AN: Hey old and new readers. I probably should have said this in the last chapter, but I forgot so: I'm back! Anyway, I have a question for you readers. I've been intending to eventually get some pairings made more noticable or develop later in the series, but I was curious as to what other people's opinions on the subject were. Should I just keep the characters with the patners from their own universes, (eg. Roxas/Namine, Gwen/Kevin, Gohan/Videl) or mix them within the group (eg. Gwen/Roxas, Gohan/Namine). Kim's staying with Ron, that one won't change, but if anyone has a pairing idea involving any of the others, put it in a review and I'll see what I can do with it. Thanks.
Chapter 2
Drowsy, green eyes slowly opened as the brunette came back to consciousness, his sleep interrupted by the constant chatter of people and birds and the louder screeches of car wheels and horns. As he slowly shrugged off the drowsiness, the first thing he noticed was the feeling of cold cement beneath his bare chest.
That's odd. We were at the lake and there isn't anything man made for miles... and there definitely wasn't any cars or crowds! His mind snapping into full alert, he jump up to his feet and stared in shock and confusion at the sight before him.
Gone were the lush trees and sparkling water. The few trees and bushes around the area were surrounded by concrete jungles. Cars flooded the streets, frequently blowing their horns at the cars before them and the footpaths were just as crowded with people of all ages.
"Well, at least we'll blend in with the crowd." He mused, notice a number of them in swim suits with towels over their shoulders. The thought immediately reminded him of the others and he whipped around to find Danny, Roxas and Kim still unconscious and scattered around what appeared to be a skate park in which they'd somehow landed in. Worried that they were hurt, he ignored his surroundings completely and rushed to Kim's side.
"Guys, come on wake up. Kim... Kim, open your eyes." He called, gently shaking her. His actions seemed to have the desired effect, causing relief to flood his system as stirred and opened her eyes groggily. His relief only grew as a moment later, though his eyes were still closed, began stretching. Despite not knowing what exactly happened or where they were, Ben still couldn't help chuckling as Roxas' eyes bolted open and he jumped up into a sitting position, his arms crossing over his chest.
"Ben? What's going on? Wait, forget that, where are we?" Kim cried as reality crashed down on her, her memories of the event coming right back.
"I'm not sure." Ben sighed, shaking his head as Roxas moved over to Danny, shaking him awake. "I would have thought that blast would have destroyed us. Did it somehow teleport us somewhere? Or did someone move us after we were hit?"
"This isn't exactly where captors have dragged me before." Danny groaned as Roxas helped him into a sitting position. "I'm voting for the blast doing it."
"So it shot us to God alone knows where and even I don't have so much as a bruise to show for it?" Kim asked sceptically, raising an eyebrow. "How would that even be possible?"
"Have you ever heard the saying 'mixing magic and technology can has unpredictable and disastrous results'?" Roxas responded, shaking his head. "I don't know what spell Gwen used, but mixing magic with a molecular disrupter beam sounds like some that really should be avoided if you ask me. Though it has definitely saved our lives. I'd say instead of throwing all of our molecules to the winds, it molecularly transported us somewhere."
"Well, then can you create a portal and take us back to the lake? We need to check Gwen, Grampa and Kevin." Ben asked hastily, his worry clearly evident on his face. Roxas' looked back sadly as he shook his head.
"If I'm right about how we got here, there's no telling where here is. A different city, country... or maybe an entirely different dimension." He sighed. "Without knowing where we are, the portal may just take us to the middle of deep space or into a volcano for I know. And we just so happen to be in a different dimension, any portal I created to take us home has a one in a million chance of getting us there. I can open interdimensional portals, but I can't direct what dimension they open to. We could end up anywhere in any dimension."
"So without an indestructible space ship, we shouldn't try that." Danny stated, his shoulders sagging.
"Sorry Ben." Roxas said sadly, looking down at the ground.
"It's ok. Let's just find out where we are and go from there." Ben replied understandably. It wasn't like he could ever blame the blond for their situation. He didn't cause it and if their crossing paths with the Freight Knight was anything to go on, Roxas, like Ben, didn't even know of his full power, let alone how to master everything he was capable of.
Nodding in agreement, the others got to their feet and followed the shape shifter towards the street.
"Umm..." Roxas started embarrassedly, blushing and grabbing his arms again as he noticed some of the teenage girls checking him out. "While we're at it, does anyone have some money I can borrow? I REALLY want a shirt on now."
...
