Steven and I decided to not bother in telling the gems about the secret armory place, especially since only Lion could access it and with how critical some of the gems could be, we both agreed that we don't want them to force the animal to show them. Besides, from what I could gather the place only went active when Steven was there so as long as he isn't, the place will remain inactive. Even so, none of our injuries were life threatening and nothing was permanent. Turns out my fingers weren't fused to my sword, instead because of them being in direct contact to the metal that was conducting the electricity, they locked up pretty hard against the aforementioned object and were lightly singed. After the movie was over, my hands relaxed and I was able to move them again, as well as send my sword away too. After that, things were pretty normal for awhile and we were able to relax a bit.
"Aaaaaah!"
"Whoaaaaa!"
Until today that is.
A giant gust of winds sends Amethyst and Steven flying back while Garnet, Pearl and I go sliding back with me having one of my swords plunged into the sand to prevent me from lifting off my feet. "Steven!" Pearl yells to the kid who's lying on a boogie board.
"You alright bro?!" I call out to him as I stand back up.
"I've seen better days." Steven replies as he gets back up.
"Pearl, I got a boo-boo." Amethyst innocently says to the pale gem.
"Oh, walk it off!" Pearl scolds the purple gem.
"Yeah! You don't see Steven complaining." I point out.
"Here it comes!" Garnet yells to us. As she does, a giant pink and green pufferfish monster rises out of the sea and blows another strong gust of wind towards us, albeit not as strong as the last one considering we are a much farther distance away from it. "You all distract it!" Garnet orders us and jumps off into the air. With her departure we all ready ourselves.
"Let's show this thing what we're made of, guys!" Pearl says to us.
"What do you think we've been doing for the past hour?" Amethyst counters Pearl.
"Less talky, more poppy!" I stop any heated argument that could transpire before it can even begin between the two.
Pearl attacks by lunging her spear directly at the monster, who responds by blowing another gust of wind towards us except this time Pearls spear is sent hurtling towards. "Duck!" Pearl warns as she hits to the sand but Amethyst looks around aimlessly.
"Amethyst! Get your head in the game!" I yell as I sprint towards her, wanting to catch the weapon.
"Man, I don't see any duc-" She finally sees the spear and ducks, but I manage to grab the spear before she realized it and I manage to redirect the movement of the spear. The only thing that happened was that some of her hair got chopped off. "Quack!" she says as she ducks.
"Pearl!" I call to her as I chuck the spear towards her. She deafly catches it and twirls it around herself in kind before she firmly grabs it.
"Thanks."
" No problem." I respond to her thanks as I move to her side.
"Steven's turn!" I hear Steven's voice behind me. Suddenly the boogie board he was holding onto sails over my head, spinning through the air like a Frisbee before getting impaled by one of its spikes. "Yup, it's got spikes.
"What was your first clue?" I say as I stab my right sword into the sand and pull out my pistol. I fire a couple rounds at the thing nowhere in particular and hope that they pop it. Unfortunately fate does not smile on me today as the rounds simply ricochet off or are stopped cold in the things flesh but otherwise it seems unharmed. "And its bullet proof." I say and holster my gun.
"It's okay, here comes Garnet!" At Amethysts words I notice a shadow on the ground and look up to see Garnet flying straight towards the creatures with her fist out. 'Holy- How the hell can they jump like that?! Seriously!'
"Smash that puff!" Steven encourages Garnet but I think the pufferfish noticed where we are looking at because it immediately refocuses its attention to Garnet and sends a gust of wind towards the gem halting her just before she makes contact. Before any of us can intervene or help, the monster doubles its blasting power and sends Garnet flying back to the boardwalk.
"Garnet! You bastard!" I yell and run towards the monster, grabbing my sword in the ground. Having both my swords in hand, I sprint around the fish to hopefully get within its blind spot as the tips of my swords graze the sand, leaving lines along my footprints. The thing begins to turn around the get an angle on me but it's not until we do a complete 360 do I find a suitable rock to launch myself off of. Running up it, I bring my swords back and prepare to pop this thing. However it does to me what it did to Garnet. It aims directly at me and sends me flying through the air before I can hit it. "Oohhhhh craaaaaaaap!" I yell as I start tumbling through the air.
"Marcus!" I hear the others faintly call out my name.
I count a few seconds while I'm in the air but I have no idea where I'm going since I only glance at the ground a few times at best.
*Crash*
However before I can make a proper landing strategy, glass suddenly embeds itself in my back as I also roll on the ground a few times and I'm pretty sure I hit a counter before slamming into something metal. "Ow. Oh man. That was crazy. Got to- OW!" AS I try to get up so I can go back and help the others, something big and metal lands on my head and plunges my world into darkness. 'If I had to guess, a pot and I probably was flung into a kitchen.' I stop my thoughts there as my world continues to spin from my tumbling in the air and the smack on the head as I try to keep myself from hurling all over the floor. Don't want to unnecessarily give this place a problem with the health department now do we.
"You alright?" I faintly hear a voice through the metal prison on my head. Reaching up, I push the edge of the metal object up enough for me to see who's talking. I'm immediately greeted by an African American teenager girl with a hand on her hip.
