Chapter Text
We begin the story right outside of Jupiter's orbit, as two large spaceships engage in a dogfight. Of course, calling it a dogfight was being generous, as the much smaller teal ship was essentially just trying to get away from the much larger brown ship, which was currently riddling it with energy blasts. Within the ship's command room, there were several beings, wrapped in black and orange jumpsuits with yellow optics, all typing at various consoles, pulling levers and turning dials, all while a man sits in the center of it all in a throne of sorts. The man was wrapped in a sleeveless black bodysuit. That's not to say the man's arms were exposed, instead, they had separate gloves of sorts that extended all the way to his shoulders, which were covered in round, spiked pauldrons, with similar boots that rose all the way to the tops of his thighs. The man has a grayish green skin tone, with the occasional yellow spot dotting his complexion, green sacs bulging from his cheeks, and tentacles hanging from his chin like a beard. His teeth were blocky and crooked, and he lacked a nose, and he stared out at the teal ship on the various monitors, hate burning in his red eyes as he does.
"Hull damage: 20 percent. Weapons systems still operational." One of the beings in a black and orange jumpsuit says in a robotic tone, not turning to look at the octopus man he was addressing.
"I have come too far to be denied. The Chaquetrix shall be mine, and there is not a being in the galaxy that dares to stand in my way!"
Meanwhile, on the planet Earth, school was doing what it always did; Tortured children with sheer boredom. Our focus was on a particular boy with green eyes and a messy head of brown hair. He was wearing a white T-shirt, with a black stripe going down the middle and wrapping around the collar, with similar black lines at the edges of his sleeves, along with a pair of cargo pants and black & white sneakers. Currently, he was doing what many would do in his situation; Anxiously glancing at the clock that hung on a nearby wall whilst folding a paper airplane. Upon its completion, he gave it a light toss, allowing it to drift in the air and bump into the back of the teacher's head. She whips around as the boy scrambles for a book, pretending to read to avoid trouble. Whether she noticed or not, the teacher turned back to the chalkboard and continued writing.
"Come on... Come on!" The boy groans to himself as he stares at the clock, his momentary distraction gone now, as he is forced to actually listen to the lesson... Or at the very least, pretend he is.
"And I just want to remind you all that I will be teaching summer school this year, and it's not too late to sign up." The teacher says, drawing a scoff from the boy, and a few similar reactions from various others in the classroom.
"Yeah right." The boy says before a loud ring muffles any further sarcastic remark he or anyone else could make. "YES! Outta here!" The boy shouts as he and many others jump out of their seats and start heading out the door.
"Everyone, have a good vacation, and I hope to see you all again in the fall." The teacher says as the children leave, barley paying her any mind. "Benjamin! Could I have a word with you before you go?" She shouts, stopping the boy at the door. He turns his head towards her and finds her smirking as she holds up the paper airplane he had thrown. One lecture later and the boy—Benjamin, or Ben for short—found himself walking towards the parking lot. As he did, he noticed that two kids were surrounding a third, and were talking so loud that Ben could overhear them.
"Normally, we'd take your money and beat you up, but since it's the last day of school, we're going to give you a break. Now fork over the cash, so we can get out of here." The taller of the two boys says, drawing a glare from Ben as he stomps towards them.
"Leave him alone!" Ben yells at the two obvious bullies, who turn to look at him with a pair of glares.
"Get lost, shrimp." The shorter of the two bullies says.
"I said, back off!" Ben says, not feeling intimidated by the two at all. Unfortunately for Ben, the bullies weren't intimidated by him either.
"Oh, looks like we got us a hero." The taller bully says as he turns to face Ben with a cocky grin. "Suppose we don't wanna back off?"
"What are ya gonna do about it, Tennyson?" He says before their eyes narrow at each other, each waiting for someone else to throw the first punch, and eventually, Ben does so, with a righteous scream and a raised fist. I'll spare you the details of the 'fight' which could barely even be called that, and tell you the ending. That being Ben and the other kid hanging from a nearby tree from their underwear in what was probably a very painful wedgie.
"Thanks a lot." The other boy says, glaring at Ben as if he was the one who put him up there.
"I was just trying to help."
"Next time you wanna play hero, make sure you can back it up." He says as they both hang there for a moment before a rusty RV pulls up on the road in front of them. The passenger seat window rolls down as an elderly man sticks his head out. He was wearing a red button up with an orange flower pattern with a white shirt underneath, paired with blue jeans and brown boots.
"Come on, Ben, let's go! We're burning daylight. I wanna make it to the campsite by nightfall." The old man says, as if Ben could actually get down from the tree himself.
