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@biscuitincharge
((Anyone wanna interact with twenty-something Steven as he prepares to pack up and head back to his winter home in Tallbark, Florida? It's the last he'll be in Beach City until mid spring, barring the possibility of occasional visits.))
((Anyone wanna interact with twenty-something Steven as he prepares to pack up and head back to his winter home in Tallbark, Florida? It's the last he'll be in Beach City until mid spring, barring the possibility of occasional visits.))
"hey hey hey in and out slow breaths " she coaxed gently hugging him "steven.....I'm the closest thing to a sibling you have so ..i..i want to help you work through this "
Steven wanted to pull away, just run off and not have to deal with any of this. But instead, he found himself just frozen in place. He felt too overwhelmed to even move. Steven's overflowing emotions seemed to leak out of his entire being in the form of the pink glow he radiated, but at least it wasn't acting as destructive as it has been. In the moment, he just couldn't make sense of anything.
"I...I wanted them to change... To do better, to fix their mistakes..." he stammered, practically vibrating on the spot. "I was the one who told them to fix their relationship with Gemkind. I asked them to find a way to make the Gems they broke whole again, and figure out how to restore life to the worlds they took it from... And...and when I finally came to see them, not only are they succeeding at making these kinds of changes, they're thriving at it, and it just...it just feels so wrong..."
((Just so everyone knows, I did a bit of rewriting on this blog's About page and most of the sub-pages; the exclusions are the relationships pages, which would require a lot more work.))
spinel nodded softly sitting next to him "how are you holding up kiddo?" she asked gently putting her hand in his shoulder "is there anything i can help with?"
Steven stiffened at the touch, but it wasn't so much the touch itself as much as it was the question: 'Is there anything I can help you with?'
"That's...supposed to be my line..." The statement was followed by a stiff, humorless chuckle. "I'm...the guy who helps people. I'm not supposed to need help. I mean, I don't..." he said about as convincingly as a coyote wearing feathers and calling itself a hen.
the slinky gem was just exploring the old palace getting used to it again felt strange so weird and wrong "hey stevie mind if i sit with ya?" she asked steven gently
His head was swimming with thoughts, but Steven couldn't help but notice how much bluer Homeworld's sky looked, with merely undertones of pink, compared to how it looked when he first came as a kid. Various trees and other flora dotted the outdoor landscape now as well, contributing to a stark contrast to the eerily lifeless feel the planet had before. Everything was changing for the better, it seemed. Everything except for him, who was rather, well...
The appearance of another pulled Steven out of that train of thought, causing him to turn his gaze towards Spinel when she arrived. Her tone in the moment felt softer and more easing than her usual over-the-top demeanor, which caught him off guard but in a good way. Spinel's typical clowning around, which apparently served her great as a party planner, wouldn't have helped Steven's mood in the slightest.
"Uh, sure, I mean... It's a free planet now, right?" he shrugged. The space dividing the large stairway between courtyard and palace doors was flanked by two large pots of shrub-like plants, which were low enough to double as big benches.
@spinel-deymayo-universe
Talking to the Diamonds was never something Steven was comfortable with. That's why, even when he had business with them such as the progress of Project Refoliate, he preferred to do it by proxy through other Gems. That was usually though Lemon and Blueberry, both of whom still seemed to maintain fairly good relations with their respective old Diamonds even after they were stripped of their status and political power.
Steven, however, was not in the best headspace at the time, exacerbated by recent events he'd really rather not talk about, and he came and talked to the Diamonds directly anyway. But that was probably a reason why this would've been one of the worst times he could've done that.
Leaving the palace, Steven needed to get away for a bit to clear his head. Yellow and Blue Diamond were of no help, and he shuddered at the idea of what trying to go to Her for help would do.
”Ohhhhh, it’s a romance. I get it.“
If she hadn’t caught on to that, Webby figured, she might have been very confused: the details of Greg DeMayo’s life certainly didn’t exactly sound relevant to the tale of history and intergalactic war otherwise. While it wouldn’t exactly have lost her, for Webby was a girl who found most things interesting, it would have felt like an abrupt change of subject.
"So… they got together again, right? Wait…”
Her eyes narrowed as she put pieces together in her head.
“If she’s an alien, and he’s one of your humans… then…”
Everything seemed to click into place in a rush.
“Are they… your parents?”
Never mind that this was seriously getting ahead of the story. But he’d said that he was the only hybrid between the two species, and while no-one said that Rose and Greg’s relationship had to result in a child, it was certainly sounding like a reasonable progression of events.
