Mirror Gem

"This mirror should be able to show you whatever you want to know about the history of the gems, or at least whatever it's seen," Pearl said.

"Wow, that's amazing!" Steven said.

"We found it at the galaxy warp a while back," Pearl said, "and I've been planning on giving it to you for a while."

"What should we ask for first?" I said.

"As I said, we found it at the galaxy warp. You haven't seen that yet, have you, Connie?"

"No, ma'am, we haven't been there yet," I said. I wonder just how many gem locations there are that I haven't seen yet!

"Then that seems like a good place to start. Mirror, show us the galaxy warp!" Pearl said.

We waited a few seconds, and nothing happened.

"Mirror, the galaxy warp," Pearl said, a little more frustrated.

Still, nothing.

"Is it supposed to take this long?" Steven said.

"No, no," Pearl said, "it should've shown it by now. I know the mirror's seen it! We found it there! I hope it's not broken, it has been a few thousand years."

I wasn't ready to give up on it, though. "Mirror, would you please show us the galaxy warp? It would be so nice to finally see such a masterpiece of gem architecture. I hope that isn't too much to ask for."

"Come on, Connie, just because you ask nicely doesn't mean it'll work any better," Pearl said.

She was quickly proven wrong, however, when the mirror shown and showed the galaxy warp in all of its glory. I had to say, it was beautiful, like all the ancient gem structures were. Even if it was basically just a bigger warp, the stuff around it was beautiful. I'm honestly surprised they aren't more well-documented online or anything!

Pearl eyed the mirror in my hands suspiciously. "It shouldn't be able to do that… It's meant to follow orders, nothing more. So why did it care about politeness?"

"Pearl, I thought we were just ignoring these mysteries," I said.

"But this mirror is completely unrelated to you two. It shouldn't have any mysteries. Could I have it back to examine it?"

"Aw, Pearl," Steven said. "I'm sure it's no big deal. This thing looks so cool. Besides, what could possibly happen if you let us keep it for a single day?"

Pearl sighed. "I'm sure you're right," Pearl said. "I guess I'm just being a bit too cautious. After the past few days, who wouldn't be?"

Steven grabbed my hand. "No prob, Pearl! Come on, let's go see what our new gem gadget can do!" He dragged me out the door and into town.

Pearl rolled her eyes. "Have fun, you two! And be safe!"

"I've endured fights with numerous monsters," I said. "What could possibly happen today?"

"So, what do we do with it?" I said. "We can't exactly ask it to detail historical events if we don't know what historical events to ask about."

"What if we asked about that one battle that took place in the strawberry fields! That'd be cool to see," Steven said.

"I don't know, didn't Garnet say it was a "Maelstrom of chaos and death" or something like that?" I said.

Steven thought on that for a second. "Maybe you're right. I guess I just don't know anything else having to do with gem history."

"Maybe we could ask the mirror. Hey, mirror! Could you show us some sort of other gem structure you've seen?" I realized that might have seemed a bit rude. "I'm sorry mirror, what I meant was, could you please show us something cool about the history of the gems? I'm sure you've seen a ton of cool stuff, and you're dying to show us something. So it would be super nice if you could show off something."

The mirror rippled for a second, then showed us a place I had never seen before. It seemed to be some sort of floating structure in the sky like most other gem structures. Of course, it was beautiful, like all the other gem structures. It was a sort of floating castle in the sky, the whole thing a brilliant blue and green.

"It's beautiful! What is it?" Steven said.

"Too bad the mirror can't tell us. I guess we'll have to ask Pearl later."

I didn't see it at the time, but Steven was still watching the mirror but as I brought the mirror downwards. It rippled again. It formed an image it had seen before, my face, and distorted it so much that letters started forming.

Steven saw that much. "Look at the mirror, Connie!" he said.

I saw the mirror distort into a strange text I didn't recognize myself.

"Is this some sort of gem dialect?" Steven said.

"I don't know. Probably, since it is a gem artifact, after all. It makes sense it would display gem texts."

The mirror shifted again and Steven and I watching in awe. The text changed into brilliant blue English characters: "The Sky Sanctuary"

"It knows English!" Steven said.

"Duh," I said. "I wonder where it learned it. We should ask Pearl what else this mirror can do!"

