Chapter 96: The Heart's Desire: Part Eight

I Don't Own Ben 10 Or Any Of The Characters

Author's Note:

* Hello and welcome to Chapter Ninety Six! This will be the final part of this arc and then we'll have two or three stand alone chapters before the next story arc. This will also be a shorter chapter, as there won't be a whole lot happening in this chapter.

* Anyway, that's all I will say. Let's get right into the chapter!

Ben

Downtown Bellwood

Gwen and I sat in the backseat of the car, as Dad drove down the street, while trying to keep Mom calm. Meanwhile, Gwen and I nervously exchanged words.

"So, what are you thinking?" she whispered to me.

I looked back at her.

"I'm thinking that this is some coincidence." I said. "You know, my little sister being born on our birthday."

She nodded.

"Yeah, it is interesting." She said. "You think your mom will be okay?"

I gave her a look of confusion.

"Of course, she will!" I said. "Mom's a strong person. If anyone can make through this, it's her!"

I smiled at her and she smiled back with envy.

"Damn your optimism, Ben." She said. "Where was that when I dumped you, when I needed it most?"

My smile disappeared after she said that.

"I thought we agreed to never mention that again?" I asked.

Her smile faded as well.

"Oh, right." She said as she looked away from me. "Sorry."

After that we rode in silence for the rest of the way to the hospital.

Ten Minutes Later

Bellwood General Hospital

We walked (although I would call it practically running) into the lobby of the hospital and got checked in. They then took Mom and Dad away, heading for the delivery room most likely. Once they were gone, one of the hospital nurses approached us.

"We already have a room ready for your mother if you want to go there and wait for her." She offered.

I looked over at Grandpa Max, who nodded at me. I turned back to the nurse.

"Yes, please. That'd be great." I said. "Lead the way."

The nurse nodded with a smile on her face and led us out of the lobby and towards the elevators.

Five Minutes Later

"Okay, this is it." The nurse replied as she opened the door to freshly cleaned hospital room. "Just sit tight, okay? Your mom will be in here in no time!"

"We will." I said. "Thank you, miss."

"No problem." She said, before leaving the room. "Just come find one of us at the information desk if you need help."

"Thanks." I said. "I'll do that."

Once she was gone, Grandpa Max spoke.

"I'm going to go get a cup of coffee." He said. "Are you kids going to be okay here by yourselves?"

"Yes, Grandpa." Gwen said. "You go on ahead."

Grandpa nodded without even saying a word to me and then left the room. Once he was gone, I heard someone speaking, as if it were coming from a radio. Gwen and I both looked at a radio that was sitting by the window, which we previously hadn't noticed.

"Reports of a plump, small four-armed creature robbing the First Bellwood National Bank." The announcer on the radio said.

What? I thought. That sounds vaguely like the creature I stopped before I found out Clancy was the killer!

"What the hell?" Gwen asked.

"I don't know…" I said. "Where'd this radio come from?"

Before I got an answer, the most surprising thing happened. An additional voice spoke from the radio.

"You hear that, kid?" A familiar voice asked. "I'm trying to help you out!"

I narrowed my eyes as I stepped up to the radio.

"Director Steel." I angrily said through gritted teeth. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"Hey, kid." Director Steel said over the radio. "Long time, no see."

"What do you want?" I asked.

"Is that anyway to say hello to someone?" he asked.

"I thought I told you that I never wanted to see you again?" I asked.

"You never said anything about talking to you." Director Steel said.

I rolled my eyes.

"Okay, you can't talk to me either." I said. "Now, how do I turn this thing off?"

"Don't turn the radio off!" he said.

I let out a sigh of anger.

"Okay, how are you talking to me?" I asked. "How can you hear me?"

"I have cameras in the room, Benjamin." Director Steel replied. "And once I figured out which room your mother would be staying after the delivery, it was easy to store a S.E.C.T. issued radio in there."

"What do you want from me?!" I asked with irritation, disregarding what he said.

"I want a favor from you kid. I hate to ask for another so soon, but I'll make it up to you one day." He said.

"A favor?" I asked. "What kind of favor?"

"There's a fat, midget tetramand robbing the First Bellwood National Bank." Steel said. "His name's Gorvan. I want you to do me a favor and go take care of him."

"But I don't want to!" I said. "And even if I did want to, I can't! I'm grounded! I'm not allowed to go hero anymore!"

There was silence from Director Steel now.

"Director…" I spoke.

"I'm sure you'll figure something out, kid." He said, interrupting me.

"No! You don't understand!" I said. "I can't go out there!"

There was no answer.

"Director Steel?" I asked.

After a few minutes of silence from his end, I finally accepted the presented fact.

"God damn it! I can't believe it!" I said as I slammed my fist down on the table. "That bastard hung up on me!"

"That bastard has a point though, Ben." Gwen said, speaking at last. "You have to go out there."

"But I'm grounded!" I said as I turned to face her. "And I don't even have a costume!"

