Walking into base was always a breath of fresh air for Caddy. As soon as the door shut, she could abandon all the heaviness of bearing the title of Yellow Diamond's Pearl, change herself however she liked, and relax her guard the way she never could when she was being watched.

She still had some responsibilities to attend to though. Her first stop was communications, delivering any news of her Diamond's workings to Aura or Millie, which would be passed on to Crimson, Cyan, Mercury, and whoever else needed it. Then, once that was done, she usually searched out small chores and things that she could help with—or if not, there was always training.

Today was different because she had plans with White, but she would still make sure to squeeze in her usual rounds. She could report information first, since White wouldn't be able to help with that, and then the two of them would meet up for the rest of Caddy's day. Well, less than a day, but she preferred to think of the few hours she spent here as separate, unable to be tainted by the time she spent attending to her Diamond.

"Thanks, Millie!" she said as the pink Pearl finished typing up her notes. "All good?"

"Yeah, I'll take it from here," Millie replied. "Go enjoy yourself; I'm sure White will be happy to see you."

"Yep, we're going to Earth together today!"

"Yeah? Lavy's going as well, you might run into each other then."

Caddy nodded, bouncing a little. "Nice! I can still help out if there's anything you need done though," she added, tilting her head to get a better view of where Chroma was squeezed in under the desk fixing something.

"Hm?" Chroma pulled a small screwdriver out her mouth, scooting back so she could see Caddy properly. "No, no, go have fun. I'm going with Lavender actually; I just needed to make sure this was taken care of first."

"Okay, thanks!" She grinned, leaning down to pick a stray screw out of Chroma's fluffy hair. "Lose this? Or are you experimenting with a new storage system?"

"Oops," Chroma laughed, taking it from Caddy's open hand. "No, I definitely don't need to start that. Thanks."

"No prob! You guys have fun today too, whatever you're up to! And say hello to Lavender for me!"

"I will."

Caddy quickly bade the two of them farewell and headed to the other side of the building to get White.

"White!" she called, knocking out a cheerful rhythm on the other Pearl's door. "You home?"

"Yeah!" White's voice came from the other side of the door, and it slid open a moment later. "Today's your day off?"

"Yep, my Diamond's preoccupied with some colony thing and I've got time to kill."

"Okay." White stepped outside, shutting the door behind her. "Oh," she said suddenly, "I forgot to say hello. Sorry. Hi, Caddy."

"Hi!" she returned cheerfully. "It's alright, it's not a big deal. And you remembered pretty quick anyway." Caddy ruffled White's short hair. "How've you been doing with everybody else?"

"I think it's going okay," she said slowly. "I've been talking to them more."

"Yeah? Anybody in particular? 'Cause we can invite more people on our little trip if you want."

White shook her head. "Not really."

"Okay. But you're doing alright?"

"Do you always hover this much or is it just with me?" she asked, a small smirk on her lips.

Caddy stuck out her tongue. "Just you."

"Figured." White paused. "I'm doing fine. It's different but I…I like it here so far. And I've been helping with renovations a bit."

"Good." She slung her arm around White comfortably, leading her down the hall. "Freedom suits you."

"Thanks."

"You're welcome."

"…Do you think I should invite someone else to come with us?" White asked curiously. "Would that be a good way to get to know someone?"

"Sure, if you want! Or if you don't want to do it today, you can warp over to Earth with a friend some other time."

"Mm… Is Sky here today?"

"Nah, she's stuck with her Diamond. Why, you wanna ask her?" Caddy looked delighted by the suggestion.

"Later, I guess."

"I'll make sure and let her know next time I see her!"

"Sure. Thanks." If there was one thing White had figured out in her time here, it was that friendships definitely weren't little groups of two and two and two separately—they seemed to coalesce into larger groups. And while Caddy seemed to be friends with everyone, Sky was certainly in her inner circle. White wanted to get along with her too, if she could, and she hadn't quite figured out how to do that yet.

