Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The air was still, the August day's heat only just beginning to cool with nightfall as the sun set over the ocean, turning the sky orange and the water gold.

The sound of guitar mixed with the crash of the waves, the same chords on loop with a few new additions every couple of repeats, interrupted by the scratching of pencil on paper as Greg pieced together a new song in the back of his van.

Rose Quartz sat in the sand, Pearl leaning against her shoulder. Her stomach that had doubled in size in the past few months was making it harder and harder for her to lower herself to the ground, and to get back up again, but the others would help her without hesitation, and she would have spent the evening no other way than with her toes in the still-warm sand and two of her favorite people, and a third, kicking at her from the inside.

Peaceful. It was a moment of peace that was becoming rare as her child's birth, and her own disappearance, drew closer. Amethyst could hardly look at her, Garnet was near silent. Pearl was showcasing how much progress she had made having, and expressing, opinions in daily heated arguments over what Rose had done. Greg was steady, but there was a current of anxiety that ran underneath every interaction they now had.

So of course it had to end in chaos.

From around the side of the cliff face came first the quiet hiss of a large amount of sand being displaced all at once. The guitar quieted as Greg paused. Pearl sat forward with a frown.

And then there was a roar, heavy footfalls, and the creature rounded the corner into view.

It was yellow, almost neon, and easily twice Rose’s size in height alone. It walked on four legs but its body was long with thin spikes protruding from its back and sides resembling a quilled Earth animal.

“What is that thing?!” Greg cried in alarm.

Pearl jumped to her feet and pulled a spear from her gem in one fluid movement, yelling over her shoulder, “Rose, get inside!”

She took off towards the corrupted gem, and Rose struggled to rise from the sand. Her stomach restricted her movements, threw off her center of gravity and made everything awkward.

Greg was running towards her, but she finally managed to stand on her own, sparing a glance to Pearl's battle with the gem monster. 

Agile as ever Pearl danced between the swipes of its giant, clawed feet, taking a stab at its exposed chest. It recoiled with a loud, angry screech, its body tensing, and then it shook.

Spikes from its form flew in all directions.

Rose didn’t even have time to pull her shield.

Pain tore through her unlike anything she had ever felt before, unlike any time she had been dissipated.

She might have screamed, or maybe it was Greg and Pearl’s voices that reached her ears through the disorientation.

She barely had time to take in that there was a spike lodged in her belly - her very pregnant belly - and think with horror ‘the baby’ before she was forced to release her form.

In eleven thousand years by her side Pearl had only seen Rose dissipated once, by her own sword and Pearl's shapeshifted hand.

A strangled cry burst from Pearl's lips as she watched Rose disappear in a burst of smoke.

She aimed a volley of blasts from her spear at the gem monster that bounced harmlessly off its spiked side, but distracted it long enough that she was able to leap onto its back and stab down with all her strength, and just like that its form gave out too.

She barely remembered to bubble the gem before she was running across the sand, tears beginning to prick at her eyes.

Greg kneeled on the ground where Rose had been standing, in his arms a thrashing infant that was making the most grating, highest pitched wail she had ever heard.

And there, next to his knees, a pink gem.

“He’s okay, he’s perfect,” Greg assured weakly as if Pearl had asked or cared about the state of the tiny human. She ignored him, bending over to pick up the gem. “Is- is Rose gonna…? This wasn’t- this wasn’t how it was supposed to happen! She said the baby would get...”

Pearl examined the gem, a sinking feeling beginning in her chest when she immediately noticed the tip of it, or rather, the lack of. The faceted cone that was supposed to taper into a sharp point was now cut off about half way down, leaving a smooth but unpolished flat bottom.

Pearl's eyes darted around frantically for the missing piece - if she could find it she could take the gem to Rose’s fountain and it would be made whole again and everything would be fine. A surge of hope rushed through her. Better than fine! Pearl had spent the last nine months hopelessly dreading the moment that Rose passed her gem to her child, but the child was here, Rose would no longer have to disappear!

A flash of pink on her right caught Pearl's eye and she whipped around in search of it.

There, embedded in the pudgy stomach of the baby in Greg’s arms was the broken piece of the Pink Diamond gem, flat top facing outward.

“Pearl?” Greg asked desperately, still waiting for an answer to his earlier question.

Cold terror replaced the hope as quickly as it had come. Gems could reform with a crack, but they would malfunction and glitch and if the fracture progressively got worse so would their condition. She didn’t know what would happen to a gem that was missing a whole piece of itself, and she didn’t know if the same rules even applied to a Diamond, coming into existence as differently as they did.

“I- I don’t know,” Pearl breathed, clutching the gem tighter in her trembling hand and ignoring the way the sharp edges bit into her palm.

She did know that even in the midst of the worst uncertainty she had ever faced, she was grateful Garnet and Amethyst had warped away on a mission earlier that day. Whether Rose would return or not it was a blessing that they hadn’t been there to see her gem in its entirety, the shape of it a dead giveaway to the secret they had hidden for six thousand years.

But Greg was, she realized. 

He looked up from the baby that had finally begun to quiet when she took a sharp step towards him. She jabbed an index finger at him, causing him to lean back in surprise. “You will never tell anyone what you saw,” She warned through gritted teeth. “Or it will be the last thing you do, do you understand?”

Greg balked, looking confused and slightly afraid. “I- I- what?” He stuttered. “I don’t- I’ve seen you guys lose your- your bodies before? What are talking-”

At that moment a pink glow washed over the both of them, the gem in Pearl's fingers growing warm and rising from her grasp.

Rose Quartz was coming back. 

Reforming was usually effortless, in the handful of times Rose had done it it was a gentle return to consciousness.

But when Rose began to emerge from her gem this time something resisted, her still-fluctuating light refusing to grow to the size she urged it to.

She had less mass to use.

Working with what she did have, she made a quick decision to sacrifice a couple of inches of hair to keep her height, and finally Rose was able to solidify.

She dropped to the ground, landing lightly on her feet only to find herself feeling unbalanced, like her center of gravity had shifted, and she stumbled and fell on her backside.

“Rose!” Pearl's voice cried seconds before her arms were around Rose’s neck, nearly toppling them both over with the force of her embrace.

One of Rose’s hands came up to hold Pearl to her while the other drifted to her belly, fingers first running over her gem, octagonal facet facing out as always, and then the realization that her abdomen was distinctly smaller than before she had dissipated hit her.

She gripped Pearl by the shoulders, pushing her back enough to look her in the eyes. “What- what happened to-”

“Rose,” Greg called softly from a little ways to the side.

Her head snapped to the sound, and there he was, shining eyes and tear stains on his cheeks, coming to kneel on the ground beside her, holding a bundle loosely wrapped in a blanket from his van.

“You did it,” He said, angling himself in a way to let her peer into the blanket at the tiny, flushed face of the baby nestled in its folds. “It’s a boy. Steven.”

He held him out towards her while Pearl sat back on her haunches to give her space.

For a moment Rose could only stare blankly, a hand still resting on her no longer-round stomach as she reeled. She wasn’t supposed to be there, she was never supposed to meet their child let alone hold them. This wasn’t how it was supposed to work.

Numbly, she let Greg set the baby in her arms, quietly reminding her to support its head. Steven gave a whimper at being jostled but otherwise stayed quiet. His cheeks were chubby, with a tiny nose that resembled Greg's, and a patch of dark hair on his head.

“He’s even got a bit of your gem, see?” Greg said, pulling down the blanket enough to uncover a circle of pink where his belly button would have otherwise been. 

“It’s the tip of yours,” Pearl explained, seeing Rose’s bafflement, her voice shaking and sounding near-hysterical. “The spike must have struck a cleavage line! I wasn’t sure you would be able to reform when I saw the infant had the piece, but you did! Isn’t it wonderful?” Pearl gave a bubbling laugh that sounded close to a sob as tears began to fall and flung her at Rose’s side again with a cry of, “Oh Rose!” 

In front of her, Greg sniffled and leaned in to press his forehead to Rose’s. “He’s beautiful. You did amazing, Rose.”

Overwhelmed by the intensity of their joy shining too bright in contrast to the hollow feeling in her chest, Rose gave her focus to Steven instead. She traced the shape of his face with the very tip of a finger, watching as his head turned to follow the touch. “Hello Steven,” She whispered. “I’m your mother.”

It didn’t feel real to say, a title she was never meant to have. She was confused, and even more so terrified, but when he opened his eyes ever so slightly to squint up at her, the love she felt for him when he was inside of her was the same she felt then, and it was strong enough that she started to feel that perhaps it wasn’t the worst outcome that she was still there, if for nothing more then seeing his little face.

But that didn’t change the dread she felt when she thought of the future of an existence she hadn’t intended to continue.

Chapter Text

Steven was everything Rose had hoped for and more when she made the decision to create a new life, he was adorable, and good and trusting and vulnerable.

Sometimes she was paralyzed by fear, I’ll hurt him I’ll hurt him I’ll hurt him repeating like one of Greg’s broken tapes in her head.

But his first word was mama, and she didn’t deserve the honor of being such a big milestone in his language development, but he called for her with it - to fetch him a drink or show her a bug he found or to tuck him into bed, and she wasn’t about to let him down yet. 

And when he fell and scraped his knee on the sidewalk, a healing kiss from her would dry his eyes in seconds, and for a moment bringing back his smile was all the purpose she needed.

Time on Earth had always felt fast, but never had it seemed faster than the handful of years it took for Steven to grow from an infant into a child that could easily hold the ukulele that once barely fit in his lap and knew everyone in town by name and proudly, impatiently, declared “I’m a Crystal Gem too!”

“Of course you are, Steven,” Pearl said, holding a squirming Centipeetle in her arms. “We just don’t want you to get hurt.”

Rose was briefly distracted from their conversation as another of the bug-like corrupted gems crawled in front of her. She brought her sword down through its middle.

“I won’t!” Steven whined. “I can help!”

“We still don’t know if you have powers in your gem,” Garnet reminded him.

“And if you did, your shield might be the size of a dinner plate with that little bitty thing,” Amethyst teased, pulling up Steven’s shirt to poke at the small stone in his belly. He pouted at her as he yanked his shirt back over his stomach.

“Oh Amethyst please,” Pearl scoffed, snapping the corrupted gem's neck to effectively poof it. “The size of a gem's weapon isn’t determined by the size of their gem.”

“So if I summon my weapon, I can help?” Steven summarized hopefully.

Pearl frowned. “That’s not exactly-”

“Mom!” Steven shouted, running across the room to her. “How do I summon my weapon?”

Rose glanced at the shield hovering over her arm and let it disappear, then knelt in front of him. “Well, I summon my shield with the feeling that I want to protect someone I care about,” She explained, and pulled another, smaller shield to demonstrate, receiving starry-eyes from Steven.

“Like, if someone is in danger?” He asked thoughtfully.

Amethyst gave a wicked grin. “So someone needs to be in danger for Steven to summon his weapon…” She pulled a whip from her gem. “Hey Pearl!”

“Amethyst, no!” Pearl warned as she backed away from her.

Rose laughed as she watched them give chase, shaking her head, then returned her focus to Steven. “But Steven, you don’t have to summon a weapon, or have powers, to be a Crystal Gem,” She said.

“I know,” He said dismissively before puffing himself up with resolve. “But just wait, I’m gonna summon the biggest, best shield you’ve ever seen!”

Rose laid a hand on his head. “I’m sure you will.”

Out of sight Amethyst yelled, “C’mon Pearl, it’s to help Steven learn!”

Steven practiced all day.

This included acting out imaginary fights against foes who he convinced Garnet to put on her best ‘bad guy’ voice for, a short-lived attempt suggested by Pearl at meditating on the feeling of protection, and Amethyst pelting him with water balloons - though that one may have been for her own enjoyment.

Steven came back into the house, his shirt damp and water still dripping from his hair, and slumped next to Rose on the couch.

“I bet you were always good at summoning your weapon,” He sighed.

“No,” Rose chuckled. “For a long time I didn’t know I could summon a weapon, I had never tried.”

Steven looked at her, surprised. “Really?” 

Rose remembered the first time she had summoned her shield, on Earth as Rose Quartz, with the very beginnings of an idea for a rebellion, away from the other Diamonds who would have shut down the idea that she needed or could handle one. And amid the joy and excitement of success when the pink shield flashed into existence there had been relief when she saw what it was: something to save, to protect, not another way to hurt.

Like her being was saying that maybe she could do something good for once.

Instead of any of that, she said to Steven, “And did you know that Pearl fought with only material weapons for the first couple hundred years of the war? It took time and patience, and willpower, for her to learn to summon her spear.”

“Wow,” Steven breathed.

Rose wrapped an arm around his shoulders and pulled him into her side, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. “And just like Pearl, I know that you are going to do amazing things, with or without a weapon.”

And then the house shook.

A dark shadow passed over the window, and a screeching hiss sounded from above them.

From the temple burst Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl. 

“It’s the mother,” Garnet said, and the three of them ran for the door with Rose on their heels.

Crawling with dozens of legs over the roof of the house and up the side of the temple statue was a much larger version of the creatures they had fought earlier that day.

Garnet leapt, and a kick to the side of its jaw brought the corrupted gem slithering back down and following them on to the beach when they took off. Rose saw Steven watching from the porch but her view of him was blocked when the Centipeetle rose up in front of them, and began hissing acid.

Rose raised her shield over the four of them as it rained down. As soon as it was clear Pearl darted out from one side and Amethyst the other. Amethyst wound her whip around its pincer-like tail as Pearl came down on it’s back with her spear-

And both were thrown in different directions when it thrashed in response.

Rose ran in alongside Garnet. Garnet darted to the side as the monster dove forward to snap at her with powerful jaws, only for its tail to swing around, forcing her to catch the two sides in either hand to stop them.

Leaving Rose as its primary target as it began to spew more acid in a steady stream against her shield.

“Mom!”

Rose’s head whipped around toward the sound of Steven’s yell that was closer than it should have been. At the same time the corrupted gem stopped and began to turn as well.

Steven jumped in front of Rose, an arm raised as he stared down the creature coming towards him with a look of determination.

A chorus of yells came from all directions. “Steven!” “Run!” “What are you doing?!”

But Steven stood his ground until the monster was nearly on him with its mouth open wide. He finally faltered, panic flashing across his face and he gave a small, scared squeak.

Rose jammed her shield between its jaws before they could close around him, and Amethyst landed on its back with her whip lashing around its neck, and Garnet landed the final blow that dissipated the corrupted gem in a blast of smoke.

The instant the monster was gone Rose was wrapping herself around Steven.

“Steven, what were you thinking? That was dangerous, you could have been hurt!” She cried as she fiercely hugged him to her.

Holding him out at arms length he looked down to avoid her gaze. “I thought, since you were in danger, I would be able to summon my shield,” He explained, tears beginning to well up in his eyes. “I wanted to protect you, but it still didn’t work!”

She felt herself soften. “Steven…”

He finally looked up. “I want to be able to protect everyone, like you do.”

She only barely suppressed a cringed at the words. Like her? As if being anything like her was something to strive for, as if he would still want to be if he knew anything about her except as his kind-hearted, loving mother.

But she gave a small smile, as much of one as she could manage with the heavy pit in her stomach, wiped away a tear from under his eye, and asked, “Why would you want to be like me, when you can be like you?”

Amethyst appeared next to him and lightly punched his shoulder. “Yeah man, we’ve already got a Rose, we need a Steven!”

“Whether you have powers or not,” Pearl agreed.

Garnet reached down to ruffle his hair, earning a fond smile from him.

Still, his demand earlier of ‘I’m a Crystal Gem too’ echoed in her ears alongside far-too similar pleas for recognition of her own thousands of years ago. She remembered the cruddy feeling at the rejection that had always followed, and the last thing Rose wanted was for him to feel the way she had been made to then, like he was unimportant or lesser, like they didn’t think he was capable.

He needed to feel included. She quickly made a decision.

She put a hand on his shoulder, and he looked at her inquisitively. She asked, “what would you think about coming on your first mission?”

Chapter Text

Rose snickered as Steven quickly stuffed a bit of cookie dough into his mouth when Pearl wasn’t looking. He shot her a mischievous grin in return before becoming the picture of innocence once again as soon as Pearl turned back from the cabinets with the sprinkles.

“Now what color should we make our stars?” Steven hummed thoughtfully as he looked over the selection of items for decorating.

“Well, stars' colors depend on their temperature and the elements that they’re made up of,” Pearl started matter-of-factly. “So the most accurate would be white, blue, yellow, or orange.”

“What about… green?” Steven asked, already reaching for the lime-colored sprinkles.

“I don’t see why not, mines purple,” Rose laughed, using icing to draw lavender squiggles around the edge of the cookie.

“So much for being astronomically accurate,” Pearl teased with a smirk at Rose.

Just then the warp pad flared, filling the room with blue light for a moment before Amethyst and Garnet were there with terrified expressions across their faces.

Garnet immediately gasped out, “In the desert-” 

Amethyst blurted, “-Out of the sky-”

“-Never seen anything like it,” Garnet continued. “But it has to be-”

“-It used the warp pad-” Amethyst shouted.

“One at a time!” Rose insisted over their voices that quickly went quiet. Steven, who had been watching the exchange with rapt interest, now looked to her, along with the other three.

Getting to her feet Rose raised her hands placatingly. “What happened?”

Amethyst looked to Garnet to answer, who did so in an uncharacteristically uncertain tone. “In the desert, a… device, fell from the sky. It used the warp pad,” She hesitated. “Rose, it- it was more advanced than anything we’ve ever seen.”

Rose felt her form go cold.

“Even that Red Eye wasn’t this futuristic-y,” Amethyst added.

“What’d it look like?” Steven asked with wonder.

Rose asked, “Where did it warp?“

“The galaxy warp,” Garnet said. 

“Let’s go.”

“Can I come?” Steven asked hopefully, big, pleading eyes directed up at her. 

Rose hesitated. Best case scenario this was a mistake, some misdirected device that landed on their planet (a voice in her mind whispered: Homeworld doesn’t make mistakes). It would raise questions from Steven that Rose didn’t want him to have.

Worst case… worst case Steven would witness the beginning of the end for all of them and his world. She wanted him far away from it, momentarily safe and oblivious.

But he had been coming on more and more missions with them, had come to expect being included, and ever since he freed the Lapis Lazuli from that mirror he had already begun to have questions.

If she said no he would argue, and Amethyst was pulling at her hair and Garnet was all tense muscles and clenched fists and Pearl was wide-eyed with terror and they didn’t have time-

She gave a sharp nod.

The galaxy warp was dark with nighttime having fallen in its hemisphere when they arrived, but illuminated by the moonlight they could see the dozens of spherical robots that swarmed the largest warp pad at its center.

“What are they doing to the Homeworld Warp?!” Pearl cried, gripping Rose’s arm.

“They’re like… little bowling balls with legs!” Steven gasped.

From the robots that crawled over the dais spouted a thick, shimmering liquid, and as the gems watched the cracks that had rendered the warp pad unusable for thousands of years began to close.

“What do we do?” Amethyst asked desperately.

Before Rose could answer, before she could even come up with one, the robots began to retreat from the warp.

It lit up.

Instinctively Rose positioned herself in front of Steven, half hiding him behind her skirt, and summoned her shield, as the others pulled each of their weapons in turn. There was a horribly long moment of suspense as the beam persisted and hot anxiety coursed through Rose where her only thought was why why why.

The light faded, and from it a green gem was deposited with her back to them. She had triangular hair, oddly clunky metallic limbs with finger-like bars that floated where her hands should be. When she looked to the left Rose caught a glimpse of the gem on her forehead - a Peridot, but unlike any peridot Rose had ever known.

From her side the fingers rose up and formed a screen, to which she began speaking, “Log date three one two, this is Peridot performing Earth hub maintenance check.”

The Peridot turned, finally noticing the group of gems behind her. She froze, flinching back with a startled squeak.

“What are you doing here?” Rose asked, her voice carrying out across the galaxy warp, relieved to find it sounded steady and commanding despite feeling neither of those things.

“Gems?!” Peridot exclaimed, her eyes flickering over the four of them and the weapons they had pointed directly at her. 

For a tense moment no one moved, there wasn’t a sound except for the ocean lapping at the sides of the structure. 

Then the warp pad reactivated with a shing, and the Peridot disappeared as fast as she had arrived.

Rose didn’t dare relax yet. “Garnet, the warp!” She ordered, not taking her eyes off the platform.

Garnet strode past her, gauntlets growing larger around her hands by the second. She reached the edge of the pedestal, lifted the weapons over her head and brought them down on the warp pad with a force that sent chunks of debris flying around them, reduced the smooth surface to rubble, and effectively cut them off from the rest of the universe once more.

Amethyst was the first to break the silence that followed. “What the fuck was that about?!”

Pearl didn’t even bother to scold her for the language, instead whispering to seemingly no one, “They’re coming back.” Her hands trembled as they came up to cover her face. “I can’t do this, not again.”

“Who was she?” Steven asked curiously.

“We’re dead!” Amethyst yelled. “We’re so dead!”

“She’s gone,” Garnet grit out through clenched teeth, as if that was the end of it when they all knew very well that didn’t mean anything.

Rose only half heard them as her own mind raced.

A Peridot. They had sent a Peridot - typically a technician or a kindergartener. Were they going to restart the colonization? Had Homeworld simply been biding their time? The Peridot had been surprised to see them, to find gems on the planet, and why shouldn’t she be? The Diamonds attack should have destroyed every gem on Earth - it nearly had. If Homeworld came again…

Rose’s eyes fell to Steven nearby. He was starting to look less and less inquisitive and more and more afraid as the gems continued to stress around him and his questions went unanswered. As if sensing her gaze, he looked at her.

Something inside Rose solidified. She would protect him.

Rose had fought for the Earth and humanity and her little band of mismatched gems, protected them for thousands of years. But even then there had been lengths she hadn’t been willing to go to, things she couldn’t bring herself to face being the coward that she is.

But Steven, Greg, the Crystal Gems, her family, and the planet they called home… she would keep them safe this time. At any cost.

“We’ve done everything we can right now,” Rose said, cutting through the ongoing panic.

“But Rose-!” Pearl protested.

“We’ll handle what comes as it does, if it does,” Rose insisted, scooping Steven up to rest on her hip, and speaking directly to him, “For now let’s go home, I believe we have some cookies to finish up, hmm?”

Steven didn’t answer for a moment, looking back at the others that slowly followed them and the now-shattered warp pad. “Y-yeah,” He agreed.

If she held Steven a little tighter than usual in the warp stream home, or laughed too easily at Amethyst's antics, or kissed Pearl harder, none of them either noticed or mentioned it.

She simply felt the need to cherish everything a little more while she could, before it was all ripped away.

Greg had retreated to his van as soon as Steven was put to bed that night. The news of the day's events, that Steven had relayed to him excitedly, had rattled him, Rose could tell.

She hated to add to his burden.

Rose stopped, lingering by the van's hood in the dark, the sand cool beneath her feet, listening to the quiet music from the tape deck and the rustle of pages from within, giving herself one last, selfish moment to bask in the calm contentment of the life she had never deserved in the first place.

She rounded the side of the van.

“Oh hey, Rose,” Greg greeted easily, looking up from his magazine. “Check out this- uh, what's up? You look like you saw a ghost,” He said. “Is it about the… the gem you guys saw earlier?”

Rose sat on the edge of the van's open back, Greg scooting up to her side. He reached over to take her hand, watching her with concern written across his face.

“I’m going to protect Steven. And you, and the Earth, no matter what,” Rose said in a rush.

Greg gave an uneasy smile. “Well, yeah, of course. I know you will!” He said. “But why does it sound like… you’re warning me about something?”

“I need to tell you who I really am,” She all but whispered.

“What?!” Greg recoiled, shaking his head. “Rose no! I told you, I don’t care who you were. It doesn’t matter-“

“It does matter!” Rose shouted, causing him to balk. “If Homeworld is coming back who I am will make all the difference! But it might mean I won’t be here any more, and I need you to know why, I need you to know it won’t be because- because I don’t want to be-”

She took a shaky breath, squeezing her eyes shut. If she revealed herself to Homeworld she would surely be taken back there, and then what? A couple thousand years in the tower, if not a bubble? Never let out of the other Diamonds sights? Certainly she would never be trusted again or allowed to return to Earth.

She would never see Greg, or Steven again.

Greg leaned forward to catch her eyes. “Rose?”

“I’m Pink Diamond,” She said. No more putting it off, no more room for protest.

He went still, his eyes darting over her features, searching. There was no way for him to understand the full gravity of the confession, but Rose knew that he knew enough about gemkind and the Diamonds to understand that it was big.

To know it was bad.

“Like… like the Diamonds you guys’ve told me about?” At her nod, he visibly gulped.

She waited with held breath. Waited for the accusations, for yelling, for him to tell her to leave.

Instead, he squeezed her hand. 

His expression was somber when she looked, but it was also as open as ever, it was kind. “Okay,” He said softly. “Okay, lets… talk.”

So she told him. In quiet, broken words at first, her fingers trembling and her throat tight, but as he listened without interruption, and his hand remained in hers, it was like a dam had broken inside her, and all of it came pouring out.

And when she was done she felt like she had been stripped down to nothing. She felt raw and nearly empty. Greg still sat by her side.

“Y’know, your Yellow Diamond sounds a lot like my dad,” Greg finally said with a small chuckle, not taking his eyes off the ocean ahead.

She blinked at him, surprised.

“He was all business. A lay down the law, no nonsense type,” He continued. “I don’t think I seen him crack a smile since I was five, I used to say that the muscles in his face wouldn’t remember how.”

A startled laugh burst from Rose’s lips. Greg grinned at her. Then it faded into something more serious.

“I know you’ll do what you have to, Rose, but don’t give yourself over too easy, alright?” He said. “You belong here.”

Rose felt tears stinging at her eyes. Seeing that, Greg rose up to his knees to pull her into an embrace. The dread of what might come next still sat heavy in her mind, but she was finding it was becoming just a little easier to breathe.

Chapter Text

Pearl watched Steven’s chest rise and fall, slow, even breaths telling of his deep sleep.

Below, the screen door opened with a creak, bringing in Rose who, with a glance up at the loft to confirm she was there, climbed the stairs to join Pearl on her nightly watch.

“How is everyone?” Rose asked in a hush as she settled onto the floor beside Pearl, absentmindedly lifting an arm for her to move in closer and wrapping it around her shoulders once she did.

“Well, Amethyst still hasn’t left her room since she went in after dinner, and Garnet said she was going to go search possible futures for the best outcome,” Pearl sighed, feeling completely worn out from both the day's developments and the turmoil that followed. “At least Steven seems to be sleeping soundly as usual.”

Rose gave a hum of agreement, reaching out to adjust the blanket around the young boy's shoulders.

Pearl nestled deeper into her side, getting comfortable for the night ahead. “It’s a good thing you’re here, Rose,” She whispered. “What would we have done without you?”

She felt Rose stiffen underneath her. “I never thought Homeworld would come back…” She said, a mix of defensiveness and guilt in her voice.

Pearl immediately lurched forward and turned to face Rose, all the previous weariness leaving her body as she waved her hands frantically in a rush to correct herself. “Of course not! None of us did!” She assured quickly. “I simply meant- we would have been a mess!” She gave a laugh that sounded off even to her own ears. “Can you imagine, the three of us without you? Raising Steven? Facing down Homeworld alone? What a disaster that would have been!”

Pearl could imagine it, she had - many times all those years ago when they had been preparing for Rose to leave them, and every so often since, when her thoughts would wander and the possibilities that had almost become reality played out in her mind in horrible detail. Sometimes it was like she felt phantom-grief, haunted by what could have been.

A life without Rose. Her without Rose.

“You would have been alright,” Rose said evenly, the same way she always had back then.

“How can you still say that?” Pearl protested, disbelief and a flash of anger rising in her. “What about when Amethyst's gem was cracked a few weeks ago, what if you hadn’t been here to heal her? Or when Steven wanted to go on that ride at Funland but only with you?” She clutched at her chest with a shaking hand. “What about me? What was I supposed to do without you?”

“As though you haven’t been doing what you want for the past six thousand years-” Rose attempted to joke.

“We need you!” Pearl cried.

“You don’t!” Rose snapped back - too loudly.

Steven stirred, his eyebrows furrowing as he squirmed further into the pillow under his head. The two of them froze, waiting with held breath until they were certain he wasn’t going to wake further.

There was an uneasy silence that followed. Neither of them seemed to want to be the first to break it.

“You all are a lot more capable than you believe. You would have surprised yourselves,” Rose said at last. She slumped then, folding her arms over her middle and looking away so that most of her face was hidden in the darkness. “And either way, I’m here.”

Pearl stared at her, trying to place the odd heaviness in the words, the melancholy in her tone, and grappling with the way it unnerved her. Rose loved the Earth, and humans, and the Crystal Gems, and Steven, and by a wonderful accident she had gotten to survive alongside him - so why did she sound… disappointed?

She wanted to pursue the topic, demand that Rose understand that her disappearance would have been horrible in every sense.

But they were both already on edge as it were, and Pearl hated when they fought, hated the anxiety that coiled tight within her and seeing the hurt on Rose’s face when they did. It was a pointless debate now anyway, Rose was right, she was there.

So Pearl let it go, with a final, firm, “Thank goodness for that.” Even as Rose continued to refuse to look her way.

They stayed there until morning, the terrible tension slowly fading from the space between them, until the horizon outside the beach house's windows began to fade to yellow and Pearl stood to begin the day.

Rose caught her wrist as she passed behind her, stopping her in her tracks as she got to her feet as well.

Wordlessly, she pressed a kiss to Pearl's gem, cupping her face in one large palm that Pearl readily leaned into.

“How awful it would have been to have never gotten to do that again,” Rose whispered with a soft laugh, her nose bumping Pearls as she rested their foreheads together.

Relief washed over Pearl strong enough to make her feel lightheaded, nearly giddy. She giggled, standing on tiptoes to wrap her arms around Rose’s shoulders.

“You can do it whenever you want,” Pearl promised.

Together they made pancakes for Steven to awake to, and when Garnet and Amethyst and Greg joined them a little while later the house was filled with voices and laughter and Rose was radiant as always, aglow in the morning light and animated amongst their little group.

Pearl was all too happy to put the unpleasantness of that night behind them.

Chapter Text

Rose carried Steven over to the counter while he dramatically sagged against her chest in exaggerated exhaustion from their fusion lesson. With a fond chuckle she set him on one of the stools.

“We could have kept going!” He protested again. “I think I almost got it that one time!”

