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novantinuum · 5 months ago

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Fandom: Steven Universe Rating: Teen Audiences Words: 4.8K~ Summary: A young human-Gem hybrid- a soul yet unknown to the rest of the Crystal Gems- takes their first brave steps towards greeting their heritage firsthand.

Chapter 3 of 4! This time, my OC goes on a tour of Little Homeschool with Bismuth, and gleans a far clearer picture of the most pertinent events of recent Gem history.

Enjoy! <3

Same as the car ride into town, the warp stream sees fit to aggravate their motion sickness.

Jean doubles over with hands on wobbly, wobbly knees when they finally reach their destination, relishing in the familiar comfort of feet planted upon solid ground once more. (Because good grief, they were whirling about like a damn tumbleweed in there. Balancing themself all perfectly poised and upright like the Gems felt near impossible.)

“Hey, you good?” the purple one— Amethyst, they remind themself— says, reaching a solitary hand out as if to catch them should they stumble.

“Y-yeah,” they stutter, still breathing heavy. “Yeah… sorry, it’s just— hoo boy, that was a lot.”

“Steven took a while to get used to the warp streams as well,” Garnet comments, issuing a formal, solitary nod. “It’s only expected that an organic being would struggle to acclimate to a zero-G environment like that. You’ll learn to manage it. In time.”

Jean swallows hard, willing that awful nausea at the base of their esophagus to recede. With any luck she’s right. It’d be such an embarrassing shame if they couldn’t physically handle such a basic form of Gem transportation. They always knew the theory for how the warp pads worked— the inter-linked system of crystalline terminals providing near-instantaneous travel between distant locations— but it’s another thing entirely to actually experience it. The whole journey from the beach house to this other settlement took, what? Maybe five or so seconds? Goodness, such a swift means of transportation could entirely revolutionize life on Earth as humanity knows it. It really is too bad these warp pads only activate for Gems.

(And that… well… they disorient every last balance-keeping anatomical feature of the inner ear. They’re thankful for Garnet’s encouragement, they are— but as of this precise moment they can’t imagine how such a trip could get any better, motion sensitivity in mind.)

Then, fingertips tapping delicately against the crystal inlaid at their chest in pure subconscious habit as the post-warp jitters fade away, they cast their gaze upwards and out. Shift their posture upright once more. This place…

“I— I’m actually here,” they mutter to themself, drinking in the glorious sight of all the colorful architecture and the bounty of Gem students milling around the busy central square.

Little Homeworld, in the flesh.

They step off the warp pad and— eyes widened with childlike wonder— begin to map out the area in their head. Clustered beyond the gold-rimmed concrete platform wrapping around the warp are a number of small buildings, each one featuring a completely different architectural style. Some are cozy A-frames, some are suspended on stilts… some are fashioned from wood and stone, others from brick… there’s square windows, circular windows, half-moon windows, no windows—! One story, two story, many, many stories… name any exotic building feature, and this place probably has it represented somewhere. And it’s a very colorful town, too— Jean has never seen a neighborhood painted in such vivid, welcoming pastel shades.

They’re still drinking in the sheer exhilarating splendor of their new surroundings when a broad figure they don’t recognize rushes across the square towards their current group, the very image of a Gem on a mission.

She’s clad in overalls that look much like their own, sporting a friendly face and— most unusually, compared to the Gems they’ve seen so far— an inverted gemstone at her chest, one that spirals inwards towards her core instead of sticking out.

“Oh, thank goodness you lot are back!” she says, nudging one of her rainbow locs back behind her shoulder as she plants herself square in front of their three hosts. “I was beginning to wonder if I needed to start the seminar on your behalf.”

Pearl’s glance flits their way for the briefest of seconds, their fingertips threading together. “Apologies, we got a little caught up in… something important, shall we say.”

“Bismuth, this is Jean,” Garnet says, gesturing towards them. “They’re a prospective student and need a full tour of our campus and dormitory. Do you or Peridot have time to show them around?”

Her mouth screws up as she considers. “Well… pretty sure Peri’s busy with her horticulture class, so I guess I can do it. It sure beats all the busy work I had going on this morning. But wait, wait—” she interrupts her own train of thought then, her attention snapping right back to the other Gem— “hold up. You said prospective student? You mean this isn’t just a tour for the short-term exchange program?”

