The world was a palette of impossible blues and blinding whites. Above, the sky stretched in an endless, cloudless vault of sapphire; below, the grass of the Cord stretched out like a carpet of living emeralds, swaying in a rhythmic dance dictated by the salt-tangled breeze of the ocean.
In the center of this vibrant stillness, a figure lay sprawled in the clover.
Phosphophyllite—Phos, to those who didn't want to trip over their tongue—was currently contemplating the nature of a ladybug. The insect was a tiny, crimson bead crawling across the back of Phos's hand. Phos's skin wasn't skin at all, but a polished, translucent mint-green crystalline surface that caught the sunlight and fractured it into a dozen tiny rainbows.
"You're very busy, aren't you?" Phos murmured. The voice was melodic, like the chiming of thin glass flute. "I wish I were busy. Or at least, I wish I were busy doing something other than waiting for my legs to stop vibrating from that breeze."
Phos was a Gem. Specifically, a Gem with a hardness of 3.5. In a world where the youngest of their kind was roughly three hundred years old and the eldest were as hard as industrial drill bits, Phos was a beautiful, shimmering liability.
"Phos!"
The shout shattered the midday quiet. Phos flinched, and a tiny, audible tink echoed from their elbow. A hairline fracture appeared in the mint-green surface.
"Oh, come on," Phos groaned, sitting up slowly. "I just got polished this morning. If I break before lunch, Rutile is going to use my shards as paperweights."
Approaching across the hills was Morganite, their pink hair flashing like a flare in the sun. Morganite was a hardness of 7.5—sturdy, arrogant, and currently moving at a sprint that Phos's brittle knees could only dream of.
"There you are, you lazy pebble!" Morganite skidded to a halt, kicking up a spray of grass and dirt. "Master Kongo is looking for you. It's finally happening."
Phos's mint-colored eyes widened. "The assignments? He's actually giving me a job? Am I on the patrol squad? Do I get a sword? Please tell me I get a sword that's longer than Cinnabar's."
Morganite smirked, hands on hips. "A sword? Phos, if you swung a sword, the recoil would turn your shoulders into glitter. Just go. He's in the main hall."
The School of Stone
...
The "School" was a monolith of white marble and soaring arches, built to house the twenty-eight Gems who remained. It was a place of silence and study, save for the occasional sound of a chisel or the rhythmic clack-clack of wooden sandals on stone.
As Phos trotted—carefully, ever so carefully—through the corridors, they passed other Gems. There was Euclase, the blue-and-white strategist, busy charting the cloud patterns that might signal an incoming Lunarian attack. There was Jade, the Speaker, looking as stern and unyielding as their namesake.
Phos felt like a dandelion seed floating through a hall of anvils.
"Don't trip, Phos," Jade called out without looking up from a scroll.
"I haven't tripped in forty-eight minutes, Jade! That's a personal record!" Phos shot back, nearly losing their balance on a stray pebble.
Finally, Phos reached the grand meditation chamber. At the far end sat Master Kongo. He was a mountain of a man—or rather, a mountain of something far denser than the Gems. Clad in heavy black robes, his bald head reflected the light with a matte finish that spoke of ancient, unfathomable strength. He was their teacher, their father, and their god.
Phos knelt, the mint-green crystal of their shins clicking against the floor.
"Master! You summoned me? Is it time? Am I the new lead scout? The Lunarians won't know what hit them! Well, they'll see me shimmering and be dazzled, and then—"
"Phosphophyllite," Kongo's voice was a deep, resonant hum that seemed to vibrate in Phos's very marrow.
"Yes, Master!"
"You are three hundred years old."
"To the day! Well, give or take a decade. I lost count during that nap in the spring."
Kongo sighed, a sound like a distant rockslide. "Your hardness is 3.5. Your tenacity is low. You are brittle even among the fragile."
Phos's shoulders slumped. "I know, I know. I'm the 'Pretty But Useless' model. But I can learn! I've been practicing my 'intimidating face' in the mirror for a century."
Kongo leaned forward. "I have found a task suited to your unique perspective. I want you to create an Encyclopedia of Natural History."
The silence that followed was so profound you could hear the microscopic shifting of the school's foundations.
"A... book?" Phos whispered. "You want me to write a book? About... grass? And rocks? Master, I am a rock!"
"An encyclopedia of the world as it is now," Kongo clarified. "The flora, the fauna, the way the tides pull the salt. Our history is written in the stars and the sea, Phos. Someone must record it."