“Connie will be here soon,” She reminded him. “You don’t want to be too tired to enjoy your visit.”

“There will be other opportunities to practice, Steven,” Pearl promised as she passed. “You did very well for your first try.”

“But I didn’t fuse…” Steven objected.

“That’s okay,” Rose said. “It was still fun dancing with you.”

“Eh, fusion is hard, even for us,” Amethyst shrugged, pulling open the fridge to grab a soda and sliding another across the counter to Steven. 

“Not for me,” Garnet said with a smirk.

Rose couldn’t help snickering at that, even as Pearl and Amethyst shot Garnet exasperated looks that only served to make her appear more smug.

“Who knows if Steven’s organic body is even capable of fusion,” Pearl fretted. “Fusion merges the physical form of gems, it just might not be possible…”

Stevens' face fell as he seemed to think about that and began to look discouraged. Rose opened her mouth to say something reassuring, because even if Pearls line of questioning was correct, Steven shouldn’t feel bad-

“I think Steven can do it.”

Garnet, with words simple and effective as ever, beat her to it. Steven brightened, and when he looked up to meet her stare through the shades he even smiled.

At the door there was a knock, Stevens' friend Connie there right on time.

With a hurried ‘see ya later ’ thrown over his shoulder Steven was gone, the screen door swinging shut behind him as the two children raced off down the porch steps, their rapid fire conversation fading out of earshot.

“Geez Pearl, way to crush the kids spirits,” Amethyst grumbled.

“I didn’t mean to offend him,” Pearl gasped. “I was simply wondering about his body's physical abilities, which is warranted given that we know nothing about what a half-human can do.”

Rose was still wondering about something different though. “Garnet, did you mean it?”

“I did.”

“And is that based on future vision or…?” Rose prodded.

“It's because I believe in Steven.” She said firmly.

“Yeah, I mean, he’s got your bubble,” Amethyst interjected, gesturing to Rose. “And he healed Lapis and Greg. We know he has powers.”

“But fusion is different,” Pearl insisted. “It requires a lightform-”

“So does shapeshifting, and he turned his fingers into cats that one time!” Amethyst reminded her.

Pearl winced. “I don’t think that's the best example, considering how disastrous it was.”

Amethyst rolled her eyes. “Yeah but he did it-”

“Steven will fuse, in his own way, when the time is right,” Garnet said, easily putting a stop to the beginnings of bickering.

“Garnet is right,” Rose said. “Steven isn’t like anyone that’s ever existed before, everything he does is going to be different- it’s wonderful. He brings newness to everything we see as familiar.”

“He has developed his powers rather uniquely…” Pearl allowed.

Amethyst laughed. “You never know what he’s gonna do next.”

As if to prove Amethyst's point, a half an hour later a familiar stranger burst through the door Steven had raced out of earlier. They had long dark hair, tan skin, a curved nose, and a tiny piece of a pink gem set in their navel.

As soon as she recognized them, as soon as she wrapped her mind around what she was seeing, Rose wasted no time in dragging the fusion into an embrace that nearly pulled them off their feet while they laughed.

“Oh my goodness, look at you!” She gushed. “You’re adorable!”

“How is this- h-how did-” Pearl was spluttering.

Garnet's hands were clasped over her mouth that was split into a wide, and still growing, grin. 

“You two look great together!” Amethyst exclaimed, running up to them. “How does it feel, Steven? Connie? Stevonnie?!”

“It feels awesome,” the newly-dubbed Stevonnie answered. 

“How did this happen?” Pearl finally managed to get out.

Stevonnie lit up as they launched into their explanation. “Steven and Connie were dancing on the beach, and it just- happened! Steven was sad that he might not be able to fuse and Connie doesn’t dance in front of people but-“

“They did it,” Rose finished for them, to which Stevonnie beamed at her and nodded enthusiastically.

“With a human…?” Pearl said faintly.

“What are you gonna do now, Stevonnie?” Amethyst asked eagerly.

“Well, I- I don’t know…” They frowned, looking down at themselves as panic started to color their expression. “I don’t really know what fusions… do?”

“Stevonnie,” Garnet said, breaking out of her delighted trance and stepping up to them. Rose backed away, keeping a hand on Stevonnie’s back as Garnet took their face in her hands. “You are not two people, and you are not one person. You are an experience! Make sure you’re a good experience. So go have fun!”

“Alright!” Stevonnie agreed. “Alright, yeah!”

Rose gave them one last hug. “Oh, I’m so happy I got to meet you,” She said. “Enjoy yourself, enjoy being yourself!”

Stevonnie smiled. “We will!”

They turned and raced out the door, the four gems rushing to the window to watch them take off down the beach, hair flying out behind them and the sound of a laugh ringing through the air.

Steven was pleasantly tired when he crawled into bed that night.

Being Stevonnie had been amazing, they had run and jumped and laughed and eaten donuts and danced, and Steven had been a part of it but it hadn’t been him, it hadn’t been Connie either, but in it he had felt so incredibly close to her.

Until near the very end, Steven hadn’t wanted it to end, Stevonnie hadn’t wanted it to end.

“Do you have everything you need?” His mom asked as she pulled the duvet over him.

“Yep,” Steven said, stifling a yawn. 

Rose sat on the edge of the bed, brushing his hair back from his face with a soft touch. “So, should we expect to see Stevonnie again sometime?”

“Heh, yeah I… I think so,” Steven said, thinking about earlier that night, waiting on the porch with Connie for her mom to pick her up, hands clasped between them the whole time as if neither were quite ready to let go completely just yet, and the meaningful look in Connie’s eyes as she said goodbye.

His mom opened her arms and Steven leaned in, closing his eyes as he rested his head on her shoulder.

“I’m so proud of you,” She whispered, warmth filling her tone, before she lowered him back into the pillows.

“Do you think… we’ll ever fuse someday?” He asked, shyly peeking up at her through his eyelashes.

Rose blinked at him as though surprised by the question. “I would be honored.”

Steven grinned. “We’d be so cool.”

She bent down to press her forehead to his, wrinkling her nose as she teased, “Only because of you.”

“Nu-uh, you!” Steven laughed. 

With a kiss on his forehead Rose said goodnight and flicked out the lamp, leaving the loft illuminated in a soft blue light from the glow stick Steven had picked up off the dance floor on their way out. He smiled to himself as he closed his eyes, knowing at that moment Connie’s bedroom was also lit by a matching pink one.

Chapter Text

There was another encounter with Peridot, over video in the control room of the Kindergarten, then a message from Lapis Lazuli warning them- no warning Steven, that gems were coming to Earth.

Their fears that Homeworld would return sooner rather than later confirmed, the Crystal Gems began preparing - gathering weapons, assessing the limited resources they had available, Pearl working nearly around the clock to create devices that might stand up to Homeworlds machines.

It was all in vain of course, against Homeworld four gems with ancient and cobbled together technology didn’t stand a chance, but they would try. It was a fact as old as the rebellion itself that Crystal Gems didn’t go down without a fight.

Rose hefted a laser light cannon she had deposited along with three others next to the warp pad into her arms, and made her way through the house, using her shoulder to nudge open the door.

“Whoa, let me help ya’ there!” Greg exclaimed when she stepped out onto the front porch where he and Steven sat.

Rose looked around the large barrel of the weapon obscuring her path to see Greg hurrying over to her. “I’m alright,” She promised. “Besides, these are a couple hundred pounds each, a little more than a human can handle.”

“I’ll have you know there are humans that train to be able to lift hundreds of pounds!” Greg said, then he coughed awkwardly. “Even if I’m not one of them.”

Rose laughed.

“Couldn’t Garnet, Amethyst, or Pearl help you?” Steven asked, eyebrows furrowed with worry.

Adjusting her hold on the bottom of the cannon, Rose said, “No no, they’re busy with their own things.”

“Amethyst was eating garbage the last I saw her,” Steven said skeptically.

“Steven, it’s fine,” Rose assured her.

She didn’t miss his frown as she turned and carefully picked her way down the stairs to stow the cannon underneath the deck, or the way he watched her closely while she repeated the process twice more.

The next day Rose, Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl gathered in the Burning Room, sat in a small circle around a projection from Pearl's gem that depicted the four of them against Homeworlds forces, changing numbers and positions and strategies.

It almost felt like they were back in the war, except Rose had felt more optimistic about the Crystal Gems odds back then.

“And if they do bring a battalion or whatever?”

Pearl glared. “We just decided they wouldn’t waste that many soldiers time on-”

“And if you’re wrong and they do?” Amethyst pressed stubbornly. She was becoming more and more agitated, her increasing combativeness through the discussion a dead give away.

“They won’t,” Pearl said, a hint of desperation in her haughty insistence.

“It never hurts to prepare for all possibilities,” Rose interjected before it could get any more heated. “If we are faced with a battalion we could try…”

They had been going around in circles for hours with little progress. There were only so many options for their tiny group whether they were faced with a squad, a platoon, or a battalion, and no amount of creative thinking would change that.

“And with the improvements I made to the disruptor-”

“The robonoids won’t matter, Pearl,” Garnet snapped, having already said as much a handful of times. “If we’re overwhelmed by other gems.”

Silence followed Garnet's rare outburst as Pearl refused to back down from a rather one-sided staring contest.

Rose reached over to lay a hand on Garnet’s shoulder, feeling how tense it was under her touch, and looked at the other two. “I say we take a break,” She said. “We accomplished a lot, all that’s left to do now is… wait.”

As Pearl and Amethyst filed out Rose hung back, turning to Garnet once they were alone.

“Thank you for all your help, Garnet,” She said. “You did good today.”

“It doesn’t feel like it…” Garnet all but whispered. After a moment she reached up to dismiss her visor, looking at Rose with three wide, terrified eyes. “Rose, all I saw was destruction.”

As though Rose’s own imagination wasn’t bad enough. She could only imagine the horrific sights Garnet was subjecting herself to in order to plan for it all, could only imagine the strain it was taking on her.

Rose told her, “We’ve faced impossible odds before.”

On one of the waterfalls in Pearls’ room said gem was waging battle against three holo-Pearls with a spear when Rose entered. Spotting her, Pearl quickly banished them in a single arcing slice of her spear through their torsos.

“It’s almost nostalgic, huh?” Pearl said with an uneasy laugh.

Rose managed a sad smile and Pearl closed the distance between them. Rose held her close, running a hand up and down her back, and said nothing, knowing Pearl found the greatest comfort simply in her presence.

Next she went in search of Amethyst.

In the living room she sat with her knee's pulled up to her chest, hunched in on herself in the corner of the couch. All it took was Rose sitting down beside her for Amethyst to burst.

“They act like I don’t have a clue,” She complained, folding her arms across her chest. “Like, because I wasn’t there for the war I don’t understand that this is bad.”

She huffed, letting her bangs fall over one eye while she turned her face away from Rose’s view.

Rose sighed. “The war had a big impact on Pearl and Garnet, and now, after five thousand years thinking we were safe, they’re scared they’re going to have to go through it all again,” She explained. “They don’t mean to make you feel bad, they’re just feeling… overwhelmed.”

Amethyst finally looked at her, fear written plainly across her features. “What’ll happen? If we lose?”

Rose hated that Amethyst even had to wonder such things. Emerging after the war, brought home by the Crystal Gems to a peaceful life, Rose had wanted nothing more for Amethyst than to never know violence or to fear for her very existence. She had tried, they all had, to keep the knowledge of where they came from out of her mind.

But giving her false positivity or an outright lie would only serve to infuriate and alienate her more. Amethyst wasn’t naïve, and given what they were up against she deserved the truth.

“We’ll be shattered,” Rose said. “Homeworld doesn’t give much leniency to traitors.”

Amethyst’s lips set into a hard line. Rose wrapped an arm around her back “I won’t allow it to come to that though.”

She sniffled. “Gonna whip out some of your awesome Rose Quartz powers and kick their asses?” Amethyst joked weakly.

“Something like that…”

They stayed that way for some time, until she squirmed out of Rose’s grasp and disappeared into the her room, leaving Rose alone on the sofa. As soon as the temple door shut she gave a heavy exhale, drooping like a wilted flower.

And that's exactly when Steven got home.

“Mom?” He called into the house, setting his cheeseburger backpack by the door. “Are you okay?”

Rose startled at his voice, straightening right away and forcing a smile onto her face. “Hi! Did you have fun in town?”

“Y-yeah but… Did something happen? Did we knock out the power again?”

Rose laughed, shaking her head. “No, nothing like that,” She assured him.

“Then, is it about Peridot?”

“There’s nothing wrong,” Rose said, rising from the couch. “But your dad did pick up the next Lonely Blade movie, and if you make the popcorn we can watch it together.”

Rose didn’t remember much of the movie once it was over, except for the part where Lonely Blade defended his home village from ninjas with nothing but a hand fan, wearily declaring ‘it’s over’ before collapsing.

That night, Rose stood on the balcony after Steven had gone to bed. The wind off the ocean was still cold even with springtime approaching. The sky was cloudless, allowing her a perfect view of the stars and the constellations various humans had taught her different names for over the centuries.

A perfect view of Homeworlds galaxy as well.

Somewhere between that pinprick of light and Earth a ship barreled through space, carrying their demise, or rather, Rose Quartz’s.

She gave a shuddering breath, her grip on the railing tightening.

She had to be strong for everyone, ease their fears, take on the biggest portion of the burden, model bravery for them. That’s what leaders did; if nothing else at least the Diamonds had taught her that. And it shouldn’t be so hard - it hadn’t been during the rebellion with dozens looking to her for strength, so why now, with only her three closest friends to guide, did she feel like she was breaking under it all?

The door squeaked as it opened behind her.

Steven stood in the doorway, pajama clad and barefoot, head tilted inquisitively as he looked up at her.

“S-Steven,” she gasped, horrified when her voice came out shaky. “What are you still doing awake?”

“I couldn’t sleep,” he admitted, stepping fully outside and padding over to the side of the porch to join her. “And I saw you were out here.”

“You should go back inside, it’s cold out,” Rose said.

“Yeah, it is,” He agreed pointedly, considering she was the one who had been outside first. He folded his arms on top of the railing, never taking his eyes off her. “What are you doing out here?”

It was the only place she might find some privacy. Even in her room someone could come looking for her.

“Just admiring the stars,” Rose lied.

Steven looked up, taking them in next to her in silence for a while. Then he sighed, “Mom, do you want to talk?”

“Sure,” She agreed. Whatever problem that had Steven troubled was sure to be easier dealt with then everything else going on. “What's on your mind?”

“About what’s on your mind!” He exclaimed. “You’re worried about Peridot but you’re trying to pretend you’re not!”

Rose could only stare for a moment, taken aback by his determined confrontation and that he had noticed at all.

She hesitated, then lowered herself to sit cross legged, guiding Steven into her lap. At least he would be warmer there.

“Of course I’m worried about Peridot,” She said.

“But you won’t let anyone help you!” He persisted. “You’re always there for Garnet and Amethyst and Pearl, but do they even know you’re scared too?”

Rose’s mouth opened but no words came out, she couldn’t find a defense, at least, not one that would satisfy him. She glanced away, out to the horizon, her shoulders slumping in defeat.

“The Crystal Gems help each other,” He continued. “I think Garnet and Amethyst and Pearl would be really sad if they knew you needed them and didn’t let them help you too.”

Rose stayed silent, trying to think of a way to divert his focus, never having wanted to put this on anyone else, let alone him. But then Steven got to his knees to wrap his arms around her neck, tucking his chin over her shoulder.

“Leaders are allowed to be scared too,” he said quietly.

She squeezed him and gave a soft laugh. “How did you get so smart?”

“I learned from the best,” He said, smiling at her.

She put him back to bed, making sure he put on socks and had an extra blanket after being outside, and then she went looking for Pearl.

She wasn’t in her room so Rose tried the Burning Room next, and there she was, along with Garnet and Amethyst too.

“What are you all doing in here?” She asked, surprised.

“Pearl was lecturing us on nerd stuff,” Amethyst said, looking at her upside down from where she was sprawled on her back on the stone floor.

“We’re trying,” Pearl corrected, shooting a withering look in Amethyst's direction. “To predict what kind of advancements Homeworld might have made in the last five thousand years, based on where technology appeared to be headed when we were there last.”

“Pearl is doing most of the predicting,” Garnet said.

“Not at all!” Pearl protested. “Sapphire used to occasionally advise on which technological ventures would be most successful, you’re providing keen insight!”

Rose stood frozen as she processed that they had been taking on tasks without her ever knowing… that perhaps they had been pitching in to ease her burden as much as she was theirs. 

Having gone on too long without a response, Pearl asked, “Are you alright, Rose?”

“I’m..." fine sat on the tip of Rose’s tongue, nearly automatic at this point. “Just a little worried, is all.”

“Oh Rose,” Pearl said sympathetically, getting up to link an arm through hers, resting her head on Rose’s shoulder.

“I mean, I’d think you were crazy if you weren’t a little freaked out,” Amethyst said, rolling on to her stomach.

“Rose, we’ve faced impossible odds before,” Garnet said, echoing Rose’s own words, drawing all of their attention. “But the Crystal Gems are made of the impossible, and we’ve never let it stop us before.”

Rose let out a breath. She gave a single, firm nod.

Pearl rose onto tiptoes to embrace her, and the next thing Rose knew Amethyst was clinging to her leg, and Garnet wrapped one arm around her and Pearl and laid a hand atop Amethyst's head.

“It’s okay,” Pearl said amidst the pile. “We’ll get through this together.”

Rose let her eyes close, and allowed herself to relax into her family's easily, readily given, comfort.

Chapter Text

The world shook at the start of the end.

An ear splitting boom reverberated through the air, rattling the living room where Rose, Steven, Amethyst, and Greg sat playing cards around the coffee table as casually as any other day, unaware until that moment that the threat they had been preparing for was finally on their doorstep.

Then they were all outside on the beach, staring up at a giant green hand in the sky, its index finger pointed directly at them, growing closer by the minute.

“Whoa,” Steven gasped in awe.

“It’s happening…” Greg muttered from somewhere behind them.

“Prepare the light cannons,” Rose ordered Pearl next to her, who gave an affirmative nod before running off.

She turned on heel and followed after her. Pearl pulled the row of cannons out from under the deck and together they adjusted their positions to aim at the ship.

Pearl scrambled out of the way, gathering with the others.

Rose took a breath, her eyes trained on the approaching ship, and recited, “If every porkchop were perfect, we wouldn’t have hotdogs.”

From below she heard Greg give a confused “What?”

Pink-tinged light burst forth from the cannons, four beams swirling and combining together into a single stream headed right for the hand-

And harmlessly bounced off it.

Rose could almost physically feel the wave of dread that rolled over the group.

“We have to take them head on,” Garnet said solemnly.

“What about Beach City?” Steven asked, glancing over his shoulder towards the town and then back to Garnet. “Everyone's gonna be in danger!”

Greg scratched the top of his head thoughtfully. “Maybe I can drive into town and spread the word, maybe… maybe everyone should leave for a bit?”

“Wait!” Steven exclaimed. “I have a better idea!” He reached into his back pocket, producing his phone. “Time for some political favors.”

He strolled a little ways away as he made the call. Rose climbed back down the slope to join the gems and Greg on the sand, all of them huddled close with stiff postures and tense expressions, occasionally shooting anxious looks at the ship.

“You really used my saying as a- a catchphrase?!” Greg asked incredulously as soon as she was close enough.

Rose giggled, reveling in the moment of levity amidst the turmoil. “I liked it,” She told him. “And I sure wasn’t going to forget it, now was I?”

“The ship will touch down in a half hour at most,” Pearl warned, staring up at its course through the sky. “We don’t have much time.”

Amethyst was unusually serious when she asked, “Do you think Opal's arrows might do anything?”

Four light cannons that had been one of their most effective weapons during the war hadn’t made so much as a dent, but, “it’s worth a shot,” Pearl agreed.

“Wait until it’s closer,” Rose said. “A hit at close range may do more damage.”

She turned to Greg, taking both his hands in hers. “You should go with the townspeople. I don’t want you or Steven near any of this.”

Greg sighed. “Steven’s not going to like it,” He rubbed at the back of his neck, looking down the beach towards where their son was still on the phone. “Yeah, okay. I’ll go… get a bag packed for him.”

Soon, Steven came running up to them declaring that mayor Dewey was putting an evacuation order out. The ship continued to get closer, casting a sickly green over everything in sight. Then the mayor's truck was rolling down the boardwalk blaring the order from its speaker as families from town drew near to listen.

“I hope everyone gets out in time,” Steven mused, watching residents race from their homes, scramble to their cars, distant shouts heard even down the beach.

Greg returned from inside the house, wrestling with the zipper on a stuffed cheeseburger backpack.

“What… are you doing with that?” Steven asked slowly, suspiciously.

Greg floundered, looking to Rose in panic and back to Steven. “Uh, well-“

“You’re sending me away?” Steven cried, outrage and, underneath it, hurt in his tone. “B-but I can help!”

“Steven…” Rose started, and then stopped as she realized she didn’t know what to say, how to convince him to go without hurting his feelings more.

Garnet stepped forward, crouching down in front of him. “Back during the war,” She said. “Not every Crystal Gem fought in every battle.” She brought a hand up to cup his cheek, drawing his eyes to where hers would be behind the visor. “That didn’t mean they weren’t important, or that we trusted them any less, it just wasn’t their time to fight.”

“That’s right!” Pearl agreed enthusiastically, standing over Garnet's shoulder. “And sometimes they had a different job that meant they were needed elsewhere, like- um…”

“Leading those humans outta here!” Amethyst offered. “You think any of us could do it? They know you! If they had Pearlie squawking at them they’d just be like ‘who’s this bossy bird chick?’”

For once, Pearl didn’t even object to the joke at her expense.

Rose felt a swell of gratitude in her chest, watching the gems come together around Steven to help protect him, to get him to safety.

Steven’s resolve visibly wavered. He nodded. “Okay.”

Rose dropped to her knees, opening her arms. Steven launched himself into them.

“You and your father mean the world to me,” She said over his shoulder. “I couldn’t bear it if something happened to either of you.”

She closed her eyes, squeezing him tighter for just a moment, trying to memorize his warmth and his softness and the way he fit in her arms like he was meant to be there, just in case things took a turn for the worse, just in case she never saw him again-

“I love you,” She whispered, hoping the three words conveyed everything she didn’t have the time to say right then, hoping he would remember it always if she wasn’t there to remind him.

“I love you too, mom.”

He went around their little group, hugging each of the gems in turn before getting in the passenger seat of the van.

Greg approached her.

“I’ll see you soon?” He said uncertainly, a pleading look in his eye.

Instead of answering, Rose kissed him.

Minutes later, the van disappeared around the face of the cliff. Overhead, the hand ship bore down unrelentingly.

The procession of cars moved slowly as they made their way out of Beach City. In the side mirror Steven watched what he could see of the green hand getting closer to his home behind them.

“Maybe when Peridot gets to Earth, she’ll see how nice all the people are,” Steven speculated. “And she won’t want to hurt anyone.”

“That’d be nice,” His dad said. “But… these other gems, they aren’t like your mother, or Garnet, Amethyst, or Pearl. They aren’t going to suddenly start caring about people now! They didn’t the first time they…”

Ahead of them, Steven could see the ‘now leaving Beach City’ sign with its waving seagull. Almost absentmindedly he asked, “The first time they what?”

Greg flinched, hands tightened around the steering wheel. “I mean, it was thousands of years ago, it’s not like I was there.”

The nervousness in his dad's voice got Steven’s attention, turning away from the window he gave him his whole focus.

His dad glanced at him wearily out of the corner of his eye. “Your mom should be telling you about this,” He said. “But I get it, she doesn’t want you to think of her that way!”

His dad was starting to scare him a little, the way he was talking like there was some secret Stevens mom was keeping from him, a secret that was big and bad, that she didn’t want him to know. “What way?”

“Well, like…” Greg winced. “Like aliens, Steven, aliens that invaded Earth.”

But that didn’t make sense, Steven thought. Sure, the gems were from outer space, and they came to Earth thousands of years ago, and sometimes they were really different from humans, but…

Steven felt like he’d had the wind knocked out of him, his chest too tight all of a sudden.

As his dad explained how the gems that had come here were doing something bad to the planet, how his mom and the others turned on their own kind, started a war to stop the invaders- all things Steven had heard before but now took on a whole new meaning - Steven thought of the barren landscape of the Kindergarten he had visited with Amethyst a few weeks ago, the field of strawberries intermingled with ancient weapons, Pearls exciting tales of battles her and his mom had fought.

“I think your mom just can’t forgive herself. None of them can,” Greg shook his head sadly. “Maybe that’s why she feels like she has to-”

He abruptly stopped, his gaze flickering over to Steven as if to confirm if he had actually been listening.

He had. “Dad?” Steven pressed when Greg didn’t continue. “Dad, has to what?”

“Nothing Steven. H-hey we’re gonna drive past that waffle place in a couple miles! I don’t know about you but I’m feeling like a big plate of chicken an-“

“Dad, what is mom going to do?!” Steven demanded.

“Nothing for sure!” His dad placated. “She just- she has some information that she thinks would stop any attacking gems.”

Steven nearly breathed a sigh of relief. That wasn’t so bad.

“But she would have to go with them if she revealed it.”

And just like that, the relief was washed away by cold horror.

“What?” Steven cried. “She can’t! She- she wouldn’t!”

“She said she would only do it if there was no other choice,” Greg assured him weakly.

Steven felt sick to his stomach. In the side mirror the handship was so close, so close-

“I’ve gotta go back,” He whispered raggedly. When he tried again, his voice was louder, surer, “I have to stop her!”

“You heard your mom and the gems, they want you safe!”

“You want mom to stay here, right?!” He shouted. “I have to stop her! Turn the van around!”

When his dad continued to stare straight ahead, his face ghastly pale and beaded with sweat, continued to drive forward, Steven felt anger, fueled by fear, rise in him with overwhelming intensity. “Dad, turn the van around, please!”

With the last word he struck out at the dashboard in front of him - harder than he meant to, harder than he thought himself capable. The next seconds happened in a too-quick blur: an airbag burst into the space, Steven reflexively summoned his bubble, and inside of it he was ejected from the van.

Disoriented but not hurt once his bubble stopped rolling and popped, Steven looked up to see his dad running towards him, and Beach City residents getting out of their cars to converge on the side of the road.

Steven shakily got to his feet before his dad even reached him. “Dad, I have to go back,” He pleaded, the anger from before completely gone, leaving only desperation in its wake. Tears welled up in his eyes. “I need to stop mom from going, I need to help the gems win so she doesn’t-” he was unable to finish as he broke off in a sob.

His dad's shoulders slumped, his own eyes glistening. “Alright. Just… be careful, I don’t want to lose either of you.”

Just as Steven was starting to ponder how to get back to Beach City in time, a wet nose pressed against the back of his neck with a huff.

He whipped around to come face-to-face with a furry pink face. The lion he had met that time on a mission in the desert, who had come bounding up to his mom right away and let Steven run his hands all through his mane.

“Lion!” He greeted excitedly.

“Steven!” Greg yelped, yanking him back.

“It’s okay dad, he’s friendly!” Steven assured. “And he really liked mom!” He reached up to place his hands on either side of the lion's face. “Is that why you’re here? To help me save mom?”

Lion gave a low rumble that Steven decided to interpret as yes.

With only slightly more hesitance from his dad, Steven was on Lions back, and they took off back towards Beach City.

Chapter Text

All of the colors on the beach in front of Stevens house were washed out, turned to shades of green and white, when he arrived. His mom and the gems stood in a row with their backs to him, facing the oncoming hand ship with weapons drawn.

With a thank you pat to Lion’s side, Steven dashed forward. “Hey guys!”

“Steven?” Several alarmed sounding voices shouted as they turned.

“No no no,” His mom gasped, looking down at him with wide eyes. “You can’t be here!”

The wind increased, blowing the sand around them and making rippling waves across the water. A whirring came from the ship as it lowered, stretching out palm-up.

“It’s too late!” Garnet yelled over the noise. “They’re coming.”

“Steven-” Rose started, then seemed to change her mind. Her expression hardened. “Stay behind us, no matter what!”

From the middle of the hand an orb emerged and rolled down the length of one finger before collapsing open.

Three gems stood inside. Peridot, Lapis Lazuli, and one Steven hadn’t seen before - larger than the other two in both height and width, muscles boasting of her strength, wild white hair down her back, and several darker stripes decorating her skin. She wore a bodysuit much like Peridots, but from her broad shoulders hung a cape that only served to make her seem bigger.

Peridot stepped up to the edge of the finger. “That’s them! They’re the ones I saw,” She said over her shoulder. “The ones that keep breaking my machines!”

The large gem lazily sauntered to her side to see, appearing almost bored by the whole event. She looked down, her eyes roving over the group until - they suddenly widened.

“Rose Quartz,” She drawled in a voice rough and low.

She leapt to the ground, pulling Lapis along with her. She straightened, her hands already in fists at her side.

“Jasper!” Peridot screeched, scrambled down the side of the ship on her own. “They keep interfering with my work!”

Jasper ignored her. “And here I thought this assignment would be another waste of my time, but you’re really here,” Jasper folded her arms over her chest, lifting her chin as she cast her gaze over the rest of the Crystal Gems. “And you’ve even managed to keep a few of your lackeys after all this time.”

Steven frowned to himself as she went down the line, insulting each of his family members, “A defective Pearl, a runt, and a shameless display, ha! About right for your army,” Jasper barked. Her eyes fell to Steven, and she gave a harsh chuckle. “And you’ve even got a little pet.”

Lapis, who had been sullenly hanging back the whole time, ran up to her. “He’s just a human, he’s not a threat!” She insisted.

Jasper continued on as if Lapis hadn’t spoken. “I’m glad I came,” She said conclusively, as if just deciding then. “Because now, I get to be the one to pay you back for everything you did!”

Without any more warning she launched herself across the sand while a flash of light left a helmet on her head, and just as Rose was tensing to meet her attack, Garnet shot ahead, clashing with Jasper gauntlet-to-helmet.

“What, is your leader too scared to fight me herself?” Jasper laughed as her and Garnet grappled.

“No,” Garnet snarled. “I just wanted to show you how shameless we really are!” She landed a punch to Jasper’s jaw that sent her staggering back a few feet.

Jasper glowered once she regained her balance. She pulled out a tool, a metallic gold stick that split into two prongs that sparked with electricity, and once again ran to meet Garnet.

