Author's Note: Muhaha, my first Ben 10 fanfic. I've been a fan of the show for a year or so now, but never really heavy duty like Teen Titans. However, with the new show Ben 10: Alien Force, I decided to watch season's 1-4 of Ben 10 online, just to see where all the references were coming from. I fell in love with it instantly. Ben 10, you have a new devotee!

Disclaimer: So what if I don't own them? If I did…I don't think I would change anything.


Ben moaned lightly, rolling onto his side. Blankets tangled around his ankles and flopped over his hips lightly, threatening to fall off of the bunk bed. Slowly, they inched towards the edge, only to be thrust back onto the mattress by the boy's tense fists. His knuckles were white with the strong grip, his arms shaking slightly. A stray bead of sweat rolled down his forehead. His breathing became labored, the darkness of the room pressing on his sleeping form like an anvil. And with a jerk, it was all over.

The brown-haired boy shot up, a scream bursting through the air. The sound of his skull hitting the roof of the Rust Bucket followed quickly behind, waking both Gwen and his grandfather. While the red head banged on the roof of her bed in protest, the elderly man walked earnestly towards him.

"Ben, is everything alright?" He asked, worry etched in his facial features.

Ben didn't answer. He simply lay on his bed, hands gripping each other tightly, wondering just what that nightmare was all about. Truthfully, he couldn't remember a speck of it. The only remnant of the nightmare was the sheer terror of falling back asleep, and the bruise on his forehead from hitting the roof. A slight tremor flowed through his body. He pulled his blanket up over his shoulders, quivering with fear.

"Ben, can you hear me?" Max rested a hand on the boy's shoulder, jostling him a little bit.

The young boy shook relentlessly, clutching the blanket closer to his chin. He rolled onto his side, and fell back asleep. Looking worried, Max turned around and went back to bed. Gwen gave one final groan before thrusting her pillow over her ears and falling back asleep.


It wasn't until sunrise that Ben woke up again. And it wasn't until Gwen yelled at him to wake up two hours later that he realized he wasn't tired. In fact, he had never felt more awake in his entire life. Okay, so there was that one time he found his mother's stash of coffee and decided to drink nearly a gallon of it…literally. But that was a different kind of awake. This time, there were no chemicals reacting with the neurons in his brain. He wasn't high off of caffeine, he wasn't staring at a video game, and he most certainly wasn't kicking bad guy butt. So why was it that his eyelids weren't heavy in the slightest? Why was it that he was aware of everything around him?

Shrugging it off, Ben hopped down off of the bunk bed and raced out the door to see what was for breakfast. With a quick, reassuring glance at the Omnitrix, Ben sat down at the picnic table and picked up his fork and knife.

"So Grandpa, what's for breakfast?" The boy quipped eagerly.

His grandfather simply smiled and presented him with a plate full of God knew what. The only thing Ben could really be sure about it was that it was alive, and quite eager to get off of his plate. With a couple of stringy tentacles, it crawled off of the dinnerware and began to wriggle across the wood. Tsking to himself, Max took his knife and drove it through the head of the creature. At least, Ben thought it was the head. Plopping it back on his grandson's plate, Max beamed.

"Don't let that squid crawl away now. It'll be no good to you if it's gone."

"Grandpa, are you really sure that thing's a squid?" Ben grimaced.

"Sure I'm sure. Now dig in." Without hesitation, Max listened to his own instructions and shoved his helping of squid into his mouth. Still chewing, he took his fork and pointed at Ben's animal. "The eyeballs are the best." He said, his voice muffled.

"I'm not all that hungry." Ben groaned, pushing the plate away. "I'll just get some cereal or something." Within moments, the child was back in the Rust Bucket, gasping for breath.

"That thing stinks!" He screamed to no one in particular, waving his hand in front of his nose.

"Tell me about it." A voice rose from behind the passenger's seat of the RV.

"Oh, hey Gwen." Ben muttered, reaching for the cereal in one of the upper cabinets. "Did you eat that thing Grandpa had?"

"Are you kidding me? I'm all for sushi, but I prefer my food be dead before I eat it."

"So if you see a cow on the side of the road, can you not eat beef?" Ben smirked.

"You're such a dweeb." Gwen stifled a yawn and lowered down in the seat.

"I know you are, but what am I?"

"You sound like such a baby when you say that." Ben's cousin groaned as she leaned the seat back.

"According to you, everything that comes out of my mouth sounds like something a baby would say."

"That's true." The red head sighed and rolled over, closing her eyes.

"Are you okay?" Ben asked casually. "You look pretty tired."

"Well, with you screaming all night long, it's kind of hard to get any good sleep." Gwen snapped.

"I never screamed." Ben insisted.

"You probably don't remember it. You never really woke up anyway." Gwen shrugged. "Even so. Do you know how hard it is for me to get back to sleep with a wake up call like that?"

"Alarm clocks must be a pain for you then, huh?" Ben mocked.

"No, they're predictable. You, on the other hand, are neither set to a certain time, nor do you have an OFF button."

"I'm sure you'd like to create one."

"You have no idea."

With a final roll of his eyes, Ben poured himself a bowl of cereal and sat down. As he ate, memories of that night's nightmare flicked through his mind. But just as quickly as they arose, they vanished, leaving him to scream bloody murder. And then there was black.

After what seemed like a few moments, Ben became vaguely aware of someone shaking him. He looked around his blurry surroundings, searching for whomever, or whatever, had a strong hold of his shoulder. Through the fog, he could barely make out the shapes of his cousin and grandfather, both calling his name relentlessly. He moaned lightly, weakly trying to brush his cousin's hand away. He could hear Gwen's voice, but it was distant and close at the same time, as though she were in a bubble or behind a curtain.

"Benjamin Tennyson, if you don't answer me right now I'm calling an ambulance. And I'll make sure they give you plenty of shots."

Ben hated shots, and the last thing he wanted was a lot of those, courtesy his cousin. And, knowing her, they'd be shots for rabies or something like that. Glaring at her as best as he could, he pushed her away.

"Don't you dare." He mustered.

"That's better. Now, mind telling me just what the heck happened?" As Gwen spoke, her voice faded, and once again, all went dark.


Author's Note: Pathetically short, I know. But don't worry. The chapters will get longer, I promise! And I'm sorry for the rush of that first part. I was in a rush to write it before last night's dream faded. That's right, my dear readers. Raven's Secret gets all of her ideas from dreams.