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Revelations of Destiny	By : Kellendros Category: Kim Possible > Threesomes/Moresomes Views: 63461 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I do not own Kim Possible, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 50
- 51
- 52
A considerable amount of time later, Kim was deeply immersed in the rotary flight manual Shego had given her. So much so that she failed to notice the low alert tone that sounded, nor Shego sliding her seat forward into piloting position to check several things. She even missed the other woman’s first few comments to her, but she couldn’t ignore the loud exclamation that came as Shego slid her seat back and turned her full attention to Kim.

“—Holy shit!”

“Humh?” Startled, Kim’s head jerked up, her attention fixing on Shego, who was staring at her wide-eyed. “What? What’s happening?”

“Did you actually read all that?” Shego’s voice was a mix of disbelief and astonishment, and Kim finally noticed that the woman wasn’t looking at her, but rather the flight manual in her lap, which she was three-fifths or more of the way into—about a hundred pages or so.

“Ummm, yeah?” Kim was confused.

“And you understood it all?”

“Well, there were a few parts that were hard to understand, but I wanted to go through it all before I asked you anything.”

Shego shook her head gently, an amused smile on her lips. “Well, that explains it then…”

“Explains what?”

“How you haven’t flunked out of school despite all the things you do when you should be studying instead.”

Kim snorted, grinning slightly. “It’s no big. Plus I probably come out ahead by studying and doing my homework while we’re in transit. On most of the rides I get, there’s literally nothing else to do for hours on end, so it really helps you focus on the work without any distractions.”

Shego shook her head. “God…”

“What?”

“Nothing…” after a short pause, Shego continued; “Anyway, we’re almost there. I’m going to have to drop down to subsonic in a few minutes, ok?”

“Oh, ok.”

Shego sat back, looking down at her lap and then off to the left, away from Kim, for a few long moments, and Kim could tell she was hesitating over something—nervous even. Eventually Shego sighed and turned back to the redhead, her face determined as she made herself speak despite her uncertainty.

“Kimmie…” Shego trailed off, turning her gaze down again, and after a moment, Kim encouraged her with a soft; “What is it Shego?”

“I want…” Shego looked up again, her eyes almost… pleading. “I need you to promise me something Kimmie. That no matter what happens between us, no matter how things go, you won’t ever… I mean; it’s my home Princess.”

Kim smiled softly, grasping her meaning despite the lack of actual elaboration. “It’s ok Shego, I understand.” Kim’s smile shifted to a playful grin, trying to dispel the heavy, serious air Shego had conjured. “Just so long as you never show up at my front door packing a rocket launcher or something, I won’t show up at yours with a search warrant, all right?”

Shego smiled appreciatively. “Thanks Princess.”

After that, Shego started putting away the few things she had out, and Kim did the same, closing her book and putting it and the binder into her seat’s side compartment. A few minutes later, after both women had moved their seats into piloting position, Shego took the plane off autopilot and reduced speed to subsonic. Then she dropped altitude until the plane was flying along barely a hundred feet above the ocean below.

Shortly thereafter, Shego activated several controls on a different section of the instrument panel, and the interior lighting dropped to almost nothing while at the same time, the entire surface of the plane’s broad canopy lit up with a grey-green monochrome view of the world outside, the display rendered by blending the data from an array of powerful infrared, ultraviolet, and light amplification cameras into a single composite whole of startlingly sharp detail. An all-encompassing, elaborate heads-up display overlaid the image in a slightly brighter yellow-green, and Kim was temporarily distracted as she took note of the grid and the numerous readouts displayed in various areas of it. When she finally looked beyond the HUD to the fast-approaching coastline beyond, her eyes widened in alarm.

“Ahhh, Shego? Why are we flying straight at that cliff?”

Shego smirked at the redhead’s tone, answering without looking up from the controls. “What’s the matter Princess? Don’t trust my flying?”

Kim growled, shooting a narrow-eyed look at Shego that she doubted the other woman could see in the dim lighting, then turned her attention back to the quickly looming cliff. Kim knew something was up, but she didn’t know what.

Shego slowed down smoothly as she approached the cliff face, so it took longer to reach than it otherwise would have, until at last, she was hovering about a hundred feet away from it at a dead stop. After flipping some switches on a control panel, Shego briefly checked some readouts on the HUD and then grinned evilly, pushing the throttle forward.

“Hang on to your hat Kimmie!”

Despite the fact that they were seemingly headed straight towards a rocky doom once more, Kim kept a tight control on her anxiety. She knew Shego wasn’t suicidal, and the plane was certainly still under her complete control, so that meant there was something else going on. A moment later Kim found out what as the high-tech hover-jet slid into the rocky surface before them without resistance. There was a brief moment of distortion as the front end passed through what turned out to be a holographic matrix, and then Kim could see a broad tunnel stretching out about two hundred feet before them, its regularly buttressed concrete walls and ceiling giving it a segmented air.

As Shego guided the plane down the tunnel with a casual, easy familiarity, Kim couldn’t help wishing for a little more clearance than the three yards or so she thought they had top and bottom, despite the consummate skill the pale woman displayed. When they came out into a big underground hangar with about another ten feet of clearance to the ceiling, Kim breathed a mental sigh of relief. A few moments later, Shego swung the hover-jet around in a tight curve, backing into the open space on the left-hand side of the hangar and extending the landing gear before setting the plane down as gently as a summer’s breeze.

While Shego started shutting down the hover-jet, the canopy returned to its normal transparent state as a bank of overhead lights came on in the hangar, illuminating everything with a strong golden light, but Kim barely even noticed, her attention fixed on the landing area across from the one they were in. After blinking several times, Kim finally found her voice.

“Shego, why do you have a spaceship in your garage?”

Shego snorted sharply and chuckled as she glanced up from her work for a brief second, taking in the dual-wing jet in front of them, all sharp edges and sinuous, aerodynamic curves that flowed into one another seamlessly, making it look like it had been smoothed out of a single solid piece of material instead of assembled.

“That is to this, as a Ferrari is to a minivan.” Shego grinned as she spoke while continuing to work. “Or maybe more like a military-grade Hummer than a minivan I guess.” Shego looked over to Kim for a moment. “My interceptor might not be as versatile as my baby here, nor as sturdy, but it’s hypersonic, and so maneuverable that even I can’t take it to its full capabilities without a good chance of passing out from it.”

Kim sighed lustily. “Whoever said ‘crime doesn’t pay’ didn’t know squat.”

Shego laughed as she finished up the final shutdown sequence, then she slid her seat back and turned to Kim with a broad, wry grin.

“Oh you don’t know the half of it…” Shego cocked her head slightly, looking at Kim with one eyebrow raised faintly. “Why Princess? You thinking of switching sides or something?”

“I don’t think so.” Kim’s tone was as dry as her expression—despite her smile. A second later she slid her seat back as well, turning to face Shego while retrieving the book and binder she’d placed in the side compartment.

“Yeah, well, probably for the best.” Shego grinned as she stood up, and Kim quickly joined her. “I’m a special circumstance; usually crime really doesn’t pay. Most of the idiots out there don’t have a clue how to handle a big score, or how to protect it so that if they do get caught, it’ll still be there for them when they get out—and that assumes they even get a big score, instead of flaming out along the way.”

“And the rest?” Kim inquired with a slightly raised eyebrow, turning and following Shego as the other woman headed for the back of the plane.

“Jail time sucks Kimmie, even with the keys to the kingdom.” Shego smirked and held up her left hand, summoning her power and twiddling her fingers as she added; “And even with the keys to freedom built right in, it ain’t no picnic either. Just because no prison on earth has ever managed to hold me doesn’t mean I enjoy my time in the penalty box.”

Pausing as she dismissed her power while opening the door to the rear section of the plane, Shego turned her gaze to Kim as she added; “Of course, aside from you, almost no one’s ever been able to put me in jail either, so there’s that too.”

“I do like to do my part.” Kim replied cheerfully.

Shego snorted, smirked, and shook her head faintly before heading into the back of the plane, where Kim quickly joined her. Crossing her arms, Shego’s expression shifted to something decidedly less amused as she stood staring down at the thirty or so cubic feet of luggage Kim had brought with her, considering. Sighing, Shego shook her head unhappily.

“Well, there’s nothing to do about it but to do it… man this is going to be a pain in the ass.”

“What’s wrong Shego?”

“Nothing really, it’s just that getting these upstairs is going to be such a hassle. We’ve got a fifty-foot tunnel, thirty-six feet of stairs, a big storage room, another short tunnel, and finally twenty-three more feet of stairs. That… is just to get into the house. From there it’s out into the main hall, up more stairs, and finally over to your room.”

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me.” Kim’s dry response was anything but pleased.

“Nope. It’s that or a few hundred yards worth of to-and-from the freight elevator, which comes up outside the house.” Glancing at Kim, Shego added; “I assume you’re only good for one of these things at a time up stairs?”

“I can do two!” After a few seconds Kim reluctantly added; “But… I’d really rather go one at a time.”

“Ok, then the best way to get this done is in steps. I’ll grab two while you bring the other three to the base of the stairs one by one. By the time you get the last one there, I’ll probably have brought the rest up to the next set, and you can come right on up.”

“Ok.” Kim acknowledged, grabbing the fist suitcase on her end while Shego picked up two on hers.