“Jean’s half-Gem,” Amethyst blurts out with clear excitement painting her tone. “Like Steven.”

Bismuth’s expression snaps from minor confusion to spellbound amazement almost faster than Jean is capable of processing. Her glance flits down, briefly hovering on the pale lavender-blue gemstone resting atop their sternum.

“Huh,” she muses out loud, balling her hand at her chin. “Well, I’ll be damned. Didn’t know that was possible.” Then, her focus pulling back up to meet their eyes: “But hey, we’ve plenty of time to talk shop about that later, right? It’s nice to meet you, Jean! We can begin that tour right now, if you’re ready. The rest of you guys, go on ahead. I’ll take it from here.”

“Sounds good,” they nod, tangling their own hands within the wide expanse of their pockets as they rock back and forth on their heels. “I, erm—” they wave an anticlimactic goodbye to the other Gems, who seem to be in a huge hurry to meet their previous engagement… golly, all of this is happening so fast— “can I just do one thing before we start, though?”

Bismuth hums an affirmative. “Whatever you need. We got all the time in the world.”

Inhaling deep through the slimmest slit of their lips, they pull their phone out of their pocket and sling a quick text to Dad, updating him on where they’re at. After all, warping straight to Little Homeworld itself was not in their plan for today… but oh, well. Life is full of surprises sometimes.

(A fact of existence that’s both a blessing and a curse.)

But with that little task out of the way, Jean follows their guide down the wide central path connecting to the main square, eagerly soaking up whatever knowledge she can spare. Bismuth, as it turns out, is the Gem who designed this whole campus. Thus for all the questions they might have, she’s got a pretty solid answer for most. Or so she claims.

From what they’ve seen of her so far, they’re apt to believe this, though.

“So… Little Homeworld,” they begin with a fair measure of timidity, skipping a little to catch up with this Gem’s large and energetic stride. “This place was only built in the last few years, yeah?”

She grins. “Yep! We broke ground in mid 2015, shortly after the start of Era 3.”

Their brow creases. “Era 3…?”

“Gem society’s current era,” she says in explanation, “which began when the Crystal Gems finally made peace with big Homeworld. You’ve… heard of Homeworld, right?”

“I mean… I always figured there was one, but that’s kinda it. I—” they trail off for a moment, their chest deflating under the humiliating weight of everything they’re unaware of. “To be completely honest, I’ve never even met any Gems until today. So there’s gonna be a lot I don’t know. Sorry…”

Bismuth merely waves their apology off. “Psssh, don’t worry about it. I can explain some of the basics to you after the tour. Plus, if you’re looking to enroll, you’ve plenty of time to learn all this stuff anyways. Now follow me, our first stop is just over here…”

The first stop she speaks of is the campus gymnasium. Jean’s interest is immediately piqued as they notice a few Gems sword fighting in one of the gym’s many courts. Bismuth— ever the keen eye— gives a fond laugh at their sharp swerve of interest, and dives straight into the meat of her tour spiel, beginning with…

Campus tour factoid number one: not only is this space utilized for structured classes (mostly swordplay and wrestling, which the quartzes are huge fans of), but students can even reserve courts for individual use. It’s not a super large gymnasium, but there’s plenty of space for sports outside, too. Apparently baseball (of all things) is a favorite pastime amongst Little Homeschool students.

Campus tour factoid number two: right next door to the gymnasium there’s a building with a bright, airy common area. Here, there’s tons of tables and chairs set up for students to play games and connect, a communal kitchen (mostly for the benefit of their human visitors, but also for Gems who wish to experiment with eating), and a mini library of human entertainment.

Campus tour factoid number three: when weather is permitting many instructors like hosting their classes outside, but they have plenty of physical classroom space too, over in the cluster of buildings nestled under the trees right across the main path. Some of the other amenities Little Homeschool boasts are a full art studio, an all-seasons greenhouse kitted out with the latest and greatest in hydroponics technology, and a records room with access ports to a whole wealth of Homeworld data banks for research and learning purposes.

The final stop on Bismuth’s tour is the dormitory, which is housed within the central tower.

