Author's Note: I dedicate this chapter to aloe vera, and the many, many burns it has soothed. Also, to my high school philosophy classes on determinism vs. Cartesian dualism.

oOoOoOo

Lesson Three: Keep Moving Forward

It took longer than perhaps necessary to gather what was left of the ferret monster's collection, for a number of reasons. Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl were finally able to get a better hang of walking with their human bodies, but they were still prone to losing their balance every time they needed to bend down to pick something up. This caused a rather lot of flailing and kicking of sand, especially since they were rarely patient enough to wait for Steven or one of the others to come and help them back up to their feet.

The Cool Kids, meanwhile, generally seemed to be far more comfortable with the situation they had been thrust into- but that didn't mean they were okay with it. At one point during the clean-up, Buck seemed to be overcome with the sheer magnitude of the situation; his frustration with the weirdness of it all overflowed, causing him to stomp down in anger. He hadn't counted on his super-strength, and put so much force into the stomp that he ended up with his entire right submerged in sand, nearly up to his hip. While Garnet herself would have reacted quite calmly to such a situation, realizing that the same strength that got her into it could easily be used to get her back out, Buck had been too shocked and surprised to move, and so had needed his two ex-human friends to pull him out. After that incident, the clean-up had become distracted by the teenagers wanting to try out there new supernatural strength in other ways.

"Like, can I lift a car?" wondered Sour Cream.

"Well, not my car," Jenny protested, seeing her friend gazing in the direction of her van. "But I wonder what would happen if I punched the cliff."

She curled her fist experimentally.

"Do it," Amethyst urged.

Garnet eyed the cliff. It was craggy, and did not look particularly stable. "You'd probably make rocks fall. We all could be trapped beneath them."

"You'd definitely make the rocks fall," said Buck. He sounded so completely sure- sure, and scared, and disquieted- that Jenny let the matter drop immediately. (Buck didn't ay anything else, but Steven had still watched his friend worriedly, suspicious of the third eye hidden behind the visor he now wore).

After that, they had all continued with the collection with a renewed sense of focus. The only other thing in the way of distracting incidents was Pearl discovering the pocket's of Sour Cream's pants for the first time, and swiftly falling in love. ("They're so much more efficient than just using hands!" she'd exclaimed while stuffing the pockets with every single item she was carrying). Pearl still wasn't over it by the time the group had finished combing the beach, and was instead busy filled up the trunk of the Pizza fan van with the spoils of their search.

"We get it, P.," Amethyst eventually moaned.

"I don't think you do, Amethyst. They are just so convenient," she said, pulling out a sea-shell, an old-fashioned fountain pen, and an entire drinking thermos from a single pocket. "Next time I reform, I'm definitely coming back with pockets."

"...You can just store stuff in your gem, y'know."

"I do know. But it's the principle of the thing."

The teenagers all exchanged glances. The Gems often said bizarre things off-handedly like that, but in their previous, limited interactions with the aliens, the teens had just found it easier just not to question it all. Now that that they were actually using the Gems' bodies, however, those weird comments suddenly seemed a lot more important.

Before any of the teens could ask anything, however, Steven beat them to it- though his question was about far more mundane matters. "So...are we all taking the car?"

"I think that's for the best," answered Garnet, shutting the van's trunk with a loud thunk. Nobody was inclined to disagree with her. It was too far from Beach City for ordinary humans to walk, and none of the teens felt like running, even with their increased speed. It was going to be a tight fit with all seven of them, but they would be able to manage.

"Besides, I'm not leaving you guys alone with my car," Jenny said. "No offence."

"None taken," said Steven cheerfully.

"You mean your family's car," Buck pointed out.

The girl shrugged. "Whatever."

