A/N: Okay, just as a note, I just realized I made an error in the previous chapter, as the temple/Beach House is on the opposite side of the giant hill thing from the city, so Steven and the Gems would not have been able to see stuff going on there. Probably would not have discovered this had I not been trying to figure out in what order Steven and the Gems would attempt to do stuff based on where places are in relationship to each other.
"Huh?"
The moment Pearl turned to face the strange creature, it crouched and then leapt, aiming to strike the gem. Steven summoned his shield out in preparation.
"Waaah!"
With one swift movement, Pearl suddenly stepped back, lowered her spear, and then swept it straight through the creature, causing it to dissipate.
"Can't believe I let myself get caught off-guard like that."
"It's… dead?"
"I guess?"
The door behind them snapped open.
"Guys," said Amethyst, "what's going on out there?"
"Shadow… things…" Steven said.
"Alright, just let me know if you need any help out there."
As this was going on, Connie saw several more of the small shadowy creatures jump up the stepladder and shamble their way towards the Gems.
"Look," Connie said while pointing, "more of them are coming this way!"
"I'm on it."
Pearl jumped onto the rail and ran across it, spinning her weapon straight through the shadows until they poofed away.
One of them shrunk flat into the ground and tried making its way toward the front door.
"And where do you think you're going?"
Pearl then sprung off the railing and plunged her spear straight through the shadow.
-POOF!-
Though the shadow dissipated, Pearl's spear had broken through the wood underneath.
"Maybe I should have waited before making that attack."
"It doesn't look that bad," said Amethyst.
"Besides, we can always try and fix it later," said Steven.
"But yeah, way to go Pearl!"
"No need to compliment me, though these things seem a lot less threatening than I expected."
Pearl dislodged her spear from the deck and proceeded towards the stepladder ahead.
She briefly turned to Steven and Connie and said, "Come along you two."
Shortly after Pearl climbed down onto the hill, Lion leaped over the porch and stood beside her.
"So what do we do about these things?" asked Connie.
Despite their relatively close proximity, the green-armored creatures seemed to ignore the group entirely, running about without any signs of losing stamina.
"It doesn't look like they're trying to hurt anyone or anything like that," said Steven. "Maybe they're different from those other things we just fought."
"Alright," said Pearl, "we'll ignore them for now, but keep your eyes peeled if more of those things try to attack us."
"Got it!" said Connie.
"Okay," said Steven, "let's start by checking to see if my dad is okay."
As Pearl and Lion circled along the beach, none of the strange creatures seemed to pester them along the way. In fact, the creatures seemed to be going out of the way to avoid them. Up ahead, most of the city seemed to be covered in darkness, save for the light from a few makeshift bonfires, lanterns, and headlights.
As they got close to the car wash, they saw Greg dash from around the corner, being chased by several floating orange beak-like things and navy-armored knight-creatures similar to the ones they saw earlier.
"Guys! I need a little help here!"
Greg Universe swung around and round with the heavy boom-box he kept in his van, but none of the strange creatures seemed to be affected by it. He also seemed to be a tad bruised up, as the various creatures seemed intent on attacking him.
"Don't worry dad! I'll save you!" said Steven.
Steven flung his shield forward, causing it to slice and ricochet through most of the floating beak-copter things. Shortly after dissipating, however, a translucent, pink, heart-shaped object burst out from each one, ascending upward while spinning on its vertical axis.
"Huh?"
Although Steven stood up from where he was, catching his shield as it returned to him, the glowing lights ascended far too rapidly for him to react.
"What are those?" Connie asked.
"Who knows?" said Pearl, as she struck through one of the silver-helmeted shadow beings nearby.
Another heart-like object burst from it, though Pearl extended her hand and bubbled it before it could escape. The heart collided with the roof of the bubble, and then began to bounce around inside, until its movement began to slow down.
"I think they might be gems," Steven thought aloud, "except different."
"We can investigate them later," Pearl said as she sent the bubble away.
As Greg ran toward them, a few more of the strange creatures approached from down the street, including a several arm-less, floating, pod-like creatures wearing wizard hats and robes in various colors. In their midst, a few dark, purplish spheres manifested and then dispersed, leaving behind even more of the shadowy beings. A deep, but soft, engine-like drone could also be heard in the distance.
"What are those things?" asked Greg.
"Still trying to figure that out," said Pearl as she made another graceful slash.