"Could be better." I respond.
"Here. Let me help you with that." She gives me aid by taking the pot off my head, placing it back where it was before giving me a hand in standing up.
"Thank you." I thank her as I stand up while still a little sore.
"No problem." When she releases my hand, we delve into a slight awkward silence between to two of us. "Soooooo, not to pry or anything, but why are you in my family's restaurant kitchen with a pot on your head?"
"Oh, right. Yeah, sorry. I was uhhh, helping my friends with something and I- Oh god! Guys!" Before I can finish my explanation, I suddenly remember the fight we were in and brush past the girl.
"Hey!" she exclaims as I move to the counter and look out the window to see if I can see the others. To my relief, I see them calmly walking towards the store I fell through. It looks like a family, especially the father, do not look happy.
"Phew. Alright, we're good." I say out loud and turn back to the girl, who has a slight scowl on her face, no doubt from me almost barreling past her like that. "Sorry about that. I was doing something dangerous with my friends but it looks like their good." I try to explain my situation to her without giving away too much info.
"Who are your friends?" she asks as she walks closer to me. She looks past me to see who it was I was talking about and sees the others. "Oh! You know Steven Universe?" she asks me with a bit of happiness in her tone.
"Yeah, I do. He's one of my best friends." I answer her. Just by answering to her that I'm friends with Steven shouldn't be detrimental to me whatsoever, hopefully.
"That's cool. Steven's a pretty cool kid to hang around with. He even helped that Lars guy with that moss stuff that attacked me and some of my other friends while back." The girl responds with her arms crossed. 'Moss? I remember Steven telling me about that moss that his mother planted awhile back and how he helped Lars save some teenagers when they ignored Pearl's police tape.' Remembering Stevens tale of the event as well as the description he gave us of the 'cool kids.' I squint my eyes at the girl.
"Wait, your Jenny then." I deduce her identity.
"Yeah! That's me." She agrees and extends her hand to me. "Sorry. I'm Jenny. Jenny Pizza."
I shake her hand. "Marcus Castellanos. Pleasure to meet you." When we finish, I can't help but smirk at her. "You know going past that police tape was not a bright idea."
"Hehe, yeah." She chuckles nervously while scratching the back of her head. "That wasn't one of our best ideas."
"He, I imagine so."
"Where's Marcus?" Looking back to the others, I see them glancing around outside in hopes of finding me.
"Crap. I better get back to the others before- Ah!" I yelp as pain shoots through my right foot, making me stumble.
"Watch it!" Jenny quickly grabs me before I can fall to the ground. "You okay?"
"A little." I note and try to put pressure on my ankle. "Damnit. I think I dislocated my ankle. This sucks." I voice my displeasure of the situation.
"Here." She grabs my right arm and slings it over her shoulder. "Let me help you outside."
"Thanks, I appreciate it." I voice my thanks to her as she helps me around the counter.
"No problem. If your friends with Steven, you can't be all bad." She notes with a smile.
I can't help but let out a chuckle at her words. 'You know, in person Jenny doesn't seems so bad. I guess it was just the storytelling and my own perception that made me think them bad. Hopefully her friends are as… generous.'
"I'm fine." Garnet says as she lands in front of the other gems.
"Hi, Steven."
"Hey, Kiki!" Steven responds to the girl before looking around. "Now, where's Marcus? I was sure he came flying in this direction." Steven says as he looks around for any other signs of damage.
"Maybe he landed behind the store?" Pearl muses.
"Hello?! Are you going to do something about my shop?!" The man yells to the gems in a very angry tone.
"We can't." Amethyst bluntly says.
"We have to find our friend." Garnet explains.
"Relax. He's right here." They all turn to the direction of the new voice and see Jenny helping me walk out of the front door of the shop.
"Marcus! You're okay!" Steven happily yells as I grab the door frame to steady myself as I push myself off of Jenny.
"Yeah, somewhat." I reply and gesture to my ankle. Pearl walks over and kneels down to examine my ankle. "You think you can-"
*Crack*
"OW!... Thank you." With a loud crack, Pearl twists my ankle harshly, making the other humans wince. I move my ankle around and find I can put pressure on it again. Still sore but nothing too serious.
"You're welcome. The bone was just slightly knocked out of place. It'll be sore for awhile but you should be fit to fight again within a couple hours." Pearl explains.
"That's good." I say and look around us. Moving myself around to make sure everything is right, I twist my head a couple times to pop my neck and I pop my spine. "Arg!" I yelp as I feel something behind me. "Hold on." I hold up a finger as I feel behind me for what caused the pain. My fingers brush something sharp, making me wince at what it could be. Firmly grasping it, I quickly pull it out and bring it over to my face and in view of everyone. It's a small but somewhat long piece of glass that was embedded in my spine. Most of the family people look either sick or horrified at the bloody piece of glass but the gems all look none the difference. I turn to the side and toss the glass towards a nearby dumpster. While looking at said waste receptacle, I notice that both my swords left my hands in mid-air as I was falling because they are both lodged in the side of the store I fell through. "Oh." I grab one of my swords and jerk it off the wood before doing the same to the other. With both swords now back to me, I make them disappear before turning to the gems. "So, what happened while I was flung?"
