Ben 10: Crisis Core
Chapter One: A Major Change in Scenery
Disclaimer: I don't own anything of the Final Fantasy VII franchise or anything of Ben 10.
A/N: This takes place after the end of Ultimate Alien. Since I love the ultimate alien forms, the new omnitrix will have the ultimate function as well.
Deep in the infinite halls of the space-time continuum, Professor Paradox studies his chrono-navigator and frowns in irritation.
The Time War has been raging far longer than he thought it would. The temporal beasts and rouge chronosapiens have caused the war to escalate rapidly, their numerous battles resulting in timelines changing constantly; straining the entire space-time continuum piece by piece.
In consequence, rifts began to form in random places. Usually these rifts are harmless with Paradox fixing the damages before harm could be done. However, today was not a usual day and deep within the Professor's calm persona he knew that something was wrong.
Meanwhile in Bellwood…
A certain green eyed teen sat in his bedroom fiddling carefully with his watch; hoping to unlock master control.
Suddenly he stops after a quick glance at his alarm clock, "Oh No! I'm about to miss a mini marathon of Sumo Slammers!"
Ben scrambles to make a small bag of popcorn for his date with the TV. It's the typical Saturday night, Gwen's out on a date with Kevin, leaving Ben to enjoy the weekend night alone. Several hours later, attention to the ending credits are ignored in favor of his growling stomach.
"Well, time for some smoothies and chili fries."
After a well-deserved snack of chili fries and a quick trip to Mr. Smoothy, Ben decided to fly home via Jet Ray express.
He touches the holographic button; slamming the dial, "Jet Ray!" he exclaims.
Pushing off the ground with remarkable speed, the red humanoid mantle ray like alien soared off into the late night air; only to run into a massive purplish tear in the sky that suddenly just appeared without warning.
The Omnitrix glows red and Ben transforms back into his regular self.
"What the ?" was all he managed to mutter as he found himself stranded in a sea of purple; a feeling of wrongness emitting from every cell in his body before everything went dark.
Pain…
He moans as his body slowly begins to feel like it`s being crushed by an enormous pressure…wetness?
Green eyes snap open; the sea of purple gradually replaced with darkness and water. The unfortunate teen quickly holds his breath and lurches for the faint green glow of his watch, frantically turning the dial looking for an aquatic alien to pop up on the holographic screen.
As he begins to see white dots, Ben locates what he is looking for and slams the button desperately.
"Ripjaws!" he triumphantly yells, transforming into a mostly gray aquatic mermaid tailed alien with a catfish like face and a long thin antenna with a glowing tip attached to his forehead. Sharp long fins on the arms, tail, and back combined with a jaw teeming with big jagged teeth allows the poor alien to earn his name of Ripjaws.
"Thank God I unlocked this alien again", he thinks grimly.
Ripjaws takes stock of the situation, the phosphorescent light on his head providing light to see through the darkness.
He is in a wide underwater tunnel, its dark walls stretching as far as he could see. With a flick of his powerful tail, the alien hero begins to swim up the length of the tunnel, hoping that it would eventually lead to an open pocket of water where he could swim to the surface.
After 30 minutes of rapid swimming, the tunnel abruptly ends; the water changing from a dark color to a light blue as sunlight streams down in beautiful rays of light.
Encouraged, Ripjaws increases his speed, angling his body upwards eagerly. He breaks through the water's surface anxiously; taking a look around.
The pocket of water is actually a lake graced with a beautiful waterfall; enclosed by a protective wall like small mountain range. Touching the Omnitrix, Ripjaws changes back into Ben; walking over to a big rock near the waterfall for a short rest and time to figure out what to do next.
He takes another look at the waterfall, the rock behind it forming a large square doorway. Curious and his gut telling him to take a closer look, Ben goes through the waterfall into a narrow tunnel; its floor covered in moss.
Tennyson walks further down the tunnel, the sound of falling water growing distant.
"I'm so sorry", a voice whispers in sorrow.
