Animo Kingdom (Gren)

**Animo Kingdom** is the twenty-second episode of Gren 10 (CYOA).

## Plot

A normal day at Codon Academy was unfolding. Gren, as Ripjaws was training on an underwater mission. V was using a water breathing spell while Rex had an enhanced rebreather he had toyed around with. They traveled to the simulated depth of Earth’s ocean to discover a dying megalodon.

“I gotta say, whoever came up with these simulations is really creative. They should replace the person who came up with the 'catapult students into a forest' test with them", Ripjaws said as he approached the animal and started to inspect if it was wounded.

“The person behind initiation is long gone. Been a tradition since before my parents came here,” Rex said.

There was a slash down their side from some sort of blade, Rex inspected it while Octavia started to summon a healing spell.

“Right. Whatever hurt this poor little massive shark is probably still around, I'll take a look", Gren said as he began to swim and use his lure to detect any other beings nearby.

Gren discovered a muscle man with a trident was searching the area for something. He was wearing a silver wetsuit with scuba gear. He noticed Gren and started shooting missiles from the tips of his trident at Gren.

“Looks like that beast had children,” the crook commented.

Ripjaws tried to dodge the missiles, lunging at the man. "So you're the one who hurt Meg, huh?"

“It’s the pirate life kid, I gotta do what I gotta do,” he replied as he swung the trident at Ripjaws.

Ripjaws tried to get a grip on the trident himself, thrusting its non-pointy end at the criminal. Gren struck the goggles of the man as they cracked causing him to panic and retreat to his ship for air. Ripjaws followed the man to see if there were others at the ship.

Ripjaws hopped up onto the deck to find himself surrounded by pirates, but was quickly joined by Rex and Octavia.

“Shall we?” Rex asked.

“Of course", Ripjaws nodded, leaping at the pirates as he looked for something useful to make shorter work of them.

The team made quick work of the pirates as the simulation ended with a successful victory for them. As they came back out of the simulation room, Gren transformed back into human.

“Nice job, team! With all the concerns we have because of the academy, I'm kind of glad grades aren't one of them..." Gren jokes.

“Speaking of, I’ll catch you guys later. I have Hex’s test to study for with Hope,” Octavia said as she ventured off to the library.

“Right! Good luck, V!", Gren said before turning to Rex. "What about you, Rex? Any plans?"

“To be honest, I'm still getting used to these powers. I’m going to go take a nap to recharge,” he said.

“That's entirely fair," Gren said. "I'll be around, let me know if you need anything."

Rex and Gren said their goodbyes as Gren wondered about. Eventually, his girlfriend came up behind him with a hug.

“Lucy!" Gren reciprocated the gesture. "How's your day been?"

“The usual. Are you ready for our ‘date’? Granted it’s not much since its cafeteria food, but oh well,” she giggled.

“Well, it may not be the best but considering my grandpa's weird taste in food and how Vitus is a terrible cook, it's the best we have", he replied with a chuckle and went along with her.

The two went into the cafeteria and got food, sitting down together. Kai noticed them and smiled as Molly handed her five pieces of taydenite.

“Huh, what was that for?" Gren thought out loud as he waved at them.

“Oh don’t worry about them”, she giggled and waved at them. “Are you ready for the end of the school year?”

"Honestly, I can't believe it's so near. Feels like it went by so quickly... Really an one-of-a-kind experience. And I don't mean just because of this", he said as he shook his Omnitrix wrist.

“I know what you mean. My first year wasn’t nearly as exciting as yours. Speaking of excitement, what’s the summer going to look like for you… us?” Lucy asked.

“Well, at first, I was thinking Brazil. Kind of a default option really, but what can I say, it is a really good place despite the memes... if you don't live there. But the watch kind of gave me a new perspective. I kind of wanna see other worlds, other experiences, that sort of thing, I dunno. Does that... make any sense?"

Before Lucy could answer, Myaxx summoned Gren to her office. Gren sighed and kissed Lucy on the cheek before leaving for the Headmistress' office. Myaxx pulled up a screen of downtown New York where an active robbery was taking place.

“We need you to go assist law enforcement. The target of this heist is a venom that is considered a bio-weapon,” Myaxx said.

