Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this but the plot and any original characters; all writing done here is solely and entirely my own, but all original Ben Ten properties belong to their rightful owners.
It's been forever since I've written fanfiction. I recently fixed and released an old document of mine done a few years ago for the book Wolf by Wolf by Ryan Graudin; no one has touched it, probably because there is less than no fanfiction attention for that incredible series on the internet at all. I actually think mine is the first one ever posted, which is wild. Get on that, fanfiction writers, I want to see more fix-it fics for that fantastic book.
Anyways, I wrote this fic for fun in two sittings yesterday after watching some episodes of Alien Force with my little sibling. Curious, I then looked up fics for the aged-up series and found that there really weren't a lot of quality ones. I don't know how this piece stands up against the rest, but I felt like typing it in response to the void. I think it filled a need for me. Have fun, and tell me what you think.
It's because he is poor, picking up loose-end impermanent jobs, changing auto parts and delivering unsavory things and racing under the cover of darkness. It's because he is a dropout in the making, scraping by on a crumbling grade point average with no direction and even fewer options. It's because he rubs against the skin wrong, never not sharp and prickly, jeans worn thin and fatherless to boot. He has holes poking through the soles of his shoes, crumbling pavement slowly creeping into his socks and bare feet, and those same holes wear into his shirts, dotting the hem like pockmark scars. He scowls as a default, parks his car just over the line of parking spaces, bleeds people's patience dry.
It's because of all of these things, because of how he dresses and acts and smirks when he's caught, that Kevin does not make attachments. He knows who he is and where he stands, his life's trajectory spiraling out into infinity. He is alone because he chooses to be, because it's easiest to set people and their imperfect senses of care and empathy and responsibility off to the side.
Ben Tennyson does not listen to the noise of his defiance, Kevin's rampant rebellious façade and ill-mannered airs. Ben is an idiot, and a hardheaded ass, and so when he starts exchanging paper airplanes during english, Kevin does not think much of it. He does not think much of the jokes the other boy cracks during math lectures, pulling faces and making the world's shittiest wisecracks through thoroughly dulling segments of algebra, and he does not think much of the way Tennyson unilaterally decides to sit with him in the back of the cafeteria, the darkest and most inconvenient corner at the rickety, rusting untouched table. Kevin, as a rule of thumb, tries not to think about others. It is far simpler for everyone involved if they know where they stand.
But Tennyson isn't so bad, really, even if he is a noisy bastard with a poor sense of causality and an inability to take a hint. Soon, Kevin snorts at his snide, terrible remarks in class. Next thing he knows, he's going to the Tennyson household after school, being tutted on by Ben's cookie-baking all-American mother as she pats his cheek and insists he stay for dinner. It's a bit too much, suddenly having someone who gives a shit about you. It's nothing Kevin signed up for or even requested, nothing he knows how to handle. He picked up Ben like he would a stray dog, because even though he's a bit weird and can't come up with any good puns, Ben has rare moments of lovability. Kevin is no monster, despite vigorous attempts to become one. Even he isn't a big enough jackass to tell Ben to fuck off, go home, stop talking to him altogether.
Despite his determination to remain an island, the Tennyson brood does not take no for an answer, and they do not surrender when faced with a challenge. By the end of junior year, Kevin is a novelty in Ben's suburban, catalog house. By the beginning of senior year in the fall, he's a permanent fixture, moonlighting at their house with a green and black gas-guzzler. He could not stay away, not when Ben calls him friends like it's obvious, not when he's got a seat at the dinner table. not when their grandfather claps him on the back and says, "call me Grandpa Max, son." But mostly, he can't stay away because of a glaring, red-hot warning flag personified.
Gwen Tennyson had a crush on him in elementary school for all of a month. Everyone knew. As they grew up, Kevin saw her: the girl with acceptance letters to any school of her choosing, the one running six clubs and learning two languages, the student at the top of every class despite taking advanced calculus and four AP courses. She's amazing, incredible, a grand success story, and the epitome of perfect to a boy with no future and dwindling options.
