Rose stood over Steven's bed, smiling warmly down at him as he slept, clearly exhausted from his day with Connie. As he snored the Gem in his forehead began to glow faintly, she bounced in place clapping her hands together and stifling a laugh. Leaning over to look down into the rest of the house she motioned for Garnet and Amethyst who'd been sitting on the couches below. They each nodded and quietly made their way up the stairs. Well Garent was quiet Amethyst was munching away on popcorn. They laid in a semi circle on one side of his bed grinning as they stared up.

"What do you think it'll be today? I bet it's the one where he's fighting those nasty bunny things." Amethyst said as she dumped the remains of her popcorn and the paper box that had contained it into her mouth."

"No no it has to he the one with Connie, he has to have that one after today." Rose offed holding back another giggle as Garnet sushed them.

"It's starting." Garnet pointed upward and the other two Gems turned to watch as Steven's dream was broadcast.

Pearl, or rather Pearl as she appeared around the time of Greg's arrival stood by the warp pad of the temple, the house the Gems and Steven now resided not yet constructed. She looked around anxiously, tapping her foot, arms crossed in front of her chest.

"Where are they, they said they'd be back by. . ." Before she could finish her sentence the warp activated and Garnet and Rose stepped out. "Well?" Pearl asked impatiently, mostly to Garnet, but it was Rose who spoke.

"The Galaxy warp is still disabled, nothing to be concerned about. Where's Amethyst?" Rose asked looking around for her.

"Off being a dog or a hawk or a millipede or some such thing." Pearl answered with a shrug shaking her head . "Rose. . .I was hoping you'd like to take a walk down the beach tonight, it's been so long since we spent some time alone. . .just the two of us." Rose turned to Pearl remorse filled eyes.

"I'm so sorry Pearl I already agreed to monitor Amethyst's fusion training with Garnet tonight, They're going to form Sugilite out in the desert to ensure if they get a little. . .over zealous no humans will be hurt and I need you to watch the temple, make sure no humans hop the fence." Pearl sighed and hung her head in resignation, nodding as Rose laid a hand on her shoulder. "Maybe tomorrow?" Pearl forced a smile and looked up, nodding again and Rose smiled back before returning to her room as Garnet set off to look for Amethyst. Pearl sat on the edge of the warp pad, looking out at the ocean and the steadily setting sun, and sang.

"Maybe tomorrow, maybe a thousand years from now

What difference would it make?

I'm offering up everything I am

All I ask is that you take

You look at me the same way you look at them

Never how I look at you

All I've ever wanted is to be there by your side

Why can't you just want that too?

Like the moon goes around the earth

In your orbit I reside

Try to pull the ocean close to me

But I can never hold the tide

Hearing the door to the Temple sliding open Pearl stood and forced the smile back onto her face, turning to greet Rose once again who returned the smile and waved. Garent appeared with Amethyst in tow a moment later and they all were standing on the warp pad, Amethyst's little hand raised up, huge smile crossing her face as she waved and the light engulfed them.

With the others gone pearl let the smile fall and made her way back into the temple to reorganize some of the mess Amethyst had been collecting over the last millenia or so. She found the work calming, and the pouty look amethyst's gave her whenever she did it was just a little satisfying. She'd only been at it for an hour or so when the most ear rending squeal reverberated through the temple and a pile of Confederate dollars she's just stacked came tumbling down. Thinking the temple under attack she produced a spear from her gem and leapt out through the door.

Another squeal, louder, this time sent shivers all along HER body, but now she knew where it was coming from. She ran, leaping the fence in a single bound, which also carried her half way down the beach, spear clutched in one hand as she hunted the source of the noise. What she found was not some powerful gem creature emitting sonic attacks, instead she found a pair of humans on a large stage that hadn't been there the last time she looked, of course that might have been months ago.

Narrowing her eyes she crept closer, hiding behind some of the rocks once she was close enough to hear.

"I'm tellin' you star child this is gonna be your big break, all you gotta do is unload the rest of that equipment from the van, get it set up, finish the sound check and rehearse all the songs you're gonna do tomorrow. While you do that I'm gonna go get the word out about the concert and get us some dinner. See you in a couple hours." There was something about that particular human that rubbed her the wrong way, the other one though, the one with hair nearly as impressive as Rose's simply nodded and got back to work. Another Squeal came as he dragged his hand over the strings of a guitar, only this one wasn't isolated, another came and another and another as the human fiddled with knobs and tugged at wires . As the human brought his hand down to stroke the strings once again Pearl stepped from her hiding place, spear lowered eyes meeting the human's coolly, his hand frozen above the strings.

