Steven peaked from under the bed. They were gone. The things that weren't there were gone. They were in other rooms. The things that no one else saw. The floating people who screamed and clawed at Steven.
He wasn't supposed to be afraid. Being afraid wasn't a good thing. Being afraid meant you were sad. If you were sad, you would cry, and if you cried, you made everyone else cry. No one was supposed to cry.
He hurt Dad and Pearl a lot as a baby. He didn't want to hurt them anymore. He didn't want to cry and make them cry, they shouldn't be sad. Dad and Pearl should be happy.
Steven got out from under the bed, slowly making his way to… the papers. He began sketching, sketching the things that weren't real. Their beady eyes, their claws, their gnashing teeth.
Dad said to express himself. Dad liked to use music. Music was fun... but music wasn't in his brain… there were too many scary thoughts in his head to make music.
But drawing… drawing made it less real… at least that's what it said in the book that Pearl would read whenever she watched Steven at night. Anytime Steven had a scary thought, he would draw, and draw, and draw until it became less scary.
Maybe he could draw Pearl chasing the things away. That would work, right? Pearl was super strong. He saw her lift dad over her head once. She was strong enough to chase them away… she just needed to know they existed… but they didn't… no one saw them, no one touched them… they just floated around in Steven's face…
"What's the matter, blue boy? Going to keep crying till your mommy comes home? Oh wait, you don't HAVE a mommy!"
"Yeah-wait, that blue skinned ballerina isn't his mom?"
"No, she's just some kind of babysitter. I think she was clam jammed by the dad, so now she looks out for the baby."
They were back… they… they weren't real. They were just figments of your imagination, they couldn't touch you, they couldn't touch you.
"So, what's the deal with this kid, anyway? Why is every ghost around here obsessed with haunting them?"
"Because they can see us even when cloaked. It makes them a long time victim, eternally terrified. Ripe for the picking."
They weren't real, they were just trying to make noise. Ignore them. They weren't real.
"Wouldn't seeing us all the time make us less scary to him? Isn't that why the Chairman doesn't just rule the human world?"
"Yeah, but he's young, so we're getting our licks in while we can. Before he just ends up desensitized, you know?"
They weren't real, they weren't real, they weren't real. Don't focus on them, don't focus on the screams, don't let it out don't let it out don't let it out.
"Ooh, look at this,a picture of his mom and dad together." The monsters picked up a picture of his dad and who he was told was his mom. "Hm… it IS cold in here…let's heat things up, shall we?" And the monster breathed fire in his room close to his face-
"Gaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhh!!!' He screamed and cried louder, and louder, and louder-
Fwooosh
…And… everything… was… frozen. "Hello…?" He looked around... ice on the floor, ice on the walls… no fire... no monster... just… ice... "Monsters? Monsters? Are…are you there?" Why did he feel so… so… cold… steam came off his body…
"SO COLD!" A monster shouted. "It's like Russia!"
"So..so cold…" He muttered as he began to feel weak. "So… cold…" he began falling…
Clutch
Right into the arms of Pearl. "My Steven, what on earth happened to you?" She felt his head. "You're running a fever, you need to get wrapped up."
"...They won't go away, Pearl…" Steven sobbed. "They won't go away no matter how much I tell them to.'
"Come on, let's get you an ice bath." She lifted him up. "We can work out the rest later."
"Ice… when I'm… cold…" The idea of rest sounded nice though.
"It'll keep the fever down and re-regulate your body heat." Pearl held his head up.
"...Why… why are you here when I hurt you?" Steven weeped. "I make things worse… I make everything worse…"
"Not for me, my Steven, and not for your father." Pearl held him tighter. "I take pain for those I view with value. You're… important to me."
",...even… even when I hurt you?" He asked quietly.
"You've never hurt me once, my Steven… knowing I'm sad when you're sad… it lets me know how much you need me… and I will always be around when you need me." She rubbed his face. "That is my duty… that… is my honor, my Steven."
"...Are there other Stevens if I'm yours?" He asked as he was placed in the tub.
"There are other people named Steven in the world, yes." She nodded as she applied the cool water to his head. "But you're the only Steven on this planet that matters to me." She applied the soap.
