Ben looked down at the small jewel resting in his cousin's palm. It had an overall shape to that of a rhombus, its corners rounded, and it had an overall blue coloring to it with its tone darkening toward its center.

"So this thing is a...what you call it again?" Ben asked.

"It's called a jewel seed Ben-kun," Nanoha reminded him as she gripped her staff with her other hand.

"Right, so what exactly are they?"

"Jewel seeds are powerful lost logia that respond to a person's desires," Nanoha explained, "they're basically wish-granting magical batteries."

"Really!? That's awesome!", Ben exclaimed excitedly thinking of all the cool stuff he could wish for, a new bike, an mp3 player, a new game station, the brand new sumo-slammer video game that's coming out next month for said game station, and a lifetime supply of sumo-slammer cereal.

"However Ben they will latch onto the first desires they find, and would oftentimes result with that wish becoming destructive in nature," Fate added.

Ben's excitement immediately died down upon hearing that bit of info.

'Well, that sucks,' Ben thought to himself, disappointedly. Then another question popped into his head.

"Hey, if these things are batteries, how much power do they hold?"

Nanoha put up a finger to her cheek, in thought, for a moment before giving Ben an answer, "We really don't know how much other than a lot, but I would probably say each one has enough to power all of Washington D.C."

Ben blanched, "Seriously, ALL of Washington!?"

"At least."

"AT LEAST!?" Ben exclaimed, his face going pale. He couldn't help but let out a nervous chuckle, "heh, I guess it was a good thing I didn't smash the part with it in it huh?"

Fate, Nanoha, and Arf all cringed at that statement. They all remember what happened the last time a jewel seed released its power, especially Nanoha and Fate as the both of them were caught right at the epicenter of the blast.

Had Ben smashed the part with the Jewel seed in it, it could have caused it to do the same thing. The only difference is the dimensional energy would be unleashed directly upon the city as opposed to just a copy of it. According to Bardiche scans, however, the jewel seed was thankfully within the chest piece of Animo's device, instead of the helmet.

"How many jewel seeds are there?" Ben asked, concern evident in his voice.

"Twenty-one in total, twelve of which are safely secured by the TSAB," Fate explained, "The rest though disappeared along with…"

Fate's face suddenly had a pained look on it, which made Ben worry he might have accidentally brought up a bad memory. Seeing this Nanoha grasped Fate's hand in her own after setting the jewel seed down on the table.

"The last time we saw them they fell into a dimensional tear," Arf finished shooting a concerned glance toward the blond hair girl.

"So this might be one of those missing jewel seeds?" Ben asked, clearly seeing the pained look on Fate's face and hoping he was steering the conversation away from whatever was making the blond girl uncomfortable.

"More than likely," Fate stated, her expression relaxing thanks to Nanoha's gesture.

"So what do we do with this one?"

"We seal it of course," Nanoha stated happily as she raised Raising Heart over her head before lowering it and positioning the staff head over the jewel.

"Sealing," the staff said before the jewel floated into the red orb and a roman number appeared on it, "Jewel Seed sealed."

"Well that's helpful," Ben commented to himself, fascinated by what he just saw.

"Yup," Nanoha replied, hearing the brown-haired boy, "Raising heart was originally used as a sealing device."

"Do all sealing devices allow you to shoot laser beams?" Ben retorted with a smile.

"I can be shot!" Raising heart stated. Ben blinked in a bit of surprise when the staff spoke.

'Huh, I didn't know those things could talk,' Ben thought to himself before briefly glancing down toward the omnitrix, 'I wonder if this thing can talk as well.'

"Nyahahaha, probably."

"Still this means that the other remaining eight are probably still out there," Fate stated with a concerned expression on her face.

"Yeah, but there's really nothing we can do at the moment," Arf said scratching her ear, "we don't really have a means of finding them."

"I guess we'll have to wait until we talk to Lindy-sama before we do anything," Nanoha said before Max entered the Rustbucket.

"So what's the verdict?" Arf asked. Guessing from his expression it wasn't good.

"Not well, somehow the fuel tank was ruptured and much of the engine looks like it's skewered by small knives and strangely enough covered in fur."

'Skewered? Fur?' the three children thought to themselves before going outside to check the damage. Sure enough, there were multiple small holes on the side of the Rustbucket. A few of those holes also had patches of fur clinging to them.

Ben couldn't help but let out a nervous chuckle before looking at the girls, "you don't think that last night with the fight with that mammoth…"

"It's, um...possible?" Nanoha said nervously.

"In any case, I'm going to have someone do repairs on it," Max stated as he stood in the door, a frown on his face. This wasn't good, the longer they stay in one spot the higher the risk more of those drones would attack them, however, they weren't going to be getting very far if they left the Rustbucket damage as it is, "In the meantime, we'll have to stay in a hotel while it's being worked on."


When Max said he was renting out a hotel for them to stay at, none of them were expecting they would be staying at a luxury hotel for the night.

"Hey Max how the heck did you manage to afford a stay here," Arf, who was now back in her puppy form and was being carried in Fate's arms, asked her voice just loud enough so that only Max could hear her.

"It was actually prepared by an old friend of mine. If all goes well you'll meet him soon," he said as he, Fate, and Nanoha made their way toward the elevator. The brunette, noticing that Ben wasn't with them, looked around for him and saw the boy in question twisting the dial on the Omnitrix, with a smile that made her concerned.

"Ben-kun what are you doing?" Nanoha asked quickly making her way toward the now surprised brown-haired boy.

"Um, nothing," Ben lied, hiding the Omnitrix behind his back.

"Ben-kun I saw you messing with the Omnitrix," Nanoha said with a stern look on her face.

"Hey, I just want to play the new sumo-slammer video game," Ben said with a groan as he pointed to a room that seems to advertise a brand new Sumo-Slammer game, the entrance was being guarded by a grumpy looking bouncer, "but Mr. grumpy pants said that it's VIPs only."

"Ben-kun it was because you used your powers to sneak into places you're not supposed to that you got Fate-chan in trouble yesterday," Nanoha stated with a frown on her face.

"Yeah well I'm not going to get caught," Ben countered with confidence as he was about to slam down on the watch. However, Nanoha grabbed the wrist of his raised hand before he got a chance to.

"Ben-kun," Nanoha growled with a pout. To anyone else, they would have found her expression to be absolutely adorable but to Ben a familiar stinging sensation in his ear returned, accompanied by a chill going down his spine.

"O-okay, okay you got a point," Ben said with a nervous smile, raising his free arm in surrender, "I mean the game does go out to the public in about a month so I can wait."

"Right," Nanoha exclaims with a bright smile as she releases his wrist, before turning on her heels and making her way back to Max, Fate, and Arf, "Come on Ben-kun, the others are waiting for us!"

"R-right," Ben said before his arms dropped to his sides and he stood in a slouch.

'That girl is surprisingly scary,' Ben thought to himself as he followed the brunette into the elevator.


You know, the more Ben thought about it, the more stupid his idea to sneak into the game room became. If he had gotten caught the hotel would have probably kicked them out, and they would have had to stay at a motel instead of this luxury room and miss out on this awesome view of the city from the balcony...as well as some of the wrecked buildings thanks to Animo.

"Hey Nanoha," Ben called out to the girl in question as she and Fate looked out over the city.

"Yes, Ben-kun?"

"How did you and Fate get into this whole mage business?"

"Well for me it kind of started out when I met Yunno who needed help with sealing the jewel seeds," Nanoha explained with a smile, before pulling out Raising heart's orb from her within her shirt, "that was when I got Raising Heart!"

"Whose Yunno?"

"He's a close friend of ours, and was the one who taught me how to use magic."

Ben gave a nod before looking toward Fate, "How about you Fate?"

"I've known about magic my whole life, and I've been trained how to use magic ever since I was little," the blond girl explained.

"So who taught you, your parents or something?" Ben asked. He'd immediately regretted asking that as he saw the pained look from before returning to Fate's face.

"Ah, s-sorry I didn't mean to-" Ben tried to apologize, but Fate simply nodded her head as Nanoha gave her a reassuring hug.

"It's alright Ben," Fate reassured with a small smile, which didn't stop the guilty feeling the boy felt at the moment.

"Um, you know I think I saw an arcade not too far from here," Nanoha brought up hoping that this would help brighten up the mood, "how about we go over there and play some games?'

Both children were glad to have a distraction from their current conversation.

"Um, yeah sure,"'

"That sounds nice,"

"Great!" Nanoha exclaimed with a smile as she brought up a fist, "Then let's go!"

