Ben 16: Fear

"Hello again when we last met young Ben Tennyson had to learn a rather hard lesson I believe. One thing I've learned from telling so many different stories is that sometimes a story can teach you things you never knew and sometimes it can make you feel emotions that can truly disturb you. Today's story is unfortunately the former for young Ben 16 will have to confront his greatest fear today.

Animo worked carefully out of fear of possibly damaging his new creation. Sparks flew from the circular device illuminating the darkened room. He heard distant footsteps outside his work room. The door opened. "What is it?" Animo asked, annoyed by the disturbance. "Colonel Rousenbaum requests your presence, doctor." The soldier said. Animo turned to face the soldier surprised by the news. "I didn't think the Colonel would get involved in securing the missing children. What has that idiot Steel been up to?" Animo nodded and the soldier left the room. Animo put his finger inside the nearby bird cage and petted the bird inside. "It appears I won't get a chance to finish my work after all."

Animo left the room and walked down the hallway to the platform where Steel and Rosenbaum stood. Animo joined the two on the platform. "Colonel, this is a surprise. I must say I wasn't expecting to see you. Is something wrong?" Animo looked over at Steel when he asked what was wrong prompting the angry lieutenant to join in the conversation. "Your freak show experiments are what's wrong Animo." The lieutenant said just barely keeping himself in check. The lieutenant and Animo had never really gotten along with one another, something that had only become worse as project Agreggor had continued although he had never shown this amount of hostility when the Colonel was around. "I thought you were supposed to be tracking down my "freak show experiments" Steel." Lieutenant Steel's face began to show obvious signs of anger. Colonel Rosenubaum finally spoke up "It seems like the children have somehow become stronger. Doctor, do you have any Idea what could have caused this?" "That is to be presumed since they now have access to a larger amount of energy outside compared to the limited amount we gave them when they were imprisoned here at area 51." Animo replied. "That's not what he means Animo. The freaks' powers are different." Steel said regaining his composure though still hostile towards Animo. Animo snapped to attention at this. Throughout all the trials he had done none of the children's powers had ever changed or evolved after they had received the dna transfusion. "What exactly do you mean Lieutenant?" Rosenbaum replied to Animos question instead of Steel "he means that" Rosenbaum pointed to the monitor across from the subject below. The monitor flashed to images of a fight. Animo saw a strange monstrous creature with four arms two of which were coated with orange fur while the top right was covered in flames and the left was coated in crystal. "What a magnificent creature." Animo had always been fond of animals as he had originally wanted to be a veterinarian before discovering a far more interesting field that only saw animals used as test subjects. "That is subject 11." Rosenbaum said. Animo turned his head in shock "you mean to tell me that the creature you showed me is the same 11 year old boy I experimented on?" Animo asked in shock. "Yeah he and his brother went on a wrecking spree down in New york." Steel replied, looking at Animo with disgust. Steel seemed to hate the fascination Animo had with the unnatural. "Which you were supposed to cover up Steel." Rosenbaum said with a firm tone. Causing Steel to recoil in shame. Animo turned back towards the monitor and sure enough a local newscaster popped on screen to commentate over the footage. "How did they obtain this footage?" Animo asked at first wondering if it was some kind of mistake but quickly put that idea aside knowing that Rosenbaum and Steel wouldn't show up just to bother him over a mistake by the media. "Someone leaked the footage to the press. My men and I are currently trying to find the lowlife who did so." Steel said, clenching his hands together behind his back. "This brings me back to my original question Animo do you know what could have caused this mutation?" Animo shook his head in confusion. "Then I wonder if somehow the DNA we injected into them mutated them somehow." Rosenbaum said, scratching his chin thoughtfully. "Unlikely as the subjects would have shown some form of symptoms before they had escaped." Animo said knowing that it wasn't possible for the DNA injected into the children to have begun changing them after all this time. But that only made Animo wonder to himself what could have caused this kind of mutation. "Sir it's like I've been saying all along this project is too dangerous. We should shut it down and focus on eliminating the kids before their powers continue to grow." Steel said. Animo couldn't believe even Steel would be this stupid. Months of testing, millions of dollars spent and Steel wanted them to throw away humanity's next phase of evolution. "Colonel, if I may perhaps Steel suited for this task, I have a new device that may be of some assistance in capturing the remaining children." Rosenbaum held up a hand to stop Steel's angry reply that was clearly coming and said. "The device you've been working on is complete?" Rosenbaum asked curiously. "Yes sir." Animo said. "Show me." Rosenbaum said. Animo nodded and asked the nearest soldier to fetch him his supplies. "Sir this is getting out of hand an entire city was almost destroyed and-" "I've heard your objections, Steel but like I told you before this project is too important to humanity I won't shut it down." Rosenbaum finished leaving Steel looking angrily away towards the subject below. Animo looked down as well at the alien being known as Aggregor they had secured down below. He still wasn't sure where the creature had come from or even how it had been captured in the first place but he did know that the DNA inside the creature was what gave the subjects their powers and was the key to evolving humanity into their next stage. "If only I could figure out how it works." Animo thought to himself. The soldier returned with Animo's supplies Animo set the bird cage down and stepped back. He fixed the modulator to his head and chest taking off his white lab coat in doing so revealing his more casual camouflage tank top he wore underneath. "Is this device some kind of fashion statement?" Steel asked jokingly. Animo gritted his teeth in anger. He walked over and opened the cage. He then turned the circular device on his chest towards the right, turning it on and said "observe my new fashion statement sir." A red beam of energy shot out and hit the bird causing it to grow in size to the point where it threatened to break the ceiling. The bird's small beak grew into a large and pointed one and his claws became large talons. After the energy dissipated the bird screeched causing Steel to yell. "Animo what have you done that thing'll kill us all!" The bird sat on the edge of the railing as Animo reached out to pet it's head. "My transmodulator gives me control over the creature preventing such an accident from occurring Lieutenant." Animo said, looking over at the frightened lieutenant who had fallen to the ground. Steel quickly got up doing his best to regain his composure despite his obvious fear of the now giant bird. "I...see."

