#just some observations within the fandom ive noticed

[redr0sewrites]

i will forever defend these two- NOT to start discourse but they are both so heavily mischaracterized by the fandom its INSANE like omg yes they are flawed but they are also trying their best PLEASE leave them alone 🙏🙏🙏

as usual im yapping in the tags if anyone cares

[dekusleftsock]

Okay, this is random but you always have interesting thoughts so I decided to ask. Despite being a girl, I've always had a difficult time relating to female characters in stories. As a child I preferred male characters over girl characters, as I often found them rather annoying. There have been a few female characters over the years that I've related to and liked though, so I started to analyze why I had such a short list. I finally concluded it was because I found most female characters to be poorly written. What do you think? As a little kid, most female characters felt more like cardboard cutouts than people to me, and due to that I was often unable to relate to or become invested in their stories. I've seen people in the past wonder why ao3 tends to neglect female characters so much, in particular lesbian couples. For me at least, it was often that I did not find any of the female characters interesting enough to read/write a fanfic about them. When I talked to other girls in various fandoms, they felt the same way. However, I've also noticed that girls tend to have higher standards for female characters than they do for male characters. In my own experience, that's been fairly true. I've noticed in general that female fans often have more sympathy for male characters and their struggles, but less sympathy for female characters and their struggles. I say this both as an observation of others and of my own behavior. I'm always working to become better, but often as a child I had far less sympathy and patience for female characters, especially when they did something I disliked. I don't know exactly why this happens, but having asked others girls/women, I found this all to be generally true. Why do you think this happens?

OHHH IVE BEEN SO EXCITED TO TALK ABOUT THIS!

Couple of things I wanna establish. The male vs female gaze and the cringification of femininity/“childlike” things.

Quick cw, I do mention a quote that talks about slavery. It dips its toes into some of the horrors of it in American history so please keep that in mind.

The thing with toxic masculinity is that it doesn’t just affect men. A patriarchal society will ALWAYS RESULT in the demonization of femininity, calling things that are romantic or pretty “childlike”, “unrealistic”, or “simple”.

So when we see very simple or annoying girl characters, it’s because men only see this idea of femininity as what women are. When, in reality, women and men are complex. Fitting people into these stereotypical ideas of masculinity or femininity IS the simple silly ideas that men create and women support. So, femcells don’t exist, pick me girls are a result of men taking away women’s individuality, and women are more complicated than romance or silly makeup.

But let’s take a step back and talk about the female vs male gaze, which I think is really the main issue here. In America and the west at least, the male gaze tends to have an actual cookie cut out idea of the perfect and attractive woman. This being, a nurturing woman who is white/lighter skinned, has a small nose, semi decently sized lips, a soft but not fat jawline, etc etc the list goes on. Here’s some images within the fine art world of women made by men.

Art made by Nenad Vasic

Art made by Richard Young

And finally, art made by John Collier

All of these women out of the male artists I found on the site, barely had even slightly diverse women. It was all skinny, slightly less skinny, white women with brown or blonde hair, maybe red if you pushed it. And this is even shown in the tumblr sexy men vs tumblr sexy women!

Urban dictionary defines a tumblr sexy man as, “A male character who goes viral on Tumblr for perceived attractiveness based on an established formula. Usually white, tall, dresses fancy and is evil or has a ‘dark side.’ Though the character can be non human or non human and anthrofied to fit the said formula. Most of the time, said character isn’t really as attractive as Tumblr weirdly makes him out to be.”

Examples off the top of my head are sans, bill cypher, dr. Habit, regan, megamind, plankton, aizawa etc. For tumblr sexy WOMEN the beauty standard is much more linear. Hatsune miku, catra, bowser woman(?), sombra, etc.

When you look at fine art or of tumblr sexy men, there’s a much more… individualistic approach to the female gaze. How people view men. In fact, the standards for men are much lower than women (though still bullshit) because most of the actual beauty standards are ones made up by men in their heads. They DECIDED what women liked, not taking into account that it’s much less centralized when making the “perfect man”.

I think the shows you watched also played a part into this. A lot of it depends on where you live, so like, in the US Cartoon Network and Disney channel stuff would have been common. (Ofc pbs too)

In a lot of “older” shows in the west like teen titans, any Disney movie, or dexters laboratory, didn’t necessarily make their women.. bad? Per say? More just, simpler. They fit into set tropes a lot of the time, like Raven being the goth mean girl or Velma being the super smart short haired girl.

It’s not that any of these shows were bad either! It’s just how the gender binary works.

I also feel like part of this plays into internalized misogyny. I dealt with it for years and based on what you’ve said I’m gonna say you probably did too. I hated pink, dressed totally tomboy, stepped as far away from femininity as possible, and now I’m inching back towards it. Pink is my second favorite color.

A lot of the girl characters I used to hate were just insecure and liked pink a lot of the time.

Anyway, I tried my best not to psychoanalyze you out of nowhere odhdijdodjdidn sorry

The thing with why society hates femininity is that the binary gives women humanity. The term “female” is just, disgusting to use, but why? Why do we see this term as inherently inhuman? There’s this quote that I love from a book I’ve been planning to read. Book is called “Females”, by Andrea LongChu. Page 45, “In the United States, the man known as the father of gynecology, J. Marion Sims, built the field in the south operating on enslaved women in his backyard, often without anesthesia or, of course, consent. As C. Riley Snorton has recently documented, the distinction between biological females and women as a social category, far from a neutral scientific observation, develops precisely in order for the captive black woman to be recognized as female. Making Sims’ research applicable to his women patients and polite white society, without being granted the status of social and legal personhood. Sex was produced in the other words, precisely at the juncture where gender was denied. In this sense, a female has always been less than a person.”

As stated in the quote, this term of “female” as opposed to “woman” or “girl” has always been used as a way to dehumanize SPECIFICALLY enslaved black women. Femininity and the gender binary, no matter how much I hate it, gives people in western and white society, humanity. When you demonize the very things that define your binary, or even call them simple, stupid, or arrogant, it is feeding into the idea that womanhood and therefore your humanity, should not exist. That, is why men and society hates femininity.

You must see women as people.

[silkmorii]

Hello folks! I’ve been given just a bit too much time to think about things today & i’ve decided to tell you about my thoughts!

I’m not sure if anyone has spoken about this before, but it’s definitely a phenomenon I’ve noticed in myself, at least.

Lately ive started jokingly calling myself a “Fandom wallflower”. This means that I am certainly in some fandoms and that I do look at the fan-made content, but I never really interact directly with a group or anything within it. I’ll like, I’ll reblog, but i’ll never really speak to that person or join a discord or group chat. Even if I do, I try not to speak too much. Usually it’s out of being nervous or the fear of judgement. Especially over text. Sometimes it’s just me not caring about the latest drama or having the energy to look. I’m not fully out of the loop though, I’m just observing the party from much further away than almost everyone I know!

I’ve thought on this a lot, and im starting to wonder if it’s a thing for anyone else too. (Its gotta be, right? im not really unique lol) Not speaking to strangers unless spoken to and keeping to myself has kind of been how I’ve navigated the net my whole life so far. I don’t mind being a wallflower in all the fandoms I’m in, but sometimes I do notice that others talk to a lot more people and I feel a bit lonely in comparison.

If there’s another term for this concept, I’d love to know! I’m probably going to stick to calling myself this though, because I think it’s funny.

[solazu1]

I feel odd whenever fandoms have a hierarchy within it. Its very competitive but something I’ve mainly noticed that happens in twitter. There’s that one popular group who everybody follows and wants to be apart of and every take they say is mass agreed with like some messiah just appeared☠️, then theres the known despised people of the fandom, wether they’ve done some fucked up shit or simply as a dick online is sorta interchangeable, then the extremely popular artists who are at the top of this thing and they’re pretty chill mostly from I have seen

Its something ive honestly only ever really observer ON twitter, on tumblr I don’t know but wouldnt doubt if its like that somewhere here, big site yk.

[tired-luxis]

Tomarrymort: Why it’s Such a Promising Ship

I absolutely adore Tomarrymort. It’s one of my all-time favorite ships, and I find myself coming back to it time and time again. Of course, it might take a bit of work to convince the quintessential skeptic about this pairing, so here are some reasons why Tomarrymort is a gold mine of content.

I. The parallels

J.K. Rowling painstakingly draws numerous similarities between Harry and Tom’s upbringing. For instance:

A. Childhoods

Although not explicitly stated by Rowling, Harry definitely grew up in an abusive home (starvation, overwork, belittlement, so on). Tom Riddle also spent his childhood in a bad environment, as he was born in 1926 at the height of global turmoil and England-specific class upheavals. As an orphan at an unforgiving home, he likely experienced harsh treatment for reasons even aside from his fear-inspiring magical abilities.

B. Unfit, Hostile Guardians

The Dursleys did everything they could to quash any freakishness in Harry. They systematically diminished his self-worth and sought to stifle his magical abilities in every way. Similarly, Wool’s Orphanage also treated Tom as an “other”. While Tom was by no means a saint, the Matron and his peers made no secret of their unease and borderline dislike for him, which likely only alienated Riddle further. 

C. Marked by Dumbledore from a young age

Since the prophecy’s creation, Dumbledore singled out Harry as a tool to win the war. Dumbledore may have cared for him and genuinely regretted the self-sacrificing role he would have to play, but regardless, he still passively and actively ensured Harry would be put in too many life-or-death situations that no child should’ve experienced. And while Dumbledore preemptively christened Harry a savior, he contrastingly damned Tom at the very start. Within mere moments of meeting Tom, he was convinced that this young boy was someone to be feared. Mind you, I’m not a Tom Riddle apologist; I fully recognize that he was a very dark villain as an adult and his actions could not be primarily attributed to the rejection he faced from adult figures. However, the way that they were both pseudo-predestined to play opposing roles is rather fascinating.

D. Why these similarities matter!!

On a surface level, children are objectively impressionable beings, and the way Tom and Harry were raised likely affected their behavior and character in interesting ways. Because they had similar influences upon their childhoods, it becomes even more intriguing to observe where their paths diverged and how they became such famous hero-villains. I’ll let Tom say it himself:

“There are strange likenesses between us, Harry Potter. Even you must have noticed. Both half-bloods, orphans, raised by Muggles. Probably the only two Parselmouths to come to Hogwarts since the great Slytherin himself. We even look something alike.”

There’s something uniquely attractive about characters who could’ve been like one another, and yet ended up as completely different people. It’s like looking into a mirror and seeing a twisted reflections  — rather incredible, isn’t it?

II. The magical ties

A. Horcruxes: Parseltongue, Occlumency, and more

This is probably the biggest addition to Tomarrymort’s intrigue. To start with, we have Harry’s Parseltongue abilities, which presented themselves early on in the first book and continued to appear in very memorable scenes throughout the series. While Parseltongue itself is a rather loaded concept rife with worldbuilding potential, its continued presence was a constant reminder of the soul relationship between Harry and Voldemort.

For, recall that Harry’s Parseltongue ability was a direct consequence of his soul relationship with Voldemort. He housed a piece of Voldemort’s soul for over a decade. This is astounding, given that there are several examples of other characters being affected by even a brief contact with Voldemort’s Horcruxes. The Diary possessed Ginny after just a school term, the Locket recreated Ron’s greatest fears after mere weeks of wear, and the shard in Nagini likely contributed to her complete obedience and lethality. That then begs the question — how could the piece in Harry have affected him? And if there was no effect, that just makes it all the more interesting with questions of why Harry alone was immune.

Bonus: ficwriters can play with the idea of soul magic or Horcrux-related worldbuilding. It’s wonderful seeing all these different interpretations of Horcrux events: restoring/rejoining pieces of Voldemort’s soul, establishing soul bonds, soul-based mind manipulation, and more.

B. The Prophecy

The actual prophecy has been re-interpreted by numerous fanfics in different ways. The last two lines are the most fanficable, in my opinion.

“And the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not...”

Consider the phrase, “mark him as his equal”. A mark in and of itself is an inherently possessive act of claiming, which ties back to Tomarrymort’s obsessive relationship. And, the pairing can be written with paradoxically imbalanced power dynamics despite their “equal” status.

“And either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives...”

Oh, would you look at that — predestined enemies, fatal tragedy, and more. It’s quite poetic, really. Imagine falling in love with your worst enemy in this scenario. For Voldemort, the prophecy ascertained Harry’s status as a threat to his greatest goal of immortality, which would make a romantic pairing between the two into a very emotionally charged concept. And for Harry, he would have already experienced pain for loving a creature defined by an inability to love, and this prophecy line would have been the final nail in the coffin. 

III. Fanfiction application

A. Sheer variety

Tomarrymort fics span across a wild spectrum. You can scroll just a couple fics down and go from a soul-crushing tale of beautiful angst to a gentle coffeeshop AU. There’s something for everyone here!

B. Depth

The nature of the pairing usually requires a good deal of buildup or context, and it can be pretty intense or achingly soft. Regardless, you’re guaranteed to get quite the vividly emotional experience. 

IV. Conclusion

Generally speaking, there are too many reasons in canon and in fanfiction application that make Tomarrymort amazing. The community itself is also so lovely, and I found some of my greatest friends here. Give the pairing a try if you’d like, and cheers to happy fandom experiences!

(If you’ve read this far, kudos to you! Check me out on ao3, where I write sometimes! Or yell at me on twitter.)

[katehuntington]

Title: Ride With Me (part six) Fandom: Supernatural AU Characters series: Reader, Dean Winchester, Bobby Singer, Ellen Singer-Harvelle, Jo Singer (Harvelle), Benny Lafitte, Ash Miles, Garth Fitzgerald IV, Castiel Novek, and many more. Timeline: 2008 Pairing: Dean x Reader (eventually) Word count: ±1900 words Summary series: Y/N is a talented horse rider who is on her way to become a professional. In order to convince her father that she deserves the loan needed to start her own farm, she goes to Arizona for six months, to intern at a ranch owned by Bobby and Ellen Singer. Her future is set out, but then she meets a handsome horseman, who goes by the name of Dean Winchester. A heartwarming series about a cowboy who falls for the girl, letting go of the past and the importance of family.  Summary part six: Y/N is getting lost in the feelings that she’s developing for Dean, and it doesn’t take long before Jo takes notice. Warnings series: NSFW, 18+ only! Fluff, angst, eventually smut. Swearing, smoking, alcohol intoxication, alcohol abuse. Mutual pining, heartbreak. Crying, nightmares, childhood trauma. Description of animal abuse, domestic violence, mentions of addiction. Financial problems, stress, mental breakdown. Description of blood and injury, hospital scenes, character death, grief. Music: Check out ‘Kate Huntington’s Ride With Me playlist’ on Spotify! Author’s note: Thank you @kittenofdoomage and @girl-with-a-fandom-fettish for helping me. You girls are awesome betas.

Ride With Me Masterlist

     Okay, maybe the tequila last night wasn’t such a good idea. Neither was that margarita the previous night, or the drinking game the night before that one. Or was it the other way around? Y/N cannot seem to recall, but today is Friday, so at least tomorrow she can sleep her way through the headache. Never ever did she drink as much as she did this week. Normally that would bother her, especially considering she’s not here on Spring break. But when the drinks are offered in a time when she needs a little something to stop thinking about that damned Dean Winchester, she couldn't care less about the increase of alcohol consumption.

     She found the balance quite quickly, too. Intoxicated enough to let go of the complexity that comes with growing fondness of the head wrangler, but sober enough to stop herself from doing anything stupid. The consequence is, however, that on this morning ride, her brain feels like it’s trying to expand beyond the size of her head. Thank God her stomach isn't acting up, because Joplin is trotting under her nervously. Seems like Y/N is having trouble finding the ‘walk’ button this early. The hot-blooded mare fails to respond when her rider asks her to slow down by saying ‘ho’ with a calm voice, but when Y/N breathes out, relaxes her legs, and shifts deeper in the saddle only by a fraction of an inch, the black horse transitions to walk.

     “Good girl,” Y/N compliments her.

     Three days without riding were more than she could handle. Meadow needed some time to recover from the long journey and to get used to her new home, but Y/N needed to restrain herself from climbing on the mare’s back anyway. She imagined this was a glimpse of what it would be like to kick an addiction cold turkey, going into withdrawal from the lack of her drug. As if not being able to train her own horse wasn't enough, it took another extra day before Y/N got onto any horse at all. It wasn't until yesterday morning that the supervisor decided that she deserved a shot at proving herself as a wrangler. She had to earn that by mucking, shit scooping, cleaning tack, and turning horses in and out. Which she gets, of course. Dean and Bobby wanted to see what she is made of before they let her ride one of their animals. But boy, was she frustrated. She even got to the point that Garth almost caught her muttering a promise to herself that if she had to clean up some horse’s massive dump one more time without a reward, she would be out of here.

     Yesterday she finally got to accompany a few guests on a trail. It was amazing to feel the horse move under the saddle again, the experience of the communication that she established within a second, and how the perfect fit on his back felt like home. Apparently, she did well, because on this morning ride, she is allowed to come along too.

     Content, she looks ahead at the large group of inexperienced riders, who find their way down the hill with some difficulty. The respect Y/N holds for the trail horses has grown, because their patience and ability to keep their clumsy passengers in the saddle hasn't ceased to amaze her. Bruce, a draft horse mix, has halted several times already, waiting motionless until his overweight German load has pulled himself back into the saddle after slowly tipping to one side. It's quite entertaining to watch.

     As she smiles at what’s playing out in front of her, the sound of hoofsteps close by on the rocky surface reaches her hearing. When she glances over her shoulder, a beautiful buckskin is just about to transition to an easy walk after catching up. Her eyes glide up until they meet his rider.

     “So, how are you this morning?” Dean wonders, a playful smile on his face.      It takes a short moment for her to answer, taken aback by her body’s response to the sight of the wrangler. A whirlwind starts to twist in her stomach, yet the headache suddenly doesn't seem as tormenting as it was a minute ago.      “I'm okay,” she claims.      He grins. “Sure about that? You had quite a few drinks last night.”      “I can handle myself,” she returns defensively, narrowing her eyes at him a little.      “Oh, I’m sure you can.”

     He chuckles, the warm and low sound rumbling deep in his throat triggering Y/N to peek at him from the corner of her eye. Was that a nervousness she detected? Did she just make him uneasy? He looks down, his lips drawn in a small smile. The sun from the east outlines the sharp lines of his jaw, edged by a scruff; apparently he didn't take the time to shave this morning. Boy, is she glad he didn’t.

     “Okay, I'll admit,” she says, trying to take away his insecurities. “My stomach might be a little… unsettled.”      Y/N isn’t lying, although alcohol has nothing to do with the butterflies that came to life inside of her. He doesn't know that, thankfully, yet he keeps a hold of his intern’s gaze for a little while longer, reading her. As if Dean’s horse wants to help love a little, the Quarter sways closer to her horse Joplin, the two of them now riding stirrup to stirrup. His knee slightly brushes against hers every other step and despite that it's barely a touch, she’s highly aware of the physical contact.

     “Don't throw up on your horse if you want to leave a good impression with me. Believe me, it ain't pretty,” Dean half jokes, half flirts.      She throws her head back in a laugh. “Don't worry, I won't. But please don't tell me you have seen that happen.”      “More than once, I'm afraid,” he remembers, turning in his saddle to face his younger cousin. “Ey, Jo?”      The blonde cowgirl, who is about thirty yards behind them, throws him a confused look, since she hasn't picked up a word of their conversation. Puzzled, she watches, inducing the riders further up to laughter.      “No way!” Y/N cries out.      “I ain’t kiddin’,” Dean sniggers. “I'll save that story for another time. Y’know, when your stomach isn't ‘unsettled’ by the same tequila that started Jo’s tale.”

     He spurs his horse, who canters forward to meet the group of guests up ahead. She observes Dean as the morning sun portrays the cowboy and his horse in a romantic light. Out here, away from the city, the Arizona landscape would have anyone believe that they traveled back to the time, when the Wild West was still the real deal. Cacti surround them, peculiar mountain peaks shaped by ten thousand years of wind erosion obstruct the far edge of the world. And in this perfect portrait rides a handsome cowboy, one with his horse, clouds of dust in their wake. An amused smile allows a glimpse of Y/N’s true feelings to shine through. There it is again, that tingly sensation in her belly. Sure, Dean. Blame it on the tequila, she thinks to yourself.

     “What the hell was that?”      Now that Dean left his spot next to her, Jo has caught up, gently pulling the reins as she sits back to bring her horse’s pace down.      Feeling caught, Y/N looks at her, brought off balance by the spite in the cowgirl’s voice. “What do you mean?”      “Oh, c’mon, Yankee. I wasn’t born yesterday, and neither were you. You just completed your master in business, don't act like you're stupid,” Jo counters. “You and Dean, what’s going on?”      The cowgirl eyes her in shock, her jaw dropping unpleasantly surprised. Was it really that obvious? How is she going to talk herself out of this one?      “I - I don't--” she stutters, blood rushing to her face. “There - there's nothing--”      She’s not sure if it’s her shameful expression or the fact that she lost her tongue, but Jo knows enough. She closes her eyes and sighs deeply.      “Y/N…” her friend starts, a mixture of disappointment and pity present in her voice. “Please don't go down that road. He will hurt you so bad you're gonna wish you never gone on that flight that got you here.”      Now the intern sighs too. Denying will not do her any good. Jo is smart enough to see right through it.      “Listen, I really like having you around. You're good company, you're a hard worker, you're great with the horses, and I don’t wanna lose my sis,” the ranch owner’s daughter says genuinely. “I would hate to see you leave because of my heartbreaker of a cousin. I've seen this play out so many times already, don't walk into that trap.”      “I think that ship has sailed,” her friend admits out loud.

     The words startle the woman who speaks them just as much as they stun Jo; she didn't intend to share that with her new friend already. But now that the comment is hovering between them without a way to take it back, a part of her is glad it’s out there. Dean has been about the only thing on her mind since she first saw him. Not being able to talk about that with anyone was driving her mad. She needs to vent to someone, someone she can trust.

     Shocked by the bombshell that Y/N just dropped, Jo turns her head to orient her big eyes towards the man in question. That son of a bitch..      “Well, that didn't take long…” The cowgirl shakes her head, then looks her in the eye after her confession. It's clear she feels sorry for her friend. “I'll talk to him.”      “No! Jo, please don't. Look, I didn't forget about your warning and I’m surely not going to act on these... feelings,” she guarantees, barely able to get out the word. “But I can't shut this off. It caught me by surprise as well.”      “He tends to have that effect on women,” Jo mutters.      “I won't do anything stupid,” Y/N assures her.      Jo glances at the intern from under her hat. “Promise?”

     She looks backs at her new friend. Honestly, she isn’t sure if she’s strong enough to resist Dean, but this agreement might help her stick to the plan. The plan to complete her internship successfully and return home to start her own ranch. It's all she ever wanted, it has been her life goal for as long as she can remember. Is she really going to let some cowboy stop her from fulfilling that dream? A very handsome, sweet, and utterly irresistible cowboy, but nonetheless. She will reach for the stars and she will have her wish, nothing will stand in her way, not even him. And so a reassuring smile forms on her lips.

     “I promise.”

Well, the cat’s out of the bag. Thank you for reading. I appreciate every single one of you, but if you do want to give me some extra love, you are free to like or reblog my work, shoot me a message or buy me coffee (Link to Kofi in bio at the top of the page).

Read part seven here

[transrightsjimin]

this might seem like a silly question but do you think tae has been okay this past year? i used to be super into bts 2013-17 and im getting back into them again so ive been watching run bts but he seems so much more quiet than i remember, ive only watched the last maybe 6 eps but i was just wondering do u think hes just tired or is this something thats been consistent? idk how to phrase my question properly i hope you understand

i dont want to psychoanalyze him too much (and have already been accused of doing so nd been attacked bc i once said i relate to him a lot in terms of my autism nd that seeing him makes me happy but. whatever lol) so i’ll just go by what he shared w us nd what is known. i’ve been a fan since 2014 and knew the group since 2013 so i will share what i know and read throughout the years. i hope my answer is a bit more helpful than the quora pages where people ask something similar to your ask (but with infantilizing nd ableist language instead) but in the end, i don’t know him nd just go by interviews and past observations.