She comes by Ben's house and kisses her aunt on the cheek, settling between the two scuffed up mismatched boys as if it's normal, as if they're a trio and she was invited. She beats them at most video games, and just about dominates all of the non-virtual ones, too. She is not afraid to get her hands dirty; when Kevin, drenched in sweat and motor grease, asks her to help him with his car - the very definition of a work in progress - she does so without complaint, despite claiming she's only there to watch and make conversation. She comes home streaked in oil, covered in stains, shit-eating grin tugging at her lips. She matches him, blow for freaking blow, whenever Kevin blows a fuse. And he doesn't, not really, because he's not the sort of perpetually angry, stick-it-to-the-man shotgun teen he used to be when Ben and Gwen are around, sticking close to his tail ends, but sometimes it's good to stir up trouble with a passing remark or two. Maybe it's just become banter, and maybe when she gets in his face, Miss Flawless on paper but so much more in real life, he loves the way her chest heaves and her eyes dance and Christ, you could bottle the way she looks in her skirts and sell it for good money. Schoolgirl fury, absolutely terrifying.
Gwen Tennyson could kick his ass and he'd welcome it any day of the week, arms spread wide and waiting. When she sits on his workbench or on the hood of his car, she looks like she belongs there, center stage in his garage. It's annoying, how she pops by and encourages him to do homework. She keeps offering tutoring and he's slowly breaking down, learning to accept, because while he learns he can also memorize the curve of her mouth as she smiles, all sunshine and praise. He can sit next to her, let their breath mingle hot and heavy with unspoken things in the summer heat as she pours over page after page of practice problems.
She never comes announced, Gwen. The redheaded menace just finds herself on his couch, or in Ben's room, or sliding into the front seat of Kevin's prized possession, bare legs sticking to the leather. He could devour her, if she'd let him. He'd never much thought of Gwen in elementary school, when he was all scrapped knees and runny noses, and he thinks it's a greek tragedy, the fact that he can't stop thinking about her now. She has a certain reputation he could absolutely soil, rub his soot-blackened hands all over. She's the only person he's ever wanted to know and found to be so much better up close. She's got the sarcasm, the sass, the smarts, the sensibility, and god almighty, she's absolutely stunning. Drop-dead gorgeous. Beautiful, in every damn sense of the word.
Her hair, pulled down and gone to pieces, kills him. Her eyes, so mischievous and alive for a goody-two-shoes, see everything. Her skin, dotted with sun-darkened freckles, melts under his fingers when he helps her into cars, when her hands or shoulders or toes or anything brush his. She's a killer, and damn, does she shine.
It's unfair. Completely and totally unfair that Kevin Levin, in all his shortcomings and loses, be saddled with the Tennysons.
On the first day of senior year, Gwen, class president and darling of the school, winds her arms around Kevin's back and squeezes. He instantly knows who she is.
"You didn't ditch," she says, like it's a freaking miracle, like she's so invariably proud. She's proud of any progress he makes, be it on the car or in academics or when he finally cracks and opens up about his shit, messed up life.
"Lucky me, I get to suffer through an introduction to remedial math," he tells her, trying to be as put out as possible, which is just impossible when you've got a girl like that looking at you with those green, green damn eyes. They can cleave through glass.
They cleave through him in seconds, sawdust boy that he is.
"Survive until lunch for me," she snorts, and even that sounds almost refined when it comes from Gwen, "I'd hate to be stuck with Ben. He chews with his mouth open."
"A man of taste."
"Not after a healthy castration and a tongue decapitation. He's disgusting," she sighs, kissing his cheek. It's a throwaway thing, the way she does it. Kevin all but dies. "Stay strong, Kevin." His name in her mouth - said with fondness, too much of it, fondness he doesn't deserve and doesn't understand how he's earned - is almost poetry. He'd do anything for her to say his name, over and over again, in complete ad nauseum.
Once, over the summer, she went to the pool. She stared at him shirtless, muscles hard and lean from years of mechanic work and heavy lifting, and he could have sworn he saw her flush red and ruddy. Just a moment, and it certainly didn't compare to the way he gaped at her in a bikini - he was the opposite of religious but he'd prayed for the sight of her in a swimsuit many a dreamless night - like a lost man in a desert. Sky blue, stringy without giving everything away. It was a feat of herculean effort to stop looking. And, when he drove her home, she leaned across the dashboard and kissed his cheek, ever so close to his lips.
