Future Fic. Companion piece to "After the Fall." Read that one first or this won't make much sense. The man inside the monster.
Alien-Force-meets-10K continuity. So kind of future Alien Force with Ken and Gwenie existing (with purposely unnamed mom), or 10K with nonevil Kevin and no Kai, whichever way you want to see it.
If you're wondering, "What's with all the Ken 10-type fics?", I'm currently involved in an RPG where I play Ben's daughter. So that's where my head's been lately. I fully intend to write some more Alien Force stuff as soon as inspiration hits me.
Disclaimer: Ben 10 and its characters are owned by Cartoon Network, and I am using them without permission. Please don't sue.
After the Fall: Ben Tennyson
On my worst days, I wish I could cease to exist in reality the same way I have in practicality.
I was supposed to be strong, inspiring, but Ben 10K, Hero of Heroes, has given up hope.
I know that rumors circulate about me, the real me, not the thing that inherits what is technically still my body. I know, because he hears them, in whispered places that he hasn't quite been able to subdue. Others assume that he allows them to continue because it amuses him, which is true at some points, but at other times it really does irritate him. Which shows over others isn't quite as total as would like you to believe.
Right, the rumors. Some think that I was destroyed the moment he came to being; others that I'm secretly fighting him from the inside. Some think that I've been working with him this whole time, or that he isn't a separate personality at all, that he is what I really am.
The truth is much sadder. I'm still here, inside of the monster, who luckily can't actually wear my face. I'm here; I can see and hear everything he sees and hears, and even know a limited amount of his thoughts and feelings. But I am powerless against anything he can do. I've tried; trust me, I've tried, but I can't stop him.
I'm sorry, so sorry, I can't stop him….
I thought, at first, those first few months would be the worst, that it could never get worse than that. Since our symbiosis began, I've never been more than any annoying gnat in his head to him. Despite that, he has always drawn pleasure from torturing me in whatever ways he could. Usually, that meant torturing my loved ones.
I remember Kevin's murder vividly. And it was a murder. Even though it was in the heat of battle, it was a murder. He specifically sought out Kevin. He took my best friend, my brother, and gutted him, laughing all the while.
His next target was, of course, Gwen. He tore down and slaughtered every Plumber in a mile radius around her, and she was captured without him inflicting a single scratch to her.
He kept her locked in a dark room for two months after that. No food, no water, no contact. She was part Anodite, he knew she could absorb enough energy from around her to survive.
Her only company? The severed head of her husband.
I was never before glad that a car accident that had killed my parents several years prior.
We finally went to visit her.
Afterwards, we came to see her. He had speculated, amusedly, about what had happened to her. Had she gone insane? Was she now broken? In her anger was she naive enough to think that she could still somehow stop him.
Turns out, it was the last one. I've never seen her more p---ed off. She stared at me with the most vicious look I have ever seen in my life, and I was glad, so glad, for the small bit of mercy that meant he could not torture people from my own face.
Most of the conversation, I don't remember. It's been nearly a decade now, since it all began, and I've lost a lot, had to block it out. I know he taunted her, and she sniped at him.
At the end, though, she looked straight in my/our eyes, and said, "Fight him, Ben. You fight him, you fight him until you win, you hear me?"
I was glad he hadn't broken her. Too bad I could have done as she asked.
When we left, he gave her, like a present, to Morningstar. I haven't seen her in a while, don't know if she's alive or dead, but the last time I did? She was just a cold, lifeless husk of a body.
If Devlin was at the battle, I/we never saw him. He issued an enormous bounty, and after several leads, a hunter came forward, claiming to have the body. But in flight, there was an explosion, and what they brought us was unidentifiable. His rage was great and the death toll for that mistake was high, but we never did find out if it was Devlin or not.
I save some of the small amount of hope I still have inside me that he's still out there, alive and safe.
