Shadows
Happy New Year, readers! 2016 will bring plot development and frustrated attempts to fit with canon. Also, possible Mad Max/Fury Road AU because nobody's managed to talk me out of it yet.
…..
The shadow of my sorrow. Let's see, 'tis very true. My griefs lie all within and these external manners of laments are mere shadows to the unseen grief which swells with silence in the tortured soul.
There lies the substance.
-Richard II, William Shakespeare
As the tension in the Diamond Authority grew, Rose often found herself thinking of Diamond Core. At the end of difficult, frustrating cycles when she retired to the silence of her rest pod, recalling Diamond Core's brilliance was something of a comfort. What would she have done, in Rose's position?
You know what she would have done. Don't lie to yourself.
But thinking of Diamond Core (just Diamond, back then) would inevitably bring back memories of her end, and then it was necessary to get out of the pod, to busy herself with something and to push away those images and the trace memory of the stench that lingered even after so many lifetimes had come and gone.
After her initial truce with Yellow, Blue had been hostile and more passive-aggressive than usual in meetings, and Yellow had taken to responding with one-word answers to everything. Even White was furious with Rose.
"I can see the sense in delaying the terraform, it's not that," she had lectured Rose when the two of them were alone together. "But you know what Yellow's like, now she thinks she's won! She's going to be insufferable for the longest time now."
"So I should take Blue's side even if I don't agree with it, then?"
White groaned.
"Rose, listen to me," she growled low, and now Rose knew she meant business. She'd used her name instead of her title.
"For the last few orbits, you've been there, but not really there. You hardly ever talk at meetings, you almost never bring up any of your own edicts and we can tell you're not listening to us. Now suddenly you think you know what the issues are? Forgive me for thinking you're not up to date on everything that's been happening lately."
Rose did her best to stamp down on the flush rising on her face that would betray her. White was dangerously close to the mark.
"What's to know?" she said with forced casualness. "I pay more attention than you think. We have a substrate issue..."
"Substrate is the least of our worries, frankly," White cut in. "Do you know how many Rubies we have on Homeworld right now?"
"That's your issue? We have too many Rubies so we need to ship them out?"
"Not just the Rubies, but yes," White told her. "You know how they get when they don't work. They need to be working. If they're not working, they make trouble. Yellow's been busting up the packs but that just moves them somewhere else and it's a waste of resources. And you'd know this if you were paying attention."
White's face softened then, and for the first time in a long time she looked like Rose's old friend again.
"I know we haven't been as close as we used to be, but we care about you. You know that. Something's troubling you and if you don't want to talk about it, that's fine but if it's making it too hard for you to work with us then you need to do something about it."
A lump formed in Rose's throat. How could she? She had no idea what to do with the knowledge she had.
"If Diamond Core was still here," she tentatively asked. "What do you think she'd do?"
At the mere mention of her name, the old friend faded away and White Diamond was back.
"Why would you bring her up now?"
…..
Rose's stomach lurched painfully as she watched Sodalite shave down the wire, Pearl by contrast was utterly calm. She tried to concentrate on the bundle of pearls milling around in the corners of the room, but the wire glimmered sharply under the lights and she couldn't look away.
"Don't stare so much, you'll make me nervous," Sodalite murmured, finally happy with the width of the wire and reaching for the liniment bottle.
"Is this really necessary?" Rose asked her.
"I'd prefer to do a saline wash, myself," Sodalite admitted. "But I think the chip is wedged in there and if there's any cracks the wash could corrupt her mass. I think the probe is the safer option."
She picked Pearl up then and perched her on the edge of the table, then beckoned for one of the corner pearls to come over.
"It won't take long," she told Rose. "It'll sting a bit, but then we'll know where we stand."
The other pearl took Pearl's hands in her own and they braced themselves as Sodalite wiped the little entry hole in her gem with liniment and in one smooth motion slid the wire into it. Then she pressed down, hard.
The effect was dramatic. Pearl's legs flailed and her teeth chattered. Her eyes blinked rapidly and her breathing was shallow and frenzied. The other pearl gripped her hands hard and shook with the effort.