Gohan and 'Ben' watched from the door as Namine bent over Gwen, her white, glowing hands placed on the redhead's stomach. The healing energy drifted all over Gwen's body, sealing cuts and putting bones back into place, but the effort required to fully heal Gwen was clearly too much as Namine had to stop midway, collapsing onto the bed.
"Namine, are you still awake?" Gohan asked, at her side in an instant, 'Ben' not far behind. Yawning loudly, Namine nodded her head as Gohan picked her up and laid her on the spare bed nearby.
"I managed to heal their most life threatening wounds." Namine said softly, her heavy eyelids closing. "All three will live, but they're all still... in bad shape. Keep them sedated while I sleep." She muttered, her voice becoming softer and softer as she fell into an exhausted sleep. Leaving her to her rest, Gohan turned to 'Ben' sympathetically.
"They'll be ok. Just let them sleep it off. You alright with monitoring them while I call the others? I'd like to get back at whoever did this and find out what happened to Kim, Danny and Roxas as soon as possible."
"Do you mind if we switch roles and I make the calls?" 'Ben' asked, feigning hesitancy. "Watching them is just making me more worried."
"Sure. If that's what you want." Gohan nodded, a little confused, but he brushed it off as nothing. "Call me when they get here. It shouldn't take long for them to arrive."
"Right." 'Ben' nodded, ducking out of the room. A dark smirk crossed his face as he made his way down the hallway, following the path that the blueprints he'd hacked into said lead to the bridge. I'll have to give them the alert to keep up appearances, but after that, I'll have plenty of time to do my job. He thought darkly, barely holding back a snigger.
It didn't take him long to find the bridge and he immediately went to the com system. "Let's make this quick, the big brute is hardly the patient type." He muttered to himself as he activated the system. It was easy to work the system and he quickly managed to open the connections to Jake and Rai. "Guardians come in, we have an emergency." He called, feigning panic. As predicted, the boys were quick to respond, their visuals appearing on screen.
"Rai here."
"Am Drag too. What's goin on?"
"We were blasted at the lake by one of Danny's old enemies." Albedo cried, letting a few alligator tears fall down his face. "Gwen's in bad shape, Namine's drained from having to bring her, Grampa and Kevin out of death's grip and there was no trace of Roxas, Danny or Kim after the blast."
"WHAT?" Jake and Rai shouted simultaneously, both going exceedingly pale. "You've gotta be kidding us." Rai added, desperate for it to be a sick joke.
"I wish I was." Albedo moaned in response, looking sadly at the ground. "We need you guys here as soon as possible to find out what happened to the others and stop this guy."
"We're on our way." Rai replied quickly, a furious look on his face as he signed off.
"Don't worry Ben, we'll fix this." Jake said reassuringly before signing out too.
As the screens went blank, a dark smile instantly replaced the sad look on Albedo's face. They were all falling into his hands, doing exactly what he'd predicted they'd do. And now he'd be left alone until he got warning of ships approaching the satellite. With all the free time he'd have before that happened, it shouldn't be much of a problem to complete phase two of the plan. Chuckling, he sat himself before the main computer and hacked in to all of the security and defences, both on the satellite. Once I'm done here, the planet will be completely defenceless. Then the real party will begin.
...
"Has anyone got a clue where we are yet?" Ben groaned, throwing his head back in exasperation. The group had been walking the streets for half an hour and he still had no clue as to where they were, only that it was near the beach and probably in America, judging by the accents. However, when Danny had pointed that out, Roxas had quickly put doubt in that hopeful thought by pointing out that many people in other worlds had the same accent. He after all was living proof of that.
"No, I haven't seen any... actually, scratch that, I'm going say the coast of Florida." Kim stated, stopping midsentence, staring strangely towards a shop.
"Really, how do you know that? I haven't seen any signs." Danny asked, looking towards the store she was staring at, expecting to see Florida up somewhere in big letters.
"Because it's part of the newspaper's name." Kim answered, pointing to the paper stand. "Off to the side of it is the date and I really hope it's a screw up."
"Why?" Ben asked approaching the pile of paper in question. "It just says... August 10 2005?" He gasped, his eyes growing to the size of dinner plates.
"Funny, I thought the date was somewhere in October in 2010." Roxas commented, though with Roxas, they were unsure whether he was being sarcastic or serious. Dates, like many other things, were different in different worlds and Roxas often ended up mixing them up.
"Talk about unpredictability." Danny cried incredulously before turning to the blond. "It's a good thing that we decided against trying a portal to the satellite. There's no base in space to go to."
