I mean, that's fair. It is incredibly petty for White to do, and sending her Pearl just rubs it in that Pink can't really do anything to stop her. But I still think it's in character for her to act like this, this is the same gem that punished Pink by taking away her Pearl and parading her around as a puppet for thousands of years just to remind Pink of her place.
Synthesis (Steven Universe AU)
- Thread starter Mre
- Start date
I mean, that's fair. It is incredibly petty for White to do, and sending her Pearl just rubs it in that Pink can't really do anything to stop her. But I still think it's in character for her to act like this, this is the same gem that punished Pink by taking away her Pearl and parading her around as a puppet for thousands of years just to remind Pink of her place.
serra2
Himouto! Sylvanas-chan
Oh, it's totally in character. It's just in context this feels worse.
Character designs by Abyranss
- Location
- New Zealand
Crossposting from the Spacebattles thread.
I drew some designs for the characters.
And here's everyone standing together with a Pearl for scale.
I drew some designs for the characters.
The description referred to her new form as sleeker and resembling the mural, so I flattened the sleeves and got rid of the poofy pants; hair became a bit spikier while keeping its general shape. I gave her bare feet, a skirt and changed the shape of her top to reflect her previous form of Rose Quartz while not making it obvious to other gems that there could be a connection. From what I've seen, gems' regenerations tend to change around the location they were injured (Pearl's sash after being stabbed, for instance) so I made the shape around her gem asymmetrical to reflect the time Spinel threw a pillar through her and also that time she was "shattered." As a happy accident, she ended up looking sort of like a monk, which is good considering she's trying to think more this time around.
Sway's design was much simpler, mostly based on Holly Blue's appearance, with a change to her hair and shoulder cape to make room for her gem.
Fire Opal takes the same general shape as the jades, being an aristocratic gem much like they are, I included some features from the fusion Opal but tried to avoid anything directly inherited from Pearl or Amethyst, not that fusions have to look like their natural counterparts, Sardonyx being an excellent example of someone who I would never have guessed was an agate, so Fire Opal gets the hair tubes and the draped cloth down the front and back of her skirt. I tried to include a lot of fire iconography much like Sunstone, in the hair colour, hair and shoulder shape, and the pattern at the foot of her skirt.
Iolite was the hardest to settle on a look for. I originally tried to draw from characters like Sherlock Holmes, with her shoulder cape being representative of the way his coat looks in a lot of pictures, but nothing was really coming together so I went to MrE and brought up problem, From that conversation I started using Dana Scully as another piece of inspiration.
Her lenses appear like glasses but aren't actually connected at all and I imagine them functioning much like Zircon's monocle; the trousers are also drawn from Zircon. Lastly, I imagine her torso underneath the cape has the same design as Aquamarine's, appearing like a suit and tie. Not as in love with the colour choices as I was with Fire Opal, but they're decent.
Her lenses appear like glasses but aren't actually connected at all and I imagine them functioning much like Zircon's monocle; the trousers are also drawn from Zircon. Lastly, I imagine her torso underneath the cape has the same design as Aquamarine's, appearing like a suit and tie. Not as in love with the colour choices as I was with Fire Opal, but they're decent.
Spinel has her canon appearance, of course, but I wanted to complete the set. Her hair is still messy, her eyes are red, and her smile doesn't quite meet her eyes but otherwise, she looks like she's doing okay.
And here's everyone standing together with a Pearl for scale.
Again, thanks for doing this, those designs are a lot better than anything I could draw myself.
TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
This made me laugh a bit, and I feel terrible about it.
Reactions 2
Today is another reactions chapter covering the ball and aftermath from a couple of different POV's, I'm aiming for Friday or Saturday for the next main chapter.
Old Soldiers
Pink Lace Agate Facet 5 cut 7XA (Sway) was not having fun. A ball to announce the return of hr Diamond after her miraculous resurrection sounded wonderful in theory, but as she ran herself ragged trying to get the Quartzes under her command ready that theory sounded less and less appealing. Even when they were in the ballroom she found herself correcting postures and fixing salutes of Rose Quartzes who had spent more than a hundred years on the front lines away from any formal occasions, and the Amethysts that had been added on from the zoo trip were only partially better. If she'd had her way, they would have gotten at least another week to practice, but her Diamond wanted to get her colony setup as quickly as possible, so she made do with what she had.
As she walked the line of gems one last time before the ceremony began, she saw her Diamond, sitting on her throne at the center of the room and talking with her Spinel, her eyes sparkling in the light while her gentle face held the hints of a smile…
Pink Diamond turned to look out over the throne room, her movement snapping Sway out of her thoughts. As she looked over towards the line of Quartzes, her eyes locked onto Sway's, and she gave a small nod. A strange feeling swept through Sway, the same feeling she had been dealing with ever since her Diamond had pulled her aside for a one-on-one discussion about her court, and she felt a smile threaten to break through her tough "command face". But her good feelings were short lived.
"You know fraternizing with a Diamond is forbidden, right boss?" An amused voice came from behind her. Whirling around with a look of anger on her face, she looked up and down the line to try and identify the speaker, but as chuckles and hushed laughter ran up the line of Quartzes as the joke spread to those who hadn't heard she found herself panicking to restore order. Only a few moments later, the music started, signalling the start of the ball. All of the Quartzes immediately stopped laughing and held perfect salutes, but as she walked past she could swear that some of them were chuckling when her back was turned.
I am not planning to fraternize with Pink Diamond, and even if I was, if a Diamond approved it then it wouldn't be forbidden. She thought to herself as she observed the arrival of the other Diamonds and the ball.
After the ball Sway and her soldiers escorted their Diamond onto her ship, and when Pink was finally aboard Sway assembled her troops for a "meeting".
"As you can tell, I'm not happy. I don't appreciate comments implying that I am engaging in inappropriate activity with our Diamond. If the speaker steps forward we will have a discussion and no one will be in trouble, but otherwise I will have to punish all of you." As she looked at the cluster of gems, she saw looks of guilt on a few faces, but more concerningly they almost all seemed upset. "Well, what do you have to say for yourselves?"
No one talked for a few moments before a Rose Quartz with her gem on her leg answered quietly. "I did it."
Sway looked over the embarrassed gem, and memories came back. 4XE, above-average soldier with a tendency to engage in minor humorous activities and excusing them by pointing out that she always gets her tasks completed on time or early, but tended to say things without thinking. Nickname… I don't think she had one…? Before she could say anything, 4XE continued. "I'm sorry Sway, everyone was all tense and you were getting all flustered and I just kind of… said it."
Sway took a moment to calm herself before answering. "Thank you for your honesty, please don't do it again. Dismissed." As she turned to leave she heard a set of footsteps following her. Turning around, she saw 4XE behind her, tears in her eyes.
Stopping in confusion, she stood there as 4XE looked in her eyes. "You changed." She said, her voice quivering. "I knew something was up with you earlier, but I just thought it was stress from getting all the newbies organized and then getting ready for the ball, but then I saw how you reacted to my joke… What happened to you?" She was nearly crying at this point.
Sway blinked at her, realization hitting. "For you, the last time you saw me was that day in the zoo when I… when Blue and Yellow Diamond ordered you all poofed and bubbled. For me, that day was five thousand years ago, and I'm happy to have you back, but…"
"But things aren't the same as they used to be, and I shouldn't have just assumed we could go back to how things were on Earth. I'll try to do better next time." 4XE said, turning away.
"It's… it's fine. I know I probably would have just laughed about it back then, but I've been having a really bad few millennia, so could you just hold off on your jokes for a while, at least while I'm around?"
"Of course. I'll let everyone else know."
"Thank you." Sway said, watching the Rose Quartz turn and walk away down the hall. Sighing, she leaned against the wall. I missed them for so long, but they didn't experience all those years, so they want to go back to normal, and I don't know if I'll ever be normal again.
Friends Old and New
Fire Opal Facet 9 Cut 6C3 joined the other Opals from Pinks court as they prepared to present themselves to their Diamond. Taking her position, as the group passed the Quartz guards she felt a tinge of envy run through her as she looked up to the towering soldiers. I was supposed to be made like that, but the incompetent in charge of my injector screwed up. Forcing the thoughts aside, she focused on the positives. Her Diamond was back from the dead, and no Gem could ever be upset about something as miraculous as that. To make it even better, her Diamond had overheard her complaining about the political games that gems played in her court and had agreed that something should be done to reduce them.
Approaching the throne, they all greeted their Diamond in the customary way. To 6C3's surprise, her Diamond looked her in the eyes and smiled at her. Instincts from centuries at the Lunar Sea Spire kept her reaction to only a few surprised blinks, and she decided to roll with the situation by nodding back. As the procession took their places and the ball went on, she could feel the constant glances from the other Opals, and she simply put a small smile on her face, ignoring the whispered requests for an explanation.
The aftermath of the ball was a confused rush to the ships, as Pinks entire court immediately prepared to leave Homeworld and begin their Diamonds new colony as soon as they were dismissed from the ball. Fortunately for 6C3, she was on Pink Diamonds ship, and only three other Opals were onboard, unfortunately there were several dozen other aristocratic gems, and they all lived up to her memories by spending all their free time gossiping. Before the ship had even left the planet, a Purple Opal and a Pink Tourmaline walked up to her.
"Hi 6C3, it's been a while, hasn't it?" The Purple Opal asked. "I was just talking to 5HZ here, and she mentioned that you two used to work together back on Earth. Isn't that great, the court's only been back together for a couple hours and old friends are already finding each other again."
6C3 stared at her. Old friends? 5HZ was a colleague who never willingly backstabbed me in the stupid power games, but I wouldn't call her a friend. And who even is this Opal? She's familiar, and she obviously is here to figure out why Pink smiled at me, but this is incredibly amateurish. She's either incredibly out of practice or she's pretending to be out of practice to get me to underestimate her. It's probably the second one, but thousands of years without playing the game would leave any gem rusty. Putting a small smile on her face, she turned to 5HZ. "It's good to see you again, I knew you got off Earth but after that I heard you were assigned to Blue Diamond."
5HZ nodded. "Yes, I served Blue for these last thousand years, but I'm just so happy that Pink is back."
"Aren't we all?" 6C3 asked, and the two old friends continued chatting for a few minutes as the Purple Opal, who 6C3 could not remember the designation of, did her best to ingrate herself in the conversation and steer it towards Pink. Just ask what you want to ask, come on, you can do it. 6C3 thought to herself, before eventually deciding to just let the gem know what she wanted to know to get her to go away. "So anyways, did you hear about Pink Diamonds Spinel and her plan for improving morale in the court?"
"I heard some rumors." The Opal answered.
"Well, she pulled me aside to discuss it, and we ended up discussing the way gems at the Lunar Sea Spire tended to spend a lot of their free time planning petty plots that would never have any long-lasting effects, and while I was talking about my experiences Pink Diamond came looking for her Spinel and overheard. She said that what she heard was proof that her attempt to build camaraderie and boost morale in her court was necessary." Not in those exact words, but close enough.
Both gems froze, staring at her. That's right, our Diamond knows about your silly little schemes, and she isn't happy with them. "Anyways, her Spinel declared me her friend, and she seemed alright with it."
"Are you… are you saying that you're friends with Pink Diamonds Spinel?" 5HZ asked.
At that moment, the Spinel in question stretched her head around the corner, putting her face right next to 6C3's. "Yep!" She said, startling all three gems. Shrinking, she pulled the rest of her body out from around the bend, ending up right next to 6C3. "I'm on a mission from our Diamond to make her court more friendly, and what better way to do that then by making friends?" She asked, a grin on her face.
The Purple Opal and Tourmaline stared at her for a moment before the Opal shook herself out of her shock. "Well, if it has the approval of our Diamond, then I have no doubt your mission will be a success. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go meet up with some of my friends and tell them the good news." With that, she turned and walked away quickly, 5HZ mumbling a quiet "see you later" and following.
With the two of them alone, 6C3 turned to Spinel. "So, what do you want?" She asked.
"Well, first rule of being friends, you don't have to want something from them to go say hello. Secondly, I just wanted to see how you were doing, make sure no one was bothering you about what happened at the ball, but I guess you have that handled."
"Yeah, thanks for checking on me though, it's nice to know someone cares enough to do that."
"No problem, that's what friends do!" Spinel answered. "So, it's going to be a long trip, got any ideas for games?"
"That's your specialty Spinel."
"Fine, but one of these days you're going to have to actually come up with a game when I ask you."
"Sure I will." 6C3 smiled, the fact that Spinel had just told her that she would be trying to get her to perform outside her function flying over her head as she smiled at her new friend.
New Questions
Iolite Facet 5 Cut 2YG relaxed in a compartment on the hand ship as it carried her and the rest of Pinks court to their new colony. In front of her was a report on some minor issue regarding her Diamonds court, and she was enjoying the light reading as the hum of the ships systems helped her block out everything outside the compartment. Making a few notes on potential solutions, she went to move on to the next report before someone knocked on the door.
Standing up, she opened the door and found her Diamond standing in the doorway. She threw her arms together into a salute, but Pink waved her off. "Iolite, I just wanted to stop by and apologize, getting the other Diamonds to agree with my plans was easier than I expected so I never used the presentation about it I asked you to make for me."
"It's not a problem my Diamond, it's actually a good sign that the other Diamonds were so willing to accept your plan, my research turned up some massive gaps in research into the creation of gems. Is there anything else you need from me?" Iolite asked.
"No, I'm still going over the work assignments, I'll let you know when we make it to our destination." Pink told her, giving her a small nod and leaving Iolite with her thoughts.
Pink is definitely acting differently from how she used to. I verified with multiple other members of the court that she wasn't like this before in case I was misremembering, and this confirms it. Pulling up a hidden folder on her personal device, she pulled up a file containing her speculations on why her Diamond was acting like this. Technically, this behavior was incredibly not allowed, but her instincts to find the truth were strong, strong enough that they partially overcame her desires to obey her Diamond.
Pink brings in her Spinel, who was apparently given to her long before she was given the Earth, and is incredibly close with her despite spending more than a thousand years apart. She is also putting a massive amount of effort into reaching out to her court, trusting her Spinel to run this "morale improvement" exercise by making friends with the court, apologizing and asking as if I and the other gems are her equals, and growing close with the commander of her personal guard. On that topic, she went to release the Rose Quartz gems from their bubbles with only two Agates to command them, reforming her personal guard out of the most distrusted Gem type in the empire. All of this put together means… something. It means there's something going on, and I can't figure out what it is.
Sighing, she put away the speculation file and leaned back in her chair with frustration. I can't let it get the better of me, I'll just get working on some other problems, Pulling up another minor report of a minor issue, she checked the manifest of the ship and found that the gem that had submitted it was onboard this vessel, and got up to track her down and ask some questions. As she walked away, she did her best to avoid thinking about the mystery of Pink Diamonds change in behavior.
