'Iwonder what's taking them so long ,' Pearl thinks to herself as she glances at the tall door to Pink Diamond's meeting room again. Meetings about colonisation usually took a while, but never as long as this. She'd been standing outside waiting for hours now. The fact that she wasn't allowed attend the meeting with Rose only made time pass even slower. Usually she'd be able to entertain herself by tuning in to whatever was being discussed at the meeting and give her own input. Internally of course. She wouldn't make the mistake of saying things out loud during a meeting ever again, even with Rose around.

But now all she had to listen to was the soft murmur coming from behind the pink crystal walls of the meeting room and the occasional sound of Pink Diamond's quartz guards shifting around. While quartzes were well above pearls, Pearl couldn't help but be thankful she didn't have their job. Most quartz guards just spent their days standing around if they weren't fighting in battle. Nowadays, there wasn't really a risk of rebels trying to assassinate one of the Diamonds. There wasn't anything they had to guard their Diamonds from . At least being a pearl offered some variety. And if you were lucky enough to be programmed right, you wouldn't have to deal with the feelings of worthlessness and shame that came with it. Maybe quartz guards were the same.

Eventually, after another few hours pass, the huge doors creak open. Pearl watches in awe as Pink Diamond herself, towering above her and the quartz guards, walks out, her pearl following behind her. She knew the Diamonds were big, but she never imagined that all the murals she saw were actually accurate in size. Pink Diamond's pearl only just barely reached her knees.

Pearl lowers her head when she sees the other pearl look at her with that same disapproving look all the other pearls used to give her. Was she that defective that someone could notice it at a glance? Or was it something to do with Rose?

Once she hears the footsteps of the quartz guards following their Diamond grow distant, she raises her head and peers around the open doors of the meeting room. She sees Rose sitting at the end of a long, pink crystal table that takes up most of the room, her head buried in her hands.

"Rose?" she calls, looking around before she cautiously steps into the room. The meeting room has the same walls as the rest of Pink Diamond's domain, polished pink crystal, though several murals of what look like battles are carved and painted into them. One side of the room is taken up by a window, overlooking what must be the only piece of land in Homeworld not taken up by a kindergarten or factory. From what Pearl can see, it's just a bare piece of land with some crystal statues and a wall surrounding it.

"Oh, hello Pearl!" Rose quickly looks up and sits up straight in her chair, smiling, "How long have you been there?"

"Not too long, just until after Pink Diamond left. I'm sorry if I disturbed you," Pearl says, flushing as she walks down the room towards Rose, "Is everything alright?"

"Well..." Rose frowns and picks up her screen, staring at it for a moment, "It's just... nothing. I'm fine! The meeting was just a bit draining. I'm sure you must be tired from waiting around."

"I'm okay. The meeting was just a lot longer than all the other ones you've been to," Pearl says, holding her hands out to take Rose's screen for her.

"Oh, don't worry about that! I'll carry it," Rose forces a smile and tucks her screen under her arm, "But if you wouldn't mind, could you carry that box for me? Thank you! Sorry about the wait though, usually meetings about things like this would be spread out over a few meetings, but with Pink Diamond you have to cram all of this into one. If we split the meetings up, this colony wouldn't even be considered until the next millennium."

Pearl snorts, "Do you know Pink Diamond well?"

"Yes, I was her head guard for almost 6 centuries," Rose says, closing the doors of the room behind her as they walk out into the crystal corridor again, "I fought alongside her in many wars, mostly defending her. She used to be an excellent warrior before she retired from fighting on the frontline."

"Did you retire too?"

"No, I was just promoted. I'm still involved in the military, partially, but not fighting. I'm not really the best on the battlefield sometimes," Rose laughs sadly, "I do miss it. It's certainly a lot more exciting than sitting around in meetings all day."

Pearl nods, though she had no idea what it was like to be on the battlefield. For a gem like Rose it would be exciting, but for a pearl, it sounded like a nightmare. She'd be broken within seconds. But she was surprised to hear that Rose wasn't "the best on the battlefield sometimes". Quartz gems were built to be great warriors, practically unbreakable, programmed to be loyal soldiers who only want to fight. "What makes you think you weren't the best on the battlefield... if you don't mind me asking, of course?"

Rose is quiet, but eventually answers, "I suppose it was just my attitude. I'm a lot more... compassionate and empathic than other quartz soldiers. I can't bare to see other gems suffer, especially my friends. Usually I'm able to contain myself, but sometimes I just couldn't help running to shield other gems or heal them when I should have been defending my- I mean, Pink Diamond."

