Sorry about the late update, I've just been a bit whelmed with homework.
Last episode was pretty catalystic, and I had a lot of fun writing the new villain, 'Spectate'. We've finally punched past the skin, and now we can get into some real epic-saga-meat. There'll be arcs, travel, growth, etc.
Sorry about the techno-science stuff. It was an attempt to write from a robot's point of view, so sorry if it didn't work as well as I thought it did. Things will be almost strictly organic from here on out.
I'm beginning to question the addition of the rustbucket mystery, as it seems to be subtracting from the rest of the story in my opinion. Imagine if Aang had to discover the deepest darkest most well-kept secret of an obscure previous avatar (who existed about a hundred lifetimes ago), all while mastering the elements and taking on the fire nation. That would make things pretty complicated. Honestly, I wasn't even completely sure what the big secret was going to be. If you have an idea, message me and I can work it in somehow. If not, I'll delete it when I go back and touch up the first few chapters.
A bit of a clarifier, the Omnitrix prime puts the symbol of all transformations on the left forearm instead of the chest, with a few exceptions (Ball weevil and other armless transformations). This way he can access it easily in any form.
Anyways, here's the episode. Hope you like.
Previously on Ben 10,000:
The fourth Sotoraggian bounty hunter turned out to be a prototype fighter named One-one. He seemed like a nice fellow, and felt interest in teaming up with the plumbers. Meanwhile, a ghost robot broke into the plumber HQ! Ben fought furiously, but to no avail. The ghastly Ecto-Tron hacked the Null Void Projector and released what is perhaps the greatest threat the universe has ever seen. Spectate and his elite corps singlehandedly hijacked the plumber HQ and sent Ben, Kai, and One-one hurdling through the universe. What will happen next? Will our heroes be able to stop this terrible threat?
Episode 7: We steal a spacecraft
When the light from the teleport cleared, Ben had a very bad feeling in his gut. You know, the kind that makes you want to throw up. Still in Heatblast form, he bent over and hurled a pool of lava onto the grained pavement beneath them.
To his left and right, Kai and One-one were having similar reactions to the Teleportation sickness. Kai found something resembling a dumpster and threw up in it, while One-one turned away and opened his helmet to let out the Sotoraggian barf.
As the lava hardened and cooled, Ben took a moment to look around. They had been deposited in some sort of alleyway on a planet that Ben didn't recognize. Buildings stretched upward in odd twisting formations, the roofs of which seeming to stretch and converge to form some sort of network. Stars could be seen through the gaps, indicating that this part of the planet was in its night stage.
He gritted his teeth, his flames getting bigger and hotter. How could Spectate do this? Just when things were going right again, it was all thrown out the window. Ben turned and punched a wall, which began to glow from the heat of his fist.
Kai looked up from her dumpster, her face a pale green. "Ben, calm down. We don't know where we are, it could be hostile."
In response, Ben turned and punched the opposite wall, and twisted his fist, grinding it in and further melting the hard rock/metal.
One-one closed his mask and got a look around, instantly recovered from his nausea. "It seems we are on Kinet. Notice the architecture of the buildings and how the roofs converge into a network of highways. You can also hear the constant sound of hundreds of speedsters." As if to further confirm his observation, a few Kinecelerans could be momentarily seen blurring past the opening to the alleyway.
Meanwhile, Ben began to pound the floor repeatedly, causing glowing cracks to appear. He seemed to lose momentum after a good eight punches and fell into a kneeling position, breathing heavily. "We have to go back." He turned to One-one. "How far is Earth from here?"
One-one thought for a moment, working out some math with his fingers. "At least one, maybe two galaxies down the X-axis."
Ben quickly pulled up the Omnitrix Prime's map, which confirmed what One-one said. He cursed and put the map away. "We need to hire a ship. You guys have any money?"
Kai pulled out her wallet. Most of her money was Earth cash, but she had five Taydens. One-one shrugged. "Mercenary work hasn't been kind to me as of late, but I have about twenty Taydens in my account."
