Ben10 & Digimon Tamers

Heroes and Humanity

Part 02: Humanity and Heroes

Another Myself – Chapter 89 Part 1

Originally Written: Sunday, October 08, 2017 358PM to 1124PM

Song: Susumu Hirasawa - Narshisas Jiben Kara Kita Hito; Anubis - Osiris Houtei ~Epilogue~

. . . . .

Albedo peered around a building, looking around, searching. He had tried to stay inside the house. He thought he had feared Tennyson more in this world. He quickly found that was not the case. The implications of all that encompassed that house... He did not want to think about it anymore. He pushed it back to the edge of his mind, and crawled out the window in the room he was in, leaving with just the clothes on his back.

He pulled at his sleeves as he walked, slipping into an alley between two small shops, one a convenience store, the other some kind of cross between a laundromat and what seemed to be a pet day care. He wasn't sure how that kind of store worked, but business seemed to be doing well this day, so he assumed it was working fine. It got his mind off the dreariness of this world at any rate, so he couldn't complain.

He easily slipped by a small group of five plumbers, taking a break in their work, probably searching for him. The plumbers were just as out of it here as they were back home. He was confident he could run circles around them. He'd go back to the red house before he got too tired to evade the plumbers, but for now the walk was well deserved.

'Error detected.'

That was another reason why he headed so far away from the daunting red house. Juggernaut kept informing him of some kind of error. Juggernaut told him it wasn't from him, but the surrounding area. It wasn't back by the house, or even inside it either. It left him curious, despite the bowling ball settled deep within his stomach. He took his time surveying the area and avoiding the plumbers. They too were looking for something, but he still didn't know if it was him, or someone else. He hoped Jenrya and Ryo were alright.

'Error detected. 15 meters (49.2 feet) west.'

Albedo took a turn to the right. Juggernaut idly spouted off facts concerning his health. He tried not to focus too much on the high pulse and quickened breathing it informed him of. He pulled at his shirt sleeves.

'Error detected. 10 meters west.'

Albedo narrowed his eyes as he walked. The distance between them was shrinking awfully fast. Was whatever this error was walking towards him? He passed by a small crowd of people and pushed forward.

Juggernaut informed him that the error was on the street he currently stood on. He looked around confused. It was a long street, but he didn't particularly see anything. He took slow steps forward, attempting to look around discreetly.

Then he saw them. Sitting on a small stack of milk crates. A small boy with messy white hair, and pale skin. Dull, deranged blood red eyes looked at him curiously. Head tilted, emphasizing the heavy bags under their eyes. He looked at the dark red shirt with a long black stripe down the front, their dingy gray jeans, and their black and dingy white sneakers on relatively tiny feet. The boy swung his feet back and forth where he sat. Albedo watched those dull blood red eyes narrow.

"You don't have one." They spoke, voice haughty and mighty. Albedo knew immediately he did not impress this kid. He wasn't sure if he even wanted to. "What use of you to us, if you don't possess an omnitrix?" He spat.

Albedo's eyes widened. He looked at the red and white device wrapped around the child's right hand and wrist. He looked up at their haunted red eyes. Questions flew through his mind, but he could not bring himself to speak. His throat felt dry and scratchy, and his tongue like sandpaper. It started to make sense to him a little bit. All that red...

The boy stood up on the crate, and placed his hands on his hips as he bent over slightly, as though getting a better look at him, to examine him and his place in the universe. "You aren't what I expected. You have not been anything close."

Albedo swallowed thickly. "What were you expecting?" He spoke softly.

"A Galvan trapped in a cage of flesh resembling the dumbest human in all existence, yes, but not a Galvan that is a weak coward. The human one called Henry would serve much better use to us."

Albedo took a sharp breath, and clenched his fists. "And why is that?"

"You saw Tennyson and fled. He saw Tennyson and tasered him. And then once more after he drew the nuisance's ire." The child laughed a dark chilling laugh that reminded Albedo too much of himself than he was comfortable with.

He looked at the boy with wide eyes. Is that why Ryo didn't want him to go with him? If Jenrya had indeed attacked Tennyson, by now he'd certainly be in Plumber custody. The thought made him sick to his stomach.

"I can see it in your eyes. Your sudden concern. Yet you gallivant around cowering at all around you instead of focusing on what's important." The boy snarled. "Pathetic."

"And who are you to judge me?" Albedo spat.

"You don't know where you are?" The boy laughed a mocking laugh.

"Undertown's slums, on an Earth different yet similar to my own." He folded his arms.

