Uh….this has never happened before. The results were tied….so…I guess I'll go with the result I see first. Uh, I guess the group goes with the explosives. Hm….okay. Anyways, I don't own Steven Universe or its characters, ideas, ect. If you have a criticism or critique, please leave a review. Special thanks to Dante Watterson, LexBoss, and BlissfulBloom for their submissions. Make sure to choose which action you want the team to follow at the end of the chapter. Enjoy the chapter.
God bless, JPLegends
CHAPTER THRITY-SIX: Harmless Explosions
"Guys, go with the team setting up the explosives," Steven said to the group. "McKreavey, we'll take a few of the biggest guns you have."
"It's going to take us longer to set up that trap," Connie says. "Once the weapons systems are off the board, we need to regroup and then start attacking Onyx."
"All we need to do is poof him," Pearl says. "Let's get this started. Where's your explosives?"
"ANFO reserves are in the next chopper," McKreavey says. "And Steven, Connie…you aren't going anywhere without vests."
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Boots thud on the black metal as the group heads past the makeshift barricade McKreavey's troops built to hold out. Steven and Connie were wearing thick, green vests. About as well made against laser weaponry as possible, but Steven's shield was still their most valuable weapon. With them was sixteen militia personnel as well as Peedee, his father, and the Pizzas, all of them in militia gear. Steven's friends have miniguns attached to their backs as well as half of the militia personnel. The other half have RPGs. It would take a lot to get past Onyx's extremely formidable strength, but at this point, this is about as much as they can use.
"Four hours and thirty minutes until the Amazon is destroyed," McKreavey says. "Let's pick up the pace."
"One thing at a time," Garnet says. "For now, we focus on the priorities of securing an exit and taking out Onyx. "
Steven's team keep an eye for whatever is around, and keep examining where they are in relation to where they are on the ship. Steven cannot help but notice how demonic everything looks. Before, it was green and modern. It looked uniform and put together. And now, everything is black with the texture of slime running down a wall. The occasional red came in here and there, and it spooked Steven out especially. Onyx can corrupt whatever he wants with this level of efficiency. And it certainly doesn't help the fact that Soren's gem is in his hands. Or- he guesses- stomach.
"Engaging," McKreavey radios. "Titan Robonoids, except very messed up."
"They're intercepting everything that comes in," Pearl says. "Onyx doesn't take prisoners. If any foreign body enters his domain, his antibodies clean them up. Keep your eyes open."
"Approaching the weapons systems," Lars's voice chirps. "These things look…God."
"Set up the explosives," Garnet commands. "We've got- LOOK OUT!" Gunfire sparks and then the radio goes silent. Steven's voice goes dry. A militia soldier holds and puts his fist in the air. Steven can here gunfire.
"That's close." Connie notes.
"This way." Mr. Fryman says, leading the charge. They go through the hallways, following the sounds of gunfire until they can hear it down one specific hall.
"We can set up our ambush here!" Connie says.
"Let's set up." Kiki says, setting up the tripods and mobile cover. They start building up a hexagonal shape with the miniguns faced towards the sounds of gunfire. Everyone puts their RPGs of the ground against the cover near the miniguns. That was the plan anyways.
In theory, it should have been simple. In practice, it was about three minutes of setting up until they see movement. Steven turns around to see black, gooey orbs with legs headed their way. On their sides are turrets, which can fire their weapons. Which they did. They erupted, their reports firing red beams toward the group. At this time, they were setting up three sides of the hexagon facing the fight down the hall. Then the Robonoids set up about sixteen feet away, and open fire. Steven covered his head with his hands, yelping as the beams pass over his head. Kofi screams as he takes a hit in the joint connecting his shoulder to his arm. Two of the militia soldiers fall to the floor, dead. They leak blood, which Steven stares at for a good five seconds before realizing the attack isn't over.
"Set up those barricades!" Fryman shouts, taking a piece of mobile cover and placing it on the side where the Robonoids are firing from. Steven runs forward, summoning a massive shield. He places himself in front of the militia setting up one area of cover, and takes in the strain. His muscles strained, sweat pouring down his face. He leveled his breathing. He's getting good at this. He thinks, looking around for areas to throw his shield.
"Connie! Where…"
"See that red light on the wall?! Throw it there!" Connie was way ahead of him.
Steven took a deep breath and held it. He shrunk his shield, and promptly lowered his head, avoiding the incoming fire. He drops to a knee, and throws his shield to where Connie told him to throw. His shield hits the red light on the wall and ricochets into the middle of the horde, causing the Robonoids to flinch as they were taking hits. The shield hit from Robonoid to Robonoid, and the fire became less focused. Steven jumps over the mobile cover and hides behind it, and shortly the Robonoid fire starts focusing again. The militia, having set up the barricade, hide behind it and start firing at the Robonoids, starting to dispatch them.
