Steven felt warm, fuzzy. Like drinking a cup of hot chocolate on a cold winter's day. Or like watching laugh-out-loud comedies while curled up against his dad, the cozy and welcoming interior of the van making him feel at home.
He tried opening his eyes, but everything was too bright.
His hearing was muffled, like someone had stuffed wads of cotton in his ears. Still, a concerned voice managed to punch through his dulled senses, "… happen to Steven?"
He opened his eyes again. The only thing he could make out for certain were the blurry white blankets and walls surrounding him. The rest of the room was a kaleidoscope of smudged colors and misshapen blobs.
"Then we'll simply wait for him to wake," the booming voice from outside spoke again, sounding a bit more irritated.
As far as Steven could tell, he was in bed. One far too large to be his. He stretched out his limbs, wincing slightly at the small jolts of pain that came with every movement. His whole body was aching, sore. Like he had just run a hundred miles and followed it up with two hundred push ups. He forced himself into a sitting position and waited for the room to stop spinning before trying anything else.
The voice he'd been listening to was joined by two others, both equally loud.
"We're his family too."
"We're not leaving until we see him."
His vision began to clear up. A TV stood across the room from him, resting atop a wooden piece of furniture. An assortment of video games, DVDs, and movies lined its shelves. A few posters decorated the walls, one of which was from the Lonely Blade movies. It was definitely a nice bedroom, although not one he recognized.
Steven slid out from under the covers and, being careful not to move too quickly, took a few tentative steps forward. He didn't wobble or sway and aside from the slight soreness in his legs, felt great. Seeing as no one else was in the room Steven made his way over to the door, headed down a flight of stairs, and did a double take.
The familiar layout of the beach house greeted him. He stole a glance back at the wooden staircase, frowned at its troubling existence, and turned his focus back to the near identical copy of his house. A proper dining table rested a few feet from an upgraded kitchen. The couches in the living room were new and unstained, even the crystal of the warp pad seemed to shimmer more brightly. It was his house, but at the same time it wasn't.
He pinched himself, but didn't wake. Before he could try again, the floor rumbled beneath him causing a cup to shake and nearly fall off a counter. Thinking it was an earthquake, Steven ran and positioned himself under the kitchen table. The earthquake abruptly stopped.
He peeked his head out from under the makeshift cover at the sound of a familiar voice, "We'll let him know you visited." Garnet sounded tense and agitated, similar to how she sounded when Steven asked her just a bit too many questions. "Right now, he needs to rest—undisturbed." She was irritated at someone. Maybe Pearl and Amethyst had gotten into another fight?
He crawled out from under the table and made his way over to the front door, noting that it was now made of actual wood. What had happened to the screen door? What had happened to the rest of the house? With a million questions still rattling in his head, Steven turned the knob and pushed the door open.
Three mountain-sized women loomed over the house, their large eyes immediately snapping on to him. Steven stopped mid-stride and stumbled forward, suddenly aware of his disheveled hair and lack of footwear.
Giant woman, he thought at the sight of them. Except, even the word giant was an understatement. These women were humongous, easily towering over the likes of Garnet and far surpassing the height of the mountainside in which the beach house resided. Each of them was a different shade of vibrant color. One blue, one yellow, and the tallest of the trio was an almost blinding white.
Standing out on the porch was the tense group of Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl. His dad and somebody else, another human, stood among them. Steven thought she looked familiar, but was far too concerned with the gawking stares that the three women were sending him to pay attention to much else. One of the women, the yellow one, pressed her lips into a thin line. She leaned forward with squinted eyes, the ground rumbling in response to her movements, and scrutinized him.
The Crystal Gems, dad, and the girl, all acknowledge his presence in similar ways. With a combination of wide eyes and agape mouths. The one nearest to him, Pearl, opened her mouth—probably to yell at him to go back inside if her pinched expression was anything to go by, but was interrupted before she could.