"Uh, Grandpa Max? A little help here?" He asks, drawing a chuckle from the man who gets out of the RV and helps Ben and the other boy down. He then gets back into the driver seat as Ben climbs into the back of the RV. "I have so been looking forward to this." He says happily, before glancing towards the table in the RV and noticing there was a girl there. She had a head of orange hair and eyes of a similar shade of green as Ben's. She was wearing a blue shirt with a cat face, white pants, and white an blue sneakers. Currently, she was typing at a computer, not looking up at Ben's arrival, with a sour expression, which was very dissimilar to Ben's sudden expression of horror at her presence. "What are you doing here? What is SHE doing here?"
"Take it easy, dweeb. This wasn't my idea. Somebody convinced my mom that "going camping for the summer would be a good experience for me"." She explains, as Ben turns his horror to Max.
"Grandpa, please. Tell me you didn't..."
"I thought it would be fun if your cousin came along with us this summer. Is... That a problem?" He asks, but neither of them want to make a bigger issue out of it, so they don't confirm that it was, indeed, a problem... For about 5 minutes. Almost as soon as the RV hit the high way, Ben let out a long groan.
"Aw, I can't believe it. I wait all school year to go on this trip, and now the queen of cooties is along for the ride."
"Hey! I had my own vacation already all planned out too, you know!" She says before tapping a few buttons on her laptop, spinning it around to reveal a very detailed spreadsheet with a font one size too small for Ben to be able to read. And that's if he cared enough to try, mind you. "Each activity is color-coded, so I never do the same thing two days in a row. Now, I'm stuck with my geekazoid cousin going camping for three months."
"Geek."
"Jerk."
"Something tells me it's gonna be a long summer..." Max groans as the implications of what he's done slowly sinks in on him as he drives down the highway.
A lot of time was spent driving, but eventually, the family manages to set up a campsite in the woods, with a small campfire and even a picnic table to eat on. Speaking of-
"Chow time!" Max says as he sets a bowl down in front of his grandchildren. A bowl filled with pale, squirming, still clearly alive grubs.
"... Okay, I give up. What - is that?" Ben asks in disgust that he tries to keep down to not hurt his grandfather's feelings.
"Marinated mealworms." He answers, as if it was somehow a great food that wasn't still clearly alive. "Hard to find them fresh in the States. You know, they're considered a delicacy in some countries."
"-And totally gross in others?" She asks, not being able to hold back her disgust, not that her grandfather actually seemed to mind.
"If these don't sound good, I've got some smoked sheep's tongue in the fridge...?" He asks, which at least had the benefit of not still being alive.
"Urgh, couldn't we just have a burger or something?" Ben asks with a smile while his cousin nods with a smile of her own, not even caring if doing so meant she was agreeing with Ben. Unfortunately, now their Grandfather thought they were the crazy ones.
"Nonsense. This summer's gonna be an adventure for your taste buds! I'll grab the tongue." He says as he heads back into the RV, unaware of his grandchildren's sudden, temporary comradery.
"Okay, I got a half-eaten bag of corn chips and a candy bar in my backpack. What do you got?"
"Some rice cakes and hard candy."
"Think we can make them last the whole summer?" Ben asks, even though he didn't have too. He knew they were more or less doomed to eat their Grandfather's gross food sooner rather than latter this summer.
Meanwhile, back at the spaceship battle from earlier, the large brown ship fires several more blasts at the teal ship, which seems to stop it from moving at all.
"Their propulsion systems have been destroyed." One of the orange and black technicians says as the octopus grins wickedly.
"Prepare to board! I want the Chaquetrix, now." He says, just as the smaller ship seems to glow intensely for a moment before firing a laser beam of his own, flying directly into the Command Room that the octopus had been sitting in. Unfortunately, this seems to prompt further retaliation as the brown ship lights up as well before firing an even bigger blast at the teal ship, causing it to detonate entirely in an incredible fire blast, lighting up the skies of distant worlds as a temporary, twinkling star for but a moment. However, as the fires roar in the vacuum of space, a small metal sphere flies away from the wreck. Directly towards Earth.
"Who wants to roast marshmallows?" Max asks as he exits the RV in his latest attempt to have fun with his grandkids this summer, only to discover them purposefully sitting with their backs to each other. Ben was playing a video game and his cousin was typing away at her computer, and they were both doing their best to ignore each other. "Okay, um... How 'bout we tell scary stories?"
"Scarier than having to spend a summer with your FREAK of a cousin?" Ben mumbles, ensuring that his grandpa couldn't hear him, but his cousin could.
"I'd like to, Grandpa," She starts with a grin and a glare aimed at Ben. "But I'm busy doing a web search on cures for 'extreme doofus-ness'! Nothing yet, Ben, but let's not give up hope!"
