Missing Peace: Chapter 4
Steven looked around at crowd of humans and Gems that was now covering most of the Beach. Most of Beach City's residents, including the newly-uncorrupted Gems, had been watching the conference from the boardwalk. Now that the visiting diplomats had left, the crowd had spilled out onto the beach itself. Many small groups were chatting amongst themselves, but a large number were gathered around Steven.
They were all talking over each other, so it was hard to make out many words, but Steven guessed they were probably asking about how the conference had gone. Steven could see Connie chatting to another, not quite-so-agitated group of Gems further down the beach. He wished he could go over to her and thank her for speaking up earlier, but he clearly wasn't going to get the chance. As he looked around for a way to slip out of the throng of people, Garnet and Bismuth pushed their way through the crowd.
"Alright you rocks." Bismuth said in a loud but jovial tone: "We know you're all real excited to know what's gonna happen, but Steven doesn't know any more than you do. We'll get back to you as soon as we know more." Without waiting for an answer from the huddle of Gems, Bismuth picked Steven up onto her shoulder, and walked him out of the crowd and back towards his house, with Garnet following close behind.
"Thanks for the save Bismuth" chuckled Steven. "I've been spending all day trying to reassure a bunch of humans; I don't think I could spend all night doing the same thing for the Gems."
Steven was grateful for the break, but he knew someone would have to give Beach City's new arrivals some answers sooner or later. Most of them had been Crystal gems during the war, and so were already quite at home around humans, but not all the Gems would be so trusting.
Centi, no…Nephrite, (Steven mentally corrected himself) and her crew, had been part of Homeworld's army, along with many of the other uncorrupted Gems. While some had gone back to Homeworld after being cured, others had stayed behind, either because they had taken a liking to Earth, or because they felt too ashamed of their new appearances to go home. Many were still dismissive or distrustful of humans, and Steven wished he could reassure them that they had nothing to worry about, but given how some of the conference guests had behaved, he knew he couldn't make that promise right now.
Once Bismuth set him down near the house, Steven cast appreciative glances at all his friends, many of whom were still clearing up after the conference. Peridot was busy tinkering with the machine she and Pearl had built to transmit Steven and White's message. It was largely made of old Gem tech, cobbled together with bits of scrap from Amethyst's room, but some fresh components brought from Homeworld by the Diamonds had helped get it up and running.
Lapis lay on her back in the sand, staring happily up at the sky, while Pumpkin slept beside her head. Amethyst was eating the spent coal out of the barbecue, while Pearl looked on with a smirk. Just a year ago, Amethyst's behaviour would have earned a look of disgust from Pearl, but they had both grown so much since then. Everyone had.
As Steven looked over to where the Diamonds' ships were parked, combined into their upper body configuration, he saw Blue and Yellow, vanishing into the entry bubbles of their respective hands. Blue waved to him with a grin as she was enveloped, and sank into her ship for the night. Yellow awkwardly flashed a peace sign as she did the same.
One Diamond though, was not heading back into her ship. Steven noticed that White was still milling around the outskirts of the small crowd. As he caught her eye, she made her way over, tip-toeing precariously so as to not accidentally step on any of Steven's friends.
"Hey White. What's up?" Steven said reassuringly to the obviously nervous Diamond.
"Well…" replied White, steeling herself enough to get her thoughts out: "How do you think it went? I know you said it went well, but I could tell you were just saying that to calm everyone down. Do you think I intimidated the humans? I hope I didn't make things worse fo-"
Steven cut her off by jumping onto his balcony and hugging her leg. "It went fine White. This is new to everyone. It's gonna take time. When they come to visit Homeworld over the next few weeks, just show them the same side of you that you show to Yellow and Blue."
"You really think that will work?" White replied, gazing down at him. Steven smiled back: "I know it will."
As White made her way into her ship, in visibly higher spirits, Steven headed into the house to get some dinner, feeling a bit more optimistic himself. After all, they'd all faced seemingly impossible tasks before, and they'd succeeded every time. If anyone could make this work, it was him and his friends…
Author's notes: Phew. It's good to take a little break from the politics to spend some time on Steven and the Gems, right? Just in case anyone was worried that the story was only going to focus on Dalton; it's not. It's going to switch between Steven/the Gems, and various human politicians etc. Hope you're enjoying it so far!