Sapphire's first memory was of crushing weight on all sides and a sharp cold wrapping around her - a blanket with none of the comfort. Her vision was slow to establish itself, her single eye casting a sheen of blue light that made little difference in the steep darkness of the crack that held her. Sapphire tested the movements of her new form, finding it hard to move anything wedged as she was, back flush against smooth ice and limbs braced awkwardly against the opposite wall. Despite her senses still being a little jumbled - was that her foot that itched or her elbow? - Sapphire eventually noted a particular strain when she moved her right hand.
Disgruntled, and with panic sprouting at the base of her neck, she craned her head as far back as it would go in an attempt to get some sort of bearing on her surroundings. The walls were tall and looming, with few to no chinks or cracks to make climbing easier. Even if she'd had free reign of her limbs, scaling her way out was likely out of the question. Sapphire frowned, but pushed the problem aside for later. One thing at a time. As she continued her scan, she thanked whatever luck she had that she'd at least formed right side up - she imagined this entire situation would be exponentially more difficult otherwise. Her eye traveled further upward until she noticed a distant glow: faint, but enough to illuminate the opening of the jagged fissure like a beacon.
Sapphire just had to figure out how to get there.
She gave another tug at her right hand, hearing an unpleasant chink and grunting at the pain that lanced up her shoulder. Shifting again, Sapphire groped her free fingers along the ice that held her hostage, curling them around the edges of the small crevice. If she just pulled hard enough, she could crack the ice and wiggle her hand free. Then she'd worry about scaling the wall. She grit her teeth and pulled as hard as her position allowed, feeling the cold seep deeper into her flesh with each second that passed. After a minute or two of continuous effort, Sapphire slumped forward with an exhausted groan, tired arms, and nothing to show for it. She pillowed her forehead against the ice, closing her eye and casting her thoughts about for another escape plan.
A faint ringing in her ears accompanied a fuzzy and disjointed mess of impressions flashing in her mind's eye.
Cracking ice, an intoxicating surge of energy, trillions of tiny lights whirling above her on a dark backdrop and three curving swaths of inky black cutting through them all. Spiraling towers and pillars of ice, looming but no longer confining. Speed and wind and everything falling away beneath her as she rose higher and higher, small right hand outstretched to gather the lights whose names mingled like old friends in the back of her mind. A blue stone, cut with the image of a triangle and set into her reaching palm, magnified and threw back their scant light.
Sapphire came back to herself with a headache and more questions than answers. That was… odd. If she weren't so certain that this was her first formation, Sapphire would've thought the images were fragmented memories. But what were they, then, that she'd seen them so vividly (even as the details dulled and faded with each second)?
The answer, she found after seconds ticked past, sat calmly in the back of her mind, blurred at the edges as all her senses were in their newness, but there. The scenes were glimpses of the future, a taste of time's cup, and while Sapphire couldn't discern what all of it meant, a skill she hoped came with time, she knew one thing for certain. She wouldn't stay here. Not forever. There had been something about that surge of energy she'd seen. If she just waited for it, freedom would be inevitable. Sapphire shifted her weight, surveying again the walls of her prison.
She only hoped it would come soon.
/\\/\\/
The memory surfaced again nearly two hundred Turns later, when Sapphire sat at the edge of a chasm much wider and far deeper than the one she'd formed in. The planes were silent, as they often were during the serenity of the Stillness, and Sapphire basked in it. The loose fabric of her layered dress hung over the cliff-side and pooled around her. Thin lines of irregularly blinking lights inched resolutely within the ice, their glow distorted and dispersed through the barrier. Sapphire glanced down, spotting a single point of light transition from the ice onto the wall of the chasm, wriggling out of one of the millions of small holes pock-marking the walls to reveal a small round creature, covered in smooth plates and with three short, stocky legs holding fast to the sheer surface. The creature turned itself around on the wall, its many eyes pulsing green as it took in Sapphire, who remained motionless, and the sky beyond her. Seeing no threat, the creature chittered and raised the plating on its back, revealing four thin wings veined with glowing light. It took off and spiraled lazily through the air, circling Sapphire's head once before heading past her towards the distant shape of the nearest city.
Slowly, at first one at a time but coming in thicker and thicker bundles, the other light creatures made their way out of their tunnels and into the air until their light no longer speckled the ice, instead weaving and spinning thick trails of bioluminescent greens and blues into the sky overhead. Sapphire watched them for a time, idly making pseudo-constellations out of the ever moving stream or spotting a rendition of a constellation she knew by heart, of which there were many, before it melted into something else.
When the sky began to clear again, Sapphire returned her gaze to the depths of the chasm. If the litulen were surfacing, then she would have to return soon. Her hands clutched at the skirt of her dress, and her eye, glowing with less intensity than the litulen's but with enough strength to dispel some of the darkness of the Surface, searched for… something. Sapphire tested the energy in the air, but found only the constant hum of the ice and the quickly dissipating ring of the litulen's energy.
After a time, she sighed and picked herself up, hovering a couple of inches off the ground to put her skirts in order before she touched down again. Today just hadn't been the day, Sapphire supposed. While she'd gained far better control over her Sight in her many Turns on the Surface, there were still problems deciphering fine details. The larger events, or the ones further off into the future, slipped far more easily around the edges of her awareness. The vision that brought her here had been almost as indistinct and jumbled as her first, and had not cleared any time she'd called it since then. The only things she'd been able to interpret with certainty were the location and the general time it would come to pass. The specific cycle, as well as the Turn, eluded her.
