The war had been over.

It had been for hours.

Maybe even days.

And she had no idea what to do next.

She had been walking for so long, she'd forgotten everything that was going on around her.

Where was she?

What was going on?

How was she still alive?

Had the army fallen?

Who had won?

Who had lost?

She did not know, but she wanted to.

She approached a clearing that lead to a forest, and her eyes widened in shock.

It was a beautiful forest of shards.

Her eyes caught her reflection in one of the shard pillars. A teenage girl that bared a resemblance to the prince-now-king. The one who had overthrown the old king and destroyed the entire kingdom.

His words echoed throughout the kingdom, with no signs of ever stopping.

"I'm king of this kingdom now."

She shook the thought off. She continued to walk aimlessly, before she caught onto voices.

"Come on!"

"Green, we've gotten miles away from the castle. Unless we're being tailed, we're fine."

"No! We need to go back! Purple's still there!"

"I hate saying this as much as we hate thinking about it, but someone's controlling Purple. We go back, and whoever's got Purple being used as a puppet will use him and fucking kill us!"

"King, you can just say that!"

"I don't want to, but it's true. I hate saying it as much as we hate thinking about it, but there's no way we're going to get Purple back without at least one death."

"He's overthrown the whole kingdom. If we thought Navy was bad, a brainwashed Purple can only mean something worse!"

"How?!"

"We've seen the damage people can do under the influence of brainwashing. We've all seen it, and if my memory is not mistaken, some of us have been through it. One wrong move, and nobody gets out of this realm alive."

The voices echoed around her.

"One wrong move, and nobody gets out of this kingdom alive."

She couldn't let that happen. She couldn't.

"Okay, Amethyst." She looked at her reflection in a shard pillar.

"Looks like you've got an agenda."

"Purple?" King asked skeptically. Chosen didn't miss the small gleam of hope that flashed across his eyes.

The figure blinked.

"Yeah, that's not Purple," Chosen said. "Sorry, King."

"It could be Purple!" Dark reasoned. "He might've gotten amnesia!"

"Okay, someone wanna tell me who the fuck Purple is?" The figure snapped.

Yellow moved closer, the torch light illuminating the stick figure.

It definitely wasn't Purple. The stick in front of them was much lighter.

Everyone stared at them.

Green spoke up.

"Someone going to tell me that's not Purple's long lost twin sister right in front of us?"

"Okay. Let me get this straight."

King and the others stared blankly at Amethyst, who had recently been told the entire situation with Purple.

"My brother, who I didn't even know existed, has been brainwashed by my father, and is currently ruling over the kingdom against all of us?"

"Essentially." Chosen said.

"And you had no idea Purple existed?" Green asked.

"No. I didn't even know half of this shit happened with my family!"

"So Navy and Orchid had a secret child?" King asked.

"If even Purple didn't know about her, then likely."

"Hey, it would justify why Purple was abused, and Amethyst seems perfectly fine." Green said.

"We know Navy wouldn't just treat Purple like shit, and treat Amethyst like a princess. Purple hasn't said shit about Amethyst. He would have known there was another child somewhere if he knew about her." King said.

"He makes a point."

"Maybe Navy was taking care of her after he left?"

"Or maybe it was an unwanted child or something related to that. Maybe Night Shade knows who she is."

"He's close with Purple's family, which we've figured out, so it would make sense. Maybe they aren't siblings. Maybe their cousins?"

"So Night Shade would be related to one of them?"

"Or maybe it's just surrogate? Maybe he's a godfather or something?"

"That wouldn't explain how Amethyst fits in here."

"Okay, let's figure this out later. We have to rescue Purple, and maybe Amethyst can help." Blue said.

Green's eyes flickered.

"Green?"

"I got an idea," He turned to the purple stick watching them with curiosity. "Do you know how to get into the castle?"

Amethyst looked at them before smiling.

"Your lucky I was fighting against Navy's army before all of this happened."