Colonel Rousenbaum who hadn't moved an inch throughout the display said "impressive doctor perhaps your right. Steel from here on out you and Animo will work together to locate the missing children." Steel despite being clearly annoyed at this did not argue. "Here is the current location of subject 4." Rosenbaum nodded towards the screen. Animo had to strain his neck to see over his bird but saw the coordinates displayed. "Very well then sir I shall go with Steel to collect subject 4." Rosenbaum nodded and left the two of them alone on the stage.

Back with Ben…

Ben stayed inside the Rust-bucket as Gwen with the help of Grandpa Max gathered up her things and left. He could hear muffled conversations outside but for the most part he couldn't really make out what they were saying. Every once and a while Gwen would look at him and then quickly look away again. "I guess she really does hate me now." Ben thought dejectedly. He put his head down not out of frustration or shame but out of tiredness. Ben struggled to sleep lately, his mind showing him haunting images of that monster he had seen when he took over Rojo's body "Be Afraid" it would say before twisting to form a monster with huge claws that would scream at him "Get out!" Ben looked out the window one more time and saw Gwen's parents waving goodbye to Grandpa as he got inside the Rust-bucket. "Anything you want to say to Gwen before we go?" Grandpa Max asked, turning to face Ben. Ben looked out the window at Gwen who looked over at him before turning and walking inside. "No Grandpa, I'm good." Grandpa Max started up the Rust-bucket and drove on over to Ben's house which was located a little ways off. Ben swayed in his seat a little and began to drift off. "I'll make you regret helping that monster Steel." Michael said suddenly the scene changed and Ben saw a huge claw with talons for fingers slam down over his head. "OUT!" Ben jolted awake and shaked his head. "What was that?" Ben thought in distress. "We're here kiddo time to get on out." Grandpa Max said before getting up and grabbing Ben's things. Ben did as Grandpa Max said, trying to get the image of that claw swinging down at him out of his head. Ben's parents were there and his mom greeted him with a hug. "It's so good to see you Ben but why are you back so soon?" She asked. "Gwen broke her leg over the trip so I thought it best if I sent her home for a while." Grandpa Max replied as walked with one arm near his shoulder holding a bag full of Ben's clothes while his other had a suitcase of Ben's belongings. "Oh poor Gwen, I hope she's alright." Ben's mom said releasing her grip on Ben. "Here dad, let me help you with that." Ben's dad walked over and took the bag filled with Ben's belongings in his hand. His dad looked over at Ben's wrist and spotted the omnitrix. "Cool watch ben." "Uhh yeah I won it at some carnival kinda hard to take off." Ben replied remembering what Grandpa Max had said about keeping the omnitrix a secret. When he first mentioned it Ben thought it made sense after all how would his parents ever believe him unless they saw him change into a monster, a monster that currently was on the news for trashing downtown New York. "Well it looks great on you Ben." His mother said. The pair of Tennysons walked on inside before a familiar voice called out "Hey Ben where've you been." Ben turned to see a familiar face. "Alan hi." Ben went over and fistbumbed his friend. "I've been on the road with my Grandpa." Alan nodded his head "yeah I know, same trip every year but did you go somewhere interesting for once?" he asked. "We did get to go to a really cool hotel but it burned down the second we got there." Ben said. Ben's mom came over and grabbed the bag he was holding. "I'll take this inside Ben, why don't you and Alan go hang out for a while." Ben nodded and said "thanks mom." Sandra gave him a scowl and said. "Thanks Sandra, remember Ben?"

