2016 Ben-Centric. Established Benrex relationship. Minor romance(in beginning), mainly action, humor, adventure, and mystery. Multiple POV. Spoilers for Ben 10 uaf and omni, also for gen rex finale
Ben wipes the sweat off his forehead. The green glow around his body fades from around his form so that all that's left is the impermeable fog and pine green forest around him. A triumphant smile dances across his face as he admires his work.
The sun doesn't shine down on the clowns below him, the sky opting instead to drizzle, so lightly that Ben barely feels it. An easy take down, he would say. Like they weren't even trying. Or maybe he was just that good? His smile widens.
Yet, it doesn't feel much like an achievement. His smile wanes.
He has no idea where he is.
Zombozo groans in pain, eyes shut and fingers twitching. He didn't know where they were either, or at least if he did, he wouldn't tell Ben.
Fair enough. There's a lot of villains in this no-name city, if the ones he had beaten up were anything to go by. Many villains to go around, not enough civilians to save. Seriously, where was everyone? He'd seen only a few walking around between when he'd first woken up and now. There were no cars in use. Everything looks desolate. The skyscrapers are cracked and some destroyed— and this time it definitely wasn't Ben's fault!
Everyone seems to stay in their house. Why wouldn't they with Animo and Hex and Zombozo going around? All Ben knew was that he wasn't in Bellwood or any of the places he'd gone to with Gwen and Grandpa Max over this summer. That, and that he didn't know where either of those two were. He'd woken up in the backseat of a car with no idea how he'd gotten there. No one was inside, but it was filled with empty smoothie cups and paper nacho bowls.
And it was remarkably green, so the person who owned it had good taste.
Ben had raced around town as XLR8 looking for his family. He turned into Wildmutt and tried sniffing the two out. He did everything he could to find them but all he found was nothing but a bunch of clowns!
So they weren't in this area. Cool.
Ben doesn't panic. He finds a phone among the unconscious bodies(his phone ran out of battery long ago) and calls the police. They don't answer. Again. He sighs, puts the phone down, and starts the Containing Process™, which consists of him turning into Upgrade and building a jail cell with whatever's around and then transporting the foes into it so they'll be ripe and ready for the police when they get there.
He's miles away before it starts pouring down. He's cold, hungry, and friendless. None of the restaurants in town are open and look like they haven't been in awhile. There is only one place Ben has seen that's open, and the guy behind the register has the presence of a rock. He looked like a zombie, but Ben guessed all service workers do. He had skin as pale as concrete and the bags under his eyes were large and pink. He didn't even seem to notice Ben when he walked in. Ben tried talking to him while he looked through the aisles, since no one was there but them two. The cashier said nothing, eyes glazed over, barely blinking, chin tucked into his palm. Ben had no money, but he took a candy bar and ate it right there, in the aisle of the grocery store, looking into those dead eyes. The man said nothing. Ben immediately felt bad and got out of there, searching for stray coins on the street to pay for it.
He still hasn't got enough, and he's afraid he'll have to use what he does have to buy a jacket. A ten-year old's gotta do what a ten-year old's gotta do. He shivers as the wind grazes his skin and the rain wets his hair, turning it almost black. The ground is soft and mushy, outside of the sticks he keeps accidentally stepping on and scaring himself with. Truth is, he's afraid. He's afraid and alone.
He doesn't feel anything under his feet as he steps forward, but still, he hears the breaking of a twig.
Or…maybe not alone.
He stops abruptly and looks to his right, and then behind him. He swears he sees a shadow or something. He stays still, trying to listen past the sound of rain.
A powerful swooshing sound, a blast of wind hits Ben in the face and he swears he sees something pass behind him for a split second. His breath catches and he stays still as two heavily clothed forms appear in front of him, hand in hand, struggling to overcome the other, fighting, and then disappearing to the right, into the trees, so fast that Ben can barely register it all.
He visualizes the image in his head, stuck on it. One was purple and black with a mask like a motorcycle helmet or a video game character. The other wore all black and grey, a hoodie pulled over his head instead of something so epic, and what looked like joggers.