“Sure. Sounds dangerous, I can already imagine it in the wrong hands. Anything else I should know beforehand or am I supposed to only know after the fact if the person who made the venom is an old acquaintance of yours or whatever like with Vilgax, Psychobos, Zs'Skayr and the Bounty Hunters? Er, with all due respect. Headmistress. ..you know what don't answer that I probably shouldn't have asked it"

“It was made by an Earth scientist with zero alien knowledge or involvement, but is still a deadly item to allow to be stolen,” Myaxx stated.

“Of course. I'll make sure nothing bad happens with it”, Gren promised.

Gren got to the teleporter pad and arrived in a secret basement level of the Empire State Building.Once there he exited the building to see people fleeing from the north near Times Square.

"...Looks like I'm too late. Off to a great start, huh?" Gren said as he scrolled over the Omnitrix selecting Ball Weevil only to mistransform into Buzzshock.

“For some reason, I'm not shocked that I got the wrong alien", he giggled before going into the power lines to travel faster towards that same direction.

Once Buzzshock arrived at the scene, he found the truck carrying the bioweapon was tipped over with the driver and passenger badly hurt, their bodies not moving, likely paralyzed. Buzzshock checked if there were any wounds he could immediately attend to or rescue workers nearby to assist with that before going on to check if the bio weapon was still in place. Despite knowing he’d likely find it missing.

After helping the truck passengers get assistance, he checked on the case that held the bioweapon to find out it was missing. Buzzshock pulled down his face and sighed before buzzing off and going to a higher point in an attempt to spot anything suspicious. Buzzshock failed to find anything which was strange, they couldn’t have gotten far.

Buzzshock looked around for security cameras on the street where the truck was toppled to access the footage of what had happened. What he saw was two masked men attack the truck, one seemingly had water based powers as a liquid came from his hands to push over the truck while the other had electrical based powers shocking the men. Buzzshock tried to check out in what direction they went. After the attack, the two criminals simply teleported away, which was strange for Earthlings.

“..hm." Buzzshock tried to upload the image to his peers and superior at the Academy to make an analysis of it.

After looking around some more,Buzzshock timed out as he headed back to the Empire State Building. As he was about to return, Myaxx called.

“Myaxx, I couldn't find anything, any idea on where and how they might have teleported?" Gren asked.

“The primal venom is gone? Damn it…. We’ll come back to that. We’ve got bigger problems at the moment. A nearby Plumber base that holds prisoners is under attack and needs assistance. I’m sending Rex ahead to meet you there”, Myaxx planned.

“That doesn't sound good. If only there was a way I could be in two places at the same time... maybe I'll have an alien for that someday. Thanks for the assistance." Gren thanked.

Gren soon arrived at the plumber base where an alien in electric jorts was waiting for him.

“Pleased you could make it. You’re in for a shocking surprise,” he said as he started to fly into the air and blasting Rex and Gren with an electric blast before taking off.

Gren groaned at the pun, even though he made a similar one not so long ago, and went for Ball Weevil’s silhouette. He transformed into the little bug as Rex got back up.

“Go after him, I’ll find the control room and try to gain back control of the base”, Rex suggested.

Ball Weevil nodded and rolled after Mr. Electric Jorts, intentionally taking some detours to size up his plasma ball. Gren soon caught up to the villain who seemed to be waiting for him. He used his powers to open all the cells in the holding block as he took off again.

A clown took out a hammer from her pocket as she smiled.

“Looks like we’re getting out on good behavior boys,” she giggled like a maniac.

“Oh, this is so not good." Ball Weevil kept up the pace and rammed straight into either villain, whichever one didn't get out of the way.

Ball Weevil took down a human man with a salt and pepper beard, who out of habit tried to jump away from it only to jump right into the plasma ball due to old age. Three more clowns came out of their cells as one grabbed Ball Weevil with their hair, throwing him into a thumb man who held Ball Weevil in his palm.

Ball Weevil tried to spit plasma straight into the thumb guy's eyes or, failing that, use a string of it as a grapple to pull himself out. Ball Weevil pulled himself up as a man started growing in mass and muscles charged at the thumb man trying to get to Gren only to tackle the other brute.