"Thanks for the ride, Kevin," she'd said, his name again, and he'd stayed up for hours thinking about kissing her, brutal in precision and in concentration, teeth and tongue and glory. About making her call out his name, again and again and again, never stopping, unbidden.
Like the last kiss, always in the wrong place, Kevin thinks about it on repeat. Agonizes over it through all of remedial math's introduction and through his other boring, confusing courses and into the start of lunch.
"You've got it bad," Ben mouths over bites of sandwich as they wait for his lovely cousin, who could sit with anyone at any table but who chooses theirs, objectively the very worst option of all her horrible options.
She was right (she always seems to be). Ben is a terrible eater, and now he can't unsee or unhear it. His open maw is disgustingly wide.
"Keep your opinions and your food to yourself, Benji," he snarls back, no bite to his bark, as he looks for flaming red hair entering the room. The sight of her knocks him out, but he'd never say that. Keep it hidden, stuffed in a box in the back of your mind, never let her know your flirting is anything more than a joke. Do that and you might make it through alive.
They'll be the death of him, this family. He knows it, like a bygone conclusion.
It's because Gwen is a fucking real-life superhero that they find themselves in the situations they do. Either Ben or Gwen, really, because both of the Tennysons never learned when to leave well enough alone, but while Ben is rampantly impulsive, Gwen has a bit of a savoir complex, as she makes it her mission to fix everything else in the world, she just can't stop herself. It's compulsion at this point.
"Why are we here again?" he grumbles, because although they're in close proximity and he can smell her perfume, which is downright sinful, their trip to the world's ugliest farmstead is not exactly ideal for making out, which is incredibly frustrating. If Kevin's sacrificing his weekend for this, it better be good.
"There's whispers all around town that he's started another fighting ring," she hisses as way of explanation. Angry Gwen - when her anger is not directed his way - is a sight to behold. He wishes he could behold her somewhere other than crouched behind a sand-striped fence, watching her pull out binoculars and a digital camera. "Look, Animo's thing is experimenting on animals and breeding them for rings, right? He just got on parole two weeks ago, so I looked at the new settlements paid for in cash within the last two weeks and cross-referenced that list with big shipments of animal feed. There were two major players, and one of them was a pet shop while the other was this isolated barn with unlicensed tractors. If he's active again, this has got to be where he's operating."
"Okay, Nancy Drew," Kevin murmurs, "but it's not your responsibility."
"We already tried the police, Kev. Right now, they're going to be no help without proof. Which we're getting." She gestures to the camera, which he bats away.
"Gwen, this is dangerous. You could get hurt," he tells her, voice all too soft, and the thought of her getting brained by a violent nutjob splatters very interesting images across his frontal lobe. Red is her color, but he never wants to see her lying in a pool of it.
"We've got to be careful," Ben says warningly, and oh yes, Ben is there. Much as he cares for Ben, sometimes when Kevin looks at his (only) friend's very impressive, very single cousin, he conveniently forgets the other boy is in the room. It's rather unfortunate. "We're not invincible, Gwen."
"Watch me," is her tired, pissed response, because if there is one thing Gwen apparently hates more than the boys not doing their homework, it's animal abuse. "C'mon, boys, there's no one around this side of the perimeter. Watch just changed."
"Watch?" Ben echoes, confused. "Wait, are you implying -"
"There's probably an active ring right now," she nods with such conviction that they both feel instantly stupid. "I dragged you guys out for a reason. Satellite images suggest that there's lots of newcomers to the farmstead at this time every other day."
"Satellite images," Kevin repeats, almost incredulous. "You're something else, you know that?"
