Chapter 9: Awe
Ha! Eat my fist, old man!"
"Oh I'll show you how it's done, whipper snapper!"
Gwen glanced up from where she was reading up on her spells in her bunk, trying to glare but fighting to hold back a grin. Grandpa and Ben were going wild on the new Sumo Slammer game that her mother had brought over for Ben when she'd tagged along with the old man to drop of a bag of essentials for Gwen. It was just as well; she'd been almost desperate enough to borrow the freak's boxers. Yuck.
"This is great, aunt Nat!" Ben had beamed, before shyly asking why he was getting it. Her mom had, in a flash or rueful affection, ruffled the boy's hair, much to Gwen's amusement. "You know why." She'd chastised.
That had been hours ago, and now they were at their camping destination; a beautiful lake in the nearby national park. Grandpa always knew the best spots. However, instead of enjoying the great outdoors, it seemed both Ben and Gwen were contend to just soak up the their home away from home again. Gwen had joined gaming for a while before going back to spellwork, leaving the boys to their toys. Grandpa's stifled groan told her he'd lost this round. "One more go!" He demanded and Ben snickered.
"Now who's the masochist?" He teased.
Gwen rolled her eyes before deciding to give up on reading and getting up from the cot, walking over to the booth where they were gaming. They were sitting with their backs to her, and she took the opportunity to take Ben unawares and drape herself over him, leaning her head on his, arms resting on his neck. She felt him tense while, simultaneously, a little vibration coursed through him. It reminded her pleasantly of a purring cat. The distraction did cost him, though, as grandpa mercilessly capitalized on it and knocked Ben's block off, finishing his character off with an ultimate move that was… odd.
"And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how we won the battle of Kerok 7 on the Sludgepuppies."
Ben's response was incredulous. "By preforming a back-flip and then whacking the opponent with a whale?"
Their grandfather shrugged. "I guess you had to be there. Anyway," he stood, stretching, old bones popping loudly. "I think I'm going to nap for a bit. You kids behave." He smiled ruefully at the way Gwen was latched onto Ben before walking off to the back of the RV, leaving Ben to shut down the gaming console.
In the ensuing silence, Gwen looked down at her doofus of a cousin, who was momentarily preoccupied with shutting off the console. When he retrieved his hand, though, he caught sight of the Omnitrix and tensed before closing his eyes and exhaling. She could feel his stress in the air, and his heart beat faster, and responded to it by leaning down and nuzzling his hair, draping her arms across his chest. Pipe down you stupid organ, you're scaring him. He latched onto them with a soft chuckle and tilted his head up to her, grinning shakily.
"I'm okay, just… overthinking. Still gonna kick it's-" She squeezed him a little, cutting him off.
"No one's asking you to do it in a single day, doofus." She chastised, gently, rolling her eyes. "Pace yourself. You can't start apologizing every time you slip."
Ben opened his mouth to protest, but shut it with a shrug, leaning back into the chair, comfortable in her embrace it seemed. "You're right. Better slow and steady than quick and sloppy, I guess."
Gwen reeled back as if burned, staring at him with shock. Ben turned around, looking slightly hurt, but mostly confused. "You said I was right." She explained, shock leaking into her voice. "Who are you and what have you done to my contrary dumb cousin?" Hurt flickered into playful annoyance.
"Oy! I can be smart. Just not… bookish." He protested, crossing his arms with a pout. Gwen snorted.
"I'm not hearing denial of the identity theft here-"
Ben vaulted over the back of his seat in a blur, coming to stand before her, hand reaching around her to tangle in the hair at the back of her head, right at the base of her skull. That derailed her train of teasing, quite handily. Hex could've walked in and started dancing on the table and she wouldn't have noticed. Ben smirked cockily, green eyes dancing with mirth.
"Would anyone else know that you go limp as a kitten when I do this?"
Cheeky, insufferable, cute- no. Not cute. Definitely not cute. She swatted his hand away and leveled a hard look at him, grabbing his collar and hoisting him close to her face. "You. Me. Outside." He paled.