Ball Weevil took advantage of his size to scuttle out of sight, hiding into some crevices and looking for a way to get to Rex. Ball Weevil notices a spark of light in the distance as it stays still for a minute taunting him

After examining it from afar for a while, Gren decides to get closer to it to take a better look. It was Mr.Electric Jorts again as he started yet another chase and went through a door.

Ball Weevil made another plasma ball to ride and give him chase. "Stop right there! Don't make me roll you up!"

As Gren went through the door he barely dodged a stone pillar that was thrown at him. He looked at who threw it to see Exo-Skull.

Ball Weevil rolled around to collect the debris from the pillar. "Hey, I remember you! I fought you, uh... in about three decades? Nevermind." He flipped back, tossing the ball at him.

He shot a laser out of his horn to break the plasma ball before it hit him.

“I hope you like surprises, Grenfell,” he laughed as he and Mr.Electric Jorts ran off again down another hall into a new cell block.

“Not when they come from villains, unless it's a surprise redemption arc", Ball Weevil replied, once again using a plasma ball to catch up to them.

Ball Weevil entered the new cell block as Rex called him from the control room.

“How’s it looking from down there?” Rex asked rhetorically.

“Oh, great. Very fun game of tag so far. What about you?" Gren replied.

“The electric guy was sent here and he’s the one letting everyone out. And I mean everyone,” Rex answered.

“Mhm. We need a plan, or this is gonna snowball into a mass-” Gren was cut off.

A black sludgy tail wrapped around his body as he was moved to become face to face with Sploot.

“Ugh! Let go, slimy! I've beaten you before... if you're even the same one that is." Ball Weevil spat plasma balls at him and immediately detonated them to break apart his body.

Sploot reformed as they spoke, “very pleased….. Grenfell….. Good sploot…. Good sploot.”

A rocket fist was launched at the two of them breaking the hold Sploot had on Gren as the sludge villain escaped through a crack in the wall. Gren turned to the one who shot the fist, letting Sploot off for now. It was a female Acrosian as she ran for freedom after the shot, Gren only seeing her backside. Gren shot and plasma string at her foot to get her to come back. She detached her foot and continued on without it disappearing into the massive prisoner crowd.

“Well, if I expected I would be throwing hands, I'd have picked an alien with hands to begin with..." Ball Weevil ultimately decided to meet back with Rex to come up with a better strategy.

As Gren traveled to the control room he gained visuals on Mr.Electric Jorts again.

“Any ideas, Rex? I wonder if there's a real reason he's doing this..."

As Gren chased after Electric Jorts, Rex surveyed catalogs.

“There’s no record of this guy… nothing to base a motive on…” Rex replied.

"Odd. I wonder where he came from. There's no way he's doing this just for the sake of creating chaos." Gren continued to chase after him, trying not to grab too much attention from the escapees.

As Gren raised himself up an elevator shaft he timed out halfway through. Rex saw this through the cameras and activated his Boogie Pack from the control room as he hurriedly grabbed Gren, aiding in the chase.

“I can’t even narrow down an alien species for this guy…” Rex added.

“Great timing as always, Omnitrix", Gren groaned. "You'd think the base would be better protected against electrokinetics, especially since you know, that's how the watch was stolen too."

“This place is protected by all sorts of natural abilities… I may have a theory that this dude isn't natural,” Rex suggested.

The duo chase the villain outside where Rex throws Gren onto the electric villain after handing him a device. Gren tries to use the device on the criminal, even though he doesn't have the slightest idea of what it does at a first glance.

Before Gren could even use the device, a giant bird alien snatched Gren away from Jorts. Rex tried to help Gren, but was shocked by Jorts.

“Oh, come on!" Gren tapped the Omnitrix impatiently while trying to kick himself off the bird. "...wait, why do you look kind of familiar?"

“You had freed me from SACT’s custody months ago. Now I have bigger fish to fry after Steel is gone,” the bird squawked.

Gren was thrown onto a rooftop as Rex crashed next to him.

“This is bad… that guy… he has a way to shut off my powers… that only a few people know about…” Rex said as he started thinking.

