Chapter 154: Static Shock: Part Three
Disclaimer: I Don't Own Ben 10 Or Any Of The Characters. I Don't Own The Rights To Nathan Black Or Any Associated Characters, The Rights Go To annihalator2015
Author's Note:
* Hello and welcome to Chapter One Hundred and Fifty Four!
* I don't really have anything to say in regards to this chapter, so let's get right into it!
* Actually, before we get into the chapter, I have something to announce. You may recall that last month, I teased something for this story and now, I'm ready to announce it. Today, I am officially announcing that I'm rebooting Volume One of this story. For the longest time, I've been very unhappy with the state of Volume One, I cringe constantly when I occasionally go back to read it.
* So, Volume One is going to be rebooted and I plan for it to be better than the original. The main story will stay intact, but key events will be changed and character personalities will be drastically altered for the better. I hope you guys are intrigued by this announcement and are interested in reading it. I will also announce that the first chapter of this reboot will come out on Friday, the twenty fourth, Christmas Eve. And along with that, new chapters will release regularly on every following Friday. I've put a good amount of work into this, so I hope you guys will like it.
* Now, on with the chapter.
Earth-Prime
Tuesday, March 12th, 2019
The Tennyson House
Ben
I couldn't believe it. Mr. Fargas had been tested on and was turned into the Electric Man. I didn't know what to do. Any plans I had of trying to defeat him were out the window. I couldn't entertain the idea of hurting an already dying man, even if the man I knew most likely wasn't in there anymore. And he has terminal cancer? How come he lied to us? Did he even know? Did his doctor keep that from him for some reason?
No, they wouldn't do that! So, why did he keep it from us? Before I could think any more about it, I heard footsteps coming down the stairs. I expected it to be Mom, coming to tell me that I needed to go to bed. But it wasn't her. It was Sunny. Once I saw her, I remembered what had happened today.
"How did it go today?" I asked as I stood up from the couch.
She approached me with a smile on her face, before coming to a stop a couple feet away from me.
"His robotic eye works like a charm!" she exclaimed. "After securing the eye in his socket, they imbedded an electronic chip into the base of his skull, so the eye's connection signal travels through the brain, just like how a real eye works! And they cleaned up some of the scar tissue that the damage caused!"
I nodded.
"Sounds great. Is that why you guys were gone all day?"
"Yeah, it took a few hours to install the chip. And once Albedo woke up, they wanted to keep him to run some diagnostic work on it, just to make sure that it worked correctly."
"Fair enough."
The smile remained on her face as she continued speaking.
"You should have been up there with us, Ben. The work and technology that they have up in their medical wing is dynamite!"
I arched an eyebrow in response.
"Oh, yeah?" I asked. "Like what?"
"They have technology that allows them to replicate organs! Imagine if they went public with some of their technology! Can you imagine going into a hospital and getting a synthetic or artificial kidney, without having to have someone donate theirs to you?"
Well, for them to go public with their technology, I think they'd have to go public themselves. And that's not going to happen.
"Fucking greedy assholes." I muttered.
The smile dropped from Sunny's face.
"What did you say?" she asked.
I shook my head.
"Forget about it."
And so she did, as she changed the topic.
"So, are you going back to school tomorrow?"
I shook my head.
"And you are?"
She shook her head as well.
"No. I'm going to keep Albedo home for another day before I let him go back, I want to be sure that he's adjusting okay. And you're not going back?"
"No, I'm not. This Electric Man thing just got even more complicated."
She gave me a confused look.
"It has? How so?"
I debated with myself if I wanted to tell her or not. I decided to test the waters a bit.
"If I tell you, do you promise to keep it between us?" I asked.
"Of course." She replied instantly.
It only took me a second to realize that she was being genuine, I heard it in her voice. So, I decided to tell her what I had found. I gently grabbed onto her forearm and once I recovered from the surprise of her not threatening me, I began to pull her towards the couch.
"Come look at this." I said as I sat down.
She sat down next to me and I showed her the document with all of the information that I was given. She read through all of it and eventually turned to look at me.
"Our chem teacher, Mr. Fargas, is that electric thing? And the Forever Knights did that to him?"
"Well, Wayne Li did. I'd be surprised if Enoch even had anything to do with it. What they did to him isn't Enoch's style."
She was silent for a second.