"More than that. This Earth is so much more." He smiled an odd smile Albedo couldn't decipher. "I can't expect one like you to know that however, I suppose." The boy shrugged his shoulders. "However, it's time to go."

He looked at the boy confused. He was already moving to disappear between some buildings.

'Plumber threat detected.'

Albedo looked around and saw the overbearing guards dressed in their white uniforms running down the street towards him. Despite knowing that he could take down the trio of plumbers, their mere appearance unnerved him.

"Are you coming?"

He turned and rushed into the alley following the deranged child. They lost the plumbers easily, weaving in and out of various streets with ease. The boy had a greater knowledge of his Undertown than Albedo had of his own.

They stopped on a relatively deserted street. The boy found another set of old boxes to climb up on top of. Albedo wondered if doing that was a good idea. From what he could tell there were not many humans or aliens his height and the age he appeared to be with white hair. There certainly were few humans with blood red eyes at that.

"As I was saying before we were rudely interrupted by the unthinking sheeple." The boy dramatically spread his arms open, as though speaking to a crowd of people at some kind of rally. "I am the only one who should be judging you,"

If he hadn't hinted at his attention towards Jenrya, Albedo would have turned around and walked away at the motion. He hoped he never acted this way. He folded his arms expectantly.

"For I am Albedo Prime."

Albedo's eyes widened as the boy grinned at him.

"You do know about timelines, don't you?"

Albedo felt his blood run cold. He nodded ever so slightly. This small child with a few screws missing at least, was the Albedo which allowed himself to exist? This ten year old, at least that's how old he looked, if someone wiped this child from his timeline, he would disappear alongside him. Albedo closed his eyes and took a step back. Perhaps, he did have a right to judge him.

"Almost everyone in relation to the Omnitrix and the Plumbers on this Earth are their Prime versions," Albedo Prime continued. "The counterparts exist only because we do. Take us for granted they do."

He mentally shook his head. No, that did not make sense. He barely knew this Albedo. What could Albedo Prime know about him? For all he knew he could be lying. Yet, Albedo didn't feel that was so. He ran his hands through his hair, frustrated.

"You're distracted. Almost washed up." He tilted his head just enough that to Albedo it looked like his shorter counterpart was looking down at him even more than he had been previously. "Tennyson is going to come out of the wood-works and off you, and you won't see it coming. It will be a travesty."

Albedo nearly asked him, 'Which Tennyson?'. "And what would you suggest I do, Prime one?" He focused completely on the boy standing before him.

"Join me, and we'll kill him. And anyone else who still foolishly thinks he's the best choice to wield the Omnitrix."

Albedo looked at the child with wide eyes. "You...you want to kill Tennyson?" He shook his head, blinking. "Like, take him to a back alley and shank him or something?"

"Preferably something with more...flashiness, and more public. His death would prove his incapability, see?"

No, he didn't see. He could remember wanting to kill Tennyson, but it was for a short, fleeting moment, and he couldn't remember when or why it stopped. Even now, after all that Tennyson put him through, he felt he'd be content if he never saw the male again, perhaps. Maybe not completely content, but somewhere nearer the side of content than not content. He liked living, he found, and Tennyson was too strong, too violent, too uncaring, too much of a tyrant, for him to stop. Maybe one day the Tennyson he knew would be stopped, but he doubted it would be by him. He wasn't sure when he started thinking as such, but hearing Albedo Prime, he found the thoughts made more sense than the child's own.

He shook his head.

Albedo Prime frowned at him. "You're that cowardly. You don't want to kill him?"

"Not...particularly." He lowered his eyes, "There isn't much of an effect I would have on him anyway..."

"If you rid time and space of Tennyson Prime, you wouldn't have to worry about yours anymore." Albedo Prime smiled a wide unseeing smile at him, as though he were imagining a world Albedo didn't want to think about the existence of.

"What..." He reached a hand towards the child. "What happened to-?" He sighed, "When was the last time you slept?"

The boy looked at him in confusion for a few moments. "Sleep?" He laughed a dark laugh, much darker than what one would think a child capable of. "What is that?" But, Albedo Prime was no ordinary child. Just as he was no ordinary human teenager.

Albedo instinctively wrapped his arms around himself.

"Too busy to sleep. Too much work to do." He giggled at a joke he knew only himself and Albedo would understand.

Would it stop? Would it end if he killed Tennyson? He shut his eyes tightly, fighting back tears. Would the nightmares stop? Would his mentor...

'Ben Tennyson detected.'

Albedo sharply looked up and around. He took a few steps back from Albedo Prime. Ben Tennyson with black hair sat on the ledge of the roof of the building Albedo Prime stood in front of. He propped his head up with an arm, and yawned dramatically.