"Hey grandpa, we're heading out," Ben called out to his grandfather, who was currently sitting in the living room watching the news, "You alright with that?"

Normally he would have been opposed to this, however between the three of them having powers as well as Nanoha and Fate's maturity (why else would their parents trust them enough to travel halfway around the world by themselves) he saw no issue with it.

"Sure it's alright," he said with a smile, "just be careful and don't go too far."

"Don't worry we'll be carefull," Nanoha reassured with a smile.

"Do you want to come with us Arf," Fate asked the orange puppy.

"Na, you kids go on without me," Arf said with a stretch before transforming into her human form, "I kind of plan on just relaxing here for the day."

With that, the kids left for the arcade.


When the kids got to the arcade, Nanoha seemed very eager to play a fighting mech game called Gundam: battle assault 3 so that's the one they decided to play. The three of them took turns playing each round with the loser of the match switching out.

"CHECKMATE!"

"I win!"

"DANG IT!"

Which always ended up with Nanoha winning practically every single match against either Fate or Ben. The latter wondered if she just picked this game solely for the excuse to clobber them as he moved back and allowed an unconfident but determined Fate access toward the arcade controls.

Ben had to be honest, he didn't think Nanoha would be interested in this kind of game, never mind being this good at them.

"So hey, surprise question," Ben asked out of curiosity and maybe hoping the question would distract the girl a bit, "but what do you like to do?'

Nanoha tilted her head to the side, "I do like to hang out with my friends, especially Fate-chan,"

Her comment made the blond girl blush a bit. that blush died down as Nanoha's strike Gundam dodged Fate's weapon and slashed at the blond's Deathscythe Gundam.

"I do like to play fighting games as well," the brunet continued as she fired her vulkans forcing Fate back before she was hit by Nanoha's beam.

'I can see why,' Ben thought with a deadpan.

"I also used to watch Gundam," Nanoha said before she pouted, "but I'm not allowed to watch it anymore."

'Oh so that's why she looked excited to play this game,' Ben thought.

"What about you Ben-kun, what do you like to do?"

"Me? well I like pretty much anything that involves Sumo-slammers, whether it's video games, trading cards, and so on," Ben replied as he placed his hands behind his head, "I also like playing baseball."

"Oh yeah, you said something about playing in the little league."

"Yeah I'm kind of on the baseball team in my school," Ben said with a proud smirk on his face.

"That's cool, Fate-chan is also pretty athletic herself," Nanoha said as she ducked below a laser fired at point-blank by Fate before retaliating with an upward slash of her beam saber, "a lot of the boys from our school often invite her to play sports with them."

As Nanoha jumped over Fate's scythe and landed behind her as she kicked back, causing fate's mech to stagger. Before Fate had a chance to recover, Nanoha finished her off with a large beam attack.

"CHECKMATE," the machine announced, declaring Nanoha the winner...again. The blond-haired girl could only slump in defeat. Her best friend was very strong when it came to fighting games.

"Nice moves kid," a voice said from behind them. The three of them looked behind them and saw a boy around their age. the kid was scrawny with shoulder-length black hair, pale skin, and dark brown eyes with black rings under them, almost as if he hasn't been getting enough sleep. He wore a black t-shirt that had the sleeves torn off, black studded armbands, brown cargo shorts, black knee-high boots, and a padlock necklace. "Think I could go a round against you?"

"Um sure," Nanoha said with a smile. Fate moved out of the way so that the boy could have access to the controls. he reached into his pocket, digging for a token. He looked a bit disappointed, before simply shrugging his shoulders and slapping the coin slot. Nanoha could have sworn she saw sparks of electricity emit from the boy's hands for a brief moment. Suddenly a flood of coins came out of the return slot, surprising the group.

"Woah," exclaimed Ben as he bent down to pick up some of the tokens, "How did you do that?"

"Eh," the boy shrugged as he picked up a few of the coins before putting one into the machine, "When you hang around here long enough, you learn a few tricks."

"Is this okay?" asked Fate somewhat uncertain, receiving a shrug from Nanoha who was also feeling uncertain.

"Hey, no one is getting hurt so it really shouldn't be a problem," Ben said as reassurance but the girls weren't too convinced, though they didn't say anything, "good luck dude, she fights like a devil."

This only made the boy smirk, "a devil huh, then this might be fun."

The pair selected their mechs, while Nanoha once again went with the Strike Gundam, and the boy selected a Sazabi. With that, the match started.

Nanoha started off by firing off her beam rifle, to which the boy dodged by jumping over it and countering with a downward slash of his beam saber. Nanoha was able to dodge it by jumping backward, as well as firing her vulcans, forcing the boy to dash backward.

Once Nanoha landed she fired her beam rifle again, to which the boy blocked with his shield before dashing towards Nanoha's mech and slashing at its chest with his beam saber.

Ben and Fate couldn't help but watch in awe as they watched the two fighters carefully dodge the other's attacks to the best of their abilities, while at the same time delivering their own attacks. For the most part, it seemed like they were evenly matched in overall skill, however, unlike Nanoha, the boy seemed to know about ins and outs of the game's mechanics as he unleashed devastating combos on the girl's mech.

Nanoha fired an energy beam from her rifle which the boy ducked under before unleashing his super move and fired off a barrage of energy bolts from his chest toward the girl's mech. Nanoha was unable to dodge the attack and could only watch as her strike Gundam was destroyed.

"CHECKMATE!"

"Woah that was awesome," Ben beamed with Fate nodding her head in agreement.

"I didn't think anyone was able to keep up with her, much less defeat her," she added with a smile.

"Yeah, you're really good," Nanoha exclaimed, "how were you able to do all of that?"

"I had lots and lots of practice," the boy said with a smirk, "You're not too bad yourself squirt."

"Hehehe thanks," Nanoha said with a smile, "by the way my name is Nanoha, this is my best friend Fate-chan-"

"Hello," the blond hair girl greeted with a wave of her hand.

"-and this is my cousin Ben-kun."

"Sup," Ben greeted with a smirk, "also it's really just Ben, not Ben-kun."

"So what's your name," the brunette finally asked with a smile.

"Name's Kevin," he said, "haven't seen you three around here before. you guys tourists?"

"Yeah. summer road trip," Ben explained, "we only been on the road for a few days and only staying at a hotel due to engine trouble."

"Bummer," Kevin cringed in sympathy, "so where are you guys from anyway?"

"Ben is from Bellwood, not too far from here," Fate explained before gesturing toward herself and Nanoha, "both Nanoha and I are from Japan."

"Wow you girls sure came a long way," Kevin said surprised before crossing his arms over his chest, "though I got to say I'm impressed that the both of you can speak English so well."

Ben didn't really think about that, to be honest.

"Nyahahaha," Nanoha let out a nervous laugh as she quickly thought up an excuse, "W-we do have a friend who was able to teach us how to speak English."

"Well that's cool," the taller dark-hair boy said with a smirk, "say you guys want a tour around the city, I know a few cool places around here?"

The trio looked at each other for a moment before Ben spoke up, "yeah sure."

"I don't see anything wrong with that," Fate said.

"Me neither," Nanoha said.

"Awesome," Kevin said with a smirk.


Kevin turned out to be a decent guy, barring the occasional creepiness. He'd seemed to know the place pretty well and showed the group a few popular areas.

Kevin even tried to show them the Washington memorial but it was apparently closed off due to damages. Some people believed that Animo's monster rampaged through the area, while others believed that a bomb went off. At that, both Ben and Fate looked at Nanoha, and she couldn't help but let out a nervous laugh of embarrassment at that moment.

She may have overdone it a little bit.

But in her defense, that mutated parrot reminded her of the monsters she fought during the jewel seed incident and those didn't go down with anything less than a divine buster.

Of course, Yunno was also there to set up a barrier so she wouldn't accidentally destroy the surrounding areas.

"There used to be a Mega Mart around here, but it got smashed last night," Kevin explained, a bit grumpy.

"Really?" Nanoha asked, a bit surprised.

"Yeah, though the crazy thing is that it was smashed by what looked like a flaming dinosaur!"

"I-Is that so?" Fate asked a bit nervously.

"I'm serious," Kevin stated, "I saw it with my own eyes."

"Trust me, we believe you," Ben said with a bit of an exasperated tone, "In fact earlier that day we kind of ran into a crazy doctor turning animals into freaky monsters."

"Really?"

"Yeah, in fact, Fate here also beaten a hamster the size of a lion," Ben explained with a smirk, nudging the blond-haired girl's arm, "If it wasn't for her I'd be hamster chow."