Taehyung has shared w fans that he has been feeling depressed the past year and dealt w sleeping problems, which i think he has mentioned in a few times but the first one i can think of is in his interview in Weverse magazine, where he discusses how tired and down he’s felt in 2020. He also explains his thoughts behind the song Blue & Grey, which is meant to comfort people in that sort of headspace. while i think he has become more quiet over the years in general, you can def see his mood change the past year. as a side note, i notice the same about the other members when watching old concerts and such. they put a lot of effort and energy into activities they could do lately but i was still really caught off guard seeing how much more happy and excitable they all looked when in front of a real audience. which is all understandable of c bc as they noted before, an audience recharges their energy of course.

i thought he had become generally more reserved over the years, even before 2020. fans have speculated it is because his grandmother (who raised him for 10+ years nd whom he had a great bond w) had passed away and he has even received a lot of hate for expressing at a show that she died as he was portrayed as ‘attention seeking‘. a good friend of him also died by suicide in 2017 and in 2018 his grandfather died. these deaths are some of the possible reasons he might be looking less excitable.

in bts festa 2019 the members talk about how much more taehyung has matured over the years, e.g. being more mindful of others. Tae adds that he changed his mind on what happiness means for him, as he used to think it meant when everything was great for him, but later on he realized that it made him most happy when all members are happy together and when he sees the positive in things. so there’s a part of maturity there in terms of being less careless / stubborn / free-spirited, even if (as the members state) that is also what used to draw in fans back in the day because he drew attention in shows.

so it’s not per se bad he became more quiet / reserved and less stubborn as it helps be mor considerate of other ppl and he reflected on how he could make the most out of difficult situations.

i’m not sure if it was him too but members have mentioned in songs and interviews (I thought also Jimin did so in the same festa but i couldn’t find the moment quickly) that many people have tried to get close to them, just because they found them interesting for their fame but not care for them. the group has become more critical to such interests and cut off people who mistreated their openness. this might not per se be the whole reason for him smiling less or a reason at all, but his character did change over the years.

it might be important to add that his character / vibe (which i will rather refer to as autistic traits than any of the ableist language people online use :S ) is what drew a lot of negative attention by netizens, such as when he mentioned his grandma on tv, or when he cried on mama 2018 stage, or when he mouthed along to a song when they won an award in 2015. him just being goofy and happy were falsely flagged as misbehaviour in controversies caused by (then) larger fandoms that tried to undermine bts.

i am in no way saying Taehyung is the only one targeted or anything. i actually really hate that framework considering all of bangtan have been targeted by hate nd went through hard times mentally as a whole. and there is a HUGE issue recently within the fandom, where solo stans of tae have been popping up, who pretend bangtan mistreats tae and that he needs to go solo. which is just insulting considering he keeps emphasising they are a group /family and that he wants people to care for all of them and not just one. what i meant to say instead is that his behaviour has changed a lot bc it has been criticized a lot.

and as a final note i want to say that it is not particularly unnatural for Tae to be more quiet / depressed / reserved. i remember that early on in my army days, either in early 2014 or early 2015, Tae was not active on social media and generally more reclusive to the public for several months in a row. then too, people speculated he was tired or overwhelmed or depressed and idk if that is true, he was just less present to the public, but i meant to address that in the past too he could be more quiet or reserved at times so it’s not completely new or different for him to be more in the background. which is totally ok and in this case, we know he is more down and why. i dont think the members are obligated to talk to us about their mental or physical health, but i do appreciate them speaking up anyway bc it is very reassuring nd opens up healthy conversations.

TLDR; tae’s personality and public persona did change over the years, for both bad and good reasons, but morever it is true that he struggled w being depressed and w sleeping problems (as he himself discussed). the pandemic doesn’t help those issues.

i hope this answers your question?

i ended up still going WAY in to depth and speculating but i tend to ramble and look up links to support stuff i remember jfhgk sorry about the long answer, i always forget where im going once im typing. my answer already feels too much like psychoananalyzing him and im not a fan who disect a picture of e.g. a member smiling / looking somewhere / not smiling and writing a whole essay on his thoughts or traumas or whatnot behind it. so i hope i didn’t come off as going that route. ^^;

[des8pudels8kern]

Ooh marriage of convenience and royalty au?

You failed to give me any characters to go with this, so I decided to pick some myself. I hope you enjoy your Aubreyad marriage of convenience royalty AU!

------------

The two high-set windows, each the size of both his hands put together, allowed a limited view of the sky, and with that provided Jack’s main source of diversion during his involuntary utilization of French hospitality. They allowed him to follow the passage of light and day and, by these same, tell the time, albeit not with the same accuracy as if he’d stood on the deck of a ship, able to gauge the exact position of the sun. He also tried his hand at predicting the turns of the weather, through observation of sky colour, cloud formation, humidity and air pressure, though, again, his accuracy was limited by his current unfortunate circumstances.

Steps disrupted his assessment of the cirrostratus clouds drifting slowly past.

It was not yet the time for lunch, and the tablet on which his breakfast had been delivered would not be retrieved until then. This meant a visit, either to one of his neighbors, or to him. And, while he did not know what other poor souls had been unfortunate to be caught out in the middle of France of all places when war was declared and ended up detained, he hadn’t noticed any door other than his own being opened outside of mealtime. Not for the first time he was grateful for his travel companion’s particular background; as much as Stephen’s occasional disdainful remarks on the monarchy and lack of patriotism cut at times, were he a fellow Englishman, he undoubtedly would have been locked up same as Jack, and they would not have seen each other since.

But he was not, and indeed the steps came to a halt outside of Jack’s door, followed by the clink of keys, and shortly after Stephen’s dear, familiar face peeked in through the door, quickly followed by the rest of him.

The guard stood watching as Stephen crossed through the room in quick steps to stand in front of Jack, grasping his hands between his own.

“Jack,” he said, “acushla, how have you been? You look pale. How is your appetite?”

Stephen himself looked drawn, his face pallid and dark circles beneath his eyes, and moved with a frantic, feverish energy. Still, the room seemed brighter for having him in it, and Jack smiled down at his friend with a tenderness that was not merely for the guard’s sake.

“I am well, my plum. Worry not for my sake.”

Stephen searched his face, and then, satisfied for the moment, continued in their script.

“Come, sit, sit. You, monsieur,” he addressed the guard still standing at the door, all the while herding Jack over to the narrow bed, the only piece of furniture in the room and thus the only thing capable of serving as a seat, “Privacy, please. You have escorted me in, and you may escort me out again in an hour, but you have no claim to the time I spend here.”

The guard watched them sink down onto the bed next to each other, thighs touching and shoulders brushing, scandalously close for a supposedly affianced couple, but understandably so for one with one of the betrothed imprisoned as a prisoner of war. Jack, despite the impotence of his current circumstances, glared at the man, insulted by his leering at their joined hands and close position, and finally the door closed and the steps moved from their room.

They listened for a moment to assure themselves of their privacy, and then turned towards each other.

Audience gone, there was no further need for such proximity, yet Jack could not bring himself to shift away. Stephen, for reasons that were his own, did not either. Instead he reached into his coat and pulled out the by now familiar cloth, wrapped into which were a crust of bread, sausage, and some cheese. He topped this off with a small apple retrieved from his breeches, and pushed the lot of it onto Jack’s lap.

“Here, eat, Jack. Eat, and tell me, how are you really?”

Hungry enough to be grateful for these additions to his meagre rations, which would be hard-pressed to sate a man of Stephen’s stature, and feeling damned useless, but there was nothing to be done about that, not when Stephen’s shoulders had bent with worry months ago when they had gotten news of the impending war and not straightened once since. “I am well, truly, my dear. Do not concern yourself on my account,” he said, reaching out to pat Stephen’s bony leg, and then going for the sausage.

“Your account is all I concern myself with.” A long breath, and Stephen retrieved a letter from his breast pocket. “You remember that I had written to the Spanish ambassador on our behalf?”

“Of course. That was the entire reason why you suggested we become engaged, was it not? The hope that, my betrothment to one of King Charles’ subjects would outweigh my rank in His Majesty’s navy and I’d be allowed to accompany you to Spain.” It had at least granted him the privilege of these daily visits from his friend, which were even more invaluable to his morale than for his stomach.

“Yes, indeed.” Stephen licked his lips, and he unfolded the papers, straightening them and worrying the fold cutting them in half.

Jack glanced at the pages, but made no effort to decipher the scribblings on them. He stood no chance to understand the words, but the meaning he could guess, had guessed from the beginning of this enterprise.

“It was only ever a fleeting chance, brother. Oh, a clever idea, and damned quick thinking, to have come up with it there on the spot,” he assured, “but this was to be expected.”

Stephen set to say something, but Jack barreled on.

“Stephen, I wish to express my gratitude, for your trying. And your visits, and this,” he gestured to the napkin in his lap, “Your presence has been a blessing, truly. I couldn’t have wished for a better companion to be arrested with. But it was only ever a chance, now there is nothing else to do, and I would understand, that is, I would think it the most sensible course of action if you were to depart for Spain alone. Who knows how this war will turn, and I would not have you locked up in one of the rooms beside me, merely because you did not leave when you had the chance.” The bread crumbled in his fingers, but he could not have swallowed the smallest bite past the lump in his throat.

“Oh, Jack, Jack, no!” Stephen’s hands stilled his own, then one rose up and cupped his cheek. “Acushla, no, none of that! Look at me now, dear: it worked!”

Jack’s head snapped up in disbelief, dislodging Stephen’s hand.

“It worked?”

“We must marry first, of course. The priest will be here within the hour – not a word! I do not give a fig what you believe or not, but you will act the happy convert to Catholicism when he arrives, let me explain that you’ve seen the error of your ways and just not along, and not breathe one word that could endanger this marriage until we’ve crossed the border, you hear?”

“I, yes, yes, of course! I wouldn’t dream of it!” His heart soared. He did not care to think himself such a coward that he would deny his faith to regain his freedom when his countrymen stayed behind, but the mere thought of having to remain here, alone, without the balm of Stephen’s presence, had left him desolate already, and it had taken all his self-control to put forward the suggestion.

Stephen, though, still worried at the pages of the letter.

“Where is your joy, brother? Your gamble has paid off; we will be free to go within the hour, will we not?” He lifted a hand to Stephen’s face, mirroring his earlier gesture, and peered into his eyes. “Come now, Stephen, what is the matter? Is it the war? Bad news from home?”

“No, dear, no, fret not. All is well.” Stephen smiled at him, wanly. “Merely that you were right. The ambassador would not have been likely to interfere on the behalf of just any of Carlos’ subjects, nor would the French have seen reason to give in to the demand.”

He wet his lips, gaze darting around the room before settling back on Jack.

“I have talked to you of the circumstances of my birth, Jack. That my father was serving in the Spanish army when he met my mother, and of my illegitimate birth. But now you must know, my dear, that it was my mother’s family who did not approve of the connection, not my father’s.”

Stephen had talked of this, yes; always in moments of weakness, and in short words. The topic was sensitive, Jack understood, and he tried to convey as much by nodding at his friend and humming supportively.

“You see,” Stephen’s lips stretched in that same feeble smile again, “we have never met, but Carlos IV is my cousin. Third cousin, once removed. But the connection exists.”

Jack blinked. He felt utterly flabbergasted, but refused to show it.

“Is that how you came to be in possession of a castle?”

That horrid smile on Stephen’s face stretched into something more real, and a croaking laugh escaped him.

“Yes, my dear. That is how I came to be in possession of a castle.”

Jack smiled back at him, and noted with satisfaction that the weight on Stephen’s shoulders seemed to finally have lifted.

------------

Day 10 of my 500 words challenge! 1597 words today. And a return to an old, old fandom. I haven’t read any Aubreyad, canon or fanfic, in, oh, surely a decade at least, so my fannish sea legs and familiarity with POB’s writing are long gone. Also, I am operating in an AU where same-sex marriages were apparently a thing during the Napoleonic era, so I think we have already reached an area where we are operating with suspended disbelief.

[ukrainian-psycho]

i find it hard to put it in words but I'll try

so ever since I joined tumblr, the blogs (I'm talking about the ones run by single individual/ non-corporate) could be categorized as personal, fandom, aesthetic, creator's blog, political/social justice, memes and shitposts, etc., most of them being a mix of a few of those. these were the blogs I followed, depending on my interests. my own blog has been personal/memes/random stuff for the last couple of years. but what Ive noticed recently is that pretty much every blog has gotten much more political. you can go to some pink aesthetic or anime fandom or shitpost blogs and you will see them reblogging posts on the world issues/social justice, if op doesn't have much to add on their own, the posts are at least reblogged in solidarity, to affirm that you are of the same opinion, to spread the message further. and like, it's not a bad thing, it's good that more people are concerned with what is happening around them, so concerned that it's not even "usually I don't reblog posts like these but signal boost, guys", so much more young people are interested in politics because they have been seeing the direct affect of it on their lives, we reblog and post about politics and sOcIeTy just as about any other event in our lives, we're so involved. and this post is not about if reblogging counts as activism and if there's a point to it at all, it's not about that. I'm just trying to say that right now it seems like every single blog is to some degree political (I just don't know a better word). politics vary, you'd see people talk and reblog info about stuff they are most concerned about. personally I am a sad person and while I read articles and check out on world news from other sources, I try to not talk about it on my blog because I am here for shits and laughs. but still, still! there would be some post about sexism, or racism, or something about my home country that I just can't not share, it resonates within me too much. and I'm not mad at all when some seemingly light hearted blog I followed for memes or pretty art posts about politics that concern the op, I totally get it! this rant is not to critisize tumblr userbase, I'm just sharing my observation. I will lie if I say I don't miss the times when you could just filter the tag "politics" and you'd me more or less sure you won't see as much upsetting stuff on your dash. I have so many words and tags filtered to not see shit about capitalism or bezos because I'm sick and tired of hearing about it but it just doesn't help! I still see so many posts related to it because it is no longer a specific interest of some tumbler users, it's a part of life of everyone on here! I don't know. for years I've been using tumblr as my "morning newspaper" and it's always been a shitty one but it's now specifically that I feel like managing your feed to try to shield yourself from the constant flow of upsetting information is futile. like sure, I consider myself well-read on some issues and there's certainly some world stuff or social issues thay is the most personal to me and such I keep on track with what's going on but I also feel like in the past 7 years of living with depression my level of universal dread has only increased and I want to be a selfish bitch for once and not care about some boo hoo bullshit that is happening somewhere on the other side of the globe. which is hard. because you see everyone caring, constantly. don't know. world has changed and it changed people and because it changed people the tumblr has changed. it's not worse, it's just different now. maybe tumblr is just not the best shits and laughs website to be on anymore. but where else I'd go.

[alsklingwille]

-fandom culture, cancel culture, expectations that fans have for the celebrities that we stan:

(some things ive observed and learned from being in fandoms for over 10 years)

///

Being in a fandom and being on the internet in general gives us fans so much access to the rest of the world and it’s beautiful!! we are constantly learning new things about social justice every single day and we are automatically more educated and progressive then the general public. I can’t tell you the amount of things I have learned from Tumblr and Twitter alone that people in my life had no idea about until years later.

But the way we learn new things is important to highlight because it typically happens in the form of someone else making a post to inform and educate the public on a bad thing they’ve experienced or noticed that they wish people would stop doing. the fault is rarely within ourselves so when we process that, it’s easy for is to learn from it and pass along that education to others.

But ive noticed with a lot of celebrities (usually those who are disconnected from social media) the most common way they learn something is when THEY make a mistake and are held accountable for it. Holding people accountable is extremely important and must be done especially if they have a platform and could be spreading harmful things without knowing. But what this means more often than not their education comes in the form of criticism rather than unbiased education, so they have that extra layer of feeling like they did something wrong. Which naturally makes anyone panic, let alone if you have a huge educated audience watching you and making conclusions while you’re still trying to process it.

It’s very natural for a person in this position to want to defend themselves or at the very least explain why they did the wrong thing in the first place. Because this is way easier to do for them since they are the ones that have fingers pointed at them. In that moment, we want them to just admit that they’re wrong and move on from it because we love them and want them to understand like we do, but it’s more difficult to immediately do this because it’s a learning process. Some celebs can totally jump straight here without getting defensive because they are able to surpass the blame and focus on where they went wrong. And for others, it’s more difficult to ignore the blame. That doesn’t mean they’re bad people or unwilling to listen and learn, it just means they need more time to get there.

Growth takes time, we are given so much time to learn things cause we’re not in the spotlight. When celebs are learning, they have the entire fandom looking at them waiting for them to say the right thing in that moment right there. Sure that comes with the territory of being a celeb, but as a fan i think its important to be mindful of the differences between us fans who spend a lot of time learning from each other and celebs who may be more disconnected so that we allow time for growth. If you are willing to educate someone you love, I think that’s awesome and admirable because it can take a lot out of you! In addition to learning how to educate with a level-head and calm presence, let’s also remember that the process takes time and we should be patient.

If someone isn’t willing to learn in that moment, then you tried your best. At the very least, you’ve planted a seed that will make them think twice in the future! But if someone finally gets there and does admit that they learned from it, please accept it! Don’t write off their admittance because of their learning process and how they got there, regardless of how messy it was. The most important thing is that people can learn from each other and in return teach others.

[littlemeowmeowschimmy]

Isabella [Namjoon x Reader]

Requests opened // m.list 

Genre: Cute // Fluff 

Summary:  Hi im new to your page, ive read everything in the past few days[stalker much], and i normally never request anything but i really enjoyed your writing so i was wondering if you could do a BTS reaction or head canon: The reader is Latina/American and has a baby daughter and shes hesitant abt dating but she sees how sweet they are with her (sorry if its to specific, i have a 6 month old babygirl and i rarely see stuff abt teen moms or single moms

A/N: Aww sweetie, thank you so much. It means the world to me that you like my writing. That’s so adorable that you’re a mom, I love that this fandom is so diverse. I’ll be happy to give you a little headcanon :)  

“How’s Bella doing?” a soft voice asked from the bedroom door. You didn’t even glance back at him because you knew Namjoon’s eyes were on you. He came over when you texted him about Isabella having a small fever. She was your first child, and you really didn’t know what to do. Of course, you had your family around, but sadly most of them were on vacation. The only person you could have called happened to be your best friend, Namjoon. Thankfully, he had today off, so he came over as soon as possible. 

You held Isabella in your arms, her small fingers curled around your shirt as her tummy pressed against your breast. Her ear was right above your beating heart. The soft pounds of it sending her into overdrive as she fell asleep rather quickly. Her body still felt warm to the touch, but not as bad as before. When you finally turned around, Namjoon noticed that Isabella was fast asleep. In this observation, he put his hands up as to silently apologize and take a step backward. 

After a few moments of small squirming, you set Isabella on her back. She lied down in her little bassinet, fists still clenched from before. You grazed some of her beautiful locks out of her eyes and pulled the baby monitor close. Then, you carefully removed yourself from the bedroom, keeping the door open. Pushing some strands of hair aside, you finally were able to answer Namjoon’s question from before. 

“I called her doctor, and she told me to give her some medicine.” You mentioned placing the monitor beside you on the couch, your eyes moving back and forth from it as you sat next to Namjoon. 

Today, he wore something rather simple. Considering that his fashion tastes were all over the place, you were a little shocked to see him in his outfit. He had a rather sizeable pink jumper on with black jeans. His large hands were hiding in the sleeves as it seemed like he was cold. Today, his hair wasn’t gelled back or even styled like it usually would be. Instead, his long bangs fell over his eyebrows, and his hair was bleached blond. 

“I’m assuming you’re getting ready to go back to America?” You questioned, leaning back against the armrest of the couch. You didn’t want to spend too much time talking about Isabella, considering that he probably didn’t want to hear you gush about her. If only you knew that Namjoon loved it whenever you poured about Bella. He loved it, especially when you brought her to the studio for everyone to coo over. 

Namjoon pushed past the question, leaning in and grabbing the monitor. His eyes watched as Isabella moved slightly to the right. A faint smile spread across his lips, and you were tempted to reach out and touch them. Little did Namjoon know you had a crush on him, one that was kind of obvious to those looking inward. But you really weren’t interested in a relationship right now. The reason being was you had Isabella to think of. 

After her father ditched, you were left to raise her on your own. Your family moved out to Seoul a little over five years ago, and you had become friends with Namjoon through the process. You watched his group grow, and you supported him throughout his journey. However, he was more of a father to Isabella than her birth father ever could be. 

“I don’t want to leave for America if Bella isn’t alright,” Namjoon mentions moving his head back up to glance at you. With his beautiful big eyes, he stares back. A look of concern filling him as he watches you shift uncomfortably under his gaze. You bit the bottom of your lip, turning your head just a little to the side. Then proceeding to reach out and snatch the monitor from him. 

Just so that you could look into it without looking at him. “My doctor said that if I keep giving her the medicine that I picked up,” you proceed. “That she would be fine within a couple of days.” you finish watching as Isabella moves just a tiny bit from where she was lying. You flash a small smile, watching her chest rise and fall as she was sleeping away her fever. 

You heard Namjoon sighing just a little. If it was a sigh of relief, you didn’t particularly know. Instead, you focused on your baby girl before glancing back up at him. This time, you felt his body shift as he moved inwards. Glancing at you still as his head tilted just a little. He proceeds to flash you a smile, his dimples now showing as you could feel a small surge of blood cover your cheeks. 

“That’s amazing,” he mentions reaching out to graze his fingers across your skin. You shiver slightly, unaware by how much his touch effects you. You couldn’t deny that Namjoon was amazing with Isabella. He was always there when you needed him, still picking up clothes, and even changing diapers for you. He would often come over whenever he had time, take her off your hands for a couple of hours, and make sure you were doing alright. 

You loved how sweet he was with her, but once again, you were hesitant with dating him. You knew that it could have been a great idea too, but with how busy BTS was, it meant that Namjoon would also be. You needed someone who was going to be present in Isabella’s life. Not someone who would show up when he got the time off, or when he just so happened to be in the area. Sighing, you shift yourself off the couch, taking the monitor in your hand as you proceed to move into the kitchen. 

Namjoon didn’t know exactly what to say, as he wanted to lean in and give you a kiss. He felt differently about you and wanted to be there for Isabella. He wanted to be her father, despite not being related to her in any way. He cared about you both and wanted to see you two thrive. Especially Isabella as she had already stolen his heart. He watches your body move into the kitchen, noting how you started to prepare yourself a small snack as well as grabbing some medicine and other things for her. 

“When do you leave again?” You question unscrewing the top of her bottle and putting the medicine in. You place the container and its content back in the fridge, your body not turning as Namjoon answers. 

“Sunday,” he mentions shifting himself back on the couch. You nod again, bringing your hand back up to your neck. Rubbing it gently as you were debating the possibility to meet him before he left. Sighing, you tilted your head downwards, your hands grasping the edge of the counter. 

You loved Namjoon, but you didn’t know if you were ready to take the next steps with him. 

[zanykingmentality]

title: the ways we say i love you chapter: 1/1 fandom: avatar pairing: zutara notes: for @goldenclasp and @zutaraexchange summary:

but this is wartime, dearest. only a few make it out alive. 

[ in which katara and zuko mend the breaks. ]

AO3

i.

zuko knows a number of things, like the smell of early-morning dewdrops dripping from leaves, the crimson glow of a fire fueled by rage, and that he is irrevocably in love with a girl who wants nothing to do with him.

he’s learned to track animal prints, and how to distinguish them; he’s learned tears don’t always mean sadness, and eyes full of affection can turn into something so twisted, so brutal, so vicious.

his mother told him, once, that love is a choice. love is being together after quarreling and spitting angry words, and love is dangerous dance that neither ever learned the steps to. improvise, zuko, and you’ll make it. he’s not sure when it became less about love and more about heartbreak, or survival, but his mother has always had a way of making things fit.

when he was too selfish to listen or understand, his uncle told him love isn’t anything. pure love is unconditional and selfless; that’s all. he said love is something we define for ourselves.

zuko has never thought much of love. and, even if he had, he would have thought love was a distraction, or something he couldn’t ever achieve.

he never thought about the way it could feel to imagine someone’s fingers intertwined in his, someone’s life intertwined in his. until he does, dreaming beside a crackling fire, and the reality of it is like a slap in the face.

to a scarred boy with nothing to call his own, love is a daydream. love is a fantasy. it is not, was not, a reality.

love has no place in war.

(still, he remembers kindness and the feel of her cool fingers against his scar. he doesn’t let anyone touch it. but she did.

somehow it feels right, that it should be her. even though he knows it’s not.)

he shifts in the dark and stares at twinkling lights centuries above him. they sparkle despite everything; they are a constant in a world that has known only injustice for far too long.

and he starts to think, no, love isn't for him. maybe what he's mistaken as love is a reaction, a normal emotion stemming from a super-charged moment surrounded by crystals and loneliness. until he sees her again the next morning, and the glare she shoots him makes his heart unexpectedly pound in his chest.

he knows her narrowed eyes and piercing gaze like the back of his hand, by now. he knows her mistrust and doesn't blame her for it.

but he also knows her soft smile when she cares, the fluid movements of her arms when she waterbends, the way she sleeps without moving, like she's ready to spring into battle at the slightest noise. he knows the ever-present fear in the back of her eyes, and how her expression is almost always guarded and unreadable.

this is wartime, and she was not born a soldier, but she was forced to be one. he knows he had a hand in that.

he has many regrets. but he will make them right again.

.

ii.

katara doesn’t expect zuko to understand. it was his people that took her mother away; how would he know that any kindness she offered him was like disrespecting the circumstances of her mother’s death? she extended to him an olive branch, once, and it turned out to be the worst mistake she’s made. to put trust in someone who rips it apart. to try to help someone who tears her apart.

she ignores his eyes over the fire. the temple is cold and drafty, and she knows zuko is warm, but she’s entirely unwilling to meet him with anything but scorn.

deep within her, she still feels some kind of call to him, some kind of siren song that pulls her toward him. it makes her body tingle with rage and something she doesn’t want to name, something that makes the anger in her even greater. katara tries her best to be a calm and parenting figure, but zuko… zuko.

so she’s surprised when he comes back with suki in tow. she’s surprised he didn’t sell her brother over to the highest bidder at the first possible chance. it’s not enough to trust him yet, but enough to make her think. she’s even more surprised when he helps sneak her out to the general who’d had her mom killed.

even more so when zuko stands back and lets her decide if she should kill. if blood should be on her hands, too. she drops the water around her and turns back to zuko, ready for the day-long flight ahead of them.

this is when she begins trusting him again.

she lets him help her collect food and water and overlooks the way his hand accidentally brushes hers as they walk. she’s not ready for the idea of it being intentional yet.

if zuko is a star she is the rest of night: inky darkness and silvery moonlight. she decides she doesn’t mind it so much.