"This is useless. And boring. He's not gonna see our reasoning. Why can't we kill him and move on already?"

Albedo Prime growled annoyed. "Well, you now just made it even more difficult to convince him." The red in his eyes burned and flowed like lava coated in a thick layer of flames. It accented the bags under his eyes even more.

"You are..." Albedo shook his head. "You're working with them?"

Albedo Prime shrugged.

"They are Ben Tennyson." He felt like pulling out strands of his hair.

"You work with allies of Ben Tennyson, don't you?"

He thought of the Tamers, and how they indirectly teamed up with Tennyson to end the Incursean invasion. "Yes, but none of them actually are-"

He looked at the other three Tennyson's. The dreary one wearing his trademarked hood walked out from an ally next to the building. The zombie-looking one trudged slowly out of another ally. Juggernaut told him the apocalypse survivor was behind him. He decided to take another approach. "They are working with Eon."

"Who else is guaranteed to kill Ben Tennyson than the one who's spent their entire life doing so?" Albedo Prime questioned in a tone that suggested he thought the older Albedo wasn't anywhere near as intelligent as he expected him to be.

"He's going to enslave them, and kill you when he's finished." Albedo held his arms out to his sides. "Ben Tennyson doesn't like Albedo of Galvan Mark II. You're my Prime version, you should know this." He pressed a hand to his chest. "Eon tried to slice me in half."

"I hear you walked right into the path of his blade." Albedo Prime tilted his head, "What were you expecting to happen?" He raised his hands as though he were speaking the obvious. The other Tennyson's surrounding him laughed sharp laughs, equally unhinged as Albedo Prime's speech.

"Told you this one wasn't as smart." The Tennyson with black hair spoke.

Albedo looked at him with wide eyes. What was the phrase? Too blind to see? He shook his head. Surely this Albedo knew better. Surely...

"No, I suppose he isn't." He continued looking at Albedo, his head tilted. "That is why I'll shepherd him."

"'Course ya will, mate."

Albedo held in a shudder.

"An Albedo like you is a travesty. We and Eon will assist you."

He shook his head. 'He's using you!' his mind screamed. He couldn't bring himself to speak. 'Why don't you see!? He and Tennyson have paved a path so dark and cold for you that you no longer think clearly!' A dark fiery rage filled him alongside a chilling fear. If this is what Tennyson could do to Albedo Prime, what chance did he have against any of this? He swallowed thickly, "I-I'll work with you, but not them. You don't belong with them."

Albedo Prime looked at him confused.

"What an uncalled for statement, dude."

"Mean dweeeb..."

"Laaaaaaame."

"He's right where he belongs."

"Shut up!" Albedo shouted. He looked up, glaring at the Tennyson with black hair. "You're wrong. His home, our home is on Galvan Mark II! Not with you!"

"On a planet where not a soul cares for either of you?"

"That's not..." He lowered his head, dread filling him.

"If they did care, why'd they let dear old Azmuth do this to you? When does technology stop being technology and start becoming torture? He's the smart one, ain't he? Guess he ain't so smart, eh mate?"

He shut his eyes tightly, and clenched his fists. He spent too many nights wondering this himself.

"Hey, A Prime." He heard the black haired Ben speak. "Show this one what you get when you actually take the right path in life, 'stead of the pathetic one."

He saw two bright flashes of red light, even behind his eyelids. He opened his eyes and saw the mass of gray and red floating before him. Limbs too small to be useful. Body so large it was physically restricting, locking him to the hovering chair it sat in. Three bloodthirsty eyes so dark and red. Lips curled into a confident unhinged grin showing off jagged yellow teeth.

"Have you ever seen what an evolved Galvan looks like? This is the epiphany, the ultimate standard of intelligence, superiority and greatness." The alien creature spoke. "How could you not want a chance at attaining this?"

He took a few steps back, forgetting that another Tennyson was behind him. He shook his head. Surely an evolved Galvan did not look so twisted. So so very wrong.

"Last chance, mate. You in, or out?" The Tennyson behind him asked confidently, Australian accent somehow stronger than usual.

Chills ran down his spine. He decided that he was better off not knowing what the ultimate standard of intelligence, superiority and greatness looked like. He was a realist however, and figured someone would tell him anyway despite protests. Therefore, at best, he hoped this monster of a creature wasn't it.

. . . . .

A/N: I've never actually seen or paid much attention to "Ultimate Albedo" in the show. His form unnerves the crap out of me, and only furthers the theories I have concerning Omniverse Albedo in my attempt to make the shitstorm known as Ben 10 Omniverse make some sense.