Steven was waiting until that moment of the story to say so, but it seemed Webby was clever enough to figure it out on her own. And that was cool of her.
"Hehe... Yup." Might as well be straightforward about it. "My dad, Greg Universe, decided the life of a traveling musician no longer called to him after he met that tall, mysterious pink-haired woman. And the bond they formed was by no means perfect; I mean, they were from two totally different worlds. But they talked, and they made it work," Steven explained with a fond smile.
"I guess they meshed together so well 'cause they both left behind old lives to reinvent themselves. And neither needed to know who they used to be, because it's who they were in the moment that was important. My dad got a job in Beach City at the local car wash, and then the old owner retired, giving the car wash to him. And mom? Well, she grew even more interested in human beings. She thought it was amazing how natural it is for humans to grow and change.
"And...I guess she really wanted to create something new like that. Something like a Gem but could grow like a human. Thing is, she kinda needed to give up her gem to the new thing she created to make it happen like that, which meant, well...basically giving up herself. ...I'm not gonna pretend to imagine why she decided to do it like that, but she felt strongly enough about it to go through with it. So, Rose Quartz gave up her physical form to bring me into the world."
Steven tugged up on his shirt so that Webby could see the pink gemstone in his navel region, pausing a moment to look down pensively at it. "I got Mom's gem. And her powers with it. It was just a matter of figuring out how to use 'em."
“Better and worse? So, same as life in general I guess…”
She shouldn’t be surprised, Webby figured, as she rubbed at her shirt sleeve a little. History rarely had happy endings, simply because it just kept on going until the present rolled around, so it didn’t really have an ending at all, happy or otherwise.
Though that did raise the question of what could possibly be worse than everyone you knew losing their minds and turning into monsters? But oh boy, looked like she was going to find out soon enough…
She didn’t regret for a moment asking Steven for his world’s history, of course; but it was certainly a roller-coaster of a tale.
Rose couldn’t heal her friends… Webby still wasn’t sure she understood quite what bubbling meant when it came to gems - she was picturing something like the hat-wearing bubbles that had guarded Black Heron’s lab, although she was aware that probably wasn’t completely accurate - but it sounded akin to putting them safely in storage, so she still got the gist. But she’d made a new friend… built an impressive statue (okay, she kinda wanted to see that for herself if it was still standing)… and mostly just people-watched. Which, Webby supposed, fair. After you’d just lost a war, what else really was there to do?
“Ooh, a musician! Fun!”
If that sounded a tiny bit forced, it was only because Webby couldn’t imagine how one guy’s arrival could possibly have marked a significant turning point in the life of multi-thousand-year-old aliens. But she’d learn, she supposed!
Steven didn't seemed to notice the Webby's forced tone of interest. After all, who wouldn't find a musician fun? Either way, an important player had entered the story by this point, and Steven was more than happy to tell the tale.
"Yup, and so begins a romantic tale of interspecies bonding and new beginnings which I call...'The Ballad of Rose and Greg'. You see, there once was a young man named Greg DeMayo who had big dreams of becoming a successful rock star. Mr. and Mrs. DeMayo didn't exactly agree with his dreams, apparently, but Greg chose to follow his heart and set off in his cool space-themed tour van to make those dreams come true, changing his name to Greg Universe to put himself and his awesome space-themed rock music out in the world.
"But while Mr. Universe's music was good, Greg had a hard time getting it out there, 'cause his music manager, a jerk named Marty who took most of the money he made, wasn't actually all that good at his managing job. One day on his tour, Mr. Universe stopped at Beach City, where he put on a big, beautiful performance on the beach, but no one showed up to see it. Except for one Rose Quartz, who loved it."
Steven was using his whole body to tell Webby the tale his father had told him numerous times before, giving it the same level of passion that he always did. Of course, no matter how many times Steven had heard the story, it always retained a special place in his heart.