"Aww, come on you two, we're all in this together. You can mope around like this all summer, or we can have some fun. Now whaddya say?" He offers his grandchild, to less than stellar effects.
"I vote for moping."
"I'm gonna take a walk. Smell ya around, Gwen." Ben says as he heads off into the woods.
"I, uh, think they're starting to grow on each other." Max mumbles to himself, while a little voice in the back of his head asks him who he was kidding.
"Aw, man. This is gonna be the worst vacation ever. I might as well have gone to summer school." Ben groans as he walks through the woods, hands in his pockets, idly kicking at rocks before something catches his eye. That something being a shooting star twinkling through the sky. "Whoa! A shooting star!" He says in wonder that quickly turns to horror as the shooting star suddenly switches direction, no longer streaking through the sky and falling straight down towards him. He tries to run away, and he manages it by a few feet just as the shooting star turned meteorite crashes into the dirt behind him, sending dirt and debris up into the air, and sending Ben flying a few feet away. As it clears, Ben stands back up and glances over the edge of the newly formed crater, finding a small metal sphere sitting in the center. "Looks like a - satellite or something..." He says as he leans over the edge, trying to get a closer look, only for the ground to give way at his feet, sending him falling down into the crater towards the meteor with a yelp.
As he picks himself up, the small sphere begins to uncurl, as if it was a cocoon wrapped around something, which it turned out it was. In the center of the pod was what looked like an odd watch, with a large fuchsia button adjacent to the watch's face which has four fuchsia studs around it, and what looked like a fuchsia hourglass bordered by black on the watch's face, except the hour glass shape was made of two small hearts with their points touching and serving as the center of the hourglass shape.
"... A watch? What's a watch doing in outer space?" Ben mutters to himself as he leans in close to examine the watch. However, as it does, it seems to wriggle and, before he can lean away, it somehow jumps at him, its leather strap seemingly turning liquid before breaking apart, leaping onto his wrist and re-binding itself, turning back to leather as it does. Ben screams at the sudden jump from the watch, and even more so as it wraps itself around his wrist. And much to his horror, he can't seem to slip his wrist back through. "Get off me! Get off, get off!" He shouts, frantically tugging at the watch and waving his wrist around to get it off, but it was all for not, unfortunately. He runs up and out of the crater, screaming for help from his grandpa, not knowing what to do about this.
"Hm. Ben's been gone a while." Max wonders to himself, looking out towards the woods before shrugging. "Well, I guess he can't get into too much trouble out here."
"Unless he wound up bear food." Gwen mentions, much to her grandpa's disapproval. "Hey, I can dream, can't I?"
Ben had since resorted to trying to take the watch off with a stick, trying to jam it underneath and pry it off his wrist like a nail from a board. So far, he hadn't even gotten the stick under the watch before it ended up snapping. At that point, he tossed the remains of the stick away before deciding to go back to just fiddling with it, hopping that would somehow allow him to get the darn thing off. As he's fiddling with it, his finger slips and he accidently hits the magenta button on the side.
"Whoa!" He gasps as the watch face rises slightly on a short cylinder covered with glowing fuchsia lines, like a circuit board, while the hearts on the face inverted turning into one large fuchsia heart that featured a black silhouette on it. The silhouette looked vaguely like a person, but they were oddly bulky, and their head seemed to be on fire despite its neutral stance. "Coooool!" He says as he presses the face back down, idly wondering what had happened to cause this in the first place. As soon as he does, he is blinded by a massive blast of fuchsia light. When the light dies down, someone new was standing in the woods with him. Whoever it was, they certainly weren't human. Their entire body was seemingly made of a random assortment of crimson rock, with glowing yellow-white lines of fire seeming to hold them all together. Their face was vaguely skull shaped, aside from otherwise being entirely bathed in fire. Though, stranger still, despite their odd appearance, Ben was pretty sure that it was a female, considering the curves of its hips and chest. And sitting around its, or rather, her neck was a bulky metal collar of sorts with the face of the watch on it. Seeing as there was a woman seemingly made of rocks and fire standing in front of him, Ben has the most natural reaction one could have. "Ahh!" That being immediately screaming.
'Where... Where am I?' The woman thinks to herself as she looks around her new surroundings, not knowing what this place was. She didn't have long to think on that though, as a scream draws her gaze to a screaming child. Being a woman who didn't know where she was, with a child screaming in fear of something, she has the most natural reaction one could have. "Ahh!" That being to join in the screaming as she glances back to see what the boy was freaking out about. "What?! What?!" She shouts, looking around to see what he was freaking out about, not actually seeing anything nearby.
"You're on fire!" The boy shouts, pointing at her frantically.
"I am?!" She shouts, still panicking for a moment before his statement sinks in. "Wait... I'm supposed to be on fire." She mutters, not sure how she knew that, she just... Did.
