It was the wee hours of the morning when Blue Diamond finally finished with all her reports, after action and situational. There were just a few more loose ends she had to tie up before she returned to DC in a few short hours.
She was to escort the Crystal Gems personally to the DC Central Detention Facility to be detained until a bond hearing. Blue rubbed her eyes and took a drink from the water bottle on her desk. The odds of any of the rogue Gems getting out on bond were slim to none. They've been fugitives for years. (Darkly she wished that Pearl wouldn't see the light of day ever again.)
Steven would be taken to a nearby airport and escorted back to Beach City. Back to his father, back to his life. The colonel frowned; she may not see the boy ever again. She had such a soft spot for him, he opened his heart to her when she needed it. And she betrayed him by arresting his family and tearing his world apart.
Her gaze wandered over to the small bedside table in her room. A dimly glowing neon blue bracelet sat next to the lamp. A gift from Steven, to remember their time on the beach… Guilt twisted in Blue's gut, god how she wanted a drink.
The colonel stood and stepped over to the table, taking the bracelet and shoving in it in her pocket. Time to see about those loose ends, she needed to see the transcripts of the interviews with the suspects, and she needed to make sure a DNA test was done. Blue also desired to see Steven at least one more time… It was a personal loose end.
To the elevator down from the barracks, past the holding cells to the offices. The guards were still there and saluted once again as the Diamond entered. The boy was up this time, he was fidgeting with his blanket when he looked up at her. Dark circles underscored his puffy eyes and tear-stained face.
"Did you sleep at all?" Blue said, ducking her head to meet his gaze. She was concerned now, was he up most the night? She sat down next to the boy on the couch, resting her arm on the back of the cushion.
"No, I couldn't." Steven's voice was rough and resigned. He couldn't meet Blue's gaze.
The colonel looked down at the floor next to the couch and smiled ever so slightly, "I see your cheeseburger backpack has been returned." Still despondent, the boy just nodded, again, not meeting Blue's eyes.
"You'll be going home this morning, Steven. You have a flight at ten, leaving from Charleston Airport to Delmarva. You'll be driven home from there." The boy just nodded, still picking at the blanket on top of his legs.
"That won't be happening, I'm afraid." Blue's head snapped to the doorway. Aquamarine stood squarely in the middle, silhouetted by the light from the hallway.
"Agent, this is a private conversation, it doesn't concern you." Blue stood arching an eyebrow in the woman's direction. Her eyes radiating a dangerous azure light.
"Oh, but it does concern me. I'm taking over as you, Lt. Colonel Diamant, have a conflict of interest in this operation." The guards entered the room behind the agent weapons drawn, their expressions obscured by their balaclavas and helmets. Blue noted that two more armed guards had joined the group since Aquamarine's arrival.
"What is this nonsense!? How dare you-" The colonel took a couple steps forward, but one of the guards held out their rifle immediately halting the woman.
"Care to explain this, Lt. Colonel?" The diminutive woman held out a manila folder, and Blue Diamond snatched it out of her grasp.
She opened it up and recognized it as the DNA results she ordered over 12 hours ago. Blue's eyes grew wide as she scanned the document. She re-read it again, it couldn't be true… She looked over at Steven, who just looked back at her scared and uncertain.
"This is a lie! Just what are you playing at agent!?" Blue threw the report in Aquamarine's direction; it landed on the floor in a flutter of pages.
"Oh? You mean, you didn't know about the boy?" A Cheshire grin graced Aquamarine's face as she walked forward, staring at Steven.
"Blue? What's going on?" Steven was standing now, clutching his backpack in his arms. Blue gave a panicked look and motioned for him to be quiet.
"I was humiliated earlier. Passed over again and again and again. Today's meeting with White Diamond and Yellow Diamond? Was the last straw." Aquamarine picked up the report and casually flipped the pages as she walked to the desk in the center of the room.
"For years, I've watched The Authority petrify in place. My division, the Criminal Investigation Branch, in particular, has languished." The agent threw the report on the desktop.
"Why? Because of you." Aquamarine pointed at Blue with such force that the material of her blazer snapped in the air.
"You're not solely to blame, White Diamond should have found a replacement for you. But the director and general are fond of you, and because of this fondness, they overlooked hard working and more capable individuals, such as myself." The shorter woman scowled and stepped right in front of Blue.
"So of course, they let the malignant tumor grow unchecked. But now, I'm in a position to surgically remove said cancer from my division." A long silence dragged out as Blue seethed internally.
"While these DNA results bring up a whole host of questions, it hardly disqualifies me as head of this operation. Please, enlighten me, agent, how do you propose getting rid of me and then convincing the director to put you in my place?" The colonel said the last sentence through grit teeth. She had to figure out what Aquamarine was planning, and that meant she had to keep her talking.
