I don't have anything to say for an author's note, so here you go, have a nice new chapter instead!
Surprisingly, what had been called "The Hall of Nightmares" didn't seem so bad. It seemed to be little more than a dimly lit tunnel. Or at least, it had at first... Down the tunnel, off in the distance, something began to move towards them at extreme speed. The dull grayness of the tunnel was replaced with solid black just behind it. Within a few seconds it had covered nearly half the distance between them. The next few brought it within proper view. It was Shard, without the orange on him, no doubt one of his memories of something bad that happened to him... In the last couple seconds, he slowed down his rapid forwards movement, coming to a stop mere feet in front of them. The terrified Gems prepared for the worst.
Nothing happened. They waited for almost a minute, expecting him to be building suspense before striking. But none came. They hesitantly looked up and saw he had his finger over his mouth as if telling them to be silent. In the darkness behind him dark and deeply disturbing memories played out behind the walls, which now appeared to be more of a glass than metal. Shard's other hand was held out in front of him. "Shh..." he whispered. "We can't make much noise or orangey up there will hear us. If you value your sanity and life, we need to get out of this place as soon as possible. I can't hold the nightmares back behind me forever, at some point they will have to pass through."
As he spoke he kept looking between them and a spot on the floor between them. A hole with a ladder in it had appeared, and each time he looked at it, it became less and less transparent, until soon it was fully solid. The Gems had noticed it while it was still quite transparent, and now that it was solid, it seemed like they had little choice but to go down. They climbed down until they reached they layer below them, which was only about ten feet down. Shard then jumped down the hole, letting it and the hall disappear as soon as he had reached the bottom.
Strangely, the room they found themselves in was much higher than ten feet, but soon enough the Gems realized that since they were in a mindscape, the standard rules of geometry did not necessarily apply. But now they wanted answers, and they were not happy. "What were you thinking!?" Amethyst nearly exploded as she yelled at him.
"What?" Shard asked nearly innocently. "Did I do something wrong?" As he talked he paced around on the white void below him, a small section of tile appearing under each foot as he put it down and disappearing as it was lifted. Screens full of calculations and figures would appear every so often in front of him for a few seconds as he walked, only to leave once he had seen them. Still, he continued to look at them for the most part as he walked.
"You made us watch you kill yourself and turn all orange, then threw us into a dark hall! On top of that, you've had us running around in here for ages!" Amethyst yelled at him again.
"So what you're telling me is that my plan worked perfectly and I actually managed to save all of you instead of letting you all die by not bringing you in here? Because that's what I'm hearing. Well, thinking technically... which reminds me, you might want to take a look at these, and listen to this..." he said as he pulled a large 3-D screen out of nowhere, and tossed a bunch of little speakers around to the sides. "This screen allows access to whatever my physical eyes are currently seeing, and the speakers have a similar connection to my ears."
The screen and speakers came to life, and after a short time the Gems got more used to looking out of someone else's eyes. Around them were several Gem scientists all looking down at Shard's physical body, although it seemed quite disturbingly as if they were looking back through the eyes at them, even though they knew it wasn't true. Soon he was made to stand up, and as he moved to stand they saw that firstly, he was no longer bound, and secondly, his clothes had all adopted some form of orange on part of them.
"They think they know so much." Shard spoke up from behind them, not really caring much if they listened or not. "They believed that simply because I look simple, they can take over my mind. So I made a fake alternate personality, nearly identical to my normal personality, but with a way fewer memories. He even believed he was the real me. But he was so much weaker. Then, those Gems out there tried to take over, and once they destroyed the fake me, they believed they'd won. But instead, I am the real winner, because they let my body be more free when they think I'm no longer in control. And even better, I can influence ol' orange me slightly, meaning I can keep some of the heat off Steven as well."
The Crystal Gems turned around, only to see that he hadn't even been looking at them when he had been telling them that, but instead was in front of his own set of screens, touching parts of them to change what they displayed, and typing in new commands occasionally.
"Sadly, you don't have the, shall we say... knowledge... that you need yet. Nor are you close enough to a part of my mindscape where you can return to your physical gems, and thus physical forms. I can bring up the memories you'll need to see, if you'd like, but you'll have to go through them alone. Meanwhile, I have to get back to work calculating the path back to Ruby that you'll be on soon. And remember, this whole place is me, so even if you can't see a physical representation of me here, I'm actually all around." As he spoke, several new and very differently shaped doors grew from the ground in front of the Gems, each one now holding the title of the memory it belonged to. Then Shard began to wave goodbye as his mental projection of himself started to dissolve.
"Wait, what happened to Ruby?!" Sapphire yelled at him. She had to know if Ruby was still alright, she couldn't bare not knowing. But it was too late, by the time she had asked, Shard was already gone, leaving only five large doors towering in front of them. As the Gems began to move into the first door, they tried to read the first door's title, but couldn't make out what language it was written in. Once they had all entered, the door began to close, and the title finished translating itself just a few seconds too late. As it clicked shut, the title read: "The final hour of Earth."
Dun dun DUUUUUN! BAM! Is this chapter a game changer or what? Anyhow, I don't have much to say for a note here other than that the next chapter should be out in a day or two. Until then, PLEASE review, and I'll see you all later. Bye!