Author's Notes: Oh my goodness, you guys! I was honestly not expecting the amount of hits this story got, especially for the first chapter! Hopefully I did a decent enough job that you'll keep coming back to it! Thank you all!


Amethyst sighed as she made her way out of the temple and toward the boardwalk in search of something to do. Ever since Pearl had tricked Garnet into fusing with her to destroy the communication hub, the two hadn't been speaking. There had been nothing but horrible tension in the temple for the past few days and she and Steven were starting to feel crushed under the weight of it all. Steven had been lucky enough to get to go on a roadtrip with Greg and Garnet but it hadn't really done much to alleviate the tension; Garnet was still refusing to actively speak to Pearl outside of necessity. It was driving Amethyst insane and she needed to find a reason to stay out of the temple for a while.

She had almost reached the boardwalk when she noticed a familiar head of red and blue streaks. Sure enough, Kinzie was sitting on the beach playing fetch with Dante. Once again, Amethyst felt drawn to the girl for some inexplicable reason and began walking over to her almost involuntarily.

"Hey," Amethyst greeted, causing Kinzie to jump.

"Oh, hi," Kinzie replied. "It's... Amethyst, right?"

Amethyst nodded. "Yeah. Met you the other day." She paused, glancing around awkwardly for a moment before looking back at Kinzie. "Do you mind if I sit with you?"

"Not at all," Kinzie said, gesturing to the spot beside her. The two sat together in silence for a moment, taking turns throwing the stick for Dante, before Kinzie looked back over at Amethyst. "Is everything okay? You look a little down."

Amethyst shrugged. "Just problems at home, I guess. It's kind of a long story. But I had to get out of that temple or I was going to hurt someone."

"I have time," Kinzie replied simply. "But if you don't want to talk about it, I get it." After a few more minutes of playing fetch, Kinzie turned back to the purple Gem. "Do you want to come back to my place for a bit? I was planning on making a video later. Maybe you'd like to be in it with me? It'd give you an excuse to steer clear of the temple."

"I don't know anything about video games," Amethyst said.

"So?" Kinzie said. "I'll do all the playing. You just have to chill with me and make jokes about whatever happens during the game."

"You know what?" Amethyst replied after thinking it over for a moment. "That actually does sound like fun. I was a little curious about how the whole thing worked anyway."

"And I've never recorded with another person before," Kinzie added as she stood up. "This could be a learning experience for both of us."

The walk to Kinzie's house was a pleasant one. Being a resident of Beach City meant that Kinzie had at least a basic knowledge of the Crystal Gems and Amethyst filled in whatever gaps were left as well as explaining more about who and what the Gems were. She'd even gone so far as to explain fusion to Kinzie and the emotional significance it held for all of them, Garnet especially.

"So does this fusion thing have anything to do with why you're so down?" Kinzie asked.

"Yeah, it does," Amethyst answered. She took a breath before beginning the story. "So, remember how I told you that the giant green hand ship was full of Gems that wanted to destroy us and how two of them fused together and dragged themselves into the ocean somewhere?" She waited for Kinzie to nod before continuing. "Well, the last Gem on the ship, Peridot, managed to get to her escape pod before the ship crashed. We found her ship but no Peridot. So we've been looking for her ever since."

"'Peridot'... 'Peridot...' Why does that name ring a bell?" Kinzie muttered before snapping her fingers in realization. "Oh, wait! Wasn't she that green chick that was on TV a few days ago?" Kinzie's expression darkened a bit. "Girl interrupted my show. I was in the middle of a really good episode of Kitchen Nightmares when she showed up. Ugh, I am so peeved right now."

Amethyst couldn't help but laugh at that. "Yeah, that was her. But anyway, we went to the communication hub where she had broadcast the signal and Garnet and Pearl fused to destroy it. But the hub kept getting repaired somehow, so Steven and I went to investigate and catch Peridot if we could. That's when we found out that Pearl had been repairing the hub the whole time."

"Why would she do that, though?" Kinzie asked.

"So Garnet would keep fusing with her," Amethyst said with a sigh. "Well when Garnet found out, she was furious. I don't think I'd ever seen her that angry before. She and I ended up fusing to destroy the hub for good but now she and Pearl aren't speaking."

"I don't mean to be ignorant about this, but why is fusing with Garnet such a big deal?" Kinzie asked.

"Garnet's the strongest out of all of us," Amethyst answered. "Fusing with her gives me and Pearl a sort of...power high, I guess. It makes us feel untouchable. It's such an awesome feeling that it makes us want to fuse with her whenever we can. That's why, while I understand why Garnet's so angry about all this, I can kind of understand where Pearl's coming from too. Fusing with Garnet gives us a feeling of strength and power that neither of us have on our own."

Kinzie was silent for a moment, processing what Amethyst had told her. Finally, she looked over to her. "I know haven't had a chance to meet Pearl yet, but I think you're pretty awesome all by yourself."

"You do?" Amethyst asked.

Kinzie nodded. "I know your abilities may not seem like much to you but, to a regular human like me, you're amazing. Not just in terms of your powers, either; I mean your personality too. Considering all you've gone through, and I'm sure there's more than what you've told me, you've come out of remarkably well. And you were so young when it all happened too. That's all the proof you need of how strong you are."

Amethyst could count the number of times she'd been stunned into silence on one hand. This was one of those times. She couldn't do anything more than stare at Kinzie as they finally approached her house, Kinzie unlocking the front door and letting them inside.

"I wish I could offer you more encouragement with the whole thing between Garnet and Pearl," Kinzie continued as she let Dante off his leash. "But this is something that they're going to have to work out. Garnet needs to get to a point where she feels like she can trust Pearl again and Pearl needs to understand that these things take time."