"Oh, but it does disqualify you! You see, finding out that the boy is your grandson, you became incredibly sympathetic to him, the Crystal Gems, and their cause. As such, you wanted to release these domestic terrorists." Aquamarine stepped back over to the officers at the door. Their AR 15 rifles carefully trained on Blue Diamond.
"And in the attempted escape, you, the boy, and the Crystal Gems killed and injured dozens of officers and agents." The agent walked past the men into the corridor.
"Fortunately, a dedicated group of officers and I managed to stop the Crystal Gems and subdue the boy. Unfortunately, you were killed during the incident. Gentlemen, try not to shoot the boy. I'd like to keep him alive for further study if possible." The diminutive woman smiled, gave a mocking salute, and hurried down the hall, leaving Blue and Steven with a group of heavily armed, hostile guards.
"Steven, get behind the desk!" The guards began firing into the room. Blue let off a few energy projectiles hitting and stopping one soldier but went down when a bullet hit her left shoulder and side spraying blood everywhere.
She thought she was done, but a piercing magenta light filled the room. Steven was standing in front of her, surrounded by some kind of bubble stopping any projectiles. He ran forward, battering the remaining assailants aside.
Blue didn't waste any time, she got up on her feet and lunged at the stunned guard. She grabbed his rifle and cracked him square in the face with the buttstock. The colonel then turned to the recovering attacker behind her and fired the gun point-blank range. The guard collapsed in a heap on the floor.
"Stop!" Steven's young voice rang a ways down the hall. Blue's vision blurred as she stumbled against the doorframe of the office. She had to stop the other attacker…
"Get down on the ground and put your hands up now!" The boy was having none of it, he summoned his shield.
"This is wrong, you're doing the wrong thing!" He then flung it at his attacker. The soldier successfully dodged out of the way as the pink disk sailed down the hall. (Blue had to step back to avoid being hit.)
What the man didn't see was the second shield that Steven had created and hurled at him. It bounced off the wall diagonally from the soldier and hit him square in the head knocking off his helmet. The man landed on the floor out cold.
The colonel ran out of the office and fell into the adjacent wall sliding down to the floor. "Blue!" Steven ran over and knelt next to her. She squeezed the left side of her abdomen just above the hip. Pressure, she needed to stop the bleeding.
A small hand with stubby fingers pressed against hers, "Steven, the-there's a trauma kit on the wall just around the corner, I need you to get it for me." The colonel's voice was as calm and even as she could make it.
The 12 year-old wasted no time and bolted down the hall, his sandals squeaking on the linoleum. She just had to stay conscious, just stay…
"Blue, you have to stay awake! In my first aid class in school last year, they said that if you lose a lot of blood, you gotta stay awake!" The woman nodded and made herself sit up against the wall gritting her teeth.
"Open the kit, the bandages we want are on the left side underneath the partition." The boy nodded and did exactly what he was told.
"These ones? He-mo-static… pads?"
"Those are it, be a good lad, and open it for me? Then hand me those scissors." Steven nodded, he had tears in his eyes, but he was calm.
Between the pair, they managed to do a rough patch job on the colonel. She had Steven help her cut off her fleece, then wrap her left shoulder and abdomen with hemostatic dressing and gauze. All the while, Blue warily watched the unconscious forms in the office across the way.
"Blue? Why is it so quiet? They shot at us, like, a lot. Someone should have noticed." Steven looked up at one of the security cameras on the ceiling then back to Blue. The boy had a point, it had been roughly 15 minutes since their gunfight in the office.
"I have a feeling that Aquamarine has recruited help from inside this facility." The woman braced her right hand and forearm on the wall behind her and made to stand up. "We need to leave now."
"I'm not leaving without my family." Steven helped Blue up, he was surprisingly strong. She swayed and felt light-headed, she needed a moment to steady herself.
"What are you doing?" Somehow through all the fighting, the 12 year-old managed to keep a hold of his backpack. He was shoving everything he could possibly fit from the trauma kit into his bag.
"I told you, I'm not leaving without my family. You'll need these later." The boy said stubbornly. He then zipped up the backpack and stood as he slipped into the shoulder straps.
"Steven, I'm not sure anything Aquamarine told us was true…" Once again, she looked at the office and then to the unconscious body down the hall. The woman took a few cautious steps forward, testing her balance. She almost fell forward and caught herself on the wall with her right hand, her left side was just about useless.
"I don't care if what Aquamarine said was true or not. You're coming with me Blue, we're all getting out of here." Blue shook her head, what did she do to earn this boy's friendship?
The colonel pointed to the discarded rifle on the floor, Steven hesitantly picked it up and handed it to her. She slung it over her good shoulder and braced herself on the wall. The boy gently took Blue's left arm and placed it around his shoulder.
