01. Hidden from whom?
The room was already beginning to smell unpleasant. And so did Benjamin. Isolated for the third day in a row, his room had become a sauna of unease: windows and curtains closed, leftover food scattered on the floor, and a mess that would make any Xylitecnian jealous. The great hero, Ben Tennyson was but a shadow of what he once was.
On the other side of the locked door, a woman’s voice is heard:
“Ben, dear, I brought you your dinner,” said his mother.
It’s already night, thought Ben.
“Open the door, son. Your father and I are worried about you.”
Ben remained silent.
Sitting on the bed, covered by a comforter, the only light in the room was the television that was on twenty-four hours a day.
“Ben, it’s been three days since you left this room.”
You wouldn’t understand. He thought. None of you would understand!
A double knuckle strike is heard on the door, accompanied by a male voice:
“Benjamin, it’s me, your father. Open that door.”
In a weak voice due to little use, Ben says:
“Go away...”
“Let’s talk, Benjamin,” says his father. “We’ve tried talking to your grandfather, but he can’t explain what happened.”
Ben looked at the watch on his left wrist and felt a slight tremor in his hands.
“Go away!”
“Ben, we are only worried about you, my son.”
“Leave me alone!” There was an edge, typical of trapped crying, in Ben’s voice. “Just leave me alone...”
The boy couldn’t see, but he knew that his mother would have bowed her head, looking at the plate of food in hand, and his father would have hugged her and rested his chin on top of his wife’s head. It was the way they both showed concern and a sense of helplessness to anyone who could see.
“I’ll leave your food out here,” she said.
“And when you’re ready to talk,” her father continued, “just know that we’re here.”
No thought of gratitude crossed Ben’s mind. There was no way. There was no room in a mind wracked with fear and panic. The young man again looked at the epicenter of his suffering stuck in his wrist. A memory resonated again in the whirlpool of his mind: “The Omnitrix is the most powerful weapon in the universe.”
And like every weapon, it serves only to wound...
A vibration over the mattress and a spotlight appeared from the cell phone screen warning the arrival of a new message. It was Gwen, his cousin. One more message piling up among the 78 unread ones. 79 now. 80. 81. Gwen and her habit of dividing her speech into several smaller messages. 82.
And then there was the explosion.