"You and Garnet wrecked this place! Gimme one down low!" Amethyst says with a raised high-five hoping we would take it however Pearl pushes the limb down.
"No accolades for you, Amethyst!" Pearl scolds her before looking towards me. "You and Garnet damaged this establishment."
"Me and…" I let the question hang in the air as I look towards the mentioned gem. Garnet responds by pointing above the store. Taking a few steps toward them and away from the store, I look to see what they mean. "Oh, wow. Yeah that's a problem." I comment as I stare at the giant caved in part of the sign for this place. 'Man. That's just rotten luck for them.' I think as I stare at both the destroyed sign and the broken window I crashed through.
"Yes, it is." The father I'm pretty sure, and owner if I had to guess about his attitude, says in more than a slightly irritated tone.
"She also knocked the pufferfish back out into the ocean." Pearl says.
"What?" I say annoyingly towards the purple gem. "Seriously Amethyst. We spent a long while trying to take him down and now you basically forced us to search for it. Nice job." I say the last part sarcastically.
"Narc." She grumbles to Pearl.
"Let's regroup back at the temple." Garnet orders us and the three of them proceed to jump away.
"Hey! Not all of us have super human jumping ability's!" I call out to them. I don't know if they heard me or not but I still see them flying and landing near the temple rocks. "I'll see you back home Steven. I need to find a better weapon and strategy to use against that fish when it comes back." With that, I sprint towards the temple while the man continues to yell at us.
"Bye! See you later!" I hear Jenny yell to me. I respond by waving back but continuing to run forward. I'd like to stay and help but right now that fish could do a lot more damage if left unchecked.
It doesn't take me long to make it to the others as they walk back to the temple. They stop as they notice me. "So, any plans?" I ask.
"We're still working on it." Garnet answers.
"Hm, well in that case, I'm going to rummage around my truck to see if I have anything that can pierce that things hide. If just one bullet can pierce it, it should act like a balloon basically and blow up." I propose as we round the mound of rocks to the temple steps and my vehicles.
"Sounds like a plan." Amethyst agrees.
"Good."
"Uh, Marcus, where's your truck?" Pearl asks.
I give her a confused look, "What do you mean? It's right…" I trail off as I see the mysteriously placed hill of sand right in front of us. Normally one would not be too caught up in the item in question, but you would when you see black corners of metal poking out of the sides of the sand. "My truck!" I exclaim loudly and in panic as I rush to the mound and proceed to dig out my stuff.
"Whelp, now we know where all that sand went now don't we?" Amethyst jokes while continue to push sand all over the place.
"Not now, Amethyst." Pearl says to her with gritted teeth, not in the mood for a joke either.
"Seriously!" I yell as I find that the tarp covering my bike and my weapon cases was blown off, covering everything in sand. "God, man! This is gonna take me a couple hours to dig out and days to clean everything!" I growl out in anger. Calming down a little, I turn back to the others, "I know we have to deal with the fish guys but, do you think you could-"
*Boom!*
A large gust of window interrupts me from the sonic blast liked effect Garnet did with her gauntlets and I suddenly find myself thrown off my buried vehicle and covered in sand. "Thank you." My thanks is muffled by the sand.
"No problem." Garnet says as she makes her gauntlets disappear.
"Buah!" I burst out of the sand and proceed to throw all of it off me and my clothes. Looking at my stuff, the majority of the sand was blown off and only bits of it are still in the back of my truck and in the cracks of everything I have. "Alright, well I can't leave this here." I say to myself. 'Without my tarp and the sand proving just how bothersome it would be to leave my stuff here, I need to do something about it.' I shift towards the others. "Now I need one more thing."
"That's the last of it." Amethyst says as she places the last few cases from my truck down on the pile next to the warp pad inside the temple. When she does, she shifts from her wrestling persona form back to her regular self.
"Thanks again." I thank her as I examine my motorcycle, looking for any wear, tear and anomalies that could damage it should I start it up now.
"No prob bob." She replies as she walks back to the kitchen.
"You're sure this will be alright, Marcus?" Pearl asks me, again.
"For the last time Pearl, yes everything will be alright with my equipment here. I know your worried about Steven possibly getting into my weapons stash but you have to remember that these things were designed to take punishment so any possibly Steven getting into them by brute force would take hours. Besides he's not that curious that he would deliberately destroy it just to get inside." I try to explain as I use a flashlight to examine the tailpipe.
"Yes but-"
"And all of my cases carrying any sort of harmful equipment is double locked with two different ones each." I say and stand up to look at the dials, "Plus I have the keys on me at all times and the codes for getting through the code lock for each one are all in my head." I interrupt her before she can protest some more. Seeing that nothing is life threatening for the machine, I stand back up and head towards the others sitting around the island counter in the middle of the kitchen. "So unless he can read minds, he's not getting in." I take a seat.
Pearl scowls a bit before resigning herself, "Very well." I smile.
"Good. Now that that's taken care of, the pufferfish." Garnet gets us back into what we were originally doing.
"Why don't we just, like, let it roam free?" Amethyst proposes an impossible idea.
