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The Island Misadventures of Ben and Charmcaster	By : GrayNeko Category: +1 through F > Ben 10 Views: 59441 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 5
Disclaimer: I do not own Ben 10, nor the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 6
- 7
She had named the spider-man Orbus and now with his new name he proudly led the way through the jungle. Charmcaster ran behind him as the sun dipped into the ocean, the already cooling air pulling at her silver hair. She carried a new spear in either hand and had a dagger like stick tucked into her skirt. She hoped to sneak in undetected but she knew it would be foolish not to expect trouble.
Before she had left she had hidden Ben back beneath the tree roots they had been using. He still showed no signs of waking up and she could only pray that it was merely a side effect of using the Omnitrix to such an extreme. She had thought about staying with him but just sitting there would have filled her with a sense of such utter uselessness. She had been nothing but victim or hostage ever since she had gotten to this damn island and she was determined to get her magic back and do the one thing she knew Ben wouldn’t be able to bring himself to do.
They had been running for some time now and Charmcaster’s breath was becoming labored as Orbus continued to charged forward. The scenery began to change quite suddenly as a cliff face appeared in the distance. The trees began to thin and soon they left the cover of the forest entirely to take a narrow ledge hugging the side of the cliff. The path was barely more than three feet wide and Charmcaster was very aware of the sheer drop to her right, especially as they kept rising in the air. Fortunately Orbus slowed as the path widened out into a small plateau and motioned for her to do so as well. She crouched as she crept up beside him, feeling exposed against the side of the cliff.
“Must go slow, others patrol here,” Orbus said.
“Do you think we might convince them to join us?” Charmcaster asked, it couldn’t hurt to turn as many of the Shaldoth’s minions against them as possible. They might even do her work for her.
Orbus shook his head, “No, too scared and they not dead already like Orbus.”
“None of us is dead yet,” Charmcaster said reassuringly. She had been uncertain of the spider-man at first, convinced he intended to lead her into a trap but he already helped her avoid one group of spider-men back near the hut as she hid Ben.
They moved in short bursts, using rocks and stands of bushes for cover and slowly they began to travel upwards again. By the time they stopped Charmcaster was able to look out over most of the island. The moon cast a green light over everything and it made the treetops blend into the sea on the horizon, making it look like the mountain they were climbing jutted straight out of the ocean.
“Over here mistress,” Orbus said, directing her gaze to a cave near the lower of the two peaks that topped the mountain. “There is a cavern, it is sealed by mistresses’ magics but there is a path Orbus knows.”
They kept their distance from the entrance and circled around to a sheer side of the peak. Orbus led her to a small stand of twisted and gnarled trees that grew right up against the side of the mountain and a few even sprouted defiantly out of the near vertical rock wall.
Charmcaster watched as Orbus skittered up the wall like it was perfectly level with the ground. When he reached the highest tree jutting out of the side of the mountain he began tugging at the tree’s thick roots. Charmcaster had no idea what he was doing until a few chunks of rock tumbled down the side of the mountain to clatter at her feet. In a flash she dropped her spears to grab hold of a tree trunk and pull herself up. She clambered from tree trunk to tree trunk until she could stand atop one and reach the roots that Orbus was still pulling at.
He had the start of a hole in the mountain side and it was only growing larger as he worked at. Together they managed to smash a hole big enough for Charmcaster to get through and from what she could tell with the moonlight overhead was that the tree roots had burrowed so deeply into the rock that they had turned a dead end crawl space into a tunnel. Charmcaster leaned back and sighed as she considered the hole and her next move.
She climbed back down to retrieve her spears and slid them into the hole before turning to Orbus.
“Orbus, go back to Ben and watch over him. If he is awake do not tell him where you brought me. Understood?”
The little spider-man was hesitant, his eyes darting between the hole and her before he finally bowed his head.
“Understood mistress. Please return safe,” He added the last part softly before turning and scurrying down the mountain, taking a more direct path right down the sheer side.
Charmcaster watched him go with the slightest of trepidation before giving herself a shake and leaning toward the hole. It took some effort to get a sturdy enough grip so she could pull the rest of her body through the hole and once she managed it she took a moment to catch her breath. Her eyes slowly adjusted as she situated herself so she could push the spears ahead of her and as she looked down the tunnel there was a pinprick of light like a distant star.