On the way out, Shego stopped to show Kim how to turn off the lights in the plane, and then once more to do the same regarding the hangar lights. As she went, Kim took note of the hangar’s layout. It was basically a big rectangular room about eighty feet wide and a little over twice that long, with a forty-foot vaulted ceiling. Off in the distance, Kim could see the entrance to the freight elevator to the left of Shego’s interceptor, and the long wall opposite the runway tunnel, the one nearest Kim, had a variety of machines and equipment laid out neatly along its length that she assumed were for maintaining the planes. Tucked into the nearest corner was a small five-foot wide corridor that led to the stairs Shego had mentioned.

By the time Kim had gotten the last of her big bags out of the plane, along with her smaller carry-on, and made it back to the stairs after turning off all the lights behind her, Shego was still nowhere to be seen, nor were the two bags Kim had left at the foot of the stairs, so she kept going, laboriously hefting the unwieldy bag and mounting the steps two at a time. Just before Kim reached the top of the long stairwell, Shego appeared in the doorway above her, and stepped back a moment later to allow Kim to pass through into the room beyond.

Setting the big suitcase down for a moment, Kim looked around idly while rolling her shoulder a few times, working the strain out of it, only to slow down and then stop altogether as she forgot all about it, her eyes widening in surprise.

The room she was in was twenty by forty feet, with a high ceiling and four sturdy metal doors, one directly across from her in the center of the far wall, one in the near left-hand corner, and one almost in the far right-hand corner, near the opposite door. All along the walls were a variety of racks, sturdy metal shelves, and benches, all holding a plethora of adventuring equipment ranging from simple climbing gear to parachutes to high-tech, ultra-light collapsible hang gliders. But that wasn’t what Kim was looking at. It was the twin walls of guns to either side of the opposite door that held her attention.

Blinking several times, Kim didn’t even notice when Shego shut the door to the stairs behind her and then picked up her bag, heading for the door near the far corner, which was standing ajar—not that she noticed that either. After a few more seconds, Kim shook her head sharply and came back to herself, stepping after Shego and intently asking; “Shego, why do you have an arsenal down here?”

“Hmmm? What?” Shego looked back and then followed Kim’s gaze to the far wall full of guns. “Oh, that.” Shego smirked. “You gotta have the right tools for the right job Kimmie.”

That disturbed Kim slightly, but it confused her far more so. Slowly approaching the gun racks, Kim’s gaze traveled over the varied weapons hanging neatly arrayed across them, and her puzzlement was evident as she spoke.

“That doesn’t make any sense Shego. I’ve seen what you can do; why would you ever need any of this?”

Shego snorted softly and set Kim’s bag down by the door before joining the girl where she stood in front of the display. “Well, I’ll admit that for the most part, I can do as much or more than anything on this wall, but, there are some things to consider.”

Shego stepped up to the section to the right of the door and indicated an enormous, bulky, .50 caliber Barrett sniper rifle, as well as three more high-powered rifles beneath it, each fully scoped and two sporting big silencers as well. “Even on my best day, these have ten times my range or more.” Shego stepped to the right and swept her hand over an array of assault rifles and chopped down Special Forces carbines. “These bad boys do twice my distance at the very least.”

“Ok, I guess that makes sense, but…” Kim looked to the wall to the left of the door, arrayed with submachine guns, assault pistols, heavy automatics, and big revolvers, most with silencers and laser sights on them. “I don’t know much about guns, but even I know that some of these can’t shoot farther than you can.”

“Yep. But, none of them come with a bright pyrotechnics display to signal everyone for miles around where I am either—at least if I’m working in the dark anyway.” Shego paused, and then added; “And it’s a pretty good attention grabber even when there is good lighting too.”

Kim snorted faintly and shook her head, then addressed the final mystery to her.

“I’m sure these all have more range than you too,” Kim pointed to a variety of recoilless rifles, rocket launchers, RPG launchers, and grenade launchers before indicating several racks of traditional grenades and plastic explosive packs, “but why do you have these? I doubt you can throw a grenade any farther than your energy blasts, and the explosives?”

“Yeah, but I can’t bounce my energy blasts around corners or toss them down stairs and air vents either. Nor can I leave them sitting around somewhere set on a timer or rigged with a remote detonator…” Shego smirked.

Kim shook her head. “And you need to do things like that regularly do you?”

Shego snorted and shook her head in the negative, grinning broadly as she answered; “Almost never. But I’m of the opinion that if you can afford it, it’s better to have something you might need than to need something and not have it. Now, unless you really want to keep doing inventory of my toys, can we please get going?”

“Hmmm, what? Oh, yeah, sorry.”

Shego turned and headed for the other door, picking up Kim’s bag as she went, with Kim following along behind her. Pausing for a moment in the corridor beyond, Shego waited for Kim to come through before she turned off the lights in the storeroom and shut the door securely behind them. After that, Shego led Kim to the end of the short passage and up a set of stairs on the right. The only thing at the top of the stairwell was a small five-foot landing that had a heavy door in the center of each wall, and Shego exited through the one to the right. After a few seconds staring at the doors with a puzzled frown, Kim followed Shego out into one end of a short seven-foot wide corridor with a markedly different décor than the stone-walled tunnels and rooms they’d passed through so far.

The floor was dark hardwood, polished to a glossy finish, and the walls had vertical wood paneling to a height of four feet, though it was a noticeably lighter dark golden-brown, capped with a simple, unadorned molding. Above that was smooth off-white plaster, rising to eight feet before curving into a gently arched ceiling that peaked at just over nine feet, with a distinctive exposed center beam and six-by-six arch supports that were finished wood, with more off-white plaster in the recessed areas between them.

To the immediate left, the corridor opened into a cavernous room with a lighter colored hardwood floor, its exact dimensions lost in the shadows beyond the pool of light coming from the door behind Kim. To the right, past where Shego had left all of Kim’s luggage, the corridor led to another large room, though this one was dimly lit, unlike the other, and Kim thought she could make out stairs to the left, along with several planters and pots farther in, all holding a variety of lush flora in them. There was also a simple wood paneled door in the center of the opposite wall, unobtrusive and only slightly darker than the wall paneling.

Kim turned and took two steps to the left, ignoring Shego for a moment as she indulged her suspicions. Leaning out into the enormous room, Kim got a sense of hollow emptiness from it as she craned her neck, finding that she’d been right; the doors at the top of the stairs led to the big room and an identical corridor running parallel to the one Kim was in, just seven feet away from her.

Turning back to Shego, Kim was just in time to see her close the door to the stairwell, which was good, because if she hadn’t, despite having passed through it moments ago, she might have questioned whether or not it had really been there, such was the degree of cunning skill with which it was hidden on this side, blending into the rest of the wall with only a hairline seam outlining it—one that Kim doubted she could have spotted if she hadn’t known where to look.

Blinking in the increased gloom, Kim was distracted by Shego as the pale woman opened a small, concealed panel in the wall next to the door, revealing an elaborate keypad input. A moment later she punched in a long string of numbers, hit a few other buttons, and then closed the panel once more. By the time she turned to look at Kim, the redhead had finally collected her thoughts.

“Shego, why are there three doors in there leading to almost the exact same place out here?”

Pausing at the unexpected question, Shego eventually smiled and answered; “Well, it’s a little bit convenience and laziness, just so I don’t have to go out of my way depending on where I’m coming from, and a little bit prudence, so I have multiple ways to get to those stairs if I happen to have… unwanted guests? So to speak…”

“Has that happened before?” Kim’s voice was understandably concerned.

“Not yet, but better safe than sorry.” Shego cocked her head slightly and gave Kim a smirking look. A second later she sobered and added; “Now, you want to lug your crap up to your room before or after the tour?”

“Better get it over with now.”

“Ok then, let’s go…”

With that, Shego turned and headed up the hallway, pausing only to grab two of Kim’s big suitcases as she went, with Kim quickly moving to catch up to her after picking up one herself.

Coming out into what turned out to be the main hall, Kim forgot about following Shego as she stood marveling at her surroundings. The hall was forty feet wide and sixty feet long, with a soaring, peaked ceiling well over thirty feet high at the sides and nearly forty in the center. Like the smaller hall behind Kim, the ceiling had exposed crossbeams and a center brace, though these were massive in comparison. Hanging from the center brace on thick chains were two enormous fifteen-foot wide black iron chandeliers. The big wrought iron rings were positioned evenly over the hall, and were the sources of the dim golden light illuminating it.

To either side of Kim were open staircases done in the same dark hardwood as the floor, with broad steps and heavy, elaborate wooden banisters, gently rising back to landings ten feet up, where a shorter set of staircases turned inward to meet at a central landing that was directly above the two smaller hallways behind Kim, and connected to a pair of five-foot wide balconies that ran the length of the hall on either side, supported by elaborately carved buttresses arching out from the wall and framed with equally elaborate molding, all in the same dark hardwood as the banisters railing them.

There were several wood paneled doors along either wall, on both floors, but Kim paid them no mind as her attention was primarily taken up by more noticeable things, such as the elaborate indoor garden that took up a twenty-foot circular area in the center of the open space between the stairs and the far wall. The plants were all species that thrived in lower lighting, and consisted mainly of big ferns, moth orchids, lady slippers, and climbing hydrangeas trained up elaborate latticework arches that allowed access to the small open area in the center of the display.

