When the sky became tinged with the orange hues of the sunset, Raff clapped his hands several times.
The time had come for the official coronation of Attea as the only and undisputed empress of the deathless Incursean empire.
"It's with immense pleasure and honor …" Raff began in an exaggeratedly solemn way "… That today, I declare Princess Attea, only daughter of Emperor Milleuos, General, Highest commander of the celebrated Calaveras Legion and blah, blah blah ..."
Ben had been more than happy to step aside, but he stopped listening after just two sentences, rolling his eyes.
-Just give her that damned crown so we can all go to sleep- he thought exasperated, looking forward to leaving from there.
Seriously, was all that sweet talk really necessary? As if the title of empress wasn't already enough.
As if Attea's ego wasn't already immeasurable.
"... And whoever wishes to challenge the new empress for the throne, step forward now or keep silent forever" Raff continued.
"Wait, challenge?" now, THIS rekindled Ben's attention.
"It's the Incursean law" Neptune, who had taken a seat next to him, informed "Whenever a new emperor, or empress in our case, is crowned, any warrior of the other noble dynasties can step forward and challenge him or her for the throne, however I doubt it will happen ... "
"Really, why?"
"Would you challenge someone who was able to defeat and subdue the wielder of the most powerful weapon in the universe?" the woman asked.
"What?! She ... she didn't subdue me!" Ben hissed indignantly.
"But you still married her" Neptune rightly pointed out.
"She threatened to destroy the Earth!" the boy defended himself, burying his face in his hands "What other choice did I have?"
"None, I know" she nodded sympathetically "But, as you can see, the Incurseans don't linger on certain details ..."
In fact, none of the noble Incurseans present there came forward to challenge Attea.
"So it's decided" Raff concluded, bowing before the former princess "Attea is the new empress of the deathless Incursean empire"
"Let the celebrations begin!" Attea ordered.
In a short time a long line of people was formed.
It was mostly composed by noble Incurseans, but there were also many representatives of various colonized or conquered planets, together with those of allied kingdoms and empires.
Each of those people waited for their turn to congratulate and show their gifts to the new royal couple.
The first to come forward was Neptune herself, who placed a little pile of old-looking books in front of Ben.
The human gently took one in his hands, leafing through a few pages and was amazed to read words written in English with a dark purple ink on parchment-like paper.
-Did she made them write in English just for me?- he thought.
"Stories and tales of the Incursean culture that I made write especially for you, Benjamin" the lady explained with a slight bow "In the hope that they will help you to understand this world and live peacefully with it"
"Thank you" the boy said.
He had never been a great reader but the kindness of the gesture warmed his heart.
Attea, next to him, rolled her eyes looking annoyed, but …
… then she actually chuckled sweetly to herself, without anyone noticing.
Knowing her stepmother, she had imagined that the Atlantean would have liked to give him such a gift.
For her instead, Neptune brought a transparent purple veil, embellished with embroidery of silver stars "To be placed on the crown" she explained.
"I will wear it willingly" Attea promised, smiling sincerely.
Later all the other gifts came, many others.
For the most part, if not all, only for Attea, especially those of the noble Incurseans who did nothing but kiss the empress' ass with phrases such as: "Oh my divine empress" or "A thousand gifts would not be enough to glorify your magnificence" or "Light of the empire, I'm not worthy …" and blah, blah, blah ... all this without ever deigning Ben of a single glance of course"
Not that the boy cared, he was only happy to be able to ignore them too, preferring to browse Neptune's gift until ...
"... Reiny?" Ben said, blinking in amazement.
Reinrassig III, the current Highbreed Supreme, came forward with a supply of ten elements of his kind.
"Ben-Ben Tennyson, it's an honor for me to see you again" the Supreme began with a slightly accentuated bow "As much as I must admit that the circumstances in which this is happening are somewhat … unexpected"
"Don't tell me" the other said, not believing his eyes.
"Reinrassig III, thank you for coming" Attea greeted.
"Thank to you for the invitation, Empress Attea" Reiny answered, looking at her "The Highbreed empire was delighted to receive your offer of alliance when your father had always rejected the idea"
"My father was a narrow-minded individual, too tied to outdated traditions, but I have a very different idea of how to make an empire flourish" Attea smiled.
"In this case, accept our wedding gifts as a sign of our friendship" the Supreme continued, motioning for his guards to bring them.
"Of course! Thank you"
Then Reiny looked at Ben.
"Indeed, I have a gift for you too, Ben-Ben Tennyson, if we can call it so"
"For me? What?"
"Bring him here" Reiny simply ordered.
A highbreed advanced with a little bundle of cloth in his arms in which something seemed moving.
Then a blue and black nose peeked out through the folds of cloth, with a faint squeak.
Ben's eyes widened.
"It can't be …"
A small Necrofriggian boy lay curled up inside the bundle, small wings wrapped around him and green sleepy eyes -Is it possible that he is ...?-
… He wasn't just any child, he was one of HIS.
"H-Hey, there" Ben murmured, taking him in his arms "How …? What happened to him? Why is his wing bandaged?" he hadn't noticed it immediately because of the cloths, but small light bandages were wrapped around one of the wings.
"We found him wandering near our system" Reinrassig explained.
"WHAT? Why was he there?" Ben asked.
-And where were his brothers?-
"Well, sometimes it happens that there are Necrofriggian babies who lag behind the rest of the brood because they are too weak to survive" the Supreme said "In fact normally it wouldn't have interested us if it wasn't that this little one did nothing but repeat your name, or at least part of it, Ben-Ben, which was rather unusual …"
"I … I thought they were able to survive on their own" Ben murmured to himself in a low voice, frowning.