"...Will… will I ever stop hurting people?" Steven asked.
"One day, when your emotions are in control." She nodded. "Your Diamon-" Pearl paused for a second. "Your… mother… she often had trouble controlling her emotions too... She was a bit of a cryer as well."
"...Why was she crying?" He asked curiously. "Did she see the monsters too?"
"Yes, she did. But that's not why she cried." Pearl answered. "She... lost someone close to her. Pink Diamond."
"...Was she her sister? They have the same last name." Which would mean Steven had an aunt!
"...Something to that effect, yes." Pearl nodded slowly. "It took a long while for your Dia-your mother to stop crying. Your father… was a tremendous help in that endeavour." She explained.
"...Was mom nice?" Steven asked once more.
"...She was everything to me." Pearl gave a weird smile. "I would have done anything for her… and now..." She wiped his face. "I will do anything for you."
"...Would you keep smiling?" He asked shyly. "You don't smile often... It's a pretty smile."
Pearl looked down at him with surprise. "I'll… try my best." She promised with a small smile. "Now, since you're overheating, I'm going to need to do something aggressive real quick, I apologize for this action in advance."
"What act-" And Steven was shoved into a tub full of ice cold water. "Gahhhh! Cold cold, why is it so cold!?"
"I'll prepare your favorite Bindaetteok later."
========================================================================
Connie smiled. "Isn't this book awesome?" She asked. Her mom let her keep reading fiction as a hobby, as long as it was on a decent grade level. Mom always preferred her literature non-fiction, which she didn't mind at all, but you could only read so many autobiographies before they began feeling like homework, which she ALSO didn't mind, but it didn't get her a lot of friends.
Of course, that changed when Connie met her 'forever friend', as the half-Taiwanese girl explained it. "It's MORE than awesome! She has a magic bird that's bonded to her soul! It's incredible!" Molly McGee cheered with her normal amount of excitability (another word from the world's most cheerful thesaurus) for life in general. "They're more than best friends forever! They're best friends forever forever forever!"
"That's a lot of forever." Connie snickered. Connie was normally a pretty shy girl. Not for lack of trying to make friends, but, when you were always the new girl in a new town, it was hard to be memorable in the eyes of most people around you. Her dad worked a lot of security jobs, and her mom was always on demand at a new hospital, so they always moved to wherever it seemed more financially secure.
Luckily, her friend's family moved just as much as hers did… she understood the pain. "Well, they're soulmates. There's gonna be a lot of forever, obviously." Molly justified. "Oooh, what if we become soulmates?"
"I don't know magic … or believe magic is real." Connie admitted.
Molly gasped. "Are you saying you don't pray to Santa every Christmas?"
"My parents give me presents every Christmas." Mostly books, but Connie WAS a bookworm, that she wouldn't deny. "And Santa doesn't-"
"Santa is only real as long as we make him real… So NEVER say that blasphemy out loud." Molly countered with a… rather intense face. The girl was pretty chipper most of the time… but on occasion she could get… frantic. "It would be worse than that Rhonaldo guy trying to tell me that snake people can't be friendly misunderstood people that just want to enjoy the feeling of a good handshake!"
"...Wouldn't snake people just be giant lizards?" Connie asked. "If they have arms and legs, they can't really be snakes."
She raised her arm to object, but paused. "...Does it count if their necks are really long, and they have enough self awareness to call themselves snakes?"
"If they have enough self awareness, then why would they call themselves snakes? We gave them the name." Connie pointed out. "There's millions of things they could call themselves."
"So what you're saying is that we can come up with a totally awesome name that's better than snake people! So that when we do find out when they exist, everyone will already know what to call them, and they'll be happy they have a cool name!" Best part about Molly McGee… she never looked at the downside of anything. Most days she seemed to be running on a 11 on a scale of 10. "That'll be my first official degree as Governor of Whimsification!"
"You want to be Governor?" She asked, amused. "Never took you for a 'politics' girl."
"Of course. If you're in charge, you can make things better." They elbowed her playfully. "What about you?"
