Chapter 14: Unexpected Downsides

August, 1999

Gwen was halfway through her second day at Adams Middle School and she was almost beside herself with joy. Everything about this school was cooler than her old one. It had an actual robotics lab, intelligent teachers and that wasn't even the best part. No, the best part was that she didn't have a single class with Macri and her lampreys this year. They didn't even have lunch together!

She couldn't wait to eat something without having to worry about the three deciding to 'visit.' Such a great year.

She even got to learn French! She didn't have to yet. Foreign languages weren't required until high school, but... Well, a part of her melted at the thought of being able to speak the language.

And at being able to insult Ben in two languages.

Things were so awesome.

Well, most things were. The uniform was going to take some getting used to. She pulled at her dark gray skirt and wished she could just wear her Capri's instead. Skirts were fine for dressing up, but she'd much rather pants or jeans even though it drove her mom nuts. And sneakers, she thought as she glared down at her Mary Janes. She missed her sneakers. She was just about to fiddle with the collar of her blouse AGAIN before she made herself stop.

It wasn't the uniform that was bothering her. Well, not much anyway. At least the blouse was her favorite color. It was the fact that she didn't know a single person here. She looked around the classroom for the third time since she'd walked through the door just in case she missed someone yesterday.

She didn't.

Sure, she recognized almost everyone. That's how she knew she was the youngest person in the class. Everyone else was two years older and trying to get a jump-start on high school before they graduated. They were all already friends and no one was even glancing at her. Not that she could blame them, she was the baby in the room. She just wished she knew how to fix it.

She knew what Ben would do. He'd just start talking to whoever was closest like it was nothing. She'd watched him do it so many times during their summers, but she couldn't figure out how he did it. She wished she could, but whenever she tried she ended up all tongue-tied.

She wished he was here with her.

He could have been. She knew Ben was smart – not as smart as her, of course, but still smartish – but school never mattered to him. She didn't know why. If he would just put half as much effort into class as he did in alien fighting...

Well, probably not this class. She couldn't imagine him taking French. But if he had been there, she knew he would have at least have had someone to joke around with by now. She looked around at all the kids and tried to think of what he would do.

The only person Gwen didn't recognize was the girl in the desk right next to her. She had her back to Gwen as she looked around, too, but now that Gwen was paying attention she was sure that she'd seen the girl in a few of her other classes. She recognized the little twinge of jealousy she felt as she stared at the girl's long black hair anyway. It hung almost all the way down her back and Gwen couldn't help brushing her hand over her own hair. She tried to grow it out over the summer, but short looked so much better on her.

Still, she kind of wished...

The girl turned around like she felt Gwen staring at her, and her chocolate brown eyes met Gwen's. She smiled just a little as she tugged at a strand of her hair. Gwen's brain itched as she finally remembered where else she'd seen her before. She was in Gwen's math class, too, and she looked just as lost and alone there. And everyone in that class was in the Gwen's grade...

She wasn't the only baby in the room, then.

"Be like Ben," Gwen whispered to herself. She tried not to think about how much that thought should have horrified her. "Hi, I'm Gwen." She smiled and her mind raced as she tried to think of what to say next.

The girl gave Gwen a very relieved smile. "Michelle," she said with just a hint of an accent.

Between the accent and the newness Gwen decided to take a leap. "How do you like our town?"

"That obvious?" Michelle let out a nervous little laugh. "I've only been here a month. It's... smaller than I'm used to."

"If you want, I can tell you about all the hot spots - well, spot- later."

"That'll be great! All I've found so far is the mall and..."

"Not much of a mall?" Gwen finished with a sigh. And a silent thank you. "Tell me about it."

"Not what I'm used to."

"Which is?"

The girl let out a sad moan. "Bigger. And more French."

Gwen let out an envious little gasp as she finally placed the accent. "You've been to France?"