The first several yards were a struggle, the tunnel narrowed where the roots had just broken through to the crawl space and Charmcaster earned several scrapes from having to force herself through a few too tight spaces. Even once she was beyond that and it grew wider by inches moving was an arduous task. Dust was stirred up by her movement and jagged pieces of rock were always waiting to dig into her flesh, forcing her to move at a blind, choking crawl.
Charmcaster forced herself to keep going as the light at the other end grew ever brighter. Finally the tunnel opened even further and she was able to push up onto her hands and knees, her breath coming a little more easily now that she wasn’t breathing in the dust so directly. As she got closer to the light she was able to make out a curtain of cob webs that hid the opening from the other side. She inched forward as quietly as possible until she could peer into the cavern the tunnel opened out into.
The chamber wasn’t as large as the one the Shaldoth resided in but this was filled with crystals that shone with an intense light. They were everywhere, they even made up the floor and Charmcaster could feel the power that radiated off of them. This was definitely where the Shaldoth stored the energy they stole from everything on the island.
Charmcaster judged the drop before sliding her spears to the ground and then climbed down until she hung from the opening. Her bootless feet were almost completely silent as they struck the crystal floor but she still spun her head this way and that, wary of anything waiting for her.
It was hard to tell with the light shining in her eyes everywhere she looked but she thought she was alone and so picked up her spears and began slowly moving along the wall. She held both spears in one hand and ran her other hand along the wall to help her find her way as she walked with her eyes closed. Though it made moving across the uneven crystal floor trickier doing so blocked out the distracting light and made it easier to sense her magical energies mixed in amongst all the life forces that were gathered here.
Her brows furrowed as she sensed her way through the energies in the crystals, it was a magical version of a needle in a haystack. Sifting through the harvested life forces of other beings was something she had never attempted before and the feeling she got from the energies pulsing around her made her nauseous, like there was the taste of rot on her tongue. Finally she felt the faint tug of energy that was like a chord being struck through her whole body.
Through narrowed eyes she looked out across the chamber and saw one crystal at the heart of them all that was a soft purple. She tried to hurry across the uneven ground but found it so hard to see where her footing was she had no choice but to go slowly, leaning on crystals that jutted up at odd angles to help keep her balance.
The terrain continued to prove deceptive as Charmcaster slid down a column and discovered the crystal containing her magic was now above her and a sheer rampart of crystal before her. There was no other way up, the trench she found herself in encircled the mound and the barrier was nearly vertical on all sides. Stopping back where she first started she found herself glaring at the impassible wall.
There had to be some way to get up there but without her magic it was physically beyond her. It was infuriating, being able to feel the pull of her magic but unable to reach it, to reclaim it!
As the injustice of it all nearly brought her to tears an idea occurred to her. If she could feel her magic pulling her maybe she could make the opposite true. Charmcaster sat down with her back against the crystal mound, legs crossed and her hands on her knees. She closed her eyes and focused on that tugging sensation that had first caught her attention. It was stronger now, almost like a constant strumming of a guitar string that vibrated through her whole body.
Charmcaster turned all of her attention to a split second in time, the cresting of the moment the “string” became taught and in that instant of time she latched onto the force pulling at her and yanked back on it with all her willpower. At first there was stillness and then Charmcaster doubled over as the force wrenched in her mental grasp, drawing the “string” within her painfully taught, almost to the point of snapping. She grunted with the effort to keep her hold on her magic and sweat instantly beaded on her forehead as her strength wavered, but after a few seconds of eternity her grip held and the barest of links was established.
After being stripped of her magic for three days the smallest of trickles felt like a raging river within her. She felt vibrantly alive and wanted to call down lightning from the sky to revel in her joy. After several deep breaths she gained control of her exuberance and opened her eyes, her irises aglow with the energy pooling within her.
She stood and turned to the mound she had been resting against, placing the tips of her thumb, index, and little fingers of her right hand against the crystal. The white crystal turned pink before shuddering to life and sinking into the ground to form a step. Crystals all over the mound followed suit, forming a spiral staircase that windingly brought Charmcaster to the top. She confidently strolled up the stairs and as the purple crystal finally came within reach a hungry smile creased her face.
“You’re so very clever, it’s a shame you weren’t born one of my sisters.”
