I keep seeing people being rude to Pink Diamond for being an actual character with real character flaws so screw that here's some fic. It's probably AU but screw it I'm jumping on this bandwagon. Some lines belong to Rebecca Sugar but so do all these characters and situations. I don't own any concepts either.

I know I haven't updated my actual fic in ages but also consider this: I'm tired and mad

Red Diamond was the oldest out of the three diamonds, and although the Diamonds were considered immortal, timeless and undefeatable, time had taken its toll- even on the most durable of gems. Red Diamond, the most ferocious of the rulers of Homeworld, she who waded through battlefronts in lieu of standing back, she who led with her temper, not Yellow's rationality nor Blue's emotionality, would not go down peacefully.

It took another three thousand years before Red Diamond finally admitted her mortality, letting Yellow and Blue combine their three powers into White Diamond's ultimate Gem creation for one last time.

And a seed was made for a new Diamond, a Pearl's seed created as an afterthought.

And Red Diamond's gem was retired, too worn to reform, placed into the center of Homeworld to provide for the Gems forever more- as eventually all the Diamonds would.

The hubbub of the arrival for a new Diamond was tremendous- all any gem, especially high ranking ones- would talk about was about the new Diamond who was made to replace Red, how she would be the new leader, what she would be like, what projects she would lead, how she would change Red's old court. It was the upheaval that hadn't existed since the previous Blue Diamond's overturn, something outside of any living gem's memory.

The due date for the new Red Diamond's emergence would be in a thousand years, and Yellow and Blue paid the incubating planet little mind as they continued their colonization across the galaxy, but it was barely three hundred years before Blue Diamond received a call from a Holly Blue Agate.

An undersized, offcolor Diamond had emerged.

Pink Diamond had been left behind from the beginning.

Bopping about, always asking questions to information she should have been created with, getting in the Diamond's way, getting attached to useless things and being forcibly separated.

Yellow Diamond refused to tolerate her, so Pink spent most time with Blue Diamond's court. Pink Diamond pat Sapphires, prodded Lapis Lazulis, and chased Amethysts, doing everything she could to investigate the Homeworld around her. It was all new to her, exciting! She could meet new gems every day, asking them about their duties and their experiences and their likes and their hobbies, and every gem was different!

Except no, Yellow Diamond was adamant that they were not different. Every gem had its place- and every gem that did anything outside their roles was obviously flawed.

"That's not true!" Pink Diamond protested. "Amethyst 3MN likes to make swings with her whip, and Tanzanite 2EP figured out how to make her arrows in different shapes, and Sapp-"

Every gem Pink Diamond named was shattered immediately. Pink returned to her Palanquin and sobbed, leaking her tears over the floor of her royal transport.

"If Blue Diamond is allowing you such unreasonable emotionality, perhaps you should spend some time with me instead," Yellow Diamond's voice broke into her Palanquin, using that this is not a request tone that pink HATED behind belief, but soon Pink Diamond was on a transport overlooking Yellow's colonies.

And Pink Diamond had some time to herself, some time to master her hovering abilities, her strength (as pathetic as her size made it), her gem making abilities. And sure, she wasn't great at any of it yet, and the expectations placed upon her were unreasonable, and Yellow barely spared her a glance for all that Yellow Diamond was to be in charge of her, and none of the Gems would talk to her as a fellow because of their standing, and Pink was so alone and none of the other Diamonds respected her enough to let her lead her own projects-

"It's not fair! I want one!" Pink Diamond screamed. This was enough of being pushed aside, alone and powerless! "I want my own army! I want my own planet! I deserve it- I'm just as important as you!"

"Then why don't you act like it!" Yellow Diamond thundered.

Pink didn't know why she didn't, or how she didn't, and it's not her fault she wasn't made knowing anything, but there's nothing she can do about it and Yellow just wants to shut the bratty Diamond up for once. Pink Diamond was given a little colony called "Dirt" and pre-written plans to colonize- ones that Yellow and Blue both told her she cannot alter under any circumstances.

All she had on Dirt is her palanquin, a pretty Pearl that had been made for her by the previous Red Diamond along with Blue and Yellow- and had actually incubated for full duration- and an army.

So she gets bored very easily.

Pink Diamond first spent her time tinkering with those "plans she wasn't supposed to alter", swapping out Blue Diamond's Amethyst seeding machines with designs for Rose Quartz soldiers instead, teaching her Pearl how to break rules, and generally looking very pretty so that the other Gems didn't lose faith in the Homeworld rulers. But that got boring too.

