DoB10 Chapter 15

The Death of Ben 10 is a story designed to continue on from where Ben 10: Omniverse left off. It takes place before Ben's galactic road trip.

Scene 1
Apollo: “So tell me…”

Apollo pulls Ascalon out from behind his back, the sword materialising from nothing. He now brandishes Ascalon high.

Apollo: “...What makes you think you can beat me?”

Apollo stands on a metal catwalk high above the alternate Bens. In the center of the massive room lies a vat full of molten iron, its heat emanating across the room.

The eight heroes stand together to confront Apollo, each one ready to transform at a moment's notice. They stare silently at Apollo, waiting for him to make his move.

Apollo: “Let’s be clear. The only reason I ran from our last encounter was because of Paradox. And look where he is now: Cowering away because he’s too afraid to face me without his time-hopping abilities.”

Ben Prime: “Yeah. People tend to do that when you take away their powers.”

Apollo: “But so long as I wield Ascalon no time travellers can join us! You eight can be the only ones to face me! And try as you might you cannot stop me!”

Ben 10’000: “And that is why all eight of us are here!”

Apollo: “Pfft- HA! So you’re serious? All of you? Against me? That’s hardly fair! You don’t stand a chance.”

Mad Ben: “We’ll see about that!”

Gwen 10: “Ben don’t!”

Mad Ben slams down his omnitrix core, becoming a tall white robotic humanoid with orange canisters in his arms. Mad Atomix flies up to Apollo to confront him, but Apollo vaults over the railing in front of him and lands on Atomix mid-air. He embeds Ascalon into the robot’s shoulder, and Atomix rears back in pain. He stops ascending before beginning to fall back down. Apollo jumps off, swiping Ascalon through the air and climbing through the gash left in its wake. With an orange flash Mad Ben becomes human once more, desperately gripping his shoulder as the floor draws closer.

Ben Prime: “I’ve got him!”

With a green burst of light, Ben transforms into a tall beige humanoid composed of linen wraps. His head is adorned with an ancient headdress. His arms begin to stretch out to beneath Mad Ben, but a blue flash interrupts him. Apollo now stands before Snare-oh menacingly, drawing the attention of his adversaries. There is a loud thud and Apollo smirks as drops of molten iron splash onto the ground behind him.

The Bens look up at the vat in front of them to see a bloodstain on the rim now dripping down the side. There is a moment's silence as they process what has just happened.

Apollo: “And so the first defender falls in my conquest of the world.”

Ultimate Ben 10: “I’m… I’m going TO KILL YOU!”

Ben slams down on his ultimatrix violently and as soon as his transformation completes he does so again. He becomes a humanoid feline with glowing orange fur and sharp black edges.

Ultimate Fasttrack (Ultimate Ben 10): “ULTIMATE FASTTRACK!”

He charges full-force at Apollo, drawing his hand back and throwing his fist as fast as the sound barrier would allow. But to Apollo, time slows as his weapon glows. He raises his sword, and blocks Ultimate Fasttrack’s fist with the flat edge of Ascalon. He goes for another punch, which Apollo answers in the same way by blocking it with his sword. Punch after punch, all blocked as Ascalon cancels out their kinetic energy. Each punch moving as fast as sound itself, but to Apollo they appear no faster than a stream of water. Fasttrack throws one last punch, threatening to break past the speed of sound, and Apollo sees his opportunity. He brings Ascalon to block once more, but this time he holds it at an angle. Ultimate Fasttrack’s fist strikes the blade and slides off sideways. In this moment, Apollo strikes with his right hand into Ben’s gut, winding him. He then kicks him back, and Ultimate Fasttrack falls backwards onto the floor.

Apollo turns rapidly to see an adult Ben launching a powerful punch at him. Ben’s fist crackles with energy and glows brightly. But Apollo holds Ascalon aloft and the super-charged fist hits it, its energy discharged immediately backwards knocking Ultimate Ben 10’000 away with violent force.

To Apollo, the world continues to move at a snail’s pace as the Bens attack him. He catches movement out of the corner of his eye and sees a blue mass of liquid launching itself towards him. Seeing the Polymorph as insignificant, Apollo deals with it by throwing a fireball of his own. The fire collides with the slime creature’s chest and begins to spread. The Polymorph stumbles backwards, patting the flames out with his hands.

