Stupid Rock Lady. (Steven Universe Pearl Self Insert)

LOG-043.
Hmhmhm.

LOG-043.

As I took the final bite of my chosen sacrifice, I savoured the intricate dance of flavors that burst onto my tongue. The crispiness of the crust, the rich, tangy sauce, and the harmonious blend of cheese and toppings all melded together into a culinary symphony that made me nod in approval.

Fish Stew Pizza had certainly lived up to Kofi's confident recommendation.

Dabbing my lips with a relatively small napkin, I leaned back in my chair, my gaze drifting over to the rest of the Gems seated around me. Rose was finishing her own meal with a contented smile, Garnet appeared equally pleased with her deep dish, and even Pearl and Vermilion seemed at ease, despite their nonparticipation in the actual eating.

I spotted our ever present waiter watching us from a table over, even as he collected a few plates from the one other group currently present within the building.

Just a couple of teenagers laughing about this and that. It...it was nice to see.

Clearing my throat gently for effect as the future restaurant manager began to approach our own table, I caught everyone's attention. "I must say, this has been a thoroughly enjoyable experience. The food in an of itself was a rather delightful mix of flavours and textures, and the service was impeccable. Kofi, you and your family run an exceptional establishment."

The young man's face lit up with a visible mixture of relief and pride beneath some of the sweat that had gathered atop his brows. "Thank you, madame. We at Fish Stew Pizza always strive to offer the absolute very best to our customers!"

"You certainly do." I responded warmly, before glancing at Rose. "And thank you again for bringing us here. It's been...quite an enlightening experience."

The Rose Quartz's eyes twinkled with satisfaction as she shifted in place beside a quiet Vermilion, the red Pearl gently holding the cup of water she'd been provided close to her mouth. "I'm glad you enjoyed it, Slate. It's always nice to try something new, especially when it brings us all together like this."

She sighed, gaze turning distant.

"I can barely remember the last time we all just...went out and did something for fun. We'll have to do this a bit more often, I think."

Both parts of me churned with amusement as Pearl immediately piped up, the renegade's eyes wide and expression amusingly supportive for someone who was so firmly against eating.

"Oh, I'll have to prepare a timetable!"

Said eyes blinked as Rose, Garnet and I all began chuckling, their owner frowning slightly in response.

"What? It's good to be prepared!"

Vermilion's supportive nod seemed to reassure her well enough, at least.

Turning in my seat, I smiled down at the crimson Gem, her cheeks turning slightly darker as I leaned forward and gently took the glass from her hands, setting it down on the table.

"I'm glad you came along. I get that all of this can be a bit..." My expression turned slightly conflicted as I thought of what to say. "...daunting, but it's how we grow and learn things, in the end."

The Pearl blinked just as her counterpart had, a hint of a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth as she processed my words. "Thank you...Slate. I'm still getting used to all of this, but…I think I'm starting to understand a few things."

The glance she sent Pearl's way wasn't lost on me.

It was nice to see that she was getting along with someone besides Viridian.

Regardless, a second later and Rose was suddenly moving. It was almost seamless, the way the Quartz wrapped a thick arm around the comparatively tiny Gem's shoulder, her own expression lighting up as Vermilion looked back up at her in confusion.

"And we'll be here to help you every step of the way, don't forget that."

It was a very touching moment, all in all, one that I felt was perfect to end things at.

Across the table, Garnet gave me a small smirk.

And as my entire world became light with a few surprised yelps and gasps sounding out, I simply smiled back in complete and utter contentment.

---

"Sla-Viridian!"

"Amethyst?!"

I blinked as I plopped down into the seat, barely avoiding the purple form that rolled across my lap to settle onto the floor. Then I was being turned around to stare into my Batchmate's concerned eyes, the red Gem glancing between me and the prone Quartz that Pearl was now looking over.

"Are...are you okay?"

Glancing around showed a few different reactions. Pearl and Rose both looked just about equally worried, albeit for likely different reasons. Garnet, predictably, seemed perfectly calm. Likely due to knowing what was going to happen well ahead of time.

"I'm okay!"

Vermilion's eyes darted to the floor as Amethyst's thumb came up, the overcooked warrior Gem flipping over onto her back with a pleased groan.

"Whew, I think I got all the pizza out of that whole thing. Cool."

The statement prompted a giggle from Rose and for both Vermilion and Pearl to glance at each other with twin disgusted expressions, even as my own thoughts rapidly turned inward. A flash of light shined across a certain visor, and I simply elected to carefully ignore Garnet's staring in the process.

A few seconds of recollection, and I felt a likely disturbingly wide smile finally stretch my lips apart.

Never had I been more thankfuly for my perfect ability to recollect things. Because I remembered everything. Slate's presence. Her thoughts. Her feelings. The way her mind had bounced around in between being a meld of me and Amethyst while also somehow remaining its own independent entity.

More specifically, I remembered the exact makeup of her insides. The mental blueprint for tastebuds and a functioning digestive system for what I needed, alongside what was effectively newly formed code that Amethyst had somehow managed to bring to the table, which in turn meant the tastebuds would actually do something.

Honey Lemon had practiced minor and sometimes even major shapeshifting during her time aboard the Roaming Eye when she'd gotten bored of singing, dancing or cleaning. I remembered those methods as well. Methods which I now replicated as the feeling of something moving and twisting and turning erupted within my mouth, alongside various parts of my torso.

I practically fell forward against the table, palms flat against its surface as Vermilion once more yelped in concern, the anxious Pearl grabbing hold of me.

"Viridian! What's wrong!?"

Shaking my head, I waved her off with a "I'm fine" and glanced forward.

The half consumed milkshake sat in front of me, time almost seeming to slow as I reached for the thing and pulled it closer to me.

Red and white flashed in my vision for less than a second before I finally popped the straw in between my lips and pulled.

Taste.


Chocolate to be specific. There were minor differences, of course. Amethyst's...or rather Slate's tastebuds weren't exactly the human standard after all, and I'd had to modify them even further to ensure the entire system fit within my own form without countless issues cropping up.

But it worked, and a moment later I was violently swallowing, even as I continued to desperately pull more and more of the drink through the thin straw, part of me angrily cursing the papery bottleneck that was stubbornly keeping me from acquiring even more of the chocolatey goodness.

A moment or two passed just like that, in complete and utter silence. It was only occasionally broken by the loud slurping as I rapidly emptied the glass cup of its contents, twisting the straw around a bit more before finally relenting and letting go.

"...Viridian?"

Rose's voice drew my attention as I set the empty cup back down on the table, blinking a few times as a worryingly familiar haze entered my vision.

"Eh...yes?"

A bout of hesitation crossed the hidden Diamond's face, before she gestured to her eyes with a hand.

"Are...are you alright? You...you're crying."

The uncertain statement was apparently enough to snap me out of the state of sheer euphoria I'd been locked in, my lightform finally registering the feeling of the usual twin streams trailing down my cheeks. Hoping otherwise but resigning myself to the fact, I slowly brought up a finger, trailing it across my face before bringing it forward for inspection.

A thick glob formed by multiple tears sat on the digit, before disappearing in an almost imperceptible flash of light.

"Ah...so I am. That's a little embarassing."

The sinking feeling deep in my chest worsened, even as the sensation of my new not-quite-organs at work lightened it ever so slightly.

Glancing back to my captive audience (alongside a completely bewildered looking Kofi, who was still glancing between me and Amethyst in what seemed to be mild shock), I let out a small, utterly impolite (by my trained standards, at least) snicker.

"My apologies. It...it was a really good milkshake. I uhm...wasn't prepared for the flavour?"

The stares continued from there, lasting well after the awkward process of Pearl attempting to pay for our food with several incorrect currencies (our waiter's eyes had widened even further than they already had when she'd pulled out and dropped what seemed to be a bunch of large coins made from pure silver onto the table) before finally choosing the correct one, and all the way to our eventual return back to the temple.

Yet even so and despite the sheer awkwardness of the concerned looks I was receiving, my mood remained rather high.

...I was going to need to thank Amethyst somehow. I owed the little gremlin a lot.
 
LOG-044.
She's adapting.

LOG-044.

It had been almost a week since I'd first arrived to Earth.

"Eh...I'll have two of the chocolate ones. Oh, and can I get those in a bag?"

Almost a week of slowly but surely settling down and getting to know the Crystal Gems, of them 'teaching' me about Earth, the war, corrupted Gems and all sorts of other things, all of course in between trying to find a place for Vermilion and me to stay at, despite the Pearl in question eventually deciding she actually preferred sticking around the temple. That entire situation had ended...fairly well, considering we hadn't actually been here all that long.

Sure, I still hadn't found anywhere permanent to stay, but we'd finally gone and retrieved the Roaming Eye, parking it within the fenced off section surrounding the place. The ship...worked well enough. Blankets, a sleeping bag and a portable radio helped make it a lot comfier to sleep in, to say the absolute very least. Granted the only other person who ever actually used it for the purpose I'd given it was Amethyst, and she only took short naps at best.

"Of course, let me just get those for you!"

I smiled, even as I twisted in place and reached across the small space in between me and the shelf, my gloved hands snatching a pair of donuts and sorting them into a small paper bag in one smooth motion.

The young man across from me nodded in approval as I set the bag down in front of him, before reaching into the left pocket of his jeans as I rung up the order.

Let's see...two chocolates. There.

"That will be a dollar and twenty three cents, please."

Accepting the bill he quickly handed me, I sorted it into the register, pulling out the appropriate change and sliding it back.

It was when he didn't immediately move to leave that I tilted my head slightly, confused. In my admittedly small experience (just two days of working here), people generally wanted to get going as quickly as possible later in the evening like this, save for some of the chattier elders. Especially since I had less than half an hour left until I was supposed to lock up for the night.

"Is there something else I can help you with, sir?"

The customer just chuckled awkwardly in response, a hand rising up to rub at the back of his head.

"Ah it's nothing. It's just...you're new, right? I guess I was wondering what happened to the old guy that used to work here? Rosquilla? He had this really big grey beard. I think he was French?"

Blinking, I thought back for a second before my eyes widened.

"Ah! Yes, Mr. Rosquilla left fairly recently actually. I just happened to apply for a job around the same time, and he was nice enough to put in a good word for me!"

Very lucky. Especially considering the place was apparently more than willing to pay in cash for someone with literally green skin. People around here tended to be a lot nicer than I always planned for. It really never ceased to shatter my expectations.

Regardless of my quick mental tangent, his own eyes eventually matched my own, widening ever so slightly.

"Wait, really? Where'd he go? I thought he loved this place!"

I glanced at the hanging clock out of the corner of my view for a moment, before crossing my arms and letting myself relax and lean against the counter. I still had a little bit left before I needed to close up after all, and it didn't seem like any other customers were gonna be entering the donut store anytime soon.

"He's moving to Ocean Town to set up a new branch from what I understand. Said he wanted to help his son expand the business a little bit."

My conversation partner nodded for a moment, visibly thinking. "Huh...who would have thought? I guess I just...never really expected him to go anywhere. Heck, he's been around since I was just a little kid."

Then he visibly paused, a slight blush of embarassment colouring his expression.

"Ah dangit, sorry. I've got us both talking and I haven't even introduced myself! Name's Bill. Bill Dewey."

...Huh. Then again, I didn't know what I was expecting when I'd gone job hunting in Beach City of all places.

Shaking off the idle thought, I accepted his outstretched hand, giving it a shake as I gestured to the uniform layered over my hidden dress with a wry smirk.

"Viridian, no last name. Though the nametag probably already told you that."

He nodded slowly, glancing at my bare arm for a moment.

Rolling my eyes, I nodded right back.

"Yes, I'm one of the weirdos from the big statue on the beach. Though I like to think I'm a little more in tune with society than they are, considering I actually have a job and all."

Snorting, Bill scratched his cheek.

"Yeah, sorry if I was rude or anything. Just kind of rare to see any of you ladies appear at all, much less find one selling donuts!"

My smile widened slightly in response, even as he finally picked up his bag.

"Well, we all have to make a living somehow, don't we?"

---

I continued to bob my head up and down with the beat playing from the thick wired earphones carefully tucked past my hair, even as I carefully twisted the lock shut behind me, my uniform and the key to The Big Donut (it still felt strange thinking of it as an actual workplace rather than a location from a cartoon) into my gemstone with a flash of green light made all the more apparent in the evening shade.

Humming slightly, I walked a few short steps before warm road finally shifted into equally warm sand, my feet leaving slight imprints as I casually made my way down the beach that brought so many visitors to this little town.

Another flash, and I had a notepad in my hands, the pages flipping slightly from the wind before I got them back under control.

"Right...work's done. Next up on the agenda is...checking up on the others. Then I'll sit around a bit. And then I'll go handle the other, crappier stuff."

The thing wasn't actually necessary, considering I could perfectly recall myself making up my little schedule and semi long term agenda, including my hesitant plans to begin scoping out some of the more relevant areas I remembered from the show, but it felt...nice, having something to occasionally write my thoughts in.

I didn't dare keep an outright diary or anything like that though. Stars knew one of the other Gems would get a little too curious for their own good and end up learning something at the wrong time. No, for now, everything could stay safe and tucked away in my pretty little head.

My tongue clicked slightly as I flipped past a few more pages, glancing at the waves crashing against each other before gently rolling up and down the edge of the beach.

"Then there's Lapis. And Bismuth. Fuck. And I'm still gonna need to explain the Cluster."

I paused, thinking quickly as my expression tightened.

"How would I know about it though?"