"President of the United States." Connie answered. "But it'll take me a long time to get there. My mom is expecting me to be in that position by the time I'm at least 45."
"Whoof, big expectations." Molly winced. "I'm just doing it for fun. Doesn't that sound a itsy-bitsy overwhelming?" She held her thumb and index finger really close for emphasis
"A little, yeah, but, you're here, so I don't mind it that much." Connie smiled, wrapping her arm around her friend.
"...I AM SO HAPPY TO HAVE A FRIEND LIKE YOU!" And Molly returned the favor by wrapping her arms around her torso. Tightly.
"I'm... really happy to… have... all the air... leave my lungs..." Connie coughed.
"Here." Molly released her and gave her address and phone number. "We move a lot, so let's make sure we keep in contact. We keep exchanging numbers and addresses, that way we can keep being friends."
"Of course-wait. You... don't give this to your other friends?" Connie asked.
"Of course I do, but after the fifth time we moved, a lot of them just… stopped communicating. I don't blame them but it felt... disheartening to see a friendship die in real time." Molly tried to hide her sadness with a light-hearted shrug. "What about you? Are you still in touch with your old friends?"
"I... don't have old friends." Connie admitted, rubbing the back of her neck. "You're the first friend I've made… ever." She chuckled weakly. "I know that sounds lame-"
"Of course it doesn't, it just makes me more honored to be the first!" Molly assured her with a wide grin. "Heck, that means we can get through my list of 'first besties goals'! I haven't been able to break out this baby in two years!" She reached into her bag and pulled out a list.
Connie blinked… then laughed. "You just kept that on hand at all times?" The absurdity was funny. It was just so… Molly.
"Of course! Who doesn't keep a list of all the best things to do with their best friend on hand at all times!?"
"...You know, that IS actually pretty practical. More people should do that." Connie agreed.
"Exactly! That's why I'm going to be an amazing governor." Molly stood proudly. "I'm going to make it illegal to never not be happy at any time!"
"What about a funeral-"
"Don't ruin the dream with reality, Connie, just let me dream." Molly held a finger up.
"...Alright, you can dream." Even if they moved yet again… at least she'd always have a friend.
========================================================================
Sasha let the clock tick down and fill the room with noise, looking over at the boy lying down on the couch. "Feel free to talk whenever you're ready. . We have all the time in the world… Well, actually, we have two hours." No one ever said that being a therapist would be easy. But Sasha thought that after leading an army of amphibians in another dimension and saving the multiverse, talking to kids about their issues would be at least a little easier.
On some days it was, on other days... It was almost like pulling out teeth, especially when the kids didn't feel like talking. Which was the case with her current patient, one 'Steven Diamond Universe'. A rather unorthodox name… not the 'diamond' or 'universe' part, but rather the 'Steven' one, because it was an American name, and the boy, from what her file read, grew up in Korea for most of his life .
"Ah…" He sighed. "Well I guess I can start with… my head." The boy, a rather stoutish, short kid who hid his entire body in a blue cloak, shivered.
"What about it?" She asked.
"...It's broken." He said. "My brain… it's… it's not normal."
"I see." She nodded as she wrote 'inferiority' down on her chart. "Is that a conclusion you came to yourself, or something someone else told you?"
"I saw it on TV." He said. "If you… see things no one else sees all the time, you're crazy."
TV, the bane of all mental health. "Steven, everyone sees things all the time no one sees, and that doesn't make them crazy. Some people are colorblind, and only see things in grey and black. That doesn't make them crazy, does it?"
"But I see… things." The shivering got worse. "Monsters."
"I see." Either this was a case of an over-active imagination, or the boy was confusing what he saw on TV for what he saw in real life. "What kind of monsters do you see?"
"...The kind that floats." He said. "They like watching me cry. They have beady eyes. They can't be touched by anyone. They have sharp claws. They scream and cry."
She nodded, maybe a horror movie? "When was the last time you saw them?"
Steven stared at the door. "They're next to the walls. They're kicking away other monsters. They're saying… 'no one disturbs Commander Sasha.'"
She felt herself tense at that and then blinked. "...Are you seeing those monsters now?" She asked.