"Are you serious?" I give her a deadpan expression.
"That's not an option." Garnet voices my thoughts on the matter as I hear the door open. I look to see Steven walking towards us looking a little glum.
"Hey, Steven!"
"Hey man. What's up? You look down." Amethyst and I greet the kid.
"I've got bad news, everyone. You've all been banned from Fish Stew Pizza." Steven gives us the apparent bad news.
"Ohhhh… no?" I say more as a question. 'Never been to the place really. With a name that has fish and pizza in it, I don't think I'd like to try that type of pizza.'
"Oh, uhhh, that's okay." Pearl responds, not too broken up about the situation.
"That pizza wasn't even that good." Amethyst comments on the place. 'Oh good, I have a reference for the place.' I think. Then again, Amethyst eats everything.
"Aren't you guys upset about this?" He asks us.
"Not at all." Garnet bluntly tells him.
"But these are our neighbors!"
"There's nothing we can do about that now."
"She's right." I agree with Garnet.
"Right now we have to figure out a way to take care of that pufferfish." Pearl voices our objective right now.
"What's the point of saving people if they're just gonna ban you from their pizza shops?" Steven tries to reconsider our take on the situation.
"We don't do it for thanks." Garnet however shuts down that idea.
"She's right, again. Chances are if we end up wanting to do it for the thanks, we might become dependent on the compliments and we would slowly trickle away from wanting to help." I try to come up with an explanation. I'm met with stares. "Well, I'm not sure about gems really but I know some humans could end up that way."
"Yeah, see! That's so nice of you, the Pizzas don't even know! If they got to spend some time with you they'd see how fun," Steven gestures to Amethyst, "And smart," To Pearl, "And powerful," now to me. 'Thanks man.' "And mysterious you are!" He finishes up with Garnet.
Garnet chuckles at her description, "Hah, mysterious."
"Hmm..." Steven begins to think, probably some way to fix this mess we are all in that apparently needs to be addressed so quickly. He suddenly gasps, "I know! I'll throw a little party on the beach in front of the temple! Just us and the Pizzas." He proposes.
"I don't know, Steven. I mean..." Amethyst tries to push down the idea but doesn't get the chance.
"Don't worry! I'll take care of everything!" he proclaims and proceeds to run outside.
None of us say anything as we all begin to think on the possibilities of what might happen at this party. "This… probably won't turn out well, will it?" I ask out loud.
"Most likely." Garnet says in a neutral tone.
Before long, I find myself outside of the temple on the beach with Steven as we grill some hotdogs and hamburgers on a grill. "Man, this is gonna be so good." Steven says as he gets a big whiff of the cooked food before giggling.
"Are you sure about this? I mean, we did kinda wreck their shop and we have powers not meant for everyday people…" I trail off nervously. It's not every day that we the Crystal gems hangout with normal humans. Hell I didn't for a long ass time. Mostly after some people called me a freak but I digress. This family is still most likely pissed at us for the broken window and sign.
"Don't worry about it, Marcus. I got this." He says confidently.
I stare at him for a few more seconds before letting out a breath, "*Sigh* Fine."
"Hey, Steven." Looking up from the meat cooking, Steven and I spot the gems coming to us.
"Hey!"
"Glad you could make it." Steven and I greet them.
"Got everything ready for your little party?" Pearl asks Steven because she knows that I was just as nervous about this as the gems are.
"Yeah, and there's one more thing." Steven reaches behind him and pulls out a magazine to give to the gems. On the cover it reads 'Foine Summer Special' and if I had to guess, it's some sort of beach clothing magazine.
"What's this for?"Amethyst asks.
"I was thinking you guys could change your outfits." He proposes to them specifically. Now that I compare us to the gems, their clothing is much more… abnormal when compared to human standards of course.
"What's wrong with what we have on now?" Pearl asks him curiously.
"Nothing. I just thought it would be nice to go kinda casual." He replies.
I guess I can see that. We all wear almost the same clothes whenever we got out on missions basically. My jacket is basically my signature at this point wherever I go, mostly because I like the feel of it, my gun holsters are strapped to the inside of it and it makes me feel like I have a second skin to protect me from minor things, and I'm pretty sure the gems clothes are all some sort self-fixing/self-cleaning thing going on considering they can change the styles by will. 'Besides, they don't look that bad, especially Pearl. Ever since she reformed, which I am still thankful for and hope it never happens again, I've kinda liked her new look. The clothing is more fleshed out and definitely suits her more, especially her sash. I don't know what it is but-'
"Is this the right address?" My train of thought cuts off at the new elderly voice. Looking towards the rocks that lead to the city, I see the Pizza family walking towards us.
"I've never seen this side of the beach before." I hear Jenny comment. 'Good, that means our secret is still a secret. Hopefully still after today.'
"Oh man, they're here! Hurry up and change." Steven tells the gems and walks to the Pizza family. "Over here everyone!" he waves to them to get their attention. "Hi!"
"Hey, Steven!" Jenny and another girl similar in age to her greet Steven. 'Probably a sister.'
"Hello." The elderly woman greets him as well.
"How are you all doing today?" Steven innocently asks them all.