"Wait you're that girl who saved the store," Kevin asked surprised, "you know before it got destroyed."

Fate merely nodded her head a bit bashfully.

"Cool," Kevin said with a smirk, "Come on, I'll show you guys where I live."

"Sure, sounds cool," Ben said before looking at the two girls, "what about you girls?"

"Sure," Nanoha said with a bright smile, with Fate giving a nod, and with that, they continued following the boy.

Eventually, he led them down to the metro. At first, Nanoha thought they were going to be taking a train, but that assumption was proven wrong when she noticed that the station looked run-down and abandoned.

She was about to ask if they went the wrong way only to see Kevin jump down onto the tracks followed by Ben. The girl couldn't help but feel concerned. She looked towards Fate and could tell by the blond haired girl's expression that she was feeling the same way. Nanoha opened up a mental communication with Fate so that Kevin wouldn't hear their conversation.

'This is weird Fate-chan,' Nanoha telepathically said as she and Fate jumped down onto the track and followed after Kevin as he led them deeper into the dark tunnel.

'I agree,' Fate nodded as she looked at Kevin who pulled out a flashlight from his pocket and turned it on, lighting up the tunnel, 'he said that he was taking us to his home, but this couldn't really lead to where he lives, right?'

Nanoha didn't say anything back as she continued to stare at Kevin.

"Watch your step," the black-haired boy said over his shoulder, "some of the planks here are loose and you can trip over them if you're not careful."

"Um, Kevin-kun," Nanoha called out but was interrupted by the boy.

"Just call me Kevin. It sounds weird when you call me that."

"Uh, okay," Nanoha said before asking, "Are you sure that walking down here is safe?"

"Yeah I kind of agree with my cousin," Ben said, voicing similar concerns, "What if a train comes through here while we're still on the tracks?"

Ben was certain that he could outrun a train while carrying Kevin to safety using XLR8. Even if he gets the wrong alien he was certain that Nanoha and Fate could easily get both him and Kevin out of harm's way. But as far as he could tell Kevin was just a normal kid and didn't have any special abilities to help him get out of danger.

"Don't worry about that," Kevin said reassuringly as he waved his hand, "these tracks have been closed down and haven't been used in a long time. The only ones that goes through here is me and the ra-"

"EEEK!" Fate suddenly let out a shriek, and Kevin immediately pointed his flashlight in her direction momentarily blinding her.

"Fate-chan are you alright?" Nanoha asked with concern.

"I just felt something crawl over my foot."

"Was it large and furry?" Kevin asked which Fate gave a nod.

Everyone heard a squeak and Kevin pointed his flashlight in the direction the sound came from, showing a rat sniffing the ground.

"As I was saying before the only thing that goes through here is me and the rats," Kevin said with a smirk before letting out a chuckle.

Fate was glad that the light wasn't on her as she could feel her cheeks heat up in embarrassment.

"Come on it's just a little further," the black-haired boy said as he continued down the tunnel with the rest of the group following after him. After a short walk, the group eventually came across a door on the side of the tunnels. "Well here we are," Kevin said as he opened the door for the three to walk through.

The group walked the hallway and found themselves in a large well-lit room. There were three TVs stacked up into a pyramid on top of two wooden crates. Hooked up to the set of TVs was a PlayStation 3 which was resting on the floor, surrounded by multiple game cases. Behind the TVs was a red arcade machine that was titled "Xingo" at the top. Hanging from the ceiling to the left of the entrance, and past both what looks like a small green gift shop and blue snack dispenser machine was a large poster displaying a sumo wrestler with the word "SUMO" printed above him.

Peering through the gift shop's door, Fate could see a makeshift bed lying on the floor of the shop.

"Is this where you live?" Fate asked with a concerned expression.

"Yeah by myself," He said as Ben and Nanoha looked around the room, both of their facial expression had a mixture of awe and concern. While Ben thought that this place seemed like an awesome place to hang out, he wouldn't want to live here. Judging from Nanoha's expression she felt the same way as well.

"What about your family?" Ben asked, looking toward the black-haired boy.

A frown appeared on Kevin's face as he looked downwards.

'Crude baskets, what is wrong with me today!?' Ben mentally screamed in his head.

"Long gone" Kevin answered grumpily as he crossed his arms, "They weren't too thrilled having a freak for a son."

"You're not a freak Kevin-ku- I mean Kevin," Nanoha argued.

Kevin looked at the girl and Nanoha was able to tell he was about to say something but stopped for some reason. Just by looking into his eyes, Nanoha can tell that the boy was feeling frustrated, confused, and a bit fearful. Why, she didn't know but she hoped he would explain it.

"Ah forget about it," Kevin said with a dismissive wave of his hand, much to the girl's disappointment. But before she had a chance to ask him what was wrong, a smirk appeared on his face as he looked towards Fate, "Ok, I got to know."

"Know what?" Fate asked with a tilt of her head.

"How did you save the store?" he asked a bit eagerly.

Fate was taken aback by this, not really expecting to be asked that, and was a bit embarrassed being put on the spot like that. It was then Ben came up next to Fate and placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Well as I said before this giant hamster was about to bite my head off when Fate just ran up and wacked it upside the head with a golf club," the green-eyed boy explained with a smile, "after that Fate ran off with the Hamster hot on her tail."

"We were going to go try to help Fate-chan but a giant bird grabbed me," Nanoha explained.

With that, the group gave a rough summary of what happened within the Mega mart with Fate finishing the explanation by describing how Animo declared how he was going to turn Washington D.C into Washington B.C. before escaping on his bird.

Kevin let out a whistle as he wrapped an arm around the blond girl's neck and proceeded to give her a noogie.

"You're pretty hardcore," he said as he let her go, "to be honest I didn't think you be so tough."

"Tell me about it," Ben admitted with a chuckle, "I kept getting surprised by these two for the past few days."

"Nyahaha," Nanoha couldn't help but chuckle a little at Ben's remark, before looking at the black-haired boy in concern, "Hey Kevin are you all right?"

"What do you mean?" Kevin asked, a bit confused.

"Well um," Nanoha shifted uncomfortably a bit, thinking of how to ask him before finally she opened her mouth, "Why would your family think you're a freak?

A frown appeared on the boy's face again for a moment.

"Simple, I wasn't the perfect normal boy they wanted," he said with a shrug, "my bastard of a stepfather actually ran me out of the house."

Fate couldn't help but press her lips together into a thin line. She could understand his frustration all too well.

"That's messed up," Ben replied with a frown.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to-" Nanoha tried to apologize, but Kevin interrupted her with a wave of his hand.

"It's fine, besides it means that I don't have to answer to nobody. I can do whatever I want whenever I want. Cool huh?"

"But you're still by yourself," she replied quietly, her face tinged with sadness as she remembered the times she spent at home alone.

Kevin shifted uncomfortably a bit before looking at the game console.

"Hey I got some cool games we can play," Kevin said with a smirk, hoping to shift the tone somewhere else, "you guys can choose which game if you want."

"Yeah sure," Ben said before either of the girls was able to say anything. Ben walked over to the console and looked at the collection of games the black-haired boy had. Kevin seemed to have a wide selection of titles, from shooters, to racing games, to fighting, and so on, however, there was one title that caught the boy's eyes.

"No way!" Ben exclaimed with excitement as he picked up the game case, "Is this the new sumo-slammer game?"

"Yup," Kevin stated proudly.

"I thought that wasn't going to come out until next month," Nanoha said with confusion, remembering what Ben told her earlier today.

"I happened to stumble across a copy," Kevin said simply with a shrug of his shoulders.

The three kids silently decided to just leave it at that, as Ben started up the game.


Arf entered the hotel room they were staying at, feeling refreshed. The woman had spent the day pretty much relaxing at the hotel's spa. She mostly wanted to just stretch her legs out in her human form.

She has gotten a few odd looks between here and the spa, but that wasn't surprising. Even though she had her ears and tail hidden, she had to wear one of Max's Hawaiian flower shirts over her barrier jacket. The shirt was far too large for her thin frame, and she had to tie the bottom end of the shirt around her waist.

She didn't bring clothes for herself, there was really no point at the beginning. She was originally just going to stay in her puppy form for the duration of the trip, mainly so she wouldn't take up so much space. There was barley enough space in the RV for one adult and three kids. And due to needing to keep magic overall a secret, she could not just switch between human and dog forms as she pleased. However thanks to the Omnitrix latching onto Ben's wrist and revealing magic to both him and his grandpa, that didn't really matter anymore.