"The visions… they never stop." The kid hugged his legs. "I can't-I can't even blink without thinking something's out to get me." He looked out the window. "There's another one outside the window… it's just sticking its gross, flabby tongue at me… There's no reason for it."
Okay… there might be something more tangible to this 'seeing monster' thing… but now didn't seem like a good time to point that out. "Alright, try not to focus on the monsters right now, it's just the two of us in this room right now." She reassured him.
"Just the two of us. They don't exist. They're not real, they're not real…" He muttered it like a mantra.
"Okay, Steven, I need you to think hard on a couple of things." Sasha crouched down to eye level with her patient. "Do you have any friends?"
"...No..." Steven shook his head. "It's usually me and Pearl in the Palanquin all day."
"I see…" She nodded. "And your parents?"
"I just said it's me and Pearl together most of the day." Steven repeated. "Dad plays music in clubs and stuff, so he's gone for most of the day."
"I'm sorry, is this Pearl person not your mother?" Sasha asked, wondering if she was dealing with a step-parent situation.
"Nanny. She and Dad made it clear that they're never going to be together… ever." Steven stressed.
"And does that bother you?" She asked.
"Not really. I mean, I still see Pearl as my mom… even if she keeps telling me she's not." Steven muttered. "…I think she liked my mom… like, 'like liked' her."
"Ah, I see." No one gave kids enough credit when it came to being observant in those types of situations. "Alright, so you spend a lot of time with your Nanny… What about school?"
"She teaches me everything." He explained. "The alphabet, numbers, things about my home."
"You're homeschooled?" She asked.
"It's… dangerous to be around people." He muttered. "When I cry, people cry. My tears... become everyone else's tears."
"I see... you're afraid of being around other people you're not comfortable with?" Sasha began forming her hypothesis. "Do you see the monsters when you're with your dad and Pearl?"
"Yes." He confirmed. "They're everywhere. They don't… leave." He moaned. "It just… it just… why won't they leave?" The room began literally turning blue as he cried…
He got more blurry… no… she was crying… crying from fear and trauma that wasn't hers. "That's…..new.." She wiped her eyes.
"I just want to be alone… is that so wrong?" He continued to cry as anxiety, loneliness, and isolation filled her brain.
If Sasha was an ordinary therapist, she would've jumped out of the window and fled the room… luckily for her and Steven, she was not an ordinary therapist. "Wanting peace and quiet isn't wrong." She pushed through the sadness.
"Thank you…" He thanked her, sniffing.
"And you're not broken just because you see things no one else can... That just makes you... you." She reaffirmed.
"But... But I don't like it…" Steven wiped his tear-filled eyes. "I... I want it gone.. I don't WANT to keep seeing things."
"And we can manage through it one day at a time. It won't work unless YOU believe it can be better." Sasha reassured him. "Do you believe it can be better, Steven? I need you to answer confidently."
"...I don't know." He responded, the blue light and sadness dying down as he curled back up into the couch. "I just… don't know."
"I do, and it can get better, Steven.. But you need to be willing to do something uncomfortable in order for it to get better. You can't spend the rest of your life hiding in your cloak." Sasha said firmly.
"...How can I be normal when every time I'm sad, other people get sad?" He asked.
"That's not unusual, Steven. That's called sympathy… and everyone has it." Sasha nodded. "Yours is just a little stronger than most people's, and everyone has control over their own sympathy. But. if you want to gain control over yours, you need to practice actually giving it to people. And not your sadness, but your happiness, your joy, your anger even, when it's appropriate of course."
"...How do I do that?"
"The best way to do it is to make friends." Sasha answered. "It might not seem like much, but having a friend, even just one, to talk to can make all the difference in your life."
"So I should go to the city and talk to people until someone becomes my friend?"
"That's one way to do it." Sasha remarked. "But, and this is only a recommendation, the best way to do it... would be going to public school."
"...But... I'd be... away from Pearl." Steven muttered softly. "She... she calms me down when I'm scared."
"I know, and I did say it was just a recommendation." She continued. "But... is Pearl always going to be there for you?"
"...She said she would be." He nodded. "She's standing outside the door right now." Alright, there might be a bit of codependency going on.
