Chapter 19: Chapter 19: Camp Fear
(Author note:This new alien is based on Hydrax from Power Rangers: S.P.D.)
On a dark stormy night, the Rust Bucket was driving through the mountains on a winding path as Ben and Gwen were having an argument as usual... Only this time, Jen was arguing right alongside her brother. Max and Allison were twitching angrily at that as Allison buried her face in a pillow with a groan.
"Change it!" Ben said to Gwen.
"No way! You change yours."
"It's two against one, Gwen," Jen said as Ben rubbed his shoes. "It's your turn to change the date of your party."
"Sorry, but I already picked the cake, color-coordinated the balloons, and sent the invitations," Gwen stated as they went over their birthday party plans. "By the way, here's yours."
She handed it to Ben who tossed it aside.
"Who plans their birthday party six months in advance?" Ben asked.
"The one who gets to celebrate it on the actual date this year," Gwen said as Ben rubbed his foot on the table.
"I don't think so Gwen," Jen said. "Grandpa Max already promised me and Ben that he would take us to laser tag for our birthday this year."
"But you can't miss my party, Grandpa," Gwen said as Max groaned.
"You three have shared the same birthday for ten years," Max said. "And if you don't stop arguing right now, none of you will make it to eleven."
He reached into the glove compartment and took out a powder.
"Here, Ben, try this on your foot. It gets rid of all kinds of fungus."
Ben caught it as Jen moved away from him. "Athlete's foot powder? Well, I am an athlete."
"More like an athletic supporter if you ask me," Gwen said.
Ben stuck out his tongue at him and started putting the powder in his shoe.
"Why doesn't Gwen just go to laser tag with you two?" Allison asked from the couch as Jen sighed.
"Easy for you to say," Jen said. "You're the only one of us who's ever had a birthday all to herself."
"It's not that simple, Allison. We live three hours apart from each other. I'm sure that Grandpa doesn't want to travel that long in one day," Ben said. "But we'll find a way to work it out. We always do. Especially when it came to the cake."
Ben then smiled and nudged his sister as she smiled back at him and she turned to Allison.
"I'm three minutes older than Ben, so I always joked to him that this one's my cake. Yours is coming in three minutes," Jen smirked as the pair chuckled and Jen gave him a playful noogie.
The Rust Bucket drove ahead when a young boy in a green camp uniform and a towel around his neck walked in front of the lights with a fearful look in his eye.
"They're coming! Help me!"
Max got a fearful look in his eye and slammed his foot on the brakes as hard as he could as the twins, Gwen and Allison tumbled forward.
"Grandpa!"
The Rust Bucket immediately pulled over, but the kid got out of the way and was sent tumbling off the cliffside and held onto a stray branch for dear life.
The twins got out and immediately got to work.
"Stinkfly to the rescue," Ben said as he slammed his Omnitrix and transfomred into... Cannonbolt. "Oh man. Can't this thing ever get it right?"
"Go get him, Ben," Jen ordered as Cannonbolt nodded and rolled up into his ball form and leaped off the cliff.
The kid lost his grip on the branch and fell to his certain doom. Fortunately, Cannonbolt caught him and rolled down the cliffside until he reached a clearing and got out of his ball form.
The kid's vision came into focus as he peered at the armadillo-like alien that was he was standing on.
"Hey, are you alright, kid?" Cannonbolt asked.
The kid screamed and immediately fainted at the alien before him.
"I'll take that as a no."
He groaned and rested by the cliffside as well before Jen flew in as Battlefly with a groan as she picked up the kid.
"I'll take it from here, Ben," she said as she flew upwards to the Rust Bucket. "Meet us back up here in 9 minutes."
Later, the group were looking over the kid as he rested on the couch.
"Just a few scrapes and bruises, that's good," Max analyzed. "But he's out cold."
"His name's Gilbert," Allison read.
"Whoa, how'd you know that?" Ben asked.
"Women's intuition," Allison smirked.
"Well, that and he's wearing a name tag," Jen said as she moved the towel away to reveal the name tag.
"He must go to Camp Opinicon," Gwen analyzed. "That would explain the uniform.
Jen also looked to see a purple rash on his arm. "Ugh, that is one ugly looking rash."
"It's obviously some kind of fungus," Gwen said. "Normal rashes don't have that color."
"I saw the sign for the camp a little way's back," Max said. "They must have a nurse."
The Rust Bucket drove up to Camp Opinicon and they arrived at the mess hall. They immediately filed out and went inside to find the place totally ransacked. No sign of anyone there.
"Hello?" Max asked. "Anyone home?"