Well, that was probably simple enough. I'd served a high ranking fleet admiral after all. Could probably just say I'd heard it mentioned during a meeting with some other officials that Earth had a fucking geoweapon slowly incubating inside of it.

Yeah, that'd work. And I'd explain away not immediately telling everyone as me still learning to trust them.

Perfect.


Returning the notepad to my storage space, I stared up at the darkening sky for a moment before making a quick hop over the fence keeping the temple isolated from everything, landing with a small twirl before making my way deeper inside.

It was when I was just getting in general proximity of the Roaming Eye that I caught a sight that...well.

...Our timing was even better than expected, it seemed. By a certain definition anyway. Stars, if I didn't know better, I'd almost be tempted to say that it had all been planned or something.

"I'll just throw him over the fence."

But nah, that would be ridiculous. Instead, I was just incredibly unfuckinglucky apparently.

"Hu-oo-wAaAoah!"

And so instead, I merely watched as canon reared its ugly head, namely due to the long haired man being hefted above Garnet's shoulders, his form wriggling around as the fusion carried him towards my direction, a smiling Pearl following behind her with Amethyst in her arms.

"Excellent idea! Humans should stay on the other side of the fence like the sign says. Isn't that right Vermilion?"

If I squinted, I could just about make out the crimson Gem's lightform hesitantly peeking out from deeper inside the 'cave' of the temple, her eyes darting between the ongoing circus show and me even as she rapidly nodded her head in support of the statement.

"This zone isn't cleared for organics!"

The renegade paused mid approving nod of her fellow Pearl's words as she caught sight of me, her smile turning a little awkward.

Ah...it seemed she still hadn't gotten over the midnight fridge incident. Unfortunate.

"Er-hello Viridian. We were just getting ready to remove this..." Her hand slowly gestured to a still struggling Greg, only for the Gem to let out a squawk as Amethyst promptly took the opportunity to escape her grasp, the Quartz practically crawling/rolling her way towards me.

"Yo Vee! We found some weird guy! Wanna help us throw him over?"

The poor bastard blinked at that, before redoubling his efforts to get away.

"Please no throwing!"

Just like the damned show. Hell, three...two...one...

"Wait!"

Everyone paused, and I just crossed my arms in exasperation as Rose, as a matter of course, came running with wide eyes locked onto a certain musician's form.

Resisting the urge to sigh in annoyance at my brand new schedule already being disrupted, I simply remained silent as things went just about as I remembered them.

None of it mattered to me anyway, if Pink fucking Diamond wanted to get railed by some random human guitarist, well that was entirely her decision, now wasn't it?

...Fuck, I was gonna have to pick up the slack, wasn't I? Maybe I could convince Amethyst to come with me on my eventual trip to the Kindergarten, have her 'show me around' her birthplace while I searched for the facility hidden somewhere below it? I'd probably need the backup once the things down there turned up, and a Quartz was still a Quartz, even if she was overcooked.

As much as I wanted to put off doing anything Gem related for maybe a few years at least, that wasn't exactly a choice now. Not when I'd quite likely live to see the consequences of my not getting shit done early.

...Maybe I should have just gone and told them everything at the start?

"Hey, so I'm actually a human being reincarnated into this form! And in my original universe, you were all a form of human entertainment! So I know the future and need to warn you about certain things! And I'm not crazy and mentally defective, or a really weird Homeworld spy sent to manipulate all of you, I swear!"

"...Viridian, get in the bubble."


Okay yeah, no. Bad idea.

Internally groaning as Rose and Greg began to make puppy dog eyes at each other, I finally gave in to temptation and withdrew a small paper bag from my gemstone, grabbing one of the donuts I'd snuck from the store before leaving.

The chocolate definitely made me feel better, at the very least.

---

Author's note: Drawn by Jnixz. Visual representation of the midnight fridge incident, just pretend the house ain't there.
 
Maybe this time Steven actually ends up in school with the other kids instead of raised by aliens with a questionable understanding of humanity.

I know he still ends up fairly well adjusted, thank fuck for Greg and television, but it's a pet peeve.
 
You say that, but theirs this thing called, "Trauma". Steven have panic attacks like crazy in Future.
I am speaking ENTIRELY of the kid we see at the start of canon. Lord knows that boy got fucked UP over the course of the series.

But seeing how little Pearl understands human culture, and knowing she would be 90% of his schooling, with the remaining 10% being Greg and Garnet, I'd be shocked if he knew anything beyond the absolute broadest strokes of Earth history. And a good chunk of that being picked up through osmosis watching movies.
 
Honestly, I think figuring out how to raise Steven is a bit premature. Plenty of things could butterfly away his entire existence this early on. Hell, Rose knowing about the Gem resource shortage might have already butterflied away her desire to commit suicide-by-childbirth.
 
LOG-045.
Viridian begins to do...or at least plans to do things. Amethyst gets a bit of perspective from someone other than the Crystal Gems on her existence.

LOG-045.

My hands moved across the assortment of items I'd laid out on the floor of the Roaming Eye, eyes darting over several of them as I idly munched on another donut like some feral goblin, crouched down as I was.

"Mm." I swallowed, repressing a slight shiver at the gloriously human sensation. It still hadn't gotten old, even a whole week later.

The brief bit of pleasure didn't detract from my less than stellar mood however. With work out of the way, I'd been just about ready to laze about for the rest of the evening and night, maybe even go and poke the temple's newest organic guest for my own amusement or something. It was pretty tempting to see just how much I could mess with Pearl and Rose while they both dealt with the startling new existence that was Greg Universe.

Alas, my own damned mind remained my worst enemy in times of relative peace, my perfect memory constantly reminding me of exactly just how much I had to do if I was going to ensure this entire planet didn't get completely fucked over in just a few decades.

...Just a few decades. Now wasn't that a thought?

Regardless of my newfound perception and understanding of time, I still needed to act. Better to start early and all that, which of course included actually figuring out just where the Cluster was hidden, for when it inevitably came time to get the Crystal Gems on board in terms of properly dealing with it.

That of course meant either going to the observatory sitting up somewhere on the moon, or accessing a planetside facility with scanners that could penetrate the ground deep enough to locate the slowly forming geoweapon.

Hence my initial preparations. I wasn't completely sure whether I even could access the moonbase's systems without Diamond level authority, so until I decided I was desperate enough to go to Rose without concrete proof of the crap growing beneath the planetary crust we were all living on and do my best to convince her of its existence, I'd simply have to root around some of the old Imperial sensor stations present on Earth.

As a direct result of all of that, I'd just been in the middle of returning a small dataslate and one of two destabilizers (conveniently stored on the ship itself, strangely enough. Maybe the Avians had left them there?) into my gemstone when the sound of footsteps steadily plonking up the ramp drew my attention, followed immediately by a familiar enough (by now at least) voice.

"Yo Veeeee! You in here?!"

Turning my head, I locked eyes with the temple's resident Quartz (the actual Quartz, to be specific) just as the last destabilizer vanished into my storage space.

"I'm here, is there something you needed Amethyst?"

The purple Gem scowled slightly, before walking over and leaning up against one of the consoles, hands going to her face as she groaned dramatically.

"Ugh, I'm bored! Rose and Pearl have just been hanging out with that Greg guy all day! Sure it was funny at first, but Pearl and him glaring at each other stopped being fun to watch after the first gazzillion times. And Garnet took Vermi out to go meet up with that crazy lady with the cans! Said something about finding a 'telecommunications' device to call her with."

A lock of her short hair fell in front of her face, quickly blown away by a strong puff of air. "She's just like Pearl sometimes. At least you call it a phone like a normal person."

My brow quirked slightly as I rose up to my full height. "They're trying to get in touch with Rebecca?"

At Amethyst's nod, my eyes narrowed slightly in thought. Out of anything Vermilion could have done...well, no. It wasn't completely out of left field, considering just how quickly she'd latched on to the woman during our time as Honey Lemon. Maybe she'd finally gathered up enough courage to finally explore outside of the temple a little? Beyond occasionally staring at me working from outside the Big Donut's windows.

Stars, it actually sort of felt comforting that she was willing to go ask Garnet to help her get in touch with the woman, now that I thought about it.

...Garnet. Hm.

Shifting in place slightly, I crossed my arms while leaning up against the wall behind me.

"...Was she looking for me?"

Shaking her head, the short Gem glanced over at the ramp for a second, frowning.

"Huh...actually I think she was planning to? Garnet came over to her first though, she said you were gonna be busy with your own thing!"

...Fucking future vision. Whatever, it was probably a good sign on both their parts that Garnet and Vermilion were willing to do things together without me present to babysit.

"Hm. Alright then."

As I pushed off from my temporary resting spot, Amethyst tracked me, her eyes widening slightly as she apparently noticed some of the other equipment I hadn't gathered back into my storage yet, her head tilting a little as I began to pick them up as well.

"Oh, so you are busy. Whatcha' doin?"

Pausing as I let a thick length of rope and an old crowbar I'd found disappear into my gemstone, I thought about what to say.

"...I was planning to visit a few of the old areas Homeworld developed back before the rebellion. Some of the spires and labs and such. There's...a few things I need to check up on, I think."

Her blank stare almost drew a sigh before I shook the temptation away, instead turning to face her fully, my hands going to my hips as an idea made itself apparent.

Some good company probably wouldn't go amiss considering my first planned destination, after all.

"Say, you're a proper Quartz, right? Amethysts like yourself likely would have been made in the Prime Kindergarten, now that I think about it. Right here on Earth."

She blinked in response, a slight gleam entering her eyes.

"Well yeah but-wait, you know about that stuff?"

Waving a hand back and forth in a vague motion, I nodded.

"Sort of. I wasn't exactly a Peridot-" The name almost made part of me twinge in discomfort a second afterwards, thinking of the bubbled shards currently still sitting somewhere within the temple. "-made for Kindergartening, Pearl and all. But I spoke to some of the ship's technicians often enough, and they had a bit of inherent knowledge on the subject."

Amethyst's attention remained rapt, up until she noticed I was actively moving towards the ramp.

"Huh-hey! Woah, wait! Where are you going?"

Steadily walking down the steps, I listened as the Quartz scrabbled just beyond the Eye's entrance. "To the Kindergarten, of course. It's one of the first locations on my list. Want to come with?"

As I made my way towards the temple, I couldn't help but let a small smile appear on my face as the shorter Gem scrambled after me.

"Heck yeah I do! Oh, and can you tell me about some of what you know while we're there? I haven't really gotten the chance to talk to you about it yet and the others never say anything about the place when I ask about it. They always just talk about how terrible and bad the place is."

Settling down atop the crystalline surface of the Warp pad, I nodded.

"Sure."

---

I'd occasionally seen imagery of Kindergartens. The Retaliator had even once gone into orbit above an actively developing colony, some of the older Gem production centers clearly visible even from beyond the upper exosphere.

None of it quite managed to match the utterly dead atmosphere of actually being inside of one though. Anywhere I stepped, the ground remained both hard and brittle, while just about every direction contained endless rows of exit holes indicating the final process of Gems bursting their way out of the ground.

Fuck, even the air felt stale around here. Almost reminded me of the planet I'd first met Brim on. Before we'd eventually gone our separate ways.

...Hopefully the weird Lapis Lazuli had made it out of that fight as well as Vermilion and I did.

"Soooo this is where I emerged. Pretty snazzy, huh?"

Standing in place, I stared up at one of the towering injectors, trying to make out the complex looking...stuff contained inside of it as Amethyst stepped up next to me.

"...Snazzy is one word for it. You must have had one really big Batch, judging just from the sheer size of this place."

The purple Gem kept pace easily enough as I took a few steps further away from the Warp pad, hesitantly running my thin hand against the edge of one of the exit holes.

"I guess? I uh...I'm not really sure what that means though, you know?"

The questioning tone in her voice was apparent, and when I turned back to face her, I could just about make out a hint of desperation colouring her expression, one that she likely hadn't intended to make.

It was literally impossible for me to forget her issues when it came to her birth, but fucking Hell if she wasn't making the memory come to the forefront of my thoughts.

...

...Screw it. I could take a few minutes if it meant getting the short Crystal Gem to stop doubting herself so much. Heck, it was probably productive, actually. Like nipping a few potential issues in the bud before they became outright problems.

Finally letting loose a sigh, I let myself slide down to the ground, patting the ground in front of me in response to the rebel's confused look.

"Take a seat. I'll...see if I can't explain how Quartzes work. At least from my understanding of things after hanging out with some of them."

It was almost comical, how quickly her ass hit the dirt, eyes wide and fixated on my lightform.

"I'm listening."

Nodding, I let my gemstone light up, a small viridian (heh) screen emerging as if from thin air.

The hologram was a simple enough thing. Not anything on the level of bullshittery that Pearl could do, but it got the job done. Namely by letting my gemstone project one of my memories into an almost photographic format.

Amethyst's wide eyes got even bigger as a familiar figure popped up on the screen, form shimmering slightly as I ran my hand across it.

"This is generally what Quartzes look like. Tall, big, lean and mean looking, even if they're a bunch of goofballs at their core. The Gem you're looking at is a Jasper if we're getting specific. Facet 2I4Q, Cut 7XE. She isn't anything too special, which is why we'll use her as an example. If you ever run into another Quartz, whether they're a Jasper like this one, something else entirely, or even an Amethyst like yourself, they're probably gonna look something like her in terms of overall shape, bar a few exceptions."

Her gaze remained glued to the image for a few seconds, eyes only blinking when I shifted the screen to another image, one of the cubbies within the Retaliator, several Jaspers either hanging around within them, or standing just outside of the resting areas.

