Throughout the next series of days Blue Diamond watched, rather in awe, how the Crystal Gems repaired themselves.
Pink's former Pearl's news had seemingly disrupted their way of life, and Blue knew her and Yellow's intrusion upon that wasn't helping in the slightest; she would have ordered Yellow and all their gems to stay atop the hill with the lighthouse if not for Steven. After he and the Pearl spoke with the Sapphire, they had returned to their base to find the Ruby long gone, and the Amethyst of no help in locating her. At first. Overwrought with emotion, Pearl and Sapphire had stayed at the base. Steven had dragged Amethyst out to find Ruby. And he had insisted the Diamonds accompany them.
"Accompany you? Why? To scare the poor thing off again?" Yellow snarled, scowling down at Steven, bent a bit closer to him in her adjusted form just to fit inside his base. And, well, it was far less imposing - Blue had insisted they couldn't even look like a threat as long as they were on Earth, so as to not provoke the Crystal Gems unnecessarily.
Steven smiled back up at her, but he was frowning slightly. "No," he half-laughed. "You said you and Blue Diamond wanted to see more of Earth, to understand why Pink Diamond fought so hard for it. I thought, what better way to see some more of it? Ruby could be anywhere around Beach City, or the country, although Peridot and Lapis say they haven't seen her at all... Don't worry, it'll be fun! And you don't have to get involved in all the emotional stuff if you don't want to, Yellow Diamond."
"Of course I don't want to," Yellow huffed. Her eyes narrowed and her shoulders gave the briefest of tremors. Blue laughed, resting a hand on the golden-skinned gem's chest, and delighting in the way her cheeks turned bright orange in an automatic blush she could no longer help. Not since their fusion attempt. "Steven, we do not know you and your Crystal Gems. We-"
"You don't know us yet," Steven interrupted. "You can start now!"
Blue still laughed to herself, imagining the accosted look Yellow had developed just to hide her apprehension and even fear. Yes, she would agree that there were personal matters the two of them had no place in - hence why they had given Steven, Amethyst, Ruby, and the human Greg space on their trip to "the wild west" while the Ruby appeared to go through what Steven had referred to as something "like a midlife crisis, almost" - but the opportunity to see more of the Earth was not something she would let them miss out on. It was all so much more beautiful from the surface. So interesting, and intricate. The more she saw, the more Blue thought she could see through Pink; there was indeed things to this planet that made it unique compared to the countless other planets the Diamond Authority had conquered, resources different than those they had ever encountered before.
The beauty felt... untouchable. Blue often found herself staring down at the grass beneath her feet and felt guilty for pressing it down under her weight. She studied what the humans had done with it, and a part of her wondered if the Earth would have been better off unchanged - as Steven had loosely detailed to her how "humanity" had changed and shifted throughout centuries, making it a much different picture than the one Pink would have seen those thousands of years ago - while the rest of her understood that it was the right of the planet's inhabitants to change their home how they saw fit.
That was the strangest part. The change. It was everywhere, seemingly instinctual, and Blue could see how uncomfortable it was making Yellow. For all their existence they had been instructed to fit a very specific mold, and enforce the order of gems below them following it just as strictly, if not more so. Pearls were made to serve. Sapphires were made to predict moments in time and offer diplomatic reason. Rubies were made to fight battles, as were a variety of Quartzes. Peridots were made to fix things. And so on and so forth. A Diamond was made to rule, to conquer other planets and expand the Gem Empire by using their resources either to make new gems or to have the materials needed for the spires, coliseums, bases, Kindergartens, etcetera they adorned their colonies with. A Diamond made sure the gems in their courts never stepped out of line, doing as they were instructed - and the unspoken rule that they never, not ever, change what they were meant for. It was unheard of.
And yet here were four gems that had. Willingly. They had fought for these identities they had made for themselves. They had tried to adopt the idea of change, to change with the Earth. Rose Quartz seemed to have done so best of all her remaining Crystal Gem army.
Thinking about it, Blue couldn't remember the last time Homeworld had changed. In appearance, function, color - nothing. It was the same as it had always been.
Looking at the way the landscape had changed from grassy hills to flatter, dustier expanses as she and Yellow, leaving their Pearls to keep an eye on things back in "Beach City", followed Steven and his friends through a piece of the wild west, Blue could see how it might be... well, boring, if nothing changed for millennia after millennia. She pictured Homeworld and she felt sad, frustrated, even a little off-put. How had she been able to stand it for so long? How had she not even thought about it?
She had expressed her thoughts to Steven, and he had laughed. Told her, "Welcome to Earth. It's only going to get more confusing before things start to make sense. Just ask Peridot."