"I see," Pearl says, looking at the murals of battles and colonies carved into the walls as they pass. Occasionally they pass a pillar with a stunning, intricately-detailed mural of Pink Diamond. The murals are decorated with broken gems and dusted with what looks like crushed pearl lustre-dust. It does make the murals look very beautiful, but it's unnerving. Is that what happened to all terminated gems?

"Now, as a medic I did need to get emotional so I could heal broken gems- seeing as it's my tears that heal. But some of the other things I did weren't 'appropriate'. I suppose I'm lucky Pink Diamond had such a soft spot for me or else I would have been terminated instead of being promoted," Rose sighs irritably and her smile fades. "Things certainly do change though," she says through gritted teeth.

Pearl doesn't ask any more questions about it. Rose doesn't usually get upset or annoyed, but when she does it's hard to ignore. She follows behind Rose down more and more corridors, passing countless murals and gigantic doors. There seemed to be lots of rooms in Pink Diamond's domain, but she wondered how many were actually used and by who. The place was clearly quite empty and devoid of life. It was so quiet that her and Rose's footsteps seemed to echo for miles.

"Wait," Rose says, stopping suddenly and staring at one of the bigger murals Pearl had seen with a small grin. It was another battle scene, with Pink Diamond in the centre surrounded by several quartz gems, but there was one that stood out. "That's me! The one in front of her."

Pearl steps closer to the mural and looks to where Rose is pointing. She's impossible to miss. Whoever carved the mural definitely paid close attention to her magnificent mane of hair and made sure to add detail to each individual curl. Instead of the pink-white dress with the diamond cut-out Pearl had always seen her in, the mural showed her dressed in the standard quartz warrior armour.

"Is that your weapon?" Pearl says in awe as she points to the gigantic sword Rose is holding in the mural.

"Oh no, the shield I'm holding is my weapon. Have I not shown it to you before?," Rose reaches out and touches the carving delicately, "But this is such a gorgeous mural! I wonder who worked on this one? It's hard to find ones like this these days, they're nowhere near as detailed. It's a shame really…"

"What gems usually created this like this?" Pearl asks, stepping back to get a good look at the whole mural. "And no, you've never shown me your weapon before."

"Oh? Remind me to show you when we get back then! I'm very proud of it. I'm surprised it wasn't the first thing I showed you!" Rose laughs and pats her gem gently, "I'll use any excuse to show it off. As for who made this, I assume it was a sodalite. Or maybe an iolite? They shut down the Creative Arts Court centuries ago and I can't really remember what gems used to be on it."

"I see… But I thought you can only summon your weapon in battle?"

"That's when you're supposed to do it. But there's nothing stopping me from doing it whenever I want," says Rose with a wink.

Pearl winks back and giggles.

"Anyway, we really do need to get going before we get kicked out," Rose adds teasingly, giving Pearl a serious look, before she laughs too, "I'm joking! Let's get going."

They both take one last look at the mural before they leave. The walk to the exit is long, but at least Rose is in a better mood than before, so she tells Pearl some more stories about the battles she and Pink Diamond fought together. Pearl had heard most of them before, but Rose never really went into detail about who she fought with. She especially never mentioned Pink Diamond before. The more Rose talks about battles and her shield the more excited Pearl gets about seeing it. She'd never seen a gem weapon being summoned before. She wasn't able to summon hers, if she had one of course. They were always thought that only warrior gems were allowed to have and summon their gem weapons. Pearls weren't made for fighting, so she couldn't see why they'd even bother letting them have weapons in the first place.

Rose seems excited about it too. "It's been decades since I last summoned my shield," she tells Pearl as they walk into her office and she shuts the door behind them. "There's just something about it that makes me feel so... alive! I think it's because it brings back memories of the excitement of being on the battlefield?"

"Maybe," Pearl says as she sets down Rose's thing on her desk. "Do you show it to many gems?"

"Anyone who's interested. It's hard to find gems who have the time to just sit down and talk about the wars and battles. Most are too young, but if they do remember, they aren't interested in talking about it," says Rose with a sigh. "The last time I summoned it was when me and a Smokey Quartz were talking about this battle I hadn't even fought in and she showed me her whip. She designed the base after some monument she saw on the planet. It was quite an interesting conversation."

"You can change how your weapon looks?"

"Yes! Though it takes a lot of practice. Here, let me show you mine now," Rose says, grinning as she positions her hand over her gem and closes her eyes. Her gem starts glow and within seconds a pink shield with a diamond in the centre materializes in her hand.

