The synchronized steps of running guards echoed through the hallways as troops marched back and forth. Slight vibrations could be felt every time the vessel fired away one of its death-rays, recoiling from the blasts. Through the ship's windshield, a myriad of neon colors and explosions would light up as the armada tore through ship after ship. As he stood on his spot, next to and below the throne, he watched all of it unfold without flinching, for he was glad that he was on this side of that windshield.

"RAFF!" – the person sitting on the throne yelled. No doubt another one of her bored cries of attention.

"Yes, Empress Attea II, Your Merciless Majesty, Y-"

"Enough with the titles." – Attea quickly stopped him. "I don't wanna hear all that for the two millionth time today."

"Yes, of course." – Raff courteously bowed down his head. Though, even when she told him to shut up, he knew she reveled in the fanfare.

"Any news on the Muttradi front?" – Attea asked him.

"No, Your Highness. Their outpost is still under siege."

"And Vilgaxia?" – Attea asked next, clearly more interested in finding something exciting to do than the actual progress of the invasions.

"Our troops on Vilgaxia were broken up and repelled 2 days ago… as you are well aware."

And at those words, Raff got hit in the back of his head by Attea's extremely long frog tongue, which she was partial to as a bludgeoning weapon.

"Who do you think you are, taking that tone with me?" – Attea proudly asked him. "As you are well aware. Hmph." – she quoted him and scoffed. "And as you are well aware, the last sylonnoid with an attitude was served by my Daddy to King Jarett of the Pantophage… on a plate." – she cruelly told him.

"Y-y-y-yes, Your Majesty, forgive me…" – Raff stuttered in apology, and bowed down so hard the glass dome of his spherical brain touched the floor. Though, Attea wasn't even paying attention to him anymore, as she was looking at another enemy ship blow up as her fleet advanced inch by inch towards her desired planet…

Raff was a smart man. Not smart enough to not let his tongue slip occasionally, but still, smart enough to live this long while serving Attea, and her father before that. He didn't figure there was a single other person still breathing that could boast the same, and certainly not an outsider. He also acknowledged that his position as an advisor was to the most powerful military force in the universe. And he also knew, though he'd never voice it, that it was ran by an impulsive little brat that would have anyone short of her dear old dad executed on a whim, and as the person closest to her, he was in the greatest risk of this happening. So, he made a point of always saying what she wanted him to say, when she wanted him to say it and how she wanted him to say it, and if acting like a whimpering suck-up in front of her royal majesty pleased her, then so be it. For now, at least…

"Y-your Majesty." – he dared utter something further, at the risk of evoking Attea's wrath, though he knew this would distract her from further outbursts.

"What is it now?" – Attea annoyedly responded as she watched her "fireworks show".

"There's been a development on Planet Fulmas. A gem ship has attacked our forces and threatened them to leave." – Raff told her. He knew she was getting restless, so he had to give her something interesting to do, something that usually wouldn't call for direct involvement of the Empress… otherwise she was sure to take her boredom out on him.

"Gems? The Gemworld gems?" – Attea asked for confirmation, though, continued without waiting for it. "Today might be somewhat interesting yet…"

As the Sun Incinerator landed in the capitol of Fulmas, Ben, Steven and the Off Colors got the opportunity to look at it from up close. The city was located on a cliffside, built right into the edge of the massive ravine that split the planet's chunks apart. It looked more vertical than horizontal, with several tall towers stacked on top of each other, as well as passages, open plateaus and magnetic rail elevators to make mobility possible, and hovering vehicles zoomed around the towers, constituting the city's three-dimensional traffic. The crew even got a look at the planet's inhabitants, the fulmini – they looked like living jolts of electricity in varying color, though covered in armor plating made from stone. Not only that, but there was a surprisingly high amount of…

"Look, Steven! There are gems down there too!" – Ben pointed at the crowds.

"Whoa!" – Steven said in excitement. The Rutile twins also looked through the window.

As Ben pointed out, there was a surprisingly high amount of gems in the planet's population. Namely, Quartzes, several Bismuths, and a couple other types that Steven recognized but didn't know by name. He even noticed a Peridot in there.

"I hope Earth can be like that one day too." – he said to himself. Ben considered telling him about the Omnitrix City he saw when he went to the future, and even realized now that Future Steven probably was a great help to it by then, but decided now was not the best time.

"Alright, we're gonna go see the planet's commander." – Captain Lars told his crew. "You guys can stay on the ship."