Well, if Pink Diamond wasn't allowed to leave her palanquin on her own, then, she wouldn't.

There was, however, a particularly dressy Rose Quartz that appeared newly on the scene of the colony.

And Pink Diamond did not an elegant Diamond make, but did she made a brilliant Rose Quartz. The Coyamito Agate lost control of the soldiers as soon as the pretty, new cut of Rose Quartz appeared on the scene, distracting the soldiers from guarding and the builders from building. In fact, said Rose Quartz could be found most often in the Prime kindergartens, crying the cracked Gems back to health and hiding in the corners with some of the failed models.

And Rose Quartz loved them, the Gems with odd colors, who told bad jokes, whose powers were unique and unusual, who reminded her of the failed, offcolor Pink Diamond. It wasn't a coincidence when they were passed over by the Homeworld Authorities when the Pink Diamond "ordered" inspections.

When suspicion became too great upon Rose Quartz, she hid away in the organic growth, inspecting the living organisms that made up the surface of Dirt.

And some of them spoke. And made things. Even if they weren't builders! They were just so versatile!

Rose Quartz spent ten years with the organic creatures that looked almost like Gems carved from flesh, healing, protecting, feeding, watching them. They started to ask her for help when they needed it, trying to feed her back, being willing to come between her and wild beasts even when they knew she was strong enough to defend herself, smiling up at her, inviting them to her homes, trusting her, hugging her, shouting the name she had given herself, and Pink Diamond thought, oh.

This is what love must feel like.

She returned to her palanquin, her Pearl bowing in welcome, the Gems who didn't know her clamoring to speak to he- to a Diamond in awed adoration Pink had never been given the chance to earn, and Pink Diamond quietly realized that she felt none of that love from her fellow Gems.

That realization stayed until a unevenly-shaped Carnelian asked Pi- asked Rose Quartz to heal a flower she had found (one that had been bruised by the Gem's enthusiasm). As soon as Pink Di- Rose Quartz had healed the blossom, Carnelian gleefully tucked it into Rose's hair and thanked her profusely for keeping the off-colored, malformed Gems in safety.

A Pyrite included Amethyst asked Rose Quartz to help dig new tunnels for the Gems in hiding, making sure the whole time that Rose Quartz ended up with her own little dirt niche, the Bismuth they'd rallied for the job leaving Rose her own "window" of sunlight for the flowers she'd started growing.

An abnormally cowardly Ruby, leftover from the previous Red Diamond's court, made absolutely certain that everyone had their own weapon and training, even if they had to be built when certain Gems had been conditioned not to summon theirs, even making Bismuth forge Rose Quartz her own sword.

And, oh, Rose Quartz realized again, the Diamonds did not love an offcolor, undersized Diamond…but the Gems who knew her did.

When a Jasper found their hideout and demanded their immediate shattering, their burrow flooded with soldiers, Rose Quartz could not afford to transform back- what if Yellow Diamond shattered her friends like she had broken Pink Diamond's first friends. Rose Quartz could not, would not, let that happen.

So when her friends faltered, Rose Quartz leapt forward with her sword-

"Can we retreat?" Pink Diamond asked Yellow over the communicator, only to be dressed down by Yellow for potential cowardice and wasting their time and resources, and of course Pink Diamond couldn't handle a colony, why had Yellow ever trusted her with one?

War was brutal, but it was better than being a vain title with no power to help those she loved.

"Sorry Yellow, they got away," Pink would pout over the communicators, only to wade back into the fight with her sword. It was worth hearing Yellow scream about Pink Diamond's incompetence, worth fighting through Yellow Diamond's criticism and the veiled threats to force Pink to return to Homeworld as a failure. Blue Diamond had no faith in Pink Diamond at all, trespassing on Pink Diamond's colony with no communication beforehand in order to settle the war on her behalf. Neither of them trusted Pink Diamond to finish the war herself; neither of them respected Pink Diamond to listen to her boundaries or plans. Pink Diamond already knew they held little regard for her as their equal, but…it still hurt.

Red Diamond's power had taken the form of a sword, Pink Diamond had been too malformed to make any weapon, but Rose Quartz had found herself summoning a shield to defend those she loved.

The Dirt planet, her friends, the humans, the life she knew to belong to it- it didn't deserve to be destroyed. If the Diamond authority would not retreat on their own, Pink would oust them herself.

Pearl was eager to make herself into something other than a tool and took to combat with grace and elegance. Garnet was a beautiful Gem in love. Rose was more than willing to defend them with her life. Together, the offcolors, the rebels, the misshapen, the defiant- they made up the Crystal Gems, and they defended the Earth.