"Uhm… any chance I can talk you out of this?" He asked her, sheepish grin on his face.
She scoffed at him. "Your 'charms' couldn't get you out of me screaming at you, and you're not trying nearly as hard now. No luck, lame brain." She wasn't joking. Ben's attempt to dissuade her from screaming at him two days ago had quickly dissolved into a game of 'who could get Lizzie to implode the hardest with how cute they were being.'
Gwen had thought she'd won that one when she'd crawled into his lap and stolen his last fry at the Burger Shack. She'd put it between her teeth to waggle at at him in triumph. A short lived triumph, for he'd met her challenge by leaning in and eating it, biting it off just shy of her lips. It had her flushing beet red and had sent Lizzie into spasms (Anna had congratulated them on that feat). He'd blushed as well, but smirked cheekily none-the-less, savoring his victory meal, being insufferably smug about it.
That same face was trying its hardest to look cute and innocent enough to let him off the hook. He was lucky that she wasn't planning on a sparring match anyway. Dragging him outside, she let go in order to walk ahead a yard or three ahead before turning back to him. The crisp air made all her senses feel sharper, despite the sunny day. Bellwood might be oddly warm year round, but the rest of the state was feeling autumn's grip. Ben was eyeing her suspiciously.
"Relax, I just want to show you something." He didn't relax a bit. She smirked. "Fine, you paranoid squirt. Check this out." Steadying her stance, she grit her teeth and started summoning all the mana she could muster, her aura becoming visible as a blue flaming cloud around her. Ben crossed his arms, unimpressed.
"What's this, a Dragon Ball rerun?"
Her lips quirked, but she didn't reply. She felt her mana coalesce throughout her body, seeping in from outside through her skin as well as spreading out from where she could feel it thrum in her very bones. Stabilize, stabilize, suck it in too much and it goes back to the core, push it out too far and you lose it too the air. Focus. Focus… there!
With a final cry of effort and a flash of light, she felt her mana fall into place, thrumming in every fiber of her being. Opening her eyes, she could see Ben stare at her, open mouthed. Through these eyes, she could also see his own mana glow faintly beneath his skin, a vibrant green that reminded her of his eyes. It flickered like a cheery campfire and the sight brought a smile to her face.
She held her own hand up, inspecting it, satisfied to find it glowing blue. She smirked. Nailed it. "Yeah, I'm awesome. No need to say it."
"That is so cool!" Ben exclaimed, ignoring her instruction and not really caring to downplay it either. When Gwen had started gathering mana, he'd inwardly braced himself for a potential lightning bolt to the face. Or a pie out of nowhere.
Instead, he got Gwen, but… cooler. Her entire body was seemingly made of pure blue energy, looking like a skintight full body suit that glowed. Her hair was still the same shape, shining a slightly brighter blue, as if though part of the 'suit'. He could vaguely see her hairclip still. But what really struck him was when she opened her eyes. They flashed brightly for a moment before settling into a duller glow, green orbs at their center. They shone like emeralds.
She dipped into a small bow. "Thank you, thank you. You are too kind." She inspected her hand, seeming to be as intrigued by it as he was, blue fire dancing between her fingertips.
"What does it do?" He asked, mystified. She smirked in response and threw her arm upwards. Ben felt a hard tug on his leg and he tumbled down, heels over head into the dirt. She laughed and he grumbled.
"You know, if you wanted to make me fall for you, you could've just bought me a drink."
"Without Lizzie present to explode over it? That would be a waste. Besides," She smiled coyly, raising her index finger, raising him off the ground with the motion like a puppet on a string, floating. "I think I got you wrapped around my finger already." She used the digit to beckon, and he was pulled forward to hover before her; upside down at that.
Rather than throw a fit about it, he merely crossed his arms and rolled his eyes, just like she always did. He could feel her amusement at the familiar gesture.
"Yeah yeah, you're irresistible; especially when you're quiet. Anyway, casting without chanting. Neat." If Gwen's face was anything to go by, there was more. Even glowing he could read her like a book.