“Now, many of the Gems who attend our school are at a delicate transitory stage in their lives,” she says, leading Jean through the front entrance of the dorm. “Plenty of them have never been apart from those of their own cut for more than a second, so the concept of ‘personal belongings’ and having a space that’s all their own is… well, for lack of a better term, alien.”

They nod as they follow Bismuth through the building’s lobby, each and every step bringing a new curiosity to gawk in awe at. Damn, this place is insane! The whole core of this tower is open space, with a set of transparent elevator-like pads stationed at the middle to ferry folks up and down from each level. There’s tons of greenery and light brightening up this expanse, and a number of railed walkways arcing across this central atrium from different angles every few floors. These walkways even have flowering vines hanging from the undersides, giving this building a strikingly organic vibe despite its concrete heavy architecture style. It all feels very… oh, what’s the style Dad always said he likes the aesthetic of, again—? Very, uh… very solar punk. Yes, that’s it. A sort of combination of solar punk and neo-futurism, what with all the bold angles and sweeping curves represented here.

A few Gems wave at Bismuth as the two of them pass by. She beckons them along towards the lift system.

“Thus, when building this school,” their tour guide continues, “we settled on dorm style accommodations, hoping that it could provide a nice balance between solo and community living for our students.”

“How many Gems are housed here, out of curiosity?” Jean asks, stepping up on the platform with her.

Bismuth taps her fingers against the diamond shaped screen inlaid in the half-wall that separates the lifts— probably imputing a floor— and the crystalline platform jolts to life. “Currently? About a hundred seventy or so,” she responds, turning back to face them. “And our roster rotates all the time. But the school itself serves plenty more— there’s a lot of Gems who warp in each day for their classes, and others who only choose to attend one or two sessions.”

They hum in acknowledgement, falling quiet to enjoy the smooth ride up to one of the upper levels.

The lift stops at floor seven, where their gracious host leads them towards what she describes as one of the few empty dorm rooms. (Or they think these are supposed to be the dorm rooms? These doorways don’t have any handles to speak of, which is a little confusing.) In any case, Jean’s brow arches in ample curiosity as they watch Bismuth press her palm flush against the adjacent panel much like one would use a hotel keycard. A dull chime rings out, and the entire surface of the door splits in two. They flinch a step backwards, wholly mystified. Wait, what?? But how did— there was no seam before, right? The doorway had no visible seam. They swear to the edge of the Earth it didn’t. So how could it just—?

Bismuth gives a fond chuckle, merely shuffling aside to invite them in to the room. “Trippy, right? This whole building’s a bit of an architectural labyrinth— held together with a whoooole lotta Gem tech, hah! So when you walk through that frame, you’re actually entering into something of a pocket dimension. It’s the only way we could scale up our operations while maintaining a slim footprint. The sunlight’s real, though,” she says, gesturing towards the wide window at the far end of the living unit.

Eager eyed, Jean takes a quick inventory of the space.

The room itself is fairly sparse, a blank canvas to be furnished and decorated however a Gem would prefer. But there’s some shelves built into the right hand wall at the far corner for storage of personal items, and a humble table and chair nestled by the window. Meanwhile, on the left side of the wall there’s a strange little person-sized inlet— a ‘cubby,’ of sorts— with another one of those touch screen panels next to it. They hum with intrigue, striding towards this mysterious furnishing feature.

“What’s this for?” they ask, the panel’s interface bursting to life under even the most feathery brush of their fingertips.

“Oh, that—?” she smiles. “It’s a newer contraption, actually… meant to mimic the unique conditions of any Gem’s exit hole.”

Jean purses their lips, absolutely nothing about the conclusion of that last sentence making sense.

Their what hole?? Oh gosh, it’s gonna take eons to figure out what even half of this stuff means, isn’t it?

Bismuth begins to speak further on the topic, delving into something more nuanced about these so-called ‘exit holes…’ something about rest, something about incubation, a kindergarten or whatever. Ugh. They don’t know. They don’t know. And even more frustratingly, for whatever goddamn reason it suddenly feels impossible to maintain focus on her words at all, their mind instead seeing fit to fixate on the daunting ravine that is their sheer lack of an even baseline understanding of Gem physiology, culture, and history. Here they are, trying to enroll in an all-Gem school, and they barely even comprehend the basic lingo. Oh god, she thinks they’re an idiot, doesn’t she?