"Yes, you do." She said as she took off the backpack she had been wearing all this time.

It finally hit me. Gwen had grabbed a backpack before we left the house. She lowered it and unzipped it, revealing all the pieces of my costume inside.

"What the hell, Gwen?!" I asked with shock, as I pushed both flaps of the bag together.

"I snagged it before we left. It was in your mother's room." She said.

"Okay, but why do you have it?" I asked with shock.

"Because I wanted to have it just incase you would need it." She said. "And you do. So, take it."

I shook my head.

"No, Gwen. I'm grounded." I said. "You hear me? Grounded!"

"You think your mom will have time to notice that you've put the costume back on while she's giving birth?" she asked with a smirk on her face.

"Sorry, I still have to say no." I said. "I can't go against what Mom says."

"Yes, you can." She said.

"Gwen…" I spoke only to be interrupted.

"Ben, I can't sit back and let you quit again." She said. "You're going to go against what your mom says, even if she won't like it."

I said nothing.

"So, take that backpack and go do what Director Steel told you to do." She said.

"No, I'm not going to do it." I said.

"Yes, you are." She said. "The city needs you right now and whether your mom likes it or not, you can't just stand by and do nothing!"

I stared at her for a few seconds, before I sighed and took the backpack from her.

"Okay, fine." I said. "You win."

She grinned back at me.

"Okay. Now go now!" she said. "And come back safe!"

I nodded and ran out of the room, heading to look for an access point to the roof.

Gwen

Five Minutes Later

Ben had been gone for about five minutes when Albedo and Sunny ran into the room, both of them being out of breath. I didn't need to ask where they had been, seeing as Sunny's hair was a rat's nest and they were both sweating, but I asked anyway.

"Where have you guys been?" I asked.

"Oh, us?" Albedo asked in a nervous tone. "Sunny and I were checking out the cafeteria!"

I rolled my eyes.

Uh-huh, sure. I thought. You were definitely checking out something, but I bet it wasn't the cafeteria.

"So, where's Ben?" Sunny asked.

"Oh, you know." I said as I turned to the window.

As I turned, I saw Ben swing past, wearing his Alien Guy costume.

"Doing what he loves." I said as he swung past.

Ben

Downtown Bellwood

Fifteen Minutes Later

I landed right behind the midget Tetramand trying to rob the bank, without him even knowing I was there.

"Alright, just give me the money!" he exclaimed as he pointed some of energy weapons at the woman at the booth, one in each of his four hands. "All of the money you got!"

I decided to speak, which ultimately scared him.

"I never knew your name was Gorvan!" I said.

He spun around and shot at me with his energy weapons, which I somehow managed to avoid. Once he saw that it was me, he stopped firing.

"Oh no, it's you!" he exclaimed.

"You know, you're kind in my neighborhood, Gorvan." I said.

As soon as I stopped speaking, he lifted his firearm and fired a bolt of what might have been super-heated plasma at me. Somehow, I managed to dodge that one, too.

"I'll kill ya, I'll kill ya!" Gorvan exclaimed as he kept firing at me.

This guy's a joke! I thought. I should just tie him up, call it done and get back to the hospital!

"I'll go easy on you this time, Gorvan!" I exclaimed. "I'll only use my gauntlets!"

Gorvan didn't comprehend what I had said, he just kept shooting at me. I kept doing flips out of the way, easily evading his blasts. I could already tell that I would be here for a while.

Gwen

Thirty Minutes Later

Bellwood General Hospital

I looked on at Aunt Sandra, as she laid in in the hospital bed, holding in her arms a small, newborn baby bundled up in a pink towel. She had given birth relatively quickly. Ben had been born relatively quickly, so why wouldn't his sister be born relatively quickly? Anyway, I looked on at Aunt Sandra holding her newborn baby.

"She's beautiful, Aunt Sandra." I commented.

Aunt Sandra looked back at me with a tired smile on her face.

"Thank you, Gwen." She said.

"Have you figured out a name yet?" I asked.

She shook her head.

"No, I can't really decide what a good name would be." She said.

"Well, it's not that hard." Uncle Carl said. "How about "Gwen"?"

I blushed at the name recommendation as Aunt Sandra shook her head no.

"No, there's already one Gwen in this family." She said. "I don't want another person named "Gwen" in this family."

"Um, okay." Uncle Carl said. "How about Natalie?"

Aunt Sandra looked up at Uncle Carl.

"Come on, Carl!" she said. "Be serious!"

Uncle Carl gave her a sheepish look.

"I am being serious!" he said.

"Then could you make a more serious attempt at helping me pick out a name?" she asked.

"Fine!" Uncle Carl said.

He put his finger on his chin and began to think for a minute. After that, a bright look appeared on his face.

"What about Vera?" he asked.

"God, you're impossible." Sandra said with frustration.

"Alright, alright!" Carl said as he put up his hands in defense. "I got nothing! We should have been thinking of baby names from the get-go!"

