FROM "A BOX OF CUDDLEBUDDIES" BY CAPTAINKODAK1; the date: June, 2007.

Tara stepped over to her dresser and pulled a box from under her underwear. Opening the box she pulled out three pair of handcuffs. Rolling Kim over on her stomach, she pulled Kim's hands behind her back and locked them around Kim's wrists.
…
A steel ring had been anchored into the wall of the cistern. Tara passed the cuff through the ring and snapped the cuff shut over.

FROM "FAMILY LEGACY" BY DACCU65; the date: Halloween, 2027.

Tara found a dark corner to conceal herself and waited, while the intruder reached the top of the stairs and started to descend. Tara gasped when the intruder appeared. It wasn't the skeletal limbs or the horrid reek that tore the expression of shocked horror from Tara Stoppable; it was the handcuffs on the figure's ankles and wrists.

A HEROINE'S LEGACY: HIS QUEEN'S BONDSERVANT

Kimberly Anne Possible had been out of the cistern for some days.  She had showered after sixty years trapped in the cistern.  She had slept in a bed in the faithful reproduction of her old loft.

All this occurred in the house of Tara Rene and Ronald Eugene Stoppable.  They had both died, Ron long ago, and Tara mere months before.

Tara and Ron's grandson, Kim's grandnephew, Ronald Zimmer Possible,  had come to talk with her; night after night.  From her had issued the screams, threats of revenge, and curses.  Shrieks of hatred; terrible warnings of  what would happen to the family should she ever break free; foul vile blasphemies.  From him proceeded affirmations of love.

And the questions.  Endless questions from both.  What had gone on outside?   What were missions like?  And even some laughter.

And finally her heart broke.  And her grandnephew obtained his heart's desire; pardon for
Tara's awful crime: the murder and the hellish imprisonment.  The heroine he always knew was still in her heart emerged at last.

She emerged physically from her cistern tomb.  Her grandnephew didn't cringe in horror at her ghastly Undead appearance, as his grandparents had done.  Quite the opposite.  He took her into his arms and embraced her joyfully, as a beloved one retuning from the dead

She resumed her missions.  And he resumed his studies to discover the cause of her Undead condition and the secret of her restoration.

She refused to ever look in a mirror.  She configured her Kimmunicator to project an artificial holographic appearance; a appearance that everyone saw but her grandnephew.  His Ronnunicator was calibrated to allow him to see how she actually looked.  And she allowed it.  He had proven himself.  He had gained her trust.

But these are all other stories.



When Kim had come out of the cistern in 2070, she still wore the handcuffs.

The chain had long since been broken in the strength of her former demonic rage.  But the fetters were still on her wrists.  She would have taken her Kimmunicator laser, cut them in pieces, and discarded them like a diseased carcass…had not her grandnephew stopped her.  At his prompting, she held up her arms while he picked the locks of both and removed them. And to her appalled response, he put one on his own wrist.

Kim was shocked.  In a  hoarse whisper, she asked why he would do such a thing.

And he embarked on his usual long involved explanation about ancient practices..  Holy relics.  Religious medallions.  Armed forces dog tags.  Identification bracelets and tags.  Wearing an item of a dearly departed.  A knight wearing his lady's colors.

It was as boring as Actuarial Society dinners she used to attend with the Stoppables.  It was as incomprehensible as her father's explanations about rocket engineering, or her mother's explanations about neurosurgery.  It was as confusing as listening to the Tweebs talk alternately, each completing the other's sentences.  It was as overwhelming as cousin Larry's stories about role-playing games, graphic novels, and cosplay at the conventions.  Which was not surprising; Ron Possible was after all the descendent; a branch on the family tree.

She couldn't remember a word…except two parts.

He quoted to her from the story of Ruth, from the first chapter and the sixteenth verse; from memory.

"And Ruth said, 'Entreat me not to leave thee, and to return from following after thee, for where thou goest, I will go.  And where thou livest, I will live.  Thy people shall be my people, and thy God shall be my God.  Where thou diest, will I die, and there will I be buried.  Yahweh do so to me, and more also, if anything but death separate thee and me.' "

He quoted to her from the Law of  Moses, from Deuteronomy, the fifteenth chapter, and the twelvth, sixteenth, and seventeenth verses; from memory.

"If thy brother, a Hebrew man, or a Hebrew woman, be sold unto thee, and serve thee six years; then in the seventh year thou shalt let him go free from thee.  And it shall be, if he say unto thee, "I will not go out from thee," because he loveth thee and thy house, because he is well with thee, then thou shalt take an awl, and thrust it through his ear unto the door, and he shall be thy servant for ever. And also unto thy maid-servant thou shalt do likewise."

He thus bound himself to her.  As a bondservant.  He thus marked himself.  It was his way of telling her he loved her and her household…their household.  He was telling her he would serve her forever.  He would accompany her anywhere…even back to a tomb, if need be.

And with awful finality, he clicked the manacle shut.  The laser diode of his Ronnunicator glowed as he welded the lock and sealed it.

Kim was stunned.  She thought she knew everything about her grandnephew she could know.  But her grandnephew had inherited the Tweebs' gift of inventiveness, and Ron Stoppable's gift of making life altering decisions in a sudden impulsive moment.

She wiped away some tears that had fallen on each cheek from each eye..   He was not a chauvinist.  But he could be so retro.  And she believed firmly in equality.  What was good for the man was good for the woman.  And after all…didn't the Bible mention "maidservants"?  And didn't Ruth make the promise also?

Kim likewise took the remaining shackle, and likewise snapped it closed on her left wrist.  She trained her Kimmunicator laser beam on the lock.  The keyhole disappeared and became a weld spot on the cuff.

Ron took a deep sigh and blinked away the wetness the blurred his vision.  And his great-aunt lifted up her chin.  She had a defiant "so THERE!"  look in her eyes.

And Ronald Eugene Stoppable's stupid grin appeared on Ronald Zimmer Possible's face.  The grandfather's infuriating smug twinkle appeared in the grandson's honest brown eyes.  "Boo-yah," he said quietly.

He saw the characteristic smirk on his great-aunt's face and the inimitable sparkle in her bejeweled green eyes.  "Spankin'," she murmured.

Each gave the other a rib-crushing hug.

"Love you, Aunt Kim."

"I ferociously love you, dear nephew."

TO BE CONTINUED