"Oh right sorry mo-Sandra." Ben replied nervously, putting his hand behind his head and smiling. His mother nodded and took his things and left. "Geez you know I used to think you were exaggerating about the whole calling your mom by her name is, weird thing but now I kinda get it." Alan said. "Yeah I know at least Dad doesn't really mind it as much." Ben said. Aland and Ben turned down and began walking down the street. "So what've you been doing this summer?" Ben asked, to which Alan replied. "Nothing much really just staying inside, mostly playing video games or going outside to play football with my little brother." Ben nodded in response to Alan's statement. "Oh hey have you seen the news about all these freaky aliens?" Alan asked with a sudden enthusiasm. "Oh yeah I heard about that." Ben said in a way that he hoped would make Alan change topics. Currently Ben didn't feel like talking about the omnitrix after what he and Gwen had been through plus all his alien transformations seemed to only be met with hostility by the local news particularly by Will Harangue. "Man those things look epic imagine what it must be like being a cool alien. I wonder where they came from." Alan said in awe of Ben's aliens. Hearing Alan talk positively about him did make Ben feel a little better but he still didn't like talking about them partly because it felt weird to be talking about himself as if he was a stranger and because of the trouble he was going through with Gwen. Suddenly a horn blared and Ben and Alan turned to see a car speeding down the road the two of them quickly ran to the side. "Hey, watch it!" Ben yelled at the driver who suddenly stopped the car next to them. The window rolled down to reveal the driver. "Geez calm down Tennyson." "Oh great, it's him." Ben thought in anger. "Cash, do you know the speed limit?" Alan asked him in a sarcastic tone. "Oh calm down Alan, we were just having some fun." Jt replied in the passenger seat. "Wait a second can you guys even drive?" Ben asked, remembering that they were both in the same grade. "Well duh Tennyson I'm in the driver's seat you know…driving." Cash said, flashing a smirk at Ben as if his joke was that funny. "I meant do you have a license?" Ben said becoming increasingly frustrated at cash. "Oh relax Tennyson it's my dad's car we were just driving it down the block no biggie besides there's no cops around here anyways." Cash said casually as if driving without a license was perfectly fine. "That is not how that works cash." Alan said, crossing his arms. "Wow, nice comeback." Cash said in a sarcastic tone. "Cash get lost or I'm calling the police." Ben said angrily, getting face to face with cash. "Ha looks like we got ourselves a hero-hey what's with that watch?" Cash asked, suddenly looking at the omnitrix. "Oh don't tell me you made that after seeing those creepy aliens on T.V." Cash started laughing. "That has nothing to do with this cash." "That has nothing to do with this." Jt said in a high pitched tone. Cash started laughing even harder and then hit the gas speeding away. "Later Tennyson." He said driving off as he spoke. Ben coughed at the fumes released by Cash's car. "I think he's even worse than before." Ben said. "Yeah I heard he's gotten a big head lately." Alan replied. "By the way what is that watch?" Alan asked to which Ben replied. "Oh just something I won at a carnival game." Alan nodded, seeming to lose interest in the watch fast. "Well it does kinda look like the symbol on those aliens." Alan said. "I didn't even realize that." Ben said looking down at the watch as if he was surprised by its design. "Yeah crazy coincidence anyways wanna play some football?" Alan asked. Before Ben could respond his phone buzzed. Ben answered the call and put the phone to his ear. "Hey Ben I think we need to talk can you come back home?" Grandpa Max asked him. "Uhh sure everything ok grandpa?" "Not really but I'll explain when you get here." Grandpa Max hung up. Ben looked up at Alan who had stood there as Be talked. "Sorry Alan I gotta go maybe some other time?" Alan nodded, "Sure Ben no problem." Ben nodded and quickly ran back home. "Hopefully nothing bad has happened."