Ben's vision is suddenly obstructed again by something pink. He stares at it for a second, eyes following up a muscular back to the ends of a black mullet and then to the back of the head it's attached to. The tall man in a reddish-pink muscle shirt lifts up his dark olive-skinned arm, and in his hand is a red and orange jacket.
"Put this on." His voice sounds young. Cool and modulated. Rain pours like sweat down his arm, and just like that Ben realizes they're surrounded.
Purple and black ninja-like forms in helmets flank them on all sides, all twins with no physical differences Ben could see in this storm.
His first thought is: It's like something out of a movie!
Ben takes the jacket, and as he puts it on, already thinking of an alien to turn into, the man runs forward. Ben breathes in sharply, about to say he can handle it, when suddenly the man's arm transforms into something blue and metallic.
.
Funchucks are always a good way to go. This, Rex was sure of. He was also sure that Eon's ninjas were stronger than the last time they'd fought. He was completely sure that ten year old Ben couldn't handle this on his own. He was completely sure he had made the right choice.
It's Ben's fault for building up doubts in his head.
Rex glares at the underling before him, two out of six already down, and Ben handling a seventh somewhere Ben couldn't see. Rex wants to sigh. This was already getting annoying. Not only was a nineteen year old Ben already by his side, but now they're adopting a ten year old Ben, as well as fighting against multiple Ben's right now! He'd chosen this route, however, and there was no way he was gonna leave the little guy alone by himself. Especially not here. Not in this strange world.
Rex swung the ninja—Ben—into the ground with his funchucks. Turning around, he only had a split second to see the awe on young Ben's face before he smacked another Ben—ninja—into a tree. A blast of wind soared by him as XLR8 grabbed one ninja from the group, so fast that he was nothing but a shadowy blur. Good. Ben only agreed to this because he didn't want young Ben to know he was him. Not like he would recognize himself in the future, anyway. Ben looked completely different as a nineteen-year old, and his voice was way more masculine. There's also the fact that he was able to take the omnitrix off whenever he wanted, so that wouldn't be a problem either.
Still, Ben likes to be difficult.
Another gush of wind.
He also likes to fight.
.
The fight is over before Ben can even join. Surrounding him and the strange robot teenager(Ben realizes he has to be a teen. He looks too young) are incapacitated bodies. Just like the clowns from before, they're unconscious and stupid. The new guy finished them all off.
He's looking around at his work, counting bodies, searching for any sign of…life, maybe? Ben isn't sure. He doesn't look especially glad to have won the fight.
"Hey, dude, who are you?" Ben had to talk over the storm, which had cooled down dramatically. "And how did you do that thing with your arm?"
They meet eyes. He can't tell if they are red or brown, but what they are is calculating and observant. He looks Ben up and down. His strong square jaw dips into his long neck as he nods. His hairline is very specific, with an inverted triangle shape on his forehead and between his eyebrows. He has, now completely soaked, blue skinny jeans. All Ben has on is the guy's jacket, a black and green shirt with the number ten on the side, and green cargo shorts.
Ben watches as the boy lifts up his arm as if to place it on his neck but instead clenches it into a fist. It starts to make a strange shrill sound as lines of blue travel down his arm to his fist and starts to grow. His hand mutates.
Ben's eyes go wide.
The hand is now fridge-sized, orange replacing blue this time.
"Dude," Ben laughs, racing towards him. "That. Is. Awesome! How'd you do it? You're not a villain, are you?"
The guy turns his hand back to normal and smiles sheepishly. "Man, I hope not." He takes one last look at the guys on the floor then holds out his hand. "I'm Rex, by the way."
"Rex, huh?" Ben takes it. "I'm Ben."
"Aren't you a little too young to be trekking this deep into the forest during a storm like this?"
"Yes. Yes I am."
Rex pats his shoulder. "Let's get you some shelter."
