Twoie rubbed the sleep from his eyes at the sound of the door slamming downstairs. Right, today was the day. He stretched and slowly made his way downstairs for a cup of coffee. "Good morning, Twoie. Did they wake you? I hope not; I told them you needed to sleep." He sighed as Pearl worriedly checked him over. The claws on his hands and feet hadn't changed since the day he'd been… But his horns on his head and back had grown slightly, and the tips of his horns poked out between the curls of his hair.
"I'm fine. I was already waking up." He poured a hot mug of coffee and felt the familiar burn on his palms. "You should go check on them. I bet Steven wants you to see the commercial too." Pearl shifted her gaze from him to the front door several times.
"Well, Steven did ask me to come down with them, but I didn't want to leave you unsupervised." Twoie hummed and took a sip of his scalding drink. It felt so soothing to him.
He leaned back against the kitchen counter and gestured at the kitchen. "Well, you guys have made it clear that I'm not allowed to go anywhere. And you'll only be going down to the beach. I'll be fine. Garnet's in her room if anything happens. Just go see how Steven's doing." Twoie saw the hesitation on her face. "It'd make him really happy. It'll only be a couple of minutes."
Pearl thought about it for a moment longer before huffing and heading out of the room. "Alright, but just for a few minutes. I'll be right back if you need me." She walked outside, and Twoie let out a sigh of relief. This was the first time he'd been left alone since that night. He refilled his mug and headed back upstairs.
'Today is an important day,' Twoie thought as he tossed Steven's hotdog duffle onto their bed. He had already packed several of Steven's things when he heard the door open up. He watched Pearl walk towards the living room, grumbling something under her breath. She angrily grabbed the blankets on the couch and folded them before throwing them back onto the couch. "You okay, Pearl?" The graceful gem jumped slightly but waved him off.
"Don't mind me, Twoie. I'm fine! Do you need anything?" At Twoie's 'no,' she walked towards the kitchen. As she passed the front door, it slammed open. She jumped again as Steven and Greg burst into the house. Pearl frowned when she saw Greg start gathering up the things he'd brought to spend the night.
"We don't need money, but it could be funny." Steven ran up the stairs and smiled when Twoie held the duffle bag out for him. "Let's go today, just point me the way!" He hugged his older brother when he noticed the bag was mostly packed. As Steven looked down into the living room, he saw their dad was mostly packed as well. He ran back downstairs with his duffle and put his bag down next to his dad. "To Empire City!" That's when he noticed Pearl nearby. She had seemed upset earlier, so Steven had a great idea. "And let's bring Pearl."
"What?" Greg looked at his son in surprise.
Pearl also looked surprised, but she quickly grimaced and went back to folding the blankets that Greg had messed up. "No, thank you. Past experiences have shown me that three's a crowd. Besides, I'm busy watching over Twoie."
Steven laughed and looked at his older brother. "Oh, Twoie is coming, too! We're gonna have a family road trip, so there'll actually be four of us."
At that, Twoie chimed in from upstairs. "Actually Steven, why don't you guys go without me? I don't really want to go to Empire City. But it'll be good for you, Dad, and Pearl to go. You know, time stuff." Pearl sputtered at Twoie's insistence that she go along.
She met his gaze with a stern glare, but the time-traveler didn't back down. "Time stuff. And are you going to explain what this 'time stuff' is?" Pearl questioned with her hands on her hips. Twoie shook his head, which only served to increase Pearl's ire.
He really needed her to go on this trip, so Twoie tried to placate her. "I promise it doesn't involve dangerous situations, but it really is important for the future that you go with them. I promise that everything will be fine here, while you guys are gone. I won't leave the house unless I have to." She really didn't want to go, but at Twoie's insistence and promise, she finally sighed and gave in. It wouldn't hurt to get out of the house for a little bit. Besides, she was only doing this for Steven and Twoie. She couldn't hold back her annoyed look as she agreed.
"Fine, I guess I could watch over Steven for a change, but you can't be here alone. Let me see if I can find-." As she was speaking, the warp pad lit up, and Amethyst warped into the room. "Perfect timing, Amethyst! Could you please watch over Twoie for the day?"
Amethyst looked at her in surprise. "You're willingly not watching over Twoie? Is something wrong?"
Pearl glowered as she gestured to Greg and Steven. Amethyst tensely waved at them before focusing on Pearl again. "Steven's going on a trip for the day and has requested that I tag along. Twoie insists it's a good idea for me to join him, so I'll be gone for just the day. It's not something dangerous, apparently, so no need to worry about us."
Amethyst narrowed her eyes and started walking to the temple door. "In that case, sorry, P, but I'm busy. Ask Garnet to watch him." Pearl cleared her throat, making the purple gem groan in annoyance as she halted.