.

iii.

being friends with katara is nothing like zuko imagined it would be. then again, he wouldn't let himself indulge in those kinds of fantasies much before he actually re-earned her trust; no point in entertaining thoughts that went straight to the pangs in his heart, anyway. they both wake early and sleep late, careful of the rise and fall of moonshine and sunlight, like a dance they tiptoe around together. they spar sometimes at night and in the morning, and they're evenly matched, depending on the time of day.

she opens up to him slowly. first it's a thank-you for helping her find closure. then it's the feel of her hand in his on appa’s back. as romantic as it feels to zuko, it's not meant like that; he knows it's katara’s way of being supportive, of understanding that he's left everything behind for their motley crew of teenagers and a cause to destroy the father he once wished could love. he doesn’t try to read between the lines of her palm.

he could, though. he could torture himself like that. he could let his dreams run away from him and imagine too much too early. she’s not obligated to like him at all, zuko feels lucky every time she doesn’t forcibly oust him from camp ━

then he jolts awake with the ghost of lips on his. his traitorous subconscious shows him scenes he can only wish become real.

by the time they’re safely on ember island, zuko’s hope has been only slightly rekindled. the girl-turned-warrior he’s fallen in love with still has a soft streak to her, like low tide, such a contrast from her sharp ice-rain. that morning after he’s tossed and turned for hours, he finally sits up. katara looks over at him.

“feeling alright?” she asks.

zuko rubs his head. “yeah, i think.”

she’s already finished making breakfast, is sharpening knives of ice using a rigid stone. the small smile on her fast juxtaposes the violent scraping of rock on ice.

“you look like you haven’t slept,” katara observes.

“i was thinking,” zuko says.

“penny for your thoughts?”

zuko stands and sits next to her on the steps, resting his elbows on his knees. “i just… i have my doubts. who knows how all this is going to end.”

katara nods but says nothing, pausing mid-scrape. she drops her tools and takes zuko’s hand, reassuring in her calm, steady grip. nothing like his hands that tremble as he combs them through his short hair. they sit for a while, resting, until the others wake up.

.

iv.

the ember island players are arguably the best part of their time on the island, but that’s not saying much. there was only one thing that the play got right: growing feelings, at least on zuko’s part. as they trudge back to camp, he can’t help but notice more acutely the slope of katara’s shoulders, the way she ushers them all along, the mother hen of the group.

he notices, over the next few days, the soft smiles that come to her face when she’s content, the stressed furrow of her brows, the slight downturn of her unimpressed mouth. he notices her mouth a lot.

but they are warriors, bred to hurt and kill, taught by powers beyond their control to hate and fight and never surrender. zuko only learns the true meaning of surrender when she stares into his eyes for a brief moment, affection in the undertones of her stunning blue eyes.

they’re alone one night when zuko finally begins to break. he looks at her lips for a beat too long, and katara notices. he’s afraid she’ll pull away from him immediately, terminate the friendship they’ve been growing ever since the abandoned air temple ━ but she doesn’t. katara’s eyes flit down over his mouth, his chest, back up to his eyes. she smirks like a challenge.

“is it okay,” zuko asks, “if i kiss you?”

“i was starting to think you’d never ask,” katara murmurs.

for once, zuko does not hesitate. he presses his mouth to hers quickly; heat overcomes the simmering fire in his veins, and he feels the cool touch of her water when she reaches up and splays her fingers along his cheek. he pulls her toward him with an arm around her waist, reveling in this, the intoxicating, beautiful feel of katara and zuko.

.

v.

when all is said and done, they move to the fire nation. katara wanders with wide eyes around peacetime festivals, no longer trying to reconcile the three versions of the fire nation she now knows: a band of cruel murders, a desolate people in search of hope, and a rowdy crowd filled to the brim with enthusiasm.

zuko links his arm through hers and pulls her toward a stand selling strange, blue drinks for a coin a cup. in the time that comes, he will be passing laws and treaties and orders to get the fire nation back on his feet. but zuko knows, he will not be alone. he takes a sip of sparkling blue magic and looks at the girl at his side, dressed now in red with the stab of her blue eyes. he sees katara and she sees him.

some say the love between them could only have lasted during the war. when they were both soldiers, fighting for the same cause. but zuko and katara both agree ━ the real story starts here.

[btsandvmin]

u really think vm is real? iv been shipping vm(romantically) for more then 2 years now not only vm i have shipped every ship in maknae line and tbh there was not even a single day when i thought vm can be real(also bcoz i dont wanna get my hopes high)i mean i have seen ur list of things which makes u think vm is real but other ships have those too they have stronger evidence then us viminers i am also open minded but i really cant see anything btw vm i jst ship them bcoz of their special bond

Thank you for the ask, it’s not a simple ask, but I tried my best to answer it. Sorry if it got a bit long.

First of all I think the list you mention is my “10 Reasons to ship Vmin”, which is not a list of proof for Vmin being real, but rather of reasons to why you can ship them romantically. Something people can do no matter if they are real or not, and which I personally think Vmin have enough chemistry for. I just don’t personally understand why Vmin’s moments would be so much more “just friends” compared to moments between other ships, so I made that post to show that there are moments that make Vmin ship-worthy as well. That being said, if you don’t see any possible romantic or sexual spark between Jimin and Taehyung and just like their bond there is nothing wrong with that. I am not here to make people believe in Vmin.

So, do I really think Vmin is real?

A short answer to this question is no, I do not believe that Vmin is real, as in that I believe they are in a relationship. But I do think there is a possibility that they are. I know Vmin love each other, but I don’t claim to know how. As an outsider that is impossible for me or anyone else to know unless they state it clearly themselves. Something they would likely never do even if they are in a relationship because of their situation and homophobic culture.

The most likely thing is that no ship is real. Just imagine what a risk it would be to themselves and their brand. There might be attraction, but I think it would take a lot for that to be turned into action and even more for it to turn into a relationship in the sense how most of us perceive the word. Personally I think being in a relationship that you would have to hide like that, and just not being straight in the first place would come with a lot of hurt and stress. In that way it would maybe be better if no ship was real. I don’t know, so basically I just try to stay grounded because there are many possibilities and too many unknown factors for me to come to a firm conclusion.

The same goes for Ji/kook and Tae/kook or any other ship, within our outside of the group, straight or non-straight. They could be real, but I don’t know. However I think some ships have potential to be real, and they aren’t equally likely based on what I can observe and my own interpretations. But interpretations aren’t something you can trust to 100% either. Basically, completely believing a ship is real is in my own opinion not something you should do when there is no real “proof”.

I would use the same logic for their sexualities as well, I don’t know so I won’t say anything for certain until they tell us themselves (which is also a bit difficult since it will always be much harder to state not being straight). However I won’t assume they are straight either, I will of course collect info and base my own guesses on what I observe. For example, I think it’s very likely that not all members are straight, especially considering how BTS and Big Hit show a lot of lgbt+ support despite being from Korea (if any group might have their members come out as non-straight it might be BTS). Personally, I think Taehyung and JK has given me the most reason to think they are not straight, while I think Namjoon is at the very least attracted to women. But I could be wrong since it’s just based in my own views and guesses. What I try to do is to keep an open mind, and this goes for most topics. These are real human beings that I don’t know or interact with personally, and people are complex. There could be a million things I miss, either because they don’t want me to see it or because I simply fail to notice. There are just too many missing pieces to come to a definitive conclusion.

And that brings me to the “proof” or “evidence” that shippers tend to talk about. Frankly, I think the fact that you say that two other ships have more evidence than Vmin says a lot. Because if both Ji/kook and Tae/kook has “proof”, that means that unless both are real, that at least some of those things that people see as proof are simply misinterpretations. This goes for every single thing that shippers bring up. There can be a hundred of reasons behind the things they see and find strange that aren’t because two people are romantically or sexually involved. We also assume that if a ship is “real” that that means they are romantically involved, because that is our ideal scenario that we want to see. Even if two or more members are more than friends, they could be friends with benefits, aromantic, asexual etc. there are a lot of different types of relationships that could be the truth.

I’ve been in other fandoms, and there is for example a Japanese idol group that I love and have followed for a really long time. Members of this groups has admitted to kissing while drunk and basically shipping their own members. So even seeing two members kiss could be for other reasons than them being in a romantic relationship. Just think of how many groups there are and how many ships people analyze and believe is real, how high are the odds that all of them really are? Not that high. People see what they want to see, and that will always interfere with a person’s judgement.

That being said, I do think Vmin could be real, based on things I have seen and interpreted myself. That doesn’t automatically erase the possibility of another ship being real though, and I have said before that I personally think that if any ship would be real one of the maknae line pairs would be the most likely. It’s just me personally that weigh my own reasons based on what I have seen that makes me reach the conclusion that Vmin makes the most sense. This is also partially tainted by my own bias, as that is something no shipper can escape. Again, people see what they want to see, and it can be hard to accept things that goes against your own beliefs.

What I don’t agree with is that Tae/kook and Ji/kook has more “evidence”. I don’t like calling it that, but hints or clues isn’t really right either. People have analyzed these ships more, but just because something is popular and get talked about a lot that doesn’t mean it’s the most likely. Vmin has always been a step behind because of their platonic label and that means that people already since years back has gotten it ingrained that they are only platonic. But is there really that much of a difference between the ships? Most of the things that you see in shipping videos all the members of Bangtan do. Sleep together, slap butts, hold hands, hug, say they love each other etc. etc. the list goes on. Using these things as evidence by saying “it just feels different between them” is not evidence to me, this goes for Vmin as well.

These things are too difficult to interpret to use as any type of hard evidence, especially since you see the members do most of these things with others as well. But even if it is exclusive it doesn’t have to mean romantic love or sexual attraction. Heart eyes and jealousy are in my opinion the worst examples of these things because the looks could literally mean anything. Take for example Vmin holding hands, they do this a lot, and unprompted simply because they seem to want to. It makes me squeal to see it, and I love it and think it’s proof of their close bond and love for each other. But I would not say it proves that they are in a relationship together. It could be 100% platonic. It can be a point to make me think it’s more likely but in the end it’s just one thing that might make me lean more in that direction.

So, besides my preference and bias towards Vmin, why do I then think Vmin is more likely compared to other ships? Well, in the only way I can, which is based on my own observations. Which are in turn also dyed by my own preexisting beliefs in how relationships look like and work, which could be completely incorrect since I don’t know how the members of BTS would think about and look at these topics themselves. Especially since their situation is rather extreme and they come from a different culture.

From what I see Vmin still share hotel rooms at least sometimes, they have slipped up before in various ways “Jimin and friends” trying to correct themselves or play it off as a joke and in general seem to be rather careful themselves with how they speak about and too each other. This goes for how the other members talk about them as well. I’ve mentioned Namjoon talking about Vmin “being great friends” a lot, and for me I just think the context of how and when he says these things seems a bit odd at times. I think the fact that everyone keeps saying how Vmin are the closest, how they call each other soulmates and a lot of other examples that come from the members themselves make it less likely for other ships to be real. Because these are things that Vmin doesn’t have to do, but they do them because they want to. I’ve talked about their neediness and how it seems they can’t be apart for too long and other things that could be platonic, but still kind of makes other ships less likely in my own mind. For me the way Vmin behave with each other simply makes me more inclined to think they could potentially be real compared to other ships in the group. I have seen theories for all ships, and I think some are really interesting, but nothing I have seen for any ship has been enough to convince me that it’s real or to make me believe in them more than in Vmin. I have seen things about Vmin that are also weird and interesting to analyze, mostly on my own because as we know there aren’t that many Vmin analysis out there. But the things I have seen still makes me raise my eyebrows sometimes. But I know I could be wrong.

To summarize I think a lot of proof and evidence that people talk about are overrated and often very misleading because how it’s presented. I think that it’s dangerous to stay too focused on only one possibility and be completely certain that what you think is the only answer. I know that Vmin has been underrated and lack the same type of focused investigating that other ships have been subjugated to. In the end all I can really do is take in the things I see and weigh them against each other to come up to likely scenarios in my head and to me Vmin being in a relationship could make sense.

I write my own analysis and share them, but in the end these are just my views that I share with you. Every person could think and see different things and we don’t know the truth, so all I really do is give different possible explanations. I also think Vmin could use more analysis to balance against the other ships. Though the fact that there are so many weird things to find with multiple pairs in itself seems to indicate that they are all less likely to be real.

Thanks for the ask, and sorry for the long and complicated reply (I feel like I might come off as a bit pretentious). But I think this fandom could do well with being a little less black and white. Either way, I love Vmin’s bond no matter what kind of love they have for each other, and I will keep on writing analysis. For fun, and because sometimes there really are things that I think are worth looking into. Thank you again, this was an interesting question to try and answer.

[owakoblack-portspa]

A Dream of Bethlehem

Fandom: Hetalia: Axis Powers

Pairings: Knights Hospitaller x Knights Templar; Prussia x South Italy

Characters: Teutonic Knights/Prussia (Gilbert),  Knights Templar (Chris),  Knights Hospitaller (Giovanni),  Kingdom of Sicily/South Italy (Lovino)

1

It is not a very good day to go to Acre, not a very good day at all, people warn little Gilbert. The deeper you go into the city, the more dangerous it becomes, people say. But I am a knight, I am not afraid, Gilbert braces himself. He has seen blood flowing like a river, he has seen corpses piling up a mountain, but he has never seen a hell like this, right in the heart of the capital of the Holy Land. In the streets of Acre, where Christians fight Christians, where brothers kill brothers, homicide and fratricide become natural, even though themselves are not natural at all--it is not a holy land, it is a wild world inhabited by evils. To Gilbert’s utter disgust, after the fall of the Genoese flag, advance the crimson Hospitaller banner and a group of knights in black uniforms into the burning street. ‘Wait, can’t you spare the citizens’ houses?’ Gilbert stands in front of the charging army, but he is unwilling to draw up his sword. ‘And can’t you see the Venetians are our enemies? Step aside, child!’ a tall Hospitaller waves his naked sword towards the little albino. A heavy sound of two clashing swords--a white knight shields Gilbert from the gigantic man, and a string of blood instantly spills onto the red petit cross embroidered on the chest. Even though his left palm is pierced by the sword, and an ugly, bloody hole appears as his enemy’s sword is swiftly and cruelly drawn away, the knight does not show any sign of fear, and quite on the contrary, his angelic face still keeps on smiling. ‘Brother Chris!’ ‘Christien!’

Two boys cry out at the same time. As Gilbert is lying on the ground and Chris is standing in front of him to protect, Giovanni appears just in time, his handsome face furious and sweaty. ‘Stop! The little one is the Teutonic Knights! Our ward!’ Giovanni shouts angrily to the tall Hospitaller. The anonymous Hospitaller sheathes his sword immediately, despite Giovanni the teenager looks much younger than him. ‘I’m sorry, Your Eminence,’ the Hospitaller now looks pallid and trembles like a leaf, ‘I didn’t mean to hurt His Eminence the Order of the Temple, but...’ ‘It’s nothing.’ Chris waves his injured palm impatiently to everyone, smiling as usual, ‘I love playing the role of a martyr. I am so glad that I protected little Gil, in spite of the fact that YOU are his guardian, Gio.’ Giovanni can tell the satire in Chris’ words, but he is not going to argue with a wounded person--after all, his another profession is doctor. ‘Let me see your wound, Christien.’ Giovanni’s voice becomes softer, but firm. ‘I’ve told you it’s nothing.’ Chris’ face becomes paler as he draws his sword in a position of defence, his flaming purple eyes threatening, ‘If you dare to touch me, I’ll revenge myself on you now!’ Giovanni stops short, staring at the blond with sudden coldness, ‘I won’t if I can.’ Then he turns to Gilbert, and raises up the little boy, ‘Are you alright, Gilbert? I’ve promised the Kingdom of Sicily to take care of you. I hope you’re not hurt.’ ‘Don’t treat me like a child!’ Gilbert’s reddened eyes make him look more like a rabbit, and he jumps high to protest. Giovanni does not take his protest seriously. He simply holds up Gilbert’s clenching hand, and retreats with his army, without casting another look at Chris, who remains standing in silence .

‘Brother Gio, can’t you treat Brother Chris a little better? He has saved me! And of all things, why do you two fight each other? You both are christian military orders!’ At the Hospitaller headquarters, Gilbert enquires. ‘The Knights Templar are stronger than us. If we don’t fight to protect ourselves, we’ll be destroyed by them.’ Giovanni replies calmly. ‘Why do the Knights Templar want to destroy you? Brother Chris in fact is very kind-hearted. Even though he knows I am on your side, he teaches me combat skills...hoops!’ Gilbert just realises that he has leaked the secret between Chris and himself. ‘Gilbert, you know I’m not happy to hear this. I hope you won’t betray me as you’ve developed a good relationship with my archrival.’

It has been a week since Chris was injured, and since that day, Gilbert has been bringing medicine to the Templar castle on Giovanni’s command as a punishment of his ‘betrayal’. What Giovanni requires Gilbert to keep in mind, is that Gilbert must not let Chris know who is actually prescribing medications. However, in the end, Gilbert cannot help telling the truth to Chris, ‘Brother Chris, I really hope you can stop fighting with Brother Gio. You see, he regrets what he’s done to you, and sends...’ ‘I hope Gio is not behind this, otherwise I will not accept medicine from you any more.’ Chris interrupts quickly. ‘Why do you hate Brother Gio so much, Brother Chris?’ ‘I hate him for not sending me medicine, and I will hate him more if he asks you to send me medicine. In sum, I just hate him.’ Chris strokes his bandaged left palm with tender passion, but Gilbert is too young to observe this detail or understand these words.

After this street fight, the two gangs seem to have ceased fire for a while, not only because one of their leaders is injured, but also because the festive spirit is approaching. In the Cathedral of Acre, people busy themselves with the preparation of the biggest event of the year--Christmas. The interior of the church is semi-decorated, and still more flowers and plants are coming. ‘Gilbert, have you understood the ceremony process that I’ve just told you?’ Giovanni bends down to speak in the ear of the absent-minded little knight. Both of them stand beside the alter. Gilbert jumps, and finally turns his attention from revery to the taller knight, ‘Sorry, what did you just say?’ ‘Could you tell me why you can’t take your eyes off the audience seats in the church? Are you expecting someone?’ Giovanni frowns. ‘Brother Gio, do you know if Frater will visit Acre for Christmas?’ Gilbert asks carefully. ‘Yes, the Kingdom of Sicily told so me in a letter. And he will attend the Christmas mass as well.’ On hearing the news, Gilbert reacts dramatically: firstly his jaw drops, then his grin broadens, and finally he raises his hands high up in the air, ‘Hallelujah! What a good tiding!’ ‘Calm down yourself, Gilbert! Shouting is forbidden in the church. And if you don’t want Sicily to be disappointed with you, you have to work hard in preparation, understood? It’s your first time to celebrate Christmas, there’re many things for you to learn.’ ‘I know, I know! I’ll work hard for Frater, and on Christmas I’m going to pay my homage to Frater, and then I’ll become a real knight! I’m so awesome! Everything’s going to be perfect! Kesesese!’ Gilbert laughs happily. ‘Don’t be too proud, Gilbert. You have to work hard to achieve your goal. Remember: no pain, no gain.’ ‘But there’s someone lazier than me! Even though Brother Chris’ wound is getting much better, he never comes to the rehearsal, and he’s going to sing in the choir!’ ‘Christien’s done the mass many times so he doesn’t need much rehearsing, and in fact, I don’t think he wants to see me.’ Giovanni looks at the choir practicing singing in a corner of the church, which is consisted of young boys in white dresses. The most beautiful one is missing, just as he has expected.

2

The Cathedral of Acre has already been enunciated with devout Christians hours before the bells announce the approach of Christmas and the beginning of the Christmas Midnight Mass. The interior of the cathedral is full of the festive spirit, decorated with myriads of flowers, draperies, hangings, ribbons, and candles, making this spacious sacred place shine with all colours of the solar spectrum. Now the congregation is holding its breath to hear the steps of the approaching holy moment, that is to say, waiting for the mass procession enter into the nave. After the bells strike twelve times, silence remains as if time stood still, so everybody turns their head to the church entrance to look for the priests and professed knights. After several seconds pass, finally, to everyone’s relief, the door opens, and a group of people in surplice solemnly walk in. At the head of them is little Gilbert with silver hair and red-pupiled eyes, swinging from side to side a golden, smoking censer in his hands. The little albino holds his chin high and looks straight ahead, so even the distant audience can tell from his rigid movements and his slightly reddened physiognomy that he is at the moment very nervous. Many in the congregation do know that for this new-born German military order, it must be his first time to perform holy services in such a big event, and accordingly they understand his nervousness and cross their fingers to pray for his success in the debut. Among the understanding, kind-hearted people, is Lovino, the Kingdom of Sicily, who comes all the way from Palermo for this special occasion, and who now sticks his little brown head out from the crowd into the aisle covered with red carpets, which makes him so distinct that even Gilbert’s sweat-filmed eyes cannot prevent the little knight from noticing this great kingdom from afar. Consequently, Gilbert starts short, as if petrified, but Lovino is no malicious Medusa--quite on the contrary, he is the most amiable personage here, so he tries to unlock the magic spell by waving his little hand and smiling sweetly to his little knight, to salute, and to encourage him. However, for Gilbert, this is more like an ignition before an explosion than a mere encouragement, for in response, stuffed of energy, he sets himself off high in the air like a rocket, the censer in his hands swinging like a mad turning wheel, spilling hot incense everywhere. All at once a commotion is caused--people sitting nearby the aisle stand up to run, only to find that within such a dense crowd running is almost impossible, thus some panic is caused as well. At this critical moment, Giovanni, who walks beside the bishop in the middle of the procession, dashes out to catch the censer which now is flying out of Gilbert’s hands, and fortunately, after the catch, he is agile enough to regain his balance in time, and stands upright with the golden censer safely contained in his hands. He makes some effort to restrain himself from panting heavily, and immediately resumes his solemn, imperturbable look to hide his shock of this unexpected episode. Realising what has just happened, Gilbert becomes the most panicked person in the cathedral. He dare not look at Lovino’s face to see his disappointment, so he looks down onto the floor, feeling too shameful for himself to move. Seeing this, Giovanni pats Gilbert’s shoulder from behind to urge him to proceed, otherwise the procession would be blocked even though Gilbert is short and tiny. Accordingly Gilbert moves on, and from now on, he becomes half absent-minded for his sense of guilt, head drooping. Despite this, the following process goes on smoothly, the episode is soon forgotten, the audience watch the performance of the servers quietly, listen to the priests’ sermons attentively, and respond by saying ‘amen’ when their heart is quite touched. However, Gilbert’s tribulations are not yet finished. As a novice, he is to give a speech in front of the holy altar, in the face of the public. It is a narration of the nativity, which should have been already familiar to any christian, so before the mass, Gilbert was so confident that he did not bring the script with him. Now, it is high time for Gilbert’s speech, and for the sake of the sense of guilt he is still sweating heavily as if he had just been fished out from the sea: ‘It was...it was in the year of four before Christ, before Christ was born. (A pause.) On the day when Christ was born, Mary found no place to lie down herself and give birth to her child, so she just...she just lied down on the floor, (some hiss from the audience) and she saw stars shining bright in the sky. Oh, I forget to say, (laugh from the audience) there was an angel coming from the sky to tell her that the child is the savior of mankind. So back to the night when Jesus was born, there were three magicians...(somebody hoots)’ Finally Gilbert’s frustrated voice seems to fade away, and people can hardly hear what the little knight is saying, and neither can they see his mouth moving, for he persists in hanging his head down. Lovino, who sits in the front row for the prerogatives possessed by such a great kingdom like him, clasps his hands all the time to pray for Gilbert, and he even dare not bat his big, radiant eyes lest they would distract his knight, but it seems all his prayers are in vain. Giovanni, who stands righteously and solemnly among the priests and servers, is as anxious as Lovino from the bottom of his heart. ‘Can anyone please do something?’ he asked without producing a sound.

‘--Long time ago in Bethlehem So the Holy Bible say Mary’s boy child, Jesus Christ Was born on Christmas day.’

Suddenly, people hear someone singing. At first, people think it is the ringing sound of a crystal stream, for it is so limpid, so pure; and then, when they realise that it is from above, they take it as the voice of an angel, for it is so beautiful and so unearthly, like a beam of light piercing through thick clouds to warm the earth, to fill everyone’s heart with bliss. While the confused audience are looking about themselves, only Giovanni immediately finds out whence the voice is from--he has heard this voice on every Christmas, and yet he still can hardly believe it--as soon as he hears the singing, he raises his head and looks up to the carved balcony facing the altar where he is standing by, and sure enough, he sees a thin, pale figure stand out of the choir boys, beneath the enormous silver organ. It is Chris who is singing. He is clad in white, laced surplice, his pale countenance becomes more tender in the radiance from the white texture, and his soft, curly blond hair makes him shine like a midnight sun. He is not yet grown up, his delicate human form hardly tells his gender, and therefore he looks more beautiful than any man or woman, and so clinks his sweet, heavenly singing voice. Here he stands, so pure he looks, so angelically he sings, even Giovanni has to admit that on this particular occasion, if Chris were not the messenger from God, he cannot tell who this sweet creature could be. ‘It’s the Knights Templar!’ a little girl cries out happily, and her mother quickly quiets her. Even Gilbert looks up from the floor to the balcony gratefully as if he has found his savior, so continues Chris:

‘While shepherds watched their flocks by night Them see a bright new shining star Them hear a choir sing The music seemed to come from afar.