A Necrofriggian swoops through Apollo, landing behind him, before unleashing a breath of sheer cold attempting to freeze him. Apollo simply swings Ascalon rapidly as though it were a fan to create a powerful breeze of air deflecting the Necrofriggian’s attack. Instead of attacking again, it jumps backwards to reconsider its plan of attack.

Ben 23 pushes down on his omnitrix dial, transforming into a blue Pyronite. He charges towards Apollo, but Apollo simply punches him in the face with his left hand, before punching him again in the gut with his right. He then slices Ascalon across Ben’s chest leaving a shallow gash painful enough to cause him to fall onto his back, temporarily finished.

Ben 10’000 slams his Biomnitrix gauntlets together, becoming a dark blue being made of thin wraps. His eyes became bright green and thin wings of bandages fold down over him, hiding his body.

Snare-Chill: “It’s time to chill out!”

Snare-Chill’s arms stretch out, flailing wildly as they approach Apollo.

Snare-Chill: “Let’s see you try and burn me now! The Big Chill half of this fusion makes me immune to your fire attacks!”

Apollo: “If you believe you have outsmarted me you are sorely mistaken. I’ll defeat you with the same attack that made the other Necrofriggian’s efforts futile!”

Snare-Chill: “Wait wha--?!”

Snare-Chill’s eyes widen with realisation, but it is too late. His dark blue tentacles were already within striking range of Apollo. Apollo spins Ascalon like a turbine again, shredding the closest of Snare-Chill’s tentacles into pieces. Snare-Chill attempts to draw back what remains of his arms, but the following gust emitted by Apollo’s attack catches him off guard and blows him far back across the room.

Apollo looks around to see his final opponent, Ben Prime, standing fiddling with his Omnitrix dial. He turns the UI, scrolling past many aliens, carefully considering his options. At last, he finds an alien powerful enough to best Apollo. The hologram appears as a human-like face with no mouth and a crest of three spikes on its forehead. Ben considers his options very carefully, before the faceplate retreats and the core pops up. His hand hovers hesitantly over the Omnitrix. With a flash, Apollo’s fist slams into Ben’s face. Ben reels backwards in pain, holding his face in both hands as the Omnitrix core retreats back inside the device. With a slice of Ascalon, Apollo falls back once more.

Apollo stands upon the rim of the large vat of molten iron, one of his feet touching the blood of the fallen Ben turning it into a fine steam. With many quick bursts of light, each Ben and Gwen returns to their human form.

Apollo: “It would appear we’ve both made miscalculations today.”

Ben Prime: “You punched me in the face?! How have I miscalculated anything?”

A single stream of blood rolls down from Ben Prime’s nose.

Apollo: “This is twice I have beaten you. But I misjudged your collective strength. Mars save me if Paradox was here as well.”

Ben 23: “Mars the planet?”

Gwen 10: “Mars the god”

Ben 23: “planets can be gods?”

Apollo laughs heartedly, but the Bens and Gwen look at him confused.

Ben Prime: “I feel like we missed the joke.”

Apollo: “Hahaha… Oh you would do. Don’t worry. You’ll get it soon enough.”

He composed himself, adopting a dead serious look and staring down once more at his foes.

Apollo: “But my most damning mistake was not expecting you to possess a Celestialsapien form.”

Ultimate Ben 10’000: “How do you even know what those are?”

Apollo: “Alright. Hands up each one of you that possesses a Celestialsapien form.”

Ben Prime raises his hand almost mockingly, followed by Ultimate Ben 10, Ben 10’000, Gwen 10, Ben 23’000, and lastly Ultimate Ben 10’000. Each one following the example of the last.

Ben 23: “Am I the only one here who doesn’t even know what that is?”

Ben 23’000: “Looks like it.”

Apollo: “Hmm. I see.”

Abruptly, two flashes of bright light appear among the Bens and Gwen; one blue and one purple. When they dissipate, Professor Paradox and Eon are revealed to now be with them.

Ben 10’000: “Wait, if you’re here that means--!”

Everyone’s attention is drawn to the top of the massive black metal vat. Apollo is missing.

Eon: “Where’s Apollo?!”

Paradox: “It would appear he has fled.”

Apollo: “Not quite.”

Apollo materialises on the far side of the room, standing atop a large engine-like machine. He holds Ascalon at arms length away from the growing crowd of heroes and it glows brightly before generating a large sustained disk of energy larger than Apollo himself.

