Chapter Two: Under My Skin
Shego stood outside in the snow-covered roof, wondering just what the hell she was doing. Freezing her ass off on the first story rooftop of a freaking cheerleader who'd been taking every opportunity to kill her boss's world domination schemes. A girl, a minor, a skinny-assed, flat-chested, redhead. A girl who just wouldn't leave her alone.
It had all started as a lark.
She'd been on the way to the Middleton Physics Lab when she'd spotted the Kimmie. The girl was walking into the local Tex-Mex cholesterol hell-hole, Bueno Nacho, with her doofus sidekick and another friend, a black girl. Shego smirked to herself, set the hoverpod down in stealth mode. She leapt onto the sombrero-styled rooftop, swung up to the post of the brightly lit sign, lay down on the dark metal frame and waited. An accomplished chi master, she felt the girl's aura step under the lip of the roof, and with a toss of her luxuriant black hair over a shoulder, she lifted her eyes above the edge of the sign. Pumpkin was reaching out for the door and pulled it open, but as she did, her head whipped about, her eyes narrowed, searching. Shego squinted to reduce the glare of the zigzagging neon light along the edge beneath her. Several times, the girl's eyes swept past where she lay.
“Yeah, just a sec, Ron, I need to check something!” Princess called into the restaurant in response to a question. The girl went around the back and stood near the dumpster, but quickly retreated as the smell of rancid grease got to her. She then backed into a tree and nearly tripped over the raised cement wall the surrounded the summer patio. Eventually, the hero gave up, shrugged and followed her friends into the eatery.
Shego had to employ all her discipline to keep from laughing out loud.
Thirty minutes later, the little girl and her sidekick showed up as Shego was dragging out the Lab's latest whatever-ray that Drakken had asked her to steal.
"Gawd Princess, you're gonna put on pounds eating at a fat factory like Bueno Nacho," she snarked as the two of them closed on each other.
The girl's eyes had widened, then narrowed. "How did you...?
"I can smell it in your hair, cupcake," she said with a smirked. So innocent! Kimmie accepted that sucker line so readily, Shego almost fell down laughing.
After that, she'd made a point to buzz the cheerleader. After a week of following the red-head, the girl would whip out her little blue doohicky and ask the nerdlinger for scans. It was a scream.
Shego wondered exactly how close she could get before Kim would catch a sense of her. She began to experiment. At first it was about fifteen feet. But as time wore on, she found that if she set a trail of low frequency plasma along the girl's route, the deep green eyes would narrow and Kim would glance about suspiciously. Even without the scanner. Perhaps it was the smell of ozone, or a faint residue of her comet powers; the girl seemed to be able to sense where she'd been. It was fascinating. It was hilarious.
Shego started charging things from a distance. The fan in the school bathroom. The rail of the mall elevator. She'd even followed the girl to Florida and zapped the ventilation distributor of the room Kim was staying at.
Six months in became an even bigger challenge. She needed her best piloting, hacking and stealth skills. A few times, Kim got wind of her and dropped into a GJ tube. That one was easy, Shego would just charge the girl's clothing. Other times, she'd duck behind a building and demand a sensor sweep by her little nerd friend. Kim was good, but sometimes, she'd forget that she moved in a three dimensional world. She even called in rides to exotic locales; that one was rough, taking large swathes of time and forcing Shego to lunge for her hoverpod and follow in full stealth mode. The girl was getting desperate.
But nine months after it all started, something changed. Kim gave up. The girl's shoulders slumped in defeat. But instead of feeling victorious, Shego felt... empty. Unsatisfied. Unfulfilled. Looking at Kim did something to the stone-cold witch that hadn't happened in a long time. It made her yearn for yesterday.
It was like a light had gone out of the girl and it made the woman's chest constrict. It made her think back to when Kim's lightning reflexes had her diving for the nearest manhole cover. And now the girl had just accepted defeat. Reduced to bearing with her lot. So unlike her. So fucking unlike her. It pained her to see the girl like that, to hear the sigh of resignation, that flicker of the lids and the sadness in those vibrant eyes.
Shego would fly out to see the girl, but when confronted by that melancholy, sometimes, the woman could only stand it for a few minutes before lighting out back to the latest lair. What the hell? Shego would ask herself. What was he point of tweaking the girl if the entertainment had completely left the activity?
But Shego continued to dog the girl's steps, follow each turn. She couldn't stop. She hated to see Pumpkin like this, she knew she was the cause of it. Each and every day, she would tell herself not to subject herself to such a thing, yet the next morning, her wandering mind would set her ass in the hoverpod, her hands on the control stick, and she'd be back on her Kim-watch. It was during another torturous vigil that Shego had a revelation.