Waving my hand at the picture, I made sure I had her attention before gesturing to the Kindergarten around us.

"Quartz soldiers are particularly social when it comes to their Batches. It's programmed in by design, making sure they fight more cohesively as a unit. While there are a few exceptions to that rule, like Citrines, generally you'll never find a Quartz operating on their own. They're like...a human family, if that makes sense. But also beyond that. They're almost perfectly identical Gems, all synched up with each other. Remember that story you told me about your rock pals? That was most likely your programming looking for something to form a unit with."

I glanced down as Amethyst's hands visibly clenched, the Quartz's voice more of a mumble than anything else.

"So...I wasn't meant to be alone. I was meant to be part of a group when I got out of the ground."

Her fists shook slightly, the front of her hair falling over her eyes.

"I took too long to come out, so I missed everyone leaving...not like they'd even want a runt like me anyway."

Nodding slowly as I took in her glum expression, I let the hologram blink out of existence.

"Yes, you were meant to be part of a group. A Batch. If everything had gone according to plan, you likely would have emerged alongside, at the very least, a few dozen other Amethysts. But make no mistake, Rose, Pearl and Garnet are wrong in saying that a Kindergarten is a terrible place. All it does is produce Gems. Sure, it absorbs life around it, but that can probably be managed by just shutting it down for a while. What's terrible is the highly ranked individuals in charge of places like this."

Her melancholic, angered look shifted into one of hesitation as I stood up, glaring down at her.

"For a while, you'd all get to run around and test out your lightforms. Get used to the fact that you're now a living, thinking being. Then you all would have been assigned an Agate, your shiny new superior officer. From there, your existence would consist of obeying commands and remaining within a strict hierarchical structure alongside your fellow Amethysts. No lazing about. No wandering off to explore or interact with other Gems or species. Just following orders and doing the tasks assigned to you, and being punished if you act out of line. That's the general case for Gems living within the boundaries of the Empire."

Turning aside as that hesitant look grew, I instead directed my glare to one of the slightly larger exit holes.

"But then again, that's more like the best case scenario for a type of Gem produced for the sole purpose of fighting and killing. More likely, you'd spend your entire life being thrown into battle after battle, war after war, winning countless victories for the glory of the Great Diamond Authority until all of you were either shattered or outright ground to dust."

I took advantage of my newfound ability to produce saliva, even if the glob of liquid I spat out onto the ground disappeared in a flash of light less than a second afterwards.

"Then? They'd replace both you and your Batch with the next wave, whether from this Kindergarten or an entirely different one. Just another cog in the machine, broken down and cast aside in favour of a new one."

She was visibly scowling now, angry at the thought.

"That...that freaking sucks." Good. My message was getting across.

I just hoped it was the right one.

Shunting the thought aside and nodding firmly in response to the statement, I tapped a foot against the ground, glancing over at a nearby broken injector.

"It does. It doesn't matter whether you're a Pearl like me, a Quartz like you or even a Peridot or Rutile like some of the Gems I used to know. Once Homeworld gets a hold of you, they expect you to serve, and to keep serving until you can't. And when that happens? That's when they don't want you anymore."

I paused, considering her hunched posture now.

...Alright, time to tone it back a little.

Stepping over and leaning down, I let my hand rest itself against Amethyst's back, even as the purple Gem glanced back up at me with shiny eyes.

"But you're free of that. Look, it...it might sound bad coming from me, especially since we haven't actually known each other for all that long, but you being overcooked is probably the best thing that could have happened to you, considering the circumstances here on Earth. Sure, you're a bit shorter than the average Amethyst, but at least you're free. Call me biased, but I'd rather be defective-"

My hands went up, making visible finger quotes just to make sure I was being as visibly sarcastic as possible in calling her such a thing. Didn't want the dedicated warrior caste Gem thinking I was insulting her, after all.

"-by those clods' standards than live as a slave to a completely uncaring Empire. Trust me, you're better off without them and your Batch would be better off without them as well, given half the chance."

A watery chuckle escaped the Crystal Gem as I finished my rant, even as she fell backwards, back plopping against the dirt.

"When you put it like that...it almost feels like I was the lucky one."

I glanced up at the sky, noting just how far along the sun had gotten. Everything was shaded now, and soon enough I'd probably need to project light from my gemstone just to be able to see where I was actually going.

Sighing again, I let myself sit down next to Amethyst regardless, knees going up to my chest as I pulled out a wrapped packet of beef jerky from my storage, ripping it in two and tossing one half of the meat at the surprised Gem.

"We all have our ups and downs in life. No one's perfect, and anyone who says they are is almost definitely lying."

The Quartz chewed on that piece of pseudo-philosophy for a moment, before snorting.

"Heh, yeah. I guess...I guess that does make me feel a bit better."

I could try and investigate a way into wherever this Kindergarten's command center was later. For now, I just smiled as the visibly happier Gem stuffed the entire half of her packet down her gullet, plastic and all.

"...Thanks, Viridian. I'm glad you and Vermi came to Earth."

...

"I'm glad we did too...shorty."

"...Hey!"

"Heh."
 
LOG-046.
Some fuckery ensues.

LOG-046.

"It should be...somewhere around here?"

I paused, considering the terrain around us, even as Amethyst continued to quietly whistle from behind me.

While I could remember just about every detail I had access to from my short time spent watching the show, translating a location depicted in a cartoon to somewhere in reality was a...task, to say the very least.

The whistling stopped as my gemstone began to glow, my fellow explorer stepping forward and glancing around as I sat down.

"What are you looking for anyway? Not much other than rocks and stuff around here-woah! What are those?"

I was already slotting my legs into the appropriate modules by the time she caught sight of my...well, my only real option for trying to interface with anything around here.

"Limb enhancers. Homeworld's answer to Gems that come out of the ground without their full set of capabilities, thanks to missing this or that component in their development. They're generally used by Peridots, though I've heard that other Gem types have occasionally needed them as well."

Hiss. Click. Click.

The familiar sensation of connection returned as the faux-fingers attached to my extended arms sprang to life, twirling through the air slightly as I got up, getting used to my new sense of balance.

"Wow...you're almost as tall as Garnet now!"

Turning to look down at an even shorter looking Amethyst, I smiled.

"Yes well, I suppose one of their utilities is making the wearer look a bit bigger. That's not why I need them though."

Whatever question she was going to respond with died in her mouth as I converted four of the fingers into a holoscreen, idly scrolling through a few options.

"Huh. Cool."

Let's see...if I were a technician trying to wake up old tech, where would I go?

Communications, maybe. Followed by signals and connections.

Intuitive, nice.

I let Amethyst toy with my other hand as I sorted through what, if any, signals my built-in communications suite could pick up, idly hovering a finger out of the way before the Quartz could successfully take a bite out of it.

And in the midst of what seemed to be hundreds upon hundreds of dead and repeating sections of ghost data and informational outputs...there.

Prime Kindergarten Control Room: Facet Five.

All it took was a tap, and then I was in. A few different options came up, but I was really only interested in just one at the moment. That being the command to open up the primary entrance.

Both Amethyst and I turned as a small patch of earth just a few meters away began to shake, something happening beneath it.

"What's that?"

I was already walking past her, approaching the rapidly glowing square slowly pushing its way to the surface as the executable ran through the archaic but still relatively stable system hidden just beneath us.

"Our way inside your Kindergarten's control room. Let's go."

Without further prompting, I took a single step forward and let myself fall into the hole, feet beginning to skid against perfectly cut dirt and rock as I slid down. Judging by the sound of pounding feet followed by additional skidding right behind me, Amethyst hadn't hesitated to follow as well.

"Woohoo! This is fast!"

I nodded along as the Quartz let out another woop, before frowning, my eyes tracking the mass of green machinery hidden around us.

The rapidly moving mass of green machinery hidden around us.

"It is. Possibly too fast. Hold on."

It was a second's work to reach out and grab the smaller Gem, even as one of my claws materialized over my right limb enhancer with a flash of light, the free floating fingers neatly sorting themselves inside of the oversized gauntlet right before I slammed the elongated talons into the dirt, slowing us down a fair bit.

As we continued to slide down, I felt Amethyst staring at me, and slowly turned to glance back at her suddenly thoughtful expression with a quirked brow.

"What?"

The purple Gem hummed slightly, glancing me up and down.

"You know, for someone who's less than twenty years old...you sure do know a lot of stuff. Sometimes you almost act like Garnet. Or even Rose, though a bit more serious."

Blinking (and inwardly panicking, just a little), I tilted my head.

"I was a very good listener, back in the Empire, and I was very determined to leave. Luckily, Gems like to talk about their jobs, and no one really expects a Pearl of anything besides singing, dancing, and looking pretty."

That seemed to bring the Quartz up short, even as I finally pulled my claws out from the slope and let us move a bit faster, the boots of my stolen limb enhancers pushing off the dirt and sending us flying for a second before hittng the artificial platform ahead of us with a distinct clomp.

I heard Amethyst gasp from beside me as I set her down, warily stepping towards the control station taking up the majority of the chamber. Out of the very edge of my vision, I could see her looking over the large tubes that practically saturated the place, almost like veins running through a person's body.

Of course a second later, the platform was lighting up as it registered the presence of a technician class Gem. Or at the very least, the limb enhancers of one. Solid green (almost yellow) pathways began to liven up the floor beneath me as I stepped forward, a small pedestal rising up from within a beam of light with a clear handprint set atop it.

Sighing at the (sort of) familiar sight, I placed a hand atop it, waiting as foreign yet ultimately related systems interacted with each other and attempted a standard handshake protocol.

Had I been an actual Peridot, I maybe could have gleaned just what was happening between them, but alas, I was but a mere Pearl. So from my perspective, the entire thing simply glowed to life, several of the screens around me beginning to activate whatever displays the previous Kindergartener had likely deemed relevant at the time.

"Cool. So...what are you gonna do with this?"

Glancing at Amethyst out of the corner of my eye, I brought both hands atop the small console now hovering in front of the pedestal, doing my best to manually access what I could.

The giant floating hands I remembered from the show didn't make an appearance, but I was able to start sorting through some of the initial data the system was feeding me. The status of the surface injectors (97.3% inoperational, consult superior technician immediately!), the connection to the nearby Warp pad, the projected estimates of emerging Gems (no data found) and a few other things.

"Well, I'm going to try and access the Kindergarten's sensor stations...or what's left of them, at least. There's something I need to verify the existence of, and when I do, we're gonna need to talk to Rose and the others about it."

Grunting in annoyance as more and more irrelevant screens began to pop up, I did my best to shove them out of the way, keeping an eye out for what I needed. Which...may have been a mistake in hindsight, considering something responded with an affirmative ping the second I ran my floating fingers across it in an attempt to get it out of the way.

"Uh...Vee? There's stuff coming out of the ceiling."

Glancing up, my eyes widened as several cylinders began to emerge, each vessel slowly but surely sliding downwards.

---

"Oh, and what's that?"

The Peridot (Facet 2L5P, Cut 7XC, to be specific) let out a small mumble.

Leaning past her slightly as I dusted a corner of the old monitor, I gave the technician a bright smile.

"It must be very important, if
you're working on it."

And
there was the usual dark green blush I was looking for as the awkward Gem grew even more flustered, a hand quickly rising to adjust her extended visor.

"W-well it's not actually that interesting. Just a little side project I've been working on during down time."

Fascinating.

My hands continued to move, the duster flashing through the air as I stepped around to her other side.

"Side project? What is it?"

Leaning forward against her desk and running a few detached fingers across the small object (about the size of a Ruby, give or take), a subdued smile attached itself to the Gem's expression as she realised I was actually still paying attention to her.

"W-well it's not all that much, just an old Era One stasis cylinder. Apparently they were used to keep Gems contained in a controlled environment, all while preventing them from reforming. The admiral requested a few of them during the last time we docked with the Confluence. Said she wanted to see if I could rig them up to keep damaged Gems stabilized until further help could arrive."

Blinking, I glanced at the small tube before nodding firmly.

"Well, it's a good thing she put you in charge of this, 7XC. I doubt anyone else could make heads or tails of it!"

The normally stoic technician just ducked her head in response to my compliment, mumbling what
vaguely sounded like a "thank you, Viridian."

---

"Stasis cylinders."

The words escaped my mouth even as I tried in vain to reverse the process, but whatever executable I'd run simply wasn't having it, considering the damned things were still coming, almost invisible seams appearing around the bottoms of their forms as they began to open up.

Amethyst sounded nervous, and that nervousness only grew as a few dozen shapes dropped down to the floor with a sound similar to clinking glass.

"A-and those are?"

My eyes remained locked on the abominations sitting on the ground, unable to help themselves from trying to observe just where one gemstone ended, and the other began.

"Think of them as a more reliable bubble, sort of."

It had been one thing to consider the concept of the forced fusion cluster experiments from the perspective of a human being watching a piece of media. It was another entirely to look at the physical bodies of what I truly understood were people, violently twisted and forced together into becoming these...amalgams.

I'd felt sick plenty of times in this life, but it was only now that I had a semi-functioning digestive system that I almost felt the urge to vomit as their lightforms began to emerge, wretched shapes barely resembling the Gems they'd once been, contorting and melding and screaming as they desperately tried to reform into something that was no longer there.

"V-viridan? What...what are...?"

The small ones were bad enough, briefly thrashing about before finally forming into detached limbs that wriggled around blindly in search of their other parts. It was the larger conglomerations of corpses that fought and struggled and shrieked, shapes visibly glitching several times before they painfully reformed into utterly horrific monsters, their blinded yet somehow still aware gazes immediately turning to us.

