Steven kicked his feet as he sat on the couch, waiting for the gems to return from their latest mission that was "too dangerous" for him. He was getting restless, though. An itch in his brain was telling him to go and explore the temple again. Maybe there were more strange and magical thing he could try to figure out. Like, a magic toaster that made perfect toast every time. A big grin breaking out on his face, Steven jumped off the couch and made his way towards the Crystal Heart of the temple so he could sneak down to the Burning Room.

"Magic toaster!" he yelled as he slid down, passing through various stages, including the layer for his mom's old room. Landing with a slight thud, he wiped some sweat from his forehead as he began to look around at the various items in the bubbles.

"Let's see..." he said, passing by numerous bubbles. "Centipeetle, a flower, some smoke, a bit of that moss... Wait, is that a...?" He immediately went over to a bubble containing an ornately crafted sword with a gem set into the hilt. The gem was milky white with bands of gray, like clouds against an overcast sky.

He reached out to touch the bubble, and the sword moved towards him, popping the bubble in its attempt to get to his hand. The minute he caught hold of it, he could feel something was off; it seemed to want to move on its own. He could feel light pressure as the sword made to move his hand. Remembering that the gems could be home any minute, he stuck the sword through a belt loop and proceeded to hop onto the Crystal Heart and climb his way back to his mom's layer.

Safely out of the danger zone, Steven pulled the sword out and looked at it again. It was just the right length and weight for him; it felt almost like a natural extension of himself. Remembering what had happened in the Burning Room, he considered it again. It still felt like it was trying to guide his hand. Now that there wasn't anything for him to mess up by hitting it with a sword, he felt like he could actually test it out.

"Room," he said, "could I get some sword-fighting test dummies?" Remembering the incident with Pearl, he hastily added, "With balloon swords instead of real ones!"

With a poof of pink smoke, a few rag-doll dummies with balloon swords in hand appeared. With the new targets available, Steven let himself follow the flow of the sword. It pulled him in quick, vicious slashes across the first dummy, who poofed away after the abuse let up for longer than a second. The second dummy had more holes in it than a block of Swiss cheese before it vanished. The third dummy was taken apart piece by piece.

"Cool..." Steven mused, starry eyes gazing at his new favorite gem item. "Why would they put this down in the Burning Room?" he said, turning it over a couple of times, and then his gaze fell to the gem in the hilt. "Wait... it has a gem. Just like the mirror with Lapis in it!" he said. His put his hand to it before pulling it back. When he'd freed Lapis Lazuli before, things didn't go so well to start with. She'd caused a lot of trouble and brought Homeworld gems down on their heads, but Steven was sure that all of that had just been because she was scared and unused to freedom. Perhaps if he could be careful and explain things to this gem before the gems got home, things would turn out differently. Taking hold of the gem, he tugged at it experimentally, before pulling on it in earnest. He felt like something was pulling against him, almost as if someone didn't want the gem free. Currents of wind were drawing some weird pattern in the pink clouds he was standing on, but Steven wasn't really paying any attention to that. He was focused on freeing this gem, who he was sure had been trapped for a very long time. With a final tug, the gem came free, the sword shattered, and the design disappeared. With a twinkle and then a flash of light, the gem reformed. She looked a bit like Lapis did. Her dress was strapless and a single piece, with very light looking fabric that you could almost see through. Some of the pink clouds began to swirl about her before they settled into the shape of wings coming from her gem on her back. She wobbled a bit on her feet before steadying herself, and turning to look at Steven.

"Hi there!" he said. "My name's Steven." She blinked a couple of times, as if she were still waking up.

"Steven?" she asked. "Who... What are you? Where am I?" The pink color of her wings was slowly changing to a light gray, and now Steven could see that the cloud-smoke wasn't what was really making her wings, but instead was trapped by constantly circulating wind currents. "Where are my team?" Steven snapped back as she seemed to become more panicked the more she woke up. "Answer me, please!"

"Uh, uh... Well, I'm a human and you're in the Gem Temple on Earth, and-"

"I'm in the Temple?" she asked, incredulous. "But it should have sank into the mantle after they captured us, unless they kept it up, but why would they..." She shook her head. "You've made no sense, Steven. How did you even make it past those monsters?"

"Oh, they were all bubbled," he said. "So I was in no real danger, and you sorta just came to me."

"I came to you?" she said. "But I was only looking for gems."

"I am a gem!" he said, showing his belly to her. "Well, half-gem, anyway."

"Hmm... How intriguing," she said. "I didn't know there was a life-form adaptable enough to hybridize with. Still, this most certainly doesn't look like any room we had in the Temple. Did you do this?" Steven shook his head.

"No, this was how my mom made the room." The gem looked around.

"Well, she has good taste in decor, but subpar sense when it comes to color choices," she said, then put a hand to her chest. "Oh, where are my manners? My name's Nepheline."

"It's nice to meet you, Nepheline!" Steven said. "Say, why were-"

"Steven, I'd love to continue talking," she said, "but first could we get out of here? The brightness is a bit grating on the nerves, especially after such a long, hard nap."

"Oh, uh... Sure," he said, and led her to the door. Stepping into the shack attached to the temple, she grimaced a bit. She had probably never seen a human house before. "Sorry it's a bit of a mess. Pearl usually cleans up for me but the gems have been going on a lot of missions lately."

"Pearl..." Nepheline said, her voice trailing off. "That name... Where did I hear it?" As her eyes widened, the warp pad made noise and lit up, the gems standing there.

"Steven we're-" Pearl started, then gasped. In a gust of wind, Nepheline had launched herself out of the house, the tailwind knocking Steven down and sending him rolling into a wall. Garnet pursued, and Amethyst and Pearl went over to Steven's side.

"Steven, who is that!?" Pearl said.

"Yeah, and why'd you let her in?" Amethyst followed. "She might be a Homeworld gem!"

"Her name..." Steven started. "She's... Nepheline. She was attached to a sword I found down in the Burning Room."

"Nepheline!" Pearl exclaimed. "Steven, why did you let her out?"

"Well, because she was trapped, like Lapis, and-"

"Yeah, because it went so well when you let Lapis out," Amethyst said.\

"Steven, I wish you hadn't done that," Pearl said, and then yelped as the sounds of combat outside escalated. Looking through the window, they could see a fierce battle, with Garnet doing flying leaps to try and hit the airborne gem. Unfortunately, with free control of her flight, she controlled the pacing of the battle, and thus was free to tire Garnet out as she dodged and wove through the air. Getting to his knees, Steven ran outside.

"Stop, please!" he cried out. "Both of you!" Garnet paused momentarily, which Nepheline used as an opportunity to lash out with gusts of wind. Knocked back into the cliffs, Garnet coughed and rested on one knee, trying to catch her breath.

"You... You lied to me!" Nepheline cried out, pointing a hand at Steven. "You said they were in containers! You said we were at the Temple! You..." She took a moment to look at the Temple's carving, then at Steven again. "No... You can't be."

"Nepheline, please, we can talk about all of this."

"Never!" she shouted. "I will never negotiate with the spawn of that witch. I will never forgive Rose Quartz, and I will never be your prisoner again!"

With an irate flap of her wings, Nepheline took off over the ocean, a loud crack following a moment later as she broke the sound barrier. Garnet picked herself up, dusting off the sand, and looked at Steven.

"Steven-"

"Yeah, I know. I'm grounded."