Now, Joseph and his wife, Mary Come to Bethlehem that night Them find no place to born she child Not a single room was in sight.

By and by, they find a little nook In a stable all forlorn And in a manger cold and dark Mary’s little Boy was born.’

The choir boys standing behind Chris, who are also sweet-looking, though not as beautiful as he, begin to sing harmoniously, and all the people in the cathedral sing along:

‘Hark, now hear the angels sing A new king born today And man will live forevermore Because of Christmas day.’

Now everyone rejoices again, because they take part in such a beautiful choir led by an angel, and has never felt so close to God before.

In many aspects, the midnight mass is as successful as last year, so afterwards everybody goes home happily. However, in a dark corner of the sacristy, Gilbert is found sobbing quietly. Because others are gone, only Giovanni and Chris see him. Chris bends down over Gilbert, beaming innocently as ever, and says cheerfully, ‘Gil, don’t cry, it’s Christmas!’ ‘I’m so stupid, I know nothing of Christmas! I’m not fit for being a knight!’ Gilbert tries to conceal his tearful face by burying it between his crouching knees. Even though Giovanni was unhappy for Gilbert’s failures of performance at tonight’s mass, which he believes are the results of Gilbert’s arrogance and ignorance of his persuasion, his benign heart is touched by the little one’s sadness and frustration, so he attempts to comfort Gilbert: ‘To err is human. If you learn from experience, you’ll be forgiven.’ Nevertheless, Giovanni’s austere tone makes Gilbert feel more miserable, ‘Forgiven? Will I be forgiven by Frater? Perhaps I can’t never become his knight!’ ‘Gio, you frightened little Gil!’ Chris criticises his big rival, and continues to console Gilbert by an even more tender voice, ‘come on, Gil, I’ll show you something. I’m sure you’ll learn Christmas by heart. Don’t worry.’ He winks, stands up, and leads Gilbert to the courtyard of the cathedral. Giovanni does not trust Chris, so he follows them into the cool midnight air. Standing under the purple starry sky, Chris brings out from his pocket a plain stone cup. ‘I’m going to use this to bring us to the night when our Lord Jesus Christ was born. You can come with us if you want, Gio.’ ‘Wait, is this...the Holy Grail?’ Giovanni is astonished. ‘Exactly.’ Chris replies matter-of-factly. ‘I didn’t know you possess it.’ Giovanni says darkly, and quickly makes the sign of the cross. In secret, he feels his stomach aching--how come his rival obtains the most sacred relic in the christian world? ‘You don’t have to know everything,’ smiles Chris. It happens very fast. After a flash of blinding light, the three knights are altogether brought to another time and place. The time is still night, but the environment is changed into a dry, rocky wild land. ‘Look! There’s the bright shining star!’ Chris points to the enormous brilliant star hanging in the eastern sky. ‘What does this mean?’ Gilbert is bewildered by this strange environment. ‘Gilbert, how many times have I told you to read the Bible more carefully?’ Giovanni’s austere look makes Gilbert wince. ‘Relax, Gio. It’s the Holy Night, let’s behold the miracle!’ Chris leads the group to walk in the direction of the bright star. After a while, they see a manger at the top of a hill. ‘Is it...?’ Gilbert is shushed abruptly by Giovanni. The three of them carefully approach the manger on tiptoe. The manger basks in the bright shining star right above, so they can see the scene clearly: Mary has just now given birth to baby Jesus, who is sleeping comfortably in his mother’s arms, and Joseph stands by them, watching the baby with great interest and affection. Noticing people approaching, Mary is alert, but as soon as she sees these people are three good-looking young boys in some kind of cassocks, she smiles and gestures them to come closer. ‘Our Lord Jesus, we’ve come to worship you.’ Both Giovanni and Chris kneel down before the little baby who opens his beautiful eyes to look upon them curiously. After realising who the baby is, Gilbert imitates his brothers to fall on kneels, not without clumsiness. Seeing this, Mary smiles affectionately to the timid little knight, and says, ‘thank you for visiting us in such a bleak winter night. Don’t be anxious, little knight, baby Jesus is very happy to see you.’ Gilbert looks up to see Mary’s smiling face, and sees a mother in her, a mother he has never had, or met, in his life. Suddenly, the albino bursts into tears, ‘oh Mother, Mother!’ Mary pats Gilbert’s silver head, speaks to him in a voice so gentle as if singing a lullaby, ‘little child, you have such beautiful hair. Don’t cry, you’ll be loved.’ It is Gilbert’s first time to be praised by someone for his hair--being an albino, he has been jeered and teased all his life. It is not necessary to describe how happy Gilbert is in seeing the Holy Virgin, and he lays his head upon her knees. Meanwhile, Giovanni finds Chris’ pale face full of tears too. Before the little Lord, the beautiful knight clasps his hands tightly while on his knees--he looks so pious, so humble that he makes this moment divine. Unconsciously, Giovanni wears a smile on his face-- O Silent Night! O Holy Night!

On the next morning, Gilbert is woken up by a familiar voice: ‘Gil, wake up! Are you alright?’ When he opens his eyes, he sees Lovino shaking his shoulder anxiously. Thus he sits up abruptly, ‘Frater! Why are you here?’ ‘Dear Gil! I was worried about you so I came to the morning mass early to see if you’re alright, but I didn’t know you slept in the courtyard over night!’ Lovino exclaims, ‘it is not good! You’ll catch cold!’ His puffing face is on the brink of tears. It is Gilbert’s turn to feel worried too, for his heart will break if he sees Lovino cry. ‘Dear Frater, I’m totally fine, so please don’t cry!’ he holds Lovino’s little hand, faking a smile to comfort him, ‘I spent a whole night with Brother Gio and Brother Chris to worship little Lord Jesus in Bethlehem, you have to know how happy I am! Please don’t worry about me!’ ‘Really?’ Lovino’s watery emerald eyes look into Gilbert’s rubies, and he sees truthfulness in them, ‘good, then. But where are Gio and Chris?’ Both of them look around. Beside the wall of the cathedral, they see Giovanni and Chris lying down there, holding each other’s body closely as if to keep warm and sleep more comfortably. Hearing noises, the two sleepy knights are awakened--it is not difficult to imagine the surprised look on their faces. However, instead of letting out a shriek or kicking each other away, in peace, they exchange morning greetings: ‘Morning, Gio.’ Chris smiles like an angel waking up from his sweetest dream. ‘Good morning, Christien.’ Giovanni blushes. He will never admit that it is Chris’ crystal purple eyes that make his heart beat fast, and he feels a little reluctant to let Chris’ warm body leave his arms when both of them get back to their feet. ‘Christien, wait!’ ‘What?’ Chris quickly turns back to face Giovanni, his huge eyes sparkling. ‘I want to apologise for the wound in your palm. I should have stopped my people hurting you.’ Giovanni smites his handsome brow. ‘It’s not your fault,’ Chris smiles mildly, ‘and I want to thank you for healing me.’ ‘You know the medicine was sent by me?’ ‘Of course, do you forget how long we’ve known each other? And as I’m your archrival, who do you think could know you better than me?’ Smiling mysteriously, Chris briskly wheels around. Without knowing why, Giovanni suddenly feels a special attachment to his rival and comrade, so he instinctively follows Chris’ white robe, which is billowing in the wind like an angel’s enormous wings. Later on, in the Christmas morning mass, people are surprised to see the two long-term rivals stand side by side in the procession, and even exchange friendly looks at intervals during the liturgy. ‘It happens once a year that the two great military orders make a truce. After all, it’s Christmas, it’s time for peace, for forgiveness, and for love.’ Among the audience, some Venetians whisper quietly, and then they shake hands with their Genoese neighbours. As for Gilbert, this time, he has done much better especially in the narration of the nativity. When the mass is done and the cathedral becomes empty, he cautiously kneels down before Lovino, ‘dear Frater, I want to be your knight, but I’m not yet perfect--could you wait until I’m fit?’ ‘I don’t need you to be perfect. Whenever you feel yourself is ready, I’ll be ready to take you as my knight.’ Lovino blushes. ‘I promise it won’t be too long, Frater.’ Gilbert tenderly kisses Lovino’s hand.

(End)

[animeniac]

Starbomb Ch. 7

Fandom: BNHA Pairing: Bakugou x Uraraka; slight Izuku x Tsuyu Genre: Romance  Chapter Summary: Uraraka doesn't show up to class. Bakugou confronts Midoriya about how he somehow caused Uraraka to run away, but he has no recollection of his "steamy" encounter with her. Late that night, he finally sees her again. (See Chapter 1 for story summary.) A/N: Sorry for the delay. Hurricanes and stuff. I don’t know if I mentioned this on here but there’s a possibility of a side pairing.  [AO3]

Chapter I Chapter II Chapter III Chapter IV Chapter V Chapter VI Chapter VII

Bakugou had some choice words for the anti-gravity girl that sent him into the air not once but twice. In class the next morning, he leered at the door and everyone who passed through it. The moment he heard it slide open, he snapped his head around to see who entered. And time after time when he failed to see her round hair, face, and cheeks, he growled.

Initially, he assumed that she feared an encounter with him because of her transgressions. When the clock neared the start of class and the bell rang, he grew sick of the game that she had forced him into playing. The tension that spanned from his spine to his fingers and coursed through his veins had all been from her relentless attack, hadn't it?

She would pay.

The shrill bell of the end of class snapped Bakugou from his thoughts, and he needed an outlet for his hostility.

Midoriya crossed his path, and Bakugou pounced to corner him outside meters away from the door. Immediately, the green haired hero bowed his head and apologized, "Sorry for interrupting the other day."

Interrupting? Come to think of it, Bakugou had no idea what transpired before Uraraka fled. Narrowing his eyes at the ceiling, all he could recall was a decent workout; Midoriya entering; Uraraka pushing him into the air; her trembling back as she ran. That was it. Hesitant to ask, the blond figured that particular word choice to be impertinent to the main issue. "Didn't I tell you to go after her?" he reminded him.

"I couldn't find her," answered Midoriya, for he searched around the pathway up until the dorms before he figured that she wanted some time to herself.

Had Bakugou known his classmate's reasoning, he would have exploded. Fortunately, he used the time to try to recall the fragments of memory that he'd forgotten - the embrace, the bite, the almost kiss. They had all conveniently slipped his mind. Perhaps, his immature thoughts could not properly handle the depth of the raw emotions he had felt in those moments. The behavior all contradicted his vows that his association with Uraraka had been purely legal and self-serving to his bloodline.

And when she left because of Midoriya, Bakugou felt more than simply anger - loss.

Lost in his thoughts, Bakugou wouldn't have heard anything Midoriya had said within the past few moments if he said anything. "Why didn't you fucking try harder to find her? Tell me where she is now. Do you have some kind of pathetic crush on her?" he interrogated and with each question, his hand tightened into a fist.

Where did that last question come from? Midoriya's face reddened as he shook his head. "I don't know where she is, and I don't know if I have a crush on her."

Who wouldn't? Surely, a sappy, sentimental kid like Midoriya developed feelings for someone like her.

Snarling, Bakugou sneered, "Drop the bullshit."

Midoriya had yet to put his feelings into words, but maybe his concern and interest in Uraraka had developed into some kind of infatuation at least. He gulped. That tightness in his chest stayed with him along with the picture of ecstasy and intrigue painted across her reddened face. As a hero - no, as her friend, he just wanted her happiness regardless of who she chose to be with. "I," began Midoriya.

Their confrontation had gained curious spectators from class 1-A. After all, Bakugou decided to interrogate him outside of the classroom.

Iida interrupted, "You know, she was fine before you began harassing her." He believed that. Over the past few weeks, he sensed stress in her tense features.

Exiting the classroom with Kirishima, Sero caught sight of Bakugou and failed to read the tension of the scene. "Hey, you okay, man? We were just kidding yesterday. I don't care if you hang out with Uraraka," he interjected in an attempt to mollify the hostility.

Too many nosy people swarmed the area for Bakugou, so he barked, "Fuck off! Everybody. You know what? This isn't some kind of grand spectacle for people to chime in their fucking opinions. I don't give a shit what you losers care about what I do. Forget this." He backed away while staring down Midoriya. "You two can be all lovey dovey for all I care, but at the end of the day, I'm going to take what's mine."

He huffed and puffed as he stomped all the way down the hall and out the building. Midoriya and Uraraka laughing like kids - that's what he saw in his thoughts as he went up to his dorm room instead of the gym like he had planned. They might as well have been laughing at him, for that pit he had felt all day exponentially grew when he observed Midoriya's wide eyes and reddened cheeks.

Easily, he could have confronted her, but something subdued his typical hubris. His frantic thoughts tossed him, and of all the times he had lost control, nothing beat that afternoon. So he confined himself. These feelings that had flown asunder were more than just rage, and he only dealt with anger.

Surely, a loser like Deku liked a girl like Uraraka - that little cheerleading cutesy act was right up his alley. And that angered Bakugou. The pride he had felt when he drew the stick that promised her to be his partner faded into doubt that any of his plans would happen. At the end of the day, he loathed the idea of a love affair between the two. Yet, he felt the trajectory of events and fate nearly missed him and ensured the future of Midoriya and Uraraka.

Midoriya and Uraraka. His thoughts stormed as a premature drowsiness took over. If they liked each other, then what could an outsider like Bakugou truly do to stop it?

He groaned and put a pillow over his face to stop his heavy breathing for a few moments. The tension he felt had spread from his gut to his chest and then to his throat. Pain replaced his anger until he slowly fell asleep.

Meanwhile, in the kitchen of the commons, Asui hoped to catch Midoriya by surprise with a vanilla sundae topped with chocolate syrup and a cherry. Whipped cream, too. She didn't know everything about Midoriya, but after witnessing his Bakugou harangue him, she knew he would stew in his conscience. Surely enough, he sat at the table and stared down at the glass filled past the brim with ice cream and decadent toppings.

Within seconds after Asui clinked down the glass, he jumped and squirmed and stammered all in one place - much to her amusement. In response, she placed a finger on her chin and asked, "Are you trying to stall until it melts? You must not like it."

"No!" he squeaked in protest. "I'm really happy and surprised." Why would a girl make him a sundae? He would have never have guessed how to properly react to such a gesture. While he knew a simple thanks would have sufficed, he hurried the ice cream down his throat with a spoon.

Asui blinked as she sat next to him. "Don't drink it too fast, or you'll get," she began to warn until she observed the faded hue of blue cascade down his face, "brain freeze."

Midoriya leaned forward and rubbed his palm against his forehead. "I-It tastes good," promised the hero as he tightly grinned. Maybe such a treat could cure the troublesome encounter he had with Bakugou. In fact, he had already forgotten about the tense encounter in the wake of Asui's kindness. As an intense headache faded, his grin melted into a smile. His shoulders yielded to the largesse gesture of his partner, and he inhaled.

"Ribbit. You are pretty energetic sometimes," commented Asui.

"Really?"

"You're all over the place at once," she noted as she gently stretched a finger towards his face. Residual turmoil hung between his eyebrows and the slight tremor of the corners of his mouth had never left. Even as he bit his lip, she could sense every ounce of tension that radiated through the rest of his rigid joints. "Even now, I can tell everything that you're thinking."

Covering his features with his hands, he replied, "All over the place? I didn't notice." Peeking through the valleys of his fingers, he reluctantly and slowly dropped his literal guard and placed a hand on his lap as he continued to spoon more ice cream into his mouth. How could something cold cause him to melt?

And, he had a cute personality, but Asui knew not to say something like that. With the mere presence of ice cream and a friendly face, he somehow sprouted a smile and could shift his mood as easily as her younger siblings. She watched him finish the dessert that he rightfully deserved as she leaned forward on her open palm. Her large eyes wandered to the corner of his mouth where a sizeable dollop of whipped cream sat. Was he unaware?

By habit, her tongue pushed against her mouth and emerged to clean the goop, but she stopped herself with a hand and pushed it back. Even someone as nice as Midoriya would probably get put off by such an odd gesture. Her face heated, and she wondered why she would be that bold. "You have something on your face," she muttered as she averted her eyes and hoped he didn't see.

Midoriya saw, but he interpreted the gesture a lot differently than she feared. "She must have wanted some," he thought as he frowned at the emptied glass. Wiping Smoothly as he could, he commented, "This was really nice of you, Tsu. I guess I'm still hungry after all of that."

"If you'd like, I could make you something else," she suggested as she got up to return to the kitchen area. Asui frowned at the absence of her usual equanimity.

Midoriya apologized, "Sorry, no, I meant, we should go somewhere. You're probably hungry, too, right?" Was that an intrusive thing to ask? Girls probably didn't like to talk about their hunger. He wasn't sure.

In accordance with her buoyant, beating heart, she smiled, "But, I like making food for you, Midoriya." Maybe for that day, she wouldn't press him for introspection. Whether or not he liked Uraraka hardly mattered. She simply wanted his goofy smile to stay on his face for as long as possible.

"Tsu," he whispered with a wide smile. His chin pressed to his palm, he leaned forward and knocked over the glass. Scurrying to catch it from falling onto the floor, he somehow found Asui's tongue binding his hand to the glassware. Midoriya apologized as his heart raced, "Sorry! I wasn't thinking."

Asui released him. "Ribbit," she groaned. Why did she do that?

Bakugou made his way to the bathroom late one night. Surprisingly, he figured that he could sleep until the morning based on the heaviness of his eyelids and grogginess in his head. Maybe he had overdone it with his workouts that week. Yawning for the fifth time, he could hardly see through his blurred vision as he exited the boys' restroom. His drowsiness expelled the unpleasant thoughts of Uraraka from the day and his dreams until he saw her?

That cursed, revealing black tank top and those familiar navy blue shorts that she always wore to training had a different appeal for that time of night. His eyes shot open, and he had to use every muscle in his body to suppress the twitch of the corners of his mouth. Questions flooded into his mind. Raising a finger, he pointed and jeered, "Uraraka." However, he could think of no insult.

The curves of her face, thighs, and chest drew silence from his throat. The dramatic darkness of her squinted eyes would have been unflattering on most people, but on her, the contrast to her typically bright, brown and round eyes amused Bakugou. Where had that energy gone?

He stepped closer to her and tilted his head down so that he maintained an unbreakable stare.

"Bakugou," she whined. "I gotta go."

Bakugou slammed his hand against the doorway of the girls' restroom to block her way. No, he hadn't finished studying her yet. "Where the fuck have you been?" demanded he. He noticed that her face had regressed from its typical roundness and developed slight, deviant dips. If his audacity led him to survey the shape with his finger tips, then he knew he'd find an anomaly. He frowned as his eyes traced up to the tips of her paling, pink cheeks. Those had changed, too.

She jumped. "Bakugou," she repeated more shortly this time. "What are you doing?"

He dropped his train of thought and snapped, "Nothing."

"Come on," pleaded Uraraka as she squirmed and bounced in place. "Please, I can't take it anymore. I need you-"

Bakugou drew his hand back into his pocket and scowled, "Shut the hell up." He cursed his heart, for he enjoyed the desperation in her eyes a little too much. That jiggling dance she did definitely didn't help. Such desperation seemed all too familiar and evocative of a time they shared away in the dimensions of his dreams. His face grew hot with anger or something of the sort.

Without another word, she passed him. Instead of taking a step towards his room, he stayed still for more moments with her. As his observations gave way to his initial fury, he remembered just what had pushed him into a disturbed state of mind. He recalled watching her flee from behind in the gym the day before.

Fortunately, she returned and tried to pretend as if her tormentor had left.

"I'm not done with you! Why did you run away?" he growled.

Uraraka, without the energy to argue, reluctantly decided to engage in his interrogation. Her heavy head finally rose to meet eyes with his. She expected more of a hostile glare than a bitter, narrow-eyed stare. As she stood her ground, she could not recall the events leading up to her fleeing from the gym. "Run away? Didn't you tell me to leave? I've been sick," she answered both his questions as her chest heaved.

"Cut the bullshit. I didn't tell you shit."

Her shoulders slumped, and she finally admitted, "I don't remember."

Bakugou had few comebacks for that, for he had also forgotten. Earlier, Midoriya had claimed to interrupt something. "Deku showed up," he reminded her.

"I-I don't know what you're talking about," she lied as sweat jumped from her face, for of course, she remembered Midoriya. Taking strides away to her dorm room, she avoided Bakugou.

That reaction - the renewed blush on her face and glow in her eyes. Did that confirm her infatuation with that loser? He couldn't sleep or stand still with that as the conclusion to their discussion. Reaching out, he meant to stop her, but once his finger tips touched the cold, soft surface of her triceps, his eyes dilated and heat climbed up his hand to his body and engulfed his entire face.

Racing heart, sweaty palms, he snatched his hand back as if her skin were molten lava.

He remembered.

Without dignifying him with eye contact, raw rage grew in Uraraka's eyes. She suddenly remembered as well. Midoriya had seen everything, but it wasn't her fault. It was Bakugou's. "What you did was unforgivable and weird," she muttered loud enough for only him to hear. The spot on her collar bone where he had marked abruptly sparked a hot sensation that spanned her entire body.

She remembered, and she had enjoyed it.

Bakugou had no chide remark to spit back at her, for she was right. Searching the words of his vocabulary, his teeth tightened to hiss an unorthodox term that had only passed his lips a few times in his life. Of all the instances to say it, he would have said it in that moment because truly, and he wouldn't willingly allow himself to lose control like that again.

He watched as her head fell back, and her body fell towards the ground like a toppling tower. Without a second thought, he caught her by the shoulders. The light had left her face like a new moon. Her eyes had shut and became illegible. A frown mounted on her lips complemented the solemn serenity of her empty profile.

Grimacing, he scoffed away his tension. His roaring thoughts and heart had mostly calmed, and he focused his energy on finding a place to dump her unconscious body. Lacking the tact of the conventional hero, he began to drag her backward towards her dorm. Uraraka Ochako.

Bakugou kicked the door open with the bottom of his shoe and entered her austere room. While she had a few clothes on the floor, some might assume she kept her area neat. Her barren, blank walls and solid, tan bed sheets lent to a completely neutral feel. Save for a few objects designed for organization, she had the bare minimum.

Tossing Uraraka onto her bed, Bakugou would have immediately left if he didn't catch sight of a sheet of notebook paper on the wall with his name on it. He scowled and put his left knee on the bed next to Uraraka's sleeping body to lean forward and get a closer look. "Bakugou and Uraraka 100% Friendship Compatibility! Perfect Match," he read next to a drawing of chibi, anime versions of themselves happily standing next to each other. He noticed a full, brightly red colored meter at the bottom beneath a somewhat intricate time graph.

He scowled, "They must have done this behind my back."

A few days before the arcade trip.

Uraraka sat in Kotone's room playing Super Smash Brothers and miserably losing. She hardly put as much heart into it as Bakugou or Kotone for that matter. Rubbing the back of her head, she apologized, "Sorry, I guess I'm bad at video games." Nonetheless, she enjoyed the energy of the room, and she always delighted in seeing Kotone.

Bakugou had gone to the restroom for longer than usual, so Kotone turned to Uraraka. They obviously wouldn't have much fun playing just video games. "Can I show you something? I want to know what you think," she casually suggested after staring at the door for a few moments. Kotone stood up before hearing her response, for time was of the essence.

"Sure," responded Uraraka as she stood up as well.

Kotone pulled a sheet of paper from her drawer and laid it out on the desk. "I never told you what my quirk was," she began. "I can hear hearts, and that tells me a lot."

"That's really cool, Kotone," she cheered before she spotted the contents of the paper.

While the girl smiled at the compliment, she wanted to be quick. "Hearts tell me a lot about people. I can hear their fears, happiness, and their sickness. Sometimes, when I hear two hearts together, I can figure out their compatibility, so I drew you and Bakugou's chart."

"Friendship compatibility, right?" Uraraka corrected her.

Pausing, Kotone then nodded.

"Really?" Uraraka grinned. "Lemme see that." She saw the ups and downs of their rhythm like an EKG monitor. Smiling faces were drawn between certain points. Although the hero-to-be could not properly understand the correlations of her student's logic, a light and flighty sensation fluttered in her heart. "100%"

"You two are really happy when you're around each other," explained the girl with a soft smile and blush on her cheeks.

Furrowing her brow to read, she looked up to ask, "Bakugou's happy?"

Kotone's eyes widened at the sudden shift in Uraraka's heartbeat - a habit that she knew that she needed to suppress one day. People usually didn't like to hear the meaning of their own hearts, so any indication that something had changed could cause conflict. Regardless, she smiled again. "Yeah," she nodded, "And, so I mapped out your hearts when you guys are together."

"Wah!" squealed Uraraka. "This is amazing!" Pointing to the first happy face, she asked, "W-When did this happen?"

Thinking back, Kotone remembered, "That's when you helped me with my history. I think you answered my question before Bakugou."

"He was happy about that?" she asked, for, at the time, she figured her eagerness to jump in annoyed him. Eagerly pointing to the second smile, she asked again, "How 'bout this?"

"Uh," Kotone stammered to keep up with her zealous attitude, "That's when he handed the controller to you."