When the probe was pulled out, Pearl collapsed forward onto the other pearl, who stroked her back without a sound. Rose got up to go to her, but Sodalite pulled her away.
"Let her take care of it," she told Rose. "We know the chip is still active now, but we also know it's not as effective. Her tolerance is a lot lower than it was. So it can't be removed, but it's not as big a deal as we thought it might be."
To you, maybe, Rose thought with an angry little stab. She didn't like the idea of the spike shard stuck in Pearl's gem forever, festering, building energy.
"I can't come by much more," Rose told her. "The other Diamonds are starting to notice something's up."
"That's reasonable," Sodalite said amiably. "I have more than enough to go on now, anyway. Though with all the raids going on lately we'll probably have to move soon."
"I can't stop those," Rose told her. "It's Yellow's edict. It's the raids or terraforming."
"I wasn't going to ask."
Pearl had recovered, and now she and the other pearl were gesture-talking. The other pearl was smiling, her face was animated and her movements gracefully pleased. Rose distantly wondered what they were talking about before Sodalite caught her attention again.
"I nearly forgot," she chuckled, and pointed into the bundle to a pearl propped up against the wall. "You'll never guess where that one came from."
Rose peered over at the pearl. It was in bad shape, compared to the others, but not too damaged. It was plainly dressed and nondescript, white-toned with short yellow curls. Sodalite was right, Rose couldn't guess. She shook her head.
"A Jasper brought her in."
Rose's mouth opened and shut, with no words. She had seen many impossible things, but this seemed downright absurd.
"A Jasper?" she sputtered finally. "Then...she's a..."
"A barracks pearl," Sodalite finished. "There was a raid going on two blocks away, and she just turned up and handed her over. Didn't say anything. I've removed her spike, and she was pretty distressed for the first few cycles but she's doing better now. The other pearls are looking after her. They do really well when they're grouped together."
Rose looked back at Pearl, smiling and chatting with the other. She wondered for a moment if it would be better for her to stay at Sodalite's base and be with the others, but the thought filled her with an odd terror and she quickly pushed it away.
"Where is Sapphire? I haven't seen her around here lately," she said, to change the subject.
"She's busy," Sodalite said with a shrug, and Rose knew that was all she would say about the matter.
…..
They had just walked through the door and Rose had yawned, stretched and turned on the lights before she realized that Pearl was rooted in the doorway, utterly still.
"Is something wrong?" she asked, searching for calm. That damned wire, I knew it...
"Someone's been in here," Pearl told her.
A cold, creeping dread suffused Rose's mass. She looked around the hall and the main room and could see nothing amiss, but there was something off about the atmosphere. There was a lingering scent, very faint.
With a sudden whirr, Pearl's gem flashed and a beam of light passed over the room, scanning everything. Snatches of a smoky figure emerged, just hands and legs and a profile, not clear enough to be identifiable. Particles of the intruder's essence floated under the beam. Pearl held them there as long as she could, then let the beam drop with a strained huff.
"How did you know to do that?" Rose asked. Troubled as she was now, that was still an impressive feat. She hadn't known pearls could scan for particles.
Pearl didn't answer, couldn't find the words. She made a gesture instead, but Rose couldn't understand it. Rose wrapped an arm around her, gave her half a hug before sighing and looking over the places the shadow had prowled by.
"It's not like they'd have found anything," she said, more to herself than to Pearl. "But this isn't good. What could we do about this?"
What would Diamond Core do?
A show of solidarity. A return to the old Pink Diamond. A display of blithe innocence.
A party.
"We're going to have a party," she groaned, waving Pearl over and dragging up the holo-cast. "Will you help me pick out invitations?"
…..
It's most important to show that you understand, that you're really not that different even though we look so different. Our masses are just surface. Anyone can be great, Rose...
A boom in the distance shook Rose out of her reverie, and she practically threw herself out of the rest pod. Pearl was already at the window, staring out at the smoke rising over the skyline.
Rose's holo-cast flashed and beeped with incoming messages from just about everyone she knew. Someone on the street below was screaming. The emergency response ship was hurtling towards the smoke pillar, lights flashing.
"You stay here," she told Pearl, summoning her shield. "I could be gone for a while."