The moment they all piled into the small boat, Grandpa Max fired up the engine and took off, completely leaving Captain Shaw behind on the docks while he was still busy untying his lines.
Finding himself stranded, the captain could only watch them go in sheer disbelief, turning his gaze toward a tiny, pathetic rowboat with a pair of wooden oars.
Grandpa Max steered their vessel underneath the old canning factory platform, and one by one, he and Gwen began scaling the framework.
Ben, however, remained on the deck of the boat, bringing up the Omnitrix interface.
“You guys go find the monster’s eggs,” Ben said, giving the dial a sharp twist.
“I’m gonna go teach those fake Fish Association creeps a lesson!”
With a firm slam of her palm, Ben triggered the transformation, shifting into Ripjaws.
True to the name, this alien form boasted a terrifying maw of razor-sharp teeth, perfect underwater night vision, and incredible aquatic mobility.
The only glaring downside was that she couldn’t survive outside of water for too long.
The very instant her transformation completed, the massive Kraken breached the surface, its colossal weight utterly tearing through the offshore platform and sending splinters flying everywhere.
Despite the absolute chaos, Jonah Melville didn’t panic.
Instead, a greedy, ecstatic grin spread across his face.
“The bigger that sea monster is, the fatter my paycheck’s gonna be!”
Leaping into a heavily armored, weaponized mini-mech, Melville opened fire with a pair of mounted machine guns.
The relentless barrage of heavy rounds quickly drove the Kraken back, forcing the giant mother into a defensive retreat.
Fortunately, Ben arrived just in time.
Lunging out of the water, Ripjaws latched herself directly onto the cockpit glass of the mech, her face contorted into a savage glare.
“You like picking on monsters so much?
Why don’t you try fighting someone your own size!”
With a sickening crunch, her powerful jaws clamped down, tearing the machine guns completely off the mech’s chassis.
In the scuffle, she managed to pry one of the stolen Kraken eggs from the machine’s robotic grip.
She dropped it onto the platform, but the spherical egg rolled unsteadily, coming to a stop right on the precarious edge of the framework, teasing a fatal drop.
Meanwhile, inside the facility, Grandpa Max peeked through a doorway to assess the room ahead.
He held up a hand, using a series of tactical CQB hand signals to direct Blake and Gwen behind him.
Unfortunately, their stealth approach was instantly cut short when an armed poacher rounded the corner, raising a rifle directly at them.
Grandpa Max immediately stepped forward, shielding the two kids behind his broad back as he glared at the guard.
“Alright, buddy.
I’m going to give you one chance to walk away.
Don’t make me do this the hard way.”
As they were forced to take a few cautious steps backward, Blake felt a familiar vibration against his wrist.
As if sensing the danger, the Omnitrix had finally finished its recharge cycle.
Without a moment’s hesitation, Blake spun the dial and slammed it down.
“Sounds to me like he *wants* the hard way.”
Utilizing Grandpa Max’s large frame as cover, a bright green flash consumed Blake as he transformed into XLR8, a personal favorite form of his, mostly due to its sheer versatility.
With XLR8’s godlike velocity at his disposal, Blake blurred through the interior of the facility.
Before the poachers could even process the sudden gust of wind, they were systematically knocked unconscious, their limp bodies neatly stacked into a pile in the corner.
Back outside, the Kraken had managed to reclaim one of her eggs.
Seeing his multi-million-dollar prize slipping away, Melville grew desperate.
“Give me back my egg!”
But before his mech could secure it, Ben executed a blind aquatic leap, intercepting the egg mid-air as they both plunged back into the deep water.
“Your eggs were never this big anyway, pal!”
(That line felt dangerously close to an innuendo, but considering there’s no real evidence, I’ll just have to keep my mouth shut.)
Melville steered his submerged mech through the dark water, tracking Ripjaws down and delivering a heavy mechanical elbow to her ribs.
“Aw, look at you, playing the brave little savior for the baby monsters.
Truly heroic!” He sneered through the comms.
“Too bad you’re a complete idiot.”
The blunt force of the blow caught Ben completely off guard, sending her reeling as Melville aggressively snatched the egg back.
Up on the shore, Blake peered into the murky water, tracking the shadows.
Knowing XLR8 was entirely unsuited for an underwater brawl, he chose to trust Ben to handle the depths while he focused on carrying Grandpa Max and Gwen safely down to the beach.
Shaking off the dizziness, Ben shook her head to clear her vision and immediately surged forward to resume her tug-of-war with Melville.