"I try." She hoists herself up through a window, because someone's been scouting. The boys follow, as she has a very particular timetable for their explorations and she's always insisting they pick up the pace. They all land in an unused horse shed; too open to the outside to allow for good fights, and the stables are too small to pack people into. As a result, they're all cleared out. Gwen's done a fair bit of homework, essentially. "Alright, now the plan is to make our way from the stables into the main barn area. According to the listings, this barn was built in the 1940s, and as all barns built at the time had rafters and exposed wooden paneling, we can climb for it. I've looked at the pictures; there's enough room for three grown people to hide, assuming he hasn't repurposed the whole building yet. If we get up there, get pictures, and escape onto the roof, there's a good chance we can slide down the roof and onto the horse stables again. When guard rotation shifts back to the doors, we make a run for it." She smiles, a devious, hard-lined thing. "Any questions?"
"I'll just say it again," Kevin says, shaking his head. "You're something else, Gwen." It's a very good something, but a terrifying something nonetheless.
"Thanks, Kev," is her response, and she brushes a lock of hair behind her ear. He really wishes he had the freedom to reach out and do the same. "Alright, boys, time to climb." They manage to sneak from the horse stables to the main event with little attention attracted, mostly because the fight itself presents a fairly big distraction. In the most shadowy corner of the barn, safely hidden behind a pile of hay, they begin the trek. Step over step, step over step, Ben is the first to find himself at the top of the rafters, with Gwen and Kevin following close behind. Twice, they are almost discovered, but as Gwen had cryptically insisted they wear all-black before partaking in this merry adventure, they blend into the background better. The sun does not reach well into this barn, choosing to keep its white-tendrilled fingers to itself as the roosters peck eachother below. Things in the dark are not meant to see the light of day.
Gwen, laying stomach-down on rotting wooden rafters whilst eagerly snapping silent shots, is trying to ensure that they will. If she weren't so reckless, so caring, then he would be cheering her on in quiet admiration.
Actually, scratch that - despite the million ways it could go wrong, despite the risk to life and limb and general sanity, Kevin would still be right here, sweating bullets in the dusty humid heat, hay in his hair and pockets. Gwen Tennyson is an attraction that cannot be missed, and whenever she asks you for backup, you go. No questions asked, all other plans cancelled. It's the Tennyson gravitational pull; once drawn in, you're in orbit, and there is no escape.
He's proud, damn it all. If they can make it out of this unscathed, he'll be even prouder.
"Do you have what you need?" Ben all but growls, scratching the back of his neck furiously. "I'm wearing fleece in August, Gwen, and I have a lab report to write before tomorrow night."
"We'll have time," she says, waving him off, "but in a second, we'll climb out the landing window. I've got what I need."
"Why didn't we just record video on our phones?" her cousin pointed out, frowning. "Wouldn't that be more conclusive evidence than photos?"
"Breaking and entering, disturbing the peace, trespassing, fabrication of evidence, conspiracy," she says flatly. "That's the beginning. We're teenagers, and phones are traceable. A disposable camera without fingerprints paid for in cash doesn't link itself to us in any way, shape, or form. And as an added bonus, disposable cameras are easier to operate and cheaper to ditch."
"Every time we do things like this, the stakes get higher and higher," the brunette boy sighs, the fight drained from him as he places a hand on his cousin's shoulder. "The plans keep getting more and more elaborate. I like it, don't get me wrong, but maybe being let in on the minutia of the 'mission' before it's executed might be nice." This was far from the first time they'd done something outlandishly stupid yet brave. Usually it was smaller stuff - schoolyard shuffles, bullying, a string of house-eggers - but last month, Gwen had taken a tumble down a flight of stairs and had crumpled like a rag doll. Momentarily, the whole world held its breath. She'd come to seconds later, held so desperately in Kevin's arms - he had run to catch her, because of course he had, and as Ben tackled the dickwad who tripped her all he could do was listen to blood rush in his ears, a siren song of panic. Not this girl, please, he pleaded to some unknown deity, anyone but her. When she groaned, said his name blindly, and shook her head, struggling to her feet, he couldn't help himself.
"Never do that again," he told her, helping her up, imploring the most stubborn woman alive to stop being such a damn savior. She smiled, and in that moment, despite the bruises and the weariness and the vein-freezing fear he'd just endured, Kevin Levin found himself smiling back.