She'd come to this spot every cycle for more than three quarters of a season at this point, having first called the vision shortly before the last of the Shaking faded and the Stillness rose. She fretted that at this rate, the vision wouldn't come to pass before the seasons turned again (that, at least, was easy to pinpoint. There was still another 20 cycles before the first tremors of the next Shaking began).
Her Sight, while uncertain at times, was a rare asset to her cluster, allowing a drastic increase in general efficiency and a similar decrease in social unrest. Consequently, she'd been assigned caretakers who were rarely allowed to let her out of their sight, even during the safety of the Stillness. Getting leave to travel alone once their cluster relocated to the Shaking Grounds would be nigh on impossible.
Most of the time, Sapphire didn't mind her retainers' presence - however imposed it was. They were good and competent gems, and they often gave insightful perspectives on her more obscure visions. On any other occasion she would have brought them along on her "investigation".
This vision, however, was born from a personal inquiry rather than a societal one, and she wanted to keep the contents as under the radar as possible. She'd pulled some strings with her superiors and managed to get a few hours' time each cycle to 'meditate' and further strengthen her Sight.
Her caretakers knew more - that she was waiting for a particularly personal vision to come to pass - but no details. They left her alone willingly enough, despite their worry.
"Sapphire, it's time to head back to the city!" A familiar voice called. Sapphire turned to see one of her handlers, Pearl, standing a few feet away, all thin willowy limbs and soft pastel colours even in the faint starlight. "Did you find anything this time?"
"Not yet." Sapphire replied, gliding across the ice to stop at Pearl's side. "But it's only a matter of time."
Pearl nodded, beginning their trek towards the city, "Let's only hope it comes before the Shaking. Stars know how you'd get here without getting hit by an avalanche, or falling into an ice sink, or getting caught in a hail storm..." She fretted for a moment, slender fingers propped over her chin, "And that's assuming you get permission to leave in the first place."
"I'll manage if it comes to that." Sapphire hummed, only slightly deterred despite her own musings in the same direction. Her visions had a way of working themselves out.
A short silence fell between the two, and Sapphire could see the faint light of Pearl's eyes swivel towards her several times before moving back to the ice ahead. The soft sound of the taller gem's mouth opening carried in the still air, and Sapphire sighed.
"We've gone over this, Pearl. I can't tell you."
"And why not?" Pearl shot back, eyes flashing, "You've never had a problem with telling me - telling us - your visions before. What's so different this time?"
Sapphire continued walking, calm and collected with fingers laced across her frock. "It's personal. None of your concern."
She could almost feel the look Pearl directed at her back, crawling and wounded. But her pace stayed constant, her shoulders stayed straight. Pearl wouldn't understand, none of their kin would. Sapphire had seen it, both with and without her Sight.
Unfortunately, Pearl understood the situation - understood Sapphire - enough to guess. She always had been a quick learner.
"Is it about those gems that come trade with us?" She asked, voice low and dangerously soft, "About wherever it is they live?"
That made Sapphire's steady pace falter, though she still didn't turn or answer. It was nonetheless enough for Pearl, who had known her since she'd dragged herself from the fissure she'd formed in. She gasped, scandalized, and Sapphire winced beneath her bangs.
"Sapphire, I thought we'd spoken some sense into you. There's nothing of interest down there."
Sapphire bit back her retort, because they had had this conversation before, many times in fact, and if Pearl hadn't understood then, she wouldn't understand now. "We should hurry." she said instead, starting once more towards the city, "The work period will begin soon."
"I just want you to stay safe." Pearl said after another pregnant pause, "The First moved up here because whatever's beneath the ice is dangerous."
Sapphire remained as silent as ever until they reached the city gates. Then she tilted her head just enough to make eye contact with Pearl, single eye glowing intently even through her bangs. "We don't know that for certain."
"You've seen what their projections are like, Sapphire. They're - they're-"
"Big?"
"Yes. Big. And their energy is like nothing I've ever felt before. Why would they form like that unless there's some sort of danger down there?"
Sapphire pursed her lips and turned back to the city gates - they would only talk each other into circles if she let this go on. So she raised her gem to the scanner. The device gave a chipper beep, and a low moan shook the ice beneath the duo's feet - a pale echo of the Shaking's at times devastating tremors, but nevertheless enough to send some fresh gems into a panic (Sapphire would never admit to the way her own energy flow had spiked and stuttered upon her first encounter with the device). Frosted iron bars clicked and shifted as they pulled away from each other to reveal a city already in motion.
Gems of various shapes and hues hustled and bustled to reach their destinations, carrying whatever trappings were necessary for the projects they'd worked on during the observation period. Paints and scrolls and scales and spools jangled and clacked together, a stark contrast to the still and carrying quiet of the planes outside the walls.
Accustomed to the abrupt atmospheric change after Turns of immersion, Sapphire wasted no time inserting herself into the stream of gems, trusting Pearl to do the same as she turned her already waking Sight to the work period ahead. Images of booming sound and streaks of light brighter than she'd ever seen, along with two blurry figures - at once familiar and strangers in the way only her Sight could manage - filed away patiently into the back of her mind. The time would come when she would encounter them first-hand.
All she had to do was wait.
A/N: If it isn't obvious, this is an AU. The gems work... mostly the same as they do in canon, but they live strictly on one planet instead of being an intergalactic empire, and fusions are separate beings from their component parts. There's a few other minor changes, but they'll be explained as the story progresses (hopefully).
I originally planned on having Ruby and Garnet's introductions here as well, but they're fighting me, so I decided to post them separately.
Feel free to tell me anything that might have been too confusing or wordy or the like. I'm always up for some concrit!
Edit: Made some changes for clarity's sake. Nothing too large story-wise