Chapter Text
Different Beginnings
Part 1
Kim Possible, college freshman and babysitter extraordinaire stood in line at the main branch of Upperton Central Bank, all the papers she needed to open an account in hand. It had been quite a fight to convince her parents to let her attend college away from home, and another to convince them it would be a good experience to handle her own finances, even if most of the money still came from them. But Kim was persistent, resourceful, and capable enough to wear her parents down on both fronts.
It helped that she had a lot of experience managing a hectic lifestyle. During High School she was captain of the Cheer Squad, an ace student, and a fledgling entrepreneur with a website where she took on babysitting gigs and the occasional odd job. Even further back she tried anything she could, from intramural sports to martial arts, and science fairs to scholastic competitions. She excelled at almost everything, except when she tried to cook in a disastrous Home-Ec class. Yet for all the challenges she took and all the new things she tried Kim always felt there was more for her to do.
Occasionally she thought back to an early hit on her website, a request to stop a villainous plot. The only issue was that she was a teenager and needed her parents permission to go to the Middleton Mall, let alone halfway around the world. When she asked they refused, despite her best puppy-dog pout, saying it was too dangerous. After that she had to limit the scope of her site, and she felt the pang of an opportunity lost. But that pang also made her push so hard to attend a college away from home and to seek out more independence. She didn’t want to miss another.
She almost regretted that thought when a chunk of the ceiling vanished in an explosion which covered her and the other customers in dust. She dove away from the raining debris and heard rope hitting the floor. When she looked back there were jumpsuit-ed men aiming guns into the crowd. They fired and Kim dove again but instead of gunshots she heard only bursts of compressed air. At least these men weren’t wantonly killing innocent people.
“Make sure you get everyone men. Shego get the safe,” a high, grating male voice yelled over the panicked crowd.
“I know Dr. D, this isn’t my first bank robbery,” a woman’s voice answered.
Kim stayed down. She hadn’t been hit by a dart but she could tell from different pleas and screams that the men were going around and getting anyone they missed in their first volley. Her mind raced and she spotted a dart on the ground nearby. It looked like it was intact and the tip was still covered in some kind of liquid. She heard heavy footsteps beside her. She looked up and locked eyes with one of the men who had rappelled in.
“Nighty-night,” he said with a gruff voice.
Her body moved on instinct. Her arms pushed her to a squat just as a dart whizzed by her then her legs sprang her forward into a roll. She grabbed the dart she had spotted earlier on the way and when she got to her feet she spun and threw it. It lodged into the mans chest and he looked at it in surprise before collapsing.
The other men noticed one of their own going down and moved to surround her. She backflipped over the bank’s front counter where the tellers usually stood just as a hail of darts were fired. She heard a series of thuds as the darts hit the counter and she took stock of her situation. There were half a dozen large, armed men on the other side of her temporary cover and she was unarmed and alone. Perfect.
“Go flush her out,” she heard from the other side of the counter.
If they were going to split their force she would welcome it. She darted towards the sound of footsteps, making sure to keep herself out of sight.
“Come ‘ere, girlie,” a voice said, close enough for Kim to strike.
She did, springing up and vaulting over the counter a second time. A punch to the man’s stomach left him hunched over and Kim took a moment to relieve him of his dart gun. She dropped an elbow to the back of his neck and he dropped to the ground unconscious. She dodged another hail of darts and leapt back behind the counter.
“SHEGO!” the same annoying voice from before bellowed. “Get out here!”
“Kinda busy Dr. D,” the annoyed reply.
“We’re losing men!”
This Dr. D was calling for reinforcements, and Kim knew she didn’t have long before this Shego person showed up. She grabbed a ream of paper and threw it into the air to her right. Another hail of darts pierced the floating paper but she was up and dashing to her left. She aimed her stolen dart gun and fired once, twice three times and three of the men dropped. Her gun clicked empty leaving two still standing.
She closed the distance and threw the empty gun at the man farther away. It clocked him on the head and he muttered to himself as he rubbed the spot. But if he was busy doing that then he wasn’t helping his ally who lunged at Kim. Kim jumped up and over her attacker and kicked his head as she went by. The thud she heard assured her there was only one man left.
She ducked a wild swing and used her momentum to roll past the last man. She kicked out and hit the back of his knee, and as he fell backwards she used his momentum to throw him across the room. He landed face down and stayed there.
