CHAPTER 11

Ben woke up that night feeling nauseous and ran to the bathroom, but instead of emptying his stomach contents, he looked around and consumed all metal fixtures in sight.

"Oh gods… I thought I had 78 more years before..." he muttered before a modulated voice came from his Ultimatrix, "Firewall blocking virus. Result, aging Necrofriggian to prevent catastrophic system failure."

"Shit… Wait… how does aging Big Chill stop the Ultimatrix from shutting down?" Ben breathed before flying out of the building and looking for metal structures that wouldn't be missed. Last time he did this, the Necrofriggian had taken over and he had just eaten all metal in sight. This time, he was aware of his actions oddly enough, and was picking and choosing his consumptions. The Ultimatrix seemed to answer his earlier question then. "Device hacking into system is attempting to access and deactivate system functions. Aging current alien to a point where the virus is too weak to affect systems."

He flew back into his room that night and began making what he remembered to be a Necrofriggian nest. "So it won't be able to affect me if I am older. Sounds like I will change back after I grow old enough to combat the virus… heh, it's like chicken pocks… maybe I should call Azmuth to fix this..." he mused as the nest neared half completion. He was about to fly out of his room again when he heard a knock on the door.

"Ben? Are you there?" Starfire asked from the other side of the door.

Ben looked at the nest and then back at the door. "Just a moment!" he called out before walking over and opening the door only halfway, blocking the view of the metal nest. Starfire smiled, though it appeared she was troubled by something. "What is it Star?" he asked. She looked at him and said, "I wanted to apologize for giving you the shoulder of ice." she said. Ben chuckled. "Honestly, I have bigger things to worry about than that right now." he confided. Star suddenly hugged him, and he returned the hug, before he heard a gasp.

"Why is there a hunk of metal in the middle of your room?" she asked. He sighed and explained the situation. When he was done she just had a smile on her face that was making him wonder why she wasn't freaking out. "Uhhh… Star?"

"Do you need any of the assistance?" She asked suddenly. He sighed, "I need another ton of metal in here to complete the nest..." he conceded. She grabbed his hand and soon they were flying to the shipyard in the bay of Jump, where she went around asking the sailors if there were any out of commission boats they could use, though she gave no reasons. The end result was that Ben used the metal on board a few boats and was soon able to finish the nest. Once that was done, Star said, "This is so exciting! Do you think we could keep one?"

Ben nearly fainted, realizing that was what that smile was for. She wanted kids! He composed himself, and answered "You know they migrate to their home planet on instinct, right?"

Star nodded, "Yes, I was just… If they…" She seemed nervous enough to be the one giving birth rather than the one who was asking to keep one as a child. Ben sighed. "Look Star, if you want kids shouldn't we wait until I am… older… ah, shit."

Starfire smiled, "On Tamaran it is normal to be wed at my age, and you seem to forget that at the moment you are at least 180 years of age, if not more."

"Can't argue with that, though the fact remains that my uhhh… kids migrate to Kylmyys when they're born."

Starfire seemed torn between asking if there was a way to change his mind, and leaving it be, though before she could decide, Ben gasped, "Can you umm… go out. I think it's time for uhhh..."

"Of course!" Starfire said, leaving the room. Twenty minutes later, Ben came out of the room to find that Julie, Raven and Starfire were in the hall looking apologetic. "So can we help with anything?" Julie asked worriedly. Ben chuckled, "You can watch them hatch as long as you don't bring a camera. I don't need anyone blackmailing me."

They all entered the room and waited for at least an hour before the small little blue bubble-like larva started eating their way out of the cocoon and flying around the room, finally phazing through the window. "Awwwww! They're so cute!" Star squealed grabbing one and hugging it. It soon phased through her arms and followed it's siblings out into space.

Once that was over with, with a flash of green, Ben returned to normal. "I will never get used to that." he shivered, referring to the whole process of childbirth.

Raven smiled, "Sorry for giving you the cold shoulder. We should have realized you were just as scared as a mother who's never had a kid."

Julie walked over and hugged Ben, who returned to gesture, saying, "can we just agree to never speak of this again?"
they agreed and the girls went back to their rooms, all of them grateful that the tension in the air had lifted, and Ben glad that Green X's little attack on the Ultimatrix's functions was over with.

=Afterword=

I know this was a VERY short chapter, and was only aimed at the girls and Ben getting over their emotional issues. I am aware the quality suffered a bit from how short it was. However I couldn't think of a good way to do this bit AND the next episode, which is Mad Mod. Anyways, I thought instead of doing this in that chapter I would simply do a mini chapter to finish the whole "stuck as Big Chill" thing. And if you have an issue with Ben "aging to prevent a shutdown of his Ultimatrix" I will just say that Technology can go ape shit when it is tampered with.

It is Technology, and Green X essentially hacked it to the point where Ben's maturity was the key factor that could remove the hack. Think of it like getting chicken pocks. You can only be cured by getting over them and taking medicine, and you never get them again in your life, so Ben got the effects and got over them, to the point where it will never work twice.