Amethyst nodded. "Yeah, I know. To be honest, though, I feel a lot better now that I've vented about it. Thanks for listening, Kinzie. I appreciate it." She took a breath before smiling up at Kinzie again. "So. What about this video we're supposed to make?"


A few moments later, Kinzie had finally set up all of the equipment she would need to record. She had opted out of using her reaction camera for the video; there was no way to angle the camera in a way that it would adequately capture both of them.

"Okay so... What am I supposed to do?" Amethyst asked as Kinzie got ready to turn on the mic and start the video, the main menu of Vampires: The Masquerade looming in front of them on the computer screen.

"Just act natural," Kinzie replied. "I know it's a little weird with all these machines here but just act like you're having a normal conversation with me and the viewers." When Amethyst still didn't look convinced, Kinzie continued with, "Just follow my lead. You'll do fine." With that, she turned on the mic and started in with the introduction. "What's up, guys? This is Marble Onyx."

"And this is... Marble Amethyst, I guess," Amethyst added. "Dang girl, you were right. Adding 'Marble' makes any name sound cooler."

"Told you so," Kinzie replied before addressing the audience again and loading up the game. "Amethyst is going to be joining us today on a wonderful trip back to Pretentious Douche-Bag Simulator."

"I still don't see why you think your character is such a-," Amethyst cut herself off when she saw Kinzie's avatar walk into the frame. "Ugh, nevermind, I totally see it now. What's going on with that walk, man? Why you gotta move your shoulders that much? Walking like that can't be comfortable."

The rest of the day carried on in a similar fashion. Kinzie had never recorded a Let's Play with another person before but she had to admit that she had truly enjoyed herself with Amethyst. Amethyst, for her part, found herself falling into the groove of a Tubetuber relatively quickly and found that playing games with Kinzie provided a sense of normalcy that she had never really known. There were no Gems or Gem powers, there was no Peridot, and, most importantly, there was no constant reminder of what she really was.


Amethyst watched Kinzie work on editing the video from her place on the couch, munching on the soda can Kinzie had been drinking from earlier.

"So how does it work exactly?" Amethyst asked. "This whole 'making videos for the internet and earning money' thing?"

"Well, it's kind of complicated," Kinzie replied, not looking up from her computer screen. "The short version is that companies pay Tubetube to advertise on their site. If a Tubetuber becomes popular and attracts a significant number of followers, that means that a number of people are watching their videos and seeing those ads, which makes Tubetube more money. Once they see that a Tubetuber consistently gets a large number of hits on their videos, Tubetube will offer the user a contract that states that, in exchange for a cut of the profits from the advertising companies, the Tubetuber will produce a certain number of videos each week. The more popular a Tubetuber gets, the more videos they're asked to produce and, in turn, the more money they earn."

"It sounds like views are the most important thing here, though," Amethyst pointed out. "Why does it matter how many subscribers you have?"

"Well, my subscribers receive notifications whenever I upload a new video which is usually a good indication that they watch them regularly," Kinzie answered. "The logic is that, if a Tubetuber has a large number of subscribers, they most likely have significant traffic to their channel and videos, which means more views, which means more money for Tubetube."

"I guess that makes sense," Amethyst said. "I just never realized how much work went into making videos."

"It's a full time job, just like any other," Kinzie replied.

"Do you ever get worn out from playing video games? I'd think doing it for a living might make it seem like less fun." Amethyst pointed out.

"It does get tiring, I'll admit," Kinzie said. "But never because of the games. You've probably already realized that I'm not really one for socializing. I've always been really introverted, so it can be tiring for me to act all party-hardy in front of the camera." She paused for a moment. "You know, now that I think about it, today was the first time it's ever felt natural for me to act like that."

Amethyst smiled. "Then maybe we should do this more often. I had a lot of fun today too. And you're a pretty chill person, Kinzie. Even if we're not playing games together, I definitely think we should hang out more." She sat up abruptly as she caught a glimpse of the night sky from Kinzie's window. "Oh dang, what time is it?"

"Almost ten," Kinzie answered after checking the clock on her computer.

"Aww man," Amethyst groaned. "I totally lost track of the time! I'm gonna have Pearl drilling me as soon as I get back about where I was." She sighed, pushing herself off the couch. "I've gotta get going, Kinzie. Do you think we could do this again sometime, though?"

Kinzie nodded, smiling back at Amethyst. "Oh yeah! This was the most fun I've had in a while. I think you're absolutely right that we should hang out more." She stood and walked over to her friend. "You're welcome here anytime, Amethyst. Actually..." She walked over to grab a small piece of paper off of her computer desk, scribbled something on it, then walked back to Amethyst and handed the paper to her. "Give this to Steven when you get back home. If you get him to show you how to use his phone, you can use that number to call or text me whenever you want."

"Will do," Amethyst replied. "Thanks, Kinzie."


Kinzie spent the rest of her evening editing and then uploading the video she and Amethyst had made, not heading to bed until the wee hours of the morning as per usual. So she wasn't especially happy when Ronaldo called her the next afternoon, waking her up.

"Ronaldo, I love you but this had better be important," Kinzie ground out.

"I'm assuming you haven't been on Tubetube yet today," Ronaldo replied, unfazed by Kinzie's groggy irritation.

"Of course not," Kinzie spat out, rolling her eyes. "It's noon-thirty. You know perfectly well that I'm not awake right now unless I have to be."

"Well you might want to check it out when you can," Ronaldo continued. "The video that you posted last night was a pretty big hit, apparently. The 'Marble Onyx' tag is trending as we speak."

"What are you saying, Ronaldo?" Kinzie asked, all traces of drowziness and irritation gone.

"I'm saying you just went viral."


Ending Notes: Once again, any feedback you guys have for me is more than welcome!

Thanks for reading! Geekinthepink, out!