"No, but Pearl might take it away from us!" Steven said.

"I'm sure it would be fine," I said. "Besides, think of all the other cool stuff we could do if we knew what it was capable-"

"No!" Steven said.

A bit startled, I said, "Well, that was a bit abdrupt. It's only Pearl, what could go wrong?"

Steven was equally startled, though. "I… didn't say anything."

"It was telepathy, then? I didn't even notice, I'm sorry," I said.

"No, it wasn't telepathy, either." Steven said. "I heard it, too. Could it have… been the mirror?"

The mirror rippled to become an image of myself. "You're right," The mirror said.

"It talks!" I said.

The image back up and repeated, "You're right."

"This is amazing!" Steven said.

"It's like some sort of AI! I wonder why Pearl didn't know that," I said. Then, I had an idea. "Hey mirror, when Pearl first summoned you, you flashed a symbol. Could you perhaps show it again?"

The mirror showed nothing for a second. It finally said showed my face saying, "What?"

"Connie, what are you talking about?" Steven said.

"As the mirror came out, I swore I saw an infinity symbol on it. Maybe I was mistaken."

"Probably," the mirror said.

Steven wasn't convinced. "Connie, you're never 'mistaken.' I think you saw something real."

"Mirror, are you sure you haven't seen this symbol before?" I said, holding up my hand.

The mirror paused for a second again, like it was concentrating. "Yes and no" The mirror said, splicing together snippets we had said recently.

"It created something new!" Steven said. "Could it always do that?"

"I don't know! This thing's really cool," I said. "No wonder Pearl always carried it around with her. Anyways, what did it mean by yes and no?"

The mirror didn't answer with speaking this time. It warped and twisted into letters again. "Can see what the Pearl sees."

"That's kind of rude," Steven said. "She's not 'the Pearl,' just 'Pearl' would be nice."

"Never mind that," I said. "Is that why Pearl had it stored in her gem? So, you've seen it through her eyes or something?"

"You're right," the mirror said.

"Oh, then you've seen the mark before then, because I know Pearl has. If you were there, then you know what it is, right?"

The mirror displayed more text. No. Had vision. No sounds.

"I'm sure that must have been hard for you, mirror," Steven said.

"We could ask Pearl to make you more comfortable in the future if you'd like," I said.

"You two are great friends," it said. And then I realized this mirror wasn't just answering our questions, it was actually alive. I didn't know what to make of that.

"Thank you, mirror! You, too!" Steven said.

Steven and I hung round with the mirror all day. It was cool having a third person in our team dynamic, even if it was a mirror with an AI imbedded inside of it. We ended up hanging out on the beach. The sun was lowering, but there was still an hour until sunset. It was a bright day.

"This has been one of the better days we've had!" Steven said.

"We might have to ask Pearl if we could keep this mirror. It's not only a cool contraption, but it's a great person!" I said.

"Thank you, Connie," the mirror said. "I would like that. But don't tell her I'm an AI."

"Pearl didn't know that, did she? She just thought you were an inanimate object." Steven said. "What's your story, mirror?"

"My story?" it said.

"Yeah, when did you become self-aware? You know, your story?" I said.

A cloud blocked out the sun. The mirror rippled and became text. "It's been a long time since someone asked me that question."

I looked at the text for a few seconds. "Well, that's oddly foreboding," I said.

The mirror kept writing. "You two are young. You aren't like the others."

"The… others?" I said. A shiver ran down my spine.

"Can I ask you a favor?" the mirror wrote.

"What… is it?" Steven said.

The mirror wrote, "I know it's a lot to ask, but," The mirror paused for a second before revealing a second line, "could you set me free?"

I was startled. "Let you free? You mean… you're trapped in there?"

"For thousands of years…" It wrote.

"We'll do whatever we can to help you!" Steven said,

"Yeah, or my name isn't Connie Maheswaran! Why didn't you say so sooner?"

"The crystal gems won't like it…"

"Who cares what the gems will think? I'm sure we can change their minds," I said.

"What can we do to help?" Steven said. "Just tell us! As your friends, mirror, what can we do to help you?"

The mirror always had to distort an image into words, it usually just took a random image. This time, it took the two of our smiling faces and distorted it into four words: "Take out my gem."

