New Ally?
The chattering of gems filled the area as Rose, Blue, and Yellow lurked behind the crowd. They were currently waiting for Dusty to return with the blueprints that she had requested to get from the bismuths. “Is she alright? Should we send someone to get her?” Yellow crossed her arms, her eyes glued to the door, as well as Blue and Rose’s eyes. “Dusty should have been back by now. It doesn’t take that long to get prints.” Blue folded one arm, putting her fist to her chin as she thought about what could possibly be holding Dusty up. Rose sighed, stepping in front of the crowd as she waved her hands to get everyone’s attention. “If I may have your attention, please... We can’t find Dusty. I need a group of gems to spread out and look for her. She’s carrying prints that could expose our plans and get all of us shattered.”
Maybe she should have sent someone with her to ensure that the pearl would be safe? Went with her? Gotten a different gem to do the task of bringing it? These were all thoughts that floated in Rose’s mind, it could have been newfound perfectionism, but she needed to make sure everything went perfectly. Had the wrong gem seen the blueprints... It would have been a wrap for everything. Then, there was the thought of what White would have done as a punishment. This would have gone beyond just getting locked in a tower for a few cycles. A few quartzes in the crowd nodded, splitting off into the halls to locate Dusty’s whereabouts.
Two quartz soldiers rushed into the area, running to Rose. “Dusty was grabbed by a Jasper. They went on a ruby ship... We couldn’t stop the Jasper that grabbed her in time.” Rose put her head down, pinching the bridge of her nose. “We need to find her. Aren’t there tracking devices built into the ships? Camera’s?” Yellow nodded, pulling up a diamond shaped yellow screen with all sorts of information about colonies and other important things. She flipped through various screens before reaching a screen that had camera’s all around Homeworld and in multiple colonies. “There should be footage of this Jasper kidnapping Dusty.”
Of all gems, why exactly would a Jasper want anything to do with a pearl? Much less of a pearl who ‘belonged’ to a diamond? It was rather suspicious, Rose watched as Yellow searched for the footage on her screen. “Here it is, whoever this Jasper may have been... they don’t seem like they were that intelligent...” The diamond muttered under her breath. Upon examining the video, Rose paused the footage on a clear image of a familiar Jasper.
“Jasper?”
— |•| —
“Leave her alone.” Lapis, finally unfrozen, had a stern, angered expression on her face as she slowly approached the two gems. She wasn’t going to allow Jasper to put the pearl through the same thing she went through with the orange gem. Jasper turned her head, locking eyes with the blue gem. “Well, look who it is...” With Jasper being distracted, Dusty slithered out of her grasp and crawled away from the gem. “You can’t force gems to fuse with you. That’s not how fusion works. I’m surprised you even consider fusion an option after fusing with me.” Jasper shrugged, turning towards the scared Pearl. “A Pearl is different from a Lapis. Especially a first era Pearl... But she’s too stubborn to realize the power we could have together.” She walked away from Lapis, approaching the Pearl.
The dark pink Pearl cowered in fear, crawling backwards before Lapis rose a beam of water into the air, turning it into chains. She targeted Jasper, capturing the orange gem in protection of Dusty. Lapis turned to Dusty giving her a look that meant she needed to run. The gem struggled in the chains, grunting as she did her best to break free. “I won’t fail White Diamond! I’ll destroy this pathetic rock of a planet. Her plan has already started – You won’t take my diamond away from me again, you crystal clods!” She screamed, rounding up all the strength she had in her body to break the chains. Although Lapis tried her best to prevent it, the orange gem succeeded in breaking free.
What Jasper said alarmed the rest of the gems – Pearl’s eyes widened before she readied herself in a battle stance, spear in hand. The orange gem summoned her helmet, charging directly at Lapis. In an attempt to fly away, she summoned her water wings and flew into the air, only for her leg to be grabbed by Jasper. With a wicked smirk, she threw her onto the ground. “Pathetic.” In the time that this was happening, Dusty summoned her war fans again, running up to Jasper and cut clean through her torso. Just as Jasper was about to throw a punch at Lapis. With a grunt, she poofed, her gem landing onto the sand.
Dusty de-summoned her fans, picking up the orange gem before looking back at the group of gems in front of her. She gave a small smile to them.
“You all must be the Crystal Gems Rose was telling me about.”