The fact still remained, however, that the car didn't actually belong to Jenny, but to Fish Stew Pizza as a whole. A good portion of the restaurant's delivery service relied on it, so they really couldn't risk damaging it. This complicated the question of who should be allowed to drive the vehicle. Jenny was usually the de facto driver, but there was currently too much of a chance of her accidentally pulling the steering wheel off, or taking the idea of 'flooring it' to a whole new extreme. The same new-found super-strength also ruled out the rest of the Cool Kids. Amethyst was eager to volunteer, on the basis that she did have Jenny's body, but she was forced to admit that while she could drive, she didn't know most of the nuances (such as 'speed limits', or 'separate lanes'). So the reckless warrior was vetoed, and Pearl instead was given the job. She had a valid driver's licence which matched her current face, reasonable control of her human muscles, and even knew how to signal.

"I don't know..." protested Pearl, even as she slid into the driver's seat. She looked immensely uncomfortable, even in comparison to the baseline expression of discomfort she'd been wearing all afternoon.

"Come on," Steven said encouragingly. "You're a great driver!"

She blushed pink under the praise, but didn't seem particularly comforted. "Under normal conditions, perhaps. But right now I'm rather-distracted."

"That's still better than the rest of us," Garnet said, as she opened one of the car's back doors and took a seat.

"You'll be fine," Sour Cream assured her, shooting a thumbs-up.

Pearl's lips were pressed together into a thin line. "But..." she began, her throat catching slightly. She forced through it. "It's just- this body is sopainful.

"And I've been trying to ignore it," the alien warrior continued. "I really have! Been trying to distract myself with a million other little things! But the pain is continuous, and it just won't stop! It is just so distracting! I don't know how I can focus on driving like this- I don't know how humans can focus on anything!"

Her outburst was met with slow, puzzled blinking from her companions. None of them- even the other newly humanized Gems- had found human bodies unusually painful to live in. Steven was the first one to put it together. "Oh!" he said. "You're burned!"

"Ooooh, yeah," Sour Cream said, his eyes widening in realization as he focused on the now pinkish-red of his/Pearl's exposed skin. With everything else going on, it had been easily overlooked. "I burn super easily. Sorry about that."

"Yeah, that looks pretty painful," commented Buck as he slid into a back-seat besides Garnet.

"So...this pain isn't normal?" asked Pearl, relief in her voice. She had always known that humans, with their weaker bodies and inability to regenerate after serious injury, felt pain more commonly and more acutely than Gems did, but she had been horrified by the thought of such true discomfort being a constant for them.

"Nope," Jenny assured her. "In fact, I think I have something to help with that."

Jenny had taken the shot-gun seat, on the principle that if Pearl turned out to be a terrible driver after all, she'd at least have the chance to take the wheel. Now she opened the seat's glove compartment, digging around in it for about thirty seconds before pulling a decently sized bottle filled with a strange green substance. "Aloe vera," Jenny pronounced proudly, passing the bottle to Pearl.

Or attempting to. Pearl merely eyes the bottle dubiously. "What is it?"

"Aloe vera gel," Jenny repeated. "Works absolute wonders on burns. We keep it on hand in case of hot-cheese related accidents."

Pearl tentatively took the bottle, then held it upside down and squeezed it. She shuddered as a cold dollop of the green, viscous goo landed on her open palm. Amethyst's eyes lit up at the sight. "That stuff looks so weird," she said with delight, standing up from her own seat in the back.

"Does it work?" Pearl asked, the skepticism in her voice fueled by thousands of years watching humans muck around ineffectively with skull-drills and leaches, all while calling the practice medicine.

"I swear by it," Jenny said seriously.

Pearl was not really reassured by the teenaged girl's words, but she was desperate, and so spread the aloe vera gel over Sour Cream's hands, face, and neck- everywhere which had been exposed to the magical blast. To her immense surprise and relief, it actually helped. A lot. It felt as though the pain was melting away, leaving only a refreshing coolness in it's wake.

"Well," she said, giving a small sigh of relief.

"Told you," Jenny said, smugly. She took back the bottle.

"Wait," Steven said, before the girl could put the aloe vera away again. With no more room in the car, he was sitting in Garnet's (or rather, Buck's) lap. "Garnet and Amethyst are also kind of burned. They should have some too!"

