Ben made his way toward the rust bucket's parked spot. He stopped when he saw his grandpa sitting in a deck chair with Grandma Verdona.
Ben hadn't seen her since she'd wanted to take Gwen to her planet and train her for 68 years to use her Anodite powers.
'Guess she found out Grandpa was alive.' Ben thought news must travel fast.
"What was the name of that one girl Carl dated in high school when he threw that party?" Grandma asked.
"Lori," Grandpa answered. "Lori Lemaris, I remember her."
"Oh, that's right. We came home in time to see her do a cannonball off the roof and into our pool," Grandma said, laughing. "Oh, you were so mad."
"Me. I'm not the one who hurt her throat yelling at Carl and Frank," Grandpa replied, the two laughing before turning, noticing Ben.
"Ben, this is a nice surprise."
"Yes, come over here, dear."
"Sorry, I just wanted to stop by. Didn't expect to see you, Grandma," Ben admitted his grandma smiled at Grandpa.
"Well, I had to come when I heard your grandfather's death was greatly exaggerated for what's the count at now, Max eighth ninth."
"Tenth," Grandpa answered, "though this was the first time after the earth plumbers merged with the Plumbers."
"Earth Plumbers," Ben asked.
Grandpa nodded. "It's what it sounds like, Ben. In the 1700s, a group of humans founded a secret organization to fight supernatural and alien threats. They called it the Plumbers. After Vilgax was defeated in the 70s, the organization was absorbed into the galactic organization, also called the Plumbers."
"That's why you never mentioned stuff like magisters or how space cops were at war with the Sludge Puppies," Ben said in realization.
"Don't use slurs. Ben calls them Lenopans," Grandma scolded before looking at Grandpa with her eyes narrowed. "You taught our grandchildren that term."
"Old habits die hard, especially with Camille's parents not letting go of their wartime grudge," Max answered, looking sheepish. Grandma huffed before looking at Ben.
"Yes, dear, your grandfather retired shortly after the earth plumbers merged with their galactic counterparts. However, the supernatural division reorganized into a separate organization called the Center or something like that. Most of his old stories are about his earth adventures."
Ben nodded. The Center's name sounded familiar for some reason. He thought about it momentarily before remembering one of his blind dates from the service. Diana had muttered something about the Center not calling after their date.
Ben sat with his grandparents for hours, listening to their stories. Some were about Grandpa's plumber days, and some were about his dad and uncle growing up. Eventually, Grandma got up, saying she had to go. She smiled, kissing Ben on the cheek before doing the same to Grandpa, teleporting away.
"You and grandma seemed to be having a nice moment when I came," Ben said.
"It was nice to catch up," Grandpa admitted. There was a smile on his face, one that Ben hadn't seen since Xylene was around.
"Are you and Grandma getting back together?" he asked, not against it when his grandma wasn't knocking the socks off him. She was nice if out of touch with how people lived on earth, being away for who knows how many years.
Grandpa shook his head. "We separated for a reason," Grandpa answered. "How's it going with that girlfriend of yours?"
"You know about Kim."
"Your dad mentioned her. Yeah, my advice, son, is that it's best to actually break up with a girl before you start dating another one," Grandpa said, teasing Ben and groaning in embarrassment. 'Dad, why'd you have to tell him that?'
Grandpa laughed at his obvious embarrassment. "It's alright. You made a mistake, and you've learned from it as long as you don't repeat it."
"Speaking from experience, Grandpa?" Ben asked teasingly.
Hey, turnabout was fair play.
"Let's just say some species have wildly different customs about defining relationships than we do on Earth and leave it at that," Grandpa answered vaguely, the way he used to say when he was little and would explain something when he was older.
Before Ben could ask any more questions, his phone went off. Pulling it out, he answered, "Hello."
"Ben, it's Wade," the manager of his girlfriend's website answered. "I've lost touch with the Kimmunicator."
"Maybe the batteries died," Ben suggested, "or she's in a place with bad reception."
"No, that's not the case," Wade answered. "I have systems for that, and even if it weren't, I've lost signals for Ron's phone too, and the rest of the cheer squads' phones somethings off."
Okay, now it was getting suspicious. "Tell me where you last picked up their signal."
"The source of a lot of Ron's phobias, Camp Wannaweep," Wade answered.
Camp Wannaweep Ben thought flying to the place as Jetray Ben had heard all the horror stories about it from Kim.
The counselors were rude or didn't care the lake was polluted. They put a live chimpanzee in a bunk with kids. For whatever reason, the camp staff went out of their way to make the place as miserable as possible for the kids who were unlucky enough to go there
The place only got shut down when one of Ron's bullies went missing.
Jetray made it to the place, and he cringed at the smell from the polluted lake below. "Holy cow, this place smells worse than Stinkfly," Ben thought, not knowing how that was possible.
The camp was a dump. The place looked like the set for a Friday the 13th movie. "If that kid who ran away turns into a Jason Voorhees knock," Ben muttered, tapping the Omnitrix. He was going to need something with more muscle than Jetray.
Ben changed in a flash of green, diving into the water, leaping out, and landing in a superhero pose. "Ripjaws," he called out as he stood flexing his jaw muscles.
"Wow, talk about a blast from the past," Ben said, flexing his webbed fingers 16-year-old Rip Jaws didn't look that different from his ten-year-old self, just with both shoulders having black scales and a small fin under his lower jaw like a beard.
"Time to find Kim," he said, heading toward where he heard a struggle.
He found Kim, the cheerleaders, and some guy, probably the bus driver or a teacher, stuck to some goop.
"Oh great, another fish freak," a brunette said, "like this is your fault, Kim."