Another thing that caught Kim’s eye, though to a lesser extent, was the enormous window above the ten-foot wide set of arched double doors that were the main entrance to the hall. It was almost as wide as the doors, rose to nearly the top of the hall, and was rounded at the top and bottom, the whole of it made up of many sections of thick, beveled glass held in a framework of wrought iron. There were also twin pairs of large, more traditional arched windows flanking the doors and, on the second floor, the central window, also composed of beveled glass in an iron frame, and two more smaller ones that bracketed the sides of the hall, though they were rather unremarkable save for the size of the single sheet of glass they each held.

Kim was suddenly snapped out of her rubbernecking by the sound of Shego’s voice.

“C’mere Kimmie… C’mon… C’mere…”

Between the woman’s high, cajoling tone and the odd noises she was making, Kim turned to find out what her problem was—and likely give her a piece of her mind as well—only to pause suddenly as she found that Shego wasn’t even looking at her, but rather was crouched down in a squat only a few yards away, looking off to the left of the area the plants were in. Raising an eyebrow, Kim finally spoke in a dry tone.

“Ahhh, Shego? I’m standing right here.”

Shego smirked and glanced over her shoulder for a second before turning back to what she was doing.

“Not you Princess.”

Kim remained perplexed and aggravated right up until a reddish-orange cat with a white underbelly, muzzle, and paws trotted out from behind a planter and up to Shego. Then she was just aggravated.

“Hello Kimmie.” Shego smiled as the cat butted its head up against the back of her hand. “You'd better not have destroyed anything while I’ve been gone…”

As Shego scooped the cat up into her arms and stood up, Kim sternly demanded; “Shego, tell me you did not name your cat after me.”

Shego snorted faintly and turned to Kim while the cat squirmed in her arms, grinning as she answered; “Noooo, of course not… that would be silly.” After a long pause her grin twisted to an outright smirk as she concluded; “She’s Princess Kimmiekins, the Pumpkinator!” Almost as an afterthought she added; “And it’s not my cat; she just lives here.”

“Shego!” Kim was just shy of livid.

“Hey, what else was I supposed to do?” Shego continued to smirk as she adjusted her hold on the fussy feline. “Somehow this stray followed me home from the middle of Sperlonga, over three miles away, where I made the mistake of giving it some of my leftover lunch. Next thing I knew it was in the house and I couldn’t get rid of the damn thing. I’d toss it out and a few hours later I’d find it back inside somewhere, no idea how it got in—still don’t even to this day—and nothing could get it to leave either. Super soakers, sonic pest control, cayenne pepper, low powered energy blasts… you name it, I tried it. So, I had a persistent pest that I couldn’t get rid of. Sound familiar?”

As Shego finished her tale the feline finally managed to shift position enough that it got some leverage and was able to vault out of her grasp, landing neatly and then trotting off nonchalantly with its tail held high in the air, as if it didn’t have a care in the world.

“See what I mean?” Shego smirked again.

“I am not amused.” Kim lied dryly, in actuality being somewhat amused now that she’d heard the full story. “Can we get going?”

Shego shook her head faintly and grinned as she turned and moved to where she’d left Kim’s luggage, only responding once she’d picked up the two bags again. “C’mon then…”

As Shego led Kim upstairs, the redhead suddenly got the strangest feeling that Shego’s home seemed… familiar, somehow—or at the very least, that the hall she was in did—but she couldn’t for the life of her fathom out why that was. Lost in thought, Kim followed Shego on autopilot as the woman led her to the right at the top of the stairs, and because of it, came just shy of running into her from behind when Shego stopped at the first door.

After several seconds spent staring at each other, Shego dryly hinted; “Only got two hands here Princess.”

“Hmmm, what?” A second later Kim blushed slightly and hastened to open the door for the encumbered Shego. “Oh! Sorry.”

Shego led Kim down a long, wide hallway to a door on the right-hand side—the only door, since Kim could clearly see the hallway dead-ended in a big window only a few yards away. This time Kim opened the door for Shego without having to be asked.

The room beyond was dimly lit from a line of five windows on the right-hand wall—three big ones separated by a (comparatively) smaller one between each of them—but Kim’s excellent night vision allowed her to make out the general details. It was about twenty feet square, with two doors on the left-hand wall, tucked into opposite corners, and held a considerable amount of furniture.

As Shego entered the room, she ignited her power so she could see to make her way toward the nearest door, and as she went, Kim saw that there was a study area set up between the two doors, with a heavy, old-style wooden desk that was built into a long set of bookshelves that ran the length of the wall behind it, a comfortable high-backed leather office chair, and a big widescreen computer monitor on one side of the desktop. To the immediate right was an area set up around an oval coffee table centered on a big rug, with a gorgeous settee and three chairs done in an elegant Victorian baroque style around it. Past that, taking up the rest of the room, was an area set up facing the far wall and the forty-two inch flat-screen widescreen TV that was mounted on the off-center right of it, with a pair of tall, narrow shelf units to either side of the TV and a big comfortable couch and two recliners about ten feet back from it.

“Nice living room…” Kim idly commented as she followed Shego through the door, only to find herself in another room, this one twenty feet long and about twelve feet wide.

“Thanks.” Shego replied, turning to the right and revealing a high king-sized bed occupying the general area of the far left-hand corner.

Seeing the bed, Kim perked up and turned in time to see Shego setting down her luggage to one side of the area to the immediate right, which had several dressers set up along the walls, including a low Edwardian queen’s dresser with a big mirror built into it.

“I thought you said you weren’t asking me to move into your bed?” Kim grinned slyly.

Shego looked over her shoulder, one eyebrow raised, and responded in a dry, matter-of-fact tone. “And I’m not… This would be your room Princess.” Before Kim could say anything, Shego continued; “Closet’s through that door,” Shego vaguely gestured at the other door in the room, on the right wall, a little ways past where she was standing, “and the other door out in the main room leads to your bathroom.”

Kim’s shocked response came right on the heels of Shego’s explanation. “Wait, what? All of this is just my room?” A second later she added; “And a bathroom too?” another pause, “My closet has its own door?” Kim’s eyes were wide as she finally concluded; “it’s the size of the whole upstairs of my house!”

Shego turned to look at Kim with a long, measuring gaze before dryly responding; “Hello? Were you not paying attention while we were coming up here? What the hell would be everywhere else if this was half the house?”

“Well… I don’t know… I just… I mean…” Kim shook her head in embarrassment, “I guess I just wasn’t thinking.”

Shego smiled faintly and shook her head, turning and heading for the door. By the time Kim put down the bags she was carrying and turned to follow, the pale woman had reached the door and turned on the lights, revealing a twelve-foot ceiling with elaborate crown molding and a dozen or more heavy, old-style brass sconces evenly spaced along the walls at a height of nine feet, each emitting a warm golden light that suffused the room. A moment later Shego dismissed her power and moved out into the main room, heading for the exit, only to pause, turning the on lights there as well, and revealing a control panel instead of a light switch. Glancing at Kim to make sure the girl was watching, Shego reached out and detached a modular section of the panel, revealing it to be a long, slender remote control.

Turning to Kim, Shego held up the remote and said; “This universal remote controls almost everything in here, and it’ll work anywhere else in the house too, though I strongly suggest you don’t take it out of your suite; they’re a major bitch to find if they’re not in earshot. Speaking of which…” Shego turned to the control panel, “if you can’t find it, this is the button you want.” Shego pressed a red button and a moment later the remote began emitting a high-pitched chirping noise. Turning back to Kim, she continued; “Won’t stop until the battery runs down or you hit this button.” Shego demonstrated, silencing the remote. Handing it to Kim, she concluded; “Once you take it out of the charging bay, don’t put it back ‘til the yellow light comes on, and leave it there until it turns green again when you do. Yellow means you’ve only got a few hours left on it by the way…”

“Ummm… ok. Thanks.”

“Now, I’m gonna go get those last two bags of yours. You just sit tight here; I’ll be back in no time at all…”

“Ok.”

Kim watched Shego’s retreating back until she was out the door, then turned her attention to the remote in her hand, trying to puzzle out the various function buttons on it. By the time she thought she’d figured out the difference between the TV and stereo controls, Shego was back, quickly schlepping Kim’s last two suitcases into the bedroom and then returning before Kim could do more than take a few steps to follow.

“So, figure it out yet?” Shego said with a teasing smile.

“M’yeah, no.” Kim’s tone was dry but amused. “What are there, like, forty buttons on this thing or something?”

“Good guess.” Shego smirked as she held her hand out for the remote. Once Kim gave it to her, the pale woman quickly ran down all the functions for Kim.

“Now, aside from all that, which works pretty much the way you’d expect it to, there’s a few specific things you need to know.” Shego turned on the TV so she could demonstrate while explaining. “I get every satellite TV signal you can receive in this part of the world, with a master control system that lets every TV in the house play them independently. You navigate through the satellites here, and then the sub-menus show you all the individual channels.” Shego waited until Kim nodded her understanding, then added; “And unless you’ve got a lot of time to kill, I suggest you use the computer to find the shows you want to watch and let it tell you where to go to get them. It’s the ‘TV’ icon on your desktop, ok? Calls up a little search interface and you just type in what you want. You can even use it to keep a list of your favorites for quick-reference, and get suggestions for similar programs you might like.”