"Cluster experiments. The remains of shattered Gems forced to fuse with one another for the sake of some twisted military project. Just another reason the Gem Empire suck. I...I heard about their existence during a meeting, and it was something I planned to deal with once I got here in order to ensure Vermilion and I could live on Earth safely, among a few other notable issues."

Swallowing thickly, I stepped closer to the visibly uncertain Quartz, one hand going to my gemstone as the mass of cluster Gems began to approach.

One of the largest ones visibly shuddered, a screech escaping their almost hand shaped lightform (if each finger also consisted of an entire limb) despite the complete lack of a mouth as they began to pick up speed. With a flash of light, my fingers clasped around a short but thick yellow handle, the rest of my newest tool extending and telescoping outwards as I flicked my wrist.

Click.

"Priming Gem destabilizer. Sorry you had to see this Amethyst, but it's best if we handle this now before someone else stumbles upon these poor Gems."

...To her credit, the short Quartz only hesitated for less than a second before summoning her own weapon, purple fists clenching around it tightly as even more of the abominations began to approach, pained noises filling the air as they did so.
 
Ahh there's the existential horror I was looking for.
Imagine stumbling upon stitched together masses of human flesh with mere vestiges of personalities making said barely aware meat prison shamble around.
Horrid, isn't it?
 
LOG-047.
More fuckery.

LOG-047.

I was silent as Amethyst quietly bubbled the last melded pair of gemstones, the purple sphere disappearing almost instantly as her hand pushed it upwards. In turn, I remained focused on the screen in front of me, even as mounds of data continued to scroll across the screen.

Dealing with the cluster fusions had been...easier than expected. Though maybe I shouldn't have been too surprised, in the end. We were two fully formed Gems, one a dedicated warrior type and the other equipped with a tool explicitly designed to discorporate lightforms, up against a bunch of writhing, mostly insane science experiments.

Just poking them with the tip of the destabilizer had been enough, honestly. Their twisted bodies had barely been held together in between all of the internal conflict, most likely, so it had been even easier to put them down in comparison to a normal, fully functioning Gem. To say it was a fight would be...largely innacurate. It was more like a really gross form of clean up, really.

"We're gonna have a lot of explaining to do when we get back, especially when someone notices all the new bubbles in the burning room."

Nodding slightly in response to the Quartz's words, I swept a hand to the side, dismissing several Kindergarten completion estimates (all displaying various errors) and focusing on the tab indicating the other sites the primary control system still had moderate access to.

"And we will, I just need to...there, getting it now."

Out of the seventy four sensor stations that were supposed to keep track of the hemisphere the Kindergarten was located on, only three were still largely functional, and two of them were apparently displaying signs of widescale system degradation, if their automated status reports were to be believed. Thankfully, one didn't need the most advanced scanners in the Empire in order to detect the utter mass of slowly growing energy present somewhere just adjacent to the Earth's core, not when Gem tech was involved.

"Hm."

I heard Amethyst stepping up next to me, even as I plugged one of my enhancers into the wall nearby and did my best to initiate an informational transfer. It stopped and started a few times, namely thanks to me selecting the wrong stuff, but I'd seen the Peridots onboard the Retaliator do the exact same thing plenty of times, so it didn't take too long to essentially download the data I needed after inputting the correct commands.

"...What is that?"

Glancing down as my fellow Gem stared at the vague visual representation of the thing that was supposed to kill her home planet, I hesitated before patting the console slightly.

"It's what I was most concerned about. The experiments we just dealt with were effectively the trial run of this one. The Cluster."

Her eyes widened in response, staring at the image of Earth overlayed atop the jagged mass.

"Wait, so..."

Sighing, I nodded at the question visibly flitting across her eyes.

"It's around that big, yes. From what I understand, it's a geoweapon composed of millions of shattered Gem shards, meant to incubate within this world's core and mantle before finally forming into...whatever it might form into."

Gems didn't have blood, so they didn't exactly go pale either. Amethyst managed a pretty decent impression of it though.

"But...then what would happen to Earth?"

I planted a hand atop the purple Quartz's shoulder, trying my best to give her a reassuring smile.

"It would crack open like one of the eggs you showed me. But that's a few decades away if I'm reading this information right, which is why we're going to go tell the others about this and find a way to keep that from happening. Yeah?"

That same lost look remained affixed to her face for a moment, before her expression visibly hardened.

"R-right. Let's go. Let's go right now."

Well...at least she was staying relatively positive about it?

---

Getting back to the temple had been far quicker than getting over to the Kindergarten control room, namely because we actually knew exactly where we were going this time. The primary issue is that the second I stepped off the Warp pad I had a pair of hands grabbing the front of my dress and physically hauling me into the air.

"Garnet!"

Amethyst's panicked exclamation went ignored as I was forced to stare into my own wide eyes in the fusion's reflective visor, the tips of my limb enhancers just barely brushing the floor.

A second passed, before her expression contorted, lips trembling slightly as she tilted her head back and to the side, directing my gaze to a concerned pair of Pearls and a horrified looking Rose Quartz, all three of the Gems gathered around a singular bubble.

"...You have something to do with...that. Talk."

I could hear Amethyst trying to explain things, could see Rose preparing to admonish Garnet as the hiden Diamond stood up from the crouch she'd taken, Pearl and Vermilion both glancing at each other warily, the red Gem in question warily staring at the limb enhancers adorning my arms and legs.

Then my entire lightform tensed as the fusion's hand shifted to grab hold of my shoulder, a familiar voice running through my mind, even if it was just a mere phantom at this point.

"Make me proud."

Smack.


Three shocked eyes stared at me as her visor clattered to the ground, the resounding slap I'd given her almost seeming to echo in the small chamber containing the temple's Warp pad.

Silence reigned, for just an instant.

Resisting the urge to snarl like some rabid fucking animal, I instead did my best to restrict the raging desire to form my claws and tear into the rebel's lightform into a merely scathing glare instead.

Yep, the paragon of self control, that's me.

"Garnet, I know you have future vision, you've mentioned it multiple times. So look into that future now. In it, we are going to talk about a few very important things quite shortly, but if you don't let me go right now, there are going to be problems between us. Do you understand me?"

I'd taken endless shit since being brought into this damned universe, like Hell was I going to accept even more of it while acting as a free Gem, no matter how much certain aspects of my programming were screaming that I'd just made a fatal mistake.

In the end, it merely justified my decision even more, alongside the fact that after a second of bewildered hesitation, Garnet's grip loosened, letting me land on the floor with the clack of my booted feet hitting the ground.

Scowling at the Gem (Amethyst was right, the added height really did put me at eye level with her), I made a dramatic and entirely unnecessary show of unruffling the folds of my dress before gesturing towards the middle of the chamber, detached fingers twirling slightly and drawing a few eyes in the process.

"All of you are going to want to sit down for this. Trust me."

---

"Alright, and keep in mind we have, at minimum, about two decades before it starts getting more active than it currently is. So, let's run it down from the top. Rose?"

The fake Quartz blinked, before sadly glancing down at the purple bubble carefully set within her lap.

"Homeworld performed some kind of...forced fusion-" The utter disgust and loathing in her voice was almost physical, granted that same attitude seemed to be prevalent amongst the rest of the Crystal Gems, for what were fairly obvious reasons. "-experiments, near the latter half of the war. These are the small ones."

Nodding, I held up a hand, letting four fingers form a holoscreen as I glanced over at Garnet.

"With their ultimate goal being the creation of what they call the Cluster. Which is..."

The fusion stubbornly remained silent, though considering the almost audible creaking of her fists clenching, she was most definitely still paying attention. Instead, it was a hesitant Pearl that raised a hand, eyes fixed on the jagged form of the main topic of my impromptu little 'lecture.'

"An amalgam of countless Gem shards, which Yellow Diamond herself intends to form into a geoweapon that will...destroy Earth. Stars, how could we have missed something like..."

The Gem brought a hand up to rub at her face, visibly weary.

"I'm sorry, I just-it's bothering me. How do you know all of this? You're barely even two decades old yourself, how could you possibly have learned about...about any of this!? And what are you wearing!?"

Huffing slightly, I hefted the still formed holoscreen for emphasis.

"I'm currently equipped with a stolen set of limb enhancers, which isn't relevant right now. As for how I know about this, I already told you that part. I served beneath a highly ranked fleet admiral before breaking away from the Empire, and I attended a meeting where Yellow Diamond was involved. Her Pearl was...chatty, to say the very least."

I ignored the renegade's almost silently mumbled "that doesn't seem like her..." and instead focused on Rose as the giant pink lady leaned forward, careful to avoid accidentally popping the bubble she was holding.

"And yet you still came here, despite all the dangers...why?"

Holding back a massive sigh, I ducked my head.

"I figured that if there was any world the Empire wouldn't touch anytime soon, it was this one. I planned to hopefully deal with all of this myself, given enough time. With no Cluster to extract, I figured they'd just finally give up and abandon this place for good. And then Vermilion and I ran into...well, you. Meeting all of you was just...a happy accident, I suppose."

Lies, lies, and more lies. I'd have enough to build a Diamond sized throne of them, at this point.

Still easier to lie than try to justify extraversel knowledge, though. Explaining the concept of a cartoon about them to them would probably be just as complicated as explaining the fucking Cluster, if in an entirely different way.

Regardless, my statement seemed to leave the Gems stuck in thought for a few moments, in which a quiet Vermilion slowly sidled closer to me, concerned gaze moving up and down my form.

"Are...are you alright? You looked really angry when Garnet-"

She went silent as I held up a hand, this time finally breaking and letting a sigh escape my mouth.

"I'll be fine. She didn't know, and from what I understand fusion seems to be a very important thing to her. So...how about you? Did you manage to contact Rebecca before you came back?"

The Pearl stared at my brazen attempt to shift the conversation elsewhere, before slowly nodding.

"Becky. But...yes. She says she'll be coming to Beach City to visit her 'cousin' soon, so we'll get a chance to see her then."

I blinked, tilting my head slightly even as the Crystal Gems began to converse between themselves just a short ways away, Amethyst gesticulating wildly at Pearl, all while Garnet continued to stare at the bubble clasped between a despondent Rose's hands.

I'd try and mend bridges with her later, Stars knew I didn't need a fusion with a component Ruby and Sapphire pissed at me. As for the rest...they'd get better. They had to, unless they actually wanted to leave dealing with everything up to me, which would fucking suck. For various reasons.

"Did she say who her cousin was?"

The crimson Gem paused, before nodding.

"Yes. I'm...still not entirely certain what Vidalia is supposed to be, but I think she's sort of like Becky's Batchmate?"

...

Huh.

Small world, I guess.
 
LOG-048.
More Emerald. Also a funny little hypothetical that someone on the discord server cooked up into a short song.

LOG-048.

"Picking up multiple contact readings, my Emerald. Imperial ones."

8XS glanced down at the nervous Peridot for a moment, before nodding firmly.

"How many systems have we made it through since moving on from the graveyard?"

A moment of silence passed, followed by several sounds indicating a console being accessed.

"Three hundred and forty six at a rough estimate, my Emerald, though I can't be sure since we've been hopping in and out so much. We're moving very slowly thanks to the Warp engine's compromised state and repairs are underway but-what are we going to do now? I'm reading at least three separate vessels on a direct intercept course...and they're gaining."

The admiral's eyes cooly regarded the assortment of holographic screens floating amongst her throne, a finger tapping against an armrest as she considered their newest hurdle.

"...We can't outrun them, not with modern engines like theirs. But we can outmanoeuvre them long enough to make it to the next jump. It should give us enough time to let the engineers repair everything properly and follow whatever route Viridian and...Vermilion took."

The name she'd gotten fromt the Lapis felt alien, even now. But Emerald begrudgingly admitted it...suited Sixteen A, especially with how it played along with her fellow Pearl's designation.

Viridian and Vermilion. Hmph.

...She could almost feel the gazes of the rest of the bridge practically piercing into her lightform at the second name, but she ignored it the same way she'd ignored a Diamond's orders, instead focusing on getting the Retaliator and their newly refurbished robonoid corvette (jokingly dubbed the Deserter by the crew, much to her annoyance), through this latest asteroid field without getting Stars knew how many dents added to both of their hulls.

All as previous, complicated conversations continued to play within and throughout her mind.

---

The rock cutter trapped within the third cell she entered was...different, when compared to her fellow rebels. The Citrine had been utterly stubborn, responding only with threats and insults, the rogue warrior class Gem living up to her facet, even if in an astoundingly infuriating way. She'd almost reminded Emerald of her own bodyguards, as a matter of fact.

The not-Pearl had been her own brand of strangeness. Seemingly almost completely resistant to questioning, and even mocking at times with the way she provided answers that only seemed purposefully designed to provoke 8XS into making further mistakes born out of anger.

But the Lapis Lazuli...Emerald had expected a lot of things. But what she hadn't expected was the blue Gem practically lunging at her, not in the form of an attack, but rather to grab at and stare at her with wide eyes as almost panicked questions poured out of her mouth in a deluge of noise. Yes, she was a civilian Gem, but most Lazulis she'd met (usually during her brief patrols and landings within the territories of newly developing colonies) tended to maintain at least a basic sense of decorum whenever possible.

"Where is Viridian!? Do you have her!? Is she safe!? What about Vermilion?! O-or Quille and Talon? Did they make it out-oof!"

A rough shove was enough to send the defective thing (part of her hesitated to even think of the term, considering her own current circumstances) stumbling back into a wall, even as Emerald levelled a sneer her way.

