A Certain Powerful Omnitrix 3: The Hate That Dwells In Shadows

Nightmares

It was dark........so very dark. It was as if all the light had gone from the world. Ben was surrounded by nothing and nothing surrounded him. All that remained was him, and the great purple eye that stared at him from the darkness..............the darkness that surrounded all things........................

"You think you have suppressed me?" The eye said maliciously. "You do not know how mistaken you are, You cannot suppress your very self."

"Shut up GhostFreak." Said Ben. "I'm not yours to control, you can go put a sock in it."

"You act like you are brave." said GhostFreak. "But you fear me. You fear what you would do while under my influence. You fear hurting those close to you............"

"Go away!" Ben cried out. "Why are you here!? Why!?

"I thought I had made it clear." said GhostFreak. "I am you.........I will always be here, even in the darkest depths of your dreams."

"Well then stop being me!" said Ben. "And get the heck out!!"

GhostFreak cackled sadistically. "You still fail to see.......I have already started taking over your very soul. You can't stop it...........the nightmare will go on forever.............and together, our power will take over the universe!!

"I'll stop you..........."

"Foolish boy". GhostFreak scoffed. "How do you plan on stopping yourself?"

Ben Tennyson woke up to a bright sunny morning. Light streamed through his living room wndow and he was sitting on the couch with a sleeping Misaka Mikoto lying on his shoulder. It took him about 5 seconds to remember the Christmas party that had gone on all last night. Ben had a Santa hat on his head and Mikoto was dressed in a Santa themed dress with furry white buttons and Kamijou Touma was sleeping on the floor with a spilled glass of sparkling cider in his hand. Index and Kuroko were huddled together on the dining table and snoozing soundly. The tv was on the Sumo Slammers tournament addition video game screen saying : Game Over. Both Ben and Mikoto had a controller in their hands.

Ben tried to clear his head. Had that dream just been the result of eating too much fruit cake? Wait a minute! When Ben and his friends had planned this party, they agreed they would do it on Christmas eve....which meant today was.

"Jumping Crashhoppers!!" Ben exclaimed. "It's Christmas!!"

Mikoto stirred from Ben's sudden outburst. "Mmm... what? What happened?"

Mikoto took one look at the wrecked living room and looked at Ben's face and her eyes suddenly widened. "Oh my gosh its....."

Ben nodded. "Yeah I know!"

The reason why Mikoto and Ben were getting so flustered about this holiday in particular was because the two of them had volunteered to help out at one of the Child Error orphanages in Academy City. Child Errors were children who were abandoned in Academy City, and therefore they were cared for in an assortment of foster homes in the different districts.

Ben and Mikoto had decided that this year, they would do something to help the world that didn't have to involve beating up aliens or smashing robots. The plan was that Mikoto would dress up as an elf while Ben would use Gravattack to levitate a sleigh on which Mikoto would fly in on and pretend to be Santa's helper handing out gifts. However, Mikoto and Ben had been supposed to leave an hour ago. And unless they could get there in around 23 minutes, a lot of children were going to be missing their Christmas miracle.

Ben and Mikoto frantically ran all over the dorm trying to get ready, not at all paying attention to the fact that they were waking up the other late night party goers. 5 minutes later , everyone else was also frantically running around. Mikoto had put on an elf outfit and a set of elf ears while Ben was frantically dialing the Omnitrix looking for the hologram of Gravattack.