"It looks abandoned," Allison said as they examined the wreckage. Not a sound was heard throughout. Not even from a mouse.
"Yep, definitely abandoned," Gwen scoffed.
Suddenly, Jen looked curious as he walked forward to a table that had a plate of spaghetti and meatballs. She waved her hand over it and felt some moist steam rising from it.
"Still warm," she analyzed. "This had to have just happened. Someone has to be at the camp."
Suddenly,thunder sounded out and the lights went out, leaving them in pitch darkness.
Max turned on a flashlight and Jen lit up a pink energy ball in her hand, illuminating the room before she and her grandfather shone their lights to an annoyed looking Gwen, a determined Allison listening to her music and Ben at the table eating the spaghetti and meatballs.
"What, I'm hungry!"
Max pulled out another flashlight and handed it to Gwen. "Here, you and Ben share. Allison, use your phone."
"Don't we share enough already?" Gwen asked as her cousin wiped his mouth.
"Will you just let it go?"
"Never!" Gwen shouted.
"Well then never plus one!" Ben said.
"Forget it, Gwen," Jen said. "There is no way that me and Ben are giving up celebrating our birthday on the actual day this year. And if you don't like it, then that's your problem."
"Then your brother's not getting this flashlight."
"Fine!" Ben said as he started fiddling with his Omnitrix, which then beeped out and gave out a green light in the shape of the symbol. "This thing has a flashlight app? Cool."
"Lucky break," Gwen groaned as they entered the kitchen.
They then shown their lights through the room to see a shadowy figure appear in the light... only to realize Jen playing by using shadow puppets in front of her energy ball.
"Ugh," Gwen groaned.
"What? I'm just trying to have some fun," Jen said as Ben chuckled at her antics and she winked to him.
The group entered the kitchen and looked around as Gwen looked nervous as she stuck close by to her cousin.
"Hey, Jen, remember when I told you back in New York that I wished I had gone to sleepaway camp?" Gwen said, shaking.
"Yeah," Jen said.
"I take it back."
They then heard a soft rumbling coming from the doorway and they shone their lights to see two sets of eyes shining in the darkness.
Ben screamed and fell on his butt as Jen reacted quickly and tossed an energy ball at the figure, only for it to crash against the wall, startling the figures out... revealing them to be two young twins with light brown hair and Camp Opinicon uniforms who looked nervously at them as Jen quickly shook her hand free of the smoke emitting from it.
"Is it safe to come out?" they both asked.
"Oh great," Allison groaned. "More twins."
"Hey, at least they're brother and sister like me and Ben. We can tell them apart," Jen said as she looked down with a kind look on her face. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you two."
"Are you some kind of superhero?" the girl asked with stars in her eyes.
"I guess you could say that," Jen said with a smile. "Are you two okay?"
"For," the boy said.
"Now," the girl finished.
"What happened?" Max asked. "Where did everyone go?"
"We heard something outside, but-" the boy said.
"We were too scared to come out," the girl finished.
"I'm Andy."
"And I'm Mandy."
"We're twins," they both said.
"Yeah, well join the club," Ben smirked as Jen smiled and laid a hand on his shoulder. "I'm Ben."
"And I'm Jen. This is our cousin Gwen, our Grandpa Max, and our good friend Allison," she introduced.
They then heard a rumbling from behind them and ran and hid behind Max in fear, trembling.
"Where's the camp nurse?" Allison asked.
"G-gone," Andy said.
"With all the others," Mandy finished.
"Not all the others," Jen said. "We found your friend Gilbert on the side of the road. That's why we came here."
Max went to the telephone, only to find nothing. Not even a dial tone. "Darn it. The storm must have taken out the landline. And there's no cellphone reception either."
"So it looks like we're alone," Gwen said as Max turned to them.
"Let's get back to Gilbert. We'll drive him to town," he said as they all nodded.
They exited the mess hall and went into the Rust Bucket where the sleeping Gilbert was waiting. Max went to the closet and handed out two towels.
"Here, to help you dry off," he said as he handed one towel to Ben, Jen and Gwen and the other to Andy and Mandy. "Sorry, but I've only got two clean ones."
"That's okay," Andy said.
"We'll share," Mandy said as she snuggled next to her brother.
He then turned to Ben and Gwen who were struggling, playing tug-of-war with their towel as Jen and Allison looked on helplessly.
"Let go!" they both shouted.
"Do I get any say in this?" Allison asked.
"NO!" Ben and Gwen said to her as Jen wriggled back.
"A couple of kids I know could learn a thing or two from you guys," Max told Andy and Mandy, rubbing their heads before he went to the driver's seat.
