A few days have passed, and after that whole showdown, everything's been relatively quiet—well, as quiet as things can get around here. However, that battle taught me a lesson I'd been dragging around for a while: Amethyst and Pearl do not get along. Even though it's glaringly obvious, I just hadn't wanted to face it. I was so caught up in my own head that I didn't realize the people around me were hurting too.
I tried talking to them a few times. Well, I actually managed to approach them, but they avoided the topic like the plague. One afternoon, for example, I walked up to Amethyst. "Hey, Amethyst," I said casually. She just gave me a quick nod while stuffing her face. "Hey, I want to talk to you about something important."
She looked up, a bit curious, and asked, "About what?"
"Pearl," I said bluntly.
The shift was instant: Amethyst tensed up like she had just bitten into a whole lemon. "Oh, hey Stevo, I just remembered I gotta do this thing... uh... I'll be right back," she stammered before scrambling off to her room. I just stood there with a blank face, letting out a sigh.
Later, as I was walking toward the door, carrying on my usual routine of fighting off boredom, I was surprised to see all three of them walking out at the same time. Garnet, Pearl, and Amethyst gave me this look like, What are you up to? I, who had been completely relaxed seconds ago, suddenly stiffened. "Uh... I'm training, is there a problem?" I asked nervously.
They stared at me in silence for a second until Garnet adjusted her visor and spoke in her usual firm voice. "Well, Steven, you have a mission."
"I do?" I asked, caught off guard.
"You do," she repeated, leaving zero room for argument. "And it will be with Pearl and Amethyst."
How convenient, I thought to myself.
"What about you?" I asked, hoping she'd at least tag along.
Garnet looked straight at me and adjusted her visor again. "I have a solo mission. So, keep each other safe," she said right before vanishing into the warp pad, not giving me a single chance to open my mouth. The hum of the warp pad faded, leaving the three of us wrapped in an incredibly awkward silence.
I looked at them with a nervous smile. "So... uh... is anyone gonna tell me what we're actually doing?"
They looked at me, then looked at each other, but quickly averted their eyes like making eye contact physically hurt. Finally, Pearl spoke up. Clearing her throat elegantly, she said firmly, "Well, Steven, our objective is to retrieve a beetle from the Magic Tower."
"There are two of them, but Garnet already has one... I think," Pearl added, a hint of doubt creeping into her voice. I just stared at her while Amethyst, in her usual carefree style and desperate to cut the tension, blurted out, "Let's go, let's go!" She grabbed me by the arm and dragged me out the door, leaving Pearl behind. Pearl just shook her head, frustrated by Amethyst's childish behavior.
Eventually, the three of us made it to the tower. What was it called? No clue. Garnet didn't tell me, and with the tension between those two, I felt too awkward to ask. So, we just kept moving forward. The place was bizarre, with rocks floating in mid-air that we had to dodge by jumping or ducking. The atmosphere was magical, but what was really weighing on me was the noise behind me: Pearl and Amethyst arguing without a single break.
I'm a patient guy—way more than I look—and I try to keep an open mind. But listening to them without Garnet around to balance them out was like having two hammers pounding inside my skull over and over again. I stopped dead in my tracks, but neither of them noticed; they just kept walking and bickering.
"Come on, Pearl, you can't seriously take that joke to heart," Amethyst complained.
"A joke? You call going into my room and swapping all my swords a joke? I spent days looking for them, do you know how frustrating that was? No, of course you don't, because you have zero sense of order," Pearl snapped back, her tone getting tighter by the second.
"Me, zero sense of order?" Amethyst repeated, deeply offended. "I'm organized in my own way. If you walk into my room, you have no idea where my stuff is, but I know exactly where it is. Your style is predictable; mine is just more free."
The two of them kept walking and arguing, completely oblivious to the fact that I was watching them from behind, feeling a mix of worry and sheer exhaustion. They had calmed down a bit compared to other times, but I had literally heard them insult each other using my mom's name, and that... that just hurt, and it made no sense at all.
With a mental drop of sweat, I kept walking behind them without interrupting, even though the knot in my stomach was getting tighter.
"Amethyst, just shut up already, you're stressing me out more than I already am," Pearl snapped.
"Stressing you out? Sure, it's always my fault, right? It always has to be because of my problems. Do you ever stop to think that maybe you're to blame too?" Amethyst shot back, raising her voice.
Suddenly, Pearl stopped and frowned. "What... are you doing?" she said under her breath, realizing something was wrong.
Looking ahead, she noticed I wasn't with them anymore. The look on her face changed instantly.
"Oh no," she whispered nervously.
Amethyst tensed up too, though she tried to hide it.
"Where is Steven?!" Pearl screamed, instantly throwing herself into a panic. Her eyes darted all over the place in desperation. "Where is my baby?!" she cried out, searching frantically.
I, completely oblivious to the chaos I left behind, was calmly walking up the tower stairs, totally unaware of what was happening below or the emotional storm that was about to hit.
They were terrified, searching everywhere, practically screaming in desperation. Meanwhile, I was in the middle of a massive internal monologue, thinking about a thousand different things; I wasn't fully present in this astral plane, so you can imagine how freaked out they were. Pearl screamed at Amethyst, her voice cracking with anxiety. "Amethyst, we lost Steven because of you!"
"My fault?!" Amethyst yelled back, completely bewildered. "How is this my fault?"