Charmcaster spun to find the largest Shaldoth clinging to the wall of the cavern, looking down on her with her arms crossed in a superior manner.
“Then again I’ve always hated competition so I think no matter what, this is how it would have ended,” the Shaldoth said with a sinister smile before swinging her arms in a practiced motion. Strands of webbing materialized, forming a great net that arced toward Charmcaster and would pin her down if she did nothing.
But this time Charmcaster wasn’t powerless, she stepped back so her left hand came to rest against the crystal containing her magic and raised her right hand, giving the Shaldoth a smile of her own as she snapped her fingers. No simple spark jumped from her finger tips, gouts of fire raced through the air, consuming the webbing in a flash and leaving nothing but ash to rain down around Charmcaster.
Charmcaster didn’t let up, she snapped her fingers again and another column of flames sped towards the Shaldoth. The Shaldoth held her arms out before her, her palms facing the fire and the attack washed across an invisible barrier, leaving the Shaldoth unharmed.
“Impressive, unlike your mate you don’t hesitate to kill.”
“Just something that I know needs doing,” Charmcaster replied as she drew on the magical energy contained in the crystal, readying it for any number of attacks or defenses.
“How do you plan to kill me when we are so evenly matched and I have the greater pool of magic to draw from?” The Shaldoth sneered.
“About that, I was thinking since you stole mine that I could return the favor,” Charmcaster said as the crystals of the mound went from being pink to lavender. The color change began to seep into more crystals before the Shaldoth screamed in outrage and unleashed a bolt of raw force at Charmcaster. Charmcaster made a rising gesture with her hand and a slab of crystal leapt into the air to block the blast, exploding as it made contact with the destructive energy.
Charmcaster had several spells on the tip of her tongue as she waited for the dust to clear but the Shaldoth was just glaring at her with arms crossed.
“I had hopes of taking you alive but you’ve just become too dangerous for me to allow that!”
Charmcaster tensed in anticipation of an attack but the Shaldoth remained still. She began preparing an attack of her own as the seconds piled atop each other when several thunderous cracks drew her gaze to the ceiling of the chamber. Crystals all over the ceiling lost their glow as they began shifting and grinding against each other, making Charmcaster think the Shaldoth meant to bury her beneath the rubble. But as she watched the crystals didn’t fall down on her head, they unfolded.
She watched with widening eyes as columns of darkened crystal lowered themselves to the ground until there were eight of them all around the chamber. She was still trying to figure out what they were when she saw into the murky depths of a column and was able to make out a massive limb. She nearly fell over with the realization that they were legs and her eyes shot skyward to confirm her fear. All but the outer edge of the ceiling turned out to be part of the massive creature and as its body continued to shift and stir she saw its head, that of a woman’s, if on a giant scale.
“Our mother,” the Shaldoth called out to Charmcaster over the rumbling cacophony. “Unfortunately for her, she was unaware of the hunger her daughters’ possessed.”
The Shaldoth laughed as the massive head looked down at Charmcaster, revealing dead eyes in sunken sockets and skin half rotted away, exposing gleaming bone. Every step from the undead Shaldoth shook the whole chamber, forcing Charmcaster to grab hold of crystals around her to keep herself upright.
She could already tell there was no she would be able take more than a few blows from the undead monstrosity before her magic was depleted. That meant she had to get away, but she couldn’t do that without leaving behind all the crystals she had converted. She knew that whatever she did manage to take with her wouldn’t hold a candle to the stockpile of energy the Shaldoth had and they would bring it all to bear against her and Ben if she didn’t do something. Indecision froze her in place as the undead Shaldoth finished turning to face her.
Just as she made to grab the center crystal and run for it a new kind of rumbling filled the air, quickly growing louder. Charmcaster turned to the hole she had crawled through and threw her hands up protectively as something exploded out of it. For a second all she could see was a yellow blur as it flew through the air and ricocheted off every surface, including the giant Shaldoth, which it slammed into with enough force to knock the monster into the far wall from the hole. When it finally stopped moving she recognized the big yellow ball that unfolded into an armored alien whose face and chest seemed to be the same thing.
“Looks like I got to the party just in time,” Cannonbolt said, turning his whole body to look around the chamber.
