Author's Note: I own nothing. I like Grandma Verdona.
31 Return Trip
Gwen held her breath as the Cradle opened and Jen stumbled forth. Verdona was right there waiting for her. She smiled and hugged her tight again.
"How are you feeling?" She smiled.
"Much better." Azmuth cleared his throat.
"Yes, yes quite good." He hopped onto Jen's wrist and spun the dial on the Omnitrix a few times. "Hm. The ectonurite DNA is intact. And it looks like your grandmother left you a bit of a surprise." Jen glanced down at the Watch and her mouth dropped open.
"No way! Really!" Verdona shrugged.
"It won't put you on equal footing since yours is temporary but the universe could do with a few more beings like you and your cousin." Jen glanced at Azmuth with pleading eyes as Gwen and Kevin glanced at each other confused.
"Fine." The Galvan conceded. "Just try not to break anything." He hopped off her wrist and she slapped down the dial on the Omnitrix. Green lights flared and didn't quite die down like normal. Instead they coalesced into a bright green bob around a greenish black face with bright white eyes. The Omnitrix symbol glowed in the center of a greenish black chest as Jen giggled loudly and flew around the room trailed by green mana. Gwen stared. Verdona shrugged.
"One of my Earth grandchildren had to have the full form and you refused." Jen crowed with excitement as she floated near the ceiling.
"This feels fantastic! I can see so many colors! Why is everyone pink? Except me! Oh I like being green! Does this make me weird, how do I get down!" Gwen burst out laughing.
"This is the one form she's lousy at!"
"Am not! I'm just not used to her yet!" Verdona laughed and took Jen's hand guiding her back to the floor. Her feet still refused to meet it though.
"She's a novice Gwen, be nice. If you could fly you'd have gotten stuck the first few times too. She needs training. But since I know she won't say yes to coming to Anodyne either you'll have to show her the basics." Gwen nodded as Jen hit the Omnitrix symbol and reformed into herself. She ran a hand through her pixie cut and frowned.
"Why is my hair so much longer as an Anodite?" Grandma Verdona shook her head.
"It's not really important, but a green Anodite is something even I've never seen." She glanced at Azmuth.
"It's likely due to the form being only accessible through the Omnitrix. Which as I've been told has a green aura of its own and has passed that to Jen." Jen nodded.
"Makes sense. We should head home, we didn't exactly tell anyone we were leaving." Verdona smiled.
"Oh that's easy enough!" She snapped her fingers and they landed in the Hole right in front of the computers. Pierce and Ethan jumped but Max didn't seem phased. He smiled.
"Good to see you all in one piece. Next time call." He turned to Verdona as Peirce and Ethan began to ask questions. "It's good to see you."
"It's lovely to see you too Max. You haven't changed." He shook his head.
"Kind of you to say but we both know it's not true." She shook her head and tapped him on the chest.
"Not in here Max, never in here." Jen ushered the other teens out of the base to let Verdona and Max have a few moments alone together. Ethan took her hand.
"What happened?"
"A lot. But we should meet up with Julie too, I have to get Ship back to her. How long were we gone?" Pierce counted on his fingers.
"Day and a half?" He said it like a question. "Max called us in about twelve hours ago." Ethan nodded.
"You had us worried. The mole thing at the golf course was taken care of but there was a giant crater in the parking lot!" Jen nodded.
"Yeah we know. We'll tell the story when we get to Julie's." Ship beeped happily and formed the Vespa under Jen taking off as she laughed loudly. Ethan managed to hop on the back as the others raced to Kevin's car which was parked in its usual spot at the garage.
A week passed and suddenly it was time to prepare to go back to school for those that still went anyway. Pierce hadn't been in years, neither had Kevin. Ethan was transferring to Jen's school. Gwen was up to her neck in school work and research about curing Kevin. She'd taught Jen a few basic spells but much to her disappointment she couldn't use any of the Anodite powers outside of the form. But she shouldn't have to use it too often. Gwen had also given her Charmcaster's old spellbook, it was easy to keep on her and even easier for her to summon since she was familiar with it and had been for years. Gwen had been using it for years and knew most of the spells in it by heart.
Jen and Julie were dragged out to shop for new school clothes by their parents while Ethan and Gwen caught up on their reading. Jen was notorious for waiting until the last minute to do her reading, and it wasn't as though she could claim that she'd been spending the summer saving the universe, even though it was true. Kevin and Pierce were left to see to most of the Plumber business. But it wasn't such a bad thing, at least not if you asked Kevin. He'd been tracking some interesting signs through town since they returned from Galvan Prime. Jen had quietly complained that Grandma Verdona had teleported them away before she could bother Azmuth about curing Kevin but he'd waved her off. Stopping her from going homicidal had been priority at that moment. But he was back to wearing his ID mask almost everywhere. But the odd signs kept popping up, weird energy drains at the local power stations. Whole factories going dark for nearly ten minutes at a time. There were a few break ins here and there, oddly enough including a bookstore. It was a small place Gwen frequented but they'd only taken a book from the rare books collection, nothing from the register. Kevin had an idea who this might be and he wanted to take out some aggression on him if it was who he thought it was, so he kept his mouth shut. He didn't like the idea of Gwen facing up against the energy vampire anymore anyway. He told the girls he was heading out on patrol as he drove his car towards the old theatrical warehouse he'd narrowed down Darkstar's hiding place to.