"No problem!" Caddy skipped ahead a little, making White quicken her pace too. "And we're still going to train a bit before we warp over, right?"

"If we have to," White sighed.

"Yes, we have to, it's important!" Caddy glanced at her. "Do you not like it? Because if you don't, then it's not like you have to have to. We've got plenty of gems that don't—Aura and Ory and Prism and…"

"It's not like that," she said quickly. "It's just not very interesting to me. You get all worn out doing nothing."

"Well…"

"And Crimson and Silver have explained ten different ways how it's not doing nothing and I should try to make practice a habit, so you don't need to convince me."

"Alright, alright," Caddy laughed. "Practice can be boring, I hear you. Hey, what about that projector Pearl you were gonna practice with sometime?"

"Oh! Dazzle. Yeah, we practiced together once, she was cool." White smiled. "I forgot about that. Maybe I should invite her to Earth too?"

"Yeah!"

"Another day though. She's been really busy helping the others figure out how to do up their rooms and whatnot."

"Mmkay."

The two of them arrived at the entrance to the training room, and Caddy let go of White as she opened the door and poked her head inside.

"Hiya!" she called to Silver. "Thought the two of us would stop in for a bit, if that's cool?"

"Yeah, for sure, come on in!" Silver beckoned them inside easily, grinning as she made eye contact with White. "Glad somebody knows how to get you in here," she teased.

"We were going to be intercepted anyway, since we have to go through you to get to the warp pad."

Silver laughed silently, eyes crinkling at the corners. "You know, that's not a bad idea. Spar me and if you win, you get to leave?"

"I'm a free Pearl and you'd let me leave whenever," White said matter-of-factly. "Besides, I won't win."

"And why's that?"

"Because I haven't…" She narrowed her eyes, realizing what Silver was getting at. "Practiced as much as you," she sighed.

Silver grinned. "See?"

"Yeah," she answered reluctantly.

"Well, while I really would like to spar with you, I know you guys have plans. And we're actually doing something a little different today." Silver pointed a thumb back over her shoulder and White and Caddy noticed for the first time that Aura was actually leading the group in something.

"I thought she couldn't be in here," White said, confused.

"She's fine as long as we're not doing any type of fighting practice," Silver replied. "Pearl suggested we incorporate some different exercises into our training. Aura was looking up some different options for us on the computer and she wanted to try this one with us. It's mostly like stretches and things, but it's pretty cool!" She beamed. "How about you join us for a few minutes before you go? I don't want to hold you up too long, but…"

"A few minutes works," she agreed, Caddy nodding happily beside her.

"Awesome! Come on over here then." Silver led the two of them over to an empty spot in the front. "Aura, couple more for you!"

"Oh, hello!" Aura smiled, only breaking the pose she was holding enough to wave at the two of them. "It's good to see you're safe, Caddy."

"Thanks. Good to see you too!" Caddy glanced back at the rest of the group, then tried to match her posture to Aura's. "We're just copying what you do, yeah?"

She nodded. "Yeah! And if you have any questions, I'll try to help! I've only watched a few videos and memorized those though, so I don't know a whole lot yet."

"Well, you seem like you're doing good!" She glanced over at White. "C'mon, it's something new for you to try."

"I already said I would," White laughed, moving to take her place beside Caddy. "Like…this?"

"Looks perfect to me," Aura said warmly, watching her. "Okay, let's hold this for another minute and then we'll move on." She stood up straight and began walking amongst the other Pearls to give them some encouragement too.

"Hi, Yellow!" Caddy turned to greet the nearby Pearl cheerfully. "What's up?"

"The same as usual, I suppose," Yellow answered, eyes flicking over Caddy's shapeshifted hair and then down to her gem. "You?"

"The same as usual, I suppose," she mimicked with a friendly smile. "I'm good, thanks for asking."

"Good."

"Where's Blue at? You two usually come to training together."