"Aye, aye, Captain!" – Rhodonite obeyed.

"You can…" "…count on us!" – the Rutiles responded as well. And only a few seconds after Steven, Ben and Lars left the ship, did Padparadscha shout "Bye-bye!" to them.

"So, uh… where do we go?" – Ben said and looked around. He then looked at Lars.

"Don't ask me, I just landed where they told us to!" – Lars responded.

"It's probably like a royal palace, right?" – Steven asked. "I don't see anything that sticks out like that at all."

"Are we even in the right city?" – Ben asked Lars.

"Yes, we're in Electric City, and please don't insult my competence as a captain." – Lars scoffed.

"I'm not insulting your… wait, it's called the Electric City?" – Ben asked him.

"Yeah."

"Like the one in Keystone?"

"I guess." – Lars shrugged.

"The High Override's office is over there." – one of the fulmini approached them as he pointed at a nearby building. His electricity was glowing green-ish, but otherwise, he looked the same as the other members of his race. In fact, all of the fulmini they could see right now had the same height and build, only somewhat distinguishable by the colors of their electricity.

"Okay." – Ben said as the three of them headed there.

"The High Override didn't sound happy with us over the intercoms." – Steven noted for the other two to hear.

"What he should be is grateful." – Lars told him. "It's not every day someone saves you out of the goodness of their heart."

"Okay, let's just go in." – Ben said just to stop this conversation. It was over anyway, as they got to the building the fulmini from earlier showed them. It was being guarded by two more fulmini, both of blue electicity, wielding impressive energy maces of the same color. Though, they didn't react as the trio of (mostly) humans entered the building.

"Looks kinda small for a royal palace." – Ben mumbled. Indeed, it looked like it was just a two-story office than somewhere they'd expect the commander of all fulmini to reside in. The walls were covered with blue glowing electric circuits, and the only thing of note that they could tell what it was was a series of mechanical objects, encased in glass, engrained into the wall. They looked like power conduits or something of the sort, and each looked more advanced than the last.

"Uh, hello?" – Steven said loudly. "High Override?"

Without any warning, the panel on the floor they were standing on started floating up, startling their balance – it was actually an elevator that took them through a gap in the ceiling. And on the second floor, their attention was immediately drawn to another fulmini – the High Override himself, sitting at a table and facing them. They couldn't tell since he was sitting, but he looked somewhat bigger than the rest, and there were three tall protrusions on his head, going up vertically, which gave it the appearance of a crown. His electricity was also a distinguishing dark purple, and it crackled in the air around him occasionally.

"Hi. High Override, I'm Ben Tennyson." – Ben introduced himself proudly. He always was the first one to start talking, even with unfamiliar people. "These are my companions, Steven Universe and Lars, uh… Lars." – he introduced the other two as well. "We are here to help."

"Fulmas is outside Plumber jurisdiction." – the High Override responded bluntly. Even his voice sounded like it had an electrical filter over it.

"Yeah?" – Ben unsurely asked, blanking on where he was going to take this.

"So…" – High Override continued, his voice firm and calculated. "You had no right to do what you did. You only multiplied my problems tenfold."

"Hey, all we want to do is help!" – Steven intervened, somewhat angry at the tone the High Override was taking at them. "The incurseans enslaved your planet, didn't they?"

"And what did you accomplish by driving the garrison guard away? They'll return with an entire fleet and retake the planet in a show of strength, whether we surrender or not." – High Override responded fickly. He hadn't raised his voice, but he didn't need to to make it clear that he was angry with the situation. And when he got angrier, it seemed like the electrical reverb in his voice got stronger. "Not only that, but some of the other continents are already questioning my authority… another civil war between this planet's people is imminent, and I don't want to see fulmini spill fulmini blood. Just like when the planet was liberated from…" – he paused, giving Steven a throughout glare. "…Fulmas fell into a state of chaos until the incurseans brought it to order."

"Hey, aren't you the damn leader of this place? Why don't you try and unite them?" – Lars fired up.

"…Or you could just let the separate continents be on their own if they want it so bad?" – Steven took a more diplomatic approach.

"A divided Fulmas is a weak Fulmas." – the High Override responded to Steven's suggestion. Though, to Ben, who has heard this kind of speech before, it just seemed like bullshit politics talk. High Override clearly wanted the whole planet to himself.