"How was I supposed to know the cheerleading competition was a trap? Two, this fish guy is on our side. He's one of those alien heroes that showed up five years ago, remember Bonnie?"
"That's right, citizens. I'm here to help."
"Could you do it quick? This goo is mutating us into fish monsters," a blonde cheerleader asked, sounding scared. "Uh, no offense," she added on realizing who she was talking to
"None taken," Ben said, ripping the goo off and freeing the girls from the wall. "Omnitrix initiate genetic repair sequence code 10."
"Scanning," the Omnitrix said, shining a green light. "Genetic repair sequence engaged," hitting the girls and repairing their DNA
"Thanks," Kim said. Ben nodded.
"My friend Ron, he's still in trouble. The guy who set this up has an axe to grind with him," Kim explained. "Could you find him?"
Ben nodded, rushing off to look for Ron.
It wasn't too hard to find him. He was standing in a dilapidated cabin with a creature from the black lagoon knockoff wrapped in a macrame prison.
"Maybe you should have done arts and crafts like I did," Ron quipped. "A booyah"
"Dude, awesome you beat the bad guy," Ben cheered.
"B-I mean, Alien hero guy dude, what are you doing here?" Ron asked quickly, covering.
"I heard about some missing cheerleaders, and I came to investigate," Ben explained quickly, coming up with an explanation. "Who's this?"
"Oh, this is Gil with two Ls now wants revenge and blames me for getting mutated by the toxic lake tricked us into coming here for revenge and to get a harem of mutated fish cheerleaders kicked his butt, no big."
"I'm gonna get you for this squeeb this and mutating me," Gill screamed.
"Sounds like you did this to yourself," Ben answered, "but if you want to be human again so badly, Omnitrix initiates genetic repair code 10."
"Command accepted," the genetic repair said, turning Gill with two Ls back to Gil with one L
"I'm human again," Gil said before he shouted, "NOOOOOOOO MY POWER, YOU MADE ME A WEAK SQUEEB LIKE STOPPABLE!" he shouted, angry with tears in his eyes.
"You need therapy," Ben said
Shortly after, vehicles came to pick up the stranded cheerleaders and to get Gil, who was taken away for psychiatric help.
'Can't blame the guy. Must have gone wild after five years alone,' Ben thought, having slipped into the woods to transform back
Looking through the trees, he saw Kim, who smiled at him, and Ben smiled back. He saw the blonde girl kiss Ron, which made the brunette freak out.
"Tara, what are you doing?" she shouted.
"I'm kissing my boyfriend. What's it look like?"
"Boyfriend," the brunette and Kim asked, though Kim sounded surprised while Bonnie looked like she would faint.
"Yeah, we met during this teen dating service. It was awkward at first, but we talked and found we had a lot in common," Tara said. "Not that it's any of your business."
"But you can't date a freak like Stoppable. He's a total loser. There's a standard cheerleader have to date jocks," Bonnie said. "You have to break up with him right now."
"Okay, that's crossing a line. You can't tell Tara what to do," Kim shouted. The other cheerleaders were standing behind Kim, saying their agreement.
"Uh, in case you forgot, Kim, this whole thing is Stoppable's fault. That fish freak wanted to get payback on Stoppable. If I knew about this, I'd have let Stoppable be turned into fish food," Bonnie said. "If you're going to date the bottom of the social food chain, you're leaving the squad, Tara."
'I think Gils, is not the only guy who needs to be taken away in a white van,' Ben thought angrily, about to turn back into Ripjaws and show this girl how to respect a hero.
But the teacher beat him to it.
"That's enough, Rockwaller," he said angrily. "If anyone is leaving the cheerleading squad, it will be you."
"What? You can't do this to me," looking horrified at the idea of not being a cheerleader.
"I can. Along with your poor behavior, you got a D+ on your last math test, bringing your grade point average below the requirement for being on a Middleton High athletics team. You can spend your new free time working to improve your grades,"
"I, I, I'm no longer a cheerleader," Bonnie stuttered. She dropped to her knees and shouted "No" at the top of her lungs before collapsing and crying.
Ben rolled his eyes. 'What a drama queen,' he muttered before transforming into Jetray and flying home
Meanwhile, in a lab located underneath Amity Park twenty, seven clones of Danny Fenton were floating in pods filled with Senzu river water. Vlad grinned, observing them flanked by his perfect son Henry and Sharktapus.
"Excellent work"
"The biometric leash has forced the clone's genetic structure to take on physical forms based on the original," Holo Maddie informed. "However, lambkins weakened their genetic stability by 85%. They will likely mutate into Moogers within three months outside of pods."
"It doesn't matter. They'll have served their purpose," Vlad said.
"I don't see why it's necessary to have these clones look like Danny Phantom," Sharktapus said dismissively, looking at one of the clones in the pod.
Vlad laughed. "for a being who thrives on fear, you don't understand how to inspire it. What's more terrifying than a faceless enemy, an enemy who can pull off multiple acts of terror anywhere and at any time? They will grow fearful and turn on Daniel while our plans come to fruition."
Sharktapus nodded, understanding in his eyes as he grinned.
"The Senzu River will rise, and the Nighlocks shall rule."
"Indeed," Vlad agreed, smiling evilly.
Special thanks to Number Boy for helping me with this chapter
Here are some announcements for new stories and old ones. For Danny and Gwen, TDI is in the works and will be up in a few weeks. For new stories, I'm working on a Danny Phantom and Digimon story. I need to think about some of the Digimon appearing in some chapters. Another story in the planning stages is Danny Phantom and Totally Spies. Anyway