And like I promised, it's time to take a look at Connie's new powers!

The next few days passed in relative peace for the Crystal Gems as Beach City was slowly restored to former glory. It took hundreds of panes of glass, clones of Pearl working into the night and a bit of help from Peridot to get the Wi-Fi back up and running but soon the sleepy town was back in shape save for a few potholes and trashed cars littering the place.

As this happened, though, Steven found he was truly getting back into the swing of his training. Garnet ramped up his workouts to include several laps swimming in the ocean at high tide and actually lifting weights in Rose's room. Pearl was back to training him in his weapons, though now they were mostly sparring to keep his skills sharp. Amethyst made very good use of her speed to resume her custom-brand sneak attack training though it did make for the hilarious sight of her crashing into his bubble at Mach 6.

Even the other Crystal Gems started getting in on it. Adamite made a rock obstacle course for him in her room to keep up his reflexes and endurance. Lapis became a new sparring partner who threw almost everything she could think of at him with water constructs. Topaz not only joined him on his training sessions to get better at hand-to-hand from Pearl, but even started showing him how to use her double mace and pugil stick combo to further boost his versatility.

At last, however, it was time for another major development. After spending a few days at home under her mother's orders to see if the odd status of her hand would resolve itself, Connie was to finally see the Crystal Gems over the issue. When she entered the beach house, she noticed how quiet the abode was. Only Topaz and Pearl were present with the two chatting about the Sun Incinerator.

"As the captain of the vessel," said the latter, "I thought I'd run the idea by you first and foremost. Peridot's convinced that with all the ships left over from Homeworld's invasion that she can develop several upgrades that would help us out later."

"Really? What did she have in mind?" asked the fused captain.

"First and foremost, she wants to equip a short-range teleportation device. She wants to avoid a repeat of this last incident so that if any form of barrier was made the ship could just phase through it."

"Wow, that does sound handy! I mean, I have no idea how we'd be able to make something like that but it could be a huge help!"

"Aside from that, it's just essentially increased weapons and speed. The ship might have been the cusp of Homeworld's engineering when Lars first commandeered, but even the weeks since then might be enough to overwhelm it."

"Um, hello?" asked Connie, "Am I interrupting anything?"

"Oh, there you are Connie! Sorry about that, got a bit carried away. Topaz, would you care to join us?"

"No thanks. Topaz wants to see if she can help outside while Topaz runs some tests on the ship."

The captain then split into her components and gave a brief kiss before one warped away while the other walked out the door. Soon it was just Pearl and her disciple standing in the empty house.

"So, any changes?" asked Pearl, "Does it feel uncomfortable?"

"Nope. I can still feel everything fine even though it's super hard like this. It does weird me out a bit, but it's growing on me."

"Well, I hope you don't mind but Steven and Garnet will be joining us. They're at the Sky Arena training right now."

"No, it's cool. I think the three of you are the best people for this. Having a doctor for a mom doesn't really cover this."

The two then stepped onto the warp pad and were whisked away to their usual training ground. They soon found the other half of their group in the middle of the arena with Steven doing pushups while Garnet stood on his back conjuring balls of ice and fire while her trainee exercised.

"That's 150," said the fusion, "Not bad. Give me a few more and we'll call it for a break."

The boy responded by grunting as he lowered himself again, his face sweating and his limbs making it very clear they were burning. He also caught Connie arriving and that made him lose his focus. He tried to wave hello to her, but that meant his balance was completely gone and his face met the stone floor. Garnet just walked off and dusted the boy off.

"You know what, that's enough," she said, "I think you've earned a break."

He gave a very muffled thanks and simply let his muscles relax while Garnet went over to Connie.

"Nice to see you again, Connie. I hope your family is doing well."

"Oh yeah, they're great. There's been a few people in the hospital with injuries for Mom, but Dad's getting paid leave from work because of all this. What's been going on with you all?"

Pearl, feeling she had a right to know, spoke about Agent Van and how they had now caught the attention of the government. While Garnet had been told about it with the rest of the team the day after, the girl was a bit stunned.

"Wow… So, does this mean some guys in dark suits are gonna show up and wipe my mind of all of this?"

"They try that," said Garnet, "And I punch them into next week."

"Trust me, Connie, Van was merely trying to look out for all the people that Homeworld might hurt in the crossfire," added Pearl, "And he seems very aware of just how outpaced human technology is compared to ours. Although I am impressed to see what people come up with next, your most modern devices would be seen as nothing but archaic in gem terms."

"Yeesh. Not exactly an optimistic picture, is it?" Connie looked down at her green hand, swearing it felt much colder.

"Never has been, but that never stopped us before," assured Garnet, "But enough of that. It's time to get down to business."

"Yep!" said Steven as he stood fully refreshed, "Now let's see what awesome magic powers you have now!"