"I'm short, but you can lean on me. Where are the Gems?" Steven held the woman's hand to his shoulder and looked up questioningly.
"We're in luck, they're on this floor down the corridor a ways. I'll help you get them out." Steven nodded and gave her a sad smile. The pair then made their way towards the detention block as quickly as they could.
… … … … … … … … …
"This is killing me! We gotta book it, like, now." Amethyst was leaning against a concrete reinforced door with a steel shell. She was strong, but the cell was made entirely of concrete, and the door was barred from the outside.
She touched her nose and winced; there was tape over the bridge to hold it in place, and her right nostril was packed with cotton. If she ever got her hands on the broad that headbutted her…
The only person out of the three of them that would have a strong chance at breaking out was Garnet, and she was shackled and chained to the wall. Amethyst peaked through the small slot in the door. It was where food and other items were passed through, they didn't even have control over that.
The window was controlled from the outside, luckily the last guard that passed by left them open to serve them dinner. Dinner was hours ago, and no-one has been by since. It was highly unusual; Amethyst had been in jail before, and they typically didn't operate like this.
Then there was all the gunfire coming from the other side of the floor. It was unmistakable, and it sounded like a hell of a fight. Amethyst's gut was telling her to run as far and as fast as she could from this place.
She heard chains rattle from the cell on the other side. "I can't break out without making too much noise."
"Garnet, it doesn't matter at this point! Something is up, and we're in way more trouble now than we were earlier. If you can bust the chains do it!" Amethyst pressed both hands against the door and listened as metal was rent from concrete.
She then peeked through the door slot across the way to see one brown eye and one blue eye looking back. The tennis instructor winked. "Finally! Think you can break the door?"
"I'm not sure, if I start beating on it someone is bound to come." Garnet looked uncertainly down the hall then back at Amethyst.
"Look, I know you have this precognition future thing going on, but no-one came when you busted the shackles. No-one came when the gunfire happened down the hall. Something's up." Amethyst was losing her patience.
"Pearl? Com'on P, whaddya think? Talk to us…" Pearl hadn't said a single thing since being placed in her cell. She hadn't even taken her food tray from the opening in the door.
Pearl's silence was worrying both Amethyst and Garnet. That wasn't even mentioning how worried they were for Steven. She'd caught a glimpse of her kiddo when they first entered the compound, and Amethyst had almost gotten tased trying to talk to him.
"Someone's coming!" The tennis instructor said worriedly. At first, the shorter woman didn't hear anything, then voices echoed against the stone walls. (There was that precognition thing again.) Amethyst looked over to Garnet. There were voices, but they were far away, undistinguishable.
"We're getting out soon, just wait," Garnet said in a hushed tone. There was a loud claxon as orange lights flashed above their doors, then all the cells on their respective block slid open.
Footsteps slapped down the hallway immediately after, "You guys! Are you there!?"
"Steven!?" Pearl burst from the doorway and grabbed Steven. Amethyst ran over to the pair with Garnet following.
"Oh, thank god! Are you hurt? Where did all this blood come from!?" Pearl held back a sob as Amethyst looked at Steven's back making sure he was okay.
"I'm okay, really! It's not my blood…" The boy looked back towards the way he came, and Amethyst followed his gaze. A tall figure with flowing silver hair and a blood-soaked t-shirt covered in bandages was gingerly walking towards the group.
"Oh, hell no-" Before Amethyst could even finish what she was saying, Garnet, leaped past the group and slammed Blue Diamond against the wall. Garnet was holding her up a couple of inches off the ground.
"You'd better start talking. I need a reason to not kill you." The black woman's smooth voice was low and dangerous.
"Garnet, no!" Steven protested, but Pearl held him back. The Diamond's face was twisted in pain, and blood was seeping through the dressing on her shoulder, leaving a crimson smear on the wall behind her.
"Because you're not getting out without my assistance." Arctic blue eyes blazed a threatening light as she spoke through a clenched jaw. Garnet set the Irish woman down, and she sagged against the wall.
"I couldn't care less about the three of you! But, it just so happens I care for Steven, which is to your benefit. I want to see him get out of here, and he cannot leave on his own." Blue Diamond's voice was shaky, she looked like she was about to fall over.
Garnet nodded at the Diamond and turned to face Amethyst and the others. "We're not getting out without her help. We have to leave now."
A deep rumble shook the entire facility, debris fell from the ceiling in small chunks as the lights flickered above the group. Alarms pealing through the halls as all the doors to the holding cells closed.
"What the hell is going on!?" Amethyst yelled at Garnet and Blue Diamond.
Garnet's heterochromatic gaze was slightly unfocused as she looked into different possible scenarios and outcomes.
"Blue Diamond, we need the most discreet way out, and we have to hurry." Garnet's words sent panic up Amethyst's spine.
