One second striding through the door, the next sprawled on the floor. Stevonnie groaned at the pain, clutching their waist as their skin deformed, tamping the organs within. Using the momentum as they fell, Stevonnie hit the ground with their shoulder, the flat of the sword tucked against their side, and rolled away from their assailant.
The Gem, off-balance by the rebound of the metal slab against Stevonnie's stomach, had fallen. She scrambled to her feet quickly, lugging the iron slab behind her. Stevonnie could roll no faster, having been temporarily incapacitated by the first strike, unexpected as it was. The Gem screamed as she swung the metal slab up, over her head, and right down at Stevonnie's stomach.
Stevonnie rolled a half-turn, bringing the sword slab-side up. Thousands of capillaries burst as slab and blade met in a shower of sparks, smashing against Stevonnie's waist, knocking them against the unyielding metal floor. Again the slab bounced off, knocking the Gem right in the nose. The Gem screeched and let go of the slab. It danced along its edge, hurtling over the tables lining the edges and embedding itself in the wall.
Stevonnie used the hand closest to the ground to propel themselves away and onto their feet, blade dragging at their side. Facing the assailant Gem, Stevonnie breathed in deeply and summoned their shield. Opening their mouth to talk, Stevonnie hacked up a cough, their sides exploding in pain. Stevonnie hammered their shield against the floor, rallying themselves.
The assailant Gem seized the iron slab from the wall, and bent it over itself six times to form a thick, cylinder-like pipe. Stevonnie glared at the Gem's face. An unknown creator had rudely hewn out features resembling a human's face. A low gash for a mouth, two jabs for eyes (three scratches above one eye resembled eyelashes), two slashes each for ears and nose-that was the Gem's face. In a contrast to the face, the Gem's body was well-made, with pitted, distinct limbs and torso. At first blush, the body resembled a human's but the bulges and curves that a human would have were misplaced on this Gem. The corner of a human's elbow was too far down, the wrists and palms too wide, the hump of muscles just below the back of the knee, just above the ankle in this Gem.
The hands were seven fingered, with no fingernails. Stevonnie could not quite tell where the Gem's clothes ended and began-the Gem's clothes were an identical color to their skin, a peachy white. The Plutonium's Gem was a silvery-white, hunk of metal the size of a fist and the shape of a fan. Dark black lines shot from the tip of the fan-shaped Gem to spiral and dance across the Gem's ends.
As Stevonnie studied the Plutonium, they held their shield close in a defensive position, back against the desks lining the wall, sword pointed out. The Plutonium stayed still, limbs relaxed, hands only loosely holding their metal slab.
"Stop staring!" barked the Plutonium, in Homeworld's language. "It's rude!"
Stevonnie did not respond quick enough. The Plutonium continued to speak. "Well, flabby half-Gem monster? Are you an agent of Yellow Diamond, come to destroy My Diamond?"
"No!" yelled Stevonnie, louder than they meant to.
"An agent of Blue Diamond?"
"I'm no Homeworld Gem!" protested Stevonnie loudly, adjusting their grip on Rose's sword. If the Plutonium decided to attack them suddenly, they had to be ready.
The Plutonium stayed still, head tilted on their shoulders. "An agent of Pink Diamond?"
"She's dead," said Stevonnie, "So I can't be working for her, can I?"
The Plutonium spoke, this time in English. "A Rebellion agent, then!" The Plutonium hefted her crude weapon in both hands, heaving it behind her back. She sprinted across the distance between her and Stevonnie, bringing down the metal slab upon Stevonnie in a mighty blow.
As she did, Stevonnie tilted their shield upwards, smoothly crouching underneath its pink lip. As the shield left the ground, Stevonnie swept their sword back and hacked at the Plutonium's thick ankles. The sword bit into the Plutonium's left ankle, removing a chunk of white, powdery material as the sword came loose. The metal slab came down upon Rose's shield, crushing Stevonnie into the ground again. They resisted the push with their bent knee, shoving the Plutonium away.
The Plutonium hurtled forward and away from Stevonnie, assisted by the rebound of the metal plate upon Rose's shield. She smashed into the far wall, and slowly rolled over onto her back. Stevonnie copy-catted the Plutonium, rising up and slamming the lip of Rose's shield into the supine Plutonium's stomach. Stevonnie removed the shield easily, tearing forth a goodly amount of powdery material from the Plutonium's stomach.