The girl giggled at his optimism. Deciding she had spent enough time waiting, she got changed behind the stands into her usual training outfit with the gauze missing from her arms. With a brief flick of her wrist, Connie made the sword appear again and stood to face Pearl in a spar.

"Are you ready?" asked her mentor. Connie nodded and soon they were both rushing at each other. While Steven and Garnet watched from the sidelines, they immediately noticed something different about the girl. Her swings carried far more power behind them, and she seemed to be moving faster than before. The sudden increase in her skill was enough to put Pearl on edge and realize how different this was. Despite knowing most of her moves ahead of time, the amount of force behind them left her shocked.

"Wow, look at her go!" Steven gaped, "She's got Pearl on the ropes!"

"Very true," added Garnet, "But you should know that power doesn't always mean someone will win."

The duelists continued trading blows, becoming more evenly matched as Pearl learned to adapt to the new power Connie had and soon they were back on even footing. As Connie went for an jumping slash, Pearl flipped to the side and landed a kick to the girl's back to send her sprawling. The gem was about to check to see if she injured her, but Connie managed to catch herself on her feet and literally leap back into action with a flying kick straight towards Pearl.

"Whoa!" gasped the sensei as she barely managed to dodge. Steven and Garnet were also shocked in the stands to see that Connie's legs were both the same green crystal up to her knees.

"Whoops! Sorry!" stammered the girl, not sure how she did that.

"Connie, look down!" said Steven. His friend did just that and was stunned to see her new legs. Even the legs of her pants had completely melded into the crystal and somehow her bare feet felt no different.

"Neat," said Garnet, as calm as ever, "Let's see what she can do now."

Feeling it was only right to continue, Connie ran in again with another sword materialized for her. The enhanced strength her arm had was now true for feet as she ran at Pearl several times faster and she had a much easier time maintaining her stance. Her mentor even tried to sweep her legs, but only injured her foot as a result.

"Ouch! Good thing Amethyst isn't here…"

"Don't worry about it, Pearl," said Steven, "I still think you're cool!"

While the other three were impressed, Connie was getting a tad worried. A small part of her was excited how strong she was now but this was starting to get too strange for her. Nevertheless, once her mentor recovered the sparring resumed and the same pattern happened. As Pearl fought longer and got a grip on Connie's new power she adapted to the situation. She sent a wide swing that targeted her only normal appendage.

The girl leapt out of the way, but the spear managed to graze her arm and leave a cut. Seeing the damage, Pearl immediately stopped and got some gauze from her gem.

"Oh my goodness! Connie, I'm so sorry I-"

"Hey, don't worry, accidents happen," the girl brushed off, "I'm sure Steven's gotten some scrapes from all this."

"Plus a few burns, one sprained ankle and two cases of pink eye."

"WHAT?!" yelped Pearl, "Where did all those come from and how did I never know?!"

"That fountain water, that's how," explained Garnet, "One drop is just right to fix little injuries like that."

While Connie laughed at that, Pearl tried wrapping her arm in bandages but noticed something odd. As she tried to cover her arm, she found the gauze seemed to be coming apart the more she wrapped it. When she tried pulling it taut, the stuff just broke and fell off her right arm to reveal the entire thing was crystal up to her shoulder.

"Huh?! What-? How-?!"

"Interesting," said Garnet, "It looks like that happened because you were almost injured."

"Okay, this is too much! I almost broke my phone three times with just one hand like this! What's having an entire arm gonna do?!"

"I don't know but let's find out!" said Steven excitedly, bouncing up and down in his seat.

"Steven, aren't you worried? This feels kinda weird…"

"Connie, if you've had enough, no one's going to force you," assured Garnet, "If you want to stop for now, we can."

"Thanks, Garnet."

The four warped back to the house with Steven looking noticeably bummed that the entire event was cut short. Once Connie was on her way back home, Pearl noticed how sour the boy seemed.

"Steven, what's wrong?"

"I guess… I didn't expect her to take it like that is all. I thought she would be super excited or something to have a power like that but she seemed… afraid of it."

"Steven, she may be a Crystal Gem," explained Garnet, "But you've been in this line of work longer than her. You're used to seeing magical things on a daily basis."

"But so is Connie… She's been under the ocean, has weekly sword fighting lessons and has even fused! I get it that new stuff like this is weird but it can still be cool!"

"And one day, I'm sure she'll get used to it. Just give her some space and let her figure things out."

"Okay… You're right. It is her stuff so she's the only one who can do anything about it."

"Well, if you're looking to take your mind off it," suggested Pearl, "You could be training instead?"

The boy just sighed, but nonetheless ran outside with Pearl making two clones behind him to head outside and practice together. That left the two veteran rebels inside to ponder the situation.