Just like then, as this little endeavor hadn't had enough nominal excitement and intrigue for one afternoon, Ben's phone buzzes. His ringtone was shrill, cutting through even the auspicious cheering and screams, and his screen flared a brilliant baby blue even through the thin fabric of his sweatpants; he pales, shut it off, but the damage is already done.
"In the rafters, on the ceiling!" they call, whoever they could be plausibly defined as, and Gwen Tennyson's eyes widen.
"Yeah, definitely time to go," she said dumbly, which seemed frustratingly understated. There were screams, movement, furious scuffling as the motley crew below reoriented themselves. None of them paid much attention to the scene, opting to make a run for the small roofside window. Ben was the first out, thoroughly terrified, and Kevin all but pushed Gwen through the exit, clobbering after her. Words never to be said in polite company were uttered rather loudly. "Sorry, sorry, sorry!" The redhead apologized as she extended a hand, helping him out. This hand was immediately retracted, however, when a shotgun introduced a high caliber round to the situation.
Kevin, thoroughly stunned, froze instead of letting out a healthy stream of expletives. Gwen took this opportunity to hoist him up.
"C'mon, Kev," she pleaded, and luckily his legs decided to work again as he ran alongside her. Slipping down the barn side, onto the stable's roof, and off, making a desperate break for the car hidden safely in the brush. Just as they reached it, stray bullets pierced the ground, shells just missing them by hairs. "Drive, drive, drive," she insists, and Kevin truly didn't need the encouragement but the instructions don't hurt.
"I'm an idiot," Ben moans once they're in the car, AC blaring and wheels tearing up pavement. "We could have died, I'm so stupid."
"It's my fault," Gwen says, shaking her head, clutching her camera like a lifeline. "It's not your fault, Ben, I swear it's mine." These people, this family, is too damn good for their own self preservation. To the casual outsider it's admirable but problematic; to Kevin Levin, who didn't mean to care but has come to follow the Tennysons into whatever danger they come across, it's more annoying than anything else. Tennysons do not take to self deprecation and the blame-game well.
"What's done is done," he grumbles, a part of him still red-hot angry and prickly at the thought of almost having a hand shot off. "Quit beating yourselves up for being noble, the tortured hero thing just makes the rest of us look bad."
"I'm no tortured hero," Ben sniffs, but as the dark-haired boy raises an eyebrow, he shrinks back into his seat and crosses his arms. "At least I'm not mopey."
"Have you met yourself? You were such a whiny brat when you were thirteen." Despite her self-induced mental flogging, she musters the good will with which to make fun of Ben. Kevin barks out a wild laugh, unexpected and unrestrained.
"I am not dying on our next adventure," he says, shaking his head, "but I'll admit, you did a good thing. It wasn't the worst spent afternoon."
"I'll try to scale down the risk to life and limb," Gwen promises, and although Kevin doesn't know whether or not he believes her - one of the most bullheaded Tennyson traits is their inability to step away from a challenge - he nods along.
"No guns. We're not a gang, we're not superheroes, I'm not bulletproof. I'll drive, but I like having both my hands."
"Agreed. No guns."
"Nothing father than an hour from town. I don't think we can handle anything bigger than what the greater Bellwood area has to offer."
"That's fair."
"I'd prefer not to climb across roofs," Ben chimes in, and his cousin snorts, her humor starting to return.
"I think we can do that." She looks down at the camera, safely ensconced in black-gloves hands. "I know it doesn't much matter now, but thank you both. And I'm sorry again."
"Ride or die, Gwen," Kevin says, for once deadly serious. "That's what we are." After all, family does not give up on family, even when they're not related and two of them are practically asking to be martyred. Family is the people who choose, again and again and again, to show up. To try to make friends with the boy who didn't think he'd ever want or need their friendship. To help him with college applications and to force-feed him homecooked meals and to celebrate his birthday, even though he hadn't had anyone to celebrate with in years. Family is something to be fought for. So he will do this all over again in a month; not because he wants to, but because it's them, and they've taught him that this is what family is for.
In the future, though, the lack of deposited disposable cameras outside of police stations might be nice.
