Kim Possible
Trial by Flyer

by Cyberwraith9



In the collective history of mankind’s hatred, no eyes had glared as balefully as those narrowed at the couple kissing in the middle of the dance floor.  If looks could kill, hers would have struck the two teenagers dead, thwarting their transparent ploy to humiliate her in front of the entire prom.  Twin opals smoldered and blackened inside of her sockets, flaring into full infernos as the couple parted to stare longingly at each other.

But Bonnie Rockwaller didn’t concern herself with her record-setting frown, or her again-ex boyfriend, who was off sharing a dance with Monique What’s-Her-Face.  Instead, she watched her arch rival dive into the arms of the school’s favorite walking joke, and choked down on her rising bile as the insufferable pair locked lips once more.

“Losers,” she muttered under her breath.  Her mumbled slight didn’t affect the kiss in the least; Kim Possible and Ron Stoppable continued their embrace on the dance floor, oblivious to the world around them.  If possible, their ignorance made her ire grow further still, trembling in her arms and churning in her stomach.

This was supposed to be her night.  Hers.  Brick would walk her into the dance, sweep her across the floor, and all eyes would be on her.  Dress selection; makeup; hair; nails; coordination; a month’s worth of work had made this night hers.  And then that redheaded upstart and her loser lapdog waltzed in at the last minute, stealing the whole show.  One little gesture – two hands intertwined – had made sure that the whole school would be talking about them come Monday morning.  Them.  Not her.

And then, an idea found Bonnie in the clutches of her green-eyed monster, an idea delicious enough to free her in one fell swoop.  Anger fled from her in terror at the idea, leaving a smile to blossom slowly in its place.  Without a moment wasted, she plumbed the depths of her teeny purse until she found her prize and drew it out.  A compact digital camera rose in her grasp, and settled its lens on the lip-locked couple while a fiendish eye glinted at them through its viewfinder.

“You want to be the center of attention?” Bonnie murmured.  Her only answer was the click of her camera.  “Fine,” she answered herself.  “Wish granted.”

*        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *
Unmitigated joy floated through Middleton High School in the guise of a teenaged boy.  His freckles danced atop a smile threatening to split his face in twain.  Straw hair bobbing, he danced from hall to hall.  The odd looks he garnered did nothing to stifle his mood.  In fact, it was all he could do to not sing the words swelling in his chest: I’m Kim Possible’s boyfriend, look at me!

“Good morning,” he said instead, tipping an imaginary hat to a gaggle of giggling girls.  “Hello!” he called to a burly sack of muscle growing at his exuberance.  “See you for the noon swirlie?  Bon-diggity!”  Ron grasped the straps of his backpack and swooned, spinning through the hall in an erratic path that sent other students scattering.  Closing his eyes, he pirouetted into a solid wall of a man.  Addled instinct led him to lean on the tall figure and tilt his chin up as he opened his eyes.  “Hey-dee-ho, Mister B.  How’s the weather up there?”

Steve Barkin glared down at his headache personified, feeling that familiar throb tense at his temples.  His lantern jaw clenched as a beetle brow overshadowed his eyes.  “Stoppable,” Barkin growled, “If you’re trying to resign from the proud ranks of manhood, there are easier ways of doing it.  Ways that don’t involve dancing like a brain-damaged caribou.”

“Not today,” said Ron, laughing.  He elbowed Barkin, making the enormous man’s eyes go wide with astonishment.  “Haven’t you ever felt like dancing?”

Regaining his composure, Barkin redoubled his scowl.  He pulled Ron from his chest and placed him firmly at an acceptable distance away.  “There are only three times in a man’s life when he may dance, Stoppable,” he lectured the goofy blond.  Ticking the choices on his fingers, he said, “At his wedding, at his daughter’s wedding, and after a touchdown.  So unless your secret lovechild just became engaged, or I’ve been grossly underestimating your athletic ability, you need to man up.”

Astonishingly enough, Barkin’s threat was dismissed with another laugh.  “Can’t help myself, Mister B.”  Twirling away, Ron called back, “I’ve got a girlfriend!”

“You’re dancing on thin ice, mister!” Barkin bellowed after him.