And suddenly, Shego felt another dusty, unused sensation.
Fear.
She jumped back into the hoverpod and flew as fast as the engine could go, back to the permanent lair, the lair that Drakken never used as his base of operations when working on one scheme or another. The lair that was home between plots. She took the elevator down the fifty-foot shaft into the main habitation dome, dashed to her room and curled up in bed, shivering under her black satin sheets, still in her full catsuit.
What the fuck was wrong with her? It was just a prank, right? A lark to laugh at the redhead for, right? Shego could remember the day, the hour, the minute it had all started.
What she couldn't recall, didn't plan on, hadn't counted on, was when it became so deep.
She'd been tailing the girl for over nine months, needling her with her eyes, taunting and teasing her with her glow. Trying to get into the little goody-goody's head. She wanted to see if Kim would jump when she said how high, if the girl would rev-up when she said go. And now it seemed that the Almighty Shego, Terror of the Western World, Most Wanted Woman Alive, on the top ten list of most wanted criminals in eleven countries, master of several forms of Kung Fu, hacker par excellence and International Thief...
...was crushing on a teenaged girl who'd just gotten her driver's license.
It was pathetic. It was horrific. And it was divine.
Shego simply could no longer help herself. And she discovered, in the end, she didn't give a fuck. She'd never been one to stick to convention. Like the convention of labelling your own sexuality. Either you liked someone or you didn't. Orientation and Sex wasn't part of that equation. She didn't consider herself a free spirit. She simply chose what she desired to be constrained with, to be called.
With that decision firmly in mind, she resumed her daily routine: spar with synthodrones, fly out to see Princess and then take care of her needs in the evening. It was blissful. It was right. It was all she could wish for.
Until the accident.
She'd been watching from the safety of one of the massive banks of night lights while Kim practiced. That was a show that Shego never missed. Kim in her uniformed tank top, the light pleated skirt that swayed and swirled even as the girl tumbled, twirled and jumped. Afterwards, as the hero exited the locker room, Shego followed, now riding the hoverpod in full stealth mode.
As Kim crossed the intersection, Shego noted the speeding vehicles in the distance. The hoverpod flew lower. All of a sudden, red and white lights split the air as a siren wailed. A bad feeling, Shego piloted the pod even lower, close to Kim now.
Five cars sped by in the intersection behind them, then another two cars, that peeled off and headed north. The last two, turning south.
As the first car skidded, she flicked on the autopilot and pressed the emergency release on the hoverpod's hatch even as her other hand snatched up a retractable grapple line. The hatch popped up as the red Honda Civic fishtailed and the silver mustang car behind jumped the manhole cover. Before the Mustang was airborne, Shego hooked the grapple and dove over the edge of the pod. She let the grapple line play out as she headed straight for Kim. The mustang flipped into the light standard, the twenty-five foot pole whipping downward. Kim, half-turning toward the silver metallic carnage, missed Shego's shadowed form as she cut behind her, the woman's left arm wrapping around the girl's waist. As her arm slapped into Kim's toned belly, the green-skinned woman engaged the line's lock. The line immediately snapped taut; Shego kicked both feet skyward to give them an extra push of momentum.
It's close, going to be close, shit that is really... went through Shego's thoughts as their momentum snapped the both of them away from the charging hulk of automobile. The driver's sideview mirror, its shattered glass coming lose even as the housing swept by, tagged the ends of her black hair, shearing two inches off from the mere brush of momentum. The driver, a kid with a pale surprised look stared out of the windshield at the destination of his trajectory. Kim coughed and wheezed, the breath knocked out of her. The thief and the hero swung upwards.
As the silver car flipped past, Shego released the grapple lock and the line played out again, dropping the two of them ten feet from the wreckage scored sidewalk. Shego let Kim slip onto the ground, then engaged the grapple reel. She shot up into the night air, even as the street lamp shattered on the ground just behind the redhead, even as the girl was reaching out toward her. She flipped neatly back into the cockpit and sat for a moment, gasping for air.
The stealthed hoverpod continued on its way, away from the redhead who stared up into the night sky, wondering.
Shego had nearly dislocated her right shoulder from suddenly taking all of Kim's weight on her left arm. The injured part was pierced by red hot spikes of agony. It hurt like hell.
That night, she leaned carefully into her lazy-boy chair and shifted the remote gingerly, before pressing the television's power button. A hundred-and-eight-inch screen illuminated, spreading iridescent patterns along her tinted face. The channel had defaulted to the local news station.
