"Look Daddy, look!" Connie giggled, skipping from the hotel's bathroom with her hair up in a bun with one of her rainbow hair clips adorning its side.

"Wow, such a pretty girl." Doug praised, scooping her up and twirling her around. He stopped when his wife stepped out, her own thick hair bundled a top her head. "Whoa, two beautiful ladies? I must be the luckiest man on the planet."

Priyanka rolled her eyes and chuckled softly, letting her husband wrap his arm around her waist and twirl her too.

"May I ask where you two lovely ladies are heading?" Doug asked, bouncing Connie in his arms, as she patted his scruff.

"To the beach, Connie made a new friend." Prinyanka said, double-checking her bag to make sure everything was there.

"Oh really?" Doug asked Connie, helping her stuff some of her detective things into her little knapsack. "What's her name?"

"His name is Steven and he's younger than me." Connie explained, face scrunched up in concentration. "Yesterday his pants fell down and I had to help him cause he couldn't get them up by himself."

"A boy?" Doug growled, protective instincts activating. "Y-you've never had any…any friends who were…boys before. I thought you said boys were icky."

"They are, but Steven's a baby boy so he's okay." Connie shrugged. It was true though most boy were pretty icky. They pulled her hair, made fun of her and called her a nerd, and chased her around the playground without her permission.

But Steven wasn't like that - sure he was clumsy and liked petting the sparkly tutu of her bathing suit when he thought she wasn't looking, but he wasn't a meanie face. He did as she asked, taking her directions well and seemed to like that she spouted out numerous facts. He asked her all types of questions and she really liked being able to answer them.

None of the kids at school really liked when she spouted impromptu facts – they more than often called her a 'know-it-all' or a 'nerdy baby face'. Even though her mother told her that in truth 'nerds' ruled the world, it still didn't feel very good when they called her it. She had expected Steven to eventually tire of it, but

"W-well you just tell Daddy if he's bothering you okay?" Doug asked, sitting Connie on his knee. "If he does something you don't like, Daddy will come and make him stop."

"Okay, Daddy! Let go, you're gonna mess up my pretty hair." Connie pouted, jumping down from his knee to go check her hair in the mirror.

"She likes boys now? I-I thought I had a few more years." Doug groaned, collapsing onto the bed face first.

"Doug, you're overreacting. She's three and Steven is still in diapers." Prinyanka rolled her eyes, patting her husband's disparaged back.

"Soon she's gonna want to date them and them maybe even marry one!" Doug moaned, sitting up with watery eyes. "Honey make her a baby again."

"Even if that was medically possible, I wouldn't. Unless you liked all the diapers, midnight feedings and acid reflux?"

"If it meant she stayed Daddy's princess-detective-doctor/president, then yes. Yes I would."

…

Connie shuffled her sparkly red sunglasses over her prescription glasses with a flare of her wrist. Detectives wore sunglasses on TV, so Connie had brought two pairs for her and Steven. They would need them to look cool and official.

Connie peeked out the window, watching the pink-tinted world stream by. As they pulled into public parking, she spotted Steven and his moms.

"Look Mom! They're already here." Connie wiggled restlessly in her car seat, resisting the urge to yell.

"Yes, I can see." Priyanka said, parking and turning back to Connie. "Why don't you go meet them while I set up our stuff? Be careful though."

"Yes ma'am." Connie squealed, unbuckling herself and squirming down onto the hot asphalt. She heaved her knapsack, which was heavy with all her detective things, onto her back before racing to meet Steven (after looking left and right and left again for cars of course.)

"Hello Connie." Pearl greeted her, holding a wiggly Steven in her slender arms.

"Hi, Miss Pearl." Connie said politely, remembering her manners.

"Oh, what a sweet darling." Pearl smiled, setting Steven down.

"Connie!" Steven yelled, stomping his feet excitedly. "'uggy? 'uggy?"

"What does he want?" Connie asked, setting her knapsack down.

"It's 'hug' dude." Amethyst said. "Hug. Come on you can say it hug?"

"Oh, you want a hug? Well ok-." Connie couldn't even get the 'okay' out before Steven had once again, clumsily tackled her. He giggled happily, nuzzling their cheeks together in glee, while chanting her name.

"Oh, not again!" Pearl tittered, lifting them both up easily. "Steven be careful. She's not Garnet, she can't take the full power of your hugs."

"Tven hug master." Steven explained to Connie, a big grin on his face as he danced. "Tective? Tective?"

"It's DEtective." Connie enunciated. "We're going to play detective."

"Tective!" Steven shouted, jumping up and down.

"So you're going to play detective today?" Pearl asked, watching as Connie dragged her knapsack close. Amethyst and Steven squatted next to her, watching curiously as she began to pull out all of her detective toys.