“So… it’s like TiVo on Crack?” Kim smirked.

“Pretty much. Speaking of which, it can do that too. Record I mean. Two-hundred-and-fifty hours worth… The computer interface lets you configure it, and manage what you have.”

“Cool! Now I won’t have to miss any of Agony County.” Shego raised an eyebrow and gave a half smirk along with a soft snort, prompting Kim to add; “What?”

“Nothing. Just can’t believe you still watch Agony County after they jumped the shark with that idiotic brain swap arc.”

“It wasn’t that bad, and… hey, wait; you watch Agony County?”

“I used to…” Shego’s tone was dryly disdainful. A moment later she smiled faintly and changed the subject. “Now, the stereo’s pretty standard. Plays CDs and you can run MP3s from the computer too. On top of that, you can pipe it into every room, though you’d better have a good memory if you wanna skip tracks or change CDs, because there’s no displays in the other rooms. Oh, and that reminds me; the surround sound is calibrated for best effect if you’re sitting in front of the TV, so it might sound a little off if you’re somewhere else in the room.”

“Got it.”

Shego handed the remote back to Kim, and then gestured in the direction of the computer.

“Computer should be able to run almost anything you want, and it has an ultra high speed satellite Internet connection that runs through a low-level encryption, so as long as you’re not trying any real hacking, you should be able to use it for anything else you need without worrying about the Internet police tracking you down.” Shego smirked.

“Internet police?” A raised eyebrow came with Kim’s amused smile and dry tone.

Shego waved her hand in a dismissive little flourish. “You know; the recording industry, Hollywood, those guys. Last thing I want is to go down for something as idiotic as file sharing, and at up to thirty K a pop the combined fines could even make me sit up and take notice.” Shego paused, smiling. “Not that I’d pay them mind you, but it would seriously piss me off to have to relocate the house just for that.” Shego made another dismissive gesture. “Anyway, you wanna settle in now, or do you want the tour?” Shego yawned and glanced at the time display on the TV menu. “Getting close to midnight… only time for one unless you plan on staying up late.”

Kim turned off the television and, after a moment’s hesitation over which button to use, the lights in the other room, then smiled as she answered; “I probably am, but I’ll take the tour now.”

Shego snorted softly and shook her head gently. “Ok, follow me then…”

With that, Shego turned and headed for the exit, leaving Kim scrambling to find a place to set down the remote before hurrying to catch up to her.

Out in the main hall, Shego paused for a second, glancing at Kim, and then turned and made a vague gesture to the left, indicating the other door farther down the balcony. “That’s my suite down there. Pretty much the same as yours except, y’know, a lot bigger and nicer; more me.” Shego smirked and, after a second, Kim snorted faintly and smiled. A moment later, the smile twisted slyly.

“So you wanna keep me close, do ya’?”

This time it was Shego’s turn to snort softly. Shaking her head, she started for the stairs at a casual pace. As she went, she gestured across the way, to the other side of the hall. “The first door opens onto a hall like yours, only leading to two slightly smaller suites instead of just the one. Second door leads directly to another suite the same as yours. Aaaand that would be everything up here.”

As Shego reached the landing at the top of the stairs, she happened to glance at Kim, only to find the girl watching her with an amused smile and considering expression.

“What?”

“Oh, nothing…” Kim responded in a teasing tone, while her grin deepened.

Shego stopped, one sable eyebrow rising slightly, and cocked her head to the side a little, shooting Kim a look as she demanded; “What?”

Kim snorted faintly, almost chuckling, and all but smirked as she responded; “Oh, I just find it reeeeally interesting that someone who says she can’t stand her brothers and makes a big point about how she’s all evil and everything just happens to have four guest r— errr, suites, in her home is all.”

Shego’s eyes grew wide and she gaped at Kim for several stunned seconds before her features twisted in outrage. “Take that back!”

“What?”

“I said take it back! Now!” Shego’s furious shout echoed through the hall, and her hands erupted in a writhing corona of bright lime-green energy as her power came forth.

Despite the threatening display, Kim kept smiling as she raised her palms to Shego, replying in a tone of contrived innocence and confusion; “What? What? I didn’t say anything…”

“I did not build this house with rooms for my brothers! It’s just a coincidence the space worked out the way it did, got it? I’d rather tear out all my hair with my own two hands than have them anywhere near this place! Do you understand?” Shego’s fists were clenched tight and she almost trembled with the strength of her seething indignation.

“All right! All right!” Kim laughed. “It doesn’t mean anything! It’s just a coincidence, got it!”

“You’re damn straight it is!” Shego huffed loudly, her power dissipating as she whirled and tromped down the left-hand stairs, growling and grumbling incoherently to herself as she went. “Of all the… stupid idea… brothers; ha! No way I’d ever… goddamn idiotic… can’t possibly think…”

Following along behind Shego, Kim tried her best to conceal her considerable amusement over the show the other woman was putting on. Fortunately for her, Shego didn’t look back, because she really didn’t do a good job of it, her mirth showing through in her bright fern-green eyes and subdued smile.

At the bottom of the stairs Shego stalked around in a tight circle to the left, heading back for a door to one side of the staircase. Yanking it open with noticeably more force than was necessary, she led Kim into a broad hallway that stretched off about twenty-five feet before ending in a ‘T’ intersection. Heading down the hall, Shego’s pace relaxed somewhat, and as she passed a door on the left, close to the intersection, she gestured to it absently while speaking in a tone that was almost normal.

“That’s the servant’s kitchen and living area. Stairs to the basement are in there too.”

“You have servants?” Kim was considerably surprised.

“Not exactly.” Shego paused at the intersection, explaining. “The place was designed with four servants in mind, but since I’m not here all that often, they live off the grounds and come in on Mondays and Thursdays to keep the place up.” Shego glanced at Kim; “Even when I’m here full time they only need to come in an extra few days a month. Despite the old-world looks, this place is ultramodern under the surface. Climate controlled, super insulated, air system filters out over ninety percent of the dust when it’s working at optimum; the place practically cleans itself—at least for the day-to-day upkeep you’d have to deal with otherwise.”

Shego gave her head a little shake. “Anyway…” she gestured up the short dead-end corridor to the left with a quick sweep of her hand, the arc taking in the two doors on each side of it. “Bathrooms on the left, rooms on the right.” Shego turned and started down the hall to the right, which was a little longer and ended in a door, with two more on the left-hand side. “Same with these two.”

Shego opened the door at the end of the hall and ushered Kim through into the dimly lit space beyond, following a moment later and turning on the lights, revealing a twenty-foot square room with two doors to the immediate right and several large windows dominating the left and far walls. It was the décor that interested Kim far more than the dimensions however.

Unlike the other parts of the house she’d seen so far, the wood paneling here rose to eight feet before arching into a vaulted ceiling comprised of elegantly carved latticework support beams and glossy, gently curved sectional panels set between them. There were two sets of elaborate bookshelves running along the only sections of wall that had no doors or windows in them, each filled with a mixture of hardcover tomes and various intricate, expensive looking ornaments. Dominating the far left corner of the room was an antique mahogany desk and high-backed burgundy leather chair, set back slightly from center and at a forty-five degree angle to the room, flanked on either side by the windows along the outer walls. Set up in a loose crescent around the near side of the desk were several comfortable looking overstuffed leather chairs, and the entire arrangement rested on a large, highly detailed Persian rug that took up over two-thirds of the floor space and matched the heavy drapery nicely.

“This would be my office.” Shego stated in a plain, matter-of-fact tone. “The computer here and in my room run on a restricted part of the network, and access the Internet through a better encryption than the others. Now I’m not going to tell you not to use them, but I’d really rather you don’t. There’s nothing in there that directly involves my work, but there is some… personal information I’d rather not share, ok?”

“All right Shego, I won’t.” As Kim kept looking around the room, taking in all the little details, she idly commented; “Y’know, I never really pictured you as an office type.”

“Meh… it’s more for show than anything else. I almost never use it.” Shego headed for the second door on the right while gesturing to the first. “Bathroom in there by the way.”

Turning out the lights and ushering Kim through the door, Shego revealed the next room was done in the same style as her office, though it was smaller—only about fifteen by twenty, with another door on the far wall, tucked into the right-hand corner, and a five foot square alcove in the middle of the right-hand wall, where a dry bar was set up on a long, narrow table. A few chairs and a pair of settees were arranged around a long, slender coffee table, facing the windows on the left-hand wall and on another large Persian rug.

“Waiting room,” Shego idly remarked as she led Kim over to the other door and out into the main hall again. As they exited, she turned to close the door behind them while indicating a door to the immediate left with a toss of her head. “ ‘nother bathroom.”

Crossing the main hall, Shego opened a door directly opposite the one they had exited, turning on the lights to reveal a large dining hall some thirty-five feet long and twenty feet wide, with three crystal chandeliers hanging over a long, heavy, antique old oak dining table flanked by well over a dozen padded leather high-backed wooden chairs. There was a door just past the center of the right-hand wall, and the far wall had an enormous ten-foot wide archway that opened onto a five-foot deep alcove with a smaller six-foot wide archway in its far side, which Kim could swear seemed to lead… outdoors?

