Three Gems and a Stand, Act 3

Amethyst had often felt like, well, an alien. Not just to Earth, which she admittedly was… except she was made there, so did that make her native to the planet? Stars, that was so confusing!

Anyway, she often felt alien to her own kind as well. A little less than five thousand years ago, she had emerged from the ground in an abandoned place. It was long after the war had already passed. The war she had been made to fight in. It had boggled Amethyst's mind when she first realized it; she had, literally, been made to fight the people she called friends. How weird is that!?

She would never dream of ever fighting any of the Crystal Gems… okay, she had done that. On multiple occasions. For several reasons, some more stupid than others. But to actually fight them, to try and hurt them? 'Inconceivable!' she would shout if she cared to use such a complicated word. And even if she did, Pearl would probably school her about the improper use of it anyways.

Bottom line, even if she was made for it, Amethyst would never dream of hurting her friends.

She didn't know it, but this was perfectly normal for an amethyst. The purple quartz soldiers were made to live and act in tight-knit groups. A human might not quite grasp the full weight of this at first. You have to realize that gems have no concept of family. At least, not in the way most humans do. They do have concepts of 'love' and 'friendship,' thought the first one is discouraged, and the latter treated as a tertiary priority, at best.

Amethysts have families; their squad-mates. They're like peas and carrots, peridots and holo-screens, pearls and their masters; Inseparable. That is until their superiors decide to split the group up for their next assignment. It was not too uncommon for amethysts to develop interpersonal relationships with other types of gems if no other amethysts were available.

The Crystal Gems' Amethyst exhibited perfectly normal behavior for her kind when she adopted them as her family. She was simply doing what came naturally to her sort, what she was programmed to do. Even if separated, and amethyst never forgets someone they once called a friend. Anyone skeptical of this statement is free to challenge it. Many have tried, and then have to endure hours of amethysts listing several thousands of years worth of gem serial numbers.

Now, of course, Amethyst didn't know any of this. All she knew was that she loved her friends, her family and that she would do anything to protect them. Even if she wasn't as strong or smart or skilled as the others, she would fight until the very end for them. And she trusted them to do the same.

Ah yes, trust. Ask any half-decent coach or team-leader what's most important in a team, and chances are 'trust' will be fairly high on that list. It is the foundation on which a team stands. If the trust is broken, the foundation is broken, and the team will crumble.

The Crystal Gems all trusted each other. They had all proved themselves worthy of each others' trust many, many times. Garnet especially had shown herself worthy of the role as leader. Strength, confidence, reassurance, future vision, sweet shades… she had all the essentials of a leader. There was an abundance of proof to support this claim. Amethyst had no doubt in their new leader's ability to lead them.

That was, until this day.

Try as she might, Amethyst couldn't help but shake the feeling that there must be some more efficient way of finding an enemy than to run around town, scaring the socks of off people, hoping to find… whoever was causing this, to begin with. Yet was what they were doing.

Garnet's plan had sounded perfectly sound to Amethyst. Find whoever's doing this, beat them up until they stop. Simple and straight to the point, like she liked her plans. There was only a teeny tiny little problem; they didn't know where the user was. And they had no clues. All they had to go off of was some hunch Garnet had. Not that it's not how they usually do things, but this time was… different.

Garnet was always so confident, she always knew what to do. Of course, she was. Not only was she super strong, but her future vision was positively broken in how useful it was. The three of them had been in many situations where the only thing standing between them and death was Garnet's future vision. But now…

She was just as lost as the rest of them.

Though to be fair, what a fricking situation they were in. There was a second arm growing out of Garnet. That was a pretty tall leap, wouldn't you agree? Amethyst was ready to accept that there were humans with strange powers. After all, she had seen humans and things-that-looked-like-humans-but-really-weren't do weird stuff before. What Pearl, Connie, and Steven had described didn't sound too much impossible. illusions and mind control were reasonable in Amethyst's eyes. But growing arms out of people? Now that was weird, odd, bizarre, and every other word in the book she never actually read.

Speaking of which, the had grown almost the entire length of Garnet's lower arm now. It looked almost like Smokey Quartz's splitting elbow. Heck, it was even grey. It didn't show any signs of stopping either. In fact, Amethyst was pretty sure it was actually getting faster now.

"Hey, Garnet… what is it? Did you see anything?" Pearl asked. The fusion gem had suddenly come to a stop. She was staring at her second arm. Her gaze then seemed to trail off from the arm, as if following something, an invisible lead…

"Yes… No… I-I don't know!" Both of them were taken aback by the sheer frustration in Garnet's tone. She was usually so cool and composed, but now…

The grey arm suddenly jerked back to life, and broke free from Garnet's grip, delivering a backhand slap to her face. Funny as it may have looked, it was enough to make Garnet stagger and knock her visor off.

If they had been taken aback by her tone, Pearl and Amethyst were practically sent flying backward by the look in Garnet's eyes. It wasn't just frustration, but anger. Hot, burning anger, like a wild flame. While they didn't get to see it often, they recognized that anger. Ruby anger.