"I get the feeling we're tampering with something we shouldn't," said Pearl quietly, "The way her arm crystallized as if responding to trauma is a useful power but-"

"It's all happening too fast for her," answered Garnet, "Like it or not, though, she's going to have to confront this."

"True. Steven usually just leapt into whatever new skills he had with no hesitation so what exactly do we do here?"

"I don't exactly know but knowing Connie she'll make it through. That girl's the most surprising Crystal Gem we've ever had."

When Connie returned home that day, her parents were stunned silent to see her. Now that all of her appendages seemed to look like geodes attached to her body, neither of them had any clue what to say. What did not help was their daughter being clearly evasive about the whole thing and just saying she wanted to go back tomorrow. Her intention was clear: she needed to sleep off today before doing anything else.

Connie headed to bed almost immediately after dinner that evening. Throughout the day she handled everything with her hands as gently as possible and even tiptoed across every floor as if her feet would break through the foundation. Even when she was alone, she would remain silent and simply stare at her arms and legs. It took almost an hour of lying in bed to finally drift into sleep, but her troubles did not end there.

When she opened her eyes, she was on a towel on the beach. As she sat up, the afternoon sun graced her skin and made her feel a warm comfort. That comfort turned into joy when she saw Steven and the rest of the Crystal Gems all having fun in the ocean. As soon as Steven saw her, he beckoned her to join them all. When she looked down, she was even wearing her bathing suit. She all but jumped up off the ground and ran right to them, the hot sand tickling her feet, until she suddenly stopped. Right as she reached the zenith of the ocean, her foot fell asleep.

She stopped herself from falling over, but she could not get her foot to budge. When she looked down, she realized why it was being so stubborn. It was solid green crystal. She felt her heart rate spike at the sight but tried to remain calm. She tried dragging her leg along, hoping she could just power through the ordeal. That was a mistake since it made the crystal inch up her leg by the second. It soon got to the point where her leg felt like a massive weight that held her in place.

She noticed the Crystal Gems had stopped their fun in the ocean to watch her, growing more worried as they saw the material move up to her knee. Connie tried calling for help, but her voice refused to work. She tried reaching out for them, but soon her hand joined the process. The others all gasped and backed away as the change progressed from her fingertips down to the palm of her hand. The gentle warmth started to become a sweltering heat as both of her left appendages were crystallized, and the spread kept going. The heaviness in her limbs became too much for the beach beneath her and soon she fell through the sand into an open sky. She shrieked in terror as she plummeted even faster than normal, her increased weight raising her velocity, until she crashed through a building.

She somehow survived the fall, but that barely crossed her mind as something else happened around her. Four transparent plexiglass walls rose up from the floor around her and formed a box reaching to the ceiling. She soon saw none other than her parents and Steven standing outside while a stranger in a lab coat escorted them through a nearby door.

"Alright, I'm afraid visiting hours are over," the scientist said to the three, "The subject needs rest."

"When can we see her again?" asked her mother, clearly trying not to cry.

"I'm afraid with this recent progression in her condition, I cannot say. There's no telling if this new growth is reversible or if she is even stable."

"What?! My daughter isn't some monster!" protested Doug, "She couldn't hurt anyone!"

"On the contrary, Mr. Mahesweran, the tests we've run show she is a grave danger to everyone around her. Her strength and speed have grown at such a pace that, at this rate, there wouldn't be a power on Earth that could match her."

"So what?!" yelled Steven, "Connie's my best friend! She's the nicest, smartest, and most responsible person in the world! She'd never hurt anyone unless they deserve it! And I'm not gonna let you keep her here!"

The boy summoned a gauntlet over one hand and proceeded to bust down one of the walls containing Connie. Alarms soon blared to life as the door leading out of the room was closed off by a metal gate. Doug and Priyanka were soon dragged out of the room by two men in dark suits while half a dozen of them tried tackling Steven. The hybrid simply summoned a bubble and was unharmed as they crashed into his barrier and urged Connie to run after him as he made a break for it.

The two made their way through the facilities, corridors turning into blurs as every door they saw was covered by a metal shutter and were soon met by several hired guns aiming lasers at them. Rather than slow down, Steven brought out his shield and barreled through the blockade with his crystalline friend right behind him.

It was not long until they burst through the front door of the facility where they saw a massive chain-link fence separating the place from miles of empty desert. They both stood there in the open to catch their breaths, half-expecting the military or seem super powerful to appear to deter them but nothing happened. The two seemed to finally be in the clear as they quickly opened the front gate and sprinted into the dunes.

Eventually, after literal miles of running, they stopped at long last and realized they were free.

"We did it, Connie!" cheered Steven as he hugged her, "Let's go home!"

Connie hugged him back, her heart soaring after spending days trapped in that room, but that happiness would not last. A loud crunch sounded throughout the air, confusing Connie until she looked at Steven. His face was frozen in a scream of agony, but no sound came from him. His back was arched in an unnatural angle thanks to her arms wrapped around him. Before she could react to this, his body suddenly vanished into a puff of smoke leaving his gemstone behind.