Charmcaster wanted to laugh in relief but instead she uttered a syllable of power and Ben’s alien form rose from where he stood and came to rest beside her on the mound. They shared a smile before Ben turned and pointed to the Shaldoth who was looking on with anger etched into her face.
“How come the Itsy Bitchy Spider isn’t trying to blast us to smithereens?”
Charmcaster narrowed her eyes as Ben made a good point. She studied the Shaldoth and the undead monstrosity before reaching a conclusion.
“She can’t, all her focus is on animating the giant corpse.”
“Well then why don’t I just squish her and solve both problems?”
Charmcaster was surprised by Ben’s suggestion and it must have shown because Ben added, “Getting up here gave me time to think. You were right, it’s us or them and I would rather it be us.”
“Actually, I’ve had another idea about that,” Charmcaster said with a smirk, earning a surprised glance from Ben with one eye opened wide.
“Fight the corpse, keep her distracted, and watch my back. I’m going to cut off the Shaldoths’ power at the source.”
“Piece of cake, which is the first thing I’m going to eat when we get back,” Ben said with a laugh, curling into a massive ball and rolling down the mound, building tremendous speed and using the other side of the trench as a ramp to hurtle through the air.
Charmcaster turned her attention from the fight to the crystals below. Out of the corner of her eye she saw her forgotten spears and summoned one to her hand. With the tip of her spear touching the ground she closed her eyes to get a better feel of the energy and how she needed to direct it to do what she planned.
Ben was using the close quarters to full effect as Cannonbolt, bouncing around the small cavern to hit the undead Shaldoth with tremendous force. The corpse couldn’t keep up with him as he bounced beneath it, striking its legs like a pinball machine until the encasing crystal shattered, leaving the rotting monstrosity unable to support itself on its decayed legs.
The Shaldoth screamed at Ben and cast a blast of energy at him with a wave of her hands.
“Ha, is that the best you can do? I’ve survived planetary reentry!” Ben yelled as he hit the blast head on and kept barreling towards the Shaldoth, forcing her to leap to safety. Their attacks became an interesting dance, the Shaldoth constantly running or leaping out of the way and Ben rebounding from every attack. Not even her webbing could slow Ben down, every time she tried to trap him with the super strong spider silk he tore through it like it wasn’t even there.
Finally frustration and desperation seemed to get the best of the Shaldoth and she slammed her hands together, creating a shockwave that rippled forth through the air. It hit Ben and he found himself halted in place, suddenly robbed of all his momentum. He dropped out of the air and uncurled, a massive paw rubbing at the back of his head.
“Nice trick but this fight is over,” Ben said.
“Insolent fool, it has just begun,” the Shaldoth spat back.
“I think she’d beg to differ,” Ben said as he pointed with a claw.
The Shaldoth turned and her eyes widened at the sight of Charmcaster floating in the air with her arms held out wide and her spear hovering in front of her, an aura of violet energy pulsing around them both. Below her more of the crystals were transforming into amethyst versions of themselves, the process had covered almost the entire floor.
The Shaldoth hissed as she raised her hands to attack Charmcaster but nothing emanated from her fingertips. The look of shock and horror on her face made Charmcaster smile as the whites of her eyes shown with purple light.
“You should have protected your magic better, now you can kiss it goodbye!”
Charmcaster raised her hands over her head and made a powerful downward pushing motion. The spear responded by shooting toward the ground and striking it with a thunderous boom and flash of light. Immediately the light died in all the crystals that had been altered by her, leaving only the original repository of her magic to glow in the sudden darkness.
Neither Ben nor the Shaldoth had to wait long to find out what Charmcaster had done as the whole chamber began to quake. Tremors shook everything and they were growing stronger by the second.
“What did you do?” Ben yelled as he teetered this way and that, his arms out to either side. Cannonbolt was already one of his least graceful aliens and with everything shaking around him it was impossible to keep his balance.
“I awoke the dormant volcano within this mountain. It will tear this place apart and the Shaldoth will have no place to hide.”
“What about us? Where do we hide from a volcano?”
Before Charmcaster answered him she pulled the purple crystal free from its cradle among the others.
“We’re going home, so do you think you could get us out of here before it explodes?”
