Hello! so this chapter wasn't actually supposed to turn out like this (story of my life right?) but I'm happy with it. I hope you guys enjoy this chapter, I am going to try to make sure that the next few chapters go up on time but I close on my house this week! and my life is even more chaotic than normal.
Thanks to squish for betaing this week and Enjoy the chapter!
It took until Domina appeared on screen and said those all too familiar words for Pink Pearl to finally relax.
"I'm alright, really Pearl."
"Domina, you had a building fall on you."
"Well sort of but I was in a pocket dimension at the time so does it really count?" Domina gave her a teasing grin, and Pink rolled her eyes. Domina looked shaken but that was to be expected.
"Leggy told me something about Yellow calling a meeting?" Domina asked. She wasn't focused on Pearl, instead she looked just past the screen. Pearl imagined the chaos there, had to be even worse than it was here, halfway across the planet. The buildings here were squatter, and sturdier. Granted, the inside of the office where she and Blue had been discussing adding troops to several outer colony planets was completely thrown into disarray. But the building hadn't fallen down on top of them.
"She did." Pink Pearl said, glancing at the message in the top right of her screen. "Though it'll be awhile before anyone gets there, a third of the warp network is down according to Feldspar."
"Of course it is. If anyone from White courts calls from off planet, my screen is buried back there somewhere," Domina said. There was a soft sound that Pink Pearl didn't quite pick up, then Domina smiled, looked down, presumably at the ruby, and shook her head. "No, no, I won't take your screen, you need it, I insist."
"I'll transfer your account to mine, for now. You really need to be more careful with those Domina. This is the third one in a month."
"This time it wasn't my fault!" Domina said faking indignation, then her face took on a more serious expression. "I'll be along eventually, they need help here." Pearl nodded.
"Be careful."
Domina grinned. "I'm always careful."
The screen closed and behind her Pink could hear Blue Pearl checking in with the emergency crews from around the city. Homeworld had experienced quakes for centuries, since the end of Era 1, but never one of this magnitude. Pink Pearl went about opening Domina's account and putting it on standby when another message came in.
"Pearl HGC-5," Pink Pearl said, barely even thinking before she opened the transmission.
"Er... yes." A quartz said. Pink Pearl looked up and saw one of the plume agates that oversaw Homeworld's main cell block, she looked stressed which did not bode well. "There's been a problem, one of the prisoners you and Feldspar brought back has..." There were a few others in the background and Pink could see there was some discussion about terminology going on.
"Has what?" Pearl asked fearing the worst. "Which prisoner?"
"Catapelite Facet 9F4S Cut 2PN." The agate said quickly, that question at least was easy. "And I suppose I'll just show you." She turned the screen towards the cell. The access pad was cut straight through, the barrier gone, and on the back wall of the cell, painted in unreasonably crisp letters were the words: Requisitioned to restore order.
The citadel was far away enough from the epicenter of the quake that it had only received the aftershocks of the event. That being said, it had still been enough to toss Yellow Diamond, at full size, completely out of her chair. When they faded and she gathered her wits to her Yellow Diamond immediately went into damage control mode.
Thirty three percent of the warp network was down, primarily in the White and Blue districts. That meant dispatching crews to get them back online. Emergency services, which had been a brilliant idea on Yellow Pearl's part, were taking care of getting any gems who were trapped out from underneath rubble and buildings. Rescuing people from the interdimensional rooms was a little bit more of a challenge. Something she thought on as she made her way to the council chamber. Yellow Pearl had beaten her there and was sitting with Forest at one of the desks the Pearls (and Domina on occasion) used.
"It's not an ideal solution," Forest muttered, watching a screen's worth of data scroll past her as she quickly fitted mechanical components into place, gem constantly glowing as she pulled them from her pearl.
"Yes, but no form is better than being stuck in an endless void." Yellow Pearl said. There was a voice, one of the peridots that Domina was close with, 9NY.
"It will be a much smaller tear to sustain, really not much different than opening a warp stream."
"Yes, but this is getting a little crystalline for me," Forest grumbled.
"Oh you Era 2 gems, crystal is a perfectly functional resource that has served us for hundreds of thousands of years without incident. Era 2 materials just aren't as-"
"Now is not the time 9NY, thank you for your assistance. I'm sure Forest has it well in hand." Yellow Pearl interrupted with a roll of her eye.
