me, but I really did come here just to get my clothes back. But while we were having this pleasant chat, Dr. D…”
Kim's Kimmunicator suddenly started beeping like mad.
“Well, I'll let the nerdlinger fill you in,” said Shego. “Later.”
And with that she was out the window and gone.