"A little time apart won't hurt, you'll still be in the same city." She reassured him. "She'll just be a phone call away if anything happens." He shifted uncomfortably. "I know the change seems scary... I had to change a lot when I wasn't much older than you... I had to live in two homes because my parents didn't want to live with each other anymore."
That got the boy's attention. "How… how did you deal with that?"
"Well… I made two friends with two people I could be myself around." She explained fondly. "Sometimes, you can experience emotions that can only exist when you're around a friend." In her case, the fact she was bi-sexual, but that wasn't relevant to the conversation at hand. "A friend, a very good friend, can change your whole perspective on life. But that might not happen… If you don't give it a chance."
"...Okay." He sighed. "I'll give the school thing a shot… I wonder if Seoul has nice teachers."
…Apparently no one told the kid he was already going to move away from Korea… she would save that conversation for his dad. "Alright, next order of business, you might want to practice NOT wearing the cloak all the time."
"...It makes me feel comfortable." He muttered. "I can hide myself from… them…" He flinched in the direction of a wall-
Plink
Where a few pencils dropped. "...Quick question that won't be on the record..." She took a moment to breathe a little. "Are you... not... completely human?"
"...You're not going to tell anyone, right?" He asked nervously.
"Doctor patient confidentiality, I swear, cross my heart, hope to die." She promised.
"...My dad's human. My mom…" He opened his cloak, lifting up his shirt to show… a blue diamond on his chest. One that didn't look forced in… but rather melded with the skin, naturally "She was a Gem."
"Huh… blue gem." Sasha nodded. "Funny coincidence."
"Huh?" Steven tilted his head. "What do you mean?"
"Oh it's a long, eventful, suspenseful story." She waved off playfully. "I'm not sure you want to hear it-"
"I want to hear it, I WANT to hear it!" Yep, in spite of the anxiousness, the boy was still a curious kid.
"You see… it all started when my friend manipulated me into manipulating my other friend into stealing a box from a thrift store on her birthday." She recalled, like it was yesterday. "But, little did I know, the box was actually a gateway into a new dimension... Full of amphibians."
========================================================================
Scratch waited… and waited… aaaaaannnnd… "OOOGABOOOGABOOGA!" He cried out.
"AAAAHHH!!" Perfect, the man tossed his triple cheese deluxe hamburger into the air. Grab it and float away.
Scratch grabbed the burger, giggling as he flew away. "A meal and a scare… now was he Tom with one m or two?" Such was the simple life of Scratch. Eat, sleep, scare. The perfect afterlife for the perfect ghost.
Scratch wasn't sure how he died… he wasn't sure of much of anything really… but he didn't mind that. Scratch lived in what he assumed was his childhood home (the house was abandoned, but it felt comfortable enough), and no one was willing to buy it. Heck, no one was really willing to do much of anything in this town. Brighton was a very haunted place even before he came around, and thus, most of the life in said town had already been depleted. Complete misery, which meant the Ghost Council was off his back.
…Of course, on occasion, he MAY have slept through some of his scare reports, but eh, not like he needed to go into great detail with those. As long as he got the results they wanted, the Council members couldn't care less about how unprofessional he was. It wasn't like they would get all angry and summon him out of-
A portal opened. "Wait, no! Let me finish my burger!" He tried to take a bite, but the portal sucked him in before he had the chance. "No! NOOOOO!!!!" DAMN IT! EVERY! SINGLE! TIME! "Do you people have to summon me when I'm eating!? It's two past twelve! I should be on my third lunch break by now!"
"We know, we summoned you at this precise moment to annoy you." The lady ghost of the ghost Council snickered, along with the rest of the Ghost Council jerks.
"And also because we hate you." The short blue one added.
"Yeah, that was pretty obvious." He grumbled. "So what's the big problem you called me for? Did a one become a zero? Did I misspell my name? Did I forget a stamp on one of the INFINITE pages I give you guys?"
"Yes to all of the above." The stingy green one glared. "But we have something else that trumps all your miserable failures… for the moment."