Ben exhaled heavily, putting a magma-covered hand to his forehead. "I don't have any of my money, I left it all in the Rustbucket IV. Twenty-five Taydens won't pay for a fast ship, or even a teleport."
Something occurred to him, and he nodded as the validity of the idea resounded with him. "There's probably a plumber base somewhere here. We just need to make our way to some sort of outpost."
With that in mind, Ben reverted to human and dared to peek out of the alleyway. Kinecelerans sped this way and that, and everything was in constant movement. It would be extremely hazardous to get through at normal speeds. He pulled back into the alleyway. Ben thought through his aliens. "If I went XLR8, -oops-, I could keep up with the Traffic, but then I would be leaving you two behind. Or I could go Big Chill or Jetray and carry Kai while One-one uses his jetpack." He glanced back outside. "Nevermind, the wind is too strong out there."
While Ben was rapidly changing and considering his options, One-one strolled out of the alleyway, pulling Kai behind him. Kai pulled away. "What do you think you're doing?"
One-one sighed, exasperated. "They won't pull over for a Bounty hunter like me, but if a human were to signal them, they'd be happy to. Just make this with your hands, and I'll do the talking." He crossed his arms To'kustar style and bent his fingertips backward to touch each other, which Kai replicated with some difficulty. Sure enough, someone slowed down for them. One-one changed his translator to Kineceleran and had a fast-paced conversation. They shook hands, and the Kineceleran sped away.
One-one set his device back to the standard language and he and Kai walked back to Ben, who was now Armodrillo. He tapped the yellow plating and Ben stopped his musings to listen to what they had to say. "There are designated paths for non-speedsters, there's an entrance not too far from here."
Ben changed back to his human form. "Oh. Well let's go, then."
Command wasn't sending any messages, nor were they responding to any of theirs. Ben had used Kai's phone and called every plumber base that he knew the contact number for, but none of them answered his calls. Either Spectate had taken over every plumber base in existence, or this planet was being jammed. By the looks of confusion from anyone on their extranet devices, it was probably the latter.
He idly scrolled through the DNA catalogue, going through a mental checklist of aliens he unlocked in the past. The only one missing was Alien X, a loss that he felt sorely. That transformation was a calming bit of reassurance that everything would turn out all right, and now that it was missing from his library he felt a pressure of unease. The master-control-like transformations were helpful to ease his peace of mind, but the lack of his trump card was unsettling.
He was surprised to see a few new transformation names in the list. There was Serpentesapien, Granulite, Testudinesapien, Geosapien, and quite a few more. He decided to try those when the fate of the universe wasn't at stake.
The trio eventually found themselves in something resembling New York Times Square. Tall buildings sported massive screens, each showing some random advertisement. Fast paced ads for customizable friction orbs, stylized helmets, and kinetic energy powered phone chargers lit up the street. But most prominent was the news screen. It currently showed live footage of the earth HQ, and Ben gasped when he saw what had happened.
A full-fledged space battle had erupted in the airspace around the station. GI-trons had apparently gained jetpacks and swarmed the station, shooting down plumber ships who scrambled to secure the sector. Aero-Tron buzzed around the base like a hornet, blasting away anything that passed the blockade.
The screen shifted to A Citrakayah reporter on the surface of earth. "The plumbers have not yet given information about this crisis, but one thing we do know is that Ben Tennyson is nowhere to be seen."
Kinecelerans in the square began to notice and point to Ben's group, murmuring. "Is that Ben Tennyson?" "Yeah, I think it is." "What's he doing here?" "Why isn't he helping over there?"
The reporter put a hand to his earpiece. "We're getting a transmission from the inside of the plumber's earth HQ." A look of confusion crossed over his face. "It's not a transmission? Then what is it?" The color drained from his face. "We're being hacked?"
