A new chapter! Sorry for the long wait, folks.
* I have to comment about something. I think it's already noticeable, but I'll still say it: The identities of Ben and Gwen are secret in this fic. If Ben were a celebrity, the media would have found out that Dawn was with him and Gwen, and Hex would have come after her a long time ago.
Ding-dong. The apartment doorbell rang.
Ben, a little paranoid with all the visions of the futures still haunting him, jumped of the couch with a hand over the Omnitrix.
"Ben, can you answer the door, please?" Gwen asked from the bathroom. "I'm giving Dawn a bath."
"I'm on my way." Ben turned into Ghostfreak, and went invisible to spy on the outside corridor first.
The young hero braced himself to find a Kevin thirsting for revenge knocking at his door, but his paranoia was unfounded. Standing at the door was a nice looking couple, a dark-skinned woman with curly hair wearing glasses and a dark-skinned man with short hair and a beard.
Ghostfreak returned to the apartment, turned back into Ben and answered the door with a smile. "Hi. What can I do for you?"
"You're Ben, right?" The man asked. Ben replied affirmatively and gave him a handshake. "My name is Marco and this is my wife Nicole." The woman also shook hands with Ben.
"My grandmother, Ms. Agnes, talked a lot about you, your girlfriend, and your daughter," Nicole said.
Ben remembered the elderly owner of the building, Ms. Agnes, had always insisted that he and Gwen were in a relationship, and that Dawn was their daughter. Both tried to explain several times that they were just cousins. But now, Ben and Gwen were indeed dating, so surprisingly Ms. Agnes turned out to be right.
"My husband and I have a daughter who will have her fourth birthday party this weekend. We wanted to invite you and your family to be there. I think our daughters can be friends." Nicole handed Ben an invitation.
"Thank you very much, we will be there," Ben said with a sincere smile.
Kevin was repairing a car. The owner of the vehicle was waiting there, he had "nothing better to do anyway", he said. The man was also very drunk.
"My wifeeeee dumped meeee!" The drunk man dragged his words.
"I'm sorry, sir. I can sympathize with your situation. My girlfriend broke up with me a few days ago," Kevin said from under the car.
"It waaas woooorseee than thaaaat. The biiiitch dumped me to get it ooon with her own cooooousin! Freaking disguuusting! And the baaaaastard used to be my frieeend too… I waaaant to kill both of theeeem…" The man snarled.
Kevin was surprised to see how this man's trajectory paralleled his own. He was about to say a few words of encouragement when he had a bad feeling about that. His many years as a street criminal taught him to notice when someone was trying to deceive him.
Kevin got out from under the car, got up, crossed his arms, glared at the man and said in a very hostile tone, "Who are you and what are you doing here?"
"Waiting for youuuu to repaaair my caaaar," the man said, looking a little scared.
"Tell me the truth or else..." Kevin slowly approached the man, who took a few steps back.
"Get away from her!" A group of Plumbers armed to the teeth entered the garage. They were led by Joel and Camille.
"Crap! I told you to stay away! You ruined everything!" The 'drunken man' let out a sigh and before their eyes turned into a young blond girl. She smirked at Kevin and said, "I almost got you."
"Lucy," Kevin stated in scorn.
Lucy was Camille's younger cousin, and Joel and Camille loved Lucy like a daughter. It was understandable why they were extremely worried about her safety, so they decided to intervene with a team of Plumbers when they thought she was in danger.
"You were trying to befriend the 'big bad monster' here, make me open up about my 'evil plans' of killing Ben and Gwen, is that it?" Kevin asked sarcastically, "Don't you Plumbers remember when I was busting my ass to save the world from the Highbreed Invasion? After everything I did, am I still the bad guy?"
"One day you're saving the world, the other you're setting it on fire." Lucy shrugged. "Can you blame me for trying to find out which side the coin fell on today?"
"A few days ago, you threatened to kill two elderly citizens. You have someone big pulling the strings for you upstairs to keep you out of jail, but we know very well what you're capable of, and we're watching you, especially now," Joel said. The team was still pointing their guns at Kevin.
"I just want to be left alone. I'm not doing anything wrong now, and you Plumbers here at my garage are violating my privacy! Go away now!" Kevin demanded.
A few minutes later, inside the bathroom, Kevin looked at the mirror and saw his reflection, which turned into a manifestation of his dark personality, Kevin 11.
"The Plumbers are on to us. We can't just kill Ben, hand Dawn over to Hex, get Gwen to drink the love potion, and simply expect the Plumbers not to suspect something wrong is going on," Kevin 11 said.
"That was never the plan," Kevin washed his face. "I will not deliver an innocent child to Hex. I'll trick Hex. I'll give Dawn to him temporarily, and then I'll take her back and kill the wizard. I'll be the great hero I've always been! Gwen will love me for saving the kid - even if she needs a little push from the love potion, it's for her own good. And Ben will lament for the rest of his days the fact that he lost Gwen to me, a fate worse than death."