Everyone waited as the rest of the humanized-Gems took the time to slather the aloe gel over their skin (Amethyst taking particular joy out of the process). Neither of their bodies had been burned particularly badly, and so they'd hardly noticed any real discomfort, but were still surprised by how nice the cream still felt on their skin.

"The fact that I burn so easily is just another reason I shouldn't be a fisher-man," Sour Cream said, partly to fill the awkward silence.

"Not now," Buck said, slumping down in the seat besides him. Usually he was perfectly content to listen to his friend vent about his strange step-dad, but right no, he was tired. They all were. None of them were in the mood to talk about stuff like that.

Or anything, really. Once Garnet and Amethyst finished, the aloe vera put was away, and Pearl started up the car; nobody volunteered any more topics of conversation. By the time the car had left the beach and began towards the highway, everyone appeared to be lost in thought, staring blankly at the landscape rolling past.

From his place in Garnet's lap, Steven also watched the fields of corns go by, but without much interest. He couldn't ignore how- odd this all felt. (And he didn't just mean how strangely small Garnet's lap was now.)

He'd seen some weird stuff before. A lot of weird stuff, actually. Body switching was still near the top of his list. But what was weird about this situation was how...strained, it all felt. It felt like there was so much discomfort, lurking just underneath the surface, but nobody was willing to show or acknowledge it.

That was Garnet, right then. She seemed as calm as usual, but there was a real tenseness to her. Garnet often could be a rock (metaphorically, at the moment), but right now she was so stiff that it almost felt like it, too.

"Garnet," he eventually asked in a soft voice, when he couldn't hold the question back any longer. "Are you...okay?"

She glanced down at him. "Yes."

"Oh. Good."

She looked at his knees, where Garnet had rested her new pair of hands. They were both pulled into tight fists, their knuckles having almost turned white. He reached out and grabbed one- Garnet let him take it, and let him gently pull her fingers open. He looked down at the hand curiously. It was softer than Garnet's, and smaller, and less pink. And in the centre of it's palm, there was only skin.

"What about Ruby and Sapphire?" he asked.

"They're fine, Steven." She lightly pulled her hand out of his grip, and laid it onto her own knee. "I'm fine."

He knew not to push it any farther, so he nodded. He settled back down, allowing himself just one more glance at his friends' hands. Garnet would know best about these kinds of things. While Steven understood the essence of fusion- that Garnet was Ruby and Sapphire, or their love for each other- he still didn't totally get it. But if Garnet said she was fine, then her component parts had to be, too. Even if their actual gems were in another body.

He was... having trouble wrapping his mind around that, too, actually. Gems were gems, he'd been told; those stone were literally the core of who they were. So how was it even possible that the Gems could even be separated from their gems?

Same thing went for his human friends, come to think of it. Connie had explained to him once about the brain, and how it was the source of all human thought. "Or most of it, at least," she'd said, after she'd finished telling him all about neurons and electrical impulses. "The brain itself isalso influenced from chemicals like hormones that are made in other parts of the body, as well."

So it made just as much sense that Jenny, Buck and Sour Cream could be separated from their brains, as it did for Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl to be separated from their gems. Unless...maybe there was some other, extra part of a person, which made them them, that wasn't tied to brains or gems or whatever. Like familiars, from the Spirit Morph Saga, but invisible, and not shaped like animals. Maybe it was that part of him which had let Steven reach out to Lapis Lazuli in his dreams. Maybe that was the 'light at the core of your being', that Garnet talked about when describing fusion.

Steven closed his eyes, out of exhaustion and confusion. He didn't know. This was the kind of thing he usually asked somebody else about. He wasn't good at thinking about stuff like this.

And it had been a long day. It wasn't that late- the sun was only just beginning to set- but after everything that had happened, he was still tired. Surely it wouldn't hurt to just take a little rest?

Lulled by the comfortable, steady movement of the pizza van, the boy slowly drifted into sleep. Garnet shifted her position slightly, in order to steady his sagging body. Then she returned to her own thoughts, just like everyone else.

The drive back to Beach City took almost an hour. They managed to get there without any accidents, despite Pearl's mind occasionally drifting to matters besides the road in front of her; it was a good thing that the highway had been practically empty. As they neared the board-walk a whispered debate broke out about where they should go now.