"Maybe I was nervous instead," Uraraka suggested. There were more times, too, but in that moment, she reveled in the fact that there were any happy moments at all. Not that she could admit that she was particularly happy around him. In fact, that was far from how she'd describe her sentiments. Maybe fascinated.

To say the least, Uraraka's slight denial disappointed Kotone. She thought that her mentor would readily acknowledge any bit of joy that she felt around Bakugou. One of them had to, or else nothing would come of such a wonderful tune.

Uraraka's eyes glowed as she continued to study their personalized heart map. Her cheeks full of joy, she continued to grin when she praised, "You have a really good memory, Kotone! C-Can I keep this?"

Kotone nodded and waved her hands like a music conductor. "It's nothing, really - like listening to music. Your hearts make catchy music," she giggled as she rose her head to reveal her blue eyes through her black bangs.

They both had more questions.

Upon closer inspection, Uraraka noticed small, simultaneous jolts on the graphs. "What are these?" she asked.

"That? Oh, um, that's just," Kotone began, but she wasn't sure what to answer without sounding too intrusive. After all, no one truly liked for her to expose their deepest thoughts and feelings. She often tried to merely scratch at the surface. Otherwise, she would lose friends and alienate those around her like she had already accomplished in her young life. Moreover, she respected Uraraka to the degree that she didn't want to dig too deep.

Fortunately, Bakugou slammed the door open. "What are you losers talking about?" he frowned.

"Our game strategy!" cheered Kotone as she stealthily slipped the paper into Uraraka's binder. "How about we team up against you - 2 vs 1?"

"That's fair. You're not gonna beat me without a handicap," responded Bakugou as he sat in a purple beanbag chair in the corner of the room. He stared at Uraraka despite the fact that she hadn't challenged him.

When their eyes met, she nodded, "You're on."

In her head, Kotone noted, "There it is." That was the jolt that Uraraka had noticed earlier. Whenever Bakugou and Uraraka exchanged glances, she could almost guarantee that she would hear that familiar downbeat. At the young age of 12, even she could deduce what that meant, for only few heart harmonies had such a rhythm accompany such a happy melody. Closing her eyes, she heard the chorus return, and she smiled.

In his project partner's bedroom, Bakugou seethed as he knelt on Uraraka's bed above her. Initially, he thought to grab the paper, but more effectively, he could grab her. His rigid fingers sprawled as he reached the center of her face. And when his palm met her nose and his finger tips grazed her forehead, he pulled back once again.

She was hot. Not in that way - well maybe in that way, but he hadn't thought of her like that yet. Her skin was hot in the way that warranted concern.

The girl must have been sick, and thus, she had become his responsibility.

All that time, she had been suffering in this room alone and sick. "How could you?" Bakugou cursed with a twisting tension in his chest and a contorted scowl on his face. He had felt that helplessness on the train before. Moreover, how could he be blind enough to overlook the withering constitution of the person he had planned to marry? Just how sick had she been?

His hand hovered over her arm as he thought to shake her from her sleep and admonish her and force her to the infirmary, yet upon witnessing her heaving chest and reddened skin, he reconsidered his tactics. Sweat collected on her forehead as she furrowed her brow and stirred. Dark circles under her eyes, she tightly shut them as she not-so-peacefully slept. This stupidly sick girl was in no condition to walk herself. Even the student hero that only thought about beating villains knew that.

Pulling her arm, Bakugou awkwardly and as carefully as he could, placed her over his shoulder. He had no idea how critical her condition had become, so he erred on the side of caution by slowly proceeding to the door. "Fucking shit. You better not tell anybody I'm doing this," he warned the unconscious girl in a low murmur. While Bakugou may have thought of her as a foolishly stubborn and robust, without knowing her exact ailment, he treated her limp body a bit more tenderly than what was conventional for him.

What a troublesome idiot.

Sometime later that night, he reached the clinic. According to Recovery Girl, she had a moderate case of malnutrition and dehydration. All in all, she would fully recover with enough rest, food, and water - essential stuff for daily life along with the nurse's quirk.

Bakugou fumed as he overlooked Uraraka sleeping peacefully with an IV feeding into her arm. The sight wrung his gut as he bit his lower lip. She probably spent her money on that loser Deku instead of food or something. Moreover, she had too much pride to come to him for help. He would have figured something out despite literally having just enough money to cover his meals until his next allowance.

Allowance.

Whipping out his cell phone, he dialed his mother's number as quickly as he could. "Oi, I need money," he tersely greeted as he shut the door to the clinic behind him. Leaning against a wall, he slid down to sit.

"Katsuki?" Mitsuki answered from the other end. She spoke considerably louder than was necessary. "It's 4 am. Are you okay?"

"Just give me some. It doesn't have to be a lot," he paused to still his gravelly voice. "I need it for the girl I'm going to marry."

She shortly questioned, "What?!"

"Shut up about it," Bakugou ordered.

"You're telling me that a girl is not only dating someone with your attitude, but she agreed to marry you? She must be pretty tough for that to happen," she said with a chuckle at the end of her tone. "Masaru!"

"Hurry up. Pl-" began Bakugou before he corrected himself. "Now." With that, he turned off his phone and buried his face into his hands. Uraraka was tough - too tough like overcooked chicken. And stubborn like an untamed steed. That was why he decided to not lose her to anything or anyone including the likes of Midoriya.

[su-navy]

The Homeworld Is Too Much With Us [ACT 1]

Rating: K+

Word Count: 18k+

Summary: Your gem is Ruby, under the alias “Navy” for an improvised undercover surveillance mission that better land you a promotion to the intelligence division. However, you’ll have to accomplish your primary objective if you even want Yellow Pearl to so much as skim over your mission report: FIND JASPER.

A/N: Why break this up into smaller chapters when I can give huge chunks at a time? Though, it’s not like anybody will read this fanfic here anyway lol. “We want more fan content,” the thirsty fandom demands. “But we’ll only like the content to maybe read later and not actually support authors with comments or reblogs.” Jk, the real problem is that my content isn’t worthy enough. 

Scene i. - Outside the Steven’s house.

“Oh please, oh please! Don’t make me go back to Homeworld! Oh, I just want to stay here with you!”

“This… is a surprise…”

You couldn’t have said it better yourself. It’s a split-second plan that your comrades would have shattered you for, but you attribute that to their traditional mindset. (You can almost feel that old veteran’s chisel weapon at your neck right now.) Guerilla warfare is what you like to call your specialty. Not all gems realize how broad of a spectrum “adhering to Homeworld’s agenda” is, and now that you’re solo, you intend to proceed with this mission your way.

“... I just want to be somewhere I can be myself.”

You can hardly sustain your form when you’re assigned a label--Navy--by the “Steven.” It’s as crude as your comrades’ (oh, wait, ex-comrades’!) strategies. You just sit and smile and remind yourself of the invaluable skill Homeworld taught you.

Assimilation.

Scene ii. - Outside the barn.

You see so much of Homeworld on this planet that it’s hard not to see it as just another colony. The Lapis reminds you of the old veteran Ruby, not that you miss her. She’s distrustful, aching, and more perceptive than she’s socially allowed to be. Absolutely adorable. You’ve had an eye on this one ever since the baseball game she seemed reluctant to be a part of. And just like with the veteran Ruby, she’s powerless to act on her own instincts without approval from her misplaced superior.

The Crystal Gems are so silly. They have this foreign concept called “equal rights” that completely contradicts itself in practice. Even they have to acknowledge that individual’s pursuit of their own self-interest only results in a life that is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short. True equality is only achieved when workinggems are united under a sovereign government for the sole sake of serving unquestionable entities. It’s impossible for a gem to disassociate herself from the inferiority complex programmed within her. You think Lapises may be the closest to breaking free of such an inevitable mentality, given their awesome craft of carving entire planets like a big bang expanding a universe. Clearly, more observation is needed.

“It might be hard to like Earth at first,” the Lapis explains quietly. “It is where a bunch of bad stuff happened.”

For the first time, you notice how ancient her gem outfit looks compared to the Peridot’s standard uniform, as fresh out of the Kindergarten as the newbie Ruby. She must have been in the war on Earth, too. It’s not a subject Homeworld likes to teach, but it sure is fun to hear from veterans. You feel like you’re in the presence of a well-preserved antique.

“What is ‘rain’?” you ask out of genuine curiosity. They don’t question your apparent lack of knowledge. It’s amazing how stupid they think you are. You’re a Ruby, for Diamond’s sake! You’ve been on missions to other planets for as long as you’ve been issued, so of course you know that undeveloped planets have inconsistent weather conditions. (Well, only thanks to stories from the veteran… You suppose that your question taken at face-value would have been valid, since most Rubies don’t know about changing weather conditions.) You’re asking what Earth’s version of rain is like because your former squadron almost got poofed when it was raining diamonds on Neptune. (You and the veteran were the only ones smart enough to stay in the ship when that happened. And, for the record, you two helped save your comrades as a contribution to your entire species’ devotion to the Diamonds’ agenda. If that’s not equality, you don’t know what is.)

The rain is just falling water, thankfully. Leave it to a Lapis to abandon Homeworld for a planet abundant in her own element.

Scene iii. - The Roaming Eye (YOUR ship!)

“This is perfect! The Crystal Gems finally have a pilot!”

More labels. That’s nice. That means you’re assimilating well. Never mind the fact that they have a Lapis with water wings, a Peridot, and the infamous renegade Pearl. It seems that Navy is going to be the Crystal Gems’ personal chauffeur from now on.

You’re just glad you have your ship back. You weren’t lying when you said the ship was the only place you feel like you belong--there has to be some truth mixed in with your facade to make it more realistic, after all--you’ve spent more time in the ship than in Homeworld. At this point, it would be easy to dump the intruders out of the ship (your ship!) and relish in the sweet ecstasy of their betrayed faces. (Oh, if only they hadn’t touched anything. All the system settings have been messed with by some Era 1 pebble who probably thinks a light year is a measure of time.)

But as you glance over your shoulder to tell Steven to hit the button you programmed to dispel everyone from the ship except you, you see the Lapis smiling at nothing. It reminds you of a strange phrase that you heard from the veteran Ruby when you were still a shiny newbie teeming with questions. Art for the sake of art--you suddenly understand it now that you can see it on the lips of a criminal Lapis that sleeps simply because she likes it. It’s senseless like shattering, yet conforms to an aesthetic that you’ve seen before in other undeveloped planets.

Just as suddenly, your cheerful act is too heavy to maintain. Rookie mistake--inconsistency. You’re supposed to be better than that. You’re no ever-changing atmosphere rich in deteriorating substances. You’re a perfect, manufactured product of precious resources, trained by the best Homeworld has to offer and shined by centuries of experience.

“Is something wrong, Navy?” Lapis asks.

She’s by your side now. Something about her concern reads more like long-awaited relief to you. You didn’t know Lapises were so sadistic. Or maybe it’s just her.

“Oh, it’s nothing. I was just thinking that you have the prettiest smile I’ve ever seen!”

For some reason, you’ve gained some hostility from the Peridot.

“You dirty little--” She has a snorting laughter that pulls you away from your controls. She leans on your chair for support. “I was wrong! I thought no one could be that well-adjusted, but you are! Otherwise you would’ve backstabbed us and dumped us out of the ship by now!”

You laugh a little alongside her, but you’re actually not sure if that’s the right thing to do.

She’s almost wheezing now, to the point where she has to perch herself on the arm of your chair because she can no longer stand on her own. “I’m really the only one that’s trapped, after all this time… My cage is your sky, my mirror is your shield, my pain is--”

You think it’s time to land.

Scene iv. - A beach, beyond the Steven’s house..

The Ruby-Sapphire fusion is already waiting on the beach to greet you, holding an inflated bag of pink aluminum attached to a string that welcomes you to “the party.” There was another similar inflated bag of aluminum, in blue, but it popped before you could get a chance to see if it had its own message. They hand you the bag with a thumbs-up.

“Wow! Thanks Ruby and Sapphire, I’m so humbled!” You’re not sure what its functional use is and hope that nobody will notice when you release it into the atmosphere later.

“It’s Garnet,” they correct you.

You stare at the inflated bag of pink aluminum. “Oh! Thanks for the Garnet, Ruby and Sapphire!” You suppose there’s some convenience to assigning labels to useless but complex objects.

They laugh. “No, that’s a balloon. I’m Garnet.” In a flash of light, they’re instantly unfused. The lovey-dovey Ruby and Sapphire that couldn’t get their hands off each other during the baseball game appear, holding hands like that part of them is permanently fused, even as individuals. “We’re Ruby and Sapphire,” the Sapphire explains.

You gasp. “Oh! That makes sense!”

And just like that, they’re a Garnet again, and they’re flashing you a thumbs-up.

The Peridot looks at you in shock. “It does?” She takes a step back once she remembers the Garnet’s presence, frantically waving her hands apologetically. “I-I mean, it does, I guess, but you just understand it that quickly?”

Lapis is smirking at the Peridot with her arms crossed smugly.

You nod. “A plus B equals C, so it’s easier to substitute C into an equation instead of saying A plus B.”

“No, fusion! You understand fusion?”

“Rubies fuse all the time.” Eyeball likes fusing with just you, sometimes.

“No, cross-gem fusions! Without any kind of functional utility other than a marginal benefit! You understand that?”

“Um, yeah…” You subconsciously look up at Lapis. “‘Art for the sake of art.’”

You don’t even know what art is, but you’re pretty sure you’re looking at it.

Scene v. -Your ship, outside the barn. Nighttime. 

She can turn off so quickly--Lapis, you mean, because in your mind it’s obvious that there’s nobody else to talk about when she’s present--and she does it so willingly, so vulnerably, like there’s nothing stopping her from doing what she wants. You’re marveled at the fact that she can still manage to feel trapped in a planet with oceans ready for her to command, sources of water everywhere you look, artillery waiting for her to fire at any whim. How much freedom does she need? She could be floating in outer space, eons away from the nearest star system, and she could still be complaining about not having enough room to stretch her wings. Yet, she’s content to settle in a primeval structure constructed with planet-made materials (wood, nails, paint).

In the dead of the night, which is a time of darkness that encompasses half of all time on Earth, noises echo in the barn. Such include her snoring. The Peridot wasn’t kidding about the volume of it. However, there are also other more insignificant noises, like the buzzing of tiny organic native species, creaking of the wood, and the gentle spring breeze. The moon and the Peridot’s computer are the only sources of light in the otherwise dim barn. You find yourself missing the soothing red light of the Roaming Eye and leave your “barnmates” to their nighttime activities.

You know this would be the perfect time to slip out of Earth, but that wouldn’t be interesting. Your personal agenda has been amended from revenge to research. This mission may finally prove your worth in the surveillance/intelligence division.

Everyone else laughed at the thought of a Ruby entering the intelligence division. (You gotta admit, it is pretty funny that a mere Ruby outranks most gems made to be smart in IQ alone.) No more. You will be the pioneer of a brave new Homeworld, where a common foot soldier can be promoted to a slightly more valued foot soldier just judging by their intelligence! Oh, such a radical revolution would have sentenced you to a shattering in Era 1, but Yellow Diamond’s rule in Era 2 was a game-changer. You’re grateful to have been made for such an innovative, tactical leader.

Hints of social mobility in gem society has been evident in Rubies, most of all, given how little resources it takes to make one and how adaptable they can be. They’re your foot soldiers, guards, factory workers, servants, heavy-lifters, and most recently, intergalactic squadrons. The more technology is developed, the more niches a Ruby can sneak into. This mission report can be your ticket to defining your rank in the hierarchy. You settle into the main commander’s seat and open up a new file to type in.

Mission Report:

You can’t use your squadron’s ID for this. That egotistical chest-gemmed Ruby would love to ride on your coattails.

Mission Report: NV-419.310

Wait, Yellow Pearl will only bother to glance at this report if your main objective has been fulfilled first. Backspace, backspace, backspace...

Mission Report: NV-419.3

Mission Report: NV

Mission Report:

Missi

Missing Jasper. Where IS she?

Personally, you feel like she has developed some kind of attachment to Earth. It is, technically, her home planet. It was the colony of her Diamond. Oh, even perfect gems corrode when exposed to Earth. Everything is fleeting on that planet.

Missing Jasper. Where IS she? Can’t stay on Earth too long.

You jump in your seat when you hear pounding on the outside of the ship. Backspace, backspace, backspace--you’ll write the report after you find Jasper. Right now, you have an unexpected visitor to deal with.

The hand-gem Ruby steps in hesitantly. You can tell it’s her without even spinning your chair around to look. Her awkward, clunky steps give it away. “H-Hey, Navy, uh… What’s, uh… How’s it going?” You can hear the sweat in her voice.

You turn around to face her, since she’s a fellow Ruby. You’re glad you get to a moment alone with her, unattached to the Sapphire (although you’re certain the Sapphire is waiting just outside the ship for this Ruby’s return). The camaraderie between Rubies is the only break from eternal servitude of the Diamonds that you’ve known. “Why don’t you just call me ‘Ruby’?”

Her nervous chuckle is sporadic and jolty, so unlike the mellifluous laughter that bubbles out of Lapis. “It’s just to lessen the confusion. You must know how confusing it gets when someone says, ‘Hey, Ruby!’ and five-million Rubies turn around…”

The cultural barrier is so thick you could cut it with a laser. Era 1 must have been a much simpler time. No gem would actually yell “Ruby!” in a room full of Rubies unless it was a joke. Sure, you could address a gem by their facet and cut number, but usually gems make it clear who they’re addressing. There’s almost like a sense for it, definitely acquired. “Oh, that’s true!” you lie. “It just seems really pretentious to have my own unique title.”

The Ruby smiles. “Welcome to Earth. We get to be individuals, here.”

That’s ironic, considering that she spends virtually all of her time in a fusion. “But I’m just a Ruby.”

“No!” she abruptly shouts. She blinks in surprise when she realizes how loud she was, then blushes. She wrings her hands behind her back. “I mean, it’s just--” Her words jostle like the Roaming Eye when it’s caught in a meteor shower. “That’s just what Homeworld wants you to think. You’re more than that.”

Um. Not really, but okay. It’s hard to conform to individualist, entropy-ridden propaganda. “I like being a Ruby, though. Don’t you?” You’re going down a bad path. You’re supposed to assimilate to whatever they say to avoid suspicion.

“No! I don’t!” Her hands are in her hair. She starts pacing back and forth, unable to form tears because they’re sizzling off of her. Thank goodness the ship was designed for Rubies--no burn marks on this baby. “I hate it!”

You close the ship’s opening. Too much noise might wake Lapis.

She freezes in her tracks when she hears what she just said. “I mean, I hated it, back when I was on Homeworld,” she corrects, but you know what she really means. She lets out a strangled scream and starts pacing even faster. “Rubies are stupid, Rubies are disposable, Rubies are worthless, Rubies are too emotional--” She pivots on her foot and waves her hands frantically at you. “--I mean, that’s not true!” she assures you, not that you’re the one who needs it, “But that’s what Homeworld makes you think!”

You know all those things, but you don’t hate it. “Well, what’s wrong with that? We’re made a certain way, that’s just fate.” At least Homeworld organizes these traits instead of randomly assigning them by a lottery. That would be unequal. All gems have the right to be where they belong. Ultimately, as long as each gem fulfills her purpose, there should be no problem.

She freezes, again. Her tears flow faster than her pyrokinesis can immediately evaporate. “That sounds like something Sapphire would say.”

“Oh, Ruby…” (Oh, Diamonds. You should have expected her to start talking about Sapphire sooner or later.) You quickly prance over to her and let her cry into your chest. Lapis mentioned something about two individuals gems having an unstable fusion, earlier, but she didn’t mention anything about fusions separating into unstable individual gems. “I’m sorry that I upset you! I just really love that you’re a Ruby, like how I love being a Ruby!” You could easily return her to her Sapphire, but you believe that only a Ruby can truly comfort another Ruby in such a state. Her blazing hot touch doesn’t faze you in the slightest, whereas an icy Sapphire would be frizzling with steam.

She collapses to her knees. “No, Ruby, I want more than that!” she sobs. It looks like she’s too distraught to keep up with that silly nickname. There’s no Ruby to disambiguate from the other if it’s just the two of them alone. “There’s a love stronger than that, and I couldn’t have it on Homeworld. I-I was going to be shattered because of it!”

That makes sense. You’ve never seen a cross-gem fusion before Garnet, but it sounds like something Homeworld wouldn’t like. Nobles would call it an abomination. “There’s nothing wrong with just being a Ruby.” And by that, you mean that she doesn’t have to be in a fusion all the time. Really. It’s great and all, but it’s a lot of energy.

She screams something incoherent into your chest.

“... What?”

She lifts her head and stares up at you with the most intense, passionate gaze you’ve ever seen in your life. The nuclear reactions from a thousand stars fills her voice with ardency as she proclaims, “I love Sapphire.”

Um. Okay. “Yeah, I know…”

She weaves her fingers into yours. “No, but I really, really, really love Sapphire! More than you love everything on Earth and more than Lapis hates everything on Earth!”

“Yes. I know, Ruby.”

She takes in a deep breath. “I lo--”

You swear you’ve barely been speaking with her for five minutes and you already want to dump her back into the Garnet fusion. At least the Garnet fusion stays silent most of the time. “Yes, you love Sapphire, we know, you love Sapphire so much, she’s the light of your physical form, you love her so much, you just love Sapphire, I know, you really love Sapphire, okay, we know, we get it, YOU LOVE SAPPHIRE. WE GET IT.”

Her clasp on your hands tighten. “You don’t KNOW how great it feels to be fused with her all the time, though.”

This conversation has taken an unprecedented turn into a salacious realm that you feel, despite being centuries old, too young to hear. Components of a perma-fusion truly are shameless. Yet, the curiosity tugs at you. The forbidden sin has to be exhilarating to make it worth committing continuously, uninterrupted, for thousands of years…

“You just don’t know how great it feels to be something entirely new. I-It’s like I’ve been re-made! Like, I don’t have to be the dispensable Ruby that Homeworld made me as! Our masses are one, but not just like two colors mixed together to make another color--more like our color transcends the spectrum entirely and a new spectrum has to be made to properly classify our love.”

And you thought you were over-using the word “love”,

“The initial burst of energy is the best, though…”

You hope that noise she just made wasn’t a moan.

“I can’t stop thinking of the next time we’ll fuse every time we’re apart. It’s so different to fuse with a different kind of gem, especially when you can never be close enough to them without fusion. It’s this unity of light, life, and love, and it’s addicting.”

You think you figured out why Homeworld restricted this practice. “Crazy idea here, but,” you introduce slowly, “isn’t--addiction--bad?” Abnormal compulsion destines a gem for instability. Exhibit A: this hand-gemmed Ruby, currently suffering from severe withdrawal. The symptoms are straight out of the textbook: restlessness, depression, irritability, crying, and, wait for it--

“Fusion isn’t bad!” she screeches at you.

Denial. It takes all of your willpower to not roll your eyes. “Do you want to fuse?”

“Yes.”

Melding into one slightly-bigger Ruby is as easy as breathing. It’s not the best fusion you’ve ever been in, admittedly--you feel much stronger than usual, but your arm-gemmed ex-comrade was much more exciting to fuse with, which was why you sought her first while you were floating around in space--but at least the hand-gemmed fusion isn’t in a total panic anymore, although her innumerable paranoid thoughts are still coursing through the fusion.

She’s thinking, above everything else, that she did miss the easy unity that same-gem fusion provided--like it’s just herself, but bigger and not alone. Every other thought is about how she’s breaching the sanctity of her love for Sapphire.

You think it’s time to unfuse. (It’s a little harder than usual to separate, this time, because this Ruby is unbelievably clingy when it comes to fusions, but you manage.)

As soon as there are two Rubies in the ship again instead of one, there’s more screaming. “Th-That’s not what I meant!”

“Oops.” You thought she was just feeling lonely.

“I have to tell Sapphire!”

“Doesn’t she already know?”

“Oh no! You’re right! What does she think of me now? She’s going to hate me now for fusing without her without me telling her! Oh no, what if she doesn’t hate me and she just forgives me right away because it’s already done and over with? This is fusion we’re talking about, though, it’s FUSION!”

She heads towards the exit of the ship. You don’t think she actually knows how to operate the exit on her own, since she talks like she was one of the lower-lower class Era 1 Rubies. You grab her hand. “I’m sorry, Ruby, I didn’t mean to cause this much trouble for you.” It’s not even that big of a deal. Rubies are meant to fuse together, in great numbers and often.

She screams. “You’re right, you’re right--you didn’t mean to cause trouble, because I was the one who came to you in the first place… This is my fault! Ugh!” She kicks a wall of the ship. “I really am a stupid Ruby!”

You’re extremely grateful that this ship was made specially for Rubies. You pull her away from the wall, just in case.

“Let! Go! I need to go back to Sapphire!”

“Wasn’t there something you came here to tell me?”

She ceases her struggles. “Who cares what I say?”

You let her go. You weren’t manufactured for this moonshine. She’s nearly clawing her way out of the ship until you finally saunter to the nearest panel to release her.

“Buh-byee!”

There’s going to be a lot of altercations excluded from your mission report when you write it.

Scene vi. - The Steven’s house. 