"We still need a scapegoat," Kevin 11 said. "It will not do any good pretending to be a hero if-"
"I'm not pretending anything! I am a hero! The real villain is that son of a bitch who stole my girl! I'm just doing whatever it takes to take her back from him!" Kevin said in anger.
"As I was saying, it will not do any good pretending to be a hero if anyone finds out that we were the ones who helped Hex to get to Dawn." Kevin 11 ignored his other half's tantrum. "We are a part of the selected few people who actually know about Dawn. We will obviously be the prime suspects."
"That's why we're going to work on increasing the pool of suspects," Kevin smirked with a glint of Kevin 11's darkness in his eyes.
While Dawn and Gwen slept peacefully, Ben - as Grey Matter - was in the living room, working hard on a device. He was still having trouble sleeping, and that work was an attempt to relax.
"Ben?" The voice of a sleepy Gwen was heard. "What are you doing?"
Grey Matter turned back into Ben. "A quick tattoo removal device. Grey Matter has already created some very interesting gadgets. This is the newest one. "
"Congratulations!" Gwen said with sincerity. "But you should be sleeping." She pulled him by the arm. "Come on. I swear you are more work for me than Dawn, you big baby."
Back in the bed, Gwen hugged Ben's head against her chest as she stroked his hair. Ben felt quite comfortable with his head rubbing against those two soft natural "pillows." If it had not been for the funny feeling in his pants, he would have easily slept in that position.
"Is there anything you want to tell me, Ben?" Gwen asked in a gentle voice.
"This is a low blow!" Ben complained. That way, he wouldn't resist and he would tell Gwen anything. Ben sighed and began to speak. "I just... I'm with the girl of my dreams and everything is fine with our little girl Dawn, and I haven't been this happy since I was ten, but at the same time... I can't ignore this feeling that something really, really bad is about to happen at any moment."
Gwen kissed his hair. "I'm going to get rid of any bad feelings you have..." she said in a seductive voice, "You said you're happy. I'll make sure all you will feel is happiness." The redhead positioned herself on top of him, with her legs pining his hips.
Was she really ...? Ben's eyes widened in surprise.
"You're the man of my life, Ben. You always were, and you always will be," she said, looking him deep in the eyes.
Ben's mind replayed the memory of Gwen pushing Ben away to save him from the wildvines in Xenon, and how he simply stopped caring about anything - even the self-destruction of the Omnitrix that could potentially destroy the whole universe - after he mistakenly thought his cousin had died.
"And you're my universe," Ben replied, also looking into her eyes.
The green eyes of the two of them met in an intense stare for a few seconds that lasted an eternity, until all that tension between them blew up in a passionate kiss. The two explored each other's mouths with their hungry tongues for a long minute until they had to stop to breathe.
"Gwen, can you cast a spell to make this bedroom soundproof? We don't want to wake Dawn..." Ben said with a mischievous grin.
"This is the place." Ben stopped the car near the party hall.
"Yippee!" Dawn shouted from the baby seat in the back. She was very excited for the party. Ben, however, was a little nervous.
"Gwen, what are we going to say that we are? Cousins? Boyfriend and girlfriend?" Ben asked in a worried tone.
"We don't have to say anything. We are what we are, and we don't owe an explanation to anyone," Gwen said with a smile.
"Probably no one here knows us, but if we are not discreet about our relationship, someone might, I don't know, take a picture of us and put it on Facebook, and some friend or relative of ours may figure things out," Ben warned.
"Relax, Ben. You're not ashamed of me, are you? "Gwen asked, tilting her head to the side.
"Of course not, never!" Ben said without hesitation, "I accept anything to be with you. But I don't want you to be humiliated, to lose friends or get in trouble with our family because of me. "
Gwen chuckled, "Ben, my last boyfriend had a criminal past and I adopted a child when I'm only 18 and still attending college. Do you think I don't know what it's like to have people talking crap about me? I don't care. I bet when my mom and my friends find out, they'll think you're a step up when compared to Kevin, even if they still think I'm a bad picker. "
"But you are a bad picker," Ben said, "Lucky me."
They both burst into laughter, and then remained silent for a few moments, until Dawn complained, "Can we go already?"
Ben and Gwen left the car holding hands with Dawn. In front of the party hall door, Gwen gave Ben a quick peck on the lips and repeated, "We are who we are."
Dawn handed over the gift Ben had bought for the birthday girl, and her mother was right, the two little girls quickly became friends. In the party hall, there was a slide, a ball pool, and several toys for the children to play with. Dawn was having a blast.
"I'm getting nostalgic," Ben commented to Gwen while they watched Dawn play with her new friends in the ball pool, "I remember when it was the two of us playing like that."
"Why don't we go there too?" Gwen suggested.
"Are you serious? We're too old," Ben said.
Gwen rolled her eyes, "And you used to say I'm the one who doesn't know how to have fun. Doofus," she pulled Ben by the arm and the two of them entered the ball pool. It was quite large and parents were allowed to get inside to play with their children.