"You're right, this is more complicated than it was before."
I nodded.
"Yep."
I let out a sigh before speaking.
"It just feels like that even after we've taken Enoch down, I can't escape the bullshit and the legacy that he left behind."
"I understand. What are you going to do about Mr. Fargas?"
I shrugged.
"I have no idea. Originally, I was going to see if I could use a weakness to beat him. Overcharge him, get him into water to disperse the charge, something. But now, I don't know what to do. Mr. Fargas might be my favorite teacher and I don't know if I can bring myself to harm him."
Sunny sat down next to me on the couch.
"You know, if Kaine can't do anything, then maybe Ben Tennyson can." She eventually said.
I turned to look at her with confusion.
"What does that mean?"
"Maybe you don't have to fight him." she replied. "Maybe you can talk to him."
I shrugged.
"I don't think so. He's entirely gone. His personality has drastically changed since the transformation."
She didn't give up.
"Try, Ben. Try to do the right thing."
I didn't say anything this time. In response, Sunny patted my back.
"Whatever you do, I'm sure you'll make the right choice."
She got up from the couch and began walking toward the stairs, before turning to look at me.
"You really should get some sleep, before you make a decision."
I nodded.
"Yeah, I should get to sleep. I'll get out of here so I'm not keeping you guys from going to bed."
"Don't be in a rush. Just don't stay down here for too late."
"I won't."
She started to head for the stairs again, but stopped once more to turn to me.
"And Ben?"
I looked back at her without saying anything and in response, she gave me a small smile.
"I just want you know that you can tell me anything."
...if you're looking for someone to talk to about this kind of stuff with...
Some of what Nathan had told me a few weeks ago began to ring in my mind after she said that.
Maybe Sunny's the person I should talk to about this kind of stuff. I mean, she knows all about my super hero career, as she should. And we're on friendly terms now, so...
That's where I stopped myself. I was barely able to keep myself from sighing.
Even if Sunny says that I can tell her anything, I still can't tell anyone about Ken. That secret is sure to bring trouble with it. If I tell Sunny, even if I ask her to keep it between us, I don't think there's any guarantee that she won't tell Gwen. And if she tells her, then Gwen will tell her parents and then there goes the neighborhood.
Regardless of what I was thinking, I nodded at Sunny.
"Okay." I replied. "And thanks, Sunny."
The smile remained on her face.
"Any time." She spoke before turning around and heading up the stairs.
Once she left me alone, I sat back down at the computer, even though there wasn't any more information that I could use. That's when I realized how tired I was.
Sunny's right, I thought. I should get some rest.
Before I could turn off my laptop and get up from the couch, I got a text message.
I have a feeling you're still awake. Check the news. – Grandpa Max
I was intrigued by what was happening on the news, so I grabbed the T.V. remote, turned on the thing and switched to the news channel. I was not so surprised by seeing Mr. Fargas in his electric form, somewhere Downtown. However, I was surprised to see that he had a piece of machinery levitating close by, which seemed to be "connected" to him by a few moving bolts of electricity.
How is he doing that? How is he moving that machinery without his electricity overloading it and making it unusable?
That's when I recalled something that Grandpa had said earlier in the day.
"...Technokinesis is where the bond between being and machine is increased and developed so well, that the user can actually work through the machines by physically animating them or making them move like puppets..."
"He must have the ability to use technokinesis if that's the case." I mused. "But still, how can the machine still be used if several thousand volts of energy is being ran through it?"
I continued watching the news, until Mr. Fargas sent a bolt of electricity at the screen and then there was nothing but static. I hoped that the camera operator didn't just get electrocuted, but I felt like my hopes were futile. I shut off the T.V., feeling even worse that I had before. I decided that now I would go to bed.
Going to bed upset, I thought to myself. Great.
The Next Morning – Wednesday, March 13th, 2019
I woke up the next morning, still feeling miserable about the discovery that I had made.
I still can't believe it. Mr. Fargas, my favorite teacher, was transformed into that electric thing just because Wayne Li wanted a Guinea Pig to experiment on.
It still pissed me off more than it made me sad. And I was currently unsure what to do about the situation. Prior to the discovery, I was prepared to do something to engage him physically, even if I was risking my own skin. After all, he had to be stopped. But that all changed last night. I didn't know who else I could go to about this. I suppose I could talk to Nathan about it, but I quickly decided against it.