Except this time when they collided Jasper sank the tool into Garnet's torso. Yellow lines zigzagged up her body. As Steven watched she fell and began to break apart, and then- she poofed.

Rose shot forward.

“Here we go,” Jasper smiled wickedly, apparently thrilled by her new opponent.

“Mom!” Steven shouted, panic closing like a fist around his heart. Amethyst held out an arm to stop him from intervening, as if Steven could have moved from the spot he felt rooted to even if he wanted to.

Rose dodged Jasper's first punch, using it to grab her arm and yank her in close, elbowing her in the chest. “You talk about me being scared, but you can’t win a fair fight?”

“Like anything you’ve ever done was fair,” Jasper shot back, straining as she struggled against Rose’s grip, and finally broke free, twisting herself around to throw Rose over her shoulder, roughly slamming her on her back into the ground.

She stood over Rose while she was struggling to her elbows. Her cheek scraped up, curls a mess around her face when she glared up at her.

Rose sprang to her feet, and in surprise Jasper reacted by thrusting the same tool she used on Garnet into her.

“Rose!” Amethyst and Pearl screamed at the same time that Steven yelled again, “mom!”

Rose Quartz’s gem fell to the sand.

Jasper picked it up, turning it over in her hands as she examined the flat top, the faceted sides that tapered down to an equally flat bottom Steven knew, but had never seen until that very moment, had been where his piece of the gem had once connected. 

“Stop,” Steven croaked. He pushed past Pearl and Amethyst who belatedly reached out for him. His eyes were burning with tears, his entire body buzzing as he ran. He had to protect his mom, he had to protect her.

“Heh, no wonder she turned traitor,” Jasper mused, seemingly talking to no one but herself. “Look at this defect.”

Stevens' voice was stronger this time when he yelled, “Stop!” Sliding to a halt in front of Jasper.

A flash of light momentarily blinded him, and when it faded a shield rested over his arm.

Everything stopped. It was as though even the wind and the ocean waves went still for just a moment. The shield was identical to his moms. It’s pink and blue surface the only colors appearing amongst the green.

Jasper looked just as shocked as Steven felt. Her face contorted with confusion that slowly morphed into rage.

Steven was beginning to shake from the exertion of keeping the shield in existence. It shimmered away, just as Jasper stomped up to him.

“Get away from him!” He heard Pearl yell.

“Fire a barrage!” Jasper shouted over her shoulder at Peridot.

Steven couldn’t see what Peridot did but in the next second a blast exploded behind him, the force shaking the ground and nearly blowing him off his feet.

Jasper grabbed him by the front of the shirt.

“And what are you supposed to be?” She rumbled, inches away from his face. Her gaze flickered downward to the piece of a gem exposed by Steven’s bunched up shirt. “What the-“

Steven pulled at Jasper's arm, kicked his legs desperately trying to find purchase, all to avail.

“I knew Rose Quartz was despicable, but this?” She said. “Disgusting.”

The last thing Steven saw was her head rushing towards his.

Chapter Text

Rose reformed in a cell.

As soon as she landed on the floor after solidifying she could feel the thrum of an engine through the soles of her feet. Around her, emerald green walls led to a yellow forcefield that buzzed nearly inaudibly with electricity. The ceiling was just a little too low for her to fully straighten up.

She looked down at herself, taking in her first new form in five thousand years. Her previous dresses full, tiered skirt was replaced with one that fell straight around her legs from the star cut out at her gem, fading from white to a dusky pink at the bottom. Flowers of the same shade followed along the neckline and continued on to create straps that draped over her upper arms.

She could hear a familiar voice singing, carrying through the ship's long, empty halls. Sapphire.

So the others were on board too.

Rose sighed heavily and slid down the wall, pressing a hand over her eyes.

She had acted thoughtlessly when she saw Garnet dissipated, overcome by rage and bolstered by ego when she went after Jasper. She should have confessed then, instead of trying to solve the problem with her fists.

Everyone would have been safe then, rather than on this ship with her, headed to their doom.

Immature and impulsive as ever, a voice in her head that sounded an awful lot like White Diamond chastised, And you thought you were becoming better? Ha! You will never learn.

“Heh, what a sight. Rose Quartz in a cell where she belongs.”

Rose’s head shot up upon hearing Jasper's voice. The orange gem stood on the other side of the forcefield with an all too smug smirk. Rose glared at her from where she sat on the floor.

“I’ve waited for this for five thousand years,” Jasper continued. “I always wanted to be the one to avenge her.”

Her came unexpectedly to Rose. Jasper’s mission was personal, then. Perhaps a friend lost to the war? Perhaps one that was something more? As hard as it was to imagine the angry gem before her ever being close with anyone, Rose had known many gems that softened around those they loved.

Jasper's mouth curled in a sneer as she leaned in closer, as if to tell Rose a secret. “I can’t wait to drag you before Yellow Diamond. Maybe she’ll even let me stay while she shatters each and every one of your little brigade of defects before she gets to you.”

Rose turned her stare to the floor in front of her. Jasper was trying to get a rise out of her, she wouldn’t give her that satisfaction.

“She might even be able to learn something useful from that little half-baked freak of a gem experiment of yours before she-“

As soon as she realized what, who, Jasper was referring to, Rose shot to her feet, stopping just inches short of slamming into the forcefield. “You let him go,” she growled. “Don’t touch him!”

Jasper laughed, a head thrown back, cruel guffaw. “There she is, the Rose Quartz that led the rebellion. Your cool, superior act doesn’t fool me,” Jasper smirked. She stepped away from the cell. “I’ll see you when we get to Homeworld.”

Rose was trembling all over as Jasper walked off, still laughing to herself, the sound reverberating between the walls and in Rose’s head.

Steven was on the ship. He was on the ship headed for Homeworld.

Rose summoned a shield, and with a cry shoved it into the forcefield.

Stinging pain shot through her body as the weapon, and the arm holding it, disappeared. She hissed and pulled back. Her arm reappeared after a moment.

The forcefield hadn’t been at all disrupted by the intrusion.

She screamed through clenched teeth, laying a punch at the wall next to her. Under her fist the metal groaned and warped.

Such a temper, the voice in her head from earlier tutted. A memory flooded her mind - a scream, a crack, a pink body turned white and face stretched in a permanent smile.

Rose bowed her forehead to the wall she had just dented, sobs beginning to shake her shoulders.

Once she composed herself there were more attempts. Rose tried throwing her shield at the forcefield, tried rolling her bubble through, tried the shield but bigger, and tried it all again.

None of it worked. Her only option left was to wait until they arrived on Homeworld.

“Where is she?!”

Jasper's enraged shout echoed through the ship. Rose sat up straighter as she strained to hear more and tried to imagine what that could mean.

Then she heard the door at the end of the hall slide open, and distinct, flip-flop clad footsteps coming before she saw him. “Steven!”

“Mom!” He exclaimed brightly as he came to a stop in front of her cell.

He had a darkening bruise around one partially-swollen shut eye, but otherwise he looked unharmed and even happy and that was enough to make relief flood Rose’s form. “What are- how did you-”

“I’ll explain everything but we’ve got to get Amethyst and Pearl first!” He said. He eyed her thoughtfully. “You might have to crawl, but it should-”

He began to reach out towards the forcefield. She bristled in panic. “No no no, Steven-!”

His hand went through as easily as through water. He turned, spreading his arm out to create a clear gap underneath. His body shook as he did, yellow lines racing across his skin, but he continued to beam proudly at her, and usually Rose wouldn’t allow him to potentially take on unseen damage to himself but in this case…

Rose did as he suggested and with some careful maneuvering, grateful for now having a smaller dress, she crawled out under Steven’s arm, and he stepped back from the field.

She grabbed him, crushing him to her and simply holding him. He was the one that pulled out of her grip, taking her hand to lead her through the halls.

Finding Amethyst and Pearls back-to-back cells wasn't hard, and soon the four of them were in the control room. Peridot was easy to take down and get wrapped up in Amethyst's whip, while Pearl confidently took the seat at the control panel - and if Rose felt a small thrill seeing Pearl in a pilot's seat again after so many years that was no one's business but hers.

On a nearby monitor Rose could see Garnet fighting Jasper. So that's where she was, she thought.

Not longer after the ship rumbled, knocking Rose off her feet.

“Shit!” She heard Amethyst curse amidst the chaos. She looked up to see her having fallen as well and a now-freed Peridot absorbed into an orb that sank back into the floor before Amethyst could reach her. An escape pod.

Outside the window the sky was tilting, the stars rushing by, and then the Earth came into view as they were crashing much too-fast towards it.

The door to the control room opened and there was Garnet. “The ship is going down!” 

“What about Lapis?” Steven cried.

Lapis was the least of Rose’s worries as she felt the ship break through the atmosphere and begin to rattle. “Everyone, get over here!”

She sat, pulling Steven closest to her chest and gathering the others between her legs. She put a bubble up around them, holding them tight in her arms and closing her eyes. She buried her face in Steven’s hair and hoped the bubble would hold.

The impact was rough but once everything went still they were all okay. Rose’s lion, much to her surprise and confusion, cleared the wreckage around them with a roar.

And just when they thought they were safe, Jasper appeared, miraculously - stubbornly - unharmed by the crash landing and somehow even angrier, and then Lapis Lazuli made her presence known too, and Jasper presented her with a terrible proposal.

“Fuse with me!”

“Don’t do it, Lapis!” Steven cried out.

“You don’t have to do this,” Rose called out to the blue gem across the sand. “We can protect you.”

Lapis glared at her, hatred burning in her eyes, and Rose knew her decision had been made even before she reached out for Jasper’s hand, knew that her counteroffer had never stood a chance of even being considered.

Their light grew and warped and came together in a fusion unlike any Rose had ever seen, monstrous, wrong, with six limbs and four eyes and a laugh in two separate voices like an echo. A water hand rose from the ocean to loom over them.

Rose didn’t take her eyes off the beast as she said to the others, “Obsidian. Now.” 

Suddenly the hand shot out - to wrap around the fusions wrist and morph into a chain, complete with a cuff that snapped into place, followed by another, and a third that wrapped around their torso, and began to pull them backwards over the sand.

They were dragged into the ocean, screaming and thrashing the whole way until they were out of sight below the waves.

In the quiet that followed Rose could only stare after them in horror as it slowly sank in that, at least for right then, it was over.

Chapter Text

Pearl couldn’t stop looking at the lion.

As she and Rose did an initial sweep of the debris for anything salvageable the pink creature was always nearby, dozing in the sand, watching them with a disinterested gaze, cleaning itself with its tongue, and following Rose whenever it deemed her to have gotten too far away.

Pearl had seen the lion once before - in the desert on a mission a couple months prior, and it had come to Rose then too. But animals tended to like Rose, and it had been gone again by the time they returned to the warp pad, and why would Rose have a lion and never mention it to Pearl? She simply hadn’t thought anything of it.

She felt a little silly now for not questioning its coloring.

Pearl wiped her brow once she and Rose set down a large part of the ship's control panel. “I should be able to reconnect these pieces and power it up,” She said. “Hopefully that will give us the location of her escape pod, and any messages she may have sent back to Homeworld before we took control of the ship…”

“Good,” Rose nodded. “We need to know if we should expect more ships soon…” 

She looked out over the ocean at the sky that was turning pink with dawn, but her gaze was distant and her shoulders slumped tiredly, and Pearl was reminded of a few days ago when Rose had come to them to admit she was more afraid then she had let on, that she needed them.

Pearl had been all too happy to oblige, having always guessed that Rose carried more than anyone, even Pearl, realized, and glad to finally know. She had vowed to be more attentive in the future.

She stepped over the pieces of wreckage between them to lay a hand on Rose’s arm. “I don’t believe I’ve told you yet, your new form is lovely,” She said softly, running a finger along the line of delicate fabric flowers across her chest.

A small smile turned up the corners of Rose’s lips, her eyes clearing as they refocused on Pearl. “You charmer,” She chuckled.

She guided Pearl into her arms, resting her chin atop her head while Pearl absentmindedly began to play with one of the curls that fell over Rose’s shoulder, twisting it around her finger and admiring the way the light played on the strands.

Pearl sighed. “I suppose it was for the best that Steven returned, though I hate that he had to witness any of that,” She lamented. She glanced up at Rose curiously. “Do you know why he came back anyway?”

“Greg probably shared with him something I told him a while ago,” Rose said.

“What?” Pearl couldn’t imagine what Rose had told Greg that would have compelled Steven to come to their rescue after they sent him away.

“That… if the conflict with Homeworld proved too much for us to handle, I would reveal the truth,” Rose answered measuredly. “About who I am.”

Pearl recoiled out of Rose’s arms that hung in the air for a moment longer as if still around her. Her head swam with a million thoughts at once - that Rose hadn’t told her , and how long had she been planning this, and of how close they had come to nearly losing her once again with Pearl none the wiser.

Ultimately the question that bubbled to the surface first was, “And y-you told Greg… everything?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I thought he deserved to know,” Was Rose’s easy reply.

Pearl felt like she was back on the hand ship as it crashed, out of control as the world tilted and spun and the floor crumbled beneath her.

For six thousand years their secret had been just that - their secret, and theirs alone. Pearl knew the whole truth, knew everything Rose hid away from others, and was honored to be the one to carry it with her, to protect it with careful deception and her own body and ordered silence. She was happy to do it, to be blessed with Rose’s whole self that no one else was allowed to know.

Rose had fraternized with humans for nearly as long, but no matter what she had with any of them, Pearl had been confident it would never be even close to what she had with her.

Rose had said they never needed to speak of their past again. Why had that changed?

Pearl sounded choked when she uttered a baffled, “What for?”

“If I was taken away I would never be able to return to Earth. I wanted him to know what had happened to me… to know that it was nothing he did,” She said, an ever so slight quiver in her voice. She took a breath and it was gone. “I thought Steven would deserve answers as well.”

“W-well, of course,” Pearl conceded. “But-“

Why now? Why him? What did I do wrong?

Pearl jerkily shook her head. “Rose, he could tell-”

“He wouldn’t,” Rose said. “He didn’t even tell Steven, only that I had a plan.”

“But you couldn’t have known that when you told him!” Pearl protested, her voice rising without her intending it to as she threw her arms out wildly.

“I do, because I know Greg.” Rose had nothing but certainty in her eyes when she looked at Pearl. She softened. “And he deserves to know me too.”

Pearl’s breath caught in her throat.

Rose really believed Greg could ever know her as well as Pearl did. Not only that, but she wanted him to, wanted him to fill a role that had only ever been Pearls

And if he did, if he could, then what use would she have for Pearl any more?

Pearl swallowed hard around the lump in her throat. “I… I think I saw a corner of the control board over there,” She said in as steadily a voice as she could manage, gesturing vaguely. “I’ll go look for it.”

Once she was out of sight around the cliff face tears burned at the corner of her eyes. Her footsteps quickened as her hands clenched in trembling fists at her side. 

As though a human could ever understand the things her and Rose had been through together! They were too short lived, and far too near-sighted because of it. They hadn't even made it out of their own solar system yet. Greg wasn’t there for the war. Greg didn’t even know who the Diamonds were! 

Pearl gave an angry huff. Rose would see that, and Greg would realize he could never hope to have that kind of connection with her.

Pearl only had to help them to reach that inevitable conclusion.

Everyone seemed to be in a better mood when Greg showed up at the temple that morning than when he returned the night before.

Steven’s grisly-looking black eye had been healed by Rose as soon as they had the chance, and he and Connie were cheerfully chatting while digging up small pieces of the scattered ship. Nearby, Amethyst was holding a broken tube that leaked a silvery substance, asking Garnet “do you dare me to drink it?” to which Garnet flatly replied “I don’t.”

A little ways down the beach, Rose was walking backwards, dragging a chunk of green metal that was easily as tall as her through the sand. Greg watched Pearl rush over to her, say something that got Rose grinning and giving a quick nod, dropping the piece of ship to the ground to instead take Pearl's hands.

Rose spun Pearl around and pulled her in, turning to light as they drew close, and becoming Rainbow Quartz.

The fusion lifted the piece of metal Rose had been dragging with ease, and carried it over to toss on top of the growing pile below the house.

“Rainbooow!” Steven shouted when he saw her, running and leaping into her expectant arms. She giggled, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

Greg strolled over to them. “H-hey, Rainbow,” He greeted with an awkward little wave. He had gotten used to Rainbow Quartz since the first time he saw her, she was a common enough presence around the beach house, and despite the animosity of their initial meeting she was friendly enough, and Steven absolutely adored her.

But Greg had never quite figured out how to interact with her, given his vastly different relationships with the two gems that made her, and what she represented between them.

“Hello,” She greeted in return.

“Are you going to help us with the clean up?” Steven asked her hopefully.

Later, once most of the beach was free of debris Rainbow bid goodbye to a disappointed Steven, and shrank back down to her components.

Pearl and Rose came back to themselves in each other's arms, Pearl looking up at Rose with a half-lidded gaze, and Rose with a dopey smile on her lips. They parted to follow Steven up to the house to start dinner, Pearl keeping an arm looped through Rose’s as they walked side by side.

Halfway up the steps Pearl glanced back over her shoulder, her eyes finding Greg's, with raised eyebrows and a smirk radiating smugness before she turned to face ahead again.

Greg blinked, confused by the look. But it was a familiar one, as was the feeling of long-subdued petty jealousy suddenly stirring in his chest.

It only took him a moment to remember that that was ridiculous, and another to place the expression he hadn’t seen since an unspoken truce between him and Pearl had formed after Steven was born.

And once he did, his first thought was oh no, here we go again.

Chapter Text

Steven could feel a new tension between Pearl and his dad.

Sure, they had never had the easy banter that his dad and Amethyst did, or even the obvious mutual respect between him and Garnet, but Pearl had always helped him fix the van when there was a problem and made extra whenever she knew he would be around for dinner, and his dad was as friendly with Pearl as he was with everyone!

So Steven wasn’t sure why that had suddenly changed.

But now, every time his mom and dad were together, Pearl would appear.

“Oh hello, Greg,” She would greet in a voice that sounded just a bit too cheerful to Steven.

Sometimes, she would inform Rose of something that needed her attention elsewhere - “Garnet says there’s a corrupted gem near a town in the west!” “I finally managed to hack into Peridots escape pod, would you come take a look?” “Rose, can we talk in my room for a moment?” (that must have been a long talk, Steven figured, since neither reappeared until later that night, long after Greg had gone back to his van.)

Or she would sit in on whatever his dad and mom had been doing prior to her arrival, wrapping herself around Rose, jumping into the conversation wherever possible while ignoring most anything Greg said. Steven's dad didn't do anything, except occasionally getting a sour look on his face.

And that was if his mom was there in the first place, and not already off somewhere with Pearl, as it seemed she was a lot more than usual recently.

All the gems had been a little on edge since everything that had happened with the hand ship and Jasper and Peridot. Maybe Pearl just needed a distraction! And when Steven saw Connie swinging her violin bow at a bunch of seagulls to scare them away from their snack he had the perfect one!

“You should teach Connie to sword fight!”

Beside him, Connie’s cheeks darkened with a blush. “Steven!” She hissed at him.

Pearl balked at the suggestion, but Rose got up from the couch to lean over her with starry eyes. “Oh, that’s a wonderful idea!”

“Connie’s really good!” Steven persisted, bolstered by his mothers approval. “She helped me fight that evil clone of herself, and some mean seagulls just now, and… uh,” He trailed off, realizing he had run out of examples. He shrugged. “She plays tennis, it can’t be that different, right?”

“I don’t know…” Pearl said.

“You should do it, Pearl!” Rose encouraged, squeezing her shoulders.

“She’s awfully young to begin something like this…” Pearl said hesitantly. A glance up at Rose’s face made her crack a sly smile. “Though, I suppose I was only a few thousand years old when I began fighting alongside you.”

Connie’s hand shot into the air. Steven looked to her curiously, as did Pearl and Rose. “Please, I want to learn!” She exclaimed, before flushing again at the outburst. “I mean, I don't know what'll happen in the future, but if something dangerous comes along, I don't wanna be a burden, I want to help! I wanna be there for Steven, to fight by his side!“

Steven beamed, a mix of pride and excitement filling his chest. Connie wanted to fight by his side, Connie wanted to be by his side.

“The Earth is my home too,” Connie said finally, looking at Pearl hopefully. “Can't I help protect it?”

Rose wasn’t the only one with starry eyes then, Pearl staring at Connie with awe.

There was no more argument after that, as she quickly ushered them all off to the Sky Arena for Connie’s first lesson.

Steven was getting worried.

Pearl was an excellent teacher - only a few weeks of training under her belt and Steven thought Connie already looked so cool and like a master sword fighter!

But some of the things Pearl said to Connie during that training made Steven… uncomfortable.

“Don’t you want him to live?” Pearl pressed when Connie hung back a moment after a rough-looking tumble. Steven wanted to interrupt, but before he had the chance Connie threw herself back into the fight, more fierce than before.

After another class, Pearl showed Connie how to clean her sword, and as she did she lectured, “We don’t do this for praise. We dedicate ourselves to our cause, and our liege, not for recognition, but because we know it is the most worthwhile thing we can do with the existence we’ve been given.”

Steven didn’t think that sounded right, but Connie readily agreed, “Yes, ma’am.”

Once, Pearl gathered Steven and Connie on the steps of the arena to project remembered battles from her gem, to equal parts amazement and horror from them.

“And when you need motivation, to remember why you fight, you think about the life you'll have together after the war,” Pearl said, watching her past-self absorb the blow of an enemy's axe before the projection went out.

She blinked back to the present as though having forgotten where she was and her gaze locked on Connie. “And perhaps that life won’t be how you imagined it,” She sighed. “But - it will still have been worth it, because no one can take your place after everything you did for them.”

Connie listened, clearly hanging on every word from Pearl's mouth.

Things like, “you’re just a human but that doesn’t mean you can’t make yourself useful.” “Even when we are overlooked or cast aside, we remain loyal.” “When you live to protect someone, you must be prepared to die.” “We have to trust that our role in their life is an important one.”

Steven didn't want Connie to ever feel any of those things! Like she had to make fighting alongside the Crystal Gems her entire life, or like she was only important if she was useful, or like someday he might not like her as much.

He groaned, slumping forward over the counter after the warp pad activated, taking Connie and Pearl away to the Sky Arena for another lesson while he still struggled with how to tell Connie all that.

“Steven?” His mom was suddenly at his side without him having heard her approach. She sat on the stool next to him, resting a hand on his back. “What’s wrong?”

Steven chewed the inside of his cheek while he mulled over his response. “I think Pearl is taking Connie’s sword training too far…” He admitted. “She keeps telling Connie that she has to devote her entire life to fighting and that I’ll only think she’s important if she does. But that’s not true! Connie is my best friend and I don’t want her to get hurt!”

He looked at his mom for reassurance, instead to see that she looked stricken. “Oh no,” She breathed.

Without another word she stood and headed for the warp pad. 

“Wait!” Steven cried, jumping down to follow on her heels. “Where are you going?”

They arrived at the Sky Arena to find Pearl in the middle of addressing Connie, who stood ridgid, straight backed as a soldier at attention in front of her.

“Remember Connie, you will only ever matter as much as what you’re willing to give.”

Connie gave a sharp nod. “Yes ma’am.” 

“Then, let us begin!” With that Pearl threw her hands out. Thick clouds began to roll across the arena, closing in on the pair at the center.

“Stop!” Rose shouted, her voice projecting through the empty ruins. 

Pearl's head shot up at the voice. The clouds of fog retreated as quickly as they had begun to advance. “Rose?”

Hiking up her dress, Rose dashed down the stairs. “Pearl, what are you doing?”

Connie turned, similarly surprised when she saw him running towards her. “Steven?”

He gripped her arms. “Connie, I don’t want you to do this any more,” He said, shaking his head vigorously. “Not like this.”

“Steven,” Pearl chastised behind them. “This is Connie’s choice.”

“Pearl, I- I thought we were past this…” Rose said.

Pearl startled. “Past what?” She asked, eyebrows shooting up in confusion.

“Past you- letting yourself get hurt for me!” Rose exclaimed. “And now you’re telling Connie that she needs to do the same!”

“I’m doing this for you!” Connie said to Steven. “To prove I’m worthy of being by your side!”

“You are worthy!” He said. “You don’t have to do anything!”

“But-”

“I’m not telling Connie to let herself be hurt!” Pearl gasped, a hand flying to her chest at Rose’s accusation. “Of course, things happen in the heat of battle that no one can predict. She needs to be prepared to protect Steven-”

“That’s not Connie’s responsibility,” Rose said firmly. “Just like it’s never been your responsibility to protect me!”

“Connie wants to be of use to the Crystal Gems, just like I did,” Pearl insisted.

Stepping up to the other gem to look in her eyes, Rose’s voice was softer when she asked, “Pearl, you know how much I care about you, right?”

Pearl blinked, clearly confused by this turn in the conversation. “Y-yes?”

“That has never been because of your usefulness,” Rose asserted. “It was never determined by the risks you took or the battles you fought. If you never picked up a sword it wouldn’t have changed that!”

Pearl shook her head, wide eyed, desperation almost palpable in her voice, “This is how I show that I care about you, too!”

“You show me that in so many other ways,” Rose said, reaching out to take Pearl's hands. “When you get groceries for Steven and bring home my favorite ice cream, or you help me in the garden-”

“Like how Connie lets me borrow her books and doesn’t mind when I keep them extra long!” Steven enthusiastically interjected.

A smile slowly crept onto Connie’s face along with understanding, and she added, “Or how Steven always texts me before I leave for school…”

Rose flashed a warm look at the pair before turning back to Pearl, letting go of one hand to cup her cheek.

Pearl leaned into the touch, closing her eyes. “I don’t want to see you hurt. Again.”

“And I don’t want to see you hurt,” Rose said. “And I know Steven doesn’t want to see Connie hurt.”

Pearl let out a breath that seemed to deflate her. “You’re right,” She finally said. She looked to Connie and Steven, stepping out of Rose’s grasp to come crouch in front of them, putting a hand on each of their shoulders. “I see how much you two care about each other, I should never have tried to insinuate otherwise.”

Connie clutched her sword to her chest. “C-can I still keep training?”

Before Pearl could answer Steven burst out, “Oh! Oh! And can I train with her? We can fight together!”

Pearl gave a surprised laugh, even if it sounded a little tired. “I think that’s a wonderful idea,” She agreed, then brightened. “You’ll have a lot of catching up to do though, Connie has proven to be a very quick learner and…”

Steven grinned at Connie as Pearl rambled on with growing excitement about her plans for them, and started to feel excited as well about getting to fight at his best friend's side.

Chapter Text

“You guys don’t think she’s going to come here looking for you, do you?”

Greg lowered his mug to glance anxiously around the group seated at the coffee table, his gaze finally settling on Rose at his side.

Thoughtfully, she replied, “No…”

“Peridot came to do something in the kindergarten, we were just an inconvenience,” Garnet expanded for her.

“Would Homeworld really try to take over this place again?” Amethyst asked skeptically, taking one of the used tea bags from a plate at the center of the table and tossing it in her mouth. “Y’know, after what happened last time? When you guys kicked their butts?”

“Homeworld is… extremely persistent. A small rebellion five thousand years ago won’t deter them from getting what they want,” Rose said, staring down into her mug. To the larger question she answered, “The only way to know is to check if the injectors are on.”

“What are injectors?” Greg asked nervously.

“Oh, Greg,” Pearl tittered. With a sweet smile she said, “Sometimes I forget how little you know about gemkind!”

Steven’s hand shot up. “I wanna know what injectors are!”

“Well Steven,” Pearl's gem lit up as she projected a diagram of an injector into the space in the middle of their small circle. “An injector plants gems in the ground,” She explained. “Where they incubate until the gem is ready to take form and emerge for the first time. The process is extremely damaging to the environment around it though, as you seen.”

“And Homeworld- Peridot, wants to start doing that again?” Greg asked, recoiling in alarm.

“One way to find out,” Garnet said, setting her nearly-empty cup of hot chocolate on the table and standing.

As Pearl, Amethyst, and Steven all followed her to the warp pad Rose quickly kissed Greg.

“Should Steven be going on this one?” He asked, glancing at their son eagerly waiting with the other gems.

“Aww, dad!” Steven groaned.

Pearl scoffed. “Steven will be perfectly safe, Greg,” She assured.

“We’re only going to look around,” Rose said. “We’ll be back before you know it.”

The kindergarten appeared the same as ever when they arrived; the air still and quiet in an eerie, unnatural way, the cavern dim as dusk even in the middle of the day. Their footsteps crunched on the dry ground.

It didn’t take long to determine that the injectors weren’t active, and hadn’t been since they were stopped five thousand years earlier. A check of the perimeter revealed nothing out of the ordinary either, but while they were split up Steven came across something - someone - else.

“Peridot!” Several voices yelled at once when they came across the two together.

The chase was on, as Peridot did everything to avoid them, including scaling the canyon walls, electrifying Amethyst's whip to get out of it, and using her floating metal fingers as a propeller to fly.

“Oh no you don’t,” Rose snarled.

She launched herself into the air, arms stretched out to grab the green gem the second she was within range.

But just before she could close them around her, Peridot swerved and soared higher, and Rose began to drop back to the ground.

Soon it became clear they weren’t going to capture her, as infuriating as that was when she taunted them until she was out of earshot, and Rose, Pearl, and Amethyst eventually turned to see where Steven and Garnet had gotten off to. 

What they found was a gaping square hole in the ground leading down to the control room they had discovered months ago.

“Do you think they’re down there?” Amethyst scrunched her nose at the prospect.

From the tunnel a voice echoed up to them, its words indistinguishable but definitely Garnet, except… her tone was… wrong.

With that confirmation the three of them jumped in to slide down the incline. As they got closer to the bottom Rose could hear more clearly what was being said.

“This is punishment for the rebellion,” Garnet growled roughly. Followed by a higher, warbly tone crying, “It’s not our fault!”

“Garnet?” Steven’s voice asked, just as they came to a stop at the bottom of the pit.

“What’s going on?” Pearl asked as they took in the scene before them, Steven’s expression filled with concern, Garnet with her back to him, her entire body trembling, her visor gone to reveal haunted, teary-eyes. Odd bundles of multicolored limbs scuttled across the floor.

Garnet’s gaze locked on Rose’s desperately when she saw her, a shudder going through her body.

“Uh,” Amethyst said, crouching to poke at one of the squirming conjoined pairs of feet. “What are these things?”

“Don’t touch them!” Garnet snapped. Behind her, Rose could see Steven wince.