Ben smiled as he unsteadily turned towards Charmcaster and began rolling towards her. He leapt into the air to grab her on the way out but before he reached her the Omnitrix began beeping and Ben found his human form flying through the air toward Charmcaster. Neither was ready for the untimely transformation and the collision sent them both sprawling.
Ben groaned as he picked himself up off the ground, a hand gingerly probing the beginnings of a goose-egg on his head. He looked for Charmcaster but only saw the crystal containing her magic. Despite his body’s protests he slowly made it to his feet to retrieve it, before he took his first step though a massive form loomed over it.
The Shaldoth and Ben’s eyes met before she smiled viciously as she stooped to reach for the crystal. Ben broke into a dead run across the short distance and slid feet first, snatching the crystal away from the Shaldoth just as her claws were about to close on it. The hiss that emanated from her as she spun made Ben’s hair stand on end and he rolled to avoid a blow from one of her legs as she tried to trample him.
“I will have her magic and then I will watch as you two are consumed in the fires of the eruption,” the Shaldoth screeched as she continued to lash out at Ben with her legs.
Ben held the crystal close to his chest like a football as he dodged her attacks while trying to find Charmcaster. It had been hard to see with the crystals all aglow but now that they were all dark Ben found himself nearly colliding with pillars of crystal that stabbed upwards at odd angles. The Shaldoth barreled after Ben, smashing through anything that stood in her way.
The terrain was becoming more unstable by the second and Ben tripped as the ground beneath him split apart and caught his foot. He went sprawling and the crystal flew out of his grasp, bouncing ahead of him to rest several feet away.
The Shaldoth laughed triumphantly as she came upon Ben, rearing up so she towered over his prone form even more so as she readied her claws for a killing blow.
“Here Ben! Catch!”
Ben’s head snapped toward Charmcaster’s voice to see her running along a raised chunk of terrain, tossing him her other spear as she drew her crude dagger. Ben snatched the spear out of the air as the Shaldoth lunged at him. The world went momentarily white with pain as he braced it against the ground but he could feel the shock of impact through the spear and a howl of pain filled his ears. The spear nearly pulled free of his grasp but he held on for dear life and was yanked off the ground. He could feel dampness on his left eye so through a squinted right eye he tried see what had happened.
The first thing he saw was his spear sticking out of the Shaldoth’s chest, one of her hands clutching the end protruding from her body. Her other hand was clapped to her neck where he could see green ichor leaking between her fingers. And then his eye fell on Charmcaster, standing atop the Shaldoth’s arachnid body with a hand full of her pale hair, yanking her head back. A savage snarl escaped her as her arm arced forward to deliver another death blow with a dagger already drenched in green blood. Ben felt the tremor run through the Shaldoth’s whole body as Charmcaster struck true and life fled the Shaldoth.
Charmcaster rode the body to the ground as Ben let go of the spear and rolled away from the corpse. She left her dagger sticking out of the Shaldoth’s neck as she stepped off the body and hurried to Ben’s side. Up close she could see that the left half of his face was covered in drying blood from a gash on his forehead. She put a hand around his waist to help steady the both of them as it began to feel like the cavern was going to shake itself apart.
“Where’s the crystal?!” Charmcaster shouted as the rumbling made it impossible to be heard otherwise.
Ben pointed further ahead where the vibrations were causing the chunk of amethyst to skitter across the floor. They tried to hurry as they stumbled forward but the crystal suddenly jumped away from them, tumbling through the air towards a newly opened chasm.
“No!” Charmcaster cried as she leapt forward, sliding across the ground towards the chasm. Her upper body went over the lip of the chasm and her hands closed around the crystal just as it fell below the surface. As Charmcaster hung there precariously she saw past the crystal and into the depths of the earth where there was a faint light boiling upwards. Her breath caught in her throat as the heat suddenly intensified into a wall of burning pressure and just as it reached the tipping point of agonizing she was yanked backward. She gasped for breath as an eruption of burning gas shot into the air out of the chasm. Ben let go of her ankles so he could pull her to her feet and together they stumbled away from the newly formed vent as it continued to discharge its deadly breath.
With Ben half blind and Charmcaster still choking from her glimpse into the chasm they were in poor shape to flee for their lives. They clung to each other as they searched for a way out when the ground buckled beneath them, their feet falling out from underneath them as the world suddenly tilted. They slid out of control, barely able to hold on to each other as the chute finally dumped them onto more level terrain. They groaned in unison before Ben looked up and began laughing. Charmcaster watched him worriedly before following his gaze and allowing a sigh of relief to escape her. In front of them was the entrance to the cavern and with no magic to power the Shaldoths’ wards they were able to run through the opening unhindered.