In return, the Plutonium swept a powerful leg savagely at Stevonnie's unprotected ankles. Stevonnie tilted backwards, trying to open up some distance between themselves and the Plutonium, but they were too close to clear the blow completely. The Plutonium's thick ankle met Stevonnie's left ankle, colliding in a shower of powder. Stevonnie screamed and fell down squarely on their butt, legs flailing in the air.
Stevonnie crumpled their ankles up to their stomach, glancing at the angry red-and-white flesh. The ankle had not yet begun to bleed, but the damage had still been dealt. A two-inch patch of skin had been removed along with the hair, showing gristly gray-and-white cartilage. Flaps of translucent and pale brown skin ringed the skinned area; like Steven peeling an apple, Plutonium had skinned Stevonnie's ankle. As they stood, they also discovered the leg bone just above the ankle was most likely fractured.
Plutonium recovered soon after delivering the painful blow. She stood in a hunchback position, watching Stevonnie wail over their ankle some feet away, one hand still on their shield. Seizing ahold of their metal plate, Plutonium charged forward for another blow.
Almost on top of Stevonnie, Plutonium's head yanked sharply upwards propelled by the sheer force of an uppercut. Her jaw dislodged, hanging limp from one hinge, almost knocking her unconscious. From a shortened, dark tunnel of vision, Plutonium watched as Stevonnie planted they sword in the ground, using it as a crutch. She watched as Stevonnie limped rapidly over to her and stomped their good foot down on their head-once twice, darkening the tunnel of their vision. Plutonium lay still.
Stevonnie stumbled backwards instantly after their attack, retreating halfway across the room. They reassumed a defensive stance, shakier than before. They kneeled with their good leg, sinking their bad leg's knee into the metal floor. The ankle trembled and bled slowly, encouraged to do so by Stevonnie's efforts.
With the brief respite, Stevonnie took the moment to calm themselves a bit, and think back to their previous fights and Connie's fights with Pearl for strategy.
"But this Gem doesn't have a sword, they have a CLUB!" one part of Stevonnie yelled. "What good will be Pearl's instructions now?"
"They'll be fine! Club, rapier, whatever! It's all the same, right?" another part of Stevonnie screamed back, countering the other.
"No matter what, we won't die here!" one said.
"Of course not!" said the first part of Stevonnie to speak. "Who said anything about dying?"
A familiar feeling began to steal over Stevonnie, like that time at Sour Cream's rave. Stevonnie struggled against the urge to panic and just run at the Plutonium, and better yet, to just run away.
Speaking of the Plutonium…a far worse scenario popped up in Stevonnie's head, silencing all others. "Did I kill her? She's awfully still…"
The Plutonium lay as Stevonnie's attacks had left her. She did not move. Worried, Stevonnie considered breaking their stance to go check the Plutonium's condition. Despite the ferocity of the Plutonium's attacks, Stevonnie did not want to kill the Gem.
As they took a step forward, Stevonnie had a flashback to Lonely Blade-the heroic ninja, so good and true, mortally injures his brother. Always good-hearted, he runs to his brother's aid-to discover his evil, cunning brother had been playing possum!
Stevonnie nodded to themselves, wincing in pain as the raw muscles of their ankle burned in the open air. "Riiight…they might just be playing dead." In addition, whenever a Gem like Pearl got hit too much, she poofed. But this one looked too solid, more solid than Pearl…
Unwilling to approach the Plutonium too closely, and also unwilling to let the Gem die, Stevonnie shuffled over to left, away from the supine Plutonium. Observing the Plutonium's head was tilted away, Stevonnie set their sword reached behind themselves, and settled her hand around a long metal rod with a clamp on the end. Stevonnie could only guess it was used to pick up materials at a distance.
Stevonnie picked up the rod, and jabbed Plutonium with it. Plutonium spun around, seizing the metal rod, and pulling Stevonnie in, towards her. Stevonnie let Plutonium pull them, and swung their shield up and down in a backhand blow. The shield's lip smashed into the bridge of Plutonium's nose, denting it.
Stevonnie lifted the shield with both hands and bludgeoned Plutonium with it until her face was unrecognizable.