"Yeah, usually." She glanced back to the front to see what Aura was doing and moved to copy her. "She said she wanted to go to Earth for a bit. To visit with the others, I guess? Anyway, I was supposed to help teach in her place, but then we changed plans and I figured I might as well stay. So here I am."

"Huh. Maybe she's coming up with a super special surprise for you!"

"I hope not."

"Aww, come on, there's nothing wrong with surprises!"

"Lately all the surprises I've experienced have involved you—or both of you," she said pointedly, indicating White, "and your pranks. I've had quite enough of them."

"Then you'll be happy to know you're getting a brief reprieve because my talents have been requested elsewhere!"

"How brief?"

"That's a surprise too!"

Yellow rolled her eyes. "Well, I pity the gem, whoever she is."

"Two gems. Mercury and Cyan."

"I take it back, I don't pity them at all. Did Tin finally snap after having to listen to them bicker day in and day out?"

"Oh, no, they actually both asked for my help in pranking each other, so I'm a double agent!"

"For who?"

"I haven't decided yet! Maybe it should be Tin, she'd be a fun accomplice…"

"I thought I was your accomplice," White pointed out.

"You're my number one accomplice!" Caddy told her. "And I was hoping you'd help me plan this one while we're out today."

"Sure," she answered, unable to keep a small smile from appearing on her face. Caddy's kind of plans were always fun.

"Regardless, just leave me out of it," Yellow muttered.

"It's a promise," Caddy laughed. "So what else has been happening around here?"

"Just renovations and stuff still," she answered with a shrug.

"Nothing cool? Nobody else has summoned or anything?"

"Well…" Yellow gestured beyond Caddy. "Silver."

"Wait, really?" Caddy twisted around to look at her. "You did? That's so cool!"

"Thanks," Silver projected, smiling proudly.

"What did you summon?" White asked. "You mostly just punch things."

She laughed silently, nodding. "Yeah, I wasn't too sure what to expect either. Hold on, let me see if I can show you." She clapped her hands, then waved to get Aura's attention. "I'm going to summon and I might need to pretend punch something, so look away for a minute?"

"Oh, alright! Thank you." Aura quickly closed her eyes, giving Silver a thumbs up.

"Okay," Silver said, settling into a comfortable stance and focusing for a moment before throwing a punch with her left hand, then her right, then her left again. Her gem glowed on the third try, brass knuckles appearing on her closed fist. "Got it!" She mouthed the words, pointing excitedly, and then slipped the weapon off to let Caddy and White see.

"Ooh, that's perfect for you!" Caddy gushed, taking hold of them and slipping them onto her own hand curiously.

"Thank you!" As soon as Silver projected, her weapon dissolved in a shimmer of light. "Oops," she said. "I haven't quite got the hang of having both going at once."

"Well, it's not like you'll need to talk very much during a fight anyway," White pointed out.

"Good point," she said appreciatively. "I'm still going to work on it though. Hold on a sec." She went over and tapped Aura on the arm gently, making her open her eyes. "All done. Sorry for the interruption there."

Aura shook her head, smiling. "I don't mind. I want you to enjoy it." She gave Silver a quick kiss on the cheek before they went their separate ways. "Alright," she continued, addressing the rest of the group, "now I think we bring our arms up like this…"

"How's your summoning been going?" Silver asked Caddy as they continued.

She shrugged. "It's going! I don't get much time to practice but I'm squeezing it in wherever I can." She reached to her gem, which lit in response, allowing her to pull out one of her emeici.

"Hey, that's much faster than you were getting it last time!" Silver congratulated her. "Good job."

"Thanks!" Caddy said happily, spinning it in her palm. "We should practice together sometime."

"Definitely!"

White let her attention wander after that, following along with Aura's instructions absentmindedly. The exercises were more of a challenge than she'd anticipated, but that certainly wasn't going to provide enough incentive to keep her coming to training.

