Disclaimer: I don't own Ben 10 Alien Force and I'm not in any way affiliated with the creators.

Notes: Wow, over 50 reviews and this is my first story! Thank you to everyone that read and especially to those that reviewed. I realize that this is really late. I just really didn't feel like writing for a long time.

Kevin slowly crept out of the bathroom. He didn't want to deal with Gwen for letting Ben fall asleep, but he knew he had to. Gwen turned towards him.

"Listen Gwen, I'm sorry." He apologized.

"I'm not the one you should be apologizing to." Gwen pointed her head towards Ben.

"Sorry Ben." Kevin meant it. Ben sighed and gave him a small smile to let him know he was forgiven.

"Okay, we've got to go break the spell in about 11 hours, so that gives us time to do something else for a while." Ben stated.

"Yeah, but we've got school remember?" Gwen asked.

"Right, I forgot." Ben admitted. "Guess we won't have any free time today." It was a little late so Kevin went above the speed limit when he drove them to school.

"See ya later!" Kevin left them at their school. As he drove around he couldn't help but wonder why Ben was so angry in the morning. (Ben said that he and Charmcaster were "having a good time". I wonder what they were doing…)

---Ben

School was much better than it was before. Ben decided to apologize to the teacher he yelled at. His teacher accepted his apology. She told him lack of sleep causes people to do weird things.

At the end of the school day Ben was in great mood.

"You look happy." Gwen stated.

"I am." Ben responded. "I've only got two things to worry about now."

"Shade and reversing the spell…"

"Can we go to the spot now? I know it's early, but I just want to be careful."

"Sure, I don't mind. Kevin's waiting for us. Let's tell him. I hope he doesn't mind."

"Ugh, we have to go there now?" Kevin complained. "We've still got another six hours!"

"I'm just being careful." Ben defended. "You'd do the same if you were in my position."

Kevin sighed. "All right. You'd better appreciate all the stuff I have to do for you."

Kevin drove them to the spot where they ran out of gas. Ben got out of the car and looked around. This place would forever be important to him.

"Ben, are you okay?" Gwen asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I was just thinking of how much this place means to me…"

"So, where's the spot?" Kevin interrupted.

"Oh, follow me." Ben answered. He led them towards the lake.

"Doesn't look so special to me."

"Hmm…" Ben walked on the spot where the spell occurred. Nothing happened. "What exactly is supposed to happen?"

C – (I'm not sure, but I think we'll be able to notice when it happens.)

"Who knows. We should just wait until we see something happen." Gwen answered, unaware that Charmcaster had given the same response.

"Guess so…" Ben replied to both of them.

"How much longer!?" Kevin screamed impatiently.

"Less than 5 minutes left." Gwen responded. "Are you ready, Ben?" Ben nodded.

B – (I guess this is it huh?)

C – (It seems like it. I'm glad the spell is going to end, but I'm also kind of glad that I used it.)

B – (Me too.)

"Ben look!" Gwen pointed towards a sphere of light.

"I really hope this works…" Ben slowly walked towards the sphere. The light began to surround him. It swirled rapidly around him. Soon Gwen and Kevin couldn't even see Ben anymore.

"Ben!" They screamed. The light slowly disappeared. Ben was visible again…and so was Charmcaster.

"Are you alright?" Gwen asked Ben.

"Yep, it worked perfectly!"

Gwen smiled then turned towards Charmcaster. She still felt like Charmcaster was her rival. Before she could say anything Kevin walked in front of her.

"So, you hurt Gwen huh?" Kevin threatened.

"Well, yes, but-" Charmcaster began.

"But nothing! I'm going to make you pay for what you did to her."

"Kevin stop!" Gwen yelled. "Fighting won't solve anything." Kevin reluctantly listened to her.

"We've got more important things to deal with." Ben added. "We gotta go after Shade. Who knows what kind of damage he will cause."

"I think I know." Charmcaster pointed to a burning building. People were evacuating it. On top was Shade.

"He's trying to attract us there." Gwen said. "He knows that we'll try and come to the rescue. I hope nobody got hurt."

"Let's go." Ben ordered. "We have to beat him. There are four of us now. We can do this!"

"Four?" Kevin was confused. "Who's the fourth?"

"Me." Charmcaster answered. Both Kevin and Gwen were extremely surprised. "Hey, it's the least I could do."

"Maybe you're not so bad after all." Gwen complimented. Kevin still had doubts, but said nothing.

"Everyone get in the car." Kevin commanded. As they approached the building they noticed Shade looking directly at them. He jumped off the building and landed on the ground.

"I knew you'd come." Shade spoke with his eyes closed. "You've lived long enough."

"You!" Ben yelled. "You destroyed a building, almost caused people on that ride to get hurt and tried to eliminate us. You're going down!!!" Ben twisted his Omnitrix then hit it. He became Big Chill. Kevin absorbed the metal from his car once again then ran towards Shade. He attempted to punch Shade, but Shade saw this coming and hit him with an energy ball. Gwen noticed that Shade was distracted, so she used her powers to bind him.

"You're not strong enough to trap me!" Shade taunted as tried to escape. He found it much more difficult than before. Shade looked down and noticed his feet were trapped by wind. "What is this!?"

"Oh, just a little magic!" Charmcaster said confidently.

"No escaping now!" Ben flew threw Shade, solidifying his body in ice.

"That seemed too easy. Did we win?"