"Who?" Ben and Gwen asked as Jen sighed before her eyes glowed pink and she used her telekinesis to levitate the towel to herself before she used it to dry herself off.
"Who do you guys think?" she asked as she then tossed the towel to Ben. "We take turns."
Max then turned the key in the ignition, only for the engine to sputter out, not engaging. Suspicious, he went outside and lifted the front hood, only to see the engine completely backed up.
"Huh, the engine's covered in some kind of fungus."
"So we're stuck here," Jen said. "Great."
"Looks like we're camping out here for awhile."
As he closed the hood, two mushroom like figures were watching from the trees, gnashing their sharp teeth angrily at the sight.
The group went out to a cabin as Max carried Gilbert adn laid him down on one of the beds.
They then spotted Ben dusting his feet with the powder as Jen started rubbing her feet.
"Hey, could you toss me that? I think I'm getting it too," she said.
Ben complied and tossed her the powder as she took her shoes off and started dusting her feet with it too.
"Athlete's foot?" Mandy asked.
"Everyone gets it here?" Andy complied.
"Now you kids stay here," Max ordered. "Keep an eye on Gilbert. I'll see what I can rustle up for us in the kitchen."
Gwen got a scared look on her face. "Grandpa rustling up a meal?"
"Now that's a scary thought," Ben said.
Jen then gulped. "If the fungus doesn't kill us, his cooking will."
"There's got to be a care package around here somewhere," Gwen said as she and the twins looked under the beds and finally found a box under the one Gilbert was sleeping on. The three then started struggling back and forth with the care package as Andy, Mandy and Allison looked o.
"Can't you guys just share?" they asked.
"Like sharing the same birthday with a relative isn't sharing enough? You guys don't get it," Jen said.
"Jen, they're twins like you and Ben. As in they were born on the same day," Allison said.
"Oh, right," Ben said. "Well they don't know what it's like to share with two relatives. I share enough with my sister already. I can't share everything with my cousin too."
Suddenly, Gilbert shot up without warning.
"They're here! All around us!"
Ben, Jen and Gwen suddenly fell to the floor in alarm.
"Who's here?" Gwen asked.
They then heard a scream from outside.
"That sounded like Grandpa!" Jen said.
She then ran for the door, only for Gilbert to tackle her in defiance with a glare.
"Don't go out there! They'll find you!"
"Chill," Ben said walking up as he and his sister held up their Omnitrixes. "I have animal instincts."
"And I kind of have a way with nature."
Later, Wildmutt was running through the forest with Blossom Rose riding on his back as she flicked his nape.
"Hey, Ben," she said as she noticed the dark woods, completely nervous. "Why don't you make like baby food and MUSH!"
They ran through the woods as Blossom Rose looked nervously around, shivering with fear.
Wildmutt sniffed the ground, trying to pick up Max's scent when he looked up and saw a construction crane on a hill.
He and Blossom Rose ran up ahead and saw that the woods on the other side of the hill was like an entire different world altogether. Giant mushrooms lined up instead of trees and other kinds of infected fungi dotted the landscape. The entire place looked like something out of Ferngully or Pandora.
"I've got a bad feeling about this," she whimpered before a sudden pain laced through her head. She groaned outwards as she heard a voice in her head.
"Intruders," it said as she whimpered in fear. "No matter. You shall join the other one... in my stomach."
"Other one?" she asked herself. "Oh no. Grandpa!"
Wildmutt ran up the area with Blossom Rose riding along as a bunch of stalks with eyes looked at them as they passed. They nervously looked down the hole in the center of the mushroom forest and suddenly, a bunch of purple tendrils burst out of the ground and wrapped around them.
Blossom Rose screamed as they struggled within the grasp as they were pulled down into the abyss.
Wildmutt used his brute strength to break the tendrils holding him and Blossom Rose shot out her hand and a ton of thorns burst from the walls around them that severed her tendrils. They looked down and saw Max being dragged downwards by the same tendrils.
"Ben! Jen!"
Suddenly, more tendrils gagged his mouth and dragged him further down into the abyss.
"Grandpa!" Blossom Rose shouted as she struggled and they both ran further down the tunnel... right before the Omnitrixes timed out. "Crap!"
The twins were then sent sprawling on top of each other and recovered as they got up.
"Oh man!" Ben shouted. "Not now! Grandpa!"
They looked around and a bunch of orange mushrooms suddenly grew eyes and limbs and two sets of jaws opened upon their stalks as they approached the twins.
"Run!" Jen shouted as they set off in a running pace, Jen tossing energy disks at them to keep them back.
