CRYSTAL

 

CRYSTAL

Real Name: Crystalia Amaquelin

First Appearance: Fantastic Four (Vol. 1) #45, December 1965

Powers: Crystalia Amaquelin is an Inhuman (Homo sapiens inanthropo), a genetically engineered human offshoot created by the Kree to possess heightened strength, speed, agility, endurance, and reaction time, roughly 50% greater than humans. She was also exposed to the mutagenic properties of the Terrigen Mist, a mutagenic or mutation causing substance discovered by the Inhuman scientist Randac. It is potent enough to cause any living organism to mutate from exposure to it, although the Inhumans zealously restrict its use to Inhumans only. Crystal's exposure to it granted her the ability to mentally manipulate the four basic elements of nature: fire, water, earth, and air.

She does so by means of a psionic interaction with the substances on a molecular level. By controlling oxygen molecules, she can cause fire to spontaneously ignite or she can douse any oxidizing flame by depriving it of oxygen. She can join hydrogen and oxygen molecules to create rain, summoning these molecules from a volume of atmosphere within a radius of approximately two miles. She can control the movement of water by manipulating surface tension, divining water from the ground and causing it to flow in designated directions. The observed maximum volume of water she can control is approximately 2,000 cubic feet (about 15,000 gallons). Thus, she cannot change the course of rivers or cause the sea to part. She can control the various substances that make up common bedrock (earth: iron, granite, shale, limestone, etc.), creating seismic tremors of up to 6.7 on the Richter scale (greater if tectonic plate fault lines are nearby) by causing a sudden shifting of the earth.

The observed maximum volume she can affect at once is 1.8 x 10" cubic feet (approximately 1/800 of a cubic mile). She can also control oxygen atoms and oxygen-containing molecules to create atmospheric disturbances of various kinds. By intermingling air with earth she can cause a dust storm, air with water a typhoon, and air with fire a firestorm. She is able to create a wind of tornado intensity, approximately 115 miles per hour. She also has some sensitivity to elemental activity in her environment, and can especially detect when something non-natural is influencing nature's course.

Originally, the limits of her powers enabled her to sustain a certain elemental phenomenon for approximately one hour before her mind began to tire. She could also create any number of effects in succession for about forty-five minutes before mental fatigue impaired her performance, but she has apparently since surpassed these limits.