"Rose was immediately taken in by Mr. Universe and his music, and Greg was taken in by Rose. He even gave her a free copy of his CD to listen to. But Rose had to go, and Greg just missed her when he left to go get her a Mr. Universe t-shirt to go with the CD. But that didn't stop Greg. After looking around the beach, he saw Amethyst and followed her back to the Crystal Temple. There, he met with Rose again, gifting her the t-shirt before heading off on the open road, but not before praying that the stars may one day align for them to meet again. That would've been the end of it, had fate not had other plans..."
biscuitincharge:
“I…uh, don’t think the moon counts as a planet, but okey…”
Brushing past that confusing statement and back to Gem History 101, Steven paused to collect himself and work out his response to Webby’s simple question. This was where things really got messy…
“I mean…technically yes? But it gets…complicated…” Steven could remember how he gradually learned bit by bit more about the Gems’ past and the rebellion, and how that simple ‘the Crystal Gems won, and the Earth was saved’ take grew more complex and confusing the more he learned. But overtime, he’d grown to understand better; finally learning who his mother really used to be really helped to recontextualize a lot he didn’t get before.
“A lot of Gems believed Rose’s cause and joined her fight, but a lot of other Gems still believed in Homeworld’s doctrine and fought back against them. Yellow and Blue wouldn’t let Pink back down, no matter how long the fighting dragged on. They said as long as Pink was around, her Earth colony would get completed like they intended.
“And then Bismuth, the builder Gem who made weapons for the Crystal Gems, thought they should end the war by going as far as shattering Pink Diamond. See, she made Rose’s famous big, pink sword to be able to poof any Gem but not break the actual gemstone, but then she made this new weapon called the ‘Breaking Point’ that was made to shatter Gems, and she wanted to use it to shatter Pink.
But, well, Pink and Rose were the same Gem, but she couldn’t explain that to Bismuth. And Bismuth got mad when Rose wouldn’t explain why she didn’t agree to this plan and got in a big fight with her over it. Which…led to Rose poofing and bubbling Bismuth. She, uh, didn’t tell anyone else what happened to Bismuth; she just said Bismuth got lost in battle…”
Steven frowned, still remembering the look of anger and pain Bismuth had vividly during their own clash. ‘You didn’t even tell ‘em…! You bubbled me away and didn’t ever tell your friends… My friends…’ Steven knew Rose’s intentions weren’t ill, but they still caused lasting harm. Like…well, many of her well-intended actions.
“I…guess she feared if other Crystal Gems found out about Bismuth’s more extreme methods and what happened to her for it, some might split off and make the war so much worse. But…then she seemed to see some merit to Bismuth’s idea after a while… I mean, obviously, Pink couldn’t shatter herself, but if the other Diamonds still wouldn’t give up the Earth, she’d make it look like she did. Since Homeworld didn’t know Rose’s sword was made to not shatter Gems, Pink staged her own shattering by having her Pearl shapeshift to look like Rose and then poof her in front of everybody, leaving behind fake shards!
“Pink thought that’d be the end of it! That the other Diamonds would see her colony failed so badly that she couldn’t keep her own subjects from shattering her, and they’d just give up and leave! But the other Diamonds were furious about what they thought they saw. So furious that they called away all their armies still on Earth so the Crystal Gems would think they won…but then fired this huge combo blast at the whole Earth that was supposed to wipe out any Gems left on the planet in one hit! Rose could only shield herself, Garnet, and Pearl from the blast! But instead of wiping out the Gems it hit, it corrupted their minds, causing them all to turn into these big, feral monsters!”
“Oh no!”
Yeah, she was definitely invested in the story by this point. Suffice it to say that, had she not been standing already, Webby would have been on the edge of her seat, both intrigued and horrified. In a way, Steven’s description of the Diamonds blasting Earth after they lost the war reminded her of Lunaris’ own attempt to blow the planet back to atoms once the invasion failed… only on an entirely different kind of level.
One that seemed to have succeeded.
“So they saved Earth for the people, like you and me -” (KINDA; Webby was aware that was a pretty big generalisation given that sentient ducks apparently didn’t exist in his world) “-but didn’t get to see it for themselves?”
Or at least, not with their own minds. Webby couldn’t say she was entirely a stranger to people who got turned into monsters; but that was usually brought about by their own flaws, such as had happened to King Honestus.
“Wow that’s, ah, pretty tragic. Does it get better from there, or…?”
If she hadn’t had such a keen desire to learn about history, alternate or otherwise, she might have wondered if she wanted to know that answer.
Steven wavered his hand thoughtfully, considering how exactly to answer that question. "Well...it gets better...and it gets worse...but, uh, for a good couple of thousands of years, there wasn't a lotta meaningful change either way," he said, working out the next stage of his story in his head.
"Rose was famous for having healing powers, even being able to fix a cracked gem. But...corruption...that damage from the Diamonds...that was a whole 'nother level... Rose didn't know how to heal the Gems that had become corrupted, so...all the remaining Crystal Gems could do was poof and bubble the Gem Monsters running around the Earth so they couldn't hurt themselves or anyone else. At least until they could find a cure."