"Because we were too busy arguing, and now Steven is gone! I don't know where he is, he's probably all alone, terrified... oh my god, is he hungry?!" Pearl kept rambling, her nerves completely shot.
Amethyst stared at her in shock, not just because Pearl was pinning the whole disappearance on her, but because of all the worst-case scenarios rushing into her own head. Dying of hunger sounded a bit dramatic, but the thoughts were still there, poking at her like poisoned needles. How is this my fault? Amethyst argued internally. You were arguing too, and on top of that, I was the one who noticed first! You were the one ranting at me, and now you want to blame me? If it weren't for me reacting, you wouldn't even know he was gone. Honestly, it feels like I care about him more; it's not like I'm the one calling him 'baby' anyway, Amethyst thought bitterly.
Pearl froze. She knew Amethyst was right, but her pride wouldn't let her admit it. So, they both stood there for about five minutes, arguing even more about whose fault it was instead of actually looking for Steven. Speaking of whom, I was just getting close enough to hear them bickering like two monkeys fighting for dominance. I looked to the side and, in a nearby tree, I actually saw two monkeys fighting over a banana. After a bit of screeching and shoving, one of them split the banana in half so they both got a piece. I couldn't help but smile, a drop of sweat on my forehead, because they reminded me of a certain duo.
I stopped overthinking and cleared my head. Thanks to that, I could hear their screams getting louder and closer. I quickly started running, stepping right into the exact situation I had wanted to avoid.
"You're useless!" Pearl screamed, her eyes full of rage, her voice shattering the air like cracking glass.
"I know I'm useless!" Amethyst fired back through tears, her throat raw with frustration. "Do you think I asked to be here?! Do you think I asked to be made?! Do you think I want to be stuck here with you?! No, I didn't! I didn't have a choice, I never had a choice!" The words cut through the air like invisible blades, leaving them both breathing heavily, gasping as if the weight of the world had just dropped on them.
In the middle of that painful silence, they both heard soft footsteps approaching, sounding almost like a ghost. It was Steven. He was walking along completely chill, acting like he hadn't heard a thing, like the air wasn't thick with tension. They froze, completely lost for words. Did he hear that? they wondered silently, terrified that Steven had just witnessed their most fragile, broken sides.
I put on an innocent smile and held up my hands. "Hey girls! You left me way behind. I got distracted watching some really interesting monkeys," I said, pointing backward to ease the tension. "So anyway, we should keep moving forward, right?"
With total calm, I walked past them to take the lead. They looked at each other, took a deep breath, and with a soft sigh, started following me. This time, they didn't take their eyes off me, completely focused, well aware that things had gotten out of hand earlier. Better not to talk, they thought, their eyes tracking my every step.
I felt a cold drop of sweat roll down the back of my neck. Why? Because I knew that in the middle of an important mission, it was not the time to talk about feelings, let alone open wounds. And even if we did talk, it wouldn't end well. Sure, I could try to help them. But could I really help them? Maybe. Would they even want to be helped by a thirteen-year-old kid and actually value his opinion? It was a fifty-fifty shot.
In my mind, things were clear. In this world, in this version of Steven Universe, I wasn't going to follow the same old steps. I wasn't going to risk everything on a relationship that probably couldn't be fixed overnight. I would help them, of course, but I needed to find a better time to talk. Not when their minds or their gems were this unstable.
I kept walking around the tower, which for some reason looked a lot like the Sea Spire. It was massive and beautiful, almost majestic in its design, and despite the silence between the three of us, the air was still heavy with tension. I, on the other hand, was recalling fragments of the show and knew more or less what was about to happen next. That worked to my advantage, so I decided to just go with the flow.
Suddenly, as if the universe wanted to throw a bit of comedy into the mix, a goat popped up right next to me. The three of us just stared at it with absolute seriousness, as if we were facing some otherworldly threat. Amethyst frowned and thought to herself that maybe it was a Gem monster. I kept my cool, scooped it up in my arms, and said naturally, "No, it's not a Gem. It's just a regular goat, made of flesh and organic life," petting its head like it was a little treasure, holding it carefully to protect it from what was coming.
In the center of the tower stood a massive dome—a hollow space that practically oozed mystery. The four of us, now including the goat, walked in slowly. Pearl, always alert and serious, stepped ahead to make sure it was safe. After inspecting the area for a few seconds, she declared with some confusion, "There's nothing here." The spot where the small central tower housing the beetle was supposed to be was completely empty.
Amethyst, with her usual carefree attitude and her own brand of logic, joked that the beetle probably just went out for a walk. Pearl couldn't help but let out a frustrated sigh, making Amethyst raise an eyebrow in annoyance. What's her problem? Amethyst thought, irritated. Pearl, with a superior look on her face, snapped back that it was impossible for a beetle to just "go for a walk."
Amethyst crossed her arms defiantly, wondering what Pearl was trying to imply. Pearl, pride dripping from her voice, replied confidently that it had to be hiding.
I watched them in silence, glancing down at the goat, which was looking up at me as if waiting for me to establish some order. With a calm smile, I stepped in before another shouting match could break out. "Hey girls," I said peacefully, "What if the beetle feels a sense of familiarity with this place? What I mean is, maybe just like animals or even humans, it has a sense of belonging toward a place it considers home. So, maybe it'll come back here on its own."
The idea hung in the air like an unexpected spark, momentarily freezing the tension between Pearl and Amethyst.
End of Chapter 10.