Hope…

Hope ran through the shadowed forest desperately trying to escape her pursuer. Normally this kind of place, dark, creepy, with only the eerie sounds of nearby animals would frighten her even with her special friends but for once she didn't care. "I have to find something with energy like Mike taught me." Hope thought to herself desperately searching for anything to use. "You can't escape me girl, give up and I won't put you in solitary." The voice belonged to Dr Animo Hope recognized it instantly and it made her run even faster. Unfortunately she tripped on a rock or maybe a tree root she didn't know or care, she quickly scrambled back on to her feet and continued running. She felt a chill wash over her and looked up to see a giant monster above her with Animo on top with a strange horn shaped helmet on his head. "Oh no why did I have to be so stupid?" She knew walking into town with her friends was a bad idea but without them she was powerless and sometimes she would be approached by strange men who scared her. Hope heard a huge thud in front of her. "What was that?" She thought to herself still running in that direction out of fear of Animo catching her if she stopped or tried to change directions. Suddenly a giant green monster jumped down in front of her. The shockwave it made as it landed knocked hope onto her back. She turned away from the monster which she realized was some kinda giant frog and tried to crawl away only for Animo's bird to land in front of her. The bird looked at her with it's huge red eyes and leaned over and screamed in her face. The noise was so loud it caused her to yell in pain as she held her ears together. Eventually the bird quieted as hope lay there holding her hands to her head kneeling on the ground. She looked up and saw Dr Animo standing before her wearing some kind of cylinder on his chest along with the horns at the top of his head. "Looks like it's solitary for you after all, subject 4." He said as he slowly walked towards her. Hope was too scared to move. Animo always made her feel that way as if she was completely naked and he was inspecting her like someone would do with their food. Hope looked away from his eyes too scared to meet them and saw something on his chest. A small spark of electricity. "You can use any kind of energy for your power's hope." Michael had told Hope this when they were escaping together. "I hope this will work." Hope waited for Animo to get closer, his eyes still scaring her. When he had gotten close enough she lunged with her arm and grabbed hold of the cylinder he wore. "What? No, get back you fool!" Animo tore her hand away but it was too late Hope had gotten what she needed. She concentrated her energy and formed her friends from rocks like usual except this time they appeared much larger than they usually did. Instead of the small dog-like creatures she normally made, Hope created two large human-like beasts stood defending her from both slides from Animos monsters. "Destroy them my pets!" Animo roared pointing directly at Hope. The giant bird flapped its wings and hovered upwards and the giant frog opposite to him lashed its tongue out at one of her friends. Hope ducked down defensible, putting her hands on her head. She still hadn't gotten over her fear of battle. One of her rock monsters grabbed the tongue of the grogs and spun it around hitting the bird that hadn't yet started flying. The two monsters collide into one another. Hope's other friend then slammed his fists into the ground sending a shockwave towards the creatures sending them soaring backwards. "No! You will pay for that girl." Animo said. Suddenly two helicopters appeared nearby. "I have to get outta here before Steel shows up too!" As if on command one of her creatures picked her up and placed her on his shoulder and began running away from the scene her other friend followed as well. Hope looked back on the scene feeling a little bit of joy at her victory. It faded immediately when she saw the angry face of Dr. Animo. He looked at her with sheer hatred and Hope immediately looked away crying at all the memories of what he had done to her that began surfacing from his glare.