"My dad was stationed in Germany for three years, but we used to go to Paris for weekends." There was a wistful smile on her face as she said this. She shook it away and sighed. "Then he got a promotion and surprise orders to come to Bellwood and reopen the army base here."

"Your dad is in charge of that? I'm so sorry," Gwen said as she wrinkled her nose. The news had been talking about the army reopening Los Soledad for weeks, but she couldn't imagine anyone wanting to live in the walled-in ghost town that she'd seen on television. If there was anywhere on earth that was haunted...

"No, thank God," Michelle said and she shivered. Gwen just knew that the girl had seen the same pictures. "They were going to, but there was some kind of environmental report that put a stop to that. They're going to build a new base from scratch. One that's closer to civilization." The girl sighed as her shoulders slumped. "Kind of, anyway."

Gwen could only nod. "Going from Europe to Bellwood? That's so not fair."

"Tell me about it."

"So this class is...?"

"Easy A. I hope."

Gwen laughed. "You sound like my cousin."

"Is that good or bad?"

Gwen started to roll her eyes for dramatic effect, but before she could finish the teacher, Mrs. Robere, came in. She was a short woman. Dark hair and skin. She looked out over the class with a tight scowl. "Like I said yesterday. This is a French class. I will be speaking French. I expect you to make the attempt. It's a beautiful language. Try not to hurt it too badly." Then she sighed. "Though I will be making allowances for today. I hope everyone did their homework."

Everyone in the class groaned, even Gwen. She couldn't believe that they'd been assigned homework on their first day. They only had to write a sentence or two about their summer vacations, but it had to be in French. On their second day. It made Gwen wonder if Ben was right and teachers were out to get them.

"Very well, begin," Mrs. Robere said, and pointed to a short boy who had picked the wrong seat yesterday.

The boy swallowed twice and said, "My family rented a house in the summer. I have it only on the beach."

Gwen blinked and didn't know what was more embarrassing; the fact he'd said it in English or that he'd managed to screw up screwing up that badly. She glanced over at the teacher and wondered what she'd do.

To her surprise, the teacher just nodded and said. "Not bad. Thank you." The boy gave the teacher a very uncertain smile and sat down as quickly as he could. "Next."

The next girl, who was still a bright red from her sunburn, stood up and said, "My uncle had to spend the summer on the farm."

"I asked about you, not your uncle."

The girl laughed and pulled at her hair. "What?"

The teacher pinched her nose. "In French please."

"What?"

"Never mind, next."

Gwen shook her head. Most of the teachers she knew were patient, but she couldn't believe that Mrs. Robere was letting everyone get away with not even trying. Not that Mrs. Robere was trying either. What was the point of the assignment if even the teacher didn't care?

"Is something wrong, Ms. Tennyson?"

"No, ma'am!" Gwen said, automatically. Then she blushed and stammered out, "I mean..."

Instead of looking angry, Mrs. Robere looked surprised. "No, no. That was correct. Would you like to go next?"

Gwen really didn't. She stood anyway. She gave her notes a quick glance, but was too nervous to read the sentence she'd spent an hour working on yesterday. She closed her eyes and went from memory. "I went to the karate championship with my cousin and grandfather."

Oh, God. She'd done it too. She waited for the teacher to yell. Instead she heard: "Very good." Mrs. Robere was giving her a happy smile. "Your accent. How long did you spend in Paris?"

Gwen shook her head. "I've never been. I mean, I've always wanted to, but..."

The woman only looked more surprised. "Then you must have watched a lot of French cinema."

Gwen shrugged and felt the eyes of all of the other kids settle on her. She already knew that they were all already thinking 'teacher's pet'. "A few, my mom likes them."

"Only a few?" the teacher teased. "You can sit down."

Gwen did, as fast as she could. Fortunately she wasn't called on for the rest of class. An entire class spoken in English, and most of it broken at that. Only Michelle and the teacher managed to sound normal. Gwen was ready to scream when the bell finally rang.