"I would appreciate it if you stopped making that terrible racket, it's. . ." She shivered again. "Troublesome." The human looked down, at his guitar, then back at the odd girl.

"Oh uhm yeah sorry about that, I was just trying to get the sound set up for my concert tomorrow." Setting his guitar down he lept from the stage onto the soft sand. Pearl half raised her spear as he approached, digging in his pocket. She lowered it again when he produced a creased flier with a picture of him riding a shooting star, the words "Mr. Universe" emblazzened along the top.

"Space train to the cosmos?" Pearl asked as he handed the flier to her, raising one eyebrow as she looked up. "Trains are land vehicles from what I understand, they need tracks, I doubt very much you could reach escape velocity in one." The human laughed and shrugged

"Artistic liscense, maybe it's a metaphor for how even getting what you want still makes you feel restricted, ya know like on the tracks no matter what." For some reason that sparked a sad thought of Rose in her and she quickly changed the subject.

"That other human, you take your orders from him?" She motioned to where the other human had been standing.

"I guess you could kind of put it like that, he's my manager, he looks out for me and gets me gigs like this one, and the big city concert I'm playing two nights from now." His eyes brightened as he spoke of his dream and she couldn't help but smile. "I can hold off on the sound stuff for the time being, I gotta finish unpacking and organizing the stuff from the van before I can get it all done anyway." Pearl looked at the stacks of boxes in his van and nodded, letting her spear wink out of existence, that brought a satisfying gasp from the human as she made his way over to the van.

"If you really need to keep making that noise to put on this recital of yours I suppose I can tolerate it if I have something to keep my mind off of it, I'll unload and organize these things for you." His eyes went wide in gratitude and he rushed over prepared to help her lift an amp that weighed easily as much as he did.

"Here let me help you with the heavy stu. . ." Hoisting the amp in one arm she tucked a small box of equipment under the other and smirked at him.

"I think I'll manage." His mouth hung open as she began unloading the Van with inhuman grace and strength.

"I'm uhm, Greg by the way, Greg Universe." Pearl was already lost in the frenzy of oranization and simply nodded.

"Pearl." She offered in response. He watched her for a few moments before regaining his senses and made his way back onto the stage. The next squeals of feedback were less intense, and quickly what had been mindless sound resolved into musical notes emitting from the amp already on the stage. By the time the equipment was all laid out and arranged by size and color the odd human was in the middle of an odd song.

". . .I know I don't have a plan, I'm workin on that part, but let me drive my van in to your heaaaart." He stopped to adjust the knobs on his guitar and pearl lept up onto the stage, startling the human. . .Greg, back a step. "You're uhm, very graceful." His face changed color oddly for a moment, she'd seen the phenomina in other humans before but not up close. Her eyed moved over the guitar in his hand, and the wire leading to the amp.

"So this is an amplifier that uses electricity to receive and increase the magnitude of the sound produced by your instrument. Very interesting I haven't listened to human music in a long time." He interest seemed to light a fire in him, he nodded enthusiastically, and began explaining how the amp worked in relation to the guitar. After she had gotten the basics of the amp and guitar he showed her microphones, the voice modulators, the synthesizer with his pre-programmed music on it, Pearl all the while drinking in the new information as she asked pointed questions the few times she couldn't immediately grasp an idea. During their conversation she noticed him looking oddly at her, a familiar look she couldn't place, and every time she caught him looking that odd coloration to his face would return. She never could understand human relationships, so she took no real mind of it as they continued talking.

Some how they eventually came to talk about his van and the internal combustion engines human now used. "So you and this Marty person actually live in your vehicle? I have a whole wing of the temple and even that some times seems crampt since amethyst began her. . ." Pearl rolled her eyes. ". . .Collection."

"That's the little purple troublemaker you were talking about?" Greg asked leaning on the hood of the Van, eyes still on her. She nodded at his question, fingers laced together as she stared out over the ocean. "And yeah it can get a little uncomfortable in there, but you put up with unpleasant stuff when you're chasing a dream." She turned to him, though now he was looking out at the horizon as he had been, mind going back to a dozen near misses during the war when she'd stood prepared to die for Rose, the glory of it duller in her mind than she'd remembered.