The entire screen went static. The entire square seemed to jump, and the image flicked to the inside of the plumber base. Front and center was Ecto-Tron. A chuckle sounded from the background, which Ben and his team instantly recognized. "Step aside, Ecto; you're scaring our viewers with your face." He did so, and revealed a caped figure obscured in shadow. Glowing red eyes and a white grin shone through the dim lighting. "Citizens of the universe, your plumbers have failed you. There is a massive threat to the universe, and they were unable to stop it."
Ben glowered as the villain's glowing grin widened. "But you have no cause for fear, for hope is here! I am Spectate, and I will assist you in this time of crisis." He stepped towards the window, where the ongoing space battle could be seen. "These poor plumbers resisted. But you can be different! Help me, by letting me help you."
He paced to the other side of the room, the camera closely following him. "You may be wondering, how can you help me? Well, I'll tell you. Open up your teleporters to my GI-trons, and let me set up various bases of operations. I'm looking for a certain… someone. Ben Tennyson, to be precise." He pulled up a hologram of Ben, complete with his beard and his new Prime-suit. "When it comes to that troublemaker, there is no greater threat to the universe."
The footage of the screen displayed Ultimate Atomix preparing a Nuclear winner high above a planet, where a worm-like creature was spiraling up towards him. "Remember when Ultimate Atomix destroyed the home world of the Gourmands?" The footage changed to that of the Annihlarg destroying the universe. "Or when he screwed up so badly that he had to rebuild reality from scratch?" The hologram of Ben once again dominated the screen. "Do you really want someone that powerful gallivanting across the cosmos?"
Spectate chuckled and stepped into the light. "Of course, he's only one threat. But in order to stop the bigger one, I need to get rid of him first. So do me a favor and help me get rid of him, ok? He could be anywhere in the universe, so get looking!"
The footage fizzed back to the Citrakayah reporter. He blinked a few times before looking back and forth between the camera and the space station. "Uh… back to you?"
Ben didn't know what to think. That jerk Spectate had just sent him away, but now he was trying to capture him? That made no sense at all!
The Kinecelerans in the area began to give the group some odd looks. Kai's hand drifted to Excalibur. "Guys? Are they actually considering this?"
One-one edged behind Ben. "I'm sure not helping your case."
Ben transformed into Chromastone and narrowed his eye, scanning the area. "Let's get moving."
They began a brisk walk through the streets of Kinet. One-one kept fiddling with a grenade from nervousness. When they turned a corner, Ben grabbed One-one and Kai by the collars and yanked them behind cover.
Straight ahead was a GI-tron, marching forward towards the Square. Ben shifted into Big Chill and grabbed his companions. Staying out of sight of the GI-tron, he made his way to the spaceport.
One-one cried out in protest. "I can fly, you know!"
Ben narrowed his eyes at him. "Can you fly silently?"
The Sotoraggian averted his gaze. "No."
Kai drew Excalibur in preparation for battle. "Why didn't we destroy it?"
Ben found the spaceport and touched down in a dark corner. He set the two down before peeking around a corner invisibly. "Kai, they're robots. They're obviously connected to each other in some way. I've always wondered why destroying one robot didn't alert any of the others in the sumo slammers robo-pocalypse stealth missions. It's what I would build into the system, so I'm not taking any chances. Don't get caught at all." He shifted Ghostfreak. "I'll see if I can find a spare ship so we can get out of here."
One-one flicked off his suit's lights. "I'll help; I've done my fair share of stealth missions."
Ben rubbed his chin in thought. "You and Kai stick together. I'll find you with Wiretap when I get something."
Kai sheathed Excalibur. "If stealth is what we're going for, then this won't be of much use." She pulled on some climbing gloves. "Don't worry, I'll be able to keep up."
Ben nodded. "Well, I'm going in."
As soon as Ben phased through the wall, One-one got moving. He shot a grappling hook up towards a window, embedding the hook into the stone just underneath the window. He retracted the line and pulled himself up.
Kai just shrugged and got ready for a jump. The sheath gave a dim glow, which began to flow into Kai's body. When she released it, the insane levels of force from the sheath shot her up immediately to the window.
