Chapter Four
Power. That's what it all comes down too in the end. Man has been striving for it, man has killed for it, man has destroyed and created for it. And Man isn't the first one. My gaze extends past stars and past time. I've seen every civilization on every planet reach for power.
It starts out normally. The kind of thing any history student sees. Empires will stretch and stretch across untold lands, until corruption or incompetence topples them, and in that Empires place will come dozens more, attempting to fill the power vacuum.
Then it gets a little more complicated. Suddenly empires can no longer expand except into each other. But that only lasts so long. On side will build a weapon so powerful and so devastating that they win, right up until another side duplicates it. and suddenly war is over. Forever. The more idealistic of us may believe that's the end of it. But it's not. Peace creates something so devastatingly powerful that no man nor god dare challenge it. The Status Quo.
The Status Quo is created when war would kill both sides. Humans call it Mutually Assured Destruction. I call it boring. This why the Omnitrix interests me so. It will never be subjected to the Status Quo, as a skilled user would never find anything that could challenge him. Thus it will never create peace, something lost on its creator, Azmuth. The only thing it will create is Envy and Fear. And those who Envy it will copy it. Those who fear it will step in line, creating the illusion of peace.
But perhaps the most interesting war the Omnitrix creates is the war within the user's own mind. Perhaps that is why Ben X hates me. I take pleasure in watching his war.
"Where are we?" Gwen asked as she looked around. A sharp girl like her could spot things such as Washington Monument, or the Capitol building. But these obvious land marks were offset by other, stranger features. A large, white, obviously mechanical pyramid floated in the sky. A spiral tower was screwed into the ground, but it also seemed to ascend the clouds, but occasionally a cloud would break, and she could see it went all the way into the sky where her vision no longer followed. Perhaps stranger still was the kind of people that were walking around with them. The typical Caucasian American was replaced with cyborgs of varying ethnicity, but it seemed human beings in general were, at best, only fifty percent of the population. The varying heights ranged from mere inches to beings that were ten feet tall, and Gwen wondered how they could all possibly cohabit. For a girl who prided herself in her progressiveness and understanding, she was beginning to feel paranoia that bordered on racism.
"Well, It used to be called Washington DC." her counterpart said. "Now it's called Constantinople."
"Conta-wa?" the younger Kevin asked.
"Constantinople. It was the center of the entire planet for quite a while. They obviously couldn't use Rome or Greece, seeing as how those places still exist. Washington DC invoked a strictly American name. So the UEF decided to call it something a little more worldly and historic." Gwen's counterpart informed. "It has the effect of also sounding kind of alien, and seeing as how Constantinople became the default United Interstellar Alliance meeting ground, that really worked out."
Ben listened to this. He could care less about mundane politics and the meaning of names. He gazed upon the alien races, searching for something, anything, to justify the hatred he felt for his counterpart. But all he could see was everything he had failed to accomplish.
Azmuth created the Omnitrix for peace and understanding, not war, and not murder. But his counterpart didn't have the same rules he did. Even in their fight, Ben got the sense that his counterpart would very quickly go for lethal strikes had Ben not been so ineffective. Admiral Tennyson was quick to admit that killing has its usefulness, a concept Ben couldn't accept.
And yet he succeeded. He counted more than thirty races of aliens, living and working together. And seemingly happy. A large, whale like species was laughing and telling jokes with a species made of rocks. Kids of different species played in the park that Gwen's older counterpart teleported them too.
The most perplexing happened when a kid, a non-human, spotted Gwen and Kevin's older counterparts. They pointed, whispered with their friends, and then, one of the braver ones ran up to Gwen.
"Uh, excuse me..." The child said. He was blue, with antennae jutting out of his forehead, just above his two, black shark eyes. Gwen's older counterpart smiled and looked at the child.
"Yes?"
"Are you lucky girl?" he asked. Gwen's older counterpart smiled.
"I sure am." she said. The boy (Ben presumed it was a boy) smiled a huge smile, revealing surprisingly sharp fang like teeth. He turned to Kevin's older counterpart.
"So that means your Kevin Omega!" he yells.
"That's right, kiddo." he responded with a thumbs up. The blue alien child turned and ran back to his group of friends, shouted incoherently, and suddenly a dozen children swarmed Kevin and Gwen's counterparts with intensity one might see if a celebrity were to walk around.
The children swarmed them with questions. Both Kevin and Gwen smiled and answered them as best they could. Kevin shot a weak bolt of energy into the sky, and Gwen made of the children levitate, and Ben could see they did this sort of thing all the time.
One of the children noticed the trio of teenagers who seemed to be more confused than crazed over the celebrity heroes. She, one of the few humans in the group, saw the Ultimatrix on Ben's wrist.
"Is that an Omnitrix?" the girl asked. Ben looked at her and smiled. He was no stranger to super hero worship in his own universe.