I had a feeling that he would tell me to forget about who this thing used to be and to take it down at all costs.
Yeah, I thought. He would just tell me to forget about the fact that this thing used to be my teacher. That there is no way to get around this thing without physically confronting it. No talking it down or otherwise.
I let out a sigh as I got out of bed. As I sat up, I noticed that Gwen was already awake. And in turn, she noticed me now being awake. She turned to look at me she pulled on the jeans that she would be wearing for the day.
"Coming to school or skipping again today?" she asked.
I gave her a sheepish look.
"Skipping, I'm afraid. I have to take care of this thing."
She sighed as she looked at me. She stood up and put on her belt as she spoke.
"Ben, are you aware of how pissed your mom is going to be about you cutting so many days?"
"Yes, I am. But this is more important than school. I have to do something!"
She was silent as she moved to the closet. She pulled out a shirt and began to put in on.
"You'll be lucky if she doesn't kick you out again." She replied as she pulled her shirt down over her bra.
I wasn't too happy with what she had said.
"Gwen—" I tried to speak, only to be cut off.
"If you'll excuse me, I need to get to school. I'll see you later."
I turned and just watched her leave the room with her backpack. I sighed as I got out of bed.
Great, I thought. Not only is there an electric man on the loose, not only could the city be in danger, but now my girlfriend is angry with me. Perfect. Just perfect.
As I stood up from the bed, there was a knock at the now closed door.
"Ben, it's me." I heard Albedo speak from the other side of the door. "Do you have a second?"
What could he possibly want?
Nevertheless, I responded.
"Come in."
The door opened and Albedo stepped into the bedroom.
"What is it?" I asked.
The look on his face was different than it had been when he had looked at me in the past couple of weeks. Instead of an angry look, I detected a look of guilt on his face. And that intrigued me.
"I need to talk to you. It's important."
I'm sure it is, I thought. but it will have to wait. For two reasons, one: there are bigger things happening right now. And there's also the fact that I don't want to talk to you at the moment.
"I'm sure it is important." I replied as I walked past him. "But it'll have to wait."
"But—" he began speaking as I heard him begin to follow me, but I turned and interrupted him.
"No buts. If you want to talk to me so bad, it'll have to wait. I'll find you later."
This time he didn't say anything in return and so I turned back around to make my way to the hallway that led to the basement stairs. On my way to the hallway, I had to pass the living room, where Mom sat on the couch, watching T.V. She gave me a questioning look.
"Are you going to school today? Or staying home again?"
I was able to detect great disapproval in her tone, even though I hadn't given my answer yet and that scared me. If I was being honest, I didn't need to answer, she probably already knew what I was doing, but I was going to answer her anyway.
"Staying home. There's more work to be done."
She stayed silent for a few moments before answering and that's another thing that scared me.
"You better pray to God that you pass your senior year."
She said that in anger, with a threatening tone. That's when I decided to get out of there, without responding to what she said. There was no point in replying to what she said, anyway. Once I was downstairs, I decided to sit down on the couch and check the news, on the account that the info I had gotten last night had given me all it could. I turned on the T.V. and began to watch the news, hoping for anything about Mr. Fargas. And eventually, my hoping paid off.
They began going over a report on Mr. Fargas, "The Electric Man" disappearing into the city's sewer systems late last night. And I recognized the location on T.V. In was in the Docks and Warehouses district, where I had gone to meet Vilgax a few weeks back.
Why would Mr. Fargas be going there? Maybe I should go down there and see what I can find. Odds are he's not going to Vilgax's hideout, but even still, the sewer system is a maze, as Nathan told me.
Little did I know that it wouldn't be much of an issue.
Sometime Later
Docks and Warehouses District
I arrived in costume and already found signs of activity from Mr. Fargas. There were black burn marks all over the ground around the manhole, maybe from the electricity arcing from his body. The manhole had been torn off and was nowhere to be found. Seeing as above ground was a bit of a mess, I wasted no time in jumping down the hole and into the tunnel below. The tunnel was even more damaged. The burn marks, if that's what they were, were even more extreme down here and more sporadic, too.
What on Earth was Mr. Fargas doing down here?