They don’t even realize they’re clutching their arms around their midsection in the sheer strife of it all until the sound of their own name cuts through all the murk and mire that’s taken their body hostage.

“Jean… hey, Jean? You doin’ okay, there? D’ya want me to slow down?”

“Yeah, no, I’m fine, I just—”

Whatever lame, emotionally downplaying words they were about to utter die like snuffed cinders upon their tongue as they hazard a sheepish glance at the Gem and note the genuine concern weaving across her features. Jean sighs, dropping their arms.

“I think I need to go outside,” they admit, averting their gaze. “Everything’s just… a little overwhelming right now.”

“Hey, that’s all right,” she says, tone soft with understanding. “The rest of the tour can always wait. In fact… how ‘bout I take you back to my forge, and we can talk shop there, instead? It’s open air, and if you’re not up for talking, I can just show ya’ how I prepare billets for a while. At least until the others come back ‘round. That sound more your speed?”

“Yeah,” they nod, the barest hints of a smile returning to their lips. “Yeah, I think I can handle that.”

The walk back to Bismuth’s forge is pretty uneventful. There’s a few Gem students who wave a friendly hello to their guide as she leads them down the path, but beyond that their journey is cast in comfortable silence. And honestly, thank goodness for that. Jean is exceedingly glad to find another soul in this place who understands the importance of like… why a person might desire chatter-less companionship. Sometimes they just flat out don’t feel up to talking, y’hear?

Bismuth only breaks their quietude when the two of them step through the arched entry into her workshop.

“Here, you can sit, if you’d like,” she says, gesturing towards a squat wooden stool nestled at the corner of the space. There’s a table there as well, filled with a number of specialized metallic hand tools Jean can’t even begin to guess the names or uses of. Their Aunt Dee might, though. As a film costumer, metal work seems like something she would’ve at very least dabbled in before.

They nod in gratitude, eagerly situating themself on the offered seat and allowing their muscles to relax. Ahhh… it feels nice to rest after such a long walk.

Their gracious host rounds the room to grab a dense bar of metal from the healthy stash she’s got stacked on the shelves. As she crosses back around, her eyes lock on them immediately. Ever so subtle, her brows lift upon her broad forehead as she regards them once more, signaling her active sympathy.

“You ‘doin any better?”

They nod, small and meek. “Yeah, I think so. Sorry, about— well, sorry.”

“Ain’t nothin’ to be apologetic for, don’t you worry,” she says, laying the metal bar down on the working surface of her anvil. Then, with a faint laugh: “‘Sides, if you think you’re feelin’ out of your element, you should’ve seen my last tour group.”

“What would a Gem have to feel out of place about…?” Jean asks, more of an under-their-breath mutter than anything else.

Of course, Bismuth seems to glean the deeper meaning behind their hazy afterthought of a query anyways. “Oh, you’d be surprised. A lot of our students here have, well… a bit of a complicated past. A large number of them fought in the war for Earth, back when the Gem Homeworld was still trying to colonize it. And a good number of those spent a few thousand years trapped in a state of mental damage we Gems call ‘corruption.’”

Their features crinkle inwards as they ponder these facts. Hmm. ‘Corruption.’ Yet another term they’ve never seen show up in any of their research efforts. It seems the scant amount of information they’ve amassed about Gems up until now really was barely scraping the barrel. Was this their fault? Did they not dig deep enough? Are these pieces of their own history they could’ve learned years ago if only they applied themselves to their search harder? But in a true blessing of a breakthrough for an anxious wreck who’s starting to feel too ashamed to bother anyone with any more of their ignorant questions, their blank, deer-in-the-headlights gaze is obvious enough that their host clues in on the confusion swirling through their mind immediately.

“Ah, hmm. I guess you prolly don’t know what corruption is either, huh?” she muses, pressing a closed fist to the edge of her lips.

Jean flashes an apologetic smile. “‘Fraid not.”

She nods, and temporarily abandons her starting metal to the anvil so she can grab a second stool from the other side of the forge and sit herself down across from them.