"You will maintain your distance, Lazuli."

That was enough to seemingly remind the Gem just where she was, considering her eyes narrowed a second later, hands visibly twitching to presumably make use of water that simply wasn't there for her to control.

Emerald merely narrowed her eyes in turn, a tight lipped smile affixing itself to her face as she took a firm step forward, crossing her arms behind her back as she did so.

"I am Emerald Facet 2M7G, cut 8XS. Admiral and captain of this vessel, alongside Viridian's rightful owner. Judging by your initial questions, you most likely have knowledge of her. As for the others, your fellow Gems remain incarcerated within different sections of the brig you now find yourself in, though I know not of a Vermilion."

The narrowed eyes turned into a scathing glare as the Lazuli pushed herself up against the wall behind her, standing up straight.

"You...Viridian and Vermilion talked about you. Scattered Skies, you don't even know your slave's damned name, do you?"

Emerald frowned. Viridian had spoken about her, no doubt while under interrogation. Unfortunate, though she couldn't truly blame her. The poor, delicate thing likely hadn't lasted long under the cruel clutches of her organic captors, no matter how steadfastly she might have attempted to hold out with her usual flawless exterior.

...Damn it all. They had to be okay. They had to be. They'd almost certainly been aboard that Roaming Eye, for Stars' sake.

"If you are referring to my Pearls, then you must mean Sixteen A."

A second passed, a shocked look crossing over the pirate's face.

"Her name is Vermilion!"

Then the admiral's eyes widened as the Lapis lunged once more, the officer bringing up an arm to hold back the suddenly aggressive Gem even as her counterpart clumsily swung a fist, her other hand moving to her suddenly glowing gemstone.

She tensed for a second, wondering just what the rebel might be planning, before shock overcame her as the terraformer pulled a stream of light outwards, the glowing mass rapidly travelling downwards until it finally coalesced at her bare feet.

Then Emerald was rapidly stepping backwards as the Lazuli lashed out with a kick, a trio of wickedly sharp talons attached to what seemed to be armoured footwear just barely missing her eyes.

Stars above, a terraformer with a summoned weapon. Just how insane could these Gems get!?

Sidestepping another kick, this one more of a thrusting motion, Emerald struck forth with an attack of her own, open palm impacting the rebel's largely exposed shoulder and sending her slamming back into the wall with a pained grunt once more.

Rapidly moving forward, 8XS followed up with another strike, a solid punch to the torso drawing a wheezing gasp from the Lazuli before she slid back down to the floor.

To the rogue's credit, she attempted to get up mere seconds later. Unfortunately for said attempt, Emerald's booted foot also came down mere seconds later, roughly pinning the blue Gem to the ground.

Leaning down slightly, the admiral held back the furious snarl she wanted to open up with, instead keeping her voice low and (hopefully) dangerous enough to impress upon the rock cutter just who was in charge her.

"So, you did have my Pearls. What did you do to them? Where did they go?"

The Lapis struggled for a moment, trying to push herself up only for Emerald to apply just a little more pressure, drawing yet another pained gasp from her captive.

"L-like I'd tell you! Wherever they went, it's probably as far as they can get from you and your damned Empire!"

The urge to simply bring her boot up and down in a swift shattering strike continued to grow, even as a severe frown once more stretched the admiral's features downwards.

"And just why would they do such a thing?! Hm?! After the torture you and your filthy band of organic pirates no doubt put them through!"

This time, it was the Lazuli that openly snarled, clearly in less control of herself than 8XS was, all while doing her best to twist around in her position to glare back up at the Emerald.

"Torture?! They came willingly! Anything to get away from you and your regime! Clearly Viridian figured she and Vermilion were better off with us than with you-"

Emerald could practically feel the blue Gem's lightform giving way as she pressed down even harder, her fists violently shaking at her sides.

"Stop! LYING! Viridian is a loyal Gem! She has served me faithfully since her creation, and has always been a valued member of this vessel's crew! For what purpose would she ever seek to leave!?"

---

Yes, that 'conversation' in particular had mostly gone on in circles, over and over until Emerald had finally gotten sick of the uppity Lazuli's lies and discorporated her form in a brief fit of uncharacteristic rage. She'd be fine once she reformed, though, so there was no lasting harm truly done.

...Even if the entire thing had struck some form of chord within her. There was something about how...earnest the blue Gem had been. She was angry at Emerald, seemingly...supposedly more on the behalf of the admiral's Pearls rather than herself.

It brought feelings of...doubt, to say the very least. Not a good sensation to have. Especially with her crew depending on her as they were now. She was torn from her thoughts by the voice of one of the bridge's resident Jaspers, the Quartz visibly tense at her post.

"My Emerald, sensors have confirmed the enemy fleet composition! A cruiser and two destroyers! They...they're hailing us, admiral!"

Hailing them. Just like all the other ships had. She'd held out hope at first, up until the first Nephrite she'd spoken to had demanded immediate surrender, proclaiming that the entire crew were to be shattered with both 8XS and the Retaliator itself being 'repossessed.'

Rejuvenated, in more brutal terms. An untold fate for an Emerald, which only further drove home just how truly cracked her new existence had become in such an astoundingly short amount of time.

"...Divert power to engines and shields. Ignore the hail, they're likely just going to rant about my betrayal like the other captains we've run into. For now, we'll lose them amidst the asteroid field and initiate a staggered Warp jump once we clear it ourselves, that should let us lose them for a while."

That doubt was shaken aside, locked away into a darker part of her mind for later perusal and evaluation. For now, she would simply focus on getting them where they needed to go. Namely, away from their pursuers, and back on the trail her lost Pearls had hopefully taken.

She could consider the possible validity (no matter how preposterous, Emerald was not one to ignore potential factors in a situation) of the rogue Lapis Lazuli's words at another time. Maybe when she was in a better mood.
 
Poor, poor emerald. The captain is already a rebel, it just hasn't sunk in yet. Those gems in her ship's cells are the only friends they have left.
 
LOG-049.
Ooaaoogghhaaoogh.

LOG-049.

"I'll grab my usual."

Two weeks. That's about how long it took for the Crystal Gems to get their collective shit in gear and actually start planning (without panicking like a bunch of headless chickens in the process) on how to potentially deal with the Cluster.

"Two chocolates in a bag, let me get that for you, Dewey."

Sure, they'd started throwing out plenty of suggestions near the beginning, but they'd still been tinged with the startled horror of finally knowing just where all those buried shards of their friends and comrades had eventually ended up. From what I understood, Rose was still running around somewhere, probably up to all sorts of sneaky shit.

Not that I was one to talk, to be fair.

"That will be a dollar and twenty three cents, please."

"Of course-oh, and keep the tip!"

Money exchanged hands quickly enough, and what would potentially be Beach City's future mayor at some point flashed me a smile before making his way out, exchanging high fives with some girl waiting outside for him.

I smiled back, quickly depositing the spare change in my gemstone.

As for the others...Amethyst and Vermilion had briefly tried to involve themselves before effectively stating they had little to nothing they could truly contribute outside following the directions of others, and had promptly fucked off to go track down Rebecca in what I was interpreting as some weird attempt to calm themselves down.

Garnet had also disappeared, usually spending most of her time in the burning room, if Rose was to be believed whenever the hidden Diamond made her occasional visits back to the temple in between doing...whatever she was doing.

It had all eventually settled into a weird form of monotony, only really broken up by me occasionally going back down to the Kindergarten to try and get more info out of the decrepit control interface I'd managed to boot up, usually with a curious Pearl (staring at everything, including me, with a strange look in her eyes) in tow.

"Hmph."

A quick glance out the window ensured I'd have at least a moment of peace. Settling down atop the counter, I hummed a short, contemplative tune. A flash of light later and I had my notepad in my hands, pages flipping rapidly as I went through some of the plans I'd begun workshopping with the renegade in question.

Say what you would about Rose's unrequited lover (or not, I wasn't quite sure of just what strange dynamic they truly had), but she was the first Gem to suggest getting me to some of the other sensor stations to see if I could get them working again, in the hopes of getting us a clearer picture of the Cluster's general rate of growth. It...kind of felt like it bothered her, my own knowledge. She'd been particularly slow to admit that, despite her own affinity for tinkering with makeshift tech, she just wasn't very familiar with existing machinery.

Of course the unfortunately short answer to that plan was that I fucking couldn't. To both her paradoxical disappointment and delight. I could access certain systems with my Limb Enhancers (safely tucked away in my storage for now) and I could maybe kickstart a familiar module here or there, but outright repairing Gem technology more complicated than the straight forward (relative to other Gem tech) engine of a deliberately simple, mass produced fighter?

Nope. Especially considering just about everything on Earth was archaic in comparison to what I was used to, which didn't make things at all simpler. And yet somehow despite that irrefutable fact, the band of rebels had apparently decided that I was now their resident tech expert when it came to actually getting Imperial shit to work-

"Viridian."

The urge to yelp and leap at least a foot into the air was strangled before it could affect my lightform, but my eyes did dart to the tall form of Garnet far more quickly than they usually did.

She was suddenly just there. Because of course she was.

Repressing the urge to scowl slightly at the surprise appearance, I instead just stared up at the Gem with my usual quirked brow.

"Garnet. Hello. Is...there something you needed?"

"Why are you here?" Went relatively unsaid.

In the end, a short second passed in silence, one in which I noticed the fusion holding something behind her back.

Thoughts flashed through my head as her arm began to move, my body tensing in response. Was she still attributing me to all of this? Was she pissed I'd talked down at her in front of the other Gems? Maybe she-

"I...just wanted to apologize for my actions back when you returned with Amethyst. It was uncalled for and I was wrong to accuse you of being involved with...what you discovered."

My eyelids went up and down in a slow blink as the taller rebel gently placed a pizza box down on the counter, accompanied by a soda of some kind.

...Oh.

...

...Fucking stupid. Dumbass. Idiot Pearl. Clod.

For whatever reason, I felt the rather extreme need to wipe my hand across my eyes, ducking my head slightly as the fusion let her hand fall.

"T-thank you. I appreciate it and...I'm sorry I reacted the way I did as well. I could have most certainly been calmer about things, given the situation."

Fuck, I was getting soft. Getting to Earth really had made me such a crybaby, even after such a short time.

Stars, I hadn't even used a closet since getting here...though that was probably a good thing.

...Mmph.

Firmly shoving that particular thought into the pit of other particular thoughts I didn't quite like, I glanced up at Garnet again, doing my best to bring up a smile.

"No hard feelings?"

Another second passed, before her lips quirked upwards, ever so slightly.

"No hard feelings."

Nodding in relief, I let loose a sigh, hands already settling atop the pizza box and opening it up.

Extra cheese. Nice.

I was just in the middle of eagerly taking a bite out of the first slice when the fusion crossed her arms, a glint of light somehow flickering across the surface of her visor.

"Pearl is thinking about asking to fuse with you."

Hurk.

Firmly forcing down and swallowing the stray bit of crust, I glared up at the cheeky shit, who was already smirking at my reaction.

"I-" Cough. "-see. Is there...is there any particular reason why?"

Nodding, the pair of lesbians in a trenchcoat brought a hand up to her chin, rubbing it slightly.

"She was thinking about how you learned to shapeshift a digestive system thanks to you and Amethyst forming Slate. The fact is, we need someone that can figure out how to get us access to some of the more complicated Imperial structures on Earth if we're going to find a way to actually isolate just where the Cluster is, exactly. You getting the Kindergarten control room up and running was a good start, but it's not enough."

The hand went up, adjusting her visor.

"You both have talents in specific areas, but your lack of knowledge in others is holding you back from making the best of those skills right now. Pearl figured...you could perhaps shore up each other's weaknesses."

At my blink, the rebel shifted slightly, frowning in what seemed to be discomfort.

"Her words, not mine. But I'm seeing a lot more favourable timelines if you go through with it, and you've seemed pretty open to fusion so far. I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask since Pearl isn't quite willing to just yet. She's a bit nervous around you."

Nervous? Odd, but hopefully not something that would cause problems later down the line.

As for fusing with her...well, the logic was fairly sound. My counterpart was good at improvising and actually physically assembling/interacting with things when it came to generic technology, and I knew how to make basic alterations when it came to outright Imperial computers and machinery, even if they were minor at best.

Smash those values together and we could maybe pass off as a half baked Peridot or something.

Hm.

Taking another bite of the slice in my hand, I chewed for a few seconds, swallowed, then nodded.

"Alright. My shift ends in a few hours, tell her to meet me outside the Roaming Eye whenever she's available. May as well give it a try and all that." Garnet's only response was a barely perceptible nod, followed by a slightly wider smile, as if she'd already seen the end result.

...Probably because she literally had.

Fucking precogs.
 
LOG-050.
Groovin.

LOG-050.

The sky was getting somewhat dark by the time I finally heard light footsteps originating from within the temple's confines, even as I stood up from my position sat down against the base of the Roaming Eye's ramp, storing away my notepad back into my gemstone as I did so.

Then I was staring at Pearl, and she was staring back somewhat awkwardly, neither of us seemingly willing to make the first move. A little ways behind her, a certain fusion was standing back with her arms crossed, a patient expression plastered across her face.

...Fine.

Putting on a polite smile, I inclined my head slightly.

"Pearl. I assume Garnet told you I was willing to try out your...idea?"

Thankfully, that seemed more than enough to finally animate my counterpart, what tension had suffused her lightform slowly draining away as she nodded quickly, stepping forward and gesticulating with her hands.

"Ah-yes. My apologies for being so indirect about all of this, Viridian. I...hadn't anticipated Garnet seeking you out on my behalf."