Authors notes
If you look up a couple of posts you'll see some wonderful fanart by Abyranss of Pinks new form and the three OC gems I introduced in this story.
Also, Reactive Cuarz on ff.net is translating this story into Spanish, I kept forgetting to mention that but not anymore (link).
As always, let me know what you think in the comments.
Old Soldiers
Pink Lace Agate Facet 5 cut 7XA (Sway) was not having fun. A ball to announce the return of hr Diamond after her miraculous resurrection sounded wonderful in theory, but as she ran herself ragged trying to get the Quartzes under her command ready that theory sounded less and less appealing. Even when they were in the ballroom she found herself correcting postures and fixing salutes of Rose Quartzes who had spent more than a hundred years on the front lines away from any formal occasions, and the Amethysts that had been added on from the zoo trip were only partially better. If she'd had her way, they would have gotten at least another week to practice, but her Diamond wanted to get her colony setup as quickly as possible, so she made do with what she had.
As she walked the line of gems one last time before the ceremony began, she saw her Diamond, sitting on her throne at the center of the room and talking with her Spinel, her eyes sparkling in the light while her gentle face held the hints of a smile…
Pink Diamond turned to look out over the throne room, her movement snapping Sway out of her thoughts. As she looked over towards the line of Quartzes, her eyes locked onto Sway's, and she gave a small nod. A strange feeling swept through Sway, the same feeling she had been dealing with ever since her Diamond had pulled her aside for a one-on-one discussion about her court, and she felt a smile threaten to break through her tough "command face". But her good feelings were short lived.
"You know fraternizing with a Diamond is forbidden, right boss?" An amused voice came from behind her. Whirling around with a look of anger on her face, she looked up and down the line to try and identify the speaker, but as chuckles and hushed laughter ran up the line of Quartzes as the joke spread to those who hadn't heard she found herself panicking to restore order. Only a few moments later, the music started, signalling the start of the ball. All of the Quartzes immediately stopped laughing and held perfect salutes, but as she walked past she could swear that some of them were chuckling when her back was turned.
I am not planning to fraternize with Pink Diamond, and even if I was, if a Diamond approved it then it wouldn't be forbidden. She thought to herself as she observed the arrival of the other Diamonds and the ball.
After the ball Sway and her soldiers escorted their Diamond onto her ship, and when Pink was finally aboard Sway assembled her troops for a "meeting".
"As you can tell, I'm not happy. I don't appreciate comments implying that I am engaging in inappropriate activity with our Diamond. If the speaker steps forward we will have a discussion and no one will be in trouble, but otherwise I will have to punish all of you." As she looked at the cluster of gems, she saw looks of guilt on a few faces, but more concerningly they almost all seemed upset. "Well, what do you have to say for yourselves?"
No one talked for a few moments before a Rose Quartz with her gem on her leg answered quietly. "I did it."
Sway looked over the embarrassed gem, and memories came back. 4XE, above-average soldier with a tendency to engage in minor humorous activities and excusing them by pointing out that she always gets her tasks completed on time or early, but tended to say things without thinking. Nickname… I don't think she had one…? Before she could say anything, 4XE continued. "I'm sorry Sway, everyone was all tense and you were getting all flustered and I just kind of… said it."
Sway took a moment to calm herself before answering. "Thank you for your honesty, please don't do it again. Dismissed." As she turned to leave she heard a set of footsteps following her. Turning around, she saw 4XE behind her, tears in her eyes.
Stopping in confusion, she stood there as 4XE looked in her eyes. "You changed." She said, her voice quivering. "I knew something was up with you earlier, but I just thought it was stress from getting all the newbies organized and then getting ready for the ball, but then I saw how you reacted to my joke… What happened to you?" She was nearly crying at this point.
Sway blinked at her, realization hitting. "For you, the last time you saw me was that day in the zoo when I… when Blue and Yellow Diamond ordered you all poofed and bubbled. For me, that day was five thousand years ago, and I'm happy to have you back, but…"
"But things aren't the same as they used to be, and I shouldn't have just assumed we could go back to how things were on Earth. I'll try to do better next time." 4XE said, turning away.
"It's… it's fine. I know I probably would have just laughed about it back then, but I've been having a really bad few millennia, so could you just hold off on your jokes for a while, at least while I'm around?"
"Of course. I'll let everyone else know."
"Thank you." Sway said, watching the Rose Quartz turn and walk away down the hall. Sighing, she leaned against the wall. I missed them for so long, but they didn't experience all those years, so they want to go back to normal, and I don't know if I'll ever be normal again.
Friends Old and New
Fire Opal Facet 9 Cut 6C3 joined the other Opals from Pinks court as they prepared to present themselves to their Diamond. Taking her position, as the group passed the Quartz guards she felt a tinge of envy run through her as she looked up to the towering soldiers. I was supposed to be made like that, but the incompetent in charge of my injector screwed up. Forcing the thoughts aside, she focused on the positives. Her Diamond was back from the dead, and no Gem could ever be upset about something as miraculous as that. To make it even better, her Diamond had overheard her complaining about the political games that gems played in her court and had agreed that something should be done to reduce them.
Approaching the throne, they all greeted their Diamond in the customary way. To 6C3's surprise, her Diamond looked her in the eyes and smiled at her. Instincts from centuries at the Lunar Sea Spire kept her reaction to only a few surprised blinks, and she decided to roll with the situation by nodding back. As the procession took their places and the ball went on, she could feel the constant glances from the other Opals, and she simply put a small smile on her face, ignoring the whispered requests for an explanation.
The aftermath of the ball was a confused rush to the ships, as Pinks entire court immediately prepared to leave Homeworld and begin their Diamonds new colony as soon as they were dismissed from the ball. Fortunately for 6C3, she was on Pink Diamonds ship, and only three other Opals were onboard, unfortunately there were several dozen other aristocratic gems, and they all lived up to her memories by spending all their free time gossiping. Before the ship had even left the planet, a Purple Opal and a Pink Tourmaline walked up to her.
"Hi 6C3, it's been a while, hasn't it?" The Purple Opal asked. "I was just talking to 5HZ here, and she mentioned that you two used to work together back on Earth. Isn't that great, the court's only been back together for a couple hours and old friends are already finding each other again."
6C3 stared at her. Old friends? 5HZ was a colleague who never willingly backstabbed me in the stupid power games, but I wouldn't call her a friend. And who even is this Opal? She's familiar, and she obviously is here to figure out why Pink smiled at me, but this is incredibly amateurish. She's either incredibly out of practice or she's pretending to be out of practice to get me to underestimate her. It's probably the second one, but thousands of years without playing the game would leave any gem rusty. Putting a small smile on her face, she turned to 5HZ. "It's good to see you again, I knew you got off Earth but after that I heard you were assigned to Blue Diamond."
5HZ nodded. "Yes, I served Blue for these last thousand years, but I'm just so happy that Pink is back."
"Aren't we all?" 6C3 asked, and the two old friends continued chatting for a few minutes as the Purple Opal, who 6C3 could not remember the designation of, did her best to ingrate herself in the conversation and steer it towards Pink. Just ask what you want to ask, come on, you can do it. 6C3 thought to herself, before eventually deciding to just let the gem know what she wanted to know to get her to go away. "So anyways, did you hear about Pink Diamonds Spinel and her plan for improving morale in the court?"
"I heard some rumors." The Opal answered.
"Well, she pulled me aside to discuss it, and we ended up discussing the way gems at the Lunar Sea Spire tended to spend a lot of their free time planning petty plots that would never have any long-lasting effects, and while I was talking about my experiences Pink Diamond came looking for her Spinel and overheard. She said that what she heard was proof that her attempt to build camaraderie and boost morale in her court was necessary." Not in those exact words, but close enough.
Both gems froze, staring at her. That's right, our Diamond knows about your silly little schemes, and she isn't happy with them. "Anyways, her Spinel declared me her friend, and she seemed alright with it."
"Are you… are you saying that you're friends with Pink Diamonds Spinel?" 5HZ asked.
At that moment, the Spinel in question stretched her head around the corner, putting her face right next to 6C3's. "Yep!" She said, startling all three gems. Shrinking, she pulled the rest of her body out from around the bend, ending up right next to 6C3. "I'm on a mission from our Diamond to make her court more friendly, and what better way to do that then by making friends?" She asked, a grin on her face.
The Purple Opal and Tourmaline stared at her for a moment before the Opal shook herself out of her shock. "Well, if it has the approval of our Diamond, then I have no doubt your mission will be a success. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go meet up with some of my friends and tell them the good news." With that, she turned and walked away quickly, 5HZ mumbling a quiet "see you later" and following.
With the two of them alone, 6C3 turned to Spinel. "So, what do you want?" She asked.
"Well, first rule of being friends, you don't have to want something from them to go say hello. Secondly, I just wanted to see how you were doing, make sure no one was bothering you about what happened at the ball, but I guess you have that handled."
"Yeah, thanks for checking on me though, it's nice to know someone cares enough to do that."
"No problem, that's what friends do!" Spinel answered. "So, it's going to be a long trip, got any ideas for games?"
"That's your specialty Spinel."
"Fine, but one of these days you're going to have to actually come up with a game when I ask you."
"Sure I will." 6C3 smiled, the fact that Spinel had just told her that she would be trying to get her to perform outside her function flying over her head as she smiled at her new friend.
New Questions
Iolite Facet 5 Cut 2YG relaxed in a compartment on the hand ship as it carried her and the rest of Pinks court to their new colony. In front of her was a report on some minor issue regarding her Diamonds court, and she was enjoying the light reading as the hum of the ships systems helped her block out everything outside the compartment. Making a few notes on potential solutions, she went to move on to the next report before someone knocked on the door.
Standing up, she opened the door and found her Diamond standing in the doorway. She threw her arms together into a salute, but Pink waved her off. "Iolite, I just wanted to stop by and apologize, getting the other Diamonds to agree with my plans was easier than I expected so I never used the presentation about it I asked you to make for me."
"It's not a problem my Diamond, it's actually a good sign that the other Diamonds were so willing to accept your plan, my research turned up some massive gaps in research into the creation of gems. Is there anything else you need from me?" Iolite asked.
"No, I'm still going over the work assignments, I'll let you know when we make it to our destination." Pink told her, giving her a small nod and leaving Iolite with her thoughts.
Pink is definitely acting differently from how she used to. I verified with multiple other members of the court that she wasn't like this before in case I was misremembering, and this confirms it. Pulling up a hidden folder on her personal device, she pulled up a file containing her speculations on why her Diamond was acting like this. Technically, this behavior was incredibly not allowed, but her instincts to find the truth were strong, strong enough that they partially overcame her desires to obey her Diamond.
Pink brings in her Spinel, who was apparently given to her long before she was given the Earth, and is incredibly close with her despite spending more than a thousand years apart. She is also putting a massive amount of effort into reaching out to her court, trusting her Spinel to run this "morale improvement" exercise by making friends with the court, apologizing and asking as if I and the other gems are her equals, and growing close with the commander of her personal guard. On that topic, she went to release the Rose Quartz gems from their bubbles with only two Agates to command them, reforming her personal guard out of the most distrusted Gem type in the empire. All of this put together means… something. It means there's something going on, and I can't figure out what it is.
Sighing, she put away the speculation file and leaned back in her chair with frustration. I can't let it get the better of me, I'll just get working on some other problems, Pulling up another minor report of a minor issue, she checked the manifest of the ship and found that the gem that had submitted it was onboard this vessel, and got up to track her down and ask some questions. As she walked away, she did her best to avoid thinking about the mystery of Pink Diamonds change in behavior.
Authors notes
If you look up a couple of posts you'll see some wonderful fanart by Abyranss of Pinks new form and the three OC gems I introduced in this story.
Also, Reactive Cuarz on ff.net is translating this story into Spanish, I kept forgetting to mention that but not anymore (link).
As always, let me know what you think in the comments.
TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I like these little reaction chapters, helps flesh out the world.
Settling In 5.1
Chapter 5: Settling In
Part 1
Pink Diamond sat on the improvised command deck of her ship. With her leg ship still buried under the sand on Earth, she was making due with a large chair inserted onto the observation deck of a hand ship with a few stations for other gems to work nearby. Blue had told her it was "below her dignity as a Diamond" to rule like that, but the lack of any easy alternatives meant that when Pink put her foot down and said she wasn't waiting for a new ship to be built she had accepted it begrudgingly. In the end, she had made due with the improvisation for three weeks as the gems of her court completed the tasks of setting up a colony.
Looking up, she saw the rest of her ships hanging in orbit above her new colony, a large blue and green circle that filled half of the viewport. A small ship broke from the formation and dove for the planets surface, and as she turned to the Peridot at the station next to her to ask why the Gem preempted her question.
"That scouting vessel is assigned to investigate potential locations for a spire to house your court, a promising site was identified and it is moving to get a closer look." The green gem told her.
Pink leaned back in her chair, a small blush on her face. I guess I've been asking that a lot. It's not like there's much else for me to do though, everyone's working and I'm just sitting here reading reports. Sighing, she pulled up a series of those reports, flicking through them absent-mindedly as the planet slowly turned above her.
The sound of footsteps gave her an excuse to put away the reports, and she turned to see the Fire Opal Spinel had befriended, cut 6C3 if she remembered correctly, enter the room. Walking to her "throne" and saluting her, the gem gave her some wonderful news.
"My Diamond, we have completed the assembly of the prefabricated buildings at the Prime Research Center, the construction of second-stage buildings is beginning now, but the first stage is ready to receive the researchers and begin experimentation."
Pink smiled at the news. "That's good to hear. 5SA, inform the research teams that the ship will be landing at the Prime Research Center. 5SB, take us down." As the two Peridots went to work, Pink looked up and saw the other ships clear a path, and then the planet rotated out of view as the ship aligned itself gravitationally as it dropped from high orbit. After a few moments, the ship entered the planets atmosphere, and only a short time later they were coming to rest hovering over a lake with two of the hand ships fingers resting on the beach to disgorge passengers.
Standing up, Pink beckoned 6C3 to follow her, and the Fire Opal fell in behind Pink's guards as Pink walked out of the ship and over to the research complex forming on a small rise above the lake.
Once inside the compound, the two of them were confronted with a mess of activity. Even with Gems dropping what they were doing (sometimes literally) to salute Pink, the whole site was a mess of barely organized chaos. Only a few buildings were actually done, with most still under construction, and as Pink made her way over to the buildings that were actually completed she marveled at how disorganized the whole setup was.