"Nope. It's even better." he said as he outstretched his wrist to show her. She examined it.
"My mommy says that only Tennyson is allowed to have one, and everybody else who has one is a criminal." the girl stated innocently. She looked up at Ben, who was preparing a suitable explanation. Before he could, however, she held her hand to her mouth and shrilled.
"ohhh!" she yelled. "You're a bad guy! Lucky Girl and Omega caught you!" she turned to Kevin and Gwen and pointed. "And your bad guys too, right?"
"Yeah. Let's go with that." Kevin said, before the much lengthier and less believable truth could be told. Kevin's older counterpart walked up behind Gwen and Kevin, putting his hand behind their back.
"Yes, they are." Kevin Omega stated. "But we're trying to teach them the error of their ways."
"Can we help?" the kids, all at once, asked.
"Just stay out of trouble so you don't end up like them." Omega replied. The kids smiled, and, taking this as their cue that the two superheroes needed to be left to their duties, they ran back towards the area they were before, all of them yelling which super hero they wanted play as. Ben noticed that none of them said "X".
Kevin and Gwen quickly turned to Omega, who, similar to his younger counterpart, displayed a dopey smile that was hard to get mad at. The two smiled and shook their head at his super heroics.
Ben, however, noticed something crucial. He turned to Gwen's older counterpart, and, with the calm, collect manor Admiral Tennyson used to interrogate him, he questioned her.
"It's illegal to make an Omnitrix?" Ben asked. Gwen seemed dumbfounded by the question, as if though he was asking if the sky was blue.
"Well of course it is." she replied. "Why? Is it legal in your universe?"
"It's just that, I thought, eventually everyone would have an Omnitrix." Ben said. "It was my understanding that it's what Azmuth wanted. That way everyone can understand what it's like to be in another species." Ben smiled a sarcastic smile. "I mean, the Omnitrix isn't a weapon, not really. Even if some people use it that way."
"Ben." Gwen chastised. "Look, I know your counterpart isn't exactly the best guy in the world, but look around. We need to take notes."
"Take notes? Are you saying that we should all go around killing criminals? That's not how that works."
"Seems to work fine for these guys." Kevin retorted.
"Let's say that I did kill criminals, Kevin." Ben says. "Where would that leave you?"
"That's different." Kevin said as took a step towards Ben. "I wasn't right in the head. And besides, Look whose standing beside us." He cocked his head in the direction of his counterpart. Ben looked at him with a confused look, as suddenly his point had lost its validity.
"Yeah...how did I deal with you?" Ben asked Omega. Omega looked at him and then his counterpart.
"What are you talking about?" he asked. "Deal with me? Why would he deal with me? Ben and I have been friends since we met."
"Are you serious?" Ben asked. "You didn't absorb my Omnitrix, go crazy, turn into a monster, team up with Vilgax and try to kill me at least half a dozen times?" Omega laughed.
"What? No way, why would I do that?" he looked at his counterpart. "When I met the Tennyson's in New York, I admit, I was a little messed up. But they took me in. I became Omega after Ben showed me he was X. It never even occurred to me to absorb the Omnitrix energy and I never tried to kill him."
"You've gotta be kidding me." Kevin muttered. "You got to be a super hero and I got sent to the null void."
"You sent him to the Null Void? Harsh." Gwen's older counterpart said. "Our universes are really different."
"How did you guys deal with the Highbreed?" Gwen asked her counterpart.
"The Highbreed? You mean their sterility problem? Ben and Azmuth worked on a solution. What happened in your universe?" she asked. Ben rubbed his eyes.
"We didn't know they had a sterility problem, and...they kinda went crazy and tried to kill everyone in the universe." Gwen says. Ben did everything he could to keep himself from listening, but he couldn't help it.
Zombozo? Turns out he's a schizophrenic. Our Ben got him help. Michael Morningstar? His powers gave him a biological need to absorb energy from those around him. Our Ben fixed him and he's a good guy now. Our Ben gave Clancy a home, now he's the authority on Entomology. Our Ben. Our Ben. Our Ben.
"That's amazing." Gwen said as she fawned over the other Ben's accomplishments. Ben quickly glanced at Kevin, who was talking to his counterpart. Ben hoped, prayed, that they weren't speaking about the same thing.
"So can you teach me how to absorb punches?" Kevin asked his older counterpart.
"No. I can't. This suit I have on amplifies my Osmosian abilities. I'm ten times more powerful than even full blooded Osmosians, plus it keeps me from going wacko every time I absorb energy."
"Cool. Where can I get one?" Kevin asks.
"Well, Ben designed and built it for me."
"Are you serious?" Kevin turned to Ben. "Hey Ben, why can't you make stuff like this?"
"I'll, uh, get right on that Kevin..." Ben nervously chuckled. His blood was beginning to boil. Gwen tapped him on the shoulder.