He looked down at the child in his arms, who actually looked smaller than normal, then he began to remember.
Big chill had done everything right.
He had built the nest, laid eggs and made sure that nothing interfered with the hatching.
From that process fourteen Necrofriggian children were born, children who, instinctively, Big Chill knew he had to let go.
Because that's how it worked, that's how things had to go.
It didn't matter that one of them was visibly smaller and more fragile than the others.
He had to fly in the cold of space alone.
If he proved strong enough he would have survived, otherwise ...
"When my subordinates told me about it, I thought he might have something to do with you" Reiny continued "I wasn't sure what to do, but then that I learned about the wedding so I thought to bring him here"
"I see, thanks for bringing him to me, He's …" the human hesitated.
Nobody knew of his involuntary "paternity" except Gwen, Kevin and Julie, he was also pretty sure that it wasn't present in his plumber file.
"... I will take care of him" he just promised, arranging the baby so that it was more comfortable.
Perhaps it was normal for the Necrofriggians to abandon their children to natural selection, but for humans it wasn't.
If only he had known before.
-I wonder if he recognize me- the boy thought -I recognized him-
As if to answer his question, the little Chill blinked, looking at him for the first time and began to squeal happily, shaking and pressing himself against Ben's chest.
"Very well then" Reiny said before turning to his escort "It's time for us to go now, it was a pleasure to see you again Ben-Ben Tennyson, Empress Attea …"
"Uh? Oh, I wish you a good journey back to your empire, Supreme Reinrassig" Attea smiled.
"See you Reiny" Ben exclaimed "And thanks"
Well, that had been a nice surprise, so nice to make him almost forget the situation he was in ...
"It seems that I'll have to find a suitable name for you" Ben smiled, cradling his baby.
"Poor him then" Attea commented, who up to that point hadn't listened their speeches about the Necrofriggian mostly because boredom "Your alien forms' names are terrible"
... ALMOST, stupid frog princess.
"Ehy! My heros' names are awesome!" Ben replied proudly looking at her badly.
"Suuuure, as you say Tennyson" Attea chuckled "The little bug is cute though, I'll let you keep it" she continued perhaps feeling who knows how generous.
"I don't need your permission" the hero hissed.
Luckily, a familiar male voice thought to stop the tiff that was about to arise between the two.
"… Well, I hope you will take care of that child better that how you usually do with my greatest invention" a voice intervened unexpectedly.
"Uh? AZMUTH?!"
Ben couldn't believe his eyes when he saw the small figure of the first thinker advancing towards him, on a little floating platform.
"Hello Ben" the inventor of the Omnitrix greeted "You seem surprised to see me"
"W-Well, yeah …" Ben admitted "I m-mean, I'm happy to see you it's just ..."
"I'm actually surprised too" Attea declared narrowing her eyes "I don't remember inviting any Galvan to my wedding"
"Really? how strange, yet my invitation is right here" Azmuth replied with complete peace of mind, pulling out a small card from which purple writing was projected in midair.
Above the writings stood out the symbol of the empire, that actually seemed to confirm his words.
"I see …" Attea murmured suspiciously.
"So, I knew that you have activated the randomizer function of the Omnitrix" the galvan muttered, shaking his head "Why doesn't it surprise me?"
"I … uh, it wasn't my intention to do it" the boy replied, holding his watch arm out to Azmuth "It was an accident"
"The randomizer function that works in one of two ways: Either the user will continuously change between different aliens every few minutes before timing out, or they will turn into one random alien for an inconsistently short period of time before changing back" Azmuth explained "And if it's not reset in time, the watch goes into a security block phase …"
"Ooooh, so that's why you changed shape continuously without a logical sense" Attea said, looking at her husband with an amused grin "Nice job, hero"
"Shut up …" Ben growled.
"Nothing its creator can't solve, anyway" Azmuth said, starting to tinker with the Omnitrix "Even if it threw you into a lot of trouble" he added in a low voice.
When he had had received the signal of the activation of the randomizer function he hadn't worried too much, it was certainly not the first time that Tennyson messed with his greatest invention, but he always managed to find a solution to his troubles.
However, when he received the invitation to the wedding by a certain Lady Neptune, he realized that things must have taken a more ...
… problematic turn.
"I'm sorry" Ben whispered "But you too, can I know why you programmed a randomizer function? what is it for?"
Azmuth just rolled his eyes, ignoring him as he continued to work.
After a few moments the Omnitrix reactivated with several beeps "Active Mode, restored" said the watch's electronic voice "User: Benjamin Kirby Tennyson, Code: 1010"
"And it is done" Azmuth commented "Consider having re-activated the Omnitrix as my ... wedding gift"
"Wait, that's all? Don't you have anything else to say?" Ben asked.
He was expecting a lecture of some kind and he would have deserved it ... probably, because, for some reason, Azmuth's silences frightened him more than lectures.
"What can I say? This is just another one of the many messes you got yourself into ..." the galvan replied, crossing his arms behind his back "… Therefore, I presume I have nothing left to do but wait and see how you get out this time, as for the child ..."
"Oh! He is ..."
"I think I know who he is, Ben" Azmuth murmured stroking his chin as he watched the way the little one was holding on Ben "I will transfer information about how to take care of him to your Omnitrix, goodbye Ben"
And after said that, he left.
...
Little Chill is HERE!
Hellooooo everyone! ^^
So, we saw several familiar faces that brought unexpected gifts to our Ben.
Now he has a son to take care of and the Omnitrix works again!
See you in the next chapter ^^