"Of course I do." Forest said, "It's simple enough, a ruby could do it with one arm behind her back."
"Well use two hands then," 9NY retorted. Yellow Pearl intelligently closed the channel, cutting off Forest's rampage before it started.
"Go. Do you need me to help?" Yellow Pearl asked.
"No, I do need Diamond to get out of my way," Forest said, storming towards the door. Yellow Diamond stepped aside.
"Thank you, Forest!" Yellow Pearl called. There was a loud grunt of acceptance before the pearl left the room.
"That's one more problem solved." Yellow Diamond said dryly.
"It is," Yellow Pearl said. "Blue and Pink are accounted for and safe, No sign of Jet but I don't believe that means anything. They're on their way."
"Probably not." Yellow Diamond shrugged. "Blue and Pink are also safe on this end. Blue is on her way and Domina..."
"Is fine. Pink said she got in touch." Yellow Pearl said briskly. They worked in the same room for a few hours more before the others began to trickle in. It was familiar and Yellow Diamond had to admit, it was easier working with someone who had already anticipated what needed doing and did it.
Jet arrived first, covered in dust, barking orders to a few platoons of soldiers to get major roads cleared. She was followed by Blue Diamond who was getting messages from her own areas affected by the quake. Then Blue Pearl and Pink Pearl with the news of the escaped catapelite from the main cell block.
Finally, after another hour, Domina drifted in, mid-air, caked head to toe in dust thick enough that she seemed to be 3 or 4 shades paler, which was unnerving, to say the least.
"Sorry, I got two buildings dropped on me today," Domina said, far too cheery for the situation.
"Nice to see you managed to keep yourself in one piece despite that." Jet spoke up with a disapproving frown. "You're difficult enough to understand when your speaking proper gem."
"O veni in Jet," Domina said with a smirk. "Sic perfectly comprehensible like this." Yellow Diamond swore for a moment she saw Jet smile before the taciturn pearl turned back to her screen. Pink Pearl didn't look as amused. "So do we have a cause? I thought the continental plates were stable he-" Domina paused mid glance around the room, she didn't land when she saw Blue Diamond, which was a habit Yellow Diamond had long grown used to in the past decade, but she was looking for someone. Finally, she turned to look at the two diamonds.
"Where's Pink?" Domina asked. Yellow blinked, part of her brain, for half a moment wondered why White would ever want Pink involved in this kind of discussion. The rest of her brain, which wasn't stuck in Era 1, was also puzzled. But mostly because since Pink had returned, Domina had spent most of the time completely ignoring the younger diamond, even when she was in the same room as her.
"In her chambers, she's perfectly safe." Blue Diamond provided the answer. Yellow did notice that all the pearls had instantly turned to Pink Pearl, whose face remained unreadable.
"I assumed so," Domina said, she turned and raised an eyebrow at Pink Pearl, an unspoken conversation going on between them in half a second before a communicator was tossed towards Domina with a shrug.
"Domina, she really doesn't need to be here." Yellow Diamond said, there really hadn't been much of a discussion between her and Blue... and she supposed any of the others that should be involved, about what to do with Pink since her return.
"Why not?" Domina asked, she cocked her head to the side and white dust fell from her hair. "If this had happened eleven years ago you would have dragged me back here from the Delta Quadrant to be involved."
"She's not-" Blue began but she was cut off by the chime of the communicator and Pink picking up, head a tad too close to the screen.
"Domina! Hey!"
"Pink, where are you?" Domina asked. And Yellow actually had to agree with that question. The area behind Pink Diamond was too dark to be her room.
"Uh... in my room?" Pink said, tilting her head, she stepped forward and the area around her lit up, and that looked a little more like her room. "Blue said I should stay here."
"Well I'm saying get over here," Domina said with a disapproving glance at Blue Diamond. Yellow Diamond was suddenly regretting pulling everyone together. "The warp pad to the citadel works, hurry up." Pink's eyes went wide and behind the screen, Yellow thought she saw Pink Pearl smile slightly.
"Yeah!" She shrieked, causing Yellow and Blue both to wince. Then Pink blushed and more professionally said: "I mean, yes. Of course, I'll be right there."