Been awhile huh? Sorry for the long hiatus, just been focusing on my work and school and my personal life. Been working hard through this whole thing and hope to continue despite my little to no free time. Well, here it is, new chapter after what a year? Hope you like it and I look forward on trying to get back on schedule. *I DO NOT OWN POKEMON OR STEVEN UNIVERSE*
Ash stumbled in place, catching himself as he nearly fell over, shocked over how quickly White Diamond had sent them away.
"You alright?" Steven asked, equally shocked.
"Yeah. Just have to catch my breath." he said leaning on the wall. "You alright Pikachu?"
"Pika-pi!" the pokemon answered equally as winded.
"So this must be Pink Diamond's room huh?" Steven asked as he began to examine their new surroundings. He plopped down on the floor slightly annoyed. "I guess we'll need a bed."
To their surprise, a bed suddenly appeared underneath him.
"What the?"
They quickly ducked under the bed, and were greeted to the sight of a collection of small, grey, individual gems hiding under it. Once they saw they were noticed, they scattered.
"Hey, don't be scared." Ash tried to reassure them.
Steven stood up thinking. "We need a place to sit."
Before Ash could ask what he was trying to do, a chair manifested itself under him. He caught on and removed his jacket.
"I need a place to put my jacket." sure enough, a coat rack appeared in front of him.
Steven approached the wall. "I need a shelf for my face." A hole opened in the wall large enough for them to stick their heads into.
"Hey there." Ash greeted them.
The little gems gasped.
"Hey, it's okay, we're not gonna hurt you."
"Who are you guys?" Steven asked as they once again ran away. "Thank you."
The small gems looked at each other confused. "Th-Thank you?" one finally asked out loud.
"Is it…" another asked coming from their hiding spot.
Ash could only watch as multiple, tiny, grey gems of varying looks emerged surrounding them.
"It is her!" a third gem exclaimed climbing on to Steven's face.
"Why does she look different?"
"Who's this one?" one of them asked, pulling on Ash's shirt.
"Hey!" he exclaimed gently pushing the small gem away, only for a second one to climb up the back of his head and taking his hat off.
"Is this your new Pearl?"
"What's that?" one asked approaching Pikachu, who backed up into the wall only for a second to pull his tail down inspecting it.
"Leave him alone!" he exclaimed, picking up the pokemon. "And give that back!" he said snatching his hat back from the gem.
One pulled Steven's shirt up to expose his gem. "Pinkie time! She's back! Our Diamond is back!"
With this revelation, the gems swarmed him, crawling all over him in pure joy and excitement.
"Hey! Don't build stuff in my mouth!" Steven exclaimed, spitting one wayward gem and a tiny house out of his mouth. "Okay, who are you guys?"
The small army of gems looked at him confused "Very funny Pink."
"Yeah, always playing your games. Pretending she doesn't know us Pebbles." with that, one of the Pebbles leaped into Steven's bag and took out his phone, indirectly taking a selfie.
Before either could respond, the door opened and Pearl ran in, embracing both in a tight hug, scaring the Pebbles back into their hiding places.
"Pearl?"
"Oh thank the stars you two are alright! What did White Diamond do? Did she hurt you?"
"No, she was like "Welcome home", Ash explained, wiggling his way out from her grip.
"I don't think she understands that I'm not Pink Diamond. Where's Connie? And Garnet? And Amethyst?"
"They're still on the ship," she explained removing Steven's hot dog duffel bag and Ash's backpack from her gem and gently placing them on the floor. "I'm only here because I'm bringing your things. And they consider me as one of your things."
A loud chime echoed through the room creating a ringing in Ash's ears. He quickly covered Pikachu's ears to protect him from the loud noise.
"The Diamond chime. It's Yellow." Pearl explained opening the door.
"Pink Diamond, Chosen One" Yellow Pearl announced as she entered the room "My Diamond has requested your presence in the extraction chamber."
"Let's get you into a suit" Pearl said opening the bag "Sorry Ash but I've only got one for Steven, you'll have to make do." she explained pulling a pair of yellow swim trunks from the bag. "You'll have to strip down."
"What?"
The next thing he knew, Steven was wearing only swim trunks and he was only in his underwear following Yellow Pearl.
"This doesn't seem formal."
"Trust me, this will be more comfortable than jeans."