The Kraken joined the fray as well, but the moment the giant mother got her tentacles on the egg, Melville activated a specialized, high-frequency sonic disruptor built into his mech.
The agonizing sound waves completely disoriented the creature, allowing the poacher to wrest the prize away once more.
Following a frantic, high-stakes underwater struggle, Ben finally managed to outmaneuver the mech, securely grabbing the Kraken’s egg and gently placing it back into the safety of the nest.
Recognizing that Ben was trying to help, the mother Kraken completely ignored her, turning her full, unbridled fury toward Melville’s mech instead.
With one massive snap of her jaws, she crushed the metal suit into a useless heap of scrap metal.
Just as the enraged beast was about to swallow Melville whole, Ben swam forward, placing her alien body directly between the predator and the poacher.
The Kraken paused, staring at the small alien that had just saved her children.
Respecting the silent plea, the creature turned away, disappearing back into the dark abyss.
Ben, however, wasn’t about to let Melville walk away scot-free.
She dragged the terrified smuggler to the surface, knocked him out cold with a single punch, and hooked his jacket onto a protruding wooden pier post, leaving him dangling over the water.
“Hang out here for a bit,” Ben muttered.
“The cops will have a nice, dry cell waiting for you.”
As she dove back beneath the surface to swim back, a massive, heavy-duty fishing net suddenly dropped over her.
Captain Shaw—who had finally caught up in his tiny rowboat—hauled the net up, cackling like a madman.
“I caught it!
I actually caught the monster!” Shaw cheered, hoisted the heavy netting over his boat.
“The monster egg must have hatched!
I’m gonna taxidermy this thing and hang it right on my living room wall!”
Ben: (???
QWQ)
Before she could protest, a brilliant flash of red light erupted from the net.
Grandpa Max walked up along the dock, looking down at the rowboat with a knowing smile.
“Well, Captain, I hate to break it to you, but I don’t think you can turn today’s catch into a trophy.”
Captain Shaw raised his lantern, squinting through the mesh to get a better look at his prize.
Instead of a horrific sea monster, he found a thoroughly drenched, disheveled Ben.
Sensing the sheer absurdity of the situation, Ben offered a thoroughly embarrassed, sheepish smile from inside the ropes.
“Uh…
hi.”
With the poaching ring officially busted and the misunderstandings resolved, Blake took advantage of the remaining time on his transformation, running off to find a secluded spot on the rocky shoreline.
For some reason, he had always found a deep sense of comfort in sitting by the quiet sea, watching the gentle, rhythmic pulse of the calm water.
Meanwhile, back at the campsite, Ben quietly cornered Gwen, keeping her voice down to an anxious whisper.
“You just *had* to jinx me, didn’t you?
What am I supposed to do now?”
Hearing her cousin’s frantic plea, Gwen paused, turning around to look Ben up and down, evaluating her critically.
With her fair, smooth skin, delicate facial features, slender arms, and that long, dark hair tied into a neat ponytail, Ben undeniably possessed the foundations of a genuinely pretty, innocent young girl.
To be completely honest, looking at her so closely, Gwen felt a small prickle of envy – well, putting aside a certain distinct area that had clearly not hit its growth spurt yet.
Suddenly, Gwen’s eyes dropped to Ben’s oversized, baggy green cargo pants.
They completely swallowed her lower half.
A girl’s legs were supposed to be one of her best features; what if Blake was secretly a guy who appreciated a nice pair of legs?
“Hey, mega-dweeb,” Gwen sighed, gesturing downward.
“Aren’t you boiling hot wearing those massive pants in the middle of summer?”
Ben blinked, completely missing the point.
She looked down at her clothes, shifting around comfortably.
“Mind your own business.
They’re comfortable.”
Frustrated by her cousin’s complete lack of romantic intuition, Gwen reached over and gave Ben a sharp rap on the head, her tone filled with exasperation.
“You absolute dummy!
I’m telling you that you need to start wearing a dress!
That’s how you’re supposed to knock a guy dead!”
“A dress?!”
Ben’s hands instinctively dropped to her cargo pants.
She tried to picture herself spinning around in a skirt, and a sudden, distinct draft of cold air seemed to hit her imagination, making her shudder.
She lowered her gaze, her fingers nervously twisting her shirt hem as she mumbled under her breath, “Would it…
would it really even look good on me…?”
The moment the words left her lips, an image of Blake’s gentle, reassuring smile flashed vividly across her mind.
A fresh wave of pink flushed over her porcelain cheeks, and her entire face began to burn up with an intense, uncontrollable heat.