The cool night air breathed new life into them as they gulped it down, pausing momentarily to take in the situation of the mountain tops. Ben blinked as what looked like snow suddenly blew in front of his face. He reached out to catch one and wrinkled his nose in surprise when it felt hot and left a soot mark on his palm.
“Volcanic ash,” Charmcaster said, pointing to the larger mountain peak. The top of the mountain was gone and black and grey clouds spewed into the sky, obscuring much of the moonlight.
“Not good,” Ben replied, recalling vague bits of one of Gwen’s ramblings about how dangerous volcanoes could be. He grabbed Charmcaster’s hand and began moving down the mountain, looking for some kind of path to make the going easier. “Can you get us home?”
“Yes… no… maybe,” Charmcaster said hesitantly, biting at her lip as she glanced at the crystal under her arm.
“Maybe? What’s the problem?” Ben asked, stopping to look at Charmcaster.
“The energy in this crystal is only enough for one try and it might not work anywhere but the bay where we arrived. We can’t get there before the volcanoes make this whole island too toxic for us to survive.”
Ben looked beyond Charmcaster to see the clouds billowing out of the other mountain top, they weren’t rising very high and he realized she was right. In a matter of minutes those clouds of choking ash were going to envelop the entire island, suffocating everything. There was no way the Omnitrix would recharge in time to save them.
He stared hard at the red face plate of the alien device before a smile spread across his face and he looked up at Charmcaster.
“Do it, cast the spell.”
“Tennyson, I don’t think you heard me. It might not-”
“It’s alright,” Ben cut her off. He took her hand in both of his and squeezed it gently. “I believe in you and no matter what we’ll be together.”
Charmcaster tried to fight the tears but they came unbidden, she wanted to hit Ben for making her cry with death about to come crashing down onto them. She squeezed his hand before slipping free of his grasp and holding the crystal in both hands.
With the amount of power in her hands casting a spell became easier in some ways. She didn’t need ingredients or a focus for the magic to channel through but her will had to be absolute, any weakness on her part and she could kill them both. That fact didn’t bother her as much as it should have, with Ben at her side she suddenly felt like she could do anything.
She closed her eyes as she drew on the power and felt it flow through her, filling her with light. In her mind she began creating a pattern, circles within circles and runic symbols layered between them. As the complexity of the pattern grew she poured the magic into it and the pattern suddenly flickered into life in the air before her. The whole design grew brighter as she focused her desire, her need, to return to Earth into an arrow that would punch through time, space, and dimensions until it found the place she was looking for.
Charmcaster reached out and touched the center of the design hanging in the air and the symbols began to blur together, turning into a whirling vortex of purple energy that grew larger and larger until the entire pattern had been swallowed by the expanding portal. The crystal dropped from her hands and her body sagged as the magic left her but Ben was there to catch her and she suddenly wished they could afford the time to stand there in each other’s embrace.
“Is it ready?” Ben asked, having to raise his voice over the rumbling of the mountain and howling winds.
In answer, Charmcaster cupped his face in her hand and brought their lips together. Her other hand found his and their fingers tightly entwined around each other before they parted. Charmcaster wiped tears from her eyes as they both stared into the portal and in unison they stepped forward.
The portal winked out of existence on the slope of the mountain and seconds later the slope was gone as the second peak erupted.

***
Max Tennyson wished he could blame the tremor in his hand on stress but he was a man used to working under pressure. He wouldn’t have done so well as a Plumber battling against alien criminals and space tyrants if he wasn’t. He wished he could blame it on his age but even though time had turned his hair grey it hadn’t weathered his body or focus. Even though he’d been up all night it wasn’t exhaustion either
That tremor in his hand was fear, fear for his grandson’s life. He didn’t like that it had such a hold on him.
He sighed and set down the soldering gun, pushing the device he’d been working on away from him as he looked over his shoulder. He massaged his wrist as he studied his granddaughter, Gwen Tennyson, from where she sat at the dining table in his motor-home known as the Rustbucket.