As they walked through the hallway, they noticed several figures Ash initially thought were statues looking down at them and following them with their eyes. Eventually they reached the end of the hall, an enormous door guarded by two Topaz.
"Pink Diamond."
"Please, call me Steven."
"Pink Steven."
"No, just Steven."
"Just Steven."
He and Ash looked at each other and entertained "Call me, Lasagna."
"Steven stop. You're going to break her." Pearl scolded them opening the door. They were exposed to a wall of steam and heat.
"Only the two of you please." Yellow Pearl said motioning towards Pikachu.
"Pika!" the pokemon said offended.
"It's alright Pikachu." Ash said turning to Pearl, "Think you can watch him?"
"Of course." she said gently picking up the pokemon.
"Have a nice extraction Chosen One, Pink Lasagna."
The two entered to see Yellow sitting in an enormous room running a sweat. "Pink. Chosen One."
"Cool sauna."
"It's new. Have a seat."
Steven took Ash's hand and the duo floated up to sit next to the giant woman.
"So you've met with White. How was it?"
"All I got to say was "Hi", "I" and "umm"."
"Two and a half words. That's a record."
"Two and a half words isn't enough. We still need to talk to her about healing all the corrupted gems on earth."
She scoffed "Good luck. White never leaves her own head these days. And she never lets anyone in, except you, I guess. It's unfair. I have hundreds of successful crystal system colonies and an elite team of pokemon of my own and she only talks to you because your one colony was a failure."
The two looked at each other awkwardly "Maybe, you should just fail?" Steven joked.
Yellow looked at them surprised before bursting out laughing. "Oh Pink, you always did have a knack for making me laugh. You're almost worth the trouble."
Before either could ask anything else, the loud chime is heard again.
"Already?" Yellow asked annoyed "Excuse me. I've got to check the latest Citrine production reports." she explained as she dried herself off and exited the room.
"Wait!" Ash exclaimed trying in vain to follow her, "What should we do about White? Or Giovanni and Jasper?" but his plea was met on deaf ears as Yellow turned the corner and was gone.
Another chime boomed through the hallway, this time Blue Pearl stood before them.
"Blue Diamond has requested your presence."
Ash groaned in annoyance as the others followed her towards Blue's chambers.
"What happened?" Pearl asked.
"We barely talked about White or Giovanni at all. She had to rush off to do a report and we couldn't go with her. I get they're like busy since they're dictators and everything. But we need more time!" He smacked himself in regret "Should've asked her what she was doing after the Citrine thing!"
"She'll be at that for awhile." Pearl explained. "Yellow oversees all aspects of Gem production on every single one of her colonies. And when she's not doing that, she's off with her armies, conquering the next one."
"What about their days off?" Ash asked.
"Or weekends?"
"Blue Diamond is just up the stairs." Blue Pearl explained.
As the duo made their way up the stairs, Ash grabbed Steven's hand "Promise me you won't leave me alone with her."
"Uh, okay."
As the two entered, Ash realized it was the exact same as the last time he saw it, the large tank filled with water types was still lively and filled with its schools of Magikarp and Luvdisc, along with the Cloyster and Dragalge he battled on the beach. Blue Diamond sat on the edge of an enormous pool with her legs resting in the water combing her hair. He could hear a voice that was not Blue's coming from the comb.
"You're here!" she exclaimed, happily putting the comb away. "Come in!"
While Ash just felt awkward in her presence, Steven immediately took advantage of the situation and ran towards the pool, jumping in with a cannonball formation.
"Come on in Ash!"
Realizing he had nothing to lose, he leapt into the pool in a jackknife position, splashing water everywhere.
"It's funny," Steven commented "we live on the beach but we end up going to space to swim."
Blue laughed and clapped her hands, causing the water to ripple as if an earthquake struck. "You haven't changed at all, so skinny. So small." She then turned to Ash with a purple blush on her face "It's nice to see you again Cho-I mean Ash."
"It's, uh, nice to see you again too I guess. And, thank you."
She looked slightly confused at him "Thank you? Why?"
"Brock told me you kept him and Misty safe. Helped them escape too. They probably wouldn't have made it if it weren't for you."
"Ah yes, your strange friends." she spoke remembering her encounter with them "Tell me, which one was Brock?"
"The one who probably professed his love to you." he explained with a smirk, truth be told Brock never told him about that part, but knowing Brock he assumed correctly that happened.