They reached a corner when a blue-green plant shot upwards under their feet and tried to chomp down on them, but Ben tackled his sister off of him.
The brown mushrooms dogpiled the twins as they landed... or so they thought. The twins were standing off to the side and they gasped as the mushrooms noticed them once again.
"Let's get out of here!" Jen shouted.
"Don't have to tell me twice!" Ben said as they both turned and ran again down the tunnels with tendrils and mushrooms chasing them down the tunnel until they reached the end and immediately climbed up the wall without looking back.
Once they reached the surface, they found a bulldozer next to the hole. They then got into it and Ben tried to work the construction machine.
"Come on, how do you work this thing?" he asked as he tried to engage the gear shift.
"Ben, we're too young to drive!" Jen said as the mushrooms and tendrils crawled up the hole and glared at him.
"We're doomed!" Jen shouted as she hugged her brother in fear.
"Not yet, we're not! We're taking you guys out at the root!" Ben shouted as he fired up the bulldozer and put it into reverse.
The bulldozer then pushed the mushrooms back down into the hole. Unfortunately, this did nothing to deter the tendrils as they wrapped around it and lifted it up.
"Jump for it, Ben!" Jen shouted as the twins leaped out and ran as the tendrils pulled the bulldozer down into the hole.
"Okay, so much for that idea."
They then looked and saw the tendrils tossed the bulldozer back outwards and tossed it back up onto the hill, destroying an outhouse.
"I think we'd better regroup back at the camp," Jen said as they ran away.
They then burst into the camp's cabin while struggling to catch their breath as they looked at Gwen, Allison, Gilbert, Andy and Mandy.
"You won't believe it!" Ben said. "There are-"
"Killer mushrooms! Everywhere!" Gilbert finished for them.
"And they're taking over the camp!" Gwen said.
Ben and Jen then looked at the others, confused as they shook their heads.
"Right!' Jen quickly said. "And they've got Grandpa!"
"Oh no!" Allison said.
"They must be a dormant species that came alive when the camp dug in this new area," Gilbert suggested. "That's what I was trying to tell you when your RV almost ran me over! We've got to get out of here!"
"We're not going anywhere without our Grandpa!" Ben said as he and his sister ran to the door.
"Make that all three of us," Gwen said as she and Allison followed them out the door.
Andy, Mandy and Gilbert followed them out the door with determined looks on their faces.
"What do you think they want?" Ben asked.
"I took this advanced botany class last semester," Gwen explained. "And-"
Suddenly, the ground shook and a gigantic white spore mushroom shot out from the ground, startling them.
"Uh, I think I have a good idea," Jen said to Gwen and Allison. "When I was Blossom Rose, I heard this strange voice in my head. It said that we were intruders to the area. They want us! For plant food!"
"Oh man," Gwen said, trying to shake the thought off as they ran away into the cabin for shelter.
They didn't get far, however, as even more mushrooms rose from the ground in the cabin.
"Everyone out!" Allison ordered as they all ran away as the cabin was completely demolished by the mushrooms growing out of the ground.
They all stood back to back as an entire forest of white mushrooms grew from the ground and they all gasped out.
"Okay, they stopped," Ben said.
"That's good, right?" Jen asked, pulling her fingers nervously.
"Actually, it's worse," Gilbert said. "Those are puffballs containing billions of mushroom spores. If those mushrooms mature and release those spores..."
"They could spread over the entire state," Gwen realized.
"Or even the entire country," Allison said.
"That does it," Ben said as he and his sister pulled Gwen and Allison over. "We're going XLR8."
"We're going to save Grandpa and start chomping these things down," Jen said.
"Actually," Gilbert said, walking up. "The only way to eliminate a mushroom is to destroy its mycelium."
"Its... what?" Ben asked.
"It's brain," Gwen explained.
"You guys know way too much about Mushrooms," Allison said as Jen nodded.
"We'll see you guys when we take out the brain," she said as she and her brother turned away.
Gwen and Allison stopped them, touching their shoulders.
"We're coming with you," Gwen said. "He's my grandpa too."
"And he took me in when I had nowhere else to go," Allison said. "I owe him."
"Look, Gwen, we may share a lot of things," Ben said as he and his sister showed their Omnitrixes.
"But we don't share these," Jen finished as she realized what she said and held her head. "Man, we sound like Andy and Mandy right now."
"What about me? I'm not exactly helpless, you know," Allison said, crossing her arms.
"I think it's best if you stay here," Ben said. "The others could use someone with powers watching over them."
"Fine. You're right," Allison groaned.