Finally arriving, she watched as the Rose Quartzes assigned to research work carried massive pieces of equipment through crowds of Bismuths and other construction gems, and suddenly everything went wrong. A Rose Quartz walking next to a pit the Bismuths were digging for a basement lost control of her precariously balanced load, and as a load of equipment fell, a Bismuth was caught underneath it and shoved onto an exposed rock. Her cry of pain before her form disappeared hit Pink, and for a moment she was back on Earth, in a lava-filled lab and her sword was buried to the hilt in one of her best friends and…
"My Diamond! My Diamond what's wrong?" She was shaken out of her flashback by 6C3's concerned voice. Blinking away the tears that had started to form in her eyes, Pink leaped down into the pit, where the other Bismuths were pulling the equipment off their fallen comrade. At her arrival, they stopped to salute, but she waved them off and to their shock she marched forward and started pulling equipment herself, her strength as a Diamond letting her quickly reach the trapped Gem.
Pulling the Bismuth from the ruins, Pink held the Gem in her hands, memories of the last time she held a Bismuth Gem running through her mind. A gasp came from a nearby Bismuth, and as Pink totated the Gem she saw a crack running through the Gem. As the onlookers whispered and some of them even started to cry at their comrades loss, she bowed her head and let her tears flow onto the Gem in her hands. When the first drops hit it, the Gem glowed softly, the crack disappearing entirely, and shock ran through the observers. Turning to the closest Bismuth, Pink walked up to her and handed over her colleagues Gem. "Get her somewhere safe until she reforms." She commanded, and the Bismuth practically leapt to obey, amazement on her face as she turned to leave.
Looking around, Pink noticed that every gem around her was staring at her, and she gave them a weak smile as she tried to think of what to say. "So… I can do that apparently." She said, cringing internally at how awkward it sounded. I can't let them know I experimented with my powers on Earth, but that was one of the worst excuses I've ever used. "Uhhhh, in light of recent events, I have a new decree that any cracked gems are to be poofed to prevent them from exacerbating the crack and then brought to me for healing. That is all, thank you." She finished before leaping out of the pit to stand next to an awestruck 6C3. "So, let's get on with the tour!" She said, fake cheer in her voice.
As the two of them walked away, Pink found her mind drifting back to Earth. I left Bismuth behind. I bubbled her away and stuck her where only I could reach her, but if I go and let her out looking like this… I have to do it, but she's not going to be happy about it. Shaking away the intrusive thoughts, she strolled past the shocked workers at a faster than normal pace, hoping to avoid any further incidents.
Pink was able to explain away the healing as something she'd just figured out, and she encouraged the Rose Quartzes to investigate if they could do the same. The discovery that they could had been a relief to the whole court, although there were some whispers about "The Rebel" from other gems Pink made sure they kept quiet.
A little over two weeks after the accident, she made a visit to the construction site of the Spire that would house her court, accompanied by some guards, 6C3, and Iolite. Because of resource shortages, the spire was not in the Sea like the one on Earth, so instead it was located high on a tall mountain peak, overlooking a fertile river valley to the west with the other peaks in the range in other directions. As the ship dropped them off, they passed a small flattened area where a pit was carved out for a warp pad and walked up a set of stairs to the construction site.
Iolite gave her a report on the colonization progress as they walked. "Construction is proceeding at a below-expected rate, and shortages of various gem types caused by losses on Earth have slowed many other construction projects, including the moon base and secondary research facilities. Without the construction of a Kindergarten to produce new gems, we will only remain on schedule for key infrastructure such as the Prime Research Center, and the Communications Hub, with all other construction sites falling behind."
"Hmmm." Pink nodded at her. "6C3, you used to work in logistics back on Earth, do you have any ideas for how we could make this go faster?"
"Well, the completion of the warp network will cut travel times for Gems and light equipment, and free up ships from having to ferry gems around, but that won't change the fact that we only have so many construction gems." Turning to her Diamond, she had a concerned look on her face. "If I may be so bold My Diamond, I believe that we should reduce the amount of Gems deployed on this project to finalize the research facilities, the sooner a way to produce Gems without interfering with organic life is found, the sooner we can begin to fill in the gaps in your court."
Pink considered her words as they stopped in front of the Spire, but she had a suspicion there was more to her idea. "If we do that, how will my court administer the colony? Right now the various Gems running the administrative functions of this colony are scattered across more than a dozen ships in high orbit, and those ships can't be used for moving material around or anything else as long as those gems are onboard."
6C3 frowned at the question before answering. "Those are all good points my Diamond, and I understand the importance of gathering the administrative Gems together in one location, but I maintain my belief that these resources would be better spent on constructing research facilities."
"Thank you for your honesty, but I believe I will need those ships free for moving materials soon." Pink said. "I believe I need to discuss this with the overseer, see what she needs to get back on schedule."
Finding the overseer was relatively easy, the Agate nearly ran over to greet her Diamond. As they discussed the issues with the construction progress, Pink realized just how short handed her court was. A lot of the Gems who joined the Crystal Gems were lower class, like Bismuth, and with the war all resources were put into soldiers. Afterwards, no new gems were made at all since I was… not around.
As the procession returned to the ship, Pink looked over the valley below them, the sight a welcome respite from the insides of the ship she had been living in for the last five weeks. "Iolite, 6C3, you two go on back to the ship, and if you have some free time, I would appreciate it if you could work on a solution to the Gem shortage here." She told the two before sitting down on a ledge, looking out towards the setting sun and the colors of the sky. I missed this. It's not the beach by the temple, but it's close enough for now, and one of these days I'll be able to go back there and enjoy the real thing.
As their Diamond enjoyed the sunset, Iolite and 6C3 made their way back to the ship. Once onboard, Iolite turned to 6C3. "I have a thinking chamber for my own use over here, we can discuss our Diamonds task for us there." She said, leading the way. Once inside, she pulled up the full roster of Gems and their deployments, and as the two of them worked she noticed 6C3 was constantly trying to find reasons that they could not redeploy Gems to support the construction efforts.
"6C3, why do you not want the Mountain Spire construction to be accelerated?" She asked bluntly.
The Fire Opal stared at Iolite, after centuries of wishing other gems would just ask her upfront instead of dancing around what they wanted from her the first time someone actually did it was a question she didn't want to answer. "I just… I don't think putting the Gems from the Sea Spire back in a Spire where they can plot and play stupid mind games all day is a good idea. I know that our Diamond needs them to keep the colony running, but there's got to be a better way."
Iolite rotated her chair to fully face the orange Gem. "I understand the distaste you feel for court politics, but you cannot let our emotions cloud your judgement. The Spire must be completed to free up ships to move heavy materials and equipment at other construction sites, and our Diamond has already begun working to prevent a repeat of the Lunar Sea Spire…"
"She sent her Spinel to make friends with them! I'm not trying to insult Spinel, she's a wonderful gem, but there's hundreds of stuck-up aristocrats in this court, she physically cannot befriend them all, not fast enough to actually stop them from causing problems with their schemes and power plays, and when that Spire is done, I'm going to be dealing with them again after millennia of being stuck far enough away from any power that no one bothered with playing politics, and it sucks and I hate it!" She yelled, anger and frustration that had been buried for thousands of years roaring back inside her.
Iolite gave her a thoughtful look before reaching out and grabbing her hand. "I understand your frustration with the court, I often found my trips to the Lunar Sea Spire on Earth unpleasant, and I only visited to report my findings or investigate one of their games that went to far." She hesitated for a moment before continuing. "However, since the Spire needs to be completed, perhaps you could be assigned to a role that takes you outside the Spire while Spinel and our Diamond work to change the culture in the court."
"Are… are you serious? What would I even do outside the Spire though? That's where all the administrative work will be happening, that's what Opals are made for!"
"I'm sure that our Diamond can find something for you to do, but only if you work with me and help me get the Spire back on schedule." Iolite said, and 6C3 knew she had only one real choice.
I cooperate and she helps me ask Pink Diamond for a job out away from the court politics, I don't cooperate and she tells Pink Diamond that I was impeding a project she asked us to complete. I can't believe I let myself get trapped like this, I let my emotions mess up my thinking. "Alright, let's get to work." She said, and to her surprise Iolite actually thanked her, and there was no hint of the smug victory gloating that was nearly universal with the gems in the Spire when they won a mind game.
After a couple hours, they had come up with a plan to accelerate construction to nearly match the schedule, at the cost of pushing several projects even further behind. Walking down the hallways, the pair found Pink Diamond in her makeshift throne room and presented their plan to her.
"And in the end these redeployments will bring the Mountain Spire projected completion date to within one week of the original projection." 6C3 finished, and Pink nodded as she reviewed the plan in front of her. This is a decent plan, I should have those two work together on these things more often.
"Additionally my Diamond, after working on this project with 6C3, I believe she would be more efficient working outside the Mountain Spire upon its completion, perhaps managing inventory at the Prime Research Facility or a similar task." Iolite said.
Pink nodded at the statement. From what I heard her say to Spinel, and the way she argued against moving resources to help build the Mountain Spire, I figured she didn't want anything to do with the gems there anymore. Iolite probably pulled her super investigation skills and figured that out while they were working.
"Well, in that case I'm sure we can find something for her to do. In fact, with how short of Gems my court is, I believe I have the perfect job for her. Right now I receive a constant stream of reports about issues with the colonization process, and I'm sure she could be of assistance resolving them. In fact, isn't investigating problems with like that what you've been doing Iolite? You can show her how it's done." Pink said, a smile on her face. And this way you can stop spending all your free time reading reports in your room and make a friend outside your caste.
"My Diamond, are you sure that would be proper? I understand that the boundaries for intellectual work are less clear than they are for physical labor, but that seems incredibly close to having her work outside her purpose." Iolite stated, and Pink was aware that the other gems nearby were watching her with focused eyes to see how this turned out.
"Well Iolite, those rules might work for the other Diamonds on their colonies, but this is a completely different situation with a different set of needs. Right now, we are incredibly short on Iolites, many were lost during the evacuation of Earth, what with them being deployed away from the warp network to investigate suspected rebel activity, so as your Diamond I am declaring that Opals and other promising administrative Gems are authorized to take the roles of Iolites and other Gems suffering similar shortages for the duration of this crisis." Pink answered, putting on her best Diamond voice to make herself sound more confident than she actually was.
Iolite saluted and bowed to her. "As you command My Diamond, I will bring Fire Opal Cut 6C3 up to speed on these tasks as quickly as possible." 6C3 belatedly joined her with a salute of her own, before they both turned and walked away. Well, that went well. Pink thought to herself. Hopefully things like this will help me get rid of the lines between different Gem types in my court. A Peridot told her that one of the ship captains was calling her, and the thoughts of how she would change the empire went to the back of her mind as she focused on yet another problem she needed to solve.
After weeks of putting out small fires and dealing with issues left and right, Pink Diamond received news from the Prime Research Facility on their work. Full of excitement, she rushed down to the facility with only a small guard to accompany her. This is wonderful, I expected it to take years for them to figure out how to make Gems without damaging the world! She thought as she arrived, meeting the Peridot in charge of the research project near one of the labs. As the green Gem talked, she realized her excitement had been a tad premature.
"And because of the revealed healing properties of the Rose Quartz Gems, we were able to gain a remarkable insight into the processes by which organic life functions, and with your permission we believe we are ready to commence trials with growing gems and observing their effects on the surrounding organic life to determine what exactly the cause of harm to organic life is." The Period finished, looking at her expectantly.
Pink fought back her urge to sigh at the news. Of course they aren't actually ready to start mass-producing Gems yet, they haven't even started! "How were you planning to run these tests?" She asked.
"Well, first we will finish setting up the equipment in the testing areas, I have them marked on this map," She pulled up a map of the surrounding area with seven red rectangles highlighted. "And then we will inject a single Gems worth of creation fluid in each of the trial areas and observe the effects. After those Gems emerge, we will not grow any more gems in the testing areas, monitoring the organic life for long-term effects, while moving the bulk of the sensors over to new testing areas, where we will begin implementing various plans for reducing the impact, such as having a Rose Quartz gem water the surrounding area with her tears or changing the fluid mixture for the creation of new Gems. There are other methods we are looking at, but until we get the information from the first test run we won't know for certain what works and what doesn't."
Pink gave her permission for the tests to begin, and as she returned to the ship she went over how long it would likely take for those experiments to work. Alright, even if they figure it out the first time, use the second to test it, and then go into mass production that'll still take more than two production cycles, and that means it'll be a long time before this works if it even can work.
Returning to her makeshift throne, she immediately was confronted by an issue that had popped up during her visit, and as she dealt with it a realization hit her. I'm going to be here for a long time. With all the work I have to do, I can't just disappear like I used to, not if I want the Gems in my court to actually trust me and follow me when I make giant changes to how everything works, especially since going to Earth means leaving the planet entirely! And to make it worse I can't just go back to Earth without making sure every Gem I bring can be trusted to know the truth about me, and right now that only includes Spinel…
Sighing, she went back to work. Hopefully once the setup is done things will quiet down like they did on Earth, then I can figure out how to justify heading over there with a small group of gems who I can trust to keep a secret… As she continued to work, the seeds of a plan sprouted in her mind, and the hope that she would one day get to return to the planet she had spent thousands of years in love with returned to her.
Authors Notes:
And we're back to the main story, sort of (everyone asking about the Cluster, rest assured that will be brought up next chapter), I had a bit of a low-energy week so I don't know if this is my best work, I only could get the energy to do a single read-through.
As always, let me know what you think about the chapter.
Part 1
Pink Diamond sat on the improvised command deck of her ship. With her leg ship still buried under the sand on Earth, she was making due with a large chair inserted onto the observation deck of a hand ship with a few stations for other gems to work nearby. Blue had told her it was "below her dignity as a Diamond" to rule like that, but the lack of any easy alternatives meant that when Pink put her foot down and said she wasn't waiting for a new ship to be built she had accepted it begrudgingly. In the end, she had made due with the improvisation for three weeks as the gems of her court completed the tasks of setting up a colony.
Looking up, she saw the rest of her ships hanging in orbit above her new colony, a large blue and green circle that filled half of the viewport. A small ship broke from the formation and dove for the planets surface, and as she turned to the Peridot at the station next to her to ask why the Gem preempted her question.
"That scouting vessel is assigned to investigate potential locations for a spire to house your court, a promising site was identified and it is moving to get a closer look." The green gem told her.
Pink leaned back in her chair, a small blush on her face. I guess I've been asking that a lot. It's not like there's much else for me to do though, everyone's working and I'm just sitting here reading reports. Sighing, she pulled up a series of those reports, flicking through them absent-mindedly as the planet slowly turned above her.
The sound of footsteps gave her an excuse to put away the reports, and she turned to see the Fire Opal Spinel had befriended, cut 6C3 if she remembered correctly, enter the room. Walking to her "throne" and saluting her, the gem gave her some wonderful news.