She gingerly reached down to try and pick up the stone, trying to run through her mind what to do about this, but her body had other plans. Her fingers suddenly elongated into razor sharp claws and punctured the gem multiple times, reducing it to shards. She let out a piercing scream into the sky as her vision suddenly went black…

…And she woke up in her bedroom, the sun still hours away from rising. Her entire body felt ice cold and she heard her parents scrambling out of their room and into hers.

"Connie, what's going on?!"

"Honey, are you okay?!"

Priyanka quickly opened the door, but they did not enter once they did. They were too busy staring at their daughter who was now crystal from head to toe. Even her hair was one solid chunk of green draped behind her head and her eyes were only recognizable by the slightly darker green pupils they could barely make out in the unlit bedroom.

"Mom? Dad? What's wrong?" asked Connie, confused until she touched her hand to her forehead. A soft clang rang out, making the girl pray that she was still dreaming. When she turned to look at the mirror on her dresser, she caught sight of herself. Her reflection only made her fears realized and soon she could not take looking at herself. Her eyes welled up with tears, actually leaving her eyes as tiny gemstones, and literally ran straight through her bedroom wall. Despite being on the second floor of her house, Connie did not feel the drop and just ran off before she could accidentally hurt anyone like this.

The parents gaped at the new hole in the wall before snapping back to reality a few moments later. Doug first began dialing his work and the police while Priyanka pulled up Greg's phone number to relay the message to the rest of the Crystal Gems.

At the crack of dawn that day, the Crystal Gems awoke to find the news not only of Connie's transformation but that she had ran off to no one knows where. All other plans for the day were cancelled in favor of finding Connie as soon as possible.

"Alright, here's how we're gonna do this," commanded Garnet to the rest of the team, "Topaz, you will act as the coordinator. Since your ship has the best ability to cover ground, you will make continuous loops around the city."

Topaz merely nodded as the crew of the Sun Incinerator stood behind her, ready to depart at a moment's notice.

"Everyone else will be heading in one major direction. Thanks to Doug, we now have the local police keeping an eye out for her around town, so we need to cover the surrounding areas. Lapis and Peridot, you will head towards the barn."

"Aye aye, captain!" said Peridot as Lapis already deployed her wings, eager to take off.

"Amethyst, you start heading towards the Kindergarten. Cover as much ground as you can."

Amethyst had to stop herself from running off, figuring that Garnet would have more to her plan. She did not want to be fifty miles away in case there was more to do.

"Pearl, you and Greg are going to be going to Ocean Town and moving out from there. Pearl, get as many clones as you can once your there and spread out."

The unlikely duo nodded with Greg heading off to his van parked nearby, also ready to drive the second they were deployed.

"Adamite and Cinnabar, you'll be covering the northwest area since it's the only one not covered. There's mountains about forty miles out so in case she gets that far I need you to handle to the terrain."

"Understood," replied the earthbender. Cinnabar, in a rare moment of seriousness, was already hanging on to Adamite's back to start their expedition.

"And that leaves the three of us staying here."

"What, huh?" asked Steven, "What are we gonna do then?"

"We, my main man," spoke Bismuth proudly, "Are gonna be mission control for everybody here thanks to a little something special Peri and I've been cooking up. Check out these!"

The proud gem held out her hand to reveal a dozen tiny devices resembling common microchips, each one a mix of green and gold circuits over blue metal and the size of Steven's eye.

"These are hands-free communicators that will allow us to reach other anywhere in the world!" Peridot boasted, "They attached to the side of your head and all you have to do to activate them is say 'Connect to…' and then the name of the recipient!"

"Cool!" Steven immediately grabbed one and placed it on his cheek. As the others all took one, he wasted no time testing it once they were all online.

"Connect to Amethyst!"

"I hear you, Captain Goofball!"

"To disconnect, simply tap the chip and the connection is severed," explained Peridot further, "They are entirely unaffected by heat, depth beneath water or earth and cannot be intercepted by any current Homeworld communication system!"

"Bravo, Peridot," complimented Pearl, "This would have been a literal lifesaver back in the old days."

"Yeah, but nostalgia can wait," said Bismuth, "Now that we're all hooked up, it's time to ship out. Everyone know the plan?"

Everyone nodded and got into position. Topaz ran towards her ship, Greg and Pearl headed to the van, Lapis readied herself for takeoff and Adamite was set to dig.

"Remember, you find anything suspicious, you report it," advised Garnet, "We can never be too careful these days. Alright then, good luck and move out."

Next time: the search for Connie! But will that be only thing the team finds? Tune in to find out!

Thank you so much for reading! Please feel free to leave a review!