“Don’t think I need to explain this one.” Shego’s wry grin matched her dry tone as she headed for the double archway.

There was a small, barely noticeable door on the left-hand side of the alcove, but Kim paid it no mind as Shego led her out through the archway, her attention focused on the space beyond, where she could just make out several lush plants growing there. As she crossed the second archway, Kim felt a strange sensation all over her body, like she was walking through a heavy cobweb or something like that. It even seemed to tug at her hair and pull on her loose shirtsleeves slightly.

“What was that?” Kim asked in a surprised tone, almost stumbling as she twisted while passing through the peculiar feeling, looking back and around only to find nothing apparent to her.

“Hmmm, what?” Shego looked at Kim for a moment, following her gaze and taking in her perplexed expression, then smiled ruefully. “Oh, sorry; forgot about that. There’s a really weak force field over the arch so that the humidity—and the bees—can’t get into the house.”

Kim turned to Shego, her expression even more confused. “Bees?”

“Can’t have fruit without bees Kimmie.” Shego grinned as she swept her hands up and out, her power igniting and revealing the verdant splendor all around them as she turned in a slow half-circle.

The pair was standing in the left-hand side of a greenhouse that ran along the side of the house for a length of about sixty feet. It was twenty feet wide or so, and, aside from the cut-stone wall that formed the side of the house, was enclosed by a single molded piece of smooth, transparent material about six inches thick, rising to a height of roughly ten feet before flowing into a gently arched roof that was just shy of eighteen feet high against the side of the house. As well, instead of a corner to the left, the transparent material curved gently, one wall flowing into the other, so that the enclosure was entirely a thing of curves and arches, devoid of any angles whatsoever.

Kim could see about four or five small, bushy trees in large stone planters closer to the house than the outer wall, encircled by lower stone planters that were filled with a variety of lush, verdant growth. Each of the trees had a plentitude of broad, fruit-laden branches that were well pruned and shaped, cultivating them to the maximum fullness allowed by the enclosed space, as if they were giant bonsai. In addition to that, there was a long, continuous planter running the entire length of the outer wall, its three-foot wide surface packed with more flowers and broad-leafed greenery, including dozens of flowering vines that were trained up long, arching trellises rising all the way to the roof and then across it, their interwoven greenery appearing almost like arch supports for the smooth surface above them.

In addition to the enchanting sights around her, Kim quickly became aware of the scents as well, when the myriad of gentle fragrances assailing her nostrils finally registered in her mind—everything from the subtle aroma of healthy bark and verdant leaf, to the musky scent of humid earth and moss, to the intermixed perfume of the countless multitude of blossoms around her.

“Oh wow… this is amazing.” Kim’s eyes were wide as she gazed around in wonder and delight.

“It better be for all the work it took.” Shego grinned wryly before her face sobered and she took on a deadly serious expression. “And I’m warning you now; if you even so much as think of using the words ‘green’ and ‘thumb’ in the same sentence, I swear to god I’ll put you through a fucking wall, understand?”

Kim snorted loudly and broke into a grin in face of the threat, responding in a giggling tone; “Never think of it…”

Still tittering a little, Kim slowly trailed along behind Shego as the pale woman headed to the right, the redhead’s attention more on exploring the greenhouse than following. A little farther on, just past the first tree, Kim saw the bees Shego had mentioned—or at least, a modest sized beehive set up against the wall of the house. Past the beehive and another tree, at around what Kim judged to be just a little farther down the house wall than halfway, was another archway leading back inside, which Shego was headed for at a sedate pace.

Following Shego inside with a slight reluctance, Kim passed through the odd clinging sensation of the force field just in time to get a face full of light as Shego hit the light switch by the archway. Kim blinked several times, dazzled by the golden illumination, while Shego dismissed her power once more. It wasn’t that the light was much brighter than that given off by Shego’s energy—it was actually rather subdued—but it was considerably more all encompassing, given it came from a dozen or so wall sconces around the room, as well as a few inset dome lights built into the center beam of the exposed, finished crossbeams running along the ceiling.

Kim’s eyes quickly adjusted, and she found herself standing in the center of a room that was about fifteen feet wide and twenty-five feet long. The first thing Kim noticed was a pair of archways to the left, just past what looked to be a modest-sized heavy wooden card table with several chairs around it. One archway was small—about three feet wide—and tucked into the corner on the far wall, while the other, right next to it in the center of the adjacent wall, was much larger—nearly eight feet wide. Almost immediately after that, Kim took in the large, ‘L’ shaped sectional couch she was practically standing on top of, so close she could almost reach out and touch the end of it.

The overstuffed couch was upholstered in a soft, velvety fabric that was a dark ivory just shy of tan, and ran for a length of ten feet on each side. Turning her head, Kim followed the line of the couch as it ran along the far wall, and found it framed a big wooden coffee table with an inset glass top, while past it, on the right-hand wall, was an enormous six-foot long widescreen plasma TV, mounted off-center both to align it with the couch, and because there was a door tucked in the right-hand corner of that end of the room.

Built into the wall around the TV was an elaborate series of wooden shelves that formed an extensive home entertainment center. A stereo and a fair-sized collection of CDs occupied the shelves to the left, a DVD player rested on a center shelf to the right, and a large collection of DVDs took up nearly all the space along the top and bottom sections of the unit.

Turning back to Shego, Kim noticed two more things; there were more shelves on the wall just past the other woman, and, unlike all the other rooms she’d seen so far, the floor was done in a tightly woven but plush, well padded pale tan carpet that went nicely with the finished wood and off-white plaster of the room.

“So what? No fireplace?” A faint smile graced Kim’s lips as she teased Shego over the apparent oversight.

“Yeah, there’s a fireplace—it comes up out of the floor.” Shego stated in a matter-of-fact tone. At Kim’s raised eyebrow and unconvinced expression she added; “No, really; it comes up out of the floor.”

“Seriously?” Kim’s tone was dryly dubious as she suspected Shego was pulling her leg in response to her teasing.

“Yes seriously.” Shego grumbled, heading for the interface panel next to the smaller archway and stabbing a few buttons as soon as she reached it.

A moment later Kim heard a noise to her right, and turned just in time to see the coffee table sink into the floor. A few seconds after the table dropped out of sight there were some more sounds from the hole—mostly low mechanical whining—and then a large round fireplace rose up out of the opening, bearing a striking resemblance to a stubby rocket for a moment as the matte black chimney pipe and shallow conical hood were first revealed. The next section was a beautifully crafted wrought iron framework supporting both the hood and a concealed track for a wraparound fireplace screen that was an intricate mesh curtain of fine black iron chain links. Lastly was the two-foot high base, made of rough stone and mortar topped with three-inch thick smooth-finished stone plates around a shallow central depression. Placed in the center of the depression was a round wrought iron fireplace grate resting on stubby legs and holding a big teepee-style arrangement of split hardwood logs.

Kim turned back to Shego with a playful grin, teasing; “What, no remote control to light it?”

“I don’t think so,” Shego responded seriously, triggering the controls to lower the fireplace once more, “what the hell’s the point of a fireplace if you don’t get the snap crackle and pop of burning real wood? Or the guttering flames and glowing coals that come at the end? Gas fireplaces are too fake for me Princess…”

Kim chuckled and nodded. “I guess you’ve got a point.”

Shego hit a few more controls, turning on the lights in the room through the bigger archway and turning off the ones in the room they were in. As Kim got the hint and headed towards her, Shego waved her left hand vaguely in the direction of the opposite end of the room, where the TV was, commenting; “Bathroom through there by the way.”

Following Shego as she turned and entered the next room, Kim saw that it was a dining room with a nice country style kitchen table and chairs. The long table was rounded at the ends and placed in the center of the fifteen by fifteen room, underneath a small chandelier with a polished mahogany frame and tiffany shades. A pair of six-foot wide archways flanked the table to either side, one leading out to the greenhouse, and the other opening onto what appeared to be a kitchen, while each corner of the room held a seven-foot high rounded unit of drawers and corner shelves that were heavily laden with a variety of tableware.

“What?” Shego asked upon seeing Kim’s smile and expression.

“Nothing, it’s just… homey.” Kim’s grin broadened.

“And what the hell’s wrong with that? I’m not allowed to do ‘homey’ or something?”

Kim snorted faintly. “No, no, just unexpected is all.”

Shego grumbled something unintelligible under her breath and headed into the kitchen, turning on the light as she went. After a few more moments looking around the dining room, Kim joined her.

The kitchen was the same size as the dining room—perhaps a little bit longer—and had two doors; one directly to the right, and the other in the right-hand corner of the far wall. The floor was a patterned tile mosaic done in various shades of brown, and extensive kitchen cabinets ran the length of the left-hand wall, with a second set running above the countertop at eye level, save for an open area over the sink. The countertop continued along the far wall as well, though it was broader there as it had a dishwasher and a gas stove built into it instead of cabinets, and there was a huge stainless steel industrial refrigerator standing against the right-hand wall.

