HOOOONK

"Ben!"

HOOOOOOOONK

"Ben, calm down!" – Steven repeated.

HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK. Despite Steven's comments, Ben kept honking at the car ahead of him. The other cars all around the Dondai were doing the exact same, creating a migraine-inducing cacophony of honks and beeps that echoed around the highway traffic jam.

"You try calming down when the guy in front of you won't move!" – Ben irritably told him as he honked again.

"AY, WHO DA HELL YOU HONKIN' AT?" – the car in front of them yelled.

Ben scrolled down the window and stuck his head out. "YOUR MOM!" – he yelled back. Though, he started coughing and had to roll the window back up again, all this exhaust was toxic.

Steven looked disapprovingly at Ben's antics, then bubbled his own head to at least be away from all the noise as he tried to relax in the passenger seat.

"This is why I hate driving normal cars." – Ben ranted. "If we were in a spaceship right now, we could just fly off out of here.

"Yeah, well, most people on Earth unfortunately can't do that. So…" – Steven said, and his words echoed through the bubble. His breathing fogged it up as well. He sighed and made it pop. "Wait…" – he then remembered something.

"Been waiting for the last half hour for this guy to MOVE IT!" – Ben yelled as he pressed honk again.

HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK!

Ben held it for an extremely long time. So long, that even when it felt like ridiculous overkill to keep pressing for even a second longer, Ben persisted with it for a full minute. "HONK! HONK! HONK! HO-HO-HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK!"

"Okay, that's it." – Steven told him, tired of Ben's road rage. "Maybe a spaceship adventure is exactly what we need.

"Got any ideas?" – Ben turned his head towards him.

"I might just have one." – Steven smirked.

Though, that smirk was short-lived, as the door of the car in front of them opened and the man that was driving it stepped out and started walking towards the Dondai.

"He seems pissed." – Ben said innocently.

A short while later, the two teens were eating burgers outside. They didn't have a table or anything, and they had left their car at a garage, so they had to make do with putting their food on a cement platform and eating while standing.

"So when is he gonna show up?" – Ben impatiently asked Steven as he took a bite from his burger.

"Any moment now. We'd better finish this before we have to go." – Steven told him as he ate some of the fries.

"How does he have a ship that can travel in space and he's still late?" – Ben said. 'Do they got traffic jams in space or something? "He knows where we are, right?"

"Don't worry, we sent him the coordinates, didn't we?"

"Imagine if all these cars see a spaceship descending and they think someone's gonna attack them." – Ben said and chuckled. "Bet they won't go all slow then." – he added as he took a sip of the soda that came with the meal. "Why don't any of these places have smoothies…"

"I still feel like you went overkill in the car back there." – Steven commented. Though, before they had the chance to continue the conversation, what they had been waiting for finally happened. They heard jet engine noise as a wind blew from overhead, scattering Ben and Steven's empty burger wrappings around and prompting them to look up.

A yellow gem starship, straight from the heart of Homeworld, was descending on them. It was the Sun Incinerator.

"Finally." – Ben sighed, as Steven dove to collect the garbage that got blown away.

The starship's entrance pad opened while still hovering a couple feet above the ground, and on it stood a smug human teenager wearing space captain's apparel, though the most eye-catching appearance was that he was entirely pink from his skin to his hair. Steven also noticed that he now wore a pair of aviator sunglasses, though the scar that ran over his right eye was still poking out.

"Come with me if you want to live." – Lars coolly told them with a confident grin as he held his hand out to them.

"Wh- what do you mean? We're in danger?" – Steven asked him. Ben instinctively looked around for signs of trouble, the trained Plumber that he was.

"No, I, uh… just always wanted to use that line." – Lars chuckled, dropping his badass façade. "But you guys should still get on, though." – he added.

"Cool. Never been on a gem spaceship before." – Ben said as he looked around.

"Ben, this is Lars." – Steven introduced him. "Lars, this is…"

"Ben Tennyson!" – Lars finished it for him.

"You know him?" – Steven asked, somewhat surprised.

