Missing Peace: Chapter 12
Crystal Gem Temple, the next morning:
Dalton clambered out of bed. After yesterday's events, everyone had agreed they needed a rest, so he and Azarov had stayed the night with the Crystal Gems, in a room that had somehow conjured a couple of spare beds into existence. Not exactly how he was used to spending diplomatic visits, but then, it seemed nothing involving Gems was going to be what he was used to.
He hadn't been planning to be there overnight; the riot the previous day had somewhat lengthened his trip, so he'd had to sleep in his suit. Rubbing his eyes, he headed to the bathroom to freshen up. He passed Azarov as he went, who gave him a brief nod. Apparently Dalton's speech the previous day had earned at least a grudging respect from the man. Whether that was because he agreed with the sentiment or because he respected Dalton's ability to play the crowd wasn't clear, but it was a start.
Closing the bathroom door, Dalton plodded over to the mirror and stared himself in the face. Overnight the reality of what he'd done had begun to hit him. His speech had certainly cooled the situation in the short term, but now there were going to be a lot of international leaders wanting to know why he'd been meeting with the Gems without consulting them. Beach City was American territory, so he was well within his rights, but it certainly didn't make him look good.
Not to mention how the public might react. It wasn't yet certain where the public mood sat regarding the Gems. People tended to get antsy after events like Rose Quartz's transmission. Dalton knew full well that he may have cost himself the next election, but that wasn't bothering him as much as he'd thought it would. His position felt pretty insignificant compared to the galactic scale of politics he was now dealing in.
Splashing some water on his face, he felt the beginnings of wrinkles around his eyes. "Yep." He said to himself. "This is definitely gonna make me go grey."
Steven walked downstairs just as he had done the previous morning. Today though, he was decidedly on edge. After all, what was to say that Rose wouldn't decide to make another 'statement'? His heart lifted a little when he noticed the morning's visitors. Today it was Nephrite and her crew.
There were eight of them in total, so the place was a bit packed. They were scattered all around the house; some chatting to Garnet, Amethyst or Pearl; some fiddling with random household appliances. Two of them were sat on the sofa, cuddling each other lovingly. They'd embraced each other in the pool after they were cured of corruption, and had barely taken their hands off each other since.
'His' Nephrite was sat at the kitchen counter. Steven still struggled to call her by her name, but he didn't want to call her 'Centi' in case it reminded her of her corrupted form. Her face lit up as she saw him, and she gave him a wave. Smiling back, he wandered over to her.
"Hey Nephrite! How're you doing?"
"Oh, I'm doing great." The one-eyed Gem replied. "The others and I were worried sick yesterday, but we feel much better now those awful humans are gone."
Truthfully, Steven was much happier with the angry mob gone too, but he didn't really like how she was talking.
"Hey now, I wouldn't go so far as awful." He said, trying to calm her down. "Those people were just acting that way because they were scared."
Nephrite didn't look convinced. "And is being scared a good enough reason to drag Gems out into the street and attack them? If my crew and I hadn't been back at our ship, they probably would have done it to us too!" She exclaimed, looking off into the distance, clearly scaring herself with her own mental image.
"Humans are usually better than that." Said Steven. "Everyone can do bad things when they're scared or angry. That's basically the whole reason the Gem War happened."
"Oh Steven, of course you'd say that, you're…" Nephrite stopped mid-sentence, perhaps reconsidering what she wanted to say.
"I'm what?" Steven asked, now getting confused.
"Well… y'know… half human." Said Nephrite sheepishly. "You were always going to be soft on them, you grew up around them. You wouldn't know any better".
Now Steven was starting to get annoyed. "Hey. I'm not being soft on the humans. I'm half Gem too y'know. Am I wrong when I tell them that you guys aren't as bad as they think?"
"That's different. You know me, and the other bubbled Gems. You don't know a bunch of random humans. You can't promise me they aren't violent".
Steven was struggling to keep his composure now. "Maybe not, but you can't just believe somebody's bad just because of what they are! I may be half Gem, but I grew up on Earth. Am I bad just because of that?!"
"Of course you're not bad Steven." Nephrite said defensively. "You're not like most humans. You're one of th-"
"One of the good ones." Steven finished her sentence for her. He couldn't hide the anger from his face, and felt tears beginning to form in his eyes.
Nephrite opened her mouth to speak again, but stopped short, having no idea what to say next. She felt bad for how she'd made him feel, but she couldn't think of anything meaningful to say. Finally she mumbled "I'm sorry, I…I'll just head home for now."
Nephrite walked quickly out of the house, some of her crew looking on in surprise. Steven didn't try to stop her. He wasn't sure he could talk to her right now anyway.
Besides, he had other things he needed to focus on. Looking out of the window, he saw White emerging from her Ship, and knew that Dalton and Azarov would be ready soon too. It was almost time for their meeting to come up with a plan for dealing with the Facet 31 situation. If they were going to get anything done, they needed his full attention.
Wiping the tears from his eyes, he composed himself, and headed out to meet White. It was time to get to work…