I quietly followed the path of destruction, if you could call it that, for a few minutes. The tunnels winded, turned and descended a few times, so I knew that I was getting deeper underground. And I didn't know whether to be intrigued by that or worried about it. Eventually after several more minutes of walking had passed, I began to see lights coming from up ahead. I came to a stop.
Why would there be lights on this deep in the sewer?
I willed the courage to begin walking again and continued toward the source of the lights. Eventually I came up on a hole in the wall and when I looked inside, I was baffled by what I saw. On the other side of the wall was a room or rather a chamber. And it was big on the inside, gigantic. The lights were coming from inside of the chamber, mounted to the walls and ceiling, but I was more interested in the machinery in the chamber. The chamber itself was spherical, being flatter at the bottom of the chamber so that walking could be done.
In the center of the chamber, was a big pedestal of some kind. The pedestal was triangular and on each corner of the pedestal rose a support beam. From each support beam, protruded pylons of some sort. They looked like they'd zap something with some kind of energy or who-knows-what when activated. There were a couple server machines on one side of the room, with cables running to the pedestal and a computer terminal that was also along with wall with the servers, with a cable running to the terminal as well. I looked all around me in astonishment. I had no idea what this machine could be used for. I walked to get a closer look at the pylons that extended from the steel support beams of the pedestal.
What if instead of giving energy, those pylons are designed to syphon energy? Could Mr. Fargas be trying to cure himself? Even though such an attempt could prove to be fatal?
I stepped back and continued looking at the machine. I made my way back over to the terminal and began using the arrow keys to navigate what I assumed was a menu. There were only three options: "Run Diagnostic Check", "Terminate Power Source", and "Begin Cycle". I didn't know why there would be an option to terminate the power source, but the way it said "Begin Cycle" told me that this thing may not have been designed to cure Mr. Fargas.
However, I still had no idea what this thing was and I didn't think that I could figure it out by myself. But I think I knew who could help me figure it out. I took out my phone and began to take pictures, including closeups, of the terminal, the few server machines and the pedestal with its pylons.
I would show the pictures to Cooper later, I didn't care if Julie refused to allow me to talk to him. Whatever this thing was, it was important. I knew it was and I had to figure out what this thing could really do. Just then I heard a noise, like electricity popping and sparking. I took one last picture of the machine and turned around.
"I have to get out of here!" I whispered to myself as I fired a line across the chamber and zipped up toward the ceiling.
As soon as I made contact with the wall of the chamber and was out of sight, Mr. Fargas entered, in all of his electric glory. As I remained where I was, watching him, he didn't seem to notice that someone had been here. And I wasn't about to stick around to find out if he would catch wind of my being here. I quietly began to crawl along the wall until I came to the hole in the chamber's wall, where I made my exit.
Sometime Later
The Tennyson House
When I got back home, I changed out of my costume and went back to the basement, where I decided what to do. Realistically, my only option was to phone Cooper and ask him for help in figuring out what that machine really was. But judging on how quickly Julie got him to hang up last night, I doubt he'd be much help. However, I couldn't (or wouldn't) exactly go to S.E.C.T. with this. I couldn't even begin to imagine how Director Steel would react to the news. So, that left me with phoning Cooper anyway and hoping for the best. These thoughts stirred up a fairly recent memory, regarding both Cooper and Nathan.
A Few Weeks Earlier
I had gotten a phone call from him a week or two after the raid on Enoch's tower. Upon answering the phone, he spoke first.
"Yo, Ben! I finished my analysis of that robotic scorpion thing that attacked Nathan a few weeks ago and I have some pretty interesting information!"
"Okay, great. I'll get Nathan and we'll head over to your warehouse to see what you've come up with."
He was silent for a second or two.
"Um, unfortunately, I can't allow Nathan in my warehouse anymore."
That surprised me, shook me to my core, actually.
"Wait, what? Why not?"
"He pulled a gun on Ms. Rojo that night, Ben. You can't tell me that didn't freak you out like it did me and Julie."
I disregarded what he said about being freaked out about it.
"Well, of course he pulled a gun on her. She threatened me!"
"She was an associate of ours, Ben. She only attacked you because of how you attacked her. It was pretty clear that you weren't in control of yourself at the time and we understand that you weren't fully right in the head at the time. She did not understand any of that."
I sighed and before I could say anything in response, he beat me to it.
"He's not your friend, Ben."
That especially shook me.
"Why the fuck would you ever say that?"