“In that case,” she jabs a solitary finger in the air, “lemme just start from the beginning and give you the ol’ Earth rebellion primer…”

So, here’s what they glean from her narrative:

The Gem Homeworld was apparently once ruled by four Diamonds. The youngest of the quartet, Pink, had Earth given to her as her first colony. The colonization efforts went as planned for a good few hundred years… and then, a lone rose quartz and a pearl (the Pearl, the one they met just an hour or so ago, which makes a damn lot of sense from what little they’re aware of her), began seeding whispers of rebellion. It started small… isolated attacks on key settlements and construction sites, strategic disruptions of supply shipments and warp pad installations, that sort of thing. At first, the two of them only ever intended to scare the others off this planet— not wanting its ecosystem to be permanently destroyed via the lethal impacts of Gem production on the Earth’s soil chemistry. But over time, the rebellion blossomed to champion a cause far broader than what was originally intended:

Freedom for all Gems, no matter how disparate to Homeworld’s stringent ideals.

This was when Bismuth joined the fray, and where much of her recounting of this history is based on eye-witness experience.

Jean takes a moment to inquire a bit deeper about the destructive impact of Kindergarting before her story moves on.

“Essentially, Gemkind used to set up camp on a new planet, construct their colony, siphon every last scrap of life out of its crust until they’ve incubated all the Gems they possibly can, and then move right along to the next one,” Bismuth says, shaking her head with a tinge of shame coating her features. “An endless, soulless cycle, with countless dissatisfied Gems trapped at its center. That’s why the mere existence of Rose Quartz was such a shockwave at the time— ‘coz she was a Gem who outright defied her superiors’ demands at every opportunity. Rose, she—” her expression grows somewhat wistful with melancholy remembrance— “she taught me that my unique existence was precious, that I didn’t need to bend to Homeworld’s demands. That I could choose my own path in life. My own friends. My own loves… Stars, Rose Quartz was everything to me back then.”

Jean’s nose crinkles as they ask the obvious next question. “But…?”

Bismuth sighs as she slumps forward on her stool, age-old exhaustion evident within her tone. “But war is complicated. And so are Gems. I made a few choices I now regret, and got bubbled over it. Missed a few thousand years ‘coz of that. And by the time I was let out, the war was long over. The Crystal Gems won, but… only by a technicality.”

“Bubbled?” they inquire, tilting their head.

“Hah,” she laughs, low and half-hearted. “Means my form was dissipated in combat, and my gem was stashed in a bubble. It’s a long story. Don’t really wanna hash through the details of it now, if that’s okay.”

Jean nods, more than emphasizing with that sort of sentiment. There’s tons of awkward stuff in their past they’re not super interested in discussing with others, either. They gesture for her to continue.

Bismuth moves on to explain how— once she was freed from her stasis and allowed to reform— she discovered that all the Gems left behind on this planet were caught in a massive retaliatory attack by the Diamonds.

“They believed Rose Quartz shattered one of their own,” she shrugs. “Pink Diamond— the appointed leader of this colony— was lost during the war. So the three who remained traveled to Earth and tried to wipe every last Gem off its surface… their own soldiers included. They assumed they destroyed all of them.“

“But they were corrupted instead,” Jean completes, remembering that specific word Bismuth had used earlier. “Which means—?”

“—that their minds were thrown into a jumbled, primal state. Unable to retain a humanoid form, or even communicate in words. To use your human lingo, it’s as if the sheer brutality of the Diamonds’ damage reduced them into monsters.”

“Hmm. So how were they healed?”

“Ah, that was all Steven’s doing. I’m assuming you already know about Steven—?”

They nod. “I’ve seen his adverts,” they put it lightly.

That’s— of course— only the tip of the iceberg. They choose not to mention the ridiculous sum of time they’ve spent combing the internet for every last scrap of information they could feasibly grasp on Beach City, Steven, and the other Gems. It’s not clear yet what this particular Gem would think about such an obsessive level of study… whether she’d admire the initiative or resent them for sticking their nose where it doesn’t belong.

“Alright. Now, here’s where things get a bit topsy-turvy,” Bismuth says, a bit of a chuckle coloring her tone. “So, Steven’s the half-human son of Rose Quartz, right?”

Yep, that tracks. None of Jean’s sources ever stated this so bluntly, but it meshes with the vague timeline of events they’ve pieced together… what with Rose’s disappearance and Steven’s arrival on the scene years later.