The Steven invites you to the Crystal Temple, along with Lapis and the Peridot. There’s no objective behind the visit besides time-wasting. In fact, there are multitudes of games and devices on Earth built solely for temporary entertainment pleasure. It’s an expected product of a hedonistic planet with no regards for full employment. Unoccupied gems can claim to be active when participating in inconsequential tasks. What a waste. The Peridot confesses that she once thought the same, but now she claims it’s “pretty great”. To them, it must be, but for a society, it would be terrible. Remove incentive, and you get low quality products. The Crystal Gems can detest Homeworld all they want, but you don’t think they would do a better job at governing an entire species.

The Steven is fascinated by your affinity for puzzles. The Peridot is more skeptical. She dumps out the pieces for three different 1000-piece puzzles into one pile, mixes them up, and challenges you to solve all of them within one hour without looking at the pictures on the boxes. Additionally, one of the puzzles is composed of only white pieces. It’s an interesting challenge, but it’s still too easy for you. You’ve trained yourself for these kinds of unorthodox intelligence-testers as soon as you set your goals on being in the surveillance/intelligence department. You heard that the exam consists of abstract teasers like these.

There’s a process to it, and with any process, a technique. Categorize, sub-categorize, match, and make educated guesses. There are key differences between the three puzzles that you look out for, like the type of paint used for the images and the art style and the way each piece is cut. Inconsistencies are easy to pick up by the trained eye--that’s why they’re such a rookie mistake. All you have to do is make quick decisions, and you should meet the time limit.

Lapis is invested in the challenge. She almost watches with as much amusement as she does when she’s indulging in Camp Pining Hearts. The Pearl becomes a spectator once Steven explains. She immediately expresses that such a feat is impossible for a--she cuts off, but you don’t miss the way her mouth shapes to say something the begins with an “R and most definitely ends with an “uby”. She cuts off because she didn’t notice that you had two puzzles finished when she sat down and that you were barely past the 40-minute mark. She amends the ending of her sentence.

“--ah, um, many gems. It’s not a natural gem skill, I mean.”

You’re not sure what kind of pretense she’s trying to pull or for what purpose. Everyone knows that a normal Ruby doesn’t even have the attention span for a 100-piece puzzle.

At the warp pad, Ruby arrives. “Hey, guys.” Everyone’s eyes are glued to her as she calmly strolls to the hub of attention. “Wow, did you complete those two puzzles all by yourself, Navy?”

“Yup. This is my third one. Peridot told me to complete all three within one hour.”

It’s the 45-minute mark, and you’re already halfway done with the final puzzle. It goes by a lot faster without the other pieces from other puzzles mixed in.

“Seriously? Most Rubies are too dumb to even do one of them in one day.”

The Pearl is at a loss for words. You just need everyone to be quiet for five more minutes, and then you’ll be done…

Of course, it only takes three more minutes before you’ve connected all the major chunks together and fit in the lonely pieces not a part of any units to complete the puzzle as a whole. The Peridot stops the timer.

“Nice job, Navy!” Ruby raises her fist to punch you in the arm--traditional Ruby gesture of praise or affection. You remember that cravings are also a symptom of withdrawal. You take a step back to dodge it. Any physical contact with her could result in an unintentional fusion, considering her absurdly high potency for fusion at the moment.

“Wow, thanks…” you mutter quickly.

Steven is choking on the unspoken issue lingering in the air. “Rubywhyareyouunfusedwhathappened?”

Ruby shrugs. “Nothing.”

The Pearl’s fingers grip the cushions of the couch like a lifeline. “Did you and Sapphire get into a fight?”

“No, really, nothing happened,” Ruby swears. She cracks her knuckles nervously. “Actually, we both went on separate missions today.”

The Steven sighs in relief. “Not missions for Garnet, huh?” he assumes.

Ruby shakes her head. “Garnet could have handled it. But, you know, so could Sapphire and me.”

Lapis bursts into laughter, that same effervescent laugh from before. “I may not win them all, but I was right about fusion, wasn’t I?” She nudges the Peridot.

Ruby blushes. The Pearl glares at Lapis.

“And what was it that you were right about, exactly?” the Pearl demands threateningly.

Lapis rolls her eyes at the Crystal Gems’ defensive nature about the sacrilegious ritual of fusion. “You need a break from it, eventually.”  

Pearl relaxes a bit, but she’s still wary of what Lapis is implying. “You can’t speak for Ruby and Sapphire’s case. Garnet is different from--”

“C’mon, now, there’s no point in arguing over this,” Ruby interrupts. “We can all speak from our own experiences, but the only ones qualified to talk about long-term fusions are me, Sapphire, Garnet, Lapis, and--” She glances at you, then immediately omits the last name. “--and, uh, that’s it. Sorry, Pearl, but Lapis is right. Sometimes we need a break.”

Huh. She actually took your advice. You suddenly have a deeper respect for Ruby. Like, two centimeters deeper.

The Pearl gapes. “You’ve had breaks before?” She holds her shocked faced in her hands. “I can’t believe it…”  

“No,” Ruby says quietly. “This is the first time. Ever.” She starts that anxious pacing again, blackening the wooden floor with Ruby-sized footsteps. “First time for everything, huh?” she mumbles, mostly to herself. “Anything could happen. She could get attacked by wasps, or fall off a cliff, or get struck by lightning, or trip and fall on her gem, or get attacked by a corrupted gem, or, or, or…” She throws her hands into the air. “... EXPLODES!” She bites her fingers. “What if she explodes, Pearl? I can’t do anything if she explodes!”

You hop onto the couch to whisper into Lapis’ ear: “I think the real challenge is if Ruby can last an hour without fusing with Sapphire.”

She smirks. You’ve gained more hostility from the Peridot, but you can’t bring yourself to care about her amiability towards you if it means getting closer to Lapis.

An Amethyst enters the room, wondering what all the racket without her was about. “Is that Ruby? Without Sapphire?”

Ruby screams. “I can’t take this anymore! Fuse with me, Amethyst!”

The Amethyst isn’t prepared for this, clearly. “Oh. Uh. What for? I’m not sure how this is going to work, to be honest; we’re both usually the dippers, not the dippees...”

Ruby full-on tackles the Amethyst to the ground. Her gem is already glowing before their masses make contact with each other. Their bodies change into blinding white light for a few seconds, before Ruby’s form pushes the Amethyst away, tumbling them both out of the fusion. “No, I can’t do it! This isn’t the answer! I’m so sorry, Amethyst, I’m so sorry…”

The Amethyst lies on the ground, still confused.

As if summoned by the power of love, the Sapphire arrives on the warp pad. Ruby and the Sapphire meet each other halfway. The Pearl smothers the Steven into her chest when their lips lock in a fusion-starved reunion makeout and covers his ears with her hands when they start moaning into the kiss. The Peridot takes the initiative to squeeze her own eyes shut and cover her ears by herself. You wonder if chipping off a part of your gem will erase the memory of this lascivious act.

“Oh, Sapphy, I was so worried! The mission was so lonely just being alone!” Ruby says in between kisses up Sapphire’s neck. “I don’t know what to do without you, Sapphire, I’m so scared…”

The Amethyst rolls her eyes. “Ugh, this isn’t a novela, guys.”

The Sapphire clears her bangs so she can see Ruby for herself, right in front of her own eye instead of just her future vision. “I foresee a long fusion dance in our future.” She captures Ruby’s lips again in hers. “Let’s make this one special. We can go to a river, like the one from 5,750 years ago, under the moon with the stars twinkling enviously above us…”

You notice that her gem is glowing, but Ruby’s isn’t. Ruby laughs nervously. “... Under the full moon?”

The Sapphire touches their foreheads together. “Silly Ruby! It’s only at its first quarter right now.”

Ruby’s sweat sizzles off of her. “We could wait until the full moon,” she suggests.

The Sapphire giggles. “You’re so funny, Ruby--it’ll take a week before it becomes a full moon.”

Ruby glances worriedly at you. You’re not sure why she’s looking at you, specifically, for help. You didn’t force her to take your advice.

The Sapphire holds Ruby’s face in her hands. Her cold gem warms up under the heat of Ruby’s blushing face. She’s too afraid to use her future vision. For once, she’s looking at the situation in front of her with her very own eye. It is daytime, the other half of all time on Earth but full of light from the ever-burning Sun, yet the Sapphire feels the most blind than she has in ages. “Are you… tired… of fusing?”

The things you do for your comrades. “Ruby, you’re so forgetful! Weren’t you going to give me a tour of Beach City? I’d love to see the… thing you were talking about before!”

Ruby hits her head. “Oh, haha, right! How stupid of me to forget!”

The Sapphire keeps her eye locked on Ruby. “You’re not stupid.”

“C’mon, Ruby,” you reluctantly urge her. “I really can’t wait to see that thing!” What does a Sapphire have to worry about, anyway? If it’ll turn out okay in the end, she should be fine with it, and if it doesn’t, then she should already know that it’s destined.

Ruby grabs your hand and runs out of the house with you. “ByeseeyoulaterSapphyIloveyou!” She bumps into the table on the way out. “Oof!”

“Buh-bye!”

You didn’t mean to gain hostility from the Sapphire, too. The room is frozen over by the time you two make it out the door.

Scene vii. - A street in Beach City. 

Earth has “food.” The native organic inhabitants consume certain substances for energy, about three times in a 24-hour cycle.  Some foods are mostly for epicurean indulgence and tend to be high in a tiny crystalline structure called “sugar.” The category for these kinds of sweet foods is called dessert, sometimes treats, other times confections or pastries. Foods can come in various forms and temperatures. Ruby likes frozen desserts--”ice cream”, specifically, though only because she likes to melt it and also because they remind her of the Sapphire.

She takes you to a specialized fried pastry store maintained by two native humans. The door jingles when she holds it open for you. Beach City is like an urbanized human zoo, except resources are harvested by the humans instead of simply handed to them and the humans have independent consciences that can make their own decisions. Ruby takes two plastic-sealed ice cream treats from a freezer. “This is a freezer, by the way,” she explains offhandedly.

“... Did you not have freezers in Era 1 Homeworld?” you ask. “All Era 2 Roaming Eyes have one in case we’re sent on a retrieval mission for materials with special storage conditions. They can also keep an object hot.”

The glass door slams shuts. “Y’know… I don’t remember.”

You two are about to walk out of the store, but the tall human speaks up. “You have to pay for goods and services, here.”

“Just put it on Garnet’s tab,” Ruby says.

The shorter human appears to have noticed the gems on you two. “You know her?”

Ruby sighs. “Well, I don’t really have the star on my outfit, since Garnet is the one with mine and Sapphire’s stars, but yes, I’m a Crystal Gem. I’m Ruby.” She points at you. “This is Navy.”

Actually, you’re both Ruby, but okay. You suppose she can be the Alpha Ruby since she has been on Earth a few centuries longer. You didn’t know seniority was a big thing on Earth. “Hi! I’m new to this planet!”

The tall human shrugs. “Steven has weird new friends, whatever. We’ll put it on her tab. If she comes complaining later, I’m blaming you two.”

Ruby grits her teeth. “Y-Yup… I’m totally… a new friend…”

This Ruby sure has a lot of triggers. Her and Eyeball could have been great friends. “Hahaha… Buh-bye!”

You pull her out of the store and let her lead you to more parts of the Beach City. She takes the plastic wrapping off of the ice cream dessert and burns that into a crisp in her fist. Not even a second passes before the ice cream dessert evaporates and the wooden stick is ashes on the ground.

You would imitate her actions, but pyrokinesis was never your forte. You never needed it before. “Why do you like sibilant destruction?”

“Huh?”

Oops. Your mistake. You rephrase yourself. “Why do you like to burn things?”

She holds her gem up to eye level. “I like to feel. Heat is hard not to feel. It burns and it melts and it sizzles and it boils and it hisses… I don’t see it as destroying. I just think it’s simple reactions.”

She’s not wrong. Atoms can neither be created or destroyed. The frozen dessert she had still exists in the form of vapor in the atmosphere. “That explains why you’re so good at it.” Not that pyrokinesis is useful on Homeworld. Modern technology has made that skill obsolete. It’s quite bleak that Earth gems are always on a pursuit for a diversion from the fact that their existences are otherwise meaningless. Even a task as small as melting ice can be a means of coping. What a primeval occupation. You hand your frozen dessert to her. She needs it more than you.

In a moment, it’s ashes and vapor. Nothing more.

“Does Homeworld consider me defective?” Ruby asks.

“Uhh, that’s not really my department--” You’d certainly make a call to a professional Kindergartener if she was on your squadron, though. “In terms of value, you’re actually more--”

“Ugh! What Lars and Sadie said back there bothers me!”

“Who?”

“They didn’t even know me, but they know Garnet. And Pearl and Steven and Amethyst, they all only see me as half of Garnet! It’s never, ‘Hey, Ruby!’ It’s always, ‘Hey, Ruby, where’s Sapphire?’”

Why did you sign yourself up for this, again? “I thought you hated being a Ruby. Isn’t that why you’re always Garnet?” It’s a miracle she can even handle being on a mission by herself without spontaneously self-combusting.

She screams. There must have been a lot of that on her solo mission. It catches the attention of a few passing humans. “You’re right! I do hate myself! The reason why I stay fused all the time is because my love for Sapphire is just as strong as my self-hatred!”

Seriously, why did you do this to yourself? Her wails are so corrosive you can almost feel your gem cracking.

You decide to take her to the beach so she can (literally) blow off some steam.

Scene vii. - The Steven’s house, within the kitchen. 

“I wish I could just set the ocean on fire!”

Now that’s a wild evocation you want to fulfill.

The interior of the Steven’s household is initially difficult to enter. You discover that it’s due to the door having been iced shut. The Sapphire is nowhere in sight, yet the house is a tundra. She must be nearby.

You’re alarmed by the unexpected fizzle under your feet as you step inside. You didn’t know your thermoregulation was unconsciously activated in frosty environments, likely an old feature that takes more trouble to get rid of than to keep. You can’t control it, though, or else you would turn it off. It tingles when you walk.

You rummage through the kitchen, a room dedicated to the storage and preparation of food, for oil. Or, at least, a handful of substances you think could be oil. Written Earth language is completely foreign to you; it’s curved or straight in all the wrong places and sometimes hook strangely like they want to pierce the letter next to them. It looks like there’s no system at all to the formation of each letter. They all exist individually with no coherent meaning unless they’re a part of a bigger word. It must be difficult to learn, and thus, difficult to teach. No wonder Earth is such a mess.

“Ruby!” The Pearl is disappointed to find that you’re not the Ruby she’s looking for. “Oh, Navy. What are you doing?”

“Hi, Pearl! I’m looking for oil.” You hold up the bottle in your hand. The liquid inside is frozen, just like everything else in the house. The freezer is probably warmer than the kitchen’s shelves at this point. “Is this oil?”

“That’s soy sauce...”

Ugh, you don’t need such a patronizing tone from a Pearl. It’s not like you’re not designated for fulfilling the wishes of another gem. You serve the Diamond Authority, so you’re not used to fetching trivial substances for a demand. Looks like you’ll need to learn Earth language for better convenience. “Is it flammable?”

“Flammable?” she echoes. “What are you trying to do?”

“Is it flammable?” you repeat. You want a proper response before you let a Pearl question your actions.

“No, it’s not,” she snaps. “Why do you need something flammable?”

“To set the ocean on fire.”

“What? You can’t set the ocean on fire!”

She’s not wrong, technically. Just smile and nod, and maybe it’ll lessen her hostility. “You’re right, Pearl! But I think I can achieve a realistic simulation of it by having a flammable buffer between the dihydrogen monoxide, preferably a liquid less dense than the dihydrogen monoxide.”

She’s taken aback. Oops. You should rephrase yourself for better understanding.

“I mean, if I put oil in the water, it’ll float and not mix with the water, so I could set the oil on fire and--”

“Yes, I know how the process goes.” The Pearl snatches away the soy sauce. You didn’t need it, anyway. “I meant you shouldn’t set the ocean on fire because it’s bad.”

So there are some forbidden recreational activities on Earth. Without some higher authority to appease, you’re not sure why. You don’t have the capability to set the entire ocean on fire unless you’re able to attain an entire ocean’s worth of oil. At best, you would be able to set a good, controlled portion of the ocean on fire. “Oh, I’m sorry, Pearl, I didn’t know it was bad! Ruby said she wanted to set the ocean on fire, so I was just trying to help…”

Scene ix. - A beach, beyond the Crystal Temple. 

The sand Ruby has been sitting in has been superheated into glass. Although the water tries to invade her personal bubble of heat, it’s to no avail. It shrivels to a semi-circle of salt deposits before it can reach her.

“There’s this thing on Earth we do, called ‘exaggeration’. It’s when you blow things out of proportions because you’re a stupid, overly emotional Ruby.”

Yes, you know how hyperboles work. You have to humor the Crystal Gems, anyway. “I don’t really get it, but that sounds funny!”

The Pearl tries to step into Ruby’s “circle of emotions” as you call it, but it’s an attempt as fruitless as the water’s. She settles for a spot in the non-superheated sand a few meters away. “You’re more than that, Ruby. You know that. You were the one--well, technically it was Garnet--who told me--”

“I know what Garnet said.” Ruby curls into herself. “I just don’t want to be what you were to Sardonyx.”

The Pearl is struck speechless. She scoops up sand in her hand and lets it fall between her fingers. The frothy white crest of the ocean laps at her feet. You wonder who Sardonyx is.

Ruby stands up from the center of her circle and walks forward into the waves. Steam rises all around her. “I was really scared on that mission without Sapphire. It was so simple, too! All I had to do was bubble one of the weakest corrupted gems out there. And I thought I couldn’t do it just because I wasn’t with her. That makes me no different than, um…” She moves farther into the ocean. “... someone who I suddenly can’t remember the name of.”

Oh, come on, that sounds so fake. Who is this mystery person that’s being referenced?

The Pearl nods knowingly. “Garnet looked so stable just last night. I would have never guessed.”

Ruby kicks and splashes the water. “This isn’t about fusion! Why is it always about fusion when me, Sapphire, or Garnet is involved?” The water starts to boil around her. “Fusion, fusion, fusion! Maybe that’s the answer! Maybe I’m sick of fusion!  Maybe I’m sick of erasing myself because existence is just an idle quest for objective in a void of absurdity!”

She’s completely right about that.

“Being makes me anxious. And I mean me, Ruby--the stupid, worthless, disposable, emotional…” She pauses for a word at the tip of her tongue. “... uh…”

“Incendiary?” you suggest.

Ruby blinks. “Um, yeah, thanks. I’m still a stupid, worthless, disposable, emotional, incendiary Ruby after a long-term fusion, a war, and the development of human civilization, but…” She pauses, but the pause goes on so long that you’re distracted by the cries of flying white-winged creatures in the sky. “Uh, that’s it, so far. It’s been like, three hours since I’ve been just Ruby all on my own. I need more time before I can learn a real lesson from all of this.”

The Pearl winces at the unresolved tensions swirling around Ruby. “Well. No rush. Just… remember what you’re worth to us as a Crystal Gem.”

Scene x. - Deep into the ocean. 

“Oh no, oh no, oh no… What am I worth as a Crystal Gem?” Ruby asks herself as she paces back and forth at the bottom of the ocean.

You look around at the aquatic organisms. Their design is unlike anything you’ve ever seen before. You don’t know how they got there or why there’s such diversity within even a single species, but you don’t want to resign yourself to the Peridot’s “nothing on Earth makes sense” theory. No matter how ludicrous it is, there is always logic within madness. There are patterns to decode, languages to translate, behaviors to study.

“I don’t even have the star! Should I poof myself and get a star? But that would be stupid!”

The Steven mentioned that Lapis performed the incredible feat of stealing all of Earth’s oceans in order to build herself a tower to get back to Homeworld when she was cracked. You think Ruby can perform a similar miracle and evaporate all of Earth’s oceans by the time she reaches her final eureka about the baffling paradox of a meaningless existence searching for meaning.

Scene xi. - The barn. 

“But which pairing do you think is better? Percy and Pierre or Percy and Paulette?”

You glance between the Peridot’s shipping chart and the unreadable notes Lapis scribbled on the blackboard. There’s a striking resemblance between the writing in the chart and the notes that distracts you from the issue your barnmates pose at you. “Why can’t all three of them be together?” you propose.

The Peridot narrows her eyes at you. “Three’s a crowd,” she hisses.

Wow, okay, totally not groovy. You hold up the shipping chart next to Lapis’ notes for better comparison. “You two have the same kind of writing. It’s like Earth language and gem language combined.”

The Peridot folds her arms smugly. “Yes, we have our own little dialect here, derived from our special culture here in our barn. We moved in at the same time.”

“We never learned English completely,” Lapis confesses bluntly, in contrast to the Peridot’s frilly interpretation of their Earth-Gem writing mess. “Maybe you could learn it and teach it to us, since you’re so good at learning.”

A genuine blush rises to your cheeks. “Oh, stop!” You perform the corresponding gesture that Ruby and the Sapphire’s fusion did in response to the same flattery-induced embarrassment.

“No, really, you’re smart for a Ruby,” Lapis insists. “I know you caught up to the third season so fast because you watched every episode at twice its normal speed. That’s pretty clever. You could ask Pearl to teach you.”

Ugh. That Pearl… But you can’t look away from that unusually kind smile Lapis has today. Maybe it’s just hard-wired into your gem to want to obey higher-ranking gems like Lapis.

Scene xii. - The Steven’s house. 

It’s a numb realization that spreads within you like ice blooming around the Sapphire--you’re enduring this long-winded, tedious torture for Lapis.

“Before we even touch the written alphabet, there’s so much to discuss about phonetics in the English language! English has five sonorous syllables categorized into ‘vowels’: A, E, I, O, U, with a tricky addition known as Y...”

This test of endurance, infinity more dull than your training days, is for an entity independent of any higher authority or community. You could even go as far as to say that, in this scenario, she’s the one acting as the higher authority. Just her. Your commitment to this task is for her sake. You placed her on a higher echelon than you for no “rational” Earth reason. Not because of a caste system or a punishment or a social pressure. After all, this is irrelevant to your primary objective to Find Jasper and your secondary objective to Get Ahead In Homeworld, and thus, won’t be included in your mission report. Your motive aligns more with a primitive inferiority complex embedded into the “moral” coding of your gem type than pure self-interest.

You don’t like to believe that amenableness is an innate quality for you, though. You comment without raising your hand, which is a gesture that communicates proper English classroom deference. “Pearl, this method of teaching is a little…”

She doesn’t hear you over her sonorous ego. “... We’ll begin at the beginning. Lots of words begin with the vowel A. Apple, air, away…” She writes two versions of the letter on the chalkboard.

You speak up a little louder. “... antiquated.”

The Pearl pauses, then smiles rewardingly. “Yes, ‘antiquated’ begins with the letter A, too!” The pedantic praise grates at you.

You slump onto the wooden platform attached to your seat. “Also, anachronistic,” you deadpan.  

“Yes!” The Pearl claps her hands together. “‘Also’ and ‘anachronistic’ begin with the letter A, too. You’re a fast learner.”

You smile. And laugh. And want to shatter yourself a little. “Oh, not really, you’re just a really great teacher, Pearl.”

She beams at you. “We’ll stop now, for today. Amethyst warned me about burning you out too soon.”

Wait. What, already? You scour the room for the nearest clock. Apparently, pi-over-six radians have already passed by in circular Earth time, or 1/24th of a solar day. All you learned was the letter A. You don’t even know the significance of the two sizes of the letter A.

On your wooden platform, the Pearl slams three kilograms of thin, white sheets in a stack. “Here’s your homework: writing practice. Complete it by tomorrow, and then we’ll be able to move on.”

You pick up the sheet on the top, which has black imprinted onto it in the shapes of variously sized A’s, along with small instructional English text at the top. Some of the A’s are formed by dots and others are in a light gray ink. You’re supposed to trace over these letters until you’re “advanced” enough to write the letter without a model (you can hear the Pearl’s emphasis on the A in your mind, ugh). Nothing is written in gem language.

Pearl snatches the sheet away from you and waves the flames off of it. Wisps of smoke trails off of the sheet as it moves. “Careful, Navy. Paper is flammable.”

“Oh no,” you say halfheartedly as you slam your hand onto the stack of homeworks. “How clumsy of me.” It combusts. “I feel. So. Bad.”

Then, the Pearl teaches you what a fire extinguisher is through demonstration--a much more efficient method than oral explanation.

Scene viii. - The Steven’s house, within the kitchen. 

The Amethyst has an even more simplistic teaching method, but at least the straightforward nature of it is faster. It’s fit for a Ruby, but doesn’t linger on the basics too long. She places small, adhesive sheets (paper, but this particular object is called a sticky note, which makes sense because it is a note that sticks) on objects with the written word for it. She sounds it out for you as she writes out the label for each object, which you have to admit is very helpful.

“Cccuuuppp… Chaaaiiirrr… Sssiiinkkk… Tttooortaaa… Rrruubbyy…” She sticks the last sticky note on your gem.

“Ruby?”

The temperature suddenly drops. The Sapphire floats into the room. Her eye is exposed, fervently searching for her Ruby, her love, her literal other half. She knows she found the wrong Ruby before she even sees you. “Hello, Navy. You’re learning English.”

You’re almost afraid to think a wrong thought in her presence. But only almost. “Yes, Your Clarity,” you respond instinctively. She can read your future, not your thoughts. Plus, since you’ve made it this far, then that means she can’t the definite future, otherwise she would have found Ruby by now.