"Very good, Ms. Tennyson, Ms. Hallam," the teacher said with a smile as she walked by. Gwen forced herself to smile back as she hurried out of the class. If she was lucky, she'd still have time to drop the class and get something where the teacher actually cared.

Michelle settled into step next to her and Gwen was sure that she was going to drop the class, too, when she bumped Gwen's arm and said, "Why didn't you tell me you knew French already?"

Gwen just looked at the girl. "I don't."

"You're a good fake then. It's not like they'll take the A away just because you already know the language." She frowned for a moment. "They won't, right?"

Gwen shook her head and then pinched the base of her nose as the headache from the start of the class came back. It was an annoying dull ache right behind her eyes.

"Are you OK, crazy girl?"

"I'm not crazy!"

"Which is why you're yelling at me in French." Michelle shook her head and bumped Gwen's arm again. "Its a good thing you promised to tell me where to find fun in this town. Unless..." Her voice went low and she looked around in barely concealed horror. "There isn't a violent anti-French mob in town, is there?"

"No!"

"Then don't deny!" Michelle said with a laugh as she nodded over at another group of kids. "I mean, you don't see them pretending they don't speak Spanish, do you?"

Gwen glanced over just in time to see a tall boy laugh and shake his head. "Julio's got a crush!"

The other kid's - who had to be Julio - eyes got wide as he looked around the hall. Then he shoved the first boy while everyone else laughed. "I do not!"

"They're n-" she started. And then she stopped. She thought back and tried to remember the last time she'd heard someone speak anything other than English, but she couldn't. Even during the week they spent in L.A. over the summer she never heard anything but English. Now that she noticed it she knew just how impossible it was. And impossible only meant one thing. "I'll be right back."

She hurried to the bathroom and pulled her phone out of her pocket and gave the Omnitrix symbol on the screen three quick taps. "Gwen?" Grandpa Max answered in a worried rush. "What's wrong?"

"Why can I speak French?"

"She has robots in her brain?" Ben asked and he gave her a wide-eyed worried look as he reached over to poke her forehead. Gwen swatted his hand away even as she let out a nervous breath. For a second she had been so sure that he was going to laugh at her.

Grandpa Max sounded calm when he told her not to worry and that he'd pick up her and Ben to explain after school, but she and her Grandfather had wildly different ideas of what was worth worrying about. Robots in her brain was definitely one of them. The fact that Ben agreed with her made her the winner, at least as far as she was concerned. She reached up and scratched at her scalp. She could swear that now that she knew about them she could feel them crawling around inside her head.

"They're not robots," Grandpa Max began and then paused to scratch the back of his own head. "Not exactly. They're kind of a mix of biological and technology. They're called translator microbes."

And Ben's worried look vanished in an explosion of laughter. He laughed so hard he fell out of the booth. "You've got cooties!" he managed to force out between laughs.

"Not helping! You wouldn't think this was so funny if you had them, too!"

"As if."

"He does."

Gwen would have laughed right back at any other time. Instead she just looked at her Grandfather in horror even as Ben jumped to his feet and shouted, "What!"

Grandpa held his hand up to hold them off. "And so do I. All of the Plumbers do."

"What!" Ben and Gwen harmonized.

Grandpa Max shrugged. "It's standard technology. We traded for them back in the Fifties. They're harmless."

"They're harmless?" Gwen echoed in disbelief even as she dug her fingernails into her scalp. How could anything be harmless when they were in her brain? Hers and the Doofus'. And she liked his brain the way it was. Besides, he didn't have any to spare if Grandpa was wrong.

"Completely." Grandpa Max nodded. "They're nothing, really. I was going to mention them, but..."

"But?" Ben asked as he sat down next to Gwen again and started rubbing at his head, too.

"It kind of slipped my mind. Besides," he shrugged, "well, I thought you'd figured it out years ago. And since neither of you said anything I didn't think it was a problem."