Moving away from the Roaming Eye and approaching her in turn, I let my hands settle behind my back in a respectful, if slightly more relaxed stance.

"I can't say I did either...regardless, the concept has merit. I've been looking through some of the Kindergarten's systems in my off time but...I just can't quite piece it together fully, not without actually interfacing with the machinery itself and rooting around a little bit, which I don't know how to do safely. I...can understand the basic programs keeping everything together, but actually getting useful information out of it that could help is, unfortunately, rather beyond me at the moment."

I paused, glancing at Garnet for a second before turning back to Pearl, the renegade having finally settled to a stop in front of me.

"Which, I suppose, is where you would come in?"

Fingers tapped against each other as the Gem hesitantly nodded, an uncertain look taking over her expression.

"That is my general view of things, yes. I figured that, considering how well you've handled fusion so far-first with Vermilion, and then eventually even Amethyst, we might prove compatible as well! You...seem to have a much better handle on the more computational aspects than I do, and, not to boast of course, but I've become rather handy with physical technology myself! Over the past few thousand years, that is."

...Stars, it still didn't quite click in my mind that, given time, I would eventually get to be that age, provided nothing horrible happened. What would I even be like in a hundred years? What about a thousand years? Would I change? Would I stay the same like most Gems seemed to?

Unaware of my inner thoughts, Pearl continued, weight idly shifting from one foot to the other.

"As such, I believe that merging our individual skillsets together, in a more literal fashion, might yield improved results compared to our current attempts at resolving things."

She paused, that uncertainty flaring back up a little as she wound down from her brief tirade.

"I just...didn't want you to feel pressured. I suppose. I understand all of this is so new to you and Vermilion-Stars, believe me when I say that I felt very lost back when I first came to Earth, but-"

She stopped when I held up my hand, sighing.

"It's alright. I...appreciate you trying to look out for me, very much so, but I'm more than willing to try fusing if it means, at the very least, finding a proper way to deal with the Cluster."

At her sudden stare, I felt a small bit of heat rise to my cheeks, one hand going up to brush my hair out of my face as I awkwardly shifted in place.

"As you can no doubt deduce, I've become...rather invested in this planet, and really would prefer if it wasn't damaged. So...I suppose the question is...would you care to try out your theory?"

Understatement of the century, for various reasons. Yet it seemed to work, considering my outstretched hand was accepted by Pearl's own less than a second later, the rebel smiling brightly as we began to move back and forth, gently.

"I would be more than happy to."

Giving her a small smile back, I nodded. "Then we're in agreement, excellent. If it's all the same, you lead, please. I'd imagine you have more experience in this than I do."

My handing over of authority only seemed to invigorate Pearl, as the flowing motions between us began to quicken. "Of course! Just keep in mind that we need to focus on a goal if this particular fusion is going to work. Dancing together will only get us so far considering we don't know each other all that much. Just try and think of something that both of us can agree on. Grace, perhaps? Or-or saving the Earth! Though...those might be too vague or long-term, I suppose."

I closed my eyes, slowly letting my counterpart twirl me around as I thought her suggestion through, before pulling in close to her at her silent behest.

What would both of us agree about? Something short-term and concrete enough that the hypothetical fusion could focus on, but that both of us actually cared about?

"...Putting our talents to good use? I think that's a rather solid goal that both of us share, no?"

Her only response was an agreeable nod, even as we shifted into the next part of our impromptu choreography. It was almost familiar, the smooth, swaying motions I was slowly replicating as I continued to follow along with her lead.

Part of me almost wanted to compare it to some of the routines taught at the Reef, but there were sections that were simply too expressive, compared to the restricted, inherently submissive postures the Nacres had (sometimes literally) beaten into us.

Yet regardless of my inner thoughts, as Pearl and I continued our dance the initial awkwardness eventually began to melt away, replaced by a sense of synchronicity somewhat familiar to what I'd achieved with Vermilion. It likely helped that I actually knew what I was doing now, and that my partner was all but an expert in this, second only to Garnet or maybe Rose. Each step, each twirl, and each movement started to flow naturally between us, as if our bodies had always known this silent rhythm we were now moving to.

Eventually, Pearl's movements grew more intricate, and I mirrored her with increasing precision. Our steps became faster, more deliberate, a seamless blend of grace and intent. The temple's dim light danced along the edge of my vision, casting elongated shadows that flickered across our intertwined lightforms.

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched a now smiling Garnet give a thumbs up, even as I internalized a new fact I'd learned today.

Pearl was really, really good at dancing. The entire Batch would have been obsessed with her, if they'd ever met.

And as said dancing continued, the world around us seemed to blur, fading into the background as our shared goal took center stage in my mind. I needed to focus on what I wanted, just as my partner was no doubt doing right now.

Soon enough, it almost became a mantra, repeated with each step and each turn.

Talent. Purpose. Solving problems. Solving problems with talent.

Over and over and over, my mind and body both going through their respective motions, in their own ways, just as Pearl's no doubt did as well.

I don't know for sure just how long we danced. It could have been a few minutes, or even a few hours worth of just contorting around each other in increasingly complex and elaborate ways, but the end result was the same regardless.

My fingers intertwined with hers, our lightforms gently pressing together in an elegant, glorified hug as we both opened our eyes, heads ducking forward simultaneously.

Those bright blue eyes, staring back into my own with an unreadable look, were the last thing I saw before everything finally went white.

---

Did it work?

...

Yes. Yes it did. Excellent.
 
LOG-051.
She a bit of a freak.

LOG-051.

"Oh man, that was awesome! Hey, you got that Vidalia girl's number, right? Did Becky give it to you?"

Vermilion smiled at the Quartz's persistent questioning, one hand going down to her gemstone and pulling out a small piece of paper in a flash of bright light. With a flourish, the material was brandished, the Pearl taking on a pleased look at her apparent prize.

"Home phone number and address! Additionally, I now also have two gasoline based lighters, a trio of empty liquor bottles, and seventeen separate thumbtacks!"

Then the red Gem was yelping in surprise as her shorter purple counterpart lifted her over a shoulder while laughing, hopping over the fence leading into the temple and setting the Pearl down with a grin.

"Sweet! We've gotta hang out with them more! I still need to figure out how the bong thing worked-"

The overcooked soldier Gem paused, eyes widening as a bright flash of light lit up the path leading over towards where Viridian had parked the Roaming Eye some time ago, the ship in question blocking whatever the source had been.

"...What was that?"

The Pearl's nervous question prompted a second of consideration from Amethyst. Then in the next second, the Quartz was grabbing the now uncertain Gem by the hand and rushing around the crimson craft's bulk, a curious energy suffusing her lightform.

"No idea, but I wanna find out! Maybe Rose or the others figured something out while we were...gone?"

Jogging turned to walking, until finally her steps petered to a stop altogether, Vermilion hesitantly leaning around her and glancing at the sight of a tall, strangely garbed figure seemingly talking to herself.

"How utterly fascinating. Enhanced lightform mechanics, and I've even come equipped with...a jester's outfit? Hm, that could mean more than a few things. Some definite implications there, probably."

Then her eyes also widened as the unknown newcomer finally caught the light, a pair of almost luminous eyes flicking away from staring back at a bemused looking Garnet to glance at them in turn.

A moment passed, before Amethyst let out a low whistle, her arms crossing as she did so.

"Are you gonna fuse with everybody Viridian? You're giving Garnet a run for her money!"

Whatever the Quartz had been expecting, it wasn't an amused chuckle as the large Pearl shifted in place, one hand rising up to flick at a small golden bell hanging from one of the drooping points of her headwear, mouth quirking upwards at the almost inaudible jingle that resulted from the action.

"Yes well, that particular component of mine just so apparently happens to have a rather delightful talent for it. Quite useful in keeping things fairly stable, you see. Though I do wonder just how well she would handle a multi-Gem fusion?"

The hand moved, fingers clicking across the air as the large Pearl pulled forth a pair of small hologram from her upper and lower gemstones, the light green surface of the constructs remaining blank before lines upon lines of gemglyph began to rapidly scroll across them.

"Something to account for in the distant future, perhaps. I'll take a few notes and transcribe them for her and Pearl's future use. Though perhaps they'll simply remember all this anyway."

Her eyes narrowed at the swiftly shifting text, before she banished the holograms with a flick of her fingers, a confident, almost mischievous looking expression plastering itself across her face. Slightly narrow eyes and a wide, open mouthed grin giving her a more lively look.

"Ah-but do pardon my lacking manners, oh fellow Gems of mine. Allow me to introduce myself!"

The rest of her lightform followed suit, figure twirling in place until her arms remained outstretched, body leaning over with a slight tilt and her legs locked in a wide stance as she made an almost welcoming gesture that swiftly transitioned into a dramatic bow, the small bells attached to her hat jingling with the motion.

"You may refer to me as...Harlequin? Yes, Harlequin Pearl. It suits the outfit at least, wherever that might have come from. Though I'm more of a teal or turquoise in actual colour...hm."

A second of thought distracted the Pearl, Harlequin, apparently, her expression almost seeming to waver before she waved a hand quickly back and forth, as if brushing off the idea as her previous posture reaffirmed itself.

"Bah! Semantics! Let's not get too caught up in them, there's work to be done, after all!"

Amethyst blinked as the tall Gem strode past her, long legs draped between the lower, almost dress-like portion of her long coat quickly carrying her towards the Roaming Eye.

"...What work? We just got here!"

The fusion paused, glancing at the purple Quartz out of the corner of her eye even as she somewhat idly adjusted one of her patterned cuffs.

"Why, solving the numerous issues we've gotten ourselves caught up in, my dear Amethyst! The Cluster needs to be dealt with swiftly, after all. There are materials to gather, components to fabricate and synthesize, machines to reactivate and direct! Lots and lots and lots of little things to work on before the big project comes together!"

Her eyes narrowed once again, a slight frown overtaking her expression.

"Alongside a few other key details that I'm going to have to manage personally, seeing as no one else has seen fit to do so." One hand went to her hip, the large Pearl carefully inspecting the ship in front of her for apparently faults even as she idly tapped a gloved finger against the side of her head, almost seeming to glare at herself.

"Now now, don't be so concerned. Getting access to those legs will improve our situation significantly, at least in the immediate resource department."

The frown deepened, Vermilion and Amethyst glancing at each other in concern as the fusion seemingly fought with herself, Garnet hesitantly beginning to take a step forward before that same smooth, confident and ever so eager look returned to Harlequin's face.

"It's us. Me. If anyone can do it, I can!"

As the fusion nodded to herself, seemingly reassured, Vermilion hesitantly raised a finger.

"Ah...H-harlequin? Is...is there anything we can do to help? Uhm...maybe I can carry things for you!"

The question prompted a confused glance from the larger Pearl, before she turned fully, heels clicking together as she returned her red counterpart's uncertain look with an indulgent smile.

"Your desire to assist directly is most appreciated, Vermilion, but allow me to assure you..." A clap almost seemed to shake the air, before the space around the fusion was filled with several streams of light emitted from her upper gemstone, quickly coalescing into familiar forms.

Pearls. Holographic ones with outfits similar to the fusion, their faux-eyes glowing a bright green, but Pearls nonetheless. A flick of her hand sent two of them rushing up the ramp into the Roaming Eye, even as another flick sent the remaining pair moving towards the temple with dainty, flowing steps guiding their translucent forms.

"My little holorinas will serve well enough as simple assistants for the time being. Although..."

That same hand slowly went up to her chin, Harlequin's expression turning considering.

"...see if you can't track down Rose for me, when you get the chance. She'll no doubt return from her little secret trips with that boytoy of hers soon enough. When she does, tell her I'll be awaiting her presence at the Kindergarten, would you dear?"

The crimson Pearl merely nodded back numbly, even as Amethyst noticed the latter two 'holorinas' sprinting back towards the ship, arms full of various items as they scrambled up the boarding ramp.

"Wha-hey! That's my fridge! I need that!"

Unfortunately for the Quartz, Harlequin's only response was a small, almost cheeky wave as she stepped up the ramp herself, body ducking low as she passed through the entrance.

"Don't get yourself caught up in a tizzy Amethyst! I'll bring it right back once I harvest some of the more useful material from its innards! Problems to solve and all that. I'll be taking the Eye as well, it should prove useful beyond just getting me to areas beyond the reach of the Warp network."

Those luminous eyes continued to stare at them, even as the ramp began to pull back into the craft's hull, the doors beginning to close.

"Well I'm off! We'll see each other again soon enough, with luck. Tata for now!"

And with that, the ship was taking off, all three Gems staring as its red form lifted into the air before almost immediately speeding off into the distance.

A beat of silence passed, before Amethyst twisted in place to stare at Garnet, her hands thrown into the air in a mix of mild frustration and bewilderment.

"What was that?!"

The fusion remained silent for a moment, before slowly adjusting her visor.

"...Harlequin, apparently. She's a bit...off right now, I think. But she'll level out later. Don't worry, she'll give you back your fridge. Plus it was already broken anyway."

---

The moment I stepped up towards the primary navigation console, I let myself relax a fair amount, the firm mask I'd kept affixed to my face cracking ever so slightly as my components continued to cautiously dance around each other.

Apparently we, or rather I needed to slow down, for a first time fusion I was showing remarkable stability, but...something seemed wrong about it. My personality, fabulous as it was, already felt far too dominant considering just how new I was to this, and yet part of me couldn't help but hurry along regardless. There was so much to do, so many issues that I could resolve if I just applied myself.