Even then Arf couldn't just teleport back to Uminari. Lindy was concerned that whoever sent those robots to attack the kids would be able to detect the Dimensional Transfer and send more after them. So until the current issue was resolved, Arf would have to make due, much to her annoyance.

Arf looked towards Max and saw him sitting on the reclining chair, watching the news.

"Hey Max," she greeted, gaining the elderly man's attention.

"Oh hey Arf," he said with a smile, "have a good time?"

"Yup, she answered with a smile, before noticing that she didn't see any of the kids, "By the way has Fate, Nanoha, and Ben come back yet?"

"No, not yet," Max answered with a bit of concern, "and the sun is about to set pretty soon."

"I wouldn't worry about that too much," Arf reassured with a wave of her hand, "If anything happens they would have contacted us, either by cell phones or telepathy."

"That's true," Max said with a shrug, his demeanor overall calm, but arf can tell he was worried as he continued watching the news with a concerned frown on his face. Arf looked toward the screen and saw that the news was reporting the aftermath of the incident with Animo.

"Are you worried about Animo?" she asked with a bit of confusion, "I don't think you have to worry about him. His device was smashed to pieces, he's locked up in jail, and even if he did escape he didn't have the jewel seed anymore. Without that, Animo's creations are easy enough to deal with."

"No, it's not Animo I'm worried about," Max said with a shake of his head, "I'm just on the lookout for more of those robots."

"Okay, I can see where you're coming from," Arf said as she gave a nod of agreement, "but again, I don't think you need to worry so much. If more of those things do show up, Fate, Nanoha, and Ben could easily smash them to pieces."

'It's not the robots that I'm concerned about, it's the one who's sending them,' Max grimly thought to himself, 'if it's truly him then-'

Max shook the thought from his head.

It couldn't be him, Max saw him destroyed along with his own personal ship, the retired plumber personally saw it to that. And even if Vilgax had somehow survived that explosion, he wouldn't rely solely on just his robots to retrieve something like the Omnitrix. He only used them to perform menial tasks. if the warlord wanted something he would personally come to retrieve it.

"I know that, but it's better to be alert than caught off guard," Max said seriously.

"I guess I can't argue with that," Arf said with a shrug of her shoulders.

Max was a strange man in Arf's opinion. Sure, overall he was no different than pretty much everyone else, however, Arf did notice things about Max that seemed weird. Not really concerning, but still weird.

The first thing was his strange taste regarding food. The first night Max served the kids mealworms.

Actual worms.

To say Arf was grossed out would have been an understatement. She hoped that Max wouldn't serve those kinds of meals often, for the kids' sake. However, Ben explained that his grandpa loved to serve these "exotic" kinds of food pretty much every day, much to the girls' despair.

Though while Max's taste in food was strange (and gross), what Arf thought was really weird was how Max was behaving through this whole situation. Other than the initial reactions during the forest fire, Max hardly reacted to Nanoha and Fate being mages, her transformation, or even the robots. He didn't even ask any questions in regards to the TSAB.

Although Nanoha's family was generally calm when they learned that their youngest member could wield magic strong enough to level a city, even they showed more surprise than Max. Even if only a little bit.

The way he carried himself during his conversation with Lindy was another thing she noticed. He acted with professionalism and discipline similar to what she saw TSAB agents do. It was honestly behavior you don't expect to see in your run-of-a-mill plumber.

Not only that but…

"By the way Max, why do you have a Police radio hooked up to your RV?" Arf asked a bit curiously. It was thanks to that radio that they learned about that robbery, but Arf wondered why he had something like that in the first place.

Max tensed at that question, he looked at her for a moment before pondering on what to say.

"Well I, um, used it a lot in my old job," he said uncertainly.

"You were a cop?" Arf asked, raising an eyebrow at his hesitation.

"Y-yeah, you could say that."

"And you kept it even after you retired?"

"W-well I do use it to contact my old buddies every now and then," Max replied with a bit of a nervous chuckle.

"Alright, if you say so," Arf said with a frown, her curiosity turning into suspicion.

Max noticed this and thought up a good way to shift the discussion in another direction.

Clearly his throat, Max stood up from the chair and made his way to his room.

"Well, I'm going to mix up some dinner for when the kids come back."

"How? The suite doesn't come with a kitchen," Arf asked in confusion.

"Oh, I pack some ingredients in some of the bags, that way I can make some special meals," the elderly man said from within the room, "huh, strange, I could have sworn I pack those mealworms."

Arf's eyes widened in horror as her face immediately turned green, "Um, don't you think we could just order room service Max!?"

"No, it's fine."

"You know not every day needs to have an adventure," Arf cried out, practically begging, ", especially for taste buds!"


The sun had already set when Max called them, telling them that they needed to come back to the hotel. Kevin was generous enough to lead them back out of the abandoned subway station.

"It's really late," Nanoha commented as she looked up into the sky.

"Yeah I should probably get a clock," Kevin stated with a shrug, "though I never felt the need for one, I always come and go whenever I please."

"Well It's been fun man," Ben said with a wave.

"Same here," Kevin replied with his own, "maybe we can hang out later sometime."

"Maybe, but we'll be leaving the city as soon as the RV is done being repaired," Fate explained before gaining a concerned expression on her face, "Are you going to be okay Kevin?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Well, would you like to stay with us for the time being," Fate asked, much to the black-haired boy's surprise. Seeing this she continued, "It would be a lot better than having to sleep down there by yourself."

"I agree with Fate-chan."

"Seconded here," Ben added with a smile, "I'm sure my grandpa wouldn't mind if you stayed with us for the night."

A moment passed before Kevin was able to get over his surprise.

"Uh, no thanks, I'm good," he said scratching the back of his head,

"Are you sure?" Nanoha asked.

"Yeah I'm sure," Kevin said as he turned and headed back down into the metro, "I'm more of a loner kind of guy, to be honest."

"Well okay then," Ben said before giving a wave, "See you later dude."

"Goodnight."

"Bye Kevin-kun."

"I said not to call me that," Kevin said with a mixture of both annoyance and amusement, to which the brunette apologized in embarrassment. The boy let out a chuckle as he waved his hand, "Welp, see ya."

With that Kevin and the group of three went their separate ways. Kevin stopped at the bottom of the stairs and looked up toward the entrance of the subway.

He thought about their offer and how sincere they seemed, especially that Nanoha girl. He wasn't really used to such kindness, to be honest.

'That's because they don't know what a freak you are.'

The boy let out a sigh as he made his way back to his home within the metro tunnels.


It didn't take the group long to make it back to the hotel. After apologizing to Max for staying out so late, everybody got ready for bed.

The hotel apartment that Max purchased had two separate rooms, so while he and Ben shared one room, Nanoha, Fate, and Arf would share a separate room.

On the bed, Fate was awake and stared up at the ceiling, her thoughts going back to the boy they met today.

"Can't sleep Fate-chan?" Nanoha asked as she lay on the other bed next to Fate's.

"Is something wrong Fate," Arf, back in her puppy form, asked as she lay next to the blond girl.

"I can't stop thinking about Kevin."

At this, Arf perked her head up in surprise.

"Wow Fate, I didn't think you start being interested in boys so soon," Arf teased with a smile, confusing the blonde girl.

"What do you-" Fate's eyes widened, realizing what the puppy was implying. She immediately sat up with her cheeks heating up.

"I-it's not like that at all Arf!" she said, waving her hand frantically in embarrassment, much to her familiar's amusement. It took a moment for Fate to regain her composure.

"It's just that I feel bad for him," Fate said sadly.

"Yeah me too," Nanoha agreed as she sat up on her bed.

"Is there something wrong with him," Arf asked with concern.

"He's a boy about our age, and he's living in the metro tunnels by himself," Nanoha explained. This shocked the puppy.

"What about his parents?"

"According to Kevin his stepfather ran him out," Fate explained with a pained expression before quietly adding, "Because he wasn't perfect."

Arf was shocked to hear this.

"I wonder if there's some way we can help him," Nanoha said with a thoughtful look, "he had this look in his eye like he was very frustrated as well as confused."

"In a way, I know how he feels," Fate admitted sadly, causing both Nanoha and Arf to look at the blond-haired girl curiously, "Not being accepted by your family I mean. How much it hurts as well as how frustrating it can be."

"Fate-chan," Nanoha muttered sadly, as she got off the bed.

"I probably would have ended up in a situation similar to his If it wasn't for Lindy taking me in after mother…" Fate stopped.

"Fate-chan?" Nanoha asked in concern.