"Wait, really?" The boy asks, calming down as her calm demeanor calms him down. "Coooool!" He says, grinning as he stands up and approaches her. "Hey, can you shoot, like, fireballs or something?"
"I... Think so?" She answers, not 100% sure of her answer. She was pretty sure she could, but she's never tried before. She focuses for a moment, holding her hand out in a finger gun gesture, focusing on the flames covering her hands. After a moment, a shot of flame flies out from her finger, slamming into a nearby tree branch and snapping it off.
"Wow, that's awesome! Can you make 'em bigger?"
"I can try." She replies, the boy's excitement proving to be infectious as she brings her hands together as if she was molding a snowball with nothing. After a few moments, a fireball forms in her hands which she tosses like a baseball pitch. It flies through three trees, much to the excitement of both herself and the boy, which rapidly fades as the fire begins to spread to the rest of the trees, and then the trees around it.
"Oh man, not awesome!"
"What's that?" Gwen asks, noticing a rather large column of smoke rising from the woods.
"Looks like the start of a forest fire." Max notes with a glare in its direction. "We better let the Rangers' Station know. Probably some darn fool camper out there, messing around with something he shouldn't." He says, only for both of their eyes to snap open wide in realization at what darn fool camper had wandered off in that general direction earlier.
"Ben!" They shout in unison as Max runs back into the RV, reemerging with two fire extinguishers in hand, one of which he tosses to Gwen. "Better take this!"
"Stop! Stop!" The fire woman shouts as tries to put out the fire by shooting it with more fire, which doesn't work out very well, at all. In fact, all it does is make more fire. Go figure.
"This would be so cool if it weren't so - not cool!" He shouts, not knowing what else to say at the inferno he had accidently encouraged. However, just as he says that, Gwen rounds the corner, spraying fire with the extinguisher as she goes. "Gwen!"
"Ben?!" She shouts, turning her head and seeing her cousin, not noticing the fire woman nearby as she jogs over to Ben. "What did you do?!"
"Why is that your first question!?" He shouts, just as the fire woman walks up behind them.
"Okay, this is not working." The fire woman says in exasperation, drawing the two's attention. However, while Ben was more or less kind of used to her appearance, Gwen wasn't, so she has a natural reaction to it.
"Ahh!" That being screaming in fright at the literal fire woman.
"Oh god, what now?" Said fire woman asks, whipping her head around to see what Gwen was screaming at, once again not understanding that it was her that was causing the child's fright. However, unlike Ben who pointed out what was freaking him out, Gwen immediately swings the fire extinguisher at the back of the fire woman's head.
"Gwen!" Ben shouts, attempting to stop his cousin as she aims the fire extinguisher at the fire woman and fires, spraying the woman with the foam and putting out the fire on her head.
"I don't know what you are, but you'll stay down there if you know what's good for you!" She shouts in warning at the woman who cradles her head in her hands as the fire returns almost instantly.
"Ow! That really hurt! Why would you do that?!" She shouts, whining in pain, drawing a bit of sympathy from Gwen. Not enough to make her lower the fire extinguisher.
"Gwen! It's okay! She's not dangerous... Well, not intentionally dangerous." Ben says, resting his hand on his cousin's shoulder to try and make her stand down. However, she can't help but notice his new accessory.
"What is that?" She asks, glancing at the symbol on the watch and the matching one on the woman's odd collar.
"Well, when I was walking, this meteor fell from the sky and almost smudged me, except that it wasn't a meteor or a satellite, but this watch thing that jumped up onto my wrist, and when I tried to get it off, she suddenly appeared, and we were messing with her cool fire powers and we accidentally started this mega forest fire!"
"So this is your fault then?"
"Why is that your takeaway?!"
"Gwen, are you alri-" Max says as he charges through the flames towards them, only to stop as he stares at the fire woman who was slowly picking herself up off the ground. "What in blazes?"
"Grandpa, it's okay! She's cool!" Ben quickly says, not wanting Max to also attack the woman.
"Just... What's going on here?" He asks, his eyes nervously darting around at the woman, the fire, his grandchildren, and his grandson's new watch.
"Well, when I was walking, this meteor-"
"Erm, excuse me? Major forest fire burning out of control, remember?" Gwen shouts, reminding them that they all might die if they don't do something... Save for the fire woman, that is.
"What do we do?" Said fire woman asks, as Max strokes his chin in thought.
"Backfire." He says after a few seconds. "Start a new fire and let it burn into the old fire. They'll snuff each other out. Think you can do it?"
"I think so." She says with a nod as they all split up, with the humans running off towards the RV while the fire woman finds another section of forest that wasn't burning and holds out her hands, focusing for a moment as a beam of fire flies out of her outstretched hands, burning more trees as it does.