"And, now, let's replay that clip for our viewers, of internationally acclaimed teen hero, Kim Possible, and her message to the person who saved her life." One of the pair of neatly coiffed news anchors turned towards the inset, which enlarged, showing the young girl's round face, as she nodded, answering unheard questions until the audio faded in.
"Yeah, I was just glad to help the police get those guys out. I had to use my laser to cut open the car that crashed into the tree; he'd've been roasted if we'd had to wait for the "jaws of life". But I wouldn't have been able to save that boy's life if that person hadn't saved mine." Kim then turned and stared directly into the camera lens, into Shego's eyes. "I just want to thank the angel who swooped down and saved me. Thank you, with all my heart, really, you were there for me when I needed someone. I-I just Thank God for you..." Kim trailed off as her face pinked in embarrassment. "I don't know what else to say." The camera picked up her flustered mutter as she looked away, an adorable flush deepening on her face.
"And that was Kim Possible, sending out a message of thanks to her unknown rescuer, who pulled her out of the path of one of the crashing vehicles and simply.... Disappeared. Kim's amazing, isn't she?" one of the anchors said, the two making small talk as the clip was faded out.
"Yeah, she's just great,” replied the other. “And the hero being saved- it's like something out of a comic book..."
Shego couldn't help the goofy smile that lit up her face.
And from that point on, everything changed.
Kim's body seemed to relax each time Shego went to see her, as if her absence created a tension that would ebb from the girl in her presence. She noticed that Kim had resumed looking, but not with eyes narrowed with suspicion or dulled with resignation, but wide deep green eyes that stole her breath. And the look in those eyes began to morph into something different, something entrancing.
A few months ago, Kim began sharing small knowing small with her each time she arrived and would draw a small dainty pout when she departed. They were smiles that were given to none of those losers that Kim seemed to take time fawning over with her friend, whom Shego now knew as Monique, or fought over with another cheerleader, known as Bonnie. Those were little quirks of the lip that were meant solely for her; small treasures storing up a wealth of emotion within her.
The girl started spending more time at home, in her room alone. At first, Shego thought it odd; the outgoing girl was always so popular and busy. But during those times, she noticed that Pumpkin would smile that secret smile and pout more often. Or she'd turn her waist a little to accentuate the flare of her hips. Or she'd lean over the bed, arching her back. At first Shego simply dismissed it as Kim being a late bloomer. Hell, her brother Hego was almost in his thirties and still didn't seem interested in sex. Teenaged hormones had messed the woman up pretty handily; an adrenaline junkie like the redhead would probably be the same.
But then came the hot pants. The short skirts. The low cut blouses and tunics.
LINGERIE!!!
Poses and dreamy stares, looking right at her, freezing her where she hid, drying up her mouth. Shego couldn't believe what she was seeing as the days progressed. It brought a blush to her face and a pulsating rush to her groin. She couldn't stop watching.
The girl then started dancing.... dancing! At first it was bellydancing, the girl's hips vibrating hypnotically. Then came pole dancing; Kim must've ordered it online. It came with a jaw dropping training video. Shego found her hands in stimulating places during these performances, unable to keep herself from being drawn into the girl's displays. Even the act of undressing became infused with a sensuality that hadn't been there before.
A month ago, Kim kicked it up a notch.
Shego couldn't believe her eyes as the girl began fondling herself. The girl would caress herself a little before turning in with that little smile. The green woman was glued to the sight. Each night it went longer and longer. Shego got closer and closer. She couldn't help herself. Even in the freezing cold of winter, Shego unzipped her catsuit to get at her aching erogenous zones. Kim kept going longer, until one day she went all the way. Shego couldn't get enough. She snuck as close as she dared, and as Kim finally slipped her hand underneath her panties, Shego dipped her hand into her own throbbing core. When the redhead thrust her hips at the window, her cries echoing through the panes, Shego's entire body vibrated violently as her voice echoed the girl's.
Shego slumped against the window for a moment, then thought: Shit! I gotta get outta here!
That was a few days ago. She'd tried to assuage her overheated libido during that time, but just the simple thought of the hero would send her mind reeling into hormonal overdrive. And now, she was outside the girl's window again.
Tonight, the girl was dress in her mission outfit coloured lingerie: plum on top, black below. Shego's eyes glazed, wondering what kind of show Princess was going to give her tonight. She just couldn't stay away. Couldn't stop watching. She was done. It was over.
Shego was addicted to Kim Possible.