"Don't worry, I'm alright," Fate reassured with a smile, "It's just painful remembering what happened."

She felt a pair of arms wrapped around her and felt a bit of weight applied to her legs as something nuzzled against her chest. Looking, the blonde hair girl found that her best friend was now on her bed hugging her and that Arf was nuzzling against her.

"It's alright Fate-chan," the brunette said softly, her voice causing Fate to smile.

"Thanks, Nanoha, Arf," Fate said as she grabbed Nanoha's arm and leaned into the hug.

The group stayed like that for about a minute before separating.

"And don't worry so much about Kevin-kun, I'm sure we can think of some way to help him," Nanoha said reassuringly, as she gave her friend a bright smile, "Maybe we can convince grunkle Max to take him with us."

"But wouldn't that eventually end up with him finding out about both the Omnitrix and magic?" Arf asked incredulously.

"Also, I'm pretty sure Ben's grandpa would be against the idea, after all, we would be putting Kevin in potential danger if we took him with us," Fate explained, "and that's assuming Kevin would want to come with us, he doesn't seem like the kind who would readily accept help from others."

Nanoha's smile fell when she heard that.

"I know that, but no one should be alone, especially the way Kevin is living," Nanoha said glumly before a determined smile appeared on her face, "We'll just do everything we can to keep him safe if danger does pop up!"

"And I'm sure I can convince both grunkle Max and Kevin-kun to agree," Nanoha continued with a bit of confidence as she placed her fists on her hips.

"You're not blasting them to next week are you?" Arf asked with a skeptical tone as she smirked.

Nanoha was taken aback by the orange puppy statement and couldn't help but blink in shock and confusion.

"Wh-what!? No!" the young girl protested with a flabbergasted expression, "Why would I do that!?"

"Well you do have a habit of blowing people up in order to get them to listen to you," Arf said with a teasing smile.

"That's not true!" Nanoha exclaimed waving her fists over her head.

"Nanoha, you blasted me with the magical equivalent of a nuke before I was convinced to fight alongside you, then there was the case with Vita where you also blew her up with your spells, and Suzuka told me how you, her, and Arisa became friends," Fate clarified with a small smile, her voice having a tinge of teasing in it.

"Mou, you too Fate," Nanoha whined with a pout, causing both the young girl and wolf familiar to giggle a bit.

"Face it, you always had to resort to some level of violence in order for people to listen to you," the familiar explained, "Especially when you trying to become friends with them."

"Again that's not true!" Nanoha exclaimed again, "I didn't have to blow Ben up, and he listened to me when I told him not to use the Omnitrix when Grunkle Max was checking us in to the hotel."

"Yeah, but he looked like he was scared of you," Arf countered as she recalled before putting a paw on her chin, "and yesterday you pulled his ear pretty hard. Sure that's not really much, but it's still something."

"Mou."

Fate couldn't help but giggle at her best friend's expense, but at the same time what Nanoha said eased her worries about Kevin.

"You're right Nanoha, I'm sure we can help Kevin," Fate said with a small smile.

"Nyahahahaha, yep, all we need to do is convince Max," Nanoha said with a bright smile that made the blonde girl blush a bit.

"Hey if you girls don't keep it down, I'm going to spray each of you with water using overflow!" Ben shouted from the next room over, followed by the muffled voice of Max apparently trying to calm the boy down.

"I don't think he's joking," Arf said wide-eyed.

"We should go to sleep," Fate said quietly, not wanting to see if the wielder of the Omnitrix will follow through with his threat.

"Sorry, Ben-kun!" Nanoha apologized as she quickly returned to her own bed.


The next morning both Nanoha and Fate explained to Max about Kevin and his situation. When they suggested bringing Kevin along with them, Ben immediately agreed with the idea. The thought of getting to hang out with the black-haired boy more filled him with excitement. However, much like how Fate predicted, Max was against the idea of bringing the boy along with them, saying that it would put Kevin in needless danger.

Although the three children tried to persuade Max to allow Kevin to join them, the retired plumber didn't budge from his decision much to the mages' and Omnitrix wielder's disappointment. Nevertheless, Max did not want Kevin to remain living in his current conditions and told the kids that he would inform the police and ask them to help Kevin.

It wasn't what the kids had hoped for, but at least Kevin could get a better place to live in than what he had now.

Sometime later the group of kids decided to head back to the arcade again after breakfast, and thanks to Kevin, the group had more than enough tokens for the day. Nanoha wanted to play another fighting game but Ben was quick to object.

"NO WAY!"

"But why?" Nanoha pouted.

"You are way too good at fighting games," Ben argued, "the only reason why you even lost yesterday was thanks to Kevin."

"I have to side with Ben on this Nanoha,"

"Eh, you too Fate-chan."

It went on like this for a bit before Nanoha reluctantly conceded. They all agreed to try out a game titled Resident Evil 4. From what they can tell it was basically about surviving hordes of zombies and a number of grotesque horrors using the pistols that connected to the machine. The machine also had four pistols so all three of them were able to play together.

The three of them competed against each other, trying to get the highest score as they mowed down numerous monsters and continued forward through the levels.

If Fate was to be honest, she found the monsters to be very disturbing, but still found the game to be enjoyable. She noticed both Nanoha and Ben were very competitive with each other, neither one wanted to be outdone by the other.

At some point, Fate had to go and used the restroom, and was now making her way back to Nanoha and Ben.

As she walked she looked around the arcade, hoping to spot Kevin. Unfortunately, the black-hair boy was nowhere in sight, which left Fate a little disappointed. She was kind of hoping to hang out with him some more. She was sure Ben and Nanoha would have liked to as well, especially the former.

She spotted both Ben and Nanoha, both of whom were playing on two separate arcade machines. She began making her way toward them when she accidentally bumped into someone.

"Sorr-" Fate tried to apologize but was quickly interrupted by the person she bumped into.

"Watch where you're going brat," the other person exclaimed harshly.

The person that Fate bumped into seemed to only be a few years older than her but was bald for some reason. He wore a brown shirt with its sleeves torn off and wore a red and white vest over it, wore navy sagging jeans and brown shoes, and on his forehead he wore a pair of goggles. The most noticeable thing fate noticed was that he had a small ring piercing his lips.

"Hold up," the teenager said before leaning down toward the blond. Fate took a step back as he got a little too close to her face. She couldn't help but grimace as a foul odor from his mouth assaulted her nose, "What the hell is wrong with your eyes."

"What?" Fate asked perplexed, her eyes blinking in confusion, "There's nothing wrong with my eyes."

"Bullshit," he said aggressively as he straightened himself, his harsh tone taking Fate by surprise, "Your eyes are fuking red. What are you, some sort of freak?"

"W-what," Fate was taken aback, her eyes widening at his words. She could feel the venom from his voice when he called her a freak, "I'm not a frea-"

"Of course you are, how else can you have red eyes, freak," he barked as he shoved the younger girl back. Fate managed to quickly regain her balance and prevented herself from falling onto her rear. The area where the boy shoved her hurt just a bit, but it was hardly noticeable due to how shocked Fate was by the boy's words and actions.

"Hey!"

A voice called out, gaining both Fate and the older boy's attention. Looking, Fate saw both Nanoha and Ben walking toward them. Neither one of them looked happy as the both of them glared at the teenager.

"You leave Fate-chan alone!" Nanoha demanded her hands clenched into fists.

"Fate-chan?" the teenager asked incredulously before he began laughing, "who the hell names their stupid f#$ing brat 'Fate-chan?' that's so stupid! Hahahahahahaha!"

Nanoha wasn't amused in the slightest, if anything she was getting even more irritated by the boy's rudeness.

"Anyway, why the hell do you care?" the teenager asked after he was done laughing like an idiot.

"We're her friends, that's why you jerk," Ben answered angrily, crossing his arms over his chest. His answer caused the older boy to laugh again.

"Hahahaha, no way you're actually friends with this freak?"

This made both Ben and Nanoha even madder as their eyes narrowed.

"Fate-chan is not a freak!" Nanoha growled as she brought a fist up, her nails were starting to press against her skin. She didn't like it when people talked badly about her best friend. She didn't like it when that terrible excuse of a mother said those awful things to Fate, and she most definitely doesn't like how this bully was calling Fate a freak.

"Of course she is, how else can you explain why her eyes are red?"

"That was how she was born, that doesn't make her a freak!" Nanoha stated with a frown, "and it doesn't mean you can be mean to her."