"The shop is closed today, because it's broken!" The man angrily points out, making his family look around nervously. I can't help but scratch the back of my head at the memory of their establishment. 'Yep, figured that would be a problem.' I think as the gems walk up to me.
"Oh, uh, that sounds, uh..." Steven nervously says, trying to come up with a response as he begins to seat.
"Hey! Do I smell hot dogs? Show me where the hot dogs are." Thankfully the elderly woman changes the subject in favor of food.
"Oh, right this way, everyone." Steven happily says and proceeds to lead them towards us. "First, let me introduce-"
"We are the Crystal Gems!" Garnet immediately cuts him off. "Garnet!" she yells her name and ins a glow on her body, changes into a more beachwear preferred style.
"Amethyst!" says and changes as well. I can't help but smile at seeing her ponytail. 'It suits her.'
"Pearl!" Pearl, who to my surprise changes into a sort of dress or gown type of beachwear, introduces herself. 'Never really pictured her in the dress wearing type.'
With the others introduced the eyes shift to me. "Marcus." I say my name and cross my arms while turning my back to the gems.
"And Steven! But you already knew my name..." Steven pops in but his intro kinda peters off.
"Oh, you're all so talented." The elder woman compliments us. Mostly the gems I imagine since they were the ones to be all flashy with their clothes changing.
"So, you are a circus act." The man practically scoffs. 'Wait, what?'
"Circus act?" Pearl voices my thoughts.
"Circus act my a-"
"Hey, let's eat!" Steven nervously suggests for us all to do, as well as cutting off my grumbling to myself.
Before long, we are at a table and happily eating, well some of us are. As usual Amethyst proceeds to lift her burger off the table and loudly takes a large bite of it while Pearl and Garnet do not eat. I went ahead and chose a burger for my meal as well, although I'm a bit less reserved in my chewing of my food. I was able to get the names of the rest of the family that came along besides Jenny of course. The sister of Jenny is named Kiki, the angry gentleman is the father named Kofi, and the elderly woman is called Nanefua.
"Everything came out great!" Kiki compliment Steven on his cooking skills.
"She's right, nice job man." I join in and take delicious bite o my burger. 'Dude knows how to grill, that's for sure.'
"Thanks, you two." Steven replies.
"Aren't you girls hungry?" I pause mid-bite as Nanefua takes note of the only two gems not eating. "You've barely touched your food." She continues as I glance nervously between them.
"We don't need to eat." Garnet bluntly says, even making sure the 'need' part is heard.
"Oh, you young people and your experimental diets." Nanefua chalks it up to teenage life. I breathe a sigh of relief at the potential secret revealed being aborted.
"I am much older than you." And there it comes again.
"Eheheheee, she just means she's much more mature her age." I nervously say and lean towards Garnet. "Ex-nay on the centuries age." I don't know if she understood but she makes no move to respond.
"So, you all live in that tiny house up on that hill?" Kofi points out our home on the rocks. Looking at it again, I can't help but smile at the craftsmanship of the statue embedded in the mountain itself.
"We inhabit the inner sanctums, only accessible through magical-"
'Is she seriously trying to give away our secret?!' I scream in my head as I grab her literal sparkling hand and pull it down, grinning nervously as I do so. "Sheeeeee means it's a lot bigger on the inside." I give her a slight glare and retain a more calm her face. "The nice chunk of the mountain was hollowed out so while it looks small out here, we have enough living space to live out our everyday lives… and then some." I bullshit my way through my teeth, hoping he bought it and didn't notice the lightshow Garnet was giving. The man only purses his lips in contemplation before silently returning to his food. 'Crisis averted.' I take a bite of my burger.
"So, then maybe you can tell why this place look like it's falling apart?" Jenny asks. Looking towards the temple again, I do notice the wear that the place is starting to see after being here for so long, especially since one of the hands has fallen off. Looking down at said fallen hand, I can't help but note the hand is angled like a ramp.
"Well, the temple has been here for thousands of years-"
"Oh! I see how it is," Pearl begins to explain but is cut rather rudely by Kofi. "When something breaks around here, you just leave it alone. JUST LIKE THE SIGN AT MY SHOP!" He practically yells at us.
My eyes lightly narrow at the man for yelling. 'Yes I know your shop is broken. I'm sorry it is but man are you starting to try my patience.'
"Um... who wants to play volleyball?" Steven suggests.
"I call referee!" I yell as I immediately throw my hand into the air. I'm met with silent stares. "I'm not much of a volleyball type of guy so I think it's best I just keep an eye out, you know?" I give my best explanation. Moving, hiding, fighting, protecting, those are my bread and butter. Making friends and social activities… not so much.
Steven draws out the boundaries for the volleyball court in the sand as I sit myself on top of the high chair.
"Okay, everyone, the court is all set. Now to get into our teams."
"But, Steven, won't our abilities give us an unfair advantage?" Pearl points out the obvious. Even though I'm a little miffed at the mention of our abilities, and I know they could stop themselves from using them, I don't think they could accurately diminish their strength capabilities.