Not quite expecting this much force, she pinwheeled her arms for a second before One-one caught her. He peeked into the room through the window. Once he confirmed that there was no one inside, he deployed his buzz saw and shattered it. He swung Kai up before pulling himself in through the opening.
They started towards a doorway. One-one listened closely for footsteps. He heard some, but they were moving away.
He nodded to Kai before Buzz-sawing the lock on the door. They crept through the hallway, listening intently for footsteps. Somehow, they made it through without incident.
At one point, they got to a stretch of hallway with a large window on the left side. As they crept past it, they looked down and saw a massive room, packed to bursting with GI-trons. A working teleporter brought more at a steady rate.
Kai gripped her hand around Excalibur. "If what Ben said was right, we'll have to deal with all of those if we get noticed."
One-one nodded grimly. "We'll just have to make sure that doesn't happen."
"Well, I'm going in." Ben turned invisible as he phased through the wall. Bracing himself for GI-trons, he gave a sigh of relief when he saw the real content of the room he was in.
He had come through in a restroom. He didn't stick around to find out which gender the room was for and pressed forward. He noticed several one-unit patrols of GI-trons, which almost completely confirmed his theory of a linked network. If they weren't linked, then they would have patrols of more than one. As he periodically encountered GI-trons, he would drift to the side. He didn't want to risk bumping into them on the grounds that they might have anti-phase technology.
He didn't see any Kinecelerans, which meant that Spectate had seized the spaceport. That meant one of two things. Either he knew exactly where they were and prepared for it, or he took control of every port he could think of. Both possibilities were less than ideal.
Ben continued his drift through the hallways, holding his breath each time he saw a GI-tron. He took a peek into each room, and saw a large monitor packed desk. The monitors showed feed from security cameras. Luckily for his comrades, no enemies were manning it, but even if they were they would only catch glimpses of them. One-one really did know his stuff.
Ben decided to take a look at the transportation options. Teleports were being watched, so he decided that some sort of craft would be optimal. He began to press on in the direction of the airfield.
Eventually, he got outside to the airfield where vehicle after vehicle were lined up. He almost attempted to take one then and there, but cursed when he remembered that it would need an activation chip or a key of some sort. He found a dark corner and shifted to wiretap before activating his various filters. He kept his eye out for two organic humanoid figures, but also searched for the telltale signs of an activation chip.
He spotted Kai and One-one very quickly, but something that caught him off guard was the sheer number of GI-trons in the spaceport. Shaking it off, he confirmed that none of the robots were near him and switched to electromagnetic filter. He took a closer look at some of the spacecraft.
After deciding which one they should take, he switched back to Ghostfreak and went to find his friends.
He had a bit of trouble finding them and had to hijack some broom closets to locate them again with Wiretap, but he very quickly caught up with them.
He phased down through the floor and dropped his invisibility. He ushered them forward in a hushed voice. "Guys! I found a ship we can use!"
Kai glanced around worriedly. "That's great, but how are we going to get there?"
One-one looked at Ben curiously. "Have you ever tried to spread an Ectonurite's abilities through physical contact?"
Ben's eye widened at that prospect. "You can do that?!" without waiting for an answer, he touched them both and focused. Sure enough, he could feel a new presence in his mind. He tugged at it, and they seemed to fuse to his hands. He went invisible, and they followed suit. "Whoa, that's cool."
He went intangible and flew them upward. "To the airfield!"
He remembered the direction he had to take to get back, so he shot off in that direction. However, he didn't account for one thing.
Effort.
It took extra concentration to keep all three of them invisible. By the time he felt his invisibility slipping, it was too late. And worst of all, he was right above a GI-tron. Kai noticed the invisibility go down, and yanked out Excalibur.
The robot saw them. Its eye flashed red, and it whipped out an energy blade. Kai blasted it with some Excalibur energy, but it was too late. It saw them.
And sure enough, the sounds of thousands of footsteps resounded through the hallway. Ben cursed and kicked his flying to top speed. "D'Arvit! We'll just have to skip the activation key!"