"Tsk, well you should be put in a concentration camp where you belong," the boy said condescendingly with a cruel smirk on his face, "After all it is summer after all."

The kids didn't fully understand the remark, but they could tell it wasn't a nice one. Ben walked upright in front of the older boy.

"Dude, I don't know what the heck your problem is, but knock it off," Ben said glaring up at the teenager.

"And who's going to make me, you? Ha, you're just a pipsqueak," he laughed before shoving Ben backward. The brown-haired boy would have fallen on his back if it wasn't for both of the girls catching him. Ben, Nanoha, and even Fate all glared at the teenage boy who had a satisfied smirk on his face.

'Oh you're asking for it now buddy,' Ben thought as he dialed up an alien on the Omnitrix. He was about to press down on the dial when a hand rested over the watch. Looking at the owner of the hand, he saw Fate shaking her head.

"Ben, don't," she whispered softly to him, much to his surprise.

"But why," Ben whispered back with a frustrated tone as he picked himself out of the girls' hands.

"He's not worth it."

"Fate-chan is right Ben-kun," Nanoha whispered, still glaring at the teenage boy, "while I think he needs to cool his head, he's not worth revealing your powers."

They were right, while Ben wanted to teach this jerk a lesson, he wasn't worth exposing himself. So he begrudgingly lowered both of his hands to his sides and glared at the older boy. The jerk in question merely let out a laugh.

"What's wrong, too scared you dumb little brats," he let out a dumb laugh as he put his hands in his pockets.

"Hey Mike," a voice called out from behind the teenager. Everyone looked and saw another boy about the same age as the teenager. He was lanky and had a blue mohawk. He wore a black oversized leather jacket over his grey shirt, a pair of short jeans, and black leather boots.

"Yeah, what? You found that freak yet?" the boy now named Mike called out, to which the other teen simply shook his head.

"Nope, we looked all over the arcade, it's not here."

"Shit," Mike let out a curse, before looking at Ben, Nanoha, and Fate, "It's your lucky day you punks, I got more important things to take care of. So long rejects."

With that, the teen walked off following the other boy.

"Jerk," Ben muttered once the two teenagers were out of sight, he and Nanoha then looked toward the blonde-haired girl, their eyes softening in concern.

"Are you alright Fate-chan?" the brunette asked softly, to which Fate replied with a nod of her head.

"Yes, thank you," Fate said with a small smile, "It's just what he said about me…"

Ben placed a hand on the blonde-haired girl's shoulder, getting her attention.

"Ah, forget about that guy Fate, he's just an idiot," the boy said with a reassuring smile.

"Ben-kun is right, Fate-chan," Nanoha added with a smile of her own, "just forget about what that jerk said alright!"

"You're right," Fate said with another smile.

"Ah, it's no problem," Ben said with a smirk, "now come on, there's a racing simulation game I found."

"That sounds like fun," Fate said with a smile. The idea of driving a vehicle excited her a bit, even if it wasn't real, and seemed like a good way to forget about that recent encounter.


A few hours later, the kids had used up all of the tokens leftover from yesterday and were now walking around the city.

"So what should we do now?" Ben asked.

"I think we should head back to the hotel, Grunkle Max said the Rustbucket repairs were done and went to pick it up," Nanoha explained, "It won't be long until he comes back."

"Good point."

The three of them then heard what sounded like a struggle accompanied by someone yelling in pain coming from a nearby alley in front of them. The group of three wasted no time in running into the alley where they heard the sound coming from.

What they found shocked them.

The three kids saw two teenagers, one of which was holding a boy about their age by the arms. One had pale skin, had long green hair tied into three ponytails, and had a goatee. He wore a beige t-shirt underneath a large red jacket, a pair of light brown shorts, and also wore a pair of black boots. The other one, and the one that would be holding the younger boy, was a large dark-skinned boy, with black braided hair and wore a white headband over his forehead. He was wearing a dark gray t-shirt that had long white sleeves, over that was an orange vest, beige sports shorts that reached down to his knees, and a pair of black boots.

And the boy within the larger teen's grasp was none other than Kevin, who had a bruised eye and a cut on his lip.

"Kevin-kun!" Nanoha cried in shock.

"What the heck are you guys doing to him!?" Ben shouted out in anger, demanding the two teenagers.

Said teenagers as well as Kevin were also surprised at the sudden appearance of the three kids, however that surprise quickly turned into annoyance for the former two.

"What does it look like we're doing you twerps?" the one with green hair with a sneer, "get lost."

"Let him go!" Fate demanded referring to Kevin. This prompted a laugh from both teens.

"Why the heck should we, little girl," the one holding onto Kevin asked mockingly, as the younger boy in question struggled and failed to get out of his grip, "in fact why do you even care?"

"Probably because she's a freak herself," a familiar-sounding voice said from behind the kids. Turning around, Ben and Nanoha glared at the boy that harassed Fate just a few hours ago, as he and the other teen from the arcade walked up to them, a sneer plastered on the former's face.

"I told you Fate-Chan's not a freak," Nanoha argued as she narrowed her eyes at the newcomer.

"Yeah she is you freak lover," Mike retorted with a sneer.

"Wait, what do you mean Mike?" The larger teen holding Kevin asked, a bit confused.

"Check out her eyes."

The green-haired teen walked up to Fate, but Ben got in front of him before he got too close to the blond. However, he was still able to see her eyes.

"Holy crap," he exclaimed in surprise at seeing the girl's red eyes, "why the heck are her eyes red!?"

"Seriously, is she like a demon or something!?" the large teen asked wide-eyed.

"Yeah I bet that must be it huh," Mike responded, smiling cruelly toward the blonde-haired girl who shifted uncomfortably but still glared back.

"Fate-chan is not a demon!" Nanoha yelled in anger, her hands curling into fists, "stop saying mean stuff about her!"

"Dude knock it off!" Ben demanded with a glare, "Seriously what's your problem!?"

"My problem is that you being all buddy-buddy with a freak!"

It was then Kevin let out a scoff.

"Really, you guys do know that people having red eyes isn't weird right, not common but still not weird," Kevin said while rolling his eyes, "I always knew you all were morons, but I didn't think you were this stupid."

"Shut it you freaky walking battery," Mike yelled out angrily before spitting at the black-haired boy's feet, "What the hell you know you tunnel rat!?"

"Leave him alone," Fate demanded with a glare

"Or what, you're going to go run to your mommy?" Mike asked mockingly.

Fate couldn't help but grimace slightly when he said that, and unfortunately the older boy noticed it.

"What don't you have a mom?" he asked with a cruel grin, at which the blond girl flinched more noticeably. His grin grew wider, "You don't, don't you!"

A pained expression grew on Fate's face at that.

"Shut up," Nanoha said darkly.

"What happened, did she walk out on you?" Mike continued, ignoring the girl's demand. Fate's expression become even more pained, at which the older teen just laughed, much to Ben, Kevin, and most of all, Nanoha's anger.

"I said SHUT UP!" Nanoha repeated with a yell, causing some of the boys to flinch.

"I knew you were a jerk Mike, but this is low even for you," Kevin said with a grim expression on his face as he saw Fate's expression.

However, the teen in question ignored all of their words and continued picking on the young blond.

"I can't say I'm surprised if she did, after all, who in their right mind would want a little fre-"

SMACK!

Everyone was surprised when Mike was suddenly knocked to the ground, courtesy of Nanoha slapping him right in the mouth.

The teen brought a hand to his stinging lips, processing what just happened, before glaring hatefully at the young brunette. However, his glare instantly turned into one of fear as he saw the cold expression on the girl's face.

"Leave Fate-chan alone," she said darkly, as she looked down at him, her hands clenched into fists.

Seeing an opportunity, Kevin brought a leg forward before pulling it back and kicking the boy holding him right in the leg. The larger boy yelped in pain as he let go of the black-haired boy in order to tend to his aching ankle. As soon as he was freed from the larger boy's grip, Kevin broke into a sprint before he shoved one of the two remaining teens down to the ground.

"Come on, let's get out of here!" he called out to Ben, Nanoha, and Fate as he ran by them. The three of them didn't hesitate as they ran alongside Kevin out of the alleyway.

"H-hey, hold on!" The last teen standing tried to chase after the four, however, he ended up falling flat on his face, courtesy of Fate subtly binding one of his ankles within a yellow mana cube.

Mike shook his head in an attempt to get his unsettled nerves under control, before yelling out, "What are you idiots doing? Go after those bastards!"

As he ran alongside Nanoha, Fate, and Kevin, Ben couldn't help but berate himself. Why didn't he go alien before going into that alley, had he done that in the first place he could have easily taught those jerks a lesson and they wouldn't be in this mess.