"My Daddy and I watch Sherlock movies together and I read all the books too. So I have these hats, they're called thinking caps. Then these magnifying glasses, these cloaks so that we look cool, this is my mystery kit and here's some notebooks to write about the clues we find." Connie explained, handing Steven a magnifying glass to his great joy.

"So what are you guys looking for?" Amethyst asked, adorning a thinking cap herself.

"Nothing really right now." Connie shrugged, eyes lowered. "I gotta train Steven since he hasn't read any of the books or seen the movies."

"Well, you two have fun." Pearl said, watching Steven with a quaint smile. "We'll be at our umbrella. Looks like your mother is going to be right over there, near us."

Connie waved at her mom before turning back to Steven to help put his sunglasses on. Steven excitedly showed Amethyst and Pearl his new sunglasses before yelling 'bye-bye' until they got the message and left to join Garnet under their pink umbrella.

"Okay Steven. We gotta start your training so that we can go look for your mom and my mystery lady." Connie whispered.

"Taining? Li…potty taining?" Steven asked, trying to put the hat on his head, despite his curls vehement resistance.

"Uh…kind of I guess. It's hard work." Connie said, tying his swim shorts when she noticed them slipping down.

"Tven gonna learn how go potty soon." Steven mumbled proudly, his little chest puffing out. "Tven big boy, no mo diapie."

"Well I wish you the best of luck." Connie said. "My mom potty trained me at seven months so I don't really remember much about it."

Steven jaw dropped, revealing the missing gap of a tooth or two. "When you was a baby baby?"

"Yes, when I was an infant." Connie shrugged, pulling out her notebooks and writing her name and then Steven's on the other. "I still have to wear them at night though."

Apparently that didn't lessen the impact for Steven because his eyes were practically glowing with admiration.

"Uh…here this is yours. Can…you write?" Connie asked, handing Steven his notebook with his pen. She got her answer when he stuck the pen in his mouth and held the journal upside down. "Well, I guess I'll just write for the both of us."

"Tven draw picture." Steven explained. "Work too?"

"Hmm…yeah that would work too." Connie hummed.

And so, the detective training began!

Steven despite his lack of formal training and his inability to keep his trunks up, was an excellent detective. Four out of five of the exercises she had created, Steven easily solved. He could follow footprints, track down missing toys (hidden safely behind Garnet), he could chase down fleeing criminals (Amethyst) and he was even pretty good at drawing - able to sketch Pearl's footprints from one of the made-up crime scenes.

"With my deduction skills and your tracking abilities – there's no way we can't find anything." Connie panted, slurping down the durian juice Pearl had provided as quickly as she could.

"Un'." Steven grunted, already finished with his juice and onto half of Connie's sandwich. Pearl made giant sandwiches, which Connie had no hope in the world of finishing, but Steven easily devoured his and now part of hers.

"Steven!" Pearl scolded, tugging at the sandwich hanging out of Steven's mouth. "That's Connie's sandwich!"

"That's okay, Miss Pearl. He can have it, he worked really hard." Connie muttered, watching in awe as Steven wolfed down the rest without either of his hands, nipping at the tips of Pearl's fingers.

"I saw!" Pearl practically gleamed with pride, wiping her hand on her shorts after gently pinching Steven's cheek. "You two running around so happily with your little magnifying glasses and cases. How did we do? I thought Amethyst looked wonderful in your little jail."

"Tven catch her." Steven hiccupped, staring hungrily now at the orange Garnet was peeling for them. He crawled over to her, resting on her foot and opening his mouth wide. Garnet chuckled, popping in an orange slice and then handing one to Connie.

"Thank you and you guys did great." Connie praised. "Usually my Mom's too busy to play with me or she forgets her role."

"Hey uh, you gonna eat that plastic bag?" Amethyst asked, her fluffy hair soft against Connie's side.

"Um…no…do you want it?"

"Yeah man! Give it here!" Amethyst munched on the plastic happily. "I was pretty awesome. Gotta say though, didn't expect Steven to find me so fast. When we play hide an' go seek it takes him foreeeeevvvver."

"Yes well, Steven's still young and with proper training he's now become sufficient." Pearl sang, petting Steven's hair as he climbed into Garnet's arms in order to get more orange slices. Nibbling on the tips of her fingers when the slices didn't come fast enough.

Yes, Connie thought. Very suf…suffe…sufic…good. The sun was already too low in the sky for them to go out and explore, but tomorrow the world would be theirs.

A/N: When Steven turns out to be the older one. Whelp, if all fanfiction followed canon we would be devoid of fanfics.

Hopefully we'll get some episodes or at least an update on episodes, cause I need episodes! Hiatuses suck, but hopefully when Spring Break starts I can fill the void with baby Steven and with all the fanfics I've been neglecting.

Thank you so much for your favorites, follows, and especially to those who took the time to leave a review.