"How on Earth could we have figured it out?" Gwen asked as calmly as she could. It was still shrill enough to make Grandpa Max wince.

"I thought it was obvious after you met Tetrax."

"Why would it be..."

"It was his first time on Earth. Did you really think he spoke English?"

Gwen's mouth moved for a second before the words caught up. "YES!"

"Oh." Grandpa Max looked away in embarrassment. Which he should be, Gwen thought. Unless he was embarrassed for her. Which was not a thought she liked.

"How?" Ben asked. He'd forced himself to stop scratching, but he twitched as if he still really wanted to.

Grandpa Max shrugged. "As far as I can tell, you got them with the Omnitrix, Ben."

Ben glanced down at the device on his arm and poked it a few times. "You haven't given me anything else, have you?" The Omnitrix didn't say anything. Not even after he tapped it against the table.

Gwen shook her head. "And me?"

Grandpa Max got up and started walking up to the driver's seat. "I really should be getting you kids home. I have some errands to run before I take my trip."

"Grandpa!"

Grandpa stopped and hunched up his shoulders. "You got them the same night that Ben got the Omnitrix."

Gwen eyes went wide as she stared at the alien watch on Ben's arm and yanked her arm away from it. She remembered running her hand across the cool metal face of the Omnitrix, but it didn't bite her or anything. "I barely even touched it! How did it get me, too?"

"It..." Grandpa started to say before he stopped and sighed. He turned around and sat down again, but he didn't look at either of them. Instead he just pushed his glass of water back and forth.

"Did it hurt her?" Ben asked as he glared at the watch.

"No. The watch didn't do anything," Max said. He reached up and rubbed at the back of his neck. "I might have... It was just a little injection, honey."

"You INJECTED me with them?"

"It's not like you noticed. You didn't even wake up."

"You injected me while I was ASLEEP?"

"...sorry?"

Ben gave their Grandfather a dirty look and Gwen could have hugged him for it. Or she could have until he opened his mouth and said, "What I want to know is, why does the Dweeb get to cheat at school while I can't?"

"I'm not cheating, Doofus!"

"Oh, please. You know French and Spanish..."

"And Chinese, German, Russian, Navajo, Japanese... And all the alien languages we know. The bugs will learn, too, if you wait long enough," Grandpa began before he saw the glares he was getting. "Right. I'll just be quiet."

"She can do it and I can't. So not fair."

Gwen shook her head. "You can, too, Doofus."

"I think I would have noticed."

Gwen snorted and grabbed the television remote from its spot on the back of the dining booth. It only took her a moment to find the channel she was looking for. One she'd heard him talk about way more than he should have.

"Telemundo!" Ben grinned. "I love this channel!"

"And did you ever notice anything?"

"What? No. What?"

Gwen pointed at the bottom corner of the screen.

"Spanish Television." There was a long pause. "I always wondered about that."

Gwen shook her head, but it was just as much at herself as at him. She should have known better than to think that he was reading the English subtitles. "So now we can speak any language."

"That the microbes know," Max allowed.

"But when I was doing my homework last night, I had to look up all the French words."

Grandpa nodded. "Spoken languages are easier. You'll have to learn writing the old-fashioned way. Sorry."

"So, we're genius illiterates," Ben said with a shrug as he got comfortable. Not by sitting like a normal person though. No, he had to lie down in the booth and use her leg as a pillow as he pulled his Gameboy out of his pocket. "Easy B then."

"I knew you'd say that. Don't you care?" she asked as she glared down at his mess of brown hair.

"Eh."

"From now on, I'll either hear everything in English, or in gobbledygook until the bugs figure it out." She felt her lip quiver. "I wanted to learn French."

Max reached over and patted her on the shoulder. "I'm sorry, Gwen."

Gwen sat back and banged her head against the back of the booth over and over again. "I have bug brains."

"I've always said so," Ben said without looking up from his game.

If he had, he would have noticed Gwen grabbing the cup from Grandpa before she dumped it on his head.