The group was lucky Amethyst knew her way around. Most of the army had separated, and most, including Amethyst's group, had tried to break into the castle to take Navy down themselves.

It had not been easy.

Chosen and Dark followed Amethyst as she led them to a deserted window at the back of the castle, towards the roof.

"Wait...that used to be Purple's room!" Blue shouted.

He had vividly remembered that detail when Amber captured them.

"Yellow, what the hell were you thinking?!" Blue shouted. "You should've known she couldn't be trusted!"

"I know she can't be trusted!" Yellow snapped back.

"Then why the hell are we here?!"

"Because she could have one of our friends! Hell, Purple could be here!"

"Why would he be here?!" Blue shouted, clearly ticked off about being a prisoner.

"Because this is the Great Above we've been trying to get into the entire time, and we're right in the crossfire of what's probably gonna become a war within the next few days."

Blue stared at him.

"And I think Amber's got a few secrets we need to uncover." Yellow finished, staring at the door to the bedroom they'd been trapped in for the past couple of hours.

"You think she'd really hurt us?"

"I won't hurt you. I just want you to come with me. I have someone you might want to see."

"She may have promised, but that doesn't mean anything. She could still hurt us for the sake of Navy's plan." Yellow said, taking her statement into consideration.

"Who would she want us to see, then?" Blue asked.

Yellow thought for a moment, and would've voiced his opinion if the vent above him hadn't been broken open and something fell on top of him.

Blue jumped back. "Sweet Jesus!"

Yellow groaned, rubbing his head. "What the hell just happened-"

"This castle really is full of surprises for me, isn't it, Navy?" Someone grumbled to themselves, and Yellow recognized the voice instantly.

"Purple?!"

"Oh, hi Yellow. Sorry for...crashing into you, I guess."

"Purple!" Blue tackled the stick into a hug. "We missed you! We were so worried! What the hell is happening?!"

Yellow smiled, but shared Blue's questions. "What is going on? Surely you must know something." He said.

"Sunny's attempting to declare war on Navy. He doesn't have a clue what's going on, so if it's going to happen, we've gotta get back to the refugee camp Sunny apparently has."

"So we're practically at war right now?" Yellow summarized.

"Exactly what Purple just said, my dear lookalike."

Sunny stared at the group through the window, a smirk on her face. "Willow's gonna meet us at the refugee camp as soon as she can, so let's get out of here while we still can. Once we can contact the others, we will."

The trio gave each other looks of curiosity, but Purple was sick of being in the vicinity of the people who had given him so many different problems, and Blue and Yellow were desperate to get out of the castle.

So they followed her out the window and into the forests surrounding the castle.

"Damn, I'm surprised you remember that detail." Yellow said, looking at his friend.

"It's directly facing the forest, it's a simple detail to remember." Blue clarified.

"Blue's right. We just have to find a way to get up there." Willow said, staring at the window from the ground.

"It's mocking us." Amethyst grumbled.

"It was easier for us to get down than up...maybe we could retrace our steps?"

"Sunny's the only one with that kind of skill," Willow said. "I wasn't there, but I know she's the one with those skills."

"And Sunny's gone AWOL, and none of us can really...climb a wall." Scarlet muttered

"Watch me." Crystal, who most of them hadn't forgotten had tried humiliating Purple months prior, scaled the wall and started climbing.

"How the fuck-" Second started.

"When you know Mocha, who can jump over a wall with two large cups of milkshake in his hand AND wearing rollerskates to ruin a kid's life, climbing walls is not that hard."

"Me and Purple were climbing fences to escape Navy's lab with our lives," Dark said. "I can't imagine climbing a wall is any harder."

"True."

Crystal reached the window, disappeared into the window for a moment, before throwing a rope down.

"Looks like Purple had some escape plans of his own."

"Or maybe Navy and the others tried to use it for an escape." Chosen grumbled, pulling on the rope before starting to climb.

