Chapter 12

Gwen had been up since before dawn now. Having caught a couple of fish, she now sat before the rebuilt campfire, cooking them for that morning's breakfast. As she looked out over the water beyond the beach, she felt a strange chill run along her spine. With the rising sun would come new prospects. One was how on earth she and her cousin were going to successfully destroy the Omnitrix. Another was regarding the seemingly brand new issues that had arisen as of the night before.

What could or would she and Ben possibly have to say to each other following the awkward events of the night before? Gwen had no idea, and she was also pretty sure that Ben would have no bright ideas about it, either.

Moving the fish away from the fire, Gwen carefully placed the skewered food down upon a cloth on the sands, before looking over her shoulder, back in the direction of the hut.

Within the dwelling, a straggly-haired Ben had just awoken. Stretching his arms beyond his head, he sat with his back against a wall. He had vague flashes of memories from the night before running through his mind, and they wouldn't seem to clear away. In particular, the image of Gwen's startled face seemed to strike him pretty hard. He hadn't meant to scare her with his kisses or with his touches. He felt really pathetic, coming to the realization that he might not be able to express his feelings for Gwen in a way that didn't scare her.

Thinking of her fearful expression again, he ultimately decided that it was ueless - that he was useless. The best he could surely hope for was for he and Gwen to be able to go about their day as if the night before hadn't happened at all. If only that were possible.

Getting up and exiting the hut, Ben immediately spotted his cousin down on the sands of the beach, near a small fire. It was then that Ben smelled the fish, too. Gwen had already made breakfast for them, or so it seemed.

"Morning," he said to her as he approached her, before taking a seat across from her on the sand.

"Morning," she replied, not meeting Ben's eyes with her own. "I made us something to eat."

"Yeah, I can see that. Smells good," he answered, before shifting slightly.

Despite her initial inward thoughts on the matter, Gwen hesitated for a moment, before saying, "Listen, about last night-"

"Maybe it's best if we don't talk about it," Ben said, before inwardly wincing as he saw the stung look on Gwen's face. "Er, I mean…"

"No, it's fine," she said to him, casting her eyes downward. "We probably shouldn't talk about it."

Sighing, Ben got to his feet, before dusting hisself off and walking away, off toward the forest.

"Where are you going?" Gwen called after him, but he didn't answer, nor did he even bother to look back. All he seemed to be capable of was saying the wrong things anyway, so what was even the point of giving her some sort of answer?

Left to her own devices as Ben disappeared altogether into the woods, Gwen hastily stood up, before picking up the cooked fish on the skewers and tossing them as hard as she could forward, into the water. Why had she even bothered to cook at all? She was clearly pretty useless, was she not?

Taking a nearby, broken piece of a jar, she stepped to the edge of the water and collcted some of it into the container before returning to the campfire and empyting the collected water over it, dousing its flames. Feeling fit to cry, she then threw the jar as well, before wading back out into the water, not stopping until she was up to her neck. She'd just stay there, she decided to herself, until the ocean decided it wanted to carry her away. It might not have been the best of ideas, but with everything going so awkward and insane lately, she felt that she'd just as soon be carried away by the waves than to do the inevitable, which was to face her feelings for her cousin.

And after all, why did Ben have to be so stubborn anyway? As far as Gwen was concerned -the more and more she thought about it- the events from the night before were definitely worth at least mentioning, if not all-out discussing. It was not worth Ben just storming away from her with a complete refusal to discuss it. She knew she couldn't be sure about him, but just the thought of what had happened the night before -the touches, the kisses- made her heart race and her stomach squirm.

As she continued to stand out in the midst of the water for a good time longer, she eventually decided to give up her intent of letting the water simply drift her away. Instead, she stripped off her top (which she knew would weigh her down a bit too uncomfortably as she left the water) and she then dipped down beneath the water just once more, feeling the coolness of it wash over her, as if it were some form of a self-baptism. Finally, needing a breath of air, she arose up and broke the surface of the water once more, her long auburn locks just managing to cover over her bare breasts as she stood there.

Unbeknownst to her, Ben had long since returned from the woods. Paused at the edge of the trees, he found that practically all of his other thought processes had come to a standstill as his eyes laid sight upon the vision of the half-naked Gwen standing amidst the light waves of the water. He could feel a strange sort of urge arise in his stomach as he watched her clutch the wet shirt she'd stripped herself of, before beginning to wade her way back to shore. Her hair was still covering over her chest, but just barely so, and while some small part of him felt that he should feel ashamed to be witnessing this sight, another part of Ben felt as if he couldn't have looked away from it even if his life had depended on it.

Watching and waiting until Gwen had reached the part of the sands and the rocks where the campfires were usually made and kept, Ben then felt enough courage to begin to step away from the woods further, walking more and more closely, until he, too, was standing on the sands and rocks there with his cousin.

"Gwen?" he said simply, looking back at her as she turned her head in surprise to look back at him.

"I… I thought you'd gone off, ran away into the woods," she said to him; she did little more than to simply make sure her hair was still hanging over her breasts to keep them covered as she spoke to him.

"Yeah, well, I did, but, I came back," Ben answered her simply, slowly turning to face his cousin as he spoke. "I was thinking about how I'd blown you off, and how unfair it was, and I was coming back to talk to you about it , but, you were in the water…"

By this point, Ben was standing right in front of the redhead, his own bare chest heaving ever so slightly as he looked back into her eyes. How he'd never quite noticed it before, he couldn't be sure, but he now saw that his cousin's eyes were a perfect almond shape, bejewled with the rarest and most sincerely beautiful emeralds known to mankind.

Feeling lost in the sight of them - practically entranced - Ben found himself slowly placing a hand on Gwen's tanned, damp shoulder. Her skin soft and smooth to the touch, he caressed his fingers first along it, and then down her arm, before pausing to take hold of her hand. Lifting his chin to again look into her eyes, Ben leant forward suddenly, still clasping onto Gwen's hand as his lips met the corner of her mouth, before moving lower, planting kisses along her jaw line… and eventually down her throat.

As the kisses gradually became harder and more determined, moving lower and lower, Gwen had a feeling that she should try to stop her cousin and his advances. She didn't though, finding that the feeling to fight back was quickly fleeting, before very well disappearing altogether.

No, Gwen instead gave in, letting Ben take control of her, letting him guide her into whatever new waves they'd fumble theirselves into next that night.