Phos felt a surge of indignation. They wanted to fight the Lunarians—those eerie, ethereal beings who descended from the moons on gilded clouds to pluck the Gems away like ripening fruit. They wanted glory. They wanted to be something other than a fragile ornament.
But looking up into Kongo's stern, yet strangely sorrowful eyes, Phos's protest died in their throat.
"Fine," Phos huffed, crossing their arms (and hearing a faint creak in their chest). "I'll be the world's most over-qualified librarian. But I'm going to make it the most stylish encyclopedia anyone has ever seen. It'll have pop-up pages. Gems love pop-up pages."
...
Stepping back out into the sunlight, Phos felt the weight of the new assignment. Or rather, the lack of weight. A pen and a stack of high-quality paper felt insulting compared to the weight of an obsidian blade.
"An encyclopedia," Phos muttered, wandering toward the jagged cliffs that overlooked the sea. "Where do I even start? 'Entry One: Grass. It's green. Sometimes it's itchy. The end.' Truly, a masterpiece of literature."
The ocean below was a churning cauldron of turquoise. This was where the Gems were born—born from the shore of the Void, where the pressure of the earth and the memory of the sea birthed sentient crystals.
As Phos wandered, the light began to shift. The gold of midday mellowed into a rich, honeyed amber. This was the dangerous time. The Lunarians preferred the light, appearing like hallucinations in the sky.
Phos reached the edge of a high bluff. "If I'm going to write a book, I need a 'Special Advisor.' Someone who knows the things I don't. Someone who stays up when everyone else is asleep."
Phos's expression softened, the bravado fading. There was one Gem who lived apart from the rest. A Gem whose very existence was a paradox of beauty and terror.
Cinnabar.
Cinnabar was a deep, bleeding red, but they were perpetually shrouded in a silver mist—mercury. The toxin leaked from Cinnabar's body uncontrollably, wilting the grass and dulling the shine of any Gem who came too close. Because of this, Cinnabar lived in the darkness of the night, patrolling the desolate shores when the others were safely tucked away in their holistic slumbers.
"Cinnabar!" Phos shouted into the wind. "Hey! Red! You out here?"
No answer. Only the crashing of the waves against the rocks.
Phos began to climb down a narrow path. "I bet Cinnabar knows about all sorts of weird stuff. Glowing moss. Deep-sea fish. Depressing poetry. It'll be the perfect first chapter."
Suddenly, the air grew cold. Not a physical cold, but a sudden thinning of the atmosphere. The sun seemed to dim, as if a veil had been drawn across the sky.
Phos looked up.
High above, a black spot appeared in the blue. It expanded like a drop of ink in water, unfolding into a grand, ornate sun-spot. Within the spot stood figures—pale, elegant, and draped in flowing silks. They held bows made of light.
"Oh," Phos whispered, their mint-green heart-core thudding against their ribs. "The Lunarians. And I don't even have a pencil to throw at them."
The Lunarians didn't speak. They moved with a terrifying, synchronized grace. An arrow was notched. A string was pulled.
Phos froze. A hardness of 3.5 meant that a single well-placed shot wouldn't just hurt—it would turn Phos into a collection of jewelry components.
"Well," Phos said, a hysterical edge to their chime-like voice. "I suppose 'Chapter One' is going to be 'How to Get Kidnapped to the Moon in Three Easy Steps.'"
Just as the arrow flew, a streak of shimmering silver sliced through the air. It wasn't a blade, but a liquid—a heavy, metallic spray that intercepted the arrow, dissolving it instantly.
Out of the shadows of a nearby sea-cave stepped a figure draped in a long, dark uniform. Their hair was a chaotic, brilliant crimson, and a cloud of silver mercury swirled around them like a protective, poisonous ghost.
Cinnabar looked at Phos with eyes full of a weary, ancient loneliness.
"You're in the way, Phos," Cinnabar said, their voice like velvet dragged over gravel. "Move. Or the mercury will dull you forever."
Phos stared, mesmerized. The encyclopedia was forgotten. The danger was forgotten. In that moment, all Phos could think was that Cinnabar was the most beautiful thing they had ever seen—and the most desperately lonely.
"I can't move," Phos chirped, a reckless grin breaking across their face. "I'm busy starting my book. And I think I just found my protagonist."
The battle for the island—and the long, glittering journey of a fragile stone—was only just beginning.