"Forget about that right now." Ben said, frowning as he rubbed his forehead. "August 10th 2005 in Florida. That's ringing bells in my... holy crap, this is the place!" He cried, staring around the crowded area, as if only just noticing his surroundings. "And the hotdog guy..." He muttered, noticing a hotdog stand rolling into the area. "I'm here."
"Um yeah, we noticed that. We came here with you remember?" Kim responded, raising an eyebrow.
"No, I mean little me. Ten year old me." Ben said wildly, turning to the others and throwing his arm out to a clothes shop. "Grampa, Gwen and I will come running out of that shop about one minute after-"
A sudden explosion cut him off at that moment, causing all four of them to jump and whip around. There, in the middle of the street, a wheel from the hotdog stand rolled away from a burning mess and what looked like a mix and match monster.
"Kevin blows up a car and the hotdogs." Ben finished unnecessarily as the screaming crowd backed ran around like chickens with their heads cut off.
"That's Kevin?" Danny asked incredulously, watching as the freak of a creature shot fire and crystal shards at everything in sight. "Wow, have things changed!"
"Yeah, that's the old, evil Kevin." Ben nodded, watching the scene with his fingers twitching to the Omnitrix. However, just as he touched it, he seemed to realise what he was doing and pulled them away. "I guess since we know that I'll win, we should just stay out of this and let history take its course."
"Yeah, I guess you're-" Kim stopped and gasped, along with the rest of the group as a little girl tripped over a piece of debris right as Kevin turned in her direction, fire already growing in the palm of his molten arm. Screwing the whole 'don't change history' law, Kim charged straight in, right into the literal line of fire. The flames heating her skin even from a distance, Kim never slowed down as she reached the now crying little girl and scooped her into her arms before using her speed to flip onto and over a car, seconds before the flames would have consumed them.
"I never knew that happened." Ben muttered, looking horrified. "If that happened, then who else got killed before I reached a battle field?"
"Don't worry about that Ben, you can't help it. And the girl's safe now." Danny replied, transforming as Kim hand the crying girl to her worry stricken mother. "And seeing as Kevin's targeting Kim now, I'm going in." With that he took off into the air and shot straight at Kevin. He struck while the monster in question was approaching a glaring Kim menacingly, planting two fists into his chest and knocking him down into a truck with surprised and pained scream. "Hi ugly, meet Phantom."
...
"Come on, That's Kevin outside. I've got to stop him." The high pitched voice of a young Ben Tennyson shouted, shouldering his way through the crowd.
"Ben, wait for us. Kevin's too strong to fight blindly and we don't know what he's gained during his time in the Null Void." Gwen yelled as she and Max struggled to follow the boy.
"I don't have time to wait for slowpokes. Kevin's out there causing who knows... whoa, who are they?" Ben cried, going from impatient to astounded as he finally passed through the doors. He watched with amazement as Kevin tried to take a swipe at a flying guy with snow white hair in black and white spandex, only for the guy to phase right through his fist. At the same time, a redheaded girl leapt into the air, twisted her body in the air and slammed her heel in the joint connecting Kevin's neck to his shoulder, causing the behemoth to stumble with a gasp as she dropped away and twisted back to her feet.
"Wow, did you see that?" Gwen asked excitedly as she stopped beside Ben, her mouth and eyes open in amazement. "She didn't use and powers and still made Kevin stumble with just one kick. You couldn't do that with Four Arms." She added with a smirk.
"Oh yeah?" Ben snapped, reaching for the Omnitrix. "I'll show you what I can do."
"Don't bother." A masculine voice said as a hand covered the device, causing him to look up in surprise to find a brunette boy clad in only green swimming trunks grinning at him. He couldn't put his finger on it, but something about the guy seemed familiar. "They can handle this no problem." He added as a boy with blond hair clad in a green shirt and black swimming trunks came up beside him, looking a bit worried.
"Huh? How do know about this thing?" Ben asked suspiciously. The guy obviously knew about the Omnitrix, but he was sure that they hadn't met before.
"Now that would be telling." The brunette grinned before turning back to the fight. "Just watch the show. I promise that these two don't disappoint." Raising a confused eyebrow, Ben just did as he was told, as did Gwen and Max.
After a few seconds, the boys words rang true in the boy's mind as a ball of green energy struck home on Kevin's back, sending him face first into the ground. "Whoa, that guy is awesome!"
Kevin gave a primal scream as he thrust his crystalline arm up at Danny, sending a barrage of dagger like shards straight at him. However, the ghost boy just stood there and grinned before turning intangible at the last minute, leaving the shards to crash into nearby cars and buildings and making civilians scatter.