As Kim was taking in the variety of appliances and racks of utensils, spices, oils, and pots and pans neatly arrayed along the counter or hanging from underneath the second set of cupboards, Shego interrupted her visual examination as she said; “Now, I don’t wanna come off the wrong way here Princess, but you need to understand that this, is my kitchen, and while you’re perfectly welcome to use it, you will do so with the proper respect, understand? Everything has its place and that’s where I expect to find it again after it’s used. Everything has a purpose and shouldn’t be used outside of that purpose—I don’t want to see you cracking walnuts with my meat-tenderizing hammer or peeling an orange with my good filleting knife. Messes will be cleaned, nothing will be left out lying around, and so help me if I ever walk in here and find a disaster that looks like something out of a comedy bit you’d better be running, because when I find you I will fuck you up, are we clear?”

Kim snorted in the face of Shego’s deadly serious air, and there was laughter in her voice as she replied; “Ja-vul mien fuehrer! The glory of the kitchenland will be upheld!”

Shego’s eyes narrowed as she growled; “I’m not joking about this Possible. I had to put up with years of that crap from my brothers while I lived with them, but this is my home and I’m not going to stand for it here, got it? You can’t deal with that then stay the hell outta my kitchen.”

“Ok, ok, I get it.” Kim grinned, raising her palms to Shego in a placating gesture. “I promise I’ll keep everything the way it’s supposed to be and clean up after myself, all right?” Kim paused, her grin twisting to chagrin. “Besides, it’s not like I’ll be doing much in here anyway.”

“Hmmm?” Shego’s puzzled hum came with a raised eyebrow.

Kim looked off to the side slightly as she all but stammered; “Let’s… just say that cooking isn’t exactly in my… skill set, shall we?”

Shego’s eyes widened and she broke into a wry, amused grin, her previous annoyance forgotten. “Oh don’t tell me that little Ms. Perfect is a klutz in the kitchen, now is she?”

Kim blushed faintly and snapped; “I am not! I get by just fine now!” Kim paused for a moment before reluctantly continuing; “Well, more or less. I mean… if it’s nothing too complicated.” Kim sighed and shook her head under Shego’s seemingly all-knowing gaze. “All right, all right, so maybe my cooking is a little bit… sub par, ok?” Kim looked up defiantly. “But it’s a lot better than it used to be! I don’t even burn potatoes or hamburgers anymore!” Kim’s reluctance returned. “Well… almost never anyway.”

Shego had to fight tooth and nail to keep from laughing in Kim’s face, and even as it was, her mirth came through clearly in her tone as she replied; “I see… well, that’s— that’s just g-great Princess. Really.”

Kim’s sharp fern-green eyes narrowed as she glared at Shego, but she held her tongue, not trusting herself to speak—both because of her exasperation over Shego being amused by her shortcoming and her embarrassment as she considered it somewhat justified, however much she’d prefer to deny it.

Shego struggled with herself, knowing full well the repercussions of pushing Kim further, and having to fight her instincts on multiple fronts in order to keep from doing so. Eventually she managed to get a hold of herself and was able to speak in a close approximation of her usual tone and air.

“Well, anyway, be that as it may…” Shego turned and indicated the section of cabinets to the left, right where the microwave was, “simple day-to-day stuff is in there, but for the most part,” Shego turned back and indicated the door on the far wall, near the stove, “you’ll find everything in the pantry—which includes the freezer, since the only freezing going on in that,” Shego pointed to the fridge, “is in the icemaker.” Kim nodded and Shego continued; “Garbage is under the sink, and although the dishwasher is a heavy-duty model, it’s better to scrape and rinse before you throw anything in it.”

Kim looked around a bit more, letting go of the last few remaining dregs of her irritation, then asked; “Why do you have such a big fridge? I mean, if there’s no freezer in it, then that thing’s huge…”

Shego huffed softly and quirked a smile as she walked over to the fridge while responding; “Fresh fruit and vegetables take up a lot of space, plus I like to make a lot of food all at once and store it for later on in the week. On top of that,” Shego opened the left-hand door, revealing fully stocked shelves that included a row of tall, rectangular, fluted glass jugs neatly lined up on the top shelf, each with a different colored liquid in them, “I like to drink a lot of different kinds of juice, so that takes up the whole top shelf.” Shego shut the door again, and then paused for a moment before concluding; “Doesn’t hurt to have extra space just in case too. After all, you’re here now…”

Kim smiled and Shego smiled back. A moment later the pale woman stood a little straighter and said; “Anyway, unless you want something let’s get going…”

“No, I’m good.”

With that declaration from Kim, Shego headed for the door behind the redhead. As Shego passed her, Kim turned, following along behind for only a step or two before the pale woman reached the doorway and opened it, ushering her through a moment later.

As Kim preceded Shego, she saw that that the door opened up in the corner of an ‘L’ shaped hallway extending twenty feet in either direction, with the small archway she’d seen in the corner of the living room to her immediate right. Glancing to the left as she exited the kitchen, Kim discovered that passage ended in another small archway, unlike like the one stretching out in front of her, which ended in a door.

As Shego joined Kim in the hallway, she pointed straight up the corridor, stating; “That door leads back to the dining hall.” Then she reached back to turn out the lights in the kitchen before closing the door behind them. A moment later she turned and led Kim down the other corridor, taking her through the archway and coming out into the main hall once more, right beside the left-hand set of stairs.

Heading around the stairs, Shego paused in front of them for a moment, gesturing to the last remaining door in the main hall that was still unidentified to Kim. “Library’s through there.”

“You have a library? Like, an actual library library? With books and everything?” Once more, Kim’s surprise was plainly evident.

“Yes, with ‘books and everything’…” Shego’s dry tone matched the look she gave Kim. “Do you know of any other kind of library?”

Kim drew breath to retort, then paused for a moment, a faint smile gracing her lips as she responded with mock seriousness; “Well, actually, there’s video libraries, music libraries, picture libraries—”

“All right enough!” Shego cut Kim off, turning and continuing out into the hall as she did. “It’s a book library smartass.”

Kim’s faint smile twisted into a half-smirk as she followed along behind Shego. “Well you asked…”

“You know damn well I didn’t—” Shego cut off mid-sentence, her teeth clicking together softly. “Never mind.” Gesturing at the twin corridors running underneath the inner stairs, she changed the subject abruptly. “Gym’s through there—I’ll show it to you tomorrow most likely—and the doors lead to storage rooms. You’ve got cleaning supplies, vacuums, and the washer and dryer to the right, tools and other repair stuff to the left.” Shego turned back to Kim and concluded; “Pool’s through the gym to the right, and the garage is out the front door and around the side to the left. That’s everything Kimmie; home sweet home.”

“You have a pool too?” Kim’s tone was one part surprise and one part excitement. “Why can’t we see it now?”

Shego vented something approaching an aggravated sigh. “Alright fine… I guess we might as well finish everything now.”

Shego led Kim down the left-hand passage and into the big, shadowy room the redhead had stuck her head in when they’d first come up from the lower levels. Kim blinked and slowed hesitantly in the gloom, her night sight long since ruined by the lights Shego had turned on while taking her through the house, while Shego moved further into the shadows with an easy familiarity.

A few moments later Kim saw a muted, multihued display light up next to Shego’s shadowy form, the black, flickering blot of her hand and fingers moving over the lights quickly. An instant later there was a faint electric hum from all around the room, immediately followed by a series of soft pops, clicks, and metallic tings as dozens of big flat panel lights along the walls sprang to life, flooding the room with a strong, pervasive light that although bright, still wasn’t harsh.

After a few blinks, Kim found that she was standing in a truly enormous room; so large that her soft “Oh shit…” echoed slightly. Looking around, Kim judged that the far wall was at least sixty feet away, with the space to either side of her stretching out by at least that much as well, while the cavernous ceiling soared no less than fifty feet overhead.

“Impressed I take it?” Again there was a faint, hollow echo through the empty space as Shego spoke up.

“Ummm, yeah, you could say that. It’s half the size of the school gym…” Kim turned her head slowly, realizing that aside from an array of exercise machines laid out in a twenty by forty foot area to her right, running along the near wall, and a strange looking fifteen-foot square grey plate in the floor a short distance out from that, the entire room seemed to be completely empty.

“Although… don’t you think all this space is a little… much? I mean unless you plan on playing basketball or something what’s the point?”

Shego snorted and smirked. “Sometimes appearances can be deceiving Kimmie, you should know that.” Kim looked over to Shego, and the pale woman’s grin broadened as she turned back to the big control panel on the wall beside her. “You just watch…”

Shego started tapping a sequence of controls on the flat panel, her fingers moving nimbly across the colored interface, and a moment later Kim turned to look out on the room once more as she heard a series of loud thumps and mechanical hums and whines. When she took in what was happening, her eyes widened in surprise, and she ended up rubbernecking like a country girl in the big city while trying to follow everything.

In a fifty-foot long, thirty-foot wide area to her left, a forest of posts were rising from the floor, most of them six inches wide, with slightly less at nine inches across, and a few that were a foot thick, all of which came to a stop in a randomly uneven pattern of heights ranging from three to six feet. An equally large section to the right of that was sprouting a series of parallel and uneven bars at various heights and configurations, while a long stretch of floor directly in front of Kim had multiple vaulting horses rising from it, and the open area in the far right corner, roughly twenty by fifty feet in size, had three balance beams deploying from the floor, two of which were uneven; one arched and the other slanted. On top of all that, dozens of hanging gymnastic rings, horizontal bars, trapezes, and several high wires were descending from the lofty ceiling overhead, forming a complex and daunting network navigable only by someone with exemplary acrobatic skills.