"Some times, the chase never seems to end." He must have heard the sadness in her voice and he turned to her again, their eyes met and she could tell in that moment he completely understood her, and to her utter amazement she understood him. They both sat a long moment, only turning from each other as the other human's nasal voice pierced the silence.

"Looks like I'm not the only one who found something interesting in this town." His eyes moved over Pearl in a decidedly unpleasant manner.

"Pearl, this is my manager, Marty, Marty this is Pearl, she helped me get set up." There was irritation in Greg's voice that pearl found comforting for some reason, perhaps because it pulled Marty's eyes from her.

"Needed help from one of the locals huh?" Marty teased. "That's okay, I plan on getting some "Help" of my own from this cool punk chick I met in town, I invited her to the show tomorrow. Which reminds me I forgot to bring the fliers with me, looks like you're gonna have to go and put those up because I am worn out." Yawning Marty moves to climb into the Van, a resigned Greg pulling a stack of fliers from a box in the passenger side of the van. Seeing this Pearl caught Marty by the arm, causing him to turn back to her one eyebrow raised.

"Correct me if I'm wrong but you infromed Greg that you would be handling the promotion of his concert while he set up the equipment, he complete his assignment, and now you expect him to do yours as well? A good leader doesn't say one thing and do another a good leader leads by example." She stared the human down, eyes not wavering even as he scowled and tried to menace her. Apparently that usually worked on human women judging how his anger turned to surprised fear.

"Fine." Marty grumbled and took the stack of fliers from Greg's hands and stormed off down the beach where he'd come from. There were stars in Greg's eyes as he grinned toothily at her and she giggled softly.

"What he was being unreasonable and all he needed was someone to explain that to him." She nodded, though let a little smugness creep onto her face.

"That's okay I was probably going to blow it off anyway, I haven't eaten all day. I probably would have just tossed the fliers in a garbage can. Ya know, if you're hungry we could get something together." His face again, she was about to ask him what those odd bursts of color meant when a light flashed in the distance and she turned, the last flicker of the warp pad fading.

"It's been that long already, excuse me Mr. Universe I have to go." She took off down the beach at full speed, taking leaping bounds to cover as much distance as she could. Looking back she saw Grag extending one arm out to her and there was a Pang of lose in her Gem. Still she managed to get back while the others were still on chatting by the warp pad.

"Pearl!" Amethyst cried and ran towards her on all fours, jumping up into her arms and Pearl couldn't help but laugh at the smiling Gem she now held. "Garnet and I were able to hold together for like ever this time."

"Four minutes." Garnet corrected. "But it was a big improvement over last time, I think forming Opal with you really gave her a feel for it."

"Ohhhh yeah, we should make Opal again, she's so cool." Rose moved to them and took Amethyst from Pearl's arms.

"Everything went well? It seems quiet as usual. . . .Well except that human hiding behind that boulder over there." Rose said pointing causing all the other Gems to turn, Greg emerged and Amethyst lunged from Rose's arms

"I've never seen this one before." The little Gem said as she circled him. "I really like your hair."

"This. . .wasn't suppose to happen." Everyone turned as Garnet spoke, Rose raising an eyebrow. "I just mean, this wasn't a very likely thing to happen, he shouldn't be here until tomorrow."

"Oh yeah, my last gig got canceled so we decided to drive in a day early and get set up ahead of time." Greg explained and everyone turned back to him. "I uh, thought you might like a t-shirt and a CD, you know for helping me." The other Gems gathered around as she took the items from him. "There's not much call for extra smalls at my shows so if you want another one I can hook you up." Looking down at the merch Pearl explained.

"He's a musician, I helped him put some of his things in order. . .his theme is space." As Amethyst made demands for him to play something and Rose tried to hush her and talk to him about music, Pearl caught something out of the corner of her eye Greg's reflection in Garnet's glasses, he was looking at her again in that familiar look. Then it struck her, she'd seen that look in Garnet's glasses before, though it hadn't been Greg then, it had been her, staring longingly at Rose. She turned to the human again, and they shared another moment of understanding, her face grew hot, and she knew what the color in his cheeks meant.