"Oh, the strange one." she turned her attention back to Steven "I'm so glad you're back, Steven."
"You-you actually said my name."
She giggled "Steven." she repeated "Steee-vonn. Such a funny name. You're so creative Pink. Remember when I let you name that batch of Pyrite, "Fool's Gold?" Oh how furious White got."
"I'm sorry, I don't remember."
She looked disappointed "Oh. Do you remember the game we used to play here? We had so much fun together, You and I, and Yellow and White."
"We all used to be together here?" Steven asked.
"You would stand all the way at the bottom and sing. And we would be above the surface and try and guess the song."
"Can we do it right now?" Steven asked "Maybe we can all talk White into coming back to Earth with us."
She looked down sad "No. We stopped coming here after you left. That was the start of Era Two. No one wanted to be here, not even Giovanni." she sniffled as a tear fell from her eye "It was so quiet."
"We know you guys have colony stuff to do, but we should spend more time together." Steven suggested as he and Ash whipped their own tears from their faces.
Before they could keep the conversation going however, the chime boomed once again. "Blue Diamond," Blue Pearl exclaimed, clearing her throat "your next appointment."
She sighed "Of course" she stood up from the water and began to make her way to the exit.
"Wait! I wanted to talk to you about White!"
"Later perhaps. Good night Steven. Ash." she said as she departed leaving a small trail of water behind her. With her presence gone, the pool drained of it's contents leaving the two in an empty pool.
"Pearl?" Steven called out.
"Yes?" she answered looking down at them.
"Some water got up my nose."
After Pearl was able to retrieve the two from the pool, they began to make their way back to Pink's quarters.
"Was this a spa day or something?" Steven angrily asked as he was stormed by the Pebbles. "And what about Pink? Did she have an actual job here? Or did she just sit in a room while they were off doing whatever?"
"Before her colony, Pink used to throw massive balls." Pearl explained.
"She was a juggler?" Ash asked.
"No, well yes, but she would also throw parties for the other Diamonds to mark their many accomplishments. Every member of every court would show up to bask in the presence of all four DIamonds."
"Even White would come?" Steven asked, an idea beginning to form in his head.
"Oh yes!" she answered before another thought entered her head "I wonder what became of Pink's court?" she suddenly gasped "That reminds me! Hang tight! I'll be back." she said rushing out the door.
"Wait Pearl" Ash called out, but she was already gone.
Steven groaned "What have we gotten ourselves into? Am I supposed to be Pink Diamond now?" He looked towards the Pebbles "Hey guys, can you help us? Who was she? What did she do? Why does this feel so-"
"Familiar. Why is this so familiar? Familiar like something I used to know. Familiar, staring up at the ceiling . Familiar, I swear that I know this feeling.
Where everybody wants me to be like mom. And everything I do, I do it wrong. I'll sway them a joke or with a song. And maybe that will help us get along.
Familiar, why is this so familiar? Familiar like something that I used to do. Familiar. That I used to throw a tantrum, insisting, but hey I'm a Diamond too?
As he sang, Ash watched astonished as the Pebbles began to reconstruct a perfect miniaturized outfit based on what he had seen Pink Diamond wear before in place of Steven's usual clothes.
I bet she drove them crazy all the time. They love her but they're leaving her behind. With more important places they should be, Than hanging out with someone just like me!
Familiar! That's why it's so familiar! Familiar like someone I used to be! Than hanging out with someone just like me!
Familiar! That's why its so familiar! Familiar that someone I used to be. Familiar: But this time I've had some practice. At helping a struggling family.
Oh, I'll get them all together in one place, and once we're all together face to face. I'll show them all the error of their ways and stop their spread of terror across space!"
"So I take it you have a plan?" Ash asked with his melody finished.
"Yes! First we-" before he could finish, Pearl returned. "Oh, hey Pearl, just thought I'd dress for the occasion."
She shook her head with a chuckle "Well, you're not the only one with a surprise." she said was her gem began to glow, and out popped Connie, Garnet and Amethyst, who fell to the floor with a thud.
"Guys!" he exclaimed as the two rushed to hug the others. "I figured it out! Remember when I was little and maybe kind of annoying, and I couldn't come on adventures? You guys would still drop everything to hang out with me! That's Pink Diamond! I know I can do this! Just watch, I'm gonna throw a huge ball. And we're gonna invite everyone!"