"You mean you haven't been thinking about baby names?" I asked him.

He turned to face me.

"Well, no." he said. "Not exactly."

"No, not exactly?" I asked.

He just shrugged. After that, we stood around in silence for a number of minutes. Finally, after several minutes, Sandra's face lit up. She looked up at Carl.

"Carl?" she asked.

Carl looked up at her.

"Yeah?" he asked.

Sandra had a smile on her face.

"What was your mother's name?" she asked, the bright look remaining on her face.

Ben

Downtown Bellwood

Fifteen Minutes Later

Somehow, in the last forty five minutes, I hadn't been able to beat Gorvan. I just couldn't get close enough to him without almost getting myself fried by those fancy alien blasters of his. You know, for a fat, midget Tetramand, he was very nimble. Luckily, I had managed to get him to follow me out of a bank and all of the bank's patrons were now out of danger.

I had led him to a vacant library, which had been vacated once news of the bank robbery reached them. I didn't know how, but somehow, I was going to defeat Gorvan. Right now, I was hiding from him, behind a shelf of books. Well, I was trying to, anyway. I kicked a book across the floor by accident, and it was over. Gorvan whirled around on the other side of the shelf and began using his guns to shred through the books on the shelf.

"Come out!" he exclaimed. "Come out so I can kill you, God damn it!"

I cursed silently as he resumed firing through the shelf. I began to sneak to the end of the shelf once again. I rounded the corner and luckily, Gorvan didn't see me. I snuck up behind him and luckily, he didn't hear me. Once I reached him, I stood up, grabbed the back of his head and drove his face forward into the shelf. He let out a yell of pain and somehow managed to push me away from him.

"I'll kill ya for that!" he exclaimed as he shot at me.

I dodged his shots, until his weapons overheated. Once his weapons had stopped working, he began to exclaim with frustration.

"Come on, damn it!" He exclaimed as he shook the weapons in his hands. "Work!"

"Looks like your luck has ran out!" I exclaimed.

Gorvan looked up at me, desperately trying to fire at me, only for his weapons to refuse to work. I lifted my arms to face him and fired my wrist gauntlets. The grapple hooks lodged right into the barrels of two of his weapons and at first, nothing happened. Then, from the sudden metal being lodged into the barrels, Gorvan was shocked by electricity that came from his weapons. He wasn't the only one though.

The electricity traveled down the cords of my wrist gauntlets and I was shocked as well. The electricity flowed for maybe a minute or so, before it stopped. Once it did, I realized that for some reason, I was virtually unaffected. I knew that because Gorvan stood there, smoking from the electricity shock, before falling over and passing out. And that hadn't happened to me. I wasn't smoking like he had been, so I think he would be fine. I retracted the cords, only to see that the grapple hooks had been crunched beyond recognition.

They would have to be replaced, again. I let out a sigh, before I bent over to pick up Gorvan. I rested him up on my shoulder and proceeded to walk out of the library.

A Couple Minutes Later

I emerged out onto the streets of Downtown Bellwood and tossed Gorvan to the ground, so the authorities could deal with him.

"Good ol' predictable Gorvan." I said as I turned, jumped up onto the wall of a building and began to climb. "See you around, pal!"

Thirty Minutes Later

Bellwood General Hospital

After finally getting back to the hospital, I took the elevator back up to the floor that Mom was staying on. I had come to a stop in front of the closed door to Mom's hospital room. I let out a sigh as I continued to stand there, staring at the door, not moving. I finally worked up the courage to knock on the door.

"Come in." a voice from the other side of the door called out to me.

I slowly opened the door and nervously walked into the hospital room. I shut the door behind me.

"Hey, did I miss…" I spoke in a nervous voice, before I stopped speaking upon seeing Mom holding a newborn baby wrapped in a light pink towel.

"Anything?" I stopped talking upon seeing Mom holding the baby.

I was scared of what Mom was going to say. She obviously knew that I had slipped out while she was in the delivery room. But when she turned to look at me, the look in her eyes surprised me. She didn't look angry with me. No, she looked happy. In fact, I could have sworn I saw some degree of approval in her eyes.

"Ben, come here." She said in soft voice.

I don't know why, but acting as though I were still in trouble, I gulped before I slowly paced over to her. Once I got to her, she looked back down at the baby. At last, she spoke.

"Ben, I'd like you to meet your little sister," she said as she continued looking down at the baby. "Verdona."

Author's Note:

* And that's it for this chapter! I hope you guys enjoyed!

* Coming up, there's going to be some changes in the story. I'm not sure if I mentioned it yet, but Chapter 100 will be a big chapter. Until the said chapter, my lips are sealed about what will happen. You won't get anything out of me.

* That's pretty much going to do it for me. I'm going to go though, so have a Bwen-tastic day and bye.

Next Chapter: Ben and his mother have a talk about Ben's hero work. Ben and Gwen try to stabilize their relationship, as an additional family member is introduced into the Tennyson Family.