Episode 29: Secret Team


Turquoise was like the cool older sister who let you do whatever you wanted most of the time. Peter really liked this part about her. There was this, combined with the fact that Turquoise had large, deep puddles of water in her room within the Temple. She also let Peter jump into them with her.

Peter climbed up on top of one of the many piles of random junk Turquoise had collected in her room. He stared into the watery pool below.

"Cannonball!" he said. Peter took a small step back before charging forward. He wrapped himself into a ball after he leapt off the pile. He landed in the pool with a large splash. When Peter reached the surface again, he was surprised to see Turquoise was nowhere in sight. From below the water, something grabbed him by the waist and lifted him out of the pool. With a huge fit of laughter, Turquoise threw Peter into the air so that he landed in the pool again. Peter swam to the surface, pushing back his wet hair when he caught sight of a grinning Turquoise.

"Turquoise, did you see?" Peter asked her as she swam to the edge of the pool. She climbed out, wringing out her short hair in both of her hands. "I think that was my best one!" Turquoise simply waved her hand back and forth, dismissing Peter's statement.

"You need to put some more 'ball' in your 'cannon'," Turquoise told him. She took a few steps away from the pool.

"Isn't that going to hurt?" Turquoise shook her head.

"Not if you do it like this!" Turquoise turned on her heel. She ran at the pool. She leapt off the shore. In mid air, the Gem used her shapeshifting ability to transform herself into a ball. The resulting impact created a huge splash that pushed Peter back onto solid ground.
"That was awesome!" said Peter with a laugh. Turquoise met him at the shoreline. "I want to jump in some more puddles."

"Okay." Turquoise looked around before pointing over to another one of the many puddles that were scattered about her room. "You can try this one." She gestured over to another. "Or that one." Peter got up off of the ground and wandered through the field of puddles. He came across one he felt was perfect. He crouched down onto his knees.

"What about this one?" Peter didn't even wait for Turquoise's answer before plunging his head in.

"No Peter, wait!" Peter was surprised. The puddle he had found acted as a portal, not a pool. It lead to the heart of the temple, stored from ceiling to floor with the bubbled, corrupted Gems that the Crystal Gems had fought and contained over the course of thousands of years. He caught sight of the only unbubbled Gem in the room. Topaz.

Before Peter could see what she was doing, he was jerked out from the puddle by Turquoise. She hed him up off of the ground like he was a bunch of grapes.

"Only Topaz is allowed in there," she said to him before dropping Peter on the ground. "Let's try something a little less dangerous than interrupting Topaz's 'alone time'. Why don't you try jumping off of that?" Turquoise pointed over to a rickety-looking pile of random junk.

"How do you even stack your stuff that high?" Peter asked her. He walked over to the pile.

"It's a talent." Peter gave a small grunt of effort as he climbed up to the top of the pile. He stared down at Turquoise below when he finally reached the top "Do it!"

"Turquoise, I hope you're ready! Because here I go!" Peter jumped off the top of the pile and towards a puddle below. Unfortunately, on his way down, Peter struck a tire that had been sticking out of the pile. His aim was sent off course. The only lucky thing about this situation was that Peter landed in a different pool. The pool had been deeper than he expected. He ended up sinking to the bottom of the pool, which then lead down into a tunnel. The tunnel opened up into a waterfall. Peter was sent down the watery path, Peter landed with a quiet splash in a large pool below. When he resurfaced, he was sure of where the tunnel had led. The room was a lot cleaner than Turquoise's was, and had many more waterfalls than he had seen in Turquoise's room, which was none at all.

"Am I in Pearl's room?" Peter muttered to himself. A splash drew Peter's attention from behind him. He turned. Turquoise had followed him. She swam up next to him.

"That was crazy, huh?" she said to him. Her gaze turned upward. Turquoise's eyes narrowed. Peter followed her gaze. She was staring directly at Pearl. The white Gem was standing on top of one of her waterfalls. Floating in between her hands was a green bubble filled with shards of fallen Gems. "What is she doing with an Emerald bubble?"