Pearl stares at the shield, her eyes wide.

"Mine is quite simple in terms of design," Rose holds her shield up proudly. "If I was fighting, I'd usually have whatever emblem we were using on it. When I first summoned it it wasn't even half the size it is now though."

"It's beautiful, Rose," Pearl whispers.

"Thank you! Would you like to hold it?"

"M-Me?" Pearl stammers. "Would I even be able to?!"

"Of course! Why wouldn't you?" Rose gives her an odd look, "Go ahead!"

Pearl stares at the shield for a moment, but then she takes it from Rose's hand very cautiously, letting it rest flat on her palms. It's cold and a lot heavier than it looks but there's something about it that feels so magical. She can't get her head around how it just... appeared . She knew it was basic gem magic, but it still confused her. "So… how do you summon it?" Pearl asks as she hand the shield back to Rose.

"There isn't an easy answer to that," says Rose as the shield fades away into nothing in her hands as fast as it came into existence. "Why don't we sit down and I'll try to explain it?"

Pearl nods and follows Rose over to her desk, leaning against it as Rose sits down beside her.

"Now, every gem has a different way of summoning theirs. The way they teach us is so rigid and it doesn't work for everyone, which is why most of us have to figure out by ourselves," Rose explains. "How did they teach you how to do it?"

Pearl blushes, "Well… they didn't. I am... just a pearl . Pearls can't summon weapons so they never even brought it up, let alone teach us about it."

"Pearls can't summon weapons?" Rose frowns and shakes her head, "That's what they're teaching you? Things haven't gotten worse than I thought..."

Pearl cocks her head to the side in confusion. Was Rose trying to imply they could ? "Sorry, but I don't understand… Why would a pearl need to summon a weapon?" she asks. "We're just servants or technicians, we're useless fighters. What's the point in giving us weapons if we can't even fight?"

"Don't," Rose whispers bitterly as she covers her face with her hands. Pearl flinches and wants to kick herself for talking too much or saying something wrong but before she can apologise, Rose looks up at her with tears in her eyes.

"Sorry," she says, wiping her eyes and laughing softly, "I told you I can get a bit too emotional. I just can't believe they're teaching you these… lies . They're making you believe all these awful things about yourself. Of course you can summon a weapon, Pearl. You could be the best warrior in an army if you wanted! I had no idea things changed this much..."

"I-I don't understand why I need to know how to summon my weapon though," Pearl says, looking at the floor, "I'm never going to fight in a battle. I'm always going to just be a pearl."

"But you're still a gem," says Rose firmly, looking Pearl in the eye, "Despite what they told you. You have every right to know about, and to be able to use all your gem abilities."

Pearl just nods in response.

"Only if you want to, of course," Rose adds, patting Pearl's hand gently. "Do you want to?"

"Yes, but it's just…" Pearl stares down at Rose's hand over hers and smiles weakly, "I'm not just a pearl, I'm also a… a defect. Even if a pearl cansummon her weapon, I probably can't. I can't really do anything right."

"Oh, Pearl…" Rose squeezes her hand gently, running her thumb over her knuckles. "You can try . It doesn't matter that you're…' defective'. That hasn't stopped you from being good at so many other things."

Pearl blushes and looks away again, "Thank you. I will try but I'm just not that confident."

"It's alright. I'll explain how I learned how to do it and you can try that, okay? Don't get too disappointed if it doesn't work out though. It's different for every gem."

"I understand," Pearl says, curling her hand into a fist once Rose takes hers away, missing the warmth.

"Alright," Rose turns her chair towards the large window behind her and points towards the sky. "The first planet I was sent to was somewhere over near the little moon. It was a strange planet, but it had water. We needed that water to bring back over here, but the planet was populated by organic life. It was a very small planet, so it was easy enough for us to conquer. The beings that were on it weren't developed at all so they were easily… defeated. Now, because the planet had water, it also had plant life. You've read about plants before, haven't you?"

Pearl nods. There wasn't that much written material about plant life in the archive system but Pearl had read everything she was able to find after Rose brought them up a few years ago. Plants intrigued her, even if she didn't really understand them.

"There was a gorgeous tree on the planet, near where I had to guard one of the lakes. It was very small though, it only came up to my knees. It had these beautiful white flowers on it that shed their petals when the wind blew and the petals would be blown all around the tree and slowly float to the ground. I remember just staying there for hours while I was on guard watching the petals fly around. They were so graceful and sometimes, they'd circle around each other like they were dancing."

"Like a fusion dance?" asks Pearl, trying to picture the scene in her head.