"Gem?" I said.

"The one on the back!" Steven said. "That's what you mean, right?"

"Right," the mirror said.

We were about to pull out the gem when Pearl's terrible timing struck back. She walked out onto the beach nearby, saw us, smiled, and called, "There you are! I've been looking everywhere for you two. Come back to the temple, it's dinnertime!"

"Just a minute, Pearl!" Steven yelled. He turned to me. "Hurry!" he said.

"But can't we wait another day, when Pearl isn't 50 feet away from us?" I said. "Should we really be doing this now?"

"Of course we should be doing this now! We can't wait any longer! Whoever's trapped in here, they've waited for thousands of years. We can't let them wait a day longer! Come on, pull out that gem!"

"Hurry, hurry, hurry…" the mirror looped. I turned the mirror over and eyed the gemstone, having no idea what was about to happen. But Steven was right. No matter what might become of us, we're the infinity duo, and I would die rather than let someone be trapped in a mirror.

Steven and I grabbed the gem together and started pulling. Water came from the ocean and started forming a pattern on the sand. I heard Pearl say something, but I couldn't hear what. She looked frightened. Steven and I kept pulling our emotions completely in sync. I felt us begin to fuse, and I forcibly cut it off. I didn't want whoever this was to come out and see Stevonnie, I wanted them to see Steven and me. I pulled harder. Pearl started sprinting towards us, seemingly wanting to stop us from releasing the entity. I pulled even harder. The water underneath us formed an infinity sign of its own. I didn't question what it meant, I just kept pulling.

Finally, the gemstone came free just as Pearl reached us, shattering the mirror instantly. An explosion of water spewed outwards, knocking Pearl away but leaving the two of us unscathed. A body came forth from the center of the gemstone, first taking on the appearance of a marionette but quickly gaining more features.

It was a gem. A brilliant blue gem, who was debatably even prettier than Pearl.

It looked up at us. "Thank you! You saved me… I thought I would never get out. I-you put so much trust in me after we had just met…"

"Who… are you?" I said.

She looked up at us. "My name is Lapis Lazuli," she said, and it sounded like she had just said her name was some sort of god.

"No, but… who are you?" I said.

"…I just said that. It's Lapis, Lapis Lazuli."

"No, no!" Steven said. "What she was trying to say was, what happened to you? How did you get trapped in the mirror? Why didn't Pearl know you were there?"

Lapis didn't get a chance to answer, because she saw something. "The Pearl! She's still awake!"

I looked over at Pearl. She was slowly getting up, despite her injuries. That explosion of water was rough. But Pearl wasn't a quitter. As I watched her, she brought up the strength she had left, screamed, and charged Lapis with her spear. Lapis prepared to strike back, taking on a combat stance and pulling up her hand. I looked back and forth between Pearl and Lapis. I didn't want to have to choose between them!

Steven jumped in front of Pearl just as she reached Lapis and yelled, "STOOOOOOOOP!"

Pearl stopped a second before she reached Steven. "Steven, get out of the way! You have no idea who she is!" Pearl said.

Steven said, "I know she was trapped in that mirror for thousands of years and that she hasn't attacked us yet, even though she had plenty of chances to do so!"

"You don't know what you're dealing with! Get out of my way."

"No! Not until you explain!"

"You know you couldn't stand up to me. Step aside before I make you do so."

"You would never do it, Pearl. You couldn't. And I'm not letting you hurt her."

Pearl looked heartbroken. "It's the only way," she said. She kicked him in the chest, causing him to sprawl to the ground nest to me. I was simply paralyzed the whole time.

I saw a flash from the corner of my vision. I turned and saw lapis, and she looked terrifying. She held up her hand and a hand of water came from behind her. "You," she said. "You found me lying on the ground, and instead of setting me free, you treated me like another artifact to add to your collection. And worst of all, you hurt Steven! I am Lapis Lazuli, not some inanimate object!" She said, hurling a fist of water at Pearl.

"No!" I yelled. No fighting. I didn't know who was on the right side, I didn't care. I didn't want anyone else to get hurt. On impulse, I jumped in front of Pearl and held up my hand. Lapis' eyes widened as her fist of water was suddenly on a collision course with me, and she couldn't stop it in time. I closed my eyes and braced for the worst. I expected to feel the painful impact of a giant fist, or just about anything, but nothing came. There was utter silence from everyone around me.