One-one deployed some vehicle hotwiring tools. "I could-"
Ben turned on intangibility and left the building. "No time! I'll just go upgrade and highjack it!"
Kai startled for a second. "Ben, you didn't turn into upgrade!"
He slowed down for a second. "I didn't? Hey, I didn't! I'm not Upgrade-", they plummeted from the sky as he turned into Upgrade.
Kai landed without a problem thanks to her sheath enhancements, and One-one simply jet-packed down. Ben wasn't as lucky, and fell flat on his face. "Ow!"
Kai helped him up as GI-trons began to swarm from out of the building. "C'mon, we have to move!"
Ben nodded and changed to Fasttrack. They sprinted forward past an array of aircraft until Ben saw the one he had picked out earlier. With a great leap, he was on top of it, and changed back to Upgrade.
He had chosen an old-looking dropship. He had no idea why something like that would be here, but it had powerful engines and plenty of space for long term usage. With a mental command, he fully integrated with the ship and opened its side doors. "Get in!"
Kai leapt forward and landed heavily in the cargo bay while One-one simply magnetized his boots to the top. He nodded to the cockpit, and Ben started the engines.
By then, the GI-trons had caught up. One-one deployed his shoulder-arms and pulled out his blasters, while his main arms tossed grenade after grenade. It only barely held them off, and by the time Ben lifted off, a significant number had latched onto the bottom of the craft. Kai slashed down at a few, and the severed forms fell back to the scrambling mass of robots.
Ben flew forward and scraped the bottom of the ship against the tops of some of the high-way buildings, ridding them of the last few GI-trons. With that, he started his ascent into space. "Screw entry zones, the whole universe is at stake!"
Suddenly, the radar of the ship detected an airborne presence. He checked through the ship's rear cameras.
It was Aero-tron.
Kai shouted up to the cockpit. "Ben, we have company!"
"I know! Use some of that Excalibur stuff!". Ben picked up the speed as Kai and One-one shot back blasts of energy. To the whole group's dismay, Aero-tron was exceptionally nimble, and easily dodged the attacks.
"I can't shake him like this! One-one, get inside!". The sotoraggian launched his grapple-hook through the opening in the side and pulled himself in. Once One-one got inside, Ben closed the side-door.
With a grunt, Ben focused all of his upgrades to the heat shield and engines, multiplying their speed tenfold. They burst through Kinet's storm-clouds and rocketed into the space above Kinet.
Aero-tron kept up his pursuit, but nothing can keep up with a Galvanic Mechamorph in a spacecraft. The elite robot fell farther and farther behind them, and eventually stopped when it realized that it couldn't catch up to them.
Ben gave a whoop and half-unincorporated from the ship to have a physical form, but also keep the engines in maximum. He and Kai high-fived, and then turned to One-one with their palms outstretched. He was confused for a second, but tentatively bumped his palms against theirs.
Ben shrugged. "We'll work on that later. But jeez, that was awesome!"
Kai sat down on one of the troop-benches. "So… what now?"
The hero sighed and glanced at the omnitrix prime. "I can't defeat any of the Elite Corps as I am. We'll just have to wait until we get a blip from Asmuth, maybe he'll leave one of those upgrades he was talking about.". He gazed out the front cockpit, his singular eye unmoving. "Until then, we'll just… wander."
Why is it that the more lenience I give you, the more you put us in danger? Well, there's no turning back now, so we'll just have to roll with it.
…
I really have to pay better attention to that microphone.
I have a lot of fun writing these. So much fun, in fact, that I may just start a second one to run side-by-side with this. It's going to be centered around the Bluespots, if you remember their introduction a few chapters back. I'll probably start it all the way back when the team originally formed. Don't worry, this one will take priority.
Well, here starts the 'trek across the universe' in the description. No longer can they teleport across galaxies instantaneously. That's bad for storytelling. They have to journey, and work for things, or the story won't be satisfying.
I'm illustrating Spectate. I can get a picture of him up on the site eventually.
Well, see you next update.