"Be careful," Gwen said as they nodded.
"Hey, Ben and I are twins," Jen said with a smile. "We watch out for each other."
They then ran off back to the center of the forest as Gwen and Allison ran back towards Gilbert, Andy and Mandy.
The twins, who both went XLR8, sped down the forest trail back from where they came for. They stopped at the construction site from before and saw even more giant mushrooms sprout from the ground in front of them as they shuddered.
"This doesn't look good," Ben said.
"I don't think that I'm going to be eating Mom's stuffed mushrooms for awhile after this," Jen said with a groan.
They then nodded, closed their visors and sped down the hole again, keeping careful watch out for the purple tendrils from before and looked around for their grandfather as they advanced further down the hole.
"Grandpa?" Ben asked.
"Where are you?!" Jen shouted.
Suddenly, the brown mushrooms from before sprouted upwards and they immediately ran away further down the tunnel.
Gwen, Allison, Gilbert, Andy and Mandy ran for shelter behind the targets at the camp's archery range. Allison looked around with her hand in her pocket, fingering her little goodies.
"Coast is clear," she said.
"If we can make it to the dining hall, we can barricade ourselves in the kitchen," Gilbert suggested.
"And fight these things off with what? A spatula?" Andy asked.
"We are so dead meat," Mandy cried. "Oh, I hate it, hate it, hate it here!"
Suddenly, the ground shot up from underneath them and a giant mushroom sprouted up with the twins on it. They screamed as the cap opened up and green tendrils wrapped around the twins and the mushroom swallowed them up.
"That's it," Allison shouted. "No more Ms. Nice Osmosian!"
She fingered the stray Diamondhead crystal and absorbed its material, coating herself in green crystal armor, Gilbert looking on in awe as she formed her arms into blades.
"Be careful not to hurt them!" Gwen shouted as Allison charged in.
Back in the tunnel, Ben and Jen reached a split path as the purple tendrils surrounded them on their left side and they both used their claws and superfast speed to slice them up before they could grab them.
"Keep your roots to yourself!" Ben shouted.
They then turned and ran down the right path with determination clear in their demeanor.
"We're coming, Grandpa!" Jen shouted.
Gwen fired arrows into the mushroom as it released a toxic gas from its stem as she smiled, pleased.
"Bullseye!" she shouted as the mushroom fell over.
Allison then used her blade arms to carefully slice open the stem as she reached in and pulled Andy and Mandy out.
As the twins recovered, they gasped when they saw more identical mushrooms rise from the ground and surround them as Gilbert gulped.
"Move it!" he shouted as they turned and ran for the mess hall.
As they ran, they were stopped once they reached the rock climbing wall and the mushrooms sprouted up from the sides, trapping them.
"We need to get to higher ground!" Gwen shouted.
"But the rock wall is only for the older campers," Mandy said.
"What's more important, Mandy? Camp rules or your life?!" Allison shouted at her.
"Um, well..."
"Hey, it's not exactly a trick question!"
"Call me crazy, but right now, I think some camp rules are meant to be broken," Gwen stated as they looked and saw glowing green eyes in the shadows.
In the deepest part of the tunnels, Max suddenly came to and looked around the area and saw that he was bound by the roots.
In as clearing in front of him, the twins came in, cutting the roots away with a determined look on their faces as they looked up to see him.
"Grandpa," Ben said as they ran ahead and started cutting their grandfather free.
"Ben... Jen..."
"Save your strength," Jen said. "We'll have you free in just a-"
That was when the Omnitrixes started beeping down and timed out as they transformed back to their armored forms..
"No!" Ben said. "Not now!"
"Ben, Jen, behind you!"
"That was when the purple tendrils sneaked up behind the twins and ensnared them, surprising them as their vision was cut off, though they were protected by their Omni Suits.
"Grandpa!" Ben shouted.
Gwen and Allison scaled the rock climbing wall with Gilbert, Andy and Mandy close behind htem.
"Come on!" Gwen ordered. "We've got to keep moving."
They looked ahead and saw the mess hall on the far side away from the wall and the way down was blocked by the giant mushrooms.
They looked up and saw a zipline by their as Andy and Mandy struggled to grasp the first line on the zipline.
"Me first!" Andy shouted.
"No, me!" Mandy retorted.
"Does it really matter?!" Allison scolded. "Now zip it!"
Mandy took the line, stuck his tongue out at his sister and zipped down the line, followed by her brother, then Gwen, then Allison and finally Gilbert, who screamed all the way down the line.
Max and the twins were struggling in the grasp of the roots as they struggled.