"That bird should be thanking me. Ugh." Gren dusted himself off. "Do you think it might be someone specific? Maybe someone we know?"

“Sploot… Animo’s old creation… Sparky able to shut off my powers that Animo gave me?... not liking the looks of this,” Rex replied.

Electric Jorts lands in front of them.

“Like the suit?” he asked.

“I feel like you're gonna start your evil monologue regardless of what I reply", Gren said, crossing his arms. "I know you want to. Go on. Tell us about the day you were bitten by a radioactive plug or whatever and decided you wanted to see the world burn."

He frowned as Gren killed the momentum of his planned conversation.

“I wasn’t bitten. I was created. We all were. By Him.” Mr.Electric Jorts hinted at.

As he said we, Jez Alba landed next to him followed by Sploot forming from out of nowhere. Exo-Skull jumped up from somewhere as a snake-man slithered off his back. They all start attacking Gren and Rex who were unable to defend themselves. Jorts delivered electric shocks to their bodies as Jez kicked their ribs in.

“Careful, don’t kill them. Bossman wants them alive,” Jorts cleared up.

Gren recoiled in pain, but tried to activate the Omnitrix to see if it had already charged. As Gren went to reach for the Omnitrix, the trix hand was then covered by a mechanical tentacle as Doctor Animo lifted himself up and grabbed the two heroes.

“Your one and only warning. Stay out of my way,” he yelled at both of them before breaking Gren’s arm and throwing him into the water below as Rex was soon thrown off too.

Gren used his legs to try to get back to the surface and turn into Swampfire to regenerate, despite the immense pain he felt. Swampfire slowly and painfully mended his body back together as Rex washed up beside him drained.

“This is going to be a long ass day…” Rex coughed up with blood and water.

“Yeah, one of those days. And that's just with the Animo thing, not even mentioning the entire mass breakout. We're gonna need help. A lot of help."

Rex shot up.

“Where the hell was Animo during that entire breakout? He only appeared at the end. And he’s been free for a while right?”

“..well, yeah actually. Since the, uh... time he brainwashed you, I guess?" Gren said with an awkward tone. "We never really got him after that."

As quietness grew to allow them to recover they realized their communicators were buzzing the entire fight.

“This can only mean two things: more problems, or the solution to the ones we got so far. Let's check it out." Gren answered the call.

It was several voicemails from Lucy, Myaxx, Octavia, Kai, Xylene and others. While Gren and Rex were handling the prison break, Animo had attacked the school. From the sounds of it, Animo had rigged the place to blow up as the final voicemail was from Lucy. It was hard to make out what it was saying. All that was heard was “you” before an explosion was heard cutting the communication.

“..we need to get to the academy. NOW."

Rex winced as his skin glowed with circuit patterns. It took a minute but eventually his boogie pack was formed. He grabbed Swampfire as he flew off to the docking bay to borrow a ship. Gren was completely expressionless. After a while, realizing where they had gotten, he decided to look for nearby Plumbers who might have information on what happened.

There were already Plumber ships heading out to the academy to try and support survivors, Gren transformed back into human and he and Rex boarded the next available flight home.

As they arrived, they saw scrap metal everywhere and various debris. In the floating rubble a spare sweater of Gren’s was floating around. It held the bodies of Blukic and Driba. Rex went out and grabbed them to give them a proper burial.

“What… What now?” Rex mournfully asked.

Gren tried to hold back the tears. "Now... first, we help. We make sure we help as many people as we can find, get them out of here.And then we make Animo pay."

Their pilot picked up a signal as a holographic pre-recording of Myaxx appeared.

“I’ve sent this message to play whenever Ciao Grenfell got to the area. Gren, we are mostly safe under the Empire State Building in New York City. It is a temporary refuge until we can all regroup. Please meet us there as soon as you can,” the message ordered.

"...well, you heard her. Let's get back to Earth and see what we'll do next."

Inside the basement of the Empire State Building, Gren and Rex arrived where Xylene was ordering people around looking very stressed out. Gren ran up to Xylene.

“Sorry, we tried to get here as fast as we could. Where's Myaxx? I want to try and... understand better what even happened."