And they would be successful. Even if-

["As long as you're on Earth," Blue Diamond told Pink, "the rebellion has no chance. They will be shattered for their crimes, and as long as a Diamond is on the surface, Homeworld's troops will succeed"]

-it sacrificed Pink Diamond herself.

And Rose Quartz was a free Gem, standing on her own reputation and successes, loved for what she actually achieved, not her role; able to care for her friends, eager to start the Crystal Gems on their new life finally free-

[and then the sky started screaming, and only a Diamond's power could withstand the powers of the Diamond Authority]

And oh, she thinks, her heart shattering along with her friends: this is what love feels like.

Rose Quartz was in mourning for a long time. Was it her fault? Why did the Diamonds destroy the Gems of an entire planet? Why didn't they just let them all go? Where did she go wrong? Where had her plan failed? Why? Why? Why?

She had to let it go eventually. She had Garnet and Pearl, the two best Gems a person could ask for, and there was still so much work to be done. The shards of the fallen- their destroyed friends, their sacrificed enemies- needed to be bubbled away in safety, lest everyone got hurt. As soon as she found a cure, she would fix it; she promised.

Even now, ground to dust and mutated, Rose would never let them hurt her friends again. Never never never. So they were subdued with time-honed teamwork and only a little bit of crying from everyone, and Rose spent her down time with fun humans their hobbies when she could. It's the only way to cope with the horrors the Diamond Authority slammed upon the planet. The humans are pretty and fun and they do weird things and they grow and die so fast that Rose needs to practically babysit them lest she left for a short trip and they'd die while she was gone.

And she was so jealous of them. She really, really was. She burst from the ground expected to be a fully formed leader and military genius. Human babies are born, expected to become, not be, designed to grow and change with time.

Rose wasn't sure she could change. She was trying. But Gems were not meant to change- their entire existence was meant to be etched in stone. If she wanted to be a better person, a better leader, a better friend, she had make herself into something new. Isn't that why she had become Rose Quartz?

But she was more Rose Quartz than Pink Diamond. Homeworld had not shaped her; war had. Trauma had. Actual leadership experience had. If she never became a Diamond again, she would be happy enough- why else would she have forced Pearl to say nothing?

She meets a tiny Amethyst, and she's so cute and Rose and Garnet and Pearl are happy to make her a Crystal Gem, and Rose is, if not satisfied, content with her life after war.

And then she meets a rock star. And she thinks, oh, this is what love must feel like.

His name is Greg Universe, and he has long hair and an attitude that won't quit. He's funny, he's kind, and he's good with other human babies-

-but more than that, he does his best to get along with her fellow Gems, tries to learn how to fuse with her, and manages to make her talk more about how insecure she is with her identity, her truest self, something between Rose Quartz and Pink Diamond, someone she'd almost been once upon a time. She wouldn't mind keeping him forever if she could, but human lifespans are finite.

And Greg says that he wouldn't mind children.

And Rose Quartz loves him too much to even consider a "no".

And Rose Quartz is so tired.

So Rose becomes pregnant, and, in a move that is more the insecure, infantile Pink Diamond than the responsible, resilient Rose Quartz, she doesn't tell anyone until she starts showing.

For Greg, it's the most agonizing nine months of his life. For Pearl, Garnet, and Amethyst, it's practically a sudden death.

Rose gets that the other Gems don't really get what she's doing. If she could find the words within her to explain, she thinks Amethyst- a fellow undersized Gem- might understand best the longing to match up, to become more than herself better than the others, but Rose can't explain the fullness of her past.

So she records Steven the things she needs him to carry with him- the endlessness of the sea, the groundedness of his father, the love she has for him in all of her forms-

Because Pink Diamond is still underformed. She always will be. Because Pink Diamond is still childish. She always will be. Because Pink Diamond is still, in many ways, a coward. She always will be.

But Steven…he'll be human. He'll grow, change, become anything he wants to be, he'll be loved and supported by his father, he'll be protected and taught by the Crystal Gems, and even better, Steven will be able to decide his own fate. His own role. His own life.

If the Earth was Pink Diamond's to give, she'd trust it to no one besides her son.

The day that Steven is born, no one sobs harder than Rose Quartz. She barely has time to kiss her beloved goodbye and place her hands over her belly before her whole world fades to black-

The children of gods are not given safe passage.

Rose thinks Steven Quartz Universe can handle it anyway.

[And, oh, Rose knows that this is what love feels like.]