Ron hardly heard the threat above his own heartbeat.  A familiar locker lay just steps in front of him, with its door opened to block his view of the lithe figure leaned inside of it.  He could see her capri-clad legs and shapely bottom beneath the edge of the locker door, and felt his heart leap into overdrive.  Taking a moment, Ron funneled a deep breath through his chest, and tried (unsuccessfully) to tame the mess atop his head.  Then, puffed with glass courage, he sauntered around the open door and draped himself against the locker adjacent.  “And the very best of mornings to you, Miss Kimberly Anne,” he sang.

“I’m not so certain about this, Kim,” Wade’s voice floated out of Kim’s locker.  Kim stared in at the computer monitor, wearing a sobering mask.  From the looks of things, she hadn’t noticed Ron’s arrival.  “I mean, there are serious ethical ramifications,” continued Wade.

Kim’s sculpted brows dropped like stones.  “Wade,” she said through clenched teeth, “Barring all the other things I’ve done, I just spent my Prom weekend stopping kids’ meal toys from rampaging across the planet.  I think I’ve earned a trip into an ethical gray area!”

The good mood on Ron’s face drained away as Kim continued to ignore him.  “Since when do we keep score on world saving?” asked Wade.

A piece of paper flapped in Kim’s hand, waving too fast for Ron to see.  Her face coiled into a scowl as she shook the paper at her computer monitor.  “You never had a problem hacking for justice before, Wade.”

“Um, yeah.  For ‘justice.’  Which this isn’t.”  Sidling over, Ron glimpsed Wade’s sour face over Kim’s shoulder.  The boy genius wore a stubborn look culled from years of working with Kim.  “Besides, I hack mainframes and government files, not personal emails.”

The rising volume of their voices set Ron’s ragged nerves on edge as he leapt into mission mode.  He leaned in and touched Kim’s shoulder.  “KP, what’s the sitch?”

Kim stiffened and spun at Ron, startled out of her argument.  “Ron!” she cried, and slammed her locker shut.  Wade’s protest fell short as the computer shut off automatically inside.  Stumbling back, Kim whisked the crumpled paper behind her back.  “Hey,” she said, smiling uneasily.  “Hi, Ron.  I, um, didn’t see you there.”  When Ron stepped toward her, she backpedaled again.

“Yeah,” said Ron, shuffling back before Kim broke and ran.  “Must’ve been hard to hear me through all the shouting.”

“Shouting?”  Kim looked around, cringing at the curious gazes around her that fled from her notice.  In a forced hush, she said, “Oh.  Shouting.”  The crinkle in her clenched fist sounded deafening in her reddened ears.

Ron felt his focus slipping as Kim’s hair sashayed around her shoulders.  “What’s with the memo?  Cuts in the Team Possible pants budget?  I’d be angry too.”

“Huh?”

His fingers circled around Kim, much to her chagrin.  Kim had to fight an urge to retreat as she felt Ron tug on her clutched secret.  “The paper,” he said, leaning dangerously close.  Minty brushed breath rolled across Kim’s face, spilling out of his wry grin.  “This paper.  The paper that...”  He frowned, tugging harder.  The paper stayed put.  “...that you’re pretty attached to.”

Tortured defeat wrung Kim’s face as she let Ron pull the paper from her grasp.  “Ron,” she moaned, cringing harder at his unsuspecting smile, “It’s nothing.  Honest.  You shouldn’t—“

But Ron wasn’t listening.  His carefree expression trickled away as he unfurled the sheet.  A hazy image of him and Kim at the Prom sat in the middle of the page; the photogenic pair stood lip-locked in the middle of the dance floor. That alone would have been fine, but the text sandwiching the picture set Ron’s teeth audibly on edge:

                                                       Losers in Love
                                                  How Long Can It Last?

                                    Enter by email at bstonewall@cutemail.com
                                    Pick the day.  When they split, you win big!

A moment of unbearable silence crawled by as Kim watched her new beau process the odd paper with their portrait.  She bit her lip as he turned it left and right, studying it from every angle through a confused expression.  “I don’t get it.  Is this some kind of prank?”

Kim’s face collapsed into her hand, aghast with his density.  “Ron, it’s a pool!”  With her free hand, Kim pointed down the hall opposite the one from which Ron had entered.  Exact copies of the flyer Ron held littered the walls and lockers, giving Middleton High panoramic evidence of the teens’ budding relationship.  As Ron followed Kim’s finger, he saw scattered strings of their classmates gathered around the flyers.  They cast furtive glances at the pair, whispering as they tried to stare without appearing to stare.  Kim reddened at the attention, throwing a challenging look down the hall.  “The whole school’s trying to guess when we’re going to break up.”