Within the remains of the ship, the octopus man now resided in a tube of liquid, most of his body being gone, his face covered with a mask, with several tubes connected to his body, as many of his organs and bones float around near him.
"What do you mean it's not there? This battle nearly costs me my life! And you say the Chaquetrix is no longer on board the transport?!"
"Sensors indicate a probe was jettisoned from the ship, just before boarding. It landed on the planet below." One of the beings in orange and black says to the octopus man in the tube, drawing an angry growl for him.
"Go. Bring it to me." He says, as a robot leaves the room to do as he had ordered.
The rangers had investigated the fire, only to find that it had put itself out somehow. If they did a bit more thorough investigating, they may have found the human family and their flaming guest sitting around a campfire, roasting marshmallows.
"And you say that this watch just "jumped up and clamped onto your wrist"?" Max asks for further clarification, as Ben finishes explaining how he had found the watch, and how the fire woman had appeared.
"Hey, this time it wasn't my fault, I swear!" Ben shouts, tossing the fire woman another marshmallow which she proceeds to roast in her hand before eating.
"I believe you, Ben." He says with a tired sigh.
"So, what are we supposed to do with the fire monster?"
"She's not a monster. She's an alien." Max explains, drawing a curious expression from those around him, while he looks startled himself. "I-I mean... Look at her. What else could' she be?"
"Human." The fire woman says softly, drawing a surprised look from them all. "I'm... Pretty sure I'm human."
"A-Are you sure?" Max says, as if he wasn't expecting her to say that. "Sure there isn't any alien in there?" He asks and after a few moments of thought, she nods, as if confirming something to herself.
"I think... I'm... A Pyronite?"
"What's a Pyronite?" Ben asks, looking to his cousin and Grandpa for answers, but his grandpa just shrugs.
"Best guess? Rocky fire people." Gwen guesses, not having heard of such a thing before. Not even in some of the more thought out conspiracy theories.
"Alright, sooo... What happens now?" Ben asks, but before anyone can answer, the watch begins to beep as the fuchsia hearts begin to flash red, while the symbol on the fire woman's collar does the same. After a few seconds, there's a large red flash that blinds them for a moment, and when it stops, the fire woman is gone. "Oh... I guess that happens." He says before trying to tug the watch off again. "I still can't get this thing off."
"Better not fool with it anymore until we know exactly what we're dealing with." Max says as he picks up a flashlight and stands up. "I'll go check out that crash site. You guys stay here until I get back." He says before promptly walking away.
At the crash sight, a large robot was scanning the metal sphere that the watch rested inside of. When it finds that there wasn't anything inside, it fires a blast of red energy at it, destroying it before two floating disks pop off of its shoulders before popping open themselves, revealing red lights and several claws before flying away from the robot, as it wanders off in a different direction.
"Hmm... I wonder what this does." Ben says as he continues to fiddle with the watch. He was currently sitting on the other side of the RV, away from his cousin's view so he could fiddle in peace. Or, at least, he thought he was.
"Caught ya!" Gwen shouts, causing Ben to jump and shriek in fright whilst Gwen laughs.
"Very funny. Like your face." Ben says before he continues to fiddle with the watch.
"Grandpa said not to mess with that thing."
"Yeah, so? What's your point?"
"Did your parents drop you when you were a baby?" She asks, appropriately timed with Ben trying to bite at the thing. He notices her smirk and groans as he stops, actually turning to face her.
"Come on. You can't tell me you aren't a little bit curious what else this thing can do?"
"Not in the least."
"... You sure you're related to me?"
"I don't like this one little bit." Max says as he investigates the crash site, not finding much other than a few scraps of metal, as if something destroyed it. Seeing that there was nothing to do but head back now, he thinks on what's happened. The device that had attached itself to his Grandson's wrist, the woman it summoned from nowhere, and how he knew exactly what was going on. "I can't believe Azmuth took me seriously. Smartest being in five galaxies can't even tell I was joking. Ugh, I can just hear Gordon saying 'I told you so'. Why did I say that?" He asks himself with a groan, dragging his hand down his face in exasperation at his own foolish, past decision as a different thought overtakes him. "Hmm, a Pyronite, huh?... Wait, no! Focus!" He says as he speeds up his stride, trying to get back to the RV even faster.
"Look. If I can figure this thing out, maybe I can help people. I mean, really help them! Not just, you know, make things worse." Ben says before fiddling with the watch again, and this time, Gwen has nothing to say.
"So, what exactly happened back there?"