"Think about it, Ben. He pulled a gun on Ms. Rojo, even though her outburst was somewhat reasonable."
"I wouldn't call it reasonable."
"Think, Ben! He pulled a gun! He is not your friend! Let's say that you suddenly posed a threat to us with him around or you posed a threat to him. Regardless of when this would be, tomorrow or fifteen years from now, he would not hesitate. Bonds don't mean shit to him. He'd execute you without a second thought."
"I think you're overreacting just a little—"
"I know his type, Ben. Julie is terrified of him. She doesn't want to be within a hundred feet of him and I have reason to believe what I've said. And if I'm being honest, I'm scared of him, too. Julie made me promise that I'd never see or talk to him again. And I'm honoring that promise, which is why I can't have him in my warehouse."
Once again, I disregarded his statement.
"She doesn't have to know that you'd be meeting him at my place."
He remained silent for the longest time.
"Fine, I'll fucking get my things together and meet you guys at your place."
"Okay, thanks Cooper. I'll see you—"
He hung up on me before I could finish my sentence.
"—soon."
I scratched the back of my neck as I lowered my phone.
"Huh." Was all I could say.
After that interesting interaction with Cooper, I called Nathan to tell him that Cooper had something urgent to talk to us about and that we were going to meet at my house to go over what he had found. When he asked why we couldn't just meet at Cooper's warehouse, I couldn't bring myself to tell him about the conversation that he and I had just had, so I told him that he would just have to ask Cooper that himself.
He relunctantly agreed to meet us at my place and told us that he'd be over soon. Cooper arrived first and began to put get pieces of tech out of his bag, presumably that would help during his presentation. After he set up, there was a little of us waiting around for him and after sometime, he showed up.
"So, any reason we couldn't meet up at your warehouse, Cooper? I'd be lying if I said I wasn't uncomfortable with meeting up with the two of you in a suburban neighbourhood, no offence to you, Tennyson. Just too many people around if someone doesn't give a damn about collateral damage and decides to come-a knocking for you, Tennyson." Nathan said as he leaned against the wall, looking at Cooper and I.
Cooper cursed with anger, as if he had known that this was coming.
"So, how do I put this? The reason I'm more comfortable with meeting here rather than my warehouse is because of my girlfriend, Julie. See, during the operation, she was already a bit wary of you, but your actions in the alley that night really scared her. And I'd be lying if I told you that I wasn't even a little bit scared, as well. When we got home that night, she told me that she didn't want me involved with you and made me promise that I'd do my best not to speak with you in the future. I'm not about to go against what my girlfriend asks of me and for my own safety, I'm a little uncomfortable with meeting you in an isolated place like my warehouse."
Nathan nodded in understanding.
"I understand, I'm not going to try and justify my actions in the alley, I did what I had to, and let's leave it at that. So, any reason why this meeting was called? All you said was that it was urgent and you needed to see us both as soon as possible." He asked, one eyebrow cocked in question.
Before Cooper got to the point, he spoke.
"I thank you for not making a bigger deal out of this than necessary."
He turned to all of the equipment that he had set up on the coffee table.
"Unfortunately, there was nothing interesting about that robotic scorpion's leg, just that it's made of a pretty tough metal alloy, though that didn't stop you from tearing it apart. When we were all talking about the final stages of the operation, I snagged one of the bot's eyes and CPU, which had been exposed thanks to the damage that you did to it. Thankfully, there was actually something to learn from the two parts."
Cooper now moved to the laptop that he had brought with him and began typing on it, before turning it so that Nathan and I could both see the video footage that was beginning to play.
"What you two are currently watching is video footage taken from the eye's point of view. I had to construct a makeshift socket for it to sit in, as well as wire it to a video capture unit so that I could, you know, actually record my findings. As you can see, it only sees in red, with darker reds used to simulate darker colors, like black and the metal of the guns that we were carrying that night. As you can also see, it's highlighting everything in its view when I fired it up, from simple tables in the warehouse to all of my machine equipment."
Cooper let out a breath of fresh air before continuing.
"It does all of this very quickly and while I was unfortunately able to have access to its footage taken during the conflict, I'm almost certain that it was highlighting and tracking just you, Nathan, perhaps looking for some sort of weakness in you. This may explain why it was sporadically moving and how it jumped to crawl along the wall toward the climax of the fight. I was scared that it might be transmitting its findings in my warehouse to an external sever somewhere, so I had to shut it down as quickly as I as I turned it back on."