"Kevin-kun, are you okay?" Nanoha asked the black-haired boy as they ran around the other pedestrians on the sidewalk.

"Ok, one I told you not to call me that," He retorted with a deadpan, causing the brunette to splutter out an apology, which prompted him to let out a smile "and two, yeah I'm fine. It's going to take more than what those losers can dish out to really hurt me."

"Get back here you F #ing freaks!" a voice yelled out from behind the group. They looked back and saw all four of the teens running after them, either going around the other pedestrians or downright shoving them out of their way. The look in their eyes promised pain.

"Wow, they do not look happy!" Ben remarked as the group kept on running.

"Yeah Mike does not like it when people mess with his "fun". Bet being smacked by a little girl no doubt sent him over the edge," Kevin said, sending a smirk to Nanoha.

"He didn't stop bullying Fate-chan," Nanoha said simply with a frown that made Kevin smile nervously before he spotted an alleyway.

"This way, we can lose them through here," Kevin said as he led them into the alley.

Mike saw this and looked toward two of the teens, "You two cut them off at the other end."

The two simply nodded and climbed over a fence and down into another ally.

The alley the four went down didn't directly go through to the other side, so the group ended up making a few turns here and there.

The group could see the opening to the other side of the alleyway. However, their exit was blocked by two of the teenagers that were chasing them.

Before they could turn around and go back the way they came, both Nanoha and Ben were lifted off the ground by the back of their shirts

"Nanoha, Ben!" Fate exclaimed as she and Kevin saw the large boy holding both brunets. She was about to run to help them but the two teenagers that cut them off grabbed both her and Kevin. She struggled to break free but the older boy's grip was too strong.

"Thought you can escape you stinking freaks," Mike spat as he walked out from behind the larger teenager, and glared at the four caught children. The four simply glared back.

"Alright you got me, Mike, now let the others go alright," Kevin grumbled in annoyance, only to get an empty can thrown in his face.

"Shut it you walking f king battery!" Mike yelled toward the young black-haired boy, before directing his glare toward Nanoha. The young girl simply glared back as the older teen sent her a sadistic smirk, "I'll get to you later, freak, but first I need to teach this Chinese girl a lesson."

"I'm Japanese."

"Tomato tamato," he spat as cracked his knuckle. He let out a sinister chuckle as he approached the brunet, his eyes promising pain for the young girl. Seeing this, Fate struggles even more than before. She was half tempted to forgo keeping magic a secret if it meant protecting her best friend as small sparks of electricity emitted from her hands that her captor hardly noticed.

Ben was even less willing to keep his secret as he brought his hand to the Omnitrix and popped the dial up. However before he had a chance to even choose an alien, Mike noticed what he was doing and his eyes fell upon the Omnitrix.

"Hey that's a nice looking watch you got there, brat," he said with a smirk as he shifted his focus from Nanoha toward Ben, "I think I'll take it."

At that, Mike grabbed onto the watch and pulled on it in a futile attempt to get it off.

"Hey, let go!" Ben said right before the Omnitrix emitted a powerful pulse. The pulse sent Mike flying backward before sprawling on the ground, the boy that was holding onto Ben and Nanoha got sent flying backward into a nearby dumpster, and Nanoha found herself smacking against the wall before falling onto the floor.

Fate and Kevin, as well as the boys that were holding on to them, were sent flying out of the alleyway and onto the sidewalk, surprising some of the pedestrians. One of the teenage boys was sent a little further and ended up on the street and almost got run over by an old RV if it didn't stop in time.

Ben merely fell down on his rear. He let out a groan as he rubbed his aching posterior.

"Okay, that happened," Ben groaned before getting back onto his feet. He looked up towards Nanoha, Fate, and Kevin, "Hey are you guys alright?"

"Yeah, I'm good," Nanoha said as she pushed herself off the ground while massaging her head.

"I'm okay," Fate reassured as she pushed herself onto her feet. She looked over to Kevin and saw that he was sitting on his rear while messaging his head. She grew worried when she saw sparks of green electricity arced across the boy's body for a moment before stopping.

"Kevin are you alright?" she said as she quickly went over to him.

The boy let out a low groan before replying, "Yeah, I'm alright."

Seeing as the boy didn't seem to be hurting, Fate relaxed a bit. She offered her hand out to him to help him up, which he accepted.

"What the heck just happened?" Kevin asked after Fate pulled him back onto his feet, causing the blond girl to tense up a bit.

"I, ugh, I'm not sure," Fate lied, not sure how to explain what just happened without revealing the existence of the Omnitrix.

Kevin merely shrugged his shoulders before calling out toward the two brunettes, "Hey Ben, Nanoha, come on let's get out of here!"

"Like hell you are," Mike growled as he pushed himself off the ground, "If you think you're getting away, then-"

"What is going on here!?" a familiar voice called out. Everyone turned to look toward the source of the voice and saw Max and Arf, the latter of whom was now in her wolf form. Both had frowns on their faces.

"Grandpa!"

"Grunkle Max!"

"Arf!"

"Okay, that is the coolest looking wolf ever!" Kevin exclaimed, with excitement evident in his voice, to which Ben couldn't help but agree. Arf's wolf form really did look awesome in the boys' eyes.

"Ah, shit!" Mike cursed before turning on his heel and running in the opposite direction. The rest of the teenagers followed suit and scrambled away.

"You got lucky this time punks," Mike yelled as he and the rest of his gang ran deeper into the alleyway, "But next time you won't be so lucky!"

The group watched them disappear into the alley, Max then focused his attention on the kids.

"Are you kids alright?" Max asked with a concerned expression on his face.

"We're alright Mr. Tennyson," Fate reassured.

"What happened?"

"After we left the arcade, we heard a struggle from an alley and went to investigate," Ben explained.

'Wait, did Ben not transform or something,' Arf mentally asked the girls with a tilt of her head.

'No, he didn't,' Nanoha answered, 'to be honest, we kind of ran in without thinking.'

'We probably wouldn't have ended up being chased if he had used one of his transformations,' Fate added.

'I probably should have tried using one of my more subtle spells on them too,'' Nanoha mentally grumbled to herself.

"And we found these jerks that were also in the arcade beating up Kevin," Ben continued on, oblivious to the mental conversation, "we tried to help him, and long story short we ended up getting chased by those guys."

"We eventually got cornered though, but before they were able to do anything…" Nanoha continued but stopped herself before she accidentally mentioned the watch. She glanced in Kevin's direction for a moment before noticing that he had vanished.

"Ehhh, he's gone!" She exclaimed in shock.

Hearing this both Ben and Fate looked around, and sure enough, Kevin was nowhere to be found.

"Hey, where did he go?" Ben asked in confusion.


Kevin wiped the sweat from his brow as he trudged down the tunnel to his home in the abandoned subway. Like he has always done whenever he got into a confrontation with Mike and his stupid cronies.

They would constantly harass him due to his…freakiness. Seriously, don't those jerks have anything better to do? It doesn't help that their dumb insults proved how stupid they were, which resulted in said insults falling flat and not making any sense more often than not. And whenever their verbal jabs didn't work they resort to physically beating Kevin to a pulp, especially whenever the black-haired preteen corrects them.

Of course, Kevin was never one to back down easily and wasn't afraid of using his freakiness to fight back. It wasn't much, but it was enough to get them to back off, or at the very least allow him to get away.

He also wasn't afraid to get back at them in various ways. Stuff like dumping garbage on top of them, tricking any of them to slip on a banana peel, stealing their lunch or money out from under them, and so on.

There was even that time he pulled a prank that involved a bucket of whip cream, a bag of feathers, a jar full of termites and another jar of bees, and four Whoopie cushions.

He'll admit that prank did get a bit out of control.

Kevin could remember how that garbage truck crashed through the mayor's office roof as it were yesterday. That and how half of New York was engulfed in what could be described as a gang war between bees and termites for a whole month.

Kevin's latest act of payback was more or less trashing mike's gang hangout…again.

He avoided mike and his cronies as best he could, but they eventually found him.

Kevin thought it was going to be the same beatdown, as usual, but then those three came.

He was honestly surprised that they were willing to help him. No one else had.

That's because they don't know how much of a freak you are.

Kevin wiped off more sweat from his brow before pulling on the collar of his shirt to allow fresh air to flow in.

Kevin didn't know why but ever since he left those three he's been feeling hotter and hotter by the second. Sure it was the summertime but come on, he feels like he's in an oven!