"Oh shoot, did someone pass away?" He asked. "…I mean on." Scratch clarified. Please let it be Geoff. The ghost just WOULDN'T let him alone! He gave the moron HALF a taco one time, and suddenly the ghost thought they were best friends or something.
"No." The pink one shook her head. "As you are probably very unaware of, our scare meter in Seoul Korea has been going off the charts, as they say, for close to a decade now."
"Oh, ah... I… didn't know that. I don't really get involved with foreign affairs, ooh, but I did hear about this one thing they do with potatoes, where instead of turning them into French Fries, they carve them into a spiral and deep fry them on a stick! Ooh, and the things they do with hotdogs, with the added potato buds they fry along with the batter, like a hot dog and a hash brown mashed together!" Scratch was a ghostly connoisseur of all things food. If there was anything he would put effort into, it was finding the tastiest treats in the world!
"The point is, that scare meter went back to normal." The short purple one cut off his daydreaming of delicious delicacies. "But a trail is moving to America."
"And despite our best efforts, our ghosts haven't been able to locate the source of such potent misery." The green one said.
"Sounds like you're angry at someone other than me for once." Scratched raised an eyebrow.
"Oh Scratch, we're always angry with you, our anger is very versatile and open to hate all forms of life. Both kinds" The purple one grinned. "But according to our scouts, the source of misery is making its way towards Brighton."
"Ooooh." He let out. "So you want me to look around for it and give you all the deets."
"Correction, we want you to look around town and keep the misery flowing. We HAVE been able to confirm that the source is indeed coming from a living being."
"This job should be easy for a pathetic, withering blight like yourself, yet important enough for us to exile you to the Flow of Failed Phantoms if you fail miserably." The pink one scoffed.
Scratch... scratched his arm. "How important can it really be if it's that easy?"
"Important enough to keep the Chairman powered for the three or so years with one scare alone." The blue one explained.
"Wait, wait, wait, the Chairman's powered by scares?" How did no one tell him this!?
"It was in the pamphlet you were supposed to read." The green one glared.
"Come on, no one reads pamphlets anymore, it's all about those... Youtube videos and whatnot, you know." The Chairman looked down on him directly, the creepy white dots gazing beyond his very soul. "But, ah, don't you worry, guys. I'll keep it flowing! Don't you worry, I'll get ya good old misery so rank it'll make Vietnam look like child's play!"
"You better, Scratch. For once, we have expectations for you." The pink one warned gravelly. "And if you fail to meet them, it's off to the Flow of Failed Phantoms for you." The blue one pointed to the admittedly terrifying cyclone above his head.
"One hundred percent understood." He was portalled back… just in time to see his burger getting chomped down by a raccoon. "...YOU THIEVING MONSTER! I STOLE THAT BURDER FAIR AND SQUARE!" He unleashed his ghostly vestige and power… only for the raccoon to throw an old apple core at him. "Ha! Joke's on you, I like dry aged fruit!" Maybe today COULD be lucky.
========================================================================
Garnet looked out on the horizon as she saw Rose waving at another one of her human 'companions'. "I thank you for the wonderful night, Mr. Fryman. I never knew the history of oil and grease could be so fascinating."
For as long as she could remember, Rose's favorite hobby seemed to be befriending any neighboring humans. She had especially been engaging in it ever since she helped that group of settlers find this stretch of land that the humans called 'Beach City'.
Thanks to their help, the humans in question viewed them with a bit more friendliness than most… examples including 'Oh my God, demons in human form!' for many years. It was certainly less annoying to deal with right now. None of the humans were capable of killing them, but even if a fly couldn't kill you, the constant presence was still a bit of an annoyance.
Rose welcomed the constant company… a little too much. Rose was a woman with… many loves. One of those loves was making connections with anyone she deemed a friend. And she made that connection in many ways…. Emotionally… and physically… The latter seemed to be her preferred form of affection and connection.
It wasn't much of a problem. Humans died, and Rose never viewed it in a serious way other than how one would an old friend passing away, never grieving for long. But… to someone like Garnet, who viewed love as the end all, be all… it tended to get a little grating. Hey Saphy, you know I only have eyes for you, right? I know you do Ruby, I don't have any doubt… I just… get worried that Rose is… treating love a bit too lightly.