Lion then leaped forward into a cluster of the navy-armored knights, knocking several of them over.
"HIYAA!"
Connie then slashed through three of the soldiers as they tried to get back on their two feet.
"Connie, wait up!"
Steven swiftly turned to bubble two of the hearts that came out, though the third got away.
The helmed creatures began to claw at Lion's left side, though he swiftly spun around to claw at them.
Connie, however, was not prepared for this, so instead she was flung off Lion's back.
"WAAAH!"
"Connie!"
For a few seconds, the world spun around her, though shortly after she met the sudden thud of Rose's sword colliding into the ground, forcing her to let go of it.
Once she stopped tumbling, she heard Pearl's voice a few dozen feet away, "Connie!"
"Connie, watch out!" Greg's voice soon said after.
Almost immediately after, two of the short, antenna-ed figures and one of the knight creatures stood right next to her.
She quickly got back up, and braced herself to fend off the shadow beings.
In a flash of light, Rose's sword appeared in her hands.
"What the…?"
"How in the world did you do that?" Connie heard Steven's dad say.
No time to think about this.
As one of the smaller creatures prepared to pounce her, Connie swept Rose's sword straight through it, and then moved to take down the other two creatures.
In the midst of her techniques, Connie thought she saw a bluish spark crack along the edge of the blade, and for an instant she thought she saw a slender key-like object manifest from underneath the blade.
A few more strikes, and all the creatures around her had dissipated, though she lacked the abilities to capture the transparent heart that surged out from the knight.
"You alright, Connie?" asked Steven as he turned away from the fight.
"I'm fine."
"Good to hear," said Greg Universe.
Now that most of the creatures were cleared from her immediate surroundings, Pearl aimed her spear towards the enemies down the street, and unleashed a barrage of energy bolts towards them.
-BOOM!-BOOM!-BOOM!-BOOM!-
More hearts rose from them, and when some of the smoke subsided, a few of the floating creatures began to drift away.
Pearl spun her spear around and then struck it into the ground. "All taken…"
-FSHOOM!-FSHOOM!-
Two miniature propeller-planes, with each pilot's head and feet sticking out the top and bottom of the plane, flew in from above the building sitting across from Greg's car wash, and then dove in towards the group.
"Oh god, how many of these things are there?" Pearl complained.
"Everyone come quick!" cried Steven as he jumped off Lion's back.
While Lion ran to take cover behind Greg's car wash, Pearl, Greg, and Connie all ran straight for Steven, who held his arms out as the aeroplanes zoomed towards them.
Just seconds before the planes came close, Steven encapsulated everyone in his hardened bubble.
Without warning, the plane on the left stopped, tilted back, and then opened fire, though none of its bullets could penetrate Steven's bubble.
The other plane suddenly zipped forward and drove right into Steven's bubble, causing it to start rolling just slightly backwards and to the side.
"Whoa…!" exclaimed Steven's dad.
"Steven!" yelled Connie.
Everyone was thrown off-balance by the plane's collision, which was then followed by a second crash coming from a completely different direction.
When the bubble finally stopped moving, Steven quickly sat back up and dispersed it.
"I think I'm going to be sick once all of this is over," said Greg Universe.
"Tell me about it," said Connie as she pushed herself up with Rose's sword.
"Alright!" said Pearl, scanning the area while holding out her spear, "just where are…"
Pearl's light then shone on one of the planes as it was swerving around the beach.
"Aha!"
Pearl fired off a barrage of bolts at the plane further away, though it still remained intact.
"These things are durable," Pearl remarked.
"Here comes the other one!" Connie noted while pointing in the direction opposite Pearl's light.
"I've got it!"
Steven Universe ran in front of the group and enlarged his shield, just as the second plane was about to let off another bullet barrage.
"You're not getting away this time!"
While the plane hovered in place, Connie circled around Steven, and then grasped onto the plane's left wing.
"HIYAA!"
In one swift motion, Connie lifted herself over the plane's hull, mounted herself right onto its tailfin, and then drove Rose's sword straight into the pilot's shoulder. She drove the sword into the plane again and again, with an audible metallic shear or squish each time around.
In an attempt to shake the girl off, the plane tried flipping itself over, but as soon as it aligned itself straight upward, Connie leaped off and slashed straight across its wings.
The creature dissipated, and Steven quickly bubbled the heart-shaped light that came out.
