Chapter 16: Identity Crisis: Part 1

I Don't Own Ben 10 or Any of the Respective Characters, The Rights Belong to Man of Action Studios and Cartoon Network

Author's Note:

* Hello and welcome to Chapter Sixteen of the reboot!

* So, rather than this chapter as a whole having a chunk of differences when compared to the original version, this entire arc will have a huge chunk of differences when compared to the original version.

* Also, this chapter is when Ben's life will start to go downhill. For a while, things will just get worse and worse before after a while things will start looking up again. I don't really have anything else to say in regards to this chapter, so let's get right into it!

Earth Prime

Saturday, June 2nd, 2018

The Tennyson House

Ben

After fleeing to my room the previous night and cowering under my covers (yes, I'm a seventeen year old and I was hiding under my covers like a child), I eventually fell asleep and made it to the next morning. As I laid asleep, I was suddenly disturbed by a voice.

"Ben..." I heard a female voice call out to me in a slightly low, sing-songy tone.

Without opening my eyes, I scrunched up my face with frustration.

"Five more minutes, Mom." I grumbled.

"Ben..." the voice repeated.

I rolled over in my bed, now facing away from the voice.

"Go away."

It continued still, though. The person continued to call out my name, while I felt something poking my cheek. Eventually, I slowly began to open my eyes as the situation dawned on me.

"Wait." I muttered to myself.

I rolled back over in my bed, facing the direction that the voice was coming from and saw Gwen sitting on her knees in front of my bed, with a smile on her face.

"Are you awake, now?" she asked in a normal voice.

I let out a groan as I sat up and Gwen inched away from my bed so that I could rest my feet on the floor.

"What are you even doing in here, anyway?" I asked, yawning as I stretched my arms. "Don't you know how to knock?"

I was expecting her smile to disappear in response, but it didn't.

"Well, good morning to you, too, captain grumpy."

"Seriously, though, why are you in here? It's not even time for me to get up yet."

She nodded in response.

"It is time for you to get up, Ben. You overslept."

"Huh?"

"It's nine o'clock."

I looked at my phone sitting on the nightstand next to my bed and she was right. It was nine o'clock.

"Are you feeling any better?"

"Feeling any better? What do you mean?"

"You came upstairs in a hurry last night and you didn't even notice me watching T.V. in the living room. Was something the matter?"

The memory of me being spooked last night came back. I shook my head.

"No, nothing you should have to worry about."

"Um, okay then."

A few seconds of silence passed between us before she spoke again.

"So, I haven't breakfast yet. I was just kind of waiting for you to get up, but you never did. So, want to go out for breakfast?"

"I guess so. Beats one of us having to cook."

"Okay, great! I'm going to go take a shower before we go, though."

I blinked out of confusion.

"What? Shower?"

"Yeah. You know, to get clean?"

"No, I get that. But you ask to go to Denny's and then you tell me you're going to take a shower first?"

"Ben, you might not want to keep up appearances, but I do."

"Gwen, I may never understand the opposite gender."

"That's sad." Gwen replied as she walked out of my room and likely towards the bathroom. "So sad."

"Oh, shut up." I called.

Once she was gone, I got up from my bed and left my bedroom to get a drink from the kitchen while I waited for her to get done with her shower. I let out a yawn and was about to open the fridge when, I kid you not, the refrigerator door swung open and hit me in the face.

"Oof!" I exclaimed as I fell over onto the tile floor.

I was about to get up, when the cabinet door right behind me swung open and hit me in the back of the head.

"Ow!"

I fell back down onto the kitchen floor and laid there for a few seconds, before I willed myself to get back up. I sat up on the floor and looked around the room.

"What the hell was that?"

That's when the memory of what happened last night came back to me once again. I felt that oh-so-familiar chill in the air and no longer felt safe.

It's got to be Ghostfreak again! What does he want from me?! Why is he doing this?!

I finally stood up from the kitchen floor and waited for another cabinet door to swing open or for the refrigerator door to open again. But neither of those happened. I inhaled sharply through my nose, before exhaling. I was no longer in the mood for a drink. I could wait until we got to Denny's. Besides, Ghostfreak wouldn't mess with me in public. Right?

After that I returned to my bedroom to get dressed for the day. And once I had done that, I walked out of my room and went to lie down on the couch in the living room. I opened up my phone and scrolled through the list of mobile games that I had installed. I eventually settled on Subway Surfers. I opened the game and waited to play a round, just to pass the time.

Gwen

I had turned on the hot water in the shower and was beginning to undress. Once I was sure the water was warm enough, I stepped into the shower. Letting the warm water soak me, I began to think about why Ben seemed to be on edge the previous night. He ran up here in a hurry last night, seeming scared out of his mind. He assured me that there was nothing to worry about, if I was being honest, I'm not sure I believed that. Just then, I could have sworn I heard a creak coming from the other side of the curtain.

"Ben?" I called out. "Is that you?"

There was no answer from the other side of the curtain.

"Ben, this isn't funny! If you're in here, just answer me!"

Just then, I heard the toilet flush and the water got even hotter.

"Ow!" I exclaimed as I tried to move out of the way.

Unfortunately as I did, I slipped and fell into the tub part of the shower. I was freaking out, my heart was beating faster than I thought it could and my breathing had quickened out of fear.

"Ben, this isn't funny!"

"It's not meant to be funny." A voice spoke. "This is serious."

It didn't sound like Ben, but it was possible that he was just trying to disguise his voice.

"Ben, what has gotten into you? Why are you in here? What do you want?"

There was no answer from him for a second.

"I'll be honest with you. Ever since you came back into my life, I wanted to catch you without your clothes on."

My blood ran cold as I heard that. I didn't think Ben would never say that, but how did I think that way? Did I really know him as well as I claimed to?