Ron’s tilted expression turned to their audience as Kim’s glare cowed the crowd into dispersal.  “What a weird thing to bet on,” he said, glancing back at the flyer.  With a small smile, he added, “Choice picture, though.”  As Kim’s smoldering glare swung onto him, he dropped his smirk for a serious look.  “I mean, who would do such a heinous thing?”

“Who else?” snapped Kim.  She snatched the paper from his hands and crushed it in her fist.  “Bee Stonewall my butt.  Ooh,” she hissed, slamming the paper wad into her locker door, “When I get my hands on that smug little shutterbug, I am going to feed her that camera.”

“Amp down, KP,” Ron said.  In fourteen years of friendship, Ron had never before been afraid of Kim’s infrequent temper.  He didn’t like the feeling.  “So Bonnie’s up to her old tricks.  No big.”  He slipped behind Kim as she leaned on her locker, and clasped her by the shoulders, kneading the iron knots in her neck.  “You’re above that, right?”

Kim deflated beneath his hands, letting her pent-up breath whistle through her teeth.  “Are you always going to be this annoyingly supportive as a boyfriend?” she asked him in a wry voice.

“Anything’s possible,” she heard whispered in her ear.  Hot breath tickled her neck as Kim felt Ron leaning in toward her cheek.  Panic swelled in her heart as she felt a thousand laughing eyes bearing down on them, and she spun away from his gentle grasp.  Ron’s pucker hung on his face, unspent, as a disappointed look pooled around it.

Flustered, Kim backed away, rubbing her neck.  “Hey, um,” she stammered, “We should probably keep that to a minimum.  Don’t need to give Mister Barkin any more excuses to give you detention, right?”

Ron, who didn’t give two flips about Barkin or his yellow slips, offered her a dull nod.  “Sure thing,” he said, and watched her go without another word.  Once she’d disappeared around the corner, he turned the other way and walked to class on leaden feet that had suddenly forgotten how to dance.

*        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *        *
“You looked pretty sloppy out there, K.”

Kim felt her toes curl against the locker room floor as her hands compacted into trembling, whitened hammers.  She kept her eyes locked on her locker, avoiding the smug look she knew waited behind her.  A dozen retorts crouched on her sharp tongue, held at bay by the uproarious grinding of her own teeth.  All of cheer practice, Kim had held her temper in check; what cruel god asked her to do the same after practice as well?

“Guess I’ve been a little distracted, B,” Kim replied without turning around.  She peeled away her sticky cheer top, shaking her hair free as it rolled out of the collar.  The act of undressing gave Kim a moment to catch her breath in deep, slow draws, allowing the color to drain back into her knuckles.  “In case you didn’t notice, she added testily, loosening her skirt, “There’s a smear campaign against me and Ron.”

The serpentine smile on Bonnie’s lips slithered with delight as she shucked her cheer uniform.  “What,” she asked with an air of innocence, “That harmless little joke?”  Trading her sports bra for a more daring model, she said, “I’m sure someone’s just having a little fun, that’s all.”

Both rivals could feel their teammates’ growing interest in the back-to-back face-off.  It irritated Kim to know that Bonnie was still getting the attention she desired, and that Kim as only making it worse by indulging Bonnie’s snide little comments.  But her mouth, unsatisfied by her maturity’s desire for the high road, raged its own war.  “Seems kind of pathetic,” countered Kim.  Sliding into her blouse, she said sightlessly, “I mean, somebody must be pretty bored and lonely to go to all that effort.”

The sound of seething rewarded Kim’s pettiness as her ears popped out the blouse’s collar.  “Huh.  That’s actually the word that came to mind when I saw the flyer, Kim.”  With diminished smugness, Bonnie glanced back and said, “Pathetic.”

“Really,” remarked Kim.  Her icy tone masked the lake of lava she felt rising in her stomach.

Dressed and composed, Bonnie watched Kim slide into her jeans.  “Oh, don’t get me wrong.  I’m sure Ron has his own special...charms,” she said, indulging in a silent gag.  “The two of you even look a little cute together.”  Another pause.  Another stealthy gag.  “But come on,” she said, adopting a faux-concerned look as Kim finally glanced back, “You don’t really think this is going to last, do you?”

Kim stuck her nose in the air as he swept her uniform into her locker.  “I don’t know if it will or won’t, Bonnie,” she answered honestly.  “I just don’t see why it should be everybody else’s business.”