Rose hadn’t seen Garnet so shaken since immediately after the corruption blast at the end of the war, and she didn’t understand what was the cause of it now, but whatever it was about these… things that had rattled her, she knew it would be best for Garnet to get away from there.

“Garnet, maybe you should go back to the temple,” Rose suggested gently.

Garnet didn’t seem to have heard her. “W-we need to- p-poof and bubble all of t-them.”

Rose put a hand on her shoulder, finally getting her attention. “We’ll take care of them,” She promised. “Go home.”

Garnet stared at her with unfocused eyes for a long moment, then took a wavering breath and stiffly walked past Rose, her steps nearly robotic, and began the climb back up the slope.

“What the heck was that about?” Amethyst wondered aloud once she was gone.

Steven fiddled with his hands in front of him, looking down. “Well…”

Rose felt completely hollow by the time she was deposited on the warp pad back home.

Once Steven explained what had happened while he and Garnet were down in the control room, and what those horrible, writhing jumbles of legs and arms were, she understood Garnet's distress.

And then she, Pearl, and Amethyst spent the next couple hours finding as many of the abominations as they could, and dissipating and bubbling them.

And all the while, all Rose could think was it’s my fault.

The broken pieces, the remains of dead gems - Crystal Gem and Homeworld soldier alike - that made up those experiments, had gotten shattered fighting Rose’s war.

And not only had they died because of Rose, but all that remained of them and their consciousness had been forced into one of the most intimate, should-be-sacred acts imaginable, all to get back at Rose. All to punish her for everything she had done.

How many more gems had she hurt, without even knowing?

Rose turned on the dais and opened the temple door.

Inside the Burning Room Garnet sat on the edge of the lava pit, her hands resting in fists on top of her thighs, facing straight ahead, visor in place making her expression unreadable, still as a statue even after Rose entered.

“We… took care of them,” Rose said quietly, kneeling in front of her on the stone floor. When Garnet didn’t answer or so much as indicate that she had heard her, Rose hung her head. She closed her eyes to hold back tears. “I’m so sorry, Garnet.”

A shudder ran through Garnet's form. Rose looked up. “It’s our fault,” Garnet whispered in a trembling, breaking voice. “We- I showed them fusion.”

Rose’s hands flew to cover Garnet’s, rising onto her knees. “No,” Rose shook her head vehemently. “No. You didn’t have any part in the creation of those things.”

Another shudder. “They must feel so…”

Garnet broke off, sucking in her bottom lip to stop it from wobbling. Rose practically crushed her to her in a fierce embrace.

She could feel Garnet begin to cry against her, stifled sobs shaking her body and wetness falling on Rose’s shoulder. Her hands clung to Rose like a lifeline, and Rose was more than willing to be one as she let her own tears fall.

Chapter Text

“Greg, are you… staying for dinner? How wonderful…”

“And then we- Oh Greg, relax, you know what our missions are like-”

“That’s alright Greg, a human such as yourself can’t be expected to have six thousand years of knowledge at their disposal.”

Pearl's little jabs throughout the meal were incessant, and as delicious as the chicken and broccoli were Greg left afterwards with a sour taste in his mouth.

He refused to reciprocate, he would not let himself be dragged into some dumb rivalry with her again, and especially not in front of Steven. That wasn’t the kind of example he was setting for his son!

But as much as he tried to remain impassive, Pearl still knew all of his buttons to push and time didn’t seem to have given her any kind of perspective on how ridiculous this feud was.

Greg sighed, pulling open the back doors of the van and climbing in.

He hadn’t been out there long when he heard the gentle rustle of fabric and shifting of sand, and Rose appeared around the side of the vehicle, carrying a bowl of steaming apple crisp.

“Steven insisted I bring this to you,” She said, holding out the bowl for him before sitting at his side. “He wouldn’t let Amethyst get her hands on any until I did.”

Greg laughed, taking the dish. “It’s much appreciated.”

“Why did you leave so soon?” 

Greg dug the spoon into a soft piece of apple and crumble. “I just wasn’t really in the mood to deal with Pearl trying to goad me into a fight.”

A long silence followed. When it started to go on too long without an answer he looked up to find Rose staring at him like he had spoken in a foreign language. “W-what?”

“You know,” He implored, and in a purposefully bad imitation of Pearl's voice, “‘Oh Greg, you humans are so dumb,’ ‘I fought a six armed beast, what did you do today?’”

Rose blinked, eyebrows creasing. “She- but… I thought…”

“It’s okay,” Greg said with a shrug. “I just didn’t have the patience for it tonight.”

“Why would she want to fight with you though?” Rose asked, sounding absolutely baffled.

“I mean, it’s not like it’s anything new,” Greg snorted. “Pearl hasn’t liked me since the moment she laid eyes on me, or actually, since I laid eyes on you.”

After another pause Rose admitted, “I don’t understand.”

Greg realized then that she was completely serious - and looking more troubled by the second. All those years, she hadn’t simply been ignoring the petty drama between him and Pearl, letting them hash it out themselves or simply afraid to rock the boat by getting in the middle of it, but apparently hadn’t even noticed it had been going on.

Greg put the bowl aside on the floor of the van and turned to her. “Pearl is trying to- I don’t even know anymore, drive me away, make my life difficult?” He explained. “She’s jealous. Heck, I used to be of her too.”

“Why?”

Greg laughed. “Because- because you’re awesome, Rose!” He threw his arms out to gesture to her. “Pearl and I, we both want to be loved by you!”

“But you are!” Rose exclaimed.

“I know that, now,” He conceded. “But Pearl… she probably doesn’t understand that, that you can love us both. She sees it as a competition, and she wants to get rid of her competitor.”

“Pearl… Pearl knows I love her,” Rose shook her head vigorously, curls bouncing around her face with the movement. “She just isn’t as fond of humans, and sometimes she can be insensitive, but she wouldn’t…”

She looked away with a huff of frustration.

“It’s always been this way, Rose,” Greg said softly, leaning forward to catch her eye. “It’s not your fault or anything.”

“But then- why didn’t either of you tell me?”

Greg shrugged. “It was kind of like an unspoken rule, getting you involved would be like, cheating. I don’t know about her, but I didn’t want to force you to choose. And, I guess, maybe I was scared that if you did… I wouldn’t be your choice.”

Because how could he hope to be, when Pearl had been with Rose for at least six thousand years, and was the same species, and was, as much as he had hated to admit it, actually pretty cool. What did Greg have to offer Rose, beyond some cheesy songs and a good time? How could he matter to her, when his lifespan would be a blip in hers and he’d be gone in less than a century?

“But I don’t want to choose between you and Pearl!” Rose exclaimed. “I don’t get- argh! Why do I have to?”

“You don’t! Or at least, I don’t think you do,” Greg said. “Look, I don’t know what set Pearl off again, I actually kind of thought we were okay now. But it’s her problem, and I can handle it,” He reached out to take her hand. “I’m not going anywhere until you tell me to.”

Rose still looked troubled, glancing back towards the house where she had left Pearl, and Greg began to wonder with growing unease what might happen, what might change, now that she knew about the battle that had been happening right in front of her that whole time.

Chapter Text

After Greg pointed it out, Rose began to take notice of the way that Pearl treated him, the cutting remarks, dismissive responses, the contempt in every action, and started to wonder how she ever could have been so oblivious to all of it.

(How she was, again, oblivious to the hurt she caused the ones she loved the most.)

Meanwhile, Peridot was becoming a pain.

After their run in in the Kindergarten they saw her next on Steven’s television screen, broadcasting a panicked plea to Yellow Diamond to send help that likely wasn’t reaching Homeworld, but was interrupting Steven and Greg’s cartoon watching.

“There’s no need to get worked up over your primitive entertainment,” Pearl tutted at Greg when he asked if it could be fixed before a program he was looking forward to that night, ignoring the fact that Steven was being far more melodramatic about the disruption then he was.

Rose laid a hand on her shoulder. “It’s important to them, Pearl,” She reminded her.

It didn’t take long for the Crystal Gems to shut off the signal by destroying the communication hub that Peridot had haphazardly ‘fixed’.

A few days later, they ambushed her while she was attempting to rebuild the Homeworld warp, piece-by-decimated-piece, and chased her off once again. When they returned home Greg was waiting to ask Rose how it went, receiving an icy glare from Pearl before she stalked off.

Next, Peridot lured them to an ancient gem ship. Rather than responding with his usual eagerness when asked if he wanted to come, Steven hesitated, explaining that he already had plans with his dad.

“You can come with us and see a vessel that brought gems to Earth six thousand years ago,” Pearl coaxed. “Or you can go help Greg with his… car washing sale.”

“You shouldn’t say it like that,” Rose rebuffed lightly, attempting to keep her tone cheerful. “Spending the afternoon with Greg would be just as exciting as with us!”

Pearl didn’t look convinced. “Of course,” She said, clearly only humoring her. “But-“

She was interrupted by Steven’s excited yell of, “I wanna see a spaceship!”

They almost succeeded in capturing Peridot that time! Until she dislocated her foot from the rest of her leg, and flew away, leaving them with the disgusting, smoking appendage.

Her attempts were becoming more and more reckless and poorly thought out the more they were thwarted. Rose couldn’t begin to guess what she would try next, and it was starting to feel like a game she had once watched Greg play at Funland with a mallet, wacking tiny Earth creatures as they popped up.

Mix that with Malachite, and keeping an eye out for any lingering fusion experiments, and Rose was beginning to envy Steven, sleeping peacefully while she and Pearl watched.

Rose sighed, leaning into Pearl's touch as she ran her fingers through Rose’s hair. The soothing motion was slowly easing the tension from her body, and quiet nights with Pearl were becoming the most calm Rose got while everything was so hectic in the daytime. But even then, refusing to be ignored, were questions that sat on the tip of Rose’s tongue whenever she and Pearl were together.

She owed it to Greg and Pearl both to try to fix what she had done, the animosity and hurt that had brewed between them because of her, and, if nothing else, she had learned from Greg that the best place to start was with a conversation.

Mustering the courage, she finally began, “Greg told me something the other day…”

She felt more than heard Pearl give a heaving sigh at the mention of Rose’s other lover, and an unenthused, “Mhm?”

Behind them, the stairs creaked. Rose and Pearl both turned.

Halfway up the steps to the loft, frozen in place when she saw them at the exact same moment they saw her, was Peridot.

Rose and Pearl were on their feet Instantly. Pearl launched herself down the stairs after Peridot, who in her attempt to quickly retreat instead tumbled backwards down the steps.

Rose jumped down from the loft. “Garnet! Amethyst!” She yelled, hoping they could hear, and in Amethyst's case wouldn’t ignore, her from inside the temple.

“Wh-what’s going- ahh!” Steven blearily took in the scene as he woke.

Peridot made a run for the door that Pearl blocked. Turning and seeing Rose approaching from behind Peridot darted into the kitchen.

The temple door opened.

“Peridot?!” Amethyst exclaimed as she and Garnet ran in.

“What are you doing here?” Pearl demanded, bracing herself on the other side of the kitchen counter, ready to leap in whatever direction Peridot went.

“My plans here are none of your business!” Peridot screeched. “I just need to get off this measly planet!”

While Pearl kept her distracted in front Rose approached from the side, only to be suddenly frozen mid-step by a beam from one of Peridot's fingers, before she was flung backwards into the window seat across the room.

Peridot ran out of the kitchen, around Steven who had quickly joined the fray with his shield, and dashed for the warp pad.

Amethyst's whip snapped, looping around her torso and pinning Peridot’s arms. Garnet strode up with even, measured steps, gauntlets ready on her hands.

Peridot's eyes widened with panic as she realized she was cornered. “Wait wait wait,” She gasped. “You need me! I’m the only one who knows about the-“

In the blink of an eye Peridot’s midsection was crushed in Garnet’s gauntlets.

The resounding pop of a gem poofing was followed by several heavy thuds and smaller clinks as what had appeared to be her arms and legs fell to the floor instead of dissipating with her.

“Ew, what the heck?” Amethyst exclaimed, crouching to pick up one of the fingers rolling across the floor.

“The nerve of that gem,” Pearl immediately began ranting. “Showing up in our house-!”

“Did it sound like she… was trying to tell us something?” Steven asked uneasily, his hands fidgeting anxiously in front of him.

“Those were just the desperate lies of a gem who’s been caught,” Garnet said, sending the green gem away in a bubble with a tap. “Don’t worry about it.”

Once Garnet said it, Rose realized she wasn’t so sure she agreed. She had heard many desperate lies from gems in trouble in her time, usually they consisted of things vague and never fully divulged, in part for the gem to retain their importance, and thus insure their safety, and in part because there was never anything to actually divulge.

Perhaps what Peridot had been about to say would have been just like all those other lies…

But pieces started to come together in Rose’s mind- Peridot's urgency and growing desperation to get off Earth the longer she was there, to the point that she would dare to infiltrate enemy territory for whatever purpose, and her odd worries about the danger of staying on the planet that Rose had previously written off as Homeworld propaganda.

It started to paint a picture that Rose didn’t like.

“Steven might be right,” Rose interjected. “We should talk to her.”

Steven brightened, as the other gems looked at her incredulously.

“Rose,” Pearl began uncertainly. “Are you sure that’s the best idea? We only just managed to neutralize her, letting her out may be… risky.”

“We have the advantage,” Rose assured her and the others. “She’ll be unprepared and without those… things,” She gestured with a grimace to the leftover arms and legs scattered across the floor. “When we release her. We can easily keep her secured in the temple.”

“I doubt she actually knows anything worthwhile,” Garnet said, though she sounded more resigned than anything.

“If Homeworld is planning something - like we’ve suspected since Peridot first showed up on Earth - she’s our best bet of finding out what it is. And if she doesn’t know anything we’ll be at no loss by talking to her.”

“Yeah!” Steven cheered, pumping a fist in the air. “Let’s talk to Peridot!”

Pearl balked, opening her mouth to object before Rose beat her to it. “Not this time, Steven,” She said with an apologetic smile. “Peridot probably won't be too eager to speak to us, it might take a while to get anything from her. You should get some sleep.”

Garnet walked up to his side, laying a hand on his head. “You won't be missing anything.”

When Steven pouted but didn’t argue any more Rose turned, the others quickly falling in step behind her.

“Alright! I’ve always wanted to be part of an interrogation!” Amethyst said, running alongside them. “Can I be bad cop?”

Rose stopped.

Amethyst had already been exposed to a lot more of the conflict with Homeworld, and in turn their ideology, then Rose would have ever liked. From their encounters she knew that Peridot had a big mouth and an even bigger attitude, and the last thing she wanted was for Amethyst around to hear whatever nonsense crossed Peridot's lips, anything that would irrevocably change her view of them, or worse, herself.

“You stay here with Steven,” She said. “Make sure he gets back to bed.”

Amethyst's jaw dropped. “But- but-“

“Too many of us in there could make Peridot feel threatened and less likely to open up,” Rose lied. “And you’ll be our last line of defense if she does escape.”

Amethyst continued to stare up at her with a mix of confusion and indignation written across her features until Rose broke eye contact first, before she could feel more guilty then she already did, and continued on to the temple door.

Her, Pearl, and Garnet entered the Burning Room, the door shutting behind them as they located the new bubble containing Peridot’s gem, pulled it down, and let it pop.

Chapter Text

“Ugh! I can’t believe they left us out here!”

Steven had been watching Amethyst pace the length of the room from counter to coffee table, occasionally shooting a glare at the temple door, for at least a half an hour now.

“I know,” Steven lamented, crossing his arms over his chest. “It was my idea to talk to Peridot!”

“Yeah!” Amethyst agreed. “Peridot could be in there telling them that we’re about to have a dozen armies on our doorsteps and we’re supposed to just- find out secondhand?” 

“Wouldn’t Homeworld just have, like, one really big army?” Steven asked around a yawn. Being woken up in the middle of the night by an ambush was starting to catch up with him. “Why would they have a dozen?”

Amethyst froze. “I don’t- psh, I don’t know! You know what I mean, Steven!”

She continued to pace, until suddenly she stopped. “We should just go in there.”

“What?” Steven exclaimed, sitting up straighter.

“We shouldn’t have to wait to hear whatever they find out - if they even tell us,” She said bitterly, rolling her eyes. “Let’s just go in there and hear it for ourselves!”

“I think they would just make us leave again,” Steven said skeptically.

Amethyst grinned wickedly. “I didn’t say we should be seen…”

That's how the two of them ended up with their heads in a puddle in Amethyst's room; a puddle that came out on the other side through the ceiling of the Burning Room.

“…want to help you. But we need your help,” Stevens' mom was saying in a gentle voice, the same one she used when he was little to coax him into a bath or to eat his vegetables.

“Yeah right,” Peridot drawled sarcastically. “That's why you’re keeping me in your bubble dungeon, to help me.”

From above the pink tubes and through different colored bubbles Steven could see Pearl and Garnet standing to one side of the room, underneath the door a few feet up the wall. Neither had their weapons drawn but Pearl looked ready to draw a spear at any moment.

Rose sat on the stone floor with her back to the other two, her dress pooled around her and her hands resting in her lap. 

A few feet in front of her was Peridot, except, she was small, with tiny, normal hands and non-floating fingers, and little green-socked feet, all pulled tight into her chest as she curled into herself.

Steven very nearly gasped aloud seeing her, only stifling it after receiving a warning look from Amethyst.

Rose visibly took a breath. “This… ‘cluster’-“

“I already told you, I’m not telling you anything, you malformed Quartz!” Peridot screeched.

Turning their heads just slightly in the small space, Steven and Amethyst exchanged a glance that confirmed their equal confusion. Cluster ?

Pearl bristled, stomping forward to stand over Rose’s shoulder. “Listen here you tiny twerp, the only reason you’re out of that bubble is to tell us what you know and if you won’t then I will put you in another one faster then-“

“I’ll shatter before I reveal anything to the likes of you!” Peridot shouted back.

Rose turned to look over her shoulder, raising a hand. “Pearl. Please,” She urged, so quietly Steven almost didn’t hear it. Pearl glared at Peridot for a second longer before backing up.

Rose turned back to Peridot. “You’re scared,” She said slowly, softly. “Of being on Earth when Homeworld's plan unfolds. But if you help us prevent it -“

“If I have to shatter for Yellow Diamond to get what she wants, th-then so be it!” Peridot said, her voice shaky.

Oh!” Rose gasped. “But you’re worth so much more than that!”

“Ahh! Your mind games won’t work on me, you clod!”

There was a long silence, where Steven’s mom sat with her mouth open. Then she abruptly stood up and turned to Pearl and Garnet. “Let's give her a minute.”

The three of them leapt the short distance to the doorway, and Steven and Amethyst pulled their heads back into Amethyst's room.

“She’s not talkin’” Amethyst said, flopping onto her back. “And what was that about a- cluster?”

“I don’t know. Hmph,” Steven crossed his arms with a thoughtful pout.

A moment later he asked, “Do you think they’re back yet?”

Without waiting for an answer, he stuck his head in the puddle. 

“Wh-what?!” He scanned the room frantically before he pulled back. “She’s gone!”

“What?”

“Peridot's not in there!” He cried.

They both shoved their head in the water, peering out the other side into a room that was distinctly Peridot-free.

“Where’d she go?” Steven wondered aloud.

“There!” Amethyst's arm burst through the puddle to point across the room, to a green foot quickly disappeared from view up one of the pipes leading out of the room.

They looked at each other with wide eyes. “She’s in the temple,” Amethyst groaned.

“We have to tell the others!”

She stopped him with a hand on his chest. “No! Hold on! We can find her,” she said. “We can find her, and that way we prove to the others that we can handle ourselves!”

It was quickly decided that Amethyst would jump down into the Burning Room and follow Peridot up the same pipe, while Steven searched the connecting rooms - without getting caught by the others.

He looked in Pearl's room first, getting thoroughly soaked as he waded through the water to check behind, and even under, the towers. 

Then he poked his head through the clouds into his moms room - and found his mom, Garnet, and Pearl huddled close. “…some kind of weapon?” Pearl offered. He left again before they could notice him there.

He searched the Crystal Heart, and even back in the Burning Room, and finally returned to Amethyst's room in defeat, hoping Amethyst was having more luck.

He had settled onto a threadbare sofa cushion to wait when he heard something scrape from behind a nearby junk pile, followed by a couple of objects crashing to the floor.

“Amethyst?” Steven called uncertainly.

When no answer came he slowly rounded the pile.

Pressed against the haphazardly stacked junk, was: “Peridot!” 

“Argh!” She gave a yell of frustration and pushed past Steven, bursting into a run.

“Wait!” He yelped, chasing after her through the maze-like mounds of junk. “I just want to talk!”

“I’ve had enough of talking to you clods!” She yelled over her shoulder.

Steven knew the door was around there somewhere, and knew that it wouldn’t take long for Peridot to find it, and made a decision - he threw himself at Peridot’s back, sending them both tumbling into a pile.

As random objects fell around them Steven grappled with Peridot to get her pinned.

“Why won’t you let us help you?!” He cried, struggling with her arms.

“Help me?” She elbowed him in the side but he pushed her shoulder down before she could roll. “You smashed me into a limbless cloud, threatened me in your harvesting chamber, and you just assaulted me!”

“I didn’t poof you! I said we should talk to you!” He managed to grab her wrists.

“So you’re the reason I was being interrogated?”

“W-well,” He cringed, then shook his head to refocus. “Back when you snuck into my room, you were scared! What were you going to say before Garnet poofed you? What do you know?”

Peridot stilled, squinting condescendingly at him. “What do I know?” She repeated. “Everything there is to know about the Cluster, you pebble.”

“What is the Cluster? Wait, pebble? Because of my gem?” His grip on her wrists loosened as she seemed to settle.

As soon as she saw the opening she brought her knee up into his stomach and wriggled herself out from under him. 

She dashed on all fours for the door that was now in sight. Steven scrambled to his feet, rushing after her-

He slammed into her back again, this time by accident, when she unexpectedly froze just outside the threshold.

In the living room staring at them were his mom, Garnet, Pearl, and a sheepish-looking Amethyst.

Peridot frantically glanced around. Seeing the only obvious exit blocked by a row of gems with weapons drawn, she took off to the right, through the open bathroom door, and slammed it shut.

 Garnet pounded a fist against the wood. “Open up Peridot, there’s no way to escape!”

From inside came the sound of the toilet flushing.

“If you’re trying to flush yourself down the toilet, it won’t work,” Amethyst called in, leaning against the frame. “Trust me, I’ve tried.”

It was quickly obvious that Peridot wasn’t coming out, or letting them in, and that, short of breaking down the door, there was nothing they could do.

“We were already trying to talk with her, what difference does it make if we do it through a door?” Rose sighed, finally put the debate to rest. “She’s not going anywhere.”

Steven managed to get some sleep in what remained of the night. He woke to hushed whispers from the gems around the dining room counter, and a bathroom door still shut tight.

He knocked on the door. “Peridot, can I come in? I need to get ready for the day.”

“No!”

He’d figured as much. Hence why he came prepared. “I have something for you.”

He heard the lock click and the door cracked open. A single green eye peeked through to see him holding out the disembodied foot she had left them with the time they clashed in the ancient spaceship.

A hand darted out to snatch it from him before the door slammed again. Steven was just starting to consider trekking to his dads car wash to use the bathroom there when it swung open.

In a single night Peridot had wreaked havoc on his bathroom. The contents of the counter and the cabinets underneath were strewn across the floor, the shower curtain and rod hung half-pulled out of the wall, and puddles of water (Steven didn’t want to know from where) littered the tile.

Steven ignored all of that and went right for the sink. He wasn’t sure how long Peridot would allow him inside, better to get down to business.

Peridot herself was huddled in the corner between the bathtub and the wall, clutching the metal foot he had given her.

She ran a thumb over its surface. “You wouldn’t happen to have the rest, would you?”

Steven splashed his face with water. “I… I don’t think the gems want you to have them right now…” He admitted.

Peridot huffed, looking away. “Of course not. They want me defenseless for when they begin their next round of interrogation.”

She said it coolly, but looking at her reflection through the mirror her scowl looked pinched with worry more than contempt. She was still rubbing her thumb over the foot in her lap.

“The gems aren’t going to hurt you, you know,” He tried gently, turning around to pick up his toothbrush from the floor. She flinched and Steven’s heart sank. “And I won’t either.”

She met his gaze uncertainly.

“We want to help you,” He continued. “Whatever the ‘Cluster’ is, we can fix it better if we all work together.”

“I doubt any of you can help me,” She said plainly. “But… I appreciate the offer.”

Steven grinned. It was a start.

Chapter Text

They were getting nowhere with Peridot.

“She’s going to crack any second now!” Pearl declared.

No one else agreed with her.

From behind the closed bathroom door Peridot screeched back, “I’ll never crack for the likes of you Crystal Clods!”

It had been going on like that for three days, shouted insults and not much of anything useful.

Strangely, she didn’t seem to hold the same hostility towards Steven. Whenever he called at the door she allowed him in, and Rose would hear quiet voices from inside.

The first few times she had listened to the exchange, afraid that Peridot might seize the opportunity of having him alone to attack, at very least verbally if not physically, but a fight never came and harsh words aimed at him were surprisingly minimal. 

Instead they just… chatted. Steven told her about his day, and answered what all the things in the bathroom were, and asked about her life back on Homeworld. Eventually, Rose stopped feeling the need to monitor the interactions.

It turned out that in the time Rose hadn’t been listening to their conversations, Steven had made more headway with her then Rose had been starting to believe possible at all, because when the Crystal Gems came home from searching for non-Peridot-provided answers about the Cluster, said gem was in their living room.

“Peridot!” Three cries rang out when they saw her.

Steven stood between the green gem, whose small form was holding as much tension as a thread about to snap, and the warp pad Rose and the others had been deposited on. “Hi guys!” He greeted with only slightly-forced nonchalance.

Rose managed to tear her gaze away from Peridot. “Hello Steven, how… was everything?”

“Well…” He took a deep breath. “Peridot is ready to tell us about the Cluster!”

“Really?” Pearl drawled skeptically.

“That's great!” Rose beamed, first at him and then at Peridot behind him.

He continued, “She says she just needs her limb enhancers to do it!”

“Absolutely not!” “No.” “Do we look like chumps?!”

Pearl, Garnet, and Amethyst's reactions were immediate, but Rose paused.

Standing in the middle of their house in stockinged feet, barely taller than Steven himself, chin raised defiantly but face tight, hands clenched into trembling fists at her side, Peridot didn’t appear like a gem trying to pull one over on them and get away. She appeared afraid.

She had already been desperate before she was captured. Now, she was surrounded by enemies, trapped on the very planet she believed was in imminent danger. Rose imagined she was only feeling more helpless then before, and perhaps, more willing to cooperate with them to save herself.

“Alright,” Rose finally said.

Peridot perked up. Steven shot a huge smile at her over his shoulder. 

“You can use them while you share the information, under our supervision inside the Temple,” Rose posited. She might not think this was a trick, but she wasn’t so trusting as to not take precautions. “As soon as you’re done we’ll be taking them back.”

“I agree to your terms, except,” Peridot folded her arms behind her back. “I will not be reentering your Harvesting Chamber.”

Rose had expected more argument. Even Steven as a toddler had been a better negotiator then Peridot.

Soon, Peridot was sat on the living room floor, fitting the strange metal limbs onto her arms and legs with practiced ease. Rose watched curiously as the fingers began to float up in response to her unspoken command.

“Now,” Peridot began, fingers forming a holo-screen between them. She tapped at it. “All the information one could ever need on the Cluster is here, in my log.”

Images of melded gem shards began to flash across the surface - the fusion experiments from the Kindergarten. Peridot launched into the explanation.

By the end Rose felt sick.

On the screen a depiction of Earth was torn apart by the giant forced-fusion that laid at its center.

Garnet had a hand covering her mouth. Amethyst stared at the image, gaping. Pearl's eyes were filled with tears. Steven hugged himself around the middle.

This was happening because of her, was Rose's first thought. Because of her actions every step of her way.

Because she wanted a colony and was such a brat the other Diamonds gave in to appease her. Because she was too much of a coward to stand up to them and defend Earth as herself. Because she faked her shattering and they wanted revenge. Because she gave up any power she held that could have effectively protected the planet in a useless attempt to protect it her own way. 

And the Earth, and everyone on it, and her friends - her family, were paying the price once again.

She was only brought out of her spiraling thoughts by Peridot's shrill voice demanding, “Rose Quartz, control your pearl!”

They had a plan. It was basic and hurriedly thought up, but it was more than they’d had before. A drill, to take them to the core of the planet and destroy the Cluster before it could take form.

Rose tried not to think too hard on how she felt about that. The safety of the Earth was top priority, what remained of already shattered gems consciousness, and the suffering they must be in, was something they couldn’t help right then.

Meanwhile, Pearl and Peridot were not off to any better of a start now that they were begrudging allies then they had been when they had been enemies.

Peridot, never having known any different, insisted that Pearl was incapable of understanding, let alone building a machine of the drills magnitude. 

And Pearl was, rightfully, boldly, wonderfully, offended.

“So if you don’t belong to the Rose Quartz, who do you belong to?” Peridot, now back to her smaller stature and natural limbs without the enhancers, asked, while examining the bow around Pearl's waist.

“Nobody!” Pearl snapped, snatching the fabric away from her. “And you better get it through your gem soon because I’m not having this conversation on repeat!”

Rose busied herself by filling her arms with spare parts from the barn that Greg had generously offered to let them use, to hide the grin quickly spreading across her face.

She loved when Pearl got haughty and assertive.

“Ha! She’s hilarious,” Peridot snickered to Steven as if sharing a joke. He simply looked at her with eyebrows knit in confusion. “Well anyway, obviously I will be lead engineer on this project, as there is no one else here with the adequate knowledge,” she concluded as if Pearl hadn’t said just moments before that they would be working together.

“We will work as a team,” Pearl grit out through clenched teeth once again. “And if you can’t handle that then you can take a less active role in the construction.”

Peridot scoffed. “As if you could so much as wire the circuit board without me-“

“I’ve been engineering since before you were incubating in the dirt-“

“At least I was made for this, not to be someone’s fancy storage-“

Rose knew the drill - no pun intended - back during the rebellion almost every gem that came to their side doubted Pearl's abilities and her independence. Peridot was not the first to show her little respect.

Of course Rose did, and always had, wanted nothing more than to set the offending gem straight, to charge in to tell them how incredible and talented and brilliant Pearl was - but it was important to Pearl, and to the gems' understanding, that she prove those things herself. If Rose jumped to defend her it would only make it seem as if Pearl couldn’t handle herself.