"My Diamond, we have completed the assembly of the prefabricated buildings at the Prime Research Center, the construction of second-stage buildings is beginning now, but the first stage is ready to receive the researchers and begin experimentation."
Pink smiled at the news. "That's good to hear. 5SA, inform the research teams that the ship will be landing at the Prime Research Center. 5SB, take us down." As the two Peridots went to work, Pink looked up and saw the other ships clear a path, and then the planet rotated out of view as the ship aligned itself gravitationally as it dropped from high orbit. After a few moments, the ship entered the planets atmosphere, and only a short time later they were coming to rest hovering over a lake with two of the hand ships fingers resting on the beach to disgorge passengers.
Standing up, Pink beckoned 6C3 to follow her, and the Fire Opal fell in behind Pink's guards as Pink walked out of the ship and over to the research complex forming on a small rise above the lake.
Once inside the compound, the two of them were confronted with a mess of activity. Even with Gems dropping what they were doing (sometimes literally) to salute Pink, the whole site was a mess of barely organized chaos. Only a few buildings were actually done, with most still under construction, and as Pink made her way over to the buildings that were actually completed she marveled at how disorganized the whole setup was.
Finally arriving, she watched as the Rose Quartzes assigned to research work carried massive pieces of equipment through crowds of Bismuths and other construction gems, and suddenly everything went wrong. A Rose Quartz walking next to a pit the Bismuths were digging for a basement lost control of her precariously balanced load, and as a load of equipment fell, a Bismuth was caught underneath it and shoved onto an exposed rock. Her cry of pain before her form disappeared hit Pink, and for a moment she was back on Earth, in a lava-filled lab and her sword was buried to the hilt in one of her best friends and…
"My Diamond! My Diamond what's wrong?" She was shaken out of her flashback by 6C3's concerned voice. Blinking away the tears that had started to form in her eyes, Pink leaped down into the pit, where the other Bismuths were pulling the equipment off their fallen comrade. At her arrival, they stopped to salute, but she waved them off and to their shock she marched forward and started pulling equipment herself, her strength as a Diamond letting her quickly reach the trapped Gem.
Pulling the Bismuth from the ruins, Pink held the Gem in her hands, memories of the last time she held a Bismuth Gem running through her mind. A gasp came from a nearby Bismuth, and as Pink totated the Gem she saw a crack running through the Gem. As the onlookers whispered and some of them even started to cry at their comrades loss, she bowed her head and let her tears flow onto the Gem in her hands. When the first drops hit it, the Gem glowed softly, the crack disappearing entirely, and shock ran through the observers. Turning to the closest Bismuth, Pink walked up to her and handed over her colleagues Gem. "Get her somewhere safe until she reforms." She commanded, and the Bismuth practically leapt to obey, amazement on her face as she turned to leave.
Looking around, Pink noticed that every gem around her was staring at her, and she gave them a weak smile as she tried to think of what to say. "So… I can do that apparently." She said, cringing internally at how awkward it sounded. I can't let them know I experimented with my powers on Earth, but that was one of the worst excuses I've ever used. "Uhhhh, in light of recent events, I have a new decree that any cracked gems are to be poofed to prevent them from exacerbating the crack and then brought to me for healing. That is all, thank you." She finished before leaping out of the pit to stand next to an awestruck 6C3. "So, let's get on with the tour!" She said, fake cheer in her voice.
As the two of them walked away, Pink found her mind drifting back to Earth. I left Bismuth behind. I bubbled her away and stuck her where only I could reach her, but if I go and let her out looking like this… I have to do it, but she's not going to be happy about it. Shaking away the intrusive thoughts, she strolled past the shocked workers at a faster than normal pace, hoping to avoid any further incidents.
Pink was able to explain away the healing as something she'd just figured out, and she encouraged the Rose Quartzes to investigate if they could do the same. The discovery that they could had been a relief to the whole court, although there were some whispers about "The Rebel" from other gems Pink made sure they kept quiet.
A little over two weeks after the accident, she made a visit to the construction site of the Spire that would house her court, accompanied by some guards, 6C3, and Iolite. Because of resource shortages, the spire was not in the Sea like the one on Earth, so instead it was located high on a tall mountain peak, overlooking a fertile river valley to the west with the other peaks in the range in other directions. As the ship dropped them off, they passed a small flattened area where a pit was carved out for a warp pad and walked up a set of stairs to the construction site.
Iolite gave her a report on the colonization progress as they walked. "Construction is proceeding at a below-expected rate, and shortages of various gem types caused by losses on Earth have slowed many other construction projects, including the moon base and secondary research facilities. Without the construction of a Kindergarten to produce new gems, we will only remain on schedule for key infrastructure such as the Prime Research Center, and the Communications Hub, with all other construction sites falling behind."
"Hmmm." Pink nodded at her. "6C3, you used to work in logistics back on Earth, do you have any ideas for how we could make this go faster?"
"Well, the completion of the warp network will cut travel times for Gems and light equipment, and free up ships from having to ferry gems around, but that won't change the fact that we only have so many construction gems." Turning to her Diamond, she had a concerned look on her face. "If I may be so bold My Diamond, I believe that we should reduce the amount of Gems deployed on this project to finalize the research facilities, the sooner a way to produce Gems without interfering with organic life is found, the sooner we can begin to fill in the gaps in your court."
Pink considered her words as they stopped in front of the Spire, but she had a suspicion there was more to her idea. "If we do that, how will my court administer the colony? Right now the various Gems running the administrative functions of this colony are scattered across more than a dozen ships in high orbit, and those ships can't be used for moving material around or anything else as long as those gems are onboard."
6C3 frowned at the question before answering. "Those are all good points my Diamond, and I understand the importance of gathering the administrative Gems together in one location, but I maintain my belief that these resources would be better spent on constructing research facilities."
"Thank you for your honesty, but I believe I will need those ships free for moving materials soon." Pink said. "I believe I need to discuss this with the overseer, see what she needs to get back on schedule."
Finding the overseer was relatively easy, the Agate nearly ran over to greet her Diamond. As they discussed the issues with the construction progress, Pink realized just how short handed her court was. A lot of the Gems who joined the Crystal Gems were lower class, like Bismuth, and with the war all resources were put into soldiers. Afterwards, no new gems were made at all since I was… not around.
As the procession returned to the ship, Pink looked over the valley below them, the sight a welcome respite from the insides of the ship she had been living in for the last five weeks. "Iolite, 6C3, you two go on back to the ship, and if you have some free time, I would appreciate it if you could work on a solution to the Gem shortage here." She told the two before sitting down on a ledge, looking out towards the setting sun and the colors of the sky. I missed this. It's not the beach by the temple, but it's close enough for now, and one of these days I'll be able to go back there and enjoy the real thing.
As their Diamond enjoyed the sunset, Iolite and 6C3 made their way back to the ship. Once onboard, Iolite turned to 6C3. "I have a thinking chamber for my own use over here, we can discuss our Diamonds task for us there." She said, leading the way. Once inside, she pulled up the full roster of Gems and their deployments, and as the two of them worked she noticed 6C3 was constantly trying to find reasons that they could not redeploy Gems to support the construction efforts.
"6C3, why do you not want the Mountain Spire construction to be accelerated?" She asked bluntly.
The Fire Opal stared at Iolite, after centuries of wishing other gems would just ask her upfront instead of dancing around what they wanted from her the first time someone actually did it was a question she didn't want to answer. "I just… I don't think putting the Gems from the Sea Spire back in a Spire where they can plot and play stupid mind games all day is a good idea. I know that our Diamond needs them to keep the colony running, but there's got to be a better way."
Iolite rotated her chair to fully face the orange Gem. "I understand the distaste you feel for court politics, but you cannot let our emotions cloud your judgement. The Spire must be completed to free up ships to move heavy materials and equipment at other construction sites, and our Diamond has already begun working to prevent a repeat of the Lunar Sea Spire…"
"She sent her Spinel to make friends with them! I'm not trying to insult Spinel, she's a wonderful gem, but there's hundreds of stuck-up aristocrats in this court, she physically cannot befriend them all, not fast enough to actually stop them from causing problems with their schemes and power plays, and when that Spire is done, I'm going to be dealing with them again after millennia of being stuck far enough away from any power that no one bothered with playing politics, and it sucks and I hate it!" She yelled, anger and frustration that had been buried for thousands of years roaring back inside her.
Iolite gave her a thoughtful look before reaching out and grabbing her hand. "I understand your frustration with the court, I often found my trips to the Lunar Sea Spire on Earth unpleasant, and I only visited to report my findings or investigate one of their games that went to far." She hesitated for a moment before continuing. "However, since the Spire needs to be completed, perhaps you could be assigned to a role that takes you outside the Spire while Spinel and our Diamond work to change the culture in the court."
"Are… are you serious? What would I even do outside the Spire though? That's where all the administrative work will be happening, that's what Opals are made for!"
"I'm sure that our Diamond can find something for you to do, but only if you work with me and help me get the Spire back on schedule." Iolite said, and 6C3 knew she had only one real choice.
I cooperate and she helps me ask Pink Diamond for a job out away from the court politics, I don't cooperate and she tells Pink Diamond that I was impeding a project she asked us to complete. I can't believe I let myself get trapped like this, I let my emotions mess up my thinking. "Alright, let's get to work." She said, and to her surprise Iolite actually thanked her, and there was no hint of the smug victory gloating that was nearly universal with the gems in the Spire when they won a mind game.
After a couple hours, they had come up with a plan to accelerate construction to nearly match the schedule, at the cost of pushing several projects even further behind. Walking down the hallways, the pair found Pink Diamond in her makeshift throne room and presented their plan to her.
"And in the end these redeployments will bring the Mountain Spire projected completion date to within one week of the original projection." 6C3 finished, and Pink nodded as she reviewed the plan in front of her. This is a decent plan, I should have those two work together on these things more often.
"Additionally my Diamond, after working on this project with 6C3, I believe she would be more efficient working outside the Mountain Spire upon its completion, perhaps managing inventory at the Prime Research Facility or a similar task." Iolite said.
Pink nodded at the statement. From what I heard her say to Spinel, and the way she argued against moving resources to help build the Mountain Spire, I figured she didn't want anything to do with the gems there anymore. Iolite probably pulled her super investigation skills and figured that out while they were working.
"Well, in that case I'm sure we can find something for her to do. In fact, with how short of Gems my court is, I believe I have the perfect job for her. Right now I receive a constant stream of reports about issues with the colonization process, and I'm sure she could be of assistance resolving them. In fact, isn't investigating problems with like that what you've been doing Iolite? You can show her how it's done." Pink said, a smile on her face. And this way you can stop spending all your free time reading reports in your room and make a friend outside your caste.
"My Diamond, are you sure that would be proper? I understand that the boundaries for intellectual work are less clear than they are for physical labor, but that seems incredibly close to having her work outside her purpose." Iolite stated, and Pink was aware that the other gems nearby were watching her with focused eyes to see how this turned out.
"Well Iolite, those rules might work for the other Diamonds on their colonies, but this is a completely different situation with a different set of needs. Right now, we are incredibly short on Iolites, many were lost during the evacuation of Earth, what with them being deployed away from the warp network to investigate suspected rebel activity, so as your Diamond I am declaring that Opals and other promising administrative Gems are authorized to take the roles of Iolites and other Gems suffering similar shortages for the duration of this crisis." Pink answered, putting on her best Diamond voice to make herself sound more confident than she actually was.
Iolite saluted and bowed to her. "As you command My Diamond, I will bring Fire Opal Cut 6C3 up to speed on these tasks as quickly as possible." 6C3 belatedly joined her with a salute of her own, before they both turned and walked away. Well, that went well. Pink thought to herself. Hopefully things like this will help me get rid of the lines between different Gem types in my court. A Peridot told her that one of the ship captains was calling her, and the thoughts of how she would change the empire went to the back of her mind as she focused on yet another problem she needed to solve.
After weeks of putting out small fires and dealing with issues left and right, Pink Diamond received news from the Prime Research Facility on their work. Full of excitement, she rushed down to the facility with only a small guard to accompany her. This is wonderful, I expected it to take years for them to figure out how to make Gems without damaging the world! She thought as she arrived, meeting the Peridot in charge of the research project near one of the labs. As the green Gem talked, she realized her excitement had been a tad premature.
"And because of the revealed healing properties of the Rose Quartz Gems, we were able to gain a remarkable insight into the processes by which organic life functions, and with your permission we believe we are ready to commence trials with growing gems and observing their effects on the surrounding organic life to determine what exactly the cause of harm to organic life is." The Period finished, looking at her expectantly.
Pink fought back her urge to sigh at the news. Of course they aren't actually ready to start mass-producing Gems yet, they haven't even started! "How were you planning to run these tests?" She asked.
"Well, first we will finish setting up the equipment in the testing areas, I have them marked on this map," She pulled up a map of the surrounding area with seven red rectangles highlighted. "And then we will inject a single Gems worth of creation fluid in each of the trial areas and observe the effects. After those Gems emerge, we will not grow any more gems in the testing areas, monitoring the organic life for long-term effects, while moving the bulk of the sensors over to new testing areas, where we will begin implementing various plans for reducing the impact, such as having a Rose Quartz gem water the surrounding area with her tears or changing the fluid mixture for the creation of new Gems. There are other methods we are looking at, but until we get the information from the first test run we won't know for certain what works and what doesn't."
Pink gave her permission for the tests to begin, and as she returned to the ship she went over how long it would likely take for those experiments to work. Alright, even if they figure it out the first time, use the second to test it, and then go into mass production that'll still take more than two production cycles, and that means it'll be a long time before this works if it even can work.
Returning to her makeshift throne, she immediately was confronted by an issue that had popped up during her visit, and as she dealt with it a realization hit her. I'm going to be here for a long time. With all the work I have to do, I can't just disappear like I used to, not if I want the Gems in my court to actually trust me and follow me when I make giant changes to how everything works, especially since going to Earth means leaving the planet entirely! And to make it worse I can't just go back to Earth without making sure every Gem I bring can be trusted to know the truth about me, and right now that only includes Spinel…
Sighing, she went back to work. Hopefully once the setup is done things will quiet down like they did on Earth, then I can figure out how to justify heading over there with a small group of gems who I can trust to keep a secret… As she continued to work, the seeds of a plan sprouted in her mind, and the hope that she would one day get to return to the planet she had spent thousands of years in love with returned to her.
Authors Notes:
And we're back to the main story, sort of (everyone asking about the Cluster, rest assured that will be brought up next chapter), I had a bit of a low-energy week so I don't know if this is my best work, I only could get the energy to do a single read-through.
As always, let me know what you think about the chapter.