If fear was wearing him out, guilt was nearly tearing her apart. She was hunched over a small book, eyes red from crying focused intently as she studied line after line of magical text. Yesterday, Gwen, Ben, and himself had been involved in a fight against a young sorceress who held a personal grudge against them. Gwen had tried to keep her from casting a spell by casting one of her own but it had backfired and created a powerful vortex that had pulled both the sorceress and his grandson into it. They had disappeared without a trace and he knew Gwen was blaming herself for what had happened to her cousin. She had studied the book of spells she possessed into the late hours of the night before quietly crying herself to sleep.
Max had wanted to comfort his granddaughter but the responsibility of getting Ben weighed heavily on him and he had spent all night working on several old Plumber devices that he was jury-rigging to work together. With any luck he’d be able to track Ben by the Omnitrix, the unique piece of alien technology had an energy trail that he could lock onto if he adjusted the sensors of the equipment.
It was a daunting task and wouldn’t get done any sooner just by thinking about it Max told himself as he pulled the device close again and picked up the soldering gun. Just as he was about to touch the gun to the circuitry he was installing, fuchsia light flooded the interior of the Rustbucket. It poured in through the windows on the passenger side and caused Max and Gwen to jump to their feet.
Max grabbed one of the other devices that had littered the table and with the press of a button it went from being a cylindrical tube to a small blaster gun. When he turned to look for Gwen she was already at his side, trying to look into the blinding pink light unsuccessfully.
“Gwen, stay behind me,” Max ordered, training and instincts kicking in as he approached the camper door. Gwen obediently stayed behind him but he could tell she was ready to spring into action if the light was what they both thought it was.
He grasped the door handle and slowly turned until he could inch the door open, leveling his blaster at the opening as he did so. The light made it hard to see but through narrowed eyes he was able to make out a whirling vortex of energy hanging in the air. He shoved the door open and checked his immediate left and right before lowering the blaster slightly as he scanned the rest of the area.
His eyes were peeled for any sign of danger but it was Gwen who cried out, “Ben!” as she rushed past him.
Max spun to see two figures sitting in the dirt below the vortex. Despite Gwen’s hopeful cry the light of the vortex made it impossible to tell who they were. Max chased after Gwen, fearing she was running into danger when the portal disappeared just as suddenly as it had come. They both stopped as they were able to get their first real good look at the two figures in the morning light.
It was definitely Ben, and the other figure turned out to be Charmcaster, but the two of them looked like they had been through a warzone. They were both covered in dirt, scratches and bruises, and that was just the beginning. Ben was shirtless and half his face was covered in dried blood. Charmcaster was wearing the tattered remains of Ben’s shirt and a skirt that was little more than rags.
The two of them looked up at Gwen and Max silently before they turned to one another and threw their arms around each other.
“You did it! You did it! I knew you could! I knew it!” Ben whispered fiercely.
Charmcaster couldn’t manage words, tears rained down on Ben’s shoulder as relief robbed her of her voice.
“Grandpa?” Gwen asked as she stepped back, looking to her grandfather with a raised eyebrow and a look of shock bordering on disgust.
“Go get the first-aid kit under the kitchen sink,” Max told her, mainly because he didn’t have an answer for her. Gwen kept glancing over her shoulder as she moved to the Rustbucket.
Max leveled the blaster at Charmcaster more out of precaution than any sense of danger as he stepped closer.
“Ben?”
Ben looked up at Max and jumped to his feet to throw an arm around him in a hug. Max hugged his grandson in return and couldn’t help but notice that Ben’s other hand was still holding Charmcaster’s. He lowered his blaster as he put his hand on Ben’s shoulder and looked his grandson in the eyes.
“What happened?”
Ben turned to Charmcaster and helped her to her feet before looking back to Max. The way he casually wrapped his arm around the teenage girl’s waist had Max’s eyebrows raised.
“It’s kind of a long story Grandpa. Do you think the Rustbucket has room for one more?”
***
Notes
***
Thanks for reading folks! There will be a hiatus next week as I post an original piece and then the week after that will commence with the sequel to this piece.
Review Response and Discussion Thread: http://www2.adult-fanfiction.org/forum/index.php/topic/57397-graynekos-review-response-and-discussion-thread/
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The Island Misadventures of Ben and Charmcaster