Garnet growled and summoned the gauntlet on her left hand. With a mighty cry, she delivered a devastating punch, intent on breaking the impostor arm in half. Instead, she nearly broke her own arm.

When she hit the grey mass, it seemed to absorb the shock, almost like a piece of rubber. Then, a split second after that, Garnet's own arm bent in the same way, nearly breaking.

"Argh!" Perhaps more in frustration than pain, Garnet punched the road beneath her feet, creating a miniature crater. Through grinding teeth, she muttered, "It reflects damage." She stood back up and looked out over the city. "Strings. Must find the strings," she muttered further.

Amethyst shot Pearl a look. Their gazes met, and amethyst saw herself in her friend. They were thinking the same thoughts. Both of them had seen Garnet angry before, but it was never like this. This wasn't how she was supposed to act. Garnet's anger was supposed to be quiet and focused. Not like this.

"Um, Garnet? Are you okay," Amethyst finally said.

"No!" Garnet snapped. The grey had moved almost all the way to her shoulder. She grunted and rubbed her forehead, muttering something unintelligible. The impostor arm to its chance to attack once again, while Garnet was distracted. It had risen ever so slightly, and aimed a strike at the gem on Garnet's right palm.

"Oh no, you don't!" It would not have any luck with that. Amethyst had quickly summoned her whip. in one swing, she wrapped it around the grey arm, binding to the original. The impostor tried to break free, but Garnet had by this time realized what had happened, and wrapped her free arm around her two right arms, preventing the grey from moving.

"Thanks, Amethyst," she grunted, as the arm tried to wrestle free. "Quick, that way," she gestured with her head towards some nondescript building at the end of the street. And off at full speed, she was then, leaving her teammates in the dust.

For half a second that is, as the two of them soon were on her tail. This was something they could get behind. Their leader had a goal, her eyes focused on something in front of them. And together, the three of them would cut right through whatever stood in their way.

xxXXxx

Katey fancied herself a calm and collected person, cool even. In school, the school nurse would come and visit the class at the start of every year and talk about stress. She would go on and on about how bad stress was, and how to avoid it and stuff. Thought them some weird breathing technique.

Those had always fallen on deaf ears when it came to Katey. She just didn't feel stress like others. Sure, she would get nervous or uncomfortable in pressing situations, but never stressed in the way others described it. She always kept a cold head. She had gotten several compliments because of it actually.

Besides, what was breathing in a square supposed to do against a panic attack? Because whatever it was, Katey kinda needed it right now. Because she was panicking.

Her plan had been going perfectly so far. She had kept her distance from the three women, hiding behind houses, making sure not to get seen. It had been hard to keep pace, for sure, as the women ran around the town, searching blindly. But Katey kept in good shape and was pretty athletic, if she may say so herself. And hey, she had always wanted to try parkour. Running and jumping through people's backyards and gardens were not all that different, right?

Overall, Katey had to say that, for someone who never wanted to hurt anybody, she was doing a pretty fine job at just that.

However, luck had run out for Katey P… again. Somehow, somehow (!) the one she was attacking, the one with the square helmet, had found her. Katey had absolutely no idea how she had done it. Not for a second had any of the three seen her, that much she knew. She was also positive they couldn't see… the thing on square helmet's back, nor the strings attached to it. If they could, they sure were awfully nonchalant about the thing. No, that couldn't be it. Not that it really mattered.

No, what mattered now was that the three of them were dashing right towards where Katey was. At the moment, it was in some random garden behind some random house. Aside from the house which still obscured her from their views, there was nowhere left to run that could hide her. The next house was across the street, and this time they would definitely see her. The garden itself didn't have much, to offer in terms of protection, just a few neat flowerbeds, and two huge, proud bushes. Or, well, not rally bushes but Katey didn't know what to actually call them…

Lacking any other alternatives, Katey dove behind one of them. When she was younger she had played hide and seek with one of her cousins over at grandma's house. She had a bush like this one, that Katey had hidden in many times, despite the fact that she wasn't allowed. It was a good hiding place.

She crawled deep into the bush, as deep as she could, curling up into a ball, making herself as small as she could. She put her free hand over her mouth, forcing herself to breathe normally, to not make any sounds. It was dark inside the bush, only a few rays of sunlight entering between the leaves.

Just as she remembered it. The bush would hide her almost completely from the outside world. As long as she kept quiet and didn't move, it was impossible to spot her inside of it. You would have to know specifically to look after her in that bush, which was how her cousin had beaten her eventually. However, even then, it was hard.

The downside was that Katey couldn't see anything herself either. Only muffled sounds and voices would reach her through the leafage.

Running footsteps coming to a stop; the women arriving at the small garden. Someone, probably the short purple one, said something.

"… what did you see?"