"Can you two reach your Omnitrixes?" Max asked as the twins fiddled with their Omnitrixes.
"We're trying," Ben said.
"I think it needs more time to recharge," Jen said as they suddenly pressed the watches down, triggering a transformation.
The Omnitrix sank into Ben's wrist and vine-like tendrils spread up his arm and encased him in a green cocoon-like shell. Two clawed arms sprouted from the sides of it, a blue spore-like sphere opened on his shoulders and he grew six black seed-like spores from his back. The bottom of the shell grew vine-like legs and the top opened up to reveal a green head with a single blue eye and razor-sharp teeth. He then posed to the camera as the transformation ended.
Jen's Omnitrix sank into her wrist as chlorophyll-filled veins grew up her arm and spread to her face, which turned chalky white as she clutched her eyes shut and they turned a full pink with energy and black lines grew out, marking her face like a mask. Her hair grew out into several leaf-like extensions with a few yellow stigmas growing from the top. Her clothes morphed into a pink long-sleeved uniform with green segments on the front and shoulders and white petals on the bottom, forming a skirt and pink shoes on her feet with root-like extensions coming from the soles with the Omnitrix symbol on her chest.
"What the heck is that?" Max asked as the two looked to each other and gained a look of confusion.
"Beats me," Ben said. "I've never gone him before."
He then grew several thorns from his body and they broke through the roots ensnaring him.
"But I like what he can do."
Jen then struggled as she groaned. "This is a different species than Blossom Rose, right? She has to do something different!"
She then groaned and threw her fingers down. Suddenly, water shot out from her fingertips and sliced through the roots and she gasped as she looked at her fingers and wiggled them.
"A plant alien that can shoot water?" she asked.
"I've seen that kind of alien before," he said. "That's a Fernovian, a plant-based being that has the ability to jettison water under an extremely high-pressured stream, enabling them to cut through any object."
"Sweet," she said as she looked herself over.
Ben then grew thorns from his hand and sliced Max's bindings, freeing him.
"Let's get out of here."
"You aren't going anywhere," said a voice sounding out from all around them.
"*Gasp* It's the voice from before when I was Blossom Rose!" Jen said as she glared.
"I hear it too!" Ben realized.
Suddenly, a ton of roots grabbed Max from under his feet and dragged him down into the ground. The twins tried to save him, but they were grabbed as well and dragged further into the earth.
They looked down and gasped as they saw a giant pink mass growing underneath them with tons of plants and spores growing out from it.
"I communicate with all vegetation on a telepathic level."
The twins gasped in fear at the horror before them.
The others were still going down the zip line with Gilbert freaking out from fear.
Unfortunately, one of the sentient mushrooms glared and bit down on the line, breaking it and sending Gwen, Allison, Gilbert, Andy and Mandy falling down, bouncing off of the mushrooms to the ground.
The twins screamed as they were surrounded by tons of sentient mushroom troops.
Gilbert, shivering with fear, turned and saw a shed on their side.
"In there!"
They ran off as blue roots shot up from where they were standing and shot after them.
Gilbert screamed as the roots shot after him. Fortunately, Allison severed the roots with her blade arm, after she absorbed the silver from her quarter.
"You're welcome," she said as the others entered the shed and she immediately closed the door behind them.
Gwen and Allison were trying to catch their breath and groaned when they saw the twins arguing again.
"We wouldn't even be here right now if you didn't make us hide in the kitchen!" Andy shouted.
"Me?" Mandy asked. "It was your idea in the first place!"
"Well you didn't have to listen to me!"
"Ugh, I take back everything I said about Ben and Jen right now," Gwen groaned.
Allison stuck her pinkies into her lips and whistled rather harshly to catch their attention. "Stop it!"
"He/she started it!"
"It doesn't matter who started it or who's fault it is," she said. "What matters is that you're family and you need to stick together."
"*sigh* Okay," the twins said.
"Good," Gwen said, picking up a baseball bat. "Because we're going to need to fight our way out of here."
"Let me guess," Ben said as he and his sister were drawn in closer to the mass. "You're the braniac."
"I prefer Mycelium," the brain said as it revealed a maw with tons of razor sharp teeth.
"Ben, Jen," Max asked. "Who are you talking to?"
"Mr. Mushroom Head," Ben said. "It's like we're connected or something. Oh man, why couldn't you be a vegetarian?"
"Ben!" Jen shouted, struggling in Mycelium's grip. "We're plants right now! Even if he was a vegetarian, we would still be food to him!"
"Struggle as you may, you can't stop me. Soon, I will consume every living creature on this planet."
