Chapter 11

It had been the near equivalent of a night's sleep since the Tennyson cousins had vowed to destroy the Omnitrix. While Gwen had eventually managed to fall asleep there on the sands by the camp fire, somewhere in the wee hours of morning, Ben had been kept wide awake the entire time, thoughts of just how he'd manage to destroy the Watch keeping him from actually getting to sleep. And so as he sat there on the sands, his eyes finally fell upon the sight of his cousin, who had lucked out far better in the sleep department than he himself had.

Her figure was alighted by the blazes of the campfire and the breezes tousled her hair about lightly. As he became more focused upon the sight, Ben found himself smiling faintly. Looking at Gwen seemed to - at least momentarily - pull him away from his uneasy thoughts.

As the wind danced across Gwen's skin, she gave a bit of a shiver, and Ben moved to sit over, nearer to her, placing a hand at her shoulder. Despite the shudder he'd witnessed, her skin was warm to the touch. Moving to then lie next to her, Ben made to wrap his arm around her, snugging it about her waist. His lips came to rest at the back of her shoulders, and his eyes fell upon the sight of the freckles at the back of her neck. As the moments passed, he began to silently count the number of them, one by one, before eventually placing a finger against her skin, connecting the dots with an invisible line via his fingertip.

As he traced this invisible line from dot to tinier dot, Gwen would, on occasion, shiver or sigh. At one point she tried to roll over onto her other side, but Ben kept her securely in place with his arm around her, and she ceased any struggles to move.

Gwen was beautiful. This thought alone was one that Ben could not get out of his mind. Here he was, all on his own with a most perfect creature on a most beautiful island - an island they had all to themselves. If it weren't for missing their family, then life might've been considered quite perfect for them. Snuggling in a bit more closely to her, Ben soon found himself caught up in the fragrance of Gwen's hair. Whatever it was exactly, he couldn't be sure, but he found it to be both floral and musky, and it intoxicated him.

"I'll never let you go, Gwen," he murmured into her skin, before planting several small kisses at the bared tops of her shoulder blades.

She tasted of honeysuckle to him, and so he continued to kiss her more, his lips trailing a line all the way from the back of her shoulders to the back of her neck, then around to the side of it. Amidst all of this, Gwen gave a slight groan, and the sound of it returned Ben to his senses. What was he doing? Surely he shouldn't be touching and kissing her this way, and especially not as she sleeps. Still, it was an intriguing thing, whatever it was that made him feel compelled to place his lips and his fingers to her skin.

Inwardly sighing, Ben eventually relaxed back into a more still state as he lay there alongside his cousin, an arm draped about her middle. Little did he know that she wasn't so much asleep as he'd assumed her to be, and if he could have taken just one look at the pink flushed across her face, he'd have known it for sure.

Lying with her face opposite to his, Gwen subtley snuggled in even closer to her cousin, liking how secure it made her feel to have his arm wrapped around her so tightly. True, though it was, that his kisses had awakened her, she found that she'd never quite gotten woken up in such a nice way before in all her life. In either case, the places where Ben's lips had touched her where still burning; still tingling. She longed for the feeling of it again, but at the same time felt too awkward to actually just say so.

And so, in silence, the two remained huddled together on the sands of the beach by the fire, both thinking the other asleep, neither saying a single word to one other. The only sounds to be heard were the sounds of the breeze and the nearby water as it crashed upon the shore. An occasional bug chirp broke this consistant melody, but not much else, and it wasn't until Ben felt the splash of a raindrop against his cheek that he felt compelled to move from his spot.

Awakening himself from his half-awake, half-dosed off state of being, the tanned young man got to his feet, before lifting up Gwen in his arms, intending to take them both to the shelter of the little hut. However, the redhead faltered with her feign of sleep as she felt herself become lifted up into his arms.

"Sorry I woke you," Ben said to her as he carried her away, toward the hut. "But rain is starting to fall, so I figured we'd do better under a rooftop than without one."

"Makes sense," Gwen replied in a sleepy sort of voice, before hitching her legs out to the side. "I can walk, though."

"Well, alright," Ben said, clumsily releasing her from his grasp as they both lost their footing and balance; the result was a tangled mess of limbs there on the ground just before the hut.

"Good going," Gwen said, unlinking her arm from around Ben's neck as they simultaneously moved to get up from the ground.

"You're the one who just had to be put down," Ben pointed out, before getting to his feet once more. "Now then, I-"

However, taking a single step forward, the teenager found himself on the ground again, this time lying on his back. Gwen, who'd knocked him down again, was straddling him, her knees at either of his sides.

"And I suppose this is all my fault, too?" she asked him, not bothering to get up off him, even as the rain began to pour in something fierce.

"Well, obviously it is," Ben agreed, his palms feeling the mushy mud beneath the grass on the ground beneath him.

"Right," Gwen replied. "You've got two left feet, but every single fall is my fault. I see."

"Well, not every single fall," Ben then said to her, before quickly reaching for her waist and tickling her, rolling them first over onto their sides, and then some more, until their roles were reversed, with Gwen lying on her back, Ben hovering over her.

As he looked down at his cousin amidst the falling raindrops, he said to her, "You know, I'm getting a distinct feeling of déjà vu…"

"Yeah, well, if it involves a crab cutting off some of my hair, then you're a dead man this time," Gwen answered him at once, before moving quickly to flip Ben back on over to his back, where she could hover supreme once more. "Besides," she then said to him. "Who's the real winner now?"

"I'd have to say, I am…" Ben answered her, lifting his face as he brought a hand to the back of her hair, bringing her face downward to greet his as their lips met for a kiss.

Deepening the kiss a bit, Gwen relaxed her stance as she hovered over Ben, allowing her body to slowly meld downward atop his, all while their lips remained locked, sharing a kiss that could've set nearly anything ablaze. Eventually though, the pair parted, and when they did, it was Gwen who scrambled to her feet first, a troubled look on her face.

"What's wrong?" Ben asked her, both looking and feeling puzzled.

"I… I don't know," Gwen answered truthfully, placing a hand over her chest. "I just feel dizzy, like I might be coming down with something. I don't know… it's a weird feeling."

"Yeah, I think I know what you mean," Ben admitted, a hand against his own lower stomach. "It happens sometimes when I think about you, or kiss you, or, well, even think about kissing you."

Unsure as to why, this admission sent Gwen's heart into overdrive, and her face turned a shade of scarlet unlike any ever seen before. "Well then, maybe I should go over to the other side of the island for a little while, so that I don't make you feel any, well, sicker, you know?"

"No, don't go," Ben said to her, raising his voice a bit to talk over the sound of the rain. "Come back into the hut with me for the night. Please, won't you? It's coming a real bad storm outside anyway."

Still feeling dizzy and lightheaded, Gwen glanced upward toward the sky. She could spy lightning and grey-to-black clouds all about; Ben was certainly right about the weather.

"Well, alright then," she finally relented, walking past Ben and entering on into the tent.

Soon following after her, the young man hesitated in the doorway, saying, "You know that sick feeling we both get?"

"Yeah, Ben?"

"Well, Gwen… does it really make you, personally, sick -sick, or just kind of sick?"

Confused, she answered, "I have no idea what you just said."

Sighing, Ben tried again. "What I mean is, sure, it feels funny, but it's also funny in a good kind of way. Do you get my drift, Gwen?"

Moving to settle down by a wall within the hut, Gwen gave her a cousin a nod of her head, before looking away, too embarrassed to keep eye contact with Ben for much longer. She did indeed get his drift - that was part of the problem.