Seated several lockers down, Tara finished lacing her shoes with a masked look of disgust.  She’d listened to Bonnie poke and prod Kim about those flyers all through practice, and had more than her fill of it by now.  It disappointed her to see Kim caving in to Bonnie’s challenge, even though she couldn’t believe Kim had lasted so long.  

Keeping her back to the bickering pair, Tara hefted her gym bag and strode out of the locker room at a quick pace.  Once out the door, she almost collided with the last person she expected to see.  “Ron?”

Ron stumbled back, breaking his anxious pacing in front of the girls’ locker room.  “Tara!  Hey,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck.  He looked around in the uncomfortable quiet that followed, and then said, “Look, I know I’ve said this before, but I have a totally good reason for hanging outside of the locker room.”

Tara couldn’t help but titter.  “I’m sure,” she said, believing him for once.  The fretful look on his face soon banished her good humor.  A question sat perched on her lips, but his hangdog expression answered it before she could ask.  She swallowed a platitude, and instead offered him a consoling smile.  “You look a little rough.”

“Bad day,” he muttered, coming back with a waxy grin.  “About to get worse.  How ‘bout you?”

She didn’t answer.  Instead, she momentarily pushed aside her blossoming romance with Josh Mankey, and recalled the things about Ron that had tickled her fancy.  There were more than she’d remembered, as well as a few new ones that his new girlfriend undoubtedly drew out of him.  “Meeting Josh and the gang for a movie.  I’d better jet.”  As she stepped around him, she paused and turned back.  “I didn’t enter the pool, Ron.”

“Oh.  Thanks?” Ron said, confused.

“I just thought you should know,” she said.  Glancing back at the door, Tara added, “You might not want to be here when they get out.”

Ron traded mechanical goodbyes with Tara as she left, staring at the mysterious and foreboding door.  Voices belonging to Tara’s ‘they’ rose to breach the barrier, teasing Ron with snatches of their argument.  Unable to resist, he tiptoed to the locker room door and pressed his ear to its cool, cracking paint.

“Maybe girls whose boyfriends just dumped them shouldn’t be passing judgment on other people’s boyfriends,” Kim snapped.  She yanked a sweaty duffle bag from her locker, struggling with its strap as it caught on the inside lock.  Her red face flushed full crimson with frustration, and she yanked again.

Bonnie smirked.  “No need to get huffy, Kim,” she insisted in a breezy tone.  “I just think you could do better on the rebound market, that’s all.”

The thin line of patience keeping Kim’s anger in check cracked as her innards froze solid.  “What did you say?” she asked coolly.

“What?” Bonnie asked with a shrug.  “I’m just saying, you—“

The rest of her veiled insult rushed out of her amidst a grunt as Bonnie caught a bulging duffle bag in the stomach.  She staggered back with the blow, falling against the row of lockers behind her.  Before she could muster breath for a squeak, a pair of hands slammed into the lockers with a deafening clang, bracketing her head.

Kim’s face shuffled into focus mere inches from Bonnie’s lolling eyes.  “Congratulations,” Kim snarled.  “I’ve been fighting megalomaniacs since I was in braces, but you’re the first person to ever really piss me off.”

“Get off, freak!” shouted Bonnie.  She tried shoving Kim off, and found herself powerless against iron muscles tempered with rage.  When she tried to rise, Kim’s lightning hands shoved her back against the lockers, jarring the bravado out of her.  The rest of the cheer squad watched with wide eyes and slacken jaws as their captain cornered Bonnie with a predatory look.  “You can’t do this to me!” squawked Bonnie.

“You know what, Bonnie?” Kim said loud enough for the rest of her team to hear.  “Go ahead and play your stupid little games.  I’m done letting you play me.”  She glanced back at the terrified girls, and added, “And I’m done being laughed at.”  Bonnie tried escaping in Kim’s moment of distraction, but the echoing clap of Kim’s fist on the lockers stopped her in her tracks.  “Ron isn’t a rebound.  He isn’t a placeholder.  Ron is my boyfriend.”

“I—“

“Shut it,” snapped Kim.  Bonnie’s jaw clicked shut.  “I don’t care what any of you think.  The only one here even remotely qualified to judge Ron as a boyfriend is me, and I happen to think he’s doing just fine.  Say whatever you want about me,” Kim announced, “But if I hear you say one thing – One.  Thing. – about Ron...”  Narrowing her eyes, she said, “Then you and I will have a problem.”