Now, sitting at the end of the beach in front of Steven's base - his home, she reminded herself - she watched the preparations they were all making, setting up chairs and a little archway... for a "wedding". That was apparently what the Ruby had decided she wanted to be after her time in the west, and she had asked the Sapphire if she wanted to be that with her... Blue Diamond didn't know how it worked. She just knew they were all very excited, and for what, Blue wasn't sure. As she understood it this was just for the Ruby and Sapphire to fuse again, and she supposed she was concerned by the fact that they couldn't do it as easily as she had been led to believe they could.
She also knew Yellow was not only so far from her comfort zone it was laughable, but that she was growing increasingly restless, uncertain... and impatient.
"Why are we waiting for them?" she snapped, and Blue turned away from the sight of Pink's former Pearl, the Ruby and Sapphire, the unnaturally small Amethyst, and the traitorous Peridot and Lapis Lazuli all standing with their hands raised, holding... something, waiting for Steven to return. He had been inside for quite awhile now. Blue met Yellow's agitated gaze and reached for her, but her fellow Diamond just leaned away. Arms crossed, posture tense, Yellow let out a shrill huff. "We need to find a way off this planet, get back home, and question White. My ship has been completely destroyed, so we need to find another way. We can't do that just sitting here while those Crystal Gems plan their... what was it called, again?"
"Their wedding," Blue said. "Yellow, please, just be patient. Steven said he will help us find a way back to Homeworld as soon as this is over. We need only wait through tomorrow."
"This is a waste of time," Yellow scoffed, turning her glare to the ocean.
Blue leaned closer, smirking just so, watching the way Yellow struggled to keep her attention on the vast expanse of water before them and not Blue's hands. She held herself up with one in the warm sand and placed the other on Yellow's leg. "We know White isn't going anywhere," she sighed. Feeling her expression go blank, she too looked out at the water. It was easier than looking at Yellow. A trend they had developed whenever they dared speak about their last remaining fellow Diamond... and what they now knew. "She hasn't left her head for so long... I don't think I remember the last time I saw her out of it. I know when I saw her last. Right after our last attack on Earth. She spoke to us both in her ship's private quarters, then she sent us away. She hardly said a word, didn't she?"
"You needn't remind me," Yellow spat. The higher pitch still in her voice just suggested to her anxiety, and Blue glided her hand farther up the soft golden fabric beneath it, all the way up Yellow's stomach to her chest. Caressed her gem - and Yellow jerked back, swatting her hand away, shooting her an uncomfortable grimace. Blue eased back. "We have no reason to believe we can't just walk into her head and confront her," the golden-skinned gem said. "We've avoided her, haven't we? Her grief was too difficult to deal with. It was easier to leave her be, to let her run her part of things from behind the curtain, and to become the faces of the Diamond Authority ourselves."
"What's left of it," Blue murmured. "Yellow, knowing now what we do... are you really so eager to confront White about it? Face to face?"
Yellow's grimace increased, a spark of panic shooting through her eyes. She ducked her head, glowering instead at her own lap, and said nothing. Blue glanced up the beach; the Crystal Gems were heading back inside the house. All her and Yellow's gems were far up above it and the Temple it was arranged around, save for their Pearls, placed a bit awkwardly between their Diamonds and their temporary home of sorts. They stood together in the sand up near the bend around the cliffs, and Blue could feel their eyes on her and Yellow.
Regardless, they were alone enough. She stood, brushing sand from her skirts. Staying in these neutral forms she felt even more like she understood Pink... the smallest of their four, so energetic, bouncing off the walls. Getting under their feet. And surely she had been able to see from a better perspective all her life, then, because she had always been much closer to the same level the majority of their gems stood at. Still never quite half as tall as Pink Diamond, not counting the battle fusions, which depended on how many of the same gem were placed together... Blue hardly felt like a Diamond at this height, her outward appearance less formal, even, and she supposed that was part of the problem. Pink hadn't felt like a Diamond, she was smaller, they all treated her like a child, and they took forever finally deciding if she was ready for her first colony or not. Blue could only imagine how it had affected her, how it had led to the end result they were met with today.
Closing her eyes tight for a second, she shook her head to herself. "Do you think Pink ever tried fusion?" she asked, drifting towards the water. It lapped over her bare feet and she heard Yellow scoff out a laugh behind her, followed by a slight scuffling that suggested she too was getting to her feet.
"With whom?" Yellow snorted.
"Well, she did sound quite close to her former Pearl."