Gwen…

Gwen had been busy finishing up her pre calc homework which for once was much easier than usual as it was only covering matrices which Gwen was very good at. Her door had swung open revealing her mother and father who stood at the doorway. "Hi guys, is their something you need?" Gwen asked. "We just wanted to check up on you." Her dad said. "I'm fine guys." Gwen said, slightly annoyed. Her parents constantly were checking up on her since she was a kid to "make sure she stayed on task" as they put it. "Good, maybe after your leg heals you can start ballet again too." Her mother said. "Oh by the way, Ben's downstairs and said he needs to talk to you." Her mother said as if it was the least important thing in the world. "Is that why you came up here?" Gwen asked, her parents always hated it when Gwen would leave to go hang out with friends instead of doing her work. "We just wanted to make sure you were ok first." Her father said. "I'm fine he can come up here." Gwen replied, trying to hide her irritation with her parents. "Aren't you working right now?" Gwen's mom asked, noticing Gwen putting her pencil aside. "I can finish it up later." Gwen responded to which her mother said. "It's ok dear Ben can wait, just finish up your work first. Frank, why don't you go down and ask Ben to wait a few more minutes." Gwen gritted her teeth in annoyance but picked up her pencil and finished up her work anyways. She knew better than to argue with her parents when they told her to finish her work. Ben eventually entered her room a few minutes later once Gwen had finished all her work which took her longer than usual with her mother looking over her shoulder constantly inquiring as to whether or not she was doing it properly or if she needed any help. Ben nodded and said hello to his mother who nodded back and left the room. "Man, your parents are really annoying." "yeah I know." Gwen replied briskly not wanting to talk about them or anything to Ben at the moment as the two of them were still on shaky terms with each other. "They made me sit down there for a while and your dad just sat there staring at me as if I did something wrong and-" "Ben is their a reason why you're here." Ben was surprised by her harsh tone but eventually answered. "Grandpa Max saw my aliens on the news and sent me here. He says someone could be watching us." Now Gwen was surprised even though she figured someone would eventually take notice of Ben's aliens for them to be on local news was troubling. "What do you mean someone's watching us?" Gwen asked confused most of all by that part. "Grandpa thinks someone's leaking this stuff to the news somehow." Gwen thought about that for a second. "It would make sense after all Steel tried hard to cover up New York so there's no way the news got this footage on their own but who could have leaked it?" Gwen looked up from her thoughts to see a worried Ben looking at her. "Grandpa also said it might be a good idea to get back on the road." Ben said. "No way Ben.'' Gwen replied firmly. "But Gwen-" "but nothing Ben if you wanna go get yourself into more and more dangerous situations that's fine but I'm tired of tagging along and getting into trouble." Ben opened his mouth as if to respond but closed it and instead looked down in dismay. Gwen felt bad for hurting her cousins feelings but she knew she couldn't continue to tag along Ben's adventures getting herself hurt or worse seeing Ben get hurt due to his actions. "All right then" Ben said and walked out of the room. Gwen thought of calling out to stop him but chose not to instead. "Be careful Ben."