"That's why I'm picking the teams. Amethyst and Jenny! Pearl and Kiki! Garnet and Kofi! And last, but not least, yours truly and Nanefua!" Steven chooses the teams. I smile at his placement of who the teams are. Each one has at least a gem in it so the humans are all on relatively equal terms. 'Nice job man. Very smart.'
"I haven't played in ages but I bet I could whoop all your butts." I can help but smile at the cockyness the elderly woman exhibits.
"That's the spirit. You guys ready? Let's play!" Steven begins the game as team Amethyst, Jenny, and Pearl, Kiki head to their respective sides on the courts.
"Oh-ho! Hope you're ready to lose, Pearl."
"There is no way I'd lose to someone like you!" Amethyst and Pearl begin the trash talk before the two begin to hit the ball to each other. It only took a couple hits before Amethyst and Jenny missed, although Amethysts attempt at kicking the ball did not go unnoticed.
"Amethyst! No kicking!" Steven calls out.
"What kind of game is this?" She grumbles, obviously not too happy with that rule.
"Nicely done, Kiki!" Pearl compliments her human partner with a high-five before they get back to game.
"Try and stick to the rules, Amethyst!"
"Try harder, Jenny!" Stevven and Nanefua say to them both.
"Here it comes!" Kiki hits theball over net, or she would have if Jenny didn't grab the net and make it wobble, hitting the ball. "Come on, Jenny!"
"What? I'm not doing anything." Jenny tries to say innocently.
"Yes you are. Point: Pearl and Kiki." I proclaim the winners with an arm gesture.
"Yes!" the winners high-five each other again.
"What?! Aw come on, Marcus." Amethyst whines.
"Don't grab the net." I say, reminding them of the rule.
"Our turn." Kofi says as he and Garnet walk onto the court after Pearl and Kiki vacated their side.
"I'm ready." Garnet announces and launches the ball.
"I got this one." Jenny calls out as she moves to intercept the ball.
" Jennifer! You touch that ball, you're grounded!"
"Whoa! Daddy, you cheatin'!" Jenny calls out to her father.
"HA-HA-HA! The look on your face! Hahaha!"
"Penalty: Garnet and Kofi." I announce out loud, making sure everyone heard me.
"What?!" Kofi calls out to me in surprise, "What for?"
"Unsportsman-like parentingship." I voice the reason, keeping a straight face. Kofi grumbles.
"Don't worry, we still got this." Garnet tries to alleviate her human partner.
"Take this, Garnet! Yeeeee-ha!" Amethyst proceeds to hit the ball high up in the air.
Garnet responds by jumping high into the air, higher than the ball itself. "Haaaghh! Ah!" She spikes the ball hard towards Amethyst and Jenny.
"We should probably move, huh?" Jenny asks her partner.
"Yeah... we should." Amethyst agrees and the two of them move away from the impact zone. The ball was traveling so fast because of Garnets hit that the fire that formed around it super-heated the sand, creating a giant spike ice structure.
"Hahaha! You're all running like wild chickens! Hahahaha!" Kofi proceeds to laugh at his daughters misery.
"Woaaaaah!" Jenny and Amethyst voice their awe at the thing that is occupying their court. I have to admit, the ice structure looks pretty badass, and dangerous but still awesome.
Amethyst then takes the glass heated by the ball and throws it into the ocean, grunting at the same time. "Let's play!"
Thing is, after Amethyst's declaration, things start really go crazy. Amethyst forgets the rules, Kofi abuses his fatherly privileges with his daughters, the gems continue to over-extend their abilities, and the biggest of all to my most disappointment, and to my surprise, Pearl decided to summon not one, but five her holo-versions. I could help but place my head in my hands at Pearls carelessness. Everything happens so fast it's a little hard to keep track of who screwed up and who is sinning at this point. It isn't long before an argument ensues between all three teams. With a resounding sigh, I hop off my place and walk over to the ball. Steven had the same idea because the two of us walk along each other.
"Well, this got interesting." I point out a bit awkwardly.
"I guess. I just wanted everyone to get along." He looks back to the others still arguing. "Now their fighting more than ever."
"Ah, don't worry man." I try to reassure him by placing a hand on his shoulder. "I'm sure things can't get any worse." I try to lift his spirts.
"Maybe…" he trails off as the wind starts to pick us as we make it to the ball. "Hey, why is it getting so... WINDY!?" Steven cries out as the watermelon colored pufferfish rounds the corner.
"Me and my big mouth." I curse myself mentally for jinxing us.
"Ah, no! It's back! Pufferfish monster's back!" Steven yells out and runs to the others with me hot on his heels.
"What's all the-" Nanefua begins to say but gets cut off.
"Nanefua! Ruuuunnn!" Steven yells out as I try to keep myself from mis-stepping along the massive cloud of sand.
Amazingly, the others are still arguing about who's cheating, who's wins, and Kofi grounding everyone. 'Enough of this.' Whirling around, I grab my guns and open fire on the monster.
"What is-"
"Garrneeeet!" Steven yells and my gunshots finally cease their arguing and gets the gems to notice the monster.
"Steven! Marcus! Oh, no! Gems! Protect the Pizzas!" After distracting it enough, I turn back around to see each of the gems grab their human partners and jump away to safety. I sprint away from the monster and manage to hide amongst the rocks near the base of the mountain. The monster begins spinning around and proceeds to blow everything away, sand, water, the table, even the grll… right at me.
