A/N: So apparently turning the fluff train into a fluff train wreck had some casualties. For all of you readers who lost your corporeal forms last chapter, I do apologize. This chapter shouldn't be as hard on your tender, exposed souls. (I've been working on that pun all morning. I'm sorry, I just had to do it XD)

In other news, I've found that Ruby is a character for whom my vocabulary explodes. I couldn't tell you why, but whenever she starts talking-especially monologuing, as she's done recently-I find myself using words I didn't even know I knew. Then I double check them, and it's actually right, but when the hell did I even learn it? The oddities of being a writer...

AND OH DEAR LORD SPATIALHEATHER DREW APATITE THIS TIME LOOKIT LOOKIT GO THIS CHAPTER WILL STILL BE HERE WHEN YOU COME BACK (theladyforester [PERIOD] tumblr [DOTCOM] /search/ united+I+stand+fanart).

"There you are!" exclaims Apatite, rushing to meet Ruby and Sapphire as the door to the rec center clangs shut behind them. Her navy blue skin is a few shades paler than usual, and her dark eyes are bright with hysteria. "Where have you two been? We have—"

"Apatite, why are you so uptight?" says the olive green gem as she tromps into the facility behind Ruby. Her skin is streaked with darker green stripes, and she titters somewhat giddily at her own joke.

"Serpentine, where have you been?" asks Apatite, scandalized for a whole new reason. This might have been funny, if Apatite's concern hadn't so clearly been pointed in the direction of Supervisors. "Why would you go off on your own?"

"Calm down, would you? Look who I was with." And she gestures one streaked hand to Sapphire and Ruby, who are each about a head shorter. Sapphire has a much more slender build than Serpentine, and while Ruby is of comparable stockiness Serpentine has visibly less definition. She is also on the lower end of the Mohs scale for her gem type—a 3.5 out of a potential 5.5—but she tends to posture as if she is much harder than she actually is, as a defense mechanism.

"Pollucite and her patrol partner Petalite got Serpentine off on her own," Sapphire says by way of explanation. "So we escorted her back to the rest of her cohort, since the Supervisors clearly didn't know the way."

Ruby snorts at that monumental understatement. They had gone far out of their way to intercept Pollucite (who had had the presence of mind to steer conspicuously clear of their usual routes from the tiny communications room to the rec center). The dent Ruby punched in the floor of the hallway also probably still reeks of hot sheet metal.

When Sapphire pointed this out earlier, Ruby had only said, "They had a 7 Mohs dagger above a 3.5 Mohs gem. Who knows what would have happened if we hadn't gotten there when we did. I didn't overreact, and I'm not sorry."

Sapphire hadn't had anything to say to that, mostly because she agreed.

So far, today has been fairly exciting—and Apatite's thinly veiled anxiety only promises more of the same.

Serpentine laughs loudly. Sapphire can still feel the way she's shaking with reaction. "Yes, that's exactly what happened."

"Serpentine, there you are!" calls an amazonite as she jogs over. "We've been looking all over the rec center for you! Come on, we're about to start a new sparring round on the exercise mat—you've got to get in on this."

"Oh." Serpentine laughs somewhat nervously now. She steps around Ruby with a new brand of hesitance, clearly still reliving the violence of twenty minutes ago in her head. "Y-yeah, of course."

"Hey, 'tine, are you okay?" asks Amazonite with concern as they walk away together.

Sapphire hopes that Serpentine tells the truth. She knows from personal experience just how much lying about something like this can damage all parties involved.

"You've clearly been through a lot today already, but you have to know," Apatite says when the pair have gotten far enough way. Her panic is back now in full force, and her voice quavers as she tells Ruby and Sapphire, "She's back."

"Who she?" asks Ruby as Sapphire's gut drops fast and hard to the ground.

It's been years since their encounter with another ruby. Seven-hundred-and-seventy-three, to be precise. Sapphire has grown complacent, she's stopped looking, and now she's blindsiding them. Again.

"Which cohort?" Ruby's voice is as rough as sandpaper, but at least she's talking. Sapphire, though she follows Ruby when the latter starts walking with Apatite towards the rest of their friends, doesn't have even that much awareness. She is too busy is she scouring the future for why. Why is she here, why now, why come back to a Containment Unit that doesn't meet your ideals, why…

"Not ours, thankfully. She's two shifts away," says Apatite. "Management has finally learned better than to put two rubies anywhere near each other."

"But she's still here," Ruby growls out. Her fingers are curling into powerful fists at her sides.

"We knew you'd be upset about it, which is why we wanted to warn you as soon as possible," says Apatite.

By this point they've reached Citrine and Tourmaline, who are halfheartedly participating in a game that involves stacking rectangular wooden blocks upon each other. "Are you okay, Ruby?" Citrine immediately inquires, her voice filled with concern.

"Does it look like I'm okay, Citrine?" Then, upon seeing Citrine's flinch (the tower of blocks collapses from the jerk of her elbow, though this goes more or less unnoticed by anyone else), Ruby immediately smooths out her tone. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have snapped."

"We all think she's bad news, Ruby," says Tourmaline, brushing wooden blocks out of the way so she can rest her arms on the table top.

Inexplicably, that's when all eyes turn to Sapphire, even Ruby's.

"I don't see her doing anything to us or our cohort," she says, spreading her hands helplessly. "Not in the foreseeable future, anyway."

"Her cohort is feeling it, though, aren't they?" says Citrine quietly. She looks at Sapphire directly.

"Yes," says Sapphire. There is no point in lying about it.