Come on, the girl is having fun. We know she's not a one gem, or human, kind of gal. She's always been clear on that.Try telling that to Pearl. She hasn't stopped staring at them for the past 10 minutes.
Ooooh yeah, the real problem of the situation. Pearl's never ending stream of jealousy. "You know." Garnet turned to Pearl, who was trying her best to turn the phrase 'if looks could kill' into a reality with Rose's latest fling. "A little honesty goes a long way."
"I'm always honest with her." Pearl spoke a little too quickly.
"So you've told her you're not happy that she talks to other humans all the time."
"I've made it very clear that she's making it harder to keep civilians out of danger by constantly bringing them to the temple." Pearl held her nose up.
"…And that is the only thing that bothers you about Rose's relationships with humans?"
"Rose doesn't have relationships with humans. She merely plays with them for a month or two and they leave." Pearl corrected indignantly.
"So when I use future vision, I don't see her becoming more intimate physically with people than you've ever been before."
"I've fused with Rose. No matter what humans do, they will never achieve that level of closeness." Pearl smugly smiled. "And it's not like the humans care about her deeply. Remember the human with the ridiculous last name? He was around for only one night in spite of Rose's forwardness."
"Yeah…" Garnet nodded. "…And that's why she likes him."
"She doesn't like him!" Pearl shouted. Garnet didn't verbally reply, simply pointing to the laminated t-shirt hanging on the wall. "It's just a wall decoration."
"One that she's made sure to not ruin or mess up." Garnet reminded her. "If you just told Rose it makes you uncomfortable, then I'm sure she'd understand."
"But… who am I to tell her she can't do anything?" Pearl asked pointedly. "We went to war because we didn't want to be told what to do."
"You're the gem who helped start a rebellion against Homeworld, and you think acting subservient is the answer?" She asked a question just as hard-hitting. "You've always been the first to go on the Frontlines. You're the renegade Pearl. Bismuth knew you weren't afraid of anything. I know you're not afraid of anything, even Rose knows that… so why don't you?"
"I…" They looked uncomfortable.
Garnet placed a hand on the gem's shoulder. "Don't replace one master for another."
Pearl visibly shrank down from that comment. "Hello Garnet, Pearl." Rose walked in on them before Pearl could say anything else. "I take it your day's going swell."
"As swell as any other." She nodded. "What's first on the agenda?"
"Making sure the moon temple doesn't collapse." Rose pointed behind her with her thumb. "I'll grab the statue." She began walking away from them
"Rose…" Pearl spoke up, causing their leader to stop and look back at her.
"Yes, Pearl?" Rose raised an eyebrow. "You have something to tell me?"
Alright Pearl, you can do this. Do this, be brave, be strong,tell Rose how much you love her… "...the ruins could be more dangerous than we remember… Perhaps we can form Rainbow Quartz to make traversal easily?" …is that progress or regression? Worse, stagnation.
"I'm down for that." Their leader nodded. "Although, wouldn't our size make travelling along the narrow stairs difficult?"
"Since when has squeezing into a small space ever been a problem for you?" Pearl shot a slightly wry smile.
"I suppose that's a fair point." Rose smirked. "Alright, Rainbow will come back out once we arrive." With that, she resumed her walk towards the statue.
Garnet sent Pearl a `What was THAT?' look. "You know fusion is a serious subject, right?"
"I am well aware, Garnet, and Rainbow Quartz is important to me too." She insisted.
"So, with that said, you're still using Fusion as an excuse to avoid telling Rose your true intentions?" Garnet crossed her arms. "And if I'm not making it clear… You're using Fusion as a way to manipulate." She let the temperature of the room rise as she softly froze Pearl's feet to the ground.
"...I…I really do want to fuse tonight..."
"But that was not your intent." She accused her. "Your intent was to be with Rose." She began walking away. "I will ignore it this one time, because you have no hostile intentions… but if you ever use Fusion like this again, I.Will. Bubble. You. And then lock you up at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean for the next 1000 years."
"…Understood." She gulped. Sometimes, Garnet wished they added a fourth member to the group, someone more upbeat to offset the seriousness of the situation.