"Well, I freaked out at first, 'cause she was on fire, but she seemed really confused, so I calmed down and asked if she could, like, shoot fire or something." He explains before he manages to press the button from earlier, as he watch face pops up again. "Hey, I think I figured out how I did it! Should I try it again? Just once?" He says, continuing to fiddle with it without noticing the sillouhette change as he messes with it.
"I wouldn't."
"No duh you wouldn't." He says before slamming the watch down, and with another bright fuchsia flash that soon fades, Ben & Gwen find that there was someone new standing there. Someone different from the fire woman. This was a tan woman wearing a black and white jumpsuit with the watch's symbol on her left shoulder. Her eyes were covered by a long, messy head of orange hair that also covered her forearms, shins, hands and feet, which were capped with long, sharp claws. "What the...?"
"That's... Not the hothead."
"No duh." Ben says as he approaches the woman. "Uh, hi? I'm Ben." He says, extending his hand for the woman to shake, which she does, drawing a wince from Ben. "Ow!" He shouts as he withdraws his hand, giving it a light shake to soothe the pain. "You've got a really strong grip." He says, as the shaggy woman frowns. Then her head perks up as she glances around, as if she was trying to find something, and Ben notices that she seemed to have gills on her neck. "What? What is it?" He asks just before she drops to all fours and starts running off into the forest, occasionally jumping and rebounding off of trees and through the branches. "Hey!"
"Where's she going?"
"I don't know! Come on!" Ben shouts as he runs after the shaggy woman, not looking back to see if Gwen was following after.
'Bad smell. Where?' The wild woman wonders to herself as she jumps through the trees, trying to find what it was that she was smelling. It smelled like the metal box that she appeared next to, but... Wrong somehow. As she jumps onto yet another tree, she flexes her gills again before leaping away from the tree as a flying brown metal disk fires a red energy blast at the tree she was just resting on. She leaps from tree to tree, dodging the various lasers before one comes a bit too close. She takes the opportunity to drop down into the shrubbery, using the explosion as cover to duck into the bushes below. It focuses on the tree, seemingly looking around for her as she creeps around behind it before launching herself up into the air before landing on the metal disk, ripping off various bits and pieces as it tries to shake her off in vain. It veers off towards a nearby cliff face, just as the symbol on her shoulder starts to flash red with a series of beeps. She leaps off the disk, just as it crashes into a fiery explosion. A few moments later, the beeping finishes with a final large red flash, and once it fades, the wild woman's disappeared. A few seconds later, Ben rounds the corner.
"Guess she's gone now?" He wonders to himself, just as another disk pops up behind him. "Oh, not good..." He mutters to himself as the robot observes him, aiming its 'eyes' at his wrist where the watch sat. It didn't get to do much, however, as Gwen sneaks up behind it and begins to bludgeon it with a shovel.
"Ugh! Back off, Sparky! No flying tree-trimmer is going to hurt my cousin!" She says as she hits it a few more times.
"Never thought I'd say this, but am I glad to see you." He says as he takes a few shots at the droid himself before it starts to give a low hum. At the sound, they both instantly recall sci-fi movies and start booking it, away from the droid. A few seconds later, their instincts prove correct as it blows up.
"I was worried that you might get popular with that thing on your wrist." Max scolds as he drives away from the campsite, his grandchildren sitting in the back of the RV, having just explained why and how he came back to a campsite that lacked both of them, despite his explicit instructions to stay there. "That's why I asked you not to fool around with it until we know what the heck it is."
"Sorry, Grandpa... But at least I figured out how to make it work." He says before walking his grandfather through it with a live demonstration. "All you do is press this button. Then, when the ring pops up, just twist it until you see who you want to bring out. Slam it down, and bammo! You get one of ten super-cool alien dudes!"
"First of all, they've all been girls so far." Gwen corrects, idly wondering why that was. "And second, if what the fire one said is anything to go by, then they're only half alien."
"Heatblast." Ben says, drawing a confused look from his cousin and their grandfather.
"Huh?"
"Well, she didn't say what her name was, so I just made one up."
"That's not even a name!"
"It's a codename! You know, like a superhero!"
"And, uh, what did you call the other one then?" Max asks, trying to halt the argument about something so petty. Ben mistakes it as interest and holds his head high as he informs his grandfather of the other great name he came up with.
"Wildmutt."
"That just sounds mean."
"What? She was had claws and fur on her arms, and she was swinging through the tress like Tarzan! It totally works!"
"Wait, what did you say this new one looked like?" Max asks, his eyes snapping wide open as he realizes what that woman probably was.
"Orange hair, gills, claws." Ben quickly explains, as Max privately admits his own surprise, as he has finally hit Pass for once.
"Well, dumb names aside," Gwen says, ignoring her cousin's sharp 'Hey' of indignation at her statement. "Have you even figured out how to keep them out for longer than, what, 10 minutes?"