He turned to look at us.
"Anything you wish to say, gentlemen?"
"Well it did immediately attack me, a surprise attack at that. The moment I got close to Animo, it fucking jumped me and sunk a big ass needle in between my throat and shoulder. But I attributed that to it determining me as the biggest threat, not to it targeting me specifically. Besides, it also went after Ben and Gwen as well, not just me, and I doubt I would've been able to take it on myself, it was only thanks to them actively pulling aggro off of me that I could actually finish it off." He said as he rubbed that spot, likely having not forgotten the pain that he no doubt felt when it attacked him. "Did you find out anything else?"
Cooper shook his head as he turned back to his laptop to shut it off.
"No. But I've never seen anything like this. It was learning while it combatted you, it analyzed you, determining how it would move in reaction to how you would behave. That's scary. I'm not sure I'm aware of an artificial intelligence that was capable of learning that quickly, let alone at all. It also seemed self-aware, which if you've watched any movies from the last twenty five years or so, that's not exactly something to be excited about."
Cooper pulled the CPU chip and the robotic eye from their connectors, before turning back to us.
"As odd as it may sound coming from me, my vote is to destroy both the eye and the chip. I'm not sure if I want technology that advanced around in our world and I'm equally unsure that I trust any government organizations or non-government organizations to handle tech like this."
He approached Nathan and held his hand out to him.
"While my vote stands, it's up you two what we should do with it. In the very least, I think I'd trust you to hang on to them, Nathan. Maybe you'd want them as a souvenir or maybe you think you could make a use for them."
Nathan grabbed the two items from Cooper's palm, and looked at them.
"Well, I'll at least hang on to them for now, if I find them too dangerous, I'll smash and burn them, make it so nobody can salvage a damn thing." He said as he pocketed them.
"Who knows, might be useful as bargaining chips later down the line, or useful to an ally who has much more experience with tech like this, whoever they might be." He said as he stepped away from the wall.
"Well, if that's everything, I think I'll be on my way."
And so after that, Nathan left. Cooper cleaned up his things and he left soon after, as well. I didn't really get a chance to voice my opinion on the situation with the robot's eye and CPU, but I'd like to say that I would agree with Nathan's decision.
Getting ready to phone Cooper made me think back on that interaction. I let out an unsteady sigh as I dialed his number and put the phone up to my ear.
"Come on, pick up." I silently urged.
After a few rings, he did pick up.
"Hello?"
"Hey, Cooper. It's me, Ben."
"I have caller ID, Ben. What is it?"
"I need a favor, Cooper."
"And I need my girlfriend to not be any more pissed off at me than she already is." He spoke in a bit of a harsh tone. "So, find someone else to help you out."
"But Cooper, you're my only option!"
"Find someone else." He repeated.
"Cooper, this is really important! I need your help!"
He was silent for a second.
"Fine, I'll piss off my girlfriend even more by helping you. Now, what do you want?"
"I'm dealing with a machine and I have no idea what it does. It would help if I could get you down there to look at it, but it's currently unsafe. So, I took several pictures of the machine in hopes that you could determine its function."
"Well, if you send me those pictures, then I guess I could figure out what it does."
"Okay. Thanks, Cooper."
"Yeah, whatever."
I then heard the click that followed his hanging up on me. I sighed as I lowered the phone.
He is really unhappy. Why is Julie so angry with the concept of him helping me? It can't be like that every day is date night! Erm, day.
I sent him the pictures from my phone and then waited for a few hours.
Later That Afternoon
When he didn't get back to me within an hour, I decided to go take a nap to rest up for a while. When I woke up, I still hadn't heard back from him. So, when I sat down to eat lunch and just as I was finishing, I got a text from him.
Get over to my warehouse, now! It's urgent! – Cooper
Judging by what he said, I assumed that he meant what he said. I quickly got up from the kitchen table and put my empty plate into the kitchen sink, without rinsing it off. I then left the kitchen, got my keys from the bedroom, got my shoes on and headed toward the front door, passing Mom on the way there.
"Gotta go, Mom!" I said on the way to the door as I waved to her. "It's important!"
She didn't say anything in response, but she gave me a glare of disapproval the whole way out.