I thought I'd never survive the horror of those first few months. But the truth is, I don't have the ability to die. I can't cease to exist, even if I've begged whatever larger power our there to let me. When I first met a time traveler we named Paradox, he said he had gone insane, and then responded by going sane. I laughed at that, but now, I understand. I got a sort-of horror fatigue; the events around me were so horrible yet completely unstoppable that my mind could no longer feel the pain of it. The best way I can describe it is that it's like I've been sitting in front of a TV screen for the past decade, unable to move, change the channel, or affect the show. It just plays on and on in front of me. At points, I've shut down so much I've become mostly catatonic. My mind is there, but unfunctioning, unthinking. It is both a pleasant and disturbing state of nothingness. These days, nothingness is better.
The only times I'm able to force myself out of this state is when my wife and children get mentioned. They are my, Ben Tennyson's, only link to reality and life beyond.
From the very beginning, he has offered huge bounties the likes the universe has never seen for the three of them, alive. He has used every tool at his disposal, from armies, task forces, and bounty hunters to psychics and private detectives. His interest has always been the amusement he can get in using them against me. It is a continuous frustration to him that, while he controls galaxies, he can't get his hands on one human woman and two little children.
Though I guess Kenny and Gwen aren't very little anymore….
He speculates often what he will do with the kids when he finds them. Will he torture them? Abuse them? Try to manipulate them by pretending to be me? Gut them and mount their head on our dresser? He imagines, in great detail, what he will do, just to amuse himself at my expense. Even that gets boring for him after a while, and I doubt I could be a worse person. How can I be desensitized to the pain of my own kids?
But, every so often, a rumor with their names pops up, and I drag consciousness back to active mode and listen in. As much as I feel guilt over all that has happened, as much as I hate and damn myself for all the evil perpetrated by my body, I know it really wasn't my fault. It was an accident. I've gone over and over it, and there wasn't much I could have done to avoid it. Maybe if I had been less amused at the number of DNA samples I could amass and more interested in learning about what I was gaining… but that that was all I really could have done differently. I take full responsibility, don't worry about that. But there is only so I can blame myself before it is counterproductive. I was trying to do good, use my powers responsibly, for the good of all.
With my kids, it's different. I felt I had a responsibility to the universe t use my powers proactively, but my responsibility to them is much deeper and more important. I was responsible for their lives, for being born. I was responsible for their food, shelter, clothing. I was supposed to raise them and teach things beyond super-heroing and more along the lines of how to walk and read, tie shoe laces and hock a loogie (and I still remember when, upon finding out I would have a daughter, Uncle Frank sat me down and explained to me all the things I was responsible with a girl. "Boys will always have friends willing and able to teach them things like loogie hocking. With a girl, it's her dad's job."). I'm supposed to teach Kenny about girls and harass Gwen's dates. Since I can't be the father they deserve to have, the very least I can do is to pay attention to if they're dead or alive.
I wonder about them a lot. I resent that he can hear when I do, but have grown so accustomed to it now that it doesn't stop me. Would I recognize them if I saw them? Ken, probably; he always looked so much like me. Does he still like superman ice cream? Does he grin as it drips down his chin? Do they even have ice cream wherever he is? Has Gwenie outgrown her tomboy stage, or would she still rather wear cleats than patent leather? Can you still tell she's tired because she plays with her hair?
Do they wonder about me? Do they think I'm gone, or that I am here, deep inside him? Do they hate me? Do they know that I love them, would do anything to make the universe safe again, if only for them? They were so young, Gwenie especially, have any memories of who I was survived?
I hope they hate me. No, I take that back. I hope that, if the worst happens and I do see them again, that they will look at us and feel nothing. Then and only then will they be immune from what he will do to them. He may be able to hurt them physically, but psychologically? They'll be safe.
As much as I miss and speculate about them, I pray to god every night that I never see them again. I've taken so much, I don't want to take their lives too.
So much as changed since the day I put on the Omnitrix all those years ago. At the time, I was just having fun, an adventure. Later, it became about protecting earth, and then the universe. To say I failed spectacularly on all fronts? Understatement of the century.
I don't know if it is possible to stop us. At this point, I don't think it's possible. I've seen a lot of good people lose their lives trying. I think the universe is stuck like this for awhile. But I'm not immortal, no matter what form I'm in. One day, this body and all its inhabitants will die. When that happens, I can only hope that all those good people left will unite and fix what I broke so marvelously.
Most people hope to live to see a better day. I hope to die to bring that day about.