"My mum bubbled that?" Peter asked Turquoise. His response was a hand over his mouth. Turquoise got a devilish look on her face that made Peter uncomfortable.

"Topaz is going to be so p—" Turquoise's voice was cut off as she sunk lower into the water. Using the water to hide her noises, Turquoise dived into the pool. Peter drew in a breath before following after her. Turquoise took his hand. She helped him to swim up the waterfall that Pearl was standing on. Pearl didn't even notice when the two broke trough the surface of the water. Turquoise and Peter pulled themselves onto the solid-like surface. With a mischievous smirk, Turquoise crept up behind Pearl. She was inspecting the bubble.

"Busted!" Turquoise shouted, causing Pear to give a startled yell. She whipped around, hiding the bubble poorly behind her back.

"What are you doing here?" Pearl said quickly.

"What are you doing in here?" Peter walked up to Turquoise's side. Pearl's face turned a dark teal.

"I…" She stood up straight, clearing her throat. Pearl brought the bubble into view. "I just wanted to see how the shards are reacting to Emerald's bubble." Her eyes narrowed. "And it's none of your business what I do in my private time."

"Uh… I think it's Topaz's business." Peter hide a snicker behind his hand. Pearl took a stride forward, seizing Turquoise by her tank top with one of her hands. The other was used to hold the bubble.

"Don't tell her!"

"How are you going to stop me?" Turquoise grabbed Pearl by her wrist. She pulled her hand away from her chest. Pearl gave a small growl from deep inside her throat. With one swift move, Pearl lifted her leg high enough so that it missed Peter entirely. It soared above his head so that Pearl's foot smacked into Turquoise's face. Turquoise groaned in frustration. She grabbed Pearl's foot. Turquoise used her advantage to flip Pearl over her shoulder. There was a small splash as Pearl hit the waterfall's solid surface.

"Turquoise!" she hissed. Peter, sensing the fight that was already emanate, stood in between Turquoise and Pearl, keeping his hands extended out to either side.

"Guys, stop fighting!" he begged. It was useless. Turquoise and Pearl ran at each other. Peter kept them apart. Emerald's bubble was hovering between the three of them, Pearl having let go of it. Peter caught sight of it. He broke his position to get a hold on the bubble. Pearl and Turquoise stopped immediately.

"Peter, be careful with that!" said Pearl.

"Yeah, give it to me!" said Turquoise. Pearl and Turquoise reached for the bubble at the exact same time. The effect of their actions were too much for the bubble to take. It popped. The Gem shards fell into Peter's hands. Peter's eyes went wide. He had seen what these shards could do once before. it was understandable why a sudden silence had fallen among the three.

The shards Peter held began to glow. This was new. Peter's heart jumped into his throat as the shards began to take the form of various limbs, much like how Pearl and Coral did when they regenerated from their stones. However, these shards didn't fully form into humanoid bodies. They became disembodied limbs. A mass amount of arms and legs ell from Peter's hands and cascaded down the waterfall. The three Crystal Gems were helpless as they watched the limbs fall into the tunnels underneath the pool in Pearl's room. They were scattered throughout the Temple.

"We got to get Topaz," said Peter, breaking the silence. It wouldn't be long before she found out about what had happened. Peter felt like it would be better to tell her than have her find out on her own.

"No! No way!" Turquoise exclaimed. "We just freed a bunch of mindless gem chunks, okay?! They're going to crawl all over the Temple!" Turquoise was panicking. Pearl wasn't much calm in the situation either. She was trying to keep her breathing steady. However, she was just as panicked as Turquoise was. Her breathing turned into hyperventilating. "And when Topaz finds out, we're dead! Okay, maybe not Peter, but you and me, Pearl. She's going to poof us and shatter us!" Pearl inhaled sharply. She had finally gotten a hold on her breathing.

"That's not going to happen," she said, trying to keep calm the best she could. "We're going to catch them. All of them." Tension slowly began to leave Turquoise's body.

"You're right. Every single one will be back in a bubble and in the basement before Topaz ever finds out!"

"Like nothing ever happened."

"And then we tell Topaz?" Peter asked the two.