All in all, she didn't mind training—often it was just that her lack of interest made her forget she was supposed to be making a habit of it. And the promise of it eventually making her a better fighter…well, it was hard to wrap her head around that. She'd never done anything intended to better her future self rather than her current one.

But that was what the rebellion was for—better futures for everyone. So she wanted to learn.

"We should probably head out now," Caddy suggested after a while. "Thanks for having us, Aura!" she called.

"I'm glad you both could make it!"

"Yeah, thanks for stopping by," Silver said. "Have fun on your date!"

"What? It's not a date," Caddy protested, blushing.

"Oh? My mistake." She winked at White, who stared back, unsure of what she was trying to imply.

"But we'll definitely have fun!" Caddy said quickly.

White nodded. "Have fun training," she offered politely.

"Definitely," Silver replied with a nod. "Practically got the whole rebellion in here for once, it's great! Well, we're missing Citrine as usual and Blue's off with the Crystal Gems and Sky's not here today and Prism's not up to this kind of thing yet and Chroma and Lavender are going to Earth too and Drini is off doing whatever it is she does… Okay, I guess it's not everyone."

Caddy laughed. "Well, it's still a pretty good turnout!"

"Yeah, for sure." Silver started walking the two of them over to the warp pad. "So, White, you going to join us again tomorrow or was this one time only?"

"I'll come back tomorrow," she decided. "I want to—well, not want to exactly—but I'm going to try to train more often."

"Yeah?" Silver smiled.

White nodded. "I'm not great at schedules though, so…"

"I could send Ory to go get you if you want," she offered.

"Um, yeah." She hadn't been expecting that. "Just for a little while until I get used to it. Thanks."

"No problem." Silver gave the two of them a gentle push onto the warp pad. "See you later then!"

"See you."

"Bye!"

It was a quick trip to Earth, appearing in Steven's home and immediately running into Blue, who had just been approaching the warp pad herself.

"Oh, Blue, hey!" Caddy greeted her. "Your girlfriend's missing you!"

Blue nodded, her smile not quite reaching her eyes. "Yeah, I was just about to head back. See you."

"Um, yeah, see ya," she replied, taken aback.

"Is something wrong?" White asked, watching Caddy closely as the warp pad whisked Blue away again.

"Not sure." Caddy shook her head. "I'm sure she can handle whatever it is, she's Blue. C'mon."

"But nothing's wrong with you, right?" she checked, quickly following after Caddy.

"Not a thing!" She smiled, catching White's arm and pulling her along. "Come on, come on, I want to squeeze in all the fun we can!"

"Where are we going?"

"The appropriately named Funland! The Land of Fun! Steven told me about it!"

"Alright," White laughed, not sure what to make of the name. It didn't really tell her what to expect, but that didn't matter. It'd be something new, and new things always seemed to be even more fun when Caddy was there.

The roller coasters were definitely White's favorite. It was all excitement and no risk, cool air whipping her hair back away from her gem and leaving her face flushed by the time the ride slowed down and stopped and they had to get out and get in line again to do it all over again.

"Want to take a breather?" Caddy asked after a while. White had lost track of how many times they'd been on the ride. "You're getting a little wobbly there."

"Oh. Sure, if you think we should." She was a bit dizzy, but it was a fun feeling.

Caddy giggled as White made her way to the nearest bench in a not particularly straight line. "Yeah, I think we should. C'mon." She steadied her gently until they were close enough for White to just flop down.

"How come you aren't wobbly?" White complained.

"I don't know, maybe cuz I haven't got my gem on my head?" she guessed, grinning. "It's fine, I'm sure you'll recover in like two minutes and then we can get back on."

"Mm."

"Or if you want a longer break, we could try one of those places that was selling food," Caddy pointed out.

White considered it for a second. "What if we get the food and take it on the roller coaster so we can do both at once?"

"I hate to be the voice of reason, but that seems like a bad idea."

"Fiiine. Let's get food then," she decided. "You probably need to head back soon anyway."

"No rush, it hasn't been that long," Caddy reassured her.