"Kofi, here!" Steven says. He crawls over and licks his hand, placing it over Kofi's shoulder. Kofi feels his shoulder, noticing it is healed.
"Thank you, Steven," Kofi says, pulling up his rifle. "I'll give you Robonoids a piece of my mind!"
The gunfight continues, with Steven's group huddled in their cover and the Robonoids firing aggressively to join the fight that's behind them.
"Ack!" Lars yells through the radio.
"Everyone okay?" Steven asks through the radio.
"We're doing fine," Jewel says, grunting. "Lars here just took one in the leg. We don't have any deaths and the explosives are nearly set up. How are you guys going?"
"Two deaths," Connie says, her voice shaky. "We're being attacked by Robonoids, and we're taking a little bit to get said up. Any sign of Onyx?"
"Not yet," Amethyst replies. "We'll head your way when he shows up. Hopefully, we'll get lucky and he'll get caught in the explosion. Yo, McKreavey! How're you doin'?"
"Still doing well," McKreavey says. "This area will be ready to go when we leave." The Robonoids keep on coming, and the firefight gets more intense. Steven throws his shield here and there, but Connie wouldn't be able to use her sword since the Robonoids were so far away. The fight goes well for another ten minutes. And then, the Robonoids start coming in with even more units. They started pushing further, trying to push the soldiers out of cover. The fire is so bad that barely anyone can get out of cover. Mr. Fryman peeks out of cover to fire a few shots at the Robonoids.
A laser passes through his head. He falls on the floor, unmoving. His head leaks blood.
"DAD!" Peedee yells. He tries to get up and forgets about the fact that there is a firefight going on. Connie grabs his arm and wraps her arm around his waist, keeping his head low and keeping him unmoving. Peedee is screaming and kicking, unable to calm down. Steven grabs Peedee's shoulders and looks into his eyes.
"Peedee! Peedee! Hey, calm down," Steven says. "Come on, we've got to get out of this alive."
Steven looked back to see Fryman, still not moving. Kofi was staring at the body. He couldn't seem to move. The Robonoids use the sudden stop in firepower to move forward, which meant even more lasers whizzing past. Steven yelps, ducking. So does Connie and Peedee, the latter of which is screaming. The Robonoids move forward, and Kofi, who didn't move, is gunned down. Jenny and Kiki, turned around to see their father fall. They seemed to choke, and started to move.
"DON'T MOVE!" Steven roared. Jenny and Kiki fell back into cover. The Robonoids were still moving forward. Steven moved immediately from shock to anger. His blood was boiling. How dare these robots kill these fathers?! How dare they take Soren?! He clenched his teeth, tears welling in his eyes. Steven summons his shield and leaps from behind cover, holding it in front of him, taking a lot of firepower. His muscles immediately ached, a headache forming in his head. He summons his bubble shield, the stress taken away, and the bubble now taking in the gunfire. The lasers made hard indents in his bubble, and Steven rolled forward aggressively. Connie took the opportunity and leaped in as well. The Robonoids staggered as Steven crashed into them and made the bubble explode, making them flinch hard. He turns at a Robonoid at his left and uses his shield to cut through the turret like butter. Black goop splatters all over his vest, and Steven kicks behind him, sending a few Robonoids flying. Steven bashes more into the Robonoid with his shield, causing it to leak more goop. He throws it into more Robonoids, effectively causing major chaos.
"Go, Steven!" Jenny yells. The militia start cheering at Steven's violent attack.
Connie uses the surprise brute force caused by Steven to cut into more Robonoids, slicing them into pieces while Steven continues bashing them and blocking the lasers fired by them. They continue bashing hard at them, effectively pushing them back. And then, Pearl screeches through the radio.
"ONYX!"
"Pull yourself together, girl!" Amethyst says.
"Explosives set up," Garnet says. "And Onion is doing…. Something. We'll be with you guys in a few moments." Steven and Connie nod at one another, and run back, taking up cover. The militia go behind cover and continue firing, Peedee and the twins have their head back in the game and are now firing intently at the confused Robonoids. And then, a few moments later, two huge explosions go off at the Robonoids. The explosions effectively destroy all of the Robonoids, and the Crystal Gems show up. Garnet had caused the explosions, as she had apparently used her gauntlet missiles. More militia soldiers show up behind them, and Onion- who is wearing the militia armor with no helmet- is looking quite skittish. Lars vaults into cover and huddles up.
"HE'S COMING!" Lars shouts. Onion pulls out a detonator and pressed the red button. And immediately, there is a loud crash. Flames lick at the hallway, and red metal is suddenly flying through the air. Steven hides his face and looks back a bit later, seeing the hallway engulfed in fire and dark ash and smoke filling the air.