Sometime Later
Cooper's Warehouse – The Riverfront
Once I got to the warehouse, I did the standard knock at the door and he quickly ushered me in.
"You were right, Ben." he said as he quickly shut the door. "This is important. In fact, it's more important than I initially thought. I'm sorry I gave you a hard time about it."
"Cooper, just calm down for a second. It's not a problem." I said as I followed him across the warehouse. "Just tell me what—"
I came to a stop in front of some kind of table, not a normal table by any means, though. It looked like one of those holographic tables, that you saw in video games and sci-fi movies. I began to scratch the back of my neck.
"Um Cooper, how the hell can you afford something like this?" I asked.
"I called in every last favor to borrow this machine from my backers." He replied in a rapid-fire tone. "Now listen, this machine of yours is complex. It took a couple hours to figure out what it could do and it took a while to convert the pictures into a holographic form. I had to drink coffee for a bit of a boost and I don't usually drink coffee!"
"I can tell."
"Listen! This machine is bad news, you have to destroy it or do whatever you can to make sure it doesn't get turned on!"
"Can you at least demonstrate what it does?"
He walked over to the other side of the table without a word and began interacting with a control console attached to the table.
"First thing's first, this thing requires a ton of power. I'm not sure if this thing had any generators or any power sources in the room with it, but if it didn't, then it must drawer power from an external source. Maybe from the city's power plant, perhaps?"
How would that work? And who's to say that Mr. Fargas himself isn't somehow providing power to his machine?
"Okay, we're past power. What else?"
He pressed a button and the hologram zoomed in on what I thought to be servers.
"These machines, they look like servers. But I don't know why a thing like this would need servers. There's no memory, at least none that I would think of, to store. Maybe they're used for maintenance or something."
I'm not sure that's how server machines work. Does Cooper know what he's talking about?
Next, the hologram zoomed in on the pylons.
"These pylons, once the machine is powered up by an unclear power source, is supposed to generate a suction field."
A suction field? What's that?
The holographic table zoomed out so that I could see the whole machine again and a circular object began to slowly form over the center of the pedestal. I watched as the object slowly got bigger, showing no signs of slowing down.
"Actually, while it is a suction field, it's more akin to a black hole, but being man made."
I snapped my head up to look at him.
"A man made black hole? You're fucking kidding, right?"
He shook his head.
"I certainly wish I was. Well, it's either that or the machine is just for decoration, which it almost definitely isn't. Come on, Ben. Don't you trust me to know what I'm talking about?"
"No, I do trust you, just trying to make sure. Jesus, Cooper. How the hell can it just form a man made black hole? How can the machine generate it?"
He shrugged.
"I have no idea, all I know is what it's capable of. Maybe the thing that built this snagged a few pieces of top secret technology from a certain defunct corrupt organization that we both helped take down."
"I don't think that's what happened, Cooper. So, what else is there, if there is anything else?"
"Well, the suction field sucks in anything in its immediate radius and it'll keep growing bigger and bigger as it takes in more material. If it's not stopped, it's entirely possible that it'll consume the world."
"Jesus."
"You need to stop it from being turned on, Ben."
"I know."
"I mean it. Seriously."
"I know!"
Silence passed between us after that and a few seconds following that, he spoke again.
"So, what are you going to do about it?"
"I'm going to do what I have to. I'm going to go down there after I leave here and shut that thing down."
"Well, alright then. Good luck. And Godspeed."
"Thanks."
I let out a sigh before I spoke again.
"Thanks for this, Cooper. I know that Julie doesn't want you doing this today, but it was really important."
"Hey, don't sweat it. I understand. I should apologize to you for making a big deal out of it."
"Water under the bridge. Anyway, now that we've gone over this, I should get back home. It's not wise for me to keep my girlfriend waiting any longer."
After he said that, there was a loud banging sound on the front door. Cooper looked to the door with a sigh.
"That's probably her now. If I don't let her in, it'll only get worse."
I watched him go as he walked toward the door, reaching out to him as I did, though he didn't see it.
"Cooper, wait! What if that isn't Julie? That series of knocks sounded aggressive!"
But he didn't listen. He kept walking toward the door and once he made it, without even looking through the peephole, opened the door. And as he opened it, the person forced it all the way open from the other side and in stepped Julie, slamming the door shut behind her.