"Well, I am a very famous celebrity." – Ben established with an unapologetically fake humble tone, obviously to brag about it.

"Dude, do you have ANY idea how much I've heard about this guy in the past few months out here in space? It's always Ben Tennyson this and Ben Tennyson that." – Lars ranted. "Ooh, Thank god he threw Vilgax into space for the millionth time! Nooo, the Highbreed, whatever would have we done against the Highbreed?" – he said in a silly tone while doing jazz hands, as if either Vilgax or the Highbreed were a bunch of pushovers.

"What, you think it's so easy to take down Vilgax?" – Ben sneered.

"It must be if YOU've done it so many times." – Lars snapped back at Ben. "Seriously? This is the guy you've been traveling with?" – he irritably turned to Steven. "That's why you blew me off on our space adventure last week? I thought you said your trip was a solo journey for contemplation and self-discovery or whatever."

"Well, plans change sometimes." – Steven admitted.

"Okay, whatever, I guess. Come on, let's meet with the crew." – Lars told them as they went into the ship's central chamber.

"Hey, guys!" – Steven excitedly told everyone. "I'd like you to meet a special someone that's gonna be joining us today." – he told them while putting his hand on Ben's shoulder.

Ben stared at all the gems in the room, and they all stared back. They all looked… somewhat different from any others gems Ben had seen before. One of them… or, rather, two, looked like a pair of Siamese twins, conjoined at the hip, where their gem was – conjoined, just like their body. Another looked like a Sapphire, though different from the one Ben had known – she was off-white and peachy-colored instead of the blue Ben recognized them as. The most normal looking one of the bunch had 4 arms and 4 eyes, by which Ben recognized she was a Fusion. Her bottom two eyes were smaller and resembled a pair of crescent glasses you'd have resting on your nose. And finally, the elephant, or rather, gem in the room – a massive, caterpillar-like gem that easily took up most of the space. She had two pairs of human-like arms, which just looked unnatural on her body, as well as three pairs of legs to go with them, though her head was also more humanoid – she resembled a caring old lady, and it looked like she always had a wistful expression on her face. Ben deduced that she had to have been a Fusion as well.

"Uh… hi, guys." – Ben awkwardly waved at them. A short silence fell between them.

"OH MY STARS!" – the two-gem Fusion suddenly yelled. "DO MY FOUR EYES DECIEVE ME?"

"Ben…" "…Tennyson?" – the twins said, one by one.

"So you guys heard about me too, then?" – Ben asked them, somewhat regaining his confident attitude as the awkward silence went away.

"Captain Lars is about to bring up Steven and… a new guest!" – the off-color Sapphire declared in joy.

"Of course, we've heard about you." – the massive Fusion told Ben. She spoke very slowly, and in a deep voice. "Your deeds have turned to legends across the cosmos."

"That's Fluorite." – Steven told Ben. "She's a Fusion of six whole gems."

"Six?" – Ben asked, somewhat surprised. "I didn't even know so many gems could fuse at once."

"Yeah, it's very rare." – Steven confirmed. "These are the Rutile twins." – Steven continued.

"Nice to…" "…meet you." – the twins greeted Ben.

"Hi, I'm Rhodonite." – the other Fusion approached Ben and shook his hand by clasping two hands around his. First with her top two hands, then again with her bottom pair. "I'm actually a… big fan." – she said and chuckled awkwardly.

"She's a Fusion of a Pearl and a Ruby!" – Steven pointed out to Ben.

"My vision tells me the most wonderful thing! Steven's friend is the famous galactic hero, Ben Tennyson!" – the off-color Sapphire declared again.

"And that's Padparadscha. She can only predict things that have already happened." – Steven explained to him.

"Oh." – Ben said as he shook her hand as well. That one left him perplexed. What use would that ability possibly have?

"Great, just great." – Lars said, mildly irritated by his crew's adoration of Ben, as he sat down in the Captain's chair.

"So, what have you guys been doing ever since you left space, Captain Lars?" – Steven asked Lars, indulging him in his space-faring role.

"Wait, that guy's the Captain?" – Ben somewhat bluntly asked.