"Troops are seeing a second hole in the ship on the ground," McKreavey says. "And I felt that from here. The ANFO was not supposed to be that powerful. How did you go that?!"
"Onion." Steven says, grinning at the small child.
Onion gives a thumbs up, a murderous look in his eyes.
"There's Onyx," Jewel says. "Attack!"
The militia take up the miniguns, RPGs, and the Crystal Gems use their abilities to fire on Onyx's tall, dark figure the second they see him. A large combination of explosions hits Onyx straight in the chest and there is a solid two minutes of Onyx getting blasted with explosion after explosion, with bullets thrown in the mix. Then, everyone stops. There is some silence, and Onyx walks through the smoke. He has a limp- a bad one- and he has a few cuts and bruises. But otherwise, he's smiling. His tongue is hanging out of his mouth, acid dripping onto the floor.
"Cute." Onyx says simply. He summons a black spear and hurls it at the group. Everyone scatters, avoiding the spear as it lands in the center of the group and explodes. The militia gets back on their feet and keep firing at Onyx as he simply walks through the area. Jewel leaps forward, summoning a sword and lunging at his chest. Onyx ducks out of the way, grabs Jewel's ankle, and slams her against the wall. Jewel gasps, her face contorted in pain. She rolls on the floor, unmoving. Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl- being much more experienced at working as a team- attack simultaneously. Pearl slides under Onyx's legs, slicing at Onyx's thighs. While Onyx is turning to follow Pearl's movements, Garnet punches at the gem's side and throws more jabs at his stomach. Amethyst uses her whips to pull Onyx's hands back to leave him open.
For a second, Onyx slowed down, and was taking damage from all sides by the gems and the militia. Then, he simply threw Amethyst over his shoulder, stunning her for a second. He then grabs Pearl's spear, ripping it out of her hands and kicking her away. Garnet moves forward to throw another punch, but Onyx summons a scythe and swings it, forcing Garnet back. He turns to see a charging Pearl, sweeping his scythe to trips her. He then raises his scythe to impale her. Steven prepared to throw his shield, but he wasn't able to throw it in time. Luckily, Amethyst whipped her weapon to wrap around the scythe, pulling it away from Onyx's grasp. Amethyst prepares for another strike, but Onyx leaps forward, and kicks him into the wall. Jewel began to stir.
Pearl got up, stunned, as Garnet moves forward for another punch. Garnet's gauntlet is caught by Onyx's hand, who smirks. On his other hand, he summons his own gauntlet-only with diamonds instead of stars on the knuckles and looking extremely demonic. Onyx lunges to the side and punches Garnet, which actually creates a sonic boom. The shockwave knocked multiple militia soldiers off their feet. Steven and Connie were rolled off their feet, and Garnet goes flying. Steven hits his head on the metal, and he groans. He looks to see Connie rubbing her head.
"Connie!" He says, grabbing her shoulder. She looks bad. Steven looks back, seeing Pearl on the wall with Onyx's arm on her throat. She falls. Onyx looks at the nearest militia soldier, and walks over. He puts his foot on the soldier's back, who starts screaming bloody murder. Onyx applies more pressure, and Steven looks away before…
CRUNCH! The soldier stops screaming.
Steven gets up, and summons his shield. He sprints toward Onyx despite Connie screaming not to. Onyx, looking discontent and confused at the body before him, didn't have the time to react appropriately to Steven's attack. He simply punches at Steven, and Steven- obeying his instincts- raises his shield and stops moving. He punches the shield and the thing resonates, sending loud reverberations through the air. Onyx staggers, his skin steaming and himself screaming. He raises his hands onto his ears, and writhing at the sound of Steven's shield vibrating. Steven steps back, motioning at Connie to come over. Connie, getting the idea, pulls out her sword and starts banging it against Steven's shield, making only light dinging sounds.
Steven grunts in frustration. Connie looks like she's about kill everyone in the room.
The noise starts to wear off, and Onyx looks like he's about to rip the two kids inside out. Luckily, before he does anything, Onyx is impaled by Jewel's sword. Jewel must have gotten up while the fight was going on. Jewel waits a few seconds, seeing Onyx not poof, and then pulls out her sword. Garnet, flying out of nowhere, punches Onyx in the face. Onyx goes flying a little bit down the hall, right over Jewel, ducking. They obviously coordinated the attack somehow. Garnet stands in front of the kids, prepared for the next attack.
"Garnet," Steven says. "Onyx is weak to the shield's vibrations!" Garnet glances over her shoulder fast, looking at Steven really quick. She turns back to see Onyx start stirring, and standing up as if what just happened did not happen. Garnet starts looking around. Steven sees the same things she does, the Crystal Gems out of commission, as well as the militia half conscious. And then, Garnet comes to a conclusion that makes perfect sense:
"Give me your shield."