Willow took the lead, following Amethyst through the halls of the intricate building.

"You remember this path?"

"Me and Purple found a lab-like base in the basement, where Amber was being kept. I can retrace that path, but I'm sure any others I was brainwashed for."

"You could lead us down there?" Yellow suggested. "If it's a lab, there's gotta be something in there. Maybe they were planning to trap Purple and the others in here and go back to rule Stick City."

"It would make sense. Without Purple in the way, they could easily take over."

"Until Purple figures out what's going on and find's a way to stop them anyways."

A crash.

"Fuck. Someone's here."

"Maybe it's Purple?"

"Doubtful. If it were Purple, about half of us would have been bombarded with energy balls by now."

"What?!" Amethyst whisper-shouted.

"Oh yeah. Probably should have mentioned that Purple has powers." Blue said.

"He has what?!"

"You'll see."

Another crash. An energy ball followed.

"Purple?!"

"Nope. Orchid."

Everyone stared at Second.

"How did you..."

"Each one of them have a energy ball with a color that corresponds to them. Purple's are purple, Orchid's are pink, and Navy's are blue. Come on, guys. Pay attention."

"Whatever. We've gotta stop her."

"Well, since we need King, me and the others will take care of Orchid. You guys find Purple and stop him. Willow, go with them." Gold said.

"Maybe Amethyst can stop her, since they're probably related, if one of our theories are correct." Lavender added.

King and the others shared nervous glances, before running off.

Gold grabbed a piece of rubble from the ground, smacking it against his hand.

"Okay. Let's do this."

Amethyst watched the castle crumble around her as King and the others started panicking.

Purple and Navy? Gone.

Vanished without a trace.

Who the fuck knew where they went?

Amethyst watched everyone panic.

Something suddenly caught her eye.

A portal.

Purple had somehow opened a portal back to their world.

Purple, you brilliant genius.

Now I know we're related.

Amethyst backed up, sparring a glance at Willow. "Run. Get to the other side of that portal and stay there. I'll come back if I can, just run!"

Willow and Sunny stared at each other, before backing up and urging the others to run.

A gust of wind, and it all went black.

Amethyst stared out her window, watching the sunny sky above her.

It had taken a while, but they'd pulled off the repairs of the entire kingdom Navy had turned into a monarchy.

She'd never been able to open a portal that could get most of them home, but they'd seem content with the simple life the kingdom brought.

Then again, Stick City was big, crowded, and loud. She wasn't too surprised when most of them quickly rebuilt family if they could, and settled into a simpler life Stick City couldn't bring.

It was actually fun for her. She didn't really have to do much, just make sure everything stayed in order. If any of Navy's old buddies, or former armed forces that had survived the war Purple brought to an end, decided to resurface, Amethyst would let volunteers take care of them.

Needless to say, most of the people Amethyst had been able to save from a potentially painful demise at the hands of a crumbling castle wanted some revenge for Navy's actions.

She didn't blame them.

If someone destroyed her entire family just to kill a literal child, she'd want revenge, too.

...Oh wait, Navy had killed her mother and father in cold blood to kill Purple, a literal child.

Christ, people had problems.

Lots of problems.

It'd been a while since she'd seen Willow and Sunny.

While the portals weren't powerful enough to last long enough to get the entire population out, it was powerful enough for Willow and Sunny to make trips every other week to help Amethyst out.

Then again, she was a teenager. She was bound to have problems running an entire kingdom.

Willow and Sunny, who had access to a lot more advanced technology in the Outernet(thanks to the fucking Dark Lord), would come by every other week or so to help Amethyst run the kingdom, do some routine checks of the perimeter, or just help citizens keep everything in line with markets and everything.

Surprisingly, it looked as if Navy had planned the entire world out. He knew what he'd been doing the entire time.

And as long as nobody resurfaced to cause trouble, Amethyst was truly content with her current life.