At roughly the same time, Lion leaped down from Beach City's enormous mound, and crushed the last plane under his claws. A heart did not seem to emerge from it, though it was likely absorbed into Lion's fur.
"We did it!" shouted Steven.
"Is that all of them?" Greg said as he looked around the area.
"There's probably more of them out there," said Pearl, "though just where are they coming from?"
"They just started appearing out of nowhere, right after the power went out. Luckily, they didn't do anything to my van. At least, I don't think they did."
"I'm just glad you're okay, dad," said Steven.
"I am too," said Greg.
"Amethyst should still be guarding the temple," said Pearl, turning back while facing the city ahead, "so you should be safe there for now."
"What about Garnet?"
"Uh… about that."
"Something happened to her during the outage," Connie added. "She mentioned something about having these visions, so I think it might have something to do with her future-vision."
"At any rate, I wouldn't get too close her if I were you," said Pearl. "Steven was fine, but there's no telling if that strange... experience had any other side-effects."
As the group began to head back to the Beach House, one of the green-bodied knights zipped from around the corner and dashed by.
"Just ignore those ones for now," said Pearl as she pointed to it. "They're harmless as far as I'm aware."
"Though if those things are gems, figuratively speaking, then maybe we should go free them," Steven suggested.
"Amethyst would probably be better at mopping up those things anyway. Let's quickly drop off your dad at the temple and get back to cleaning up this mess."
"Well that's another batch taken care of."
The two warriors then de-summoned their weapons and continued along the highway. The walls had taken quite a few hits during the fight, though luckily they had been quick enough to extinguish the flames before they could spread to the forest.
The lankier of the two individuals, Lea, folded his arms behind his head, and then leaned in towards his compatriot, "So how long do you think it'll take until they find us this time?"
"Who knows? We didn't land near the break this time around."
"True," said his more casually dressed partner. "Maybe that'll buy us some time."
"I sure hope so."
During the short silence, the black-coat warrior looked up at the stars in the sky. It looked similar enough to the constellations of his home world, though perhaps if he looked hard enough, there would be a few differences here and there.
"The Heartless are thinning at any rate," said Lea's partner.
"Yeah," said Lea.
It was strange just to even think about it, as Heartless never had this much trouble adding soldiers to their own ranks prior to - well - whatever the heck was going on now, though that might have had something to do with some of the other irregularities of these so-called "new" worlds. Unlike most of the worlds they had encountered, these "new" worlds seemed to exist within realms of their own, neither connected via the Lanes Between nor the Corridors of Darkness. It was only happenstance that the two of them figured out how to access these "Worlds Beyond."
"You think those hearts we're releasing are going back to their original bodies?"
"I'd like to think so," said Riku. "Let's just keep moving."
"Whatever you say. You're the one with the keyblade, after all."
His partner glanced back, but then continued moving forward.
How do we even know we're going the right way?
A few minutes later, they saw a flicker of light among the trees past the left wall.
Riku raised his finger up, and then shifted over to the wall.
After an exchange of gestures, the two of them ascended the wall.
On the other side, they found a youth wearing an over-sized shirt and shades. He turned his flashlight toward the two fighters, and briefly took a moment to wipe his shades.
"Those are some mad skills you've got there. Not many people can jump over those walls in one go."
The boy extended his hand to them.
"The name's Buck Dewey. You guys from another planet or dimension or something?"
"Sorta," said Riku.
"Cool." Buck briefly glanced past them. "So what was going on up there?"
"Heartless."
"Oh, so that's like gem stuff, right?"
The two warriors glanced at each other, and then turned back towards the native.
"Yeah. Sorta like that," Riku responded.
"That's cool."
"You see anything unusual around here?" asked Lea.
"Aside from the aurora, blackout, and giant meteor shower, not really. This stuff's kinda normal around here. Usually the Gems take care of stuff before everything gets out of hand."
"Alright," said Riku, "we'll be sure to pay them a visit."
"Yeah," said Buck, "I better get back to my dad before he realizes I've gone missing."
"Mind if we come with?" Lea asked.
"Oh sure, by all means. By the way, I don't think I ever got your names."
"Riku." The boy planted his fist into his chest. "And this…"
"The name's Lea, got it memorized?"
A/N: I considered waiting until the last possible moment to reveal Lea and Riku's names, but the writing just looked awkward when I tried obscuring their identities. But yeah, it should be apparent by this point that stuff's kinda different. Anyway, be sure to stay tuned for more stuff to come!