Sometimes, Gwen falls asleep during movies, and as she tends to sit next to him, she'll rest her head on Kevin's shoulder. Ben will still be trained on the scene, spilling popcorn out of his lap like an idiot, and Kevin will be paralyzed with some unquantifiable, overwhelming sense of belonging. The idea that someone so capable, so close to perfect, would ever need him for anything - even as a shoulder to lean on, a piece of furniture - fills him with importance. Need. Gwen is so consistently strong, so constantly mothering to the two of them, and when she lets go, it's a special thing. Kevin has never had someone trust him that much.
He can't identify when he started liking Ben's cousin. Sure, he had always noticed she was pretty, but that was a subliminal, automatic perception. He had known she was smart and decently popular and attractive in very general, common-knowledge facets. One day, he woke up and smelled the roses and now, there's no looking away. He simply can't. She's Gwendolyn, and her grins make days brighter and he sees how her tongue flicks out as she does calculus. Gwen is not afraid to show the world her least polished, most gritty sides of herself; she can dig deep when she needs to and she doesn't give a shit about Kevin seeing her three days into her period, all baggy sweatpants and messy buns and never-ending complaints of pain. She is an unapologetic devotee to a children's television show; to this day she has posters of Lucky Girl taped to her walls, the way they so lovingly were when she was thirteen and acne-ridden (he's now seen enough photo albums, courtesy of Ben's mother, to know that Gwen was practically polka-dotted).
She takes a new women's self defense class every year. She butchers the flute, but she still struggles to practice and improve. She will champion any worthy cause she takes interest in, including himself.
Gwendolyn Tennyson is a triple threat (quadruple, quintuple, an infinite terror) because there are too many things about her to love. Sometime between seeing her again last year and now, Kevin finally happened to take a long look at the girl who liked him briefly in elementary school. He finds that he likes what he sees, and he sees more and more with every day.
It's like watching movies, letting her fall asleep on his shoulder. With every new flick he watches, he thinks he learns a bit more about both the plot and himself; he cried, unexpectedly so, at The Green Mile, laughed aloud at Ten Things I Hate About You. Apparently you can learn a lot about yourself by loving someone else, like how basic you are for wanting a girl to use you as a pillow.
"When are you going to say something?" Ben is nosy, because he can be and because he has no grasp on social norms. This is coming from the boy who lives alone in a garage and whose previous best friend was his spoiled brat of a car, so this says quite a bit. A world in which Kevin Levin is the expert on social graces is one doomed from the very start.
"Say what?" he huffs, rolled underneath his car; he's long since finished tuning up the underside but he's reluctant to come out and answer Tennyson's intrusive questions face-to-face. Kevin is no coward, save for when he's threatened with an honest heart-to-heart. It's so much worse than a punch to the face or a kick to the liver.
"It's obvious that you've got a thing for her," Ben starts, and Kevin tries his best not to visibly cringe. "Which is, you know, gross because Gwen's my cousin, and even if she wasn't, I saw her during her awkward acne-and-flab phase. It was terrible. The thought of you two making out is just -"
"Ben, have you ever once thought of me as the sensitive type?"
"You look like a depressed emo from the early two-thousands," Ben replies dryly. "I think that says enough."
"Good," he responds, resisting the urge to smooth a hand over his face, massage the bridge of his nose. "I have a wrench in hand. Be grateful I'm not getting up and throwing it at you."
"Despite acting like a dick, you're not a bad guy," he scoffs, out of sight. Kevin's glad for that; he wouldn't want to deal with an awkward hug-it-out. "I want you to be happy. If she feels the same way, great. But you better do something. She deserves that."
"Ben," the dark haired mechanic says, warningly. "It's not that simple. Let it go."
"I will," he snorts, "when you stop being so obvious. You're not subtle." He bangs on the roof of the car for good measure. A new grease stain relocates itself to Kevin's face, but instead of rampaging, he lays still, thinking.
There's silence, and then: "Obvious, huh?"
Though he can't see Ben, he knows that his companion sports a shit-eating grin. "That doesn't even begin to describe it."
Kevin scratches his neck, suddenly red-eared and exhausted. "Do you think she knows?"