"Whoa!" I duck as the grill slams into the wall above me, raining hot charcoal pieces on me. I quickly brush them off and carefully peer over my cover again.
"Oh! Oh! Over here!"
"No! Over here! Come on!" I can't help but gawk at seeing Nanefua and Steven tag-team the creature in opposite directions, confusing it immensely. 'For an old broad, she sure can move.'
"Oh my gosh! Steven!"
"What are they doing?" Pearl and Kiki yell out to the two of them.
"Everybody! Get ready!" Steven responds.
"Ready?" I mumble. 'Ready for what?'
Steven and Nanefua then begin to call out various jobs that everyone needs to do, Amethyst turning into a ball, rolling her to the net, Pearl hitting Amethyst into the air and Garnet spiking her back to the ground. It isn't until the ice forms on the sand that everything clicks. 'Of course.' I smile with my thoughts and look around for anything I can do to help. Remembering something, I take off around the corner.
"Marcus! Where are you going?!" Steven calls out to his companion as the man runs away from the battle.
"Focus! Everyone take the net to the other side of the court!" Nanefua orders everyone.
"Okay, everyone, pull the net into its face!" Steven adds. With that, everyone begins to push the net onto the monster's face, forcing it against spiked ice but not enough to pop it.
"It's not enough!" Nanefua calls out.
"Don't worry, here comes Garnet!" Steven alleviates everyones fear of the plan going awry as Garnet flies through the air towards the monster, just like last time. Unfortunately, the holes in the net allow for enough air to pass through to halt Garnet again just before she hits it.
"It's still not enough!" Pearl yells. Everyone begins to worry again as Garnet tries to push through the opposing air force.
"What are we- Huh?" Steven begins to ask before a peculiar sound interrupts him.
*Vvvvvrrrooooooommm!*
A shadow follows Garnet.
"Ooh Rah!" I yell the marine war cry as my truck sails through the air towards the monster. I remembered the hand that looked like a ramp from earlier and decided to bring in a bit more mass to use against the creature.
My intuition was correct as when I rounded the corner, I saw the others forcing the pufferfish against the ice with Garnet trying to deliver the final push. Seeing she needed help, I took the opportunity. My truck isn't impeded at all by the air being blown at me and with the combined force of both my vehicle and Garnet, it pops.
Only problem is, Garnet lands gracefully on the ground while my tuck isn't as fortunate. I slam hard into the soft sand by my grill, managing to fly over the spiked ice and I flip forward onto my roof. My whole world is thrown upside down and filled with sand as I already feel blood starting to rush to my head. "I did not think this through enough."
"Marcus!" A voice calls to my left and for a second I'm blinded by the light pouring into the truck when my door opens but they adjust quickly to see Pearl and the rest of the gems there, with the Pizza family trailing behind. "Are you okay?!" she asks frantically.
"Yeah. Why wouldn't I be?" I ask non-chalantly, acting like I didn't just fly through the air, slam into the monster and am not upside down while only being held onto my seat via my seatbelt. (Buckle up kids. It may save your life.)
"Well, you did just crash." Garnet answers as she sends the creatures gem away.
"Oh, yeah, that."
"Do you need some help?" Amethyst asks.
"No no, I'm- Koh!" I let out a strangled yelp as my seatbelt snaps off and I'm suddenly laying on the roof of my truck. "I'm good." I say with strained breath.
"C'mon. Let's get you out." Steven says and grabs one of my arms. He and Jenny proceed to pull me out of the driver seat.
"Eh yeah. Thanks guys." I thank them as I stand.
"No problem."
"Sorry about your truck Marcus." Jenny says. With her saying that, I turn back around to see the damages to my vehicle. As I look all around it, to my surprise nothing seems to be majorly damaged.
"Actually, everything looks good. The grill didn't take any damage, nothing looks broken in the seat section. Besides cleaning this thing out of all the sand, I think my only concern is flipping this over… but think I got that covered." I say the last part while looking towards Garnet, who nods.
"Well, that's good." Kiki says. I notice Nanefua nudge Kofi a bit, like she wants him to say something.
"Thanks for your hospitality." He says. Nanefua then lightly punches his stomach.
"And?"
"And, for saving my family, you are all officially un-banned from my shop." Kofi announces. While I didn't care whether or not I was allowed in that place or not, I guess it's better to be allowed there than not.
"Aw, thank you so much, Kofi! We really appreciate it, right, guys?" Steven asks us.
"Okay, yes, thanks." Garnet bluntly replies barely a thanks.
"Aaaand?" He eggs us on again.
"What were we banned from again?" Pearl asks absentmindedly, completely forgetting why we hung out with the Pizza's in the first place.
I suppress a chuckle as Steven laughs nervously at Pearl's forgetfulness. Thankfully, Kofi doesn't take note. "With that out of the way, I think its time we head back home. Let's go family." Kofi says to his relatives as he turns back to start walking towards the city.
"Goodbye." Nanefua and the rest of her family walk away with the father as they send their goodbyes with waves. I wave back to them as they round the rocks to head back to the city.