Normally I would say that's spoilers, but that's pretty obviously where this was going, so instead I'll say "congratulations" on being the first person to actually say it instead of figuring it out and keeping it to yourself.
Although the Rose Quartz tears won't be entirely useless, their tears are weaker versions of Pinks, but they will be a lot less effective. Thankfully, there are a lot more Rose Quartzes than Pink Diamonds, so the difference in quality can be made up for with quantity.
aledeth
The Flesh is Weak
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The idea of literal tear farming is kinda sad, unless they're able to produce tears on command without the emotion?
I know Steven's spit works the same way, is that a case of human differences or just that Pink never thought to slobber all over a cracked gem?
I know Steven's spit works the same way, is that a case of human differences or just that Pink never thought to slobber all over a cracked gem?
Well, I'm assuming that they can make the tears on command, because if they can't do that things get kind of "for the greater good you must suffer and cry for eternity".
And on the Steven thing, I'm chalking that up to differences in how the power manifested, like his tears did nothing to heal but the resurrected Lars, while "Rose" had healing tears I'm assuming she resurrected Lion. Although it would be funny if the reason only some of the Rose Quartzes have healing tears is that they have healing spit instead.
TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Nice chapter, can't wait for Pink to freak out about the Cluster.
Ask and ye shall receive
Settling in 5.2
Chapter 5: Settling In
Part 2
Pink Diamond sat on a throne at the top of the newly completed Mountain Spire. She had decided to combine the functions of a Spire, being an administrative hub, and the Moon Base, as her personal base to oversee the colonization. Doing so saved resources and allowed her to stay close to her court to give her a chance to push her views on them instead of trying to do so remotely. To that end, she had replaced the top of the Spire with a replica of the Moon Base, an entry level connected to the rest of the building, an observation platform, and a throne room topped in a glass dome. Looking out that glass dome, she saw the sun rising over the river valley below. As she took a few moments to admire the view, a light began blinking on her throne. Pressing a nearby button, a screen popped up with the image of the Agate running the Communication Hub construction site.
"My Diamond, I regret to inform you that the recent redeployment of workers has left us behind schedule. Our timetable for communicating with Homeworld has been pushed back another two weeks."
Pink nodded, doing her best to not let her feelings show through to the surface. Now if only the Diamond communication system relied on the Communication Hubs, then I would be able to avoid talking to Blue whenever she gets worried about me. "Thank you for the update, I will take this knowledge into consideration." She said, watching the figure bow before wincing to herself. That could not have sounded faker. Sighing, she slouched in her throne until a thought came to her. Pulling up her communication equipment, she made a dozen attempts to use the Diamond communication device, canceling it before a connection was made to the network each time. Switching off the device, she wrote up a request for a technician to take a look at it, and to add on to the amount of time she would have an excuse to not use the device she also threw a request for her court investigator to audit the logs "to ensure this malfunction was not used by seditious elements to gain access to the network," and that the communicator remain offline until the audit was complete. It was obviously an unnecessary step, but a believable one from a Diamond that had been shattered by a rebel. As she sent the request, she felt a sense of calm. With the Communication Hub construction delayed and her private line to the Diamonds down for maintenance, she finally was beyond Blue and Yellows reach.
Pulling up the list of reports on her personal workscreen, she read up on the progress at the Prime Research Center. Let's see, standard drain on the untouched areas, most experimental methods have no effect on life drain… except Rose Quartz tears on the soil during growth. Staring at the report, the implications sank in. She had used her tears on the kindergarten on Earth several times, but only long after the gems made there had been completed. If Rose Quartz tears reduced the life drain of growing a gem, then maybe her mistake was waiting until after the gems were done growing and the kindergarten was dead! She quickly composed a message, commanding the researchers to run more experiments with the Rose Quartz tears. She then wrote a new message commanding over a hundred new Rose Quartzes to be deployed to provide their tears for further study. Hopefully we can synthesize whatever is in their tears that reduces the drain, it would be horrible if we needed to have them constantly crying to make new Gems. She shuddered at the thought, knowing that Blue and Yellow would easily order every Rose Quartz ever made to cry for eternity if it meant increasing the number of gems they could pull from a planet.
Pulling up the next report, she found herself slipping into the busywork of running a colony, with few reports coming close to even being a fraction as important as the two she had just received, but she knew that if they were not addressed work on the parts of the colony she actually cared about would grind to a halt. As the sun rose overhead, she found herself fighting the urge to run off and find something more entertaining. Sighing, she leaned back in her throne, staring at the ceiling of her throne room, when she heard footsteps coming up from below.
Turning towards the entrance where the stairs rose into her throne room, she saw Spinel enter with a forced smile on her face.
"So, how's it going up here My Diamond?" Spinel asked her through a clenched smile.
Pink blinked in confusion before deciding that if Spinel wanted to tell her what was wrong, she would. "Boring, it seems like every time I finish dealing with one issue there are two more that I need to deal with. How about you, did you make any new friends?"
Spinels eye twitched at the question. "I've made a bit of progress, but these Gems… it's like they don't care about anything but their own petty little power games, and the more I do to try and make them stop fighting each other the more they focus on fighting me." Spinel leaned against the throne, putting her head in her hands as she slumped down onto the floor.
Pink frowned, looking down at the small pink Gem. "They can't all be that bad, you said you made some progress."
Spinel sighed, dramatically sprawling her arms and legs out over the floor with her shapeshifting. "Yeah, but it's getting harder and harder to figure out who is actually trying to change and who is just saying what they think I want to hear. These Gems are at least a thousand years old, and they are fighting as hard as they can to avoid ever having to change their way of doing things."
Pink reached down and gave Spinel a pat on the back. "That does sound hard. I'm grateful that you are willing to do this for me Spinel, and I can go down their and help if it will make it easier for you…"
"No, thank you for offering Pink, but you have to keep the whole colony running. I was literally made to be a 'Best Friend', if I can't get a Spire full of nobles to be nice to each other, why am I even here?"
"Spinel, having a hard time with one assignment doesn't make you worthless, it makes you normal. It's not like I've always done all my tasks perfectly." Pink told her friend, trying to reassure the sad Gem.
"Yeah, but it's alright if a Diamond messes up, everyone just ignores it and pretends you meant for it to happen, or decides that someone gave you bad information or failed somehow. Meanwhile, when 'normal' Gems mess up we get shattered, or bubbled, or left on an empty garden in the middle of space for several thousand years!" Spinel cried, tears rolling down her face.
Pink lifted herself from her throne and knelt down in front of Spinel, pulling the smaller gem into a hug. "Spinel, that won't happen, alright? Even if we are separated, I won't leave you alone, and I won't tell you to stand still and wait for me. I'm so sorry that I did that to you, but I give you my word, as a Diamond and as a friend, that I won't leave you alone like that, I won't shatter you, or bubble you, or punish you in any way for not being perfect."
Spinel gave one last sob, her hands grabbing onto Pink as she pulled the Diamond in close. The two sat there together for a few minutes as Spinel cried out her anger and frustration until she was feeling better. Sitting together at the base of the throne, Pink and Spinel shared one last hug before they both stood up.
"Thanks Pink, I needed that."
"Anytime Spinel, and if you ever need any help with your job just let me know, alright?" Pink asked as Spinel walked towards the exit.
"... Yeah, I'll tell you if I need any help Pink, but right now I feel like you have enough work to do yourself. If I really need help, I'll ask, but you shouldn't ignore your own work to help me out." Spinel told her as she walked away.
Pink could tell Spinel was just making excuses to not get her involved, but she decided not to push the issue. I can't force her to be honest with me. Well I could, but that would basically destroy our friendship. She thought as she watched Spinel leave the room. Returning to her throne, she couldn't help but think that neither of them was handling going back to work full time all that well.
A few hours later, a Fire Opal and an Iolite returned to their workspace in the Spire after a long week of inspecting construction sites on their Diamonds orders. Fire Opal Facet 9 Cut 6C3 was excitedly carrying an entire conversation herself as the Iolite simply listened and nodded, a small smile on her face.
"...and now that the ships are free for moving heavy materials we should be able to ramp up the equipment production levels soon, and with limb enhancers and construction tools we'll be able to make up for the Bismuth shortage and get construction back on track and that will let us ramp up the amount of experiments running at once to get results for our Diamond faster…" She trailed off as she noticed the Iolite calmly sitting at her workstation watching her. "You already figured that out, didn't you?"
The Iolite gave her a small nod. "It's good that you figured it out for yourself though, once I tell out Diamond that you are ready you'll be performing inspections without me."
"And I can't wait!" 6C3 answered, before realizing what she'd said. "Not that I don't like working with you, it's just I spent so long locked up in a Spire like this on Earth, hoping that I could go outside and be useful instead of sitting around indoors all day, and if our Diamond approves I'll be constantly going out to tour the colony!"
Iolite nodded at her. "I understand, with your enthusiasm for manual labor I am convinced you might have some Quartz mixed in with you." As she said it, she watched 6C3 slouch down in response. She doesn't like talking about her origin, hopefully I didn't go too far, she is a good colleague and I don't want her to feel resentful towards me.
"... I never did tell you how I was made, did I?" 6C3 asked her quietly. Iolite shook her head in response, and the orange Gem hang her head. "I actually was supposed to be a Quartz, but you read the reports of the Beta Kindergarten on Earth, it was a disaster. I'm just lucky that my Gem met the quality standards despite being the wrong type, the off-color prohibition was only relaxed for Quartzes and other combat Gems, if I'd come out wrong, or some sort of mismatch between Opal and Quartz, I would have been shattered. And a lot of the Gems at the Lunar Sea Spire used the way I was made as an insult, and I know you weren't trying to hurt me, but…"
"I understand, I will refrain from making such comments in the future." Iolite told her, and at the small smile on 6C3's face she felt relieved. I am glad I did not offend her, it would have upset me if she had been unhappy. She blinked at the thought, the idea that another Gems feelings could change her own feelings was not unheard of, she had served in Blue Diamonds court after the Pink Court's disbandment after all, but this felt different. 6C3 spared her further introspection when she pulled up a list of tasks from their Diamond and the two began filing the paperwork for all their little field trips.
Several hours later, at nearly midnight local time, 6C3 turned to Iolite to ask her a question. "Hey, Iolite, I found something weird."
"6C3 please be more specific when describing a problem." Iolite responded as she turned to face the orange Gem.
"Well, you know that request Pink made for us to audit the logs of her personal communicator device to make sure no rebels used it or something? I pulled the logs, and there's a pair of uses from a few months ago, before our Diamond returned."
Iolite went very still. "What?"
6C3 nodded at her. "It gets weirder. See, the call was made using Pinks ID, which is why it came up in the logs, but the physical device used was the device at her old Moon Base on Earth. Look, one call, very short, from Pink Diamond to Yellow Diamond, terminated by Pink Diamond, and then moments later a self-destruct command sent from Yellow Diamonds end. Which can only mean…"
"A rebel on Earth got access to the Moon Base and activated the device." Iolite answered, staring at the logs. "But my Diamond informed me that the other Diamonds wiped all Gem life from the planet in retaliation for Rose Quartz's attack on her."
6C3 shrugged. "Maybe we should inform our Diamond of this?"
Iolite nodded. "Yes, bring a copy of the logs, let's go to the throne room."
"What, right now?"
"This is a serious problem for our Diamonds long-term plans, she should hear about it immediately." Iolite answered, already halfway out the door. 6C3 scrambled, pulling out a mobile workscreen and jogging to catch up to Iolites retreating form. As the two gems climbed the tower towards their Diamonds chambers, neither realized the importance of what they had discovered.
Pink Diamond was still on her throne, she hadn't moved since Spinel had left the day before, but after hearing the news Iolite and 6C3 had brought her, she really wanted to get out of the chair. As the two presented their findings, a pit had formed in her stomach. Why would any of the Crystal Gems call Yellow Diamond? And why wouldn't Yellow tell me about it? A sinking feeling in her gut, she waited for Iolite to finish before pulling up the files on Earth. As dread filled her, she pulled up the classified files, the ones she had thought were nothing more than Yellows erroneous belief that their attack had wiped out every Gem on the surface of the Earth. As she read over the file, a name stuck out, The Cluster, and she found that it had its own file. As she read it, she felt herself grow numb. Millions of shards… implanted within the crust of the Earth near the Prime Kindergarten… Expected time to mature… When she read that last entry, she looked at the current date, and realization hit her. The Cluster could emerge at anytime in the next 50 years. Turning to her station, she manually re-activated the Diamond communication device, the fake problems forgotten as she filled with rage at her fellow Diamonds for creating such an abomination.
As the device went to connect, she slowed herself down and thought. Yellow knew, she expected you to know, and if you tell her you didn't know then she will look down on you. She gave you enough equipment to handle it yourself, she gave you the information about it, you should cancel this call and go deal with it with the equipment she gave you, every minute wasted here is another minute it gets closer to destroying the Earth! Before she could end the call, Yellow Diamonds Pearl popped up on the screen.
"My Diamond, Pink Diamond is calling you on the secure line." Her voice called out. Pink bit her tongue to keep herself from exploding at Yellow when the camera turned and focused on her.
"Pink, what a surprise, do you need anything?" Yellow asked her, and Pink barely kept herself in check before letting out a breath and answering.
"Actually, I had an audit done of my call log to ensure no rebels used my ID to access the Diamond Communication Network, and I found a call dating from just before my 'resurrection' with my ID on it."
"Ah, yes that was the insolent little Peridot I sent to check on the status of The Cluster, she was rambling on about putting the planet to use instead of destroying it, and when I repeated her orders she called me a clod, so I detonated the device."
So she wanted to save the Earth like I do and you tried to kill her for it, wonderful. "I see, thank you Yellow, I will be making a visit to Earth to deal with The Cluster, and I'll keep an eye out for any interference from her while I'm there."
"Very well Pink, if you need any additional equipment or Gems just let me know." Yellow said, and after a few more exchanges of pleasantries the call was ended.
Turning to the two Gems in front of her, Pink spoke to them in a low anger-filled voice. "Get the heavy mining equipment ready to pull that thing out of the Earth's crust, and get a hand ship ready to launch with me, you two, and my personal guards, we will fly ahead and survey the situation on Earth personally."
As the two Gems bowed and left the room, Pink turned back to the files on her screen, most importantly a screen capture of a video communication made by Peridot Facet-2F5L Cut-5XG while inspecting fusion experiments at the Prime Kindergarten. In it, she saw Garnet, Pearl, and Amethyst, all ready to fight, and the sight of them made her heart ache with nostalgia. But there, in the middle of the three taller figures, was a small human boy, and on his stomach was a bright pink Gem. Steven… She blinked tears from her eyes as she went to hurry the preparations. She was not going to lose her son before she ever got the chance to meet him.
