Under the scorching Sun, we can see Ben drying his sweat on a rag as he looks at the Rust Bucket's engine, his long hair tied back for once, flip flops, shorts and his oversized t-shirt.

- Of course, this damn thing had to break in a fucking ghost town, where we can't get a proper mechanic! – He sighs loudly, almost letting out a frustrated scream, but holding back as he didn't wanna worry Gwen.

Meanwhile Gwen comes out of the RV, tray in hand with cups of soda and snacks, Ben smiles as he sees her, her usual outfit replaced by short shorts that ended around the middle of her thighs and one of Ben's oversized sleeveless shirts, which looked more like a tank top being worn by Gwen, her hair tied up in a messy bun.

They sat under the shade of one of the abandoned buildings, eating snacks as Ben tries to figure out what's wrong with their transport, he's (somewhat) fixing an alien watch that most humans couldn't even imagine existing, fixing an RV shouldn't be that hard! He sighs once again and leans on Gwen, who happily leans against him. Both then get up and stretch after they're done eating.

- Alright, back to… – That's all Ben can say before Gwen, who's beside him, is sent through the building behind them with a loud crash, Ben's eyes widen in shock as he dodges the falling building – Gwen!

Ben tries to run after her, only to be kicked away, hard. He gets up with a groan, tries to breath and winces at the pain on his torso, definitely cracked a rib or 2 there… He looks up to see a… Man? Probably an alien, purple spandex full body suit and black armor.

- What's with you alien assholes and attacking kids? Is it a fucking fetish or something?! – Ben shouts as he dusts himself off.

Ben quickly runs forward, staying close to the ground, before suddenly jumping left, trying to run past the unknown alien, only for said alien to appear in front of him, saying something in what seems like his native language, Ben could almost hear the smugness dripping from his voice, despite not understanding a single word. Ben just smiles widely and swipes the alien's feet with a kick, grabbing his face with his only hand and slamming him on the ground.

Suddenly, something went flying past Ben, wait, was that a crab? The loud, distorted, deep voice that Ben knew well laughed, Gwen Arms, Gwen's favorite alien, showed up and started beating the crab (?) robot alien. I just chuckle and turn back to the one I beat, might as well get some loot from all this.

Except the moment Ben's hand reaches for one of the weapons, he swears loudly in pain as a crystal suddenly embeds itself in his hand, Ben turns to see who shot the crystal that was somewhat familiar… A tall, wide figure in full body armor looks at them, well, Ben thinks he's looking at them, the helmet makes it kinda hard to know where it's looking.

- Mind not shooting my hand? Only got one of those now, y'know? – Ben says cheekily as Gwen now stands protectively behind him, growling at the new alien – So… You with these guys? Working alone? Come on, talk to me, man!

Ben sees it's crystal-like hand before it's armor covers it again. Crystal… So same species as Diamond Gwen? Or at least very closely related, same shade of green and basic structure… What was it's name, Petro-something? Weaknesses…

While Ben's mind is going at 110%, the thing lowers it's helmet, giving Ben the confirmation he needed, that was a male Petrosapien.

- Give me the watch and I'll let you live, no one needs to get hurt, child. – The alien said, his deep voice would have totally scared been at the start of this whole… Adventure, but not anymore.

- Name's Ben, and say that BEFORE you fucking start my hand, asshole! – Ben shouts annoyed as he shows his bleeding hand – And we both know the damn watch won't just come off, so what do you really want?

- I am Tetrax, the last of the Petrosapiens, but not for long… - He points at Gwen – Word has it that the Omnitrix can revive races, so I'll use it to revive mine, and if I have to hurt you to take it, so be it – He says, arms coming out of his armor again, taking the shape of pointy hooks, made to rip and tear.

- Oh really? – Ben says, lopsided grin on his face – Sorry to give you the bad news, but the damn watch can barely transform Gwen after squidface broke it, if the rumours really are true, which I doubt, do you really wanna risk it?

Seeing Tetrax start walking towards them, silence as his hooks drags on the sand, seems like there's no reasoning with him, Ben can understand him, really, he can, he'd burns cities if it meant bringing his doofus, annoying cousin back to what she was, no pain, no night terrors. But he can't, and giving up the watch will leave Gwen forever like this. Ben made his choice, the last of the Petrosapiens falls today.

- Charge! – Ben drops to his knees and leans back, his back touching the ground as Gwen charges forward from behind him, barely evading Ben as she puts her left arms forward and hits Tetrax head on, sending him flying.

Ben takes this chance to run to the Rust Bucket, cabinet doors fly open, boxes and papers get thrown to the floor as he looks for something, he can hear the two fighting outside, he then suddenly stops, he found what he was looking for. As the turns around to go help Gwen, he gets kicked hard on his already cracked ribs, for sure breaking them now and cracking a few more. It was the robot he knocked down before, Ben falls to the floor as the alien rants in some alien language, Ben tries to breath as well as he can in his condition. The alien gets down to his level as he talks to Ben, Ben doesn't understand a single word, but he can hear the condescending tone clear as day in it's voice, he heard it often enough at home to identify it no matter the language.

- Yeah, yeah, fuck off, will ya? – Ben just barely grabs one of the weapons he threw on the floor earlier, shooting the alien point blank on the side of it's head as it tried to protest – Fuck! – Ben screams, of at least he thinks he does, whatever he grabbed and shot was so bright and loud, it had blinded and deafened him.

Ben trips and tumbles as he comes out of the RV, ears still ringing like hell, but able to see for the most part. He finds Gwen and Tetrax fighting, Gwen covered in cuts, mostly on her human side, some crystals stuck on her body, while Tetrax was flying around on… Is that a fucking hoverboard?! Shaking his head, he runs towards them, pushing a few buttons on the device he was holding and throwing it at Tetrax. Gwen gasps, seeing what Ben threw and jumps at him, covering him with her body.

- Really? A grenade? If your Tetramand pet can't – Oh boy, if Ben thought he was deaf before, this was 10x worse, but oh well, this is what sounds grenades are for, right? Tho maybe Ben shouldn't have set it to max output.

When both turned to look at Tetrax, they could see him screaming and agonizing on the floor as his body shattered and broke apart. Ben points at him and Gwen gets the message, she wastes no time jumping Tetrax and pummeling him into the ground, his already broken body didn't even last against one punch, but Gwen didn't stop until his shards were no bigger than pebbles.

- I'm this close to breaking into grandpa Max's whiskey collection… – Ben says to himself, knowing he wouldn't actually do it, but the temptation was there.

Hours later, Ben had gotten most of his hearing back and looted anything he thought could be useful from the mercenaries' bodies. Yes, apparently they were mercenaries sent by Vilgax, something he learned after looking into the robot crabs equivalent of a hard drive. Ben sighs heavily before looking at Gwen, who's napping in her underwear on the couch with a tub of half-eaten (And now mostly melted) ice cream. How did he find them? Is he tracking them? Ben made sure there were no trackers on the watch, he's sure of it… He'll have to check the files he got from the mercs later, there might be a lead there.

Ben shakes his head, he can think about this tomorrow, he needs to sleep, he makes sure to turn on all the security measures on the Rust Bucket just in case. Ice cream on the fridge and Gwen in bed, he feels her arms wrap around him, pulling him closer, he feels her nom on his hair and chuckles quietly. He hugs her back, tightly, as if she'd disappear the moment he let her go, hell, from all he knows that might actually happen because of that cursed watch, so he doesn't let go. For the first time since this started, Ben lets himself cry, quietly so Gwen doesn't hear him. She still does, awake from the moment he hugged her, but she doesn't say anything, her broken mind doesn't know what to do, so she just holds him close.