"Not quite." Ben noticed that the ice was starting to . "As soon as he gets out hit him with everything you've got!" Suddenly shards of ice began flying in the air. Gwen quickly created a protective barrier to prevent any shards from cutting through someone. "He's free! Hit him quickly."

Gwen created a few energy discs then threw them at Shade. Shade punched each one, sending them right back at Gwen. Being frozen messed up his senses, so Shade didn't realize that Gwen was just keeping him busy. He found himself in a lot of pain as he pummelled to the ground. Shade turned towards the person that had hit him.

"You will pay for that human!" Shade threatened. He got up quickly and sprinted towards Kevin with a ball of energy forming in his left hand. Ben realized that Shade was going to try to hit Kevin with a direct energy ball. That would probably incapacitate him.

"Not so fast Shade!" Ben flew towards him attempting to freeze him again. Shade kept going for Kevin, but decided to use his energy ball on Ben instead. He fired the shot which hit Ben on his chest.

"Ben, you okay?" Charmcaster asked.

"Yeah, but I'm more worried about Kevin right now." He looked over to see Kevin preparing to punch Shade. "Kevin's going to get hut bad!"

Charmcaster looked at Gwen seriously. "Use one of your energy discs."

"But they don't hurt-"

"Trust me on this!"

"Okay." Gwen threw a disc towards Shade. Shade ignored it thinking it would have no effect on him. When it hit him it hurt a lot! He was knocked into a building which hurt him even more.

(Why did that hurt?) Shade looked at Gwen. She was using more energy discs. What surprised him was the way the energy discs looked. It wasn't pink. It was a dark purple and looked like it was fire. He turned then figured out what was going on. (That other is using some kind of fire to merge with the discs. They're working as a team! Not bad, not bad at all…) Shade attempted to get up. He felt an immense amount of pain in his right leg. He looked down. His leg had been hit with that merged attack! "This is just great…" Unfortunately for him three discs were approaching at high speed. They hit their target directly. The bad luck continued. As he was sent flying in the air he was electrocuted by Ben who had switched from Big Chill to Brainstorm. He landed hard on the road. His four opponents gathered around him.

"Had enough?" Ben asked.

(Is he telling me to give up? I'll never-) He closed his eyes. He felt the pain again. (What can I do? They've got me beat, but if I surrendered that would make me weak! Plus I won't get paid! Then again, they've proved to be stronger than my boss and I never work for the losing side.)

"Well?" Kevin interrupted Shade's thoughts.

"I…surrender." Shade announced shamefully. He had never given up once in his life. "I never expected you people to be so powerful. The guy I worked for told me that you were just some 'vermin that had interfered'."

"We try hard to keep this place peaceful." Ben explained. "It's not about power. It's about teamwork. We work together combining all of our skills. If you work alone even if you're strong you'll eventually end up in a bad situation. Who's there to help you when you need help? Nobody."

(I wish I could counter that, but that logic makes too much sense!) "I see. Perhaps we'll meet again someday."

"I gotta say you aren't half of a jerk most of the enemies we have are." Gwen told him.

"So, are you going back to your planet?" Charmcaster asked.

Shade laughed. "I'm from Earth."

"What!?" Kevin shouted. "How can you be? Didn't you tell Ben and Gwen that you were from another galaxy?"

"Technically I am. I'm from another world entirely. The main planet there is Earth where I'm from. It's a much different Earth than this. Well, I'd better be heading off now. I'm glad we've had the opportunity to battle. Farewell." A light appeared from the sky engulfing him. In a second he was gone. The others tried to understand what Shade had said.

"I'm beyond confused!" Ben put his hand on his hand. He had a headache.

"Me too." Gwen admitted. "If other worlds exist and each world contains millions of galaxies then why haven't we heard of anything?"

"I guess our world isn't advanced enough to figure it out…or Shade's lying." Charmcaster guessed.

"He didn't seem like he was lying." Kevin spoke.

"No, it didn't." Ben sighed. It looked like they weren't going to be figuring this out anytime soon. "It's been a long day. You guys want smoothies? It'll be on me."

"Sure, I haven't had one in ages." Charmcaster replied.

"I forgot how good these were." Charmcaster had already finished her smoothie. Ben finished his a minute after. As soon as he was done Charmcaster grabbed his hand and pulled him far away from Gwen and Kevin.

"You think we should be worried?" Kevin asked Gwen.

"I think we can trust her." Gwen answered.

"This week has been something hasn't it Ben?" Charmcaster asked.

"It sure has." Ben responded. "I wouldn't change any of it even if I could."

"Me either." Charmcaster agreed getting closer to Ben. Slowly their lips touched. They heard a strange noise, but ignored it. After a 10-second kiss they broke apart and smiled. Looking to their right they saw what creature had made that noise. Kevin choking on his smoothie. He looked shocked and confused. They laughed then headed towards them.

As of that day, Charmcaster was an official member of the team. Kevin eventually learned to trust her. Gwen found out that she and Charmcaster had a lot in common, so they became pretty good friends. Ben and Charmcaster became really close. They went out on dates often and had a good time almost always (except for when aliens interrupted). Aliens were still a big issue, but it was easier with another person. With the four of them fighting together nearly nobody stood a chance.

Well, looks like my first story is finished (finally). Sorry for making you guys wait so long. I hope I haven't lost too much experience since I haven't been writing for a while, but I do like the ending. I hope you like it too!