“Pretty sweet, eh Pumpkin?” Shego’s voice brought Kim back to herself.

“Ok, I take it back, this is just amazing!” Kim turned, half her attention on Shego, half still on the room. “Way cool setup Shego; totally spankin’.”

“Heh… I thought as much.” Shego’s tone and smile were both smug. “And it gets better Princess. You can use the interface to do a considerable amount of customization, changing the heights and configurations of everything in dozens of different ways, so you can keep things challenging instead of learning a course by rote.”

“Really? Wow… I think I’m going to like it here.” Kim turned her attention fully to Shego, her smile twisting to playfully suggestive; “I mean, aside from the primary benefit.”

Shego raised one sable eyebrow and stared at Kim dryly for several long moments before turning back to the control panel, her lips curving into a soft smirk as soon as they were hidden from the redhead’s view. Hitting a button sequence, Shego set all the various apparatuses in the room to retracting into their concealed positions. By the time she turned back to Kim, she’d schooled her face to a carefully neutral expression once more.

“Well, come on; we don’t have all night. I need to get to bed soon…” Shego’s impatience wasn’t entirely feigned; she really was starting to get tired now, since she hadn’t slept for at least thirty hours.

“So you want to go to bed now, do you?” Kim’s smile twisted further as she walked towards Shego slowly, her voice smooth and an octave lower. “Well, if you want, I can help strip you down and tuck you in all nice and… snug, for the night.”

Shego turned and began walking towards a door in the center of the right-hand wall, her dry tone floating back to Kim as the girl followed along behind her. “Is this what you’re like all the time now?”

Kim giggled, her smile shifting to a more humorous bent, and there was laughter in her voice as she responded; “Not all the time, no.”

Shego just gave her head a little shake and kept going, only to pause a few moments later when Kim curiously asked; “Ahhh, Shego, whyyyy don’t any of your weight machines seem to have any, y’know, weights on them?”

Snorting softly, Shego turned to see Kim staring at the streamlined, high-tech equipment to their right, a puzzled expression on her face.

“That would be because they don’t use any actual weights.” Shego grinned slyly as the teen turned to look at her. “There are a few advantages to working for a mad scientist Kimmie—” Shego’s voice turned bone dry for just an instant, “very, very few—and one of them is that when they come up with something interesting that isn’t so ridiculously complicated it can’t be used for more reasonable applications—or arbitrarily expensive, as the case may be—then you might be able to figure out how to use it for other things. In this case, it’s Drakken’s hover tech.” Shego gestured to the various exercise machines with a broad sweep of her left arm. “They all have repulsor units in them, but instead of providing lift, they’re focused inward to create resistance on a central bar inside the housing, which is attached to the rest of the mechanism like a normal weight would be.”

“Really? Wow, that’s… actually kinda cool, that you were able to figure out how to use something Drakken made for… well, anything else.” Kim grinned.

“Yeah, I’m just full of surprises.” Shego grinned back wryly. “Anyway, unlike normal weight machines, these are only limited by the tensile strength of the material they’re constructed with—in this case, that would be solid titanium. That gives a top range of about one half to two tons of resistance, depending on the machine. Not, mind you, that I could ever use that much, but hey, they were custom built, so I figured I might as well go all-out.”

Kim gave a soft snort of amusement—more a strong exhalation than anything else—and glanced to the left for a moment, looking at the big, matte grey square plate in the floor.

“Soooo… what’s that then? Anything special?”

“You could say that.” Shego’s enigmatic reply came with a teasing smile. “Why don’t you take a walk out onto it?”

Kim raised an eyebrow, staring at the other woman blandly for a few seconds, then indulged her by turning and walking out onto the dull looking plate, coming to a stop in the center before turning back to find Shego squatting down by the right-hand corner, sliding a small section of the plate to one side and exposing a small control panel. Pressing a sequence of buttons, Shego looked up and gave Kim a grin.

“You ready Pumpkin?”

“How can I be ready if I have no idea what’s going to happen?” Kim shot back dryly.

“I thought you could do anything…” Shego smirked, then hit another button, causing the plate to emit a faint, high-pitched electronic hum and begin vibrating ever so slightly. “So wha’d’ya think?”

“Ummm… world’s… largest… vibrator?” Despite the flip response, Kim’s brow was somewhat furrowed as a puzzled expression graced her young features. She wasn’t entirely sure, but she thought she was feeling… something strange.

Shego’s smirk twisted further and she responded; “Yeah, right. You’ll see…” A moment later she pushed a slider control about a fifth of the way up its range on the panel, causing the faint hum to deepen slightly as well as making Kim absolutely certain something was going on now. Her entire body felt leaden, almost as if she were tired from a long day of physical activity, or something was trying to pull her down to the dull grey surface beneath her feet.

“What’s going on Shego?”

“C’mon Kimmie, I thought you were smart… Can’t you figure it out yet?”

Shego slowly slid the slider control halfway up its track smoothly, and Kim didn’t quite stagger as the leaden sensation increased, but it was an effort for her to continue standing upright. She felt like she was worn out, that her entire body weighed more; her clothes and even her hair seemed to be dragging her down now.

Stubbornly struggling to fight off the sensation even as her mind raced trying to figure out what was going on, Kim’s eyes suddenly widened as she noticed how the loose, flaring, airy cuffs of her tunic were hanging straight down and somewhat taut against her wrists, and the answer finally hit her. She wasn’t imagining the sensations of weight and drag; she really was heavier now.

Her head snapping up to look at Shego—or rather, slowly pivoting up because of the added resistance—Kim loudly proclaimed; “It’s some kind of gravity enhancing thingy, isn’t it?”

“There you go.” Shego grinned as Kim finally figured it out. “When you reverse the polarity on one of Drakken’s repulsors, it becomes an attractor, and if you lay out a grid of, say, forty-eight of them in a nice reinforced frame, you get a nifty little force effect that simulates higher gravity. Right now you’re at one-point-five Gs Princess; slightly less than half of what this thing can do.”

Kim couldn’t help grinning. “Way cool Shego, way cool.” Raising her arms, Kim took a few careful steps around the area, and within moments she was feeling the strain from simply moving about; even breathing was harder than usual, and she was sure that she’d break out in sweat after only a few minutes of exposure despite the advanced conditioning she had now. “This is just totally awesome. I love it!”

“Yeah well, given what it cost you’d better—all the more so because of the drawbacks.”

“Drawbacks?” Kim paused, looking at Shego.

“Yeah.” Shego started powering down the grav-plate. “It’s not the same as working out with weights. Because everything is put under constant strain while you’re using it, it really increases the risk of injury from high impact stuff, and you can pull or tear things you’d almost never be able to normally, so it really cuts down on how useful it is.”

“Awww… that sucks.” Kim pouted petulantly for a moment, then sighed. “Well, I’m sure it comes in handy even if it does have limited applications.”

“Meh… it’s a toy. A really big, expensive, slightly useful toy, but a toy nonetheless.” Shego slid the cover back over the interface and stood up, giving a small, suppressed yawn as she did. “Ok, let’s get this over with. On to the pool…”

Feeling strangely light and springy after her experience on the grav-plate, Kim followed along behind Shego as she resumed heading for the door she’d been headed to before Kim sidetracked her. Less than a minute later Kim felt the clinging effects of another weak force field as she passed through the doorway into the dark, noticeably humid room beyond. As Kim stepped inside, Shego turned on the lights, which were warm and subdued, revealing the area fully.

The door opened up in the left-hand corner of a room that was about forty feet wide and stretched out to twice that distance, with a twenty-foot high, gently arched ceiling. The left-hand wall appeared to be made of the same transparent material used in the greenhouse, while the first eight feet of the remaining walls were done in symmetrical, repeating pattern mosaics, the glazed tiles running a gamut of blues from pale robin’s egg to brilliant azure to midnight cobalt, followed by bare brown stone up to the ceiling—though it too had a faint, glassy sheen to it, seemingly covered in a clear coating of some kind. The floor was patterned mosaic tile as well, though with a dull, porous, tacky finish to it, so it would provide traction even if wet.

Directly in front of Kim was the pool, which was positioned in a decidedly odd fashion as far as she could tell. It seemed to extend directly out of the left-hand wall to a width of thirty feet, with a fifty-foot length and rounded corners on the right-hand side. As Shego led Kim a little ways to the right and the redhead could finally see out the transparent wall instead of getting nothing but glare off it, she quickly discovered why the pool was positioned so oddly; it wasn’t fifty feet long, but rather fifty feet wide, extending out of the room and off into the gloom outside farther than she could see, with the transparent wall ending a mere six inches beneath the waterline.

“Oh wow, how big is that?”

“Hmmm?” Shego looked back to Kim in order to see what she was talking about. “Oh. Olympic length, though it’s considerably more narrow. And before you ask, yes, those lines do mean the wall can be raised up so you don’t have to swim under it if you want to use the full length of the pool. Controls are by the door.”

Kim blushed ever so faintly, not having noticed the faint lines running up the transparent wall along the edges of the pool until Shego mentioned them, but she held her tongue instead of offering the admission.