Smiling a little, Steven continued, "Some time after the war ended, the Crystal Gems found a Gem named Amethyst living in the old Prime Kindergarten where the Quartz soldiers were made. Turns out, she was still forming in the ground when the Diamonds did their big final attack, so it didn't hit her. But, 'cause Amethyst stayed in the ground as long as she did, she didn't come out as a big beefy soldier but instead small, like me!"
That was wrong by Homeworld's standards, of course, but perfect as far as Steven was always concerned. "Rose took Amethyst in so the Crystal Gems could teach her to live free and see how awesome the Earth is, so Amethyst became a Crystal Gem, too. Together, they built this cool temple off the coast of what's now Delmarva with a giant statue that looks like the fusion of all of them together. They called their new home...the Crystal Temple! Later, humans showed up and settled the nearby land, calling it Beach City."
Steven fondly remembered when he and his mailman buddy Jamie put on a play of that exact moment. Acting sure was fun. "For a long time, the Crystal Gems kept an eye out all over the world for corrupted Gems that needed to be contained while they figured out how to cure them. In the mean time, Rose enjoyed watching humans and seeing them do their human things, while the others, well...kinda preferred to keep to themselves... Except Amethyst, actually. She always liked doing human stuff like eating and sleeping, even though Gems don't need to."
He smiled again as he continued, "So it was really a whole lot of the same for a while. Fighting corrupted Gems, keeping humanity safe... And then one day, a young up-and-coming rock star named Mr. Universe rolled into town."
SU Steven Universe Masterlist
Like or reblog this post to have your muse added to the su masterlist! Must be a steven universe rper. Whether that be canon, AU or oc. PERSONALS/NON RP BLOGS WILL BE BLOCKED.
The warp pad in Little Homeworld’s central plaza lit up from an incoming warp. And when the light faded away, there was one whole Dondai Supremo parked atop its surface. Over the past year or so, Steven had concluded that warping back via his private warp in Tallbark was the best way to save on gas for his commute between winter and summer homes. And the Little Homewarp was the closest outdoor warp to Beach City that could be driven on and off of.
“Eyyyy… Does Knuckles work here?” he joked out the open car window to whomever happened to be outside.
The warp pad in Little Homeworld’s central plaza lit up from an incoming warp. And when the light faded away, there was one whole Dondai Supremo parked atop its surface. Over the past year or so, Steven had concluded that warping back via his private warp in Tallbark was the best way to save on gas for his commute between winter and summer homes. And the Little Homewarp was the closest outdoor warp to Beach City that could be driven on and off of.
“Eyyyy… Does Knuckles work here?” he joked out the open car window to whomever happened to be outside.
outoftheirdifferences:
Steven didn’t need to worry if Webby was still following; she absolutely was. History was all one big fascination to Webby, and mythological beings equally much - and doubly so if they were aliens too! - and if it was actually the history of an alternate reality? Well, that was just the icing on the cake for a girl like Webby who adored learning new things. Her expression bounced between curiosity, fascination, excitement, eagerness to learn more…
And when he got to the part about Sapphire saving Ruby and falling in love, she couldn’t contain a heartfelt “Aww, that’s so sweet!”
“Wow, your history sounds like really something else. I mean, our history here is pretty great too, not to brag; but we didn’t get aliens on earth until a couple of months ago, and even then they weren’t from any further than the moon. ‘The Planet Moon’, they always call it. Though, you know…”
The moon’s not a planet was a common refrain in Duckburg these days. Just don’t ever say it to Lieutenant Penumbra.
“But about your rebellion… they must have won, right? Since you’re alive to be here and all?”
“I...uh, don’t think the moon counts as a planet, but okey...”
Brushing past that confusing statement and back to Gem History 101, Steven paused to collect himself and work out his response to Webby’s simple question. This was where things really got messy...
“I mean...technically yes? But it gets...complicated...” Steven could remember how he gradually learned bit by bit more about the Gems’ past and the rebellion, and how that simple ‘the Crystal Gems won, and the Earth was saved’ take grew more complex and confusing the more he learned. But overtime, he’d grown to understand better; finally learning who his mother really used to be really helped to recontextualize a lot he didn’t get before.