She put him down on his feet and placed her hand on his shoulders and jumped, as if to vault over him- only to stop mid-jump right above him, unbothered by gravity. Gwen hovered upside down as he'd done just a moment ago and grinning down in his face, before she moved her hands from his shoulders to pinch his cheeks and peck him on the forehead.
"Gwen!" He whined as she floated just out of reach of his flaying arms. Her giggle filled he air. I'll show that little glow-bug…
Launching to catch her, she evaded to the side and slid past him, booping him on the head. He growled and repeated the process a few more times, each time with her slipping past and tapping him on the head, floating just an inch or so above the ground, always just out of reach. Giggling while at it of course. Cheater.
On his sixth launch, he course corrected just before he leaped, diving towards where he knew she was going to be – shouldn't dodge to the right every time, dweeb –and managed to catch her around the shoulders.
"Ha! Got you!" He cried, latching on and pulling her into a headlock, preparing to give her noogie when he froze, the sensation coming from his arm registering, as well as the heat from where she was pressed up against his shirt.
It didn't feel like a suit. Or like magic. It felt like-
"Gwen!" He cried, jumping away from her and slapping a hand over his eyes. "Put some clothes on!" He squeaked, voice rising several octaves as he flushed deep crimson.
"I'm not naked you dolt!" She cried out, indignant. "I'm made of energy, I don't even have a body in this form! Sorta. It's complicated." She explained; or rather, didn't.
An awkward silence reigned for a minute before Ben dared to lower his hand. He still wasn't going to look at her though, staring instead at the ground before him. His heart rate skyrocketed when he saw two small, glowing blue feet stop right in front of his though, toes brushing the tip of his shoes.
Looking up, he quickly passed over… the rest of her, and settled on her face. It was odd, what with it being blue and the glowing green eyes, but those were so undeniably Gwen's that it seemed less strange the longer he looked. Her expression was miffed, but there was no sign of the blush that would usually be there. Lucky her. Distantly, he wondered what the problem even was; he'd seen her in a swimsuit plenty of times and that hadn't mattered to him. Though, he supposed, back then she was just his dorky cousin.
Much as he was loathe to admit it, she was much more than that nowadays.
"This," she said, gesturing to herself. "is my energy being. According to the spellbook, it's basically my soul. Just… solid." She elaborated, flicking his nose. Ben took a deep breath. Okay. Soul. He could work with that. A soul that looked like it was wearing a skintight bodysuit and felt like it wasn't wearing anything at all. Weird. Very. But-
"Wait, your hairstyle is part of your soul? That's some dedication to fashion, dweeb."
"Figures. Here I am, literally baring my soul, and you make a joke about my hair. Terrible doofus of a boyfriend." She groused, but this was familiar at least. Taking a deep breath, and a step back, he looked her up and down.
Huh. He thought, seeing faint shades of pink enter her blue glow. So she can blush.
Well, if she was going to show off and float around… he smirked at her. "I'll show you something cool too." Steeling himself, he let his mind lock onto the Omnitrix, thinking of Ghostfreak. Feeling the familiar sensation of his cells shifting one by one, the heat of the watch's power washing over him, he allowed himself that old rush of excitement he used to feel whenever he transformed.
It was scary. It was dangerous. But it was his. Not just to fight bad guys. Not just when he didn't really think about it. Always. Settling into the ghostly form, he reveled the sensation of weightlessness as he hovered and couldn't quite contain the joy of feeling strong again. If he'd had tear-ducts in this form, he probably would have cried.
Opening his lone eye, it struck him that Gwen looked slightly different to the Ectonurite gaze. Where she appeared as a solid tone of blue to his human eye, barring her hair and eyes, his current vision revealed sightly more nuance. He could see her energy run just beneath the surface, contained, but stormy, moving rhythmically with every motion she made, roughly following the lines of her musculature. Powerful, controlled... but playful. Gwen in a nutshell.
Rather than be impressed at the master control being on again (Azmuth had been kind enough to trust him with that when he'd fixed the device), she eyed him wearily, mana hissing like a cornered snake.