"Hey Ben, you remember that planet? That girl sent us a message for us to end a war?"
"Oh yeah. Probity."
"Yeah, her. What was her planet called?"
"Uh...i don't remember."
"Oh." Gwen turned to her counterpart. "Well it was a weird planet. They were warring over the fact that some of them were red and some of them were blue."
"Oh yeah!" Gwen's older counterpart exclaimed. "That's Yomary Cruz. Weird planet."
"Did your Ben stop the war?" Gwen asked.
"Oh yeah. He set one foot on that planet when he was fourteen." Gwen's counterpart coughed and made her voice sound unnaturally deep. "He said 'you WILL stop fighting each other and Join the UIA. Or else.' and they joined later that day." she laughed. Gwen turned to Ben, laughing. She playfully punched him in the arm.
"Maybe you really should take notes from this Ben, Ben. He seems like-"
"Take notes?" Ben exclaimed. "Take notes?" the two Gwen's stopped laughing. "This guy is killing people with the Omnitrix and you want me to take notes? This is the kind of guy that we fight, Gwen." Ben felt like striking something. He violently grabbed his head and began to pull on his hair to avoid doing something with his hands that he would regret. "Since when does the end justify the means, huh? I don't care if he ended war, I don't care if he did all of this good, the way he did it was wrong and no amount of good that comes from it is going to make it right! And being in war doesn't excuse it! I've been in two wars, thank you, and I never killed anybody. We ended the highbreed conflict without killing any of them! And I'm sorry I couldn't end that red and blue war but I still don't think that killing anybody would have solved anything!" Ben realized that he hadn't taken breath during the entire rant. He still couldn't breathe, as he was now crying violently, weeping, and his lungs seemed intent to expel even more from his body. Ben leaned against a tree and sat down, and he inhaled just enough to continue his rant. "I'm sorry I couldn't help Kevin when we met him. I'm sorry I'm not smart enough to know when someone's a schizophrenic and I'm sorry I don't know how to solve problems without hitting them! But...but..." Ben pressed his hands to his temples, attempting to keep the massive pressure in his head from escaping via explosion.
The two Gwen's and Kevin's merely looked at him. Neither had seen Ben in such a state of shock and dismay. For the older versions, their Ben was always calm and collect, even when facing down space gods and titans that outmatched him. Their Ben always had the upper-hand, and he could stare down oblivion without blinking.
For the younger versions, it was just as shocking. Their Ben had faced down galactic threats and cosmic entities. But he could crack off a joke and slap his wrist, and even when he was losing, he always seemed to keep his chin up, and hope, for him, always seemed to be just a wisecrack away.
But now, his very reality was being challenged. The morality comic books and cartoons taught him was beginning to crack and fade away, and suddenly he was confronted by the shortcomings of his idealism. He desperately wanted something, anything, to hold against this version of himself. This wasn't the Ben Tennyson he was told of. This man wasn't evil. He was different. And he was ten times the man Ben was.
"Ben, I didn't mean..." Gwen started.
"I know what you meant." Ben snapped, his voice gaining the calm qualities that depression brought. Gwen began reaching for him, to comfort him, but he seemed to be miles away. Her counterpart, however, had no problem trekking those miles. She grabbed his shoulder and shook him. He looked up, surprised to see that the older Gwen was the one who was concerned.
"I think there's something you need to see, Ben." she said. She turned to Kevin Omega. He nodded slightly.
"Alright, guys. How's about I take the two of you to my place. I'll see if I can't whip something up that will shake off the post-universe travel hangover."
"Uh, yeah." the younger Gwen said. "Totally. I've got a killer headache."
"I don't." Kevin says.
"Yes you do Kevin. Let's go."
"But- oh. Oh yeah." he says. He glances back at Ben, and Kevin Omega leads them away. Ben gets up, attempting to wipe away his tears without acknowledging that they exist.
"Our Ben...he isn't perfect." She told him. She turned around, muttered a few magic words, and suddenly the air boiled and gave way to a large, purple portal. "Follow me."
I can see why Ben X hated his counterpart. He cried? Because of failures? Ha! I have to say, when I saw Ben 10 break down in tears, I was disgusted to the point of just ending the entire ordeal then and there. For everything I loathe of Ben X, I at least respect him. And I respect him because he's a man. This Ben was a boy. A child. And no amount of super powers and super heroics could change that.
Idealism is the only thing I hate more than the Status Quo. On one hand, it gives me a chance to see a fight more than once. Obviously a hero that doesn't kill a powerful villain will fight him again. And again. And again. The Battles lose their luster after a while.
The thing I hate most about Idealism is that it inevitably sustains the Status Quo, and I can't state how much I hate that. And Ben 10 was getting his idealism all over my beautiful fascist, and I couldn't have that. That's why I shook things up. That's why I introduced him to my other creation.