"Mommy! Daddy!" Dawn exclaimed happily.
"Dawn, let's hit Mommy dweeb!" Ben said and started throwing balls at Gwen. The redhead soon retaliated, throwing balls back at him. It was just like old times.
Another thing Ben enjoyed a lot at the party was the food. Snacks, chocolate truffles, pie, cake...
"Watch your manners, Ben!" Gwen scolded him for chewing with his mouth open, "Just because you played in the ball pool like you did when you were a kid, it doesn't mean you need to be gross like you were when you were a kid!"
"I've always had good manners, ever since I was a kid," Ben said... and then let out a burp. "Oops, my bad."
"I changed my mind. It's too humiliating to be seen in public with you. I want to break up," Gwen rolled her eyes.
Then Dawn let out a burp too and laughed, "Look, Daddy, I know how to do it too!"
Gwen gave Ben a disapproving look.
"Okay, okay," Ben said sheepishly. "I have a daughter now. I promise that I will try hard to improve my manners and be a good example."
Ms. Agnes introduced Ben and Gwen to several parents there. For the cousins' luck, no one asked too many questions. Possibly people noticed that Ben and Gwen were very young "parents" and imagined that questions would embarrass them.
But Ben wasn't embarrassed. He was proud. Ben put his hand on Gwen's waist and pulled her closer to him. Gwen was the most beautiful, intelligent and funny girl he knew, and she was his girlfriend. And together they were raising a wonderful little girl.
At some point during the party, a clown arrived to entertain the children. Dawn had a good time, but Ben was a bit uncomfortable - he was no longer afraid of clowns, but that didn't mean he liked them. And Ben's discomfort was actually justified.
The clown gave balloons to the children, tying them in the kids' arms so the balloons wouldn't fly away. But Dawn's balloon was not tied very well, and it flew up.
And then Dawn stretched out her tiny hands towards the balloon - which was on the ceiling of the party hall - and it levitated down back to her hands.
"Wow, what a coincidence. My little girl is very lucky," Gwen said with a fake smile to a couple that was sharing the table with her and Ben.
There was nothing they could do but hope that everyone there would believe that the balloon coming down was just a coincidence, and hope that no one would think Dawn had powers.
Hours later, back at the apartment, Dawn was sitting on a mat on the floor watching a cartoon on the TV while Ben and Gwen were sitting on the couch.
"It was a close call at the party today," Ben said in a low voice. "Do you think people believed that the balloon thing was a coincidence?"
"I think so," Gwen laid her head on Ben's shoulder as he wrapped his arms around her waist. "But I have to find a way for Dawn not to use magic in public, and I have to do it fast. She's only three years old. She's too young to understand that she can't do it. Probably in her head all the other children are just like her too."
Ben buried his nose in the redhead's hair and took in its pleasant fragrance. "You have a lot of books about magic. Doesn't any of them have advice from a wizard dad or a witch mom for this kind of thing?"
Gwen giggled. "Not really. Usually children with magical powers don't start to manifest their powers that early. But Dawn is very powerful. She is an exception. I'll try to adapt a spell or look for an artifact that might help."
"I'm sure you'll find something. And maybe Grey Matter can come up with a solution for that too, I'm going to work on it... if you give me some motivation, of course," Ben added the last part in a joking tone.
"Your motivation is to keep our identities secret, Doofus," Gwen giggled. Ben kissed his cousin's cheek, pressing his lips against her soft skin for a long time. Now that they were together, he wanted to make up for all the time away from her. If there wasn't a child in the room, he would definitely be doing a lot more than a kiss on the cheek. But that could wait until Dawn's bedtime...
"Change the channel," Dawn said in a sulky voice tone. Ben and Gwen were so engrossed in the conversation with each other that they didn't notice the cartoon Dawn was watching was already over, and the news had started.
Ben was about to switch channels when he realized that the news showed brief videos of several of his aliens. Then the image cut back to the studio, with the hateful host Will Harangue.
"I am Will Harangue, and I've tirelessly denounced a threat from the outside - an ongoing alien invasion on our planet. I have to admit that I wasn't quite right in my assumptions."
Ben laughed. "Is this jerk finally going to admit that I'm a hero and that he was wrong about me?"
"The threat doesn't come only from the outside, from other planets. It comes from our midst. All those aliens you saw in the previous footage are actually one person, an American. And his name is Benjamin Kirby Tennyson. We will show a full report with all the evidence, and expect the authorities to take the appropriate actions against this criminal."
If there wasn't a child in the room, Ben would utter a swear-word.
* Correction: Ben's identity WAS secret... up until now XD We will see the consequences of his identity being exposed in the next chapters.
* I could have included a 'hot' scene in this chapter, but I ended up cutting it for lack of time to write and to keep this T rated, but if there is a demand for it, after I finish the story, I can do an extra filler chapter with that scene.
* Thanks to Aurora Nighstar for beta reading this.