"To the Temple," Pearl said simply, before any real arguments could take root. Not that there was much chance of it, in all honesty. The teenagers' had figured that maybe they should all head back to their homes...but none of them were really sure how to even bring up the subject of their recent body-switching to their families, and were hopeful that whatever the mysterious magical temple contained would make such explanations unnecessary.

There was therefore no protests when Pearl turned off the main road, headed past the Big Donut, and rolled down onto the beach below. The car came to a stop at the bottom of the hill which lead up to Steven's house and the crumbling Temple above.

Everyone unbuckled seat-belts, got out of the car, stretched, and began heading up...except for two.

"Uh, Garnet?" Amethyst asked, noticing her missing friends. "You coming?"

"Yes," Garnet replied. She was still holding the sleeping Steven in her lap. She slid her feet out of the open car door, planting them firmly in the sand, but made no move to stand up.

"...so?" Amethyst prompted.

Garnet did not get embarrassed. She did not. Which was why her face remained perfectly blank, and her voice completely neutral, when she said; "Steven is rather heavy."

An unreadable expression flashed across Amethyst's face. "Oh."

By then, the others had also noticed the back-up, and had returned to see what was going on. Maybe they had all overheard the exchange, or maybe Sour Cream had just managed to put the pieces together, because he said, "Here, let me take him."

Garnet looked once between the teenager inhabiting Pearl's body, and the young child sleeping peacefully in her arms and said, "Okay."

Pearl herself was not all that pleased with the arrangement. "Wait!" she hissed, arms flailing with fear. "Be careful! You don't know your own strength, and he's very delicate!"

The DJ looked at her. His expression was as deadpan as usual, but there was somehow something more serious to it than usual. "I know," he said. "I have a baby brother. I'll be careful."

Pearl bit her human lip, then nodded.

Garnet shifted and helped the teenager take the sleeping child into his arms. Sour Cream picked him up with exceeding carefulness, as if acutely aware of just how strong he now was. Still, as he clutched Steven to his chest, his eyes widened. He was still surprised by just how light the boy felt.

Living with the Gems, Steven had become able to sleep through most minor disasters, however loud and/or explosive, as long as he was sleepy enough. It wasn't surprising then, that even with all the excitement, that he didn't stir once from his sleep once throughout the transfer. Sour Cream backed away, and with a small shrug, Garnet finally stood, shut the van door behind her, and began leading the group up the hill.

"Neat digs," Buck said, once they'd made it up and entered into the house proper through the screen door. The Cool Kids had never actually been inside their friend's home before. It was, overall, a nice place- almost surprisingly mundane, all things considering.

"This is just Steven's room," Amethyst said, while Sour Cream began to carry the boy in question up the stairs to his bed. "The real Temple is in there-" she pointed to the magical door at the other side of the house. A hint of boastfulness entered her voice. "It exists in another dimension."

Buck nodded. "Cool."

"No, that's cool!" Jenny exclaimed, when she noticed the mass of green wires and wreckage across the living room floor and attached the warp pad through complicated circuitry. She bent down to inspect it, her eyes alight. "This is that weird space pod thing, right?"

"Don't touch it!" Pearl ordered.

The girl's hands flew up. "I wasn't!"

Pearl looked skeptical, but Jenny was being honest. She'd remembered how the crashed space-pod had started firing death lasers everywhere, and was in no rush to repeat the experience.

Having deposited the sleeping boy on his bed, Sour Cream made his way back down the stairs and came to stand next to his friends. He crossed his arms, apparently for a lack of anywhere else to put them. "So," he asked. "What now?"

"We need to get inside the Temple," Pearl explained. "If I'm to find the necessary equipment to reverse the reaction, that's where it will be."

"Great," Jenny said. She strode confidently towards the door indicated. She pressed against it with both hands. When nothing happened, she pressed against it harder. Yet, even with her increased strength, the door remained as immovable as any mountain normally would. She eyed the closed portal critically, then looked at the Crystal Gems. "Um. How?"