"…Yeah." – Lars turned around to him. "What, do you have a problem with that?"

"No, I just… didn't expect you to be like the captain of a ship or whatever." – Ben answered. "Aren't you the dude from the pastry shop?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I am." – Lars answered, expecting Ben to follow up with another insult.

"Those donuts were pretty good." – Ben told him instead.

"Oh. Cool." – Lars answered, somewhat surprised. "Well, to answer Steven's question, we've mostly been flying around helping people in need. Sometimes we take on jobs, sometimes we raid massive battleships and then donate all the salvage to a planet or colony that needs it or something. Just like how we'd raid Diamond colonies in the good old days of Era 2, right?"

"Oh, that's pretty cool. So you're like a space bounty hunter Robin Hood." – Steven concluded.

"Pretty much. But, it didn't end well a couple times. This one mission on Bryonna VII, we even had the Plumbers on our tails! We totally lost them, though." – Lars humbly bragged.

"What in the world did you do to get the Plumbers after you?" – Ben asked him.

"We robbed some asshole galvanic mechamorph carrying ill-gotten goods." – Lars said coolly.

"Really." – Ben said, comprehending Lars' train of thought. Was he even aware that Ben was a Plumber and could arrest them all right now? Well, of course he wouldn't do that, but this was pretty funny.

"For the record, I told him it was a bad idea!" – Rhodonite interjected before Ben even said anything.

"Was the mechamorph's name Baz-L by any chance?" – Ben asked Lars.

"Seems like you know him too. He was a total ass, right?"

"Dude, are you kidding? He once sent the Vreedle brothers after my girlfriend! You probably didn't go far enough with him!" – Ben joked.

The two of them laughed, and Steven laughed along to be a part of the moment, though he wasn't aware what they were talking about and frankly, he wasn't sure if he approved of Lars robbing people. Rhodonite gave a light nervous chuckle from her station as well.

"So where are we headed today, then?" – Ben asked the Captain, though still refusing to use the title.

"We were about to go to the planet Fulmas when you guys contacted us." – Lars continued.

"Fulmas?" – Steven asked.

"Not sure if I've heard of it." – Ben also said.

"It's a former Diamond colony, and apparently, it was one of their most valuable ones." – Lars explained as he pulled up a holographic image of the planet on the ship's interface.

The planet Fulmas looked like it was torn apart. There were deep cracks running all throughout the terrain. In fact, they were deeper than cracks. It seemed like they ran all the way through, and the planet was shattered into several large chunks. but somehow retaining its spherical shape. The inside of the planet that could be seen was glowing an electric blue so bright that it faded into white in the center. There were also chunks of the planet that had left the landmass and were floating around in the orbit.

The view very strongly reminded Steven of the shattered shapes of the gem Homeworld.

"Yeesh. That looks bad." – Steven mentioned.

"Yeah. The planet is magnetically charged, and the chunks being attracted to each other is what's holding it together."

"What caused it to shatter like that in the first place?" – Ben inquired.

"Resource depletion." – Lars plainly said. "Fulmas is rich with electric energy through its minerals, so it was a big target for the Diamonds during Era 2. They didn't even bother to set up more than one Kindergarten – what they really wanted was power sources instead of more gems. Well, for the most part, anyway."

"What exactly do you mean by "for the most part?" – Ben inquired.

"There is one mineral found in abundance on Fulmas that is nearly indestructible." – Lars told him. "Taydenite."

"Oh. Yeah, I can see where this is going." – Ben nodded.

"Taydenite is the galactic currency, right?" – Steven asked them.

"Yeah. It's literally the most sought-after material in the whole universe. So, you can imagine what would happen after the Diamonds demilitarized the area and dismantled the occupation." – Lars told him. "Enter the Incursean Empire."

"We're almost here!" "Pulling out of hyperdrive!" – The Rutile twins informed them as they were discussing.

"Incurseans are the frog aliens, right?" – Steven asked him again. It was weird, but out of the three, he was the least knowledgeable about non-gem related aliens.

"Yeah. They're always giving Plumbers a hard time." – Ben told him.