And she absolutely could.

Just as their fight was reaching a fever pitch, Steven interjected. 

“A giant, robo-race!” He concocted, starry eyed.  “With prizes, giant robo-prizes!”

“You mean, like a competition?” Pearl summarized.

He nodded eagerly. “Yeah! To see who’s better at building stuff!”

Rose didn’t know how any gem could see the gleam in Pearl's eye as she declared her certain-to-be victory and still not believe that she was her own gem.

The stars out at the barn were breathtaking, without any of the light from town blocking them out.

But Rose was much more interested in the amazing gem in her lap.

“I’m fine, Rose,” Pearl tutted. Rose tilted her face to the other side anyway, making sure she had healed the last of the scrapes. Pearl pushed at her shoulders. “Ro- Rose, please.”

Rose pouted dramatically while Garnet and Amethyst snickered. Pearl cupped her cheek. “I won’t shatter from being a little roughed up.”

“I know, you’re much tougher than that,” Rose teased. 

“And now Peridot knows it too,” Garnet added with a smirk.

Amethyst laughed. “Yeah, I think the bruise on her cheek will keep her in line for a few days at least.”

Pearl frowned at the reminder, fretting, “I wish I hadn’t acted like that in front of Steven…”

“You showed Steven not to take crap from anyone! That's a good lesson!” Amethyst insisted.

“I don’t want him to think resorting to violence is a way to solve problems,” Pearl said.

“Why not? Violence is great for solving problems,” Amethyst said, Rose knew just to be contrary, earning an unimpressed glower from Pearl.

Before they could get into it, Rose interrupted. “I do have a feeling Peridot won’t need any more convincing to show you the respect you deserve.”

“Do you think it would be naïve to hope for smooth sailing from here on?” Pearl asked.

Just then, Peridot leaned out of the open barn doors. “Perma-fusion! I have need of your assistance.”

Garnet's lips puckered sourly.

“I will say, punching her was extremely cathartic,” Pearl supplied.

Chapter Text

Amethyst and Peridot were hitting it off, to everyone’s surprise.

Granted, as far as Rose could tell it was because Amethyst found Peridot funny and Peridot seemed to like the positive attention, but she was still the first of them besides Steven to win the green gems approval.

Despite their agreement to cooperate Peridot didn’t like Pearl, or working with Pearl rather than above her. She admitted to a begrudging respect for her learned expertise in engineering, but that was about it.

She was clearly uncomfortable with Garnet's presence, and voiced as much. Expectedly, her view of fusion was the same as Homeworlds - it was a tool to be used for a purpose, and if Garnet wasn’t currently serving a purpose she shouldn’t exist. Garnet was not happy with that attitude, to say the least.

As for Rose, she had overheard Peridot speaking into her recorder the evening before, “the Rose Quartz has proven to be less… fearsome than Homeworld legend tells.” Which she was glad for, Rose didn’t want Peridot to be afraid of her. But it was immediately followed up with, “she is also less of a strategic genius, or any kind of genius, then believed.” Which she was less glad to hear.

So when the need arose, Rose decided to encourage the budding friendship by allowing Peridot, along with Amethyst and Steven, to take a trip to the Prime Kindergarten to dismantle an injector for its drill head. She also figured if Peridot would listen and behave for anyone, it was most likely to be those two.

Except, when they got back, successfully toting an injector drill head, Amethyst was in a foul mood, wouldn’t answer why, and had completely reversed course on warming up to Peridot and had begun avoiding her at all costs.

As well as Rose.

Rose let her have her space, historically Amethyst sometimes needed to work things out on her own and pushing for answers would only anger her further. But when a day passed and Amethyst was still rejecting Rose’s attempts to connect, Rose knew she had to take the first step.

She found Amethyst in the loft of the barn, sprawled on the old, worn down couch there, with a bag of chaps on her stomach.

Seeing Rose appear at the top of the ladder Amethyst made no move to make room for her to sit, so Rose sat cross legged on the floor by the armrest instead.

Once settled she asked, “Would you like to tell me what happened at the Kindergarten?”

Amethyst shrugged. “Nothin’, just got a crash course in ‘gemetics’,” She made air quotes around the term before folding her arms over her chest. “So basically you’re a real Quartz, and I’m a shitty excuse for one.”

“No!” Rose gasped, eyes going wide. “No!”

Amethyst pushed herself onto her elbows to look at her pointedly. “So I’m not defective? Peridot was lying?” She challenged. When Rose took a beat to answer she fell back with a huff. “Yeah that’s what I thought. Peridot is a lot of things but she’s not a liar, which is more than I can say for you guys apparently.”

“We didn’t lie to you…” Rose tried. They hadn’t, really, if only by omission.

“You told me I’m perfect!” Amethyst exclaimed. “And now I find out from Peridot that I’m about as wrong as you can get!”

“You’re perfect the way you are,” Rose reiterated the words she had told Amethyst so many times over the years. “You don’t need to be perfect how Homeworld intended.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me, huh? Why did I have to find out from Peridot who I’m supposed to be?” Amethyst pressed, throwing her arms out wide. “Because you didn’t want me to know how embarrassing I am? Because you didn’t want me to know I’m a screw up at even existing?”

“No!” Rose said more firmly. “We didn’t tell you about Homeworld's expectations because we… I, didn’t want you to believe the only thing you could be was what you were made for. I wanted you to be able to choose who you became.”

“But I didn’t know this- this major thing about myself!” Amethyst rebuffed. “I didn’t get to choose how to feel about it or if it mattered to me! Because you guys made that choice for me!”

Rose bit back her near-automatic protest, Amethyst's words striking her into silence while she processed them.

She thought of Pearl, who was so proud of all that she accomplished, specifically because it was in spite of everything she was supposed to be. 

She thought of Bismuth, who was immediately as enamored with the idea of choice as Rose was, but especially choosing to choose, knowing what you were meant to do and doing something else instead.

She thought of all the Crystal Gems who had been well suited and comfortable in certain aspects of their assigned role, while rejecting others - Crazy Lace, who was a wonderful motivator but hated being an authority; Biggs, who fought with all the fierceness of her cut but was so soft off the battlefield; Zircon, who could remember and interpret any information she was given, but hated arguing.

Who was Rose to say for someone else how they felt about themselves or the role they were meant for?

Once a Diamond, always a Diamond, she thought bitterly.

She took a breath, closing her eyes on the exhale. ”You’re right.”

Amethyst clearly hadn’t expected an agreement, if the shock on her face was anything to go by.

“It wasn’t fair to you to believe I knew what was best for you. It should have been your decision to make. But please, Amethyst,” She became more fervent. “You have to know that it was never because we thought who you are was something to be ashamed of.”

Amethyst finally sat to face Rose, feet dangling off the couch.

”I just- I’ve wondered, you know?” She admitted tentatively. “About this stuff, and… what the other Amethysts were like, if they were… like me.” Her shoulders slumped even as she gave a forced-sounding laugh. “Guess now I know.”

Rose pulled herself up to sit in the space Amethyst had left free next to her. ”Amethysts tend to be less… restrained, then other quartzes. I always enjoyed them, they’re so fun!” Rose said with a chuckle. “You would have fit right in.”

“Yeah?” Amethyst looked up at her hopefully. Then she smirked. “So, what, were the other Rose Quartzes all like, uptight and serious?”

Rose almost flinched. She remembered her Rose Quartzes, the ones that were playful and silly, the ones that were thoughtful and soft spoken, the ones that were cunning and brave, and how they were all condemned for her crimes.

She created them only to go and ruin their lives.

She had been quiet for too long, judging by the frown slowly creeping across Amethyst's face and the furrow of her eyebrows, but before she could say anything the other gem beat her to it.

”I guess I always thought… it must not have been as bad for you, Homeworlds roles and junk,” Amethyst said, looking away. “You’re you! How could you not have been exactly what Homeworld wanted!

“But you started a whole war to get away from it, so… it must’ve been pretty fucked up,” She glanced up at Rose through her bangs. “But you know, you guys wouldn’t have been like that, right? You wouldn’t have made me be a soldier. I just would’ve known why I like kicking people's ass so much.”

She flashed a lopsided grin, and Rose couldn’t resist smiling back, and when Amethyst started to laugh, a real, genuine laugh it was a welcome sound after a day without it.

When the moment of levity passed Rose slowly put an arm around Amethyst's shoulders, giving her ample time to pull away if she wanted.

She didn’t. She leaned into Rose's side with a sigh.

“I’m sorry we didn’t tell you,” Rose said, running a hand over Amethyst's hair. “And I am sorry you found out from Peridot, I’m sure she wasn’t the most… delicate.” 

Amethyst groaned, dropping her head against Rose’s shoulder. “She wasn’t even trying to be a jerk, she just has zero clue how to talk to people,” She scrunched up her face. “Still kinda pissed at her though.”

Rose thought about it for a moment. “I think she’s taking one of Steven’s mandatory breaks right now, you could… hide all the screws at her station?”

Amethyst smiled wickedly. “Yeah… ooh and I’d bet she doesn’t have a clue what a battery is, so if I take them outta the drill she’s using she’s gonna freak and…”

Later, after the angry screeching and irritated muttering about useless clods died down, Rose saw Peridot and Amethyst talking by the fence, and if Amethyst's snickering was anything to go by she thought perhaps the newfound friendship hadn’t been entirely ruined after all.

Chapter Text

August thirteenth was a special day for the Crystal Gems. Even out at the barn, working to prevent the end of the world, they were going to recognize it.

It was Steven’s birthday.

Rose couldn’t think of a better reason to put construction of the drill on hold for a few hours then to celebrate the day that the most wonderful person came into the world.

Garnet had already kicked off the festivities at midnight by regaling him with the story of how Ruby and Sapphire fell in love, followed by Amethyst dropping a couple dozen balloons on him from the barns rafters the second he woke up, and then there were waffles for breakfast courtesy of Pearl.

Rose, of course, had smothered him in kisses and a hug that lasted until he started to squirm.

“You were so little I could practically hold you in one hand,” Rose reminisced over breakfast.

“And you did,” Amethyst pointed out, snickering. “It almost gave Greg a heart attack.”

Soon after they finished eating the van pulled up with Greg and Connie, and all the decorations, supplies, and cake they would need for the day.

Connie jumped from the passenger side door the moment the van stopped, arms already open as she ran to Steven for a hug. “Happy birthday!”

“Thanks!” Steven squeezed her back tight. “Welcome to the barn!”

Greg greeted Rose with a quick peck and a quiet, “How’s it been going out here?”

“As well as can be expected,” She sighed. They had only been at the barn for a handful of days but they were days filled with mediating conflicts, gathering needed materials, and building an incredibly complicated piece of machinery, all while trying to ignore any of her own doubts about the drills effectiveness or morality. “Thank you for letting us use all this stuff.”

“It’s all been sitting out here for decades, now it can be used to save the world!” Greg said. He inclined his head toward where Peridot was busy putting together the control panel that would later be attached to the interior of the drill. “That’s her?”

“That’s her,” Rose confirmed with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. 

Pearl came up from behind them, already sporting a sour look as she approached. “Hello Greg,“ She said coolly. “Did you bring the disposable plates and cutlery? I don’t see them in the bag and I’d rather not search through the mess in your vehicle.”

Greg rubbed the back of his neck. “Uh yeah, I- they’re in the… I’ll just get them for you.”

He left Rose’s side and Pearl immediately took his place, looping an arm around Rose’s and smiling up at her. Rose’s lips lifted in return, almost automatic, even while her thoughts went to the conversation they still needed to have about her and Greg.

Steven and Connie’s laughter filled the air. Amethyst and Garnet were setting up the decorations. There was a Cookie Cat ice cream cake quickly getting runny in the heat.

It was going to be a happy day, Rose decided. Anything else - the drill, Peridot, the Pearl and Greg issue - could wait.

The party was a success, as far as Rose could tell. Cake was eaten, presents were opened (Rose delighted in the stars in Steven’s eyes when he saw the Ninja Squad action figure she got him), they played badminton, and then Greg pulled out his old stereo, turned up the music, and the birthday party started to look more like a dance party.

“Ahem,” Peridot's nasally voice alerted them to her presence. The gems all turned to her with varying levels of irritation at her unwelcome intrusion. “I am… unfamiliar… with some of the primitive systems we are working with. I require assistance. Only momentarily.”

Pearl sighed and followed her away from the party a little ways away to where the drill lay on its side, wires pouring out an opening in the top leading to a workbench. When Rose glanced over a few minutes later she and Peridot were leaning over the table with a look of concentration as they worked.

She hoped Pearl wouldn’t be away from the party for too long - as it was she missed watching Steven and Connie blushing as a slow song came on, and Garnet and Amethyst teaming up for charades, and Steven’s attempt to get Lion to wear a birthday hat that had them all laughing as the large cat pawed it off his head.

When the sun was fully below the horizon and the stars starting to peek out Steven and Connie ran up to her.

“Hey mom, I’m going to help Connie set up her tent, then do you think we can make a fire and roast marshmallows?”

Rose smiled and brushed his cheek. ”Anything for my birthday boy.”

“Mom,” He groaned, shooting an embarrassed glance at Connie as she snickered.

Greg went with them to get Connie’s things from the van, handing off the supplies to the kids who insisted they could handle it by themselves.

On his way back he stopped in front of the drill, looking it over. Rose could hear him saying to Pearl, “Whoa, this is some pretty impressive stuff for how long you guys have been out here! Can I take a look?”

She didn’t hear Pearl's answer, but Greg began circling the machine, before hoisting himself into the hollow part at the top of it that would eventually become the cockpit.

”Alright!” Steven cheered over in the field. Rose looked to see the tent standing upright and Connie next to it with her hands proudly on her hips.

“I told you I’ve been reading ‘How to Survive the Punishment of Nature’ and-“

There was a whirring. And a scream.

Greg’s scream.

Rose’s head whipped around toward the source of the sound.

The drill had turned on and was quickly gaining speed as it spun - with Greg inside clinging to the rim.

“Dad!”

Peridot returned from inside the barn and dropped her armful of scrap metal with a screech. “The drill!”

“What happened?” Amethyst yelled to no one in particular.

Rose ran.

She passed Pearl who stood wide-eyed and frozen at the table where she had been working, watching the drill go round and round, turning up ground and tossing Greg as it went.

Doing her best to time it so she wouldn’t hit Greg, Rose launched herself at the drill, grabbing onto the ledge and pulling herself in.

Everything was a blur outside the machine, and the spinning immediately threw off her equilibrium, but she could see a bunch of tangled wires hanging out of the dashboard, attached to a circuit board that was being pulled along through the air in the drill's wake.

She grabbed the wires and pulled. As easy as thread they snapped in her hand, little sparks flying from the exposed ends.

The drill started to slow, rolling to a stop on its side.

Greg groaned and slumped down in the bowl with a hand over his mouth and the other on his stomach. His face was pale and his hair blown wildly to one side.

“Are you okay?” Rose asked him. She scooped him up and jumped out, floating to the ground slowly.

“Y-yeah, just a little-“ he stopped to clench his mouth shut with a gulp.

“Dad!” Steven shouted again, running up to them as Rose set Greg down on the ground.

Rose straightened up. “What happened?” She asked, looking from the drill that looked the same - if a little dirtier - than it had a few minutes ago, to the small group gathered around.

Pearl was glaring at Greg. “Well, Greg was poking around in the drill and, clearly, he turned it on!”

Greg, starting to look a little less green, looked up with alarm. “I- I didn’t! I didn’t touch anything, there wasn’t even any- buttons or- or switches-“

“it’s an extremely complex machine, there doesn’t need to be a button or a switch for you to have touched the wrong thing and set it off!”

Peridot spoke up, confusion coloring her tone. “That doesn’t make sense. We were working on the control board.”

It was as if even the crickets went silent in the moment that followed.

Rose had an awful, sinking feeling in her chest.

“It couldn’t have been turned on from the inside?” She asked Peridot, hoping, wanting to be wrong. “Even by accident?”

“No,” Peridot confirmed in a tone that implied the notion was ridiculous, shaking her head.

“Pearl,” Rose slowly turned to her. “Is that true?”

Pearl's cheeks were teal. “W-well,” She stammered. “Yes, I was working on the control panel, but-“

“Did you turn the drill on?” Rose pressed.

Pearl's eyes darted over Rose’s face, searching, before she forced out, “Y-yes! But-“

“Greg could have been hurt!”

Pearl waved her hands. “He wasn’t in any real danger, we were right here and humans are quite resilient when it comes to-“

“That’s enough!” Rose snapped. Her cheeks felt hot. At her sides her hands shook. “The Earth is in danger of being ripped apart any day now and you were willing to risk our hope of stopping it to- to make Greg look bad? And it’s Steven’s birthday! You-“

She closed her eyes to try to steady herself, feeling like she was still spinning inside the drill. “Why?”

Pearl's mouth opened, but no sound came out. Rose knew there was no good answer.

Rose turned away from her. Behind her, Greg now stood with Steven and the others a few feet back, watching the exchange silently.

“Rose! Rose, wait!” Pearl gasped, running after her and taking hold of her arm. “I’m sorry! Please, I just-”

Rose stopped midstep. “I can’t do this, Pearl.” She nearly sobbed.

She pulled her arm out of her grip, and kept going before Pearl could say anything else.

Chapter Text

Rose stayed out of the way while construction of the drill finished.

She knew nothing about engineering or programming or geophysics. Pearl did, and whenever Rose was around it was a distraction the other gem didn’t need.

They hadn’t talked about what happened at Steven’s birthday, or even been alone together since. That night Rose had stayed in the van with Greg, and since then spent nights in the barn with Steven. During the day she took jobs that involved anything outside of the building zone - sorting materials, warping home for groceries for Steven, shooing away the cows that kept wandering into the field a little too close to the barn.

There simply wasn’t time to discuss Pearl's actions, her resentment towards Greg, the history that brought them to this point, what it all meant and why, and how it could be resolved - if it could be resolved.

At least, that’s what she told herself. 

Blaming her inaction on bad timing was easier than admitting that she was too scared to try.

Pearl didn’t make any attempt to initiate the conversation either. Rather, every time Rose was near Pearl became either timid and flustered, or exaggeratedly upbeat and focused on their task.

Then, the drill was completed; gleaming in the moonlight, held upright by support beams, its sharp point hovering over the ground in preparation for use.

The gems stood in a half circle around it, admiring and reveling in relief that such a massive undertaking was complete.

Peridot turned to the group, clearing her throat. “I request the use of my limb enhancers to retrieve vital information.”

In the weeks of building the drill Peridot had slowly gone from useful nuisance to a trusted, and sometimes even enjoyable, ally. She was, albeit often unintentionally, funny, with a deep curiosity and eagerness to learn - a trait that came in handy as she stumbled through insulting interactions with each of them in the early days yet continually came back attempting to understand and do better.

“Sure,” Rose agreed easily.

She glanced Pearl's way pointedly, the other gem jumping to alert and scrambling to summon the limbs from her gem.

Soon Peridot was opening files and flicking through them with a floating finger while the rest of the gems and Steven watched patiently, and watched as frustration, and then dread, began to grow on her face.

“It’s not here…” She whimpered, looking up at them with clear panic. “It’s- it’s not in any of the reports!”

“What’s not?” Steven asked from where he had been leaning over her shoulder to watch her use the holo pad.

“The Clusters exact coordinates!” Peridot answered. “We can’t drill without them!”

As worried looks were exchanged, Pearl and Rose’s eyes met across the group, an unspoken idea passing between the two of them.

Then Pearl flushed and her eyes darted away, leaving Rose with the reminder that the easy connection they had shared for so long wasn’t so easy any more.

She pushed the pang of sadness aside and spoke to the group. “If it’s in their records, we may be able to find the information at a Diamond Base.”

“Yes!” Peridot gasped, leaping up. “And you have one on your nearest orbital body!”

Steven blinked at her blankly “Our wha’?”

“The moon. We do,” Rose confirmed. “Except, the rebellion destroyed access to it five thousand years ago.”

Peridot visibly drooped. “Of course you did.”

“Mom, what about Lion?” Steven asked. “He can warp us there!”

“He… what?”

“When the ship came to Earth and I was leaving with dad, Lion warped me back to you guys!” He explained. “You didn’t know that?”

“Um. I didn’t,” She admitted. But as crazy as the notion was, she didn’t doubt that it was true. Besides, they didn’t have any other ideas for getting to the moon. “Why don’t you go get him?”

Steven took off behind the barn to where she had last seen Lion napping on his back in the grass with his pink mane fanned out around him and legs occasionally twitching as if in a run. A few minutes later the pair returned, Steven practically skipping, and Lion sauntering less than enthusiastically a few paces behind.

“He’ll take us!” Steven said as if he had asked, and received an answer from, the animal.

It quickly became clear all six of them wouldn’t fit on Lion's back, so after Rose showed them how to enter the dimension in his mane Steven, Peridot, and Amethyst sat half-inside, and Rose settled herself behind his head.

She looked over for who would be getting on next, to see Pearl hesitating, having immediately, automatically, stepped forward to be behind her before thinking better of it.

Instead, Garnet got on, with Pearl bringing up the rear. When Pearl reached around to hold onto Garnet's middle Rose could feel the brush of her knuckles against her back. She ached to reach behind and take her hand, to squeeze it and interlace their fingers.

She kept her hold on the fur at Lion’s neck.

With everyone in place the feline let out a roar and a swirling tunnel of light opened before him. He really could create warps.

Rose only had a moment to be in awe before he leapt into it.

They came to a sliding stop on stone floor.

The moon base was dark, silent. The air was so still you could almost feel that nothing had moved inside it in thousands of years.

A blue-tinged beam of light pierced the darkness as Pearl's gem lit up.

“This is it,” Rose whispered into the quiet.

In the center of the floor a four piece Diamond insignia layed out, proclaiming the building's ownership. The ceilings overhead rose high enough to accommodate the tallest of gems. On the walls around the room four murals towered above them. Rose couldn’t keep her eyes from following their lines up, up, up to their artistically depicted features - a sharp nose, downturned eyes, a piercing white gaze.

Tiny fingers slipped into her hand.

“Who’re they?” Steven asked, looking up at her with innocent curiosity.

“Are you joking me?!” Peridot whirled around from where she had been admiring Yellow’s mural. “The Diamonds? The gem matriarchs?!”

“Oh, the Diamonds!” Steven nodded. “So… why’re they such a big deal, anyway?”

Peridot balked at him. Taking the opportunity of her stunned wordlessness, Garnet answered instead. “Because they believe they are, and demand everyone else does too.”

“Yeah, those guys suck,” Amethyst added, crossing her arms over her chest.

From across the room Pearl called out, “The control service is over here.”

Activating the panel was easy. Rose gently, subtly, brushed a toe on the tile and it lit, the stairs lifting and taking place along the walls.

Several floors up the steps opened to the glass dome of the control room. Rose nearly ran into Steven and Amethyst where they stood frozen in the entrance, wide eyes taking in the view.

Outside, the surface of the moon stretched out, dotted with craters and small hills, and in the inky black sky overhead, half in shadow, hung the Earth.

For a moment Rose remembered the first time she stood at the top of those stairs, mesmerized by the deep blue orb with its patches of green and rolling swatches of white, her very own planet.

The beauty of the sight still amazed her as it had then, but now she felt no claim to the planet except to call it home.

“We really are on the moon,” Steven breathed.

Rose smiled to herself and ducked to scoop him up and set him on her hip. “It’s magnificent, huh?”

He nodded, still not taking his eyes off the sky.

Unphased by the sight, Peridot pushed past her legs and ran ahead to the pedestal in the center of the room. Begrudgingly, Rose followed, setting Steven down at the top.

Everything was exactly as Rose remembered, from the length of the control panel glistening in the faint light, the straight backed chair likely in the last position she had left it, to the Diamond communicator set in the armrest.

“Oh my goodness, this looks like it could be brand new!” Peridot squealed.

While she continued to gush over the technology, Rose watched Steven clamber up into the chair behind her, barely taking up a quarter of the seat, his flip-flop clad feet dangling over the edge, and begin inspecting its gadgets.

“How do we turn it on?” Amethyst interrupted Peridot in the middle of her rant.

“…I have no idea.”

Steven pressed his hand to the activation key.

Before Rose could react - and how could she have reacted anyway, without raising suspicion? - the board glowed to life.

All the gems turned.

Rose couldn’t have taken a breath even if her form required it. For the second time that night her eyes flashed to Pearls across the group, seeing them filled with the same barely-concealed panic that she was feeling.

Then, Peridot yelled that he couldn’t sit there, and Amethyst was snickering at the back and forth between them that followed, and no one looked concerned about Steven being able to activate the panel. As far as they knew, all it needed was any touch to turn on.

No one else knew it was keyed into the Pink Diamond gem.

By the time Rose began to feel less rattled Steven had convinced Peridot to join him in the chair. She swiped through system files, titles Rose vaguely recognized flashing by.

Beta Progress Report

Resource Request

Ziggurat Casualties

Facet Eleven G Warp Blueprint

And there, one she had never seen before, simply labeled: Cluster.

“There’s the insertion point,” Peridot said. A red bullseye blinked on the Earth's map. “Looks like the Beta kindergarten in Facet Nine. It’s the smaller of the two, not nearly as impressive as yours, Amethyst.”

Rose’s lips twitched into a tight line. She hadn’t wanted Beta to exist in the first place. They had been midway through the war, fighting off enough Quartz soldiers as it was, and desperate not to cause anymore damage to the planet then already had been done.

But Yellow and Blue said she needed more troops, and the more Pink had fought them on it the angrier and more insistent they became until she had no choice but to do as they wished and sabotage it however she could.

And then, apparently, it had been used to implant the most atrocious of crimes against gemkind into the planet.

“…all we have to do is feed this data to the drill and we should be all set.”

“That’s it then!” Pearl clapped her hands together. “Mission accomplished!”

There was a muted chorus of expressed relief and eagerness to get out of there, but Steven hung back while Peridot was closing up. “Wait! Hold on, does this thing have any games on it?”

Rose chuckled. She could only imagine what he was conjuring up in his mind - gem video games, perhaps something like the bird-flinging game on his phone.

“No no no, it wasn’t used for games,” Peridot shook her head. “It was used for planning the colony. Here, look.”

With a flick of her wrist a different map of the Earth was displayed on the screen, red dots marking each of the gem structures that had been constructed, while she rattled off statistics.

“Well, what was the plan?” Steven asked after one of her points.

Rose needed to put a stop to this - Steven didn’t need to know, Garnet and Amethyst didn’t need to learn the depth of the destruction that was planned, she and Pearl remembered it all too clearly and she never wanted to see again what had almost became of such a wonderful world if she hadn’t wised up in time.

But Peridot tapped on the panel, and it was too late.

Gasps rang out in the otherwise silence of the moon base as the image of Earth hollowed out, spires and warps and arenas dominated what little landmass was left. The vast oceans reduced to puddles, any native life destroyed.

Rose closed her eyes, sickened by the portrayal.

“Ta-da! A finished Earth colony,” Peridot presented cheerfully. “Wow, look at this! Eighty-nine kindergartens, sixty-seven spires, a Galaxy Warp in each facet, efficient use of all available materials.”

Rose’s hands clenched into fists. No birdsong, no humans dancing, no yellow flowers waving in a gentle wind, no brightly colored spiders scurrying.

“What were you thinking, shutting this operation down?” Peridot exclaimed, flinging a hand out towards the screen. “It could've been great!”

“It would have been horrible,” Rose said as calmly as she could muster. “The completion of the Earth colony would have wiped out all life on the planet. It would have been a husk, all the beauty, all the uniqueness, gone.”

“But think of the good it would have done!” Peridot persisted. “The gems that would’ve been made, our empire expanded!”

“The Crystal Gems fought to keep Earth out of that empire,” Rose said firmly. “And free of gem interference.”

“Ohho, well your little rebellion did a lousy job!” Peridot shot back. She climbed up to stand on the seat behind her, putting her at more of an equal height to the rest of them. “You think you accomplished something with your war, but there would be no Cluster if the Earth had stayed a colony. Now there’s no colony, and there’s gonna be no Earth. So congrats, you lost, and you doomed the planet! How’s that for ‘interference?!’’

Rose’s mouth opened but no sound came out, she couldn’t find any words to rebuff Peridot's accusation - because she wasn’t wrong.

She looked down, the fall of her bangs casting her eyes into shadow.

Suddenly, Garnet's hand shot out, grabbing Peridot by the front of the leotard and yanking her up. Peridot gave a terrified squeak.

“You, listen to me, now,” She snarled, a gauntlet appearing on her free hand. “You are talking about things you do not understand-“

“Garnet!” Both Rose and Stevens' voices cried at the same time. Steven glanced at Rose desperately, letting her continue. 

“You’re right, she doesn’t understand,” Rose sighed. “And this won’t help her to.”

The blank stare of Garnet's visor turned back on Peridot for a moment longer before she dropped her unceremoniously.

“We’re done here,” She grit out through clenched teeth.

Without warning she wheeled around on the control panel, and with the fist that was still encased in a gauntlet, punched through it, smashing the stone into multiple pieces.

She retreated down the stairs.

Rose held out a hand for Steven, who was looking at Peridot sadly. He accepted, and together they followed Garnet's lead.

Rose was more than happy to leave the moon base behind again.

Chapter Text

Peridot had the Diamond communicator from the moon base.

Then briefly, they, the Crystal Gems, had the Diamond communicator.

Then Peridot snatched it back and took off in the robot she had constructed for the competition with Pearl weeks ago.

And now-

“This is the Diamond control room,” The nasally voice of Yellow Diamond’s Pearl droned. “Who authorized you to make this call?”

Crouched behind the wreckage of the robot, Rose and the other Crystal Gems exchanged terrified looks. After all those months where Peridot had been loose on Earth and they feared she would find a way to contact Homeworld and bring their full force down on them, they had started to trust her, they had befriended her. They believed that particular danger in the past.

And now Peridot had finally gotten through to someone on Homeworld after all.

And not just anyone.

“Pearl?” Yellow Diamond called.

All the air in Rose’s shapeshifted-lungs left in one sharp exhale. Suddenly the dew wet grass underneath her hands and knees, the birdsong signaling dawn, the warmth of the first rays of sun touching her skin, felt far away. 