Amethyst appeared as thought she was just barely suppressing a smirk. "It ain't like that," she said. "You gotta use your gem."

"Is this the same thing as summoning those weapons?" asked Buck.

"Not exactly," Garnet said. "But similar. The Temple has been imbued with the very power and essence of our gems. You must focus on that essence, connect with it, to be granted entry."

Throughout her short speech, each of the Cool Kids had begun looking at the gemstones they now bore, as if willing them to activate. They all remained stubbornly dim.

"Look," Amethyst said, coming to stand besides the bearer of her Gem, hand on hip. "It's easy. You just gotta feel it, y'know?"

"No."

"That's easy for you to say," Sour Cream complained. "But none of us were born to this Gem stuff."

"Well, neither was I," Amethyst shot back.

Pearl put a reassuring hand on her friend's shoulder (briefly reflecting how odd it was to be nearly the same height). "It's alright," she told Sour Cream. "I understand. Mastering your gemstone can require a great deal of training, dedication, and time-"

"-the latter of which we don't have," interrupted Garnet. "Our time is limited. Malachite is still at the bottom of the ocean, a time bomb waiting to go off. Peridot is on the loose, trying to find a way to contact Homeworld and signal for reinforcements. We need our bodies back, as soon as possible.

"The Temple is our home," Garnet continued, turning to the door bearing the star insignia, determination etched into her face. "And we will find a way into it."

"So, you got any ideas then?" asked Buck, realizing that determination probably wasn't going to be enough.

"Yes," she replied. "But you will have to listen to us."

All three of the teenagers nodded.

"Whatever it takes, man," said Buck.

"Yeah," agreed Jenny. "I've got my own stuff to deal with. We all do."

With that agreed upon, they all broke away into pairs, each person with their body-swapped partner. The plan was to give a training session that would provide a way for each of the new Gems to access their powers. Buck and Garnet went to sit cross-legged on the couch and begin something akin to meditation. Pearl got some tea-leaves out of a cupboard, and let them fall to the floor, while giving a poetic soliloquy/ballet performance to Sour Cream. Amethyst, meanwhile, lead Jenny through an explanation that involved a lot of intense hand-punching.

But time wore on, and no progress was made. There wasn't a single glimmer of light in any of the gemstones. Frustration built, and tempers began to flare. Steven eventually awoke when Sour Cream began shouting; "-but I don't see what the dancing has to do with ANYTHING!"

The boy sat up on his bed, trying to rub sleep and confusion out of his eyes. He wasn't in the car anymore, and it had grown dark outside. Quietly, he slipped to the floor and crawled over to the ledge overlooking the living area below. He was momentarily confused as to why 'Amethyst' was growling angrily at the Temple door, and why 'Pearl' was sitting on the kitchen counter, glaring at 'Sour Cream', who was giving some passionate speech about "dance being central to the essence of all Gem-kind". Then the events of the last day caught up with him, and he winced.

They were trying to get into the Temple, Steven immediately realized. Trying, but clearly not succeeding. And that was a problem. If the Cool Kids couldn't find a way to activate their Gems, then they couldn't get access to the Temple, and they could be stuck like that forever.

Then, Steven blinked, a new thought striking him. Who said that the Cool Kids were the ones who had to get into the Temple? After all, they weren't the only ones with gems.

He pulled up his rumpled t-shirt, and looked down at the pink stone sitting in the place of his belly button. Admittedly, he'd only ever gotten into his Mom's room twice before, both times by accident. But in fairness, he'd also never really tried to get in.

So Steven closed his eyes, and tried to summon that same feeling he got whenever he pulled up his bubble or shield. He tried to reach his mind out to the massive, looming power of the Temple, and thought; 'Hello, room? It's me, Steven. I'd like to come in, please.'

He knew it had worked when he heard the chorus of surprised gasps from below.

Hastily, the boy pulled his t-shirt back over his still-glowing gem, and half-ran down the stairs. He smiled sheepishly at the audience that was now staring at him, and waved an arm towards the cloud-filled portal and said, "Well. Uh. Shall we?"