Authors Notes:
A day late, I kept getting sidetracked during the week and I wrote most of this today. The setup is done, and the next few chapters are going to be a ride if I get them right.
Part 2
Pink Diamond sat on a throne at the top of the newly completed Mountain Spire. She had decided to combine the functions of a Spire, being an administrative hub, and the Moon Base, as her personal base to oversee the colonization. Doing so saved resources and allowed her to stay close to her court to give her a chance to push her views on them instead of trying to do so remotely. To that end, she had replaced the top of the Spire with a replica of the Moon Base, an entry level connected to the rest of the building, an observation platform, and a throne room topped in a glass dome. Looking out that glass dome, she saw the sun rising over the river valley below. As she took a few moments to admire the view, a light began blinking on her throne. Pressing a nearby button, a screen popped up with the image of the Agate running the Communication Hub construction site.
"My Diamond, I regret to inform you that the recent redeployment of workers has left us behind schedule. Our timetable for communicating with Homeworld has been pushed back another two weeks."
Pink nodded, doing her best to not let her feelings show through to the surface. Now if only the Diamond communication system relied on the Communication Hubs, then I would be able to avoid talking to Blue whenever she gets worried about me. "Thank you for the update, I will take this knowledge into consideration." She said, watching the figure bow before wincing to herself. That could not have sounded faker. Sighing, she slouched in her throne until a thought came to her. Pulling up her communication equipment, she made a dozen attempts to use the Diamond communication device, canceling it before a connection was made to the network each time. Switching off the device, she wrote up a request for a technician to take a look at it, and to add on to the amount of time she would have an excuse to not use the device she also threw a request for her court investigator to audit the logs "to ensure this malfunction was not used by seditious elements to gain access to the network," and that the communicator remain offline until the audit was complete. It was obviously an unnecessary step, but a believable one from a Diamond that had been shattered by a rebel. As she sent the request, she felt a sense of calm. With the Communication Hub construction delayed and her private line to the Diamonds down for maintenance, she finally was beyond Blue and Yellows reach.
Pulling up the list of reports on her personal workscreen, she read up on the progress at the Prime Research Center. Let's see, standard drain on the untouched areas, most experimental methods have no effect on life drain… except Rose Quartz tears on the soil during growth. Staring at the report, the implications sank in. She had used her tears on the kindergarten on Earth several times, but only long after the gems made there had been completed. If Rose Quartz tears reduced the life drain of growing a gem, then maybe her mistake was waiting until after the gems were done growing and the kindergarten was dead! She quickly composed a message, commanding the researchers to run more experiments with the Rose Quartz tears. She then wrote a new message commanding over a hundred new Rose Quartzes to be deployed to provide their tears for further study. Hopefully we can synthesize whatever is in their tears that reduces the drain, it would be horrible if we needed to have them constantly crying to make new Gems. She shuddered at the thought, knowing that Blue and Yellow would easily order every Rose Quartz ever made to cry for eternity if it meant increasing the number of gems they could pull from a planet.
Pulling up the next report, she found herself slipping into the busywork of running a colony, with few reports coming close to even being a fraction as important as the two she had just received, but she knew that if they were not addressed work on the parts of the colony she actually cared about would grind to a halt. As the sun rose overhead, she found herself fighting the urge to run off and find something more entertaining. Sighing, she leaned back in her throne, staring at the ceiling of her throne room, when she heard footsteps coming up from below.
Turning towards the entrance where the stairs rose into her throne room, she saw Spinel enter with a forced smile on her face.
"So, how's it going up here My Diamond?" Spinel asked her through a clenched smile.
Pink blinked in confusion before deciding that if Spinel wanted to tell her what was wrong, she would. "Boring, it seems like every time I finish dealing with one issue there are two more that I need to deal with. How about you, did you make any new friends?"
Spinels eye twitched at the question. "I've made a bit of progress, but these Gems… it's like they don't care about anything but their own petty little power games, and the more I do to try and make them stop fighting each other the more they focus on fighting me." Spinel leaned against the throne, putting her head in her hands as she slumped down onto the floor.
Pink frowned, looking down at the small pink Gem. "They can't all be that bad, you said you made some progress."
Spinel sighed, dramatically sprawling her arms and legs out over the floor with her shapeshifting. "Yeah, but it's getting harder and harder to figure out who is actually trying to change and who is just saying what they think I want to hear. These Gems are at least a thousand years old, and they are fighting as hard as they can to avoid ever having to change their way of doing things."
Pink reached down and gave Spinel a pat on the back. "That does sound hard. I'm grateful that you are willing to do this for me Spinel, and I can go down their and help if it will make it easier for you…"
"No, thank you for offering Pink, but you have to keep the whole colony running. I was literally made to be a 'Best Friend', if I can't get a Spire full of nobles to be nice to each other, why am I even here?"
"Spinel, having a hard time with one assignment doesn't make you worthless, it makes you normal. It's not like I've always done all my tasks perfectly." Pink told her friend, trying to reassure the sad Gem.
"Yeah, but it's alright if a Diamond messes up, everyone just ignores it and pretends you meant for it to happen, or decides that someone gave you bad information or failed somehow. Meanwhile, when 'normal' Gems mess up we get shattered, or bubbled, or left on an empty garden in the middle of space for several thousand years!" Spinel cried, tears rolling down her face.
Pink lifted herself from her throne and knelt down in front of Spinel, pulling the smaller gem into a hug. "Spinel, that won't happen, alright? Even if we are separated, I won't leave you alone, and I won't tell you to stand still and wait for me. I'm so sorry that I did that to you, but I give you my word, as a Diamond and as a friend, that I won't leave you alone like that, I won't shatter you, or bubble you, or punish you in any way for not being perfect."
Spinel gave one last sob, her hands grabbing onto Pink as she pulled the Diamond in close. The two sat there together for a few minutes as Spinel cried out her anger and frustration until she was feeling better. Sitting together at the base of the throne, Pink and Spinel shared one last hug before they both stood up.
"Thanks Pink, I needed that."
"Anytime Spinel, and if you ever need any help with your job just let me know, alright?" Pink asked as Spinel walked towards the exit.
"... Yeah, I'll tell you if I need any help Pink, but right now I feel like you have enough work to do yourself. If I really need help, I'll ask, but you shouldn't ignore your own work to help me out." Spinel told her as she walked away.
Pink could tell Spinel was just making excuses to not get her involved, but she decided not to push the issue. I can't force her to be honest with me. Well I could, but that would basically destroy our friendship. She thought as she watched Spinel leave the room. Returning to her throne, she couldn't help but think that neither of them was handling going back to work full time all that well.
A few hours later, a Fire Opal and an Iolite returned to their workspace in the Spire after a long week of inspecting construction sites on their Diamonds orders. Fire Opal Facet 9 Cut 6C3 was excitedly carrying an entire conversation herself as the Iolite simply listened and nodded, a small smile on her face.
"...and now that the ships are free for moving heavy materials we should be able to ramp up the equipment production levels soon, and with limb enhancers and construction tools we'll be able to make up for the Bismuth shortage and get construction back on track and that will let us ramp up the amount of experiments running at once to get results for our Diamond faster…" She trailed off as she noticed the Iolite calmly sitting at her workstation watching her. "You already figured that out, didn't you?"
The Iolite gave her a small nod. "It's good that you figured it out for yourself though, once I tell out Diamond that you are ready you'll be performing inspections without me."
"And I can't wait!" 6C3 answered, before realizing what she'd said. "Not that I don't like working with you, it's just I spent so long locked up in a Spire like this on Earth, hoping that I could go outside and be useful instead of sitting around indoors all day, and if our Diamond approves I'll be constantly going out to tour the colony!"
Iolite nodded at her. "I understand, with your enthusiasm for manual labor I am convinced you might have some Quartz mixed in with you." As she said it, she watched 6C3 slouch down in response. She doesn't like talking about her origin, hopefully I didn't go too far, she is a good colleague and I don't want her to feel resentful towards me.
"... I never did tell you how I was made, did I?" 6C3 asked her quietly. Iolite shook her head in response, and the orange Gem hang her head. "I actually was supposed to be a Quartz, but you read the reports of the Beta Kindergarten on Earth, it was a disaster. I'm just lucky that my Gem met the quality standards despite being the wrong type, the off-color prohibition was only relaxed for Quartzes and other combat Gems, if I'd come out wrong, or some sort of mismatch between Opal and Quartz, I would have been shattered. And a lot of the Gems at the Lunar Sea Spire used the way I was made as an insult, and I know you weren't trying to hurt me, but…"
"I understand, I will refrain from making such comments in the future." Iolite told her, and at the small smile on 6C3's face she felt relieved. I am glad I did not offend her, it would have upset me if she had been unhappy. She blinked at the thought, the idea that another Gems feelings could change her own feelings was not unheard of, she had served in Blue Diamonds court after the Pink Court's disbandment after all, but this felt different. 6C3 spared her further introspection when she pulled up a list of tasks from their Diamond and the two began filing the paperwork for all their little field trips.
Several hours later, at nearly midnight local time, 6C3 turned to Iolite to ask her a question. "Hey, Iolite, I found something weird."
"6C3 please be more specific when describing a problem." Iolite responded as she turned to face the orange Gem.
"Well, you know that request Pink made for us to audit the logs of her personal communicator device to make sure no rebels used it or something? I pulled the logs, and there's a pair of uses from a few months ago, before our Diamond returned."
Iolite went very still. "What?"
6C3 nodded at her. "It gets weirder. See, the call was made using Pinks ID, which is why it came up in the logs, but the physical device used was the device at her old Moon Base on Earth. Look, one call, very short, from Pink Diamond to Yellow Diamond, terminated by Pink Diamond, and then moments later a self-destruct command sent from Yellow Diamonds end. Which can only mean…"
"A rebel on Earth got access to the Moon Base and activated the device." Iolite answered, staring at the logs. "But my Diamond informed me that the other Diamonds wiped all Gem life from the planet in retaliation for Rose Quartz's attack on her."
6C3 shrugged. "Maybe we should inform our Diamond of this?"
Iolite nodded. "Yes, bring a copy of the logs, let's go to the throne room."
"What, right now?"
"This is a serious problem for our Diamonds long-term plans, she should hear about it immediately." Iolite answered, already halfway out the door. 6C3 scrambled, pulling out a mobile workscreen and jogging to catch up to Iolites retreating form. As the two gems climbed the tower towards their Diamonds chambers, neither realized the importance of what they had discovered.
Pink Diamond was still on her throne, she hadn't moved since Spinel had left the day before, but after hearing the news Iolite and 6C3 had brought her, she really wanted to get out of the chair. As the two presented their findings, a pit had formed in her stomach. Why would any of the Crystal Gems call Yellow Diamond? And why wouldn't Yellow tell me about it? A sinking feeling in her gut, she waited for Iolite to finish before pulling up the files on Earth. As dread filled her, she pulled up the classified files, the ones she had thought were nothing more than Yellows erroneous belief that their attack had wiped out every Gem on the surface of the Earth. As she read over the file, a name stuck out, The Cluster, and she found that it had its own file. As she read it, she felt herself grow numb. Millions of shards… implanted within the crust of the Earth near the Prime Kindergarten… Expected time to mature… When she read that last entry, she looked at the current date, and realization hit her. The Cluster could emerge at anytime in the next 50 years. Turning to her station, she manually re-activated the Diamond communication device, the fake problems forgotten as she filled with rage at her fellow Diamonds for creating such an abomination.
As the device went to connect, she slowed herself down and thought. Yellow knew, she expected you to know, and if you tell her you didn't know then she will look down on you. She gave you enough equipment to handle it yourself, she gave you the information about it, you should cancel this call and go deal with it with the equipment she gave you, every minute wasted here is another minute it gets closer to destroying the Earth! Before she could end the call, Yellow Diamonds Pearl popped up on the screen.
"My Diamond, Pink Diamond is calling you on the secure line." Her voice called out. Pink bit her tongue to keep herself from exploding at Yellow when the camera turned and focused on her.
"Pink, what a surprise, do you need anything?" Yellow asked her, and Pink barely kept herself in check before letting out a breath and answering.
"Actually, I had an audit done of my call log to ensure no rebels used my ID to access the Diamond Communication Network, and I found a call dating from just before my 'resurrection' with my ID on it."
"Ah, yes that was the insolent little Peridot I sent to check on the status of The Cluster, she was rambling on about putting the planet to use instead of destroying it, and when I repeated her orders she called me a clod, so I detonated the device."
So she wanted to save the Earth like I do and you tried to kill her for it, wonderful. "I see, thank you Yellow, I will be making a visit to Earth to deal with The Cluster, and I'll keep an eye out for any interference from her while I'm there."
"Very well Pink, if you need any additional equipment or Gems just let me know." Yellow said, and after a few more exchanges of pleasantries the call was ended.
Turning to the two Gems in front of her, Pink spoke to them in a low anger-filled voice. "Get the heavy mining equipment ready to pull that thing out of the Earth's crust, and get a hand ship ready to launch with me, you two, and my personal guards, we will fly ahead and survey the situation on Earth personally."
As the two Gems bowed and left the room, Pink turned back to the files on her screen, most importantly a screen capture of a video communication made by Peridot Facet-2F5L Cut-5XG while inspecting fusion experiments at the Prime Kindergarten. In it, she saw Garnet, Pearl, and Amethyst, all ready to fight, and the sight of them made her heart ache with nostalgia. But there, in the middle of the three taller figures, was a small human boy, and on his stomach was a bright pink Gem. Steven… She blinked tears from her eyes as she went to hurry the preparations. She was not going to lose her son before she ever got the chance to meet him.
Authors Notes:
A day late, I kept getting sidetracked during the week and I wrote most of this today. The setup is done, and the next few chapters are going to be a ride if I get them right.
TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Oh Pink, this is going to end in disaster...
TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Pearl is going to have the fright of her life! Also it would be hilarious if she saw Greg first and he started to put the moves on her. After all, he was about to try seducing Blue!
Landfall 6.1
Chapter 6, Landfall
Part One
The chaos in Pink Diamonds court was palpable. When their Diamonds gave orders to prepare to pull The Cluster out of the Earth's crust, she destroyed a carefully crafted set of plans and timetables, disrupting the delicate systems of her court just as they had finally begun to reach a state that could be generously be considered "normal". Pink knew this intellectually, but at the moment she was not in much of a mood to care. She was standing on the landing pad by the Mountain Spire when Spinel ran up to her.
"Pink, what's going on? Why are we going to Earth? I thought we needed more time to prepare in case your secret got out."
"Something more important came up."
"More important…? Pink what happened?"