"Well you're not starting with us!" Ben said as he grew his thorns from his body, shredding Mycelium's roots off of him before shooting his arm out to save himself, which stretched out to the ceiling and gripped it. One of the seeds on his back was shaken loose and fell down onto Mycelium, where it exploded like a bomb.
Jen glared as she made a few hand gestures and shot her water out from her hand that sliced through the vines like a blade before she fired her hands behind her and flipped onto a root as she looked at her hands.
"Wow," she said, admiring her hands before she looked her body over, admiring the lily-like qualities of the flower dress. "This girl gives new meaning to water lily."
Ben stretched out his arms and grabbed his grandfather before he joined Water Lily on the root with a glare.
"Surely as plants, you must understand the wisdom of sharing a single intelligence."
"We're not really good at sharing anything," Ben said as he pulled out his seeds. "Just ask our cousin!"
The twins then leaped down to battle. Ben twisted his body around, sending his seed pods flying everywhere, where they exploded all over Mycelium's brain-body.
Water Lily ducked and tumbled through the battle, firing her water jets from her hands, which sliced clean through the vines and roots before she leapt up and fired water blasts from her hands, which soaked into him and ripped up several parts of the Mycelium as she glared.
"It's time to water the plants!" she shouted with a glare.
Meanwhile, Gwen, Allison and the campers shouted out as they charged into battle against the living mushroom sentries. Gwen was armed with her baseball bat, Allison was armed with the energy cannon, Mandy with a paintball gun and mask, Andy with a hockey stick and mask and Gilbert with a leaf blower.
Gwen immediately charged up and swatted the mushrooms back with her bat and caused her to go flying back into the giant mushrooms with a shout.
They immediately charged into the herd with no mercy on their minds.
Allison climbed up onto one of the mushrooms and used the energy cannon to blast them and set them on fire with a glare. She then noticed one sneaking up on her and she immediately absorbed the metal from the cannon, morphed her arm into a blade and sliced it down the middle with a glare on her face.
Mandy fired several paintballs at the mushrooms while her brother fired hockey pucks at them with his stick, bouncing off of them and knocking them out.
One of the mushrooms tried to get the jump on them, only to be blown away by Gilbert's leaf blower and blasted by Allison with a glare from above.
"Nice shot," the twins said in unison before getting a worried look on their faces. "Uh-oh." They then ran off when they saw a giant warm of mushroom sentries charging them from behind.
"Run!" Allison shouted as she shot the energy cannon at them as the others ran off with her giving them cover as she ran across the mushrooms before she caught her breath. "Come along with us, she says. It'll be a great adventure, she says."
Gwen, Andy, Mandy and Gilbert ran through the maze of mushrooms while trying to outrun the mushroom swarm and eventually reached the camp lake.
"Oh man," Gwen groaned before she looked and saw a boat by the lake. "Everyone thinking what I'm thinking?"
They all then picked up the boat and used it as a shield/battering ram for them as they ran towards the swarm. "Charge!"
They rammed down the mushrooms with reckless abandon as Allison fired on them as well from her perch.
"Take no prisoners!" Gilbert shouted as they finished and they set the boat down and ran for the mess hall again.
Unfortunately, a vine reached out from behind and snagged Mandy up by the shirt, sending her screaming up into the air.
Andy gasped and reached into his duffel bag and pulled out a pair of ice skates. He tied the laces together. He twirled them around in his hands by the laces and tossed them like a bladed bola, which sliced the root in half, freeing his sister, who flew into him.
Allison immediately jumped down from her perch and grabbed the twins as they closed in on the mess hall and Gwen immediately shut the door as the mushrooms closed in on it.
Back with Ben and Water Lily, they were continuing their battle with Mycellium as they sliced it up with their claws/water jets as they shouted out and sliced it up as Ben shot his fine-like arms out and sliced several sections of him off at a time.
"Whoa!" Ben said as he looked himself over. "I'm going to call this guy Wildvine from now on."
"Resistance is futile," Mycelium warned. "For even if you destroy me, you cannot possibly destroy the billions of spores I am about to release into your atmosphere."
"We'll worry about them next!" Water Lily shouted before she looked down as her and Wildvine's Omnitrixes started beeping before timing out, leaving them in their Omni Suits as they shouted out.
"Oh come on!" Ben shouted as he, his sister and their grandfather were snatched up again by Mycelium's roots.
Mycelium opened its maw and brought them in slowly as they looked on in fear.
"Grandpa, we're sorry," Jen whimpered.
In the barricaded mess hall, Gwen, Allison, Andy, Mandy and Gilbert watched closely as the mushrooms pounded on the door. They tried to run out the back door, but the mushrooms weren't that stupid and they easily broke through the door with a glare.