Steven wasn't sure how giving away his shield was going to help, but he didn't ask. He got the idea. Then, Garnet defused before his eyes, with Ruby holding his shield and Sapphire in a fighting stance.
"You sure?" Sapphire asks. Her dress looks the same as it did all that time ago, when things were still somewhat normal. So did Ruby's fighting outfit, except the fact that he was holding Steven's shield. Ruby had a glimmer of sweat on her head.
"Positive. I think," Ruby says, summoning his gauntlet. "Go. Steven, Connie, check him out. We gotta know how to weaken him."
"I'd love to see you tr-AGH!" Onyx screams, getting cut off by Ruby hitting Steven's shield. Steven guessed that since gems are naturally stronger than humans, Ruby could strike at the shield hard enough to make the resonating sound. Which may be as hard as a missile flying at full speed. Ruby keeps smashing at the shield, making Onyx writhe in obvious pain. Meanwhile, Sapphire vanishes in a flash of blue, a blur appearing and disappearing, taking the gems and soldiers with her. Super speed is handy, especially when you need to get a lot of people out of a place quickly. Steven and Connie draw their weapons and charge, slicing and swinging at the gem eater. Steven noticed that no matter how hard they hit, they did not seem to be able to make a dent. Only the magic energy from Steven's shield being emanated from the sound seems to be harming him, but no other magic seemed to have any effect.
It reminded Steven of how Lapis's water magic seemed really strong and was actually winning the fight when she stole Earth's oceans forever ago. Steven's shield managed to disable Lapis's magic in one fell swoop by the same resonance. So….Onyx is made of gem magic, which resonates with gem magic. Steven keeps fighting, swinging and chucking and catching is shield, then jumping to a different angle when Onyx flails his direction. Connie is way more efficient at fighting than him, but he still does an efficient job. He jumps around and notices a deep cut at Onyx's side. Steven's heart start beating really fast in excitement.
"Connie, over here!" Steven calls out. They both meet at Onyx's side and follow it wherever the gem moves, cutting deeper and deeper into Onyx's form. Sweat flies off of each other's faces, and there is only a flash of weaponry as they see the cut get deeper into the grey chunk of Onyx's chest. Eventually, Connie cuts into Onyx and is greeted by a puff of black smoke and the scent of rotten eggs. Steven and Connie jump back, holding their noses and waiting for Onyx to poof. Steven accidentally got some of the smoke in his mouth and was trying not to throw up. The smoke pours out fast and aggressively, as if it was under pressure. Even making the evil hisssss sound, which had a hint of discordant violin and cello. They see Onyx glow black, seemingly about to poof. But Onyx simply turns back into regular Onyx and stops smoking. Onyx's face had turned black with anger, kind of like angry blushing.
"That's all I needed to see." Sapphire says, suddenly at Ruby's side. She has a smirk on her face. She runs forward (well, less like a run, more like a flash) and suddenly, Steven sees blurs of black all around him for about twelve seconds. Then it stops, and Steven is hit with a light headed feeling. Connie has about the same reaction Steven did the first time he went through that: off balance, dazed, and groaning "ughhh…"
Then Ruby appeared with Sapphire. Onyx was nowhere in sight. But Sapphire had clearly taken the soldiers and gems somewhere else on the ship. They were safe for now.
"Where are we?" Steven asks, holding onto Connie to help her keep her balance.
"The very end of the index finger of the ship," Sapphire says. "Far enough away to be safe from Onyx for a good amount of time. So, what did you guys find out?"
"For one, Onyx is weak to the shield's resonance." Connie says.
"Yeah, that was apparent." Ruby says, rolling her shoulders to show off Steven's shield.
"But we noticed there was a cut in Onyx's side," Steven says. "And we were able to make it deeper."
"Hit it hard enough, and it dies," Ruby says, grinning. "That solution still applies, eh?"
"Not really," Sapphire says. "That…thing is able to resist poofing." Steven agrees with the fact that Onyx isn't humane (ironically) enough to be gem. It kills without remorse, and shows no emotion when doing so.
"What about the smoke?" Connie asks. Steven was thinking the same thing.
"I dunno," Ruby says. "Pearl knows most about Onyx. We can ask her about it when she wakes up." Steven noticed that Pearl is unconscious. So is pretty much everyone here. Ruby hands Steven back his shield, and Steven promptly makes it disappear. Ruby faces Sapphire.
"M'lady," Ruby says, grinning. "Shall we?" Sapphire turns dark blue.
"Oh…sure." Sapphire takes Ruby's hand, and they start dancing.
Sorry for the giant delay getting this out. Decision chapter is next. See you guys then.