"Not to mention they invaded and occupied the Earth for an entire month!" – Lars said. "But the great Ben Tennyson wasn't there for that part, was he? No, he turned himself in and got exiled or whatever." – he returned to critiquing Ben.

"Hey, the only reason I did that was to save the planet!" – Ben objected. "And I'm the one that came back and saved it in the end! What the heck were you doing the whole time if you're so great?"

"Uh, hello? Fighting for our lives against the army of thousand-feet-tall Way Bads?" – Lars reacted.

"Okay, you guys need to relax." – Steven put his hands in between Ben and Lars. "That was all in the past. There's plenty of war-mongering frogs to fight in the future, right?"

"Yeah, I guess." – Lars backed down.

"Hold on." – Ben interjected. "I don't think picking a fight with the Incursean empire is the best idea."

"Wait, what?" – Steven asked in confusion.

"WHAT?" – Lars objected, much firmer than Steven. "Dude, they literally enslaved the population and are forcing them to mine their own planet hollow!"

"Yeah, no, I get that, I've seen them do that all the time, it's just that they are currently the most powerful military force in the entire universe, and I just want to suggest we think this entire thing through before we do something that we might regret." – Ben explained.

"Ben's right. We can't take on their entire armada!" – Rhodonite agreed, clearly anxious about the whole thing.

"I mean, this isn't the first time we've tangled with the incurseans and they've never been able to catch us so far." – Lars said in a casual cool voice, still in a braggart tone.

"You've been lucky." – Ben assured him, ignoring his confident claim.

Steven felt torn. Not only were two of his close friends arguing, both of them raised solid points and he wasn't sure who to agree with.

"Well, too bad it's my ship." – Lars said, keeping up the smug façade of the confident spaceship captain. This decision might have been to just rub in Ben's face. Maybe. But he still knew he could pull it off. "Rutiles, get us down there! Fluorite, make sure the engine is operating at optimal capacity. Padparadscha…"

"We're about to reach Fulmas!" – Padparadscha "predicted".

"Just keep doing what you're doing." – Lars told her. It's not as if he could demand anything more from her. And it felt good to give out orders like that. Made him feel like the team was all contributing.

As they were entering the planet's atmospheric field, a screen started flaring up on the sideboard.

"We're getting a transmission from Fulmas!" – Rhodonite told Lars. "It's probably the incurseans!"

"Hold on!" – Ben yelled. "Don't answer just yet!"

"What are you talking about?" – Lars turned to him, preparing to disregard anything the "great Ben Tennyson" was about to order.

"I guess we're really doing this…" – Ben sighed. "Well, if we are, we can't let them see me."

"Why not?" – Steven asked.

"The Earth has a peace treaty with the incurseans, and I'm literally the one that signed it! How do you think they'd react if they saw me here? They'd invade Earth all over again!"

"Well, what do you propose we do?" – Lars asked him.

"Just hold onto your butts." – Ben declared as he activated the Omnitrix and hit the dial. And as the Omnitrix's green energy dissipated, in the center of the room stood…

"An Emerald?!" – Rhodonite yelled, somewhat startled. Even Lars was surprised by this transformation, this being the first time he'd seen Ben do it. The Rutile tweens looked around to look at him too, and even Fluorite peeked from the engine room to see what was going on.

"What?" – Hardlight asked, not realizing why this transformation attracted so much attention.

"I'll tell you later. Answer the incursean call, first, before they blow us up." – Steven said, and Lars pressed a button on the Captain's seat.

The image of a high-ranking incursean soldier, adorned with a battle helmet and wearing a decorated white uniform instead of the standard black one, popped up on the ship's windshield.

"Unidentified gem spaceship. Turn back immediately or be shot down. This is your only warning." – he bluntly declared.

"Uhhuh this is the personal shuttle of his majesty the uh the Pink Diamond!" – Hardlight awkwardly thought of on the spot and pointed at Steven.

"What?!" – Steven yelled in shock.

"That's right! He's here to, uh… negotiate with the commander!" – Ben continued.

