KP - Countdown : Part I
Kim took a bottle filled with a gel almost the same color as her eyes and started carefully applying it to her face, forearms and her belly. Pretty soon she would pass the container to Ron and he would spread some on the exposed part of her back. The sunburn was not terribly painful, though it did sting a bit. Kim's main concern was how it was going to make her look. Summer had only barely begun and she hadn't had proper time to build up a base tan.
The tan-lines her mission clothes were going to leave would certainly look funky with the teeny little bikini she was planning to debut the first chance the two teens had to ride out to Lake Middleton. In fact, she should have already been there. That was the plan for Saturday, especially since their traditional "Date Night" had been taken up by a dual family party celebrating their graduation from Middleton High School. Saturday was supposed to be for them.
Somebody should have told Jackie Oaks that.
There had been a brief respite from missions after their prom night fiasco. Kim didn't know if that was because of what had happened to them that night, because nothing actually came up or because she openly defied GJ when they tried to arrest a girl who had pretty much just saved their lives. All she knew is they were half way to the lake, ready for a day of sun and fun and not just a little lip smacking when the Kimmunicator went off.
Jackie wasn't in prison terribly long, considering the only actual crimes he committed were the museum heists. Since he was the founder and promoter of the GWA, there really wasn't anybody to bring charges against him for turning into a giant Jackal creature during a wrestling match in Middleton. With time off for good behavior, he was out and about in just under two years.
He wound up in Egypt, trying to find more ways to get in touch with his inner 'demon.'
Naturally, Team Possible was called in to deal with him once more. Unfortunately, the operation included Will Du, who, in a completely foreseeable display of overconfidence and fundamental ineptitude, managed to get all three of them captured. If it had not been for Ron's quick thinking and nimble toes, Oaks would have once again become a giant creature resembling one of the ancient Egyptian gods and they very likely would have still been chained to a wall inside one of the great Pyramids.
Kim was extremely glad she had taught Ron how to pick locks. She was also glad she had a couple bobby pins in her hair as well. They may have been old-fashioned, but they did have their uses. The only thing she could complain about with Ron's performance was that he needed to put a little bit of foot powder in his mission boots.
A little bit of stinky-foot could be forgiven in the desert.
It was a good thing they had been inside for most of the op. What little time they had spent out in the sun had crisped her exposed skin pretty quickly. Ron's face was in slightly worse shape, though he wasn't complaining. His freckles were slightly more vivid than normal, making him look semi-permanently embarrassed.
That made her gasp as she realized something else involving freckles. With a glance at the latched door set in the front of the passenger cabin, she started rooting around in her pack. Agent Du was up front piloting the GJ hoverjet that was carrying them back to Middleton at hypersonic speed and she hoped like heck he stayed there. Somehow over time she had grown to despise him more than some of her enemies and even though the two of them weren't doing anything private, she hoped he stayed up there. The aircraft could run almost totally on automatic but it made her nervous whenever he would leave the controls.
Will Du made her nervous any time he was around. If there was anyone in the world who was supposed to be on her side that she would like to punch out…
Kim's hand closed on the object she was searching for. Pulling it out, she opened it up, staring at the interior of her compact.
"It's a small mirror for looking at my face." Kim once explained to Ron, who was assuming it was one of her high-tech gadgets. That's precisely what she was using it for at that particular moment.
"Oh no." She moaned slightly.
"What is it, KP?" Ron asked, a concerned look on his face.
"Ron, why didn't you tell me my freckles were showing?"
He shot her a 'oh, come on' look. Then he got up and took both sides of her face in his gloved hands, kissing her upper cheeks and the bridge of her nose. She smiled softly, appreciating the gesture. "Ewwwwwwww, man that aloe stuff just tastes nasty." He brushed his tongue a bit before switching back to his 'supportive boyfriend' face. "They look cute on you, Kim. Don't worry about it."
She held up the little mirror, looking at the faint spots across the bridge of her nose. "First thing we're doing when we get home is head for the drug store to pick up some fresh concealer and a bottle of the strongest sun-block they've got. We're not setting foot on another mission unprepared like this."
Ron rolled his eyes, sitting back down in the acceleration lounge. Ever since the prom, they had been carrying a fairly heavy load in their mission packs. There were spare batteries for the Kimmunicators, extra charges for the grappler gun, a rather complete first aid kit, among other little doo-dads they may or may not end up needing. After ending up in the field with absolutely nothing, Kim wasn't leaving anything to chance. It was a wonder they had gone on the mission in standard clothes instead of her more advanced outfit or even one of their super-suits.
"What time is it?" Kim asked, flopping back down in her seat.