So, it was her after all, I thought.
And she wasn't happy.
"Pack it up, mister, because you're done!" she exclaimed with anger. "Time to go home!"
To my surprise, he didn't try to protest.
"Yes, dear." He said as he walked toward the holographic table. "Let me just go turn this machine off."
"Make it quick."
As he did this, Julie turned to me and approached me. Once she reached me, she surprised me by aggressively grabbing the top half of my shirt.
"And as for you," she angrily exclaimed as she pulled me close. "You don't get to steal Cooper away from me to help with your super hero stuff!"
I was frankly surprised by her outburst.
Why is she acting so possessive?! What's the word for that? Yandere? Yeah, yandere. I think that's it.
I should have just nodded along and apologized, but I didn't. And that was my mistake.
"Julie, this is more important then you and him, or me borrowing him for a few hours, there are bigger things happening than—"
"I don't care!"
"Julie, I'm serious! This is serious and no one else could help me and—"
That's when she got violent and it definitely surprised me. She removed one of her hands from my shirt and slugged me in my jaw, probably as hard as she could, sending me to the floor. I held my chin as my entire lower jaw flared with pain and looked up at her.
"Julie, why did you—"
"Stay the hell away from us!" she yelled as she pointed down at me. "We don't need you in our lives!"
I stared in shock as she walked toward Cooper. Once she reached him, she grabbed his elbow, like she was a cop and not his girlfriend.
"Come along, Cooper." She said as she forcefully pulled him along.
I watched both of them go and was still somehow surprised when Cooper didn't try to resist in anyway. They left me alone in the warehouse and after that, I had to get up and leave to lock the place up. I waited until they were gone though, I didn't want to continue to get on Julie's bad side. As I left the place, just one thought resonated with me.
I don't think I'm going to be working with Cooper again anytime soon, I thought. And I think it's best if I leave the two of them alone for a while.
Later That Evening
The Tennyson House
I stood in the attic, trying to work up the courage to put on my mask and go risk my life against Mr. Fargas in his electric form again. As I stood there, I heard the attic door open and I turned to look at the light coming from the staircase down to the ground floor.
"Ben, are you up there?" my father called up.
"Yes." I called back.
"May I come up?"
"Yes." I repeated.
I heard him grunting as he made his way up the stairs and into the attic. Once he was fully up the stairs, he walked further into the room and eventually sat down a stool some ways away from me. He let out a sigh before looking up at me with a stern gaze.
"What are you thinking, Ben?" he asked. "Disappointing your mother by skipping school just to play hero all day?"
"Dad, I know it sounds bad, but I have a good reason!"
He shook his head.
"It doesn't matter what your reason is. You're in your final year of high school, you don't have the time to be wasting on trivial stuff like this."
I found myself scowling.
"You sound just like her. You could never understand."
I don't know why I said that, it wasn't right as he clearly did understand better than Mom did. He sighed.
"Then help me try to understand. Why are you doing this?"
How could I explain this?
I let out a breath and explained it to him the best I could.
"So, if you've paid attention to the news, you'll know that some creature made of electricity is on the loose in the city. Except, it's not just some creature. My chemistry teacher, Mr. Fargas, was nabbed and was tested on by a splinter division of the Forever Knights and now he's going to try to use a machine that he built to destroy the city and I have to stop him before he can turn it on."
He was silent for a few seconds after that and I could tell that he was taking it all in.
"Well, that is quite the situation."
He let out a sigh.
"Well, I understand why you're doing this, even if I don't approve of this idea. So, go on now, before I change my mind."
I was astonished by this. But apparently, he meant it, because he slowly got up from the stool and slowly made his way back down the stairs, closing the attic door behind him. I turned to the attic window and took a deep breath, before putting my mask on. And then I left.
Author's Note:
* And that's it for the chapter, I hope you all enjoyed!
* What are your thoughts on Mr. Fargas' machine? Do you believe what Cooper says about it? Speaking of Cooper, what is your opinion on how Julie is treating him and Ben? I'm really curious about any thoughts that you could have on this chapter, so tell me anything you want to.
* With that said, I'm going to go though, so have a fantastic day and bye.
Next Chapter: Ben defeats Mr. Fargas in a different way than he usually would. Later on, Ben makes progress with Albedo, while taking a few steps backwards at the same time.