"What are you doing?! That's not part of the plan!" – Lars hissed at him quietly, so that the incursean officer wouldn't hear.

"Your plan would have blown us to kingdom come! This way we'll at least touch the surface!" – Hardlight whispered back.

"AN EMERALD?!" – Padparadscha suddenly yelled.

"Well…" – the incursean commander said, confused on what was he supposed to do. "Alright, you may proceed."

And with that, Hardlight detransformed back into Ben.

"That was actually a close call." – he said.

"Dude, what the heck?!" – Steven asked him. "Next time, can you please warn me before you call me Pink Diamond and start making negotiations in my name?"

"Yeah, sorry. It was somewhat of an emergency situation. I won't do it again." – Ben nodded. "My Diamond." – he slyly added while doing the Diamond salute, to the very visible discomfort of Steven.

And as the ship rapidly descended into the atmosphere, Ben and Steven could make out the rough rocky landscape, populated by shiny electric blue crystals and other monolithic rock formations sprinkled out throughout the land. The sky was dark, and it looked like an electric storm was rampaging through the glum environment, as electrical energy was crackling in the sky and around the glowing crystals.

"Approaching the capitol now, Captain!" – Rhodonite warned him.

"Okay, you got us this far, but I'll take it from here." – Lars told Ben. "Lock onto the defenses!" – Lars ordered the twins.

"You're gonna attack them after we just declared we came for negotiations?" – Steven asked him.

"I'm pretty sure that's a war crime." – Ben pointed out.

"Well, that's exactly what the incurseans deserve!" – Lars yelled, shrugging off Ben and Steven's doubts as the spaceship fired its lasers at the city's unsuspecting anti-air turrets. One of the turrets fired in response, but the Rutiles dodged it no problem. After flying past the settlement, the Sun Incinerator turned around and went for a second strike.

"Aim for the incursean barracks!" – Lars ordered next.

"You got it, Captain!" – they dutifully responded at the same time and fired at one of the buildings. They could see the Incursean ground troops get scattered everywhere, even from the ship. Several frogs shot at them from the ground, though their blasts were ineffective against a spaceship, and the scattered response meant that no one was really hitting the Sun Incinerator anyway. As countermeasures, they deployed two of their own airships to pursue Lars'.

"We've got two bogies on our tail, Captain!" – Rhodonite warned him, though Lars was fully aware.

"We'll shake them off in the wastelands!" – Lars declared, and the Rutiles took the ship outside of the city's limits. As they were flying forward, laser blasts pursued them from two directions, trying to knock them down from the air.

"Well, if we're doing this…" – Ben sighed as he activated the Omnitrix.

"What are you gonna do?" – Steven asked him.

"I'll be right back. Lars, release a hatch or whatever so I can get out." – Ben instructed him.

Rhodonite looked at him for approval on the order, and Lars carefreely waved his hand as a sign of approval. She pressed a button and a hole opened through the floor. Ben hit the Omnitrix and transformed into Jet Ray as he dove through and outside of the ship, then headed for the incursean pursuers. He took the attention of one, while the second still followed Lars' ship.

"Do a dead loop from behind those crystals!" – Lars ordered, pointing at the field of the electric glowing crystals that popped up from the ground across the landscape.

"Got…" "…it!" – the Rutile twins confidently answered, realizing what Captain Lars wanted them to do. As they flew around the crystal, putting it in between of them and the incursean ship and therefore out of the frogs' sight, they pulled the ship up and did a loop. By the time the incurseans got past the same crystal, they had no idea where the Sun Incinerator had gone, while it was, in fact, behind them.

"Bingo bongo!" – Lars pointed his finger guns at them while the Sun Incinerator blew the incursean ship up. He had no way of knowing, but he was sure that the explosion probably got reflected off his sunglasses in a badass way.

They turned the Sun Incinerator around to see Ben had taken care of the other ship and was flying back to them.

"He took it down on his own?" – Rhodonite said, astounded.

"Pfft, no big deal. Steven could have done the same with the Star Skipper." – Lars shrugged off the praise to Ben as their ship headed back to the capitol.

