Note: Self indulgent AU where Blue Diamond's pearl joins the rebellion. Because I need every pearl to be angry & safe & free.
Warning for slavery, abuse, trauma, homeworld shittiness.
"I need a standard risk/reward analysis for this assignment," Blue Diamond says out loud to the open air, and you immediately snap upright and focus, an indistinct light already wafting from your chest.
Of course a need of Blue Diamond's is never really spoken to the open air. Of course a command like that never needs to be directed. If there is something Blue Diamond needs, it will presently materialize beside her, and she needn't distract herself with looking something like you in the eye.
You run through the data you've been given. As Blue Diamond's personal pearl, you have nearly unlimited access, of course.
The fortunetelling sapphire has a good track record with crises, you've been informed. She's calm and considered, and never acts rashly, and she's never been wrong. She's dependable, but too valuable to risk. You are going to recommend a quartz, or at least four or five rubies for her exclusively.
By the time the envoy is ready to go, and some of your suggestions have been adopted, and some overlooked, and none acknowledged, naturally – what a meaningless thing to point out – you've learned quite a bit about the potential colony in question. You now know a little bit about its geology and ecosystem, its estimated life expectancy, its native population, but – much more interestingly, you now know a lot about its rumors, some confirmed and some tentative and some wildly silly.
And so, when Blue Diamond confirms her attendance on this mission, you feel – mortifyingly, helplessly, and very, very secretly – pleased.
There's a decent probability that you'll run into a certain group of notorious dangerous criminals, and you can't help being thrilled at the prospect.
.
The small group of persistent rebels, such as it is, evidently consists of exactly two gems, one of them a pearl, as advertized. She's dressed very simply and smiles very unpleasantly, and you instinctively know she has only herself to please. You watch her cut through the loud self-assured quartz captains as if they're basic training holograms, watch her skip right past Blue Diamond as if she can't feel her gaze like a barbed net poised to tighten.
You watch as the sapphire's vision is subverted entirely, watch as she fuses with one of her guards, and you watch as they abandon their duties and run away together. You watch as the remaining delegate members around you lose focus and direction and descend into murmuring chaos.
You watch, careful and practiced, and you catch the fraction of moment when Blue Diamond stops watching.
And through that tiny, temporary gap, you slip away.
.
You've learned a respectable amount about this half-wild planet, enough to know it doesn't contain very many things that can really threaten you, and enough to know that it isn't altogether all that large. Still, you spend your day and a half of searching drenched in an unnecessary layer of cold sweat, shaking uncontrollably with the possibly of being found, and the possibility of never finding what you need to.
But you are replaceable, you tell yourself over and over, much more replaceable than the number of other delegates it would take to mount a proper retrieval squad. And after a day and a half, there isn't the vaguest hint of a breath from Blue Diamond, and you have already found what you're looking for.
The sapphire and one of the rubies' fusion is already there. She looks at you with wide eyes, and you feel vaguely glad that she's survived. Then you're somewhat distracted by the sharp points of two slim swords pointed directly at your nose.
"Uh," you say, high and shaky and perfectly unhelpful.
"Pearl," says the leader of the rebellion, fond and exasperated.
"Oh, it's you," says the renegade pearl, but doesn't lower her swords. "What do you want?"
"I – I –" you stammer uselessly.
The fusion steps forward, looking surer of herself now, seemingly on familiar ground. "Does Blue Diamond have a message for us?" she asks you, firm but calm. "She can't have sent you to capture us on your own."
"She could be a spy," the pearl says, adjusting her swords even closer to your face.
The leader lays a hand on the pearl's shoulder, and the pearl immediately, perceptibly relaxes. "Pearl, look at her, please," she says. "She's terrified."
"I – I – I'm not terrified!" you finally find your voice to say, outraged and desperate and trying not to hope. "I'm brave and strong enough to be here, so you'd better let me stay!"
The pearl scowls at you. "What? What are you talking about?" she demands. "Tell us why Blue Diamond sent you."
"Nobody's sent me! I came on my own!" You tilt your chin up to look at her, sweep her swords aside. Your bangs slide and tumble from your eyes. "I – I want to join the rebellion!" you proclaim.
There's a brief, inscrutable silence. The two swords vanish into the pearl's forehead, but her scowl remains. "What is this, random misfit recruitment day," the pearl mutters, and you've had quite enough. She doesn't trust you; she doesn't want you. You've risked everything of significance still left in you, fought every instinct, every urge drilled into you or adapted naturally, all for this wild, uncertain chance. And if she doesn't understand, then who possibly ever could?
You drift down to the ground, hands unconsciously clasping over your chest, knees folding protectively over them, and tremble silently.
You've made so many terrible mistakes in your too long, drawn out life, and this is absolutely the worst of them all.
You can't say what passes between them in the next several moments. You don't look, and none of them speaks. But there's a shuffling in front of you, and a hand brushing your arm, and then you're pulled upright into the snuggest, warmest, most overwhelmingly sensory hug you've ever received. Touch is scarce for someone like you, especially touch of this kind – no, something like this isn't rare. It's just unprecedented. You're very quickly overwhelmed, and you push at the warm pink form enveloping you, and are immediately released.
"Sorry," the leader tells you with a contrite half smile. "I couldn't help myself."
There's a cough. You look up, and the pearl lightly pats your shoulder once.
"I'd also like to apologize," the pearl whispers to you. "That was entirely unwarranted."
"So," says the leader, satisfied, drawing herself up to look from you to the fusion. "Do either of you want to see our secret base?"
.
The Crystal Gems' secret base is a large cave filled with mossy rocks and surrounded by vegetation so thick it's as effective as any force field, but which easily parts with barely a gesture from the leader.
"This is it," the leader says with evident fondness, "If you're interested in protecting this wondrous little planet – or if you simply enjoy dark, rocky places, I suppose – you're welcome to stick around."
The fusion nods, and turns her attention to gently prodding at fungi with one hand, then the other, with a look of happy concentration.
You wish you could relax like that. "I can't fight at all," you admit to the pearl, who's walked up next to you.
"Well, whatever, that's all right," says the pearl with an arrogant flick of her hair. Then her chin comes down and she smiles and you… flutter. "We'll protect you."
You want to say something a little bit eloquent, or at least yes, please, or even I've been waiting for someone like you for so long.
But the beautifully arrogant pearl has already turned to the leader, something unbearably soft and infinite in her face. "Won't we, Rose?" she asks, and the leader, Rose – could she really be a quartz? But why would a quartz ever choose to leave, when she isn't like you, when she has things to lose – Rose smiles and nods and is palpably tender in return.
They hold that moment between them like a physical thing, and when Rose turns away, you feel as if there's a visible snap.
"Right. I need to know more about you," Rose says to the fusion. "And I think the two of you should have a talk," she adds with a quick glance at you.
The pearl nods. "Come on," she tells you. "I'll show you my favorite rocks."
.
The pearl's favorite rocks are smooth and round and exactly identical to all the others. She touches one of them with a palm and slides down to sit propped up against it on the ground. You imitate her, gathering your feet close.
"If you have any questions, you can ask them," the pearl tells you. "I'm very good at giving explanations."
She must mean questions about the rebellion, their objectives, their reasons for all of it, or something even more practical than that, like their plans for the near future. But there are much more pressing things you want to know. "You call yourself Pearl?" you ask quietly, nearly breathless at your audacity. "Isn't that… painful?"
The pearl winces. "I suppose it is, in some ways. But it's also my choice." She shifts her position, folding her hands in her lap. "Of course, I've never been very creative with this sort of thing."
"What do you mean, your choice? Hadn't that been chosen for you?" you press.
Pearl looks at you, seeming surprised. "Does it seem like they can shape me now?" she asks, nose in the air, oddly shaped gem glinting in the dying light.
No, you think, abruptly, jarringly, envious and admiring. You are so far beyond their reach.
"I'm so scared," you tell her, barely audible.
"I know," she says, frowning and earnest. "I'm still scared, too."
"I can't do this," you admit, ashamed, tugging at your hair.
Pearl shakes her head. "What are you talking about?" she says. "You already have."
You clutch both hands over your gem, rubbing unconsciously. Pearl looks at you very seriously. You want so badly to believe her.
"Um," you say, rub faster. "I think I'd like to try something."
Giving up your physical form voluntarily is not easy. It carries too many unpleasant memories, too. But you aren't going to need much time; you aren't planning to change that much. Just a quick reshaping of your most external parts, just so you don't have to wear her clothes anymore, that don't cover the things you want and don't sit on you at all like they're yours.
Pearl sits silently and watches as you disappear, and she's still sitting and watching when you materialize again, probably no more than half an hour later.
You're wearing loose pants now, like you're some kind of warrior, your shirt reaching up to your shoulders and neck. Your gem is invisible like this, an unforgivable breach of regulation, but you think, maybe a lawless renegade is a bit beyond being outraged.
"Well," says Pearl with a nod. "I'm glad you can finally look like you should."
You feel something building up in your throat, and you try to swallow it, but you can't; you don't want to. You've been resigned for so long, you never thought the seed of bitterness buried deep and secret inside you would ever have a chance to bloom. But now it does, now it has, and you feel nauseous and heavy and giddy with anger, open freeing forbidden anger and dizzying, tantalizing relief.
"Fuck them," you murmur, low and intense and shaking with your uncontainable accumulated fury. "Fuck her."
"That's right," Pearl whispers, smiling lopsidedly, and the terrifying rogue of cautionary tales is crying quietly onto the crumbly alien earth between you, her hands hovering at just the right distance not to be touching but still being felt.
"I don't need her," you say, louder. "I don't need any of the names she gave me."
"You don't." Pearl shakes her head with the sentiment, flicking tears onto your knee.
"I'll figure one out for myself," you decide. Pearl's head bobs up and down now, up and down. "Can I stay with you until then?"
"Until then, until after – I mean, if you want," Pearl says with half a shrug, but she sniffles, too.
You look up at her, and you want to thank her with everything you have, with all the words you've never been too good at and all the expressions you've never let anyone see. But she must have noticed, because she grimaces, and shakes her head.
"Don't say it," Pearl asks you, and finally touches your hand. "You can be strong enough to surpass gratitude."
She isn't that strong yet, you can tell, every time she looks at Rose. But maybe you are, already, and maybe she will be, too. And maybe you will be here long enough to find out.
You tug at her hand, and she lets you pull her into her hug. She holds you very carefully and you wish she'd be firmer, you're shaking so hard, but you can understand why she isn't. And it's fine like this, too. The terrain has softened from her tears and it sticks to your clothes with your movement, but these aren't the clothes you've been given, these are the clothes you have made, and the dirt is only an improvement.
"I'm glad you were able to come here," Pearl tells you when you back away.
"I couldn't have done it without the fusion." Or you, you don't add, in the spirit of strength and not gratitude.
"I couldn't have done it without Rose," says Pearl. "It might all balance out, in the end."
Does that mean you might be able to do that, be that person for somebody else, someday? It seems absurd even to think it. But you have some dirt on your knees and moss between your toes and a place in the secret lair of a group of fearsome rebels, and as you absentmindedly rub your gem through your shirt, you decide you aren't going to make any more predictions, at least for the moment.