"I will now speak to Steven." he began to walk, "you might wanna be there, it might interest you what i came here to tell him." he said, and with that, Pearl walked behind him toward the house.
Steven was still behind the kitchen counter. He wondered whether or not the fighting had stopped. He hoped that Pearl would win, he knew she would, she was probably the most responsible and tactical gem in the group, no way some random guy was going to beat her. He then realized that he was still hiding.
"What am I doing? I have to help Pearl." And with that he stood up and began to make his way to the destroyed front door. He exited out into the deck and saw the man running toward Pearl, he was about to run toward them when he got close to Pearl. They both stopped, and he saw that both were now talking. He then saw the man give Pearl a flower. This made Steven frown. Usually a man gave girl the flower, not fight her before that. Maybe he lost and decided to give her something for beating him. Steven decided.
Steven began to walk down the stairs. As he made his way further down he stopped as they both saw him. Pearl immediately ran toward Steven and put her arms around him.
"Oh Steven, are you ok? Did the explosion hit you?" Pearl began to talk fast, as she does when she's nervous.
"I'm fine Pearl." He confirmed. "At,least you beat him, right? hehe" He chuckled nervously. Pearl flinched and looked away. "Right Pearl? You beat him..." Steven's chuckle slowly stopped.
"Actually, no, he won." Pearl admitted while looking at the man. She then stood up to face him."But I only held back because I know my powers and I swore to protect all life on earth." Pearl said as if making a point and trying not to let Steven think that the gems were vulnerable.
"Keep telling yourself that princess," he walked past her and made his way to Steven. "I won without using a fraction of my skill or weapons." He bent down to get on Steven's eye-level.
"I take it you're Mr Universe." He held out his hand for Steven to shake. Steven just looked at his hand and was hesitant on shaking it.
"Uh- Actually, Mr. Universe is my dad. I'm just Steven Universe." Steven said. He was about shake the hand, but the man got impatient and took it back.
"My apologies, Steven." The man said.
"Do you know why I'm here?" he asked Steven.
Steven looked at Pearl for a second, and she nodded at him with a small smile, telling Steven it was returned his attention to the man "Uhm, you came to ask Pearl on a date after beating her?" Steven asked innocently. The mans face scrunched to a look of incredulity. "What?! No! What kind of way of asking a girl out is that?" He then stopped and put his hand on his chin as if giving it a thought. "Then again... It would be lead to a very interesting date if she said yes." He said aloud, he then snapped back to the task at hand. "Anyway, I'm not here for that. That Rose I gave her was from my client." He said.
"And just who is this client of yours?" Pearl asked as it did concern her. The man turned to her to answer her.
"My client has asked to remain anonymous. But he has confirmed to meet you when the time's right." He turned to Steven before Pearl asked any other question.
"Steven, what do you know about human culture?" He asked him.
"Hmm" Steven pondered. "Well... I have a lot of cool books written by humans, their food is super good, aaand they need the Crystal Gems when the town's in trouble." Steven smiled at the last comment, proud of being a Crystal Gem himself. This however made the man frown slightly.
"Really, is that so?"
"Yup." confirmed Steven.
"Are you proud of being human?" The man asked.
"I...uhm" Steven began to think, what was he proud about his humanity, he hardly knew about his human heritage compared to the Gems. "I guess not much. But I do have friends who are humans and I know they make money, have jobs, go to school, and care about each other." He smiled at the thought of all the people in Beach City.
"Really?" The man said. He paused for a second. He turned toward Pearl with a frown. "It appears that I am needed here." Pearl was shocked and nervous. The man got closer to her as if he was about to angrily shout at her. "You are responsible for taking care of Steven. He is half human and you're only teaching him about Gem culture, he doesn't know anything important about humans." The man's voice was bordering on emotional anger, but professionally maintaining his composure. Pearl was feeling a little guilty, but noticed something in his minor rant.
"Wait, how did you know Steven is half human?" She said. Pearl expected to have him stutter or pause because she thought he knew something he shouldn't and decided to pick on that.
"I know just as much as you do." He said, almost as if what he said was true. "My client informed me a lot of you gems." He looked at Pearl with a look that dared her to continue the subject. "But we're getting out of topic." He turned back to Steven. "Steven, I am here to teach you about your humanity, especially human history. I am hired to do exactly that. But I need to know that you want to. " He said. He was waiting for Steven to answer him.
Steven was considering about his offer.
He knew about his lack of human history, and the outside world. But he didn't feel safe with this man. In fact, not at all, he beat up Pearl, and destroyed the doorway. Steven wanted to learn more about his human side, but not from this man. Steven clenched his fist.
"No. You beat up Pearl. You damaged our house." He pointed at where the door used to be. The man looked up too, and chuckled nervously and scratched the back of his head.
"I mean yeah, but-" He was about to continue when Steven stopped him.
"Stop, I don't need you to teach me. You are mean and you're dangerous. Get off our property." Steven said as his final word. The mans face went to one of disappointment, and a failure for himself. He sighed.
"Well, I guess I didn't get through to you, did I?" He gave Steven an apologetic look. "Look I'm going to be in town for a few days, so just let me know if you change your mind." He turned around, and began walking away from the beach.
Steven and Pearl were both relieved that he decided not to put up a fight.
As they saw him leave, Pearl turned to Steven.
"That was very brave of you Steven, and I know its hard for you to label others as mean." She put her hand on his shoulder. "Thanks." She smiled at him, and he did the same. "Now, lets fix that door before Amethyst and Garnet sho-" Before Pearl finished her sentence, they saw a light emit from the house. They saw Garnet, with Amethyst following close behind, walk out into the deck and turn to them. She looked at the doorway, then jumped high and landed in front of them, before saying.
"Explain."