Yellow stood beside her, grimacing again, hands clasped behind her back. Ever the general, even out of armor. "That's just obscene, Blue," she snapped. "A Diamond, fuse with a Pearl? Please. At least hypothesize more realistically. It could have been with Rose Quartz."
"Do you really think we knew Pink?" Blue murmured. "After hearing all this, I realized... though I loved her, and she was my best friend... I didn't know her at all, nearing the end."
Very slowly, Yellow turned to her. She heaved out a long, weighted breath. "Pink became so busy with her work, and then there was the mess of Rose Quartz's rebellion," she said. "She didn't have the time to warp back to Homeworld and catch up with you in your pool. Even if she had time to call us, she only really spoke to White."
"After we both refused to let her give up on her colony," Blue said. She shook her head. "Don't you see, now? She wasn't trying to quit, overwhelmed by the responsibility, just like we always feared. It was why we said she might not be ready."
"I feared. I said she wasn't ready. You always encouraged her," Yellow murmured.
"She was trying to free this planet."
"And... she did."
"She lost her life for it, Yellow! We cannot make light of that."
Eyes flicking away, Yellow pursed her lips. She carefully shifted just a bit closer. "We're going to drive ourselves mad, trying to guess so many things we don't know," she said softly. "Please, can we... can we put a hold on this conversation?"
"One of many," Blue sighed.
Quiet enfolded them, broken by the sound of the waves, a gentle breeze rifling Blue's skirts and blowing her white hair into her face. She brushed it away to maintain her eye-contact with Yellow, a bit surprised she hadn't turned away again. Smiling, she reached up, running her hand through Yellow's golden hair, smoothed backwards in this slightly altered form, the softest Blue had probably ever seen it. She giggled, and Yellow blushed fiercely.
"This planet isn't so bad," she said. "I think it's quite beautiful, actually."
"It's... interesting," Yellow huffed.
"Can't you see why Pink must have loved it so?"
"Of course. I see how she could have bonded with Rose Quartz over their shared love for it. A bit misguided, perhaps, but... there's a chance Pink might not have been anything like either of us, certainly not White, regardless of if she hadn't perished after only somewhat establishing her very first colony. She was always so very different."
"And we so rigid," Blue chuckled.
"We never had anything like this." Yellow stepped a bit farther out into the water, wading in up to her knees.
Blue followed her, wrapping her arms around her waist from behind. "I'd like to talk to Steven more about this Earth custom they're engaging in," she said. "I did really like the sound of it, though I still don't understand its purpose. We can absolutely learn from that Ruby and Sapphire. From all of them, truly. Maybe we should just stay here."
Yellow stiffened in her grip. "What? And abandon Homeworld? All our responsibilities?"
"I don't mean permanently, silly," Blue laughed. "There's hardly any rush to return to White. For all we know she won't even let us in her head, and then how do you propose we talk to her? This is not a matter to be discussed over screens."
Rolling her eyes, Yellow rested her arms over Blue's. "If that is what you wish. To stay here longer than absolutely necessary. I won't argue with you."
"You don't think we could learn something here? Each of those Crystal Gems have something to teach us. I can feel it."
"Then we'll stay. I'll try not to worry so much about finding a way off this planet. Though... it won't be long until White realizes we're missing, and that she can't even contact us. She may not come after us herself, but she'll send someone, and then-"
"I won't let anything happen to you, my dear."
Yellow relaxed an increment in her hold, letting out a long, slow exhale. She turned around in Blue's arms and wrapped hers around her fellow Diamond. Blue heard her take in a shaky inhale, felt a tiny drop of wetness as a single tear fell to her shoulder. Holding Yellow tightly to her, she watched the sun start to dip towards the far horizon, steadily casting bright, amazing colors across the sky. So very, very different than anything on Homeworld.
For now, though they were in unfamiliar territory, relying on gems they had previously known only to be their enemy, completely at their mercy, really... they were still alright. They were safe. They were together. And that was all Blue felt she needed.
For now.
A/N: y'all. Where do I even begin.
I know it's been a really long time, and I apologize for that (and for the short filler chapter), but mental health struggles and overall life insanity kinda drew me away from this story. However, with the official (unofficial if we get that broadway musical) end of Steven Universe, I got really inspired and motivated and I do want to really try and put work into finishing this. I won't tell y'all all my plans, just that the next two chapters ish will still kinda follow the episodes "Made of Honor" and "Reunited", loosely with the former, tiny bit closer with the latter. I hope to update soon.
Thank you for those of you sticking with this story. I really appreciate all of you. Please favorite if you're a newcomer, and follow me for more!