Ultimate Ben 10: “What’s he doing?”

Paradox: “I have no idea...”

He walks six feet away from disk, parallel to the heroes, and repeats the process. He continues this pattern four more times hastily.

Apollo: “That was a purely tactical retreat, I assure you.”

With a burst of energy Apollo appears where he had once been standing atop the rim of the vat once more.

Apollo: “You pathetic humans are not the only ones capable of taking advantage of the multiverse!”

He holds Ascalon high up in one hand.

Apollo: “Behold! The power of Apollo!”

Lightning crackles from the tip of Ascalon. Each bolt arcs off and strikes one of the energy disks. Each one shatters immediately, revealing within a parallel version of Apollo now manifest in our dimension.

Ultimate Ben 10’000: “There’s one of them for each of us. I’m not sure we can win this.”

Ben 23’000: “I’m sure we’ll do fine, right Professor?”

Paradox: “Maybe.”

Ben Prime: “Now that’s a voice I can get behind.

Apollo: “Professor. Eon. We meet again!”

Paradox: “I’m sorry, we’ve met before?”

Eon: “I think he’s messing with us!”

Apollo: “True. I am messing with you. But we really have met before. Or do you not remember your visit to Pyros?”

Paradox: “Oh dear.”

Eon: “So that’s where I-- I mean- So that’s how he got Ascalon!”

Ultimate Ben 10: “Wait, why was Ascalon on Pyros? Last time I saw it Azmuth took it back.”

Eon: “No time to explain now, there are more important issues at hand!”

As Eon answers Ben’s question, Paradox counts the versions of Apollo opposite him. He then turns, and counts the Bens besides him.

Paradox: “Hang on a second. We’re missing one… What happened to Mad Ben?”

Apollo smiles, tapping his foot on the side of the vat next to the shallow stain of blood.

Paradox: “O-oh. Right then.”

His voice is soft, cracking slightly as he speaks. He kneels down onto one knee.

Paradox: “Right.”

Apollo: “What’s the matter? Scared are you?”

Professor Paradox stands back to full height, his voice now monotone. All the charm from his words is gone.

Paradox: “You keep pushing your luck, Apollo. Eventually that luck will run out.”

Apollo: “We’ll see about that!”

A moment of silence rings through the facility as those words echo through the minds of the Bens. The hatred in the eyes of some of them near boiling point.

Gwen 10: “Does anyone have a plan?”

Ben Prime: “I do. Everyone pick a target. Eon and Paradox; I’m going to need your help for this one.”

Each Ben lines up their sights on one of the Apollos in the distance. Two of the Apollos have blue flames, one Apollo appears to be made of metal. Two of them appear interchangeable with Apollo Prime and the final one has flowing fire-like hair going down his back as well as a stockier frame.

Apollo: “What are you planning?”

Ben 10’000: “We all ready? Charge!”

They each charge their targets, and Ben Prime slams down his omnitrix. He becomes a wide, round humanoid of dark brass. He has a black face, with black patterns running around his body. Green clockwork mechanisms can be seen inside his chest, with the omnitrix symbol being in the center. Eon and Paradox places their hands on one of Ben’s shoulders and electric-like energy sparks through their arms and into Ben. Ben raises his arms across each other, then stretches them down as he shouts:

Clockwork (Ben Prime): “CLOCKVERK!!”

Deep bells clang as a large key-like structure in the top of Ben’s head begins to turn, accelerating with each rotation until a green light begins to flow out of it, consuming the room. The blinding light dies down as the key’s spin starts to slow. Apollo removes his left arm from covering his eyes. Looking around, he becomes greatly confused.

Apollo: “WHAT?!”

Clockwork (Ben Prime): “Something the matter?”

Apollo: “What did you do? Where did you send everyone?”

All five alternate Bens, Gwen, Eon, Paradox, and the six new Apollos were all gone- vanished without a trace.

Clockwork (Ben Prime): “ha-hah! I might not be good enough with Clockwork just yet, but that boost from Eon and Paradox was more than enough.”

Apollo: “What are you talking about?!”

Clockwork (Ben Prime): “I can’t send them all home, I’m not quite that good yet. But I can send them all to the next best place: Away from here!”

Apollo: “So now it’s just you and me?”

Clockwork (Ben Prime): “Yeah! Just you a--”

Apollo smiles.

Clockwork (Ben Prime): “Oh. Oh no.”