"So you actually want the planet to be enslaved, then?" – Ben interjected. "Wouldn't you rather mine those resources for your own race's advancement instead of giving it all to the incurseans?"

"I don't need to explain myself or what I do with my people to you." – High Override sneered.

"And what about the gems on your planet, then?" – Steven asked. "There's tons of them. And, they are my business."

With this line, Steven felt like he was talking as Pink Diamond, not Steven Universe, as this was turning into a debate between two authoritarian figures. He felt dirty talking like this, but it needed to be done for the sake of the planet.

"This planet also has a gem population that would suffer under the incurseans just like your people." – Steven continued.

From there, Ben expected the High Override to tell them something along the lines of "why don't they leave, then?" but surprisingly, all he did was glare at them instead of taking this obvious choice of the dialogue tree. Ben wondered if there was a reason to that.

"Okay, why did you bring us up here in the first place, then, just to scold us?" – Lars impatiently burst out at the High Override again.

"What I would have you do… is leave my planet. Unfortunately, I can't do that. Fulmas is weak. The fulminic, unprepared. So, instead, I'll allow you to fix the situation you three have caused." – High Override told them. "Steven Universe." – he said suddenly, and Steven flinched. "You claim that the gem population of the planet is also at stake. Shouldn't the Diamond Authority take responsibility for them and send aid?"

"Are you talking about… reinforcements?" – Steven asked to clarify.

"Obviously.

Steven didn't like this. The Diamonds getting into another war… there was no way this was going to end well. And this time, he was headlining it! He should have probably listened to Ben and not let Lars attack the incurseans. Though, planetary occupation didn't exactly sit right with him either, so he was at a total loss. For a moment, he wanted to ask Garnet and Pearl on what to do, expecting them to be in the room next to him, but he quickly realized that he was on his own now and tried to shrug off that feeling of dependency.

"It's worth a shot." – Ben told Steven.

"As long as you keep Plumber involvement to a minimum." – High Override reminded him.

And with that, the elevator lowered them back into the lobby.

"So I guess it's off to Homeworld for us, then." – Steven said. He wasn't really looking forward to talking to the Diamonds again. Especially not about this.

"Hey, this'll be my first visit. It'll be fun." – Ben tried to look on the bright side of things.

"I hope you guys don't mind me sitting this one out." – Lars told them. "The Diamonds… kinda scare me. I'll be in the Sun Incinerator with the rest of the crew." – he told them.

"If you're staying here how are we gonna get to Homeworld? You're our ride!" – Ben responded.

"Via Warp Pad? Duh!" – Lars snapped back. "Every gem colony has a Galaxy Warp."

"Oh, yeah." – Steven remembered, confirming Lars' statement. "I didn't realize we could do it from here, too. Okay, Ben, come on, let's get this over with." – he told Ben. "I think I saw a warp pad over there earlier."

"Ugh, I'm still not used to these." – Ben said as he stumbled off the platform.

"You'll get used to it as you use it more." – Steven assured him. "At least you never fell down flat on your face when warping."

"Whoa." – Ben said as he looked around. "Now that's a view!"

The immediate thing that caught Ben's eye was the color everywhere. Blue, yellow and white were prevalent as far as the eye could see, but pink really had taken center stage, from the crystalline buildings in the distance to even the clouds in the sky having a purplish tone to them… In front of them was the massive marble staircase to the Diamond palace, with White Diamond's ship in the image of her bust parked on top. Various plants of different origin were also decorating the place as far as the eye could, which was made possible though recent efforts to "organify" Gemworld.

"What do these tubes do?" – Ben asked about the pipes built across the city while gawking at the environment.

"I think they're for transport- Ben, are you taking a video?!" – Steven yelled when he turned around and saw that Ben had his phone out.

"Okay, okay." – Ben rolled his eyes as they went up the steps and entered the palace.

The three Diamonds sat on their thrones, all together. With Era 3 in full swing, they weren't nearly as busy as when they were building armies and terraforming and conquering worlds. In fact, lately, they've been feeling like museum exhibits that their former subjects would come and gawk at. The only thing that had been keeping them entertained was Spinel, but even she couldn't do it all. So, the three of them sat around in the throne room, bored.

"Which planet was it where we left the Glass of Time?" – Yellow asked while looking at her nails to have something to talk about.

"Oh, I don't remember… Blue struggled to recollect. Didn't White suggest we put it…"

"Where nobody would ever find it?" – White finished her sentence for her. "Yes, but when I said that, I didn't expect that to include us as well."