"No!" Both of the full gems said at once. Pearl placed a hand on Peter's shoulder.

"This has to stay a secret," she said. "Alright?"

"Our secret? Together?" Pearl nodded. "If we've got a secret, we've got to do this right." He gave a small gasp. "Which means we've got to come up with a name for our secret-keeping team — Something cool, like… the Secret Team!" Pearl exchanged a glance with Turquoise.

"Great, Peter," said Pearl. She let go of him and summoned her spear. "Come on. We're doing this." Turquoise gave her a nod before summoning her whip.
"Secret Team, move out!" said Peter. This was going to be fun.


Pearl, Turquoise, and Peter started their trek around the Temple. Peter, unlike his two Gem guardians, wasn't helping much with the task of poofing and containing the shards. Pearl and Turquoise were doing most of the work. There was one thing about the entire situation that Peter found to be lighthearted. Pearl and Turquoise. The two Gems often bickered like cats and dogs. This time, however, they weren' pair were acting like a well-oiled machine and watching out for each other. Peter believed this is how they should act all the time.

Soon, the three had collected all the Gem shards that had been sent throughout the Temple.

"Okay," said Pearl. She held out her hand, showing Peter and Turquoise the shards she had collected. Peter and Turquoise did the same thing.

"That looks like all of them," said Turquoise.

"Yeah! Secret Team!" exclaimed Peter. Pearl's eyes gazed over the shards. She muttered numbers under her breath.

"There's twenty-two here," she said before looking up at Turquoise. "Are you sure that we didn't miss any?" Turquoise shook her head.

"No way!" she said. "We totally nailed this."

"Yeah, Pearl," Peter added. "We got all of them." Pearl nodded, clearing her throat.

"If you sure this is all of them, then there's just one thing left to do," she said. Pearl looked over to Peter. "We need to seal them in an Emerald bubble."

"Peter, this is all you!" said Turquoise. She dropped her shards into Peter's open hand. "Think you can do it?"

"Yeah, I can do it," Peter said with a nod. "I bubbled one gem before. I can do it again. What's a bunch of gem shards to that?"

"Of course you can bubble them," said Pearl. "You're part of the Secret Club."

"Secret Team."

"Yes. Secret Team." Pearl placed her shards in Peter's hand. He placed his other hand on top of the gem shards. With a slight amount of difficulty, Peter managed to generate a translucent green bubble around the shards after a few tries. There was only one final step in their plan.


The three made their way down into Turquoise's room. There was a simple way to sneak the bubble into the basement with the help of one of her pools.

Pearl and Turquoise held onto Peter as the boy lowered himself into the pool. The pool opened up into the heart of the temple. He froze when he saw the room. Topaz had not budged at all from when Peter saw her earlier. He began to kick his legs. Pearl and Turquoise pulled him up.

"Topaz is down there!" he said as soon as he was free from the water.

"Did she see you?" Turquoise asked. Peter shook his head.

"I don't think so."

"Then what are you waiting for?" said Pearl. They plunged him back down into the pool. Peter kept his eyes on Topaz, silentl wishing that she wouldn't look behind her. He let go of the bubble, allowing it to float to the ceiling. Pearl and Turquoise pulled him back up.

"Mission accomplished," Pearl said with a relieved sigh. "Congratulations, us."

"We're off the hook," Turquoise said. She flopped backwards onto a cleaned patch of the ground.

"What's next?" Peter asked, looking between Turquoise and Pearl.

"Nothing," Turquoise sat up, resting herself on her elbows. "Mission's over."

"Now, everything goes back to normal and we never speak of this again," Pearl said. "I'll see you later." Pearl began to walk out of the room. Peter watched her go.

"What about Secret team?"


Peter felt like everything was a ticking time bomb. When the timer counted down, Pearl and Turquoise would exploded at each other yet again. He wanted Secret Team back together. That way, they wouldn't argue. That's when he got an idea.

Peter dragged Pearl and Turquoise down into Pearl's room.