"Damn it! Stop phasing!" Kevin growled, leaping into the air. Seeing Danny simply rise higher, he tried rapidly flapping his insectoid wings to get what little height and prolonged flight they gave his bulky body. However, Kim chose that moment to remind him of her presence as she leapt off a car and onto his back as he started to rise. Grinning cockily, she grabbed the base of all of his wings in her hands, inhibiting their movement.
"Get off of me, you good for nothing weakling." Kevin growled, turning his head as far around as he could to see her as he tried in vain to get his back there and grab her.
"I'll give you good for nothing weakling." Kim snapped. Following his wishes, she jumped off, only to use his head as a board, kicking off of it into a back flip as they got close to the ground. The sudden, unexpected force on such a sensitive part of his body caused his body to spin forward and he crashed head first into the ground, Kim landing gracefully on her feet a few meters away.
"You'll pay for that girl." Kevin growled between ragged gasps. "You and the freak boy up in the sky."
"Hey! Who are you calling a freak?" Danny shouted, looking quite offended. "At least I don't look like a mix and match reject."
The retort only seemed to make Kevin angrier as he used his full speed before jumping off a car and rebounding off a building, breaking a hole in the wall in the process, straight towards Danny, fire appearing in his molten hand and a sharp blade growing from the crystalline one.
Danny just smirked at him for a second before disappearing without a trace.
"What?" Kevin cried, the flames disappearing as his concentration broke. "Where did he go?"
"Up here!" Dual voices called, using the exact same voice and tone. Turning himself in the air, Kevin had just enough time to widen his eyes before to identical, grinning phantoms shot balls of energy the size of basketballs at his chest and stomach. Screaming in pain, he plummeted back to the earth, dust and debris flying all over the crowd as he made a crater in the road.
"Maybe we should help." Roxas said softly, catching all of the Tennysons' attention.
"What? Nah, they have this under control." Ben brushed it off.
"I'm fully aware that they don't need saving, I can't say the same for everyone else." Roxas responded, waving his hands around the area. "A lot of damage is being done and in case you haven't noticed, the crowds stopped running away five minutes ago. Now they're crowding around the fight and it's only a matter of time before someone's hurt."
"Your friend's right." Max stated firmly before turning to his youngest grandson. "Go finish this Ben."
"Right." Ben said cockily, moving to activate the Omnitrix again.
"Don't bother." Older Ben said again before turning back to the fight. "Hey guys, stop showing off and wrap this up will ya?" He shouted.
"Ok." Danny called.
"Not a problem." Kim shrugged.
"YOU THINK IT'S THAT EASY?" Kevin roared, charging in at Danny and Kim again. Not waiting to reach them this time, he took a deep breath and spat multiple slime balls at them.
"Now that's just gross." Kim shouted disgustedly, leaping into the air. Rising after her, Danny grabbed Kim by the waist and tossed her straight towards Kevin as hard as he could. Twisting her body in midair, she sailed over the big brute before spinning her body again and slamming her leg into the back of his knees, sending him tumbling towards the ground again. However, before he could fall halfway, Danny shot in front of him, both of his glowing hands placed right in the centre of Kevin's chest.
"Nighty night!" Danny smirked and released a powerful, point blank beam, blasting Kevin's screaming form away faster than any had seen him move before, over a ducking Kim and into a concrete wall, causing anyone nearby to run away screaming again. When the resulting dust settled, it revealed on sore and unconscious creature.
"Well, that takes care of that." Danny stated, dusting off his hands as he turned to the cheering crowd. The cheers sounded good to his ears, the second he noticed a camera and microphone in a pair's hands, he quickly got nervous. "Sorry to kick butt and run, but I gotta fly." Taking into the air, he grabbed Kim around the waist and took off in the direction opposite to the beach.
"I think we better get moving." Roxas stated, turning seriously to Ben. "Our friend seems to have forgotten that we have no communicators and that the three who could track them down aren't here. If we don't move, we may lose them."
"Yeah, you're right." Ben nodded, turning to Max. "I trust that you can send him back to the Null Void." He said, nodding towards Kevin before a sudden, confused look crossed his face. "Wait a minute, I remember Kevin bragging about not being alone this time. Then... THE ROBOTS CAME!" He shouted the second it clicked in his head.
"The what?" Roxas asked, not understanding why Ben looked a little more worried then he'd expect with the idea of such simple opponents. He didn't have to wonder long however, as at that moment the screaming started again, followed by multiple explosions. Whipping around, Roxas found himself staring at two, large orange robots with round heads quickly approaching their location, lasers full charged and about to fire.