Out…

Ben walked out of Gwen's house feeling dejected. "She hates me so much she won't even come with me for her own safety." The thought made Ben think about the news. "Who is leaking this stuff it can't be Steel and there's no way Kevin or Rojo could have gotten the footage so who did? Is it Mike doing this? No way none of my aliens have the power to get footage like that so neither can he right?" Ben was broken ouit of his thoughts when he heard a car zooming down. "Oh great these guys again." The car came to a stop in front of Ben who stood outside Gwen's house. The window rolled down revealing the round head and face of Cash. "Hey Tennyson leavin your cousin all alone?" Cash smirked as if he had said something funny. "What's it to you?" Ben asked, annoyed at seeing Cash again. Another voice inside the car responded to Ben instead "geez don't tell me your cousin turned you down that's sad even for you." Ben clenched his fists in anger at hearing Jt's voice. "Hah looks like your right Jt poor Ben can't even date his cousin." Cash started laughing hysterically at his own joke. "What's wrong with these guys I mean who would even think about me and Gwen being a couple? Someone should teach these guys a lesson." That last thought made Ben even angrier so much so that he reached for the omnitrix but stopped just short of touching it. "Whoa gotta calm down that's the last thing I want to do right now." "hey Tennyson, you hearing me?" Cash's voice broke Ben out of his thoughts. "He's too busy playing wit his stupid toy." Jt responded. 'Too bad he couldn't play with his cousin." Cash said, breaking out into hysterical laughter yet again. "You two are disgusting!" Ben said his face turning red as he spoke. "Not as much as you are with your cousin Tennyson." Jt responded, causing Cash to laugh even more. "Oh...that's good anyways see ya around freak you know if your not too busy with your cousin or anything." Cash sped away once again leaving Ben coughing at the fumes. "All right that's it!" Ben hit the dial and began turning the faceplate. "I'll just turn into upgrade and mess with them and demerge just before I time out no one will notice." Ben selected the upgrade silhouette and slammed the watch down. He felt the surge of energy burn through him. This time it felt even stronger than it usually did and pumped him with even more adrenaline. His skin shrunk away and his eyes merged together forming a ghastly monster where the teenage boy had been. "Ghostfreak I didn't pick you!" Ben said aloud. "Ahh!" Ben heard a scream and turned to see a girl on her back shaking with fear at the sight of him. "That's Julie!" Ben thought with alarm instantly recognizing the girl from his class. Suddenly he felt a burning anger in him at her. Julie, the girl who always did well in school and was a top Tennis player unlike him. "Why do I care so much about that?" Ben thought before feeling another surge of anger run through him. "I'm gonna make those punks cash and Jt sorry they were even born!" Ghostfreak turned away from Julie and raced down the street turning intangible as he did so to avoid detection. He saw Cash's car speeding down the neighborhood with its windows down. As he got closer he could hear the two of them faintly laughing and speaking to one another. "Did you see how red he got? Priceless guy was so mad" Ghostfreak's anger surged at hearing this and he sped even faster till he was right next to Cash's side. Then he ripped the car door off its hinge and reached his claw out towards cash making himself visible as he did. "Get Out!" Ghostfreaked yelled in his raspy voice pulling on cash's shirt. "Ahhh! What are you!" Cash screamed. Jt's face went pale as he watched in horror as Ben yanked Cash out of the moving car. The car continued forward and crashed into a street light. From the corner of Ghostfreak's eye he saw Jt jump out. "Please...let me go, I won't say anything to anyone...I promise." Cash said weakly. Ghostfreak's saw the fear in his eyes as they began to water and tears streamed down his face. "You won't say anything to anyone every boy!" Ghostfreak lifted his hand up to… what was he doing? "Stop, I can't do this what's happening." Ben thought desperately trying to let cash go. Suddenly the watch began to beep. "NOOOO!" Ghostfreak dropped cash and soared away from the neighborhood into a forest desperately trying to figure out a way to stop the countdown. "I'm not going back this time!" The watch beeped down and Ben felt the energy wash away from him all at once causing him to collapse onto the ground. "Whatever just happened I'm glad it's finally over." Ben said aloud his thoughts feeling more in his control. "So am I Ben." A thick raspy voice replied. Ben looked up to see a creature that resembled Ghostfreak but unlike Ghostfreak his head was upside down and his skin was darker and his fingers had claws on them. But worst of all his chest was bursting with unnatural tentacles that slithered out in all directions. "At last I am free of you!"