"I actually read the reports Yellow gave me about what they did to the Earth, and it turns out there's a giant cluster of shattered Gems buried in the planet's crust and when it emerges it will kill everything and everyone on the planet."
As the only Gem in her court who knew the whole story, Spinel realized immediately what the emphasis on "everyone" meant. "Well that's not good. What are you going to do if the work crews run into… 'surviving rebels'?" She asked, with enough emphasis that Pink could practically hear the quotation marks.
"I'll try to keep the work crews from running into them, we don't need any… complications right now." Pink answered, looking back and forth at the Rose Quartzes of her personal guard nearby to make sure their conversation wasn't being overheard. "But in case it is… I think I have to let a few others know the truth." I need to get the Crystal Gems off Earth, and that means I need to at least let Sway know as commander of my personal guard, and Iolite will figure out something is wrong as soon as I order any rebels we find not be shattered…
Her musings were interrupted when the ship she had requested landed nearby. She rushed forward, Spinel hot on her heels, and entered the ship, turning around and urging the rest of the Gems that would be coming to Earth to get on board as quickly as possible.
Once the ship took off, Pink knew she didn't have much time before the ship reached Earth. When she had asked for a colony near Earth, the short travel time had been a blessing, but now it meant she needed to rush through what was likely going to be the second most important conversation of her day in order to get it done before they reached Earth.
Reaching one of the many small rooms scattered throughout the ship, she turned towards her guards. "You, go get your commander and bring her to this meeting room. You, go grab my Court Investigator, bring her here as well. The rest of you, guard the door, this is a private meeting." She told them, before entering the room and sitting at the head of the table as Spinel took a position at her side.
Turning to face the smaller Gem, Pink took a moment to try and calm herself. It's alright, I'm not alone here, Spinel has my back, she's been making friends, she knows how to handle emotions. I just wish I had more time to get ready…
The door opened as Sway, the Pink Lace Agate in charge of her personal guard, entered the room. Pink waved off the Agates initial salute, telling her to take a seat, when the door opened and Iolite entered, followed by Fire Opal 6C3. Pink frowned at the unexpected arrival, and Iolite knew immediately what the problem was.
"My Diamond, you requested your Court Investigator, and since you recently promoted her 6C3 is technically also a Court Investigator, at least according to the orders you signed." The small purple Gem told her, her face neutral as the orange Gem behind her flushed with embarrassment.
Pink sighed, but resigned herself to the situation. Why not? It's not like she can make anything worse, and she is technically a Court Investigator, so she would find out anyway. Why not just get it over with, hell why not just broadcast to the entire ship? She felt Spinels hand touch her, and took a moment to stabilize herself. Spinel thought she was trustworthy, and she hated court life too. Maybe she'll understand why I did it.
"Very well, all three of you please sit, we don't have much time before we reach Earth and I have a lot to say. Before I begin, what you are going to hear is top secret, to the point where not even the other Diamonds know. If any of you harbor lingering loyalties for Blue or Yellow from your time in their courts, speak up now." She looked around, no one said a word. Here goes nothing she thought as she pulled up an image of the Earth. "Very well, let's begin. This is the true story of what I did on Earth and my death. It all started right before the first batch of Quartz soldiers were due to emerge from the ground. I wanted to tour the Kindergarten and greet them, but I knew Blue and Yellow wouldn't approve. But then an idea came to me." I can't let anyone blame Pearl, I have to make them all think it was my idea. "I disguised myself as a common Quartz soldier, rotating my Gem and shifting my form, and went to visit. During the tour, I greeted the first batch of Amethysts to come out of the ground, and then I toured the rest of my colony, still in a disguise."
"After taking a day to view the surrounding organic life, I realized that the colony was slowly killing the planet it rested on, and I decided to do something about that. I asked Blue and Yellow to let me pause the colonization process, and they told me that I had to do it their way. They told me I was acting immature, that I needed to do things 'properly' or they would take away my colony." Pink seethed as she remembered those meetings, Blue making her visit and beg on her knees for a chance while Yellow had only been marginally better, visiting in person and letting her stay in her throne as she completely dismissed everything Pink wanted to do. The other Gems in the room all looked nervous. Being around an angry Diamond is not a good idea for "lesser" Gems, even if their anger is directed at another. Also, aside from Spinel they were shocked to hear that their Diamond was treated with such disrespect by Blue and Yellow. The Diamonds always show a united front, but how much of that is really true? Ran through three minds as they tried to comprehend the Diamonds treating one of their own like that.
Pink wasn't paying attention, continuing her story. "So when White refused to even let me visit, I knew what I had to do. I had to make them listen to me, in a way they couldn't just dismiss." As she said that, she stood up from her seat. "I pulled out an old form, the same form I used to tour my colony privately, and attacked the machinery that was killing the planet." Iolite went still, her face emotionless as she realized what was going on. Sway on the other hand was obviously in denial, trying to convince herself that she was hearing things wrong. 6C3, who didn't know the story of the beginning of the rebellion, was just staring at her, confusion in her eyes as she tried to figure out what was going on.
"That form would go on to inspire other Gems to try and fight back, with my cover story of being a rebel against the Diamonds bringing recruits to my side by the hundred, starting with my own Pearl." Pink said, and saw shock spread over 6C3's face, as even she knew the story of the terrifying renegade Pearl. "But it wasn't enough, Blue and Yellow refused to let me abandon the colony, even after centuries of doing my best to defeat every army sent to Earth. One day after I asked them again, Blue told me that as long as I was there to rule, the Gems of my court would fall in line and crush the rebellion. So I decided that I couldn't continue to live a double life, and that Pink Diamond had to die, so one night she did, and for the next several thousand years I lived my life as the identity I had created to tour the Earth in peace, the leader of the Crystal Gems, The Rebel Rose Quartz."
With those words, the room stood still. Not a single Gem moved or said a word, and the only sound was the background hum of the ships systems. After this silence dragged on for nearly a minute, Iolite gave a slow nod. "That explains the situation, although I have further questions…"
"HOW CAN YOU BE SO CALM ABOUT THIS?" Sway roared across the table. "We spent the last several thousand years suffering because of her, and you just want to ask questions?"
"We are not to question our Diamond." Iolite answered, her normally calm demeanor hiding a sea of emotions.
"'Our Diamond' rebelled against herself and we all suffered for it, and if she doesn't like it she can shatter me herself!"
"Sway, I'm not going to shatter anyone. Iolite, I actually agree with Sway, I did not expect you to be this calm…"
"Don't agree with me!" Sway stood up, marching over to Pink and doing her best to be intimidating despite the massive height difference. "After everything you did, everything we suffered through, you don't have any right to talk to me! I spent thousands of years living with the regret of that night and now you're telling me you weren't even shattered? That you got to spend the entire time I was being shuffled around backwater posts and treated like garbage living on Earth without a care in the world? No duties, no responsibilities, just you and your band of rebels lazing around for thousands of years while your court suffered?!" She was crying now, tears streaking down her face as she held back sobs. "We were your Gems! We were made for you, our entire existence was about serving you! We loved you, and you threw us away like waste." She looked down, tears flowing freely as her emotional heat burned out, leaving her feeling numb as she stood still crying. Pink went to hug her, but she pushed away angrily, making to leave the room before Pink stopped her.
I know this isn't a good time for us to be in a small room together, but I can't let her just leave like this, not if there's the risk she could tell someone. Pink thought, making eye contact with the distressed Agate. Sway held the look for only a moment before breaking it off, stomping angrily back to her seat to try and get her emotions under control. At that, Pink turned to Iolite.
"Iolite, I know this is a lot to take in, but I need you to be honest with me about how you feel about everything I just said, I'll answer any questions we have time for, but I don't want you to just keep quiet because I'm your Diamond." She said, hoping that would be enough to calm the rational Gem. When Iolite met her eyes, she realized it wouldn't.
"Why?" Came her voice, low and soft. "Why do all of that for Earth? There had to have been a better way, something else that you could have done, why do all that?" She asked, her voice low.
"Because I was stupid." Pink answered, thousands of years of regret coming to the surface. "I knew what I wanted to do, but not how to do it, so I messed up. A lot."
"But what made the Earth worth doing that for? What made saving the Earth worth the shattering of thousands and the last five thousand years of resource shortages?"
"I didn't want to cause all of that, I just wanted to run experiments with organic life and halt the colonization until they were done! I promise you that I never wanted anyone to get hurt… except for Blue Yellow and White." Pink added hastily, no reason to be a liar now after all.
"But the Diamond Authority is the center of our species! We all exist because of them, our race cannot exist without the other three Diamonds, losing you was bad enough!"
"... I repeat, I was stupid. I just wanted to get away from the other Diamonds, in fact I wanted to stop being a Diamond entirely, and I did whatever I could think of to make that happen."
"But…" Iolite let her voice trail off, sinking back down into her seat as she thought about her Diamonds words. The room was silent as Pink turned to the last Gem in it to ask her a question.
"6C3, what do you think of all this?"
The Fire Opal looked up at her and shook her head slowly. "I don't know. Part of me is angry, because you spent all that time running around playing pretend instead of your job, and that let your court turn into a giant mess that I had to suffer through, and then there's the way you being gone hurt the empire and gems like Sway… But at the same time, part of me wants to thank you."
Every head in the room turned towards her with those words, but 6C3 continued. "If you had never lead the rebellion, I would never have been made, so in a way your mistake is the whole reason I'm standing you telling you how I feel about what you did, and it's not easy to hate someone for giving you life."
Pink nodded at her. "Thank you, for what it's worth I'm glad my mistakes made things better for you and… a few other Gems." She turned to face Sway, who had moved from keeping her tears under control to keeping the volume she cried at low. "Sway, I hope you understand that I never meant to hurt you, I just wanted to do the right thing and everything spiraled out of control. When we get done with our business on Earth, I'll sit down and explain everything, answer every question, whatever you want from me, but until then I need you to do something." Sway looked up, pain and anger in her eyes, and Pink scrambled to find an alternative. "It's not just for me, it's also for a group of Gems that I spent thousands of years lying to and then abandoned to try and get away from the consequences of what I'd done."
Sway looked at her for a moment in confusion before Iolite spoke up. "The rebels, you want us to keep the remnants of the rebellion from being arrested while we deal with The Cluster." She said without a hint of doubt.
Pink nodded, and Sway looked at her with anger in her eyes before answering. "Fine, fine let's just get this over with. After all, My Diamond wants something done, so my role is to do it."
"Sway, that"
"Attention, arrival at Earth in two minutes!" The announcement came over the loudspeaker, and Pink bit her lip as she realized they'd talked away all their time. I don't want you doing this because I ordered you to do it, I wanted you to understand why I did it, and ease you into it. I am sorry I had to spring this on you so early.
"Alright, once this is done, we are all going to have a long talk about what this means and what I want to do, and right now I just want you all to know that I told you this because I trust you, and I hope you will understand why I did what I did in the future, but for right now we need to deal with The Cluster and the Crystal Gems."
"How are we supposed to 'deal with' an army of rebels who aren't going to be happy with us returning?" 6C3 asked.
"There won't be an army, there's only 4, they are based right next to one of the warp pads… here! Pink pointed Beach City out on a globe."
"Only four? What happened?"
"The other Diamonds happened, they did… something, and now every Gem on Earth that was outside my protection is corrupted."
"Corrupted?"
As Pink hurriedly explained what corrupting a Gem did to them, she breathed a sigh of relief internally. The initial crisis was done, and although it was likely that none of the Gems who she'd told would ever forgive her, at least they were willing to work with her for now.
When Pink Diamonds ship entered orbit around Earth, it was a little after midnight in the sleepy tourist town of Beach City. At the tip of the peninsula the town rested on, there was a massive moss-covered statue of a woman with multiple arms, the ancient rock contrasting with the modern beach house nestled in a pair of her hands. Inside this house, a young boy with a pink gem on his stomach named Steven Universe slept away the night. Normally, his powers did not react much (anymore) to the wanderings of his subconscious mind, almost as if they had grown used to the way their bearer occasionally lost consciousness and started telling them to do inane things like take over other humans bodies, but tonight someone else reached in. On her ship in orbit, Pink Diamond took a break from planning to look out a window, and as she closed her eyes her emotional powers slipped out. Normally, this wouldn't be enough to do anything, with the distances involved and her lack of focus forging a connection would be impossible unless there was a Gem as powerful as a Diamond on the ground below.
Tonight, these two powers reached for each other, each one's bearer unaware of what was going on, forming a solid connection between them. With Steven unconscious, his power tried to alert his mind to the connection the simplest way possible, by showing him how it worked. Interrupting a nonsensical dream about a dog with helicopter wings and butt rockets, one Pink Diamond saw through the others eyes.
Whoa, I'm in space! Steven thought, staring out the window and watching the Earth below him. This is so cool, it's like when Jasper and Peridot came except this time I'm not in mortal danger! His attention was drawn from the view when he saw a large pink gem reflected in the window. Whoa, why is she here? And how does she look like she's about to cry and incredibly angry at the same time? Before Steven could get any answers to his question, his vision shifted. Now he was looking at a conference room, like the ones on TV, except this one was full of gems! There was a short purple one, a short pink one, an orange one with a funny dress and hairstyle that looked like she had fire on her, and the angry/sad tall pink one. Before he could give them all funny names like he had for the Ruby Squad, his vision shifted down just enough to let him see his body. His pink body. His pink body with a large pink gem, right in the middle of his stomach.
Steven woke up with a panic. Staring around his room, he leaned back in his bed as his heart calmed down. It was just a dream. He thought, looking out the window into space, as if he could see a spaceship from where he was if he just looked hard enough. After a few minutes, he laid back down in bed. Just a dream.
Authors notes:
It's technically still Friday in my time zone and that's all that matters for a goal I set for myself. Fun fact, it's been so long since I wrote "he" in this fic that when I was writing about Steven's dream I found myself writing "she" instead by accident.
As always, let me know what you think.
Part One
The chaos in Pink Diamonds court was palpable. When their Diamonds gave orders to prepare to pull The Cluster out of the Earth's crust, she destroyed a carefully crafted set of plans and timetables, disrupting the delicate systems of her court just as they had finally begun to reach a state that could be generously be considered "normal". Pink knew this intellectually, but at the moment she was not in much of a mood to care. She was standing on the landing pad by the Mountain Spire when Spinel ran up to her.
"Pink, what's going on? Why are we going to Earth? I thought we needed more time to prepare in case your secret got out."
"Something more important came up."
"More important…? Pink what happened?"
"I actually read the reports Yellow gave me about what they did to the Earth, and it turns out there's a giant cluster of shattered Gems buried in the planet's crust and when it emerges it will kill everything and everyone on the planet."
