To say that Ben was screwed was like saying Vilgax had issues making friends, his roommates appearance at the exact time of his disturbing utterance could only spell one thing, social disaster. However, lucky for Ben his roommate proved oddly receptive to the statement, which is to say, he started to laugh hysterically.
" Ben, that hilarious! I mean yeah the "I kissed my cousin" is a weird choice for a joke, but I got to admit your surprised the hell out of me with that one. Faking being asleep and then scaring the crap out of me with a random statement, well done my friend, well done." Ethan said clapping a little, as he merely continued to laugh, believing that Ben's exclamation was a well planned joke containing a fair amount of shock value.
Ben could only sit there speechless, perhaps caught between discerning as to whether he had just suffered an incredible bout of luck, or if perhaps he had been giving his roommate's intelligence far more credit than it deserved… Still, whatever the reason, Ben needed a plan, his mind was racing at a thousand thoughts per second, trying to figure out how all of this had happened.
Okay, I've just got to calm down, first things first; I need to get Ethan out of here so I can plan what I'm going to do next. There's got to be an explanation…there just, I don't know, has to be!
However, before Ben could even begin to respond to Ethan, or think up even how he would respond, a knock loud enough to interrupt his roommates laughter cut through, the sound emanating from his hospital room door. The person behind the door turned out to be Max Tennyson, hoping to check in on his Grandsons progress after another full night's sleep.
"Oh, Hello there I didn't realize my grandson had a visitor" Max said, speaking to the young man sitting at Ben's bedside.
"Ah, Hello." Ethan said jumping up from his chair to introduce himself to the newly arrived guest. "My Name is Ethan, Ben's roommate you must be…his Father?" Unsure of whether his guess was correct or not his eyebrows unconsciously rearranged themselves to present a puzzled look.
Max Tennyson merely laughed at the young man's assumption, "oh, no, no, I'm Ben's Grandfather, but you were close."
"OH! So your Grandpa Max! Ben's told me about you before, you're the famous plumber right? He doesn't talk much about his family, or at all, so I only know a little. Nice meet you." Ethan said extending a hand, which Max took and firmly shook.
"Yes it's nice to meet you too." Max replied, however by this point his eyes had drifted to Ben and from what he saw he knew something had happened, though he wasn't exactly sure what.
"Say Ethan, I don't mean to be rude, but do you think I could speak with Ben for a little, I uh, need to discuss a few medical related issues with him."
"Huh, oh yeah, sure, I just dropped by to see how he was doing. Alright then Ben I'm glad to see your still in once piece, oh and by the way that stack of papers on the desk is the last few days class work enjoy~!" Ethan said snickering before he walked out the door, oblivious to the fact that Ben could give less of a damn about the work and more about how he would act around Grandpa Max.
His Grandfather now took the seat Ethan had been sitting in just recently. For a moment Max studied Ben's face, drawing in the look of confusion and anxiety he had within his eyes. Ben simply waited for his grandfather to say something, lacking the ability to properly formulate even the simplest greeting due to the torrent of emotions and thoughts now raging within. With a sigh, Max realized that he could no longer afford to keep his grandson in the dark, whatever was happening to him and Gwen, they deserved to know the truth.
"Ben, I think it's time we had a talk" Max said, looking awkwardly at the floor and running his hand through his silver hair.
Crap, there has never been a pleasant conversation that's ever started with those words…
"You see Ben, it's about those dreams you've been sharing with Gwen. The truth is, what you and Gwen are both experiencing is called the Somnial bond."
It was easy enough for Ben to tell his Grandfather was fairly uncomfortable with where this conversation was going, but Ben needed to figure out what his Grandpa knew, what had just happened with Gwen had left him too confused, he needed answers.
Still seeing the turbulent flow of emotions with his grandsons eyes Max continued. "As you may or may not know, Anodine is a planet populated by only females, however like humans they too require males to reproduce. You see, a long time before Earth was even created, Anodine was supposedly reaching its peek as an intergalactic dynasty. Despite this though, the planet still had its fair share of troubles. Male Anodite dominated the planet, creating an unequal caste system in which the women lived subservient to the men." Max paused a moment, allowing what he'd said to sink in and continuing to gauge Ben's reaction, as he still hadn't spoken a word.
"Apparently male Anodites were capable manipulating energy at a greater level than even the most powerful females, something that only fed their superiority complex I suppose. For an unknown amount of years this situation persisted until finally a rouge group of female Anodites fashioned a virus capable of affecting even their highly evolved species. They engineered it to specifically attack anyone on their planet who carried a set of mixed X and Y chromosomes." It was at this point that Max finally saw a reaction from his Grandson, a look or realization, genocide of the male species. It was true that Ben knew there many people in the Galaxy that had done terrible things, horrors no mind could examine in safety, but even he couldn't picture being responsible for that level of death, such indiscriminate killing. Though he did sympathize with the women of Anodine, he himself still felt the weight of that little girl's singular death, and he had to imagine that even evil men left their own weight…
Meanwhile on Anodine Gwen was going through a similar experience with her Grandmother. Like Ben she had also been told by her elder that it was time they had a talk. Currently she was sitting at the kitchen table, staring deeply into a cup of tea her grandmother had placed in front of her, listening. "Though I personally never lived through the days in which the male Anodites occupied the planet, many of this cities elders have, even now their eyes, in a certain light, can still seem troubled and haunted. Many even try to refuse the call of the somnial bond, because they are afraid of bringing back the old days in which we lived as we did, oppressed and constricted. It is not a part of our long history we are proud of…Still, an important lesson kiddo, especially for one such as yourself who has yet to fully learn of her heritage." Verdona sighed, this was not how she wanted to teach her granddaughter about their history, still it was important that she hear this, in hopes that she may come to understand what was happening to her.