"Hello, is anybody there?" Ben called, his hand close to the Omnitrix ready for anything.
Silence and a light glowing at the end of the tunnel is his only answer. The light is revealed to be a cave filled with glowing crystals.
To his complete surprise, there is a woman standing in front of a large crystal at the center of the cave.
The woman was pale, brown hair tied back into a large ponytail and clad in a worn white lab coat with a simple ruffle blue blouse. Her legs garnished with a dark blue skirt with red high heels for shoes; on her left ankle dangle a sliver anklet.
"Stay back! I want to disappear… I want to die, please leave me in peace", she sobs in torment.
"I am sorry to bother you, but I am lost. Where am I?" Ben asked gently; expecting her to recognize him.
Surprised, the woman regarded him thoughtfully "How did you get here, did you wander here on your chocobo?"
"What is a chocobo?" he puzzled.
"Chocobo… do you take me for a fool?
"No, I'm just not from around here" he said hastily.
The lady regards him fully for the first time, shaking away her tremendous guilt for a moment; taking in the young stranger's appearance.
The young man wore a black shirt, blue pants, and black shoes. Over the black shirt, he wore a green jacket with white stripes and the number ten emblem on the breast of his jacket.
However, the most striking thing about him was a glowing watch on his left wrist. It strangely did not bare any numbers, instead the faceplate was black with green lines forming an hourglass; its borders white with three green squares on each side.
In all, it looked like a futuristic piece of tech and there was only one place where you could get very advanced things from: Shinra.
"Are you from Shinra?" she asked with suspicion forming on her face. The woman steps back carefully, her posture tense and ready for flight.
"Shinra? No, I'm not from Shinra", Ben denied in confusion.
"I'm not going back… after all this time Shinra wants me back?", a gun appearing out of her lab coat to point at the young hero; threatening him quietly.
Hands now up in the air, Tennyson tries to convince her to put down the gun, "I'm not from Shinra; heck, I don't know what Shinra is… just here for directions because I'm lost."
"Liar, the Shinra Company is the government in power, how can you not know?" She demanded.
"Exactly, if I am from this government, then why would I ask you these questions?
She walks closer, a look of confusion on her face, "Who are you?"
"My name is Ben Tennyson from Bellwood, a small town in the United States." He answered, hands still high in the air, the gun dropping from pointing at him to only point at the floor.
"United States?" The lady's face begins to morph from anger to confusion with a humongous dose of grief mixed in.
Deciding that enough was enough, Ben used his voice command, "Omnitrix access voice recognition mode."
"Voice recognition mode enabled", droned the Omnitrix.
The gun quickly goes back up to its previous position, but it was too late… "Swampfire!"
The unstable lady could only watch in shock and horrid fasciation as the young man instantly becomes a tall mostly green monster with black patches of skin on its shoulders and sides of its torso; two large rocks serving as feet with fleshy vines connecting it back to the main body.
Its pitch black face, adorned with a green mouth and green eyes. The shoulder and head crested with red spikes and a yellow hornlike spike in the center of its head. The gun fires off in terrified reflex, but Swampfire absorbs it with ease.
"What?" she gasped.
"Yeah, you finally got it, I'm not from around here", Swampfire smirked.
"You're a twisted creation of Hojo!" she said with unquestionable certainty.
"Ah man, here we go again", Swampfire groaned.
After several hours of discussion (and one lady tied up in vines) and a couple of demonstrational transformations later, the lady (who stated that her name is Lucrecia Crescent) finally understood that Ben was just a lost super hero.
"So you're an alien superhero", she stated in childlike wonder.
"Yeah", Ben smirked in pride.
"Oh I have so many questions to ask you", Lucrecia exclaimed.
"I could take days telling you about how I saved the universe, but I need some of my questions answered."
"Tell me about this planet and why you were so close to committing suicide." he voiced with a mixture of concern and curiosity.
Lucrecia instantly sank back down into her depression; her curiosity brutally erased. "It all started when Professor Gast unearthed an ancient…