On the screen a large hand, easily twice the size of Yellow Pearls whole body, reached out, and the image lifted, until-

She hadn’t changed a bit. Rose was almost shocked. She had gotten so used to everything, everyone - even gems, changing on Earth. But Yellow Diamond looked exactly the way she had the last time Rose saw her.

Steven, Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl,  all huddled at Rose's sides, gasped.

“My Diamond!” Peridot straightened, folding her arms into the Diamond salute. “Peridot, reporting in.”

“Which Peridot?” Yellow Diamond asked. Her voice was deep and hard, practically dripping with annoyance.

It was a tone Rose was quite familiar with.

Peridot winced. Rose realized with a start, likely at the same time Peridot did, that she had forgotten that on Homeworld she was known only by her facet and cut. That simply Peridot meant nothing to them.

“Facet two-F-five-L, cut five-X-G,” She recited. “I’m sorry to contact you this way, but all other forms of communication have been destroyed and-“

Yellow simply holding up a hand silenced Peridot. Rose had never known anything to stop Peridot talking as quickly or effectively. She hated it.

Having pulled up Peridot's file, Yellow continued. “This says you’re behind schedule on your mission to…” There was a pause, and for the first time since the call started, she turned to face the communicator full on, giving the other gem her full attention. Even through a holo screen and light years away her golden eyes were piercing. “How is the Earth?”

“It’s… full of life,” Peridot said haltingly.

“Organic life.” Yellow scoffed, sounding disgusted by the mere thought.

As if Rose needed the reminder of how Yellow, and Blue and White, felt about her beloved planet, about anything that didn’t further their quest to conquer the entire galaxy. 

Yellow’s reaction was the same as it had been every time Rose had talked about the wonder of Earth, or brought an organic from a colony back to Homeworld, or cared about something that the other Diamonds deemed worthless.

It wasn’t only her appearance that hadn’t changed a bit in five thousand years.

Yellow continued, “And where is the Jasper I assigned you? And why aren’t you calling from the ship?”

“The ship was destroyed,” Peridot admitted, hunching in on herself even more than she had since the call started to go downhill.

“By whom?”

Here it came. The moment that their continued existence was revealed to Homeworld. Rose wondered if they would bother sending anyone to take care of the last of the rebels, or if they would simply wait for the Cluster to finish the job.

She wondered if they would even use up time and resources to send anyone for Peridot, or if she would be written off as collateral damage, easily replaceable.

“I-it was destroyed by…”

Steven pushed himself up on his knees to peer over the top of the ruined robot. Rose nearly yanked him back down, terrified that Yellow Diamond's sharp eyes would catch the movement.

Instead, Peridot did. She turned her head. almost imperceptibly, her gaze flickering over him. She answered, “No one. There was an accident while we were landing.”

The look of irritated disapproval that settled on Yellow's face was another thing Rose was familiar with.

After a final short exchange Yellow dismissed Peridot, promising, to Rose’s surprise, that a ship would be sent to retrieve her, but before she could end the call, Peridot interrupted.

“Wait! I wouldn’t have called just to waste your time with a report!”

“You already have,” Yellow chastened.

“No, I mean- the reason I called, the real reason is…” Even from behind Rose could see Peridot steel herself, squaring her shoulders and pulling herself up tall. “I believe we should terminate the Cluster!”

Wait what?

Rose passed confused looks with Amethyst, Garnet, and Pearl.

Yellow Diamond's tone was flat, almost as if she were bored with the conversation. “Why?”

“The organic ecosystem creates resources unique to this world, we can't sacrifice all that potential just for one geo-weapon!” Peridot rattled off quickly, eagerly, like this was something she had been thinking about for some time.

Perhaps she had, Rose thought, perhaps the uniqueness of Earth hadn’t been lost on her as she had started to believe it was.

“I’d like to tell you some plans I came up with to utilize the planet without disrupting the local-“

“I've heard enough!” Yellow snapped, pinching the bridge of her nose. “I don't care about ‘potential’ and ‘resources’. I want my Cluster, and I want that planet to die. Just make that happen.”

“No!”

Yellow turned, eyes hard. “Are you questioning my authority?” She asked incredulously.

“I'm... questioning your objectivity!” Peridot stuttered. And then tacked on, almost as an afterthought, along with a quick salute, “My Diamond.”

Yellow Diamond rose from her seat, raising the image on the screen with her. “You are out of line,” She warned in a dangerous rumble.

Rose remembered how that tone used to fill her with dread, the threat in it making her want to cower in fear of Yellow's anger and the consequences that would follow.

So she was impressed when Peridot persisted.

“I just think-“

“I'm not interested in the puny thoughts of a Peridot.”

“But-“

As if Peridot wasn’t trying to speak, Yellow went on. “You have disrespected this channel and my time with your presence and you would do well to-“

“But-“

“Shut your mouth!” Yellow yelled.

Peridot jumped. Even several feet back, Steven flinched. Rose may have as well.

“You have failed at every stage of this mission. Your only chance to redeem yourself is to obey this simple order,” Yellow ranted, glaring down at Peridot. “You are to leave the Cluster to grow. It will tear apart the Earth, and I will take immense satisfaction in erasing that hideous rock off of our star maps! Is that clear?!”

“Then I won’t do it!” Peridot cried. “I  can tell you with certainty that there are things on this planet worth protecting!”

“What do you know about the Earth?”

“Apparently more than you, you…” Peridot's body tensed like a coil about to spring. “CLOD!”

Rose's hands shot up to cover her mouth. On either side of her she heard gasps.

They only had a moment to take in the outrage on Yellow's face before Peridot grabbed the communicator from the air, closing the line.

Steven was the first one clambering over the wreckage, running to Peridot with a cheer,. The others weren’t far behind.

“I can’t believe I just did that,” Peridot groaned  when they reached her.

Rose believed they officially had a new Crystal Gem.

Chapter Text

Steven was taking a nap, right there on a blanket in the sun outside the barn.

Rose knew he must be exhausted after being up all night - first the trip to the Moon Base, and then dealing with what they had believed was Peridot betraying them. 

He needed the rest. So while he slept the gems went about - quietly - preparing the drill for imminent use.

Rose was packing Steven’s backpack with water and snacks when the barn doors slid open to let in Pearl.

She froze in the entryway as soon as she saw Rose in the truck bed. “O-oh, I was just- but I- I’ll come back… later-“

“You don’t have to!” Rose was quick to call out, stopping Pearl mid-turn. “Please, stay.”

Pearl hesitated a moment more before coming in the rest of the way. She hurried to one of the tables-turned-makeshift-workbenches, not once glancing Rose’s way.

The silence as they went about their individual tasks felt heavy. Rose searched desperately for something to say, some way to bring the tension and the awkwardness and the avoidance to an end.

Pearl had been wrong.

But so had Rose. The harshness of her response replayed in her head every time she thought about reaching out - how she yelled, cut Pearl off, refused to hear her after promising thousands of years ago that Pearl would always have a voice, leaving in the heat of the fight, the anger that had coursed through her in that moment (and how it terrified her (a scream, a crack, a blank white smile)).

Maybe that was why Pearl had made no attempt to repair things between them either, because Rose had finally hurt her too much. Maybe she finally saw Rose for who she was.

Rose did up the zipper on Steven’s cheeseburger backpack, and was about to flee like the coward she was when Pearl spoke.

“That was a very… eventful evening,” She said.

Rose tried to match her casual tone. “If we never return to the Moon Base again it will be too soon.”

Pearl hummed. “I certainly haven’t missed it,” She agreed. “And seeing Yellow.” She looked up to meet Rose’s eyes.

Rose wanted to cross the barn floor and wrap her arms around Pearl, for Pearl to hold her in return, cup her face, feel the tenderness that was in her eyes in her touch.

“I’d imagine she’s rampaging through Homeworld right now,” Rose said instead, grinning. “Any Peridots unfortunate enough to cross her path better watch out.”

Pearl gave a small snicker back. Then she sobered. Her hands started twisting around themselves in front of her. Her gaze dropped. “Rose… I-“

The barn shook.

“This is it!” Came the sound of Peridot's cry.

They rushed out to find Steven awake, and Peridot mid-panic, frantically gesturing to the chalkboard behind her.

“-Stage three, the Earth is destroyed! We're running out of time. We need to drill right now!”

“No! It’s Malachite!” Steven interrupted.

Their confusion was met with an explanation of a new power Steven had uncovered - the ability to project himself into one of the Steven-shaped watermelons he had created last year. 

And while inside one he had encountered Malachite, who was quickly becoming less stable, and in turn, more dangerous.

“We have to do something about them,” Garnet said thoughtfully.

“Garnet, Pearl, Amethyst, you take care of Malachite,” Rose said. “I’ll stay here, in case anything else arises.” 

Given their luck as of late, the odds of that didn’t seem unlikely.

The three took off, leaving her, Peridot, and Steven to watch the warped flare in the distance.

Peridot asked, “What is Malachite?”

The Earthquakes were becoming more frequent, and more powerful. Rose was becoming more anxious as they did.

“We should be there helping them!” Steven insisted after another tremor shook the ground.

“Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl can handle Malachite, you know how strong they are,” She assured, sounding more confident than she truly felt. She placed a hand on his back. “Why don’t you tell me more about the Watermelon Stevens?”

“Mom!” He gasped. “What if I went back to sleep and go into a Watermelon Steven again?”

Rose hesitated. While it sounded safe in theory - Steven asleep right there in front of her while viewing the fight from a possessed fruit, it was possible there was some risk they weren’t aware of yet.

But truthfully, she was as anxious as he was to know how the fight was going. “Well, I suppose you could…”

“Yes!” He pumped his fist in celebration before flopping back on the blanket. 

Another Earthquake. “If they’re in trouble you have to wake up and tell me-“

He was already asleep.

While they waited Peridot climbed into the drill, fastidiously double checking everything before they put it into use.

“I still can’t believe Yellow Diamond could be so irrational,” Her rant echoed from inside the cockpit. “The Cluster has no purpose ultimately, and I was going to offer her a solution to the resource crisis that’s been plaguing Homeworld for centuries! But she’s only interested in-“

The ground shook again, stronger than before.

Peridot's head popped out of the wobbling-drill, then the rest of her followed, and she came scurrying down the ladder to safety. “Are we certain that Lapis and Jaspers fusion is the cause of these tremors?” She asked skeptically, arms out to steady herself. “How big was it, exactly?”

“Well, how would we know if it was the Cluster?” Rose countered.

A crack split jaggedly through the field around them, smaller fissures splitting off from it.

“I think it’s a good guess!” Peridot screeched.

Steven jolted awake with a yell as a rift opened underneath the duvet he laid on, and the blackboard that had been brought nearby came crashing to the ground.

“Oh good! If you’re done just lying there, maybe now we can stop the world from ending!” Peridot exclaimed. “Where are the others!?

“They're stuck on Mask Island!” He shouted.

“What?!” Peridot shrieked at the same time as Rose cried, “They’re stuck?!”

Peridot took a sharp inhale. “There’s no time, we need to drill now!” She asked, looking solemnly between the two of them, “Are you ready?”

They both gave a firm nod.

The drill's cockpit was… smaller, than Rose had expected from the outside. Once they were all in Steven was forced to sit in her lap, Peridot just narrowly avoiding the same by managing to squeeze in beside her. Her hair poked at Rose’s arm, Rose couldn’t have moved without pinning her to the wall on the other side.

The cockpits opening slid shut, and with a few quick taps across the interior panel the drill began to rumble, and they sank into the Earth until all the blue and green was swallowed by black. 

A light flicked on overhead, illuminating the dark inside the machine and the rock rolling past outside it.

In her lap, Steven shuddered. She found his hand and took it in hers.

“Are you alright?” She asked, leaning forward as much as she could to see his face.

“Yeah,” He said, though he sounded uneasy. “It’s just… kinda freaky down here.” He squirmed. “Kind of cramped.”

“Aw, are you feeling,” She wracked her brain to recall the word. “Uh, arachnophobic?”

“Do you mean claustrophobic?” He asked with a light laugh. “Yeah, I guess maybe a little.” He frowned at Peridot. “How’d you think you were going to get everyone in here?” 

Peridot shrugged. “I don’t know, they’d… shrink, or something,” She eyed Rose pointedly. “We didn’t have a lot of time to plan!”

That was an understatement. They had conceived of and built the drill in a matter of weeks, with only functionality and end goal in mind. She was surprised anyone had even thought to include seating.

Halfway through what Peridot called ‘the asthenosphere’, an ocean of molten rock that glowed with heat, they encountered a batch of fusion experiments - bundles of limbs and undefined mass clambering over the drill.

Peridot passed Rose the controller to shoot them down.

She nearly didn’t hear Steven’s whisper over the shots of the blast cannon. “This doesn’t feel right…”

“What?” She asked, glancing down.

“Poofing them and just… leaving their gems out there!” He said, looking up at her with wide eyes that pleaded for her to understand. “If we could bubble them they’d be safe, they- they wouldn’t be hurting anymore, right?”

Rose could do nothing but stare at her young, innocent, compassionate son. She remembered when they had explained bubbling to him - as a way of putting disembodied gems into a kind of stasis, something akin to sleep for a human, so they wouldn’t be scared or in pain any more, so they could rest.

She hadn’t realized how seriously he had taken that lesson, or how far his care would extend.

“There’s no time for that,” Peridot interrupted before Rose could find an answer. “Even if we could bubble those gems, the Cluster is getting closer to forming every second.”

Steven turned back to the window. In the reflection she could see his troubled expression, and above it, her own.

The drill began to rattle. 

“We’re hitting some denser rock!” Peridot alerted. “This is it!”

It was a bumpy ride while they pierced through the crust below, until they broke into a cavern, and the drills engine shut off, leaving them in eerie silence.

Below them a sea of multicolored gem shards glittered, stretching out well beyond what could be seen in the small ring of light cast by the drill.

Rose thought she had been prepared.

She hadn’t.

Every one of those shards below had once been a full gem, with a form, and a future and relationships and memories. She had known some of them. Some of them had known each other, most probably hadn’t and now they were forced together.

All of them deserved better than this, then what Homeworld had done to them.

She pressed a hand over her mouth to stifle a sob that sat in her throat and threatened to escape.

Steven looked over his shoulder. “Mom? Are you-“

Everything shook, worse underground then it has been above. The mass of shards glowed. 

“It’s too late, it’s taking form!” Peridot yelped.

A nearly-translucent shell rose up over the Cluster and started to quiver and expand.

Peridot shrunk back, “Steven, Rose Quartz,” She looked at them with shining eyes. “I’m sorry I couldn’t save this planet… I’m sorry I couldn’t save all of you!”

Steven leaned over in Rose’s lap to put an arm around the green gem, the other wrapping around her. “I love you Peridot,” He said. “I love you, mom.”

“Wow, thanks,” Peridot whimpered, hugging him back.

Rose pressed her face into his hair and held him tight. She could feel him trembling. “I love you too, sweetheart.”

The drill slammed to one side with a bang, then the other, shaking the whole time. White light filled the cavern. Rose briefly thought of summoning a bubble around them but any protection it offered would be momentary when the Cluster fully formed and the Earth ripped apart.

And then, as quickly as it came, the light faded and the drill stilled. On the monitor, the Clusters' many transparent limbs writhed on its surface.

“It's still struggling to take its form!” Peridot gasped. “This means we still might have time. There's still a chance!”

Rose didn’t dare yet relax as Peridot went to work repositioning them.

“Guys…” Steven said softly, staring out the window. “I don't think we should hurt the Cluster, I don't think it knows what it's doing.”

“Steven,” Rose sighed. She didn’t know how to tell him, with all his beautiful idealism and wonderful optimism, that while he was right - the gem shards below weren’t a villain or an intentional danger - they had to focus on saving the Earth, saving themselves.

Peridot summed it up best. “It doesn't matter if it knows what it's doing, it’s still going to do it.”

With that the drill dropped, freefalling for a split second before hitting the Cluster. The machine roared as it bored into the gem shards.

“Argh!” Steven clutched his head.

“Steven?!” Rose gasped.

He curled in on himself, his skin felt clammy where it touched hers.

Peridot shot a fearful look his way. “What?! Is the increased vibration causing damage to your head holes?”

“I don’t know!” Steven shouted. Rose gathered him up in her arms and tucked him into her chest, holding him the same way she had when he was a baby. He rested his head there the same way he did then too.

“We're not even piercing the crust yet! I need to increase power!” Peridot warned, still looking at him with an amount of concern Rose had never seen from her. “Are you going to be okay?”

He forced his eyes open, even though they stayed unfocused. “Yeah, yeah,” He panted. “I think it's just the noise… I think. Keep going.”

Peridot continued. Outside the drill Rose could see pieces of gem shards flying out from underneath them. Steven continued to take heaving breaths while she brushed her fingers through his hair and kissed his temple - wishing for something to heal to make him better.

Then they lost a drill head, and then another.

Steven flinched hard, giving a strangled gasp. He grabbed at his head and stomach, his eyes glassy. His breath started to come in quick gulps.

A faint pink glow shone through the fabric of his shirt.

Fear seized her. Rose had never seen him like this. She tried to settle him, gently placing a hand on his chest and pulling him back. At her touch he grabbed her arm with a vice-like grip, like it was an anchor. “Steven, what’s wrong?!” 

He fell back, limp and unconscious.

“Steven!” She cried, taking his face in her hands.

“What’s wrong with him?!” Peridot yelled.

Distantly, Rose was aware that the drill had come to a halt and was laying on its side, but all her focus was on her son, the fear, pain, and panic he had been feeling, the pallor of his skin and his slack features. Tears filled her eyes that she let drip onto his face - there had to be something that could be healed, something that she could do.

But he didn’t wake, even as more tears fell, and then more when her crying changed from an attempt to heal to simple fear.

She sat back, cradling him.

“Is he going to be alright?” Peridot asked, uncharacteristically quiet.

“I don’t know,” Rose hiccuped, wiping her face with the back of her hand. “Why have we stopped?”

Peridot's gaze slid away. “The drill is inoperable,” She said. “We- we failed. I failed.”

“It was always a long shot,” Rose all but whispered. She pushed the hair away from Steven’s damp forehead, marvelling at the softness of his skin, the dark eyelashes that brushed his cheeks, the rise and fall of his chest. She was going to appreciate every detail in the moments they had left.

Far above them, through layers and layers of earth, the sky was still that beautiful blue that had caught Rose off guard the first time she saw it. All the incredible, strange creatures were building their shelters and searching for their next meal and tending to their young. Humans were going about their lives unaware they were about to be cut short.

Greg would never know she had failed. He wouldn’t get to say goodbye to their son. She wouldn’t get to say goodbye to him.

Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl were up there looking for a way back to them. They wouldn’t make it in time. 

She would never reconcile with Pearl. She wouldn’t feel Pearl's lips on hers again.

Rose had to blink tears from her eyes at the thought of her friends - her family.

“I’m sorry,” Peridot said into the silence, her voice quivering. Somehow, she looked even smaller than usual. “For my part in this.”

Rose shook her head. “No, I’m sorry,” She said firmly. “This is because of me, because of the things I did-“

“No!” Peridot interrupted. She pressed a palm to her chest. “I was wrong to say that your rebellion didn’t accomplish anything. You let this planet thrive for thousands of years, and it’s- it’s beautiful.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “I-I’m glad I got to see it.”

After a deep breath, she continued, “Rose Quartz, thank you, for allowing me to join you, and for… being my friends.”

Rose gave her a wobbly smile. “I’m glad we got to be your friends, too.”

Steven bolted upright in Rose’s arms.

“It doesn’t want to form!”

“Huh?” She questioned, still trying to process his sudden consciousness and feeling like she had missed something important.

He pushed himself out of her grasp and dropped to his knees on the cockpit floor. “We’ve gotta put it in a bubble!”

“Bubble that?!” Peridot screeched.

Steven pressed his hands flat against the floor, determination in the set of his shoulders.

Movement in her peripheral pulled Rose's attention outside the drill, along with Steven and Peridots.

Bubbles, in dozens and dozens of colors and shades, were beginning to form across the surface of the Cluster.

A smile split across Steven’s face. He gasped, “They’re bubbling each other!”

Rose couldn’t believe what she was witnessing, formless gems - shards of gems at that - utilizing what little consciousness they had left to protect themselves. It shouldn’t have been possible, it didn’t make sense…

Steven spoke as if the Cluster could hear him, warmth, and something like pride, in his voice. “I’ve got you, you’ve got this!”

Rose fell to her knees beside him, placing her hands next to his and projecting outwards, further than she had ever tried, to create a bubble. He grinned at her.

“We’ve all got each other!” 

A giant pink bubble swept across the surface of the Cluster like a wave, absorbing the smaller bubbles into it as it went, growing and strengthening until it stabilized with a pop.

“Yes!” Steven whooped.

Rose laughed, relief rushing through her so strong it was the only thing she could do. She opened her arms and Steven launched himself into them.

He reached behind them, finding Peridot’s wrist, and pulled her in too.

Chapter Text

The morning after Steven’s birthday party dawned pink and orange, the sun coming up over the horizon immediately bringing the summer heat with it.

Pearl squinted in the new light. She had been at work on the drill all night, repairing the torn-off control panel and finally fusing it into its proper place inside the machine. She had begun work on the internal mechanisms of the cockpit, and even cleaned the dirt off the drill head after its run the night before.

The whole time, Rose’s words repeated in her head: ‘the Earth is in danger of being ripped apart any day now and you were willing to risk our hope of stopping it-‘

The least Pearl could do was put them back on schedule, and a little bit ahead.

Quiet voices from the kids tent alerted her that Steven and Connie were awake. She put aside the pliers, pulled a frying pan from her gem, and set off to the cooler for eggs.

Soon, Steven and Connie trotted over to the picnic table, still rubbing sleep from their eyes and wearing pajamas, greeting her respectively with a “hi, Pearl,” and “good morning, ma’am!”

“Kids,” She replied with a smile that didn’t feel quite right on her face. “How do you like your eggs, Connie?”

The pair happily chatted over breakfast. It wasn’t long before Amethyst and Garnet joined the small group at the picnic table, rustling Stevens hair as they passed, Amethyst tossing the leftover egg shells into her mouth.

Pearl was making an extra omelet for Amethyst when the nearby-vans rear doors swung open.

Greg climbed out, then Rose.

So that’s where she had been all night.

Pearl busied herself sprinkling cheese over top of the eggs to distract from the sudden heaviness that dropped like a stone in her chest.

“Rose! Good morning!” She welcomed when the two came to the table.

Rose looked at her wide-eyed like one of Earth's forest creatures caught in a vehicle's headlights. She stayed silent.

Pearl fought down the wave of hurt that swept over her and quickly moved on. “Greg, I have an omelet here for you!”

“Hey! I thought that was mine?!” Amethyst protested. 

Greg blinked in apparent confusion. “Uh, thanks?”

Her plate empty, Connie stood. “I’d better take down my tent.”

Steven went to help her. Rose joined them.

Greg and Rose took Connie home. Amethyst and Garnet started taking down the party decorations from yesterday.

Pearl went back to work on the drill.

“I sorted more screws and nuts for you!”

She looked up to Steven at her side, holding two old containers full of the said materials.

“Thank you,” She said, taking the tins. She placed them aside and turned herself on the stool to face him, hands folded in her lap to keep from fidgeting. “Steven, I’m sorry, for ruining your birthday party.”

“It’s- it’s okay, you didn’t ruin it. I still got to see Connie, and that Cookie Cat cake was really cool…” He said. His smile faltered, then dropped entirely. After a pause, hesitantly he asked, “Why did you do it?”

Pearl closed her eyes with a heavy exhale. “I don’t know,” She said truthfully. In the moment when she saw Greg climbing in the drill and the button on the control panel laid right at her finger tips she hadn’t thought it through. She hadn’t thought at all. She had just burned with the familiar need to debase the man and no sooner had the idea flickered through her mind than she was acting.

“I suppose I wanted to make a point to your mother.”

She felt a small hand slip into hers. She opened her eyes to Steven’s meeting hers intently. “Couldn’t you have tried just… telling her?”

Pearl let out a breathy laugh. “That probably would have been best,” She agreed.

“It’s not too late,” He said.

“I’m not so sure about that,” She all but whispered.

Steven squeezed her hand. “You should try,” He encouraged. “I’m going to go finish my present for Peridot! Let me know if you need any help!”

He ran back the way he came. Pearl sighed and returned to her work.

That night Rose put Steven to bed in the barn as she did most nights.

Unlike most nights, she never returned. When hours passed and the moon was on its descent back toward the horizon Pearl realized she was spending the night inside - and the only reason Pearl could think of for that choice was to avoid her.

She sat at the workbench by the drill, connecting circuits, soldering wires together. All the while tears silently dripped off her jaw.

She had never heard Rose speak to her the way she did after Pearl caused the drill incident, had never seen the anger flashing in Rose’s eyes directed at her. In six thousand years and even in her previous form she had never been so upset with Pearl.

She could still feel Rose’s arm pulling out of her grasp before she turned away. The tears in her eyes were there because of Pearl, after swearing to both Rose and herself she would never cause her pain.

And to what end? To best Greg in their decades long competition? The one that Greg didn’t even seem particularly interested in fighting - because he knew he had already won.

Pearl put down her tools and dropped her head into her hands, her shoulders shaking with quiet sobs.

Days passed and Rose continued to stay away. 

Pearl had hoped, that first day, that she would be able to apologize to Rose, show that she would be kinder to Greg to make up for what she did, and they could all move on and forget that it ever happened.

But it was becoming more and more clear that Rose wanted nothing to do with her.

Pearl had finally gone too far; she had finally lost Rose for good.

That morning Pearl remarked that they were getting low on supplies for Steven. Before anyone else could offer, Rose had warped back home to Beach City, alone, to go grocery shopping.

It had always been a chore that she and Pearl did together. Pearl liked creating and crossing things off the list, arranging items in the cart by category and size, finding the best deals; Rose loved choosing the produce and perusing the shelves in fascination of the selection and speculating what items would excite Steven the most. The menial task was made more enjoyable in each other's company, as with most things.

But Rose had gone alone.

Peridot was back at the workstation, having finished the interior of the drill head, and Pearl wasn’t about to cry in front of the green gem so she made an excuse and disappeared behind the barn, sinking to the ground with her back to the grainy wood and the grass underneath her. She pulled her knees up to her chest.

She heard the footsteps rounding the corner first, then Amethyst appeared. She looked surprised for a moment to find Pearl there, but as she took her in her expression softened.

Pearl turned away, wiping at her cheeks with embarrassment.

She felt Amethyst sit down beside her, and an arm fell across her back and pulled her into the smaller gems side.

“That was a pretty dumb thing you did,” Amethyst said, but despite the harsh words her tone lacked any bite, any judgement.

“I know,” Pearl whispered. “Rose is never going to forgive me.”

Amethyst squeezed her tighter. “Yes she will,” She said resolutely. “Rose can’t hold a grudge to save her life.”

Pearl took a shaky breath, tears filling her eyes again. “I just… I just wanted-“ her voice broke and sobs began pouring from her once again.

Amethyst tugged her into a hug. Pearl went willingly, pressing her forehead into the other gem's shoulder and clinging to her like a life preserver.

“Yeah,” Amethyst sighed, a hand rubbing up and down her back. “I know.”

Since the project first started Pearl and Peridot had been struggling to convert what had been Peridot's escape pod from the hand shop into a cockpit for the drill. 

Many of the pods' more advanced components were too damaged to salvage, and merging Earth tech with Homeworlds was proving difficult.

Finally, Pearl found their solution - without Peridot and her so-called ‘expertise,’ she might add. The screens inside the escape pod blinked to life and showed the data she had already input. She stepped back, her hands on her hips and a smile on her lips.

She couldn’t wait to tell Rose.

Then she remembered - Rose was angry with her. She had barely said a dozen words to Pearl in two weeks.

Pearl deflated.

Rose had always been so thrilled by Pearl's proficiency in engineering, she had not only allowed but enabled her to learn. She would kiss her and call her a genius and let Pearl show off her work whenever she built or fixed a piece of machinery. She would be more excited about it then Pearl herself.

Instead, when Peridot returned from inside the barn Pearl gestured to the cockpit. “I got it to work,” She said smugly.

Peridot leaned in to inspect the machine.

She straightened. “Finally,” She drawled, and walked away without another word.

It wasn’t that she cared about or wanted Peridot's acknowledgement. 

But someone’s would have been nice.

Pearl and Rose spoke. After a hectic night that included a trip to the Moon Base and a call to Yellow Diamond, they had the longest conversation between them since Stevens' birthday.

It had been stilted and awkward but Pearl couldn’t help feeling that maybe it meant Rose was ready to, at the very least, be in her presence again.

Then the threat of Malachite interrupted them.

Despite the circumstances, fusing with Garnet and Amethyst was wonderful, to not be herself for a short time was a welcome relief, and to feel her friends' love was reassuring.

The warp pad was destroyed in the fight, forcing Pearl, Garnet, and Amethyst, toting an unconscious-Lapis Lazuli to find a way to the next nearest warp pad - on the mainland a fair distance away from Mask Island.

Pearl had kept the raft Steven brought on their ill-fated mission to the Sea Spire in her gem ever since, and it was finally coming in handy.

Some time into their paddle across the ocean the earthquakes that had continued to rumble and turn the water choppy around them stopped. They could only assume that the drill had successfully neutralized the Cluster.

“Oh man, I can’t wait to go back home,” Amethyst enthused. “Things can finally go back to normal.”

“Normal,” Pearl repeated softly, more to herself than anyone else. She watched the rhythmic splash of water parting under her paddle. “I don’t even know what that looks like now, what I’ll do…” 

“What you have always done,” Garnet said, facing forward she gave no indication it was Pearl she spoke to.

“How?!” Pearl demanded, shoulders raised. “What am I- what do I do if Rose- if she won’t…”

“You go on,” Garnet said easily, as if it were truly that simple. “Rose is not your entire existence.”

“Of- of course not,” Pearl agreed. She had fought for a life that wasn’t lived only in service of another. Yet, there wasn’t much in her existence that wasn’t touched by Rose. “But I love her!”

“You didn’t act with love,” Garnet said firmly. “What you did was wrong. Rose is allowed to be angry.”

The words, and the bluntness with which they were said, stung, even while Pearl knew they were right. She looked down, “I know.”

“Greg matters to Rose,” Garnet continued. “Greg is also Steven’s father. You know you can not get rid of him.”

As if Pearl could ever forget, as if it wasn’t clear now more than ever. She snapped, “I know!” 

Lying unconscious in the middle of the raft, Lapis Lazuli twitched at the outburst before stilling again.