Xylene took Gren and Rex to a secure room where Myaxx was in a tank badly injured. She was unconscious. In beds next to her tank were Lucy and Kai who were also hurt.

“Blukic, Driba, Jyro, and Cash are all missing and presumed dead… Animo came in while having you two distracted. He had an army of mutants with him… Leonidas defeated most of them, allowing more people to escape. He’s recovering in another room. Animo stole his entire lab research and equipment,” Xylene laid out.

“We... did find Blukic and Driba when we got to the academy. I'm glad to hear my grandpa is recovering and was able to help... we'll make sure Animo pays for this."

The doors swung open and Grenpa limped in. He stumbled in but caught himself on Gren.

“He’s the one that took that bioweapon… got him to monologue his evil plan…. He’s making a devolution nuclear bomb,” Grenpa relayed.

“That's even crazier than the other things he's done before... if he succeeds, it would be an unprecedented disaster." Gren replied.

“We’ll be looking at a global extinction level disaster,” Rex clarified.

"Right. Any clues on where Animo might be right now? Although it would be a bad idea to just jump in, we need a plan..." Gren asked.

“He’d need a nuclear reactor to set something like that off… so only 440 active locations could be…” Rex awkwardly smiled before it turned to a frown.

"I'm slightly surprised you just know that, but uh, over 400 is a bit too many to check. Unless we get massive Plumber support, which would be a risk. I haven't ever gotten anywhere close to being fast enough with Fasttrack or Astrodactyl to be able to check each one, either." Gren replied.

“I guess we are stuck waiting until we get an alert to a break in?” Rex questioned.

“But then it could be too late..." Gren pointed out.

Octavia then came in. “I might be able to track him, but then I’ll be out of commission for the fight”

“I dunno, then, we need all the help we can get to take on Animo... then again, can't fight him if we can't find him”, Gren countered.

“I think it’s our best bet…” Rex said as he thought about it.

“Mhm. Go ahead, V. Let's see if we can find him."

Octavia breathed as she focused after around ten minutes she got a signal. As the image of a Dallas Reactor was shown before she passed out from exhaustion. Gren tried to assist V and get her to Xylene so she could be properly taken care of before he and Rex could leave.

Gren arrives at Dallas’s nuclear reactor site with Rex, Molly, Team NECD, and Cooper. There the prison breakers were waiting for them. Rex grows a Smack Hand and throws Gren over the villains.

‘Stop Animo. We can handle these lackeys,” Rex said.

Gren nodded and headed deeper into the reactor site, finding Animo at a control system. Gren hit down the Omnitrix as he transformed into a teal light.

Gren closed his eyes as his skin turned green. His hair fell out as his ears grew, taking up most of his face. Webbed feet grew out of his shoes as growths sprouted all over his body. The growths popped becoming a mass of eyes as they blinked a few times. The teal light died down completing Gren’s transformation into Eye Guy.

“Well, eye've never seen this one before... But it'll work!" Eye Guy tried to sneak on Animo and hit him with a beam to try out his powers.

A mutated hornet that Animo had as a last resort was flying around and spotted Eye Guy flying stinger first at him as it dodged a fire blast from Eye Guy. Eye Guy decided to change his focus to the new enemy, trying to use ice blasts to immobilize it as quickly as possible while still attempting to get a blast on Animo since he can shoot from so many different places anyway.

The ice traps the hornet as it falls next to Animo alerting him to Gren’s presences.

“Of course you show up. I was hoping you’d heed my warning, Grenfell,” he yelled back as he moved leaving one mechanical tentacle to finish the preparations.

“You will pay for each life you've taken, Animo." Gren merges the eyes on his body to form the big chest eye, aiming it at Animo. "This is your last chance to give up on this madness."

“Never! In less than a minute my DNA bomb will revolutionize the world! And there’s nothing you can do to stop it, even if you kill me!” Animo laughed.

“Very well then. An eye for an eye." Gren fired the max-power electric blast from the singular eye at Animo... then after the initial shock, changed the target to the bomb's control panel.

Animo flew into the reactor as his body melted away inside the machine. As Eye Guy fired a blast at the control panel, the timer turned to an error message as a pulse flashed out of the machine sending a wave of unknown energy into the air, both upwards and outwards.