"I - Kinda haven't figured that part out yet."
"With a device as powerful as that watch clamped on you, my guess is we better help you learn, fast."
"Alright." Ben says with a grin, just as the radio on the RV's dashboard crackles to life.
"Mayday! Mayday! Somebody help us! We're under attack by some sort of - I know you're not going to believe me, but... Robot!" The man on the other end of the radio screams in a panic, the sounds of destruction rising up behind him.
"Sounds just like those things that attacked me. Must be looking for the watch. Those people are in trouble because of me! I think we can help them." Ben says, and for probably the first time all day, he and Max are in complete agreement as he presses his boot down on the accelerator.
A short while later, the trio found themselves approaching a larger rest area from the woods, having parked a small bit away before proceeding through the trees. They couldn't see anything from where they were, but at this point, Ben brought up his wrist and pressed the button. "Alright, let's see. Eenie, meenie, miney..." He says, spinning the dial past silhouettes of what looked like a ghost, and another of a really big bug before stopping on something bulky with spikes growing from their back. "Here goes!" He says, slamming the watch face back down, resulting in yet another bright fuchsia flash. Once it fades, they find yet another woman standing there. She was wearing a black and white jumpsuit that extended all the way into boots but no sleeves, with the watch's symbol over her left breast. This woman, however, seemed to be completely made of diamonds, save for her eyes which looked more like two pieces of topaz.
"So what can she do?" Gwen asks as the diamond woman looks around the area.
"Don't know, but I bet it's gonna be cool." Ben says before waving them forward. They do, with the diamond woman looking considerably more confused than the others, as they creep up to a nearby RV. They peak around the side to see a giant robot stepping on various RVs, firing red lasers at some, and driving everyone away in fear. "Looks like papa-robot this time." He says before turning back to the group. "You get Gearhead's attention, and we'll get the campers to safety."
"Huh?" The diamond woman mutters, not sure of what she just heard. The Tennysons don't hear her question, or at least they don't acknowledge it, as they all immediately run over to the campers, leaving her to realize that she was the one who was supposed to be distracting the 'Gearhead'. "Aaalrighty then." She says before rolling her shoulders before running over to the robot just as it grabs a park ranger. "Hey! Metal mouth!" She screams at the droid who turns its head to her. "Drop him. Now!" She orders, and the robot does, leaving the man to scramble away from the robot before turning to the diamond woman and immediately firing a laser at her feet, sending her flying into one of the RVs. Literally, she flies through the air and crashes perfectly through the sunroof. Before she can get out, however, the robot fires a follow up blast that blows the RV up with her inside. It approaches the wreck, only for a diamond blade to stab through the wreck, carving a slit into the metal before the diamond woman pulls it apart and pulls herself out, revealing that the blade was her arm. "Okay then." She says before running at the robot, blade arm extended, but the giant robot leaps into the air, spinning its three legs like helicopter blades for a moment before crashing back down, pinning her underneath its metal claws.
"What is going on here?" The park ranger asks as Ben, Gwen, and Max help him stand up.
"You probably wouldn't believe me if I told you. Now come on." Gwen says, leading him away from the fight. He hesitates for a moment, but after the diamond woman almost crashes into him after being chucked by the giant robot, he gets the lead out and gets away from the fight.
"Crap crap crap!" The diamond woman repeats as she runs around the campsite, barely dodging the various blasts coming from the robot. Then, one of them hits a tree, causing it to slowly fall towards Gwen. "Crap!" She yells as she runs over, getting between Gwen and the falling tree as jagged diamonds erupt from her back, causing the tree to split in half and fall harmlessly on either side of them. "You alright?"
"Yeah." Gwen answers right before the giant robot wraps its claws around the diamond woman.
"Oh, you've gotta be-" She says before the robot lifts her up, then grabs one of her arms with its other hands and starts to tug. "Ow! Hands off bub!" She shouts before the robots hand explodes, revealing that the diamond woman had turned her hand into a mess of jagged diamonds that had pierced it. The robot clearly doesn't appreciate this, as it lets go of the diamond woman and fires the laser in its hand directly into her back, propelling her to crash into a nearby bathroom with a fiery blast. She pulls herself out of the rubble with an angry growl. "Okay, I've had just about enough of you!" She says before forming both of her hands into blades, running at the robot with her arms outstretched. The robot fires another blast at her, but she's ready this time, as she raises her arms and blocks the shot, causing them to bounce off her diamond skin and off to the sides. She glances at the stray shots, not having expected that, but that moment of distraction makes her loose her footing, causing her to fly back again. "Urgh, how do I stop this thing?!"
'Reflect the shots!' Ben says, but she can't help but notice that Ben was too far away for her to hear, and it didn't sound like he was shouting, and yet she perfectly heard him somehow. Though, considering the current situation, she decided not to focus on that for now, and instead test out his idea.