Quieter, she repeated. “I know, I…”

She could still feel what it had been like to be Alexandrite that morning, her easy confidence, the security she felt in herself, the closeness of her components that filled her with love. It left Pearl even more painfully aware of the absence of those things in herself, how she wished she could feel like that all the time.

“I wish Rose and I could be like you, like Ruby and Sapphire”

“Your relationship with Rose is different, as is every relationship,” Garnet said. “Ruby and Sapphire only desire each other, but Rose has a huge capacity for love. That doesn’t mean you’re less important to her than Ruby and Sapphire are to one another.”

She finally turned to Pearl. “You can’t force Rose to be someone she isn’t. I don’t believe you would want to.”

“Of course not!” Pearl vigorously shook her head. The mere suggestion was offensive to her, that she would dare to dictate how Rose should be, that she would ever infringe on her happiness with her own selfish wants. Pearl was the problem, not Rose. Never Rose.

“Then you have to accept that she wants to share that love with others, as well as you.”

Pearl sighed. In the thousands of years since they first came to Earth Rose had taken lovers, and every time Pearl had hoped they would be the last, that finally, somehow, she would be enough for her.

She turned away from Garnet‘s visored-gaze. “It’s not as if it matters now,” She said sullenly. “I think… I think it’s over.”

Saying it out loud left a hollowness in her chest, like the words took any last hope she had been holding on to with them.

She felt a gemmed-hand on her back. “I don’t believe that’s true,” Garnet said with the kind of conviction that always left the recipient wondering if she spoke from future vision or simply the confidence she had in her beliefs. “But with or without Rose, you have a purpose, Pearl. Your life is your own.”

Of course, Pearl thought. She very nearly scoffed. She had been her own gem for millennia; Rose had long renounced any ownership over her; she had never even asked for the loyalty with which Pearl followed her. Pearl made her own choices, she had even gotten good at it.

But then… why did she feel so lost?

Chapter Text

Rose’s garden had fallen by the wayside while she and the Crystal Gems were out at the barn. Now that they had returned home it was time to give It some much needed attention.

Thick, thorny brambles had started to creep from the rose bushes toward the stone wall that bordered her healing fountain, the sweet autumn clematis was growing with abandon with no one trimming it back, the plants that depended on Rose’s care to thrive in a climate they weren’t suited for were wilted or completely dead.

Rose surveyed the scene, considering where best to start, before setting to work urging the vines back to their bushes.

“Mom, how can I tell if the carrots are bad?” Steven called from one of the nearby garden beds that held a variety of vegetables Rose grew just for him. He held up a large, dirt covered carrot in each hand.

“When the surface is cracked,” She said. “That means they’ve been in the ground too long.”

He gave an affirmative nod. “Got it.”

A while later, once the garden was looking significantly less neglected and a basket of fresh fruits and vegetables sat by the warp pad, Rose and Steven knelt together at the edge of a stone path, their knees and hands caked in soil while they pulled weeds.

“Look at this one,” Steven said, presenting a small white and purple weed. “It’s so pretty!”

“Oh, it’s lovely,” Rose agreed.

He put it in the growing pile of weeds behind him that he would take home and make into flower crowns as he always did with the ones he deemed too pretty to waste. It made Rose happy since she had always found pulling the weeds a bit of a shame too, and she loved seeing her friends sporting wreaths of colorful plants on their heads for the rest of the day.

Breaking the comfortable quiet between them, Steven asked, “Remember how I rode in Lion's mane when we went to the moon?”

Rose nodded.

“So, I can go in without you!” Steven said. At her raised eyebrows surprise he grinned. “Yeah! I just wanted to see if I could at first, but then… I saw the tree with a bunch of stuff around it.”

A flash of guilt crossed his face and he looked away, down at his hands as he began to twist the stem of a dandelion between his fingers. “I- I know I shouldn’t have been looking through your things,” He said as if expecting to be rebuffed. “But there was this old tape with my name on it.”

With a sinking feeling Rose realized the reason for the troubled look in his eyes, and where this conversation was leading.

She had nearly forgotten about the tapes she made before Steven was born. In fourteen years her mind had been preoccupied with other things - learning to care for the ever-changing needs of a child, guiding her family through Homeworlds return, reevaluating beliefs that had always gone unquestioned, and somehow, despite it all, feeling more joy then she had in millennia.

All things she hadn’t anticipated when she made those videos.

“You really- you were going to stop existing when you had me?” Steven asked, glancing at her through his eyelashes.

“Yes,” Rose confirmed. “That was the plan.”

His eyebrows furrowed. “You were supposed to- to die, and you were just… okay with it?”

Rose went to reach for him, then realized her hands were still covered in dirt. She quickly wiped them off on her skirt before tenderly brushing his cheek.

“Having you, letting you live, was worth it,” She said, smiling softly.

She had been so excited for her baby; the humanity they would embody, the love they would feel, the opportunities that awaited them in life, it had overshadowed any doubt, any fear of what would become of her.

She could create a new life in giving her own. She could bring someone better into the world, one that would learn and grow and change.

It was the best thing she could ever do with her existence.

“But didn’t you want to be here? Didn't you want to see me?” He pressed, pulling away from her touch. “And what about dad? And Garnet and Amethyst and Pearl?” His eyes shone with tears. His voice became small as he asked, “What about me?”

“They love you so much you wouldn’t have even needed me,” She assured with a fond chuckle.

“But no one can love me like you!” He insisted. “No one could replace you, you’re my mom! Why would you- how could you think I wouldn’t need you?”

Because, she would have thought to herself back then, they all would be better off without her - freer, happier, no longer following someone who had deceived them every step of the way, able to keep growing without her holding them back.

But now? That didn’t seem right.

In the years since she survived by horrible, miraculous happenstance, she had seen the gems grow anyway, with her right there - they had come to nurture Steven and take on new roles in his life, they were closer than ever, they had accepted Peridot, a Homeworld gem that threatened their peace - a feat that never would have happened a handful of years ago.

And Steven was everything she had imagined he would be and more. His love felt bright and warm as a sun, easily and eagerly given. He pulled them ahead into a brighter future along with him, and surprised Rose with new solutions to old problems that she never would have considered herself.

She felt lucky to have gotten to see it all.

She had given dozens of answers to questions like Stevens when she had been pregnant, defending her choice to Greg, and Pearl, and Garnet and Amethyst. It had always seemed easy to reason then, but now, she hesitated, unexpectedly uneasy.

Before she could formulate a response that felt right the tears in Steven’s eyes spilled over onto his cheeks.

“Oh, oh,” She tsked. She brought him into her arms, a hand cupping the back of his head as he pressed his face into the crook of her neck, wetness dripping onto her collarbone.

“I’m here,” She murmured to him, pressing a kiss to the side of his head. Even after fourteen years it filled her with a rush of affection to do so. “I’m here.”

He stayed there for a bit longer until his shoulders stopped shaking with sobs and his breath evened, then pulled back with a sniffle, wiping at his eyes with the back of his hand. 

He stared at her for a long moment, eyes darting across her features searchingly. Then he rose up on his knees to hug her again.

“I’m happy you’re here,” He said, tucking his chin over her shoulder.

She held him tight. It surprised her that she truly meant it when she said, “Me too.”

Chapter Text

“What?!”

“I’m rich!” Greg repeated with a giant, slightly wild, grin. “Rich rich!”

Rose didn’t quite know the difference between rich and rich rich (she barely understood human money to begin with) but Greg was excited, practically shaking with it as he held out the piece of paper with his name and a very large number scrawled across it in messy writing. Steven, as well, was beaming, bouncing on the balls of his feet next to his dad. Clearly this was a very big deal.

“Wow!” She exclaimed a little uncertainly. “What… happened?”

“You remember my old manager, Marty?” Greg asked. 

She did, vaguely, recall him telling her about the man he came to Beach City with the night they met - how he’d lured Greg in with the promise of taking him under his wing and making him a star, then been reckless and demanding and outright cruel at times, not to mention the lack of effort he put into his part of their agreement.

“Technically he still has the rights to all my old music and he sold one of my songs for a commercial!”

Steven pulled his phone out of his pocket. “Looking it up now…!”

A familiar tune started to play from the device's speakers, accompanied by an unfamiliar voice and words. The three of them leaned in to watch the video play -  a burger being put together and eaten by a blonde haired man. “Would you like a burger from Pepe’s Burgers?”

Rose was starry eyed by the end. “This is amazing! That's your song!” She squealed to Greg. She turned to Steven. “Your dad was playing this the night we met!”

Greg chuckled awkwardly. “It wasn’t about burgers back then. I’ll play the actual song for you later.”

“Woah,” Steven awed, putting his phone away. “So, what’re you going to do with the money?”

“I don’t know,” Greg admitted. He winked at Rose. “I’ve always wanted to take my lady for a night on the town; wine and dine her, you know?”

Rose giggled.

“What town? Beach City?” Steven squinted at him skeptically. “There’s no romantic restaurants in Beach City!”

“And I don’t need to eat,” Rose added helpfully.

Greg rubbed the back of his neck. “Heh, yeah I guess you’re right,” He sighed.

“Buuut, we still have to eat,” Steven said. He gasped, clapping his hands to his cheeks, slapping his hands to his cheeks. “Imagine how many toppings we can get at Fish Stew Pizza!”

Greg was startled awake by the sharp jab of an elbow to his ribs.

Steven, he quickly remembered, was asleep beside him, sprawled out nearly sideways and taking up most of the room on the twin size mattress that fit in the back of the van. He had slept the same way since he was a toddler, though he hadn’t been quite so big back then.

A gentle ocean breeze drifted across Greg’s skin, rustling the hair by his face. He looked past the boy next to him to see the back doors open, Rose’s imposing figure blotting out the night sky where she sat in the entrance.

After their ‘night on the town’ that consisted of dinner at the Crab Shack - including desserts - and a walk around Funland where they played as many rounds of the games as it took to win Steven a stuffed Sniffling Croissant from Crying Breakfast Friends and Rose a giant pink whale, they had come back to Greg’s van and, as if an unspoken agreement passed between the three of them, settled in for the night as a family.

In the dark Greg could just make out the heavy slump of Rose’s shoulders, the hard line of her lips that turned down into just the barest hint of a frown at one corner, the flatness in her eyes that were cast into even deeper shadow by the fringe of hair above them.

She stared out across the sand, toward the beach house, and the Temple beyond.

He knew: toward Pearl.

He had caught her doing that often, recently. In quiet moments her gaze would drift off into the middle distance, her expression falling. Sometimes, it was as though she was only half there with him.

All those years ago when Greg had wished to have Rose all to himself he never imagined it like this - her heartbreak, and how it would break his own heart to witness.

Greg sighed, and decided against pulling Rose from her rumination, knowing she wouldn’t let him comfort her, but rather would put on a happy face for him.

Instead, he gently moved Steven’s elbow out of his side, gave Rose another glance, and closed his eyes.

Chapter Text

The corrupted gem tore through the forest, leaving a path of destruction in its wake - cracked and fallen trees, upturned soil, brush trampled under its hooves.

It was a flighty one, darting through the trees with no obvious direction except away from them. It reminded Rose of a deer, with knife-sharp antlers rested atop its head. It ran on all fours, though it had proven capable of rearing up on two legs. The gem on its back flashed green and red in the sunlight that filtered through the trees.

“Rose, your left!” Garnet yelled.

Rose went left as instructed, heading the gem off as it made to change course again. She raised her sword and positioned her shield.

It gave the monster pause long enough for Amethyst to get a whip around its hind legs before it could take off.

Pearl threw a spear that lodged in its side, and with roar and a pop the corrupted gem retreated to its stone.

Rose knelt to bubble the gem and send it off. “Did anyone see where Steven went?” 

“He fell back a while ago,” Garnet said.

They followed the path of ruin back the way they’d came, finding Steven sitting against the trunk of a tree that had been snapped in half. He was cradling something small and furry in his lap.

Getting closer, Rose could see it was a tiny squirrel, old enough to have separated from its mother but just barely.

“Hey guys,” Steven greeted, speaking in a hush so as not to disturb the sleeping creature in his hands. “Sorry I couldn’t keep up, but look! It was hurt, so I healed it.”

Rose crouched in the grass beside him. “Aww, how sweet,” She cooed, running a finger over the squirrel's back.

“I was thinking,” He said, looking down as if hesitant to meet their eyes while he spoke. “My healing powers are super easy now. Right Pearl? You saw how I healed Connie after training the other day!” He insisted. He peeked up at Rose. “So, maybe if mom and I did it together… we could try healing one of the corrupted gems?”

“Oh, Steven,” Pearl sighed sadly.

Rose laid a hand between his shoulder blades. “Honey, I-“

He interrupted her with a sudden determination. “I know it’s never worked before! But there’s two of us now, that’s double healing! That's gotta make it stronger!”

He gave them what Greg would call puppy dog eyes. “If there’s even a chance it could work, isn’t it worth it?”

Rose chewed on the inside of her lip. 

It wasn’t going to work. Thousands of years and thousands of attempts hadn’t made a bit of a difference as their friends continued to bear monstrous forms and no semblance of their previous selves. Rose didn’t know how many hours- how many days she had spent crying over gems of friends and foe alike, hoping to bring any one of them back.

She didn’t want Steven to be crushed when the corruption persisted, when their effort once again failed.

But she had to admit, he had a point. His piece of her gem functioned as its own, completely independent of hers. Didn’t that make it two gems with healing powers? Two Diamonds? And perhaps with two of them the potency would be stronger. Weren’t the Crystal Gems always betting on unlikely odds? Weren’t they formed on what was believed to be impossible?

“We can try,” Rose agreed, but before Steven could launch into the celebration he was clearly about to, she locked eyes with him, imploring him to take what she was about to say to heart. “As long as you understand that if we fail it won’t be because of anything you did or didn’t do. You can not blame yourself, alright?”

Steven gave a solemn nod, and, still holding her eyes, added, “You too.”

She almost recoiled at the intensity of his stare. It was as if he could see into her core, to the guilt that plagued her, all the times after attempted healings where why isn’t it working? Why can’t I fix this? I did this to them! swirled in her head like a storm. She felt exposed.

She looked away from him, to the tiny animal in his hands. Scritching between the squirrel's ears, she said, “Let’s get this little guy back in his tree.”

With a lift from her, Steven returned the squirrel to a branch on an unbroken tree nearby. It scurried off as good as new, as if it had never been injured in the first place. Rose set Steven back down on the forest floor.

“You’re washing your hands the second we get home,” Pearl said, leading Steven to the warp pad with a hand on his back. “Do you know how many diseases those things can carry?”

It didn’t work.

Yes, the Centipeetle Steven had befriended and wanted to try healing had reformed with a humanoid appearance. She also had enough rational to not immediately attack, and had intelligence, memories, and even personality that she showed through the afternoon with Steven.

It was the most progress Rose had seen in any of the corrupted gems - but it didn’t last.

The Centipeetle started to regress, her form flickering and rapidly morphing back into something bug-like and wrong. This time, no healing worked.

They followed her to the jungle where they discovered a whole group of Centipeetles had taken up residence in an old spaceship - what had likely once been their spaceship. They weren’t suffering, they even seemed happy to see each other.

They allowed her to stay.

“Where’s the word for ship?” Steven asked, flipping through the papers that Centipeetle had communicated with.

“Hmm,” Rose leaned over his shoulder, rifling through for the right page, and pointed it out on one that also held a drawing of a glow in the sky. “Here.”

“Ohhh!” Steven grinned. He traced his fingers over the gem glyphs, then across the paper toward the art. He was quiet as they walked through the jungle toward the warp pad. “What… what was that light? Lapis saw it too, in the mirror.”

Ahead of them, Garnet and Pearl both glanced back nervously.

Rose scooped Steven up, holding him on her hip. “That was the Diamonds attack,” She said.

“That’s what caused the corruption, right?”

She nodded.

“But- why?” He demanded. “Why did they attack then? And Centi was- was one of them! Didn’t they know there were Homeworld gems on Earth?!”

“They probably didn’t care,” Rose said as gently as she could. “Gems are… expendable to the Diamonds. They don’t mind losing a few to achieve their goal.”

“To stop the rebellion,” Steven summarised, voice hard. His eyes shone with furious tears.

Rose pressed a kiss to his forehead, squeezing her eyes shut for just a moment as she did.

She joined Garnet, Pearl, and Amethyst on the warp pad. Steven looked back over her shoulder, in the direction of the spaceship. “They lost some really good gems.”

The light flared, taking them home.

Rose stood in the entrance to the burning room, looking out over the sea of bubbles that floated near the ceiling. With a deep sigh she leapt to the floor below.

The stones were warm under her bare feet as she padded to the edge of the lava pool and sat on its ledge.

Her eyes scanned the bubbles overhead, picking out friends and comrades, in her mind seeing them how she had known them during the war and then how they had found them after the corruption. She saw smiles turned to snarls and embracing arms turned to grotesque appendages.

She shouldn’t have been disappointed. She knew they wouldn’t be able to heal them. She knew.

But she had gotten her hopes up. When she saw the Centipeetle more healed then any of the other corrupted gems in the past. She had thought maybe they could bring her further, with more healing and some time, and then they would be able to heal their friends too, and-

Her entire form felt heavy, like it was made of the same rock as her gem rather than light, like it would take mustering all her strength just to rise from the floor.

“Rose,” A soft voice spoke from behind her. “Are you alright?”

Pearl and Garnet had entered without her notice, and were looking at her with matching concern.

She didn’t question how they knew they would find her there, or knew that she would be upset. The two had seen her through the war and the decades after, seen her weep over broken and corrupted gems and weep again when she failed to bring them back. They had never let her mourn alone, even when she tried to insist they should.

“I knew it wouldn’t work,” She said, almost as though she could talk herself out of her despair by remembering that. “I was doing it for Steven. But the Centipeetle got better and I started to think…-“

“We would get our friends back,” Garnet finished for her, sitting at her side so close their arms touched.

Rose looked at the bubbles again, unmoving and unchanging, some having been there for nearly five thousand years. “They deserve so much more than this,” Rose said thickly. She took a shuddering inhale, tried to steady herself. “They came to the Crystal Gems because they wanted more, instead I brought this on them.”

“We don’t blame you for what the Diamonds did.” Garnet said. “None of the Crystal Gems would. You aren’t responsible for their actions.”

Rose looked down at her hands folded in her lap. She was responsible. She had provoked the Diamonds like she somehow always managed to, except this time instead of an extended stay in the tower she brought their wrath down on her friends and who knew how many other innocent gems, and ruined their lives.

Pearl, who had been hovering nearby finally sat on Rose’s other side, noticeably further than Garnet but still turned toward her, leaning in. “You tried your hardest, like you always have. So did Steven.”

Garnet laid a hand on Rose’s wrist. “You told Steven he couldn’t blame himself if this didn’t work,” She said. “That same goes for you.”

Her mind immediately supplied protests - that was different, Steven shouldn’t expect himself to reverse damage from three of the galaxy's most powerful beings, that was too much for one person to carry.

Then suddenly, she saw Steven’s eyes from earlier that day, holding hers and desperately willing her to be kind to herself. To be as kind to herself as she was to him.

And here were her friends, having sought her out when she fled because they wouldn’t, and never had, let her drown in remorse by herself.

She didn’t deserve their kindness or to be let off the hook for the things she had done, but she knew that if she continued to berate herself and bury herself in the crushing guilt, she would let Steven and Garnet and Pearl and Amethyst down. And even then they wouldn’t be angry with her, only sad too.

“I miss them,” She whispered, gazing into the sea of bubbled gems.

Pearl's eyes settled on one gem in particular. “Remember when Biggs brought that raccoon back to camp?”

“She was smitten with the thing,” Garnet chuckled.

Rose laughed, it sounded a little wet and shaky, not quite right, but it was genuine. “And left it in Bismuth's forge while she went on a mission.”

“Without telling her,” Garnet added.

“I heard her scream across camp!” Pearl laughed.

They both joined her, laughing together as they remembered their friends, filling the cavernous room that housed the subjects of their grief, for just a moment, with joy.

Chapter Text

When Pearl left her room she found Steven sitting at the window seat, his legs swinging back and forth over the side while he stared out the window.

She smiled fondly. “Is Connie on her way?” 

“Yep! She should be here any second…” Steven said.

“Are you ready?” She asked him, eyeing the cheeseburger backpack at his feet.

He nodded, picking up the bag to rifle through it, listing, “I’ve got snacks, extra mittens, walkie talkies, board games - and my phone is all charged for taking pictures!” 

She raised an eyebrow. “Pictures? Why?”

“Connie’s parents asked me to take some,” He explained. “It's her first mission!”

“She has done remarkably well,” Pearl mused. “I never imagined she would make such progress so fast.”

When they started training Pearl had thought she would teach the young girl the basics - some parries, some footwork, and perhaps in a few years, if Connie was still interested and had a proficiency, she could attempt more.

Then Connie came at sword fighting with an enthusiasm that, frankly, reminded Pearl of herself when she had first started to learn. She hung on every word Pearl said, soaked in the lessons, took corrections to heart. Soon, she had mastered the basics and Pearl was teaching her more advanced skills, continually impressed when she got them right and by her determination.

She was proud of Connie, and being her mentor had become a source of pride in herself as well.

“Yeah, Connie’s the best,” Steven said, glancing down at his feet shyly.

Looking out again he suddenly leapt up. “Connie!” He shouted, and ran for the door. Out the window Pearl could see him leaning over the porch railing as he waved wildly.

The pair collided in a tight hug at the top of the steps and a moment later they were inside, Connie toting a large backpack, the handle of the sword Pearl had given her sticking out from the top.

“Good morning, Connie,” Pearl welcomed. “Are you ready for our mission?”

“Are you excited?!” Steven added, practically abuzz with his own eagerness.

“I’m packed, I did my warm ups, and I’m ready,” Connie answered diligently. Then she broke into a grin at Steven. “And excited.”

With that, they took to the warp pad, setting off for the Great North.

The mission did not go as planned.

When Pearl first planned to bring Connie along the mission had been simple, no different then the ones they had routinely been taking Steven on - find and dissipate a corrupted gem, bubble it, and be home before Connie’s mom arrived to pick her up.

Things went awry almost immediately; the corrupted gems - the two of them, Pearl had only anticipated one - took off in separate directions upon seeing the three of them before they could so much as attempt an attack. 

The kids persuaded her to split up to search, but Pearl had no luck finding the one she was after, and then a snowstorm hit. While it would have no effect on her, she worried about Steven and Connie’s safety.

When Connie called to say they had found the monster - a hint of panic clear in her voice - Pearl thought maybe the trip wouldn’t be a total failure.

But when she got there-

“Jasper!” She shrieked.

The orange gem slowly raised her piercing golden eyes to them. Grasped in her hands were the two corrupted gems they had been seeking.

Jasper chuckled; a low, rumbling sound more akin to a tiger's growl than a true laugh. “Tell Rose I’ll see her soon.”

She straightened from her crouch and turned from them, slowly, entirely unconcerned to have them at her back, and made to disappear into the storm.

Pearl darted forward into her path.

“You’re not going anywhere,” She said, brandishing her spear between them.

Jasper smirked at her. “And who’s going to stop me?”

She swiped her arm in a wide arc to knock Pearl aside. Pearl ducked the offensively-easy attack, then leapt over the limb on the next swing back.

With Steven and Connie behind her she called over her shoulder, voice hard as she kept her eyes on Jasper, “Kids, go back to the warp pad.”

“Pearl-!”

“Ma’am, we can help-“

“Go!” She ordered, waiting until they took off for a narrow pathway leading to the top of the surrounding cliff before she threw herself at Jasper again.

With the tip of her spear at Jasper's chest, she lunged. The large gem dodged, and Pearl spun to stab at her side.

Before she could Jasper landed a blow that flung Pearl backwards into the snow.

“I’m not wasting my time on some pearl,” Jasper sneered, sounding bored. She began to walk away again, waving her hand dismissively. “Go back to singing and dancing.”

Pearl jumped up from the ground and threw herself at Jasper’s retreating back. Jasper turned at the last second, eyes widening in surprise as she barely managed to block Pearl's spear with her forearm - earning a nasty scratch across the skin but avoiding a direct hit that would have been enough to destabilize her form.

Her surprise turned to anger, a glower twisting her features, her eyes hardening.

She twisted the spear around the forearm that it had struck and grabbed the handle in one fluid movement, yanking Pearl forward into a punch to her jaw.

Pearl staggered back, disoriented, her spear gone.

She summoned another, her head still spinning. The side of her face throbbed.

She dove in to strike-

Jaspers fist landed another blow that knocked her sideways to the ground.

Pearl's breath came in short puffs, visible in the cold air. She trembled with exertion as she pushed herself up.

Jasper's boot connected with her chest before she could even get her footing. Pearl slammed into a tree trunk behind her, her vision swimming while heavy piles of snow fell on her from the branches above.

Every part of her form hurt. Despite not being affected by the cold she still felt its sting, the freezing drops running down her back and the clumps in her shoes.

Jasper looked down at her with utter contempt.

Pearl couldn’t win this. She had faced quartzes before, cruel ones and strong ones and dozens at a time, but that had been a long time ago when things had been different, when she had been different.

During the war she had been driven by fighting for Rose Quartz, protecting her, dreaming of the life they would have together when it was all over. She had won many battles bolstered by those intoxicating thoughts.

But Rose didn’t want her. Their life was nothing like what she had dreamed of.

Without a purpose she was nothing. She really was just a pearl.

“Pearl!”

Her head snapped up at the cry. Steven and Connie were still at the top of the cliff! She had believed they were long gone, back to safety and not witnessing her pathetic defeat.

Connie pulled at Steven’s arm. Pearl just barely heard her words over the howling wind, “Come on, we can go get the others!”

“Is that all you can take?” Jasper taunted, bringing Pearl's attention back to her. “Figures. You’re just a pearl playing at soldier.”

Pearl tried to glare at her, but she was shaking from head to toe, scraped and bruised and damp from the snow. She doubted she looked very intimidating at all.

“I heard the stories about the Terrifying Renegade Pearl,” Jasper said. “Ha! You’re exactly as ‘terrifying’ as I expected. Without Rose Quartz to give you orders you’re useless.”

“Come on, Pearl!” Connie’s voice rang out clear over the cannon. “She’s wrong!”

Over Jasper's shoulder Pearl could see her. The fiery determination in the young girl's eyes took her aback, the way she stepped up to the cliff's edge with a firm stance that spoke to the fight in her.

“You can’t seriously be listening to this! She knows nothing about you!”

Steven stepped up beside her. “You don’t need anyone to tell you what to do!” He added. “You’re a fighter, Pearl, and you’re amazing!”

“You trained the Crystal Gems! You taught me everything I know!” Connie reminded her, putting a gloved-hand to her chest. “And you never let anyone think they were better than you!”

Pearl recalled the stories she had told Connie, of times during the rebellion when new Crystal Gem recruits would look down on her, skeptical if not outright disbelieving when told that she was her own gem as well the group's strategist and Rose Quartz’s second in command. They were rude, dismissive, and ultimately wrong.

Some of them challenged her to a spar, smug and certain they could beat her and teach her a lesson.

And every single one of them changed their minds when she bested them, and became her friends who laughed when other newbies doubted her.

She had done that for herself, because she was proud. Because she was her own gem. Not for Rose Quartz. Not because Rose Quartz told her to.

She looked up at Jasper. 

She was no different than any of those ignorant gems that hadn’t believed her capable, except that she wasn’t a newly-made Crystal Gem and Pearl didn’t have to go easy on her.

“I don’t need orders to fight,” Pearl said. She ignored the ache throughout her body as she pushed herself up. Her gem glowed and she produced a spear. “And I certainly don’t need anyone to tell me what to do with you.”

Jasper snarled.

Pearl dove to the left, dodged Jasper's grab, spun behind her and placed a kick to the back her knee - making the large gem buckle for a moment before she caught herself - then danced away.

Jasper lunged at Pearl with a growl. Pearl leapt, springing off the back of Jaspers neck into a flip that put her in front again. Jasper pulled her face out of the snow with a roar.

“And those stories about the Terrifying Renegade Pearl?” Pearl said, twirling the spear in her hand. “They’re true.”

She jabbed the point at Jasper's gem, stopping just short of contact.

Golden eyes burned with rage looking up at her. “I already got what I came for.”

She curled into a spin-dash that plowed through Pearl's legs, knocking her over and sending snow flying in all directions as she disappeared into the storm and thick forest.

Pearl sat up and shook off the snow.

“Pearl!” Steven yelled. Him and Connie dashed down the side of the cliff. “You did it!”

“Hardly,” Pearl grumbled. She glared in the direction of the path Jasper had made into the trees. “She should be in a bubble in the temple right now.”

“But you beat her!” Steven exclaimed.

“She left because she was scared!” Connie pointed out.

Pearl couldn’t deny the rush of glee she felt at those words. It never got old, making gems recognize her as a formidable opponent.

She winced as she got to her feet.

“Are you alright, ma’am?” Connie asked, grabbing her hand to help her up.

“I am,” Pearl assured. When Connie let go of her hand she placed it on the girl's shoulder. “Thanks to you two.”

Connie flushed, but held Pearls eyes. “You always tell me not to let anyone else define who I am,” She said. “I just thought you needed to remember that.”

Off to the side she heard the snap of a camera, and looked over to Steven taking a picture with a soft smile.

She was a little embarrassed to think of being captured in such a state, but she put that out of her mind and pulled Connie into a hug anyway, just as Steven took another photo. With that, he shoved the phone in his coat pocket and ran to throw his arms around them too.

Chapter Text

The screen door creaked open. Pearl looked up from the dishes in the sink to see Amethyst and Steven enter, back much earlier than expected and - wet?

From where she sat on the couch Rose’s expression conveyed as much confusion as Pearl felt. She asked, “What happened?”

“A pipe burst at the car wash!” Steven dramatically cried. He was especially soaked, a small puddle had begun to form where he stood.

“And Greg’s bailing on us,” Amethyst grumbled, stalking to the counter to throw herself down on one of the stools. “This stinks!”

“You aren’t going to the concert?” Rose asked, eyebrows creased.

“Dads waiting for the repair guy, but it might be awhile…” Steven said as he headed for the stairs, pulling off his soggy shirt as he went.

Rose stood. “I should see if I can help.” And with that she swept out the door and leapt from the deck.

“Ugh, I can’t believe we actually got tickets for the show and now we can’t even go,” Amethyst complained, propping her head in her hand with a glower.