It's only when Ben is being led toward the tree line that he realizes how suspicious this is. A strange group of ninjas suddenly attack him, then a mysterious older guy saves him and then leads him into the woods? Ben stops abruptly, rain still pattering on his head, but with way less force than a few minutes ago. He shivers, but pays no mind to the cold.
Rex turns around, "What's—" then does a double take, looking back behind him to see something Ben hadn't noticed until now. Rex steps back, a hand over his heart. "Geez, you scared me!"
Standing against a tree with its arms crossed is the hooded figure from before. Instinctively, Ben places a hand over his watch.
"Ben, this is my partner." Rex smiles with his eyebrows furrowed up, a hand out towards the black clothes. His partner doesn't move, face completely masked by a hood and what looks like a scarf. "He doesn't talk much."
Ben moves back.
"No, it's—" Rex starts before being interrupted.
"Kid, where are your parents?" The hooded…teenager? (He sounds like a teenager, too, but Ben couldn't trust that) speaks up.
"I'm not gonna tell you," Ben glares at the two, backing up again. No, this was too suspicious.
"Right," the boy sighs. He and Rex seem to look at each other, Rex with a tight frown, the other with inky blackness.
"Look, we'll take you back to the city. It's dangerous for kids to be outside. How did you even get out?" Rex again.
Now this was getting somewhere. "Where are we? Why is it dangerous to stay outside?"
The two look at each other again. "You don't know?" Rex says it as a statement rather than a question. He sounds almost disappointed.
"I don't think he's from here," the other guy says it like it's obvious. And yeah, Ben realizes, it is.
"Somebody better start talking or I'm going to start throwing arms!" With that, Ben twists the omnitrix on his wrist and slams down on it. He feels himself growing larger. Muscular. His skin turns red and two extra arms grow out of his sides. He stands tall, a few feet higher than them, with two arms folded and two hands on his hips. "Four arms!"
Out of all the reactions to get— screams, cowering, running away, or a foes own fighting stance— Ben wasn't expecting Rex's in the least:
"My jacket!" Rex falls to his knees, hands cupping his cheeks and absolute pain on his face. "My jacket! Not again…!"
Ben looks down at himself, his clothes replaced with a black and white shirt and tight black pants. Rex's jacket is nowhere to be found.
Rex's partner looks down at him. "Dude…" he says in a judgemental tone.
Ben has no idea what to do now. He feels awkward, looking down at the two. He scratches the back of his head. "Uhh, is he gonna be ok?" His voice is deeper in this form. More rough.
"He's fine." He says as Rex seems to be sobbing on the ground, head hanging between his arms, on his hands and knees. "Look, you're like us. We're not going to hurt you so change back and we'll explain everything."
"You know where Gwen and Grandpa Max are?"
The hooded boy looks at him silently for a few seconds. Ben really wishes he could see his face. "I have no idea who that is."
After a few seconds of contemplation, he transforms back, jacket and all.
.
Rex was surprised to hear that Ben had infinite alternate dimension hims. Rex was still getting used to the fact that there were more dimensions than his own! Yet here he was, in the flesh. Rex and Ben had fought many of Ben's enemies throughout their time here, and they were just starting to relax when suddenly they started hearing about an onslaught of new but familiar looking bad guys in town.
Rex stared in shock from the shadows as a smaller version of the Ben Tennyson at his side turned back into human form after trapping a weird-looking Animo in a box. There were obvious differences, yes, but that was definitely Ben. The Ben beside him didn't look surprised at all. In fact, he looked more tired than anything. Ben later explained to him the Ben multiverse, filled with Ben 23 and Gwen with the Omnitrix and many different versions of himself. It would be unbelievable if Rex hadn't seen it face to half-a-yard-away face.
But Ben didn't want to have anything to do with it. The only reason they had even decided to pick up young Ben was because he was causing irreparable damage to the city whenever he fought. One of the only citizens that felt comfortable, or worried, enough to talk to them was a elderly lady(that apparently looked like Ben's aunt) who had come up to them the day before, asking for help against a child. They immediately knew who she meant, and Ben was forced to comply.