"Hey, ugly! Come and get some!" She shouts at the robot, attempting to goad it into firing again.
"Get out of there!"
"No, hang on!" Ben says, drawing his grandfather's attention for a moment. "I think she had the same idea as me!" He says before the robot fires at the diamond woman, as she holds out her hands and braces herself, as the laser slams into her open palms, pushing her back a few feet, but not sending her flying this time.
"Alright, ya techno-freak! Let's see how you like a taste of your own medicine!" She says before her hands start to grow and stretch, causing the beam to reflect off her hands, before she moves them to guide the reflected laser back at the robot, cutting through it with a single clean slice through its abdomen, leaving it to fall over to the ground and blow up.
"Alright, way to go!" Ben cheers, drawing the attention of a few of the saved campers. "What? She saved us!" He defends, which satisfies the other campers, as they turn to look at the currently celebrating diamond woman.
"Yes! Yes! Screw you ya overrated tin can! Haha!" She says before immediately stopping at the sight of everyone staring at her, with the Tennysons wildly waving in the back, pointing towards the woods they had come from. "Well, um... Good day." She says with a small bow before booking it back to the woods.
"Who was that lady?" One of the campers asks, not noticing the Tennysons creeping away back to the woods before anyone could ask too many questions.
"Okay, that... That was stressful. Please don't spring that on me again." The diamond woman says, collapsing against a tree as they all regroup in the woods.
"Right, sorry Diamondhead."
"Huh?"
"Oh, well, uh, you didn't give a name, so I thought one up."
"Diamondhead?... Huh, I like it." She says with a smile, while Ben shoots a smug grin at his cousin who simply rolls her eyes at him. "By the way, good call on reflecting the shot."
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"Earlier, when you told me to reflect the shot back at the robot."
"I didn't say that? I mean, I thought it, but I didn't say it." Ben says, sounding very confused at what Diamondhead was talking about all of the sudden.
"What? But... I could've sworn-" She starts to say, only to be cut off by a now familiar set off beeps and red light, before she disappears in another red flash.
"What was that about?"
"No idea, but for now, let's get back to the Rustbucket. I'm sure you kids are tired." Max says, leading his grandkids back to the RV. "And hey, I can pull out those mealworms from the fridge. I'm sure all this excitement has worked up your appetite." He says, idly filling Ben and Gwen with dread.
Meanwhile, in the brown ship floating above the planet, the octopus man was not happy with the news that his robots had been destroyed.
"Failure?! Unbelievable! The puny Earth being that is keeping the Chaquetrix from me- will soon hang on my trophy wall."
The next morning, Max and Gwen were packing up their campsite. It was better to move on out of there before anyone could ask about the other night and all that had happened, and they still had plenty of stops to make before summer was over. However, as they pack, Max couldn't help but notice that his grandson wasn't helping. Or rather, he wasn't even around to help in the first place.
"Where's Ben?"
"I haven't seen him since breakfast." Gwen answers as she hauls another back into the RV, before they both stop as a loud bang fills the air. They turn their heads in the direction of the bang and see smoke rising in the air, as if something was incredibly fast was coming right towards them. Evidently, something was, as that something comes to a stop right in front of them, with Ben hanging off its, or rather, her neck. She looked like a blue, humanoid velociraptor, with a black jumpsuit with a white stripe down the center. She had a long blue tail with black stripes, three bulky claws on each of her hands, and balls under her feet. She also seemed to have a biker helmet covering her entire head, with a visor covering her face. It quickly retracts, however, revealing a blue face with green eyes, black lips, and black stripes around her eyes, extending to her forehead and cheeks.
"Hey ya'll." The velociraptor says with a small wave of her three-clawed hand as Ben quickly walks over.
"Hey, you guys gotta see how fast XLR8 here is." Ben says, gesturing for her to do something. She taps her chin in thought before she starts to run around the campsite, leaving behind nothing but a blue blur as, before any of them know it, the campsite has been packed up into the Rustbucket.
"Tada!" XLR8 says, doing jazz hands, or at least, as close as she can manage with her claws before the watch beeps again, and she disappears in a red flash.
"I think this is gonna be the best summer ever."
"Absolutely."
"It's definitely going to be interesting." Gwen says, only willing to agree just a little bit with her cousin as they all climb into the RV. "So, where'd you go anyway?"
"Just had to take care of a couple of things before our vacation really got rolling." He says, snickering to himself as he remembers what he and XLR8 got up to.
Meanwhile, back at the school, two bullies were hanging from their underwear in a perpetual wedgie, calling out to passing cars for help, not really knowing how they had gotten up there in the first place.