"Now." I say and do a complete turn back to my truck. "Garnet, would you mind?" I gesture to my truck.
"No problem." She responds and cracks her knuckles. After grabbing a solid part of my vehicle, she easily flips my vehicle over in one move, not even breaking a sweat. A large dust of cloud kicks up as my truck lands back on all four and rocks a little. Taking one last look, my truck definitely doesn't have any major damage to it, a few dents here and there, some scratches but other than that and the possibility of a ton of sand getting into the engine, nothing seems worrisome.
"Thank you."
"You welcome."
"That was some slick move back there Marcus." Amethyst congratulates me as she slaps my back.
"Thanks. I figured we needed something big to force that monster against the spike. Your good Garnet but at that point we needed mass to counteract that creatures wind power." I say to the gem. She shrugs in agreement, not even going to argue. She knows, especially since the last time we faced that fish monster we both got sent flying to the Pizza's- "Oh!"
Remembering something, I jump into the passenger side of my truck and reach into the glove compartment. "Uhhh, what are you doing?" Steven asks me from outside.
"Grabbing something I think will help the Pizza's. Got it." Items in hand, I close the door and run to catch up with the family.
I run a bit, although much less than I would prefer because of the sand. 'I should run along the beach. I'm sure the sand would be a great obstacle for me to deal with when trying to get stronger.' Taking the note in my head for later, I see the Pizza's not far ahead of me. "Hey!" I call out to them.
All members of the family turn around to see me running up to them. "Hey Marcus! Did you need something?" Jenny asks me.
Regaining my composure, I talk, "I just wanted to say, I'm sorry for what me and Garnet did to your store. While you did give us leave to come and go into your store for saving your lives, the fact of the matter is that your store is still wrecked." The family glance at Kofi as he grimaces, no doubt a little angry at being reminded the situation they are in. "As a token of being sorry on behalf of my friends and I, here." I hand Kofi a small folded pile of cash.
"Son… its going to take a lot more than a few bills to…" he trails off as he takes note of just 'what type' of bills those few ones I gave him are.
"It may be a few bills but it's what kind they are that make all the difference." I can't help but say with a wide grin on my face. The grin gets wider as the rest of the family see the cash as well.
"How did-"
"Do you really wanna know?" I cut off the father with a pointed look. They are silent for a few seconds before I notice they are looking not at my face but a little lower. Looking down, I notice my right gun inside my jacket is slightly peeking out. I quickly grab both sides of my jacket and close it. "I have a permit for those." 'No I don't… but he doesn't need to know that.' "Besides, you saw what I have to deal with it." I mention the monster from before. He looks at the money a couple times before nods.
"This will help out greatly. Thank you." He thanks me and extends his hand. I go ahead and accept the handshake.
"No problem."
"Well, now that that is one situation I no longer have to worry about, I should call some people to start the repairs immediately. Thank you again." He says and continues to walk back to his show.
"Good luck with the repairs."
"Thank you young man." Nanefua says to me. "You didn't have to do that. We have enough money in our savings for the repairs."
"Yeah… but I did."
"You are a good man. Thank you again." She says and walks off with Kiki.
"Yeah… sure." I say and with a slight head tilt to the ground.
"Hey." In my moment, I almost forgot that Jenny was still here. "Look I… I haven't seen you before but you seems like a cool guy." She says and reaches into her pocket. She takes out a slip of paper and a pen from her back pocket. "If you ever wanna… you know, hang out, I usually hang out with some friends of mine. I'm sure you'd like them if you met them. They'll probably like you too, especially if you mention you hang out with Steven." She explains and finishes writing on the paper before handing it to me. "Give me a call sometime and we can hang." I look down at the number I have before looking up to see Jenny already walking away, waving back to me. "Later." she says as she walks to catch up to her family.
"Huh, cool." I say and pocket the number. With nothing else, I begin my trek back to the others. As well as thinking about which weapons I should check to see if their working. I don't make it far before I realize something.
"Wait, did I just get a girls phone number?"
Done. You know, now that I look at it, this one felt really tame compared to the majority of the others. There wasn't a major difference that happened in comparison to the show and I apologize if that's what you guys don't want. I hope you still like some things that happened though. The truck flying part was my fav. Anyway, next up is Rose's room and I feel like giving something good.
But I can't say anything so sorry but you guys are screwed until I get it finished. Sorry about that. But you know my track record when it comes to posting chapters so you probably won't have to wait long.
Maybe.
Probably.
Assuming nothing big comes up…
Also if some of you have been wondering about why I've taken so long to upload this compared to my previous uploads, both college assignments and Battlefield 1 beta kept me occupied. Some of the guns given to us were really awesome to use and its some much fun to play with friends. The shotgun and a bolt action rifle with no scope are probably my most favorite weapons to use. As well as the P08 Luger as my side arm. I always feel the need to have the anti-tank grenade as my grenade for all my classes because if there's thing I don't like is being completely useless against a tank.
Ah well, enough of my excuses, as long as the beta is up I'll be playing it and tests are starting to come up for some of my classes. Hopefully I won't be too bogged down but in any case, have fun reading.