Allison looked to behind her and the roots outside burst through the barricade and the mushrooms flooded in.
"I am not going down without a fight!" Allison shouted as she absorbed the metal from the energy cannon and started wielding it in front of her as she started firing wildly from it, blasting mushrooms left and right as the kids covered behind her.
Some of the mushrooms tried to sneak up behind her, but she formed her arm into a sickle blade and sliced a few caps off with a determined look on her face.
"If I'm going down, I'm going to at least take the 'fun' out of this fungus!" Max shouted as he kicked the roots with his boot.
That was when Ben got an idea in his head. "That's it!" he exclaimed as he pressed the Omnitrix symbol on his armor's chestplate, deactivating it.
"What's it?" Jen asked, raising an eyebrow at seeing her brother deactivate his only means of defense.
"You said the foot powder kills any kind of fungus, Grandpa!" Ben said as he kicked his legs back and forth and kicked off his shoe, which was filled with athlete's foot powder, into Mycelium's mouth.
It groaned in pain and started pulsing back and forth and foaming at the mouth.
"Ben, you're a genius!" Jen exclaimed as she pressed her own armor's Omnitrix symbol, deactivating it, so she could reach into her pants pocket and throw down the entire bottle of foot powder into Mycelium's mouth.
Mycelium howled in pain as it frothed back and forth as its roots came undone, freeing Ben, Jen and Max, sending them falling on their butts as they looked up as Mycelium exploded in a pool of mushroom juice.
Back in the mess hall, Allison kept slicing and blasting away the living mushrooms as they closed in on her, when something caught her eye. As one of them stopped dead in its tracks as it shriveled up and died, falling to the floor. The rest of the swarm followed suit, leaving a bunch of dead fungi in the hall as the others looked confused.
"What just happened?" Gilbert asked.
"My cousins just happened," Gwen smiled. "They came through."
They walked out of the mess hall with a satisfied smile on all of their faces as they looked on.
"This camp rocks!" Andy and Mandy cheered, pumping their fists.
"I can't wait to come back!" Gilbert said.
Suddenly, they looked ahead and saw the twins and Max dripping and covered in mushroom juice as they groaned miserably.
"You two did it!" Gwen cheered as Allison smiled with her hands on her hips.
"I'd shake your hand and hug you, but I'm not getting mushroom juice on me. I just had these clothes washed," she chuckled as Jen smiled.
"We're not done here yet," she said, looking up. "We've still got to stop these spores."
Ben then got an idea to his head and looked to Andy.
"Did you say everyone here gets athlete's foot?" he asked.
Andy nodded his head.
After taking a quick dip in the lake, they ran for the nurse's office and opened the medicine cabinet to find several jars of athlete's foot powder.
"Andy brilliant ideas on how to let this stuff go?" Ben asked.
Gwen and Allison looked to each other and smirked. "Actually, as a matter of fact..."
A cloud of athlete's foot powder was bathed over the mushroom spores, killing them almost instantly as Gwen and Allison flew on the backs of Stinkfly and Firefly as they let the powder go from the jars in their duffel bags.
"I love camping!" Allison shouted after they killed the last of the spores as she stood up and smiled as Firefly passed over the lake. "Let me go take a dip."
She then hopped off and cannonballed into the lake, whooping all the while as the others looked on with a smile.
"Nice work, cuz," Ben said as the gang sat at a table at a pizza parlor as they smiled.
"And you to, Allison," Jen said as they waited. "We couldn't have done it without you."
"Thanks," Gwen said, grateful.
"And we were thinking," Jen said as she and her brother smiled. "I guess we can have our birthday anytime. You take the real date."
"That's nice of you two," Gwen said before shrugging. "But it's really no big deal. You two can take the real date."
The twins then smiled mischievously to one another before giving each other a high-five.
"Psych!" Ben said as they both laughed as Gwen growled at them and Allison facepalmed.
"I knew we'd get it out of you after only one "You take the real date!" Jen snickered.
"Dweebs!"
"Oh well," Allison groaned, burying her face in the menu. "Guess they really can't agree on anything."
That was when the pizza was delivered and the only topping on it was...
"Mushrooms?!" everyone but Max asked as they all backed away slowly. "Gross!"
"Well, almost anything," Max said, munching on his pizza.
Next time on Ben and Jen 10:
Ultimate Weapon
(Author note: I gave Jen another plant alien when she already has Blossom Rose, I needed another alien for her to hear Mycelium and it only works on plants, so there you go.)
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone