Chapter Text
The three diamonds are on her, looking at Spinel anxiously.
She is lying horizontally on something she can identify as soft and comforting.
-Spinel? - She listens to a familiar voice, focuses her eyes and between the yellow, blue and white haze in the background, she can see Steven's silhouette clear.
The four diamonds were loomed over her with worried looks, sharing a dialogue she couldn't hear.
She felt sick all these days, now finally her body reached it's limit.
Who would say that strong emotions can cause such strong physical discomforts?
-Spinel- Again Steven's voice, stronger and authoritative this time, but no less friendly.
It seemed that his voice was getting farther and farther, his silhouette slowly deformed until it was nothing more than another blurry and colorful spot in her point of view and then nothing.
Steven watched as she struggled to focus on him, but then, her eyes rolled back and her eyelids closed completely.
That was the breaking point for Steven, he firmly denied making a decision.
-Spinel comes to earth with me-
-But, Steven! - The voice of the three diamonds echoed in the room, complaining about the idea of separating from her little treasure when she was in such bad shape.
-Without buts- Steven exclaimed making a sign to the three pearls that were standing next to the room, admiring the scene worried without getting into it.
They progressed a lot in those two years, but they slowly broke the habits of eons, one of them was to interrupt their diamonds when they were busy or when they didn't call them.
Lately they were improving on that, but there was something about the nervous energy that the diamonds transmitted that made them stay on the side.
They approach the center of the room, seeing a sick Spinel lying on a bed that the pebbles created for her.
To be frank, she look terrible.
-Is there anything you know that has put it her this way? - Gems did not get sick commonly, not as far as he knew. He lived sixteen years surrounded by gems that came out with light clothes in winter, cured their contagious diseases and never caught a simple cold.
He removed his organic jacket by gently lifting Spinel's back to sit on the bed, who seemed barely to register the action of others while he wrapped his jacket on her shoulders.
The three pearls gave the same answer as diamonds: a negative.
As far as everyone knew, Spinel had been fine yesterday, when she was playing and singing songs in the pool with the rest of the diamonds.
No one noticed anything.
She didn't say anything.
And now Steven reloaded her in his arms to take her to the Warp Pad while she didn't seem to record what was happening to her, she open and close her eyes in a sleepy, vague way.
She look at an empty point completely oblivious to the outside world.
-Steven! Wait- White Diamond begged completely worried as he took just three steps to reach the boy running to the Warp Pad.
-We want to go with her- She knelt causing a small tremor on the floor, followed by several more steps behind her.
-Yes, please! - Blue and Yellow begged.
This could not be happening, they could not lose someone they adored ... again.
They had to go and make sure that she is fine, that she will recover soon.
-Guys, what are we talking about? You can't warp there. It's too small for you, you can come in your ship later, I'll take care of everything, Spinel will be fine- He smiled, hiding the stab of concern he felt, hiding his feelings from the matriarchs.
He could swear that if they had a supplication or a puppy face, it was this one.
-I will inform you of her state, I promise. Now I need to go- He turned taking the last step toward the platform, deforming toward the ground.
Steven hated to leave those three with that latent concern, but when he looked down to see the gem that rested on his chest, he remembered why the huge rush.
He had never seen her worse than now.
Energetic as she used to be (even when she was furious. Especially when she was furious) now she was just an inert body in his arms, swaying slightly at every step he took.
Now, her eyes had closed completely and the vibrant pink of her skin looked dull and sickly.
The outline of her eyes still had rose in them; Spinel had cried recently?
She had been living with diamonds for a few months, despite the enormous trauma she dealt with day and night, he thought she would be better.
At least better than this , he thought.
A bright light invaded the recently added dome to the temple, gently depositing two gems on the smooth and crystalline surface.
The first thing the boy did, was to go down to his room, depositing Spinel in his own bed to keep her comfortable and then down the stairs running for help.
Maybe Pearl knew something about mysterious gem diseases or Garnet could foresean a cure for her.
Maybe she ate something in disrepair?
No, that was out of the question, there was no food at Homeworld and not even a five-year-old donkey would put her that bad.
Many more options crossed his mind as he walked down the stairs, wandering between simple and deadly diseases.
There were no crystal shrimps, right?
As a child in the Sea Spire, Pearl explained in her frantic screams that they venom was deadly, but those animals did not exist in Homeword, much less in the palace of diamonds ...or did they?
Stop rambling, concentrate Universe . He scolded himself mentally, forcing himself to return to reality and ask for help from the gems.
Spinel needed him.
-Guys? - He called out loud before even analyzing the room to process that Pearl was preparing breakfast, Amethyst chatted happily with her while stealing the occasional ingredient from the table and Garnet was just sitting on the sofa thoughtful.
For years, he thought it was boring to be quiet looking or doing nothing, but since he knew that she was a fusion made of love, he knew that she was not alone and certainly not bored.
Who knows what was going on in her head, something romantic, perhaps.
He had caught her more than once smiling with a smile that he could only classify as that of a completely and hopelessly in love.
The thunderous way in which under the stairs, almost tripping over his own steps, quickly caught Pearl's attention.
Despite being a diamond and quite resistant to blows and falls (including that he could also float) the maternal instinct that developed in sixteen years taking care of him remained intact.
-Steven! Be careful, you could ... -
-It's Spinel! - He interrupted in the middle of her sentence, without giving her a chance to finish her speech about never running on the stairs and how dangerous it could be to fall from them (Even knowing that he was rolling in his bubble down the stairs for fun) .
-I think she's sick, you need to come with me now-
Before Pearl was able to articulate a sentence, she felt a hand take her wrist and pull her to the stairs, forcing her to drop the ladle in her hand awkwardly in the kitchen and run away.
-Steven! - Pearl reproached for the way to practically drag her into the room, those were two imprudencies in no time.
Any other word or claim she could have for him, died in her mouth when she saw the little pink gem lying on the bed and watched as Steven moved frantically at her side, worry remarking in his expressions and body language.
Garnet and Amethyst shared a brief look, from their point of view, everything happened so fast that they could barely understand the word "Spinel" before Steven pushed Pearl down the stairs.
Garnet was the first to react and get up by climbing to see the stage unfolding in his room. Amethyst was just moments behind her.
-What happened? - Pearl asked sneaking up to the bed, quickly noticing the paleness of the gem.
Although her appearance had changed dramatically in a way that reflected all the pain inside her, the small details of her discomfort could be seen with the naked eye.
She look terrible.
-I don't know- Steven replied nervously.
-The diamonds don't know, the Pearls either, nobody knows what happened to her!- He watched as Pearl approached posing her sight in the brilliant heart-shaped gem, tentatively looking for a crack, wound, scrape, something out of place that explains her actual state.
The gems did not get sick, not as humans, not because of bacteria or viruses, they were not organic.
This had to be something that resides in her gem, but at first glance it was intact.
-This ... is strange- Pearl admitted.
-Gems ... do not get sick- Some toxins were capable of damaging them, but they were counted and there were definitely none of those in Homeworld, much less in the palace where the Diamonds lived.
-So what's wrong with her?- Steven was starting to get frustrated by the same concern.
Would she die? Would she be broken?
No. No, that was not going to happen.
He could fix her gem, she wouldn't die, she wouldn't even if she started to break, he would heal her.
Spinel would be fine.
Perhaps if he repeated it enough to believe it, it would become a reality.
Garnet approached the opposite side of the bed, raising her hand and putting it on the forehead of the tired gem, barely placing her fingers in her skin, her expression told them that she was thinking, but knowing what, it was impossible.
She must be seeing the future. Steven thought.
-Well? - He asked expectantly.
-It's not her gem- Garnet made a small grimace by removing her hand.
She could feel the gems, that's why she used to lead missions, touch structures and know how unstable they were, know that there was a corrupt gem nearby or an intruder near her, besides being able to see them for her future vision.
She could feel Spinel and her physical form was weak, but not broken. Her gem was intact.
The problem did not originate physically, it was not a blow, a fall, a poison.
She let out a small sigh, turning away to look up at Seven, selecting the right words to tell him something she knew, was going to bother him.
-Indeed ... she is sick ... but this is not external- She started.
-What do you mean? - He asked confused, turning to see Spinel while he felt two gentle hands taking his shoulders.
- Emotions affect gems. If they are intense enough, both cheerful or painful, they can poof us- as Spinel had already done in the Garden as soon as she learned that her "best friend" had left her with no intention of coming back for her.
-But we also wear out physically and mentally- in that, they looked a lot like humans.
No being could feel terribly bad for a long period of time and maintain its normal health and energy.
Steven blinked, tilting his head a little towards Spinel with a stab of sadness in his chest.
She was still depressed, still in pain and this was her body's way of demonstrating how she felt.
It was not a poison, it was not broken, it was not damaged and for some reason this was the cause it did not reassure him at all.
She was sick, but it wasn't just physical, it was mental.
And she needed help.
She really needed it.