She has the courtesy to stop staring directly towards your general direction. (You know she’s not looking at you, she’s looking through you.) It unnerves you how subtly her power manifests in the way she carries herself. The thin glaze of frost barely misses you. Your natural heat prevents external conditions from affecting the temperature within your minuscule radius. “We don’t use those titles on Earth,” she says politely.

Classless, unorganized society on its path towards self-ruination--right, right. You offer a sunny smile with your hands clasped behind your back. “Forgive me.”

“Hm.” The noise communicates nothing you can use to your advantage.

“Dude, chill,” the Amethyst whispers. Pun fully intended.

You resort to laughter. Ruby does it when the situation is uncomfortable, so it must be a proper course of action. “Are there no manners on Earth, either? I was polished to be a gentlegem.”

“Formalities are discarded amongst one’s compatriots.”

You don’t know what to say. There’s no energy to match. Even time seems to stand frozen in her presence, so fragile that you’re afraid a single movement could shatter the moment. The ice crystals continue to spread around her.

“‘The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog,’” she finally concludes.

Then, she floats out of the room as lightly as she floated in. The Amethyst goes to the fridge to rearrange the jumble of plastic magnetic English letters on it to form the sentence. “Woah, that’s cool.”

“Everything in the room is cold,” you point out.

“No, the sentence she just said uses up all the letters of the alphabet.” She writes it down on a sticky note for you. “This will totally ruin Pearl’s lesson plans, huh?”

Scene xiv. - The barn. 

You finish the remaining two seasons of Camp Pining Hearts at double the speed, with subtitles, then the entire series from the start with subtitles, on mute. You think you get it, but just to make sure, you search the barn for a book so you can apply your knowledge. If you’ve truly learned it, then simple tasks like setting the ocean on fire will be that much easier. It’s difficult to find a small stick of metal in a stack of dried organic stems, though. By luck, you’re able to find one of Lapis’ favorite books. She said it only makes sense to her because of the pictures, but anything with written words in it will do. Read from right to left, she said.

Your hope sinks as you flip through the pages. These characters, although more elegant and reminiscent of gem language, are nothing like “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog.” They consist of more complex strokes within a single character, which can stand alone like mini pictures. Nothing you just learned is applicable.

Scene xv. - Beyond the barn, in the corn fields. Nighttime. 

One of the noises of the dark half of time is chirping from a cricket. The source is difficult to locate because the creature, you’ve read, is only about 50 millimeters. The Peridot had you read her a book about insects to test you. Obviously, you passed, or else you wouldn’t be following her while she hunts for crickets. On Earth, doing favors for others has unexpected consequences.

The corn stalks rustle. “Peridot?” you call out. She disappears into the corn so easily.

“Naaaaavyyyyy!”

The Steven flies out of the corn stalks and onto you. The surprise attack induces a Pavlovian response from your training days, which includes rolling on top of him and readying yourself to summon your weapon. Upon finding that your fight or flight response is for naught, you let yourself roll back under you to feign submission. “Steeeeveeen!” You hope he didn’t notice the glow of your gem. Dust clouds kick up around you two as you both roll around.

“Haha, you’re really warm!” He gets off of you. “Actually, you’re hot…”

You laugh, too. Gaining better control of your thermoregulation is currently at the bottom of your agenda. It’s his business if he gets himself burned. “Steven, why is manga so different? Is it from another planet?”

“No, Earth has a lot of different languages. Manga is in Japanese instead of English.”

“Ohyou’vegottobekiddingme,” you hiss between gritted teeth. Earthlings can’t even decide on a single planet-wide language to use. You can’t imagine how there’s not wars left and right just about the language barrier issue.

“Huh?”

You force yourself to laugh more. “Oh, no kidding! Earth is such a funny place, I love this planet so much!”

Steven hugs you. This time, you’re prepared for it. “I’m so glad, Navy! That’s one more gem lending her hand to protect Earth!”

You didn’t sign up for that.

Scene xvi. - Your ship. 

Lapis sitting on the edge of your Roaming Eye’s opening is unsettling. Wind swirls around the ship like a private tornado and makes all conversation useless. A few times, she stood up with intent, letting her skirt ripple and flap around her as if she was readying herself for flight, but then she sits back down after a while until the process starts all over again. You offered her your seat as an incentive to rest somewhere less precarious. She declined. You don’t really understand art, even if you appreciate its aesthetic.

You don’t hear her walk up behind you. She perches herself on the arm of your chair. “You can close it now.”

You don’t hear that, either, so you close the door. “Huh?”

She shrugs. You will never know what she said. “The moon is beautiful tonight.”

Actually, you don’t like the Earth’s moon. Bad stuff happened there. “Uhh…”

“You know what else is beautiful?” she asks you. The Peridot’s attention is caught, now.

You blush. “U-Um…”

Long fingers dangle mere centimeters away from your own--temptingly, teasingly. A radiance this dark isn’t supposed to charm you. It’s an art, though. You must resist. Such close proximity on the captain’s seat is reserved for gossip. Giving into primal urges would make you more human than gem. Relinquish the Id, bask in the Superego.

Her rise in volume is uncharacteristically jarring. “The phases of the moon.”  

A chill runs through you. You nod. “‘O, swear not by the moon, th’ inconstant moon,’” you quote, “‘That monthly changes in her circle orb, Lest thy love prove likewise variable.’” Waves of heat wash over you.

“Do you know what else is beautiful, Ruby?” the Sapphire chimes in. She sits in what used to be the rookie Ruby’s seat.

“You?” Ruby squeaks. She sits on the opposite side of the Sapphire, where you formerly sat.

“Garnet.”

You think about that button at the back of the ship, the one that you were going to tell Steven to press on your first day on Earth. That’s a really nice button.

The Pearl stands up and claps her hands together. The Amethyst is quick to occupy her spot as soon as she makes her way towards the center of the ship. “Alright, everyone, here’s how this mission is going to go--”

You spin your chair around to face her. “What is this mission?” Usually, you know your objective before you proceed. It’s standard protocol for successful missions, no matter where you pledge your loyalty.

The Pearl doesn’t appreciate being interrupted as much as you don’t appreciate being uninformed. She reluctantly explains the objective to you. “We’re searching for eight corrupted gembeasts. Since there are eight of us now, we can split into four even teams--”  

“Isn’t it safer if we all just stick together?” you propose.

Lapis spins the two of you away from the Pearl. “If there’s eight of us, then that’s one for each corrupted gem.” Then, she spins you two back to her. And then away. And then back. And then in a circle.

The Pearl sighs. The Sapphire floats towards her and rests a comforting hand on her shoulder. “One team is too slow and eight teams is too risky. It’ll be me and Ruby, Pearl and Amethyst, Lapis and Peridot, and Steven and Navy.”

There appears to be unanimous satisfaction with the groupings until Ruby spins her chair towards the center. “That’s so predictable, Sapph,” she teases.

You shiver.

“N-Not that there’s anything wrong with predictable! Or predicting!”

Amethyst kicks her feet up on the dashboard of the aggressive Ruby’s former post. “Yeah, it’s always same-old, same-old. Let’s change it up. It’s kinda unfair that the veteran Crystal gems get paired up.”

The Sapphire isn’t pleased with this new path, but she concedes. “The most compatible pairs, then, would be--”

“Me and Amethyst, Sapphire and Steven, Lapis and Navy, and Pearl and Peridot,” Ruby proposes.

The Sapphire sits back down.

“Wait,” the Peridot says, “what were the most compatible pairs?”

“Oh, no, those were it, Peridot,” the Sapphire confirms. “Even if we’re split up, we’re still synchronized with the power of love.”

You and Lapis cringe simultaneously.

Scene xvii. - Above an evergreen forest. Flying. 

You’re holding hands with Lapis. You’re also dangled a few thousand meters above a forest, but gosh, you’re holding hands with Lapis. The Lapis’-eye-view impresses you, even as shadowy as it is. You’re never able to get this great of a look on the landscape in the ship--just clouds and meteors.

“What does a corrupted gembeast look like?” you ask, finally.

She doesn’t even seem to be on the lookout for the targets. “I dunno. Peridot said they’re ugly.”

Oh, that sure narrows it down. Most things on Earth are ugly: the English alphabet, crickets, unresponsive photosynthetic organisms… It’s only worth living on to find the few exceptions, sparse and rare. “Wouldn’t it be better to get a closer look on the ground, then?”

“Oh no, you’re slipping,” Lapis declares halfheartedly as she lets go of your hands entirely.

You maintain your grip on her. “I do know how to float.”

“Really?” Lapis is genuinely surprised. “Peridot said that Era 2 gems are handicapped by the lack of resources on Homeworld.”

“I wasn’t made on Homeworld.” You see a couple of trees fall over, below. “Plus, Rubies are easier to make, so they turn out better.”

Her hands hold onto yours, again. She squeezes yours. “... Do you miss Homeworld?”

“My squadron had this saying: ‘Homeworld is where the conquering is.’” Your eyes stay locked on the fallen trees.

Her hold on your hands loosen. “Oh.”

A cry, which you believe can be rightly classified as “ugly”, erupts. You think the source is from the same area from the fallen trees, but it’s hard to tell from so high up. Everything looks like it can be measured in centimeters from your perspective. “We should get a closer look.”

She looks down at you. “I like the view.”

Oh, right--Lapises aren’t made for missions. “Gosh, Lapis,” you say with exaggerated fascination, “your wings are so strong! I bet you can descend really easily--”

“Ugh, okay, I heard you the first time.” She lets go of you for a brief second before wrapping her arms around your waist and diving towards the fallen trees. You’re alarmed by the hand over your navel gem. “Stop heating up or else I’ll drop you.”

(Were you always this uptight about mission objectives? You swear you would’ve had the same attitude as Lapis before.) “I don’t know how,” you confess.

“Seriously? Ugh, Era 2 gems and their lack of control over their powers!”

She actually drops you. You thought it was only an empty threat, so you fall for a few seconds and scream until she dives under you to catch you on her back. Your gem feels ready to burst out of its placement location. She snorts when you immediately cling to her back. “Ha! You totally fell for that!”

Lapis terrifies you more than an Agate. “Haha… I sure am susceptible to gravity when dropped thousands of meters in the sky…” This flight has sure brought you two closer together. In fact, you’re inseparable from her now. You’re quivering against her back gem as she accelerates straight down.

She doesn’t even care to fly into the clearing that was made earlier, she just crashes you both through the branches. You end up falling off of her and tumble into the dirt while she gracefully floats beside you. Her toes touch the dirt first, then her entire foot rolls into the Earth. “Did you know that the trees on Earth change colors during certain seasons?”

You brush the dirt off of you after standing up. You have a limit to how much you can pretend to love the dirt. “These are evergreen trees. They stay green all the time.”

She crosses her arms. “Oh.”

You’ve disappointed her. How cruel of her to go through phases so quickly. At least the inconsistency of the moon has a pattern. She pulls tides at mere whims. “Th-They still change!” you promise. “They just stay the same color when they grow.”

She uncrosses her arms. “Oh!”

You hear trees fall to your right. “That way.” You light your gem in the direction of the noise.

You deliberately slow down so Lapis can lead you. Although the moist dirt gives way to the pressure of your feet, Lapis barely leaves a trace. You think she hates the Earth so much that she doesn’t even want to walk on it--she’s so silly.

“You’re slow,” Lapis says bluntly.

“I like the view,” you say without thinking. Oops. You try to save face. “I mean--”

“You really think so?”

A dried twig you step on scorches. Maybe you should learn how to control your powers instead of ignoring them for the sake of more important tasks. “... ‘I have sworn thee fair, and thought thee bright, Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.’”

“You’re so funny, Navy!” Lapis giggles out. “That’s like, spoken meepmorp.”

Well, she’s not wrong. You’d be happy to tell her more if the corrupted gem beast hadn’t just cried out. It’s close. You and Lapis stay still while the noise echoes. The soundwaves bounce into the open air for a few good seconds, then silence settles in their place--a void compensating for a lack of substance. Lapis scoops you into her arms and takes off towards the noise. Water wings are out before you can even register that you’re off the ground.

Your pink gem light is turned towards the corrupted gem. The monster’s mane travels from down its head to a tail at the end. Where eyes should have been are horns. The entirety of its body (you can’t even bring yourself to imagine the gem it used to be, so it’s an “it”) is a muddy brick orange, splotched with yellow and dark orange. It screeches from the light exposure, then pounces away on its hind legs. It’s forced to tread on four limbs instead of two due to its abnormally long flat hind legs and awkward back arch, which weighs down its chest like its intended pose is to be prostrated before proper gems.  

“It really is ugly!” Lapis remarks. Puddles rise in the form of chains and fly after the beast. They wrap around its hind legs. The hands disturb you the most--they’re fat, stubby fingers that remind you that its form was once another perfect creation of the Diamonds and they claw desperately into the dirt in an attempt to escape. The chains pull the beast towards Lapis, piling just in front of her, without her even lifting a finger. She walks towards her trapped prey. “So this is what Jasper has been up to.”

Jasper. You let yourself slip out of Lapis’ arms and float to the ground. The beast garbles and snorts softly as a makeshift whimper. You can’t believe the Jasper your squadron has been looking for associated herself with malformed masses of monstrosity. That thing was a Jasper, too, you think.

(You turn off your light. Such a blasphemous form is better to be forgotten in the pits of death’s second self. If only more trees could shoot out of the ground and shade this tragedy from the moonlight’s gaze.)

“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Mass-produced gems cling to each other for strength. She found one of her own kind.” The chains tighten. “No offense.”

(Can’t those chains capture you, instead? Won’t they wash over you, cleanse your gem, and thus spring forth a renewed form? Oh, but you’re just mass. Mass and light. Perhaps darkness is the water you’re looking for.)

You approach it cautiously. You’re afraid you might catch its peculiar affliction if you’re too close. “What was Jasper doing?”

“Bad stuff,” Lapis says, and leaves it at that. How wonderfully vague. “You wanna shatter it?”

You… sincerely hope she’s joking. She says it so casually that you don’t know if she’s serious. Gems are never shattered, nowadays. Poofing is the worst punishment due to how little resources are available for manufacturing new gems. The methods of poofing, though, have advanced since Era 1. “We’re supposed to bubble it.”

“Oh, but…” Her voice pitch shoots up to soprano as she feigns a coy, swooning facade. “... I wanted to see a strong, capable gem weapon from a modern-day gem!”

“I haven’t summoned my weapon in ages.” (What is it, again? A hammer? Wait, no, that’s another Ruby. A scythe, right?)

Lapis rolls her eyes. “Ugh, Era 2,” she grumbles. “It’ll be out of its eternal misery if it’s shattered.”

She’s right. “Sapphire specifically told us that we’re not allowed to shatter the corrupted gems.”

“Fine, but you’re in charge of capturing the next one if you’re not going to shatter anything. I can’t do all the work around here.” She saps water from the ground to form a giant bubble around the corrupted gem. “Plus, I really do want to see your weapon.”

You don’t remind her that you’re the reason why the task is being completed correctly. The two of you continue to look for another corrupted gem with the bubbled beast floating behind. You end up summoning your weapon, mostly for Lapis’ sake, to clear some thick foliage out of the way.

“Oh, so it’s a sickle. You should help Peridot and me harvest.”

Scene xviii - Near a lake in an evergreen forest. 

You think Lapises are attracted to water, no matter where they are, because her leading you to the lake is no coincidence. Though, you think she would have preferred it if weren’t frozen over and that Steven and Sapphire weren’t hiding in a spiky pink bubble in the middle of the lake while five corrupted gems circle around them.

“This one’s yours,” Lapis says. She crosses her arms and leaves you to your designated task. “Go ahead.”

You walk towards the lake for a better look. The beasts aren’t alarmed by your presence and seem to have no interest in attacking you. However, you can’t simply rush up to them, slash with your sickle, and hope they’ll suddenly be tamed--for one, ice automatically melts in your presence, and also, there’s no way you can take on all of the beasts at once.

“Sapphire!” Ruby comes springing out of a bush and immediately rushes up to them, summoning her gauntlet, under the assumption that she can subdue them all at once. You tackle her down. “What are you doing? She needs me!”

You can’t believe you have to explain something so obvious. “Ice melts under heat.”

“I don’t care! I can swim!” She pushes you off of her, but then catches sight of Lapis and the bubbled beast. (You would’ve put up more of a fight, usually, but seeing how second-nature she summons her weapon frightens you. Maybe she could subdue all the gem beasts at once.) “You!” She points at Lapis angrily. “First of all, you’re supposed to poof the corrupted gems!”

“Pearl said we had to bubble them.”

“Yes!” Ruby exclaims, pulling at her hair. “Poof, and then bubble them!” She lets out a strangled scream. “And second of all, why aren’t you helping? You could have saved Sapphire by now!” She kicks up dirt. “Ice is frozen water!”

Lapis cares enough to fix at least one of her mistakes, and compresses the bubble tighter and tighter until it poofs the corrupted gem. You look away. “Okay, I know all the properties of ice now--thanks, Rubies, but did you also know that ice is frozen ice?”

She’s… not… wrong…

The Amethyst emerges from a bush. “Thanks for leaving me behind, Ru…” She brushes leaves and dust off of her form, then runs to the edge of the lake where her partner is. “Steven and Sapphire!” She makes it onto the frozen lake, but the ice is unable to handle her weight, causing it to crack and collapse the Amethyst into the water.

“Thin ice,” you observe.

The Amethyst swims back to land. “Really? I didn’t notice.”

But if the beasts are still able to stay on the ice without falling into the water, you reason that the ice must be thicker where they are.

“What does that even mean, Lazuli?” Ruby shrieks.

Lapis crosses her arms. “It means that your fusion counterpart is leaving me to do all the work even though she’s literally in her element and I don’t want to do it.”

You heat up your sickle, then throw it far into the lake to where the corrupted beasts are circling the spiky pink bubble. It hooks deep into the ice with a force strong enough to initiate a long crack down the middle of the entire lake. The beasts’ mindless panic exacerbates it, which causes more cracks and separates each beast onto its own personal floating ice island. Steven uses this opportunity to roll the bubble back onto land, away from the beasts. He’s panting when he makes it; letting the pink bubble burst is a major relief to him.

“Sapphire!”

“Ruby!”

“... And… Steven!” Steven adds between gulps of oxygen.

The two gems look like they’re about to embrace, but Ruby grabs Sapphire by the shoulders and shakes her. “Why didn’t you just poof them yourself? You can control ice! You could’ve made spikes or frozen them or made the ice so slippery they couldn’t walk or trapped them in ice cages or used your future vision to avoid this in the first place…”

Sapphire throws herself into Ruby’s arms. “I didn’t know. I just saw the moon, and then I couldn’t think anymore.”

“The moon?” Ruby looks up at that cursed orb and sees what Sapphire saw: a waning gibbous, the phase after the full moon. All frustration leaves her. Her voice softens. “Oh Sapph, I’m--” But she already knows nothing she says can prevent Sapphire from sobbing into her hands, so she takes Sapphire’s hand gem and kisses it. “I’m stupid. You can’t even control ice, you just know how to freeze things. I can’t control fire, either, I just know how to heat things.”

Sapphire brushes her bangs out of her face and stares up at Ruby. “You’re not stupid. Stupid is that we’re still unfused. I can’t see a future where we’re not together, yet we’re still apart from each other. I don’t even know what we’re fighting about!”

“We’re not fighting, Sapphire.”

“Then what’s the problem?” Sapphire begs. “Garnet is the perfect fusion, Ruby. How could you just throw that away?”

“Nonono, we can still be Garnet! But don’t you just want to… exist?”

“Not without you.”

Ruby glances at the Steven. She hugs Sapphire. “Let’s end this.”

Scene xix. - Your ship. 

You’re not sure, exactly, how Lapis ended up taking up your entire seat. She seemed content on the arm of the chair until she began to lean on you. You think you gradually scooted to the edge of your seat to accommodate her. At one point, she was across your lap, sound asleep, and you couldn’t see the panel at all. You just decide to relinquish the seat to her and surrender to your old seat on the right side of the captain’s seat. You could still pilot the ship from there, anyway, and the controls on that panel are more familiar to you.

While you’re up, you look around. The Steven is asleep, too, squished into the same seat as the Peridot, who is making sure all is well with the ship. The Pearl is doing the same while talking quietly with the Amethyst next to her. The Sapphire is as still as an unbreakable silence. Ruby can’t stop moving.

Ruby stops swiveling in your chair when she sees you accessing the panel in front of her. You sigh--someone altered the basic customization settings. All the applications are in the wrong place, and, ugh, someone thought blue was a more suitable color for the windows than yellow. You can barely read with the new color preferences. Nothing feels right at your very own seat. You rest lightly on Ruby’s knees while you squint for the settings application. This panel is the one remnant of your squadron you’re not willing to sacrifice.

“Do you want me to move?” Ruby asks.

“C’mon, we’re Rubies, you know it’s fine,” you scoff. “Unless you think it’s more comfortable to just fuse.”

She relaxes. “Oh. Um. Okay.”

You have no idea which application is which, anymore. You’re just taking shots in the dark. You’ve become desensitized to the icons and text of each application after a couple of decades of having the spot of each application memorized based solely on where it felt right to be in. Honestly, you don’t think you recognize half these applications simply because you never used them often.

By chance, you stumble upon the panel settings. There are so many sliders to adjust, though. You don’t remember the exact slider positions for the yellow color you preferred. You look to your left, where the veteran Ruby is supposed to be, but she’s not there to help you find that exact shade of yellow you prefer with her virtually photographic memory. The Steven is there, squished into the same seat as the Peridot.

You slam your hands onto your panel and hop onto Ruby’s lap. That touch command was supposed to close all of the apps, but even that has been changed. It opens the atmospheric shield settings. “Oh, Ruby…” You hide your face in her shoulder; you don’t even want to look at your panel, anymore, it’s already ruined. Crystal germs, indeed--nothing is safe from their infectious touch. The Ruby you’re with is no different, but it’s hard to see her as an enemy. “Comrade,” says you, who only wants to feel the word escape your lips at least one more time.

“N-Navy? What’s wrong?” Ruby doesn’t know what to do with her hands, suddenly. The heat of her hands hover behind your back.

That gut-wrenching feeling when you saw the corrupted gem beast clawing its hands into the dirt returns. “Why are we poofing gems?”

She tentatively puts one hand on your back. “Existence is painful for corrupted gems. We’re bubbling them until we find a way to completely heal them.”

That thing that used to be a Jasper was afraid for the remnants of its life. Homeworld would have put them to use. Maybe in a zoo. Maybe for research. At least they would have a use instead of being hidden away in a gemmade static purgatory. “May I express dissent, my comrade?”

Ruby sighs and rubs reassuring circles on your back. “You don’t need to be so formal on Earth.”

“I don’t like poofing gems,” you confess. You curl into Ruby’s chest. “There’s too little resources. Too little gems. I’m proud that Rubies are disposable because that means we can still live on after one of us is gone. We’re popular. We can go more places, have more uses, be more significant in quantity if not quality.” Maybe you don’t have as much sign value as a Pearl, but a Ruby’s use value is much higher than a Lapis’. Lapises have no more new planets to terraform.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize…”

Your face feels wet. “Do you remember what bubbling means on Homeworld?”

“Imprisonment.”

You smile. Her age makes you feel like you’re still fresh out of the Kindergarten. “No, not anymore. We have special barriers for that. Now, it means a gem is obsolete. Too good to shatter, but not useful enough to exist.” 

“We’re trying to save them, though--we’re different. It’s not like we’re the ones that corrupted them.”

That’s what Homeworld says, too. “At least those gems can still exist when they’re not bubbled.”

Scene xx. - Near the Steven’s house. 

The official Crystal Gems are dropped off first at the Crystal Temple. With the deep oranges mixing into the midnight blue, a dawn of a new day flourishes. The hot color forgets last night’s immoralities, yet permeates it into your memory all the same. You try not to look at the sunrise. You have no right to tarnish a star’s light with personal afflictions. It is not the dawn after a dusk of poofing, it is only dawn, and there will continue to be more similar dawns after this one no matter what you see during the dusk.

Ruby is the last to leave the Roaming Eye. She lingered, even after she shooed you off of her lap and you shooed Lapis off of the captain’s seat. You wanted her to leave so you could close the door already.

“Is there something you want to say?” you ask. You hope it’s what she was going to say when she first visited you in the ship.

She punches you in the arm. “Oh, who cares what I say?”

She’s jovial, for some reason. You wonder if you should say that you care, that Homeworld would’ve given a strong Era 1 gem like her her own squadron, that inflation has made her far more valuable than what she thinks she’s worth. But you wonder for so long that she’s already out of the ship and hugging her Sapphire from behind. The light of the rising sun makes you blink, which is long enough for you to miss their masses turning into light and fusing into one Garnet.

“Garnet!” the Pearl, Amethyst, and Steven exclaim.

They all run to hug her. Peridot rushes to your side to see what she missed. Lapis groggily joins you, too.

“How did Ruby and Sapphire make up, though?” the Steven asks. “They were fighting the entire time until they just decided to ignore each other on the ride back home!”

The fusion’s visor gleams. “An answer isn’t always needed. After all, I’m too good to not exist.”

You give her a thumbs-down before you drag Lapis and the Peridot back inside the ship so you can close the door. (There’s no way you can ever condone this absurdity.) The ramp retracts slowly. Oh your stars, who changed that setting? Who could possibly want all the suspense and apprehension of a slow ramp?