Was this some kind of freak heatwave or something?

As Kevin entered his home his mind went back to Ben, Nanoha, and Fate. He was grateful for their help and all but he wasn't too keen on sticking around with who appeared to be their grandpa there. He wasn't a big fan of grown-ups.

Though he wouldn't mind if he met up with them in the future. He'll admit they were pretty fun to hang out with. Nanoha and Fate were surprisingly cool despite being girls, and that Ben kid was especially cool.

CRACK!

Kevin was pulled out of his thoughts when he felt something hard struck him in the back of his head. The next thing he knew he was falling face-first onto the concrete floor.

Kevin let out a pained groan as he brought a hand up and rubbed the back of his head. He blinked when he felt something wet running down his head. Pulling his hand out in front of him, Kevin's eyes widened when he saw his hand covered with a red fluid.

Blood to be precise.

The temperature got hotter.

"About time you showed up freak," a familiar voice sneered behind Kevin.

Kevin rolled over so he would be sitting on his rear and facing the owner of the voice.

It got hotter.

The black-haired boy glared in shock at the sight of mike and his cronies. Each of them had sadistic smiles plastered on their faces, and they each wielded steel bats. The one in Mike's possession was stained with Kevin's blood.

"What the hell are you doing here mike!?" Kevin demanded with a snarl, "in fact how did you find this place!?"

Kevin felt his body getting hotter.

Mike let out a chuckle as he walked up to Kevin.

"Oh please you freak, you didn't really think that we wouldn't be able to find this little hole you go to recharge did you?" Mike taunted with a smirk, "do you think we're stupid or something?"

"Is that a rhetorical question?" Kevin quipped with a smirk.

Mike's smirk was immediately replaced with a sneer. He swung his bat and struck Kevin across the face.

The young black-haired boy found himself again face-first on the floor. Kevin could taste metal in his mouth.

"Shut your stinking mouth you freak!" Mike snarled before kicking Kevin in the chest, causing Kevin to cough up a bit of blood, "as for why we're here, we thought we pay you back for what you did to our hang out by trashing your place."

The teen kicked Kevin again.

"But after what you and that little bitch and her friends did we decided it's time to do this world a little favor and get rid of you freak!"

Kevin couldn't help but let out a chuckle, "you can knock it off with the scary act Mike, we all know you don't have the guts."

Kevin was once again struck on the head.

It got hotter.

"I told you to shut it freak!" Mike yelled as the rest of his gang walked up and surrounded the downed boy, "though after we're done you won't be talking anymore."

With that Mike and his cronies lifted their bats and began to strike him multiple times with a few kicks every now and then.

Kevin brought his arms up to shield his cranium from the brutal assault as best he could. However, Mike seemed determined to keep to his word.

Hotter.

Mike and his gang kept on hitting Kevin with their bats over and over again. Calling him a freak, how no one cared for him, how he was better off dead, and so on.

Hotter.

It went on like this for minutes, though for Kevin it felt like it went on for hours.

Hotter.

At some point, something fell out of Kevin's pocket and fell to the floor with a clink loud enough to gain everyone's attention.

"What the hell is this," Mike muttered as he crouched down to pick up the object. Kevin's eyes widen in shock at what he picked up.

Hotter.

In the teenager's hand was a circular disk-like object marked with a green hourglass symbol on a black background.

Hotter.

"Hey, give that back, it's mine!" Kevin shouted out as he tried to reach out toward the object. He got a kick to the face for his troubles.

Hotter.

"This is your's," Mike asked in a taunting tone before laughing loudly, "oh please, a freak like you don't have any rights to anything!"

Hotter.

"This piece of junk is mine now you freak," Mike declared with a cruel smile, as his cronies resume their beating.

Hotter.

It wasn't a piece of junk.

Hotter.

It belonged to his father.

Hotter.

His real father, not his sorry excuse of a stepfather.

Hotter.

The one his mom told stories about to him.

Hotter.

The one who did amazing deeds.

Hotter.

The one he never got to meet.

Hotter.

And instead, he got stuck living with a drunk lazy pig of a stepfather that constantly treated him like a freak.

Hotter.

Hotter.

What did he do to deserve this?

Hotter.

Hotter.

He never asked for his freaky powers.

Hotter.

Hotter.

Hotter.

His stupid curse.

Hotter.

Hotter.

Hotter.

Hotter.

The teenagers ceased clobbering Kevin when they saw smoke coming off his body accompanied by the occasional arcs of electricity.

"What the heck is the freak doing now?" The one with the Mohawk asked nervously.

"Beats me," the blue-haired teenager shrugged.

"H-hey m-maybe he's short-circuiting or something," the large teen said with a nervous chuckle.

Hotter.

Hotter.

Hotter.

Hotter.

Hotter.

It wasn't fair.

Hotter.

It wasn't fair.

Hotter.

IT JUST WASN'T FAIR!

Kevin let out an agonizing yell as his body from head to toe was suddenly engulfed in fire.

Mike and his cronies' eyes widen in both shock and horror. They all scrambled away from Kevin, dropping their bats and the disk-like object in the process.

Once the pain ceased, Kevin looked down at himself and his eyes widened and he screamed out in horror.

"AHHHHHH! Wha-what's happening to me!" Kevin shouted as he stared at his flaming hands. He began to frantically pat down his arms and body in an attempt to put out the flames. However, no matter what he did, the flames wouldn't go out.

He then began to notice that his skin became hard and rocky, similar to that of volcanic rock. He also noticed that despite the intense heat, Kevin didn't feel like he was being burned.

"h-hey Fre- I mean Kevin, easy there it was all just a joke," Mike said with a nervous smile on his face, his hands up defensively, and fear clearly evident in his voice.

Kevin stiffen at the teen's words. He slowly turned his head toward Mike and his gang and glared at them as if they have just spoken the stupidest thing in the world.

Kevin pushed himself back onto his feet. The fact that Kevin was still on fire faded from the young boy's mind as it was immediately replaced by an overwhelming boiling rage as he slowly walked toward his tormentors.

"A joke! A JOKE! You saw everything you did to me like a freaking JOKE!" Kevin roared in disbelief, the fire covering his body flaring up in intensity, "you bastards were the ones who started to harass and beat me to a pulp for no real reason other than the fact that I'm a freak! And when your fragile little egos got bruised by a bunch of kids, you decided to try and kill me! Tell me, how the hell is all that a FREAKING JOKE!?"

Mike and his gang took a couple more steps backward as the flames encasing Kevin once again increased in intensity.

"L-look Fre…Ke-Kevin we can work this out alright!" Another one of the teenagers pleaded out of fear for his life.

"Y-yeah, you can be the leader of our gang," the large teen suggested with a nervous smile on his face.

"Y-yeah, we'll do whatever you want boss," Mike said in agreement, silently hoping that the flaming freak would let them live.

Kevin narrowed his eyes in disgust as he let out an unamused scoff. He knew that these jerks were cowards but this was pathetic.

For as long as he knew Mike and his goons, they've done nothing but try and make his life like hell as much as they could whenever they can. They tried to freaking kill him just a few moments ago, and now their trying to grovel down to him.

Kevin's mind was overall a mess and his head felt like there was a raging storm inside of it. However, there was one thing that was clear to the young boy…

The four before him were the most pathetic people on the planet.

"I. Don't. Think. So," Kevin growled as he fired a stream of fire from his hand.

Mike and his gang's agonizing screams echoed throughout the subway tunnels.


AN: Okay, I'm so sorry for taking so long with this chapter. I don't have any excuses, I got caught up with another fanfic, kept getting writer's block with this chapter, then fell into a writing funk. It also doesn't help that I don't really have a beta reader, aside from using both Grammarly and natural reader to check for any grammatical errors. Again I'm sorry.

Anyway relatively mundane chapter, not much happened other than the fact that Kevin appeared earlier than in canon, and that his interaction with Ben, Nanoha, and Fate was overall positive. I also plan on writing Kevin in a similar fashion as he was in the reboot, where he would be at most an antagonist to Ben, Nanoha, and Fate, but not a villain (aka a crazy bloodthirsty psychopath). Now before you guys go saying, but you had kevin kill those kids, remember he wasn't exactly in a calm state of mind at the time, and they also did try to kill him in the first place so you could chalk that up to self-defense. And yes I am using some elements from the Ben 10 reboot and mixing it in my story. Love it, hate it, you still have to admit some content in the reboot is cool, like shock rock.

So yeah, not much else to say. Stay safe, stay healthy, and have an awesome day.