Katey couldn't quite make out what the tall square-helmeted one answered. Her tone was so deep, it was reduced to only base sounds inside the bush. Though she might have heard the words 'don't know' in there somewhere.

"The user must be close then!"

It was a lot easier to make out the voice of the tall pale one. Her voice was a couple of octaves higher than the other two's.

A droplet of cold sweat ran down Katey's face. Yes, the pale one was right. She was close by, alright. And lying on the dirty ground, she was completely defenseless. The square woman had found her before, maybe she could do it again? Then Katey was finished.

Even though the bush's isolating barrier, Katey could clearly make out the surprised yelp and grunt the square woman made the clone on her back once again came back to life.

Katey couldn't see it, but she could almost feel it, how the clone was growing. True, the three of them getting closer meant they were closer to beating her. But it also meant her power would work faster. Before, when she was far away, it had worked slowly, but now…

A snap, the purple one yelling; a smack and the sound of something crashing into the wall. A sickening sound of something breaking reached Katey's ears clearly.

This was it. Through the strings connected to her right hand, she felt it, almost like a pulse. About half of the clone had emerged. It was over now. The intense pulse in her hand told her just how strong it was, there was no way these women could fight against it.

Less than a whisper, even less than a breath, a word escaped Katey's lips.

"Sorry," she said for the second time that day. She didn't even bother listening anymore to the sounds of struggle outside. There was no meaning to it, it was useless. Even when the square-helmeted one's furious scream left fell on deaf ears…

A bright light, as if the sun had decided to take a trip down to Earth it up the small garden. even inside the dark bushes, Katey saw it. Had she looked at it directly, it would have been blinding. Not as blinding as the pain in her hand though.

Katey let out a scream of agony as a pain greater than anything she could have ever imagined hit her right hand. She screamed as every bone was broken and the strings buried themselves deep into her flesh, huge gashes in their wake. From the space between her middle and ring finger, and all the way down to the wrist, her hand split up, practically exploded in a fountain of blood.

The strings retracted themselves, reeling in the body of Hot n' Cold. The cloth had been torn to pieces, much like Katey's hand. In a flash of energy, the rags disappeared from existence, leaving Katey alone.

Through the haze of unimaginable pain, she heard a sharp sound, and the sun once again beamed on her face.

It is strange what a human in pain will notice in her last moments. The fact that the tall, maroon woman was gone didn't quite click in Katey's mind. Nor did she particularly care for the arrival of two new people. Not directly, anyway. No, what bothered her was the helmet on the short red one's head. Because it was not a helmet; it was hair.

Who the heck has an afro shaped like a cube?

Then the pain and bloodloss rendered her unconscious.

xxXXxx

[Katey P.]

An innocent young woman, drawn into this whole mess and forced to attack the Crystal Gems. Has been having a streak of bad luck recently.

Stand: Hot n' Cold

Appearance: A "flat puppet" (like a sheet of fabric, or clothes) extending and connected to the user's hand by thin strings. When first summoned, it takes the appearance of whatever the user is wearing, but more stylized and with inverted colors. When it attaches itself to a victim, it mimics the appearance of said victim.

Notable Powers and Abilities:

•Don't Wanna Stay, Don't Wanna Go-Despite its semi-automatic nature, the user still has to stay within a certain range of the victim, and is always connected to the stand via the strings. Physical objects will pass through the strings, but if the victim moves outside range, the strings will pull on the user, potentially injuring them.

•In and Out-HnC attaches itself to a victim and pulls out a replica of the person. The replica is identical, aside from being grey in color scale.

•Love Bipolar-Once partially extracted, the replica will begin attacking the victim. Any attacks aimed at the replica will be reflected back to the opposite point of the victim.

Stats:

Destructive Power: E

Speed: B

Range: B (ca. 40-45 meters)

Durability: C

Precision: D

Development Potential: B

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I'm terribly sorry for the wait. I seriously underestimated how much time and energy I could put into this project. I hope the chapter was worth the wait...

Actually, I think I could probably have extended Amethyst's scene a bit, perhaps let it go until they got to the garden where Katey was hiding, then switch to her perspective. Could probably have ended her scene a bit better too. At the same time, I really wanted to get this out as quickly as I could, so here we go.

Speaking of Katey, kudos goes to DiRunner over on who correctly guessed the stand user was named after Katy Perry. The stand is, of course, named after her song 'Hot n' Cold,' which can be found in the album 'One of the Boys.'

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Now, on the topic of the next chapter... I have "planned" we'll get another chapter from Hayato's perspective, probably a direct follow-up to his previous chapter. Then we'll get a chapter from the Duwang Gang (which should feature the first real stand battle on their side, so look forward to that) and then we'll back to SU (more specifically featuring Steven, Connie, Peridot, and Lapis).

As for when it will be ready... I figure I could try and aim for one chapter a week? Is a weekly update schedule acceptable? Perhaps I'll try and lengthen the chapters a bit.

Whatever I may decide to do until next time, take care of the planet Earth, and remember that anything can happen in space.