"It's you this time, right?" She asked slowly. "Because if it's not," She started levitating again, slowly inching towards him. "and something else is hijacking my cousin's body again," her mana flared brightly, eyes lighting up. He could feel electricity in the air around them as twin orbs of lightning gathered in her palms. "I will rip you from him and burn your ghost ass alive." She finished with a hiss.
Part of him was flattered. An inordinately large part of him was strangely mesmerized. Most of him, however, focused on the death threat she'd leveled at him.
"Wow!" He called out, raising his hands defensively, raspy voice hissing through the air. "Bad dweeb, down! It's just me in here. No frying your favorite cousin, please."
She hovered before him for one long second before the lightning faded and the oppressive feeling over her mana lifted. He didn't need to breathe in this form, but he still felt like gasping for breath anyway. Gwen was terrifying under normal circumstances, but like this?
Yeah. I'd sooner take on Vilgax with nothing but a stick, thank you. Throw in Kevin for good measure.
Recovering, he leveled a challenge at her. "Besides, if you wanna 'burn' me, you first need to catch me." Launching himself up into the air, he made for the clouds, twirling a little in the wind, but confident in his speed, enjoying the feeling of flight for the first time in- too long. Too long by far. A minute later, he reached one of the lone clouds in the sky and turned back around to search for Gwen, his lone eye taking in the majesty of all of the natural park spread out below him. Gwen, strangely, was not amongst that majesty, nor did she seem to be following him.
Narrowing his eye, trying to spot her closer to the ground, he felt something prickle the back of his neck.
"Boo."
With a startled yelp he snaked away and whipped around, coming face to face with a guffawing Gwen, holding her belly while being carried around by the wind like a feather made of light.
"How did you-?! Oh, no way!" He hissed, ghostly hands cradling his head.
Gwen motioned as if she was playing an imaginary violin. "If it's any comfort, I'm pretty sure I'm not as fast as XLR8." Taking control of her flight back from the wind, she flew closer to grab both his hands in hers, pulling them away from his head. It should have hurt; she was a being made of light and he was in his Ghostfreak form; it and light didn't get along. Instead of a burning sensation though, her hands felt pleasantly warm, like the rays of the sun on a face chilled by cold.
She grinned comfortingly, if teasingly. He wanted to do the same, and decided that he really had no reason not to. A flash of green turned him back into a grinning Ben, and gravity immediately dragged on him. He pulled her into his free fall with him, descending toward the clear blue lake below shouting with delight, though even he couldn't hear it over the roar of the wind.
Beside him, Gwen looked at him strangely, shaking her head with an amused smile, but he only smiled right back, striking a superman pose. He could see the giggle even if he couldn't hear it. It took them about thirty seconds of falling before they reached ground level, Ben transforming back into Ghostfreak and phasing through the water he crashed in, slowing down under the surface. Gwen did the same, a bright beacon in the water, unaffected by the impact.
Shooting up, they both broke the surface, and she wasted no time to start flying laps around the lake at high speed, running her fingers through the water below her, whooping with joy. He was more than content to follow in her wake, happy to see her cut lose a little... until her form dissipated, seeming to extinguish like a candle and leaving behind regular Gwen, causing her to crash into the water with a loud splash.
Racing over, fear spiking for a brief second, he was relieved when she surfaced with the grumpiest look he had ever seen, wet red hair sticking to her face. His ghostly cackles echoed over the water.
"Yeah yeah, laugh it up." She panted, glaring murderously, looking irritated and tired. He hovered closer to snicker in her face, just as she had done to him when their chase had started. He wasn't going to peck her though. Not as Ghostfreak. Not even he was that cruel.
"Aww, is wittle Gwenny a wittle tiwed?" He teased. Gwen's right eye twitched before she shot out of the water, hand landing briefly on the symbol of the Omnitrix peeking out on his chest, sending some of her mana directly into it. A flash of green later, he was Ben again, and a microsecond after that he hit the water face first.
Surfacing with a gasp, he immediately whirled around to glare at where Gwen was paddling beside him, smirking.
"No," he panted, sending a wave her way. "fair." And another for good measure. He got one in return for that, cold water dousing his head.