"I know you must be wondering why I brought you here," said Peter to the two. They didn't answer, only giving each other weird look. "It's 'cause I'm gettin' the team back together! The Secret Team is back on top! Here's what we need to―" Turquoise's groaning stopped Peter.

"Peter, the Secret Team is over," she said. "It's dad."

"Secret Team?" said Pearl. "What's that?" She gave a nervous laugh. She was acting like nothing had ever happened.

"But we had so much fun together!" said Peter. "You two were getting along, we were sneaking around…" Pearl put her hands tightly on Peter's shoulders.

"Peter, that was not fun," she said. She sighed, taking her hands off them and crossing her arms over her chest. "That was about fixing our terrible mistake."

"Uh, it was your mistake," said Turquoise. "You shouldn't have had that bubble in the first place."

"It would never had popped if you hadn't invaded my personal space!" said Pearl, failing at not grinding her teeth together.

"Guys, stop it," said Peter. He got in between the two, pushing them apart. This is exactly what happened last time.

"Fine," said Turquoise, Ignoring Peter's words. "You can have all the personal space you want. I never want to be on a team with you again!" She turned around.

"Good!" Pearl shouted. "I don't want to be on a team with you either!" Turquoise glanced back at them.

"Fine!" Turquoise walked off the waterfall, dropping down in the the pool below.

"Fine!" Pearl said through gritted teeth.

"Guys, come on!" said Peter. But he had been too late. The bomb had already gone off.


Peter sat on a bench near the beach. The sun had gone down a while ago. He had lost track of how long he had been sitting there. After the fight between Pearl and Turquoise, he didn't want to be in the Temple anymore. Peter was cold.

The cold he felt started to go away when something dropped across his shoulders. Peter wrapped his sweatshirt around his shoulders. He didn't look back to see who had given it to him. He didn't want to.

"Peter," came Topaz's voice from behind. Peter pulled on the sweatshirt to keep him warmer than he had been with it just over his shoulders. "Come on, Peter. It's late. You can't be out here much longer or you'll freeze." Peter shook his head. Topaz walked around from the back of the bench to sit down next to him. "You're making zhat face again. Zhe one you make vhen you did somezhing wrong. Vhat happened?"

"Pearl and Turquoise are fighting again." To Peter's surprise, Topaz laughed.

"Peter, zhey alvays fight," she said. "It's not a big of a deal."

"They're fighting because of me. It's my fault." Topaz lowered her gaze. Peter felt like something was choking him.

"Peter. Vhat are you talking about?" Peter sighed. He had to come clean if he wanted to help Turquoise and Pearl work together.

"Pearl and Turquoise popped one of the bubbles. We made a Secret Team to cover it because they didn't want you to know. Everything was great, but now they're fighting again and won't be on the same team anymore because I tried to get Secret Team back together." Topaz was silent for a moment. When she finally spoke again, the words that came out of her mouth was something Peter didn't expect.

"You did zhe right zhing telling me." Peter looked over at her.

"I don't want them to fight anymore."

"Vhile zhat may be somezhing ve can't control, I can zhink of a vay to get zhem to vork togezher again. "Ve'll have to form our own Secret Team to do it."

"You mean like a Super Secret Team?" Topaz shrugged.

"I guess you could say zhat." She stood up. "Come on. I'll tell you one zhe vay home." Peter got off of the bench and followed after Topaz.


Pearl was in her room. She had her spear in hand, practicing against her own holographic clones. She thrusted her spear through the final hologram, watching it fade away. She sighed, standing up straight.

"Alright, let's try that again," she said to herself. "Maybe I should enhance the―" Pearl was cut off by a sudden shake from behind. She whipped around, releasing her spear in the process. There was Topaz. Turquoise as thrown over on of her shoulders, and Peter was tucked away under her arm.

"Topaz!" Pearl gasped. Topaz didn't speak. She threw both of her prisoners at Pearl's feet. Pearl only helped Peter up.

"What's the big idea?" said Turquoise, hold her head in her hand.

"What's this all about, Topaz?" said Peter. Topaz had a dangerous feel about her.