"I suppose, but they didn't dance for a particular reason. They just... were . I had just fought my first real battle and I was trying hard to summon my weapon so I'd be on par with the rest of our army. I was really struggling with it. Back then, they told us it would just come to us when we needed it to, but I couldn't figure out when that time would come," Rose pauses and sighs, "Eventually, all the flowers on the tree died, so there was nothing for me to watch while I was on guard duty. I hated being a guard and it was the only thing that helped me get through my shift without wanting to punch the jasper I had to work with in the face.

"I know, it probably sounds stupid. But there was something about organic life that just made me so… happy! It was so magical and different from what I was used to. However, most of the life on the planet was slowly dying as we took more and more of the water away. I was expecting that tree to die too, which made me quite sad. I knew I'd never get to see something as beautiful as that again, seeing as plant life is so rare.

"One day, I came on duty and it was in full bloom again, when it shouldn't have been at all! The whole planet was stripped of life and water, but there it was… alive and just as beautiful as before. I was so amazed and happy and for some reason, I noticed my gem starting to glow when I knelt beside it. I felt so light and airy and suddenly, this circular shape started to form from my gem!"

"Your shield?"asks Pearl. While it did seem odd to her that being happy about some tree helped Rose summon her weapon, it was so typical of Rose. It made Pearl smile. Though, she was a lot more interested in how these petals "danced". How could something that wasn't alive dance?

"That's right!" Rose says with a dreamy look on her face, "My very own gem weapon appeared right in front of me and I finally felt like I was an actual soldier. I wanted to run off and tell everyone, but I didn't want them to ask how I managed to summon it. 'A tree' didn't seem like a very exciting or quartz-like story, so I kept it to myself. No one noticed or asked any questions when I took it out on the battlefield, thankfully."

"So… when you want to summon your shield, you think about that tree?"

Rose laughs, "I did for a while! I know, it sounds pathetic, but it worked. Eventually, I figured out that it was thinking about things I loved and things that meant a lot to me that helped me summon it. Especially if that thing was in danger."

"I see," says Pearl, trying to make sense of it in her head. She tried to think about what she loved and what meant a lot to her. She liked space and history and she thought about them a lot, but her gem didn't glow when she did. She also thought about Rose a lot. Rose certainly meant a whole lot to her, but thinking about her didn't make her weapon appear either. It didn't make sense to her at all. "What did you think about when you summoned your shield a few minutes ago?"

"Oh, well, it's second nature to me now. At this point I can just will it into existence," Rose looks up at her and smiles, " But there are some things that mean a lot to me that I think about to help me out a bit. Certain gems, places, memories, it really depends."

"I'm sorry but... I don't qute understand," Pearl admits, blushing more and staring down at her feet. She knew she wouldn't be able to get it. Rose's explanation was so vague and abstract and she couldn't figure it out no matter how many times she thought about it.

"It's fine, Pearl," Rose assures her. "That's my own personal way of doing it. Like I said, we're all different. At least now you know you can summon your weapons so you can think about ways that might work for you!"

Pearl nods, "I definitely will… Is there anyway I could read more about it?"

"I assume there is! I can let you borrow my screen to look for some while I go upstairs to call Rhodochrosite. I was supposed to call her earlier but it completely slipped my mind until now. But do try and figure it out for yourself, okay?"

"I will," Pearl says as she steps away from Rose's desk and looks out at the night sky towards the planet Rose was pointing at. "Thank you, by the way."

"My pleasure! And don't be afraid to ask me about some of the other gem abilities they didn't teach you about, alright?" Rose adds as she walks towards the door, "My screen is on my desk. I'll be back within the hour, and if anyone comes looking for me I'm in Unakite's office!"

"Alright, thank you," says Pearl as she picks up Rose's screen. "See you in a while!"

Rose winks and waves at her and then leaves, closing the door behind her. Pearl smiles to herself and then types in the passcode to Rose's screen, leaning against the window. There weren't many articles in the archive system about weapon summoning, which did disappoint her a bit, but she could understand why. The articles she could find were just as vague as Rose's explanations and there seemed to be nothing that tried to make sense of the magic behind it or give a more straightforward explanation. It looked like she'd just have to come up with her own way, which only discouraged her more.

She was a pearl . A defective one, no less. She couldn't think up things like this on her own. She needed someone to tell her what to do and exactly how to do it. Maybe that's why they didn't bother teaching them about it? Why would they bother teaching something that was personal and unique to each gem to pearls? She just couldn't understand why Rose had so much faith in her.