“I know,” Steven bemoaned from the loft. “And I was really excited to meet dads friend too! You know he said she…”

Pearl only distantly heard their conversation, staring after Rose even after she was long out of sight, the dishes forgotten and the water growing cold. 

“You’re coming to the rock show.”

“H-huh?” Pearl startled, tuning back in to find Amethyst at her side.

Amethyst crossed her arms. She repeated, “You’re coming to the show with us.”

Still up in the loft where he was getting changed, Steven gasped. “Yeah!”

Pearl raised an unamused eyebrow at what she was sure was Amethyst's idea of a joke. “So you can sit on my shoulders to see better?” She said flatly. “I think I’ll stay here.”

“It’s not my fault you make a good step ladder,” Amethyst teased, then fixed her in a firm look. “Seriously, dude, you need a night out, have some fun for once.”

Pearl's gaze slid back to the door. “I don’t know…”

“Forget about Rose!” Amethyst groaned. “She’s all you’ve thought about for the last two months! No wait, the last six thousand years! Come on, have some fun without her!”

Pearl opened her mouth to protest, until Amethyst cut her off.

“I get it, you guys just broke up-“

Pearl initially disregarded the words. She and Rose had never defined their relationship in human terms. How ludicrous it had always seemed to try to describe everything that they were to each other, everything between them, all of their years together, in words created by such short lived beings for their own fleeting relationships.

But, that’s what this was, wasn’t it? Pearl realized. The end of a romantic relationship.

She and Rose had broken up.

The phrase called to mind gems split in two, fusions falling apart. Something made unwhole.

It felt awfully fitting.

“I’m not saying you’re going to get over Rose in one night,” Amethyst continued, unaware of Pearl's musings. “But you have to start somewhere, and where better for healing from heartbreak than a rock concert! There’ll be good music and dancing and hot girls-“

“Hot girls?” Pearl repeated skeptically. “What does that have to do with anything?”

Amethyst rolled her eyes. “So you can see that there’s tons of other people out there, just waiting for a nerd like you to sweep ‘em off their feet!”

“Any girl would be lucky to meet you, Pearl!” Steven added, joining them in the kitchen in fresh, dry clothes.

Pearl worked her bottom lip between her teeth as she considered.

She could stay home and let the persistent sadness that sat heavy at her core consume her while she waited for Rose to return, only to exchange a few stilted words before parting again. She could stay in the safety of the familiar, quiet longing.

Or she could spend the night with Steven and Amethyst, in their companionship that always brought her joy, in a big, strange city, experiencing something completely new.

And many times before in her life, when she had stepped outside the safe and familiar, she had found something new in herself as well. Who was to say another New Pearl wouldn’t emerge that night?

There was nothing to hold her back. She was her own gem, who made her own choices, she could do whatever she wanted, be whoever she wanted.

“You’re right…” She said slowly. At their looks of surprise she was even more emboldened. She would show them what a rebel she could be! “You’re right, I can have a good time without Rose. I can talk to humans and dance to loud music. I’m going to go to a rock show!”

“You’re going to a rock show!” Amethyst whooped. She grabbed Pearl's arm. “Now c’mon, you can’t show up to a rock show looking like that.”

The leather jacket Amethyst lent her was stiff over Pearl's shoulders, and carried a musty smell. The fabric of the jeans clung too-tight to her legs, their seams sitting all wrong.

But Amethyst and Steven said that she would fit in perfectly at the venue they were headed to, so Pearl ignored the mild discomfort of the outfit and followed them to the car wash.

A stream of water more akin to a small river ran down the driveway of the establishment. As they got closer Pearl could see it was coming from inside the wash itself.

Greg leaned against the hood of his van, rubbing his head in defeat, as wet as Steven had been when he came home earlier.

At his side, Rose looked them over while they approached. Pearl had to be only imagining Rose’s gaze lingering on her. It couldn’t be anything more than wishful thinking. “Where are you going?”

“The concert,” Amethyst answered.

“You guys are still going? That’s great!” Greg perked up. He threw a thumb over his shoulder at a small grey car parked behind them. “Hey, why don’t you take the Dondai? Tonight was supposed to be its debut, you guys show her a good time for me!”

The Dondai was like new even though Greg claimed he had purchased it used, and it was a smooth ride - much smoother than his van that Pearl had had the misfortune of driving a handful of times. Of course, nothing compared to the thrum of a spaceship's engine beneath her fingers responding to her command, the galaxy stretching out before her, but she could appreciate a well built machine no matter how primitive.

They stopped at the Big Donut on their way out of town. While Pearl waited Steven and Amethyst did their best to clean them out of their last donuts, then set about raiding the fridges.

The door opened with the pleasant chime of a bell.

Pearl did a double take. For just a second she thought that Rose Quartz had entered.

The woman - who at any more than a passing glance was very distinctly human - was an imposing figure, taking up the doorway with a full form. Her light pink hair was the same shade that colored all of Pearl's best memories. Her green eyes were heavy lidded, her lips full and adorned with a silver ring protruding from the bottom one. 

“Uh, Earth to Pearl?” Amethyst's called. “You ready to go?”

Pearl pulled her gaze away from the woman walking across the shop to the counter. “…Yes.”

“What’re you… ohhh,” Amethyst's voice dropped as she realized. “Go talk to her.”

“What?” Pearl balked.

“Go talk to her!” Amethyst hissed, nodding her head in the woman’s direction. “This is exactly what you need! And we’re not even outside Beach City yet, it’s like a practice round.”

“What do I even- say to her?”

“Just say hi!” Steven said.

Pearl hesitated. She shifted on the balls of her feet, watched the girl warily and looked back to Steven and Amethysts encouraging faces, before straightening and marching over.

“Hi,” She said.

The woman looked up from the cup of coffee she was stirring. “Hi,” She returned. 

And then she waited. She quirked an eyebrow at her.

Pearl realized the woman was waiting for her to say something else. 

Why couldn’t she think of anything else? She hadn’t planned any further than hi. Words were suddenly elusive.

“I just- erm, that is-“ Pearl's cheeks were burning. She forced a weak smile onto her lips, and retreated to where Steven and Amethyst watched with clear dismay. The woman left.

“Wow…” Amethyst muttered.

Pearl's cheeks returned to their normal color somewhere between leaving Delmarva and passing through Jersey.

Music from the artist they were going to see that night played over the stereo. The sun had set and the stars were beginning to peak out above the quickly dimming strip of light on the horizon.

“It’s alright, Pearl,” Steven assured, leaning forward into the space between the front seats. “Remember the first time I met Connie? I fell off my bike in front of her! And we still became best friends!”

“Psh, you’re a dork,” Amethyst snorted, playfully shoving his head back. She laid a hand on Pearl's arm. “Look, pay attention tonight and I’ll show you how to bag humans.”

Pearl shot her a sidelong glance. “Will you?” 

“Have you really dated humans?” Steven asked curiously.

A flash of alarm crossed Amethyst's face.

Pearl grinned. “Yes Amethyst, I’d love to hear about these numerous romantic exploits of yours, all of which you’ve somehow kept hidden from Rose, Garnet, and myself…”

Amethyst glared at her as Steven chuckled. “I could’ve if I wanted to,” She snapped.

Pearl laughed.

Farmland and small towns turned to sprawling suburbs then city, then they passed through an underground tunnel and when they emerged they were driving between skyscrapers and busy sidewalks. Empire City quickly folded them into its hustle and bustle.

They got to the venue just as the doors opened and soon were pushing their way through the crowd to get as close to the stage as possible. Pearl was barely able to keep track of Steven and Amethyst a mere step ahead of her.

“What about her?” Amethyst asked about a woman a few bodies ahead of them in line for the bar with long blonde hair pulled up in a high ponytail, red lips, wearing a floral patterned dress.

Pearl's expression must have said it all. Amethyst let it go.

“Why are you drinking that?” Pearl asked as they left the bar, eyeing the straw colored liquid in Amethyst cup. “Alcohol has no effect on gems…”

“Don’t knock it till you try it,” Amethyst shrugged.

“Well,” Pearl hedged. “Maybe I will.”

“You want to try beer?!” Amethyst crowed.

“You just said I should try it!” Pearl defended, now feeling self conscious.

“Yeah alright.” Amethyst, still snickering to herself, handed over the plastic cup. She and Steven watched with rapt attention.

Before she even brought the cup to her lips the smell made her recoil - sour yet warm and sweet. She preserved and took a mouthful.

And immediately spit it out in a spray as she coughed and gagged. It tasted even worse than it smelled.

Amethyst doubled over howling.

“My dad doesn’t like beer either,” Steven said. “Maybe you should just try a soda?

Pearl sighed and passed the fowl drink back to Amethyst. “I think that’s… enough beverages for tonight.”

The concert started with the stage lights slamming on and a roll of the drums. A cheer went up through the crowd. 

Pearl was pushed and bumped between humans on every side. The leather jacket that had been a bit warm earlier now felt stiflingly hot.

It was overwhelming, but perhaps not in the worst way as Pearl buzzed with the energy around her. The singer's voice was rich and resonant with a slight rasp, the music bold and pounding, she could feel the pulse of it under the soles of her feet.

“Ooh, she’s cute!” Amethyst yelled over the clamor later that evening, pointing to a person a few bodies over. They wore a leather jacket similar to Pearl's own, their dark hair cropped short.

Pearl turned back to the stage as her answer.

With the next song the music changed to something slower, and when the artist began she sounded plaintive, sorrowful, as she sang about a love lost.

Around her people swayed to the tune but Pearl was frozen in place. Suddenly everything she hadn’t thought about all night came crashing back down on her.

The lyrics spoke of loneliness, restlessness, feeling like nothing would ever be right again. On stage the woman gripped the mic tight, her eyes squeezed shut as she belted out a long note that seemed to reverberate through Pearl's very being.

Tears stung her eyes, blurring the lights on the stages until she blinked them away.

With a start, she realized Amethyst and Steven were looking at her with concern.

She didn’t want to ruin this for them. They had been so great all night, insisting she come have fun, distracting her from her pain, making her laugh and feel truly happy. They were excited for this show, they shouldn’t be worrying about her.

She took a staggering step back, then another, and ran. She pushed her way back through the close-packed bodies towards the doors, bursting out first into the nearly empty lobby, and then into the night.

The sidewalk out front of the theatre was illuminated in a warm glow from the giant sign lights overhead. Pearl took a shaking breath as the cool air hit her overheated skin.

Despite the time of night the street was still busy, pedestrians rushing by and yellow cabs crawling along, bumper to bumper, on the road. She could hear a siren in the distance.

A splash of pink out of the corner of her eye caught her attention.

On the other side of the entryway stood the woman she’d tried to talk to earlier at the Big Donut.

Pearl couldn’t believe the Mystery Girl was here, and she didn’t know if she was excited or embarrassed to see her again.

At the start of the night Pearl had wanted so badly to try something new, to try to be something new.

But as the evening went on she had begun to feel like maybe her days of reinvention were behind her, that she was too firmly entrenched in her self-assigned role at Rose’s side and directionless without it, too afraid of the unknown to really try.

Looking at the pink haired woman she was filled with excitement and a tinge of fear.

And she remembered: she had been scared and unsure every step of the way into the rebellion too, not simply because of the danger, but because it meant going against everything she was created to be, challenging herself to do what seemed impossible.

She approached the Mystery Girl.

“Hi.”

The woman showed surprise for only a second, then gave a crooked smile that was almost teasing. “Hi again.”

Words didn’t feel so hard this time. “Are you here for the concert?” At Mystery Girls' hum of confirmation she asked, “Are you enjoying it?”

“Yeah, yeah, she’s one of my favorite artists,” Mystery Girl said, flipping her hair over her shoulder with a flick. “I just needed some air. You?”

“Oh, yes! Very much,” Pearl enthused. “It’s much more fun then I imagined it would be! I didn’t realize music could be so… stirring.”

“Heh, yeah, it can be,” She agreed. “I mean, there’s always a song for whatever you’re going through, you know?”

Pearl didn’t want to think about what drove her out here in the first place. She searched for something else. “So, um, pink hair?”

Mystery Girl reached up to touch a piece that fell over her shoulder. She shot Pearl a smirk. “For now. You like it? It was sky blue a week ago.”

Pearl blinked. “Really? Why?”

“It’s just fun.”

She tried to picture the woman in front of her with blue hair, and quickly concluded it would have suited her just as well. Perhaps any color would. “I didn’t realize that was something you could do,” Pearl admitted.

It was the girls turn to look confused. “You’ve never tried a different color?”

“I’ve never considered it.” She supposed she could, technically, given all the colors her form had available to it, but the idea had never occurred to her.

“You should try it, I bet you’d look great.”

“Not nearly as good as you,” Pearl said truthfully.

Mystery Girl's eyes widened, then she laughed.

She really was beautiful, in the glow of the lights, with a gentle blush rising on her cheek and her green eyes crinkling with mirth. Her laugh was warm and contagious, bringing a smile of her own to Pearl's face. 

If Pearl had been interested she certainly was what she would have been looking for.

The cellular device in Mystery Girl's hand buzzed. She looked down at the screen. “Shoot, I gotta go,” She muttered. She looked back up at Pearl. “Uh… Here.”

She reached into the brown bag that hung from her shoulder and pulled out a rather rumpled piece of paper and a pen. She tore a strip off the paper and, using the wall beside them as a surface, wrote something down.

She handed the paper to Pearl, who could now see it had a series of numbers and an S. scrawled across it in messy handwriting. “See ya.”

Pearl turned to watch her walk past her and back inside, finding that Steven and Amethyst were watching from the doors.

“Pearl!” Steven cried as she ran to her. “We were looking everywhere for you! What happened?”

“Wasn’t that the girl from the Big Donut?!” Amethyst asked.

“I’m sorry for leaving, I,” She recalled Mystery Girls' excuse before. “Needed some air. And yes, it was.”

“And you were talking to her!” Amethyst exclaimed. “How did it go?”

“I thought it was going well, but she had to leave and she gave me… this?” She held out the piece of paper.

Both Steven and Amethyst's mouths fell open.

“No way,” Amethyst awed. “She gave you her number?!”

“What does that mean?” Pearl asked, confused by their excitement.

“It means she wants you to call her and talk to her on the phone!” Steven explained.

“What’d you say to her?!” Amethyst demanded excitedly.

“We talked about the concert, then I asked about her hair - she changes the color frequently! Did you know humans could do that?” Pearl said. “Then she said I would look nice if I changed mine, and I said ‘not as good as her.’”

“ Pearl ! You flirt!” Amethyst shouted. “Ohohoh Rose is going to be so jealous.”

Pearl froze. “I’m- You think so?”

“Uh yeah dude, did you see the way she was staring at you before we left? And now you’ve got a chicks number after wooing her! It's going to drive her nuts!”

“Oh.” So she hadn’t been imagining the desire in Rose’s eyes earlier. She wasn’t sure what to make of that, if Amethyst's assessment was accurate or if there was another, more plausible, explanation. “I’m not sure I want that.”

She knew the feeling intimately, the sting of watching your beloved with someone else, the hurt in feeling cast aside and forgotten, and she didn’t wish that for Rose. She didn’t want to hurt her by having this girl's number or by talking to her on the phone. Truthfully, she didn’t want to talk to Mystery Girl on the phone at all, she wanted to talk to Rose, the way they used to - easy, fun, lovingly spoken between kisses while wrapped up in each others arms, or hurriedly around the kitchen counter, or whispered in the dark of night.

“I’m not ready for this,” Pearl whispered, the hand holding S’s number falling to her side.

Steven and Amethyst were quiet for a moment.

“That’s okay,” Steven said.

“I told you you weren’t going to get over Rose in one night. That would be crazy fast!” Amethyst said. She frowned. “I shouldn’t have pushed you so hard to talk to people.”

Pearl admitted, “I did enjoy talking to the woman from the Big Donut.”

“We just wanted you to have some fun tonight, that’s all,” Amethyst promised.

Pearl managed a weak smile. Despite the embarrassing moments and the horrible drink and the heart-rending music, “I did.”

On their return to the car later that night they passed a dark shop window and Pearl caught a glimpse at her reflection, seeing herself for the first time that night.

She stopped, struck by how much she actually liked the outfit Amethyst had dressed her in - the way the pants hugged her legs and the jacket squared her shoulders, even if it was uncomfortable. It was different from anything she had worn before, but it felt right, it felt like a new her.

Chapter Text

Steven, Greg, and Rose were packing a bag.

Pearl sat on the couch, a book open in her lap despite not having absorbed any of the words for several minutes as she listened to the chatter above her in the loft.

Footsteps started down the stairs. “We can go to the Eiffel Tower, and eat French bread, and-“

Steven stopped at the bottom of the steps, hot dog shaped duffle bag slung over his shoulder, Rose and Greg on his heels. He brightened upon seeing Pearl.

“And let’s bring Pearl!”

She blinked. “Huh?”

“We’re going to Paris!” He explained. “You should come!”

Behind him, Rose’s eyes widened with panic. Greg nervously glanced between her and Pearl.

“Oh Steven, I don’t think…” Pearl wrung her hands, wracking her mind for an acceptable excuse to refuse the invitation to what would surely be an unpleasant trip for everyone with her there. “Y-you three should have some family time, and Garnet and I are going out to search for Jasper later…”

“You’re family! And I know Garnet can handle Jasper!” He insisted. He folded his hands in front of his chest and gave her his most pleading look. “Please? Please please please?”

Greg put on what was clearly a very forced, uncomfortable smile. “Yeah, Pearl, the more the merrier!”

Pearl nearly shot a glare his way before managing to soften her features. It was generous of him to accept her for Steven’s sake, and now she couldn’t very well turn them both down. She closed the book in her lap with a sigh. “Well, alright.”

Steven threw his arms up. “Woohoo!” 

He practically bounced all the way to the warp pad, him and Rose on either of Greg’s sides once they got on. “Ready dad?”

The pale blue light surrounded them, eliciting a gasp from Greg. He grabbed for Rose’s arm as they were lifted into the stream.

“Isn’t it cool?!” Steven beamed.

Greg flailed wildly to stay upright. “Who needs passports when you can do this !”

Rose laughed and helped to straighten him. Steven showed him how he could do flips in the stream. Rose reached out to ruffle the boy's hair.

Pearl stood off to the side, out of their way and, likely, out of their minds as they delighted in each other's company, the very picture of a happy family.

It was her own fault, of course. If she hadn’t tried  for all those years to push Greg away from Rose, berating and humiliating him at every chance, eventually forcing Rose’s hand, she could have been holding on to Rose’s arm too, laughing with Steven, welcome amongst them rather than an afterthought of Steven’s kindness.

“Pearl!” Steven exclaimed, floating over to her. “We should go to that castle you told us about in training! And take lots of pictures to show Connie-“

The warp stream faded as they were deposited at their destination. Pearl squinted in the sudden darkness. The City of Lights, as the humans called it, lived up to its name, stretching out before them from the hill the warp pad laid on, a glowing grid of streets punctuated in the distance by a shining tower reaching into the sky.

“Wow,” Steven and Rose both said on a breath at the same time.

Then Steven shouted “let’s go!” and dashed down the hill, leaving them no choice but to follow.

The suite Greg checked them into was lavish. Not that Pearl had been in many hotels (or any for that matter) to compare it to, but even so she could tell by the gleaming marble floors and plush rugs underfoot, the large floral arrangements placed around the room, the entertainment system that Steven immediately zeroed in on, and the balcony with an unobstructed view of the Eiffel Tower, that this was the epitome of luxury for human travel accommodation.

“… Le bar est ouvert jusqu'à deux heures, un service de chambre est disponible vingt-quatre sept,”

“The bar is open until two AM,” Pearl relayed in English to their group. At least her fluency in multiple human languages made her presence somewhat useful. “And room service is twenty four seven.”

“Et nous avons un tailleur parmi notre personnel pour tous vos besoins de garde-robe.”

“And there’s a tailor on staff.”

Greg chuckled. “A tailor? I don’t think we’re gonna-“ Suddenly, his eyes lit up. “Hold on a minute…”

And that was how Pearl found herself, alongside Steven and Greg, being fitted for a tuxedo. 

She stepped out from behind the privacy curtain to the pair eagerly waiting for her in their own formal wear.

Steven’s eyes went starry. “You look amazing!”

“I must admit,” She said, smile growing. She reached up to adjust the bowtie around her neck. “It’s a perfect fit.”

On the other side of the room another curtain opened and Rose Quartz revealed herself.

Her usual white gown had been replaced with a sparkling black dress that hugged her form, accentuating every curve and glittering like the stars in the night sky as she moved. A slit up the skirt exposed a long leg with each step, a cutout leaving the gem in her stomach on display. She did a small turn for them to see.

Pearl was grateful she didn’t strictly need to breathe, as she couldn’t seem to catch her breath.

She wanted nothing more than to grab Rose by those sequin covered hips, slide her fingers down the bare skin of her back, place a kiss to the curve of her shoulder and watch Rose blush as she always did no matter how many times Pearl had done it.

“What do you think?” Rose asked.

“Whoa,” Greg said weakly.

Pearl had finally found something they agreed on

Pearl quietly slipped away when the dancing started - Greg pulling Rose into his arms and the pair laughing and twirling around the floor of their suite. It called to Pearl's mind the dance she had watched them share on the beach so many years ago that had truly marked the beginning of the end for Pearl's place in Rose’s life.

It was all just a little too much for her to handle.

When she returned a while later the room appeared empty. She peeked into the bedrooms, the bathroom, then noticed the curtains around the balcony doors billowed with a warm breeze, and the sounds of the street far below came in through the open doors.

Steven, Greg, and Rose were gathered at the railing with their backs to her, looking out over the city, and the glowing Eiffel Tower.

Then the tower's lights went dark- and for a moment it was as if the very city held its breath, before they came back on in a twinkle, shimmering across the structure's surface like the sparkles on Rose’s dress.

“You have to kiss!” Steven insisted.

“I think that's New Years, Schtuball,” Greg said.

Rose turned to kiss him anyway, her half-lidded eyes soft and warm, full of adoration. She looked at him like he was the most important being in the galaxy.

She looked at Greg the same way she used to look at Pearl.

And when she caught sight of Pearl standing in the doorway those warm, adoring eyes became  closed off and dark. Because that was the only way she looked at Pearl now.

She turned on her heel and took off back the way she came.

Steven watched the suite door quietly shut behind Pearl, his cry of her name as she left going ignored. His heart dropped.

Behind him his mom and dad were frozen, staring after her guiltily.

“We have to find her,” He said.

It was quickly decided they would split up, Steven’s mom heading to the hotel's upper levels, while he and his dad went downstairs.

“I’m not so sure Pearl will be happy to see me,” Greg sighed, rubbing the back of his neck while they walked one of the seemingly endless, quiet hallways. “We never got along, and now with this thing with her and your mom…”

“That’s exactly why I wanted her to come,” Steven answered firmly.

They searched the lobby, the lounge, the bar, and finally they found Pearl in the dark courtyard among the patio seating and long planters of flowers and foliage. She leaned against one of the garden beds filled with blooming pink rose bushes, a plucked flower hanging loosely in her hand.

When she looked up at their arrival Steven saw a tear hanging precariously from her chin.

“Greg,” She gasped, her voice breaking on the name.

Steven led his dad to her, and then waited as a heavy silence stretched between them. Neither met the other's eyes, rather glancing around the courtyard as if looking at each other would be too brazen.

Steven pursed his lips in frustration. “Why don’t you talk to each other?” He suggested, spreading his hands. “About what happened. About- all of this?”

The silence dragged on a moment longer, long enough that Steven began to question if this would work at all, or if his family was doomed to awkward exchanges and sad looks and avoiding each other forever when he just wanted them to be like they were before, maybe even better than before. Couldn’t they just try?

Then, his dad spoke. “Look, if I were you I’d hate me too.”

Steven winced. That wasn’t the way to start a productive conversation.

But Pearl finally looked at Greg, and asserted, “I don’t hate you.”

His eyebrows raised in surprise. “But… I’m the reason you and Rose are on the outs.”

“No you’re not,” Pearl said with a bitter laugh in her voice. “I did that on my own. I tried to cast you from Rose’s life when I knew how important you are to her.”

“Sure,” Greg admitted, shrugging as he leaned against the same planter as Pearl. “But it’s not like I never did the same.”

Pearl shook her head. “You were never as awful to me as I was to you.”

Greg dropped his gaze to his hands, absentmindedly picking at a thumbnail. “I guess I always kind of thought you were, you know, like a non-negotiable, a packaged deal,” He said. “You and Rose, you were always going to be together. How could I compete with that?”

“But she fell in love with you,” Pearl sighed. “And you made her happy, happier than I’ve seen her in so long.” She turned her face up to the sky, visible above the courtyard. “You were all she could talk about, how great you were, how human you were.”

Tears filled her eyes, glistening in the low light. “And then she confided in you, things that only I ever knew, things she said she never wanted to speak of again, except she did, with you, as though…” She trailed off, unspoken words hanging in the air.

Steven was burning with questions. Pearl made it sound like his mom was keeping secrets, things only she, and now his dad, knew. He very nearly wanted to interrupt the important conversation for answers.

Greg leaned forward to catch Pearl's eye. “I would never try to take your place in Rose’s life,” He said gently. “I couldn’t. You know that, right?”

“I think perhaps she wants you to,” Pearl muttered.

Greg reeled back. “Pearl! Are you kidding?!” He laughed with disbelief. “Rose has been- heartbroken since you two have been fighting! She won’t talk about it but I know. You’re probably the most important person in her life. You know her better than anyone, better than I can ever hope to! I wasn’t there for the war, I haven’t been with her for six thousand years-“

“It was quite a few more than that,” She interjected.

“Once, you called me a novelty,” Greg said. “And for a while I thought you were right, that I was a fling. I know that’s not true, now, but I’m still not gonna live forever like you guys, a hundred years from now I’ll be gone and you’ll still be here, like always.”

“Yes, I’ll still be here,” Pearl echoed bitterly. “Something she can never get away from.”

Greg frowned. “I don’t think-“

Pearl suddenly gasped, looking past Steven with alarm. “Rose!”

Steven whirled around to see his mom in the entryway. She looked stricken, tears brimming in her eyes.

“Mom?”

His dad and Pearl leapt up to rush to her side. Greg took her hand. Rose stared at their intertwined fingers as if struggling to process the tender gesture.

“I’m sorry,” She whispered.

“Whatever for?” Pearl asked.

“I’ve caused you both so much pain,” Rose said, barely above a whisper. “You’re both so wonderful and I’ve made you feel like you’re not enough for me when that couldn’t be further from the truth- I don't deserve either of you. Look what I’ve put you through! All the problems between you are because of me.”

“No!” Pearl vigorously shook her head. “No no, that’s not true!”

“The problems between us, they’re our problems,” Greg said firmly.

It was as if Rose didn’t hear them. “If I wasn’t so horrible I would have seen how I was hurting you-“ She screwed her eyes shut tight. “And I wouldn’t have kept making your lives miserable!” 

Pearl and Greg shared a look of shock, before it turned into something more like resolve, an agreement seeming to pass between them. They turned their attention back on Rose.

“Miserable?” Pearl repeated softly. “You’ve done nothing but bring joy to my life.”

“You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, Rose,” Greg said.

Rose opened her wet eyes, taking in both of them uncertainly.

“Without you I would have never become the gem I am,” Pearl said. “You believed in me so much it made it possible for me to believe in myself…”

“You gave my life meaning. Heck, you gave me the greatest gift of all!” Greg said, smiling at Steven over his shoulder. He squeezed Rose’s hand. “Our son, and he’s every bit as loving and kind as his mom.”

“And you’re the best mom ever!” Steven jumped in. “You protect me, and you give the best hugs, and I love hanging out with you!”

“You make me laugh,” Greg added with a growing grin.

“Yes!” Pearl agreed eagerly, sharing a smile with Greg before turning it on Rose. “And you’re always so thoughtful.”

“And you get excited just because you see I’m excited.”

“You know just how to quiet my mind, which is no small feat as you know.”

“Sometimes, I still get chills when you say my name!”

“You too?” Pearl looked at Greg, eyes lit up. She giggled. “It’s silly, isn’t it?!”

Rose interrupted the barrage of compliments with a breathy laugh, swiping at her wet eyes that now crinkled with a smile. “Oh, you two…”

She hesitantly turned to Pearl. “I thought… you must have wanted nothing more to do with me.”

“No, never!” Pearl asserted. “I- well, I believed you wanted nothing more to do with me.”

“No!” Rose gaped.

“I suppose there’s been a- a slight misunderstanding then,” Pearl chuckled, blush rising on her face. She traced her fingertips down Rose's arm to catch her free hand. “I will always love you Rose.”

“I love you too,” Rose said back, her expression turning soft.

She brought a hand to cup Pearl's cheek, and guided her into a kiss that Pearl readily fell into, her arms around Rose’s neck and fingers burying in her curls.

Steven smiled and let out a breath of relief.

The morning brought warm sunlight that fell across the bed from the balcony's open doors, along with pleasantly cool air and the sounds of the city starting its day.

Steven’s tux was rumbled from sleeping in. He yawned, slid from the bed, and padded out to the living room.

He heard quiet voices before he saw their source - his mom and Pearl, back in their regular clothes after the formalwear of the evening before, leaning into each other on the couch with barely a space between them.

“Morning,” He greeted. He pulled at the bow tie hanging loosely around his neck.

“Good morning,” His mom beamed at him.

“Here, let me help you,” Pearl offered. He stood in front of her so she could undo the knot.

His dad joined them at the same time that there was a knock on the door. Rose welcomed him with a quick peck while Pearl went to answer it.

An attendant carried in a tray of pastries and a pot of something steaming, placing it on the coffee table.

“Hey, thanks! Or uh, merci?” Greg said.

“I ordered breakfast,” Pearl explained brightly.

Steven dug into the most buttery, flakiest, best croissant he’d ever had in his life, while he watched an unfamiliar scene play out across from him.

His dad rested a hand on his moms back. Pearl didn’t react at all. A moment later she laughed at something Greg said, a real, genuine laugh.

“-Well,” Pearl said with a smirk. “Rose always does what she wants. Did she ever tell you about the time she-“

There was no animosity, no tension thick in the air between them. Pearl handed Greg a pastry out of his reach. He poured Rose more hot chocolate.

When Steven's mom pretended to pout over a teasing story about her they both laughed. Pearl pressed a quick kiss to her lips while his dad grinned.

And finally, Steven thought, it felt like a family vacation.