“A lot of Gems believed Rose’s cause and joined her fight, but a lot of other Gems still believed in Homeworld’s doctrine and fought back against them. Yellow and Blue wouldn’t let Pink back down, no matter how long the fighting dragged on. They said as long as Pink was around, her Earth colony would get completed like they intended.
“And then Bismuth, the builder Gem who made weapons for the Crystal Gems, thought they should end the war by going as far as shattering Pink Diamond. See, she made Rose’s famous big, pink sword to be able to poof any Gem but not break the actual gemstone, but then she made this new weapon called the ‘Breaking Point’ that was made to shatter Gems, and she wanted to use it to shatter Pink.
But, well, Pink and Rose were the same Gem, but she couldn’t explain that to Bismuth. And Bismuth got mad when Rose wouldn’t explain why she didn’t agree to this plan and got in a big fight with her over it. Which...led to Rose poofing and bubbling Bismuth. She, uh, didn’t tell anyone else what happened to Bismuth; she just said Bismuth got lost in battle...”
Steven frowned, still remembering the look of anger and pain Bismuth had vividly during their own clash. ‘You didn't even tell 'em...! You bubbled me away and didn't ever tell your friends... My friends...’ Steven knew Rose’s intentions weren’t ill, but they still caused lasting harm. Like...well, many of her well-intended actions.
“I...guess she feared if other Crystal Gems found out about Bismuth’s more extreme methods and what happened to her for it, some might split off and make the war so much worse. But...then she seemed to see some merit to Bismuth’s idea after a while... I mean, obviously, Pink couldn’t shatter herself, but if the other Diamonds still wouldn’t give up the Earth, she’d make it look like she did. Since Homeworld didn’t know Rose’s sword was made to not shatter Gems, Pink staged her own shattering by having her Pearl shapeshift to look like Rose and then poof her in front of everybody, leaving behind fake shards!
“Pink thought that’d be the end of it! That the other Diamonds would see her colony failed so badly that she couldn’t keep her own subjects from shattering her, and they’d just give up and leave! But the other Diamonds were furious about what they thought they saw. So furious that they called away all their armies still on Earth so the Crystal Gems would think they won...but then fired this huge combo blast at the whole Earth that was supposed to wipe out any Gems left on the planet in one hit! Rose could only shield herself, Garnet, and Pearl from the blast! But instead of wiping out the Gems it hit, it corrupted their minds, causing them all to turn into these big, feral monsters!”
“Hope everybody up in Beach City’s been having a great Yuletide season. I got to be the Mall Santa down here in Tallbark this year! Which was fun.”
“Anyway, Happy Yule if you celebrate, and if you don’t, have a nice day.”
((I dunno, I thought it was funny.))
outoftheirdifferences:
“Yeah, ya think?”
She wasn’t deliberately being a jerk about the lack of context he’d given at first; heck, Vanellope never specifically meant to come off as such. She was just a child with an incredibly sassy mouth on her, and one who wasn’t always careful with who exactly she directed it at. So yeah, she could be rude, she could hurt feelings–
It was just never done maliciously.
As such, she listened attentively as the kid elaborated. His explanation seemed to take minor tangents here and there, but Vanellope decided to play nice and resisted the urge to comment. The game’s story seemed decent enough, pretty standard fare for an action game as she’d have expected. At least, until he got to the part about the ancient battlefield.
“Oh, sweet mother of monkey-milk, that’s cool!”
Now that she was paying more attention, she did indeed notice the giant weapons scattered around the landscape; and now the girl’s interest was piqued, for sure. It looked like a pretty neat bit of platforming as well, and she was already itching to just scramble all over it just because it was cool and it was there. She was tempted to just make a dash for the nearest one while Steven was doing his thing with the nearest strawberry, in fact; but she held off for now. Just for curiosity’s sake.
“Cool, cool. So if those things bounce like that, they must make for pretty good trampolines if you jump on top of ‘em too, right?”
Because that was also a fairly standard game mechanic, at least in old-school platformers.
Steven took everything in stride. In fact, he seemed happy enough to even have a new friend to chat with, gladly helping her get acquainted with the mechanics. The rest of his friends and family were in other areas, including Connie. Even Hessonite could be nice company in times like these when off the clock, if programmed with a somewhat pretentious demeanor.
He opened his mouth to respond to the girl with his own expertise on his game but trailed off before he even began speaking. “...I...actually never tried...” he mused at the notion, his tone showing his own surprise that he never did. “I mean, I’ve got my own little ‘double jump’ move if I wanna jump higher, so I never really considered bouncing off stuff...”