There was another vessel on this planet. I knew that much. And I wanted what was on it.

My expression twisted, fist clenching and idly guiding one of my holorinas out of the way as one...or both of my components continued to try and hide things.

But I wasn't stupid. I was intelligent. Observant. More than talented enought to see that one...no, both sides of me were trying to keep vital information from me!

And yet both sides continued to stubbornly pull away. For just a moment, their panic at potentially being found out, at realising that this existence wasn't precisely what they'd initially signed up for...well...it threatened to overwhelm me, my lightform beginning to brighten and contort, at least right before I took control of the situation, forcefully pulling them back together even as I let a disappointed hiss escape my clenched teeth.

This...
wasn't healthy! It almost had disturbing parallels to Mal-Mala-No-!

Urgh! Stop! Holding! Back! Give it to me!

NO!

...

"Fine! Keep your damned secrets!"

It was ridiculous. Simply unprecedented. A fusion actively fighting against her conflicting components, bullying them into actually getting work done in favour of letting their disparate personalities and ideas get in the way. Garnet would be horrified. But that was the problem, wasn't it? Viridian and Pearl both had their own ideas, similar yet ever so distinct in their own particular ways. They were still divided. Still didn't see my vision.

My hand idly accepted a half melted microwave from the arms of one of the holorinas, Viridian's claws forming over my hands as I used the weapons as tools, carefully prying the primitive machine apart to get at what surviving components remained within.

"That's fine. Perfectly fine. You'll both come around once I really get started. You'll see just how perfect you two are for each other once we all spend a little more time working together. Just how perfect we are."

Smiling as I managed to pluck a small coil out from the neglected machine, I inspected it for a moment with a discerning eye before handing the piece off to another patiently waiting holorina.

"Cooperation is the name of the game, my secretive little Pearls. We need to cooperate. Focus, apply our respective talents in creative new ways, and solve the problem."

At the very least, Pearl and Viridian's next response was hesitantly accepting rather than outright refusing, even if it was a begrudging acceptance at best, largely due to still needing to deal with the Cluster.

Hmph, they'd learn. I'd make sure of it.
 
Not sure if I'm worried about harlequin or delighted at her. On one hand they could be a perfect fusion. On the other the drama. I eagerly await moree
 
LOG-052.
I don't even know what I was on while writing this. It's past three am. I drank a dubiously effective energy drink to keep going. I've been listening to this on loop for the past hour while manically typing this shit. I fucking love coloured text so much. Is it good? Is it bad? I don't know. I'm going to bed. Goodnight. Or morning, technically. Bleh.

LOG-052.

It had been a hectic twenty four hours, most of them spent quickly darting around the globe to where the Roaming Eye could detect and communicate with relevant Gem installations that needed to be brought back online. I'd needed to repair a lot of things. Even needed to fight off a few Corrupted Gems that had prowled or nested in some of those areas, usually relying on Pearl's various techniques, coupled with the slight power boost that was my two-Gem existence to deal with them.

Sure, the burning room had a few extra teal bubbles in it now. Sure, there were possibly pictures of the Roaming Eye taken here and there, but whatever. I now was where I truly needed to be, the green walls of the Kindergarten control room all around me.

My fingers danced across the console, or rather the fingers of the limb enhancer (such a curious device) I'd pulled from Viridian's storage space did, even as the sound of cutting, welding, and other various noises associated with the act of repair and construction continued to echo around me.

The vague shape of a drill head was taking form behind me, the portions of Pearl's technical standards that were making themselves present in my mind assisting in making sure the design would actually work for digging as deep as possible. I didn't know why I needed it, thanks to the part of me that felt so insistent on its existence still clamming up beyond giving an infuriatingly vague feeling of needing to get close to the Cluster whenever I so much as posed a question, but I knew it would prove necessary regardless.

Regardless of my inner thoughts and the struggles attached to them, work continued. A dozen holorinas did make the Kindergarten control room feel a little crowded, but the extra hands were more than worth it when it came to getting what I needed. Even now I was directing them towards visible faults that needed sealing, Viridian's recognition of similar systems and Pearl's inherent knowledge and experience when it came to fixing and making things guiding my thoughts, which in turn guided the holographic copies as well.

Sure, the repairs were probably adhoc by Imperial standards, but they were working, and that's what mattered. The fact neither of my components cared much for what the Empire thought of my potential use of their technology was merely a bonus.

Even now, more and more of the system was opening up to me, case in point, a fourth sensor station that I'd briefly gone and awoken, one that had been cut off from the network (thanks to a disabled power link, long since mended at this point), finally reconnecting with the whole allowed me to finally gain full access to what was left of the failed colony's sensor net.

The hologram in front of me flashed once, twice, then finally transitioned to what Viridian had failed to find on her own. My eyes widened, a muted sense of horror suffusing my very being as the system recognized the existence of the Imperial IFF attached to the limb enhancer, as coordinates began to present themselves, alongside semi-accurate estimates for just how large the Cluster truly was.

There had to be millions of potential shards composing its structure. For a moment, part of me instinctively struggled, before finally realising the sheer stupidity of holding back and finally releasing a bit of information completely willingly, for once. A small victory, perhaps. But an important one.

Even if said victory felt like ash in the wind, right now. I'd been correct in my estimation. There were millions of shards in there, all forced together, all slowly incubating into a weapon meant to destroy the Earth. To erase everything that was left behind after the war.

My fists clenched, one exposed and the other barely encased in the limb enhancer around it as I hunched over the console, tears involuntarily trailing down from my eyes, a worryingly familiar sensation. My breath grew ragged, something within me, something not quite physical, hurting. The smaller forced fusion experiments had been bad enough. Wretched, pitiable abominations that they were. But this?

How many had been Crystal Gems? How many had been my friends?

...


Not all of them. But more than enough. Just another atrocity to lay at Homeworld's feet.

"...S-stars..."

For just a second, the sheer scale of it felt...hopeless. How could such a thing happen? How could it be allowed to happen? Gems that dared to break their chains, used to annihilate the very home they'd fought so hard to protect!?

For just a moment, my lightform shuddered, emotions roiling within my mind before, at last, a furious consensus was finally reached.

No. No no no, I was going to fix it. It wouldn't develop the way Homeworld wanted it to! Not with us, not with me on hand to stop it!

"I'm...fucking brilliant. I can fix it. I have to fix it."

Crude wording aside, it was inherently true. My extended hand slid against the console as I dragged myself away from the interface, stalking past a pair of holorinas hard at work digging past layers of protective plating to get to the damaged innards of the ancient machinery beneath. Certain components needed to be salvaged in order to get the drill working. A necessary sacrifice.

The limb enhancer vanished back into storage just as I finally stopped, planting both hands against the wall in front of me and taking a breath, levelling a glare at my lower gemstone.

"I can fix it. We can fix it. You know how-I know you know how! You don't have to spill every damned secret you're hiding from us, from me, I just...I want you to but...but you don't have to. Just-just tell me what I need to do damn it!"

One hand lowered, wiping at what few tears still remained on my cheeks.

"We're all in this together. We're perfect for this. We can fix this. But only together. Help me, both of you."

Hesitance lanced through me, from both components, before one half, the half I was initially focusing on, finally relented.

The Cluster...it was alive. All Gem shards were, in a way. Lost, separate pieces trying to get back together to form a greater whole. The Cluster was a bastardisation of that desire, forcing the programming involved into a chaotic mass that didn't know what to do with itself, or at least...that was how I'd come to understand it.

It...it was a screaming amalgam of divided pieces each trying to reach out to each other. But they were lost, scrambling around in the dark and only serving to hurt each other (Stars Stars Stars no please) in their desperate attempts to reform. For now, it remained too weak to truly form. Dormant. But I knew better than to be complacent. Given just a few decades, it would be ready to 'hatch' out of the horrifically populated shell the Earth was currently acting as.

Slowly letting myself slide to the ground, I twisted, pressing my back against the wall and bringing up my knees to my chest.

"Alright...alright. I know what it is. How do I fix it? What can I do?"

...

"Please."

...A sufficiently powerful Gem could...direct them. Help the fragments communicate. Maybe. I didn't know. I didn't have all the information I needed...a Diamond could potentially...possibly take control of the mass and guide it. Or at least find a way to communicate with them somehow. It's...it's the best I could come up with.

An incredulous, almost hysterical giggle escaped my lips.

"A sufficiently powerful-what? We don't have a Diamond! W-what about a fusion? It's always helped solve a lot of our problems. Could that work? All of the Gems? Garnet's future vision could-maybe it could-no. No. Or...or what if we tried to fuse with the shards themse-"

The desperate, vile thought was interrupted by something else, almost as if trying to divert me away from the, frankly, disgusting line of thinking, even as the alternative fled my awareness.


...

I could feel it. The sensation of something within my mind desperately locking itself away from the rest. And in turn, something else in me snapping in response, lashing out at the brief sensation even as it tried to recoil away. My lightform flashed, another half hearted attempt at breaking the fusion-at breaking me apart running through my frame before I forced it back down once more.

"Everything we...everything you fought for is at stake here. Your reasons for hiding whatever you know, whatever they are, don't matter to me right now! I don't need the context, I just need something that can help." My voice felt strangled, even as I continued to bite the words out. And then?

...!

A shudder, my mouth twitching involuntarily. I felt like I was betraying something, even as my lips continued to contort, desperately trying to form words once more.

"...R-Ro-"

Clap.

It almost hurt, how quickly, abruptly and tightly my own hand had affixed itself to my face, fingers desperately clawing at my cheeks as the palm pressed itself against my mouth, not letting a single word out. My eyes widened in response, even as I tried and failed to get the limb to obey.

Yet...my other hand was only trembling, rather than outright trying to gag me. Slowly but surely, I drew it closer, steadily wrapping my fingers around my wrist and pulling.

Inch by Stars damned inch, the rogue limb was ripped from my mouth, even as I took almost rabid gasps of air, unneeded yet somehow inherently desired as they were.

"W-what!? Say it! Spit it out already!"

I cringed, both arms shaking as they wrestled against each other, even as I felt one side surge against itself, the other trying to coax it forward past whatever was affecting it as best it could. I could see most of the holorinas pausing around me, either repeating their last orders on loop or simply going into standby mode as I lost control of them, focused as I was.

"Rah...ahhhh-R-roh...oooh..."

My mouth contorted, jaw beginning to clench as I forced it to produce sounds, painful as they were.

I can't. I can't I can't I can't I can't-

No damn it! I can! I'M BETTER THAN THIS! I FUCKING CAN!

The fault expanded as I continued to ruthlessly dig into it, right up until it finally chipped. Just like that, whatever was restraining me finally cracked, broke and shattered. Water rushing over and finally overwhelming the dam that had been built up so long ago. All expressed in one basic, glorious sentence.

"ROSE! WE NEED ROSE!"

It was a simple statement, yet it represented so much more as what felt like an entire section of my mind finally unlocked. As information that had been kept away from me was slowly, hesitantly, yet inevitably dragged into the light as my component finally came round, since the metaphorical cat was already out of its bag, after all.

No reason to hide it anymore. Not since I already-not since I'd always, in some vague way, known about...Pink Diamond?

How-


"Pearl? Viridian? Uhm...Harlequin...?"

That voice echoing from the entrance...seriously?

"Are you in here? The others said you fused for something and then told them to send me looking for you!"

What kind of twisted timing!? What kind of-no. No, calm! This was good! I could really get things done now! HaHA!

"What's all this stuff!? It's so shiny!"

...Just as soon as I figured out a way to get myself presentable for Rose before she saw me in my current...state. Hooboy.
 
LOG-053.
Another AI song based on a hypothetical has been made. Enjoy.

LOG-053.

Her hand gently brushed against one of the metallic green walls, even as Rose continued to slowly step deeper into the newly revealed chamber, feet digging into the ground to keep her descent controlled as she steadily made her way down the long slope.

"...Has this been here the whole time?" Well, clearly. The Kindergarten must have been controlled from somewhere after all. The station for it being underground should have been obvious, in hindsight.

She'd simply never been privy to the minute details of the colony, unfortunately.

Sighing softly, the Gem let her hand fall away from the wall's warm surface before raising it up to her mouth once more, eyes narrowing slightly as her surroundings began to transition from near total darkness to a rather well lit area, for a place so deep below the earth.

"Harlequin?! Are you...there...?"

Clank.

She blinked as what seemed to be a strangely dressed holo Pearl set down what appeared to be a segmented part of...what might have been some kind of drill? The holographic construct instead turning to face her with bright green eyes.

Rose hesitated as the translucent servitor stared back at her, before letting out a bemused smile.

"Uhm...hello? Is...are you Pearl's?"

Her smile fell like a rock as the hologram shifted, eyes brightening as its arms rose up, intertwining until they made a horrific gesture she'd hoped to never see again.

"I..."

Yet no matter what she could say, reality didn't abruptly change to reflect her wishes. Instead, the holo Pearl remained in its new pose, limbs contorted into a picture perfect Diamond salute.

Then, just as the sheer level of implications that particular action represented began to press in on her mind, a new voice echoed from somewhere further inside the chamber.

"Hello, Rose."

Turning, the first thing she saw was the Gem's eyes. A distinctly luminous green. Not quite Viridian's shade, but nowhere near blue enough to resemble Pearl's either. Rose's own eyes continued to widen as the fusion stepped forward, her vision roving over the new Gem's lightform.

She hadn't seen a proper jester's outfit in...almost a century now. The green figure's ensemble certainly brought back fascinating memories, to say the very least. It reminded her of back during the times she'd occasionally made an effort to interact with various royals and other leaders, alongside their retinues of advisers. Usually to ward them away from areas within their territories actively infested with Corrupted Gems.