"I would, but Garnet is busy already. She's meditating right now to see if she can find the cause of Twoie's condition or a way to cure it in one of the timelines. Since she's analyzing them thoroughly, I expect her to take a couple of hours to do it. Garnet can come to relieve you then, okay? I can't leave him alone." Amethyst let out a long sigh, but turned around and walked back into the room. Pearl's eyes lit up, and she turned around to Steven and Greg. "Alright, let's get going then."
The group quickly finished packing and headed out of the room. Twoie took a deep breath. It was finally just him and Amethyst. Now was his chance to see what was bothering her. He looked downstairs from his bed to see Amethyst checking something on her phone. "Hey, Amethyst, I haven't seen you in a while. What have you been up to?"
She tapped her phone and looked up at him. "Same old, same old. Going out to train for a little, walking around Beach City, adding to my collection of stuff."
Twoie walked downstairs and sat at the couch. She hadn't really given him anything to work with. "Training? How has that been going for you? I'm not used to you training unless it's part of group training." That made Amethyst tense. Her eyes narrowed a little, and she looked away. Bingo. Twoie was glad that he got a reaction out of her.
"Fine. Figured I could start training early since we have a break from Homeworld stuff." Her replies were stiff and brief.
She sat up straighter, and Twoie knew she was beginning to feel uncomfortable. "Well, as long as you don't spend all of your time training. Relaxing is good for you, and it's not like anything will be happening anytime soon."
Amethyst scoffed at him. "Uh, just because it's not happening anytime soon, doesn't mean something can't happen before then. I'll relax when everything is done." Her eyes widened in shock as her brain caught up to her mouth. She said too much.
"Amethyst, tell me the truth. You're not relaxing at all, are you…" When she stayed silent, Twoie continued. "I get it. You want to be stronger, but you can't push yourself this hard. You're just going to make yourself exhausted and then blame yourself when you mess up in training because you're exhausted!"
Amethyst tucked her phone away and pushed herself off the stool. "Why don't you stop telling me what to do? If you've noticed, you haven't been following your own advice. How many times did you go to bed really late because you were working on school for Steven, or trying to remember what happens next in the timeline?" Twoie blinked at her sudden rage, and Amethyst walked forward until she was standing in front of him. "At the barn, you stayed up late countless times to help us with the drill or reform Peridot. You even butted into our discussion with Bismuth, even though we had it handled! And look how well that went! You overwork yourself all of the time, so don't try to give me your high and mighty advice when you're not even following it yourself!" Amethyst was panting by the time she finished her rant. Twoie was staring at her with wide eyes. She felt a little guilty and was about to apologize when Twoie stood up. His brows furrowed in anger.
Your feelings matter. Twoie clenched his fists. "That's because I needed to! I'm the only one who knows what happens in the future, and everyone relies on me to try to find the best way of dealing with situations. I get it! I'm a hypocrite, thanks for reminding me, but I'll be one a thousand times over if it means you guys get a better timeline than I did!" Twoie almost kept his thoughts bottled up, but that one phrase popped to the forefront of his mind.
Amethyst rolled her eyes. She was getting really tired of his 'martyr' schtick. "That's another thing. You bring up these time shenanigans all of the time, but the truth is you wouldn't be the only one who knows about what will happen in the future if you just trusted us more!"
Now Twoie was the one rolling his eyes. "That's rich coming from you. You and the others didn't trust me until I was unconscious and bleeding after saving Steven from the damaged cliff! At least I'm being careful about messing with the timeline too much! If I change everything, I won't be able to predict the outcome anymore! Everything in my time turned out good except for me!" Twoie snarled as he gestured to himself.
Amethyst raised both of her arms in exasperation. She could feel her anger rising and before she knew it, she was shouting back at Twoie. "We said we were sorry! At least we could admit we were in the wrong. You could have help when dealing with time stuff at any time if you just asked Garnet. We'd be careful about changing anything, but instead, you make it harder for everyone! And what are you even talking about?" She poked Twoie in the chest as she got in his face. "I don't get why you think you turned out bad when you're the strongest of all of us! You're the one who keeps getting us through every single mission! Every time something goes wrong, you're the one who ends up fixing it! So why are you standing here, telling me that you're the one bad thing that comes out of all of this?" She angrily ruffled her hair, messing up the ponytail slightly. "If anything, I'm the one who probably makes everything harder for you. I always thought that Steven was the worst on the team, and recently, I felt like crap for thinking it because that's such an awful thing to be happy about! But now that I know he'll be as strong as you, I feel even worse! I'm the weakest link on the team. I goof around too much or don't pay enough attention in battle, and then you have to go and fix it! Just look at Bismuth! I had her, and she broke away from me. That was the only reason you got cracked!" She didn't miss Twoie flinch at the word, and that only fueled her rage and despair. "See? You can't even hear the word without reacting badly to it! That's my fault, too, so don't even stand here and tell me that you're the bad one on the team. I've known for a while that's it's me." She glared at him, as though challenging him to dispute her. Before Twoie could even try, Garnet walked out of the temple.