Apatite winces and looks down. Tourmaline looks away, her expression uncharacteristically subdued. They are all projecting the same vibe, but only Citrine has the gumption to look right at Sapphire and say, "Well, aren't you going to do something about it?"

At least she says it.

Before Sapphire can reply, however, Ruby is interjecting, "You don't know what you're asking for, Citrine."

"Don't I?" Citrine throws her arm out toward the exercise mat, where Serpentine is indeed participating in a friendly sparring match with her friends. "You go out of your way to save people you don't know all the time! You're the strongest gems in this entire Containment Unit, and you've already beaten her once. How am I being unreasonable?"

"Because you're expecting it," says Sapphire.

Citrine gives her a hard look. Unless this is the result of dozens of small sentiments that have been building up for centuries, she isn't acting like herself. Sapphire presses her lips together; her eye narrows from behind her bangs, brow furrowing as she tries to differentiate between the two.

"Sapphire, we're all expecting it," says Citrine. "Every time a Supervisor steps out of line, we all expect you and Ruby to avenge us, at the very least. Hell, we depend on it! Morale in his cohort has never been better, because we all expect vengeance by your hand! How do you not see this?" Citrine's yellow-orange palm slaps the table top, and her scowl turns her typically friendly face into something nearly unrecognizable. "Damnit, one of my dearest friends was destroyed because of you! Nepotism doesn't make you any better than the Supervisors you claim to oppose!"

"Citrine." Ruby's voice is very low, and frankly a little bit terrifying. Sapphire can feel the heat beginning to radiate from her. "You need to stop talking and walk away, right now."

"Ruby, it's fine." Sapphire touches her partner's arm and gives it a soft squeeze. "She's right, and she was here first. I'll just go back early."

She doesn't wait to hear a response as she turns on heel and removes herself from the recreation facility. It's for the best.

Honestly, though, it's not surprising when Ruby jogs into place beside her. "You could have stayed," she says anyway. "I wouldn't have held it against you."

"I know that," Ruby says gruffly. "But Citrine made me mad too, you know."

"It makes sense, in a way."

"No, it doesn't. She is in no place demand that we fight anyone, for her sake or anyone else's. What we do with our weapons is our own choice, not hers. It's not fair for her to expect anyone else to fight her battles for her. That we happen to do it anyway is just happy coincidence. It isn't a right."

Sapphire's façade of calm collectedness wanes somewhat as she glances at the gem beside her. How in the universe had an asymmetrical gem who has spent most of her life in a Containment Unit come to develop such a firm sense of justice and morality?

Ruby kicks her foot up a little harder than she needs to when she takes her next step. "It's not like I don't want to help other cohorts," she mutters. "But we can't do everything. We'd destroy ourselves trying. Why can't Citrine see that we aren't a permanent solution, but just a temporary reprieve?"

"Probably because it's easier to pretend that you and I will slowly but surely fix everything," says Sapphire. "It's a tempting delusion, don't you think? Just believe in us, and we'll eventually save everyone."

"It's not realistic. It's not fair."

"No, it's not," Sapphire agrees. She debates for a moment, pursing her lips together with hesitance, and then she says, "She blames me for what happened to Rhodochrosite, and I can't really blame her. I've felt guilty about your friend ever since I learned about her destruction. I didn't think of the gem my arrival would displace before then, and I don't know why. I suppose I was hoping there wouldn't be one."

"I've always wondered about that." Ruby says it like the memory of Rhodochrosite still pains her, but Sapphire is surprised when she reaches for her gloved hand. She pushes her fingers in the spaces between Ruby's strong red ones anyway, and yet… "You can't blame yourself for what happened to Rho, Sapph," she says. "It's not your fault that you exist, and it's not your fault Containment Units are so crowded. You never chose Unit 6; it was chosen for you."

"But—"

"What happened to Rho is symptomatic that this system is rotten from top to bottom, not of anything you ever did to her. Sapphire." Ruby squeezes her hand and looks over at her. Some of that old grief is still in her expressive face—most likely, it will never leave—but there is empathy, too. And affection. Sapphire feels something in her chest clench at that last, and she presses her lips together to keep herself from doing something stupid. "If I knew Rhodochrosite at all—and I like to think I did—she would be very upset by your shortsightedness. Look at the bigger picture: the way you are treated is just as indicative of this system's brokenness as Rho.

"You aren't the enemy here, Sapphire," Ruby says. "You never were. And the sooner we can get more gems to see the bigger picture like that, the sooner we can get them to start fighting for themselves instead of waiting for us to pick up their swords for them. And the sooner we can send these damn arbitrary lines dividing My Side from Your Side up in smoke and actually move forward. All inmates should be on the same side in this; there shouldn't be any exceptions."

Wow.

It takes so long for Sapphire to recover her bearings that Ruby's fingers become twitchy and hot with nerves. "Um, Sapph—"

"I needed to hear that," she says. Then, when Ruby starts to say something, "No, I really did. Citrine's just hurting. She's always been empathetic, and she's always wanted everyone to have a happy ending." Whatever that is. Sapphire supposes it can be subjective. "If she sees us as a means to that end, I can understand why she became so frustrated."

"That doesn't mean she's right, though."

"No, it doesn't. But." Here Sapphire glances over and offers a small smile that Ruby returns somewhat belatedly, a little lost but supportive nonetheless. "Knowing that is helping me to see the bigger picture."

Fun fact: Pollucite, 6.5-7 Mohs, was named after Pollux (the constellation). It is intentionally juxtaposed with Petalite, 6-6.5 Mohs. Petalite, incidentally, is formerly known as Castorite (after Castor, of the constellation).