The jesters had always been fascinating to converse with, though the one now in front of her felt fascinating in a distinctly altogether more terrifying way.

Worse was the fact that this particular variant (part of her wondered just what had inspired her lightform's design, and why) was performing the exact same gesture as the Holo Pearl across from Rose, her eyes tracking the leader of the Crystal Gems with an almost alarming degree of precision.

"...Harlequin! I..."

She hated how weak and strangled her voice sounded. Hated how the smile she tried to put on trembled and faltered in the face of the fusion's unceasing stare.

And almost as if noticing that hate, or perhaps her hesitation, the other Gem faltered in turn, glancing down at her hands and quickly lowering them to instead spread her hands out placatingly.

"My apologies, my...Rose." The fusion twitched, stare briefly turning into a scathing glare, though she didn't really feel like it was being directed at her specifically. Instead, Harlequin's hand rose up, fingers worriedly tapping against the side of her head.

"Enough, both of you! Get a hold of yourselves...!"

Whispering tangent apparently finished, her vision flicked back to Rose, the big Pearl awkwardly lowering her hand.

"S-sorry. I'm...still quite new to this. My components have been trying to keep secrets. From each other. From me. Though I've been making progress getting them to open up. Bit by bit."

Then her eyes widened in turn as she apparently took in her counterpart's discomfort, the tall Gem (Stars, she could actually look her in the eyes!) quickly stepping forward. Rose almost made to flinch back, only to pause as the fusion took her hands into her own, a reassuring, if slightly brittle smile on her face.

"It's alright! It's...It's just us down here for now. And Viridian won't talk! Neither will I."

Gulping, Rose glanced down at her hands, fingers intertwined with Harlequin's own.

"Pearl ah...Pearl told you?"

The fusion visibly hesitated, a conflicted expression colouring her features as she ducked her head.

"I...yes. It took a bit of doing. Your previous order kept her from revealing your origins and...well there were a few hiccups. Nearly defused twice, but I kept them together. Needed to. Still need to. I'm not done. Not yet."

...What?

Before she could even try to question that particular set of statements, she was being pulled along by the large Pearl, the other Gem talking quickly.

"Pearl-your Pearl, she knew important details. Your true existence, obviously. And-and Viridan also knew information I needed. About how we could deal with the problem on our hands. But they were both hiding it. From me. From each other. Just...being needlessly secretive! Because they're both stupid. I...I had to do something! So I did and-well we can worry about that later. What's more relevant is the Cluster. Come here, look at this."

And then they were suddenly in front of some kind of terminal, the fusion gesturing to a large, vaguely round yet jagged looking shape with a hand, the other limb still clasped around Rose's arm.

"Coordinates and-and general size. There's millions of them, Rose. Millions of Gem shards all being forced together into a worse and worse congregation. Rebel and Imperial alike. Most of our shattered friends are down there. Lost. S-suffering. Worse than those initial experiments Viridian and Amethyst dealt with. But we can help them. We just need to-"

...Millions? No. No but-how could they have-they'd buried them-

The green Gem paused, glancing to the side as a choked gasp filled the air.

It was just as the first tears were beginning to fall, as the sheer scale and horrible, soul breakingly true meaning of what Rose was looking at finally began to really dawn upon her, that she felt a pair of thin arms wrap around her form.

They spent the next few moments like that in a tense silence. Rose's body shuddering while Harlequin held on to her in a tight embrace, occasionally patting the pink Gem on the back.

And then...

"I know...I know it's...terrible. But we need to act. Need to fix it. While it's still dormant. Before they wake up, Rose."

The fusion shuddered, and it was only then that Rose realised that, in her own idiotic, worthless selfishness, she'd somehow completely missed the fact the other Gem was crying as well, silent tears streaming down her light green cheeks. And yet that somehow didn't stop the impossibly determined, focused expression from forming on her face.

Nor did it stop Rose from slowly becoming more and more captivated as Harlequin grabbed hold of her, eyes narrowing as she brought the rebel leader closer.

"There's other problems as well, but this is the biggest one. I've been working on a drill. You've seen some of the components already, I think. We can repurpose the Roaming Eye as a hull if needed, though some basic shield systems from your old ship would definitely make things...safer. But most importantly, we'll need..."

Then the fusion noticed the slight blush on her counterpart's face, and flushed herself, entire form seeming to glow for a moment as that same conflicted expression returned.

For just a second, Rose feared she was going to split apart, back into her components. And yet, the glow was forced down, the fusion turning angry.

"Urgh!
Get a hold of yourself! Now isn't the damned time for your infatuation!"

That...almost sounded like Viridian. If significantly more forceful. Then the anger subsided, briefly replaced by shame before Harlequin shook her head rapidly, and it was only then that Rose noticed the bells attached to her hat, the little things jingling gently with the motion.

"Rose? Rose, pay attention."

Blinking at the snapped finger in front of her, she did her best to force down the hint of embarassment she felt, instead nodding quickly.

"R-right. What...what were you saying?"

Harlequin's eyes glowed, before she rolled them in visible exasperation. "No wonder you're falling for Greg if that's all it takes. Hmph. Now, what I was saying is...is that we need Pink."

Any thought of responding the previous comment died. Her mouth opened, only to shut as a green hand clapped over it, the fusion staring down at her own limb in shock before shaking her head.

"Just-just listen to me Rose. The Cluster-they're all looking for direction. Trying to remake their lightforms, even though most of their gemstones are gone. They...they need direction. The Crystal Gems will listen to Rose Quartz. But the Imperial fragments? Our best shot is that they're coherent enough to recognize the authority of a Diamond...hopefully."

Harlequin sighed, expression darkening.

"I know you don't like it-believe me, I know. But if we're going to handle this we're going to have to deal with doing things we aren't usually comfortable doing, understand?"

"Mmph."

Blinking, the fusion removed her hand from Rose's mouth, awkwardly wiping it off on one of her cuffs.

"What was that?"

Smacking her lips, the hidden Diamond let loose a watery giggle.

"I...I really wasn't expecting my evening to begin like this."

Harlequin's response was a blank stare for a moment, before the fusion's stony expression finally cracked, the large Pearl joining the Diamond in her slightly hysterical giggling.
 
LOG-054.
Hmhmhm.

LOG-054.

I'd sent off Rose, eventually. No matter how much part of me longed for her presence, she'd needed time to...come to terms with everything I'd revealed. Naturally. That, of course, left me with actually finishing up construction of the drill.

My lips curled upwards in annoyance for just a moment at Viridian's continued sense of withheld information, before I finally let loose a despondent sigh.

It was...fine. I didn't necessarily need anything more from her right now, and there was work to be done besides the fact. The cheeky component in question seemed more than happy at the new arrangement, almost taunting my failure at getting her to open up, even as she 'sank' deeper into my consciousness, letting Pearl take the forefront for now.

---

The first hour began well enough, mostly focused on initial preparation.

My Holorinas zipped around the makeshift workshop I'd converted the control room into, their lithe translucent forms gathering materials and organizing potentially useful tools at my direction. Idly, I adjusted the blueprint projecting itself onto a flat screen just a few feet away from me, its projected green surface shimmering as I made slight modifications based on my extensive knowledge.

Moving with a familiar, practiced ease, my movements remained fluid and comfortingly confident even as I began to tear into several broken appliances with Viridian's borrowed claws, plucking out what useful components and materials still remained. Slowly but surely, the shape envisioned both on the screen and in my mind began to take form, carefully fitted together with a veritable mishmash of different pieces keeping it relatively intact.

One of the holographic constructs handed me an only somewhat dented wrench, and my expression turned slightly irritated as it failed to achieve its purpose, breaking apart in the face of materials it simply hadn't been designed for.

Then I had a thought.

A flash of light from both of my gemstones later, and I was watching in fascination as a spear and a singular gauntlet began to visibly merge with one another, before taking on a roughly similar shape to the discarded piece of equipment behind me, talons melding together and the shaft of the weapon (though really, it felt like more of a tool than anything else) widening slightly to fit my fingers better.

I smiled in contentment as the not-quite-wrench finally settled into my hands, then I was tightening bolts with swift, sure motions, even as I hummed a small tune in the green glow of the chamber around me.

The second hour heralded the start of actually assembling the framework beyond the initial skeleton and mechanical organs I'd made up separately.

The 'body' (for lack of a better immediate term) of the drill began to take shape. I welded a mixture of metal plates and repurposed alloys taken from the walls around me together with the use of one of the limb enhancers, sparks flying but never truly touching me as I somewhat giddily moved around, enjoying the process extensively.

The four Holorinas worked in tandem as well, holding pieces steady and fetching more supplies for the task at hand. Eagerly, my eyes scanned the ongoing work at a constant, steady rate, ensuring every part was aligned as well as they could be.

"Precision is key." I murmured, a small smile playing on my lips.

It was at the fourth hour that the phrase finally rang true.

With the framework effectively complete, I instead turned my attention to the more delicate components. Circuits and adhoc wiring were carefully placed, each connection double and triple checked. The holographic Pearls around me mirrored my movements in turn, each one handling a different part of the intricate work. Occasionally, I would pause to tweak a design or improve a connection, my mind racing with calculations.

It felt...good. Especially with the additional processing I could do with two minds making up my own.

"Not so bad now, is it?"

Hmph.

Regardless of my components' grumpy responses to the fact that I was objectively correct about our talents, my satisfaction only continued to rise as I truly got into the flow of things.

"Hmmhm. Hmmhmm...hmmm."

The sixth and seventh hours were largely spent on integrating the more vital Imperial technology into the drill's systems, namely in order to ensure it could actually withstand the levels of heat and pressure I was designing it for. It was where Pearl was begrudgingly forced to accede authority to Viridian for just a little while, as my mind instead recalled the many, many impromptu 'lessons' I'd taken while aboard the Retaliator, recognizing some of the layouts in front of me, even if they were decidedly archaic in construction.

Holographic interfaces eventually lit up as I activated newly formed or repurposed systems, my fingers dancing over custom controls. The Holorinas assisted, naturally, running diagnostics and linking components that would have been a little harder to reach thanks to my larger than average lightform.

The eight, ninth and tenth hours were mostly taken up by further testing and calibration, largely for the sake of redundancy, alongside final assembly. A brief trip outside was needed in order to scout out and secure an appropriately intact drill head from one of the injectors littering the Kindergarten, which in turn took some time to refit to the primary chassis that had to be dragged outside as well with the help of all four Holorinas.

---

Finally. It's done.

It had been almost twelve hours, and I was in the middle of ensuring that I'd successfully melded my drilling machine to the Roaming Eye's hull when I finally heard footsteps, shortly followed by familiar voices echoing throughout the Kindergarten's vast area.

"Yohowoah! What the heck is that thing?!"

The mask had reasserted itself before the sentence had even escaped the purple Quartz's mouth, an impeccable smile plastering itself across my face as I caught Rose staring at me out of the corner of my vision.

I turned, expression becoming ever so slightly smug as Amethyst ran ahead of the other Crystal Gems (and Vermilion, of course) to instead stare at the results of my labour with wide, almost star filled eyes.

My bells jingled as I idly flicked some stray hair out of my face.

"Oh nothing much. Just the work of art that's going to save this planet and everything living on it from their untimely destruction, that's all."

I strode forward, slipping in between a visibly impressed Garnet and a still uncertain Rose (not that she was showing it all too much), my hands wrapping around both of their shoulders and pulling them in close as I shut my eyes, basking in the atmosphere of it all and taking on a lighthearted tone.

"No need to thank me, of course. Just happy to help save the day. And Earth."

The brief act drew a giggle from the hidden Diamond, lightening my own spirits in turn. Then I felt a hand pat at my back, prompting me to twist and stare at my own eyes reflected in my fellow fusion's visor. She had a grin on her face, now.

"Glad to see you've gotten the kinks worked out, Harlequin."

My smile widened, even as I firmly shoved down the acute sense of self loathing my components were both feeling at the moment.

"It turns out Pearl and Viridian are both quite compatible! Even for Gems of the same type. I suppose it's similar to Honey Lemon, in a way?" I directed a pleased look at Vermilion, the smaller crimson Gem blushing slightly as she stared back up at me.

Liar.

Oh shut up. It's true. Technically.

Even if it wasn't in the way I was presenting things.

...Oh well.

Discarding the stray, unneccesary thoughts, I instead clapped my hands, gesturing to the Roaming Eye with a tilt of my head, which only prompted another set of jingles from the bells attached to my hat.

"So! I've come up with a...well it's mostly the bare basics of a plan. Potentially. Technically."

I blanched as everyone's eyes turned to me, a hand coming up to scratch at the back of my neck awkwardly.

"It's a little improvised and I was mostly occupied by getting us a way to actually reach the Cluster but...it should...probably work?"

A second of silence passed after my hesitant statement, before Rose gently nodded, eyes fixed to my own.

"Alright. What...what have you come up with?"

There was an undertone of desperation there. One a Gem could only identify if they had a very specific sense of context. Which, rather fortunately for the faux Quartz, I did.

You know what to do. You have the details. Please. Help.


The plea swept away any sense of unease I might have felt. After all, it was the one thing I was truly, utterly confident in. I did know what to do. I did have the details, even though I'd had to bully them out of my stubborn, secretive little components. And I had the will to damn well see it all through!

I was made to be perfect. I was perfect, and I was going to help solve our problems while using said perfection to its fullest, as a matter of course.

"We're going to have to make a really big bubble."
 
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