"Yeah, but you need to be careful."

"You know, it's kinda nice having you saying that to me instead of the other way 'round!"

"Caddy, I'm serious."

"So was I," she returned. "Look, I'm being careful, I promise. Sky and I don't take nearly as many chances as before to get out of there. But if we don't get out to relax once in a while, we're gonna go insane. Let me have a little time to not think about the Diamonds, okay?"

"Okay," White agreed quietly.

"Thank you for worrying about me though," Caddy said with a warm smile.

"You're welcome," she said automatically.

Caddy just looked at her for a moment, eyes bright with happiness, and then tugged White to her feet. "Alright, let's go get our food! What would you like?"

"Have you tried ice cream?" White asked.

"Nope! Is it good?"

"Mm-hm. There was a place back that way."

"Then let's go!"

It didn't take long to locate the little ice cream shop, and White watched as Caddy flitted back and forth trying to decide on what flavor to get.

"You can always try samples," the human behind the counter suggested helpfully.

"Ooh, really? I'd like a sample of everything then!"

"That's… Okay, sure, I guess that comes out to about the same size as a regular cup. What about you?" they asked, looking at White warily.

"Vanilla. Please."

"Right, one everything and one vanilla coming right up."

"Oh, maybe I should have ordered a yellow one," Caddy said, looking over at the vanilla. "You got one that matches you. Well, sorta."

White shook her head. "It's just the one I know I like. I tried a bunch when I got some on my own the first time."

"Aha," she said. "A perfect coincidence then! We'll have to see which one I like. Maybe I should wear a blindfold so I'm not biased…"

"There's not even a yellow one."

"Well, I'm pretty biased towards another color too." Caddy grinned, saying a quick thank you as her container full of tiny sample cups was handed over. "But I don't want to wear a blindfold anyway, people watching is fun. Let's sit down over there, seems like it'll have a good view."

White nodded, taking her own ice cream and heading over to the small round table Caddy had indicated.

Once they were seated, Caddy immediately began taste-testing everything, her face lighting up with each new flavor. "This is all so fun! And cold!"

"Yeah." She was glad Caddy had liked the recommendation, and she slowly began eating her own scoop of ice cream as she watched.

For once, Caddy was pretty quiet—though still quite animated—and it was a comfortable quiet, one that let White's mind focus on all the fun they were having and just enjoy it for a while. She liked being here and she knew that the other Pearl must have spent at least some time on this, finding an activity that would appeal to White's thrill-seeking nature in a safer way. She wished they could do things like this more often.

And speaking of things to do together, maybe this would be the right time to ask the question that had been on her mind lately.

"Caddy, can I kiss you?"

Golden eyes lifted to meet White's slowly, and the small sample spoon Caddy had been using to eat her ice cream slipped out of her hand.

White waited. And waited some more, until she felt like she needed to repeat the question because Caddy was only giving her a blank stare. "Can I kiss—"

"I heard you!" Caddy's voice seemed higher pitched than usual.

"Then why didn't you answer?"

"Because I just went from eating this delicious caramel ice cream to kissing propositions and I don't even—what's going on? Am I dreaming?"

"Do you usually dream about gems asking to kiss you?"

"Yes. No! Definitely not!"

White laughed, watching Caddy's cheeks tinge a darker yellow.

She huffed and picked up her spoon, stabbing it back into one of her little ice cream cups. "Anyway, what are you really asking?"

"If I can kiss you," she repeated slowly.

"I meant your reasoning."

"Well," White said thoughtfully, "I want to try it, I know you like kissing, and so I hoped you'd say yes."

Caddy didn't look any less confused. Or flustered. "You know I like kissing?" she repeated.

"You watch that TV show where everyone's obsessed with it," she said with a shrug. "Plus I've seen you kiss Viri before."

"You've what?"

"Was that meant to be a secret? You were in the middle of the common room."