"Gwen? She's the smartest person I know," Ben says. "She's got absolutely no idea."
Ben and Julie have been dating for months, which is surprising to just about everyone. In the eyes of his cousin and friends, Ben is a good man but a questionable choice of partner. That's not to say that he's a terrible boyfriend - he can be, at times, but for the most part, he's encouraging and supportive and has unprecedented reserves of thoughtfulness. Ben loves his girlfriend, and there's no reason he shouldn't; Julie is, to the Tennyson brood's delight and shock, beautiful, brainy, an accomplished athlete, and a kind yet opinionated young woman with a promising future. There is no fault with Julie, save that she's interested in Ben, who forgets to close his mouth when eating half the time and whose favorite hobbies oscillate from playing videogames to playing neighborhood hero.
They work well together, by some black magic. After becoming Ben's friend, Kevin still can't confidently pin down why, but it's far more important that they do.
Gwen and Julie now have 'girl's days' because neither of them have a surplus of female friends and they share a general kinship over Ben. It's nice, the fact that they have an outlet for shopping and spa days and manicures that they lacked beforehand. What was a little less nice was running into them at the mall and offering to carry one of Gwen's bags (one, because he's an idiot and it looked heavy at the time). Ten boxes in and trailing behind two unencumbered girls, Kevin was about ready to pitch himself off the third floor balcony. Before he can do this, however, Gwen falls through an elevator shaft and he's making a trip to the local hospital with her, leaving Julie with their haul.
"Guess this'll teach you to look before you leap, huh?" he tells her, because although it was absolutely terrifying to watch her plummet through the floor, her continuous glares at the medical technicians as they attempted to give her glasses of water or painkillers was priceless. So far she's got a leg injury that will require weeks of a boot.
"It wasn't my fault," she grumbles, feathers ruffled, "and anyways, elevators don't do that." Sliding to the edge of her hospital bed as the doctor finished wrapping her cast, she makes a grab for crutches. "I'm going to check it out." When she all but collapses seconds after, Kevin all but pushes her back onto the bed.
"The only place you're going is home." His tone leaves no room for argument or persuasion.
"I want that elevator given the once-over," she insists, and he internally moans, frustrated. Gwendolyn Tennyson is not known for making things easy, is she?
"If we were a normal couple, this is when we would reach some sort of compromise," he tries. She only stares him down.
He'd had to lie to even get into the room, referring to himself as her boyfriend in order to make sure she wasn't alone when the examination was conducted. He deserves a bit of gratitude. Unfortunately, he's not going to get any from her - nor did he ever expect to, because following Gwen around is just old hat at this point - so he might as well inform the rest of the group of any new developments.
Ben and Julie, who were previously sitting in the waiting room, come up to Kevin's side and begin asking questions. He responds only wit, "Gwen will get the cast off in six weeks, but she wants someone to check out the elevator to make sure there's not a bigger conspiracy at work."
"Someone?"
"She won't let me take her home until it's checked," he says, scrubbing a hand over his face.
"Meaning me?" Ben replies. He knows his cousin well.
"No," Julie says, slipping her hand into his, "meaning us." Julie is, in many ways, the best thing to ever happen to Ben. She's patient and measured, willing to go where he goes without hesitation. It's that sort of all-for-one behavior that Kevin can identify in the Tennyson family, that he has so carefully started to cultivate with them. It's because of that that he lets them go with a nod and a wave, loading an irate redhead into his car and back to her house.
"Movies?" he asks, as it's unwise to leave an angry Gwen to her own devices. It's not really a question.
"Sure," she consents, frustrated as ever but, being confined to her couch and bed for the foreseeable future, grateful for the offer.
She continues to rant about the elevator throughout everything they pick. Kevin's well aware that this is the manifestation of a lifetime of never breaking a bone and getting bested out of the blue by a wayward mechanical flop, but he'd never admit it out loud. No, it's far safer to let her finish her spiral.
"Coincidence explains it just as well," he tries to argue as she finishes her latest spiel about the untimely nature of her accident. "I don't think anyone rigged the elevator to get you."