As the only Gem in her court who knew the whole story, Spinel realized immediately what the emphasis on "everyone" meant. "Well that's not good. What are you going to do if the work crews run into… 'surviving rebels'?" She asked, with enough emphasis that Pink could practically hear the quotation marks.
"I'll try to keep the work crews from running into them, we don't need any… complications right now." Pink answered, looking back and forth at the Rose Quartzes of her personal guard nearby to make sure their conversation wasn't being overheard. "But in case it is… I think I have to let a few others know the truth." I need to get the Crystal Gems off Earth, and that means I need to at least let Sway know as commander of my personal guard, and Iolite will figure out something is wrong as soon as I order any rebels we find not be shattered…
Her musings were interrupted when the ship she had requested landed nearby. She rushed forward, Spinel hot on her heels, and entered the ship, turning around and urging the rest of the Gems that would be coming to Earth to get on board as quickly as possible.
Once the ship took off, Pink knew she didn't have much time before the ship reached Earth. When she had asked for a colony near Earth, the short travel time had been a blessing, but now it meant she needed to rush through what was likely going to be the second most important conversation of her day in order to get it done before they reached Earth.
Reaching one of the many small rooms scattered throughout the ship, she turned towards her guards. "You, go get your commander and bring her to this meeting room. You, go grab my Court Investigator, bring her here as well. The rest of you, guard the door, this is a private meeting." She told them, before entering the room and sitting at the head of the table as Spinel took a position at her side.
Turning to face the smaller Gem, Pink took a moment to try and calm herself. It's alright, I'm not alone here, Spinel has my back, she's been making friends, she knows how to handle emotions. I just wish I had more time to get ready…
The door opened as Sway, the Pink Lace Agate in charge of her personal guard, entered the room. Pink waved off the Agates initial salute, telling her to take a seat, when the door opened and Iolite entered, followed by Fire Opal 6C3. Pink frowned at the unexpected arrival, and Iolite knew immediately what the problem was.
"My Diamond, you requested your Court Investigator, and since you recently promoted her 6C3 is technically also a Court Investigator, at least according to the orders you signed." The small purple Gem told her, her face neutral as the orange Gem behind her flushed with embarrassment.
Pink sighed, but resigned herself to the situation. Why not? It's not like she can make anything worse, and she is technically a Court Investigator, so she would find out anyway. Why not just get it over with, hell why not just broadcast to the entire ship? She felt Spinels hand touch her, and took a moment to stabilize herself. Spinel thought she was trustworthy, and she hated court life too. Maybe she'll understand why I did it.
"Very well, all three of you please sit, we don't have much time before we reach Earth and I have a lot to say. Before I begin, what you are going to hear is top secret, to the point where not even the other Diamonds know. If any of you harbor lingering loyalties for Blue or Yellow from your time in their courts, speak up now." She looked around, no one said a word. Here goes nothing she thought as she pulled up an image of the Earth. "Very well, let's begin. This is the true story of what I did on Earth and my death. It all started right before the first batch of Quartz soldiers were due to emerge from the ground. I wanted to tour the Kindergarten and greet them, but I knew Blue and Yellow wouldn't approve. But then an idea came to me." I can't let anyone blame Pearl, I have to make them all think it was my idea. "I disguised myself as a common Quartz soldier, rotating my Gem and shifting my form, and went to visit. During the tour, I greeted the first batch of Amethysts to come out of the ground, and then I toured the rest of my colony, still in a disguise."
"After taking a day to view the surrounding organic life, I realized that the colony was slowly killing the planet it rested on, and I decided to do something about that. I asked Blue and Yellow to let me pause the colonization process, and they told me that I had to do it their way. They told me I was acting immature, that I needed to do things 'properly' or they would take away my colony." Pink seethed as she remembered those meetings, Blue making her visit and beg on her knees for a chance while Yellow had only been marginally better, visiting in person and letting her stay in her throne as she completely dismissed everything Pink wanted to do. The other Gems in the room all looked nervous. Being around an angry Diamond is not a good idea for "lesser" Gems, even if their anger is directed at another. Also, aside from Spinel they were shocked to hear that their Diamond was treated with such disrespect by Blue and Yellow. The Diamonds always show a united front, but how much of that is really true? Ran through three minds as they tried to comprehend the Diamonds treating one of their own like that.
Pink wasn't paying attention, continuing her story. "So when White refused to even let me visit, I knew what I had to do. I had to make them listen to me, in a way they couldn't just dismiss." As she said that, she stood up from her seat. "I pulled out an old form, the same form I used to tour my colony privately, and attacked the machinery that was killing the planet." Iolite went still, her face emotionless as she realized what was going on. Sway on the other hand was obviously in denial, trying to convince herself that she was hearing things wrong. 6C3, who didn't know the story of the beginning of the rebellion, was just staring at her, confusion in her eyes as she tried to figure out what was going on.
"That form would go on to inspire other Gems to try and fight back, with my cover story of being a rebel against the Diamonds bringing recruits to my side by the hundred, starting with my own Pearl." Pink said, and saw shock spread over 6C3's face, as even she knew the story of the terrifying renegade Pearl. "But it wasn't enough, Blue and Yellow refused to let me abandon the colony, even after centuries of doing my best to defeat every army sent to Earth. One day after I asked them again, Blue told me that as long as I was there to rule, the Gems of my court would fall in line and crush the rebellion. So I decided that I couldn't continue to live a double life, and that Pink Diamond had to die, so one night she did, and for the next several thousand years I lived my life as the identity I had created to tour the Earth in peace, the leader of the Crystal Gems, The Rebel Rose Quartz."
With those words, the room stood still. Not a single Gem moved or said a word, and the only sound was the background hum of the ships systems. After this silence dragged on for nearly a minute, Iolite gave a slow nod. "That explains the situation, although I have further questions…"
"HOW CAN YOU BE SO CALM ABOUT THIS?" Sway roared across the table. "We spent the last several thousand years suffering because of her, and you just want to ask questions?"
"We are not to question our Diamond." Iolite answered, her normally calm demeanor hiding a sea of emotions.
"'Our Diamond' rebelled against herself and we all suffered for it, and if she doesn't like it she can shatter me herself!"
"Sway, I'm not going to shatter anyone. Iolite, I actually agree with Sway, I did not expect you to be this calm…"
"Don't agree with me!" Sway stood up, marching over to Pink and doing her best to be intimidating despite the massive height difference. "After everything you did, everything we suffered through, you don't have any right to talk to me! I spent thousands of years living with the regret of that night and now you're telling me you weren't even shattered? That you got to spend the entire time I was being shuffled around backwater posts and treated like garbage living on Earth without a care in the world? No duties, no responsibilities, just you and your band of rebels lazing around for thousands of years while your court suffered?!" She was crying now, tears streaking down her face as she held back sobs. "We were your Gems! We were made for you, our entire existence was about serving you! We loved you, and you threw us away like waste." She looked down, tears flowing freely as her emotional heat burned out, leaving her feeling numb as she stood still crying. Pink went to hug her, but she pushed away angrily, making to leave the room before Pink stopped her.
I know this isn't a good time for us to be in a small room together, but I can't let her just leave like this, not if there's the risk she could tell someone. Pink thought, making eye contact with the distressed Agate. Sway held the look for only a moment before breaking it off, stomping angrily back to her seat to try and get her emotions under control. At that, Pink turned to Iolite.
"Iolite, I know this is a lot to take in, but I need you to be honest with me about how you feel about everything I just said, I'll answer any questions we have time for, but I don't want you to just keep quiet because I'm your Diamond." She said, hoping that would be enough to calm the rational Gem. When Iolite met her eyes, she realized it wouldn't.
"Why?" Came her voice, low and soft. "Why do all of that for Earth? There had to have been a better way, something else that you could have done, why do all that?" She asked, her voice low.
"Because I was stupid." Pink answered, thousands of years of regret coming to the surface. "I knew what I wanted to do, but not how to do it, so I messed up. A lot."
"But what made the Earth worth doing that for? What made saving the Earth worth the shattering of thousands and the last five thousand years of resource shortages?"
"I didn't want to cause all of that, I just wanted to run experiments with organic life and halt the colonization until they were done! I promise you that I never wanted anyone to get hurt… except for Blue Yellow and White." Pink added hastily, no reason to be a liar now after all.
"But the Diamond Authority is the center of our species! We all exist because of them, our race cannot exist without the other three Diamonds, losing you was bad enough!"
"... I repeat, I was stupid. I just wanted to get away from the other Diamonds, in fact I wanted to stop being a Diamond entirely, and I did whatever I could think of to make that happen."
"But…" Iolite let her voice trail off, sinking back down into her seat as she thought about her Diamonds words. The room was silent as Pink turned to the last Gem in it to ask her a question.
"6C3, what do you think of all this?"
The Fire Opal looked up at her and shook her head slowly. "I don't know. Part of me is angry, because you spent all that time running around playing pretend instead of your job, and that let your court turn into a giant mess that I had to suffer through, and then there's the way you being gone hurt the empire and gems like Sway… But at the same time, part of me wants to thank you."
Every head in the room turned towards her with those words, but 6C3 continued. "If you had never lead the rebellion, I would never have been made, so in a way your mistake is the whole reason I'm standing you telling you how I feel about what you did, and it's not easy to hate someone for giving you life."
Pink nodded at her. "Thank you, for what it's worth I'm glad my mistakes made things better for you and… a few other Gems." She turned to face Sway, who had moved from keeping her tears under control to keeping the volume she cried at low. "Sway, I hope you understand that I never meant to hurt you, I just wanted to do the right thing and everything spiraled out of control. When we get done with our business on Earth, I'll sit down and explain everything, answer every question, whatever you want from me, but until then I need you to do something." Sway looked up, pain and anger in her eyes, and Pink scrambled to find an alternative. "It's not just for me, it's also for a group of Gems that I spent thousands of years lying to and then abandoned to try and get away from the consequences of what I'd done."
Sway looked at her for a moment in confusion before Iolite spoke up. "The rebels, you want us to keep the remnants of the rebellion from being arrested while we deal with The Cluster." She said without a hint of doubt.
Pink nodded, and Sway looked at her with anger in her eyes before answering. "Fine, fine let's just get this over with. After all, My Diamond wants something done, so my role is to do it."
"Sway, that"
"Attention, arrival at Earth in two minutes!" The announcement came over the loudspeaker, and Pink bit her lip as she realized they'd talked away all their time. I don't want you doing this because I ordered you to do it, I wanted you to understand why I did it, and ease you into it. I am sorry I had to spring this on you so early.
"Alright, once this is done, we are all going to have a long talk about what this means and what I want to do, and right now I just want you all to know that I told you this because I trust you, and I hope you will understand why I did what I did in the future, but for right now we need to deal with The Cluster and the Crystal Gems."
"How are we supposed to 'deal with' an army of rebels who aren't going to be happy with us returning?" 6C3 asked.
"There won't be an army, there's only 4, they are based right next to one of the warp pads… here! Pink pointed Beach City out on a globe."
"Only four? What happened?"
"The other Diamonds happened, they did… something, and now every Gem on Earth that was outside my protection is corrupted."
"Corrupted?"
As Pink hurriedly explained what corrupting a Gem did to them, she breathed a sigh of relief internally. The initial crisis was done, and although it was likely that none of the Gems who she'd told would ever forgive her, at least they were willing to work with her for now.
When Pink Diamonds ship entered orbit around Earth, it was a little after midnight in the sleepy tourist town of Beach City. At the tip of the peninsula the town rested on, there was a massive moss-covered statue of a woman with multiple arms, the ancient rock contrasting with the modern beach house nestled in a pair of her hands. Inside this house, a young boy with a pink gem on his stomach named Steven Universe slept away the night. Normally, his powers did not react much (anymore) to the wanderings of his subconscious mind, almost as if they had grown used to the way their bearer occasionally lost consciousness and started telling them to do inane things like take over other humans bodies, but tonight someone else reached in. On her ship in orbit, Pink Diamond took a break from planning to look out a window, and as she closed her eyes her emotional powers slipped out. Normally, this wouldn't be enough to do anything, with the distances involved and her lack of focus forging a connection would be impossible unless there was a Gem as powerful as a Diamond on the ground below.
Tonight, these two powers reached for each other, each one's bearer unaware of what was going on, forming a solid connection between them. With Steven unconscious, his power tried to alert his mind to the connection the simplest way possible, by showing him how it worked. Interrupting a nonsensical dream about a dog with helicopter wings and butt rockets, one Pink Diamond saw through the others eyes.
Whoa, I'm in space! Steven thought, staring out the window and watching the Earth below him. This is so cool, it's like when Jasper and Peridot came except this time I'm not in mortal danger! His attention was drawn from the view when he saw a large pink gem reflected in the window. Whoa, why is she here? And how does she look like she's about to cry and incredibly angry at the same time? Before Steven could get any answers to his question, his vision shifted. Now he was looking at a conference room, like the ones on TV, except this one was full of gems! There was a short purple one, a short pink one, an orange one with a funny dress and hairstyle that looked like she had fire on her, and the angry/sad tall pink one. Before he could give them all funny names like he had for the Ruby Squad, his vision shifted down just enough to let him see his body. His pink body. His pink body with a large pink gem, right in the middle of his stomach.
Steven woke up with a panic. Staring around his room, he leaned back in his bed as his heart calmed down. It was just a dream. He thought, looking out the window into space, as if he could see a spaceship from where he was if he just looked hard enough. After a few minutes, he laid back down in bed. Just a dream.
Authors notes:
It's technically still Friday in my time zone and that's all that matters for a goal I set for myself. Fun fact, it's been so long since I wrote "he" in this fic that when I was writing about Steven's dream I found myself writing "she" instead by accident.
As always, let me know what you think.
TheBleachDoctor
Secretly a Cat
- Location
- The Plane of Infinite Kittens
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Huh. Didn't expect Pink to come clean, but at least that bandaid has been ripped off. Time for the big drill to freak everyone out now!
Yeah, Pink needed to tell someone, there was just no way she could manage to run a massive operation to pull The Cluster out of Earth's crust when only she knew the truth, since that's the sort of thing that would get the Crystal Gems attention, especially since the Crystal Gems literally live right next to an operational warp pad that her gems could access at any moment during the visit.
Well, like I said I figured she kind of needed to tell somebody, and it's probably for the best that she got it over with now.
I just want to say that I love this, dunno why, but showing a calm reaction beforehand gives more strenght to the outburst and the question makes me give a more in deep consideration to both responses.
Thanks! I was hoping that a more varied response would get the point across better than just having them all be angry.
Yeah, that's what I was going for when I made the character, hopefully I can do the pain she feels justice because she went through some shit. Also, "fun" fact I realised when writing this chapter, since Sway was made on Earth she technically has spent most of her life with PTSD from the night Pink faked her own shattering.