"After the virus was released it ravaged the planet, the male Anodites had no defense against it and within a matter of years the planet was left empty of every male inhabitant it since its first dawn… However, it was only in the wreckage of our once proud world that we came to realize that we had doomed ourselves to extinction, without males we could not produce any new offspring. Surely we had known this before we released the virus, but our hatred overpowered our sense of reason." At this Verdona looked almost sad, the troubled look on her granddaughters face over this mass extinction causing her once again to realize the level of power her species had been given. Lesser species must either think they look like Gods or monsters, their actions either divine or demonic. To this she didn't know, and perhaps didn't care too, to her life was about living, which was why such talks often discomforted her so.
"Our species was ensured its extinction with this final act of revenge, or so we thought. It was about 348 years later when women, the youngest of the last generation, started to have the incessant dreams of strange people from across the universe. In each they met a male of a certain species who spoke with them through these dreams and shared with them fond memories" At this Gwen's head instantly perked up, aware of the similarity between what her grandmother was describing and what she had been experiencing. "These "dreams", these Somnial Bonds as they came to be called, were the answer to the survival of the Anodite species. For within the universe existed certain individuals of many different species that processed the ability to reproduce with Anodites…" Verdona watched as Gwen's eyes shot open in shock, her mind slowly starting to collect enough of this disturbing information to formulate a picture. However, before Gwen could even form a sentence Verdona cut her off. "Before you say anything Kiddo, there's something else you should know, these dreams, there not simply to inform every Anodite that there's a potential mate out there in the universe, it carries a somewhat…deeper meaning, if you know what I mean.
"As you know, Ben does have Anodite DNA, being my grandson after all, so you might assume that even though he doesn't have the "spark" that he might be compatible, however the Somnial bonds don't work like that... each is, unique." It was at this point that Verdona shifted uncomfortably in her seat, perhaps buying herself to time to find the proper words to explain the fearful conclusion that Gwen had perhaps already grasped.
Meanwhile on earth, Ben was struggling with the disclosure of similar information. Grandpa Max was sitting across from his bed, at a loss for finding a gentle way to explain what Ben was going through. Finally, with a sigh, Max decided it was best to simply be straight with Ben, there really was no way of saying this properly anyways, he doubted there could be.
"Ben, the Somnial bond is, or at least this is how it was described to me, the universes way of telling you…who your destined to fall in love with." Max waited for a reaction, any kind of reaction, from vomiting to outrage even to acceptance, but nothing came, not a noise or a twitch or even a blink, nothing.
It was a while before Ben even reacted to Max's words and when he did it was in the form of a question; "how?" A simple question that to Ben carried the weight to bridge worlds, to tear through space and bind two people in more ways that blood ever could.
Max responded as best he could, hoping that in some part of his explanation was the part Ben was looking for. "It has something to do with the Anodites ability to manipulate energy, who they are, they're very essence radiates across the universe until it finds its match. It's almost like a kind of echo location really, when an Anodite reaches a certain age this process starts." Max sighed.
On Planet Anodine Gwen had just received the same exact news from her grandmother and despite the shock that overwhelmed her body, which threatened her with stress induced unconsciousness, her heartbeat sped up, if even just a tiny bit.
"Anodites are pure mana Gwen, the closest a being can get to the same substance from which everything was born. However, mana exists in many forms, many philosophical, many spiritual, in many forms we know, but cannot classify. Your mana, resonates with Ben. Who you are to him and who he is to you, is no longer restricted by blood, you are bound by a dream and so much more." Verdona said, her old wispy eyes, whom played with whimsy like a cats now shone a stony grey. Verdona was unsure and unsettled, yet not upset and not without sympathy to a situation just as this.
Worlds away, separated by space and time, by stars and planets that many eyes had never even glimpsed, the impossible unity of two people transcended what even the greatest minds couldn't have guessed at. Ben and Gwen Tennyson, cousins, heroes, protectors of that small pale, blue dot called earth, were now tasked with one of mankind's oldest and greatest hardships, the enigma of the heart.
Yeah, I know it's mostly filler, but it needs to be here plot-wise or the story doesn't work. Don't worry the next chapters the confrontation between Ben and Gwen, so you know it'll be good. Anyways, I hope you all enjoy this newly chapter and its newly rewritten predecessors. Till next time.