As the wave hit Gren, he was thrown back as unbeknownst to him some of the feedback energy absorbed into the watch. A teal flash changed him back to human as everything calmed down.

Gren took a moment to recollect himself, staring into the reactor for a moment and thinking about the outcome. After a while, he snapped out of it, deciding to check if the Omnitrix was charged to help his allies with the escapees.

The watch changed from its usual timeout color to bright teal rather quickly as Gren used it to change into Fasttrack to help his team. Gren took a deep breath before getting into a running position and speeding towards his allies to assess the situation.

With overwhelming numbers this time instead of just a duo, the escapees were easily taken care of and it looked like Animo’s machine failed to do anything.

“Well, we did it. We took care of a mass breakout and prevented the extinction of all life on Earth. I just don't know why I don't feel good about having saved the day, this time,” Gren sighed, “I guess it must have been the whole... academy blowing up thing."

“Let’s just count ourselves lucky this whole thing only had two confirmed casualties..,” Rex sighed as he collapsed to the floor exhausted.

Plumbers arrived to arrest the escapees and collect foreign tech Animo installed in the place. After not finding Animo’s body they declared him dead as Gren regrouped with the Academy back at the Empire Basement. There Octavia was recovered and Lucy and Kai were beginning to wake up.

Gren decided to check up on his friends as they were starting to come back to consciousness.

“I think we could all use a normal day of shopping after all of this…” Lucy giggled but stopped holding her side.

“For sure. I'm just really glad you made it out of what happened... We really underestimated what Animo was capable of. I know I did, at least. Sure, him being on the run was always on the back of my mind. I thought he could make some frogs really big or animate another pile of goo or turn people into dinosaurs or whatever, but... destroying the entire academy? A near global extinction?"

“He did have months to plan this and sit on it..” Rex said.

“So much for graduation,” Kai joked.

A solemn silence fell over the group as they rested after the brutal onslaught that was the day.

## End Credit Scene 1

The inside of the Omnitrix was seen as it moved based circuit boards and into veiny tubes and then DNA. The teal coloration turned a pale orange as it zoomed back out to reveal the outer edges of the Omnitrx turned orange in Gren’s sleep as he turned over.

## Major Events

* Blukic, Driba, and Dr.Animo die.
* Eye Guy debuts.
* Zzzakat, Ssserpent, Jonah Meville, and an unknown villain debut.
* The Omnitrix enters its Self-Destruct Countdown.

## End Credit Scene 2

Barbara fell over as an energy pulse hit the Earth. Arryn rushed to her side to help her. Animo’s daughter began mutating as she grew fur, fangs, claws, ears, and her eyes changed. She rushed over to a mirror to see she had transformed into some sort of beast.

“Oh Dad…. what did you do….”

## Characters

* Gren
* Octavia
* Rex
* Lucy
* Molly
* Kai
* Myaxx
* Xylene
* Grenpa
* Blukic *(death)*
* Driba *(death)*
* Barbara Animo *(end credit scene only)*
* Arryn Lua *(end credit scene only)*

### Villains

* Jonah Meville *(debut)*
* Zzakat *(debut)*
* Zombozo *(debut)*
* Kangaroo Kommando *(debut)*
* Frightwig *(debut)*
* Thumbskull *(debut)*
* Acidbreath *(debut)*
* Exo-Skull
* Sploot
* Fistina *(debut)*
* Jez Alba
* Sserpent *(debut)*
* Doctor Animo
* Unknown Villain *(end credit scene only)*

## End Credit Scene 3

The nuclear plant’s cooling towers were seen. A green hand with the skin falling off to reveal bone crawled out before being grabbed by a furry hand.

## Aliens Used

### Gren

* Ripjaws
* Buzzshock *(selected alien was Ball Weevil)*
* Ball Weevil
* Swampfire
* Eye Guy *(debut*, *selected alien was Ghostfreak)*
* Fasttrack

## Trivia

* This chapter came from the idea of building up the starting conflict of Doctor Animo a bit more
	+ Taking the idea and plot from that scene and adding the Spider-Man PS4 Sinister Six as well.