"But what if," she intones bitterly, which is a comment he frankly doesn't know how to combat.
"C'mon," the mechanic says. "You've let it out for upwards of three hours. Now it's time to take it easy."
"I will not -"
"I promise you, Ben and Julie are looking at the elevator as we speak. It's going to be fine."
"I've got -"
"Nothing to worry about for the time being." He tucks a stray hair behind her right ear, the way he's so often wanted to, and he puts an arm around her. "Relax, Gwen. We've got it under control."
"With you guys? That fails to ease my mind," she grumbles, but soon she allows herself to melt into his side, cheek pressed into his shirt, sweater riding up so that the barest hint of freckled skin is visible. Her hair, so usually pulled up and perfect, slips into something messy and disorganized, tickling his collarbone whenever she moves. It's agony, and it's kind of a dream come true, and the fact that she's only with him like this is because her foot's in a massive boot hurts his heart in a very specific place. Still, it doesn't dissuade the frantic pounding of his chest, a wild and frantic tune he's shocked she can't discern. It grows savage when she's near.
"Today was long," Kevin says, which is sort of like claiming the sun rises in the east. It's an incredibly unnecessary, unhelpful statement. A bar brawl unfurled by the discovery of a private drug deal tends to lead to a messy afternoon and an interesting story.
"Ben nearly broke his nose," Gwen mumbles, crossing her arms and slinking back in his car seat. The radio is streaming out something neither of them are listening to, the heater blaring steady and hot, and they're eating up miles of pavement and dirt roads as Ben slumbers over the backseats. "Why he decided throwing hands with Vilgax was a good idea, I'll never know. He's a literal mobster, Ben's so -"
"Remember when you promised the next one wouldn't be so dangerous?" Kevin interrupts, and Gwen gets scattered.
"Yes, Kev, I remember."
"And you said nothing too far out of Bellwood?" He gestures to the long open stretch ahead of them, over two hours from their starting destination. Gwen winces.
"I know, I know, I'm a hypocrite." She slouches further down, closing her eyes, letting some of the wrinkles on her forehead ease away. "It could have just as easily been me, but it was him. And I don't know whether to be mad or guilty."
"I also got my hands dirty," he says, eyes fixed on the road, "don't I deserve a bit of sympathy?" Gripping the wheel, his knuckles are raw, bloodied in some places. His calloused palms move over the smooth leather as he tries to avoid thinking about bandages and antiseptic, and how much it's going to hurt. It always does.
She pats his shoulder, shaking her head. "I'm sorry, Kev, I'm grateful you punched people off of my idiot cousin."
"And drove us there and back," the mechanic adds.
She kisses his cheek, and for a second, he forgets he's in control of a moving vehicle. "Does that make up for it?"
" . . . It's sufficient apology for now," he grumbles. "One day, Gwen, I'm going to be collecting in full."
"You can get back to me on that," she says, fighting back a yawn, and it occurs to him that she's hanging onto consciousness by a thread, that being a makeshift vigilante in addition to the million other things she defines herself as is a full-time non-stop job. It taxes her immensely, and still she suppresses exhaustion and stays awake, presumably to make conversation.
"Take a nap, Gwen," he finds himself saying. He'd rather have a companion to gripe to, but she needs it.
"Are you sure?"
"Sleep while I drive," he shrugs, making an effort to appear nonchalant. "It'll be fine, trust me. I'll wake you up when we get to your house."
She studies him for a long moment in the darkness of the night, features illuminated only by lights on his dash. She's passing judgement on him, and he can only hope he measures up to whatever standards she has.
"Okay," she finally says, "I trust you." Gwendolyn Tennyson leans back in the passenger's seat and curls into herself, hair undone, defenses lowered. He drives in near silence after that, listening only to the sound of her breathing.
The following chapter will likely come out sometime in the next week to a month, all things going well. I imagine it will be about this length of slightly shorter, depending on how out of hand it gets. Likely, it's either going to be the last or the next-to-last installment. I write these things for fun, and so I'm notoriously bad at planning them out ahead of time. Whoops.
Anyways, have a good day! I look forward to reading your comments; they mean more than you know.