I creaked my eyes open. I saw my mark glowing bright purple, and Steven's shield was summoned in front of my hand. The hand of water turned back into just water and fell to the ground via gravity. I held the position for a few moments, my hand stretched upwards. The shield slowly disintegrated and I was left standing there, no shield in sight. The only sound was my own heavy breathing

Through all my emotions, I finally said, "No more fighting. Please."

The two of them looked at me. Finally, Pearl set down her spear, and Lapis loosened up a little.

Lapis said, "Fine, I'll let bygones be bygones for now, but I haven' forgotten what she's done to me. So, do the two of you want to know the truth? You aren't getting it from a gem who would push you aside like Pearl. Come with me, and I'll tell you the truth." She held up her hand and the ocean behind her parted.

Pearl said, "Don't trust her!"

I looked at her for a few seconds. Waiting for more words to her own defense. But none came. I said, "You really… don't have anything more to say? Just, don't trust her. All of the accusations thrown your way and that's your only defense. "Don't trust her." You know what, I'm going with Lapis, and if you're truly the gem I think you are, you won't try to stop me." Pearl didn't say anything back.

Steven sat up, still sore from when he had been knocked aside by Pearl. "Connie, I just- we can't leave Pearl!"

"But she lied to us! She knew Lapis was in there and she did nothing!" I said.

"But there has to be a reason. We can't leave Pearl here alone! We still trust Garnet even though she lied to us, don't we?"

"But Garnet didn't imprison another person willingly!"

"Pearl had to have had a good reason… right? Pearl, come on, you have to have had a good reason to not let her free. You thought she was evil, right? Or you didn't know she was in there, right?" Pearl stayed silent. "Please, Pearl, say something. Anything. You can't be the person lapis says you are, can you?"

Steven looked at Pearl, waiting for her to defend herself. Hoping she would defend herself. But she didn't say a word.

Steven's face darkened. "Let's go Lapis," he said.

Steven grabbed my hand. The two of us walked with Lapis into the sea, leaving Pearl standing alone on the beach.

We walked in silence through the ocean. I didn't know what to think. We meet a new gem, and now we've abandoned everything we've ever known to follow her. What will the others do to us if we do go back? Could we ever go back? But I wanted to hear Lapis' story.

Steven said, "So Lapis, how did you end up in the mirror in the first place?"

Lapis said, "I… don't want to talk about it."

I smiled. "I know how you feel. We all have traumatic events. Although, I would say yours is worse than mine."

"Pearl… Pearl didn't trap you in there, did she?" Steven said. I didn't want to think about it, but it seemed like it might be possible.

Fortunately, Lapis shook her head. "No, that honor goes to homeworld. I really don't want to talk about it."

"Then why do you hate Pearl so much?"

"We were at war with them, of course," Lapis said. "And when Pearl found me a good 50 years ago, she did nothing to save me. She saw my gem in the back, unable to do anything to escape, and she either didn't notice or didn't care."

"That's horrible!" I said.

"Why do you think I attacked her? You two are the first ones to ever show me any sort of kindness. I don't know how you can stand to be around the crystal gems."

"What's so bad about the gems?" Steven said. "Besides leaving you in the mirror, of course."

"They must have kept you two in the dark. They're… what's the word you humans would use? Terrorists."

"What?" Steven and I said at the same time.

"Homeworld planned to build a colony here, but the gems, they didn't like that. They killed many gems, poofed and imprisoned… oh, I'm sorry, bubbled, countless others. They stopped the progress of homeworld all to save this meaningless planet."

We took that in as we walked in silence for a while longer. "Where are we going?" I said.

Lapis looked up into the sky. "I'm going to homeworld. I don't know how I'm going to get there, but I'm going to try."

"We'll do whatever we can to help," Steven said.

Lapis shook her head. "Why are you two doing this for me? You just met me today. You're going to anger the people you've known your entire life, and for what? To help a simple Lapis Lazuli."

"Who wouldn't do it? We couldn't leave you in there," Steven said.

"You two might be the only two in the entire cosmos that think like that."