“Buh-bye,” Garnet says before her face disappears behind the closing door.

Scene xxi. - The Steven’s house.

Lapis likes to pick out puzzles for you to complete. You’ve actually already finished all of the Steven’s puzzles at least twice, but that’s not saying much. He only has five. Nevertheless, Lapis enjoys how fast you’re able to make pictures out of pieces. Of course she does. Earth is a planet of instant gratification. Time is like a currency. Earthlings gain more when they spend more of it.

The Steven digs in his closet for more toys for you to play with. “Aha!” he exclaims triumphantly. He tosses a cube with multi-colored squares on it to you. “That’s a Rubik’s Cube! Right now, it’s mixed up, but the goal is to shift it so that every side has only one color.”

You toss it back at him, completely solved. “Earth puzzles are so absurd,” you muse. By that, you mean all struggles on Earth are senseless and characteristic of a chaotic universe.

Garnet and the Pearl arrive on the warp pad.

“Oh, perfect!” the Pearl says. “You’re all conveniently gathered here, just waiting for something new to do! Garnet and I were just talking about how our newer additions should be employed more.”

Garnet nods. “That means Peridot, Lapis, and…”

There’s a moment of suspense as she holds off on saying your name. The first few seconds could have been brushed off as dramatic effect. At the ten-second mark, it becomes questionable.

“... Navy,” she finally finishes. But then she shakes her head. “No, not Navy.” She folds her hands together. “Yes, Navy should come, too.” Then, she throws her hands back to her sides in closed fists. “We can’t make her,” she hisses.

“I’ll go,” you declare. You feel pressured to volunteer if everyone else is going. If you didn’t, you would be left all alone in the Steven’s house with Id-filled games. At least you’ll be put to use. It’s working for the enemy, yes, but you’ll just call it “advanced undercover work.” Maybe you’ll be able to sneak in a few questions about where bubbled gems go when they’re sent off, what Jasper was trying to do, where Jasper is…

You’ve been developing a theory about where she could be, but it’s hard to brainstorm without four other heads and with notes you have to write in Japanese to keep secret. (Lapis and the Peridot think it’s a Piercy fanfiction about a bad game of Truth Or Dare. Eventually, you’ll actually need to write one for them. You also need a completely new set of notes just listing all the lies you’ve told.) Something about Pink Diamond, that’s the most you know. It all seems to come back to her--the missions you were sent on, the fits the veteran Ruby has thrown, the diminishing resources on Homeworld, the disappearance of Blue Diamond’s influence--yet nobody wants to actually talk about her. That’s the flaw about gems’ built-in inferiority complex. Their devotion drives them to their own destruction. Meanwhile, you can’t even fully commit yourself to your squadron.

“... so, that’s why everyone should be involved!” the Pearl explains.

Oh, groovy. You missed the entire briefing. You’re too used to tuning out the Pearl’s voice. “Uh, can you clarify the… um… first part?”

“Garnet and I were talking about how you, Peridot, and Lapis should be utilized more for missions.”

“Oh, haha, I meant the second part!”

“Last night’s mission could have been more… efficient,” the Pearl says, with a pointed gaze towards the cross-armed Peridot, “if our forces were more well-rounded--”

You wave that off. “The part after that.”

The Amethyst huffs. “It’s just sword training with Pearl. Are you down with the clown, or what?”

“Sounds groovy.”

Scene xxii. - The Ancient Sky Arena. 

The Ancient Sky Arena is R-E-K-T, wrecked. On Homeworld, the ruins would have been restored to their former glory. Earth lets beauty rot instead of fixing it. The Crystal Gems don’t even care enough to preserve what’s left.

“As you can see, this place, where the first battles of the rebellion took place, has been sculpted by years of fighting,” the Pearl summarizes (for once). “Though, some damage is… newer.”

The Steven and Amethyst chuckle suspiciously on the higher steps. The Peridot is catching on, from her assessment of the cracks in the structure, that a certain pair had a lot of fun only weeks ago.

Lapis blows a raspberry. “The Arena wasn’t always a battleground, you unpolished pebble.”

(You think that’s the Era 1 equivalent of “clod”.) You and the Peridot are unable to back her up, though. You’re always on missions away from Homeworld and she’s only a technician. Neither of you had any business on any kind of arena. Garnet, however, nods, but doesn’t give anything away more than that. The Pearl lets the statement linger on your mind while she summons a rack of sabres from her gem.

Lapis can’t help herself, and laughs. “Are you going to put on a show for us?”

The Pearl draws a sabre from the rack. “A demonstration,” she corrects. The irritation is clear in her tone. “Swords are more than pretty props that you spin and toss.”

The Steven can’t take any more of this hinting. “Waaaiiit, whaaaaat?”

Lapis takes the liberty of drawing her own sabre from the rack. “Blue Diamond’s court is renowned for their performances in Arenas. Especially their colorguard.” She started spinning it in her right hand. “I spent all my time in the Cloud Arena when I wasn’t busy. I was never a part of any group, but all members of Blue Diamond’s court are expected to learn a thing or two.” She stops spinning it and readjusts the position of it so she can push down on one end and send it straight up into the air, where it makes at least three rotations before it returns perfectly to her hands.

You gasp. There are stars in your eyes. Art for the sake of art--this is what it means. “Blue Diamond’s court was known for that?”

Lapis pauses her idle sword-spinning. “‘Was’? Does Blue prefer something else, now?”

You’re surprised she can address her Diamond so casually. “She’s like a ghost. Nobody has seen her for thousands of centuries. There’s no more Arenas, now, or anything like it.”

“Arenas are for new planets, to celebrate--” Lapis’ eyes widen. “Oh! No wonder Era 2 is so miserable.” She goes back to spinning the sabre in her hand. “At least Earth held on to some of Era 1’s glory.”

The Pearl kicks Lapis’ sabre out of her hand. “We’re not here to learn a retired noblegem sport. We’re here to learn sword fighting.”

Lapis makes a disgusted face. “Pass.”

“Oh, no! You’re not getting away so easy!” the Pearl chides. She picks up Lapis’ sabre and shoves it back into her hands. “You won’t always be able to rely on water during a battle. And since you’re so eager, you can go first.”

(Garnet mumbles something in agreement behind you. Something about being a strong, independent gem who doesn’t need a fusion?) The Pearl summons a hologram version of herself from her gem. Its blank, white eyes seem to stare straight into your very core.

“Welcome to Holo-Pearl version 2.0000001,” it says, with its rough, robotic voice.

“Initiate Combat Mode, Level 1,” the Pearl commands. “What I want you to do first, is widen your stance and lower your body for stability.”

“Combat Mode, Level 1, initiated.” The Holo-Pearl lowers its stance and does a sweeping rond de jambe on its left foot to the back as it holds its sword across its chest. “Do you wish to engage in combat?”

“No,” Lapis answers.

“Level 1, begin!” it says anyway. “Your defeat is my pleasure!” It advances towards Lapis with a thrust, which Lapis easily dodges, before she impales her sword straight into the Holo-Pearl’s chest. It glitches as soon as it’s pierced. “Match set. Challenger wins.”

Lapis unsheathes the sword from the Holo-Pearl’s chest. “You do realize that I taught you a third of the sword techniques you use today, right?”

There’s a tense blush on the Pearl’s face. “Initiate Expert Combat Mode, Rank F.”

The Holo-Pearl shifts into a forward lunge with its sword held high behind it. “Commence duel. This shall be your fatal flaw!”

Lapis is nearly caught off-guard, but blocks a hit just in time. She remains cool, though, and is able to push the sword off fast enough to leap for an opening in the Holo-Pearl’s leg. The Holo-Pearl, however, spin-kicks Lapis’ arm away, which then gives it the opportunity to recede away from Lapis. She sighs.

“When, exactly, will I be unable to use water from my own gem?” she asks.

“When your gem is cracked,” the Pearl answers.

(The Amethyst cackles and shakes the Steven for him to spit on that sick roast.)

Unfazed, Lapis stalks towards her opponent lazily. The Holo-Pearl detects the obvious opening she has and dashes towards it with her sword. Lapis spins her sword high into clouds before she hops atop the Holo-Pearl’s sword and uses it as a springing board to backflip behind her. The Holo-Pearl whips around quickly, only to be kicked backwards by Lapis. Before it can recover, Lapis’ sabre comes crashing down on it. The Holo-Pearl is hit right on the head by the blade, and falls to the ground. The sword clangs down beside it.

“Challenger wins.”

Lapis picks up the sabre. “Colorguard was not just a noblegem sport, by the way. All gems loved it. You can get poofed just from not catching a big toss.” She looks into her reflection in the sabre. “Era 2 sure is missing out.”

As horrifying as it is to play with spinning weapons for other’s entertainment, it has you hooked. You’re certain everyone on Homeworld would rush to complete their tasks if such exhilarating performances were the reward.

“Congratulations for completing the easiest level on Expert mode,” the Pearl mutters dryly. “Navy and Peridot, you’re up.”

Garnet leg is unable to stop shaking. One of her fists is clenched.  She crosses a leg over her shaking one, which temporarily stops its incessant movement, before it starts shaking again. She suddenly unfuses into a disgruntled Sapphire and a restless Ruby. Ruby drags the Sapphire down the steps to where you and Peridot are. “Us too!” Ruby says.

Ohohoho. You can see where this is going. “Welcome to the party,” you greet them.

The Pearl isn’t exactly thrilled to see them unfused again. “You two don’t--”

“I agree,” the Sapphire replies. Not that you need future vision to know what the Pearl was about to say.

Ruby accepts the sabre from Lapis. “You can go spinning, if you want, but I’ll just remind you that the last fight one of us had was 5,750 years ago, before Garnet even existed.”

“That was fate,” the Sapphire says.

“Garnet was fate. That was--” Ruby looks up at Pearl, then at Steven. “--uh, doesn’t matter. Just... let me do this for you, okay?”

The Sapphire draws her own sword from the rack. “You’re not my guard, anymore, Ruby. We’ll do this together.”

Scene xxiii. - Still in the Ancient Sky Arena. 

Apparently, the rule with the Crystal Gems is that any time there are an even number of participants involved, teams will be arranged. You didn’t listen to the real sparring rules, or the song the Pearl sang about sword fighting technique and sacrificial love. You attribute that mistake to your one-track mind--great when studying, bad when distracted. (You think you caught that all gem abilities are allowed, though?)

You’re still hung up on the fact that there were entire architectural feats dedicated to the gay jubilance of unoccupied gems. Gems used to be so invested in their pastime that they would risk their physical forms for a few minutes of entertainment--oh, that’s so Earthlike! But how can you jeer at it when its potential is so beautiful? It makes you realize how long you’ll live. Eras come and go, too. Rookies become veterans and veterans become… super veterans, or something. For the first time, you’re realizing that the Earthlings were right about something: there’s a lot of time out there. As long as you eventually finish your task and the Earth doesn’t self-destruct, you can hypothetically vacation for as long as you want.

“... Navy will spar with Ruby and Sapphire with spar with Peridot.”

You forgot about the other rule that Ruby and the Sapphire aren’t allowed to be paired together. Or, maybe it’s just that you and Ruby were paired due to your similar sword-wielding progresses. Not that you were paying attention to anyone’s progress. Oh, sometimes you feel like a rookie all over again, head in the clouds and dreamy-eyed and such. You suppose you are, from the Crystal Gems’ perspective. That would explain why your vision has been so blurry. You wave the cloud away. Ruby is already in a proper stance. What was your plan, again?

��Psst, Sapph!” Ruby not-so-discreetly whisper-shouts. “Who wins?”

The Sapphire giggles. “Only time will tell,” she whisper-shouts back.

“Really? Because I see a victory kiss in our future.”

You remember your plan, now.

“Begin!” the Pearl declares.

You drop your sword immediately. “I don’t want to fight you, comrade.”

“It’s just pretend! Sorta!”

“But I love you.”

“And I love Sapphire.” Ruby comes running towards you with her sword, which is exactly what you expected her to do. “We fight for what we love on Earth!”

You wait until she’s close enough to summon your sickle. Ruby’s sword strikes down in the curve of your weapon. Bright orange sparks fly. Oh your stars. She could have poofed you. You’d like to thank your preliminary training days for drilling weapon summoning into your gem, and Lapis for reminding you that you’re still capable of summoning it even after years upon years upon years of neglecting it. You can almost hear the Steven’s cheers for you over your internal screaming.

Ruby continues to strike down at you, but you’re diligent enough to block every one of them. The force of her hits send orange sparks bursting at each clang. She’s incredibly strong. A new weapon does nothing to put her at a disadvantage. If only you could take her back to Homeworld as an ally. “Stop! Blocking!”

You have to, eventually. She has enough pure strength to dissipate your weapon. You catch Ruby’s sword in the curve of your sickle, again, and slide it towards the hilt before twisting it down, then swinging it away. The sword flies off to the edge of the Arena.

“Now we’re talking.” Ruby summons her gauntlet and crashes it down to the ground as hard as she can. You jump high into the air onto a column to avoid the resulting quake. Her gauntlet sends ripples of marvelous architecture erupting away from the point of impact. You continue to scream internally.

The Sapphire has already predicted this, and has jumped high enough to avoid the vibrations, whereas her opponent is knocked over. The Sapphire uses this opening to thrust towards the Peridot. The Peridot bends the metal away from her body, curving it just enough to give her time to scramble away backwards. She’s unable to fully rip the Sapphire’s weapon out of her hand, though, because ice has frozen her hand to it.

“Are you a gem or a rock?” Ruby mocks. You forgot that taunting one-liners were also a part of the unwritten set of fake sarcastic rules you’ve begun noting in your head. She runs towards the column you’re on with her gauntlet of doom in tow. “What were you planning to do in a real battle?”

You pounce onto her with your sickle held high behind your head and strike down at her. Hopefully the physics of your attack is enough to deal some worthy damage. But it’s not. She counterattacks with her gauntlet. You tumble backwards behind her. Your weapon dissipates. “We--” No, your squadron isn’t here. You don’t have a squadron, anymore. “I would’ve just fused.” You never added anything to the Mega Ruby fusion other than mass, before, though. You just melted in and let your captain take over.

“You can’t depend on that! That’s just, ugh, a cheap tactic to get stronger!” She kicks a low cloud. Having to admit that physically pained her. She looks at the Pearl, though, which reassures her. “Be strong in the real way!”

(In your defense, your second option would have been to avoid combat at any cost. One-on-one combat was never in your resumé, job description, or agenda. That strategy has worked wonders, save for this abnormal exception.)

She picks up a fist-sized rock and throws it up into the air. You’re distracted long enough for Ruby to pick up the sabre you discarded earlier. You’re not dumb enough to fall for her diversion. You roll out of the way as Ruby. To your side, the other fighting pair approaches, clashing metal to metal. Ruby launches the sabre straight forward, where you used to be. The rock falls just in time on the Peridot’s head. She lets out a yelp. The diversion works too well, though. Miscalculations cause the Peridot to be impaled in the shoulder and the stomach.

The Peridot looks down at her wounds. “Wow, thanks,” are her final words before she poofs.

You raise your hand. “Can I forfeit?” You feel like this is the most appropriate time to request this. Forfeiting would be a very lovely option at this point.

Scene xxiv. - A panic-filled Ancient Sky Arena. 

The Steven stands up. “Peridot!” Everyone else follows suit, except for Lapis, who saunters over. She picks up the Peridot’s gem. It still has that Homeworld-patented Era 2 shine to it.

“I’ll bubble her,” she volunteers. A thin water bubble forms around the Peridot’s gem.

You shriek. You understand where Jasper is, now. Stupidstupidstupid. She was defeated, she was poofed, she was captured, she was bubbled, she was imprisoned, she was forcefully withdrawn from any and all utility by the Crystal Gems because she was bad. Her moral expiration date arrived and what was left of her had to be sealed away, as if she was corrupted into a monster that needed to protected from its own agonizing existence. The Crystal Gems don’t think she’s good, so she has to be bad, and she has to be gone.

Ruby hugs you into her chest. Her gauntlet is gone. “That’s not how we deal with all poofed gems, Lazuli. That’s not even a proper bubble! That’s just water!”

“She’s fine. She just needs some time to regenerate,” the Sapphire says. “This isn’t the first time we’ve poofed her, after all.”

You let out a muffled shriek. You can’t believe it’s a common practice to poof comrades on Earth.

“Not funny, Sapphire,” Ruby deadpans.

“Oops.”

Scene xxv. - Just outside the barn. 

Lapis and the Sapphire are in charge of cooling you down because everything you’re around bursts into flames. It was a better option than being banished to the bottom of the barn pool. Ruby is making you sit cross-legged in a pile of ice slush with your fingers intertwined and your thumb tips touching. The Steven is in the barn, analyzing any dings or dents that may be on the Peridot’s gem.

“Shh, sh sh, just breathe in… and out… Can you do that for me, Navy? In, then out.”

You know how to breathe. “Is this a normal thing on Earth?”

The Amethyst laughs. “Yup. I get poofed, like, every other week.”

The slush around you boils and sizzles. Lapis adds more water around you for the Sapphire to freeze.

“Amethyst!” the Pearl scolds.

Ruby picks up the Amethyst and places her a good distance away from you, where she thinks you won’t be able to hear her lecturing the Amethyst. “Listen here, young gem, you were not polished to speak so irresponsibly around your juniors--do you want to try calming a Ruby down? We don't need another visit from the fire department!”

You let yourself collapse backwards into the ice. It steams slowly around you. Above you, Lapis and the Sapphire remain as cool and blue as the Earth sky. You sit up properly and straighten your posture, but make sure to keep your gaze on the ground. “My Clarity, why did this happen?” You were under the impression that future vision was supposed to prevent accidents like this.

“Sit down,” she orders.

You do so and hug your knees to your chest. She sits down in front of you, too, with the same position Ruby showed you, presumably with her legs also crossed under the blue puff of her skirt. You follow suit.

She clears her throat. “Take a moment to think of just…”

Ruby has already finished her lecture with the Amethyst and senses the impromptu musical number. She comes sliding over to the Sapphire’s side. “... flexibilityloveandtrust!” she finishes frantically.

They sing in perfect harmony together. “Take a moment to think of just, flexibility love and trust.”

The Amethyst sighs heavily. Lapis’ water wings are out. You stand up. “Nonono, I'm asking why you didn't foresee this, My Clarity!”

Ruby isn't happy about having her duet thwarted. “You don't even sing on Homeworld, anymore?”

“We use regular verbal communication to answer simple questions, comrade.”

Lapis pours slushy ice water onto Ruby.

“What the heck was that for, Lazuli?”

“Thought you needed to cool down after that hot roast,” she says.

Ruby scoops up slush into a tight ball, but it melts immediately. Lapis snorts at the poor attempt. She doesn’t expect the snowball thrown at her back by the Sapphire as revenge.

“Nice!” the Amethyst exclaims. She throws a snowball straight at the Pearl’s butt. “Snowball fi--”

A ball of snow is flung into the Amethyst’s mouth by the Pearl before she can finish her battle cry. “... I’m also curious why this wasn’t preventable,” the Pearl admits.

All eyes turn to Her Clarity. Even Ruby is curious.

“In the heat of battle, I can only focus on one future possibility at a time, so I have to bet on the most likely outcome,” the Sapphire reveals.

Multiple future possibilities! You were right! You’ve been a bit afraid that the Sapphire is simply an omniscient figure that withholds information for the sake of universal balance. You’re going to regret asking this, but, “What outcome did you bet on?”

“The one where--” Her blushing, nervous laughter scares you a little. Maybe a lot. Ice crystals grow. That grin on her lips is nothing but perverted. “--uh, that doesn’t matter!” She clears her throat. “What I saw was that you were supposed to have an epiphany about gem independence and start attacking Ruby seriously.”

… But you were fighting her seriously the entire time?

“You should have blocked the sabre with your sickle, but be distracted long enough to still be hit with the rock. Peridot was supposed to block my thrust to her chest, but then bump into you. I would have used that opening to tap her lightly on the shoulder with my sabre. That’s Peridot’s loss. Inevitably, after charging into offense, you should have quickly lost, too.”

No wonder the Peridot’s poofing wasn’t predicted. The Sapphire was depending on you to be the pneumatic Ruby everyone thinks you are. It’s only a matter of time before the dark matter recipe comes out of the vault--time and a lot more terrible acting on your part. “Oh, this is all my fault!” you wail. You toss yourself into the mound of ice. It only melts slightly under your mass, though. Can’t fake guilt that well. “If I figured out how to be--” (Ugh.) “--strong in the real way, then Peridot would’ve never poofed!” (Ah, but isn’t that true? You still haven’t fulfilled the prophecy the Sapphire spoke of. You’re only surviving from lie to lie.)

The Sapphire folds her hands. “... I can’t say that you’re wrong.”

The Pearl nods. “That would have saved Peridot.”

The Amethyst takes more time to fully process the scenario. “Ooh, I get it. Your cowardliness doomed us all.”

Lapis doesn’t even try to sugarcoat her blame on you. “Yeah, Navy, I can’t believe you poofed my barnmate.” She shakes her head in disappointment.

Oh your stars, they’re seriously putting all the blame on you for not sticking to a script they never gave you. Never mind that two fighting rookies not cut out for combat were pit against veterans of the Gem War, that all you did was avoid getting injured yourself, that the Peridot was too inexperienced to prevent this disaster herself, or that Ruby and the Sapphire were literally the ones who stabbed her. It was all your doing that the wrong future played out.

Ruby doesn’t contradict everyone else, but she doesn’t buy into what they’re saying, either. “What’s supposed to happen in this future, then?”

“I don’t know,” the Sapphire admits bluntly. “Peridot was never supposed to poof.”

You sit up.

Ruby doesn’t like how fast that answer came out. “What futures were you looking for?”

“All the ones where Garnet is back together.”

The Amethyst’s eyes widen. The Pearl starts to falter backwards, barely saved by the Amethyst shapeshifting into a chair to catch her. “Y-Y-You mean,” she babbles, “that you two won’t… Garnet isn’t… This future is… Oh boy.”

Ruby groans. “That doesn’t make sense! Garnet always exists as long as we’re here.” She pulls the Sapphire close to her and fuses them into Garnet to prove her point.

“This is Garnet, back together,” Garnet says.

They unfuse. “And this is Ruby and Sapphire,” Ruby says.

Then, they fuse again. “Garnet.”

And they unfuse. “Ruby and Sapphire.”

Fuse. “Garnet.”

Unfuse. “Sapphire and Ruby!” Ruby exclaims. “Also known as, Ruby and Sapphire, but in a different order.”

Your eyes hurt. The Sapphire pushes Ruby away. “Okay, we get it. You’re giving me a gem ache. It’s just hard to see all the possible futures while I’m trying to sword fight without depth perception.”

“Sorry.” Ruby rubs the Sapphire’s hand gem soothingly. “I’m just saying, we’re overlooking something important. The last time this sort of thing happened was when Pearl--” She takes a moment to glare at said gem. “--tricked us into fusing into Sardonyx.”

(Ah, so that’s who Sardonyx is.)

The Amethyst returns to her original form, which sends the Pearl falling to the ground. “Can’t save your butt there.”

The Pearl stands back up and brushes the dust off of her. “I--”

“We already forgave you,” the Sapphire assures her. “Right, Ruby?”

Ruby narrows her eyes at the Pearl. “This Ruby doesn’t forget so easily.”

“Ruby--”

“No, Sapph, I’m serious! All future vision is biased towards what we want to happen.” She starts pacing into the ice slush area. The mound of ice you’re on melts in her presence. “What if Peridot is cracked?”

“Steven has healing spit,” the Sapphire reminds her.

(Woah, really? That’s groovy!)

“What if your future vision has become defective?”

“Ex-cuse me?”

“Uh, kidding! What if there’s a new fusion coming?”

Everyone looks at each other. It’s silently agreed upon that nobody is in the mood for a new fusion.

“What if Pearl tricks us again?”

The Amethyst snickers. The Pearl shakes her head; nothing is up her sleeve.

“What if Navy is an evil genius just waiting for the right moment to betray us all, just to see the looks on our faces?” Lapis suggests.

The Pearl can hardly withhold her laughter. She turns away. The Sapphire, though, shakes her head. “She’s on our side, now. I’m certain.”

Personally, you’re rather offended that Lapis is the only one who acknowledges your intellect. All the better for your plan, though. “That’s groovy, My Clarity, but how can you be so sure?” There’s no way you’re not going to betray them eventually.

“Everything has already aligned in our favor.” And she leaves it at that. Very mysterious.

(“Already aligned,” she says... Then, they’re looking in the wrong direction.)

“That’s what you like to think,” Ruby grumbles. “We’re in your blind spot and I refuse to re-fuse until we’re out of it!”

“You’re overre--” The Sapphire breaks her calm facade and takes the time to laugh at the pun. “Ah, that was a good one! Steven would’ve loved that!”

Ruby is unable to stay mad. (You have to admit, that was pretty clever.) She gives the Sapphire a quick peck on the lips. “Oh, be serious, Sapphire!” she teases. “Isn’t this the baseball game all over again? Us being unable to focus on anything but each other…” Her hands slide down to the Sapphire’s waist. “I don’t forget so easily.”

“How about I… test how well you remember how to dance?”

The Pearl clears her throat. “You were saying something about a blind spot, Ruby?”

“There’s still time,” Ruby and Sapphire promise in unison.

You sure hope so.