“You think you’re all that, but you’re not,” said the annoying voice again. That must be Dr. D, and he was there, above her in some kind of hovercraft. His skin was a shade of blue that didn’t look healthy. He had a tuft of hair rising up from his forehead and a thin short ponytail. A noticeable scar ran from his nose to the edge of his mouth under his left eye. Despite his strange appearance he looked familiar. Something she had seen on tv a few years before. But the details didn’t come to her.
“I don’t know, your men might say something different,” she said defiantly.
Before he could respond a woman leapt into the room. She was tall with long black hair and bright green eyes. Her skin was a pale green and she was wearing a form-fitting cat suit in green slashed with black. She wore a small pouch at her ankle. That would be Shego.
“Who cares what a bunch of nobodies think,” Shego said. “I’ll be the judge of Pumpkin here.”
Face to face with Shego, Kim suddenly remembered where she had seen these two before. Every so often some wannabe world conquerer would hit the news for some crazy plot, and these two had done so a few times. Giant robots, doomsday lasers, mind control, they had tried almost every supervillain cliché, though they always seemed to fail on their own at critical moments. Kim smiled. No wonder the goons had been so easy to beat. And this Shego would probably go down easily too.
Then Shego jumped into action and Kim had to fight for her life. Whatever caused these two to fail, it wasn’t the woman trying to claw her face off. She was fast and she hit hard. But Kim was faster and was no slouch when it came to power. She gave as good as she got. Better even, when she incorporated a split into the fight to dodge an attack and get a free shot at Shego. The other woman went down, but not for long. She rolled backwards, regained her feet, growled and her hands began to glow green.
None of Kim’s martial arts lessons prepared her for an opponent with glowing hands, and after Shego got close and narrowly missed taking her head off she realized that the glow burned as well. Kim backed away quickly, throwing whatever she could get her hands on at Shego to give her space and time to think of a plan. Shego was not inclined to give her either and chased her around the entirety of the bank. She would have to distract the other woman another way- or goad her into a mistake.
Kim grabbed a chair as she ran past it and turned and hurled it at Shego. The other woman batted it aside but Kim used it as cover to get in close and deliver a kick. She sprang away before the other woman could recover and smiled at her.
“So, how does ’Pumpkin’ rate? Because so far, you’re not much different from the guys I already beat.”
Shego rubbed her stomach and glared. “So far you’re nothing but cheap tricks.”
“Funny, I don’t see my hands glowing green.”
“That trick ain’t cheap.”
“Could have fooled me. All it’s done so far is help me warm up- and I need to, since fighting you has been-”
Kim didn’t get to finish her sentence because Shego growled and launched herself at Kim. That was exactly what Kim wanted. An angry opponent was a stupid opponent, prone to making mistakes. And she didn’t have to dodge long before she spotted one. Both of the other woman’s hands reached for Kim leaving her torso unprotected. Kim dropped under the hands and launched a flurry of punches into the unguarded stomach, ribs, and chest. She heard the breath driven from the other woman who managed to stagger back.
Kim was about to move in for another assault when Shego pushed her arms forward and the glow flew at her. She had to dodge and give ground again instead. The plasma smashed against a wall with a flash, leaving behind scorch marks and crumbling drywall. A direct hit might not be lethal, but would certainly be unpleasant. That glow was definitely not a cheap trick.
“Do I have to do everything myself?” Dr. D’s voice interrupted.
He was behind Kim holding one of the dropped dart guns. He must have come down from his hovercraft during their fight. Not good. Fighting Shego was difficult despite her bravado, someone trying to put her down with a tranquilizer would certainly tip the scales against her.
“When do you do anything?” Shego asked sarcastically.
Then Dr. D fired and the dart whizzed past Kim with plenty of room to spare. Shego could only stare, dumbstruck, as it hit her instead.
“That wasn’t even close,” she managed to say before falling to the ground.
Kim turned to face the blue man. He tried to fire but the gun was empty. Kim smirked.
“Looks like it’s just you and me, Dr. D.”
He gulped as Kim advanced on him.
The police were confused when a lone red-headed girl led a complaining villain out of the Upperton Central Bank. They listened to her story but didn’t believe it until they saw the tapes for themselves, and even then it was only with difficulty. But the press ate it up. An attractive young woman taking on a group of villains by herself and coming out on top was the stuff of Hollywood, so to have a real-life example left them salivating.
But Kim didn’t care what the police or the press thought. She had been exposed to a world she thought shut off form her. Despite the danger she had loved every second, e specially that fight with Shego. It felt exactly like what she had been missing in life. She could only hope she would get the chance to do it again.