“Well, back when he was a kid, this whole bombshell secret ‘bout his mother comes out. I wasn’t there for the reveal,” she shrugs, gesturing wide with her palms spread open, “and only learned about it secondhand, but— basically, all along, Pink Diamond and Rose Quartz were the same person.”

Their brows scrunch inwards. “Wait, what?”

“Wild, right?” she says with noted amusement. “All those years of chaos and turmoil… when the whole time, Rose was simply waging a false war against herself. I’m sure you’ll learn plenty more about this era of history in time, but the important part is that this makes Steven one of the Diamonds. Which gave him the unique authority to negotiate with them for not only the complete liberation of Earth, but also the healing of all the corrupted Gems. Such a cure took the powers of all four of them to achieve. So, hah—” Bismuth cracks a half-hearted, wistful smile— “as much as it really cut my facets down a size at the time… in the end… making peace with Homeworld was literally the only option.”

Jean continues to muse on the broader implications of all this newly learned history as the Gem moves on to describe how Little Homeworld came to be. (Which— they’re ashamed to admit— they’re only halfway paying attention to.) So, Steven’s like… what… royalty, then? Some sort of Gem prince? It certainly would explain the sheer level of political sway he had in setting up this school, and the almost reverent way people here have spoken of him so far. Still, it’s not what they expected. Online documentation on Gem matters is still very sparse, yes, but nothing they’ve read thus far even remotely mentioned the existence of ‘Diamonds,’ let alone Steven’s innate connection to them. They can’t help but wonder if there’s any specific reason why.

Their thoughts migrating to related horizons, they inquire more about the rest of the Diamonds… are they still in some form of power today, they ask?

Bismuth shakes her head no. “Not entirely. It’s, ah… it’s complicated. We’ve elected leaders to aid in governing each of Homeworld’s planets, but… it’d be foolish to claim that the Diamonds don’t still hold a certain sway over a vast percentage of Gemkind. Our society’s entering a vital transitional state right now, shall we say.”

“Makes sense,” Jean nods.

Especially with how long-lived Gems are, though they elect not to say as much out loud. They have no idea if the topic of age is as sensitive for Gems as it can oft be for humans.

“But despite any lingering influence they may hold, they’re not ‘in charge,’ so to speak,” she continues, throwing up air quotes as emphasis. “Not as they once were. Everything’s different now.” Bismuth shifts back upon her stool as she pauses in her lesson, allowing the rejuvenating relief of those three little words to sink in for the both of them. A serene, content smile rises upon her lips. “After a lifetime of struggle, Gems are finally free to be their own selves in this era. We can finally rest.”

Their host meditates within the cusp of this welcoming truth for a few moments, staring off towards the open air doorway at their right to watch a fair handful of residents pass between activities. She closes her eyes, her features aligning into an almost unparalleled show of utter tranquility. Then, bobbing her head a little as she wrestles through the last few items on her laundry list of mental troubles, she clasps her hands upon her knees and pushes herself wholly upright once more.

“Anyways, that’s probably enough history for today, yeah? Hah, wouldn’t want to spook ya’ away with all the heavy stuff before you’ve even enrolled.”

“No, please, don’t worry ‘bout it,” they say with a slight laugh, shaking their head. “I thought it was pretty interesting, really.”

“Well, I’m glad to hear it!” she chimes, pacing back across the forge to her anvil. “We can talk shop in more detail when Pearl’s back, but— should you be interested in becoming a student long-term— my plan is to retrofit one of those dorm rooms you saw with a kitchenette and a bathroom, as well as shuffling around some of the furnishings to make space for a bed. Does that sound suitable for your needs?”

“More than suitable,” Jean chimes, folding their hands in their lap.

“Good, good…”

Bismuth shines her a bright, enthusiastic grin, and picks up that dense hunk of metal she fetched minutes earlier.

“So… with all that said and done—” in a flash of brilliant light, she morphs her hand into a broad mallet— “d’ya think you’re still up for a lil’ demonstration?”

#su #su future #(as in... it's Post that)#bismuth #garnet #amethyst #pearl #jean maverick #ocs #su fanfic #su oc #echoes of chalcedony #my writing stuff

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