"Well, what if someone finds it and destroys the space-time continuum?" – Yellow theorized. Spinel listened to their conversation intensely, turning her neck around 90 degrees each time one of them spoke and ended up twisting it around herself twice.

"If that were to happen then the past would have already imploded and we wouldn't be here." – White answered her.

"Fair point."

"STEVEN!" – Spinel then suddenly yelled. She hopped off Pink's throne (which she had symbolically been sitting on), did a cartwheel mid-air and landed on the floor, where she ran in place really quickly, ramping up movement in her legs until she unleashed it all in a rapid dash forward and crashed into Steven on the other side of the massive throne room. The crash caused both of them to fall down and roll on the floor. Ben, who had been standing right next to Steven, didn't react in the slightest besides turning his head around.

"Hi, Spinel." – Steven casually told her as he pushed her off of him and got up, having gotten used to her antics by now.

"Oh! Steven!" – Yellow quickly became lively.

"Is that really you?" – Blue asked.

"Welcome back, Steven. I do hope this visit will be a pleasant one for you." – White greeted him. Though, she could have done without alluding to a past unpleasant visit.

"And who is this cutie pie?" – Spinel immediately turned her head to Ben.

"Uh… hi." – Ben greeted her. "I'm Ben."

"Spinel. Very nice to meet you." – she told him as she stretched her arms forward and grabbed his hand and started shaking it violently, even though Ben never offered her a handshake in the first place.

"So, Steven, it's been so long since you've visited us." – Yellow Diamond told him. "I do hope you've been feeling better lately? The outbursts have stopped, haven't they?"

"No more sadness weighing down your heart?" – Blue added.

"No deep, dark thoughts within your head?" – White completed the trifecta.

This single interaction was probably going to bring them back, Steven thought. This was exactly why he hated coming here.

"Um, no, I'm fine." – Steven lied. Well, he was feeling better, and the outbursts did really stop, but he wasn't all right either. Though, bringing that up was only going to prompt them to pursue the conversation further, and that's the last thing Steven would have wanted even if he didn't have an interplanetary war as a pressing issue.

"I see you brought your… friend back here." – White said, referring to Ben. "Erm, Connie, was it?"

At that, Ben and Steven just stared at each other, mouths agape. Even Spinel knew that White was way off the mark. Ben looked at the color of his skin on his hands to make sure there wasn't anything he wasn't seeing.

"No…" – Steven finally answered her. The only way to get over this shock was to move on from this comment. "This is Ben Tennyson of the Plumbers. You might have heard of him?'

"Oh, I'm sorry for confusing you. It's just that you organics all look so alike…" – White went on. Ben and Steven side-eyed each other again. Steven knew that Ben's stare was yelling "WHAT THE HELL IS GOING THROUGH HER HEAD?".

"Wait, you haven't heard of me?" – Ben then asked, ignoring the confusion. "Ben Tennyson, savior of the universe? No?"

"You'll have to forgive us, but until very recently, we've been isolated on the happenings of the cosmos." – Blue explained to him.

"Surely you must have heard of the Omnitrix, at least?" – Ben asked as he held it up to them. All three of them leaned down their massive heads to get a better look at Ben's tiny wristwatch. "It's the device that lets me transform into any alien form I meet." – he said and to demonstrate, activated the Omnitrix and slammed it down, turning him into Goop.

"Whoa!" – Spinel yelled. "Well, Ben Tennyson, can you do this?" – she asked and leaned back and down, down, eventually stretching her upper body through between of her legs and then back up again, almost tying herself into a knot.

Ben transformed again, this time into Mole-Stache, and started hovering in place with the mustache propeller.

"Aww, this one's adorable!" – Spinel yelled and did the same propeller trick with her hands, helicoptering up.

"A device that lets you turn into other lesser beings… how interesting." – White Diamond said as she observed Ben transforming. "Sorry! Equal! I meant equal beings!" – she quickly corrected herself.

"Ahem…" – Ben bluntly called attention to himself and transformed one more time, this time into a planet-appropriate Hardlight.

"WHOOOOOA!" – Spinel gasped. Though, the Diamonds were taken aback. It seemed like they were trying to decide whether or not were they supposed to be offended.