Bonnie swallowed, gasping for a voice.  “I’m not afraid of you,” she stammered.

“Why?  Because we’re already rivals?”  A frightening smile crept beneath Kim’s smoldering scowl.  “You want to find out what being Kim Possible’s enemy is like?  Try me,” she dared.  Bonnie said nothing, swallowing a retort in the face of the slumbering giant she’d awakened.  Kim stepped back, allowing Bonnie to scramble a safe distance away.  “Next time anyone feels like pulling another stunt like this,” she said to the entire room, “Just remember; you’ll be messing with my boyfriend.”  Her frightening smile widened, bearing its canines.  “And that would be pretty high on the Stupid Scale.”

The door fell open as Ron tumbled in, wailing and bouncing onto the floor.  His loud entrance shocked Kim’s gawkers into a frenzy.  They shrieked and covered themselves, retreating deeper into the locker room’s showers, leaving Kim and Bonnie to stare at the intruder picking himself off the floor.  Kim’s anger subsided, replaced by blushing horror as she realized what Ron had just overheard.

“Heh.  Ladies,” Ron said, giving them a nervous nod.  He let his gaze wander, unable to look Kim in the eye.  “This is a lot cleaner than I imagined.”

Kim’s duffle bashed him in the head, launched by Bonnie’s hand.  “Ron Stoppable, you perverted loser!” she yowled as Ron fell to the floor.  “Get out of here!”

Kim shoved Bonnie hard, knocking her aside, and strode to Ron’s aid.  “Are you okay?” she asked, helping him up.  “Did...did you hear...?”

True to form, Ron shook the hit off without effort.  He clasped Kim’s hand and allowed her to draw him up.  “Yes,” he said.  Then, blushing, he admitted, “...and yes.  Did....I mean, you meant it, right?”

Deep, dark insecurity glistened in Ron’s eyes, fanning the spark of shame burning in Kim’s stomach.  Her eyes plumbed the rest of him, searching for the answer somewhere in a face she knew better than hers.  Everything between them had happened so fast that she didn’t know how to act around Ron anymore.  She still felt unsure of herself, and of them.  But returning to Ron’s eyes, Kim found something beneath his uncertainty.  Its beauty, its loyalty, and its purity stole her breath away.

Kim brushed Ron’s face with her fingertips, leaning in close.  With no words to offer him, she pursed her lips and brought them to his.  Her hand cupped his chin, keeping him close, as though she feared he would disappear.  She needn’t have worried; an arm slid around her waist, pressing her close with a clammy hand against her back.  When their kiss broke and her eyes fluttered open, she found no doubt remaining between the crinkled lines of his smile.

Sweeping Kim to his side with one hand, Ron fished his pocket with the other.  “Hey, Bon-Bon,” he said, “Can I enter your pool, too?”  A crumpled bill emerged, clasped in his fingers.  He waggled the bill in her face and said, “Put me down for the day after you get a clue.”

Laughter rang in Kim’s lips as Ron dropped his money at Bonnie’s feet.  “He’s dorky,” she sang, leading Ron toward the door with an arm around him.  Ron thoughtfully stooped and slung her bag over his shoulder, giving Kim a moment to toss a smile over her shoulder and say, “But quite the gentleman.”

They pushed through the door, leaving Bonnie to fume alone.  Kim reveled in the little thrill she felt when Ron’s arm tightened around her.  “That was some tongue-lashing you gave Bonnie.  You have quite the mouth on you when the situation calls for it,” Ron said.  “I never knew that about you.”

“Maybe you don’t know me as well as you think,” Kim countered.  “Fourteen years isn’t so long, you know.  Besides,” she added, “Bonnie only got half of what she deserved for messing with my man.”

“So,” Ron asked, “Does this mean we’re going steady?”

An impish gleam lit Kim’s eyes as she collapsed against Ron’s side.  Her arms snared his elbow, clutching it like a possessive vice.  “Well,” she drawled, “I’d hate for anyone to win Bonnie’s stupid pool.  I guess I can keep you around for a little while.  Just on a trial basis, of course,” she added with somber tone and sober face.

Ron laughed and drew her close.  “Nice to see you keeping your perspective about all this,” he said.

Leaning on Ron’s arm, Kim kept a tiny smile all to herself.  “I’ve got my priorities straight,” she assured him, resting her head on his shoulder.

End