"Oh, don't whine, you big baby. It's not like I did it while you were fighting the bad guys." She eyed him thoughtfully, bobbing up and down in the water. "Speaking of which, we really need to get you some combat training if we're going to stick to being heroes. You're a sitting duck in human form right now."
Ignoring the way his heart warmed when she mentioned that they were going to keep on being heroes, as well as wrestling down the visceral panic the words brought him, he instead assuaged his wounded pride with mock irritation. "If you think I'm putting on those ridiculous pajamas's, you're even dumber than you look." He deadpanned, splashing her again.
She splashed back, complimentary glare to boot. "It's a gi. And I'm serious. Master control is powerful, don't get me wrong, but if I can disrupt it, so can Charmcaster and Hex. Heck, Vilgax could figure out a way." She sighed, seeming to drop it. "But we can discuss that later. Can you get us back to the shore?"
Ben glanced around and noticed that they were near the middle of the lake, a good hundred yards from any shore. He smirked at her. "Correction: I can get me to the shore. You have fun swimming back!" He was about to transform into Ripjaws to go (and carry her with him anyway, because what hero left a damsel, even one as annoying as her?) when she quickly swam forward and latched on to him. He had to paddle extra hard not to go under.
"Oh no you don't!" She glared in his face, close enough for him to see the droplets of water stuck in her lashes.
"We're gonna sink like this dweeb-! Oh screw it." Ben stopped paddling and sucked in a deep breath, their wet clothing pulling them under easily. The last thing he heard was Gwen's squeak before the faint roar of being underwater filled his ears and cold engulfed them.
Ben opened his eyes to peek at his cousin through the clear lake water. She was glaring at him, mouth closed, holding in her breath. He had to wonder how her eyes could still spit fire under water. Magic?
He grinned back at her. I regret nothing. She heard the silent message and sighed, a torrent of bubbles escaping her mouth, tickling his face, before a small pinpoint of light materialized between them, expanding into a bubble that surrounded their heads, down to the base of their neck, pushing water away and allowing them to breathe. They were still sinking slowly though.
"Real smooth, freakazoid." Gwen grumbled. Ben snickered.
"Figured you could use a bath."
"As if I wasn't soaked already!" She snapped, angrily. He felt her mana trail across his skin, agitated. It should be frightening, but it wasn't. It tickled a little, but not unpleasantly, kinda like fingers raking through his hair. Guess her magic likes me, even when she's pissed.
Ben was about to reply when her mana accidentally popped the bubble, water rushing back into the vacant space to slap them in the face. They had just enough time to instinctively suck in one last breath of air before they were enclosed again.
The shock did cause them to drift apart a bit, and Ben got a good view of his cousin floating in the water, pinching the bridge of her nose, red hair swishing about her head, the sunlight filtering down from above playing over her features. It occurred to him that, maybe, she wasn't enjoying her magical mishaps as much as he was, and that bothered him. Which was a strange thought for Ben; having fun at her expense had given him life for years. Now, though he still loved to tease her, he wanted her to have fun alongside him. It wasn't as fun if it was just him.
Swimming forward to draw level with her again, she opened her eyes, and he could see the annoyance in them. Tired annoyance, though not with him, he thought. Distantly he felt that his lungs were getting uncomfortable with the lack of air, but they still had time, and they hadn't sunk very low.
He reached his arms around her and bumped his forehead against hers gently, noses brushing, closing his eyes. He could feel the tension in her face ease as the creases left her furrowed brow, and didn't need to look to know that she'd closed her eyes as well. Her arms settled around his neck. They were all familiar gestures of comfort, and could admit that he really needed no other reason to give them than the fact that he wanted to at this point. He opened his eyes again to see her staring back, a happy smile on her face, before her green orbs started to drift shut again.
Her hand snaked up to tangle in his hair and his arms tightened around her waist in response. Distantly, Ben wondered if the lack of air was getting to them, but when Gwen tilted her head and leaned in, he decided thinking was overrated. Mirroring the gesture, he met her halfway and captured her lips in his.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone