It's been decades since she's had an… event, quite this bad.
There's nothing in particular that triggered it. She'll sit down and analyze the situation later, picking at all the little details for hours upon hours until Sapphire finds her and tells her to stop. But she can't pin it on anything specific, any one single event. It's cumulative, the buildup of half a dozen little things that stick to her soul like burrs on Steven's clothing.
Steven and Amethyst were gone first thing in the morning, with no indication of where they'd disappeared to. Garnet, similarly, was out on a mission until the early afternoon; leaving Pearl to worry and wonder and clean the beach house by her lonesome. Eventually Garnet returns, having added several more bubbles to the Temple, and she can fill Pearl in - the pair are gone skateboarding with the small posse of humans Steven has affectionately nicknamed the Cool Kids.
Pearl spends the next hour researching everything she can about this human pastime. It seems markedly more dangerous than the two-wheeled transportation device Steven regularly employs - this one has more wheels, but the riders seem inclined to foolish stunts and acrobatics that end with skinned knees at best, broken bones or fatalities at worst. Amethyst is impulsive; Pearl instinctively knows that she will be egging on the trio of humans (and one half-human), encouraging ridiculous attempts at these tricks, and probably without any of the regulation safety equipment. They'd had no struggle encouraging Steven to use helmets and pads, having well-instilled into him by now the value of safety, but would he think about it with this new sport, with three strange humans nearly twice his age, and with Amethyst of all people being his guardian?
After that thought, Pearl can't help it; she goes to take careful stock of their medical supplies, first raiding the bathroom cabinet and then searching through their loft storage. Band-aids, neosporin, wraps, braces, a pair of crutches that Greg had left behind one day - is that enough material to be suitable for broken limbs? What if it's something worse? She isn't sure. She's only tended marginally to the the advances in human medicine, and only since they became responsible for Steven. Steven is half-Gem, but he's also half-human, and that is by far the most frail part of him: half of immortality is mortality.
After that, she waits.
It isn't until the sun is setting that Steven finally comes back, shins and elbows scraped, sunburned, having eaten nothing but unhealthy junk foods all day that would eventually kill him as surely as any accident. He immediately runs off to slap on some aloe and bandages - he is old enough to do it himself by now - so that leaves her free to tirade into Amethyst, who of course is having none of it.
"He's FINE, Pearl! Gosh, you act like I don't know anything -"
"He wasn't wearing any safety equipment! What if he had -– broken something?" Pearl can't bring herself to mention anything worse but she's imagining it. It's like her own horrific future vision, but all the outcomes are bad. Is she the only one who sees the consequences to anything?
They go back and forth for awhile until Garnet breaks it up. Steven returns then, and they put aside their differences long enough to settle Steven in with a board game. There's still tension there, thin but palpable, and as soon as Steven declares it to be his own bedtime, the three of them (and Peridot) part ways immediately, no longer having a catalyst to draw them together. Amethyst stomps off somewhere, Garnet tends to Steven, Peridot goes back to hiding in the bathroom once Steven has vacated it, and Pearl takes the warp.
She isn't certain where she's going. She needs to do something. She isn't allowed to watch Steven sleep any more, and she can't bear to not watch him when she's within range. Steven would not have been kidnapped if she'd been watching, of that she is certain - what if Malachite returns, or something else from Homeworld? What if -
She stops by the Geode. The duct tape is holding - for how long, they don't know. This is where Steven lost his healing powers, however briefly. It should have worked, shouldn't it? They don't know nearly enough. She's deduced that they won't work on himself, most likely; otherwise he would never accrue injuries, and he most certainly has. Even if they could, if he loses confidence at a critical moment - humans are known to be volatile when they are injured or desperate. Steven is good at keeping his head, but he's just a child. He may stay that way for decades if he so decides.
She doesn't want to stay here. The stone is in a holding pattern. She takes the warp pad again. Thick hedges filled with hidden thorns, a tunnel hollowed through. No, she doesn't need to check on the fountain. The tears still work; she is certain of that in her synthesized heart. As long as the fountain flows -
She checks on the fountain. It's flowing.
But she doesn't want to stay here, either, so she makes another jump, trying to find somewhere she can feel safe, settled. She gets a brief glimpse of a beautiful starlit night, shadowed greenery, the scent of strawberries -
Pearl jumps before her throat seizes.
She makes a few more tries, but none of them are places she wants to stay. She is starting to feel the need for a roof over her head, for some kind of protection, something guarding her back. Maybe she understands now Amethyst's penchant for hiding in her Kindergarten hole when she storms off to have a fit; everywhere feels too open, too insecure. This isn't the war anymore but it's hard to remember sometimes that she doesn't have to hide, doesn't have to fear the open. It's been five thousand years but sometimes it still isn't long enough.
She stops in the desert, and by the time she does, it's true midnight. She makes a break from the warp pad in case someone is watching; she bolts and the desert sand flies out behind her in wide arcs, advertising her position. She stops after a dozen miles and then moves slowly, covering her tracks as thoroughly as she can, watching out for ambushes. The stars are bright; good to lead her way, but it means she needs to stick to cover, and the further away from the warp pad she gets, the fewer standing pillars there are to use as cover. She moves from pillar to pillar, but they're getting further and further away, and eventually she has nowhere left to go.
Things get - blurry, after that. She slides down, keeping her back to the pillar, and she draws in her legs, holding her head in her hands. Every noise, every whisper of wind against the sand and every chirp of some gem beast in the desert - it's too loud, too vibrant. The stars are beautiful but there's too many of them, they're too bright in the sky, and the pinpricks against her eyes are like the beginnings of a migraine. The desert is too open - but the distance between the pillars seems to widen and stretch and she can't head back, either. The sand is everywhere, a thousand different gritty, annoying sensations against her skin. It's too much; too loud, and she will be trapped here until morning at the earliest and then where will she hide?
Gems don't need to breathe, inherently. They don't need to blink. They don't even need to experience physical sensations. Over the centuries they have adapted stomachs, lungs, hearts, the better to relate to humans, to blend in, to understand. Pearl sucks in breath like she needs it to live, trying to feed oxygen to her lungs, but it doesn't help, it isn't calming. The air stings her lungs and something thick and heavy coats her throat, making breathing all the more difficult. Saltwater stings her eyes. She can't keep enough in, or out.
It feels like her form is trying to fly apart; like she will explode into a thousand motes of light and poof inside her gem and never reemerge. She'll be cracked and no one will find her here. She keeps her hands clamped to her head and draws in her arms and knees, trying to hold herself together before her gem can shatter. The force of her breathing, her nervous tics, rocks her back and forth in the sand, and she can't stop it; the motion is the only thing keeping her centered. But it's too much noise and someone is going to find her here, she needs to run but she can't move she can't move-
She isn't certain how much time passes. But gradually there is a weight spreading over her shoulders; something thick and warm and heavy that feels like shelter. It spells hiding to Pearl, spells safety. The weight holds her together. Her form stops trying to fly apart at the seams. It becomes a little easier to breathe.
She hears a voice, muffled and distant at first as though it was echoing across the desertscape; it starts becoming easier to hear the more she concentrates. It's rough, raspy, insistent; it runs counter to all the lights and noise that are drowning her.
"- come on, P, breathe with me. In and out, okay? Here we go, just listen to me - "
It's a lifeline in the storm. She grabs onto it, holds with all her might, trying to follow the directions. She breathes in sync, and it gets a little easier each time. Her world narrows down to the words being fed to her, to the warmth against her side and across her shoulders. Breathe. In and out.
Eventually she can parse what is happening. It's Amethyst. The purple Gem is kneeling next to her, one arm slung across her shoulders. It's still nighttime; the sands are cold underneath her, still gritty and unpleasant. Her tunic is soaked with sweat; her face and hair are ragged, wet with tears. But she can breathe again, painful as it is, and she can feel the wind against her skin. It's more soothing than before, even though the grit is everywhere and makes her shift uncomfortably, trying to get it off of her.
"I brought a blanket," Amethyst says, eventually. "You want it?"
Pearl makes a muted noise of assent. Amethyst removes the heavy arm from her shoulders, but only long enough to grab the blanket from a cheeseburger-shaped backpack and spread it out. She helps Pearl shift to the blanket and then drapes the arm back over her shoulder. Pearl burrows into the warmth. With a layer between her and the sand, and Amethyst's arm over her shoulders, she starts to feel a bit more normalized.
She's too exhausted for shame. All the tears she could synthesize have been cried by now. Leaning into Amethyst's warmth, the bone-deep tiredness settles into her, and she can't keep her eyes open for long. Sleep is another refuge normally denied to Gems, but in her current state she can no longer resist its lure.
Her rest is ragged, uneven. Constantly on the verge of nightmare, she is woken up several times throughout the night. She slips in Amethyst's arms; she gets an elbow in the ribs; she slides off the blanket and the grittiness of the sand rouses her into partial wakefulness, the fragments of her dream-projections sparking out of existence in the air above them.
Accidents, Amethyst claims.
Pearl is too tired to complain. Eventually, she settles into deep dreamless sleep, and this time she remains that way.
The sun prods her awake in the morning; a slow-moving ray of light and warm that creeps across her body. She stirs into wakefulness to find herself cradled in Amethyst's lap, feet dangling out haphazardly. Amethyst is still asleep, back against the broken pillar, arms locked around Pearl. The blanket is pulled up around the two of them. Pearl is tangled up in Amethyst's mane; any attempt to extricate herself will painfully rouse the younger Gem.
Pearl waits. It's warm, but not so hot yet as to be uncomfortable. She's bedraggled, and still weary, but she's feeling - better. She doesn't remember why she was so anxious. It's difficult to feel upset with the desert lit up in golds and pinks, with her face burrowed into Amethyst's shoulder. Here, held, home. It's still too much effort to think much more than that, and with nowhere to go, gradually she dozes off again.
When she wakes up yet again, Amethyst is sitting up and waiting, having untangled most of her hair from Pearl's limbs. She looks to Pearl with her usual lopsided smile, but it's cautious, uncertain.
"Heya, P," Amethyst says. "Uh…. better?"
"Yes," Pearl agrees, taking a slow breath and finding herself able to keep it steady. "Much better, I think. ...thank you, Amethyst."
"Okay," Amethyst replies, quietly. It seems to reassure her. After a few more moments that are comfortable but not awkward, the pair disentangle themselves completely. Pearl pieces herself back together, absently fixing her hair and straightening her outfit while Amethyst folds up the blanket and stuffs it into the backpack.
"So, uh, it's a long way back," Amethyst says, glancing up once she's done, holding the backpack by a single strap.
"Several dozen miles, at least," Pearl agrees, distractedly glancing onto the horizon. Amethyst's hopeful tone doesn't sink in for a few long moments and she could nearly slap herself once she recognizes it. Amethyst is subtly making an offer. It's kind - she is tempted to say no, she'll be alright, but maybe they could both use the moment together.
"I think Opal would cover the distance fastest," Pearl says, and is rewarded with a cheeky lopsided grin.
A short dance later, Opal stretches into existence. She twists, balances, becomes familiar with herself; then, orienting herself with the aid of the sunrise, she begins her long trek back to the warp pad. Her progress is unhurried. They both wish to enjoy the time alone together, the warmth of the desert sun, the peace.
(They return several hours later to pick up the forgotten backpack, before Steven notices it's gone.)