"Well, no, but I—I didn't think you'd noticed! And that was ages ago!" Caddy thunked her head down onto the table and White winced sympathetically before remembering her gem didn't take the hit the way her own would.

"I'm observant."

Caddy groaned. "I know."

"So what about the kissing?" she tried again.

The other Pearl tilted her head up, chin resting on the table for a moment before she sat up properly again. "I, uh, think I'm gonna have to say no," she mumbled. "Sorry."

"Oh." White didn't know what to say anymore.

"Sorry," Caddy repeated, not really looking at her. "Just…yeah."

"Okay."

"I mean, you shouldn't kiss just anybody," she added quickly.

"You're not just anybody," White said, confused. "You're Caddy."

"No, I mean—I mean, you should like the person you have your first kiss with. Romantically."

"But—"

"I mean, you don't have to, it's okay to do it for fun too! If both people want to. But that's not really my thing. I mean, it was sort of my thing with Viri, but this is different and I don't really wanna be your practice round, y'know?"

"No," White said bluntly. "I don't know."

"Well—"

"I never said anything about you being a 'practice round', I just wanted to know if you'd kiss me. For fun and romantically."

"…What?"

White was taken aback by the softness in Caddy's voice, trepidation like she didn't quite believe any of it.

"Do you mean that? You want to kiss me for real?"

"Yeah," she answered quietly. "I want to."

"And then…?"

"And then we relabel all our activities as dates and add kissing to them and take good care of each other, if I understand your TV shows right."

A small, hopeful smile curved Caddy's lips. "Yeah?"

White nodded.

"Me?"

"Of course you," she said, exasperation leaking into her voice. "I love being around you."

"You really know how to romance a gem," Caddy said happily, sudden restless energy making her rock forward and back in her chair.

"Is…that a yes?" White asked hopefully.

"That is a million yeses, oh my stars." She jumped up and ran to hug White, not even letting her get out of her chair first. "I can't believe this is really happening! I didn't think I'd ever really get a chance and I was kinda sorta trying to get over you and just appreciate you as an adorable friend, but then you asked me out and I can't believe it!"

"You wanted to date me?"

Caddy laughed, squeezing her tight. "I think that was painfully obvious to everyone but you."

"It was?"

"I thought it was," she said with a smile as they separated, running her hands down either side of White's face. "I've liked you forever, White."

A faint blue tinge appeared on her cheeks. "You have?" she squeaked out before clearing her throat. "It can't be that much of a forever, neither of us have even existed for very long."

"Oh, look at you, you can flirt!" Caddy said, like White was the cutest thing she'd ever seen.

"That was flirting?"

"It's a start!" Caddy gathered White's hand into her own. "Ask me to kiss you again?"

"Um…" A small smile found her lips as she squeezed Caddy's hand. "I really like you. Would you kiss me, please?"

And for once, Caddy didn't say anything, just pulled White to her feet and drew her in close, lips warm as they met White's. She was pretty sure the top of her leotard must have been jabbing into Caddy's arm as she cradled White's head, but she was too caught up in the kiss to shift it off. It was exciting and new and everything White wanted, but it was calm too. It felt safe and perfect, even if she wasn't quite sure she was returning it properly. But Caddy leaned into her and felt like she was smiling as White's hands moved to her waist and back. She let White figure out how to hold her, let her decide when to end the kiss.

"How was it?" Caddy asked softly as they parted.

"I definitely like kissing. And kissing you in particular."

The last hint of nervousness in Caddy's eyes faded and she laughed happily. "I like kissing you in particular too."

"Good." White hesitated for a brief second. "Do you want another one?"

"Mm-hm." Soft fingers settled on her cheek. "Anytime you want."

"Thank you." White leaned in and kissed her again, careful with the radiant smile on her lips. "I'll do my best," she said quietly, "so please keep being patient with me while I figure out how dating works?"

She nodded, eyes warm. "We'll figure it out together."

She lost count of the kisses after that, but Caddy tasted like ten flavors of ice cream and White loved every single one of them.