“Ok, we’ve got showers to rinse off with over there,” Shego turned and pointed to a pair of nozzles projecting from each wall of the near right-hand corner, then gestured across the room, taking in what looked to be a sectioned off area in the far right-hand corner, about twenty feet long and ten feet wide, with two evenly spaced doors in it, “that’s the sauna and the steam room, and yes, they are different. The sauna’s dry heat, while the steam room’s like a jog through the Amazon during the rainy season,” Shego paused, glancing a Kim for a second, then pointed across the pool to a separate, smaller, ten-foot round pool right along the edge of the bigger one, connected to it by a slight depression and a set of underwater stairs, “annnnd that’s the hot tub. There, tour’s done.”

Shego turned and took a few steps toward the exit before pausing as she drew even with Kim. Looking the girl square in the eyes she spoke with a serious air; “And you will remember to use a damn towel instead of tracking water all over my house, right?”

Kim snorted faintly and dryly responded; “Yes Shego, I have a brain.”

“All right then, you’re on your own…” Shego turned and resumed heading for the exit, yawning noticeably as she went.

After looking around for a few more moments, Kim hurried to catch up with the increasingly sleepy Shego, pausing only to figure out how to turn off the lights in the pool room and then again as she was leaving the gym. By the time she finally caught up to the pale woman, Shego was climbing the right-hand set of stairs out in the main hall.

Despite her previous statement, Shego slowed and came to a stop as the pair reached the door leading to the hall to Kim’s suite. Turning to Kim, Shego smiled faintly and asked; “So, everything you thought it’d be?”

“Not really.” Kim paused, then elaborated; “I mean, I didn’t have that much in mind to begin with, but you living in a huge mansion on a cliff overlooking the Italian coast wasn’t it, whatever ‘it’ was.” Kim gave a faint smirk, looking out on the lavish main hall. “And crime doesn’t pay why again?”

Shego chuckled softly. “Exception that proves the rule Kimmie, exception that proves the rule.”

Kim smiled softly, then, a moment later and out of the blue, said; “I just wish I knew why this place looks so damn familiar…”

Shego stiffened for a moment, then visibly forced herself to relax as she spoke with an assumed air of indifference; “Well, anyway, I’m off to bed. See ya tomorrow Princess.”

Kim turned her head, watching Shego’s retreating form with one eyebrow raised. A moment later she loudly proclaimed; “I’ll figure it out eventually Shego; it’s only a matter of time. You might as well just tell me now…”

“No idea what you’re talking about Kimmie.” Shego kept walking, not even looking back as she responded—mainly because she was wincing and hunching her shoulders slightly.

“Oh yes you do.” Kim was completely certain she wasn’t imagining things now. “And eventually I will too.”

“No you woooon’t,” Shego responded in a singsong tone as she opened the door to her room, “because there’s nothing toooo know. G’night!”

Kim just shook her head as Shego disappeared into her room. She didn’t know why the pale woman was lying, especially about something Kim was sure would prove to be ultimately trivial, but she intended to figure it out. As she turned and stepped over to the doorway leading to her rooms after spending another minute or so studying the hall further, Kim supposed she could always call Shego on the grounds that they had supposedly promised to always be honest with one another, but then she gave her head another gentle shake. It wouldn’t be nearly as satisfying—or as fun—if she did it that way.

Smiling, Kim reached out to turn off the lights in the main hall with the switch by her door. Blinking a few times in the sudden gloom, Kim cautiously stepped into the hallway to her room and closed the door behind her before slowly walking down the dark passage.

I could have sworn we left the lights on in my living room when we left. Oh well, maybe they’re on a timer or something… A second later Kim snorted and chuckled softly as she realized she’d just thought “my living room.” Living with Shego was going to be very dangerous. Not just for the obvious reasons, but also because it might warp her sensibilities if she wasn’t careful.

Entering her suite, Kim shut the door firmly behind her, and then fumbled with the softly lit control panel for a moment before getting the lights on. Looking over her shoulder, Kim experimented with the brightness until it was about halfway between the highest and lowest settings, getting a result that bathed the main room in a soft, warm glow reminiscent of lamplight, and highly appropriate for the old-world décor—at least in Kim’s opinion.

Moving into the bedroom, Kim set the lights there to a much brighter level and started unpacking, spending the next hour or so transferring a substantial amount of clothing and mission gear to her new closet and wide array of dressers. When she was finally finished, Kim stepped back and swept her gaze over the area, taking in part of the closet through the open door as well. Sighing, Kim shook her head ruefully. Despite the enormous amount of things she’d brought with her, she’d barely managed to fill half the space she had available. She honestly doubted she could have filled it all even if she’d brought everything she owned.

“Oh yeah, definitely dangerous living here…” A soft, wry smile accompanied Kim’s murmur.

Kim shook her head again and gave a little sigh before indulging in a long, languid, full body stretch, her every muscle trembling faintly as she rose up to her tiptoes. A moment later she went over to the closet and took off her shoes, adding them to the rest before turning out the light and shutting the door, stripping off her jeans and tossing them in the clothes hamper next to it afterwards.

Wandering out into the main room in nothing but her lose tunic, tight cotton shorts, and socks after grabbing her toiletries bag, Kim spent the next half-hour or so setting things up in her new bathroom—which she discovered to her delight was as big or even a little bigger than her bathroom at home, with a full bath and shower taking up the back wall and a nice long countertop around the sizable sink, over which a big wall-mirror was mounted securely in a metal frame.

Quickly returning the toiletries bag to her closet, where she’d stashed her other luggage as well, Kim returned to the living room and set her mind to figuring out the remote control for everything as well as exploring the capabilities of the computer. After an hour or so she thought she had everything down, and was fairly impressed by the computer as well. Kim didn’t know all that much about computers, but even she could tell that the system was much more powerful than her own computer at home.

Yawning as she turned off the big monitor, Kim realized she was actually starting to get tired now, despite not having worked out today and it only being—Kim had to pause for a moment to work out the time difference—somewhere around eight or nine o’clock back home. Standing up, Kim wandered over to the couch and flopped down onto it. She wasn’t quite tired enough to go to sleep yet, but she didn’t really feel like doing anything constructive either.

Turning on the TV, Kim started flipping through channels randomly, bouncing from satellite to satellite as she did, looking for something—anything—interesting she could watch for a little while to wind down before going to bed. A few minutes later Kim landed on something that took her a few moments to figure out, but then, once it clicked—mainly due to the groans and moans coming out of the speakers—had her sitting up and taking notice, her eyes widening and a faint blush coloring her cheeks.

Kim instinctively flipped the channel as she sat up straight and looked around the empty room, only to simultaneously realize that there was no one to see what she’d been looking at, and, that the new channel she’d just flipped to was playing an even more explicit porn movie scene—if that was even possible, though Kim was fairly certain her assessment was right.

Cautiously settling back onto the couch, Kim was about to flip the channel again when she hesitated. It wasn’t that she was particularly opposed to watching what she was watching—she’d even done some… exploration, over the Internet in the first few months she was with Corscan, and she’d been to a couple of high-class private strip clubs with the woman as well—but rather that she’d had little opportunity or experience with it. Watching porn was kind of pointless if you were getting thoroughly and repeatedly laid on a regular basis—at least, in Kim’s opinion.

Of course, you’re not getting laid regularly let alone thoroughly right now, are you? The suggestive thought slid seductively through Kim’s mind.

Relaxing into the couch fully, a faint, sly smile on her lips, Kim watched the explicit display before her in earnest now. After a minute or two she shook her head slightly, her smile twisting to a wry smirk as she murmured; “Well, I’ll admit you’ve got a really nice cock guy, and you sure do know how to use it, but what it’s attached to? Yeah, so not workin’ for me…”

Flipping through what was apparently an entire block of porn channels, Kim paused on each one for a few minutes to see what was going on before moving on, with a few notable exceptions, like the three channels of guy-on-guy action, the highly censored Asian movie she found, and a very, very fast flip off a scat scene that made Kim’s stomach lurch violently after only a few seconds of figuring out what exactly she was seeing. Swallowing, Kim concentrated on her breathing and scouring the images from her head, trying hard to ignore the bile in the back of her throat.

“Ok, lesson learned; don’t go randomly flipping through porn without knowing what you’re getting into because you might puke; got it…”

Still just a touch queasy, Kim switched over to the navigation menu and used it to continue her search. A few minutes later she nervously turned to a channel listed as running a four-hour long “all-girl” compilation from Vivid Video called Two Girls for Every Girl, looking away from the TV and turning her head back slowly so she could use her peripheral vision to carefully take in the screen bit by bit before committing to a full look, which thankfully revealed a seemingly normal scene of hot lesbian sex.

After a few minutes watching the much more enticing images now on screen, her previous bad experience slowly slipped from her thoughts, and Kim relaxed onto the couch for the third time, her right hand sliding up under her tunic and then down under her cotton briefs, softly stroking her rapidly stiffening clit and heated pussy. This was definitely something she could use to help her get ready for bed.

Kim smiled softly as she stroked herself. Living with Shego was going to be far more dangerous than she expected, but, just like the woman herself, the advantages outweighed the risks as far as Kim was concerned—just so long as she remembered to keep a level head anyway.

Pausing for a moment, Kim quickly stripped off her tunic and shorts before lying back on the couch and spreading her legs wide, her hands moving eagerly over her naked flesh as she stopped thinking and immersed herself in… relaxing, before it was time to go to sleep.
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Revelations of Destiny