"Listen, the reason we've come here now is because we need your help." – Steven told the Diamonds to finally get the conversation to reason of his visit. "The planet Fulmas is in terrible danger. If we don't act now, thousands of gems and fulminic could-"

"Oh, yes, Fulmas. That was one of my colonies." – Blue Diamond interrupted him. "In fact, it was one of the most important colonies for the evolution of Homeworld. Most of Era 2 advancements in technology happened through the resources we mined there."

"Yeah." – Steven said, eager to get back to what he was saying, as what Blue said wasn't exactly important right now. "And the planet is in danger now. Did you know that after you decolonized it, another empire took over almost immediately? The Incursean Empire?"

"So?" – Yellow asked him with little care.

"Wh… so?" – Steven said shocked. "Don't you care that someone else conquered the planet that you decided to free?"

"We undid the damage that we did, didn't we?" – Blue told him.

"Yes, you can't expect us to keep track of every single one of those worlds when the whole point was that we wouldn't meddle in their affairs anymore?" – Yellow continued.

"You don't understand! Just… stopping the occupation isn't enough!" – Steven objected. "You had the planet under your control for thousands of years and kneecapped its development. Of course, they're going to be weak and defenseless afterwards! You can't exactly "undo" the effects of that!"

"Well, what do you want us to do now, then, Steven?" – Blue Diamond asked him.

"We drove the incurseans away temporarily but they're bound to retaliate. The people of Fulmas need all the help they can get, and I want to help them with our forces."

"I'm afraid we can't do that." – White Diamond reacted, though not without regret.

"WHAT? Why?" – Steven reacted.

"One of the big changes of Era 3 was dismantling our fleets. Have you forgotten that? It was you who demanded it in the first place." – White reminded him.

"But you still have the ships, right? Can't you just bring them out again?"

"We'd have to recruit gems to pilot the ships, and I don't think we're going to have many volunteers, and just assembling a military force on that level would take days, if not weeks." – White told him.

"Can't you try anyway? The Fulmini really need our help!" – Steven insisted.

"Oh, for goodness' sake, Pink, be reasonable. You're the one that demanded we demilitarize our forces in the first place, and now you want them back. Is this another one of your outbursts?" – Yellow protested. "I thought we all agreed that war was bad?"

"War definitely is bad." – Blue nodded in agreement.

"Wow." – Steven said in awe. And that slip-up didn't get past him, either. "Alright, nevermind, I guess." – he said bitterly and stormed away. "Come on, Ben. We're going."

Ben and Spinel had been wrestling over the control of the Omnitrix this whole time after their showing off competition.

"Let me play with it for a while!" – Spinel was demanding.

"It doesn't come off!" – Ben denied her.

"You have it all the time, why can't I have it for a little bit?" – Spinel insisted.

"Ben?" – Steven repeated, waiting on him so they could leave.

"Aaaw, you're leaving already?" – Spinel frowned. "Can't Ben stay a little bit longer?"

"Sorry, Spinel, maybe some other time." – Steven said and dragged Ben away by the sleeve like a mom taking a kid home after a play date.

"From what I heard, that didn't go well." – Ben commented as they left. Steven didn't respond, seething in frustration. The two of them walked back to the Galaxy Warp in silence. It looked like they'd have to carry the weight of Fulmas on their shoulders on their own.

As you can see, this story arc is turning into the longest one yet with two parts and more to come. The original set of chapters were mostly self-contained, so now that we're taking things to space I want to make more serialized stories as well.

The unrest on Fulmas grows as the threat of the Incurseans draws closer, but I guess what really stole this chapter was the scene on Homeworld. I had various ideas for when Ben would finally see Homeworld, and a brief visit to the Diamonds in time of necessity was what I decided on, with opportunities to go more in-depth in the exploration of Gem society later down the line when war isn't imminent. The entire Homeworld thing was a detour that I wasn't originally planning on, at least not for this chapter, but I decided to do it now and get it out of the way since it'd make sense for them to ask others for help immediately (even if unsuccessfully.)

The Attea scene in the beginning was first of its kind where it didn't follow Ben or Steven's POV, which what I was sticking to until now. I wanted to showcase her in advance for when she finally gets involved in the conflict. And there's also a thematic reason - the story is slowly drifting from Steven's show to Ben's show and the POV shift reflects that, since Ben 10 has no qualms about showing us things outside Ben's knowledge. In fact, it's the norm.

I liked writing Ben interact with Spinel and the Diamonds too but I reserved those for the comedy where actual character conversation was dedicated to Steven, cause, c'mon. It's the Diamonds.