Steven stopped and stared at the sea. The fish swimming everywhere, it was a marvel.

He didn't tell me he was about to stop, though, so I ended up falling forwards, along with Steven.

"Well, you two are klutzes," Lapis said. "What made the two of you trip at the same time?"

I exchanged a look with Steven. "You don't know about our infinity link?" he said.

"What's an infinity link?" Lapis said.

"Haven't you ever wondered why we always stay so close to one another?" I said.

"I just figured the two of you were just close friends," she said.

"It's hard to explain," Steven said, "But for some reason we were cursed to never leave one another's side. We can't walk more than three feet away from each other, or we're jerked backwards.

Lapis stopped in her tracks. "A gem bond? With a human?" she said.

"A gem bond?" Steven and I said simultaneously. Did she know what happened to us?

Before she could elaborate further, though, the ground shook. I saw a crack appear before us. The landmass beneath us started lifting up into the sky.

"What's going on?" I said. The ground began to rise/

"I don't know!" Steven said.

Before we could do much of anything about it, the landmass beneath us was already 50 feet in the air and rising. The water around us spilled away into the ocean.

"We need to get the gems, they'll know what to do!" Steven said.

"Who's to say the gems didn't do this in the first place?" Lapis said.

The sand beneath us started falling, so we had no choice but to run back to Beach city. It wasn't too far away, we had been walking slowly on the way in, and now we were sprinting. It was only a third of a mile or so. It wasn't exactly a chase sequence against the falling sand, we were easily staying ahead of it, but the island was slowly shrinking all the same. "It doesn't matter. We're going to butt heads with the gems sooner or later, we might as well meet with them now," I said.

Lapis sighed. "Why do you still trust them?"

"Because I've known them for years, and they wouldn't ever hurt someone for no reason," Steven said.

"You're changing positions on this really quickly," I said.

As we ran backwards, we met up with Pearl on the beach. She was furious.

"I know this is your fault!" Pearl and Lapis said at the same time.

"Stop fighting and get out of the sand? That's what's falling!" I said.

I grabbed Pearl's hand and pulled her onto the boardwalk. It wasn't close, but 30 seconds later the sand on the beach fell as well, leaving just beach city to float high above the clouds.

"What the heck is going on?" Pearl said.

"How should I know?" Lapis said. "Maybe your friends did this."

Pearl said, "Oh, you did not just insinuate that we did this."

"I'm just using the information given to me." Lapis said.

"You'd better have not hurt these kids!" Pearl said.

"Of course I didn't! I'm not the one that kicked Steven to the ground."

"Why you little-"

The tensions were high. Then, just to make matters worse, Garnet and Amethyst came out onto the boardwalk to see what was going on only to find Lapis standing there.

"What's going on? What's a homeworld gem doing standing here on the boardwalk?" Garnet said. "Did you raise this city into the air?" Garnet said, summoning her gauntlets.

I covered my head with my hands. I didn't even know who I could trust anymore. Beach city was floating high above the earth. Lapis hadn't done anything wrong, but was going to get poofed for sure if we didn't do something. And she even knew what our link was. I thought the bird was bad. I thought the room was bad. I thought Garnets secrets were bad.

But this is something I could never prepare for.

What was I going to do?

A/N: I tried to keep the first half brief, you've all seen the episode before already. The new stuff is what you're looking forward to, after all. I do have a twist planned to explain the whole 'floating beach city' thing, so look forward to that next chapter.

Just so you know, school's starting soon for me, so you might want to expect a few delays. I'll try my best to get chapters out twice a week, but keep that in mind.

Hey, Lemur? I have another idea for some fanart if you or anyone else is interested. How about the scene where Connie blocks the wave of water with her hand, infinity symbol shining purple, Steven's shield in hand with Steven at her feet, protecting Pearl from Lapis? Or anyone else, I think it'd be pretty cool lookin'! Yeah, if you ever see a cool scene you want to draw, feel free to do so and sent me a review or PM of the artwork! I don't really expect anything unless I specifically request it, but you know, I can hope. I mean, Steven and Connie pulling the gem out with the infinity symbol underneath would be pretty cool as well.

Next time: We see what happens when an author decides to extend a two-parter into a three-parter. See you guys then!