"I know all about zhe gem shards!" Pearl and Turquoise exchanged a worried glance with one another. Peter stood up.

"It was me!" he said. He was taking the blame for the both of them. "I'm the one who popped the bubble. I did it. Just me."

"Peter…" said Pearl. Peter looked back at her. "I can't believe you!" He couldn't believe it either. They were letting him take the blame for something he didn't even do. Turquoise got up off the ground.

"If no one has anyzhing else to say, and everyone else is innocent…" Topaz said. She looked over to Turquoise and Pearl. They didn't say anything. She sighed, looking to Peter. "Peter, I'm going to have to punish you. Come vith me." Before Peter could make as so much of a single move, a dark orange hand shot up out of the water. It grabbed Topaz around her waist. She gave a scream before the hand pulled her into the watery depths.

"Topaz!" shouted all three of the remaining Crystal Gems. They ran to the spot where she disappeared.

"I can't see her!" said Turquoise. The hand shot back up from one of the other water pedestals that Pearl had throughout her room. It still held Topaz in its grasp. She wriggled around, trying to get free. She managed to pry one of her hands loose. Before she could summon her gauntlet, the hand pulled her back down.

"Help!" Topaz screamed before her voice was clogged by water.

"We missed a shard!" said Peter. pearl summoned her spear. Turquoise summoned her whip. Peter made a failed attempt to summon his shield. The hand burst out for the water that Pearl, Turquoise, and Peter were standing on. This time, it was missing Topaz. The hand made a mad dash from Turquoise, landing a blow square her stomach. Turquoise got to her feet and tried to make a run at the hand to attack it directly. However, another hand shot out of the water. It seize her in its tight embrace. Her whip fell out of reach and down the waterfall.

"Turquoise!" shouted Peter. He tried to summon his shield again. Turquoise moved around frantically. She needed to free one of her hands to summon her whip again. She needed her hands free so she could free herself.

Pearl made a charge at the hand. Before she could make a dent, the second hand went under and burst from the water almost a split second later. It grabbed her. Pearl lost her grip on her spear. It took the same path as Turquoise's whip had just moments before.

"Pearl!" yelled Peter. He tried to summon his shield for a third time. It wouldn't work. The hands suspended Pearl and Turquoise high above the water. The two tried to free themselves with what they had. Their own bodies.

"Turquoise, shapeshift!" shouted Pearl in a panic. "Get small or something!" Turquoise shook her head.

"I can't! I'm freaking out!" Turquoise said, kicking her legs wildly. "You do it!"

"I can't concentrate!" The hands tightened their grip on the two Gems. "This is all my fault! I never should ave had that bubble in the first place!"

"It wouldn't have popped if it weren't for me!"

"We should've told Topaz!" said Peter, still trying to form his shield. "I knew Secret Team was wrong. I just— I wanted to see you guys acting like friends!" In the next moment, there was a sound of laughter. Out from the water rose Topaz. The hands holding Pearl and Turquoise shrunk until they were normal sized again. They were Topaz's own two hands. They were also holding Pearl And Turquoise by the back of their shirts.

"Zhat's all I needed to hear," said the Gem Leader before dropping her two teammates.

"Topaz?" said Pearl out of confusion. "What's going on?" Peter dashed forward.

"Our plan worked!" he said to her. Topaz gave a short nod. Her calm expression melted away when her gaze fell on Pearl and Turquoise.

"So you two can't get along unless you zhink I'm going to kill you." Pearl and Turquoise didn't make eye contact with anyone. Their faces turned a dark shade of teal. Topaz sighed, looking down towards Peter. She crouched down to his height. "Peter, I know you vanted to help zhem. You vanted to protect zhem, even from me. Zhey made you feel like you had to take zheir side. But zhere are no sides, because ve're all on the same team." Topaz stood up to her full height. All eyes were on her. "Ve are zhe Crystal Gems! Am I understood?!" There was a collective sigh. All three nodded.

"Crystal." Topaz relaxed her body.

"Good." Topaz walked over, the waterfall's edge jumping down into the pool to leave the room. Pearl, Turquoise and Peter were left in their own silence.