He rolled his eyes again. Twenty plus pounds of mission gear lugged around and Kim still didn't regularly wear a watch. "It's a little past eleven pm."
"Grrrrrrrr. Can't this thing fly any faster?" She sat back, crossing her arms.
Ron propped up his head slightly, closing his eyes. "What's the rush? Saturday's pretty much a done deal now anyway."
"I wanted today to be just for us. Yesterday was fun, but that was all fam time." She griped, scowling at the cockpit hatch.
"Kimila, it's not like we don't have the whole summer to ourselves. I mean, what are they going to do? Call us every five minutes? Besides, I'm here aren't I?"
Her expression softened slightly. "Yeah, I know, Baby. It just tweaks me like nobody's business sometimes. Just wish we were heading off like everybody else we know to some place fun."
He nodded. Most of the Class of 06 pretty much scampered out of town the moment the graduation ceremony was complete. That included the majority of their friends, including Felix and Monique, who were heading for Malibu; Josh and Tara, who were renting a cottage on one of the Great Lakes and even Bonnie couldn't get out of town fast enough. Following that time honored tradition, the new graduates were fanning out over the country, celebrating their new-found freedom from the bondage of high school.
Kim and Ron were not following them, at least not yet. The rest of their friends had already reached that all-important milestone of their lives…
…they had all turned eighteen already.
When Kim was little, she always reveled in the fact her birthday fell in high summer. That meant there were always plenty of kids who could come to her parties and they could almost always be held outside. Two summers ago she even got to have an old-fashioned Sweet Sixteen party, though she was absolutely mortified when her mother suggested everyone should come in poodle skirts and have a sock hop. That idea was firmly vetoed, but Ron still showed up in his leather jacket with his hair up in a pompadour, sticking his thumbs up in the air constantly in an impression of some 50s motorcycle greaser.
A week before graduation Kim laid out her plans during the weekly Pizza Night. She was going to go off with Monique and Felix, taking Ron with her for a week of sun and fun on the West Coast. Anne and James Possible looked at each other a moment and both firmly killed that idea.
"You see, Kimmie-cub, it's not that we don't trust you and Ron, it's just…well, you're still seventeen."
"Dad! Ron and I have been going off together since we were fourteen and we still do."
He shook his head resolutely. "Like I said, we trust you, but the rest of the world sees things a little differently. To us you are a very intelligent, very responsible woman. To the rest of the world, at least those who don't know you as a teen hero, you're just a teenage girl, one who is still legally a minor."
The…discussion…went on for quite some time like that. Missions were one thing. A one-night trip for Valentine's Day was okay too. A whole week without any kind of adult supervision was clearly out of the question. Finally he pulled the 'you-are-a-minor and we-are-your-parents' card out and put the kibosh on the whole debate. That was the end of the matter as far as they were concerned.
The one concession she had won was that when she did actually reach her birthday at the end of July, she could do what she wanted (within reason.) That meant nearly two whole months where she was still 'little Kimmie-cub' and stuck in town while the rest of her friends whooped it up.
Now even the big party at Lake Middleton was over with. They were still almost a half-hour away from home and the only party goers left at the state park would be paired off in every conceivable private spot in the place. The swimming, the cookouts, the loud music, all of that was over with now. Even if the two of them were to ride out there on Sunday, the place would be a holy mess until the park staff could get it cleaned up, making her feel like she should be pitching in to help instead of spending the day with her boyfriend. It would take a whole battalion of workers wearing Valkyrie 1000 shoes to clean that mess up in time to enjoy the lake.
Not to mention, the weather guy had been calling for thunderstorms much of the afternoon on Sunday.
She glanced over at Ron, whose eyes were closed. He was starting to develop her habit of catching forty winks on the ride back from a mission. She didn't blame him, though she would rather be snuggling him. Not that she didn't try after they left Egypt. It was just too uncomfortable knowing that detestable 'Top Agent' was only a dozen feet away from them, locked hatch notwithstanding.
There was movement in Ron's pants and moments later a tiny head popped out of his cargo pocket. Poor Rufus, he was still covered head to long skinny tail in zinc oxide. Without it, the desert sun would have turned him into a crispy critter inside of five minutes. Kim thought about her sun freckles and wished she had put that on her face as well.
Patting her lap, she called him over to her. She pulled out a handkerchief and started trying to clean the greasy sun block off his body. He quietly obliged, thankful to have most of the stuff off of him finally. She rewarded him with a pack of tortilla chips she had in her pack and he went right to munching away at them, sending a spray of nacho cheese powder everywhere.
It was going to be a long summer, counting down to their eighteenth birthdays.
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