"We got another incoming transmission!" – Rhodonite pointed out.

"Ben?" – Steven turned to him.

"Yeah, I know, it's Hardlight time." – he said as he hit the Omnitrix yet again. The Emerald was standing in the room again.

"Ben is about to transform into a creature named Jet Ray!" – Padparadscha exclaimed. Fortunately, this was before Lars picked up the call.

"So, these are the negotiations Diamonds deal in?" – the incursean commander asked with dissatisfaction.

"These are the "negotiation tactics" that the incurseans usually employ, aren't they?" – Hardlight asked cockily. If they were committing war crimes, they could at least commit to the bit.

"Fair enough. What are your demands?" – he asked them in a demanding tone himself.

"We want all incurseans vacate the planet immediately!" – Lars boldly demanded.

"All of them?!" – the incursean commander responded in shock. "You do realize how big the planet is, right?"

"That's right. All of them!" – Hardlight confirmed, going cocky on him.

"Hold on for a moment." – the incursean commander told them as he muted the call and walked off-screen. Though, he returned almost immediately.

"We accept your terms." – he nodded. Soon, they could see the occupying incursean ships flying off into space.

"That's it?" – Steven questioned.

"We did it." – Lars said as he put his hands behind his head.

"We did it!" – the Off-Colors started cheering, Padparadscha a couple seconds later than the others, as always.

"Yeah, no. We didn't do anything… besides instigating a war, that is." – Ben told them. "Do you really think it's over just like that? The reason they left is so that they could get reinforcements. Now, you better get our butts down there, and you start getting the planet ready for an incursean invasion." – Ben explained to them.

"Oh, boy. Five minutes in space and we already started a war." – Steven sighed.

So. Well, I didn't lie last time when I said I'd be taking them to space, right?

And this marks the reappearance of Lars of the Stars, as well as the Off-Colors. I wanted to give them something to do because they were, well, absolutely wasted in the original show ever since their debut. And I also tried to recontextualize their purpose for the greater Cartoon Network Universe, namely, the Ben 10 aspects of it, since space isn't just one big Diamond-controlled area anymore, there are millions of planets and species that Lars could interact with. And I took what he mentioned doing in Lars of the Stars, which was raiding Diamond colonies and stealing their shit, and took that to a new level where he does it with other aliens who deserve it, namely the Incurseans.

It feels weird writing the Incurseans in lower cap in the actual story, just like the Gems, but in the context of the universe, all species are written in lower cap, just like humans are. It's a pet peeve of mine.

Speaking of the Incurseans, they've been getting busy, taking over the planets that the Diamonds had liberated, huh? More on that in future chapters.

And then there's the planet Fulmas. Originally I just needed a random OC planet to be the one that the incurseans had conquered, but I felt like it would let me connect to it a lot better if I did an existing one instead. And looking at it, I decided Fulmas to be the most appropriate. It is a planet that was introduced in the Reboot, and the fulmini species is Reboot Ben's transformation of Shock Rock. And I'm gonna be incorporating elements of the Reboot into main continuity just like this one. Duncan Rouleau said that the reboot aliens and villains exist in the main continuity and even if he hadn't, I would have brought them over anyway. In the reboot, the Fulmini Empire is a mighty race of conquerers that pillage world after world for energy, much like the main universe's Incurseans. Already a connection there. But as I brought them over, I didn't need yet another ultimate space army in the main universe the cosmos has had enough of those, so in this timeline, the Fulmini Empire was kneecapped by the Diamond conquest before it ever got the chance to form. I actually had a bit of trouble writing about the scenes that took place on the planet itself, and I decided to write a seperate doc outlining the history, environment and geography of Fulmas. It ended up being 1,600 words long, almost half as long as this chapter itself. Ideas just flow when you write a separate worldbuilding doc like that. And in the end I ended up using like 5% of it lmao. I mean, this is just the first part, so obviously I'll use the rest in the next one.

And about Lars and Ben not getting off on the right foot... well, that's just fun, isn't it? Steven got caught in the middle of it all, too.