What they weren't expecting was to find him so fast, and so close to their cabin too. Ben was on patrol when it happened. Footsteps could be heard through the window in the hallway. Rex happened to be sitting on the counter beside it, and he thought maybe the sound was just Ben in one of his many-legged alien forms. But the front door didn't creak, and the sound of leaves crunching under feet got too far to hear. He called Ben. He answered after the first ring.
Ben wasn't anywhere near the cabin.
Ben was seeing something.
Ben suddenly got very quiet. The sound of rain filled the line.
Then a low voice, serious, barely above a whisper, "I need you here."
Rex was out of the house and into the mass of wet forest around it. He'd meant to find Ben, and, well, he did, in a way.
"They're with this guy named Eon." Rex recalls from his Ben's earlier explanation. "He's some time-travelling, alt-dimension, B-rated villain that shows up sometimes to annoy everyone."
He peeks back at the kid behind him. He looks like he's in his thoughts, his eyes on the ground as his hands fiddle with Rex's jacket.
.
Ben pulls on the leather of Rex's jacket over and over, absentmindedly wrapping himself away from the cold. It's too big on him, but it works to keep the breeze off his chest. The rain has stopped for the most part, but now the coolness has taken hold. It's eerie. No birds singing, no frogs croaking, no crickets chirping. It makes him uncomfortable.
"B-rated?" He asks, looking around and up into the trees. The sky is still grey, same as it has been since he'd woken up. He wonders if the sun ever shines here.
"This city is infested with bad guys. They've been terrorizing the place for I don't even know how long. The folks here don't even go outside most of the time because of how bad it is." Rex explains, keeping his eyes forward. Ben could run away right now without him seeing, but he's not too sure about the other guy in front of him.
The hooded guy hasn't said a word since they left the fight. He walks with his hands in his pockets and intent in his step.
Ben lets out a yelp as he runs into Rex. He looks up at the back of Rex's head. "Why'd you stop?"
Rex faces him. "We're here." He lifts his arms and smiles. Ben leans to his right. His vision fills with the sight of an old, small-looking white and wooden house. The non-too-steady patio is white and rusted with dark brown spots. The grass in the front lawn is mowed but the area surrounding it is bushy with forestry, like they gave up halfway through. The windows aren't boarded up but they might as well be, the curtains make it look like they're painted black. "This is our place. Mi casa."
"You live in a cabin in the woods?" He backs up. There's no way two people live there. He doesn't even need to look inside.
"It's not like we could stay with the people in town." Rex furrows his eyebrows with a tilt of his lips. His hands glow blue for a second, as if to remind Ben.
Ben nods slowly. He has a point, but Ben's suspicions aren't fully acquiesced. He asks another question. "So, how'd you get your powers?"
"A group of scientists had a idea that blew up in their face and gave me control over the nanites in my body so I can make machines out of myself." He shrugs. "You?"
Ben tries to sort through all the things the boy before him just said, but the few seconds of silence it takes is enough to make Rex elaborate.
"Nanites are germs, basically. But if germs were microscopic machines."
"Oh!"
"Yeah." Rex sets his hands on his hips. Ben notices the hooded man starting to walk off.
He pulls up the sleeve of Rex's jacket and shows off the watch. "This fell from the sky when I went camping and I haven't been able to get it off since. It turns me into ten different aliens. In counting." He glances to the side as a door closes. "Anyway, what's your partner's deal?"
Rex's brown eyes glide to the right as he brings a hand up to his mullet. "Ahhh," he laughs then. "I shouldn't have called him my partner. It's kinda weird. He's my boyfriend, and, yeah, he gets like that sometimes."
Ben's eyes widen. "Boyfriend?" He squeaks.
Happy Valentine's Day! I started writing this in January 2020, so before Covid and also before the movie crossovers all happened in Ben 10 2016. It'll update weekly, so stay tuned! Artwork for the series is on my tumblr of the same name (Rolaplayor101)
please please leave a comment! It'll give me motivation to keep posting!