"Gwen?"

"Stop this! If this is your idea of a joke, then this is taking it too far! Now, get out of here, please!"

"I have a better idea. Why don't you make this easy for me and just pull back the curtain. Then we'll have a look at you."

I got up and braced my hands against the edge of the curtain, trying to keep it from moving.

"Gwen, am I really going to have to open the curtain myself?"

I didn't dare to answer.

"Okay, fine." Ben said.

Ben

Minutes Earlier

I got up from the couch, now being sick of playing Subway Surfers. I slipped my phone into my pocket and walked towards the basement stairs. I began to walk down the stairs, when all of a sudden; I felt someone's hands on my back and as I was pushed all the way down the stairs. Once I had reached the bottom step, I groaned in pain and made no attempts to get back up. Sometime later, I came back to my senses as I heard the sound of frantic footsteps from upstairs. It was probably Gwen, now being out of the shower. I began to hear her footsteps getting closer to me and that's when I realized she was coming down the stairs. I felt her kick me in the foot as she spoke.

"Hey! Why were you in the bathroom trying to peep at me?!"

I looked up at her with confusion as I slowly stood up.

"What? What are you talking about?"

"Someone was trying to peep at me while I was in the shower, as they said obscene things about me! And seeing as we're the only two in the house, it only could have been you!"

My face scrunched up in response to Gwen accusing me of doing those things.

"Do you really think that I would do such a thing?! Besides, I've spent the last few minutes just lying here after I fell down the stairs!"

"You're just making up excuses! Why should I believe anything you say?"

"Gwen, I didn't do it! Why would I do such a thing?"

"No one else could have done it, Ben. I won't be as upset if you just apologize to me and explain yourself."

I shook my head.

"I have nothing to apologize for, Gwen. I didn't do anything and I promise you that."

"So, you're just going to continue lying to me?"

I shook my head once more.

"I'm telling the truth, Gwen."

She just stood there, staring at me in silence with a look of disbelief on her face. Eventually she spoke once more.

"I see."

She stood there for another second more before speaking further.

"You can't be here."

"Excuse me?"

"You can't be here. I need you to leave."

"What are you saying? This is my house!"

"Sorry if I don't currently feel safe with you around. Just leave for a few hours so I can be alone for a while. I'm not kicking you out, I just need—"

"—to be alone for a while. Right, I get it. You're a real friendly person, Gwen."

She didn't say a word as she stepped aside so I could get up the stairs.

"Just so you know, breakfast at Denny's is off. You can make something for yourself if you're so hungry."

She didn't say anything in response to that, either. I continued up the stairs, through the living room and out the front door. I tried not to slam the door behind me, despite how displeased I currently was. I began walking down the sidewalk, trying to figure out where Gwen got the impression that I had been trying to peep at her while she was in the shower. I was angry, too. I had no idea why she would think that. Things had been weird last night. What if Ghostfreak somehow found its way to her? And now he was impersonating me to frighten her, in order to make my life more difficult.

All of a sudden, I found myself being taken into a chokehold from behind. I began struggling to breath and as I put one hand on the forearm of my assailant, whose skin was cold to the touch, I used my other arm in an attempt to elbow him in the face. After a few strikes, I was freed. I ran forward and spun around, with my fists up, to face who was attacking me. As soon as I saw who I was dealing with, I lowered my fists in disbelief.

What the hell are you?!

I was staring at myself! But this... doppelganger... had pale white skin. He looked more like an albino person!, skinned hand, just reached out from my chest! He also had silver gray hair and bright, glowing red eyes. I was silently hoping that this was all just a bad dream and I just hadn't woken up yet. Unfortunately, this thing was real and it was standing no less than three feet away from me, bearing an evil smile. I was shocked to my core and was scared once again. But this time, my fear wasn't due to Ghostfreak's doing. There was nowhere to run. Whatever this thing was, I had to face it. Alone.

"The look on your face says it all. You want to know what the hell I am and what I want." The double said in a weird voice and in a different tone than I spoke. "Well, prepare to be enlightened."

Author's Note:

* And that's it for this chapter, I hope you all enjoyed!

* What did you guys think of this one when compared to the original version of Chapter Sixteen? Did anything stand out to anyone? Give me any comments or questions that you may have in either a review or a private message, please. I am very curious on what you all thought of this version of Chapter Sixteen.

* Anyway, that's going to do it for me. I'm going to go now, so have a great day and bye.

Director's Commentary

* So, there's a decent amount of stuff to talk about in this installment. With that said, let's get started! There were a good amount of rewrites that had to happen here with this one, such as the opening scene from the original with the weird "conversation" between Ben and Gwen, as well as the some of the writing around Ben falling/being pushed down the stairs.

* Now to the two major things that you guys may want to see me talk about. First off, is it weird to keep the scene from the original cut where "Ben" tries to peep at Gwen while she's in the shower? Yeah, probably. But I needed an excuse for Gwen to be angry with Ben, as well as feeling unsafe with him in the house. And if it really is Ghostfreak who was mimicking Ben's voice to mess with her, then I think it's something that he would really do. So, maybe I was able to polish that aspect and make it a little less weird. Go ahead and tell me how I did if you want.

* And lastly, the whole Albedo thing. If you remember from way back when, he just kind of "sprang" from Ben's chest in the original cut, for whatever reason. I seriously have no idea how I came up with that idea or why I thought it made sense. Anyway, if you've been paying attention, you'll know that I rewrote Albedo's origin story to make him a clone of Ben that The Forever Knights (pretty obvious, right?) made from a blood sample of Ben's. Anyway, I think I've covered everything that I've wanted to. With that said, it's time to wrap this up. Thanks for reading.

Next Chapter: Ben and his double have their first confrontation.