It took almost five days, but I finally caught up! I just wanted to say I love your style for doing this, because I've never read Work before, and this way I get the full story along with the commentary, without any of the text being left out. I also have ADHD, so somehow reading the story in chunks like this makes it much easier to get through. Thank you! ...Whoops, I need a question. Who do you think would win: The Undersiders or the Crystal Gems, with whichever team configurations you prefer?
I’m glad I could help! :D
As for the question... Let’s see.
Steven Universe and Worm spoilers ahead.
The Gems have fairly basic powers, but they have a lot of them.
Garnet: Fire resistance, future vision, shapeshifting, strength, toughness, weapon summoning (gauntlets), rocket gauntlets, fistkind proficiency, gem bubbling, fusion, super jump, passive gravity adjustment, weighted hair.
Ruby: Strength, passive heat manipulation, fire resistance, probably shapeshifting, weapon summoning (gauntlet), gem bubbling(?), passive gravity adjustment, fusion.
Sapphire: Passive cold manipulation, future vision, probably shapeshifting, gem bubbling(?), passive gravity adjustment, fusion.
Amethyst: Shapeshifting with proficiency, spindash, weapon summoning (whip), electric whip, whip proficiency, gem bubbling, passive gravity adjustment, fusion, super jump.
Pearl: Hammerspace (slow retrieval), weapon summoning (spear or sword), finesse, spear and sword proficiency, laser spear, allegedly shapeshifting, projections, summoning holographic duplicates with swordfighting capabilities, minor fog/cloud and sand manipulation, gem bubbling, fusion, passive gravity adjustment, super jump.
Peridot: Toughness, metallokinesis (weak), gem bubbling, passive gravity adjustment, fusion(?).
Steven: Weapon summoning (shield, throwable Captain America style), defensive bubble (optionally spiked), gem bubbling, fusion, healing spit, active gravity adjustment, ability to create sentient plants, resurrecting tears that bestow pink powers, dreamwalking, body hijacking.
Lion: Force shouts (similar to Triumph), creating portals, walking on water, mane portal to pocket dimension, cat.
Connie: Fusion (with Steven), sword proficiency, being great.
(If the gems got Lapis to care, the Undersiders would be in some serious trouble. Her hydrokinesis is way stronger than Leviathan’s.)
And then we have the Undersiders:
Skitter: Complete control of insects, arachnids and crustaceans within a range of 2-3 blocks (sometimes 4-6).
Grue: Generation of gas-like substance that blocks light, muffles sound and provides minor resistance to movement.
Tattletale: Superpowered Sherlock, constant influx of information based on what she’s looking at.
Regent: Nerve manipulation, body hijacking (requires very slow process).
Bitch: Empowering of dogs and wolves.
As we go into this, let’s start off with a very important question:
How does Grue’s darkness interact with beings made of hard light? It’s entirely possible that Grue could singlehandedly destabilize and poof everyone except Steven, Connie and Lion at once, and probably make Steven jittery too. After that, dealing with Steven and Connie shouldn’t be too hard, though Lion might still be an issue.
Let’s assume that isn’t the case from now on.
One other thing I feel is worth noting right away is that Regent’s power is probably of limited use. It is unlikely that Gems have nerves for him to manipulate. He could still affect Steven, Connie and probably Lion, though.
Apart from Peridot, the Gems are highly skilled melee fighters, and are generally tougher than humans. Among the Undersiders, Grue in particular is good at melee, and has been training some of the others, but he is probably nowhere near as well-trained as the superhuman war veterans. If the Undersiders want to win, they should avoid melee as much as possible. Even then, some of the Gems have decent ranged attacks too, with Garnet’s explosive rocket gauntlets, Pearl’s laser spear and Steven’s shield throwing.
However, Bitch’s dogs could cause the Gems a lot of trouble. Garnet might be able to pick one up and throw it, but even so. It certainly helps that Bitch has a lot of them these days - we’ve seen the Gems overwhelmed with sheer force of numbers before, by far weaker enemies (specifically watermelons). Unlike the watermelons, the hellhounds could easily poof most gems and maim or kill Steven and Connie. Lion might put up more of a fight against a single doggo, maybe three, but with the numbers Bitch has now, he’d be overwhelmed too.
Speaking of Garnet, her future vision is very powerful in combat, allowing her to predict the opponent’s next moves in advance. The closest counter to this is Tattletale’s power, but Tattle’s knowledge is far less reliable as far as predicting the enemy’s actions goes.
Tattletale is very good at manipulation. The Gems are good at not listening to people, but do have their sore spots, such as Amethyst’s feelings about herself as a defective gem, or Pearl’s past as a slave. Tattletale might find a way to use this to her advantage, if she can get the Gems to listen.
Imp might be highly useful. With the Gems forgetting her existence each moment, she could sneak up behind them with a piercing weapon, which has usually proven to be the most reliable way to poof a gem. This might be countered by Garnet’s future vision (the same way Tattletale seems immune or resistant to Imp’s power), or it might throw the future vision for a loop and make Garnet’s predictions less accurate.
Even if it doesn’t destabilize the Gems by itself, Grue’s darkness would probably be quite effective. Most of the Gems’ fighting relies on sight, both melee and ranged, and the darkness would take that away. Garnet’s future vision might help her, but the rest would quite literally be left in the dark.
Skitter’s power could probably take out Steven, Connie and maybe Lion quite easily. I doubt it would do much against the Gems, but at least it would let her track their locations and movements.
So far, the Gems have a chance, but the Undersiders have a slight upper hand. But that’s before we pull out one of the Gems’ most powerful tricks: Fusion.
Sardonyx (Garnet+Pearl): Probably everything Garnet and Pearl can do, weapon merging (gauntlets+spear=hammer), considerable size, fourth wall breaking, 360 degree torso spin.
Sugilite (Garnet+Amethyst): Probably everything Garnet and Amethyst can do, weapon merging (gauntlets+whip=flail), considerable size, toughness.
Opal (Amethyst+Pearl): Probably everything Amethyst and Pearl can do, weapon merging (whip+spear=laser bow), considerable size, acrobatics.
Alexandrite (Garnet+Pearl+Amethyst): Probably everything all of them can do, weapon merging (every combination), even more considerable size, fire breath, 360 degree torso spin, possibly other abilities of the previous three fusions.
Smoky Quartz (Steven+Amethyst): Probably everything Steven and Amethyst can do (definitely including active gravity adjustment), weapon merging (shield+whip=yo-yo), strength, rapid spinning.
Stevonnie (Steven+Connie): Probably everything Steven can do (minus active gravity adjustment and possibly shapeshifting), sword proficiency, Yoshi hover.
Fusion is incredibly versatile and can cause a lot of trouble for the Undersiders as some of their human-sized enemies become bigger and more powerful at the cost of numbers.
Surprisingly, this might be a thing for Tattletale to deal with. The fusions need to keep their state of mind focused on their task and on working together in order to remain stable. Tattletale, if she can get them to listen, would probably be able to manipulate some of the fusions’ component personalities and pit them against each other, causing the fusions to fall apart.
But until that happens, the fusions will have a much easier time dealing with threats like Bitch’s dogs or Grue’s darkness (by way of being tall enough to look over it, though he could adjust to that). Not to mention the fact that some of the fusions could squash all the Undersiders in a single attack, provided they were gathered together.
So I guess my conclusion is this:
Despite a large amount of powers for each member and numbers slightly on their side, the Crystal Gems might find themselves at least reasonably challenged by the Undersiders, if not necessarily defeated, and they might have to resort to fusions in order to beat them.