"Is that…" The woman who, based off the glimmering yellow stone above her chest, was actually a gem moved her face even closer to him. He shuffled backwards, unconsciously inching closer to his family "… Steven?" She still somehow managed to sound strong and commanding despite her incredulous expression.
Steven looked to the gems for guidance, an explanation, anything, but they only stared unblinkingly at him. The trio of colossal gems' reaction was much the same, the three of them pressed shoulder to shoulder as they peered down at him with their wide eyes. An uncomfortable silence descended upon them. No one dared move, each group waiting to see what the other would do.
He swallowed his anxiety and plastered on a friendly smile. "Hi… I'm Steven," he greeted and when he received no response, nervously added, "What's your name?"
Like a spell being broken, everybody sprang to life at his question. Pearl yanked him from view and pulled him close. Dad, Garnet, Amethyst, and the girl hurried to form a half circle around them. Their attempt at keeping him hidden was thwarted by the sheer size of the gems looming over them. The trio only had to crane their necks to look over the group. Chaos reigned as a mess of overlapping and frantic voices fought for dominance.
"You need to leave, now," Garnet told the three large gems.
"Take Steven inside," Amethyst said, uncharacteristically serious.
Dad ran a hand through his very short head of hair. "Steven, are you okay?" He turned to the girl next to him, tugging at a clump of hair. "When did he get older? Should we call your mother?"
"I was going to say something, bu—"
"Why does Steven look like that?" the yellow gem asked her companions.
"He's adorable," the blue one said.
The white one frowned. "I thought humans only aged forward?"
Pearl's gaze never wavered from the three gems even as she pulled him along toward the house. "Let's go inside, Steven."
Steven squirmed in Pearl's hold, pulse racing. "Pearl, what's going on? Is something wrong?"
From the moment he had woken up everything had been strange. The beach house had undergone some major renovations, a group of giant gems were demanding to speak with him, his dad was bald. Pearl, Amethyst, and Garnet had completely new forms. He hadn't noticed at first, too distracted by everything else, but they each sported brand new outfits. Just how long had he been asleep?
Pearl responded by guiding him into the beach house, but before he could enter a pink and white blur zoomed in the air and landed in front of him. Steven's head throbbed with a dull ache at the sight of the upside down heart-shaped gemstone.
The air reeked of chemicals and singed grass. Steven's hair stood on end. He leapt to the side. A flash of energy crackled on the ground where he had been standing moments ago. A pink scythe buzzing with barely contained energy and twirled in the air before heading straight for him. A deranged gem grinned at him, her smile far too large to be genuine.
There were a few surprised cries as Steven was engulfed in a tight embrace. He thrashed against the hug, still in panic mode from the strange flash of memory. He was abruptly yanked away from the pink gem and pulled back into Pearl's protective arms. He squirmed, sick of being held, but Pearl's grip on him only tightened and Steven resigned himself to his fate.
"Wowee! You sure are a lot shorter than I remember," the pink gem said oblivious to the current tension. Steven was faintly aware of Garnet's ongoing confrontation with the trio of gems. The pink gem pulled an object from behind her back and happily presented it to him. "You forgot your foot-thong thingy."
Steven blinked, any fear he had of the pink gem vanishing. What?
She waved a familiar red piece of footwear around. She had been talking about his flip-flops, he realized.
"Oh," he said after a brief moment of blankly staring at her. He reached out and accepted the footwear. "Well, thanks for bringing it back to me."
"Yes, thank you, Spinel," Pearl said, tersely. "Now, if that's all I think it's time for you to lea—"
"What's with the new look?" Spinel asked, poking the star on his red shirt. Pearl took a step backwards, pulling him along with her. "Is that something that humans do? Shrink?"
Steven frowned. Sure, he wasn't the tallest kid his age, but he liked to think he was growing a bit each day. However, before he could inform Spinel of that fact she was pulled away by Amethyst.
"Steven needs to be alone right now," Amethyst said, glancing over her shoulder to give Pearl a small nod.
With a single red flip-flop still in his possession, Steven was quickly ushered inside the beach house by Pearl, the wooden door closing behind them.